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Map of Ancient Mesopotamia

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Map of Mesopotamia in the Ancient World

This map reveals the areas in Ancient Mesopotamia. Most scholars date the beginning of Babylonia to the fall of the third dynasty of Ur, around 2000 BC because many Amorites apparently migrated from the desert into Mesopotamia.

The Amorites were a group of Semitic speaking nomads, who captured the local city-states where they established new dynasties and adapted to the culture of the surrounding area. The Amorites had helped destroy the Sumerian civilization and dominated Mesopotamia for about 300 years (1900-1600 BC). They ruled the land out of the city of Babylon. But soon the Amorite immigrants and the previous locals began fighting for power, in this caused considerable confusion during this early period.

Around the middle of the 18th century BC two cities, Isin and Larsa ultimately dominated the scene so that the era has been called the Isin-Larsa period.

The city-state of Larsa was soon captured by an Amorite ruler named Kudur-mabug, who appointed his two sons Warad-Sin and Rim-Sin, to rule over Larsa while he was away on military campaigns. Rim-Sin (1822-1763 BC) continued to build upon his father's small Empire and eventually conquered their ancient rival, Isin, in his 30th year.

Larsa's period of glory lasted for little while longer, approximately 30 years (1763 BC), when Hammurapi of Babylon came to conquer, thus ushering in a new era.

By this time the Hebrews were in Egypt and Joseph had been dead for about 50 years.

Mesopotamia in Smith's Bible Dictionary (Read Full Article)

Mesopotamia - (between the rivers), the entire country between the two rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates. This is a tract nearly 700 miles long and from 20 to 250 miles broad, extending in a southeasterly direction from Telek to Kurnah. The Arabian geographers term it "the Island," a name which is almost literally correct, since a few miles only intervene between the source of the Tigris and the Euphrates at Telek. But the region which bears the name of Mesopotamia, par excellence, both in Scripture and in the classical writers, is the northwestern portion of this tract, or the country between the great bend of the Euphrates, lat. 35 degrees to 37 degrees 30', and the upper Tigris.

We first hear of Mesopotamia in Scripture as the country where Nahor and his family settled after quitting Ur of the Chaldees. Ge 24:10 Here lived Bethuel and Laban; and hither Abraham sent his servants to fetch Isaac a wife. Ibid. ver. 38. Hither too, a century later, came Jacob on the same errand; and hence he returned with his two wives after an absence of twenty-one years. After this we have no mention of Mesopotamia till the close of the wanderings int he wilderness. De 23:4 About half a century later we find, for the first and last time, Mesopotamia the seat of a powerful monarchy. Jud 3:1 ... Finally, the children of Ammon, having provoked a war with David, "sent a thousand talents of silver to hire them chariots and horsemen out of Mesopotamia, and out of Syria-maachah, and out of Zobah." 1Ch 19:6 According to the Assyrian inscriptions Mesopotamia was inhabited in the early times of the empire, B.C. 1200-1100, by a vast number of petty tribes, each under its own prince, and all quite independent of one another.

The Assyrian monarchs contended with these chiefs at great advantage, and by the time of Jehu, B.C. 880, had fully established their dominion over them. On the destruction of the Assyrian empire, Mesopotamia seems to have been divided between the Medes and the Babylonians. The conquests of Cyrus brought it wholly under the Persian yoke; and thus it continued to the time of Alexander. Since 1516 it has formed a part of the Turkish empire. It is full of ruins and mounds of ancient cities, some of which are now throwing much light on the Scripture.

Mesopotamia in Wikipedia (Read Full Article)

Mesopotamia (from the Greek meaning "land between the rivers") is an area geographically located between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, largely corresponding to modern Iraq,[2] as well as northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey, and the Khūzestān Province of southwestern Iran.

Commonly known as the "cradle of civilization", Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the Akkadian, Babylonian and Assyrian empires. In the Iron Age, it was ruled by the Neo-Assyrian Empire and Neo-Babylonian Empire, and later conquered by the Achaemenid Empire. It mostly remained under Persian rule until the 7th century Islamic conquest of the Sassanid Empire. Under the Caliphate, the region came to be known as Iraq.

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