Nebuchadnezzar II's Palace Inscriptions - Biblical Archaeology Encyclopedia

Overview

Nebuchadnezzar II left hundreds of building inscriptions - on cylinders, stone tablets and stamped bricks - but almost none report his wars. The largest is the East India House Inscription, a ten-column stone tablet found at Babylon before 1803, which recounts his work on the temples of Esagila and Ezida, the city walls and gates, and above all the rebuilding of the old palace and the building of new palaces 'between the walls' and to the north.

Langdon (1905) showed that the East India House text is an enlarged re-edition of an earlier palace cylinder known in two copies (British Museum 85-4-30,1 and Louvre AO 1506). The palace passages match what Koldewey excavated on the Kasr: a palace raised on a high platform next to his father Nabopolassar's, with thick walls of burnt brick in bitumen and lime mortar.

None of these texts mention Judah or Jerusalem. Barton (1917) noted this directly: 'His inscriptions give no account of these events.' Their biblical interest is the king's own boast of building Babylon, compared with Daniel 4:30. In 2025 two new Nebuchadnezzar cylinders from the ziggurat of Kish and a full edition of 527 administrative tablets from the Babylon palace archives were published.

In its own words

Upon the top of it a great abode for my royal dwelling place with mortar and burnt brick I made high. With the palace of my father I annexed it. In a favorable month, upon a lucky day, I placed its foundation upon the breast of the abyss. Its top I raised like a rocky cliff. In 15 days its work I completed.East India House Inscription col. VIII 59 - IX 1, trans. S. Langdon, Building Inscriptions of the Neo-Babylonian Empire I (1905), p. 139

What the evidence shows

EIH: ten columns, 624 lines, archaizing script; first published in London in 1803 (Langdon 1905).
EIH describes restoring Nabopolassar's old palace, whose foundations had been weakened by flood water and whose gates had sunk below the raised street (Langdon 1905, p. 135).
EIH describes a new palace built between the city walls, joined to his father's palace, 'In 15 days its work I completed' (Langdon 1905, p. 139).
EIH describes rebuilding the gates of Imgur-Bel and Nimitti-Bel with bulls and serpents and bronze bulls at their thresholds (Langdon 1905, p. 131) - the Ishtar Gate program.
Koldewey's excavation of the Kasr (1899-1917) found Nebuchadnezzar's palace on a raised platform, with lime mortar used in his latest buildings (Kasr, Principal Citadel, Babil) (Koldewey 1914, p. 31).
Barton's selection of Nebuchadnezzar texts (1917) contains a general claim of conquests 'from the upper sea to the lower sea', the Wadi Brisa (Lebanon) text, and a wall-building text; none mentions Judah (Barton 1917, pp. 379-380).
Pedersén (2025) publishes 527 administrative texts from the South Palace archives of Nebuchadnezzar's reign; its abstract states the largest single oil allotment went to 'the biblical king Jehoiachin'.

Open questions

Why no Judah? The royal building inscriptions describe buildings and piety; Nebuchadnezzar's 597 BCE capture of Jerusalem is known instead from a separate genre of text, the Babylonian chronicles. Barton (1917, p. 380) states that his inscriptions 'give no account of these events'. Whether this silence reflects genre or choice is a reading, not something the texts say.
Which copy is the 'real' text? Langdon (1905) argued the Louvre cylinder (AO 1506, his 'B') is the earlier original and the British Museum cylinder ('A') a later, Marduk-focused copy, with EIH an enlargement of B. That textual history is Langdon's reconstruction from comparing wording (e.g. 'their lordship' vs 'his lordship'); later editions have not been checked against it for this entry.
The '15 days' claim for the new palace is the text's own figure; nothing in the excavation report tests it.

Since 2024

2025Pedersén publishes the full South Palace administrative archive of Nebuchadnezzar II (527 texts, excavated 1902-1903), including the Jehoiachin oil lists. [4]
2025-12Two identical clay cylinders of Nebuchadnezzar II recording his restoration of the ziggurat of Kish published (Iraq Museum IM.227410, IM.227488); a new building inscription, though for Kish, not his Babylon palace. [5]

Sources

S. Langdon, Building Inscriptions of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, Part I: Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1905), Nebuchadnezzar No. 15 (East India House Inscription) link translation
R. Koldewey, The Excavations at Babylon, trans. A. S. Johns (London: Macmillan, 1914) link excavation report
G. A. Barton, Archaeology and the Bible (Philadelphia: American Sunday-School Union, 1916; 2nd ed. 1917), Part II, '16. Nebuchadrezzar II', pp. 379-381 (Project Gutenberg eBook 43070) link translation
O. Pedersén, The South Palace Archives in Babylon: Administrative Records in the Palace of Nebuchadnezzar II (Abhandlungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft; Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2025). DOI 10.13173/9783447124140 link editio princeps
A. A. Jawad & H. F. Al-Ammari, 'Two Inscribed Cylinders of Nebuchadnezzar II from the Ziggurat of Kish,' Iraq 87 (2025): 7-17. DOI 10.1017/irq.2025.10023 link editio princeps

Corrected from the earlier edition of this page

Old entry: the inscriptions 'provide a detailed account of ... the construction of the famed Ishtar Gate and the reconstruction of the Etemenanki ziggurat'. The EIH does describe the walls' gates with bulls and serpents; Etemenanki appears in the related palace cylinder (Langdon's No. 14 lists work on Etemenanki), not in the palace passages quoted here.
Old entry: the discovery 'provides concrete evidence that validates the accounts found in the biblical text' about Daniel 4. The texts show the king boasting of building Babylon; they say nothing of the dream, madness or restoration in Daniel 4.
Old entry: 'Discovery: 19th-20th centuries'. The EIH was found before 1803 and published in London in 1803; the palace was excavated 1899-1917.
Old entry: 'Date: c. 580 BCE' as a single date. The inscriptions span the reign (604-562 BCE); the EIH belongs to the later palace-building phase.
Old biblical list 'Ezra 1 (Return from exile)' has no link to Nebuchadnezzar's building texts; removed.
Old 'Housed in ... the British Museum and the Louvre' is supported (EIH and a cylinder in the BM; cylinder AO 1506 in the Louvre, per Langdon 1905); kept, with numbers.

Checked against new publications through 2026-09.