In the years following Sargon of Akkad's conquests of the ancient cities of Sumer in the 24th century BC,

Acadians ruled supreme for close to 200 years. It was only then, after the now prosperous and complacent Acadians were racked by a long series of droughts and famines,

but a vast and terrifying new wave of outsiders began to flood into the empire.

The Samarians called them scorpions in the form of men. We know them as Gutians, and they

were about to destroy the Acadian Empire for good, leveling their capital so completely

that it was never occupied again, remaining lost to this day.

From the mountains beyond the borders of the civilized world they came, and unlike the

Acadians, who had at least been a part of Sumerian society during the time of Sargon's

conquests, the Gutians were

illiterate outsiders, uninterested in the trappings of the civilized world, beside riches

and power. After descending from their homeland in the Zagros Mountains, they swiftly

conquered the cities of the plains, forcing the city dwellers to accept their rule.

For more than a century to come, the Goutians ruled as barbarian warlords, firmly keeping

their boots over the necks of their Samarian and Acadian subjects.

The Goutian occupation created little in terms of culture, and caused huge damage from an

environmental perspective.

The already fragile, heavily salinated Mesopotamian landscape,

weathered from thousands of years of intense farming in an already marginal environment,

dried up completely in many areas due to lack of upkeep and population displacement.

As the years went by, this lack of care led to massive droughts and societal chaos,

and eventually the downfall of the Gutians.

It was then, during the midst of this dark and tragic time,

...