Let's talk the 15th century

Oh Strayer, don't act like Africans were not already engaged in an internal slave trade. They live in an underpopulated continent where the biggest lacking resource is labor. They're capturing and selling each other.

The Atlantic slave trade wasn't the only slave trade. In addition to an internal slave trade there was also a Muslim slave trade that transported just as many people out of Africa as the Atlantic did. It also went on for much longer than the Atlantic.

I don't know why the author didn't keep talking about pastoralists in the last chapter. That could have been done without adding the Black Death in randomly.

When is China not looking to its past? What did China do before it could look to its past on the proper way rulers should rule?

I don't know how I feel about sea-faring on giant Chinese treasure ships being viewed as a past time for the emperor of that period. Is that really all he decided he would do for fun? Am I the only one who thinks Strayer makes China sound SUPER arrogant with the 'if there's anything of value outside this country, it will be brought to us'. What? Where is your sense of adventure and curiosity? No interest in the world beyond? None? I don't buy that.

What's amazing is that however silly that map looks on page 571, it's clear the cartographer knows how small Europe is in the scheme of things. Also, the Portuguese should get some points for their work around Africa, because that's a pretty accurate outline of the continent.

Can we talk about the fab hats the Ottoman Janissaries are wearing? One of them has a plume of black feathers, two of them are wearing giant squirrel tails and that last two have bushy white brooms. I want to know who designed those.

I don't know about Strayer's snide remarks about how other historians ignore pastoralists and Paleolithic-like peoples in exchange for civilizations when he barely mentions them and they're all clumped together. So he gets brownie points for putting down two paragraphs that describes three different groups simply because everyone else ignores them?

The Black Death

Though I think it's a little messed up to put the Black Death in terms of European art in the Mongol section instead of a European section of that time period, I digress. I will assume that the author doesn't mean to totally blame everything on the Mongols but just doesn't have enough information on them and needs to fill out the document quota. Or perhaps Strayer really wants to talk about the Black Death.

I had a wonderful art history class at CSM my first semester of college on the Renaissance and Baroque periods. Like all things in history, before discussing an event, the causes of that event must be discussed. So our first teachings were about the Proto-Renaissance, the Renaissance before the Renaissance, and of course, the Bubonic Plague.

I find Strayer's choice of paintings a tad lackluster. His "culture of death" is wrong. It's usually known as 'dance of death' throughout the languages of most European countries. There are many paintings of the living of all stations of life, not just the rich, but also the poor and the young (paintings like these have included infants) are literally dancing with skeletons. The point of all these paintings was how death was unavoidable at this time. Everyone was the same once they were infected with the plague. Death was an equal status.

The fact that these paintings were so widespread reflects how big of an impact the plague had on Europe at the time. Death was everywhere and that was elucidated in the writing and art of the time. The people of Europe were overwhelmed by it. They couldn't bury their growing number of dead, they couldn't do anything. Their loved ones were dropping like flies. This was an absolute catastrophe. But they bounced back in a big way. the Medieval Period was a minor Ice Age and following the Plague, it began warming. The smaller population was the beginning of the Renaissance and Europe landed on the global stage in a big way.

I can't ignore it. This section needs to be in Europe. It's just messed up to include with the Mongols because their trade routes spread it. The Age of Discovery needs to include an entire section of paintings about the destruction of Native Americans if this book is going to be considered fair. Beyond the disclaimer at the beginning that it isn't necessarily the Mongols fault, none of these have anything to do with them.

Ch. 9

Just recently went to a Greek Orthodox wedding where most of it was sung. I wonder if Muslims got the idea of reciting their scriptures rather than just reading them from that. It's definitely got the Greek tragedies and comedies flare to it.

I don't know how radical it could be if Judaism and Christianity had been around for at least five centuries before that around the same area. Maybe for the Persians it was radical but its not like Buddhism or Confucianism isn't also based around one person.

It makes sense how Islam grew successful. Religions tend to grow greater when they find an audience. With the rich hoarding all the wealth, it makes sense that this would appeal to the lower classes as a way of helping themselves.

