Historians will probably never come to a common opinion about what the most ancient civilization in the world was. Official sources are repeatedly disputed by various legends of ancient peoples. The legends of ancient India and the Middle East say that the most ancient civilizations on Earth emerged long before the appearance of the most ancient peoples of Mesopotamia. And the most ancient peoples already known to us simply used the knowledge of their distant ancestors.

About what is the most ancient civilization on Earth, there have been disputes for more than one century, and history cannot yet give an exact answer to this question. The Hyperboreans, Atlanteans and the peoples of South Asia, who are known only from vague legends and traditions, were named as the most ancient civilizations.

Atlanta

If a list were compiled that included the most ancient civilizations in the world, it would certainly include Atlantis. This strange civilization existed, according to various sources, from 7 to 14 thousand years ago. Atlantis was first mentioned by Plato in his Dialogues. This ancient explorer learned about the existence of Atlantis from the elder Solon, who, in turn, relied on the knowledge of the Egyptian sages.

According to Plato, the Atlanteans lived on an island located in the Atlantic Ocean. This most ancient civilization possessed tremendous knowledge, possessed magnificent weapons. The Atlanteans themselves were distinguished by their great growth and longevity. But overnight, the Atlantean state sank into the sea, and not a trace remained of this ancient civilization.

Hyperborea

A legendary country located in the far North. Very little is known about its origin - it is practically not mentioned in ancient Greek sources. But the Greeks knew that in a distant country the sun shines for six months, and for six months it is night. There are no bad winds in this country, but there are numerous meadows and groves. The Hyperboreans are glorious seafarers and excellent merchants. The Hyperborean civilization collapsed during the last Ice Age, when the entire territory of the forgotten country was covered with ice and covered with snow. The Hyperboreans gradually retreated south and mixed with other peoples.

Until reliable scientific evidence of the existence of these peoples is obtained, the answer to the question of which civilization is the most ancient will be considered open. But both official and unofficial sources agree that most of the information to this day has come down to the Sumerian civilization.

Sumerian civilization

Reliable historical sources tell us that the most ancient civilization on Earth arose between the Tigris and the Euphrates just over 5 thousand years ago in the territory that modern historians have called Mesopotamia. The Sumerians attributed their origin to the mysterious heavenly people - the Anunnaki, who descended to Earth in time immemorial. Perhaps these legends had some basis, otherwise it is difficult to explain why the people who emerged from oblivion suddenly began to rise sharply among the semi-savage primitive tribes. What was unique about the Sumerians and how did they manage to achieve such an amazing breakthrough?

Social component

It's amazing how quickly the Sumerians build cities and fortresses of stone on the untouched lands of Mesopotamia. Moreover, the quality of the erected temples and buildings was so great that some fragments of the buildings that this most ancient civilization erected have survived to this day.

In a short time, the Sumerians built an excellent administrative system, dividing the state into cities and provinces, created an administrative apparatus and developed an established system of taxes and fees. Only many centuries later, the Egyptians recreated (or maybe adopted from the Sumerians) the irrigation system for fertile fields and meadows. The Sumerians had an army, an internal police force, and courts - in general, all the attributes of a normal state system. How they managed to do this is still a mystery.

Sumerian religion

The Sumerians worshiped not just one god, but a whole pantheon. All divine essences were divided into creative and non-creative. The creative gods were responsible for the birth and death of people, animals, light and darkness. Uncreative gods were in charge of order and justice. Interestingly, there was room for goddesses in the pantheon as well. Thus, the significant role of women in the Sumerian culture was indirectly determined.

Scientific knowledge

Disputes about which civilization is the most ancient on the planet do not make sense if you do not include in the discussion the assessment of the level of scientific knowledge of this or that ancient people. Judging by scientific knowledge, the Sumerians were far ahead of all the peoples existing at that time. They possessed considerable knowledge in the field of mathematics: they used the sixagesimal system of calculus, knew about the number "zero", the Fibonacci sequence. Representatives of this ancient civilization knew how to calculate time from the stars and possessed considerable scientific knowledge in the field of natural sciences.

Astronomy and origins

The Sumerians knew about the structure of the solar system, and in its center they put the sun, not the earth. The Berlin Museum keeps a stone slab on which the Sumerians depicted the Sun surrounded by the planets and objects of our system. These objects were invisible to the naked eye and were rediscovered by Europeans only a few thousand years later. It is interesting that this most ancient civilization knew about the wandering planet Nibiru. The Sumerians placed it between Mars and Jupiter and attributed it to a very elongated ellipsoidal orbit. It was the inhabitants of Nibiru, the mysterious Anunnaki, that the Sumerians considered their ancestors. According to the ancient legends of the Sumerians, all the knowledge they possessed was received by them from heaven.

The fall of the Sumerian civilization, rather, is associated with the assimilation of the "children of heaven" with various neighboring tribes. Based on historical facts, it can be assumed that the Sumerians mixed with other peoples and laid the foundation for successful and aggressive new states - Elam, Babylon, Lydia. Scientific knowledge and cultural heritage were preserved only to a small extent - most of the achievements of the Sumerians were lost in the fire of wars and forgotten forever.

On this, the list, which includes the most ancient civilizations on Earth, can be considered closed. The civilizations of Ancient India and China appeared already during the heyday of Assyria, Elam and Babylon, which arose on the ruins of Sumerian culture. And the first Egyptian kingdoms arose even later. The most ancient civilizations on Earth left many scientific discoveries and developments that their contemporaries were unable or unwilling to take advantage of.

The most ancient civilization known to us originated in the Middle East. The history of some cities, such as Damascus and Hierochon, is at least 5 thousand years old.

What were the ancient cities like?

In terms of their size, the first cities cannot be compared with today's cities. The city of Chatal Huyuk, which is located in present-day Turkey, was built about 9 thousand years ago, and only 5 thousand people lived in it.

The houses were built of mud bricks and were so tightly adjacent to each other that there were no streets. People entered and exited their homes, from the hole in the rooftops using ladders.

Video: Secrets of Ancient Empires - The First Civilizations

Video description: The evolution of man, who has gone from a hunter-gatherer, a cave dweller, to a modern farmer or city dweller, contains many mysteries and mysteries; uncovering which are incredibly difficult. Our concepts and ideas about the past are changing, as historians, anthropologists, biologists and archaeologists shake off the dust layer of the past centuries and reveal the secrets of bygone civilizations.

It is necessary to have the flexibility of thinking, the ability to change ideas and beliefs about our past in accordance with new findings, facts and artifacts. History is used to promote the dictatorship. Also, purely political interests can be traced. The history of the past has enormous potential for political impact.

Many countries are armed with archaeological discoveries to support the ruling elite in their claims to certain territories. Almost always, this is accompanied by violence and the death of innocent people. The history of Civilization is a story about all of Humanity. It is a never-ending book that we, the authors, continually make changes to. The distant past influences our views, beliefs, art and science. It is possible that this is the reason for the constant striving of man to reveal the mysteries and secrets of ancient civilizations.

What did the Sumerians invent?

The Sumerians knew how to weave material, make property out of metal, and make utensils on a potter's wheel. But they made the greatest progress in writing, mathematics and astronomy. The disclosures in these areas allowed them to keep track of taxes and conclude contracts, write laws and draw up a calendar.

Video: SHUMER - THE LAND OF GUARDS

Where was Mesopotamia?

Mesopotamia means interfluve. Now the modern state of Iraq is located on this territory.
The rivers are called Tigris and Euphrates, and the first inhabitants of these places were the Sumerians. Already at the beginning of the third millennium BC, there were powerful cities such as Ur and Uruk; they traded and fought with each other.

In ancient cities, up to 50 thousand inhabitants could live in each, and they were often built around temples made of clay bricks, which were called zigguratomi.

Video: City States of Mesopotamia

Which states of the Ancient East were the most powerful?

