Ancient Mesopotamia
Euphrates • Tigris
Cities / Empires
Sumer: Eridu • Kish • Uruk • Ur • Lagash • Nippur • Ngirsu
Elam: Susa
Akkadian Empire: Akkad • Mari
Amorites: Isin • Larsa
Babylonia: Babylon • Chaldea
Hittites • Kassites • Hurrians/Mitanni
Assyria: Assur • Nimrud • Dur-Sharrukin • Nineveh
Chronology
History of Mesopotamia
History of Sumer • Kings of Sumer
Kings of Assyria
Kings of Babylon
Mythology
Enûma Elish • Gilgamesh
Assyro-Babylonian religion
Language
Sumerian • Elamite
Akkadian • Aramaic
Hurrian • Hittite

Nineveh (Akkadian: Ninua; Aramaic: ܢܝܢܘܐ; Hebrew: נינוה, Nīnewē), an "exceeding great city", as it is called in the Book of Jonah, lay on the eastern bank of the Tigris in ancient Assyria, near the modern-day major city of Mosul, Iraq which lies across the river. Mesopotamia (from the Greek meaning "land between the rivers" is an area geographically located between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers largely corresponding The Euphrates ( ( Arabic: ar نهر الفرات; Turkish: tr Fırat Syriac: syr ܦܪܬ; Hebrew: he פרת The Tigris is the eastern member of the two great Rivers that define Mesopotamia, along with the Euphrates, which flows from the mountains of southeastern Sumer ( Sumerian: sux-Latn [[Ki (earth ki]]-[[EN (cuneiform en]]-'''ĝir15''', Akkadian: Šumeru; possibly Biblical Shinar Eridu (URUNUNKI; Sumerian:eridug Akkadian: ?) from the Sumerian for 'mighty place' is modern Tell Abu Shahrain, Iraq Uruk ( URU UNUG, Sumerian: unug Akkadian: uruk) from the Akkadian rendering of the Sumerian Toponym 'unug' is modern Ur ( Sumerian:urim; Akkadian: ?) is modern Tell el-Mukayyar, Iraq, and was a city in ancient Sumer. Lagash ( is modern Tell al-Hiba, Iraq. Located northwest of the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and east of Uruk Nippur (URUENLIL; Sumerian: Nibru Akkadian: Nibbur) from the Sumerian for 'lord wind' (Enlil is modern ? in Afak Al Qadisyah Ngirsu (cuneiform? Sumerian:Ĝirsu Akkadian: ?) is modern Tell Telloh, Dhi Qar Governorate, Iraq, and it was a city of Elam is the name of an ancient civilization located in what is now southwest Iran. Susa ( Biblical שושן ( Shushan) also Greek: Σοῦσα Transliterated as Sousa; Latin Susa) Mari (modern Tell Hariri, Syria) was an ancient Sumerian and Amorite city located 11 kilometers north-west of the modern town of Amorite ( Sumerian MARTU, Akkadian Tidnum or Amurrūm, Egyptian Amar, Hebrew ’emōrî Isin (modern Ishan al-Bahriyat was a city of lower Mesopotamia, which flourished during the 20th century BC. Larsa (also Larag or Larak, modern Tell as-Senkereh, Iraq, possibly the Biblical Ellasar) was an important city of Babylonia was an Amorite state in lower Mesopotamia (modern southern Iraq) with Babylon as its capital Babylon was a City-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which can be found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq Chaldea (from Greek grc Χαλδαία Chaldaia; Akkadian akk māt Kaldu Hebrew כשדים Kaśdim, "the Chaldees" of the The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a language of the Anatolian branch of the Indo-European language family and established