|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Covering the ancient
world through the age of technology, this illustrated lecture series by Eugene
Weber presents a tapestry of political and social events woven with many strands
— religion, industry, agriculture, demography, government, economics, and
art. A visual feast of over 2,700 images from the Metropolitan Museum of Art
portrays key events that shaped the development of Western thought, culture,
and tradition. Below is a list of
media presentations by Dr. Weber; each one is approximately thirty-minutes
(30) in length. These are being offered
to the student as a supplement to other sources presented in this section. The student needs to provide “log-on” information
to get access to the presentations; there is no cost to the student. Review
Units:
Mesopotamia
Settlements in the Fertile Crescent gave rise to
the great river civilizations of the Middle East
From Bronze to Iron
Metals revolutionized tools, as well as societies, in the empires
of Assyria, Persia, and Neo-Babylonia
|
Professor Page’s
Study Questions:
·
The evolution from “hunter-gatherer” to
methods of sedentary agriculture initiated the “Neolithic Revolution.” Why do archaeologists label this evolution
as “the most profound in the history of modern humans.”
·
What are the remarkable legacies of the
Mesopotamian civilization?
|
The Fertile Crescent:
Food First!
Human history began in Southwest Asia in
a place historians refer to as “the
Fertile Crescent.” The
“crescent” portion of its name comes from the crescent-like shape of its uplands
as seen on the map above. The term “Fertile” is used to describe this region
because, as we shall see, it was uniquely positioned geographically in such
a manner to support vast natural sources of food production. Within this region, archaeologists confirmed,
was the earliest center of food production in the world. The history of this region changed life, as
we know it. The Fertile Crescent became
the place for a large number of developments: cities, writing, empires, and
what historians refer to as civilization. “All of those developments sprang,
in turn, from the dense human populations, stored food surpluses, and feeding
of non-farming specialists made possible by the rise of food production in
the form of crop cultivation and animal husbandry.”
[1]
Therefore, domesticated plants and animals is what provided the inhabitants
of the Fertile Crescent a substantial head start in the process of the development
of civilization. . “Thanks to this
availability of suitable wild mammals and plants, early people of the Fertile
Crescent could quickly assemble a potent and balanced biological package
for intensive food production. Eventually, thousands of years after the beginnings of animal domestication
and food production, the animals also began to be used for milk, wool, plowing,
and transport. Thus, the crops and
animals of the Fertile Crescent’s first farmers came to meet humanity’s basic
economic needs: carbohydrate, protein, fat, clothing, traction, and transport.”
[2]
The transition from hunter-gatherer within
the Fertile Crescent occurred rather quickly.
In 9000 B.C.E., inhabitants were almost entirely reliant on “wild foods”
while by 6000 B.C.E. some societies became completely dependent on crops and
domesticated animals.
While they are
not exciting in appearance, settled agricultural villages
like this early example at Ban Po, China (below left) represented a radically
new way of life for human beings, unlike
anything that had
existed before.
[3]
Village of Ban Po China
Profound cultural rather than technological changes
were necessary at first to permit adaptation to the new mode of life. But
once the shift had occurred, ever more changes, both cultural and technological,
became possible.
[4]
In contrast to hunting and gathering
as a mode of life, agriculture means modifying the environment in order to
exploit it more effectively. Agriculture alters both the animals and plants it domesticates.
Ultimately, it changes the very landscape itself.
Organizing communities meant an enormous
expansion of what human beings could accomplish together. At the same time,
the ancient practical egalitarianism of hunter-gatherer societies was challenged
by the circumstances of the new mode of life. In addition to the new threats
to security, the new life in towns and cities required a new mode of
social organization--a division between those who direct
and manage and those who are directed. As specializations emerged in the economy,
inequalities of wealth and status emerged with them. In short, hierarchies
of wealth, status and power began to characterize the new societies.
[5]
|
Professor Page’s Study Questions:
·
What is “mythology”
and what role does it play in the development of civilization?
·
What is a “ziggurat?”
What role did they play in the ancient cities of Sumeria?