The first great conqueror we know of was Sargon of Akkad. In the period from the XVIII to the XII century. BC. there was a Hittite empire in Anatolia (modern Turkey). The Assyrians who lived in the city-state of Ashur were also a warlike people. In 800-650 years. BC. they created a huge empire stretching from the Persian Gulf to Egypt.

Video: Ancient city of Ashur (Kalat-Shergat) (UNESCO / NHK)

Video description: The ancient city of Ashur is located on the Tigris River in northern Mesopotamia in a transitional natural zone, on the border between humid and arid regions. The city dates back to the 3rd millennium BC. In the XIV-IX centuries. BC. it was the first capital of the Assyrian Empire, a city-state and a center of trade of international importance. It also served as the religious capital of the Assyrians, being closely associated with the cult of the god Ashur. The city was destroyed ...

Where did the first civilization originate in the Mediterranean?

Around 2200 BC the Minoans began to build palaces on the island of Crete. The Palace of Knossos could accommodate up to 80 thousand people. Around 1400 BC The Minoans were conquered by the Mycenaeans who came from Greece.

More interesting facts: According to Babylonian law, a son who struck his father had his hand cut off.

Interesting video: The origin of civilization

Video description: For a long time, our planet was lifeless, and about 3.5 billion years ago, a meteorite fell on its surface, bringing the first living organisms to the Earth. However, scientists recently made a sensational discovery that life on Earth did not arise by chance, it is a well-thought-out plan. Scientists managed to scientifically prove the existence of a higher mind. In October 2011, French scientists made an incredible discovery, they found a place where life could have originated.

According to the definition of scientists, civilization is a stage of the social system, characterized by the development of agriculture and crafts, the existence of cities, social classes, writing, as well as the progressive and rational thinking of the population. The history of mankind is counted in millennia, and during this period of time more than one highly developed and powerful civilization was born and died. What were the most ancient civilizations on Earth, how they developed, what they achieved and how they influenced the modern world, you can find out from this article.

Sumer

The Sumerian civilization arose at the turn of the 4th - 3rd millennium BC. NS. in the area between the Middle Eastern rivers Tigris and Euphrates. Here the Sumerians built several fortified cities, the economy of which was based on the cultivation of fertile land, irrigated by a network of irrigation canals.

Each Sumerian city was a separate independent state, with its own ruler and patron deity. They could accommodate 50-60 thousand people. A kind of capital was the city of Nippur, in which the sanctuary of Enlil, the main god of the Sumerian religion, was located.

Already in those distant times, the Sumerians:

• built high stone walls and monumental buildings;
• mined and used copper;
• were familiar with the wheel and used it;
• possessed advanced knowledge in the field of astronomy;
• kept a historical chronicle.

But their main achievement is considered to be the invention of cuneiform writing - the earliest form of writing, the oldest example of which is a clay tablet, roughly dated to 3, 5 thousand BC. NS. And, although the Sumerian civilization ceased to exist in the 24th century BC, conquered by the Babylonian kingdom, its memory was preserved in the known and still circle of the zodiac, as well as the division of the day into hours, minutes and seconds, and the years into seasons and months.

Ancient Egypt is the name of the historical region and cultural ancient civilization that stretched along the banks of the Nile in its lower part. Its history goes back 40 centuries. The development of civilization was ensured by the annual floods of rivers, leaving fertile silt on the soil, and a system of irrigation canals. They made it possible to grow crops in excess on these lands, which made it possible to provide food not only for its own population, but also to establish trade with the Mediterranean countries.

In addition to agriculture, Egypt was known for its advanced construction technologies at that time. They made it possible to organize the collective construction of huge structures that have survived the centuries and have become symbols of modern Egypt:

• the pyramids and the Sphinx;
• temple and palace complexes with monumental statues and colorful wall paintings.

Other achievements of the ancient Egyptians include the original writing system, achievements in mathematics, astronomy and practical medicine. The peculiar and mysterious culture of Egypt attracted peoples even in antiquity, it is still popular today.

The Indian or Harappan civilization existed on Earth in the 33-13th century BC. It developed in the valley of the Indus River and was distinguished by the largest area of ​​all then existing civilizations with a population of about 5 million people.

Soil fertility, plant diversity and natural moisture of the area contributed to the development of the main occupation of the Harrap people - agriculture. They lived in fortified cities, which were distinguished by the correct layout, the presence of water supply and sewerage systems.

Already at that time, the ancient Indians:

• used copper and bronze tools and weapons;
• were able to make persistent mineral and vegetable dyes, aromas and poisons;
• made glass and artificial precious stones.

The most important achievements of the Harrap civilization are the invention of one of the most convenient and widespread number systems - decimal and the beginning of the recording of the Vedas - the oldest known collection of sacred texts.

Chinese civilization has a long and interesting history, and its peculiarity is that it developed apart from other centers of ancient civilizations. The territory of this country has always been densely populated, there were many warring kingdoms replacing each other.

But the history of the most powerful Chinese state began in the 3rd century BC. e., when the ruler of the Qin kingdom united the 7 strongest kingdoms into a single empire and carried out cardinal reforms that affected all spheres of society. This time was marked by the development of agriculture and crafts, the creation of great philosophical, romantic, historical and religious works.

In the following centuries, China was ruled by many more, both local and alien dynasties, and periods of the empire's power were often replaced by periods of decline. However, the country has always emerged from each crisis with dignity, having managed to preserve its national identity and increase its cultural wealth.

Ancient China, like no other ancient civilization, gave the world many technologies and inventions that we still use today:

• silk;
• porcelain;
• paper;
• powder;
• typography,

as well as dozens of other equally important inventions, without which the modern world would not have become what it is now.

This ancient country occupied a narrow strip of land on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean, delimited from the rest of the land by the Lebanese mountains. The very first settlements arose on it about 3 thousand years BC. NS.

Several centuries later, cities were in their place - Ugarid and Arwad in the northern part, Tire and Sidon in the southern, Byblos in the center. They were fortified with powerful walls and built up with 2-storey adobe or brick houses. Local residents were engaged in:

• kept sheep and cows;
• grew grapes, olives and dates;
• traded in olive oil, wine and wood of the famous Lebanese cedars, cypresses and oaks;
• made purple dye and dyed fabrics with it, which were popular with the nobility of all neighboring states.

The Phoenicians gave the world the alphabet, which became the ancestor of many modern alphabetic, as well as some other writing systems.

Modern mankind owes a lot to this ancient civilization, located in the southern part of the Balkan Peninsula and on the islands of the Aegean Sea. Little Ancient Greece at the time of its heyday stood out even among the powerful powers of its time - Egypt, Babylonia and Persia - and, above all, not by its conquests, but by its cultural influence on its contemporaries.

It was here that the fundamental concepts of philosophy, politics, social structure, medicine, sports, literature, art and education were born in exactly the same meaning as they are commonly understood today. Any sphere of contemporary arts (theater, architecture, painting, music, literature) or science, in one way or another, has experienced the influence of this enlightened state.

Ancient Greece in the view of modern man is inextricably linked with:

• majestic marble temples and statues;
• fascinating mythology;
• theater;
• original frescoes and ceramics;
• Olympic Games.

All this makes Ancient Greece one of the most interesting and attractive ancient civilizations that ever existed on Earth. The progenitor of arts and science, she still attracts the attention of those who are fascinated by the history of mankind.

The list of the most ancient world civilizations would not be complete without the majestic ancient Rome. It is one of the largest empires in the history of the world, reaching the peak of its power in the 2nd century AD. NS. and left a memorable mark in all the lands where her victorious legions were able to visit. These are stone fortifications and roads, aqueducts and bridges thrown over local rivers. The construction of all these structures became possible after the invention of concrete and arch as the main architectural detail by the Romans.

There is something to see in the Eternal City itself. These are the famous:

• The Colosseum and circuses where gladiator fights took place;
• The Roman Forum, which was once the center of the city's social life;
• The Pantheon, which is distinguished by the largest dome that ancient buildings had;
• Palatine - the most famous and largest hill in Rome, where its history began;
• huge baths of Caracalla and Diocletian and much more.

