Download Draft Teaching Manual

Secondary 3 History
Bridging Programme
Teaching Manual
Prepared on behalf of
Education Bureau, HKSAR
by
David Faure and Ma Muk Chi
Centre of Comparative and Public History
Department of History
The Chinese University of Hong Kong
Content
Part I. Introductory Comments
Copyright Notes of Pictures and Photos
Part II. Teaching Topics
1. What is history?
2. East and West
3. The rise of civilisation
4. Heroes and myths
5. City states
6. Rome and the Roman Empire
7. The legacies of Greece and Rome
8. Revision
9. The Middle Ages
10. The Renaissance
11. Reformation
12. The rise of science
13. Voyages of discovery
14. Enlightenment
15. The French Revolution
16. Revision
17. Industrial Revolution
18. Old empires and new empires
19. Asia in the age of European expansion
20. The abundance of steel and the arms race
21. European nationalism
22. The World Wars in Europe
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23. East Asia from the First to the Second World War
24. Post-Second World War politics
25. Advances in science, technology and livelihood
26. Revision
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Part I. Introductory Comments
1.
This manual is more concerned with helping students to understand historical
trends than with making them remember facts.
2.
Understanding is not the same as defining. There is no need for students to
memorise definitions.
3.
Abstract definitions do not help. For example, don’t try to define “feudalism”.
Show them how historians use the word.
4.
Do not worry very much about “first hand” or “second hand” sources. Most
sources that reach the historian are indirect.
5.
It is unfortunate that most textbook illustrations are not inserted with a purpose.
Illustrations are only useful if they make a point.
6.
The timeline can be used throughout the course.
7.
It is more important for students to state the ordering of events correctly than to
remember dates.
8.
Place names are meaningless unless they can be related to maps.
9.
Names of people are kept to the minimum. Students are encouraged to introduce
personal names in their projects but, except for a handful, they are not required to
remember them as part of the curriculum.
10. Documents are used in the teaching of history to give students a chance to
interpret, to weigh arguments against evidence and to develop sensitivity to
historical subjects. They are not provided simply to make a factual point. If you
want your students to learn a fact, you may as well just tell them.
11. Background knowledge is often needed to understand historical events and
documents. If you want your students to remember events, dates and names,
think of the following:
(1) Be consistent about what you want them to remember,
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(2) Keep memory work to the absolute minimum,
(3) Draw from them what they already know; you will be surprised they
know more than you or they think.
12. We state below the objectives of what each unit is meant to achieve, and a
summary of what the unit deals with. We are serious in stating our objectives. It
is important that the syllabus is presented as a whole: topics are not isolated one
from another, there should be cross references as teaching proceeds.
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Copyright Notes of Pictures and Photos
1. There is note attached to each picture, which reminds the users of copyright
clearing status. Please do not use any picture with a note read, “Permission to
use the picture will be sought. Please do not copy or distribute the picture until
further notice.
2. For those owned by Department of History, The Chinese University of Hong
Kong, David Faure, Ma Muk Chi and Joan Cheng, permission is granted to
copy, distribute and/or modify.
3. For those downloaded from Wikimedia Commons and Wikipedia The Free
Encyclopaedia, please follow the guidelines attached to this manual when
using the picture. It is not recommended to mount them onto the Internet for
further distribution.
4. It is not recommended to mount those pictures found at the following two
websites onto the Internet for further distribution:
www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk
www.makingthemodernworld.org
Use a hyperlink instead of direct mounting.
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Part II. Teaching Topics
Topic 1: What is history?
Objectives
To encourage students to discover for themselves what history is in daily life and why
it is cited. To introduce the idea of the time line, the use of dates and difference
between B.C. and A.D.
Sample teaching plan
Why do we talk about the past?
Exercise 1:
Ask two students to act out the following conversation. (The conversation can also be
pre-recorded and played. It would be helpful if students have script in front of them.)
A:
I can’t find my keys.
B. Where did you put them?
A:
I don’t remember. I last had them yesterday when I came in.
B:
Did you put them down somewhere?
A:
I had them in my hand. I really don’t understand.
B:
Think about what happened.
A: Well, when I came in, the telephone rang. Did I put them near the phone?
B:
Let me see; no, they aren’t there.
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A:
I answered the phone. It was a wrong number. When I put the phone down, I
went into the kitchen.
B:
What did you do in the kitchen?
A:
I washed my hands.
B:
So you weren’t holding the keys in your hand any more. Have you checked the
kitchen table?
A: No, they aren’t there.
B:
Well, if you didn’t put them by the phone or on the kitchen table, why don’t you
look in your pockets?
A: Yes, oh, yes, they’re there. Why didn’t I think of that earlier?
Questions:

What words in the conversation indicate time? (Notice three sorts: events,
sequences – e.g. “then” -- and time pointers e.g. “yesterday”.)

Can you describe the events in a chronological order from the time A came in to
the time he found his keys?

How long is this history?

Why did B ask A about what happened in the past?

Did the questions help?
Exercise 2:
Look at the front page of the Daily World of July 2, 2007, a newspaper published in
Hong Kong.
Is there any event reported on the front page that is not related to a history?
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Headline
Event
Handover commemoration
Handover of Hong Kong, July 1, 1997
Global warming
35 years of rising temperature
Stock Market Advance
Increase of stock value over one day or one week
Tax increase proposal
Not yet an event, but related to tax rates in current
and previous years
Murder
An event, it will be counted as an indication of law
and order in Hong Kong now and compared to
previous years.
Are these events related? Probably not. Not all events happening at the same time are
related. But, together, they may have an effect on people living at the time.
How long is this history? (The longest is 30 years.)
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Exercise 3:
Consider these statements (best if students hear them through a recording):
 That Westerner can’t speak Chinese.
 This is the best film I have seen.
 He has no culture.
What is the history behind these statements?
Summary so far
In this topic, we answer the question what is history by seeing how and why people
talk about the past. We think there are three ways by which they talk about the past:
they refer to events, they use words which indicate time relations and they refer to
specific times. They do this because past events relate to what they do.
Tools for talking about the past
Exercise 4:
Let us play the lost keys story again and this time, instead of asking you to write a
paragraph about it, I shall ask you to draw it on a line, like this:
Yesterday A came in
A went into the kitchen
Talked to B, found keys
-!--------------------------!-------------------!-----------------------!---------------------!-------The telephone rang
Today A found he had lost
his keys
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Exercise 5:
Let us now look at the Daily World front page again:
Average temperature
!------------------------------------!-----------------------------------!----------------------------!
July 1, 1977
July 1, 1997
Hong Kong handover
July 1, 2007
Handover commemoration
Stock market rose
A murder
Talk about tax increase
Why draw the time line? Because it represents graphically what we should know,
even when sometime we do not know.
Exercise 6:
What happens when the history to be covered is VERY long?
---------------------------------------------1--------------------------------------------------------B.C.
0
A.D.
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Not every society registered dates in this way. In China, years were counted from the
first reign of an emperor:
Qianlong from 1st year to 60th year
Followed by Jiaqing from 1st year to 25th year, etc.
In the West, the Church was very influential in deciding on the shape the calendar
should take. It is not surprising that it counted from what it believed to be the most
important event of all, the birth of Jesus Christ.
This should raise the question why the Church was so influential in the West, and, if it
was so influential, what else did it do besides deciding on the calendar? These are
questions we shall address in later topics.
Summary:
Any reference to the past is a description of history. We refer to history all the time.
To talk about the past accurately, we can compile time lines. Time lines make use of
calendars. The demarcation A.D. and B.C. in describing time are standard for use in
Western history.
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Topic 2: East and West
Objectives
To introduce the view of the world in ancient times by looking at an old map, and
discuss the idea of cultural similarities and variations by looking at architecture,
writing systems and dress styles as examples.
Sample teaching plan
Exercise 1:
Look at these two maps (Maps 1 and 2).
Map 1
(Source: J.G. Barthologmew LLD, A Literacy & Historical Atlas of Asia, London: J.M.
Dent & Sons, Ltd.; New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, unknown publishing year.)
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Map 2
(Source: Department of History, CUHK.)
Map 1 was drawn in around 500 B.C. in Greece. Map 2 is a map of the twentieth
century. Compare the two. (Make sure students have looked at the Mediterranean Sea,
Greece, Italy, Egypt and India. Ask them: Where is ...? Indicate 500 B.C. on a time
line.)
Do you notice the similarities and differences between the two maps?
Greek map of the world
Modern map of the world
Centred at the Mediterranean
Centred at the equator
Africa and India distorted
Africa and India correctly denoted
No Americas, Australia
With Americas and Australia
No Britain!
With Britain
Quite accurate about the Mediterranean
Mediterranean close to Greek map
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Exercise 2:
If knowledge of the world to the Greeks was as indicated by the map, how do you
think these different parts of the Mediterranean were connected?
(1) Through trade (and shipping)
(2) Through the circulation of knowledge, especially in books
(3) Through war
We can cite examples of each, but details can be left to later topics.
Exercise 3:
Nowadays many people in Hong Kong travel in this area for their holiday. There is
also a lot of information about places on the map to be found on the internet. The
following (Pictures 1 and 2) are only a small number of pictures which we have
downloaded from the internet. Students can download a lot more themselves. (Look
up Wikipedia for Greek architecture, Roman architecture.) Can they place these
pictures in the right locations on the Greek map?
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:AthensAcropolisDawn06034.jpg
Picture 1
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http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Kheops-Pyramid.jpg
Picture 2
Exercise 4:
We would like to know if the people around the Mediterranean Sea shared a common
culture. An indication we can use is their writing. Look at the following table
(Diagram 1) and see how similar the alphabets are in the countries around the
Mediterranean (see Map 3). (Much more can be found in Wikipedia. Look under
“alphabet,” “history of the alphabet.”)
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Reference:
Andrew Robinson, The Story of Writing, Alphabets, Hieroglyphs and Pictograms,
Thames and Hudson, 2007.
Diagram 1
(Source: Department of History, CUHK)
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Map 3
Location of Scripts
Latin
Greek
Phoenician
(Source: J.G. Barthologmew LLD, A Literacy & Historical Atlas of Asia, London: J.M. Dent
& Sons, Ltd.; New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, unknown publishing year.)
Exercise 5:
Nevertheless, look at dress styles and you can see that in different places, people dress
differently (Pictures 3 to 6). Look under “national costume” and “history of clothing”
in Wikipedia, or try http://www.siue.edu/COSTUMES/COSTUME1_INDEX.HTML.
(Also Carolyn G. Bradley, Western World Costume: an Outline History, Mineola, NY:
Dover Publications, 2001, 1st published in 1954.)
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Picture 3
Picture 5
Picture 4
Picture 6
(Source of Pictures 3-6: Department of History, CUHK.)
Dress styles tend to be determined very much by on-going practices and religion.
National costumes are often symbolic also of status and power. They may change
with government, but are often very resilient.
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Exercise 6:
Let us compare what we have observed in the past with what you can see around
Hong Kong. Hong Kong includes a mixture of architectural styles (see Pictures 7 to
10), special ones being associated especially with religion and government. In Hong
Kong, both English and Chinese books are widely circulated, but most people read
either the Chinese or the English language newspaper. Its people are dressed in ways
that reflect occupational, status and religious differences. In much of the
Mediterranean surroundings, the same would have been true of architecture and dress.
In time, a development similar to that found in Hong Kong also spread over much of
this area: Latin became the common written language for the west, and Arabic was
the common written language of the Middle East.
Picture 7
Picture 8
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Im
age:HK_WC_Stone_Nullah_Lane_Chi
na_Resources_Vanguard_Shop.JPG
(Source of picture: Ma Muk Chi)
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Picture 9
Picture 10
http://commons.wikimedia.org/w
iki/Image:Tsang_Tai_Uk_%E6
%9B%BE%E5%A4%A7%E5%
B1%8B_o.jpg
(Source of picture: Ma Muk Chi)
Summary:
In this topic, we have shown that different parts of the world have different ways of
doing certain things, such as looking at the world, writing, dress and architecture.
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Topic 3: The rise of civilisation
Objectives
To discuss how changes in technology, settlement and government together brought
about the features often recognised as “civilisation”.
Sample teaching plan
In “East and West”, we have seen that the diffusion of architectural styles, the use of
writing, dress styles denote cultural regions (such as “the West” or “East Asia”).
There might well be other features that could demarcate cultural differences, such as
food, religion and customs. We do not really know how and why these different
features are brought together. It would seem that many of these features might have
been related to changes in technology, settlement and forms of government.
It is very difficult to find out how governments were organised before there was
writing. Historians, therefore, often refer to the period before writing appeared as
“pre-historic” (in contrast to the “historic” period, after writing has appeared.) The
pre-historic period is largely investigated through archaeology. In the historic period,
historians and archaeologists work hand in hand.
Archaeologists excavate ancient sites and examine material remains. Unless there is
writing, these remains do not appear with a date. How do they know when the objects
they found were made?
In general, there are two methods for dating archaeological remains. The first method
is carbon-dating. Carbon has always been found in the air and supports life (both
animals and plants). Most carbon atoms are stable (not changing over time), but a tiny
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portion (0.0000000001 percent), known as Carbon 14, is radio-active. That is to say,
this carbon atom decays over time: every 5730 years, it loses half its mass. By
examining the proportion of carbon 14 in a sample of living organism (wood or bone)
using very fine equipment, the archaeologist can work out the approximate age at
which it died.
The other method is to record very carefully the layers in which material objects are
found and to compare layers of objects in different locations. If earth has not been
disturbed, the older objects are found in the lower layers. So, by noting where the
layers are, and what objects have been found in each, and comparing the styles of
these objects, the archaeologist is able to reconstruct the history of how these objects
are transformed over time. That record can be used as a time line for measuring
changes in different locations. For an interesting short film on how this happened, see
http://www.mesopotamia.co.uk/time/challenge/cha_set.html.
Exercise 1:
We shall not go into the details of how archaeologists learn from their excavations.
We shall simply note what they have found and what their finds might tell us about
the rise of civilisation. We shall do that by looking at the following summary of
discoveries made at Uruk, in present-day Iraq, one of the oldest cities discovered by
archaeologists.
For thousands of years, southern Mesopotamia (ancient Iraq) was home to hunters,
fishers, and farmers, exploiting fertile soil, rivers, and abundant animals. By around
3200 B.C., the largest settlement in southern Mesopotamia, if not the world, was
Uruk.
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Uruk was a true city dominated by monumental mud-brick buildings decorated with
mosaics of painted clay cones embedded in the walls, and extraordinary works of art.
Large-scale sculpture in the round and relief carving appeared for the first time,
together with metal casting. Simple pictographs were drawn on clay tablets to record
the management of goods and the allocation of workers’ rations. These pictographs
are the precursors of later cuneiform writing.
Cities such as Uruk continued to expand. During the Early Dynastic period
(2900–2350 B.C.), when city-states dominated Mesopotamia, the city rulers gradually
grew in importance and increasingly sought luxury materials to express their power.
These goods, often from abroad, were acquired either by trade or conquest.
Source: Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art. “Uruk: The First City”. In Timeline of Art
History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–.
http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/uruk/hd_uruk.htm (October 2003)
Draw a time line to record the events described in this passage. It should include:
hunters, fishers and farmers; the beginnings of a city at Uruk in 3200 B.C., the
appearance of writing (early pictographs, that is, drawings which are like words); the
use of metal; the Early Dynastic period and city states.
Of hunting, fishing and farming, which do you think was most important for
supporting the population who lived in Uruk?
Notice the three developments which seem to have come together: the city, the use of
metal and the emergence of writing. Are there reasons to think they might be related?
What are these reasons?
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Where was Mesopotamia? Point that out in Map 1 of Topic 2.
Hint for the teacher:
Writing was needed for administration and record keeping (e.g. accounts), the use of
bronze at this stage was more complicated. The early bronzes were largely ornamental
or religious. Later, they came to be increasingly used for weapons and tools. In
general, it might be said that both writing and metal working led to occupational
specialisation. A government was beginning to appear as would be evident in the
appearance of luxurious burials to be discussed in Topic 4.
Exercise 2:
Look at the following object (Picture 11) which was found in Egypt, probably dating
to 3000 B.C. That was before the pyramids were built.
You can probably tell a little of the story even without the background to the pictures.
Notice that in one picture, a man is holding the head of another man, and at the
bottom of the picture, two men are running away. In the other picture, the upper part
shows a man in a parade, while the bodies of ten headless men lie on one side.
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Picture 11
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:NarmerPalette_ROM.jpg.
It will not take a lot of imagination to work out that this is a battle scene followed by
victory. But for the rest, you will need a little background. Look at the picture on the
left, what is that bird holding a reed leading to the man’s head? If I tell you that Egypt
was located along a river (the River Nile), and that this little diagram tells you where
the battle was fought, do you think that was in the north or the south of the river?
(Answer: the north, in the marshes, as indicated by the papyrus plants in the diagram.)
The king in the two diagrams wears two different crowns. Historians know something
about those crowns: the crown in the left-hand picture was that of upper (southern)
Egypt, and the one on the right, of lower Egypt. So, on the left-hand-side picture, you
have the king of Upper Egypt conquering some enemies, and then in the
right-hand-side picture, of him as the king of Lower Egypt in a triumphal procession.
The bird, Horus, represented the king. On the right-hand-side picture, the strange
looking animals with their long necks entwined probably refer to the joining of upper
and lower Egypt. In the picture below this, you see another battle scene, of a bull
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trampling enemies and taking and breaking down a city wall. You see bulls’ heads at
the top of the palette as well; they probably indicate the strength of the king. For more
information, you can look up http://www.ancient-egypt.org/index.html.
How would a palette like this one symbolise the rise of civilisation? The same
observations about Uruk in Exercise 1 can be made:
(1) The cities are there, you see one of them in the left-hand-side picture where the
enemies are running away, and on the right-hand-side picture where the bull is
attacking its walls;
(2) There are signs of writing, as you can see in the seal in between the bull’s heads at
the top of the palette; Egyptian historians tell us that is the name of the king;
(3) The king in this battle scene
Picture 12
commands an army; there must have
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Kh
been a government in Upper Egypt for
eops-Pyramid.jpg
him to supply this army, and so, to win
this war. Four hundred years later, the
king of Egypt would be building the
pyramid that you saw in Topic 2 (Picture 12), and that would have taken a great deal
of organisation.
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Civilisation: We have not defined the word “civilisation.” “Civilisation” is one of
those words which are impossible to define. Historians use it to indicate the beginning
of writing, cities, government and the use of tools. The rise of civilisation is a very
long process; it indicates the gradual development of large numbers of people living
together, using their own inventions to control their surroundings.
The area around Iran and Iraq, known to historians as Mesopotamia, have yielded
records of many ancient cities. Other parts of the world where cities appeared by 2000
B.C. include: Egypt, the Indus Valley (in India), and North China. Locate these places
on the map provided in Topic 2.
Hint for the teacher:
The students will notice that China comes off the map.
Summary:
At about 3,000 B.C., cities, writing, governments and, in some places, the use of
bronze, began to appear in some parts of the world. They created a new environment
for human beings living together. From that time on, we begin to have written records
of history.
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Topic 4: Heroes and Myths
Objectives
This topic continues from the previous in doing two things: (1) it focuses attention on
sources and drawing information from them; and (2) it discusses what early
government might consist of.
Sample teaching plan
Every society had its great men and women. Some were thought of as kings and
queens, so that their descendants might continue to be kings and queens. When
writing appeared, their names and deeds were recorded in writing. Before writing
appeared, how do historians know that they existed?
Exercise 1:
The following two pictures (Pictures 13 and 14) were found on the two sides of a
panel in a grave at the city of Ur in Mesopotamia (see Topic 3) and dated to
2600-2400 B.C. Where is the great man in these pictures? What do these pictures tell
us about his greatness?
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Picture 13
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Standard_of_Ur_-_peace_side.jpg
Picture 14
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Standard_of_Ur_-_War.jpg .
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Hint for the teacher:
Notice that the panel in Picture 13 indicates the king’s economic resources, and 14 his
army. In the top row of Picture 13, the king is seated in a banquet, facing a number of
seated men, who are being entertained by a musician. In the second and third rows,
their servants bring animals and supplies. In Picture 14, the king’s army consists of
foot soldiers and chariots. Again, like the Egyptian palette we saw in Topic 3, this
shows a battle scene. Enemies lying dead under the chariot indicate victory.
So, what do kings do according to these panels? They find the resources needed for
their government, build armies and win wars.
Exercise 2:
Beliefs in great men, including kings, have also come down to us in the form of
stories. As you know, every society has many such stories. They include stories of
creation, stories of the great flood, stories of war, stories of law giving. In the
following, you will find a simple story of a mother looking for her daughter told by
the ancient Greeks. The mother, Demeter, was “Mother Earth”, the goddess who
looked after the earth and the crops.
TALES FROM GREEK MYTHOLOGY.
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THE SORROW OF DEMETER.
In the fields of Enna, in the happy island of Sicily, the beautiful Persephone was
playing with the girls who lived there with her. She was the daughter of the Lady
Demeter, and every one loved them both; for Demeter was good and kind to all, and
no one could be more gentle and merry than Persephone. She and her companions
were gathering flowers from the field, to make crowns for their long flowing hair.
They had picked many roses and lilies and hyacinths which grew in clusters around
them, when Persephone thought she saw a splendid flower far off; and away she ran,
as fast as she could, to get it. It was a beautiful narcissus, with hundred heads
springing from one stem; and the perfume which came from its flowers gladdened the
broad heaven above, and the earth and sea around it. Eagerly Persephone stretched out
her hand to take this splendid prize, when the earth opened, and a chariot stood before
her drawn by four coal-black horses; and in the chariot there was a man with a dark
and solemn face, which looked as though he could never smile, and as though he had
never been happy. In a moment he got out of his chariot, seized Persephone round the
waist, and put her on the seat by his side. Then he touched the horses with his whip,
and they drew the chariot down into the great gulf, and the earth closed over them
again.
Presently the girls who had been playing with Persephone came up to the
