Early European History

Anne Soulard, Charles Franks, Robert Fite, and the Online Distributed

Proofreading Team.

EARLY EUROPEAN HISTORY

BY

HUTTON WEBSTER, PH.D.

"There is no part of history so generally useful as that which relates to the progress of the human mind, the gradual improvement of reason, the successive advances of science, the vicissitudes of learning and ignorance, which are the light and darkness of thinking beings, the extinction and resuscitation of arts, and the revolutions of the intellectual world." —SAMUEL JOHNSON, Rasselas.

PREFACE

This book aims to furnish a concise and connected account of human progress during ancient, medieval, and early modern times. It should meet the requirements of those high schools and preparatory schools where ancient history, as a separate discipline, is being supplanted by a more extended course introductory to the study of recent times and contemporary problems. Such a course was first outlined by the Regents of the University of the State of New York in their Syllabus for Secondary Schools, issued in 1910.

Since the appearance of the Regents' Syllabus the Committee of Five of the American Historical Association has made its Report (1911), suggesting a rearrangement of the curriculum which would permit a year's work in English and Continental history. Still more recently the Committee on Social Studies of the Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Education, in its Report (1916) to the National Education Association has definitely recommended the division of European history into two parts, of which the first should include ancient and Oriental civilization, English and Continental history to approximately the end of the seventeenth century, and the period of American exploration.

The first twelve chapters of the present work are based upon the author's Ancient History, published four years ago. In spite of many omissions, it has been possible to follow without essential modification the plan of the earlier volume. A number of new maps and illustrations have been added to these chapters.

The selection of collateral reading, always a difficult problem in the secondary school, is doubly difficult when so much ground must be covered in a single course. The author ventures, therefore, to call attention to his Readings in Ancient History. Its purpose, in the words of the preface, is "to provide immature pupils with a variety of extended, unified, and interesting extracts on matters which a textbook treats with necessary, though none the less deplorable, condensation." A companion volume, entitled Readings in Medieval and Modern History, will be published shortly. References to both books are inserted in footnotes.

At the end of what has been a long and engrossing task, it becomes a pleasant duty to acknowledge the help which has been received from teachers in school and college. Various chapters, either in manuscript or in the proofs, have been read by Professor James M. Leake of Bryn Mawr College; Professor J. C. Hildt of Smith College; Very Rev. Patrick J. Healy, Professor of Church History in the Catholic University of America; Professor E. F. Humphrey of Trinity College; Dr. James Sullivan, Director of the Division of Archives and History, State Dept. of Education of New York; Constantine E. McGuire, Assistant Secretary General, International High Commission, Washington; Miss Margaret E. McGill, of the Newton (Mass.) High School; and Miss Mabel Chesley, of the Erasmus Hall High School, Brooklyn. The author would also express appreciation of the labors of the cartographers, artists, and printers, to whose accuracy and skill every page of the book bears witness.

HUTTON WEBSTER

LINCOLN, NEBRASKA, February, 1917

[Illustration: ANCIENT AND MEDIEVAL GEMS.
1 Steatite from Crete, two lions with forefeet on a pedestal, above
a sun
2 Sardonyx from Elis, a goddess holding up a goat by the horns
3 Rock crystal a bearded Triton
4 Carnelian, a youth playing a trigonon
5 Chalcedony from Athens, a Bacchante
6 Sard, a woman reading a manuscript roll, before her a lyre
7 Carnelian, Theseus
8 Chalcedony, portrait head, Hellenistic Age
9 Aquamarine, portrait of Julia daughter of the emperor Titus
10 Chalcedony, portrait head, Hellenistic Age
11 Carnelian, bust portrait of the Roman emperor Decius
12 Beryl, portrait of Julia Domna wife of the emperor Septimius
Severus
13 Sapphire, head of the Madonna
14 Carnelian, the judgment of Paris, Renaissance work
15 Rock crystal, Madonna with Jesus and St. Joseph, probably Norman
Sicilian work]

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

LIST OF MAPS

LIST OF PLATES

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY

CHAPTER

I. THE AGES BEFORE HISTORY.

1. The Study of History 2. Prehistoric Peoples 3. Domestication of Animals and Plants 4. Writing and the Alphabet 5. Primitive Science and Art 6. Historic Peoples

II. THE LANDS AND PEOPLES OF THE EAST TO ABOUT 500 B.C.

7. Physical Asia
8. Babylonia and Egypt
9. The Babylonians and the Egyptians
10. The Phoenicians and the Hebrews
11. The Assyrians
12. The World Empire of Persia

III. ORIENTAL CIVILIZATION.

13. Social Classes 14. Economic Conditions 15. Commerce and Trade Routes 16. Law and Morality 17. Religion 18. Literature and Art 19. Science and Education

IV. THE LANDS OF THE WEST AND THE RISE OF GREECE TO ABOUT 500 B.C.

20. Physical Europe 21. Greece and the Aegean 22. The Aegean Age (to about 1100 B.C.) 23. The Homeric Age (about 1100-750 B.C.) 24. Early Greek Religion 25. Religious Institutions—Oracles and Games 26. The Greek City-State 27. The Growth of Sparta (to 500 B.C.) 28. The Growth of Athens (to 500 B.C.) 29. Colonial Expansion of Greece (about 750-500 B.C.) 30. Bonds of Union among the Greeks

V. THE GREAT AGE OF THE GREEK REPUBLICS TO 362 B.C.

31. The Perils of Hellas 32. Expeditions of Darius against Greece 33. Xerxes and the Great Persian War 34. Athens under Themistocles, Aristides, and Cimon 35. Athens under Pericles 36. The Peloponnesian War, 431-404 B.C. 37. The Spartan and Theban Supremacies, 404-362 B.C. 38. Decline of the City-State

VI. MINGLING OF EAST AND WEST AFTER 359 B.C.

39. Philip and the Rise of Macedonia 40. Demosthenes and the End of Greek Freedom 41. Alexander the Great 42. Conquest of Persia and the Far East, 334-323 B.C. 43. The Work of Alexander 44. Hellenistic Kingdoms and Cities 45. The Hellenistic Age 46. The Graeco-Oriental World

VII. THE RISE OF ROME TO 264 B.C.

47. Italy and Sicily 48. The Peoples of Italy 49. The Romans 50. Early Roman Society 51. Roman Religion 52. The Roman City State 53. Expansion of Rome over Italy, 509 (?)-264 B.C. 54. Italy under Roman Rule 55. The Roman Army

VIII. THE GREAT AGE OF THE ROMAN REPUBLIC, 264-31 B.C.

56. The Rivals Rome and Carthage, 264-218 B.C.
57. Hannibal and the Great Punic War, 218-201 B.C.
58. Roman Supremacy in the West and in the East, 201-133 B.C.
59. The Mediterranean World under Roman Rule
60. The Gracchi
61. Marius and Sulla
62. Pompey and Caesar
63. The Work of Caesar
64. Antony and Octavian
65. The End of an Epoch

IX. THE EARLY EMPIRE: THE WORLD UNDER ROMAN RULE, 31 B.C.-l80 A.D.

66. Augustus, 31 B.C.-l4 A.D. 67. The Successors of Augustus, 14-96 A.D. 68. The "Good Emperors," 96-180 A.D. 69. The Provinces of the Roman Empire 70. The Roman Law and the Latin Language 71. The Municipalities of the Roman Empire 72. Economic and Social Conditions in the First and Second Centuries 73. The Graeco-Roman World

X. THE LATER EMPIRE: CHRISTIANITY IN THE ROMAN WORLD, 180-395 A.D.

74. The "Soldier Emperors," 180-284 A.D. 75. The "Absolute Emperors," 284-395 A.D. 76. Economic and Social Conditions in the Third and Fourth Centuries 77. The Preparation for Christianity 78. Rise and Spread of Christianity 79. The Persecutions 80. Triumph of Christianity 81. Christian Influence on Society

XI. THE GERMANS TO 476 A.D.

82. Germany and the Germans 83. Breaking of the Danube Barrier 84. Breaking of the Rhine Barrier 85. Inroads of the Huns 86. End of the Roman Empire in the West, 476 A.D. 87. Germanic Influence on Society

XII. CLASSICAL CIVILIZATION.

88. The Classical City
89. Education and the Condition of Children
90. Marriage and the Position of Women
91. The Home and Private Life
92. Amusements
93. Slavery
94. Greek Literature
95. Greek Philosophy
96. Roman Literature
97. Greek Architecture
98. Greek Sculpture
99. Roman Architecture and Sculpture
100. Artistic Athens
101. Artistic Rome

XIII. WESTERN EUROPE DURING THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES, 476-962 A.D.

102. The Ostrogoths in Italy, 488-553 A.D. 103. The Lombards in Italy, 568-774 A.D. 104. The Franks under Clovis and His Successors 105. The Franks under Charles Martel and Pepin the Short 106. The Reign of Charlemagne, 768-814 A.D. 107. Charlemagne and the Revival of the Roman Empire, 800 A.D. 108. Disruption of Charlemagne's Empire, 814-870 A.D. 109. Germany under Saxon Kings, 919-973 A.D. 110. Otto the Great and the Restoration of the Roman Empire, 962 A.D. 111. The Anglo-Saxons in Britain, 449-839 A.D. 112. Christianity in the British Isles 113. The Fusion of Germans and Romans

