The British Museum

The British Museum is a pretty incredible place.  Like many colonial powers, Great Britain did a lot of collecting all over the world.  They now house many of those collections at the British Museum.  The BM is huge, and it takes more than one day to see all that it holds.  I have been many, many times, and I know that I have not yet seen it all.


Last weekend, I visited the BM with the specific purpose of re-visiting Near Eastern collections.  I was primarily interested in visiting the walls from the palace at Ninevah, built for the Assyrian king, Sennacherib.  The walls re-count many Assyrian conquests, including one from a site called Lachish (located near Jerusalem).  I have examined skeletons from this site -- skeletons that are believed to be the victims of Sennacherib's war campaign (although, there is not much evidence that they were the victims of that campaign, but more on that later).   Sennacherib's army laid siege on the city of Lachish in 701 BC.  I was looking for images in the reliefs of what the Assyrians did to people of the city (or at least what they said they did to the people of Lachish).  It is a bit grisly.

There were Assyrian archers, shooting arrows into the city.

There were slingers, throwing rocks into the city.  They also built a large siege ramp to attack Lachish, where a defense was mounted.  Sling stones were found during excavations at Lachish near the large siege ramp.  Some of these artifacts are at the museum, as well.

Some people fled.

Others were beheaded.

Some were hung on poles.

Some were flayed alive.

Some submitted to Sennacherib (whose head was purposely defaced below).

These panels provide vivid imagery of what happened during the siege.  We'll see what the skeletons have to say!

--Prof. Ullinger