In 1258, the city of Baghdād fell to the Mongol ruler Hūlāgū Khān and his army. The Mongols, an ethnic group from Central Asia, looted and destroyed the city’s mosques, palaces, and centres of learning.

The ancient city of Persepolis, located in the province of Fārs, south-western Iran is among the most iconic sites of the ancient world and was the ceremonial capital of the Persian Empire, then ruled under the Achaemenid dynasty.

Under the Ottomans (c. 1515–1922), most Assyrians lived as subjects and their millennia-old cultural identity was heavily fragmented as a result of the empire’s millet system— from Arabic meaning “nation”.