Textbook - Themes in World History - 0 views
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Philosophy and science took a prominent role within the Greek society, as men such as Socrates played a particularly vital role
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Sparta, the warlike state, possessed the world’s greatest military, while Athens, based on a fundamental belief in democracy, relied upon debate, discussion, and freedom as core principles.
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While the Greek civilization was slowly splitting apart, a few miles to the west the Roman Empire was growing into a vital and powerful world power.
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The first Roman rule lasted under something known as the Roman Republic, a society similar to the Greek democracy, but nonetheless weighted towards the wealthy (whose votes counted for more than the poor). This society ultimately failed, giving way to the Roman Empire around 30 B.C.E., in which a dictator maintained control over both the government as well as the military.
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During this period, the Roman Empire expanded to cover a massive quantity of land throughout the Mediterranean world
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Initially considered a cult by the Romans, the Christian church grew steadily throughout the next few centuries until, by roughly 300 AD, it became the official religion of the Roman Empire.
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At that same time, the Roman Empire not only covered land stretching from modern Great Britain to modern Iraq, but also had a significant influence in every aspect of a citizen’s life, from politics to economics and even religion.
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Silk Road
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The trade routes that arose along the Silk Road linked Central Asia with the Middle East and Mediterranean Civilizations. This trade route allowed for the exchange both of goods as well as culture (cultural diffusion) as traders would meet and share conversations and ideals every time an exchange took place.
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By 500 CE, the Roman Empire had split into a number of smaller political organizations and eventually broke up completely. This lead to a period in Europe known as the Middle Ages. Lasting from roughly 500 CE through 1400 or so, the Middle Ages were defined by a series of small kingdoms. During this time, Europe experienced a tremendous downturn in terms of technological, political, philosophical and social advancements.
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Luckily, in other areas of the world, culture was thriving. In both the Middle East and Asia, cultural advancements consistently developed.
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Over in Asia, technology was exploding. Inventions such as gunpowder would forever change warfare
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Islam arose in roughly 600 CE under the guidance of Muhammad.
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Lead by the Pope, the Christians from Europe waged a series of Crusades against the Islamic civilizations in an effort to regain “the Holy Land”: Israel.
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1000 AD,
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Unfortunately, when items are traded across long stretches of geography, sometimes its not only goods that get exchanged. In the mid-1300s, an airborne disease traveled from Asia to Europe through contact between traders and caused the Black Death, which took the lives of up to 2/3 of the population in some areas of Europe. The conditions in Europe, which weren’t exactly the cleanest, did not help the situation. In the end, the world was left with significant devastation and a massive loss in population.
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n roughly 1300 and 1550, Europe began to catch up to the Middle East and Asia in terms of cultural achievement. This era, known as the Renaissance, saw a rise in advanced literature and art as well as technology. Much of this was due to the invention of the printing press, an invention that made mass production of written materials cheap and easy. The impact of this invention on the world cannot be overstated; some have called this the single most important event in human history. As documents, books, and newsletters became easy to distribute, more people began to learn to read and write, thus increasing exponentially the amount of interaction going on between average people. These interactions lead to an explosion of ideas that would define the actions of the next five generations.
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This era, known as the Renaissance, saw a rise in advanced literature and art as well as technology. Much of this was due to the invention of the printing press, an invention that made mass production of written materials cheap and easy. The impact of this invention on the world cannot be overstated; some have called this the single most important event in human history. As documents, books, and newsletters became easy to distribute, more people began to learn to read and write, thus increasing exponentially the amount of interaction going on between average people.
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The advancements in travel technology allowed for exploration to lands that had heretofore been inaccessible, and connections were made between groups of people that had spent the previous 3,000 years developing entirely separate and distinct history.
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first sustained interactions between Europe, Africa, and the Americas
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While many detestable traders were participating in the horrible slave trade, others were involved in moving goods back and forth from the Africa to the Americas and Europe.
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The Triangle of Trade, as it was called, involved the movement of goods between these three continents for the purpose of manufacturing and developing products to be sold
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In the midst of this exploration, Europe was also seeing internal conflict that would encompass many different aspects of civilization. The first would rip apart the Christian religion that had grown steadily throughout the previous 1100 years. The Protestant Reformation, beginning with Martin Luther’s rejection of the pope in 1519, saw the Christian church split into numerous sects, each containing slightly different rules and dogma.
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The Scientific Revolution, emerging from the work of Muslim astronomers, was a movement in Europe that placed a significant weight on mathematics and scientific observations to guide man’s understanding of the world
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The Enlightenment, a movement that questioned the nature of social relationships between those in and out of power in Europe, developed within the minds of its followers a willingness to think of government power as challengeable
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In the 1700s, the impact of the Enlightenment, Reformation, and Scientific Revolution was truly realized with the French and American Revolutions. The American Revolution (1776) created the United States, while the French Revolution (1783) ousted the monarchy in France and eventually lead to rule by a new dictator
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While the American Revolution was successful in installing a democracy that would last until today, the French fell back into a dictatorship, albeit one not featuring a monarch. Napoleon Bonaparte came to rule France in the early 1800s through impressive use and command of a vast military
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By the late 1800s, the European powers were so comfortable with their assumed position that they met in Berlin to literally carve up the entire continent of Africa, portioning out colonies for each of the European colonial powers. The Berlin Conference, creating many of the African countries that exist to this day, also provided the basis for a bloody century in which the colonized Africans first fought the Europeans for independence, then splintered and fought each other for control of the newly independent countries.
