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The Nile is divided into sections by cataracts.  A cataract is a rocky area that creates a waterfall or rapids.  There are six cataracts in the Nile river.

 As the water level lowered, it would leave behind rich fertile soil for farmers

Fresh water, irrigation, fertile soil--this is why people called it the "gift" of the Nile.

Around 6000 BCE the climate began to change, which might explain why many humans changed from hunting and gathering to farming.  Before civilization, early humans came to the Nile River to hunt, fish, and gather food, but gradually as people learned to farm and domesticate animals (about 7000 BCE and 5500 BCE), and therefore live in permanent settlements, areas around the Nile became more crowded.

The change from nomadic hunter-gatherers to civilized living followed the same pattern as other places around the world: farming provided extra food, which allowed the division of labor, which allows the development of government and religion and creates social classes. 

Historians call them Upper Egypt and Lower Egypt

We know so much about the Egyptians because there are so many written resources and because their culture lasted so long with few interruptions

Another reason we know so much about Egypt is because they made their architecture out of stone, which has lasted for the most part. 

Religion was a the center of Egyptian life.  Egyptians believed in many Gods, so they were polytheistic.

Later Egyptians would call their kings “pharaoh”.  Egyptian people believed the pharaoh was a living God, so the Egyptians developed a theocracy, or a government ruled by religious leaders.  This is important to understanding why Egyptian people were so willing to give their grain to the Pharaoh and build him or her incredible temples—they thought the Pharaoh was a living God that would be with them forever in eternity.

The most well-known ritual was mummification.  Egyptians believed in life after death, and they wanted the body to look life-like.  Anyone could be mummified if they had enough money

Egyptians were a very advanced civilization due to their inventions and technology.  Egyptians developed a writing system called hieroglyphs that combined pictures and symbols.  Eventually, they created an alphabet from their symbols.  In 1822 CE a European explorer found what is called the Rossetta Stone (left picture)--a stone with the same message written in 3 different languages, which finally allowed historians to translate ancient hieroglyphs. Egyptians developed a 365-day calendar and used a number system based on 10. Egyptians figured out amazing ways to cut stone to use in their temples and obelisks.  An obelisk is a tall narrow monument that becomes more narrow as it goes up.  They created a writing material similar to paper called papyrus from reeds found in the Nile.  Egyptians were excellent ship builders and excelled at mathematics.  They used fractions, decimals, addition, subtraction, multiplication, division and basic ideas of geometry.  Egyptian art and architecture is famous and has been reused and copied by many other civilization including Greece, Rome, and even the United States

Egyptian life depended on what social class you were a part of.

At the top of society was the Pharaoh.  Below the Pharaoh was the royal court (Pharaoh's family), high priests, government officials, and scribes and nobles (rich land owners).  Below them were doctors and engineers, craftsman, and then farmers and unskilled workers at the bottom.  Egyptians did use some slaves, but slavery is hardly mentioned in their writings.

Bread was the main food source, but they would have eaten meat during festivals. 

Egypt's history is divided into six different time periods

creating Egypt's first dynasty.  He defeated some enemies and united Upper and Lower Egypt into one civilization.

One of the first major Pharaohs of the Old Kingdom was Djoser.  His temple was one of the first pyramids Egyptians tried to build.  It was a "step pyramid" and it started the tradition of building pyramids as a burial ground for Pharaohs. Although the term "Pharaoh" wasn't used until much later, we will keep using it to refer to Egyptian kings.   

Hatshepsut was a women Pharaoh.  Her tomb is an amazingly long ramp leading to a temple that has been cut out of a mountain.  Pharaoh Akhenaten tried to start a new religious tradition of worshipping only one God.  Worshipping one God is called monotheism.  This did not sit well with the polytheistic population that has honored many gods for thousands of years.  After Akhenaten's death his monuments were destroyed and his name was removed from the list of kings. Years later he was often referred to as, "the enemy". Akhenaten's son would also become famous, thousands of years later when his tomb was found perfectly preserved. His name was Pharaoh Tutankhamen--he is known and King Tut. He became Pharaoh at age 9 or 10 and ruled for only 9 years.

Documentary sources revealed the presence of at least 17,376 individuals of foreign origin were in London between the years 1336 and 1584, as far away as Iceland and India.

New research on people buried in London during the Black Death suggests that the city’s population was more diverse than currently believed, including the presence of people with African heritage.

