CTESIPHON, an ancient city in the south of Assyria, situated on the left bank of the Tigris, about twenty-five miles south-east of Baghdad. It is reported by Ammianus to have been founded by a Parthian, Varanes by name, of whose history nothing is known; it rose into importance when the city of Seleucia on the opposite bank began to decline.: and under the Parthian kings, who originally selected it as a winter residence, it ultimately acquired the rank of the sole capital of their dominions. On the fall of the Parthian empire it naturally declined; but on the establishment of the Persian dynasty of the Sassanids it recovered somewhat of its prosperity, and was occasionally chosen as the residence of royalty on account of the pleasure-grounds and hunting-parks in the vicinity. At the time when it fell into the hands of the Roman emperor Severus (232 a.d.) its population must have been very great, as it furnished no fewer than 100,000 prisoners of war. About 263 it was besieged by Odenathus, king of Palmyra; and in the minority of Sapor II. it was taken by storm by a Mesopotamian chieftain named Thair. Though the emperor Julian gained the day in a great battle before the city, and its capture seems to have been one of the chief objects of his manoeuvres, he retired without attempting an investment. ¢ In 637 it was abandoned by Yezdejird, the last of the Sassanids, and seized by Sa’ad, the Arabian general, who found within its walls so extensive and costly a booty that, after the works of art and a fifth of the whole were set apart for the caliph, he was able to bestow 12,000 dirhems, or upwards of £300, on each of his 60,000 soldiers. After this date the destruction of the city seems to have been rapidly accomplished; and in the present day the site is marked by ...