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Industrial Revolution marked a massive change in the manner in which business was done throughout the world, as the means of production changed from the farm to the factory
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1700s
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The technological advancements allowed for the faster and easier production and shipment of goods, which lowered prices and allowed more people to obtain those goods. On the flip side, the lack of jobs outside the factory system forced a large number of people to abandon farming and seek work inside these factories, which typically paid ridiculously low wages and presented dangerous (sometimes deadly) working conditions.
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Another country would make its name during the First World War, although it had been around for almost 150 years prior. This would be the first war entered by the relatively young country known as the United States. Although they remained out of the war for the first three years, their entrance turned the tide of the war towards the side populated by England and France, defeating Germany and the Ottoman Empire
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Although the actual impact of these punishments is hard to determine, the perception among many Germans that these punishments destroyed the German nation would give rise of a mood within Germany that would leave it vulnerable to well-spoken politicians who wanted to see people punished for this “atrocity.” It is far from a coincidence that a man like Adolf Hitler rose to power in the years after the Great War.
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The Epoch of Interactions contains an event that truly can never be repeated: the initial contact between “worlds” that had virtually never come in contact with one another, in an exchange of culture, values, and ideals that were utterly and completely distinct from one another. This interaction was a major step in social, technological and philosophical advancement of the world, but also massively devastating to a significant portion of the world. The virtual elimination of the native inhabitants of the Americas coupled with the enslavement of millions of Africans represents tragic era in world history whose effects are still clearly being felt worldwide.
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The creation of a truly global world also brought about another unfortunate consequence: World War. Marking the end of Epoch Three, the First World War represents the end of the “old order,” 500 years of European empires and colonial rule that touched all the corners of the world. The fourth Epoch would see world power shift from Western Europe and into the new world powers: Russia and the United States.
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Just a heads up, guys-it might be best to keep your highlights private. If you have something you want to share, go ahead and do it in a sticky note.
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This worldwide depression was particularly devastating in Germany, where the combination of damage done to the infrastructure as well as the loss of some of its most valuable land destroyed most of the potential for growth within the country.
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This overriding dictatorship would become the blueprint for governments both in Japan and Germany in the 1930s.
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In both the United States and the new Soviet Union, the economic problems were equally devastating, but the two states turned to very different leaders in the hopes of righting the ship during the 1930s. The United States elected Franklin Roosevelt, a liberal reformer, to the presidency, while the Soviet Union appointed Joseph Stalin as premier. These two men were quite opposed to one another politically, but would form an uneasy alliance during World War II to battle a common enemy.
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Adolf Hitler, moving up the political ladder and delivering fiery speeches that denounced Jews and Communists throughout the 1920s, finally gained full power in the mid-1930s.
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After suffering through Depression, they too escaped through a massive military buildup. And like Germany, they used that military to fight and occupy much of East Asia and even most of China.
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By 1941, the entire (now fully global) world was engaged in the biggest conflict it had ever seen. Battles, destruction and loss of lives were seen on three continents, and in the span of 4 years, the world saw all the major powers moved to the brink of destruction. Finally, in 1945, the coalition of American, British, French, and Soviet forces destroyed the last remnants of Nazi German rule and, in a stunning show of force the world had never seen, the Americans dropped not one but two atomic bombs on the country of Japan, knocking it out of the war and changing the face of warfare forever.
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For the next 45 years, virtually every international event would be in some way influenced by the position of these two superpowers.
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Although the two would never formally use military force against one another, this Cold War would be none the less traumatic for millions of people throughout the world.
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European nations sided with the United States, forming military alliances like NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization).
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As the dust settled after World War II, many of the old colonial powers (like England and France) quickly realized that they could no longer afford to hold on to and rule the colonies in Africa, Asia, and Central/South America.
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Independence from colonial rule became a reality for many new countries throughout the world.
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Additionally, many of these countries (especially in Africa) were created with artificial borders that didn’t represent the true breakdown of the civilizations that occupied the areas. As such, it was possible (and usually likely) that two ethnic groups that had never gotten along were asked to create a coalition government in this new country. Unfortunately, the old differences were difficult to put aside and in many cases, Civil War broke out. Even more unfortunately, these civil wars were usually settled only when a single dictator took control and tended to institute a tyrannical or despotic rule.
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As the new states struggled with independence, the Cold War escalated. The use of the Atomic bomb by the Americans in 1945 raised the stakes of warfare and, when the U.S.S.R. completed work on their own atomic weapon in the 1950s, the entire world was faced with the prospect not only of World War III, but a world war in which one decision could kill millions instantaneously. Throughout the next 30 years, there was a constant threat of nuclear war that hung over every conflict between the U.S. and U.S.S. R., and even those conflicts that may not have seemed to be between the two great powers, but whose involvement by these two was nonetheless prominent.
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The U.S.’s use of a proxy in the Afghan War would have significant long-term consequences. While it resulted in a victory over the Soviets (speeding up the end of the Soviet Empire), the mujahedeen that were armed and trained by the United States counted among their leaders a young radical known as Osama bin-Laden. When he turned his rage away from the U.S.S.R. and towards the United States during the fifth epoch, it would have devastating worldwide consequences.
