Nebuchadnezzar II, more correctly spelled Nebuchadrezzar II, meaning "Nabu, watch over my heir", was the second king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, ruling from the death of his father Nabopolassar in 605 BC to his own death in 562 BC. Often titled Nebuchadnezzar the Great, he is regarded as the empire's greatest king, famous for his military campaigns in the Levant and their role in Jewish history, and for his construction projects in his capital of Babylon. Ruling for 43 years, Nebuchadnezzar was the longest-reigning king of the Neo-Babylonian dynasty. By the time of his death, he was among the most powerful rulers in the world.
Possibly named after his grandfather of the same name or after Nebuchadnezzar I, one of Babylon's greatest warrior-kings, Nebuchadnezzar II had already secured renown for himself during his father's reign, leading armies in the Medo-Babylonian conquest of the Assyrian Empire. At the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BC, Nebuchadnezzar inflicted a crushing defeat on an Egyptian army led by Pharaoh Necho II and ensured that the Neo-Babylonian Empire would succeed the Neo-Assyrian Empire as the dominant power in the ancient Near East. Shortly after this victory, Nabopolassar died and Nebuchadnezzar became king.
Despite his successful military career during his father's reign, Nebuchadnezzar's early reign saw few achievements and witnessed a disastrous failed invasion of Egypt. This performance led some of Babylon's vassals to doubt Babylon's power and was the cause of brewing rebellion across his empire. After first putting down some insurrections in the east, Nebuchadnezzar turned his attention to the Levant and in the 580s BC engaged in a string of campaigns against his rebellious vassal states. In 587 BC Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem and destroyed it and the Kingdom of Judah, deporting much of its population in what became known as the Babylonian captivity. This episode earned Nebuchadnezzar a position of notoriety in Jewish history. Through this conquest, the subsequent capture of the Phoenician city of Tyre, and other campaigns in the Levant, Nebuchadnezzar restored the Neo-Babylonian Empire's fortunes in the ancient Near East.
Beyond his military campaigns, Nebuchadnezzar is remembered as a great builder who erected many of Babylon's religious buildings, including the Esagila and Etemenanki, embellished its palaces and beautified its ceremonial centre through renovations to the city's processional street and the Ishtar Gate. As most of Nebuchadnezzar's inscriptions deal with his building projects rather than military accomplishments, he was for a time seen by historians mostly as a builder rather than a warrior.
Sources There are few cuneiform sources for the period between 594 BC and 557 BC, which covers much of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II and the reigns of his three immediate successors, Amel-Marduk, Neriglissar and Labashi-Marduk. This lack of sources has had the effect that even though Nebuchadnezzar's reign was the longest among the Neo-Babylonian kings, less is confidently known about it than others. Though the handful of cuneiform sources recovered (notably the Babylonian Chronicle) confirm some events of his reign (such as conflicts with the Kingdom of Judah), other events—such as the 586 BC destruction of Solomon's Temple and other military campaigns Nebuchadnezzar possibly conducted—are not covered in any known cuneiform documents.
As a result, historical reconstructions of this period generally follow secondary sources in Hebrew, Greek and Latin to determine what events transpired at the time, in addition to contract tablets from Babylonia. Though some see the use of the sources written by later authors—many of them created several centuries after Nebuchadnezzar's time and often reflecting their own cultural attitudes to the events and figures discussed— as presenting problems in and of itself, blurring the line between history and tradition, it is also true that these sources are less likely to present the bias bound to be present in contemporary sources written by authors subject to the king’s authority. As is often the case with ancient history the best approach is to use the existing written sources and archaeological evidence to gain insight into Nebuchadnezzar's reign.
Background
Name
Nebuchadnezzar II's name in Akkadian was Nabû-kudurri-uṣur, meaning "Nabu, watch over my heir". The name was often interpreted in earlier scholarship as "Nabu, protect the boundary", given that the word kudurru can also mean 'boundary' or 'line'. Modern historians support the 'heir' interpretation over the 'boundary' interpretation in terms of this name. There is no reason to believe that the Babylonians intended the name to be difficult to interpret or to have a double meaning.
Nabû-kudurri-uṣur is typically anglicised to 'Nebuchadnezzar', following how the name is most commonly rendered in the Bible. In Hebrew, the name was rendered as נְבוּכַדְנֶאצַּר (Nəḇūḵaḏneʾṣṣar) and in Greek it was rendered as Ναβουχοδονόσορ (Nabouchodonosor). Some scholars, such as Donald Wiseman, prefer the anglicisation "Nebuchadrezzar", with an "r" rather than an "n", following the assumption that "Nebuchadnezzar" is a later, corrupted form of the contemporary Nabû-kudurri-uṣur.
The alternative anglicisation "Nebuchadrezzar" derives from how the name is rendered in the books of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, נְבוּכַדְרֶאצַּר (Nəḇūḵaḏreʾṣṣar), a more faithful transliteration of the original Akkadian name. Assyriologist Adrianus van Selms suggested in 1974 that the variant with an "n" rather than an "r" was a rude nickname, deriving from an Akkadian rendition like Nabû-kūdanu-uṣur, which means 'Nabu, protect the mule', though there is no concrete evidence for this idea. Van Selms believed that a nickname like that could derive from Nebuchadnezzar's early reign, which was plagued by political instability.