The Kassites were an Ancient Near Eastern tribe who gained control of Babylonia after the fall of the Old Babylonian Empire after ca The Hurrians (also Khurrites; cuneiform Ḫu-ur-ri 𒄷𒌨𒊑 were a people of the Ancient Near East, who lived in northern Mesopotamia Mitanni ( Hittite cuneiform, also Mittani) or Hanigalbat ( Assyrian Hanigalbat Khanigalbat cuneiform) Early history The most Neolithic site in Assyria is at Tell Hassuna, the center of the Hassuna culture Assur also spelled Ashur, from Assyrian Aššur, was one of the capitals of ancient Assyria. Nimrud is an ancient Assyrian city located south of Nineveh on the river Tigris. Dur-Sharrukin ("Fortress of Sargon" present day Khorsabad, was the Assyrian capital in the time of Sargon II of Assyria. See Short chronology for a timeline in absolute dates The Chronology of the Ancient Near East is a framework of dates for Ancient Mesopotamia was settled and conquered by numerous ancient Civilizations. The history of Sumer, taken to include the prehistoric Ubaid and Uruk periods spans the 5th to 3rd millennia BC ending with the downfall of the Third The Sumerian king list is an ancient text in the Sumerian language that lists kings of Sumer from Sumerian and foreign dynasties The following is a list of the kings of Babylonia, a major city and empire in ancient lower Mesopotamia, compiled from the traditional Babylonian king lists and modern Mesopotamian mythology is the collective name given to Sumerian Akkadian Assyrian and Babylonian mythologies from the land between the Tigris The akk Enûma Eliš is the Babylonian Creation myth (named for its Incipit) Gilgamesh was the son of Lugalbanda and the fifth king of Uruk (Early Dynastic II first dynasty of Uruk ruling circa 2600 BC according to the Sumerian king The pre- Christian religions of Babylonia and Assyria are the earliest attestation of Ancient Semitic religion, in particular Mesopotamian mythology Assyriology (from Greek grc Ἀσσυρίᾱ Assyriā; and grc -λογία -logia) is the archaeological historical and linguistic study Sumerian ( " native tongue " was the language of ancient Sumer, spoken in Southern Mesopotamia since at least the 4th millennium BC Elamite is an Extinct language, which was spoken by the ancient Elamites. Aramaic is a Semitic language with Hurrian is a conventional name for the language of the Hurrians (Khurrites a people who entered northern Mesopotamia around 2300 BC and had mostly Hittite or Nesili is the Extinct language once spoken by the Hittites, a people who created an empire centered on ancient Hattusas (modern Aramaic is a Semitic language with In the Hebrew Bible, the Book of Jonah is the fifth book in a series of books called the Minor Prophets The Tigris is the eastern member of the two great Rivers that define Mesopotamia, along with the Euphrates, which flows from the mountains of southeastern Early history The most Neolithic site in Assyria is at Tell Hassuna, the center of the Hassuna culture For the village in Azerbaijan see Mosul Azerbaijan. Mosul (الموصل Al Mūṣul, Kurdish: Mosul/Ninawa, Musul For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Iraq topics.

