The placard accompanying this relief explains that is is one of the first replicas cast (pre-1940) at the British Museum where the original is. It depicts Assyrian King Sargon II...famous for conquering the Kingdom of Israel.
Wikipedia (
visit link) adds:
"Sargon II ... reigned 722 – 705 BC) was an Assyrian king. Sargon II became the ruler of the Assyrian Empire in 722 BC after the death of Shalmaneser V. It is not clear whether he was the son of Tiglath-Pileser III or a usurper unrelated to the royal family. In his inscriptions, he styles himself as a new man, rarely referring to his predecessors; however he took the name Sharru-kinu ("true king"), after Sargon of Akkad — who had founded the first Semitic Empire in the region some 16 centuries earlier. Sargon is the Biblical form of the name...
Conquest of Israel
Under his rule, the Assyrians completed the defeat of the Kingdom of Israel, capturing Samaria after a siege of three years and exiling the inhabitants. This became the basis of the legends of the Lost Ten Tribes. According to the Bible, other people were brought to Samaria, the Samaritans, under his predecessor Shalmaneser V (2 Kings 18). Sargon's name actually appears in the Bible only once, at Isaiah 20:1, which records the Assyrian capture of Ashdod in 711 BC."
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