Gilgamesh is one of the oldest known works of literature, and I'm not going to spoil it for you. There's a link to the poem in the video info. But suffice it to say that in the showdown between country and city, the city wins. So what were these city-states like? Well, let's take a look at one such city-state, Gilgamesh's hometown of Uruk, in the Thought Bubble. Uruk was a walled city with an extensive canal system and several monumental temples called ziggurats. The priests of these temples initially had all the power because they were able to communicate directly with the gods, and that was a useful talent because Mesopotamian gods were moody and frankly pretty mean.