the requirements and patterns to development Edited By: Robert
Guisepi The term civilization basically means the level of
development at which people live together peacefully in
communities. Ancient civilization refers specifically to the
first settled and stable communities that became the basis for
later states, nations, and empires. The study of ancient
civilization is concerned with the earliest segments of the much
broader subject called ancient history. The span of ancient
history began with the invention of writing in about 3100 BC and
lasted for more than 35 centuries. Mankind existed long before
the written word, but writing made the keeping of a historical
record possible. The first ancient societies arose in
Mesopotamia and Egypt in the Middle East, in the Indus Valley
region of modern Pakistan, in the Huang He (Yellow River) valley
of China, on the island of Crete in the Aegean Sea, and in
Central America. All of these civilizations had certain features
in common. They built cities, invented forms