It's a smart way to build a religion that would unify a wide group of diverse people. It makes sense how it went so well in Africa, considering how far apart and diverse the population there is. Though its clear that the lesser jihad of the sword will present problems in the future.

A constant in history is displaced Jews being harmed or exploited by their neighbors. That has never really changed. Inquisition, Holocaust, even Crusaders went out of their way to kill European Jews.

Am I the only one that kinds the promise of material gain in the new religion kind of ironic given it rose to power condemning the growing wealthy elites?

Sound like combining political and religious power leads to religious civil war. Europe quit doing that after the disaster of the 100 years war.

Ch. 8 reading notes

It's interesting to hear that China was affected by outsiders when their position to stay closed off before the open door policy and spheres of influence was a big thing in the 20th century. The fragmentation of China in the 2nd century sounds like Europe during the Middle Ages, though it seems like China didn't take a thousand years to reunify.

While it didn't take long to build a new dynasty, China sure seems to go through a lot of them. I guess if the ruler doesn't keep the Mandate of Heaven the way the people describe it, out they go. The fact that their meritocracy grew but was still primarily built around scholar-elites, and some positions just went to elites is a bit paradoxical.

Foot binding is not cool! Not cool!

It's interesting that China wanted to keep the nomadic tribes out as much as they could yet relied on them so much for goods. It's also interesting that the nomads were the ones in control of most of the routes for the Silk Roads.

It's hilarious that the Chinese tribute system so often worked in favor of the northern nomads but China had to keep acting like they were the stronger party. Political rhetoric never really changes. I'm getting the sense that anyone who isn't Chinese will be called a barbarian based on which direction they are from.

So Korea uses China as a trading partner as part of its rulers legitimacy; Vietnam fought the cultural implications more and were considered the lesser trading partner by China and Japan just borrowed whatever they wanted without having to worry about being invaded and taken over like Korea and Vietnam.

ch. 6 reading notes

I don't know if I agree with his anecdote about Bolivia and pretty much any other country in Latin America or Africa that uses its pre-colonial history as a rallying cry. That happens pretty often and the circumstances and fairly similar. Plus, if the choice is between using the time period before your ancestors were exploited by the Europeans or using the time period it was happening, I think it's pretty obvious which one you are going to go with politically.

I sincerely doubt population was the reason historians initially ignored Africa and the Americas. I'm pretty sure that has more to do with the fact that historians were European males that did not see the savages of Africa and Americas as having a culture or civilization to study.

Strayer is missing something huge about Africa by not talking about their special cows. Or the elephants? Who doesn't want to talk about elephants?

I do hope at some point Strayer will go into some detail about the rise of Islam in North Africa, because hearing the end of a civilization occurred due to Islam, but not understanding how exactly that happened is starting to irk.

Mesoamerica sounds a lot like Egypt spiritually and not just because they both built pyramids. They had a wide variety of gods, their leaders served as both a mediator between heaven and earth as well as a ruler. They both buried their leaders with sacrifices of animals and humans.

My question is how did the Chavin know about the Amazon basin if they were up in the mountains? And why are you not discussing the fact that they hung out in the Amazon River basin?

ch. 5 reading notes

According to the reading, China was the first meritocracy and bureaucracy. The two go hand in hand in many ways. Meritocracy opens up the labor pool more than choosing people for personal favors or heritage. Though the fact that education was a private institution clearly favors the upper classes.

I probably shouldn't be amused by the idea that China's governance fluctuates most often on account of peasant rebellions, but I can't dispel the image of torch-carrying, pitch-fork waving people on a rampage.

It's very interesting that the book claims the caste and sub caste system was the cause for a lack of empires in India. But having such a rigid social structure with all its rules fleshed out, it makes since that people did not require anything to bring them together, when they were together and portioned out so clearly and well-defined. They wouldn't need another structure that an empire would provide.

It doesn't surprise me that slavery was such a minor issue in China and India. They have huge populations. In Africa, there are three separate slave trades: Atlantic, Islamic and internal. And the reason Africans traded other groups was because Africa has been historically underpopulated. People worked in the condition of labor shortage. Their entire society was built on having as many people as possible, whether through natural increase from polygamy or the taking and enslaving of other peoples. China and India had plenty of laborers, so there was no need for forced labor.

