he attack of Bharaoh.

They were secretly incited to rebellion by a power which played nearly
the same part with regard to them that Egypt had played in Southern
Syria. Urartu had received a serious rebuff in 735 B.C., and the burning
of Dhuspas had put an end to its ascendency, but the victory had been
effected at the cost of so much bloodshed that Tiglath-pileser was not
inclined to risk losing the advantage already gained by pushing it too
far: he withdrew, therefore, without concluding a treaty, and did not
return, being convinced that no further hostilities would be attempted
till the vanquished enemy had recovered from his defeat. He was
justified in his anticipations, for Sharduris died about 730, without
having again taken up arms, and his son Busas I. had left Shalmaneser V.
unmolested:* but the accession of Sargon and the revolts which harassed
him had awakened in Busas the warlike instincts of his race, and the
moment appeared advantageous for abandoning his policy of inactivity.

* The name of this king is usually written Ursa in the
Assyrian inscriptions, but the _Annals of Sargon_ give in
each case the form Rusa, in accordance with which Sayce had
already identified the Assyrian form Ursa or Rusa with the
form Rusas found on some Urartian monuments. Belck and
Lehmann have discovered several monuments of this Rusas I.,
son of Sharduris.

The remembrance of the successful exploits of Menuas and Argistis still
lived in the minds of his people, and more than one of his generals
had entered upon their military careers at a time when, from Arpad and
Carchemish to the country of the Medes, quite a third of the territory
now annexed to Assyria had been subject to the king of Urartu;
Eusas, therefore, doubtless placed before himself the possibility
of reconquering the lost provinces, and even winning, by a stroke of
fortune, more than had been by a stroke of fortune wrested from his
father. He began by intriguing with such princes as were weary of the
Assyrian rule, among the Mannai, in Zikartu,* among the Tabal, and even
among the Khati.

* Zikruti, Zikirtu, Zikartu, may probably be identified with
the Sagartians of Herodotus.

Iranzu, who was at that time reigning over the Mannai, refused to listen
to the suggestions of his neighbour, but two of his towns, Shuandakhul
and Durdukka, deserted him in 719 B.C., and ranged themselves under
Mitatti, chief of the Zikart