CH 12 15TH CENT

CHAPTER 12:

THE WORLDS OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY

The Shapes of Human Communities

• In 1500, balance between all types of societies was different from what it had been in 500.
• Australia and North America
• still had gather and hunter societies
• interacted with neighbors 
• both developed very differently 
• agriculture/farming
• The Igbo and the Iroquois
• Igbo 
• dense population and trade
• purposely rejected kingship and state building
• relied on title societies, woman’s associations, and hereditary ritual experts to create a stateless society
• Iroquois 
• speakers had become fully agricultural 
• maize and beans
• around 1300
• warfare triggered the creation of the Iroquois confederation
• Central Asia and West Africa
•  Turkic warrior Timur (Tamerlane) tried to restore the Mongol Empire ca. 1400
• Timur’s conquest was the last great military success of Central Asian nomads
• African pastoralists remained independent from established empires for several centuries longer 

Civilizations of the Fifteenth Century: Comparing China and Europe

• by 15th century most of world lived in major civilization
• Ming Dynasty China
• Europe
• State Building
• Cultural renewal
• population started to rise
• Maritime Voyaging
• Portuguese voyages of discovery began in 1415 
• 1492: Columbus reached the Americas 
• 1497–1498: Vasco da Gama sailed around Africa to India

Webs of Connection

• Large-scale political systems 
• brought culturally different people together
• Religion divided and united
• Christendom
• divided into Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy
• Buddhism linked people
• China
• Korea
• Tibet
• Japan
• parts of Southeast Asia
• Islam good at bringing its people together
• Patterns of trade evident

What to Come

• Modern human society emerged first in Europe in the nineteenth century and then throughout the world
• prominence of Europe grew on global stage over last 500 years

(MY THOUGHTS...) I found this chapter to be very interesting. It was cool to see everything we have been reading coming together to lead us into the modern era. Strayer did a really great job bringing all his ideas and concepts of the pre-Modern Era together for this chapter. All major civilizations come together and form the world as we know it today.

CH 11 The Mongol Moment

CHAPTER 11:

PASTORAL PEOPLES ON THE GLOBAL STAGE - THE MONGOL MOMENT

• The Mongols
• formed the greatest land-based empire in history following their breakout from Mongolia in the thirteenth century
• created far greater contact between Europe, China, and Islamic world than ever before
• total population about 700,000
• did not have major cultural impact
• didn't push their ideas on those they took over
• exploited them greatly
• Chinggis Khan
• universal ruler
• created Mongol Empire
• China
• Korea
• Central Asia
• Russia
• much of Middle East
• parts of Eastern Europe
• Are without a real plan
• good timing
• nomads
• always on the move
• powerful army
• sizes varied
• units of 10, 100, 1,000, and 10,000 warriors
• Mongol reputation for brutality and destructiveness
• Conquest of China was hard
• Mongols unified a divided China, made many believe that the Mongols had been granted the Mandate of Heaven
• Mongols didn’t know how to govern an agricultural society, so they used many Chinese practices
• Persia
• Mongols were transformed far more in Persia than in China
• Persian bureaucracy
• Russia
• integrated into Mongol Empire as the Kipchak Khanate
• Russian princes adopted Mongol weapons, diplomatic rituals, court practices, tax system, and military draft

(MY THOUGHTS...) The Mongols were a very significant civilization. Without the Mongols Europe and China may not have ever interacted they way they did and things would be a lot different today.The Mongols were not her for a long time but they left a huge mark. They did not spread there own culture but they spread all other culture which allowed the world to change and I think that is really cool. The Mongols were terrible people but so were the Europeans. No one had clean hands.

CH 8 CHINA

CHAPTER 8:

CHINA AND THE WORLD

• China considered to be next superpower
• always at the top
• no real decline
• dominated trade

Together Again: The Reemergence of a Unified China

• Han dynasty 
• collapsed 220 CE
• Golden Age 
• Sui dynasty(589-618)
• reunified China
• Tang and Song built off of Sui
• golden age of art and literature
• economic evolution under Song
• rapid population growth
• many inventions (print, gunpowder, compass, etc.)
• Song wasn't golden for woman 
• tightening of patriarchal restrictions on women
• Tang was good for elite women
• more freedom
• women more educated
• to educate sons

China and the Northern Nomads: A Chinese World Order in the Making

• Chinas greatest interaction with steppes
• N nomads
• China needed them
• horse
• goods, Silk Road
• Tribute system
• non-Chinese authorities must acknowledge Chinese superiority  
• present tribute to emperor 
• would receive trading privileges and bestowals 
• Nomads adopted Chinese ways
• interaction
• trade, military, conflict, negotiations, etc.

