25th century BC
Events
- c. 2900 BC–2334 BC — Mesopotamian wars of the Early Dynastic period.
- c. 2500 BC — Scribal schools flourish throughout Sumer.
- c. 2500 BC — Cylinder seal from Sumer and its impression are made. It is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
- c. 2500 BC — Excavation and development of the Hypogeum of Ħal-Saflieni at Paola, Malta, a subterranean templex complex subsequently used as a necropolis.
- c. 2500 BC - Valley Temple of Khafra, Giza, is built.
- c. 2494 BC — End of Fourth Dynasty, start of Fifth Dynasty in Egypt. The Pyramids began construction.
- c. 2494 BC – 2345 BC: "Sculptors at work", relief from Saqqara, Fifth Dynasty. It is now at Egyptian Museum, Cairo, Egypt.
- c. 2494 BC – 2345 BC: "Seated Scribe" from tomb of vizier Kai, Saqqara, sculpture, Fifth dynasty of Egypt is made. It is now in Musée du Louvre, Paris.
- 2492 BC — Traditional founding date of the Armenian nation.
- c. 2450 BC — End of the Early Dynastic IIIa Period and beginning of the Early Dynastic IIIb Period in Sumer.
- c. 2450 BC — Kish is lost to Khamazi tribesmen of the Kurdistan mountains; Elamites from Awan occupy parts of Sumer. (Roux 1980)
- c. 2410 BC — By this time, kings in Sumer have ceased to be automatically high priests of the city deity. (Roux 1980) Semitic infiltration and conquest of Mesopotamia begins. (1968 RD Almanac)
- Megalithic culture comes to Ireland from Spain, spreading also through Europe and the western Mediterranean. (1968 RD Almanac)
- Celts begin invading Europe from the east. (1968 RD Almanac)
- Earliest signs of Battle Axe Culture from the Caucasus. (Encyc. Americana)
- Southeastern Spain is settled from the Mediterranean, by people using Predynastic Egyptian-style pottery. (Encyc. Americana)
- Italy begins to be settled by Illyrians and others. (1968 RD Almanac)
- Amorites and Canaanites occupy Syria and Lebanon. (Encyc. Americana)
Significant persons
Deaths
Inventions, discoveries, introductions
- Harappan civilisation, at its peak, covered an area of around 480,000 km². Its heartland lay in the Indus river valley in Pakistan, but settlements spread as far as the Makran coast, Baluchistan, Afghanistan, eastern Punjab, Kutch and Saurashtra. They included cities like Harappa, Mohenjo-daro, Kalibangan, Dholavira, ports like Lothal, Sutkagen-dor and Sotka-koh and numerous villages as well. They used irrigation to farm and constructed cities. The two main cities had sewage systems, bronze, trade tokens (early coins), and hieroglyphs. There were even baths at one of the villages, besides the great baths of brick in each city. Geometry of shrines and altars tends to identify these with the cities of the Yajur Veda: they might easily be a thousand years older than this conservative date.
- Cycladic marble figures depict the use of both the musical pipe and the kithara form of lyre. (Archaeology of the Olympics 1988)
- Earliest surviving ski is left in a peat bog at Hoting, Sweden, about this time. (Encyc. Americana)
- Sumerians use domestic asses on war chariots (Standard of Ur), not gurs as early interpreters claimed. (Clutton-Brock)
- Agriculture at Prieta Huaca includes cotton and bottle-gourds. (Bailey 1973)