ANCIENT CULTURES

ANCIENT CULTURES

mesopotamia, egypt, india,china.

Index

mesopotamia

china

Pag. XX

egypt

activities

Pag. XX

india

Bibliography

Pag. XX

Pag. XX

LEARNING EXPERIENCE QUIZ

Mesopotamia

3,100 bc - 539 bc

LOCATION

5 interesting facts about The Sumerians:

1. They invented the wagon wheel.2. They were the first to make bronze out of copper and tin. 3. They created a number system based on 60, and they used geometry. 4. They charted the heavenly constellations. 5. They created a cuneiform system of writing.

Mesopotamia

• Between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

• Mesopotamian civilization refers to three general areas: Assyria, Akkad, and Sumer.

Sumer Akkadia

• By 3000 BC, they were established in Ur and Uruk and formed city-states.

• The Mesopotamians were polytheistic. The state was a theocracy.

• The Sumerians discovered bronze, copper, gold, and silver. The invention of the wheel, and axle made trading possible.

• There were three social groups: nobles, commoners, and slaves.

• Around 3,000 bc, the Sumerians created a cuneiform system of writing, made by a reed stylus on clay tablets.

• The most prominent building of the cities was the Ziggurat.

• Around, 2300 BC, Summer was conquered by the armies of Akkadia, by King Sargon

Babylon Assyria NBabylon

• The empire of Babylon reached its height around 1750 BC.

• From 1300 BC to 600 BC, the Assyria controlled a large Empire. But, they were defeated in 612 BC by their conquered people, the chaldeans.

• With the chaldeans, Babylon rose again: New Babylonian Empire. But, in 539 BC, the New Babylonian Empire fell to the Persians.

4 fun facts about the babylonians:

4 fun facts about New Babylonians Empire:

1. The king Hammurabi created this Empire with the cities of Sumer. 2. King Hammurabi invented a code of 282 laws. 3. The Hammurabi's Code included laws for adopting children. 4. This code did not apply equally to all people.

1. His royal palace had several terraces, with landscapes of trees and gardens: the Hanging Gardens. 2. They measured the length of a year. 3.They farmed honey bees. 4. They built Ishtar Gate.

3 fun facts about Assyria:

1. They invented the battering ram. 2. They used armed charioteers. 3. They had a remarkable library in the area.

Egypt

3,100 bc -30bc

5 interesting facts about The Egyptians:

1. They invented hieroglyphics, a system of writing.2. They believed in an afterlife. 3. They wrote on papyrus. 4. Their knowledge of mathematics (to calculate area, volume, and geometry) helped them to build their massive monuments. 5.The Great Pyramid of Giza is aligned almost perfectly with the four cardinal directions (north, south, east, west).

• Egypt´s history began around 3,100 BC, when King Menes united Upper and Lower Egypt into a single kingdom and created the first royal dynasty.

• The Nile River played an important role in civilization's life. It is the longest river in the world.

THE OLD KINGDOM 2700 - 2200 BC.

• It was an age of prosperity and splendor.
• The rulers were called "pharaohs". They possessed absolute power.
• To administrate the kingdom, they created bureaucracy, with officials with regular procedures.

MUMMIFICATION

To preserve the physical body after death, the Egyptians practiced a process of slowly drying a dead body to prevent it from rotting.

• Workers first removed the liver, lungs, stomach, and intestines and placed them in four special jars, that were put in the tomb with the mummy.
• Then, they covered the corpse with natural salt that absorbed the body´s water.
• Later, they filled the body with spices and wrapped it with layers of linen with resin.
• At the end of the process, a lifelike mask was placed over the head and shoulders of the mummy.
• The mummy was then sealed in a case and placed in its tomb.
• This process took about 70 days.

THE MIDDLE KINGDOM 2055 BC to 1650 BC

• During this period, Egypt began a territorial expansion and the trade rose.

THE NEW KINGDOM 1567 to 1070 BC

• The pharaohs created huge armies of foot soldiers, mounted warriors and charioteers.

• King Tutankhamen became ruler of Egypt while he was still a child. At about age 18 he died and was buried with many precious objects. His tomb was discovered in 1922.

INDIA

2600 bc -1900bc

5 interesting facts about the ancient india:

1. The Indus Valley script has not been deciphered by linguists.2. No one knows the truth about its destruction. It could be because of natural disasters. 3. 70% of the city of Mohenjo-Daro is yet to be excavated. 4. They developed a drainage system and a system of chutes for taking trash from houses. 5. Hinduism is one of the world´s oldest living religions.

