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91-523: The Babylonian festival traditionally started on 4  Nissan , the first month of the year, as a celebration of the sowing of barley. All the people in the city would celebrate, including the awilu (upper class), muskena (middle class), wardu (lower class), High Priest, and the King. The priest of Ésagila (Marduk's house) would recite sad prayers with the other priests and the people would answer with equally sad prayers which expressed humanity's fear of

182-425: A centre of worship of Ishtar , whose cult was responsible for the city's early importance. The goddess's statue was sent to Pharaoh Amenhotep III of Egypt in the 14th century BC, by orders of the king of Mitanni . The Assyrian city of Nineveh became one of Mitanni's vassals for half a century until the early 14th century BC. The Assyrian king Ashur-uballit I reclaimed it in 1365 BC while overthrowing

273-408: A day. When the difference between the calendars changes the calculated value applies on and from 1 March (civil date) for conversions to Julian. For earlier dates reduce the calculated value by one. For conversions to the civil date the calculated value applies on and from 29 February (Julian date). Again, for earlier dates reduce the calculated value by one. The difference is applied to the calendar one

364-605: A few kilometers to the northeast. Nineveh was a typical farming village in the Halaf Period . In 5000 BC, Nineveh transitioned from a Halaf village to an Ubaid village. During the Late Chalcolithic period Nineveh was part one of the few Ubaid villages in Upper Mesopotamia which became a proto-city. Others include Ugarit , Brak, Hamoukar, Arbela , Alep , and regionally Susa, Eridu, Nippur. During

455-583: A garland for a home's front door. Newer traditions have also arisen in diaspora communities. The Assyrian community in Yonkers, New York has a tradition of raising the Assyrian flag in front of City Hall on April 1. Nisan Nisan (or Nissan ; Hebrew : נִיסָן , romanized :  Nīsān from Akkadian : 𒁈 , romanized:  Nissāni ) in the Babylonian and Hebrew calendars

546-566: A mosque, in which the prophet Jonah was buried. Another hill in this district is called Kalla Nunia, or the Castle of Nineveh. On that lies a village Koindsjug." In 1842, the French Consul General at Mosul, Paul-Émile Botta , began to search the vast mounds that lay along the opposite bank of the river. While at Tell Kuyunjiq he had little success, the locals whom he employed in these excavations, to their great surprise, came upon

637-413: A period of nineteen years. These are not Nisan molad times, although the offset necessarily remains constant. (The fractions shown are fractions of a minute.) Every nineteen years this time is 2 days, 16 hours, 33 1/18 minutes later in the week. That is either the same or the previous day in the civil calendar, depending on whether the difference in the day of the week is three or two days. If 29 February

728-560: A pivotal role in the development of theories of religion , myth and ritual . While the purpose of the festival remains a point of contention among both historians of religion and Assyriologists , it is certain to have played a pivotal role in the regular setting of an agenda, priorities, and in the overall advancement of Western Civilization as being one of the first regularly occurring forums where proposals for social maintenance or change could consistently be made and crucial issues readily addressed. The modern observance of Akitu began in

819-701: A prophet who preached to Nineveh. Large numbers of Assyrian sculptures and other artifacts have been excavated from the ruins of Nineveh, and are now located in museums around the world. The English placename Nineveh comes from the Latin Nīnevē and the Koine Greek Nineuḗ ( Νινευή ) under influence of the Biblical Hebrew Nīnəweh ( נִינְוֶה ), from the Akkadian Ninua ( var. Ninâ ) or Ninuwā . The city

910-479: Is "the great city". The ruins of Kuyunjiq, Nimrud , Karamlesh and Khorsabad form the four corners of an irregular quadrilateral. The ruins of the "great city" Nineveh, with the whole area included within the parallelogram they form by lines drawn from the one to the other, are generally regarded as consisting of these four sites. The description of Nineveh in Jonah likely was a reference to greater Nineveh, including

1001-482: Is 72d 21h 28 16/18m earlier. Convert back to the civil calendar by applying the formula. So, in 20874 CE, the Jewish year is due to begin 87d 2h 31 2/18m later than in 2026 CE and 1d 2h 31 2/18m later in the week. In 20874 CE, therefore, the Jewish year is due to begin at 11.30 3/18 A.M. on Friday, 14 June. Because of the displacements, it actually begins on Saturday, 15 June. Odd months have 30 days and even months 29, so

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1092-625: Is a fish within a house (cf. Aramaic nuna , "fish"). This may have simply intended "Place of Fish" or may have indicated a goddess associated with fish or the Tigris, possibly originally of Hurrian origin. The word נון/נונא in Old Babylonian refers to the Anthiinae genus of fish, further indicating the possibility of an association between the name Nineveh and fish. In the Quran , Jonah

