Sumer

Sumer
(c. 5500 – c. 1800 BC)

The general location on a modern map, and main cities of Sumer with ancient coastline. The coastline nearly reached Ur in ancient times.
Geographical range	Mesopotamia, Near East, Middle East
Period	Late Neolithic, Middle Bronze Age
Dates	c. 5500 – c. 1800 BC
Preceded by	Ubaid period
Followed by	Akkadian Empire

Sumer (/ˈsuːmər/) is the earliest known civilization, located in the historical region of southern Mesopotamia (now south-central Iraq), emerging during the Chalcolithic and early Bronze Ages between the sixth and fifth millennium BC. Like nearby Elam, it is one of the cradles of civilization, along with Egypt, the Indus Valley, the Erligang culture of the Yellow River valley, Caral-Supe, and Mesoamerica. Living along the valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, Sumerian farmers grew an abundance of grain and other crops, a surplus which enabled them to form urban settlements. The world's earliest known texts come from the Sumerian cities of Uruk and Jemdet Nasr, and date to between c. 3350 – c. 2500 BC, following a period of proto-writing c. 4000 – c. 2500 BC.