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Chronologically traces the course of human history and civilization from prehistoric times to the present day, covering key events, people, inventions and discoveries, and ideas and beliefs.

The alluvial lowlands of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in southern Mesopotamia are widely known as the “cradle of civilization,” owing to the scale of the processes of urbanization that took place in the area by the second half of the fourth millennium BCE. In Ancient Mesopotamia at the Dawn of Civilization, Guillermo Algaze draws on the work of modern economic geographers to explore how the unique river-based ecology and geography of the Tigris-Euphrates alluvium affected the development of urban civilization in southern Mesopotamia. He argues that these natural conditions granted southern polities significant competitive advantages over their landlocked rivals elsewhere in Southwest Asia, most importantly the ability to easily transport commodities. In due course, this resulted in increased trade and economic activity and higher population densities in the south than were possible elsewhere. As southern polities grew in scale and complexity throughout the fourth millennium, revolutionary new forms of labor organization and record keeping were created, and it is these socially created innovations, Algaze argues, that ultimately account for why fully developed city-states emerged earlier in southern Mesopotamia than elsewhere in Southwest Asia or the world.

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A dramatically new understanding of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution—from the development of agriculture and cities to the origins of the state, democracy, and inequality—and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation. For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike—either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself. Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what’s really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume. The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action. Includes Black-and-White Illustrations

An absorbing and enlightening adventure through time… This book tells the story of the ancient world from the Fourth Millennium to the Sixth Century BC. All the major civilizations are covered, from the Near East, Egypt and Mediterranean to the great river valleys of India and China and the coastlines of Mexico and Peru. The histories of these cultures have been woven into a compelling and compact narrative, illuminating this formative period and providing a context for the better-known classical era that followed. The Dawn of Civilization tells the story of the earliest kings and queens to grace the historical record, the rise and fall of the first empires, glorious battles, incredible innovations and colourful myths and legends from the works of Homer and the ancient religions. Discover the harsh and uncompromising world of vain Egyptian pharaohs, brutal Assyrian warlords and bloodthirsty barbarian hordes. Marvel at the awe-inspiring age of mystical Cretan priestesses, heroic warriors and earthly wonders such as the Egyptian pyramids and the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. Anyone who has not specialised in ancient history could be forgiven for thinking that nothing meaningful happened before the Fifth Century BC, when the western classical age is generally considered to have begun. However the civilized world existed and flourished for an incredible 3,500 years before the classical Greeks first came to prominence. Author Sean Ellerker provides a fresh perspective on antiquity by focusing solely on the ancient world before the rise of Greece and Rome, organising this remarkable period of history into a single volume. The Dawn of Civilization makes this fascinating and multifaceted era accessible to everyone. It is an ideal read for anyone interested in history, archaeology and the classics, including students of these subjects at school or university.