4 HIST 201 Lesson 4 Complex Societies and Cities

Yellow River

Also known as the Huang-He. The second longest river in China. The majority of ancient Chinese civilizations originated in its valley.

Hammurabi

Amorite ruler of Babylon (r. 1792-1750 B.C.E.). He conquered many city-states in southern and northern Mesopotamia and is best known for a code of laws, inscribed on a black stone pillar, illustrating the principles to be used in legal cases.

Evaluate the kinds of problems cities faced that agricultural societies did not, as well as possible solutions for those problems.

food shortage, disease,

Semitic language family

the name given to a family of languages native to West Asia (the Middle East) Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, Amharic Extinct: Akkadian, Canaanite, Phoenician, Punic

Akkadians

"Semitic people" north of the Sumerian city-states

Shang dynasty

(1766-1122 BCE) The Chinese dynasty that rose to power due to bronze metallurgy, war chariots, and a vast network of walled towns whose recognized this dynasty as the superior. Second Chinese dynasty (about 1750-1122 B.C.) which was mostly a farming society ruled by an aristocracy mostly concerned with war. They're best remembered for their art of bronze casting.

Old Kingdom in Egypt

- Era of pyramid building - 2700 BC-2200 BC

Pharaoh

A king of ancient Egypt, considered a god as well as a political and military leader.

height of Harappan civilization

2500-2000 BCE The Harapan civilization extendedover n early five hundred thousand square miles in the Indus Valleyo, making it more than twice as large as ancient Egypt or Sumer. Harappan civilization was marked by uniformity. Throughout the region even in small villages, bricks were made to the same standard proportion. Figurines of pregnant woman have beenfound throughout the area, suggesting common religious ideas and practices. Cities were defended by great citadels that were 40 to 50 feet high. The cities had been planned and built before being seing settled. Street were straight and varied from 9 to 34 feet in wicth. The houses were substantial, two stories tall, some three stories. The foca point of a house was a central courtyard onto which the rooms opened. They had complex systems of drainage. Each house had a bathroom with a drain connected to brick-lined sewers located under the major streets. Openings allowed the refuse to be collected, probably to be used as fertilizer on nearby fields. No other ancient city had such an advanced sanitation system.. One of the large structures was a large ventilated storehouse for the community's grain. A marketplace or place of assymbly, a palace, and a huge pool some 39 feet long by 23 feet wide by 8 feet deep in Mohenjo-daro city.

cuneiform

A form of writing developed by the Sumerians using a wedge shaped stylus and clay tablets.

Identify the characteristics of Indo-European societies specifically.

A number of peoples were part of the Indo-European migrations, and their languages are part of the Indo-European language family. This includes the Hittites (settled in Mesopotamia, Asia Minor), the Celts (Europe), the Medes and the Persians (Mesopotamia), Aryans (India), and the Greeks (Greece). Germanic and Slavic languages are also part of the Indo-European language family. These were all peoples who had original homelands somewhere in Central Asia and migrated into agricultural areas. They were formidable enough that in many cases they were able to dominate the existing agricultural peoples—so much so that eventually their language and perhaps their culture won out over existing languages and cultures. Originally these different Indo-European peoples were pastoralists, but over time they mixed with the settled peoples and became agriculturalists too.

Hittites

A people from central Anatolia who established an empire in Anatolia and Syria in the Late Bronze Age. With wealth from the trade in metals and military power based on chariot forces, they vied with New Kingdom Egypt over Syria.

Indus River

A river in South Asia that flows from the Himalayas to the Arabian Sea.

How were religion and the state of Indus River Valley Civilization intertwined?

After the decline of the Harappan civilization, a people who called themselves Aryans became dominant in north India.Named for the Vedas, a large and significant body of ancient sacred works written in Sanskrit, this period witnessed the Indo-Aryan development of the caste system and the Brahmanic religion and the writing of the great epics that represent the earliest form of Indian literature. At the head of the Aryan tribe was a chief, or raja, who led his followers in battle and ruled them in peacetime. The warriors in the tribe elected the chief for his military skills. Next in importance to the chief was the priest. In time, priests evolved into a distinct class possessing precise knowledge of the complex rituals and of the invocations and formulas that accompanied them. As Aryan rulers came to dominate large settled populations, the style of political organization changed from tribal chieftainship to territorial kingship. The ruler now controlled an area with people living in permanent settlements, not a nomadic tribe that moved as a group. Kings no longer needed to be elected by the tribe; it was enough to be invested by priests and to perform the royal ceremonies they designed. The priest, or Brahmins, supported the growth of royal power in return for confirmation of their own power and status. The Brahmins also served as advisers to the kings.

establishment of the Akkadian empire

Around 2300 BCE Sargon, the king of a region to the north of Sumer, conquered a number of Sumerian cities with what was probably the world's first permanent army and created a large state. The symbol of his triumph was a new capital, the city of Akkad. Sargon also expanded the Akkadian empire westward to northern Syria, which became the breadbasket of the empire. He encouraged trading networks that brought in goods from as far away as the Indus River in South Asia and what is now Turkey. Sargon spoke a different language than did the Sumerians, one of the many languages that scholars identify as belonging to the Semitic language family, which includes modern-day Hebrew and Arabic.

