History of Western Asia

This chronology records kingdoms, cities, rulers, wars and inventions alongside the sacred history of gods and divine powers. Entries marked Sacred Chronicle describe supernatural events in the living world; unmarked entries describe the historical and archaeological sequence.

Early Bronze Age: 3300–2100 BCE

Sumer, Akkad and Ur

3200 BCE: a writing system was developed in order to keep administrative records; it was called cuneiform and was made up of pictograms (pictures) describing objects and ideograms describing ideas or actions.
- The invention of writing enabled complex societies to arise: record-keeping and libraries served as a storehouse of knowledge and increased the cultural transmission of information. Humans no longer had to spend all their time working for survival—curiosity and education drove the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom.
2900 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Kingship in Sumer passes to Erech and Inanna is given dominion over the Third Region. In the wider historical record, the Indus Valley civilisation is developing during this broad period.
2800 Etana became the first Sumerian monarch and established the Kish dynasty; he put northern Mesopotamia under his control, built the first monumental building as his palace, and called himself king of the “four quarters of the world”; Meskiaggasher established the Uruk dynasty and controlled most of the south.
2800-2670 BC: the Kish dynasty established a powerful kingship and because it was situated at a critical spot on the Euphrates river it controlled irrigation flow to the southern city-states and thus kept the Uruk dynasty, in the south, under control.
2900 BC: because the city-states were at constant war, they needed a strong military leader to oversee war and large building projects; they began to replace theocracies with hereditary monarchies and according to ancient tablets, “the kingship came down from heaven.”
2700 BC: Gilgamesh, grandson of Enmerkar, became king of Uruk; he constructed the brick walls around Uruk and his deeds formed the basis of the Gilgamesh Epic; Enmebaragesi became king of Kish, he ordered the construction of the Temple of Enlil at Nippur, which became the spiritual center of Sumer, and he led victorious campaigns against Elam.
2670 BCE — Mesanepada established the Ur dynasty; he defeated Agga, king of Kish, which ended the Kish dynasty, and put the Uruk and Ur dynasties simultaneously in power.
2670–2370 BCE — the Uruk dynasty became weak from constant attacks in the north which only strengthened the power of the Ur dynasty in the south.
2650 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Royal power shifts between Sumerian cities as Enlil grows increasingly hostile toward the unruly human multitudes.
2612 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Nephren-Ka and his followers flee to the underground catacombs of Kish, where he sacrifices a hundred victims to Nyarlathotep. In exchange he receives prophetic visions and spends his remaining years covering the walls of his tomb with images of the future.
2525 BCE — Lugalannemudu of Adab, a city in the north, united northern Sumer under his control; his power quickly passed to Mesilim, king of Kish; these conquests by the northern city-states ended the Uruk dynasty and put the Ur dynasty in complete power.
2425 BCE — Eannatum established the Lagash dynasty; he united Sumer under his control, called himself king of Kish, and conquered much neighboring territory.
c. 2340 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Inanna favours Sharru-Kin (Sargon) as he seizes power and begins the rise of Akkadian imperial rule.
2370 BCE — Urukagina of became king of Lagash; he enacted many social reforms and during his reign Lugalzagesi, king of Umma, defeated him and took control of Sumer, which went into a state of civil strife.
c. 2340 BCE — Sargon of Akkad, remembered as a former cupbearer at Kish, seizes power and conquers the southern Mesopotamian city-states, founding the Akkadian dynasty and building the first great territorial empire of Mesopotamia.
2316 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Sargon’s actions reignite the Marduk–Inanna conflict. Nergal travels north to Babylon and persuades Marduk to withdraw from Mesopotamia.
c. 2269–2255 BCE — Manishtushu, son of Sargon, rules Akkad and continues the dynasty’s campaigns and consolidation across Mesopotamia and neighbouring regions.
c. 2254 BCE — Naram-Sin ascends the throne of Akkad. Sacred Chronicle: Inanna drives his campaigns toward Sinai and Egypt. His royal ideology claims rule over the “four quarters,” and he is among the earliest Mesopotamian kings explicitly deified in his lifetime.
2255 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Inanna seizes power in Mesopotamia, Naram-Sin defies Nippur, and the Great Anunnaki destroy Agade. Inanna escapes while forces loyal to Enlil and Ninurta move into Sumer and Akkad.
c. 2240 BCE — Naram-Sin campaigns north and west, while Akkadian power reaches its greatest territorial extent across Mesopotamia and into neighbouring regions.
c. 2144–2124 BCE — Gudea rules Lagash during a revival of southern Mesopotamian art and temple building. Sacred Chronicle: Thoth assists him in the construction of the great temple of Ningirsu, the warrior god closely identified with Ninurta.
2193 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: Terah, father of Abraham, is born at Nippur into a priestly-royal family.
c. 2154 BCE — Akkadian imperial rule finally collapses after decades of fragmentation. Gutian groups, independent city rulers and surviving Akkadian centres compete for power; later literature links the disaster to Naram-Sin’s offence against Enlil.
c. 2144 BCE — Gudea’s reign at Lagash begins; his building programme, inscriptions and surviving statues become some of the best-known monuments of the Neo-Sumerian age.
2130 BCE — Sacred Chronicle: As Enlil and Ninurta withdraw, central authority weakens. Inanna briefly attempts to restore kingship to Erech, but the effort does not last.
2120 BCE — Utuhegal became king of Uruk; he and his general, Ur-Nammu, defeated the Gutians and drove them from Sumer; Utuhegal rewarded Ur-Nammu by making him governor of Ur.
2112 BCE — Ur-Nammu establishes the Third Dynasty of Ur, reunifies much of southern Mesopotamia, sponsors major temple construction and issues one of the earliest surviving law collections.

