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17. BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE 263
the Syro-Anatolian Hurrian ritual tradition was not successful, for Esarhaddon refused to accept the replacement
and had his army invade Subria: the kingdom was subdued, annexed and split into two Assyrian provinces, 164
and, with the Assyrian refugees from Subria dealt with, the next year, 672 BC, saw the announcement of
Esarhaddon’s succession arrangements.
Esarhaddon also handed all Urartian fugitives found in Subria over to Rusa; this would indicate that there
was an agreement between Assyria and Urartu in place, guaranteeing that Rusa would not get involved in the
conflict in exchange for the extradition of the refugees who might otherwise have been used against Urartian
interests. That Esarhaddon had previously worried about Urartu’s position is clear from a query to the sun
god 165 which we can put in the context of agreeing the pact 166 with Rusa who may here be referred to as the
king of Biainili; if the restoration proves to be correct, this would be the only known Assyrian attestation of
that name; clearly, the diviners wanted to make perfectly sure that the sun god understood who was under
investigation:
Will Ursa (= Rusa), king of Urartu, whom they call Yaya […], whom they call king of KUR.Pa-[i-ni-li] 167 , strive
and plan? Will he, [either by his own wish] or on the advice of his counsellors, together with his army or with the
Cimmerians or any of his allies take the road from where they are (now) to wage war, kill, plunder and loot and
come to Subria, either to URU.Pu-ú-mu or to URU.Kul-im-me-ri or to (any other of) the fortresses of Subria? Will
they kill what there is to kill, plunder what there is to plunder and loot what there is to loot? Of the fortresses of
Subria, will they annex a few or many and turn them into their own?
Subria’s reputation as a haven for refugees from Assyria and Urartu alike is not only apparent from
Esarhaddon’s official reports but also clear from several letters of the political correspondence of Sargon II
which indicate that this was a major problem in the otherwise easy relationship between Assyria and Subria, 168
people from as far away as Mê-Turan 169 on the Diyala fled to Subria to escape justice and could expect the
king of Subria to refuse their extradition. This remarkable behaviour has to be recognized to constitute a deliberate
policy on Subria’s behalf, not at all in evidence for any of the other border kingdoms, and should therefore
not just be seen as the result of the geographical position of the kingdom between Assyria and Urartu. 170
Yet it seems anachronistic to assume that Subria offered asylum ‘as a means of defiance and “neutrality”
between the imperial powers’, as Bradley Parker argues, 171 what did Subria stand to gain from such actions
which were directed, after all, against both powerful neighbours in equal measure? 172 Tamas Deszö has recently
argued that Subria’s policy was anchored in a religious tradition and proposed to assume the existence of a
refuge sanctuary at Uppummu 173 . I agree with his assessment and would moreover suggest the nearby Tigris
Grotto to be this very place, a holy precinct in open nature, with unlimited water and shelter from the powers
of nature offered by three caves in addition to the river grotto itself. 174
While little else is known about Subria’s gods and temples, it is obvious that the ‘Tigris source’, as the
riverine cave system at Birkleyn (38° 32b N, 40° 33b E) was known to the Assyrians and probably also to the
Subrians themselves, must have been highly esteemed as a sanctuary, not only locally but also internationally.
164 For Subria’s fate under Assyrian rule see Radner & Schachner 2001: 772-773 for a discussion of the governors of the Subrian provinces
and Çilingiroglu & Salvini 2001: 21-22 for the Urartian invasion in 657 BC.
165 SAA 4 18 ll. 4-11 (= Starr 1990).
166 Compare e.g. the oracle query SAA 4 20, inquiring into the intentions of the Scythian king when a treaty between him and Esarhaddon
was considered.
167 Not recognized in the edition. While in Neo-Assyrian itself, the voiced and unvoiced plosives p and b are mostly if not always written
correctly (Hämeen-Anttila 2000: 15-16 it is conceivable that the initial phoneme of the Urartian word Biainili would have been realised with
an initial p as Urartian phonology differed considerably from Neo-Assyrian.
168 SAA 5 35, 53, 54.
169 As is the case in the situation discussed in the letter SAA 5 53.
170 As does Kessler 1986: 65.
171 Parker 2002: 384.
172 According to Esarhaddon’s Letter to Assur (Borger 1956: 105 Götterbrief II iii 28-34), Ik-Tessub of Subria had refused to extradite
Urartian refuges to Rusa. See Leichty 1991: 55.
173 Deszö 2006: 37 who speculates about the existence of a Tessub temple in Uppummu.
174 For the results of a 2004 survey of the site see Schachner (Hrsg.) 2009.