Contents 1 Geography 2 History 3 Biblical Nineveh 4 Nineveh in classical history 5 Archaeology 5.1 City wall and gates 5.2 Kuyunjik 6 Rogation of the Ninevites (Nineveh's Wish) 7 Modern Nineveh 8 References 9 External links

Geography

Ancient Nineveh's mound-ruins (36°22'N 43°09'E), Kouyunjik and Nabī Yūnus are located on a level part of the plain near the junction of the Tigris and the Khosr Rivers within an 1800-acre (730 ha) area circumscribed by a 12 km (7. The Khosr River was a tributary of the Tigris River which ran directly through the centre of the the ancient city of Nineveh in Northern Mesopotamia 5 mile) brick rampart. This whole extensive space is now one immense area of ruins overlaid in parts by new suburbs of the city of Mosul.

Nineveh was an important junction for commercial routes crossing the Tigris. Occupying a central position on the great highway between the Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean, thus uniting the East and the West, wealth flowed into it from many sources, so that it became one of the greatest of all the region's ancient cities. The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's Oceanic divisions covering about 20% of the water on the Earth 's surface ^[1]

History

Texts from the Hellenistic period and later offered an eponymous Ninus as the founder of Nineveh. This article focuses on the cultural aspects of the Hellenistic age for the historical aspects see Hellenistic period. Ninus, in texts arising in Hellenistic period and later was accepted as the eponymous founder of Nineveh, and thus the city itself personified although he does not The historic Nineveh is mentioned about 1800 BC as a worship place of Ishtar, who was responsible for the city's early importance. The 18th century BC was the Century which lasted from 1800 BC to 1701 BC Ishtar ( D IŠTAR 𒀭𒌋𒁯 is the Assyrian and Babylonian counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna and to The goddess´ cult statue was sent to Pharaoh Amenhotep III of Egypt in the 14th century BC, by orders of the king of Mitanni. Amenhotep III (sometimes read as Amenophis III meaning Amun is Satisfied was the ninth Pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty. Mitanni ( Hittite cuneiform, also Mittani) or Hanigalbat ( Assyrian Hanigalbat Khanigalbat cuneiform) The city of Nineveh was one of Mitanni's vassals until the mid 14th century BC, when the Assyrian kings of Assur seized it. Assur also spelled Ashur, from Assyrian Aššur, was one of the capitals of ancient Assyria. ^[2]

There is no large body of evidence to show that Assyrian monarchs built at all extensively in Nineveh during the 2nd millennium BC. Later monarchs whose inscriptions have appeared on the high city include Shalmaneser I and Tiglath-Pileser I, both of whom were active builders in Assur; the former had founded Calah (Nimrud). Shalmaneser I ( Shulmanu-asharidu) king of Assyria. (1274 BC – 1245 BC or 1265 BC - 1235 BC Son of Adad-nirari I, he succeeded his father as King Tiglath-Pileser I (from the Hebraic form of Akkadian: Tukultī-apil-Ešarra, "my trust is in the son of Esharra " was a king Nimrud is an ancient Assyrian city located south of Nineveh on the river Tigris. Nineveh had to wait for the neo-Assyrian kings, particularly from the time of Ashurnasirpal II (ruled 883-859 BC) onward, for a considerable architectural expansion. Ashur-nasir-pal II ( Transliteration: Aššur-nâṣir-apli, meaning " Ashur is guardian of the heir" was king of Assyria from 884 BC-859 Thereafter successive monarchs kept in repair and founded new palaces, temples to Sîn, Nergal, Šamaš, Ishtar, and Nabiu of Borsippa. Sin (Akkadian Sîn, Suen; Sumerian Nanna) is a Sumerian God in Mesopotamian mythology. The name Nergal (or Nirgal, Nirgali) refers to a Deity in Babylonia with the main seat For the Canaanite sun godess see Shemesh Shamash was the common Akkadian name of the Sun-god and god of justice in Babylonia Ishtar ( D IŠTAR 𒀭𒌋𒁯 is the Assyrian and Babylonian counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna and to Nabu is the Babylonian god of Wisdom and Writing, worshipped by Babylonians as the son of Marduk and his consort Sarpanitum, Borsippa (modern Birs Nimrud site Iraq) was an important ancient city of Sumer, built on both sides of a lake about 17

It was Sennacherib who made Nineveh a truly magnificent city (c. The Pergamon Museum ( German: Pergamonmuseum) is among the museums on Museum Island in Berlin. Sennacherib ( Akkadian Sîn-ahhe-eriba "(moon god Sîn has replaced (lost brothers for me" was the son of Sargon II, whom he 700 BC). He laid out new streets and squares and built within it the famous "palace without a rival", the plan of which has been mostly recovered and has overall dimensions of about 210 by 200 m (630 by 600 ft). It comprised at least 80 rooms, many of which were lined with sculpture. A large number of tablets were found in the palace. Some of the principal doorways were flanked by human-headed bulls. At this time the total area of Nineveh comprised about 1,800 acres (7 km²), and fifteen great gates penetrated its walls. An elaborate system of eighteen canals brought water from the hills to Nineveh, and several sections of a magnificently constructed aqueduct erected by Sennacherib were discovered at Jerwan, about 40 km (25 miles) distant. The enclosed area had more than 100,000 inhabitants (maybe closer to 150,000), about twice as many as Babylon at the time, placing it among the largest settlements worldwide. Babylon was a City-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which can be found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq ^[3]

