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Course: Ancient Mediterranean + Europe > Unit 2
Lesson 6: Babylonian- Babylonia, an introduction
- Ancient Babylon: excavations, restorations and modern tourism
- The Babylonian mind
- The Law Code Stele of King Hammurabi
- Hammurabi: The king who made the four quarters of the earth obedient
- Law Code of Hammurabi
- Ishtar gate and Processional Way
- Ishtar Gate
- Map of the world
- Towers of Babel
- The "Queen of the Night" relief
- Kassite Art: Unfinished Kudurru
- Neo-Babylonian
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Babylonia, an introduction
By The British Museum
On the river Euphrates
The city of Babylon on the River Euphrates in southern Iraq is mentioned in documents of the late third millennium B.C.E. and first came to prominence as the royal city of . He established his control over many other kingdoms stretching from the Persian Gulf to Syria. The British Museum holds one of the iconic artworks of this period, the so-called “Queen of the Night.”
From around 1500 B.C.E. a dynasty of Kassite kings took control in Babylon and unified southern Iraq into the kingdom of Babylonia. The Babylonian cities were the centers of great scribal learning and produced writings on divination, astrology, medicine and mathematics. The Kassite kings corresponded with the Egyptian Pharaohs as revealed by cuneiform letters found at Amarna in Egypt, now in the British Museum.
Babylonia had an uneasy relationship with its northern neighbor Assyria and opposed its military expansion. In 689 B.C.E. Babylon was sacked by the Assyrians but as the city was highly regarded it was restored to its former status soon after. Other Babylonian cities also flourished; scribes in the city of Sippar probably produced the famous Map of the World.
Babylonian kings
After 612 B.C.E. the Babylonian kings Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar II were able to claim much of the Assyrian empire and rebuilt Babylon on a grand scale. Nebuchadnezzar II rebuilt Babylon in the sixth century B.C.E. and it became the largest ancient settlement in Mesopotamia. There were two sets of fortified walls and massive palaces and religious buildings, including the central ziggurat tower. Nebuchadnezzar is also credited with the construction of the famous "Hanging Gardens." However, the last Babylonian was defeated by Cyrus II of Persia and the country was incorporated into the vast Achaemenid Persian Empire.
New threats
Babylon remained an important center until the third century B.C.E., when Seleucia-on-the-Tigris was founded about ninety kilometers to the north-east. Under the new settlement became the official Royal City and the civilian population was ordered to move there. Nonetheless a village existed on the old city site until the eleventh century AD. Babylon was excavated by Robert Koldewey between 1899 and 1917 on behalf of the Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft. Since 1958 the Iraq Directorate-General of Antiquities has carried out further investigations. Unfortunately, the earlier levels are inaccessible beneath the high water table. Since 2003, our attention has been drawn to new threats to the archaeology of Mesopotamia, modern day Iraq.
For two thousand years the myth of Babylon has haunted the European imagination. The Tower of Babel and the Hanging Gardens, Belshazzar’s Feast and the Fall of Babylon have inspired artists, writers, poets, philosophers and film makers.
© Trustees of the British Museum
Additional resources
Read a chapter in our textbook, Reframing Art History, about rethinking how we approach the art of the Ancient Near East.
Want to join the conversation?
- As a first visitor to looking at this period in any depth, I found the timelines of the various empires somewhat confusing. There seems to have been some to and fro and re-emergence and establishment. Perhaps a simple timeline would provide better clarification?(16 votes)
- I have the exact same problem and have been searching the internet for a good timeline. The best I've found is the Heilbrunn timeline: http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/ht/?period=02®ion=wam. Sadly, it's a bit too detailed for beginners like you and me and does not use the same subdivision into Sumerian-Akkadian-Babylonian-etc. that Khan uses. So, I wholeheartedly support your motion for a timeline on Khan that matches the structure of their treatment of the art of the Ancient Near East.
EDIT: I've found a better timeline right here on KA, in the Big History Section. https://www.khanacademy.org/partner-content/big-history-project/what-is-big-history/welcome-to-big-history/a/infographic-timeline.(19 votes)
- Why did Antiochus I decide to establish a new capital at Seleucia-on-the-Tigris?(6 votes)
- Most convenient for traffic from both waterways, Euphrates and Tigris, allowing exchange of goods from Asia, India, Persia and Africa.(7 votes)
- Um.. where do the Akkadians come in??(2 votes)
- where are the achievements(1 vote)
- Concern for threats since 2003? Wasn't the first gulf war in the early to mid 90's threatening enough allied bombing damaged ruins across Iraq.(0 votes)
- I need more detail as to who all these people are and what some of these things that are being said are because i don't know everyone that has ever lived so.(0 votes)
- what was so great about Babylonian cities? why were there two kings at once cant that cause tension and disagreements?(0 votes)
- Mostly because of the art and history of it. Its been standing 25,000 year's. And mind's of
them(0 votes)