The Mesopotamia And The Nile River Valley

Ancient civilizations across history have shown unique and incredible feats of mankind. Arguably, two of the most prominent ancient civilizations in the Middle East and even the world are the Mesopotamians (Beginning 5,000 B.C.) and Egyptians (Beginning 3,150 B.C). Even though these two civilizations peaked about 2,000 years apart, they share numerous similarities contributing to their success, and also show even more differences that distinguish how each had a unique culture and way of life.

The Nile shaped Egypt by influencing its geography, popular distribution, and settlements. The majority of settlements in Ancient Egypt were located around the Nile River Delta (Doc. A), where land was fertile, trade was good, and there were many natural resources. Because of geography in this civilization, Egyptians could easily protect and defend themselves, as well as settle down and have good lives.

The earliest forms of civilizations were said to be located on the three river valleys of the Tigris-Euphrates River in ancient Mesopotamia, the Nile River in ancient Egypt and the Huang He and Indus River in ancient India and China. These three river valley civilizations had many differences yet still lived common life styles. Although the civilizations are located on different continents, they share similar social, political, and economic beliefs from their intellectual developments to types of government to religious beliefs and trading systems.

The first topic of comparison is the prospect of culture and environment in each society. Due to cultural diffusion amongst the civilizations, except geographically isolated China, among other factors, it can be deduced that the civilizations had many similar practices. However, each society boasted distinctive qualities. Early Mesopotamia, known by the moniker of “the land between the rivers,” was a fertile plain settled near the Tigris and Euphrates rivers located in the Fertile Crescent. All of the river valley civilizations settled near a river. Egypt settled near the Nile; the Indus Valley

The Nile River was the life force of ancient Egypt. People from all over the region immigrated to the area for its irrigation waters and rich silt deposits. The geography of the region played a huge role in the way the inhabitants and civilization in general was formed. The main core of Egypt covered 386, 560 square miles, of which only 11, 720 were cultivable (Tignor et al., Worlds Together, 62). The Nile differed itself specifically from the Tigris and Euphrates in that its waters did not irrigate or fertilize nearly as well but it did create green belts along the water. This created a society that flourished along the river. The Nile unlike Mesopotamia did not have a bountiful borderland but did have a desert rich in materials. The Niles predictability as the source of life and abundance shaped the character of the people and their culture. (Tignor et al., Worlds Together, 63). The Nile was peaceful and calm unlike the vicious Tigris And Euphrates Rivers. Egypt with its natural borders, which included the Mediterranean Sea, Deserts, and Large Waterfalls, was very isolated. This helped to achieve

The civilizations of the Nile River valley, the Mesopotamia valley, and Indus Valley marked human progress toward fixed settlements and the development of a rich culture. These civilizations shared many characteristics that contributed to their success. What made these civilizations unique were the contributions that each one gave to the world. They contributed their own ideas and accomplishments in the areas of religion, science, and mathematics. These contributions defined each civilization and how they would be remembered, as well as, their importance to the world.

Ancient Mesopotamia, sometimes referred to as the “Cradle of Civilization”, was located in the Fertile Crescent between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, bringing the Greek origin of its name, of “land between rivers”. There were two very different regions in ancient Mesopotamia:

The Nile shaped Egypt because it provided protection against foreign invaders. Egyptians would settle near Seas from the Nile like the Mediterranean Sea and Red Sea. In addition, to the bodies of water they also had the Eastern and Western Deserts that also protected them from invaders. (Document A) Since Egypt has a various amount of geographic features throughout Egypt it caused Egypt to be less vulnerable to attacks because they had several options to escape from. Egyptians had different sections around Egypt that served as borders against people who tried to invade the land. If invaders came by land they would easily be able to escape by water. Without the Nile

The earliest societies, such as Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt exhibiting indicator traits of civilization developed along the floodplains of great rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates in Iraq, and the Nile in Egypt. People had settled in Mesopotamia by 7000 B.C. and the First Dynasty of Egyptian

Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt are both cradles of civilization. Both contributed greatly to human development through their achievements, failures, peoples, scientific accomplishments, philosophies, religions, and contributions.

The civilization of Ancient Egypt was one of the earliest in history one of the things that most help the Ancient egyptians was the Nile river.The Nile river is located in egypt and was a huge benefit to the Ancient Egyptians (Transportation,Water,Food),. Today i am going to explain why that is.

The book Gifts of the Nile Valley tells the history of, not only one of Africa's greatest and most important natural monuments, The Nile River, but also uses that history to link the earliest traces of mankind to Africa. The begging of the book explains the importance of the Nile River both for mankind and for the environment around it. The beginning chapters also explain how the Nile River actually works, which I personally found very interesting. According to the book the Nile River is the longest River in the world , stretching as long as 4,132 miles. It also functions much differently than normal rivers. Unlike other rivers, The Nile River flows south to north. Also, while normal rivers need to be fed rain and connected to other bodies of water, The Nile River runs through mostly desert and does not get any rain. The Nile is also not connected to any other body of water. As bizarre as that is, its not the most impressive thing that this legendary river can do. Throughout its entire length, The Nile river has somehow managed to fertilize the soil around it for up to ten miles. It's believed that through this river, Civilizations from thousands of years ago managed to sustain themselves.

Since the food was plentiful, the population expanded. Soon, advanced cities developed for large area trade. As social standing

For many years it was believed that the Nile River Valley and Tigris and Euphrates River Valley were the only early civilizations. Then in the 1920’s archaeologists uncovered a secret hidden just beneath earth’s surface; another civilization had existed, a civilization that was home to an estimated population of 50,000 to 200,000 people. This civilization was not only tremendous in number and size of its cities, but in intelligence and ability as well. The Harappan people had built their homes, buildings, and roads from bricks. These homes were more extravagant than one would guess for this time with many of the homes being multi-level. Their architecture was built on platforms to combat flooding in the area. In another impressive feat the

The Egyptians became good farmers, and developed an irrigation system. Papyrus grew along the Nile’s banks. Hieroglyphics Hieroglyphics were Egyptian writing. They were sets of pictures.