The legacy of Ancient Rome is well known - it is Roman law and the Latin language, as well as Christianity, which originated in the territory of the Roman Empire.

This is the most ancient civilization that arose on the South American continent. The beginning of its formation falls on the 20th century BC. BC, but it reached its greatest development in the classical period, which lasted from the 3rd to the 10th century A.D. NS. The flourishing period of Mayan culture did not last long - already by the arrival of the Spanish conquerors, it was in complete decline.

On the territory of the Maya empire there were about 1 thousand populous cities with luxurious stone palaces, wide squares, huge stepped pyramid temples. The cities were linked by a network of well-maintained paved roads with road stations and inns, some of which have survived to this day.

The most famous Mayan cities:

• Chichen Itza;
• Palenque;
• Tikal;
• Uxmal;
• Copan;
• Quirigua.

The ancient Mayans were excellent mathematicians and astronomers, as evidenced by the creation of the famous solar calendar. But the main gift that this ancient Indian civilization and those that followed it presented to the world are plants that were used by the local population for food (corn, potatoes, tomatoes, beans, pumpkin, paprika and vegetable peppers), as well as tobacco.

Video

Ancient civilizations Mironov Vladimir Borisovich

The origin of the first civilizations. Who are the Sumerians?

Where did the first civilization begin? Some consider this to be the land of Shinar (Sumer, Akkad, Babylonia), which is located in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The ancient inhabitants called this land "the House of two rivers" - Bit-Nahrain, the Greeks - Mesopotamia, other peoples - Mesopotamia or Mesopotamia. The Tigris River originates in the mountains of Armenia, south of Lake Van, the sources of the Euphrates lie east of Erzurum, at an altitude of 2 thousand meters above sea level. The Tigris and Euphrates linked Mesopotamia with Urartu (Armenia), Iran, Asia Minor, and Syria. The inhabitants of southern Mesopotamia called themselves "the people of Sumer". It was established that Sumer was located in the south of Mesopotamia (south of present-day Baghdad), Akkad occupied the middle part of the country. The border between Sumer and Akkad ran just above the city of Nippur. In terms of climatic conditions, Akkad is closer to Assyria. The climate here was more severe (snow often fell in winter). The time of the appearance of the Sumerians in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates is about the 4th millennium BC. NS. Who they are and where they came from, despite many years of persistent research, it is difficult to say for sure. “The Sumerians considered the country of Dilmun, corresponding to the modern islands of Bahrain in the Persian Gulf, to be the place where mankind appeared,” writes I. Kaneva. "Archaeological data allow us to trace the connection of the Sumerians with the territory of ancient Elam, as well as with the cultures of the northern Mesopotamia."

G. Dore. global flood

Ancient authors very often talk about Egypt, but there is no information about Sumer and the Sumerians. The Sumerian language is peculiar and absolutely unlike the Semitic languages, which at the time of its appearance did not exist at all. It is also far from the developed Indo-European languages. The Sumerians are not Semites. Their writing and language (the name was given to the type of writing in 1700 by Professor of Oxford University T. Hyde) have nothing to do with the Semitic-Hamitic ethno-linguistic group. After the deciphering of the Sumerian language at the end of the 19th century, the name of this country, found in the Bible, Sin, ar, was traditionally associated with the country of Sumer.

It is still unclear what caused the appearance of the Sumerians in those places - the Flood or something else ... Science recognizes that the Sumerians most likely were not the first settlers of the Central and Southern Mesopotamia. On the territory of the Southern Mesopotamia, the Sumerians appeared no later than the 4th millennium BC. NS. But where they came from is still unknown. There are also a number of hypotheses regarding the place where they came from. Some believe that it could be the Iranian plateau, the distant mountains of Central Asia (Tibet), or India. Others recognize the Caucasian people in the Sumerians (S. Otten). Still others consider them to be the original inhabitants of Mesopotamia (G. Frankfort). Others speak of two waves of migration of the Sumerians from Central Asia or from the Middle East through Central Asia (B. Grozny). The patriarch of modern "world history" V. McNeill believed that the Sumerian written tradition is consistent with the idea that the founders of this civilization came from the south by sea. They conquered the indigenous population, the "black-headed people" who formerly lived in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates. They learned to drain swamps and irrigate the land, for L. Woolley's words that Mesopotamia previously lived in the setting of a golden age are hardly accurate: “It was a blessed alluring land. She called, and many responded to her call. "

Although, according to legend, there was once Eden. Its location is indicated in Genesis 2, 8-14. Other scholars claim that the Gardens of Eden may have been in Egypt. In the Mesopotamian literature there is no indication of traces of an earthly paradise. Others saw him at the source of the origin of four rivers (Tigris and Euphrates, Pison and Geon). The Antiochians believed that heaven was somewhere in the east, perhaps somewhere where the earth meets the sky. According to Ephraim the Sirin, paradise was to be located on an island - in the Ocean. The ancient Greeks imagined the finding of "paradise", that is, the posthumous abode of the righteous, on islands in the ocean (the so-called Islands of the Blessed). Plutarch, in his biography of Sertorius, described them: "They are separated from one another by a very narrow strait, they are ten thousand stages from the African coast." The climate here is favorable due to the temperature and the absence of sudden changes in all seasons. Paradise was a land covered with an evergreen garden. This is how the image of the Promised Land was seen, where people are full and happy, eating fruits in the shade of gardens and cool streams.

The concept of a paradise earth (according to A. Kircher)

The imagination of people supplemented these fabulous traits of well-being with new and new colors. In the "Life of St. Brendan ”(XI century) the picture of the paradise island is drawn as follows:“ There were many herbs and fruits growing there ... We walked around it for fifteen days, but could not find its limit. And we have not seen a single grass that would not bloom, and not a single tree that would not bear fruit. The stones there are only precious ... "

Bahrain Map

Research scientists have provided food for new guesses and hypotheses. In the 50s of the XX century, an expedition of the Danes led by J. Bibby discovered on the island of Bahrain traces of what others immediately called the ancestral home of the Sumerian civilization. Many believed that it was here that the legendary Dilmun was located. Indeed, such ancient sources as the poem about the adventures of the gods (mother earth Ninhursag and Enki, the patron god of the most ancient city of Mesopotamia - Eridu), rewritten in the 4th millennium BC. NS. from an even more ancient source, already mentions a certain Arabian country of Dilmun. The poem begins with lines of glorification of this country:

Give sacred cities to Enki,

The sacred land of Dilmun,

Holy Sumer grant him.

Holy Land of Dilmun,

Immaculate land of Dilmun,

Pure Land of Dilmun ...

This "sacred and innocent country", apparently, was once located on the island of Bahrain in the Persian Gulf, as well as on the nearby lands of the Arabian coast. There is no doubt that she was famous for her wealth, developed trade, the luxury of her palaces. The Sumerian poem "Enki and the Universe" also notes as a well-known fact that the ships of Dilmun carried timber, gold and silver from Melluh (India). It also speaks of the mysterious country of Magan. The Dilmuns traded in copper, iron, bronze, silver and gold, ivory, pearls, etc. It was truly a paradise for the rich. Let's say, in the II century BC. NS. a Greek traveler described Bahrain as a country where "the doors, walls and roofs of houses were inlaid with ivory, gold, silver and precious stones." The memory of the amazing world of Arabia lasted for a very long time.

Oannes - the fish man

Apparently, this circumstance caused the expedition of J. Bibby, who described his odyssey in the book "In Search of Dilmun". On the site of a Portuguese fortress (Portugal took possession of these places and stayed here from 1521 to 1602), he discovered the remains of ancient buildings. A sacred well was found nearby, in which the mysterious "throne of God" stood. Then the memory of the Sacred Throne of Dilmun passed from nation to nation and from era to era, being reflected in the Bible: “And the Lord God planted paradise in Eden in the east; and put the man he had created there. " This is how a fairy tale-tale about this magical country arose, from which the expulsion of a person was so painful, if it took place, of course.

