SUSA

SUSA — Elam (v.). The very ancient Šūfan (“lily” or “whiteness”), situated at the southern foot of the mountain range of present-day Luristán, has been known since the time of the Second Dynasty of Ur. Toward the end of the Third Dynasty of Ur (21st cent. B.C.) it already had several kings. It became the capital of the glorious Elamite Empire (cf. Gen. 10:22; 14:1) and later of the Neo-Elamite Kingdom.

The Assyrian Assurbanipal sacked S. (640–639 B.C.), burned the sacred groves, invaded and destroyed the sanctuaries and the great ziggurat with its glazed tiles, carried away approximately 32 golden and silver statues of deities and kings, violated their tombs, and scattered their bones. Among the Samaritans who wrote to Artaxerxes against the Jews, there were also deportees from S. (Eid. 4:9), probably deported by Assurbanipal (the Aramaic Asnappar), who dispersed the inhabitants of S. and of all Elam throughout his Empire and sent various colonists to S.

Under the Persians, S. returned to its former splendor. Darius I settled there, and his successors Persepolis (v.), the summer at Ecbatana, and the winter at S. Darius I (around 500) began the construction of the magnificent Royal Palace (more than 100 stairways) (cf. Esth. 1:5); he lived there during his last three years and died there in 486. In the time of Artaxerxes I (445–42), a great fire damaged the Apadana, a large hall supported by numerous columns that served for government assemblies (cf. ibid. 1:3); it was restored by Artaxerxes II (404–359), who made many alterations elsewhere. The events of the Book of Esther take place at S.

The excavations, following the discovery by L. Loftus in 1851 (v. BIBLICA) near the present-day village of Sūš, were begun by M. Dieulafoy (1884–1886) and subsequently continued by J. Morgan (1889) and by the “Mission archéologique en Perse,” initially directed by Morgan himself. The ruins as a whole consist of four hills or tells. The city of the artisans, or lower city, a kind of suburb, is of little interest; it lies northeast of the other three tells. These form a very compact group, surrounded by walls: this is the city proper. Within it there are two clearly distinct parts: to the left of the river (the ancient Choaspes, the modern Kerkha), the acropolis or citadel, occupied by the royal palace; to the right (east), the immense tell of the city inhabited by the people. Esth. 3:15; 9:6, 11, etc., distinguishes the two parts by different names: in Hebrew, respectively, bīrāh (Aramaic “fortress,” and, by extension, “acropolis”) and 'fr. In the citadel (Neh. 1:1), Nehemiah received from one of his pa-

(Fotocotere, Turin)