[CP]
Semi-nomadic communities who moved into southern Mesopotamia in the early 1st millennium bc from the west, settling down as sedentary groups although still organized as tribal descent groups. Strongly associated with Ur, Iraq and the biblical stories of Abraham, the Chaldeans contributed to political and economic upheavals in Assyria and Babylonia when they first settled the area, but in the 8th century bc they strongly resisted the Assyrian occupation of Babylonia. The rulers of the neo-Babylonian empire in the mid 1st century bc are sometimes referred to as being of the Chaldean Dynasty, but there is no evidence that they were Chaldeans.
