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Nimrud

a Pleiades place resource

Creators: M. Roaf, St J. Simpson
Contributors: R. Talbert, Carolin Johansson, W. Röllig, Jamie Novotny, Tom Elliott, H. Kopp, DARMC, Jeffrey Becker, Sean Gillies, B. Siewert-Mayer, Rune Rattenborg, Francis Deblauwe, Eric Kansa
Copyright © The Contributors. Sharing and remixing permitted under terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License (cc-by).
Last modified Jun 15, 2023 08:48 AM — History
In the ninth century BC, Ashurnasirpal II (r. 883-859 BC) built himself a new administrative center. Kalhu (biblical Calah) — modern Nimrud, a site identified as Larissa, a city mentioned in Xenophon’s Anabasis — became the capital of the Assyrian Empire, replacing Ashur, which had served as Assyria’s capital since the third millennium BC. The city — which is located twenty miles south of the modern Mosul and which occupied a strategic position six miles north of the point where the Tigris River meets the Greater/Upper Zab — served as Assyria’s capital until the reign of Sargon II (r. 721–705 BC). Although Kalhu never again became the primary residence of Assyria’s kings, that city remained a vital administrative, military, and religious center until the fall of the Assyrian Empire.

https://pleiades.stoa.org/places/894019

36.0999751709, 43.3315352658
    • Calah (unspecified date range)
    • Kalah (Akkadian, 1000 BC - 540 BC)
    • Kalhu (Akkadian, 1000 BC - 540 BC)
    • Less than certain: Larisa (550 BC - 330 BC)
    • Nimrud (German, modern)
    • Nimrūd (Modern Standard Arabic)

settlement, archaeological site

Barrington Atlas: BAtlas 91 E1 Kalhu/Calah/‘Larisa’?

The Barrington Atlas Directory notes: Nimrud. The name Nimrud is believed to be derived from an association with the Biblical figure "Nimrod" (Genesis 10:11-10:12, Micah 5:5, Chronicles 1:10). In 1850, Henry Rawlinson identified the city as the Biblical city of Calah (Kalhu, Kalakh; in Hebrew כלח and in Greek χαλαχ). The site covered an area of 360 hectares.

According to inscriptions of the ninth-century-BC Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II (r. 883-859 BC), the Middle Assyrian ruler Shalmaneser I (r. 1263-1234 BC) had built the city Kalḫu. By the time Ashurnasirpal ascended the throne, it “had become dilapidated, lay dormant, (and) had turned into ruin hills” (RIAo Ashurnasirpal II 001 iii 132–133). That important king states that he had the old ruins removed down to the water table (which is said to have been at a depth of 120 layers of bricks) and then had the city constructed anew.  Inside the citadel — which was located in the southwest corner of the near, close to the Tigris River — Ashurnasirpal constructed a large, ornately-decorated palace (the ‘Northwest Palace’), a ziggurat (dedicated to Kalḫu’s tutelary deity Ninurta), as well as several temples. At that time, Kalḫu (biblical Calah) became the capital of the Neo-Assyrian Empire; from the last quarter of the third millennium BC, Ashur had been the principal administrative, military, and religious center of Assyria.

Shalmaneser III (r. 858-824 BC,) Ashurnasirpal’s son and successor, had an armory (‘Fort Shalmaneser’) built in the southeast corner. That building, despite the fact that Kalḫu ceased to be Assyria’s capital at the end of the reign of Sargon II (r. 721–705 BC), remained in use until the end of the Assyrian Empire; for example, it was renovated by Esarhaddon (r. 680–669 BC).


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M. Roaf, St J. Simpson, R. Talbert, Carolin Johansson, W. Röllig, Jamie Novotny, Tom Elliott, H. Kopp, DARMC, Jeffrey Becker, Sean Gillies, B. Siewert-Mayer, Rune Rattenborg, Francis Deblauwe, and Eric Kansa, 'Nimrud: a Pleiades place resource', Pleiades: A Gazetteer of Past Places, 2023 <https://pleiades.stoa.org/places/894019> [accessed: 23 December 2024] 

            {{cite web |url=https://pleiades.stoa.org/places/894019 |title=Places: 894019 (Nimrud) |author=Roaf, M., St J. Simpson |accessdate=December 23, 2024 11:27 am |publisher=Pleiades}}