What kinds of social distinctions existed in Egyptian society?

At the top stood the pharaoh, who relied on a circle of nobles, officials, and priests to administer his kingdom. all of them were assisted by scribes, who used a writing system perhaps adapted from Mesopotamia or perhaps developed independently. the cities of the Nile Valley were also home to artisans of all types, along with merchants and other tradespeople. A large group of farmers made up the broad base of the social pyramid.

emergence of Neolithic settlements in the Yellow River Valley

By 5000 BCE there were Neolithic village settlements in several regions of China. The primary Neolithic crops were drought-resistant millet, kgrown in the loess soils of the north, and rice, grown in the wetlands of the lower reaches of the Yangzi River. In both aread pigs, dogs, and cattle were domesticated and by 3000 BCE sheep had become important in the north and water buffalo in the south. Sild roduction can also be traced back to this period.

What kinds of social distinctions existed in Indus River Valley Civilization society?

Caste was central to the social life of these north Indian kingdoms. Aryan society had distinguished: warrior elite, the priest, ordinary tribesmen, and conquered subjects. They evolved into the caste system. Society was conceived of as four hierarchical strata whose members did not eat with or marry each other. These strata, or varnas, were Brahmin (priests), Kshatriya (warriors and officials), Vaishya (merchants), and Shudra (peasants and laborers). Those without places in the four varnas were outcastes (untouchables).

What is the geographical location of Yellow River civilizations? Is it in proximity to other societies? Did the people interact with any of the other four major societies?

China proper occupies much of the temperate zone of East Asia. The northern part, drained by the Yellow River,is colder, flatter, and more arid than the south. Wheat and millet were the regions' most important crops. The Yangzi River is the dominant feature of the warmer, wetter, and more lush south, a region well suited to rice cultivation. Mountains, deserts, and grasslands separated China proper from other early civilizations.

Was there writing in Egypt society? What was it used for?

Egyptian scribes who used a writing system perhaps adapted from mesopotamia or perhaps developed independently. Egyptian scribes actually created two writing systems: one called hieroglyphics for engraving important religious or political texts on stone or writing them onpapyrus made from reeds growing in the Nile Delta, and a much simpler system called hieratic that allowed scribes to write more quickly and was used for the documents of daily life.

What was the basic political unit in Mesopotamia? City-state? Kingdom? Empire? Some combination of two or three? Was there change over time?

Exactly how kings emerged in Sumerian society is not clear. Scholars have suggested that during times, of crisis, a chief priest or sometimes a military leader assumed what was supposed to be temporary authority over a city. He established an army trained it, and led it into battle. Temporary power gradually became permanent kingship, and kings in some Sumerian city-states began to hand down the kingship to their sons, extablishing patriarchal hereditary dynasties in which power was handed down through the male line.

establishment of the first cities in Sumer

Farmers from the northern hilly parts of the river valleys, brought techniques of crop raising southward by about 5000 BCE to the southern part of Mesopotamia known as Sumer. In this arid climate farmers developed large-scale irrigation, which required organized group effort but allowed the population to grow. By about 3800 BCE one of these agricultural villages, Uruk, had expanded significantly, becoming what many historians view as the world's first city. Over the next thousand years, other cities emerged in Sumer. These cities built defensive walls, market places, and large public buildings; each came to dominate the surrounding countryside, becoming city-states independent from one another, though not very far apart.

How does writing shape what we know about the past, and how did writing develop to meet the needs of cities and states?

Historians who study human societies that developed systems of writing continue to use many of the same types of physical evidence as do those who study societies without writing. For some cultures, the writing or record-keeping systems have not yet been deciphered. so our knowledge of these people also depends largely onphysical evidence. Scholars can read the writing of a great many societies, however, adding greatly to what we can learn about them.

How did the geography or environment of Indus River Valley Civilization affect the development of agriculture?

Immediately to the south are the fertile valleys of the Indus and Ganges Rivers. These lowland plains, which stretch all the way across the subcontinent, were tamed for agriculture over time, and India's great empires were centered there. Along the western coast of this part of India do the hills give way to narrow plains where crop agriculture flourished

What was the basic political unit in Indus River Valley Civilization? City-state? Kingdom? Empire? Some combination of two or three? Was there change over time?

