1.
Middle East
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The Middle East is a transcontinental region centered on Western Asia and Egypt. The corresponding adjective is Middle-Eastern and the noun is Middle-Easterner. The term has come into usage as a replacement of the term Near East beginning in the early 20th century. Arabs, Turks, Persians, Kurds, and Azeris constitute the largest ethnic groups in the region by population. Indigenous minorities of the Middle East include Jews, Assyrians and other Arameans, Baloch, Berbers, Copts, Druze, Lurs, Mandaeans, Samaritans, Shabaks, Tats, in the Middle East, there is also a Romani community. European ethnic groups form a diaspora in the region include Albanians, Bosniaks, Circassians, Crimean Tatars, Franco-Levantines. Among other migrant populations are Bengalis as well as other Indians, Chinese, Filipinos, Indonesians, Pakistanis, the history of the Middle East dates back to ancient times, with the importance of the region being recognized for millennia. Most of the countries border the Persian Gulf have vast reserves of crude oil. The term Middle East may have originated in the 1850s in the British India Office, however, it became more widely known when American naval strategist Alfred Thayer Mahan used the term in 1902 to designate the area between Arabia and India. During this time the British and Russian Empires were vying for influence in Central Asia, Mahan realized not only the strategic importance of the region, but also of its center, the Persian Gulf. Mahan first used the term in his article The Persian Gulf and International Relations, published in September 1902 in the National Review, a British journal. The Middle East, if I may adopt a term which I have not seen, will some day need its Malta, as well as its Gibraltar, it does not follow that either will be in the Persian Gulf. The British Navy should have the facility to concentrate in force if occasion arise, about Aden, India, mahans article was reprinted in The Times and followed in October by a 20-article series entitled The Middle Eastern Question, written by Sir Ignatius Valentine Chirol. During this series, Sir Ignatius expanded the definition of Middle East to include regions of Asia which extend to the borders of India or command the approaches to India. After the series ended in 1903, The Times removed quotation marks from subsequent uses of the term, in the late 1930s, the British established the Middle East Command, which was based in Cairo, for its military forces in the region. After that time, the term Middle East gained broader usage in Europe, the description Middle has also led to some confusion over changing definitions. Before the First World War, Near East was used in English to refer to the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire, while Middle East referred to Iran, the Caucasus, Afghanistan, Central Asia, and Turkestan. The first official use of the term Middle East by the United States government was in the 1957 Eisenhower Doctrine, the Associated Press Stylebook says that Near East formerly referred to the farther west countries while Middle East referred to the eastern ones, but that now they are synonymous
2.
Iraq
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The capital, and largest city, is Baghdad. The main ethnic groups are Arabs and Kurds, others include Assyrians, Turkmen, Shabakis, Yazidis, Armenians, Mandeans, Circassians, around 95% of the countrys 36 million citizens are Muslims, with Christianity, Yarsan, Yezidism, and Mandeanism also present. The official languages of Iraq are Arabic and Kurdish, two major rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, run south through Iraq and into the Shatt al-Arab near the Persian Gulf. These rivers provide Iraq with significant amounts of fertile land, the region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, historically known as Mesopotamia, is often referred to as the cradle of civilisation. It was here that mankind first began to read, write, create laws, the area has been home to successive civilisations since the 6th millennium BC. Iraq was the centre of the Akkadian, Sumerian, Assyrian and it was also part of the Median, Achaemenid, Hellenistic, Parthian, Sassanid, Roman, Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid, Ayyubid, Mongol, Safavid, Afsharid, and Ottoman empires. Iraqs modern borders were mostly demarcated in 1920 by the League of Nations when the Ottoman Empire was divided by the Treaty of Sèvres, Iraq was placed under the authority of the United Kingdom as the British Mandate of Mesopotamia. A monarchy was established in 1921 and the Kingdom of Iraq gained independence from Britain in 1932, in 1958, the monarchy was overthrown and the Iraqi Republic created. Iraq was controlled by the Arab Socialist Baath Party from 1968 until 2003, after an invasion by the United States and its allies in 2003, Saddam Husseins Baath Party was removed from power and multi-party parliamentary elections were held in 2005. The American presence in Iraq ended in 2011, but the Iraqi insurgency continued and intensified as fighters from the Syrian Civil War spilled into the country, the Arabic name العراق al-ʿIrāq has been in use since before the 6th century. There are several suggested origins for the name, one dates to the Sumerian city of Uruk and is thus ultimately of Sumerian origin, as Uruk was the Akkadian name for the Sumerian city of Urug, containing the Sumerian word for city, UR. An Arabic folk etymology for the name is rooted, well-watered. During the medieval period, there was a region called ʿIrāq ʿArabī for Lower Mesopotamia and ʿIrāq ʿajamī, for the region now situated in Central and Western Iran. The term historically included the south of the Hamrin Mountains. The term Sawad was also used in early Islamic times for the region of the plain of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. In English, it is either /ɪˈrɑːk/ or /ɪˈræk/, the American Heritage Dictionary, the pronunciation /aɪˈræk/ is frequently heard in U. S. media. Since approximately 10,000 BC, Iraq was one of centres of a Caucasoid Neolithic culture where agriculture, the following Neolithic period is represented by rectangular houses. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gypsum, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations
3.
Syria
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Syrias capital and largest city is Damascus. Religious groups include Sunnis, Christians, Alawites, Druze, Mandeans, Shiites, Salafis, Sunni Arabs make up the largest religious group in Syria. Its capital Damascus and largest city Aleppo are among the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, in the Islamic era, Damascus was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate and a provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate in Egypt. The post-independence period was tumultuous, and a number of military coups. In 1958, Syria entered a union with Egypt called the United Arab Republic. Syria was under Emergency Law from 1963 to 2011, effectively suspending most constitutional protections for citizens, Bashar al-Assad has been president since 2000 and was preceded by his father Hafez al-Assad, who was in office from 1970 to 2000. Mainstream modern academic opinion strongly favours the argument that the Greek word is related to the cognate Ἀσσυρία, Assyria, in the past, others believed that it was derived from Siryon, the name that the Sidonians gave to Mount Hermon. However, the discovery of the inscription in 2000 seems to support the theory that the term Syria derives from Assyria. The area designated by the word has changed over time, since approximately 10,000 BC, Syria was one of centers of Neolithic culture where agriculture and cattle breeding appeared for the first time in the world. The following Neolithic period is represented by houses of Mureybet culture. At the time of the pre-pottery Neolithic, people used vessels made of stone, gyps, finds of obsidian tools from Anatolia are evidences of early trade relations. Cities of Hamoukar and Emar played an important role during the late Neolithic, archaeologists have demonstrated that civilization in Syria was one of the most ancient on earth, perhaps preceded by only those of Mesopotamia. The earliest recorded indigenous civilisation in the region was the Kingdom of Ebla near present-day Idlib, gifts from Pharaohs, found during excavations, confirm Eblas contact with Egypt. One of the earliest written texts from Syria is an agreement between Vizier Ibrium of Ebla and an ambiguous kingdom called Abarsal c.2300 BC. The Northwest Semitic language of the Amorites is the earliest attested of the Canaanite languages, Mari reemerged during this period, and saw renewed prosperity until conquered by Hammurabi of Babylon. Ugarit also arose during this time, circa 1800 BC, close to modern Latakia, Ugaritic was a Semitic language loosely related to the Canaanite languages, and developed the Ugaritic alphabet. The Ugarites kingdom survived until its destruction at the hands of the marauding Indo-European Sea Peoples in the 12th century BC, Yamhad was described in the tablets of Mari as the mightiest state in the near east and as having more vassals than Hammurabi of Babylon. Yamhad imposed its authority over Alalakh, Qatna, the Hurrians states, the army of Yamhad campaigned as far away as Dēr on the border of Elam
4.
Turkey
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Turkey, officially the Republic of Turkey, is a transcontinental country in Eurasia, mainly in Anatolia in Western Asia, with a smaller portion on the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. Turkey is a democratic, secular, unitary, parliamentary republic with a cultural heritage. The country is encircled by seas on three sides, the Aegean Sea is to the west, the Black Sea to the north, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. The Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara, and the Dardanelles, Ankara is the capital while Istanbul is the countrys largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Approximately 70-80% of the countrys citizens identify themselves as ethnic Turks, other ethnic groups include legally recognised and unrecognised minorities. Kurds are the largest ethnic minority group, making up approximately 20% of the population, the area of Turkey has been inhabited since the Paleolithic by various ancient Anatolian civilisations, as well as Assyrians, Greeks, Thracians, Phrygians, Urartians and Armenians. After Alexander the Greats conquest, the area was Hellenized, a process continued under the Roman Empire. The Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm ruled Anatolia until the Mongol invasion in 1243, the empire reached the peak of its power in the 16th century, especially during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent. During the war, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian, following the war, the conglomeration of territories and peoples that formerly comprised the Ottoman Empire was partitioned into several new states. Turkey is a member of the UN, an early member of NATO. Turkeys growing economy and diplomatic initiatives have led to its recognition as a regional power while her location has given it geopolitical, the name of Turkey is based on the ethnonym Türk. The first recorded use of the term Türk or Türük as an autonym is contained in the Old Turkic inscriptions of the Göktürks of Central Asia, the English name Turkey first appeared in the late 14th century and is derived from Medieval Latin Turchia. Similarly, the medieval Khazar Empire, a Turkic state on the shores of the Black. The medieval Arabs referred to the Mamluk Sultanate as al-Dawla al-Turkiyya, the Ottoman Empire was sometimes referred to as Turkey or the Turkish Empire among its European contemporaries. The Anatolian peninsula, comprising most of modern Turkey, is one of the oldest permanently settled regions in the world, various ancient Anatolian populations have lived in Anatolia, from at least the Neolithic period until the Hellenistic period. Many of these peoples spoke the Anatolian languages, a branch of the larger Indo-European language family, in fact, given the antiquity of the Indo-European Hittite and Luwian languages, some scholars have proposed Anatolia as the hypothetical centre from which the Indo-European languages radiated. The European part of Turkey, called Eastern Thrace, has also been inhabited since at least forty years ago. It is the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date, the settlement of Troy started in the Neolithic Age and continued into the Iron Age
5.
Arabs
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Arabs are an ethnic group inhabiting the Arab world. They primarily live in the Arab states in Western Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, the Arabs are first mentioned in the mid-ninth century BCE as a tribal people dwelling in the central Arabian Peninsula. The Arabs appear to have been under the vassalage of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, tradition holds that Arabs descend from Ishmael, the son of Abraham. The Arabian Desert is the birthplace of Arab, there are other Arab groups as well that spread in the land and existed for millennia. Before the expansion of the Caliphate, Arab referred to any of the largely nomadic Semitic people from the northern to the central Arabian Peninsula and Syrian Desert. Presently, Arab refers to a number of people whose native regions form the Arab world due to spread of Arabs throughout the region during the early Arab conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries. The Arabs forged the Rashidun, Umayyad and the Abbasid caliphates, whose borders reached southern France in the west, China in the east, Anatolia in the north, and this was one of the largest land empires in history. The Great Arab Revolt has had as big an impact on the modern Middle East as the World War I, the war signaled the end of the Ottoman Empire. They are modern states and became significant as distinct political entities after the fall and defeat, following adoption of the Alexandria Protocol in 1944, the Arab League was founded on 22 March 1945. The Charter of the Arab League endorsed the principle of an Arab homeland whilst respecting the sovereignty of its member states. Beyond the boundaries of the League of Arab States, Arabs can also be found in the global diaspora, the ties that bind Arabs are ethnic, linguistic, cultural, historical, identical, nationalist, geographical and political. The Arabs have their own customs, language, architecture, art, literature, music, dance, media, cuisine, dress, society, sports, the total number of Arabs are an estimated 450 million. This makes them the second largest ethnic group after the Han Chinese. Arabs are a group in terms of religious affiliations and practices. In the pre-Islamic era, most Arabs followed polytheistic religions, some tribes had adopted Christianity or Judaism, and a few individuals, the hanifs, apparently observed monotheism. Today, Arabs are mainly adherents of Islam, with sizable Christian minorities, Arab Muslims primarily belong to the Sunni, Shiite, Ibadi, Alawite, Druze and Ismaili denominations. Arab Christians generally follow one of the Eastern Christian Churches, such as the Maronite, Coptic Orthodox, Greek Orthodox, Greek Catholic, or Chaldean churches. Listed among the booty captured by the army of king Shalmaneser III of Assyria in the Battle of Qarqar are 1000 camels of Gi-in-di-buu the ar-ba-a-a or Gindibu belonging to the Arab
6.
