Babylonia

Legacy

Babylonian law, mathematics and astronomy, including the division of the circle into 360 degrees, shaped later Persian, Greek and Jewish thought.

Timeline of Babylonia

1. 1792 BCE
   Hammurabi succeeds Sin-muballit as king of Babylon

   Since the fall of Ur, Mesopotamia had been divided among kingdoms ruled by Amorite dynasties. Babylon was a secondary city where an Amorite dynasty had taken root about a century earlier and built a modest kingdom including Kish, Sippar and Borsippa. When Hammurabi succeeded his father Sin-muballit in 1792 BCE (middle chronology), he was surrounded by stronger neighbours: Rim-Sin's Larsa in the south, Eshnunna in the Diyala valley, and Shamshi-Adad's kingdom of Upper Mesopotamia, with whom Babylon kept good relations. For two decades he mostly built temples and canals.

2. 1763 BCE
   Hammurabi conquers Larsa and annexes Rim-Sin's kingdom in the south

   After helping to repel an Elamite invasion of Mesopotamia, Hammurabi turned on Rim-Sin of Larsa, the long-reigning king who had earlier absorbed Isin and Uruk. Citing Rim-Sin's poor support against Elam and alleged raids, he launched a lightning war with help from his ally Zimri-Lim of Mari. Larsa was besieged until its defenders ran short of food; Babylonian troops took the walls and brought Rim-Sin out alive. With Larsa annexed in 1763 BCE (some accounts say 1764), Hammurabi controlled all of southern Mesopotamia and took the old title 'king of Sumer and Akkad'.

3. 1761 BCE
   Hammurabi takes Mari on the Euphrates; its palace is destroyed by 1759

   Mari, on the middle Euphrates, was a rich trading kingdom whose palace archives of more than 25,000 tablets are a key source for this age. Its king Zimri-Lim had been Hammurabi's ally, but the two fell out, apparently over Babylonian ambitions in the Jebel Sinjar region. The course of the war is not recorded, but the outcome is clear: Mari was captured around 1761 BCE and destroyed by 1759, ending its archive. Babylon now controlled the Euphrates route towards Syria, and the map's Babylonian realm stretched far upstream.

4. 1760 BCE
   Ekallatum in Assyria is subjugated; Eshnunna has already been beaten

   North of Babylon, Eshnunna in the Diyala valley had been weakened by the Elamite war. Hammurabi first allied with its new king, Silli-Sin, who married one of his daughters, but then defeated it, a victory named in his 32nd year. The name for his next year boasts that he subjugated Mari and 'the many cities of Subartu', including Ekallatum on the Tigris, once the seat of Shamshi-Adad's son Ishme-Dagan, and Assyria was reduced to a vassal. Babylon was now master of almost all Mesopotamia, from the Gulf to the upper Tigris.

5. 1755 BCE
   Code of Hammurabi set up late in his reign

   Near the end of his reign, Hammurabi had his laws inscribed on stone monuments. The best-preserved copy is a basalt stele 2.25 metres tall, topped by a relief of the king before Shamash, the sun god and god of justice. Its prologue says the gods chose him 'to prevent the strong from oppressing the weak', and its rulings, written as 'if this, then that' cases, cover crime, family, property and trade, including 'an eye for an eye'. The exact date is uncertain (often c. 1753 BCE). Taken to Susa as Elamite plunder centuries later, the stele was found in 1901 and is now in the Louvre.

6. 1750 BCE
   Hammurabi dies; his son Samsu-iluna succeeds

   Hammurabi died around 1750 BCE, in the 43rd year of his reign, apparently after a long illness; his son Samsu-iluna seems to have been running the kingdom in his final months. In four decades Hammurabi had turned Babylon from one Amorite kingdom among many into the master of Mesopotamia, and the city would remain the region's leading centre for over a thousand years. But his empire had been won by conquest within a single lifetime, and many newly conquered cities still remembered independence. Samsu-iluna inherited a realm that would soon start to shrink.

7. 1741 BCE
   Rim-Sin II's revolt spreads to 26 cities; first known Kassite attack repelled

   In Samsu-iluna's ninth year (c. 1741 BCE), a man calling himself Rim-Sin, perhaps a nephew of the king Hammurabi had defeated, led a revolt from Larsa. It spread to some 26 cities, including Uruk, Ur and Isin in the south and Eshnunna in the north. Within a year Samsu-iluna broke the northern rebels and had the king of Eshnunna executed. That same year he turned back an invading Kassite army, the earliest known mention of the people who would later rule Babylonia. The kingdom survived the shock, but the south remained at war.

8. 1737 BCE
   Samsu-iluna retakes Larsa; Ur and Uruk sacked, the south largely abandoned

   For several years Samsu-iluna's armies fought Rim-Sin II's forces across the borderlands between Babylon, Sumer and Elam. Eventually he attacked Ur, pulled down its walls and sacked it, then did the same to Uruk and Isin, before finally defeating Larsa. Records from Ur and Uruk stop after his tenth year, and archaeology suggests these ancient cities were largely abandoned for centuries, until well into the Kassite period. Whether war alone was to blame, or Samsu-iluna made a deliberate retreat, is debated, but the old Sumerian south of the map was emptied.

9. 1725 BCE
   Ilum-ma-ili's revolt founds the Sealand dynasty; Sumer lost for centuries

   A few years later a new pretender, Ilum-ma-ili, claiming descent from the last king of Isin, raised another revolt across Sumer. After an indecisive first battle, he defeated Samsu-iluna in a second and founded the First Sealand Dynasty in the far south. Samsu-iluna turned to defence, rebuilding fortresses around Nippur, while Assyria and Elam also broke free of Babylon. The south stayed independent for roughly 270–300 years (estimates differ), and the Babylonian kingdom shrank back towards its northern core around Babylon and the middle Euphrates.

10. 1595 BCE
    Mursili I of Hatti sacks Babylon, ending Hammurabi's dynasty

    Hammurabi's successors ruled a much smaller kingdom: Abi-eshuh failed to retake the Sealand, and the last king, Samsu-ditana, faced growing pressure from the Kassites. Then, around 1595 BCE (middle chronology; proposed dates vary by as much as 230 years), the Hittite king Mursili I marched some 2,000 kilometres from Anatolia, destroyed Aleppo and sacked Babylon, carrying captives and treasure back to Hattusa. The Hittites did not stay. Their raid ended Hammurabi's dynasty, which had ruled Babylon for about three centuries, and the Kassites took control of Babylonia for the next four centuries.

Periods and reigns

• Hammurabi 1792–1750 BCE
• Samsu-iluna 1750–1712 BCE
• Abi-eshuh 1712–1684 BCE
• Ammi-ditana 1684–1647 BCE
• Ammi-saduqa 1647–1626 BCE
• Samsu-ditana 1626–1595 BCE

Rulers

• Hammurabi c. 1792 – 1750 BCE

  Unified southern Mesopotamia and issued his famous law code

• Nebuchadnezzar I c. 1121 – 1100 BCE

  Defeated Elam and recovered the statue of Marduk

• Nabopolassar 626 – 605 BCE

  Freed Babylon from Assyria and helped destroy it

• Nebuchadnezzar II 605 – 562 BCE

  Built the Ishtar Gate and captured Jerusalem

• Nabonidus 556 – 539 BCE

  Last king, defeated by Cyrus the Great

Realms on the map

• Babylonia 1800–601 BCE
• Neo-Babylonian Empire 600–539 BCE

Chapters

• The world in 1500 BCE: Chariots and Empires