Similarities Between Mesopotamia And India

There are many similarities and differences between the early civilizations of the Middle East and India. The early Middle East civilizations will include Mesopotamia and Egypt. Mesopotamia was founded in 3300 BC, and Egypt was founded around 3000 BC. India was founded around 2500 BC. So these civilizations were founded all around the same time. There are many similarities and differences in their political characteristics, social/cultural characteristics, and economic characteristics. First, Mesopotamia and Egypt are both similar and different to India politically. In the Middle East, Mesopotamia had independent city-states governed by monarchs, and Egypt had Pharaohs rule the kingdoms as gods. A monarch would a king or a queen, and Pharaohs

In Mesopotamia they had new inventions. For example they had the wheel, the sail, and the plow. In Egypt they had came up with the idea of pyramids. The pyramids were built by slaves and other workers. The pyramids were made for the Pharaohs or the Egyptian god-kings. In India they a plumbing and a sewage system. The reason why these inventions go into the economic category is because not every single person had these. Mostly the people who were wealthy could take advantage of these opportunities. In Egypt only the wealthy people and the Pharaohs got pyramids. In Mesopotamia the main thing people did was farm. They were the first people to use the irrigation system. That is why in Mesopotamia they had a surplus of crops. In Egypt they did a lot of mining. They found things like gold and turned it into jewelry. In India they did a lot of engineering. For example they used engineering to build their cities. One economic similarity that these civilizations have is trade. In Mesopotamia they used the Tigris and Euphrates river to trade with neighboring civilizations. In Egypt they used the Nile river to trade with other civilizations. In India they used the Indus and the Ganges river to trade. They traded things that they had a lot of and in return they got things that they didn 't have, Another similarity these civilizations had was that they all had a writing system. In Mesopotamia they had the cuneiform. The cuneiform was a system of writing that was on clay tablets. In Egypt they had hieroglyphics. Hieroglyphics were basically simple pictographs. In India the writing system has not been discovered yet. ”In contrast to cuneiform and hieroglyphics, the Harappan language has been impossible to decipher” (Beck 48) The writing would be an economical characteristic since not every single person was able to learn the writing systems. For example the poor people were not able to learn