Outline: Part 1, Chapter 1
From the Origins of Agriculture to the First River-Valley Civilizations
Civilization is a very vague term defining complex societies. Eight characteristics define what we consider to be
a civilization: administrative centers, political system based on territory, not kinship, specialized industry (nonfood producing), accumulation of wealth by certain groups, monumental building, permanent record keeping,
long distance trade, and advances in science and the arts.
1. BEFORE CIVILIZATION
a. Tool-making and artwork indicate complex prehistoric societies.
i. A good example is the Lascaux cave art (Southern France).
ii. Culture is defined as learned patterns of action and expression. This includes religion, art,
knowledge, and technology.
1. “Material culture” refers to physical objects, such as dwellings, clothing, and tools.
b. History is defined as the study of past events and changes in the development, transmission, and
transformation of cultural practices.
c. Stone Age: 2 million years ago – 4,000 years ago
i. Characteristics: stone & nonmetallic tools.
ii. Paleolithic Age: until 10,000 years ago
iii. Neolithic Age: until 3,000 years ago
1. Origins of agriculture
d. FOOD GATHERING AND STONE TOOLS
i. Cooking, Traveling, and Shelter
1. Foraged – gathered wild vegetables
2. Occasionally ate meat for feasts.
3. Animal skins would be used for clothing, shelter
4. Women did the gathering and cooking.
5. Housing was not a priority
a. Foragers moved often
b. Permanent structures were only by riverbeds with abundant fish
ii. Clothing and Lifestyle
1. Animal skin clothing – 70,000 years ago
2. Fiber clothing – 26,000 years ago
3. In game-rich areas only 3-5 hours per day would go towards foraging and hunting
a. More time for art, tool making, social life
iii. Nonstone Technologies, Art, and Religion
1. Foundations of science, art, and religion come from the Stone Age
2. People knew their natural environment
a. Which plants were best for food
b. What animals were best to hunt
c. How to use plant and animal parts for
i. Twine
ii. Building materials
iii. Dyes
d. How to use natural substances for medicine
3. Painting and drawing were main forms of artistic expression
a. Painted wild animals
b. Hunts
e. THE AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTIONS
i. 10,000 years ago
1. Climate change forced
a. Domestication of animals
b. Food production
2. As a result, population increased
ii.
iii.
iv.
v.
3. Agricultural Revolutions: Then change from food gathering to food production that
occurred between ca. 8000 and 2000 BCE (a.k.a. the Neolithic Revolution).
A Gradual Process
1. Families settled near crop fields
2. Tools for agriculture
a. Polished stone heads to work soil
b. Bone with stone bits embedded to ground grain
c. Fire to clear brush
Middle East Wheat and Barley
1. First transition to agriculture happened in the Middle East around 8,000 BCE
a. Wild grasses transformed into grain
i. Example: Wheat and barley
b. Alternated the cultivation of grains and pulses
i. Kept the soil fertile
c. Men typically tended the fields
2. 6,000 BCE – Plant domestication in Greece
3. 4,000 BCE – Plant domestication in Central Europe
4. 3,000 BCE – Plant domestication in the rest of Europe
a. Swidden agriculture: leaving fields to fallow after growing seasons to restore
fertility
5. 2,600 BCE – Oxen used to plow fields in central Europe
African, Asian, and American Crops
1. No wheat and barley in Africa
a. Unsuitable rainfall patterns
2. 8,000 BCE – Sorghum domesticated in Africa
3. Saharan farmers also grew
a. Black-eyed peas
b. Pearl millet
c. Sesame
d. Gourds
4. 5,000 BCE – drier conditions forced many to the Nile Valley
a. Annual flooding provided fertile farming soil
5. West Africa – domesticated yams and rice
6. 5,000 BCE - Southern China, Northern SE Asia, Northern India
a. Domesticated rice
7. 5,000 BCE – Americas
a. Domesticated maize, manioc, beans, and squash
8. 4,000 BCE – Americas (modern day Peru)
a. Quinoa
Animal Domestication
1. First animal domesticated: the dog
a. In Siberia. Helped track wild game.
2. Domesticated animals help provide
a. Meat
b. Milk
c. Fiber
d. Energy
3. 7000 BCE – Middle East
a. Domestication of goats
4. Animals helped plow fields – good for grain production
a. Droppings became good fertilizer
5. However, in the Americas domestication of animals wasn’t as great
a. Few species to domesticate
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
Eastern animals couldn’t cross the submerged Bering land bridge.
