...The human race has existed for 2 or 2.5 million years and in that long period of time we have managed to accomplish so much. Much of human history depends on the knowledge, inventions, and social contracts. The rise of human kind was incredible slow and long in the early ages so it was described by the term Paleolithic or Old Stone Age. The Paleolithic people later on improved their tool use and then speech developed, the development of speech provided rich language and symbols for the transmission of culture and growth. By the later Paleolithic period, people had developed rituals but their greatest achieve was the spread of the human species across the earth. In the Middle Ages, human development began to accelerate, people learned to sharpen...
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...History The history of Africa begins with the prehistory of Africa and the emergence of Homo sapiens in East Africa, continuing into the present as a patchwork of diverse and politically developing nation states. Some early evidence of agriculture in Africa dates from 16,000 BCE,[1] and metallurgy from about 4000 BCE. The recorded history of early civilization arose in Egypt, and later in Nubia, the Maghreb and the Horn of Africa. During the Middle Ages, Islam spread through the regions. Crossing the Maghreb and the Sahel, a major center of Muslim culture was Timbuktu. Some notable pre-colonial states and societies in Africa include the Nok culture, Mali Empire, Ashanti Empire, Kingdom of Mapungubwe, Kingdom of Sine, Kingdom of Saloum, Kingdom of Baol, Kingdom of Zimbabwe, Kingdom of Kongo, Ancient Carthage, Numidia, Mauretania, theAksumite Empire, the Ajuuraan State and the Adal Sultanate. From the late 15th century, Europeans and Arabs took slaves from West, Central and Southeast Africa overseas in the African slave trade.[2] European colonization of Africa developed rapidly in the Scramble for Africaof the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Following struggles for independence in many parts of the continent, as well as a weakened Europe after the Second World War, decolonization took place. Africa's history has been challenging for researchers in the field of African studies because of the scarcity of written sources in large parts of sub-Saharan Africa. Scholarly techniques...
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...1. The Emergence of Civilization, How many aspects are defining the concept of Civilization? Early human beings formed small groups and developed a simple culture that enabled them to survive. As human societies grew and developed greater complexity, civilization came into being. A civilization is a complex culture in which large numbers of people share a variety of common elements. Concepts of civilization : 1. Urban focus 2. New political and military structures 3. A new social structure based on economic power 4.The development of more complexity in a material sense. 5. A distinct religious structure 6. The development of writing. 7. New and significant artistic and intellectual activity The first civilization were developed in Mesopotamia and Egypt. 2. What does mean “The Neolithic Revolution” and when does it started and where spread? The end of the last ice age around 10,000 B.C.E. was followed by what is called the Neolithic Revolution, a significant change in living patterns that occurred in the New Stone Age (the word Neolithic is Greek for ‘‘new stone’’). The biggest change was the shift from hunting animals and gathering plants for sustenance (food gathering) to producing food by systematic agriculture (food production). Systematic agriculture developed independently in different areas of the world between 8000 and 5000 B.C.E. From the Middle East, farming spread into southeastern Europe and by 4000 B.C.E. was well established in...
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...Africa 10 frica lies south of Europe and southwest of Asia. Geographically it is about three times the size of the United States, excluding Alaska and Hawaii. At its northeast corner is Egypt, which is connected to the Sinai Peninsula—and hence to the Asian continent by a very narrow strip of land. This is the only spot where Africa touches another continent; otherwise, it is surrounded by water. The Mediterranean Sea separates it from Europe in the north; the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden lie between it and the Arabian Peninsula to the east. Two vast bodies of water—the Indian Ocean on the eastern side, and the even larger Atlantic on the west—surround the remainder of Africa. A Why Africa is important One of the greatest civilizations of all time, Egypt, was in Africa. Perhaps the only ancient civilizations that can be compared with it are those of Greece and Rome, which were influenced by it. Egypt, of course, has had its own chapter in this series; and Carthage, in North Africa, is also covered elsewhere. The focus of this chapter is entirely on Africa south of the Sahara 283 Map of Africa. XNR Productions. The Gale Group. Desert—that is, sub-Saharan Africa—as well as on the desert itself. That desert would have an impact on African history right up to the modern day; so, too, would the African civilizations of ancient times. There was the kingdom of Kush, which developed its own form of writing and briefly ruled Egypt; the kingdom of Aksum, an important trading...
