C-Notes #1

Today during class, we had to take notes on the textbook pages 35 through 43.

Pyramids on the Nile
The Fertile Crescent is situated near Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
Egypt is situated near the longest river in the world, running through 4,100 miles-- the Nile river.

• Herodotus, a Greek man, stated in the fifth century B.C. that Egypt was the "gift of the Nile".
• The desert prevented invaders from entering Egypt, and Egyptians from leaving.

A cataract is the point in a river where boulders turn it into churning rapids.

Nile delta region is a broad, marshy, triangular area formed by deposits of silt.

Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt were united under the reign of the king Scorpion or king Narmer.

A pharaoh in Egypt was seen a god-king, an example of a theocracy-rule that is based on religious authority.

• Pharaohs in Lower Egypt wore a red crown while in Upper Egypt, they wore a white crown.
• At around 3,000 BC, the Narmer Palette was sculpted; it perhaps celebrated the unification of both Lower and Upper Egypt, as it depicted Narmer wearing both crowns.
• In the Old Kingdom (2,660-2,180 BC), pyramid-building was becoming a rising practice.

• A pyramid is a place where kings' tombs were buried.
• At the time, it was believed that kings had eternal life force even after death, otherwise known as ka.
• Egyptians and people in the Fertile Crescent were polytheists, as were most other civilizations.
• Some important gods and goddess in ancient Egypt were:
• Re, the sun god,
• Osiris, the god of the dead, and
• Isis, the ideal mother and wife.
• Overall, Egyptians worshiped more than 2,000 gods and goddesses.
• Anubis was the guide of the underworld--who weighed each person's heart.
• (If someone's heart was as light as a feather, the or she was able to live eternally, otherwise, he or she would go to hell because his or her sins were too heavy).
• Mummification was the practice of drying up a corpse to prevent it from decaying; it involved embalming.
• The book of the dead is a collection of scrolls containing hymns, prayers, and magic spells that would supposedly guide a deceased's soul in the afterlife.
• Hieroglyphics (from the Greek words hieros and gluph) means "sacred carving".
• It translates a picture into an idea--and later a sound, which resembles the modern alphabet.
• In the beginning, Egyptians wrote on slabs.
• Later, they discovered papyrus reeds (which grew in the Nile delta region); they are better writing surfaces that resemble a paper-like sheet.
• Hierarchy in Old Egypt:
• King and queen, and other royals.
• Government officials, priests, army commanders, and wealthy landowners.
• Merchants and artisans.
• Peasant farmers and laborers.
• Someone's place in Egyptian hierarchy was not set in stone.
• One could gain higher status though a better work position or marriage.
• For that, the subject would need to be literate.
• Men and women are thought of as equals.