Re: Mesopotamia


mark wrote:
> Someone said this to me today "it is known fact that modern civilisation
> appeared virtuall overnight in Mesopotamia 6000 years ago"....
>
> I didn't know how to answer, cause franky I didn't know what he was talking
> about.
>


Whether or not it appeared "overnight" is probably open to question.
However, the Sumerian culture, located a bit south of central
Mesopotamia, appeared somewhat prior to Mesopotamian culture, and is
considered to have I believe the first "written" culture. The
Mesopotamians later adopted much of the Sumerian pantheon of gods.
Hebraism and the Greek culture and pantheon as we normally learn it
also grew out of this. Several books which are truly fascinating are:

History Begins at Sumer, 27 "Firsts" in Man's Recorded History, by
Samual Noah Kramer, 1959. The classic.

The Ancient Near East, by James B. Pritchard, 1958.

The Epic of Gilgamesh, by John Gardner and John Maier, 1985

The last one is especially enlightening and entertaining, and is the
book they should have given us in high school.


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