The first civilizations: Mesopotamia and Egypt – Agenda 1ºESO –

In this article about the first civilizations, Mesopotamia and Egypt, we are going to invite you to travel to the past with us so that you can discover for yourself how they were organized, where they were located and why, as well as we will talk about the most remarkable milestones of each of them.

Early Civilizations: Mesopotamia

Let’s start talking about origin of the word Mesopotamiafrom a Greek root, where we find “meso” “potamos” that we would have to translate as “land between the rivers«. Notice how the origin of the word and its meaning is already indicating part of the location of this first civilization, which settled on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. If we go into the current geography, Mesopotamia would be located in the Middle East, mostly in Iraq but also in some areas of northeastern Syria, parts of Turkey and part of southwestern Iran.

As a quick but essential summary, Mesopotamia has gone down in history for being the cradle of civilization, where the development of the civilizations of Sumeria, Acadia, Babylon or the Assyrian Empire stands out, of which we have already talked about in previous articles (you can access them by clicking on each civilization). These civilizations would be settled in the Bronze Agewhile in the iron age we would have to talk about the Neo-Assyrian Empire and the Neo-Babylonian Empire, later it would be conquered by the Persian Empire and was under its rule for a long time, until it was conquered by Alexander the Great (king of Macedonia) and finally fell into the hands of the Roman Empire.

One of the most surprising aspects is that the first news about Mesopotamia dates from the years 6000-5000 BC, there is talk of a redistributive civilization directed by a council of elders who were considered the wisest. The beginning of agriculture, the domestication of animals and the first attempts with livestock are believed to have caused the first social differences that would lead to the creation of the first cities.

Another fundamental milestone is the writing Creation, back in 3000 BC, and was written on unfired wet clay tablets created by scribes in temples in order to keep records on the materials that went in and out of it.

Again, in this same period, we find one of the most important inventions for commerce, land transport or as a fundamental part of other machines, the wheel. Something that today may seem so simple and so ours, was invented before Christ and has been essential for the development and progress of all civilizations.

Next, I am going to leave you a series of complementary links so that you can count on more information about Mesopotamiatheir civilizations, their way of life and information about some important data that we have mentioned:

Early Civilizations: Egypt

One of the first civilizations was the Egyptian, based on the Nile river valley, an area where it could be cultivated prolifically. It is necessary to differentiate between two regions in this valley, the Upper Nile and the Lower Nile, which was also called the Lower Egypt and Upper Egypt.

A fundamental fact for the organization of Egyptian history for your knowledge, understanding and structuring of works is that its history begins in the year 3100 BC and was differentiated into three periods: Ancient empire, the Middle Kingdom and the new kingdom. Finally, the history of this civilization ends in the year 30 BC when it is conquered by the Romans.

Most likely you know the names of some pharaohs, either because of the three pyramids of Giza, because of the archaeological discoveries that are still happening or because of your knowledge of history. A fact that may seem very curious to you is that in those almost 3000 years they came to rule 31 families/dynastiesthe most important being Cheops, Khafre, Akhenaten and Ramses II, although you may have also heard of Tutankhamun because of the impressiveness of the find, but he died too young to be relevant on a historical level.

Really, the pharaohs They were the ones who occupied the most privileged place at a social level, generally being the men who governed, except for a few cases of women who came to occupy a high rank. One of the most important women was pharaoh queen hatshepsutthe third pharaoh-queen in the history of Egypt, who ruled with serious difficulties since she skipped all the laws and customs of the time to proclaim herself pharaoh, and her funerary temple still stands today, described as “the wonder of wonders » and which is located a few kilometers from the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens in Luxor.

As we mentioned before about the location of this civilization, being in the Nile River valley, they enjoyed an economy based on farming, because the periodic floods make its shores very fertile. Refering to craft of this civilization you can find innumerable and impressive samples of its level in museums or in Egypt, where you will discover tombs with an impressive level of painting, jewels that you would wear today, fabrics, papyri… What about the hieroglyphs! It is true that it is not easy to understand and that you will need someone to translate what the symbols mean but you will discover how they are repeated, which will allow you to have the feeling of knowing a little more. Thanks to this method of writing today we can know how they had great medical advances or more about your polytheistic religion.

Who has not ever seen a representation of the sphinx egyptian? It is such a famous image that we can use it to understand how they represented their gods with a fusion between natural symbols (sun, animals, river, flower, etc.) and anthropomorphic features. Some of their gods were Ra (Sun), Osiris (god of agriculture and the dead), Isis (great mother goddess), Horus (god of royalty in the sky, of war and hunting), Ptah and Amun (primal creator gods), Nut (goddess of the sky), Seth (god of the desert, war, drought and chaos), Thoth (god of writing), Anubis (god of the Beyond) and Hathor (goddess of love and motherhood). They were worshiped, each of them in their temple, such as the Temple of Karnak or the Temple of Isis.

To finish more information about Egypt Continue reading this selection of articles where you can see how mummifications were carried out, what type of constructions they were, why the pyramids, etc.: