Lower Mesopotamia [1] [2] is a historical region of Mesopotamia. It is located in the alluvial plain of Iraq from the Hamrin Mountains to the Faw Peninsula near the Persian Gulf.
In the Middle Ages it was also known as the Sawad and al-Jazira al-sflia ("Lower Jazira"), which strictly speaking designated only the southern alluvial plain, [3] and Arab Iraq, as opposed to Persian Iraq, the Jibal. [4] Lower Mesopotamia was home to Sumer and Babylonia. [5]
The medieval Arab geographers placed the northern border between Iraq and Upper Mesopotamia (the Jazirah) in a line running from Anbar on the Euphrates to Tikrit on the Tigris, although later it was shifted to a line running due west from Tikrit, thus including several towns on the Euphrates past Anbar into Iraq. [6]
An alluvial plain begins north of Tikrit Near Hamrin Mountains and extends to the Persian Gulf. Here the Tigris and Euphrates lie above the level of the plain in many places, and the whole area is a river delta interlaced by the channels of the two rivers and by qanat. Intermittent lakes, fed by the rivers in flood, also characterize southeastern Iraq. A fairly large area (15,000 km2 or 5,800 sq mi) just above the confluence of the two rivers at al Qurnah and extending east of the Tigris beyond the Iranian border is marshland, known as Lake Hammar, the result of centuries of flooding and inadequate drainage. Much of it is permanent marsh, but some parts dry out in early winter, and other parts become marshland only in years of great flood.
Because the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates above their confluence are heavily silt-laden, irrigation and fairly frequent flooding deposit large quantities of silty loam in much of the delta area. Windborne silt contributes to the total deposit of sediments. It has been estimated that the delta plains are built up at the rate of nearly twenty centimeters in a century. In some areas, major floods lead to the deposit in temporary lakes of as much as thirty centimeters of mud.
The Tigris and Euphrates also carry large quantities of salts. These, too, are spread on the land by sometimes excessive irrigation and flooding. A high water table and poor surface and subsurface drainage tend to concentrate the salts near the surface of the soil. In general, the salinity of the soil increases from Baghdad south to the Persian Gulf and severely limits productivity in the region south of Amarah. The salinity is reflected in the large lake in central Iraq, southwest of Baghdad, known as Lake Milh. There are two other major lakes in the country to the north of Lake Milh: Lake Tharthar and Lake Habbaniyah.
Anbar also known by its original ancient name, Peroz-Shapur, was an ancient and medieval town in central Iraq. It played a role in the Roman–Persian Wars of the 3rd–4th centuries, and briefly became the capital of the Abbasid Caliphate before the founding of Baghdad in 762. It remained a moderately prosperous town through the 10th century, but quickly declined thereafter. As a local administrative centre, it survived until the 14th century, but was later abandoned.
The Euphrates is the longest and one of the most historically important rivers of Western Asia. Together with the Tigris, it is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia. Originating in Turkey, the Euphrates flows through Syria and Iraq to join the Tigris in the Shatt al-Arab, which empties into the Persian Gulf.
The geography of Iraq is diverse and falls into five main regions: the desert, Upper Mesopotamia, the northern highlands of Iraq, Lower Mesopotamia, and the alluvial plain extending from around Tikrit to the Persian Gulf.
The Tigris is the eastern of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the mountains of the Armenian Highlands through the Syrian and Arabian Deserts, and empties into the Persian Gulf.
The geography of Mesopotamia, encompassing its ethnology and history, centered on the two great rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates. While the southern is flat and marshy, the near approach of the two rivers to one another, at a spot where the undulating plateau of the north sinks suddenly into the Babylonian alluvium, tends to separate them still more completely. In the earliest recorded times, the northern portion was included in Mesopotamia; it was marked off as Assyria after the rise of the Assyrian monarchy. Apart from Assur, the original capital of Assyria, the chief cities of the country, Nineveh, Kalaḫ and Arbela, were all on the east bank of the Tigris. The reason was its abundant supply of water, whereas the great plain on the western side had to depend on streams flowing into the Euphrates.
The Tigris–Euphrates river system is a large river system in Western Asia that discharges into the Persian Gulf. Its principal rivers are the Tigris and Euphrates, along with smaller tributaries.
Upper Mesopotamia constitutes the uplands and great outwash plain of northwestern Iraq, northeastern Syria and southeastern Turkey, in the northern Middle East. Since the early Muslim conquests of the mid-7th century, the region has been known by the traditional Arabic name of al-Jazira and the Syriac variant Gāzartā or Gozarto (ܓܙܪܬܐ). The Euphrates and Tigris rivers transform Mesopotamia into almost an island, as they are joined together at the Shatt al-Arab in the Basra Governorate of Iraq, and their sources in eastern Turkey are in close proximity.
