Mesopotamia's last native empire rose, peaked and fell inside ninety years
Nabopolassar was crowned in Babylon in 626 BC after a revolt against Assyria. Within two decades his alliance with the Medes had toppled Nineveh, and his son Nebuchadnezzar turned Babylon into the centre of the known world. Then Cyrus of Persia marched in, in 539 BC, posing as a servant of Babylon's own god.
Babylon had been a great power once before, under Hammurabi in the 18th century BC, but for nearly a thousand years afterwards it was dominated by others. From 729 BC Assyrian kings ruled it directly. Chaldean tribes who had settled in the south and adopted Babylonian names became major political players, and every leading tribe had supplied at least one king by 730 BC. When Assyria was weakened by a brief civil war, the official Nabopolassar seized Babylon and Nippur, held out through a siege at Uruk, and took the crown in November 626 BC.
By 620 BC he controlled all of Babylonia. The Medes under Cyaxares then invaded Assyria and took Assur, and Nabopolassar allied with them. Their joint army broke into Nineveh in August 612 BC, Assyria's last king was beaten at Harran in 609 BC, and the crown prince Nebuchadnezzar crushed Assyria's Egyptian allies at Carchemish in 605 BC, the year he succeeded his father.
Nebuchadnezzar II reigned for 43 years. He married Amytis, a Median princess, and some sources credit him with the Hanging Gardens for her, though whether the gardens existed at all is debated. His Levantine campaigns ended the Kingdom of Judah in 587 BC and began the Babylonian Captivity, and he blockaded island Tyre for 13 years until it accepted vassal status in 573 BC. At home he rebuilt at least 13 cities, and in Babylon he raised the Ishtar Gate and widened the Processional Street for the New Year festival of Marduk.
After his death the throne changed hands violently. His son Amel-Marduk was murdered after two years by the courtier Neriglissar, whose own young son Labashi-Marduk lasted nine months. The last king, Nabonidus, favoured the moon god Sîn over Marduk, which handed Cyrus the Great a pretext to invade. Babylon kept its own names and religion into the Parthian era but never regained independence.
Source: Neo-Babylonian Empire
