About 4000 B.C. the Sumerians, racially distinct from the Semitic and lndo-Germanic peoples, settled down in part of Mesopotamia. Their capital city was Ur, and the land area they controlled was called Sumer. Though their culture reached its height about 2250 B.C., even before this, about 2500 B.C., the Sumerians came under the political control of the Akkadians, a Semitic people whose major city was Akkad and who were led at that time by the ruler Sargon. Sumerian civilization was submerged in the Akkadian. A period of high culture occurred during the reign of King Hammurabi (about 1700 B.C.), who is known as the formulator of a famous code of law.
