During the era of third-wave civilizations, China, a massive and powerful civilization, was imitated by adjacent peoples. It gave rise to China-centered "world order" encompassing most of eastern Asia. Its borders extended deep into central Asia while its wealthy and cosmopolitan culture attracted its visitors from all over Eurasia. China's prospering economy and many of its technological innovations affected the Afro-Eurasia world with its ripple effects. The country was involved in international trade which stimulated important social, cultural, and economic changes within China itself.
Reemergence of China
The fall of the Han dynasty around 220 C.E. created more than three centuries' worth of political fragmentation in China and resulted in the rise of powerful and local entrenched aristocratic families. The incursion of northern nomads created the merging of language and families. They learned Chinese, dressed like Chinese, and married into Chinese families and governed northern regions of the country in a Chinese fashion.
China regained its unity under the Sui dynasty (589-618) because its emperors solidified its unity through a vast extension of the country's canal system, which stretched around 1,200 miles in length. The canals linked northern and southern China economically and contributed to the prosperity that soon followed.
China and the Northern Nomads
China had many interactions with the Eurasian world from early times to the nineteenth century. It had its most enduring and intense interaction with foreigners were in the north. It involved many nomadic pastoral or semi-agricultural peoples of the steppes. Even though the Chinese often came with threats, bringing their own military forces deep into the steppes, building the Great Wall to keep the nomads out, and preventing the pastoral people easy access to trading opportunities in China, the Chinese still needed the nomads. The nomads' lands were sources of horses and products such as skins, furs, hides, and amber, which were all valuable to China. The relationship and interaction between China and the northern nomads brought together people occupying different environments, practicing different economics, governing themselves with different institutions, and thinking about the world in very different ways.
China and the Eurasian World Economy
China's incredible economic growth took place during the Tang and Song dynasties and could hardly be contained within China's borders and had a major impact throughout Eurasia. China was both a recipient and donor in the economic interactions of the third-wave era, and its own economic achievements owed something with the larger world.
Sunday, November 6, 2016
Tuesday, November 1, 2016
Ch. 9 The Worlds of Islam (Afro-Eurasian Connections) & Ch. 10 The World of Christendom (Contraction, Expansion, and Division)
Ch. 9
The history of Islam is one that reveals a great history of diversity and debate. Islam played a central role in the Afro-Eurasian world for a thousand years or more. From 600 to 1600 or later, it was a proud, cosmopolitan, often prosperous, and frequently powerful civilization that spanned Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. The early Islamic community also associated with Medina, Mecca, and Muhammad as a model for Islamic renewal in the present. Sharp religious differences between Sunnia and Shia understandings of the faith, differences in emphasis between advocates of the sharia and of Sufi spirituality, and more divided the umma.
Ch. 10
Over the past thirty years, China, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, the Philippines, Vietnam, and parts of India all hosted substantial Christian communities. Yao Hong, a Chinese woman, became a Christian sometime around 1990 after discovering her husband was having an affair; and she was devastated. She is one of the many millions who has made Christianity a rapidly growing faith. The non-Muslim regions of Africa also witnessed an explosive advance of Christianity during the twentieth century. And Latin America has experienced an incredible growth of Pentecostal Protestant Christianity since the 1970s.
In the early twenty-first century, over 60% of the world's Christians lived in Asia, Africa, or Latin America. The sixth- and seventh-century world of Christendom revealed flourishing communities in Arabia, Egypt, North Africa, Ethiopia, Nubia, Syria, Armenia, Persia, India, and China, as well as Europe. Over the course of a thousand years, changes that occurred shaped the Christian World. The African and Asian posts largely vanished, declined, or were marginalized; and Christianity became primarily a European phenomenon for the next thousand years or more.
Byzantine Christendom
Byzantium had no clear starting point, unlike most empires. It was simply viewed as a continuation of the Roman Empire. Some historians date its beginning to 330 C.E. when the Roman emperor Constantine, who began to favor Christianity during his reign, established a new capital, Constantinople, on the site of an ancient Greek City - Byzantium. At the end of this century, the Roman Empire was formally divided into eastern and western halves - launching the division of Christendom which lasted into the twenty-first century.
While the western Roman Empire collapsed during the fifth century, the eastern side lasted for another thousand years.
Late Rome with its roads, taxation system, military structures, centralized administration, imperial court, laws, and Christian persisted in the east for many centuries. Emperors, who feared contamination by "barbarian" customs, forbade the residents of Constantinople from wearing boots, trousers, clothing made from animal skins, and long hairstyles, which were all associated with the Germanic peoples. The Byzantine Empire became known as the home of a distinctive civilization.
Political Life in Europe
The traditional date marking the collapse of the empire was 476 when the German general Odoacer overthrew the last Roman emperor in the west. Disease and warfare reduced Western Europe's population by more than 25%. Land under cultivation contracted and forests, marshland, and wasteland expanded. Urban life also dimished and Europe veered off to a largely rural existence. On a political front, a series of regional kingdoms emerged to replace Roman authority and these were: the Visigoths in Spain, Franks in France, Lombards in Italy, and Angles and Saxons in England. Contact with the Roman Empire in the first seven centuries C.E. genderated more distinct ethnic identities among them, militarized their societies, and gave greater prominence to Woden, their god of war. When Germanic peoples migrated into or invaded Roman lands, many of them were deeply influenced by Roman culture, especially if they served in the Roman army. As leaders of their own kingdoms, the Germanic rulers acticely embraced written Roman law, used fines and penalties to provide order and justice in their new states in place of feuds and vendettas.
