| Sumer may very well be the first civilization in the | | | | myth can be found in Genesis. |
| world, although long term settlements at Jericho | | | | Cylinder seals were pressed into wet clay to |
| predate Sumer and examples of writing from | | | | leave an impression of the design in order to seal |
| Egypt and the Harappa, Indus valley sites may | | | | vessels, consignments of goods and the door |
| predate those from Sumer. From its beginnings as | | | | latches of storerooms so that it could be |
| a collection of farming villages around 5000 BC, | | | | ascertained whether the contents had been |
| through its conquest by Sargon of Agade around | | | | tampered with. They were usually made of red |
| 2370 BC, and its final collapse under the Amorites | | | | jasper, black steatite, and green stone and |
| around 2000 BCE, the Sumerians developed a | | | | various other stones. The designs were standing |
| religion and a society which influenced both their | | | | male figures, gypsum seated worshipper in a |
| neighbors and their conquerors. The Babylonians, | | | | calf-length woolen skirt, animals, birds with |
| who also took many of their religious beliefs, | | | | outspread wings, male figures leading a horned |
| borrowed Sumerian cuneiform, the earliest written | | | | animal, animals leaping and prancing, animals in |
| language. In fact, traces and parallels of Sumerian | | | | combat, rearing animals, and running animals. |