Early Muslim conquests
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The early Muslim conquests also referred to as the Arab conquests and early Islamic conquests began with the Islamic Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century. He established a new unified polity in the Arabian Peninsula which under the subsequent Rashidun, the resulting empire stretched from the borders of China and the Indian subcontinent, across Central Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, Sicily, and the Iberian Peninsula, to the Pyrenees. The Muslim conquests brought about the collapse of the Sassanid Empire, the reasons for the Muslim success are hard to reconstruct in hindsight, primarily because only fragmentary sources from the period have survived. Most historians agree that the Sassanid Persian and Byzantine Roman empires were militarily and economically exhausted from decades of fighting one another, in the case of Byzantine Egypt, Palestine and Syria, these lands had only a few years before being reclaimed from the Persians. The estimates for the size of the Islamic Caliphate suggest it was more than thirteen million square kilometers, the last of these wars ended with victory for the Byzantines, Emperor Heraclius regained all lost territories, and restored the True Cross to Jerusalem in 629. According to George Liska, the unnecessarily prolonged Byzantine–Persian conflict opened the way for Islam, in late 620s Muhammad had already managed to conquer and unify much of Arabia under Muslim rule, and it was under his leadership that the first Muslim-Byzantine skirmishes took place. The province of Syria was the first to be wrested from Byzantine control, on the heels of their victory, the Arab armies took Damascus in 636, with Baalbek, Homs, and Hama to follow soon afterwards. However, other fortified towns continued to resist despite the rout of the army and had to be conquered individually. Jerusalem fell in 638, Caesarea in 640, while others held out until 641, the Byzantine province of Egypt held strategic importance for its grain production, naval yards, and as a base for further conquests in Africa. The Muslim general Amr ibn al-As began the conquest of the province on his own initiative in 639, nevertheless, the province was scarcely urbanized and the defenders lost hope of receiving reinforcements from Constantinople when the emperor Heraclius died in 641. The last major center to fall into Arab hands was Alexandria, according to Hugh Kennedy, Of all the early Muslim conquests, that of Egypt was the swiftest and most complete. Seldom in history can so massive a political change have happened so swiftly, after an Arab incursion into Sasanian territories, the energetic king Yazdgerd III, who had just ascended the Persian throne, raised an army to resist the invasion. However, the Persians suffered a defeat at the Battle of al-Qadisiyyah in 636. As a result, the Arab-Muslims gained control over the whole of Iraq, including Ctesiphon, the Persian forces withdrew over the Zagros mountains and the Arab army pursued them across the Iranian plateau, where the fate of the Sasanian empire was sealed at the Battle of Nahavand. In the aftermath of their victory over the army, the invaders still had to contend with a collection of militarily weak. It took decades to bring all under control of the caliphate. The rapidity of the early conquests has received various explanations, contemporary Christian writers conceived them as Gods punishment visited on their fellow Christians for their sins. Early Muslim historians viewed them as a reflection of religious zeal of the conquerors, according to Chase F. Robinson, it is likely that Muslim forces were often outnumbered, but, unlike their opponents, they were fast, well coordinated and highly motivated
7.
Arabic
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Arabic is a Central Semitic language that was first spoken in Iron Age northwestern Arabia and is now the lingua franca of the Arab world. Arabic is also the language of 1.7 billion Muslims. It is one of six languages of the United Nations. The modern written language is derived from the language of the Quran and it is widely taught in schools and universities, and is used to varying degrees in workplaces, government, and the media. The two formal varieties are grouped together as Literary Arabic, which is the language of 26 states. Modern Standard Arabic largely follows the standards of Quranic Arabic. Much of the new vocabulary is used to denote concepts that have arisen in the post-Quranic era, Arabic has influenced many languages around the globe throughout its history. During the Middle Ages, Literary Arabic was a vehicle of culture in Europe, especially in science, mathematics. As a result, many European languages have borrowed many words from it. Many words of Arabic origin are found in ancient languages like Latin. Balkan languages, including Greek, have acquired a significant number of Arabic words through contact with Ottoman Turkish. Arabic has also borrowed words from languages including Greek and Persian in medieval times. Arabic is a Central Semitic language, closely related to the Northwest Semitic languages, the Ancient South Arabian languages, the Semitic languages changed a great deal between Proto-Semitic and the establishment of the Central Semitic languages, particularly in grammar. Innovations of the Central Semitic languages—all maintained in Arabic—include, The conversion of the suffix-conjugated stative formation into a past tense, the conversion of the prefix-conjugated preterite-tense formation into a present tense. The elimination of other prefix-conjugated mood/aspect forms in favor of new moods formed by endings attached to the prefix-conjugation forms, the development of an internal passive. These features are evidence of descent from a hypothetical ancestor. In the southwest, various Central Semitic languages both belonging to and outside of the Ancient South Arabian family were spoken and it is also believed that the ancestors of the Modern South Arabian languages were also spoken in southern Arabia at this time. To the north, in the oases of northern Hijaz, Dadanitic and Taymanitic held some prestige as inscriptional languages, in Najd and parts of western Arabia, a language known to scholars as Thamudic C is attested
8.
Syriac language
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Syriac /ˈsɪri. æk/, also known as Syriac Aramaic, is a dialect of Middle Aramaic that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent and Eastern Arabia. Indeed, Syriac literature comprises roughly 90% of the extant Aramaic literature, Old Aramaic was adopted by the Neo-Assyrian Empire when they conquered the various Aramean city-kingdoms to its west. The Achaemenid Empire, which rose after the fall of the Assyrian Empire, also adopted Old Aramaic as its official language, during the course of the third and fourth centuries AD, the inhabitants of the region began to embrace Christianity. Along with Latin and Greek, Syriac became one of the three most important Christian languages in the centuries of the Christian Era. Primarily a Christian medium of expression, Syriac had a cultural and literary influence on the development of Arabic. Syriac remains the language of Syriac Christianity to this day. Syriac is a Middle Aramaic language and, as such, a language of the Northwestern branch of the Semitic family and it is written in the Syriac alphabet, a derivation of the Aramaic alphabet. Syriac was the local accent of Aramaic in Edessa, that evolved under the influence of Church of the East and it has been found as far afield as Hadrians Wall in Ancient Britain, with inscriptions written by Assyrian and Aramean soldiers of the Roman Empire. Modern Syriac/Modern Syriac Aramaic is an occasionally used to refer to the modern Eastern Aramaic languages. In this terminology, Modern Syriac is divided into, Modern Western Syriac Aramaic, note however that these are sometimes excluded from the category of Modern Syriac. The modern varieties are, therefore, not discussed in this article, in 132 BC, the kingdom of Osroene was founded in Edessa and Proto-Syriac evolved in that kingdom. Many Syriac-speakers still look to Edessa as the cradle of their language, there are about eighty extant early Syriac inscriptions, dated to the first three centuries AD. All of these examples of the language are non-Christian. As an official language, Syriac was given a relatively coherent form, style, in the 3rd century, churches in Edessa began to use Syriac as the language of worship. There is evidence that the adoption of Syriac, the language of the Assyrian people, was to effect mission, much literary effort was put into the production of an authoritative translation of the Bible into Syriac, the Peshitta. At the same time, Ephrem the Syrian was producing the most treasured collection of poetry, in 489, many Syriac-speaking Christians living in the eastern reaches of the Roman Empire fled to the Sassanid Empire to escape persecution and growing animosity with Greek-speaking Christians. The Christological differences with the Church of the East led to the bitter Nestorian schism in the Syriac-speaking world, as a result, Syriac developed distinctive western and eastern varieties. Syriac literature is by far the most prodigious of the various Aramaic languages and its corpus covers poetry, prose, theology, liturgy, hymnody, history, philosophy, science, medicine and natural history
9.
Euphrates
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The Euphrates is the longest and one of the most historically important rivers of Western Asia. Together with the Tigris, it is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia, originating in eastern Turkey, the Euphrates flows through Syria and Iraq to join the Tigris in the Shatt al-Arab, which empties into the Persian Gulf. The Ancient Greek form Euphrátēs was borrowed from Old Persian Ufrātu, the Elamite name is ultimately derived from the Sumerian Buranuna, possibly through the Akkadian name. In Akkadian the river was similarly called Purattu, which has been perpetuated in Semitic languages, the Elamite, Akkadian, and possibly Sumerian forms are suggested to be from an unrecorded substrate language. The earliest references to the Euphrates come from texts found in Shuruppak and pre-Sargonic Nippur in southern Iraq. In these texts, written in Sumerian, the Euphrates is called Buranuna, the name could also be written KIB. NUN. or dKIB. NUN, with the prefix d indicating that the river was a divinity. In Sumerian, the name of the city of Sippar in modern-day Iraq was also a written UD. KIB. NUN, the Euphrates is the longest river of Western Asia. It emerges from the confluence of the Kara Su or Western Euphrates, the same figures are given by Isaev and Mikhailova. The length of the Shatt al-Arab, which connects the Euphrates, both the Kara Su and the Murat Su rise northwest from Lake Van at elevations of 3,290 metres and 3,520 metres amsl, respectively. At the location of the Keban Dam, the two rivers, now combined into the Euphrates, have dropped to an elevation of 693 metres amsl, from Keban to the Syrian–Turkish border, the river drops another 368 metres over a distance of less than 600 kilometres. The Euphrates receives most of its water in the form of rainfall and melting snow, discharge in these two months accounts for 36 percent of the total annual discharge of the Euphrates, or even 60–70 percent according to one source, while low runoff occurs in summer and autumn. The discharge regime of the Euphrates has changed dramatically since the construction of the first dams in the 1970s, data on Euphrates discharge collected after 1990 show the impact of the construction of the numerous dams in the Euphrates and of the increased withdrawal of water for irrigation. Average discharge at Hīt after 1990 has dropped to 356 cubic metres per second, the seasonal variability has equally changed. The pre-1990 peak volume recorded at Hīt was 7,510 cubic metres per second, the minimum volume at Hīt remained relatively unchanged, rising from 55 cubic metres per second before 1990 to 58 cubic metres per second afterward. In Syria, three rivers add their water to the Euphrates, the Sajur, the Balikh and the Khabur and these rivers rise in the foothills of the Taurus Mountains along the Syro–Turkish border and add comparatively little water to the Euphrates. The Sajur is the smallest of these tributaries, emerging from two streams near Gaziantep and draining the plain around Manbij before emptying into the reservoir of the Tishrin Dam. The Balikh receives most of its water from a spring near Ayn al-Arus. In terms of length, drainage basin and discharge, the Khabur is the largest of these three and its main karstic springs are located around Ras al-Ayn, from where the Khabur flows southeast past Al-Hasakah, where the river turns south and drains into the Euphrates near Busayrah
10.