Llamas provided transport and wool
Dogs, guinea pigs, and turkeys provided meat.
Hunting was most important
vi. Pastoralism
1. A way of life dependant on large herds of small/large stock
a. In arid parts of Africa, Central Asia
i. 2500 BCE – Pastoralism replaces farming in the Sahara
1. Too dry to farm; many move southward
2. Moved often, like foragers.
a. No substantial housing
b. No accumulation of possessions
c. Bartered skins, meat, milk for other goods
vii. Agriculture and Ecological crisis
1. Temperate climates became very warm between 6000 – 2000 BCE.
2. Lack of wild food in the ME prompted food production
3. Aborigines (Australia) still foraged by this point.
4. Amerindians hunted, fished. Little farming
a. Equitorial, South Africa does the same, also foraged
5. Between 5000 BCE – 1000 BCE world pop. doubles 10mil – 50/100mil
LIFE IN NEOLITHIC COMMUNITIES
i. Food producers
1. Worked harder, longer hours versus foragers
2. Less starvation. Could store food.
3. Died earlier. Exposed to diseases in permanent settlements.
a. From domesticated animals/their waste
b. From their own waste
ii. The Spread of Agriculture
1. Peaceful transition from foraging/hunting to farming
2. Small surpluses = advantage for farmers
a. Led to population expansion
b. As fields expanded, people moved closer to their fields, thus expanding farming
in general.
3. Farming spread from SE to NE in Europe
iii. Society and Religion
1. Farming communities were organized around
a. Kinship (lineages or clans)
i. Matrilineal society – descending via the mother
ii. Patrilineal society – descending via the father
b. Marriage
2. Religion
a. Revolved around nature.
i. Food gatherers – worshiped sacred groves, springs, animals
ii. Pastoralists – worshiped the Sky God (controls rains)
iii. Farmers – worshiped the Earth Mother (source of new life)
b. Examples of Neolithic worship
i. Megaliths (structures/complexes of large stones for
ceremonial/religious purposes)
1. Egypt – 5000 BCE. Burial chambers for ancestors. Large portal of
stones illuminated by sun during summer solstice.
2. Ireland – 3200 BCE. Newgrange. Burial chambers for ancestors.
Portal illuminated during the winter solstice.
3. England – 2000 BCE. Stonehenge.
3. Denser villages had specialized crafts, storage buildings for food, etc.
iv. Jericho and Catal Huyuk
1. Jericho – Israel. 8000 BCE
a. Had round, mud-brick dwellings.
b. By 7000 BCE had rectangular buildings with plastered walls, courtyards
c. Defensive walls around the settlement (10 acres)
2. Catal Huyuk – Turkey. 7000 – 5000 BCE
a. Mud brick rooms with decoration.
b. No defensive wall (32 acres)
i. Walls of houses formed a continuous barrier (no windows, doors)
1. Entered houses by ladder & on roof.
c. Traded obsidian (black, glossy igneous rock)
i. Good for tools, weapons, mirrors, decoration
d. Made pottery, wove baskets, wove cloth, made stone/shell beads, worked
leather and wood
e. House size varied
i. No evidence of dominant class
f. Farmer barley, vegetables wheat
g. Domesticated pigs, goats, sheep
h. Art
i. Depicted hunting
ii. Depicted people in leopard skins
i. Funerary/Religious practices
i. Men buried with weapons of war/hunting
ii. Every 2 houses = 1 religious shrine
1. Horned wild bulls, female breasts, leopards, handprints,
goddesses.
2. Offered meat, grains, legumes
3. Plump female goddesses outnumbered any male gods
v. Metallurgy and Architecture
1. Metalworking = specialized craft/occupation in late Neolithic.
a. Silver and gold were worked very early
i. Nice, but soft & couldn’t help farming/hunting
ii. Status symbols
2. Specialized crafts emerged with development of towns
a. Extra food needed for craftsmen, priests
b. Labor needed to erect buildings, walls, religious structures
i. Freely performed or coerced?
