The Rise of Complex Societies

Question 1

States are ____ societies.

Answer 1

True class. There is an evident class system in place.

Question 2

What is important about Ur, Mesopotamia?

Answer 2

Dated to 4380-3800 BP, recorded as the world’s earliest state. There was an increased population located along the rives, canals to help crops, a food surplus, mud brick structures, and four main residential areas with connecting alleys and roads. Ziggurat was the temple for Goddess.

Question 3

What 7 things characterize civilization or the state?

Answer 3

1. Food surplus
2. Large, dense population
3. Social stratification
4. Formal government
5. Labour specialization
6. A system of record keeping
7. Monumental work

Question 4

What was V. Gordon Childe’s view on food surplus and civilization?

Answer 4

Food surplus can support non-agricultural activities, and craft specialization leads to more cultural complexity; however, craft specialization is not a casual explanation. All aspects of human life were effected by economy, food surplus is essential to the development of urban life.

Question 5

What are the Ten Characteristics of States according to Childe?

Answer 5

1. Increased size and density of settlements supporting large population requiring broader social integration
2. Full time specialization of labour, with institutionalized craft production, distribution, and exchange
3. Concentration of surplus food and craft products in the hands of powerful social institutions and elite classes
4. Division of society into classes dominated by small number of privileged religious, military, and/or political leaders
5. Organization of population based not only on kinship but also on social, political, economic, and residential factors under auspices of permanent government
6. Monumental institutional works
7. Well-organized long distance trade routes
8. Standardized artwork, employed for social and political purposed
9. Writing system
10. Beginnings of science

Question 6

1. Increased size and density of settlements supporting large population requiring broader social integration

Answer 6

These settlements often include dense urban centres or cities, Mesopotamian civilization occurred in the south, during 6300-5500 BP (seen in Ur).

Question 7

What is the first official city?

Answer 7

Uruk, Mesopotamia. 5500 BP.

Question 8

2. Full time specialization of labour, with institutionalized craft production, distribution and exchange

Answer 8

Food surplus lets some people focus on technology, arts, crafts, education; increased products lead to increased skills and specialists. Full time craft specialization is related to social and political institutions. Specialists can only exist with food surplus and with rational behind why those specific specialists.

Question 9

3. Concentration of surplus food and craft products in hands of powerful social institutions and elite classes

Answer 9

Crafts needed only in a society that demands their work. In Mesopotamia, the temples and religious shrines were demanded by religious elite. Priests became chiefs, the control of irrigation systems and networks came with power.

Question 10

4. Division of society into classes dominated by small number of privileged religious, military, and/or political leaders

Answer 10

Social stratification. People tend to be born into a social level, which defines their role in life, their power, and their destiny.

Question 11

5. Organization of population not merely based on kinship but also based on social, political, economic, and residential factors under auspices of permanent government organization

Answer 11

In Ur, the depiction of military from the Royal Standard. Military forces are one form of institutional organization population common in states.

Question 12

How many independent city-states did the Sumerians have?

Answer 12

6000.

Question 13

6. Monumental institutional works

Answer 13

Like temples, palaces, storehouses, and irrigation systems.

Question 14

7. Well-organized long distance trade linking cities and regions

Answer 14

Ur traded for metals/minerals that were not found locally; Sumerians were successful traders. Royal tombs contain staggering amounts of wealth and precious stones/metals, jewelry, weapons.

Question 15

8. Standardized artwork, often monumental, employed for social and political purposes

Answer 15

No exactly art for arts sake. In 5500 BP, Mesopotamia art glorified rulers and devotion to religious affinity. There was no signature on artworks, there were lavishly decorated tombs. The Victory Stele of Naram Sin, king of Mesopotamian city of Akkad, is the first artwork that equated human with God/shows the importance of a person.

Question 16

9. Writing system to facilitate institutional organization and management

Answer 16

There is a Mesopotamian tablet featuring cuneiform writing and relating part of the epic Gilgamesh. Most early writing is very political/for serious purposes. In 5100 BP most documents were contracts declaring ownerships. 4400 BP saw the emergence of poems/religious texts.

Question 17

10. Beginnings of science in form of engineering, arithmetic, geometry, and/or astronomy

Answer 17

Sumerians were the first people to develop a system of arithmetic, using the Base 60 number system. Their writing system arose from their need to trade.

Question 18

What is important to keep in mind about the 10 characteristics of civilization?

Answer 18

That not all states displayed all ten characteristics. For example, the states of the Andes (the Inca) never developed a formal writing system. They used quipu (knots) as a means of recording and communicating, mostly numerical information.

