Agriculture In Ancient Mesopotamia
Agriculture was the main economic activity in ancient Mesopotamia. Operating under tough constraints, notably the arid climate, the Mesopotamian farmers developed effective strategies that enabled them to support the development of the first known empires, under the supervision of the institutions which dominated the economy: the royal and provincial palaces, the temples, and the domains of the elites. They focused above all on the cultivation of cereals (particularly barley) and sheep farming, but also farmed Fabaceae, legumes, as well as date palms in the south and grapes in the north. There were two types of Mesopotamian agriculture, corresponding to the two main ecological domains, which largely overlapped with cultural distinctions. The agriculture of southern or Lower Mesopotamia, the land of Sumer and Akkad (region), Akkad, which later became Babylonia received almost no rain and required large scale irrigation works which were supervised by temple estates, but could produce ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Agriculture
Agriculture encompasses crop and livestock production, aquaculture, and forestry for food and non-food products. Agriculture was a key factor in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to live in the cities. While humans started gathering grains at least 105,000 years ago, nascent farmers only began planting them around 11,500 years ago. Sheep, goats, pigs, and cattle were domesticated around 10,000 years ago. Plants were independently cultivated in at least 11 regions of the world. In the 20th century, industrial agriculture based on large-scale monocultures came to dominate agricultural output. , small farms produce about one-third of the world's food, but large farms are prevalent. The largest 1% of farms in the world are greater than and operate more than 70% of the world's farmland. Nearly 40% of agricultural land is found on farms larger than . However, five of every six farm ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Deciduous
In the fields of horticulture and botany, the term deciduous () means "falling off at maturity" and "tending to fall off", in reference to trees and shrubs that seasonally shed Leaf, leaves, usually in the autumn; to the shedding of petals, after flowering; and to the shedding of ripe fruit. The antonym of deciduous in the botanical sense is evergreen. Generally, the term "deciduous" means "the dropping of a part that is no longer needed or useful" and the "falling away after its purpose is finished". In plants, it is the result of natural processes. "Deciduous" has a similar meaning when referring to animal parts, such as deciduous antlers in deer, deciduous teeth (baby teeth) in some mammals (including humans); or decidua, the uterine lining that sheds off after birth. Botany In botany and horticulture, deciduous plants, including trees, shrubs and herbaceous perennials, are those that lose all of their Leaf, leaves for part of the year. This process is called abscission. I ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Discharge Regime
Discharge regime, flow regime, or hydrological regime (commonly termed river regime, but that term is also used for other measurements) is the long-term pattern of annual changes to a stream's discharge at a particular point. Hence, it shows how the discharge of a stream at that point is expected to change over the year. It is thus the hydrological equivalent of climate. The main factor affecting the regime is climate, along with relief, bedrock, soil and vegetation, as well as human activity. Like general trends can be grouped together into certain named groups, either by what causes them and the part of the year they happen (most classifications) or by the climate in which they most commonly appear (Beckinsale classification). There are many different classifications; however, most of them are localized to a specific area and cannot be used to classify all the rivers of the world. When interpreting such records of discharge, it is important to factor in the timescale over wh ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf, sometimes called the Arabian Gulf, is a Mediterranean seas, mediterranean sea in West Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Arabian Sea and the larger Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical NameWorking Paper No. 61, 23rd Session, Vienna, 28 March – 4 April 2006. accessed 9 October 2010 It is connected to the Gulf of Oman in the east by the Strait of Hormuz. The river delta of the Shatt al-Arab forms the northwest shoreline. The Persian Gulf has many fishing grounds, extensive reefs (mostly rocky, but also Coral reef, coral), and abundant pearl oysters, however its ecology has been damaged by industrialization and oil spills. The Persian Gulf is in the Persian Gulf Basin, which is of Cenozoic origin and related to the subduction of the Arabian plate under the Zagros Mountains. The current flooding of the basin started 15,000 years ago due to sea level rise, rising sea levels of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Anatolia
Anatolia (), also known as Asia Minor, is a peninsula in West Asia that makes up the majority of the land area of Turkey. It is the westernmost protrusion of Asia and is geographically bounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the south, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Turkish Straits to the northwest, and the Black Sea to the north. The eastern and southeastern limits have been expanded either to the entirety of Asiatic Turkey or to an imprecise line from the Black Sea to the Gulf of Alexandretta. Topographically, the Sea of Marmara connects the Black Sea with the Aegean Sea through the Bosporus and the Dardanelles, and separates Anatolia from Thrace in Southeast Europe. During the Neolithic, Anatolia was an early centre for the development of farming after it originated in the adjacent Fertile Crescent. Beginning around 9,000 years ago, there was a major migration of Anatolian Neolithic Farmers into Neolithic Europe, Europe, with their descendants coming to dominate the continent a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tigris
