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About Ctesiphon


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Ctesiphon the imperial capital of the Arsacid Parthians, and of the Sassanid Persians, was one of the great cities of ancient Mesopotamia.

The ruins of the city are located on the east bank of the Tigris, across the river from the Hellenistic city of Seleucia. Today, the remains of the city lies in Baghdad Governorate, Iraq, approximately 35 km south of the city of Baghdad.

The Latin name Ctesiphon or Ctesifon derives from Greek Kt?siph?n, a Hellenized form of a local name that has been reconstructed as Tosf?n or Tosb?n. In Iranian sources of the Sassanid period it is attested in Manichean Parthian, in Sassanid Middle Persian and in Christian Sogdian as Pahlavi tyspwn, continuing in New Persian as Tisfun. Syriac sources mention it as Q??sf?n, and in medieval Arabic texts the name is usually ?aysaf?n or Qa?aysf?n, in Modern Arabic al-Mada'in. "According to Y?q?t, quoting ?amza, the original form was ??sf?n or T?sf?n, which was arabicized as ?aysaf?n." The Armenian name of the city was Tizbon. Ctesiphon is first mentioned in the Book of Ezra of the Old Testament as Kasfia/Casphia (a derivative of the ethnic name, Cas, and a cognate of Caspian and Qazvin).

Location

The Taq-i Kisra, as drawn 1824 by Captain Hart
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Ctesiphon is located approximately at Al-Mada'in, 20 miles (32 km) southeast of the modern city of Baghdad, Iraq, along the river Tigris. Ctesiphon measured 30 square kilometers (cf. the 13.7 square kilometers of 4th century imperial Rome). The only visible remains are the great arch Taq-i Kisra or Tagh-e Kasra (the literal meaning: arch of Khosrau) located in what is now the Iraqi town of Salman Pak
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