 The region that the Chaldeans eventually made their homeland was in

relatively poor southeastern Mesopotamia, at the head of the Persian

Gulf. They appear to have migrated into southern Babylonia from the
Levant at some unknown point between the end of the reign of Ninurta-
kudurri-usur II (a contemporary of Tiglath-Pileser II) circa 940 BC, and
the start of the reign of Marduk-zakir-shumi I in 855 BC, although there
is no historical proof of their existence prior to the late 850s BC.[22]
 Chaldean leaders had by this time already adopted Assyro-Babylonian
names, religion, language, and customs, indicating that they had
become Akkadianized to a great degree.
 The Chaldeans remained quietly ruled by the native Babylonians (who
were in turn subjugated by their Assyrian relations) for the next seventy-
two years, only coming to historical prominence for the first time in
Babylonia in 780 BC, when a previously unknown Chaldean
named Marduk-apla-usur usurped the throne from the native Babylonian
king Marduk-bel-zeri (790–780 BC). The latter was a vassal of the
Assyrian king Shalmaneser IV (783–773 BC), who was otherwise
occupied quelling a civil war in Assyria at the time.
 This was to set a precedent for all future Chaldean aspirations on
Babylon during the Neo-Assyrian Empire; always too weak to confront a
strong Assyria alone and directly, the Chaldeans awaited periods when
Assyrian kings were distracted elsewhere in their vast empire, or
engaged in internal conflicts, then, in alliance with other powers stronger
than themselves (usually Elam), they made a bid for control over
Babylonia.
 The Chaldean rule proved short-lived. A native Babylonian king
named Nabonassar (748–734 BC) defeated and overthrew the
Chaldean usurpers in 748 BC, restored indigenous rule, and
successfully stabilised Babylonia. The Chaldeans once more faded into
obscurity for the next three decades. During this time both the
Babylonians and the Chaldean and Aramean migrant groups who had
settled in the land once more fell completely under the yoke of the
powerful Assyrian king Tiglath-Pileser III (745–727 BC), a ruler who
introduced Imperial Aramaic as the lingua franca of the empire. The
Assyrian king at first made Nabonassar and his successor native
Babylonian kings Nabu-nadin-zeri, Nabu-suma-ukin II and Nabu-mukin-
zeri his subjects, but decided to rule Babylonia directly from 729 BC. He
was followed by Shalmaneser V (727–722 BC), who also ruled Babylon
in person.
 Nabopolassar, a previously obscure and unknown Chaldean chieftain,
followed the opportunistic tactics laid down by previous Chaldean
leaders to take advantage of the chaos and anarchy gripping Assyria
and Babylonia and seized the city of Babylon in 620 BC with the help of
its native Babylonian inhabitants.
 Sin-shar-ishkun amassed a powerful army and marched into Babylon to
regain control of the region. Nabopolassar was saved from likely
destruction because yet another massive Assyrian rebellion broke out in
Assyria proper, including the capital Nineveh, which forced the Assyrian
king to turn back in order to quell the revolt. Nabopolassar took
advantage of this situation, seizing the ancient city of Nippur in 619 BC,
a mainstay of pro-Assyrianism in Babylonia, and thus Babylonia as a
whole.
 However, his position was still far from secure, and bitter fighting
continued in the Babylonian heartlands from 620 to 615 BC, with
Assyrian forces encamped in Babylonia in an attempt to eject
Nabopolassar. Nabopolassar attempted a counterattack, marched his
army into Assyria proper in 616 BC, and tried to besiege Assur
and Arrapha (modern Kirkuk), but was defeated by Sin-shar-ishkun and
chased back into Babylonia after being driven from Idiqlat
(modern Tikrit) at the southernmost end of Assyria. A stalemate seemed
to have ensued, with Nabopolassar unable to make any inroads into
Assyria despite its greatly weakened state, and Sin-shar-ishkun unable
to eject Nabopolassar from Babylonia due to constant rebellions and
civil war among his own people.
 Nabopolassar's position, and the fate of the Assyrian empire, was
sealed when he entered into an alliance with another of Assyria's former
vassals, the Medes, the now dominant people of what was to become
Persia. The Median Cyaxares had also recently taken advantage of the
anarchy in the Assyrian Empire, while officially still a vassal of Assyria,
he took the opportunity to meld the Iranian peoples;
