I am working on an essay about Persian culture and its influence on the Greek world, and I want to try something out. I am sure through today's media (cartoons, gaems, movies, etc) we get certain associations to anything.
If we think of Egypt, we get the picture of pyramides, mumies and deadly traps. If we think of the Greeks, we think of the mythic world of Homer, in addition of later heros cults and man whorshipping, or theatre. "Greek God" is a common term in the literature.
I am counting some adjectives and I want to ask you to write down any associations you can think off. Association is allowed to history, culture and architecture and literature and world view, everything you can think off.
Keep in mind, they are all based on ancient civilisations.
*Greek
*Egyptian
*Roman
*Indian
*Native American(counting in Mayan and Aztec)
*Babylonian
*Assyrian
*Scythian
*Phoinician
*Germanic
*Gallian/Celtic
*African
*Aramaic
*Israeli
*Persian
Will maybe keep some of you busy, but the more answers I get, the better 8)

Wiki says: "Babel is the name used in the Hebrew Bible for the city of Babylon."

shadow of the colossus played very fast and loose with biblical myth. Nimrod ruled a kingdom it's never named though and he's only mentioned in the apocrypha according to the kabbalah he was against it's construction.
Also the ziggurat of babylon was square based while the tower of babel is (supposedly) round. The Etemenanki was first linked to it by Flavius Josephus in something like 100AD. In truth it's probably based on an earlier summerian myth and since babylon didn't exist then...

So I failed then, it was the Gaul I referred to.

The Native Americans actually learned that practice from the European settlers who stole their land. At one time, there was actually a bounty for Native American scalps equivalent to several thousand dollars per scalp in today's money.

*Greek - good food, naked olympics, weird teacher/student relationships, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle,
*Egyptian - pyramids, primitive artistry (no sense of perspective), Ptolemy (and his astronomical accomplishments)
*Roman - stolen culture, Caesar
*Indian - curry, Gandhi, Hinduism
*Native American(counting in Mayan and Aztec) - awesome buildings, human sacrifice, lots of gold, screwed over by Europeans
*Babylonian - Hanging Gardens, arithmetic
*Assyrian - Mesopotamia
*Scythian - pokemon (Scyther) Other than that, I've got nothing
*Phoinician - (I assume this is Phoenician) alphabet
*Germanic - shields, knights
*Gallian/Celtic - kilts
*African - screwed over by Europeans, colonies, triangle trade
*Aramaic - language
*Israeli - Jews, religious conflict, persecution
*Persian - good food, scientific advancements, Aryan

Okay, before I pollute myself by reading other replies, here it goes:
*Greek - pottery, Herecles, Cyclopes, Circe, Homer, Sparta, Greek city-states, philosophy, togas
*Egyptian - "Walk Like An Egyption", Rosetta Stone, heiroglyphs, The Nile, spermicide made out of crocodile dung (I'm not kidding), mummy, slavery, killing, complex afterlife myths, embalming, source of many gnostic mysteries (religions predominant in southern Europe around the time that Christianity was gaining a foothold), Osiris, Serapis, Isis, Alexander and Cleopatra
*Roman - rip-off of Greek civilization, gladiators, senate, colliseum, invasion, war, chariots (I know they did not invent them)
*Indian - Kali, caste systems, historically rather highly violent, red dots on foreheads, rat monastery (the monks live with and eat with rats), reincarnation, bovine worship.
*Native American(counting in Mayan and Aztec), obsidian weapons, supposed lack of wheel (not sure I buy this one totally), Polynesian colonization (it seems it was half them, half asians), Montezuma, Montezuma's revenge (diarrhea), Catholic conversions, burning of the Mayan library, sun worship, Quetzlcoatl, prostitutes had specific costumes and makeup, Dances With Wolves
*Babylonian - The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, iconic of wickedness in the Bible (and maybe Pentateuch), mathematics
*Assyrian - I always thought these guys were similar to Babylonians (probably ignorance on my part)
*Scythian - I got nothing.
*Phoinician - Phoenician (the spelling I know), bronze...
*Germanic - small areas owned by barons, internecine squabbles, The Bulldog (don't even recall his real name), fractured language, German dictionary was published very late compared to other closeby regional languages, Huns/barbarians
*Gallian/Celtic - woad, Enya, longbow, source of many legends later attached to the Arthurian legend
*African - Anubian empire, bowmen, Lucy (australopithecus afarensis) and Big Man, agriculture
*Aramaic - this is a language rather than a civilization, right? Many old books written in this, probably most of the original sources for the Jewish, Islamic, and Christian stories were first recorded in Aramaic, strong oral traditions
*Israeli - source of an insane amount of world conflict for nearly 4000 years, direct and indirect cause of several genocides. Setting of many of the Bible myths
*Persian - Aryan, Farsi, bronze age (probably wrong about that), agriculture, nomads.

