Egypt, Sumer & Persia Flashcards
Epic of Gilgamesh allows us what?
insight into the lives of the ancient Sumerians
Epic of Gilgamesh teaches us and confirms:
There was a large, almost worldwide flood
They believed in gods with human like emotions
They valued gold, copper, gems
They rode in wheeled chariots
Historiography
Using literature to teach history
What’s Mesopotamia mean?
Land between the rives
Meso- Middle
Potamia- Rivers
The 2 rivers around Mesopotamia are the
Tigris and Euphrates
The Tigris and Euphrates flowed down to the
Persian Gulf
The rivers flooded —– and ——, and often
How did this river compare to the Nile?
violently, unpredictably
The Nile flooded more gradually, making it much easier to predict.
What was a benefit when the Tigris and Euphrates flooded?
The floods brought silt, which made plants grow very well
What was a negative of the rivers flooding?
when both rivers flooded at the same time, many people were killed, people kept coming back to the area between the rivers because of the allure of the economy and land - they also thought the floods wouldn’t effect them if they prayed more 💀
Where was Mesopotamia? (modern day country)
Located between modern day Turkey and Iraq
Why did the land in Mesopotamia attract many people?
The land was very fertile
Also a crossroad of trade
What was a negative of Mesopotamia’s geography?
No natural protection - wide open space - easy to invade
What were cities surrounded by in Mesopotamia?
Walls
Ziggurats
pyramid temples that soared towards the heavens
What was the biggest L in Mesopotamian history?
they couldn’t figure out how to put a stairwell inside the ziggurat💀
Where did rulers live in Mesopotamia? How did everyone else live?
Rulers lived in huge palaces and other people were packed together in close quarters.
People needed to —– —— to survive in Mesopotamia
work together
Temple priests/royal officials provided the —- people needed (Sumer).
leadership
Where did traders come from in Mesopotamia?
Traders came from far away and the city was very wealthy.
Like China distance far
What was a incredibly easy way to become wealthy in Mesopotamia?
Merchant
What was the overall government like in Sumer?
Sumer consisted of many independent city-states (warred constantly)
Therefore Sumer had a Decentralised Government
I.e. Ancient Greece was ——–, U.S. is ——–
decentralised, centralised
How did the whole theocracy ordeal work in Sumer?
Sumer had a theocracy (religious government), wherein each city-state had a religious, political, and social leader, which were all one man.
The Sumerian Hierarchy worked as follows:
Ruling family, officials, and high priests
Merchants, scribes, artisans, priests, warriors
Peasant farmers and slaves
Women in Sumer
A mother goddess was the central figure of creation
Women lost some status but were still well respected and had legal rights
Polytheistic
many gods
What were gods or goddesses responsible for in Sumer, and what did they explain?
Everything, everything
True or False
The gods were very human-like in Sumarian religion?
True
Was it important in Sumer to keep the gods happy?
mhm
Therefore priests became important figures
Every city-state picked their own what in Sumer?
god
New Year’s Day was important; it proved (Sumer):
They had a calendar
They had a form of writing
They knew math
They understood astronomy
After-life was believed (Sumer):
To be gloomy, although it was gloomy due to the way the river flooded and coated everything in mud
sumer was emo
Cuneiform
Grew out of a system of pictographs
God/heavens and the stars were associated
Cuneiform eventually became —- ——
more advanced
How was cuneiform originally formed?
Originally formed by wedges in clay, made by a stylus
Math (Sumer)
Algebra and Geometry
Base 60 system,
Derived from their affiliation with time
Corporal Punishment (Sumer)
Physical punishment was utilised to motivate and punish kids in schools
The Nile overflows every year and deposits large amounts of
Silt (fertile soil from rivers)
The Nile flows from — to — towards the —
south, north
delta
Upper Egypt is —–, lower Egypt is —- because of the what?
south, north
flow of the Nile
The source of the Nile is
Lake Victoria
The Nile flows into the —– —
Mediterranean Sea
The Nile has many —— (rapids) - people needed to what because of these?
cataracts
carry their boats over land periodically to avoid these
Near the Nile was called the — —
black land (good soil)
Land away from the Nile was called the — —
red land (bad soil)
Egypt was originally — regions
two
Upper Egypt
hundreds of miles from the Mediterranean sea
Lower Egypt
the Delta region of the Nile
Who was was the first to unite Upper and Lower Egypt, hailing from Upper Egypt (3100 BCE [year is not on tests])?
King Menes
Wat was The Nile used for?
The Nile was used for transporting armies & trading goods
Egypt was ruled by ——–
pharaohs
What did the pharaoh claim about his power?