1183-579: Is also contemporary with the Proto-Elamite period in Susa. At this time, Nineveh was still an autonomous city-state . It was incorporated into the Akkadian Empire . The early city (and subsequent buildings) was constructed on a fault line and, consequently, suffered damage from a number of earthquakes. One such event destroyed the first temple of Ishtar, which was rebuilt in 2260 BC by

1274-528: Is bisected by the Khosr river. North of the Khosr, the site is called Kuyunjiq, including the acropolis of Tell Kuyunjiq; the illegal village of Rahmaniye lay in eastern Kuyunjiq. South of the Khosr, the urbanized area is called Nebi Yunus (also Ghazliya, Jezayr, Jammasa), including Tell Nebi Yunus where the mosque of the Prophet Jonah and a palace of Esarhaddon / Ashurbanipal below it are located. South of

1365-703: Is called Nissān in the Book of Esther . It is a month of 30 days. In the year 2024, 1 Nisan will occur on 9 April. Counting from 1 Tishrei , the civil new year, it would be the seventh month (eighth, in leap year), but in contemporary Jewish culture, both months are viewed as the first and seventh simultaneously, and are referred to as one or the other depending on the specific religious aspects being discussed. The biblical Hebrew months were given enumerations instead of names. The new moon of Aviv , which in Hebrew means "barley ripening" and by extension "spring season"(Exodus 9:31)

1456-478: Is converting into . A negative value indicates that the Julian date is ahead of the civil date. In this case it is important to remember that when calculating the civil equivalent of 29 February (Julian), 29 February is discounted. Thus if the calculated value is −4 the civil equivalent of this date is 24 February. Before 1 CE use astronomical years rather than years BCE. The astronomical year is (year BCE) – 1. Up to

1547-466: Is evidence of repairs at the temple of Nabu after 612 and for the continued use of Sennacherib's palace. There is evidence of syncretic Hellenistic cults. A statue of Hermes has been found and a Greek inscription attached to a shrine of the Sebitti . A statue of Herakles Epitrapezios dated to the 2nd century AD has also been found. The library of Ashurbanipal may still have been in use until around

1638-403: Is included fewer than five times in the nineteen – year period the date will be later by the number of days which corresponds to the difference between the actual number of insertions and five. If the year is due to start on Sunday, it actually begins on the following Tuesday if the following year is due to start on Friday morning. If due to start on Monday, Wednesday or Friday it actually begins on

1729-420: Is located below the destroyed Mosque of the prophet Jonah on Tell Nebi Yunus. Archaeological excavations are conducted since 2019. Subsequently, an extensive research project, currently under the direction of Stefan M. Maul , University of Heidelberg, developed, focusing also on other areas of Nineveh. At Tell Kuyunjiq, activities started in 2021 with rescue and restoration measures for the destroyed reliefs in

1820-950: Is not clear whether Nineveh came under the rule of the Medes or the Neo-Babylonian Empire in 612. The Babylonian Chronicle Concerning the Fall of Nineveh records that Nineveh was "turned into mounds and heaps", but this is literary hyperbole. The complete destruction of Nineveh has traditionally been seen as confirmed by the Hebrew Book of Ezekiel and the Greek Retreat of the Ten Thousand of Xenophon (d. 354 BC). There are no later cuneiform tablets in Akkadian from Nineveh. Although devastated in 612,

1911-445: Is one of the few called both by name and by its number, the first. Nisan and other Akkadian-origin names for the equivalent lunar months in the Babylonian calendar came to be applied to the Hebrew calendar during the Babylonian captivity , in which the month of Aviv's name was Araḫ Nissānu , the "month of beginning". The list below gives a time which can be used to determine the day the Jewish ecclesiastical (spring) year starts over

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2002-558: Is referred to as Dhu'n-Nun "owner of the fish", though this may be related to the story of him being swallowed by a "large fish". Nabī Yūnus is the Arabic for "Prophet Jonah ". Kuyunjiq was, according to Layard , a Turkish name (Layard used the form kouyunjik , diminutive of koyun "sheep" in Turkish); known as Armousheeah by the Arabs, it is thought to have some connection with

2093-546: Is the month of the barley ripening and first month of spring. The name of the month is an Akkadian language borrowing, although it ultimately originates in Sumerian nisag "first fruits". In the Hebrew calendar it is the first month of the ecclesiastical year, called the "first of the months of the year" ( Exodus 12 :1-2), "first month" (Ex 12:14), and the month of Aviv (Ex 13:4) בְּחֹ֖דֶשׁ הָאָבִֽיב ḥōḏeš hāʾāḇîḇ ). It

