Facts for the Everyday

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Plantation Life in the Eighteenth Century

Technology and Environment

From fourteen to eighteen months after planting, the sugar canes were ready to be cut. The roots continued to produce new shoots that could be harvested about every nine months. Only simple tools were needed. What made the sugar plantation a complex investment was that it had to be a factory as well as a farm. Freshly cut canes needed to be crushed within a few hours to extract the sugary sap. For maximum efficiency, each plantation needed its own expensive crushing and processing equipment. At the heart of the sugar works was the mill where canes were crushed between sets of heavy rollers. Small mills could be turned by animal or human power, but larger, more efficient mills needed more sophisticated sources of power. Eighteenth-century Barbados went in heavily for windmills, and the French sugar islands and Jamaica used costly water-powered mills. From the mill, lead-lined wooden troughs carried the cane juice to a series of large copper kettles in the boiling shed, where the excess water boiled off, leaving a thick syrup. Workers poured the syrup into conical molds in the drying shed. Sugar crystals that formed in the molds were packed in wooden barrels for shipment to Europe. The dark molasses that drained off was made into rum in yet another building, or it was barreled for export. To make the operation more efficient and profitable, investors gradually increased the size of the typical West Indian plantation from around 100 acres in the seventeenth century to at least twice that size in the eighteenth century. Jamaica specialized so heavily in sugar production that the island had to import most of its food. Saint Domingue had a comparable number of plantations of smaller average size but generally higher productivity. Although sugar production was paramount, some planters raised provisions for local consumption and crops such as coffee and cacao for export in the French colony. In some ways the mature sugar plantation was environmentally responsible. The crushing mill was powered by water, wind, or animals, not fossil fuels. The boilers were largely fueled by burning the crushed canes, and the fields were fertilized by manure from the cattle. The plantation was also very damaging to the environment because of soil exhaustion and deforestation. Repeated cultivation of a single crop removes more nutrients from the soil than animal fertilizer and fallow periods can restore. Instead of rotating sugar with other crops in order to restore the nutrients naturally, planters found it more profitable to clear new lands when yields declined too much in the old fields. When land close to the sea was exhausted, planters moved on to new islands. Deforestation continued a trend begun int he sixteenth century. The Spanish had cut down some forests in the Caribbean to make pastures for the cattle they introduced. Sugar cultivation rapidly accelerated land clearing. Forests near the coast were the first to disappear, and by the end of the eighteenth century only land in the interior of the islands retained dense forests. Combined with soil exhaustion and deforestation, other changes profoundly altered the ecology balance of the West Indies. By the eighteenth century nearly all of the domesticated animals and cultivated plants in the Caribbean were ones that Europeans had introduced. The Spanish had brought cattle, pigs, and horses, all of which multiplied so rapidly that no new imports had been necessary after 1503. They had also introduced new plants. Of these, bananas and plantain from the Canary Islands were a valuable addition to the food supply, and sugar and rice formed the basis of plantation agriculture, along with native tobacco. Other food crops arrived with the slaves from Africa, including okra, black-eyed peas, yams, grains such as millet and sorghum, and mangoes. These species crowded out indigenous species.

Slaves' Lives

During the eighteenth century West Indian plantation colonies were the world's most polarized societies. On most islands 90 percent or more of the inhabitants were slaves. Power resided in the hands of a plantocracy, a small number of very rich men who owned most of the slaves and most of the land. Only a few others could be found--some estate managers and government officials and, int he French islands, small farmers, both white and black. The profitability of a Caribbean plantation depended on extracting as much work as possible from the slaves. Their long workday might stretch to eighteen hours or more when the cane harvest and milling were in full swing. Sugar plantations achieved exceptional productivity through the threat and use of force. On a typical Jamaican plantation about 80 percent of the slaves actively engaged in productive tasks; the only exceptions were infants, the seriously ill, and the very old. Everyone on the plantation, except those disabled by age or infirmity, had an assigned task. Slave labor was organized by age, sex, and ability. Only 2 or 3 percent of the slaves were house servants. About 70 percent of the able-bodied slaves worked in the fields, generally in one of three labor gangs. A "great gang," made up of the strongest slaves in the prime of life, did the heaviest work, such as breaking up the soil at the beginning of the planting season. A "grass gang" composed of children under the supervision of an elderly slave, was responsible for weeding and other simple work, such as collecting grass for the animals. Women formed the majority of the field laborers, even in the great gang. Nursing mothers took their babies with them to the fields. Slaves too old for field labor tended the toddlers. Because slave ships brought twice as many males as females from Africa, men outnumbered women on Caribbean plantations. A little over half of the adult males were employed in nongang work. Some tended the livestock, including the mules and oxen that did the heavy carrying work; others were skilled tradesmen, such as blacksmiths and carpenters. The most important artisan slave was the head boiler, who oversaw the delicate process of reducing the cane sap to crystallized sugar and molasses. Skilled slaves received rewards of food and clothing or time off for good work, but the most common reason for working hard was to escape punishment. A slave gang was headed by a privileged male slave, appropriately called the "driver,", whose job was to ensure that the gang completed its work. Slaves toiled in the fields from sunup to sunset, except for meal breaks. Those who fell behind due to fatigue or illness soon felt the sting of the whip. Openly rebellious slaves who refused to work, disobeyed orders, or tried to escape were punished with flogging, confinement in irons, or mutilation. Sometimes slaves were punished with an "iron muzzle," which covered their faces and kept them from eating and drinking. Even though slaves did not work in the fields on Sunday, it was no day of rest, for they had to farm their own provisioning grounds, maintain their dwellings, and do other chores. Sunday markets, where slaves sold small amounts of produce or animals they had raised to get a little spending money, were common the British West Indies. There was little time for recreation and relaxation. Slaves might sing in the fields, but singing was simply a way to distract themselves from their fatigue and the monotony of the work. There was certainly no time for schooling, nor was there willingness to educate slaves beyond skills useful to the plantation. Time for family life was also inadequate. The large proportion of young adults in plantation colonies ought to have had a high rate of natural increase, the opposite occurred. Poor nutrition and overwork lowered fertility. A woman who did become pregnant found it difficult to carry a child to term while continuing heavy fieldwork or to ensure her infant's survival. These conditions along with disease and accidents from dangerous mill equipment, deaths heavily outnumbered births on West Indian plantations. Life expectancy for slaves in nineteenth-century Brazil was only 23 years of age for males and 25.5 years for females. The figures were probably similar for the eighteenth century Caribbean. A callous opinion, common among slave owners in the Caribbean and in parts of Brazil, held that it was cheaper to import a youthful new slave from African than to raise one to the same age on a plantation. The harsh conditions of plantation life played a major role in shortening slaves' lives, but the greatest killer was disease. The very young were carried off by dysentery caused by contaminated food and water. Slaves newly arrived from Africa went through the period of adjustment to a new environment known as seasoning, during which one-third, on average, died of unfamiliar diseases. Slaves also suffered from diseases brought with them, including malaria. Only slave populations in the healthier temperate zones of North America experienced natural increase. Such high mortality greatly added to the volume of the Atlantic slave trade, since plantations had to purchase new slaves every year or two just to replace those who died. The additional imports of slaves to permit the expansion of the sugar plantations meant that the majority of slaves on most West Indian plantations were African-born. As a result, African religious beliefs, patterns of speech, styles of dress and adornment, and music were prominent parts of West Indian life. Slaves in the West Indies often sough to regain the freedom into which most had been born. Individual slaves often ran away, hoping to elude the men and dogs who would track them. Sometimes large groups of plantation slaves rose in rebellion against their bondage and abuse. A large rebellion in Jamaica in 1760 was led by a slave named Tacky, who had been a chief on the Gold Coast of Africa. One night his followers broke into a fort and armed themselves. Joined by slaves from nearby plantations, they stormed several plantations, setting them on fire and killing the planter families. Tacky died in the fighting that followed, and three other rebel leaders stoically endured cruel deaths by torture that were meant to deter others from rebellion. Because they believed rebellions were usually led by slaves with the strongest African heritage, European planters tried to curtail African cultural traditions. They required slaves to learn the colonial language and discouraged the use of African languages by deliberately mixing slaves from different parts of Africa. In French and Portuguese colonies, slaves were encouraged to adopt Catholic religious practices, though African deities and beliefs also survived. In the British West Indies, where only Quaker slave owners encouraged Christianity among their slaves before 1800, African herbal medicine remained strong, as did African beliefs concerning nature spirits and witchcraft.

