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Matter of Aratta
The Matter of Aratta is the modern-day title for a collection of four poems – Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta, Enmerkar and En-suhgir-ana, Lugalbanda in the Mountain Cave, and Lugalbanda and the Anzud Bird – concerning the rivalry between...
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Mesopotamian Science and Technology - Scientific Method in the Ancient Near East
Mesopotamian science and technology developed during the Uruk period (circa 4000-3100 BCE) and the Early Dynastic period (circa 2900-2350/2334 BCE) of the Sumerian culture of southern Mesopotamia. The foundation of future Mesopotamian advances...
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Enheduanna - Poet, Priestess, Empire Builder - Redefining the Gods for the People
Enheduanna (circa 2300 BCE) is the world's first author and was the daughter (either literally or figuratively) of the great empire-builder Sargon of Akkad (reign 2334-2279 BCE). Her name translates from the Akkadian as "high priestess of...
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Mesopotamian Education - Creating the First Written Works in History
Mesopotamian education was invented by the Sumerians following the creation of writing circa 3600/3500 BCE. The earliest schools were attached to temples, but later schools were established in separate buildings, in which the scribes of ancient...
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Tiamat
Tiamat is the Mesopotamian goddess associated with primordial chaos and the salt sea best known from the Babylonian epic Enuma Elish. In all versions of the myth, following the original, Tiamat always symbolizes the forces of chaos, which...
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Mesopotamia - The Beginning of Beginnings
Mesopotamia (from the Greek, meaning "between two rivers") was an ancient region located in the Near East (Middle East) bounded in the northeast by the Zagros Mountains and in the southeast by the Arabian Plateau, corresponding to modern-day...
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Zarathustra
Zarathustra (also given as Zoroaster, Zartosht, Zarathustra Spitama, l. c. 1500-1000 BCE) was the Persian priest-turned-prophet who founded the religion of Zoroastrianism (also given as Mazdayasna “devotion to Mazda”), the first monotheistic...
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Detail of the War Scene of the Standard of Ur Showing Sumerian Warriors
This is a detail of the so-called "War Scene" of the Standard of Ur. This detail is part of the left half of the middle register. Here, six Sumerian soldiers stand and stride to the right. They wear leather head caps and cloaks as well as...
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The Weld-Blundell Prism Version of Sumerian King List
The Weld-Blundell Prism, the most complete version of the Sumerian King List extant, from Larsa, c. 1827-1817 BCE.
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.
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Cuneiform Tablets in Sumerian
Carved stone cuneiform tablets in Sumerian.
Left: Temple of Ningirsu, Girsu. Right: Temple of Nindara, Ur. Dating around 2141-2122 BCE.