Brandon Gordon
Professor J. Gonzales
HIST 100
21 February 2014

The Factors Enabling Civilization to First Appear in Mesopotamia

History shows us that Mesopotamia had many key factors that played a significant role in allowing the first civilization to develop there. Despite the word being highly debated by subject matter experts worldwide, most would agree that “a civilization is a culture capable of sustaining a great number of specialists to furnish the economic, social, political and religious needs of a large social unit” (Edgar, Hackett, Jewsbury, Molony, Gordon 10). From the beginning to the end, key advancements have set it apart and made it a widely studied world area. Due to Mesopotamia’s geographical advantages in farming capability and advancement in technology, language and laws, it sustained long enough and in a matter to be regarded as the world’s first civilization.
After the Neolithic period and Agricultural revolution, people migrated southeast from the northern part of the Fertile Crescent. These people, mostly farmers, settled on the plain between where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers almost connect and modern day Iraq is. The name Mesopotamia is Greek meaning “between the rivers”. Rainfall was inadequate for farming however and these new settlers, out of necessity, developed irrigation techniques that would then allow the rivers to help water their planted crops. This required much teamwork and cooperation from these people though in order to use the overabundant flood waters, during two seasons of the year, and bring that water inland where the crops were actually grown. Through systems of a multitude of dykes, canals and buckets even, farming was able to exist where it otherwise may have not. This successful farming provided the sustenance for the people in the Sumerian region to thrive for many centuries.
Mesopotamian civilization was also made possible through the many inventions and technological advancements. Technology at that time grew much slower than it does now however it grew significantly quickly in Mesopotamia compared to other habitations that have been studied. Due to the geographical area being scarce of earlier tool making materials, items such as stone and metal had to be imported. Most imports at that time came from the northern area of the Fertile Crescent, where the now Sumerian inhabitants had once branched off from. In order to import things from other areas, the Sumerians used old land methods of donkey drawn chariots as well as the using both rivers to float goods down to Mesopotamia using boating devices. Using the rivers for transportation allowed to more quickly import these necessary items to the Mesopotamian people but also opened new avenues for trade. The rivers are a key factor in what helped accelerate the urban growth of Sumer and Akkad. With their farming and food supply methods working, urban centers and homes made of clay quickly sprang up and allowed for the masses to come to these areas. Inhabitants of these areas could work building or developing items for trade and personal use. All would serve in the greater good of the inhabitants. Craftsmen invented the alloy bronze through the forging of copper and tin. Bronze was a stronger and easier to sharpen making it a more sought after metal to be used in weapons. This was extremely important to the people of the Mesopotamian area, throughout time, because the open geographical terrain left it very susceptible to attackers. Bronze would be the metal of choice for all people’s of that time looking to gain an edge on the enemy in order to gain the advantage and further their conquests for their ruler’s gain. The pottery wheel is also said to be invented in Mesopotamia. This probably allowed the craftsmen to create better and more robust pottery more quickly which then could be used internally or exported bringing in more wealth to the locals and the king. Evidence has been found of advanced principals of math especially Algebra and Geometry in Mesopotamia which is very suggestive of the intelligence level that existed back then. The concept of counting by six, which is still used in modern day time keeping and geometrical 360 degrees of a circle, were first found on artifacts from Mesopotamia. These are prime examples of the existence of urban life and the interdependence of those who lived there thus bringing Mesopotamia that much closer to the accepted definition of a civilization. Also, on a side note, we know slavery was present in Mesopotamia however it did not necessarily carry with it the negative connotation that is does in modern America. This gives insight to a more than just a sense of hierarchy that existed amongst the citizens that although may not be necessary for a civilization to exist, it exhibits an early signature of what we see in research throughout the world, for centuries.
Mesopotamia is where the first evidence of writing was discovered, on clay tablets. Initially, this writing was pictographic and each pictograph could represent ideas as well as the actual depicted items. It is said that this early form of writing may have influenced Egypt in their development of Egyptian Hieroglyphics, though is a debatable point. Eventually these Sumerian pictographs merged into a phonetic language where more complex thoughts could be recorded in cuneiform writing. Cuneiform writing was done by the pressing of a reed stylus into soft clay which could be dried then preserving the work giving it more permanence than just mouth-to-ear communication. Cuneiform was important because unlike early cave drawing and paintings, cuneiform allowed for the mobility of writings. This allowed for more accurate record keeping which is considered a fundamental of a civilization. Records were kept of rainfall, crop abundance (or lack thereof) and surplus materials which could be used to show wealth and power of an empire. Also, for the first time, we see that laws were recorded. King Hammurabi (c. 1792-1750 B.C.E.) was once a great warrior who significantly expanded the Babylonian Empire. He developed a set of laws, often referred to as a code. This code, built largely upon what laws the Sumerian people had already created, was an advancement because it also listed appropriate punishments to each transgression of the said law. The Code of Hammurabi was mass-produced through the cuneiform writing and could be taken remotely to people like judges and would serve as a guideline for how to rule each smaller area of the empire (or any area). Transportable documents were extremely important during this time also because through stamps and seals official word could be sent out by the king across a growing empire but reviled by the people as true word from the ruler. This advancement of law, although not a technological advancement like talked about earlier, was still equally important because it served the people in giving them a sense of what the social expectations of themselves and each class was also. This law gave the citizens a clearer understanding as to their expectations as individuals and social groups which will aid in the overall civil obedience that is necessary for a civilization to exist. This fact is proven by the centuries of turmoil which followed King Hammurabi’s death which would eventually lead to the downfall of the Babylonian Empire.
Although with many civilization’s growth and development, sometimes so rapidly it becomes their biggest downfall, we see in modern history even what lasting effects the Mesopotamian accomplishments played throughout the world’s other civilizations. Like many civilizations thousands of years ago, the empires in Mesopotamia were fueled with war and constant turmoil. The developments of the area eventually made their way out, through exports and knowledge gained from travel and trade which could have subsequently been used against the people since we see that so much in history of that time. Although these characteristics remain the building blocks of what defined Mesopotamia as the world’s first civilization they also provided them with the ability to sustain their way of life as long as they did. In turn, they then supply the rest of the growing area’s with a tried and true method of civil existence that with fine tuning and small changes, often due to the geo-location of other growing civilizations, could serve as the building blocks for success for many rulers to come in developing their own civilization.

Works Cited
Edgar, Robert, and Neil Hackett, George Jewsbury, Barbara Molony, Matthew Gordon. Civilizations Past & Present Vol I: To 1650. New York: Pearson Longman, 2008.