2. MESOPOTAMIA
a. Mesopotamia – Greek. “Land between the rivers.” Modern Iraq.
i. Land = between the Tigris & Euphrates
ii. Start in modern Anatolia (Turkey), move SE & empty into Persian Gulf.
iii. Alluvial plain – flat, fertile
b. Settled Agriculture in an Unstable Landscape
i. Irrigation Agriculture
1. Agriculture in MPT 5000 BCE
2. Hot climate, little rainfall
a. Needs irrigation – artificial diversion of water to crops
b. 3000 BCE – MPT construct canals to divert water
3. 4000 BCE – ox-plows to till earth.
a. Barley – main crop
i. Could handle warm, dry conditions
b. Fields left fallow every other year to keep earth fertile
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Date palms provided wood, food, fiber
Gardens – vegetables
River reeds – fiber used for mats, baskets
Fish – dietary staple
Sheep, goats – grazed on fallow land. Meat, milk, wool.
Donkeys carried heavy loads
a. By 2000 BCE camels & horses would do this.
c. Sumerians and Semites
i. Sumerians – Dominated southern MPT from 4th MBCE until end of 3rd MBCE
1. Created irrigation, cuneiform, & MPT religion
ii. Semites – (adj. Semitic) Family of related languages spoken across parts of western Asia and
North Africa. 2900 BCE
1. Hebrew, Aramaic, Phoenician, Arabic
2. Lived in peace with the Sumerians
3. By 2000 BCE, Semites were politically dominant
a. Semitic language, Akkadian, supplants Sumerian
b. However, Semites keep much of Sumerian culture
i. Sumerian literature even translated into Akkadian
d. Cities, Kings, and Trade
i. MPT = land of villages & cities
1. Groups of farming families banded together for work, protection
2. City-state: small, independent state with an urban center and surrounding agricultural
territory.
a. MPT, Archaic/Classical Greece, Phoenicia, early Italy
3. City dwellers would farm in surrounding farmland
4. Others were specialized craftsmen or priests
a. Pottery, artwork, clothing, weapons, tools
b. Specialists depended on extra food production
5. Cities would collect surplus food & in return offer protection to rural districts & farmers
6. Still, many cities built defensive walls
ii. Religious and Political leaders
1. New land could be cultivated for farming with canals
a. Dams raised/lowered water level
b. Drainage ditches took water away
i. Take harmful elements in water away from crops (salt)
c. Operating canals needed centralized organization via city leaders
d. Other operations needed this too
i. Wall construction
ii. Building construction
iii. Sheep shearing
iv. Harvesting
v. Warfare
iii. Little known about political organization
1. King/religious structures were default centers of power
2. Lugal – big man (king), Sumeria 3rd MBCE
a. Possibly chosen by his fellow citizens
b. Central location of temple suggests greater importance than king
c. However, king presented himself as earthy representative of a deity & saw over
upkeep of temples, rituals, other infrastructure concerns, & justice
iv. Early Regional Empires
1. 2350 BCE Sargon (ruled the city of Akkad) united many cities under one king/capital. 4
family members followed him.
a. Retained power by razing walls of conquered cities.
b. Then installed governors loyal to Akkad.
c. Garrisoned the cities with loyal troops.
d. Gave the troops land to ensure loyalty
e. Adapted cuneiform to their semitic language
2. 2230 BCE Akkadians fall.
3. 2112-2004 BCE Third Dynasty of Ur
a. Used marriages to retain power
b. Obsessive record keeping
c. Many administrators, bureaucracy
d. Networks of road messengers (very communicative)
e. Had an official calendar
f. Standard weights and measures
i. All of these benefited those in power
g. Built 125mi. wall to keep out Amorites
h. Toppled by outside incursions, worst being the Elamite incursion.
4. Amorites then founded Babylon, not far from Akkad
a. Largest, most important city in MPT. Hammurabi’s home.
