Lecture 31: Agrarian Civilizations in Other Regions

Agrarian Civilizations in Other Regions ..........................................

LECTURE

The Nile was a wonderful river along which to trade. Trade winds

heading south and river currents heading north made sailing up and

down the river relatively easy. And we know that Egyptian rulers sent

expeditions for ivory and gold, for example, to Nubia and Punt, in

modern Ethiopia, and also to Lebanon for its famous cedars. We still

have ¿ ne illustrations of a À eet that was sent by Hatshepsut—one of the

few female pharaohs, who ruled soon after 1500 B.C.E.

H

ow typical was Sumer of Agrarian civilizations in general? Agrarian

civilizations were constructed using the huge human and material

resources generated in regions of À ourishing agriculture, so each

civilization was shaped to some degree by the cultural traditions and

ecology of the regions in which it emerged. This lecture brieÀ y surveys six

different areas in which Agrarian civilizations appeared early. The main

exception to the general rule that agriculture generated civilizations is in

tropical areas such as Papua New Guinea (and perhaps the Amazon basin).

Here, agriculture may have appeared early, but it was based on root crops

that could not be stored for long periods. As William McNeill argues, the

lack of storable wealth may explain why these regions never supported

Agrarian civilizations.

Within the Afro-Eurasian world zone, Agrarian civilizations emerged along

fertile river systems in four different regions. We have seen how Sumerian

civilization arose in the Euphrates-Tigris basin, in the form of a cluster of

competing city-states all dependent on irrigation. Nearby, in modern Sudan

and Egypt, an Agrarian civilization appeared at about the same time, based

on the remarkable natural irrigation system of the Nile River. The annual

À oods of the Nile, the world’s longest river, brought nutritious silts from the

south. After about 5000 B.C.E., the Sahara desert became drier, and more

people settled in the Nile Valley. As in Sumer, populations grew rapidly,

but here most settled in a long ribbon of villages along the Nile. Wheat

and barley, introduced from Mesopotamia around 5000 B.C.E., À ourished.