Ninus, according to Greek historians writing in the Hellenistic period and later, was the founder of Nineveh, ancient capital of Assyria. The figure or figures with which he corresponds in Assyrian records is uncertain; an association or identification with Ninurta has been proposed. An identification with Shamshi-Adad I, Shamshi-Adad V, and/or a conflation of the two have also been suggested.
Ninus from Guillaume Rouillé's Promptuarii Iconum Insigniorum
Nineveh, also known in early modern times as Kouyunjik, was an ancient Assyrian city of Upper Mesopotamia, located in the modern-day city of Mosul in northern Iraq. It is located on the eastern bank of the Tigris River and was the capital and largest city of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, as well as the largest city in the world for several decades. Today, it is a common name for the half of Mosul that lies on the eastern bank of the Tigris, and the country's Nineveh Governorate takes its name from it.
The reconstructed Mashki Gate of Nineveh (since destroyed by the Islamic State)
Artist's impression of Assyrian palaces from The Monuments of Nineveh by Sir Austen Henry Layard, 1853
View of the village of "Nunia" or "Ninive", published by Carsten Niebuhr in 1778
Village in Nineveh in 2019