Technology

A

1

Rise of Agriculture

By the time of the Bronze Age, the human societies that dotted every continent had long since made a number of other technological advances. They had developed barbed spears, the bow and arrow, animal-oil lamps, and bone needles for making containers and clothing. They had also embarked on a major cultural revolution; the shift from nomadic hunting and herding societies to the more settled practice of agriculture.

Farming communities first emerged following the end of the most recent ice age, about 10,000 bc. Their traces can be found in widely scattered areas, from southeastern Asia to Mexico. The most famous ones occur in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) near the temperate and fertile river valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates. The loose soil in this region, known as the Fertile Crescent, was easily scratched for planting, and an abundance of trees was available for firewood.

By 5000 bc, farming communities were established in areas known today as Syria, Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Greece, and the islands of Crete and Cyprus. Agricultural societies in these places constructed stone buildings, used the sickle to harvest grain, developed a primitive plowstick, and advanced their skills in metalworking. Trade in flint also began. By 4000 bc, farming had spread westward from these centers to the Danube River in central Europe, southward to the Mediterranean shores of Africa (including the Nile River), and eastward to the Indus Valley.

Development of the Nile River valley led to other technological advances. In that valley, the river floods in the early spring. A system of irrigation and canals had to be developed to water the crops during the growing seasons, when insufficient rain falls. Land ownership had to be redetermined each year by a system of surveying, because property markers often were lost during the floods. The Tigris and Euphrates valleys presented other technological problems. Floods came later in the growing season, so that people had to master the craft of building dikes and flood barriers.

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A

2

Other Early Developments

To assist the efficient transportation of minerals for the growing copper-working industry, two-wheeled carts were constructed; the oldest wheels yet found date from about 3500 bc, in Mesopotamia (see Wheel). The yoke, which was used with the plow, was adapted to these first land vehicles. The most frequently employed carriers of goods, however, were reed boats and wood rafts, also first observed in Mesopotamia and Egypt (see Boats and Boatbuilding). An important result of trade in pottery, metals, and raw materials was the creation of a mark, or seal, used to identify individual creators or owners. Other marks, made with a wedge-shaped reed on soft clay, were devised in Mesopotamia to record commercial transactions. These so-called cuneiform inscriptions were the first form of true writing to be preserved.

Human technology also began to manifest another of its effects: major alteration of the environment. Water management has already been mentioned, but other practices effected greater changes. For example, the demand for firewood led to deforestation, and the overgrazing of sheep and cattle caused fewer new trees to grow in the thin soils of the region. Thus, animal domestication, single-crop agriculture, deforestation, and periodic floods brought about the gradual appearance of desert areas.

B

Urbanization

After about 3000 bc, one of the most complex creations of humankind appeared: the city. From this point forward, technology cannot be described only in terms of simple tools, agricultural advancements, and technical processes such as metallurgy, because the city itself is a technological system. This is evident even in the first written symbols used to represent a city; the symbol is a circle containing networks of lines that indicate transportation and communication systems. The emergence of the city made possible a surplus of food and an abundance of material wealth, which in turn made possible the institution of holy kingship and the construction of temples, tombs, and citadels. The accumulation of precious metals, the acquisition of the power to build defensive walls, and the control of armies and priests ensured the ascendancy of the king, who may be called the first urban technologist.

The ziggurats of Mesopotamia and the pyramids of Egypt symbolize the organizational power and the technological magnitude of the first urban settlements. The pyramid of King Djoser (reigned 2630-2611 bc) of Egypt was built at Şaqqārah by Imhotep around 2620 bc. The first engineer known by name, Imhotep was worshiped as one of the gods of wisdom. The Great Pyramid of King Khufu involved the organization of more than 100,000 workers and the cutting of 2.3 million blocks of stone, each weighing 2 to 4 metric tons. The construction of such massive buildings and monuments, the growth of trade in metalware, and the development of water-resource management also brought about a standardization of measurement. In Mesopotamia the cubit became the standard of length, and the shekel the standard of weight. Time was measured in Egypt with a calendar that divided the yearly cycle of seasons into months and days (see Archaeoastronomy).

Urbanization also stimulated a greater need for writing. The Egyptians improved on the clumsy clay tablet by manufacturing, from papyrus plants, a paperlike material on which they wrote in hieroglyphs. In addition, the city brought about a new division of labor: the caste system. This structure provided security, status, and leisure for an intellectual class of scribes, doctors, teachers, engineers, magicians, and diviners; the greatest resources, however, were allotted to the military.

