Nimrud

Nimrud (/nɪmˈruːd/; Arab: النمرودcode: ar is deprecated ) merupakan nama Arab baharu bagi sebuah kota Assyria yang terletak 30 kilometer (20 bt) di selatan kota Mosul, dan 5 kilometer (3 bt) di selatan desa Selamiyah (Arab: السلاميةcode: ar is deprecated ), di Dataran Nineveh, Mesopotamia utara. Ia merupakan sebuah kota utama Assyria pada sekitar tahun 1250 SM hingga 610 SM. Kota ini terletak di sebuah kedudukan strategik iaitu 10 kilometer (6 bt) di utara titik pertemuan sungai Tigris dengan cawangnya iaitu Zab Besar.^[1] The city covered an area of 360 hektar (890 ekar).^[2] Reruntuhan kotanya terdapat di dalam lingkungan satu kilometer (1,100 yd) dari desa Noomanea di Wilayah Nineveh, Iraq yang letaknya kira-kira 30 kilometer (19 bt) di tenggara Mosul.

Nimrud
Sebuah patung lamassu di Istana Barat Laut Ashurnasirpal II
Jenis	Settlement
Lokasi	Noomanea, Wilayah Nineveh, Iraq
Luas	3.6 km2 (1.4 bt2)

Pada tahun 1845 bermulanya usaha penggalian kaji purba secara berselang-seli hingga tahun 1879, kemudian bersambung semula mulai 1949. Banyak hasil penemuan penting yang ditemui. Kebanyakannya terpindah ke muzium-muzium di dalam dan luar Iraq. Pada 2013 Majlis Penyelidikan Seni dan Kemanusiaan di UK menubuhkan "Nimrud Project" untuk mengenal pasti dan mencatatkan sejarah koleksi artifak sedunia dari Nimrud^[3] yang terpencar kepada sekurang-kurangnya 76 muzium di seluruh dunia (termasuk 36 di Amerika Syarikat dan 13 di United Kingdom).^[4]

Para pengkaji purba percaya bahawa kota Nimrud dinamai sedemikian pada zaman moden bersempena Raja Namrud yang disebut dalam Alkitab.^[5][6] Kotanya dikenal pasti sebagai Calah (Kalhu, Kalakh; Ibrani: כלחcode: he is deprecated , dalam Bahasa Yunani Kuno: χαλαχcode: grc is deprecated ) menurut Alkitab yang mula-mula disebutkan di samping Raja Namrud dalam kitab Kejadian bab 10 oleh Henry Rawlinson in 1850 on the basis of a possible interpretation of the city's cuneiform proper name as "Levekh".^{[7][8][note 1]}

Pada 2015, pertubuhan pengganas ISIL mengumumkan hasratnya untuk memusnahkan tapak Nimrud kerana sifatnya yang "tidak Islamik". Pada Mac 2015, pemerintah Iraq melaporkan bahawa ISIL telah menggunakan jentolak untuk memusnahkan bahan tinggalan kota yang digali keluar. Video yang keluar pada Mac 2015 memaparkan sebuah patung lamassu di kota berkenaan diserang dengan tukul besi. Seteruk mana kemusnahannya belum dijelaskan.^[9]

