In the West, we have all heard about the great Library of Alexandria. But how many are familiar with the fact that Caliph Al-Mamun built one of the world’s greatest libraries in 9th century Baghdad, the “House of Wisdom”? And how many of us have heard of the Library of Nineveh, modern-day Mosul, Iraq, built by King Ashurbanipal about 650 BCE which supposedly contained more than 20,000 clay tablets written on with cuneiform text? It was discovered in the 1840s. H. G. Wells called the library “the most precious source of historical material in the world.” Among other things, it contained the Epic of Gilgamesh.
Episode file · 188
Renaissance #188 – The Library of Nineveh (Reconquista #9)
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