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...1 African Kingdoms I. General Overview a. The single most important development in the history of northwestern Africa was the use of the camel as a transport vehicle. In ancient times, the Egyptians and Carthaginians engaged in just a trickle of commercial trade with west Africa, even though west Africa was rich in gold, precious metals, ivory, and other resources. b. The reason for this was the imposing barrier of the Sahara, which in Arabic simply means "The Desert." Around 750 AD, under the influence of Islamic peoples, northern and western Africans began to use the camel to transport goods across this forbidding terrain. c. Camels do several things exceptionally well: they can carry unbelievably heavy loads for impossibly long distances and they can keep their footing on sandy terrain. It was as if someone had invented sand ships and its effect on western African culture was just as profound as if they were sand ships. d. The most important developments occurred in the Sahel area just south of the Sahara; the Sahel provided southern terminal points for the goods being shipped across the Sahara. The Sahel is a dry, hot area with fertile areas and grasslands; all of the major north African kingdoms grew up in this area: Ghana, Mali, Songhay, and Kanem-Bornu: the Sahelian kingdoms. SLIDE: African Empire Chronology SLIDE: Key terms SLIDE: Map of Africa II. Sahelian kingdoms a. The largest African cities and kingdoms were located in the Sahel, a desert and savannah region south...
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...genetically varying people, especially from different environments. Another commonly espoused answer is the differences in climate stimulate human energy and creativity to develop technology. Cold climates encourages one to build a warm home and clothing, while in hotter climates, simpler homes and less clothing(22). Diamond, however, states that, also in example, the people of northern Europe did not create anything important to the Eurasian civilizations until the last couple thousands of years, and simply had the luck to live in an environment that would receive...
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...Events/Important/key Dates • 7,000~ 4,000 BCE: Spread of agriculture through most of Middle east. • 5,000 BCE: Farming along Nile River • 4,000 BCE: Sumerians settle in Tigris- Euphrates valley • 4,000 BCE: Sumerians (a people who had migrated into the area from the north) provided final boost toward establishing civilization • 4,000 BCE: cumulative effects of agriculture & technology → civilization as a new organizational form (wheel, bronze use, and writing facilitated) • 3,500 BCE: Writing is introduced. (based on new needs for commercial property and political records → celebration of the deeds of proud local kings) • 3,500 BCE: Early Sumerian alphabet • 3,100~2,700 BCE: Initial kingdoms in Mesopotamia and Egypt • 3,000 BCE: Introduction to bronze tools • 3,000 BCE: Mesopotamian husbands veiled their wives on marriage → to protect the wife’s honor • 2,700~2,200 BCE: Old Kingdom period , Egypt • 2,600 BCE: First great pyramid • 3,400~2,200 BCE: Akkadian Empire conquers Sumer • 2,052~1,786 BCE: Middle Kingdom period → civilization spreads to Upper Nile. • 2,000 BCE: Sumerians wrote the Epic of Gilgamesh ( world’s oldest story) • 2,000 BCE: Sumerians produced the potter’s wheel, invented glass, introduced useof fertilizer and silver → Trade expands → Sumerians had trading contact with India • 1800BCE: Babylonian Empire rose again • 1600BCE: fall of Babylonian Empire • 1,300 BCE: (Egypt) Queen Nefertiti → role in religious reforms → men and women have equal...
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...There are many reasons for the motivation of new age imperialism. However, some of the main causes are power, civilization, and economic expansion. The want of power was one cause of imperialism in the 19th century because people during this time believed that if they had more power, they would have more authority. Countries wanted more control because with this they would have more access to resources like raw materials that would fuel the industrial revolution. France and Britain were known for taking over other places using their military force. For instance, in document eight it describes how the Vietnamese were taken over by the French soldiers and how the French army is much more powerful than everyone else. Also, in document nine it...
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...How did civilizations prior to 1600 obtain, consolidate and maintain power in Africa and the Americas? Africa, is the third continent by its extension after Asia and America located between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. On the other hand this America is the second largest continent of the earth and extends from the Arctic Ocean to the islands of Diego Ramirez. It is possible to be said that these two continents had enough to see in the creation of the Maya empire, Azteca and Inca, since in specific places of these lands they themselves developed their civilizations. The Mayan Empire, a civilization developed by the Mayan peoples, was developed between the years 250 and 900AD in Mexico in the Yucatan Peninsula. The Maya were very skilled...
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...such a head start? Was it religion, trade, or another unknown aspect? Jared Diamond argues that geographic and environmental luck have been the most important factors allowing the Eurasian societies to dominate the rest of the world. Jared Diamond’s argument, geography was the reason civilizations advanced, is correct. For two reasons, the East to West axis spread, and the fact that the Europeans had better plants that were easy to farm and spread. The first reason geography was an important aspect to civilization is the East to West axis spread. First, according to document B, the East to West spread allowed Europeans to spread ideas, animals, plants, religion, language, and more throughout Europe. A main reason this spread was easy is because the continents of Europe and Asia have a large latitude,giving many places the same length of day, soil, and temperature, making it easy to travel and easy to plant the same plants successfully and domesticate the same animals. This spread also led to interconnection which gave Eurasia most of its power. According to document I, the East to West led to domesticated animals, plants, food storage, successful...