Middle Bronze Age: 2100–1550 BCE

Isin, Larsa and the Rise of Babylon

c. 2094 BCE — Shulgi succeeds Ur-Nammu and presides over a highly centralised Ur III state with extensive administration, record-keeping and major building works.
2004 BCE — The Ur III state collapses. Elamite forces from the east and their allies help overthrow Ur, while new dynasties at Isin, Larsa and other cities compete for control of southern Mesopotamia.
c. 1750 BCE — Hammurabi’s law collection records river-ordeal procedures for accusations of sorcery. Hammurabi rules Babylon from 1792 to 1750 BCE, so the code belongs to the eighteenth century BCE rather than 2000 BCE.
1900: the Amorites, a group of nomadic peoples from Syria encouraged by the internal strife, invaded and conquered Sumer; they intermingled with the Sumerians and obtained many high positions, including becoming kings of cities, the most powerful being the Isin dynasty.
1894: Sumu-abum, an Amorite, conquered a small portion of land in middle Mesopotamia; he built up the small village of Babylon and there ruled as king.
1823 BC: Rim-Sin, an Amorite, became king of Larsa; he conquered Isin, ending its reign of power, and united Sumer under the rule of the Larsa dynasty.
1792 BCE — Hammurabi becomes king of Babylon. During his reign, 1792–1750 BCE, Babylon expands across much of southern Mesopotamia and becomes the centre of a major territorial state; his reign is also associated with the famous law collection known as the Code of Hammurabi.

Hittite and Kassite Ascendancy

1750 BCE: Samsu-iluna succeeded his father Hammurabi as king of Babylon; he defeated the first invasion of Babylonia by the Kassites, a group of nomadic peoples from the east.
1595 BCE — A Hittite army sacks Babylon, ending the Old Babylonian period. Kassite rulers subsequently establish a long-lasting dynasty in Babylonia.
1570 BC: Agum, a Kassite, became king of Babylonia; he reconquered lost lands and extended his control over all Mesopotamia.

