Taharqa: The Kushite Pharaoh Who Faced the Assyrian Empire

Taharqa was a king of Kush and pharaoh of Egypt who reigned from 690 to 664 BC, the most powerful ruler of the 25th Dynasty, sometimes called the dynasty of the “Black Pharaohs”. He presided over a period of great building and prosperity along the Nile, from the Delta to the region of modern Sudan. His reign is also remembered for his long struggle against the Assyrian Empire, which invaded Egypt and finally ended Kushite rule there. He appears in the Bible as Tirhakah, king of Kush.

Background: Kush on the throne of Egypt

The kings of Kush, ruling from Napata near the holy mountain of Jebel Barkal, had taken control of Egypt in the late 8th century BC. Taharqa’s father Piye defeated the Egyptian princes in about 727 BC (see Piye’s Conquest of Egypt), and his successors Shabaka and Shebitku ruled Egypt directly.

The 25th Dynasty presented itself as restoring the old order of the pharaohs. Its kings honoured Amun, revived the art styles of the Old and Middle Kingdoms, and ruled through Egyptian officials and priests, especially at Thebes.

Rise to power

According to inscriptions at Kawa in Nubia, Taharqa came north to Egypt as a young man of about twenty, summoned by King Shebitku together with other royal “brothers”. He became king in 690 BC after Shebitku’s death and was crowned at Memphis.

The same Kawa texts tell how his mother, Abar, travelled from Nubia to see him crowned, a scene the inscription compares to Isis seeing her son Horus on the throne. Taharqa’s family ties linked him to both the royal house of Kush and the religious leadership of Thebes.

A reign of building and plenty

In the sixth year of his reign, around 685 BC, a great Nile flood brought exceptional harvests. Taharqa recorded it on stelae set up in several temples, describing how the river rose high enough to cover the land without destroying it, and how rats and snakes were kept away from the fields.

Taharqa was one of the great builders of the period. At Karnak he raised a monumental colonnade of ten columns in the first court; one column, about 21 metres high, still stands. He added structures at the sacred lake, at Medinet Habu and at other Theban temples.

In Nubia he built or rebuilt large temples at Jebel Barkal, Sanam and Kawa. At Kawa he restored the temple of Amun, bringing craftsmen and architects from Memphis. A small shrine from this temple was dismantled in the 1930s and rebuilt in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.

Ruling a double kingdom

Taharqa governed a state that stretched more than 2,000 kilometres along the Nile, from the Mediterranean coast to the region of the Fourth Cataract and beyond. He spent much of his time at Memphis, the traditional royal city of Egypt, while Napata remained the religious and dynastic heart of Kush.

At Thebes, real power lay with a network of priests and officials. The God’s Wife of Amun, a royal princess who served as the god’s earthly consort, held great wealth and authority. Under Taharqa this office was held by Shepenupet II, a daughter of Piye, with Taharqa’s own daughter Amenirdis II adopted as her successor. Powerful officials such as Montuemhat, Fourth Prophet of Amun and mayor of Thebes, managed the region’s affairs and survived the political upheavals of the period.

Kushite rule also encouraged a revival of old traditions. Artists studied monuments of the Old and Middle Kingdoms and copied their styles, while scribes copied ancient religious texts. Statues of Taharqa show a distinctive Kushite royal image, with a close-fitting cap crown and a double uraeus, the twin cobras that symbolised rule over both Egypt and Kush.

Taharqa and the Bible

The Hebrew Bible says that when the Assyrian king Sennacherib invaded Judah in 701 BC, he heard that “Tirhakah king of Ethiopia” was marching against him (2 Kings 19:9; Isaiah 37:9). In the Bible, “Ethiopia” translates the Hebrew name Kush.

Because Taharqa only became king in 690 BC, the reference has puzzled historians. Many think he led an Egyptian and Kushite army as a prince in 701 BC, perhaps at the Battle of Eltekeh, and that the biblical writers used the royal title by which he later became famous. Others see the passage as a later combination of events.

Wars with Assyria

Assyria, the strongest empire of the time, was expanding along the Levant and saw Egypt as a supporter of rebels in Phoenicia and Judah. Taharqa encouraged opposition to Assyria among the cities of the eastern Mediterranean.

The Babylonian Chronicle records that an Assyrian army was defeated in Egypt in about 674 BC, a rare setback for Assyria. In 671 BC, however, King Esarhaddon invaded again, won several battles, and took Memphis (see Esarhaddon’s Conquest of Egypt). Taharqa escaped south, wounded according to Assyrian accounts, but his queen and his son Ushanukhuru were captured and taken to Assyria. A stela of Esarhaddon found at Sam’al (Zincirli) in Turkey shows a kneeling prince, usually identified as Ushanukhuru, with a rope around his neck.

Taharqa soon recovered Memphis. Esarhaddon set out on a new campaign in 669 BC but died on the way. His son Ashurbanipal sent an army that defeated Taharqa around 667 BC and occupied Memphis and Thebes. Taharqa withdrew to Nubia, while several Delta princes, among them Necho I of Sais, were left as Assyrian vassals.

Death and succession

Taharqa died in 664 BC. He was succeeded by Tantamani, a son of Shabaka or Shebitku, who led a brief reconquest of Egypt. Ashurbanipal responded by invading again and sacking Thebes in 663 BC. Kushite rule in Egypt ended, and the Saite king Psamtik I, Necho’s son, gradually reunited the country under the 26th Dynasty.

Taharqa was buried at Nuri, near Napata, in the largest of the Kushite royal pyramids. He was the first king to be buried there rather than at the older cemetery of el-Kurru, and the site became the main royal necropolis for the next three centuries (see Nuri Pyramids).

Key people

• Taharqa: king of Kush and Egypt, 690-664 BC.
• Shebitku: his predecessor, who summoned him north.
• Esarhaddon: king of Assyria, 681-669 BC, conqueror of Memphis.
• Ashurbanipal: king of Assyria from 669 BC, who drove Taharqa from Egypt.
• Tantamani: Taharqa’s successor and the last Kushite king to rule in Egypt.

Timeline

• 701 BC: Sennacherib’s campaign in Judah; the Bible mentions Tirhakah leading an army.
• 690 BC: Taharqa becomes king and is crowned at Memphis.
• c. 685 BC: High Nile flood of regnal year 6 is recorded on stelae.
• c. 674 BC: An Assyrian invasion of Egypt is repulsed.
• 671 BC: Esarhaddon takes Memphis; Taharqa’s family is captured.
• 669 BC: Esarhaddon dies on a new campaign against Egypt.
• c. 667 BC: Ashurbanipal’s army defeats Taharqa, who withdraws to Nubia.
• 664 BC: Death of Taharqa; burial at Nuri.
• 663 BC: Assyrians sack Thebes after Tantamani’s brief reconquest.

Why it matters

Taharqa ruled one of the largest states in Africa’s history and left monuments from the Delta to the Fourth Cataract. His wars with Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal show Egypt and Kush at the centre of the great-power politics of the Near East, and his reign marks both the height and the end of Kushite rule over Egypt.