Draft: this lesson was written with AI help and has not yet been read by a human editor.
1 What your class asks
This lesson asks you to analyse how processes of the physical environment may affect human settlements in the future. The museum looks backwards: it links one past case in which the failure of a water structure ruined settled life, and your class must carry the question forward to the present and the future. 1
Curriculum expectations, with their official codes
- A1.2 analyse how processes related to the physical environment may affect human settlements in the future […]
2 The lesson
What can a river or a dam do to a settlement?
Notice the expectation's words 'processes' and 'may affect'. Name the process, the settlement and the link between them, then ask what signs could have been noticed early and what the people could have done.
Go deeper
According to The Sealed Nectar's estimate, the bursting of the Marib Dam came in 450 or 451 CE 2. After Yemen gained its independence from the first Abyssinian occupation in 378 CE, breaches began to appear in the dam, until the great flood came 2. The dam had begun to be built in the time of the mukarrib kings of Saba, and it has great importance in the history of Yemen 3 2. The author states that the flood was a major event that led to the ruin of civilisation and the scattering of peoples 2, and that the migration of most clans of Kahlan from Yemen took place shortly before it, when their trade failed 4. How firm is the date? It is the author's estimate, and he notes the wide disagreement among the sources in fixing the years 5.
Think about it
In this account the breaches came one after another before the great flood, and the record says nothing about repairs. What signs could people living below such a dam have noticed early, what could they have done, and what does the record leave out that you would need to know before judging them?
Into the museum
- The flood of al-Arim: the bursting of the dam and its effects, as the record gives them.
- The Marib Dam: the dam itself, from the time of the mukarribs of Saba.
- Qur'an 34:16: the verse this record cites for the flood; the lesson's card shows it.
Try this
Read the Flood of al-Arim and the verse the lesson links. Write a short chain of cause and effect, from the water structure to the people, using only what the record says. Then write one question about a settlement you know today.
3 Carry it further
Where this lesson leads in the museum.
4 Check yourself
Nothing here is marked or sent anywhere. It is for you.
In your own words: what does The Flood of al-Arim (the Bursting of Maʾrib Dam) have to do with this lesson?
Compare with the card
The dam that burst. The Sealed Nectar puts the bursting of the Marib Dam in Yemen at 450 or 451 CE, the great flood that the Qur'an mentions as the flood of al-Arim. The author calls it a major event that led to the ruin of settlement and the scattering of peoples, and notes that the sources differ widely on the dating. How can the failure of one water structure change where people can live?
In your own words: what does Qur'an 34:16 have to do with this lesson?
Compare with the card
Read Saba 16. The record of the flood points to Surat Saba, verse 16, as the place where the Qur'an mentions the flood of al-Arim. Read the verse on the page as the museum prints it. Then ask: what does it say in its own words, and how does it sit beside the history of the dam in this lesson?
I can now
Notes
- 1. The Ontario Curriculum: Social Studies, Grades 1 to 6; History and Geography, Grades 7 and 8 (2023)
- 2. al-Raheeq al-Makhtum — Safi al-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri, p.24
- 3. al-Raheeq al-Makhtum — Safi al-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri, p.23
- 4. al-Raheeq al-Makhtum — Safi al-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri, p.16
- 5. al-Raheeq al-Makhtum — Safi al-Rahman al-Mubarakpuri, p.25