Inventions
The first writing system ever, developed in ancient Mesopotamia
What is cuneiform?
The highest-up in the social classes. Most wealthy. People believe they had direct contact with the gods.
Who are priests and kings?
The names of the two rivers around which the land of Mesopotamia was developed.
What are the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers?
This is the material that cuneiform writing was pressed into.
What is hot clay?
This includes a city with surrounding mudhouses and farmlands. The Ziggurat is usually the center of it.
What is a city-state?
This invention made pottery, farming, and daily living easier by enabling clay to spin fast and smoothly, and for allowing carts to be pulled smoothly.
What is the wheel/pottery wheel?
Lowest tier of the social classes. A way of having cheap labor. These people could actually buy their freedom if they saved enough. Commoners could also become a part of this class if they had debts to pay.
Who were enslaved peoples?
The present-day continent and area where Mesopotamia existed.
What is Southwest Asia?
This is a reed with a slanted end that was used as the cuneiform writing tool.
What is a stylus?
This is a rectangular tower with steps leading up to a temple at the top. The lower levels were used for trade and warehousing, and the upper levels were used as residences for priests and nobles.
What is the Ziggurat?
A way to supply water to an area of land, usually by digging canals for the rivers to flow into.
What is irrigation?
This class of people includes craftsman, tradesmen, farmers, and merchants.
Who are the commoners of Mesopotamia?
The land right next to the riverbanks where flooding often occurs.
What is a floodplain?
This is the literal translation of cuneiform.
What is "wedge-like"?
This type of religion believes in many gods.
What is Polytheism?
Invented by Sumerians and represented modern day chess or checkers.
What is a board game?
This gender of people were typically expected to take care of the home and raise children. In rare cases, they received an education and could even own land and become priestesses.
Who are the women of Mesopotamia?
Fertile bits of soil that are picked up and carried by flowing river water. This soil is good for growing crops!
What is silt?
Reasons why written language was so important and life-changing for humanity.
1. Gave people ability to document things like crop yields year to year
2. Gave people power - those who could write had more ability to leverage power and control
3. Things like stories and laws could now be in writing
This is what Mesopotamia translates to.
What is the land between 2 rivers?
A farming invention, usually a large blade pulled by an ox to make furrows in the ground. This allowed seeds to be planted.
What is the plow?
Another word for "Craftsmen," these people often made pottery and did weaving.
What are artisans?
A name given to the region of Mesopotamia, because it was very fertile and it was also shaped like a crescent.
What is the Fertile Crescent?
This is the name of the flattened clay where cuneiform was carved (and is also a general name for an ipad!)
What is a tablet?
This is the name of the people of Sumer, the first civilization in Mesopotamia.
What are Sumerians?