Urtak or Urtaku was a king of the ancient kingdom of
Elam,
which was to the southeast of ancient Babylonia. He ruled from 675 to 664 BCE, his reign overlapping those of the Assyrian kings
Esarhaddon
Esarhaddon, also spelled Essarhaddon, Assarhaddon and Ashurhaddon ( Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , also , meaning " Ashur has given me a brother"; Biblical Hebrew: ''ʾĒsar-Ḥaddōn'') was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from the death of hi ...
(681-669) and
Ashurbanipal (668-627).
Urtak was preceded by his brother, Khumban-Khaldash II.
Khumban-Khaldash made a successful raid against Assyria, and died a short time thereafter.
He was succeeded by Urtak, who returned to Assyria the idols his elder brother had taken in the raid, and who thereby repaired relations between Elam and Assyria.
He made an alliance with Assyria's Esarhaddon in 674,
and for a time Elam and Assyria enjoyed friendly relations,
which lasted throughout the remainder of Esarhaddon's reign, and deteriorated after Esarhaddon was succeeded by Ashurbanipal.
During a famine in Elam, Ashurbanipal welcomed temporary refugees from Elam into his empire, and sent food aid to Elam itself.
However, after a time Urtak, joining his forces with the
Gambulu The Gambulu, Gambulai, or Gambuli were a tribe of Arameans in ancient Babylonia. They were the most powerful tribe along the eastern border of Babylonia, or in the south toward the border with Elam. It is difficult to pinpoint their exact locatio ...
tribe of Arameans,
attacked Babylonia around 665 BCE, and died shortly afterward.
Urtak was succeeded by his brother
Teumman
Teumman was a king of the ancient kingdom of Elam, ruling it from 664 to 653 BCE, contemporary with the Assyrian king Ashurbanipal (668 – c. 627). In various sources, the name may be found spelled as Te’umman, Teumann, or Te-Umman. For a time, ...
, who was killed by Ashurbanipal shortly afterward.
See also
*
List of rulers of Elam
The kings of Elam were the rulers of Elam, an ancient civilization in modern-day south-western Iran. The earliest known Elamite dynasty was the Awan dynasty, which came to power in the Early Dynastic period. Elam was conquered by the Akkadian E ...
References
Elamite people
7th-century BC deaths
7th-century BC rulers
Year of birth unknown
Military history of the ancient Near East
Elamite kings
Kings of the Neo-Elamite Period
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