There were many individual civilizations in and around the Mesopotanian region. There are two in particular that shall be examined here. These are the Sumerians and the Babylonians. In 3000bc, the Sumerians founded Sumer. They developed a system for society, in the form of twelve main city-states. They had developed a written language named Cunciform, and they had also developed many other useful skills such as the ability to forge weapons and tools from bronze, the use of irrigation, calendars for agriculture, and an early establishment of a currency. These major developments were followed with the first signs of education, laws, and medicine. These were all significant developments in the way people lived. The Sumerians were however, eventually conquered by the Acadians, and so their era of evolution ended.
The other major civilization of the time that shall be examined is the Babylonian civilization. These people were founded and lead by a man named Hammurabi. The main developments that the Babylonians made on the evolution of the Sumerians, were the openness and ability to trade with others, religion, and laws. Religion had developed further, as the Babylonians were now building temples, which were the focus of their cities. Polytheism was popular, and religion was dominant throughout the Babylonian empire. Laws were also passed, and there is evidence for this in the discovery of Hammurabi’s code. These were the earliest written laws to be discovered, and thus attributed to being the first written laws made. From these two civilizations, the Sumerians and the Babylonians we can see a clear formation of the ideals that make a people a civilization. The Egyptians were also developing around this point in time. They also had a strong focus towards religion, the great pyramids being proof of their own. The Egyptians also had a very strong political leadership in their pharaohs. These made for as more organized and decisive society. The Egyptians were lacking in written laws, but were however very advanced in their written language. Hieroglyphics were an advanced form of written language for their time, and the discovery of papyrus, allowed for the expansion and wide use of this language.
As civilization is defined as the structured and organized existence of humans, the previous civilizations mentioned are all classed as civilizations. Structure and organization can be seen in many aspects. The main aspects are urbanized living conditions, a written language, written laws, a division of labor and a development in the arts sciences and medicine. The Sumerians, Babylonians, and the Egyptians all show signs of these aspects in some form or other, whether they have a sign of all these aspects or just a few of them.
There are two of the largest of the ancient civilizations that can be examined that will show evidence of progression from the older civilizations of Mesopotania and Egypt. Firstly there were the Greeks. The Greeks showed further development in education, which was aided by a more wide spread, universal and easy language. Religion was dominant and well respected, as was respect for the arts, such as theatre and architecture. Also the history of their civilization was regarded with more importance, with a man named Homer making written accounts of Greek history in his works. Temples to the Greek gods were elaborate in their design and purpose. Also, of great note, was the importance and evolution of the human thinking. Brilliant human thinkers of the time such as Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, delivered people form the limited ways in which they thought, as did other groups of people, such as the sophists. Great advances in science were made here to, mainly in the fields of biology and mathematics. The Romans were the next great empire to follow. This civilization didn’t make to many advances on the Greek civilization, more over, just compounded and solidified ideas such as law and democracy, in writing. The twelve tablets are a good example of such establishments. Written and spoken language has developed immensely, Latin being the prominently dominant language. Labor was divided amongst the population; for example, being a soldier was now a profession. Developments in art were noticeable, such as the passion for entertainment. Great coliseums and theatres were constructed to house the people’s favorite entertainment, whether it was plays or gladiatorial battles. Also a massive evolution in a central organizing body to run the empire was evident in the Roman Senate. In both of these civilizations, great advances can be seen in the structure, and organization of civilizations when characteristics of old civilizations such as the Sumerians, Babylonians, and Egyptians are compared with newer civilizations such as the Greeks and the Romans.
In conclusion, the opinion of whether the early civilizations were primitive or not, is clearly not in question. A distinct amount of evidence from archeological research has shown the major developments in civilized human behavior, from early civilizations such as the Sumerians and Egyptians; to the later more advanced civilizations of the Greeks and Romans. Developments in the civilizations, especially in the main characteristics of civilizations; language, laws, division of labor, and development in the arts, science and medicine, are self-evident. So after examining this information and establishing the fact that the first settlements and civilizations occurred around 3000bc, the clarity of how primitive the Sumerians, Babylonians, Egyptians, and other civilizations of that time period were compared to the civilizations that followed them, such as the Greeks and Romans. They are clear signs of civilization evolution towards the society that exists today.