the Medes, Persians, Sagartians and Parthians, into a large and
powerful Median-dominated force. The Medes, Persians, Parthians,
Chaldeans and Babylonians formed an alliance that also included
the Scythians and Cimmerians to the north.
 While Sin-shar-ishkun was fighting both the rebels in Assyria and the
Chaldeans and Babylonians in southern
Mesopotamia, Cyaxares (hitherto a vassal of Assyria), in alliance with
the Scythians and Cimmerians launched a surprise attack on civil-war-
beleaguered Assyria in 615 BC, sacking Kalhu (the
Biblical Calah/Nimrud) and taking Arrapkha (modern Kirkuk).
 Nabopolassar, still pinned down in southern Mesopotamia, was not
involved in this major breakthrough against Assyria. From this point
however, the alliance of Medes, Persians, Chaldeans, Babylonians,
Sagartians, Scythians and Cimmerians fought in unison against Assyria.
 Despite the sorely depleted state of Assyria, bitter fighting ensued.
Throughout 614 BC the alliance of powers continued to make inroads
into Assyria itself, although in 613 BC the Assyrians somehow rallied to
score a number of counterattacking victories over the Medes-Persians,
Babylonians-Chaldeans and Scythians-Cimmerians. This led to a
coalition of forces ranged against it to unite and launch a massive
combined attack in 612 BC, finally besieging and sacking Nineveh in
late 612 BC, killing Sin-shar-ishkun in the process.
 The Chaldean king of Babylon now ruled all of
southern Mesopotamia (Assyria in the north was ruled by the Medes),
[25]
 and the former Assyrian possessions
of Aram (Syria), Phoenicia, Israel, Cyprus, Edom, Philistia, and parts
of Arabia, while the Medes took control of the former Assyrian colonies
in Ancient Iran, Asia Minor and the Caucasus.
 The Chaldeans might have been history's biggest opportunists and most
brilliant diplomats, which was good for them because they were never a
military power. The Chaldeans, a Semitic-speaking tribe, migrated to a
Mesopotamian region next to the Persian Gulf between 940 and 855
B.C.E. We don't know if they conquered anyone who was already there,
but we can be certain they established a kingdom for the first time in
their history. The Chaldeans were conquered by the Assyrian Empire in
852. For the next 232 years, the Chaldeans took advantage of every
distraction to claim independence and create an empire. And every
time, Babylonia or Assyria re-conquered them.
 The word ''Chaldean'' comes from a Greek word derived from an
Aramaic word, which was in turn derived from an Akkadian word
''Kaldu.'' This term refers to the Chaldean culture.
 The Chaldean Empire was a relatively small state in the Mesopotamian
region. It was a ''little sister'' to the Assyrian Empire and Babylonian
Empire. Some scholars refer to the Chaldean Empire as the Neo-
Babylonian Empire, and many references to Babylon do not refer to the
city during the era of the Babylonian Empire. They refer to the city as it
existed and prospered under the reign of the Chaldeans. The main
characteristics of this state were:
Opposition to the Assyrian Empire
Its capital was Uruk, which was south of Babylonia
 The state religion of the empire was the Mesopotamian
 Chaldea was founded in Mesopotamia. It was located right next to the
Persian Gulf above the Arabian Peninsula. The Chaldean Empire
occupied essentially the same geographic area as present-day Iraq.
 What is Chaldean? The main cultural characteristics of the Chaldeans
are centered on their religious practices and beliefs. The dominant
religious tradition in Chaldea was the Mesopotamian pantheon. Major
gods in this pantheon include Marduk, the father of all the other gods,
and Nebo, the god of writing and the fates of men. Before the creation
of the Chaldean Empire, Marduk was simply a local god, important only
to the city of Babylon. Nabopolassar made him the god of the entire
Empire to consolidate the religion of his citizens.
 The most frequent Chaldean rituals involved astrology and witchcraft.
These include:
New Year Festival: This festival was held in the middle of March and
was associated with the spring equinox.
Meticulous care for the idols of the gods
Prescribed rituals for asking the gods for forgiveness, regardless of their
social status
 The language of the Chaldean Empire was Chaldean, which was a
language of the Semitic family. This means it is related to both Aramaic
and Arabic.
 Chaldean kings then ruled Babylonia for a short time