Nebuchadnezzar II's name, Nabû-kudurri-uṣur, was identical to the name of his distant predecessor, Nebuchadnezzar I ( 1125–1104 BC), who ruled more than five centuries before Nebuchadnezzar II's time. Like Nebuchadnezzar II, Nebuchadnezzar I was a renowned warrior-king who appeared in a time of political upheaval and defeated the forces of Babylon's enemies, in Nebuchadnezzar I's case the Elamites. Although theophoric names using the god Nabu are common in texts from the early Neo-Babylonian Empire, the name Nebuchadnezzar is relatively rare, being mentioned only four times with certainty. Though there is no evidence that Nabopolassar named his son after Nebuchadnezzar I, Nabopolassar was knowledgeable in history and actively worked to connect his rule to the rule of the Akkadian Empire, which preceded him by nearly two thousand years. The significance of his son and heir bearing the name of one of Babylon's greatest kings would not have been lost on Nabopolassar. If Jursa's theory concerning Nabopolassar's origin is correct, it is alternatively possible that Nebuchadnezzar II was named after his grandfather of the same name, as the Babylonians employed patronymics, rather than after the previous king.
Ancestry and early life
Nebuchadnezzar was the eldest son of Nabopolassar (626–605 BC), the founder of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. This is confirmed by Nabopolassar's inscriptions, which explicitly name Nebuchadnezzar as his "eldest son", as well as inscriptions from Nebuchadnezzar's reign, which refer to him as the "first" or "chief son" of Nabopolassar, and as Nabopolassar's "true" or "legitimate heir". The Neo-Babylonian Empire was founded through Nabopolassar's rebellion, and later war, against the Neo-Assyrian Empire, which liberated Babylonia after nearly a century of Assyrian control. The war resulted in the complete destruction of Assyria, and the Neo-Babylonian Empire which rose in its place was powerful, but hastily built and politically unstable.
As Nabopolassar never clarified his ancestry in lineage in any of his inscriptions, his origin is not entirely clear. Subsequent historians have variously identified Nabopolassar as a Chaldean, an Assyrian or a Babylonian. Although no evidence conclusively confirms him as being of Chaldean origin, the term "Chaldean dynasty" is frequently used by modern historians for the royal family he founded, and the term "Chaldean Empire" remains in use as an alternate historiographical name for the Neo-Babylonian Empire.
Regardless of his ethnic origin, Nabopolassar appears to have been strongly connected to the city of Uruk, located south of Babylon. It is possible that he was a member of its ruling elite before becoming king, and there is a growing body of evidence that Nabopolassar's family originated in Uruk, for instance that Nebuchadnezzar's daughters lived in the city.
In 2007, Michael Jursa advanced the theory that Nabopolassar was a member of a prominent political family in Uruk, whose members are attested since the reign of Esarhaddon (681–669 BC). To support his theory, Jursa points to how documents describe how the grave and body of "Kudurru", a deceased governor of Uruk, was desecrated due to the anti-Assyrian activities of Kudurru's two sons, Nabu-shumu-ukin and a son whose name is mostly missing. The desecration went so far as to drag Kudurru's body through the streets of Uruk. Kudurru can be identified with Nebuchadnezzar (Nabû-kudurri-uṣur, "Kudurru" simply being a common and shortened nickname), a prominent official in Uruk who served as its governor under the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal (669–631 BC) in the 640s BC. In Assyrian tradition, the desecration of a dead body showed that the deceased individual and their surviving family were traitors and enemies of the state, and that they had to be completely eradicated, serving to punish them even after death. The name of the son whose name is unpreserved in the letter ended with either ahi, nâsir or uṣur, and the remaining traces can fit with the name Nabû-apla-uṣur, meaning that Nabopolassar could be the other son mentioned in the letter and thus a son of Kudurru. Strengthening this connection is that Nebuchadnezzar II is attested very early during his father's reign, from 626/625 to 617 BC, as high priest of the Eanna temple in Uruk, where he is often attested under the nickname "Kudurru". Nebuchadnezzar must have been made high priest at a very young age, considering that his year of death, 562 BC, is 64 years after 626 BC. The original Kudurru's second son, Nabu-shumu-ukin, also appears to be attested as a prominent general under Nabopolassar, and the name was also used by Nebuchadnezzar II for one of his sons, possibly honoring his dead uncle.
Crown prince
Nebuchadnezzar's military career began in the reign of his father, though little information survives. Based on a letter sent to the temple administration of the Eanna temple, it appears that Nebuchadnezzar participated in his father's campaign to take the city of Harran in 610 BC. Harran was the seat of Ashur-uballit II, who had rallied what remained of the Assyrian army and ruled the Neo-Assyrian rump state. The Babylonian victory in the Harran campaign and the defeat of Ashur-uballit in 609 BC marked the end of the ancient Assyrian monarchy, which would never be restored. According to the Babylonian Chronicles, Nebuchadnezzar also commanded an army in an unspecified mountainous region for several months in 607 BC.