patience was worn out:  he drew off his troops and fell back on Phoenicia, laying Tyre, Sidon, and Byblos under tribute before returning into Mesopotamia.  Hazael had shown himself possessed of no less energy than Ben-hadad; and Damascus, isolated, had proved as formidable a foe as Damascus surrounded by its vassals; Shalmaneser therefore preferred to leave matters as they were, and accept the situation.  Indeed the results obtained were of sufficient importance to warrant his feeling some satisfaction.  He had ruthlessly dispelled the dream of Syrian hegemony which had buoyed up Ben-hadad, he had forced Damascus to withdraw the suzerainty it had exercised in the south, and he had conquered Northern Syria and the lower basin of the Orontes.  Before running any further risks, he judged it prudent to strengthen his recently acquired authority over these latter countries, and to accustom the inhabitants to their new position as subjects of Nineveh.

He showed considerable wisdom by choosing the tribes of the Taurus and of the Oappadocian marches as the first objects of attack.  In regions so difficult of access, war could only be carried on with considerable hardship and severe loss.  The country was seamed by torrents and densely covered with undergrowth, while the towns and villages, which clung to the steep sides of the valleys, had no need of walls to become effective fortresses, for the houses rose abruptly one above another, and formed so many redoubts which the enemy would be forced to attack and take one by one.  Few pitched battles could be fought in a district of this description; the Assyrians wore themselves out in incessant skirmishes and endless petty sieges, and were barely compensated by the meagre spoil which such warfare yielded.

[Illustration:  134.jpg A MOUNTAIN VILLAGE]

     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Alfred Boissier.

In 838 B.C.  Shalmaneser swept over the country of Tabal and reduced twenty-four of its princes to a state of subjection; proceeding thence, he visited the mountains of Turat,* celebrated from this period downwards for their silver mines and quarries of valuable marbles.

* The position of the mountains of Turat is indicated by the nature of their products:  “We know of a silver mine at Marash and an iron mine not worked, and two fine quarries, one of pink and the other of black marble.”  Turat, therefore, must be the Marash mountain, the Aghir-Uagh and its spurs; hence the two sorts of stone mentioned in the Assyrian text would be, the one the pink, the other the black marble.

In 837 he seized the stronghold of Uetash in Melitene, and laid Tabal under a fresh contribution; this constituted a sort of advance post for-Assyria in the sight of those warlike and continually fluctuating races situated between the sources of the Halys and the desert border of Asia Minor.* Secure on this side, he was about to bring matters to a close in Cilicia, when the defection of Ianzu recalled him to the opposite extremity of the empire.  He penetrated into Namri by the defiles of Khashmur,** made a hasty march through Sik-hisatakh, Bit-Tamul, Bit-Shakki, and Bit-Shedi, surprised the rebels and drove them into the forests; he then bore down on Parsua*** and plundered twenty-seven petty kings consecutively.