Nineveh's greatness was short-lived. About 633 BC the Assyrian empire began to show signs of weakness, and Nineveh was attacked by the Medes, who about 625 BC, joined by the Babylonians and Susianians, again attacked it. Events and trends 636 BC — Duke Wen of Jin ascends to power in the State of Jin during the Zhou Dynasty of China. Early history The most Neolithic site in Assyria is at Tell Hassuna, the center of the Hassuna culture The Medes were an ancient Iranian people who lived in the northwestern portions of present-day Iran. Events and trends 628 BC — King Josiah of Judah dies in the Battle of Megiddo against Pharaoh Necho II of Babylonia was an Amorite state in lower Mesopotamia (modern southern Iraq) with Babylon as its capital Elam is the name of an ancient civilization located in what is now southwest Iran. Nineveh fell in 612 BC, and was razed to the ground. Events and trends 619 BC — Alyattes becomes king of Lydia. 619 BC — Death of Zhou xiang wang, King of the Zhou The people in the city who could not escape to the last Assyrian strongholds in the west, were either massacred or deported. Many unburied skeletons were found by the archaeologists at the site. The Assyrian empire then came to an end, the Medes and Babylonians dividing its provinces between them.

Following the defeat in 612 BC, the site remained unoccupied for centuries until the Sassanian period. The city is mentioned again in the Battle of Nineveh in 627 AD, which was fought between the Eastern Roman Empire and the Sassanian Empire of Persia near the ancient city. The Battle of Nineveh was the climactic battle of the last of the Roman-Persian Wars between the Byzantine Empire and the Sassanid Empire, in 627 The Sassanid Empire or Sassanian Dynasty or Sassanian Dynasty (ساسانیان) is the name used for the third Iranian dynasty and the second Persian empire The Persian Empire was a series of Iranian empires that ruled over the Iranian plateau, the original Persian homeland and beyond in Western Asia From the Arab conquest 637 AD until modern time the city of Mosul on the opposite bank of the river Tigris became the successor of ancient Nineveh. For the village in Azerbaijan see Mosul Azerbaijan. Mosul (الموصل Al Mūṣul, Kurdish: Mosul/Ninawa, Musul

Biblical Nineveh

In the Bible, Nineveh is first mentioned in Genesis 10:11: "Ashur left that land, and built Nineveh. Etymology According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word bible is from Latin biblia, traced from the same word through Medieval Latin and Late Latin Ashur (אַשּׁוּר often also transliterated as Asshur to reflect the pointing of Hebrew letter 'ש' ( Shin) in the Masoretic text which doubles the 'ש' was the " Some modern translations interpret "Ashur" in the Hebrew of this verse as the country "Assyria" rather than a person, thus making Nimrod the builder of Nineveh. Nimrod ( was a Mesopotamian Monarch mentioned in the Jewish Tanakh, and who figures in many legends and folktales

Though the Books of Kings and Books of Chronicles talk a great deal about the Assyrian empire, Nineveh itself is not again noticed till the days of Jonah, when it is described (Jonah 3:3ff; 4:11) as an "exceeding great city of three days' journey", i. The Books of Kings ( Sefer Melachim, ספר מלכים are a part of Judaism 's Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible. The Books of Chronicles ( Hebrew Divrei Hayyamim, דברי הימים Greek Paraleipomêna) are part of the Hebrew Bible (Jewish According to the Hebrew Bible ( Tanakh / Old Testament) and Qur'an, Jonah (; Arabic: يونس, Yunus or e. , probably in circuit. This would give a circumference of about 100 km (60 miles). It is also possible that it took three days to cover all its neighborhoods by walking, which would match the size of ancient Nineveh. At the four corners of an irregular quadrangle are the ruins of Kouyunjik, Nimrud, Karamles and Khorsabad. Nimrud is an ancient Assyrian city located south of Nineveh on the river Tigris. Karamles (or Karemlash Keramlais Syriac: ܟܪܡܠܫ is a Town in Iraq located less than south east of Mosul, located These four great masses of ruins, with the whole area included within the parallelogram they form by lines drawn from the one to the other, are generally regarded as composing the whole ruins of Nineveh. It was also mentioned in Jonah that Nineveh was an evil city that needed to be condemned. To fix this problem, God sent Jonah to preach to Nineveh, and they repented.

