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By Raul S.
Manglapus In searching East and West for original democratic traditions,
one need not retreat when confronted with monarchy,
aristocracy, nobility, or slavery. In fact, the search must begin
in the East, not the West, for it is in the East that early
original egalitarian societies first developed hierarchies and
blossomed into mature civilisations, clustered around life-
giving sources of water which provided not only irrigation but
also arteries of commerce and communication, stimulating
urbanisation.
In fact, the earliest such civilisation, Mesopotamia, was
2
named for its position between the two great rivers the Tigris See Karl S.
and the Euphrates (Greek mesos, middle, and potamos, Wittfogel,
river). It is the earliest prototype for Wittfogel's "hydraulic Oriental
society", which necessitates and produces Oriental despotic Despotism: A
2
power - "total and not benevolent". Indeed, the most Comparative
common recollections of Mesopotamia are those of original Study of Total
imperial despotisms. Power, Yale
University
Press, New
Haven, 1957.
An, the god of heaven and "father of the gods", was their
presiding officer, and Enlil, god of the storm, was their
executive officer and discussion leader. There were fifty
"senior gods" - corresponding to the earthly seniors in the
Assyrian karum - who handled the discussion, and seven
deciding "gods of fates", corresponding to the group of seven
members of the karum entitled to seal documents.