The first part of this volume deals with the rivalries and triumphs of the Assyrians and the Babylonians in the period of their greatest achievements and fame. Babylonia slowly recovered from a long economic decline and under the leadership of Chaldaean tribal chieftains began the attempt to assert its independence from the overshadowing power of Assyria, but while Assyria's energy remained, the struggle was an unequal one.

Assyria appeared to move from strength to strength. The old enemy in the north, Urartu, was defeated by Sargon in a spectacular campaign. Expansion in the west led to the capture of Samaria and the elimination of Israel by Sargon in the eighth century, and to the invasion of Egypt by Ashurbanipal in the seventh century. In the east, Elam was crushed. The great palaces built by Tiglath-pileser III at Calah (Nimrud), by Sargon at Dur-Sharrukin (Khorsabad), and by Sennacherib and Ashurbanipal at Nineveh (Kouyunjik) are public monuments to Assyrian success, and the libraries, sculptures and ornament found in them are the epitome of Mesopotamian culture. In contrast, the internecine struggle between Ashurbanipal and his brother Shamash-shuma-ukin, appointed as King of Babylon, proved to be the beginning of a fatal weakness. The sudden arrival on the international scene of the Medes and the Scythians and their alliance with the Babylonians led to the unexpected defeat and collapse of Assyria in 612 B.C., and its almost total disappearance from the historical record.