Nabopolassar
 Nabopolassar: He was the first ruler of the Chaldean Empire, and took
over Uruk from the control of the Assyrians in 626 B.C.E. He devoted
most of his energy toward attempts to conquer Assyria, which finally
succeeded in 612 B.C.E. Nebuchadnezzar II was his son.
 Nabopolassar was the founder and first king of the Neo-Babylonian
Empire, ruling from his coronation as king of Babylon in 626 BC to his
death in 605 BC. Though initially only aimed at restoring and securing
the independence of Babylonia, Nabopolassar's uprising against the
Neo-Assyrian Empire, which had ruled Babylonia for more than a
century, eventually led to the complete destruction of the Assyrian
Empire and the rise of the Neo-Babylonian Empire in its place.
 There is several pieces of evidence that links Nabopolassar and his
dynasty to the city of Uruk (which was located south of Babylon),
prominently that several of Nabopolassar's descendants lived in the
 city[14] and that his son and successor, Nebuchadnezzar II, worked as
a priest there before becoming king.
 Nabopolassar was not able to enjoy his success for long, dying in 604
BC, only one year after the victory at Karchemish. He was succeeded
by his son, who took the name Nebuchadnezzar II, after the unrelated
12th century BC native Akkadian-Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar I,
indicating the extent to which the migrant Chaldeans had become
infused with native Mesopotamian culture.
 Regardless of his ethnic origin, Nabopolassar appears to have been
strongly connected to the city of Uruk,[14][9] located south of Babylon,
possibly having been a member of its ruling elite prior to becoming
Babylon's king.[9] In a 1998 paper, the Assyriologist Paul-Alain
Beaulieu mentioned that there was a growing body of evidence that
Nabopolassar's family originated in Uruk, and also presented evidence
that several of Nebuchadnezzar II's (Nabopolassar's son and
successor) daughters lived in the city.
 In 614 BC, the Medes brutally sacked the city of Assur, the religious and
ceremonial heart of Assyria, and in 612 BC the Medes and Babylonians
assaulted Nineveh, Assyria's capital. As with Assur before it, Nineveh
was brutally sacked, with its inhabitants, including children, slaughtered
en masse and the entire city being burned to the ground. Sinsharishkun
probably died in its defense. Other Assyrian cities, such as Nimrud,
were also assaulted and sacked much in the same way. The brutality of
the Medes, including their habit of sacking even the religious temples,
was so excessive that it shocked the Babylonians;
contemporary Babylonian chronicles, otherwise hostile to the Assyrians,
lament the sackings with sorrow and remorse. Nabopolassar's own
attitude towards Assyria is unclear; in some inscriptions he is careful to
ascribe his victory and its aftermath to divine intervention to rid himself
of the blame and in others he openly boasts of the destruction.
 The Neo-Babylonian Empire's claim to succeed the Neo-Assyrian
Empire was immediately challenged by Egypt under Pharaoh Necho II,
who fought for several years to restore the Assyrians, whom he was
allied to, until he was defeated at the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BC.
Upon his death that same year, Nabopolassar was succeeded by his
son Nebuchadnezzar II. As the founder of the Neo-Babylonian Empire,
Nabopolassar was long remembered by the Babylonians after his death,
even beyond the fall of his empire less than a century later. In
the Hellenistic period, several centuries later, Nabopolassar's legend
was still remembered, with Babylonian authors casting him as a
champion ordered by Marduk, Babylon's chief deity, to avenge their
 homeland, and as a symbol against the domination of foreign empires
over Babylon.
 THE FALL OF NINEVEH 612 BCE
A joint effort between Nabopolassar and the Cyaxares the Mede leads
to the capture of the Assyrian capital city of Nineveh. This effectively
signals the demise of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, and the return of
imperial power to Babylon.
 The Fall of Harran 610 BCE
Following the demise of Nineveh, the Assyrians escape to Harran, led by their
new king Assur-uballit II. By taking Harran in 610 BCE, Nabopolassar and
Cyaxeres the Mede prevent any possibility of Assyrian resurgence. The
Assyrians do not surrender easily, though, for battle apparently continues into the
ensuing year.
The Fall of Harran refers to the siege and capture of the Assyrian city of
Harran by the Median and Neo-Babylonian empires.
 Battle of Carchemish 605 BCE
After a long conflict with Assyria, Egypt remained to challenge Babylonian
imperial ambitions. To this point, Egypt appears to have taken advantage of
Assyrian preoccupation with Babylon by gaining control of the Levant. Other
sources beyond those from a Babylonian perspective corroborate the Egyptian
advance, such as Psamtek's Second Seapeum Stela dated to year 52 of
Psamtek's reign (612 BCE), which indicates that chiefs from the Levant were
paying taxes to Egypt at this time. Thus, Nebuchadnezzar's victories at
Carchemish and Hamath bolster Babylonian control by forcing Egyptian retreat
from the important region of Hamath. This also became an important personal
achievement of Nebuchadnezzar, which almost certainly helped him ascend
seamlessly to the Babylonian throne.
The Battle of Carchemish was fought about 605 BC[3][4][5] between the armies
of Egypt allied with the remnants of the army of the former Assyrian Empire
against the armies of Babylonia, allied with the Medes, Persians, and Scythians.
This was while Nebuchadnezzar was commander-in-chief and Nabopolassar was
still king of Babylon. Nebuchadnezzar became king right after this battle.

