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Famous stories from the rest of the world such as the Atrahasis and
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American archaeologist James Henry Breasted coined the term “Fertile Crescent” in a 1914 high school textbook to describe this archaeologically significant region of the Middle East that contains parts of present day Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Israel, Syria, Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Cyprus.

On a map, the Fertile Crescent looks like a crescent or quarter-moon. It extends from the Nile River on Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula in the south to the southern fringe of Turkey in the north. The Fertile Crescent is bounded on the west by the Mediterranean Sea and on the East by the Persian Gulf. The Tigris and Euphrates rivers flow through the heart of the Fertile Crescent.

The region historically contained unusually fertile soil and productive freshwater and brackish wetlands. These produced an abundance of wild edible plant species. It was here that humans began to experiment with the cultivation of grains and cereals around 10,000 B.C. as they transitioned from hunter-gatherer groups to permanent agricultural societies.

Ancient Mesopotamia

Mesopotamia is an ancient, historical region that lies between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in modern-day Iraq and parts of Kuwait, Syria, Turkey and Iran. Part of the Fertile Crescent, Mesopotamia was home to the earliest known human civilizations. Scholars believe the Agricultural Revolution started here.

The earliest occupants of Mesopotamia lived in circular dwellings made of mud and brick along the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates river valleys. They began to practice agriculture by domesticating sheep and pigs around 11,000 to 9,000 B.C. Domesticated plants, including flax, wheat, barley and lentils, first appeared around 9,500 B.C.

Some of the earliest evidence of farming comes from the archaeological site of Tell Abu Hureyra, a small village located along the Euphrates River in modern Syria. The village was inhabited from roughly 11,500 to 7,000 B.C. Inhabitants initially hunted gazelle and other game before beginning to harvest wild grains around 9,700 BCE. Several large stone tools for grinding grain have been found at the site.

One of the oldest known Mesopotamian cities, Nineveh (near Mosul in modern Iraq), may have been settled as early as 6,000 B.C. Sumer civilization arose in the lower Tigris-Euphrates valley around 5,000 B.C.

In addition to farming and cities, ancient Mesopotamian societies developed irrigation and aqueducts, temples, pottery, early systems of banking and credit, property ownership and the first codes of law.

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