Ancient Shamash Gate in Nineveh Reveals Two Battles 2,500 Years Apart
The Shamash Gate in ancient Nineveh has revealed rare evidence of two violent chapters separated by more than 2,500 years: the fall of the Assyrian capital in 612 B.C. and the battle to free Mosul from ISIS in 2017.
Editor's pick This post is part of hand-picked stories from across the web, curated by the editors of the Assyria Post.
"The Shamash Gate was one of 18 entrances into Nineveh. Ancient records link its construction to King Sennacherib, who ruled from 705 to 681 B.C. The gate connected the city to the east, along the road from Erbil to Nineveh.
Inside the city, the route led toward major royal and religious areas, including Nabi Yunis and the palace of Esarhaddon. This made the gate a key point in Nineveh’s movement, trade, and defense.
Researchers say the site now preserves evidence from two battles. The first was the fall of Nineveh in 612 B.C., when the city fell to invading forces. The second was the fight to liberate Mosul from ISIS in 2017."
Excavators of Tel Hadid recently released the discovery of a unique seal stamp from the seventh century b.c.e., the time of Assyrian domination of the Levant.
Researchers from Iraq, the United Kingdom, and Sweden have launched a new Arabic-language platform for one of the world’s largest collections of cuneiform texts. The project gives Arabic speakers wider access to ancient records written thousands of years ago across Mesopotamia.
The results of a study show that scribes did not always refine their clay, barely used fire to harden the texts, and that tablets made in the workshop coexisted with others brought from outside.
Abbot Eliyo Atto, one of the founders of the Mor Ephrem monastery in Twente, the Netherlands, was a friend of young people, a brother to the elderly and a paternal teacher.
German police have arrested a 26-year-old man in connection with a fire that damaged the construction site of the Syriac Orthodox Church of St. Mary in Germany last weekend.
While today Tur Abdin stands as a symbol of historic endurance, it was once the epicenter of a remarkable, half-millennium-long ecclesiastical fracture that saw two rival Patriarchs claiming authority over the same flock.
Excavators of Tel Hadid recently released the discovery of a unique seal stamp from the seventh century b.c.e., the time of Assyrian domination of the Levant.
Nisha Zahid