The Church and Women
The Church had offered some women an aletrnative to home, marriage, family, and rural life. In Buddhist lands, a substantial number of women, mostly from aristocratic families, were attracted to the secluded monastic life of poverty, chastity, and obedience within a convent which gave them relative freedom from male control that it offered. This is just one example of the religious opportunities women were able to have.
Reason and Faith
Some early Christian thinkers sought to maintain a clear separation between the new religion and the ideas of Plato and Aristotle. There was an intellectual tension between the claims of human reason and those of faith. There was also a notion that Greek philosophy could serve as a "handmaiden" to faith, disclosing the truths of Christianity. European Christian thinkers, a small group of literate churchmen, began to emphasize the ability of human reason to penetrate divine mysteries to grasp the operation of the natural order. Logically, philosophy and rationality would operate in service to Christ. European intellectuals applied their newly discovered confidence in human reason to law, medicine, and the world of nature, exploring optics, magnetism, astronomy, and alchemy. The scientific study of nature gradually began to separat itself from theology, although never completely. The integration of political and religious life in the Islamic world (Byzantium) contrasted with their separation in the West, where there was more space for the independent pursuit of scientific subjects.
Many of the characteristic features of Christendom, which emerged during the era of the third-wave civilizations have had a long life and have extended into modern era. Much of what occurred during this time regarding religion contributed to the study of history with linking the past to what came later, helping the people with human understanding. Because we have our histories, we are limited and shaped by it.
The history of Islam is one that reveals a great history of diversity and debate. Islam played a central role in the Afro-Eurasian world for a thousand years or more. From 600 to 1600 or later, it was a proud, cosmopolitan, often prosperous, and frequently powerful civilization that spanned Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. The early Islamic community also associated with Medina, Mecca, and Muhammad as a model for Islamic renewal in the present. Sharp religious differences between Sunnia and Shia understandings of the faith, differences in emphasis between advocates of the sharia and of Sufi spirituality, and more divided the umma.
Ch. 10
Over the past thirty years, China, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, the Philippines, Vietnam, and parts of India all hosted substantial Christian communities. Yao Hong, a Chinese woman, became a Christian sometime around 1990 after discovering her husband was having an affair; and she was devastated. She is one of the many millions who has made Christianity a rapidly growing faith. The non-Muslim regions of Africa also witnessed an explosive advance of Christianity during the twentieth century. And Latin America has experienced an incredible growth of Pentecostal Protestant Christianity since the 1970s.
In the early twenty-first century, over 60% of the world's Christians lived in Asia, Africa, or Latin America. The sixth- and seventh-century world of Christendom revealed flourishing communities in Arabia, Egypt, North Africa, Ethiopia, Nubia, Syria, Armenia, Persia, India, and China, as well as Europe. Over the course of a thousand years, changes that occurred shaped the Christian World. The African and Asian posts largely vanished, declined, or were marginalized; and Christianity became primarily a European phenomenon for the next thousand years or more.
Byzantine Christendom
Byzantium had no clear starting point, unlike most empires. It was simply viewed as a continuation of the Roman Empire. Some historians date its beginning to 330 C.E. when the Roman emperor Constantine, who began to favor Christianity during his reign, established a new capital, Constantinople, on the site of an ancient Greek City - Byzantium. At the end of this century, the Roman Empire was formally divided into eastern and western halves - launching the division of Christendom which lasted into the twenty-first century.
While the western Roman Empire collapsed during the fifth century, the eastern side lasted for another thousand years.
Late Rome with its roads, taxation system, military structures, centralized administration, imperial court, laws, and Christian persisted in the east for many centuries. Emperors, who feared contamination by "barbarian" customs, forbade the residents of Constantinople from wearing boots, trousers, clothing made from animal skins, and long hairstyles, which were all associated with the Germanic peoples. The Byzantine Empire became known as the home of a distinctive civilization.
Political Life in Europe
The traditional date marking the collapse of the empire was 476 when the German general Odoacer overthrew the last Roman emperor in the west. Disease and warfare reduced Western Europe's population by more than 25%. Land under cultivation contracted and forests, marshland, and wasteland expanded. Urban life also dimished and Europe veered off to a largely rural existence. On a political front, a series of regional kingdoms emerged to replace Roman authority and these were: the Visigoths in Spain, Franks in France, Lombards in Italy, and Angles and Saxons in England. Contact with the Roman Empire in the first seven centuries C.E. genderated more distinct ethnic identities among them, militarized their societies, and gave greater prominence to Woden, their god of war. When Germanic peoples migrated into or invaded Roman lands, many of them were deeply influenced by Roman culture, especially if they served in the Roman army. As leaders of their own kingdoms, the Germanic rulers acticely embraced written Roman law, used fines and penalties to provide order and justice in their new states in place of feuds and vendettas.
The Church and Women
The Church had offered some women an aletrnative to home, marriage, family, and rural life. In Buddhist lands, a substantial number of women, mostly from aristocratic families, were attracted to the secluded monastic life of poverty, chastity, and obedience within a convent which gave them relative freedom from male control that it offered. This is just one example of the religious opportunities women were able to have.
