Cities, Inequalities and New Social Realities WHAP/Napp

Cities, Inequalities and New Social Realities WHAP/Napp

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“Thus far, most experts agree that innovative primary urbanization (the process by which towns and cities are formed and become larger as more and more people begin living and working in central areas), not borrowed or imposed from outside, took place in seven places: five river valleys in the eastern hemisphere – Mesopotamia, the Nile, the Indus, the Huang He, and the Niger – and, in the western hemisphere, in Mexico and in the Andes Mountains. The birth of primary urbanization took place in these seven locations at very different times, with Mesopotamia the oldest at about 3300 B.C.E. and the Niger the most recent at about 400 C.E.

But cities are more than bricks and mortar, metal and artifacts. They require institutions for their larger scale of organization and administration. As society and economy became more complex, new class hierarchies emerged. Professional administrators, skilled artisans, long-distance traders, local merchants, and priests and kings enriched the diversity and sophistication of the growing cities. External relations with other cities required skilled negotiations, and a diplomatic corps emerged. Armies mobilized for defense and attack. In short, with the growth of the city the early state was also born, with its specialized organization, centralized rule, and powerful armies.

To keep track of business transactions and administrative orders, the proclamations of rulers and the rituals of priests, the legends of gods and the histories of the city, new methods of record keeping were developed. At first these were tokens, pictures, seals, personalized markings, and in the Andes, quipu, knots made in special lengths of string. By about 3300 B.C.E., in Sumer, which is geographically equivalent to today’s southern Iraq, the world’s first system of writing had evolved. This was one of the most revolutionary inventions in human history. The prestigious occupation of scholars was born, and schoolteachers soon followed.” ~ The World’s History

1-Define urbanization. ______

2-What is “innovative primary urbanization”? ______

3-Identify the seven places were innovative primary urbanization occurred. ______

4-What was the earliest location where primary urbanization occurred? ______

5-What do cities require? Why? ______

6-Define class hierarchy. ______

7-What was “born” with the growth of the city? ______

8-Why did writing develop? ______

9-Where did the first writing system develop? ______

Notes:

1. The First Civilizations

1. Mesopotamia (Tigris/Euphrates Rivers – Circa 3500 B.C.E.)

1. Competing Sumerian city-states
2. Surplus, Specialization, Cities, Writing

1. World’s earliest written language (Cuneiform)
2. Uruk, largest city, with population of around 50,000
3. Ziggurat, temple, in center of city

1. Nile River Valley in northeastern Africa

1. Unified state; Pharaoh – divine ruler

1. Nubia

1. Farther south along Nile
2. Cultural diffusion from ancient Egyptians but unique elements too

1. Along the central coast of Peru (3000-1800)

1. Little rainfall but dozens of rivers
2. Twenty-five urban centers known as Norte Chico
3. Economy based to an unusual degree on fishing
4. Did not rest on grain-based farming or pottery or writing
5. Existence of a 5,000-year-old quipu (knotted rope to keep records)

1. Indus and Saraswati River Valleys in present-day Pakistan

1. By 2000 BCE, embraced a larger area than Mesopotamia
2. Elaborately planned cities; Standardized weights and bricks
3. Written language, thus far undeciphered

1. Little indication of a political hierarchy (No evidence of kings)

1. Early Civilization in China

1. Perhaps as early as 2200 BCE
2. Ideal of a centralized stated evident from Xia dynasty (2200-1766)
3. By Zhou Dynasty, belief that emperor was the Son of Heaven and ruled by Mandate of Heaven

1. Teotihuacán – located in central valley of Mexico

1. Perhaps 200,000 people/Dozens of temples/Pyramids

1. Characteristics of Early Civilizations

1. Class and occupation at least as important as kinship
2. Specializationsurplus freed some people for different tasks
3. Upper classes/great wealth in land/salaries, avoid physical labor
4. Development of Law Codes

1. Code of Hammurabi; early written law code (harsh punishments but based on social class of violator, thus class divisions), developed in Mesopotamia under Babylonian king

1. Free Commoners

1. Vast majority of population
2. Agricultural surplus appropriated through taxes, rent, required labor, and tribute payments to support upper classes

