Lecture 29: From Villages to Cities
Eurasian steppes. These made it possible to exploit animals throughout their
lifetime by using their “secondary products,” or resources they generated
while alive. These techniques included the use of milk for food and wool
for cloth-making. They also included exploitation of the draft power of
large animals for riding and transportation or for pulling plows. Oxen or
horses can deliver up to four times as much power as human beings, so this
change counted as an energy revolution. Animal power allowed farmers
to plow soils more deeply and to farm soils with tougher surfaces. It also
revolutionized transportation in both commerce and warfare. In arid steppe
regions, these innovations laid the foundations for pastoralist communities,
which were largely nomadic, relying primarily
on the exploitation of domestic animals that they
grazed by traveling to different sites through the
year. Pastoral nomadism would create new types of
communities, which because of their mobility and
military skills would play a vital role in the history
of Afro-Eurasia.A second group of innovations was linked to
irrigation. Irrigation means arti¿ cially introducing
water to regions with limited natural rainfall but
fertile soils and plenty of sunlight. Such regions
can often be found in arid lands with alluvial plains
(regions that are regularly À ooded by large rivers).
Mesopotamia, the land within the loop of the Fertile Crescent, was such a
region. Literally, “Mesopotamia” means “land between the rivers,” the rivers
being the Tigris and Euphrates. Most of it is within modern Iraq.Archaeologists have lavished much attention on Mesopotamia, so here better
than anywhere else, we can see how increasingly productive technologies
prepared the way for the ¿ rst Agrarian civilizations. As we have seen, some
of the earliest farming communities appeared in the Fertile Crescent, around
the edges of Mesopotamia.By 9,000 years ago, some farming communities were starting to settle the
arid plains of Mesopotamia itself, but only in better-watered regions. As they
pushed into the arid lowlands, they developed simple forms of irrigation.As we have seen,
some of the
earliest farming
communities
appeared in the
Fertile Crescent,
around the edges
of Mesopotamia.