The Nebuchadnezzar Chronicle, also known as Jerusalem Chronicle, is one of the series of Babylonian Chronicles, and contains a description of the first eleven years of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II. The tablet details Nebuchadnezzar's military campaigns in the west and has been interpreted to refer to both the Battle of Carchemish and the
Siege of Jerusalem (597 BC)
The siege of Jerusalem (597 BC) was a military campaign carried out by Nebuchadnezzar II, king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, in which he besieged Jerusalem, then capital of the Kingdom of Judah. The city surrendered, with king Jeconiah of Jud ...
. The tablet is numbered ABC5 in Grayson's standard text and BM 21946 in the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
.
It is one of two identified Chronicles referring to Nebuchadnezzar, and does not cover the whole of his reign. The ABC5 is a continuation of Babylonian Chronicle ABC4 (The Late Years of Nabopolassar), where Nebuchadnezzar is mentioned as the
Crown Prince
A crown prince or hereditary prince is the heir apparent to the throne in a royal or imperial monarchy. The female form of the title is crown princess, which may refer either to an heiress apparent or, especially in earlier times, to the wi ...
. Since the ABC 5 only provides a record through Nebuchadnezzar's eleventh year, the subsequent destruction and exile recorded in the
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach" '' Grabbe, p216 quote: "It is so easy to forget that 587 BCE is exclusively a biblical date. That the one of 597 BCE is confirmed by external sources does not prove that 597 BCE really took place. It is probably likely that something like 587 BCE happened, but it cannot be proven. The presence of members of the Judaean royal family at the Babylonian court in Neo-Babylonian times does not presuppose the destruction of 587 BCE not even according to the Old Testament-it only presupposes the abduction of Jehoiachin in 597 BCE"
As with most other Babylonian Chronicles, the tablet is unprovenanced, having been purchased in 1896 via an antiquities dealer from an unknown excavation.The_Babylonian_Chronicles_Classification_and_Provenance /ref> It was first published 60 years later in 1956 by Donald Wiseman.
Carchemish
The tablet claims that Nebuchadnezzar "crossed the river to go against the Egyptian army which lay in Karchemiš. They fought with each other and the Egyptian army withdrew before him. He accomplished their defeat and beat them to non-existence. As for the rest of the Egyptian army which had escaped from the defeat so quickly that no weapon had reached them, in the district of Hamath the Babylonian troops overtook and defeated them so that not a single man escaped to his own country. At that time Nebuchadnezzar conquered the whole area of Hamath."
Siege of Jerusalem
The Chronicle does not refer to Jerusalem directly but mentions a "City of Iaahudu", interpreted to be "City of Judah". The Chronicle states:
In the seventh year (of Nebuchadnezzar) in the month Chislev (Nov/Dec) the king of Babylon assembled his army, and after he had invaded the land of Hatti (Turkey/Syria) he laid siege to the city of Judah. On the second day of the month of Adar (16 March) he conquered the city and took the king (
Jeconiah
Jeconiah ( he, יְכָנְיָה ''Yəḵonəyā'' , meaning "Yah has established"; el, Ιεχονιας; la, Iechonias, Jechonias), also known as Coniah and as Jehoiachin ( he, יְהוֹיָכִין ''Yəhōyāḵīn'' ; la, Ioachin, Joach ...
) prisoner. He installed in his place a king (
Zedekiah
Zedekiah (), was the 20th and last king of Judah before the destruction of the kingdom by King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon. His birth name was Mattaniah/Mattanyahu ( he, מַתַּנְיָהוּ, ''Mattanyāhū'', "Gift of God"; el, Μαθ ...
) of his own choice, and after he had received rich tribute, he sent forth to Babylon.
Chronology
The Chronicle is understood to confirm the date of the First Siege of Jerusalem. Prior to publication of the Babylonian Chronicles by Donald Wiseman in 1956, Thiele had determined from the biblical texts that Nebuchadnezzar's initial capture of Jerusalem occurred in the spring of 597 BC, while other scholars, including Albright, more frequently dated the event to 598 BC.Kenneth Strand, "Thiele's Biblical Chronology As a Corrective for Extrabiblical Dates," ''Andrews University Seminary Studies'' 34 (1996) 310, 317.
There are no extra-biblical sources for the Second Siege of Jerusalem, which has been dated to 587 BC. The date was arrived at by comparing the evidence of the Chronicle to dates given in the
Book of Ezekiel
The Book of Ezekiel is the third of the Latter Prophets in the Tanakh and one of the major prophetic books, following Isaiah and Jeremiah. According to the book itself, it records six visions of the prophet Ezekiel, exiled in Babylon, during ...
in connection to the year of captivity of Jeconiah (i.e. the first fall of Jerusalem).