Sargon of Akkad Books
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Harper (01 April 2008)Price: $7.99 -
Harper (01 April 2007)Price: $7.99 -
Basic Books (27 January 2009)Price: $17.82 -
Harper Perennial (24 January 1992)Price: $18.99 -
Princeton University Press (19 November 2007)Price: $28.67
Definition
Ancient Mesopotamia (like ancient Greece) was dotted by many small city-states all of whom fought one another over fertile territory and water. Lugalzagesi of Uruk had marched through the land and conquered the city-states one by one, uniting all of them under his authority. When Sargon overthrew Lugalzagesi and seized power he gained an already united kingdom which he could use to advantage in military campaigns to, finally, establish the first empire over all of Mesopotamia.
After the defeat of Lugalzagesi, however, the city-states hardly accepted Sargon with grace and submission; they rebelled against their new ruler, and forced him to prove his legitimacy as king through military might. He traveled throughout Mesopotamia conquering one city-state after another and expanded his empire as far as Lebanon and the Taurus mountains of Turkey. He built the first city of Babylon and instituted military practices of combining different types of fighting forces which became standard down through the time of the Persian Empire.
Throughout his life Sargon would continue to encounter uprisings as city-states asserted their autonomy and rose against the empire. For the next three-thousand years the Babylonians would tell tales of the kings who rose against Sargon of Akkad and of his glorious victories, citing Sargon’s own words from his purported autobiography, “In my old age of 55, all the lands revolted against me, and they besieged me in Agade ‘but the old lion still had teeth and claws’, I went forth to battle and defeated them: I knocked them over and destroyed their vast army. ‘Now, any king who wants to call himself my equal, wherever I went, let him go’!”
According to the Sumerian king list, Sargon reigned for fifty-six years and was considered a popular and successful king. After his death, the empire passed to his son Rimuc, who was forced to endure what his father had and put down the rebellions which contested his legitimacy. Rimuc reigned for nine years and then the kingship passed to Sargon’s other son, and finally to his grandson, Naram-Suen. During his reign, the empire began to unravel as city-states broke away to form their own independent kingdoms. Soon after, the Gutians, an invading tribe from the Zagros Mountains, destroyed Akkad and toppled the teetering Akkadian Empire, ushering in a dark age for Mesopotamia.
Articles
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The story of Sargon's birth and childhood is given in the "Sargon legend", a Sumerian text purporting to be Sargon's biography. The extant versions are incomplete, but the surviving fragments name Sargon's father as La'ibum. After a lacuna, the text skips to Ur-Zababa, king of Kish, who awakens after a dream, the contents of which are not revealed on the surviving portion of the tablet. For unknown reasons, Ur-Zababa appoints Sargon as his cupbearer. Soon after this, Ur-Zababa invites Sargon to his chambers to discuss a dream of Sargon's, involving the favor of the goddess Inanna and the drowning of Ur-Zababa by the goddess. Deeply frightened, Ur-Zababa orders Sargon murdered by the hands of Beliš-tikal, the chief smith, but Inanna prevents it, demanding that Sargon stop at the gates because of his being "polluted with blood." When Sargon returns to Ur-Zababa, the king becomes frightened again, and decides to send Sargon to king Lugal-zage-si of Uruk with a message on a clay tablet asking him to slay Sargon. The legend breaks off at this point; presumably, the missing sections described how Sargon becomes king.
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