In 401 BC, Xenophon and his Greek mercenary army, stranded in Persia after a civil war, stumbled upon the vast, deserted ruins of Nimrud and Nineveh, cities larger than anything he had seen in Greece. These ruins, centuries older than the Parthenon, sparked his curiosity about the people who built such colossal metropolises that had vanished so completely.

Paul Cooper introduces The Fall of Civilizations podcast, focusing on the Assyrian Empire. He aims to explore its rise from the Bronze Age collapse, its development into the world's first military superpower, its artistic and intellectual flourishing, and its eventual, devastating collapse.

The episode revisits Mesopotamia, the arid floodplain watered by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, part of the Fertile Crescent. This region, extending from southern Iraq to Egypt, fostered some of the world's first great societies, including the Assyrians.

The Assyrians had a rich awareness of their ancient history, revering Sumerian heroes like Gilgamesh and Akkadian kings like Sargon the Great. They interpreted ancient ruins as remnants of a great flood, viewing themselves as the culmination of human progress, not an early culture.

After the Sumerian Empire's fall, Akkadian became the dominant language, and independent city-states emerged. Ashur, an early trading city on the Tigris, grew wealthy due to its strategic location and trade. Its people named their city's god, Ashur, after the city itself, and his worship became the supreme religion as the city grew in importance.

The Assyrians, known as Ashurayeh, made several attempts to found kingdoms, with King Shamshi-Adad expanding their territory and building a ziggurat. However, their power was often absorbed by larger empires like Babylon. Despite these periods of subservience, Assyrian culture flourished, as seen in the war-like Tukulti-Ninurta epic. The Bronze Age collapse, a period of widespread destruction, significantly challenged Assyria around 1200-1150 BC.

Assyria survived the Bronze Age collapse by withdrawing to its heartland. Its enemies' disunity, untouched main cities, and access to iron, a new and abundant metal for weapons, were crucial for its survival. Tiglath-Pileser I, a formidable king, ascended in 1114 BC, inheriting a threatened Assyria. He campaigned relentlessly, expanding the empire, celebrating his victories, and bringing back exotic animals, showcasing Assyria's growing power and wealth.

Adad-Nirari II's ascension in 910 BC marks a precisely datable event in Near Eastern history due to meticulous Assyrian record-keeping of year names and astronomical events like eclipses. He began expanding the empire, relying on the formidable Assyrian army, which consisted mainly of farmers called to fight annually. This rhythm of war and harvest defined the empire's expansion.

Ashurnasirpal II, a ruthless warrior, utilized terror tactics and brutal executions to maintain control, as detailed in his inscriptions. He forced conquered territories to pay tribute, enriching Assyria. He also extensively resettled conquered peoples within Assyria, increasing its population and creating cosmopolitan cities, though this practice also served as a punitive measure to break their ties to their homelands. His son, Shalmaneser III, continued these policies, but a rebellion led by his own son ultimately weakened the empire.

Tiglath-Pileser III, taking his name from an earlier powerful king, revolutionized the Assyrian military around 745 BC. He transformed it into a professional, modern army with elite armored troops, cavalry, and chariots, and a significant engineering component. This allowed for sustained sieges, like the three-year siege of Arpad, and increased the use of iron for weapons and armor, marking an era of mass production and unparalleled military effectiveness.

Tiglath-Pileser III's empire treated outer regions as sources of wealth extraction, as evinced by Ashurnasirpal II's records of immense plunder, including silver, gold, tin, bronze, iron, and thousands of slaves. Tiglath-Pileser conquered vast territories, including Syria, the Mediterranean coast, northern Israel, and most notably, the ancient and proud city of Babylon, linking trade routes from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean. This powerful empire was then passed to his son, Sargon II, initiating the Sargonid Dynasty, a period of peak achievements but also eventual collapse.

The daily life of Assyrian citizens is richly detailed through countless surviving clay tablets. A great city like Nineveh, with its 12-kilometer walls and 15 gates, would have been a bustling, cosmopolitan hub. Life involved preparing food, brewing beer, and navigating busy docks. Roads were patrolled but bandits were common. Rooftops were centers for daily chores and social interaction. Assyrians also believed their world was filled with demons and spirits, warded off with talismans and exorcisms. Cylinder seals were crucial for identity and contracts, though common people used fingernail prints.

The Sargonid Dynasty brought immense changes, orchestrated within the royal palaces. Sennacherib, son of Sargon, ascended in 705 BC. His rule began with widespread rebellion among Assyrian vassals, whom he ruthlessly reconquered, as his brutal inscriptions attest. This period is uniquely documented by both Assyrian chronicles and the Hebrew Bible, particularly concerning his campaign against the Kingdom of Judah.

Sennacherib's campaign against the Kingdom of Judah, centered on Jerusalem, is a key moment. King Hezekiah's fervent monotheistic beliefs led him to defy Assyria, resulting in a siege of Lachish. Assyrian reliefs vividly depict the siege, showing their advanced engineering with siege ramps and engines. Lachish fell, its inhabitants brutally deported. Jerusalem, despite Hezekiah's fortifications and prayers, faced severe pressure, paying a heavy tribute. The siege of Jerusalem ended mysteriously, possibly due to plague, an embarrassing failure for Sennacherib.

Babylon was a constant source of trouble for Assyrian kings due to its unique culture and power. Sennacherib, after years of rebellion and the death of his son, decided to decisively solve the 'Babylonian problem' by destroying the city in 689 BC. This act, considered excessive even by contemporary standards, led to an outcry and the symbolic trial of the Babylonian god Marduk. After this, Sennacherib shifted his focus to building, making Nineveh his magnificent new capital, creating palaces with splendid decorations and botanical gardens, possibly inspiring the legend of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. This indicates a potential personal change in the king, though it wasn't passed on.

Sennacherib's choice of his youngest son, Esarhaddon, as crown prince over his older brother Udru-Mulissu sparked a fierce succession crisis. Despite oaths of allegiance, Esarhaddon's brothers plotted against him, forcing him into exile. In 681 BC, Udru-Mulissu and another brother assassinated Sennacherib. Esarhaddon, fueled by outrage, quickly gathered an army, and his brothers' soldiers deserted. He retook Nineveh, exacting brutal revenge on the conspirators and their families. Esarhaddon, living in paranoia due to his experiences, sought advice from oracles and priests, and rebuilt Babylon to repair past damage, even invading Egypt to curb its rebellious activities.

Esarhaddon's health deteriorated, possibly suffering from severe depression and physical ailments. His frequent requests to his chief exorcist reveal his despair and constant fear of death. To prevent another civil war, he devised an inventive succession plan, naming his son Shamash-shum-ukin as King of Babylon and his younger son Ashurbanipal as King of Assyria. This vision of dual rule, meant to bring peace, instead laid the groundwork for a devastating conflict, marking the final chapter of the Assyrian age.

Ashurbanipal's reign represented the golden age of the Assyrian Empire, a vast and culturally rich empire with Nineveh as its capital. Uniquely, Ashurbanipal was a literate king, a fact he was proud of, leading to the creation of the world's first universal library in Nineveh, housing over 30,000 clay tablets preserving rich Mesopotamian history and literature. Despite intellectual pursuits, Ashurbanipal faced real-world challenges, including a persistent rebellion in Egypt and a growing threat from the Elamite peoples. The Elamite king Teumann, in alliance with Ashurbanipal's brother Shamash-shum-ukin, launched a surprise attack, which Ashurbanipal repelled, brutally defeating and decapitating Teumann.

Ashurbanipal's brother, Shamash-shum-ukin, previously installed as King of Babylon, rebelled and declared Babylonia independent. Ashurbanipal was deeply hurt by this betrayal. He besieged Babylon for four years, during which conditions became horrific, leading to starvation and cannibalism. When the city fell, Shamash-shum-ukin died in a fire, and Ashurbanipal's forces brutally massacred the remaining inhabitants. Following this, Ashurbanipal launched a war of extermination against Elam, utterly destroying its capital, Suza, and sowing salt on its lands, leaving a vacuum that would be exploited by the Medes.

Around 640 BC, Ashurbanipal commissioned the lion hunt reliefs, depicting controlled hunts as a symbol of royal power. These reliefs, exquisitely realistic, portray the sorrowful expressions of the hunted lions, a poignant reflection of the empire's impending doom. Meanwhile, climate research suggests a mega-drought began around 675 BC, weakening Assyria and placing it at an economic disadvantage. However, Assyria's heavy-handed military rule had bred deep unpopularity, creating countless enemies who, led by the Medes, were poised to exploit any weakness.

Ashurbanipal's last 12 years are shrouded in mystery, possibly due to illness or depression, as suggested by his lamenting inscriptions. After his death in 639 BC, chaos engulfed Assyria. Its provinces rebelled, Babylon declared independence, and civil war erupted. The Medes, now a formidable power, allied with the Babylonians under Nabo-polassar, began their invasion. They captured and sacked the ancient capital of Ashur in 616 BC, signaling the empire's vulnerability.

Nabo-polassar, initially a commoner who became King of Babylon, formed a crucial alliance with the Medes. Their combined forces pushed north, culminating in the siege of Nineveh in 612 BC. The archaeological record reveals fierce fighting at the Halzi Gate. The city fell, and its population suffered a devastating defeat. The descriptions from the Babylonian chronicles and the Hebrew Bible's Book of Nahum vividly portray the brutality and joyous destruction of the city, viewed as divine retribution for Assyria's cruelty. All three Assyrian capitals lay in ruins, their king dead, and the last resistance crushed at Harran.

Nabo-polassar celebrated the destruction of Assyria, paving the way for the new Babylonian kings, including Nebuchadnezzar. The great Assyrian cities were never reoccupied, left as smoking ruins overtaken by desert sands. Ironically, the fires that destroyed Nineveh baked Ashurbanipal's clay tablets, preserving his vast library. Looters defaced the kings' carvings but spared the lion hunt reliefs. Centuries later, Xenophon and his men found these ruins unrecognized, their history forgotten. The painstaking work of archaeologists and scholars has since brought these voices back from the silence of millennia, allowing us to understand the suffering and loss through works like 'The Lament for a City'.