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Mesopotamia The Seeds of Creativity

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Became Phonetically-related Symbols. Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC) ... Zodiac (astrology and astronomy) Mathematics. Babylonians, ... Zodiac ... – PowerPoint PPT presentation

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Title: Mesopotamia The Seeds of Creativity


1
Mesopotamia The Seeds of Creativity
2
The Rivers and the Land
Between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers
3
The Rivers and the Land
  • Problems
  • Flooding during the growing season
  • Salt accumulation
  • This required Creativity for civilization to
    flourish
  • Flooding Dams and catch basins connected to
    canals.
  • Salt Flushed salt out by moving water from the
    high elevation of the Euphrates River to lower
    elevation of the Tigris River.

4
Domestication of grain
  • 56 wild grasses possible (seed size, seed
    retention, nutrition, storage, etc.)
  • 32 varieties in Mediterranean Eurasia (versus 11
    max elsewhere)

5
Sumerian Period3500-2350 BC
Note Few natural barriers to invasion
6
Sumerian Period3500-2350 BC
Sumeria (Southern Mesopotamia)
7
Sumerian Period3500-2350 BC
  • Polytheistic religion
  • Religion was directed toward ensuring a good crop
    and good trading
  • No ethics from religion
  • Priests subservient to kings
  • Invasion-prone area so armies were important
  • First wheeled vehicles
  • Ziggurats
  • Temples
  • Tombs
  • Governmental sites

8
Ziggurat
Tower of Babel?
9
Sumerian Period3500-2350 BC
  • Creative Contribution Writing (cuneiform)
  • Language not connected to any other (Adamic?)
  • Written on clay tablets with reed or sharpened
    stick
  • Recorded business and laws
  • Adopted by other empires because it could apply
    to any language
  • 1200 known characters

10
  • Started as Pictograms (pictures that were
    individualized)
  • Developed to being Ideograms (stylized pictures
    that were customized)
  • Became Phonetically-related Symbols

11
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
12
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
  • Descendants of Shem
  • Semitic language (Arabic, Hebrew, etc)
  • Creative Contributions
  • Standing army
  • System of royal servants and landholders
  • Poetry/epic
  • Written law
  • Governmental bureaucracy
  • Mathematics

13
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
  • Standing army
  • Led by Sargon I the King of Akkad
  • Conquered the Sumerians
  • Expanded the empire greatly (paid the army from
    the spoils of war)
  • New lands and territories that had to be
    controlled
  • Royal servants given new lands
  • Very loyal
  • Created economic vigor in trade
  • Created intelligent division of labor

14
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
  • Poetry
  • Epic of Gilgamesh
  • About 2000 B.C.
  • Oldest known literary document
  • Account of King Gilgamesh
  • Includes a flood story (similar to Bible)

15
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
  • Written Law The Code of Hammurabi
  • Developed by King Hammurabi (1700 B.C.)
  • Great leader, ruled during the cultural pinnacle
    of the early Babylonian Period
  • Personally supervised navigation, construction of
    temples, agriculture, and tax collection.
  • First set of laws (predates Moses by 200 years)
  • Brought uniformity to society
  • Reduced resentment and possibilities for revolt
  • Engraved on 8-foot stella (pillar)

16
Code of Hammurabi Trial by ordeal
  • "If a man has accused another of laying a death
    spell upon him, but has not proved it, the
    accused shall go to the sacred river, he shall
    plunge in the sacred river, and if the sacred
    river shall conquer him, he that accused him
    shall take possession of his house. If the sacred
    river shall show his innocence and he is saved,
    his accuser shall be put to death. He that
    plunged in the sacred river shall appropriate the
    house of him that accused him."

17
Hammurabi Code vs The Bible
  • Source God
  • Religious Strong
  • Capital crimes
  • Murder (unless God delivered him)
  • Smite or curse parents
  • Steal man and sell him
  • Killed fetus
  • Adultery
  • Justice Eye for eye or compensation
  • Equality No differences
  • Responsibility Repeated ox goring
  • Source Existing laws
  • Religious Little
  • Capital crimes
  • False accusation or witness
  • Stolen temple goods
  • Stolen child
  • Assisted fleeing slave
  • Adultery
  • Justice Eye for eye or compensation
  • Equality Changes by rank
  • Responsibility Surgeon, home builder

18
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
  • Governmental Bureaucracy
  • Established by King Hammurabi
  • Administrators paid by the government (local
    taxes), unlike Sargon Is.
  • Could keep an eye on empire without expensive and
    continuous military entanglements.

