Tigris (/ˈtaɪɡrɪs/; Sumerian: 𒁇𒄘𒃼 Idigna or Idigina;
Akkadian: 𒁇𒄘𒃼 Idiqlat; Arabic: دجلة Dijlah [didʒlah];
Syriac: ܕܹܩܠܵܬ Deqlaṯ; Armenian: Տիգրիս Tigris;
Դգլաթ Dglatʿ; Hebrew: Ḥîddeqel חידקל, biblical
Hiddekel; Turkish: Dicle; Kurdish: Dîcle, Dîjla دیجلە) is
the eastern member of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia,
the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the
mountains of southeastern
Iraq and empties itself into
the Persian Gulf.
4 Management and water quality
5 Religion and mythology
6 See also
8 External links
Tigris is 1,750 km long, rising in the
Taurus Mountains of
Turkey about 25 km southeast of the city of
about 30 km from the headwaters of the Euphrates. The river then
flows for 400 km through Turkish territory before becoming the
Syria and Turkey. This stretch of 44 km is the
only part of the river that is located in Syria.
Close to its confluence with the Euphrates, the
Tigris splits into
several channels. First, the artificial
Shatt al-Hayy branches off, to
Euphrates near Nasiriyah. Second, the Shatt al-Muminah and
Majar al-Kabir branch off to feed the Central Marshes. Further
downstream, two other distributary channels branch off (the
Al-Musharrah and Al-Kahla), which feed the Hawizeh Marshes. The main
channel continues southwards and is joined by the Al-Kassarah, which
drains the Hawizeh Marshes. Finally, the
Tigris joins the Euphrates
near al-Qurnah to form the Shatt-al-Arab. According to Pliny and other
ancient historians, the
Euphrates originally had its outlet into the
sea separate from that of the Tigris.
Baghdad, the capital of Iraq, stands on the banks of the Tigris. The
port city of
Basra straddles the Shatt al-Arab. In ancient times, many
of the great cities of
Mesopotamia stood on or near the Tigris,
drawing water from it to irrigate the civilization of the Sumerians.
Notable Tigris-side cities included Nineveh, Ctesiphon, and Seleucia,
while the city of
Lagash was irrigated by the
Tigris via a canal dug
around 2900 B.C.
Tigris has long been an important transport route in a largely
desert country. Shallow-draft vessels can go as far as Baghdad, but
rafts are needed for transport upstream to Mosul.
Francis Rawdon Chesney
Francis Rawdon Chesney hauled two steamers overland through
Syria in 1836 to explore the possibility of an overland and river
route to India. One steamer, the Tigris, was wrecked in a storm which
sank and killed twenty. Chesney proved the river navigable to powered
craft. Later, the
Tigris Steam Navigation Company was
established in 1861 by the Lynch Brothers trading company. They had 2
steamers in service. By 1908 ten steamers were on the river. Tourists
boarded steam yachts to venture inland as this was the first age of
archaeological tourism, and the sites of Ur and
popular to European travellers.
In the First World War, during the British conquest of Ottoman
Mesopotamia, Indian and Thames
River paddlers were used to supply
General Townsend's Army. See
Siege of Kut
Siege of Kut and the Fall of Baghdad
Tigris Flotilla included vessels Clio, Espiegle,
Lawrence, Odin, armed tug Comet, armed launches Lewis Pelly, Miner,
Shaitan, Sumana, and stern wheelers Muzaffari/Mozaffir. These were
joined by Royal Navy Fly-class gunboats Butterfly, Cranefly,
Dragonfly, Mayfly, Sawfly, Snakefly, and Mantis, Moth, and Tarantula.
After the war, river trade declined in importance during the 20th
century as the Basra-Baghdad-
Mosul railway, an unfinished portion of
Baghdad Railway, was completed and roads took over much of the
Bedouin crossing the river
Tigris with plunder (c.1860)
Ancient Greek form
Tigris (Τίγρις) meaning "tiger", if
treated as Greek) was adapted from
Old Persian Tigrā, itself from
Elamite Tigra, itself from Sumerian Idigna.
The original Sumerian Idigna or Idigina was probably from *id (i)gina
"running water", which can be interpreted as "the swift river",
contrasted to its neighbour, the Euphrates, whose leisurely pace
caused it to deposit more silt and build up a higher bed than the
Tigris. The Sumerian form was borrowed into
Akkadian as Idiqlat, and
from there into the other
Semitic languages (cf. Hebrew Ḥîddeqel,
Another name for the
Tigris used in
Middle Persian was Arvand Rud,
literally "swift river". Today, however, Arvand Rud (New Persian:
اروند رود) refers to the confluence of the
Tigris rivers (known in
Arabic as the Shatt al-Arab). In Kurdish, it
is also known as Ava Mezin, "the Great Water".
The name of the
Tigris in languages that have been important in the
Outside of Mosul, Iraq
Name for Tigris
دجلة, Dijlah; حداقل, Ḥudaqil
Տիգրիս, Tigris, Դգլաթ, Dglatʿ
ἡ Τίγρης, -ητος, hē Tígrēs, -ētos;
ἡ, ὁ Τίγρις, -ιδος, hē, ho Tígris, -idos
חידקל , Ḥîddeqel biblical Hiddekel
Dîcle, Dîjla دیجلە
Old Persian: 𐎫𐎡𐎥𐎼𐎠 Tigrā; Middle Persian: Tigr; Modern
Management and water quality
Tigris is heavily dammed in
Turkey to provide water for
irrigating the arid and semi-desert regions bordering the river
valley. Damming has also been important for averting floods in Iraq,
to which the
Tigris has historically been notoriously prone following
April melting of snow in the Turkish mountains.
