Ancient History Intro + Unit 1

Historiography

The study of how history has been written, the history of history

External Criticism

The process of testing authenticity and validity of a historical source

Autographa

The original unprocessed document/manuscript

Myth

Stories of the divine and mans relationships with the divine

Legend

Stories that can act as sign posts to historians and contain some truth

Stratigraphy

A branch of Geology that studies rock layers and layering to understand Earth and Ancient Civilizations

Radio-carbon Dating

a scientific method that measures the radioactive decay of carbon to find the age of organic materials

Social History

field of historical study that focuses on the daily lives of ordinary people

Chronology

the arrangement of events, records, or dates in the exact order in which they happened

Mental Baggage

preconceived ideas that led people to interpret events or draw conclusions in a way that meets their expectations

Nabonidus

Ruled Ancient Iraq. known to have excavated ancient buildings and even set up a museum so that he could display the objects he found.

Maurice de lorraine

proper excavation first efforts to tunnel into the ground

Hutton & Lyle

CJ Thomsen

created three age system (stone, bronze, iron), began cataloguing the objects in denmark

Champollion and Rawlinson

Deciphered hieroglyphics and cuneiform script

Wiliam Petrie

Styles of pottery can help date ages

Wheeler and Kenyon

Invented the method where you are in 5 meter squares so travel between squares was easier

Focus of History

Change

Main question of history

why?

Four major factors of history

Events, recording, Subjective factor, judgement of the historian

Example of Historical Legends

Atlantis, Robin Hood, King Arthur

Sargon

United Mesopotamia and spread its culture around the fertile crescentHa

Hammurabi

Established Babylons the leading power and created Hammurabis Law code, which is the earliest written law code

Levee

embankments produced by the build up of sediemnt over thousnds of years of flooding

Despotic

A system of government in which the ruler has absolute power and authority

Cuneiform

The written language of the sumerians meaning “wedge shaped“P

Polytheistic

A religion that follow more than one god

Ziggurat

A stack of platforms decorated and painted beneath with the temple on the top

Cradle of Civilization

Mesopotamia was the birthplace of modern civilization

Significance of the Moabite stone

Found in 1868