Sargon Of Akkad Research Paper

A History of Sumer Leading Up to the Rule of Sargon of Akkad and How His Rule Affected the Sumerians

Sargon of Akkad, was a very distinguished king who ruled the Akkadian empire which was at one point in time, was the Sumerian empire. He helped to create one of the first large civilizations in human history which was made up of many individual city states. The name of the Sumerian empire comes from the Akkadian language and it means “the land of the civilized kings”. Before Sargon of Akkad became the king of the Akkadian empire, he was the ruler of the city of Akkad and led his people with an iron fist. Once he captured the bulk of the Sumerian empire, he then continued on to expand the territory of his empire to help Akkad become one of

the largest empires in the history of the fertile crescent. While most of the advancements occurred much after 4,000 B.C.E the history of the Sumer and the Akkadian empire dates back to 5,500 B.C.E. This was when archeologists believe that the fertile crescent was first inhabited by nomads.
In the 5,500 B.C.E time period, nomads began to settle in what is now fertile crescent, however, it took over a 1,500 more years before major cities and city states emerged. Around 4,000 B.C.E, the first city states such as Ur appeared. Ur was founded in 3,800 B.C.E and was considered the largest city in the world in terms of population. There were also cities such as Ubaid. However, Ubaid was founded in 6,500 B.C.E and it was not directly related to the Sumerian Empire. The city vanished in the following 3,000 years, just before Sargon of Akkad took over. Following the creation of Ur, multiple other city states began to be built adopting the same city structure of Ur leading to many city states built across the fertile crescent.
In these cities, many technological advancements were made, and by 3,600 B.C.E, the Sumerians were very ahead of their time as they had invented the wheel along with writing and sailboats.

The wheel was an invention which allowed for them to establish trade routes along land and this coupled with the invention of sailboats helped them to establish many trade routes across the fertile crescent. They used writing to keep tally of the goods and services for this trade and with these three inventions Sumerian trade improved dramatically. Although they did not use these three creations to a great extent, they would become extremely helpful when the Sumerians started to establish trade with the Indus Valley and the Ancient Egyptians civilizations. Further inventions include irrigation systems and the idea of cities. These were the main inventions of the Sumerians before the period of time during which it became the Akkadian empire. However, they never utilized their resources and innovations until Sargon of Akkad conquered them. This implies that Sargon of Akkad forced change and as an end result had a positive effect on the Sumerian civilization. Aside from starting trade, Sargon of Akkad joined the empire such that the resources were shared which allowed for them to take more people and use them for labor inside the cities for labor. In turn, the human capital went

up.
There were many things that made each Sumerian city state successful even though they were at one point all individual.

This was because each Sumerian city state was built in a similar way. This allowed each of the cities, since the design of these cities were based upon how to maximize efficiency, to be successful when harvesting their crop and other resources such as clothing. They were made out of reeds. Based on the excavations of many major Sumerian cities such as Ur, Uruk, and Lagash, they all, the cities were built around a singular temple called a ziggurat. A ziggurat was a type of temple which looked similar to those found in ancient Mayan territories. The ziggurat had stairs leading up to the top of one three dimensional trapezoid. There were multiple box like structures stacked on top of each other and stairs leading up to them. There were also small rectangular prisms which had multiple squares that were evenly spaced at the top. Arches were engraved on all four sides of this prims and there were two of them in the complete temple. Each Ziggurat was devoted to a particular god. The city, which was surrounded by walls, would be ruled by a priest king who lived in the city as well. There were many buildings in the city all connected by an intricate series of pathways. Every building was made out of mud brick since it was the most abundant resource in the area. However, In the roads themselves, there were canals which were found in the city to bring in water for