Coping with China: Comparing Korea, Vietnam, and Japan

• Relations with Korea, Vietnam, and Japan
• Korea
• temporary conquest during Han
• accepted Chinese culture
• Vietnam
• adopted Chinese government
• provided rice
• Japan
• never invaded or conquered by China
• borrowed from China
• bureaucracy 

(MY THOUGHTS...)

China is really impressive. They have been at the head of the game for years. Even in present day they are killing it. Now when asked if there Golden Age was as significant as Western Renaissance  I have to disagree. China was already a really big deal. They never really went through hard times. The West really went through it, so the fact that they are were they are is very significant. Both equally important, but Europe needed the help a lot more than China did since China has always been a superpower.

CH 10 Worlds of Christendom

CHAPTER 10:

The Worlds of Christendom: Contraction, Expansion, and Division

Christian Contraction in Asia and Africa

• Spread of Islam dividing force in the contraction of Christianity
• within century of Muhammad's passing, Christianity almost unheard of in Arabia
• Nestorian Christians (Church of the E) survived
• shrank in size in Syria, Iraq, and Persia
• coastal N African Christians largely converted to Islam
• Egypt Coptic Church survived
• Christianity took shape in 5th & 6th century in Nubian kingdoms
• Ethiopian christians 
• geography protected from Muslim world

Byzantine Christendom: Building on the Roman Past

• Byzantine Empire had no clear starting point
• continuation of Roman Empire
• had advantages over western empires
• Byzantine State
• size reduced by Islamic expansion
• politic centered around emperor in Constantinople
• Church 
• caesaropapism
• emperor head of state and church
• lit was influenced by orthodox Christianity 
• Eastern Orthodoxy increasingly defined itself
• With world
• Byzantium had a foot in both Europe and Asia
• Rome's fight with Persia
• continued
• Russia
• Moscow declared the “third Rome” 
• role of protector of Christianity after fall of Constantinople

Western Christendom: Rebuilding in the Wake of Roman Collapse

• W Europe on margins of world
• Fall of Roman Empire 
• Roman heritage lived on!
• Greece tried to recreate 
• Church and ruling class usually reinforce each other 
• growth of territorial states with better- organized governments

Western in Comparative Perspective

• Hybrid civilization
• Europeans happy to trade
• by 1500 Europe caught up with China and Islamic World
• even surpassing them in some areas
• distinctive intellectual tension between faith and reason developed

(MY THOUGHTS...) I found it interesting to see how religion shaped civilizations of the past. Religion practically fuels them. Give them a following and with a following they have power. People are willing to fight for something they believe in. Quite brilliant when you think of it. Now combining church and state is taboo, as it should be. Religion has no place in law. America likes to say we separate church and state but that is a lie. Religion still impacts laws till this day (marriage equality, abortion, ect) We are not so different from the civilizations of the past.

Ch 9 The Worlds of Islam

CHAPTER 9

THE WORLDS OF ISLAM: AFRO-EURASIAN CONNECTIONS

Birth of a New Religion

• emerged from marginal region
• founder
• Muhammad Ibn Abdullah
• beginning revelations from Allah in 610 CE
• these revelations recorded in Quran
• core message is the 5 Pillars of Islam
• Started with a small following and quickly expanded throughout Arabia
• doesn't separate church and state
• did not start out as prosecuted minority 

The Making of an Arab Empire

• Arabic conquests were a continuation of log-term raiding pattern
• conquest wasn't that destructive 
• initial conversion for many was "social conversion"
• not deep spiritual change
• state provided incentives for conversion 
• central problem: who should serve as successor to Muhammad?
• split because of central problem, has differences
• sunni
• shia
• Islamic law- the sharia
• Quran viewed men and women as equals
• Islam gave new religious outlets for women