·
What is meant
by the term “holy city” and what does it tell us about the nature of
early human cultures? Does
this notion of “holy city” still exist today?
|
Sumerian Cities: CosmoMagical:
When one contemplates the mysteries of
Ancient Mesopotamia (Greek name: mesos `middle' and 'potamos' - 'river' so
`land between the rivers') nothing is more compelling than the ubiquitous ziggurat. The geographer Paul Wheatley uncovered much
of the secrets of these Sumerian cities none more significant than their religious
and ceremonial aspects. “Whenever,
in any of the seven regions of primary urban generation we trace back the
characteristic urban form to its beginnings we arrive not at a settlement
that is dominated by commercial relations, a primordial market, or at one
that is focused on a citadel, an archetypical fortress, but
rather at a ceremonial complex…” (Wheatley, pp.225-6).
Joseph Campbell, a preeminent authority
on the origins and meaning of world myths, wrote
in his book “The Hero With A Thousand Faces” that “ancient cities are built
like temples, having their portals to the four directions, while in the central
place stands the major shrine of the divine city founder.
The citizens live and work within the confines of this symbol. And in the same spirit, the domains of the
national and world religions are centered around the hub of some mother city:
Western Christendom and Rome, Islam around Mecca.”
[6]
When we examine the extant fragments of written tablets found
within the mystical cities of Sumeria we find clues that lead us to see that
these earliest cities where indeed "Holy
Center". An example can be found in Nippur, which reveals the words
of the birth goddess Nintur, and her remedy for savage nature of man.
She provides instructions on the building of a city that would be dedicated
specifically for worship of the gods.
"May they
come and build cities and cult-places,
that I may cool myself in their shade;
may they lay the bricks for the cult-cities in pure spots, and
may they found places for divination in pure spots."
She
gave directions for purification, and cries for quarter, the things that cool
(divine) wrath. She perfected divine
service and the august offices, she said to the (surrounding) regions:
"Let me institute peace there”
(Jacobsen, The
Eridu Genesis, p. 515)
|
Professor Page’s Study Questions:
·
What conclusions does Lewis Mumford make regarding the evolutions
of cities, civilization, and warfare? In your opinion is he correct or incorrect? Why?
|
Lewis Mumford, one
of the most respected modern commentators on the history of cities, regarded
this early union of power, religion, and continuous warfare as a permanent
curse of urban life. He wrote, “even when it is disguised by seemingly
hardheaded economic demands, uniformly turns into a religious performance;
nothing less than a wholesale ritual sacrifice.”
[7]
The warfare was especially destructive because the kings and soldiers
believed that they were upholding the honor
of their gods. When
cities are sacred, conflicts between them mean holy war, fights to the finish. The “Lamentation over the Destruction of Ur,”
which was addressed to Ningal, goddess of the Ekushnugal Temple, describes
that city’s utter destruction after the Elamites sacked it, exiled its rulers,
and destroyed the temple c. 1950 B.C.E.
After your
city had been destroyed, how
Now can you exist!
After your house
had been destroyed, how has your heart led you on!
Your city has become
a strange city; how
Now can you exist!
Your house has
become a house of tears,
How has your heart
led you on!
Your city which
has been made into
Ruins—you are no
longer its mistress!
Your righteous
house which has been
Given over to the
pickax—You no longer
Inhabit it,
Your people have
been led to slaughter—
You are no longer
their queen. (Kramer, The Sumerians, p 142)
|
Professor Page’s Study Questions:
·
Karl Marx’s “scientific”
and almost “religious” argument that the development of cities was the
catalyst for a universal “class struggle.” What did Marx propose as a solution? In your opinion is Marx correct, why or why not?
|
Creation of Social
Hierarchies:
The first Sumerian
cities fostered division of labor into occupational categories. There existed a whole panoply of occupational
categories absent in villages but forming the backbone of a sophisticated
urban economy and society: kings, priests, landowners, architects, astronomers, scribes, long-distance traders,
local merchants, artisans, cooks, farmers, soldiers, laborers, and slaves.
[8]
The socialist philosopher-historian, Karl
Marx, argued that the rise of cities brought about “the division of the population into
two great classes.” Marx’s formulation was too stark, ignoring the
broad range of classes in the city, but he does force us to think about the
class structure in our own cities, including the relationship between rich
and poor, and its implications for the health of society.
[9]
|
Professor Page’s Study Questions:
·
In your opinion
are the inequalities between men and women biological or are they historical?
Has the forces of biology dictated the subordination of women
or did we merely learn them from sources like the Bible?
|
Subordination of
Women:
Finally, the transformation of society
from a rural, egalitarian, kin based to an urban, hierarchical, territorial,
and class base may have provided the entering wedge for the subordination
of women. Women
in Sumer generally had certain basic rights, including the
rights to hold property, engage in business, and serve as legal witness. Nevertheless, it is clear that their husbands
limited women’s legal rights. Even
powerful women were often only pawns in the power struggles of men.