place where the beautiful narcissus was growing; but they could not see her anywhere.
And they said, “Here is the very flower which she ran to pick, and there is no place
here where she can be hiding.” Still for a long time they searched for her through the
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fields of Enna; and when the evening was come, they went home to tell the Lady
Demeter that they could not tell what had become of Persephone.
Very terrible was the sorrow of Demeter when she was told that her child was
lost. She put a dark robe on her shoulders, and took a flaming torch in her hand, and
went over land and sea to look for Persephone. But no one could tell her where she
was gone. When ten days were past she met Hekate, and asked her about her child;
but Hekate said, “I heard her voice, as she cried out when some one seized her; but I
did not see it with my eyes, and so I know not where she is gone.” Then she went to
Helios, and said to him,” O Helios, tell me about my child. You see everything on the
earth, sitting in the bright sun.” Then Helios said, “O Demeter, I pity you for your
great sorrow, and I will tell you the truth. It is Hades who has taken away Persephone
to be his wife in the dark and gloomy land which lies beneath in the earth.”
Then the rage of Demeter was more terrible than her sorrow had been; and she
would not stay in the palace of Zeus, on the great Thessalian hill, because it was Zeus
who had allowed Hades to take away Persephone. So she went down from Olympus,
and wandered on a long way until she came to Eleusis, just as the sun was going down
into his golden cup behind the dark blue hills. There Demeter sat down close to a
fountain, where the water bubbled out from the green turf, and fell into a clear basin,
over which some dark olive trees spread their branches. Just then the daughters of
Keleos, the king of Eleusis, came to the fountain with pitchers on their heads to draw
water; and when they saw Demeter, they knew from her face that she must have some
great grief; and they spoke kindly to her, and asked if they could do anything to help
her. Then she told them how she had lost and was searching for her child; and they
said, “Come home and live with us: and our father and mother will give you
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everything that you can want, and do all that they can to soothe your sorrow.” So
Demeter went down to the house of Keleos, and she stayed there for a whole year.
And all this time, although the daughters of Keleos were very gentle and kind to her,
she went on mourning and weeping for Persephonê. She never laughed or smiled, and
scarcely ever did she speak to any one, because of her great grief. And even the earth,
and the things which grow on the earth, mourned for the sorrow which had come upon
Demeter. There was no fruit upon the trees, no corn came up in the fields, and no
flowers blossomed in the gardens. And Zeus looked down from his high Thessalian
hill, and saw that everything must die unless he could soothe the grief and anger of
Demeter. So he sent Hermes down to Hades, the dark and stern king, to bid him send
Persephonê to see her mother Demeter. But before Hades let her go, he gave her a
pomegranate to eat, because he did not wish her to stay away from him always, and he
knew that she must come back if she tasted but one of the pomegranate seeds. Then
the great chariot was brought before the door of the palace, and Hermes touched with
his whip the coal-black horses, and away they went as swiftly as the wind, on and on,
until they came close to Eleusis. Then Hermes left Persephone, and the coal-black
horses drew the chariot away again to the dark home of King Hades.
The sun was sinking down in the sky when Hermes left Persephone, and as
she came near to the fountain she saw some one sitting near it in a long black robe,
and she knew that it must be her mother who still wept and mourned for her child.
And as Demeter heard the rustling of her dress, she lifted up her face, and Persephone
stood before her.
Then the joy of Demeter was greater, as she clasped her daughter to her breast,
than her grief and her sorrow had been. Again and again she held Persephone in her
35
arms, and asked her about all that had happened to her. And she said, “Now that you
are come back to me, I shall never let you go away again; Hades shall not have my
child to live with him in his dreary kingdom.” But Persephone said, “O mother, it may
not be so; I cannot stay with you always; for before Hermes brought me away to see
you, Hades gave me a pomegranate, and I have eaten some of the seeds; and after
tasting the seed I must go back to him again when six months have passed by. And
indeed I am not afraid to go back; for although Hades never smiles or laughs, and
everything in his palace is dark and gloomy, still he is very kind to me; and I think
that he feels almost happy since I have been his wife. But do not be worried, my
mother, for he has promised to let me come up and stay with you for six months in
every year, and the other six months I must spend with him in the land which lies
beneath the earth.”
So Demeter was comforted for her daughter Persephone, and the earth and all the
things that grew in it felt that her anger and sorrow had passed away. Once more the
trees bore their fruits, the flowers spread out their sweet blossoms in the garden, and
the golden corn waved like the sea under the soft summer breeze. So the six months
passed happily away, and then Hermes came with the coal-black horses to take
Persephone to the dark land. And she said to her mother, “Do not weep much; the
gloomy king whose wife I am is so kind to me that I cannot be really unhappy; and in
six months more he will let me come to you again.” But still, whenever the time came
round for Persephone to go back to Hades, Demeter thought of the happy days when
her child was a merry girl playing with her companions and gathering the bright
flowers in the beautiful plains of Enna.
(Source: George W. Cox, Tales from Greek Mythology, London: Longman, Roberts, & Green,
1863, pp.1-7.)
36
Knowing that Demeter was also “Mother Earth”, why do you think the story of her
search for her daughter might also represent changes in the season and of the annual
cycle of farming? Do you think a hunting community would have thought of “Mother
Earth” in quite the same way?
Notice the god Zeus. He was the king of the gods, but he also allowed Hades to take
away Demeter’s daughter. You are probably used to gods standing for what is right;
notice that in Greek mythology, gods were powerful but not always good.
Notice where Zeus was. Demeter went down from the Mount of Olympus after she
saw Zeus. Olympus was the home of the gods. Have you seen this word or its
variation? Where do you see it?
Hint for the teacher:
The story of Demeter, like many myths, can be read in different ways. At one level, it
is the story of a mother and her daughter, and of the daughter being taken away by a
stranger. At another level, it is an account of the changes of the seasons. When
“Mother Earth” was upset, crops would not grow. At the same time, it also represents
the authority of kings. Zeus was the king of the gods, but other gods had powers and
responsibilities which he did not have authority over: Demeter over the earth, Helios
as the sun, Hades governing the underworld. In the ancient world, each city would
have had its own ruler, and over many of them, there would have been a king. The
king probably had little authority in many of these cities, but he could have raised his
army from them, or demanded payment of taxes. What was Zeus responsible for?
37
When Demeter refused to look after the earth, he did not order her to return to her
duties; instead, he had to solve her problem for her.
Zeus ruled from Olympus. The name appears nowadays in the Olympic Games. Topic
5 will again refer to sports in Greece. It may be useful here to allow students to
associate the Olympic Games with Greek history.
Greek names look hard to read, but they are not. Read every vowel, e.g. Persephone is
read per-se-phon-e (-e as a short “i” in English); Helios as he-li-os.
Summary:
Stories of heroes as recorded in pictures or told by word of mouth (and then written
down) are records of the exploits of kings. They tell historians something about
ancient governments. Kings had to find resources to build armies; they had to make
sure that crops could grow, and they had to balance the interests of the powerful
people under their rule.
38
Topic 5: City States
Objectives
To familiarise students with the idea of the city state, the principles of democracy
practised therein, some preliminary knowledge of Greece within European history,
and Alexander the Great’s conquests.
Sample teaching plan
Agriculture was one of the greatest human inventions. With agriculture, human beings
settled down. They had to work on the earth and to improve the rivers. They produced
more food and so more people could be supported, some of whom did not farm.
Society became more varied. You saw a little of this in the cities of Uruk and Ur, in
between 2000 and 3000 B.C. These cities were seats of government, where kings
ruled, with the support of priests and scribes. In the next millennia, the cities
multiplied, especially in Egypt and Mesopotamia.
Some of the kings of Egypt and Mesopotamia were so powerful that they conquered
many cities. The cities that grew up on their edges, remained independent. In some of
the cities in Greece, which were founded more than a thousand years later than Uruk
and Ur, the inhabitants drove away their kings. The tradition of ruling without kings,
which evolved in some Greek cities, contributed to the manner of government known
as democracy.
Go back to the ancient map of Topic 2, and you can see where these Greek cities were.
(For reference, Egypt and Mesopotamia can be pointed out to students.) You can see
39
that the region marked out is located on the edge of modern-day Turkey. In the 5th
century B.C., Turkey came within the Persian Empire, which had taken over most of
Mesopotamia. The Persian conquest stopped short of Greece because in 490 B.C. the
cities put up a strong resistance and repelled the Persian invasion. You probably know
the name of the place where that battle took place. It is Marathon. What do you
understand by the word “marathon” today? Why is that word used in this way?
Map 4
(Source: J.G. Barthologmew LLD, A Literacy & Historical Atlas of Asia, London: J.M. Dent
& Sons, Ltd.; New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, unknown publishing year.)
Exercise 1:
Athens
If you go to the most famous city in Greece today, Athens, you will see on top of the
hill at the city the ruins of the ancient city state (see Picture 15).
40
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:AthensAcropolisDawn06034.jpg
Picture 15
The buildings on the mount were the main temples and the centres of government of
the city of Athens. You can see from the picture that the city was located by the sea.
In fact, Athens was a naval power. It depended on trade and its people migrated to the
islands off the coast, founding cities in the model of Athens itself. In 430 B.C., at the
beginning of thirty years of war for the control of Greece between Athens and another
city, Sparta, Pericles, who commanded the Athenian army, said the following in a
speech he gave before battle:
Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We
do not copy our neighbours, but are an example to them. It is true that we are called a
democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But
while the law secures equal justice to all alike in their private disputes, the claim of
excellence is also recognized; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is
41
preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit.
Neither is poverty a bar, but a man may benefit his country whatever be the obscurity
of his condition.
And we have not forgotten to provide for our weary spirits many relaxations from toil;
we have regular games and sacrifices throughout the year; our homes are beautiful
and elegant; and the delight which we daily feel in all these things helps to banish
melancholy. Because of the greatness of our city the fruits of the whole earth flow in
upon us; so that we enjoy the goods of other countries as freely as of our own.
(Source: Leon Bernard and Theodore B. Hodges, Readings in European History, New York:
Macmillan, 1958, p. 6.)
Which sentence in the passage suggests that Athens was a trading city? Which
sentence suggests that sports formed an important part of city life? He said “games”,
can you name one of them? He said “regular games and sacrifice”, could the two have
been related?
Pericles talked about democracy. He indicated that certain conditions were required
for it to work. What were they?
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
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If time permits, hold a class discussion on how democracy in Athens was different
from democracy in a modern society?
Hints for the teacher:
The International Olympic Committee maintains a website which gives an interesting
history of the Olympic Games. This may be found at www.olympic.org . Look under
“Olympic Games” (on the left-hand side), and then “The ancient Olympic Games” at
the bottom of the page. The cartoon video is good fun to watch.
The games were held in honour of the gods. On democracy, see the second paragraph
in the passage.
For classroom discussion suggested here, it would be useful to think about democracy
in the city states as a direct form of democracy, in the sense that people of the city
voted directly for their government. The reason they could do that had to do with their
small population size, compared to most modern countries. Even then, not everybody
could vote. The Greek cities permitted slavery, and slaves did not vote. In a modern
society, voting is often indirect, in the sense that the electorate vote for the party
rather than members of government.
Exercise 2:
Alexander the Great
Athenian democracy did not last a long time. It lasted probably just about 200 years,
from the 5th to the 4th century B.C. Athens and Sparta fought and both weakened. A
new city came to the fore, which not only defeated them all, but went on to conquer
Mesopotamia and Egypt. This was the city that was ruled by Alexander’s father,
43
Philip. Alexander, known in history as Alexander the Great, succeeded as king of
Macedon while a very young man in 336 B.C. He died in 323 B.C. at the age of 32.
His conquests were conducted in a little more than a decade.
Map 5
C
A
B
(Source: Department of History, CUHK)
Can you name the three areas marked A, B and C?
Hint for the teacher:
Most textbooks would have a chapter on Alexander with a map of his conquests. We
suggest that you look at the map and mark the conquests on the Greek map provided
in this lesson (Map 5). Show your students that Alexander made himself ruler of the
world. If needed, a discussion can be launched as to why Alexander could have made
his conquests in such a short time. Again, the textbook may well have some pictures
of the Greek phalanx (the formation of Greek foot soldiers, known as hoplites). This
could be a starting point on the history of war tactic. For reference, see William H.
44
McNeill, A World History, New York: Oxford University Press, 1979, pp.93-96. A
short optional section is attached below.
A note on war:
From around the 7th century, the Greeks invented a new battle field tactic which
involved the use of foot soldiers in formation. The men of the Greek city were
required to serve in war, but they brought their own weapons. Most farmers came
with their armour and a spear. Those who could not afford this equipment helped in
other ways, such as rowing boats. They had to train regularly for war. They fought in
formation (known as the phalanx), that is to say in tight masses of rows of men (often
eight rows) and were required to move forward and backward together. It was not
easy to train and command soldiers in these formations, but when that was
successfully done, they could be very effective. Alexander was a brilliant commander
of men in formation. His use of formations brought him many victories in the
battlefield.
Picture 16
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Achil
les_Penthesileia_BM_B209.jpg
45
Can you see a connection between the rise of the phalanx and Greek city state
democracy? In the city state, which class a man belonged to depended very much on
where he fought in war. The commanders were high-class men. Many men served as
foot soldiers. Serving together in war provided the solidarity that made up the city
state. The training needed went together with the emphasis in sports. In picture 16,
you can see the drawing on a Greek vase of the hoplite foot soldier in action.
Summary:
In this topic, we looked at the essentials of Greek city state democracy as described by
one of their leaders. We also noted Alexander the Great’s empire, which stretched
from Greece to Egypt and Mesopotamia, and considered how his success might have
been related to the emergence of the phalanx formation in battle.
Reference:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/greeks/greekcritics_01.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phalanx_formation (interesting pictures of the phalanx
here.)
46
Topic 6: Rome and the Roman Empire
Objectives
To familiarise students with the geographic spread of the Roman Empire within the
context of European history, with the extension of Roman law and citizenship beyond
Rome, and the connection between coinage devaluation and the decline of the empire.
Sample teaching plan
Alexander’s empire broke up as soon as he died, and the successor to it was the
Roman empire, which took from the 3rd to the 1st century B.C. (three hundred years)
to build up. By the 4th century A.D., the Roman Empire itself had collapsed. Even
then, it provided a sense of unity to the Western world for most of four to five
centuries, and that left a tremendous influence on the history of Europe. In the next
topic, we shall look at some of these consequences. In this topic, we shall trace the
rise of Roman and the changes in government as an empire is built and expands.
Rome began as a city state. It expanded by accident. The Roman Empire had not been
planned. In the 3rd century B.C., Rome had defeated all the Italian cities, but its
expansion brought it into conflict with Carthage, the maritime power based in North
Africa. After bitter wars, Rome defeated Carthage. Some of those wars brought it into
conflict with Macedonia, which had allied with Carthage. Rome defeated Macedonia.
It then turned on the area which used to be known as Mesopotamia, conquered by
Alexander but since his death had come under native rule. By the 2nd century B.C.,
Rome had conquered this area. By the 1st century B.C., Rome was already the most
47
powerful city in the whole of the West. It continued conquering, now into Egypt and
towards the north into present-day France and Britain (known as Gaul).
Map 6
(Source: Department of History, CUHK.)
How did Rome as a city govern such a vast territory? Most of the time, it did not. It
was almost impossible to control the military commanders to begin with. That was
why by the 1st century B.C. victorious military commanders were demanding power
from the Roman senate, the government of Rome. One of these was Julius Caesar
(you know his name already, it is in the calendar, which month do you think was
named after him?) Julius Caesar was assassinated. His nephew, Augustus Caesar
(another month was named after him, which?) became the most power man of Rome.
He became, in fact, the emperor.
Let us give you two examples by which the empire was governed. The first had to do
with law, the other had to do with money.
48
Exercise 1:
Some of you know about the Bible. The Bible is divided into the Old Testament and
the New Testament. The Old Testament records events that happened before the birth
of Christ (1 A.D.) and the New Testament records events that happened for a few
generations after the birth of Christ. So, all the events of the New Testament happened
while Rome had an empire. In one of those events, Paul, who became a Christian after
the death of Jesus Christ, was arrested for preaching the Christian message. Passage A
is a record of what happened to him.
Passage A:
When they had tied him up with thongs, Paul asked the centurion who stood by, “Is it
lawful for you to scourge a man who is a Roman, and not found guilty?”
When the centurion heard it, he went to the commanding officer and told him, “Watch
what you are about to do, for this man is a Roman!”
The commanding officer came and asked him, “Tell me, are you a Roman?”
He said, “Yes.”
The commanding officer answered, “I bought my citizenship for a great price.”
Paul said, “But I was born a Roman.”
Immediately those who were about to examine him departed from him, and the
commanding officer also was afraid when he realized that he was a Roman, because he
had bound him.
(Source: The Acts of the Apostles, chapter 22, verses 26-29, World English Bible, taken from
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/acts.html)
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Paul was not tortured as soon as he said he was a Roman. He was born a Roman, and
the commanding officer, who was also a Roman, had purchased his citizenship.
Compare that passage with Passage B, a speech given by Emperor Claudius in the
Roman Senate in 48 A.D.
Passage B:
I know, as facts, that the Julii came from Alba, the Coruncanii from Camerium, the
Porcii from Tusculum, and not to inquire too minutely into the past, that new
members have been brought into the Senate from Etruria and Lucania and the whole
of Italy, that Italy itself was at last extended to the Alps, to the end that not only single
persons but entire countries and tribes might be united under our name. We had
unshaken peace at home; we prospered in all our foreign relations, in the days when
Italy beyond the Po was admitted to share our citizenship, and when, enrolling in our
ranks the most vigorous of the provincials, under colour of settling our legions
throughout the world, we recruited our exhausted empire. Are we sorry that the Balbi
came to us from Spain, and other men not less illustrious from Narbon Gaul? Their
descendants are still among us, and do not yield to us in patriotism.
What was the ruin of Sparta and Athens, but this, that mighty as they were in war,
they spurned from them as aliens those whom they had conquered? Our founder
Romulus, on the other hand, was so wise that he fought as enemies and then hailed as
fellow-citizens several nations on the very same day.
(Source: History Source Book, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/tacitus-ann11a.html)
50
Julii, Coruncanii, etc. are names of different sorts of people in Italy. It does not matter
to us exactly where they came from. The Po is a river north of Rome. The point is
clear: Rome can be stronger if it accepts all these different types of people, not only in
Italy, but also from Spain and Gaul (France and Britain today). Paul was not born in
Rome, not even Italy. But his parents must have been Roman for him to claim to have
been born Roman.
If you compare the two passages, why do you think people in the Roman Empire
wanted to become Roman citizens? What advantages did including all these people as
Roman citizens give to the Roman Empire?
Exercise 2:
Look at the picture below of two coins. The one on the left is a Roman silver coin of
the 3rd century A.D. The one on the right is a current United States coin. The picture
on one side is that of the portrait of the emperor Severus Alexander. The equivalent
picture on the United States coin is the portrait of Washington, the first president of
the United States of America. What do you find similar or dissimilar in the two?
51
Picture 17
(Source: Department of History, The Chinese University of Hong Kong)
Governments issue coins and put the portrait of their kings and queens (if there are
any) on them. That is one way of letting their people know who is in charge and that
has been done from the beginnings of coinage. However, notice how the Roman coin
is not quite a circle, but that a circle has been stamped on it.
Notice what happens round the edges of the Roman coin. The silver has been broken
off, why? Should the value of the coin now remain the same? But supposing it is the
52
government that does not have enough silver and so the government has been putting
less silver into the coin, what happens to its value? In Roman times, as often in history,
a coin was only as good as the amount of metal put into it. When the amount of
precious metal in it was reduced, the coin was devalued. This was exactly what
happened in the 3rd century A.D. The Roman government found it harder and harder
to find the money to pay all the needed expenses and devalued the coinage. As a
result, prices soared.
The breaking up of the Roman Empire:
It was hard to govern a vast territory such as the Roman Empire. By 330, the then
Roman Emperor, Constantine, split the empire into two halves. The western half
would be ruled from Rome, and the eastern half ruled from Constantinople, also
known as Byzantium. Why would he do that? It is necessary to understand that
throughout Roman history, the east was still wealthier than the west. Moreover, the
west came under constant pressure from “barbarians” and the city government of
Rome. After the empire was split, the Roman emperor ruled from Constantinople.
What happened in the West is a complicated history. To put it briefly, “barbarian”
tribes moved into Italy, some of whom served in the Roman armies, but by 476, the
Roman commanders of the West, who had come from the “barbarian” tribes, decided
not to fill the post of the emperor’s deputy in Rome. The Roman Empire in the west
had, therefore, fallen, but the eastern empire remained for another thousand years.
53
Hint for the teacher:
How much Roman history should one teach in a general course? The history of
Rome’s expansion is fascinating, but it involves knowledge of the geography of the
Mediterranean Sea and its surroundings and high-school students probably do not
have this in their background. This lesson plan supposes that most of this history can
be skipped so that the focus can be put on Rome as a world empire and some
consequences of that on its government. As an exercise, students can be asked to
compare the map of the Roman Empire with the map of Alexander’s empire to make
the point that the extension had been towards the west.
Summary
From approximately the 3rd century B.C., Rome grew from a city state into an empire,
and then declined. Its growth was characterised by the spread of Roman citizenship
and law. Its decline was related to coinage devaluation and the invasion of
“barbarian” tribes.
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Topic 7: The legacies of Greece and Rome
Objectives
To make students realise that the legacies of Greece and Rome persist to the present
day and may be found within the contexts of their existing knowledge.
Sample teaching plan
You know more about Greece and Rome than you realise. As you noted in the last
lesson, the names of some of the emperors are in the calendar. If you think about it,
there are two more months that should strike you as strange: October and December.
Let me tell you why.
Words
“Octo” in English is usually associated with the number 8. For example, we say the
octopus, the octagon, the octave (in music). Why is it used for the tenth month of the
year? In the same way, “Deca” means 10, for example, in decade, decimal; so why are
we using the word for the twelfth month?
How would you solve this mystery?
Hint for the teacher:
These months were added in the reign of Augustus Caesar; originally the Roman
calendar had only ten months.
Words like octo- and deca- come from Latin, the language of Rome. Latin is different
from Greek. The English language has borrowed heavily from both these two
55
classical languages. Just as English borrowed Latin words when it accepted the
Roman calendar, it borrowed Greek words when it adopted Greek teaching (for more
of this, see Topic 10.
Again, you know more of them than you realise:

Do you know anyone by the name Sophia? What does that mean?

Add the Greek word “philo-” to the Greek word “sophia”, what do you get?
What do you think that means?

Do you notice the prefix geo- in English? It comes in geography, geometry,
geology; what do these words have in common?

Geometry was a Greek word. Euclid, a Greek, wrote the most popular textbook
in geometry. What do you think metria means?

And what about the “-logy” in so many words. Where do you think that comes
from?
Hint for the teacher:
sophia = wisdom; philo = love; philosophy = love of wisdom; geo = earth; metria = to
measure; geometry = measuring the earth, that is, the mathematics for measuring;
-logy comes from “logus”, which means “word”; geology, therefore, is talking about
the earth, biology is talking about life, etc.)
You have been using Roman and Greek words without realising.
However, the Greeks and the Romans have not only been contributing to English
words, they have also been contributing ideas. In fact, it is because they contribute the
ideas that the words have come with them.
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Ideas
In Topic 5, you saw one of these: democracy. The word demo- stands for people, and
-cracy for government. So that is government by the people. You remember that in the
Greek city state, that was an ideal.
But there is more to democracy than government. Compare these statues from
different parts of the ancient world (Pictures 18, 19 and 20):
http://en.wikipedia.org/
wiki/Image:Gudea_of_
Lagash_Girsu.jpg
Picture 18: Rome, c.1st
Picture 19:
Century A.D.
Mesopotamia 2100
Picture 20: Egypt, c.1480B.C.
B.C.
(Source of Pictures 18 and 20: Joan Cheng)
57
Which one looks most human-like to you? Could it be that the Greeks wanted to say
something about human beings, so much so that when they talked about their gods,
even gods were very human-like. For example, they could be both good and evil at
the same time.
In a religion in which there are many gods, it is usually the case that different gods are
given different functions (Demeter as Mother Earth, and Hades as the God of the
Underworld, for example). However, some Greeks were not satisfied with this idea.
They took their cue from a different approach, a belief in the perfection in the
universe. For example, in mathematics, you have studied Pythagoras’ theorem. Has it
occurred to you that what mattered to this Greek thinker was that numbers could fit
together so perfectly? He noticed that some numbers could form squares, and some
numbers triangles, and he was interested in those patterns. He was also interested in
music, because music could be represented by numbers. Thinkers in Greece looked
for patterns that might explain even the gods, and they came up with the idea that the
whole universe must be made of one, or at least very few things. The one thing which
made up the universe is the atom. That was their idea.
Philosophers were interested in understanding the universe. In this sense, they were
also scientists. The word “science”, however, is Roman. In Latin, it simply means “to
know”.
The idea that there should be patterns in things appeared in many different ways in
Greek and Roman thought. Buildings, for example, should be well balanced. Look at
the temple on the hill at Athens
(http://library.thinkquest.org/23492/cgi-bin/parthenon1.cgi) and see what you think.
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The Roman idea of law also made use of the quest for order which the Greeks
invented. You might remember in the last lesson the Roman citizen came under a
different law from other people. What law did non-Romans come under? You might
think they would all come under different laws. That was not how the Romans
thought about it. Instead, they depended on the idea that something fundamental must
be common to the laws of all nations and tried to work out what those were. On this
reasoning, law was not arbitrary but should be consistent, and so they codified it.
Roman law, with its codes, was very influential in Europe even after the fall of the
Roman Empire.
The idea of order also came into religion. The idea that one god rather than many
gods determined the fate of human beings was not Greek in origin, but through the
Greeks’ quest for understanding the world, it made a special impact under the Roman
Empire. In the Roman Empire, it was given a meaning understandable to the Greek
world. Christianity, which gained ascendance from the 2nd century A.D. taught that a
single God was the creator and law-giver. When the Roman emperor also embraced
this religion, from the time of Constantine (who built Constantinople), the empire and
religion under a single God were merged. There was one god in heaven, and one
emperor on earth, his representative.
Cultural heritage
The Roman Empire lasted for so long and embodied so much of Europe that for many
years afterwards, it remained a symbol of civilisation. Especially after the fifteen
century, it was looked upon as being much more civilised than the period that came
59
after, known as the Dark or Middle Ages, which we shall discuss under the next few
lessons. It became a symbol of Western civilisation.
For an example of Greek and Roman culture as symbols of civilisation, look up the
Olympic Games. Look again at the official website of the Olympic movement at
http://www.olympic.org/uk/games/ancient/index_uk.asp and watch the cartoon video
of the history of the game. There are also examples of Greek and Roman architectural
styles which you can see in Hong Kong. Look for the use of domes (more of that in
Topic 10) and granite pillars. Look at pictures of the Legislative Council building in
Central District (Picture 21).
60
Picture 21
(Source of picture: Ma Muk Chi)
Summary
The Roman Empire learnt a great deal from the Greeks, and, as the empire expanded,
Greek and Roman ideas and practices spread to many parts of Europe. For some
examples, they made an impact on the calendar, on European words, on ideas about
knowledge, on religion and on architecture. These influences are still with us today.
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Topic 8: Revision
1. Put the following words on a time line in the correct order:
Pre-historic, birth of Jesus Christ, Roman empire, Alexander the Great, the Olympic
Games in Beijing, 2007
2. Look at this map. How do you know it was an ancient map?
(Source: J.G. Barthologmew LLD, A Literacy & Historical Atlas of Asia, London: J.M. Dent
& Sons, Ltd.; New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, unknown publishing year.)
3. The following passage is taken from the Greek myth about Demeter and her
daughter Persephone. Demeter was the Earth Goddess, and Hades was the king of the
underworld. What does this passage tell you about changes in the seasons? What does
it tell you about social relationships?
So Demeter was comforted for her daughter Persephone, and the earth and all the
things that grew in it felt that her anger and sorrow had passed away. Once more the
62
trees bore their fruits, the flowers spread out their sweet blossoms in the garden, and
the golden corn waved like the sea under the soft summer breeze. So the six months
passed happily away, and then Hermes came with the coal-black horses to take
Persephone to the dark land. And she said to her mother, “Do not weep much; the
gloomy king whose wife I am is so kind to me that I cannot be really unhappy; and in
six months more he will let me come to you again.” But still, whenever the time came
round for Persephone to go back to Hades, Demeter thought of the happy days when
her child was a merry girl playing with her companions and gathering the bright
flowers in the beautiful plains of Enna.
(Source: George W. Cox, Tales from Greek Mythology, London: Longman, Roberts, & Green,
1863, p. 7.)
4. Which one of the two buildings below represents a Western style? Why do you
think so? Point out four features in the buildings which show that they are different.
A
B
http://commons.wikimedia.org
/wiki/Image:Tsang_Tai_Uk_%
E6%9B%BE%E5%A4%A7%
E5%B1%8B_o.jpg
(Source of Picture B: Ma Muk Chi)
63
5. Compare the two maps below. Which one do you think was drawn earlier? Why do
you think so? What accounts for the differences between the two maps?
Map A
(Source: J.G. Barthologmew LLD, A Literacy & Historical Atlas of Asia, London: J.M. Dent
& Sons, Ltd.; New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, unknown publishing year.)
64
Map B
(Source: Department of History, CUHK.)
6. This is a description of the government of Athens in 430 B.C. Describe four
features of the democracy of that city as indicated.
Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We
do not copy our neighbours, but are an example to them. It is true that we are called a
democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But
while the law secures equal justice to all alike in their private disputes, the claim of
excellence is also recognized; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is
preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit.
Neither is poverty a bar, but a man may benefit his country whatever be the obscurity
of his condition.
(Source: Leon Bernard and Theodore B. Hodges, Readings in European History, New York:
Macmillan, 1958, p. 6.)
7. The following passage describes a legend about the Olympic Games recorded by
the Greek traveller Pausanias in the 2nd century A.D. From what he says, were
65
women allowed to take part in the games? When one woman was caught at the games,
why was she pardoned from punishment? Rewrite the legend from the woman’s point
of view. Why did she go to the games? Why did she become so excited? What did it
mean to her that he son won?
As you go from Scillus along the road to Olympia, before you cross the Alpheius, there
is a mountain with high, precipitous cliffs. It is called Mount Typaeum. It is a law of
Elis to cast down it any women who are caught present at the OlympicGames, or even
on the other side of the Alpheius, on the days prohibited to women. However, they say
that no woman has been caught, except Callipateira only....She, being a widow,
disguised herself exactly like a gymnastic trainer, and brought her son to compete at
Olympia. Peisirodus, for so her son was called, was victorious, and Callipateira, as she
was jumping over the enclosure in which they keep the trainers shut up, bared her
person. So her sex was discovered, but they let her go unpunished out of respect for her
father, her brothers and her son, all of whom had been victorious at Olympia. But a law
was passed that for the future trainers should strip before entering the arena.
(Source: Fred Morrow Fling, ed., A Source Book of Greek History, (Boston: D. C. Heath,
1907), pp. 47-53, cited in Internet Ancient History Sourcebook,
www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/greekgames.html .)
8. The following picture shows two coins. The one on the left is an ancient Roman
coin, and the one on the right is a contemporary American coin. Why is the Roman
coin not round?
66
(Source: Department of History, The Chinese University of Hong Kong.)
9. The two pictures shown below are found on a panel at the city of Ur and dated to
2600-2400 B.C. Write a short paragraph of 50 words about government at Ur from
information you can obtain from them.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Standard_of_Ur_-_peace_side.jpg
67
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Standard_of_Ur_-_War.jpg .
10. Look at the pictures in question 9 again. Write a paragraph of 50 words describing
the life of an ordinary person living in Ur at 2,500 B.C. Make sure you state clearly if
you are writing about a man or a woman.
68
Topic 9: The Middle Ages
Objectives
To present an introduction to the Middle Ages, with emphasis on the rise of feudalism
and what that meant in daily life, and on the role of the Christian Church in the
Middle Ages, with some focus on the Crusades.
Sample lesson plan
Feudalism
Watch the power-point file, “The story of the Middle Ages”.
Ask students to present on a time line the following incidents:

