Abstract
The writing of history is by definition conditioned by the sources available. The history of Upper Mesopotamia is no exception to this rule. The various political groupings that developed there are documented by sources whose nature varies considerably over time. While the Paleo-Babylonian period produced mainly local administrative and epistolary documents with broad geographical horizons, the Middle Ages produced mostly local sources. The recent period, for its part, provides few archival documents, but a few royal inscriptions with abundant commentary, notably concerning the "province of Nergal-êreš", a famous governor of the IXth century BC. By assessing the impact of the type of sources available on the writing of history, and on our understanding of the powers that produced them, we propose a diachronic analysis of the organization of power in these regions, in order to grasp the continuities and discontinuities.
