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SIEGE

A warfare strategy involving the surrounding of a city until its population either surrendered or was weakened enough to be overcome. An effective siege cut off all lines of communication of a city as well as all nearby water supplies. Although siege warfare was practiced as early as Middle Kingdom Egypt and known throughout the ancient Near East, the Assyrians and later Babylonians became true masters of this type of warfare.

The siege of Rabbah (2 Sam. 12:27) is the earliest recorded siege of the Israelites; prior to this direct assault was the preferred means of capturing a city. When the Israelites besieged a city, they built a siege wall or earthen mound to protect the attackers down below (2 Sam. 20:15; 2 Kgs. 19:32 = Isa. 37:33; Jer. 6:6; 32:24; 33:4; Ezek. 4:2; 17:17; 21:22). Examples of such works have been found at sites throughout Palestine, as have water tunnels that allowed for the collection of water without leaving the safety of a walled city (as at Hazor, Megiddo, and Jerusalem).

Assyrian siege methods are well attested in both reliefs and cuneiform sources. The Assyrians used battering rams and other war machines to knock down a city’s gates and walls; walls were further weakened by digging trenches along the outside of the city wall. When the city’s defenses were sufficiently weakened, the heavily armed attackers ascended tall scaling ladders, fending off arrows and boiling oil hurled by the besieged. It is believed that the extremely thick, well-built city walls and gates of Middle Bronze Age Palestine were constructed with the battering ram in mind.

The Seleucids also employed Assyrian and Babylonian methods of siege warfare, notably in their 2nd-century b.c.e. siege of Jerusalem (1 Macc. 6:48). The Seleucids had various methods for hurling fire and stones into besieged Jerusalem; it is unclear if catapults or similar machines were known to the Assyrians.

Jennie R. Ebeling

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

SIEGE

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)