Conversion of the barbarians to Christianity

The rise of Islam

Islam’s expansion into Spain

The emergence of the Holy Roman Empire

The Crusades

The rise of cities
Hint for the teacher:
It is more important to get the order of events than the dates right. If you must include
dates, consider the crowning of Charlemagne as Roman Emperor in 800 and the First
Crusade in 1095.
69
Let us consider what happened to social life when all these events were taking place.
The crucial thing to remember is that the social institutions which made the Roman
Empire great were collapsing by the 4th century. What does that mean?
(1) The devaluation of the currency in the 4th century was destroying trade. As the
Roman Empire receded, trade receded. When there was no trade, there was little use
for money. What happens when money disappears?
What do you use money for?
How would you get the same result
without using money?
1. To buy things
1. Make them yourself
2. To employ people
2. Make your family work for you
3. To get a place to live in
3. Somebody will have to give your
house to you, but what do you give in
return?
4. To pay your taxes
The money society
4. Pay in goods or in service
The money-less society
After you have bought things, employed You make all your own things and so you
people, found a place to live in, paid your have no time left, then you work as a
taxes, you can do what you want to do.
member of a big family, which gives you
a place to live in but wants you to be
70
attached to it all the time, and the
government can demand work out of you,
there is little freedom left.
(2) As the money society collapsed, new social institutions were emerging. For an
example of such institutions, read the following, which is a description of a 12th
century ceremony of someone becoming the vassal of a lord:
First they did their homage thus, the count asked if he was willing to become
completely his man, and the other replied, “I am willing”; and with clasped hands,
surrounded by the hands of the count, they were bound together by a kiss. Secondly,
he who had done homage gave his fealty to the representative of the count in these
words, “I promise on my faith that I will in future be faithful to count William, and
will observe my homage to him completely against all persons in good faith and
without deceit.” Thirdly, he took his oath to this upon the relics of the saints.
Afterward, with a little rod which the count held in his hand, he gave investitures to
all who by this agreement had given their security and homage and accompanying
oath.
(Source: Homage and Fealty to the Count of Flanders, AD 1127, from Galbert de Bruges,
Chronicle of the Death of Charles the Good, ed. Henri Pirenne, Paris, A. Picard, 1891. p. 89,
Internet Medieval Source Book,
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/feud-fief1.html.)
Does this description remind you of a wedding ceremony? Is it possible that the
wedding ceremony was a variation of this ceremony? What does it mean to “be
willing to become completely his man”? How long was the promise to last?
71
Hint for the teacher:
The wedding ceremony was exactly a variation of the investiture ceremony, in which
one man became the vassal of another. To be a vassal was to become somebody else’s
man, much like a woman becoming a wife or a man becoming a husband. The
promise was to last for life.
(3) The meaning of feudalism. Feudal law was very different from our law. In our law,
if I give you something, it is yours. In feudal law, I can give you something, and it
remains mine, but you are allowed to use it as long as you remain my man. So, when
you die, I get that thing back, although usually I would give it to your son in return for
his agreeing, again, to be my man. A man so bound to another was not free. If he was
killed, the lord would be compensated. Society in which this sort of law was common
was feudal. When money disappears, the binding of one person to another would be
an effective way to provide benefits in return for service.
(4) You can, therefore, understand why under feudalism, some people escaped to the
cities. In the cities, they became free men. Money reappeared in the cities long before
it did in the countryside. Cities had charters with the king so that in return for paying a
sum of money, the king would protect the city but leave it alone. Cities had their own
organisations, including the guilds.
The Church
Most textbooks would have a chapter on Islam. In our power-point in the previous
topic, we have referred to its conquest in the 7th century. Look at the textbook. See if
it contains a map indicating Muslim advance through North Africa into Spain (Iberian
72
Peninsula). Look for a reference to the battle (Battle of Poitiers, 732) in which the
Franks stopped the Muslim advance.
For the three hundred years after this battle, two major developments took place in
Europe: the Church grew in strength, and with the support of the Church, the leaders
of the Franks who stopped the Muslim advance were crowned Holy Roman Emperor.
The Holy Roman Emperor was a title; he did not always have power. The Holy
Roman Empire broke up very soon after it was formed, but succession to the title of
the Holy Roman Empire continued. The Church, however, remained a powerful
institution.
The Church was powerful for a number of reasons:
1) The Church had a clear organisation under the Pope, who claimed authority from
God. (The first Pope was said to be St Peter, the disciple of Jesus Christ.)
2) From the 5th century, the Church was supported by the monasteries. The
monasteries were communities of devoted people who lived together in order to
pray and to serve the Christian religion. They lived simple lives under strict rules.
They were very wealthy institutions. They were well managed, and they received
donations, especially from people who wanted prayers said for them after they
died. You must also understand that many monasteries were linked. Some owned
land at different places on the principal highways, providing shelter for travellers.
At a time when governments were weak and money was little used, they provided
very useful services.
3) The monastic orders and the priests were among the best educated people in
Europe. Most people in the Middle Ages were illiterate. Monasteries and churches
73
kept books and trained people to read them. They knew how to read and write and
to keep accounts.
4) In the Middle Ages, many people were firmly religious. For most people, life was
short and they desired salvation after death.
5) Even kings and emperors had to take the Pope seriously. He had the power of
excommunication, that is, of driving them out of the church. Without the
protection of the Church, they could not legitimately be king or emperor.
Hint for the teacher:
This is likely to be one of the hardest topics to teach in the syllabus, and yet it is
extremely important as background for later developments. The Church, and
Christianity, was very much an integral part of European life. Some of your students
are likely to be familiar with the church through their own religious beliefs. You can
by all means draw on this experience to make the above points. For some examples of
what you can do:
The story of Christmas: Have you ever wondered how the shepherds could have
been watching their flock by night in the middle of winter? The early Church
recognized only Easter. The Church took over a pagan festival (winter solstice) to
celebrate Christmas. For an interesting story, see “The real story of Christmas” at
http://www.history.com/minisites/christmas/viewPage?pageId=1252. The story of the
Church’s major festivals could be an interesting classroom project.
On the question of literacy: see the picture of the chained book (Picture 22). Why
was the book chained?
74
In the Middle Ages, books were hand-copied. They were, therefore, very valuable.
These books were chained to the bookshelves in libraries attached to churches and
monasteries. The monks spent a lot of time copying books.
Picture 22
.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:
Milkau_B%C3%BCcherschrank_mit_angeke
ttetem_Buch_aus_der_Bibliothek_von_Cese
na_109-2jpg
Because the ideas of the Church conflicted with new ideas in later periods, especially
new ideas from science, the Church is often portrayed as being backward. This was
not necessarily the case for most of the Middle Ages. At a time when the Church
provided the principal means of education, it was a great preserver of knowledge. The
university, which was founded in Paris in the by the 13th, was very much a Church
institution, but it was also the centre of some of the most important intellectual
75
discussions in European thought. The history of the universities is also another subject
on which students can do a classroom project.
Remember, classroom projects should not be conducted for the sake of learning more
facts. Set a problem: What celebrations were held in mid-winter, and why do we think
the Church might have taken over pagan festivals in order to celebrate Christmas?
When was the first university founded? What subjects were taught there? Who were
the teachers? How was the Church involved in it? We don’t advise a project on the
history of the book at this stage. In a later lesson, we shall discuss the invention of
printing. That would be a good time for a project on the history of the book.
The Crusades
For most of 300 years, although there were wars between Christians and Muslims in
Spain, the Muslim world and the Christian world were kept apart. From the 11th
century, the Christians sent the Crusades to fight in the Holy Land. What happened?
Read the following. This was Pope Urban II speaking in 1095 (at the Council of
Clermont):
Let hatred therefore depart from among you, let your quarrels end, let wars cease, and
let all dissensions and controversies slumber. Enter upon the road to the Holy
Sepulcher --, wrest that land from the wicked race, and subject it to yourselves. That
land which, as the Scripture says, ‘floweth with milk and honey’ was given by God
into the power of the children of Israel.’ Jerusalem is the centre of the earth; the land
is fruitful above all others, like another paradise of delights. This spot the Redeemer
of mankind has made illustrious by his advent, has beautified by his sojourn, has
consecrated by his passion, has redeemed by his death, has glorified by his burial.
75
(Source: James Harvey Robinson, ed., Readings in European History: Vol. I: (Boston: Ginn
and co., 1904), 312-316. This text is part of the Internet Medieval Source Book.
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/urban2a.html)
What was the “wicked race”? What was the place they were occupying? Why should
Christians try to get it back? What must they do in order to get it back?
The story: You have to remember that, up to now, the eastern Mediterranean (known
as the Middle East nowadays), was the richest and most developed parts of the
Western world. The Muslims were not wicked; they were extremely civilised. After
the fall of the Roman Empire, in Western Europe, scholarship declined. However, the
Muslim world preserved and advanced Greek learning. The Muslim world had the
best libraries, the best scientists and mathematicians.
However, the Muslims were a threat to the Christians in two ways. Firstly, Christians
travelled to the Holy Land on homage and the Holy Land was controlled by the
Muslims. Secondly, the Turks, who were now in control of the Arab world, were in
conflict with their immediate neighbour, the Eastern Roman Empire (known as
Byzantium). Byzantium was also Christian, although it did not come under the
authority of the Pope. When it was threatened, it called for help from the Christians in
the West.
The Crusades conducted a holy war, but that war also coincided with the expansion of
Europe. Some of the groups that joined the crusade, especially the Normans, had been
expanding very rapidly. Some of these were hired soldiers; they were professional and
76
they were prepared to fight for gain. Faith counted a lot, but there were also
opportunities for gain in the Crusades.
The Crusades did not conquer the Holy Land. But the movement of people increased
contact between Christians and Muslims. Increasing trade and organising for war also
encouraged the growth of the power of the kings in some parts of Europe, especially
in England and France. In the next topic, you will see that changes followed.
Summary:
You have learnt how the following came together in the Middle Ages: little money
was available, most people were unfree because they were given land in return for
being someone else’s men, but some people escaped to the city and they became free.
Society under personal bonds is often referred to as feudalism.
The church was a very important aspect of European life in the Middle Ages. It was
the major unifying force after the fall of the Roman Empire. In time, the power to
organise armies and to go to war fell into the hands of the Holy Roman Emperor and
the kings of individual countries, especially England and France. The Church
remained its authority in education and in intellectual thought.
77
Topic 10: The Renaissance
Objectives
(1) To introduce to students some of the discoveries of the Renaissance, including
humanism. For this topic, humanism will be taken to mean the revival of Greek values
and learning. That revival came at the time printing was invented. The impact of that
will also be considered.
(2) To demonstrate the impact humanism made on art and architecture, in particular,
how Renaissance art and architecture differed from the Gothic, and how Renaissance
painting made use of perspective and anatomy.
Sample lesson plan
The invention of printing and humanism
1) By 1450, a new movement was coming over Europe. This was the Renaissance.
The word means “rebirth”. Unlike many words used by historians to deal with
periods of history, this one was created by contemporaries. They believed that
after the fall of the Roman Empire, they had gone through a “Dark Age” and, by
their own time, they were emerging from that age. See Ernst H. Gombrich, A
Little History of the World, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005, chapter 26.
2) What was so new about the age of rebirth? It was the rediscovery of Greek books.
Before the Renaissance, intellectual discussions had focussed on the Bible. The
very strict religious view of life suggested that people should be bound to their
lords. The Renaissance view saw people as free agents. Education was needed to
develop their qualities. This was the Greek view.
78
3) Read the following, a passage written in 1400 (by Petrus Paulus Vergerius) on the
need of education:
We call those studies liberal which are worthy of a free man; those studies by
which we attain and practice virtue and wisdom; that education which calls forth,
trains and develops those highest gifts of body and of mind which ennoble men,
and which are rightly judged to rank next in dignity to virtue only. ...
We come now to the consideration of the various subjects which may rightly be
included under the name of “Liberal Studies.” Amongst these I accord the first
place to History, on grounds both of its attractiveness and of its utility, qualities
which appeal equally to the scholar and to the statesman. Next in importance
ranks Moral Philosophy, which indeed is, in a peculiar sense, a “Liberal Art,” in
that its purpose is to teach men the secret of true freedom....I would indicate as the
third main branch of study, Eloquence, which indeed holds a place of distinction
amongst the refined Arts. By philosophy we learn the essential truth of things,
which by eloquence we so exhibit in orderly adornment as to bring conviction to
differing minds....
(Source: Petrus Paulus Vergerius, De ingenues moribus et liberalibus studiis, trans. by W.
H. Woodward, Vittorino da Feltre and other Humanist Educators, (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1897), 102-110; This text is part of the Internet Medieval
Source Book, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/vergerius.html. )
Exercise:
Consider once again what you learnt about Greek democracy and learning (Topics 5
and 7). Do you see the similarities between Vergerius’ views on education and the
Greek ideals of life?
79
To refresh your memory, let us give you some of the sources you looked at under
those topics.
Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. We
do not copy our neighbours, but are an example to them. It is true that we are called a
democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But
wile the law secures equal justice to all alike in their private disputes, the claim of
excellence is also recognized; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is
preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit.
Neither is poverty a bar, but a man may benefit his country whatever be the obscurity
of his condition.
And we have not forgotten to provide for our weary spirits many relaxations from toil;
we have regular games and sacrifices throughout the year; our homes are beautiful
and elegant; and the delight which we daily feel in all these things helps to banish
melancholy. Because of the greatness of our city the fruits of the whole earth flow in
upon us; so that we enjoy the goods of other countries as freely as of our own.
(Source: Leon Bernard and Theodore B. Hodges, Readings in European History, New York:
Macmillan, 1958, p. 6.)
Picture 23
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image
:Dionysos_pediment_Parthenon_BM.jpg
A Greek word
Philo + Sophia = philosophia
(philosophy)
80
4) Why did a revival of Greek learning take place at this time?
You might remember from the last topic that the Muslims had preserved Greek
learning. After the Crusades, by way of trade and exchange, knowledge of Greek
learning would have come to the Christians from the East. Moreover,
Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453. Constantinople was a much more
established centre of learning than any city of Western Europe. The fall of the city
might have driven some people to move back to Christian Europe.
However, the Renaissance was also helped by the invention of printing, in the
15th century. (The printing press was invented around 1450.)
5) The invention of printing was a very important event in history. It is surprising
that it took so long, as throughout all the years without printing, people in the
West were used to the idea of making patterns from seals. In Asia, the Chinese
printed books much earlier. One problem was perhaps the lack of paper. Until
paper was invented, again an idea in which China was ahead of Europe, printing
served little purpose. Another reason might be the shortage of readers. It was
worth printing books only when there were many readers. For that to happen,
there had to be more people living in cities, using writing in their daily lives.
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Exercise:
Contrast the picture of a 16th-century printing press in Europe (Picture 24) with the
art of printing in China (Picture 25).
Picture 24
Picture 25
(Source of Picture 24: Department of History, CUHK)
(Source of Picture 25: David Faure)
It is often said that the European printing process originated in China. Would you
agree?
Hint for the teacher:
Putting a sheet of paper on moulds would be common to both processes, but the
Chinese did not use a press. Instead, Chinese printers brushed the paper by hand while
it was placed on the printing block. In contrast, from the beginning of printing,
Europeans had movable type made in metal, and, although the Chinese also had the
same, the process was seldom used.
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6) The use of vernacular: The spread of printing led to more and more books being
printed in the vernacular, that is to say, not in Latin but in the local languages,
such as English. William Shakespeare (1564-1616) produced an English literature
in his life time. The Bible, which used to be available only in Latin, was translated
into English in 1611. The first English dictionary appeared in 1604 (Robert
Cawdrey’s Table Alphabeticall). The emergence of the vernacular was very
influential in building up the nation state, to be discussed in a later topic.
History in architecture
You see around you all the time building styles indicating different views of culture.
Sometimes they indicate the sense of being modern; at other times, they include
features that suggest that they are related to some particular culture (such as, being
Western, or Chinese). However, you also realise that buildings must be safe. So, to
design a building, the architect not only expresses a view about culture, but also
makes use of existing technology to ensure that it can be inhabited safely and
comfortably. Buildings, therefore, tell us a great deal about history. They reflect ideas
about culture and technological changes.
We shall consider here only one simple technological question: how do you build a
roof 40 feet above ground? What will hold it up? (40 feet is not very high for a
building, it is about four floors by Hong Kong standard).
1) You can use timber for pillars. It is not easy to find trees taller than 40 feet (don’t
forget you have to cut both ends), but it is not impossible. However, you have to
think about transporting 40-foot trees to your building sites, and that is not so
easy.
83
Picture 26
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Parthen
on.Southern.Side.damaged.jpg
2) You can think about using
stone. Stone is also a good
building
material,
but,
again, if you do not find it
near your building site, it is
difficult
to
transport
because of its weight. Even
then, you can see that the taller the building the thicker the stone wall must be.
City walls can be very thick, house walls less so. (See in Picture 26 how stone was
used in Greek buildings in this picture of the Parthenon at Athens.)
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Picture 27
(Source of Picture 27: Department of History, CUHK)
3) You can build walls of brick or earth. This is easy to move around (you can make
the brick at the site), but brick is not nearly as strong as stone, or even timber.
4) If you have built the walls, now you have to put up the roof. The trouble with
roofs is that the wider the walls, the harder it is to put them up. Again, you have
the same question about the length of trees if you use wood. If you use stone, how
do you build a pillar across space? Don’t forget that the roof is heavy. You can
always put pillars in the building, but they take up space.
This is why the arch is so valuable.
Picture 28
In Picture 27, you can see how
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Pantheo
pieces of stone can be used to
n-panini.jpg
bridge a wide space. The Romans
used the arch widely. They also
turned them into domes. Look at
this picture of the Pantheon in
Rome, built in 125 A.D. (Picture
28) You must understand how
difficult it is to build this perfect
dome.
85
Every piece on the roof had to be made perfectly before the pieces could be fitted
together. The height of the dome is about 140 feet, and the dome itself weighs 5000
tons. The Romans knew how to use concrete, and so that was what it was made of, not
stone. This building was an amazing feat of ancient engineering.
After the fall of the Roman Empire, Europe put up no building comparable to the
Pantheon for a few hundred years. The knowledge of how to build the dome
disappeared in Europe. It started up again in the Middle Ages in a different way.
5) The Gothic invention: buttress walls
Picture 29
(Source of Picture: Joan Cheng)
86
Picture 30
(Source of Picture 30: David Faure)
Picture 31
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:HK_St_John_s_Cathedral_60401_6.jpg
87
In the 12th century (that is to say, during the Middle Ages), the Church of St. Denis
was rebuilt using buttressed walls. You can see these buttresses in Pictures 29 and 30:
the buttresses are themselves walls of stone or brick built perpendicular to the
building wall and they hold up the building wall. The builders found that using the
buttresses, not only could walls be made stronger, and therefore, taller, they could
also put large windows into them. You can imagine how dark houses were before
there could be these large windows. The idea that churches could be bright was also
appealing for religious reasons, and this style caught on very quickly.
You see buttresses on a lot of European buildings. You see them in many church
buildings, including modern ones that do not need the buttresses for support. Their
use has become an architectural style. Picture 31 shows a side hall of St. John’s
Cathedral in Hong Kong exhibiting buttresses. These buttresses were used only as
decoration; the walls in this modern building in all likelihood do not depend on them
for strength.
6) All the above is background. Now, let us introduce the Renaissance. The
architects of the Renaissance, who were the same people as the painters and sculptors,
rediscovered the Greek and Roman ideals of architecture. They recovered some of the
skills of the Romans, for example, in using domes. Domes came to be very commonly
used from the 16th century. However, the change was not only technological. The
Renaissance artists believed they had rediscovered how mathematical proportions
might be related to human lives. They believed that the classical traditions (Greek and
Roman) fitted better with these proportions. Picture 32 is a beautiful example of a
Renaissance building. This is St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican.
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Picture 32
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:St._Peter%27s_Basilica_Facade%2C_Rome
%2C_June_2004.jpg
History in art
The same humanist thinking -- a reversion to the classical, ie Greek and Roman style
-- was apparent in painting and sculpture. The objective was to capture human beings
as human beings. The Greeks had considered the human form itself graceful, and
were not shy of representing it in the nude. The style of the Middle Ages (known as
Gothic) had departed in a different direction. Medieval artists produced many statues,
but they preferred the symbolic more than the realistic. Their work expressed the
beauty of lines and curves, rather than the accurate representation of the human body.
This you can see by comparing the three models below:
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Picture 33: Greek
Picture 34: Medieval
http://commons.wiki
http://commons.wikimed
media.org/wiki/Imag
ia.org/wiki/Image:France
e:Dionysos_pedimen
_Paris_St-Denis_Trinity.
t_Parthenon_BM.jpg
jpg
Greek
Medieval
Picture 35: Renaissance
Renaissance
Source of Picture 35: Joan Cheng
Hint for the teacher:
Except for the odd student with art background, you are probably better off providing
these few examples as background knowledge. When there is enough time, art history
is a great deal of fun and extremely informative. You might let some of your students
research the Renaissance artists, or compare Italian and Byzantine paintings, but for
this topic, home in on the use of perspectives and the realistic representation of the
human form.
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How might an artist create a realistic image of the human form?
One such method was the use of perspectives. Nowadays, we are so used to drawings
with perspective that we do not realise that this was an art form that had to be
invented. We use it nowadays not only in paintings, but also in engineering and
architectural drawing and so this invention has not only enriched our artistic sense,
but has also had very important practical applications.
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Look at this painting:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/w
iki/Image:Antonio_Pollaiuolo_0
Picture 36: The martyrdom of St Sebastian,
by Piero del Pollaiuolo
and Antonio del Pollaiuolo, 15th century
03.jpg
(1) Of the six men with bow and arrow, you will notice they come in two groups. The
two who are bending down you see front and back. The other four you see in four
different directions. Each group shows really the same model, drawn from
different perspectives.
(2) In the background, you see the landscape sloping away, objects towards the far
end looking smaller than objects at the near end.
(3) In both observations above, the artist tried to present the objects he drew as they
appeared to his eyes. He allowed for the distortion of distance and the angle at
which he was viewing these objects.
Allowance for perspective was an invention of the Renaissance. It had a lot to do with
Humanism. It was part of the classical interest to capture the world as it was. It
involved the application of mathematics to art. It also implied an interest in the human
body, and the attempt to portray from it the nature of the human being. Renaissance
artists studied the human anatomy to make sure they painted the body right.
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The Renaissance artists were much more than painters and sculptors. They were
architects, scientists, engineers and all-round scholars. They were interested in the
world, and in new ways of representing it.
Hint for the teacher:
In this lesson, we have avoided producing names of the artists, even the most famous
ones. If time permits, it could be a helpful project to ask students to look up Leonardo
da Vinci, Michelangelo. They might concentrate on a few examples of their works,
for example, the Sistine Chapel, and explain how they relate to perspectives, anatomy
or a reversion to classical style.
Some useful websites:
http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings.html#S
http://www.saintpetersbasilica.org/
http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/fnart/arch/contents_europe.html
http://witcombe.sbc.edu/ARTHrenaissanceitaly.html#Italy15
http://www.davincisketches.com/Default.htm
Summary:
There is a great deal that can be taught about the Renaissance. This sample lesson has
concentrated on (1) the idea of the Renaissance being an idea inherent at the time; (2)
the creation of knowledge had much to do with the invention of printing; (3) the
architecture reveals the use of classical forms, especially the dome; (4) paintings and
sculpture made use of knowledge of perspective and of anatomy; and (5) these
different aspects add up to the view that the Renaissance artists were not only artists,
but also thinkers and scientists, that is to say, people interested in understanding the
world.
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Topic 11: Reformation
Objectives
To present the history of the Reformation in the context of other developments in the
period, especially the Renaissance; to present the differences between Protestant and
Roman Catholic beliefs; to relate the Reformation to state formation in the sixteenth
century.
Sample teaching plan
Most textbooks give an account of the Reformation in three parts: (1) Martin Luther’s
revolt against the Roman Catholic Church; (2) the Peasants’ War; and (3) the
separation of England from the Roman Catholic Church. Several points might be
made clearer in class related to these three parts:
(1) The Reformation gave rise to the Protestants, as opposed to the Roman Catholic
Church. Both Protestants and Roman Catholics are Christians.
(2) The Protestant revolt was sparked by the sale of indulgences, that is, the
forgiveness of sin in return for donation. The Church had long accepted that
sinners had to do penance, as a result of which sins might be forgiven. Payments
of money for an indulgence were a variation of this practice.
(3) The Protestants reacted against the authority of the Roman Catholic Church. They
believed that the individual could reach salvation without the intervention of the
church, but they also believed that individual faith was needed in order for a
person to reach salvation.
(4) The spread of Luther’s doctrines, and the writings of other Protestant leaders, was
helped by the invention of the printing press.
(5) Once the doctrines against the Roman Catholic Church spread, they were seized
upon by common people in the countryside (peasants) as excuses for attacking the
monasteries and local lords.
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(6) The English Reformation was another complicated event which had to do with the
English king’s politics both in England and in relation to Europe. By becoming
the head of the church, the English king ceased to recognise the Pope’s authority
over England. He also proceeded to dissolve the monasteries, a move which broke
the power of the Roman Catholic Church in England.
(7) The usual text book version of the Reformation is that the Church became corrupt,
and so Martin Luther mounted a revolution. It is useful to begin a discussion of
the corruption of the Church by looking at the attached page from Grombrich, A
Little History of the World, chapter 28. What was it corrupt about? The object of
the supposed corruption was exactly the Renaissance, on which we showered so
much admiration in the previous topic.
We can see how the events of the Renaissance and the Reformation were related by
comparing time charts. Use the Reformation cards provided to ask students to place
major events on a time line. A summary of events is provided by the chart below.
Renaissance
Reformation
Voyages of Discovery
and Scientific Revolution
1415: Portugal captures Ceuta
1450: Invention of printing
press
1452: Leonardo da Vinci born
1488: Diaz sailed past Cape of
Good Hope
1490s: Leonardo painted Last
1492: Columbus’ first voyage
Supper
1498: Vasco da Gama reached
India
1500s: Leonardo painted
Mona Lisa
1506: Pope Julius II lays the
first stone of the new basilica
under the St. Veronica pier.
1508-1512: Michelangelo
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paints the Sistine Chapel
1513-1516: Leonardo da
1517: Martin Luther published
1519-1522 Magellan’s fleet
Vinci lives in Rome at the
his Ninety-Five Theses On the
circumnavigated the world
service of Leo X
Power of Indulgences
1519 Leonardo died
1524-1525: Peasants’ War
1534: Act of Supremacy made
1539: Copernicus published his
Henry VIII Supreme Head of
heliocentric theory
the Church of England
1546: Michelangelo, aged 71,
is named architect of St.
Peter’s.
1547: Michelangelo produced
his first wooden model of St.
Peter’s.
1564: Death of Michelangelo
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Pictures for Reformation Cards:
Picture 36a: Leonardo da Vinci, Mona Lisa (1500s)
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:La_gioconda.jpg
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Picture 36b: Martin Luther (posted 95 theses, 1517)
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Luther46c.jpg
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Picture 36c: Michelangelo, Sistine Chapel (1508-1522)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Sistine_Chapel_ceiling_left.png
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Picture 36d: Michelangelo, David (1504)
Source of Picture: Joan Cheng
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Picture 36e: Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Leonardo_self.jpg
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Picture 36f: Henry VIII Supreme Head of the Church of England, 1534
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Henry-VIII-kingofengland_1491-1547.jpg
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Picture 36g: Peasants plundering a cloister in the Peasants’ War, 1524-1525
Source of Picture: Roland H. Bainton, Here I Stand, A Life of Martin Luther, Abingdon Press,
201 Eighth Avenue South, Nashville, Tennessee 37202, USA. Entry for p. 214 in “sources of
illustrations” indicates the picture was taken from a pre-World War II journal,
Propylaenwelgeschichte.
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Picture 36h: Leonardo da Vinci, The Last Supper (1495-1498)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:The_Last_Supper_pre_EUR.jpg
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Picture 36i: Painting of Columbus in the New World, depicting a scene of 1492
(drawn in 1893)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Columbus_Taking_Possession.jpg
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Summary:
The Renaissance led to many consequences, one of which was the Reformation. The
Renaissance introduced not only new ideas, but also expensive church buildings
which had to be paid for. The Reformation attacked the corruption of the Roman
Catholic Church and revolted against its authority. Ideas of the Reformation spread
because printing was available and the vernacular was becoming popular. Meanwhile,
some new states, such as England, seized upon the religious revolt to break free from
the authority of the Roman Catholic Church. Just as the Reformation was proceeding,
a new era of history was beginning with the discovery of new sea routes.
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Topic 12: The rise of science
Objectives
The rise of science was part of the movement from the Renaissance to create a new
world view. In this topic, we explore what that world view might consist of and
consider some reasons for its emergence.
Sample teaching plan
What is science?
In your science lessons, you conducted this experiment:
Diagram 2
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Prism_rainb
ow_schema.png
You passed a beam of white light into a prism (look at the drawing from the left hand
side), and observed that it divided into seven colours. You could flash the seven
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colours into another prism (look at the drawing from the right hand side), and it
became a beam of white light again. What did you find out about light in this
experiment?
Did you know that this was an experiment conducted by Isaac Newton in 1666? He
came to the same conclusion you did. Newton came to this discovery while he was
making a telescope. You can understand that making a telescope required using lenses,
and he found that however fine his lenses were, there were distortions. Finally, he
realised that light did not enter glass in a straight line, and it was defraction which
separated the colours.
Why was this a scientific discovery? Did Newton find out something new? How did
he know he was right? How did you find out he was right? What is an experiment?
Hint for the teacher:
Newton found out something new. He found out that he was right by conducting an
experiment. We also know he was right because we can conduct the same experiment.
An experiment is a repeatable event in which we can observe the consequence of
some action. An experiment requires combining reason and observation.
Another development: did the sun go round the earth?
Before the sixteenth century, it used to be thought that the sun went round the earth.
In 1539, Nicolaus Copernicus published his theory that the earth went round the sun.
What observation could have supported that the earth went round the sun?
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Hint for the teacher:
We don’t expect your students will know the answer to this one. You will have to
give them a nutshell history of astronomy. For centuries, the Arab astronomers had
accumulated a great deal of knowledge about the movement of the planets. They
noticed that Mars did not move in a straight line. It went forward, and back and
forward again. This was a problem that many astronomers tried to solve, but could not,
because they all believed that the sun went round the earth. That was, until
Copernicus came up with another solution.
Diagram 3
Retrograde Motion in Copernican System
(see Gif image)
(Note: You may also visit
http://csep10.phys.utk.edu/astr161/lect/retrograde/copernican.html )
That was a very clever argument. Moreover, observation of the planets was there for
all to see. However, was this an experiment? The history of this theory (the
heliocentric theory) took a strange and political turn.
The theory went against the teaching of the Church. In the sixteenth century, the
Church had decided, from its interpretation of the Bible, that it was the sun that went
around the earth. The Church had for its support the Greek theory of the universe as
propounded by Aristotle, who believed that the earth was the centre of the universe
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and the sun went round it. That did not mean the Church forbid the publication of
Copernicus’ theory. Copernicus was a very well-known astronomer by the time he
wrote his book, and the view of the Church was merely that his explanation of the
movement of Mars should be taken as a conjecture and not a definitive description.
Copernicus died in 1543 at about the time his book was published. It was widely read
by scholars, but it remained a hypothesis. However, Galileo (1564-1642) took it a step
further when he published an account of it in 1632 which implied that Copernicus’
theory was more than conjecture. He was required by the Church to retract his
argument and was put under house arrest until he died in 1634.
Religious persecution and the rise of science
Picture 37
In the 15th and 16th centuries, the Church
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:
was
Willisau_1447.JPG
very concerned
about
heresies.
Heretics were arrested and put on trial.
Those found guilty were punished, some
by the death sentence. One of the ways for
doing that was burning at the stake. (See
Picture 37.) It is important to understand
that this was an age, when on the one hand,
science was emerging, but on the other,
the belief in magic and witches was very
common. During this time, common
people hunted down witches, sometimes with very little evidence, and when found
guilty, they were burnt. The same treatment was given to Protestants during the
Reformation. After the death of the English king, Henry VIII, England briefly
Picture
37 at
reverted to Roman Catholicism, and more than 200 Protestants were burnt
to death
the stake. However, the Church also held trials on dissenters, including scientists.
Very few scientists were executed, but there was one very famous one before
Galileo’s trial, Giordano Bruno, another supporter of Copernicus’ theory, who was
sentenced to death and burnt at the stake in 1600.
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The Church also exerted a great deal of control on publication. It was common for
writers such as Galileo to address their books to important people, in the expectation
that they might be protected. Galileo, in fact, obtained permission from the Pope to
write his book before he wrote it, but, even then, was found to have gone too far.
Isaac Newton and the revolution triumphant
To understand in what sense the scientific revolution succeeded with Newton, we
have to go back to the Church’s argument. The Church believed that the truth about
the world was revealed in the Bible, and that this revelation was more reliable than
human observation. The scientists, such as Copernicus, Galileo and Newton believed
that they had to explain observed facts, and that it was by understanding these
observed facts they could understand the revelation. Newton appended to his major
book, Principia Mathematica, the general principles of science. The first two
principles may be summarised as:
1. Science accepts only causes which are true and sufficient to explain appearances.
2. Therefore to the same natural effects we must, as far as possible, assign the same
causes.
In other words, scientists observe (so they note the appearances of what they see), and
they look for causes which are true and sufficient. By sufficient, they refer to the same
causes giving the same effects. However, in addition, he said:
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3. In experiments we draw conclusions from observations, whether or not we can
imagine other explanations. We assume these conclusions to be true until they are
proved, by experiments, to be wrong.
So, whether or not the Bible, or classical Greek texts, agreed with the conclusion
would be irrelevant. What mattered was that scientists drew conclusions from their
observations.
Newton discovered the law of gravity, and used that to explain the movement of the
planets. He published his book in 1687, by which time England was well established
as a Protestant country, a Revolution had occurred and Parliament had gained
ascendance (more under Topic 14). The political background of the 1680s in England
was very different from that of the 1630s in Italy. Science was now being encouraged
and the Church no longer wielded the influence it had had.
Summary:
In this topic, the student has been introduced to the idea that it was from the 16th
century that observation and experiment were made the cornerstone of science. This
new approach was at one time opposed by the Church, but by the 17th century, it had
clearly won.
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Topic 13: Voyages of Discovery
Objectives
To introduce to students the voyages of discovery of the 15th and 16th centuries, and
account for their importance.
Sample teaching plan
Again, most textbooks give an account of the major voyages of discovery in the 15th
century. The most important dates are probably the following:

