ONE LAND · 13 ATLASES
History of Iraq in maps
Iraq as it appears in 13 interactive history atlases, from 264 BC to 2015: Mesopotamia, Iraq — Baghdad & the Abbasid caliphate, the Abbasid Caliphate, Iraq. Each era below lists who ruled the land and when control changed, linked to the dated map that shows it.
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What was Iraq before it was Iraq? Below, every era of this land in the Maps of History atlases — who ruled it, what it was called, and when control changed — each line linked to the dated map that shows it. Modern borders stand in as an honest approximation; every atlas says so on the map itself.
Mesopotamia (mod. Iraq) · Ancient Rome
Mesopotamia: the wealthy river-world where Roman ambition went to be humbled — Crassus died at Carrhae, Trajan reached the Gulf and held it two years, Julian died retreating in 363. Ctesiphon, the Parthian and Persian capital, sat here: closer to Roman Syria than Rome was to Milan, a fact that governed the East’s strategy for centuries.
| 264 BC | Hellenistic kingdoms — the opening position |
| 146 BC | Rival great powers |
| Roman territory | |
| Rival great powers |
ANCIENT ROME: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq — Baghdad & the Abbasid caliphate · Crusades
Iraq held Baghdad, seat of the Sunni Abbasid caliph — a spiritual figurehead whose recognition legitimized the Seljuk sultans and, later, Saladin, but who wielded little real power. The distant centre of the Sunni world, its disunity in 1095 opened the door to the First Crusade; the Mongol sack of Baghdad in 1258 ended the caliphate entirely.
| The Islamic powers — Seljuk, Zengid, Ayyubid, Mamluk — the opening position |
CRUSADES: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
The Abbasid Caliphate (mod. Iraq) · Mongol Empire
Seat of the Abbasid caliphate, 500 years old when Hülegü’s ultimatum arrived. Baghdad fell in February 1258; the caliph was executed, the House of Wisdom scattered, and the canal country of Mesopotamia — the world’s oldest irrigated landscape — broke and was not restored for centuries. The region’s center of gravity moved to Cairo and did not return.
| The Islamic powers — the opening position | |
| The Mongol Empire |
MONGOL EMPIRE: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · Industrial Revolution
| Opened by force or treaty — the opening position | |
| Opened by force or treaty |
INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · Age of Revolutions
| Neutral / uncommitted — the opening position |
AGE OF REVOLUTIONS: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · Meiji Japan and post-Soviet Russia
| Non-aligned or stateless — the opening position |
MEIJI JAPAN AND POST-SOVIET RUSSIA: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Mesopotamia (Ottoman Empire) · WWI
Iraq · Stalin’s Soviet Union
STALIN’S SOVIET UNION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · Road to WW2
| Colonial empires & possessions — the opening position |
ROAD TO WW2: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · WW2
| Western Allies — the opening position |
Iraq · Cold War
| US-aligned states — the opening position | |
| Non-aligned & neutral | |
| Soviet-aligned states | |
| Non-aligned & neutral | |
| Soviet-aligned states |
COLD WAR: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · Feminism and the Tunisian Revolution
| Refused: women excluded; ERA never ratified — the opening position | |
| Right won in law | |
| No reform yet / outside this story |
FEMINISM AND THE TUNISIAN REVOLUTION: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
Iraq · Refugee crises
REFUGEE CRISES: EVERY CHAPTER AND MAP →
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