*Greek: The parthenon, sculpture, art, ruins, greek mythology, robes, senate, democracy, old men with white bushy beards, Plato, Aristoteles, Socrates, Homer, the illyad, the oddisey, My Big Fat Greek Wedding. When I think of old greek culture, I get a sense of wise, resourceful and knowledgeable people.
*Egyptian: Pyramids, Pharaohs, Cleopatra, sphinx, tombs, mummies, chariots, egyptian dresses and make up (the eyes), tanned skins, slavery, snakes, cats, egyptian mythology, empire, The Prince of egypt, sand, heat and dust. From these guys, I also get a sense of advanced civilization for it's time but also of being "the bad guys" since I went to catholic school and that's the impression you get in your tender, malleable yound mind when you read about the old testament.
*Roman: Latin, roman numerals, Nero, Julius Caesar, empire, conquerors, roman mythology (mostly greek with oher names) armor, soldiers, large square curved shields, the color red, feathers on top of the helmets, formations, gladiators, the colisseum, acueducts, Gladiator (the movie), Rome: Total War, Praetorians. From these, an advanced and conquering civilization. Also the bad guys on the new testament.
*Indian: Dots on their foreheads, Mahatma Gandhi, indian clothing (white or colorful), indian accent, elephants, indian mythology (Mostly Kali and the guy with the elephant head), tanned skins, big eyes, indian music and dance, kamasutra, complex pyramids and architecture, the taj mahal, Ganges river, overpopulation, bad smell, dirty streets, roaming animals, strange cooking, Slumdog Millionaire, Raj from the Big Bang Theory. Don't get much of a vibe from indian culture, mostly because I haven't read or seen much about it.
*Native American(counting in Mayan and Aztec): I don't think the same way of the north american indians than I do mayans and aztecs.
North American indians: Nomads, tipis, feathers, bow and arrow, redskins, the wild west, war paint, honorable savages, the bad guys, pipe smoking, old wrinkled men with strange names, horses, tomahawks, drums, steppes, sun and heat, Dances with Wolves, chanting, buffalos, Sitting Bull, Geronimo, Oumpah Pah.
Mayan and Aztecs: Stepped Piramyds, sacrifices, hyeroglyphics, spanish conquest, jungle, poisoned arrows, feather and leopard clothing, snakes, Cortez, Monctezuma, doom.
*Babylonian: Gardens, sin, library, large headdresses. Not much else, I've only read about them in school text books but haven't bothered digging further.
*Assyrian: Commerce, ships, mediterranean.
*Scythian: Nothing, just the name.
*Phoinician: Nothing, just the name.
*Germanic: White, big and blonde, barbarians. When I think of germans my mind wanders more to World War 2 than to ancient history.
*Gallian/Celtic: Barbarians, druids, plaid pants, forests, undisciplined, Asterix & Obelix.
*African: Dark skinned, primitive, deserts, jungles, animals, tribal, strange painful piercings and body deformations, slaves, savages, huts, Zulus, Chaka Zulu, Tarzan.
*Aramaic: Old tongue.
*Israeli: Jews, Moses, Abraham, slaves, Religion, old testament, shepherds, nomads, white, big nosed, bushy beards, Jerusalem.
*Persian: Ships, round shields, spears. I know they existed as an important society of old and all that, but much like the Scythians and Phenicians, the name is almost the only thing that rings a bell.
Hope it helps.

Persian: Zoroastrism, Ahura Mazda, Zahhak (also known as Dahaka, Azi Dahaa), Severance - Blade of Darkness (game), Prince of Persia The Sands of Time and Warrior Within.

I know close to nothing about ancient Persia. The scientific and technological advances in the Arabic-speaking world during the Middle Ages (so the Greeks already fell into slumber) are however extremely under appreciated. That's the first thing that pops up in my mind every time I hear about the Middle East.

That's the point of this experiment. While we know alot of Greece and Egypt,heck even Celtic, which got even in popculture, the normal one doesn't know an inch about the middle east and relies mostly on Greek authors who made the most impact about our view, even if most could be haux and misinterpretation.

Well, that's just untrue, imho ;-) The bible itself does contain stories that were around since the Babylonian empire. So even the "Christian" Catholic world is unquestionably full of references (even though inconscious) to the Middle-East tradition. An example? The tower of Babel.
And the three great monotheistic religions themselves (Catholic, Hebrew and Islamic) are largely based on Persian's Zoroastrism setup, so....

Let's be honest, the written languages of the middle east were mostly incomprehensible. I don't mean to offend anyone but I have read (but not verified since I don't read ancient Arabic) that the 70 virgins in heaven thing in the Koran has an alternate translation of "many white skinned grapes". You see there were no characters indicating vowel sounds in a lot of older languages. This makes very complex works really hard to read.
The reason we know so much about Greeks, etc., in our western cultures today is 1) we can actually read their crap and 2) their works were largely the sources of inspiration for our western enlightenment period (and holy crap do we need a 2nd enlightenment these days!).
I think, regardless, you have your data, what you need to do now is figure out the "why" of it.

All the Greek works surviving today (except Plato) were translated from Arabic:
[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_translations_of_the_12th_century
My feeling is that most people rely on the very incomplete picture history textbooks (in France's schools at least) gave them and assume they're not missing anything, while they are, by a very long shot..

Yes, because the Catholic church burned almost all greek books. However that written Arabic is the newer written form, I think. Maybe I'm wrong though.