Catatan

1. William Francis Ainsworth, who preferred the identification of Resen with Nimrud (on the basis of Bochart's identification of Resen with Xenophon's Larissa), summarised the debate in 1855 as follows: "The learned Bochart first advanced the supposition that this Assyrian city was the same as the primeval city, called Resen in the Bible and that the Greeks having asked its name were answered, Al Resen, the article being prefixed, and from whence they made Larissa, in an easy transposition. I adopted this presumed identity as extremely probable, and Colonel Chesney (ii. 223) has done the same, not as an established fact, but as a presumed identity.... In 1846, Colonel Rawlinson, speaking of Nimrud, noticed it as probably the Rehoboth of Scripture, but he added in a note, "I have no reason for identifying it witli Rehoboth, beyond its evident antiquity, and the attribution of Resen and Calah to other sites. (Journal of Roy. Asiat. Soc. vol. x. p. 26.) At this time Colonel Rawlinson identified Calah with Holwan or Sir Pul-i-Zohab, and Resen, or Dasen, with Yasin Teppeh in the plain of Sharizur in Kurdistan. In 1849 (Journ. of Roy. Asiat. Soc. vol. xi. p. 10), Colonel Rawlinson said, "The Arabic geographers always give the title of Athur to the great ruined capital near the mouth of the Upper Zab. The ruins are now usually known by the name of Nimrud. It would seem highly probable that they represent the Calah of Genesis, for the Samaritan Pentateuch names this city Lachisa, which is evidently the same title as the Λάρισσα of Xenophon, the Persian r being very usually replaced both in Median and Babylonian by a guttural." In 1850 (Journ. of Roy. Asiat. Soc. vol. xii.). Colonel Rawlinson added the discovery of a cuneiform inscription bearing the title Levekh, which he reads Halukh. "Nimrud," says the distinguished palaeographist, "the great treasure-house which has furnished us with all the most remarkable specimens of Assyrian sculpture, although very probably forming one of that group of cities, which in the time of the prophet Jonas, were known by the common name of Nineveh, has no claim, itself, I think, to that particular appellation. The title by which it is designated on the bricks and slabs that form its buildings, I read doubtfully as Levekh, and I suspect this to be the original form of the name which appears as Calah in Genesis, and Halah in Kings and Chronicles, and which indeed, as the capital of Calachene, must needs have occupied some site in the Immediate vicinity." Lastly, in 1853 (Journ. of Roy. Asiat. Soc. vol. xv. p. vi. et seq.), Colonel Rawlinson describes the remarkable cylinder before alluded to as found at Kilah Shirgat, which establishes that site to have been the most ancient capital of the Assyrian empire, and to have been called Assur as well as Nimrud and Nineveh Proper. This Assur, we have seen, he identifies with the Tel Assur of the Targums, which is used for the Mosaic Resen; and instead, therefore, of Resen being between Nineveh and Calah, It should be Calah, which was between Nineveh and Resen. But, notwithstanding such very high authority, the conclusion thus arrived at does not appear to be perfectly satisfactory."

Rujukan

1. Brill's Encyclopedia of Islam 1913-36, p.923
2. Mieroop, Marc van de (1997). The Ancient Mesopotamian City. Oxford: Oxford University Press. m/s. 95. ISBN 9780191588457.
3. The Nimrud Project at Oracc.org
4. The Nimrud Project at Oracc.org: Museums worldwide holding material from Nimrud; "Material from Nimrud has been dispersed into museum collections across the world. This page currently lists 76 museums holding Nimrud objects, with links to online information where available. The Nimrud Project welcomes additions and amendments to the list."
5. Genesis 10:11–10:12Template:Bibleverse with invalid book, Micah 5:5Template:Bibleverse with invalid book, and 1Chronicles 1:10Template:Bibleverse with invalid book
6. Brill's Encyclopedia of Islam 1913-36, p.923, "Nimrud": "At the present day the site is known only as Nimrud, which so far as I know first appears in Niebuhr (1778, p. 355, 368). When this, now the usual, name arose is unknown; I consider it to be of modern origin. It should be noted that names like Nimrod, Tell Nimrod, etc. are not found in the geographical nomenclature of Mesopotamia and the Iraq in the middle ages, while they are several times met with at the present day."
7. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Volume 12, page 417, quote "The title by which it is designated on the bricks and slabs that form its buildings, I read doubtfully as Levekh, and I suspect this to be the original form of the name which appears as Calah in Genesis, and Halah in Kings and Chronicles..."
8. The Conquest of Assyria, Mogens Trolle Larsen, 2014, Routledge, page 217, quote: "Rawlinson explained to his audience that the large Assyrian ruin mounds could now be given their proper names: Nimrud was Calah..."
9. Karim Abou Merhi (March 5, 2015). "IS 'bulldozed' ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud, Iraq says". AFP. Dicapai pada March 5, 2015.