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Iraq Journey
العربية
The rebuilt al-Hadba minaret of the Al-Nuri mosque rising over an old-city street in Mosul, visitors on the wet cobbles below.
North IraqSpirit of Resilience

Mosul

A city putting its old town back together stone by stone, on a river bank that has been the crossing point of the north since Nineveh.

Plan your visitSee the heritage
Rebuilding

Stone by Stone, House by House

Mosul's old city took the worst of the fighting in 2017. What is happening now on the western bank is slower and far quieter than the destruction was: masons re-cutting Mosul marble to the original profiles, families moving back into houses rebuilt around their own courtyards, and Al-Nuri and its minaret going up again from measured drawings.

This is not a museum restoration. The alleys are lived in while the work goes on, and the murals on the standing walls were painted by the people who live behind them. Come with a local guide, ask before photographing, and buy your lunch in the market you walk through.

See the heritage
A vaulted alley in Mosul's old city, damaged stone walls on either side and a painted mural of a girl holding a teddy bear above the arch.

Beyond the old city

Mosul sits in the middle of the Assyrian heartland. Three of its neighbours are worth the drive.

The Temple of Maren at Hatra seen from the corner, its colonnade, carved cornice and pedimented central arch standing to full height under a pale desert sky.
Heritage

Hatra

Two hours south, a Parthian caravan city whose temples still stand at full height — columns, carved cornices, pediments and all.

The Assyrian gallery of the Iraq Museum in Baghdad, winged lamassu bulls and carved stone reliefs flanking the hall as visitors look down it.
Archaeology

The Assyrian capitals

Nineveh is the mound directly across the river, Khorsabad fifteen kilometres north-east. Their gate guardians and Ashurbanipal's tablet library now live in Baghdad.

The Citadel of Erbil from the air — the walled oval of the old city on its tell, with the streets of modern Erbil radiating out around it.
Nearby

East to Erbil

Ninety minutes east the plain runs into the Kurdistan Region, and into a citadel that has been lived on for eight thousand years.

Keep going

One country, seven thousand years

No single city tells the whole story. Follow the thread onward — through the gallery of destinations, or straight into planning the trip.

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