Editing Ninus

{{Short description|Mythical founder of Nineveh}}
[[File:Ninus Rex.jpg|thumb|Portrait from ''[[Promptuarium Iconum Insigniorum]]'' (1553) by [[Guillaume Rouillé]]]]
'''Ninus''' ({{langx|el|Νίνος}}), according to Greek historians writing in the [[Hellenistic period]] and later, was the founder of [[Nineveh]] (also called Νίνου πόλις "city of Ninus" in Greek<!--Flavii Josephi opera omnia: "ἀπῆλθεν είς τὴν Νίνου πόλιν"-->), ancient capital of Assyria. The figure or figures with which he corresponds in Assyrian records is uncertain; an association or identification with [[Ninurta]] has been proposed.{{citation needed|date=November 2022}} An identification with [[Shamshi-Adad I]], [[Shamshi-Adad V]], and/or a conflation of the two have also been suggested.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Soultanian |first1=Gabriel |title=The History of the Armenians and Moses Khorenats'i |date=2011 |publisher=Bennett & Bloom |page=126}}</ref>

==In Hellenic historiography==
Many early accomplishments are attributed to Ninus, such as training the first hunting dogs, and taming horses for riding.{{Citation needed|date=January 2009}} For this accomplishment, he is sometimes represented in Greek mythology as a [[centaur]].

The figures of King Ninus and Queen [[Semiramis]] first appear in the history of Persia written by [[Ctesias of Cnidus]] (c. 400 BC), who claimed, as court physician to [[Artaxerxes II]], to have access to the royal historical records.<ref>''"Like a Bird in a Cage": The Invasion of Sennacherib'', Lester L. Grabbe (2003), p. 121-122</ref> Ctesias' account was later expanded on by [[Diodorus Siculus]].  Ninus continued to be mentioned by European historians (e.g. [[Alfred the Great]]), until knowledge of [[cuneiform]] enabled a more precise reconstruction of Assyrian and Babylonian history from the mid 19th century onwards.

He was said to have been the son of [[Belus (Assyrian)|Belus]] or [[Bel (mythology)|Bel]], a name that may represent a Semitic title such as [[Ba'al]], "lord" (the famous name of a "god" whom [[Elijah]] opposed in [[1 Kings]] 17ff). According to [[Castor of Rhodes]] (''apud [[George Syncellus|Syncellus]]'' p.&nbsp;167), his reign lasted 52 years, its commencement, according to Ctesias, corresponding to 2189 BC. He was reputed to have conquered the whole of western [[Asia]] in 17 years with the help of Ariaeus, king of [[Arabia]], and to have founded the first empire, defeating the legendary kings Barzanes of [[Armenia]] (whom he spared) and Pharnus of [[Media (region)|Media]] (whom he had crucified). 
[[File:Ninus.png|thumb|left|300px|Ninus' Empire according to [[Diodoros]]]]

As the story goes, Ninus, having conquered all neighboring Asian countries apart from India and [[Bactriana]], then made war on Oxyartes, king of Bactriana, with an army of nearly two million, taking all but the capital, [[Bactra]]. During the siege of Bactra, he met Semiramis, the wife of one of his officers, [[Onnes (general)|Onnes]], whom he took from her husband and married. The fruit of the marriage was [[Ninyas]], said to have succeeded Ninus.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ninus|title=Ninus {{!}} Greek mythology|work=Encyclopedia Britannica|access-date=2017-04-25|language=en}}</ref>

Ctesias (as known from Diodorus) also related that after the death of Ninus, his widow Semiramis, who was rumored to have murdered Ninus, erected to him a temple-tomb, 9 [[stadia (length)|stadia]] high and 10 stadia broad, near [[Babylon]], where the story of [[Pyramus and Thisbe]] (Πύραμος; Θίσβη) was later based. She was further said to have made war on the last remaining independent monarch in Asia, king Stabrobates of India, but was defeated and wounded, abdicating in favour of her son Ninyas.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/historyantiquit09duncgoog|title=The History of Antiquity|last=Duncker|first=Max|date=1882-01-01|publisher=R. Bentley & son|language=en}}</ref>

==Identifications==
A number of historians, beginning with the Roman [[Cephalion (historian)|Cephalion]] (c. AD 120) asserted that Ninus' opponent, the king of Bactria, was actually [[Zoroaster]] (or first of several to bear this name), rather than Oxyartes.

Ninus was first identified in the ''Recognitions'' (part of [[Clementine literature]]) with the biblical [[Nimrod]], who, the author says, taught the Persians to worship fire. In many modern interpretations of the [[Hebrew language|Hebrew]] text of ''[[Book of Genesis|Genesis]]'' 10, it is Nimrod, the son of [[Biblical Cush|Cush]], who founded Nineveh, though other translations (e.g., the [[KJV]]) render the same passage as naming [[Ashur (Bible)|Ashur]], son of [[Shem]], as the founder of Nineveh.<ref>The King James Version of verses 8-12 has "And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the LORD: wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the LORD. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. Out of that land went forth Asshur, and builded Nineveh, and the city Rehoboth, and Calah, And Resen between Nineveh and Calah: the same is a great city." But verse 11 can be interpreted as "Out of that land went forth Asshur. And he (that is, Nimrod) builded Nineveh..."</ref>

More recently, the identification in ''Recognitions'' of Nimrod with Ninus (and also with Zoroaster, as in ''Homilies'') formed a major part of [[Alexander Hislop]]'s thesis in the 19th century tract ''[[The Two Babylons]]''.

==Historicity==
The decipherment of a vast quantity of cuneiform texts has allowed modern [[Assyriologists]] to piece together a more accurate history of [[Sumer]], [[Akkadian Empire|Akkad]], [[Babylonia]], [[Assyria]], and [[Chaldea]] aa well as of the Levant, Anatolia and Ancient Iran. Ninus (like Nimrod) is not attested in any of the far older extensive king lists compiled by the Mesopotamians themselves, nor mentioned in any Mesopotamian literature, and is thus considered wholly fictional.

An Assyrian queen [[Shammuramat]] is known to be historical, and for five years from 811 BC ruled the [[Neo-Assyrian Empire]] as regent for her son [[Adad-nirari III]], and had been the wife of [[Shamshi-Adad V]], rather than having any conne tion to the fictional Ninus. The later Hellenic myths surrounding Semiramis are considered by some to be inspired by the novelty of a woman ruling what was the largest empire in history at that point.

==In culture==
The story of Ninus and Semiramis is narrated in a 1st-century AD [[Hellenistic period|Hellenistic]] romance called the ''Ninus Romance'', the ''Novel of Ninus and Semiramis'', or the ''Ninus Fragments''.<ref>''Daphnis and Chloe. Love Romances and Poetical Fragments. Fragments of the Ninus Romance'', Loeb Classical Library {{ISBN|0-674-99076-5}}</ref>  A scene from it is perhaps depicted in mosaics from [[Antioch on the Orontes]].<ref>Doro Levi, "The Novel of Ninus and Semiramis" ''Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society'' '''87''':5, Papers on Archaeology, Ecology, Ethnology, History, Paleontology, Physics, and Physiology (May 5, 1944), pp. 420-428</ref>

In his 7th-century compendium, the ''[[Etymologiae]]'', [[Isidore of Seville]] claimed that idolatry was the invention of Ninus, who had a gold statue made of his father Belus, which he worshipped. This claim was highly influential throughout the medieval period into the Early Modern.<ref>[[Michael Camille]], ''The Gothic Idol: Ideology and Image-Making in Medieval Art'', Cambridge, 1991: 50-51.</ref><ref>The [[Euhemerism|euhemeristic]] tradition according to which pagan [[idolatry]] began with the veneration of a statue erected by Ninus to his father Belus was accepted by [[Thomas Aquinas]] in his discussion of idolatry, ''[[Summa Theologica|Summa]]'', II, II, Q. 94, art. 1-4.</ref>

Two major works from late-16th-century England refer to Ninus in passing. William Shakespeare's ''[[A Midsummer Night's Dream]]'' has the story of Pyramus and Thisbe as a play-within-a-play. The actors constantly mispronounce the location "Ninus' Tomb" as "Ninny's Tomb," though they are corrected initially, and in vain, by "director" [[Peter Quince]]. At the same time, Edmund Spencer's epic poem ''[[The Faerie Queene]]'' refers to Ninus’ pride in Canto V, verse XLVIII:
:And after him old Ninus farre did pas
:In princely pompe, of all the world obayd
:There also was that mightie Monarch layd
:Low under all, yet above all in pride

In 1846 London, the Italian opera ''[[Nabucco]]'' by Giuseppe Verdi and Temistocle Solera was rewritten as ''Nino'' due to [[Lord Chamberlain's Office|British censorship]]; to avoid depicting Biblical scenes, the enslaved Hebrews under Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar were changed to enslaved Babylonians under Serbian Emperor Ninus.<ref>{{cite journal|first=Roberta Montemorra |last=Marvin|title=The Censorship of Verdi's Operas in Victorian London|journal=Music & Letters|volume=82|issue=4|pages=591–592|date=November 2001|doi=10.1093/ml/82.4.582 |jstor=3526278 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3526278|accessdate=2023-11-27|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

==Sources==
*{{Cite EB1911|wstitle=Ninus}}
*{{EB1911|wstitle=Ninus|volume=19|page=706}}
*[https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/2A*.html#1 Full account in Diodorus]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
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[[Category:Ancient Assyrians]]
[[Category:Hellenistic historiography]]
[[Category:Legendary monarchs]]
[[Category:Nimrod]]
[[Category:Mythological city founders]]
[[Category:Nineveh]]