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Lesson · Grade 7 · Social Studies

Mesopotamia: the land between two rivers

  • Grade 7
  • Social Studies
  • 1 min 31 s
  • British Columbia
  • BC7-SS-09

A schematic map builds up step by step: mountains in the north, the Tigris and Euphrates flowing south-east to the Persian Gulf, the land between them shaded and named Mesopotamia, then spring floods, rich soil, canals and fields, the first cities of Sumer at Uruk and Ur, and later Babylon and Nineveh. A strip under the map records three things that began here (first cities about 3500 BCE, writing about 3200 BCE, Hammurabi's written laws about 1750 BCE), and the video ends on the recap that Mesopotamia, the land between two rivers, was home to some of the world's first cities.

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In one sentence

The question this lesson answers

Where in the world did some of the very first cities grow?

Two great rivers flow from the mountains in the north down to the Persian Gulf.

Transcript

What the lesson says

Where in the world did some of the very first cities grow?

Two great rivers flow from the mountains in the north down to the Persian Gulf.

They are the Tigris in the east and the Euphrates in the west.

The land between them is Mesopotamia, a Greek word meaning 'between the rivers'.

Today most of this land is in the country of Iraq.

The southern plain was hot and flat, with very little rain.

But each spring, melting snow in the mountains made the rivers flood.

The floods left behind rich mud called silt, which made the soil perfect for farming.

Farmers dug canals to carry river water to their fields during the dry months.

Big harvests fed many people, and by about 3500 BCE villages in the south, in Sumer, had grown into the first cities.

Here people also invented one of the first writing systems, cuneiform, about 3200 BCE.

Later, other peoples ruled here too, such as the Babylonians at Babylon and the Assyrians at Nineveh.

A king of Babylon, Hammurabi, had his laws carved in stone about 1750 BCE, one of the oldest law codes we know.

Mesopotamia, the land between the Tigris and the Euphrates, was home to some of the world's first cities.

Curriculum

Where this fits

British Columbia, Grade 7

Social Studies, Ancient world to the 7th century: features and characteristics of civilizations and factors that led to their rise and fallBC7-SS-09

Previous: Why Civilizations Rise and FallNext: Ancient Egypt and the Nile

The outcomes and strands follow the British Columbia curriculum.

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