Early World History
September 2025 - June 2026
Unit 0: Prehistory
Creation Myths
Readings:
Mayan Popol Vuh
Buddhist Long Discourses 27
Summary: Students compared the Mayan creation myth to the modern account of the Big Bang.
Key Questions:
What might we have to learn from reading ancient texts like the Mayan Popol Vuh? Students concluded that, at the very least, they offer us something about the people who told the story. E.g., The Popol Vuh tells us something about the Mayans.
How might we account for the vast similarities between something like the Mayan Popol Vuh and the Hebrew account of Genesis? We can begin approaching an answer when we recognize that both the Mayans and the Hebrews were trying to determine something about the world and reality they lived in, and both worlds (despite their obvious differences) shared important and basic similarities. This is true for both objective reality (the physical world) and subjective reality (what it is like to be a human being).
How do we know about the Big Bang? ← I never got an answer here that I fully understood, much less that I could convey to the class in a way they could understand.
What are some of the similarities and differences in the Mayan, Hebrew, and Modern Creation Stories? Notably, both the Hebrew and Mayan creation stories (1) begin with the Word or speech, and (2) prominently feature a serpent. (3) Both stories feature a creator who uses speech to bring order to chaos. In the Mayan story, the serpent and the creator god are allies. In the Hebrew story, they are adversaries. All three stories tell the story of something emerging out of nothing. The key distinction between the ancient and modern stories is the presence or absence of a creator. The Big Bang does not include a God or gods (or serpents) to do the creating, and therefore does not account for the Word or speech it tells of creation.
What are some of the similarities shared between the Hebrew and the Mayan civilizations (that might account for these similarities in story)? (1) Snakes were among the first adversaries on our path of evolution. As we learn in Sapiens, (2) the key distinction between homosapiens and other humans was our capacity for mass coordination via shared stories. Shared stories are only possible because of speech.
Sapiens
Summary: Our discussion on Sapiens focused on the key lessons from the first two sections of the book: (1) The Cognitive Revolution, and (2) The Agricultural Revolution. In the Cognitive Revolution, Harari argues that once humans could create “shared fictions” (e.g., myths, laws, gods, money), we became capable of coordinating at ever-larger scales. Our ability to coordinate via shared stories allowed us to outcompete (and dominate) every other hominin species.
The Agricultural Revolution, by contrast, reads as a tragic inversion of progress. Harari suggests that farming domesticated us as much as we domesticated wheat: populations swelled, labor intensified, diets worsened, and inequality deepened. The deeper lesson is that civilizations grew more complex while individual lives grew harder. Although this was not mentioned in class, Harari’s story mirrors the Genesis account of tilling the land and working by the sweat of the brow, etc (Genesis 3:17-19).
Objections to Sapiens
Importantly, we would later take issue with Harari on two fronts.
First, we objected to the term “shared fictions” in our lesson titled “Are Ideas Real?” Here, we noted that our lives get much worse when certain “ideas” are not treated as real. This qualifies as evidence of their realness. The key example here is love. A family that does not believe in the reality of love will inevitably be worse off than a family that does believe in the reality of love, and therefore, we notice the existence of love in its absence. Some other “ideas” that clearly affect reality are numbers, justice, freedom, and beauty. We have since shifted from the term “shared fictions” toward using the term “shared stories” or “shared ideas.”
Secondly, we took issue with Harari’s purely negative depiction of civilization through the character of Enkidu in the Epic of Gilgamesh. I will address this more directly in the Epic of Gilgamesh section below.
What is Civilization?
We focused here on the trajectory of civilization and laid out the following cause-and-effect mechanism.
Agriculture → Food Surplus (as one person can now make enough food for two or more people, people are now freed to pursue other crafts) → Specialization (as people specialized, they produced various goods to exchange) → Trade (growing trade networks require a medium of exchange) → Money (trade and money necessitate accounting) → Writing
We have since expanded on this trajectory and will continue to do so throughout the course.
Unit 1: Myths and Shared Stories
In the summer reading, Harari posited that homo sapiens excelled due to their ability to coordinate via shared stories. In Unit 1, we began to engage with key “shared stories” of various ancient civilizations. In class discussions, we worked to extrapolate the key lessons and understandings from these shared stories that the ancient civilizations used to coordinate their people and build their civilizations.
Mesopotamia
Enheduanna
Enheduanna is the earliest known author. She was the high priestess of Ur and the daughter of Sargon of Akkad, the first ruler of the Akkadian Empire. In class, we read some of her writing to get a feel for early civilization. Her writings are primarily dramatic pleas to the Mesopotamian gods that describe her dire situation after her father was overthrown and she subsequently lost her position as high priestess. With Enheduanna, we first encountered ancient politics and religion, and we met our first character in the greater Mesopotamian story.