The pharaoh claimed that his power came from the gods & that he also was a god (Theocracy)
Vizier
The pharaoh’s chief advisor
The old kingdom is known as the
“Pyramid Age”
Pyramids took —— to build
decades
(this is crazy fast)
What purpose did pyramids serve in Egypt?
Pyramids were tombs for pharaohs & other wealthy Egyptians
What is a Mastaba?
A rectangular building placed next to a pyramid in which secondarily important people were buried
Pyramids are a sign of how organised the Egyptians really were, they proved they:
Were good at engineering
Had strong government
had/used Astronomy (some were lined up with the stars or something)
Had social classes
Had a surplus
Large amount of slaves
Religion
The Middle Kingdom
The was a period of time marked by war and disunity
Started off great, got conquered, then ended great (Mr. Kelly described it as a roller coaster)
Egypt was briefly taken over by the Hyksos
Who took over in the New Kingdom?
In the New Kingdom a ruler, female, named Hatshepsut took control of Egypt. (1503-1482 BC)
Spit some info about Hatshepsut
Crossdresser
Ruled for her nephew, because of which, her nephew tried to erase her from history
How many calories in a baked potato
There are 390 cal in a loaded baked potato
Ramses II
A brave military leader who conquered much land for Egypt
Also known as the middle east
Had 100+ kids
After ramses, many groups conquered Egypts ineffective rulers.
Spit some facts about Nubia
Nubia was a wealthy kingdom located south of egypt
Egypt and Nubia competed for power and control of the Nile
Sun god in Egypt:
Amon-Re (Ra)
Only the —— could conduct ceremonies for Ra
Pharaoh
Who ruled the underworld and was the god of the Nile? (the flood)
Osiris
Who kills Osiris, and then who kills the killer that killed Osiris🤨?
Set (or Seth)
Horus
After Osiris gets cooked by Set (or Seth), what happens to him?
Osiris becomes god of underworld because he died🚑
Spit about Isis
Women worshipped her
Married to Osiris
Had Horus
Egyptians thought Osiris was a king of Egypt who was great. Set hated Osiris so he murdered him to death. Set cut him into many bite-size pieces and spread them out. Isis collects all his pieces and unlike humpty dumpty Osiris gets put back together. Then kinged hell. Horus kills Set for vengeance like batman. “Foul tarnished, in search of the Elden Ring. Emboldened by the flame of ambition. Someone must extinguish thy flame. Let it be Margit the Fell!”
Read this when the card pops up it’d be very cool
After Life in Egypt
People’s were tested in death
Who are the grand jurors of the afterlife in Egypt?
How’d they do the judging?
Anubis and Thoth
Weighed heart against feather of truth
Balanced was good: Happy field of food
Too heavy meant heart gets eaten: Soul (Ka) spent forever in the stomach of the eater of the dead
Mummification
Remove organs and prepared body for life after death
At first, this privilege was only for high-ranking officials
Tombs
Tombs full of vast riches were often robbed
King Tutankhamen’s tomb was found in 1922 and it was full of treasures
Which pharaoh tried to change the religion of Egypt💀?
What was his new system called?
Was is reversed, and if so, how?
A pharaoh named Amenhotep IV (changed his name to Akhenaton) tried to get people to worship only one god, Aton
Monotheistic
Yes, his son Tutankhamen changed it back
Most Egyptians were-
farmers
What were farmers doing when they weren’t farming?
When they were not farming they were working for the pharaoh
Social Changes- Egypt
Merchant class grew in size and status
New demand for artisans
Women in Egypt
They had higher status in Egypt than they did in the rest of the world
Could have almost any job
Couldn’t take government roles or become scribes
What are Hieroglyphics?
formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptian language.
Hieroglyphics-symbols for nouns; very subjective.
Who kept all types of records: math, medicine, engineering, etc in Ancient Society?
Scribes
Scribes used a ——; a simpler form of writing for everyday use.
Demotic
What did Scribes in Egypt write on?
Wrote on Papyrus; reeds that are dried out, that are capable of holding ink
Rosetta stone
French scholar discovered this in the early 1800s
Napoleon’s army found it
Contained the same message in Greek, hieroglyphics and demotic.
Jean Champollion figured out the rosetta stone
Cannot be trusted is French!!!!!!!!!!!!
Egyptian Medicine
Many people believed in magic
They performed surgery and were skilled at diagnosing illnesses
They learned most of this from their knowledge of mummification
Who studied the heavens in Egypt?
priest-astronomers
Egyptian Calendar
12 months
30 days each
Added 5 days
Annual flooding of the Nile lead to what?
