transcript
- 1. The Rise of Sumerian City-States
- 2. Mesopotamia: The land between the rivers Tigris &
Euphrates Rivers Modern-day Iraq 1st cities appear In Sumer LINK:
Interactive Timeline & Map
- 3. City-States Earliest cities date back to 3500 BCE Each city
was like a small, independent country Each had its own ruler Each
had its own farmlands
- 4. A Difficult Environment Mesopotamians were farmers Farms
need water 4 Key Problems: 1. Food shortages in the hills 2.
Uncontrolled water supply on the plains 3. Difficulties building
and maintaining irrigation systems to serve several villages at
once 4. Attacks by neighboring communities Q: What might neighbors
fight over?
- 5. Food Shortages By 5000 BCE there is not enough land in the
foothills to grow enough food for everyone Q: Why did people move
to the plains? Climate: Foothills: mild weather, plentiful rain,
timber for building Plains: dry, little rain, no trees or stones
for building, rivers that flood The plains were called Sumer and
the people who lived there were called Sumerians
- 6. Uncontrolled Water Supply in the River Valley Spring: rain
and melted snow from the mountains flood the Tigris and Euphrates
Rivers Rest of the year: sunbaked soil, dry, hard as stone Either
too much water or not enough Sumerians built levees & dams
- 7. Euphrates river canal
- 8. Building and Maintaining a Complex Irrigation System Canals
bring water from the river Irrigation passed through many villages
Silt clogs canals Working together helped communities grow SILT
VERY FINE MUD
- 9. Village Town City
- 10. Attacks by Neighboring Communities Cities fought over the
right to use water. The plains offer no natural barriers for
protection. Sumerians build walls to protect their cities.
- 11. Was Ancient Sumer a Civilization? CivilizationWriting
Technology Stable Food Supply Social Structure Government Religion
The Arts
- 12. Sumerian Civilization SUMERCuneiform Wheel Plow Social
Class King Ziggurat Music
- 13. Summary 1. The people of Mesopotamia solved problems in
order to live successfully in their environment 2. Their solutions
led to building large walled city states 3. Sumer had a complex
social structure, government, religion, and culture 4. Sumer was
one of the worlds first civilizations