Feminist historian Gerda Lerner argues
that before the evolution of city-states, with their warfare and hierarchical
class structures, the status of women had
been more equal. Kin groups had been the basic economic units
of society, and women had had more power in these family groups than they
did in the city-states that displaced them.
Lerner claims that inequalities between men and women are not products
of unchanging biological differences. Rather,
humans have created the inequalities—and humans can alter them.
[10]
|
Professor Page’s Study Questions:
·
How do we explain
the extraordinary similarities of the flood story in the “Epic of Gilgamesh”
to that of what is told in the Old Testament in the chapter of Genesis?
·
What similarities
and/or differences exist between the Babylonian “Code of Hammurabi”
and Mosaic Law Codes of the Hebrews? What conclusions can we make from this?
·
What, in your
opinion, is the reason for the ubiquitous nature of “flood stories”
across time and space?
|
Achievements in
Literature and Law:
The Epic of Gilgamesh
The Epic of Gilgamesh
is from Babylonia, dating from long after the time that king Gilgamesh was
supposed to have ruled. It was based on earlier Sumerian legends of Gilgamesh.
The most complete version of the epic was preserved on eleven clay tablets
in the collection of the 7th century BC Assyrian king Ashurbanipal
The Flood Tablet
(Note: The above
link has a nice video segment attached. It
might be helpful to review the definition of oral
history and biblical mythology.)
This, the eleventh tablet of the epic, describes the
meeting of Gilgamesh with Utnapishtim. Like
Noah in the Hebrew Bible, Utnapishtim had been forewarned
of a plan by the gods to send a great flood. He built a boat and loaded it
with everything he could find. Utnapishtim survived the flood for six days
while mankind was destroyed, before landing on a mountain called Nimush. He
released a dove and a swallow but they did not find dry land to rest on, and
returned. Finally a raven that he released did not return, showing that the
waters must have receded.
George Smith, an assistant in The British Museum, identified
this Assyrian version of the Old Testament flood story in 1872.
(Note: Take a glimpse at other flood stories
across time and place)
|
Professor
Page’s Study Questions:
What evidence exists to confirm or deny that the Ten
Commandments originated from the “Code of Hammurabi?”
|
King Hammurabi’s
(1792-1750 B.C.) greatest achievement was the issuance of a law code designed
"to cause justice to prevail in the country, to destroy the wicked and
the evil, that the strong may not oppress the weak."
The Code of Hammurabi, created ca. 1700 BC , also known as the Codex Hammurabi,
is one of the earliest sets of laws found, and one of the best preserved examples
of this type of document from ancient Mesopotamia.
It shows rules and
punishments if those rules are broken. It focuses on theft, farming , property
damage, women's rights, marriage rights, children's rights, slave rights,
murder, death, and injury. The punishment is different for different classes
of offenders and victims.
The laws do not accept excuses or explanations for mistakes or fault: the
Code was openly displayed for all to see, so no man could plead ignorance
of the law as an excuse. Few people, however, could read in that era .
Property
Property laws incorporate laws of consumer protection for house buyers,
boat renters, contractors for services. In one case, a brutal punishment for faulty workmanship indicates
that common people, too, were viewed as commodities. The sins of the fathers may be taken out on the children. Some of the specific laws include:
[11]
If [the collapse of a building]
has caused the death of a son
Of the owner of
the house, they shall put the son of that builder to death.
If any one steal
the property of a temple or of the court, he shall be put to death,
And also the one
who receives the stolen thing from him shall be put to death.
| Urban Crime |
Many laws provided for punishment for robbery and for personal injuries.
Many of the latter varied according to the social class of the person
inflicting the injury as well as the person suffering the injury.
[12]
If any one is committing
a robbery and is caught, then he shall be put to death.
If a gentleman
has destroyed the eye of a member of the aristocracy, they shall destroy his
eye.
If he has broken
another gentlemen’s bone, they shall break his bone.
If he has destroyed
the eye of a commoner or broken the bone of a commoner, he shall pay one mina
of silver.
If he has destroyed
the eye of a gentleman’s slave or broken the bone of a gentleman’s slave,
he shall pay one half his value