K. Crivelli. The Riches of the Land of Dilmun

The symbols of paradise are similar everywhere: the presence of the characteristic features of the “paradise civilization”: an abundance of food, fertile natural conditions, luxury goods. Among the peoples of Mesopotamia, the magical kingdom of Siduri is represented as a place where plants from precious stones grow, which bring people "beautiful-looking and great-tasting" juicy fruits. It is also interesting that all these legends were known in Russia as well. In a message from the Novgorod Archbishop Vasily Kalika to the Tver Bishop Theodore the Good (compiled around 1347), it is reported that the Novgorodian travelers allegedly reached some island where paradise was located. They arrived there on three boats, one of which died. This place is located near high mountains, on the mountain you can see the image of "Deisus with a wonderful azure." Everything around is illuminated by a wondrous light that cannot be conveyed by words, but exclamations of exultation are heard from the mountains. In 1489, the traveler John de José also described a similar island near India, on which Mount Eden was located. The ancient Greeks identified the islands of the Blessed with the actually existing islands of the Atlantic Ocean (Azores or Canary Islands). It is worth remembering the famous story of Plato about Atlantis.

Thus, we see that each nation represented its own land as a paradise abode. Paradise was transferred from the south to the Far East, then to the North Pole, to America, even beyond the borders of the earth. John the Theologian gave a description of the heavenly Jerusalem, the walls of which are lined with precious stones. The Egyptians in the "Tale of the shipwrecked" described a journey across the Red Sea. It talks about a ghost island, an island of the Spirit, inhabited by certain ghosts. Heaven and hell are most likely ghosts that people use to brighten up the dullness of their existence.

Looking at the lifeless, dead space of Mesopotamia, where sandstorms rage, the bright sun beats mercilessly, it is somehow difficult to correlate this with paradise, which should delight the eyes of people. Indeed, as M. Nikolsky wrote, it is not easy to find a more inhospitable country (although earlier the climate could have been different). For the Russian and European gaze, accustomed to greenery, there is nothing to keep an eye on - only deserts, hills, dunes and swamps. Rains are rare. In the spring and summer, the view of Lower Mesopotamia is especially sad and gloomy, because here everyone is languishing from the heat. Both in autumn and winter, this region is a sandy desert, but in spring and summer it turns into a watery desert. In early March, the Tigris floods, and in mid-March, the Euphrates begins to flood. The waters of the flooded rivers merge, and the country, in its significant part, turns into one continuous lake. This eternal struggle of the elements is reflected in the myths of Sumer and Babylonia. In the poem about the creation of the world ("Enuma Elish") we read:

When the sky is not named above

And the land below was nameless,

Apsu the firstborn, philanthropist,

Foremother Tiamat, who gave birth to everything,

Their waters interfered with each other ...

The nature of Mesopotamia was described by many ancient authors, and it is quite harsh. Among the sources we will name the most famous: "History" of Herodotus, "Persian History" by Ctesias of Cnidus, "Historical Library" by Diodorus, "Cyropaedia" by Xenophon, "Cylinder of Cyrus", "Geography" by Strabo, "Jewish Wars" by Josephus Flavius. In these works, they spoke extremely sparingly about the life of the people, for these writers did not know the language of the Babylonians and Assyrians. The book of the Babylonian priest Berossus, who lived 100-150 years after Herodotus, was of interest. He wrote a great essay on Babylon in Greek, using the original records of the priests and scholars of Babylon. Unfortunately, this work was almost entirely lost. Only excerpts have survived, which is quoted by the church writer Eusebius of Caesarea.

G. Dore. The death of all living things

Centuries and centuries will pass until, finally, thanks to the excavations of Leyard, Woolley, Gilbrecht, Fresnel, Opper, Grotefend, Rawlinson, etc., these cuneiform texts were deciphered. But at first, readers were forced to form an impression of life in Mesopotamia from the biblical texts. As N. Nikolsky wrote, “the Assyrians seemed cruel, bloodthirsty conquerors, drinking human blood, almost cannibals; Babylonian kings and Babylonians were portrayed as vicious, pampered people, accustomed to luxury and sensual pleasures. There was no thought that these scourges of ancient Israel and Judah could be highly cultured peoples, even the teachers of the Greeks and Romans. " For a long time, all the stories about the crowded cities and powerful rulers of Assyria and Babylonia seemed exaggerated, and the main source of information was the Bible. But from the middle of the 19th century and especially intensively in the 20th century, more or less regular excavations of the lands of ancient Babylon and Nineveh began.

Portrait of an ancient Sumerian

Mesopotamia was a type of agricultural civilization based on irrigation. If in Egypt the role of the king of agriculture was played by the Nile, then here - the Tigris and the Euphrates. Drainage of the swamps made it possible to obtain quite stable harvests, and as a result of this, the first settlements and cities began to appear here. Navigation allowed the inhabitants of these places to bring the necessary building materials, tools and raw materials from other regions, often hundreds and even thousands of kilometers away from them. At the same time, the people of Egypt and the Indus Valley were building their own civilizations, thanks in part to the experiences they borrowed and the ideas they acquired through their contacts with Mesopotamia. The decisive historical shifts were based on two main reasons - the migration of tribes and peoples, changing the picture of the world, and certain changes in natural and climatic conditions. These are a kind of milestones in historical evolution.

It would be natural to assume (if McNeill was right in saying that clashes with foreigners are the engine of social change) that the earliest complex societies arose in the river valleys of Mesopotamia, Egypt, northwestern India, adjacent to the land bridge to the Old World, where the largest land masses of the planet. "Continental grouping and climatic conditions made this region the main hub of land and sea communications in the Old World, and it can be assumed that it is for this reason that civilization first arose here."

English archaeologist L. Woolley

Many believed that Sumerian culture was a derivative culture. The Englishman L. Woolley, a researcher of royal burials in Ur (by the way, Ur-Nammu is believed to be the creator of the city of Ur and the ziggurat temple), for example, expressed the following conjecture: “Undoubtedly, the Sumerian civilization arose from elements of three cultures: El-Obeid, Uruk and Dzhemdet-Nasr, and finally took shape only after their merger. Only from this moment on, the inhabitants of Lower Mesopotamia can be called the Sumerians. Therefore, I believe, - writes L. Woolley, - that under the name "Sumerians" we should mean the people, whose ancestors, each in their own way, by scattered efforts created Sumer, but by the beginning of the dynastic period, individual features merged into one civilization. "

Euphrates river

Although the origin of the Sumerians ("blackheads") remains largely a mystery to this day, it is known that in the middle of the 4th millennium BC. NS. settlements arose - the city-principality of Eredu, Ur, Uruk, Lagash, Nippur, Eshnunna, Nineveh, Babylon, Ur. As for the ethnic roots of the inhabitants of Mesopotamia, we can only say about the presence here at different times of different peoples and languages. Thus, the famous researcher of the East, L. Oppenheim, believes that from the beginning of the invasion of nomads from the plateaus and deserts and until the final Arab conquest, the Semites most likely constituted the overwhelming majority of the population of this region.

Clay figurine of the mother goddess. Uruk. 4000? G. BC NS.

Tribal groups in search of new pastures, hordes of warriors striving for the riches of "Gardariki" ("Lands of cities", as the Normans of Russia have long been called), they all moved in a continuous stream, mainly from Upper Syria, using constant routes leading to the south, or through the Tigris, to the east. These groups of Semites differed markedly not only in languages, but also in their relation to urban culture, which was a feature of social and political life in Mesopotamia. Some of them were inclined to settle down in cities, and thus made a rather significant contribution to the cause of urbanization; others preferred to roam freely, without settling, without engaging in productive labor - “to roam without loving anyone”.

