Babylonia
Babylonia(see map: The Hellenistic world), country in south Iraq, stretching from modern Baghdad to the Arab-Persian Gulf, drained by the Euphrates and Tigris rivers. Settlement (dependent on irrigation) is first attested in the sixth millennium bc. The population was mixed; non-Semitic Sumerian dominates the literary record in the third millennium, gradually replaced by Semitic Akkadian in the second millennium, which in turn was displaced by Aramaic in the later first millennium.
Babylonia's political pattern until the 15th cent. bc was one of contending city-states, some of which succeeded in imposing control on their rivals (e.g. Agade: 2340–2200; Third Dynasty of Ur: 2100–2000; Babylon: 1760–1595). From then on, Babylonia formed a territorial state with Babylon as its capital. Babylonia was subject to Assyria from the late 8th cent. until the Babylonian general, Nabopolassar, fought back the Assyrians...
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