The Epic of Gilgamesh
Plot
We meet Gilgamesh as a tyrannical king of Uruk, an ancient Mesopotamian city, and the height of civilization in the ancient world. He is ruling in a way that brings both terror and despair to his people. As a response to his terror, his people pray to their gods to bring someone who is his equal in strength and power to overthrow him and rule more justly.
The prayers are answered, and the gods create a “wild man” who lives in the woods amongst the animals (very similar to our Tarzan story). His name is Enkindu. Upon receiving word of this wildman, the Temple priestess Shamhat is sent into the wild to civilize him and bring him into society. She does so successfully.
Enkindu learns about the terrors Gilgamesh is inflicting upon his people and decides to do something about it. He challenges Gilgamesh to a fight, and they wrestle for many hours. Ultimately, Enkindu acknowledges Gilgamesh's superior strength. But, importantly, Gilgamesh has developed a deep respect for Enkidu, and the two become friends. The mutual respect and friendship Gilgamesh develops with Enkidu soften his heart, and he becomes a more just ruler.
With his new friend, Gilgamesh proposes a journey to the Cedar Forest to slay the monstrous demigod Humbaba in order to gain fame and renown. With great trepidation, Enkidu agrees. With the help of the Mesopotamian sun god Shamash, the two heroes defeat Humbaba.
The gods, angered by the killing of Humbaba, decree that one of the heroes must die, and Enkidu falls ill. His decline is slow and agonizing, and Gilgamesh watches helplessly as his friend slips away. Before Enkidu dies, he first curses Shamat, the priestess who civilized him and brought him into civilization. But Shamash reasons with him and notes that he met his best friend in civilization and also enjoyed all the nice things that Uruk had to offer. His gentle persuasion breaks through Enkidu’s bitterness, and Enkidu withdraws the curse and blesses Shamat instead.
Enkidu’s death shatters Gilgamesh; the triumphant king who once feared nothing now trembles before the mystery of his own mortality. And so he sets out once more, this time not for fame or conquest, but in desperate search of the secret to eternal life. He decides to seek out Utnapishtim, the ancient survivor of the great flood, hoping he holds the key to immortality. After endless travel, he arrives at the waters of death, a boundary no mortal should cross, and finds Utnapishtim dwelling at the farthest edge of creation. Utnapishtim takes pity on Gilgamesh and challenges him to a test. The King must stay awake for six days and seven nights, to show he is ready for immortality. Gilgamesh is unable to do so and begins to return home in failure.
As they are leaving, Utnapishtim's wife asks her husband to offer a parting gift. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh that at the bottom of the sea, there lives a plant that will make him young again. Gilgamesh, by binding stones to his feet so he can walk on the bottom, manages to obtain the plant. But when Gilgamesh stops to bathe, the plant is stolen by a serpent, who sheds its skin as it departs. Gilgamesh weeps at the futility of his efforts. He has lost all chance of immortality. Finally, he returns to Uruk, where the sight of its massive walls prompts him to praise his city and civilization at large.
Themes and Lessons
Gilgamesh begins as an evil king but softens and gains a conscience through his friendship with Enkidu. This is a lesson exceptionally relevant for early civilization, as it points to the transition from adversarial relationships (e.g., that of a tyrant to his people) to cooperation (e.g., that of a just King to his people).
The hero confronts death and mortality, which is the theme that will be present in nearly every important story from the ancient world.
Both Gilgamesh and Enkidu decide in favor of civilization, and thereby present an oppositional argument to Harari’s view of the agricultural revolution. Before Enkidu dies, he first curses Shamat, the priestess who civilized him and brought him into civilization. In response, Shamash says, “Enkidu, why are you cursing the priestess Shamhat? Wasn’t it she who gave you fine bread fit for a god and fine beer fit for a king, who clothed you in a glorious robe and gave you splendid Gilgamesh as your friend? He will lay you down on a bed of honor, and the people of Uruk will mourn you.” So, what is it that Shamash argues was worthwhile about civilization? Food and drink, friendship, honor, and mourning. The last one is especially strange, as we don’t usually think of mourning as a positive, but here it is presented as so. The gentle persuasion of Shamat breaks through Enkidu’s bitterness, and Enkidu withdraws the curse and blesses Shamat instead. This, in turn, is a blessing of civilization (and being civilized) as a whole. It is a decision in favor of the Agricultural Revolution that Harari argued against.
The students considered what we can and cannot know about Mesopotamian civilization based on The Epic of Gilgamesh and additional archeological evidence.
Materials
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