[3] The size of the kingdom varied over time; initially encompassing an area between the Zab Rivers, it eventually gained control of Nineveh and starting at least with the rule of Monobazos I (late 1st-century BCE), Gordyene became an Adiabenian dependency.

[9] However, coinage implies the establishment of a kingdom in Adiabene around 164 BCE, following the disintegration of Greek Seleucid rule in the Near East.

[13] Queen Helena of Adiabene (known in Jewish sources as Heleni HaMalka, meaning Helene the Queen) moved to Jerusalem, where she built palaces for herself and her sons, Izates bar Monobaz and Monobaz II at the northern part of the city of David, south of the Temple Mount, and aided the Jews in their war with Rome.

27, Ararat, Minni, and Ashkenaz are paraphrased by Kordu, Harmini, and Hadayab, i.e., Corduene, Armenia, and Adiabene; while in Ezekiel xxvii.

[31] It has been suggested that the royal house of Adiabene, after fleeing Trajan's invasion, established the later Amatuni dynasty which ruled the area between the lakes Urmia and Van.

[32][33] Adiabene was a district in Mesopotamia between upper and lower Zab and was a part of the Neo-Assyrian Empire and inhabited by Assyrians even after the fall of Nineveh.

[38] The Ten Thousand, an army of Greek mercenaries, retreated through Adiabene on their march to the Black Sea after the Battle of Cunaxa.

[39] Queen Helena of Adiabene (known in Jewish sources as Heleni HaMalka) moved to Jerusalem where she built palaces for herself and her sons, Izates bar Monobaz and Monobaz II at the northern part of the city of David, south of the Temple Mount, and aided Jews in their war with Rome.

A pair of inscriptions on the sarcophagus, "tzaddan malka" and "tzadda malkata," is believed to be a reference to the provisions (tzeda in Hebrew) that Helena supplied to Jerusalem's poor and to the Jewish kingdom in general.

Another tradition has it that she met a Jewish jewelry merchant in Adiabene by the name of Hananiah (Ananias) or Eliezer, who told her about the people of Israel and persuaded her to join them.

[40] All historic traces of Jewish royalty in Adiabene ended around 115 CE, but these stories made huge impact on rabbinic literature and Talmud.

[42] The little kingdom may have had a series of native rulers nominally vassal to the Macedonian, Seleucid and later Armenian (under Tigranes the Great) empires.

According to Dio Cassius, Caracalla took Arbela in the year 216, and searched all the graves there, wishing to ascertain whether the Arsacid kings were buried there.

Due to this, and religious differences, Adiabene was never regarded as an integral part of Iran, even though the Sasanians controlled it for several centuries.