In History Begins at Sumer, Kramer informs us about how Sumerians lived during 2000 B.C. He discusses different topics such as education, justice, medicine, and many more. The book mainly focuses on Sumer but as you read you start to notice that our world and Sumerian world are similar. It’s an eye opener to how everything we do came about and where it all started. The part we don’t actually know is how Sumerians came up with their way of living. Many may assume that their ancient world is so different but after reading History Begins at Sumer they would later realize the similarities outweighs the differences. Kramer wrote that Sumerians and modern humans are fundamentally analogous, comparable, and reciprocally illuminating (Kramer, 259). Which he’s basically saying that our worlds are obviously different but at the same time extremely similar. His book persuades you to have the same thought process. Kramer wrote about the education system in the ancient Sumerian world which happens to sound a little like modern world’s education system. The school has one main focus and that was to teach scribes to write in Sumerian language (Kramer, 6). Student had to remember then recite what they’ve learned in a tablet which later became textbooks. They spent most of their day in school and like modern humans spent multiple years in school. We are in school from the age 6 to whenever we decide to be done. Sumerians according to History Begins at Sumer stayed in school from an early
In the southernmost region of ancient Mesopotamia laid the land of Sumer. Many believe that it is the cradle of civilization. The name Sumer comes from the language of Northern Mesopotamia known as Akkadian. It translates as “ the land of civilized kings”. The Sumerians referred to themselves as “the black headed people” and the thier home was simply “the land”. The biblical Book of Genius makes mention of this area calling it Shinar. We know the land today to be southern Iraq.
Generally within textbooks on Western civilization it tells us about how the Sumerians began organized agriculture, domesticated wheat and such animals as the horse and donkey, initiated urban living by building cities, and invented writing and the wheel. The Sumerians, apparently, initiated human civilization 6000 years ago. Nevertheless, European (white) written textbooks do not recognize them like they
The two rivers had a delta which was called the Fertile Crescent. This was because of its crescent-like shape and because of how fertile it was due to the two rivers depositing rich silk into it, giving it the ability to support agriculture. The two rivers were incredibly important to the ancient Sumerians because it supplied them with water for their irrigation systems. They were able to also dump their sewage as well. The water gave them mud to use as clay for building. The river led them to the concept of regional government, which was used to manage their irrigation systems, consequently resulting in them creating a city-state. Unlike the Chinese and Harappan people, the Sumerians left behind records that we today are able to decipher. Their writing system was called ‘cuneiform’, which they wrote on clay tablets. This tell us that the Sumerians were civilized and organized. Unlike the Chinese, they utilized their time to learn how to read and write instead of fighting
When analyzing the biological, cultural, and social, aspects of the ancient Sumerians and modern day humans we see a profuse amount of distinctions and contrasts. Modern humans live in advanced and culturally diverse societies which in comparison makes ancient Sumer’s way of life seem very plain. The two groups evidently share many differences , but the author, Samuel Kramer, argues that in the face of oblivious contrasts, the roots of these two societies are still very fundamentally analogous. Kramer then expands his point to say modern humans and ancient Sumerians are similar and comparable on the content of their character, their reactions to war and conflict, and with the similarity of their social class system.
The Sumerians created a civilization located in the Fertile Crescent, or Mesopotamia, which is located in the Middle East. The legendary ruler of the Sumerians, Hammurabi, was famous for his set
The Sumerians received a different kind of treatment from their gods while they were alive. The Sumerians were very
Sumer was the first civilization in a region called Mesopotamia. Mesopotamia means “between the rivers” because it had two major rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates River Valley. Its advanced cities were Uruk, Umma and Ur and they densely populated with about 50,000 people. Its form of record keeping was cuneiform where a scribe would write down records of business transactions, barters, historical events customs and traditions in soft clay with a stylus. Advanced technology included irrigation, a system that brought water to crops, metalworking and the invention of the wheel plow and sail boat as well as the creation on bronze weapons and armor. Their workers included farmers, artisans and scribes and their complex intuitions included a formal
Sumerian written history can be dated back to 5300-4100 BC, however the historical remains seems to remain obscure up until the Early Dynastic Period III. After the Sumerian Civilization was established, grew, and expanded greatly, various
Ancient Sumer is considered one of the oldest, if not the first civilization known to man. Thought to be over 7000 years old by some historians, the ancient civilization of Sumer is truly one of a kind. Being such an old group of people, was Sumer able to advance its own culture and society in such an ancient time? Has Sumer affected modern society as we know it today? To begin, the inventions of ancient Sumer truly had an effect on both their society and us today.
The Sumerians remain in history as one of the first ever recorded people to have a stable society and culture. From their creation story to the end of their lives on earth, the Sumerians followed their religion in accordance to their gods. They lived their whole lives through their religion, making it a huge part of their culture.
Sumerians were one of the first civilizations that existed and had an established developed government. The Sumerian’s lived in Mesopotamia which was located right between Tigris river and Euphrates river and the land in the middle was a great place for people to settle in because it was fertile. The people who lived here were no longer hunters and gatherers and there were more that people could do. Farmers contributed their crops to others and so people had the chance to acquire other skills. With plenty of food and great innovation, the population of the Samarians grew they populated other areas which became city-states.
Throughout history, societies have been divided. Divisions have been created through war, by money, and because of power struggles. Ancient Sumer was no different. There were three main classes in Ancient Sumer that contributed to this division in society.
Samuel Kramer’s argument that the ancient civilization of Sumer and the modern-day world are “fundamentally analogous” (p. 250) is supported heavily throughout his literary work History Begins at Sumer, and has evidenced this from the social perspective, as well as from an institutional one.
Describe the ancient Sumerian and Egyptian civilizations in terms of political structure, religion, society, and culture. Account for the similarities and differences between them.
Sumerian progress took frame in the Uruk period (fourth thousand years BC), proceeding into the Jemdet Nasr and Early Dynastic periods. Amid the third thousand years BC, a nearby social beneficial interaction created between the Sumerians, who talked a dialect segregate, and Akkadian-speakers, which included far reaching bilingualism. Sumerian culture appears to have showed up as a full-fledged progress, with no pre-history.