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Fertile Crescent/Mesopotamia
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Fertile Crescent | large arc of rich or fertile farmland |
| Mesopotamia | means "between the rivers" in Greek |
| silt | mixture of rich soil and tiny rocks |
| irrigation | a way of supplying water to an area of land |
| canals | human-made waterways |
| surplus | more than needed |
| division of labor | arrangement in which each workers specializes in a particular task or job |
| rural | countryside |
| urban | city |
| city-state | consisted of a city and all the countryside around it |
| empire | land with different territories and peoples under a single rule |
| role | a part or function |
| impact | effect, result |
| polytheism | worship of many gods |
| Priests | people who performed religious ceremonies |
| social hierarchy | division of society by rank or class |
| cuneiform | world's first system of writing |
| pictographs | picture symbols |
| scribe | writer |
| epics | long poems that told stories of heroes |
| architecture | science of building |
| ziggurat | a pyramid-shaped temple tower |
| monarch | a ruler of a kingdom or empire |
| Hammurabi's Code | set of 282 laws that dealt with almost every part of daily life |
| chariot | a wheeled, horse-drawn cart used in battle |
| alphabet | set of letters that can be combined to form words |
| Nebuchadnezzar | Chaldean king who rebuilt Babylon into a beautiful city |
| Gilgamesh | King of Uruk who became a legendary figure in Sumerian literature |
| Sargon | King of Akkad; built the world's first empire after defeating Sumer and northern Mesopotamia |
| barter | trading system in which people exchange goods directly without using money |
| stele | carved stone slab or pillar that stands on end |
| colony | an area ruled by a distant country |
| cultural diffusion | spreading of cultural traits from one region to another |