India's first civilization is known today as the Indus Valley or the Harappan civilization. Archaeologists have discovered some three hundred Harappan cities and many more towns and villages. It was a literate civilization. Because no one has yet deciphered the written language of the Harappan people, their political, intellectual, and religious life is largely unknown.

Harappan civilization

Indus River Valley Civilization

Was there writing in Indus River Valley Civilization society? What was it used for?

It was a literate civilization. Because no one has yet deciphered the written language of the Harappan people, their political, intellectual, and religious life is largely unknown. Aryans became dominant in north India.Named for the Vedas, a large and significant body of ancient sacred works written in Sanskrit, this period witnessed the Indo-Aryan development of the caste system and the Brahmanic religion and the writing of the great epics that represent the earliest form of Indian literature.

How were religion and the state of Mesopotamia intertwined?

Kings made alliances with other powerful individuals, often through marriage. Royal family members were responsible for many aspects of government. Kings worked closely with religious authorities and relied on ideas about their connections with the gods, as well as the king's military might, for their power. Acting together, priest, nobles, and kings in Sumerian cities used force, persuasion, and threats of higher taxes to maintain order, keep the irrigationo systems working, and keep food and other goods flowing.

Assyrians

Known as a warrior people who ruthlessly conquered neighboring countries; their empire stretched from east to north of the Tigris River all the way to centeral Egypt; used ladders, weapons like iron-tipped spears, daggers and swords, tunnels, and fearful military tactics to gain strength in their empire

How did the geography or environment of Mesopotamia affect the development of agriculture?

Mesopotamia was part of the Fertile Crescent, where settled agriculture first developed. The earliest agricultural villages in Mesopotamia were in the northern, hilly parts of the river valleys, where there is abundant rainfall for crops. Farmers had brought tehniques of crop raising southward by about 5000 BCE, to the southern part of Mesopotamia known as Sumer.

What is the geographical location of Mesopotamia? Is it in proximity to other societies? Did the people interact with any of the other four major societies?

Mesopotamia was part of the Fertile Crescent, where settled agriculture first developed. The earliest agricultural villages in Mesopotamia were in the northern, hilly parts of the river valleys, where there is abundant rainfall for crops. Farmers had brought tehniques of crop raising southward by about 5000 BCE, to the southern part of Mesopotamia known as Sumer. In this arid climate farmers developed large-scale irrigation. Over the next thousand years, other cities emerged in Sumer.

What is the geographical location of Indus River Valley Civilization? Is it in proximity to other societies? Did the people interact with any of the other four major societies?

Monsoon rains sweep northward from the Indian Ocean each summer. The lower reaches of the Himalaya Mountains in the northeast are covered by dense forests. Immediately to the south are the fertile valleys of the Indus and Ganges Rivers. These lowland plains, which stretch all the way across the subcontinent, were tamed for agriculture over time, and India's great empires were centered there. To their west are the deserts of Rajasthan and southeastern Pakistan, historically important in part because their flat terrain enabled invaders to sweep into India from the northwest. South of the great river valleys rise the Vindhya Mountains and the dry, hilly Deccan Plateau. Only along the western coast of this part of India do the hills give way to narrow plains where crop agriculture flourished. India's long coastlines and predictable winds fostered maritime trade with other countries bordering the Indian Ocean.

What is the geographical location of Egypt? Is it in proximity to other societies? Did the people interact with any of the other four major societies?

Nile River. The Nile unified Egypt serving as a highway.

What were the characteristics of pastoral societies?

Pastoralists make their living by raising animals. Most pastoralists were nomadic, They moved from place to place in search of pasture and water. Pastoral nomadism is commonly found where the climate and landscape produce seasonal pastures but are not conducive to intensive agriculture. The most important animals raised by pastoralists were sheep, goats, cattle, horses, donkeys, and camels. Pastoral peoples used the meat and milk of their animals and made clothing out of wool and animal skins. They often lived in houses called yurts—circular tents made of animal skins over wood frames and that were easy to dismantle and transport. Pastoral societies were organized around mobile households rather than individuals, and everyone—men, women, and children—was involved in the various aspects of production. There were probably fewer social inequalities in pastoral societies than in complex agricultural societies. There were often ruling families but fewer slaves or dependent peasants. Agriculturalists and pastoralists were not isolated from each other—in fact, they needed each other for the types of products that they produced. Throughout the course, we will see that agriculturalists and pastoralists interacted frequently, with important results for their societies. Pastoralists were crucial for long-distance trade and often acted as middlemen, exchanging goods between peoples separated by great distances. Pastoral peoples were also more formidable than agricultural peoples, in many cases. One of the most basic trends in history before 1500 or so is that pastoralists tended to be attracted to agricultural settlements, mainly to attack and plunder. But there were also periods when they would migrate into agricultural areas; these migrations often changed the course of history.