2184-487: Is the one which shows the correct starting date for the following year in the last row. If 29 February falls within a Jewish month the first day of later months will be a day earlier than shown. For long period calculations, dates should be reduced to the Julian calendar and converted back to the civil calendar at the end of the calculation. The civil calendar used here (Exigian) is correct to one day in 44,000 years and omits

2275-704: The Akkadian king Manishtushu . In the final phase of the Early Bronze, Mesopotamia was dominated by the Ur III empire. After the fall of Ur in 2000 BC, with the transition into the Middle Bronze, Nineveh was absorbed into the rising power of Assyria . The historic Nineveh is mentioned in the Old Assyrian Empire during the reign of Shamshi-Adad I (1809-1775) in about 1800 BC as

2366-557: The Hebrew Bible , Nineveh is first mentioned in Genesis 10:11: " Ashur left that land, and built Nineveh". Some modern English translations interpret "Ashur" in the Hebrew of this verse as the country "Assyria" rather than a person, thus making Nimrod , rather than Ashur, the founder of Nineveh. Sir Walter Raleigh 's notion that Nimrod built Nineveh has been disputed by eighteenth century scholar Samuel Shuckford . The discovery of

2457-491: The Metropolitan Museum . The study of the archaeology of Nineveh reveals the wealth and glory of ancient Assyria under kings such as Esarhaddon (681–669 BC) and Ashurbanipal (669–626 BC). The work of exploration was carried on by Hormuzd Rassam (an Assyrian ), George Smith and others, and a vast treasury of specimens of Assyria was incrementally exhumed for European museums. Palace after palace

2548-490: The Neo-Assyrian Empire , particularly from the time of Ashurnasirpal II (ruled 883–859 BC) onward, there was considerable architectural expansion. Successive monarchs such as Tiglath-pileser III , Sargon II , Sennacherib , Esarhaddon , and Ashurbanipal maintained and founded new palaces, as well as temples to Sîn , Ashur , Nergal , Shamash , Ninurta , Ishtar , Tammuz , Nisroch and Nabu . It

2639-552: The Qara Qoyunlu dynasty. These toponyms refer to the areas to the North and South of the Khosr stream, respectively: Kuyunjiq is the name for the whole northern sector enclosed by the city walls and is dominated by the large (35 ha) mound of Tell Kuyunjiq, while Nabī (or more commonly Nebi) Yunus is the southern sector around of the mosque of Prophet Yunus/Jonah, which is located on Tell Nebi Yunus. The remains of ancient Nineveh,

2730-635: The Uruk Expansion because of its location as the highest navigable point on the Tigris. It was contemporary and had a similar function to Habuba Kabira on the Euphrates. By 3000 BC, the Kish civilization had expanded into Nineveh. At this time, the main temple of Nineveh becomes known as Ishtar temple, re-dedicated to the Semite goddess Ishtar , in the form of Ishtar of Nineveh. Ishtar of Nineveh

2821-469: The 1960s during the Assyrian intellectual renaissance. Due to political oppression, however, the celebrations were largely private until the 1990s. It is interchangeably referred to as Akitu and Assyrian New Year, and unlike the historical festival it is only celebrated for one day, the first of April. Assyrians continue to observe and celebrate Akitu with parades, picnics, and parties both in Iraq and in

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2912-399: The 4th century CE, these tables give the day of the Jewish month to within a day or so and the number of the month to within a month or so. From the 4th century, the number of the month is given exactly and from the 9th century the day of the month is given exactly as well. In the Julian calendar, every 76 years the Jewish year is due to start 5h 47 14/18m earlier, and 3d 18h 12 4/18m later in

3003-524: The Great restored the temple of Ishtar at Nineveh and probably encouraged resettlement. A number of cuneiform Elamite tablets have been found at Nineveh. They probably date from the time of the revival of Elam in the century following the collapse of Assyria. The Hebrew Book of Jonah , which Stephanie Dalley asserts was written in the 4th century BC, is an account of the city's repentance and God's mercy which prevented destruction. Archaeologically, there

3094-769: The Mitanni Empire and creating the Middle Assyrian Empire (1365–1050 BC). There is a large body of evidence to show that Assyrian monarchs built extensively in Nineveh during the late 3rd and 2nd millenniums BC; it appears to have been originally an "Assyrian provincial town". Later monarchs whose inscriptions have appeared on the high city include the Middle Assyrian Empire kings Shalmaneser I (1274–1245 BC) and Tiglath-Pileser I (1114–1076 BC), both of whom were active builders in Assur (Ashur). During