Reason and Faith
Some early Christian thinkers sought to maintain a clear separation between the new religion and the ideas of Plato and Aristotle. There was an intellectual tension between the claims of human reason and those of faith. There was also a notion that Greek philosophy could serve as a "handmaiden" to faith, disclosing the truths of Christianity. European Christian thinkers, a small group of literate churchmen, began to emphasize the ability of human reason to penetrate divine mysteries to grasp the operation of the natural order. Logically, philosophy and rationality would operate in service to Christ. European intellectuals applied their newly discovered confidence in human reason to law, medicine, and the world of nature, exploring optics, magnetism, astronomy, and alchemy. The scientific study of nature gradually began to separat itself from theology, although never completely. The integration of political and religious life in the Islamic world (Byzantium) contrasted with their separation in the West, where there was more space for the independent pursuit of scientific subjects.
Many of the characteristic features of Christendom, which emerged during the era of the third-wave civilizations have had a long life and have extended into modern era. Much of what occurred during this time regarding religion contributed to the study of history with linking the past to what came later, helping the people with human understanding. Because we have our histories, we are limited and shaped by it.
Monday, October 24, 2016
Intro to Part Three & Ch. 7
Intro to Part Three:
The Third Wave Era
The different patterns of development within particular civilizations have made it difficult to define the Third Wave era in a single, all-encompassing fashion. During this time, the world's various regions, cultures, and peoples interacted with one another far more frequently and extensively. The change in human societies was the result of contact with strangers. In places like island Southeast Asia, coastal East Africa, Central Asian cities, parts of Western Europe, the Islamic Middle East, and the Inca Empire were all cosmopolitan regions that emerged in trade, migration, and an empire bringing together different cultures. These were "mini-globalizations" and they were not totally isolated or separate from their neighbors.
- One pattern of interaction was in long-distance trade which grew along the Silk Roads of Eurasia, within the Indian Ocean basin, across the Sahara, and along the Mississippi and other rivers. Another pattern of interaction was in large empires. They incorporated many distinct cultures within a single political system; but their size and stability also provided the security that encouraged travelers and traders to journey long distances from their homelands. And the largest of the empires created the existence of nomadic or pastoral peoples. Technology also diffused widely: in China, there was monopoly on the manufacture of raw silk. But, this technology spread far beyond E. Asia and this allowed the development of the silk industry in the eastern Mediterranean and later in Italy. In India, they had crystallized sugar, a system of numerals and the concept of zero, techniques for making cotton textiles, and many food crops. In the Americas, corn gradually diffused. The Plague, also known as the Black Death, also destroyed many parts of Eurasia and North Africa.
Ch. 7
Commerce & Culture (500-1500)
Trade affected the lives of working people, encouraging them to specialize in producing particular products for sale in distant markets rather than for use in just their own communities. Trade reduced the economic self-sufficiency of local societies as it changed the structure of the societies. Trade also had the capacity to transform political life. With controlling and taxing trade, the wealth available motivated the creation of states in different parts of the world. It helped sustain those states once they had been developed.
- The volume of trade on the Silk Roads was modest and its focus was mainly on luxury goods that were limited to its direct impact on most people. Elite Chines women and their men helped in furnishing the demand for the luxurious fabrics which marked their high status.
- The inhabitants and rulers of the sophisticated and prosperous cities were dependent on long-distance trade; and they were linked to the larger, wealthy, and prestigious civilization of India. As Buddhism progressed and spread across the Silk Roads from India to Central Asia, China, and beyond, it also changed. The original faith had shunned the material world with the emphasis that no material possession is necessary or important. But, Buddhist monasteries in the rich oasis towns of the Silk Roads became wealthy. They received gifts from merchants, artisans, etc. Sculptures and murals in the monasteries portrayed musicians and acrobats as well as women applying makeup and even drinking at parties.
- Diseases like smallpox and measles affected and devastated the Roman Empire and the Han dynasty. And in the Mongol Empire, the dissemination of disease that occurred there facilitated the spread of the Black Death.
General Notes
* Sea-based trade routes connected distant peoples all across the Eastern Hemisphere.
* Sand Road commercial networks made an impact because it helped stimulate the growth and enrichment of the West African civilization and connected it to larger patterns during the third-wave era.
* In the Western Hemisphere, it was a gradual spread of cultural elements.
Commerce and Connection in the Western Hemisphere
The direct connections with the various civilizations and cultures of the Americas were less densely intertwined than in the Afro-Eurasian region. But, the most active and dense networks of communication and exchange in the Americas laid between the regions of Mesoamerica and the Andes. Both the Maya cities in the Yucatan area of Mexico and Guatemala and the huge city-state of Teotihuacan maintained commercial relationships with each other and throughout the region. The Maya conducted a seaborne commerce along with this. Most of this trade was in luxury goods and it was important that they upheld the position and privileges of royal and noble families. Cotton clothing, jewels, and feathers attracted many of the elite groups.
The Economic relationships among the third-wave civilizations were more balanced and multicentered than those of the modern era. Even though tremendous inequalities occurred within certain regions and societies, interactions between major civilizations operated on a more equal stance than in the globalized world of the past several centuries.
The Third Wave Era
The different patterns of development within particular civilizations have made it difficult to define the Third Wave era in a single, all-encompassing fashion. During this time, the world's various regions, cultures, and peoples interacted with one another far more frequently and extensively. The change in human societies was the result of contact with strangers. In places like island Southeast Asia, coastal East Africa, Central Asian cities, parts of Western Europe, the Islamic Middle East, and the Inca Empire were all cosmopolitan regions that emerged in trade, migration, and an empire bringing together different cultures. These were "mini-globalizations" and they were not totally isolated or separate from their neighbors.
