Early India and China

Ancient India

WH1B: DESCRIBE THE SOCIETIES OF INDIA AND CHINA, INCLUDE:
RELIGION, CULTURE, ECONOMICS, POLITICS, AND TECHNOLOGY.

India’s Geography

1. Surrounded by the Hindu Kush and Himalayan

Mountains

2. First civilization settled around the Indus River

3. The rivers and mountains protected India from

invasion from other cultures.

Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro

1. India’s most well known early city states.
2. Their cities were planned out on a grid system
3. Created musical instruments, toys a pottery.

Technological Advances

1. Writing consisted of Pictograms that are

undecipherable (can’t be read)

2. Cities were planned out on a grid system.

3. Indoor plumbing and sewer system

4. Irrigation for farming

5. Math (weight and measurement)

City grid

Bathroom
and sewer

Economics

1. Traded with people from other places:
2. Traded jewelry, cotton cloth and wood

Religion and Politics

1. The Indus people were polytheistic people

a. Their polytheism may have been an early form of

Hinduism

2. Their society may have been a Theocracy

(leader seen as some type of god incarnate)

Multiple Choice

Which of the following is NOT a geographical feature in India?

• Indus River

• Himalayan Mts.

• Thar Desert

• The Alps

Multiple Choice

Which civilization below had planned cities, sewer systems and writing?

• Mesopotamia

• Egypt

• Indus

• China

Multiple Choice

Why can't historians and archaeologist know more about this advanced culture?

• Undecipherable writing

• Didn't leave a written record

• All records were lost in a flood.

• Leaders order their secrets burned

Multiple Choice

True/False: India's first two civilization were Harappa and Mohenjo Daro.

• True

• False

Ancient China

WH1B: DESCRIBE THE SOCIETIES OF INDIA AND CHINA, INCLUDE:
RELIGION, CULTURE, ECONOMICS, POLITICS, AND TECHNOLOGY.

Geography

1. China is isolated from several different physical features

a. The Gobi Desert to the east
b. Himalayan Mountains in the South
c. The ocean

2. China’s early civilizations developed along the Huang He

and the Yangtze River

​Shang Dynasty

Politics and Economics

1. China’s fist dynast (family of rulers) was

established by the Shang Family

2. The kings ruled with the help of nobles
3. Mainly agricultural based, little trade.

Culture

1. Society is Patriarchal: The oldest male is

in charge and to be totally respected

2. Chinese people put the family

relationship above all else.

Priest

Noble

s

Peasants

Technology

1. Flood control and

Irrigation

2. Chariots for travel and

warfare

3. Writing System

consisting of pictograms
(not linked to spoken
language).

Religion

1. Polytheistic with many gods and one major god named

Di

2. Believed that the family ancestors brought good

fortune or bad fortune depending on how families
were honored

3.

Believed that they could communicate with ancestors
through the oracle bone
a. Oracle bones were animal shells that had questions

written on them and then heated.

b. The way the bone was cracked when it was heated gave

people answers to their questions

Multiple Choice

Which of the following was NOT a geographical features make up China's River Valley Civilizations?

• Huang He

• Thar Desert

• Yangzi River

• Gobi Desert

Multiple Choice

Which of the following was NOT an achievement of the Shang Dynasty?

• Irrigation

• Pictogram writing

• Calendars

• Chariots

Multiple Choice

The Shang people communicated with their ancestors and deities through the use of a _____.

• Oracle Bone

• Psychic

• Crystal Ball

• Fortune telling

Fill in the Blank

The early Shang Dynasty were ______ and believed in many gods.