Early Bronze and Iron Age Civilization.Pmd
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UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT SCHOOL OF DISTANCE EDUCATION M.A. HISTORY ( I SEMESTER) CORE COURSE : HIS1C04 EARLY BRONZE AND IRON AGE CIVILISATIONS (2019 ADMISSION) 190504 1 2 EARLY BRONZE AND IRON AGE CIVILISATIONS STUDY MATERIAL Semester I CORE COURSE : HIS1C04 M.A.HISTORY (2019 ADMISSION) UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT SCHOOL OF DISTANCE EDUCATION Calicut University- PO, Malappuram, Kerala, India - 673 635 3 4 UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT SCHOOL OF DISTANCE EDUCATION STUDY MATERIAL FIRST SEMESTER M.A.HISTORY (2019 ADMISSION) EARLY BRONZE AND IRON AGE CIVILISATIONS CORE COURSE : HIS1C04 Prepared by VIVEK. A. B ASSISTANT PROFESSOR ON CONTRACT (HISTORY) SCHOOL OF DISTANCE EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT. Scrutinized by SARAVANAN. R ASSISTANT PROFESSOR IN HISTORY, PG AND RESEARCH DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY, PSMO COLLEGE, THIRURANGADI 5 MODULE Page No. I 7 II 46 III 103 IV 133 6 MODULE I EGYPTIAN CIVILISATION THE BRONZE AGE The Bronze Age marked the first-time humans started to work with metal. Bronze tools and weapons soon replaced earlier stone versions. Ancient Sumerians in the Middle East may have been the first people to enter the Bronze Age. Humans made many technological advances during the Bronze Age, including the first writing systems and the invention of the wheel. In the Middle East and parts of Asia, the Bronze Age lasted from roughly 3300 B.C.E. to 1200 B.C.E., ending abruptly with the near- simultaneous collapse of several prominent Bronze Age civilizations. Humans may have started smelting copper as early as 6,000 B.C.E. in the Fertile Crescent, a region often called “the cradle of civilization” and a historical area of the Middle East where agriculture and the world’s first cities emerged. Ancient Sumer may have been the first civilization to start adding tin to copper to make bronze. Bronze was harder and more durable than copper, which made bronze a better metal for tools and weapons. Archaeological evidence suggests the transition from copper to bronze took place around 3300 B.C.E. The invention of bronze brought an end to the Stone Age, the prehistoric period dominated by the use of stone tools and weaponry. Different human societies entered the Bronze Age at different times. Civilizations in Greece began working with bronze before 3000 B.C.E., while the British Isles and China entered the Bronze Age much later—around 1900 B.C.E. and 1600 B.C.E., respectively. The Bronze Age was marked by the rise of states or kingdoms—large-scale societies joined under a central government by a powerful ruler. Bronze Age states interacted with each other through trade, warfare, migration and the spread of ideas. Prominent Bronze Age kingdoms included Sumer and 7 Babylonia in Mesopotamia and Athens in Ancient Greece. The Bronze Age ended around 1200 B.C.E. when humans began to forge an even stronger metal: iron. THE IRON AGE The Iron Age was a period in human history that started between 1200 B.C.E. and 600 B.C.E., depending on the region, and followed the Stone Age and Bronze Age. During the Iron Age, people across much of Europe, Asia and parts of Africa began making tools and weapons from iron and steel. For some societies, including Ancient Greece, the start of the Iron Age was accompanied by a period of cultural decline. Humans may have smelted iron sporadically throughout the Bronze Age, though they likely saw iron as an inferior metal. Iron tools and weapons weren’t as hard or durable as their bronze counterparts. The use of iron became more widespread after people learned how to make steel, a much harder metal, by heating iron with carbon. The Hittites—who lived during the Bronze Age in what is now Turkey—may have been the first to make steel. The adoption of iron and steel directly impacted changes in society, affecting agricultural procedures and artistic expression, and also coincided with the spread of written language. In historical archaeology, the earliest preserved manuscripts are from the Iron Age. This is due to the introduction of alphabetic characters, which allowed literature to flourish and for societies to record historic texts. EGYPTIAN CIVILISATION The central theme of the Egyptian civilization, as all we know, is the river Nile. The people of Egypt recognised its importance in all the walks of their life. It created and sustained the civilisation. The reverent hymn to the Nile goes as “The harbinger of food, rich in provisions, creator of all good, lord of majesty, sweet of fragrance.... He who fills the magazines, makes the granaries wide, and gives things to the poor. He who makes 8 every beloved tree to grow.” Till the Enlightenment, Egypt