Imagine a library written in a language only a handful of people on earth can read or understand… then read and understand it!

Selena Wisnom, one of very few cuneiform scholars, has brought the language to life. When a team of Victorian archaeologists chanced upon one of the oldest and greatest stores of knowledge ever seen, they opened up the spectacular story of the ancient world and the king who ruled that vast swathe of the Middle East, Mesopotamia. Even after his death the Assyrian king’s influence lived on: vengeful rivals attempting to burn descriptions of his achievements, only succeeded in baking the stories more firmly on to the clay tablets.

Wisnom now shares these engaging tales, revealing the everyday lives of the Mesopotamians and how their influence still affects us. Home to advanced mathematics, astronomy, banking, law and literature Mesopotamia also brought us aqueducts, medical diagnosis, even the 60-minute hour.

‘Mesopotamia, not Greece and Rome, was the real birthplace of ‘Western’ knowledge as we understand it today’