How did the Mesopotamian civilization adapt to its violent and hostile environment?
What will be an ideal response?
A. Early writers depicted harshness of landscape
1. gods of storm and flood dominate
2. rivers fell through a parched landscape from a distant land of rain
3. summers were too harsh and dry to produce food for the early cities
4. rain was largely confined to winter with its ferocious storms
5. floods that created the life-giving alluvial soils were also life-threatening and rivers could swell and sweep away crops
B. Had to adapt to survive
1. relied on winter crops of wheat and barley, onions, chickpeas, and sesame
2. celebrated and prayed to gods of earth and water
3. ferocity of the climate demanded hardy plants, so Mesopotamia produced much more barley than wheat
4. digging raised dwellings above the flood and diverted and conserved water
5. farmers throughout the region were using plows drawn by oxen
6. necessarily resourceful people
a. made ships in a country with no timber
b. worked masterpieces in bronze in a part of the world where no metal could be found
c. built fabulous cities without stone by baking mud into bricks
d. dammed rivers with brushwood, reeds, and earth
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