Early Sumerian City-State

Emergence of Kings, exercised distinct political rather than religious authority. Also warring Sumerian city-states, which fought for control of the river valleys in the lower Mesopotamia.

The society of Sumer, as said in a document “ was home to a privileged class of elites who headed households by nearby irrigated land”. Sumer was a growing civilization with a written language, education, government, religion, economy, and family hierarchy. “Sumer was a particular civilization that developed in the region of Mesopotamia.” Due to Mesopotamia being so plentiful, this let Sumer bloom into a great civilization. A written language in Sumer was in the form of cuneiform, characters formed by the arrangement of small wedge-shaped elements.

In 1950, V Gordon Childe drew up a list of traits of to what he considered to be the common characteristics of early civilizations. According to Fagan & Scarre, a recent archaeologist Charles Redman divided Childe’s list into primary and secondary characteristics. The primary characteristics included cities and states, together with full-time specialization of labor, concentration of surplus, and a class-structured society. For the secondary, the characteristics included symptoms or by-products of these major economic and organizational changes: monumental public works, long-distance trade, standardized monumental artworks, writing, and the sciences (arithmetic, geometry, and astronomy)(Scarre and Fagan 2003). One of the most common characteristics involve was a large, dense population living in a city. This essay well state and describe two early cities in Mesopotamia and explore the layouts and characteristics of these two cities. Also, whether each city is unique or share common characteristics with each other. The two cities are Maskan-shapir and Ur.

Mesopotamian city state has unity but they are independent from other city states. They would usually trade with each other.

Leading in and out of every city was at least one, usually several, canals, used to store trading ships in times of peace and warships during the wars. Underneath their cities the Sumerians had a complete sewer system made of baked bricks.

Sumerian cities also faced external tribulations because of their wealth and virtually defenseless entrances o their land. Because the land and location was so flat and vulnerable the cities built defensive walls and organized military forces.6 Gilgamesh built a very similar structure. The wall of Uruk was an amazing barrier that sheltered every square mile of land. The citizens of Uruk claimed the wall to be "the pure treasury." 7 It becomes evident in Mesopotamian culture as well as with Gilgamesh that major defense mechanisms are needed in order to maintain security. When a city --state gains structure the next step is to become proactively aggressive; therefore, conquering and punishing other cities. For example, "External threats came later to Egypt than to Mesopotamia, but the invasion of the Hyksos prompted the pharaohs to seize control of regions that might pose future threats." 8

Describe the ancient Sumerian and Egyptian civilizations in terms of political structure, religion, society, and culture. Account for the similarities and differences between them.

One of the biggest challenges there was an uncontrollable water supply. When snow from the Zagros mountains melted, it fed the rivers and made them floodThey had solutions, oo. They learned to build levees and created a form of irrigation for crops to flourish. They learned to build canals, but they needed to be cleaned regularly. Overall, they learned to build for the better. The canals proved to be a game changer for them. The canals needed to be cleared of silt frequently, so people of different villages teamed together for the job. Eventually they began to live together, forming the first Sumerian city states. But why were they called city states? The villages had grown into small country-like places, so we call them city states because they are basically cities and are like states. Think about it like the United States. Each state has its own capital city, right? Each of those cities is like a city-state. They are cities within a much larger piece of land, or a state. They are called Sumerian city states because they were located in the lands of

While Sumerian cities were each dedicated to a different god, the Roman Imperial Cult unified Romans while not oppressing most religions of the conquered. The Lands once controlled by Sumeria were eventually ruled by Rome.

In Mesopotamia the ruling powers were both divine and royal. The Sumerians had a belief that people were created by gods to labor for them. The temple and its land belonged to the god Ningirsu and his wife Baba, and their family. The land owning upper classes included ruling princes and their families, leading priests, and palace officials. The political function was not separated from the religious function for much of Mesopotamia's history. In old Babylonian times a town or a precinct mayor led a group or council of elders. Nobility formed the upper house of elders, and also land-owning commoners met in a popular assembly to make important decisions. Together they managed dealings such as appointing governors, and choosing kings to be temporary military commanders in times of crisis. Eventually there was a separation of the kings from the temple, and the soldiers were kept in the king's palace. The king with his increasing

Similar to Egyptians, Mesopotamians were polytheists and their gods created the natural phenomena. However, the temple in each city-state mainly worshipped a local god and was the central power in the city. The Mesopotamians ascribed human’s appearance and characteristics to represent their deities. The presence of the cult image in the temple indicated the presence of the deity in the city. Each cult image of the local god was placed in the city’s largest and most sophisticated sanctuary. For instance, the cult image of Marduk–Babylon’s city deity–resided in the Esagila temple. Mesopotamians believed the shrine of the Esagila temple was the heart of the universe. According to the inscriptions in the Steinplatten, the cult statue, the walls and the ceilings of the sanctuary were plated in gold. In practice of the daily ritual, the servants or priests of the temple cleansed and dressed the cult statue in new clothes. Since the priests directly served the patron city god, they were respected by common people. Additionally, the inscriptions from king Neriglissar’s cylinder revealed that he was submissive to the gods and thus the king’s power was shared to the priests and the local government. Local government governed the city and controlled the economy on behalf of the city’s god. Consequently, the cult’s control over the economy and society was limited inside the city-state.

Gun control is not one issue, but many. Gun control is a crime issue, to others it is a rights issue. It is a safety issue, an education issue, a racial issue, and a political issue, among others. Issues such as gun control and gun rights have remained a matter of debate and have been lobbying around in Congress meetings. Over the years, there have been many different laws and regulations on weapons in the United States. However, to fully understand American views on guns, one must go back to the beginning of American history itself.

In the perspective of world history, recorded history begins in around 4th millennium BC with the accounts of the ancient world which concurr with the invention of writing. The earliest chronologies date back to the two earliest civilizations: the early dynastic period of Egypt and the ancient Sumerians of Mesopotamia which emerged independently of each other in around 3500 B.C.

In the ancient civilization of the Sumerians religion was an important part of both the lives of the

Government:The government of Mesopotamia was a strange one. There were kings and nobles who decided the laws and declared how their subjects should worship the gods, Then there was a group of people who could overrule the king and say which law was good or not, and get rid of it if it was not.