On the other hand, the traditional identification with a site in Assyria would then imply the later sense of " Babylonia ", and a few interpreters have additionally tried to identify Abraham's birthplace with Chaldia, a distinct region in Asia Minor on the Black Sea.

Assyria retained control and subjugation of Media, Persia, Aramea, Phoenicia, Israel, Judah, Asia Minor, northern Arabia, the neo Hittites and Cyprus with few problems during Ashurbanipal's reign.

The history of the site during the intervening period is unclear, though the presence of a few cuneiform tables from Old Assyria

Within a few years of his death, Elam and Assyria had withdrawn from Babylon's orbit and revolutions had started in all the conquered territories.

In the Neo-Assyrian period the Aramaic language became increasingly common, more so than Akkadian — this was thought to be largely due to the mass deportations undertaken by Assyrian kings, in which large Aramaic-speaking populations, conquered by the Assyrians, were relocated to Assyria and interbred with the Assyrians.

The earliest accounting records were found amongst the ruins of ancient Babylon, Assyria and Sumeria, which date back more than 7, 000 years.

He was once more defeated at Kish, and again fled to Elam where he died in exile after one final failed attempt to raise a revolt against Assyria in his homeland, Bit-Yâkin in 700 BC.

From the 14th to 11th centuries BC Assyria once more became a major power with the rise of the Middle Assyrian Empire which dominated the whole of Mesopotamia and much of the Near East and Anatolia.

After an interregnum of a hundred or so years, Assyria began to expand once more with the rise of the Neo Assyrian Empire.

Initially Babylon was a small nation which did not control much territory, and was overshadowed by much older, powerful, and more established kingdoms like Isin, Larsa, Assyria and Elam.

The latter then also lost a war with Assyria, losing more territory in the process.

His successor Esarhaddon rebuilt Babylon, and upon his death he installed his eldest son Shamash-shum-ukin as king in Babylon, and his youngest, Ashurbanipal in the more senior position as king of Assyria.

Eventually, the prosperity of this trade would attract more powerful regional neighbours, such as Ancient Egypt, Assyria, the Babylonians, Persians, Ancient Greeks and Romans, who would control the Canaanites politically, levying tribute, taxes and tariffs.

Any rivalry between Menahem and Pekah could only appear more and more foolish in light of the growing menace of Assyria.

The more widely accepted version, recounted in Ovid's Metamorphoses, is that Aphrodite compelled Myrrha ( or Smyrna ) to commit incest with her father Theias, the king of Assyria.

While temples and sanctuaries to Nusku-Girru are found in Babylonia and Assyria, he is worshipped more in symbolical form than the other gods.

In 2 Kings 18, the Rabshakeh gave the word from the king of Assyria, dissuading trust in the Lord, asserting that God is no more able to deliver than all the gods of the land.

Tyre was tributary to Assyria, but Luli revolted against the Assyrians more than once.

Ninus (), according to Greek historians writing in the Hellenistic period and later, was accepted as the eponymous founder of Nineveh ( also called Νίνου πόλις " city of Ninus " in Greek ), Ancient capital of Assyria, although he does not seem to represent any one personage known to modern history, and is more likely a conflation of several real and / or fictional figures of antiquity, as seen to the Greeks through the mists of time.

King Ashur-Uballit I ( 1365 BC-1330 BC ) of Assyria attacked Shuttarna and annexed Mittani territory in the middle of the 14th Century BC, making Assyria once more a great power.

Suppiluliuma claims that " the entire land of Mittanni went to ruin, and the land of Assyria and the land of Alshi divided it between them ", but this sounds more like wishful thinking, although Assyria annexed Mitanni territory the kingdom survived.

Although the exact circumstances of the shift from the ramp to the crane technology remain unclear, it has been argued that the volatile social and political conditions of Greece were more suitable to the employment of small, professional construction teams than of large bodies of unskilled labour, making the crane more preferable to the Greek polis than the more labour-intensive ramp which had been the norm in the autocratic societies of Egypt or Assyria.

