Download Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia
Vocabulary
• Mesopotamia – The land between the Tigris and
Euphrates Rivers, Located in present day Iraq
• Levees – Raised areas of land around a river, used
for flood control
• Canals – Man made ditches that were filled with
water, used for irrigation or transportation
• Irrigation – Man made system for watering crops
Vocabulary
• City-State – cities and the area surrounding them, often
have their own government
• Artisans – Skilled workers
• Ziggurat – Sumerian Temple, “Mountain of God”,
Square shaped step-like pyramid
• Cuneiform – Sumerian Writing, produced by pressing
sharp reeds into clay
• Scribe – A professional writer
Vocabulary
• Priest-King – A person who serves a group of
people as their government and religious leader
• Hereditary – passed down from parent to child
I. Intro to Mesopotamia
• Sumer was the first area to be settled in
Mesopotamia, around 3500 BC
• Sumerians were short, black haired people
• First known civilization
I. Intro to Mesopotamia
• Sumerians were the first to control their physical
environment
– Extended the natural levees left behind after flooding
of the rivers to protect from future flooding
– They also created a canal system by digging holes in
the levees and allowing them to drain into large
ditches, this allowed them to water crops during the
dry season
I. Intro to Mesopotamia
• The primary crop of the Sumerians was barley, but
they also grew wheat, flax, palm, and other fruits
and vegetables
• Canal work lead to cooperation among the
Sumerians, they learned to work together
• Governments were set up so that the Sumerians
had a set of laws to live by
I. Intro to Mesopotamia
• Sumerian cities were made up of buildings
that were built with sun dried bricks
• The largest of these was the city of Ur
• Sumerians built the first cities in Mesopotamia
II. City-States
• Each city was considered to be its own state
• Each had their own god and government, but were
protected by the Sumerian Military
• Consisted of the city itself and the land surrounding it
• Surrounded by a wall of sundried bricks with a bronze
gate for protection
• City-States often fought one another over boundaries
and to prove which one was stronger
II. City-States
• Center City was were upper class (Priests and
Merchant) homes were located
– Houses were two stories high
– Wooden balconies overlooking courtyards
– Outside walls had no windows (protection from
heat and smells)
II. City-States
• Just outside of the upper class homes were
the middle class (shopkeepers, gov’t officials,
and artisans) homes
– One story
– Opened to a courtyard
• Just outside of the middle class homes were
the lower class (farmers, unskilled workers,
and fishermen) homes
– One story
– Stood alone with no open courtyard
III. Religious and Family Life
• Each city-state had a temple called a ziggurat
at the center
• Home of the city-state’s chief god
• Only priests could enter
Ziggurat of Ur
III. Religious and Family Life
• Around the ziggurat were open areas called
courts.
• The courts contained:
– Schools
– Work areas for the Artisans
– Storage for the Farmers
– An area where special events were held
– A place were the poor could get food
III. Religious and Family Life
• All natural forces were considered to be gods by the
Sumerians
• Priests were the only ones who could know the will
of the gods
• Humans were invented because the male gods had to
work very hard to please the female gods, so they
invented servants HUMANS
• Sumerians believed they were only on Earth to please
the gods
– They could only be happy if the gods were happy
III. Religious and Family Life
• Priests ran the schools
• Schools was only for the sons of wealthy citizens
• Located off of the temple court yard they were known
as “tablet houses” because the main goal of the school
was to teach writing
• Learning to write was important they had to hand copy
all texts, upon graduation the student would become a
scribe and work for the temple, gov’t, palace or private
business men
III. Religious and Family Life
• The Sumerians had their own writing called
cuneiform
• Cuneiform was produced by pressing a
sharpened reed into a clay tablet creating a
series of marking shaped liked wedges
• Cuneiform was invented to keep track of
business transactions
III. Religious and Family Life
• Women had rights to buy and sell property, own
slaves, and run businesses
• Husband was the head of the household, divorces
would be granted simply by the husband saying
“You’re not my wife”
• The Husband could sell his wife and kids to slavery if
they needed money
• He also arranged the marriages of his children
III. Religious and Family Life
• Children were expected to care for their
parents when their parents grew old
• Elders were respected
• EVERYONE followed the rules of the Gods
IV. Priests and Kings
• Priest-kings ruled Sumerian city-states
• Gilgamesh from Uruk is the most famous of the
Sumerian priest-kings
• Stories of Gilgamesh make him to be more of a god
then a human
– Oldest stories in the world
– He was searching for eternal life
– One story even tells the story of global flooding just like
Noah’s Ark
IV. Priests and Kings
• An assembly of free men gave the priest-kings advice
• Of these men a leader was chosen for the military in
times of war
• Overtime these leaders stayed on even after war was
over, taking over for the priest-king and simply
becoming King
• Kingship eventually became hereditary
http://alternativearchaeology.jigsy.com/sumeriansocial-life