CHAPTER 1

The Beginnings of Civilization:, 10,000 - 2000 B.C.E.

Culture- the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded
collectively.

Civilization- the stage of human social development and organization that is considered
most advanced.

Homo sapiens sapiens- is the binomial nomenclature for the only extant human
species.

Domestication- is the process of adapting wild plants and animals for human use
Food production- is the process of transforming raw ingredients into prepared food
products.

Fertile crescent- the region in the Middle East which curves, like a quarter-moon
shape, from the Persian Gulf, through modern-day southern Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan,
Israel and northern Egypt.

Levantine Corridor- is the relatively narrow strip between the Mediterranean Sea to
the northwest and deserts to the southeast which connects Africa to Eurasia.

This corridor is a land route of migrations of animals between Eurasia and Africa.
Abu Hureya- is an archaeological site located in the Euphrates valley in modern Syria.
The remains of the villages within the tell come from over 4,000 years of pre-ceramic
habitation. Abu Hureyra started out as hunter-gatherers but gradually moved to farming,

making them the earliest known farmers in the world.

Jericho- A town in Palestine, in the West Bank north of the Dead Sea. According to the
Bible, was a Canaanite city destroyed by the Israelites after they crossed the Jordan into the

Promised Land.
Anatolia- the Asian part of Turkey, occupying the peninsula between the Black Sea, the

Mediterranean, and the Aegean.

Cuneiform- denoting or relating to the wedge-shaped characters used in the ancient
writing systems of Mesopotamia, Persia, and Ugarit, surviving mainly impressed on clay
tablets.

Polytheistic- the belief in or worship of more than one god.

Otzi the Ice Man- A mummified body of a prehistoric humancirca 5,300 years old
from the Stone Age, who was discovered frozen in ice in the tztal Alps at the Austrian-

Italian border, and is providing information on the early settlers in Europe.

Hunter-Gatherer Societies- is a human living in a society in which most or all
food is obtained by foraging (collecting wild plants and pursuing wild animals), in contrast to
agricultural societies, which rely mainly on domesticated species.

CHAPTER 1
The Beginnings of Civilization:, 10,000 - 2000 B.C.E.

Catal Hyk- was a very large Neolithic and Chalcolithic proto-city settlement in southern
Anatolia, which existed from approximately 7500 BC to 5700 BC, and flourished around 7000 BC. It is

the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date

Uruk- was an ancient city of Sumer and later Babylonia, situated east of the present bed of the
Euphrates river, on the dried-up, ancient channel of the Euphrates

Gilgamesh- A legendary king of the Sumerian city state of Uruk who is supposed to
have ruled sometime during the first half of the 3rd millennium bc. He is the hero of the
Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh, which recounts his exploits in an ultimately unsuccessful
quest for immortality.

Sargon of Akkad- was the ruler of Akkad in Mesopotamia from 2340 to 2305 B.C.,
and is credited with creating the world's first known empire. The Akkadians expanded their
territory into locales along the Euphrates River and northern parts of the Middle East,

including Syria and Turkey

Empire- an extensive group of states or countries under a single supreme authority,
formerly especially an emperor or empress.

Ur- took over the Sumerians and the Akkadian kings empire. Kings of Ur

centralized the gov and the economy.

King Hammurabi- Hammurabi expanded the city-state of Babylon along
the Euphrates River to unite all of southern Mesopotamia. He extended
Babylon's control throughout Mesopotamia through military campaigns.
Hammurabi is known for the Code of Hammurabi, one of the earliest

surviving codes of law in recorded history.

Hieroglyphs- a character of the ancient Egyptian writing system.
Osiris- A god originally connected with fertility and the afterlife, husband of Isis and father
of Horus.

Neolithic- of, relating to, or denoting the later part of the Stone Age, when ground or
polished stone weapons and implements prevailed

Linear Pottery cultures- This culture extended from modern day

Holland to Russia, developed rudimentary political authority, and built

communal stone tombs called megaliths.

Battle Axe cultures- Between 3500 B.C.E. and 2000 B.C.E., these
cultures gradually supplanted the Linear Pottery cultures and probably

introduced the ancestor of most modern European languages.

Megalith- is a large stone that has been used to construct a structure or monument, either
alone or together with other stones.

CHAPTER 1
The Beginnings of Civilization:, 10,000 - 2000 B.C.E.

Stonehenge- Stonehenge is perhaps the worlds most famous

prehistoric monument. It was built in several stages: the first

monument was an early henge monument, built about 5,000
years ago, and the unique stone circle was erected in the late
Neolithic period about 2500 BC. In the early Bronze Age many
burial mounds were built nearby.