Western Civilization to 1500

Preface

This book is a revised and updated fourth edition of the now classic textbook Western Civilization to 1500 originally written by Dr. Walther Kirchner (1905–2004), the H. Rodney Sharp Professor of History emeritus at the University of Delaware. Along with its companion volume Western Civilization from 1500, Kirchner’s work has been for many years among the most important supplemental works for all College and University courses on the history of Western civilization. Since this textbook first appeared in 1958 it has gone through several more editions (1966, 1975 and 1991). Kirchner himself was an expert in the history of Russia, and his other important textbook, A History of Russia, remains essential reading in the field, having been published in six separate editions. Kirchner was also a master of many fields of study, researching and publishing on a large number of topics related to the history of Russia (see Kirchner, The Rise of the Baltic Question, Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1954); Russian and American relations (see Kirchner, Studies in Russian-American Commerce, 1820–1860, Leiden: Brill 1975); and Russian and European relations (see Kirchner, Commercial Relations Between Russia and Europe, 1400–1800, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1966).

After Professor Kirchner’s death on June 30, 2004, I was approached to update and revise this textbook for a fourth edition. For this present fourth edition of Western Civilization to 1500, I have made many stylistic and content changes affecting most chapters. Due to Kirchner’s own research interests, his editions of the text had a primarily political and economic focus. I have added in most chapters more coverage of the social and cultural actors, events, and developments, focusing on our currently expanding understanding of religious, social, and gender relations in Western Civilization. Furthermore, new research and historiographical arguments have been incorporated into each chapter, especially in the sources cited and suggested reading sections. Since general studies, monographs, and large numbers of scholarly journal articles continue to shape our understanding of the history of Western civilization to 1500, I have expanded the bibliographic references found at the end of each chapter to accommodate the most recent general studies and monographs dealing with the history of Western civilization. In most instances, I have left intact Professor Kirchner’s suggested readings, but I have augmented them with current scholarship on the various topics covered in the text. The format of this fourth edition has also changed. The reader will also note that now each chapter includes a brief introduction, a general overview, the text, suggested readings and resources, and a final set of test yourself questions along with a detailed answer section.

I also wish to acknowledge here my own personal debt and gratitude to a number of important friends, colleagues and family members who have helped provide me with the encouragement and support that I needed in order to complete this current project. I wish to thank first of all my colleagues and my students at Missouri State University for their patience and their support. I want to offer thanks especially to Dr. Ahmed H. Ibrahim, the master, for his encouragement and assistance in deciding to undertake this project; and to Dr. David Gutzke for his own passion for scholarship and publication. I consider both of them close friends. I also want to thank my loving wife Argelia Segovia Liga, who understands the historian’s need for so many sleepless nights and I offer her thanks for her help, her patience, and her work with this manuscript. I also want to thank the editors and copy editors of this text, as well as my mother Patricia Chuchiak, for all of their editorial work in proofreading the manuscript in its final stages. Finally, I also want to thank Fred Grayson of the American Booksworks Corporation, first of all for inviting me to undertake this project, but most importantly for his patience and understanding in working with historians who often have more than a few irons in the fire.

I hope that students and interested readers of history alike will find this fourth edition of Western Civilization to 1500 as helpful as earlier editions.

—John F. Chuchiak IV, Ph.D.

Springfield, Missouri

April 2006

THE STUDY OF HISTORY

The study of history has not always meant to people what it means to them today. Perhaps at all times, curiosity has induced them to desire to perpetuate great events and noble deeds and has impelled them to write down what they witnessed. But it is only our own age, influenced by present-day attitudes, that has looked to history as a science that can reveal and explain trends underlying human life and human affairs. Whether or not history can be regarded as a science, it may well be that future generations will deprecate our efforts. Yet in the age in which we live, history serves as more than a remembrance of times gone by and of past efforts of humankind; it serves as a guide for our actions, which shape the future.

