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Outline of Chapter 1, Section 3

1.3 Civilization, Case Study: Ur in Sumer (pgs. 17-21)

1) Villages Grow into Cities

i) As technology developed, harvests were larger and populations could increase.

ii) The change from village life to city life was a gradual process and took several generations.

a) Economic Changes

i) To produce more crops, larger villages built elaborate irrigation systems. Because of a surplus in crops, villagers could pursue other jobs and skills.

ii) The wheel and the sail allowed traders to transport more goods over longer distances.

a) Social Changes

i) Building and operating irrigation systems required the cooperation of many people. As other groups of workers formed, social classes with varying wealth, power and influence emerged.

ii) Religion became more organized as city dwellers developed rituals founded on earlier religious beliefs. Common spiritual values became lasting religious traditions.

2) What is Civilization?

i) Most historians believe Sumer, in present day Iraq, was one of the first civilizations.

ii) Civilization is defined as a complex culture with the following five characteristics: advanced cities, specialized workers, complex institutions, record keeping, and advanced technology.

a) Advanced Cities

i) Cities are more than large groups of people and size does not separate villages from cities.

ii) One key difference is that a city is a center of trade for a larger area where farmers, merchants, and traders bring goods to market in cities.

a) Specialized Workers

i) Food surpluses provided the opportunity for specialization, the development of skills in a specific kind of work, such as traders, government officials, and priests.

ii) Some city dwellers became artisans, skilled workers who make goods by hand, such as jewelry, metal tools and weapons, or pottery.

b) Complex Institutions

i) Large populations made a system of ruling necessary and leaders emerged to maintain order.

ii) Institutions are long-lasting patterns of organization in a community. For example, government, religion, and the economy.

iii) Temples became centers of government, religious, and economic affairs.

c) Record Keeping

i) As cities grew, there was a need for government officials to document tax collection, the passage of laws, and the storage of grain. Priests needed to track yearly calendars and rituals and merchants had to record debts and payments.

ii) Around 3,000 B.C.E. Sumerian scribes, professional record keepers, invented a system of writing called cuneiform, which means “wedge-shaped” because of the tool used to write.

d) Advanced Technology

i) Farmers began to use oxen to plow fields and created complex irrigation systems.

ii) Artisans used potter’s wheels to shape clay and metalworkers melted copper and tin together to make bronze.

iii) The Bronze Age refers to the time when people began using bronze, rather than copper and stone, to fashion tools and weapons and it began around 3,000 B.C.E. in Sumer.

3) Civilization Emerges in Ur

i) Ur was one of the earliest cities in Sumer and stood along the Euphrates River.

ii) Ur was a flourishing urban civilization with great power and well-defined social classes.

a) An Agricultural Economy

i) Ditches carry water into farmers’ fields a mile away from its source as part of the elaborate irrigation system.

ii) Government official plan and direct this public works project to keep the economy thriving.

a) A Glimpse of City Life

i) Most people live in small, windowless, one-story boxlike houses packed together along broad dirt roads. Wealthy families have two-story houses with an inner courtyard.

ii) Artisans work full-time in their shops producing trade goods that help Ur prosper.

b) Ur’s Thriving Trade

i) People do not use coins to make purchases, but rather they know what trades are equal and barter, which is a way of trading goods and services without money.

ii) More complicated trades require a scribe who makes cuneiform signs on a clay tablet.

c) The Temple: Center of City Life

i) Temples were surrounded by heavy walls and often housed storage areas for grains, woven fabrics, and gems as offerings to the city’s god.

ii) Ziggurats, the pyramid-shaped monument within the temple gates that towers over the city, means “mountain of god” and priests conduct rituals to worship the city god at the peak.

d) A Religious Ritual Recorded

i) Poems preserved from Ur show the Sumerians’ belief in an afterlife and their burial rituals.

ii) Fruits, grains, and other goods are mentioned which suggest a wide range of crops Sumerians grew themselves or received as trade goods.

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