All language subtitles for Lost.Treasures.of.the.Bible.Secrets.of.Faith.S01E05.720p.WEB.H264-SHIIIT_track4_[eng]

[Narrator] 10 miles outside
of Baghdad in modern-day Iraq,

a pioneering team
of investigators

unearths the remains
of an ancient palace.

The wall is over there.

[Narrator] As they dig deeper,

they uncover treasures buried
for nearly 3,000 years.

Fragments of painted plaster

which were discovered
this morning.

Excavating these vivid colors
from the past,

yeah, it's emotional,
it's something that

when you figure it,
you say, "Oh, wow."

[Narrator] These newly
discovered wall paintings

reveal the power and wealth
of ancient kings,

and could shed light
on one of the Bible's

most infamous cities, Babylon.

♪ ♪

♪ ♪

The stories in the Bible are
famous across the world.

They tell of great battles
between good and evil,

earthshaking catastrophes

and epic heroes.

Of all the cities and places
mentioned in the Bible,

Babylon is one of
the most infamous,

second only to Jerusalem

in how many hundreds of times
it appears,

from the first Book of Genesis,
to the last, Revelation.

A city that was described

as home to legendary
megastructures

like the Tower of Babel,

as well as monstrous villains
like King Nebuchadnezzar II,

who destroyed Jerusalem
and captured its people.

[Historian] Biblical writers
cast Babylon as a place

that pillaged, sieged and
expelled people from their home.

[Narrator] In modern-day Iraq,

the city of Babylon
still stands.

Much is modern reconstruction

built upon what little
ruins remain.

And the reality of
its links to the Bible

lies lost beneath the desert.

To piece together the
historical world of Babylon,

international teams of experts
must hunt for clues elsewhere,

in mysterious cities
that share its secrets.

They dig through
centuries of earth.

[Archaeologist 1] Wherever you
basically put your spades

in the ground, you will find
something new and exciting.

[Narrator] And decipher
ancient inscriptions.

[Archaeologist 2]
This is important,

this is a message for posterity,

this reaches us
from the depths of time.

[Narrator] To answer
the question,

why did Babylon
have such a hold

over the writers of the Bible?

The first clue might be found
some 10 miles west of Baghdad

at the archaeological site
of Dur Kurigalzu.

♪ ♪

Here, it's not long after dawn
and a team of archaeologists

from the University of Bologna
in Italy

is already hard at work.

Look, expose this part here,
this one.

[Narrator] Archaeologist
Nicolò Marchetti and his team

are uncovering the remains
of an ancient city,

the ruins cover
over 1,000 acres,

making this site one of
the largest in ancient Iraq.

The site is immense,
so it's very exciting,

but it's also very challenging.

Usually in Near East archaeology
we are not used

to this kind of spectacular
preservation state.

[Narrator] This morning they are
excavating the ruins

of a huge building, on
a mission to discover evidence

of who built it and when.

♪ ♪

Already they're
turning up finds.

The base should be
further inside.

You see this is the direction,

so in theory it should be
more or less here.

It's beautiful!

[Narrator] Many of these
3,400-year-old discoveries

are in amazing condition,
giving Nicolò clues

about the kind of life and
industry that went on here.

Let's dig this hole.

Then we'll see if there's
a middle of the same width

as this one inside,
immediately inside.

So now maybe I'll do it by hand.

♪ ♪

[Nicolò] And the ash has
just started to come out.

[Narrator] This series of
small chambers shows evidence

of being scorched by heat.

That's it, we have the entrance
of the kiln.

[Nicolò] A beautifully
preserved specimen,

and I expect the kiln to be
fairly deep below my feet.

[Narrator] It's a kiln, an oven
chamber used to make pottery.

[Archaeologist] We are finding
in this level a lot of ashy soil

and the charcoal, this should be
the bottom of this kiln.

We've found many of these
complete vessels

on the bottom of it,

and this is the classic
Kassite shape of pottery.

[Narrator] This characteristic
style of pottery tells Nicolò

that Dur Kurigalzu was founded

by a people called
the Kassites.

They were said
to have originated

outside of Mesopotamia,

in the Zagros Mountains
in modern-day Iran.

They seized control
of the city of Babylon

in the 16th century BCE

and ruled it for
over four centuries.

Today, the ruins of the ancient
city of Babylon

have been restored, giving
a glimpse of its former glory.

The Kassites ruled here
for longer than anyone else.

