A relief from Ashurbanipals palaceshowing him in a chariotBritish Museum/Auday HusseinIt is one of the oldest and greatest stores of knowledge: a vast library of texts amassed by Assyrian King Ashurbanipal, who ruled ancient Mesopotamia about 2700 years ago. But after his death, it was ransacked and burned to the ground. Luckily, the texts were written on clay tablets, and so were baked and preserved by the heat.A fragment of the Epic of GilgameshBritish Museum/Camryn GoodWhen the ruins of the library were found in Victorian times in what is now Iraq, the astonishing richness of this lost world was revealed. A new book, The Library of Ancient Wisdom by Selena Wisnom at the University of Leicester, UK, pieces together a vivid portrait of Mesopotamian life from the shattered remnants of the 30,000 or so tablets in Ashurbanipals library.AdvertisementRoyal Game of Ur board gameCamryn GoodWritten in cuneiform, the worlds oldest form of writing, the tablets not only bring kings and queens to life, but also priests, traders and professional lamenters. They also include magic spells and letters of complaint. Our lives are still influenced by ripples from this ancient world via the 60-minute hour, mathematical discoveries and the invention of the zodiac.Clay prism with accounts of Ashurbanipals military campaignsAnthony Huan/CC BY-SA 2.0Pictured from top: a relief from Ashurbanipals palace showing him in a chariot; a fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh, telling the story of a great flood; the Royal Game of Ur board game, which Ashurbanipal enjoyed as a boy, according to letters by his brother; a clay prism with accounts of Ashurbanipals military campaigns; and a letter in which his sister berates his wife for her poor cuneiform.A letter inwhich his sister berates his wifeforher poor cuneiform.Auday HusseinThe Library of Ancient Wisdom is out now in the UK and will be published on 12 May in the US.Human origins: Neolithic and Bronze Age TurkeyEmbark on a captivating journey through Turkey, a land rich with historical treasures that illuminate the story of human origins.Find out moreTopics:
