Romans in the East: the upper Tigris River region (SE Turkey) and the Roman Eastern frontier

The article focuses on the ancient topography of the upper Tigris river valley, the area located in southeastern Turkey between the modern town of Bismil and the Cizre-Silopi plain, in the first half of the 1st millennium CE, when it was a contested borderland between Roman and Eastern Empires. The upper Tigris river region lies at a crucial intersection between Anatolia and Mesopotamia. Located between the Caucasus, the Syrian-Iraqi border, southeastern Anatolia and western Iran, the region was affected by the relations between many north-south focused and east-west focused political forces throughout millennia. Due to its position, at the end of the 1st millennium BCE the region was highly influenced by the pervasive interests of Rome in expanding toward the East: therefore the upper Tigris became the stage of combat between Romans and Parthians until the 2nd century CE, when the Arsacids where replaced by the more aggressive Sasanians. Therefore, throughout the first half of the 1st millennium CE the landscape in the upper Tigris river valley was highly influenced by its nature as borderland, as it is suggested by historical sources and archaeological data.