So what might their
civilization reveal

about Babylon,
and why it held such sway

over the writers of the Bible.

Clues could come from exploring
the city's architecture.

♪ ♪

Archaeologist Haider Almamori
has devoted his career

to exploring Babylon's
many mysteries.

[Haider Almamori]
Babylon was my first love.

From the beginning, since
I get in love with the city

and the ruins of Babylon,

I decided to be
an archaeologist.

[Narrator] The first mention
of Babylon in the Bible

is in the Book of Genesis.

It says it was one of the
oldest cities in the world.

So when you walk around, you can
feel that it's an ancient city.

It has temples, palaces,

streets, and even the landscape
is very nice,

the ancient cross
of Euphrates River

and Shatt Al-Hillah River

is still seen inside the city.

[Narrator] The site spans
2,500 acres.

At its height, Babylon had
a canal network

and huge public spaces.

Historical documents also
record that it had

a monumental tower called
the Etemenanki ziggurat.

[Haider] Etemenanki means
house, foundation,

platform of heaven and earth.

[Narrator] Ziggurats were
stepped pyramids.

They had no cavities inside,
unlike the Egyptian pyramids,

but staircases around the
outside and a temple on top.

The ziggurat would be dedicated
to the patron god of a city

which could be one of several
thousand Mesopotamian deities

and served as their
dwelling place on Earth.

Babylon's ziggurat was said
to be the inspiration

for one of the Bible's
most famous landmarks,

the Tower of Babel,
a mythological tower

built to reach the heavens

that's described
in the Book of Genesis.

Today, all that remains
of the Etemenanki Tower

is the square base.

So what did Babylon's ziggurat
actually look like?

Answers could lie back
at the Kassite-built city

of Dur Kurigalzu.

Outside the city's
urban center,

a very unusually shaped mound
rises from the desert sands.

Standing 187 feet tall,
this strange, layered monument

was first recorded by travelers
in the 16th century.

Archaeologists now believe
it is the core

of a ruined ziggurat.

Who built it and when?

Nicolò explores one of
the religious buildings

next to the crumbling tower
to unlock its secrets.

[Nicolò] So this was
a very large temple area,

we do have walls standing
more than four meters high.

[Narrator] The builders used
bricks made of sunbaked mud

to construct the 13-foot-tall
walls of the temple.

Close inspection reveals

they're stamped
with ancient text.

[Nicolò] Some of the big bricks,
they bear a stamp

with a cuneiform inscription
by King Kurigalzu.

[Narrator] King Kurigalzu
was a powerful ruler

from the Kassite Dynasty.

The bricks reveal that
he built the ziggurat.

[Nicolò] So to the god Enlil,

he dedicates the construction
of the temple.

[Narrator] Enlil is god
of the wind, air and storms

and the king of all the gods.

[Nicolò] We counted 500
of these stamps,

both on the walls
of baked bricks, like here,

or on the floors.

They wanted these inscriptions
to be immediately visible,

not only to posterity, but also
to their contemporary people

walking along the walls.

[Narrator] Archaeologists know
the approximate period

of King Kurigalzu's rule, which
helps them date the ziggurat.

The Kassites began building

this pyramid-shaped mudbrick
monument around 1350 BCE.

Its vast base once covered
nearly 50,000 square feet,

with three more layers
of sunbaked platforms

stacked on top,
rising towards the sky.

Three grand staircases
led to a summit

that in its prime towered
nearly 200 feet tall.

This is quite possibly
what Babylon's ziggurat

would have looked like, too.

But for archaeologists working
at Babylon, there's a puzzle.

Etemenanki's remains
have been dated.

They're 300 years older than
the ziggurat at Dur Kurigalzu.

It can't have been
built by the Kassites

as it was here before
they conquered Babylon.

So who did build this ziggurat
immortalized in the Bible?

[Narrator] In Oxford, England,
Lara Bampfield,

an expert in ancient
Mesopotamian writing,

investigates who lived at
Babylon before the Kassites.

She's one of the few
people in the world

that can read and write
Babylonian cuneiform script.

Cuneiform is the oldest known
writing system,

established 5,000 years ago

and shared among many languages
in Mesopotamia.

[Lara Bampfield] It's formed
of small wedge shapes

that are joined together
into words or phrases.

[Narrator] In 1901,
archaeologists unearthed

a stone slab called a stele
in Susa, modern-day Iran.