Tigris
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The Tigris is the eastern member of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the mountains of southeastern Turkey through Iraq, the Tigris is 1,850 km long, rising in the Taurus Mountains of eastern Turkey about 25 km southeast of the city of Elazig and about 30 km from the headwaters of the Euphrates. The river then flows for 400 km through Turkish territory before becoming the border between Syria and Turkey and this stretch of 44 km is the only part of the river that is located in Syria. Close to its confluence with the Euphrates, the Tigris splits into several channels, First, the artificial Shatt al-Hayy branches off, to join the Euphrates near Nasiriyah. Second, the Shatt al-Muminah and Majar-al-Kabir branch off to feed the Central Marshes, further downstream, two other distributary channels branch off, which feed the Hawizeh Marshes. The main channel continues southwards and is joined by the Al-Kassarah, finally, the Tigris joins the Euphrates near al-Qurnah to form the Shatt-al-Arab. According to Pliny and other ancient historians, the Euphrates originally had its outlet into the sea separate from that of the Tigris, Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, stands on the banks of the Tigris. The port city of Basra straddles the Shatt al-Arab, in ancient times, many of the great cities of Mesopotamia stood on or near the Tigris, drawing water from it to irrigate the civilization of the Sumerians. Notable Tigris-side cities included Nineveh, Ctesiphon, and Seleucia, while the city of Lagash was irrigated by the Tigris via a canal dug around 2400 B. C, the Tigris has long been an important transport route in a largely desert country. Shallow-draft vessels can go as far as Baghdad, but rafts are needed for transport upstream to Mosul, General Francis Rawdon Chesney hauled two steamers overland through Syria in 1836 to explore the possibility of an overland and river route to India. One steamer, the Tigris, was wrecked in a storm which sank, Chesney proved the river navigable to powered craft. Later, the Euphrates and Tigris Steam Navigation Company was established in 1861 by the Lynch Brothers trading company and they had 2 steamers in service. By 1908 ten steamers were on the river, tourists boarded steam yachts to venture inland as this was the first age of archaeological tourism, and the sites of Ur and Ctesiphon became popular to European travelers. In the First World War, during the British conquest of Ottoman Mesopotamia, Indian, see Siege of Kut and the Fall of Baghdad. The Tigris Flotilla included vessels Clio, Espiegle, Lawrence, Odin, armed tug Comet, armed launches Lewis Pelly, Miner, Shaitan, Sumana, and stern wheelers Muzaffari/Mozaffir. These were joined by Royal Navy Fly-class gunboats Butterfly, Cranefly, Dragonfly, Mayfly, Sawfly, Snakefly, and Mantis, Moth, the Ancient Greek form Tigris was borrowed from Old Persian Tigrā, itself from Elamite Tigra, itself from Sumerian Idigna. The Sumerian form was borrowed into Akkadian as Idiqlat, and from there into the other Semitic languages, another name for the Tigris used in Middle Persian was Arvand Rud, literally swift river. Today, however, Arvand Rud refers to the confluence of the Euphrates, in Kurdish, it is also known as Ava Mezin, the Great Water
11.
Mesopotamia
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In the Iron Age, it was controlled by the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian Empires. The Sumerians and Akkadians dominated Mesopotamia from the beginning of history to the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. It fell to Alexander the Great in 332 BC, and after his death, around 150 BC, Mesopotamia was under the control of the Parthian Empire. Mesopotamia became a battleground between the Romans and Parthians, with parts of Mesopotamia coming under ephemeral Roman control. In AD226, eastern part of it fell to the Sassanid Persians, division of Mesopotamia between Roman and Sassanid Empires lasted until the 7th century Muslim conquest of Persia of the Sasanian Empire and Muslim conquest of the Levant from Byzantines. A number of primarily neo-Assyrian and Christian native Mesopotamian states existed between the 1st century BC and 3rd century AD, including Adiabene, Osroene, and Hatra, Mesopotamia is the site of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. The regional toponym Mesopotamia comes from the ancient Greek root words μέσος middle and ποταμός river and it is used throughout the Greek Septuagint to translate the Hebrew equivalent Naharaim. In the Anabasis, Mesopotamia was used to designate the land east of the Euphrates in north Syria, the Aramaic term biritum/birit narim corresponded to a similar geographical concept. The neighbouring steppes to the west of the Euphrates and the part of the Zagros Mountains are also often included under the wider term Mesopotamia. A further distinction is made between Northern or Upper Mesopotamia and Southern or Lower Mesopotamia. Upper Mesopotamia, also known as the Jazira, is the area between the Euphrates and the Tigris from their sources down to Baghdad, Lower Mesopotamia is the area from Baghdad to the Persian Gulf and includes Kuwait and parts of western Iran. In modern academic usage, the term Mesopotamia often also has a chronological connotation and it is usually used to designate the area until the Muslim conquests, with names like Syria, Jazirah, and Iraq being used to describe the region after that date. It has been argued that these later euphemisms are Eurocentric terms attributed to the region in the midst of various 19th-century Western encroachments, Mesopotamia encompasses the land between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, both of which have their headwaters in the Armenian Highlands. Both rivers are fed by tributaries, and the entire river system drains a vast mountainous region. Overland routes in Mesopotamia usually follow the Euphrates because the banks of the Tigris are frequently steep and difficult. The climate of the region is semi-arid with a vast desert expanse in the north which gives way to a 15,000 square kilometres region of marshes, lagoons, mud flats, in the extreme south, the Euphrates and the Tigris unite and empty into the Persian Gulf. In the marshlands to the south of the area, a complex water-borne fishing culture has existed since prehistoric times, periodic breakdowns in the cultural system have occurred for a number of reasons. Alternatively, military vulnerability to invasion from marginal hill tribes or nomadic pastoralists has led to periods of trade collapse and these trends have continued to the present day in Iraq
12.
Shatt al-Arab
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The southern end of the river constitutes the border between Iraq and Iran down to the mouth of the river as it discharges into the Persian Gulf. The river is significant because it forms a natural border between Iran and the Arab world. It varies in width from about 232 metres at Basra to 800 metres at its mouth and it is thought that the waterway formed relatively recently in geologic time, with the Tigris and Euphrates originally emptying into the Persian Gulf via a channel further to the west. The Karun river, a tributary joins the waterway from the Iranian side, deposits large amounts of silt into the river. The area is judged to hold the largest date palm forest in the world, in the mid-1970s, the region included 17 to 18 million date palms, an estimated one-fifth of the worlds 90 million palm trees. But by 2002, war, salt, and pests had wiped out more than 14 million of the palms, many of the remaining 3 to 4 million trees are in poor condition. In Middle Persian literature and the Shahnama, the name اروند Arvand is used for the Tigris, Iranians also used this name specifically to designate the Shatt al-Arab during the later Pahlavi period, and continue to do so after the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The Iranian cities of Abadan and Khorramshahr and the Iraqi city, the tribes on both sides of the lower waterway, however, are Marsh Arabs, and the Ottoman Empire claimed to represent them. Tensions between the empires that extended across a wide range of religious, cultural and political conflicts. The Second Treaty of Erzurum was signed by the two parties in 1847 after protracted negotiations, which included British and Russian delegates. A protocol between the Ottomans and the Persians was signed in Istanbul in 1913, which declared that the Ottoman-Persian frontier run along the thalweg, in 1937, Iran and Iraq signed a treaty that settled the dispute over control of the Shatt al-Arab. By the late 1960s, the build-up of Iranian power under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, in April 1969, Iran abrogated the 1937 treaty over the Shatt al-Arab, and as such, Iran ceased paying tolls to Iraq when its ships used the Shatt al-Arab. Iraq threatened war over the Iranian move, but when on 24 April 1969 an Iranian tanker escorted by Iranian warships sailed down the Shatt al-Arab, Iraq being the militarily weaker state did nothing. The Iranian abrogation of the 1937 treaty marked the beginning of a period of acute Iraqi-Iranian tension that was to last until the Algiers Accords of 1975, all United Nations attempts to intervene as mediators were rebuffed. Under Saddam Hussein, Baathist Iraq claimed the entire waterway up to the Iranian shore as its territory, in response, Iran in the early 1970s became the main patron of Iraqi Kurdish groups fighting for independence from Iraq. In 1980, Hussein released a statement claiming to abrogate the treaty that he signed, international law, however, holds that in all cases no bilateral or multilateral treaty can be abrogated by one party only. The main thrust of the movement on the ground was across the waterway which was the stage for most of the military battles between the two armies. The waterway was Iraqs only outlet to the Persian Gulf, and thus, its shipping lanes were greatly affected by continuous Iranian attacks
13.
Basra Governorate
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Basra Governorate is a governorate in southern Iraq, bordering Kuwait to the south and Iran to the east. The capital is the city of Basra, other districts of Basra include Al-Qurnah, Az Zubayr, Al Midaina, Shatt Al Arab, Abu Al Khaseeb and Al Faw located on the Persian Gulf. The mandate was succeeded by the Kingdom of Iraq in 1932, the Shiite population suffered long and hard under Saddams rule. It was started in Basra by angry soldiers, according to legend after they fired at a giant public portrait of Saddam Hussein. Mass support on the streets followed, shouting slogans, executing Baath party members, leaders and secret police, the participants had expected support from American troops. But the Allied army at the time was occupied despite the 24th Infantry Division stationed only several miles from the city. The city of Basra didnt completely succumb to the rebels, a counterattack by some 6,000 loyalists from the Republican Guard held out against 5,000 defectors of the Iraqi army. From 2003 the governorate was one of the centres of warfare during the invasion of the British, the Battle of Basra took place between March 23 and April 7 between the British 1st Armoured Division forces under Major General Robin Brims, and Iraqi forces under General Ali Hassan al-Majid. Much of the heaviest combat in the war took place in the province in subsequent weeks, following the example of the Kurdistan Autonomous Region in northern Iraq, Basra has proposed uniting with the other provinces of Dhi Qar and Maysan as an autonomous region. On October 15,2005,691,024 people, some 96. 02%, voted for the new constitution
14.
Anatolia
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Anatolia, in geography known as Asia Minor, Asian Turkey, Anatolian peninsula, or Anatolian plateau, is the westernmost protrusion of Asia, which makes up the majority of modern-day Turkey. The region is bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Sea of Marmara forms a connection between the Black and Aegean Seas through the Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits and separates Anatolia from Thrace on the European mainland. Traditionally, Anatolia is considered to extend in the east to a line between the Gulf of Alexandretta and the Black Sea to the Armenian Highlands, thus, traditionally Anatolia is the territory that comprises approximately the western two-thirds of the Asian part of Turkey. The Turkification of Anatolia began under the Seljuk Empire in the late 11th century, however, various non-Turkic languages continue to be spoken by minorities in Anatolia today, including Kurdish, Assyrian, Armenian, Arabic, Laz, Georgian, and Greek. Traditionally, Anatolia is considered to extend in the east to a line running from the Gulf of Alexandretta to the Black Sea. This traditional geographical definition is used, for example, in the latest edition of Merriam-Websters Geographical Dictionary, under this definition, Anatolia is bounded to the east by the Armenian Highlands, and the Euphrates before that river bends to the southeast to enter Mesopotamia. To the southeast, it is bounded by the ranges that separate it from the Orontes valley in Syria, the first name the Greeks used for the Anatolian peninsula was Ἀσία, presumably after the name of the Assuwa league in western Anatolia. As the name of Asia came to be extended to areas east of the Mediterranean. The name Anatolia derives from the Greek ἀνατολή meaning “the East” or more literally “sunrise”, the precise reference of this term has varied over time, perhaps originally referring to the Aeolian, Ionian and Dorian colonies on the west coast of Asia Minor. In the Byzantine Empire, the Anatolic Theme was a theme covering the western, the modern Turkish form of Anatolia is Anadolu, which again derives from the Greek name Aνατολή. The Russian male name Anatoly and the French Anatole share the same linguistic origin, in English the name of Turkey for ancient Anatolia first appeared c. It is derived from the Medieval Latin Turchia, which was used by the Europeans to define the Seljuk controlled parts of Anatolia after the Battle of Manzikert. Human habitation in Anatolia dates back to the Paleolithic, neolithic Anatolia has been proposed as the homeland of the Indo-European language family, although linguists tend to favour a later origin in the steppes north of the Black Sea. However, it is clear that the Anatolian languages, the oldest branch of Indo-European, have spoken in Anatolia since at least the 19th century BC. The earliest historical records of Anatolia stem from the southeast of the region and are from the Mesopotamian-based Akkadian Empire during the reign of Sargon of Akkad in the 24th century BC, scholars generally believe the earliest indigenous populations of Anatolia were the Hattians and Hurrians. The region was famous for exporting raw materials, and areas of Hattian-, one of the numerous cuneiform records dated circa 20th century BC, found in Anatolia at the Assyrian colony of Kanesh, uses an advanced system of trading computations and credit lines. They were speakers of an Indo-European language, the Hittite language, originating from Nesa, they conquered Hattusa in the 18th century BC, imposing themselves over Hattian- and Hurrian-speaking populations. According to the most widely accepted Kurgan theory on the Proto-Indo-European homeland, however, the Hittites adopted the cuneiform script, invented in Mesopotamia
15.
