BY: Ben Cooper, Matt Boling, Ben Brown, and Danny Cameron

Assyrian Religion:

The Assyrians practiced the religion of Ashurism and worshipped the god Ashur, the supreme god of the Assyrians, until 256 A.D.

In first century A.D., Assyria (under the claim of King Abgar of Edessa) was the firstnation to cooperatively convert to Christianity.

And in the year of 33 A.D., the Assyrian church, Church of the East, was founded by Patriarchs Thaddeus, Thomas and Bartholomew . **Today the church is called the Holy Apostolic Catholic Assyrian Church of the East

But the church split in year 451 A.D. because of the belief whether Christ’s indivisible nature was, both human and divine or not.

After the split, the Syriac Orthodox Church was born.

When the dispute of choosing a new Patriarch, either by election or hereditary, for the Church of the East, began, the party split.

This established an allegiance with the Catholic Church of Rome. Pope Julius Caesar III now called this new church, Chaldean Church of Babylon.

Assyrian Religion :

Assyrian Religion :

Today, Assyrians are members of other Christian denominations including:

-Evangelical,-Pentecostal, -Presbyterian, -Baptist -And enforced Islamization.

And of course those who don’t have a religious following

Assyrian Architecture :

For the Assyrians, life was condemned to small villages. But there were larger cities, that served as trade and craft centers.

Another part in the Assyrian culture was wall carvings and craftsmanship, which showed that the Assyrians were high skilled in craftsmanship.

The architecture for these houses were mostly made out of mud bricks and occasionally stone. Buildings and houses would never be exceeding one story and had flat roofs.

The houses only covered small amount of an area, while temples and palaces covered large areas in the cities.

Assyrians created the world’s first written language and Hammurabi’s code of law.

One of the biggest pieces of art the Assyrians had, were their two languages: Ancient Assyrian and Modern Assyrian. Also known as Akkadian and neo-syriac.

But the Aramean’s language, Aramaic , soon replaced the Ancient Assyrian language and became the second official language of the Assyrian empire in 752 B.C.

Assyrian Language:

Assyrian Language cont.:

Literature, was one of the finest cultural achievements of Assyria and Assyrians initially used the cuneiform alphabet from the Babylonians, and wrote it on clay tablets until 750 B.C. And then the Arameans introduced writing on leather, parchment or papyrus.

This literature dealt with legal issues, medicine and history and a number of other subjects.

The language of Aramaic is also called Assyrian Aramaic, by the scholars. The scholars call it that because the language the Assyrians used, heavily introduced the Akkadian words.

Assyrian Politics:

Assyria had the traditional monarchy, in which the king answered to his court and if the king died, the son would take over.

The government of Assyria was built around area rulers who paid taxes to the king as well as provided men for the army.

As the Assyrian territories were extended through the military campaigns, the local rulers had to fulfill their duties to the Assyrian king, so they could be allowed to govern their old regions.

Assyria was divided into 70 provinces, under the rule of Sargon 2

** The Assyrians were well acknowledged for they growing knowledge in organization and for warfare.

Sargon of Akkad:

He reigned from 2334 to 2279 BC.Created an empire that united Mesopotamia.He created the first great Semitic empire.

Sargon of Akkad History: He was an orphan adopted by a gardener and not in a royal family.

He conquered all of the great kings around him to become one of the most dominant Kings.

The empire did not fall during his reign or his sons reigns it wasn’t until his grandson ruled that the Akkadian empire fell.

Short Term Impact: Approximately 1472 B.C., a Mittanian King took over Assyria, and lasted for about 70 years.

Mittanian control was taken over in 1365 B.C. by Ashuruballit, who laid the foundation of the first Assyrian empire.

Short Term cont.: Invaders from the Taurus mountains, north of Assyria, posed a significant threat to Assyria,

and occupied Arik-den-ili for a number of years, but were successfully driven out, making the way for Adad-narari (1307 B.C.) to establish the first Assyrian empire, which lasted until 1248 B.C.

The Middle Assyrian empire began in 1307 B.C. with Tiglath-Pileser, who greatly expanded Assyrian territory.

Short Term cont.: He also established several zoos in Assyria, as he had a fascination with foreign animals.

Ashur-dan II would concentrate on rebuilding Assyria within its natural borders, from Tur Abdin to the foothills beyond Arbel.

Short Term cont.: Ashur-danII built government offices in all provinces, and as an economic boost, provided

ploughs throughout the land, which yielded record grain production and made Assyria the major world power of its time.

The four Kings that followed Ashur-dan II were Adad-nerari II (his son), Tukulti-Ninurta II, Ashur-nasir-pal II, and Shalmaneser III.

Long Term Impacts: Assyria is comprised of three major cities: Ashur, Nineveh, Arbel

Sargon of Akkad established his kingdom in 2371 B.C., becoming the first king to assert control outside of his city-state.

Sargon of Akkad model for conquering and controlling cities that creates empires is still in use today.

Shamshi-Adad I would establish the Assyrian kingdom in 1813 B.C. uniting the three major cities.

Shamshi-Adad forever united the three cities of Ashur, Nineveh, and Arbel into one solid unit, and brought Arrapkha firmly into the Assyrian sphere, so that henceforth these four cities, and Nimrod, would constitute the very core of Assyria.

Long Term Impacts:

Long Term cont.: Assyria was where locks and keys were first used.

Assyria was where paved roads were first used.

Other firsts in Assyria were:postal system, use of iron, magnifying glasses, libraries, plumbing and flush toilets,electric batteries, guitars,aqueducts,

During his reign, a significant development occurred, the Aramean migrations into Assyria.

Long Term cont.:

The first epic is written, “The Epic of Gilgamesh,” with its universal and timeless theme of the struggle and purpose of humanity.

Work Cited Pagehttp://www.sloganizer.net/en/http://www.aina.org/aol/peter/brief.htm#Hist

oryhttp://rosiemalekyonan.wordpress.com/2009/

05/18/assyrians-religion-religious-divisions/

http://lexicorient.com/e.o/assyria.htmhttp://www.hyperhistory.net/apwh/bios/

b1sargon.htm