Nebuchadnezzar II
 Perhaps the most famous Chaldean ruler was Nebuchadnezzar II, who
captured Jerusalem, the capital of the kingdom of Judah, in 597 B.C.E.
He ruled from 605 to 561 B.C.E. When Judah rebelled several times, he
put them down violently. In 586 B.C.E., Nebuchadnezzar completely
destroyed Jerusalem. He established the importance of the Akkadian
religion in Chaldean society by establishing temples throughout his
empire. The most famous of these was the Etemenanki, which was
constructed in the middle of Uruk. Nebuchadnezzar frequently led
 processions to this temple and used religion to legitimize his reign. He
also built smaller temples, as well as the Ishtar Gate, which was built to
honor the Mesopotamian goddess of war.
 The most famous Chaldean king was Nebuchadrezzar II (ruled about
605 to 561 BCE). He expanded his empire along the Mediterranean Sea
to the border of Egypt. Many Jews were forced to leave Jerusalem after
Nebuchadrezzar’s forces captured that city.
 Nebuchadrezzar is also known for rebuilding the temple of Marduk in
Babylon. Marduk was the main god of Babylonia. The temple was a
huge ziggurat—a tower shaped like a pyramid with large steps.
 Out of the 77 years of the Chaldean period king, Nebuchadnezzar II
ruled for 43 years, which were full of military achievements and
construction works and organization. Apart from extending the borders
of the empire, he had managed to construct large-scale hydraulic works
which were intended for irrigation, navigation and even for defensive
purposes. He excavated, re-excavated, and maintained four large
feeder canals taking off from the Euphrates, which served the
agriculture in the whole area between the Euphrates and the Tigris in
the middle and lower Euphrates regions. Moreover, he was concerned
with flood protection and so he constructed one large reservoir near
Sippar at 60 km north of Babylon to be filled by the Euphrates excess
water during floods and to be returned back to the river during low flow
season in summer. His works involved river training projects, so he
trained the Euphrates by digging artificial meanders to reduce the
velocity of the flow and improving navigation and allow the construction
of the canal intakes in a less turbulent flows. It seems also that he had
diverted the river during the building of Babylon Bridge and trained the
Euphrates River penetrating Babylon by constructing riverside
revetments. Nebuchadnezzar II had the foresight for building extensive
defensive fortifications to secure the country against possible enemy
attacks from the north and adding to the walls and fortifications deep
moats filled with water for higher security. This was the case with the
wall he built north of Sippar. It extended over the whole distance
between the two rivers, and the wall around Sippar itself. Similarly, he
had dug a great moat alongside the wall of Babylon, which he supplied
with water from the Euphrates. Moreover, he had introduced
improvements on the four large feeder canals and the extensive canal
networks that belonged to them to be used as water barriers against the
advance of any enemy troops. Building temples and grand royal palaces
and the Babylon Bridge took part of Nebuchadnezzar’s attention and his
name was linked with the “Babylon Hanging Gardens”, one of the seven
 wonders of the ancient world, which he had built to please his wife.
Description of the gardens according to historians is given in this book
in addition to reporting the results of archeological digging of the
supposed site, which can shed light on the irrigation method used to
irrigate these elevated gardens. The flourishing agriculture and wealth
and prosperity it had brought to Babylon during Nebuchadnezzar’s reign
is described in details, and the active trading and commercial dealing it
had generated is also treated. The first banking services in history
related to this period, which was linked to one Jewish family known as
“House of Êigibi” is described. This family continued to serve for very
long time by collecting the land rents and water taxes for canals use for