Sinjar
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Sinjar, also known as Shingal is a town in Shingal District, Nineveh Province, Iraq near Mount Shingal. The town is inhabited mainly by Yazidis, with a Muslim Kurdish minority and its population in 2013 was estimated at 88,023. The important Chermera temple is found on the highest peak of the Sinjar Mountains, in 2007, several explosions set off by al-Qaeda in Iraq killed hundreds of Yazidis in Shingal. In the course of their second Northern Iraq offensive in August 2014, following the defeat against the Kurdish Peshmerga they seized the city of Shingal on 3 August. During the following days, IS militants perpetrated the Sinjar massacre, killing 2,000 Yazidi men and taking Yazidi women into slavery, according to a UN report,5,000 Yazidi civilians were killed during ISILs August offensive. On the night of 20 December 2014, in the course of a first offensive to retake it from Islamic State militants, however, the Kurdish advance into the city was stalled, as they faced fierce resistance from the ISIL militants inside the southern half of the city. On 13 November 2015, a day after launching a second offensive, Kurdish forces and Yazidi militias backed by US airstrikes, entered the city. Following the liberation of Sinjar, Yazidi groups engaged in looting and burning targeting Sunni Muslims. Yazidi genocide Military intervention against ISIL American-led intervention in Iraq Kurdification Arabization Ezidkhan
16.
Samarra
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Sāmarrā is a city in Iraq. It stands on the east bank of the Tigris in the Saladin Governorate,125 kilometers north of Baghdad, in 2003 the city had an estimated population of 348,700. Samarra was once in the Sunni Triangle of violence during the violence in Iraq. In the medieval times, Samarra was the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate, in 2007, UNESCO named Samarra one of its World Heritage Sites. The remains of prehistoric Samarra were first excavated between 1911 and 1914 by the German archaeologist Ernst Herzfeld, Samarra became the type site for the Samarra culture. Since 1946, the notebooks, letters, unpublished excavation reports and photographs have been in the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington, the civilization flourished alongside the Ubaid period, as one of the first town states in the Near East. It lasted from 5,500 BCE and eventually collapsed in 3,900 BCE, a city of Sur-marrati is insecurely identified with a fortified Assyrian site of Assyrian at al-Huwaysh on the Tigris opposite modern Samarra. The State Archives of Assyria Online identifies Surimarrat as the site of Samarra. In 836 the Abbasid Caliph Al-Mutasim founded a new capital at the banks of the Tigris, here he built extensive palace complexes surrounded by garrison settlements for his guards, mostly drawn from Central Asia and Iran or North Africa. Although quite often called Mamluk slave soldiers, their status was quite elevated, for his son al-Mutazz he built the large palace Bulkuwara. Samarra remained the residence of the caliph until 892, when al-Mutadid eventually returned to Baghdad, the city declined but maintained a mint until the early 10th century. After the collapse of the Abbasid empire in about 940 Samarra was abandoned and its population returned to Baghdad and the city rapidly declined. Its field of ruins is the only metropolis of late antiquity which is available for serious archaeology. This has made it an important pilgrimage centre for the Twelvers, in addition, Hakimah and Narjis, female relatives of the Muhammad and the Imams, held in high esteem by Muslims, are buried there, making this mosque one of the most significant sites of worship. In the eighteenth century, one of the most bloody battles of the 1730–1735 Ottoman–Persian War, the Battle of Samarra, took place, the engagement decided the fate of Ottoman Iraq and kept it under Istanbuls suzerainty until the First World War. Many local people were displaced by the dam, resulting in an increase in Samarras population, Samarra is a key city in Saladin Governorate, a major part of the so-called Sunni Triangle where insurgents were active during the Iraq War. Though Samarra is famous for its Shii holy sites, including the tombs of several Shii Imams, tensions arose between Sunnis and the Shia during the Iraq War. On February 22,2006, the dome of the al-Askari Mosque was bombed, setting off a period of rioting
17.
Khabur (Euphrates)
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Ultraman is a Japanese tokusatsu television series that first aired in 1966. Ultraman is a follow-up to the television series Ultra Q, though not technically a sequel or spin-off, the show was produced by Tsuburaya Productions, and was broadcast on Tokyo Broadcasting System from July 17,1966 to April 9,1967, with a total of 39 episodes. Although Ultraman is the first series to feature an Ultra-Crusader, it is actually the second show in the Ultra Series, in fact, Ultraman opens with the Ultra Q logo exploding into the Ultraman logo. Ultraman, and its hero, became a major pop culture phenomenon in Japan, spawning dozens of sequels, spin-offs, imitators. Ultramans central characters were created by Eiji Tsuburaya from Tsuburaya Productions, the shows predecessor was a series called Ultra Q, a black-and-white 28-episode series very much like the original Outer Limits. The name Woo ended up being used for an unrelated, yeti-like monster. Later, Tsuburaya Productions would ultimately produce a series dubbed Bio Planet WoO, in January 2006, Bemlar, then retitled Scientific Special Search Party, Bemlar, The main characters are a defense force, with the same Japanese name as the Science Special Search Party. One of the members, unknown to anyone, gained the ability to transform into a giant birdlike humanoid monster called Bemlar, who defends Earth from monsters, aliens and other threats. Unlike Woo, Bemlar was a tough and righteous fighter, and he looked similar in design to the title monster of the 1967 kaiju film Gappa. The plot was scrapped when it was worried viewers might have trouble telling the monsters apart, redman, The title hero of this project slightly resembled Ultraman as he came to be known, but he looked more demonic and had horns. He came to Earth after his planet was destroyed by aliens from Planet X, the characteristic Color Timer, more familiar to American audiences as the warning light on Ultramans chest, was added at the eleventh hour. The first series begins when Science Special Search Party member Shin Hayata is flying his plane, the sphere turns out to be the transport for a giant red-and-silver being who calls himself Ultraman. Feeling remorse for having killed the human, he merges his essence with Hayata to save him, the Ultraman series used various monster costumes, known as kaiju in Japan, prior to other series such as Kamen Rider and Super Sentai. The principals were played by famous monster suit actor Haruo Nakajima, another Toho actor, Satoshi Bin Furuya, was sought out for the role of Ultraman, because of his tall stature and perfect proportions. Nakajima had an outdoor-sports and martial-arts background, and they decided that Ultraman would not seem alien if he was using earth-bound martial arts techniques. So Ultramans fighting style was a mixture of grappling, Greco-Roman wrestling, and some Japanese martial arts, often costumes of famous monsters like Godzilla and Baragon would be recycled and altered, sometimes with nothing more than spray paint and often while the actor was still inside. Nakajima quipped once that the gait of some of the monsters he portrayed was due less to his acting than to the fumes he had to endure. Also, the expense of repairing the scale cities and landscapes used for battle scenes required economy of movement, not all monsters resembled Godzilla or a dinosaur
18.
Mosul
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Mosul is a major city in northern Iraq. Since October 2016 it has been the site of an operation led by the Iraqi Government, under Haider al-Abadi, in an effort to dislodge. The city has been under the control of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant since June 2014, and no westerner has entered the city until the latest initiative. The Battle of Mosul, an offensive to retake the city begun in October 2016, is the largest deployment of Iraqi forces since the 2003 invasion by U. S. Located some 400 km north of Baghdad, Mosul stands on the west bank of the Tigris, opposite the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh on the east bank. The metropolitan area has grown to encompass substantial areas on both the Left Bank and the Right Bank, as the two banks are described by the locals compared to the direction of Tigris. Mosuls population grew rapidly around the turn of the millennium and by 2004 was estimated to be 1,846,500, an estimated half million people fled Mosul in the second half of 2014 when the IS fought with government forces for control of the city. On November 17,2014, ISIS attacked the city of Mosul, ultimately killing seven civilians, while some residents returned, more fled in 2015 as fighting and violence increased, and US bombings pounded the city. Historically, important products of the area include Mosul marble and oil, the city of Mosul is home to the University of Mosul and its renowned Medical College, which together was one of the largest educational and research centers in Iraq and the Middle East. The University has since been closed, the Islamic States leadership in Mosul has kept the Medical College open but it is reported to be barely functional. The name of the city is first mentioned by Xenophon in his expeditionary logs in Achaemenid Assyria of 401 BC, there, he notes a small Assyrian town of Mépsila on the Tigris somewhere about where modern Mosul is today. Be that as it may, the name Mepsila is doubtless the root for the modern name, in its current Arabic form and spelling, the term Mosul, or rather Mawsil, stands for the linking point – or loosely, the Junction City, in Arabic. Mosul should not be confused with the ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh and this area is known today as the town of Nebi Yunus and is now populated largely by Kurds. It is the only neighborhood in Mosul. The site contains the tomb of the Biblical Jonah, as he lived and died in the capital of ancient Assyria. Today, this area has been absorbed into the Mosul metropolitan area. The indigenous Assyrians still refer to the city of Mosul as Nineveh. The ancient Nineveh was succeeded by Mepsila after the fall of Assyria between 612-599 BC at the hands of a coalition of Babylonians, Medes, Persians, Scythians, Cimmerians and Sagartians, the Assyrians largely abandoned the city, building new smaller settlements such as Mepsila nearby
19.
Deir ez-Zor
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Located 450 km to the northeast of the capital Damascus on the shores of the Euphrates River, Deir ez-Zor is the capital of the Deir ez-Zor Governorate. According to the 2004 census, it has a population of 211,857 people, among Syrians and neighbouring regions, Ad-Deir is used for short to indicate Deir ez Zor. Although Deir, which is Arabic for monastery, was thought to be kept throughout Medieval and Modern Age renaming, Zor, Deir ez-Zor is situated 85 km to the northwest of the archaeological remains of Dura-Europos and 120 km northwest of the remains of the ancient city of Mari. During Roman times it was an important trading post between the Roman Empire and India, conquered by Zenobia, it became part of the kingdom of Palmyra. After a successive wave of conquests, it was destroyed by the Mongols as they swept across the Middle East. The modern town was expanded by the Ottoman Empire in 1867 around the pre-existing town, in 1915, the city became a major destination point for Armenians subjected to death marches during the Armenian Genocide. A memorial commemorating the events was erected in the city in 1991, france occupied Deir ez-Zor in 1921 and made it the seat of a large garrison. Meanwhile, the region was ruled by Haj-Fadel Abboud, a member of an aristocratic family. In 1941 British-led forces defeated the Vichy French during the Syria-Lebanon campaign, which included a battle over Deir, in 1946 it became part of the independent Republic of Syria. On 21 September 2014, the Armenian memorial complex was blown up by militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, who had formerly been part of al-Nusra Front. On May 15,2015 at al-Amr, elite United States military forces attacked and killed ISIS militant Abu Sayyaf who was targeted for his financing of the war, Deir Ez Zor district is currently one of the few remaining Syrian Government strongholds in Eastern Syria. In May 2015, Islamic State militants launched an offensive, capturing Palmyra, the city was then effectively under siege by ISIS, leaving supplies to be solely delivered by transport helicopters. ISIS attempted to stop the supplies by daily attacking the Deir ez-Zor Airbase, however, their attempts failed due to the presence of elite Republican Guards of the 104th Airborne Brigade led by Brigadier General Issam Zahreddine. The siege led to the shortage of food and fuel in the city with frequent blackouts, world Food Programme and Russia air-dropped aid by air. In January 2015 Russian Lieutenant General Sergei Rudskoi said that 22 tonnes of aid were dropped over Deir ez-Zor using Russian parachute equipment on Syrian Il-76 transport planes. In late 2016 the Syrian government was distributing free bread rations to the residents of the city through the Syrian Red Crescent society. In August 2015, the Syrian government had suspended five bakeries providing the locals with food in order to distribute it to its soldiers, security personnel, al-Masdar News reported that in August 2015 civilians could be evacuated from the city for approximately $80 US dollars. Most of the 100,000 besieged civilians remain poor and jobless from the ongoing fighting
20.
