Assyr’ia, (Α᾿σσυρία). We must here distinguish between the country of Assyria and the Assyrian empire. They are both designated in Hebrew by אִשּׁוּר, ASSHUR, the people being also described by the same term, only that in the latter sense it is masculine, in the former feminine. In the Septuagint it is commonly rendered by Α᾿σσούρ or Α᾿σσύριοι, and in the Vulgate by Assur and Assyrii, and seldom or never by Α᾿σσυρία, or Assyria. The Asshurim (Α᾿σσουριείμ) of Genesis 25:3, were an Arab tribe; and at Ezekiel 27:6, the word ashurim (in our version “Ashurites”) is only an abbreviated form of tedshur, box-wood. Assyria derived its name from the progenitor of the aboriginal inhabitants-Asshur, the second son of Shem (Genesis 10:22; 1 Chronicles 1:17), a different person from Ashchur, son of Hezron, and Caleb’s grandson (1 Chronicles 2:24; 4:5). In later times it is thought that Asshur was worshipped as their chief god- by the Assyrians (Layard, Nin. and Bab. p. 537). SEE CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTIONS. The extent of Assyria differed greatly at different periods. Probably in the earliest times it was confined to a small tract of low country between the Jebel Maklub, or Taurus range on the N., and the Lesser Zab (Zab Asfal) toward the S., lying chiefly on the immediate bank of the Tigris. Gradually its limits were extended, until it came to be regarded as comprising the whole region between the Armenian mountains (lat. 37° 30’) upon the north, and upon the south the country about Bagdad (lat. 33° 30’). Eastward its boundary was the high range of Zagros, or mountains of Kurdistan; westward it naturally retained the Tigris as its boundary, although, according to the views of some, it was eventually bounded by the Mesopotamian desert, while, according to others, it reached the Euphrates. Taking the greatest of these dimensions, Assyria may be said to have extended in a direction from N.E. to S.W. a distance of nearly 500 miles, with a width varying from 350 to 100 miles. Its area would thus a little exceed 100,000 square miles, or about equal that of Italy.
1. Ancient Notices of its Position.—This was a great and powerful country, lying on the east of the Tigris (Genesis 2:14), the capital of which was Nineveh (Genesis 10:11, etc.). Its exact limits in early times are unknown; but when its monarchs enlarged their dominions by conquest, the name of this metropolitan province was extended to the whole empire. Hence, while Homer calls the inhabitants of the country north of Palestine Arimoi (evidently the Aramim or Aramesans of the Hebrews), the Greeks of a later period, finding them subject to the Assyrians, called the country Assyria, or (by contraction) Syria, a name which it has ever since borne. It is on this account that, in classical writers, the names Assyria and Syria are so often found interchanged (Henderson, On Isaiah p. 173; Hitzig, Begriff d. Krit. d. A lt. Test. p. 98); but it may be questioned whether in Hebrew “Asshur” and “Aram” are ever confounded. The same, however, cannot be affirmed of those parts of the Assyrian empire which lay east of the Euphrates, but west of the Tigris. The Hebrews, as well as the Greeks and Romans, appear to have spoken of them in a loose sense as being in Assyria, because in the Assyrian empire. Thus Isaiah (Isaiah 8:20) describes the Assyrians as those” beyond the river,” i.e. east of the Euphrates, which river, and not the Tigris, is introduced at 8:7, as an image of their power. In Genesis 25:18, the locality of the Ishmaelites is described as being east of Egypt,” as thou goest to Assyria,” which, however, could;only be reached through Mesopotamia or Babylonia, and this idea best reconciles the apparent incongruity of the statement in the same book (ii, 14), that the Hiddekel, or Tigris, runs “on the east of Assyria,” i.. e. of the Assyrian provinces of Mesopotamia and Babylonia; for there can be no doubt that, not only during the existence of the Assyrian monarchy, but long after its overthrow, the name of Assyria was given to those provinces, as having once formed so important a part of it. For example, in 2 Kings 23:29, Nebuchadnezzar is termed the king of Assyria, though resident at Babylon (comp. Jeremiah 2:18; Lamentations 5:6; Judith 17; 2:1); even Darius, king of Persia, is called, in Ezra 6:22, king of Assyria (comp. Plin. Hist. Nat. 19:19); and, on a similar principle, in 2 Maccabees 1:19, the Jews are said to have been carried captive to Persia, i.e. Babylonia, because, as it had formerly been subject to the Assyrians, so it was afterward under the dominion of Persia. (Comp. Herodotus, i, 106, 178; iii, 5; 7:63; Strabo, ii, 84; 16:1; Arrian, vii; Exped. Alex. 7:21, 2; Ammianus Marcellinus, 23:20; 24:2; Justin, i, 2, 13.) One writer, Dionysius Periegetes (v, 975), applies the designation of Assyria even to Asia Minor, as far as the Black Sea. Yet, ultimately, this name again became restricted to the original province east of the Tigris, which was called by the Greeks Α᾿σσυρία (Ptolemy, 6:1), and more commonly Α᾿τουρία (Strabo, 16:507), or Α᾿τυρία (Dion Cassius, lxviii, 28), the latter being only a dialectic variety of pronunciation, derived from the Aramaean custom of changing s into t. A trace of the name is supposed to be preserved in that of a very ancient place, Athur, on the Tigris, from four to six hours N.E. of Mosul. Rich, in his Residence in Kurdistan (ii, 129), describes the ruins as those of the “city of Nimrod,” and states that some of the better informed of the Turks at Mosul” said that it was Al Athur, or Ashur, from which the whole country was denominated.
2. Boundaries. — According to Ptolemy, Assyria was in his day bounded on the north by Armenia, the Gordieean or Carduchian mountains, especially by Mount Niphates; on the west by the River Tigris and Mesopotamia; on the south by Susiana, or Chuzistan, in Persia, and by Babylonia; and on the east by a part of Media, and Mounts Choathras and Zagros (Ptolemy, 6:1; Pliny, Hist. Nat. v, 13; Strabo, 16:736). It corresponded to the modern Kurdistan, or country of the Kurds (at least to its larger and western portion), with part of the pashalic of Mosul.
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Author: McClintock and Strong Cyclopedia
Keywords: Assyria
Bible reference(s): 1 Chronicles 1:17, 1 Chronicles 2:24, 1 Chronicles 4:5, 1 Chronicles 5:26, 1 Samuel 15:6, 2 Chronicles 28:16, 2 Chronicles 33:11, 2 Kings 15:19, 2 Kings 16:9, 2 Kings 17:6, 2 Kings 18:32, 2 Kings 19:37, 2 Kings 20:12, 2 Kings 23:29, 2 Maccabees 1:19, Amos 1:5, Amos 9:7, Daniel 10:4, Ezekiel 27:6, Ezra 4:2, Ezra 6:22, Genesis 10:22, Genesis 11:3, Genesis 14:4, Genesis 2:14, Genesis 25:3, Hosea 10:4, Isaiah 10:8, Isaiah 20:6, Isaiah 30:2, Isaiah 31:1, Isaiah 33:1, Isaiah 36:4, Isaiah 37:6, Isaiah 39:1, Isaiah 7:18, Isaiah 8:20, Jeremiah 2:18, Jonah 1:2, Jonah 3:6, Jonah 4:11, Judges 3:8, Lamentations 5:6, Micah 5:6, Nahum 1:1, Nahum 2:7, Nahum 3:8, Numbers 24:22, Zephaniah 2:5
Source: John McClintock and James Strong, Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical Literature.
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