Culture
the ways of living built up by a group and passed on from one generation to another
-includes things like courtship, tools, clothing, shelter, ideas, institutions, beliefs, and languages
-culture is learned and not inherited
Early Humans and their Culture
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The Paleolithic Age
-nomads-move from place to place
-it was the earliest period
-dates from about 1 million years ago to 10,000 B.C.E.
-People in this age were hunters, fishers, and gatherers
-Paleolithic culture could only support a sparsely settled society
-did not produce their own food
-use of stone tools
-spread out because they couldn't get a lot of people in one area because they could kill all the animals
What led to the Neolithic Revolution?
agriculture
The Neolithic Age
-settled area
-about 10,000 years ago, some groups in the middle-east began to change from being in a hunter gatherer culture to a more settled agricultural one
-domesticated, know how to plant things
- Neolithic Age comes from the Greek word "new store."
-Neolithic farmers built permanent homes
-Domestication allowed people to settle new areas
-invention of pottery enabled people to store, transport, and cook foods and liquids
-people made cloth from flax+wood
-coincided with advances in stone tool technology
-domesticated productive animals such as sheep and goats, as were food crops including wheat and barley
Neolithic Age: Villages and social status?
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Traits of Civilization
civilization- a form of human culture masked by urbanism, technological advancement, social complexity, long distance trade, and symbolic communciation
-The things that are associated with a civilization:
-The earliest writing is associated with the growth of cities
-writing-what was its significance?
-writing was a powerful means of communicating over space and time and invented to deal with urban problems
-fertile soil, created barriers, built around rivers
-all river valley civilizations
FOCUS QUESTIONS
1. What was the process behind the creation of early civilizations?
2. What are the similarities and differences among the world's earliest civilizations?
Sumerian cities
-2125 the Sumerian city of UR rose to dominance
-sumerian culture and literature flourished
-after a century, the Third Dynasty of Ur disintegrated in the face of famine and invasion
-Elamites attacked from the East and captured the king
-Amorites attacked from the north and west settling around the Sumerian cities eventually founding their own dynasties
-Unfortunately, the Sumerians gradually disappeared
Sumerian cities
-2125 the Sumerian city of UR rose to dominance
-Sumerian culture and literature flourished
-After a century, the Third Dynasty of UR disintegrated into the face of famine and invasion
-Elamites attacked from the East and captured the king
-Amorites attacked from the north and west settling around the Sumerian cities and eventually founding their own dynasties
-Sumerians gradually disappeared
Sumerian Culture
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cuneiform
A writing system invented by the Sumerians that used a wedge shaped stylus, or pointed tool, to write on wet, clay tablets that were then baked or dried {cuneous means "wedge" in latin}
-the writing was also cut in stone
Akkadians
-In the East, a people known as the Akkadians, established their own kingdom at a capital city called Akkad
-conquered all of the Sumerian city-states and invaded southwestern Iran and northern Syria
-included numerous peoples, cities, languages, and cultures, as well as different ecological zones
-history's first empire, having a heartland, provinces, and an absolute ruler
-External attack and internal weakness destroyed the Akkadian empire, but several small states survived independently
chattel slavery
-A form of slavery in which humans are owned as goods; the slave has no legal standing as a person, and few, if any rights
Mesopotamian's: View of the Afterworld
-vague and gloomy picture of the afterworld
-the winged spirits of the dead were recognized as individuals-confined to a dusty, dark, netherworld, doomed to perpetual hunger and thirst unless someone offered them food or drink
-there was no preferential treatment in the afterlife for those who had led religious or virtuous lives -everyone was in equal misery
** Mesopotamian religion focused on problems of this world and how to lead a good life before dying
Egyptian Civilization
-Egyptians recognized two sets of geographical divisions in their country:
-Upper {southern} Egypt-consisted pf the narrow valley of the Nile
-Lower{northern} Egypt-referred to the broad triangular area, named by the Greeks after their letter Delta, formed by the Nile as it branches out to empty into the Mediterranean
-Egyptians made a distinction between the two:
-"Black land"- the dark fertile fields along the Nile
-"Red land"- the desert cliffs and plateous bordering the valley
Nile's significance
#1-made agriculture possible in Egypt's desert environment
#2-served as the major highway connecting Upper and Lower Egypt
Egypt
-The cataracts, the desert, and the sea made Egypt relatively isolated
-Egypt's security, along with the predictable flood calendar, gave its civilization a more optimistic outlook than that of Mesopotamia
-the 3,000 year span of Egyptian history is divided into thirty-one royal dynasties, clustered into eight periods
-experienced political and social disintegration , rival dynasties often set up separate power bases in Upper and Lower Egypt until a strong leader reunified the land
pharaoh
-the god-kinds of ancient Egypt
-the term originally meant "great house" or "palace
pyramids
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Middle Kingdom
-pharaohs sought to evoke the past by building pyramid complexes like those of the later Old Kingdom rulers
-Gone with the God idea of rulers- the king was directly concerned with his people
-seem thoughtful, careworn, and brooding
-Egypt's relation with its neighbors became more agressive
Egypt's relations
-to the south, royal fortresses were built to control Nubia and the growing trade in African resources
-to the north and east, Syria and Palestine increasingly came under Egyptian influence
-the western Delta established an independent dynasty, ushering into the Second Intermediate Period {1630-1550 B.C.E.}
New Kingdom (1550-(1075 B.C.E.)