Free Whites and Free Blacks

The lives of the small minority of free people were very different form the lives of slaves. In Saint Domingue, which had nearly half of the slaves in the Caribbean in the eighteenth century, free people fell into three distinct groups. At the top of free society were the wealthy owners of large sugar plantations (the grands blancs, or "great whites"), who dominated the economy and society of the island. Second came less-well-off Europeans (petits blancs, or "little whites"). Most of them raised provisions for local consumption and crops such as coffee, indigo, and cotton for export, relying on their own slave labor. Third came the free blacks. Though nearly as numerous as the free whites and engaged in similar occupations, they ranked below whites socially. A few free blacks became wealthy enough to own their own slaves. The dominance of the plantocracy was even greater in British colonies. Whereas sugar constituted about half of Saint Domingue's exports, in Jamaica the figure was over 80 percent. Such concentration on sugar cane left much less room for small cultivators, white or black, and confined most landholding to a few larger owners. At midcentury three-quarters of the farmland in Jamaica belonged to individuals who owned 1,000 acres or more. Reputedly the richest Englishmen of this time, West Indian planters often translated their wealth into political power and social prestige. The richest planters put their plantations under the direction of managers and lived in Britain, often on rural estates that once had been the preserve of country gentlemen. Between 1730 and 1775 seventy of these absentee planters secured election to the British Parliament. Most Europeans in plantation colonies were single males. Many of them took advantage of slave women for sexual favors or took slave mistresses. A slave owner who fathered a child by a female slave often gave both mother and child their freedom. In some colonies such manumission (legal grant of freedom to an individual slave) produced a significant free black population. By the late eighteenth century free blacks were more numerous than slaves in most of the Spanish colonies. They made up almost 30 percent of the black population of Brazil, and they existed in significant numbers in the French colonies. Free blacks were far less common in the British colonies and the United States. In the Caribbean runaways were known as maroons. Maroon communities were especially numerous in the mountainous interiors of Jamaica and Hispaniola as well as in the island parts of the Guianas. Jamaican maroons, after withstanding several attacks by the colony's militia, signed a treaty in 1739 that recognized their independence in return for their cooperation in stopping new runaways and suppressing slave revolts. Similar treaties with the large maroon population in the Dutch colony of Surinam (Dutch Guiana) recognized their possession of large inland regions. Source: Bulliet, The Earth and Its Peoples

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Plantations in the West Indies

Colonization Before 1650

Spanish settlers introduced sugar-cane cultivation into the West Indies shortly after 1500, but these colonies soon fell into neglect as attention shifted to colonizing the American mainland. After 1600 northern Europeans were interested in growing tobacco and other crops. Because of greater support from their government, the English colonies prospered first, largely by growing tobacco for export. Tobacco was long used by Amerindians for recreation and medicine. Some English businessmen were dreaming of a tobacco trade as valuable as Spain's silver fleets. Diseases, hurricanes, and attacks by the Carib and the Spanish scourged the early French and English West Indies colonists. Also suffered from shortages of supplies from Europe and shortages of labor sufficient to clear and plant virgin land with tobacco. Chartered companies: to promote national claims without government expense, France and England gave groups of private investors monopolies over trade to their West Indies colonies in exchange for the payment of annual fees. The companies began to provide free passage to the colonies for poor Europeans. By the middle of the century, the Caribbean colonies were in crisis because of stiff competition from milder Virginia-grown tobacco. The cultivation of sugar cane, introduced in the 1640s by Dutch investors expelled from Brazil, provided a way out of this crisis. The labor force changed from mostly European to mostly African. By 1600 Brazil was the Atlantic world's greatest sugar producer. In the first half of the seventeenth century the Dutch were fighting for their independence from the Spanish crown. Not just a disguised form of the Dutch navy, the Dutch West India Company was a private trading company. Its investors expected the company's profits to cover its expenses and pay them dividends. The company prospered by supplying the plantations with enslaved Africans and European goods and carrying the sugar back to Europe. The Portuguese were able to drive the Dutch out of Angola after a few years, Elmina remained the Dutch West India Company's headquarters in West Africa. Once free of Spanish rule in 1650, the Portuguese crown turned its attention to reconquering Brazil. This was a momentous turning point in the history of the Atlantic economy.

