Notes

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Geographic Setting
The Fertile Crescent was an important route for cultural diffusion and migration in ancient times in the Levant and Mesopotamia. It is a semi-circular belt of land in Southwest Asia that can support agriculture in a mostly desert or semi-arid region. The western leg of the crescent (the Levant) along the Mediterranean coast receives adequate rainfall from the Mediterranean Sea. However, the eastern leg between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers (Mesopotamia) is a fertile plain that can support agriculture only with irrigation. To the north are two mountain ranges that extend across what is now Turkey (Anatolia in ancient times). Between the two mountain ranges is a high, hilly plateau. To the east, a plateau also covers much of Iran (Persia in ancient times) between mountain ranges.

The Tigris and Euphrates rivers begin in the mountains of Anatolia and flow south until they join to become a delta before flowing into the Persian Gulf. The Nile River flows from its source in the mountains of East Africa to the Mediterranean Sea. It forms a narrow, fertile strip through the Sahara Desert.

Coastal Egypt and the Fertile Crescent have Mediterranean climates of hot, dry summers and cool, damp winters. Over three-fourths of the Middle East receives less than 10 inches of rain per year; however, most of the rains fall in the winter months whereas the summer months of the crop-growing season are relatively dry.

First Civilizations
Neolithic farmers had to irrigate their crops because of inadequate rainfall. After many centuries of bare subsistence living, some communities began producing a surplus that allowed their cultures to become more complex. Early civilizations began because the construction and maintenance of irrigation systems required cooperation and a system of law and order. The annual flooding of farmland replenished the soil, but removed boundary markers. Thus, mathematics developed to survey properties and to keep an accounting of surpluses. Also, a calendar was needed to set planting and harvest times and to predict flood times.

Between 4000 B.C. and 3500 B.C. city-states in Mesopotamia had the features historians look for in a civilization. The Sumerians at the southern reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers had cities ruled over by a central government. The people were divided into social classes, had job specialization, and practiced a religion. Also, art and architecture had become part of the culture. In Egypt the Nile River Valley had become densely settled at a time period later than in Mesopotamia. However, evolution from Neolithic village-life to a civilization took place more rapidly, possible because of contact with the Sumerians.

The Sumerian Civilization
The first leaders of the city-states of Sumer most likely were the priests of the polytheistic religion who required offerings to the gods. The priests ordered the construction of large, stepped temples called ziggurats. None have survived because they were made of sun-dried brick. The priests also probably organized the collection, distribution, and storage of grain and the construction and maintenance of the irrigation systems. Later, warrior chiefs became more important when city-states fought among themselves or were attacked by other people. The cities were enclosed with defensive walls and the warrior leaders became kings.

The Sumerians developed trade early because the Tigris-Euphrates plains lacked natural resources. They imported wood, stone, and metals in return for grain and items hand-made by artisans. Artisans, merchants, and scribes made up the small middle class. A small group of rulers and priests were the upper class, whereas most of the people were peasants of the lower class. Scribes became important after the Sumerians developed cuneiform writing around 3300 B.C. Early written records reveal that slavery had become common in the city-states.

The Early Egyptian Civilization
In Egypt the kingdoms of upper and lower Egypt were joined by conquest to form the first unified state. The Nile River served as an avenue for control by the rulers' armies as well as for trade. The pharaohs of the Old Kingdom used their wealth and power to build the Great Pyramids at Giza as their tombs. These stone monuments were the most massive structures made by humans until 4,500 years later in the 20th century. The polytheistic religion of early Egyptians included a belief in an afterlife. Those who could afford it had their bodies mummified and entombed with material goods to use in eternity. The Egyptians developed a form of picture writing that required the memorization of hundreds of symbols. A scribe who could read and write became an important person in Egyptian society. Women had the right to own property, manage a business, obtain a divorce, or become a priestess. However, they could not become scribes or government officials.

New Kingdoms
A pattern evolved of aggressive cultures conquering more advanced civilizations because they coveted their wealth and food surpluses. The newcomers adapted the culture of the vanquished and helped to spread it. The city-states of Sumer were first conquered by the Akkadians from the north and then by the Babylonians. Hammurabi, king of Babylon, adapted the law codes of the Sumerians; however, the city-states of Sumer were absorbed after thousands of years of independence.

The New Kingdom in Egypt restored the power and glory of the Pharaohs after a period of occupation by invaders from the Middle East. In turn, Egypt expanded its influence beyond its borders to occupy the Levant and Southwest Asia up to the Euphrates River, and Kush to the south in Africa. Egyptian art and architecture reached the peak of its creativity. Pyramid-building had long since ended; however, temples in the capital of Thebes and tombs hidden in a nearby valley were richly and elaborately decorated. Egyptian and Mesopotamian cultures freely adapted from each other and influenced other cultures in Asia and Africa.

