Scribd
Upload
68 views47 pages

Ancient Civilizations Summary

- Cuneiform was one of the earliest known forms of writing, developed by the Sumerians in Mesopotamia around 3500 BC using wedge-shaped markings on clay tablets. - Uruk was a major city in ancient Mesopotamia, considered the first true city in the world and home to early developments in writing, architecture, cylinder seals, and ziggurats. - The Ziggurat of Ur, a massive stepped structure, was built around 2100 BC as a temple for the moon god and an important religious and political center in the city.

Uploaded by

osshiie
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
68 views47 pages

Ancient Civilizations Summary

- Cuneiform was one of the earliest known forms of writing, developed by the Sumerians in Mesopotamia around 3500 BC using wedge-shaped markings on clay tablets. - Uruk was a major city in ancient Mesopotamia, considered the first true city in the world and home to early developments in writing, architecture, cylinder seals, and ziggurats. - The Ziggurat of Ur, a massive stepped structure, was built around 2100 BC as a temple for the moon god and an important religious and political center in the city.

Uploaded by

osshiie
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 47

- https://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=-EhJ8wQm2RQ
Cuneiform was first developed by the
ancient Sumerians of Mesopotamia
around 3,500 B.C. The first cuneiform
writings were pictographs created by
making wedge-shaped marks on clay
tablets with blunt reeds used as a stylus.
Uruk was one of the most
important cities (at one
time, the most important)
in ancient Mesopotamia.
According to the Sumerian
King List, it was founded
by King Enmerkar
sometime around 4500
BCE. Located in the
southern region of Sumer
(modern day Warka, Iraq).
It is considered the first true city
in the world, the origin of
writing, the first example of
architectural work in stone and
the building of great stone
structures, the origin of the
ziggurat, and the first city to
develop the cylinder seal which
the ancient Mesopotamians used
to designate personal property
or as a signature on documents.
The Ziggurat of Ur and the
temple on its top were built
around 2100 B.C.E. by the
king Ur-Nammu of the Third
Dynasty of Ur for the moon
god Nanna, the divine patron
of the city state.
The structure would have been the highest
point in the city by far and, like the spire of
a medieval cathedral, would have been
visible for miles around, a focal point for
travelers and the pious alike. As the
Ziggurat supported the temple of the patron
god of the city of Ur, it is likely that it was
the place where the citizens of Ur would
bring agricultural surplus and where they
would go to receive their regular food
allotments. In antiquity, to visit the ziggurat
at Ur was to seek both spiritual and physical
nourishment.
EGYPTIAN
CIVILIZATION
• Ancient Egypt was one of the greatest and
most powerful civilizations in the history of
the world. It lasted for over 3000 years
from 3150 BC to 30 BC.
1. Paper of papyrus
• In as early as 3000 B.C., the
Egyptians had developed a technique
for making paper from the pith of the
papyrus plant. The ancient Egyptians
used the stem of the papyrus plant to
make sails, cloth, mats, cords, and,
above all, paper. Paper made from
papyrus was the chief writing material
in ancient Egypt, was adopted by the
Greeks, and was used extensively in
the Roman Empire.
2. Hieroglyphics
• The Ancient Egyptians used
picture words to write called
hieroglyphics. It is a very
old form of writing that they
started using as early as
3000 B.C. Hieroglyphics
was a very complicated way
of writing involving 1000s of
symbols. Some of the
symbols represented
sounds, like our letters, and
other's represented entire
words.

14

3/15/2023
• The script was composed of three basic types of
signs: logograms, representing words;
phonograms, representing sounds; and
determinatives, placed at the end of the word to
help clarify its meaning. As a result, the number
of signs used by the Egyptians was much higher
compared to alphabetical systems, with over a
thousand different hieroglyphs in use initially
and later reduced to about 750 during the Middle
Kingdom (2055-1650 BCE). In the 1820s CE,
Frenchman Jean-François Champollion famously
deciphered hieroglyphs using the 2nd century
BCE Rosetta Stone with its triple text of
Hieroglyphic, Demotic and Greek. Egyptian
hieroglyphs are read either in columns from top
to bottom or in rows from the right or from the
left.
ROMAN
CIVILIZATION
CODEX/ BOUND
BOOKS
• Codex, the Earliest Form of a
Bound Book
• A codex was an early form of what
we now know as a book.
• The plural of "codex" is "codices."
• The term codex is derived from a
Latin term that means "block of
wood"
• Instead of being composed of sheets of paper it was generally
composed of sheets of vellum, papyrus, or other materials.

