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Whilst Sennacherib's statement, taken on its own, might appear to be bravado on his part, it becomes worthy of serious attention in the context of this revision. Deioces the Mede ….. We need to pause here for a moment on the subject of the Medes, because a study of their famous king Deioces, in relation to the neo-Assyrian kings who were contemporaries of Hezekiah, would tend to support my argument that this period stands in need of a time reduction. Deioces the Mede Sargon, in his Annals for c. 715 BC, refers to Deioces ( , Daiukku) as ruler of Mannai (the Minni of the Bible). As we saw above the Mannaeans were allies of the Medes. Most scholars consider this king to be the same as the Deioces of the Greek sources, the founder of the Median empire. Daiukku followed Aza and Ullusuv as ruler of Mannai. But he had a very short reign as Sargon deposed him from the throne after only a year in power [290] and exiled him to the west. On the other hand, Herodotus makes Deioces an approximate contemporary of Gyges, who made a treaty with Ashurbanipal, thought to be Sargon's great-grandson. Herodotus wrote that Alyattes, the son of Sadyattes, the son of Ardys, the son of Gyges, made war with Cyaxares, the son of Phraortes, the son of Deioces [300]. M. Luckerman, not surprisingly, has some problem with the chronology of this [310]: "If this be the case, then Deioces would be a contemporary of the early part of Ardys' reign or the late part of Gyges' reign. However, if we recall that in 660 BC Gyges made a treaty with Ashurbanipal, it would seem strange to find Deioces, who was transported by Sargon in 715 BC to Hamath, to be still found at the time of Ashurbanipal. A span of 55 years (715-660 BC) for Deioces, though humanly possible, is rather unlikely. Thus Luckerman, in order to maintain the traditional identification between Deioces and Daiukku, feels it necessary to stretch the matter a bit: "It is not beyond the realm of possibility that Daiukku, if he is correctly identified with Deioces, was only a child ruler when first overthrown by Sargon of Assyria. Later, while the successors of Sargon expended Assyria's power in debilitating warfare, Daiukku/Deioces was able to take advantage of the situation to found a Median dynasty." And such a stretching is indeed necessary if one maintains the conventional succession of (i) Sargon, (ii) Sennacherib, (iii) Esarhaddon and (iv) Ashurbanipal. According to the model being proposed here on the other hand, with Sargon identified as Sennacherib, and with Esarhaddon's entire reign being encapsulated within his father's reign, then the conventional 55 years for Deioces is reduced by approximately 30 years [i.e. 55-25: (c.17 more of Sennacherib + 8 of Ashurbanipal = 25)]. In that case Luckerman's "child ruler" theory for Deioces need no longer be proposed. Sennacherib's Third Campaign Corresponds to Sargon's Year 9 (to Year 11) Sargon's Year 9 (-Year 11) This year, according to what was determined in Part One, should coincide mathematically with the fourteenth year of king Hezekiah. Thus it should tell us of an Assyrian incursion into southern Palestine. It does not - at least not at first glance! Sargon's armies, in Year 9 of the Annals, are still fighting the Medes and the Persian rebels in the east. But a deeper probing into Sargon's records - which we are going to have to do now in some detail with the assistance of Boutflower - will confirm an Assyrian invasion of the west. We shall find that his Year 9 was in fact the very year that Sargon sent his Turtan to Ashdod, as recorded in Isaiah 20:1. Sargon was intending soon to follow up the conquest by his Turtan [320]. Both Sargon and the Bible telescope what was actually a lengthy campaign, waged in various stages. The Assyrian king, as we shall see, by no means followed his Turtan immediately to the west. Ashdod - Click here for a comparison. Now, when Sargon refers to Ashdod, we need to be clear as to which location he had in mind, for he also refers in the same account to an 'Ashdod-by the Sea'. Thus we read: "Ashdod, Gimtu [Gath?], Ashdudimmu [Ashdod-by-the-Sea], I besieged and captured". [322] It is the 'Ashdod by the Sea' that I am going to propose - contrary to the usual view - is the well known Ashdod of the Philistine plain; whilst the "Ashdod" mentioned first by Sargon I am going to identify as the mighty stronghold of Lachish (S.W. of Jerusalem). These three cities of Lachish, Gath and Ashdod, taken together, form a cuneiform shaped wedge of formidable forts in the Shephelah. Assyria had to take them as they were a dangerous base for an aggressive Egypt.  The fortress of Lachish was the focal point of Sennacherib's initial thrust. To no city in the plain would the description of Ashdod, that is, a very strong place [330], apply more aptly than Lachish. "What a surprise, then", writes Russell, regarding the surrender of Lachish, the high point of Sennacherib's western campaign,"to turn to the annalistic account of that same campaign - inscribed on the bulls at the throne-room entrance - and discover that Lachish is not mentioned at all" [340]. But, I answer, had not Sargon already covered it in his Ashdod account? Now, let us listen to Boutflower in his reconstruction of this somewhat complex campaign. Referring to the fragment Sm. 2022 of Sargon's Annals, which he calls "one particularly precious morsel". Boutflower draws this crucial substance from it [350]: "The longer face [of this fragment], with which we are concerned, is about 1½ inches in height, and has a dividing line drawn across it near the bottom. Immediately below this line, and somewhat to the left, there can be seen with the help of a magnifying-glass a group of nine cuneiform indentations arranged in three parallel horizontal rows. Even the uninitiated will easily understand that we have here a representation of the number "9". It is this figure, then, which gives to the fragment its special interest, for it tells us, as I am about to show, "the year that the Tartan came unto Ashdod". After further probing analysis, Boutflower concludes that the fragment in question "is one year later than the reckoning adopted in the Annals".
