Khorsabad [key], village, NE Iraq, near the Tigris River and 12 mi (20 km) NE of Mosul. It is built on the site of Dur Sharrukin, an Assyrian city (founded 8th cent. b.c. by Sargon), which covered 1 sq mi (2.6 sq km). Its mounds were excavated by P. E. Botta in 1842 and in 1851, and statues of Sargon and of huge, winged bulls that guarded the gates of the royal palace were taken to the Louvre. In 1932 there were discovered hundreds of cuneiform tablets in the Elamite language and a list of kings ruling from c.2200 b.c. to 730 b.c. Excavated ruins there were looted and razed in 2015 by the Islamist extremist group Islamic State.
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