Studying History

What is History? What is it that historians do when they study or write history? Historians have spent centuries trying to answer these two central questions concerning the study of history. Since the age of the Ancient Greek historians, historians of Western Civilization have struggled to define history or to discuss the nature of historical thinking. The answers that historians have come up with to these questions themselves are diverse. For the purposes of this textbook, and in an attempt to offer current students some help in understanding the study of history, two major definitions of history are necessary. For our purposes, history will have two interrelated definitions or meanings: History is at its most basic definition the past. Regardless of whether someone has written about it or not, history always happens! But, history as an academic subject, has at the core of its definition the process of studying and writing about the past in a systematic and organized way. History, in the broadest sense then, results from a interrelated encounter between the past (events, actions, etc.) and the men and women who choose to study and write about the past. Written histories produced by historians, however different in choice of subject and approach, share many similarities. All written history is based on a critical analysis of evidence, including both secondary as well as primary sources. The evidence most traditionally used by historians of Western Civilization are written records, but other valuable sources also exist to aid the historian in his task of re-constructing history. For example, artistic, and visual evidence, or archeological remains, even the biological impact of diseases and other climatic events can be gathered from an examination of human bones and other remains. Modern historians in dealing with all of the available evidence, need to use a critical approach to understand biases in their sources. Historians also construct and interpret facts and sources by placing them into patterns or other relationships determined by the judgment of the historian. The collection of facts and their interpretation are thus woven together in the study of history.

Why Study History?

Most students would ask the question why study history? Why should we, to be more specific, understand something about the history of Classical Greece or Ancient Rome, or the history of Europe during the Middle Ages? The answer is that what the people of these early times thought and did in many ways still influences our own modern Western world. Also, from the study of the past, we can learn something about the shared history of humanity. Historians ask questions that have significance for our own modern world, such as: How and why did civilizations develop? How did different political systems evolve? How did people invent agricultures that could sustain complex civilizations? How did a society’s religious beliefs influence daily life? Historians ask these basic human questions and through their study of the remains of past historical societies they seek the answers that may help our own modern culture remedy some of its on-going current problems. Thus, historians attempt to ask and answer questions that are applicable not only to a specific ancient society that they study, but rather, questions and answers that can apply to all of humanity at any given place or at any given time.

Divisions of History

Historians of Western Civilization have traditionally divided history into three parts: ancient, medieval, and modern. Ancient history includes all events from the rise of civilizations up until the decline of the Roman Empire—i.e., approximately up to the fourth or fifth century C.E. (what before was commonly called A.D.) Medieval history comprises the events from then until approximately the end of the fifteenth century. What has happened since the fifteenth century constitutes modem history.

This division of history was established centuries ago and has often been challenged, especially by more modern historians who view history differently based on their own periodization and objects of study. Some historians feel that it would be more logical to divide history just as we divide our calendar,—namely, into what earlier historians and others in the Christian west called the periods B.C. (before Christ) and A.D. (anno domini—year of the Lord). They suggest a first, primitive stage, which ended approximately in the fifth century B.C.; a second, higher stage, from then to about the twelfth century A.D.; a third, lasting until the eighteenth century; and the stage in which we now live, which would make up a fourth era. However, this view takes into account only the Christian tradition in Western Civilization.

The Christian dating system has other problems associated with it. For instance, the Christian monk Dionysius Exiguus who devised this system of dating time in or about the year A.D. 532, based his system on the determination of the year in which Jesus Christ was born. For instance, in the date A.D. 2006, the prefix A.D. stands for Anno Domini which is Latin means the year of our Lord. Similarly, in the date 500 B.C., the suffix B.C. stands for Before Christ. There are other more practical problems in using this system. For instance, the concept of zero was still unknown to the Europeans during the time of Exiguus and therefore, his year 1 B.C. was followed by the year A.D. 1. Furthermore, recent scholars have determined that Christ’s birth was actually four years earlier than Exiguus believed.

Since Western Civilization includes the combined and interrelated histories of people who were followers of the Pagan, Christian, and Islamic religious traditions, this textbook will adopt a more modern dating system that does follow the previously accepted usage of a Christian era. The religiously neutral abbreviation B.C.E. (for Before Common Era) can be substituted for B.C. and similarly, the abbreviation C.E. (for Common Era) can replace the Christian term A.D. These modern terms will be used throughout this textbook in order not to impose a particular theology on the readers and deny the important legacy of the pagan (Greek & Roman) and Islamic civilizations. Also, in terms of usage, there is more clarity in using the new terminology. Both C.E. and B.C.E. are used as suffixes to dates, whereas the proper usage of B.C. and A.D. required an alternation between the use of A.D. as a prefix, and the usage of B.C. as suffix to a given date.

Regardless of which dating system is used, many other historians prefer a division of history according to the main stages of mankind’s rational development as expressed by scientific interests, organization of labor, and mastery over natural forces. Still other modern historians, asserting that the traditional divisions do not take most of the non-European cultures into consideration, propose still other periodizations, the purpose of which would be to make the divisions meaningful in terms of world history. However, dates and periods are not much more than aids contrived to help organize an unbelievably vast amount of information so that it may be grasped and interpreted.

