Notes

In chapter 5, we learned about Ancient Sumer’s development in life. The Sumerians learned how to farm and make a stable food and water supply. In most city-states, people had statuses. The upper class included priests, land owners, and government officials. The middle class, (aka the common class) was made of merchants and craftspeople, farmers, and fishermen. Slaves were the lowest class, and they lived in their owner’s house.
Kings ruled the city-states. People believed that they were chosen by the gods and were very powerful. The King’s most important job was to lead the army into battle. Sumerians were very religious. Religion influenced their daily lives. When they had ceremonies in the ziggurats, the people would do something as daring as a human sacrifice to the gods. The Sumerians were experts in arts. The arts include creative forms of painting, architecture, and music. The musicians would play music during ceremonies.
The Sumerians advanced in technology compared to earlier early men. Their most important invention was the wheel. They made wheels by clamping pieces of wood together. Before wheels were made, they used sledges, which were not as sufficient as wheels. Wheels made everything lighter and easier to carry over long distances. They also invented arches. They were made by stacking bricks so that they rose from walls to make a V or U shape. The final characteristic of civilization is a highly developed written language. The Sumerians wrote in cuneiform. Cuneiform is writing that uses wedge shaped characters to form words. It was developed in 2400 B.C.E. When it was first invented, there were 2000 characters. As the Sumerians developed, the language symbols shrunk down to 700 characters. So was Ancient Sumer a civilization? According to the proof we have, Ancient Sumer was a civilization.