25 The Ancient Middle East
In the fourth millennium BCE, some of the earliest known great cities emerged in southern Mesopotamia, a region between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, known then as Sumer. The people who built these cities, the Sumerians, developed one of the earliest forms of writing, known as cuneiform, around 3400-3000 BCE. This writing system enabled them to record their literary works, laws, and business transactions, which continued to be studied and preserved by later Mesopotamian civilizations, even after the Sumerian language fell out of everyday use.
This region, now modern-day Iraq, benefited from fertile soil deposited by the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, which flowed from the Taurus Mountains to the Persian Gulf. However, the rivers’ unpredictable flooding created a need for cooperative irrigation projects, leading to the development of sophisticated water management systems. Agriculture began in Mesopotamia around 8000 BCE, and settlers started establishing themselves in southern Sumer around 5500 BCE. As the region became wetter and more suitable for agriculture, the Sumerian civilization flourished. By 4500 BCE, small villages were transformed into thriving urban centers, with Uruk becoming the first large city, boasting a population of around 50,000 by the end of the 4th millennium BCE. This rapid urbanization marked the beginning of Sumer’s rise as the earliest civilization in Mesopotamia, laying the groundwork for the development of subsequent cultures.
The fourth millennium BCE was a transformative period in Sumer, marked by groundbreaking technological innovations. One of the most significant advancements was the development of bronze, an alloy of tin and copper, which marked the beginning of the Bronze Age in Mesopotamia around 3300–3000 BCE. Bronze soon replaced stone as the primary material for tools and weapons, maintaining its dominance for nearly three millennia. Additionally, the ancient Sumerians developed pioneering agricultural tools, such as the plow and the wheel, and sophisticated irrigation systems that utilized channels, canals, and dikes to divert river water into fields. These advancements facilitated population growth, urbanization, and increased agricultural productivity.
In the realm of science, the Sumerians devised a complex mathematical system based on the numbers sixty, ten, and one. They also made a revolutionary invention: writing. The Sumerians created cuneiform, a script featuring wedge-shaped symbols that evolved into a phonetic system, where each symbol represented a syllable. They inscribed their laws, religious texts, and property transactions on durable clay tablets, which, once baked, became long-lasting records. These tablets documented commercial exchanges, including contracts, receipts, taxes, and payrolls. Cuneiform, the writing system developed by the Sumerians, was remarkably complex and enabled rulers to codify their laws and priests to preserve rituals and sacred stories, t