1488 Diaz sailed past Cape of Good Hope, going around the tip of Africa

1492 Columbus’ first voyage across the Atlantic

1498 Vasco da Gama reached India, going round the tip of Africa and then
across the Indian Ocean
Hint for the teacher:
There is no need to make your students remember all these names. It is much more
valuable to understand why these routes were difficult for Europeans in the fifteenth
century. Make sure your students know the names of the oceans (Atlantic, Indian), the
continents (North and South America, Africa), and the locations of India and China.
Describe the discoveries above as the Cape of Good Hope route, the Atlantic route
and the Indian route.
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Map 7
(Source: Department of History, CUHK.)
As an exercise, plot the routes taken by Diaz, Columbus and da Gama on a world map
(Map 7).
Arab traders had long known the Indian Ocean route, all the way to China.
Mediterranean traders could sail from the Mediterranean to north-western Europe.
With the Atlantic route and the Cape of Good Hope route, Europeans could now
almost sail round the world.
Hint for the teacher:
The University of Calgary has a very informative website on the voyages of discovery.
Especially interesting is an animated map which shows the routes of several major
explorers and how they related to wind and current. You will find the website under
http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/eurvoya/index.html.
For the animated map, look under “Knowledge and Power”, and then “The sailing
map”, or directly at http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/eurvoya/map.html.
Why were these voyages difficult for the Europeans? They had to sail in uncharted
waters, they had never sailed such a long distance in open sea (compare sailing by the
coast to sailing across the ocean), and the Cape of Good Hope was a dangerous part of
the ocean to sail round.
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How did it all begin? Some textbooks mention Prince Henry the Navigator
(1394-1460) for promoting sea-faring but they seldom make it clear what he did. He
was actually quite an important person in the history of discovery, because his efforts
proved to be quite profitable early. He started a school for map-making and sailing,
and he also invested in voyages which discovered Madeira and the Azores islands in
the Atlantic Ocean in the 1420s. These islands were colonised by Portugal and they
became very profitable as producers of cane sugar.
Hint for the teacher:
It is probably worth spending some time talking to your students about sugar. Sugar
cane could not grow in Europe, and so what did Europeans eat for sugar?
Another reason for the voyages was the attraction of finding a sea route to Asia.
Europeans by the mid-15th century were looking for a route whereby they could
import spices, which were grown in Southeast Asia. Columbus raised the capital he
needed by suggesting that he could find the route to Asia. They also believed that gold
might be found beyond the Sahara Desert. Many were driven by profit from trade, but
there was always also a religious element in it, in the belief that the new routes could
help to spread Christianity. Portuguese traders, who succeeded to control the route to
India by going round Africa, made large profits from the spice trade. In the early 16th
century, they reached China. By the mid 16th century (approximately 1556), they
started trading in Macau.
Consequences of the new trade routes
The discovery of new trade routes and new continents was a very major development
in European history. In the first place, trade increased, especially for the cities on the
Atlantic coast. The centre of trade and industry soon shifted away from the
Mediterranean to this part of Europe. Secondly, many products, including new crops,
found their way not only into Europe, but also to all parts of the world. Thus, tea was
soon imported in large quantities from China, and silver from the new world was sent
not only to Europe but also to China. Among the most noted new crops which
originated in America were potato, sweet potato, corn (also known as maize), tobacco,
and peanuts. (To appreciate the change, think about this question: what did Europeans
eat before they had potato?) These came to be known as the “New World crops”. In
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the “Old World”, their introduction led to an increase in food supply and so, in the
next few centuries, a substantial increase in population. However, thirdly, contact
between people who had always been kept apart also spread disease. Smallpox spread
from the Old World to the New World, killing most of its population. In return,
syphilis, a sexually transmitted disease, spread to the Old World, and had persisted to
the present day.
Summary:
New trade routes across the Atlantic and down the African coast and across the Indian
Ocean to East Asia, opened up many new opportunities. More trade resulted, and new
crops spread to all parts of the world. However, contact across continents also
exposed large populations to diseases which they had not previously suffered.
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Topic 14: Enlightenment (17th to 18th century)
Objectives
To introduce three ideas from the Enlightenment: (1) the social contract; (2) the law
of Nature, and (3) human beings being born free and equal; and to relate these ideas to
the popularisation of science and the English Civil War.
Sample lesson plan
The use of money
You might remember that in Topic 9 (The Middle Ages), we talked about how the use
of money made an impact on social relationships:
The money-less society
The money society
You make all your own things and so you After you have bought things, employed
have no time left, then you work as a things, employed people, found a place to
member of a big family, which gives you live in, paid your taxes, you can do what
a place to live in but wants you to be you want to do.
attached to it all the time, and the
government can demand work out of you,
there is little freedom left.
We said: in a society in which money is widely used, you can do what you want to do
after you have found a place to live in and paid your taxes. Well, it is not as simple as
that. There is law and order to think about (who protects you when someone wants to
take over your house?), there is the question of who looks after the poor and needy
(who provides medicine, or decide where people should be buried?), and how to
educate young people, just to mention a few of the responsibilities we now think
governments should accept. Most of these ideas came about in the 18th and 19th
centuries. In the Middle Ages, most people simply did not go to school, doctors who
came out of universities were few in number (medicine was not yet a single
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discipline), the Church provided some social service and increasingly, kings provided
law courts. The gradual decline of the Church and the increasing powers of the kings
was a very long process. By the 17th century (after the Reformation), some of these
kings were claiming authority to rule not only because they were appointed by the
Church, but also because they represented a people. France, England and Spain
became national states. The appearance of national states led to new ideas about social
relationships.
The rise of national states
Several reasons led to the rise of national states, most of which you have already
come across. One of these would be the wider use of vernacular which you saw under
Topic 10 (the Renaissance). Another reason would be the decline in the influence of
the Church. By the time of the Reformation, Protestant churches were strong in
England and some other European states. There, the rulers no longer came under the
authority of the Pope. Religious independence closely supported political
independence in an age when religious beliefs formed an important part of life.
However, one other reason was also very important for the rise of national states: the
use of firearms. In Europe, gunpowder came to be used for warfare in the 15th
century (it was used in China earlier than that). Guns were expensive, and only those
monarchs who controlled sizable territories could have afforded many guns.
Moreover, castles built in the Middle Ages could not defend themselves against heavy
firearms, and so by the 16th century, the city states could no longer withstand the
kings’ armies. Meanwhile, as the kings expanded their control, their armies also
became much larger than before. The nature of war changed.
Yet another reason was that the kings had become much richer thanks to the discovery
of new trade routes and the increase in trade. The new trade enriched the kingdoms in
Western Europe. Prosperity shifted from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic coast. The
new powers of the 16th and 17th centuries were Portugal, Spain, Holland, England
and France.
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Restraining the king
(1) Kings and parliaments:
Kings had enormous power, but throughout the Middle Ages, their power was not
unrestricted. One reason their power might be restricted was that, in the Middle Ages,
their power came from God. For that reason, the Church could provide some
restraints.
However, in order to collect tax, kings also required the support of the wealthy. The
principle came about early in England and France, during the Middle Ages, that kings
and their subjects should meet to agree on the rate of taxation. The institution at which
they might meet was the parliament (the word was derived from the French word
“parle”, meaning to talk.) Unlike the parliaments of today, in the 15th and 16th
centuries, parliament did not meet regularly. Parliament only met when the monarch
called it to meeting and only when there was special business to discuss, such as
raising tax. Also unlike modern-day parliaments, the parliaments of the Middle Ages
were not elected. Instead, parliaments represented functional constituencies such as
the Church, the nobility and commoners, many of whom were merchants.
In England, in the middle of the 17th century, the clash of Parliament with the King
led to civil war (1642-51). Parliament won, executed the King, and for the next ten
years, England had no king. (Monarchy was not by any means abolished. In 1660,
Parliament invited the beheaded king’s son to become King of England.)
(2) The social contract:
In the Middle Ages, kings ruled because they were given the authority to do so from
God. If that was the case, what justification could there be for beheading the king?
More important than that, what justification could there be for the maintenance of
peace after a civil war?
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In this context, the theory of the social contract was born. The theory argued that the
monarch and his people were bound by a contract. The people agreed by this contract
to accept the monarch’s rule, and believed that the monarch, in turn, should protect
them and maintain order. You will recognize in this theory the generalization of the
personal bond established by relationship between lord and vassal in the Middle Ages
(or, for those familiar with Chinese history, the theory of tianming 【天命】as
advocated by the Chinese philosopher Mencius 【孟子】). If the monarch fulfilled his
or her part of the contract, so this theory claims, the subject people should obey. If he
or she did not, they might, with justification, rebel.
(3) The laws of Nature, freedom and equality:
Another very important influence on the Enlightenment was the Scientific Revolution.
The Scientific Revolution discovered that there are laws of Nature, such as the colours
in white light, or the force of gravity. The laws of Nature were the ways in which the
universe worked, and so, the question arose if the same laws governed human beings.
The search for the laws of Nature provided a beginning for the social sciences, such as
psychology and economics. This line of thinking also made a very major impact on
political thought.
The reason why thinking about the laws of Nature could make an impact on political
thought is that it encouraged the idea that men are born free and equal. Many
Enlightenment thinkers made this point; the following gives three examples:
To understand political power right, and derive it from its original, we must consider,
what state all men are naturally in, and that is, a state of perfect freedom to order their
actions, and dispose of their possessions and persons, as they think fit, within the
bounds of the law of nature, without asking leave, or depending upon the will of any
other man. (John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, 1690.)
(Source: From John Locke, Two Treatises of Government (“An Essay Concerning the True
Original, Extent and End of Civil Government”, Chapter 2 ‘Of the State of Nature ’). The text
is cited from the Internet Modern History Sourcebook,
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1690locke-sel.html .)
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Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. One thinks himself the master of
others, and still remains a greater slave than they. (Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social
Contract, 1762.)
(Source : Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract, 1762. The text is taken from the
Internet Modern History Sourcebook,
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/Rousseau-soccon.html .)
In every government there are three sorts of power.... When the legislative and
executive powers are united in the same person, there can be no liberty; because the
same monarch or senate might enact tyrannical laws. Again, there is no liberty, if the
judiciary power is not separated from the legislative and executive. Were it joined
with the legislative, the life and liberty of the subject would be exposed to arbitrary
control. Were it joined to the executive power, the judge might behave with violence
and oppression. (Montesquieu, The Spirit of Laws, 1748)
(Source: Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, vol. 1, trans.
Thomas Nugent (London: J. Nourse, 1777), pp. 221-237, passim. The text is from Internet
Modern History Sourcebook, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/montesquieu-spirit.html.)
Exercise 1:
Examine the passages above, which words appear most often? Would you agree that
human beings are only free when they can do whatever they may do in the state of
Nature? How does Montesquieu think that freedom might be protected?
(4) The American War of Independence:
By the 18th century, England had colonies in North America. In 1775, the colonies
rebelled, the immediate causes being increased taxation. In 1776, the colonies
declared that they would become independent. In the Declaration of Independence,
they said:
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We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal; that they are
endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights; that among these are Life,
Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness; that, to secure these rights, Governments are
instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed;
that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the
Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying
its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them
shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
(Source: The Declaration of Independence, text from
http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/index.htm .)
In 1787, the states which were involved in independence produced a constitution for
the United States of America, and that says from its very beginning:
We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish
justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the
general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do
ordain and establish this constitution for the United States of America.
(Source: Constitution of the United States (1787), text from USINFO – The United States
Department of State, http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/6.htm .)
The constitution goes on to lay down the structure of the United States government.
The power to make laws rested in the Congress, executive power was held by the
President and judicial power should be vested in the Supreme Court.
The principles of election were embodied in the constitution. In this manner, the
United States had no kings; it became a republic.
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Exercise 2:
Which words appear most commonly in the American Declaration of Independence
and the United States Constitution? Would you agree that the Enlightenment made an
impact on these documents?
(5) The abolition of slavery:
Another consequence from the thinking that men are born free and equal was that
slavery appeared no longer reasonable. The small population of North America and
the possibility of growing cotton and tobacco there on a large scale had led to the
slave trade, in which Africans were exported to and sold in North America. English
people were engaged in this trade as traders. By the end of the 18th century, a
movement was gathering force in England to abolish the slave trade within the British
Empire. In 1807, thanks to these efforts, Parliament outlawed the slave trade. In 1834,
slavery was abolished in the British Empire. However, slavery persisted in America
and was brought to an end there only after the American Civil War (1861-1865).
Summary:
This topic has covered the history which led up to the Enlightenment, some of the
major ideas of the Enlightenment and how they influenced the United States
Constitution. A new form of government was appearing, under which monarchs were
governed by written constitution. The objective of the constitution was to protect
liberty.
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Topic 15: The French Revolution
Objectives
To show students how the ideas of the Enlightenment were translated into action in
the French Revolution.
Sample lesson plan
The year 1789 was a momentous year in French as well as European history. A series
of events took place in Paris which marked the end of an old order and the beginning
of a new one. It was not clear when the events began to appear that they were to have
the consequences they did, but in another ten years time, they became symbolic of a
new age. Paris was the capital of France. It was for centuries a cultural and
administrative centre. From there, the French king ruled France. The fall of Paris to a
new government was highly symbolic of this change.
The events began to unfold as the French King, Louis XVI, found that he needed to
raise tax. In order to do so, he called a meeting of the equivalent of the parliament,
consisting of the three estates of nobles, clergy and the Third Estate. The meeting took
place in Paris as the city was seized by a sense of fear. It was widely rumoured that
bandits were about, and the common people were seizing arms for defence. The
nobles and the clergy were unpopular with the common people of Paris, and so the
Third Estate was able to establish itself as the representatives of the people. With the
king’s approval, they formed the National Assembly. The countryside was descending
into disorder. One of the Assembly’s first acts was to declare the rights of man and to
abolish feudalism.
The National Assembly was not necessarily opposed to a monarchy. Over the next
two years, it reorganised local administration, took over the land that had belonged to
the Church, and drafted a constitution. It was at odds with the aristocracy, and it never
won the full-hearted support of the King, who was held captive in Paris. In 1791, the
King tried to escape but was stopped by the crowds. By 1792, a counter-revolutionary
movement, with support from other European monarchs, brought an army to fight
against the revolution. The urgency of war raised both patriotic and anti-aristocratic
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feelings. The newly elected National Convention abolished the monarchy and
established a republic.
As war continued, the National Convention itself became divided. A small faction
demanded extreme measures, including the arrest and execution of large numbers of
opponents. They supported government control of prices, taxing the rich, providing
free and compulsory education, and they also succeeded in raising a large army which
became very successful in Europe. By 1794, the committee which had been in charge
was overthrown by a coup d’etat, and by 1795 the National Convention was
disbanded and the extremist measures were abandoned. A new constitution provided
for a Directorate of five members, which continued until 1799 when it was abolished
by Napoleon Bonaparte, who was appointed “First Consul.”
Napoleon had been a very successful soldier. He conquered Italy and Egypt before he
became First Consul. He became emperor in 1804, and continued to wage war against
other European powers. He was successful in continental Europe but he was offset by
two defeats. In 1805, he lost the sea battle at Trafalgar to Britain. In 1812, he was
defeated in his Russian campaign. He finally lost to the coalition of European states in
1814. He was exiled, but he returned from exile to fight at Waterloo in 1815, and was
once again defeated.
A note to the teacher:
Most textbooks give a chronological account of events from the meeting of the Estate
Generals (1789) to the rise of Napoleon (1799). The events are quite hard for students
to grasp, let alone explain. In the teaching plan suggested here, focus is shifted to
some of the lasting decisions made by the revolutionary government in 1789, and the
consequences of Napoleon’s reign. The events in between have been supplied to tie
the two together.
Reference:
The following website provides good illustrations for an account of the French
Revolution: http://www.historywiz.com/frenchrev-mm.htm .
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Exercise 1:
The following clauses come from the Declaration of the Rights of Man by the
National Assembly in 1789. Do they remind you of the ideas of any period of
European history? Which period would that be? Why do you think so?
1. Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions may be
founded only upon the general good.
2. The aim of all political association is the preservation of the natural and
imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security, and
resistance to oppression.
(Source: The Declaration of the Rights of Man (1789), text from
http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~wldciv/world_civ_reader/world_civ_reader_2/rights_of_man.htm
l .)
Exercise 2:
The two faces of war
Look at these two paintings:
Picture 38
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image
:Napoleon4.jpg
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http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Francisco_de_Goya_y_Luciente
s_023.jpg
Picture 39
The upper painting (Picture 38) was painted in 1801, depicting Napoleon crossing
into Italy. The lower painting (Picture 39) was painted in 1814, depicting the
execution of Spanish defenders of Madrid by French troops in 1808. What do these
two paintings suggest to you about war? Which one was opposed to war? What can
you say about the man to be executed?
Hint to the teacher:
The painting of Napoleon shows him to be a hero, full of spirit, riding into victory.
The painting of the execution shows the culprit defenceless, facing a squad of
well-armed soldiers. It is ironic that a revolutionary army, in support of freedom and
liberty, should be executing this unarmed and helpless native. The former obviously
supported war, and the latter was against it.
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Summary:
The French Revolution overthrew the king’s rule and implemented many ideas which
were supported by thinkers of the Enlightenment. They included rule by parliament,
abolition of feudalism and the rights of the Church, and the pronouncement of
individual political rights, including the rights to remain free and equal. Nevertheless,
as the revolution proceeded, war and persecution followed. Out of this disorder,
Napoleon Bonaparte became emperor of France. The wars carried on, departing from
the original purposes of the revolution.
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Topic 16: Revision
1. Arrange the following events on a time line, indicating which century in which
each event occurred. Associate each event with the following names: Leonardo da
Vinci, Napoleon Bonaparte, Martin Luther, Renaissance, Prince Henry the Navigator.