- One pattern of interaction was in long-distance trade which grew along the Silk Roads of Eurasia, within the Indian Ocean basin, across the Sahara, and along the Mississippi and other rivers. Another pattern of interaction was in large empires. They incorporated many distinct cultures within a single political system; but their size and stability also provided the security that encouraged travelers and traders to journey long distances from their homelands. And the largest of the empires created the existence of nomadic or pastoral peoples. Technology also diffused widely: in China, there was monopoly on the manufacture of raw silk. But, this technology spread far beyond E. Asia and this allowed the development of the silk industry in the eastern Mediterranean and later in Italy. In India, they had crystallized sugar, a system of numerals and the concept of zero, techniques for making cotton textiles, and many food crops. In the Americas, corn gradually diffused. The Plague, also known as the Black Death, also destroyed many parts of Eurasia and North Africa.
Ch. 7
Commerce & Culture (500-1500)
Trade affected the lives of working people, encouraging them to specialize in producing particular products for sale in distant markets rather than for use in just their own communities. Trade reduced the economic self-sufficiency of local societies as it changed the structure of the societies. Trade also had the capacity to transform political life. With controlling and taxing trade, the wealth available motivated the creation of states in different parts of the world. It helped sustain those states once they had been developed.
- The volume of trade on the Silk Roads was modest and its focus was mainly on luxury goods that were limited to its direct impact on most people. Elite Chines women and their men helped in furnishing the demand for the luxurious fabrics which marked their high status.
- The inhabitants and rulers of the sophisticated and prosperous cities were dependent on long-distance trade; and they were linked to the larger, wealthy, and prestigious civilization of India. As Buddhism progressed and spread across the Silk Roads from India to Central Asia, China, and beyond, it also changed. The original faith had shunned the material world with the emphasis that no material possession is necessary or important. But, Buddhist monasteries in the rich oasis towns of the Silk Roads became wealthy. They received gifts from merchants, artisans, etc. Sculptures and murals in the monasteries portrayed musicians and acrobats as well as women applying makeup and even drinking at parties.
- Diseases like smallpox and measles affected and devastated the Roman Empire and the Han dynasty. And in the Mongol Empire, the dissemination of disease that occurred there facilitated the spread of the Black Death.
General Notes
* Sea-based trade routes connected distant peoples all across the Eastern Hemisphere.
* Sand Road commercial networks made an impact because it helped stimulate the growth and enrichment of the West African civilization and connected it to larger patterns during the third-wave era.
* In the Western Hemisphere, it was a gradual spread of cultural elements.
Commerce and Connection in the Western Hemisphere
The direct connections with the various civilizations and cultures of the Americas were less densely intertwined than in the Afro-Eurasian region. But, the most active and dense networks of communication and exchange in the Americas laid between the regions of Mesoamerica and the Andes. Both the Maya cities in the Yucatan area of Mexico and Guatemala and the huge city-state of Teotihuacan maintained commercial relationships with each other and throughout the region. The Maya conducted a seaborne commerce along with this. Most of this trade was in luxury goods and it was important that they upheld the position and privileges of royal and noble families. Cotton clothing, jewels, and feathers attracted many of the elite groups.
The Economic relationships among the third-wave civilizations were more balanced and multicentered than those of the modern era. Even though tremendous inequalities occurred within certain regions and societies, interactions between major civilizations operated on a more equal stance than in the globalized world of the past several centuries.
Friday, October 7, 2016
Ch.6 Commonalities and Variations - Africa & the Americas 500 B.C.E. 1200 C.E.
Apart from the the civilizations of Eurasia - the Greeks, Romans, Persians, the Chinese, and the Indians of South Asia, there were also the Mesoamerican Maya and the Andean Tiwanaku who thrived along with several other civilizations in sub-Saharan Africa. It also included the Meroe, Axum, and the Niger River valley.
Starting in Africa, the movement of mankind encompassed Eurasia, Australia, the Americas, and Pacific Oceania. Gathering and hunting remained the basis for sustaining life and societies in different communities formed by these people. On the super-continents of Eurasia, Africa, and the Americas, the revolutionary transformation of human life generated particularly in rich agricultural environments. During the second-wave era, Eurasia was home to more than 80% of the world's people with Africa at around 11%, and the Americas between 5-7%. The Americas had no pastoral societies since they had no presence of most animals. Africa also lacked in having animals but because of their close proximity to Eurasia, there was availability in them after the animals had been domesticated. Africa often interacted with Eurasia because it was adjacent to Eurasia while separating the Americas from both Africa and Eurasia.
Africa's Civilizations
Africa was the most tropical of the world's three super-continents. Constant warm temperatures resulted in decomposition of humus which affected poorer and less fertile soils and less productive agriculture than in Eurasia. Africa's climate also caused health problems with disease-carrying insects and parasites.
Mesoamerica's Civilizations
Mesoamerica: "extraordinary diversity compressed into a relatively small space."
Mesoamerica's environment consisted of lowland rain forests to cold and windy highland plateaus with numerous mountains and valleys. These conditions contributed to the substantial linguistic and ethnic diversity along with chiefdoms and states. It was a region bound together by elements of a common culture despite its diversity. Its peoples shared an intensive agricultural technology devoted to raising maize, beans, chili peppers, and squash. They practiced religions that featured a pantheon of male and female deities, understood a cosmic cycle of creation and destruction, and constructed monumental ceremonial centers. Also, they practiced human sacrifice. Their ritual calendar included 260 days and they communicated frequently with themselves. They learned hieroglyphic writing and were influenced by the Olmec culture who had similar traits and ways of doing certain things in their own civilization.