However, other tribes born to wives, including the firstborn Reuben, were also included on the eastern outskirts, and immediately adjacent to Israel's more traditional enemies at the time of their entry to Canaan, the Moabites and Ammonites ( wars with Aram and Assyria did not begin until over 500 years after the entry to Canaan-I Kings 11: 25, II Kings 15: 19 ).

In Assyria, however, years came to be named for the annual presiding limmu official appointed by the king, rather than for an event.

Additionally, the claimants to this ancestry also claim descendancy from Sargon of Akkad ( whose dynasty died out over 1500 years before the Assyrian dynasty fell ), and from Nabopolassar, who was a Chaldean, politically and militarily opposed to Assyria, and not in fact an Assyrian.

Sennacherib's successor as king of Assyria, Esarhaddon rebuilt Babylon, but for the next 75 years Babylon remained under direct Assyrian control.

The Medes, Persians, Chaldean ruled Babylonians, together with the Scythians and Cimmerians attacked Assyria in 616 BC, and by 612 BC, after five years of bitter fighting, the alliance had sacked Nineveh, killing Sin-shar-ishkun in the process.

The Sumerian civilization spanned over 3000 years and began with the first settlement of Eridu in the Ubaid period ( mid-6th millennium BC ) through the Uruk period ( 4th millennium BC ) and the Early Dynastic periods ( 3rd millennium BC ) until the rise of Assyria and Babylonia in the late 3rd and early 2nd millennium BC respectively.

The Philistine cities lost their independence to Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria by 732 BC, and revolts in following years were all crushed.

However, Taharqa was able to return some years later and wrest back control of a part of Egypt as far as Thebes from the Egyptian vassal princes of Assyria.

Shulgi was a well known historical figure for at least another two thousand years, while historical narratives of the Mesopotamian societies of Assyria and Babylonia kept names, events, and mythologies in remembrance.

Under his successor Samsu-iluna ( 1749-1712 BC ) the far south of Mesopotamia was lost to a native Akkadian king called Ilum-ma-ili and became The Sealand Dynasty, remaining free of Babylon for the next 272 years, and both the Babylonians and Amorites were driven from Assyria to the north by an Assyrian governor named Puzur-Sin, and after a civil war, a native king named Adasi seized power.

In 729 BC, Babylon was fully incorporated into the Assyrian Empire by Tiglath-Pileser III, who instead of allowing Babylonian kings to remain as vassals of Assyria as his predecessors had done for two hundred years, decided to rule directly himself.

Three years later Cyrus had become king of all Persia, and was engaged in a campaign in Assyria.

This important kârum was inhabited by soldiers and merchants from Assyria for hundreds of years, who traded local tin and wool for luxury items, foodstuffs and spices, and, woven fabrics from the Assyrian homeland and from Elam.

Records from Babylon and Assyria, dating about 4000 years ago mention sesame.

The real and historical Shammuramat ( in Greek, Semiramis ), was the Assyrian queen of Shamshi-Adad V ( ruled 824 BC – 811 BC ), King of Assyria and ruler of the Neo Assyrian Empire, and its regent for four years until her son Adad-nirari III came of age.

Over the next two years he appeared in Love's Labour's Lost, The Merchant of Venice, The National Health, The Good Natured Man, The Captain of Kopenick, and a two-hander play with Anthony Hopkins, The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria.

* John Murray ( 1867 ), Nineveh and its remains: a narrative of an expedition to Assyria during the years 1845, 1846 and 1847

Isaiah 7: 1-8: 15, although set in the time of king Ahaz, apparently dates from the reign of Ahaz's son Hezekiah some thirty years later, and its purpose was to persuade Hezekiah not to join with other kings who intended to rebel against their joint overlord, Assyria.

About 400 years later it was also described by Pliny the Elder, who called it nata Assyria malus.

Tiglath-Pileser III of Assyria began his reign in 745 BC three years before Menahem became king of Israel.

However, from that time the kingdom of Israel was a tributary of Assyria ; and when Hoshea some ten years later refused to pay any more tribute, it started a sequence of events which led to the destruction of the kingdom and the deportation of its population.

Under him, Assyria became the leading power of the Middle East, a position the kingdom largely maintained for the next five hundred years.