Baghdad, the capital of Iraq

In Iraq, all roads lead to the capital Baghdad, the City of the Caliphs and birthplace of Sinbad, the famous sailor and prosperous merchant. A city with a glorious past and a magnificent present.

Baghdad indeed, reflects the most unusual country that frames it. Iraq, after all, is the old, old Mesopotamia of Sumer, Babylon, Assyria, of the glorious sun-burst of the Abbasid Empire of Harun Al-Rashid, of Persian intrusions, and the affliction of 4 hundred dead years of Ottoman rule. In other words, Baghdad is the still-beating heart of a former cradle of civilization, a country as historically dramatic as the Nile Valley or Ancient Greece.

How old is Baghdad?

Baghdad, as a name, had been mentioned as Baghdadu on the Assyrian cuneiform records of the 9th century BC, and Babylonian bricks bearing the Royal Seal of King Nebuchadnezzar (6th century BC) were found in the Tigris here. It also appeared in many other historical records prior to the Christian era. But whatever settlement existed then, historic Baghdad was undoubtedly founded by the 2nd of the Abbasid Caliphs, Abu Ja'far Al-Mansour (AD 754-775), who had established his capital (The Round City) in almost the same location on the west bank of the Tigris River in 762 AD, and the name Baghdad is probably a combination of two Persian words meaning "Founded by God". Arabs call it "Dar Essalam" (The City of Peace).