3185-611: The archaeological period known as Ninevite 5 , or Ninevite V (2900–2600 BC). This period is defined primarily by the characteristic pottery that is found widely throughout Upper Mesopotamia. Also, for the Upper Mesopotamian region, the Early Jezirah chronology has been developed by archaeologists. According to this regional chronology, 'Ninevite 5' is equivalent to the Early Jezirah I–II period. Ninevite 5

3276-554: The areas of Kuyunjiq and Nabī Yūnus with their mounds, are located on a level part of the plain at the junction of the Tigris and the Khosr Rivers within an area of 750 hectares (1,900 acres) circumscribed by a 12-kilometre (7.5 mi) fortification wall. This whole extensive space is now one immense area of ruins overlaid by c. one third by the Nebi Yunus suburbs of the city of eastern Mosul. The site of ancient Nineveh

3367-798: The beasts in the city. Nineveh's repentance and salvation from evil can be found in the Hebrew Tanakh , also known as the Old Testament , and referred to in the Christian New Testament and Muslim Quran . To this day, Syriac and Oriental Orthodox churches commemorate the three days Jonah spent inside the fish during the Fast of Nineveh . Some Christians observe this holiday fast by refraining from food and drink, with churches encouraging followers to refrain from dairy products, fish and other meats. The location of Nineveh

3458-581: The city was not completely abandoned. Yet, to the Greek historians Ctesias and Herodotus (c. 400 BC), Nineveh was a thing of the past; and when Xenophon passed the place in the 4th century BC he described it as abandoned. The earliest piece of written evidence for the persistence of Nineveh as a settlement is possibly the Cyrus Cylinder of 539/538 BC, but the reading of this is disputed. If correctly read as Nineveh, it indicates that Cyrus

3549-413: The city would be in constant chaos. The priests would also collect all statues of the gods on this day and bring them inside the temple. Marduk was said to disappear on this day to go fight the goddess Tiamat . Nabu and other gods were said to go out to go rescue Marduk from a prison in the mountains of the universe. It was said that on this day the other gods would give their power to Marduk, making him

3640-524: The country's Nineveh Governorate takes its name from it. It was the largest city in the world for approximately fifty years until the year 612 BC when, after a bitter period of civil war in Assyria, it was sacked by a coalition of its former subject peoples including the Babylonians , Medes , and Scythians . The city was never again a political or administrative centre, but by Late Antiquity it

3731-604: The death of its last great king Ashurbanipal , the Neo-Assyrian Empire began to unravel through a series of bitter civil wars between rival claimants for the throne, and in 616 BC Assyria was attacked by its own former vassals, the Chaldean , Babylonians , Medes and Scythians . In about 616 BC Kalhu was sacked, the allied forces eventually reached Nineveh, besieging and sacking the city in 612 BC, following bitter house-to-house fighting, after which it

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3822-496: The diaspora. Those celebrating will wear traditional Assyrian clothing and poppies and use the greetings Reesh Shato Brikhto, Reesha D’Sheeta Brikhta or Akitu Breekha. Some people will dress up as ancient Assyrian royalty. Due to its modern alignment with April Fool's Day , the festival is often more lighthearted than its historical counterpart. One tradition, Deqna Nissan or "The Beard of April", involves Assyrian women gathering plants and flowers and fashioning them into

3913-502: The fall of the empire of which it was the capital. Nineveh is also the setting of the Book of Tobit . The Book of Jonah , set in the days of the Assyrian Empire, describes it as an "exceedingly great city of three days' journey in breadth", whose population at that time is given as "more than 120,000". Genesis 10:11–12 lists four cities "Nineveh, Rehoboth , Calah , and Resen ", ambiguously stating that either Resen or Calah

4004-662: The fifteen Jubilees texts found amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls has since shown that, according to the Jewish sects of Qumran, Genesis 10:11 affirms the apportionment of Nineveh to Ashur. The attribution of Nineveh to Ashur is also supported by the Greek Septuagint , King James Bible , Geneva Bible , and by Roman historian Flavius Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews (Antiquities, i, vi, 4). Nineveh

4095-414: The final carving was done. Most of the statues weigh between 9,000 and 27,000 kilograms (19,842 and 59,525 lb). The stone carvings in the walls include many battle scenes, impalings and scenes showing Sennacherib's men parading the spoils of war before him. The inscriptions boasted of his conquests: he wrote of Babylon : "Its inhabitants, young and old, I did not spare, and with their corpses I filled

4186-413: The first time on the eighth day, this time they will decide the fate of the people of Marduk. In ancient Assyrian philosophy Creation in general was considered as a covenant between heaven and earth as long as a human serves the gods till his death, therefore, gods' happiness isn't complete except if humans are happy as well, thus a human's destiny will be to be given happiness on the condition that he serves