Lake Milh, also known as Lake Razzaza, is an artificial lake located a few miles west of Karbala, Iraq. The lake is located in a depression into which excess water from Lake Habbaniyah, which comes from the Euphrates River, is diverted through a controlled escape channel or canal. The lake is listed as a wetland of international importance. The lake is rather shallow and the water level changes seasonally. Due to its salt content and changing water level, this largest freshwater lake in Iraq has lost its important stock of fish species and only a few recreational areas exist around the lake.
Iraq has a number of environmental issues.
Umm al Binni lake is a mostly dry lake within the Central Marshes in Maysan Governorate in southern Iraq. The 3.4 km (2.1 mi) wide lake is approximately 45 km (28 mi) northwest of the Tigris–Euphrates confluence. Because of its shape, location, and other details, it was first conjectured by Sharad Master, a geoarchaeologist, to represent an impact crater. However, these claims have been disputed, with other studies finding subsidence of the underlying rock a more plausible explanation.
The wildlife of Iraq includes its flora and fauna and their natural habitats. Iraq has multiple biomes from mountainous region in the north to the wet marshlands along the Euphrates river. The western part of the country is mainly desert and some semi-arid regions. As of 2001, seven of Iraq's mammal species and 12 of its bird species were endangered. The endangered species include the northern bald ibis and Persian fallow deer. The Syrian wild ass is extinct, and the Saudi Arabian dorcas gazelle was declared extinct in 2008.
The Mesopotamian Marshes, also known as the Iraqi Marshes, are a wetland area located in Southern Iraq and southwestern Iran as well as partially in northern Kuwait. The marshes are primarily located on the floodplains of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers bound by the cities of Basra, Nasiriyah, Amarah and a portion of southwestern Iran and northern Kuwait. Historically the marshlands, mainly composed of the separate but adjacent Central, Hawizeh and Hammar Marshes, used to be the largest wetland ecosystem of Western Eurasia. The unique wetland landscape is home to the Marsh people, who have developed a unique culture tightly coupled to the landscape – harvesting reeds and rice, fishing and herding water buffalo.
The Mesopotamian Marshes were drained in Iraq and to a smaller degree in Iran between the 1950s and 1990s to clear large areas of the marshes in the Tigris-Euphrates river system. The marshes formerly covered an area of around 20,000 km2 (7,700 sq mi). The main sub-marshes, the Hawizeh, Central, and Hammar marshes, were drained at different times for different reasons.
The Hawizeh Marshes are a complex of marshes that straddle the Iran–Iraq border. The marshes are fed by two branches of the Tigris River in Iraq and the Karkheh River in Iran. The Hawizeh marsh is critical to the survival of the Central and Hammar marshes also make up the Mesopotamian Marshes, because they are a refuge for species that may recolonize or reproduce in other marshlands. Hawizeh Marshes are drained by the Al-Kassarah. This river plays a critical role in maintaining the marshes as a flow-through system and preventing it from becoming a closed saline basin.
A fluvisol in the World Reference Base for Soil Resources (WRB) is a genetically young soil in alluvial deposits. Apart from river sediments, they also occur in lacustrine and marine deposits. Fluvisols correlate with fluvents and fluvaquents of the USDA soil taxonomy. The good natural fertility of most fluvisols and their attractive dwelling sites on river levees and higher parts in marine landscapes were recognized in prehistoric times.
The Bahmanshir channel is a secondary estuary of the Karun River that parallels the Shatt al-Arab/Arvand Rud waterway on the far side of the Abadan Island, Iran, for 70 miles before emptying into the Persian Gulf.
Water supply and sanitation in Iraq is characterized by poor water and service quality. Three decades of war, combined with limited environmental awareness, have destroyed Iraq's water resources management system. Thus, Iraq faces difficulties to realize the target of 91% of households using safe drinking water supply by 2015. Currently, 16% of households report daily problems with supply and 20% use an unsafe drinking water source. Furthermore, animal waste and septic tanks pollute the drinking water network.(11)
Sawad was the name used in early Islamic times for southern Iraq. It means "black land" or "arable land" and refers to the stark contrast between the alluvial plain of Mesopotamia and the Arabian Desert. Under the Umayyad and Abbasid Caliphates, it was an official political term for a province encompassing most of modern Iraq except for the Syrian Desert and Upper Mesopotamia in the north.
The Nahr Isa or Isa Canal was a navigable canal that linked the two great rivers of Mesopotamia, the Euphrates and the Tigris, during the Abbasid Caliphate. It was one of the main water sources and the main avenue of river-borne commerce for the Abbasid capital of Baghdad.