TRANSMAG 2013: Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia (Syriac: ܒܝܬ ܢܗܪܝܢ "Bet Nahrin") is the area of Tigris and the Euphrates, corresponding to modern-day Iraq, the northeastern part of Syria and to a lesser extent southeastern Turkey and smaller parts of southwestern Iran.

Mesopotamia is considered as the cradle of civilization in the west. Assyrians, Babylonians & Sumerians represent Mesopotamia and they were pioneers in Architecture, Warfare, Science, Art ,Laws … etc.

City-states of Mesopotamia created the first law codes, drawn from legal precedence and decisions made by Kings. The codes of Urukagina and Lipit Ishtar have been found. The most renowned of these was that of Hammurabi, as mentioned above, who was posthumously famous for his set of laws, the Code of Hammurabi (created c. 1780 BC), which is one of the earliest sets of laws found and one of the best preserved examples of this type of document from ancient Mesopotamia. He codified over 200 laws for Mesopotamia.

The conquest of the whole of Mesopotamia and much surrounding territory by the Assyrians created a larger and wealthier state than the region had known before, and very grandiose art in palaces and public places, no doubt partly intended to match the splendour of the art of the neighbouring Egyptian empire. The Assyrians developed a style of extremely large schemes of very finely detailed narrative low reliefs in stone for palaces, with scenes of war or hunting; the British Museum has an outstanding collection. 

They produced very little sculpture in the round, except for colossal guardian figures, often the human-headed lamassu, which are sculpted in high relief on two sides of a rectangular block, with the heads effectively in the round (and also five legs, so that both views seem complete). Even before dominating the region they had continued the cylinder seal tradition with designs which are often exceptionally energetic and refined.

Although works of precious gems and metals usually do not survive the ravages of time, some fine pieces of Assyrian jewelry were found in royal tombs at Nimrud.

There is ongoing discussion among academics over the nature of the Nimrud lens, a piece of quartz unearthed by Austen Henry Layard in 1850, in the Nimrud palace complex in northern Iraq. A small minority believe that it is evidence for the existence of ancient Assyrian telescopes, which could explain the great accuracy of Assyrian astronomy. Other suggestions include its use as a magnifying glass for jewellers, or as a decorative furniture inlay. The Nimrud Lens is held in the British Museum. The Assyrians were also innovative in military technology with the use of heavy cavalry, sappers, siege engines etc.

And this is just some of their many great achievements, and speaking as an Assyrian, I'm more than proud of my ancestors for knowing that they have given this much to humanity, thus we should appreciate the work of our ancestors and pay more attention to our history, and that's the least that we can do.

Prepared by:

Daniel Nichola

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Sources:

The British Museum [http://www.mesopotamia.co.uk]

Ancient History Encyclopedia [http://www.ancient.eu.com]