4277-444: The following day. If due to start on Saturday, it actually begins on the following day if the previous year was due to begin on Monday morning. The table below lists, for a Jewish year commencing on 23 March, the civil date of the first day of each month. If the year does not begin on 23 March, each month's first day will differ from the date shown by the number of days that the start of the year differs from 23 March. The correct column

4368-469: The garden which Sennacherib built next to his palace, with its associated irrigation works, were the original Hanging Gardens of Babylon ; Dalley's argument is based on a disputation of the traditional placement of the Hanging Gardens attributed to Berossus together with a combination of literary and archaeological evidence. The greatness of Nineveh was short-lived. In around 627 BC, after

4459-433: The gods. So Marduk and the gods renew their covenant with Babylon, by promising the city another cycle of seasons. After the fate of mankind is decided, Marduk returns to the heavens. On the last day of the festival it was believed that the gods returned to the temple. The festival was also adopted in the Neo-Assyrian Empire following the destruction of Babylon . King Sennacherib in 683 BC built an "Akitu house" outside

4550-422: The hills to Nineveh, and several sections of a magnificently constructed aqueduct erected by Sennacherib were discovered at Jerwan , about 65 kilometres (40 mi) distant. The enclosed area had more than 100,000 inhabitants (maybe closer to 150,000), about twice as many as Babylon at the time, placing it among the largest settlements worldwide. Some scholars such as Stephanie Dalley at Oxford believe that

4641-693: The lands, who livest in Eudul, who takest the fallen by the hand; Have pity upon thy city, Babylon Turn thy face towards Esagila, thy temple Give freedom to them that dwell in Babylon, thy wards!" On the second day the high priest would bathe in the Euphrates River before performing special prayers at the temple with the other priests. On the third day special craftsmen would create two puppets made of wood, gold, and precious stones and dress them in red. These puppets were set aside and would be used on

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4732-512: The leap day in centennial years which do not give remainder 200 or 700 when divided by 900. It is identical to the Gregorian calendar between 15 October 1582 CE and 28 February 2400 CE (both dates inclusive). To find how many days the civil calendar is ahead of the Julian in any year from 301 BCE (the calendar is proleptic [assumed] up to 1582 CE) add 300 to the year, multiply the hundreds by 7, divide by 9 and subtract 4. Ignore any fraction of

4823-555: The month of barley ripening, marks the beginning of the Jewish ecclesiastical year. ( Exodus 13:4; 23:15 ) Since the Babylonian captivity , this month has mainly been called Nisan ( Nehemiah 2:1, Esther 3:7 ) Kha b-Nisan is the name of the spring festival among the Assyrians . The festival is celebrated on April 1, corresponding to the start of the Assyrian calendar . The Assyrian and Babylonian Akitu festival has played

4914-582: The mound of Tell Nebi Yunus, which was the ancient arsenal of Nineveh, or along the outside walls. Here, near the northwestern corner of the walls, beyond the pavement of a later building, the archaeologists found almost 300 fragments of prisms recording the royal annals of Sennacherib, Esarhaddon, and Ashurbanipal, beside a prism of Esarhaddon which was almost perfect. After the Second World War , several excavations were carried out by Iraqi archaeologists. From 1951 to 1958, Mohammed Ali Mustafa worked

5005-650: The neolithic. Caves in the Zagros Mountains adjacent to the north side of the Nineveh Plains were used as PPNA settlements, most famously Shanidar Cave . Nineveh itself was founded as early as 6000 BC during the late Neolithic period. Deep sounding at Nineveh uncovered soil layers that have been dated to early in the era of the Hassuna archaeological culture . The development and culture of Nineveh paralleled Tepe Gawra and Tell Arpachiyah

5096-704: The palace. The solid foundation was made out of limestone blocks and mud bricks; it was 22 metres (72 ft) tall. In total, the foundation is made of roughly 2,680,000 cubic metres (3,505,308 cu yd) of brick (approximately 160 million bricks). The walls on top, made out of mud brick, were an additional 20 metres (66 ft) tall. Some of the principal doorways were flanked by colossal stone lamassu door figures weighing up to 30,000 kilograms (30 t); these were winged Mesopotamian lions or bulls , with human heads. These were transported 50 kilometres (31 mi) from quarries at Balatai, and they had to be lifted up 20 metres (66 ft) once they arrived at

5187-414: The period between 4500 and 4000 BC it grew to 40 hectares in size. The greater Nineveh area is notable in the diffusion of metal technology across the near east as the first location outside of Anatolia to smelt copper. Tell Arpachiyah has the oldest copper smelting remains, and Tepe Gawa has the oldest metal work. The copper came from the mines at Ergani . Nineveh became a trade colony of Uruk during

