What Is Mesopotamia? The Land Of Humanity’s Firsts

Humanity’s first cities and empires rose and fell in a region cradled between the River Tigris and River Euphrates: Mesopotamia. During the first echelons of recorded history, this ancient land was the birthplace of the Sumerians, the Babylonians, and the Assyrians. Cities thrived, and eventually gave rise to writing, mathematics, astronomy, and stunning artistic developments. These “great civilizations” are now little more dust and ruins, but the legacy of Mesopotamia is hard to overstate. 

Mesopotamia is located within Tigris–Euphrates River system in current-day Iraq and Syria (stretching as far as southeastern Turkey and western Iran under some definitions). In fact, the name Mesopotamia comes from the Ancient Greek for “land between the rivers.”

Today, this area is fraught with drought and increasingly arid land, but it was once part of an area known as the Fertile Cresent which provided the ideal conditions for humans to start farming during the Agricultural Revolution around 12,000 years ago or more. 

Agriculture merged independently in many parts of the world during this time, particularly in the Fertile Crescent, but Mesopotamia was one of the first regions to reap the fruits of this development. Unlike the day-to-day grind of hunting and gathering, settled agriculture allowed human populations to generate a surplus and a plannable food supply, which made it possible to support larger population groups. 

Mesopotamia was the location of the earliest recorded civilization, Sumer, which emerged around 5,500 BCE. They made significant contributions to human history, inventing the earliest known writing system called cuneiform, developing advanced irrigation techniques, and building some incredible architectural feats.  

Its biggest city was Uruk, found today in Iraq, which was most likely home to some 80,000 people at its peak. It was here where some of the world’s earliest texts were produced in the form of clay tablets that date to around 3200 BCE.

Around 2334 BCE, Sumer fell under the influence of the Akkadian Empire, the world’s first recorded empire. Under the rule of Sargon of Akkad, several Sumerian city-states were incorporated into his empire that extended across much of Mesopotamia. It was short but sweet though, lasting less than 200 years. 

In 1894 BCE, the Babylonian Empire gained prominence and became the powerhouse of the region. It was centered around Babylon in the lower Euphrates. Among the many achievements of the Babylonian Empire, they produced one of the earliest sets of written laws called the Code of Hammurabi, written around 1750 BCE.

The First Babylonian Dynasty lasted roughly 300 years. During this period, other civilizations, like the Hittites and Assyrians, rose to power and exerted influence over Mesopotamia. The Assyrian Empire was perhaps best known for its fierce military might, which it used to conquer huge parts of present-day Iraq, Syria, Iran, Turkey, and Egypt. 

Then came the Neo-Babylonian Empire (626 BCE – 539 BCE), which saw the creation of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, known as one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World (although some historians doubt it existed). 

The next part of Mesopotamian history was shaped by outside forces from near and distant lands: first the Persian Empire, then the Hellenistic and Roman Empires, then Islamic Caliphates, and eventually the Ottoman Empire. 

In the 20th century, the dictator Saddam Hussein often harked back to the legacy of Mesopotamia to show off the glory of Iraq’s history and even attempted to “rebuild Babylon.” His project, however, ultimately failed and the site was abandoned. 

Nevertheless, the legacy of Mesopomia’s heyday well and truly left its imprint on the world: the first farmers, the first cities, the first empires, and the first writing systems, to name but a few of the region’s grand achievements. 

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