Made of polished black diorite,

it was just under
eight feet tall

and covered in
cuneiform writing.

[Lara] We have script that
appears on all of its sides.

Its preservation is immaculate.

[Narrator] She begins to decode
the symbols on the stele.

At the top of the stele
lies an image

of the Babylonian
sun god Shamash,

and a king who is
named Hammurabi.

[Lara] We can see Hammurabi
being bestowed with the tools

he would need to rule
successfully by a god.

[Narrator] Hammurabi ruled
Babylon in the 1700s BCE,

centuries before the Kassites.

Before him, Babylon was
a minor town in a small state.

But during his 42-year reign,

grand building works
transformed Babylon

into one of the most advanced
cities in the world.

Through conquest and diplomacy,

he took over neighboring cities
in the Near East.

[Lara] Hammurabi was best known
for bringing together

the south and the central
parts of Mesopotamia.

[Narrator] He forged an empire
named Babylonia

with capital city Babylon
at its center.

Babylon's ziggurat was built
around the time of his rule.

But perhaps his most famous
legacy is on this stele,

some of the first written laws
in human history.

[Lara] Below this image we see
282 lines of cuneiform script

that talk about the laws
themselves,

what you shouldn't do,
and the punishments

that you would be put under
if you were to break these laws.

[Narrator] Lara writes out
law code number 22.

At the time of Hammurabi,

the language spoken
by Babylon's residents

and many in Mesopotamia
was called Akkadian.

[Lara] In Akkadian, it would
read "su ma a wi lum hup tam ich

but ma itash bat
a wilum shu itak."

Translated into English,
it would be

"If a man committed a robbery,
then he shall be executed."

They did rule with an iron fist,

some of the punishments that
they state in the law code

are pretty harsh
and pretty extreme.

[Narrator] But his laws also
reveal a strong sense

of responsibility
towards his citizens.

[Lara] They talk about marriage,
they talk about property,

they talk about tenancy, wages,
professionals, building works.

The epilogue at the start of the
law code actually talks about

how Hammurabi protects the weak

and how these laws have been
put in place to make sure

that the society functions

in a peaceful
and harmonious way.

[Narrator] Hammurabi set down
laws that influenced

many cultures that followed.

Some experts believe these laws
may have inspired

writings in the Bible.

The 10 Commandments,
the famous set of rules

given to the Israelites by God
which shaped their society,

bear many similarities
to Hammurabi's Code.

But in 1750 BCE, Hammurabi's
reign came to an end,

and in 1595, the Kassites took
over the empire he had built.

Evidence of what they did with
this kingdom could be found

back at the vast archaeological
site of Dur Kurigalzu.

The Kassite rulers originated
from outside Mesopotamia,

but Nicolò believes,

rather than stamp their own
culture on Babylon,

the Kassites preserved
many of its customs,

whilst expanding the empire
further still.

When the Kassite dynasty
established itself,

they resided in Babylon which
was the main cultic center.

Sometime they decided to move
the capital 100 kilometers north

to here at Dur Kurigalzu.

[Narrator] In this new capital
city built in the 1300s BCE,

the Kassites replicated
Babylon's ancient architecture

in the form of the ziggurat.

But they also built
a vast palace

which Nicolò and his team
are now excavating.

We have walls standing up
almost four meters high.

We are definitely in awe
at the power of the thickness

of the monumentality of the
architecture we are unearthing.

In the center of the city

we have this enormous
royal palace.

[Narrator] Nicolò believes
it could once have spanned

37 acres, making it potentially
the largest palace

in the Middle East.

[Nicolò] The vastness
of the Royal Palace,

this is unprecedented.

So this speaks volumes
of the power and the wealth

of those who built it,
the Kassite kings.

[Narrator] This season, the team
has begun to unearth

something truly extraordinary,

it appears to be
decoratively painted plaster,

an artwork known as a fresco.

[Nicolò] And it's a decoration

which is so peculiar
and important.

For example, just here you can
see fragments of painted plaster

which were discovered
this morning,

and they have
geometrical motifs,

they have these rosettes.

[Narrator]
To see color preserved

after thousands of years
is incredibly rare.

They are painted on stucco,
and they use Egyptian blue.

They use a series
of chemical mixtures

which are highly resistant.

They are actually still
very vivid, the colors, today.

They haven't been oxidized.

I think it's a direct glimpse,
into this opulent lifestyle.

This is the apex
of palatial building.

