In my Western Civilization class were currently discussing/ debating which civilization of the following has contributed the most to society/ the human race:
Give the Phoenicians some credit for inventing the alphabet.
Jace Cooper
Assyrians contributed dank maymays.
Chase Thompson
Europe: Sumer, Greece, Rome, Britain East Asia: China South Asia: Mauryans, Guptas, Meluha (Indus Valley Civ) West Asia: Sumer, Egypt, Babylon, Arabia, Israel Africa: Arabs
Brayden Gomez
The alphabet was invented by Sinaitic people so no.
The alphabet was invented at least twice,by the Ugarits in the bronze age and again by the Egyptians in the iron age. The Egyptian one is the one the Phonecians picked up and popularised, they didn't invent it tho.
Parker Hughes
Mfw Babylonians/ Hebrews are the two civilizations my group is researching :^)
Luis Bailey
>and again by Egyptians in the iron age
Hum no, that was in the bronze age too
Eli Watson
>Arabia You mean Mesopotamia, since any Arab worth a shit is from the region of the Levante or Egypt during the Golden age.
The only tribes that stayed back in the desert where the shit ones or the religious clerics that were in charge of keeping Medina in check and oversee the haji.
Matthew Fisher
No I mean the Arabs under Mohammed and his successors. Like them or loathe them, they've had a massive impact on the civilisation of the middle east.
Anthony Reyes
Always me, to be fair I'd give Phoenicians 4 for helping to urbanize Europe and North Africa and increasing trade in the Western and Eastern Med
Camden Russell
Not really, Carthage itself was razed to the ground and it's colonies in Spain existed alongside native urbanised peoples, suhc as the Tartessians and the people of Saguntum.
Owen Ortiz
Carthage wasn't the only city in north Africa and "Tartessians" were hardly urbanized
Aaron Murphy
The handful of cities they built in North Africa notwithstanding, Spain was already urbanizing before the Carthageans started colonising it. And if the Carthageans weren't there,Tunisia would just have been settled by the Greeks instead. It's not like they were the only city-builders around.
Brayden Davis
>Spain was already urbanized
No, it wasn't, the few native settlements in the "Tartessian" zone were glorified villages built around 7-6th BC, so after the Phoenicians came, and it was Phoenician traders who gave the alphabet to the Iron age Greeks
Nicholas Gomez
>glorified villages
You keep implying this but the settlements the Carthageans built in Spain were not any more "city like" than native sites such as saguntum.
Thomas Robinson
Saguntum was built in the 5th century BC
Anthony Walker
And the Carthageans barely had any presence in Iberia before the 3rd, so what? Carthage is a meme civilisation, it's a great "could have been" but it's ultimate influence is marginal.
Gavin Hernandez
Love the discussion but if I could get some responses to the original question that'd be great
Dylan Gray
A ranking:
>1. Sumerians: Literally the first civilization. Most ideas in abrahamic religions stem from their mythology, also proto-Sumerians (if you will) domesticated a shit ton of species .
>2. Babylonians: Time is in intervals of 60 because of them, Also a shit ton of Astronomy, mathematics, etc..
>3. Phoenicians: Their alpphabet is a pretty big deal.
>4. Hittites:Their chariots were pretty sick, but not much else in terms of long-term contribution
>5. Hebrews: pretty shit overall but i guess their one-god meme ended up being pretty big.
7. Assyrians: Overrated , mostly did nothing but burn down shit and genocides. I guess they had a nice library but other than that fucking shit.
Isaiah Rodriguez
America. Reason: #1. Bitches.
Daniel Gonzalez
theres no wrong answer u sperg just pick the one you like the most for reasons pick 3 reasons conclusion intro boom ur done
1. Sumerians 2. Babylonians 3. Hebrews 4. Persians 5. Phoenicians (their ranking is highly dependent on the alphabet)
POWER GAP
6. Hittites 7. Chaldeans
POWER GAP
9001. Assyrians
Jack Stewart
strongly depends on who you ask, Jews will tell you Hebrews contributed most In Iran they will tell you about Persian glory. Germans will claim to have invented the wheel. Only exception is Americans. They will make no bullshit claim about ancient glory.