Reformation

French Revolution

American War of Independence

English Revolution

Invention of the printing press

Columbus’ voyage across the Atlantic
2. Compare the following maps. Map A was drawn in the 5th century B.C. and Map B
in 1598. How are the two maps different?
Map A
(Source: J.G. Barthologmew LLD, A Literacy & Historical Atlas of Asia, London: J.M. Dent
& Sons, Ltd.; New York: E.P. Dutton & Co, unknown publishing year.)
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Map B
(Source: Wytfliet’s Map of the World 1958, from The Scottish Geography Magazine, Vol.
XVI, No. 1, 1900. The map is taken from Perry-Castaneda Library Map Collection,
www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical (go to “Historical Maps of The World”, then “Wytfliet’s
Map of the World 1958”.) (Used by permission of the University of Texas Libraries, The
University of Texas at Austin.)
3. Compare the three buildings below. Which one was built first, and which one
last? How do you know?
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Picture A
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:St._Peter%27s_Basilica_Facade%2C_Rome%2
C_June_2004.jpg
Picture B
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Parthenon.Southern.Side.damaged.jpg
131
Picture C
(Source of Picture: Joan Cheng.)
4. The following is a picture of the Legislative Council building in Hong Kong.
Which features suggest that it is built in the Western tradition?
132
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Legislativ
e_Council_Building,_Hong_Kong,_Mar_06.JPG
5. Read the following passage:
We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal; that they are
endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are
instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
(Source: The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies, July 4, 1766. The text is
taken from www.law.indian.edu/uslawdocs/declaration.html .)
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Which sentence in this passage suggests that democracy is an ideal in this document?
Which sentence suggests that it is influenced by the ideas of the Enlightenment?
When do you think this document was written, 800 A.D., 13th century (A.D.), or 18th
century (A.D.)?
6. Picture A is a picture of the printing press and picture B is a picture of printing in
China. Looking at these pictures, would you argue that printing in Europe originated
in China? Give your reasons.
Picture A
Picture B
(Source of Picture A: Department of History, CUHK. The original picture could be found at
Shakespeare’s Life and Times. Internet Shakespeare Editions, University of Victoria, BC,
2001-2005. http://ise.uvic.ca/Library/SLT/literature/press1.html )
(Source of Picture B: David Faure)
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7. What is the following diagram a drawing of? In which historical period,
Renaissance, Middle Ages, the Scientific Revolution, the Enlightenment, was it drawn?
How do you know?
Diagram 4
(Source: Department of History, CUHK. The original picture could be found at Anders Piltz,
The World of Medieval Learning, Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1981, p.52.)
135
8. The following map shows the principal languages spoken in North and South
America. Why do you think the three European languages were spoken in those parts
of the two continents indicated?
Map C
(Source: Department of History, CUHK.)
136
9. In the following passage, Pope Urban II in 1095 called for the Crusades to fight in
the Holy Land:
Let hatred therefore depart from among you, let your quarrels end, let wars cease, and
let all dissensions and controversies slumber. Enter upon the road to the Holy
Sepulcher --, wrest that land from the wicked race, and subject it to yourselves. That
land which, as the Scripture says, ‘floweth with milk and honey’ was given by God
into the power of the children of Israel.’ Jerusalem is the centre of the earth; the land
is fruitful above all others, like another paradise of delights. This spot the Redeemer
of mankind has made illustrious by his advent, has beautified by his sojourn, has
consecrated by his passion, has redeemed by his death, has glorified by his burial.
(Source: Medieval Sourcebook, Urban II: Speech at Clermont 1095,
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/urban2a.html )
How do you think a Moslem might react to this argument? Write a paragraph of 50
words to indicate that reaction.
10. Do you think the following paragraph indicates that the ideas of the Scientific
Revolution and the Englightenment might be connected? Would the following
paragraph be evidence of that connection? Why do you think so?
To understand political power right, and derive it from its original, we must consider,
what state all men are naturally in, and that is, a state of perfect freedom to order their
actions, and dispose of their possessions and persons, as they think fit, within the
bounds of the law of nature, without asking leave, or depending upon the will of any
other man. (John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, 1690.)
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(Source: From John Locke, Two Treatises of Government (“An Essay Concerning the True
Original, Extent and End of Civil Government”, Chapter 2 ‘Of the State of Nature ’). The text
is cited from the Internet Modern History Sourcebook,
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1690locke-sel.html .)
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Topic 17: Industrial Revolution
Objectives
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, very large-scale changes came about which
were brought on by the development of industry. Under this topic, we shall look at
two aspects of these changes: firstly, how they came about, and, secondly, how
society changed as a result.
A. How the Industrial Revolution came about
Sample teaching plan
1. If you go down to the street and look at things that move, forget electricity (for it
was applied increasingly only from the 1880s), and you are left with motor cars.
Motor cars run on the internal combustion engine, as you know. That, however,
was also invented in the 1880s. From the name, you can deduce that something
burns in the internal combustion engine, that is, petrol. Before the internal
combustion engine was invented, the machine which might have driven an engine,
such as a railway engine, was the steam engine, driven by steam rather than the
spark from burning petrol. The steam engine was invented in 1778. Before that,
you might have pushed or pulled the cart with your own hands, or allow it to be
drawn by an animal.
Exercise:
Draw a timeline showing electric lighting and internal combustion engine in 1880s
and the steam engine in 1778.
2. What was the steam engine?
The following diagram shows how the steam engine works. The boiler produces
steam which pushes up and down the piston housed in the cylinder. Notice the valves
which open and close to control the direction of steam. The downward thrust of the
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piston drives out steam from the cylinder, which condenses in the condenser. In this
diagram, the piston is attached to the arm of a pump which pumps water from a mine.
Picture 40: Steam Engine
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/interactive/animations/beam_engine/index.shtml
Picture 40: Steam engine
Notice that the steam engine required precision (see how well the piston must fit the
cylinder). We have had precision machines before, e.g. the clock, but this was the first
precision machine on this scale. The steam engine was a sizable machine, easily taller
than a person and wider than his or her hands could reach.
3. How was the steam engine invented?
The inspiration did not come from watching a boiling kettle. To understand the steam
engine, we have to talk about fuel from the Middle Ages. In England, the principal
fuel was wood, which came from the forests. As the forests were cut back, there was a
shortage of wood, and so gradually coal was used, of which there was plenty in
England. However, coal had to be mined, and coal mines were often found in
limestone areas. As you know from your science lessons, limestone conceals pockets
of water, which would have to be extracted. The early steam engines, therefore, were
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water pumps. James Watt, often described as the inventor of the steam engine,
effectively made it a more efficient machine.
4. The steam engine gave us a new motive force. But a motive force was only useful
if it could turn something. If the steam engine was not adapted to produce circular
motion, it would have remained a water pump. So what was it used for?
Use No. 1. Driving spinning and weaving machines in the factories
Picture 41: Spilling mill (factory)
http://www.makingthemodernworld.org/stories/manufacture_by_machine
/01.ST.01/?scene=1
Note how cotton came to be commonly used. Cotton was not grown in England. It
was imported from Egypt, and then from America. However, there was one big
problem with cotton; the fibre came with a seed. One of the first machines which
revolutionalised cotton was the carding frame. After that, improvements were made to
spinning and weaving machines. [Students who are interested can look into these
machines. It is quite easy. See pictures in Appendix.] Here is what one writer said:
From the year 1770 to 1788 a complete change had gradually been effected in the
spinning of yarns, - that of wool had disappeared altogether, and that of linen was also
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nearly gone, - cotton, cotton, cotton, had become the almost universal material for
employment.
Source: William Radcliffe, On Power Looms, 1828. The text is from Internet Modern
History Sourcebook, http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1828looms.html .
How were the new machines driven? At first, by hand or water, and then the steam
engine was installed at the factory.
Use No. 2. Railway engines
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Stephenson%27s_Rocket_drawi
ng.jpg
Picture 42. The “Rocket”, 1829
If the steam engine could be made smaller and fitted with wheels, it would work as a
motor car. That had to come later. (How could the tyres have been made until rubber
was found in Malaya?). To allow the engine to move smoothly, iron rail tracks were
laid and the train ran on them. However, there was a problem. The engine was so
142
heavy that it cracked the rails. The problem was finally solved by George Stephenson,
who inserted springs into the engine to spread out the weight of the machine.
Why was the railway so successful? Note that before the railway engine was invented,
English people were already undergoing a transport revolution. They were building
roads for horse-drawn carriages and canals. The railway was a very timely invention.
Use No. 3. Propelling steamships (or “steamers” 輪船 or 火輪船)
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Clermont_illustration_-_R
obert_Fulton_-_Project_Gutenberg_eText_15161.jpg
Picture 43. The “Clermont,” 1807
Just as the steam engine could be fitted on wheels for the railway engine, it could be
inserted into a ship (known as a steamer) to drive a paddle wheel. Again, why were
steamers needed? Note connection to import and export, and migration of people.
More cotton meant more imports, but soon England exported yarn and cloth. The
income from yarn and cloth more than made up for the purchase of cotton.
5. The new industries created work for a lot of people. They ceased to farm. How
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was it possible for so many non-farm people to be fed? Note the Agrarian Revolution,
which involved better use of land, husbandry and tools. [Again, this is a very good
subject for a project. For this lesson, the details can be left out.]
6. How did so many inventions come about in such a short time as a hundred years?
Nobody has a very good reason for that. We may assume that England had a less rigid
class structure than Europe. Quite a few inventors were people from working class
background and that did not prevent them from moving up socially when they were
successful. Nevertheless, the Industrial Revolution was not planned. The various
developments reinforced one another. However, it was the steam engine that brought
about the idea that technology could create a new world.
B. How society changed
To consider how the Industrial Revolution changed society, compare the following
pictures:
http://commons.wikimedia.org
http://www.makingthemodernworld.org/stories/
/wiki/Image:Hermann_Sonder
manufacture_by_machine/01.ST.01/?scene=1
mann_Familie_mit_Frau_am_
Spinnrad_detail.jpg
Picture 44: Home spinning
Picture 45: Spinning mill (factory)
144
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/ITmanchester.htm
Picture 46: Manchester 1750
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Image%3ACottonopolis1.jpg
Picture 47: Manchester, first half of 19th century
For more comparative information, look up the website
http://www.makingthemodernworld.org/learning_modules/history/03.TU.04/
145
Exercise 1:
Looking at these pictures, can you imagine how:
1. The kind of work people did in the cotton industry would have changed.
2. The amount of cotton yarn and cloth produced would have changed.
3. The availability of cotton cloth for ordinary people would have changed (what did
people wear before they had cotton cloth?)
4. The environment would have changed (look at the tall chimneys in Picture 47).
5. Cities would have changed.
6. Conditions in cities would have changed (would there have been enough houses to
live in?)
146
Note for the teacher:
Before factories became common, most workers worked at home. Machines would
have been turned by hand, and work would have been organised on a small scale.
When factories became common, workers worked together in a team. The machines
were soon turned by the steam engine and work would have been organised on a
much larger scale.
Working with machines meant that workers could be much more productive. So,
much more cotton yarn and cloth was produced than when work was done by hand.
That also means that yarn and cloth became cheaper and many more people could
afford to use it for clothes.
Note also that England did not produce cotton. For a long long time, English people
did not have cotton cloth for clothes. Instead, the most common clothing material was
linen 麻布, made from flax 麻. Cotton being the softer and more comfortable
clothing material, was easily popularised when its price came down. Such a result of
the Industrial Revolution improved the standard of living of many people.
However, because the steam engine had to be driven by coal, its wide employment in
the factories meant that industrial towns were extremely polluted. Manchester was
such an industrial town, and you can see by comparing pictures 46 and 47 how the
growth of industry must have been quite damaging to air quality, and, therefore,
health.
Many more people lived in the cities as factories were set up. Factories needed regular
supplies of raw material and easy distribution for their products. They were, therefore,
located where transport was relatively easy. Major transport centres, especially when
they were sited near supplies of fuel or raw material, grew into large cities.
Before the eighteenth century, Europe had very few large cities. Most cities would not
have had a larger population than a district in Hong Kong nowadays. The rapid
expansion of cities brought about many social problems. Think about the easy spread
of disease when many people lived together. Think about the need to separate the
supply of clean water from the sewage. There were not enough houses, and so these
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cities were overcrowded. Slums were left very much to themselves. Add on to these
conditions periodic unemployment because many more people came into the cities
than there were jobs for them. You can see that law and order was also a problem.
The novels of Charles Dickens are a useful source of information for many of these
issues.
Exercise 2:
The pictures do not really tell the whole story. In the early stages of the Industrial
Revolution, say up to the mid 19th century, the workers had quite a hard life. The
rapid growth of industry created many problems. One of these problems was child
labour.
Reference:
You can see some telling passages in the following websites:
http://nhs.needham.k12.ma.us/cur/Baker_00/2002_p7/ak_p7/childlabor.html#wages
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Twork2.htm
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/IRarkwright.htm
Another problem was the long working hours and harsh working conditions, not only
in the factories, but also the mines. There was no legal protection for workers. Wages
were also low. It took a generation for workers to organise into trade unions, and
almost a century for laws of election to change so that workers might also be given
the vote.
It is not difficult to understand, therefore, that in the mid-19th century, it was widely
thought that the owners of factories and their workers belonged to two different
classes. Karl Marx in the Communist Manisfesto, wrote the following:
Modern Industry has converted the little workshop into the great factory of the
industrial capitalist. Masses of laborers, crowded into the factory, are organized like
soldiers.... Not only are they slaves of the bourgeois class, and of the bourgeois state;
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they are daily and hourly enslaved by the machine, by the overlooker, and, above all,
in the individual bourgeois manufacturer himself.
(Source: Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, ‘Bourgeois and Proletarians’, Manifesto of the
Communist Party 1848. Text from
http://www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/classics/manifesto.html#Bourgoise .)
Remembering the pictures you looked at for Exercise 1, can you relate this paragraph
to some of the features you noted there?
Summary:
A series of changes came about in England, the Agrarian Revolution, the Transport
Revolution, the Textile Revolution, and the invention of the steam engine, bringing
about the Industrial Revolution. Among the most important inventions of the time was
the steam engine. It transformed production and transport. By making it easier to
produce in large quantities, and to move goods around, industrial development
improved the standard of living of many people. However, it also led to pollution and
the gathering of large populations into cities, and these changes created many social
problems.
Appendix to Topic 17: Machines of the Industrial Revolution
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Ima
http://www.spartacus.s
ge:Spinningwheel.JPG
choolnet.co.uk/TEXfra
me.htm
Picture 48: Traditional spinning wheel
Picture 49: Spinning frame (1769)
149
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Im
age:Spinning_jenny.jpg
Picture 50: Spinning jenny
Picture 51: Loom fitted with flying
shuttle (1733)
(Source of Pictures:
Picture 51: PLANCHES, L'Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et
des metiers (online), http://diderot.alembert.free.fr/PLANCHES/PLANCHES03.pdf (p. 269).)
150
Topic 18: Old empires and new empires
Objectives
To show how the “old empire” (Austrian, Ottoman) had been breaking up and the
“new empires” (Britain, France, German, Italian and Russia) were expanding in the
19th century.
Sample teaching plan
1. The “old empires”
Look at these two maps:
Map 8: Austrian Empire (excluding land held in Italy)
151
Map 9: Europe today
(Source of Maps 8 and 9: Department of History, CUHK)
On the map of Europe today, draw the Austrian Empire and list the countries today
that have been formed from it. What languages are spoken in these countries?
In a later topic, you will see that most of those countries were formed after the First
World War. Italy, however, was formed in the 1860s, and Germany, in 1870. In the
18th century, much of Italy and Germany would both have come under the Holy
Roman Empire, which would have included also Austria and Hungary.
Similarly, the Ottoman Empire, which used to incorporate present-day Greece,
Turkey, much of the Middle East, and Egypt, was broken up slowly into many
individual states.
2. The “new empires”
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Throughout the 19th century, other countries in Europe were building empires. They
did that beyond Europe, overseas. The establishment of colonies away from Europe
had started from as early as the 15th century when new trade routes were discovered.
In the 15th and 16th centuries, Spain and Portugal were the most energetic empire
builders. By the 17th and 18th centuries, the Dutch, French and British had followed.
In North America, both the British and French had colonies, but France lost its North
American colonies to Britain. The most important Dutch colonies were the islands of
Southeast Asia, including what is now Indonesia. Britain lost its most important
American colonies after the American War of Independence, but retained Canada. In
Asia, through the East India Company, it controlled India.
Map 10: Colonial empires in 1914
(Source of Map 10: Department of History, CUHK)
The Industrial Revolution provided more reason for colonial expansion. While in
earlier centuries, the colonial effort had been focused on the control of trade routes
and limited migration of Europeans overseas, by the 19th century, colonisation was
looked upon as a means of economic expansion. Industrialised European nations
required resources (cotton, metals) and markets for their industrial goods. They were
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interested in the rights to mine and to build railways. Moreover, by the second half of
the 19th century, European nations competed for colonies, each nation fearing that if
its claims had not been established, the territory to be claimed would have been taken
by another nation. During the 19th century, major efforts of colonisation were made
by Britain, France, Germany and Belgium in Africa, by the British in Australia and
New Zealand, and by France in Southeast Asia. The same nations, and Russia,
established spheres of influence in China. They were soon joined by Japan in this
effort.
Exercise 1
Identify the major colonial powers illustrated in Map 10? Where did Britain, France,
Germany, Italy and Japan have colonies?
Note for the teacher
Please keep details to the minimum. For example, it is enough to note that the British
Empire extended over Canada, Africa, Australia and Malaya; France had colonies in
Southeast Asia and Africa, Germany and Italy had colonies in Africa, and Japan had a
colony in Taiwan.
3. Imperial expansion led to conflicts
Imperial expansion led to conflict, but these conflicts were of two sorts. Firstly, as the
old empires declined, some of their territories were fought over by the newly growing
empires. The part of the Ottoman Empire on the edge of Russia and the Austrian
Empire was a very contentious area because Russia saw it as a passage into the
Mediterranean, and Austria saw any Russian expansion there as a threat. Secondly,
the new empires also competed for land and influence overseas. In Asia, they
combined forces to expand their influence in China, especially after China lost in war
to Japan in 1894 to 1895. In Africa, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Belgium
contested for colonies. To maintain their influence away from home, it was necessary
for these governments to build a navy, and they competed to build more and stronger
ships (see Topic 20).
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4. The “White man’s burden”
The empire builders were very conscious of their technological and military
superiority. These ideas of superiority appeared in many ways, especially in the fields
of medicine and education. There was also religious backing for the enthusiasm to
extend Western knowledge of science and medicine in that missionaries sought to
preach Christianity to peoples who had not previously been exposed to the religion. In
the nineteenth century, under the influence of the theory of evolution, it was thought
that white people were superior to other races.
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Picture 52 “The white man’s burden” appearing in an advertisement
(Source of Picture 52: Department of History, CUHK. The original picture could be found at
Wikimedia Commons,
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:1890sc_Pears_Soap_Ad.jpg )
156
Exercise 2.
Look at Picture 52. You can see it is a soap advertisement, and that is why it shows a
white man washing his hands. Why does it say “The first step towards lightening the
white man’s burden is through teaching the virtues of cleanliness”? Look at the
pictures in the four corners. What is the story they tell?
Note for the teacher
Pear’s was a very well-known brand of soap in the nineteenth century and it must
have sold very well in the British Empire. Obviously, the manufacturers of Pear’s
soap believed its product was much more effective as a cleaning agent than anything
colonial natives might have. The two pictures at the top corners were probably meant
to indicate a long period of time (from the sailing boat to the steam boat). On the
bottom left, goods were being unloaded from a steamer. On the bottom right, a white
man was handling out a piece of soap to a native. The white man standing up, and the
native sitting on the ground probably indicated their relative social positions and
power.
5. Globalisation
The interest in building empires, however, promoted explorations and led to an
explosion in knowledge about the world. The development of transport, especially
steamships and the railway, opened many parts of the world to substantially increased
trade. World trade increased by many times. The economy of the world was gradually
becoming global.
Summary
Under this topic, you saw how the old empires were breaking up and new empires
were being formed in the second half of the nineteenth century. These changes in
empire decline and empire building led to competition among countries. The
expansion of Europe overseas also promoted a sense of cultural superiority. Yet,
through this process, different parts of the world were becoming more intricately
connected, and globalisation was taken forward another step.
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Topic 19: Asia in the age of European expansion (From the
Opium War to 1911)
Objectives
To show that before the expansion of the West into Asia, China, ruled by the Qing
dynasty, was an empire to which neighbouring countries paid tribute. As Western
countries expanded to Asia, China and Japan were opened under pressure and
subjected to unequal treaties. Both countries underwent Westernization and reforms,
with the consequences that the Qing empire gradually broke up while Japan became
increasingly powerful. Japan eventually established an empire in Asia.
Sample teaching plan
A.
China: An Asian empire under the tribute system
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A note for the teacher:
1.
Prior to the advent of Western powers into Asia, China’s neighbouring countries
were China’s tributary states. They sent regular missions to China to pay tribute. In
the Qing dynasty, Southeast Asian countries, such as Annam (Vietnam) and Siam
(Thailand), Korea and Ryukyu were tributary states of China. (In the Ming dynasty,
Japan also accepted China’s conferment and paid tributes to China.) At that time,
China was an imperial overlord.
2.
China and Britain came into conflict as a result of problems in trade. War
between the two countries ensued when the Qing dynasty banned the opium trade.
China was defeated and signed the Treaty of Nanjing with Britain, under which Hong
Kong Island was ceded to Britain. The treaty marked the beginning of unequal treaties
between the Qing dynasty and foreign powers by which China had to cede territories
and pay indemnities. Japan, which, like China, had been a closed country, was also
pressured to open its ports for trade. It also signed unequal treaties with many
Western countries.
3.
The Tokugawa family, which headed the government of Japan at that time, had
to give way to Western demands and accept unequal treaties. As a result, many local
lords (known as “daimyo”) and warriors (known as “samurai”) became deeply
discontented with them. They renewed their support to the emperor and demanded
reforms. The army of the Tokugawa government (known as “Bakufu”) was finally
defeated and it was forced to return its power to the emperor. A unified government
was set up under Emperor Meiji and a reform programme was launched in which
Westernising the country was the objective.
B.
Reforms
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When faced with the armed expansion of the West, both China and Japan had
embarked on various reforms. The following time lines show the political, military,
educational and financial reforms carried out by the two countries.
1. 1898 Imperial University
2. 1902 Modern schools
3. 1903 New armies
4. 1908 Da Qing Bank
5. 1911 National constitution
China
1,
2, 3,
4
5
┏━━━┳━━━┳━━━┳━━━┳━━━┳━━━┳━━━┳━━━┓
1870
1875
1880
1885
1890
1895
1900
1905
1910
┗━━━┻━━━┻━━━┻━━━┻━━━┻━━━┻━━━┻━━━┛
1, 2
3
4
5
Japan
1. 1872 Modern schools
2. 1873 New armies
3. 1877 University of Tokyo
4. 1882 Central bank
5. 1889 Meiji Constitution
Note for the teacher:
1
In 1889, Japan proclaimed the Meiji Constitution and the Imperial Diet
(parliament) was formed the next year. The Imperial Diet was made up of the
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House of Peers and the House of Representatives. Members of the House of
Peers were appointed by the emperor whereas members of the House of
Representatives were elected.
2
The Qing dynasty proclaimed the preparation for a constitution in 1908 and set
1916 as the year for the election of an assembly and 1917 as the year for the
establishment of a parliament. Subsequently, local associations and chambers of
commerce petitioned and demanded the earlier promulgation of the constitution.
The imperial court finally proclaimed a constitution in 1911. However, the
revolution which broke out in the same year led to the Qing dynasty’s collapse
before parliament met.
Exercise 1
Compare the timing of individual reforms in China and Japan. Fill in the following
boxes with the approximate year in which the reforms were carried out.
The timing of reforms in China and Japan
China
Japan
School reforms
University founded in
Army reforms
Bank set up
Constitution pronounced
Question:
Which country, China or Japan, began reforms earlier?
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Why do you think the Chinese reforms were all concentrated towards the end of the
19th century and the early years of the 20th century?
Note for the teacher:
The reason was that the Qing dynasty was defeated by Japan in the Sino-Japanese
War in 1895. Defeat brought a shock all over China. Reforms followed, first proposed
by Kang Youwei (康有為). Those reforms (known as the Hundred Days’ Reform)
were foiled by the Empress Dowager Cixi (慈禧), and a different series of reform was
conducted under her dominance in the years which followed.
C.
The ideology of Westernisation
Look at these two pictures:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Im
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/comm
age:The_Emperor_Meiji.jpg
ons/8/8e/The_Ci-Xi_Imperial_Dowager_Em
press_%284%29.PNG
Picture 53: Emperor Meiji, 1888
Picture 54: Dowager Empress Cixi, 1900
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Questions:
Which picture related to China, which to Japan?
Who was dressed to appear Western?
Dress indicates culture. However, Westernisation involved more than changing the
dress style. In the following passages, a Japanese thinker and a Chinese thinker wrote
down what changes they thought their countries needed.
Exercise 2.
Read the passages below and write a short paragraph to describe what these two
writers found impressive in Westernisation.
1. This was what Fukuzawa Yukichi (福澤諭吉) said in 1871:
“Look at the progress of the West. Their various types of electric and steam
engines are always new and changing as a result of their competition against one
another for improvement. This is true not only of tangible machines, but of other
aspects as well. As people become enlightened, their circles of contacts broaden.
The broader the circles of contacts become, the more harmonious their
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relationships. Hence, international law is used to limit war. At the same time,
economics becomes increasingly popular, and once political and commercial
changes occur, the school system, the form of writings, government measures and
meetings of assemblies are changed in an even more refined and boundless way.
(Source: Fukuzawa Yukichi , “Encouraging Learning”, 福澤諭吉著，王桂譯，《福澤論吉
教育論著選》，北京：人民教育出版社，1991，頁 18。)
2. In “Emerging from Asia” of 1884, Fukuzawa also said:
“We cannot wait without hesitation for the civilization of our neighbours in order
to make a concerted effort to revive Asia. Let us separate ourselves from their
group and ally with Western civilization. Even the way we receive China and
Korea should not be specially courteous simply because of their status as our
neighbours. We must act in accordance with how the Westerners receive them.”
(Source: Fukuzawa Yukichi , “Emerging from Asia”
轉引自許介鱗，〈福譯諭吉：對朝鮮
的謀略〉，《近代日本論》，台北：故鄉出版社有限公司，1987 年，頁 59。
或參看 http://www.chinaelections.org/NewsInfo.asp?NewsID=9756 )
3. In 1902, Liang Qichao (梁啟超) published “On the New Citizen”. In “Explaining
the Meaning of the New Citizen”, he said:
“So there is no intention to strengthen our country today. If there is such intention,
wide references must be made to the way in which various nations and countries
established themselves and we choose and take their strengths in order to
complement our weaknesses. Commentators at present know that we must take
the strengths of others to complement our weaknesses in politics, learning, arts
and skills, but they do not know that virtue, wisdom and ability of the people are
really the biggest source of politics, learning, arts and skills.
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(Source: Liang Qichao, “On the New Citizen: Explaining the Meaning of the New Citizen”
梁啟超，《梁啟超全集》，北京：北京出版社，1999，頁 658。)
“One of the most lacking in our citizens is civic virtue. What is civic virtue?
Thanks to civic virtue, people form into groups and nations are nations…Hence,
civic virtue is the source of all virtues. Qualities that are beneficial to the populace
are good whereas those that do not are wicked.”
(Source: Liang Qichao, “On the New Citizen: On Civic Virtue” 梁啟超，《梁啟超全集》，
北京：北京出版社，1999，頁 660。)
Note for the teacher:
According to Fukuzawa Yukichi, apart from scientific skills, the education system,
economics and commerce, government structure and the Diet system, Japan should
also learn the way that Western countries treated Asian countries such as China and
Korea. Like Britain and France, Japan must play the role of an imperialist power in
Asia.
Liang Qichao argued that the “new citizen” was the basis of a strong and wealthy
nation. The “new citizen” was a person who identified with the nation and put the
interests of the public before his or her own. In the past, Chinese people had lacked
this civic virtue, and as a result, China failed to be united and reforms did not succeed.
4.
The contest for power in Asia
a. Since the Opium Wars, on one occasion after another, China was forced to
cede territory, pay indemnity and accept the new political order gradually
established by Western powers in Asia. In 1881, Russia accepted a
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considerable amount of land in Yili; in 1882, after the Sino-French War,
Vietnam became a French protectorate and was totally moved out of the Qing
dynasty’s influence, and in 1886, Britain occupied Burma.
b. In 1894, Japan went to war with China over Korea. Japan defeated China, and
China was forced to cede the Liaoning Peninsula, Lushun (Port Arthur),
Dalian and Taiwan to Japan, and accept its domination of Korea. Russia
perceived Japan’s expansion as a threat, and, under its opposition, Japan
surrendered Liaodong. In 1910, Japan annexed Korea as its colony. Fearing
the expansion of Russia, Britain formed an alliance with Japan in 1902.
Japan’s international status, which was raised by defeating China and allying
with Britain, enabled it to revoke unequal treaties it had signed with Western
powers. The conflict between Japan and Russia over the Northeastern
Provinces (known as Manchuria) finally resulted in war in 1904, in which.
Japan was victorious. As part of the war settlement with Russia, Japan
acquired Lushun, Dalian and all rights over the South Manchurian Railway.
Since then, the Northeastern Provinces became Japan’s sphere of influence.
c. The Sino-Japanese War further exposed China’s weakness and a series of
events followed in rapid succession. Foreign powers competed among
themselves for spheres of influence in China. While that went on, an
anti-foreign movement developed in North China in which “Boxers” (Yihe
tuan) attacked and killed some foreign missionaries in the Beijing-Tianjin area
and attacked the foreign legations in Beijing. Western governments, and Japan,
sent troops to Beijing, which led to the Qing court fleeing from this capital
city. The Qing government signed a humiliating treaty which confirmed the
foreign powers’ spheres of influence. The failure of the Qing government to
withstand the foreign threat promoted a revolutionary movement, just at the
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Qing court began to implement yet another reform programme. The reforms
failed to re-establish the powers of the government. In 1911, revolution broke
out and the Qing dynasty came to an end.
Summary:
When faced with the expansion of Western powers to Asia, China was forced by
military force to open its doors to trade and diplomatic relationships. Small parts of
China (such as Hong Kong) were ceded away as colonies, but much more extensive
areas came under the influence of different foreign powers. The humiliation of failure
to reform and defeat in war brought about the collapse of the government in 1911.
Japan, on the other hand, was able to rebuild centralized authority and carry out
Westernization reforms. The various Japanese institutional reforms came earlier than
China and were more complete. In the Sino-Japanese War and Russo-Japanese War,
Japan was able to defeat China and Russia and gain such colonies as Taiwan and
Korea. Japan became a strong and powerful empire while the Qing government was
overthrown.
167
Topic 20
The use of steel and the arms race
Objectives
The popular use of steel and the use of steam as a motive power were the major
factors influencing industrial development in the 20th century. They also changed the
way in which European countries engaged in the armament race. This topic aims to
explain these changes through the introduction of the use of weapons by various
countries before the Second World War and to arouse students’ thinking about the
changes in weapons and their relationship with society and the economy.
Sample teaching plan
Guns and ships in the days of wind and sail
In the 18th century wind was the motive power for warships. They were made of
wood. Therefore,

