Geography and History

How Geography helps us learn about History.

Understanding History

• Think of how long history spans. The Earth has been in existence for nearly 4.6 billion years. While we as humans have only been in existence for the last 200,000 years.

• So being the new kids on the block, how can we possibly discover and learn so much about our past?

• The answer is history.

Dividing History• Nearly 5,000 years ago groups of people in Southwest

Asia,(Mesopotamia) and in Africa began to develop the first basic systems of writing.

• They kept written records of their environments, beliefs and human experiences.

• With the creation of a way to record events, this marked the beginning of what we know as HISTORY.

• History- is simply written and recorded events of people.

Earliest Discovered piece of writing in history (discovered in Pakistan)

One of the oldest recorded stories in history is “The Epic of Gilgamesh”, which we will

look at when we study Mesopotamia

• It comes to us from Ancient Sumeria, and was originally written on 12 clay tablets in cuneiform script.

Dividing History

• So if history is the written record of events then what happened the few billion or so years before?

• Well, The name we give the period before history is, yes you guessed it PREHISTORY.

• As I’m sure you learned in Latin class the prefix pre means before.

• So prehistory – is the period of time before writing was invented.

Prehistory • So if there is no written record of what happened before 5,000 years ago

how do we have so much information about life in prehistoric times, from dinosaurs, to Neanderthals.

• The answer to that question is Archeology.

• Archeologists- are scientist who examine objects to learn about past peoples and their culture.

• I hate to tell you most archeologists are not like Indiana Jones. What most archeologists do is dig and excavate through rock and dirt to find prehistoric camps, and caves.

• At these sites archeologists study the bones tools and other object buried for thousands of years, and try to gather information about who used them and why.

Archeology Archeology

History- Not just in a book

• In addition to the written records historians use, they also look at and study a cultures oral tradition.

• Oral Tradition- are stories passed down by word of mouth.

• Oral tradition can be stories about families, or stories about heroes or events in the past.

• Does your family have any oral tradition that they pass on from generation to generation?

Daughtrey Family Oral Tradition

Linking Geography to History • History has dates. As students of history we need to

know when things occurred. Like when was the Declaration of Independence was signed, or when Pearl Harbor was attacked.

• But, we also need to know where these events happened. To do this we go back to our old friend geography. (Yep your not done with it by a long shot).

• Oh those dates by the way July, 4 1776, and December 7, 1941

Geography

• Geography- once again is the study of Earth’s surface and the processes that shape it (Take a guess if this definition will be on the test, the answer is yes!)

• Geography also looks at the features of specific places, such as climate, landscape and location.

• How are these features important when studying a civilization such as ancient Egypt?

Ancient Egypt • Climate- Ancient Egypt was founded close to a desert climate where

it was difficult for living things to survive.

• Landscape- Even though Egypt was located in the desert it had one very important feature that allowed it to thrive, the Nile River. Every year the Nile river would flood and leave rich soil behind allowing farmers to grow crops, to feed a large population

• Location- Egypt was in location that made it difficult for enemies to attack, the deserts to the west, cataracts down the Nile and the Red Sea and Mediterranean Sea made it difficult for enemies to attack.

• Allowing Egypt to form one of the greatest and longest lasting civilizations in history.

Geography

• Knowing the connections between geography and history is often the key to understanding why events took place.

Review: Key Terms History-

the written and recorded events of people.

Prehistory-

the period of time before writing was invented.

Archeologists-

scientists who examine objects to learn about past peoples and their culture

Oral Tradition-

stories passed down by word of mouth.

Geography-

is the study of Earth’s surface and the processes that shape it

Review Key Ideas In what parts of the world did people first develop a system of writing?

Even though oral tradition might contain stories that are not historically accurate, what can they tell us about the past? Cultures beliefs and traditions

How does geography help us better understand history?

To learn about life in prehistoric times archeologists use

a. oral tradition b. objects such as tools

c. early writings d. powerful computers that create hypothesis

Historians use oral traditions to

a. describe their research b. examine the geography of a civilization

c. learn what people in a society d. determine date of objects.

find important