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Earliest Civilisations
The earliest civilizations arose in Mesopotamia, followed by Egypt. After that, many more civilizations emerged, such as the Old Babylonians, Assyrians, Israelites, Chaldeans, and Persians. Despite the differences in their structures, all civilizations have a few common traits. Dense population hubs are one of them, along with impressive architecture and distinctive artistic movements, elaborate systems for controlling regions, sophisticated labor divisions, shared communication techniques, and the stratification of individuals into socioeconomic strata. However, Sumerians were the most successful of the civilizations mentioned above because they developed many inventions, such as the first written language and cities, which are highly relevant today.
The invention of writing is attributed to the Sumerians around 3100 B.C.E. Initially, objects were shown as plain images that were etched into clay slabs and known as pictographs. Then, the images were simplified to a collection of chisel-shaped marks known as cuneiform, which later evolved into a phonetic writing system1. Every symbol represented a letter that could be combined to create a word. Indeed, the cuneiform writing was replicated by the Babylonians, Persians, and Assyrians. The cuneiform writings preserved communications, historical occurrences, and business dealings. A perfect illustration is the cone of Uruinimgina, which bears “inscriptions announcing tax reduction”2. Finally, they developed into writing sagas like the Epic of Gilgamesh, the world’s earliest extant piece of literature3. Thus, the Sumerians pioneered the art of writing, which would not have developed without them.
The Sumerians transformed their villages into more than 20 city-states, the earliest urban capitals in the world, including Uruk. Every metropolitan area was a separate political entity. These cities served as government, business, religion, industry, and entertainment hubs. Since the Sumerians believed that “gods ruled the cities, making the state a theocracy,” each municipality had a priestly king in charge4. The most significant public structures in the city were gathered around the temple in the city’s center, which served as the power headquarters. Today, nearly all countries have decentralized governance systems headed by mayors, governors, or equivalent political leaders similar to the Sumerians.
Sumerians were the most successful civilization among the earliest types since modern societies still rely heavily on their inventions. The development of written language ushered in a new way of communication and a standard way of sharing ideas and information. Similarly, Sumerian city-states influenced the development of devolved governance systems, which brought leadership to the people, hence the ability to influence how citizens are governed by their leaders.
Ancient Greek Culture
Ancient Greek culture significantly impacted a wide range of fields, including philosophy, language, educational frameworks, politics, science, and the arts. Classical Greece was marked by a particular fascination with humans and their abilities. Specifically, Greece saw extraordinary cultural and intellectual advancement, with Periclean Athens serving as its epicenter. Humanism was an underlying idea and phenomenon shared by all of classical Greece’s most significant cultural accomplishments.
Apart from offering offerings and seeking out oracles for future predictions, the Greeks did not have a close spiritual relationship with their gods. Despite this, one of the most significant cultural breakthroughs of the ancient Greeks, the development of drama, sprang from their worship of the deities. The first Greek dramas were tragedies, the most notable being Sophocles’s “Oedipus the King.” Oedipus believes he has evaded a dreadful prophesy that he would “slay his father and marry his mother” by fleeing his birthplace, but the prophecy is ultimately fulfilled5. Sophocles intends to demonstrate through this tragedy that no human action can thwart the gods’ will.
From an intellectual standpoint, the significance of Greek scientific achievement is not largely based on the assumptions established by Greek scholars, which were often empirically incorrect. Instead, its significance lies in its ethos of logical exploration, the notion that the human mind can unravel new information regarding the universe through analysis and reflection. Thales of Miletus, the earliest known Greek scientist, is most renowned for his theory centered on the water as the origin of all things, with the Earth being disk-shaped and floating over an expansive sea6. To this end, the relevance of Greek scientists lies in the fact that they attempted to develop hypotheses to interpret observations made from the surroundings. They were exploiting a uniquely human ability known as inductive reasoning, which involves beginning with inference and proceeding to the analysis.
Politics and ethics were among the significant issues with which the majority of Greek thinkers grappled. The central debate that emerged during this period was whether ancient Greece’s ethical and political systems were essentially influenced by nature or were just sociological traditions that had developed through time. Plato’s book “The Republic” describes an ideal city-state in which elected politicians are nurtured from birth to become “philosopher-kings,” integrating experience with a profound comprehension of philosophical notions7. Plato perceived that a prospective leader’s education was of utmost significance, possibly outweighing their military leadership skills. In other worst, Plato posited that leadership was not an inherent human ability. Instead, it was something that had to be imparted through education.
The historical significance of classical Greece rests equally on what Greeks believed as on what they accomplished. The Greeks of the Classical Era should be commended for their intellectual tradition, which produced notable breakthroughs such as drama, philosophy, politics, and a renewed emphasis on the capacity of the human brain to understand the complex universe and advance political and social order. Many of the achievements of classical Greece are evident in modern societies.
Work Cited
Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization. Cengage Learning, 2020.
Footnotes
- Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization. Cengage Learning, 2020.
- Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization. Cengage Learning, 2020.
- Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization.
- ibid.
- Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization. Cengage Learning, 2020
- Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization.
- Spielvogel, Jackson J. Western Civilization.
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