XIV. EASTERN EUROPE DURING THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES, 395-1095 A.D.

114. The Roman Empire in the East 115. The Reign of Justinian, 527-565 A.D. 116. The Empire and its Asiatic Foes 117. The Empire and its Foes in Europe 118. Byzantine Civilization 119. Constantinople

XV. THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH IN THE EAST AND IN THE WEST TO 1054 A.D.

120. Development of the Christian Church 121. Eastern Christianity 122. Western Christianity: Rise of the Papacy 123. Growth of the Papacy 124. Monasticism 125. Life and Work of the Monks 126. Spread of Christianity over Europe 127. Separation of Eastern and Western Christianity 128. The Greek Church 129. The Roman Church

XVI. THE ORIENT AGAINST THE OCCIDENT: RISE AND SPREAD OF ISLAM, 622-1058 A.D.

130. Arabia and the Arabs 131. Mohammed: Prophet and Statesman, 622-632 A.D. 132. Islam and the Koran 133. Expansion of Islam in Asia and Egypt 134. Expansion of Islam in North Africa and Spain 135. The Caliphate and its Disruption, 632-1058 A.D. 136. Arabian Civilization 137. The Influence of Islam

XVII. THE NORTHMEN AND THE NORMANS TO 1066 A.D.

138. Scandinavia and the Northmen 139. The Viking Age 140. Scandinavian Heathenism 141. The Northmen in the West 142. The Northmen in the East 143. Normandy and the Normans 144. Conquest of England by the Danes; Alfred the Great 145. Norman Conquest of England; William the Conqueror 146. Results of the Norman Conquest 147. Norman Conquest of Southern Italy and Sicily 148. The Normans in European History

XVIII. FEUDALISM

149. Rise of Feudalism
150. Feudalism as a System of Local Government
151. Feudal Justice
152. Feudal Warfare
153. The Castle and Life of the Nobles
154. Knighthood and Chivalry
155. Feudalism as a System of Local Industry
156. The Village and Life of the Peasants
157. Serfdom
158. Decline of Feudalism

XIX THE PAPACY AND THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE, 962-1273 A.D.

159. Characteristics of the Medieval Church 160. Church Doctrine and Worship 161. Church Jurisdiction 162. The Secular Clergy 163. The Regular Clergy 164. The Friars 165. Power of the Papacy 166. Popes and Emperors, 962-1122 A.D. 167. Popes and Emperors, 1122-1273 A.D. 168. Significance of the Medieval Church

XX. THE OCCIDENT AGAINST THE ORIENT, THE CRUSADES, 1095-1291 A.D.

169. Causes of the Crusades 170. First Crusade, 1095-1099 A.D. 171. Crusaders' States in Syria 172. Second Crusade, 1147-1149 A.D., and Third Crusade, 1189-1192 A.D. 173. Fourth Crusade and the Latin Empire of Constantinople, 1202-1261 A.D. 174. Results of the Crusades

XXI THE MONGOLS AND THE OTTOMAN TURKS TO 1453 A.D.

175. The Mongols
176. Conquests of the Mongols, 1206-1405 A.D.
177. The Mongols in China and India
178. The Mongols in Eastern Europe
179. The Ottoman Turks and their Conquests, 1227-1453 A.D.
180. The Ottoman Turks in Southeastern Europe

XXII. EUROPEAN NATIONS DURING THE LATER MIDDLE AGES

181. Growth of the Nations
182. England under William the Conqueror, 1066-1087 A.D., the Norman
Kingship
183. England under Henry II, 1154-1189 A.D., Royal Justice and the
Common Law
184. The Great Charter, 1215 A.D.
185. Parliament during the Thirteenth Century
186. Expansion of England under Edward I, 1272-1307 A.D.
187. Unification of France, 987-1328 A.D.
188. The Hundred Years' War between England and France, 1337-1453 A.D.
189. The Unification of Spain (to 1492 A.D.)
190. Austria and the Swiss Confederation, 1273-1499 A.D.
191. Expansion of Germany

XXIII. EUROPEAN CITIES DURING THE LATER MIDDLE AGES

192. Growth of the Cities 193. City Life 194. Civic Industry—the Guilds 195. Trade and Commerce 196. Money and Banking 197. Italian Cities 198. German Cities, the Hanseatic League 199. The Cities of Flanders

XXIV. MEDIEVAL CIVILIZATION

200. Formation of National Languages 201. Development of National Literatures 202. Romanesque and Gothic Architecture, the Cathedrals 203. Education, the Universities 204. Scholasticism 205. Science and Magic 206. Popular Superstitions 207. Popular Amusements and Festivals 208. Manners and Customs

XXV. THE RENAISSANCE

209. Meaning of the Renaissance 210. Revival of Learning in Italy 211. Paper and Printing 212. Revival of Art in Italy 213. Revival of Learning and Art beyond Italy 214. The Renaissance in Literature 215. The Renaissance in Education 216. The Scientific Renaissance 217. The Economic Renaissance

XXVI. GEOGRAPHICAL DISCOVERY AND COLONIZATION

218. Medieval Geography
219. Aids to Exploration
220. To the Indies Eastward—Prince Henry and Da Gama
221. The Portuguese Colonial Empire
222. To the Indies Westward: Columbus and Magellan
223. The Indians
224. Spanish Explorations and Conquests in America
225. The Spanish Colonial Empire
226. French and English Explorations in America
227. The Old World and the New

XXVII. THE REFORMATION AND THE RELIGIOUS WARS, 1517-1648 A.D.

228. Decline of the Papacy 229. Heresies and Heretics 230. Martin Luther and the Beginning of the Reformation in Germany, 1517-1522 A.D. 231. Charles V and the Spread of the German Reformation, 1519-1556 A.D. 232. The Reformation in Switzerland: Zwingli and Calvin 233. The English Reformation, 1533-1558 A.D. 234. The Protestant Sects 235. The Catholic Counter Reformation 236. Spain under Philip II, 1556-1598 A.D. 237. Revolt of the Netherlands 238. England under Elizabeth, 1558-1603 A.D. 239. The Huguenot Wars in France 240. The Thirty Years' War, 1618-1648 A.D.

XXVIII. ABSOLUTISM IN FRANCE AND ENGLAND, 1603-1715 A.D.

241. The Divine Right of Kings 242. The Absolutism of Louis XIV, 1661-1715 A.D. 243. France under Louis XIV 244. The Wars of Louis XIV 245. The Absolutism of the Stuarts, 1603-1642 A.D. 246. Oliver Cromwell and the Civil War, 1642-1649 A.D. 247. The Commonwealth and the Protectorate, 1649-1660 A.D. 248. The Restoration and the "Glorious Revolution," 1660-1689 A.D. 249. England in the Seventeenth Century

