(1) Some of the most sophisticated ancient civilisations once thrived in Iraq, but the cities of the Babylonians, Assyrians and Sumerians have become fragile ruins, in a nation recovering from war.(2) He spends all of Judah's money to please the King of Assyria and even worships Assyrian gods.(3) In 1853, the archaeologist Austen Henry Layard and his team were excavating the palace library of the ancient Assyrian capital Nineveh.(4) The Assyrians left one of the earliest records of weaponry, tactics, and battlefield engagements.(5) The ancient Chaldeans and Assyrians engaged in astrological divination some 3,000 years ago.(6) From the Assyrians in ancient Israel and the Romans in Carthage to the Belgians in the Congo and the Turks in Armenia, history is a bloody and barbaric tale.(7) From 750 B.C. on, Assyrian kings repeatedly claimed sovereignty over the islands.(8) Items from ancient Babylon and Nineveh, Sumerian statues, Assyrian reliefs and 5,000-year-old tablets bearing some of the earliest known writing have been taken or damaged whilst troops stood by and watched.(9) First the Mycenaeans grabbed it, then the Phoenicians, Egyptians, Assyrians and Persians owned it.(10) The Assyrian king Sennacherib laid siege to 46 cities in Judah in 701, and locked up Hezekiah like a bird in a cage in Jerusalem.(11) The ancient Assyrians , like many more recent armies, deliberately burned the woodlands of their enemies.(12) Hammurabi, a great leader known for creating the first recorded legal code in history, united the Assyrians and Babylonians in harmony.(13) It is the site of an ancient Assyrian castle, whose many walls have been integrated into the general city architecture.(14) They are the descendants of the ancient Assyrians , who in Old Testament times controlled the largest empire in the Middle East.(15) Most structures were built in limestone gypsum and are an eclectic mix of Assyrian , Hellenistic, Parthian and Roman styles.(16) Our strongest early evidence of deliberate, aggressive expansionism, though, comes from the Assyrians .
