Was Ancient Sumer a Civilization?
History Alive
Chapter 5
5.1 Introduction
 Focus on Sumerian culture.
 In 1800’s archeologists
bean finding artifacts in
Mesopotamia.
 By studying artifacts the
archeologists have learned
about Sumer.
 One artifact is the Standard
of Ur.
Standard of Ur
 It was found where the city
of Ur once stood.
 It is made of wood and
decorated with shell and
lapis lazuli.
 It shows the Sumerians in
war and at peace.
Standard of Ur
Characteristics of a Civilization
Stable food
supply
Social
structure
System of
government
Religious
system
Highly
developed
culture
including
painting,
architecture,
music, and
literature
technology
Written
language
5.3 Stable Food Supply
 A stable food supply is
what allows people in a
society to have the food
they need in order to
survive.
Two Sumerian inventions that helped
create a stable food supply
 Complex irrigation system
including canals, dams, and
reservoirs to provide their
crops with water.
 The plow is a tool used for
turning the soil to prepare
it for planting.
5.4 Social Structure
 A social structure is the
way a society or civilization
is organized.
Upper
Class
Common
Class
Slaves
Sumerian Social Class Structure
Priests
Land owners
Government Officials
Upper
Class
These people had large
and luxurious two story
homes near the center
or the city.
Sumerian Social Class Structure
Merchants and
Craftspeople
•Metalworkers—
•Famers
•Fisherman
Common
Class
Lived in small,
mud-brick houses
at the edge of the
city.
Sumerian Social Class Structure
Lived in their
owners’ homes and
owned no property.
Slaves
5.5 Government
 The people or groups that
rule a particular region.
 Sumerian city-states were
ruled by kings who they
believed were chosen by
Sumerian Gods.
Sumerian Kings
 Enforced laws and
collected taxes.
 Built temples.
 Maintained the irrigation
system.
 Led his army to war.
List of the Sumerian Kings
Sumerian Government
 Sumerian Army
 Governors
 Scribes
 Irrigation Patrol
5.6 Religion
 A religious system includes
a set of beliefs, usually in
god or gods, together with
forms or worship.
 Sumerians built ziggurats.
 A ziggurat is an ancient
Mesopotamian temple
tower.
5.7 The Arts
 All civilizations have a
highly developed culture,
including the arts. Arts
include creative forms of
expression such as painting,
architecture, and music.
Artists and Craftspeople in Sumer
 Sumerian metalworkers
made weapons, cups,
mirrors, jewelry.
 Artisans also decorated the
ziggurats.
Sir Charles Leonard Woolley


Discovered the treasures from the
Royal Tombs of Ur

British archaeologist Charles Leonard Woolley (April 17,
1880-February 20, 1960) became famous for the artifacts
and information he uncovered during his magnificent
excavations at Ur. Woolley is noted as one of the first
modern archaeologists, and was knighted in 1935 for his
services to archaeology.
Born in London to a clergyman, Woolley graduated from
New College in Oxford, and in 1905 he became Assistant
Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. In 1922,
Woolley was chosen by the British Museum and the
University of Pennsylvania to lead the famous excavation at
Ur. The excavations of the temple complex and the ziggurat
in the city complex were impressive but it was the Royal
Cemetery of Ur which proved to be the most amazing
archeological find of the period. His most important
discovery was the tomb of "Queen" Puabi. Miraculously
untouched by looters, her tomb contained thousands of
beads and other pieces of jewelry including a seal bearing
her name in Sumerian. Buried with her were her
attendants, guards and musicians who had participated in
the funerary ceremony. Woolley was adept in conserving
objects while they were still in the ground. Filling the lost
wooden elements with wax, dowels, and plaster, he was
able to reconstruct the form of many objects. His work at
Ur, which ended in 1934, added tremendous amounts of
information to our knowledge of this early period.
Unwilling to rest on the laurels brought by the work at Ur,
he also excavated at the sites of Tell Atchana and al-Mina in
Syria. In addition to being a talented archaeologist, Woolley
wrote more than 25 books including Excavations at Ur: A
Record of 12Years'Work, published in 1954, and Spadework:
Adventures in Archaeology, published in 1953.
Sumerian Architects designed
ziggurats.
Sumerian Musicians
 Played the drums, pipes,
and a small harp called a
lyre.
 Lyres were wooden
instruments made of a
sound box and strings.
 The lyres were also
decorated.
5.8 Technology
 The use of tools and other
inventions for practical
purposes.
 Sumerians invented the
wheel.
5.8 Technology
 Sumerians also invented
the arch.
 An arch is an upside down
U- or V-shaped structure
that supports weight above
it, as in a doorway.
5.9 Writing
 The Sumerians created a
written language called
cuneiform.
 The names comes from the
Latin word for “wedge.”
 The Sumerians used a
wedge-shaped stylus to
etch their writing in clay
tablets.
5.10 Chapter Review
 Was Sumerian culture a civilization?
 What are the characteristics of a civilization?
( sfs, ss, g, r, a, t, wl)
The End