Jacob Clark
>No Egypt Tell me, whose idea was it for a 365 day calendar?
And for the masons out there, you should well know how much of your concepts of statecraft really comes from Egypt.
Go with the Minoans, or Mycenaeans on, tell the voice in your head quack quack.
Michael Rivera
>Only exception is Americans. They will make no bullshit claim about ancient glory.
Probably because they haven't existed long enough in comparable context that they could brag about X contribution so many thousands or hundreds of years ago. If they could they would.
It's not as though Americans don't try and bullshit about their lineage and contributions though
>Muh ROME inheritors >Muh American exceptionalism >Muh PAX AMERICANA
Americans are just as vile in making claims as any other.
Owen Foster
easily persians though as they are the closest thing to having anything to do with the power formation of >West >Ern >Civilisation
Jackson Russell
They're just the closest time wise, but conceptually, the Egyptians hold the most influence.
Ethan Hernandez
>Hittites:Their chariots were pretty sick, but not much else in terms of long-term contribution They were one of the first to use iron
Julian Gonzalez
>summer break is barely over >children are already asking Veeky Forums to do their homework for them
Aiden Reed
>In my Western Civilization class were currently discussing/ debating which civilization of the following has contributed the most to society/ the human race: >contributed the most to society/ the human race: Either you're trolling or your "Western Civilization" class is pathetically childish.
Aaron Lewis
Phoenicians did though since the 8th century bc
Connor Garcia
no uni class will debate such thing because cultures are not superior or inferior to others
especially not discussing eastern ones in a class which you made up
polshitter
Julian Gutierrez
Not really, iron was discovered first in a Assyrian colony in Anatolia predating the Hittities, who just copied it from those guys
Joseph Miller
>because cultures are not superior or inferior to others
Liam Martinez
>t downsyndrome
Caleb Murphy
>Arabs Islamic contributions to Europe were mainly by non-Arabs though.
>British empire is the best Debatable, severely so. >biggest empire Maybe, again depends on defintion of "biggest". Total area? Population? Growth/output? Lot of factors there.
Jason Miller
>Islamic contributions to Europe were mainly by non-Arabs though. You mean Arab contributions to Europe were mainly by non-Muslims
Kayden Brooks
Not really, no, not what I meant at all.
Leo Edwards
Most of the contributions in mathematics and sciences were by Persians/Iranians, Indians, Berbers that came back around to Europe.
Jose Morales
Sumeria pioneered civilization.
The Achaemenids defeated competing warlords and emerged as a vast empire presiding over the early classical period.
Phoenicians pioneered Mediterranean trade.
The Assyrians and Babylonians straddled the bronze age collapse and dominated Mesopotamia before the Persian empire.
Hittites were influential in Anatolia.
Chaldeans were influential in Mesopotamia though not as successful.
Hebrews were mainly a cultural/religious influence, though the effects of this would only occur centuries later.
Hudson Ward
You forgot about Zoroastrianism for the Persians
Jeremiah Howard
> Phoenicians pioneered Mediterranean trade.
Not really, those would be Myceneans and Cypriots
Jaxon Jenkins
>Phoenicians pioneered Mediterranean trade.
Not really, those would be Myceneans and Cypriots
William Harris
Minoans*
Levi Reed
Minoans never ventured to the Western Mediterranean as far as we know.
Jose Richardson
yes they did
Landon White
No, they didn't, there's no trace of Minoan pottery or materials in the Western Med, Cretans ventured the Western Med only in the Mycenean period.
Gabriel Gonzalez
they were middle men merchants, and there is
Carson Rivera
>And there is
What's this supposed to mean?
>They were middle men merchants
What does it mean?
Elijah Green
...
Brody Thompson
Can't see anything, and most of these maps posted here.