Therefore, although this textbook will adapt the modern dating system for its chronology, it will maintain the established divisions of ancient, medieval, and modern history for the study of Western Civilizations. Moreover, since most college and university textbooks have maintained this periodization (at least for the study of Western civilization) this text will continue in that tradition. In terms of the study of Western civilization, this periodization has an inner justification insofar as it corresponds to the various stages in the growth of the West. Ancient history comprises the areas around the eastern Mediterranean where the earliest high civilizations flourished. Medieval history includes all of the European continent and modern history encompasses the whole of the globe.

Beginnings of History

More difficult than establishing generally acceptable divisions of history is the task of fixing a date for the beginning of history. Peculiarly enough, although we constantly move farther and farther from the earliest civilizations, we come to learn more and more about them. Remembrance may fade, but, as the work of archaeologists and historians proceeds, records (carved in stone or brick, written on parchment or tree bark, or embodied in utensils for daily use and monuments erected by ancient generations) become increasingly available.

Judging by the results of this work, we may say that the beginnings of history must lie somewhere in the fifth millennium B.C.E. From about that time date the earliest artistic achievements, the first decipherable records of man’s higher rational development, and the beginnings of political and social organizations that deserve to be called states.

Can we speak of this period also as the beginning of Western civilization? Obviously not, if by Western civilization we mean the civilization of the European peoples—the Germanic, Romance, and Slavic nations. Their history begins, properly speaking, only with the medieval period, or at the earliest with the history of ancient Greece and Rome.

Yet the more we learn about ancient times, the more we come to realize that a close connection existed between Europe and earlier civilizations in Syria, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Asia Minor. The heritage of these regions bordering on the eastern Mediterranean was strongly felt, especially in Greece, and was, indirectly, transmitted by Greece to Western civilization. We are therefore justified in including some of the ancient Near East into an account of Western civilization.

Concepts of History

The questions of periodization of history and the beginnings of history are closely interwoven with our philosophy of history. Many different philosophies have been proposed, reflecting the optimism or the pessimism of each age in which they were conceived.

Concepts of Progress and Retrogression

The most widely accepted contemporary view postulates progress. Those who hold this view insist that mankind, or at least Western man, has developed from humble beginnings in ancient times to certain heights in the present and will continue to advance. But they have come to realize that this progress is traceable chiefly in man’s rational and material life and less so in ethical and moral development.

Actually both Greek and Christian traditions have maintained quite an opposite view—namely, that retrogression rather than progress marks mankind’s development. Thus the Greeks spoke of the earliest age as a Golden Age and considered subsequent stages as less happy; their own age they termed the Iron Age. Similarly, Jews, Christians, and Muslims have put Paradise at the beginning of their story; later and present stages of mankind have brought suffering and death. Indeed, no solution exists in the Christian view until the end of man and of mankind’s history with the Day of the Last Judgment. Even rationalist thinkers of recent centuries have been inclined to see primitive man as the noble man and have attributed to the coercion exercised by law and civilization of modem ages the blame for having morally corrupted mankind.

Concepts of Continuity and Cyclical Movements

Advocates of progress and retrogression, imaginative as they are, have often ignored the facts taught by history. Wiser investigators have approached the problem on a more scientific basis. Searching the past, some of them have come to the conclusion that fundamentals have not changed in the stream of history. Men and women are what they have always been, and no more can be traced throughout history than eternal recurrence of all human aspirations and activities, without beginning, aim, logic, or meaning.

Others have maintained that mechanical or economic laws govern the path of history. Once these laws are understood, we might even be able to predict future developments.

Still others have interpreted history in terms of repetitive cyclical movements, each having its own fulfillment, and all sharing a common pattern. For, according to them, each individual civilization has a beginning, a period of maturity, and an end—like the human life cycle, which encompasses the stages of birth, growth, decline, and death. They have come to the conclusion that Western civilization itself is now declining and that another cycle will shortly supersede it.

Lastly, some thinkers have tried to combine this theory of cycles with the philosophy of progress and have insisted that there is a spiral, rather than disconnected cycles, and that the spiral shows an upward direction.

Significance of Historical Studies

All philosophies of history seem to have one thing in common: the assumption that history is not only the story of past events, or their recording by historians, but that it is also a thought process in the present. Herein lies the value of history—a value that, however, can be achieved only through a scientific and sober presentation of facts and through clear and disciplined thought based on these facts. If facts are thus presented and thought thus given, history cannot fail to have meaning for our lives of today and to exercise a powerful influence upon our actions.