Sugar and Slaves

The Dutch infusion of expertise and money revived the French colonies of Guadeloupe and Martinique, but the English colony of Barbados best illustrates the dramatic transformation that sugar brought to the seventeenth-century Caribbean. By the 1680s, enslaved Africans were three times as numerous as Europeans in Barbados. The expansion of sugar plantations in the West Indies required a sharp increase in the volume of the slave trade from Africa. During the first half of the seventeenth century about ten thousand slaves a year had arrived from Africa. Most were destined for Brazil and the mainland Spanish colonies. In the second half of the century the trade averaged twenty thousand slaves a year. A century later the volume of the Atlantic slave trade was three times larger. The shift in favor of African slaves was a product of many factors. Recent scholarship had cast doubt on the once-common assertion that Africans were more suited than Europeans to field labor. Eric Williams, West Indian historian, argued that "Slavery was not born of racism: rather, racism was the consequence of slavery." Williams suggested that the shift was due to the lower cost of African labor. Yet slaves were far from cheap. Cash-short tobacco planters in the seventeenth century preferred indentured Europeans because they cost half as much as African slaves. As the cultivation of sugar spread after 1750, rich speculators drove the price of land in the West Indies so high that end-of-term indentured servants could not afford to buy it. Poor Europeans chose to indenture themselves int he mainland North American colonies, where cheap land was still available. Rather than raise wages to attract European laborers, Caribbean sugar planters switched to slaves. Rising sugar prices helped the West Indian sugar planters afford the higher cost of African slaves. The fact that the average slave lived seen years, while the typical indentured labor contract was for only three or four years, also made slaves a better investment. The planters could rely on the Dutch and other traders to supply them with enough new slaves to meet the demands of the expanding plantations. Rising demand for slaves drove their sale price up steadily during the eighteenth century. Source: Bulliet, The Earth and Its Peoples

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Plantations in the West Indies - Chronology

ca. 1500 - Spanish settlers introduce sugar-cane cultivation 1620s and 1630s - English and French colonies in Caribbean 1640s - Dutch bring sugar plantation system from Brazil 1655 - English take Jamaica 1670s - French occupy western half of Hispaniola 1700 - West Indies surpass Brazil in sugar production 1760 - Tacky's rebellion in Jamaica 1795 - Jamaican Maroon rebellion

Atlantic

1530 - Amsterdam Exchange opens 1621 - Dutch West India Company chartered 1660s - English Navigation Acts 1672 - Royal African Company chartered 1698 - French Exclusif 1700 to present - Atlantic system flourishing

Africa

1500-1700 - Gold trade predominates 1591 - Morocco conquers Songhai 1638 - Dutch take Elmina 1680s - Rise of Asante 1700-1830 - Slave trade predominates 1720s - Rise of Dahomey 1730 - Oyo makes Dahomey pay tribute

Source: Bulliet, The Earth and Its Peoples

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What is Enlightenment?, Immanuel Kant

Source: Immanuel Kant, “What is Enlightenment?” in The Philosophy of Kant, Carl J. Friedrich, ed. Reprinted by permission of Random House, Inc. (New York, 1949), pp. 132-34, 138-39. Copyright © 1949 by Random House, Inc.

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Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, Sir Isaac Newton

We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearances.

Rule II

Therefore to the same natural effects we must, as far as possible, assign the same causes.

Rule III

The qualities of bodies, which admit neither intensification nor remission of degrees, and which are found to belong to all bodies within the reach of our experiments, are to be esteemed the universal qualities of all bodies whatsoever.

Rule IV

In experimental philosophy we are to look upon propositions inferred by general induction from phenomena as accurately or very nearly true, notwithstanding any contrary hypotheses that may be imagined, till such time as other phenomena occur, by which they may either be made more accurate, or liable to exceptions.

Source: Sir Isaac Newton, Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, Andrew Motte, trans., revised by Florian Cajori (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1947), pp. 398, 400. Copyright © 1934 Renewed 1962 Regents of the University of California. Reprinted by permission of the University of California Press.

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The Discourse on Method, René Descartes

The first rule was never to receive anything as a truth which I did not clearly know to be such; that is, to avoid haste and prejudice, and not to comprehend anything more in my judgments that that which should present itself so clearly and so distinctly to my mind that I should have no occasion to entertain a doubt of it. The second rule was to divide every difficult which I should examine into as many parts as possible. The third rule was to conduct my thoughts in an orderly manner, beginning with objects the most simple and the easiest to understand, in order to ascend as it were by steps to the knowledge of the most composite, assuming some order to exist even in things which did not appear to be naturally connected. The last rule was to make enumerations so complete, and reviews so comprehensive, that I should be certain of omitting nothing. Those long chains of reasoning led me to think that everything which might fall under the cognizance of the human mind might be connected together in a similar manner. There would be none so remote at which he might not at last arrive, nor so concealed which he might not discover.

Source: René Descartes, “The Discourse on Method,” in The Philosophy of Descartes, Henry A.P. Torrey, ed. and trans. (New York: Henry Holt, 1982), pp. 46-48

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The Ottoman Social Order

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Village Life and Government in China

PROHIBITION ORDINANCE

Laws rule the entire nation; ordinances control only one area. Each year the ordinance is denigrated by the greedy and overturned by the influential. As a result they are rendered ineffective, customs deteriorate, and incalculable damage is done by our people and their animals. The problem is not that ordinances cannot be enforced; rather, it is that those in charge of the ordinances are unequal to their posts, and those who design them are incompetent…In this manner, contact between the high and low will be established, and a cycle will be formed. Anyone who violates our village ordinances will be sentenced by the public; if he thinks the sentence is unfair, he can appeal to the village assembly. No cover-up, bribery, blackmail, or frame-up will be tolerated; such evil doings will be exposed by Heaven and punished by thunder. The morality of our people will be restored. The village as a whole as well as each individual will profit from such a situation, and there will be peace between the high and the low, their morality and custom having been unified. An “ordinance” is nothing but the means to better ourselves.

ORDINANCE PROHIBITING GAMBLING

This concerns the prohibition of gambling. Those who are farmers devote their time to their work and certainly do not gamble. It is the unemployed vagrants who have the gambling disease…they use all the cunning they have to steal from others; in more serious cases they set fires and brandish weapons, stopping at nothing. They should tend to their principal occupations. Our purpose is clearly stated in the above, and this notice is not posted without good reason.

PROHIBITION ON TRAVEL AT NIGHT

This ordinance is drawn up by so-and-so to prohibit travel at night, for the purpose of safeguarding our village. As soon as the sun sets, no one will be allowed to walk about; not until the fifth drum will traffic be allowed to start again. We will take turns patrolling the streets, carrying a bell, and clapping the nightwatchman’s rattle. He who sights a violator will sound his gong, and people in every household will come out with weapons to kill the violator on the spot. Should anyone fail to show up for roll call at the sound of the gong, he will be severely punished.