Nineveh was the flourishing capital of the Assyrian empire (2 Kings 19:36; Isa. 37:37). The book of the prophet Nahum is almost exclusively taken up with prophetic denunciations against this city. Nahum ( Hebrew: נַחוּם Naḥūm) was a Minor prophet whose prophecy is recorded in the Hebrew Bible. Its ruin and utter desolation are foretold (Nahum 1:14; 3:19, etc. ). Its end was strange, sudden, tragic. (Nahum 2:6–11) According to the Bible, it was God's doing, his judgement on Assyria's pride (Jonah Nah). In fulfilment of prophecy, God made "an utter end of the place". It became a "desolation". Zephaniah also (2:13–15) predicts its destruction along with the fall of the empire of which it was the capital. {For|the prophetic book|Book of Zephaniah} Zephaniah or Tzfanya ( is the name of several people in the Bible Old Testament and Jewish Tanakh

Nineveh's exemplary pride and fall are recalled in the Gospel of Matthew (12:41) and the Gospel of Luke (11:32). The Gospel of Matthew (Gk Κατά Ματθαίον Ευαγγέλιον is one of the four Canonical gospels in the New Testament and is a Synoptic gospel The Gospel of Luke (Gk Κατά Λουκάν Ευαγγέλιον) is a synoptic Gospel, and is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels of the

Nineveh in classical history

Before the excavations in the 1800s, historical knowledge of the great Assyrian empire and of its magnificent capital was almost wholly a blank. Vague memories had indeed survived of its power and greatness, but very little was definitely known. Other cities that had perished, such as Palmyra, Persepolis, and Thebes, had left ruins to mark their sites and tell of their former greatness; but of this city, imperial Nineveh, not a single vestige seemed to remain, and the very place on which it had stood became only matter of conjecture. Palmyra ( Arabic: تدمر Tadmor) was in ancient times an important city of central Syria, located in an Oasis 215 km northeast of Damascus Persepolis ( Old Persian: Pārsa, Modern Persian: تخت جمشید/پارسه Takht-e Jamshid or Chehel Minar) was the ceremonial Thebes ( Classic Greek Θῆβαι, Mod Θήβα) is a city in Greece, situated to the north of the Cithaeron range which divides

In the days of the Greek historian Herodotus, 400 BC, Nineveh had become a thing of the past; and when Xenophon the historian passed the place in the Retreat of the Ten Thousand the very memory of its name had been lost. Herodotus of Halicarnassus ( Greek: Hēródotos Halikarnāsseús) was a Greek Historian who lived in the 5th century BC ( 484 BC&ndash Events By place Persian Empire Artaxerxes II King of Persia appoints Tissaphernes to take over all the districts in Xenophon (Ancient Greek, Modern Greek "Ξενοφών" "Ξενοφώντας" ca This article is about the It was buried out of sight.

Archaeology

Today, Nineveh's location is marked by two large mounds, Kouyunjik and Nabī Yūnus "Prophet Jonah", and the remains of the city walls (about 12 km/7. According to the Hebrew Bible ( Tanakh / Old Testament) and Qur'an, Jonah (; Arabic: يونس, Yunus or 5 mi in circumference). The Neo-Assyrian levels of Kouyunjik have been extensively explored. The other mound, Nabī Yūnus, has not been extensively explored because there is a Muslim shrine dedicated to that prophet on the site. However, Iraqi excavations on Nabī Yūnus in 1990 exposed a number of large Neo-Assyrian sculptures that appeared to be the entrance to a palace.