Question 19

What do states often involve?

Answer 19

Many highly organized institutions, systems of authority and government that are developed to the point that they are permanent and entrenched. A chief would have less power than a king or Pharaoh. Chief societies beg for power while kings/Pharaohs demand it.

Question 20

What was involved in the development of cities?

Answer 20

The focus of institutional authorities in such centres often led to the concentration of monumental architecture, such as palaces and temples, and the size of centres also required organizational features like street grids and sewage systems.

Question 21

What are some drawbacks to the Rise of the State?

Answer 21

Extraction of surplus from majority of population by centralized authority, which led to detriment of lowest ranks of society. A well regulated developed class system relegates most individuals to a subordinated position, allowing small elite classes to monopolize social, political, and economic power. With that comes formal laws, regulation, and punishment for disobeying. 
Increasing dense populations that are subject to extraction of surplus are increasingly vulnerable to health and nutrition issues, which may be complicated by problems of concentration in urban centres. Overpopulation leads to disease spread and increase in sanitation problems.

Question 22

Why did State Societies Develop?

Answer 22

Many theories suggest change was forced by a similar range of factors; population increase and environmental management.

1. Population expansion was made possible by large irrigation networks, which led to hierarchical development.
2. Interaction among geography, population increase, warfare. Areas tended to be surrounded by natural barriers, and population increase led to increase in need for resources which led to increase of resource/territorial fights.

Question 23

How did State Societies develop?

Answer 23

Multi-causal - many different pathways to civilization.

Need two preconditions - high populations and ability to mobilize sufficient economic resources.

Question 24

Basic Ancient Egypt information

Answer 24

Centred along the Nile River valley, a combination of the White Nile and the Blue Nile - key to the development of Egyptian civilization. The earliest agricultural settlements are dated to 8100 BP - domesticated wheat, barley, goats, sheep. Early history is not well known; it was split into two provinces, Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt. The divide was based off of the flow of the Nile River.

Question 25

What is important about This, Nagadam, and Hierakonpolis?

Answer 25

Location of major Pre-dynastic sites in Egypt, dated to around 5500BP. They had rectangular, brown brick, houses and there was an increase reliance on domestication. There was attempts to unify communities along the Nile, which led to competition between Kings.

Question 26

What is important about Nhkhen (Hierakonpolis)?

Answer 26

“The City of the Falcon”, dated to 5800-5000 BP. The first mummies appear around 5600 BP, the earliest mummies were created naturally due to the environment. This had an impact on religion - the preservation of the body after life had an impact on the status of the afterlife. Pre-dynastic. There was pottery and elaborate burials (social inequality based on wealth of burial)

Question 27

When was Unification of Egypt?

Answer 27

5100 BP, the symbolic linking of Upper and Lower Egypt (Narmer Palette). Found at Hierakonpolis, the formation of a new state (Egypt). King Naremr depicted with the crowns of upper and lower Egypt, this marks the end of the pre-dynastic period.

Question 28

What are the cultural periods of Egypt?

Answer 28

Old Kingdom = 4574-4180 BP.
Middle Kingdom = 4040-3640 BP.
New Kingdom = 3530 BP.

Question 29

What is important about the Archaic Period of Egypt?

Answer 29

5100-4575 BP, period of consolidation. The First Pharaohs appear, with the crook and flail regalia. Symbolized the triumph of order over universal chaos. Crook = shepherd, flail = necessary punishment. All powerful King who resided over a complex organization.
Mastaba tomb was a typical Old Kingdom elite burial.

Question 30

What is important about the Old Kingdom?

Answer 30

Dated to 4575-4180 BP. The Royal Capital at Memphis; image of Kingship - Osiris (Lord of the Dead, Fertility/Harvest God).
Large number of pyramids were constructed during this period as burial places for the Pharaohs. Kings were worshipped like Gods.

Question 31

Egyptian Gods and Goddesses
Amun
Anubis 
Geb
Horus 
Isis
Osiris
Ra
Seth

Answer 31

Amun = King of the Gods
Anubis = God of embalming 
Geb = God of the Earth 
Horus = God the Sky 
Isis = Goddess of Life
Osiris = God of the Dead
Ra = God of the Sun
Seth = God of Chaos

Question 32

What is important about Step Pyramid of King Djoser?

Answer 32

Dated to 4630 BP, Egypt’s first pyramid - oldest in the world. Stacks of mastabas on top of each other, but instead of mud bricks it was made out of stone.

