Ancient Near East

1. Ancient Near East Egypt, Mesopotamia, & The Hebrews

4. Egypt • Nile: World’s longest river • Herodotus: Egypt=“gift of the Nile” • Overflowed on regular, annual basis: • Fertile land • Sense of order • Egypt protected by desert & sea • From about 3100 BCE, for 3000 yrs.

6. Mesopotamia • Tigris and Euphrates Rivers—Fertile Crescent • Mesopotamia=“the land between the two rivers” • Overflow unpredictable • Sense of instability • Exposed plains • Open to invasion

7. Mesopotamia • Beginning with Sumer, about 3500 BCE • First cities: Uruk, Ur, Kish, Nippur, Lagash • Unlike Egypt, Mesopotamia was a series of civilizations

9. Hebrews • Tribal people who migrated from Fertile Crescent to Canaan (Israel) after 2000 BCE • After 1700 BCE migrated to Egypt, and enslaved • Around 1300 BCE returned to Canaan (the “Exodus”)

12. Religion God & Creation

13. Egypt: God & Creation • At beginning of time, Nile produced mound of silt and sun god emerged from it • this sun god (Amon, Re, Aten) gave birth to the other gods (19) • Amon gives ankh (“life”)

14. Egypt: God & Creation • Akhentaten’s Reform (30): monotheism • The power of the sun’s rays: in 1.17 the rays end in hands • marked by a change in the visual arts, movement toward realism

17. Queen Nefertiti

18. Mesopotamia: God & Creation • Man created through violence & strife • Apsu (sweet waters) and Tiamat (bitter waters) give birth to Lahmu and Lahamu (Note: As in Egypt, silt precipitates) • Anshar and Kishar (horizon of sky and earth) give birth to Anu (god of sky) who gives birth to Ea (wisdom).

19. Mesopotamia: God & Creation • Tiamat prepares for war. • Marduk is Supreme Commader to fight Tiamat (bitter waters). • Upon slaying Tiamat, Marduk splits open Tiamat’s body to make sky and earth. • Marduk makes man as a work of “cosummate art” for the “faithful service” of the gods.

20. Statuettes, Abu Temple, Iraq

21. Ziggurat

22. Hebrews: God & Creation • Supreme Creator, who existed before the physical world, with ethical charge (47): ethical monotheism (48)

23. Genesis • Genesis 1: God created “man” last. God created “man” male and female: put them over the earth to subdue/master it. • Genesis 2: God creates man first (out of the soil), then the garden, the animals, then the woman.

24. Religion Morality & Afterlife

25. Egypt: Polytheism

26. Anubis

27. Egypt: Isis & Osiris • Isis—Osiris Set (Osiris’ evil brother): chopped Osiris into pieces and threw in Nile • Isis: puts Osiris back together again and brings him back to life • Horus: revenge on Set—becomes ruler of Egypt

28. Osiris: king of the dead

29. Isis: mother goddess

31. Horus: the falcon god

32. The Eye of Horus

34. Myth of Isis & Osiris • Pharaohs associated with Horus, the avenging son of Isis & Osiris • The myth supported a belief in resurrection of the dead—not only for the pharaoh but for commoners as well

35. The Step Pyramid

36. Pyramids at Giza

37. The Valley of Kings

38. Book of the Dead

39. Mesopotamia: Epic of Gilgamesh • Gilgamesh, 2/3 god and 1/3 man, has lost his best friend Enkidu. • Gilgamesh is heartbroken, and he also fears his own death, so goes on a journey to his father Utnapishtim, who has eternal life, to see if he can gain it too.

40. Epic of Gilgamesh (2) • First he needs to seek out the permission of Man-Scorpion to pass through the mountain • He hangs out with Siduri, maker of wine, for a while, then eventually reaches Utnapishtim, who informs Gilgamesh that all is impermanent.

41. Epic of Gilgamesh (3) • Gilgamesh asks Utnapishtim how he got everlasting life, and Utnapishtim relates the story of the flood and how he managed to survive and save mankind. • Gilgamesh goes with Urshanabi the Ferryman to check out the plant that brings everlasting youth, but in the end a serpent snatches it away.

42. Hebrews: Morality & Afterlife • Ten commandments: the consequences for bad behavior are not in an afterlife but in this life and in future generations—see 49; See also Jeremiah on 51. • “eye for eye, tooth for tooth” (49) • responsibility to enemies (49)

43. Hebrews: Afterlife • Hebrew attitude toward the afterlife was uncertain: see Job 53

44. Government & Social Order

45. Egypt: Gov/Society • Union of Upper and Lower Egypt shown on Palette of Narmer (22-23). • Narmer was the first pharaoh. Pharaoh: “great house” • Theocracy: pharaoh ruled in the name of the sun god • Pharaoh identified with Horus and symbolized by the falcon

46. Horus→ sky god; god of Egypt

47. Egypt: Gov/Society • Land was sacred: ruled by the pharaohs in the name of the gods—worked by the peasants and slaves. • System: theocratic socialism: harvest shared by community

48. Egypt: Gov/Society • Authority went from the pharaoh to the husband of the pharaoh’s daughter—thus sometimes sons would marry their sisters in order to get the thrown. (Property passed through women)

49. Egypt: Social Structure • Pharaoh • Vizier: top bureaucratic official • Merchants traders, builders, scribes (middle class) • Peasants • Slaves: unfree: captured enemies, criminals, debtors

50. Canon of Proportion