Victory Stele of King Esarhaddon

During excavations by German archaeologists in 1888 in the gate area of the castle of Samal (now Zincirli, southern Turkey), numerous fragments of relief were found which, when reassembled, formed an almost complete victory stele of the Assyrian king Esarhaddon. The richly costumed and bejewelled Assyrian ruler is symbolically represented over life-size; there is a club in his left hand, which also holds the rope to which are attached two prisoners in a demeaning posture, shown much, much smaller. A cult symbol in the king's right hand and the nine symbolic representations of the gods before his eyes underline the official character and great importance of the monument. The cuneiform writing that extends over the bottom half of the stele gives the historical background to this portrait - the king is on his way back from his victorious campaign in Egypt in 671 BCE. The inscription evokes among other matters the deportation of the crown prince of Egypt, identifiable as the kneeling prisoner with the uraeus above his brow. The standing prisoner may represent a vanquished Syrian prince. On each of the two lateral surfaces of the stele is a further male figure, presumably representing the Assyrian crown princes Ashurbanipal and Shamash-shumu-ukin.