Download The Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire:
Social;
 Social Stratification
o Peasants worked land and paid owner rent.
Political;
 Justinian Code; collection of Roman laws.
o Legal codes in Europe till nineteenth century.
 Seljuk Turks; from central Asia, gain control of Asia Minor.
 Emperor Alexius; asked Pope to regain the Holy Land.
o Fourth Crusade; Christian soldiers sack the city of Constantinople.
 Ottoman Turks conquered Constantinople, end of the Byzantine Empire.
Interaction;
 Stored city water in underground cisterns.
Culture;
 Policy of Iconoclasm; practice of opposing the veneration of religious
images and icons.
 Created alphabet based on Greek, adopted by Russian and Slavic peoples.
 “The Great Schism;” split between the Roman Catholic Church and the
Eastern Orthodox Church.
o Reason, veneration of icons.
 “Hagia Sophia,” Orthodox Church, built by Justinian I.
 The halo was a symbol featured in all Byzantine icons (art).
 Responsible for transmission of ancient Greek learning to Western Europe
and the Islamic world.
Economic;
 Connected trade routes of Europe with those of China and India.
Russia:
Social;
Political;
 Vikings conquer East Russia.
o Rulers called Rus (Russia).
 Kievan Rus adopted from Byzantium the political idea of imperial control of
the Church.
 Council of boyars; (nobles) elected the prince of Kievan Rus.
 Mongols invade Kiev.
o “Khanate of the Golden Horde” for 250 years.
Culture;
 Adopted Eastern Orthodox religion.
o Prince Vladimir I converted kingdom to Christianity.
o Onion-dome churches imitated Byzantine churches.
Economic;
 Princes demand tribute of peasants as slaves.
o Transported slaves to Constantinople for gold.
Feudal Europe:
Social;
 Very little social mobility.
o Peasant’s life of economic dependency.
o Knight role as protectors.
o Nobility life of privilege.
 Long-distant trade, leads to growth of a middle class, (burghers).
 Women practiced trades (weaving).
 Renaissance; revival of classical Greek and Roman literature, art, civic
virtue, and culture.
o A focus on individuals rather than God.
Political;
 Franks stop Muslim invasion of France at the Battle of Tours.
 Charlemagne; named Emperor of the Romans by the pope.
o Relationship between politics and religion was that rulers provided
protection for the Church in return for religious legitimacy.
 Vikings; called Norsemen.
o Used long boats to travel far inland on rivers.
o Raided settlements.
o Settled in England, Ireland, Russia, Iceland and northern France.
 Magyars; invaders from Asia.
o Settled in Hungary.
 Feudalism; political system.
o Emphasized the reciprocal ties between a king and his vassals, and
between a lord and his serfs.
 Nobles built stone castles and recruited professional warriors.
 “Code of chivalry;” a knight’s duty to God, countrymen, and women.
 Normand king William the Conqueror invaded England.
 The Magna Carta (1215) signed by King John.
o King must observe certain rights, like the right to a jury trial before a
noble could be imprisoned.
 Hundred Years War; England and France.
o England loses all lands in France.
 Crusades; an attempt to reclaim the Holy Land of Palestine.
o Long-term impact of the Crusades;
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Spain, and Sicily joined Western Christendom.
Egypt no longer tolerant of Christian subjects.
Opened up global trade.
Global trade led to Black Death.
Plague caused shortage of people weakening feudal system.
Interaction;
 Only 5 percent of the population lived in towns.
 High Middle Ages; built Gothic style Cathedral.
Culture;
 Latin remains language of Church; but developed into French, Italian, and
Spanish.
 Monks and nuns lived in communities.
o They kept learning alive, by copying the classic Greek text into Latin.
Economic;
 Long-distance trade ended in Western Europe after the collapse of the
Roman Empire, until the Crusades.
o Long-distant trade led to borrowing technologies from other
civilizations (gunpowder).
o Marco Polo; Italian merchant, visited China.
 Writings increase curiosity about Asia.
 Manorial System; estates known as manors were economic self-sufficiency.
o Worked by serfs, tied to the land.
 Late Middle Ages agriculture improvements;
o Three-Field System
o Windmills
o The heavy plow with wheels
o Horse collar
 Guilds; associations of craftspeople and merchants in towns.
Islam:
Social;
 Slavery;
o Came from Africa, Kievan Rus, and Central Asia.
o Not hereditary.
o Conversion to Islam brought freedom.
o Women served as concubines.
 Hijab; Covering head and face; from Byzantine culture.
 Women status in Islam;
o Dowries paid to wife, not her father.
o Forbade female infanticide.
o Allowed to run businesses.
Political;
 “Hijra;” Muhammad forced out of Mecca to Median.
o Beginning of Islamic calendar.
 Conquers Mecca, making Kaaba most holy shrine in Islam.
 Muhammad’s death creates division between the Sunnis and Shias.
o Disagreement over who should assume leadership.