the government, in addition to concluding contracts and ratifying
transactions for the public. As bankers, they gave farmers loans to
invest in all types of agrarian operations and practiced money transfers
between various cities which helped trading especially with large scale
export and imports of the various crops.
 Nebuchadnezzar II and his allies may well have been forced to deal with
remnants of Assyrian resistance based in and around Dur-Katlimmu, as
Assyrian imperial records continue to be dated in this region between
604 and 599 BC.[26] In addition, the Egyptians remained in the region an
attempt to revive the Asian colonies of the ancient Egyptian Empire.
 Nebuchadnezzar II was to prove himself to be the greatest of the
Chaldean rulers, rivaling another non-native ruler, the 18th century
BC Amorite king Hammurabi, as the greatest king of Babylon. He was a
patron of the cities and a spectacular builder, rebuilding all of
Babylonia's major cities on a lavish scale. His building activity at
Babylon, expanding on the earlier major and impressive rebuilding of
the Assyrian king Esarhaddon, helped to turn it into the immense and
beautiful city of legend. Babylon covered more than 8 km2 (3 sq mi),
surrounded by moats and ringed by a double circuit of walls. The
Euphrates flowed through the center of the city, spanned by a beautiful
stone bridge. At the center of the city rose the
giant ziggurat called Etemenanki, "House of the Frontier Between
Heaven and Earth," which lay next to the Temple of Marduk. He is also
believed by many historians to have built The Hanging Gardens of
Babylon (although others believe these gardens were built much earlier
by an Assyrian king in Nineveh) for his wife, a Median princess from the
green mountains, so that she would feel at home.
 A capable leader, Nebuchadnezzar II conducted successful military
campaigns; cities like Tyre, Sidon and Damascus were subjugated. He
also conducted numerous campaigns in Asia Minor against
 the Scythians, Cimmerians, and Lydians. Like their Assyrian relations,
the Babylonians had to campaign yearly in order to control their
colonies.
 In 601 BC, Nebuchadnezzar II was involved in a major but inconclusive
battle against the Egyptians. In 599 BC, he invaded Arabia and routed
the Arabs at Qedar. In 597 BC, he invaded Judah,
captured Jerusalem after the siege of Jerusalem (597 BC) and deposed
its king Jehoiachin, carrying the Israelites into captivity in Babylon.
Egyptian and Babylonian armies fought each other for control of the
Near East throughout much of Nebuchadnezzar's reign, and this
encouraged king Zedekiah of Judah to revolt. After an eighteen-month
siege, Jerusalem was captured in 587 BC, thousands of Jews were
deported to Babylon, and Solomon's Temple was razed to the ground.
 Nebuchadnezzar successfully fought the Pharaohs Psammetichus
II and Apries throughout his reign, and during the reign of
Pharaoh Amasis in 568 BC it is rumoured that he may have briefly
invaded Egypt itself.
 By 572, Nebuchadnezzar was in full control of Babylonia,
Chaldea, Aramea (Syria), Phonecia,
Israel, Judah, Philistia, Samarra, Jordan, northern Arabia, and parts
of Asia Minor. Nebuchadnezzar died of illness in 562 BC after a one-
year co-reign with his son, Amel-Marduk, who was deposed in 560 BC
after a reign of only two years.
 The Chaldeans did pretty well as rulers. Nebuchadnezzar II began his
rule in 604 B.C.E. and was the greatest of the Chaldean kings. He
rebuilt all of the cities in Babylonia, making Babylon the jewel of his
empire with a Mesopotamian pyramid called a ziggurat at the center,
and next to a temple to Marduk, the King of the Gods. In warfare, he
successfully defended his borders and expanded into Egypt and parts of
Asia Minor. He was the king who captured Jerusalem. Nebuchadnezzar
finally died in 562 B.C.E.
 Nebuchadnezzar II's death was the end of Chaldean stability. Several
rulers came and went quickly, and by 539, the Chaldean Empire had
been conquered by the Persians. Within a couple of centuries, the word
'Chaldean' had ceased to have any ethnic meaning.



