triangular area of land 

formed by deposit of 

silt at the mouth of the river.

Narmer- The king who united

Egypt as one whole around one

whole around 3000 B.C.

Pharaohs - Egyptian kings (treated 

like gods).

Theocracy - A type of government

based on religious authority.

Pyramid - A resting place 

after death for kings of the 

old kingdom.

Mummification - Embalming 

and drying the corpse to 

prevent it from decaying.

Hieroglyphics - A more 

flexible writing system. 

Cuneiform was the earliest

form of writing used

by Sumerians.

Papyrus - reeds split into strips and

woven as a writing surface

Loess is when fertile soil is blown by the wind from desert to the west and north.

Oracle bones are animal bones and tortoise shells on which priests had scratched questions for the gods.

Mandate of Heaven is a just ruler with divine approval.

Dynastic cycle is the what the historians described to be the pattern of rise, decline, and replacement of dynasties.

Feudalism is the control over different regions to members of the royal family and other trusted nobles.

Mesopotamia - A plain facing the Mediterranean Sea. The name means "land between the rivers"

City-state - Each city and the surrounding land. They functioned like an independent country.

Dynasty - A series of rulers from a single family.

Cultural Diffusion - The process by which a new idea or a product spreads from one culture to another.

Polytheism - Belief in more than one god.

Empire - Several peoples, nations, and previously independent states under the control of one ruler.

Hammurabi - Babylonian emperor from 1792-1750 B.C. who put together a uniform code of laws

Three main challenges in China were the floods in the villages, they didn't trade with the outsiders, and had invasions continuously occurring.

Almost 10% of the land in China is fitting for farming.

Monsoons: Seasonal winds which most of India's climate is made up of. From...

Oct - Feb winter monsoons blow wind from NW westward.

June - Oct = Winds blow eastward from SW carrying humidity from the ocean created rain clouds.

Harappan Civilization: Indus Valley is sometimes called Harappan civilization, because of the many archaeological discoveries made at that site.

The Indus river flows South West from the Himalayas to the Arabian Sea. Lower Indus Valley is mostly all Thar desert. Together, the Indus and Ganges river made up a large flat and very fertile plain called the Indo-Gangetic plain that took up 1,700 miles across Northern India. These two rivers are essential to the Harappans because not only do they carry water for irrigation but also rich soil and silt for agricultural purposes. 

The Ganges River flows to the east going across northern India. Then southern part of the subcontinent, just right under the Indo-Gangetic Plain becomes a peninsula that is dead-on with the Indian Ocean. The Peninsula is mostly made up of plateaus and many swerving rivers.

Eventually the two kingdoms were united. Solid evidence points to king Narmer. (even though some historians believe that King Scorpion united the kingdom)

Narmer made the double crown and joined the two kingdoms. He settled his capital 'Memphis' where Lower and Upper Egypt met. He also started the first dynasty.

Social life in the Indus was different from most social classes back then. There were not very many, if at all, dramatically different social divisions.

The Indus had one of the most constructed and thought out cities at the time. Buildings were standard size, built with oven-baked bricks. There were sophisticated sewage and plumping systems, and had the first drainage system before the 19th century. The streets were thought out and were not all winding alleys.

People of all classes plan for their burials so that they can safely get to the other world. Kings and Queens have great tombs like pyramids but other Egyptians build smaller tombs. Royal and elites have their body preserved through a long process called mummification.

Scribes developed a flexible writing system called hieroglyphics. Egyptians also invented a calender and priests observed the stars. Egyptians also made the first 'paper', Papyrus. They also developed medicine and had great mathematical knowledge to engineer such great buildings

According to legend, the first Chinese dynasty, the Xia (shyah) Dynasty, emerged about 2000 B.C., when early Chinese cultures were building farming settlements along the Huang He. When the Huang He flooded, it was the reason why settlements could grow. Shang Dynasty was the first family to have left written records.

Shang peoples built cities to surround themselves in protection because war kept occurring.

The society was divided between nobles and peasants. Noble families owned the land.

Next to family was religion. The Chinese believed that the spirits of family ancestors had the power to bring good fortune or disaster to living members of the family. The spirits were viewed more as either a troublesome or a helpful neighbour, demanding attention and respect.

In the Chinese method of writing, each character generally stands for one syllable or unit of language. The disadvantage of the Chinese system was the enormous number of writtencharacters to be memorised. To be a true scholar, one needed to know at least 10,000 characters, but a normal person will need to know 1,500 characters to be barely literate. As a general rule, a nobleperson’s children learned to write, but peasant children did not.

The first governments they had were mainly the temple priests, who could talk to the gods for people. During war however, a fighter was chosen to oversee all the soldiers. As wars became more frequent, priests gave commanders full power, and they eventually ruled through dynasties.

The Sumerians were able to produce surpluses of food, so that allowed them to do more long distance trading. This game them materials they needed to keep advancing and encouraged cultural diffusion.

In 2000 B.C., the Amorite warriors invaded Mesopotamia. They defeated the Sumerians too and made their capital, Babylon, on the Euphrates River. This empire's peak was during the reign of Hammurabi, who created a code of laws for everyone to live by. Although the laws differed by social class, they were consistent, so you knew the consequences of any action, and that was an improvement.