Mathematics; Geometry in Egypt
First Empire
Akkadians
Akkadians
took control of the city states of Sumer
This was the first empire in history
Invaded Sumer
It was ruled by a king, Sargon
Hammurabi
He was a Babylonian king who took most of Mesopotamia
He is famous for his code
Hammurabi did not invent all the laws;
he was the first to have them written down
Benefits of Hammurabi’s code for the citizens and government
Good for the people because the laws cannot be changed as easily
Good for the king because people cannot say they didn’t know
Civil law:
Criminal law:
Civil law deals with the disputes between individuals, organizations, or between the two, in which compensation is awarded to the victim.
Criminal law is the body of law that deals with crime and the legal punishment of criminal offenses.
*Hammurabi’s Code contained both
“An eye for an eye” only applies to-
people of the same social class
Why were Hammurabi’s laws so harsh?
These laws were harsh to keep people in line
Hammurabi’s Code was written down on-
a huge stone pillar placed in a town square
Even if someone could not read, in Babylon-
they had to learn Hammurabi’s Code.
Hammurabi’s Code and Women
His code did protect women but the man was the head of the household.
Other achievements of Hammurabi
Irrigation, strong army, replaced Sumerian gods with Babylonian gods
Where’d the Hittites pull up from?
Turkey/Asia Minor/Anatolia
Who first discovered Iron/Metallurgy?
Hittites
Why were the Hittities lucky?
They were lucky because there was a lot of iron ore in Turkey
Big reason of why the Hittites were able to defeat Babylon.
They were able to defeat the Babylonians partly because of their iron weapons, which were stronger than bronze and copper ones.
Hittities tried to keep this technology —–
secret
Assyrians and Warfare
The Assyrians were a very strong group
They terrorised people along the rivers and eventually dominated the area
Once the Assyrians settled down, they became what?
They also had an organised —— and founded one of the first ——-
less brutal and learned
societs-libraries
Nebuchadnezzar
defeated the Assyrians and restored Babylon
He did NOT restore the Babylonian empire; they were gone
He enslaved all Jewish people because he thought they were wrong
He built canals, temples, new walls and his famous hanging gardens
Cyrus the Great did what?
defeated the Chaldeans in 539 BCE
Persian Empire
Spit some facts about Persia from the notes
They had a large empire and were tolerant of the people they conquered
Freed the Jews
United many peoples
Darius was an important Persian ruler
He divided his empire into provinces and assigned a satrap to rule each province
He had laws made for the people
He built roads to help unite empire
Roads helped connect Persia:
They helped transport soldiers
They helped unite the government
Economy or smth
Satrap
governor
Darius the Great used what to help trade?
This made sure of what?
weights and measures
Makes sure you get what you pay for
Darius the Great introduced —— to replace the —— —–
What didn’t hold value in his society?
Coins-Barter System
Slaves
Control of Mesopotamia Timeline
Sumerians
Akkadians
Babylonians
Hititties
Assyrians
Chaldeans
Persians
Other ways Egyptians used math besides the Nile
Geometry - for making new boundaries
They needed math for irrigation
Darius introduced weights and measures to replace the Barter System because:
Some things don’t hold value (e.g. apples rot and lose their value)
It is hard to know the exact value of an item in the barter system
What modern day country was Persia located in?
Iran
What was the name of a thinker that rejected the old gods in Persia?
Zoroaster
What did the Zoroaster teach?
He taught that one god, Ahura Mazda, ruled the world
There was good and evil and people chose which side they would support
People would be judged after good triumphed over evil, and go to heaven or hell.
Zoroastrianism is still a religion today
True or False
True
What’d the Persian empire do with Zoroastrianism?
They eventually adopted this religion over their earlier polytheism
The Phoenicians used what kind of dye?
Was the dye cheap expensive? Why?
purple dye from snails
The dye was expensive because it was hard to make
What were the Phoenicians famous for?
Where did they live?
Famous for their sea travels
They lived along the Mediterranean coast
Phoenicians Made the first
alphabet
22 letters
Phoenicians were skilled-
merchants and craftsman
The Phoenicians set up-
colonies along the coast
(Africa, Italy and Spain)
COC
The Phoenicians were CARRIERS OF CIVILIZATION. Spread ideas
How much autonomy did Darius allow?
Darius allowed some autonomy
Persia was a —— based society
tribute
tribute
A payment by one ruler or nation to another in acknowledgment of submission or as the price of protection. also. Maintaining control.