Selected Readings

Ardrey, Robert. The Territorial Imperative: A Personal Inquiry into the Origins of Property and Nations, Dell Publishing Co., (1966)

Bonnie Blackburn, Leofranc Holford-Strevens. Calendars and chronology, in The Oxford Companion to the Year, Oxford Univeristy Press, (1999), pp. 659–937.

Clough, Sheperd B. The Rise and Fall of Civilization: An Inquiry into the Relationship between Economic Development and Civilization, Greenwood Press, (1978)

Colinvaux, Paul. The Fates of Nations: A Biological Theory of History, Simon & Schuster, (1980)

Declercq, Georges. Anno Domini: The Origins of the Christian Era, Turnhout, (2000).

Handlin, Oscar. Truth in History, Harvard Paperbacks, (1979)

Nietzsche, Friedrich. Use and Abuse of History, Prentice Hall, (1957)

Spengler, Oswald. The Decline of the West, Oxford University Press, (1932)

Rael, Patrick. Reading, Writing, and Researching for History: A Guide for College Students, Bowdoin College, (2004).

Rampolla, Mary Lynn. A Pocket Guide to Writing in History. 4th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, (2004).

Richards, E. G. Mapping Time, Oxford: Oxford University Press. (2000).

CHAPTER 1

The Earliest Known Civilizations

5300–3000 B.C.E.: Transition from villages to cities in Mesopotamia

4600–2500: Rise of the world’s first city, Uruk

3200: First known cuneiform artifacts

3100–2200: Egypt’s Old Kingdom

ca. 3100: Reign of Menes (First Dynasty) of Egypt

ca. 3000: Unification of Mesopotamia (Sumer); development of wheel (in Mesopotamia)

3000–2200: Early Minoan civilization (Crete)

ca. 3000: Building of first pyramid (Imhotep) ca. 2800: Egyptian calendar

ca. 2650: Reign of Khufu (Cheops) (Fourth Dynasty) of Egypt

ca. 2600: Reign of Messanipada of Sumer

ca. 2500: Reign of Eannatum of Sumer

ca. 2350: Reign of Sargon of Akkad

ca. 2300: Reign of Pepi II (Sixth Dynasty) of Egypt

2200–2040: Time of troubles (First Intermediate Period) in Egypt

2200–1600: Middle Minoan civilization

2040–1785: Egypt’s Middle Kingdom

ca. 2000: Reign of Dungi (Shulgi) in Mesopotamia; early Codex of Law and Epic of Gilgamesh in Mesopotamia

The earliest known civilizations developed in regions to the south and east of Europe—Southwest Asia, North Africa, the Indus Valley of modern Pakistan and India, and the Yellow River in China. In Europe itself, Neolithic (New Stone Age) people—ancestors of the various modern peoples of Western civilization—appeared about 5000 B.C.E.; but written sources about them do not exist. It is South West Asia, the area that archaeologists traditionally refer to as the Near East—the regions composed of Syria and the fertile valleys of the Nile, Euphrates, and Tigris, and also Anatolia—not central Europe or the American continent—that furnishes us with the first artifacts and records of settled human societies.

By the time our ancestors arrived in the Near East—ca. 4500 B.C.E.—they had progressed somewhat beyond the New Stone Age. They had ceased their dependence upon hunting and had learned to build permanent dwellings and to domesticate certain animals. They knew how to cultivate the soil, to make tools and weapons, to build ships, to fashion stone utensils and earthenware, and to weave cloth. They manufactured copper utensils (although they had not yet produced bronze), and they used gold and silver. They had developed political organizations and laws and had begun to live in towns. They owned property, produced and traded merchandise, and built ornamental altars to their gods and protective spirits, and elaborated tombs for their dead.

Records of that age are extremely scarce. One of the oldest is a seal in the form of a cylinder, with images and a few symbols or early writing on it. Its age has been estimated to be about 6,500 years old, and it was found in Syria just north of present-day Antioch. Syria was a centrally located area at the crossroads of early trade routes; it was perhaps there that the first grain was planted and the first bricks made. Yet not even Syria furnishes us with much additional information. Its two great towns, Aleppo and modern-day Damascus, are more than 4,000 years old, but we know nothing of their beginnings. We must therefore turn to Mesopotamia and Egypt of the fourth millennium in order to get our first glimpses of the precursors of Western civilization and the oldest known civilizations. It was the invention of writing that enabled the first civilizations to preserve, organize, and expand knowledge and to pass it on to future generations. In Mesopotamia and Egypt, we find the world’s first writing systems and the world’s first documented civilizations.

