ESMesopotamia

Emily's Home-Page //Location://** Between Tigris and Euphrates rivers, Persian Gulf and Mediterranean Sea, Southwest Asia, modern day Iraq //**Architec**t**ure:**// arches, ramps, colums, pyramids, ziggarats-religious, political, economic, and social center of Mesopotamia culture //**Social class:** On the top- kings, land-owners, priests, Next-wealthy merchants, Next-ordinary people,worked in fields or workshops, Lowest- slaves(from debt or war) note that the two next levels are really one level of class three classes total
 * MESOPOTAMIA NOTES FOR A QUIZ/TEST
 * //Culture://** Farming society Both men and women worked
 * //Geography://** curved shape,"fertile cresent", flat swampy land, rich soil-silt, desert climate, mosopotamiab=land etween rivers
 * //Agriculture/Economy://** traded grain and cloth for stone, wood and metal, grew wheat, barley, sorgham, through traade exchanged ideas
 * //Time period://** 4500 B.C. people began to farm 3300 B. C. in Sumer
 * //Challenges://** unpreidctable floding, limited natural resoces, desert, little rain, no naural barriers-defenslell, easy to see enemy coming, not a lot of building material, not water for crops and survival, built irrigation ditches.
 * //Military/War://** built city walls, constant war between city-states, hard to defend-no natual barriers,spread culture, men picked leader during times of war
 * //Institution://** city-states independant self-governing city including its surrounding farmland, empires- independant city-states brought under 1 ruler ( Sargon created the first empire), Babylonian invaded Mesopotamia, dynasty-series of rulers from 1 family
 * //Religion://** polytheism- belief in many gods, gods controlled nature, go to the "land of no return" after death, gave offering and sacrifices to gods-to make them happy
 * //Literature://** Epic of Gilgamash, gives us information of how they might have lived, story is similar to Noah's arc(has a big flood)
 * Equality/Womens rights:**// women could be merchants, farmers, or artisans, could own property, could be priests, some upperclass could read write and become scribes note more rights than many women in ancient societies
 * //Technology://** inventions-wheel, plow, bronze, sail, needed math to plan and build thngs, arithmatic and geometry, base 60 ( 60 sec to min, 60 min to and hour) 360 degree circle, architecture- ramps, arches, pyramids, ziggarats ect. writing cuneiform on clay tablets
 * //Important people://** Sargon-conquered Sumer adapted and spread culture, Hammerabi- leader of Babylonian empire ( know for code of law)
 * //Government://** controlled by priests at first, during war men chose strong tough fighter to lead at first control ended after war ended, with more frequent wars tough fighters/ leaders got permanent control, Hammerabis code of law