Mesopotamian Influence Today
The wheels on the bus go ‘round and ‘round….. but they wouldn’t if not for one invention that occurred in Mesopotamia. Ancient Mesopotamia’s influence goes much farther than a common children’s song. The way that we measure time, our various modes of transportation, and how we communicate are three of the ways that Mesopotamia still speaks to us today. We measure the passage of time with seconds, minutes, hours, days, et cetera.
Sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour, and 24 hours in a day are the standard, international measurements for time. Whether you’re in Europe, in China, or in Brazil, time is measured in the same units. But who came up with these measurements? The people of Sumer, at the southern end of the Fertile Crescent where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers meet the Persian Gulf. These people were some of the first to develop astronomy and mathematics, studying the sky and documenting the movements of planets and stars. Their number system was based on six, instead of ten like ours is now, and from them we get sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour, and so on, as well as 360 degrees in a circle. We still use these measurements today, proving that all of Mesopotamia’s legacy is not lost. We also demonstrate this legacy by moving. Not by running or walking, but by nearly all of the other varying modes of transportation used today. From rollerblading to airplanes, almost every vehicle in our society has wheels. Without wheels, we would walk,run, or ride, or be dragged or carried everywhere. We would use sleds and sleighs instead of carts and cars. Our society would not run nearly as smoothly as it does now. Also, we use wheels to create thrown pots and bowls of clay. Just imagine the plates and vases we would have if nothing could be made on a pottery wheel. The wheel, this important part of our lives, is thought to have originated in Sumer, where goods from as far away as India have been found. These goods could not have
Sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour, and 24 hours in a day are the standard, international measurements for time. Whether you’re in Europe, in China, or in Brazil, time is measured in the same units. But who came up with these measurements? The people of Sumer, at the southern end of the Fertile Crescent where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers meet the Persian Gulf. These people were some of the first to develop astronomy and mathematics, studying the sky and documenting the movements of planets and stars. Their number system was based on six, instead of ten like ours is now, and from them we get sixty seconds in a minute, sixty minutes in an hour, and so on, as well as 360 degrees in a circle. We still use these measurements today, proving that all of Mesopotamia’s legacy is not lost. We also demonstrate this legacy by moving. Not by running or walking, but by nearly all of the other varying modes of transportation used today. From rollerblading to airplanes, almost every vehicle in our society has wheels. Without wheels, we would walk,run, or ride, or be dragged or carried everywhere. We would use sleds and sleighs instead of carts and cars. Our society would not run nearly as smoothly as it does now. Also, we use wheels to create thrown pots and bowls of clay. Just imagine the plates and vases we would have if nothing could be made on a pottery wheel. The wheel, this important part of our lives, is thought to have originated in Sumer, where goods from as far away as India have been found. These goods could not have