So way back in the 4th millennium we find that all those scattered cities in modern Iraq have developed into very complex cities, with social hierarchies, walls, irrigation and a common language, the language is Sumer, and thus we call these people the Sumerians (who reside in Mesopotamia, which at the time was more a region than a nation). During this time life was hard, for anybody who wasn't in the upper parts of society, and the early religions of the time described death as a mind crushing nightmare, where you ate dirt for all eternity and knew no warmth or comfort. Now you may wonder why they would have such an unpleasant after life set up for themselves? Well it's because life was so completely awful, waking every morning so you could toil in the fields, on the walls, or pretty much any place the local king told you he needed toiling, that suicide seemed like a great way out. That's right, life sucked so bad that people had to be made to fear death so they wouldn't take the easy way out. Remember it's the ancient Sumerians who worshiped Gozer the Gozarian and Zuul.
Anyway, this period has proven difficult for historians to keep track of because of the multitude of city states, each with its own history and that this is when writing was first developed in the region, meaning no one was capable of writing gripping historical epics yet. However we can discuss the greatest Sumerian of the age, Gilgamesh!
NO GOD DAMMIT! GILGAMESH! THIS GUY!
Gilgamesh was a King of Uruk, a city of ancient Sumeria/Mesopotamia sometime around 2700 BC. He was described in his semi-biographical piece 'The Epic of Gilgamesh' as being two parts God, one part man. He was like some kind of shitty cake, because what kind of two part God would hang around in Mesopotamia? The Gilgamesh kind! Anyway, here's the story of Gilgamesh as told via the amusing Epic of Gilgamesh. Our hero is born and grows to manhood, where he builds a mighty wall for the city of Uruk, so no one can get in. In spite of this generous service the people complain to Gilgamesh that he sucks and that he has a nasty tendency to sleep with everyones wives...usually before the marriage ceremony is complete. This kind of cheeses off the Goddess of creation who creates a wild man named Enkidu to run amok and wreck up Uruk...because that will totally irk Gilgamesh?
Anyway, Gilgamesh sends Enkidu a hooker...
Who proceeds to spend a week with Enkidu, banging him into submission. Enkidu becomes civilized and no one learns a lesson about anything...especially Gilgamesh, who starts having strange dreams where he is told he'll be making an awesome friend soon.
After this we see Gilgamesh and Enkidu travel all over creation, killing things, weeping, offering horrible monsters their loved ones. In the end Gilgamesh suffers a bout of depression until he sees the outstanding wall he built at which time he air guitars his way back into Uruk and lives probably happily ever after...until he dies and goes to a realm of darkness where he eats dirt forever.
Then there was the Elam, the peoples who dwelt in the city of Susa(in modern Iran). They are terribly boring and suffered mightily later on under the hands of Ashurbanipal and later the Persians.
Of some more importance however was the kingdom of Akkadia, which was ruled over most importantly by King Sargon. Akkadia conquered Uruk and pretty every other bit of land in Iraq and it was during this time that Sargon (at that time the Royal Gardener) looked over his group of well trained and hard working gardener friends and decided to overthrow the king. So before you write off your local Hispanic landscapers as being not worthy of praise remember that there was a time when they could rise up and completely overthrow the government and found one of the great empires of antiquity.
Sargon ruled for 56 years, which is pretty damned impressive when your life expectancy is probably like a biscuit longer than a dogs. He conquered pretty much the whole of the Middle East and at the end of his long reign managed to defeat a massive insurrection that besieged his capital city of Akkad. However the Akkadian hegemony was short lived, within 100 years the empire collapsed and became the Neo-Summerians. This was short lived as soon the Amorites took over, amorites being basically a ethnic group who moved en masse all over the failing Kingdoms of Ur and eventually ended up just taking over. They effectively ended the long held tradition of city states (your kingdom ends at the city walls) in favor of regular old kingdoms (my kingdom stretches from this pile of dirt over to that cow skeleton). Amorites also appear in the bible, for those of you who care, in which they are used interchangeably with the term Canaanites. They were said to be descended from giants, however it is unlikely that these Amorites are the same group as the historical Amorites...amiright?
After the fall of the Amorites in the 17th century BC we see Hammurabi of the Babylonians gain a position of leadership over the central kingdoms of the old empires (primarily every city in between the Tigris and Euphrates). Hammurabi was a fairly nondescript ruler, who is more known for his strict code of laws, one of the first written sets in recorded history. The punishment for crimes was usually death or disfigurement. Steal a loaf of bread to feed your starving family? Lose your hands and feet. I am sorry to say however that when Rastafarian's refer to the world at large as being Babylon they are using some kind of super hyperbole.
After a short stint as lords and masters of the 'cradle of civilization' the Babylonians fell to the Kassites. The Kassites were a third rate power from the Zagros Mountains in
During this whole period we also see the rise and fall of many Assyrian dynasties. They were largely left alone by the other powers that came and went, probably because their name sounds incredibly dangerous. However by 911 BC(NEVER FORGET!)
The Assyrians, or rather the Neo-Assyrians would dominate the whole of the Middle East. Great plagues and droughts struck all across the old empires of this period allowing the Assyrian Kings to steam roll right over everyone and anyone in their way including the Kingdom of Israel. Poor Kingdom of Israel, they popped up around 1030 BC and were conquered in short order by 931, at which time 27,000 odd people were displaced. Assyria also managed to conquer Egypt in around 600 BC.
Assyria would see unprecedented growth in culture and art under King Ashurbanipal, but sadly this period was short lived as almost immediately after his death the whole of the the Middle East erupted into civil war. We see the Neo Assyrians swept away and the speakers of the Akkadian language (used by the leadership of the Assyrians) wiped out by 605 BC.
Lets leap back over to our old friend Egypt, who we left back in 1500 BC or so. during this whole period Egypt primarily did what it did best, invade its neighbors, allow its priests to get too much power and fall into complete disarray. One such period is when the Pharaoh Akhenaten takes the reigns of leadership, his exciting plan being to completely throw out the old religion and found a new one. He saw a growing threat from the Priests of Thebes, who were effectively directing public opinion at this point, so he declared that there was only one God, Aten, who ruled over all and that he was Atens messanger on Earth. This is one of the first monotheistic religions in history, but it only lasted for the duration of Akhenatens rule, after his death his wife Nefertiti tried to keep up the old ways but was not so successful as did Akhenatens son Tutenkhaman, who under pressure from the priests recounted and reinstated the old religion. After King Tut we see Ramses II eventually arise. Ramses the Grea,t as he is known, builds more temples, statues and great works than any other pharaoh. He also sires a metric shit ton of children and battles the feared Hittites (we'll get to them) into a peace treaty (the first in history). Ramses II is probably one of the most well known Egyptian pharaohs, for his great civic works, his constant canoodling with women and that he is often equated with the pharaoh under whom the 'exodus' takes place. Whether this is in fact under his reign is debatable as there is little evidence to support it especially since it will be still another three hundred odd years before the Kingdom of Israel is founded. you may also know Ramses from Percy Bysshe Shelley's "Ozymandias" in which a tablet is inscribed with the phrase,
My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
You probably know Ozymandias as the alter ego of boy loving, purple clad, Studio 54 frequenting multi billionaire playboy Adrian Veidt from Watchmen.
Now then, that should about wrap it up with Mesopotamia, Egypt and pretty much every place in the cradle of civilization. Up next we'll visit Ancient Asia, South America and all those other rubbish places no one talks about. after that we'll hit up Super Ancient Greece, where we will learn all about the Trojan War.
No comments:
Post a Comment