SUMER AND EGYPT UP TO THE SECOND MILLENNIUM B.C.E.

The beginnings of Mesopotamian and Egyptian history go back to the fifth millennium (5000 B.C.E.). In the two great river valleys of the Nile and the Tigris-Euphrates, small communities or kingdoms arose. Royal offices evolved based on law and exercising political, religious, and economic duties.

With the help of advanced tools such as the plow and perfected techniques such as irrigation, the peoples of both areas quickly learned to control their natural surroundings to a certain extent. In both areas, they learned to exploit available water resources through irrigation and canal building, to increase the fertility of the land so as to make settled agricultural life possible, and to enforce laws that would guarantee the maintenance of these achievements and further the common welfare. In both of these cultural regions, the river systems played a central part in the development of civilizations as the chief source of water in a hot, dry climate, and the most reliable source of soil fertility through flooding and silting of the surrounding lands. Both of these early civilizations seem to have been acquainted, as early as 4000 B.C.E., with primitive furnaces in which copper could be melted and formed into utensils. Each developed a calendar, which implies observation of nature, and the art of writing, which implies record-keeping, history, and scholarship more generally.

Whether or not significant and direct connections existed between Egypt and Mesopotamia during these early stages of development cannot be determined; the parallels, however, are interesting. We know that Egypt led a fairly isolated existence. Owing to its location, it enjoyed a modicum of peace from outside disturbances, except for rare invasions from the south and still rarer attacks from Mediterranean pirates on the Nile delta. Mesopotamia, on the other hand, found itself in the midst of much action and agitation. It carried on brisk trade with distant regions (including the city of Mohenjo-Daro from the faraway Harappan culture in India’s Indus Valley), experienced much intermingling of peoples, and suffered from numerous invasions. And it was in Mesopotamia that this dynamism produced the world’s first cities, including the oldest one of all: Uruk.

Sumer

Mesopotamia is generally conceded to have seen the rise of the world’s first cities, and hence, civilization. The development of the first cities took place in the lands enclosed between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which comprised Mesopotamia, a Greek word that means between the rivers. Here, too, nature favored the early growth of civilization. Probably from about 3000 B.C.E., we have written evidence that the numerous small and independent Mesopotamian communities began to consolidate into one kingdom. This kingdom was dominated by Sumerians (of unknown origin) who had invaded Mesopotamia in the fourth millennium and after whom the region is named: Sumer.

Government

The early government of Sumer did not enjoy the same stability that contemporary Egypt possessed. Central authority remained so weak that individual city-states (the basic political unit of Mesopotamian civilization), such as Uruk, Ur, Akkad, and Lagash, retained a large measure of independence. Their government was in the hands of local kings or priests who exercised both economic and political control. These kings all claimed divine authority given to them from their gods, though some of them may have been elected by popular assemblies. At various times, one or another of these local rulers overthrew the central Sumerian government. Thus, at various times, the kings of Uruk, Ur, Lagash, Akkad, or other regions succeeded in making themselves masters of the whole area. But tensions remained and were increased by struggles over economic control, especially of the water supply and irrigation. Moreover, difficulties resulted from the steady influx of nomadic Semitic tribes. These eventually became numerous enough to impose their language upon the entire area.

Rulers

A number of outstanding rulers appeared in Mesopotamia during the course of the third millennium. There was Messanipada (ca. 2600 B.C.E.), during whose reign trade flourished, reaching from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea. Eannatum (ca. 2450 B.C.E.) reigned about a century later. His rule originally encompassed no more than the northern parts of the region; but, being a mighty conqueror, he soon extended his sway over most of the south. Great monuments, temples, and sculptures mark the path of his victorious armies.

Perhaps the most famous ruler was a man who had risen from relatively humble origins, Sargon of Akkad (ca. 2350 B.C.E.). Around 2340 B.C.E., Sargon, leader of the Akkadians, conquered the Sumerian city-states and established an empire that included most of Mesopotamia as well as territory to the west. Sargon put an end to the renewed internal strife that had preceded his reign, once more unified Mesopotamia, established firm central authority, and conquered additional territory up to the shores of the Mediterranean. His empire differed from the earlier ones in character, language, manner of dress, religious ways, and administrative bureaucratic institutions.

