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The story of writing, astronomy, and law.

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The story of civilization itself begins in one place, not Egypt, not Greece, not Rome,

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Mesopotamia.

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Mesopotamia is an exceedingly fertile plain situated between the Tigris and the Euphrates

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rivers.

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For five millennia, the small strip of land located in what is today Iraq, Kuwait, and Syria

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fostered innovations that would change the world forever.

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Mesopotamia was inhabited for nearly 12,000 years, its stable climate, rich soil, and reliable

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freshwater supply, making it a prime location for the rise and prosperity of agriculture.

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Around 6,000 years ago, some of these agricultural communities rapidly evolved into some of the

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world's first cities.

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In 4,000 and 3,100 BC, Mesopotamia was a mosaic of competing city-states.

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These were once unified under the Akkadian Empire before fracturing into the empires of

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Assyria and Babylon.

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Despite nearly constant warfare, ancient Mesopotamia was a hotbed of innovation and development.

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Mesopotamia's natural structures, such as palaces and cigarettes, massive temples serving

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as sacred spaces to commune with the gods, were built.

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The Mesopotamians also developed advanced mathematics, including a base 60 system that

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gave us the 60-second minute, the 60-minute hour, and the 360-degree circle.

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The Babylonians applied their sophisticated mathematical system to astronomy, charting

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the skies and dividing the year into 12 periods named after the prominent constellations,

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a practice later adopted by the Greeks to create the zodiac.

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They also divided the week into seven days, each named after their seven gods represented

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by the seven observable planets.

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Arguably, Mesopotamia's most far-reaching innovation was literacy.

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What began as simple pictographs on wet clay to track goods and wealth evolved into a

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complex writing system by 3,200 BC.

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This system, known today as Cuneiform, was so versatile that it was adapted for over

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a dozen major languages and countless uses over 3,000 years, including the recording

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of laws by Babylonian king Hamarabi, which laid the foundation for a standardized justice

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system.

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However, Mesopotamia's prosperity also led to its downfall.

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Babylon, in particular, became an irresistible target for conquest.

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In 539 BC, the Persian king Cyrus conquered Babylon, securing control over Mesopotamia.

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For centuries, the region became a territory of successive foreign empires.

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Eventually fading into the annals of history, its cities sank beneath the sands of Iraq,

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and its groundbreaking ideas in literacy, law, mathematics, astronomy, and the very essence

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of civilization endured.