Mesopotamia Mythology

Many hear of the Ancient Greek gods and the gods of Ancient Egypt but few know anything about the gods of Mesopotamia. This could be due to the lost of artifacts and documents pertaining to mesopotamian culture through out time creating a variation in mythological stories told. Regardless of the reason, I thought looking into the mythology of ancient Mesopotamia could be interesting. I specifically looked at three gods, Anu, Ea and Enlil, also known as the Triads. Although they were important gods in the region there is little information on them. Mythology tells a lot about a cultures past. I figured since I did not know much about Mesopotamia, their mythology would let me in on some of their past beliefs. Mesopotamia mythology is a combination of Assyrian, Babylonian, Akkadian, and Sumerian myths, as well as myths from surrounding areas. As a result, many gods are known by more than one name. The same is true for Anu, Ea, and Enlil.

The first of the Triad consists of Anu. He is the sky god, father of all gods, evil spirits, kings and the yearly calendar. Depending on where the myth is told, Anu consort is Antu, who is also the mother of Ea and Enlil, the two other gods of the triad. Antu was later replaced by Ishtar, the goddess of love, sex, fertility and war. The second god, Ea is the god of water and wisdom.The acts of writing, craft, magic and farming are associated with Ea. He sometimes may be depicted as half goat, half fish. The last of the Triad is Enlil, known for his short temper. He is the god of land and earth; He is the keeper of men's fate.

Like many civilizations of their time, these people used mythology to understand their environments. Although their mythology is not as well known as the ancient Greeks and Egyptians, it still played an essential role in developing an understanding of the culture of Mesopotamia.




http://www.gods-heros-myth.com/godpages/ea.html
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/a/anu.html

The Parthenon in Athens, Greece

In 448 BC The Parthenon was being built in Athens, Greece. The Parthenon was designed by Iktinos and the master builder for this project was Callicrates. This structure was built on top of an old temple that was destroyed by the Persians and was built in a scheme of structures that were built in Athens and surrounding areas. Even though the Parthenon was very large in size; there were temples in Sicily and Asia Minor that were much larger. The Greeks made up for the smaller temple by using great detail on the temple and using Pentelic Marble. They wanted to temple to be “perfect” because they felt they were getting closer to the perfection of the gods they served. The Parthenon was completed in 432 BC and was used for two separate roles.

The temple consisted of two chambers; which were both used for different reasons. The west chamber of the Parthenon known as the Parthenon proper was used as part of the state treasury. The west chamber was also used for the storage of tax money collected by the Delian League. This chamber was smaller than the east chamber; I believe this is because the other chamber was used to honor a Goddess.

The west chamber (Hekatampedon) was used to honor the Greek Goddess Athena. The Athenians wanted to show their gratitude because Athena helped them defeat the Persians. In the chamber was a large statue of Athena built out of wood and ivory. Athena, the Goddess of War and Wisdom was known for her role as a judge, and diplomat. She was often viewed as a warrior, but only fought in wars if her mediating role did not work. For the most part Athena was a calm woman, but was known to get “hot headed” if challenged by anyone of the same gender.

My blog contains information I found from http://www.goddessgift.com/goddess-myths/greek_goddess_athena.htm and http://www.thenagain.info/WebChron/Mediterranean/Parthenon.html

Shifty Writing - A Basic Chronology of Ancient Egyptian Writing

Something that has always interested me is the writing system of the Ancient Egyptians. Not only is it one of the first forms of writing ever discovered, but it is vastly complex and intricate. For the most part, I am referencing the first form of writing to come out of Ancient Egypt, hieroglyphs, but even with the advancement of easier and quicker methods of written documentation, there still remains a certain mystery as to understanding what the writing actually meant.

The Egyptian writing system began with pictures around 3500 B.C.E. These pictures were used to communicate simple ideas, but not everything could be documented or explained through these pictures. They were unable to record specificities such as dates and names, hence the information known from these writings is not great.

Shortly after this, early hieroglyphic signs were used starting in 3300 B.C.E. and by about 3200 B.C.E. hieroglyphic script came into existence. This script was considered the most sacred writing form and was used solely for religious writings and information about pharaohs. These types of writing were focused on religion and pharaohs and found in places such as temples and tombs.

For quite a long period of time, this sacred script remained the main form of writing in Egypt until it gave rise to hieratic script. This script was derived from the principle of hieroglyphic script, but it was a quicker, easier, cursive representation of the symbols used in the hieroglyphic script. Because this form was easier to write, it was useful for documenting everyday events opposed to only sacred events and rituals.

The last shift based on the original hieroglyphic script was from hieratic to demotic. Demotic script was an even easier cursive form based on the hieratic script. With the increasing ease of writing this script, it became widely used for most official documents.