The freelancers evaded military and labor service, from paying taxes and, in general, represented an unstable, eternally dissatisfied or rebellious material. The Amorite tribe had a particularly noticeable influence on the nature of political processes in the region. Oppenheim believes that they are associated with the transition from the concept of city-states to the idea of ​​territorial states, the growth of trade relations due to private initiative, the expansion of the horizons of international politics, and within states - a rapid change of power and orientation among the rulers. Then (probably around the 12th century BC) tribes who spoke Aramaic came here, they settled in Upper Syria and along the Euphrates. The Arameans sided with Babylonia against Assyria. At the same time, the Aramaic alphabetical writing slowly but inevitably began to supplant the cuneiform tradition of writing. You can also talk about the influence of the Elamites and other peoples. At least there is no doubt that for almost three millennia Mesopotamia has been in constant contact and conflicts with its neighbors, which is confirmed by numerous written documents. The region with which the inhabitants carried out contacts - direct or through various intermediaries - stretched from the Indus Valley through Iraq (sometimes even significantly going beyond its borders), up to Armenia and Anatolia, to the Mediterranean coast and further, right up to Egypt ...

"Standard from Ur": scenes of peace and scenes of war. Sumer. OK. 2500? G. BC NS.

Others consider the Sumerians a lateral branch of the ethnic tree of the Slavs, or, more precisely, the super-ethnos of the Rus in the Middle East. “Apparently, the Sumerians became the first Russes who lost their main subspecies trait, and the second ethnos that emerged from the super-ethnos of the Rus,” writes Yu. Petukhov, who studied the genesis of Indo-Europeans, Russians, and other Slavic peoples. What does he put forward as a justification and confirmation of such a point of view? According to his version, the bulk of the Protorians 40-30 thousand years ago could have settled in the Middle East and Asia Minor. Although they did not yet possess a written language, they already had a fairly developed culture. It is clear that the "brilliant and written Sumer" did not immediately appear in Mesopotamia. It was allegedly preceded by a multitude of agricultural and cattle-breeding villages of these same “Indo-European Rus”.

Ibi-il statuette from Mari

The clans, settlements of the Rus of the mountainous regions and the Rus of Palestine-Suria-Rusia advanced along the river beds to the south for hundreds of years, reaching by the middle of the VI millennium BC. NS. the southernmost points of Mesopotamia, that is, precisely the places where the Euphrates flows into the Bitter River, into a narrow branch of the Persian Gulf. The Sumerians were not outsiders in the Middle East. They were, in his opinion, a community of genera of the Middle Eastern Rus with minor infusions of the Indus Valley Rus and the Rus of Central Asia. The above culture was the successor to the cultures of the Rus Khalaf and Samarra and the predecessor of the famous Sumerian culture. In the region of Ur, more than 40 settlements of the Ubeid people have already been found. There are 23 settlements in the Uruk region, each with an area of ​​over 10 hectares. These ancient cities, and this is significant, have non-Sumerian names. It was here that the Rus rushed from the Armenian Highlands, and then the Rus from Central Asia and the Indus valleys.

Ziggurat in Agar Kuf. III millennium BC NS. Modern look

The Sumerians managed to create a vast state with the capital at Ur (2112–2015 BC). The kings of the third dynasty did their best to appease the gods. The founder of the dynasty, Urnamu, took part in the creation of the first codes of the Ancient Mesopotamia. No wonder S. Kramer called him the first "Moses". He became famous as a magnificent builder, erecting a number of temples and ziggurats. "To the glory of his mistress Ningal Urnamu, a mighty man, king of Ur, king of Sumer and Akkad, erected this magnificent Gipar." The sons completed the tower. There was a sacred quarter in the capital, which was dedicated to the moon god Nunn and his wife Ningal. The ancient city, of course, did not resemble modern cities in any way.

Ur was an irregular oval, only about a kilometer long and up to 700 meters wide. It was surrounded by a wall with a slope of raw brick (something like a medieval castle), which was surrounded by water on three sides. A ziggurat, a tower with a temple, was erected within this space. It was called the "Heavenly Hill" or "The Mountain of God." The height of the "Mount of God", on the top of which stood the temple of Nann, was equal to 53 meters. By the way, the ziggurat in Babylon ("Tower of Babel") is a copy of the ziggurat in Ur. Probably of all such ziggurats in Iraq, the one in Ur was in the best condition. (The tower of Babel was destroyed by the soldiers of Alexander the Great.) The Ursk ziggurat was an observatory temple. It took 30 million bricks to make it. Little has survived from ancient Ur, tombs and temples of Ashur, Assyrian palaces. The fragility of the structures was explained by the fact that they were created from clay (in Babylon, two buildings were built of stone). The Sumerians are skilled builders. Their architects invented the arch. The Sumerians imported material from other countries - cedars were delivered from Aman, stones for statues from Arabia. They created their own letter, an agrotechnical calendar, the world's first fish hatchery, the first forest shelter plantations, a library catalog, and the first medical recipes. Others believe that their oldest treatises were used by the compilers of the Bible when writing texts.

Outwardly, the Sumerians differed from the Semitic peoples: they were beardless and beardless, and the Semites wore long curly beards and shoulder-length hair. Anthropologically, the Sumerians belong to the large Caucasoid race with elements of the minor Mediterranean race. Some of them came from Scythia (according to Rawlinson), from the Hindustan peninsula (according to I. Dyakonov, etc.), some came from the island of Dilmun, present-day Bahrain, the Caucasus, etc. It is also argued that, since the Sumerian legend tells of mixing languages ​​and that "in the good old days they were all one people and spoke the same language", it is likely that all peoples came from the same primordial people (superethnos). Yu. Petukhov believes that this first people of Sumer were the Rus, the first farmers of Sumer. Further, the general and similar names of the gods are emphasized (the Sumerian "god of air" En-Lil and the god of the Slavs Lel, whose name is kept by our ritual poetry). Common were, he believes, the heroes of the thunder, defeating the dragon-serpent. It passes among the Russians (or their filial ethnic groups) through the centuries and millennia: Nin-Hirsa-Horus-Khors-George the Victorious ... "Who could have given both Sumer and Egypt one deity Horus-Khoros-Hirsu?" - our researcher asks the question and answers it himself: “There is only one ethnos. The one that became the basis of both the Sumerian and Egyptian civilizations - the super-ethnos of the Rus. All "mysterious" peoples are unraveled, all "dark ages" are highlighted if we study history from a scientific point of view, and not from a political point of view, in which the mention of the Russians earlier than the 9th century. n. NS. the strictest taboo. "

Sumerian beauty

The appearance of documents (c. 2800 BC) was preceded by a long period, a thousand years or more. None of the countries of the Ancient East has such an abundance of documents as in Mesopotamia. For that time, this is a high level of civilization. In the III millennium BC. NS. a significant portion of the men in this country could read and write. The ruins and inscriptions of Mesopotamia told a lot. As A. Oppenheim wrote, thanks to these documents, we learned hundreds of names of kings and other prominent people, from the rulers of Lagash who lived in the III millennium to the kings and scientists of the Seleucid era. There was also an opportunity to observe the rise and fall of cities, assess the political and economic situation, trace the fate of entire dynasties. The documents were written not by professional scribes, but by ordinary people, which testifies to the high level of literacy of the population. Although a lot of texts perished (the cities of Mesopotamia were destroyed during the wars, some of them were destroyed by waters or covered with sand), but what came down to researchers (and these are hundreds of thousands of texts) is invaluable material. Fortunately, the clay tablets on which the texts were written were used as building materials in the construction of the walls. Therefore, the earth, over time, absorbing them, and preserved entire archives.

Reconstruction of the temple in Tepe-Gavra near the city of Mosul. Iraq. IV millennium BC NS.