5278-472: The prophet Nahum is almost exclusively taken up with prophetic denunciations against Nineveh. Its ruin and utter desolation are foretold. Its end was strange, sudden, and tragic. According to the Bible, it was God's doing, his judgment on Assyria's pride. In fulfillment of prophecy, God made "an utter end of the place". It became a "desolation". The prophet Zephaniah also predicts its destruction along with

5369-492: The region's ancient cities, and the last capital of the Neo-Assyrian Empire . Nineveh was one of the oldest and greatest cities in antiquity. Texts from the Hellenistic period later offered an eponymous Ninus as the founder of Νίνου πόλις (Ninopolis), although there is no historical basis for this. Book of Genesis 10:11 says that Nimrod or Ashur , depending on the translation, built Nineveh. The context of Nineveh

5460-432: The ruins of a building at the 20 km far-away mound of Khorsabad , which, on further exploration, turned out to be the royal palace of Sargon II , in which large numbers of reliefs were found and recorded, though they had been damaged by fire and were mostly too fragile to remove. In 1847 the young British diplomat Austen Henry Layard explored the ruins. Layard did not use modern archaeological methods; his stated goal

5551-546: The several gates and the existent mudbrick walls, as well as the system that supplied water to the city in times of siege. The excavation reports are in progress. After Mosul’s liberation from the control of the Islamic State (IS), Peter A. Miglus , University of Heidelberg, established a rescue project in 2018, exploring and documenting the intrusive IS tunnels in the Assyrian Military Palace that

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5642-468: The site of the Temple of Nabu , the god of writing, where another cuneiform library was supposed to exist. However, no such library was ever found: most likely, it had been destroyed by the activities of later residents. The excavations started again in 1927, under the direction of Campbell Thompson , who had taken part in King's expeditions. Some works were carried out outside Kuyunjiq, for instance on

5733-482: The site, presumably by a ramp . There are also 3,000 metres (9,843 ft) of stone Assyrian palace reliefs , that include pictorial records documenting every construction step including carving the statues and transporting them on a barge. One picture shows 44 men towing a colossal statue. The carving shows three men directing the operation while standing on the Colossus. Once the statues arrived at their destination,

5824-491: The site. The work was continued from 1967 through 1971 by Tariq Madhloom. Some additional excavation occurred by Manhal Jabur from the early 1970s to 1987. For the most part, these digs focused on Tell Nebi Yunus. The British archaeologist and Assyriologist Professor David Stronach of the University of California, Berkeley conducted a series of surveys and digs at the site from 1987 to 1990, focusing his attentions on

5915-412: The sixth day. Meanwhile, the priests and the people would pray before sunset. The king took a statue of Nabu son of Marduk into the temple to be worshipped. The fourth day involved memorials and celebration. The priests would tell creation stories while the people would sing and dance. On this day the public would gather at the river to eat together and celebrate. Meanwhile, the king was brought to

6006-727: The starting dates are 2, 15 July; 3, 13 August; 4, 12 September; 5, 11 October; 6, 10 November; 7, 9 December, and 8, 8 January. The rules are based on the theory that Maimonides explains in his book Rabbinical Astronomy . The times in the list are those calculated by Gauss with an offset of -14 days as his calculation gives the civil date of Passover rather than the start of the month. Gauss's calculation has been rigorously proved. Nineveh Nineveh ( / ˈ n ɪ n ɪ v ə / NIN -iv-ə ; Akkadian : 𒌷𒉌𒉡𒀀 , NI.NU.A , Ninua ; Biblical Hebrew : נִינְוֵה , Nīnəwē ; Arabic : نَيْنَوَىٰ , Naynawā ; Syriac : ܢܝܼܢܘܹܐ , Nīnwē ), also known in early modern times as Kouyunjik ,

6097-400: The street Al-'Asady (made by Daesh destroying swaths of the city walls) the area is called Jounub Ninawah or Shara Pepsi. Nineveh was an important junction for commercial routes crossing the Tigris on the great roadway between the Mediterranean Sea and the Indian Ocean , thus uniting the East and the West, it received wealth from many sources, so that it became one of the greatest of all

6188-719: The streets of the city." A full and characteristic set shows the campaign leading up to the siege of Lachish in 701; it is the "finest" from the reign of Sennacherib , and now in the British Museum. He later wrote about a battle in Lachish : "And Hezekiah of Judah who had not submitted to my yoke...him I shut up in Jerusalem his royal city like a caged bird. Earthworks I threw up against him, and anyone coming out of his city gate I made pay for his crime. His cities which I had plundered I had cut off from his land." At this time, Nineveh comprised about 7 square kilometres (1,730 acres) of land, and fifteen great gates penetrated its walls. An elaborate system of eighteen canals brought water from

