The Assyrians and the Chaldeans

About 1000 years after Hammurabi Mesopotamia was inhabited by a group called the Assyrians who became well known because of their large army. Eventually, the Assyrians conquered and controlled most of Mesopotamia.

 Strong fighting force of foot soldiers armed with spears and daggers.  Were the first large army to use iron for weapons.  As the Assyrians took over territory, they drove people from their lands and forced their rule on the people they conquered.

 Well organized.  Stretched from the Persian Gulf to Egypt’s Nile River.  Capital city was Nineveh.  Assyrian kings were the first to build roads to connect and join their empire.

 Assyrians were skilled builders and constructed large temples and palaces filled with statues and wall carvings.  Assyrians built one of the world’s first known libraries in Nineveh that held over 25,000 tablets of stories and songs.  Were polytheistic and believed in many gods.

 The Assyrians cruel treatment of people led to a huge rebellion around 650 B.C.E.  The Assyrians began fighting with each other after the rebellion over who would become the new Assyrian king.  Eventually a group of people called the Chaldean took control of Nineveh in 612 B.C.E.

 Were led by a king named Nebuchandnezzar who controlled Mesopotamia from 605 B.C.E. to 562 B.C.E.  Most Chaldeans were decedents of the Babylonian people who made up King Hammurabi’s empire 1200 years earlier.  Babylon became the world’s largest and richest city.  The most prominent feature of Babylon were the “Hanging Gardens of Babylon” built by King Nebuchandnezzar in honor of his wife.

As time passed, the Chaldeans began to lose their power. They found it hard to control the peoples they had conquered. In 539 B.C.E. Persians from the mountains to the northeast captured Babylon. Now Mesopotamia is under Persian control.