A great success for science was the discovery of the ancient economic archives of Uruk and Jemdet-Nasr (tables with records of receipts and distribution of products, the number of workers, slaves). Moreover, much more documents came from the II and I millennia BC. NS. First of all, these are temple and royal archives, business papers of merchants, receipts, court records. There are tens of thousands of "books" written in cuneiform. Therefore, one can hardly agree with the opinion of the respected R. J. Collingwood, who believes that the Sumerians "did not have and does not have a real history": "The ancient Sumerians left nothing behind them that we could call history." He believes that at best these texts can be defined as a historical ersatz, a document, a fragment of a historical canvas. The author also denies the Sumerians the presence of historical consciousness: “If they had something like a historical consciousness, then nothing has survived that would testify to its existence. We might assert that they should certainly have it; for us, historical consciousness is such a real and all-pervading property of our being that it is incomprehensible to us how it could be absent from anyone else. " However, among the Sumerians, if we adhere to the facts, Collingwood continues, such a consciousness nevertheless appeared in the form of a "hidden entity." I believe that as this "hidden essence" is revealed and deciphered, our understanding of the nature of the history of the Sumerian civilization may also change.

Stone statue of Gudea - ruler of Lagash

And now in the museums of Europe, Asia, America, Russia there are already about a quarter of a million Sumerian tablets and fragments. The most ancient place (or "city") where the Sumerians settled (if we accept the migration version) was Eredu (the modern name is Abu-Shahraion). In the "Royal List" it is said: "After kingship descended from heaven, Eredu became a place of kingship." Perhaps the lines gave rise to an extravagant point of view. Others read the word "Sumerian" as "a man from above" ("shu" - from above and "mer" - a man): supposedly, the Americans deciphered with the help of the latest computers and "found out": the Sumerians are from another planet, from a twin of the Earth, not found astronomers. In support of this, there were even lines from the legend of Gilgamesh, where the hero calls himself a superman. In Eredu, as the myth said, there was supposedly a palace of the god Enki, erected at the bottom of the ocean. Eredu became the place of worship of the god Enki (Eia) among the Sumerians.

Stone figurine of a worshiper from Lagash

Gradually, the Sumerians began to move north. So they captured and began to develop Uruk, the biblical Erech (now Varka). The temple of the god Ana ("White Sanctuary") was also discovered, a section of the pavement of untreated limestone blocks - the oldest stone structure in Mesopotamia. Impressive dimensions (80 x 30 m), perfection of the architectural form, vaulted niches framing the courtyard with a sacrificial table, walls oriented to the four cardinal points, stairs leading to the altar - all this made the temple a real miracle of architectural art, even in the eyes of a very sophisticated archaeologists. In the Sumerian temples, writes M. Belitsky, there were dozens of rooms where prince-priests, ensi, rulers, officials and priests, who held the supreme secular and spiritual power in their hands, lived with their families. The first tablets with pictographic writing were discovered in the cultural layers of Uruk, one of which is kept in the Hermitage (2900 BC). Later, pictograms were replaced by ideograms. There were about 2000 such icons. Their meaning is extremely difficult to guess. Perhaps for this reason, despite the huge number of tablets, history is still silent. Traces of the influence of the Uruk culture on the culture of the Mediterranean countries - Syria, Anatolia, etc.

Sumerian board game

In Egypt (the era of Nagada II, corresponding to the culture of Uruk IV), luxury items brought from Sumer, vessels with handles, etc. were found. On the slate tiles of the ancient ruler of Upper and Lower Egypt, the legendary Menes, there is a typical Sumerian motif dating back to the era of Uruk - fantastic looking animals with long necks. On the hilt of a dagger found in Jebel al-Arak, near Abydos, in Upper Egypt, there is an extremely curious motif - scenes of battles on land and sea. Scientists have come to the conclusion: on the handle, dating back to the Jemdet-Nasr era (2800 BC), depicts a battle fought between the Sumerians who arrived via the Red Sea and the local population. All this means that even at such a distant time, the Sumerians not only could already get to Egypt, but also had a certain impact on the formation of Egyptian culture. The hypothesis according to which not only hieroglyphic writing arose thanks to the Sumerians, but the very idea of ​​creating written signs was born in Egypt under their influence, has already a considerable number of supporters. In a word, a talented people of builders, artists, organizers, warriors, scientists appeared before us.

White Temple in Uruk. Reconstruction

So how was life in the city-state of the Sumerians? Take Uruk as an example, which was located in the south of Mesopotamia. In the middle of the III millennium BC. NS. this city occupied an area of ​​over 400 hectares. It was surrounded by 10 kilometers of double mud brick walls. The city had over 800 watchtowers and a population of 80,000 to 120,000. One of its rulers, who were called "en" or "ensi", apparently was the legendary Gilgamesh. German scientist H. Schmeckel in his book "Ur, Assyria and Babylon" reconstructed the life of the city. On the streets of the city, in residential areas, traffic, noise, vanity. The sultry, sultry day is over. The long-awaited evening coolness has come. Blacksmiths and potters, gunsmiths and sculptors, masons and carvers walk along the blank clay walls, the monotony of which is broken by small openings leading into the houses. Women are seen with jugs of water. They rush home to quickly prepare dinner for their husbands and children. In the crowd of passers-by, many warriors are noticeable ... Slowly, as if afraid to drop their dignity, important priests, palace officials, scribes walk along the street. Elegant fashionable skirts make them more noticeable. Indeed, in the social hierarchy, they are superior to artisans, workers, farmers, shepherds. Noisy, mischievous boys, after a long day of exhausting study at the school of scribes, threw down the signs and with carefree laughter accompany the caravan of donkeys. Those are loaded with baskets of goods from ships unloaded at the pier. Suddenly, from somewhere in the distance, a scream is heard, then another, a third. These screams are getting closer and louder.

A goat eating the leaves of a tree. Decoration from ur

Street in sumerian city

The crowd on the street parting, forming a wide corridor and humbly bowing their heads: an ensi is riding towards the temple. Together with his family and courtiers, he worked all day on the construction of a new irrigation canal and now, after a hard day, he returns to the palace, which is located next to the temple. Erected on a high platform, surrounded by wide staircases leading to the very top, this temple is the pride of the inhabitants of Uruk. Eleven halls stretch along its 60-meter-wide and 12-meter-wide courtyard. The utility rooms contain storerooms, barns, warehouses. Here the priests put in order the tablets: on them the sacrifices made in the morning in the temple, all the incomes of the past day that went to the treasury, which will further increase the wealth of the god - the lord and ruler of the city. And the ensi, the prince-priest, the ruler of Uruk, is only a servant of the god, in whose care are the lands, riches and people belonging to the god. This is how the life of the city is reconstructed.

Head of the statue of Gudea from Lagash

Statue of Gudea (ensi)

In the III-II millennia BC. NS. the main ways of economic development of the region were determined. The upper stratum of state people (officials, the highest ranks of the army, priests, a number of artisans) acted as the owner of the communal lands, had slaves and slaves, exploiting their labor. The Sumerian civilization (sometimes considered the beginning of Western civilization) developed with two sectors: one sector we will conditionally call "state", the other - "private property". The first sector consisted mainly of large farms (they were owned by temples and the top of the nobility), in the other - the lands of large-family communities (headed by their patriarchs). The farms of the first sector later became the property of the state, the second became the property of territorial communities. People on public sector land had the right to own land. It was a kind of payment for the sovereign's service. The resulting harvest was used to feed the families. However, the land could have been taken away, and many public sector workers did not have it at all. We believe that the fact of peaceful coexistence at the dawn of history of two economic sectors - public and community-private (with a noticeable predominance of the first) - seems to be symptomatic and important. Land tenants paid off the owners. They also paid to file the state on the basis of income tax. Their land was cultivated by hired workers (for shelter, bread, clothing).

The courtyard of a wealthy inhabitant of Ur in the II millennium BC. NS.

