Welcome to the world of Ancient Mesopotamia.  In this era, they had many religions including polytheism and monotheism. The Judaism (monotheistic) religion is one where they used The Ten Commandments as their laws.  They also had many new ideas such as: the alphabet, division of labor, social hierarchy, and empires.  Like other civilizations they had imports, exports, and architecture.  After all, they were the first ever civilization.  

    Civilization began around ten-twelve thousand years ago.  It’s first city was Jericho. We know this because evidence has been found from pottery industries and granaries. The people decided to create a civilization together because it is easier to live together then by yourself.  They also came together because of their gods and their attitudes towards women.  Mesopotamia is very important to current times because they created many inventions such as; writing, plows, and the wheel.  

   The first civilization began in the Fertile Crescent.  The Fertile Crescent is also known as the Cradle of Civilization.  The Fertile Crescent refers to the areas of fertile soil near important rivers nearby.  The rivers were the Tigris and Euphrates.  The fertile crescent was fertile because they had a flooding season; the flooding left the rich, deep soil on top of the ground and onto the top layer.  This was perfect for good planting.

    One of the religions of Ancient Mesopotamia was polytheism.  “Poly” meaning many and “theos” meaning God, polytheism is the belief in more than one god.  This idea is based on the idea that the universe is governed by more than one force.  There were water gods, desert gods, air gods, birth gods, and many more. They created these gods because they didn’t understand how the world worked, so they created their own gods to explain it all.

     While the majority of the people believed in polytheism, a small portion of the people believed in monotheism. With “mono” meaning one, and “theos” meaning God monotheism is the belief of one god.  The most famous monotheistic religions are Judaism, Christianity and Islam.  The story of one God was always passed down from the beginning of time with Adam and Eve.  Moses later recorded this story in the book of Genesis.

   One of the main monotheistic religions was Judaism.  Judaism is one of the oldest religions that still exists today.   Approximately fourteen million people today identify themselves as Jews.  Judaism began in Canaan when God chose Abraham to be the father of his chosen people the Israelites from which the Jewish religion grew.  In Genesis 17:6 it says, “I will make you very fruitful;  I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you.”     

    Later, the Ten Commandments came.  The Ten Commandants known as the Decalogue were instructions given to the Israelites by God at Mount Sinai.  God gave Moses the Ten commandments written on tablets of stone.  We still have the original stones tablets which The Ten Commandments were written on, we understand a little bit more about what The Ten Commandments say because of Exodus 20:1-17 and Deuteronomy 5:6-21.  The Bible later explains to us in Galations 3:24 that The Ten Commandments were given to the Israelites to serve as a foundation for the nation of Israel and to give instructions on how to live their lives.

    Architecture was one of the many jobs in Ancient Mesopotamia. Before civilization they had rock shelters, but around 3,500 B.C., cities were formed.  These cities provided protection and assured food supply.  Each city had their own powerful ruler, set of officials, crafts people, and slave labor force.  The buildings in the city were made out of clay bricks that had been baked by the sun.  It was the architect’s job to organize the layout of the buildings, an architect would also design buildings, open areas, communities, and artificial constructions and environments.

    In Ancient Mesopotamia they used division of labor to help divide up the people, it was created so that people could specialize in different tasks.  Some of the jobs that you would find in Ancient Mesopotamia were kings, priests, scribes and farmers.  There were many advantages to this system.  People were more productive when they were more experienced.  It was also a way to save more natural resources and equipment.  It’s different from America because in America we get to choose which area to work in verses being assigned to an area for the rest of your life.   

    Another way to divide up the people was social hierarchy, in Ancient Mesopotamia there were four different groups of social hierarchy.  These were the poor, working class, middle class, and the higher class.  Within each major class came their own little subdivisions.  Gender, age, race, religion were the most obvious factors of their economic status.  Their income and jobs were determined by which social class they were in.  Kings, priests, scribes, merchants/artisans, commoners and slaves all made up these classes.

    Artificial irrigation also led to the formation of different communities, with the higher class enjoying the benefits.  The classes began to form when the people started moving to towns, and different types of governments started to form.  Surprisingly, you could move up classes by working hard and being promoted within your subdivision and then could possibly move up even more.

     Importing was essential to their economic well-being.  Importing is bringing in goods or merchandise from another country.  Some items were high in demand but were not available in the domestic market.  Other items were just cheaper to buy from other countries than to make it yourself.  They imported grains, oils, textiles and more. Most of the time they traded with Babylonia.  They received these goods by boat, donkey, or foot.  Most things were exchanged for timber, wine, precious metals, or stones.

    Exports are part of the trading vocabulary.  Sumerians exported because they often times had extra merchandise to spare and could sell to other countries to make a better profit than what they could in their own country/town/city.  The methods of transportation were gulf boats, river boats, donkey, cart, raft, by coracle, or foot. The Sumerians were very rich in fruits, veggies, dairy, nuts, fish, and meat.  They were also rich in clay, mud, and reeds.  It was very good to use donkeys because they could carry up to 150 lbs and they could get into spaces that carts couldn’t. Eventually, Mesopotamian trade went in all directions.

      Cuneiform was the alphabet of Ancient Mesopotamia.  Cuneiform was written in symbols. Each symbol stood for a syllable.  They didn’t have paper, but they did have plenty of clay, so they used clay blocks to write on.  They used a sharp river reed for a pen and called it a stylus.  The reeds made triangular shapes in the clay, and these triangles were used to create their symbols.   West Asia was the first place to start using cuneiform, and Egypt started using cuneiform soon afterwards.  Mesopotamians started using cuneiform because cities arose and people needed records of business and government deals.  

  Ancient Mesopotamia also created empires.  Empires were a group of people ruled over by an emperor or an empress.  That one single person had supreme power. The very first empire was Akkadian, which was led by Sargon the Great. There are two different types of empires: territorial empires, and hegemonic empires. Territorial empires gained more land through military or direct force whereas Hegemonic empires gained land through influencing or manipulating people.  Multi-national/multi-ethnic state was a state that was dominant over all the others states with one empire ruling.  It was a very big advantage to that dominate state because they would control all the wealth and all the resources.  

   As you leave the world of Ancient Mesopotamia, keep in mind that there is still more to learn about.  Ancient Mesopotamia was the least documented civilizations of them all as a result of it being the oldest and many artifacts being lost over time.  Although we do know about it’s new inventions/ideas, religions, and division of labor. Maybe someday you could be on a team that searches for artifacts from their time. You never know what the future holds.