The Tigris ( ; see #Etymology, below) is the eastern of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia, the other being the Euphrates. The river flows south from the mountains of the Armenian Highlands through the Syrian Desert, Syrian and Arabian Deserts, before merging with the Euphrates and reaching to the Persian Gulf. The Tigris passes through historical cities like Mosul, Tikrit, Samarra, and Baghdad. It is also home to archaeological sites and ancient religious communities, including the Mandaeans, who use it for Masbuta, baptism. In ancient times, the Tigris nurtured the Assyria, Assyrian Empire, with remnants like the relief of Tiglath-Pileser I, King Tiglath-Pileser. Today, the Tigris faces modern threats from geopolitical instability, dam projects, poor water management, and climate change, leading to concerns about its sustainability. Efforts to protect and preserve the river's legacy are ongoing, with local archaeologists and activists working to safeguard its future ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Euphrates
The Euphrates ( ; see #Etymology, below) is the longest and one of the most historically important rivers of West Asia. Tigris–Euphrates river system, Together with the Tigris, it is one of the two defining rivers of Mesopotamia (). Originating in Turkey, the Euphrates flows through Syria and Iraq to join the Tigris in the Shatt al-Arab in Iraq, which empties into the Persian Gulf. The Euphrates is the List of longest rivers of Asia, fifteenth-longest river in Asia and the longest in West Asia, at about , with a drainage area of that covers six countries. Etymology The term ''Euphrates'' derives from the Koine Greek, Greek ''Euphrátēs'' (), adapted from , itself from . The Elamite name is ultimately derived from cuneiform 𒌓𒄒𒉣; read as ''Buranun'' in Sumerian language, Sumerian and ''Purattu'' in Akkadian language, Akkadian; many cuneiform signs have a Sumerian pronunciation and an Akkadian pronunciation, taken from a Sumerian word and an Akkadian word that mean ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hunter-gatherer
A hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living in a community, or according to an ancestrally derived Lifestyle, lifestyle, in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local naturally occurring sources, especially wild edible plants but also insects, Fungus, fungi, Honey hunting, honey, Eggs as food, bird eggs, or anything safe to eat, or by hunting game (pursuing or trapping and killing Wildlife, wild animals, including Fishing, catching fish). This is a common practice among most vertebrates that are omnivores. Hunter-gatherer Society, societies stand in contrast to the more Sedentism, sedentary Agrarian society, agricultural societies, which rely mainly on cultivating crops and raising domesticated animals for food production, although the boundaries between the two ways of living are not completely distinct. Hunting and gathering was humanity's original and most enduring successful Competition (biology), competitive adaptation in the nat ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Lentil
The lentil (''Vicia lens'' or ''Lens culinaris'') is an annual plant, annual legume grown for its Lens (geometry), lens-shaped edible seeds or ''pulses'', also called ''lentils''. It is about tall, and the seeds grow in Legume, pods, usually with two seeds in each. Lentil seeds are used around the world for culinary purposes. In cuisines of the Indian subcontinent, where lentils are a staple food, staple, split lentils (often with their hulls removed) known as ''dal'' are often cooked into a thick curry that is usually eaten with rice or roti. Lentils are commonly used in stews and soups. Botanical description Name Many different names in different parts of the world are used for the crop lentil. The first use of the word ''lens'' to designate a specific genus was in the 17th century by the botanist Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, Tournefort. The word "lens" for the lentil is of classical Roman or Latin origin, possibly from a prominent Roman family named Lentulus, just as ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Legumes
Legumes are plants in the pea family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seeds of such plants. When used as a dry grain for human consumption, the seeds are also called pulses. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consumption, but also as livestock forage and silage, and as soil-enhancing green manure. Legumes produce a botanically unique type of fruit – a simple dry fruit that develops from a simple carpel and usually dehisces (opens along a seam) on two sides. Most legumes have symbiotic nitrogen-fixing bacteria, Rhizobia, in structures called root nodules. Some of the fixed nitrogen becomes available to later crops, so legumes play a key role in crop rotation. Terminology The term ''pulse'', as used by the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), is reserved for legume crops harvested solely for the dry seed. This excludes green beans and green peas, which are considered vegetable crops. Also excluded are seeds that are main ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Wheat
Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, wheat species and hybrids include the most widely grown common wheat (''T. aestivum''), spelt, durum, emmer, einkorn, and Khorasan wheat, Khorasan or Kamut. The archaeological record suggests that wheat was first cultivated in the regions of the Fertile Crescent around 9600 BC. Wheat is grown on a larger area of land than any other food crop ( in 2021). World trade in wheat is greater than that of all other crops combined. In 2021, world wheat production was , making it the second most-produced cereal after maize (known as corn in North America and Australia; wheat is often called corn in countries including Britain). Since 1960, world production of wheat and other grain crops has tripled and is expected to grow further through the middle of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Grass
Poaceae ( ), also called Gramineae ( ), is a large and nearly ubiquitous family (biology), family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos, the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns and pasture. The latter are commonly referred to collectively as grass. With around 780 genera and around 12,000 species, the Poaceae is the fifth-largest :plant families, plant family, following the Asteraceae, Orchidaceae, Fabaceae and Rubiaceae. The Poaceae are the most economically important plant family, including staple foods from domesticated cereal crops such as maize, wheat, rice, oats, barley, and millet for people and as forage, feed for livestock, meat-producing animals. They provide, through direct human consumption, just over one-half (51%) of all dietary energy; rice provides 20%, wheat supplies 20%, maize (corn) 5.5%, and other grains 6%. Some members of the Poaceae are used as building materials ( ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |