Early Human History and Ancient Civilizations Vocabulary

A set of vocabulary flashcards covering early human development, prehistoric eras, hominids, and ancient Fertile Crescent civilizations based on lecture notes.

City State

A state with political and economic control over the surrounding countryside.

Theocracy

A government established by divine authority, such as religion.

Empire

A large political state or unit, usually under a single leader, that controls many people or territories.

Sargon

Leader of the Akkadians who became the first emperor.

Hammurabi

A Babylonian King who wrote down laws in $1992\text{ OCE}$ to establish order in Tigris and Euphrates, which included rights for women.

Zoroastrianism

The Persian religion founded by a prophet who held a belief in a universal struggle between good and evil.

Cyrus the Great

Persian leader who conquered land in the Fertile Crescent and built an extensive route system for his army.

Assyrians

Inhabitants of the Fertile Crescent known for being fierce warriors who used iron weapons, chariots, and cavalry, with their capital at Nineveh.

Nineveh

The Assyrian capital containing a huge library of clay tablets featuring literature, art, and the Epic of Gilgamesh.

Epic of Gilgamesh

A mythical story of a king's journey to the underworld preserved in the library at Nineveh.

Nebuchad zezzar

A Chaldean ruler whose astronomers improved the calendar and who built the Hanging Gardens of Babylon for his wife.

Hittites

An ancient group that learned to use iron and kept its production secret to win in combat.

Paleolithic

The Old Stone Age, characterized by the development of fire, clothing, hunting, and gathering.

Mesolithic

The Middle Stone Age, characterized by the development of pottery, fish hooks, bows, and arrows.

Neolithic

The New Stone Age, marked by farming, which is considered the most important development in human history.

Beringia

A land bridge between Siberia and Alaska formed by glaciers between $10,000$ and $100,000$ years ago, crossed by nomads following herds of mammoth and bison.

Artifacts

Objects made and used by human hands or hominids, such as tools, clothing, works of art, weapons, and toys.

Fossils

Bone or plant matter solidified into stone that can be carbon-dated.

Archeology

The study of people through artifacts.

Anthropology

The study of cultures, both past and present.

Hominids

Humans and other early human-like creatures.

Culture

A set of beliefs, knowledge, and patterns of living developed by a group of people.

Lucy

A female hominid skeleton discovered in Ethiopia in $1974$ by a team led by Donald Johnson, believed to have lived $3$ million years ago.

Mary Leakey

Anthropologist who discovered a $3.7$ million-year-old Australopithecus hominid skeleton in Tanzania.

Neanderthals

European and SW Asian Homo sapiens living $35,000$ to $130,000$ years ago who buried their dead, showing beliefs in religion and an afterlife.

Cro-Magnons

European Homo sapiens from about $35,000$ years ago known for complex tools and cave wall art in France and Spain.

Nomads / Hunter-gatherers

People who move around continuously in search of food and do not have permanent homes.

Agriculture

The raising of crops for food; farming.

Domestication

The taming of animals such as cattle, goats, and sheep for food and/or labor.

Civilization

A complex culture meeting at least three criteria: producing surplus food, establishing large towns with a government, and practicing specialization of labor.

Irrigation

A system using ditches and canals to move water to crops in fields.

Artisans

Craftspeople performing specialized work, such as potters and carpenters.

Cultural Diffusion

The spread of ideas and cultural elements from one area to another through trade, language, writing, maps, education, and marriage customs.

Pictographs

A form of picture writing.

Stylus

A wedge instrument used to press writing marks into clay tablets.

Cuneiform

A wedge-shaped system of writing created by pressing marks into clay tablets using a stylus.

Ziggurats

Temple structures representing religion and architecture in ancient Sumerian civilization.

Polytheism

The religious practice of worshipping multiple gods.

Sumer

An ancient Fertile Crescent civilization that developed the arch, a number system based on $60$, and likely created the wheel.

Ur

The best-known city in Sumer and Mesopotamia.