In the 19th century, the French consul at Mosul began to search the vast mounds that lay along the opposite bank of the river. The Arabs whom he employed in these excavations, to their great surprise, came upon the ruins of a building at the mound of Khorsabad, which, on further exploration, turned out to be the royal palace of Sargon II, which was largely explored for sculptures and other precious relics. This article is about ruins in Architecture; for other meanings see Ruins (disambiguation. Dur-Sharrukin ("Fortress of Sargon" present day Khorsabad, was the Assyrian capital in the time of Sargon II of Assyria. Sargon II ( Akkadian Šarru-kinu "legitimate king" reigned 722 – 705 BC was an Assyrian king

In 1847 the young British adventurer Sir Austen Henry Layard explored the ruins. The Right Honourable Sir Austen Henry Layard (ˈɔːstɪn ˈhɛnriː lɛəd 5 March, 1817 – 5 July, 1894) was a In the Kuyunjik mound Layard rediscovered in 1849 the lost palace of Sennacherib with its 71 rooms and colossal bas-reliefs. Sennacherib ( Akkadian Sîn-ahhe-eriba "(moon god Sîn has replaced (lost brothers for me" was the son of Sargon II, whom he A bas-relief (baʁəljɛf in French; French for "low relief" derived from the Italian basso rilievo) or low relief is a Sculpture He also unearthed the palace and famous library of Ashurbanipal with 22,000 cuneiform clay tablets. The Royal Library of Ashurbanipal, named after Ashurbanipal, the last great king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, is a collection of thousands of Clay tablets The study of the archaeology of Nineveh reveals the wealth and glory of ancient Assyria under kings such as Esarhaddon (681-669 B. Esarhaddon (Greek and Biblical form Akkadian Aššur-ahhe-iddina " Ashur has given a brother to me" was a king of Assyria who reigned C. ) and Ashurbanipal (669-626 B. C. ).

The work of exploration was carried on by George Smith, Hormuzd Rassam, and others, and a vast treasury of specimens of Assyria was incrementally exhumed for European museums. George Smith ( Chelsea London March 26, 1840 &ndash August 19, 1876) was a pioneering English Assyriologist Hormuzd Rassam (1826 &ndash 16 September, 1910) was an Assyriologist and traveller who made a number of important discoveries including the stone tablets Palace after palace was discovered, with their decorations and their sculptured slabs, revealing the life and manners of this ancient people, their arts of war and peace, the forms of their religion, the style of their architecture, and the magnificence of their monarchs.

The mound of Kuyunjik were excavated again by the archaeologists of the British Museum, lead by Leonard William King, at the beginning of the twentieth century. The British Museum is a Museum of human history and culture in London. Leonard William King (08 December 1869–20 August 1919 was an English Archaeologist and Assyriologist educated at Rugby School and King's College Their efforts concentrated on the site of the Temple of Nabu, the god of writing, where another cuneiform library was supposed to exist. Nabu is the Babylonian god of Wisdom and Writing, worshipped by Babylonians as the son of Marduk and his consort Sarpanitum, However, no such library was ever found: most likely, it had been destroyed by the activities of later residents.

The excavations started again in 1927, under the direction of Campbell Thompson, who had already taken part in King's expeditions. These excavations, however, were rather unfortunate. Some works were carried out outside Kouyunjik, for instance on the mound of Nebi Yunus, which was the ancient arsenal of Nineveh, or along the outside walls. Here, near the northwestern corner of the walls, beyond the pavement of a later building, the archaeologists found almost 300 fragments of prisms recording the royal annals of Sennacherib, Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal, besides a prisms of Esarhaddon which was almost perfect. Sennacherib ( Akkadian Sîn-ahhe-eriba "(moon god Sîn has replaced (lost brothers for me" was the son of Sargon II, whom he Esarhaddon (Greek and Biblical form Akkadian Aššur-ahhe-iddina " Ashur has given a brother to me" was a king of Assyria who reigned Ashurbanipal ( Akkadian: Aššur-bāni-apli, " Ashur has made a son" or "Ashur created an heir" (b