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Travels in the Mogul Empire: Politics and Society in India

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European Chronology

TECHNOLOGY AND ENVIRONMENT

1200s – Use of crossbows and longbows becomes widespread; windmills in increased use 1300 – First mechanical clocks in the West 1315-1317 – Great Famine 1347-1351 – Black Death ca. 1350 – Growing deforestation 1400s – Large cannon in use in warfare; hand-held firearms become prominent ca. 1450 – First printing with movable type in the West 1454 – Gutenberg Bible printed

CULTURE

1210s – Religious orders founded: Teutonic Knights, Franciscans, Dominicans 1225-1274 – Thomas Aquinas, monk and philosopher 1265-1321 – Dante Alighieri, poet ca. 1267-1337 – Giotto, painter 1300-1500 – Rise of universities 1304-1374 – Francesco Petrarch, humanist writer 1313-1375 – Giovanni Boccaccio, humanist writer ca. 1340-1400 – Geoffrey Chaucer, poet 1389-1464 – Cosimo de’Medici, banker ca. 1390 – 1441 – Jan van Eyck, painter 1449-1492 – Lorenzo de’Medici, art patron 1452-1519 – Leonardo da Vinci, artist ca. 1466-1536 – Erasmus of Rotterdam, humanist 1472- 1564 – Michelangelo, artist 1492 – Expulsion of Jews from Spain

POLITICS AND SOCIETY

1200s – Champagne fairs flourish 1204 – Fourth Crusade launched 1215 – Magna Carta issued 1337 – Start of Hundred Years War 1381 – Wat Tyler’s Rebellion 1415 – Portuguese take Ceuta 1431 – Joan of Arc burned as witch 1453 – End of Hundred Years War; Turks take Constantinople 1469 – Marriage of Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castille 1492 – Fall of Muslim state of Granada

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Collision at Cajamarca

The events at Cajamarca were recorded in writing by many of the Spanish participants: “The prudence, fortitude, military discipline, labors, perilous navigations, and battles of the Spaniards…will cause joy to the faithful and terror to the infidels…Such riches brought home for the King and for themselves; and that such terror has been spread among the infidels, such admiration excited in all mankind. “Whose deeds can be compared with those of Spain? “Governor Pizarro wished to obtain intelligence from some Indians [the Natives] who had come from Cajamarca, so he had them tortured. The camp looked like a very beautiful city. “All of us were full of fear, “‘I will receive him as a friend and brother. No harm or insult will befall him.’ [Atahuallpa’s messenger to Pizarro] “The Governor concealed his troops around the square at Cajamarca “So great was the amount of furniture of gold and silver which they bore, that it was a marvel to observe how the sun glinted upon it…Eighty lords carried him [Atahuallpa] on their shoulders, all wearing a very rich blue livery, Atahuallpa himself was very richly dressed, with his crown on his head and a collar of large emeralds around his neck. “[Pizarro] required Atahuallpa in the name of God and of the King of Spain…I beseech you to be their friend, for such is God’s will, and it will be for your good.’ “Why remain polite and servile toward this over-proud dog “We had placed rattles on the horses to terrify the Indians [Natives]. The booming of the guns, the blowing of the trumpets, and the rattles on the horses threw the Indians into panicked confusion…they were attacked without danger to any Christian. “The Governor took Atahuallpa to his lodging. The Indians carrying the litter, and those escorting Atahuallpa, never abandoned him: all died around him. “The Indians remaining in the square, terrified at the firing of the guns and at the horses—something they had never seen…when the squadrons of Indians who had remained in the plain outside the town saw the other Indians fleeing and shouting, most of them too panicked and fled. “If night had not come on, few out of the more than 40,000 Indian troops would have been left alive. Six or seven thousand Indians lay dead, and many more had their arms cut off and other wounds. . . All those Indians who bore Atahuallpa’s litter appeared to be high chiefs and councilors. They were all killed, as well as those Indians who were carried in the other litters and hammocks…to see so powerful a ruler captured in so short a time, “The Governor ordered Atahuallpa to sit near him and soothed his rage and agitation. The Governor said to Atahuallpa, ‘Do not take it as an insult that you have been defeated and taken prisoner,…greater kingdoms than yours, and have defeated other more powerful lords than you, imposing upon them the dominion of the Emperor, whose vassal I am, and who is King of Spain and of the universal world. We come to conquer this land by his command, that all may come to a knowledge of God and of His Holy Catholic Faith; and by reason of our good mission, God, the Creator of heaven and earth and of all things in them, permits this, in order that you may know Him and come out from the bestial and diabolical life that you lead…When you have seen the errors in which you live, you will understand the good that we have done…Our Lord permitted that your pride should be brought low and that no Indian should be able to offend a Christian.’”

