The Neo-Babylonian Empire, also known as the Chaldean Empire, was a Mesopotamian empire which existed from 626 to 539 BC, with Babylon serving as its capital. Nabopolassar led Babylonia in a rebellion against the civil war-plagued Neo-Assyrian Empire and allied with the Medes to destroy the Assyrian army at Harran and to sack Nineveh in 612 BC, ending Assyrian rule. Under Nebuchadnezzar II (r. 605-562 BC), the Babylonians conquered Arabia and, in 587 BC, razed Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem and took the Jews into captivity. Babylonia continued to be a large and powerful empire until Cyrus the Great and his Persians invaded Babylon and deposed Nabonidus, leading to the rise of the Achaemenid Empire.
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Map of the Neo-Babylonian Empire