In Manasseh’s time, Assyria reached the height of its power – the mastery over the entire Fertile Crescent with its conquest of Egypt in

663. This unprecedented triumph was followed by an equally astonishing decline. After the death in 627 of Assyria’s last great king, Ashurbanipal, Egypt almost immediately regained sovereignty, the Babylonians and Medes rebelled and the Judeans under Josiah reasserted their religious independence and waited for Assyria’s deaththroes.