Highlights
4000 B.C. - 300 B.C.

• Uruk Period: 3800 BC-3200 BC
  (Ur I: 2600 BC - Ur II: 2360 BC - Ur III: 2112 BC)
• Amorites invade: 2000 BC
  (Beginning of Babylonian Empire)
• New Babylonian Empire: 605-547 BC
• Conquest by Persians: 539 BC
• Copper Age - Chalcolithic Age
  (Tools of copper, smelting began in the Middle East before 4000 BC)
• Bronze Age - man combined copper & tin to make stronger alloy.
  Casting of bronze began 3500-3000 B.C. in Mesopotamia
• First development of record-keeping, schools, democracy, vaults, arch, wheel
• Hammurabi Code of Law
• Developed cunieform: A distinctive form of writing

With the continuous development of village farming (raising crops and livestock started in the Neolithic period), settlements became more permanent. Two great civilizations arose about the same time. Mesopotamia, between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, in present day Iraq; the other, Egypt, united under pharaonic rule. For nearly three millennia, the two centers retained their distinct and individual character, even though they had close contact with each other.

Sumer is considered the first civilization in the world. From its beginning as a collection of farming villages around 5000 BC, through its conquest by Sargon of Agade in 2370 BC, to its final collapse under the Ammorites in 2000 BC, Sumer was a powerful influence to both neighbors and conquerors throughout its history of constant invasions, rebellions, and changing dynasties. The Sumerian cunieform writing is the earliest written language.

The oldest written political history in the world, 4500 BC, was compiled by the king of Ladash as a lesson to the city of Umma, whose attempt at conquest had failed. It is in the Sumerian language.

The New Babylonian Empire, under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar II (605 BC), took measures to strengthen the empire. By 612 BC, the Assyrians were defeated. What has been excavated at Marduk and the Hanging Gardens of Babylon was all from the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II. During this time, two main cults of worship became strong. The Cult of the Moon god (male) - Nanna, also known as Sin, was widely practiced among the Semites; and the Cult of Marduk, a Babylonian cult. Nabonidus (556 BC-539 BC), ruler of Babylon, practiced the Cult of the Moon and opened new trades routes with others of the same belief.

Promoting trade with Yathrib (Medina) and northwestern Arabia brought antagonism among the citizens of Babylon. By 547 BC, Babylon fell to the Persian Cyrus with little resistance. For the next few centuries, the fertile land that was Mesopotamia was influenced by the North.

Excavations have uncovered artifacts representing a culture that had a high regard for both social organization and ceremony: pottery, mosaics, relief, metalwork, cylinder-seals, sculpture in clay, gypsum, diorite, and ivory.

Read over the First Mathematicians, and then take the .....
Ancient Near East Travel Check-In Exam

Babylonian mathematical texts comprised about 200 tables, showing tables for multiplication, division, and the calculations of reciprocals, powers, and roots; and 100 texts describing algebraic problems, solving quadratic equations, and showing the understanding of the value of pi to within 0.6%. They also devised geometric processes and a method for measuring angles by dividing a circle into 360 parts called degrees, dividing those degrees into 60 parts called minutes; then 60 additional parts called seconds. This is the origin of the modern telling of time.

The Sumerian language, written and spoken, was a combined form of dialects introduced into Mesopotamia by waves of immigrants from the west.

The temple collected and distributed the harvest and kept accounts of economic matters. Writing and the recording of information was a "priestly priviledge." Ninety-five percent of all existing cuneiform tablets are economic in content. Others, from 3000 BC, are royal building inscriptions and hymns.

The White Temple (3500 BC-3000 BC) at the Sumerian city of Urak still survives on its ziggurat at the present day city of Warka. Its sloping sides are reinforced by solid brick masonry and rise to a height of forty feet upon a brick terrace. Stairs and ramps lead up to the platform on which stands the sanctuary of white-washed brick. The temple area was designed to be seen as a whole. The worshipper would start at the bottom of the stairs on one side and continue around many corners before reaching the top. It was designed as a processional path, an angular spiral leading to a place of the divine. This type of architectiure, called "bent-axis," is typical of Mesopotamian religious centers and is in contrast to the Egyptian straight-angled pyramids and temples.

Marduk (Tower of Babel) - Babylon - 1792 BC - 1750 B.C.

The Marduk ziggurat was built by Hammurabi, constructed within a large, sacred area on the southern end of the town of Babylon. It was surrounded by the Euphrates River, a canal, a double-wall, and a Processional Way. Its Sumerian name was Etemenanki - "The Foundation of Heaven and Earth." Marduk was the powerful god of magic. A found tablet, believed to be from the Greek historian Herodotus, describes the ziggurat as having seven stages of different colors with a temple at its top.

Ram in the Thicket

Found at the Royal Cemetary at Ur was a statuette of wood, overlaid with gold and silver, and inlaid with lapis lazuli. It shows a ram eating from a flowering tree. This is one of a pair found close together in the west corner of the Great Death Pit . This burial site held bodies of sixty-eight elaborately dressed women and six men. Both statues were found crushed, but the differences in the states of destruction helped in the restoring of both. They were thought to have been used as supports for an offering table.

It is engraved on a tall stone slab of diorite, showing Hammurabi at the top confronting the sun god, Shamash. Shamash's right arm is raised in a speaking gesture as if the sun god is reporting to the divine king.

This harp, or lyre, was found at Ur and dates from 3000-2700 BC. The head of the bull is inlaid with gold foil and lapis lazuli. - University Museum, Philadelphia

Plaque Showing Harpist - 2000-1600 BC

This baked clay plaque, to the left, was cast from a mold. The artist found this process simple and a very inexpensive way to produce multiple relief figures.


Hammurabi Law Code (1760 B.C.) In the later part of the third millenium, inhabitants of Northern Mesopotamia drifted south. They were less bound by a tradition of theocratic socialism, or divine guidance, and produced the first Mesopotamian rulers who openly called themselves kings and proclaimed their ambition to conquer their neighbors.

The greatest figure of this age was Hammurabi, (right), architect and powerful ruler, and his most memorable achievement was his law code.

This is the earliest written body of laws, rationally written and humane in concept.