Assyria

An Assyrian winged bull, or lamassu.

Assyria was a city-state on the Upper Tigris River in the Middle Bronze Age. It was named after its capital, the ancient city of Assur.

The Assyrians were just to the north of their rivals, the Babylonians. All kingdoms of ancient Mesopotamia used the cuneiform writing system, which had been invented by the Sumerians.

Assyrian people

The Assyrians are an ethnic group whose descendants remain in what is today Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria, but they have gone to the Caucasus, North America, and Western Europe during the past century. Hundreds of thousands more live in the Assyrian diaspora. They are part of the Iraqi refugees communities in Europe, the former Soviet Union, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Syria, Jordan, and Lebanon.

Related pages

• Assyrian genocide
• Nineveh