Pizarro had only 62 soldiers mounted on horses, along with 106 foot soldiers, while Atahuallpa commanded an army of about 80,000. Did the factors acting in the encounter of Atahuallpa and Pizarro also play a broader role in encounters between Old World and New World peoples and between other peoples? Pizarro’s military advantages lay in the Spaniards’ steel swords and other weapons, steel armor, guns, and horses. To those weapons, Atahuallpa’s troops, without animals on which to ride into battle, could oppose only stone, bronze, or wooden clubs, maces, and hand axes, plus slingshots and quilted armor. The sole Native Americans able to resist European conquest for many centuries were those tribes that reduced the military disparity by acquiring and mastering both horses and guns…They were brought by Europeans and proceeded to transform the societies of Indian tribes that acquired them. Thanks to their mastery of horses and rifles, the Plains Indians of North America, the Araucanian Indians of Southern Chile, and the Pampas Indians o Argentina fought off invading whites longer than did ay other Native Americans, succumbing only to massive army operations by white governments in the 1870s and 1880s. These Spanish victories cannot be written off as due merely to the help of Native American allies, to the psychological novelty of Spanish weapons and horses, or (as is often claimed0 to the Incas’ mistaking Spaniards for their returning god Viracocha…but the battles after Cajamarca were fought against determined resistance by Inca armies that had already seen Spanish weapons and horses. Within half a dozen years of the initial conquest, Incas mounted two desperate, large-scale, wel-prepared rebellions against the Spaniards. All those efforts failed because of the Spaniards’ far superior armament. By the 1700s, guns had replaced swords as the main weapon favoring European invaders over Native Americans and other native peoples. In the Spanish conquest of the Incas, guns played only a minor role. The guns of those times (so-called harquebuses) were difficult to load and fire, and Pizarro had only a dozen of them. Far more important were the Spaniards’ steel swords, lances, and daggers, strong sharp weapons that slaughtered thinly armored Indians. In contrast, Indian blunt clubs, while capable of battering and wounding Spaniards and their horses, rarely succeeded in killing them. The Spaniards’ steel or chain mail armor and, above all, their steel helmets usually provided an effective defense against club blows, while the Indians’ quilted armor offered no protection against steel weapons. Horsemen could easily outride Indian sentries before the sentries had time to warn Indian troops behind them, and could ride down and kill Indians on foot. The shock of a horse’s charge, its maneuverability, the speed of attack that it permitted, and the raised and protected fighting platform that it provided left foot soldiers nearly helpless in the open. When Quizo Yupan-qui, the best general of the Inca emperor Manco, who succeeded Atahuallpa. The transformation of warfare by horses began with their domestication around 4,000 BCE. Horses permitted people possessing them to cover far greater distances than was possible on foot, to attack by surprise, and to flee before a superior defending force could be gathered. Their role at Cajamarca thus exemplifies a military weapon that remained potent for 6,000 years, until the early 20th century, and that was eventually applied on all the continents. When we consider the advantages that Spaniards derived from horses, steel weapons, and armor against foot soldiers without metal, it should no longer surprise us that Spaniards consistently won battles against enormous odds. Atahuallpa and his army came to be at Cajamarca because they had just won decisive battles in a civil war that left the Incas divided and vulnerable. Pizarro quickly appreciated those divisions and exploited them. The reason for the civil war was that an epidemic of smallpox, spreading overland among South American Indians after its arrival with Spanish settlers in Panama and Colombia, had killed the Inca emperor Huayna Capac and most of his court around 1526, and then immediately killed his designated heir, Ninan Cuyuchi. Those deaths precipitated a contest for the throne between Atahuallpa and his half brother Huascar. If it had not been for the epidemic, the Spaniards would have faced a united empire. Infectious diseases endemic in Europe played a decisive role in European conquests, by decimating many peoples on other continents. Throughout the Americas, diseases introduced with Europeans spread from tribe to tribe far in advance of the Europeans themselves, killing an estimated 95 percent of the pre-Columbian Native American population. The most populous and highly organized native societies of North America, the Mississippian chiefdoms, disappeared in that way between 1492 and the late 1600s, even before Europeans themselves made their first settlement on the Mississippi River. A smallpox epidemic in 1713 was the biggest single step in the destruction of South Africa’s native San people by European settlers. Malaria, yellow fever, and other diseases of tropical Africa, India, Southeast Asia, and New Guinea furnished the most important obstacle to European colonization of those tropical areas. Pizarro came to Cajamarca by means of European maritime technology, which built the ships that took him across the Atlantic from Spain to Panama, and then in the Pacific from Panama to Peru. Lacking such technology, Atahuallpa did not expand overseas out of South America. Pizarro’s presence depended on the centralized political organization that enabled Spain to finance, build, staff, and equip the ships. The Inca Empire also had a centralized political organization, but that actually worked to its disadvantage, because Pizarro seized the Inca chain of command intact by capturing Atahuallpa. Since the Inca bureaucracy was so strongly identified with its godlike absolute monarch, it disintegrated after Atahuallpa’s death. A related factor bringing Spaniards to Peru was the existence of writing. Spain possessed it, while the Inca Empire did not. Information could be spread far more widely, more accurately, and in more detail by writing than it could be transmitted by mouth. The first published report of Pizarro’s exploits, by his companion Captain Cristobal de Mena, was printed in Seville in April 1534, a mere nine months after Atahuallpa’s execution. It became a best-seller, was rapidly translated into other European languages, and sent a further stream of Spanish colonists to tighten Pizarro’s grip on Peru. Atahuallpa had very little information about the Spaniards, their military power, and their intent. He derived that scant information by word of mouth, mainly from an envoy who had visited Pizarro’s force for two day while it was en route inland from the coast. That envoy saw the Spaniards at their most disorganized, told Atahuallpa that they were not fighting men, and that he could tie them all up if given 200 Indians. It never occurred to Atahuallpa that the Spaniards were formidable and would attack him without provocation. In the New World the ability to write was confined to small elites among some peoples of modern Mexico and neighboring areas far to the north of the Inca Empire. Although the Spanish conquest of Panama, a mere 600 miles from the Incas’ northern boundary, began already in 1510, no knowledge even of the Spaniards’ existence appears to have reached the Incas until Pizarro’s first landing on the Peruvian coast in 1527. He [Atahuallpa] offered his famous ransom in the naïve belief that, once paid off, the Spaniards would release him and depart. he had no way of understanding that Pizarro’s men formed the spearhead of a force bent on permanent conquest, rather than an isolated raid. Atahuallpa was not alone in these fatal miscalculations. Chalcuchima’s miscalculation marked a turning point in the collapse of Inca resistance, a moment almost as significant as the capture of Atahuallpa himself. The Aztec emperor Montezuma miscalculated even more grossly when he took Cortés for a returning god and admitted him and his tiny army into the Aztec capital of the Tenochtitlan. No living inhabitants of the New World had been to the Old World…Atahuallpa “should” have been more suspicious, if only his society had experienced a broader range of human behavior. Pizarro too arrived at Cajamarca with no information about the Incas other than what he had learned by interrogating the Inca subjects he encountered in 1527 and 1531. Literacy made the Spaniards heirs to a huge body of knowledge about human behavior and history.

Pizarro’s capture of Atahuallpa illustrates the set of proximate factors that resulted in Europeans’ colonizing the New World instead of Native Americans’ colonizing Europe. Immediate reasons for Pizarro’s success included military technology based on guns, steel weapons, and horses; infectious diseases endemic in Eurasia; European maritime technology; the centralized political organization of European states; and writing.

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Islamic Civilization

THE WEALTH OF ARABY: TRADE AND CITIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST

This era was probably, overall, one of the most prosperous periods in the history of the Middle East. Trade flourished, not only in the Islamic world but also with China, with the Byzantine Empire, and with the trading societies in Southeast Asia. Trade goods were carried both by ship and by the “fleets of the desert,” the camel caravans that traversed the arid land from Morocco in the far west to the countries beyond the Caspian Sea. From West Africa came gold and slaves; from China, silk and porcelain; from East Africa, gold, ivory, and rhinoceros horn; and from the lands of South Asia, sandalwood, cotton, wheat, sugar, and spices. Within the empire, Egypt contributed grain; Iraq, linens, dates, and precious stones; Spain, leather goods, olives, and wine.