After his death, anarchy returned. Foreign invasions followed, and not until about 2100 B.C.E. was independence restored to Mesopotamia—this time by the rulers of the city of Ur. Rather than war, the arts of peace reigned during their rule, especially during that of Dungi (or Shulgi) (ca. 2000 B.C.E.). Laws were codified and enforced. New canals were built, the irrigation system repaired, and beautiful temples erected.

Like the Egyptian pharaohs after them, the authority of the Mesopotamian rulers rested upon their claim to a position equal to that of the gods. They were commanders of the army, arbitrators of all political disputes, and, indirectly, owners of all property. They controlled the irrigation system, which was the basis of Mesopotamian prosperity. Their weakness, in contrast to the Egyptians, lay in their failure to develop an effective and reliable bureaucracy. They remained dependent upon local kings, priests, and a nobility—a situation fraught with danger, inasmuch as the army was composed of mercenaries who often proved to be untrustworthy.

Learning

The Sumerians studied mathematics, astronomy, and medicine. They knew how to alloy metals (adding tin to copper in order to manufacture bronze), and they worked metals into everyday utensils. By 3000 B.C.E., they had succeeded in constructing a wheel and could use this invention to build wheeled carriages and improve the manufacture of pottery by turning it on a horizontal wheel. They were skilled construction engineers and built in brick as well as stone. They developed a numerical system and worked out a correct lunar calendar with twelve months and brought it into harmony with the solar year by adding an extra month from time to time.

They also invented a system of writing called cuneiform, whose wedge-shaped signs were entered on clay tablets using reeds. They practiced a type of cuneiform writing long before 3000 B.C.E., but in the course of time, they simplified the signs, adopted symbols for individual syllables and sounds, and eventually created a remarkable written literature. Libraries were built, numerous records were kept, and engraved cylinders serving as seals for documents were produced. Among the works of literature still preserved is the Epic of Gilgamesh. It contains legends of gods, kings, and heroic events, some of which show marked similarities to those recorded in the Old Testament. The Epic of Gilgamesh constitutes an invaluable source of information about Sumerian life, beliefs, and ethics.

Art

To judge from surviving monuments, the Sumerians did not produce as many objects of material art as the Egyptians. Scarcity of raw materials may be partly responsible for this fact. Nevertheless, their sense of beauty, their artistic genius, and their craftsmanship are attested to by numerous surviving works. They created fine sculptures; they built elaborate palaces, temples, and graves for their kings; and their metalwork rivaled in beauty and perfection some of the best creations of ancient times. The sound of their music has, of course, vanished, but representations on monuments indicate that the Sumerians appreciated music and possessed a wide variety of musical instruments, such as the lyre and the flute.

Commerce and Law

The central location of Mesopotamia along major waterways favored foreign trade. Some historians believe that, at the time of Sargon, Mesopotamian trading connections became extended. Certainly, traders reached India, Egypt, North Africa, Syria, and Asia Minor. Lacking any type of coined money, they exchanged goods on a barter basis. They exported fine jewelry and woven goods, as well as tools, arms, and slaves. They imported metals and other necessary materials.

Law was codified at various times: A most revealing codex, which throws light on social conditions, dates back to about 2000 B.C.E. Much of it would find its way into the famous Code of Hammurabi more than two centuries later.

Society was clearly stratified along strict class lines. The population consisted of a priestly caste, who enjoyed a privileged position; ordinary citizens, who were free; and slaves who, in the course of time, seem to have become a large part of the total population. A sizable class of artisans and merchants existed, but the largest group remained that of the peasants. Despite the importance of trade, agriculture formed the basis of economic life in Mesopotamia, as in Egypt. Even more so than in Egypt, the production of beer from grain was one of the single biggest industries, with, by some estimates, 40 percent of barley going to produce it. As one of the few potable drinks that was nutritious and could be preserved, it was the drink of choice for much, if not most, of the population. It also provided a sizeable amount of employment to women as tavern owners, staff, and in various stages of the brewing process.

