| Term | Definition |
|---|
| Mesopotamia | the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers |
| silt | the fine soil carried by rivers and deposited on nearby lands |
| civilization | an advanced form of culture that developed in cities |
| Sumer | a region of city-states in Mesopotamia that was home to the first civilization |
| city-state | a political unit made up of a city and its surrounding lands |
| ziggurat | a temple built atop a series of increasingly smaller platforms |
| polytheistic | believing in many gods |
| cuneiform | the first-known writing system, which used wedge-shaped symbols and was developed in Sumer |
| Fertile Crescent | a region stretching from the Persian Gulf northwest up the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and west over to the Mediterranean Sea |
| Hammurabi's Code | one of the world's first law codes, compiled by the ruler Hammurabi |
| Harappan civilization | an ancient civilization that developed along the Indus River |
| grid | a network of horizontal and vertical lines that create squares or rectangles |
| Anatolian Peninsula | in Southwest Asia between the Black Sea and Mediterranean Sea |
| Plateau of Iran | a high plateau in central and eastern Iran, surrounding |
| Tigris River | a river of Southwest Asia that flows from a plateau on the Anatolian Peninsula to the Persian Gulf(North) |
| Euphrates River | a river of Southwest Asia that flows from a plateau on the Anatolian Peninsula to the Persian Gulf (South) |
| oasis | fertile or green spot in desert created by underground water coming to the surface |
| plateau | a high area of flat land |
| Arabian Peninsula | peninsula of Southwest Asia between the Red Sea and Persian Gulf |
| Bedouin | an Arabic-speaking, traditionally nomadic people of Southwest Asia |
| Muhammad | the founder and major prophet of Islam |
| monotheism | a belief in one god |
| Islam | a monotheistic religion based on the teachings of Muhammad and the writings of the Qur' an, the Muslim holy book |
| Muslim | a believer in the religion of Islam who accepts Allah as the only god |
| Ottoman Empire | a Muslim Empire based in Turkey that lasted from the 1300s to 1922 |
| OPEC | Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, founded in 1960 |
| Kurd | a member of an ethnic group that does not have its own country but whose homeland lies in parts of Turkey, Iraq, and Iran |
| Persia | a historic region of Southwest Asia located mostly in what is now Iran |
| shah | title for king of Persia or Iran |
| theocracy | a government run by religious leaders |
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