World History
The Early (EARLY) Days

In A Nutshell
If there’s one thing you can say about human beings, it’s that we’re always hungry.
Humans have always settled near food sources.
Areas that produced the most food became the most populated.
Grain cultivation (beginning in 9000 BC) fed more people than hunting and fishing.

Another thing...
• We don’t like to share.!

• Tribes constantly battled for territory,and some

were pushed into less friendly environments...which forced humans to make the most from limited resources.! • Arabs conquered theArabian Peninsula by taming camel,centralAsians took to horses and sheepherding.! • Inuits learned to build homes from ice.

And...oh yeah...
•

•
•
•

We reproduce.A lot.!

The most fertile places for grain harvesting experienced huge population explosions.!
Soon,there was so much food and so many people that people could stop working in the fields and specialize in crafts.! Expert potters,weavers,and masons were soon followed by tailors,leather tanners,miners,and other trades.!

•

Even,ahem,the“world’s oldest profession.”

When we all Get
Together...
•people
Around 8000 BC,the world’s first civilizationsliving together in cities-began appearing.!
•forCraftspeople
lived together in encampments safety against rival groups and convenience of trade.!

• cases,shaped
Cities became centers of government (in most from hereditary monarchies descended form tribal authority.

Governments...never been smooth

• Little is known about the world’s first

governments,but they were most likely dominated by a single family or clan passing authority from generation to generation.!

• Dominant man being leader.!
• Each of the world’s first kingdoms was dominated by a man.!

• Men have hogged the remote ever since.

The king’s job was simple: • Protect his followers.(No selfish motive,right?)!
• People believed the king’s authority came from the immortal gods.!
• Gave kings an association with religion,or a mystical aura.!
• charge
In some cases,the king served as high priest,in of sacrificial offerings and ceremonies intended to bring a good harvest.

Know your enemy
•

Rival kings could cause trouble,but early civilizations’ biggest threat was nature itself.!

• Droughts,floods,natural disasters destroyed crops and caused starvation.!
• Translation...if everyone had enough to eat,the gods were happy with the leader.If there wasn’t...well...!

• No surprise that across the“civilized” world that the

first thing a ruler did was to store grain for hard times.!

•

Developed systems of storage during good harvests.

Write it down.No,
Seriously...write it down
• which
To keep up with which grain surplus came from landowner,priests invented writing.!

•
•

Recording quantities,names,and dates on clay tablets led to accounting and banking.!

Soon,regular folks began quantifying everyday goods such as livestock,tools,etc.!

•theses
Writing led to the first commercial contracts:“For three pigs you will bring me two cows...”!
•

Never said it was fancy.;-)

Born a Ramblin’ Man...
• Not all peoples chose to settle down.!
• Nomadic people frequently clashed with those who settled into cities.!
• Thenomadic accumulated wealth in the cities was very lucrative to people.! • Nomadic people were more skilled in horse-mounted warfare.! • settled
The threat continued,but by 1500 BC,the power of the society had been established.!
• The history of civilization is their story.

Spinning the globe
•

The first large scale settlements in the world were Jericho in modern day Israel!

•

And Catal Huyuk in modern dayTurkey.!

• Both settlements were a "first try"!
• Never grew as large scale civilizations and eventually disappeared mysteriously !

•
•

Between 8000 and 7000 BC (ish),they both had around 2000 inhabitants !

Appear to have practiced ancestral worship.
Already?!?!

• After Jericho and Catak Huyuk,a collection of city-states in

Mesopotamia developed along or near theTigris and Euphrates
Rivers!

• All part