[Narrator] The Kassite Empire
brought stability to Babylonia

for over 400 years, preserving
the architecture and culture

of the ancient city as well
as its knowledge and history

through their written records.

[Nicolò] They were
definitely successful,

they basically ruled for
at least half a millennium

in a very unruly area.

[Narrator]
But in the mid 1100s BCE,

the Kassite Empire
began to collapse.

[Nicolò] When the state weakens,

the capital itself
gets weakened,

so this is what happened
to Dur Kurigalzu

in the late phases
of its history.

The Painted Palace
was destroyed.

[Narrator] What followed
was a period

known as
the Babylonian Dark Ages,

with few written records
and frequent invasions.

The old Babylonian Empire of
law, culture and architecture

which inspired
the Tower of Babel story,

and perhaps
the 10 Commandments,

seemed to be over.

But a new era,
one that would inspire

some of the Bible's
most dramatic moments,

was soon to begin.

[Narrator] In 729 BCE,

after centuries of turmoil
and decline,

a group of notorious warriors
claimed the city of Babylon

for their empire--

the Assyrians.

275 miles north of Babylon
in the city of Mosul

in northern Iraq is the
archaeological site of Nineveh.

In the 7th century BCE,

it became the capital
of the Assyrian Empire.

Archaeologist Jan Heiler is
part of a team of experts

exploring the city.

[Jan Heiler] It's every
archaeologist's dream

to work at a site like Nineveh.

Every day we're finding
something interesting,

and we're adding a little bit
more information

to the historic records.

[Narrator] Nineveh also features
heavily in the Old Testament.

Like Babylon, it was depicted
as an enormous city.

[Jan] In the Bible
it says that Nineveh

had about 120,000 inhabitants,

and it took three days
to walk across the city.

[Narrator] Today, much
of the city lies buried

under modern Mosul.

But archaeologists have deduced

that the circumference
of the city walls

was in reality
about eight miles,

making it one of the largest
cities of its day.

Today, Jan and the team
excavate a building

that dates to
the late 7th century

and appears to be more than
10,000 square feet in size.

Conservator Justyna Hrabska
is in charge

of preserving the new finds.

[Justyna Hrabska] We're just
preparing for the consolidation

and a little bit of static
stabilization of that slab,

which is fantastic.

[Jan] Yeah.

[Justyna] Because we found
another inscription on it.

[Jan] Oh, nice,
on the back, yeah.

[Justyna]
Yeah, at the back of it.

[Narrator] The team has been
hunting for evidence

of who owned this building

and finds clues inscribed
in the slabs themselves.

[Justyna] So the front,
which wasn't really decorated

with the relief, is flat
and badly destroyed,

but at the back is
a well preserved inscription,

actually two, and there
is Sennacherib mentioned,

so we had something to work for.

[Narrator] Sennacherib was
one of the most warlike

Assyrian kings.

During the 7th century,

he claimed the title of
king of Babylon for himself,

to the irritation of
the defiant Babylonian people.

Excavating this building could
reveal more about his power.

But the archaeological team
here faces a huge problem--

the walls are mostly made
of a stone called anhydrite.

[Justyna] For the sculptors
and artists,

it was a nice, soft stone.

[Narrator] But as soon as
the team unearths the surface,

anhydrite begins
to absorb moisture,

and any cracks in the stone
could cause it to fall apart.

The team has to find a solution

that doesn't harm
the precious remains,

so they use a chemically
similar substance

called gypsum plaster
to fill any cracks

and preserve
the fractured stone.

[Justyna] Now we are
at this stage when Jasim,

who is super experienced here,

is injecting the gypsum
in between the cracks

to stabilize the stone.

[Jan] Yeah.

[Justyna]
You need to be pretty fast

because gypsum sets
rather quickly,

especially in
these temperatures.

Hopefully it will
survive even longer

after our consolidation
and restoration treatment.

[Narrator] The team's mission is
to stabilize this building

so that they can understand
what it was used for.

Evidence for that could lie
with the discovery

of something truly
extraordinary

just outside
the building's walls.

[Jan] We have these hooves
that are carved so nicely,

even with these little lines
here and the gap in between.

The surface was
completely smooth.

This must have taken a lot
of time and effort to do,

so it's very, very
impressive work.

It must have looked
really amazing

when it was still
in its original shape.

And we imagine that these
sculptures would have been

up to six meters in height.

