Battle of Nihriya

Infobox Military Conflict


caption=
conflict=Battle of Nihriya
partof=|date= Approximately 1230 BCE
place=Nihriya
result=Assyrian victory
combatant1=Hittites
combatant2=Assyria
commander1=Tudhaliya IV
commander2=Tukulti-Ninurta I
strength1=
strength2=
casualties1=
casualties2=
The Battle of Nihriya was the culminating point of the hostilities between Hittites and Assyrians for control over the remnants of the former empire of Mitanni.

When Suppiluliuma I (13th century BCE) conquered Mitanni, he created two provinces (Aleppo and Carchemish), and distributed the large part of territories of this kingdom between his allies. The rest of what had been the empire of Mitanni retained its independence as a Hittite vassal state called Hanigalbat. This great expansion of Hittite power was the last cause of the war between Egyptian Hittites and which took advantage of Assyria to be occupying the vacuum progressively left by Mitanni. Sometime during the reign of the Hittite king Mursili III (better known as Urhi-Teshub), Hanigalbat was conquered by the Assyria Empire and the Assyrians controlled the East bank of the Euphrates. [ [http://www.thebritishmuseum.ac.uk/pdf/6a%20The%20Eternal%20Treaty.pdf The ‘Eternal Treaty’ from the Hittite perspective] pp.3-4 by Trevor Bryce] Hence, when Hattusili III ousted his nephew Urhi-Teshub and seized the Hittite throne, he had to be content with the permanent loss of Hanigalbat to the Assyrians despite its former status as a Hittite vassal state. (ie. Hattusili faced a fait accompli)

The Assyrian expansion into Syria continued under the command of king Tukulti-Ninurta I and precipitated a crisis between Hatti which controlled the Nairi lands which Assyria coveted. The Hittites considered the Assyrian advance to be a clear attack on the frontiers of their empire and went into battle under their king: Tudhaliya IV, Hattusili's son and successor. This led to a major battle which is known today as the Battle of Nihriya. The exact date of the conflict is not certain.

Outcome

The conflict between both great powers took place in the neighborhood of Nihriya in the Tigris region, with the Assyrians gaining a decisive victory that allowed Assyria to annex the local Nairi region into their Empire and oust 40 native rulers who had resisted their advance into this territory. [Trevor Bryce, The Kingdom of the Hittites, Clarendon Univ. Press, 1998. pp.316-317] The Assyrian victory shook the Hittite state to its foundations as its king Tudhaliya IV was placed in a difficult situation since he faced several internal revolts against his reign, one of which may well have been an attempted "coup d'etat" led by Kurunta, a son of Muwatalli II and younger brother of the deposed Hittite king Mursili III. Tudhaliya IV would ultimately overcome all these challenges to his authority and retain the kingship of Hatti.

Although Assyrian sources state that, after the battle, they captured 28,800 Hittite prisoners (although this may be an exaggeration), [Bryce, op. cit., p.318] there were no significant consequences for Hittites in the long term, since Assyria henceforth turned its attention to the conquest of Babylonia, a project in which it invested too many resources to permit expanding its western border. The remaining Hittite empire could, therefore, exist peacefully into its last years, until its final collapse under the onslaught of the "Peoples of the Sea" (c. 1178 BCE).

References

* Itamar Singer, “The battle of Nihriya and the end of the Hittite empire,” ZA 75 (1985), pp.100-123.