APPENDIX—Table of Events and Dates

INDEX AND PRONOUNCING VOCABULARY

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Disk of Phaestus.
A Papyrus Manuscript.
A Prehistoric Egyptian Grave.
A Hatchet of the Early Stone Age.
Arrowheads of the Later Stone Age.
Early Roman Bar Money.
Various Signs of Symbolic Picture Writing.
Mexican Rebus.
Chinese Picture Writing and Later Conventional Characters.
Cretan Writing.
Egyptian and Babylonian Writing.
The Moabite Stone (Louvre, Paris).
Head of a Girl (Musée S. Germain, Paris).
Sketch of Mammoth on a Tusk found in a Cave in France.
Bison painted on the Wall of a Cave.
Cave Bear drawn on a Pebble.
Wild Horse on the Wall of a Cave in Spain.
A Dolmen.
Carved Menhir.
Race Portraiture of the Egyptians.
The Great Wall of China.
Philae.
Top of Monument containing the Code of Hammurabi (British Museum,
London).
Khufu (Cheops), Builder of the Great Pyramid.
Menephtah, the supposed Pharaoh of the Exodus.
Head of Mummy of Rameses II (Museum of Gizeh).
The Great Pyramid.
The Great Sphinx.
A Phoenician War Galley.
An Assyrian.
An Assyrian Relief (British Museum, London).
The Ishtar Gate, Babylon.
The Tomb of Cyrus the Great.
Darius with his Attendants.
Rock Sepulchers of the Persian Kings.
A Royal Name in Hieroglyphics (Rosetta Stone).
An Egyptian Court Scene.
Plowing and Sowing in Ancient Egypt.
Transport of an Assyrian Colossus.
Egyptian weighing Cow Gold.
Babylonian Contract Tablet.
An Egyptian Scarab.
Amenhotep IV.
Mummy and Cover of Coffin (U.S. National Museum, Washington).
The Judgment of the Dead.
The Deluge Tablet (British Museum, London).
An Egyptian Temple (Restored).
An Egyptian Wooden Statue (Museum of Gizeh).
An Assyrian Palace (Restored).
An Assyrian Winged Human headed Bull.
An Assyrian Hunting Scene (British Museum, London).
A Babylonian Map of the World.
An Egyptian Scribe (Louvre, Paris).
Excavations at Nippur.
Excavations at Troy.
Lions' Gate, Mycenae.
Silver Fragment from Mycenae (National Museum, Athens).
A Cretan Girl (Museum of Candia, Crete).
Aegean Snake Goddess (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).
A Cretan Cupbearer (Museum of Candia, Crete).
The François Vase (Archaeological Museum, Florence).
Consulting the Oracle at Delphi.
The Discus Thrower (Lancelotti Palace, Rome).
Athlete using the Strigil (Vatican Gallery, Rome).
"Temple of Neptune," Paestum.
Croesus on the Pyre.
Persian Archers (Louvre, Paris).
Gravestone of Aristion (National Museum, Athens).
Greek Soldiers in Arms.
The Mound at Marathon.
A Themistocles Ostrakon (British Museum, London).
An Athenian Trireme (Reconstruction).
"Theseum".
Pericles (British Museum, London).
An Athenian Inscription.
The "Mourning Athena" (Acropolis Museum, Athens).
A Silver Coin of Syracuse.
Philip II.
Demosthenes (Vatican Museum, Rome).
Alexander (Glyptothek, Munich).
The Alexander Mosaic (Naples Museum).
A Greek Cameo (Museum, Vienna).
The Dying Gaul (Capitoline Museum, Rome).
A Graeco-Etruscan Chariot (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).
An Etruscan Arch.
Characters of the Etruscan Alphabet.
An Early Roman Coin.
A Roman Farmer's Calendar.
Cinerary Urns in Terra Cotta (Vatican Museum, Rome).
A Vestal Virgin.
Suovetaurilia (Louvre, Paris).
An Etruscan Augur.
Coop with Sacred Chickens.
Curule Chair and Fasces.
The Appian Way.
A Roman Legionary.
A Roman Standard Bearer (Bonn Museum).
Column of Duilius (Restored).
A Carthaginian or Roman Helmet (British Museum, London).
A Testudo.
Storming a City (Reconstruction).
Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus (Spada Palace, Rome).
Marcus Tullius Cicero (Vatican Museum, Rome).
Gaius Julius Caesar (British Museum, London).
A Roman Coin with the Head of Julius Caesar.
Augustus (Vatican Museum, Rome).
Monumentum Ancyranum.
Pompeii.
Nerva (Vatican Museum, Rome).
Column of Trajan.
The Pantheon.
The Tomb of Hadrian.
Marcus Aurelius in his Triumphal Car (Palace of the Conservatori, Rome).
Wall of Hadrian in Britain.
Roman Baths, at Bath, England.
A Roman Freight Ship.
A Roman Villa.
A Roman Temple.
The Amphitheater at Arles.
A Megalith at Baalbec
The Wall of Rome
A Mithraic Monument
Modern Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives
Madonna and Child
Christ the Good Shepherd (Imperial Museum, Constantinople)
Interior of the Catacombs
The Labarum
Arch of Constantine
Runic Alphabet
A Page of the Gothic Gospels (Reduced)
An Athenian School (Royal Museum, Berlin)
A Roman School Scene
Youth reading a Papyrus Roll
House of the Vettii at Pompeii (Restored)
Atrium of a Pompeian House
Pompeian Floor Mosaic
Peristyle of a Pompeian House
A Greek Banquet
A Roman Litter
Theater of Dionysus, Athens
A Dancing Girl
The Circus Maximus (Restoration)
Gladiators
A Slave's Collar
Sophocles (Lateran Museum, Rome)
Socrates (Vatican Museum, Rome)
Corner of a Doric Façade
Corner of an Ionic Façade
Corinthian Capital
Composite Capital
Tuscan Capital
Interior View of the Ulpian Basilica (Restoration)
A Roman Aqueduct
The Colosseum (Exterior)
The Colosseum (Interior)
A Roman Cameo
Tomb of Theodoric at Ravenna
Charlemagne (Lateran Museum Rome)
The Iron Crown of Lombardy
Cathedral at Aix la Chapelle
Ring Seal of Otto the Great
Anglo Saxon Drinking Horn
St. Martin's Church, Canterbury
Canterbury Cathedral
A Mosaic of Justinian
The Three Existing Monuments of the Hippodrome, Constantinople
Religious Music
The Nestorian Monument
Papal Arms
St. Daniel the Stylite on his Column
Abbey of Saint Germain des Prés, Paris
A Monk Copyist
Mecca
A Letter of Mohammed
A Passage from the Koran
Naval Battle showing Use of "Greek Fire"
Interior of the Mosque of Cordova
Capitals and Arabesques from the Alhambra
Swedish Rock Carving
A Runic Stone
A Viking Ship
Norse Metal Work (Museum, Copenhagen)
Alfred the Great
Alfred's Jewel (Ashmolean Museum, Oxford)
A Scene from the Bayeux Tapestry (Museum of Bayeux, Normandy)
Trial by Combat
Mounted Knight
Pierrefonds
Château Gaillard (Restored)
King and Jester
Falconry
Farm Work in the Fourteenth Century
Pilgrims to Canterbury
A Bishop ordaining a Priest
St. Francis blessing the Birds
The Spiritual and the Temporal Power
Henry IV, Countess Matilda, and Gregory VII
Contest between Crusaders and Moslems
"Mosque of Omar," Jerusalem
Effigy of a Knight Templar
Richard I in Prison
Hut-Wagon of the Mongols (Reconstruction)
Tomb of Timur at Samarkand
Mohammed II
The "White Tower"
A Passage from Domesday Book
Windsor Castle
Extract from the Great Charter
Coronation Chair, Westminster Abbey
A Queen Eleanor Cross
Royal Arms of Edward III
English Archer
Walls of Carcassonne
A Scene in Rothenburg
House of the Butchers' Guild, Hildesheim, Germany
Baptistery, Cathedral, and "Leaning Tower" of Pisa
Venice and the Grand Canal
Belfry of Bruges
Town Hall of Louvain, Belgium
Geoffrey Chaucer
Roland at Roncesvalles
Cross Section of Amiens Cathedral
Gargoyles on the Cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris
View of New College, Oxford
Tower of Magdalen College, Oxford
Roger Bacon
Magician rescued from the Devil
The Witches' Sabbath
Chess Pieces of Charlemagne
Bear Baiting
Mummers
A Miracle Play at Coventry, England
Manor House in Shropshire, England
Interior of an English Manor House
Costumes of Ladies during the Later Middle Ages
Dante Alighieri
Petrarch
An Early Printing Press
Facsimile of Part of Caxton's "Aeneid" (Reduced)
Desiderius Erasmus (Louvre, Paris)
Cervantes
William Shakespeare
Shakespeare's Birthplace, Stratford-on-Avon
Richard II
Geographical Monsters
An Astrolabe
Vasco da Gama
Christopher Columbus (Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid)
Isabella
Ship of 1492 A.D.
The Name "America"
Ferdinand Magellan
Aztec Sacrificial Knife
Aztec Sacrificial Stone
Cabot Memorial Tower
John Wycliffe
Martin Luther
Charles V
John Calvin
Henry VIII
Ruins of Melrose Abbey
Chained Bible
St. Ignatius Loyola
Philip II
The Escorial
William the Silent
Elizabeth
Crown of Elizabeth's Reign
London Bridge in the Time of Elizabeth
The Spanish Armada in the English Channel
Cardinal Richelieu (Louvre, Paris.)
Gustavus Adolphus
Cardinal Mazarin
Louis XIV
Versailles
Medal of Louis XIV
Marlborough
Gold Coin of James I
A Puritan Family
Charles I
Execution of the Earl of Strafford
Oliver Cromwell
Interior of Westminster Hall
Great Seal of England under the Commonwealth (Reduced)
Boys' Sports
Silver Crown of Charles II
A London Bellman
Coach and Sedan Chair
Death Mask of Sir Isaac Newton

LIST OF MAPS

Distribution of Semitic and Indo-European Peoples.
Physical Map of Asia.
Egyptian Empire (about 1450 B.C.)
Canaan as divided among the Tribes.
Solomon's Kingdom.
Assyrian Empire (about 660 B.C.)
Lydia, Media, Babylonia, and Egypt (about 550 B.C.)
Persian Empire at its Greatest Extent (about 500 B.C.)
Ancient Trade Routes
Phnician and Greek Colonies.
Physical Map of Europe.
Ancient Greece and the Aegean.
Aegean Civilization.
Greek Conquests and Migrations.
The World according to Homer, 900 B.C.
Greece at the Opening of the Persian Wars, 490 B.C.
Vicinity of Athens.
Greece at the Opening of the Peloponnesian War.
Route of the Ten Thousand.
Empire of Alexander the Great (about 323 B.C.)
Kingdoms of Alexander's Successors (about 200 B.C.)
The World according to Eratosthenes, 200 B.C.
The World according to Ptolemy, 150 A.D.
Ancient Italy and Sicily.
Vicinity of Rome.
Expansion of Roman Dominions in Italy, 509-264 B.C.
Colonies and Military Roads in Italy.
Expansion of Roman Dominions, 264-133 B.C.
Expansion of Roman Dominions, 133-31 B.C.
Expansion of Roman Dominions, 31 B.C.-180 A.D.
Plan of Jerusalem and its Environs.
Roman Britain.
Roman Empire (about 395 A.D.)
Palestine.
Growth of Christianity to the End of the Fourth Century.
Germanic Migrations to 476 A.D.
Europe at the Deposition of Romulus Augustulus, 476 A.D.
Plan of the Ulpian Basilica
Plan of Ancient Athens
Plan of the Parthenon
Plan of Ancient Rome
Europe at the Death of Theodoric, 526 A.D.
Europe at the Death of Justinian, 565 A.D.
Growth of the Frankish Dominions, 481-768 A.D.
Europe in the Age of Charlemagne, 800 A.D.
The Frankish Dominions as divided by the Treaties of Verdun
(843 A.D.) and Mersen (870 A.D.)
Europe in the Age of Otto the Great, 972 A.D.
Anglo-Saxon Britain
Peoples of Europe at the Beginning of the Tenth Century
The Roman Empire in the East during the Tenth and Eleventh Centuries
Vicinity of Constantinople
Plan of Constantinople
Plan of Kirkstall Abbey, Yorkshire
Growth of Christianity from the Fifth to the Fifteenth Century
Expansion of Islam
Discoveries of the Northmen in the West
England under Alfred the Great
Dominions of William the Conqueror
Plan of Château Gaillard
Plan of Hitchin Manor, Hertfordshire
Germany and Italy during the Interregnum, 1254-1273 A.D.
Mediterranean Lands after the Fourth Crusade, 1202-1204 A.D.
The Mongol Empire
Russia at the End of the Middle Ages
Empire of the Ottoman Turks at the Fall of Constantinople, 1453 A.D.
Dominions of the Plantagenets in England and France
Scotland in the Thirteenth Century
Unification of France during the Middle Ages
Unification of Spain during the Middle Ages
Growth of the Hapsburg Possessions
The Swiss Confederation, 1291-1513 A.D.
German Expansion Eastward during the Middle Ages
Trade Routes between Northern and Southern Europe in the
Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries
Medieval Trade Routes
Plan of Salisbury Cathedral, England
The World according to Cosmas Indicopleustes, 535 A.D.
The Hereford Map, 1280 A.D.
Behaim's Globe
Portuguese and Spanish Colonial Empires in the Sixteenth Century
The West Indies
An Early Map of the New World (1540 A.D.)
The Great Schism, 1378-1417 A.D.
Europe at the Beginning of the Reformation, 1519 A.D.
Extent of the Reformation, 1524-1572 A.D.
The Netherlands in the Sixteenth Century
Western Europe in the Time of Elizabeth
Europe at the End of the Thirty Years' War, 1648 A.D.
Acquisitions of Louis XIV and Louis XV
Europe after the Peace of Utrecht, 1713 A.D.
England and Wales—The Civil Wars of the Seventeenth Century
Ireland in the Sixteenth Century

