How Did Mesopotamians Study Astronomy

Commonly called “The Cradle of Civilization”, Mesopotamia was an ancient region located in the Eastern Mediterranean. Mesopotamia gets its name from its location, Mesopotamia literally translating to “between two rivers” in Greek; those two rivers being the Tigris and the Euphrates Rivers.

Did you know that the ancient Mesopotamian created cuneiform? Cuneiform was the first form of writing. It was created over 5000 years ago! Mesopotamians created Cuneiform to make trading deals. You might think in your head, why don’t they just remember it? Well, that is because if they traded a year from now the people could lie and get more of their

To start, the Sumerians invented cuneiform, which began the path to written language in the future. Cuneiform was the first written language. It was invented over 5000 years ago! (Doc. 1). They used a stylus to make imprints for writing. Written on the clay tablets it was used to keep records, document business

The historical land of Mesopotamia significantly contributed to early civilization in relation to its close proximity to the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and rich fertile land it provided. The rivers offered the people of Mesopotamia fertile soil, irrigation water for crops and fishing, and also supplied an abundance of wild barley and wheat for food or could stored as a food supply.

The Mayan empire was a very complex civilization. The Mayan empire who was a civilization that was located in Mexico and parts of South America. Their civilization lasted nearly 3,000 years before their empire collapsed. Astronomy to the mayans was very important because in their society they believed that the stars where messages from the gods. Since the mayans were polytheistic they believed that each star was a deity or god. They believed in many gods and where religious, they had a god for everything. The mayans like the aztecs thought the sun was a god. There obsession with the stars lead to many discoveries.

The communication technology of writing is thought to have emerged in Sumer, southern Mesopotamia, from 3500 -3000 BCE. This form of writing was Cuneiform, which consists of making specific marks in clay with a reed tool. Cuneiform was invented due to the long distance communication needed for trade. Meanwhile, the writing system of the Egyptians, or Hieroglyphics, was in use before 3150 BCE. Although disputed, hieroglyphics are thought to be based on cuneiform. Therefore, cuneiform is the first written language that we know.

Cuneiform is a development of the early civilizations that has had, and continues to have, the greatest impact. The ancient civilizations of Mesopotamia had very defective ways of tracking events. Everyone, varying from farmers attempting to keep crop dates, to priests tracking ziggurat activity, struggled to remember important information. “The business activities of the ziggurat required the keeping of accurate records.” (Howe, H. & Howe, R., 1992). With no way to record important information, it was chaos. The Mesopotamians needed a way to fix this problem, a way to record information. An additional problem was communication; the Mesopotamians did not have a solid way of communicating ideas or stories. All stories needed to be passed down by word of mouth, this form of storytelling made it

Mesopotamia means “between the rivers” and is found by the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. Around 3300 B.C , the oldest civilization formed in Mesopotamia, in a land called Sumer. Mesopotamia was part of the fertile crescent. The fertile crescent is a fertile arc of land from the eastern coast of the Mediterranean sea, through Mesopotamia,to the Persian gulf.

In spite of what painters, archeologists, or researchers of the nineteenth century believed about the ancient world, cuneiform has since proven its historical mettle. As displayed by Darius and his memorial at Bisitun, the early, crude cuneiform of 5000 B.C.E. adapted itself to culture after culture, and morphed into the dusty forerunner of our modern alphabet.

Astrology began in Mesopotamia around 3000 B.C. when civilizations began to observe the constellations and planets in the sky. The Babylonians then realized that the position of celestial bodies allowed them to predict the seasons and other events that happened cyclically

An important technological advancement in the history of mankind was the invention of writing language. Known as cuneiform at the time, its origination hailed from a place in southern Mesopotamia called Sumer in 3500-3000 BCE. The process during its invention involved making markings in wet clay with a reed-like instrument. The reason for its invention was for the flourishment of commerce. The Sumerians needed a way to communicate with merchants and customers from between large expanses of land and sea. They used pictographs in order to scale the quantity of resources required in the trade and represent different objects. To communicate ideas more complex than financial transactions or lists and quantities, a more elaborate writing system was

Mesopotamia was one of the first known civilizations. The Mesopotamians were expert architects. ¨There was not many trees in the desert. So the Sumerians had to use what was available to make buildings.They were first to make mud bricks. They used these bricks to make temples for their gods. These special temples were called Ziggurats.¨ They made humongous Ziggurats out of mud bricks.There were temples on the top to worship their many gods. ¨The Babylonians built Ziggurats high into the sky to make it easy for their gods to visit. The Babylonians were able to build really tall ziggurats making it very easy for their gods to visit.¨ They wanted the ziggurats to reach heaven.¨ They were the first to make mud bricks¨. The mesopotamians had the

The ancient Mesopotamia stories were seen to be closely related with the old testament which is Biblical. The similarities and differences accounted were historical, cultural, social and religion. however, the creation story which is religion narrates the human creation and flood account. The Mesopotamian religion had a polytheistic belief, which means people believed in multiple gods instead of just one God examples are (Anu-Sky god, Enki- God of fresh water, Inanna- God of love, Nanna-God of the moon and the son of Enlil and Ninlil and many other) and these gods competed each other, each city had its own god, at the center of the city a large temple or ziggurat was built to that god, their priest lived and made sacrifices. they believed that

Written language, first was an extraordinary achievement. It could help the Sumerians record and pass on ideas to others in their time or in the future. Cuneiform, at the time was made of shapes that were described. Cuneiform was made by slash marks in

Ancient civilizations used astronomy to count the passage of time. First just days, then they made a whole calendar based on the sky. Not only did they keep track of days, months, and years, they kept track of seasons by watching and observing the sky. They also named several of the planets after their gods and goddesses because the believed that space had a connection with (or were ruled by) the gods and goddesses of their beliefs. The Sun, Moon, and stars were what many civilizations (such as the Egyptians) used to determine when to plant and harvest crops.