Chapter 1 Early Societies

I. VERY SHORT ANSWER TYPE OF QUESTIONS; 

1. From which Latin word, does the English word ‘city’ come? 

Answer: It comes from the Latin word “Civitas”. 

2. Name the country in which the towns first grew? 

Answer: Mesopotamia (present day Iraq). 

3. Give two important components of civilization. 

Answer: Urban development and art of writing. 

4. When did the cities first begin to emerge? 

Answer: Between 5000-6000 years ago. 

5. In which areas first towns emerged? 

Answer: Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) 

6. What factors led to the growth of towns? 

Answer: Growth of new professions and increased in trade. 

7. When was Mesopotamia city UR discovered by the archaeologists? 

Answer: 1830. 

8. When did the royal city of Mari flourish? 

Answer: Around 2000 BCE the royal city of Mari flourish. 

9. Give the names of any two early cities of India. 

Answer: Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro. 

10. During which period of history, the art of writing began to develop? 

Answer: Between 4,000, BC to 3,000, BC. 

11. Give the name of the earliest type of system of writing. 

Answer: Pictographic form of writing. 

12. What type of book was written by Julius Caesar? 

Answer: Julius Caesar wrote a history of his war in Gaul (Modern France). 

SHORT ANSWER TYPE QUESTIONS: 

13. Explain the meaning of city. 

Answer: The English word “city” comes from the Latin word “Civitas”, which describe a highly organized community like the city state of ancient Greece. The city provided a man with his religion, his amusement, his education and sought to satisfy his every need. 

14. How did the villages come into existence? 

Answer: The man in Palaeolithic age was a wanderer. When men became food producers, the life became more settled and the family unit came into existence. They continued to live in a large group but functioned more through family units than the groups. The families began to build mud houses with thatched roofs. Most of these houses were close to one another and were surrounded by a common fence of prickly bushes or mud walls. A number of families constituted a village. Gradually, some of the villages grew into large ones. 

15. How did the early big villages develop into cities? 

Answer: The number of people in the villages gradually increased. As the needs of the villagers increased, new occupations came into being. These villages became prosperous they were now producing more food than they required for subsistence. They could now exchange their surplus food for other things from weavers or carpenters or potters. It was no longer necessary for every family living in the village to work in the fields and produce its own food. With the growth of new professions and increase in trade, the craftsmen began to live together and thus big villages grew into cities. 

16. Give reasons why the village people migrated to cities? 

Answer: People move to the cities for various reasons but the most significant reason is economic. When city’s economy is prospering, it attracts people from the villages. Droughts, and famines or exploitation of farmers can cause extreme rural poverty and that “Pushes” people out of the villages and settle in the towns. 

17. How the cities served as the promoters of civilization? 

Answer: Urban dwellers have proved to be more receptive to new ideas and change than their rural neighbours. Townsmen have been more interested in wealth accumulation and the use of wealth for better living. The towns have been the instigators of freedom since they had “a middle class”, that is, a class without traditions and the conservatism bred of traditions. Moreover, urban centres have been market places, areas where goods were exchanged, deposit points for merchant fleets and caravans. Cities are linked to commerce. 

18. Give three basic reasons for the growth of early cities. 

Answer: The three basic reasons for the growth of early cities were economic growth, natural increase and rural urban migration. 

19. Write a note on the Mesopotamia city of Mari. 

Answer: Mari, the capital city of the Mari kingdom flourished around 2000 BC. It was a trading town in a pastoral zone. Mari was a good example of an urban centre prospering on trade in wood, copper, tin, oil and wine. Some of the Mesopotamian nomadic communities of western desert became prosperous and got settled down and some became so powerful and established their own kingdom such as Akkadians, Assyrians and Armenians. They also raised a temple at Mari for Dagan god of steppe. King Zimrilim built a palace in the capital city of Mari with only one entrance on the north. 

20. What do you know about the city of Kerkuk? 

Answer: Kerkuk city was built by king Nasirbal of Assyria between 884 and 858 BC as a military defence line. The Sluks built a strong defensive wall with 72 towers around the centre of the city, two entries and 72 streets. It was a trade and export centre for the surrounding areas. Textiles were also manufactured in this city. 

21. Write a note on Pictographic system of writing. 

Answer: Pictographic system of writing is a form of writing which uses representational, pictorial drawings similar to Cuneiform of writing. Writing was first entirely pictographic-that is, telling a story by means of a pictures. Pictographic writing is known from the Neolithic period. It is not a true writing, since it does not record speech itself but reflect speech content. This form of writing was developed in Mesopotamia. 

22. Why do we say that it was not natural fertility and high levels of food productions that were the cause of early urbanisation? 

Answer: Because Cities and towns are not just places with large populations. It is when an economy develops in spheres other than food production that it becomes an advantage for people to cluster in towns. Urban economies comprise besides food production, trade, manufactures and services. City population remains no more self-sufficient. It depends on the products or services of other people living in the villages or other cities. There is continuous interaction among them. There must be social organisation in a place to be urbanized. Division of labour is a mark of urban life. 

