domestication of plants and animals occurred and
cities with monumental architectUre and writing
were constructed. The ancient civilizations that
flourished there between the fourth millennium
and the first millennium b.c.e. were those of the
Sumerians, Akkadians, Assyrians, and Babylo-
nians. Their religious life emphasized the worship
of multiple gods and goddesses whose images
were housed in great temples and shrines in the
major cities. Many of these deities represented
cosmic and natural forces, such as Anu, the god of
the heavens, Antu, the earth goddess and wife of
Anu, Enlil, the lord of the winds, and Ea (Enki),
the god of the sweet waters. There was also Inanna
(Ishtar), a youthful goddess associated with the
planet Venus and fertility, and Erishkigal, god-
dess of the underworld. Ancient Mesopotamian
deities also governed aspects of human culture,
such as kingship, warfare, writing, childbirth,
and magic. One of the most important works of
Mesopotamian literature was the creation hymn
“Enuma elish” (When on High), written on clay
tablets in the Akkadian language. Another impor-
tant literary work of the Mesopotamians was the
Epic of Gilgamesh, which related the adventures
of a king named Gilgamesh and his companion
Enkidu. The Code of Hammurabi is one of the ear-
liest compilations of law in history and may have
influenced the law codes of the Hebrew Bible.
Mesopotamian civilization produced a vast num-
ber of other cuneiform writings, from economic
records and histories to incantations and religious
hymns.
In addition to its agricultural wealth, Iraq
benefited from its location along major trade
routes that linked it to Central Asia, india, Africa,
and the Mediterranean world. It prospered from
this trade, but its prosperity and strategic loca-
tion also made it a prize for conquest by outside
powers throughout its history. During the first
millennium b.c.e., Iraq was ruled by a succession
of large empires, some of them native, others for-
eign. The first of these was that of the Neo-Assyr-
ians, based in northern Iraq (tenth to seventh
centuries b.c.e.). This was followed by that of
the Neo-Babylonians (seventh to sixth centuries
b.c.e.), or the Chaldeans, which is remembered
for its destruction of the temple of Yahweh in
JerUsalem in 586 b.c.e. and removing its Israelite
population into captivity in Babylon, the imperial
capital in southern Iraq. The land of the Tigris and
Euphrates Rivers became part of the great Persian
empire of the Achaemenid dynasty, based in Iran,
during the sixth to fourth centuries b.c.e. One of
the things this dynasty is remembered for is allow-
ing the Israelite Jews to return to Jerusalem and
rebuild their temple in 538. The empire fell when
the Middle East was conquered by the armies of
aleXander the great of Macedon (d. 323 b.c.e.)
during the last decades of the fourth century b.c.e.
The Seleucid dynasty, heirs of one of Alexander’s
generals, ruled Iraq between 312 and 141 b.c.e.
They built a capital city called Seleucia on the
Tigris about 20 miles southeast of where Baghdad
would later be built by Muslim rulers. Parthian
armies from Iran invaded Iraq during the second
century b.c.e. and swept the Seleucids away. They
began to use Ctesiphon, a town next to Seleucia,
as their regional capital. During the second cen-
tury b.c.e., the Parthians began to engage with
Roman armies for control over Middle East trade
routes, and the two empires continued to battle
with each other intermittently for more than two
centuries.ISlAMIC IrAQ
Early in the reign of the caliph Umar ibn al-
khattab (r. 634–644 c.e.), a series of skirmishes
between Arab Muslim and Persian forces ended
with a complete defeat of the Persian army at
the Battle of al-Qadisiyya (ca. 636), changing the
course of Iraq’s history for centuries to come. The
Sasanian dynasty that had ruled Iraq and Persia
since it had deposed the Parthians in 226 never
recovered from the blow. When the last Sasanian
king finally died in 651, Muslims had become the
undisputed rulers of the region. Several garrisons
built for immigrant Arab Muslim armies in IraqK 368 Iraq