1. Slavery

1. Slaves at the bottom of the social hierarchy

1. Rise of Patriarchy/New Inequalities for Women

Questions:

1-Identify the rivers that made sedentary agriculture possible in Mesopotamia. ______

2-Where did the world’s earliest writing system evolve? What is this writing system called? ______

3-Define ziggurat. ______

4-Identify one political way in which Sumerian civilization differed from Egyptian. ______

5-Identify one significant fact about Nubia. ______

6-How did Norte Chico differ from Sumerian civilization? ______

7-Explain the following statement: The Indus River Valley civilization exhibited evidence of urban planning. ______

8-What dynasty in China adopted the Mandate of Heaven? ______

9-Explain the Mandate of Heaven. ______

10-Identify one significant fact about Teotihuacán. ______

11-Define specialization. ______

12-Explain the following statement: The Code of Hammurabi observed class divisions. ______

13-Describe the class hierarchies in the First Civilizations. ______

14-Define patriarchy. ______

Reading:

“By 2000 B.C.E., the agricultural foundations for an urban civilization were in place in Mesoamerica [from Central Mexico to Honduras and Nicaragua]. Farmers throughout present-day Mexico and Central America were cultivating maize, gourds, beans, and other food crops. In addition to farming dry fields, their methods included ‘slash-and-burn’ agriculture,’ which kept them moving from place to place in search of new land; ‘pot irrigation,’ dipping pots into low-lying wells and simply pouring the water on the fields; canal irrigation; and in low-lying swamplands, the creation of chinampas, raised fields or so-called ‘hanging gardens.’ Chinampas were created by piling up the mud and the natural vegetation of the swamps into grids of raised land crisscrossed by natural irrigation channels. When the Spanish arrived in 1519, they estimated that the chinampas could feed an impressive four persons per acre; more recent archaeological estimates of their productivity suggest eight people.” ~ The World’s History

1-What crops were staple crops in the Americas? ______

2-How did chinampas differ from slash-and-burn agriculture? ______

1. All of the following were changes to human societies brought about by the Neolithic Revolution EXCEPT:
(A)Reliable food supplies increased
(B)Job specialization occurred
(C)Women and men grew to have more equal status
(D)The distinction between nomads and settled people became important
2. Most of the earliest civilizations developed in
(A)Areas around the Mediterranean Sea
(B)Inland areas in moderate climates
(C)Areas with abundant rainfall
(D)The Western Hemisphere
(E)River valleys in warm, dry climates
3. Most experts believe that agriculture first originated in
(A)The Middle East and then spread by cultural diffusion to many other areas of the world
(B)The Andes Mountain area and China around the same time
(C)China and then spread by cultural diffusion to many other areas around the world
(D)The Middle East but also began later as independent invention in many other areas around the world
(E)Several areas in both the Western and Eastern Hemispheres around the same time / 4. Surplus production
(A) is caused by poor cultivation methods
(B) prevents specialization of labor
(C) gives rise to the specialization of labor and stratification of society
(D) can never occur in modern societies
(E) none of the above
5. How did pastoralism affect early social development?
(A) Herding societies tended to settle on particular lands, and thus civilization emerged relatively quickly.
(B) Pastoralism led to the adoption of a monotheistic approach to religion.
(C) No pastoral societies mixed animal husbandry with the domestication of plants.
(D) Herding societies tended to migrate frequently, and thus civilization took longer to emerge.
(E) Pastoral societies tended to be led by women.
6. One of the most important political legacies of the Zhou Dynasty in Ancient China is
(A)A written law code
(B)The establishment of a theocracy
(C)The tradition of having two rulers instead of one
(D)Participation by citizens in the decision-making process
(E)The mandate of heaven

“The first significant civilization to develop in Mesoamerica was that of the Olmecs. Considered by some to be the mother culture of pre-Hispanic Mexico, the ‘rubber people’ venerated the jaguar as supernatural…The Olmecs are noted for the six colossal basalt heads each measuring eight to nine feet in height and weighing 20-40 tons.” ~ Berkeley.edu

The Nahuatl (Aztec) name for the Olmecs means “rubber people”. Olmecs extracted latex from rubber trees.