The Black Death did set the stage for more modern medicine and spurred changes in public health and hospital management. Frustrated with Black Death diagnoses that revolved around astrology and superstition, educators began placing greater emphasis on clinical medicine, based on physical science.

generally suffered a communal crisis of faith.

They had turned to the church for an answer to the plague, and the church had been able to offer no help.

celebrate being alive.

The danse macabre, or dance of death, is an allegorical concept that was expressed in drama, poetry, music and visual art.

The range of figures shown is meant to show that death will come for everyone, and the various activities depicted are a reminder that death could always be right around the corner.

deeply affected by the invaders’ interactions with indigenous groups—interactions that, through a combination of violence and disease, resulted in massive declines in indigenous populations.

The Spanish Empire

Colonial expansion under the Spanish Empire was initiated by the Spanish conquistadors and developed by the Monarchy of Spain through its administrators and missionaries.

motivations for colonial expansion were trade and the spread of the Christian faith through indigenous conversions.

The Exploration and Conquest of the New World

Major French exploration of North America began under the rule of Francis I, King of France. In 1524,

A major French settlement lay on the island of Hispaniola, where France established the colony of Saint-Domingue on the western third of the island in 1664.

Shortly after Columbus’ first voyage to the New World, the British Empire funded an exploratory mission of its own led by John Cabot. Cabot explored the North American continent,

Upon the death of Christopher Columbus,

“Whereupon the Tartars (Mongols), worn out by this pestilential disease, and falling on all sides as if thunderstruck, and seeing that they were perishing hopelessly, ordered the corpses to be placed upon their engines and thrown into the city of Kaffa. Accordingly were the bodies of the dead hurled over the walls, so that the Christians were not able to hide or protect themselves from this danger, although they carried away as many as possible and threw them into the sea.”

summer of 1347, the Italian merchants headed to their ships and the fled the city of Kaffa. En route, however, the Italians stopped at Constantinople, inadvertently infecting the city. Thousands of people were killed, including Andronikos, the son of the Greek Emperor, John VI Cantacuzenos. Those who were able fled the city, many not realising that they were already infected. By the autumn, the western coast of Asia Minor was experiencing the full force of the Black Death and it would not be long before returned home to infect their native Italy.

A peninsula is a piece of land surrounded by water on three sides.

southern end of a very large peninsula. located in southern Europe

natural coastline and many natural harbors

seafood to eat.

geo means “earth” and -graphy means “to write.” 

located in relation to other places,

what their own and other places were like, and how people and environments were distributed. These concerns have been central to geography ever since.

Throughout human history, most societies have sought to understand something about their place in the world, and the people and environments around them.

More importantly, they also raised questions about how and why different human and natural patterns came into being on Earth’s surface, and why variations existed from place to place. The effort to answer these questions about patterns and distribution led them to figure out that the world was round, to calculate Earth’s circumference, and to develop explanations of everything from the seasonal flooding of the Nile River to differences in population densities from place to place.

Advances in geography were chiefly made by scientists of the Muslim world, based around the Arabian Peninsula and North Africa. Geographers of this Islamic Golden Age created the world’s first rectangular map based on a grid, a map system that is still familiar today. Islamic scholars also applied their study of people and places to agriculture, determining which crops and livestock were most suited to specific habitats or environments.

They were the first to use the compass for navigational purposes.

The very fact that the curriculum was structured by the church gave it the ability to mould the students to follow its doctrine

Unofficially, education started from a very young age. This sort of early education depended on the feudal class of the child’s parents

Even the children of serfs would be taught the skills needed to survive by their parents. The boys would be taken out into the fields to observe and to help their parents with easy tasks, while the girls would work with the animals at home, in the vegetable garden with their mothers, or watch them weave.

Children of craftsmen and merchants were educated from a very young age in the trade of their fathers. Trade secrets rarely left a family and they had to be taught and understood by all male (and unusually, female) heirs, in order to continue the family legacy.

Young boys of noble birth would learn how to hunt and swing a weapon, while the young ladies of nobility would learn how to cook

The main subject of study in those schools was Latin (reading and writing). In addition to this, students were also taught rhetoric – the art of public speaking and persuasion – which was a very useful tool for both men of the cloth and nobles alike.