With the spread of irrigated agriculture and technology (potter's wheel, loom, copper, iron, water-lifting machines, tools), labor productivity also increased. As in Egypt, there are many channels. Herodotus also pointed out serious differences between the northern Mesopotamia - Assyria, and the southern - Babylonia: “The land of the Assyrians is irrigated with rain a little; rainwater is enough only to feed the roots of grain plants: crops grow and grain ripens with the help of irrigation from the river; This river, however, does not flow over the fields, as in Egypt; irrigate here by hand and with the help of pumps. All Babylonia, like Egypt, is cut with canals; the largest of them, navigable, stretches from the Euphrates south to another river, the Tigris. " The creation of such channels, of course, took a lot of effort.

Carriage of the winged bull

The inhabitants also faced another dilemma: crops will be flooded with too abundant water, or they will perish from lack of water and drought (Strabo). As you can see, everything or almost everything in Mesopotamia depended only on whether or not it was possible to maintain the system of agriculture and irrigation in working and good condition. Water is life. And it is not by chance that King Hammurabi, in his introduction to the code of famous laws, emphasized the particular importance of the fact that he “gave life to Uruk” - “he delivered water in abundance to the people”. The system worked under the vigilant control of the "channel overseer". The dug canals could serve as a transport route at the same time, reaching a width of 10–20 m. This allowed ships of a fairly large tonnage to pass through. The banks of the canals were framed with brickwork or wicker mats. At high places, water was poured from a well to a well with the help of a water drawer. People cultivated this land with ordinary hoes (the hoe was often depicted as the emblem of the earth god Marduk) or a wooden plow.

A married couple from Nippur. III millennium BC NS.

Enlil - "the greatest god" of Sumer, the son of Heaven and Earth

The work required huge labor costs on the part of the mass of people. Without irrigation and agriculture, life here would be completely impossible. The ancients understood this perfectly, paying tribute to the calendar of the farmer, toilers, the hoe and the plow. In the work "The Dispute Between a Hoe and a Plow" it is especially emphasized that the hoe is "the child of the poor man." With the help of a hoe, a huge amount of work is done - digging land, creating houses, canals, erecting roofs and laying streets. The days of the work of a hoe, that is, an excavator or a builder, are "twelve months." If the plow is often idle, the hoe worker does not know an hour or a day of rest. He erects "castles with palaces" and "gardens for kings." He is obliged to unquestioningly carry out all work on the orders of the king or his dignitaries, in particular, it is necessary to build fortifications or transport the figures of the gods to the right place.

The population of Mesopotamia and Babylonia consisted of free farmers and slaves. Theoretically, the land in Babylonia belonged to the gods, but in practice - to the kings, temples and large landowners who rented it. N. M. Nikolsky noted that during the entire ancient history of Mesopotamia "an individual person becomes the owner of the land temporarily and conditionally, as a member of the collective, and never a private owner of the land." Sometimes, the kings put soldiers on the land, distributed it to officials, etc. All of them had to pay taxes to the state (one-tenth of the income). The bulk of the slaves were then of local origin. The slave was not a full citizen, being the complete property of the owner. He could be sold, pledged, or even killed. The source of replenishment of slaves is debt slavery, prisoners and children of slaves. As in Egypt, abandoned children could be turned into slaves. This practice was widespread in antiquity.

Such orders existed in Babylonia, Egypt, in ancient Greece. Prisoners of war captured during wars from other countries were turned into slaves. The thieves themselves were made slaves of those who suffered from theft. The same fate awaited the murderer's family. It is curious that the laws of Hammurabi allowed the husband to sell a walking or wasteful wife. Slaves are slaves. Their life was hard. They starved, died of hunger and cold. Therefore, to make them work, they were shackled, often imprisoned.

In a number of cases, poor married couples, unable to feed young children, threw them into a hole or in a basket into the river, threw them on the street. Anyone could pick up a foundling and raise, and then do with him as he wishes (adopt, adopt or include in a dowry, sell into slavery). The custom of condemning a child or saving an infant from imminent death was called “to throw the child into the mouth of a dog” (or “to pull it out of its mouth”). Oppenheim cites a document that says how one woman, in the presence of witnesses, held her son in front of a dog's mouth, and a certain Nur-Shamash managed to snatch him out of there. Anyone could pick him up and raise him, make him a slave, adopt or adopt. Although the adoption of girls, apparently, resorted to relatively rarely. There was a firm rule: foster children were required to provide the former owners with food and clothing for the rest of their lives. The fate of the adopted children evolved in different ways. Some of them became full members of the family and even became heirs, while others faced an unenviable fate. Laws somehow regulated this process.

Goddess of death, mistress of the "Land of no return" - Ereshkigal

The labor of a farmer, excavator or builder, undoubtedly, was hard ... We find echoes of this in the "Legend of Atrahasis", which has come down to us from the Old Babylonian time (1646-1626 BC). It speaks in poetic form about the time when the gods ("Igigi") were forced to work, like mere mortals. "When the gods, like people, carried the burden, dragged baskets, the baskets of the gods were huge, hard work, great adversity." The gods themselves dug rivers, dug canals, deepened the channel of the Tigris and Euphrates, worked in the depths of water, built a dwelling for Enki, etc., etc. So they worked for years and years, day and night, “two and a half thousand years". Tired of such overwhelming work immensely, they began to fill with anger and shout at each other. After a long and heated debate, they decided to go to the main one, Enlil, to complain about their bitter fate. They "burned their weapons", "burned their shovels, set their baskets on fire" and, holding hands, marched "towards the holy gates of the warrior Enlil." In the end, there they arranged a council of the high gods, where they reported to Enlil that such an unbearable burden was killing the Igigi.

The victorious stele of King Naramsin

They deliberated for a long time until they decided together to create a kind of people and to impose a heavy and convict burden on it. "Let man bear the yoke of God!" And so they did ... Since then, man obediently began to perform the work of the gods. He builds, digs, cleans up, obtaining food for himself and the gods. Less than twelve hundred years have passed since the country has grown, people have multiplied in it. And the gods began to worry about the mass of people: "Their hubbub worries us."

And then they sent the wind to the earth to dry it up, and showers to wash away the crops. The gods declared: “Deprivation and hunger will destroy people. May the womb of the earth rise up against them! Grasses will not sprout, cereals will not sprout! Let the sea be sent down to people! The uterus will shrink, babies will not be born! " Why do people need such gods ?! In the most complete list of the Assyrian era, more than 150 names of various deities are mentioned. Moreover, at least 40-50 of them had their temples and cults in the Assyrian era. Around the 3rd millennium BC. NS. the college of priests came to an agreement and created the myth of the triad of great gods: Anu, Enlil and Ea. The sky went to Anu, the earth to Enlil, the sea to Ea. Then the old gods handed the fate of the world into the hands of their young son - Marduk. This is how a revolution took place in the kingdom of the gods. After remaking Sumerian myths, the Babylonian priests put Marduk in Enlil's place. Obviously, this divine hierarchy had to correspond to the earthly hierarchy of kings and their entourage. This goal was served by the cult of the first kings of Ur. The legendary king of Uruk, Gilgamesh, who was declared the son of Anu, was also deified. Many rulers were deified. The king of Akkad Naramsin called himself the god of Akkad. The king of Isin and the king of Larsa, the kings of Ur of the third dynasty (Shulgi, Bursin, Gimilsin), also called themselves. In the era of the first Babylonian dynasty, Hammurabi equated himself with the gods and began to be called "the god of kings."

The legendary ruler of Uruku - Enmerkar can be attributed to the same category. He, having become a king and reigned for 420 years, actually created the city of Uruk. It must be said that the emergence and existence of these city-states, as in Ancient Greece (at a later time), will take place in constant rivalry with nearby settlements and formations. Therefore, it is not surprising that ancient history is filled with incessant wars. At that time, all of the rulers were aggressors and there were (almost no) peace-lovers.

