Editing Ur (section)

==== Ur III period====
{{Main|Third Dynasty of Ur}}
[[File:World in 2000 BC.svg|thumb|270px|Map of the world around 2000 BC showing the Third Dynasty of Ur]]
After a short period of chaos following the fall of the Akkadian Empire the third Ur dynasty was established when the king [[Ur-Nammu]] came to power, ruling between c. 2047&nbsp;BC and 2030&nbsp;BC. During his rule, temples, including the [[Ziggurat of Ur]], were built, and agriculture was improved through [[irrigation]]. His code of laws, the ''[[Code of Ur-Nammu]]'' (a fragment was identified in [[Istanbul]] in 1952) is one of the oldest such documents known, preceding the [[Code of Hammurabi]] by 300&nbsp;years. He and his successor [[Shulgi]] were both deified during their reigns, and after his death he continued as a hero-figure: one of the surviving works of Sumerian literature describes the death of Ur-Nammu and his journey to the underworld.<ref>[[Amélie Kuhrt]] (1995). ''The Ancient Near East: C.3000-330&nbsp;B.C.'' Routledge. {{ISBN|0-415-16762-0}}.</ref>

Ur-Nammu was succeeded by [[Shulgi]], the greatest king of the Third Dynasty of Ur, who solidified the hegemony of Ur and reformed the empire into a highly centralized bureaucratic state. Shulgi ruled for a long time (at least 42&nbsp;years) and deified himself halfway through his rule.<ref name=DTPotts132>{{cite book|last1=Potts|first1=D. T.|author-link=Daniel T. Potts|title=The Archaeology of Elam|date=1999|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge, United Kingdom|isbn=0-521-56496-4|page=132|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mc4cfzkRVj4C&pg=PA132|access-date=16 May 2015}}</ref>

[[File:Ziggurat of UrInbound1427286134917083377.jpg|thumb|[[Ziggurat of Ur]]]]
The Ur empire continued through the reigns of three more kings with [[Akkadian language|Akkadian]] names, [[Amar-Sin]], [[Shu-Sin]], and [[Ibbi-Sin]]. It fell around 1940&nbsp;BC to the [[Elam]]ites in the 24th [[regnal year]] of Ibbi-Sin, an event commemorated by the [[Lament for Ur]].<ref>Ur III Period (2112–2004&nbsp;BC) by Douglas Frayne, University of Toronto Press, 1997, {{ISBN|0-8020-4198-1}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |url=http://cdli.ucla.edu/staff/dahl/dissertation.pdf |title=The ruling family of Ur III Umma. A Prosopographical Analysis of an Elite Family in Southern Iraq 4000 Years ago |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060512183750/http://cdli.ucla.edu/staff/dahl/dissertation.pdf |archive-date=2006-05-12 |first=Jacob Lebovitch |last=Dahl |publisher=UCLA dissertation |year=2003}}</ref>

According to one estimate, Ur was the largest city in the world from c. 2030 to 1980&nbsp;BC. Its population was approximately 65,000 (or 0.1 per cent share of global population then).{{citation needed|date=March 2023}}