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The name under which Edessa figures in cuneiform inscriptions is unknown; the native name was Osroe, after its purported founder (who was probably only legend), this being the Armenian form for Chosroes; it became in Syriac Ourhoļ, in Armenian Ourhaļ in Arabic Er Roha, commonly Orfa or Sanli Urfa, its present name. Due to similarity of names, folk mythology in Islam connects Edessa with Ur as the abode of Abraham. Seleucus I Nicator, when he refounded the town as a military colony, 303 BC, called it Edessa, in memory of the ancient capital of Macedon of similar name (now Vodena). Under Antiochus IV Epiphanes the town was called Antiochia on Callirhoe by colonists from Antioch who had settled there.
On the foundation of the Kingdom of Osroene, Edessa became the capital under the Abgar dynasty. This kingdom was established by Nabataean or ArabThere are three factors which may assist to varying degrees in determining whether someone is considered Arab or not: Political: whether they live in a country which is a member of the Arab League (or, more vaguely, the Arab World); this definition coversic tribes from North ArabiaArabia is a peninsula in Southwest Asia at the junction of Africa and Asia. It lies north of Ethiopia and northern Somalia; south of Israel, the disputed Palestinian territories, and Jordan; and southwest of Iran. The coastal limits of Arabia comprise: on, and lasted nearly four centuries (c. 132 BCCenturies: 3rd century BC 2nd century BC 1st century BC Decades: 180s BC 170s BC 160s BC 150s BC 140s BC 130s BC 120s BC 110s BC 100s BC 90s BC 80s BC Years: 137 BC 136 BC 135 BC 134 BC 133 BC 132 BC 131 BC 130 BC 129 BC 128 BC 127 BC Events The First Ser to 214Events The kingdom of Osroene becomes a province of the Roman Empire. The Korean kingdom of Baekje attacks the Mohe tribes. Births Aurelian, Roman emperor Claudius II, Roman emperor Diophantus, Greek mathematician (possible date) Deaths King Chogo of Baek), under twenty-eight kings. It was at first more or less under the protectorate of the ParthiaTrajan's Column The Parthian Empire was the dominating force on the Iranian plateau beginning in the late 3rd century BCE, and intermittently controlled Mesopotamia between ca 190 BCE and 224 CE. Origins The Parthians were an illiterate nomadic people, thns, then from the time of PompeyThis article refers to the Roman General. However, Pompey is also the nickname of the city of Portsmouth in Hampshire, England, and also of its principal football club, Portsmouth F. Pompey is not to be confused with the Roman city of Pompeii. Gnaeus Pomp under the Romans60 and 400 with major cities. During this time only Dacia and Mesopotamia were added to the Empire but were lost before 300. The Roman Empire is the term conventionally used to describe the Roman state in the centuries following its reorganization under t. Following its capture and sack by TrajanMarcus Ulpius Nerva Traianus ( September 18, 53 August 9, 117), Roman Emperor ( 98 117), commonly called Trajan was the second of the so-called " five good emperors" of the Roman Empire. Under his rule, the empire reached its greatest territorial extent., the Romans even occupied Edessa from 116 to 118, although its sympathies towards the Parthians led to Lucius Verus pillaging the city later in the second century. From 212 to 214 the kingdom was a Roman province. The literary language of the tribes which had founded this kingdom, was Aramaic, whence came the Syriac.
Rebuilt by Emperor Justin, and called after him Justinopolis ( Evagrius, Hist. Eccl., IV, viii), Edessa was taken in 609 by the Persians, soon retaken by Heraclius, but lost to the Arabs in 638. The Byzantines often tried to retake Edessa, especially under Romanus Lacapenus, who obtained from the inhabitants the " Holy Mandylion", or ancient portrait of Christ, and solemnly transferred it to Constantinople, August 16, 944. This was the final great achievement of Romanus' reign. For an account of this venerable and famous image, which was certainly at Edessa in 544, and of which there is an ancient copy in the Vatican Library, brought to the West by the Venetians in 1207, see Weisliebersdorf, Christus und Apostelbilder (Freiburg, 1902), and Dobschütz, Christusbilder (Leipzig, 1899).
In 1031 Edessa was given up to the Byzantines by its Arab governor. It was retaken by the Arabs, and then successivelly held by the Greeks, the Seljuk Turks ( 1087), the Crusaders ( 1099), who established there the County of Edessa and kept the city until 1144, when it was again captured by the Turk Zengui, and most of its inhabitants were slaughtered together with the Latin archbishop. These events are known to us chiefly through the Armenian historian Matthew, who had been born at Edessa. Since the twelfth century, the city has successively belonged to the Sultans of Aleppo, the Mongols, the Mameluks, and from 1517 to 1918 to the Ottoman Empire.