Neo-Babylonian Empire · 605-539 BC

Nebuchadnezzar and the glory of Babylon

For seventy years after Assyria fell, Babylon was the greatest city on earth. Students explore Nebuchadnezzar's blue Ishtar Gate and towering ziggurat, the exile of Judah, and the night in 539 BC when the city opened its gates to Persia.

Teach it live New Open on the map
Length
50 minutes
Ages
11–14
On the map
3 steps, 605 BC to 539 BC
Live lesson
7 rounds, 3 on the map
Worksheet
Two A4 pages, with Classroom
You need
A projector; phones for live

Live lesson · new in Classroom

Teach it live. The class answers on their phones.

Put the board on the projector. Students join with a six-digit code, no account needed, and tap the map: where was the frontier, where did the grain come from. Their pins drop in together when you reveal, and the closest student takes the round.

€19 per month: every lesson live, every worksheet, cancel anytime. Rome at its height runs live for free.

A live lesson on the projector: the class's pins on the map around Alexandria, the closest students listed beside it A student's phone: the question and a map to tap
7 rounds
3 places to find on the map, quiz questions, a class vote and a one-line answer.
About 15 minutes
Run it as the map step, or to open the discussion. You move on with the space bar.
A report
Every answer, per student and per round, to read back or print after the lesson.
1

Introduction

5 min

Read aloud

For seventy years after Assyria fell, Babylon was the greatest city on earth. Students explore Nebuchadnezzar's blue Ishtar Gate and towering ziggurat, the exile of Judah, and the night in 539 BC when the city opened its gates to Persia.

By the end of the lesson, students can

  • Locate Babylon on the Euphrates and describe two of its famous buildings.
  • Explain what the Babylonian exile was and why it mattered to the people of Judah.
  • Describe how Babylon fell to Cyrus in 539 BC.
2

Explore the map

15 min

Project the map, or let students follow on their own devices. Each step opens the map at the right year and place.

a

605 BC

The city of the gate

Open the map in 605 BC on Babylon with the Cities layer on. The Euphrates ran through the middle of the city. Nebuchadnezzar rebuilt the walls, the Ishtar Gate of blue glazed bricks and the ziggurat Etemenanki. Why build a capital on a river?

Open this view on the map
b

605 BC

The empire of Babylon

Zoom out in 605 BC. That year Nebuchadnezzar beat the Egyptians at Carchemish on the Euphrates and took over Assyria's old lands in the Levant. Find Carchemish (near today's Turkish-Syrian border) and Jerusalem. The map's borders here are rough: Babylon's rule reached the Mediterranean.

Open this view on the map
c

539 BC

The gates open

Jump to 539 BC. The map now shows the Persian Empire: Cyrus took Babylon in October 539 BC, by most accounts without a battle at the city itself. Turn on Historical Events (Political Events) and find "Cyrus Conquers Babylon".

Open this view on the map
3

Class discussion

15 min

Pick two or three. They run from what happened to why it mattered.

  1. Nebuchadnezzar wrote that he built his walls and gates for the gods. What other reasons might a king have for a huge building program?
  2. In 597 and 586 BC Babylon took thousands of people from Judah into exile. Why did their religion survive, and even grow stronger, far from home?
  3. The Hanging Gardens are on the list of Seven Wonders, but no Babylonian text mentions them and some scholars place them in Nineveh. How should a historian treat a famous story with no hard evidence?
  4. Babylonian astronomers kept records of the planets for centuries and gave us the 60-minute hour and the 360-degree circle. Why did astronomy matter so much to them?
  5. In 539 BC Babylon's priests seem to have welcomed Cyrus. What makes a city give up on its own king?
4

Game round

10 min

Play one round of Rule History as Cyrus the Great, standing before Babylon in 539 BC. Students decide: storm the walls or enter as a liberator? Then compare with what the Cyrus Cylinder claims really happened.

Open Rule History
5

Worksheet

5 min

This worksheet comes with Classroom

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