Ammon (Ammonite: 𐤏𐤌𐤍 ʻAmān; ; ) was an ancient Semitic-speaking nation occupying the east of the Jordan River, between the torrent valleys of Arnon and Jabbok, in present-day Jordan. The chief city of the country was Rabbah or Rabbat Ammon, site of the modern city of Amman, Jordan's capital. Milcom and Molech are named in the Hebrew Bible as the gods of Ammon. The people of this kingdom are called "Children of Ammon" or "Ammonites". History The Ammonites occupied the northern Central Trans-Jordanian Plateau from the latter part of the second millennium BCE to at least the second century CE. Ammon maintained its independence from the Neo-Assyrian Empire (10th to 7th centuries BCE) by paying tribute to the Assyrian kings at a time when that Empire raided or conquered nearby kingdoms. The Kurkh Monolith lists the Ammonite king Baasha ben Ruhubi's army as fighting alongside Ahab of Israel and Syrian allies against Shalmaneser III at the Battle of Qarqar in 853 BCE, possibly as vassals of Hadadezer, the Aramaean king of Damascus. In 734 BCE the Ammonite king Sanipu was a vassal of Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria, and Sanipu's successor Pudu-ilu held the same position under Sennacherib () and Esarhaddon (). An Assyrian tribute-list exists from this period, showing that Ammon paid one-fifth as much tribute as Judah did. Somewhat later, the Ammonite king Amminadab I () was among the tributaries who suffered in the course of the great Arabian campaign of Assurbanipal. Other kings attested to in contemporary sources are Barachel (attested to in several contemporary seals) and Hissalel - Hissalel reigned about 620 BCE, and is mentioned in an inscription on a bronze bottle found at Tel Siran in present-day Amman, along with his son, King Amminadab II, who reigned around 600 BCE. Archaeology and history indicate that Ammon flourished during the period of the Neo-Babylonian Empire (626 to 539 BCE). This contradicts the view, dominant for decades, that Transjordan was either destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar II, or suffered a rapid decline following Judah's destruction by that king. Newer evidence suggests that Ammon enjoyed continuity from the Neo-Babylonian to the Persian period of 550 to 330 BCE. In accounts in the First Book of Maccabees, the Ammonites and their neighboring tribes are noted for having resisted the revival of Jewish power under Judas Maccabaeus in the period 167 to 160 BCE. The dynast Hyrcanus founded Qasr Al Abd, and