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The Arab Empire and Its Successors

Muslims saw no separation between political and religious authority. According to the Qur’an, “Whoso obeyeth the messenger obeyeth Allah.” After Muhammad’s death, followers selected Abu Bakr as caliph (khalifa, literally “successor”). The caliph was the temporal leader of the Islamic community and was also considered, in general terms, to be a religious leader, or imam. Muhammad had used razzia or raid in the struggle against his enemies. The Qur’an called this activity “striving in the way of the Lord,” or jihad. Although sometimes translated as “holy war,” the term is ambiguous and has been subject to varying interpretations.

CREATION OF AN EMPIRE

Arab triumph was made substantially easier by the ongoing conflict between the Byzantine and Persian Empires. Valor was enhanced by the belief that Muslim warriors who died in battle were guaranteed a place in paradise. Once the armies had prevailed, Arab administration of the conquered areas was generally tolerant. Conversion to Islam was generally voluntary in accordance with the maxim in the Qur’an that “there shall be no compulsion in religion.” Those who chose not to convert were required only to submit to Muslim rule and pay a head tax in return for exemption from military service. The local populations often welcomed Arab rule as preferable to Byzantine rule or that of the Sasanid dynasty in Persia. The religion’s egalitarian qualities (all people were viewed as equal in the eyes of Allah).

The Rise of the Umayyads

Mu’away thereupon made the caliphate hereditary in his own family, called the Umayyads. The new caliphate remained in power for nearly a century. Arab armies advanced across North Africa and conquered the Berbers, a primarily pastoral people living along the Mediterranean coast. Around 710, Arab forces crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and occupied southern Spain. The Visigothic kingdom, already weakened by internecine warfare, quickly collapsed, and by 725, most of the Iberian peninsula had become a Muslim state. The Battle of Tours (or Poitiers) would be the high-water mark of Arab expansion in Europe. In 717, another Muslim force had launched an attack on Constantinople with the hope of destroying the Byzantine Empire. But the Byzantines’ use of Greek fire, a petroleum-based compound containing quicklime and sulfur, destroyed the Muslim fleet.

SUCCESSION PROBLEMS

Muslims of non-Arab extraction resented the favoritism shown by local administrators to Arabs. Hussein, disputed the legitimacy of the Umayyads and incited his supporters—to be known in the future as Shi’ites (from the Arabic phrase shi’at Ali, “partisans of Ali”)—to rise up against Umayyad rule in 680. Hussein’s forces were defeated, but a schism between Shi’ite and Sunni (usually translated as “orthodox”) Muslims had been created that continues to this day. Umayyad rule, “more political than pious,” created resentment. Umayyads may have contributed to their own demise by their decadent behavior. One caliph allegedly swam in a pool of wine and then imbibed enough of the contents to lower the level significantly.

THE ABBASIDS

The Abbasid caliphs brought political, economic, and cultural change to the world of Islam. They tried to break down the distinctions between Arab and non-Arab Muslims. All Muslims were now allowed to hold both civil and military offices. Helped open Islamic culture to the influences of the occupied civilizations. In 762, the Abbasids built a new capital city at Baghdad. New capital was strategically positioned to take advantage of river traffic to the Persian Gulf and also lay astride the caravan route from the Mediterranean to Central Asia. Judges, merchants, and government officials, rather than warriors, were viewed as the ideal citizens.

ABBASID RULE

Experienced a period of splendid rule well into the ninth century. Best-known caliphs were Harun al-Rashid (786-809), or Harun “the Upright,” whose reign is often described as the golden age of the Abbasid caliphate. al Ma’mun (813-833) was a patron of learning who founded an astronomical observatory and established a foundation for undertaking translations of classical Greek works. This was a period of growing economic prosperity. Arabs had conquered many of the richest provinces of the Roman Empire and now controlled the routes to the east. Baghdad became the center of an enormous commercial market that extended into Europe, Central Asia, and Africa; promoting an exchange of culture, ideas, and technology from one end of the known world to the other. Under the Abbasids, the caliphs became more regal. More kings than spiritual leaders, described by such august phrases as the “caliph of God,” they ruled by autocratic means, hardly distinguishable from the kings and emperors in neighboring civilizations. The bureaucracy assisting him in administering the expanding empire grew more complex as well. The caliph was advised by a council (called a diwan) headed by a prime minister, known as a vizier (wazir). The caliph did not attend meetings of the diwan in the normal manner but sat behind a screen and then communicated his divine will to the vizier. Persian influence was strong.

INSTABILITY AND DIVISION

The lack of spiritual authority may have weakened the caliphate in competition with its potential rivals, and disputes over succession were common. At Harun’s death, the rivalry between his two sons, Amin and al-Ma’mun, led to civil war and the destruction of Baghdad. By awarding important positions to court favorites, the Abbasid caliphs began to undermine the foundations of their own power and eventually became mere figureheads. The life of luxury enjoyed by the caliph and other political and economic elites in Baghdad seemingly undermined the stern fiber of Arab society as well as the strict moral code of Islam. Strictures against sexual promiscuity were widely ignored. The process of disintegration was accelerated by changes that were taking place within the armed forces and the bureaucracy of the empire. Given the shortage of qualified Arabs for key positions in the army an the administration, the caliphate began to recruit officials from among the non-Arab peoples in the empire, such as Persians and Turks. Abd al-Rahman took the title of emir, or commander, and set up the emirate of al-Andalus (the Arabic name for Spain). The rulers developed a unique society in which all religions were tolerated. The court also supported writers and artists. The fragmentation of the Islamic empire accelerated in the tenth century. Morocco became independent. In 973, a new Shi’ite dynasty under the Fatimids was established in Egypt. The Islamic world was held together only by the common commitment to the Arabic and the use of Qur’an as the prevailing means of communication.

