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| Etymology | |
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The Arabic name العراق al-ʿIrāq has been in use since before the 6th century. There are several suggested origins for the name. One dates to the Sumerian city of Uruk (Biblical Hebrew Erech) and is thus ultimately of Sumerian origin, as Uruk was the Akkadian name for the Sumerian city of Unug, containing the Sumerian word for "city", URU.[9][10] According to Professor Wilhelm Eilers, "The name al-‘Irāq, for all its Arabic appearance, is derived from Middle Persian erāq for lowlands".[11]
Mesopotamia has always been called "the land of Iraq" in Arabic, meaning "the fertile" or "deep-rooted land".[12] During the medieval period, there was a region called ʿIrāq ʿArabī ("Arabian Iraq") for lower Mesopotamia and ʿIrāq ʿajamī ("Persian Iraq"[13] or "Foreign Iraq"[14]), for the region now situated in Central and Western Iran.[13] The term historically included the plain south of the Hamrin Mountains and did not include the northernmost and westernmost parts of the modern territory of Iraq.[15]
As an Arabic word, عراق means hem, shore, bank, or edge,[16] so that the name by folk etymology came to be interpreted as "the escarpment", viz. at the south and east of the Jazira Plateau, which forms the northern and western edge of the "al-Iraq arabi" area.[17]
The Arabic pronunciation is [ʕiˈrɑːq]. In English, it is either /ɪˈrɑːk/ (the only pronunciation listed in the Oxford English Dictionary and the first one in Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary) or /ɪˈræk/ (listed first by MQD), the American Heritage Dictionary, and the Random House Dictionary. /aɪˈræk/ is frequently heard in US media.
[edit] Tags:Arabic,/,Iran,Mesopotamia,Akkadian,Sumerian,American,Uruk,Erech,Uru,Middle Persian,Fertile,Deep-rooted,Lower Mesopotamia,Hamrin Mountains,Folk Etymology,Escarpment,Arabic Pronunciation,[ʕiˈrɑːq],First,Arabia,Persia,Arab,City, | |
| Ancient Iraq | |
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Main article: History of Mesopotamia
The upper part of the stela of Hammurabi's code of laws
Iraq has the common epithet, the "Cradle of Civilization", as it was home to the earliest known civilization, the Sumerian civilization, which arose in the fertile Tigris-Euphrates river valley of southern Iraq in the Chalcolithic (Ubaid period). It was here in the late 4th millennium BC, that the world's first writing system and recorded history itself were born. The Sumerian civilization flourished for over 3,000 years and was succeeded by the rise of the Akkadian Empire in the 24th century BC. Over two centuries of Akkadian dominance was followed by a Sumerian Renaissance in the 21st century BC. An Elamite invasion in 2004 BC brought the Third Dynasty of Ur to an end. By the 21st century BC, a new Akkadian civilization, Assyria, had risen to dominance in northern Iraq, and by the 19th century BC a contemporaneous Amorite state, Babylonia, had formed in southern Iraq.
Iraq was to be dominated by the Assyrians and Babylonians for the next 14 centuries, and under the Babylonian empire of Hammurabi, the Assyrian Empires of 1365 - 1076 BC and the Neo Assyrian Empire of 911 - 609 BC, and the final Babylonian empire of 620- 539 BC Iraq became a centre of world power. The Neo Assyrian Empire in particular put Iraq at the heart of a massive empire stretching from the Caucasus to Egypt and Arabia, and from Cyprus to Persia.
In the 6th century BC, Cyrus the Great of neighbouring Persia defeated the Neo-Babylonian Empire at the Battle of Opis and Iraq was subsumed into the Achaemenid Empire for nearly four centuries. In the late 4th century BC, Alexander the Great conquered the region, putting it under Hellenistic Seleucid rule for nearly two centuries.[18] The Parthians conquered the region during the reign of Mithridates I of Parthia (r. 171–138 BC). From Syria, the Romans invaded the region several times. Christianity began to take hold in Iraq (particularly in Assyria) between the 1st and 3rd centuries, and Assyria became a center of the Church of the East. The Sassanid Persians under Ardashir I destroyed the Parthian Empire and conquered the region in 224 AD. The region was thus a province of the Persian Empire for four centuries, until the Muslim conquest of Persia in the 7th century, although a number of indigenous states evolved during the Parthian era, such as Adiabene, Osroene and Hatra.
[edit] Tags:Syria,Tigris,Euphrates,Cradle Of Civilization,Writing,Law,Assyrian,Babylonian,Achaemenid,Hellenistic,Parthian,Sassanid,Roman,History Of Mesopotamia,Hammurabi,Civilization,Chalcolithic,Ubaid Period,4th Millennium Bc,Writing System,Akkadian Empire,Elamite,Third Dynasty Of Ur,Amorite,Caucasus,Egypt,Cyprus,Cyrus The Great,Neo-babylonian Empire,Achaemenid Empire,Alexander The Great,Seleucid,Parthians,Mithridates I Of Parthia,Romans,Several Times,Assyria,Church Of The East, | |
| Islamic Golden Age | |
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Main articles: Islamic conquest of Iraq, Abbasid Caliphate, and Islamic Golden Age
Abbasid-era gold coin minted in 1244 in Baghdad.
The Islamic conquest in the 7th century established Islam in Iraq. Under the Rashidun Caliphate, Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law Ali moved his capital to Kufa "fi al-Iraq" when he became the fourth caliph. The Umayyad Caliphate ruled the province of Iraq from Damascus in the 7th century. (However, eventually there was a separate, independent Caliphate of Córdoba.)