further use. This allowed for farmers to have easy access to water their plants. The cities were also surrounded by large fields of grain and land devoted to farming and agriculture in general and from here, there were roads built to help farmers transport goods.
The society of Sumer during the years leading up to Sargon of Akkad’s rule was made up of multiple classes put together in the form of a social spectrum. The classes included the King, the Nobility, the Priests, the Upper class, the Lower class, and the Slaves. The King was the ruler of the city state and his success was measured based off of how well he maintained his empire. If he was not doing well, it would be considered that the gods were displeased with him. If the empire was doing well, the gods were pleased. Below the King was the nobility including the king’s wife and family. The priests and priestesses were below the nobility and were literate in Sumerian. They acted as doctors for specific medical issues including as dentists. They were expected to identify omens and signs. This was followed by the Upper class who were made up of merchants, accountants, astrologers, architect, military men, tutors, and scribes. These eight jobs were very respectable. For merchants, it was respectable since they toured the world and made it to multiple different civilizations to trade and provide economic growth. For the Scribes, it was respectable since not a lot of people were literate. For the remaining jobs, they were all held in high esteem since it involved literacy or it involved a position which was related directly the well being of the country. This was followed by the lower class, which included the farmers who cultivated the crop and eventually other profession who did not belong in the higher class. The slaves who were brought from the nearby mountains to provide necessary manpower to build cities, ziggurats and for farming as well were part of the lowest class and did not have many rights. As compared to Men had more rights than women in Sumer. All young children were educated in writing by the scribes. This lifestyle of the Sumerians, although it did not change, was affected when Sargon of Akkad created the New Akkadian Empire.
Around 2,300 B.C.E Sargon of Akkad conquered all of the independent city states which, together, under a common leader were much more effective. His rule lasted from 2304B.C.E to 2279 B.C.E during which he opened trade with multiple republics. This allowed for the economy of Sumer to grow greatly. However, before he began this process, he marched his forces on major city states all across Sumer and expanded the reaches of the empire much more than it had previously been. The result of this larger more conformed republic was the ability to share more resources between the different city states. Before, the resources that were harvested by the independent city states were not shared, but instead, were traded and were fought over desperately. Now with the merging of all of the city states together, they were shared and more of the energy could be spent on producing goods and trade for the economy.
The negative effect of this was much rebellion. During the rule of Sargon of Akkad, multiple city states, under certain leaders, tried to rebel against the rule. Although Sargon of Akkad was an average ruler, who expanded the territory of the once Sumerian empire, he was rather oppressive. This was because, many city states rebelled against the idea of a conformed government even though the idea of shared resources between them would boost the economy. He also was very biased. Taxes such as food and other goods were imposed on the poorer people and during Sargon’s reign they were very exorbitant. This was because of the products and labor they needed to maintain the city as well as the and labor they needed to maintain the army. Sargon continued to expand his empire tirelessly and through using a large portion of the goods that he needed on the army, he spent the remaining to improve trade leaving no remaining commodity to give back to the people. Also, because there was no money, the people could not be paid back and remained very poor. This resulted in a poor standard of living and this along with the lack of hygiene. This in turn resulted in the poor health condition of many people in the Akkadian empire. Even after his rule, Sargon of Akkad had a negative impact on the Akkadian empire. This was the collapse of his empire. This was because he had not planned the future out such that his children and their children after them could rule the empire after him effectively. This was so that they could continue their reign for a long period of time.
Although the Sumerians made many inventions which helped to advance human society, it was because of Sargon of Akkad that their economy grew. This, in turn, allowed for the first trade to be conducted between two different civilizations. Through this trade, the Sumerians learned to use multiple materials to create other goods to trade again and use in its cities. When Sargon of Akkad joined all of the individual city states of the Sumerian area into one single empire, it allowed for them to increase their workforce since fewer people would be needed as a whole from a singular city state for the army to protect and expand territory. This resulted in increased economic production, and although the quality of life was poor, Sargon of Akkad expanded his empire and helped to make one of the largest empires the world has ever seen. The unique Sumerian empire, although advanced before Sargon of Akkad joined it into a single empire, advanced its economy but collapsed due to the lack of planning for the futures of itself in terms of the royalty.