Western Civilization I / Unit 1 WC1 0007 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Sumer, Akkad, and Uruk's Redistributive Economy
Captions available
The idea
Sumer, the south, spoke a language unrelated to any living one; Akkad, the north, a Semitic tongue. Uruk was a large city by thirty-five hundred B.C.E., trading with Anatolia and the Indus.
In practice
Rulers taxed all output, paying workers in food and beer for walls and temples.
Where people slip
Redistribution: the state collects everything and hands it back, with no market in the modern sense.
Your place on the trail
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