| Civilisation | Key Dates | Location | Comment |
| Neolithic Revolution | c10,000BC | Middle East | Agriculture brought about a chain of innovations: settlements, trade, pottery, weaving, stone tools. |
| Natufian | c9,000BC | Palestine and south Syria | A Mesolithic people who lived partly in caves and partly in incipient villages. a developed Neolithic civilisation existed in Jericho by 8,000BC |
| Elamite | c7,000BC | Iran | Elam is the Biblical name for the people of south west Iran. There were agriculture and villages. |
| Summerian | c4,000BC | Southern Mesopotamia; Umma, Lagash, Uruk and Ur | They may have come from the Iranian highlands. As settlers, they cleared forests and built canals. Their innovations included wheeled carts, sailboats, plows, smelting and writing. Power centered on city-states. They built towns, temples and ziggurats. |
| Egyptian | Earliest Dynasties: I, 3200-3000; 11, 3000-2780. Old Kingdom III, 2780-2720; IV, 2720-2560; V, 2560-2420; VI, 2420-2270. Middle Kingdom XI, 2100-2000; XII, | Nile Valley | |
| Phoenician | 3000BC | Palestine and Lebanon | As a seaborne people, they colonised North Africa. Invented a phonetic script c1500BC which became the basis of the western alphabet.. |
| Ayran | 3,000BC | The Indo-Europeans (Ayrans) were nomads from near the Caspian Sea. They domesticated the horse c3000BC. They invented a 2-wheeled chariot c1700BC | |
| Hittite | 2,000BC | Anatolia | By 2,000BC the Aryans established a Hittite civilisation in Anatolia. |
| Akkadian | 2385-2200BC | Akkad is near Babylon | Led by King Sargon of Akkad, the people were semitic and came from further north. Now extinct, the Akkadian language was spoken from 3rd to 1st millennium BC. |
| Babylonian | 1900BC | Babylon | The Babylonians re-united the Akkadian empire. Hammurabi ruled from 1792BC. |
| Egyptian | New Kingdom : XVIII, 1555-1350; XIX, 1350-1200; XX, 1200-1090; XXI, 1090-945; XXII, 945-c. 745; XXIII, c, 745-718; XXIV, 718-712 | ||
| Assyrian | 1400BC | Iraq, centred on Mosul | Introduced cavalry into Middle Eastern warfare and were famed for their cruelty. . Tiglath-pileser III, Sargon II and Sennacherib united most of the region from Egypt to the Gulf. The capital, Ninevah, fell in 612BC |
| Hebrew | 900BC | The tribe of Judah was displaced by the Assyrians and took possession of the Promised land as one of the 12 tribes if Israel | |
| Medes | c700BC | Media (northwest Iran) | An invasion of Assyria, helped by the Babylonians, put an end to the Assyrian empire. |
| Chaldean | 626BC | Took control of Babylon in 626BC. | |
| Persian | 559-330BC | The first Persian empire was ruled by the Achaemenids after Cyrus II broke free of the Medes |