Although the script became easier to write over time, the ability to read and write script was only possessed by few depending on their positions in society. If they were in a position in which writing was necessary, such as scribes and priests, they were trained in reading and writing the scripts. The general population of Egypt did not fall under this category, however, and were not taught how to understand the language. Even for those who were trained in reading the scripts, it was often hard to determine what was written because of the variance of symbols used, especially when the cursive hieratic and demotic scripts were used.

The written language in present day Egypt is no longer based on hieroglyphic script. After the change to demotic, the main script changed to Greek, and later arrived at its final destination of Arabic in about 643 A.D. That is what is spoken and written in Egypt today. Although there is something to be said for the absolute complexity and intricacy of Ancient Egyptian scripts, the changes throughout its history have made it overwhelmingly easier to read and write for all citizens.

This is where I found a majority of my information.
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/time/explore/main-wri.html
http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/writing/home.html
http://www.britannica.com

Why the Maya are Awesome.

So, this being my first ever blog post, I decided to do it on something I consider to be awesome, the Maya. First and foremost, they get thrown into this category in my opinion because they are the ONLY pre-Columbian civilization in America which had its very own fully developed written language. This to me is crazy, because the Maya had their own language, and on top of that it was one which was recorded and written. This is mind blowing because at the time many European cultures were not even educated enough to have the majority of their population know how to write. Another interesting aspect of the Maya society is their architectural advances as well as their mathematical intelligence. Using this intelligence, they discovered two items. The first of which, being the idea of the number zero, which was unknown to civilization before this point. Secondly, was the Gregorian calendar, which used a 365 year period.

Another odd Mayan tradition originates with their religion, being both celestial and terrestrial there was a priest which interpreted the cycles and sort of gave ideas to what the future held. The most interesting aspect of their religion to me is the idea of human sacrifice. Now this has been seen in other cultures up until this point as well, however, the enthralling aspect of the Maya is that in many cases there would be individuals who held the human being sacrificed arms and legs while the priest tore his heart from his living body. There is no known reasoning behind this, although there are many theories. Another interesting fact is that many of the sacrifices made were children, who were thought to be pure.

At its peak, the Maya culture was one of if not the largest civilization in the world, with a very diverse and ambiguous culture (to the Europeans). Although the reasoning’s are not entirely sound, the Maya empire sort of diminished in the 17 and 1800’s. Some theorize there was a massive drought, others believe it may be due to overpopulation and food running out, whatever the cause the Maya’s were one amazing culture.

The Start of Agriculture

When most people think about agriculture they imagine men working the fields. What most people don’t know, however, is that agriculture was created by woman. Throughout the Stone Age humanity was based in nomadic tribes hunting and gathering what they needed to live. Traditionally hunting was the man’s job and women and child were in charge of gathering. Since tribes were nomadic they had different areas where they would be for a certain time of year. If a site was a favorite of the tribe’s some of the women left seeds behind so crops could grow again for next year. By doing this women discovered they could manipulate the environment.

Eventually the plants grew so well and so abundant that some of the nomads decided to stay the next time they visited the site. With the tribe stationary men still went hunting but the women and children tended the little gardens they created with simple tools, this was called horticulture. Since the tribes were becoming stationary they had the ability to keep livestock like sheep around. In time more nomads came and settled with the others and make a permanent settlement. Eventually with the increase in population women needed more help tending the fields so they enlisted the men. With men helping they were able to do more, and eventually they took over all together. The men were able to completely change the way farming was done by using larger tools, this was called agriculture.

Intro Post

Hello,

My name is Precious. I am a senior with a major in Social Studies with an emphasis in History for Elementary Education. I have always been interested in History especially ancient Egypt and Rome. I hope that through my posts I am able to create an interest in history for someone. History is actually fun ,but I think people begin to hate it at an early age because of memorization. History is more than that and through this blog I hope to show people that.



PJ

Hello there, a little about myself

Hello there, my name is Crystal Moenaert. I am a sophomore here at Grand Valley, and I am originally from Troy Michigan. I am studying to become an elementary teacher. I would love to teach 3rd grade or lower, and history has always been one of my favorite subjects.

A little more about me, I love the outdoors, camping, fishing, hiking you name it. I love all types of music, my favorite genre being country. I belong to a sorority on campus. It has been one of the best decisions I have made considering it has encouraged me to become a leader, and it has given me some of my best friends. I am a concert junkie, I love concerts, and that is a major contribution to my lack of money. My roommates hate me because I watch college football like there is no tomorrow, and then Sunday and Monday night football, oh and baseball too. Basically, I love to watch sports.

With this blog I hope to develop better writing skills since the more often you write the better you become, and considering I will be posting once or twice a week I hope to accomplish this. For the most part I will be sticking to the list of subject postings required. However on our free weeks, I hope to write about ancient empires such as Greek, Roman, and Byzantine because this is what most fascinates me during the time period of this class.