 Rapid expansion due to the weakness of Byzantine and Persian empires.
 Umayyad Caliph; first Muslim dynasty.
 Abbasid Caliph; second Muslim dynasty.
o Allowed non-Arabs prominent role in society.
 Arab Empire stretched from Spain to India.
o Sharia; Islamic code of law.
 Outlines requirements for daily life.
Interaction;
 Developed the first windmills.
Culture;
 Muhammad; founder of Islam.
 Quran; religious text.
 Reforming religion, like Christianity.
 Similarities with Judaism and Christianity;
o Monotheistic
o Honors Abraham and other prophets.
o Salvation and hell.
o Christians and Jews, “People of the Book.”
 Five Pillars;
o Only one god, Allah
o Praying five times daily
o Giving to the poor
o Fasting during Ramadan
o Pilgrimage to Mecca (Hajj)
 Jihad; struggle to improve both oneself and society.
 Hadith; collection of sayings of Mohammad.
o Not treated as scripture.
 Muslim; one who submits to god’s will.
 Umma; community of believers.
 Sufis; Muslim sect from Persia and India.
o Renunciation of the material world.
o Emphasizes personal experience of the divine, rather than the law.
 Islamic education was a force that unified the Islamic world.
 Al-Jazari; developed a crankshaft in a chain pump.
 Developed algebra.
Economic;
 Conversion to Islam offered many financial and social benefits.
o Merchants were respected (Muhammad was a merchant).
 Developed the Dhow; Arab trade ship with lateen sails.
 Revived the land and sea routes of the Silk Road, after fall of Rome and Han
Empires.
Tang Dynasty:
Social;
 Food surplus leads to doubling of population.
 New social class “scholar gentry” educated in Confucian philosophy.
o Most influential social class in China.
 Merchants were lowest class.
o Didn’t produce anything, living off labor of others.
Political;
 China extended into central Asia, Manchuria, and Vietnam.
 “Middle Kingdom;” society which the whole world revolved.
 “Tributary system;” neighbors had to pay money or provide goods to honor
the Chinese Emperor.
o “Kowtow” before emperor.
Interaction;
 Grand Canal; trade route from rich south to populous north.
Culture;
 Buddhism enters China.
o Daoist principles create “Zen Buddhism.”
 Direct experience and meditation as opposed to formal learning
of scriptures.
o Buddhist morality conformed to Confucian principle of “filial
submission and obedience.”
o Government did not like Buddhism; Indian “barbarians” religion.
 “Neo-Confucianism;” social and ethical philosophy combining rational
thought with the metaphysics of Daoism and Buddhism.
o Popular in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam.
 Developed “wood-block printing.”
o Helped spread of Buddhism.
 Landscape painting based on Daoism’s emphasis of nature.
Economic;
 “Equal-field system;” all families had land to cultivate.
 Agricultural Improvements;
o Manure to enrich the soil.
o Water wheel pumps, and terraces.
o Heavy plows able to farm unusable land.
o Champa rice, from Vietnam, two crops a year.
 People paid for government projects; no work tax.
 Created gunpowder.
 Creation of paper money.
Song Dynasty:
Social;
 Most urban civilization in the world.
 Confucian revival leads to “Foot binding.”
Political;
 Smaller than the Tang China.
o Manchurian nomads set up capital in Beijing (Jin dynasty).
 Confucian bureaucrats responsible for military, not good.
 Mongol Empire conquer China (Yuan Dynasty).
Culture;
 Developed a process for making coke.
o Fewer impurities than in coal.
o Metal was stronger.
Economic;
 Went through “proto-industrialization,” meaning a phase that precedes full
industrialization.
o Porcelain and silk industries.
 Southern China transforms from subsistence to export-oriented economy due
to Indian Ocean trade.
Feudal Japan:
Social;
 Very little social mobility.
o Peasant’s life of economic dependency.
o Samurai role as protectors.
o Daimyo life of privilege.
 Had more power than the nobility in Europe.
Political;
 Shotoku Taishi; first and only dynasty.
 Fujiwara clan gains control of government.
o Emperor just a figurehead.
o Feudalism leads to civil war.
 Minamoto clan create the first “shogun,” or military ruler, to reign supreme.
o Feudal system; nobles (daimyo) recruited professional warriors
(samurai) and built stone castles.
o “Code of Bushido,” frugality, loyalty, the martial arts, and honor unto
death.
 “seppuku” a ritual suicide.
 Kublai Khan (Yuan dynasty) tried to invade Japan.
o Destroyed by a typhoon (kamikaze).
Culture;
 Shinto; main religion “The way of the gods.”
o Find beauty in “kami” (forces of nature).
o Sun goddess, creator of Japan.
 Zen Buddhism; popular with Samurai class.
o Co-existed with Shinto belief of unity with nature.
 “The Tale of Genji” world’s first full-length novel (Lady Murasaki).