Syriac Culture - History - Ancient History

Ancient History

The Assyrian people can trace their ethnic and cultural origins to the indigenous population of pre-Islamic and pre-Arab Mesopotamia, (in particular Sumer, the Akkadian Empire, Assyria, Babylon, Mari, Eshnunna, Adiabene, Osroene, Hatra and the geo-political province of Assyria under Achaemenid, Seleucid, Parthian, Roman and Sassanid rule) since before the time of the Akkadian Empire.

Mesopotamia was originally dominated by the Sumerians (from at least 3500 BC) and the native Semites, later to be collectively known as Akkadians lived alongside them. Akkadian ruled city states first appear circa 2800 BC. In the 24th century BC the Akkadians gained domination over the Sumerians under Sargon the Great who founded the worlds first empire. By the 21st century BC the Akkadian Empire had collapsed, and the Akkadians split into essentially two nations; Assyria and some time later, Babylonia, although Babylonia was ruled by non native dynasties for most of its history. According to the Assyrian King List the earliest Assyrian king was a 24th century BC ruler named Tudiya. Assyria became a strong nation in the 21st and 20th century BC, founding colonies in Asia Minor. In the 19th century BC a new wave of Semites, the Amorites entered Mesopotamia from the west, usurping the thrones of the Akkadian states of Assyria, Isin and Larsa, and founded Babylon as an independent City State The Amorite rulers turned Assyria into a short lived imperial power from the late 19th century BC until the mid 18th century BC, However, after its fall to Babylon they were driven from Assyria by a king named Adasi in the late 18th Century BC, but eventually blended into the population of Babylonia in the south, where they maintained rule until 1595 BC. By approximately 1800 BC, the Sumerian race appears to have been wholly absorbed by the Semitic Akkadian population. According to the story told in the Book of Genesis, it is around this time that the Semitic tribal leader Abraham travelled out of Mesopotamia and became the father of his people, the Hebrews.

Assyria and later Babylon, became major powers. There were further influxes of peoples such as Hurrians, Kassites and Mitanni, the Kassites ruled Babylon for over 500 years, and the Mitanni dominated Assyria for a brief period. The Kassites, like the Amorites before them, seem to have disappeared into the general population in Babylonia, while the Mitanni and Hurrians were overthrown and driven out of Assyria. Assyria then once again became a major imperial power from 1365 BC until 1076 BC, rivalling Egypt.

In the 12th century BC a new influx of Semites from the west took place, with the arrival of the Arameans. The Arameans originally set up small kingdoms within southern Mesopotamia, but were eventually brought under control and incorporated into Assyria and Babylonia where they were culturally and politically Akkadianized, and they ethnically intermixed and blended in with the native Akkadian population.

It was not until the Neo-Assyrian Empire (911-608 BC) and the influx and interbreeding with Aramean tribes that the Assyrians and Babylonians began to speak Aramaic, an Akkadian infused Mesopotamian version of the language of the Aramaean tribes who had been assimilated into the Assyrian empire and Mesopotamia in the 9th century BC, and whose descendant dialects survive to this day. Mass relocations were enforced by Assyrian kings of the Neo-Assyrian period. During the period of the Neo-Assyrian Empire many Israelite Jews were deported to Assyria and a fair proportion of these were absorbed into the general population.

The Neo-Assyrian Empire (911 BC - 608 BC) saw a massive expansion of Assyrian power, Assyria became the center of the greatest empire the world had yet seen, with Babylon, Chaldea, Persia, Elam, Media, Gutium, Israel, Judah, Aramea (modern Syria), Phonecia/Canaan, Palestine, Mannea, much of Asia Minor (modern Turkey), the Neo-Hittite states, Corduene, Egypt, Cyprus, parts of the Caucasus, Dilmun, Samaria, Edom, Nabatea and Arabia brought under Assyrian control, the empire of Urartu defeated and conquered in the Caucasus, the Nubians, Ethiopians and Kushites defeated and driven from Egypt and the Phrygians paying tribute to Assyria.