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The Battle of Opis, fought in September 539 BC, was the second and final engagement of the war between Cyrus the Great of Persia and Nabonidus of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. It followed an earlier battle on the Tigris said to have taken place some time in February 539 BC. The battle resulted in a decisive defeat for the Babylonians and led, a few weeks later, to Cyrus's unopposed entry into the city of Babylon and his proclamation as king of Babylonia.

According to the Babylonian Chronicles, the main surviving source of information on the battle,

"In the month Tashritu Cyrus did battle at Opis on the Tigris among the army of Akkad; the people of Akkad retreated. He carried off the plunder (and) slaughtered the people. On the fourteenth day Sippar was captured without battle. Nabonidus fled. On the sixteenth day Ug/Gubaru, governor of Gutium, and the army of Cyrus without a battle entered Babylon. Afterwards, after Nabonidus returned, he was captured in Babylon."

Although later propaganda such as the Cyrus cylinder inscription portrayed his conquest of Babylonia as essentially peaceful, the battle demonstrates that the existing Babylonian regime actively resisted the Persian invasion of Mesopotamia. It was perhaps a sign of the divisions in the regime - Nabonidus was reputedly highly unpopular among the Babylonian elite - that some Babylonian subjects appear to have welcomed the Persians. It is, however, unclear how widely the Persians were supported within Babylonia, as accounts of the invasion and Nabonidus's rule are coloured by Cyrus's subsequent propaganda.

The site of the battle was near the city of Opis on the river Tigris, located about 50 miles (80 km) from modern Baghdad. The city is thought to have been "the usual and the best place to cross the river", which presumably was shallower or narrower there than elsewhere. By taking Opis, Cyrus broke through the "Median Wall" defensive line north of Babylon and opened the road to the capital.

The Babylonian Chronicles report that the Persians carried out a massacre and large-scale looting following the battle, though historians are divided about whether the description in the Chronicles relates to a sacking of the city of Opis or whether it refers to the fate of the main camp of Nabonidus' broken army, assuming that the Persians captured it intact. The battle and massacre are pointedly omitted from the later Cyrus cylinder inscription, which portrays Cyrus as liberating Babylon peacefully and with the consent of its people. Simon J. Sherwin comments that the battle at Opis "gives the lie to the idea of Cyrus as a benign liberator" and suggests that the aim of the massacre was "to terrorize the population" to intimidate Sippar and Babylon into surrendering without resistance.

The account related in the Chronicles indicates that Cyrus then halted at Opis, sending his general Gubaru with an army to invest Babylon. The king did not travel to the capital until well after it had been secured, some three weeks after the battle. Sherwin draws attention to Cyrus's non-participation in the taking of Babylon, suggesting that it demonstrates that Cyrus "was not expecting an easy victory".

References

1. Amélie Kuhrt, "Cyrus the Great of Persia: Images and Realities", in Representations of Political Power: Case Histories from Times of Change and Dissolving Order in the Ancient Near East, eds. Marlies Heinz, Marian H. Feldman, p. 185. Eisenbrauns, 2007. ISBN 157506135X
2. Jane McIntosh, Ancient Mesopotamia, pp. 113-14. ABC-CLIO, 2005. ISBN 1576079651
3. Oppenheim, A.L. "The Babylonian Evidence of Achaemenian Rule in Mesopotamia", in The Cambridge History of Iran vol. 2, p. 539. Ilya Gershevitch (ed). Cambridge University Press, 1993. ISBN 0521200911
4. ^ T. Cutler Young, Jr., "The rise of the Persians to imperial power under Cyrus the Great", in The Cambridge Ancient History vol. 4, p. 39. John Boardman (ed). Cambridge University Press, 1982. ISBN 0521228042
5. William G. Lambert offers an alternative translation to the effect that Cyrus "defeated the soldiers ", rather than carrying out a massacre. "Notes Brèves 01 - In Support of Joachim Oeslner's Identification of LBAT 1500", Nouvelles Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires no. 1, 2007 (March)
6. ^ Amélie Kuhrt, ibid pp. 174-175.
7. ^ Simon J. Sherwin, "Old Testament monotheism and Zoroastrian influence", in The God of Israel: Studies of an Inimitable Deity, p. 123. Robert P. Gordon (ed). Cambridge University Press, 2007. ISBN 0521873657

• Battles of Cyrus the Great
• 539 BC
• 6th century BC conflicts
• Battles involving the Achaemenid Empire