164 Geoff Emberling
culture and royal ideology, and suggests that their own Assyrian identity was not strongly
defined in these cultural terms.
The Assyrian expansion during the Middle Assyrian period has been subject to increas-
ing scholarly attention. Liverani (1988) has suggested that its control resembled a net-
work of strongholds more than it did a contiguous territory (an “oil stain,” in his terms).
More recently, Postgate (2010) has discussed the typological question of whether it
should be called a state or an empire, and suggests that it is not truly imperial because
it did not impose tribute obligations on surrounding client or vassal kingdoms or tribes,
as was done in the Neo-Assyrian period of the first millenniumBC(Postgate 1992). For
the purposes of understanding ethnicity in the Assyrian expansion, however, the typolog-
ical question is not as important as the imperial techniques that were increasingly in use,
including conquest and subjugation of other cultural groups. Postgate (2010) rightly
highlights the uniformity of some aspects of Middle Assyrian material culture, particu-
larly written records and ceramics, and it remains of great interest to investigate the ways
in which these objects were deployed by local communities in the newly annexed areas.
In the later eleventh century, Assyrian control across the Jazira gradually contracted to
the area around Ashur and its neighboring provinces. Conquests and indeed the produc-
tion of royal inscriptions diminished significantly, and while it was not a complete dark
age (H. Kühne 2011), it was for the most part not a period of expansive growth either.
Ethnicity at the Height of Empire
After more than a century of relative calm, the Assyrian Empire began to re-establish
its imperial practices and retake its former conquests. By the reign of Ashur-nasir-apli
II (r. 883–859BC), the empire returned to its fullest extent, in particular conquering
Aramaean and (Neo-)Hittite groups to the west. The empire was bounded by Babylo-
nian and Elamite polities to the south and the rising power of Urartu in the mountains
to the north. In this context, the Neo-Assyrian Empire resumed and expanded the prac-
tices of its Middle Assyrian predecessors. Under Ashur-nasir-apli II, the center of the
Assyrian state was moved away from Ashur to a new capital city of Nimrud (ancient
Kalhu, biblical Calah), where a grand palace, now known as the Northwest Palace, was
built (Oates and Oates 2001). This palace provides the first extensive Assyrian narrative
art in the form of reliefs that lined the walls of the palace courtyard and throne-room
(Winter 1981; Cifarelli 1998). Assyrian narrative reliefs depicted many of the themes
that were expressed in writing in the royal inscriptions. The Assyrian army attacks enemy
cities, tortures and deports enemies, and receives tribute, and a diversity of locations is
indicated by vegetation, topography, and in features of enemy hairstyle and clothing.
Commentators are divided on whether these reliefs indicate an interest in the specific
cultural practices of Assyrian enemies (e.g., Reade 1979; Collon 2005), or whether they
rather blur together into a generalized portrait of the enemy (Fales 1982; Zaccagnini
1982). There certainly is a sense in which the features of both Assyrians and foreigners
are stereotyped (Wäfler 1975).
Beginning in the reign of Tukul-apil-esharra III (r. 744–727 BC)—known as
Tiglath-pileser and as “Pul” in the Bible—the first groups of foreign soldiers served in
the Assyrian army as spearmen, slingers, archers, and also horsemen and chariots (e.g.,