It's nice that the book points out how inadequate Athenian democracy was. It may have been direct, but it was severely limited. Realistically, it was just a larger group of mainly wealthy men than Sparta. I think the biggest thing from Sparta is that death in battle and death in childbirth were viewed as equally honorable. Strayer tosses it away as still patriarchy but the fact that main thing men are viewed as valuable for was on the same level as what women were viewed as valuable for is huge. Most societies did not view reproduction as on the level with warriors. Sparta did.

Chapter Four Reading Notes

The picture on the front of the three major traditions in China living in harmony is one of the coolest things I have ever seen. Why can’t every other religion live in harmony? Look at how cute baby Buddha is. Look at how happy Uncle Confucius and Uncle Laozi are.

It’s interesting that Legalism lost its popularity and never really regained it from the brutality of the regime that used it. The rise of alternatives like Confucianism and Daoism probably didn’t help either.

It’s fascinating that Daoism saying the opposite of Confucianism still works in harmony with it as far as people are concerned. Everyone sees the strengths of both and doesn’t want to lose one in favor of the other, when they can be adapted to work together. That kind of societal compromise is pretty amazing.

Also Daoist paintings are really pretty. I’m noticing a pattern with Asian religions about combining not fighting each other.

The book very quickly throws out how the religious thought worked as part of society. I know it’s more important to give as in-depth an overview as possible, but this short-changes how the religion worked with the rest of the civilization.

Hinduism reinvents itself and then absorbs Buddhism. I hope we learn later how Buddhism spread and maintained a separate identity outside of India.

Not being mean or anything, but the original concept of God is kinda a jerk. Socrates: the original troll.

Kinda want to learn about the fanatic worship of the wine god Dionysus.

I do like that the chapter doesn’t focus solely on religions but the most important forms of thinking present at the time. It paints a more accurate picture and shows that people weren’t all fanatic religious nuts, they had other things going on and were probably more worried about their crops.

Author loses points for ignoring the fact that the rediscovery of Greek texts jumpstarted the Renaissance before the Scientific Revolution or Enlightenment.

I wish there was more information or even a television series about Jesus being a social activist and critic. It would be much cooler if the Church focused on how militant and rebellious their religious leader was at the time.

 

Points of Interest (Chapter Three)

It’s pretty cool and significant that the two waves of civilization are the waves that involved a lot of philosophical and religious thought that are still predominate today. If that isn’t significance, I don’t know what is.

It’s strange to see so many huge technological advances swept under the rug because they were not the two biggest advances of human history. Sure the discovery of gunpowder and silk making are above modest achievements. Life without the trading on the Silk Road or war on that level have huge implications historically. I understand we are doing an overview, but surely those are a bit bigger than being lumped into one sentence.

It’s always fascinating to see early bureaucracies in action and remember in other classes insisting that bureaucracies came much later. Or maybe people just forgot the secret of them, like cement. Romans were the first people to use cement in buildings and this art was lost until the Renaissance. Kinda gives hope that while there is still a lot humans do not know, there’s a chance to discover or rediscover it. Knowledge may not be lost forever.

I can’t help but notice that classical Greece seems to have a lot in common with Mesopotamia. Small city-states clashing with one another despite a similar language and religion. Also, very focused on males. I like that they would put aside their differences for the Olympics but that didn’t do much to lessen tensions or further diplomacy. Some things never change.

I love that it’s the winner of the war between Greece and Persia that actually changes, not the loser. Persia, despite losing a war, just keeps chugging along. Meanwhile, Greece goes super nationalistic and changes everything. Then there’s a civil war and they get conquered. But by being conquered and part of a greater empire, their culture is spread.

