Geography
This river, along with the Tigris, formed the fertile region known as Mesopotamia.
What is the Euphrates River?
The Mesopotamians believed in many gods and goddesses, making their religion this type of belief system.
What is polytheistic?
This system of writing, developed by the Sumerians, used wedge-shaped marks pressed into clay tablets.
What is Cuneiform?
This Sumerian city-state was an independent political unit with its own government and patron god.
What is a city-state?
This crop was the most important staple food in Mesopotamia and formed the basis of its agricultural economy.
What is Barley?
This weather phenomenon made the land of Mesopotamia suitable for farming, though they were unpredictable.
What are annual floods?
This massive religious structure served as a temple and was believed to connect heaven and earth in Mesopotamian cities.
What is a Ziggurat?
The Mesopotamians invented this mathematical system based on the number 60, which we still use today to measure time and angles.
What is the base-60 system?
Hammurabi was the famous king of this Mesopotamian empire that unified much of the region around 1800 BCE.
What is Babylon?
Mesopotamians used this commodity as a form of money and trade in early economies before the invention of coins.
What is barley/grain/barter?
The region between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers is located in what modern-day country?
What is Iraq?
Marduk was the chief god of this Mesopotamian civilization.
What is Babylon?
This code, created by Hammurabi, was one of the first written legal systems and established the principle of "an eye for an eye."
What is Code of Hammurabi?
This form of government, in which a priest-king ruled on behalf of the gods, was common in early Sumerian city-states.
What is Theocracy?
This social class in Mesopotamia included priests, nobles, and government officials.
What is Upper class/aristocracy?
This geographic feature to the north and east of Mesopotamia provided natural barriers and resources, such as timber and stone.
What are the Zagros Mountains?
The Mesopotamians believed that the gods controlled natural events like floods and droughts, so they performed these religious ceremonies to please them.
What are sacrifices/rituals?
The Mesopotamians created this tool to help with irrigation and water management in their agricultural society.
What is a Shaduf?
This empire, led by Sargon of Akkad, conquered the Sumerians and created this, one of the world's first empires.
What is Akkadian Empire?
This social class in Mesopotamian society included merchants, scribes, and skilled craftspeople who had more rights than commoners but fewer than nobility.
What is the middle class?
Mesopotamia's lack of natural resources like stone and timber forced its people to develop this type of trade relationship with neighboring regions.
What is long-distance trade?
This ancient religious text from Mesopotamia describes the creation of the world and a great flood, similar to stories found in other ancient cultures.
What is Enuma Elish?
This Mesopotamian literary work, written in cuneiform, tells the story of a king's quest for immortality and is considered one of the oldest known pieces of literature.
What is Epic of Gilgamesh?
This practice, where kings claimed to be chosen by the gods or divine themselves, helped legitimize their rule in Mesopotamian societies.
What is divine right/kingship?
In Mesopotamian society, this group formed the largest portion of the population and included farmers, laborers, and artisans with limited rights.
What is commoner/peasant class?