Fall of Nineveh and Collapse of Assyrian Power
- Date
- 612 BCE
- Category
- Military & conflict
- Region
- Mesopotamia (Iraq)
- Era
- Classical Antiquity
- Significance
In 612 BCE a coalition of Babylonians under Nabopolassar and Medes under Cyaxares, with Scythian support, besieged and stormed Nineveh, the great capital of the Neo-Assyrian Empire.
After a siege of about three months the defences were breached; the city was plundered and burned, and the Assyrian king Sin-shar-ishkun perished. The fall of Nineveh shattered the dominant power of the ancient Near East: although a remnant Assyrian state held out briefly at Harran under Ashur-uballit II, the empire effectively ended within a few years. The event transferred Mesopotamian hegemony to the rising Neo-Babylonian Empire and the Medes, redrawing the region's balance of power and clearing the way for the later Persian ascendancy. The destruction is recorded in the Babylonian Chronicles and echoed in biblical prophetic literature.
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Empires active in 612 BCE
- Roman Kingdom753 BCE to 509 BCE
- Neo-Assyrian Empire911 BCE to 609 BCE
- Neo-Babylonian (Chaldean) Empire626 BCE to 539 BCE
- Zhou Dynasty1046 BCE to 256 BCE
- Scythians800 BCE to 300 BCE
- Carthaginian Empire650 BCE to 146 BCE
Related military & conflict events
- Tiglath-Pileser III's Military and Administrative Reformsc. 745 BCE
- Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem and the start of the Exile587/586 BCE
- Death of Cyrus the Great in Battle Against the Massagetaec. 530 BCE
- Battles of Thermopylae and Salamis480 BCE
- Darius I's Scythian Campaign North of the Black Seac. 513 BCE
- Assyrian destruction of the Kingdom of Israel and fall of Samaria722/720 BCE
Essential reading
- Invention of Standardised Coinage in Lydia (the Lydian Stater)c. 630 BCE
- Han-Xiongnu Heqin Treaty Inaugurates Tribute-and-Marriage Diplomacy198 BC
- Earliest securely dated Maya/Mesoamerican Long Count inscription36 BCE (Long Count 7.16.3.2.13)
- Wang Mang nationalises land under the Xin dynastyAD 9
Further reading
The wider story
Ancient Assyria: A Very Short Introduction
A leading Assyriologist's concise, authoritative primer.
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