19
Akkadian/ Early Babylonian Period (2350-1650 BC)
  • Mathematics
  • Decimal and sexigesimal system
  • 60 and 360 religious numbers
  • Sexigesimal numbers today
  • Circle
  • Time
  • Placeholder concept
  • No Concept of Zero

20
Hittites (1450-1200 B.C.)
  • From Anatolia (present day Turkey)
  • Creative Contribution
  • Iron

21
Hittites (1450-1200 B.C.)
  • Iron
  • Much harder and stronger than all former metals
  • Found in natural state (soft)
  • Gold and copper
  • Bronze (copper with tin)
  • Brass (copper with zinc)
  • Iron required much higher temperatures
  • Conquered Mesopotamia because of weapon strength
    (1650 B.C)
  • Agricultural productivity higher when farming
    tools were made of iron
  • Started the move from the Bronze Age to the Iron
    Age (1500 B.C.)

22
Phoenicians/Philistines/Sea Peoples (1200 B.C.)
  • Conquered Hittites and learned the secrets of
    iron-working
  • Dominated Israelites until time of David
  • Controlled the coastal regions of Mesopotamia
    (then called Canaan)

23
Phoenicians/Philistines/Sea Peoples (1200 B.C.)
  • And the children of Israel cried unto the Lord
    for he Jabin, King of Canaan had nine hundred
    chariots of iron and twenty years he mightily
    oppressed the children of Israel.
  • -Judges 43

24
  • Now there was no smith found throughout all the
    land of Israel for the Philistines said, Lest
    the Hebrews make them swords or spears But all
    the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to
    sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and
    his axe, and his mattock. Yet they had a file
    for the mattocks, and for the coulters, and for
    the forks, and for the axes, and to sharpen the
    goads. So it came in the day of the battle, that
    there was neither sword not spear found in the
    hand of any of the people that were with Saul and
    Jonathan
  • -1 Samuel 1319-22

25
Assyrians (900-626 B.C.)
  • Creative contribution
  • Torture
  • Creativity can be good or bad
  • Extremely vicious
  • Entire cities surrendered because of fear
  • Conquered Mesopotamia from within the territory
    of old Babylonian empire
  • Capital was Ninevah (Jonah story)
  • Captured the 10 tribes and carried them northward
    (721 BC)
  • Defeated by the Babylonians and Medes (626 BC)

26
Babylonians, Medes, Persians626-333 BC
27
Babylonians, Medes, Persians626-333 BC
  • Powerful rulers
  • Nebuchadnezzar
  • Cyrus the Great
  • Xerxes
  • Darius
  • Empire very large
  • Included Chaldeans and others
  • Established king worship
  • Daniel and the 3 Israelites
  • Jewish temple was built
  • Esthers story

28
Babylonians, Medes, Persians626-333 BC
  • Creative Contibutions
  • Art/technology
  • Hanging Gardens
  • Government
  • City planning
  • Ethical Monotheism
  • Zodiac (astrology and astronomy)
  • Mathematics

29
Babylonians, Medes, Persians626-333 BC
  • Ethical monotheism
  • Zoroastrianism (Zoroaster/Zarathustra)
  • Arose from Persia in 7th Century B.C.
  • Founded by the prophet Zarathustra who used fire
    as part of worship
  • Communication with God
  • The three wise men in the story of Christs birth
    were likely Zoroastrians
  • Driven from Persia in 700 A.D. to India where
    they are known as the Parsi

30
Babylonians, Medes, Persians626-333 BC
  • Zodiac
  • Method of measuring the earths movements though
    the years sky with respect to 12 constellations
  • Earthly events (seasons and tides) based on
    celestial bodies
  • No difference between astrology and astronomy in
    ancient times
  • Astrologers became common
  • Three wise men

31
Babylonians, Medes, Persians626-333 BC
  • Astrology was, after all, a reasonable science.
    The sun dominates life on earth the moon has
    many, more subtle, influences for example, it
    rules the tides. Surely, then, on commonsense
    grounds, the minor planets must have their own
    distinctive influences on the lives of men and
    women?
  • Donald Cardwell, The Norton History of
    Technology, 1994

32
Mesopotamia
  • Conquered by Alexander the Great (333 BC)
  • This was the end of what is considered
    Mesopotamian history
  • We will discuss him later

33
Mesopotamia
  • Overall creativity assessment
  • Many conquerors kept creativity fresh

34
Thank You
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