After the Second World War, several excavations were carried out by Iraqi archaeologists. Nineveh was revisited by British archaeologist and Assyriologist Professor David Stronach of the University of California, Berkeley. David Stronach is a renowned Scottish archeologist of ancient Iran and Iraq. The University of California Berkeley (also referred to as Cal, Berkeley and UC Berkeley) is a major research university located in Berkeley (1981 to present). He conducted a series of surveys and digs at the site from 1987-1990, focusing his attentions to the several gates and the existent mud brick walls, as well as the system that supplied water to the city in times of siege.

City wall and gates

The ruins of Nineveh are surrounded by the remains of a massive stone and mudbrick wall dating from about 700 B. C. About 12 km. in length, the wall system consisted of an ashlar stone retaining wall about 6 m. high surmounted by a mudbrick wall about 10 m. high and 15 m. thick. The stone retaining wall had projecting stone towers spaced about every 18 m. The stone wall and towers were topped by three-step merlons. A merlon, in Architecture, forms the solid part of an embattled Parapet, sometimes pierced by Embrasures The word comes from the

The city wall was fitted with fifteen monumental gateways. In addition to serving as check points on entering and exiting the city, these structures were probably used as barracks and armories. With the inner and outer doors closed, the gateways were virtual fortresses. The bases of the walls of the vaulted passages and interior chambers of the gateway were lined with finely cut stone orthostats about 1 m. high. A stairway led from one of the interior chambers to the top of the mudbrick wall.

Five of the gateways have been explored to some extent by archaeologists:

Mashki Gate. Translated "Gate of the Watering Places", it was perhaps used to take livestock to water from the River Tigris which currently flows about 1. 5 km. to the west. It has been reconstructed in fortified mudbrick to the height of the top of the vaulted passageway and seems accurate as far as it goes. The Assyrian original may have been plastered and ornamented.

Nergal Gate. Named for the god Nergal, it may have been used for some ceremonial purpose, as it is the only known gate flanked by stone sculptures of winged bull-men (lamassu). The name Nergal (or Nirgal, Nirgali) refers to a Deity in Babylonia with the main seat The Sumerian word lama, which is rendered in Akkadian as lamassu, refers to a beneficient protective female deity The reconstruction is conjectural, as the gate was excavated by Layard in the mid 19th century, and reconstructed in the mid 20th century.

Adad Gate. Named for the god Adad. This article is about the Sumerian god Adad also known as Ishkur. A reconstruction was begun in the 1960s by Iraqis, but was not completed. The result is an uneasy mixture of concrete and eroding mudbrick, which nonetheless does give one some idea of the original structure. Fortunately, the excavator left some features unexcavated, allowing a view of the original Assyrian construction. The original brickwork of the outer vaulted passageway is well exposed, as is the entrance of the vaulted stairway to the upper levels. The actions of Nineveh's last defenders can be seen in the hastily built mudbrick construction which narrows the passageway from 4 m. to 2 m.

Shamash Gate. Named for the Sun god Shamash, it opens to the road to Arbil. For the Canaanite sun godess see Shemesh Shamash was the common Akkadian name of the Sun-god and god of justice in Babylonia It was excavated by Layard in the 19th century. The stone retaining wall and part of the mudbrick structure were reconstructed in the 1960s. The mudbrick reconstruction has deteriorated significantly. The stone wall projects outward about 20 m. from the line of main wall for a length of about 70 m. It is the only gate with such a significant projection. The mound of its remains towers above the surrounding terrain. Its size and design suggest it was the most important gate in Neo-Assyrian times.

Halzi Gate. Near the south end of the eastern city wall. Exploratory excavations were undertaken here by the University of California expedition of 1989-90. There is an outward projection of the city wall, though not as pronounced as at the Shamash Gate. The entry passage had been narrowed with mudbrick to about 2 m. as at the Adad Gate. Human remains from the final battle of Nineveh were found in the passageway.

