Ancient Mesopotamia was the earliest civilization in world history, and the longest lasting. It was probably also the most influential, as all later western civilizations were built on foundations it laid.
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Mesopotamia is known as one of the cradles of human civilization because during the fourth millennium BCE, the earliest cities in Western history were constructed in the area known as the “Fertile Crescent.” The surpluses won from organized agriculture opened up the area to trade with near and more distant neighbors.
The cultural openness of Mesopotamia is mirrored in its geography. The only land through which all trade routes from Europe to Asia and from Africa to Asia cross is Mesopotamia. The area's lack of natural boundaries (like difficult mountain ranges or large rivers) led the Mesopotamians to a receptiveness to external influences. Sometimes these influences were accepted and sometimes they were forced on the Mesopotamians by invading groups interested only in the material wealth to be appropriated from the land.
This receptivity led to Mesopotamia’s singular position in the history of human society. It must be seen as one of the first significant multilingual, multicultural societies in history, with its 3,000 years of development and no less than four major periods under different ruling groups (Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian, and Persian). Its culture also influenced its neighbors: the Egyptians, the Ancient Hebrews, and, to the East, India. Furthermore, the domestication of wild plants and animals was accomplished in Mesopotamia around 8500 BCE, well before any other nascent civilization.
Mesopotamia encompasses the land between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers. Both rivers are fed by numerous tributaries, and the entire river system drains a vast mountainous region. Overland routes in Mesopotamia usually follow the Euphrates because the banks of the Tigris are frequently steep and difficult. The climate of the region is semi-arid with a vast desert expanse in the North which gives way to a region of marshes, lagoons, mud flats, and reed banks in the South. In the extreme south, the Euphrates and the Tigris unite and empty into the Persian Gulf.
Agriculture throughout the region has been supplemented by nomadic pastoralism, where tent-dwelling nomads herded sheep and goats (and later camels) from the river pastures in the dry summer months, out into seasonal grazing lands on the desert fringe in the wet winter season. The area is generally lacking in building stone, precious metals and timber, and so historically has relied upon long distance trade of agricultural products to secure these items from outlying areas. In the marshlands to the south of the area, a complex waterborne fishing culture has existed since prehistoric times, and has added to the cultural mix.
The earliest language written in Mesopotamia was Sumerian. Along with Sumerian, Semitic dialects were also spoken in early Mesopotamia. Akkadian, became the dominant language during their rule, but Sumerian was retained for administration, religious, literary and scientific purposes. Aramaic, which had already become common in Mesopotamia, then became the official provincial administration language of the Achaemenid Persian Empire. Akkadian fell into disuse, but both it and Sumerian were still used in temples for some centuries.
Early in Mesopotamia's history (around the mid-4th millennium BC) cuneiform script was invented. Cuneiform literally means "wedge-shaped," due to the triangular tip of the stylus used for impressing signs on wet clay. The standardized form of each cuneiform sign appears to have been developed from pictograms.
Libraries were evident in towns and temples during the Babylonian Empire. An old Sumerian proverb averred that, "he who would excel in the school of the scribes must rise with the dawn." Women as well as men learned to read and write, and for the Semitic Babylonians, this involved knowledge of the extinct Sumerian language, and a complicated and extensive syllabary.
Mesopotamian mathematics and science was based on a base 60 numeral system. This is the source of the 60-minute hour, the 24-hour day, and the 360-degree circle. The Sumerian calendar was based on the seven-day week. This form of mathematics was instrumental in early map making. The Babylonians had theorems on how to measure the area of several shapes and solids. They measured the circumference of a circle as three times the diameter and the area as one-twelfth the square of the circumference, which would be correct if pi were fixed at 3.
The Babylonian astronomers were excellent at mathematics and could predict eclipses and solstices. Scholars thought that everything had some purpose in astronomy. Most of these related to religion and omens. Mesopotamian astronomers worked out a 12-month calendar based on the cycles of the moon. They divided the year into two seasons: summer and winter. The origins of astronomy as well as astrology date from this time.
During the 8th and 7th centuries BC, Babylonian astronomers developed a new approach to astronomy. They began studying philosophy dealing with the ideal nature of the early universe and began employing an internal logic within their predictive planetary systems. This was an important contribution to astronomy and the philosophy of science and some scholars have thus referred to this new approach as the first scientific revolution.This new approach to astronomy was adopted and further developed in Greek and Hellenistic astronomy.
Mesopotamian people invented many technologies including metal and copper-working, glass and lamp making, textile weaving, flood control, water storage, and irrigation. They were also one of the first Bronze Age people in the world. They developed from copper, bronze, and gold on to iron. Palaces were decorated with these very expensive metals. Also, copper, bronze, and iron were used for armor as well as for different weapons such as swords, daggers, spears, and maces.
According to a recent hypothesis, the Archimedes Screw may have been used by the King of Assyria, for the water systems at the Hanging Gardens of Babylon in the 7th century BC, although mainstream scholarship holds it to be a Greek invention of later times.
Mesopotamian religion was the first to be recorded. Mesopotamians believed that the world was a flat disc, surrounded by a huge, holed space, and above that, heaven. They also believed that water was everywhere, the top, bottom and sides, and that the universe was born from this enormous sea. In addition, Mesopotamian religion was polytheistic.