Was there writing in Mesopotamian society? What was it used for?

Pictographs were the forerunners of the Sumerian form of writing known as cuneiform. Pictographs were initially limited in that they could not represent abstract ideas, but the development of ideograms--signs that represented ideas--made writing more versatile. The real breakthrough came when scribes started using signs to represent sounds (cuneiform). the development of the Sumerian system of writing was piecemeal, with scribes making changes and additions as they were needed. Scribal schools were primarily intended to produce individuals who could keep records of the property of temple officials, kings, and nobles, Writing first developed as a way to enhance the growing power of elites, not to record speech. Summerians wrote numbers as well as words on clay tablets.

What was the basic political unit in Yellow River Civilization? City-state? Kingdom? Empire? Some combination of two or three? Was there change over time?

Shang kings ruled from large settlements. Shang kings were military chieftains. The Shang king was also the high priest, the one best qualified to offer sacrifices to the royal ancestors and the high god Di.

What kinds of social distinctions existed in Yellow River Civilaztion society?

Shang society was marked by sharp status distinctions. The The king and other noble families had family and clan names transmitted along patrilineal lines, from father to son. Kingship similarly passed along patrilineal lines. The kings and the aristocrats owned slaves, many of whom had been captured in war. In the urban centers there were substantial numbers of craftsmen who worked in stone, bone, and bronze. Shang farmers were obligated to work for their lords (making them essentially serfs).

How were religion and the state of Egypt intertwined?

The Egyptians worshiped gods of death and the Nile as well as gods of creation and the sun. They buried their kings (pharaohs) in grand burial tombs in order to give them a good afterlife The political power structures that developed in Egypt came to be linked with the Nile, somehow the idea developed that a single individual, a king, was responsible for the rise and fall of the Nile. The king came to be viewed as a descendant of the gods and thus a god himself.

Compare and contrast the characteristics of ancient complex societies.

The Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Indus Valley, and Yellow River societies were all alluvial societies, meaning they were all located near a river in a river valley. Although the Mesopotamian, Egyptians, Indus Valley, and Yellow River societies engaged in trade, the Egyptians and the Yellow River societies were quite isolationist. They were surrounded by natural barriers such as the Sahara Desert west of Egypt and the Himalayas south of China. Their isolation did prove to withstand any conquerors and thrive much longer than the likes of Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley. While Mesopotamia fell into the hands of various conquerors, they eventually succumbed to various empires from Persia, Greece, Rome, and Arabia. The Indus Valley civilization likewise fell into the hands of Persia and Greece later on. Egypt, however, maintained their sovereignty for centuries until its integration into the Roman Empire and the Chinese civiliztion lasted although morphed and evolved along the way straight into the 20th centruty as the Qing dynasty fell into the hands of Mao Ze Dong. All four ancient societies had a clear and powerful class system. At the top of the class system was usually the rulers of the civilization, whether that be a ruler of government, religion, or military. Often times, farmers and other workers of manual labor were on the bottom of the system. All four ancient civilizations had some form of religion. The Mesopotamians worshiped their gods of the Tigris and Euphrates in order to have a bountiful harvest and also to keep stability within the civilization. The Egyptians worshiped gods of death and the Nile as well as gods of creation and the sun. They buried their kings (pharaohs) in grand burial tombs in order to give them a good afterlife. The Indus Valley civilizations worshiped idols. The Yellow River societies worshipped their ancestors and asked their dead for guidance. Much of Yellow River societies ancestral worship is still reflected on many East Asian cultures today. All four early civilizations had thier unique systems of writing. The Mesopotamians used a script called cuneiform to record their information. The Egyptians used hieroglyphs. the Indus Valley civilization used the Indus script (or Harappan Scripts). which is a script yet to be completely deciphered and is rather undeveloped compared to cuneiform and hieroglyphs. finally, the Yellow River script was developed and evolved over millennia to become the common Chinese script used today.

How did the geography or environment of Egypt affect the development of agriculture?

The Nile flooded once a year for a period of several months, bringing fertile soil and moisture for farming. Through the fertility of the Nile and their own hard work, Egyptians produced an annual agricultural surplus, which in turn sustained a growing and prosperous population. The Nile also unified Egypt, serving as a highway that promoted easy communication.