LIST OF PLATES

Ancient and Medieval Gems
Stonehenge
The Rosetta Stone (British Museum, London)
The Vaphio Gold Cups (National Museum, Athens)
Greek Gods and Goddesses: Zeus, Hera, Apollo, Aphrodite
Aphrodite of Melos (Louvre, Paris)
Hermes and Dionysus (Museum of Olympia)
Sarcophagus from Sidon (Imperial Ottoman Museum, Constantinople)
Laocoön and his Children (Vatican Museum, Rome)
Victory of Samothrace (Louvre, Paris)
Oriental, Greek, and Roman Coins
A Scene in Sicily
Bay of Naples and Vesuvius
Relief on the Arch of Titus
The Parthenon
Views of Pediment and Frieze of Parthenon
Acropolis of Athens (Restoration)
Acropolis of Athens from the Southwest
Roman Forum and Surrounding Buildings (Restored)
Roman Forum at the Present Time
Sancta Sophia, Constantinople
Fountain of Lions in the Alhambra
The Taj Mahal, Agra
Campanile and Doge's Palace, Venice
Illuminated Manuscript
Reims Cathedral
Cologne Cathedral
Interior of King's College Chapel, Cambridge
Ghiberti's Bronze Doors at Florence
St. Peter's, Rome
Italian Paintings of the Renaissance
Flemish, Spanish, and Dutch Paintings of the Renaissance

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY

PERIODICALS

All serious students of history should have access to the American Historical Review (N. Y., 1895 to date, quarterly, $4.00 a year). This journal, the organ of the American Historical Association, contains articles by scholars, critical reviews of all important works, and notes and news. The History Teacher's Magazine is edited under the supervision of a committee of the American Historical Association (Philadelphia, 1909 to date, monthly, $2.00 a year). Every well-equipped school library should contain the files of the National Geographic Magazine (Washington, 1890 to date, monthly, $2.00 a year) and of Art and Archeology (Washington, 1914 to date, monthly, $3.00 a year). These two periodicals make a special feature of illustrations.

WORKS ON THE STUDY AND TEACHING OF HISTORY

Useful books for the teacher's library include H. E. Bourne, The Teaching of History and Civics in the Elementary and the Secondary School (N. Y., 1902, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.50), Henry Johnson, The Teaching of History (N. Y., 1915, Macmillan, $1.40), H. B. George, Historical Evidence (N.Y., 1909, Oxford University Press, American Branch, 75 cents), Frederic Harrison, The Meaning of History and Other Historical Pieces (New ed., N.Y., 1900, Macmillan, $1.75), J. H. Robinson, The New History (N. Y., 1912, Macmillan, $1.50), and H. B. George, The Relations of History and Geography (4th ed., N. Y., 1910, Oxford University Press, American Branch, $1.10). The following reports are indispensable:

The Study of History in Schools. Report to the American Historical Association by the Committee of Seven (N. Y., 1899, Macmillan, 50 cents).

The Study of History in Secondary Schools. Report to the American Historical Association by a Committee of Five (N. Y., 1911, Macmillan, 25 cents).

Historical Sources in Schools. Report to the New England History Teachers' Association by a Select Committee (N. Y., 1902, Macmillan, out of print).

A History Syllabus for Secondary Schools. Report by a Special Committee of the New England History Teachers' Association (N. Y., 1904, Heath, $1.32).

A Bibliography of History for Schools and Libraries. Published under the auspices of the Association of History Teachers of the Middle States and Maryland (2d ed., N. Y., 1915, Longmans, Green, and Co., 60 cents).

DICTIONARIES AND ENCYCLOPEDIAS

The most useful dictionaries of classical antiquities are H. B. Walters, A Classical Dictionary (N. Y., 1916, Putnam, $6.50) and H. T. Peck, Harper's Dictionary of Classical Literature and Antiquities (N. Y., 1897, American Book Co., $6.00). Cambridge University, England, has published A Companion to Greek Studies, edited by L. Whibley (2d ed., N. Y., 1906, Putnam, $6.00), and A Companion to Latin Studies, edited by J. E. Sandys (N. Y., 1911, Putnam, $6.00). These two volumes treat every phase of ancient life in separate essays by distinguished scholars. For chronology, genealogies, lists of sovereigns, and other data the most valuable works are Arthur Hassall, European History, 476-1910 (new ed., N. Y., 1910, Macmillan, $2.25), G. P. Putnam, Tabular Views of Universal History (new ed., N. Y., 1915, Putnam, $2.50), and Karl J. Ploetz, A Handbook of Universal History, translated by W. H. Tillinghast (Boston, 1915, Houghton Mifflin Co., $3.00).

SYLLABI

The Illustrated Topics for Ancient History, arranged by D. C. Knowlton (Philadelphia, McKinley Publishing Co., 65 cents), contain much valuable material in the shape of a syllabus, source quotations, outline maps, pictures, and other aids. The following syllabi have been prepared for collegiate instruction:

Botsford, G. W. A Syllabus of Roman History (N. Y., 1915, Macmillan, 50 cents).

Munro, D. C., and SELLERY, G. C. A Syllabus of Medieval History, 395- 1500 (N. Y., 1913, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.00).

Richardson, O. H. Syllabus of Continental European History from the Fall of Rome to 1870 (Boston, 1904, Ginn, boards, 75 cents).

Stephenson, Andrew. Syllabus of Lectures on European History (Terre
Haute, Ind., 1897, Inland Publishing Co., $1.50).

Thompson, J. W. Reference Studies in Medieval History (2d ed., Chicago, 1914, University of Chicago Press, $1.25). A rich collection of classified references.

ATLASES

An admirable collection of maps for school use is W. R. Shepherd, Historical Atlas (N. Y., 1911, Holt, $2.50), with about two hundred and fifty maps covering the historical field. The latest and one of the best of the classical atlases is Murray's Small Classical Atlas, edited by G. B. Grundy (N. Y., 1904, Oxford University Press, American Branch, $1.35). A special feature of this work is the adoption of the system of colored contours to indicate configuration. The Atlas of Ancient and Classical Geography in "Everyman's Library" (N. Y., 1910, Dutton, 35 cents) might well be purchased by every student. Other valuable works are E. W. Dow, Atlas of European History (N. Y., 1907, Holt, $1.50) and Ramsay Muir, A New School Atlas of Modern History (N. Y., 1911, Holt, $1.25). Much use can be made of the inexpensive and handy Literary and Historical Atlas of Europe by J. G. Bartholomew in "Everyman's Library" (N. Y., 1910, Dutton, 35 cents).

WALL MAPS AND CHARTS

Kiepert's New Wall Maps of Ancient History (Chicago, Rand, McNally, and Co.) and Johnston's Classical Series (Chicago, A. J. Nystrom and Co.) may be obtained singly, mounted on common rollers, or by sets in a case with spring rollers. The text is in Latin. The Spruner-Bretschneider Historical Maps are ten in number, size 62 x 52 inches, and cover the period from A.D. 350 to 1815. The text is in German (Chicago, Nystrom, each $6.00; Rand, McNally, and Co., each $6.50). Johnston's Maps of English and European History are sixteen in number, size 40 x 30 inches, and include four maps of ancient history (Chicago, Nystrom, each $2.50). A new series of European History Maps, thirty-nine in number, size 44 x 32 inches, has been prepared for the study of ancient history by Professors J. H. Breasted and C. F. Huth, and for medieval and modern history by Professor S. B. Harding (Chicago, Denoyer-Geppert Co., complete set with tripod stand, $52.00; in two spring roller cases, $73.00). These maps may also be had separately. The maps in this admirable series omit all irrelevant detail, present place names in the modern English form, and in choice of subject matter emphasize the American viewpoint. The school should also possess good physical wall maps such as the Sydow-Habenicht or the Kiepert series, both to be obtained from Rand, McNally, and Co. The text is in German. Phillips's Model Test Maps and Johnston's New Series of Physical Wall Maps are obtainable from A. J. Nystrom and Co. The only large charts available are those prepared by MacCoun for his Historical Geography Charts of Europe. The two sections, "Ancient and Classical" and "Medieval and Modern," are sold separately (N. Y., Silver, Burdett, and Co., $15.00). A helpful series of Blackboard Outline Maps is issued by J. L. Engle, Beaver, Penn. These are wall maps, printed with paint on blackboard cloth, for use with an ordinary crayon. Such maps are also sold by the Denoyer-Geppert Co., Chicago.