was known to the western world only as the land of lofty pyramids. Things changed when Egyptology as a new discipline of historical and archaeological exploration emerged during the early decades of the nineteenth century. The newfound interest in the studies regarding Egypt and its civilization spread to Europe, partly, as a result of military expeditions of Napoleon. In 1798 C.E., Napoleon led a group of archaeologists and geologists, of course in addition to his army, to the land of pyramids. They were tasked to map the land, which they did, and paved the way for the exploration of one of the most astounding civilisations ever existed on earth. Decipherment of the famous Rosetta stone containing inscription in hieroglyphics, demotic and the Greek script by Francois Champollion in 1822 C.E. resulted in discovery of the entire Egyptian alphabet and opened the way to the recovery of a lost world. Egypt- The Gift of Nile The great civilization of Egypt, flourished on the flood plain of mighty Nile River, the longest river in the world. As a thin ribbon of water in a dry desert land, the great river brings its water to Egypt from distant mountains, plateaus and lakes in present-day Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda, and Ethiopia. Egypt’s settlements arose along the Nile on a narrow strip of land made fertile by the river. As in the valley of Euphrates and Tigris in Mesopotamia, yearly flooding brought the water and enriches soil that allowed settlements to grow. Every year in July, rains and melting snow from the mountains of east-central Africa caused the Nile River to rise and spill over its banks. When the river receded in October, it left behind a rich deposit of fertile black mud. Before the scorching sun could dry out the soil, the peasants would hitch their cattle to ploughs and prepare their fields for planting. All fall and winter, they tended the wheat and barley plants. They watered their crops from an intricate network of irrigation ditches. At last came the welcome harvest. This cycle of flood, plant, harvest 9 repeated itself year after year. In an otherwise parched land, the abundance brought by the Nile was so great that the Egyptians worshiped it as a god who gave life and seldom turned against them. Hence. the ancient Greek historian Herodotus remarked in the fifth century B.C.E., Egypt was the ¯gift of the Nile. Ancient Egyptians knew only the lower part of the Nile-the last 750 miles before the river meet the Mediterranean Sea. Their domain ended at a point where jagged granite cliffs and boulders turn the river into churning rapids called a cataract. Riverboats could not pass this spot, known as the First Cataract, to continue upstream to the south. Between the First Cataract and the Mediterranean lay two very different regions. Upper Egypt (to the south) was a skinny strip of land from the First Cataract to the point where the river starts to fan out into many branches. Lower Egypt (to the north, near the sea) consisted of the Nile delta region, which begins about 100 miles before the river enters the Mediterranean. The delta is a broad, marshy, triangular area of land formed by deposits of silt at the mouth of the river. This rich land provided a home for many birds and wild animals. The Nile provided a reliable system of transportation between Upper and Lower Egypt. The Nile flows north, so northbound boats simply drifted with the current. Southbound boats hoisted a wide sail. The prevailing winds of Egypt blow from north to south, carrying sailboats against the river current. The ease of contact made possible by this watery highway helped unify Egypt’s villages and promote trade. The vast and forbidding deserts on either side of the Nile acted as natural barriers between Egypt and other lands. They forced Egyptians to stay close to the river, their lifeline, which reduced their interaction with other peoples. At the same time, the deserts also shut out invaders. For much of its early history, Egypt was spared the constant warfare that plagued the Fertile Crescent. Egyptians were coming into contact with the people of Mesopotamia due to movement of goods and ideas by 3200 10 B.C.E. In the meantime, Egyptian traders were also traveling up the Nile on barges to the lands of Nubia and Kush to the south. They were in search of such goods and commodities as gold, ivory, cattle and granite blocks for their massive temples and tombs. Whole groups of people seem to have moved freely from one region to another in search of better land for farming or grazing. The early Egyptians may have borrowed some ideas from the Mesopotamians in the early development of their cities and in their system of writing. However, the period of Mesopotamian influence ended quickly. From then on, Egypt followed its own cultural path, which was very different from Mesopotamia’s.