Capital Punishment and the Afterlife (CH. 2 DOCS)

The Epic of Gilgamesh skirts around the subject of a life after death. The two people Gilgamesh speaks to in order to find out about the afterlife don’t give him a straight answer on what it will be like. Instead, they both focus on telling Gilgamesh to live the life he has been given by the gods. His mortality is mentioned repeatedly so that it is palpable and is described so it seems like the natural way of things. Nothing lasts forever. Life should be no exception. Gilgamesh is encouraged to live life to the fullest and stop worrying about death. It will get him nowhere.

In contrast, the afterlife depicted by the Egyptians is very sunny and pleasant. The deceased are welcomed home by the gods as long lost family members. Then, in the Negative Confession, this bright hope of an afterlife is extended to the rest of the population. The royals are considered god-like, so it makes sense for them to be greeted and honored in the afterlife with the gods. The only reason this blessing is extended to the common peoples is if they prove that they are good people, that they have not committed any crimes. In a way, they can become god-like by being virtuous in their lives. For the Egyptians, life is about preparing for the beauty of the afterlife, for the Mesopotamians, life is about living to the fullest.

Hammurabi’s Code relies heavily on capital punishment. Most of the offenses listed end in death for the first offense. Those that do not, tend to involve mutilation or heavy fines. It clearly favors the upper classes and males. This is a very blunt form of justice that works with the idea that life isn’t fair and the strong can legally kill the weak.

Ch. 2 reading thoughts

I like that the book is doing more than the usual Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilization history. It mentions one in South America coming into itself around the same time and it is going to discuss 7 independently formed civilizations, even if there is a lot more to learn about them as opposed to arguing everything happened around the Mediterranean and spread after that.

It's interesting to see how regimented and exact people of the Saraswati river civilization are, how hard the Indus river valley people were on the land and how even the earliest of Chinese societies was so bent on monarchy. These are all different ways people came up with on how to live.

Fascinating that the earliest cities seemed to be so well thought out and built so regimented when most of the cities in western civilization are characterized as haphazard growths with little to no planning.

It's hard to agree that the Agricultural Revolution and the creation of civilization is what led to inequality when those were both undertakings by humans. Wouldn't that mean that our tendency to classify and divide is naturally inherent? As thought it is just part of the way we try to understand the world around us, by dividing it up into bite-sized pieces.

A little ironic for the author to list out all the reasons civilization is bad when without it, we would be unable to read his work and he'd be unable to write it. I sense a lot of negatives, a sort of necessary evil of civilizations.

I'm counting this as a bright side. Murders decreased as state violence predominated. People did not kill each other for personal reasons as much as they had before the agricultural revolution.

I agree that their use of religion was basically for justification, and it's not like it hasn't been used that way since, but something has to be used to explain things and we haven't hit the scientific revolution yet or the Greeks and their philosophy, so religion and its mystical stories are the only ways to explain the world. I don't know if it is quite as self-serving as the author paints it. If religion only served as justification for the building of hierarchal societies, wouldn't those returning to nature outgrow it? Or perhaps those who champion democracy and a republic? It seems as though putting religion in a box diminishes its importance to the overall culture. And that doesn't sound historically accurate.

The Indus river valley and the Olmec languages of pictures are the only ones that are very easy to read even now.

The big problem I have with this unrelenting critique of civilization is how ostentatious the author paints the social hierarchy. These rulers probably didn't live much longer than the common people and they were just as liable to disease as others. It undercuts the humanity running through civilization, which has to be there since we are the only ones who do it. The author makes it sound like civilization turned elites into inhuman war lords and lower classes into subhuman victims.

It's interesting how historians are reluctant to speak of what affect the environment had on humans but then is able to explain most of the culture by specifically using the geography of the land. Kinda sounds like defeating your own argument to me.

Is it fair to categorize Sumer as a single unit, when they seem to be competing states? It seems like every city-state was out for itself, which doesn't sound like the best unit with which to build a civilization. It sounds like Mesopotamia was grouped together because they were all close by and subject to each other's environments. Which seems awfully based on geography, but I digress.

