Download ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS - Laurens County School District

Ancient River Valley
Civilizations
Characteristics of Civilizations
Cities
Government
Complex Religions
Job Specialization
Social Classes
Art & Architecture
Public Works
Writing
ANCIENT MESOPOTAMIA
Oldest known
civilization
Cradle of human
civilization
Old Testament
Nebuchadnezzar
Ziggurat (right)
Hanging gardens
Geography
Earliest civilizations
rose in the valleys
between the Tigris
and Euphrates Rivers.
Some say this Fertile
Crescent was the real
Garden of Eden.
Tigris and Euphrates Rives
In what modern day country was
the Fertile Crescent?
Kingdoms of Mesopotamia
Sumerians
Babylonians
Assyrians
Persians
Sumer, 3200-2350
B.C.
Sargon’s Empire, 23502320 B.C.
The Amorite invasions, 21001900 B.C.
The Dynasty of Ur,
2100-2000 B.C.
Reign of Hammurapi of Babylon,
1792-1750 B.C.
CITIES & GOVERNMENT
The State and Urban Revolution:
In the city-state (or state), kin and tribal loyalties are, by
definition, subordinated and replaced by political ties….
What makes a city-state different from an agricultural town is
the synergy created by its people interacting with each other
on the basis of political relationships rather than traditional
blood ties.
Ur, the capital city of
Mesopotamia
Social and political organization:
•
•
•
The King: he had military powers.
The Governors: they governed the territories of
the kingdom. They were generals and judges at
the same time.
The aristocracy: they were priests and traders.
• The peasants: the people who work the land.
The King
The Governors
The Aristocracy
The Peasantry
Kish was one of the twelve city-states of ancient Sumer civilization. In this
city lived the famous and magnificent Akkadian King Sargon of Agade,
founder of the first Empire in history. One of the earlier kings in Kish was
Etana who "stabilized all the lands" securing the 1st dynasty of Kish and
establishing rule over ancient Sumer and some of its neighbors. The title King
of Kish became synonymous with King of Sumer.
Ruins of Kish
Grand Palace of Kish
Ziggurat of Kish
Mesopotamian Law
Code of Hammurabi
Written on a stele (at
right) in cuneiform
Based on the premise
of an“eye for an eye
tooth for a tooth”
Hammurabi’s Code
*Strict code of justice with
severe penalties
*Penalties varied according to
the social class of the victim
*Largest category of laws
focused on marriage and the
family – supported the
patriarchal society
COMPLEX RELIGION
For thousands of years, Nippur was the religious center of Mesopotamia.
According to Sumerian religion, it was at Nippur where Enlil, the supreme
god of the Sumerian pantheon, created mankind. Although never a capital
city, Nippur had great political importance because royal rule over
Mesopotamia was not considered legitimate without recognition in its
temples. Thus, Nippur was the focus of pilgrimage and building programs
by dozens of kings including Hammurabi of Babylon and Ashurbanipal of
Assyria.
Map of
Nippur
These carved stone figures, their
eyes wide with awe and their hands
clasped in reverence, were placed in
Mesopotamian temples by
worshippers to stand in perpetual
prayer on their behalf before the god
or goddess to whom the sanctuary
was dedicated.
There were many gods.
For example, Anu was the father of
the gods and the god of the sky; Enlil
was the god of the air; Utu was the
sun god and the lord of truth and
justice; Nanna was the moon god;
Inanna was the goddess of love and
war; Ninhursag was the goddess of
While they served and revered the great gods, most
earth; and Enki was the god of fresh
people felt little connection with these distant
water as well as the lord of wisdom
beings. Ordinary people depended on a relationship
and magic.
with their own personal god - a kind of guardian
angel - who protected individuals and interceded for
them with the great deities.
Apsu: the fresh waters (male principle)
Tiamat: the salt waters (female principle)
Ea, the god of intelligence
and wisdom, puts Apsu in a
trance and then kills him.
The statue of the god Marduk
with his dragon, from a
Babylonian cylinder seal.
Marduk killed Tiamat.
Ziggurats
Temples
Ziggurat of Ur Nammu
ART &
ARCHITECTURE/PUBLIC
WORKS
The ancient city of Babylon, under King Nebuchadnezzar II, must
have been a wonder to the traveler's eyes. "In addition to its size,"
wrote Herodotus, a historian in 450 BC, "Babylon surpasses in
splendor any city in the known world."
Herodotus claimed the outer walls were 56 miles in length, 80 feet
thick and 320 feet high. Wide enough, he said, to allow a four-horse
chariot to turn. The inner walls were "not so thick as the first, but
hardly less strong." Inside the walls were fortresses and temples
containing immense statues of solid gold. Rising above the city was
the famous Tower of Babel, a temple to the god Marduk, that
seemed to reach to the heavens
Hanging Gardens of Babylon
One of the seven wonders of the Ancient World.
