Empires of the Fertile Crescent

1. Empires of the Fertile Crescent CH 2 Section 4

2. Chapter review • Why did geographic isolation benefit the Egyptians? • Name the outside invaders that came in and took over Egypt for a while • What Direction does the Nile river flow? • Were the Nile floods predictable? • What was used to create Cuneiform writing?

3. The Akkadians • In 2330 BC the Akkadians attacked and conquered the Sumerians • The Akkadians spoke a Semitic language relates to modern Hebrew and Arabic • The most powerful Akkadian King was Sargon who ruled from 2334 BC to 2279 BC • His Empire stretched From the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean sea, covering the Fertile crescent • The Empire lasted 150 Years and when it ended the Sumerians were able to reestablish the city of Ur until the Babylonians came in and took over

5. The Babylonians • Around 1792 BC a strong ruler moved in named Hammurabi • He conquered most of the Fertile crescent and was a great political leader and lawmaker • He was best known for the {Code of Hammurabi which was a collection of 282 laws} • This Code dealt with all aspects of life from laws and punishments to commerce and industry • It set a minimum wage and working conditions • The punishment it put out was base on “an eye for an eye” but if you were wealthy you paid a fine

7. Babylonian Culture • In some ways Babylonian culture resembled that of the Sumerians • They farmed and kept domesticated animals; they wove cotton and wool cloth • They used the things they made and grew in excess to trade with others in the fertile crescent • The Babylonian women did have some rights, including property rights • They had the right to be merchants, traders, and even scribes • If their husbands were cruel to them they could leave them and take her property with her

8. Religion • The Babylonians made sacrifices to their gods in order to get good harvests or success in business • They believed that the afterlife was a shadowy so they needed a good life on earth • They gave the priests the higher positions because they believed that they could tell the future

10. The Hittites • The Hittites were a war like people that invaded from the Asia Minor region in the 1600’s BC • One of their important achievements was that they were able to smelt iron (to melt ore in order to get metal from it, or produce metal in this way. The separation of the metal) for tools and weapons • Their most important contribution was their law code and government • {Their law code had a death penalty for breaking major laws, and fines for minor law infractions} • They conquered and looted the city of Babylon, but it was too far from their home to control it and withdrew and remained powerful in the West

13. The Assyrians • They were a Semitic speaking people from Northern Mesopotamia • They had been dominated by others in their region but did establish an empire in 1300 BC • They were able to expand their empire between 900 and 650 BC all the way into Egypt • They were fierce effective warriors they used chariots and cavalry (solders on horseback) • They were able to control the people they defeated through terror and deporting them • People in unfamiliar surroundings rarely fight their captors

14. A mythological beast called a Lammasu, from the gates of Nineveh.

15. The Assyrians Continued • The Assyrians were able to attack, loot, and destroy Babylon • Through the use of moving people out of their homeland they were able to effectively manage a large empire • The King had absolute power and answered only to the god Ashur, The priests and Govt officials answered to the king • Governors that would rule the conquered land and report back to the king • Nineveh was their capitol city an it had a wall that was 70ft high and 7.5 miles around the city

16. Assyrian culture • Nineveh contained a library that contained literature from all over the empire • This contained the {Epic Of Gilgamesh which was Sumerian and one of the oldest texts on record} • In 635 BC Civil war broke out in the Assyrian empire weakening it to outside attack • In 612B BC the Chaldeans and the Medes captured and destroyed the great city of Nineveh

17. A drawing of the Assyrian capitol of Nineveh.

18. The Chaldeans • Under the leadership of Nebuchadnezzar the Chaldeans were able to take much of the land the Assyrians had once conquered • Nebuchadnezzar rebuilt the city of Babylon and ran his kingdom from there • He built the city with canals and large buildings and also created the hanging gardens of Babylon for one of his wives • The Chaldeans were skilled in astronomy and recorded the movements of the stars and other heavenly bodies and were able to predict solar and lunar eclipses

19. Chaldeans Continued • They were also able to advance in mathematics, they were able to calculate the length of a year • Unfortunately the strength of the empire laid in the hands of Nebuchadnezzar and within 30 years of his death the empire fell

20. The Persians • These are the people from the movie 300 • They Conquered Babylon in 539 BC and ruled the area with a group called the Medes • But the Persian leader Cyrus the Great rebelled against the Medes and took over • Cyrus, Darius I and his son Xerxes expanded Persian rule even more stretching from the Indus river to Northern Africa and parts of Europe • They tried to conquer Greece but Darius I and Xerxes were unsuccessful • This was the mightiest Empire up to this time

22. Persian Government • The Persian kings were effective rulers along with being great generals • They controlled taxes and administered the law fairly • {They allowed the defeated people to keep their religion and laws} but had spies that were “the king’s eyes and ears” • They built roads to connect the cities in their empire • The royal road stretched more than 1,250 miles • The roads were built for the army and postal riders to move them quickly and effectively

24. Persians Religion • The religion at first was much like the others around them; polytheistic • {About 600 BC the prophet Zoroaster taught that people were on the earth to train for a future life • There were forces of good and evil in the world} and they would battle one another and people must chose between them • The people who chose good would receive eternal blessings and the evil would face punishment • Zoroastrianism was the first religion to teach the struggle between good and evil and the idea of final judgment, this was a major influence and precursor to Christianity

25. Persian decline • The Persian leaders that followed Darius and Xerxes lacked leadership ability • The Persian army suffered their final defeat at the hands of Alexander the Great • Centuries later the Persians revived their dynasty under Ardashir who tried to rid the empire of outside influence including those left by the Greeks • He also revived the religion of Zoroastrianism but it did not last long

26. Section Questions • The Hittites law code contained what for minor offences? • Who was the Prophet that taught there was a choice between good and evil? • Why was Persian rule effective? • Who was Gilgamesh? • Was he a king that conquered Babylonia?