Late Bronze Age: 1550–1200 BCE

Hittites, Assyria and the Eastern Mediterranean

15th century BCE — Thutmose III campaigns repeatedly through Canaan, Phoenicia and Syria, extending Egyptian power toward the Euphrates. These wars belong to the Levant and Syria rather than a conquest of Asia Minor.
Late 15th–early 14th century BCE — Tudhaliya I/II rules the Hittite kingdom; exact numbering and dates remain disputed in modern Hittite chronology.
14th century BCE — Tudhaliya III rules the Hittites before Suppiluliuma I; proposed dates vary, commonly around the mid-fourteenth century BCE.
1336 Aetolus conquers Aetolia after murdering Dorus the son of Phthia and his brothers
c. 1300 BCE — Mursili II’s reign as Hittite great king ends.
1225 Tukulti-Ninurta I, king of Assyria in northern Mesopotamia, captured Babylon and extended his rule through northern Mesopotamia; although the Kassite dynasty continued to rule, it was only nominal.
1140 Shutruk-Nahhunte I, king of Elam, captured Babylon; he ended the Kassite dynasty and placed his son Shilhak-Inshushinak on the throne; he encouraged sculpture and literature.
(Ramses III expels Sea-Peoples from Egypt in 1175 BC. Among those named are the Peleset, Tjeker and Denyen, ie. the Pelasgians, Teukrians and Danaians who are said to be based in Cyprus)

Iron Age: 1200–539 BCE

Assyria and Neo-Babylonia

1125 Nebuchadnezzar I became king of Isin; he defeated Shutruk-Nahhunte and united Babylonia under his rule.
1115 BC: Tiglath-pileser I became king of Assyria; he defeated Nebuchadnezzar and reclaimed control of Babylonia, assuming it into the Assyrian Empire.
705 BCE — Sennacherib becomes king of Assyria. His reign lasts until 681 BCE; after repeated revolts he destroys much of Babylon in 689 BCE.
1000 groups of nomadic peoples, mostly the Aramaeans and Chaldeans, began raiding Babylonia continuously; the Assyrians conquered began to conquer these groups one by one.
626 BC: Naabopolassar, a Chaldean, proclaimed himself king of Babylonia and established the Chaldean dynasty; he conquered the Assyrians with the help of his allies, the Medes, the Scythians, and the Cimmerians.
605 Nebuchadnezzar II succeeded his father Naabopolassar as king of Babylonia; he conquered all of Mesopotamia, defeated Egyptian invasions, destroyed Jerusalem (586 BC), and rebuilt the city of Babylon as his capital (including the hanging gardens of Babylon, one of the seven ancient wonders).
6th century BCE — Later Greek and Roman tradition associates the legendary Hanging Gardens with Babylon, often with the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II. Their exact location and even whether the famous “hanging” gardens stood at Babylon remain debated; some scholars have proposed Nineveh instead.
556 BC: Nabonidus, one of Nebuchadnezzar II’s governors, became king of Babylonia; he angered the priestly class of Babylon and sent the empire into a state of civil wars.

Persia, Alexander and the Hellenistic Successors

539 BCE — Cyrus the Great, king of Persia, conquered Babylonia; he added Babylonia to the Persian Empire and ended the Chaldean dynasty.
499 Aristagoras, acting on behalf of the Persian Empire, leads a failed attack on the rebellious island of Naxos.
499 Aristagoras instigates the Ionic Revolt, beginning the Persian Wars between Greece and Persia.
499 Sardis destroyed by Athenian and Ionian troops.
492 First expedition of King Darius I of Persia against Greece, under the leadership of his son-in-law Mardonius. This marks the start of the campaign that culminated in the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC.
490 The Battle of Marathon, where Darius I of Persia is defeated by the Athenians and Plataeans under Miltiades.
486 Xerxes I succeeds Darius I as Great King of Persia.
480 Battle of Thermopylae Leonidas, Spartan, makes sacrifice of 300 so main force can escape; Xerxes son of Darius is leading the Persians.
431 Peloponnesian War
334 – Alexander the Great makes a sacrifice to the gods near the ruins of Troy before his siege of Persia.
333 Alexander the Great defeats Persians at Battle of Issus, Oct, but Darius III escapes
331 at Battle of Gaugamela Oct 1, Alexander the Great ends Achaemenid Dynasty and takes Persian Empire
330 Alexander the Great conquers the Persian Empire, decline and depopulation of Ancient Greece with large migrations towards the conquered lands.
312 Seleucus I Nicator establishes himself in Babylon, founding the Seleucid Empire.
281 Antiochus I Soter, on the assassination of his father Seleucus becomes emperor of the Seleucid empire.
270 Celts moved in to Galatia
261 BC: Antiochus II Theos, 2nd son, at the death of his father becomes emperor of the Seleucid empire.