Andes's Civilizations
The landscape of the Andes had bleak deserts, dozens of rivers, and mountains. Deserts supported human habitation because they were cut by dozens of rivers which flowed down through the mountains opening up the possibility of irrigation and cultivation. The presence of the Pacific Ocean offered the Andes an abundant amount of seabirds and fish. The Andes was a towering mountain chain with highland valleys and ecological niches. The Andean societies looked for access to resources through these environments in colonization, conquest, or trade.
The Incas were the most well-known civilizations to take place in this environment. They encompassed practically the entire region in the 15th century. But, the coastal region of central Peru (Norte Chico) had been one of the world's First Civilizations. Between 1000 B.C,E, to 1000 C.E., a number of Andean civilizations arose and eventually died out because they never truly developed as civilizations. They did not develop writing so historians who look into their lives have to depend on archaeology in order to come to some sort of understanding regarding these civilizations.
Bantu Africa
Although civilizations are what world historians focus most and put effort in to break down, understand, and come to conclusions about, there were also human communities that evolved alongside civilizations. Two regions in Africa and North America developed in this way. In Africa, Bantu-speaking peoples moved into the subcontinent in the vast region of Africa south of the equator. The Bantu expansion was a slow movement of peoples. It generated a number of cross-cultural encounters. Bantu-speaking farmers had a numerical advantage because agriculture pushed them to a more productive economy. Gathering and hunting at large were displaced, absorbed, or eliminated in most parts of Africa.
North America
In the Mesoamerican and Andean regions, cities, states, and dense populations created civilizations similar to those of Afro-Eurasia. In other places, gathering and hunting peoples carried most of ancient human adaptions to the environment. In the eastern woodlands of the United States, Central America, the Amazon basin, and the Caribbean islands were populated by peoples who could be considered as "semi-sedentary" - less intensive and productive agricultural societies. These people made their own histories changing and developing their unique environments.
The growth, prosperity, and general development of these civilizations are very much a significant part of our world's history. Historians take so much time and effort to find and discover evidence from these civilizations to better understand how the people lived as individuals and as communities.
Starting in Africa, the movement of mankind encompassed Eurasia, Australia, the Americas, and Pacific Oceania. Gathering and hunting remained the basis for sustaining life and societies in different communities formed by these people. On the super-continents of Eurasia, Africa, and the Americas, the revolutionary transformation of human life generated particularly in rich agricultural environments. During the second-wave era, Eurasia was home to more than 80% of the world's people with Africa at around 11%, and the Americas between 5-7%. The Americas had no pastoral societies since they had no presence of most animals. Africa also lacked in having animals but because of their close proximity to Eurasia, there was availability in them after the animals had been domesticated. Africa often interacted with Eurasia because it was adjacent to Eurasia while separating the Americas from both Africa and Eurasia.
Africa's Civilizations
Africa was the most tropical of the world's three super-continents. Constant warm temperatures resulted in decomposition of humus which affected poorer and less fertile soils and less productive agriculture than in Eurasia. Africa's climate also caused health problems with disease-carrying insects and parasites.
Mesoamerica's Civilizations
Mesoamerica: "extraordinary diversity compressed into a relatively small space."
Mesoamerica's environment consisted of lowland rain forests to cold and windy highland plateaus with numerous mountains and valleys. These conditions contributed to the substantial linguistic and ethnic diversity along with chiefdoms and states. It was a region bound together by elements of a common culture despite its diversity. Its peoples shared an intensive agricultural technology devoted to raising maize, beans, chili peppers, and squash. They practiced religions that featured a pantheon of male and female deities, understood a cosmic cycle of creation and destruction, and constructed monumental ceremonial centers. Also, they practiced human sacrifice. Their ritual calendar included 260 days and they communicated frequently with themselves. They learned hieroglyphic writing and were influenced by the Olmec culture who had similar traits and ways of doing certain things in their own civilization.
Andes's Civilizations
The landscape of the Andes had bleak deserts, dozens of rivers, and mountains. Deserts supported human habitation because they were cut by dozens of rivers which flowed down through the mountains opening up the possibility of irrigation and cultivation. The presence of the Pacific Ocean offered the Andes an abundant amount of seabirds and fish. The Andes was a towering mountain chain with highland valleys and ecological niches. The Andean societies looked for access to resources through these environments in colonization, conquest, or trade.
The Incas were the most well-known civilizations to take place in this environment. They encompassed practically the entire region in the 15th century. But, the coastal region of central Peru (Norte Chico) had been one of the world's First Civilizations. Between 1000 B.C,E, to 1000 C.E., a number of Andean civilizations arose and eventually died out because they never truly developed as civilizations. They did not develop writing so historians who look into their lives have to depend on archaeology in order to come to some sort of understanding regarding these civilizations.
Bantu Africa
Although civilizations are what world historians focus most and put effort in to break down, understand, and come to conclusions about, there were also human communities that evolved alongside civilizations. Two regions in Africa and North America developed in this way. In Africa, Bantu-speaking peoples moved into the subcontinent in the vast region of Africa south of the equator. The Bantu expansion was a slow movement of peoples. It generated a number of cross-cultural encounters. Bantu-speaking farmers had a numerical advantage because agriculture pushed them to a more productive economy. Gathering and hunting at large were displaced, absorbed, or eliminated in most parts of Africa.