The epic poem, conventionally named by SN Kramer "Enmerkar and the ruler of Arrata", speaks of the most acute political conflict that arose in ancient times between Iraq and Iran. The poem tells how in ancient times the city-state of Uruk, located in southern Mesopotamia, was ruled by the glorious Sumerian hero Enmerkar. And far to the north of Uruk, in Iran, there was another city-state called Aratta. It was separated from Uruk by seven mountain ranges and stood so high that it was almost impossible to reach it. Aratta was famous for its wealth - all kinds of metals and building stone, that is, exactly what the city of Uruk, located on the flat, treeless plain of Mesopotamia, lacked. Therefore, there is nothing surprising in the fact that Enmerkar gazed lustfully at Aratta and her treasures. He decided at all costs to subjugate the people of Aratta and its ruler. For this purpose, he started a kind of "war of nerves" against them. He managed to intimidate the lord of Aratta and its inhabitants so that they obeyed Uruk. The king of Uruk threatened to destroy all the cities, devastate the land, so that the whole of Aratta will be covered with dust, like the city cursed by the god Enki and will turn into nothing. Perhaps it was these long-standing, almost forgotten sensations, reinforced by religion and geopolitics, that forced the ruler of Iraq to attack Iran in the current times.

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Sumerians - teachers of teachers? In 1837, during one of his business trips, the English diplomat and linguist Henry Rawlinson saw on the sheer cliff Behistun, which rises by the ancient road to Babylon, some strange relief surrounded by cuneiform signs. Rawlinson

From the book Ancestral home of the Rus the author Rassokha Igor Nikolaevich

6. INDEuropeans and Sumerians

From the book Secrets of the Three Oceans the author Alexander M. Kondratov

Sumerians and Ubaidians In the light of recent studies, it turns out that the language of the most ancient inhabitants of the Tigris and Euphrates valleys, who preceded the Sumerians, could belong to the Dravidian languages. Linguists guessed its existence by studying the most ancient Sumerian texts.

the author Matyushin Gerald Nikolaevich

Europe in the era of the first civilizations Neolithic tribes of Europe. At the time when the cities of Jericho and Chatal Guyuk were being built, there were no cities or even villages in Europe. However, geometric microliths and insert tools have already begun to penetrate here. Agriculture and

From the book Secrets of Civilizations [History of the Ancient World] the author Matyushin Gerald Nikolaevich

OLIGARCHS, KINGS AND THE DEATH OF THE FIRST CIVILIZATIONS Ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt was the only state in the world where, from the very beginning, society was organized along the lines of a herd of baboons. All power in the country was in the hands of one person. He was called a living god, and people

From the book The Road Home the author Zhikarentsev Vladimir Vasilievich

From the book Jesus. The mystery of the birth of the Son of Man [collection] by Conner Jacob

Sumerians, or Aryans When did the Sumerians come there and why has history forgotten about their existence? Only in the second half of the 19th century. modern archaeologists have discovered in these cities buried under the burial mounds of Mesopotamia that someone was trying hard to forget, namely, a long time ago

From the book Mission to Russia. National doctrine the author Valtsev Sergey Vitalievich

The origin of man - the birth of spirituality Spirituality is as ancient a phenomenon as man himself. From the beginning of his evolution, man possessed spirituality. Actually, this is obvious, because spirituality is a distinctive characteristic of a person. There is spirituality - there is

Modernity has long stepped forward and is moving on. And many secrets of the origin of life on earth remain unsolved. Many scientists, historians, archaeologists, and just lovers of history of the whole world are constantly arguing about what kind of civilization can be attributed to the first? And which of them should be considered the most ancient civilization?

Disputes, disputes, and so far this has not been proven for certain by anyone. This is the same as the first spores - the egg or the chicken. Scientists have even compiled lists of civilizations to determine which of them can be the first. It is important for all scientists and, naturally, historians to know what was achieved by each of them, how were they formed? What culture, writing was in this or that civilization. How did the ancient people provide for themselves, what god they worshiped.

Time passed, but this mystery, which civilization is the most ancient, has not yet been solved.

Some scholars believe that the first civilization was in Australia. It was the aborigines who were independent, they lived and developed freely. They have developed their own culture, their own way of life. The most interesting thing is that in these tribes everyone was equal. The tribes were small - up to 150 people. What kind of relationship they had there is not precisely studied. Their culture has received little research. Earlier it seemed to everyone that she was unworthy of attention and very primitive. Now in this territory, after the invasion of the British, it is unlikely to study something and return it back. Time has passed.

Atlantis

There are a lot of disputes and assumptions about the Atlantis civilization, which was located close to the Strait of Gibraltar. This civilization flourished for a long time, about nine thousand years ago, but it is remembered to this day. This culture was on the island, the land there was not fertile, but people - Atlanteans - achieved a lot. There were magnificent architectural buildings, beautiful sculptures and temples. The inhabitants were surrounded by a wonderful climate. They developed more and more. There was no one left in the neighboring territories who could contradict them. But Athens stood in their way. As a result of the earthquake, Atlantis completely disappeared from the face of the earth. Plato was the first to remember her. Already at the end of his life, he told everyone about the amazing land he visited in his youth. Centuries have passed, but what Plato told only lives in myths, fairy tales and legends.

Until now, historians have various disputes, versions and disagreements about this, such a distant and mysterious civilization. Although they still compose songs and poems about her. But Atlantis was not forgotten, it was revived in the new civilization of the Egyptians with their pyramids. Irrigation systems appeared in America, which were also in this amazing civilization. According to legend, the gods with Zeus destroyed this civilization of greedy, greedy people who appeared there over a long period of time. They constantly fought wars and demanded further enrichment. The water simply flooded the entire island, leaving no more land. True or not, it's not up to us to decide.

Lemuria

Another civilization that scientists and historians call, which was destroyed due to an earthquake, is Lemuria. She was on earth about 80 thousand years ago. According to the remaining legacy, scientists and historians have determined that the people of this civilization even mastered the construction of buildings from stone. This was their main great achievement.

A lot of interesting information has been collected about the most ancient Slavs. Although it is difficult to determine exactly when this civilization originated, due to different interpretations and judgments.

But one thing is indisputable that after climate change, a civilization called Hyperborea had to move to other fertile lands. And it was then that it gave, the emergence of new civilizations. If the secret of the origin of life was not hidden by the priests, who carefully kept it, in our time there would be a lot of knowledge about these civilizations. But even so it is known that the ancient Slavs had their own gods: Yarilo, Perun, Veles.

The priests, who were called guardians of the clan, had many secrets, but they did not reveal them to anyone else. At that time there was paganism, the people of that time were not completely united in their faith. But already in the period from the 7th to the beginning of the 9th century, pottery, blacksmithing and arms business, weaving and jewelry crafts were well developed there. Already at that time, writing arose, but some letters were similar to Greek, and even to Germanic runes.

Historians believe that the first civilization was truly the Sumerian civilization, which existed as far back as the 4th century BC, and consisted of many cities. These cities were called by the following names: Eridu, Ur, Ummah, Akkad, Sippar, Nippur, Lugash. But these are only the largest cities. They were all in Mesopotamia. Historians found out that these peoples from the Sumerian civilization had knowledge of the solar system, intelligent life and knew the count.

But these cities were constantly at war with each other, which naturally led to a decline in the development and culture of the Sumerians. And according to the narration of historians already in 2000 BC. this ancient civilization has completely weakened.

The stories of ancient peoples have survived to this day, allowing us to believe that the very first civilization arose somewhere in the Far North. Where the ice is cold now. The Chinese, the Egyptians, the Indians and the Eskimos also came to the same opinion. They argue that earlier it was there that human life originated, and they consider the North Pole as a human cradle.

After all, it is not for nothing that various remains of mammoths were found there, telling that these animals were considered herbivores. So, once upon a time, there was a normal climate. How many expeditions, already in our time, went in search of truth and returned with some finds. One way or another, our knowledge will be improved, not everything has been studied yet. Archaeologists do not give up, they are finding more and more places for excavation, which means that topics for disputes between historians and scientists will constantly be supplemented with new knowledge. And who knows, maybe in the near future, it will become clear which civilization is the most ancient, the very first, which gave life to all other civilizations.