ring suspicions that
would have boded ill for the safety of the late king's councillors and
servants. He looked upon his father's miserable ending as a punishment
for some unknown transgression, and consulted the gods to learn what
it was that had aroused their anger, refusing to authorise the burial
within the palace until the various expiatory rites suggested by the
oracle had been duly performed.*

* This is my interpretation of the text published and
translated by Winckler. Winckler sees in it the account of
a campaign during which Sargon was killed by mountaineers,
as was Cyprus in later times by the Massagetse; the king's
body (according to him) remained unburied, and was recovered
by Sennacherib only after considerable delay. In support of
his version of this event Winckler cites the passage in Isa.
xiv. 4-20, which he takes as having been composed to exult
over the death of Sargon, and then afterwards adapted to the
death of a king of Babylon.

Thus mysteriously disappeared the founder of the mightiest dynasty that
ever ruled in Assyria, perhaps even in the whole of Western Asia. At
first sight, it would seem easy enough to determine what manner of
man he was and to what qualities he owed his greatness, thanks to the
abundance of documents which his contemporaries have bequeathed to us;
but when we come to examine more closely, we soon find the task to be by
no means a simple one. The inscriptions maintain so discreet a silence
with regard to the antecedents of the kings before their accession, and
concerning their education and private life, that at this distance of
time we cannot succeed in forming any clear idea as to their individual
temperament and character. The monuments record such achievements
as they took pride in, in terms of uniform praise which conceal or
obliterate the personality of the king in question; it is always the
ideal Assyrian sovereign who is held up for our admiration under a score
of different names, and if, here and there, we come upon some trait
which indicates the special genius of this or that monarch, we may
be sure that the scribe has allowed it to slip in by accident, quite
unconscious of the fact that he is thus affording us a glimpse of his
master's true character and disposition. A study of Sargon's campaigns
as revealed in his annals will speedily convince us that he was
something more than a fearless general, with a keen e