North America
In the Mesoamerican and Andean regions, cities, states, and dense populations created civilizations similar to those of Afro-Eurasia. In other places, gathering and hunting peoples carried most of ancient human adaptions to the environment. In the eastern woodlands of the United States, Central America, the Amazon basin, and the Caribbean islands were populated by peoples who could be considered as "semi-sedentary" - less intensive and productive agricultural societies. These people made their own histories changing and developing their unique environments.
The growth, prosperity, and general development of these civilizations are very much a significant part of our world's history. Historians take so much time and effort to find and discover evidence from these civilizations to better understand how the people lived as individuals and as communities.
Tuesday, October 4, 2016
Ch. 5 Society and Inequality in Eurasia/North Africa
China
Chinese society was unique because it was shaped by the actions of the state. It was significant in the political power and social prestige of Chinese state officials - all males. Acting in the name of the emperor, bureaucrats represented the cultural and social elite of Chinese civilization for 2,000 years.
Confucius advocated selecting officials such as administrators based on merit and personal mortality rather than birth or well.
When the Han dynasty was established and its authority arose around 200 B.C.E., its rulers had each province send men of promise to the capital where they were examined and chosen for official positions based on their performances.
Emperor Wu Di - in 124 B.C.E., established an imperial academy where potential officials could be trained as scholars and learned about history, literature, art, and math with emphasis on Confucian teachings. It enrolled around 30,000 students by the end of the Han dynasty. This favored families who were wealthy enough to provide the years of education required. The ones who made it into the bureaucracy entered the realm of high privilege and great prestige.
Senior officials: moved around in carriages, had robes, ribbons, seals, and headdresses appropriate for their rank.
Lower officials: distinguished by speech, cultural sophistication, urban manners, and political authority.
Most officials came from wealthy families meaning they had land. By the 1st century B.C.E., growing populations, taxation, and debt generated many more landowners as impoverished peasants were forced to sell their lands to more prosperous neighbors.
Throughout the course of China's civilization, peasants accumulated the vast majority of the population. Nature, the state, and landlords combined made the peasants' lives more vulnerable. Peasants were oppressed in China and exploited; but they were also honored and celebrated in the official ideology of the state.
India
Caste system: "race" or "purity of blood"
-Evolved from a racially defined encounter between light-skinned Aryan invaders and the darker-hued native peoples.
-the top: Brahmins: priests whose rituals and sacrifices alone could ensure the proper functioning of the world.
-Kshatriya: warriors and rulers charged with protecting and governing society.
-Vaisya: commoners who cultivated the land. the first three classes came to be regarded as pure Aryans and were called the "twice-born."
-The Untouchables
Far below...
-Sudras: native peoples incorporated into the margins of Aryan society in subordinate positions.
-Jatis: occupationally-based groups.
India's caste system showed the exploitation of the poor by the wealthy and powerful.
Rome
Slavery: ownership by a master, possibility of being sold, working without pay, and status of "outsider" at the bottom of the social hierarchy.
In the Greco-Roman world, society was based on slavery.
Aristotle developed the notion that some people were "slaves by nature."
-By the time of Christ, the Italian heartland of the Roman Empire had 2-3 million slaves - 33-40% o the population.
-The vast majority of slaves had been prisoners who were captured in many wars that accompanied the creation of the empire. Thousands of people were enslaved with pirates also capturing them to sell them to Roman slave traders on the island of Delos. Some slaves also came from slave reproduction where slave mothers were regarded as slaves themselves.
*Romans regarded their slaves as "barbarians" - lazy, unreliable, immoral, prone to thieving, etc. They often worked chained together and worked as skilled artisans, teachers, doctors, business agents, entertainers, and actors.
*If a slave murdered his master, Roman law demands the lives of all of the victim's slaves. When one Roman official was killed by a slave in 61 C.E., every 1 of his 400 slaves was condemned to death. Brutal owners made their slaves' lives a living hell. Benevolent owners made life tolerable and sometimes granted slaves their freedom or allow them to buy their freedom.
Buddha and Solomon
"What has been will be again... there is nothing new under the sun" attributed to King Solomon and it was a despairing and sad view of changelessness and futility of human life. Buddhist teachings on the other hand, has the concept of impermanence - "everything changes, nothing remains without change."
Patriarchy which has assumptions of male superiority and dominance has not been challenged until the recent centuries and even then, it has continued to shape the lives and and the ways of thinking of the vast majority of humankind.
Chinese society was unique because it was shaped by the actions of the state. It was significant in the political power and social prestige of Chinese state officials - all males. Acting in the name of the emperor, bureaucrats represented the cultural and social elite of Chinese civilization for 2,000 years.
Confucius advocated selecting officials such as administrators based on merit and personal mortality rather than birth or well.
When the Han dynasty was established and its authority arose around 200 B.C.E., its rulers had each province send men of promise to the capital where they were examined and chosen for official positions based on their performances.
Emperor Wu Di - in 124 B.C.E., established an imperial academy where potential officials could be trained as scholars and learned about history, literature, art, and math with emphasis on Confucian teachings. It enrolled around 30,000 students by the end of the Han dynasty. This favored families who were wealthy enough to provide the years of education required. The ones who made it into the bureaucracy entered the realm of high privilege and great prestige.
Senior officials: moved around in carriages, had robes, ribbons, seals, and headdresses appropriate for their rank.
Lower officials: distinguished by speech, cultural sophistication, urban manners, and political authority.
