Geography & Maps
The two major rivers that bordered Mesopotamia are the____________ and the _________.
What are the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers.
The belief in and worship of many different gods, such as Anu, Enlil, and Ishtar.
What is polytheism?
The world's first system of writing, characterized by wedge-shaped symbols.
What is cuneiform?
The first leader in history to rule an Empire (the Akkadians).
Who is Sargon?
Famed sailors who depended on sea trade because their geography lacked farmland. They invented the first alphabet.
Who are the Phonecians?
The large region of rich farmland near these rivers is known as the _____________________.
What is the Fertile Crescent?
he oldest known author in history, a Sumerian high priestess and daughter of Sargon.
Who is Enheduanna?
These highly trained, professional citizens were among the few in Mesopotamia who knew how to read and write, using a sharpened reed stylus to record taxes, trade deals, and laws on wet clay tablets.
Who are scribes?
Created one of the world's oldest written law codes (Babylonian).
Who is Hammaurabi?
Made from sea snails; so expensive that it became a symbol of royalty.
What is purple dye?
Mesopotamia translates to "the ____________________."
What is the land between the rivers?
he superhuman protagonist of the world's oldest written epic poem.
Who is Gilgamesh?
Originally invented by Sumerian artisans around 3500 BCE to help spin and shape pottery, this mechanical breakthrough was later flipped sideways and attached to wagons, completely transforming trade, farming, and warfare.
What is the wheel?
Grew the Persian Empire by allowing conquered people to keep their customs.
Who is Cyrus the Great?
An infrastructure project built by Darius I to improve communication in the Persian Empire.
What is the Royal Road?
This fine, nutrient-rich soil was deposited along the riverbanks after the annual, unpredictable floods, turning the dry desert land into highly productive fields.
What is silt?
These towering, pyramid-shaped mud-brick temples sat at the absolute center of Mesopotamian city-states, acting as political hubs, storehouses for grain, and the literal dwelling places for local deities.
What is a ziggurat?
Discovered by modern archaeologists inside the wealthy tombs of kings, this popular, highly competitive ancient tabletop pastime provides historians with clear evidence that Mesopotamians possessed the leisure time and strategic minds required for complex games.
What is the Royal Game of Ur?
If a man put out the eye of another man, his eye shall be put out... but if he put out the eye of a man's slave, he shall pay one-half its value." What does this show about the laws of Babylon?
What is social inequality?
This sequence represents the emergence of major powers in the Fertile Crescent from ancient to classical times.
What are Sumer>>Accadia>>Babylonia>>Assyria>>Phonecians>>Persians?
Looking at a map of the ancient Near East, both the Tigris and Euphrates rivers originate in the northern mountains of Turkey and flow southeast until they empty into this vital body of water.
What is the Persian Gulf?
This revolutionary religious concept, championed by Abraham after he left his home city-state of Ur, completely disrupted Mesopotamian culture by rejecting polytheism in favor of worshiping a single supreme God.
What is monotheism?
This advanced mathematical framework developed by the Sumerians relies on the number 60 as its core unit, creating a structural legacy that still dictates how the modern world divides time into minutes and geometry into 360-degree circles.
What is the base 60 math system?
True or false? Many Mesopotamian kings claimed their authority came from the gods.
What is true?
Persian King Darius I revolutionized trade by introducing this economic tool, which largely replaced the traditional barter system.
What is standardized currency?