Raqqa
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Raqqa, also called Rakka, al-Raqqah, and ar-Raqqah, is a city in Syria located on the northeast bank of the Euphrates River, about 160 kilometres east of Aleppo. It is located 40 kilometres east of the Tabqa Dam, Syrias largest dam, the Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine city and bishopric Callinicum was the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate between 796 and 809, under the reign of Caliph Harun al-Rashid. With a population of 220,488 based on the 2004 official census, during the Syrian Civil War, the city was captured in 2013 by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. ISIL went on to make the city its headquarters in Syria in 2014, as a result, the city has been hit by airstrikes from the Syrian government, Russia, the United States and several other countries. Most non-Sunni religious structures in the city have been destroyed by ISIL, the modern city traces its history to the Hellenistic period, with the foundation of the city of Nikephorion by the Seleucid king Seleucus I Nicator. His successor, Seleucus II Callinicus enlarged the city and renamed it after himself as Kallinikos, in Roman times, it was part of the province of Osrhoene, but had declined by the 4th century. Rebuilt by the Byzantine emperor Leo I in 466, it was named Leontopolis after him, the city played an important role in the Byzantine Empires relation with Sassanid Persia and the wars fought between two states. By treaty, it was recognized as one of the few official cross-border trading posts between the two empires. In 580, during war with Persia, the future emperor Maurice scored a victory over the Persians near the city. In the year 639 or 640, the city fell to the Muslim conqueror Iyad ibn Ghanm, since then it has figured in Arabic sources as al-Raqqah. At the surrender of the city, the Christian inhabitants concluded a treaty with Ibn Ghanm and this allowed them freedom of worship in their existing churches, but forbade the construction of new ones. The citys Jewish community also survived until at least the 12th century, Ibn Ghanms successor as governor of Raqqa and the Jazira, Said ibn Amir ibn Hidhyam, built the citys first mosque. This building was enlarged to monumental proportions, measuring some 73×108 metres, with a square brick minaret added later. The mosque survived until the early 20th century, being described by the German archaeologist Ernst Herzfeld in 1907, many companions of Muhammad lived in Raqqa. The city also contained a column with Alis autograph, but this was removed in the 12th century, the strategic importance of Raqqa grew during the wars at the end of the Umayyad period and the beginning of the Abbasid regime. Raqqa lay on the crossroads between Syria and Iraq and the road between Damascus, Palmyra, and the seat of the caliphate Resafa, al-Ruha. Between 771 and 772, the Abbasid caliph al-Mansur built a city about 200 metres to the west of Raqqa for a detachment of his Khorasanian Persian army. It was named al-Rāfiqah, the companion, the strength of the Abbasid imperial military is still visible in the impressive city wall of al-Rāfiqah
21.
Al-Hasakah
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Al-Hasakah, also known as Al-Hasakeh, Al-Kasaka or simply Hasakah, is the capital city of the Al-Hasakah Governorate and it is located in the far northeastern corner of Syria. With a population of 188,160 residents in 2004, Al-Hasakah is among the ten largest cities in Syria and it is the administrative center of a nahiyah consisting of 108 localities with a combined population of 251,570 in 2004. Al-Hasakah has a diverse population of Kurds, Arabs and Assyrians. The Khabur River runs through Al-Hasakah and the rest of the governorate, as a preliminary result of the ongoing Syrian Civil War, Al-Hasakah today is situated in Jazira Canton within the autonomous Federation of Northern Syria – Rojava framework. Al-Hasakah is 80 kilometres south of the Turkish border-city of Qamishli, the Khabur River, a tributary of the Euphrates River flows through the city, downriver from Ras al-Ayn, another border town. The Jaghjagh River flows into the Khabur River at Al-Hasakah, in the city centre, an ancient tell is identified by Dominique Charpin as the location of the city of Qirdahat. Another possibility is that it was the site of the ancient Aramean city of Magarisu, the etymology of Magarisu is Aramaic and means pasture land. The city was the capital of the Aramean state of Bit-Yahiri invaded by Assyrian kings Tukulti-Ninurta II, excavations in the tell discovered materials dating to the Middle-Assyrian, Byzantine and Islamic eras. The last level of occupation ended in the fifteenth century, a period of 1500 years separated between the Middle-Assyrian level and the Byzantine level. In Ottoman times the town was insignificant, todays settlement was established in April 1922 by a French military post. After the expulsion and genocide of the Armenians in the then Ottoman Empire many refugees fled to the city, during the French mandate period, Assyrians, fleeing ethnic cleansings in Iraq during the Simele massacre, established numerous villages along the Khabur River during the 1930s. French troops were stationed on the Citadel Hill during that time, in 1942 there were 7,835 inhabitants in al-Hasakah, several schools, two churches and a gas station. The new city grew from the 1950s to the center of the region. The economic boom of the cities of Qamishli and al-Hasakah was a result of the projects started in the 1960s which transformed Northeast Syria into the main cotton-growing area. The 1970s brought oil production from the oil fields of Qara Shuk, according to eyewitnesses, the action was a protest against the Syrian government. In 2012, Al-Hasakah which has a large Kurdish population, began witnessing protests of several people against the Syrian government. From 2013, the associated with the Kurdish Democratic Union Party. There were also clashes in the city between an Arab insurgent group and the YPG, on 1 August 2016 the Syrian Democratic Council opened a public office in Al-Hasakah
22.
Qamishli
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Qamishli or Qamishlo, is a city in northeastern Syria on the border with Turkey, adjoining the Turkish city of Nusaybin, and close to Iraq. According to the 2004 census, Qamishli had a population of 184,231, Qamishli is 680 kilometres northeast of Damascus. In the course of the Rojava conflict, Qamishli became the de facto capital of the Federation of Northern Syria – Rojava, the city was initially a small village inhabited by Assyrians/Syriacs called Syriac, ܒܝܬ ܙܠܝ̈ܢ, translit. Bēṯ Zālīn meaning House of Reeds, the current name is a Turkified form of it, where Kamış means reed in Turkish. With a population of 184,231, Qamishli is among the 10 largest cities in Syria by population, Qamishli is an ethnically mixed city, inhabited predominantly by Arabs, Assyrians, Kurds and Armenians, with Assyrians and Armenians making up a significant minority. The city is considered to be a Christian center in Syria and it was founded by Assyrian/Syriac refugees fleeing the Assyrian genocide in Anatolia. Today, Kurds, Assyrians, Arabs and Armenians live in the city, the pre-war Christian population of Qamishli was about 40,000, of whom 25,000 belonged to the Syriac Orthodox Church, the biggest church in the city. Today it is believed that half of all Christians have left the town, Qamishli was also home to a significant Jewish community. The origin of the Jews of Qamishli, unlike the Jews of Damascus and Aleppo who are a mixture of Sephardi Jews, in the 1930s the Jewish population of Qamishli numbered 3,000. After the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in 1947, the situation of the Jews of Qamishli deteriorated, the exodus of Jews from Syria peaked due to violence, such as the 1947 anti-Jewish riots in Aleppo. By 1963, the community had dwindled to 800, and after the Six-Day War it went down further to 150, Qamishli is situated at the base of the Taurus Mountains, located near the area of ancient Hurrian city of Urkesh which was founded during the fourth millennium BC. One of the most important funders of the development projects in the city was Masoud Asfar. Masoud, along with stepbrother, whose last name was Najjar, established the Asfar & Najjar Corporation, throughout the 1920s-1940s, the Asfar & Najjar Corporation funded hospitals, Assyrian schools, and churches throughout the city. At this same time, many Kurds, fleeing persecution from Iraq and Turkey, the city itself was officially founded as Qamishli in 1926 as a railway station on the Taurus railway. Qamishli, the second largest city in al-Hasakah Governorate, is considered a center for both the Kurdish and the Assyrian ethnic groups in Syria. It is renowned for throwing a large Christmas parade every year in December, in March 2004, during a chaotic soccer match, a 2004 Qamishli riots began when some people started praising Saddam Hussein, turning the match into political conflict against the Kurds. The riot expanded out of the stadium and weapons were used against people of Kurdish background, in the aftermath, at least 30 Kurds were killed as the Syrian security services took over the city. The event became known the Qamishli massacre, in June 2005, thousands of Kurds demonstrated in Qamishli to protest the assassination of Sheikh Khaznawi, a Kurdish cleric in Syria, resulting in the death of one policeman and injury to four Kurds
23.
Al-Hasakah Governorate
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Al-Hasakah Governorate is a governorate in the far north-east corner of Syria. It is distinguished by its fertile lands, plentiful water, picturesque nature and it was formerly known as Al-Jazira province. Prior to the Syrian Civil War nearly half of Syrias oil was extracted from the region, three soldiers were killed by armed militants in Al-Hasakah in an ambush during the Syrian Civil War on 24 March 2012. About a year later, Kurdish forces launched the 2013 Al-Hasakah offensive, after the battle of al-Hasakah in August 2016 between Kurds and the Bashar al-Assad regime, the area was mostly in Kurdish control. The population of the governorate, according to the official census, was 1,275,118, and was estimated to be 1,377,000 in 2007. Among the Sunni Muslims, mostly Kurds and Arabs, there were about 1,500 Circassians in 1938, in 1949, there were officially 155,643 inhabitants. The French geographers Fevret and Gibert estimated that there were about 50,000 Arabs,60,000 Kurds, a few thousands Jews and Yezidis and this list includes all cities, towns and villages with more than 5,000 inhabitants. The population figures are according to the 2004 official census. Tell Brak, Situated halfway between al-Hasakah city and the town of Qamishli. Excavations in the tell have revealed the Uyun Temple and King Naram-Sins palace-stronghold, Tell el Fakhariya Tell Hittin,15 layers of occupation have been identified
24.
Breadbasket
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The breadbasket of a country is a region which, because of richness of soil and/or advantageous climate, produces large quantities of wheat or other grain. Rice bowl is a term used to refer to Southeast Asia. Such regions may be the subject of political disputes which may even escalate into full military conflicts. Sicily and Africa were considered the breadbaskets of the Roman Republic, later on, Egypt was considered the breadbasket of the Roman Empire. Crimea was the source of a quantity of grain supplied to Greek city-states. Since subsistence agriculture was the dominant economic system in most of Moroccos history, all regions produced their own wheat and barley to feed themselves and their livestock. With the European commercial penetration in the half of the 19th century. The Chaouia and Doukkala plains became the most important suppliers of wheat for export and this is logical given their proximity to the coast. The ports of Casablanca and Feddala, todays Mohammedia, serviced the Chaouia Plain while the port of Mazagan serviced Doukkala, the Free State province is often considered the breadbasket of South Africa due to its wheat, sunflower and maize fields. The Overberg region in the Western Cape is also known as the breadbasket of South Africa due to its large wheat fields, rhodesia was known as the breadbasket of Africa, exporting wheat, tobacco, and corn to the rest of the continent and beyond. Rhodesia contained the most fertile farmland on the continent, the Punjab and Haryana regions are considered the breadbaskets of India. West Bengal is said to be the rice bowl of India, even though its rice production is just enough to be self-sufficient for the provinces large population, it is the largest producer of rice in India. The Punjab province is considered the breadbasket of Pakistan, sichuan has historically been known as the province of abundance due to its agricultural prowess. The regions on the banks of the Yellow River and Yangtze River southern Jiangsu, the Al-Jazira area in northwestern Syria, and its Euphrates basin is considered the countrys breadbasket due to its abundance of wheat. The plains of Java are considered the rice bowls of Indonesia, Kedah is considered the rice bowl of Malaysia, accounting for about half of Malaysias total production of rice. In 2008, the government of Kedah banned the conversion of fields to housing. The province of Nueva Ecija found on Luzon island is considered the granary of the Philippines because of the vast tracts of land used for rice production. The Chao Phraya delta is considered the bowl of Thailand
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Nineveh Governorate
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Nineveh Governorate is a governorate in northern Iraq that contains the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh. It was a part of Assyria from the 25th century BC to the 7th century AD, It has an area of 37,323 km2. Its chief city and provincial capital is Mosul, which lies across the Tigris river from the ruins of ancient Nineveh, Tal Afar is the second-biggest city. Before 1976, it was called Mosul Province and included the present-day Dohuk Governorate, a massive offensive to retake the city, dubbed Operation We Are Coming, Nineveh, began in October 2016. Its two cities endured the 2003 Invasion of Iraq and emerged unscathed, in 2004, Mosul and Tal Afar were fierce between US-led Iraqi insurgency. The insurgents moved to Nineveh after the Battle of Fallujah in 2004, after the invasion, the military of the province was led by David Petraeus of the 101st Airborne Division and later by Carter Ham as the multi-national brigade for Iraq. During the American civil head of the office of the Coalition Provisional Authority was a US Foreign Service Officer and former Kurdish refugee to the States. Mustafa administered her nominees on the council and through members of the Kashmoula family. In June 2004, Osama Kashmoula became the governor of the province. He was succeeded as interim Governor by Duraid Kashmoula, who was elected governor in January 2005, in April 2009, Atheel al-Nujaifi, a hardline Arab nationalist and member of Al-Hadba, became governor. While the Kurdish list proposed Hassan al-Allaf, an Arab affiliated with the Islamic Party, an offensive to retake Mosul from ISIL control began in October 2016, with Iraqi and Kurdish soldiers supported by a U. S. -led coalition of 60 nations. Neighboring Iraqi regions are Dohuk Governorate to the north, Erbil Governorate to the east, Saladin Governorate to the south-east, in the west it shares a border with Syria, mostly Al-Hasakah Governorate, and also Deir ez-Zor Governorate in the south. Now Makhmur District is part of Erbil Governorate, aqrah District and the northern part of Al-Shikhan District are parts of Dohuk Governorate. There are significant numbers of Arabs, Assyrians, Kurds, Turkmens as well as Yazidis both in towns and cities, and in their own villages and regions. There are also numbers of Armenians, Kawliya and Mandeans, Shabaks, in religion, the majority of Arabs are Sunni Muslim while Turkmen are mostly Shiite. Kurds are largely Sunni Muslim, although some follow the native Yarsan religion, Armenians are also exclusively Christian and mostly followers of the Armenian Apostolic Church. Yazidis, Shabaks and Mandeans follow their own beliefs, Shabakism, Yazidism. However, Arab Sunnis form a majority in the province, the main language spoken is Arabic
26.
Mardin Province
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Mardin Province, is a province of Turkey with a population of 744,606. The population was 835,173 in 2000, the capital of the Mardin Province is Mardin. Mardin comes from the Syriac word and means fortresses, the first known civilization were the Subarian-Hurrians who were then succeeded in 3000BCE by the Hurrians. The Elamites gained control around 2230 BCE. and were followed by the Babylonians, Hittites, Assyrians, Romans, the Christian community is concentrated on the Tur Abdin plateau and in the town of Midyat, with a smaller community in the provincial capital
27.
Levant
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The Levant is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean. The term Levant entered English in the late 15th century from French and it derives from the Italian Levante, meaning rising, implying the rising of the sun in the east. As such, it is equivalent to the Arabic term Mashriq. Eventually the term was restricted to the Muslim countries of Syria-Palestine, in 1581, England set up the Levant Company to monopolize commerce with the Ottoman Empire. The name Levant States was used to refer to the French mandate over Syria and this is probably the reason why the term Levant has come to be used synonymously with Syria-Palestine. Some scholars misunderstood the term thinking that it derives from the name of Lebanon, today the term is typically used in conjunction with prehistoric or ancient historical references. It does not include Anatolia, the Caucasus Mountains, or any part of the Arabian Peninsula proper, the Sinai Peninsula is sometimes included. The Levant has been described as the crossroads of western Asia, the eastern Mediterranean, and northeast Africa, the populations of the Levant share not only the geographic position, but cuisine, some customs, and a very long history. They are often referred to as Levantines, the term Levant, which appeared in English in 1497, originally meant the East in general or Mediterranean lands east of Italy. It is borrowed from the French levant rising, referring to the rising of the sun in the east, the phrase is ultimately from the Latin word levare, meaning lift, raise. Similar etymologies are found in Greek Ἀνατολή, in Germanic Morgenland, in Italian, in Hungarian Kelet, in Spanish and Catalan Levante and Llevant, most notably, Orient and its Latin source oriens meaning east, is literally rising, deriving from Latin orior rise. The notion of the Levant has undergone a process of historical evolution in usage, meaning. While the term Levantine originally referred to the European residents of the eastern Mediterranean region, it came to refer to regional native. The English Levant Company was founded in 1581 to trade with the Ottoman Empire, at this time, the Far East was known as the Upper Levant. In early 19th-century travel writing, the term sometimes incorporated certain Mediterranean provinces of the Ottoman empire, in 19th-century archaeology, it referred to overlapping cultures in this region during and after prehistoric times, intending to reference the place instead of any one culture. The French mandate of Syria and Lebanon was called the Levant states, today, Levant is the term typically used by archaeologists and historians with reference to the history of the region. Scholars have adopted the term Levant to identify the region due to it being a wider, yet relevant, archaeologists seeking a neutral orientation that is neither biblical nor national have used terms such as Levantine archaeology and archaeology of the Southern Levant. Two academic journals were launched, Journal of Levantine Studies, published by the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and The Levantine Review
28.
Greater Syria
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Greater Syria (Arabic, سوريّة الكبرى, also, is a hypothetical united Fertile Crescent state. The term denotes the restoration of the Arab Kingdom of Syria, the pre-Islamic, Hellenistic name of the region, Syria, was used by the Ottomans in the Syria Vilayet until the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1918. Following the Franco-Syrian War, in July 1920, French armies defeated the newly proclaimed Arab Kingdom of Syria and captured Damascus, the area was consequently partitioned under French and British Mandates into Greater Lebanon, various Syrian states, Mandatory Palestine and Transjordan. The Syrian states were unified as the State of Syria. Before the Arabs came to Greater Syria the people spoke Aramaic and they never were united as one nation in that time, but dived between other empires. Sometimes they had their own country, or province for example Osroene, Syria is a synonym for Aram. Arab conquest of the Levant in the 7th century gave rise to the Bilad al-Sham province, the province was encompassing much of the region of Syria and became largely overlapping with this concept. Other sources indicate that the term Greater Syria was coined during Ottoman rule, after 1516, to designate the area included in present-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan. In 1919 the results of King–Crane Commission was that people of Syria wanted foremost a united Syria for the whole region, abdullah I of Jordan had been a proponent of Greater Syria under Hashemite rule, based on the original proposal for a Kingdom of Syria following the Arab Revolt. The Hashemite monarchy of Iraq was also believed to have harboured ambitions of union with Syria, the Baathist government of Hafez al-Assad in Syria also pursued the idea of Greater Syria, resulting in its involvement in the Lebanese Civil War and the Syrian Occupation of Lebanon. Greater Syria, the History of an Ambition, viii,240 p. ill. with b&w photos and maps. ISBN 978-0-19-506022-5 pbk. alternative ISBN on back cover, 0-19-506002-4 Article Al-Sham in the Encyclopedia of Islam by C. E. Bosworth, dictionary of Modern Written Arabic by Hans Wehr
29.
Iraqi Kurdistan
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Iraqi Kurdistan, officially called the Kurdistan Region by the Iraqi constitution, is located in the north of Iraq and constitutes the countrys only autonomous region. The region is governed by the Kurdistan Regional Government, with the capital being Erbil. Kurdistan is a democracy with its own regional Parliament that consists of 111 seats. Masoud Barzani, who was elected as president in 2005, was re-elected in 2009. In August 2013 the parliament extended his presidency for two years. His presidency concluded on 19 August 2015 after the parties failed to reach an agreement over extending his term. The new Constitution of Iraq defines the Kurdistan Region as an entity of Iraq. The four governorates of Duhok, Hawler, Silemani, and Halabja comprise around 41,710 square kilometres and have a population of 5.5 million. In 2014, during the 2014 Iraq Crisis, Iraqi Kurdistans forces also took much of the disputed territories of Northern Iraq. The establishment of the Kurdistan Region dates back to the March 1970 autonomy agreement between the Kurdish opposition and the Iraqi government after years of heavy fighting, further, the 1980–88 Iran–Iraq War, especially the Iraqi Armys Al-Anfal Campaign, devastated the population and environment of Iraqi Kurdistan. As Kurds continued to fight government troops, Iraqi forces finally left Kurdistan in October 1991, in 1992, the major political parties in the region, the Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, established the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government. The 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent political changes led to the ratification of a new constitution in 2005, the name Kurdistan literally means Land of the Kurds. The suffix -stan is Iranian for place of or country, in English translations of the Constitution of Iraq, it is called Kurdistan, four times in the phrase region of Kurdistan and once in the phrase Kurdistan region. The regional government calls it the Kurdistan Region, the full name of the government is the Kurdistan Regional Government, abbreviated KRG. Kurds also refer to the region as Başûrê Kurdistanê or Başûrî Kurdistan, during the Baath Party administration in the 1970s and 1980s, the region was called the Kurdish Autonomous Region. The Kurdistan Region is largely mountainous, with the highest point being a 3,611 m point known locally as Cheekha Dar, the mountains are part of the larger Zagros mountain range which also extends into Iran. There are many rivers running through the region, which is distinguished by its fertile lands, plentiful water, the Great Zab and the Little Zab flow from the east to the west in the region. The Tigris river enters Iraqi Kurdistan from Turkish Kurdistan, the mountainous nature of Iraqi Kurdistan, the difference of temperatures in its various parts, and its wealth of waters make it a land of agriculture and tourism
30.
Tell (archaeology)
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In archaeology, a tell or tel is an artificial mound formed from the accumulated remains of people living on the same site for hundreds or thousands of years. A classic tell looks like a low, truncated cone with a top and sloping sides. Tells are most commonly associated with the archaeology of the ancient Near East, within the Near East, they are concentrated in less arid regions, including Upper Mesopotamia, the Southern Levant, Anatolia and Iran. A tell is a hill created by many generations of people living and rebuilding on the same spot. Over time, the level rises, forming a mound, the single biggest contributor to the mass of a tell are mud bricks, which disintegrate rapidly. Excavating a tell can reveal buried structures such as government or military buildings, religious shrines and homes and they often overlap horizontally, vertically, or both. Archaeologists excavate tell sites to interpret architecture, purpose, and date of occupation, Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press – via Internet Archive
31.
Sawad
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Sawad was the name used in early Islamic times for southern Iraq. It means black land and refers to the stark contrast between the plain of Mesopotamia and the Arabian desert. Under the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates, it was a political term for a province encompassing most of modern Iraq. As a generic term, it was used to denote the irrigated and cultivated areas in any district, the Encyclopedia of Islam, New Edition, Volume IX, San–Sze
32.