Most officials came from wealthy families meaning they had land. By the 1st century B.C.E., growing populations, taxation, and debt generated many more landowners as impoverished peasants were forced to sell their lands to more prosperous neighbors.
Throughout the course of China's civilization, peasants accumulated the vast majority of the population. Nature, the state, and landlords combined made the peasants' lives more vulnerable. Peasants were oppressed in China and exploited; but they were also honored and celebrated in the official ideology of the state.
India
Caste system: "race" or "purity of blood"
-Evolved from a racially defined encounter between light-skinned Aryan invaders and the darker-hued native peoples.
-the top: Brahmins: priests whose rituals and sacrifices alone could ensure the proper functioning of the world.
-Kshatriya: warriors and rulers charged with protecting and governing society.
-Vaisya: commoners who cultivated the land. the first three classes came to be regarded as pure Aryans and were called the "twice-born."
-The Untouchables
Far below...
-Sudras: native peoples incorporated into the margins of Aryan society in subordinate positions.
-Jatis: occupationally-based groups.
India's caste system showed the exploitation of the poor by the wealthy and powerful.
Rome
Slavery: ownership by a master, possibility of being sold, working without pay, and status of "outsider" at the bottom of the social hierarchy.
In the Greco-Roman world, society was based on slavery.
Aristotle developed the notion that some people were "slaves by nature."
-By the time of Christ, the Italian heartland of the Roman Empire had 2-3 million slaves - 33-40% o the population.
-The vast majority of slaves had been prisoners who were captured in many wars that accompanied the creation of the empire. Thousands of people were enslaved with pirates also capturing them to sell them to Roman slave traders on the island of Delos. Some slaves also came from slave reproduction where slave mothers were regarded as slaves themselves.
*Romans regarded their slaves as "barbarians" - lazy, unreliable, immoral, prone to thieving, etc. They often worked chained together and worked as skilled artisans, teachers, doctors, business agents, entertainers, and actors.
*If a slave murdered his master, Roman law demands the lives of all of the victim's slaves. When one Roman official was killed by a slave in 61 C.E., every 1 of his 400 slaves was condemned to death. Brutal owners made their slaves' lives a living hell. Benevolent owners made life tolerable and sometimes granted slaves their freedom or allow them to buy their freedom.
Buddha and Solomon
"What has been will be again... there is nothing new under the sun" attributed to King Solomon and it was a despairing and sad view of changelessness and futility of human life. Buddhist teachings on the other hand, has the concept of impermanence - "everything changes, nothing remains without change."
Patriarchy which has assumptions of male superiority and dominance has not been challenged until the recent centuries and even then, it has continued to shape the lives and and the ways of thinking of the vast majority of humankind.
Sunday, September 25, 2016
Intro to Part Two & Ch. 3 (State and Empire)
The earliest of empires showed up during the era of the First Civilizations when Akkadian, Babylonian, and Assyrian empires encompassed the city-states of Mesopotamia and then established imperial tradition in the Middle East. As for Egypt, it became an imperial state when it temporarily ruled Nubia and the lands of the eastern Mediterranean.
Empires: states, political systems that exercise coercive power. Reserved for more larger and aggressive states that conquer, rule, and extract resources from other states and peoples. Empires have encompassed a variety of peoples and cultures within a single political system; and have been associated with political or cultural oppression.
Eurasian empires (second-wave era)
Persia, Greece under Alexander the Great, China during the Qin and Han dynasties, India during the Mauryan and Gupta dynasties all shared common problems - imposing culture of imperial heartland, ruling conquered people directly or established local authorities, extracting wealth of empire through taxes, tribute, and labor while maintaining order, etc.
Why the fascination with empires?
They were big, creating a looming presence over their regions. They were also bloody and important.
In the era between 500 B.C.E. and 500 C.E., the second-wave civilizations flourished in the Mediterranean world, Middle East, India, and China.
Persians and Greeks
- Both these civilizations, physically adjacent to each other, has a century-long interaction and clash; it was one of the most consequential encounters of the ancient world.
*The Persian empire was the largest and most impressive empires in 500 B.C.E. Persians were an Indo-European people whose homeland lay on the Iranian plateau. The Persians, under the Achaemenid dynasty (553-330 B.C.E.), constructed an imperial system that drew on previous examples such as the Babylonian and Assyrian empires. Under the leadership of Cyrus (557-530 B.C.E) and Darius (522-486 B.C.E.), Persian conquests reached from Egypt to India - intertwining 35-50 million people - which in turn created an immensely diverse group (peoples, states, languages, and cultural traditions).
- Persian empire centered on cult of kinship . Ruling by the will of the great Persian god Ahura Mazda, kings were absolute monarchs who deserved their title in the eyes of many - "Great king, King of kings, King of countries containing all kinds of men, King in this great earth far and wide").
-Persian empire also had an effective imperial system: Persian governors (satraps), imperial spies ("eyes and ears of the King").
-Because of their imperial bureaucracy and court life filled with administrators, tax collectors, record keepers, and translators, the Persian empire became a model for the other subsequent regimes in the region. They also had a system of standardized coinage.
*The Greeks were also an Indo-European people. The Greeks, who called themselves Hellenes, created a civilization that was distinctive. The total population of Greece and the Aegean basin was 2-3 million. Their civilization took place in steep mountains and valleys. They were developed in hundreds of city-states or small settlements; and most were modest in size and consisted of 500-5000 male citizens.