How were religion and the state of Yellow River Civilization intertwined?

The Yellow River societies worshipped their ancestors and asked their dead for guidance. Much of Yellow River societies ancestral worship is still reflected on many East Asian cultures today.

Harappans

The first river valley civilization of India on the Indus River. They mysteriously disappeared.

What kinds of social distinctions existed in Mesopotamian society?

The king and the nobles held extensive tracts of land, as did the temple; these lands were worked by the palace's or the temple's clients--free men and women who were dependent on the palace or the temple. They received crops and other goods in return for their labor. although this arrangement assured the clients of a livelihood, the land they worked remained the possession of the palace or the temple. Some individuals and families owned land outright and paid their taxes in the form of agricultural products or items they made. At the bottom rung of society were slaves. Like animals, slaves were a source of physical power for their owners,providing them an opportunity to amass more wealth and influence.

How did the geography or environment of the Yellow River civilizations affect the development of agriculture?

The northern part, drained by the Yellow River,is colder, flatter, and more arid than the south. Wheat and millet were the regions' most important crops. The Yangzi River is the dominant feature of the warmer, wetter, and more lush south, a region well suited to rice cultivation.

Sumerians

The people who dominated southern Mesopotamia through the end of the third millennium B.C.E. They were responsible for the creation of many fundamental elements of Mesopotamian culture-such as irrigation technology, cuneiform, and religious conceptions.

What was the basic political unit in Egypt? City-state? Kingdom? Empire? Some combination of two or three? Was there change over time?

The political power structures that developed in Egypt came to be linked with the Nile, somehow the idea developed that a single individual, a king, was responsible for the rise and fall of the Nile. The king came to be viewed as a descendant of the gods and thus a god himself. Groups of sea faring people whom the Egyptians called "sea peoples' raided, migrated, and marauded in the eastern Mediterranean, disrupting trade and in some cases looting and destroying cities. These raids, combined with the expansion of the Assyrians, led to the collapse of the Hittite empire and the fragmentation of the Egyptian empire.There is evidence of drought, and some scholars have suggested that a major volcanic explosion in Iceland cooled the climate for several years. With the contraction of the Egyptian empire, an independent kingdom, Kush, rose to power in Nubia, with its capital at Napata in what is now Sudan. The Kushites conquered southern Egypt, and in 727 BCE the Kushite king Piye swept through the entire Nile Valley to the delta in the north. United once again, Egypt enjoyed a brief period of peace during which the Egyptians culture continued to influence that of its conquerors. In the seventh century BCE invading Assyrians pushed the Kushites out of Egypt, and the Kushite rulers moved their capital farther up the Nile to Meroe.

Nile River

The river in which early kingdoms in Egypt were centered around.

Indo-European migrations

Tribes from southern Russia that migrated to India as well as Europe and distributed language

city-states

a city that with its surrounding territory forms an independent state.

Indo-European languages

a family (or phylum) of several hundred related languages and dialects,[1] including most major languages of Europe, Iran, and northern India, and historically also predominant in Anatolia and Central Asia.

What kinds of problems did cities face that agricultural villages did not? What kinds of solutions did ancient peoples employ to try to solve those problems?

cities were dirty, unhealthy places to live. Disease was a constant problem in urban areas (more about this later). Food supply was also an issue in ancient urban areas. Cities don't produce their own food—they import it from the countryside. If cities did not store large quantities of grain, then a couple of bad harvests or an attack by an enemy people could create famine and tremendous loss of life. One of the major responsibilities of any ruling power was to build and maintain large storage facilities, as well as use the bureaucracy and military power to make sure supply lines remained open. Rulers of cities or city-states who did not do this would likely not be in power for long. living in cities was difficult because of the lack of social controls found in large societies. In an agricultural village of a hundred people, or even several hundred people, everyone knew everyone else. Family and kin networks were the primary way in which society was organized, and those networks enforced social norms. This was especially true when it came to marriage and the transfer of property that happened at the time of the marriage. Those transactions would be handled by the kin group. If someone committed a crime, that crime could be dealt with by the leaders of the kin groups as well. There were also natural disincentives for a lot of types of crime.

The Harappans were the earliest known manufacturers of

cotton cloth

Phoenicians

located on eastern Mediterranean coast; invented the alphabet which used sounds rather than symbols like cuneiform

pastoralists

nomads who kept herds of livestock on which they depended for most of their food

Was there writing in Yellow River Civilization society? What was it used for?

the Yellow River script was developed and evolved over millennia to become the common Chinese script used today.

Tigris and Euphrates rivers

the two rivers that surround Mesopotamia. These rivers would flood and provide silt that made the soil fertile.