The people of Sumer are among the earliest denizens of Mesopotamia. By about 4000 BCE, the Sumerians had organized themselves into several city-states that were spread throughout the southern part of the region. These city-states were independent of one another and were fully self-reliant centers, each surrounding a temple that was dedicated to god or goddess specific to that city-state. Each city-state was governed by a Priest King.
