Sennacherib's Prism — Hezekiah shut up "like a bird in a cage"
The invasion of Judah in 701 BC, Hezekiah by name, the siege of Jerusalem and the tribute are all recorded by the invader himself — and the city's survival is implicit in his own silence about taking it.
Named outside the BibleInscriptionc. 691 BC
A six-sided clay prism recording Sennacherib's campaigns. The third describes his 701 BC invasion of Judah: forty-six walled towns taken, Hezekiah besieged in Jerusalem, heavy tribute exacted. What the Assyrian account conspicuously does not claim is the capture of Jerusalem — the one city its own annals leave standing.
As for Hezekiah the Judahite, who did not submit to my yoke… him I shut up in Jerusalem his royal city like a bird in a cage.
- Found
- Nineveh, Iraq, 1830 — Acquired by Col. R. Taylor, British Consul-General at Baghdad
- Now held at
- British Museum, London (near-duplicates in Chicago and Jerusalem) (BM 91032 (Taylor Prism))
- Language
- Akkadian
How far it goes
Both sides agree on the campaign, the siege and the tribute; they differ on why Sennacherib withdrew. The Assyrian text simply stops short of claiming the city.
How historians use it
The 701 BC campaign is one of the best-documented events in Iron Age history, reconstructed by secular historians from the Assyrian annals, the Lachish reliefs and the biblical account together.
In Scripture
Connects to
Sources
These summaries are written in English for now. Translations follow.