b. 1792-1750 BCE – Hammurabi’s military campaigns enlarge “old Babylonian
State”
i. Law Code – on a polished, black stone pillar
1. Severe physical punishments
2. Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth
5. Many conquests driven by desire for vital resources
a. Otherwise, had to trade for raw materials
6. 3rd MBCE - Eventually merchants are employed by palace or temple
a. had the means to do this
nd
7. 2 MBCE – Independent merchants became more powerful
a. Bartered, traded
b. Valued items by weights of precious metal (silver) or grain
e. Mesopotamian Society
i. Social classes
1. Generated by urbanized civilizations
2. Classes separated by legal/political privilege
3. Control of agriculture or even record keeping meant power
4. Law Code of Hammurabi
a. 3 social divisions
i. Free landowners, including royalty, ranking officials, warriors, priests,
merchants, craftsmen, shopkeepers
ii. Dependent farmers and craftsmen, legally attached to royal, temple, or
private estates
ii. Slaves and Peasants
1. Slavery wasn’t fundamental, not widespread
2. Slaves came from captured peoples
3. Debtors
4. Identified by their hairdo
5. In general, most people lived in poverty
6. Written record kept my male scribes – trained professionals in reading/writing for
royalty
iii. Women
1. Lost social standing
a. Men could do hard work in fields, women couldn’t
2. Generally, men did all the work in the fields and canals
3. Women could own property
a. Could engage in trade
b. Could keep their dowry
c. Prostitutes, fortunetellers, textile/brewery workers
4. Tended to the household
5. Women lost more social standing 2 MBCE
a. Rise of urbanized middle class & private wealth
b. Men could take other wives if 1st gave no children
f. Gods, Priests, and Temples
i. Gods
1. Sumerian gods = gods of nature
2. Anthropomorphic: gods of nature with human bodies/conduct
3. Mesopotamians = fearful of these gods, wanted to appease them
ii. State Religion
1. Temples = religious structures of the state
2. Main temple houses main deity
a. Smaller chapels for smaller gods
b. Large statue represented deity, had its life force
i. Priests maintained this statue, temple daily
3. Ziggurat: massive pyramidal stepped tower made of mud bricks. Function unknown.
4. Priests
a. Passed office to sons when they died
b. Hierarchy within the priesthood
iii. Private religion
1. Amulets: small charms meant to protect bearer from evil (commoners)
2. Hard to determine. No written record. Go by material culture.
g. Technology and Science
i. Techne: Greek. “Skill”
ii. Writing
1. Appeared in MPT before 3300 BCE.
a. Tablets found in temple at Uruk
2. Tokens?
3. Clay tablets, reed stylus
4. Cuneiform: wedge shaped symbols represented words, or syllables.
a. Originated in MPT
b. Used by Sumerians, Akkadians
i. Later Hittites, Elamites, Persians
c. Tough skill, only administrators/scribes knew it
d. Several hundred signs
e. First cuneiform documents were economic, but then covered art, literature,
politics, science, etc.
iii. Transportation, Metallurgy, and Engineering
1. Cattle-drawn plows, boats/barges, donkeys
2. MPT had to import metals
a. Used combo of copper/tin/arsenic to make bronze
i. Stronger than stone
ii. Very valuable commodity
3. Clay used widely for artwork, house wares, walls
iv. Warfare
1. Armies were originally untrained militias
2. Professional soldiers = 2nd MBCE
a. Coincides with horses in MPT
i. Chariots
v. Mathematics and Science
1. Multiples of 60
a. Origin of seconds & minutes
2. Astronomy
a. Recorded events according to astronomy
3. EGYPT
a. The Land of Egypt: “Gift of the Nile” (nickname: Herodotus)
i. River and Desert
1. 100 miles to Mediterranean – Nile delta
2. River was main means of transport/communication
3. Southern boundary of Egypt was the First Cataract
4. Rain rarely falls south of the delta
5. September – flooded banks
ii. Natural Resources
1. Many in Egypt. Led to self-sufficiency.
a. Fish in river, clay in banks, copper & turquoise deposits in the east, gold in the
south
2. Farming in Egypt: 5500 BCE.
a. Sahara dries out over 2 millenia, people move towards Nile
b. Divine Kingship
i. Unification of Egypt: Menes.
1. King of 2 Lands: Upper/Lower. Two crowns.
2. Egypt unified early in its history, unlike MPT.
3. 30 Dynasties (attr. to Manetho 3rd CBC)
