This may sound a little bias to some, but I truly believe that my homeland, Mesopotamia, is the finest out of all four river valley civilizations. I’m Sargon of Akkad and I had been the ruler of Mesopotamia from 2334 all the way to 2279 B.C. Not to brag or anything of that sort, but I had also been one of the earliest empire builders. When I was young, I was a typical gardener, though I was often told that I could do so much more with my strength and skill. So that’s exactly what I ended up doing. I built up an army and conquered all of southern Mesopotamia and parts of Syria, Anatolia, and Elam (which is western Iran for those of you who don’t know). My defeat of Lugalzaggisi, the last Sumerian king, had brought me to royalty and crowned me as king of Mesopotamia.

Why is Mesopotamia the best land you say? Well, many reasons in fact. The first being that it has mountain borders. What does that have to do with how great it is? It provides protection, for one. Say there’s an army charging from Asia Minor into my lands. In order to get in they’d have to march their way either through or entirely around the Taurus Mountains, which separate the lands. If that army isn’t at least weakened and slowed by the long journey, I probably would of surrendered my crown a long time ago. 

Another reason why these mountain borders are so great is because they provide both water and minerals, which gets me to my next point: Mesopotamia has many sources of water. This water is used as drinking water, for farming, and for irrigation. 

These rivers also carry minerals throughout the land that cause the land to be very fertile. This fertile land makes farming so much easier (remember I was a gardener– I know how difficult it can be to simply make a tiny plant sprout out of the ground). Therefore, the food and water supply are high. 

The fourth point is that Mesopotamia focuses on both trade and farming. Trade is often done by wagon, donkey, carts, or even simply by foot. Sheep and goat wool, barely, stone, wood, pearls, copper, ivory, and reeds are just a few of these valuable traded items. 

Finally, the most interesting and unique point in my opinion is that Mesopotamia is the inventor of many items still used in today. For example, my people discovered the concept of time, math, created the first wheel, sailboats, maps, and writing (which is a system that we call cuneiform). Without these things we wouldn’t of been able to sail the seas, find our way back to places we’ve been nearly as easily, and we wouldn’t of had chariots. I don’t know how 

But how does this compare to the other river valley civilizations? Egypt, didn’t have sewer systems (unlike Mesopotamia) and focused much more on farming, verses Mesopotamia focuses on both farming and trade. India experiences many droughts and monsoons, focuses mostly on trade, and instead of having indestructible mountains, they had to build their own walls for protection. Lastly, China mainly grows wheat, rice, and corn, when Mesopotamia grows wheat and barley. China focuses a lot on trade as well.

I hope you now understand my pride towards my land and have a similar (if not same) opinion as I do. If you disagree, I hope I at least helped give you a little peek into Mesopotamia and its history.

Sources: 

-https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sargon

-http://www.angelfire.com/nt/Gilgamesh/achieve.html

-https://www.cabarrus.k12.nc.us/cms/lib/NC01910456/Centricity/Domain/2836/Ancient%20Mesopotamia%20Evans.pdf

-https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/world-history/world-history-beginnings/ancient-mesopotamia/a/mesopotamia-article

-http://rivervalleypeyton.weebly.com/compare-and-contrast.html

-https://oakman.dearbornschools.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/976/2014/12/Chapter-6-pp-history-alive-7th.pptm

-https://alancientrivervalleycivilizations.weebly.com/compare–contrast.html