Adad: son of the divinity Anu, he is the god of the storm in Mesopotamia, whose symbol is the lightning.
Akkad: former capital of the eponymous kingdom created around 2350 BC by Sargon, the first to unite under his control the territory stretching from the Persian Gulf to the shores of the Mediterranean.
Aramaeans: ethnic groups living in the northern regions of Mesopotamia at the end of the 2nd and the beginning of the 1st millennium, founders of many local kingdoms.
Ashur: city in Northern Iraq and first capital of the Assyrian Empire, it is known since the 3rd millennium and continues to prosper in the Parthian period, after the fall of the Assyrian empire.
Assarhaddon: king of Assyria between 680 and 669 BC, he was the son of Sennacherib.
Assurbanipal: king of Assyria between 668 and 626 BC, he was the son of Assarhaddon and the founder of the library of Nineveh, which notably delivered the account of the Flood.
Assurnasirpal II: king of Assyria between 883 and 859 BC, father of Salmanazar III, he led numerous territorial reconquest expeditions and founded the capital Kalhu.
Atabeg: turkish title of nobility meaning "father of the prince".
Austen Henry Layard (1817-1894): English diplomat, he led the first excavations on the site of Kalhu and, following Paul-Emile Botta, on the site of Nineveh.
Babylon: a Mesopotamian city in central Iraq, it is notably known for having been the capital of the kingdom of Hammurabi in the 18th century BC and then of the Babylonian Empire at its peak under the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II (605-562 BC).
Badr al-Din Lu'lu' (d. 1259): of Armenian origin and a convert to Islam, freed slave of the Zangid ruler Nur al-Din Arslan Shah I, he is recognised for his great leadership qualities, and took the title of Atabeg around 1200.
Claudius James Rich (1787-1821): English traveller and scholar, he travelled through Iraq on numerous occasions and was the first to study the ruins of Babylon.
Ctesiphon: ancient Parthian city, located on the left bank of the Tigris, 30 km south-east of the current city of Baghdad, in Iraq.
Cyaxare: ruler of the Medes kingdom from 625 to 585, he reorganised the Mede army and attacked the Assyrian Empire, laying siege to Nineveh, capital of Assyria.
Diyala: region in Iraq that borders the river of the same name, northwest of Baghdad, and whose valley was the site of many key Mesopotamian sites (Eshnunna, Tell Asmar, Khafaje, among others).
Dur-Sharrukin: neighbouring Nineveh and located on the site of Khorsabad, it is the short-lived capital of the Assyrian Empire founded by Sargon II in 707 BC and abandoned after his death.
Ernest Alfred Thompson Wallis Budge (1857-1934): an English Egyptologist, he worked for the British Museum for a long time and made many acquisitions for the cuneiform tablets collection.
Faisal II (1935-1958): third and last king of Iraq, he acceded to the throne at the age of three, in 1939, after the death of his father King Ghazi, and reigned from 1939 until the coup d'état of 1958.
George Smith (1840-1876): an English Assyriologist, he was the first to translate the Flood episode of the Gilgamesh epic.
Ghazi of Iraq (1912-1939): sovereign of the Kingdom of Iraq from 1933 to 1939 under Ottoman rule, he was the eldest son of King Faisal I, the first Iraqi ruler.
Hamdanids: Arab dynasty of Shiite emirs from the eastern part of the Jazira, they ruled over an area from northern Iraq to Syria, whose capitals were Mosul and Aleppo.
Hormuzd Rassam (1826-1910): employed as an assistant to Austen Henry Layard, he worked on the excavation of the sites of Nineveh and Nimrud, including the great library of Ashurbanipal which yielded the tablets of the Flood narrative.
Ibn Hawqal (943-988): tenth-century Arab traveller, chronicler and geographer, he left his native Upper Mesopotamia in 943 for a series of peregrinations around the world.
Ishtar: female deity of the Mesopotamian pantheon, also known as Inanna in Sumerian, she is the goddess of war and love.
