3.6: Key Terms
- Page ID
- 211906
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- Bronze Age
- the period from 3500 to 1110 BCE when bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, was the preferred material for manufacturing tools and weapons
- city-state
- an independent political entity consisting of a city and surrounding territory that it controls
- Code of Hammurabi
- a list of judicial decisions that the Babylonian king Hammurabi had inscribed on stone pillars throughout his kingdom
- culture
- all the ways in which members of a human society interact with one another and with their environment and pass these ways from generation to generation
- cuneiform
- a phonetic writing system based on the sounds of words and invented by the Sumerians in about 3000 BCE
- Harappan
- a term describing the ancient Indus valley civilization, named for one of its largest cities and the first to be discovered by archaeologists
- hieratic
- a simplified form of hieroglyphics employed by Egyptian scribes for recording everyday documents such as receipts and contracts
- hieroglyphics
- a complex writing system developed around 3000 BCE in which written symbols represented both sounds and ideas
- lugal
- the Sumerians’ term for their ruler
- monsoon
- the seasonal pattern of wind and rainfall across South Asia
- nomarchs
- regional governors in ancient Egypt
- papyrus
- a type of paper Egyptians made from a common reed plant growing along the Nile
- pastoralists
- nomadic people who rely on herds of domesticated animals for subsistence
- pharaoh
- the title of the Egyptian ruler, translated as “big house”
- polytheists
- people who worship multiple gods, usually associated with different aspects of the natural world
- social stratification
- the hierarchical order of society in which people sharing the same level of wealth and status make up a distinct class or strata
- specialization
- a societal characteristic in which people perform specific tasks, such as farming (farmer) or producing tools and clothing (artisan), that contribute to the well-being of the community
- ziggurat
- an immense stepped tower with a flat top built of mud-brick that served as a temple in Sumerian cities