They could only go as fast as the wind could carry them.

They were small.

Because they were small, the guns they could carry were also small. (If you fire a
cannon, as the cannon ball goes out, the gun moves backwards. This backward
movement, known as “recoil”, could upset the ship unless it was steadied by its
weight.)
An arms race in those days consisted of putting more guns on the ship. The guns were
fitted on the two sides (known as the broadsides). During war, ships turned their sides
towards their enemies so that they could fire their guns at them. This is illustrated in
Picture 55.
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Picture 55: Traditional sea battle in the 17th century
(Source: Geoffrey Parker ed., The Cambridge Illustrated History of Warfare: the
Triumph of the West, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp.128-9.)
The picture shows a sea battle conducted on 25 July 1666 between 89 British and 88
Dutch warships. See how they fired at each other from their sides. Two Dutch ships
and one British ship were destroyed.
Steam as a motive power
By the beginning of the 19th century, warships were built which were powered by
steam. You might remember from Topic 17 that early steamers were fitted with
paddle wheels. However, you can see that while paddle wheels would work for
passenger ships, they were not suitable for warships. For example, paddle wheels
occupied the space for guns on the broadsides and could easily be a target for enemy
fire. So, the wide use of steam power on warships had to wait until the invention of
the screw propeller. Screw propellers were fitted under the ship and were, therefore,
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harder to attack. By the 1850s, warships installed with screw propellers were
becoming widely used.
When the ship was driven by steam, it was no longer dependent on wind. However,
early steamers were not really much bigger than wooden ships. It was not, in fact, a
good idea to fit steam engines on wooden ships because the fire from the steam
engine was always a fire hazard. The next major change in ship-building had to come
with the wide use of steel.
Improvements in steel making
In the mid-19th century, new furnaces were invented which greatly improved the
steel-making process. Before these new machines were invented, it took several days
to convert iron into steel, but with the new furnaces, steel could be produced in about
half an hour. Other inventions removed impurities from the iron ore much more
quickly and cheaply. With these inventions, the cost of steel was greatly reduced and
productivity enormously improved.
Steel is a very useful metal for machine-making. It is harder than iron and not brittle
(that is to say, it does not break easily). It became widely used in railways, engines,
ships and other machines.
Steel-clad ships and their guns
By the end of the 19th century, warships were no longer made of timber, but of steel.
Picture 56: French warship Le Redoutable in 1876
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:LeRedoutablePhoto.jpg
Steel is much heavier than wood. When ships were made of steel, they became much
heavier than wooden ships. They could be fitted with heavier guns, which had a much
longer range than the lighter guns fitted on wooden ships. The battleship HMS
Dreadnaught (ships belonging to the British Royal Navy are referred to as “His, or
Her, Majesty’s Ship”, HMS for short), built in 1906, became the standard for warship
production among the naval powers of the period. A race was started between Britain
and Germany for building the most powerful navy. Ships competed for the size of the
guns, the thickness of their armour and speed. Not only the Western powers, but also
Japan, were involved in this arms race.
171
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:HMS
_Dreadnought_1906_H61017.jpg
Displacement: 18,000 tons; 18
steam boilers, 4 steam engine
units, 22,000 horsepower; 10
12-inch guns; 27 12-pounder
cannons and 5 18-inch torpedo
tubes; armour thickness 102-279
mm
Picture 57: The HMS Dreadnaught
Transport and war
Until the steamers and railways were used for transport, it was not easy to move large
numbers of soldiers around or to supply them. The difficulties in transport in the 18th
century limited the scale of war. For instance, during the Napoleonic Wars, the
600,000-man strong army led by Napoleon failed to conquer Russia. The loss of men
during this long conquest and the fatal blow caused by the lack of reinforcements
simply showed that the means of transportation at that time was still unable to support
such large-scale military campaign.
The use of steamships and railways as means of transport in the 19th century changed
the scale of war. For example, during the war between France and Austria in northern
Italy in 1859, it took France only 11 days to transport 120,000 men to the battlefield.
172
Before the construction of railways, that would have taken two months. During the
Crimean War of 1854, the emergence of steamships enabled Britain and France to
transport a large number of soldiers to the Crimea. During the Franco-Prussian War of
1870, the use of railways transported 1,000,000 soldiers to the front line. In the 19th
century, European nations competed in the construction of railways because railways
not only promoted economic development but also played an important role in
strengthening the nation’s military power. During the second half of the 19th century,
Prussia could quickly suppress uprisings in big cities by sending troops and supplies
via the railway network.
Industrialisation for war
By the 19th century, war required continuous supplies of ammunition, machinery, raw
material such as steel, medicine, and food. Hence, the ability to mobilize all these
resources was a decisive factor in winning. In order to fight a war, it was not only
necessary to recruit a large number of solders, but also to mobilize a large number of
civilians to produce for war. At the same time, with the invention of the telegraph,
reports of war could be sent quickly home. This meant that governments could take
charge of war efforts much more effectively than in the past, and for news of the war,
through the newspapers, to spread to civilians. The age had come when war would be
“total”, that is to say, involving the entire country, civilian and military alike.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Krupp_Factory_WWI.jpg
Picture 58: Industrialisation of war – arsenals and naval dockyards became important
venues of war
Exercise 1.
Look at the following table:
Year
War
Warring parties
No. of men
1704
Battle of Blenheim
Combined forces of
56,000
France and Bavaria
Combined forces of
52,000
Germany and Austria
1853-1854
Crimean War
Combined forces of
650,000
Britain and France
Russia
1.2 million
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1870
Franco-Prussian War France
North German
500,000
550,000
Confederation
Source:
Geoffrey Parker ed., The Cambridge Illustrated History of Warfare: the Triumph of
the West, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995, p.175.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_War
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franco-Prussian_War
The scale of war in the 18th century rarely exceeded 80,000 fighting men. However,
by 19th century, many more men were involved. Why did the scale of war grow
rapidly after the mid-18th century? Write a paragraph of about 50 words in answer.
Exercise 2.
Look at the two pictures below. Knowing that steamers were invented in the early
nineteenth century and steel became widely used only by the second half of the
eighteenth century, state which ship (the upper or lower) was used in war earlier?
Describe two features of these ships that would show that one ship was more powerful
than the other in war.
175
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Redoutable.jpg
Picture 59: A battleship in the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805
176
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:HMS_Ocean_%28Canopus-class_battleship%29.j
pg
Picture 60: A British battleship in c1855
Features of war in the twentieth century
1. In the First World War, soldiers were stationed in trenches on the battlefield.
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Trenches were fortified, barbed wire and machine guns provided defence against
enemy attack.
Advances beyond the trenches were slow.
2. The tank was invented to overrun trenches. The tank’s heavy armour gave it
protection, and its tracks allowed it to move easily on the battlefield, even when there
were no roads.
3. By the later stages of the First World War, aeroplanes were used to bombard the
enemy’s rear, thus expanding the war into areas far away from the battlefield.
4. Submarines also came to be used widely during the First World War. Germany
used submarines to fight the blockade imposed on it by the British navy. However,
that meant that the submarine was used to attack commercial as well as military
shipping. The German submarine (known as the “U-boat”) was a serious threat to
British and American ships. The attack on American ships ultimately brought the
United States of America into the war.
5. By the Second World War, war was waged on land and sea, and in the air.
6. The aircraft carrier, combining the ability to fight on the sea and in the air, became
the centre of command, especially in the Pacific Ocean.
7. Submarines continued to be used to attack enemy shipping.
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Summary
Through the 19th century, weapons of war became closely tied to industrial
development. Advances in ship building and gun making started the arms race in
Europe, while weapons such as the battleship, tank, aeroplane, and submarine
increased the cost of war. Research and development of military technology was
crucial to success in the armament race. The entire population of the country was
involved in their financing and development.
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Topic 21: European nationalism
Objectives
To let students realise that nationalism was an emotional subject, that it involved
individual identity, and it became a factor in European politics through the nineteenth
century, leading to the First World War.
Sample lesson plan
1. Nationalism as emotion
In the Middle Ages, personal allegiance would have been owed to the church, the
kings and the lords. By the Renaissance, the emergence of the vernacular meant that
some kings would have identified with their subjects through the written vernacular.
In this connection, any sense of the nation would have been closely defined by
allegiance to the kings. By the Enlightenment, when it was thought that kings ruled by
virtue of a social contract, they were thought of as representing the state. By the 19th
century, the increasing focus on common language and culture as the foundation of
the state meant that nationalism came to be closely tied to the emotion. A nation’s
people would have felt deeply about the state and its interests, especially insofar as its
sovereignty was threatened. This is brought about in the story, “The last lesson”,
written by French author Alphonse Daudet.
Read the following story. It may take about 10 to 15 minutes.
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THE LAST LESSON
BY
ALPHONSE DAUDET
I started for school very late that morning and was in great dread of a scolding,
especially because M. Hamel had said that he would question us on participles, and I
did not know the first word about them. For a moment I thought of running away and
spending the day out of doors. It was so warm, so bright! The birds were chirping at
the edge of the woods; and in the open field back of the saw-mill the Prussian soldiers
were drilling. It was all much more tempting than the rule for participles, but I had the
strength to resist, and hurried off to school.
When I passed the town hall there was a crowd in front of the bulletin-board. For the
last two years all our bad news had come from there--the lost battles, the draft, the
orders of the commanding officer--and I thought to myself, without stopping:
“What can be the matter now?”
Then, as I hurried by as fast as I could go, the blacksmith, Wachter, who was there,
with his apprentice, reading the bulletin, called after me: “Don’t go so fast, bub;
you’ll get to your school in plenty of time!”
I thought he was making fun of me, and reached M. Hamel’s little garden all out of
breath. Usually, when school began, there was a great bustle, which could be heard
out in the street, the opening and closing of desks, lessons repeated in unison, very
loud, with our hands over our ears to understand better, and the teacher's great ruler
rapping on the table. But now it was all so still! I had counted on the commotion to
get to my desk without being seen; but, of course, that day everything had to be as
quiet as Sunday morning. Through the window I saw my classmates, already in their
places, and M. Hamel walking up and down with his terrible iron ruler under his arm.
I had to open the door and go in before everybody. You can imagine how I blushed
and how frightened I was.
181
But nothing happened, M. Hamel saw me and said very kindly: “Go to your place
quickly, little Franz. We were beginning without you.”
I jumped over the bench and sat down at my desk. Not till then, when I had got a little
over my fright, did I see that our teacher had on his beautiful green coat, his frilled
shirt, and the little black silk cap, all embroidered, that he never wore except on
inspection and prize days. Besides, the whole school seemed so strange and solemn.
But the thing that surprised me most was to see, on the back benches that were always
empty, the village people sitting quietly like ourselves; old Hauser, with his
three-cornered hat, the former mayor, the former postmaster, and several others
besides. Everybody looked sad; and Hauser had brought an old primer, thumbed at the
edges, and he held it open on his knees with his great spectacles lying across the
pages.
While I was wondering about it all, M. Hamel mounted his chair, and, in the same
grave and gentle tone which he had used to me, said: “My children, this is the last
lesson I shall give you. The order has come from Berlin to teach only German in the
schools of Alsace and Lorraine. The new master comes to-morrow. This is your last
French lesson. I want you to be very attentive.”
What a thunder-clap these words were to me!
Oh, the wretches; that was what they had put up at the town-hall!
My last French lesson! Why, I hardly knew how to write! I should never learn any
more! I must stop there, then! Oh, how sorry I was for not learning my lessons, for
seeking birds’ eggs, or going sliding on the Saar! My books, that had seemed such a
nuisance a while ago, so heavy to carry, my grammar, and my history of the saints,
were old friends now that I couldn’t give up. And M. Hamel, too; the idea that he was
going away, that I should never see him again, made me forget all about his ruler and
how cranky he was.
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Poor man! It was in honor of this last lesson that he had put on his fine
Sunday-clothes, and now I understood why the old men of the village were sitting
there in the back of the room. It was because they were sorry, too, that they had not
gone to school more. It was their way of thanking our master for his forty years of
faithful service and of showing their respect for the country that was theirs no more.
While I was thinking of all this, I heard my name called. It was my turn to recite.
What would I not have given to be able to say that dreadful rule for the participle all
through, very loud and clear, and without one mistake? But I got mixed up on the first
words and stood there, holding on to my desk, my heart beating, and not daring to
look up. I heard M. Hamel say to me:
“I won’t scold you, little Franz; you must feel bad enough. See how it is! Every day
we have said to ourselves: ‘Bah! I’ve plenty of time. I’ll learn it to-morrow.’ And now
you see where we've come out. Ah, that’s the great trouble with Alsace; she puts off
learning till to-morrow. Now those fellows out there will have the right to say to you:
‘How is it; you pretend to be Frenchmen, and yet you can neither speak nor write your
own language?’ But you are not the worst, poor little Franz. We’ve all a great deal to
reproach ourselves with.
“Your parents were not anxious enough to have you learn. They preferred to put you
to work on a farm or at the mills, so as to have a little more money. And I? I’ve been
to blame also. Have I not often sent you to water my flowers instead of learning your
lessons? And when I wanted to go fishing, did I not just give you a holiday?”
Then, from one thing to another, M. Hamel went on to talk of the French language,
saying that it was the most beautiful language in the world -- the clearest, the most
logical; that we must guard it among us and never forget it, because when a people are
enslaved, as long as they hold fast to their language it is as if they had the key to their
prison. Then he opened a grammar and read us our lesson. I was amazed to see how
well I understood it. All he said seemed so easy, so easy! I think, too, that I had never
listened so carefully, and that he had never explained everything with so much
patience. It seemed almost as if the poor man wanted to give us all he knew before
going away, and to put it all into our heads at one stroke.
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After the grammar, we had a lesson in writing. That day M. Hamel had new copies for
us, written in a beautiful round hand: France, Alsace, France, Alsace. They looked
like little flags floating everywhere in the school-room, hung from the rod at the top
of our desks. You ought to have seen how every one set to work, and how quiet it was!
The only sound was the scratching of the pens over the paper. Once some beetles flew
in; but nobody paid any attention to them, not even the littlest ones, who worked right
on tracing their fish-hooks, as if that was French, too. On the roof the pigeons cooed
very low, and I thought to myself:
“Will they make them sing in German, even the pigeons?”
Whenever I looked up from my writing I saw M. Hamel sitting motionless in his chair
and gazing first at one thing, then at another, as if he wanted to fix in his mind just
how everything looked in that little school-room. Fancy! For forty years he had been
there in the same place, with his garden outside the window and his class in front of
him, just like that. Only the desks and benches had been worn smooth; the
walnut-trees in the garden were taller, and the hop-vine, that he had planted himself
twined about the windows to the roof. How it must have broken his heart to leave it
all, poor man; to hear his sister moving about in the room above, packing their trunks!
For they must leave the country next day.
But he had the courage to hear every lesson to the very last. After the writing, we had
a lesson in history, and then the babies chanted their ba, be, bi, bo, bu. Down there at
the back of the room old Hauser had put on his spectacles and, holding his primer in
both hands, spelled the letters with them. You could see that he, too, was crying; his
voice trembled with emotion, and it was so funny to hear him that we all wanted to
laugh and cry. Ah, how well I remember it, that last lesson!
All at once the church-clock struck twelve. Then the Angelus. At the same moment
the trumpets of the Prussians, returning from drill, sounded under our windows. M.
Hamel stood up, very pale, in his chair. I never saw him look so tall.
“My friends,” said he, “I--I --” But something choked him. He could not go on.
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Then he turned to the blackboard, took a piece of chalk, and, bearing on with all his
might, he wrote as large as he could:
“Vive La France!”
Then he stopped and leaned his head against the wall, and, without a word, he made a
gesture to us with his hand; “School is dismissed--you may go.”
Source: Project Gutenberg’s International Short Stories: French
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/10577/10577-8.txt
Hints for the teacher:
Point out those parts of the stories that evoke feelings: the French language, from a
little boy, the community turned out to attend the last lesson, the teacher, he had to
leave (his sister was packing as the lesson went on), the Prussian troops returned from
drill at midnight, “Long live France”, and a lot more (in red above). Hammer home
how the story stresses that language, especially the written language, represented the
nation.
Then the history: Alsace and Lorraine. What is the history here?
In the last topic, we have talked about the unification of Germany, but we did not put
in the details. To understand this story, we need a little detail.
Alsace and Lorraine are located today in France, on the border with Germany. There
have always been a mixture of French and German speakers living here. In 1870, after
the Franco-Prussian War, which France lost, these two areas were ceded to Prussia.
German replaced French in school.
2. The history of European nationalism
(1) You might remember the appeal to Greek and Roman culture in the Renaissance
and the spread of the written vernacular languages after the invention of the
printing press. That was the 15th century. There was the same appeal in
nationalism. It was believed that people who spoke the same language had the
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same culture.
(2) During the French Revolution, nationalism was very much a central theme of
liberation. You can see this in the French national anthem, La Marseillaise,
composed during the French Revolution in 1792. For the tune in various formats,
see http://www.marseillaise.org/english/
Let us go, children of the fatherland
Our day of Glory has arrived.
Against us stands tyranny,
The bloody flag is raised,
The bloody flag is raised.
Do you hear in the countryside
The roar of these savage soldiers
They come right into our arms
To cut the throats of your sons,
your country.
Source:
Modern History Sourcebook, La Marseillaise
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/marseill.html
Napoleon used the same ideas in his campaigns. Subsequent to those, in 1848, there
were uprisings which were nationalist (e.g. in Hungary).
3. More schools
Nationalism was also promoted by popular education. Throughout the 16th to the 18th
centuries, throughout Western Europe, there were more and more schools, especially
primary schools. By the 19th century, many schools were supported by the
government and they taught in the national language. The spread of primary education
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promoted the national language, the national history and the national literature. They
were very important in inculcating the national identity.
4. What would happen to empires if people speaking each language became an
independent nation?
Nationalism could be a strength in those countries in which a single language
dominated. It posed a dilemma for the old empires, that is Austria (the
Austro-Hungarian Empire in the last decades of the 19th century) and the Ottoman
Empire, in which different peoples spoke different languages. In the last years of the
19th century, this problem was particularly difficult because Russia was expanding
and extending protection to its south European neighours in a Pan-Slav movement.
Britain and France were worried that Russian entry into this area could threaten their
security, and equally worried that an expanded Germany and Austria might be
dangerous. The problems arising out of this region were known as the Eastern
Question and were potentially explosive.
Map 12: Austrian Empire
Map 13: Europe today
(Source of Maps 12 and 13: Department of History, CUHK)
187
Summary:
Nationalism was emotional. By the nineteenth century, it became part of the personal
identity of a lot of people. It became generally accepted that people who spoke the
same language had the same culture and belonged to the same nation. However, if the
people of the same nation were allowed to create their own country, some of the old
empires might break up. The resultant changes could be politically dangerous.
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Topic 22: The World Wars in Europe
Objectives
To introduce to students how the First and Second World Wars began, noting in
particular, (1) the “German problem”, (2) what objectives were posed at the beginning
of the wars and (3) why the wars were so difficult to end. The Russian Revolution
will be introduced along with a brief account of the First World War.
Note for the teacher
The Hong Kong history syllabus has for many years put a great deal of emphasis on
the First and the Second World Wars. It is important to understand why this happened.
When the syllabus was drawn up in the 1950s, the Second World War was fresh in
many people’s memory, and there was, therefore, a great deal of interest in what led
to it. That syllabus was continued not because it was intrinsically valuable, but
because it became a tradition to do so. In 2007, the Second World War is no longer an
event of the recent past. There is no reason why students should be made to memorise
facts, especially place names, which were familiar to people who were living in the
1950s. In this bridging programme, students should know that the wars took place,
and that they devastated the most powerful European nations. They should be aware
of the conflicting interests which led to war and the reasons why the wars, once
started, were hard to stop. They should understand various concepts related to the
period: total war, the principle of self-determination and international cooperation and
peace keeping. The wars should be taught as part of a long continuous history
emerging out of interests formed in the 19th century and not singled out as isolated
events of the 20th century.
Sample lesson plan
The two world wars in the first half of the 20th century killed millions of people,
toppled the governments of some of the most powerful countries at the time and
changed the political map of Europe. They were such a powerful source of change
because war had become much more devastating than they had ever been in history.
Not only were the weapons more powerful, but also because once war was started, the
combatants could not stop. They did not stop until one side was annihilated.
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1. What did wars mean for soldiers?
Here is a famous First World War song:
It’s a Long Way to Tipperary
It’s a long way to Tipperary,
It’s a long way to go.
It's a long way to Tipperary
To the sweetest girl I know!
Goodbye Piccadilly,
Farewell Leicester Square!
It’s a long long way to Tipperary,
But my heart's right there.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It’s_a_Long_Way_to_Tipperary
(Tipperary is a town in Ireland and the location of barracks for the British army when
Ireland was still part of Britain. Piccadilly and Leicester Square are places in London.
Originally, the song was sung to express feelings for girlfriends at the barracks.
During the First World War, it came to be sung as a marching song which evoked
feelings
of
home.
An
audio
version
may be
found
on
the
web
at
http://www.firstworldwar.com/audio/itsalongwaytotipperary.htm.)
Play “It’s a long way to Tipperary” as an introduction to war. It shows that soldiers
did not want war; most would much rather go home.
2. When did these wars take place?
_______________!_____!_______________________________!______!_________
1914
1918
1939
1945
3. Which countries were involved on the two sides?
In the First World War (1914-1918) Britain, France, Russia (known as the Triple
Entente) and the USA fought Germany, Austria (known as the Triple Alliance,
together with Italy), and Turkey. What happened to Italy? Although it was part of the
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Triple Alliance, by a secret alliance with France, it stayed out of the war until 1915,
when it joined on the side of the Triple Entente.
In the Second World War (1939-1945) Britain, France, USSR and the USA (the
Allies) fought Germany and Italy (the Axis). In Asia, Japan joined in the war on the
side of the Axis powers. War on China by Japan began in 1937, that will be the
subject of the next topic.
3. How did war begin?
To understand how the First World War began, it is necessary to be familiar with the
area lying on the edge of three old empires of Europe: the re-shaped Austrian Empire,
expanding Russia and the collapsing Ottoman Empire. The spot which led directly to
war was Bosnia and Serbia, as indicated in the map on the right. Bosnia came within
Austria, but its population was Slav, and therefore the people were linguistically close
to Serbia. Serbia was backed by Russia, which also had a large Slav population, and
was also interested in this area as an expansion into the Mediterranean.
Map 14: Austrian Empire
Map 15: Europe today
(Source of Maps 14 and 15: Department of History, CUHK)
191
Austria was backed by Germany. Germany was as yet a newly unified country in
1914. After war with Austria in 1866, Prussia occupied half of Germany. After war
with France in 1870, Prussia united the German states and set up the new state of
Germany. Germany was one of the major European powers from 1870 to 1914. It
built an army, expanded overseas, and defended the German interest in Europe, even
when such interests did not fall with Germany. It was closely allied to Austria.
In 1914, the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the throne, was assassinated
by a Serbian while on a visit to Bosnia. Austria declared war on Serbia. Russia came
to the support of Serbia. France and England came to the support of Russia. Germany
supported Austria. The United States joined in on the side of the Allies in 1917.
The Second World War began because Germany, defeated in the First World War,
was made to be pay a heavy indemnity and lost territory. Austria and the Ottoman
Empire were broken up (see impact of war below for more). Payment of indemnity
could only be supported by loans from the US and by devaluing the German currency.
The result was hyper-inflation in the 1920s. The government set up after the First
World War collapsed, and an ultra nationalist party, the National Socialist Party (Nazi)
came to power under Adolph Hitler. The Nazi government rebuilt the economy and
the army very quickly, and expanded. Once again, expansion was justified on the
grounds that the German nation had the responsibility to defend German interests
even when they fell outside Germany. It annexed Austria and invaded Czechoslovakia
in 1938. It invaded Poland in 1939. On that point, Britain and France declared war.
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Map 16
(Source of Map: Department of History, CUHK)
4. What were the objectives of war and why were these wars so hard to end?
A. Look at these websites which show the two fronts during the wars:
http://www.pbs.org/greatwar/maps/maps_outbreak.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/launch_ani_western_front.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/launch_ani_fall_france_campaign.sh
tml
Early in both wars, France lost substantial territories. Germany would not give up its
acquisitions, nor would France acquiesce. Because neither side could back down, war
could not end.
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B. Total war:
Picture 61: This is a British poster of 1914 advertising recruitment of soldiers for the
war. In the First World War, serving in the army was voluntary in Britain until 1916,
after that conscription was introduced.
(Source of Picture 61: Department of History, CUHK. The original picture could be found at
Wikimedia Commons, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Kitchener-leete.jpg )
194
In the following passage, Winston Churchill, British Prime Minister during the
Second World War, captures the totality of the new war:
There is another more obvious difference from 1914. The whole of the warring
nations are engaged, not only soldiers, but the entire population, men, women, and
children. The fronts are everywhere. The trenches are dug in the towns and streets.
Every village is fortified. Every road is barred. The front line runs through the
factories. The workmen are soldiers with different weapons but the same courage.
Source: August 20, 1940, speech by Winston Churchill to House of Commons. Text
from The Churchill Centre (online), Speeches & Quotes, ‘The Few’,
http://www.winstonchurchill.org/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=420 [visited 24 July
2007].
Picture 62
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:L
Compare the passage to Picture 62, which
ondonBombedWWII.png
shows the bombing of London from the
air during the Second World War.
Explain what Churchill meant by the
sentence, “the whole of the warring
nations are engaged”.
5. What were the consequences of the wars?
The wars came to an end only when one side or the other collapsed. In the First World
War, Russia yielded in 1917 when the Russian Revolution broke out. Revolution had
been brought about, among other reasons, because of military and economic disaster
195
since the beginning of war. The German imperial government was also brought down
by revolution in 1918, and war ceased soon afterwards.
Another important consequence was that in the treaties signed after the First World
War, the victorious countries applied the principle of national self-determination in
dealing with German, Austrian and Ottoman territories. Many new states were created
in eastern Europe as a result.
Even countries that won suffered badly. Britain, traditionally a wealthy country, went
heavily into debt, having borrowed heavily from the United States in pursuing the
war.
The Second World War was also concluded in Europe only when the Allies,
strengthened by the United States entry into the war, counter-attacked. Heavy
bombing of Germany, economic trouble and military attack finally defeated the
German armies. Hitler held out to the very end.
The end of the Second World War saw the emergence of the Soviet Union as a major
world power, and the beginning of the Cold War. European powers, considerably
weakened by war, gradually gave up their overseas colonies. Outside Europe, a wave
of nationalism saw the establishment of many new states.
Both wars highlighted the need for an international body in which disputes might be
peacefully settled. At the end of the First World War, the League of Nations was
created, and at the end of the Second World War, the United Nations.
Summary
This topic has dealt briefly with the First and the Second World War in Europe.
Students have been introduced to the countries involved in the war, some of the
reasons which led to war, and they have distinguished between reasons leading to the
outbreak of war, and reasons which caused war to continue once it had broken out.
196
They were also given the concept of the “total war”, and introduced to the idea that an
international institution was needed for the maintenance of peace.
197
Topic 23
Asia between the Two World Wars
Objectives
To explain that a constitutional monarchy was set up in Japan after the Meiji
Restoration and that a constitutional movement in the country had flourished during
the 1910s. To examine the reasons for Japan’s move towards militarism, the invasion
of China and the launch of the Pacific War in the 1930s.
Sample teaching plan
(1) A summary of events in East Asia
You might remember that in 1894, Japan went to war against China, and in 1902, it
fought Russia. As a result of these wars, the Japanese empire was founded, to include
as colonies Korea and Taiwan. (See Topic 19)
Japan entered the First World War on the side of the Triple Entente. At the peace
settlement of Versailles after the war in 1919, Japan obtained control of parts of China
which had fallen under German influence.
During the 1920s, relationship between China and Japan was peaceful. However, by
the 1930s, the military was gaining influence in Japan, and the Japanese government
took an increasingly belligerent stance towards China. It attacked and obtained the
Northeastern provinces of China in 1931, it attacked China in 1937, leading to eight
years of bitter war. By 1941, Japan extended the war to British and French colonies in
Asia, and attacked the US naval base of Pearl Harbour in Hawaii. It surrendered in
1945 after the atomic bomb was dropped on it by the United States.
The wars of the 1930s and 1940s were connected to the rise of the military in Japan at
the time. How did that happen?
(2) Japanese politics to the 1920s
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An important background reason for the rise of militarism in Japan lies in some
features of the Meiji Constitution of 1889. (See Topic 19.) The following summarises
some articles in the Meiji Constitution:

The empire of Japan is ruled by the emperor descended in a lineal unbroken line
for thousands of generations.

The emperor is sacred and inviolable.

The emperor is assisted by the Imperial Diet and exercises legislative power.

The emperor convenes the Imperial Diet. The Diet meets, concludes and
suspends meetings, and the House of Representatives is dissolved pursuant to the
order of the emperor.

The emperor is the commander of the army and navy.

The emperor determines the deployment of the army and navy and the size of the
regular armed forces.
Source: http://henryxing.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!508A09EB188BC47!895.entry
Exercise 1. The following table compares the Meiji Constitution of Japan and the
constitutional spirit of the United States. What are the differences between the two
constitutions and what do they imply?
Japan
United States
Divine power of the emperor who was Popularly elected President
infallible
Citizens were the emperor’s subjects
Men are born free and enjoy liberty
Legislative and executive powers vested Separation of executive, legislative and
in the emperor
judicial powers
Military power belonged to the emperor The President is the commander-in-chief
directly
of the armed forces
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A Note for the teacher:
For implications of the comparison above, consider the following:
Firstly, a very special feature of Japanese politics was the role of senior statesmen (the
most trusted courtiers in the early Meiji period and former prime ministers).They had
the power to nominate cabinet ministers to the emperor. These elder statesmen, and
even the prime minister or cabinet ministers, were not necessarily members of
political parties. So, although the parties took part in election, the results of the
election did not determine who had power.
Secondly, the Meiji Constitution stipulated that the emperor was sacred and the
source of all authority. The emperor was the highest commander of the army and navy
and could command the armed forces directly. His constitutional power could,
therefore, be used by military leaders to shield themselves from the control of the
cabinet or the prime minister. As long as they were not restrained by the emperor,
they could decide and act arbitrarily. As there was no external check and balance over
the military structure, the military could easily and rashly dispatch their men overseas
for the sake of expansion.
Thirdly, the Constitution stipulated that the posts of Army Minister and Navy
Minister must be held by current servicemen, thus virtually granting the military the
right of vetoing cabinet decisions. For example, in 1912 when the newly formed
cabinet refused to increase military expenditure in an attempt to deal with the
economic crisis caused by rapid inflation, it aroused the discontent of the military.
The Army Minister resigned and refused to nominate his successor. As the prime
minister was unable to form a cabinet, he was forced to resign.
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However, in the 1910s, public opinion thought that the army had encroached upon the
constitutional government. It thought that the military had failed to respect the voting
power of the elected Diet over the budget, and, as a result, supported the
government’s efforts to reduce the budget. The political parties also initiated a
movement to safeguard constitutionalism. Riots broke out in Tokyo and other cities.
As a result, although the senior statesmen never gave up their right of appointment,
elected members of the Diet came to be included in the cabinet. In fact, members of
minority parties, by being included in the cabinet, could gain influence, and such
personal influence would, in turn, allow their parties to gain in strength.
(3) Expansion into China
Japanese politicians, including the senior statesmen, political parties and the military,
endeavoured to obtain equal status for Japan with Western powers and agreed that
Japan should establish itself as an imperialist power in Asia. After the First World
War, when Japan faced economic crisis caused by serious inflation and renewed
economic competitions among Western powers, imperial expansion seemed
imminent.
However, through the 1920s, successive Japanese governments took a conciliatory
attitude towards China. China, fragmented by internal wars, was at it weakest point in
the twentieth century. In 1928, the Japanese army stationed in the northeastern
provinces of China (known then as Manchuria), took matters into its own hand.
Members of the army decided, without approval from the Japanese government, to
assassinate the warlord of Manchuria, Zhang Zuolin. The Japanese government knew
of the event, but failed to hold the assassins to account. Instead, the Prime Minister
resigned. By September 1931, the Japanese army stationed on the Manchuria-Korea
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border attacked Manchuria, and drove out Zhang Zuolin’s son, Zhang Xueliang. It
took over Manchuria and turned it in the Manchukuo Kingdom. The Chinese
government protested to the League of Nations, but the League was totally ineffective
in restraining Japan, even though it condemned Japan’s aggression.
Exercise 2.
Look at the following cartoon. The Tiger Japan has swallowed the little human
Manchukuo. Identify what event the cartoon refers to and what the Chinese
government (indicated by the man on whom the Chinese characters “zhengfu” has
been written) was doing about it?
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/linglong/index.html)
Picture 63
(Source: Ling Long Women’s Magazine, 1932, issue no. 70.
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Image from Columbia University Library,
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/linglong/index.html)
A Note for the teacher
During the economic downturn in the late 1920s, the Japanese government adopted
stringent measures to reduce the government’s expenditure. One result was the
reduction of the military budget. The majority of military commanders accepted this
policy. At this time, the government adopted a cooperative policy with Western
powers towards China. For example, Prime Minister Takashi Hara (原敬) agreed to
return Shandong to China even though Japan retained its long-term interests over
major railways. In 1924-1927, Foreign Minister Kijuro Shidehara (幣原喜重郎)
refused military intervention in the anti-Japanese movement in China.
In the 1910s and 1920s, there was no controversy over whether Japan should expand,
the only contention being whether expansion should proceed gradually or radically.
The gradualist faction advocated cooperation with Western powers, especially Britain
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and the United States. The radical faction, on the other hand, advocated acting alone,
taking into account only Japanese interests, and disregarding the China policy adopted
by Britain and the United States. Public opinion largely agreed the gradualists,
whereas the military advocated “radical development”.
However, the dissent in policy was not limited to the political parties and the military,
nor did it represent a sharp opposition between the military and the public. By the end
of the 1920s, a more apparent dissent appeared. Political parties advocated
cooperation and consultation with powers like Britain and the United States for the
resolution of disputes over China, but the military, especially the middle- or
lower-ranking officers, were impatient with such conciliatory diplomacy as they
became increasingly critical of the political parties. The army viewed China, in
particular the problems in northern and northeastern China, as the biggest threat to
Japan’s position as Asia’s leader. The navy, on the other hand, was concerned with
the challenges posed by Western powers in the Pacific Ocean.
Because the Meiji Constitution did not provide for a check-and-balance system on the
military, the military could ignore the opposition from the political parties and launch
its own radical policy on northeastern China. That policy amounted to military
invasion.
As the world economic crisis set in by the end of the 1920s, Japan’s economy was hit
hard. Between 1930 and 1932, Japan’s industrial unemployment rate reached as high
as 15 per cent of the labour force. The unemployment rate in the cities was even
higher. Many army officers became increasingly discontented with Japan’s domestic
and foreign policies. They saw the conciliatory diplomacy as cowardly. They
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considered the reduction in the military budget as a way of degrading the armed
forces, impoverishing the soldiers and undermining their morale. They were of the
view that this was the result of collaboration between big business (known in Japan as
the zaibatsu) and political parties under the capitalist system.
The success of the Northern Expedition led by the Guomindang Party in China also
prompted action from the Japanese military. After the fall of the Qing dynasty, China
was a divided country dominated by separatist warlord regimes. The completion of
the Northern Expedition and the establishment of a unified Nationalist (Guomindang)
government in Nanjing in 1928, could eventually lead to a stronger China. An
imperialist viewing China from Japan would have argued in the early 1930s that if
war was inevitable, it should be waged sooner rather than later.
The Japanese Kanto Army stationed in northeastern China was set up in 1906 to
protect Japanese interests in Japan’s leased territories in China and its railway rights
in South Manchuria. It had attempted to make the Japanese government adopt a more
proactive Manchurian policy by assassinating the warlord, Zhang Zuolin (張作霖).
Although Prime Minister Giichi Tanaka ( 田 中 義 一 ) realized that the main
conspirators of the assassination of Zhang Zuolin were the Kanto Army, the Japanese
government failed to impose any effective sanction on them for acting without
authority. Instead, Prime Minister Tanaka was forced to resign because the emperor
was dissatisfied with his handling of the event.
This event set a bad precedence for the military. It also encouraged radicalism among
young army officers and right-wing nationalists. Leaders of political parties and
business later became their targets of assassination. At this time, leaders of the Kanto
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Army advocated that as war between Japan and Western powers was inevitable, Japan
must control northeastern China because the region was rich in mineral resources, and
its fertile lowland could be reclaimed for agriculture. By promoting migration to
Manchuria, Japan could also ease population pressure in the countryside. This line of
thought led to the Manchurian Incident, when on 18 September 1931, the Kanto Army
launched a full-scale attack on Manchuria on the pretext that the Chinese army had
been responsible for an explosion on the South Manchurian Railway. Although Prime
Minister Inukai Tsuyoshi (犬養毅) did not agree to the annexation of northeastern
China by the Japanese army, he nevertheless allowed the establishment of a puppet
government – Manchukuo (Manzhouguo) (滿州國) – by the Kanto Army. The fact
that the Kanto Army could take matters into its own hands by occupying northeastern
China without the approval from the government reinforced the growth of militarism.
Between 1931 and 1936, the Chinese government in Nanjing conciliated to Japanese
demands in the north of China. By 1936, in concession to public opinion, the Nanjing
government pledged a hard stand in the event of further aggression. When by the
Marco Polo Bridge Incident (蘆溝橋事變) on 7 July 1937, the Japanese army
captured Beijing, full-scale war broke out. In the initial few months of the war, China
lost heavily and even the capital of the Nationalist government in Nanjing fell. With
the fall of Nanjing to Japanese forces, the Nationalist government moved its seat to
Chongqing (重慶).
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Exercise 3
On 1 January 1938, the President of the Chinese Nationalist government Lin Sen (林
森) said in a speech:
“We demand final victory, and we will fight a protracted war of resistance. In this
protracted war, any temporary military retreat is only the loss of a battle. It will not
affect the overall outcome of the war. During the First World War, in less than one
month, the French government had to give up Paris and half of France fell into enemy
hands. Nevertheless, from losses France emerged in victory. Although the French
situation was slightly different from our present situation, the weaknesses of Japan are
too many. Its soldiers are mostly grassroots workers. Once their young men have been
conscripted, students abandon school, farmers cease to farm, merchants cease to trade
and workers cease to produce. As time goes by, Japan cannot hold out. The more land
it occupies and the longer the frontlines of war, the sooner will come its defeat. We
must drag the war on and wear down our enemy’s military and financial strengths so
that its economic structure and military advantages will collapse simultaneously. The
removal of the capital to Chongqing shows our determination to engage in a
protracted war … to accomplish the aim of final victory.”
(Source: Zhu Huisen (朱匯森) ed. A Concise Account of Historical Events in the Republic of
China, 1938, Part 1 (中華民國史事紀要)，Taipei: Academia Historica 1989，頁 2-3.)
Answer these two questions in two short paragraphs:
According to Lin Sen, why did the Chinese government move its capital to
Chongqing? Why did he think that China would ultimately win the war?
Reference for teachers:
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The Japanese government deployed 600,000 men to invade China. They could hold
the cities and transport lines in the areas they occupied, but were unable to control the
countryside. In March 1940, Japan set up a puppet government in Nanjing under the
leadership of Wang Jingwei (汪精衛). By September, Japan tried to break the
stalemate by allying with the two Axis Powers, Germany and Italy. That was
preparation for its attack on Southeast Asia, as Vietnam was a French colony. When
Japan occupied northern Vietnam, the United States expanded its oil embargo against
Japan and provided cheap military supplies to China. When in June 1941, Hitler
declared war on the Soviet Union, Japan turned to Southeast Asia knowing that when
the Soviet Union was occupied in war in Europe, it could not wage a separate war in
northeastern China. Japan attacked the British and American colonies in Southeast
Asia and seized the oilfields in the region. To neutralise the United States, Japan also
attacked the American naval base of Pearl Harbor. The attack of Pearl Harbor brought
the United States into the war.
Summary
Japan was a constitutional monarchy in which the emperor’s power was divine and
absolute. Although there was an elected House of Representatives in the Imperial Diet,
and voting right had been expanded and the cabinet was formed by political parties,
the Diet was not able to control the military. Military power was placed directly in the
hands of the emperor. When the Japanese government dealt with a financial crisis by
adopting stringent economic measures and reducing military expenditure, the
discontent of the military was aroused. The army opposed conciliation with countries
like Britain and the United States. It acted alone in northeastern China, launched a
military campaign and promoted a policy of advancing into southern China, hence
moving Japan along the road to militarism.
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Topic 24
International relations after World War II
Objectives
To introduce the causes of the Cold War and the development of the rivalry between
the US-led camp and the Soviet camp in the 1950s and 1970s.
Sample teaching plan
Armed confrontations after the Second World War
The following table shows major armed confrontations involving the United States
and the Soviet Union after the Second World War:
Year
Confrontation
Who supported whom?
1945-1949
Chinese Civil War
US
supported
the
Guomindang
government, and the USSR the Chinese
Communist Party
1948-1949
Berlin Blockade
US supported West Germany, USSR
supported East Germany
1950-1953
Korean War
US supported South Korea, USSR and
China supported North Korea
1962
Cuban Missile Crisis
US objected to USSR building a missile
launch site in Cuba
1963-1973
Vietnam War
US supported South Vietnam, USSR and
China supported North Vietnam
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The locations of these confrontations are indicated in the map below.
(Source of Map: Department of History, CUHK)
Exercise 1. Answer these questions:
f1. From the table above, which two countries appear most frequently in opposing
camps?
2. Where are these two countries located in the world map?
3. From your answers to questions 1 and 2, how would you divide these countries into
two camps: Britain, USA, East Germany, West Germany, North Korea, South Korea,
the People’s Republic of China, France.
Unlike the First and Second World Wars, these confrontations were not total wars.
That is to say, although in the areas in which war was conducted, many people died
and much property was destroyed, many countries which took sides in these
confrontations, such as the United States and the Soviet Union, did not see war
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touching their own territory. For the most part, from the end of the Second World War
to the 1980s, an ideological gulf divided the United States and the Soviet Union, as
the result of which, they and their allies contested for economic and military
superiority. Many countries were drawn into the two camps led by them. This
constant state of tension between the two camps was known as the Cold War.
Two ideologies
A. Communism
This is The Internationale, the song of the international communist movement. Listen
to the song and read the words, and then answer the questions that follow:
Arise, ye workers from your slumber,
Arise, ye prisoners of want.
For reason in revolt now thunders,
And at last ends the age of cant!
Away with all your superstitions,
Servile masses, arise, arise!
We'll change henceforth the old tradition,
And spurn the dust to win the prize!
Chorus:
So comrades, come rally,
And the last fight let us face.
The Internationale,
Unites the human race.
So comrades, come rally,
And the last fight let us face.
The Internationale,
Unites the human race.
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(Source: Wikipedia: The Internationale (British/Irish translation)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Internationale#English_lyrics)
The song addresses “workers,” “prisoners of want,” “servile masses,” and
“comrades,” which social class do you think these terms refer to?
Exercise 2:
You might remember that in Topic 21, you came across the French national anthem,
La Marseillaise, which called upon “the children of the fatherland” to oppose tyranny.
In comparison, the aim of the Internationale was to “unite the human race”. Which
song do you think stands for nationalism, and which one stands for internationalism?
Hint for the teacher:
The word “Internationale”, used in the title of the song and referred to in the chorus,
stands for the International Workers’ Union set up in 1864. The words, “workers”,
“prisoners of want”, “servile masses”, refer primarily to industrial workers, many of
whom were poorly paid and subjected to harsh working conditions. The word
“comrade” refers to these people being united in the same movement, working
towards the same objective of liberation. The movement, as the name of the union
implies, was international in outlook.
There are different versions of this song. The version reproduced here is the English
translation of the French original, written in 1870. After the October Revolution in
Russia, Lenin made Internationale the temporary national anthem of the Soviet Union
anthem. The Soviet Union actively promoted international communism which was
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exactly the spirit of Internationale. In the 1920s, Internationale was translated into
Chinese.
The idea that industrial workers should be united to demand better pay and working
conditions had many origins in the nineteenth century. One of the most influential
books on the subject was The Communist Manifesto, written by Karl Marx in 1848. In
The Communist Manifesto, Marx made two important points about the theory of
Communism, which became closely affiliated with the international working class
movement which was promoted by the Soviet Union. He said:
The immediate aim of the Communist is the same as that of all the other
proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the
bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat.
The theory of the Communists may be summed up in the single sentence:
abolition of private property.
(Source: The Avalon Project at Yale Law School,
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/treatise/communist_manifesto/mantwo.htm)
The word “proletarian” means the industrial working class. The word “bourgeois”
means “capitalist”, that is to say, people who owned the machines and employed
workers to operate them.
In 1918, Lenin, who emerged as the leader of the Russian Revolution, declared that it
was the policy of the Soviet Republic (later to become the U.S.S.R.) to abolish private
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ownership of land, factories, mines, railways and banks. All land, factories, mines,
railways and banks were to be owned by all the people within the state. The state,
therefore, would be led by the working class.
Internationalism, the abolition of private property, and the control of the state by the
working class, under the leadership of the Communist Party, were the essential tenets
of Communism.
The U.S.S.R. was committed to promoting Communism throughout the world. At the
end of the Second World War, the Soviet Union set up communist regimes in Eastern
Europe, including Poland, Rumania, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, East Germany and
Bulgaria. A communist camp led by the Soviet Union was formed vis-à-vis the
Western camp led by the United States and Britain.
B. Human rights
Europe was the major battlefield of the Second World War. Both victors and
vanquished were worn down by the war. As a result, the United States emerged from
the war the international leader. The United States and Western Europe did not share
the Communist ideology of the USSR. They viewed the spread of Communism
beyond the USSR as a threat.
Some ideas of the ideological differences between the US and the USSR may be seen
in President John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address in January 1961. In this speech, he
said,
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We observe today not a victory of party, but a celebration of freedom –
symbolizing an end, as well as a beginning – signifying renewal, as well as
change. For I have sworn before you and Almighty God the same solemn oath
our forebears prescribed nearly a century and three quarters ago.
The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power to
abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life. And yet the
same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue around
the globe – the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the
state, but from the hand of God.
We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the
word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has
been passed to a new generation of Americans – born in this century, tempered
by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage –
and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to
which this Nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed
today at home and around the world.
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any
price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in
order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
(Source: Inaugural Address of John F. Kennedy, 20 January 1061,
http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres56.html )
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Exercise 3. Answer this question:
In his speech, what values did Kennedy emphasize that the American new generation
should maintain and preserve? Quote the relevant phrases in his speech and explain.
Hint for the teacher:
The relevant sentences are marked and numbered below:
(1) We observe today not a victory of party, but a celebration of freedom –
symbolizing an end, as well as a beginning – signifying renewal, as well as
change. For I have sworn before you and Almighty God the same solemn oath
our forebears prescribed nearly a century and three quarters ago.
(2) The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power
to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life. (3) And yet
the same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue
around the globe – the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity
of the state, but from the hand of God.
We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the
word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that (4) the torch
has been passed to a new generation of Americans – born in this century,
tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient
heritage – and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human
rights to which this Nation has always been committed, and to which we are
216
committed today at home and around the world.
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that (5) we shall pay any
price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in
order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
Obviously, the dominant value cited in the speech was freedom and liberty. See
sentences (1) and (5).
However, closely related to that is the idea of “human rights”. See sentences (3) and
(4). Notice in sentence (3), human rights are not given by governments (that is, “the
state”), but by God. Without the religious implication, this sentence means that
everyone is entitled to human rights by virtue of being human, whether or not
governments would grant them.
Notice also the two sentences at (2). So, President Kennedy was saying that the
United States stood for freedom and human rights, but these must not be empty
promises. Human beings by the 1960s had the power to abolish poverty, and so they
must do that. They also had the power to destroy all human life, through war, and they
must prevent war.
Exercise 4. Compare the ideology of communism with the ideology of human rights.
Why would the two be in conflict?
Hint for the teacher:
This is a difficult question to answer. Notice that both ideologies believe in freedom
217
and liberty. Communism believes that private ownership of land, machines and banks
is necessary to liberate the worker, and that in order to do so, the working class must
control the state. The ideology of human rights believes that all human beings have
the same rights, and that these rights include the rights of owning property. It may be
useful to refer to the Declaration of the Rights of Man during the French Revolution
in 1789 (See Topic 15 Exercise 1), which described human rights as “liberty, property,
security and resistance to oppression”. They agree broadly with the American
Declaration of Independence written in 1776 (See Topic 14 Section 4), which
described them as “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Notice also that
Kennedy’s speech was given after he won an election. Look at sentence (1), where he
described the election as a “celebration of freedom”. The human rights ideology goes
against the idea that any one social class must control the government. Karl Marx
would have disagreed. He believed that elections did not guarantee the working class
the right of representation.
The atomic bomb
President Kennedy continued in the speech to talk about preventing war:
We dare not tempt them with weakness. For only when our arms are sufficient
beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they never be employed.
But neither can two great and powerful groups of nations take comfort from our
present course – both sides overburdened by the costs of modern weapons, both
rightly alarmed by the steady spread of the deadly atom, yet both racing to alter
that uncertain balance of terror that stays the hand of mankind’s final war.
218
So let us begin anew – remembering on both sides that civility is not a sign of
weakness, and sincerity is always subject to proof. Let us never negotiate out of
fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.
(Source: Inaugural Address of John F. Kennedy, 20 January 1061,
http://www.bartleby.com/124/pres56.html )
Exercise 5. Answer these questions:
President Kennedy’s speech referred to the “two great and powerful groups of
nations”. Which two groups of nations did he mean? He talked about the “deadly
atom” the cost for which overburden these nations and the destructiveness of which
could be described as “mankind’s final war”. What was this weapon he was referring
to?
Hint for the teacher:
Towards the end of World War II, the United States had developed the atomic bomb
and dropped two such bombs respectively on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. After
the war, the Soviet Union caught up in the research on the atomic bomb and
successfully tested one in 1949. It then became the second nuclear power in the world.
The destructive power of the atomic bomb was unprecedented. It can be divided into
four aspects:
1
Thermal radiation: Thermal radiation is the radioactive light released during a
nuclear explosion. For example, the thermal radiation released by the atomic bomb
219
dropped on Nagasaki caused immediate blindness, burnt skin and skin ulcer and the
burning of substances in areas within 7,000-metre radius from the site of explosion.
2
Blast: Blast is an enormous air current of hyper-pressure produced by a nuclear
explosion. For example, the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki completely destroyed
all buildings and organisms in areas within 650-metre radius from the site of
explosion.
3
Early stage nuclear radiation: This is the radiation produced during the first
several dozens of seconds after a nuclear explosion. For example, the atomic bomb
dropped on Nagasaki killed and wounded people in areas within 1,100-metre radius
from the site of explosion.
4
Radioactive dust: A huge mushroom-shaped cloud will appear after a nuclear
explosion and a large quantity of radioactive dust will fall when the cloud has
dissipated. When in contact with human body, the dust will burn the skin and even
cause death. Its destructive power is therefore shocking. The atomic bomb dropped on
Nagasaki caused the death of 40,000 people and the radiation inflicted many people.
Picture 64: The scene after the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima, Japan
220
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Hiroshima_aftermath.jpg
The US and the USSR competed in the race to build more powerful atomic bombs.
They also competed in building the intercontinental missiles which might effectively
carry the bombs over a long distance. Previously, an atomic bomb might destroy only
a single city, but now some atomic bombs can destroy entire countries.
No country had used an atomic bomb in war since the Second World War. However, if
more countries might build the bomb, there was always the danger that one day some
country might use it. Non-proliferation of atomic weapons has been a major item in
international negotiation. Despite that concern, besides the US and the USSR, six
countries, and possibly seven, had developed atomic bombs since the Second World
War. These six countries are: Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea.
221
Israel might also have the atomic bomb, but its government has not confirmed that
fact.
Summary
After the Second World War, the US and the USSR became the most powerful
countries in the world. They were allied separately to many countries, which formed
into two camps. The USSR camp embraced communism as a central ideology. The
US camp supported human rights as its central theme. An arms race developed
between the US and the USSR, both countries seeking superiority in atomic weapons
and intercontinental missiles. However, no war was fought with these weapons.
Instead, crisis or war on a smaller scale broke out numerous times in strategic areas
such as China, Berlin, Korea, Cuba, and Vietnam.
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Topic 25
Modern life and the environment
Objectives
To understand that while living conditions have continued to improve with
advancements in technology, the new technology has also brought about new crises.
Sample teaching plan
Technology comes into every sphere of life. Changes in technology affect most
aspects of daily life. Some examples of these changes are cited here to illustrate these
changes.
1. The technology of travel
Exercise 1.
Think of a trip you took outside Hong Kong. For this trip, write down the following
information on a sheet of paper:
a
Name of destination
b
Distance between Hong Kong and the destination (make use of your knowledge
in geography, mark the destination on a map and calculate the distance from
Hong Kong)
c
The transportation used to go from Hong Kong to your destination (boat,
aeroplane?)
d
The time required to reach the destination from Hong Kong
Now, note the following information about travel in the past:
Before the use of steamships, it took 120 days to travel from Britain to China on
223
high-speed sailing boats.
With the emergence of steamships, the same journey from Britain to China was
reduced to 77 days.
When the Suez Canal was opened in 1869, steamships which ran between Britain and
China in the 1870s required 50 days to complete the journey. By 1882, the fastest
steamship could reach go from China to Britain in 29 days.
Nowadays, it takes about 11 hours to fly to Britain from Hong Kong.
Answer the following questions:
1. Compare the time you spent reaching your destination with what someone might
have taken in the past. How much time have you saved thanks to more efficient means
of transport?
2. Why has faster means of transport promoted more travelling?
3. What fuel is used in aeroplanes? What happens when the fuel is consumed and gas
is transmitted into the sky?
Hint for the teacher
Nowadays, most travellers abroad fly. Your students may remember how much time
their journey took, or can look it up on the internet. Simple arithmetic and a map will
give some idea of the time taken by a sailing ship or a steamer. Of course, it takes
much less time nowadays to reach our destinations. Short travel time encourages
travel, because most people cannot take off for long holidays. Also, a long journey by
boat is likely to cost much more than a short flight. However, technology advances
224
come at a cost. In the case of air travel, aeroplanes consume a great deal of petrol and
emit carbon dioxide.
2
The application of electricity to everyday life
Exercise 2.
Make a list of the electrical appliances used every day in your home, e.g. electric
lights, air-conditioner, television, washing machine, refrigerator, computer, telephone,
rice cooker, electric water heater.
Try to think what changes you must make to your life if all these appliances are not
available for one day. Keep a diary for that imagined day, share and discuss it in class.
Why do electrical appliances work? What fuel is consumed to produce electricity?
What happens to the environment when the fuel is consumed?
Hint for the teacher
Electrical home appliances give us a great deal of convenience, and without them, our
houses will be dark and hot, and we shall find it hard to work at night. We shall also
have to give up much home entertainment (the television, radio, recorded music and
computer games). The washing machine will not work, and clothes will have to be
hand-washed. Not to be forgotten is that without electricity, quite a lot of the work
which we now conduct in factories will have to be done at home. For example, it is
possible to buy ready-made clothes because it is cheaper to produce them in factories
run on electricity. In the days before there was electricity, mothers made clothes for
225
the family by hand. Cooking, cleaning and washing would take up so much time that
most women would not be able to work outside the home.
Again, the convenience brought by electricity comes at a cost. Power stations
consume gas or oil, and the supplies of these fuels are limited. As cost goes up,
nuclear fuel becomes more attractive, but there is, as yet, no perfect solution to the
disposal of nuclear waste.
3. Leading a longer life and its social consequence
There is little doubt that with technological changes, the quality of life has improved.
One indication of that is that we have, on the whole, been living longer.
Exercise 3
Look at the following graph of the population of Hong Kong between 1947 and 2000.
Population Census of Hong Kong, 1947-2000
Year
Birth rate
Death rate
Infant
Total
(per thousand)
(per thousand)
mortality (per
population
thousand)
(million)
1947
24
8
102
1.80
1948
26
8
91
1.80
1949
30
9
99
1.86
1950
27
8
100
2.06
1951
34
10
92
2.07
1952
34
9
77
2.18
226
1953
34
8
74
2.30
1954
35
8
72
2.42
1955
36
8
66
2.55
1956
37
7
61
2.67
1957
36
7
56
2.79
1958
37
7
54
2.91
1959
35
7
48
3.02
1960
36
6
42
3.12
1961
35
6.1
37.7
3.17
1962
34
6.3
36.9
3.31
1963
33.5
6.0
32.9
3.42
1964
30.7
5.3
26.4
3.50
1965
28.1
5.0
23.7
3.60
1966
25.3
5.3
24.9
3.63
1967
23.7
5.4
25.6
3.72
1968
21.7
5.1
23.0
3.80
1969
21.4
5.0
21.8
3.86
1970
20.0
5.1
19.6
4.00
1971
19.7
5.0
18.4
4.05
1972
19.5
5.2
17.4
4.12
1973
19.5
5.0
16.4
4.21
1974
19.3
5.1
16.8
4.32
1975
18.2
4.9
14.9
4.40
1976
17.7
5.1
13.7
4.44
1977
17.7
5.2
13.5
4.51
227
1978
17.6
5.2
11.8
4.60
1979
17.0
5.2
12.3
4.88
1980
17.1
5.0
11.2
5.04
1981
16.9
4.8
9.7
5.15
1982
16.5
4.9
9.9
5.23
1983
15.7
5.0
10.1
5.31
1984
14.4
4.8
9.1
5.36
1985
14.0
4.6
7.6
5.50
1986
13.0
4.7
7.7
5.52
1987
12.6
4.8
7.5
5.58
1988
13.4
4.9
7.6
5.60
1989
12.3
5.1
6.9
5.69
1990
12.0
5.2
5.9
5.70
1991
12.0
5.0
6.5
5.75
1992
12.3
5.3
4.9
5.80
1993
12.0
5.2
4.7
5.90
1994
11.9
5.0
4.8
6.04
1995
11.2
5.1
4.4
6.16
1996
9.8
5.0
4.0
6.31
1997
9.0
4.9
4.0
6.49
1998
8.0
5.0
3.2
6.54
1999
7.6
5.0
3.2
6.61
2000
8.1
5.1
2.9
6.66
(Source: Hong Kong Statistics 1947-1967, Hong Kong: Census & Statistics Department,
Hong Kong, 1969, pp.39-40; Hong Kong Annual Digest of Statistics 1982-2001, Hong Kong:
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Census and Statistics Department, 1983-2002; Hong Kong Population Projections 1971-1991,
Hong Kong: Census and Statistics Department, 1974.)
Answer these questions:
(1) In what year between 1947 and 2000 was the birth rate highest? In what year was
it lowest?
(2) In what year between 1947 and 2000 was the death rate highest? In what year was
it lowest?
(3) How many babies out of every 1,000 died in 1947? How many died in 2000?
(4) What conclusion can you draw about population increase from the answers to the
three questions above?
(5) Why were fewer babies born in the 1970s than in the 1950s? Why did fewer
people die in the 1970s than the 1950s? Why did fewer babies die in the 1970s than
the 1950s?
Hint for the teacher:
Hong Kong’s population depends on immigration and emigration as well as on birth
and death. For this reason, the vital statistics (that is, birth rates and death rates) given
in the graph is not the only reason for population changes over the years, even though
they remain one of the important reasons for these changes.
In general, the graph shows a rising birth rate until the 1970s and a declining death
rate throughout. The decline in the birth rate during the 1970s can be ascribed to the
practice of family planning, introduced from that time. The decline in the overall
death rate represents better health and medical care, and that in infant mortality (death
of babies at birth) the improvement in delivery service. Birth control is necessary if
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infant mortality falls, for otherwise, population increase will quickly outrun increases
in productivity and the living standard will decline.
A declining death rate means that people are living longer. A falling birth rate means
that fewer babies are born. Together, they imply that the population is ageing. When a
population ages, the demand on social welfare services increases while the tax-paying
portion of the population declines. Taxes charged on tax-payers must, therefore,
increase in order to pay for the social services.
4
Diseases – A protracted war
Throughout history, epidemics have led to large numbers of deaths. The following
table provides some information on various epidemics that swept large parts of the
world and the number of people who died from them.
Year
Main area of
Disease
No. of deaths
infection
1347-1352
Europe
The plague
25 million
1556-1560
Europe
Influenza
25 million
1855-1896
Asia
The plague
10 million
1918-1919
World
Influenza
25 million
2002-2003
China
SARS
775 persons
(Source: Wikipedia, http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%98%9F%E7%96%AB)
As you can see in the table, the plague and the spread of influenza at different times
killed millions of people. Compared to them, the number of people who died from
SARS was relatively small. You might remember that SARS was identified in
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Guangdong in February 2003 and spread to Hong Kong in March. For a short while, it
looked as if it might spread like deadly forms of influenza in the past, but fortunately,
it was controlled by June.
Exercise 4. Look up the newspapers or reports of SARS on the internet for what
happened from March to June 2003 in Hong Kong. How was SARS put under control
so rapidly?
Advances in medical technology has made it possible to identify diseases quickly and
to develop cures for them. However, despite these advances, some diseases have
remained incurable. An example of an incurable disease is AIDS (or HIV). Since its
discovery in 1981 to 2004, 23 million people had died from AIDS. Because it is
known that in many cases, the disease is transmitted through sexual contact with a
person who has contracted the disease, medical agencies seek to prevent its spread by
educating the public on methods of prevention. No cure is as yet available.
5. The role of NGOs (non-government agencies) in spreading the new technology
Governments deal with many of the problems that have arisen with technological
advances. However, governments alone have not been adequate and many
non-government agencies (NGO’s) are also involved in that effort. The following are
examples of some of these organisations:
Medicines sans frontiers (Medicine without frontier)
Medicines sans frontiers is an international and humanitarian medical rescue
organisation. Since its inception in 1971, it has focused on providing emergency
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medical assistance to victims affected by wars, natural disasters and diseases. It also
provides basic medical services to regions without sufficient medical facilities and
helps these regions to rebuild their medical system in order to achieve self-sufficiency.
Currently, it works in more than 70 countries in the world. Every year more than
3,000 volunteers, including doctors, nurses, rear professionals, drinking water and
health engineers and management personnel, from more than 60 countries, go to
different places to participate in humanitarian work. In 1999, it was awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize. See its website at http://www.msf.org.hk/public/main
Green Peace
Green Peace is a global environmental organisation endeavouring to protect the
earth’s environment and world peace. It was set up in 1971 and currently has branches
in more than 40 countries, and works with 2.8 million supporters. In order to maintain
justice and independence, Green Peace does not receive any sponsorship from
governments, enterprises or political organisations. It only receives direct donations
from individuals and independent funds. See its website at
http://www.greenpeace.org/china/en
WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature)
World Wide Fund for Nature is one of the most prestigious and largest independent
non-governmental environmental protection organisations in the world. It has active
networks in more than 90 countries and almost 5 million supporters throughout the
world. Its mission is environmental protection. It wants to contain the deterioration of
the earth’s natural environment and to create a bright future for humans to live
harmoniously with nature. To achieve these aims, the organisation endeavours to
protect the diversity of organisms in the world, ensure the sustainability of renewable
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resources, promote pollution reduction and reduce consumer behaviour which causes
waste. See its website at http://www.wwfchina.org.
Exercise 5.
Answer these questions:
Why are governments inadequate in dealing with medical facilities in times of
disasters or environmental protection? Why must these issues require international
efforts?
Hint for the teacher
Many governments are too poor to do very much about welfare or the environment.
Governments in rich countries may also have agendas which suit their own national
interests more than those of the countries which require aid. Non-governmental
organizations which cross national boundaries create a new international order which
goes beyond national interests. Many environmental disasters are global in character,
and they have to be dealt with outside the framework of national interests.
Summary
Technological progress has brought many conveniences. In the second half of the
20th century, we have lived longer lives. Some technological advances have been
devasting to the global environment, and the danger of epidemics has not disappeared.
Much work now requires an international effort.
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Topic 26: Revision
1. Compare the two following pictures of the same city in England. One of them was
drawn in the eighteenth century and the other one in the nineteenth century. Which is
which? Give some reasons for your answer.
Picture A
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/ITmanchester.htm
(Source of Picture:
Picture B
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Image%3ACottonopolis1.jpg
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2. On 1 January 1938, the President of the Chinese Nationalist government Lin Sen
said in a speech:
We demand final victory, and we will fight a protracted war of resistance. In this
protracted war, any temporary military retreat is only the loss of a battle. It will not
affect the overall outcome of the war... The weaknesses of Japan are too many. Its
soldiers are mostly grassroots workers. Once their young men have been conscripted,
students abandon school, farmers cease to farm, merchants cease to trade and workers
cease to produce. As time goes by, Japan cannot hold out. The more land it occupies
and the longer the frontlines of war, the sooner will come its defeat. We must drag the
war on and wear down our enemy’s military and financial strengths so that its
economic structure and military advantages will collapse simultaneously.
Source: 朱匯森主編，《中華民國史事紀要》，（中華民國二十七年一至六月份），
台北：國史館，1989，頁 2-3。
In 1940, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said to the British Parliament:
There is another more obvious difference from 1914. The whole of the warring
nations are engaged, not only soldiers, but the entire population, men, women, and
children. The fronts are everywhere. The trenches are dug in the towns and streets.
Every village is fortified. Every road is barred. The front line runs through the
factories. The workmen are soldiers with different weapons but the same courage.
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Would it be fair to conclude from these two passages that both prime ministers
believed that the Second World War was a “total war”? Explain what the term “total
war” means and quote the sentences in these two passages which support your
argument.
(Source: Winston Churchill, “The Few”, August 20, 1940
http://www.fiftiesweb.com/usa/winston-churchill-so-few.htm)
3. Looking at these two pictures, how would you argue that advances in industry in
the nineteenth century improved the power of weapons used on ships?
A.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Redoutable.jpg
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B.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:HMS_Ocean_%28Canopus-class_battleship
%29.jpg .
4. Some words come together because they suggest a common ideology. Which of the
following words can be grouped together to illustrate the ideology of nationalism and
which the ideology of communism: fatherland, abolition of private property, October
Revolution, common language, colony, decolonisation? Summarise these two
ideologies using the words you have placed in each group.
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5. The following points may be made about Japan’s Meiji Constitution:

Divine power of the emperor who was infallible

Citizens were the emperor’s subjects

Legislative and executive powers vested in the emperor

Military power belonged to the emperor directly
It may be concluded from these points that the Japanese parliament (known as the
Diet) had little control over the military. Why would these observations be relevant to
an explanation of war between China and Japan in the 1930s?
6. In order to sell soap, a soap company in the nineteenth century produced the
following advertisement:
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(Source of Picture: Department of History, CUHK. The original picture could be found at
Wikimedia Commons,
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:1890sc_Pears_Soap_Ad.jpg )
The main point of the advertisement is that “the first step towards lightening the white
man’s burden is through teaching the virtues of cleanliness.” What is the “the white
man’s burden”? Why does teaching the virtues of cleanliness lighten it?
7. The following cartoon depicts Japanese attack on Manchuria (China’s northeastern
provinces) in 1931 and its efforts to set up a new country there known as Manchukuo.
You can see that the governments of many countries, and the world, are looking on.
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What is the artist trying to say about this incident?
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/linglong/index.html
(Source: Ling Long Women’s Magazine, 1932, issue no. 70. Image from Columbia
University Library)
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8. Look at the following table of Hong Kong’s population growth from 1947 to 1966.
Describe the trends in the birth rate and death rate. Why were death rates declining?
What conclusion would you draw about Hong Kong’s population growth in this
period on the basis of the figures?
Hong Kong Population, 1947-1967
Year
Birth rate (per
Death rate (per
No. of stillborn
Total
thousand)
thousand)
babies (per
population
thousand births)
(million)
1947
24
8
102
1.80
1951
34
10
92
2.07
1956
37
7
61
2.67
1961
34
6
38
3.20
1966
25
5
25
3.78
9. Looking at the three passages below, why do you think Europeans and Americans
believe that freedom is a human right?
Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. One thinks himself the master of
others, and still remains a greater slave than they. (Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social
Contract, 1762.)
Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions may be founded
only upon the general good....The aim of all political association is the preservation of
the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property,
security, and resistance to oppression. (The Declaration of the Rights of Man, 1789)
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We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the word go
forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed
to a new generation of Americans – born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined
by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage – and unwilling to witness or
permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this Nation has always been
committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world. (U.S.
President John F. Kennedy, 1961)
10. The Japanese writer Fukuzawa Yukichi wrote in 1871:
Look at the progress of the West. Their various types of electric and steam engines are
always new and changing as a result of their competition against one another for
improvement. This is true not only of tangible machines, but of other aspects as well.
As people become enlightened, their circles of contacts broaden. The broader the
circles of contacts become, the more harmonious their relationships. Hence,
international law is used to limit war.
Fukuzawa wrote the above passage before the First and Second World Wars.
Knowing the history of these wars, would you agree with him that as science and
engineering advance, people would become more enlightened and harmonious? Use
your knowledge of twentieth-century history as evidence for your argument.
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