Jazira: a region in northeastern Syria, north of the Euphrates River, which constitutes the northwestern part of Mesopotamia.
Khosr: river that crosses the site of Nineveh and flows into the Tigris.
Kufa: Iraqi city located about 170 km south of Baghdad on the banks of the Euphrates River.
Mamu: god of dreams in the Mesopotamian pantheon.
Max Mallowan (1904-1978): English archaeologist, husband of Agatha Christie, he excavated many sites in Iraq, notably Tell Arpatchiyah and Nimrud.
Medes: people living in the north-eastern part of Iran at the end of the 1st millennium BC and who dominated the Middle East between the 7th and 5th centuries BC, notably putting down the Assyrian Empire thanks to a coalition with the Babylonians.
Nabopolassar: Babylonian king from the end of the 7th century BC and father of Nebuchadnezzar II, he enabled the fall of the Assyrian Empire through a coalition with the Medes.
Nimrod: legendary character of the Bible, descendant of Abraham, he is known to be the first king on earth after the Flood and the builder of the Tower of Babel.
Obeid: archaeological site in southern Iraq which gave its name to the prehistoric period of the same name, between 6500 and 3700 BC.
Ottoman Empire: empire stretching from Asia to Europe to Africa (1299-1923) whose capital was Constantinople (the present name Istanbul was already widely used in the late Middle Ages).
Parthian: dynasty of ancient Iran dating from the first half of the 3rd century BC.
Pasha: high-ranking title of nobility granted to governors of Ottoman provinces.
Paul-Emile Botta (1802-1870): French diplomat and archaeologist, he was responsible for the rediscovery of the site of Khorsabad.
Salmanazar III: king of Assyria between 859 and 824 BC and son of Assurnasirpal II, he is known to have continued and extended the military campaigns initiated by his father.
Sargon II: king of Assyria between 722 and 705 BC and father of Sennacherib, he founded the new capital of Dur-Sharrukin, on the site of Khorsabad, which was abandoned when he died suddenly during a military campaign.
Seleucia of the Tigris: ancient city located in Iraq, opposite Ctesiphon and about 30 km from present-day Baghdad, it was founded by Seleucus I, and quickly became an important commercial centre.
Seljuks: turkish dynasty of a tribe that migrated from Turkestan to the Near East, whose empire (1037-1194) included present-day Iraq and Iran, and all of Asia Minor.
Sennacherib: king of Assyria between 705 and 681 BC and son of Sargon II, he moved the capital to Nineveh and undertook numerous constructions there.
Shapur I: founding ruler of the Sassanid Empire, who bore the title "King of Kings" and reigned from 240 to 272 AD.
Tiglath-Phalazar III: king of Assyria between 745 and 727 BC and father of Sargon II.
Umayyad: Arab dynasty (661-1031) that governed the Muslim world and then the kingdom of al-Andalus in present-day Spain, it took its name from the great-uncle of the Prophet Muhammad, Umayyah b. Abd Shams.
Umar ibn al-Khattab (586-644): companion of the Prophet Muhammad and of the Quraysh tribe, he succeeded Abu Bakr (632-634), the first Caliph of Islam, and became in turn Caliph and Commander of the Faithful.
Uqaylids: dynasty of Shiite emirs who ruled Iraq, northern Syria and eastern Turkey from 990 to 1096.
Ur III: shortened form of the period known as the Third Dynasty of Ur, it is characterised by the domination of an empire whose capital was Ur and which dominated Mesopotamia between 2112 and 2003 BC.
Victor Place (1818-1875): French diplomat, he took over the excavations of Paul-Emile Botta in Khorsabad.
Zagros: high mountain range on the border between present-day Iraq and Iran.
Zangi (1087-1146): eponymous founder of the Zengid dynasty, he became Atabeg of Mosul in 1127 and of Aleppo in 1128, unifying the two cities under his personal reign.
Ziggurat: stepped religious building in Mesopotamia, presented as a succession of superimposed terraces, they are characteristic of the great cities of the 3rd millennium, the most famous of which are located in Ur and Uruk.