In 717 B. C. Sargon II, laid the foundation of “Sargon’s fortress” Dur-Sharrukin, a site twenty-four kilometers to the northeast of Nineveh, near the modern village of Khorsabad.
The town was square in plan, each side measuring more than one and a half kilometers, and seven fortified gates pierced its wall.
In its northern part an inner wall enclosed the citadel, which contained the royal palace, a temple dedicated to ‘Nabu’ and the sumptuous houses oh high-ranking officials such as Sin-ah-usur, the Vizier and king’s brother.
The palace itself stood on a sixteen meter-high platform over looking the city wall and comprised were than two hundred rooms and thirty courtyards. Near by rose a Ziqqurat of which the seven storeys were painted with different color and connected by spiral ram .
A beautiful viaduct of stone linked the palace with the temple of ‘Nabu’ for in Assyria the religious and public functions of the king were closely interwoven.
The hole City was build in ten years, in one of Sargon’s inscriptions Sargon says:
For me, Sargon, who dwells in this palace, may he (Ashur) decree as my destiny large life, health of body, joy of heart, brightness of soul.
But unfortunately and sadly one year after Dur-Sharrukin was officially inaugurated Sargon ‘went against Tabal and was killed in the war’ (705 B. C.). His successors preferred Nineveh to the Mesopotamian Brazilia, but Khorsabad remained inhabited by governors and their retinue: until the final collapse of Assyria.