Tikrit
city in Saladin, Iraq
Tikrit (Arabic: تِكْرِيت, romanized: Tikrīt [ˈtɪkriːt]), historically romanized as Tekrit, is a city in Iraq, located 140 kilometers (87 mi) northwest of Baghdad and 220 kilometers (140 mi) southeast of Mosul on the Tigris River. It is the administrative center of the Saladin Governorate. In 2012, it had a population of approximately 160,000. Tikrit is widely regarded as the cultural capital of Iraqi Sunni Arabs, with control of the city carrying symbolic weight due to its former prestige.
The inner city is notable for also being a university town as it is frequented by students of the city's major university, the University of Tikrit which attracts talent from around Iraq.
Originally created as a fort during the Assyrian empire, Tikrit was the birthplace of Muslim military leader Saladin. Many Iraqi government officials during the Ba'athist period (1968–2003) were from Tikrit; former president Saddam Hussein was born in the village of Al-Awja, 13 km south of the city.
Following the 2003 invasion of Iraq by a United States-led coalition, Tikrit was one of the cities in Iraq's "Sunni Triangle" which were core to an anti-coalition insurgency by Sunni militants—notably, the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI). In 2014, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), ISI's successor, captured the city, and massacred 1,700 cadets of the Iraqi Armed Forces there. It was the second-deadliest terrorist attack in history.
“Tikrit” enters the record as city in Saladin, Iraq. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Tikrit, city and Saladin can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Tikrit” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Tikrit, city and Saladin provides the most credible route into that argument.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q165444. VIAF identifies the subject as 158463946. The Library of Congress control number is n2001058037. Authority coordinates are 34.600, 43.683. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2012, 1968, 2003 and 2014.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Tikrit” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.