OUTLINE MAPS

The "Studies" following each chapter of this book include various exercises for which small outline maps are required. Such maps are sold by D. C. Heath and Co., Boston, New York, Chicago. Useful atlases of outline maps are also to be had of the McKinley Publishing Co., Philadelphia, Atkinson, Mentzer and Grover, Chicago, W. B. Harison, New York City, and of other publishers.

ILLUSTRATIONS

The best photographs of ancient works of art must usually be obtained from the foreign publishers in Naples, Florence, Rome, Munich, Paris, Athens, and London, or from their American agents. Such photographs, in the usual size, 8 x 10 inches, sell, unmounted, at from 6 to 8 francs a dozen. All dealers in lantern slides issue descriptive catalogues of a great variety of archaeological subjects. In addition to photographs and lantern slides, a collection of stereoscopic views is very helpful in giving vividness and interest to instruction in ancient history. An admirable series of photographs for the stereoscope, including Egypt, Palestine, Greece, and Italy, is issued by Underwood and Underwood, New York City. The same firm supplies convenient maps and handbooks for use in this connection. The Keystone stereographs, prepared by the Keystone View Company, Meadville, Penn., may also be cordially recommended. The architecture, costumes, amusements, and occupations of the Middle Ages in England are shown in Longmans' Historical Illustrations (six portfolios, each containing twelve plates in black-and-white, Longmans, Green, and Co., 90 cents, each portfolio). The same firm issues Longmans' Historical Wall Pictures, consisting of twelve colored pictures from original paintings illustrating English history (each picture, separately, 80 cents; in a portfolio, $10.50). Other notable collections are Lehmann's Geographical Pictures, Historical Pictures, and Types of Nations, and Cybulski's Historical Pictures (Chicago, Denoyer-Geppert Co.; each picture separately mounted on rollers, $1.35 to $2.25). The New England History Teachers' Association publishes a series of Authentic Pictures for Class Room Use, size 5 x 8 inches, price 3 cents each. The Catalogue of the Collection of Historical Material at Simmons College, prepared by the New England History Teachers' Association (2d ed., Boston, 1912, Houghton Mifflin Co., 25 cents), contains an extensive list of pictures, slides, models, and other aids to history teaching. Among the more useful collections in book form of photographic reproductions and drawings are the following:

Fechneimer, Hedwig. Die Plastik der Ägypter (2d. ed., Berlin, 1914, B.
Cassirer, 12 marks). 156 plates of Egyptian sculpture.

Fougères, Gustvae. La vie publique et privée des Grecs et des Romains (2d ed., Paris, 1900, Hachette, 15 francs). An album of 85 pictures.

Furtwängler, Adolf. Masterpieces of Greek Sculpture (N. Y., Scribner, $15.00).

Hekler, Anton. Greek and Roman Portraits (N. Y., 1913, Putnam, $7.50). 311 plates, with comment and bibliography.

Hill, G. F. Illustrations of School Classics (N. Y., 1903, Macmillan, $2.50).

Muzik, H., and Perschinka, F. Kunst und Leben im Altertum (Vienna, 1909,
F. Tempsky; Leipzig, G. Freytag, 4.40 marks).

Osborne, Duffield. Engraved Gems (N. Y., 1913, Holt, $6.00).

Parmentier, A. Album historique (Paris, 1894-1905, Colin, 4 vols., each 15 francs). Illustrations covering the medieval and modern periods, with descriptive text in French.

Rheinhard, Hermann. Album des klassischen Altertums (Stuttgart, 1882,
Hoffman, 18 marks). 72 pictures in colors.

Rouse, W. H. D. Atlas of Classical Portraits. Greek Section, Roman Section (London, 1898, Dent, 2 vols., each 1_s_. 6_d_.). Small, half-tone engravings, accompanied by brief biographies.

Schreiber, Theodor. Atlas of Classical Antiquities (N. Y., 1895,
Macmillan, $6.50).

WORKS OF TRAVEL

To vitalize the study of geography and history there is nothing better than the reading of modern books of travel. Among these may be mentioned:

Allinson, F. G. and Allinson, Anne C. E. Greek Lands and Letters (Boston, 1909, Houghton Mifflin Co., $2.50). An entertaining work of mingled history and geography.

Barrows, S. J. The Isles and Shrines of Greece (Boston, 1898, Little,
Brown, and Co., $2.00).

Clark, F. E. The Holy Land of Asia Minor (N. Y., 1914, Scribner, $1.00).
Popular sketches.

Dunning, H. W. To-day on the Nile (N. Y., 1905, Pott, $2.50).

——— To-day in Palestine (N. Y., 1907, Pott, $2.50).

Dwight, H. G. Constantinople, Old and New (N. Y., 1915, Scribner, $5.00).

Edwards, Amelia B. A Thousand Miles up the Nile (2d ed., N. Y., 1888,
Dutton, $2.50).

Forman, H. J. The Ideal Italian Tour (Boston, 1911, Houghton Mifflin
Co., $1.50). A brief and attractive volume covering all Italy.

Hay, John. Castilian Days (Boston, 1871, Houghton Mifflin Co., $1.25).

Hutton, Edward, Rome (N. Y., 1909, Macmillan, $2.00).

Jackson, A. V. W. Persia, Past and Present (N. Y., 1906, Macmillan, $4.00).

Lucas, E. V. A Wanderer in Florence (N. Y., 1912, Macmillan, $1.75).

Manatt, J. I. Aegean Days (Boston, 1913, Houghton Mifflin Co., $3.00).
Describes the most important islands of the Aegean.

Marden, P. S. Greece and the Aegean Islands (Boston, 1907, Houghton
Mifflin Co., $3.00).

Paton, W. A. Picturesque Sicily (2d ed., N. Y., 1902, Harper, $2.50).

Richardson, R. B. Vacation Days in Greece (N. Y., 1903, Scribner, $2.00).

Warner, C. D. In the Levant (N. Y., 1876, Harper, $2.00).

HISTORICAL FICTION

The following works of historical fiction comprise only a selection from a very large number of books suitable for supplementary reading. For extended bibliographies see E. A. Baker, A Guide to Historical Fiction (new ed., N. Y., 1914, Macmillan, $6.00) and Jonathan Nield, A Guide to the Best Historical Novels and Tales (3d ed., N. Y., 1904, Putnam, $1.75). An excellent list of historical stories, especially designed for children, will be found in the Bibliography of History for Schools and Libraries, parts viii-ix.

Bulwer-Lytton, Edward. The Last Days of Pompeii (Boston, 1834, Little,
Brown, and Co., $1.25).

Champney, Elizabeth W. The Romance of Imperial Rome (N. Y., 1910,
Putnam, $3.50).

Church, A. J. Roman Life in the Days of Cicero (N. Y., 1883, Macmillan, 50 cents).

——— Stories of Charlemagne and the Twelve Peers of France (N. Y., 1902, Macmillan, $1.75).

Cox, G. W. Tales of Ancient Greece (Chicago, 1868, McClurg, $1.00).

Dahn, Felix, Felicitas (Chicago, 1883, McClurg, 75 cents). Rome, 476
A.D.

Doyle, A. C. The White Company (Boston, 1890, Caldwell, 75 cents). The
English in France and Castile, 1366-1367 A.D.

Ebers, Georg, Uarda (N. Y., 1877, Appleton, 2 vols., $1.50). Egypt, fourteenth century B.C.

Eliot, George. Romola (N. Y., 1863, Dutton, 35 cents). Florence and
Savonarola in the latter part of the fifteenth century.

Fénelon, François. Adventures of Telemachus, translated by Dr.
Hawkesworth (Boston, Houghton Mifflin Co., $2.25).

Hale, E. E. In His Name (Boston, 1873, Little, Brown, and Co., $1.00).
The Waldenses about 1179 A.D.

Hardy, A. S. Passe Rose (Boston, 1889, Houghton Mifflin Co., $1.25).
Franks and Saxons of Charlemagne's time.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter (N. Y., 1850, Dutton, 35 cents). Massachusetts in the seventeenth century.

Henty, G. A. The Young Carthaginian (N. Y., 1886, Scribner, $1.50).
Second Punic War.

Hugo, Victor. Notre Dame (N. Y. 1831, Dutton, 35 cents). Paris, late fifteenth century.

Irving, Washington. The Alhambra (N. Y., 1832, Putnam, $1.00). Sketches of the Moors and Spaniards.

Jacobs, Joseph (editor). The Most Delectable History of Reynard the Fox
(N. Y., 1895, Macmillan, $1.50).