In other words, the Annals make Sargon's reign to commence in the year 722 BC [sic], styled the rish sharutti or "beginning of the reign", 721 being regarded as the first year of the reign; whereas our cylinder, which after Winckler we will call Cylinder B, regards 721 as the "beginning of the reign", and 720 as the first year of the reign. From this conclusion we obtain the following remarkable result.
The capture of Samaria is assigned by the Annals to the "beginning of the reign" of Sargon, i.e. to the last three months of the year 722, and it is recorded as the first event of the reign. But according to this new reckoning of time on Cylinder B that event would not be included in the reign of Sargon at all, but would be looked upon as falling in the reign of his predecessor Shalmaneser V. Boutflower now moves on to the focal point of Assyria's concerns: the city of Ashdod. Here we shall need to follow his crucial argument at some considerable length: The second difficulty in Sm. 2022 is connected with the mention of Ashdod in the part below the dividing line. According to the reckoning of time adopted on this fragment something must have happened at Ashdod at the beginning of Sargon's ninth year, i.e. at the beginning of the tenth year, the year 712 BC, according to the better-known reckoning of the Annals. Now, when we turn to the Annals and examine the record of this tenth year, we find no mention whatever of Ashdod. Not till we come to the second and closing portion of the record for the eleventh year do we meet with the account of the famous campaign against that city. What, then, is the solution to this second difficulty Boutflower asks? Simply this: that the mention of Ashdod on the fragment Sm. 2022 does not refer to the siege of that town, which, as just stated, forms the second and closing event in the record of the following year, but in all probability does refer to the first of those political events which led up to the siege, viz. the coming of the Tartan to Ashdod. To make this plain, I will now give the different accounts of the Ashdod imbroglio found in the inscriptions of Sargon, beginning with the one in the Annals (lines 215-228) already referred to, which runs thus: "Azuri king of Ashdod, not to bring tribute his heart was set, and to the kings in his neighbourhood proposals of rebellion against Assyria he sent. Because of the evil he did, over the men of his land I changed his lordship. Akhimiti his own brother, to sovereignty over them I appointed. The Khatte [Hittites], plotting rebellion, hated his lordship; and Yatna, who had no title to the throne, who, like themselves, the reverence due to my lordship did not acknowledge, they set up over them. In the wrath of my heart, riding in my war-chariot, with my cavalry, who do not retreat from the place whither I turn my hands, to Ashdod, his royal city, I marched in haste. Ashdod, Gimtu [Gath?], Ashdudimmu [Ashdod-by-the-Sea], I besieged and captured. The gods dwelling therein, himself together with the people of his land, gold, silver, the treasures of his palace, I counted for spoil. Those towns I built anew. People of the countries conquered by my hands I settled therein. My officers as governors over them I set, and with the people of Assyria I numbered them, and they bore my yoke. [Boutflower, p. 113, 114] Typical Assyrian war records! Boutflower now shows that the Assyrian extracts connect Year 9 and Year 11: The above extract forms, as already stated, the second and closing portion of the record given in the Annals under Sargon's 11th year, 711 BC., the earlier portion of the record for that year being occupied with the account of the expedition against Mutallu of Gurgum.[355] In the Grand Inscription of Khorsabad we meet with a very similar account, containing a few fresh particulars. The usurper Yatna, i.e. "the Cypriot", is there styled Yamani, "the Ionian", thus showing that he was a Greek. We are also told that he fled away to Melukhkha on the border of Egypt, but was thrown into chains by the Ethiopian king and despatched to Assyria. .... In order to effect the deposition of the rebellious Azuri, and set his brother Akhimiti on the throne, Sargon sent forth an armed force to Ashdod: It is in all probablity the despatch of such a force, and the successful achievement of the end in view, which were recorded in the fragment Sm. 2022 below the dividing line. As Isa 20:1 informs us - and the statement, as we shall presently see, can be verified from contemporary sources - this first expedition was led by the Tartan. Possibly this may be the reason why it was not thought worthy to be recorded in the Annals under Sargon's tenth year, 712 BC. But when we come to the eleventh year, 711 BC, and the annalist very properly and suitably records the whole series of events leading up to the siege, two things at once strike us: - first, that all these events could not possibly have happened in the single year 711 BC; and
- secondly, as stated above, that a force must have previously been despatched at the beginning of the troubles to accomplish the deposition of Azuri and the placing of Akhimiti on the throne.
