ABSTRACT
The homeland of the Assyrians was the triangle formed by the Tigris and the Little Zab rivers and the Zagros Mountains. In the Old Akkadian period, Sargon of Akkad and Naram-Sin came as conquerors but were later remembered with admiration as rulers of wide empire, so that two Assyrian kings used the name of Sargon and one the name of Naram-Sin. The Assyrian King List begins with a certain Tudija and provides a continuous sequence to Shalmaneser V as the 109th king, and the remaining known kings bring the total to 117. In commemoration of the victory, the Assyrian king built a new city, Kar-Tukulti-Ninurta, where fragments of wall paintings have been found in the ruins of the palace. Life in the kingdom is reflected in the so-called Middle Assyrian Laws, copies of which were found at Qalat Sharqat. Shalmaneser V, son and successor of Tiglath-pileser III, ruled, as his father had done, in Babylonia as well as Assyria.