Around the same time, Indo-Europeans began moving onto the Iranian Plateau. They merged with local tribes to establish the kingdom of Persia. The dominant group in the Middle East had been the Semites whose language is the basis of Hebrew and Arabic, as well as Aramaic and other languages commonly spoken in ancient times. Indo-Europeans who also moved onto the Anatolian Plateau became the Hittites who later expanded southward and challenged the Egyptians for control of the Mediterranean coast. The Hittites also learned how to smelt iron ore and forge iron tools and weapons. They kept the process secret for hundreds of years; however, by 1200 B.C. the use of iron had become common in Egypt and Southwest Asia. Before this discovery, the most commonly used metal was bronze, an alloy of copper and tin. The beginning of the Iron Age signaled the end of the Neolithic period and the Bronze Age.

Religious and Cultural Developments in the Levant
Around 1200 B.C., after a long period in Egypt and an exodus across the Sinai Peninsula, the Hebrews settled in Canaan. According to the Old Testament, the Hebrew tribes originated in Sumer. Centuries of migration along the Fertile Crescent brought them to the coast of the Mediterranean before they went to Egypt during a time of famine. The ancient Hebrews practiced the first monotheistic religion and developed a law code derived partly from Mesopotamian law. Their religion and culture was based on the Torah -- chronicles and teachings that later became the first five books of the Old Testament. They believed the Torah, which includes the Ten Commandments, to be the revealed word of God.

Following a period of struggle with other groups in the Levant, a Hebrew Kingdom was established by King David. His son, Solomon, built a temple in accordance with the Torah, and ruled over a rich and powerful kingdom. However, the Assyrians conquered part of the kingdom and later the Chaldeans took over the remainder. They took many Jews in captivity to Babylon until the Persian conquest of the Chaldeans allowed the Jews to return to Palestine. There the Jews remained a subject people under the Persians, then under the Greeks, and finally under the Romans. A rebellion against Rome in 70 A.D. led to the second forced dispersion of the Jews from Palestine to other parts of Africa, Asia, and Europe. Judaism flourished in Egypt, North Africa, Iraq, Persia (Iran), and eventually became established in Europe, particularly Spain. Judaism thrived in these areas because the Jews continued to maintain their identity and beliefs by living in self-contained communities. Following the expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492, Jews migrated to other parts of Europe, including France, Holland, Italy, Turkey, Poland, and Russia. With the colonizing of the New Word, Jewish merchants and bankers immigrated to South America, the Caribbean, and in the 17th century to the thirteen British colonies in North America where they established their businesses and Judaism. From the Middle East, Judaism spread eastward to India and China. During 2,000 years of the Diaspora, the Jews retained their separate identity by following the Torah, despite persecutions for their religious beliefs, and their ethnic solidarity.

During the Roman occupation of Palestine, Jesus, a Jew, began preaching ideas that Roman and Jewish leaders' thoughts were contrary to their interests. Following the arrest and execution of Jesus, his followers, especially Peter and Paul, spread his teachings about salvation and brotherhood among gentiles as well as Jews. The new religion of Christianity was a monotheistic religion based on the divinity of Jesus; but it also shared many of its beliefs and scriptures with its Jewish origins.

The Phoenicians, another Semitic group further north on the Levant, developed an alphabet that became the basis of the alphabet currently in use in European languages. The Phoenicians were also seafarers and traders whose ships sailed to all parts of the Mediterranean. They set up colonies in Europe and North Africa, thereby spreading their alphabet and the advanced cultures that had evolved in the Middle East.

The Decline of Mesopotamia and Egypt
The warlike Assyrians expanded from their base in upper Mesopotamia to rule a large empire that, by 650 B.C., included Egypt, the Levant, Mesopotamia, and part of Anatolia. The Semitic conquerors built splendid palaces and a library of cuneiform tablets in their capital of Nineveh. They ruled their empire harshly and kept their own women in veiled seclusion. Rebellions and the Chaldeans brought an end to the Assyrian Empire. King Nebuchadnezzar of the Chaldeans rebuilt Babylon into a splendid city of gardens, temples, and palaces. However, his dynasty was cut short by the Persians, who built the largest empire of ancient times until it too was surpassed by that of Alexander the Great, and then by the Romans.

By 500 B.C. the Persian Empire included all of Anatolia, Egypt, the Fertile Crescent, and Central Asia up to the Indus River. Under Cyrus the Great and Darius, the Persians consolidated the empire by building a system of roads and codifying laws adapted from those of subject nations. The use of coins, first begun by the Lydians, began to replace bartering as the medium of exchange for merchants. Zoroaster, a Persian religious leader, taught a monotheistic religion about the struggle between light and dark, good and evil, and that the triumph of the forces of light would lead to a judgment day. Six hundred years later, Christianity included similar beliefs.

The Persians were the first of the Indo-European empires to control Southwest Asia and Egypt. However, they benefited from the thousands of years of intellectual, cultural, artistic, and economic developments of Mesopotamia and Egypt. The synthesis of this long heritage and their own contributions strongly influenced the Greeks and the Romans and developments in Europe and India. The Persian Empire was weakened by its failure to defeat the Greeks and came to an end when conquered by Alexander the Great in 331 B.C.

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