C

The Rise of the Military

The first cities were also, in effect, war machines, built within walls for defense and organized for battle and conquest. Urban centers at Ur, Nippur, Uruk, Thebes, Heliopolis, Assur, Nineveh, and Babylon were arsenals of destructive weaponry. The goal of a military force was to lay waste the city of its enemy. Ur, in Sumer, was not only one of the first great cities to arise (about 4000 bc) but also one of the first to be destroyed (about 2000 bc). Similarly, in the Indus Valley far to the east, the great city of Mohenjo-Daro was founded about 2500 bc and destroyed about 1700 bc by chariot armies from the north. This same pattern was repeated in Peru and Ecuador in about 1000 bc and later in Central America.

Military technology in the ancient world developed, loosely, in three stages (see Army). In the first stage arose the infantry with its leather or copper helmets, bows, spears, shields, and swords. This stage was followed by the development of chariots (see Chariot), which at first were clumsy vehicles for the use of commanders. The later addition of spokes to the wheels to lighten them (circa 2000 bc), and a bit and bridle for the horse, made the chariot a light war machine that could outflank enemy infantry. The third stage of ancient military technology centered on increasing the mobility and speed of the cavalry. The Assyrians, with their knowledge of iron weaponry and their superb horsemanship, dominated much of the civilized world between 1200 and 612 bc.

With the introduction of the stirrup from Asia about the 2nd century bc, horsemen were able to obtain better leverage in fighting with swords, and they made chariot warfare obsolete. Swift-striking cavalry units, first observed in Egypt and Persia, became the major military forces. With their emergence came the need for better transportation and communication systems. The Persians were the first to set up a network of roads and posting stations in order to rule their vast empire, which extended all the way from the Punjab to the Mediterranean Sea.

D

Greek and Roman Technologies

The Persian Empire of Cyrus the Great was overthrown and succeeded by the empire of Greece's Alexander the Great. Greece had first become a power through its skill in shipbuilding and trading and by its colonization of the shores of the Mediterranean. The Greeks defeated the Persians, in part, because of their naval power.

The Persians and Greeks also introduced a new caste into the division of labor: slavery. By the time of Greece's Golden Age, its civilization depended on slaves for nearly all manual labor. Most scholars agree that in societies that practice slavery, problems in productivity tend to be solved by increasing the number of workers rather than by looking for new production methods or new energy sources. Because of this, theoretical knowledge and learning in Greece—and later in Rome—was largely separated from physical labor and manufacturing.

This is not to say that the Greeks did not develop many new technological ideas. People such as Archimedes, Hero of Alexandria, Ctesibius, and Ptolemy wrote about the principles of siphons, pulleys, levers, cams, fire engines, cogs, valves, and turbines. Some practical contributions of the Greeks were of great importance, such as the water clock of Ctesibius, the diptra (a surveying instrument) of Hero of Alexandria, and the screw pump of Archimedes. Similarly, Greek shipping was improved by Thales of Miletus, who introduced methods of navigation by triangulation, and by Anaximander, who produced the first world map. Nevertheless, the technological advances of the Greeks were not on a par with their contributions to theoretical knowledge and their wide-ranging speculations.

The Roman Empire that engulfed and succeeded that of the Greeks was somewhat similar in this respect. The Romans, however, were great technologists in the sense of organizing and building; they established an urban civilization that enjoyed the first long peaceful period in human history. The great change in engineering that occurred in the Roman period came as a shift from building tombs, temples, and fortifications to the construction of enormous systems of public works. Using water-resistant cement and the principle of the arch, Roman engineers built 70,800 km (44,000 mi) of roads across their vast empire. They also built numerous sports arenas and public baths and hundreds of aqueducts, sewers, and bridges. The engineer of public works for Rome in the 1st century ad, Sextus Julius Frontinus, fought corruption and illegal practices and took great pride in the public works that provided better sanitary conditions for the citizens of Rome.

Roman engineers were also responsible for introducing the water mill and for the subsequent design of undershot and overshot water wheels, which were used to grind grain, saw wood, and cut marble. In the military sphere, the Romans advanced technology by improving weapons such as the javelin and the catapult (see Artillery).

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