Before Egypt built its pyramids and long before Greece became a center of philosophy, an extraordinary civilization was already rising between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers.

The Sumerians built some of the world’s earliest great cities, developed cuneiform writing, advanced mathematics and timekeeping, used the wheel, created schools and legal systems, and raised enormous stepped temples above the Mesopotamian plain.

Their world gave us the Epic of Gilgamesh and its ancient story of a devastating flood. Their kings and queens were buried with astonishing treasures, while thousands of clay tablets preserved everything from trade and taxes to literature, religion, and law.

But the civilization that helped create the foundations of the modern world did not last forever.

Centuries of warfare, political instability, foreign invasions, and worsening soil salinity slowly weakened Sumer. Ur was eventually destroyed, the Sumerian language disappeared from everyday speech, and its cities were buried beneath the desert for thousands of years—until archaeologists uncovered them again.

This documentary follows the incredible rise, achievements, mysteries, and collapse of one of humanity’s earliest civilizations.

How did Sumer change the world so completely—and how did such a powerful civilization disappear?

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