Secrets of Nineveh and Babylon
Nineveh and Babylon were two superpowers of the ancient world but for the writers of the Bible they were the cities of sin. Why do they have such poor reputations in the Old Testament and what were these cities really like?
Our cameras have rare access to discoveries at Nineveh, in modern Mosul, the setting for the story of Jonah and the whale. Here archaeologists are rebuilding the city’s mighty gates and piecing together lost wonders destroyed by Islamic State. At Babylon, we follow specialists restoring the Ishtar Gate, built by Nebuchadnezzar II, one of the most notorious tyrants of the Old Testament. The rivalry between Nineveh and Babylon determined the fate of the ancient world – could their conquests also lie behind their terrible reputations in the Bible?