ARTH-2428 The First Cities: The Urban Revolution In Early Mesopotania

This course focuses upon the material record for the so-called Urban Revolution that took place in Mesopotamia (modern eastern Turkey, northern and eastern Iraq, and southwestern Iran) ca. 5000-3000 BC; the course will also follow the trajectory of the development of the city down to ca. 2000 BC. In ancient Mesopotamia, humans first organized together into urban settlements, first began to write, and first began to live in complexly structured socio-political environments. The most critical locus of the early city, both physical and conceptual, was the central temple of the major deity of the city. The principal types of monuments discussed in this course are architecture, sculpture (free-standing, relief, and architectural) and glyptic (stamp and cylinder seals). The course will involve critical inquiry from various disciplines, including history, anthropology, archaeology, urban studies, and art history.