At a glance
Babylon was one of ancient Mesopotamia’s major capitals and ritual centers, where political power and cultic life concentrated resources and skilled labor. Physically it combined broad, heavy mudbrick building volumes for most of the city with selectively fired and glazed‑brick faces on gates, temples and palaces placed along canals and ceremonial axes so the state’s presence read from a distance.
Sources
modern
- Vorderasiatisches Museum / Pergamonmuseum — 'From Fragment to Monument: The Ishtar Gate in Berlin' (exhibition page and catalogue material).Link
- Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (ISAW-NYU) exhibition 'A Wonder to Behold' — discussion of materials, techniques and ritual use of Ishtar Gate fragments.Link
- Microscopic analyses of architectural glazes from Aššur, Khorsabad and Babylon — MDPI Minerals article on pigments and glaze technology.Link
- Archaeometric study comparing glazed‑brick technology to Babylonian examples — Journal of Cultural Heritage (discussion of pigments and opacifiers).Link
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — Ishtar Gate / Neo‑Babylonian architecture overview.Link
primary|modern
- British Museum collection entries for glazed bricks from Babylon (Ishtar Gate / Processional Way fragments).Link
primary
- Robert Koldewey, The Excavations at Babylon (English translation) — field observations and plans.Link
- Royal Inscriptions / ORACC (RINAP) — Nebuchadnezzar II building inscriptions (translations referencing the Processional Way and temple restorations).Link
- Translation of an Ishtar Gate/Processional Way inscription (Nebuchadnezzar II) — K. Chanson translation and related published inscriptions.Link
secondary|modern
primary (classical)
- Herodotus, Histories — classical description of Babylon's walls and gates (translation online / LacusCurtius).Link