a. Old, middle, new kingdoms
4. Pharaoh = king. God sent to earth to maintain ma’at (order of the universe).
a. Link between people/gods
b. Gods were beneficent
ii. Royal Tombs
1. Early tombs were flat-topped of mud brick
2. Djoser 2630 BCE (3rd dynasty) builds 1st pyramid at Saqqara
a. Followed by Khufu 2550 & Khefren 2490 at Giza
3. Made with stone tools, levers, pulleys, rollers, human power
c. Administration and Communication
i. Centralized Administration
1. Capitals
a. Memphis (near apex of the delta) – Old Kingdom
b. Thebes (south) – Middle/New Kingdom
2. Palace, bureaucracy, army supported by 50% tax rate
a. Kept track of people , land, products, long-distance trade
i. In MPT, urban middle class did this
ii. Writing
1. Ruling class – literate.
2. Hieroglyphics – pictorial symbols represented sounds, syllables, or concepts.
a. Used for monumental inscriptions
b. Cursive form used on papyrus (papyrus native to Egypt)
i. Used by lower classes/scribes
3. High ranking officials served in the capital, lower ones in villages
iii. Tensions between Rulers and Officials
iv. Cities
1. Most Egyptians lived in rural communities & farmed
2. Capitals were mainly administrative centers, not as critical to commerce as their MPT
counterparts
v. Foreign Relations and Trade
1. Old/Middle Kingdoms – Isolationist FoPo
a. Xenophobic – foreigners = enemies
b. Mainly interested in raw materials in the area
i. Egypt traded w/the Levant
1. Exported gold, papyrus, grain
2. Imported cedar wood
2. Many desirable resources in the South (Nubia)
a. Gold especially
b. Could access tropical Africa on the Nile for
i. Ivory
ii. Ebony wood
iii. Jungle animals
3. Early 2nd MBCE – Egypt takes Nubia & its gold fields.
a. New border = 3rd cataract
d. The People of Egypt
i. 1-1.5 million people, no large migrations
ii. Peasant Life
1. Farmed, maintained canals
a. Archaeological record reflects property disputes
iii. Women’s Lives
1. Subordinate to men
2. Women = yellow flesh = indoor lifestyle
a. Men = red flesh = outdoor
3. Could own property
4. Could inherit from parents
5. Marriage = no ceremony, just an agreement
6. More legal rights in Egypt than MPT
e. Belief and Knowledge
i. Gods – Nile gods
1. Natural world was a place of cycles
2. Sky – great ocean around the world
3. Sun god – Re
4. Osiris (underworld), Isis, Horus
5. King
a. Intermediary between gods/people
i. Chief priest
ii. Lavished money on temples
iii. Keep the gods happy – rule will go well
6. In art – depicted with animal heads, usually given human form
7. When a town became capital, its god became prominent
a. Ptah = Memphis
b. Re = Heliopolis
c. Amon = Thebes
ii. Public and Private Cult
1. Bes – god of marriage
2. Magic strong in Egypt
iii. Burial and Afterlife
1. Death – journey beset with hazards
2. Book of the Dead – rituals/spells to protect journeying spirit
a. Final test: weighing of deceased’s heart by gods of underworld
3. Mummification – evidence of obsession with afterlife
4. Tombs – indicative of wealth
a. Shawabtis – figurines. servants to the deceased
b. Loaded with possessions, food
iv. Science and Technology
1. Accurate calendar
a. Star Sirius’ appearance on horizon = flood imminent
2. 50 mile canal to connect Nile to Red Sea
4. INDUS VALLEY CIVILZATION
a. Natural Environment
i. 1 million acre floodplain
ii. Floods twice a year
iii. Pamir and Himalayas’ melting snow feed the Indus
b. Material Culture
i. 2600-1900 BCE
ii. Urban Centers
1. 2 great cities among many
a. Harappa
i. NW frontier (modern Pakistan)
ii. Center for materials from Afghanistan/Iran
iii. Population 35k
iv. Defensive wall
b. Mohenjo-Daro
i. Largest of Indus Valley (modern Pakistan)
ii. Street grids, standardized building materials
1. Indicative of central planning
iii. Population >100k
iv. Defensive wall
2. 5000 BCE – earliest settlements
iii. Technology
1. Many metals (more than Egypt & MPT)
a. Available to most classes (not just elites)
2. Irrigation, potter’s wheel, building foundations
3. Writing – undecipherable, 400 characters
iv. Trade and Culture
1. Wide trading contacts.
2. Metals/stones from Iran/Afghanistan
3. Ore/timber from India
4. Indus river used for trade/transport
5. Little known about religious, social, political institutions
c. Transformation of the Indus Valley Civilization
i. Indus abandoned after 1900 BCE
1. Systems failure? Breakdown of institutions
a. Cause: natural disasters?
b. Cause: Hakra River drying up, salinating?
2. Village-based farming, herding take place
3. Elites didn’t have power, merged with lower classes