Nabonide

Nabonide , last king of the néo-Babylonian empire.

Governor of Babylon sixty years old, it is carried to the capacity in -556 by the party of the entreated priests, probably favorable to the god Sîn after the setting to died of the king legitimates Labâshi-Marduk, wire of Nériglissar.

Very religious, he is undoubtedly the son of a governor araméen and a priestess of the sanctuary of Sîn with Harran. He dedicates a worship very particular to Sîn, the god-moon, worship which will be reproached to him by its enemies after the fall of Babylon (of which priests of Marduk, god up to that point supported by the kings). He makes restore the temple of this god with Ur and ambitionne to restore that of Harran, destroyed by the Mèdes.

At the beginning of its reign, Nabonide seems to continue the old traditions. It goes in the south to regulate administrative problems and carries out several forwardings in the Raising.

Following a dream received in -556, which announced to him the future and in opposition with the clergy of Marduk, Nabonide decides to rebuild the temple of Sîn to Harran. He requests the assistance of Cyrus II the Large one, king of Anshan, against Mèdes to take the city. Cyrus accepts. Its suzerain and grandfather Astyage, king of Mèdes with wind of the plot and convene it with Ecbatane. Cyrus refuses, which causes a war which will end in the victory of Persians (-550).

Disorders undoubtedly worsened by a bad economic situation burst then in Babylonia and in the southernmost cities. Nabonide installs his/her son Balthazar on the throne of Babylon and from goes away then in the oasis of Taima in the Hedjaz, which it conquers as of -552, like a whole series of cities. There remain ten years in Arabia, by preventing by its absence the great festival of the New year in Babylon, without one giving satisfactory explanation of it: conquest, devotion with the god-moon of the Arabs with Taima, abandonment of Babylon in prey to the famine and the civil war…

In -539, Nabonide leaves Arabia to inaugurate the large temple of Sîn with Harran, then goes back to Babylon the day before the action of Cyrus against the capital. Nabonide does not seem to have included/understood the danger which threatens the empire. All its action appears in complete shift with the situation. To strengthen its spiritual power, it makes transport to Babylon all the images of the gods of Mésopotamie of the South. The populations are demoralized.

Cyrus II takes Babylon, without engagements, one feastday the October 23rd -539. It kills the governor Balthazar, imprisons Nabonide (or appoints it governor of Carmanie, in Iran), and is posed as a liberator, making recognize his son Cambyse II as king by the will of Marduk without annexing the country.

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