Egypt And Mesopotamia Similarities

Mesopotamia and Egypt were early river valley civilizations. Archaeologists have discovered an incredible amount of information about them, and in that research many similarities and differences about the civilization’s religions stood out. Both Mesopotamian and Egyptian religions were polytheistic and believed in an afterlife, however Mesopotamians viewed gods as human-like and had grim views of life after death, while Egyptians viewed gods as a cross between humans and animals and had brighter views concerning their afterlife.

Both Mesopotamia and Egypt were polytheistic civilizations. Mesopotamians believed in gods such as Utu, the sun god, and Ereshkigal, the god of the afterlife (Mesopotamia ppt). It was likely that Mesopotamians did

In Mesopotamia, people believed in the “Land of No Return,” where there was no happiness and people ate clay (32). This was probably because the Tigris and the Euphrates, the rivers that Mesopotamia was built between, were often unpredictable, which caused floods to ruin crops and destroy villages. Mesopotamians assumed that gods controlled these floods, and since the gods weren’t very good to them while they were living, they wouldn’t be kinder once they were dead. In Egypt, on the other hand, people believed in a beautiful afterlife. They mummified bodies, a process of drying out and preserving corpses, to ensure that people's bodies were at their best even after death. They buried bodies with valuable possessions that the person would use in the Other Life (38). The Egyptians probably believed in a nice underworld because their life wasn’t as hard as it was for Mesopotamians. The Nile River was much more predictable than the Tigris and the Euphrates, and the floods were always expected. This allowed Egyptians to use the flooding in their favor, making for a better life, resulting in hopes of a better underworld. Mesopotamians did not expect much from their afterlife, while Egyptians had high hopes.

Although Egypt and Mesopotamia were both ancient river valley civilizations, their cultures were unique in their own ways. While they were both polytheistic and believed

Ed. Julie L. Carnagie, et al. Vol. 1: Almanac. Detroit: UXL, 2007. World History in Context. Web. 11 Oct.