6279-501: The strong by his glance, Lord of kings, light of men, who dost apportion destinies, O Lord, Babylon is thy seat, Borsippa thy crown The wide heavens are thy body.... Within thine arms thou takest the strong.... Within thy glance thou grantest them grace, Makest them see light so that they proclaim thy power. Lord of the lands, light of the Igigi, who pronouncest blessings; Who would not proclaim thy, yea, thy power? Would not speak of thy majesty, praise thy dominion? Lord of

6370-442: The supreme god. On this day a large procession was held with the king and the gods, adorned with gold and precious stones. It is said that on this day Marduk began celebrating his victory alongside the other gods. He returned to the capital to perform a ritual marriage ceremony to ensure the fertility of the land. The gods return accompanied by their Lord Marduk to meet again in the Destinies Hall "Upshu Ukkina", where they met for

6461-503: The surrounding cities of Rehoboth, Calah and Resen The Book of Jonah depicts Nineveh as a wicked city worthy of destruction. God sent Jonah to preach to the Ninevites of their coming destruction, and they fasted and repented because of this. As a result, God spared the city; when Jonah protests against this, God states he is showing mercy for the population who are ignorant of the difference between right and wrong ("who cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand" ) and mercy for

6552-472: The temple, where he would show humility before the gods. The high priest would slap the king as a way to further induce humility; the king's tears were seen as a good omen for the coming year. The priests would then reintroduce the king to the public. Before the gods arrived, the day would be filled with commotion. The puppets that were made on the third day would be burned and mock battle would be taking place as well. This commotion signified that without Marduk,

6643-704: The time of Alexander the Great . The city was actively resettled under the Seleucid Empire . There is evidence of more changes in Sennacherib's palace under the Parthian Empire . The Parthians also established a municipal mint at Nineveh coining in bronze. According to Tacitus , in AD 50 Meherdates , a claimant to the Parthian throne with Roman support, took Nineveh. By Late Antiquity , Nineveh

6734-427: The unknown. This fear of the unknown explains why the high priest would head to the Ésagila every day asking for Marduk's forgiveness, begging him to protect Babylon, his holy city, and asking him to have favor on the city. This prayer was called "The Secret Of Ésagila". It reads: "Lord without peer in thy wrath, Lord, gracious king, lord of the lands, Who made salvation for the great gods, Lord, who throwest down

6825-621: The walls of Assur . Another Akitu house was built outside Nineveh . The Akitu festival was continued throughout the Seleucid Empire and into the Roman Empire period. At the beginning of the 3rd century, it was still celebrated in Emessa , Syria , in honour of the god Elagabal. The Roman emperor Elagabalus (r. 218-222), who was of Syrian origin, even introduced the festival in Italy ( Herodian , Roman History , 5.6). The new moon of Aviv ,

6916-474: The week. On what civil date does the eighth month begin in CE 20874–5? 20874=2026+(248x76). In (248x76) Julian years the Jewish year is due to start (248x3d 18h 12 4/18m) later in the week, which is 932d 2h 31 2/18m or 1d 2h 31 2/18m later after removing complete weeks. Allowing for the current difference of thirteen days between the civil and Julian calendars, the Julian date is 13+(248x0d 5h 47 4/18m) earlier, which

7007-516: Was Sennacherib who made Nineveh a truly influential city ( c.  700 BC ), as he laid out new streets and squares and built within it the South West Palace, or "palace without a rival", the plan of which has been mostly recovered and has overall dimensions of about 503 by 242 metres (1,650 ft × 794 ft). It had at least 80 rooms, many of which were lined with sculpture. A large number of cuneiform tablets were found in

7098-667: Was "to obtain the largest possible number of well preserved objects of art at the least possible outlay of time and money". In the Kuyunjiq mound, Layard rediscovered in 1849 the lost palace of Sennacherib with its 71 rooms and colossal bas-reliefs . He also unearthed the palace and famous library of Ashurbanipal with 22,000 cuneiform clay tablets. Most of Layard's material was sent to the British Museum , but others were dispersed elsewhere as two large pieces which were given to Lady Charlotte Guest and eventually found their way to

7189-564: Was also known as Ninuwa in Mari ; Ninawa in Aramaic ; Ninwe (ܢܸܢܘܵܐ) in Syriac ; and Ninawa ( نینوا ) in Arabic . The original meaning of the name is unclear but may have referred to a patron goddess . The city was said to be devoted to "the goddess Inanna of Nineveh" and Nina was one of the Sumerian and Assyrian names for that goddess. The Assyrian cuneiform for Ninâ ( 𒀏 )