[Narrator] These colossal
stone hooves

are some of the largest ever
found in Assyrian archaeology.

[Jan] This was all done from
one single piece of stone,

it is a really impressive feat
of engineering and artwork,

it definitely displays the might
and power of the Assyrian kings

because they were just able
to do something like that.

[Narrator] These feet once
belonged to a mythical beast

called a Lamassu, a creature
with the body of a bull,

the wings of an eagle,
and the head of a man.

They guarded the entrance
to a throne room

which archaeologists believe

was Sennacherib's
military palace,

the royal residence
and armory for a city

that reflected
the military power

and might of
the Assyrian Empire.

♪ ♪

Yet despite his display
of authority here at Nineveh,

the Babylonians refused
to stay subjugated

and rebelled against his rule.

After a siege lasting
nine months, in 689 BCE,

a furious Sennacherib
ordered Babylon

to be razed to the ground.

He plundered its temples,

diverted a river
to flood the city,

and he destroyed the famous
Etemenanki ziggurat.

[Jan] This sort of created
a grudge that the Babylonians

held against the Assyrians
until the very end,

and when the opportunity
finally came

for them to pay them back,
they did.

[Narrator] At the archaeological
site of Nineveh,

Jan continues to explore
the palace

originally built
by King Sennacherib.

He's unearthed another statue,

but this one hasn't
fared so well.

[Jan] And as you can see here,
we have one of the Lamassu.

This one's been
toppled down here,

so you can see the line of it
goes this way,

so this is the line
on the facade,

and it has toppled
down that way,

so together with
the mudbrick walls,

everything has come down here.

[Narrator] Jan has discovered
clues that this damage

was not the natural result
of time, but intentional.

[Jan] In all the places that
we have excavated so far,

we have found remains
of charcoal.

It's all over the place,

in the fill and in the debris
from the walls.

Pieces of charcoal like these
are from beams of a roof

or from other wooden features
of the architecture.

[Narrator] It's evidence
of fire damage,

damage that appears
all over the site.

[Jan] And here we have
these mudbricks,

they are from the walls
but tumbled down,

and you can see that they
are preserved quite well,

because the fire was so hot

that it started to, like,
slightly burn these mudbricks,

so they are preserved as is,
as you can see here.

This points us towards
the theory that the whole palace

was completely
destroyed by fire.

[Narrator] The evidence has been
dated and found to match up

with historical records.

[Jan] On the inscriptions
and the texts,

we know very well that Nineveh
was destroyed in 612 BC.

And the evidence that we found
during the excavation

absolutely supports this.

We are quite sure
that this represents

the destruction of 612.

[Narrator] Jan believes that
the evidence found here

shows Nineveh's rivalry
with the Babylonians

came to a destructive finale
in 612 BCE.

[Jan] The Babylonians had been
on the sort of rule

of the Assyrians since
Sennacherib's time,

and so in the end,

when the Assyrians' power
was already waning,

they decided that now was
the time to get together

and put an end to it.

[Narrator] With the help
of allies,

the Babylonians sacked Nineveh,
obliterating the entire city.

[Jan] It was the end
of the Assyrian Empire,

and the Babylonians took over
rule in Mesopotamia.

[Narrator] The Babylonian Empire
would soon become

even more powerful than
in the days of Hammurabi.

Could this hold a clue to why
the writers of the Bible

were so obsessed with Babylon?

Back at the ancient city
of Babylon,

Haider explores the walls

of one of its most
important monuments.

This is a reconstruction
of the Ishtar Gate,

the largest and most
elaborately decorated entrance

to the inner city of Babylon.

It stood over the magnificent

half-mile-long
processional way.

Its walls are inscribed
with cuneiform,

which reveals one of
the great rulers of Babylon,

Nebuchadnezzar II.

They use the stamp seal,
usually made from metal,

they write the inscription on it

and then they stamp
on the bricks.

The inscription mentioned

that Nebuchadnezzar II
built this palace.

[Narrator] Nebuchadnezzar II's
name appears

over and over again
in the Bible.

He rose to power around 606 BCE
and drove Babylon to become

one of the greatest, most
advanced cities in the world.

It was a small city
in his father's time,

but in his time
it became larger and larger.

Its size became like Rome
after 600 years.

So it was a huge city
during Nebuchadnezzar II.

He built three palaces,
at least we know.

[Narrator] All enclosed
within five miles

of formidable city walls.