Kingsley, Charles S. Hypatia (N. Y., 1853, Macmillan, $1.25).
Alexandria, 391 A.D.

——— Westward Ho! (N. Y., 1855, Button, 35 Cents). Voyages of Elizabethan seamen and the struggle with Spain.

Kipling, Rudyard. Puck of Pooks Hill (N. Y., 1906, Doubleday, Page, and
Co., $1.50). Roman occupation of Britain.

Lang, Andrew. The Monk of Fife (N. Y., 1895, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.25). The Maid of Orleans and the Hundred Years' War.

Lane, E. W. (translator). The Arabian Nights' Entertainments (2d ed., N.
Y., 1859, Macmillan, 35 cents).

London, Jack. Before Adam (N. Y., 1907, Macmillan, $1.50). Prehistoric life.

Manzoni, Alessandro. The Betrothed (N. Y., 1825, Macmillan, 2 vols., 70 cents). Milan under Spanish rule, 1628-1630 A.D.

Mason, Eugene (translator). Aucassin and Nicolette and other Medieval
Romances, and Legends (N. Y., 1910, Dutton, 35 cents).

Newman, J. H. Callista (N. Y., 1856, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.25).
Persecution of Christians in North Africa, 250 A.D.

Reade, Charles. The Cloister and the Hearth (N. Y., 1861, Dutton, 35 cents). Eve of the Reformation.

Scheffel, J. Von. Ekkehard, translated by Helena Easson (N. Y., 1857,
Dutton, 35 cents). Germany in the tenth century.

Scott, (Sir) Walter. The Talisman (N. Y., 1825, Dutton, 35 cents). Reign of Richard I, 1193 A.D.

——— Ivanhoe (N. Y., Heath, 50 cents). Richard I, 1194 A.D.

Sienkiewicz, Henryk. Quo Vadis? (Boston, 1896, Little, Brown, and Co., $2.00). Reign of Nero.

Stevenson, R. L. The Black Arrow (N. Y., 1888, Scribner, $1.00). War of the Roses.

"Twain, Mark." A Connecticut Yankee at the Court of King Arthur (N. Y., 1889, Harper, $1.75).

Wallace, Lew. Ben-Hur; a Tale of the Christ (N. Y., 1880, Harper, $1.50).

Waterloo, Stanley. The Story of Ab (2d ed., N. Y., 1905, Doubleday,
Page, and Co., $1.50). Prehistoric life.

HISTORICAL POETRY

It is unnecessary to emphasize the value, as collateral reading, of historical poems and plays. To the brief list which follows should be added the material in Katharine Lee Bates and Katharine Coman, English History told by English Poets (N. Y., 1902, Macmillan, 60 cents).

Browning, Robert. Echetlos and Pheidippides.

Burns, Robert. The Battle of Bannockburn.

Byron (Lord). Song of Saul before His Last Battle, The Destruction of Sennacherib, Belshazzar's Feast, Prometheus, "Greece" (The Corsair, canto iii, lines 1-54), "Modern Greece" (Childe Harold, canto ii, stanzas 85-91), "The Death of Greece" (The Giaour, lines 68-141), "The Isles of Greece" (Don Juan, canto in), and "The Colosseum" (Childe Harold, canto iv, stanzas 140-145).

Clough, A. H. Columbus.

Coleridge, S. T. Kubla Khan.

Domett, Alfred. A Christmas Hymn

Drayton, Michael. The Battle of Agincourt.

Dryden, John. Alexander's Feast.

Jonson, Ben. Hymn to Diana.

Keats, John. Ode on a Grecian Urn.

Kingsley, Charles. Andromeda and The Red King.

Landor, W. S. Orpheus and Eurydice.

Longfellow, H. W. "The Saga of King Olaf" (Tales of a Wayside Inn) and The Skeleton in Armor.

Lowell, J. R. Rhoecus and The Shepherd of King Admetus.

Macaulay, T. B. Lays of Ancient Rome ("Horatius," "Virginia," "The Battle of Lake Regillus," and "The Prophecy of Capys"), The Armada, and The Battle of Ivry.

Miller, Joaquin. Columbus.

Milton, John. Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity.

Praed, W. M. Arminius.

Rossetti, D. G. The White Ship.

Schiller, Friedrich. The Maid of Orleans, William Tell, Maria Stuart, and Wallenstein.

Scott, (Sir) Walter. "Flodden Field" (Marmion, canto vi, stanzas 19-27, 33-35).

Shakespeare, William. Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra,
King John, Richard the Second, Henry the Fourth, parts i and ii, Henry
the Fifth, Henry the Sixth, parts i, ii, and iii, Richard the Third,
Henry the Eighth, and The Merchant of Venice.

Shelley, P. B. To the Nile, Ozymandias, Hymn of Apollo, Arethusa, and Song of Proserpine.

Tennyson, Alfred. Ulysses, Oenone, The Death of Oenone, Demeter and
Persephone, The Lotus-Eaters, Boadicea, St. Telemachus, St. Simeon
Stylites, Sir Galahad, and The Revenge: a Ballad of the Fleet.

Thackeray, W. M. King Canute.

Wordsworth, William. Laodamia.

SOURCES

Full information regarding the best translations of the sources of ancient, medieval, and modern history is to be found in one of the Reports previously cited—Historical Sources in Schools, parts ii-iv. The use of the following collections of extracts from the sources will go far toward remedying the lack of library facilities.

Botsford, G. W., and Botsford, Lillie S. Source Book of Ancient History
(N. Y., 1912, Macmillan, $1.30).

Davis, W. S. Readings in Ancient History (Boston, 1912, Allyn and Bacon, 2 vols., $2.00).

Duncalf, Frederic, and Krey, A. C. Parallel Source Problems in Medieval
History (N. Y., 1912, Harper, $1.10).

Fling, F. M. A Source Book of Greek History (N. Y., 1907, Heath, $1.12).

Munro, D. C. A Source Book of Roman History (N. Y., 1904, Heath, $1.12).

Ogg, F. A. A Source Book of Medieval History (N. Y., 1907, American Book
Co., $1.50).

Robinson, J. H. Readings in European History (Abridged ed., Boston, 1906, Ginn, $1.50).

Thallon, Ida C. Readings in Greek History (Boston, 1914, Ginn, $2.00).

Thatcher, O. J., and McNeal, E. H. A Source Book for Medieval History
(N. Y., 1905, Scribner, $1.85).

Webster, Hutton. Readings in Ancient History (N. Y., 1913, Heath, $1.12).

——— Readings in Medieval and Modern History (N. Y., 1917, Heath, $1.12).

Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History (N. Y., 1894-1899, Longmans, Green, and Co., 6 vols., each $1.50).

MODERN WORKS

Most of the books in the following list are inexpensive, easily procured, and well adapted in style and choice of topics to the needs of immature pupils. A few more elaborate and costly volumes, especially valuable for their illustrations, are indicated by an asterisk (*). For detailed bibliographies, often accompanied by critical estimates, see C. K. Adams, A Manual of Historical Literature (3d ed., N. Y., 1889, Harper, $2.50), and the Bibliography of History for Schools and Libraries, parts iii-v.

GENERAL WORKS

Carlyle, Thomas. On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History (N.
Y., 1840, Dutton, 35 cents).

Creasy, E. S. The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World from Marathon to
Waterloo (N. Y., 1854, Dutton, 35 cents).

Gibbins, H. De B. The History of Commerce in Europe (26. ed., N. Y., 1897, Macmillan, 90 cents).

Herbertson, A. J., and Herbertson, F. D. Man and His Work (3d ed., N. Y., 1914, Macmillan, 60 cents). An introduction to the study of human geography.

Jacobs, Joseph. The Story of Geographical Discovery (N. Y., 1898,
Appleton, 35 cents).

Jenks, Edward. A History of Politics (N. Y., 1900, Dutton, 35 cents). A very illuminating essay.

Keane, John. The Evolution of Geography (London, 1899, Stanford, 6s.).
Helpfully illustrated.

Myres, J. L. The Dawn of History (N. Y., 1912, Holt, 50 cents).

Pattison, R. P. B. Leading Figures in European History (N. Y., 1912,
Macmillan, $1.60). Biographical sketches of European statesmen from
Charlemagne to Bismarck.

Reinach, Salomon. Apollo; an Illustrated Manual of the History of Art throughout the Ages, translated by Florence Simmonds (last ed., N. Y., 1914, Scribner, $1.50). The best brief work on the subject.

Seignobos, Charles. History of Ancient Civilization, edited by J. A.
James (N. Y., 1906, Scribner, $1.25).

——— History of Medieval and of Modern Civilization, edited by J. A. James (N. Y., 1907, Scribner, $1.25).

PREHISTORIC TIMES

Clodd, Edward. The Story of Primitive Man (N Y., 1895, Appleton, 35 cents). Generally accurate and always interesting.

——— The Childhood of the World (2d ed., N. Y., 1914, Macmillan, $1.25).

Elliott, G. F. S. Prehistoric Man and His Story (Philadelphia, 1915,
Lippincott, $2.00).

Holbrook, Florence. Cave, Mound, and Lake Dwellers (N. Y., 1911, Heath, 44 cents).

Mason, O. T, Woman's Share in Primitive Culture (N. Y., 1900, D. Appleton, $1.75). The only work on the subject; by a competent anthropologist.

* Osborn, H. F. Men of the Old Stone Age (N. Y., 1915 Scribners, $5.00).
An authoritative, interesting, and amply illustrated work.