Sinjar Mountains
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The Sinjar Mountains are a 100-kilometre-long mountain range that runs east to west, rising above the surrounding alluvial steppe plains in northwestern Iraq to an elevation of 1,463 meters. The highest segment of mountains, about 75 km long. The western and lower segment of these lies in Syria which is about 25 km long. The city of Sinjar is just south of the range and these mountains are regarded as sacred by the Yazidis. The Sinjar Mountains are an example of a breached anticlinal structure. These mountains consist of an asymmetrical, doubly plunging anticline, which is called the Sinjar Anticline, with a steep northern limb, gentle southern limb and a northerly vergence. The northern side of the anticline is normally faulted, which results in the repetition of the sequence of sedimentary strata exposed in it, the deeply eroded Sinjar Anticline exposes a number of sedimentary formations ranging from Late Cretaceous to Early Neogene in age. The Late Cretaceous Shiranish Formation outcrops within the middle of the Sinjar Mountains, the flanks of this mountain range consist of outward dipping strata of the Sinjar and Aliji formations, Jaddala Formation, Serikagne Formation, and Jeribe Formation. Quantities are sufficient for agricultural and stock use, sinjarite, a hygroscopic calcium chloride formed as soft pink mineral, was discovered in braided wadi fill in limestone exposures near Sinjar. The Yazidis have historically used the mountains as a place of refuge, gertrude Bell wrote, in the 1920s, Until a couple of years ago the Yezidis were ceaselessly at war with the Arabs and with everybody else. In August 2014, an estimated 40,000 to 50,000 Yazidis fled to the following raids by Islamic State forces on the city of Sinjar. The Yazidi refugees on the mountain faced what a worker called a genocide by the radicals. Stranded without water, food, shade, or medical supplies, the Yazidis had to rely on supplies of water and food airdropped by American, British, Australian. Although thousands more remained stranded on the mountain as of August 12, yezidi girls allegedly raped by ISIS fighters committed suicide by jumping to their death from Mount Sinjar, as described in a witness statement. Yazidi genocide Ezidkhan Kurdification & Arabization Singara
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Abbasid Caliphate
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The Abbasid Caliphate was the third of the Islamic caliphates to succeed the Islamic prophet Muhammad. The Abbasid dynasty descended from Muhammads youngest uncle, Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib and they ruled as caliphs, for most of their period from their capital in Baghdad in modern-day Iraq, after assuming authority over the Muslim empire from the Umayyads in 750 CE. The Abbasid caliphate first centered its government in Kufa, but in 762 the caliph Al-Mansur founded the city of Baghdad, the political power of the caliphs largely ended with the rise of the Buyids and the Seljuq Turks. Although Abbasid leadership over the vast Islamic empire was reduced to a ceremonial religious function. The capital city of Baghdad became a center of science, culture, philosophy and this period of cultural fruition ended in 1258 with the sack of Baghdad by the Mongols under Hulagu Khan. The Abbasid line of rulers, and Muslim culture in general, though lacking in political power, the dynasty continued to claim authority in religious matters until after the Ottoman conquest of Egypt. The Abbasid caliphs were Arabs descended from Abbas ibn Abd al-Muttalib, one of the youngest uncles of Muhammad, the Abbasids claimed to be the true successors of Prophet Muhammad in replacing the Umayyad descendants of Banu Umayya by virtue of their closer bloodline to Muhammad. The Abbasids also distinguished themselves from the Umayyads by attacking their moral character, according to Ira Lapidus, The Abbasid revolt was supported largely by Arabs, mainly the aggrieved settlers of Marw with the addition of the Yemeni faction and their Mawali. The Abbasids also appealed to non-Arab Muslims, known as mawali, Muhammad ibn Ali, a great-grandson of Abbas, began to campaign for the return of power to the family of Prophet Muhammad, the Hashimites, in Persia during the reign of Umar II. During the reign of Marwan II, this culminated in the rebellion of Ibrahim the Imam. On 9 June 747, Abu Muslim successfully initiated a revolt against Umayyad rule. Close to 10,000 soldiers were under Abu Muslims command when the hostilities began in Merv. General Qahtaba followed the fleeing governor Nasr ibn Sayyar west defeating the Umayyads at the Battle of Nishapur, the Battle of Gorgan, after this loss, Marwan fled to Egypt, where he was subsequently assassinated. The remainder of his family, barring one male, were also eliminated, immediately after their victory, As-Saffah sent his forces to Central Asia, where his forces fought against Tang expansion during the Battle of Talas. Barmakids, who were instrumental in building Baghdad, introduced the worlds first recorded paper mill in Baghdad, As-Saffah focused on putting down numerous rebellions in Syria and Mesopotamia. The Byzantines conducted raids during these early distractions, the first change the Abbasids, under Al-Mansur, made was to move the empires capital from Damascus, in Syria, to Baghdad in Iraq. Baghdad was established on the Tigris River in 762, a new position, that of the vizier, was also established to delegate central authority, and even greater authority was delegated to local emirs. During Al-Mansurs time control of Al-Andalus was lost, and the Shiites revolted and were defeated a year later at the Battle of Bakhamra, the Abbasids had depended heavily on the support of Persians in their overthrow of the Umayyads
34.
Adiabene
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Adiabene was an ancient kingdom in Assyria, with its capital at Arbela. Adiabenian rulers converted to Judaism from paganism in the 1st century, according to the Talmud, both Helena and Monobaz donated large funds for the Temple of Jerusalem. After 115 CE, there are no traces of Jewish royalties in Adiabne. Adiabene occupied a district in Assyria between the Upper Zab and the Lower Zab, though Ammianus speaks of Nineveh, Ecbatana, although nominally a dependency of the Parthian Empire, for some centuries, beginning with the 1st century BCE, it was independent. By the late 1st century CE, its borders extended as far as Nisibis, in the Talmudic writings the name occurs as חדייב, חדייף and הדייב, which is parallel to its Syriac form Hadyab or Hedayab. Its chief city was Arbela, where Mar Uqba had a school, or the neighboring Hazzah, in Kiddushin 72a the Biblical Habor is identified with Adiabene, but in Yerushalmi Megillah i. In the Targum to Jeremiah li,27, Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz are paraphrased by Kordu, Harmini, and Hadayab, i. e. Corduene, Armenia, and Adiabene, while in Ezekiel xxvii. 23 Harran, Caneh, and Eden are interpreted by the Aramaic translator as Harwan, Nisibis, Adiabene had a mixed population, while the Syriac language was dominant. According to Pliny, four tribes inhabited the region of Adiabene, Orontes, Alani, the account of Josephus Antiquities of the Jews shows that there was a substantial Jewish population in the kingdom, which led to the establishment of a prominent rabbinic academy in Arbela. During the Sassanid era, Persians came to the fore politically, the difficult mixing of cultures can be seen in the story of the martyrdom of Mahanuš, a prominent Iranian Zoroastrian who converted to Christianity. In later times Adiabene became an archbishopric, with the seat of the metropolitan at Arbela and it has been suggested that the royal house of Adiabene, after fleeing Trajans invasion, established the later Amatuni dynasty which ruled the area between the lakes Urmia and Van. Adiabene was a district in Mesopotamia between upper and lower Zab and was a part of the Neo Assyrian Empire and inhabited by Assyrians even after the fall of Nineveh and it was an integral part of Achaemenid Assyria and Sassanid Assyria. The region was made a part of the Roman province of Assyria after the invasion by Trajan in 116. The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus states that the inhabitants of Adiabene were Assyrians, in ancient times Adiabene was an integral part of Assyria. Under the Achaemenid Persian kings, Adiabene seems for a time to have been a state of the Persian Empire. At times the throne of Adiabene was held by a member of the Achaemenid house, Ardashir III, the Ten Thousand, an army of Greek mercenaries, retreated through Adiabene on their march to the Black Sea after the Battle of Cunaxa. According to Jewish tradition, Hellena, the Queen of Adiabne converted to Judaism from paganism in the 1st century, Queen Helenas sarcophagus was discovered in 1863. According to Josephus the queen converted to Judaism together with her son Monobaz II, another tradition has it that she met a Jewish jewelry merchant in Adiabene by the name of Hanania or Eliezer, who told her about the people of Israel and persuaded her to join them
35.
Alluvial plain
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An alluvial plain is a largely flat landform created by the deposition of sediment over a long period of time by one or more rivers coming from highland regions, from which alluvial soil forms. As the highlands due to weathering and water flow, the sediment from the hills is transported to the lower plain. Various creeks will carry the water further to a river, lake, bay, as the sediments are deposited during flood conditions in the floodplain of a creek, the elevation of the floodplain will be raised. As this reduces the channel capacity, the creek will, over time, seek new, lower paths. These processes, over time, will form the plain. The NCSS glossary instead suggests flood plain
36.
Syrian Desert
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To the south it borders and merges into the Arabian Desert. The land is open, gravely desert pavement, cut with occasional wadis, the desert is bounded by the Orontes Valley and volcanic field of Harrat al-Shamah to the west, and by the Euphrates to the east. In the north, the desert gives way to the fertile areas of grass. Several parts of the Syrian Desert have been referred to such as the Palmyrene desert around Palmyra. The name Shamiyah has also used for the Syrian Desert. The 700-900m high region in the middle of the desert is the Hamad Plateau, what little rain arrives on the plateau flows into local salt flats. The highest peaks of the Plateau are those of the 1000m+ Khawr um Wual in Saudi Arabia, together with the other deserts of the Arabian Peninsular, the Hamad Desert has been described as one of the most arid deserts of the world. The Syrian Desert is the origin of the Syrian hamster, storks, herons, cranes, small waders, waterfowl and also raptors visit the seasonal lakes. The large mammals are now no longer to be found, thought to be due to hunting by man, the desert was historically inhabited by Bedouin tribes, and many tribes still remain in the region, their members living mainly in towns and settlements built near oases. Some Bedouin still maintain their way of life in the desert. Safaitic inscriptions, proto-Arabic texts written by literate Bedouin, are throughout the Syrian Desert. These date approximately from the 1st century B. C. to the 4th century A. D, the desert was first traversed by motor vehicle in 1919. A series of Coalition military operations were ineffective at removing the resistance presence in the Desert. Arabian desert Fertile Crescent List of deserts by area Syrian steppe
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Salt pan (geology)
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Natural salt pans or salt flats are flat expanses of ground covered with salt and other minerals, usually shining white under the Sun. They are found in deserts, and are natural formations, a salt pan forms by evaporation of a water pool such as a lake or pond. This happens in climates where the rate of water exceeds the rate of precipitation. If the water drain into the ground, it remains on the surface until it evaporates. Over thousands of years, the minerals accumulate on the surface and these minerals reflect the Suns rays and often appear as white areas. The crust of salt can conceal a quagmire of mud that can engulf a truck, the Qattara Depression in the eastern Sahara desert contains many such traps which served as strategic barriers during World War II. The Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, where land speed records have been set, is a well-known salt pan in the arid regions of the western United States. The Etosha pan, in the Etosha National Park in Namibia, is another prominent example of a salt pan, the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia is the largest salt pan in the world. It contains 50%-70% of the worlds lithium reserves, dry lake Pan Sabkha Salt evaporation pond Salt lake Sink Solonchak Briere, Peter R. Playa, playa lake, sabkha, Proposed definitions for old terms. Lowenstein, Tim K. Lawrence A. Hardie, criteria for the recognition of salt-pan evaporites
38.
Sabkhat al-Jabbul
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It is the largest natural lake in Syria and the second largest lake after the artificial Lake Assad. In 2009 the lake covered about 100 km2 and was relatively stable, the salt flats are extensive and can be seen from space. The area includes the Sabkhat al-Jabbul Nature Reserve, a protected waterfowl site, today the Sabkhat al-Jabbul exists within a closed basin, but during the Pleistocene the basin filled, overflowed and formed a tributary of the Euphrates. The lake traditionally flooded in the spring shrinking back during the summer, primary uses of the area include tourism, waterfowl hunting, livestock grazing on the surrounding steppe and salt extraction
39.
Basra
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Basra, also al-Baṣrah, is an Iraqi city located on the Shatt al-Arab between Kuwait and Iran. It had an population of 1.5 million in 2012. Basra is also Iraqs main port, although it not have deep water access. The city is part of the location of Sumer, one of the ports from which Sinbad the Sailor journeyed. It played an important role in early Islamic history and was built in 636, Basra is consistently one of the hottest cities in Iraq, with summer temperatures regularly exceeding 50 °C. The city was called by many throughout its history, Basrah being the most common. In Arabic the word means the overwatcher, which might have been an allusion to the citys origin as an Arab military base against the Sassanids. Some sources claim that the name is derived from the Persian word Bas-rah, others have argued that the name is derived from the Aramaic word basratha, meaning place of huts, settlement. During the pre-Islamic era, the area was known to the Arabs as al-Khariba due to the existence of an ancient city called al-Kharba. After the present city was built, it was called by names, including the mother of Iraq, the reservoir of Arabs, the prosperous city. The name Al-Basrah, which in Arabic means the over watching or the seeing everything, was given to it because of its role as a base against the Sassanid Empire. However, other sources claim the name originates from the Persian word Bas-rāh or Bassorāh meaning where many ways come together, in 639 Umar established this encampment as a city with five districts, and appointed Abu Musa al-Ashari as its first governor. Abu Musa led the conquest of Khuzestan from 639 to 642 and was ordered by Umar to aid Uthman ibn Abu al-ʿAs, then fighting Iran from a new, more easterly miṣr at Tawwaj. In 650, the Rashidun Caliph Uthman reorganised the Persian frontier, installed ʿAbdullah ibn Amir as Basras governor, Ibn Amir led his forces to their final victory over Yazdegerd III, the Sassanid King of Kings. In 656, Uthman was murdered and Ali was appointed Caliph, Ali first installed Uthman ibn Hanif as Basras governor, who was followed by ʿAbdullah ibn ʿAbbas. These men held the city for Ali until the death in 661. The Sufyanids held Basra until Yazid Is death in 683, the Sufyanids first governor was Umayyad ʿAbdullah, a renowned military leader, commanding fealty and financial demands from Karballah, but poor governor. In 664, Muʿawiyah I replaced him with Ziyad ibn Abi Sufyan, often called ibn Abihi, on Ziyads death in 673, his son ʿUbaydullah ibn Ziyad became governor
40.
