Culture and the Beginnings of Civilization

What does it mean to be civilized What does it mean to be civilized? The word civilized comes from an old Greek idea, meaning “living in cities.”

Different people have different ideas of what it means to be civilized, but usually “civilization” means a complex society with cities or towns, transportation networks, long-distance trade, many different jobs and established systems of law and government.

Humans haven’t always had civilizations, but we have always had culture.

So let’s talk about what culture is, and how civilization grew out of early human cultures. If someone asked you what makes your culture special, you might say it’s the holidays your family celebrates…

or the music you listen to

or your favorite comfort food.

Culture is everything we teach to each other from generation to generation, everything that makes us who we are that isn’t genetic.

Culture is the languages we speak.

Culture can be the ways we make a living.

Our spiritual beliefs are part of culture.

So are the ways we take care of our babies.

The real color of your hair isn’t culture, but the way you style it is.

The earliest cultures were all hunter-gatherers

That’s because they hunted animals and gathered plants from nature for food, clothing, shelter, and medicine

Most hunter-gatherer cultures were (and are) nomadic, meaning they didn’t live in the same place all year

But that doesn’t mean they just wandered around

Hunter-gatherers have detailed knowledge of the environments they live in, and they know where and what time of year each resource they need is at its best

Hunter-gatherer cultures have existed in every climate zone, from the tropical jungle

to the desert

to the north polar ice

Hunter-gatherers know how to carry just what they need

and how to work together in families or clans, because small groups are best for travel and taking resources direct from nature. Each person often does many jobs.

Early religions centered around spirits and forces of nature, and honoring departed ancestors

More than 6,000 years ago, a few groups of people started to build a different way of life

They found that if they replanted seeds and roots from wild plants and tended them carefully

They could grow more food than they could gather They could grow more food than they could gather. They became the first farmers.

Others found that if they captured some of the less ferocious wild animals and bred them in captivity, there would be more reliable supplies of meat, wool, and hides than from just hunting. They became the first herders.

They found that domesticated animals could also provide milk

and be ridden or trained to pull a wagon or plough.

Farming and herding created extra food, but farms need to be worked all year

Farmers still hunted and gathered resources, but the seasonal round became short trips away from permanent villages.

This change is called the neolithic revolution, because it began when people still used stone tools (lith = stone).

Farming was invented separately in several parts of the world

but always along rivers, where plenty of water was always available for crops and yearly floods brought fresh topsoil.

The earliest farms and towns started in the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, in what is now Iraq and Iran.

This region is called Mesopotamia, a word meaning “between the rivers” This region is called Mesopotamia, a word meaning “between the rivers”. The Tigris-Euphrates valley and the nearby Jordan River valley formed a lush curve around the Syrian desert. This 800 mile long area was so well suited to farming, it became known as “The Fertile Crescent”. One of the earliest civilizations there was called Sumer.

This mosaic panel shows life in Ur, one of the cities of the Sumerian people.

Cultures in the Nile valley in Egypt, the Indus valley in India and the Huang valley in China also invented farming more than 5,000 years ago.

People in the Americas, such as the Maya and Inca, also invented farming

But thousands of years later, because people came to the Americas later than Africa, Asia and Europe

In each of these river valleys, extra food from farming supported larger populations.

Extra population supplied workers for building projects and villages grew into towns, then cities with temples, palaces and defensive walls.

Permanent settlement allowed more elaborate technologies like carpentry, metalworking, pottery, and weaving.

Specialists began to trade their work for food grown by farmers.

Hunter-gatherers often traded with nearby groups, and sometimes trade brought them a few items from far away

Growing civilizations built far-reaching trade networks with roads or ships that brought food, crafted items and luxuries over hundreds or thousands of miles

As cities grew, thousands of people lived close together, not just with families and clan members.

Traditions, beliefs and customs of hunter-gatherers became the laws of new civilizations.

Keeping records of crops, trading and laws led to the invention of writing. Writing was developed by the Sumerians, Egyptians, Chinese and Maya, and spread to other cultures

Governments were established to keep peace in cities, organize public works and help trade prosper

Laws were written down, and judges and police were needed to enforce them.

Armies were needed to defend cities and conquer new territory.

Successful war leaders and land owners became warlords, then kings and emperors.

Kings claimed kinship to the divine, and people’s ideas of gods changed from the forces of nature and honored ancestors to heavenly kings and queens.