• A codex is distinguished as: Handwritten, sequential pages


bound together and enclosed between a case (that is, cover) to
form a single, portable unit of reading material.

• According to Nicole Howard, author of The Book: The Life Story


of a Technology, The Roman diptych was the precursor to the
codex and may have been the inspiration for the development
of its form.
Julius Caesar started the tradition of stacking up papyrus to form pages of a book.
• Later on, they were to provide covers to protect the papyrus.
• With the papyrus pages bound together and covered by animal skin, ancient Roman was able to
produce the first book or codex.
ROMAN
ARCHITECTURE
• Romans were famous for their advancement in architecture and
engineering. Before the Romans, the most commonly used
building style was the post and lintel. This way of building was of
course limited in the weight it could carry and therefore the span
between the supports.

• The Romans changed all this and advanced this by introducing


new methods of architecture; The Columns and The Arches. With
these methods the romans were able to construct bigger temples
and buildings than ever before.
Roman architects used three types of columns
throughout their long history: Doric, Ionic,
Corinthian.
• Doric Style: It's plain features where not as attractive as its
futures forms but it served a great purpose - to hold up
huge and heavy buildings.
• Ionic Style: this is more decorative base and top, was
the next type to be used. It still had the same
purpose as the Doric style but it further increased
the awe power of the building it was used with.
• Corinthian Style: was the King of all Columns. It's
fine details and size made the other two types look
like rather ordinary.
NEWSPAPER
A newspaper is a periodical publication containing
written information about current events and is often
typed in black ink with a white or gray background.
Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as
politics, business, sports and art, and often include
materials such as opinion columns, weather
forecasts, reviews of local services, obituaries, birth
notices, crosswords, editorial cartoons, comic strips,
and advice columns.
Silk
Definition
Silk is a thin, but strong fiber that
silkworms produce when they are
making their cocoons. It can be woven
into a very soft and smooth fabric.
Legend of silk

Discovered around 2700 BC


Chinese Empress Leizu (also known as Xi
Ling Shi) discovered silk by accident when a
silkworm cocoon dropped into her cup of tea. Hot
water softens the silk fiber that the silkworm
cocoon is made of, and thus the cocoon began to
lose its cohesiveness. When Leizu lifted the
cocoon from her teacup, the end of the silk
thread was loosened, and the cocoon began to
unravel. Leizu noticed that the cocoon was made
out of a single long strand of silk.
Leizu shared her discovery to her husband,
the Yellow Emperor Huangdi
Leizu persuaded her husband to gift her a grove of
Mulberry trees to farm silkworms in
She learned a lot by studying silkworms and Mulberry
trees around her and eventually started to teach her
attendants how to raise silkworms. Empress Leizu was
also said to have invented the silk reel, a device used to
spin the silk fibers from multiple cocoons together into
one thread, and the silk loom, a tool used to weave silk.
Sericulture
Sericulture is the process of farming silkworms
to create silk fabrics, which became a very
profitable industry in China
Leizu and her attendants were the first ones to
practice silkworm farming
Leizu’s alleged discovery lead her to be crowned
as Goddess of the Silkworm and Sericulture in Court Ladies making Silk by
Chinese mythology Huizong of Song

Leizu also known as Silkworm Mother


Great Wall of China
History
The Great Wall of China’s history began in the Spring and
Autumn Period (770–476 BC), was first completed in the
Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC), and was last rebuilt as a
defense in the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644). It protected
China’s north from invasion for all but two dynasties that
were invader-led: Yuan (1279–1368) and Qing (1644–
1912).

3.5 4.3
2.8
2
Highlights
The Great Wall of China is one of the
greatest sights in the world — the longest
wall in the world, an awe-inspiring feat of
ancient defensive architecture. Its
winding path over rugged country and
steep mountains takes in some great
scenery.

3.5 4.3
2.8
2
3.5 4.3
2.8
2
Gun Powder
History
The history of gunpowder began during the pursuit of
immortality in early Chinese history, an ironic twist on its
eventual application. An alchemist combined a mixture of
saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal, and when heat or flame was
introduced, its ignition sent shockwaves that reverberated
throughout centuries of military and civilian forces.
Highlights
Innovated gunpowder technology sufficiently to be
able to construct a variety of weapons by using
different formulas such as rockets, primitive guns,
small cannons, incendiary devices, chemical
weapons, bombs, grenades, landmines, and
smoke-making devices for camouflage. They also
made fireworks and blasting powder for mining
applications.

You might also like