Notes

Defining Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia means "(Land) between two rivers" in ancient Greek. The oldest known occurrence of the name Mesopotamia dates to the 4th century BCE, when it was used to designate the land east of the Euphrates in north Syria.[1] In modern times it has been more generally applied to all the lands between the Euphrates and the Tigris,[citation needed] thereby incorporating not only parts of Syria but also almost all of Iraq and southeastern Turkey.[2] The neighboring steppes to the west of the Euphrates and the western part of the Zagros Mountains are also often included under the wider term Mesopotamia.[3][4][5] A further distinction is usually made between Upper or Northern Mesopotamia and Lower or Southern Mesopotamia.[6] Upper Mesopotamia, also known as the Jazirah, is the area between the Euphrates and the Tigris from their sources down to Baghdad.[3] Lower Mesopotamia is the area from Baghdad to the Persian Gulf.[6] In modern scientific usage, the term Mesopotamia often also has a chronological connotation. In modern Western historiography of the region, the term "Mesopotamia" is usually used to designate the area from the beginning of time, until the Muslim conquest in the 630s, with the Arabic names Iraq and Jazirah being used to describe the region after that event. [2][7]