Islam & Cultural Encounter: A Four-Way Comparison

• The Arab Empire had all but disintegrated politically by 10th century
• Emergence of Muslim communities in India
• buddhists and low-caste Hindus found Islam attractive
• by 16th century several West African cities were Islamic centers 
• religious toleration started breaking down by late 10th century

The World of Islam as a New Civilization

• By 1500 Islamic world embraced at least parts of nearly every other Afro-Eurasian civilization
• Islamic world was an immense arena for exchange of goods, technology, and ideas

(MY THOUGHTS...) This chapter does not really relate to me at all. I have never been a very religious person, but I do find learning about religion really cool. I feel like as we are today we have to keep ourselves educated. There are people out there that know nothing about Islam yet speak as if they do. I have studied Islam before in my World Religions course here at NDNU and I find it really interesting. Especially since I took it during Trump's Travel Ban. The actions of few do not make up the actions of a whole community. I find it crazy that people still don't see that.

CH 7 Commerce and Culture

CHAPTER 7: 

COMMERCE AND CULTURE

Silk Roads

• One of the world's most extensive and sustained networks of exchange
• China, Siberia, India, Middle East, Mediterranean
• was not a real road!
• array of goods travelled along the Silk Roads
• goods for elite
• silk
• porcelain
• furs
• spices and other foods (nuts, etc.)
• transport cost to much, price did not allow movement of staple goods
• Benefitted elite
• Disease travelled road as well
• Athens- great epidemic
• Roman and Han empire- smallpox and measles
• Mediterranean- bubonic plague
• China, Europe, and Central Asia- Black Death
• took out 1/2 of European population

Sea Roads

• Was world's most important network until 1500
• China, East Africa, Arabia, India, Mediterranean, Southeast Asia
• China dominated
• was not a real road!
• transportation of bulk goods
• textiles
• pepper
• timber
• rice
• sugar
• wheat
• it was easier to transport bulk good because the sea was cheaper than land travel

Sand Roads

• earliest trade region among agricultural people of Sudan
• West Africa was main location
• goods
• salt
• gold
• slaves
• manufactured goods
• Merchants participated in this road
• travelled at night to avoid heat
• trade encourage new and larger political structures

(MY THOUGHTS)
I wouldn't want to live in any of these regions. As a woman they all seem terrible. I don't even like how women are treated in today's society so I know all too well I wouldn't be able to stand being a woman back then. If I was a man, I think I would choose the Sea Roads because its the cheapest and who doesn't enjoy an ocean view.

CH 6 COMMONALITIES AND VARIATIONS

CHAPTER 6: Commonalities and Variations: Africa, the Americas, and Pacific Oceania

Africa

• had no common cultural identity in the premodern era
• Meroe
• almost as old as the Egyptian civilization
• enormous
• most distinctive 
• pulled by monarch 
• sometimes a woman
• had craft specialization
• rural had herding and farming 
• long distance trade

Mesoamerica

• lack of interaction
• very diverse
• development without domesticated animals/ironworking
• Maya
• Present-day Guatemala and Yucatan
• cultural achievements 
• math system
• calendars
• writing system
• architecture
• Economy
• supported elite and artisan class
• politics
• city states 
• regional kingdoms
• densely populated urban /ceremonial centers
• frequent warfare 
• collapse
• Teotihuacan
• considered Americas greatest city
• much is unknown 
• gridlike pattern
• specialized artisans
• little evidence of rulers/traditions
• had deep influence to mesoamerica
• had diplomatic connections with other areas
• mysterious collapse 

Andes

• Chavin
• good location for trade
• did not become empire
• Moche
• agriculture based on complex irrigation system
• relied on fishing
• Wari and Tiwanaku
• centered on large urban capitals 
• Wars used traced agriculture and Tiw raised field systems

Bantu Africa

• most significant interaction: agricultural Bantu and gathering and hunting peoples
• creation of many distinct societies 
• less patriarchal 

North America

• pit houses and great houses
• est permanent villages 
• 2000BCE agricultural revolution
• not enough to be an agricultural society till later

(My thoughts...) What I enjoyed about this chapter is being able to see the similarities and differences of each place. Each place had different stages in development. For example, the agriculture movement in the Americas was much different than elsewhere because the Americas didn't have animals to domesticate and this affected their agricultural development. Same thing with how different places interacted. Other places were well versed in other parts of the world while others were not. For example, the Americas.