THE SELJUK TURKS

Seljuk Turks were a nomadic people from Central Asia who had converted to Islam and flourished as military mercenaries for the Abbasid caliphate, where they were known for their ability as mounted archers. In 1055, a Turkish leader captured Baghdad and assumed command of the empire with the title of sultan (“holder of power”). The Abbasid caliph remained the chief representative of Sunni religious authority, the real military and political power of the state was in the hands of the Seljuk Turks. By the last quarter of the eleventh century, the Seljuks were exerting military pressure on Egypt and the Byzantine Empire. In 1071, when the Byzantines challenged the Turks, the Turks took over most of the Anatolian peninsula. The Byzantine Empire turned to the west for help and set in motion the papal pleas that led to the Crusades. The Turks were viewed as barbarians who destroyed civilizations and oppressed populations. Turkish rule in the Middle East was probably beneficial. Converted to Islam, the Turkish rulers temporarily brought an end to the fraternal squabbles between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims while supporting the Sunnites. They put their energies into revitalizing Islamic law and institutions and provided much-needed political stability to the empire, which helped restore its former prosperity. Muslims began to organize themselves into autonomous brotherhoods, whose relatively tolerant practices characterized Islamic religious attitudes until the end of the nineteenth century, when increased competition with Europe led to confrontation with the West. Seljuk political domination provoked resentment on the part of many Persian Shi’ites. Hasan al-Sabahh formed a rebel group, popularly known as “assassins” (guardians), who for several decades terrorized government officials and other leading political and religious figures. Sabahh’s followers were highly motivated and were adept in infiltrating the enemy’s camp in order to carry out their clandestine activities. The organization was finally eliminated by the invading Mongols in the thirteenth century.

THE CRUSADES

Alexius I said that the Muslims were desecrating Christian shrines in the Holy Land and also molesting Christian pilgrims en route to the shrines. In actuality, the Muslims had never threatened the shrines or cut off Christian access to them. Beginning in 1096 a series of Christian raids on Islamic territories known as the Crusades brought the Holy Land and adjacent areas on the Mediterranean coast from Antioch to the Sinai peninsula under Christian rule. Muslim rulers were taken aback by the invading crusaders, whose armored cavalry presented a new challenge to local warriors. The Seljuk Turks by that time were preoccupied with events taking place farther to the east and took no action themselves. In 1187, Saladin’s army invaded the kingdom of Jerusalem and destroyed the Christian forces concentrated there. Further operations reduced Christian occupation in the area to a handful of fortresses along the northern coast. Unlike the Christians, however, Saladin did not permit a massacre of the civilian population and even tolerated the continuation of Christian religious services in conquered territories. Christian occupation forces even carried on a lively trade relationship. The Christians returned for another try a few years after the fall of Jerusalem. The Christians would retain a toehold on the coast for much of the thirteenth century they were no longer a significant force in Middle Eastern affairs. The Crusades had only minimal importance in the history of the Middle East, although they may have served to unite the forces of Islam against the foreign invaders, thus creating a residue of distrust toward Christians. Mongol armies later spread across Central Asia, and in 1258, they seized Persia and Mesopotamia, bringing an end to the caliphate at Baghdad.

THE MONGOLS

Under the Seljuk Turks, the Mongols were not Muslims, and they found it difficult to adapt to the settled conditions that they found in the major cities in the Middle East. Their treatment of the local population in conquered territories was brutal and destructive to the economy. Mongols advanced as far as the Red Sea, but their attempt to seize Egypt failed, in part because of the effective resistance posed by the Mamluks (a Turkish military class originally composed of slaves; sometimes written as Mamelukes). Eventually, the Mongol rulers in the Middle East began to take on the coloration of the peoples that they had conquered. Mongol elites converted to Islam, Persian influence became predominant at court, and the cities began to be rebuilt. By the fourteenth century, the Mongol empire began to split into separate kingdoms and then to disintegrate. In the meantime, the old Islamic empire originally established by the Arabs in the seventh and eighth centuries had come to an end. The new center of Islamic civilization was in Cairo, now about to promote a renaissance in Muslim culture under the sponsorship of the Mamluks. In 1453, Sultan Mehmet II seized Constantinople and brought an end to the Byzantine Empire.

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China After the Han Dynasty

INTERNAL DECAY OF THE HAN STATE

Collapsed largely because of internal problems that its rulers could not solve. One problem involved the development of factions within the ranks of the ruling elites. Marriage alliances between imperial and aristocratic families led to the formation of many factions whose members sought to advance their own prospects in the imperial government and exclude others from important positions. Atmosphere led to constant infighting and backstabbing among the ruling elites. An even more difficult problem had to do with the perennial issue of land and its equitable distribution. During the last two centuries of the Han dynasty, large landowners gained new influence in the government. They managed to reduce their share of taxes and shift the burden onto peasants. Even formed private armies to advance the interests of their class.

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Cultural and Biological Exchanges Along the Silk Roads

THE SPREAD OF BUDDHISM AND HINDUISM

Buddhism made its way along the silk roads to Iran, central Asia, China, and southeast Asia. Buddhism first established a presence in the oasis towns along the silk roads and oasis towns became cosmopolitan centers. Residents of oases adopted Buddhism, which was the most prominent faith of silk roads merchants. The earliest Buddhists in China were foreign merchants—Indians, Parthians, and central Asian peoples who observed their faith in the enclaves that Han dynasty officials allowed them to inhabit in Chang’an and other major cities. Buddhism remained the faith largely of these expatriate merchants, and it did not appeal very strongly to native Chinese. The presence of monasteries and missionaries offered Buddhism the potential to attract Chinese converts. During the postclassical era became the most popular religious faith throughout all of east Asia, including Japan and Korea as well as China. Buddhism and Hinduism also began to attract a following in southeast Asia. Rulers of southeast Asian states called themselves rajas (“kings”), in the manner of Indian rulers, and they adopted Sanskrit as a means of written communication. Many rulers converted to Buddhism, and built walled cities around lavish temples constructed in the Indian style. They appointed Buddhist or Hindu advisors, and they sought to enhance their authority by associating themselves with honored religious traditions.

THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY

Early Christians faced intermittent persecution from Roman officials. Most Christians refused to observe the state cults that honored emperors as divine beings. Imperial officials considered Christianity a menace to society because zealous missionaries attacked other religions and generated sometimes violent conflict. Missionaries took full advantage of the Roman’s magnificent network of roads and sea lanes. By the late third century CE, in spite of continuing imperial opposition, devout Christian communities flourished throughout the Mediterranean basin in Anatolia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and north Africa as well as in Greece, Italy, Spain, and Gaul. A few Christian churches had appeared as far away as India. Christians did not dominate eastern lands as they did the Roman empire. Alongside Jews and Zoroastrians, Christians constituted one of the major religious communities in their region, and they remained so even after the seventh century CE, when the Islamic faith of Arab Muslim conquerors began to displace the older religious communities. Christians in southwest Asia often followed strict ascetic regimes: they abstained from sexual contact, refused fine foods and other comforts, and sometimes even withdrew from family life and society. Christians had begun to abandon society altogether and live as hermits in the deserts of Egypt, the mountains of Greece, and other isolated locations. Others withdrew from lay society but lived in communities of like-minded individuals who devoted their efforts to prayer and praise of God. The faithful in southwest Asia became Nestorains—followers of the Greek theologian Nestorius, and emphasized the human as opposed to the divine nature of Jesus.

