Legacy - The Origins of Civilization

Aug 13, 1991

In places like Uruk and Eridu in modern-day Iraq, humans founded the first cities nearly 6,000 years ago. They left us literature, astronomy, and mathematics, as well as lessons in overpopulation and environmental stewardship.

Aug 20, 1991

Beginning 5,000 years ago, the "Land of the Seven Rivers" cultivated a tradition of nonviolence, renunciation of the material world, and a focus on humans' inner life. Today, these ideas survive in tension with the vestiges of Western colonialism.

Aug 27, 1991

With great thinkers such as Confucius and Lao-Tzu, the Chinese conceived a civilization reflecting cosmic harmony, sustained by civic and social virtue, ancient ritual, and reverence for ancestors.

Sep 10, 1991

In the world's first great nation, the annual flooding of the Nile conferred not only fertility, but also a deep respect for social and cosmic stability, a belief in the resurrection of the dead, and the hope of eternal life.

Sep 17, 1991

Independent of great civilizations elsewhere, the Maya and Aztecs developed a violent, fatalistic culture, envisioning a cosmos that required bloody sacrifice for renewal. It placed the sovereignty of nature above all else - even human life.

Sep 24, 1991

Now adopted nearly all over the globe, the modern Western ideas of individualism, property, and purposeful history trace their roots to Christianity, Greco-Roman humanism, and Germanic social values.