Review Mesopotamia: The Invention of the City, by Gwendolyn Leick

This is a bit out of my usual area. It had been sitting, as many things are wont to do, in my basket, and as I was clearing out the enormo-list of things to actually buy a handful of items there was a sale on. This new book was cut from about £12 to £4, so I decided to get it.

Through looking at ten cities in an approximately chronological order, from Eridu to Babylon, the settlements and civilisation of Mesopotamia are explained to the reader. There are various different peoples/cultures covered, such as Sumerians, Assyrians, and Babylonians. I knew very little of this period (mostly the Persians under Cyrus replacing the Medes and conquering the entire area, which is touched on briefly at the very end) and the book begins with a somewhat prehistoric look which soon turns historical.

The name Mesopotamia means ‘between the rivers’, and the shifting course of the waters plays a major role in cities rising, falling, and rising again. The time periods involved are quite astonishing, literally thousands of years. Equally interesting is the shift from a potentially egalitarian society through to god-kings (in a broad sense, not dissimilar to what happened with Rome).

There are various particular terms which are always explained as they crop up, as are the various gods, which was very useful as I had no idea otherwise what many of them meant. Necessarily, there’s a lot of knowledge gaps with many uncertainties due to lack of evidence. In other areas, fortune preserved tablets which, upon discovery, revealed surprisingly detailed accounts of myths and historical events (or propaganda, perhaps).

I found it a very interesting book, and one good for people unfamiliar with the period.

Thaddeus