World History: Cultures, States, and Societies to 1500
Contributing Editors
Eugene Berger, Ph.D.
George L. Israel, Ph.D.
Charlotte Miller, Ph.D.
Brian Parkinson, Ph.D.
Andrew Reeves, Ph.D.
Nadejda Williams, Ph.D.
ISBN
978-1-940771-10-6
Print Version
$53.99
Digital Version
Free
World History: Cultures, States, and Societies to 1500 offers a comprehensive introduction to the history of humankind from prehistory to 1500. Authored by six USG faculty members with advance degrees in History, this textbook offers up-to-date original scholarship. It covers such cultures, states, and societies as Ancient Mesopotamia, Ancient Israel, Dynastic Egypt, India’s Classical Age, the Dynasties of China, Archaic Greece, the Roman Empire, Islam, Medieval Africa, the Americas, and the Khanates of Central Asia. It includes 350 high-quality images and maps, chronologies, and learning questions to help guide student learning. Its digital nature allows students to follow links to applicable sources and videos, expanding their educational experience beyond the textbook. It provides a new and free alternative to traditional textbooks, making World History an invaluable resource in our modern age of technology and advancement.
Table of Contents
Chapter One: Prehistory
1.1 Chronology
1.2 Introduction
1.3 Questions to Guide your Reading
1.4 Key Terms
1.5 Human Beginnings in Africa
1.6 Agriculture and the “Neolithic Revolution”
1.7 Summary
1.8 Works Consulted and Further Reading
1.9 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Two: Early Middle Eastern and Northeast African Civilizations
2.1 Chronology
2.2 Introduction
2.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
2.4 Key Terms
2.5 Ancient Mesopotamia
2.6 Sumerian City-States
2.7 Mesopotamian Empires
2.8 The Significance of Mesopotamia for World History
2.9 The Israelites and Ancient Israel
2.10 Early Israelites
2.11 The United Kingdom of Israel
2.12 The Importance of the Israelites and Ancient Israel
2.13 Ancient Egypt
2.14 Dynastic Egypt
2.15 Nubia: the Kingdoms of Kerma and Kush
2.16 Summary
2.17 Works Consulted and Further Reading
2.18 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Three: Ancient and Early Medieval India
3.1 Chronology
3.2 Introduction
3.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
3.4 Key Terms
3.5 What is India? The Geography of South Asia
3.6 India’s First Major Civilization: The Indus Valley Civilization
3.7 The Long Vedic Age
3.8 Transition to Empire: States, Cities, and New Religions
3.9 The Mauryan Empire
3.10 Regional States, Trade, and Devotional Religion
3.11 The Gupta Empire and India’s Classical Age
3.12 India’s Early Medieval Age and the Development of Islamic States in India
3.13 Conclusion
3.14 Works Consulted and Further Reading
3.15 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Four: China and East Asia to the Ming Dynasty
4.1 Chronology
4.2 Introduction
4.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
4.4 Key Terms
4.5 Geography of East Asia
4.6 China from Neolithic Village Settlements to the Shang Kingdom
4.7 The Long Zhou Dynasty
4.8 The Qin Dynasty and the Transition from Ancient to Imperial China
4.9 The Han Dynasty
4.10 The Period of Division
4.11 The Tang Dynasty and the Emergence of East Asia
4.12 The Song Dynasty
4.13 The Yuan Dynasty
4.14 Conclusion
4.15 Works Consulted and Further Reading
4.16 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Five: The Greek World from the Bronze Age to the Roman Conquest
5.1 Chronology
5.2 Introduction
5.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
5.4 Key Terms
5.5 Geography and Topography
5.6 Periods of Greek History
5.7 Methodology: Sources and Problem
5.8 From Mythology to History
5.9 Archaic Greece
5.10 The Classical Period
5.11 Hellenistic Period
5.12 Conclusion
5.13 Works Consulted and Further Reading
5.14 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Six: The Roman World from 753 BCE to 500 CE
6.1 Chronology
6.2 Introduction
