978-1-4222-3442-6

32

I RAQ

believe that it is the place where human settlements first evolved into a society with complex social and political organization and advanced cultural achievements. Nomadic hunter-gatherers may have settled in the area between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers as early as 9000 BCE . They used the river water for agriculture and began to domesticate animals such as sheep and dogs. As these hunters tied themselves to the land and depended on farming for their food, they began to build villages. Over thousands of years, these would evolve into city-states and, eventually, kingdoms and empires. Sumer, considered the world’s first civilization, was the most famous of the early Mesopotamian empires. By the 24th century B . C ., the Sumerian cities had been unified into an empire. The Sumerians are credited with many inventions. One of these was cuneiform writing, in which long reeds were used to make wedge- shaped characters on tablets of soft clay; these tablets were later baked to make them hard, preserving the writing. Hundreds of thousands of cuneiform tablets have been found and translated,

Words to Understand in This Chapter

coup—the sudden, and often violent, overthrow of a government by a small group. mandate—an order given by the League of Nations to one of its members for that member to help establish a responsible government in a former colony. nomadic—having no fixed home but moving from place to place. regent—someone who governs a kingdom when the king is under age or is away. secular—not religious; concerned with the present world. shah—a Persian king or ruler. sheikh—a term of respect and authority given to an Arab tribal leader, or to the ruler of a small kingdom called a sheikhdom.