The second campaign was partly in the same region and with the same people.  The Moschians, who were still loth to pay tribute, were again attacked and reduced.  Commagene was completely overrun, and the territory was attached to the Assyrian empire.  The neighboring tribes were assailed in their fastnesses, their cities burnt, and their territories ravaged.  At the same time war was made upon several other peoples or nations.  Among these the most remarkable are the Khatti (Hittites), two of whose tribes, the Kaskiaits and Urumians, had committed an aggression on the Assyrian territory:  for this they were chastised by an invasion which they did not venture to resist, by the plundering of their valuables, and the carrying off of 120 of their chariots.  In another direction the Lower Zab was crossed, and the Assyrian arms were carried into the mountain region of Zagros, where certain strongholds were reduced and a good deal of treasure taken.

The third campaign was against the numerous tribes of the Nairi, who seem to have dwelt at this time partly to the east of the Euphrates, but partly also in the mountain country west of the stream from Smmeisat to the Gulf of Iskenderun.  These tribes, it is said, had never previously made their submission to the Assyrians.  They were governed by a number of petty chiefs or “kings,” of whom no fewer than twenty-three are particularized.  The tribes east of the Euphrates seem to have been reduced with little resistance, while those who dwelt west of the river, on the contrary, collected their troops together, gave battle to the invaders, and made a prolonged and desperate defence.  All, however, was in vain.  The Assyrian monarch gained a great victory, taking 120 chariots, and then pursued the vanquished Nairi and their allies as far as “the Upper Sea,”—­i.e., the Mediterranean.  The usual ravage and destruction followed, with the peculiarity that the lives of the “kings” were spared, and that the country was put to a moderate tribute, viz., 1200 horses and 200 head of cattle.

In the fourth campaign the Aramaeans or Syrians were attacked by the ambitious monarch.  They occupied at this time the valley of the Euphrates, from the borders of the Tsukhi, or Shuhites, who held the river from about Anah to Hit, as high up as Carchemish, the frontier town and chief stronghold of the Khatti or Hittites.  Carchemish was not, as has commonly been supposed, Circesium, at the junction of the Khabour with the Euphrates, but was considerably higher up the stream, certainly near to, perhaps on the very site of, the later city of Mabog or Hierapolis.  Thus the Aramaeans had a territory of no great width, but 230 miles long between its north-western and its south-eastern extremities.  Tiglath-Pileser smote this region, as he tells us, “at one blow.”  First attacking and plundering the eastern or left bank of the river, he then crossed the stream in boats covered with skins, took and burned six cities on the right bank, and returned in safety with an immense plunder.