On the retirement of this force sedition must again have broken out in Ashdod, for it appears that the anti-Assyrian party were able, after a longer or shorter interval, once more to get the upper hand, to expel Akhimiti, and to set up in his stead a Greek adventurer, Yatna-Yamani. The town was then strongly fortified, and surrounded by a moat. This could easily be done, owing to the abundance of water from the hills of Judah, which finds its way to the sea under the plains of Philistia, a little below the surface of the ground. These are the "underground waters" of which Sargon speaks. It is at about this stage, Year 11, that Sargon was stirred to action: Meanwhile, the news of what was going on at Ashdod appears to have reached the Great King at the beginning of his eleventh year, according to the reckoning of the annalist .... So enraged was Sargon that, without waiting to collect a large force, he started off at once with a picked body of cavalry, crossed those rivers in flood, and marched with all speed to the disaffected province. Such at least is his own account; but I shall presently adduce reasons which lead one to think that he did not reach Ashdod as speedily as we might expect from the description of his march, but stopped on his way to put down a revolt in the country of Gurgum. In thus hastening to the West Sargon tells us that he was urged on by intelligence that the whole of Southern Syria, including Judah, Edom, and Moab, as well as Philistia, was ripe for revolt, relying on ample promises of support from Pharaoh king of Egypt. A ringleader in all this sedition was king Hezekiah of Judah, so we find as we switch momentarily to Sennacherib's corresponding Third Campaign account to learn how Assyria dealt with the Egyptian factor: The officials, nobles and people of Ekron, who had thrown Padi, their king, bound by (treaty to) Assyria, into fetters of iron and had given him over to Hezekiah, the Jew (Iaudai), - he kept him in confinement like an enemy, - they (lit., their heart) became afraid and called upon the Egyptian kings, the bowmen, chariots and horse of the king of Meluh-ha (Ethiopia), a countless host, and these came to their aid. In the neighbourhood of the city of Altakû (Eltekeh), their ranks being drawn up before me, they offered battle. (Trusting) in the aid of Assur, my lord, I fought with them and brought about their defeat. The Egyptian charioteers and princes, together with the charioteers of the Ethiopian king, my hands took alive in the midst of the battle. .... Boutflower now explains why he believes that the first expedition against Ashdod was led, not by Sargon in person, but by his Turtan. Sargon in that his tenth year, he says, refers to himself as being "in the land"; the phrase used in the chrononogical lists to denote that the king stayed at home in such and such a year, and did not lead his troops in person. Sargon was at the time quite occupied with the building of his new city of Dur Sharrukin:
The kings of Assyria, in the language they use in their inscriptions, seem to have been guided by the motto, "quod facit per alium facit per se", and indications are not wanting that such was the case in the present instance, seeing that the record for the Annals for this tenth year of Sargon is unique. The earlier portion, as in the previous years, is devoted to the king's warlike doings; but in line 196 an entirely fresh subject is introduced with the words, "At that time the treasures of the mountains of Khatte [i.e. Syria]" .... The king is telling us how he amassed treasures of various kinds from the conquered countries, and he ends the recital with the words, "countless treasure, which my fathers had not