Chronicon
Menu
Historical Period

Ctesiphon, the Talmud, and the Church of the East in the Persian heartland.

Use the timeline below to navigate through major events and milestones.

Sasanian Mesopotamia · AD 224-637
Late Antique Mesopotamia

Sasanian Mesopotamia — Asōristān

Under the Sasanian kings the Mesopotamian plain, which they called Asōristān, was the beating heart of the Persian empire — its richest province and the site of the capital, Ctesiphon. Here rose the greatest brick arch of the ancient world; here the rabbis compiled the Babylonian Talmud and the Church of the East took root; and here the long duel with Rome finally exhausted Persia, on the eve of the Arab conquest. Slide across the last age before Islam.

224 AD
Sasanian Empire
1 / 10

224 AD

Sasanian Empire
  • Political

    Ctesiphon, capital of the Sasanians

    Ardashir I overthrows the Parthians and rules his new Persian empire from Ctesiphon on the Tigris.

10 milestones

Meanwhile

Around 224 AD

Full Chronicle

Sasanian Mesopotamia — Asōristān

Under the Sasanian kings the Mesopotamian plain, which they called Asōristān, was the beating heart of the Persian empire — its richest province and the site of the capital, Ctesiphon. Here rose the greatest brick arch of the ancient world; here the rabbis compiled the Babylonian Talmud and the Church of the East took root; and here the long duel with Rome finally exhausted Persia, on the eve of the Arab conquest. Slide across the last age before Islam.

  1. Sasanian Empire

    • Ctesiphon, capital of the Sasanians

      Ardashir I overthrows the Parthians and rules his new Persian empire from Ctesiphon on the Tigris.

  2. Sasanian Empire

    • Shapur I captures a Roman emperor

      Shapur I defeats and captures the emperor Valerian, and settles his Roman prisoners in Mesopotamia.

  3. Sasanian Empire

    • The Lakhmids of al-Hira

      An Arab client dynasty at al-Hira guards the Sasanian desert frontier and becomes a centre of Arab culture.

  4. Sasanian Empire

    • The Church of the East

      A council at Seleucia-Ctesiphon organizes the Christians of Persia into an independent Church of the East.

  5. Sasanian Empire

    • The Babylonian Talmud

      In the great rabbinic academies of Sura and Pumbedita, the scholars of Jewish Babylonia compile the Babylonian Talmud.

  6. Sasanian Empire

    • The golden age of Khosrow I

      Khosrow I Anushirvan reforms the state and brings Sasanian civilization, centred on Ctesiphon, to its height.

  7. Sasanian Empire

    • The great arch of Ctesiphon

      The vaulted throne hall of Ctesiphon, the Taq Kasra, rises as the widest single-span brick arch ever built.

  8. The Last Great War

    • Khosrow II conquers the East

      Khosrow II overruns Syria, Palestine, and Egypt, carrying the True Cross from Jerusalem back to Ctesiphon.

  9. The Last Great War

    • The Battle of Nineveh

      The Byzantine emperor Heraclius strikes deep into Mesopotamia and shatters the Persian army near ancient Nineveh.

  10. Collapse

    • The murder of Khosrow II

      Khosrow II is overthrown and killed, and the Sasanian empire plunges into civil war on the eve of the Arab conquest.