-Egypt persuaded foreign expansion with renewed vigor
-economic and political power was at its height
-Military expeditions reached as far north as the Euphrates in Syria with frequent campaign in the Levant
-major Egyptian temples in Sudan
-end of 20th century-Egyptian glory passed
Hitties {Asia Minor}
-destroyed the Mitannian's kingdom
-spoke a language related to Greek and Sanskrit
-By about 1500 B.C.E. established a strong, centralized government w a capital near Ankara, the capital of modern day Turkey
-between 1400 and 1200, they contested Egypt's control of Palestine and Syria
-they played an important role in transmitting the ancient cultures of Mesopotamia and Egypt to the Greeks, who lived on the western frontier
-Gov. is different than that of Mesopotamia-did not claim to be divine or even to be the chosen representatives of God
Kassites {Babylonies}
-unknown origin who spoke their own language
-established at Babylon a dynasty that ruled for nearly 500 years
-organized into tribal families and carved out great domains for themselves in Babylonia
-promoted Babylonian culture and many of the important works of Babylonian literature were written during their rule
-they supported a military aristocracy based on horses and chariots, the prestige weaponry of the age
Mitannies {northern Syria and Mesopotamia}
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Assyrians
-originally lived in Assur, a city in northern Mesopotamia on the Tigris River
-spoke a Semitic language closely related to Babylonian
-proud, independent culture influenced by the Babylonians
-was an early center of trade but emerged as a political power during the 14th century
-Arameans invaded Assyria
-characteristic-ruthless, proud of weapons and tactics
-warfare, tactics, known for getting into ancient cities
The Second Assyrian Empire
-By 655 B.C.E., they controlled all of Mesopotamia, most of Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt to its southern frontier
-well-disciplined army and society that valued military skills
-constructed magnificent palaces at Niheven and Nimnud surrounded by parks and gardens
-exploited their empire-used various methods of control, collecting tribute, stationing garissions in others, and pacifying districts by deporting and scattering their inhabitants
-empire became too large to govern efficiently
-civil war divided country
-Medes attacked Assyria
THe Neo-Babylonians
-the Medes did not follow up with their conquests; therefore, Nebuchadnezzar took over much of the Assyrian Empire
-Under him and his successors, Babylon grew into one of the greatest cities in the world
-great fortifications, walls, boulevards, and parks
-Babylon prospered as a center of world trade linking Egypt, India,Iran and Syria -Palestine by land and sea routes
Indus Civilization
-discovered at the site of Harappa in the 1920's-70 cities such as Harappa and Mohenjadaro-35,00 people in each
-bronze tools, writing, covered drainage systems, and a diversified social and economic organization
-sanskrit-writing was undeciphered; it remains the least understood of the early river valley civilizations
-Archaeological evidence and inferences allows us to reconstruct something of its highly developed and once thriving culture
-covered a huge area, yet homogenous
-had city layouts, building construction, weights and measures, seal inscriptions, patterned pottery and figurines-are usually uniform in all Indus towns suggesting an integrated economic system and good internal communications
-culture was constant over time
-stability, regularity, and traditionalism has led scholars to speculate that a centralized government controlled this society
-cities were laid out in grids
hieroglyphs
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Harappan
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Vedic Aryan Civilizations
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Veda
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Vedic Aryans
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