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Turkey - History (Grades 6-8)

Turkey - History (Grades 6-8)
Reading Level
     edHelper's suggested reading level:   grades 6 to 8
     Flesch-Kincaid grade level:   9.02

Vocabulary
     challenging words:    reestablished, further, hardness, apostle, modern-day, survival, internal, emperor, revolt, society, invaders, injury, defeat, democratic, historical, illegal
     content words:    Middle East, Peace Treaty, Under Roman, Christian Bible, Byzantine Empire, Roman Empire, Seljuk Turks, Ottoman Turks, Ottoman Empire, World War I.

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Turkey - History
By Ekaterina Zhdanova-Redman 		  
1     Turkey's long history is full of interesting twists and turns, great power, and some historical firsts. Turkey's location in the Middle East puts it in the middle of some of the oldest civilizations on earth. Its location has also put it at the center of some of the greatest struggles in human history.
 
2     Turkey hasn't always been called Turkey. In fact, it's only been in the last few hundred years that it has had that name. For the thousands of years of human history in the area, Turkey was known as Anatolia. According to scientists, the earliest humans in Anatolia lived there around 7500 BC. These ancient people were mostly hunters and farmers. There exists today a cave called Karain where teeth and bones of these ancient people have been discovered.
 
3     Several thousand years later, a group of people called the Hattians lived in Anatolia. They were the first people in Anatolia to use a written language. The Hattians were the first people to use envelopes for their writings. They wrote on soft clay tablets, baked them for hardness, then wrapped the hardened tablet in more clay, then baked the whole thing again. It's a lot of work just to wrap one page of writing, but it was all the Hattians had to work with.
 
4     After the Hattians came the Hittites. The Hittites moved into Anatolia from the north about 2000 BC. Once they were settled into Anatolia, the Hittites took on many of the customs of the Hattians. By 1500 BC, the Hittite empire was as strong as it would become. The Hittites tried to expand their control, but ran into the Egyptians, who weren't about to let the Hittites take them over. The Hittites fought the Egyptians, but the conflict ended in a tie. Rather than continuing the fight, the two countries agreed to a truce. They signed the Peace Treaty of Kadesh in 1284 BC, which was the first peace treaty ever signed in the history of the world.

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