6.3 Questions to Guide your Reading
6.4 Key Terms
6.5 Geography and Topography of Rome and the Roman Empire
6.6 Basic Chronology and Periods of Roman History
6.7 Sources and Problems
6.8 Early and Middle Republic
6.9 Fall of the Roman Republic
6.10 The Early Empire
6.11 The Third-Century Crisis, and Late Antiquity
6.12 Conclusion
6.13 Works Consulted and Further Reading
6.14 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Seven: Western Europe and Byzantium Circa 500 - 1000 CE
7.1 Chronology
7.2 Introduction
7.3 Questions to Guide your Reading
7.4 Key Terms
7.5 Successor Kingdoms to the Western Roman Empire
7.6 Byzantium: The Age of Justinian
7.7 Perspectives: Post-Roman East and West
7.8 The British Isles: Europe’s Periphery
7.9 Byzantium: Crisis and recovery
7.10 Western Europe: The Rise of the Franks
7.11 Global Context
7.12 Daily Life in Western Europe and the Byzantine Empires
7.13 Carolingian Collapse
7.14 The Tenth-Century Church
7.15 Byzantine Apogee: The Macedonian Emperors
7.16 Conclusion
7.17 Works Consulted and Further Reading
7.18 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Eight: Islam to the Mamluks
8.1 Chronology
8.2 Introduction
8.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
8.4 Key Terms
8.5 Geography of the Middle East
8.6 Rise of Islam
8.7 The Expansion of Islam
8.8 The Rashidun Caliphs
8.9 The Umayyad Caliphate
8.10 The ‘Abbasid Caliphate
8.11 The Fatimid Caliphate
8.12 The Crusades
8.13 The Mamluk Sultanate
8.14 Conclusion
8.15 Works Consulted and Further Reading
8.16 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Nine: African History to 1500
9.1 Chronology
9.2 Introduction
9.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
9.4 Key Terms
9.5 Writing the History of Ancient and Medieval Africa
9.6 Aksum and Ethiopia
9.7 The Western Sudanic States
9.8 The Spread of Agriculture and Great Zimbabwe
9.9 The Swahili City-States (East Africa)
9.10 Conclusion
9.11 Works Consulted and Further Reading
Chapter Ten: The Americas
10.1 Chronology
10.2 Introduction
10.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
10.4 Key Terms
10.5 Mesoamerica
10.6 The Maya
10.7 The Aztec
10.8 Early Andes
10.9 North America
10.10 Conclusion
10.11 Works Consulted and Further Reading
10.12 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Eleven: Central Asia
11.1 Chronology
11.2 Introduction
11.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
11.4 Key Terms
11.5 Geography of Central Asia
11.6 Turkic Migrations
11.7 Islam
11.8 The Mongol Era
11.9 The Khanate of Chagatai
11.10 The Khanate of the Ilkhans
11.11 Timur
11.12 Conclusion
11.13 Works Consulted and Further Reading
11.14 Links to Primary Sources
Chapter Twelve: Western Europe and Byzantium Circa 1000 - 1500 CE 426
12.1 Chronology
12.2 Introduction
12.3 Questions to Guide Your Reading
12.4 Key Terms
12.5 The Emergence of a Feudal Order in Western Europe
12.6 Growth of Towns and Trade
12.7 Growth in Agriculture
12.8 A Roman Empire?
12.9 The Holy Roman Empire’s Peripheries
12.10 Expansion of Christendom
12.11 Church Reform in the Eleventh Century
12.12 The Crusades
12.13 The Twelfth Century in Western Europe
12.14 Empires: Recovery and Collapse
12.15 The Twelfth-Century Renaissance
12.16 The Third Crusade
12.17 The Fourth Crusade
12.18 The states of Thirteenth-Century Europe
12.19 Later Crusades and Crusading’s Ultimate Failure
12.20 Scholasticism
12.21 Daily Life at the Medieval Zenith
12.22 Fourteenth Century Crises
12.23 War
12.24 Southeastern Europe in the Late Middle Ages
12.25 The Late Medieval Papacy
12.26 The European Renaissance
12.27 States in the Late Middle Ages and Renaissance
12.28 Iberia and the Atlantic: New Worlds
12.29 Conclusion
12.30 Works Consulted and Further Reading
12.31 Links to Primary Sources
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Download the Index World History to 1500 (PDF). Index prepared by Laurel Rush.
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