The ENTIRE History of Sumer: The Civilization Conquerors Couldn’t Destroy

Sumer lost every war. Akkad, the Gutians, Elam and Babylon all tore down its cities. So why do we still read its clay tablets 5,000 years later? This is the entire history of Sumer, the world's first cities, told in about 10 minutes: from Eridu and Uruk (c. 5400 to 3300 BC), through the first writing, the sixty-minute hour and the oldest law code, to Sargon of Akkad, the fall of Ur, Hammurabi's Babylon, and Enheduanna, the first author we know by name. The thesis: conquerors always kept the clay. Chapters: 00:00 Every Conqueror Made the Same Mistake 01:41 The Plain Between Two Rivers 02:02 Eridu and Uruk: The First Cities 02:52 Why Writing Began as Receipts 03:25 Why Your Hour Has Sixty Minutes 03:41 Ur-Nammu and the Oldest Law Code 04:17 Was Sumer Ever a Country? 04:52 Sargon of Akkad Conquers the South 05:56 The Akkadian Empire Cracks 06:27 The Fall of Ur (2004 BC) 07:13 Hammurabi and the Schools of Babylon 07:52 The Last Cuneiform Tablet 08:25 Enheduanna: The First Named Author 09:11 Sumer Today 09:33 Why the Clay Survived Sources: Samuel Noah Kramer, The Sumerians (University of Chicago Press, 1963) Harriet Crawford, Sumer and the Sumerians, 2nd ed. (Cambridge University Press, 2004) Marc Van De Mieroop, A History of the Ancient Near East, ca. 3000-323 BC, 3rd ed. (Wiley-Blackwell, 2016) and King Hammurabi of Babylon (Blackwell, 2005) Nissen, Damerow, Englund, Archaic Bookkeeping (University of Chicago Press, 1993) Joan Goodnick Westenholz, Legends of the Kings of Akkade (Eisenbrauns, 1997) Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature, Oxford (Sumerian King List, Code of Ur-Nammu, Death of Ur-Nammu, Lament for Ur, Enheduanna's hymns): https://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk Betty De Shong Meador, Inanna, Lady of Largest Heart (University of Texas Press, 2000) M. J. Geller, "The Last Wedge," Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 87 (1997) UNESCO World Heritage List, "The Ahwar of Southern Iraq": https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1481 Leonard Woolley, Ur Excavations IV Subscribe for the next entire history. #Sumer #AncientHistory #Mesopotamia #History #Cuneiform #AnimatedHistory