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...The history of the world is the history of humanity, beginning with the Paleolithic Era. Distinct from the history of Planet Earth (which includes early geologic history and prehuman biological eras), world history comprises the study of archeological and written records, from ancient times on. Ancient recorded history begins with the invention of writing.[1][2] However, the roots of civilization reach back to the period before the invention of writing. Prehistory begins in the Paleolithic Era, or "Early Stone Age," which is followed by the Neolithic Era, or New Stone Age, and the Agricultural Revolution (between 8000 and 5000 BCE) in the Fertile Crescent. The Neolithic Revolution marked a change in human history, as humans began the systematic husbandry of plants and animals.[3][4][5] Agriculture advanced, and most humans transitioned from a nomadic to a settled lifestyle as farmers in permanent settlements. Nomadism continued in some locations, especially in isolated regions with few domesticable plant species;[6] but the relative security and increased productivity provided by farming allowed human communities to expand into increasingly larger units, fostered by advances in transportation. World population[7] from 10,000 BCE to 2,000 CE. The vertical (population) scale is logarithmic. As farming developed, grain agriculture became more sophisticated and prompted a division of labor to store food between growing seasons. Labor divisions then led to the rise of a leisured...
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...Name: __________________________ World History Unit Two: Global Inequality [pic] An Overview of Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel Why do some nations have so much material wealth while so many others have so little? This was the question Jared Diamond posed in his book Guns, Germs, and Steel. After identifying a point in time when all societies were roughly equal (over 13,000 years ago), Diamond identified the key variables that allowed some societies to develop highly complex, material-rich societies, while others developed at much slower rates. Guns, Germs, and Steel uncovers how Europeans came to dominate every other group on the planet by virtue of their access to what Diamond terms the “Agents of Conquest”: Guns, Germs, and Steel. Jared Diamond’s journey of discovery began on the island of Papua, New Guinea. There, in 1974, a local named Yali asked Diamond a deceptively simple question: "Why is it that you white people developed so much cargo (material goods), but we black people had little cargo (material goods) of our own?" Diamond realized that Yali's question penetrated the heart of a great mystery of human history -- the roots of global inequality. Why were Europeans the ones with all the cargo? Why had they taken over so much of the world, instead of the native people of New Guinea? How did Europeans end up with what Diamond terms the Agents of Conquest: Guns, Germs and Steel...
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...British identities were engraved in the diverse colonial settings, just as the metropolitan British identities were being forced in relation to “others” (people of dissimilarity) in the 18th and 19th century. Legal and social classifications designated who could or who could not obtain membership to the elite group, and who could become a citizen rather than a subject. In the 17th century the Dutch and the British colonized the previously unexplored South Africa in a drive for modernity. The rapid English domination of the Dutch offspring (known as Boers or Afrikaners) resulted...
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...Test #1 – Global 1 Why do we study the Middle East and North Africa together? (think about what they have in common) • You should be able to identify the Middle East and North Africa on a world map, and recognize several countries in these regions Types of maps – political and physical • Political maps show boundaries of states and countries, major roads, capitals • Physical maps show physical features of the land like mountains, plains, volcanoes Types of geography (geography = the study of the earth) – physical and human • Human geography studies where people are in the world, what the people are like who live in certain areas, how people impact geography (for example, population density) • Physical geography studies landforms and physical features of the earth Paleolithic Age – 2.5 million BCE to 8000 BCE • Humans were nomadic (were constantly moving) • Evolved (slowly changed and advanced) by learning to walk upright, making stone tools, etc. Neolithic Revolution (Agricultural Revolution) – occurred in 8000 BCE • During this revolution, humans stopped being nomadic and settled down into communities and villages (which would later develop into civilizations thousands of years later) • Humans being FARMING (agriculture) – this allowed people to have much more food than they previously had, which made life easier o At the same time, there was a separation between the work that men and women did ...
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...Geography changed Latin American culture. The triangular trade between Europe, Africa and America helped shape Latin American civilization in numerous ways. There were a variety of objects and people being passed around from civilization to civilization during this time. With all of these objects and people being passed around, the geography and civilizations of Latin America were changing rapidly. The goods, resources and slaves were the most popular objects being traded. Many of the civilizations desperately wanted the slaves. Also, smallpox affected Latin American Civilization immensely because like everything else being passed around, this factor was killing thousands of people. Diseases from domesticated animals also affected civilization because people were also being killed from that as well. Geography did play...
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