During a time when most
settlements were mere villages,

Babylon may have been
the first city on Earth

to reach a population
of 200,000.

Nebuchadnezzar even rebuilt
the famous ziggurat of Babylon.

We have texts and resources

mentioning that the tower was
renewed and reconstructed

in the New Babylonian Period
by Nebuchadnezzar II.

[Narrator] It was a time of
prosperity for the Babylonians.

Yet there's a puzzle.

In the Bible,
Nebuchadnezzar II is painted

as a villain and tyrant.

So what did he do
to inspire such rage

among the Bible's writers?

[Narrator] The investigation
into why Nebuchadnezzar II

is portrayed as such
an evil king finds clues

in accounts of a devastating
event for the Jewish people--

an episode recorded
in historical texts

from the 5th and 6th century
BCE and in the Old Testament.

The Book of Kings tells how
his armies besieged Jerusalem

in 586 BCE.

They looted gold
and silver treasures

from the Lord's Temple.

The king's troops then
set fire to the temple,

the most sacred site
in Judaism,

and razed it to the ground,

taking the treasures that
they had plundered to Babylon.

He then drove the people
of Jerusalem from their homes

and exiled them to Babylon.

Up to 18,000 Jewish people
were forced to live there.

Could this brutal event explain

the Bible authors'
obsession with the city?

♪ ♪

It certainly suggests
why Nebuchadnezzar II

was immortalized as one of
the Bible's most evil kings.

[Nicolò] The biblical writers,

they applied their own
point of view, of course,

and so foreign rulers
were violent tyrants

aiming at depriving the Jewish
people of any kind of freedom.

[Narrator] Today,
historians believe

that many of the Bible's
stories were written

by Jewish people in Babylon
during this time of exile.

One such tale appears
in the Book of Genesis

and was likely inspired
by the Etemenanki ziggurat,

which would have stood
right in front of the eyes

of the Jewish exiles--

the story of
the Tower of Babel.

♪ ♪

The Bible says that a mighty
hunter called Nimrod

ruled Babylon, or Babel, as the
Old Testament also calls it.

Jewish traditions describe how
he encouraged his people

to build a tower in the city

that would reach
into the heavens.

Genesis tells how God
resented their ambition

and scattered the people
of Babylon across the Earth,

leaving the tower unfinished.

The tower that seemingly
inspired the story

had been restored to its former
glory in the 6th century

by Nebuchadnezzar II.

Yet it's now nothing

but a square pile
of rubble in a field.

Why didn't it survive,
when others are still standing?

♪ ♪

One possible clue
could be found

back at the archaeological site
of Dur Kurigalzu.

Nicolò continues to investigate
the secrets of the ziggurat.

Most mudbrick structures
this old

have completely disintegrated,

but the central core
of this ziggurat

still stands
at almost full height.

For archaeologists, its
preservation is a puzzle.

This ziggurat has been so
resilient in time from erosion

it actually has eroded much less
than other ziggurats, for example.

[Narrator] The exposed brickwork
here offers a rare insight

into how this mysterious
structure was built.

Nicolò spies
an additional element

in the ziggurat's construction
that could be key

to its surviving for
more than 3,000 years.

In this specific case,
the ziggurat

is made of mud bricks,
but they are also

paused at intervals
with reed mats.

Now, this is quite
an act of genius.

♪ ♪

[Narrator] A ziggurat built of
mudbrick alone would crumble

under compressive stress before
it ever reached full height.

So builders wove mats of reeds

between every eight layers
of brick in the core

to distribute weight

and prevent any cracks
from spreading.

They sealed the outer layers
with bitumen,

which waterproofed the walls
against heavy rains,

and preserved the ziggurat
from erosion.

It was these techniques that
allowed the Mesopotamians

to build their ziggurats
as tall as 300 feet.

But few other ziggurats
have survived

as well as Dur Kurigalzu.

Nicolò believes another
engineering feature

is the unique secret
to its success.

A closer look
at the structure reveals

an intriguing
regular pattern of holes.

They're not just
using this solution,

they're also using ventilation
shafts horizontally

so that it keeps this mass
of mud bricks dry inside.

There is no humidity basically.

[Narrator] The lack of moisture
has stopped the mudbricks

disintegrating inside the core

and saved this
ancient monument.

The preservation of this
architectural wonder

allows today's visitors some
idea of what the Jewish exiles

would have seen dominating
their daily view,

a site they may
well have written

into their stories
in the Bible.

