Transcript Kagan10ech01

Chapter 1
The Birth of Civilization
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Early Humans and Their Culture
Homo sapiens: emerged about 200,000
years ago
Culture
Definition: the ways of living built up by a
group and passed on from one generation to
another
Includes: behavior (courtship, child-rearing
practices, etc.); material goods (tools, clothing,
shelter, etc.); ideas, institutions, beliefs
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Paleolithic (“Old Stone”) Age:
1,000,000–10,000 B.C.E.
Dates from earliest use of stone tools
Hunter-gatherer societies
No agriculture
Learned to make and control fire
Acquired language
Forms of religious and magical belief emerge
Probable division of labor by sex
Men: hunting, fishing, tool- and weapon-making, fighting
Women: childbearing/rearing, gathering nuts/berries/grains, basket
weaving, clothing-making
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Neolithic (“New Stone”) Age:
10,000–3500 B.C.E.
Cultivation of agriculture
Domestication of animals
Transition from nomadic lifestyle to a more
settled agricultural existence
Greater control over nature
Invention of pottery
Population growth
Growth of cities
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Bronze Age: 3100–1200 B.C.E.
Refers to Near East and eastern
Mediterranean civilizations
Tin + copper = bronze (stronger and more
useful)
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Iron Age: After 1100 B.C.E.
(identified later in the chapter)
Discovery in northern Anatolia of how to
smelt iron
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Defining Civilization
Urbanization
Social change
Growth in population
Technological and industrial change
Bronze metallurgy
Long-distance trade
Writing
Representational art
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Mesopotamian Civilization
Tigris and Euphrates Rivers
Politically fragmented
Sumerian and Semitic languages
Akkadian influence
Sargon and unification
Naram-Sin and the victory stele
Babylonian dominance
Hammurabi (r. 1792–1750 B.C.E.)
Law code
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Mesopotamian Culture
Writing
Cuneiform
Writing restricted to an educated elite
Mathematics
Sexagesimal system (base-60)
Astronomy
Religion
Polytheistic
Nature gods
Pessimistic view of life and afterlife
Slavery
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Egyptian Civilization
Importance of the Nile River
Upper Egypt (south): Nile valley
Lower Egypt (north): Nile delta
Unification and trade
Security and optimism
Extraordinarily long political history
Old Kingdom (2700–2200 B.C.E.)
Pharaoh was a god on earth
Pyramids: pharaonic tombs representing power and wealth of Egypt
First Intermediate Period (2200–2052 B.C.E.)
Decentralization and disorder
Middle Kingdom (2052–1630 B.C.E.)
Power of pharaohs more limited
Second Intermediate Period (1630–1550 B.C.E.)
Arrival of the Hyksos
New Kingdom (1550–1075 B.C.E.)
Military expansion and empire
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Egyptian Culture
Language and literature
Hieroglyphics
Religion
Polytheistic
Akhetaten’s monotheism
Worship and the afterlife
Clear view of afterworld
Mummification
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Egyptian Society
Women
Women could own and control property, sue
for divorce, and had equal legal protection
Hatshepsut: powerful female pharaoh
Slaves
Became common during Middle Kingdom
Black Africans and Asians
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Ancient Near Eastern Empires
Hittites (1500–1200 B.C.E.)
Indo-European people occupying Asia Minor
Spoke language related to Greek and Sanskrit
Clashed with Egyptians at Kadesh, 1285 B.C.E.
Kassites & Mitannians
Kassites: Babylonia
Mitannians: northern Syria and Mesopotamia
Both conquering minorities, absorbed the
cultures of their subjects
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Ancient Near Eastern Empires
(cont.)
Assyrians
Semitic-speaking peoples in Assur, northern Mesopotamia
Major expansion, 1000–665 B.C.E.
Conquered Mesopotamia, southern Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine,
Egypt
Large, well-disciplined army; highly structured empire
Civil war and collapse at hands of Medes and Babylonians
Neo-Babylonians
Occupied much of former Assyrian empire
Nebuchadnezzar and wonders of Babylon
Conquered by Persians, 539 B.C.E.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
The Persian Empire
Arose in area of present-day Iran
Two main groups: Medes and Persians
Cyrus the Great (Cyrus II, r. 559–530
B.C.E.)
United Medes and Persians
Captured Asia Minor, Babylonia
Pursued policies of toleration
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
The Persian Empire (cont.)
Cambyses: son of Cyrus, conquered Egypt
Darius the Great (r. 521–486 B.C.E.)
Brought empire to its greatest extent
Extended east to northern India, west to the
edge of Greece, south to Egypt
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Persian Government
Hereditary monarchy with divine sanction
Sophisticated bureaucracy, semiautonomous provinces (satrapies), efficient
postal service, excellent roads
Adopted Aramaic as language of
government and commerce
Core army of Medes and Persians greatly
expanded with subject armies when
necessary
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Persian Religion
Original forms
Roots in Vedic religion brought to India by Aryan peoples ca.
1500 B.C.E.
Animal sacrifices, reverence for fire
Polytheistic, with Ahura Mazda (“Wise Lord”) as chief god
Zoroastrianism
Reforms of Zarathushtra (Zoroaster in Greek), ca. 1000
B.C.E.
Made Ahura Mazda only god
Life as eternal battle between good and evil
Chief Persian religion by 6th century B.C.E.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Palestine
Birthplace of Judaism, Christianity, and
Islam
Canaanites
First inhabitants
Farmers and seafarers
Phoenicians
Descendants of Canaanites
Seafarers with colonies across Mediterranean
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Palestine (cont.)
Israelites
Main historical source: Hebrew Bible
Conquered Canaan, 13th c. B.C.E.
Kingdom peaked under kings David and
Solomon, 10th c. B.C.E.
Then split: Israel (north) and Judah (south)
Israel conquered by Assyrians, Judah by NeoBabylonians (“Babylonian exile”)
Monotheistic religion with powerful ethical
element
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Mideastern Cultures:
General Outlook
Nature
Irregular, unpredictable, subject to divine whims
Human existence is therefore precarious
Only possible recourse is to magic
Gods, law, justice
Gods bound by no law or morality
Humans subject to destruction at any time
Tried to win gods over with prayers and sacrifices
Hebrew innovation: God capable of wrath and
destruction but open to persuasion and bound by
morality
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.
Greek Intellectual Revolution
6th c. B.C.E.: First purely rational inquiries
into natural world
Initiated both philosophy and science
First attempts to diagnose and cure disease
without reference to supernatural forces
Conceptions of law and justice as coming
from man
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc., Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved.