The First Civilisations (Years 6–8) — History

How the first cities, writing, the wheel and written law appeared in Mesopotamia, the land between two rivers.

Around 5,000 years ago, in a region called Mesopotamia, people built the world's first true cities. Mesopotamia means 'the land between the rivers' in Greek, and it sat between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in what is now Iraq.

Why this matters Almost everything we take for granted — cities, writing, wheels, schools and laws — was worked out for the first time here. When we study Mesopotamia, we are looking at the very beginnings of recorded human history.

The Fertile Crescent

The Tigris and Euphrates flooded each year, leaving behind rich, dark soil. Farmers learned to dig irrigation channels to carry water to their fields. With plenty of food, not everyone had to farm. Some people could become potters, weavers, priests or scribes instead. This is how the first cities, such as Uruk and Ur, grew large.

Mesopotamia's first cities grew up between the Tigris and Euphrates, where irrigation channels carried river water to the fields.

The gift of writing

To keep track of trade and taxes, the Sumerians invented writing around 3400 BC. They pressed a reed with a wedge-shaped tip into wet clay tablets. We call this script cuneiform, from a Latin word meaning 'wedge-shaped'.

At first it recorded goods, such as sacks of barley or numbers of sheep.
Later it recorded stories, prayers and laws.
One of the oldest stories on Earth, the Epic of Gilgamesh, was written in cuneiform.

Common exam mistake: mixing up cuneiform with hieroglyphs. Cuneiform is Mesopotamian writing pressed into wet clay with a wedge-shaped reed; hieroglyphs are Egyptian picture-writing carved or painted onto stone and papyrus. Naming the wrong civilisation loses marks even when the point about early writing is correct.

Inventions that changed the world

Mesopotamians gave us several inventions we still rely on:

The wheel, first used for pottery and then for carts.
The plough, which let farmers turn soil more easily.
Early mathematics based on the number 60 — which is why we still have 60 minutes in an hour.

The first written laws

Around 1754 BC, King Hammurabi of Babylon had a set of laws carved onto a tall stone pillar so everyone could see them. Historians call this the Code of Hammurabi. Some punishments seem harsh to us today, but the idea was important: rules should be written down and apply to everyone, not simply be decided on the spot by a ruler. This is one of the earliest steps towards the idea of justice.

Exam technique: when explaining why Hammurabi's Code mattered, don't just say 'it had laws' — explain the change: laws were written down and displayed publicly, so they applied to everyone rather than being decided arbitrarily by a ruler. Explaining the change, not just describing the source, earns the higher marks.

Put these events in order, earliest first:

Cities such as Uruk and Ur grow using irrigation from the Tigris and Euphrates
The Sumerians invent cuneiform writing (about 3400 BC)
Mesopotamians develop the wheel and the plough
King Hammurabi has his code of laws carved in Babylon (about 1754 BC)