What are the two rivers that flow through the Fertile Crescent?

The Tigris and the Euphrates

The "twin" rivers gathered as much history along their courses as the Tiber, the Nile and the Mississippi put together.

The Neolithic settlements on their banks have been among the first, they were prolific and momentous. Agriculture began in the Fertile Crescent; so did architecture, writing and possibly the first legal documents ever conceived.

Why was it so? There are other areas of equivalent climate and fertility on our planet. What was so special with the land that Herodotus named Mesopotamia ( Μεσοποταμία = between the rivers)? Maybe the reason is to be found in the path that led humanity out of Africa to the conquest of the rest of the world.

Moving from the Lakes' Region to the North East along the Nile Valley and across the Sinai to Asia, Humans soon came across the "Crescent". They could go South to the green pastures of Yemen and the fresh waters and cool mountains of Aden. They could go North to the lakes and fruit trees of Kurdistan and Syria. They could go West to Lebanon and its cedar trees. Or they could settle in the middle and found great cities such as Nineveh, Babylon and Ur. They could also take a breath, respite and write beautiful epic such as the Bible, the Koran or the Saga of Gilgamesh.