mesopotamia

Mesopotamia before the creation of city states

• Samarra phase

  • 6500 to 5900 BCE

• Halafian phase

  • 6100 to 5100 BCE

• Hassuna phase

  • Around 6500 BCE

• ubaid phase

  • 6000 to 4200 BCE

ubaid phase

• The foundation for the mesopotamian civilization

• One of the first ever widespread cultures

• Farmers settle in the southern plain and establish villages

• Began temple institution (the central point of the society) and expansion of irrigation

eridu

• In 4500 BCE

• Urbanization

• 2 tiered

  • Irrigation

  • Plow farming

• The settlement was unwalled

• The ubaid culture spread across:

  • Eridu, northern plain,  Persian Gulf coast, Oman (copper)

  • Because traders would move to places with materials

• They sailed

  • Evidence is Ubaid pottery found in Egypt

temple institution

• The focus of the ubaid society

• Held patron gods and religious authority

• Responsible for:

  •  irrigation

  •  water allocation

    • Powerful because they lived on a floodplain

  • trade

    • because they had storage facilities

• Main land holders and employers of the land

  • Settlements tend to grow around temples

• At this point not yet priest rulers

  • Influence still limited but grew as settlements grew

  • Not coercive

• Produced and received the surplus of the land

  • Allowed them to obtain luxury items which reinforce their status

  • The priests started wearing the regalia that belonged to the temple which began the process of them being in a higher class

uruk revolution

• 4200 to 3100 BCE

• The beginning of the first city and city states

  • Cities were walled

  • There were smaller centres and agricultural centres

• Had writing, wheeled vehicles, craft specialization

• Religion was centralized but control was secular

  • The first king

• Trading networks expanded

• Social hierarchy is evident

  • Beyond just priests and farmers

uruk

• the city

• aka warka

• Had full time bureaucracy, military

•  social hierarchy

  • 4 tiered based on settlement

• The first ever true city

• Largest of the uruk period

• Huge increase in number of settlements after 4000 BCE

• 40,000 to 80,000 people

tells

• Artificial mounds

  • made of Mud brick buildings that collapsed and rubbish of city dwellers

• The main remnant of Mesopotamian cities

• In various abandoned places in the desert because rivers changed their course

secular rulers

• There was a government That included a secular ruler in the uruk period

• Evidence

  • Images of men taking enemies and prisoners

  • Sculptures of male individuals with long hair, beard, and net skirts that possibly was the ruler

• Men dominated politics even though both genders were prominent in temple institutions

cult deities

• Imagery of gods were made from wood and covered in gold

  • According to sumerian written records

• Gods were in the idol itself and in the spiritual realm

• They were carried through communities

• Feasts were organized for them and they were praised

• They had great influence over peoples lives

sumerian civilization

• Within the early dynastic period

  • 2900 to 2350 BCE

early dynastic period

• Written records were for more than just trade

  • Including kings lists, literature, poetry

• The age of the southern sumerian city states

• The southern plain was divided into two parts

  • Sumer = South

  • Akkad = north

the bronze age

• Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin

• More stronger and durable

• Better for agriculture

•  warfare

  • Used for weapons and wheeled vehicles that were pulled by donkeys or ox

trade

• Afghanistan

  • Lapus lazuli

• Anatolia AKA Turkey

  • Obsidian

  • chert

  • Lead

  • Gold

  • Silver

• Persian Gulf

  • Copper

  • pearls

• Southern Arabia

  • Steatite

  • Diorite

  • Copper

• Indus

  • Carnelian

cemetery of the city of Ur

• Just outside of the city

• Excavated by Woolley in 1922

• 2500+ burials

  • Simply pits with people wrapped in mats or in a wooden coffin

• 16 graves were royal

  • Had lavish goods

  • Buried in brick or stone chambers

  • Included human sacrifices and prestigious objects

• Human sacrifices stopped being a thing after the early dynastic period

queen puabi

• She was placed on a wooden bier (bed)

• Cloaked with lapis

• Gold and carnelian beads, wigs, gold bands

• Included three attendants

• A death pit surrounded her consisting of men, female attendance, oxen, grooms

  • A total of 59 human sacrifices

  • Most of them were also wearing gold and silver jewelry

• Under her tomb is that of a man who might be her husband

  • He had 19 female and two male sacrifices

  • 6 oxen

  • Chariots, musical instruments, silver objects

akkadian empire

• 2334 to 2230 BCE

  • About 50 years

• The first empire of the near east

• Lebanon, syria, anatolia, southern Mesopotamia

• Biggest expansion was under the grandson of sargon the first,  naram-sin

• Rulers after this increased irrigation to increase wealth but it wasn't enough to sustain the empire

  • Collapse due to drought, outside pressure, bad ruling

sargon I

• A priestess had a son in secret

  • Sargon means legitimate ruler

  • Probably making up for the fact that he was a usurper

• the myth

  • He was placed in the basket on the Euphrates

  • Was found and raised at the Royal Court and became a ruler

  • Just like Moses's story

• Kingship used to shift amongst the city states but now there was 1 ruler

• A great warrior

• He established iconography for the male form and depicted rulers to be larger than life

 

naram sin of akkad

• Declares himself divine

  • Both the spiritual and secular authority

• Undermines the authority of the temple

  • The temple is still very powerful

• Not sure if his authority exerted over the larger city states

  • They were defeated by him but they weren't necessarily controlled

•  the image

  • depicts himself with a helmet with horns which only gods wear

  • Larger than the other figures to show himself as God

imperial Ur

• 2112 to 2004 BCE

• The third dynasty of Ur

• An important port for Indian Ocean trade

• Influence expanded through diplomacy and religion not warfare

  • More emphasis on alliances

• Had large ziggurats, wrote codes of law found in tablets in nippur