* Spearing, H. G. The Childhood of Art (N. Y., 1913, Putnam, $6.00).
Deals with primitive and Greek art; richly illustrated.

Starr, Frederick. Some First Steps in Human Progress (Chautauqua, N. Y., 1895, Chautauqua Press, $1.00). A popular introduction to anthropology.

Tylor, (Sir) E. B. Anthropology (N. Y., 1881, Appleton, $2.00). Incorporates the results of the author's extensive studies and still remains the best introduction to the entire field.

ORIENTAL HISTORY

Baikie, James. The Story of the Pharaohs (N. Y., 1908, Macmillan, $2.00). A popular work; well illustrated.

* Ball, C. J. Light from the East (London, 1899, Eyre and Spottiswoode, 15s.). An account of Oriental archaeology, with special reference to the Old Testament.

Banks, E. G. The Bible and the Spade (N. Y., 1913, Association Press, $1.00). A popular presentation of Oriental archaeology.

* Breasted, J. H. A History of Egypt from the Earliest Times to the Persian Conquest (2d ed., N. Y., 1909, Scribner, $5.00). The standard work on Egyptian history.

Clay, A. T. Light on the East from Babel (4th ed., Philadelphia, 1915,
Sunday School Times Co., $2.00).

* Erman, Asolf. Life in Ancient Egypt (N. Y., 1894, Macmillan, $6.00).

* Handcock, P. S. P. Mesopotamian Archaeology (N. Y. 1912, Putnam, $3.50).

Hogarth, D. G. The Ancient East (N. Y., 1915, Holt, 50 cents). "Home
University Library."

* Jastrow, Morris, Jr. The Civilization of Babylonia and Assyria (Philadelphia, 1915, Lippincott, $6.00). A finely illustrated work by a great scholar.

Macalister, R. A. S. A History of Civilization in Palestine (N. Y., 1912, Putnam, 35 cents). "Cambridge Manuals."

Maspero, (Sir) Gaston. Life in Ancient Egypt and Assyria (N.Y., 1892,
Appleton, $1.50). Fascinating and authoritative.

Ragozin, Zénaïde A. Earliest Peoples (N. Y., 1899, Harison, 60 cents). A well-written, fully-illustrated account of prehistoric man and the beginnings of history in Babylonia.

——— Early Egypt (N. Y., 1900, Harison, 60 cents).

GREEK AND ROMAN HISTORY

Abbott, Evelyn. Pericles and the Golden Age of Athens (N. Y., 1891,
Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

Baikie, James. The Sea-Kings of Crete (2d ed., N. Y., 1912, Macmillan, $1.75). A clear and vivid summary of Cretan archaeology.

Blümner, Hugo. The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks, translated by Alice
Zimmern (3d ed., N. Y., 1910, Funk and Wagnalls Co., $2.00).

Bulley, Margaret H. Ancient and Medieval Art (N. Y., 1914, Macmillan, $1.75). An elementary treatment, particularly designed for schools.

Church, A. J., and Gilman, Arthur. The Story of Carthage (N. Y., 1886,
Putnam, $1.50). "Story of the Nations"

Davis, W. S. The Influence of Wealth in Imperial Rome (N. Y., 1910,
Macmillan, $2.00). An interesting treatment of an important theme.

——— A Day in Old Athens (Boston, 1914, Allyn and Bacon, $1.00).

——— An Outline History of the Roman Empire (N. Y., 1909, Macmillan, 65 cents). Covers the period 44 B.C.-378 A.D.

* Dennie, John. Rome of To-day and Yesterday; the Pagan City (5th ed.,
N. Y., 1909, Putnam, $3.50).

Fowler, W. W. Rome (N. Y., 1912, Holt, 50 cents).

——— The City-State of the Greeks and Romans (N. Y., 1893, Macmillan, $1.00). The only constitutional history of the classical peoples intelligible to elementary students.

——— Social Life at Rome in the Age of Cicero (N. Y., 1909, Macmillan, 50 cents). In every way admirable.

——— Julius Caesar and the Foundation of the Roman Imperial System (2d ed., N. Y., 1897, Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

* Gardner, E. A. Ancient Athens (N. Y., 1902, Macmillan, $3.50).

Gayley, C. M. The Classic Myths in English Literature and in Art (2d ed., Boston, 1911, Ginn, $1.60). Of special importance for the illustrations.

Goodyear, W. H. Roman and Medieval Art (2d ed., N. Y., 1897, Macmillan, $1.00).

Grant, A. J. Greece in the Age of Pericles (N. Y., 1893, Scribner, $1.25).

Gulick, C. B. The Life of the Ancient Greeks (N. Y., 1902, Appleton, $1.40).

* Hall, H. R. Aegean Archeology (N. Y., 1915, Putnam, $3.75). A well- written and well-illustrated volume.

Hawes, C. H., and Hawes, HARRIET B. Crete, the Forerunner of Greece (N.
Y., 1909, Harper, 75 cents).

How, W. W. Hannibal and the Great War between Rome and Carthage (London, 1899, Seeley, 2_s_.).

Jones, H. S. The Roman Empire, B.C. 29-A.D. 476 (N. Y., 1908, Putnam, $1.50). "Story of the Nations."

* Lanciani, Rudolfo. The Ruins and Excavations of Ancient Rome (Boston, 1898, Houghton Mifflin Co., $4.00).

Mahaffy, J. P. Old Greek Life (N. Y., 1876, American Book Co., 35 cents).

——— What have the Greeks done for Modern Civilization? (N. Y., 1909, Putnam, $1.50).

Mahaffy, J. P., and Gilman, Arthur. The Story of Alexander's Empire (N. Y., 1887, Putnam, $1.50). The only concise narrative of the Hellenistic period.

* Mau, August. Pompeii: its Life and Art, translated by F. W. Kelsey (N.
Y., 1899, Macmillan, $2.50).

Morris, W. O'C. Hannibal and the Crisis of the Struggle between Carthage and Rome (N. Y., 1897, Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

Oman, Charles. Seven Roman Statesmen of the Later Republic (N. Y., 1902, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.60). A biographical presentation of Roman history.

Pellison, Maurice. Roman Life in Pliny's Time, translated by Maud
Wilkinson (Philadelphia, 1897, Jacobs, $1.00).

Pickard-Cambridge, A. W. Demosthenes and the Last Days of Greek Freedom
(N. Y., 1914, Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

Powers, H. H. The Message of Greek Art (N. Y., 1913, Macmillan, 50 cents).

Preston, Harriet W., and Dodge, Louise. The Private Life of the Romans
(N. Y., 1893, Sanborn, $1.05).

Robinson, C. E. The Days of Alcibiades (N. Y., 1916, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.50), A picture of Greek life and culture in the Age of Pericles.

* Seymour, T. D. Life in the Homeric Age (N. Y., 1907, Macmillan, $4.00).

* Stobart, J. C. The Glory that was Greece: a Survey of Hellenic Culture and Civilization (Philadelphia, 1911, Lippincott, $7.50).

——— The Grandeur that was Rome: a Survey of Roman Culture and Civilization (Philadelphia, 1912, Lippincott, $7.50).

Strachan-Davidson, J. S. Cicero and the Fall of the Roman Republic (N.
Y., 1894, Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

Tarbell, F. B. A History of Greek Art (2d ed., N. Y., 1905, Macmillan, $1.00).

Tozer, H. F. Classical Geography (N. Y., 1883, American Book Co., 35 cents). A standard manual.

Tucker, T. G. Life in Ancient Athens (N. Y., 1906, Macmillan, $1.25).
The most attractive treatment of the subject.

——— Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul (N. Y., 1910, Macmillan, $2.50).

* Walters, H. B. The Art of the Greeks (N. Y., 1900, Macmillan, $6.00).

* ——— The Art of the Romans (N. Y., 1911, Macmillan, $5.00).

* Weller, C. H. Athens and its Monuments (N. Y., 1913, Macmillan, $4.00).

Wheeler, B.I. Alexander the Great and the Merging of East and West into
Universal History (N. Y., 1900, Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

Wilkins, A. S. Roman Antiquities (N. Y., 1884, American Book Co., 35 cents).

MEDIEVAL HISTORY

Adams, G. B. The Growth of the French Nation (N. Y., 1896, Macmillan, $1.25). The best short history of France.

Archer, T. A., and Kingsford, C. L. The Crusades (N. Y., 1894, Putnam, $1.50).

Baring-Gould, Sabine. Curious Myths of the Middle Ages (N. Y., 1869,
Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.25).

Bateson, Mary. Medieval England (N. Y., 1903, Putnam, $1.50). Deals with social and economic life. "Story of the Nations."

Cheyney, E. P. An Introduction to the Industrial and Social History of England (N. Y., 1901, Macmillan, $1.40). The best brief work on the subject.

Church, R. W. The Beginning of the Middle Ages (N. Y., 1877, Scribner, $1.00).

Cutts, E. L. Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages (London, 1872, De
La More Press, 7s. 6d.). An almost indispensable book; illustrated.

Davis, H. W. C. Medieval Europe (N. Y., 1911, Holt, 50 cents).

——— Charlemagne, the Hero of Two Nations (N. Y., 1899, Putnam, $1.50). "Heroes of the Nations."

Emerton, Ephraim. An Introduction to the Study of the Middle Ages (Boston, 1888, Ginn, $1.10). The most satisfactory short account, and of special value to beginners.

Foord, Edward. The Byzantine Empire (N. Y., 1911, Macmillan, $2.00). The most convenient short treatment; lavishly illustrated.