-Each of the city-states were fiercely independent. and had conflict with neighbors. But, they spoke the same language and worshiped the same gods. All of them stopped their conflicts every 4 years for the Olympic Games which began in 776 B.C.E.
-The Greeks were also an expansive people.
-Their most distinctive feature was the idea of "citizenship." Free people managing the affairs of state, equality of all citizens before the law was very unique.
*The Greco-Persian Wars
-Persia tried to conquer parts of Greece; but Greece fought back. Surprised by this act of rebellion, Persia tried to punish Greece with major military expeditions; but luckily enough, the Greeks held them off on both land and sea. Beating the Persians in battle was a huge source of pride for Greece. The victory also radicalized Athenian democracy.
The second-wave empires proved legitimacy for contemporary states, inspiration for new imperial ventures, and abundant warnings and cautions for those looking to criticize more recent empires.
Empires: states, political systems that exercise coercive power. Reserved for more larger and aggressive states that conquer, rule, and extract resources from other states and peoples. Empires have encompassed a variety of peoples and cultures within a single political system; and have been associated with political or cultural oppression.
Eurasian empires (second-wave era)
Persia, Greece under Alexander the Great, China during the Qin and Han dynasties, India during the Mauryan and Gupta dynasties all shared common problems - imposing culture of imperial heartland, ruling conquered people directly or established local authorities, extracting wealth of empire through taxes, tribute, and labor while maintaining order, etc.
Why the fascination with empires?
They were big, creating a looming presence over their regions. They were also bloody and important.
In the era between 500 B.C.E. and 500 C.E., the second-wave civilizations flourished in the Mediterranean world, Middle East, India, and China.
Persians and Greeks
- Both these civilizations, physically adjacent to each other, has a century-long interaction and clash; it was one of the most consequential encounters of the ancient world.
*The Persian empire was the largest and most impressive empires in 500 B.C.E. Persians were an Indo-European people whose homeland lay on the Iranian plateau. The Persians, under the Achaemenid dynasty (553-330 B.C.E.), constructed an imperial system that drew on previous examples such as the Babylonian and Assyrian empires. Under the leadership of Cyrus (557-530 B.C.E) and Darius (522-486 B.C.E.), Persian conquests reached from Egypt to India - intertwining 35-50 million people - which in turn created an immensely diverse group (peoples, states, languages, and cultural traditions).
- Persian empire centered on cult of kinship . Ruling by the will of the great Persian god Ahura Mazda, kings were absolute monarchs who deserved their title in the eyes of many - "Great king, King of kings, King of countries containing all kinds of men, King in this great earth far and wide").
-Persian empire also had an effective imperial system: Persian governors (satraps), imperial spies ("eyes and ears of the King").
-Because of their imperial bureaucracy and court life filled with administrators, tax collectors, record keepers, and translators, the Persian empire became a model for the other subsequent regimes in the region. They also had a system of standardized coinage.
*The Greeks were also an Indo-European people. The Greeks, who called themselves Hellenes, created a civilization that was distinctive. The total population of Greece and the Aegean basin was 2-3 million. Their civilization took place in steep mountains and valleys. They were developed in hundreds of city-states or small settlements; and most were modest in size and consisted of 500-5000 male citizens.
-Each of the city-states were fiercely independent. and had conflict with neighbors. But, they spoke the same language and worshiped the same gods. All of them stopped their conflicts every 4 years for the Olympic Games which began in 776 B.C.E.
-The Greeks were also an expansive people.
-Their most distinctive feature was the idea of "citizenship." Free people managing the affairs of state, equality of all citizens before the law was very unique.
*The Greco-Persian Wars
-Persia tried to conquer parts of Greece; but Greece fought back. Surprised by this act of rebellion, Persia tried to punish Greece with major military expeditions; but luckily enough, the Greeks held them off on both land and sea. Beating the Persians in battle was a huge source of pride for Greece. The victory also radicalized Athenian democracy.
The second-wave empires proved legitimacy for contemporary states, inspiration for new imperial ventures, and abundant warnings and cautions for those looking to criticize more recent empires.
Saturday, September 17, 2016
Ch. 2 Documents - Introductory Question Response
The Epic of Gilgamesh
How does the Epic of Gilgamesh portray the gods and their relationship to humankind?
The Epic of Gilgamesh presents how the Mesopotamian gods agreed to exterminate mankind because they were growing in population and becoming more wild and intolerable. It describes how the lord of the Storm, Adad, turned daylight into darkness where he smashed the land of Shurrupak. He flooded the entire the land; and caused so much chaos and despair, that even the other gods felt fear and fled to the highest heavens. The Queen of Heaven mourned for the people even tough she commanded evil upon them. As the people float in the ocean like dead fish, the gods of heaven and hell wept. This shows just how much power the gods have over humankind. If the gods feel that the people serve no purpose to the world anymore, they obliterate them.
How does the Epic of Gilgamesh portray the gods and their relationship to humankind?
The Epic of Gilgamesh presents how the Mesopotamian gods agreed to exterminate mankind because they were growing in population and becoming more wild and intolerable. It describes how the lord of the Storm, Adad, turned daylight into darkness where he smashed the land of Shurrupak. He flooded the entire the land; and caused so much chaos and despair, that even the other gods felt fear and fled to the highest heavens. The Queen of Heaven mourned for the people even tough she commanded evil upon them. As the people float in the ocean like dead fish, the gods of heaven and hell wept. This shows just how much power the gods have over humankind. If the gods feel that the people serve no purpose to the world anymore, they obliterate them.
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