The Abbasid Caliphate built the city of Baghdad in the 8th century as their capital, and it became the leading metropolis of the Arab and Muslim world for five centuries. Baghdad was the largest multicultural city of the Middle Ages, peaking at a population of more than a million,[19] and was the centre of learning during the Islamic Golden Age. The Mongols destroyed the city during the siege of Baghdad in the 13th century.[20]
[edit] Tags:Baghdad,Abbasid,Rashidun,Umayyad,Mongol, | |
| Mongol invasions | |
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Mongol invasion of Iraq
The sacking of Baghdad, 1258
Siege of Irbil, 1258-1259
Siege of Mosul, 1261-1262.
Illustrations from the Jami' al-tawarikh by Rashid-al-Din Hamadani Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Département des Manuscrits, Division Orientale.
Main articles: Siege of Baghdad (1258) and Ilkhanate
In 1257, Hulagu Khan amassed an unusually large army, a significant portion of the Mongol Empire's forces, for the purpose of conquering Baghdad. When they arrived at the Islamic capital, Hulagu Khan demanded surrender but the last Abbasid Caliph Al-Musta'sim refused. This angered Hulagu, and, consistent with Mongol strategy of discouraging resistance, Baghdad was decimated.[21] Estimates of the number of dead range from 200,000 to a million.[22]
The Mongols destroyed the Abbasid Caliphate and The Grand Library of Baghdad (Arabic بيت الحكمة Bayt al-Hikma, lit., House of Wisdom), which contained countless, precious, historical documents. The city has never regained its status as major center of culture and influence. Some historians believe that the Mongol invasion destroyed much of the irrigation infrastructure that had sustained Mesopotamia for many millennia. Other historians point to soil salination as the culprit in the decline in agriculture.[23]
The mid-14th-century Black Death ravaged much of the Islamic world.[24] The best estimate for Middle East—Iraq, Iran, Syria, etc.—is a death rate of a third.[25]
In 1401, warlord of Mongol descent Tamerlane (Timur Lenk) invaded Iraq. After the capture of Bagdad, 20,000 of its citizens were massacred.[26] Timur ordered that every soldier should return with at least two severed human heads to show him (many warriors were so scared they killed prisoners captured earlier in the campaign just to ensure they had heads to present to Timur).[27]
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| Ottoman Empire | |
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Main articles: Ottoman Empire, Ottoman Iraq, and Mamluk rule in Iraq
During the late 14th and early 15th centuries, the Black Sheep Turkmen ruled the area now known as Iraq. In 1466, the White Sheep Turkmen defeated the Black Sheep and took control. In the 16th century, most of the territory of present-day Iraq came under the control of Ottoman Empire as the pashalik of Baghdad. Throughout most of the period of Ottoman rule (1533–1918) the territory of present-day Iraq was a battle zone between the rival regional empires and tribal alliances. The Safavid dynasty of Iran briefly asserted their hegemony over Iraq in the periods of 1508–1533 and 1622–1638.
By the 17th century, the frequent conflicts with the Safavids had sapped the strength of the Ottoman Empire and had weakened its control over its provinces. The nomadic population swelled with the influx of bedouins from Najd, in the Arabian Peninsula. Bedouin raids on settled areas became impossible to curb.[28]
During the years 1747–1831 Iraq was ruled by the Mamluk officers of Circassian origin who succeeded in obtaining autonomy from the Ottoman Porte, suppressed tribal revolts, curbed the power of the Janissaries, restored order and introduced a program of modernization of economy and military. In 1831, the Ottomans managed to overthrow the Mamluk regime and imposed their direct control over Iraq.[29] The population of Iraq had shrunk to under 5 million by the early 20th century.[30] [31]
[edit] Tags:Safavid,Ottoman, | |
| World War I | |
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Main articles: Mesopotamian campaign, Damascus Protocol, McMahon-Hussein Correspondence, and Sykes–Picot Agreement
Frederick Stanley Maude with British Indian Army entering Baghdad in 1917
Ottoman rule over Iraq lasted until World War I when the Ottomans sided with Germany and the Central Powers. In the Mesopotamian campaign against the Central Powers, British forces invaded the country and suffered a major defeat at the hands of the Turkish army during the Siege of Kut (1915–1916). British forces regrouped and captured Baghdad in 1917. An armistice was signed in 1918.
During World War I the Ottomans were driven from much of the area by the United Kingdom during the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The British lost 92,000 soldiers in the Mesopotamian campaign. Ottoman losses are unknown but the British captured a total of 45,000 prisoners of war. By the end of 1918 the British had deployed 410,000 men in the area, of which 112,000 were combat troops.
In 1916, the British and French made a plan for the post-war division of Western Asia under the Sykes-Picot Agreement.
After the war, the League of Nations granted France mandates over Syria and Lebanon and granted the United Kingdom mandates over Mesapotamia and Palestine (which was subsequently partitioned into two autonomous regions: Palestine and Transjordan). On 11 November 1920 Iraq became a League of Nations mandate under British control with the name "State of Iraq".
[edit] Tags:Western Asia,Jordan,British,League Of Nations Mandate,League Of Nations, | |
| British occupation | |
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Further information: Iraqi revolt against the British
The Sykes-Picot agreement had been made with the assent of Imperial Russia, defining their respective spheres of influence and control in West Asia after the expected downfall of the Ottoman Empire during World War I. The Agreement was concluded on 16 May 1916.[32] Britain imposed a Hāshimite monarchy on Iraq and defined the territorial limits of Iraq without taking into account the politics of the different ethnic and religious groups in the country, in particular those of the Kurds and the Assyrians to the north. During the British occupation, the Shi'ites and Kurds fought for independence.
Faced with spiraling costs and influenced by the public protestations of war hero T. E. Lawrence in The Times, Britain replaced Arnold Wilson in October 1920 with new Civil Commissioner Tags: | |
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