Mezopotamia

History of Civilization Mezopotamia

 The area around both the Euphrates and Tigris the land is very fertile and curved like a crescent shape so that the historian of the United States is Breasted called Mesopotamia by the phrase "The Fertile Crescent Moon" (the fertile crescent region) the ancient Greek historian named Herodotus called Mesopotamia as "Land is a beautiful paradise." fertile soil conditions and the rivers that can be used for various purposes is a supporting factor for the growth of civilization of a nation. Because of its location on a vast plain with no natural defenses are adequate then the development of Mesopotamia into the target seizure of the surrounding nations to inhabit the area. The nations who never develop their civilization in Mesopotamia was Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian and Babylonian New. For more details please see the description below carefully.

A. Sumer (± 3000 BC)Sumerian is the first nation that inhabit Mesopotamia. Firstarea of ​​the swamp. After drying the area becomessettlements inhabited by groups of organized society. Is the oldest inhabited city of Ur and Sumer.

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2. system of government
Sumerians developed a government based in the city of Ur near the mouth of the river Euphrates. The rulers have enormous power. Apart from being head of government, the King also as head of religion that the king called Patesi (Rev. King). King is responsible for people's lives both physically and mental. King should be able to regulate economic life, safety or peace, law and justice, and religious life.

One patesi Nanshe named Ur. He is the King who built the city of Lagash circa 2500 BC. Ur actions Nanshe Patesi followed by (King) Gudea who ruled circa 2400 BC. It was he who made ​​the city of Lagash be the most meaningful cities in Sumer.

Note the picture beside the figure of King Gudea.

If the king is also mentioned as the head of the religion then how Sumerian belief system? Consider the following description.
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3. belief system
Polytheism is the belief Sumerians. They believe and worship many gods. One of the main deity was Marduk. In addition there are the gods who control nature, ie they worship Enlil (god of earth), Ea (god of water), Anu (god of the sky), Sin (God of the moon), Samas (sun god) and Ereskigal (God of death).Sumerian belief is growing and embraced by the public

Building material in Mesopotamia is generally made ​​of clay
dried in the sun. By considering the ziggurat, remember you will be building megaliths in Indonesia that serves as a place of worship? Surely you remember, the building was the punden terraces.
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b. writing

Sumerian writing is called writing a nail (cunei form). They use the sign ± 350 pictures and each picture is a single syllable. The letters were written on clay board that streaked / writeable using rock hard and sharp-tipped. Why writing is called writing a nail? So called because the letters were shaped like a nail or a wedge (see picture 3.15).

Letter nails has been known since 3000 BC used to record crops, property and trade affairs. Spikes letter circulated by the Phoenicians around the Mediterranean Sea. The Greeks
take and develop into the letter Alpha, Beta and Gama. Then the Romans developed into Latin letters.
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c. knowledge
Sumerian is an important contribution to the world in the field of mathematics. They develop a basic count of 60 (called sixagesimal) their discovery of the count circle is 360o, one hour is 60 minutes, 1 minute is 60 seconds we still use today.

Knowledge on the basis for calculating the time for one day is 24 hours, one month is 30 days, one year is 12 months. Calculation time is called a dating system which later developed by the Babylonians. Calculations based on the circulation of the Babylonian calendar month (or the lunar calendar system called Komariah).

B. Akkadian (± 2350 BC)
Entering the year 2800 BC, Mesopotamia ruled by the Akkadian, after berhasilmengalahkan Sumerians. The leader of the nation Akkadian king Sargon is that you can see the statue in the image below.

hey chose as his capital Agade. In terms of national culture mimics Akkadian Sumerian culture that has been developed so that there developed a new culture called the culture of Sumer Akkad Semitic language.

After the Akkadian, peoples who occupied the next Mesopotamia?

