Mesopotamiaand Egypt share several similarities starting with their location as they areboth located near a river. Egypt is located along the Nile River in northernAfrica, while Mesopotamia people (known as Sumerians) was located justnorth-east of Egypt between the Tigris River and the Euphrates River. BothEgypt and Mesopotamia shared a government called a “theocracy” which means theyblended political outlooks with religious beliefs. Another similarity wouldinclude the fact that they are both “polytheistic” which meant they bothworshipped more than one god. Although they were both polytheistic, they bothhad different outlooks on the gods that they worshipped. In Mesopotamia, theysaw the gods as chaotic and unpredictable, this was due to how hectic naturewas in this area.

Sumerians believed the gods were beings with extraordinarypower who had to be kept happy by the people. So the Sumerians believed thattheir lives needed to revolve around pleasing their gods. On the other hand,Egypt was much less chaotic when it came to natural disasters so Egyptians sawthe gods as understanding and kind.BothEgypt and Mesopotamia were ruled by kings. The kings of Egypt were called”pharaohs”.

The pharaohs of Egypt claimed to be actual embodiments of godswhile Sumerian kings were seen more along the lines of messengers of the gods. BothEgyptians and Sumerians had religious temples to worship the gods. Sumerianshad buildings called “ziggurats”. Ziggurats were rectangular stepped towersthat sometimes had a tower placed on the top, Egyptians used ordinarystructures, reminiscent of regular houses, where they held rituals to pleasetheir gods.

Sumeriansand Egyptians both had their own writing systems, Egyptians used symbols called”hieroglyphics” while Sumerians used “cuneiform”. Cuneiform was a wedge-shapedstyle of writing that was written by using a stylus to cut into soft clay tomake word signs or pictographs. Hieroglyphics were more along the lines ofsymbols instead of dashes like cuneiform. Hieroglyphics were mostly used tokeep records and writing religious documents.