Ancient Mesopotamia

It was in the early second millennium BC period that several very minor regional kings governed a number of individual cities in the Diyala river valley region of ancient Mesopotamia.

Today this forms part of central Iraq, to the east of Baghdad. Largely these people were Amorites in terms of their ethnic origin rather than the long-diminished population of ethnic Sumerians.

Minor cities at the time were especially numerous in the River Diyala area, with them largely having emerged during the late third millennium BC period under (or shortly prior to the rise of) the Ur III empire in Sumer, or immediately after its fall around 2004 BC.

For at least two centuries Mesopotamia became a politically fragmented landscape which was dominated by a series of independent city states, starting with Isin but also including Mari and Eshnunna.

Diyala river valley

Lying between the Tigris basin and the foothills of the Zagros mountains to the east, the Diyala valley was and is a farming production hub, with excellent water supplies and good growing opportunities.

The region between about 2000-1761 BC controlled important trade and communications routes which linked southern Mesopotamia with Elam and the Iranian plateau.

Rather than forming a unified kingdom, cities such as Eshnunna, Nerebtum, Shaduppum, Tutub, and Uzarlulu experienced frequent shifts in power, alliances, and vassalage throughout the two and-a-half centuries before the expansion of Babylonian power under Hammurabi.

The strongest polity in the region was Eshnunna, centred at Tell Asmar. Initially one of several successor states in the post-Ur III landscape it gradually emerged as the dominant power under a series of strong rulers during the twentieth and nineteenth centuries BC.

Eshnunna dominant

Bilalama of Eshnunna in the early twentieth century BC is particularly well known for issuing one of Mesopotamia's earliest surviving collections of legal codes, despite at the time seemingly being a vassal governor for Isin.

His city of Eshnunna steadily extended its authority over neighbouring settlements after Isin's sudden decline around 1920 BC, often reducing them to vassal status while preserving local administrations.

Some of the earliest cities, such as Sippar, Borsippa, and Kish in the north, and Ur, Uruk, and Eridu in the south, formed the endpoints of what became the complex Sumerian network of cities and canals (click or tap on map to view full sized)

The expansion continued during the late 1800s BC under Narām-Sîn of Eshnunna (not to be confused with the earlier Akkadian ruler of the same name), who ruled during the early eighteenth century BC. He exploited the weakening of surrounding states to bring much of the Diyala valley firmly under Eshnunna's control.

Smaller centres such as Ashur (seemingly), Ekallatum, and Tutub were incorporated into his state while others accepted subordinate status in exchange for retaining local governors.

Control of the valley was nevertheless contested by neighbouring powers which included the early Assyrians at Ashur, along with perennial actors from the edges of Mesopotamia: Mari and Elam.

Their diplomatic correspondence demonstrates the fact that alliances could rapidly change according to military necessity.

One of Narām-Sîn's successors was Dadusha, who continued his expansionist policy and formed a temporary alliance with Shamshi-Adad I of the kingdom of 'Upper Mesopotamia' against common enemies.

The ancient city of Shaduppum - the modern archaeological site of Tell Harmal - now lies in the Baghdad governorate of Iraq, and within the borders of modern Baghdad itself

Rivalry and Babylon

Their joint campaigns extended influence beyond the Diyala itself, although cooperation soon gave way to rivalry as the balance of power shifted. Eshnunna remained an important regional kingdom following Dadusha's reign under Ibal-Pi'el II, but it faced increasingly pressure from larger states which were competing for supremacy.

By the mid-eighteenth century BC the political independence of the Diyala valley cities had become increasingly precarious. Although individual settlements retained administrative identities, their rulers were often little more than governors who were acting on behalf of stronger kings.

The decisive change came in 1761 BC when Hammurabi of Babylon conquered Eshnunna after earlier campaigns had weakened the kingdom. Local rulers were entirely removed in favour of the imposition of centralised power.

The incorporation of Eshnunna ended the period in which the Diyala valley was dominated by competing local dynasties, bringing its cities under Babylonian rule and fundamentally altering the political geography of Mesopotamia.

These figures are from Eshnunna, probably dating from the period around 2000 BC when the city was experiencing a period of independence and regional power

Main Sources

Dominique Charpin - Writing, Law, and Kingship in Old Babylonian Mesopotamia (University of Chicago Press, 2010)

Douglas R Frayne - Old Babylonian Period (2003–1595 BC) (The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia: Early Periods, Vol 4, University of Toronto Press, 1990)

D T Potts - A Companion to the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East (Ed, Wiley-Blackwell, 2012)

Marc van der Mieroop - History of the Ancient Near East c.3000-323 BC (Blackwell Publishing, 2004, 2007)

Norman Yoffee - The Economic Role of the Crown in the Old Babylonian Period (Undena Publications, 1977)

Additional Sources

Amélie Kuhrt - The Ancient Near East, c.3000-330 BC  (Routledge, 2000, Vol I & II)

Clemens Reichel - Political Change and Cultural Continuity in Eshnunna from the Ur III to the Old Babylonian Period (Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago, 11 June 1996)

Enrico Ascalone - Mesopotamia: Assyrians, Sumerians, Babylonians (Dictionaries of Civilizations 1, University of California Press, 2007)

Gwendolyn Leick - Mesopotamia: The Invention of the City (Penguin Books, 2001)

J N Postgate - Early Mesopotamia: Society and Economy at the Dawn of History (Routledge, 1994)

John Heywood - Historical Atlas of the Ancient World, 4,000,000 to 500 BC (Barnes & Noble, 2000)

Michael Road - Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East (Facts on File, 2000)

Online Sources

Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature

Ancient World Magazine

Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary Project (published between 2003-2021, part of the Babylonian section of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology)

Maps and text copyright © P L Kessler. An original feature for the History Files.