ANCIENT RIVER VALLEY CIVILIZATIONS NOTES

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ANCIENT RIVER VALLEY CIVILIZATIONSNOTES

• WRITE DOWN THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION
• Civilization River (s)
• Sumerians/Mesopotamians Tigris Euphrates
• Egyptians Nile
• Harappans Indus
• Shang Dynasty Huang Ho
• Civilization Society with a developed knowledge
  of farming, trade, government, art, and science

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Mesopotamia / Sumer

• Write down the following information
• Mesopotamia means the land between the rivers
• What was Mesopotamia is now modern-day Iraq
• The people who settled in southern Mesopotamia
  were called Sumerians after their area known as
  Sumer.
• Sumerian civilization is the earliest known on
  earth
• The Sumerians were the first city builders
• Sumerian civilization has been called the cradle
  of civilization
• The oldest written records known are Sumerian

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• Write down the following information
• The Sumerians developed the following
• ?Cuneiform earliest form of writing
  wedge-shaped/pictographic
• ?City-States each w/ own god and government
• ?Ziggurat temple at center of city
• ?Irrigation canals controlling river water to
  irrigate crops
• ?Social system priests / kings at top, slaves
  at bottom
• ?Polytheistic belief in many gods
• ?Number system based on 60 60 second minute,
  60 minute hour, 360 circle

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Later Mesopotamian Empires

• Write down the following information
• Sargon I of Akkad created the worlds first
  empire in 2300 B.C. by conquering the Sumerians.
• About 1800 B.C., Hammurabi conquered Akkad and
  Sumer and established the Babylonian Empire.
• Hammurabi unified the Babylonian Empire by
  setting up a single code of law and by raising
  the god of Babylon above all others.
• Hammurabis Law Code was a long series of legal
  judgments which promoted fair treatment for
  citizens. The penalties for crimes were severe.

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Hammurabis Code of Law

• Read the following examples and information
• EXAMPLES OF CODE OF LAW
• A son who strikes his father will have his hands
  cut off.
• If a man strikes and wounds another, then he will
  pay the physician. But, if the man puts out the
  eye of another, his own eye will be put out, and
  if he breaks anothers bones, his bones will be
  broken.
• If a builder has built a home for a man and has
  not made his work sound, so that the house he has
  made falls down and causes the death of the owner
  of the house, that builder shall be put to death.

• Hammurabis Law Code is considered by historians
  to be a positive development in civilization.
• Hammurabis codes were an attempt to deal fairly
  with people in a political state made up of
  former independent states with different
  traditions.
• The code set up a social order based on
  individual rights.

If a man has not his witnesses at hand, the judge
shall set him a fixed time not exceeding six
months, and if within six months he has not
produced his witnesses, the man has lied he
shall bear the penalty of the suit. (Google
images)
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On a separate piece of paper make the following
chart.Today, fill in the information for
Mesopotamian / Sumerian.Keep your CHART in your
Soc. Studies folder to complete for each
civilization as given.
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Search Online

• Find information and pictures of the Sumerian
  civilization CONTRIBUTIONS, (i.e. writing,
  ziggurat-(temple), irrigation canals, wheel,
  calendar, system based on 60, etc.).
• Write a short (1 complete sentence) description
  of 2 Contributions by the Sumerians.
• Write these description sentences on the back of
  your chart. Title it Sumerian Contributions