Nisa and the San Response

            I thought Nisa’s story of her people, the San, was very interesting. I think her way of life is very simple compared to the way we live or the way the agricultural societies neighboring her live. Nisa states that when she was younger, she had no idea about an outside world, but clearly she had contact since then, given she immediately says: “We are not village people. I have no goats. I have no cattle” (Shostak). While, she knows about an outside world, she still chooses to live with her people. It sounds like she may have some negative opinions about those who live in a village, which is probably due to ethnocentrism, the belief that her group has a better culture than any other, something that nearly everyone who identifies with an ethnic group believes about their people, so that’s not surprising.

The San have liberal attitudes towards sex and marriage. Despite marrying multiple times, Nisa still had lovers beyond her husbands and they had lovers as well. She likens them to what they bring her: “One many gives you only one kind of food to eat. But when you have lovers…one comes with meat, another with money, another with beads” (Shostak). While people today argue that we have very liberal ideas about sex and very loose ones about marriage, but within our culture, people tend to disapprove of cheating on a spouse, while in the San culture, that’s perfectly acceptable and involves gift-giving as part of the exchange. Lovers seem to serve a purpose within the culture, where cheating may not in ours, part of the reason it is viewed negatively.

 

Shostak, Marjorie. Nisa: The Life and Words of an !Kung Woman. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1981. 41, 69, 87-89, 153-55, 166, 210-11, 226-27, 271, 299, 301-2, 316-17. Print.

Chapter 1

Interesting that the author says the other human species died out rather than we outcompeted them and drove them to extinction, which would be more accurate biologically.

Following the warming of the planet, nomadic people began settling because there was more flora and fauna to scavenge from. This led to a rise of societies and their ills: inequality and agriculture.

Change to agriculture is the second turning point for humanity. Agriculture to Industrial Revolution is a phase. Fair enough, the migration into cities didn’t take place until after there were jobs at to be had at plants, most people lived off the land as farmers until that point.

Of course cities couldn’t form until after agriculture, there wouldn’t be enough people to populate even ancient cities without the advent of agriculture.

Paleolithic and Neolithic time periods are divided by the advent of agriculture. People had already migrated out of Africa by the time the Neolithic period rolled around and each group discovered planting on its own.

Actually most historians until very recently didn’t think Africa had any history to speak of so no research was done to discover it.

Why would humans go to Australian before Europe if they are coming up through the Middle East? Was it just too cold up there at that point? It seems like a lot of work to make a boat rather than walk in a different direction.

Seems like the author is engaging in hubris in mentioning yet again that we are the only large animal that populates every climate type on earth. He is also using niche in a biological sense improperly. If we were part of every biological niche that would mean we would be considered producers, consumers, detrivores, predator and prey regularly. We are not.

I would certainly hope clothing would come into being during the Ice Age, especially in Russia, or our ancestors would have a very difficult if not impossible task of living in places up north.

They probably temporarily abandoned their nomadic tendencies when the weather refused to let them move forward and they had to hunker down somewhere. They had to get out of the cold at some point, or they would die from exposure.

I like that the land bridge get its nickname but the kelp highway doesn’t. I would think the fact that our ancestors made boats would get more attention in this chapter. The amount of time and supplies it would take involves a lot of teamwork and craftiness within the group and even more to get it to go anywhere so people survive the trip. Much more impressive that walking over ice, however cold it is.

Yes extinction tends to create new species that fit into the niches of those that died.

Interesting that no one decided to populate Antarctica. If they were willing to live up North, why not down at the South Pole?

Funny that people are trying to understand ancient art and acknowledge that they will run into the same problems as looking at art from today. It is subjective and one has to wonder how much they expect their guesses to help in understanding the distant past.

Mutual dependence in the animal world is not as bad a thing as the textbook paints it. It’s perfectly fine to have a symbiotic mutualistic relationship with domesticated plants and animals as far as the species involved are concerned. For everything else it might leave something to be desired.

I thought the Fertile Crescent referred to Mesopotamia not southwest Asia. I guess they can both be called that. No I was right. When did the Middle East become Southwest Asia? Who calls it Southwest Asia? I have never heard of it referred to as that. Ever.

Figs were the first domesticated crop? Interesting.

First Post

Testing...Testing..1...2...3