The Tigris is the river that flows through Baghdad and forms one of the two major rivers of Mesopotamia. The other is the Euphrates, and together they shaped the region’s agriculture, cities, and early states.
The Tigris rises in eastern Turkey and flows southeast through Turkey and Iraq before joining the Euphrates near Al-Qurnah. Their combined waters form the Shatt al-Arab, which reaches the Persian Gulf.
Baghdad stands on the Tigris, and the river has been central to the city’s history since its foundation in the Abbasid period. The river also passes near or through sites associated with ancient Assyrian and Babylonian civilizations.
The name Mesopotamia comes from Greek words meaning “between rivers.” Although the region is often described as fertile, irrigation, salinity, floods, droughts, and changing river courses have all affected settlement over thousands of years.