Download CHAPTER 8: THE FIRST CITIES AND STATES

CHAPTER 8: THE FIRST CITIES AND STATES
CHAPTER OVERVIEW
This chapter discusses the characteristics of states, including the nature of their formation and decline. It
focuses on the emergence of chiefdoms and states in the Middle East and Mesoamerica.
CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
1. Know how Kottak defines the state, what general factors have contributed to the emergence of states,
and the relationship of food production and state formation.
2. Be able to identify the key attributes of states that Kottak describes, and consider how these attributes
interrelate.
3. Be familiar with the shift from chiefdoms to states in the Middle East and in Mesoamerica, and
consider the formation of early states in the Indus River Valley and China. Know the main sites and
periods of early state formation in these regions and consider their primary characteristics of state
organization.
4. Know how scholars have explained the fall of states, particularly in the case of Mayan state collapse
upon which Kottak focuses.
CHAPTER OUTLINE
I. The Origin of the State
A. The state is a form of social and political organization that has a formal, central government
and a division of society into classes.
B. Multiple factors contribute to state formation; although some factors have appeared again and
again, no single one is always present.
C. Hydraulic Systems (Wittfogel)
1. In certain arid areas, states have emerged to manage systems of irrigation, drainage,
and flood control.
2. However, hydraulic agriculture is neither a sufficient nor a necessary condition for
the rise of states.
a. Many societies with hydraulic agriculture never experienced state formation.
b. There were states that developed without hydraulic agriculture.
3. Water control increases agricultural production, which fuels population growth,
which requires a political system that can regulate production as well as interpersonal
and intergroup relations.
D. Long-Distance Trade Routes
1. Some researchers believe that states emerged at strategic locations in regional trade
networks.
2. Like hydraulic agriculture, long-distance trade is neither a sufficient nor a necessary
condition for the rise of states.
E. Population, War, and Circumscription (Carneiro)
1. This is a multivariate theory for state formation, in that it incorporates three factors
working together instead of a single cause.
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2. According to Carneiro, wherever and whenever environmental circumscription (or
resource concentration), increasing population, and warfare exist, state formation will
begin.
3. Environmental circumscription may be physical or social.
a. Physically circumscribed environments include small islands, river plains,
oases, and valleys.
b. Social circumscription exists when neighboring societies block expansion,
emigration, or access to resources.
4. This theory explains many (e.g., coastal Peru), but not all, cases of state formation.
5. Highland Papua New Guinea has environmental circumscription, warfare, and dense
populations, but the region has never experienced state formation.
F. Food production did not inevitably lead to the formation of chiefdoms and states, nor did all
chiefdoms develop into states.
II. Attributes of States
A. States control specific territories.
1. The area controlled by a state is much larger than the territories controlled by kin
groups and villages in prestate societies.
2. Early states were expansionist—that is, they arose when one of several competing
chiefdoms conquered others, extending its rule over a larger territory.
B. Early states had productive farming economies, supporting dense populations.
1. Often these populations were nucleated in cities.
2. The agricultural economies usually involved some form of water control or irrigation.
C. Early states used tribute and taxation to accumulate, at a central place, resources needed to
support hundreds, or thousands, of specialists.
D. States are stratified into social classes (e.g., elites, commoners, and slaves).
E. Early states had imposing public buildings and monumental architecture, including temples,
palaces, and storehouses.
F. Early states developed some form of record-keeping system, usually a written script.
III. State Formation in the Middle East
A. Urban Life
1. The first towns arose around 10,000 years ago in the Middle East.
2. Jericho, located in modern Israel, was the earliest known town.
a. Jericho was settled by the Natufians around 11,000 B.P.
b. Some 2,000 people lived in the town, which was surrounded by a sturdy wall
with a massive tower.
c. Around 9,000 B.P., the town was destroyed and later rebuilt, its new
inhabitants living in square houses with plaster floors and burials sealed
beneath.
d. Pottery first appeared at Jericho around 8000 B.P.
3. Çatal Hüyük, located in Anatolia, Turkey, was probably the largest settlement of the
Neolithic.
a. Çatal Hüyük flourished between 8000 and 7000 B.P., with up to 10,000
people living at the site.
b. The town’s inhabitants lived in square mud-brick dwellings that had separate
areas for secular and ritual activities.
c. Çatal Hüyük appears to have lacked priests as well as a centralized political
organization.
B. The Elite Level
1. Halafian pottery (7500-6500 B.P.)
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a. Halafian was a widespread, delicate pottery style, first found in northern
Syria.
b. The low number of Halafian ceramics suggest they were luxury goods
associated with a social hierarchy - the elite level and the first chiefdoms
emerged during the Halafian period.
2. Ubaid pottery (7000-6000 B.P.)
a. This style of pottery was first discovered at the site of Tell el-Ubaid, located
in the southern part of modern Iraq.
b. Ubaid pottery is associated with advanced chiefdoms and perhaps the earliest
states in southern Mesopotamia.
