Sumerian History

Robert McC. Adams made this remark about the history of "Ancient Sumer, Modern Iraq."

"Nothing is deterministic or linear in the dynamics of this system, which is characterized by stress, uncertainty and conflict but never by equilibrium. Like many social and natural systems, it wanders erratically through history along a ridge between two adjoining basins of attraction: chaos and order. The longer intervals of political fragmntation, urban decline and tribal resurgence leave few records and monuments and have received very little historical attention. It is the shorter intervals of self-asserted splendor at the hidden cost of harshly imposed centralization that too often are taken to represent the whole."

Perhaps Adams is suggesting a plot of eras of "self-asserted splendor" against the general time-line would reveal a Cantor set. Who knows?