Civilization

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Civilization

• Characteristics and Beginnings

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Characteristics of Civilization

• Complexity (relative term)
• Hierarchy of social classes
• Permanent governmental institutions
• Urbanity
• Concentration of political power
• Formalized religion
• Tax collection, compulsory agencies (army and
  police, system of writing

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Why Civilization

• Recent phenomenon in human history
• Agricultural Revolution provided the material
  foundation for and may have compelled
  civilization (irrigation projects)
• Little evidence to explain why people
  civilizedprotection, coercion.
• Given the time involvedover many peoples
  lifetimesits likely that people were not aware
  of the change until after the event

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Civilization followed Agriculture

• In present day Greece and Syria, seasonal farming
  of lentils and emmer wheat began by 8000 B. C. E.
• Cities like Jericho emerged as seasonal farming
  bases
• From earliest times, growers of food were vitally
  interested in life and how to manipulate it.
• Led to evolution of more formal religious
  practices and rituals.

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Lentils and Emmer Wheat
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Domestication of Animals

• Sheep, Goats, and latter Cows were domesticated
  as sources of food and clothing.
• Later, they were made beasts of burden.
• Farmers and herders became increasingly
  specialized.

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Mesopotamia A Cradle of Civ.
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Civilization at Sumer

• First described by Archaeologist Samuel Noah
  Kramer.
• By 3000 B. C. E., there were urban settlements,
  central government, irrigation projects, and
  symbolic religion.
• Lower Mesopotamia had fertile soil but also a
  serious flooding problem.
• The need, and subsequent ability, to direct
  collective human activity in the lower alluvial
  plain of the Tigris and Euphrates river likely
  made this one birthplace of Civilization.

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Sumerian Ascendancy (3000-2000 B. C. E.

• Government and religion was in the hands of
  priests who lived in massive ziggurats
• Sophisticated pottery tells not only of the use
  of the wheel but artistic specialization as well.
• A vast trading network emerged with other peoples
  in the Fertile Crescent.
• Cuneiform writing developed. (tax registers)

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Governmental Institutions

• Sumer was not a country or nation in a modern
  sense
• City-Stateperiodically one of the Sumerian
  cities would predominateUr was often the
  dominant city.
• Each city-state had its own deitylink of
  religion w/ patriotism
• Priests gathered the wealth of the city, fed the
  gods who gave life to the people, and
  redistributed the remainder.
• Famine was sign of gods displeasure.

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Ziggurat at Ur (Ca. 2100 B. C. E.)
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Major Sumerian Cities
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Sumerian Religious pantheon

• Angod of the sky
• Enlilgod of wind
• Enkigod of the earth
• Ninhursagagoddess of life
• These main gods were assisted by their
  childrenUtu, the sun god, for example.
• Key human activity was to try to discern and
  manipulate the will of the godsdivination.

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Akkadian Hegemony

• Trade ties and political ambition led to the
  consolidation of power and the creation of the
  first Empire in recorded history.
• The city of Akkad became the base.
• Under Sargon I (2334-2279 BC), known as the
  Great, Akkad dominated the Sumerian cities and
  its hegemony extended over southern Mesopotamia
  as well as parts of Syria, Anatolia, and Elam
  (western Iran)

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King Sargon ruled for 56 years
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Ancient Tribute to Sargon

• Sargon, King of Akkad, through the royal gift of
  Ishtar was exalted, and he possessed no foe nor
  rival. His glory over the world he poured out.
  The Sea in the East he crossed, and in the
  eleventh year the Country of the West in its full
  extent his hand subdued. He united them under one
  control he set up his images in the West their
  booty he brought over at his word. Over the hosts
  of he world he reigned supreme. Against Kassala
  he marched, and he turned Kassala into mounds and
  heaps of ruins he destroyed the land and left
  not enough for a bird to rest thereon. Afterward
  in his old age all the lands revolted against
  him, and they besieged him in Akkad and Sargon
  went forth to battle and defeated them he
  accomplished their overthrow, and heir
  widespreading host he destroyed. Afterward he
  attacked the land of Subartu in his might, and
  they submitted to his arms, and Sargon settled
  that revolt, and defeated them he accomplished
  their overthrow, and their widespreading host he
  destroyed, and he brought their possessions into
  Akkad. The soil from the trenches of Babylon he
  removed, and the boundaries of Akkad he made like
  those of Babylon. But because of the evil which
  he had committed, the great lord Marduk was
  angry, and he destroyed his people by famine.
  From the rising of he sun unto the setting of the
  sun they opposed him and gave him no rest.

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Sumers decline

• After the Akkadian hegemony, Sumerian cities
  regained their hegemony.
• By 2000 B. C. E., Sumers neighbors coveted its
  cities and resources.
• Major pattern in history of Middle East is the
  invasion of settled areas by vigorous but more
  primitive people on the borders.
• Babylonia Amorites overran lower Mesopotamia by
  1900 B. C. E.

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Amorite Civilization (1900-1600

• Sumerian kings were considered divine Amorites
  had to justify their usurpation.
• Accomplished this through centralization.
• Various Sumerian cities were brought under
  central control by Amorite kings headquartered at
  Babylon.
• Political order replaced the chaos of rival city
  states. To some degree, people traded
  independence for security.

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Hammurabi, (r. 1792-1760)

• Considered greatest Amorite king
• Most famous for his code of laws.

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Hammurabis Code

• By what it regulated and the language it used to
  depict the regulation, it tells us much about
  Babylonian society.
• It was class based with much wealth and power
  concentrated in the hands of the few.
• There was not equality before the law a crime
  against a rich person might lead to the death
  penalty a crime against a poor person was not
  considered as severe.
• Crimes against the public order got the death
  penalty.
• Women were legally inferior to men but had more
  rights than they would possess under Hebraic and
  Roman Law.

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Revolutionary Features in the Law Code

• The State, not private parties, will dispense
  justice.
• Lex talionis an eye for an eye replaced a
  life for an eye.
• State regulation of sexuality and family matters
  and a public good. (Origin of police powers
  concept.)

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Mesopotamia

• A birthplace of civilization, Mesopotamia would
  continue to host a welter of civilizations and
  invaders until modern times.
• The qualitative difference between Mesopotamian
  civilization and the transhumance existence of
  prior humans provides data to define the
  characteristics of human civilization
  inductively.