aurochs, and onagers. Agriculture supplemented their diets
but did not necessarily dominate it. Th e cultivation of plants
quickly spread from areas with a good water supply to regions
that were watered only by sporadic rainfall, but these latter
areas could not produce much in the way of crops. In areas
that were marginal for agriculture, people kept up their gath-
ering habits for thousands of years, and their populations did
not increase as rapidly as those in more fertile regions.
In these fertile regions agriculture dramatically altered
human society. Towns that could produce large amounts of
food quickly grew larger. Farmers improved their techniques,
experimenting with grains and developing more productive
crops by selective breeding. Th ey also applied selective breed-
ing to livestock. In addition to growing wheat and legumes,
they also kept orchards of fruit trees; dates were the most im-
portant product, but farmers also grew apples, cherries, fi gs,
pears, plums, and pomegranates. Th ey used techniques such
as graft ing (attaching a branch from the desired plant to a
root from a stronger plant) to grow the strongest trees and
employed date palms to give shade to lower-growing trees
that disliked the excessive heat of the region.
Water was always a limiting factor. Th e entire region
was fairly dry, but some portions were drier than others. Th e
fi rst settlements arose close to rivers, but as the population
grew, people were forced into drier land farther from the
river. Drought was always a danger. To ensure a steady water
supply, farmers invented irrigation techniques and devices.
Th e earliest farmers carried water to the fi elds by hand, us-
ing baked clay containers to scoop up water from ponds and
rivers and transport it to crops. As farms grew larger, people
began digging irrigation ditches to direct water from rivers to
their fi elds. Th ey also dammed rivers to prevent water from
fl owing downstream.
Farmers built several types of machines to help with the
task of moving water from its natural sources to their fi elds.
Th e shaduf (also spelled shadoof) was a counterweighted de-
v ice t hat used leverage to lift water. It consisted of two upright
posts made of wood and a wooden crosspiece with a weight
on one end and a bucket on the other. Th e weight made it
easy for farmers to lift water from ponds or wells and swing
it up to their fi elds or irrigation ditches. Around 300 b.c.e.
large farms began using more complicated devices such as the
saqiyah and the Archimedean screw (also called Archimedes’
screw). Th e saqiyah (also spelled sakia or sakieh) was a large
wheel with buckets attached to its circumference and turned
by oxen or donkeys. Th e buckets fi lled with water when they
were submerged and then poured the water out into a pipe or
other device that allowed it to fl ow where it was needed. Th e
Archimedean screw consisted of a pipe placed on an inclined
plane, with the lower end in the water. Inside the pipe a large
screw turned, raising water as it moved; the water poured out
of the top of the pipe into an irrigation ditch or channel.
Developments in irrigation increased agricultural pro-
ductivity and heightened the need for food storage. Eventual-
ly farmers developed methods of storing grain. Agricultural
surplus has many advantages for those who can store it; it can
stave off famine in lean years, and it means that not everyone
must work at farming. A successful agricultural community
can support people who do not produce foods, such as craft s-
men, scholars, soldiers, priests, bureaucrats, and rulers. Th e
rise of agriculture was thus accompanied by the growth of
towns and eventually cities. In a city there was space to store
grain, and the inhabitants gradually developed the means
to control and distribute it; kings and scribes facilitated this
process, kings by making decisions and scribes by keeping
records of grain storage and distribution.ANCIENT AGRICULTURAL SOCIETIES
Agriculture spread throughout the Middle East; by 7500
b.c.e. people were cultivating crops throughout Anatolia,
the Levant, Mesopotamia, and Persia, and grain crops were
beginning to make inroads in Pakistan and the Caucasus
Mountains. One ancient Near Eastern agricultural com-
munity was Çatalhüyük, a large settlement in southern
Anatolia, near modern Konya, Turkey. Th is town appears
to have been fi rst settled around 7500 b.c.e. and was con-
tinuously inhabited for thousands of years. Its population
was between 8,000 and 10,000 when the town was at its
largest. Its residents lived in mud-brick houses with holes in
the ceiling that served as both a source of ventilation and a
door; people climbed ladders to get in and out. Archaeolo-
gists have found storage bins used to hold wheat and barley,
and the inhabitants also grew peas and harvested local pis-
tachios, almonds, and fruits. In addition, they herded their
own sheep. Archaeologists believe the residents may have
worshipped a female deity who protected the harvest; some
grain storage bins contained female fi gurines that may have
depicted a mother or fertility goddess.
Th e Sumerians (5200–2000 b.c.e.), based in the city of
Sumer in southern Mesopotamia, developed the fi rst ma-
jor agricultural society. Sumerian farmers were constantly
plagued by lack of water. Th e region received only about fi ve
inches of rain per year, and, thus, farmers had to invent ways
of getting water to their fi elds. Th ey dug canals and reservoirs
and built dams. Th e Tigris was prone to fl ooding, and the ca-
nals required constant maintenance to remove silt and repair
banks. Once a year, however, the farmers deliberately fl ooded
their fi elds by opening the canals; this was to wet the soil in
preparation for sowing. Aft er the water drained back out, they
released cattle into the fi elds to stomp out weeds and fertilize
the ground with their manure. Th ey used oxen to pull plows
to break up the earth and then raked it to smooth it out before
sowing their grain. During the fall farmers reaped their grain
with stone or bronze sickles and bound it into sheaves before
threshing and winnowing it to separate the grain from the
straw and chaff. In addition to wheat and barley, Sumerians
grew other crops, including lentils, chickpeas, onions, leeks,
as well as garlic and lettuce.
As their population grew, Sumerians became an urban
people; by 3000 b.c.e. nearly 90 percent of Sumerians lived28 agriculture: The Middle East