China and India
We have seen that the early civilizations began and developed in Mesopotamia and Egypt and the little island of Crete in the Mediterranean Sea. About the same time, in China and in India also, great civilizations began and developed in their own way. In China, as elsewhere, people settled down in the valleys of great rivers. These people were what are called the Mongolians. They made beautiful vessels out of bronze and later of iron. Canals and fine buildings were made, and a new way of writing was evolved. This writing was quite different from our writing in Hindi or English or Urdu.
It was a kind of picture writing. Each word and sometimes even a short sentence was a picture. In ancient Egypt and in Crete and Babylon also, there used to be picture writing. This is now called hieroglyphic writing. You must have seen this writing in the museums and in some books. In Egypt and in the West this writing is only found in very old buildings. Nobody has used this writing there for a very long time. But in China even now, the writing is a kind of picture writing and it is written from top to bottom; not from left to right as in Hindi or English or right to left as in Urdu.
In India, many of the oldest remains of buildings are perhaps still buried in the earth and the sand. They are hidden from us till someone digs them up. But some very old ruins have already been found in the north.
We know, however, that long long ago, even before the Aryans came to India, there were Dravidians here, and they had a fine civilization. They used to trade with people in other countries. They sent many of their. goods to Mesopotamia and Egypt. Specially they sent across the seas rice and spices, like pepper, and teak wood to build houses. It is said that some of the ancient palaces of the city of Ur in Mesopotamia were made of teak wood which was sent from South India. It is also said that gold and pearls and ivory and peacocks and apes were sent from India to western countries.
We thus see that there must have been a great deal of trade between India and other countries in those days. Trade can only exist when people are civilized Both in India and China, there were then little states or kingdoms. Neither of these countries was all under one government. Each little city with some villages and fields had a separate government. These are called city states. Many of these were republics even in those early days. There were no kings, only a kind of elected panchayat to govern the state. Some of them, however, were little kingdoms. But although the city states had separate governments, they sometimes cooperated with each other, that is, helped each other. Sometimes one big state became a kind of leader of several smaller states.
In China, these small states soon gave place to a great big state, an empire. It was in the days of this empire that the Great Wall of China was built. You have read about this Great Wall and what an enormous thing it is. It was built from the sea to the high mountains in the north to keep off other Mongolian tribes from breaking into China. This wall is 1,400 miles long and is twenty to thirty feet high and twenty-five feet broad. At intervals there are forts and towers in it. If such a wall was built in India it would extend from Lahore in the north to Madras in the south. The Great Wall stands even now, and if you go to China you can see it.
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