7280-459: Was an ancient Assyrian city of Upper Mesopotamia , located in the modern-day city of Mosul in northern Iraq. It is located on the eastern bank of the Tigris River and was the capital and largest city of the Neo-Assyrian Empire , as well as the largest city in the world for several decades. Today, it is a common name for the half of Mosul that lies on the eastern bank of the Tigris, and

7371-527: Was as one of many centers within the regional development of Upper Mesopotamia . This area is defined as the plains which can support rain-fed agriculture. It exists as a narrow band from the Syrian coast to the Zagros mountains . It is bordered by deserts to the south and mountains to the north. The cultural practices, technology, and economy in this region were shared and they followed a similar trajectory out of

7462-670: Was conflated with Šauška from the Hurro-Urartian pantheon. This temple was called 'House of Exorcists' ( Cuneiform : 𒂷𒈦𒈦 GA 2 .MAŠ.MAŠ; Sumerian : e 2 mašmaš). The context of the etymology surrounding the name is the Exorcist called a Mashmash in Sumerian, was a freelance magician who operated independent of the official priesthood, and was in part a medical professional via the act of expelling demons. The regional influence of Nineveh became particularly pronounced during

7553-444: Was discovered, with their decorations and their sculptured slabs, revealing the life and manners of this ancient people, their arts of war and peace, the forms of their religion, the style of their architecture, and the magnificence of their monarchs. The mound of Kuyunjiq was excavated again by the archaeologists of the British Museum , led by Leonard William King , at the beginning of the 20th century. Their efforts concentrated on

7644-459: Was known, to some, continuously through the Middle Ages. Benjamin of Tudela visited it in 1170; Petachiah of Regensburg soon after. Carsten Niebuhr recorded its location during the 1761–1767 Danish expedition . Niebuhr wrote afterwards that "I did not learn that I was at so remarkable a spot, till near the river. Then they showed me a village on a great hill, which they call Nunia, and

7735-689: Was not called Mosul until after the Arab conquests . It may have been called Hesnā ʿEbrāyē (Jews' Fort). In 627, the city was the site of the Battle of Nineveh between the Eastern Roman Empire and the Sasanians. In 641, it was conquered by the Arabs , who built a mosque on the west bank and turned it into an administrative centre. Under the Umayyad dynasty , Mosul eclipsed Nineveh, which

7826-794: Was preceded by the Late Uruk period . Ninevite 5 pottery is roughly contemporary to the Early Transcaucasian culture ware, and the Jemdet Nasr period ware. Iraqi Scarlet Ware culture also belongs to this period; this colourful painted pottery is somewhat similar to Jemdet Nasr ware. Scarlet Ware was first documented in the Diyala River basin in Iraq. Later, it was also found in the nearby Hamrin Basin , and in Luristan . It

7917-427: Was razed. Most of the people in the city who could not escape to the last Assyrian strongholds in the north and west were either massacred or deported out of the city and into the countryside where they founded new settlements. Many unburied skeletons were found by the archaeologists at the site. The Assyrian Empire then came to an end by 605 BC, the Medes and Babylonians dividing its colonies between themselves. It

8008-431: Was reduced to a Christian suburb with limited new construction. By the 13th century, Nineveh was mostly ruins and was subsequently absorbed into Mosul. A church was converted into a Muslim shrine to the prophet Jonah , which continued to attract pilgrims until its destruction by ISIL in 2014 . The modern city of Mosul is occasionally referred to as Nineveh, such as during the operation to retake Mosul in 2016-17. In

8099-587: Was restricted to the east bank of the Tigris and the west bank was uninhabited. Under the Sasanian Empire , Nineveh was not an administrative centre. By the 2nd century AD there were Christians present and by 554 it was a bishopric of the Church of the East . King Khosrow II (591–628) built a fortress on the west bank, and two Christian monasteries were constructed around 570 and 595. This growing settlement

8190-464: Was the flourishing capital of the Assyrian Empire and was the home of King Sennacherib , King of Assyria, during the Biblical reign of King Hezekiah ( חִזְקִיָּהוּ ) and the lifetime of Judean prophet Isaiah ( ישעיה ). As recorded in Hebrew scripture, Nineveh was also the place where Sennacherib died at the hands of his two sons, who then fled to the vassal land of `rrt ( Urartu ). The book of

8281-458: Was the seat of a Christian bishop. It declined relative to Mosul during the Middle Ages and was mostly abandoned by the 13th century AD. Its ruins lie across the river from the historical city center of Mosul. The two main tells , or mound-ruins, within the walls are Tell Kuyunjiq and Tell Nabī Yūnus , site of a shrine to Jonah . According to the Hebrew Bible and the Quran , Jonah was

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