EASSY TYPE QUESTIONS: 

23. Describe the development of art of writing. Answer: One of the essential conditions for the birth of civilisation is a system of writing. Between 4000 BC and 3000 BC, there was a steady progress in the art of writing. A pictograph form of writing was developed in Mesopotamia. The first Mesopotamian tablets written around 3,200 BC contained pictures of signs and numbers. There was a list of around 5000 oxen, fish, bread, etc. it is believed that writing began when society needed to keep records of transactions because in the city life, transaction were made at different times. The ordinary writing material was a soft clay tablets. The signs on the clay tablets were impressed with a stylus having a triangular tip. This gave each stroke the shape of wedge, hence the whole system is called cuneiform or wedge shaped. By 2,600 BC, the letters became cuneiform and the language was Sumerian. The Akkadians adopted Sumerian script to represent their Semitic language, and the Babylonians and the Assyrians followed their example. The Assyrians added some two hundred new syllabic signs to those already in use. To learn to read and write the cuneiform script was a considerable achievement, and the script formed an important class in society. 

24. What are the uses of writing? 

Answer: The development of art of writing contributed to the development of literature. Most of the people recognised the value of writing for the preservation of history. Julius Caesar wrote history of his war in Gaul. Numerous scholars recorded the events of history in the ancient and medieval period. Winston Churchill wrote a lengthy history on Great Britain’s share of World War II. The great Indian freedom fighter Nehru, while in prison wrote to his daughter a long series of letters on world history. The art of writing has preserved the knowledge of every subject. Writing has now used not only for keeping record but also making dictionaries, giving legal validity to land transfers. Writing was also used for keeping a historical record of the kings and announcing the changes a king had made in the customary law of the land. Cuneiform writing in the Akkadian language continued to be used until the first century BC which roughly means for about 2000 years. Writing has greatly helped in the spread of literacy mostly in the cities because the people in the early cities mostly belonged to professional classes and traders. The traders could better record their transactions in writing than in any other form. 25. Write an easy on the growth of early cities in Iraq. 

Answer: Mesopotamia is the land between Euphrates and Tigris. The archaeologists believed that city life began in Mesopotamia, part of modern Iraq. The Archaeologists hold that civilization appeared earlier in the southern Mesopotamia than anywhere else because urban settlement s, monumental architectures and writings were all in existence by 3,500 BC in Iraq. Some of the early cities which emerged in Mesopotamia were Urik, Amri, Tepe Gawra and Kerkuk. The cities appeared in Egypt and Indus Valley several centuries after Mesopotamia. In the Sumeria (Mesopotamia) there were 15 to 20 large cities, each surrounded by a smaller town, Villages and hamlets. In Egypt, people did not know of any cities of the early period. The Mesopotamia cities were different from the rigid, almost military looking cities of the Indus Valley cities. In contrast with the Indus Valley cities, the Mesopotamia cities had winding lanes. They appeared to have grown up as the circumstances required without the benefit of preconceived town planning. Towns elsewhere in Western Asia which arose rather later in the 2000 BC were more obviously based on those of Mesopotamia model. These cities developed around temples and were centres of long distance trade. 

26. Describe briefly the features of early cities. 

Answer: 

a) UR: It is one of the earliest cities of Mesopotamia excavated in 1830’s. Ordinary house of this city has narrow winding streets and irregular shapes and it indicates that there was no system of town planning. There was not drainage system. The omen tablets at UR have recorded many superstitions about the houses of this city. The UR town had a cemetery which consisted of royal and commoner’s graves. 

b) URUK: According to Archaeologists, this city grew to the enormous extent of 250 hectares around 3000 BC and by 2800 BC the city had extended to 400 hectares. Uruk consisted of defensive walls. There were technical advances at Uruk and bronze tools began to be use for various crafts. The architects learnt to construct bricks columns. Hundreds of people were employed to build the temple and the workers were paid rations. The temple halls had beautiful paintings. Uruk was a large and beautiful city, a trading centre and had flourishing industries. 

c) MARI: This is the capital city of the Mari kingdom flourished around 2000 BC. It was a trading town in a pastoral zone. Mari was a good example of an urban centre prospering on trade in wood, copper, tin, oil, and wine. The officers of the town of Mari inspect the cargo and levied taxes. The Akkadians, Assyrians, and Armenians also established their own kingdoms in this city and they also built a temple at Mari for Dagan god of steppe. King Zimrilim built a palace in the capital city of Mari with 260 rooms nad covered an area of 2.4 hectares. 

d) TEPE GAWRA: This town was excavated during 1932-1938. This city is situated in northern Iraq and lies between the Tigris River and the foothills of the Marros Mountains. Gawra was certainly a link in trade for Lapis lazuli and other exotic goods from the Zagros highlands from the Upper Tigris. The method of burial of the dead has helped the archaeologists to reconstruct the growth of the town of Tepe Gawra. The dead were buried either in built tombs made mud brick, in simple pits, vessels, pits with small walls at their backs and mud plaster lined pits along with articles or costly things. 

e) KERKUK CITY: Kerkuk city was built by king Nasirbal of Assyria between 884 and 858 BC as a military defence line. King Sluks built a strong rampart with 72 towers, two entries and 72 streets. Textiles were also manufactured here. It was a trade and export centre for the surrounding area’s agriculture product.