Internet Ancient History Sourcebook
Mesopotamia and Syria
See Main Page for a guide to
all contents of all sections.
Contents
Ancient Near East
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Sumeria (c. 3100-c. 2000 BCE)
- WEB The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature [At Oxford] [Internet Archive back up here]
- Map: Sumerian Archeological
Sites [At Sumerian] [Internet Archive backup here]
- Interactive Map: Political Change in Ancient Mesopotamia, 3000-1000 BCE [At TimeMaps]
- The Emergence of Kingship: Inscription of Umma and Lagash, c. 2500BCE [Was At piney.com, now Internet Archive]
- The Sumerian King List [Was At
CSUN, now Internet Archive]
- Proverbs from Ki-en-gir (Sumer), c. 2000 BCE [At
this Site]
- Penitential Prayer to God [Was At Then Again, now Internet Archive]
- Inanna Texts [Was At CSUN, now Internet Archive]
- Enki and the World Order: A Sumerian High God [Was At Eliade Site, now Internet Archive]
- A Sumero-Akkadian prayer to Every God [Was At Eliade Site, now Internet Archive]
- Shamash Hymn [Was At Eliade Site, now Internet Archive]
- The Epic of Gilgamesh
- Epic of Gilgamesh,
Complete Text of Robert Temple translation, [At Gates of Babylon] [Internet Archive back up here]
- The Epic of Gilgamesh: An Outline, Much
more than its name implies..[Was At UNT, now Internet Archive]
-
Gilgamesh Tablet [Was At
Piney, now Internet Archive]
- Gilgamesh in Search of Immortality [Was At Eliade Site, now Internet Archive]
- Epic of Gilgamesh, Maureen Kovacs translation [Was at King of Heroes, now Internet Archive]
Epic of Gilgamesh, Ronald Campbell Thompson translation [Was at King of Heroes, now Internet Archive]
- Sumerian Prologue
to Gilgamesh [At UPenn] [Internet Archive version here]
- An Old Babylonian Version of the Gilgamesh Epic by Clay and Jastrow
[Project Gutenberg]
-
Domestication of Enkidu [Was At
Piney, now Internet Archive]
-
Enkidu's Dream [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]
-
Gilgamesh Flood Story [At Internet Archive, from Creighton]
- Gilgamesh Flood Story [Was At Eliade Site, now Internet Archive]
- 2ND Arthur A. Brown: Storytelling, the Meaning of Life, and The Epic of Gilgamesh [At EAWC][Modern Account]
- The Worm and the Toothache [Was At
Piney, now Internet Archive]
- The Creation of the Pickax [Was At
Piney, now Internet Archive]
- Sumerian Mythology FAQ [Was At
UNH, now Internet Archive]
- The Ludlul Bêl Nimeqi, c. 1700 BCE [At this Site]
A Sumerian Job.
- Sumerian Language
- Art
- Connections with India
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Akkadia (c.2350-2200 BCE)
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Babylonia (c.2000-1600 BCE)
- WEB Livius: Babylonia Page [At Livius] [Internet Archive backup here]
Texts from
Mesopotamia in general, not just the two periods called "Babylonian".
- Some Babylonian Proverbs from the Library of
Ashurbanipal, c. 1600 BCE [At this Site]
- A Collection of Mesopotamian Laws, c. 2250 - 550 BCE [At
this Site]
- A Collection of Contracts from Mesopotamia, c.
2300 - 428 BCE [At this Site]
- Code of Hammarabi
- Code of Hammarabi c.1780 BCE [This Site][Full Text, with
introductions]
Hammurabi (or Hammarapi), r. c. 1792-1750 BCE
- Code of Hammarabi c.1780 BCE [Was At EAWC, now Internet Archive] [Full Text]
- Code of Hammarabi c.1780 BCE extracts [Was At WSU, now Internet Archive]
- Cities
- Creation Myths
-
Babylonian Creation Myth [Was At Then Again, now Internet Archive]
A 12th century BCE version of a Sumerian account.
-
The Enuma Elish (The Babylonian Creation Story), c. 2000 BCE [At Sacred Texts] [Internet Archive version here]
- The Enuma Elish (The Babylonian
Creation Story), c. 2000 BCE [Internet Archive version here] and Notes [Internet Archive version here] [At CSUN]
- The Enuma Elish (The Babylonian Creation Story), c. 2000 BCE [Was At Eliade Site, now Internet Archive]
-
Atrahasis: Human Creation [Was At Piney, now Internet Archive]
-
Myth of Adapa [Was At Piney, now Internet Archive]
- Religion
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Kassites and Hittites (c.1600-717
BCE)
- Kassites
- 2ND Kassite Rule in Babylon c.1600-1200
BCE [At Crystal Links][Modern Summary] [Internet Archive version here]
- The Long Interlude
Mesopotamian history is often taught as a sequence of imperial states. Modern interpretations stress how fragile those states were and that for long periods and over wide areas there was no imperial hegemon. The Kassites
(c.1570-1155 BCE) are usually passed over quickly, and from c 1200 BC until the 7th century BC there is a period referred to as "the long interlude". Five hundred years, however, is more than interlude. Generations of local rulers, farmers, families, and religious traditions and institutions persisted. For more on this see James C, Scott,Against The Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States (2017) [Link is to a Wikipedia summary]. Chapter 6 on the fragility of early states is especially interesting - stable imperial states were actually prominent for fairly short periods of time within the 3000 year plus history of ancient Mesopotamia - and this is perhaps of interest, and worth conveying in even in survey classes.
