Sennacherib was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from 705 BC to his death in 681 BC. He is one of the most famous Assyrian kings for his role in the Old Testament of the Bible, which describes his campaign in the Levant. The Levantine War of 701 BC broke out after several Assyrian vassals in the region rebelled, including the Kingdom of Judah under King Hezekiah. The Assyrians invaded Judea, and Hezekiah submitted. Sennacherib faced considerable difficulty in controlling Babylonia and destroyed the city of Babylon in 689 BC. He transferred the capital of Assyria to Nineveh, launching one of the most ambitious building projects in ancient history. He expanded the city and constructed great city walls, numerous temples and a royal garden. Sennacherib was murdered by his eldest son, who had been disinherited and hoped to seize power for himself. A younger son, Esarhaddon, raised an army, seized Nineveh, and installed himself as king as intended by Sennacherib.

Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sennacherib

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1899:

Philippine–American War: American forces defeated troops commanded by Philippine president Emilio Aguinaldo at the Battle of Marilao River. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marilao_River

1941:

World War II: Encouraged by the British Special Operations Executive, a group of pro-Western Serbian-nationalist officers of the Royal Yugoslav Army Air Force carried out a coup d'état after Yugoslavia joined the Axis powers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yugoslav_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat

1981:

The Solidarity movement in Poland staged a warning strike, the largest in the history of the Eastern Bloc, in which at least 12 million Poles walked off their jobs for four hours. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1981_warning_strike_in_Poland

2002:

A suicide bomber killed about 30 Israeli civilians and injured about 140 others at the Park Hotel in Netanya, triggering Operation Defensive Shield, a large-scale counter-terrorist military incursion into the West Bank, two days later. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passover_massacre

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

wagon: 1. A four-wheeled cart for hauling loads. 2. A four-wheeled child's riding toy, pulled or steered by a long handle attached to the front. 3. An enclosed vehicle for carrying goods or people; (by extension) a lorry, a truck. 4. An enclosed vehicle used as a movable dwelling; a caravan. 5. Short for dinner wagon (“set of light shelves mounted on castors so that it can be pushed around a dining room and used for serving”). 6. (slang) Short for paddy wagon (“police van for transporting prisoners”). 7. (rail transport) A freight car on a railway. 8. (chiefly Australia, US, slang) Short for station wagon (“type of car in which the roof extends rearward to produce an enclosed area in the position of and serving the function of the boot (trunk)”); (by extension) a sport utility vehicle (SUV); any car. 9. (Ireland, slang, derogatory, dated) A woman of loose morals, a promiscuous woman, a slapper; (by extension) a woman regarded as obnoxious; a bitch, a cow. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wagon

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

A modern theory of knowledge which takes account of the relational as distinct from the merely relative character of all historical knowledge must start with the assumption that there are spheres of thought in which it is impossible to conceive of absolute truth existing independently of the values and position of the subject and unrelated to the social context. Even a god could not formulate a proposition on historical subjects like 2 x 2 = 4, for what is intelligible in history can be formulated only with reference to problems and conceptual constructions which themselves arise in the flux of historical experience.   --Karl Mannheim https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Karl_Mannheim