 The Chaldeans rule of Babylon came to an end in 539 BC when
Babylon fell to the Achaemenids attacks that were already established
in Persia led by Cyrus II. Babylon, however, kept a special position
between the various capitols of this empire due to its splendor and
wealth. It served therefore as the economical capitol and the winter
residence of the kings Achaemenid Empire for most of this period while
its agriculture continued to generate a great portion of the empire’s
revenue. The archive gave us information on the agrarian relations and
the agricultural outputs in Babylonia at that period. During the
Achaemenid times, as it was the case during the Chaldean times,
irrigation systems in Babylonia were kept under close observation and
good maintenance which kept agriculture at its best. The inevitable
decline of this empire came in the end due to the rule of weak kings,
conspiracies and palace intrigues, and finally the bitter defeat came on
the hands of Alexander the Great who entered Babylon in 331 BC and
kept it as the Jewel of his new empire.

THE FIRST REGNAL YEAR OF NEBUCHADNEZZAR II

604 BCE
After his victory at Carchemish, Nebuchadnezzar returns to Babylon to
ascend the throne. Immediately, he returns to north Syria to ensure the
region is not lost to Egypt. The next decade is spent asserting control
over the area.

NEBUCHADNEZZAR II MARCHES AGAINST EGYPT

601 BCE
Nebuchadnezzar's march against Egypt appears to have been a
devastating move for Babylon. A chronicle detailing the event claims
both sides suffer severe losses, but it is perhaps telling that no
Babylonian campaign is recorded in the ensuing year (600 BCE).

NEBUCHADNEZZAR II CAPTURES JERUSALEM

597 BCE
One casualty of the Babylonian and Egyptian conflict in the Levant is
the city of Jerusalem. In the seventh regnal year of Nebuchadnezzar II,
Jerusalem is captured, its king Jehoiachin is taken to Babylon, and a
vassal king named Zedekiah is installed in his place (cf. 2 Kgs 24:19-
20). Confirmation of Babylonian control of Gaza at this time is also likely
indicated from the Istanbul prism of Nabû-kudurrī-uṣur II (EŞ 7834),
which associates the king of Gaza with other Babylonian vassal kings
from the Levant.
 • Nabonidus: This was another ruler who emphasized the
importance of religion in Chaldean society. His primary god was named
Sin, while the major god of Chaldea was Marduk. This initiated religious
civil wars throughout the Chaldean Empire.
REIGN OF AMEL-MARDUK
561 BCE — 560 BCE
No extant cuneiform sources survive from Amel-Marduk's reign.
Reconstructing his life depends upon later sources, such as Ptolemy's Canon
and the writings of Berossus. These suggest he was murdered and usurped
by his successor Nerglissar following an "unjust" rule.

REIGN OF NERIGLISSAR
560 BCE — 556 BCE
A high ranking official, Neriglissar seizes power from the family of
Nabopolassar by deposing Amel-Marduk. A fragment of a Babylonian
chronicle depicts a war with Syria in his third regnal year.
556 BCE
Labashi-Marduk ascended the throne as a child and was murdered 9
months after taking the throne in a coup headed by Nabonidus.