received, within Dur-Sargon my town I heaped up." He is thus seen to be busy over his darling scheme, the decoration of the new palace at Dur-Sargon, which is here mentioned for the first time. It was with this object in view that Sargon remained "in the land" , i.e. at home, during the year 712, entrusting the first expedition to Ashdod to his Tartan, as stated in Isaiah 20:1. Sennacherib Storms Lachish and the Other Forts of Judah There may be no annalistic account specifically of the siege of Lachish, but there is abundant pictographic detail of it in Sennacherib's Palace Without Rival at Nineveh. Sennacherib used the area as his base whilst in Judaea. Lachish was a much-prized target. "Recent excavations at Lachish", Russell tells us, "show that Sennacherib concentrated immense resources and expended tremendous energy in its capture." [360] But the formidable Assyrian army took more than Lachish, which - according to the prophet Micah - was only "the beginning of sin to daughter Zion" (Micah 1:13), referring specifically to Judah's reliance on Egypt. For "... disaster has come down from the Lord to the gate of Jerusalem" (Micah 1:12). Sennacherib is more circumstantial: I laid waste the large district of Judah and made the overbearing and proud Hezekiah, its king, bow in submission. As for Hezekiah of Judah, who did not submit to my yoke, 46 of his strong walled cities, as well as the small cities in their neighbourhood, which were without number - by levelling with battering-rams and advancing the siege engines, by attacking and storming on foot, by mines, tunnels, and breaches, I besieged and captured. 200,150 people, great and small, male and female, horses, mules, asses, camels, cattle and sheep without number, I brought away from them and counted as spoil.[365] Now, if Sargon's Ashdod really was Lachish, as is being held here, and his war was therefore being brought right into Judaean territory, then we might even hold out some hope of identifying the succession of rulers of Ashdod whom Sargon names with Biblical characters of Hezekiah's era. I refer to: 1. Azuri,
2. Yatna-Yamani and
3. Akhimiti The first and the last of these names are Hebrew. The middle one, Yatna-Yamani ('the Cypriot'; 'the Ionian'), is Greek. King Hezekiah had, much to Assyria's fury, enlarged the territory of his kingdom by absorbing Philistia, and had placed captains over key cities. This would no doubt include those governors with Jewish names in the Philistine cities. Thus Sennacherib refers to a Padi (that is, Pedaiah) in Ekron and a Tsidqa (Zedekiah) in Ashkelon. As for Lachish, well we might expect that the king of Jerusalem would entrust to only a very high official the responsibility of so strong and strategic a fort. I suggest that Lachish was entrusted to a succession of high priests; the high priest being the foremost official in the land according to I Kings 4:2. I propose to identify Sargon's: Azuri with the high priest Uriah, notably of the time of Hezekiah's father, Ahaz;
Yatna with the ill-fated Shebna of Hezekiah's time; and
Akhi-Miti with Hezekiah's chief official, Eliakim - the same as the high-priest Eliakim (var. Joakim) of the Book of Judith.  The latter also appears as Mitinti (thought to be Hebrew, Mattaniah), as the ruler of Ashdod in Sennacherib's Third Campaign account. Here is my reconstruction of an approximate flow of events regarding this succession of governors: Azuri was king Ahaz's sycophantic high-priest who, when ordered by his pro-Assyrian king, built an altar (to the god Assur?) in Jerusalem (2 Kings 16:10-11). Perhaps Azuri was rewarded for this act of 'loyalty' by Tiglath-pileser III with the prestigious governorship of Lachish.
