Nineveh

Large walled city, a capital of the Assyrians from the end of the 8th century BC, located across the Tigris River from Mosul, Iraq. The site was occupied from the earliest times, with pottery from the Hassuna phase on. The site today consists of two main mounds, Kuyunjik (the citadel) and Nebi Yunus (the arsenal). It was occupied from the 6th millennium BC (a test pit beneath the Temple of Ishtar, the goddess of love, produced material of Hassuna type at the bottom) until it was destroyed by the Medes late in the 7th century BC. Ninevite ware (or Ninevite V) represents the comparatively backward culture of the north, contemporary with the Early Dynastic of Sumer. Little of importance is recorded of the site until it became a joint capital of Assyria, with Assur and Nimrud, in the early 1st millennium. Sennacherib was responsible for making it a capital and his great palace has splendid carved reliefs. To this period belong the site's other spectacular monuments, the palaces with their elaborate architecture, carved reliefs, and cuneiform inscriptions. The most important finds were probably the two libraries of clay tablets found in the palaces of Sennacherib (704-681 BC) and Assurbanipal (668-627 BC). It was destroyed by Medes in 612 BC. A lifesize bronze head of an Akkadian king, possibly Sargon (founder of the Akkadian empire), dated to the later 3rd millennium BC, was found there.

One of the most important of the ancient Mesopotamian cities, situated c400 km north of Baghdad on the Tigris River opposite Mosul in Iraq. The site today consists of several mounds, the main one being Kuyunjik. It was occupied from the 6th millennium be (a test pit beneath the Temple of Ishtar, the goddess of love, produced material of Hassuna type at the bottom) until it was destroyed by the Medes late in the 7th century bc. Even after this date settlement continued, but now on the plain next to the river and it subsequently became a suburb of the expanding city of Mosul. The heyday of the city was in the 7th century bc when Sennacherib made it the capital of Assyria and most of the surviving remains date from this period. They include parts of the city wall, 12 km in circumference, and the great palace of Sennacherib with its splendid reliefs. Some of these reliefs, together with the great archives of cuneiform tablets which constituted the two libraries of Sennacherib himself and his grandson Assurbanipal, were transferred to the Louvre and the British Museum during the 19th century.