Lessons frequently started at sunrise and finished at sunset

University education, across the whole of the continent, was a luxury to which only the wealthiest and brightest could ever aspire

Since the creation of the first university in 1088

Students attended the Medieval University at different ages, ranging from 14 (if they were attending Oxford or Paris to study the Arts) to their 30s (if they were studying Law in Bologna)

The dynamic between students and teachers in a medieval university was significantly different from today. In the University of Bologna students hired and fired teachers by consensus. The students also bargained as a collective regarding fees, and threatened teachers with strikes if their demands were not met

A Master of Arts degree in the medieval education system would have taken six years; a Bachelor of Arts degree would be awarded after completing the third or fourth year. By “Arts” the degree was referring to the seven liberal arts – arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music theory, grammar, logic, and rhetoric

The sons of the peasants could only be educated if the lord of the manor had given his permission

Any family caught having a son educated without permission was heavily fined

Historians today believe that this policy was another way in which authority figures attempted to control the peasants, since an educated peasant/villein might prove to question the way things were done and upset the balance of power which kept the nobles strong.

Students held the legal status of clerics which, according to the Canon Law, could not be held by women; women were therefore not admitted into universities.

main threats lay in early childhood, as the child's immune system was coming to terms with the threats posed by a disease-ridden environment.

Thatch roofs were common in the countryside (where 85-90% of the population lived) and they attracted insects and rodents

They carried bacteria, which they deposited either on the inhabitants or the food they would eat

There was no plumbing, so human waste was deposited outside - but not too far from - the house. Such material produced a breeding ground for the biggest killers of the period, cholera and typhoid, which were caused by unsanitary living conditions.

body lice living on infected people.

increased risk of death as a result of accidents at work.

It was noblemen who were most successful at keeping themselves clean, and they surrounded themselves with well-scrubbed servants.

But between the ages of 14 and 40 - the years of having children - a woman's life expectancy was half that of a man's.

One reason offered for this is that having babies in the middle ages was more dangerous than going to war

less sanitary, and put the mother at a high risk of fatal infection.

Food storage was also primitive, with no refrigeration except in winter, and consumers showed a tolerance of slightly rancid goods because there was a general shortage of food.

while relatives of the afflicted prayed for miracles.

citizen has a direct impact on every policy decision, since he has a vote on each issue

opportunity to speak and be heard, and there is an incentive for the community to be involved in town meetings, referenda and other elections.

power in the hands of the people,

opportunity to know about all of the important decisions, but they also have the responsibility to get the information necessary to understand the issues and make the best choices for laws and policies

transparency to government

accountable to the people.

opportunity to voice her concerns, it's more difficult to brush concerns aside or to hide uncomfortable issues.

apathy of some citizens who don't choose to attend town assemblies or vote can result in something more like a representative system than a pure democratic one. Direct democracy also involves many more elections, which can be both inconvenient and expensive. Finally, because direct democracy is usually effective only in small societies, the influence of the media and government officials may be stronger there than in a larger setting.

Women were not citizens and therefore could not vote or have any say in the political process.

about 20 percent of the population of Athens were citizens.

In Athenian democracy, every citizen was required to participate or suffer punishment.

Slaves and foreigners were not citizens and also could not participate in the democracy.

suited for agriculture

volcanic ash made the soil near Rome some of the best in all of Europe. Rome attracted new settlers during its rise to power due to its agricultural potentia

The Roman population grew quickly, thanks to surplus production of grains, olives and other crops. The extra population later helped Rome's military expansion by providing a large supply of troops.

establish trade ties with other Mediterranean powers, enhancing the city's economic might.

position at the center of the Mediterranean Sea. As Smith notes, the Italian Peninsula is only 50 miles from Greece, while Sicily is less than 100 miles from Africa. Rome is also a short voyage by boat from Spain and only a few days' journey to France on horseback. Its central location made Rome a desirable trading post even before the city's rise to power. This centrality later helped the Romans administer their empire effectively by reducing communication times.

Several geographic advantages helped Rome to grow and ultimately dominate the known world.

Rome's naturally defenses made the city almost immune to attack,

The soil and the mild climate helped the Romans grow surplus olives and grain. Reliable food production allowed the population to grow, and the trade in olives and olive oil helped the Roman economy expand.

the republic had virtually no naval forces. To facilitate their invasion of Carthage, the Romans had to build 150 ships from scratch

lack of viable ports.

Rome's geography forced the Romans to rely on overland transportation much more than other empires. The absence of ports and small number of major rivers lead the Romans to build a massive network of roads.

80,000 kilometers of roadways,

transportation system made the city of Rome the critical trade hub