But during the next reign, Hezekiah's, Azuri changed sides to fit in with Judah's now pro-Egyptian tendencies, and for this he was subsequently deposed by Sargon along with other of Hezekiah's officials. Assyria replaced him with his less politically inclined brother, Akhi-miti. This choice of Akhi-miti as governor, however, did not suit the Hittites, who were then in league with Egypt against the Assyrians who had been pummelling them. Hence they elevated to the governorship of Lachish an adventurer called Yatna-Yamani, who - given his newly found prestige - began to lord it over the kingdom of Judah as (the equally foreign-named) Shebna (var. Sobna), the 'ring-in' of whom the Lord complains to Isaiah: Come, go to this steward, to Shebna, who is master of the household, and say to him: 'What right do you have here? Who are your relatives here, that you have cut out a tomb here for yourself, cutting a tomb on the height, and carving a habitation for yourself in the rock?' [Isaiah 22:15-16; For tomb click Here] Shebna's rank should instead be translated as "over the House [Temple]", that is, high-priest. He was "the leader in this pro-Egyptian movement" [370], and therefore anti-Assyrian, which fits this reconstruction perfectly. Under mounting pressure from Assyria, Yatna-Yamani abandons Lachish and, according to Sargon, flees to Ethiopia. But here again the Assyrian may be telescoping events; for firstly we find him, as Shebna, now playing second fiddle (as "secretary") to the reinstated Akhi-miti/Eliakim (e.g. 2 Kings 18:18), as had been foretold by Isaiah (22:17-21). "The Lord is about to hurl you [Shebna] away violently, my fellow. He will seize firm hold on you, whirl you round and round, and throw you like a ball into a wide land; there you shall die, and there your splendid chariots shall lie, O you disgrace to your master's house! I will thrust you from your office, and you will be pulled down from your post. On that day I will call my servant Eliakim son of Hilkiah, and will clothe him with your robe and bind your sash on him. I will commit your authority to his hand, and he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah. ..." This last prediction by Isaiah about Eliakim's being "a father" to his people must be a projection to a later, less adverse time - such as is recorded in Judith when the high-priest Eliakim was free to act as a true leader [380]. For soon Hezekiah's numero uno will find himself in as much bother as the king of Jerusalem himself, having to kow-tow completely to the Assyrians. The fort entrusted to him, Lachish, will lie in ruins. It may be this unhappy situation that is intended by Isaiah's footnote (v.25): "On that day, says the Lord of hosts, the peg that was fastened in a secure place [Lachish?] will give way; it will be cut down and fall, and the load that was on it will perish ...".. Historians, not knowing who Shebna really was, tend to doubt that he ever suffered the grim fate that Isaiah had foretold of him. Olmstead thinks that [390]: "In part, Isaiah's prediction was successful, for Shebna, though not entirely removed, was demoted ...". But, with Shebna now identified with Sargon's foe Yatna-Yamani, we can tell exactly what did happen to him, and it is fully in accordance with Isaiah. Sargon tells us that he fled to Ethiopia, on the border of Egypt, but was thrown into chains by the Ethiopian king and despatched to Assyria. Thus, like "a ball", this opportunist was tossed from one place to another; and finally to captivity in Assyria, never to be heard of again. Isaiah's Pantomime Our merging of Sargon's and Sennacherib's activities in Palestine enables for an explanation of a strange pantomime performed by Isaiah himself, imitating what will happen to the Egypto-Ethiopian allies upon whom Judah was then so dependent: "In the year that the Turtan, who was sent by king Sargon of Assyria, came to Ashdod and fought against it and took it - at that time the Lord had spoken to Isaiah son of Amoz, saying, 'Go, and loose the sacklcloth from your loins, and take your sandals off your feet', and he had done so ... Then the Lord said, 'Just as my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot for three years as a sign and a portent against Egypt and Ethiopia, so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians as captives and the Ethiopians as exiles ... naked and barefoot, with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt. And they shall be dismayed and confounded because of Ethiopia their hope and of Egypt their boast." Isaiah 20:1-5. This time-span of "three years", Jewish rekoning, is to be dated from the coming of the Turtan to Ashdod (as Isaiah makes clear) until Sennacherib's defeat of the Egypto-Ethiopian forces at Eltekeh in his Third Campaign (Sargon's Year 9-11).[400] Thus were perfectly fulfilled the words of Isaiah. The Egyptians and Ethiopians on whom the Palestinians were depending for support were taken off into captivity, barefoot and naked. As we look at the Assyrian representation on the Gates of Balâwat of captives being led away after this fashion, the Isaianic oracle seems to live before our eyes. Boutflower's linking now of Sargon's Ashdod campaign with his invasion of Syria would square with Sennacherib's account of his Syro-Hittite assault before coming to Judaea: .... it is not a little remarkable that in [Sargon's] Annals, which are strictly chronological, this [Ashdod] campaign is recorded, not as the first, but as the second and closing event of the year, being preceded by the campaign against Gurgum. How is this apparent discrepancy to be reconciled? A glance at the map will show us the way out of the difficulty. The country of Gurgum lies a little to the north-west of Carchemish, and therefore only