Give me evidence of Minoan ceramics and objects found in the Western Med before the Myceneans took over the island.
Mason James
ur autistic why would minoan ship its pottery to spain what a fucking autistic retard fuck off pleb
Xavier Turner
Because that would be evidence of Minoans in the western Med, you havent given me ONE piece of evidence of Minoans traveling West of Greece, let alone Spain.
Gabriel Cook
Who contributed the most is a bit of an ambiguous statement so I based my list on the biggest changes. Zoroastrianism wasn't as pivotal as its Abrahamic successors and the main effects would come centuries later, a lot was added that can't easily be attributed to Zoroastrianism. Don't want to dismiss religion as a spook and ignore its impact entirely, the evidence is just not strong enough. You're right, maybe I should have said pioneered the restoration and expansion of trade after the bronze age collapse.
Carter Baker
YOU FORGOT THE GREEKS AND ROMANS. FAGGOT.
Connor Wright
Brits, French, Romans, Greeks, Germans and Spaniards are undoubtedly #1
James Morales
but who is #1 in that list
Benjamin Brown
yeah, that map, now go disprove it
Elijah Reed
thats some spooky shit right there
Jordan Thompson
I'm guessing you mean apart from Greeks, whose picture you have used in your OP.
Matthew Fisher
Zoroastrianism was pivotal for its influence on the Abrahamic faiths.
Isaac Brooks
No, you are the one who has to support your outlandish claims, posting a map with no source isn't a proof of anything, give me one single Academic article which states the existence of Minoan ceramics, objects/weapons west of Greece which testifiy the presence of Pre-Mycenean Cretans (Minoans) West of Greece, as far as I know there are no archaeological proof of Cretans sailing west of Greece.
You are ignorant and arrogant, your only arguments consist on using buzzwords without providing one single proof of what you so vehemently claim, this is getting tedious, dealing with someone who doesn't want to discover the truth but just keeps making the same unsupported claims is a waste of time.
What I know, by having actually read articles and a few books about the subject is that Myceneans (yes, among them Cretans under Mycenean influence too) and Cypriots sailed west to South Italy and the furthest we know they went is Sardinia, it's doubtful that they reached Iberia, because the few Mycenean materials there were found in later contexts, when Myceneans had already collapsed, and thus probably were mediated by Sardinians.
And yet you insist on claiming that Minoans reached not only Italy, but Spain too.
That said, I am open to change my ideas if you bring any proof, an unsourced map from a random site is not a proof, you're only coming off as an arrogant idiot.
Luis Baker
>Child in a college course
Also, this is really good discussion, nothing people are responding with I am using, I was just curious as to what you guys thought. Here's your (You) though
Parker Brooks
Rome and Athens I'd say. Just look at the civil calendar, it directly derives from the Julian calendar.
Lucas Nguyen
If Britain is relevant to Europe then France deserves a mention. You should also add that western civilisation has been a huge influence on all other extant civilisations.
>Africa: Arabs Relevant to North Africa and the Sahel but not really anywhere else. Africa isn't a single sphere and should be divided into subregions like Asia.
>North Africa Egypt, Phoenicia, Rome, Caliphates, westerners
>West Africa Ife, Ghana, Muslims, Westerners
>Central/Southern Africa Bantus, Westerners
>East Africa Egypt, Ethiopia, Arabs, Persians, westerners
Luis Morgan
>If Britain is relevant to Europe then France deserves a mention Roman was the only relevence until Varus went and fucked pan-roman up for everyone at teutoberg. dude litearlly fucked history.
Ayden Collins
I forgot the Iranians had heavily colonized the shit out of East Africa.
Pax Romana continued for nearly 2 centuries after Varus. The only thing the debacle proved was the general extent of Roman expansion into Northern European was checked.
Tyler Murphy
What the fuck kind of class teaches you about LE CONTRIBUTION TO HUMANITY shit? Ranking civilizations is for autists and normies with no knowledge of history.
Jace Butler
Sumerians obviously. If you have to choose only one of those.