Mesopotamia

Episode 9, the Disappearing Kingdom: Medes and the Median Empire

You can download the new episode form this link…

As usual, the feed is here.

Names of the characters mentioned

Dioces: the “founder” of the Median Empire according to Herodotus (possibly inspired by the Mannean Diakku, mentioned in Assyrian annales)

Phraortes: his son, possibly the chief Kashtariti mentioned in the chronicle of Essarhaddon

Cyaxares: the greatest of the Median kings, according to Herodotus, and the “conqueror” of Assyria. Possibly Umakishtar who is mentioned in the Gadd Chronicle and said by the Babylonian chronicles to be the person who sacked Assur/Ashur.

Astyages: the last of the Median Emperors, possibly Ishtumigu of the Babylonian chronicles.

median_empire_map chaldeamap

Modern, Artist's imagination of the "Hanging Gardens of Babylon"

Modern, Artist’s imagination of the “Hanging Gardens of Babylon”

For further reading…

If you are interested to know a little more about the people I talked about in episode 6, please follow these links:

The Lullubi: an article from Encylopaedia Iranica. Some images of the relief of Anubanini at Sar-e Pol-e Zahab. If you have a sense of humour, then read my attempt at being funny with the Lullubi, which I published a few years ago online!

Kassites: Again, the entry from EIr. A map of Kassite Babylonia. Here is a bit on Kassites which talks about their origin. Interesting proposal, and a huge bibliography, on Kassite Nippur.

The Gutians: the entry on Gutians from the EIr. Gutian Sumer, in digested form! You’ll see what I mean about people deciding how folk looked 4,000 years ago when you read this, arguing for a ‘Black’ origin of the Sumerians, or this one which has decided that they were Caucasian. This ‘Kurdish argument‘ is not actually half-bad in camparison…

The Manneans: the entry on Mannea from the EIr. Very good review of the Mannean pieces at the Met Museum (it’s a PDF).

Happy reading!

Episode 3: From Pre-History to History

— This is episode three, out after some mishaps… Download/Stream it from here

— As usual, subscribe via Feedburner here, and you can always look for it on the iTunes and other podcast directories (Podbay?).

— I promised a list of terms and names I was using, so here they are.

Chalcolithic = the so-called “copper” age, or the coper-stone period

Elam = The civilisation I talked about the most, and will continue talking about for the next episode

Tepe Sialk = Archaeological site in central-northern part of the plateau

Tepe Hissar= Archaeological site on the northeast of the Iranian Plateau

Shahr-e Sukhte = the Burnt City, site on the east side of the plateau, by the Helmand River

Sargon of Agade = the first king of the Empire of Agade/Akkad (2332 BCE).

Gutians and Lulubians = mountain tribes/confederations to the north of Elam

Jiroft = archaeological side on the central eastern part of the plateau

Naram-Sin= Grandson of Sargon

Ur-Namma (2112-2095) = the founder of the Third Dynasty of Ur

Puzur Inshushinak = contemporary of Ur-Namma, king of Awan, the first Elamite ever mentioned

Shimashki= the dominant city of Elam after 2004 BC

Sukkalmah=the title of the “governor” of Elam under Larsa’s dominance; later the most powerful rulers in the region

Gungunum of Larsa (1932-1906) = the founder of the dynasty of Larsa

And here is a map (note that Malyan is Anshan!)

mesoiranmap