slightly off the track of an army advancing to the West. It would, then, be a likely move, so one thinks, for the Assyrian king to set matters right in Gurgum, and put down the rebellion which had broken out there, before advancing south to Ashdod. .... Further in confirmation of this, he writes: Now there are not wanting other indications that this was the course actually pursued by the Assyrian king. On the Grand Inscription of Khorsabad, lines 85,86, the march to Gurgum is described thus: "In the rage of my heart, riding in my war-chariot, with my cavalry, who do not retreat from the place whither I turn my hands. To Marqasa" - the capital of Gurgum, represented by the modern Marash - "I marched in haste." Here it will be observed that the language used, except in one single instance, is word for word identical with that in which the king describes his hasty march to Ashdod in line 220 of the Annals given above. Boutflower finds the whole account here highly dramatic and personal, leaving "no doubt upon the mind that both expeditions were undertaken by the king in person". His reconstruction of events, in light of Isaiah, enables for an estimation of the duration of the the siege of Ashdod (Lachish): We are now in a position to discuss the three years which were to elapse between the giving of the sign and its fulfilment .... The sign was enacted and the prophecy uttered probably at the time of the Tartan's visit or shortly after, i.e, about midsummer 712 BC. Ashdod fell, as I imagine, some eighteen months later, in the winter of the following year. How can this interval be spoken of as three years? The answer lies, first, in the Jewish mode of reckoning time, according to which parts of years are spoken of as whole years; and secondly, in the arrangement of the Jewish civil and economic year. .... This economic or agrarian year commences on the first day of the month Tisri (September-October), which is still called in the Jewish calendar Rosh Hashanah "the Beginning of the Year". On the supposition, then, that this civil year is the one referred to in this prophecy, it is plain that the interval which separated the giving of the sign and the prophecy which accompanied it from its fulfilment in the fall of Ashdod would, according to the Jewish mode of reckoning, be justly described as three years, seeing that it embraces one civil year - viz. from Tisri 712 BC to Tisri 711 BC - and parts of two others; for my contention, as stated above, is that the Tartan came to Ashdod before Tisri 712 and that Sargon captured the city after Tisri 711. Sennacherib Exacts Tribute from Jerusalem Naturally the Assyrian army also placed Jerusalem under siege as it went about diminishing Hezekiah's kingdom [404]: [Hezekiah], like a caged bird, I shut up in Jerusalem, his royal city. Earthworks I threw up against him, - the one coming out of his city gate I turned back to his misery. The cities of his, which I had despoiled, I cut off from his land and to Mitinti, king of Ashdod, Padi, king of Ekron, and Silli-bêl, king of Gaza, I gave them. And (thus) I diminished his land. I added to the former tribute, and laid upon him (v., them) as their yearly payment, a tax (in the form of) gifts for my majesty. Shebna's flight to Egypt/Ethiopia may have occurred around about this time, with the desertion of Hezekiah's mercenaries: As for Hezekiah, the terrifying splendor of my majesty overcame him, and the Urbi (Arabs) and his mercenary (?) troops which he had brought in to strengthen Jerusalem, his royal city, deserted him .... In addition to 30 talents of gold and 800 talents of silver, (there were) gems, antimony, jewels (?), large sandu-stones, couches of ivory, house chairs of ivory, elephant's hide, ivory (lit., elephant's "teeth"), maple (?), boxwood, all kinds of valuable (heavy) treasures, as well as his daughters, his harem, his male and female musicians, (which) he had (them) bring after me to Nineveh, my royal city. To pay tribute and to accept ... servitude he dispatched his messengers. The Bible tells a similar sad tale and concurs that Hezekiah paid 30 talents of gold, after Sennacherib had taken all of his strong cities (2 Kings 18:14-16): King Hezekiah of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, 'I have done wrong; withdraw from me: whatever you impose on me I will bear'. The king of Assyria demanded of king Hezekiah of Judah three hundred talents of silver and thirty talents of gold. Hezekiah gave him all the silver that was found in the House of the Lord and in the treasuries of the king's house ... [he] stripped the gold from the doors of the Temple of the Lord, and from the doorposts that king Hezekiah of Judah had overlaid and gave it to the king of Assyria. That ends our account of Assyria's crucial western campaign. We now return again to the east, where our Assyrian king has to tackle for the second time the wily Merodach-baladan. Sargon goes into great detail over this his Year 12 campaign, culminating with his own triumphal entry into Babylon. Sennacherib predictably gives a much shorter account of the campaign. He, too, refers to Elam as an ally of the Chaldean, and he also implies that he took control of Babylon, adding the detail that there he set his son upon the royal throne. Sargon's Year 12 Corresponds to Sennacherib's Fourth Campaign [410]
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I constructed inside them (the doors) .... Eight lions, open at the knee, advancing, constructed out of 11,400 talents of shining bronze, of the workmanship of the god Nin-a-gal, and full of splendour ... two great cedar pillars, (which) I placed upon the lions (colossi), I set up as posts to support their doors. 
on the Mer`ash Lion, King Mita or Midas, The King of the Aleppo Inscription.