The metropolitan area has grown to encompass substantial areas on both the "Left Bank" east side and the "Right Bank" west side , as the two banks are described by the locals compared to the flow direction of Tigris. At the start of the 21st century, Mosul and its surroundings had an ethnically and religiously diverse population; the majority of Mosul's population were Arabs , with Assyrians , [5] [6] [7] Armenians , Turkmens , Kurds , Yazidis , Shabakis , Mandaeans , Kawliya , Circassians in addition to other, smaller ethnic minorities.
In religious terms, mainstream Sunni Islam was the largest religion, but with a significant number of followers of the Salafi movement and Christianity the latter followed by the Assyrians and Armenians , as well as Shia Islam , Sufism , Yazidism, Shabakism , Yarsanism and Mandaeism. Mosul's population grew rapidly around the turn of the millennium and by , the city's population was estimated to be 1,, Historically, important products of the area include Mosul marble and oil.
The city of Mosul is home to the University of Mosul and its renowned Medical College, which together was one of the largest educational and research centers in Iraq and the Middle East. Mosul, together with the nearby Nineveh plains , is one of the historic centers for the Assyrian people [10] [11] and their churches; the Chaldean Catholic Church , the Syriac Orthodox Church , and the Assyrian Church of the East , containing the tombs of several Old Testament prophets such as Jonah , some of which were destroyed by ISIL in July The name of the city is first mentioned by Xenophon in his expeditionary logs in Achaemenid Assyria of BC, during the reign of the Persian Achaemenid Empire.
Be that as it may, the name Mepsila is doubtless the root for the modern name. In its current Arabic form and spelling, the term Mosul, or rather "Mawsil", stands for the "linking point" — or loosely, the "Junction City," in Arabic. Mosul should not be confused with the ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh , which is located across the Tigris from the Old City of Mosul, on the eastern bank, at the famed archaeological mound of Kuyunjik Turkoman for "sheep's hill".
This area is known today as the town of Nebi Yunus "prophet Jonah " and is now populated largely by Kurds. It is the only fully Kurdish neighborhood in Mosul. The site contains the tomb of the Biblical Jonah, as he lived and died in the then capital of ancient Assyria. Today, this entire area has been absorbed into the Mosul metropolitan area. The indigenous Assyrians still refer to the entire city of Mosul as Nineveh or rather, Ninweh. The Assyrians largely abandoned the city, building new smaller settlements such as Mepsila nearby.
