Pumbedita פומבדיתא
The Babylonian academy famed for sharpness: «they can pass an elephant through the eye of a needle».
Pumbedita on the Euphrates was founded by Rav Yehuda bar Yechezkel around 4020, after Nehardea's destruction, and for nearly eight centuries remained one of the two poles of Jewish learning. Its style was dialectical sharpness; the Talmud jokes that its sages «pass an elephant through the eye of a needle», while also warning about their cleverness.
Here Abaye and Rava headed the academy, and their disputes became the model of talmudic reasoning; they are argued on nearly every page, and the law almost always follows Rava.
After the Talmud was sealed, Pumbedita and Sura led the geonic age: questions came from Spain, North Africa and Italy, and responsa went back, holding halacha to a single standard. The academy functioned until the eleventh century.