Ctesiphon

CTESIPHON, an ancient city on the left bank of the Tigris in 33° N. and 45° E., and about 25 miles south-east of Baghdad. The site is famous for the remains of one of the most magnificent buildings in Mesopotamia, a great vaulted hall of the Sassanian period. The earliest mention of Ctesiphon is by Polybius in 220 B.C. The city was however overshadowed by its neighbour Seleucia on the opposite bank of the Tigris, which became the most famous commercial city in western Asia. Owing to the Greek sympathies of Seleucia the Arsacids after they had conquered the land east of the Euphrates in 129 B.C. did not dare to occupy it but made Ctesiphon their headquarters. Although for a short period in in the first century A.D. Ctesiphon revolted from the Parthians it remained as the eastern city, while Seleucia was western in its sympathies. After the destruction of Seleucia by Rome in A.D. 164 Hellenism died in Babylonia, and Ctesiphon, with the f ounda tion of the Sassanian Empire in the second century, became the metropolis. It increased in size and various kings added new suburbs. After the Arab success at the battle of Qadisaya Ctesiphon was plundered. The removal of the capital to Baghdad marks the definite recognition by the Abbasids of the shifting of the centre of power. From this time Ctesiphon was dead.

Ctesiphon, Battle of,

Nov. 21, 1915. This denoted the high water mark of the first British advance towards Baghdad in the World War. After successive victories, gained by skilful tactics rather than superior force, General Townshend reached Ctesiphon and there attacked the Turkish forces which were concentrating to cover the close approach to Baghdad. Townshend gained an initial advantage, but the arrival of Turkish reinforcements nulli fied much of his success, and three days later, Townshend was compelled to give the order for retreat, and to extricate his force from their dangerously isolated situation by falling back to Kut al' Amara (q.v.), where he was shortly besieged. For an account of these operations and the strategy which dictated them, see