THE SPREAD OF MANICHAEISM

Spread of Manichaeism illustrated how missionary religions made effective use of the silk roads trading network. The faith derived from the prophet Mani (216-227 CE), a devout Zoroastrian. Mani drew deep influence from Christianity and Buddhism. Regarded Zarathustra as the prophet of Persia, Buddha as the prophet of India, and Jesus as the prophet of the Mediterranean world. Saw a need for a prophet for all humanity, and he promoted a syncretic blend of Zoroastrian, Christian, and Buddhist elements as a religious faith that would serve the needs of a cosmopolitan world. Mani was a dualist: viewed the world as the site of a cosmic struggle between the forces of light and darkness, good and evil. Associated light with spiritual awareness and darkness with the material world. Urged his followers to reject worldly pleasures, which entangled the spirit in matter, and rise toward the light. His doctrine offered a rational explanation for the presence of good and evil in the world while also providing a means for individuals to achieve personal salvation and contribute to the triumph of good over evil. Insisted that disciples observe high ethical standards. Devout Manichaeans, known as “the elect,” abstained from marriage, sexual relations, fine clothing, meat, rich foods, and other personal comforts, dedicating themselves instead to prayer, fasting, and ritual observances. Less zealous, known as “hearers,” led more conventional lives, but they followed a strict moral code and provided food and gifts to sustain the elect. All looked forward to individual salvation and eternal association with the forces of light and good. Mani was a fervent missionary, dispatched disciples to lands that he could not visit himself. He also created a Manichaean church with its own services, rituals, hymns, and liturgies. Doctrine attracted converts first in Mesopotamia, and before Mani’s death it had spread throughout the Sasanid empire and into the eastern Mediterranean region. Zoroastrian leaders urged the Sasanid rulers to suppress Mani’s movement as a threat to public order. Mani himself died in chains as a prisoner of the Sasanid emperor, who sought to use Zoroastrianism as a cultural foundation for the unification of his realm. Roman authorities also persecuted Manichaeans, whom they suspected because of the religion’s origins in the rival Sasanid empire. Manichaeism survived in central Asia, where it attracted converts among west Asia. Manichaeism relied on the trade routes of classical times to extend its influence to new lands and peoples.

THE SPREAD OF EPIDEMIC DISEASE

Infectious and contagious diseases also spread along the trade routes of the classical world. Pathogens attacked population with no inherited or acquired immunities to the diseases they caused. Information about human populations in classical times is scanty. During the second and third centuries CE, the Han and Roman empires suffered large-scale outbreaks of epidemic disease. most destructive of these diseases were probably smallpox and measles, and epidemics of bubonic plague may also have erupted. All are devastating when they break out in populations without resistance, immunities, or medicines to combat them. Epidemics appeared slightly later in China than in the Mediterranean region. Demographic decline in turn brought economic and social change. Both economies also moved toward reigional self-sufficiency.

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Early China (2000-221 BCE)

GEOGRAPHY AND RESOURCES

Flow of population toward the warmer southern lands caused the political and intellectual center to move south. Flooding eliminates weeds and rival plants and supports microscopic organisms that keep the soil fertile.

THE SHANG PERIOD (1750-1027 BCE)

Aristocrats served as generals, ambassadors, and supervisor of public projects. Frequent military campaigns, prisoners of war were taken in these campaigns and used as slaves in the Shang capital. Cities had gates opening to the cardinal directions, are an early manifestation of the Chinese concern with the orientation of buildings known as feng shui. Pictograms and phonetic symbols representing the sounds of syllables were combined to form a complex system of hundreds of signs. Worshipped the spirits of their male ancestors. Rulers used divination to determine the will of the gods. Burials of kings also entailed sacrifices, not only of animals but also of humans, including noble officials of the court, women, servants, soldiers, and prisoners of war.

THE ZHOU PERIOD (1027-221 BCE)

Was the longest lasting and most revered of all dynasties in Chinese history. Chief diety was referred to as “Heaven”; monarch was called the “Son of Heaven”; and his rule was called the “Mandate of Heaven.” Proof of divine favor was the prosperity and the stability of the kingdom. Officials, including the king, were supposed to be models of morality, fairness, and concern for the welfare of the people. Chinese also learned from the steppe nomads to put fighters on horseback. Codes of law were written down. Governments collected taxes from the peasants directly, imposed standardized money, and managed large-scale public works projects. Legalist thinkers maintained that human nature is essentially wicked and that people behave in an orderly fashion only if compelled by strict laws and harsh punishments. Believed that every aspect of human society ought to be controlled and personal freedom sacrificed for the good of the state.

CONFUCIANISM, DAOISM, AND CHINESE SOCIETY

Confucius drew a parallel between the family and the state. Government exists, he said, to serve the people. Benevolence, avoidance of violence, justice, rationalism, loyalty and dignity were emphasized. Daoists accept the world as they find it, avoiding useless struggles and adhering to the “path” of nature. Sense that the world is always changing and lacks any absolute morality or meaning. Scholars believe that women may have acted as shamans. By the time written records begin to illuminate our knowledge of women’s experiences, they show women in a subordinate position in the strongly patriarchal family. Fathers held authority over the women and children, arranged marriages for their offspring, and could sell the labor of family members. Differences in male and female activities were explained by the concept of yin and yang.

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Phoenicia and the Mediterranean (1200-500 BCE)

Phoenician trading network spanned the entire Mediterranean.

CARTHAGE’S COMMERCIAL EMPIRE

Carthage stretched between Byrsa, the original hilltop citadel of the community, and a double harbor. The inner harbor could accommodate up to 220 warships. A watchtower allowed surveillance of the surrounding area, and high walls made it impossible to see in from the outside. Carthaginian fleet consisted of fast, maneuverable galleys—oared warships. The archaeological record provides few clues about the commodities traded by the Carthaginians.

WAR AND RELIGION

A belt of fertile land in northeastern Tunisia, owned by Carthaginians but worked by native peasants and imported slaves, provided a secure food supply. Carthage relied on mercenaries from the most warlike peoples in its dominions. War was not the primary business of the state, there was a separation of military command from civilian government. Gods were powerful and capricious entities who had to be appeased by anxious worshippers.