According to the Old Testament,
the Jewish people would remain

in exile at Babylon
for around 70 years,

a trial that would come to
an end with their liberation,

but also with
the brutal conquest

and destruction
of the city itself.

So who was responsible
for the fall of Babylon?

[Narrator] The fall of Babylon
is recorded

in one of the most famous
stories in the Old Testament,

Belshazzar's feast.

King Belshazzar, grandson
of Nebuchadnezzar II,

was holding a feast
in the city of Babylon.

He drank wine from the sacred
vessels taken from the temple,

mocking the Lord.

In the midst of the revelry,
a hand appeared,

etching words of divine
judgement on the palace wall.

That very night,
Belshazzar was slain

and Babylon fell to invaders.

But does the biblical version
of events match up

with the historical records?

And who was responsible?

♪ ♪

In Oxford, Lara Bampfield, an
expert in Mesopotamian writing,

investigates
an ancient document

called the Cyrus Cylinder.

[Lara] This is a very
important artifact,

and it was excavated
at Babylon in the 1800s.

[Narrator] It records the
victories of a Persian king,

Cyrus the Great, who ruled
the vast Persian Empire.

Archaeologists believe he
conquered Babylon in 539 BCE.

[Lara] This once former,
impressive, monumental city

that controlled trade
over the whole of Mesopotamia

absolutely fell apart
and was abandoned.

[Narrator] To peoples like the
ancient Greeks and Egyptians,

the Persians were adversaries;

but to the authors of
the Bible, Cyrus is a hero.

Lara decodes the cylinder
for clues as to why.

[Lara] There is one line
on the Cyrus Cylinder

that a lot of people
have attached to,

and this is because it talks
about the return of people.

Line 32 reads, "I returned
the images of the gods

who had resided there,
to their place,

and I let them dwell
in eternal abodes.

I gathered all their inhabitants

and I returned them
to their dwellings."

[Narrator] The cylinder doesn't
name these people,

but a tantalizing theory links
them to biblical history.

[Lara] There is a lot
of speculation

about whether this is
actually the Judeans

returning to Jerusalem;

the return of exiled
people to their home.

[Narrator] The act of liberating
the exiled Jews in Babylon

cemented the heroic status
of Cyrus in the Bible.

But for Babylon's reputation,
the damage was done,

immortalized throughout
many books of the Bible

in the very strongest terms.

Babylon is depicted as
the mother of prostitutes,

her golden cup filled
with abominations,

intoxicating the nations
with her immorality.

The Babylonians are said to be
as greedy as the grave--

like death, never satisfied,

gathering all nations
and taking them captive.

The city was called "the hammer
of the whole earth,"

renowned for violence and
burning the holy temples.

Until Babylon's arrogance
and pride led to its downfall,

its grandeur reduced to ruins

among the nations
it once dominated.

This season's excavations
at some of Iraq's

biggest archaeological sites
have shed light

on one of the Bible's
most infamous cities.

Babylon was the most
important city.

With its richness,
with its power,

represented in the eyes
of biblical writers,

a corrupt power.
But in fact, it was

in a way misrepresented,
if not misunderstood altogether.

[Narrator] At Dur Kurigalzu,

the excavation season
is nearly over.

After months of work
inside the Painted Palace,

the team has excavated
340 feet of frescoed wall

to a depth of six feet
in places.

The archaeologists here have
unearthed the lost world

of the Kassites,

whose careful custody over
nearly half a millennium

preserved
the architecture and laws

that would inspire
the writers of the Bible.

Excavating these vivid colors
from the past,

yeah, it's emotional.

It's something that when you
figure it, you say, "Oh, wow."

[Narrator] At Nineveh,

home to one of Babylon's
greatest adversaries,

archaeologists unearth
a story of revenge

that propelled Babylon

to become perhaps the greatest
city in the world.

[Jan] Defeating the Assyrians
and destroying Nineveh

definitely led to
a huge shift in power.

[Narrator] Together,
these excavations,

along with the historical
records of forced exile,

reveal what made Babylon
so extraordinary

that the Bible's authors
turned to it for inspiration

hundreds of times.

[Lara] I think Babylon
has a place

in biblical writers' history

because the Judeans were part
of the Babylonian history.

They lived it, they were
traumatized through it,

and as a result of that
it was a hot topic

for the biblical writers.

[Narrator] And so, Babylon's
status was cemented

as a truly legendary city
of the Bible.