Advancement in Ancient Civilizations

German linguist and cultural scientist Harald Haarmann is vice-president of the Institute of Archaeomythology and director of its European branch. He has written more than 50 books in various languages, including numerous studies on cultures and languages. He lives in Finland.

Table of Contents


List of Maps

List of Figures

Introduction: The Organic Whole of Human Existence and the Quality of Life

1. The Life Cycle of Cultures: Trajectories of Interaction Between Human Beings and Their Environment

Arbitrators of socio-cultural change: The challenge of changing environmental conditions for adaptive skills 5

Climate-induced changes in human ecology: The origins of the Black Sea 10

Environmental ecology and how human beings adapt to local conditions of existence 16

The role of older cultural patterns in the formation process of advanced cultures 18

2. Timeline: The Ancient Civilizations in Light of a Differential Model of Cultural Advancement

The Mesopotamian bias and the Greek myth of the German romantics in the early 19th century 23

The significance of the incubation stage for the emergence of advanced cultures 26

3. Early Achievements: Elementary Innovations as the Driving Force of Progress in Technological Domains

Prototypes of the plough 39

Pyrotechnology for the production of ceramic ware and prototypes of the potter’s wheel 40

Furnaces and metal-working 41

The ancient traditions of shipbuilding and seafaring 44

4. The Wheel, the Wagon and the Chariot: Dynamics of Technological Transfer in Antiquity

The significance of the wheel 49

The impact of steppe people on transport technology and the origins of Indo-European terminology 49

The input of ancient European technology in the context of collaboration with Indo-European pastoralists 51

The advent of wheel and wagon in Mesopotamia 52

The chariot: Technological breakthrough in the Eurasian steppes 52

The absence of the wheel as a practical device in pre–Columbian civilization: A mysterious case of a “missing link” 55

 5. The Economic Foundations: Trade Routes, Centers and Networks

Trade routes, centers and networks in the commonwealth of Old Europe 61

The movement of trade goods, technological know-how and ideas between Old Europe and Mesopotamia 66

The early network of Middle Eastern trade routes: Sumerian cities interconnected with Dilmun and the Indus Civilization 67

Gift exchange to build trust among trading partners and enhance harmony in social relations 68

Early trading networks in pre–Columbian Mesoamerica: The proliferation of Olmec goods and ideas 70

 6. Settlement Planning: From Villages to Urban Agglomerations

The model of urbanization evolving from egalitarian villages 72

The model of urbanization in a milieu of stratified society 77

 7. Architecture: Houses, Workshops and Temples

Houses and forms of accommodation in agrarian communities 83

Sacral architecture 86

Famous temple monuments of antiquity vis-à-vis cultural memory: Between oblivion and iconicity 90

 8. Social Networking: Models of Community Life, the Fabric of the Common Good

The œcumene model of ancient civilization—The archaeological record 101

The rise of the state model of civilization, associated with social hierarchy and stratified society 105

Socioeconomic models of ancient civilizations in a comparative view 107

 9. Religion and Worldview: Anthropomorphic and Zoomorphic Images of the Divine, Sanctuaries and Holy Precincts

Archaic forms of spirituality 110

From spirit to female divinity 114

Divinities relating to plant cultivation 119

The personification of individual divine agents and the origins of monumental statuary 123

The emergence of divinities in the context of pre–Columbian civilization 124

Figurines as a lingua franca of ritual life 124

10. Human Activity Between Life and Afterlife: The Intergenerational Chain in Light of Cultural Memory

The world of public entertainment: Did the ancient Greeks invent theater? 126

Fashion and dress-codes: Between social constraints and individual choice 130

The place of the dead in cultural memory 136

Connecting with the ancestors in the world of shamanism 138

11. Specialized Systems for Communication: Writing Numbers

The beginnings of numerical and calendrical notation 144

Writing numbers in pre–Columbian Mesoamerica and South America 146

Writing numbers in pre–Columbian South America 147

The interrelation of numerical notation and writing: The special case of the Sumerians 149

12. Specialized Systems for Communication: The Visual Recording of Ideas and Writing Language

Writing technology and its significance for the construction of civilization 153

Writing systems in the ancient civilizations 158

Writing systems of the Old World 159

Writing systems of the New World (pre–Columbian): The Olmec script (ca. 1500–600 bce) 173

Writing technology as a vehicle of progress 176

13. Intellectual Domains: What Was the Driving Force for Science and How Did Philosophy Originate?

Pre-Socratic philosophers as the first to reflect on cosmology and the natural world 178

Picking up the threads: The rope model of repetitive continuity of ideas 184

Philosophy as a tool for rationalizing mythic truths and for organizing community life 185

14. Art and Aesthetics: Artistic Genres in Their Cultural Context

The cultural meaning of sculptures in the Old European, Native American and Mesopotamian context 190

Classical Greek philosophy and art: Plato’s concept of aesthetics 192

Ancient civilizations as inspirational sources of modern art 198

Epilogue: Cultural Memory

Bibliography

Index