Exploring Mesopotamia and

the First Civilizations

The Tigris and Euphrates Rivers Valley

 

 

Why the Fertile Crescent?

The Tigris and Euphrates valley is called the Òfertile crescentÓ.

á      Why does the name fit?

á      What clues can you get from the geography of the region to explain why Mesopotamia became the Òcradle of civilizationÓ?

View the Ancient Cities map:

á      Where were most of the cities located? Why there?

View the modern political map of the area:

á      With which of these cities are you familiar?

á      What do you notice about the locations of these modern cities?

View the Terrain map:

á      Look to the northeast of Mesopotamia. Why is this area not as hospitable to agriculture? The southwest?

View the Natural Resources map:

á      Mesopotamia was agriculturally rich. Why did vibrant trade develop in the larger region shown on the map? Other than agriculture, what other natural resources is Mesopotamia rich in? What is it rich in today that makes it important to world trade?

 

Was the environment of Mesopotamia a blessing or a burden?

Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia means "between the rivers" in the Greek language. It is a fertile region situated around the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers and runs from the Persian Gulf to the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Its characteristic fertility and shape account for its commonly known nickname, the Fertile Crescent. A number of ancient river valley civilizations developed in this region. The most well known were Sumer and Babylon.

Environment

A region's environment is pivotal in the development of its culture. Religion, economic and government systems, fashions, and even food choices all reflect the various adaptations that groups of people have made to the climate and geography they live in. The fact that some of the world's earliest civilizations developed in the harsh climate of the Mesopotamian region is a credit to the adaptability of the people who lived in these ancient civilizations.

Civilization

Civilizations can be characterized by certain basic features that they have in common. These features include:

á       The existence of cities

á       Job specialization

á       Institutions of government and religion

á       Some form of record keeping

á       Technology

Each of these characteristics were present in the civilizations that developed in the Fertile Crescent. For example, the Sumerian city of Ur was home to over 25,000 people. The Sumerians invented the wheel and the world's first system of writing, called cuneiform. These characteristics indicate ways in which the people of Sumer adapted to their environment.

Was the environment of Mesopotamia a blessing or a burden?

 

Use your packet and the below sites to research the answers to this question.

 

Site 1:                           Geography: Ancient Cities

á              Use the Choose a Map drop-down menu to examine maps and to answer questions 1-5 on the Respond sheet.

 

Site 2:                           Ancient Babylonia - Geography

á       Read sections on the Tigris and Euphrates, climate, and trade.

 

Site 3:                           The Mesopotamian History

á       Read the information on the human use of rivers in the Geography section.

 

Site 4:                           The Historical Geography of Mesopotamia

á       Read the sections on favorable geographic circumstances and water supply in the region.

 

The culture of Mesopotamia

 

Mesopotamia Timeline:

á      What developments in the civilization would have been facilitated by or even require writing?

 

Jobs in Mesopotamia:

When you are thinking about the development and urbanization of Mesopotamian civilization, think about the relationship between the kinds of occupations that developed over time.

 

I have already talked about a shift (Neolithic Revolution) from a nomadic pursuit of game and wild vegetation, to settles cultivation (agriculture), and eventually towards settled villages, towns, and cities. As societies became, first, more settled as farmers, and then in certain places more urbanized as some population became townsfolk, what kinds of new tasks and jobs would need to be done?

á      Look at the list of occupations.

o   What jobs on the list no longer exist?

o   Which jobs are unfamiliar to you?

o   Which jobs to do think were most common? Why?

o   Which jobs on the list are part of an industry, trade, or profession with need for record keeping? Explain your answers.

o   Choose one job (no two people in class should have the same job). Create a page that explains the job. Include a picture. Would it be possible to complete the tasks of the occupation without being able to write anything down? Print out and attach to packet. 

 

Thinking About Writing:

Writing is constantly evolving to serve civilization. Imagine that in an instant all knowledge of alphabetic writing disappeared. Only simple pictures remained as the means of written communication.

á      Using a pictograph writing system of your own design, write:

o   Your name

o   A verb

o   An adjective

o   The wordsÓ Òlife, liberty, and the pursuit of happinessÓ

o   A name of a song that you like

á      What does Òpicture writingÓ do well?

á      What advantages does Òpicture writingÓ have?

á      What are its weaknesses?

á      Can a pictograph convey what the word it is depicting sounds like?

Writing in ancient Mesopotamia arose from necessity – specifically, the need to keep records. Gradually, civilization in the Tigris-Euphrates River Valley became more urbanized. Eventually, a number of complex systems developed: political, military, religious, legal, and commercial. Writing developed as well, becoming essential to those systems.

á      Did writing enable those complex systems to arise or did complex systems create the need for a more sophisticated system of writing?

 

 

 

 

The Emergence and Evolution of Cuneiform Writing System

One of the characteristics of a civilization is writing. The earliest writing systems evolved independently and roughly the same time in Egypt and Mesopotamia, but current scholarship suggests that MesopotamiaÕs writing appeared first.  That writing system, invented by the Sumerians, emerged in Mesopotamia around 3500BCE. At first, this writing was representational: a bull might be represented by a picture of a bull, and a pictograph of barley signified the word barley. Though writing began as pictures, this system was inconvenient for conveying anything other than simple nouns, and it became increasingly abstract as it evolved to encompass more abstract concepts, eventually taking form in the worldÕs earliest writing: cuneiform. An increasingly complex civilization encouraged the development of an increasingly sophisticated form of writing. Cuneiform came to function both phonetically (representing a sound) and semantically (representing a meaning such as an object or concept) rather than only representing objects directly as a picture.

 

Barley and the Story of Writing:

What is barley? How is it used? Draw a picture of what it looks like in its natural state.

 

Barley was a very important in Ancient Mesopotamia. A pictograph of barley is one of the signs we find on the oldest examples of writing from the region.

 

Using The Story of Writing website, complete the quiz in your packet, then answer the below questions

á      Why do you think that the Ancient Mesopotamians decided to change the writing system from just pictures (pictographs) to the cuneiform shapes?

á      Who do you think would want to have a record of the buying and selling of barley? Why do people make or keep receipts?

á      How did the change from pictures (direct representation) o cuneiform (abstract representation) affect who could use the system?

 

Learning from Artifacts:

Look at the penny provided. Imagine you are form the distant future. You know the English language, but you know little else about America in the 21st century.

á      What hypotheses can you make from a penny?

Using the same logic, view at least 4 cuneiform writing examples.

á      What can be learned about civilization in the Tigris-Euphrates River Valley at the time of the artifactÕs creation?

á      What specifically about the artifact supports your hypotheses?

á      How important can you imagine written language was to the society that created the artifact?