Nineveh

Remember the city of Nineveh mentioned in the Bible? In the biblical account of Jonah, God commanded Jonah to go to that city and preach about the wickedness of the people. Jonah refused, hopped on a ship, and sailed away. God sent a terrible storm and a very large fish that ended up swallowing Jonah.

You can look up the account in the book of Jonah if you don't remember the rest of the story. It is only four chapters short.

Well, that same biblical place was a real city in what is now Mosul, Iraq, located on the Eastern bank of the Tigris River. Its ancient ruins are still there.

It is interesting to note that this city was first mentioned in the Bible back in Genesis 10:11.

This city sat on the only major roadway that lead from the Mediterranean Sea to the Indian Ocean. So everyone who had goods to trade or sell passed through the city, spending money and trading goods there. This was a bustling major city, the capitol of Assyria.

It was destroyed in 612 BC by the Medes. Some of the residents escaped. Those who could not were killed or taken away into captivity.

Archaeologists have found many of the skeletons from the destruction of the city who were never buried. The city walls and two large mounds are still at the site of the once-great city.

Many large palaces, sculptures, and bas-relief art were uncovered. A lot of it has either been destroyed or stolen. Photos of found ruins were taken back in 1990 showing them. Photos taken in 2003 show that what is left has been reduced to rubble. This is due to looters and the turmoil in Iraq that has gone on from 1990 forward.

No one lived there for hundreds of years after its fall. It was brought back into history in 637 AD in the Battle of Nineveh. The Eastern Roman Empire and the Sassanian Empire of Persia battled it out there. Arabs took over the city that same year.

In modern times, this ancient biblical city is a province called Ninawa. It is home to Sunni Arabs, along with a minority of Yezidi and Sunni Kurds and Assyrian Christians.

The city of Mosul is an oil processing center and is considered to be modern-day Nineveh City by the locals.

Return from Nineveh to Mesopotamia