C. Babylonian (± 1900 BC)
Babylonian kingdom was founded by the nation Amorit also called Babylon. The word comes from the Babylonian babilu which means gateway to God. Babylon is located
± 97 kilometers south of Baghdad today, the river Euphrates, southern Iraq. Babylon became the government (the capital), trade and religious.King Hammurabi of Babylon which is the largest (1948 - 1905 BC). King Hammurabi known as a maker of legislation. According to belief, the law comes from giving god Marduk. As seen in the picture next to 3:17. In order to be read by the public, the law was engraved on a memorial stone placed as high as 8 feet in the middle of the capital. The essence of the law of Hammurabi is retaliation, for example, eye for eye, tooth for a tooth. The application of the law is very harsh, for example: "If someone does a burglary at a house, then he should be killed and burned in front of the house where he was committing theft". Thus the order of society is achieved by obedience to the law.After Hammurabi's death, about 1900 BC by the Babylonians conquered Hittit from the highlands to the north of Mesopotamia. How the subsequent development of the history of Mesopotamia? For a while there is no record of civilizations of Mesopotamia important. Only in the year 1200 came the BC government that controls the Assyrians of Mesopotamia. Casethat you can read the description below.D. Assyrian (± 1200 BC)Assyrians including the Semitic family. They built the city of Asshur and Niniveh. Niniveh city located on the banks of the Tigris river made the capital. You can see in the image map above.Military-style government Assyrians. Assyrians was named as the Romans from Asia. What emerged for the title? Because like the Romans, the Assyrians are conquering the surrounding areas so successfully formed a large empire. Assyrian territory stretched from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean Sea. They greatly feared by other nations because the infantry, cavalry and soldiers with war train is very strong.The empire was divided into several provinces and each province was ruled by a governor responsible to the King. To facilitate the relationship between the capital and the region, he built a good road.In addition to military life is patterned, the Assyrians also built the country into a highly developed nation, among others in the field of education. One of the famous Assyrian king was Assurbanipal. During his reign he left 22,000 pieces of clay tablets stored in the library Niniveh. Slab (the tablets) contains writings about religious issues, literature, medicine, mathematics, natural science, dictionaries and history.After experiencing the heyday less than six centuries, the Assyrian empire was destroyed. What causes that? During the reign of the Assyrian nation, the conquered nations tried to construct the power to defeat it so that in the year 612 BC, the Chaldean can destroy Niniveh.How does the state government in Mesopotamia next? The description belowcan you read about the rule of Babylon by the Chaldean nation.E. New Babylon (± 3000 BC)The famous Chaldean king was Nebuchadnezzar. He rebuilt the city of Babylon and make the city as the capital of so-called New Babylon. There are two interesting things in the city is the tower of Babel and the Babylonian hanging gardens. Babel tower whose height reached 90 meters serve as a beacon for the beauty of the city and surrounding traders who will go to the city of Babylon. The second interesting thing is making hanging gardens which is dedicated to his wife.The park was built on an artificial hill. 107 meters high. The shape of terraced podium planted trees, grass and flowers. There is an artificial waterfall coming from the Euphrates river water that flowed to the top of the hill and then flows through an artificial channel. When viewed from afar as if it's hanging gardens, a view that is amazing.In the field of knowledge has developed the nation's Chaldean astronomy and astrology. They believe that the future can be known by studying the stars. In addition to predicting the fate of a person is also a prophecy about the eclipse. They divided the week into seven days, one day into 12 hours dual (half-day day / light and 1 / 2 day night / dark). Calculating the passage of time with hours of water (water clock) and sundial (Sundial).An important note about the events of the conquest of Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom of Judea and Palestine. Capital of the capture of Jerusalem, King Solomon's camp was burned and plundered the land of Judea. The people of Israel, including its leaders were transported to the country as slaves and captives. The event is called during the disposal of Babylon from 586-550 BC, a very imprint for the nation of Israel. After Nebuchadnezzar died shortly of the year 539 BC, New Babylon conquered by the Persians.