Religion

In view of the dominant position of the priests, religion was bound to play an important role in Mesopotamia. Mesopotamians worshipped the sky, sun, earth, water, and other forces of nature. Statues of gods like Anu the supreme god; Inanna (or Ishtar), the goddess of love and war; Enlil, the wind; and Enki, earth and rivers, were made, and vast pyramidal stepped buildings—known as ziggurats—were erected and adorned with temples and sculptures. Religion so permeated all Sumerian culture that the Sumerians assigned even to abstract ideas (gods, spirits, natural forces, religious concepts) a place in their daily life and in the hierarchy of society. The Mesopotamians became preoccupied with questions of immortality and resurrection, but they never reached the depths of transcendental religious thought explored by the Egyptians or the ancient Israelites. Indeed, historians often cast them as rather gloomy and fatalistic in outlook in contrast to the optimistic view of the Egyptian afterlife, and the absolute power and mercy of the Hebrew Yahweh.

Egypt from 3500 to 1800 B.C.E.

Information about Egypt becomes more detailed with the period after 3500 B.C.E., as the originally independent communities along the Nile began to draw closer to one another. A process of unification began, and first two kingdoms evolved (Upper and Lower Egypt), then—by ca. 3100 B.C.E.—one single unified kingdom was formed. With it began a period, lasting for more than a thousand years, during which Egyptian culture created enduring monuments of a high civilization. This period is traditionally divided into two parts: the Old Kingdom (ca. 3100–2200 B.C.E.) and the Middle Kingdom (ca. 2040–1785 B.C.E.).

Early Kingdom

The Early Kingdom begins with the rule of the so-called First Dynasty, founded by the mythological figure King Menes or Nermar (ca. 3100 B.C.E.). Menes, the ruler of Upper Egypt, conquered the Nile Delta and Lower Egypt, and he resided in the city of Thinis on the middle course of the Nile. He is credited with having achieved the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt. Under his successors, the kingdom increased its strength. The rulers (called pharaohs) accumulated power, reaching a climax with Khufu (or Cheops, ca. 2650 B.C.E.) of the Fourth Dynasty. By that time, the capital city had been moved to Memphis, close to the delta of the Nile. The Egyptians believed the pharaoh to be both man and a god. The pharaoh was an absolute ruler of the land and held his court at the city of Memphis. From Memphis, by means of rigorous centralization, the pharaohs exercised strict control over the whole region. Khufu, best known of the great pyramid builders, was, according to the records, hated for his regimentation and harsh exploitation of the people.

The decline of the Early Kingdom set in with the Pharaoh Pepi II (ca. 2300 B.C.E.) of the Sixth Dynasty. He extended the sway of Egypt far up the Nile to the second cataract, or series of falls, of this river, but during his long rule, the central authority of the pharaoh could not be maintained. An autonomous landholding nobility began asserting itself and various slave rebellions occurred. Disintegration of the kingdom followed.

Governmental and Societal Structure

The pharaoh was identified in earliest times with the falcon-headed sun god Horus and later with the sun god Ra. He was ruler and lawgiver and possessed absolute and divine authority. As supreme landlord, he levied elaborately systematized taxes in kind and service, regulated agriculture, and exercised control over the water system, which served periodically to irrigate the land with the waters of the Nile. He ruled with the help of a steadily growing bureaucracy (consisting not only of nobility and priests but also of numerous scribes recruited from the common people) and governors (often royal princes), who supervised the execution of the laws in the various districts or nomes into which the kingdom was divided.

Most of the farmers were free—at least during the early dynasties—and possessed cattle and their own plows and hoes. Later, the nobility succeeded in monopolizing much of the land and began cultivating it with the help of slaves. Yet strict class stratification did not exist: Social mobility prevented a rigid structure, and many rose from low to high estates. Women seem to have had an equitable place in society; monogamy was the rule, even though the rich occasionally took several wives.

Skills and Learning

Ancient Egypt was comparatively densely populated. A number of larger towns existed besides Memphis, the capital. Trade and artisanship flourished. Egyptians produced textiles, jewelry, papyrus, glass, and metal objects of gold, silver, and copper. In the schools, scribes instructed children in writing, reading, mathematics (including algebra and geometry), mechanics, astronomy, medicine, and they also prepared them for government service. Scholarship was also promoted. As early as about 2800 B.C.E., Egyptian culture developed a solar calendar of 365 days. The Egyptian year had twelve months of thirty days each. In order to complete the solar year they added a separate period of five days after the last month. The Egyptian solar calendar was more accurate than the Babylonian lunar calendar.

A system of Egyptian writing evolved that used hieroglyphs. At first, only pictures were used to represent complete words or concepts, but later (before 3000 B.C.E.) they also acquired symbolic and phonetic values for individual sounds. For the development of writing, Egypt profited greatly from the availability of the papyrus plant, from which they created paper that provided a far more satisfactory material on which to make records than did stone, brick, or clay tablets, as had been used elsewhere.