- Hittites
- Hittite Texts
- Material Culture
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Assyria (c.1350- 612 BCE)
- WEB British Museum: I am Ashurbanipal king of the world, king of Assyria [2019 Exhibition Website]
- Map: Assyrian Empires [Wikipedia]
- Assyrian Kings List [at aina.org] [Internet Archive version here]
- Assyrian Army Attacks a City [Was At Then Again, now Internet Archive]
- Letter of Pabi, Prince of Lachish, to Akhnaton, King of Kemet
(i.e. Egypt), circa 1350 BCE. [At this Site]
-
Old Assyrian
Marriage Contract 19th Cent. BCE [At Jewish Christian Lit] [Internet Archive version here]
- The Code of the Assyrians, c. 1075 BCE
Excerpts on sex and gender matters.
- Tiglathpileser I (r. 1115-1077 BCE): Inscription [Was At Then Again, now Internet Archive]
- Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III (d. 823 BCE) [Was At M Univ, now Internet Archive]. Images can be found here [British Museum]
Each of its four sides is divided into five compartments of sculpture representing the
tribute brought to the Assyrian King by vassal princes, Jehu of Israel being among the
number. Shalmaneser, whose annals and conquests are recorded upon it, was the son of
Assur-natsir-pal, and died in 823 BCE. [Note this king has now been renumbered as III rather
than II!]
- Annals of Assur-nasir-pal (prob. r. 883 to 858 BCE) [Was At M Univ, now Internet Archive]
- Sennacherib's
Campaign vs. Judea 701 BCE [At Internet Archive, from ANET]
- Accounts of the Campaign of Sennacherib, 701 BCE [At
this Site]
- Banquet of Ashurnasirpal II (669-626 BCE), [Was At Wittenberg, now Internet Acrhive]
- The Library of Ashurbanipal II [At British Musuem]
- Account of
Revolt of the City of Suru of Bit-Halupe 7th Cent BCE [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]
- Legend of Ahikar the Wise [At
Internet Archive]
- Herodotus: Greek Reports of Babylonia, Chaldea, and Assyria [At
This Site]
Includes accounts of Semiramis and Nitocris, Marriage customs, and the Persian conquest.
- 2ND John Malcolm Russel: Stolen Stones: The
Modern Sack of Nineveh [At Archeology] [Internet Archive version here]
Splendid photographs of the modern sites.
- 2ND Austen Henry Layard: A Popular Account of Discoveries in
Nineveh. (New York. 1854) Complete text. [At Assyrian International News Agency] [Internet Archive version here]
- WEB Nineveh
Online [Internet Archive version here]
Ancient and modern Assyrian culture.
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Chaldea/Neo-Babylonia (612-539
BCE)
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Syrian Cities: Ebla, Ugarit, Emar
Ebla was an ancient city in Syria at Tell Mardikh. The palace library, with thousands
of tablets, was excavated by an Italian expedition in1975. These showed that Ebla had been
a major commercial center. The tablets, written in a Canaanite language (Eblaite), dating
from c.2500 BCE. Exacavations over the past century have revealed more and more about
Syrian cities.
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Phoenicia 950 BCE on
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Carthage: The Punic Empire
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ANE Arts and Architecture
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ANE Mathematics and Astronomy
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Gender and Sexuality
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Common Issues:
Mesopotamian/Egyptian/Hebrew/Greek History
There are a number of problems in the various proposed chronologies of ancient
Mediterranean cultures. One that most students might notice is a diversity in the dates
given for Egyptian and Mesopotamian states, periods, and monarchs. The variety of methods
used to ascertain dates leads to rival schemes with dates which vary by nearly a century.
There is also a much large inconsistency claimed by credentialed scholars whose motives
seem, however, to derive from Biblical literalism.
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NOTES:
The Internet Ancient History Sourcebook is part of the Internet History Sourcebooks Project. The date of inception was
4/8/1998. Links to files at other site are indicated by [At some indication of the site
name or location]. WEB indicates a link to one of small
number of high quality web sites which provide either more texts or an especially valuable
overview.
The Internet History Sourcebooks Project is located at the History Department of Fordham University, New York. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook, and other medieval components of the project, are located at the Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies.The IHSP recognizes the contribution of Fordham University, the Fordham University History Department, and the Fordham Center for Medieval Studies in
providing web space and server support for the project. The IHSP is a project independent of Fordham University. Although the IHSP seeks to follow all applicable copyright law, Fordham University is not the institutional owner, and is not liable as the result of any legal action.
© Site Concept and Design: Paul Halsall, created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 6 October 2023 [CV]
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