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8. The Sumerians - Fall of the First Cities

Fall of Civilizations · podcast · Watch on YouTube

World historyDocumentaries & storytelling

What it is

Episode 8 of the Fall of Civilizations podcast, a roughly two and a half hour history of the Sumerians. It covers their mysterious origins, invention of writing and mathematics, great early cities and eventual collapse, with myths, proverbs and recreated music.

Why Hacker News recommends it

HN commenters strongly recommend it as an audiobook-length, deeply informative introduction to Sumer and early Mesopotamian civilization.

  • 7 people recommended it
  • 9 different months
  • 2 strong recommendations
  • first 2020, last 2023

What HN commenters said

  1. “I highly recommend the _Fall of Civilizations Podcast_ episode 8.”

    Audiobook-length episode teaching a ton about Sumerian civilization

    wanderingstan, 2022-10 · Strong recommendation · in “Drone photos reveal an early Mesopotamian city made of marsh islands”

  2. “Fall of Civilizations is absolutely amazing stuff, I double recommend it.”

    Episode covering Ur and Sumer

    Strom, 2022-11 · Strong recommendation · in “Ur”

  3. “If you have 1 hour, hear/listen to this podcast/video”

    Hour-plus podcast on Fertile Crescent civilization

    oblio, 2020-11 · Recommendation · in “1% of farms operate 70% of world's farmland”

  4. “btw this is great series on that time (and what preceded it)”

    Series on Sumer and what preceded it

    andyxor, 2021-08 · Recommendation · in “Archaeologists discover 4k-year-old ancient city in Iraqi desert”

  5. “I recommend the Fall of Civilizations podcast for more on this and other societies”

    Covers collapse of Mesopotamian civilizations

    mannerheim, 2021-09 · Recommendation · in “Life-size camel sculptures in Saudi Arabia are older than Stonehenge, pyramids”

  6. “I especially enjoyed”

    First cities were advanced and lasted centuries

    miltondts, 2021-12 · Recommendation · in “The sea people: Alexander the Great trod in the footsteps of forgotten Greeks”

  7. “This YouTube series is a great deep dive into it all”

    Deep dive into Sumerian history and language

    davedx, 2022-05 · Recommendation · in “Ancient civilisation under eastern Turkey estimated to be 11k-13k years old”

Excerpts from Hacker News comments, linked to the originals. Summaries and labels were written by a language model from those comments.

Topics: sumer, mesopotamia, cuneiform, ancient history, first cities

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