Art

The Egyptians have left to posterity an extraordinary artistic heritage. Paintings and masterpieces of sculpture have been found in temples and tombs. Representations on textiles, pottery, and numerous other objects of daily life bear witness to the greatness of Egyptian civilization. No general statement would seem adequate, however, to describe the art of Egypt, for the period of Egypt’s artistic creations spanned more than two millennia and, notwithstanding a considerable degree of conservatism, the Egyptian taste and approach to beauty changed subtly in the course of the centuries. All one could point out by way of generalization would be, perhaps, a rather persistent trend toward large size; a very special, unvaried calm and dignity in the highly stylized representations; and the particular sense of balance conveyed by the paintings, sculptures, and architectural masterpieces of the Egyptians—their temples, columns, and tombs. There persisted throughout a pronounced element of symbolism, which reflects the unchanged grandeur of their artistic conceptions and a sense of the dominance that gives their creations a timeless character. This is closely combined with a sense of the importance of religious beliefs in their artistic creations.

Among their extraordinary achievements were the pyramids. Imhotep, an adviser, physician, and architect of the pharaoh, it is said, constructed the first pyramid ca. 3000 B.C.E. Some of the early attempts, as with the tomb of Djoser at Saqqara, constructed around 2680 B.C.E., featured stepped sides, perhaps symbolizing a ladder to the heavens. Others, more daring in technique, followed. The culmination of these efforts was the monumental complex of Khufu, built around 2600, the Great Pyramid of which rises to an unprecedented 481 feet and covers thirteen acres. Like the great European cathedrals of the Middle Ages, the pyramids, temples, and tombs probably also served economic purposes, creating work in time of need. But this objective was transcended by more important motives. The pyramids were primarily an expression of the Egyptian attitude toward life, death, and existence beyond death. They served the glorification of the divine, the exaltation of the pharaoh, and the beautification of the people’s surroundings.

Agriculture, Industry, Trade, and Law

A considerable shifting and movement of populations went on within Egypt. The majority of the people lived by agriculture, raising wheat, barley, vegetables, and grapes, as well as cattle and fowl. Horses were unknown in the Early and Middle kingdoms. Of course, agriculture depended upon seasonal irrigation and silting of the desert by the waters of the Nile, and the maintenance of the irrigation system was one of the chief tasks of the government and a major burden for the farmers. A minority engaged in industry, mined copper on the Sinai peninsula, worked stone and made bricks, and produced cloth and articles of glass and bronze. They made pottery, adorning even simple daily utensils with lovely colors and paintings. They made writing materials out of the papyrus plant that grew on the banks of the Nile, and they produced luxury items for the small wealthy class, which lived in richly furnished mansions in the towns.

Pharaohs frequently went to war to safeguard trade routes and sources of raw materials. Although evidence for widespread external trade is sparse, long-distance trade does seem to have played some role in Egyptian foreign relations. However, most exports were essentially restricted to supplying neighbors, such as Nubia. Other trade connections extended to overseas regions, including Syria and Crete. Syria was a vital source of wood, which came from the famed cedars of Lebanon. Because money did not exist, barter was the basis of all trade. Laws (eventually codified) regulated both trade and agriculture, and census of the land was periodically taken for tax purposes. During the first few dynasties, justice seems to have been dispensed fairly equitably to all classes, but the growing stratification of society, which came with more complex living conditions under later dynasties, ultimately terminated the practice of equality before the law.

Religion

Religion permeated all phases of Egyptian life. In early times, it concerned itself less with ethics than with human fate, especially after death; hence the furnishings and splendor of the tombs for kings, queens, nobles, and the rich, and the mummification of their bodies. Religion later embraced broader aspects of the Egyptians’ spiritual life and inspired literary and artistic works. Eventually, the priests, who had been under the control of the pharaohs and had attended mainly to services in the temples, achieved their own political power and prominence.

The supreme Egyptian divinities were successively Horus, Ra, and Amen—all of them identified with the sun. Osiris, who represented the Nile, held a special place as judge and ruler of the dead, but myths concerning him later became intermingled with those of Horus and Ra. Isis, goddess of motherhood and fertility, was the sister and wife of Osiris. Egyptians supplemented the worship of these highest gods with the veneration of lesser local deities. Many of the gods were represented as animal or part-animal forms.

Ancient Egyptian religion focused on