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Iraq (//, i//, or //; Arabic: al-Irq), officially the Republic of Iraq (Arabic: (helpinfo) Jumhriyyat al-Irq; Kurdish: ), is a country in Western Asia encompassing the Mesopotamian alluvial plain, the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, and the eastern part of the Syrian Desert.[6]

Iraq borders Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, Kuwait to the southeast, Saudi Arabia to the south, Jordan to the southwest, and Syria to the west. Iraq has a narrow section of coastline measuring 58km (36mi) on the northern Persian Gulf. The capital city, Baghdad is in the center-east of the country. Two major rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, run through the center of Iraq, flowing from northwest to southeast. These provide Iraq with agriculturally capable land and contrast with the steppe and desert landscape that covers most of Western Asia.

Iraq has been known by the Greek toponym 'Mesopotamia' (Land between the rivers) and has been home to continuous successive civilizations since the 6th millennium BC. The region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers is often referred to as the cradle of civilization and the birthplace of writing. At different periods in its history, Iraq was the center of the indigenous Akkadian, Sumerian, Assyrian, and Babylonian empires. It was also part of the Median, Achaemenid, Hellenistic, Parthian, Sassanid, Roman, Rashidun, Umayyad, Abbasid, Mongol, Safavid, Afsharid, and Ottoman empires, and under British control as a League of Nations mandate.[7] Iraq is home to two of the world's holiest places among Shias: Najaf and Karbala.[8]

Iraq's modern borders were mostly demarcated in 1920 by the League of Nations when the Ottoman Empire was divided by the Treaty of Svres. Iraq was placed under the authority of the United Kingdom as the British Mandate of Mesopotamia. A monarchy was established in 1921 and the Kingdom of Iraq gained independence from Britain in 1932. In 1958, the monarchy was overthrown and the Republic of Iraq was created. Iraq was controlled by the Ba'ath Party (Iraqi-led faction) from 1968 until 2003. After an invasion led by the United States of America including multinational forces, the Ba'ath Party was removed from power and multi-party parliamentary elections were held. The American presence in Iraq ended in 2011.[9]

The Arabic name al-Irq has been in use since before the 6th century. There are several suggested origins for the name. One dates to the Sumerian city of Uruk (Biblical Hebrew Erech) and is thus ultimately of Sumerian origin, as Uruk was the Akkadian name for the Sumerian city of Urug, containing the Sumerian word for "city", UR.[10][11] An Arabic folk etymology for the name is "deeply rooted, well-watered; fertile".[12] During the medieval period, there was a region called Irq Arab ("Arabian Iraq") for Lower Mesopotamia and Irq ajam ("Foreign Iraq"),[13] for the region now situated in Central and Western Iran.[14] The term historically included the plain south of the Hamrin Mountains and did not include the northernmost and westernmost parts of the modern territory of Iraq.[15] The term Sawad was also used in early Islamic times for the region of the alluvial plain of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, contrasting it with the arid Arabian desert. As an Arabic word, means "hem", "shore", "bank", or "edge", so that the name by folk etymology came to be interpreted as "the escarpment", viz. at the south and east of the Jazira Plateau, which forms the northern and western edge of the "al-Iraq arabi" area.[16]

The Arabic pronunciation is [irq]. In English, it is either // (the only pronunciation listed in the Oxford English Dictionary and the first one in Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary) or // (listed first by MQD), the American Heritage Dictionary, and the Random House Dictionary. // is frequently heard in US media.

The "Cradle of Civilization", is a common term for the area comprising modern Iraq as it was home to the earliest known civilization, the Sumerian civilization, which arose in the fertile Tigris-Euphrates river valley of southern Iraq in the Chalcolithic (Ubaid period). It was here in the late 4th millennium BC, that the world's first writing system and recorded history itself were born. The Sumerian civilization flourished for over 3,000 years[citation needed] and was succeeded by the rise of the Akkadian Empire in the 24th century BC. Over two centuries of Akkadian dominance was followed by a Sumerian Renaissance in the 21st century BC. An Elamite invasion in 2004 BC brought the Third Dynasty of Ur to an end. By the 21st century BC, a new Akkadian civilization, Assyria, had risen to dominance in northern Iraq, and by the 19th century BC a contemporaneous Amorite state, Babylonia, had formed in southern Iraq.

Iraq was to be dominated by the Assyrians and Babylonians for the next 14 centuries, and under the respective Assyrian and Babylonian empire of Shamshi-Adad I and Hammurabi in the 19th and 18th centuries BC, the Middle Assyrian Empire of 13651053 BC and the Neo Assyrian Empire of 911605 BC, and the final Babylonian empire of 620539 BC Iraq became a center of world power. The Neo Assyrian Empire in particular put Iraq at the heart of a massive empire stretching from the Caucasus to Egypt and Arabia, and from Cyprus to Persia.

In the 6th century BC, Cyrus the Great of neighbouring Persia defeated the Neo-Babylonian Empire at the Battle of Opis and Iraq was subsumed into the Achaemenid Empire for nearly two centuries. In the late 4th century BC, Alexander the Great conquered the region, putting it under Hellenistic Seleucid rule for over two centuries.[18] The Parthians (247 BC 224 AD) from Persia conquered the region during the reign of Mithridates I of Parthia (r. 171138 BC). From Syria, the Romans invaded western parts of the region several times. Christianity began to take hold in Iraq (particularly in Assyria) between the 1st and 3rd centuries, and Assyria became a center of the Church of the East. The Sassanids of Persia under Ardashir I destroyed the Parthian Empire and conquered the region in 224 AD. The region was thus a province of the Sassanid Empire for over four centuries, until the Muslim conquest of Persia in the mid-7th century, although a number of indigenous Neo Assyrian states evolved during the Parthian era, such as Adiabene, Osroene and Hatra.

The Arab Islamic conquest in the mid 7th century AD established Islam in Iraq, and saw a large influx of Arabs and also Kurds. Under the Rashidun Caliphate, the prophet Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law Ali moved his capital to Kufa when he became the fourth caliph. The Umayyad Caliphate ruled the province of Iraq from Damascus in the 7th century. (However, eventually there was a separate, independent Caliphate of Crdoba.)

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