Iraq is battling its worst drought in decades. Lack of rainfall and poor resource management has left communities that depend on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers devoid of the water they need to survive. So authorities drained part of the Mosul Dam reservoirin the country’s Kurdistan region this January to keep crops from drying out.
Archaeologists got brief access…
The Akitu Festival began with the Sumerians. The word Akitu means “barley” in Akkadian.
The Sumerian calendar had two festivals one in the Autumn beginning in the month of Tashritu in celebration of the “sowing of barley,” the other in Spring, beginning in the month of Nisannu celebrating the “cutting of barley.”…