Question 33

What is important about Giza Plateau?

Answer 33

It reached it’s apex (during the Old Kingdom 4575-4180 BP) with the fourth dynasty Kings. No enclosure wall, it is surrounded by subsidiary monuments. Khufu was the first pyramid built, largest ever, and then Khafre was built (the stone casing still covers it). Menkaure is the most famous.

Question 34

What is important about the Pyramid of Khufu?

Answer 34

150 metres tall, 2.5 million stone blocks weighing 2275 kg each. Called the “Great Pyramid”, originally enclosed in stone. Between 20,000-30,000 labourers were needed and it is plain inside, with no decorations.

Question 35

What is important about the Pyramid of Khafre’s and the Great SPhinx

Answer 35

Khafre was the son of Khufu. His pyramid is smaller but at a higher elevation and with more complex surroundings, such as the Sphinx. The Sphinx is dated to 4500 BP and is a cat with a human head, built into the bedrock of a small hill.

Question 36

What is important about the First Intermediate Period of Egypt?

Answer 36

4180-4040 BP, marked the decline of the state’s central power. There was a prolonged drought cycle (one of the most intense climate changes of the Holocene), not a lot of evidence from this period. Temples were pillaged and violated.

Question 37

What is important about the Middle Kingdom of Egypt?

Answer 37

4040-3640 BP, extension of trading throughout the Middle East. Classic period of Egyptian civilization, reunification. Armies and forces, defensive in military strategies. Art, literature.

Question 38

What is important about the Second Intermediate Period of Egypt?

Answer 38

3640-3530 BP. Another period of political instability and economic disorder, Egypt under control of the Hyksos - new weaponry and unstable control. Burials from the kings of this period have not been found. Math, literature, Book of the Dead, Underworld texts.

Question 39

What is important about the New Kingdom?

Answer 39

3530-3070 BP, overthrow of the Hyksos. Traded with the mysterious “Land of Punt”. 18th Dynasty Pharaohs: Queen Hatshepsut, Akhenaten, Tutankhamun.
Political centre was in the Delta but the religious centre was in Upper Egypt. Monumental architecture honouring Gods and Pharaohs, art for the use of non-royal people.
Queen Hatshepsut brought back trees from foreign areas, the first known transplant of plant fauna.

Question 40

What is important about Queen Hatshepsut?

Answer 40

Ruled from 3473-3458 BP, mortuary complex located near the entrance of the Valley of the Kings - lush gardens.
One of the most successful Pharaohs, one the first great women in history. Reestablished international trading relations, brought great wealth to Egypt - one of the most prolific builders in Ancient Egypt, buildings were grander than ever seen before.

Question 41

What is important about Akhenaten and Nefertiti?

Answer 41

Akhenaten was one of the most influential and controversial Pharoahs. He abandoned polytheistic views of Gods and promoted a monotheistic view. Changed his name to show his belief. He instituted changes to art and culture, wanted to be shown as he really was instead of a great, powerful Pharaoh; thick thighs, pot belly, skinny arms. When he died he was wiped from Egyptian history. Nefertiti was his wife; the Queen, and she often worked alongside her husband.

Question 42

What is important about Tut?

Answer 42

Son of Akhenaten and Akhenaten’s sister, ascended to the thrown at the age of 9/10, married his half-sister.
He reversed a lot of changes of his fathers, back to polytheistic views. No surviving records of his last days → died at age 19. He had a broken leg, perhaps genetic effects caused his death. There were a lot of injuries alongside one half of his body → chariot crash.

Question 43

What is important Late Period of Egypt?

Answer 43

3070-2332 BP. Conquered by the Persians in 2343 BP.
Conquered by Alexander the Great in 2332 BP.
Conquered by Rome in 2030 BP, Julius Caesar, Cleopatra, Marc Antony and Octavius.
Alternated between native rule and Persian rule, Julius was regarded as a liberator. Cleopatra the Seventh was the most famous queen. The apparent suicide marked the end of a period of time.

Question 44

What is important about Writing in Egypt?

Answer 44

Fully developed by 5100 BP, brought in from Mesopotamia and developed by Egyptian priests. Hieroglyphs: pictorial writing, earliest form of Egyptian script and the longest lived form. Hieratic: cursive hieroglyphic script. Rosetta Stone discovery was key in figuring out Egyptian script, the same message in three different forms of writing, Greek and two forms of Egypt writing.
The people in the hieroglyphs face the beginning of the line of script → tells someone the direction to be read. Recording of name = no disappearance after death.
Egyptians invented paper.