Meagre details survive regarding the reign of the next king, Shalmaneser IV (781-772 B.C).  These are, however, supplemented by the Urartian inscriptions.  Although Adad-nirari boasted that he had subdued the kingdom of Urartu in the north, he appears to have done no more than limit its southern expansion for a time.

The Urarti were, like the Mitanni, a military aristocracy[501] who welded together by conquest the tribes of the eastern and northern Highlands which several Assyrian monarchs included in their Empire.  They acquired the elements of Assyrian culture, and used the Assyrian script for their own language.  Their god was named Khaldis, and they called their nation Khaldia.  During the reign of Ashur-natsir-pal their area of control was confined to the banks of the river Araxes, but it was gradually extended under a succession of vigorous kings towards the south-west until they became supreme round the shores of Lake Van.  Three of their early kings were Lutipris, Sharduris I, and Arame.

During the reign of Shamshi-Adad the Assyrians came into conflict with the Urarti, who were governed at the time by “Ushpina of Nairi” (Ishpuinis, son of Sharduris II).  The Urartian kingdom had extended rapidly and bordered on Assyrian territory.  To the west were the tribes known as the Mannai, the northern enemies of the Medes, a people of Indo-European speech.

When Adad-nirari IV waged war against the Urarti, their king was Menuas, the son of Ishpuinis.  Menuas was a great war-lord, and was able to measure his strength against Assyria on equal terms.  He had nearly doubled by conquest the area controlled by his predecessors.  Adad-nirari endeavoured to drive his rival northward, but all along the Assyrian frontier from the Euphrates to the Lower Zab, Menuas forced the outposts of Adad-nirari to retreat southward.  The Assyrians, in short, were unable to hold their own.

Having extended his kingdom towards the south, Menuas invaded Hittite territory, subdued Malatia and compelled its king to pay tribute.  He also conquered the Mannai and other tribes.  Towards the north and north-west he added a considerable area to his kingdom, which became as large as Assyria.

Menuas’s capital was the city of Turushpa or Dhuspas (Van), which was called Khaldinas[502] after the national god.  For a century it was the seat of Urartian administration.  The buildings erected there by Menuas and his successors became associated in after-time with the traditions of Semiramis, who, as Queen Sammu-rammat of Assyria, was a contemporary of the great Urartian conqueror.  Similarly a sculptured representation of the Hittite god was referred to by Herodotus as a memorial of the Egyptian king Sesostris.

The strongest fortification at Dhuspas was the citadel, which was erected on a rocky promontory jutting into Lake Van.  A small garrison could there resist a prolonged siege.  The water supply of the city was assured by the construction of subterranean aqueducts.  Menuas erected a magnificent palace, which rivalled that of the Assyrian monarch at Kalkhi, and furnished it with the rich booty brought back from victorious campaigns.  He was a lover of trees and planted many, and he laid out gardens which bloomed with brilliant Asian flowers.  The palace commanded a noble prospect of hill and valley scenery on the south-western shore of beautiful Lake Van.