Although the beliefs described above were held in common among Mesopotamians, there were also regional variations. The Sumerian word for universe is ‘An-Ki’, which refers to the god An and the goddess Ki. Their son was Enlil, the air god. They believed that Enlil was the most powerful god. He was the chief god of the Pantheon, equivalent to the Greek god Zeus and the Roman god Jupiter.
Hunting was popular among Assyrian kings. Boxing and wrestling feature frequently in art, and some form of polo was probably popular, with men sitting on the shoulders of other men rather than on horses. They also played majore, a game similar to the sport rugby, but played with a ball made of wood. They also played a board game similar to backgammon, now known as the "Royal Game of Ma-asesblu."
The geography of Mesopotamia is such that agriculture is possible only with irrigation and good drainage, a fact which impacted on the evolution of Mesopotamian civilization. The need for irrigation led the Sumerians, and later the Akkadians, to build their cities along the Tigris and Euphrates and the branches of these rivers.
Mesopotamian inventions in this field include the control of water by dams and the use of aqueducts. Early settlers of fertile land in Mesopotamia used wooden plows to soften the soil before planting crops such as barley, onions, grapes, turnips and apples. Mesopotamian settlers were some of the first people to make beer and wine. As a result of the skill involved in farming in the Mesopotamian, farmers did not depend on slaves to complete farm work for them, but there were some exceptions.
Although the rivers sustained life, they also destroyed it by frequent floods that ravaged entire cities. The unpredictable Mesopotamian weather was often hard on farmers; crops were often ruined so backup sources of food such as cows and lambs were also kept.
Among the rivers the Sumerian people built the first cities along with irrigation canals which were separated by vast stretches of open desert or swamp where nomadic tribes roamed. Communication among the isolated cities was difficult and, at times, dangerous. Each Sumerian city became a city-state, independent of the others and protective of its independence.
At times one city would try to conquer and unify the region, but such efforts were resisted and failed for centuries. As a result, the political history of Sumer is one of almost constant warfare. Eventually Sumer was unified by Eannatum, but the unification was tenuous and failed to last as the Akkadians conquered Sumeria in 2331 BC only a generation later.
As city-states began to grow, their spheres of influence overlapped, creating arguments between other city-states, especially over land and canals. These arguments were recorded in tablets several hundreds of years before any major war—the first recording of a war occurred around 3200 BC but they were not common until about 2500 BC. At this point, warfare was incorporated into the Mesopotamian political system, where a neutral city may act as an arbitrator for the two rival cities. This helped to form unions between cities, leading to regional states. When empires were created, they went to war with foreign countries. King Sargon, for example, conquered all the cities of Sumer, some cities in Mari, and then went to war with northern Syria.
Houses
The materials used to build a Mesopotamian house were the same as those used today: mud brick, mud plaster and wooden doors, which were all naturally available around the city. Most houses had a square center room with other rooms attached to it, but a great variation in the size and materials used to build the houses suggest they were built by the inhabitants themselves. The smallest rooms may not have coincided with the poorest people; in fact it could be that the poorest people built houses out of perishable materials such as reeds on the outside of the city, but there is very little archaeological evidence for this.
Palaces
The palaces of the early Mesopotamian elites were large-scale complexes, and were often lavishly decorated. Earliest known examples are from the Diyala River valley sites such as Khafajah and Tell Asmar. These third millennium BC palaces functioned as a large-scale socio-economic institutions, and therefore, along with residential and private function, they housed craftsmen workshops, food storehouses, ceremonial courtyards, and are often associated with shrines. For instance, the so-called Giparu Temple at Ur where the Moon god Nanna's priestesses resided was a major complex with multiple courtyards, a number of sanctuaries, burial chambers for dead priestesses, and a ceremonial banquet hall. A similarly complex example of a Mesopotamian palace was excavated at Mari in Syria, dating from the Old Babylonian period.
Assyrian palaces of the Iron Age have become famous due to the pictorial and textual narrative programs on their walls, all carved on stone slabs known as ‘orthostats.’ These pictorial programs either incorporated cultural scenes or the narrative accounts of the Kings' military and civic accomplishments. Gates and important passageways were flanked with massive stone sculptures of mythological figures. The architectural arrangement of these Iron Age palaces were also organized around large and small courtyards. Usually the King's throne room opened to a massive ceremonial courtyard where important state councils met and state ceremonies were performed.
Northern Mesopotamia fell under Median Empire rule in the 7th-6th century BC. Cyaxares reorganized and modernized the Median Army, then joined with King Nabopolassar of Babylon. These allies overthrew the Assyrian Empire and destroyed Nineveh in 612 BC. After this victory, the Medes conquered Northern Mesopotamia, Armenia and the parts of Asia Minor east of the Halys River, which was the border established with Lydia after a decisive battle between Lydia and Media, the Battle of Halys ended with an eclipse on May 28, 585 BC. Babylon and Lydia fell under Persian rule in the 6th century BC. After two centuries of Achaemenid rule, Mesopotamia fell to Alexander the Great in 330 BC, and remained under Hellenistic rule for another two centuries.
See TimeMaps of the Ancient Mesopotamia Civilization and how it fits into the bigger picture of history on the TimeMap of World History