C. Social Ranking and Chiefdoms
1. Egalitarian Society
a. Egalitarian societies are most typically found among foragers.
b. These societies lack status distinctions except for those based on age, gender,
and individual qualities, talents, and achievements.
c. In egalitarian societies, status distinctions are usually achieved by individuals
during their lives, rather than being inherited from their parents.
2. Ranked Society
a. Ranked societies have hereditary inequality but lack social stratification
(sharp social divisions based on unequal access to wealth and power) into
noble and commoner classes.
b. There is a continuum of status, with individuals ranked in terms of their
genealogical distance from the chief.
c. Not all ranked societies are chiefdoms; only those ranked societies in which
there is a loss of village autonomy are called chiefdoms.
3. Chiefdoms
a. A chiefdom is a ranked society in which relations among villages as well as
among individuals are unequal.
b. Primary states (states that arose on their own, not through contact with other
state societies) emerged from competition among chiefdoms, as one
chiefdom managed to conquer its neighbors and integrate them into a larger
political unit.
c. Chiefdoms first appeared in the Middle East around 7300 B.P. and in
Mesoamerica around 3000 B.P.
d. One of the archaeological markers of chiefdoms is the presence of wealthy
burials of children too young to have achieved or earned prestige of their
own, but who were born into elite families.
D. Advanced Chiefdoms
1. Excavations at Tell Hamoukar, located in northeastern Syria, suggest that advanced
chiefdoms arose in northern areas of the Middle East independently of the
developments in southern Mesopotamia.
2. By 5700 B.P., the settlement covered 32 acres and was surrounded by a defensive
wall.
3. Evidence of large-scale food preparation has been found at the site, perhaps
indicating that elites were hosting and entertaining in a chiefly manner.
4. The excavators also have recovered seals of various sizes, presumably used by people
with greater or less authority to mark storage containers.
E. The Rise of the State
1. Uruk Period (6000-5200 B.P.)
a. The first cities in southern Mesopotamia appeared during this period.
b. Economies were managed by centralized leadership.
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c. Settlements spread north into what is now Syria.
2. Writing
a. Writing first developed in Sumer, in southern Mesopotamia.
b. The first writing presumably developed to handle record keeping associated
with a centralized economy.
c. Mesopotamian writing, known as cuneiform, consisted of wedge-shaped
impressions made in raw clay with a stylus (writing implement).
d. Both the Sumerian (southern Mesopotamian) and the Akkadian (northern
Mesopotamian) languages were written in cuneiform.
3. Metallurgy is the knowledge of the properties of metals, including their extraction
and processing and the manufacture of metal tools.
a. The discovery of smelting, the process of using high temperatures to extract
pure metal from an ore, was vital to the invention of metallurgy.
b. After 5000 B.P., metallurgy evolved rapidly.
c. The Bronze Age began when bronze (an alloy of copper and either arsenic or
tin) became common and greatly extended the use of metals.
d. The Iron Age began once high-temperature iron smelting was mastered (after
about 3200 B.P.).
4. Mesopotamian States
a. The Mesopotamian economy, based on craft production, trade, and intensive
agriculture, spurred population growth and an increase in urbanism.
b. Large populations were densely concentrated in walled cities.
c. Secular authority replaced temple rule by 4600 B.P., with the office of
military coordinator developing into kingship.
d. By 4600 B.P., Mesopotamia had a well-defined class structure, with complex
stratification into nobles, commoners, and slaves.
IV. Other Early States
A. Indus River Valley (or Harappan) Civilization
1. The Indus River Valley state, in northwestern India and Pakistan, flourished between
4600 and 3900 B.P.
2. This state was characterized by urban planning, social stratification, and an early
writing system.
3. The major cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-daro had carefully planned residential
areas with wastewater systems.
4. The Indus River Valley state apparently collapsed as a result of warfare.
B. China
1. The first Chinese state was that of the Shang dynasty, which arose in the Huang He
(Yellow) River area of northern China around 3750 B.P.
2. The Shang state was characterized by urbanism, palaces, human sacrifice, and a sharp
division between social classes.
3. The Shang had bronze metallurgy and an elaborate writing system.
V. State Formation in Mesoamerica
A. Early Chiefdoms and Elites
1. There were three centers of early chiefdom development in Mesoamerica: the Olmec
area of the Gulf Coast, the Valley of Oaxaca, and the Valley of Mexico.
2. The Olmec chiefdoms flourished between 3200 and 2500 B.P.
a. Olmec chiefly centers consisted of large earthen mounds grouped into plaza
complexes, presumably for religious use.
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b. The Olmec are well known for the massive stone heads (perhaps images of
chiefs or ancestors) that they carved.
3. Long-distance exchange networks linked these three regions of early chiefdom
development.
4. These chiefdoms evolved rapidly as a result of intense competitive interaction.
5. State formation involves one chiefdom incorporating several others into the emerging
state that it controls.
6. By 2500 B.P., the city of Monte Albán, the capital of the Zapotec state, was founded
in the Valley of Oaxaca.
7. The city of Teotihuacan, the capital of a state that developed in the Valley of Mexico,
flourished between 1900 and 1300 B.P. (A.D. 100-700).
B. States in the Valley of Mexico
1. After 2500 B.P., the development of new maize varieties and small-scale irrigation
allowed population to grow, and cultivation to take place, in the northern part of the
Valley of Mexico.
2. By A.D. 1, a settlement hierarchy—a ranked series of communities that differ in size,
function, and building types—had emerged, with Teotihuacan as the dominant site.
3. A three-tiered settlement hierarchy (capital city, smaller urban centers, and rural
villages) is considered archaeological evidence of state organization.
4. The Teotihuacan state was characterized by urban planning, large-scale irrigation,
status differentiation, and complex architecture.
5. After flourishing for centuries (A.D. 100-700), Teotihuacan experienced a rapid
decline in size and power, and its population dispersed.
6. Following the Toltec period (A.D. 900-1200), agricultural intensification, population
increase, and urban growth returned to the Valley of Mexico—culminating in the
formation of the Aztec state (A.D. 1325-1520) with its capital at Tenochtitlan.
VI. Why States Collapse
A. Various factors can threaten the economy and political institutions of a state, including
invasion, disease, famine, prolonged drought, and environmental degradation.
B. The Mayan Decline
1. Classic Maya culture, including several competing states, flourished between A.D.
300 and 900 in what is now southern Mexico, Guatemala, western Honduras, Belize,
and El Salvador.
2. Generations of scholars have debated the decline of classic Maya civilization around
A.D. 900.
3. Archaeologists now believe that social, political, and military upheaval and
competition had as much or more to do with the Maya decline and abandonment of
cities than did natural environmental factors.
C. Whereas before archaeologists tended to explain state formation and collapse mainly in terms
of natural environmental factors (e.g., climate change, habitat destruction, demographic
pressure), they now consider how social and political factors influenced the origin and
decline of states.
VII. Anthropology Today: Pseudo-Archaeology
A. Despite what the Indiana Jones series and other popular works suggest, archaeologists do not
engage in nonstop adventures; rather, they are concerned with reconstructing lifeways
through the analysis of material remains, in order to understand culture and human behavior.
B. Contrary to claims by Heyerdahl, even if contact between ancient civilizations did occur,
there is no evidence that suggests that civilization originated only once and then diffused
globally.
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C. Rather, evidence clearly shows that when civilizations arose, they did so because indigenous
conditions supported such a transition.
D. Evidence of gradual transitions, existing in many different archaeological sequences, refutes
claims like those of van Daniken, who argued that civilization was seeded by extraterrestrial
contact.
LECTURE TOPICS
1.
Discuss how states differ from other forms of sociopolitical organization and how those differences
are manifested in the archaeological record.
2.
Discuss the differences between egalitarian, ranked, and stratified societies. How are the differences
between these kinds of societies manifested in the archaeological record?
3.
Discuss why states collapse. Be sure to emphasize that just as no single variable can explain the rise
of states, one variable cannot explain their collapse.
4.
Discuss how long distance trade relationships and migrations characterized the formation and
maintenance of states in several world regions. How is the state’s geographic territory manifested in
the archaeological record?
SUGGESTED FILMS
The Future of the Past
2000 50 minutes
This film examines the shift in archaeological research from excavating grand palaces to discovering and
learning more about some of the earliest communities and domestic residences. From Films for the
Humanities and Sciences.
Messages from the Past: Reassessing Ancient Civilizations
2000 4-part series
59 minutes each
This four-part series explores the origins of civilization in four different areas of the world: Egypt,
Mesopotamia, South Asia, and China. Titles in the series: Egypt: Journey to the Global Civilization;
Mesopotamia: I Have Conquered the River; Indus: The Unvoiced Civilization; and China: Heritage of the
Wild Dragon. From Films for the Humanities and Sciences.
A History of the Mayans
45 minutes
This film explores the history of the Maya from its beginnings to the arrival of the Spanish. From Films
for the Humanities and Sciences.
The Fall of the Maya
23 minutes
This program examines recent research of Mayan sites and hieroglyphics regarding the rise and fall of the
Maya. From Films for the Humanities and Sciences.
The Legacy of the Inca
1989 43 minutes
This film presents a history of the Inca as it visits important sites and depicts the analysis of an Inca
mummy. From Films for the Humanities and Sciences.
Easter Island: A Vanished Culture
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1995 24 minutes
This film explores what life was like on Easter Island and what led to the collapse of the culture. From
Films for the Humanities and Sciences.
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