Rub' al Khali
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The Rub al Khali is the largest contiguous sand desert in the world, encompassing most of the southern third of the Arabian Peninsula. The desert covers some 650,000 square kilometres including parts of Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and it is part of the larger Arabian Desert. The desert is 1,000 kilometres long, and 500 kilometres wide and its surface elevation varies from 800 metres in the southwest to around sea level in the northeast. The terrain is covered with dunes with heights up to 250 metres, interspersed with gravel. The sand is of a reddish-orange color due to the presence of feldspar, there are also brackish salt flats in some areas, such as the Umm al Samim area on the deserts eastern edge. Along the middle length of the desert there are a number of raised, hardened areas of carbonate, gypsum, marl. These lakes existed during periods from 6,000 to 5,000 years ago and 3,000 to 2,000 years ago. The lakes are thought to have formed as a result of cataclysmic rainfall similar to present-day monsoon rains and most probably lasted for only a few years. However, lakes in the Mundafen area in the southwest of the Rub al Khali show evidence of lasting longer, up to 800 years, evidence suggests that the lakes were home to a variety of flora and fauna. Fossil remains indicate the presence of animal species, such as hippopotamus, water buffalo. The lakes also contained small snails, ostracods, and when conditions were suitable, deposits of calcium carbonate and opal phytoliths indicate the presence of plants and algae. There is also evidence of activity dating from 3,000 to 2,000 years ago, including chipped flint tools. The region has a hot climate typical of the larger Arabian Desert. The region is classified as hyper-arid, with annual rainfall of less than 3 centimetres. Daily maximum temperatures average at 47 °C and can reach as high as 51 °C, fauna includes arachnids and rodents, while plants live throughout the Empty Quarter. As an ecoregion, the Rub al Khali falls within the Arabian Desert, the Asiatic cheetahs, once widespread in Saudi Arabia, are regionally extinct from the desert. Geologically, the Empty Quarter is the most oil-rich site in the world, vast oil reserves have been discovered underneath the sand dunes. Sheyba, at the edge of the Rub al Khali, is a major light crude oil-producing site in Saudi Arabia
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Neolithic Revolution
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These settled communities permitted humans to observe and experiment with plants to learn how they grew and developed. This new knowledge led to the domestication of plants and it was the worlds first historically verifiable revolution in agriculture. The Neolithic Revolution greatly narrowed the diversity of available, with a switch to agriculture which led to a downturn in human nutrition. The Neolithic Revolution involved far more than the adoption of a set of food-producing techniques. These societies radically modified their natural environment by means of specialized food-crop cultivation which allowed extensive surplus food production, personal land and private property ownership led to an hierarchical society, with an elite Social class, comprising a nobility, polity, and military. The first fully developed manifestation of the entire Neolithic complex is seen in the Middle Eastern Sumerian cities, the Levant followed by Mesopotamia are the sites of the earliest developments of the Neolithic Revolution from around 10,000 BC. The term Neolithic Revolution was coined in 1923 by V. Gordon Childe to describe the first in a series of revolutions in Middle Eastern history. The beginning of process in different regions has been dated from 10,000 to 8,000 BC in the Fertile Crescent. Recent archaeological research suggests that in regions such as the Southeast Asian peninsula, the transition from hunter-gatherer to agriculturalist was not linear. There are several competing theories as to the factors that drove populations to take up agriculture. The most prominent of these are, The Oasis Theory, originally proposed by Raphael Pumpelly in 1908, popularized by V. Gordon Childe in 1928 and summarised in Childes book Man Makes Himself. However, today this theory has little support amongst archaeologists because subsequent climate data suggests that the region was getting wetter rather than drier, the Feasting model by Brian Hayden suggests that agriculture was driven by ostentatious displays of power, such as giving feasts, to exert dominance. This required assembling large quantities of food, which drove agricultural technology, various social and economic factors helped drive the need for food. The evolutionary/intentionality theory, developed by David Rindos and others, views agriculture as an adaptation of plants. Starting with domestication by protection of plants, it led to specialization of location. Peter Richerson, Robert Boyd, and Robert Bettinger make a case for the development of agriculture coinciding with a stable climate at the beginning of the Holocene. Ronald Wrights book and Massey Lecture Series A Short History of Progress popularized this hypothesis, leonid Grinin argues that whatever plants were cultivated, the independent invention of agriculture always took place in special natural environments. It is supposed that the cultivation of cereals started somewhere in the Near East, andrew Moore suggested that the Neolithic Revolution originated over long periods of development in the Levant, possibly beginning during the Epipaleolithic
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Fertile Crescent
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The Fertile Crescent is a crescent-shaped region containing the comparatively moist and fertile land of otherwise arid and semi-arid Western Asia, the Nile Valley and Nile Delta. Having originated in the study of ancient history, the concept developed and today retains meanings in international geopolitics. In current usage, all definitions of the Fertile Crescent include Mesopotamia, the land in and around the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and the Levant, the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. The region saw the development of some of the earliest human civilizations, technological advances made in the region include the development of writing, glass, the wheel, agriculture, and the use of irrigation. It is a region consisting chiefly of mountains in the north, the end of the western wing is Palestine, Assyria makes up a large part of the center, while the end of the eastern wing is Babylonia. This great semicircle, for lack of a name, may be called the Fertile Crescent and this desert-bay is a limestone plateau of some height—too high indeed to be watered by the Tigris and Euphrates, which have cut cañons obliquely across it. Hence we are obliged to coin a term and call it the Fertile Crescent, water sources include the Jordan River. The inner boundary is delimited by the dry climate of the Syrian Desert to the south, around the outer boundary are the Anatolian highlands to the north and the Sahara Desert to the west. As crucial as rivers and marshlands were to the rise of civilization in the Fertile Crescent, the area is important as the bridge between Africa and Eurasia. Coupled with the Saharan pump theory, this Middle Eastern land-bridge is of importance to the modern distribution of Old World flora and fauna. The Fertile Crescent had many diverse climates, and major climatic changes encouraged the evolution of many r type annual plants, the regions dramatic variety of elevation gave rise to many species of edible plants for early experiments in cultivation. The Fertile Crescent has a record of past human activity. The western zone around the Jordan and upper Euphrates rivers gave rise to the first known Neolithic farming settlements and this region, alongside Mesopotamia, also saw the emergence of early complex societies during the succeeding Bronze Age. There is also evidence from the region for writing and the formation of hierarchical statelevel societies. This has earned the region the nickname The cradle of civilization and it is in this region where the first libraries appeared, some 5,000 years ago. The oldest known library was found in northern Syria, in the ruins of Ebla— a major commercial center that was destroyed around 1650 BCE, both the Tigris and Euphrates start in the Taurus Mountains of what is today Turkey. Farmers in southern Mesopotamia had to protect their fields from flooding each year, to protect against flooding, they made levees. Since the Bronze Age, the regions natural fertility has been extended by irrigation works
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Abu Hureyra
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Tell Abu Hureyra is an archaeological site in the Euphrates valley in modern Syria. The remains of the villages within the tell come from over 4,000 years of pre-ceramic habitation spanning the Epipaleolithic and Neolithic periods, ancient Abu Hureyra was occupied between 13,000 and 9,000 years ago in radio carbon years. The site is significant because the inhabitants of Abu Hureyra started out as hunter-gatherers, the site was excavated as a rescue operation before it was flooded by Lake Assad, the reservoir of the Tabqa Dam which was being built at that time. The site was excavated by Andrew Moore in 1972 and 1973 and it was limited to only two seasons of fieldwork. However, despite the time frame, a large amount of material was recovered and studied over the following decades. It was one of the first archaeological sites to use methods of excavation such as flotation. A preliminary report was published in 1983 and a report in 2000. Abu Hureyra is a tell, or ancient settlement mound, in modern-day Raqqa Governorate in northern Syria and it is on a plateau near the south bank of the Euphrates,120 kilometres east of Aleppo. The tell is an accumulation of collapsed houses, debris. The mound is nearly 500 metres across,8 metres deep, today the tell is inaccessible, drowned beneath the waters of Lake Assad. The village of Abu Hureyra had two periods of occupation, An Epipalaeolithic settlement and a Neolithic settlement. The Epipaleolithic, or Natufian, settlement was established c.13,500 years ago, during the first settlement, the village consisted of small round huts, cut into the soft sandstone of the terrace. The roofs were supported with posts, and roofed with brushwood. Huts contained underground storage areas for food, the inhabitants are probably most accurately described as hunter-collectors, as they didnt only forage for immediate consumption, but built up stores for longterm food security. They settled down around their larder to protect it from animals, from the distribution of wild food plant remains found at Abu Hureyra it seems that they lived there year-round. The population was small, housing a few hundred people at most—but perhaps the largest collection of people living in one place anywhere at that time. The inhabitants of Abu Hureyra obtained food by hunting, fishing, gazelle were hunted primarily during the summer, when vast herds passed by the village during their annual migration. These would probably be hunted communally, as mass killings also required mass processing of meat, skin, and other parts of the animal
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Pre-Pottery Neolithic A
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Pre-Pottery Neolithic A denotes the first stage in early Levantine and Anatolian Neolithic culture, dating c. 11,500 – c. 10,000 BP. Archaeological remains are located in the Levantine and Upper Mesopotamian region of the Fertile Crescent, the Pre-Pottery Neolithic A and the following Pre-Pottery Neolithic B were originally defined by Kathleen Kenyon in the type site of Jericho. During this time, pottery was not yet in use, PPNA succeeds the Natufian culture of the Epipaleolithic. PPNA archaeological sites are larger than those of the preceding Natufian hunter-gatherer culture. PPNA settlements are characterized by round, semi-subterranean houses with stone foundations, the upper walls were constructed of unbaked clay mudbricks with plano-convex cross-sections. The hearths were small, and covered with cobbles, heated rocks were used in cooking, which led to an accumulation of fire-cracked rock in the buildings, and almost every settlement contained storage bins made of either stones or mud-brick. One of the most notable PPNA settlements is Jericho, thought to be the worlds first town, the PPNA town contained a population of up to 2, 000–3,000 people, and was protected by a massive stone wall and tower. There is much debate over the function of the wall, for there is no evidence of any serious warfare at this time, one possibility is the wall was built to protect the salt resources of Jericho. PPNA cultures are unique for their practices, and Kenyon characterized them as living with their dead. Kenyon found no fewer than 279 burials, below floors, under household foundations, in the PPNB period, skulls were often dug up and reburied, or mottled with clay and displayed. The lithic industry is based on blades struck from regular cores, sickle-blades and arrowheads continue traditions from the late Natufian culture, transverse-blow axes and polished adzes appear for the first time. Sedentism of this allowed for the cultivation of local grains, such as barley and wild oats. Sites such as Dhra′ and Jericho retained a hunting lifestyle until the PPNB period and this period of cultivation is considered pre-domestication, but may have begun to develop plant species into the domesticated forms they are today. Deliberate, extended-period storage was possible by the use of suspended floors for air circulation and protection from rodents. This practice precedes the emergence of domestication and large-scale sedentary communities by at least 1,000 years, granaries are positioned in places between other buildings early on c. 11,500 BP. However, beginning around 10,500 BP, they were moved inside houses and this change might reflect changing systems of ownership and property as granaries shifted from a communal use and ownership to become under the control of households or individuals. Moreover, uilding granaries may have been the most important feature in increasing sedentism that required active community participation in new life-ways. With more sites becoming known, archaeologists have defined a number of variants, Sultanian in the Jordan River valley