• The Indus River and the Ganges River flow across.
• Their government were theocratic.
• The most important cities were Harappa and Mohenjo Daro. Both of them located in present-day Pakistan.
• Around 2000 BC, the people abandoned the cities.
• Their most important crops were wheat, barley, cotton and rice, they made clay pots, jewelry, cotton cloth, and metal tools.

• Around 1900 BC, the new group Aryans started writing in Sanskrit, an Indo-European language.
• The religious books were The Vedas. They told stories about their princes, known as Rajas.

• The Aryans organized their society around four classes.

• Caste (Jati) system: which maintained people in the same caste of their parents.

Religion and philosophy

HINDUISM

• One of the oldest religions in the world.
• Hindus believe in one great spirit called Brahman: all living things are part of It. Any soul will eventually join Brahman, before the soul must live many lives (reincarnation).
• If people do the duties of their jati, they do their personal duty and follow the dharma.
• Karma is the result of how a person lives.

BUDDHISMPrince Siddhartha Gautama was born about 563 BC. One day, he was shocked to see that most people were poor. So he decided to leave his family and search for answers. Meditating under a tree, he reached "enlightenment", the meaning of life.

• The Buddha taught that everyone should stop wanting fame and money. Then they would reach nirvana, a feeling of perfect peace and happiness.

CHINA

2070 bc -221bc221-207 bc

GLOSSARY

• WARLORD
• ANCESTOR
• PICTOGRAPH
• IDEOGRAPH

• DAO

5 interesting facts about the ancient CHINA:

1. The most ancient human dated to be 1.7 million years old! 2. The Sanxingdui civilization left no written records. 3. The first emperor of the Qin dynasty, Qin Shihuang (259-210 BCE), built an incredible tomb surrounded by rivers of toxic mercury and the site is unstable for archaeological expeditions. 4. Because it lasted from 1046 BC to 256 BC, a length of 790 years, the Zhou dynasty is the longest in China’s history. 5. The first recorded writing comes from the time of the Shang dynasty,

• The River Huang He, or Yellow River, and the Yangtze River flow across China. The mountains and deserts were natural barriers that limited the contact between China and other civilizations.
• The first dynasty was The Shang, it began about 1750 BC.
• Chinese people were polytheistic and their government was theocratic.
• Early Chinese writing used pictographs and ideographs, and together both express an idea.

THE ZHOU DYNASTY

• The Zhou ruled China for more than 800 years
• The King was helped by a bureaucracy system, and the aristocrats.
• The king was ruled by the Dao, duty of honor and pleasing the gods. Those were times of prosperity and development.
• The social structure was: First, the aristocrats, then, farmers; after them, the artisans, and, merchants.

THE QIN EMPEROR

• The new ruler was Qin Shihuangdi "The first Qin emperor" of the Qin Dynasty.
• He wanted to unify China.
• He began a project to connect walls across northern China.

THE HAN RULERS

• The Han Dynasty ruled China for over 400 years.
• The emperor Han Wudi created a system of schools to prepare the student for the civil service.
• During nearly 150 years, China lived peacefully and developred art and technology.

PHILOSOPHY

• The three major philosophies were:Confucianism, Daoism, and Legalism.

thank you!

REFERENCES

Text

• Reading Essentials & Study Guide. (2018) McGraw Hill Education.
• Prentice Hall history of our world : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive. (2005). Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/prenticehallhist0000unse_x3k3/mode/1up

Pages

• https://www.metmuseum.org
• https://www.britishmuseum.org/
• https://www.britannica.com
• https://www.louvre.fr/es

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activity 1

Unit 1 Project: The project for this unit consists of three assignments, with the final product being the presentation of three “clay” tablets that, together, form a poem. During this unit, we studied several ancient civilizations in class, such as the Egyptian, Chinese, etc. We explored how each of these civilizations settled around rivers and water sources that enabled their survival. They developed agriculture and cities, domesticated animals, created belief systems, and writing systems, defended their territories, developed technology, and formed ideas on how to live their daily lives. In this project, you and your team are asked to imagine yourselves as members of one of these cultures and create a poem about its natural and cultural environment. Each team will be assigned a civilization and must develop an alternative alphabet to the current one, write a three-paragraph poem, and then inscribe this writing on their “clay” tablets as if they were made of stone or original clay. The goal of this project is to deepen your knowledge about a particular civilization, encourage originality, and develop teamwork skills through research and creativity.