Uruk
Another painting of the hanging
gardens with Tower of Babel in back
Fragment from the Stele of the Vultures, erected by Eannatum
of Lagash. It depicts the battle of Umma with Eannatum of
Lagash defeating the king of Umma, included is a professional
phalanx. Circa 2525 B.C.
Upper Register of the Stele of Vultures
The Standard of Ur comes to us from a royal tombs found in
the ancient Sumerian city of Ur. In the Standard of Ur, a
chariot is shown in the top register on the left. The Standard
presents, on the top 2 registers, the aftermath of another
successful victory for Sumer, with a procession of troops
presenting POWs to the victorious king at the center of the
top.
The Law Code of Hammurapi
WRITING
Writing
The Sumerians
invented writing.
This is cuneiform.
Babylonians wrote
using this “wedgeshaped” writing on
clay tablets.
The Beginnings of Writing
Farmers needed to keep records.
The Sumerians were very good farmers. They raised animals such as goats and cows (called livestock). Because they needed
to keep records of their livestock, food, and other things, officials began using tokens.
Tokens were used for trade.
Clay tokens came in different shapes and sizes. These represented different objects. For example, a cone shape could have
represented a bag of wheat. These tokens were placed inside clay balls that were sealed. If you were sending five goats to
someone, then you would put five tokens in the clay ball. When the goat arrived, the person would open the clay ball and
count the tokens to make sure the correct number of goats had arrived. The number of tokens began to be pressed on the
outside of the clay balls. Many experts believe that this is how writing on clay tablets began.
A system of writing develops.
The earliest form of writing dates back to 3300 B.C. People back then would draw "word-pictures" on clay tablets using a
pointed instrument called a stylus. These "word-pictures" then developed into wedge-shaped signs. This type of script was
called cuneiform (from the Latin word cuneus which means wedge).
Who used cuneiform?
Not everyone learned to read and write. The ones that were picked by the gods were called scribes. Boys that were chosen to
become scribes (professional writers) began to study at the age of 8. They finished when they were 20 years old. The scribes
wrote on clay tablets and used a triangular shaped reed called a stylus to make marks in the clay. The marks represented the
tens of thousands of words in their language.
THE ORIGINS OF WRITING: Tokens are small geometric clay objects (cylinders,
cones, spheres, etc.) found all over the Near East from about 8000 B.C. until the
development of writing. The earliest tokens were simple shapes and were
comparatively unadorned; they stood for basic agricultural commodities such as grain
and sheep. A specific shape of token always represented a specific quantity of a
particular item. For
example, "the cone ... stood for a small measure of grain, the sphere represented a large
measure of grain, the ovoid stood for a jar of oil." (Before Writing 161). Two jars of oil
would be represented by two ovoids, three jars by three ovoids, and so on. Thus, the
tokens presented an abstraction of the things being counted, but also a system of great
specificity and precision.
With the development of cities came a more complex economy
and more complex social structures. This cultural evolution is
reflected in the tokens, which begin to appear in a much greater
diversity of shapes and are given more complicated designs of
incisions and holes.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF
CUNEIFORM: The Sumerian
writing system during the early
periods was constantly in flux. The
original direction of writing was
from top to bottom, but for reasons
unknown, it changed to left-to-right
very early on (perhaps around 3000
BCE). This also affected the
orientation of the signs by rotating
all of them 90° counterclockwise.
Another change in this early system
involved the "style" of the signs.
The early signs were more "linear"
in that the strokes making up the
signs were lines and curves. But
starting after 3000 BC, these strokes
started to evolve into wedges, thus
changing the visual style of the
signs from linear to "cuneiform".
Cuneiform
Sumerian Alphabet
Sumerian Economy
Sumerians
(Mesopotamians) were
known to trade with
the Egyptians, the
Indus Valley
civilizations and the
Chinese.
In later years, these
trade routes became
Silk Road.
Sumerians invented the
wheel!
The wheel was
invented by 6000 BC!
It helped with the
military, farming and
trade.
This wheel is made of
wood.
Sumer, 3200-2350 B.C.
Sargon of Akkad unifies Mesopotamia:
world’s first empire, ca. 2240 B.C.
The Dynasty of Ur,
2100-2000 B.C.
Reign of Hammurapi of Babylon, 17921750 B.C.
Mesopotamia Quiz
What law system did Sumerians use?
What was the trade route followed by the
Sumerians called?
Between what 2 rivers did the Fertile
Crescent appear?
What type of writing did they use?
Name one architectural accomplishment of
the Sumerians.