Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq) formed 7000 BC

Farming and Cities  Used irrigation and built canals to control water  Surplus of food = fewer farmers = artisans

Government  Akkadians and Sumerians live peacefully  Around 2300 BC, Sargon (army defeated Sumer = world’s first empire)  Sargon dies  Ur conquers  Mesopotamia is powerful

Religion  Polytheism—many gods Priests—relied on to gain gods’ favor

Society 1.Monarch 2.Priest 3.Artisans—craftspeople, merchants, traders 4.Farmers/laborers 5.Slaves

Cuneiform-Sumerian Writing System

Cities  City-State—combined of city (urban) and countryside (rural) Ur, Uruk, and Kish  depended on military strength  “The Epic of Gilgamesh ” (Uruk’s King)

MEN vs WOMEN MEN  political power  made laws  received education  scribes WOMEN  cared for home and children  few were educated  priestesses

Babylonians  Hammurabi becomes king in 1792 BC  His Code or laws (282 laws) was the first evidence EVER of a justice system  “Eye for an eye”

Babylonians Babylon under Hammurabi Hammurabi with Shamash (the Sun-god)

Hittites 1.Ironworking = strong weapons 2.Chariot—wheeled horse-drawn cart used in battle a.Captured Babylon 1595 BC

Hittites

Assyrians  1200 BC controlled Babylon  900 BC conquered Fertile Crescent, parts of Asian Minor and Egypt

Assyrians

Hanging Gardens of Babylon

Phoenicians  Expanded trade  Created on of the world’s first alphabets—in which ours is based on

Phoenicians Finqiya means all caps in Phoencian terms