Research Catalog

Details

Description

1. xx, 217 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, maps, plans; 21 cm

Summary

1. Renowned archaeologist David Wengrow creates here a vivid new account of the "birth of civilization" in ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, bringing together within a unified history the first two nations where people created cities, kingdoms, and monumental temples to the gods. But civilization, Wengrow argues, is not exclusively about large-scale settlements and endeavors. Just as important are the ordinary but fundamental practices of everyday life, such as cooking, running a home, and cleaning the body. Tracing the development of such practices, from prehistoric times to the age of the pyramids, Wengrow reveals unsuspected connections between distant regions and provides new insights into the workings of societies we have come to regard as remote from our own. The book obliges us to recognize that civilizations are not formed in isolation, but through the mixing and borrowing of culture between different societies. It concludes by drawing telling parallels between the ancient Near East and more contemporary attempts to reshape the world according to an ideal image.

Subject

1. To 634
2. Civilization, Western
3. Civilization, Western > Middle Eastern influences
4. Comparative civilization
5. 15.51 Antiquity
6. History
7. Civilization
8. International relations
9. Geschichte
10. Zivilisation
11. Kultur
12. Entstehung
13. Cultural history
14. Zivilisation > Ägypten (altes)
15. Zivilisation > Mesopotamien
16. Civilization, Western
17. Civilization, Western > Middle Eastern influences
18. Comparative civilization
19. Iraq > Civilization > To 634
20. Egypt > Civilization > To 332 B.C
21. Western countries > Relations > Middle East
22. Middle East > Relations > Western countries
23. Egypt
24. Iraq
25. Middle East
26. Western countries
27. Mesopotamien
28. Ägypten Altertum
29. Alter Orient
30. Westliche Welt
31. The West
32. Mesopotamia
33. Egypt
34. Iraq > Civilization > To 634
35. Egypten > forntiden
36. Irak > historia > forntiden

Genre/Form

1. History (form)

Contents

1. Chronology chart -- Introduction: A clash of civilizations? -- pt. 1. The cauldron of civilization -- Camouflaged borrowings -- On the trail of blue-haired gods -- Neolithic worlds -- The (first) global village -- Origin of cities -- From the Ganges to the Danube : the Bronze Age -- Cosmology and commerce -- The labours of kingship -- pt. 2. Forgetting the old regime -- Enlightenment from a dark source -- Ruined regimes : Egypt at the revolution -- Conclusion: What makes civilization?

Owning institution

1. Harvard Library

Bibliography (note)

1. Includes bibliographical references (pages 177-208) and index.

Processing action (note)

1. committed to retain