Recent Turkish damming of the river has been the subject of some
controversy, for both its environmental effects within
Turkey and its
potential to reduce the flow of water downstream.
Mosul Dam is the
largest dam in Iraq.
Water from both rivers is used as a means of pressure during
In 2014 a major breakthrough in developing consensus between multiple
stakeholder representatives of
Turkey on a Plan of Action for
promoting exchange and calibration of data and standards pertaining to
Tigris river flows was achieved. The consensus which is referred to as
Geneva Consensus On
Tigris River" was reached at a meeting
Geneva by the think tank Strategic Foresight Group.
In February 2016, the United States Embassy in
Iraq as well as the
Prime Minister of
Haider al-Abadi issued warnings that
could collapse. The United States warned people to evacuate the
floodplain of the
Tigris because between 500,000 and 1.5 million
people were at risk of drowning due to flash flood if the dam
collapses, and that the major Iraqi cities of Mosul, Tikrit, Samarra,
Baghdad were at risk.
Religion and mythology
In Sumerian mythology, the
Tigris was created by the god Enki, who
filled the river with flowing water.
In Hittite and
Hurrian mythology, Aranzah (or Aranzahas in the Hittite
nominative form) is the
Hurrian name of the
Tigris River, which was
divinized. He was the son of
Kumarbi and the brother of
Tašmišu, one of the three gods spat out of Kumarbi's mouth onto
Mount Kanzuras. Later he colluded with
Anu and the
Teshub to destroy
Tigris appears twice in the Old Testament. First, in the Book of
Genesis, it is the third of the four rivers branching off the river
issuing out of the Garden of Eden. The second mention is in the
Book of Daniel, wherein the prophet states he received one of his
visions "when I was by that great river the Tigris".
River is also mentioned in Islam. The tomb of Imam Ahmad
Bin Hanbal and
Syed Abdul Razzaq Jilani is in
Baghdad and the flow of
Tigris restricts the number of visitors.
Coat of arms of the Kingdom of
Iraq 1932-1959 depicting the two
rivers, the confluence
Shatt al-Arab and the date palm forest, which
used to be the largest in the world
The river featured on the coat of arms of
Iraq from 1932-1959.
Cradle of civilization
Ilisu Dam Campaign campaign against a planned dam on
Tigris in Turkey
List of places in Iraq
Wildlife of Iraq
^ a b Isaev, V.A.; Mikhailova, M.V. (2009). "The hydrology, evolution,
and hydrological regime of the mouth area of the
Shatt al-Arab River".
Water Resources. 36 (4): 380–395.
^ Kolars, J.F.; Mitchell, W.A. (1991). The
River and the
Southeast Anatolia Development Project. Carbondale: Southern Illinois
University Press. pp. 6–8. ISBN 0-8093-1572-6.
^ Pliny: Natural History, VI, XXVI, 128-131
^ "Mesopotamia, Tigris-Euphrates, 1914-1917, despatches, killed and
died, medals". naval-history.net. Retrieved 28 November 2015.
^ F. Delitzsch, Sumerisches Glossar, Leipzig (1914), IV, 6, 21.
^ a b Genesis 2:14
^ E. Laroche, Glossaire de la langue Hourrite, Paris (1980), p. 55.
^ Vidal, John. "Water supply key to outcome of conflicts in
Syria, experts warn" The Guardian, 2 July 2014.
^ "Analysis & Water Agenda". ORSAM. Retrieved 2015-11-28.
^ Borger, Julian (29 February 2016). "Iraqi PM and US issue warnings
over threat of
Mosul dam collapse". The Guardian. The Guardian.
Retrieved 29 February 2016.
^ "US warns of
Mosul dam collapse in northern Iraq".
BBC News. BBC.
BBC. 29 February 2016. Retrieved 29 February 2016.
^ Jeremy A. Black, The Literature of Ancient Sumer, Oxford University
Press 2004, ISBN 0-19-926311-6 p. 220-221
^ Daniel 10:4
Wikisource has the text of the
Encyclopaedia Britannica (9th ed.)
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tigris.
Hausleiter, A., M. Roaf, St J. Simpson, R. Wenke, P. Flensted Jensen,
R. Talbert, T. Elliott, S. Gillies. "Places: 912964 (Tigris/Diglitus
fl.)". Pleiades. Retrieved March 9, 2012. CS1 maint: Multiple
names: authors list (link)
Bibliography on Water Resources and International Law Peace Palace
Outline of WWI Battles involving the
Turkey (523 km)
Syria (40 km)
Iraq (1,377 km)
Pre- / Protohistory
Pre-Pottery Neolithic A
Pre-Pottery Neolithic A (PPNA)
Pre-Pottery Neolithic B
Pre-Pottery Neolithic B (PPNB)
Timeline of the Assyrian Empire
Culture / Society
Destruction by ISIL
Muslim conquest of Persia
Ottoman Iraq (Mamluk dynasty)
Kingdom of Iraq
Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party –
Iraq Region (National Command)
Invasion of Kuwait
U.S. troop withdrawal
Civil War (2014–present)
Council of Representatives (legislative)
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in pre-Saddam Iraq
in Saddam Hussein's Iraq
in post-invasion Iraq
in ISIL-controlled territory
Freedom of religion
Wars and conflicts
Iraqi Turkmen dialect
Turkey by drainage basin
Coordinates: 38°26′0″N 39°46′22″E / 38.43333°N
39.77278°E / 38.43333; 39.77278