The urban history of northern Mesopotamia or Assyria (= today’s north Iraq and north-east Syria) to a large extent connects with that of the south, traced earlier in Chapters 2 and 3. The physical environments of north and south are in large part different, however, which certainly affected the development of cities. Although the arid countryside along the Euphrates River gave rise to cities dependent on river water in a manner seen in southern Mesopotamia, the area to the north and north-east, between the Euphrates and the Tigris, lies within the Fertile Crescent, a region in which rainfall is adequate to sustain agriculture without recourse to irrigation. to this rainfall, people settled throughout the landscape, not needing to cluster by the rivers. Settlements tended to be smaller as well, villages for the most part, since people could spread out and live closer to their fields and flocks without worrying that they might be occupying precious farmland.
Although not directly part of the Sumerian world, the north was quickly absorbed into the larger Mesopotamian cultural sphere. Cities developed especially in the third millennium BC, and prospered through the second millennium BC. We have noted in Chapter 8 how the important city of Assur established mercantile outposts at Kanesh and other Anatolian cities in the Middle Bronze Age (early second millennium BC). We shall pick up the story of these Assyrian cities in the early first millennium BC, with the well-documented sites of Kalhu (modern Nimrud), Dur-Sharrukin (modern Khorsabad), and Nineveh.
“Neo-Assyrian” is the adjective applied to the resurgent state of Assyria in northern Mesopotamia during the early Iron Age. The opening centuries of the first millennium BC witnessed a tremendous expansion of Assyrian power under a series of absolute monarchs intent on fashioning empires and maintaining open trade routes with the west. In the early ninth century BC, Assur-nasirpal II (883-859 BC) set the precedent of relocating his capital. He left Assur, the traditional capital and home of the state’s main god, also named Assur, in favor of the city of Kalhu. Then, in good Assyrian military tradition, he led his conquering army westward across the Euphrates to Aleppo and the Mediterranean coast.
Conquests of subsequent rulers enlarged Assyrian territory into north-west Iran, Anatolia, Egypt, and Babylonia (southern Mesopotamia). Powerful kings included: Sargon II (ruled 721-705 BC), who founded his capital at a new site, Dur-Sharrukin; Sennacherib (704-681 BC); and Assurbanipal (668-631 BC), these last two both reigning from the older city of Nineveh. The Assyrian Empire fell in the later seventh century BC, when the Medes of north-west Persia captured Kalhu and Assur in 614 BC and, with the help of the Babylonians and the Scythians, Nineveh in 612 BC.
The ancient cities of Kalhu, Dur-Sharrukin, and Nineveh are important in the history of archaeology. Pioneer excavations in the 1840s-1870s by Paul Emile Botta, Austin Henry Layard, and Hormuzd Rassam first brought the reality of the Ancient Near East into the consciousness of the general public. Here, we will inspect these sites to see how they illustrate essential features of Assyrian architectural planning and decoration, this last featuring a long-lasting royal interest in the power of pictorial imagery. The palace at Kalhu, with its remarkable finds, will be our first stop. We shall then examine the city plan at Khorsabad and, lastly, the city plan and stone relief sculptures from Nineveh.
World History
