The purpose of this book is to present the image and role of enemy in
the Neo-Assyrian royal inscriptions as well as in selected textual
sources of other kinds, including literary, magical and religious texts,
along with some administrative or even economic sources. In contrast to
other publications, where all mentions of military opponents (or, more
broadly, of non-Assyrians) are treated as mentions of enemies, I will
focus here only on those fragments where such opponents are clearly and
unambiguously described as enemy, and that means that specific
expressions are used to define individuals, peoples and lands as hostile
to Assyria. five such terms will be discussed in detail in this book,
namely aiiabu(m), g%eru(m), nakru(m), za'eru(m) and zawianu (zamanu) as
well as epithets regarding them. This book is divided into six parts.
The First of these is a short historical background to the described
issue, with special regard to royal inscriptions and changes in their
composition. The Second part is devoted to textual sources of different
kinds, which are useful for studying the matter of enemy in the
Neo-Assyrian period. The third part contains a short description and
characteristics of Assyrian rulers, as can be found in textual as well
as pictorial sources. The fourth part is the main one and consists of
detailed descriptions of terms used to describe enemies of Assyria, and
epithets that can be presented as being related to these terms. the
fifth part is a short summary of the issues discussed in this book,
while the last part is a list of textual fragments, containing terms and
epithets that concern peoples and forces inimical to Assyria.