Kuyunjik

The ruin mound of Kuyunjik rises about 20 m above the surrounding plain of the ancient city. It is quite large, measuring about 800 m x 500 m. Its upper layers have been extensively excavated and several Neo-Assyrian palaces and temples have been found there. A deep sounding by Max Mallowan revealed evidence of habitation as early as the 6th millennium BC.

Today, there is little evidence of these old excavations other than weathered pits and earth piles. In 1990, the only Assyrian remains visible were those of the entry court and the first few chambers of the Palace of Sennacherib. Since that time, the palace chambers have received significant damage by looters due to the turmoil in the area. Portions of relief sculptures that were in the palace chambers in 1990 were seen on the antiquities market by 1996. Photographs of the chambers made in 2003 show that many of the fine relief sculptures there have been reduced to piles of rubble. (see link to Joanne Farchakh-Bajjaly photos)

A small area of undisturbed post-Assyrian remains was identified in 1990 near the southwest corner of Kuyunjik.

Rogation of the Ninevites (Nineveh's Wish)

Assyrians of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Chaldean Catholic Church and Assyrian Church of the East practice a fast called Ba'uta d-Ninwe or Bo'utho d-Ninwe (ܒܥܘܬܐ ܕܢܝܢܘܐ) which means Nineveh's Wish. The Assyrians are an Ethnic group whose origins lie in what is today Iraq, Iran, Turkey and Syria. The Syriac Orthodox Church is an autocephalous Oriental Orthodox church based in the Middle East with members spread throughout the world The Chaldean Catholic Church or the Chaldean Church of Babylon (الكنيسة الكلدانية) is an Eastern particular church of the The Holy Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East (ܥܕܬܐ ܩܕܝܫܬܐ ܘܫܠܝܚܝܬܐ ܩܬܘܠܝܩܝ ܕܡܕܢܚܐ ܕܐܬܘܪ̈ܝܐ ‘Ittā Qaddishtā wa-Shlikhāitā Qattoliqi Copts and Ethiopian Orthodox also maintain this fast. A Copt ( Coptic: ouRemenkīmi enEkhristianos, literally Egyptian Christian) is a native Egyptian Christian. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (in transliterated Amharic: Yäityop'ya ortodoks täwahedo bétäkrestyan) is an Oriental See article about the Roagation of the Ninevites

Modern Nineveh

On 15 October 2005, the province of Nineveh (Ninawa) cast the deciding votes in the referendum for Iraq's Constitution. Events 533 - Byzantine General Belisarius makes his formal entry into Carthage, having conquered it from the Year 2005 ( MMV) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link displays full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Ninawa ( Arabic: نینوى Kurdish: Neynewa, Aramaic: ܢܝܢܘܐ Nîněwâ) is a governorate The current Constitution of Iraq was approved by a referendum that took place on 15 October 2005. One of three mostly Sunni Arab provinces whose veto could defeat the constitution, Nineveh was closely watched through the extended electoral count.

Home to a majority Sunni Arab population and ethnically diverse minority which includes Kurds (Yezidi and Sunni) and Assyrian Christians, as well as the oil processing center Mosul (which is often considered to be the modern Nineveh city, and is called so by Aramaic speakers), the province of Nineveh promises to play a large role in Iraqi politics into the future. For the village in Azerbaijan see Mosul Azerbaijan. Mosul (الموصل Al Mūṣul, Kurdish: Mosul/Ninawa, Musul

References

• This entry incorporates text from the public domain Easton's Bible Dictionary, originally published in 1897.

External links

• Joanne Farchakh-Bajjaly photos of Nineveh taken in May 2003 showing damage from looters.
• John Malcolm Russell, "Stolen stones: the modern sack of Nineveh" in Archaeology; looting of sculptures in the 1990s.
• Nineveh page at the British Museum's website. Includes photographs of items from their collection.
• ABC 3: Babylonian Chronicle Concerning the Fall of Nineveh
• Layard's Nineveh and its Remains- full text
• A history
• Austen Henry Layard - Nineveh and Its Remains full book readable

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