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About History of
Mesopotamia
- The History Of
Mesopotamia
- The history and
Culture of Mesopotamia
- Think & Quest
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| The
History Of Mesopotamia |
The name Mesopotamia ( meaning "the land
between the rivers" ) refers to the
geographic region which lies near the Tigris and
Euphrates Rivers and not to any particular
civilization. In fact, over the course of several
millennia, many civilizations developed,
collapsed, and were replaced in this fertile
region. The land of Mesopotamia is made fertile
by the irregular and often violent flooding of
the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. While these floods aided
agricultural endeavors by adding rich silt to the
soil every year, it took a tremendous amount of
human labor to successfully irrigate the land and
to protect the young plants from the surging
flood waters. Given the combination of fertile
soil and the need for organized human labor,
perhaps it is not surprising that the first
civilization developed in Mesopotamia. The
origins of civilization can be traced to a group
of people living in southern Mesopotamia called
the Sumerians.
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| By c.3500 BC, the Sumerians had
developed many of the features that characterized
subsequent civilizations. Towns grew to be
cities, an early form of pictographic writing was
used, metal working had begun, and temples were
built on a monumental scale. Generally speaking,
however, true civilization is said to have begun
around 3100 BCE with the development of cuneiform
writing. Cuneiform
was a system of writing established by the
Sumerians which required the use of a stylus in
order to make wedge-shaped marks on wet clay
tablets, once the tablets were dry they could by
stored, transported, etc.
After its
development, cuneiform became the dominant system
of writing in Mesopotamia for over 2000 years.
Even after Sumerian became extinct as a spoken
language, many other Near Eastern cultures
continued to write using cuneiform. As a result
of its extensive use of several centuries, many
cuneiform tablets have survived. These tablets
provide historians with the opportunity to
glimpse the culture of the ancient Mesopotamian
civilizations.
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| The
history and Culture of Mesopotamia |
It is thanks to Italian-French archaeologist Paul
Emile Botta ( 1802-1870 ), that people know the
history and culture of Mesopotamia today. Botta
came from a prosperous family and studied
medicine. In 1842, he was appointed consul of
Mossul in Assyria, which gave him the opportunity
to excavate the city.Before then, the history of
the city was only known through ancient sources
such as The Bible.In 1843, Botta began excavating
from the east bank of the Tigris ( Mossul is on
the west bank ), and in one week dug up the
remains of gigantic palace from the reign of
Sargon 2nd ( 721-705 B.C ), a sculpture of a
winged deity, a relief, and some stone cuneiform
tables.
The palace he
discovered was named "Dur-Sharrukin,"
meaning "the city of Sargon," and was
in fact constructed while Sargon 2nd was the
ruler. Known today as Khorsabad, the palace was
built in 717-707 B.C and was situated 24-km
northeast of Nineveh. Archaeologists from French,
England, Germany, and Iraq carried out excavation
work on the site systematically for over 150
years, and the history of the palace was
gradually unveiled to the world.
In the following
pages, we will introduce the history pf
Mesopotamia by the left time line for this lesson
chap.
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| TimeLine ( B.C ) |
| Neolothic Age |
Proto Literate
Period |
| 8000-3500 |
3500-2900 |
| Early
Dynastic-3rd Period |
Akkadian Empire
& Ur 3rd |
| 2500-2350 |
2350-2004 |
| Old Babylonian
Period |
Assyrian Empire
Period |
| 2000-1600
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1960-609 |
| New Babylon Period |
Ending...... |
| 626-539 |
539... |
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| Think & Quest |
- Why did the
ancient cultures always exsist near a
river? ( Like Chinese, Eygpt, Roma... )
- What could a river
bring to one culture?
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