Aspects/Achievements The Egyptian Civilization
At the beginning it was polytheist, then It was polytheistic, they
the unification under the old kingdom
resulted in a fusion of gods. All the
RELIGION deities were merged into the great sun
god Re and Osiris the god of Nile.
After the establishment of the empire
religion underwent a serious
debasement Magic and Superstition
gained ascendancy ,over the ethical
meaning it had
During the old kingdom the
characteristics examples of architecture
ART Architecture were the pyramids, with political and
religious significance. The construction
of the pyramids was held to be an act of
ambition to endow the state with
permanence and stability.(possibly
served as symbols of sun worship)
During the middle kingdom and the
empire the leading architectural form
was the building of temples.
Sculpture together with paintings were
Sculpture and adjuncts to architecture.
painting Their mean features were:
Colossal size, no expression and
anatomical distortion.
They invented the solar calendar,
Astronomy mapped heavens, identified fixed stars
and could accurately identify the
position of stellar bodies.
The Sumerians The Old Babylonians Assyrian
It was polytheistic and there Mesopotamian Religion was They developed an Astral
believed in a number of was no spiritual significance. polytheistic, but regionally
gods and goddesses. henotheistic. Although the religion
Anthropomorphic: Each had approximately 2,400 gods, some
deity had its distinct cities had special connections with
personality with human one particular god and built temples
attributes. that were considered the deity’s
Monistic: The same god home on earth. For the most part,
gods had anthropomorphic bodies,
was capable of being good
but some were also associated with
or bad at the same time.
specific animals and astral or natural
There was no morality.
phenomena or abstract symbols.
Temples known as ziggurat Temples known as ziggurat The main features were the arch and
were massive were massive constructions. the dome (and the columns invented
by the Egyptians). It was
constructions.
They invented arch and characterized by its huge building. It
dome. featured finely detailed narrative
relief sculpture in stone or alabster -
found mainly in the royal palaces -
depicting most hunting episodes and
military affairs. Animal forms, of
horses and lions, are magnificently
represented in some detail, although
human figures are more rigid. Typical
themes include scenes of battle or
individual combat.
The Sumerian were also They were also artists and Assyrian sculptors produced very few
artists and builders. They builders. Their artwork served statues, except for huge animal or
excelled in metal work,gem different purposes and anthropomorphic figures (typically
carving,and sculpture. functions and the addition of lions and winged beasts with human
decorative elements gave heads, sculpted in high relief on two
character to objects. sides of a rectangular stone block,
with the heads effectively in the
round) which flanked royal gateways,
or other fortified entrances.
Their systems of They used the water clock and The Assyrians therefore studied the
numeration and of weights the lunar calendar. motions of the Sun, Moon and
and measures were planets very carefully, looking for
duodecomañ with,number omens, good or bad. They regarded
Chaldeans
Religion .God were identified
with the planets and exalted into
trascendet ,omnipresentbeings.
Religion was fatalist.all that man
could do was to resign himself to
his fate. Spiritual consciousness
The gods are addressed as exalted
beings who are concerned with
justice and righteous conduct of
men. Awareness of sin.
The most notable constructions
of Chaldean art in this early
period of the empire, in addition
to the walls and irrigation
channels that began there, are
the towers called ziggurats that
served as temples and tombs.
There were also palaces and
castles.
The towers were colossal
buildings of a stepped pyramidal
shape
Their painting must have
attained considerable imminence
and far surpassed that of Egypt
and other neighboring nations.
They worked out a system for
recording the passage of time
invented the seven week day
calendar and the division of the

SCIENCE
Arithmetics:They devised adittion,
Mathematics substraction and division.The didn’t
discovered how to multiply.
Geometry: They could calculate the
area of a triangle, rectangles and
hexagons. They discovered the radio of
the circumference.
The egiptians did some remarkable
Medicine work in medicine.
They discovered the importance of the
hearth and the pulse.
They could perform simple operations
and they discovered the curatives
properties of certain drugs.
They invented a system of writing
known as the “hieroglyphic” the system
is composed of pictoric signs denoting
WRITING meaning and concrete objects.
Egyptians must be credited with the
invention of the principles of the
alphabet.
Twenty four symbols,each representing
a single consonant sound of the human
voice ,were added in the O.K. The
ultimate step was the complete
separation of the alphabetic from the
non-alphabetic characters
No formal Egyptian code of law has
been preserved, although several
LAW pharaohs, were known as lawgivers.
60 s the most common
unit.They invented the
water clock and the lunar
calendar.
They used multiplication,
square root and cube root.
Herbalism and magic
Cuneiform system
The lex talionis, an eye for
and eye.
Semiprivate administration
They used multiplication,
square root and cube root.
Herbalism and magic
Cuneiform system of writing
They changed the system of
law to conform new
conditions and developed the
the heavenly objects as gods. The
priests therefore took most interest
in the sky
Geometry: Division of the circle
into 360 degrees.
Lacations of the surface of
hearth.latitude and longitude
Astronomy: They recognized five
planets. And achieved some
success in predicting eclipses
They discovered the importance of
more than five hundred drugs and
indicated their uses.
Cuneiform system of writing.
The ashuri or Assyrian alphabet .
They were influenced by the
summerians and the old
Babylonians.
day into twelve double hours 120
minutes each.
The Babylonians developed a
system for writing down
numbers, using symbols for
singles, tens, and hundreds,
showing that they probably used
a decimal system for everyday
life. This system allowed them to
handle large numbers
comfortably and perform all of
the major arithmetical functions.
They knew the principle of zero,
and they did not use fractions.
There was a transfer of the
Chaldean and Greek Medicine
tradition to Islamic Medicine
The Chaldean adopted the
Aramaic over their Akkadian
language because of its easy
alphabet and richer vocabulary,
compared to cuneiform writing. 
They used the Code of
HAMMURABI.
The ultimate authority in the settlement
of disputes was the pharaoh, whose
decrees were supreme. Because of the
complex nature of legal administration,
the pharaoh delegated powers to
provincial governors and other officials.
Next to the pharaoh, the most powerful
individual was the vizier, who directed
all administrative branches of the
government.
of justice.The victim had to Code of HAMMURABI. -punishment for crimes suggestive
bring the offender to of treason and sedition.
justice. Divorce was placed in the hands of
Penalties were graded the male.
according to the social Married women were forbidden to
range of the victim and the appear in public with their faces
offender. Patricians, unveiled.
burghers, serfs and slaves.
Inadequate distinction
between accidental and
intentional homicide.
Ancient Civilizations
 The Persian Empire
Cyrus conquer
RELIGION
Zoroastrian religion . Intends to purify the traditional beliefs (eradicate polytheism, animal sacrifice and magic)
and to establish
ART
Architecture It was secular. They copied the raised platform and the terraced building style from Egypt, also they adopted the column and the colonnade, and used
palm and lotus at the base of columns
SCIENCE
LAW