Download Mesopotamia

MESOPOTAMIA
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What culture gave this region between the
Tigris and Euphrates Rivers the name
Mesopotamia?
Code of Hammurabi
“An eye for an eye and a tooth for
a tooth”
The Fertile
Crescent
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Modern day Iraq
Meso (Greek) = middle
Potamos (Greek) = river
“The land between the rivers”
Civilization
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What is Civilization?
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Society with a developed knowledge of
farming, trade, government, art and science.
“Cradle of Civilization”
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First known civilization in human history
5,000 B.C.E. - Earliest evidence of civilization
Ancient
Sumer
•Earliest known
civilization.
•Southern
Mesopotamia
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Each Sumerian city was considered a state in
itself with its own god and government
The Sumerians were the first city builders in
Mesopotamia
Levees
Sumerians
where the first people to
attempt to control their natural
environment: Levees and Irrigation
–Wet Season
–Control flood
waters
–Dry Season
–Irrigate crops
Vocabulary
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City-State: A city and surrounding
territory which also has it’s own
independent government
Ziggurat: A Sumerian temple which
means “mountain of god.” They served
as the city center.
Ziggurat:
Modern Iraq
Recent Events in Ur (Iraq)
Religious and Family Life
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Ziggurats served
as the center of
Sumerian cities
around them
were courts
The Sumerians believed
that the forces of nature
such as wind, rain and
flood were gods: There
were over 3,000
Sumerian Gods
Sumerians believed that
the gods created
humans from the mud
of rivers to do their
work
Sumerian
Priests
They were very
powerful
 All of a Sumerian
city-state’s land
was controlled
and administered
by the city’s
priests
 Also, priests
controlled the
schools

Tablet Schools
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Only the sons of the rich could attend school:
students sat on stone benches and wrote with
sharp edged reeds on clay tablets. Only the
sons of the rich could attend school: students
sat on stone benches and wrote with sharp
edged reeds on clay tablets
Schools were referred to as tablet houses
because students learned how to write
Sumerian writing was called: Cuneiform: it
was made of hundreds of markings shaped like
wedges
Cuneiform
Writing
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Writing developed as a result of the development of
business
Initially, Sumerians used pictures to represent objects.
Then they used pictures to represent ideas. Finally the
used pictures to represent syllables.
When a student graduated from school he became a
scribe: or a writer.
Scribes worked for the Temple, the palace, the
government or the army.
Some scribes set up their own businesses
Priests and Kings
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At first Sumerian Priests were the Kings of city-states
Priest-Kings received advice from an assembly made of
free men
When war broke out with another city-state the
assembly would select one of its members to serve as
military leader until the war was over.
As time went on these leaders stayed in charge even
after the war was over: 3000 B.C. the took the place of
priests as permanent kings
At the same time kingship became hereditary: or
passed from parent to child.
Priest-Kings to Kings
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Free men took power from the priests
during times of war
After the war was over, the newly
appointed kings remained in power
Their power passed through a hereditary
system
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Parent to child