* Gibbon, Edward. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire, edited by J. B. Bury (N. Y., 1914, Macmillan, 7 vols., $25.00).
The best edition, illustrated and provided with maps, of this standard
work.

* Green, J. R. Short History of the English People, edited by Mrs. J. R. Green and Miss Kate Norgate (N. Y., 1893-1895, Harper, 4 vols., $20.00). A beautifully illustrated edition of this standard work.

Guerber, H. A. Legends of the Middle Ages (N. Y., 1896, American Book
Co., $1.50).

Haskins, C. H. The Normans in European History (Boston, 1915, Houghton
Mifflin Co., $2.00).

Hodgkin, Thomas. The Dynasty of Theodosius (N. Y., 1899, Oxford University Press, American Branch, $1.50). Popular lectures summarizing the author's extensive studies.

Jessopp, Augustus. The Coming of the Friars, and Other Historic Essays
(N. Y., 1888, Putnam, $1.25). A book of great interest.

* Lacroix, Paul. Science and Literature in the Middle Ages and at the
Period of the Renaissance (London, 1880, Bickers and Son, out of print).

Lawrence, W. W. Medieval Story (N. Y., 1911, Columbia University Press, $i.50). Discusses the great literary productions of the Middle Ages.

Mawer, Allen. The Vikings (N. Y, 1913, Putnam, 35 cents).

Munro, D. C., and Sellery, G. C Medieval Civilization (2d ed., N. Y., 1907, Century Co., $2.00). Translated selections from standard works by French and German scholars.

Rait, R. S. Life in the Medieval University (N. Y., 1912, Putnam, 35 cents). "Cambridge Manuals."

Synge, M. B. A Short History of Social Life in England (N. Y., 1906,
Barnes, $1.50).

Tappan, Eva M. When Knights were Bold (Boston, 1912, Houghton Mifflin Co., $2.00). An economic and social study of the Feudal Age; charmingly written.

Tickner, F. W. A Social and Industrial History of England (N. Y., 1915, Longmans, Green, and Co., $1.00). Very simply written and well illustrated.

* Wright, Thomas. The Homes of Other Days (London, 1871, Trübner, out of print). Valuable for both text and illustrations.

TRANSITION TO MODERN TIMES

Cheyney, E. P. European Background of American History, 1300-1600 (N.
Y., 1904, Harper, $2.00).

Creighton, Mandell. The Age of Elizabeth (13th ed., N. Y., 1897,
Scribner, $ 1.00). "Epochs of Modern History."

Fiske, John. The Discovery and Colonization of North America (Boston, 1905, Ginn, 90 cents).

Gardiner, S. R. The Thirty Years' War (N. Y., 1874, Scribner, $1.00).

Goodyear, W. H. Renaissance and Modern Art (N. Y., 1894, Macmillan, $1.00).

Hudson, W. H. The Story of the Renaissance (N. Y., 1912, Cassell, $1.50). A well-written volume.

Hulme, E. M. The Renaissance, the Protestant Revolution, and the Catholic Reformation in Continental Europe (rev. ed., N. Y., 1915, Century Co., $2.50). The best work on the subject by an American scholar.

* Joyce, T. A. Mexican Archaeology (N. Y., 1914, Putnam, $4.00).

——— South American Archaeology (N. Y., 1912, Putnam, $3.50).

Kerr, P. H., and Kerr, A. C. The Growth of the British Empire (N. Y., 1911, Longmans, Green, and Co., 50 cents).

Oldham, J. B. The Renaissance (N. Y., 1912, Dutton, 35 cents).

Seebohm, Frederic. The Era of the Protestant Revolution (N. Y., 1875,
Scribner, $1.00). "Epochs of Modern History."

CHAPTER I

THE AGES BEFORE HISTORY

1. THE STUDY OF HISTORY

SUBJECT MATTER OF HISTORY

History is the narrative of what civilized man has done. It deals with those social groups called states and nations. Just as biography describes the life of individuals, so history relates the rise, progress, and decline of human societies.

MANUSCRIPTS AND BOOKS

History cannot go back of written records. These alone will preserve a full and accurate account of man's achievements. Manuscripts and books form one class of written records. The old Babylonians used tablets of soft clay, on which signs were impressed with a metal instrument. The tablets were then baked hard in an oven. The Egyptians made a kind of paper out of the papyrus, a plant native to the Nile valley. The Greeks and Romans at first used papyrus, but later they employed the more lasting parchment prepared from sheepskin. Paper seems to have been a Chinese invention. It was introduced into Europe by the Arabs during the twelfth century of our era.

[Illustration: THE DISK OF PHAESTUS Found in 1908 A.D. in the palace at Phaestus, Crete. The disk is of refined clay on which the figures were stamped in relief with punches. Both sides of the disk are covered with characters. The side seen in the illustration contains 31 sign groups (123 signs) separated from one another by incised lines. The other side contains 30 sign groups (118 signs). The inscription dates from about 1800 B.C.]

[Illustration: A PAPYRUS MANUSCRIPT The pith of the papyrus, a plant native to the Nile valley, was cut into slices, which were then pressed together and dried in the sun. Several of the paper sheets thus formed were glued together at their edges to form a roll. From papyros and byblos, the two Greek names of this plant, have come our own words, "paper" and "Bible." The illustration shows a manuscript discovered in Egypt in 1890 A.D. It is supposed to be a treatise, hitherto lost, on the Athenian constitution by the Greek philosopher Aristotle.]

INSCRIPTIONS AND REMAINS

A second class of written records consists of inscriptions. These are usually cut in stone, but sometimes we find them painted over the surface of a wall, stamped on coins, or impressed upon metal tablets. The historian also makes use of remains, such as statues, ornaments, weapons, tools, and utensils. Monuments of various sorts, including palaces, tombs, fortresses, bridges, temples, and churches, form a very important class of remains.

BEGINNINGS OF HISTORY

History, based on written records, begins in different countries at varying dates. A few manuscripts and inscriptions found in Egypt date back three or four thousand years before Christ. The annals of Babylonia are scarcely less ancient. Trustworthy records in China and India do not extend beyond 1000 B.C. For the Greeks and Romans the commencement of the historic period must be placed about 750 B.C. The inhabitants of northern Europe did not come into the light of history until about the opening of the Christian era.

2. PREHISTORIC PEOPLES

THE PREHISTORIC PERIOD

In studying the historic period our chief concern is with those peoples whose ideas or whose deeds have aided human progress and the spread of civilization. Six-sevenths of the earth's inhabitants now belong to civilized countries, and these countries include the best and largest regions of the globe. At the beginning of historic times, however, civilization was confined within a narrow area—the river valleys of western Asia and Egypt. The uncounted centuries before the dawn of history make up the prehistoric period, when savagery and barbarism prevailed throughout the world. Our knowledge of it is derived from the examination of the objects found in caves, refuse mounds, graves, and other sites. Various European countries, including England, France, Denmark, Switzerland, and Italy, are particularly rich in prehistoric remains.

[Illustration: A PREHISTORIC EGYPTIAN GRAVE The skeleton lay on the left side, with knees drawn up and hands raised to the head. About it were various articles of food and vessels of pottery.]

THE TWO AGES

The prehistoric period is commonly divided, according to the character of the materials used for tools and weapons, into the Age of Stone and the Age of Metals. The one is the age of savagery; the other is the age of barbarism or semicivilization.

THE STONE AGE

Man's earliest implements were those that lay ready to his hand. A branch from a tree served as a spear; a thick stick in his strong arms became a powerful club. Later, perhaps, came the use of a hard stone such as flint, which could be chipped into the forms of arrowheads, axes, and spear tips. The first stone implements were so rude in shape that it is difficult to believe them of human workmanship. They may have been made several hundred thousand years ago. After countless centuries of slow advance, savages learned to fasten wooden handles to their stone tools and weapons and also to use such materials as jade and granite, which could be ground and polished into a variety of forms. Stone implements continued to be made during the greater part of the prehistoric period. Every region of the world has had a Stone Age. [1] Its length is reckoned, not by centuries, but by milleniums.

[Illustration: A HATCHET OF THE EARLY STONE AGE
A hatchet of flint, probably used without a helve and intended to fit the
hand. Similar implements have been found all over the world, except in
Australia.]

[Illustration: ARROWHEADS OF THE LATER STONE AGE
Different forms from Europe, Africa, and North America.]

THE AGE OF METALS

The Age of Metals, compared with its predecessor, covers a brief expanse of time. The use of metals came in not much before the dawn of history. The earliest civilized peoples, the Babylonians and Egyptians, when we first become acquainted with them, appear to be passing from the use of stone implements to those of metal.

COPPER

Copper was the first metal in common use. The credit for the invention of copper tools seems to belong to the Egyptians. At a very early date they were working the copper mines on the peninsula of Sinai. The Babylonians probably obtained their copper from the same region. Another source of this metal was the island of Cyprus in the eastern Mediterranean. The Greek name of the island means "copper."

BRONZE

But copper tools were soft and would not keep an edge. Some ancient smith, more ingenious than his fellows, discovered that the addition of a small part of tin to the copper produced a new metal—bronze—harder than the old, yet capable of being molded into a variety of forms. At least as early as 3000 B.C. we find bronze taking the place of copper in both Egypt and Babylonia. Somewhat later bronze was introduced into the island of Crete, then along the eastern coast of Greece, and afterwards into other European countries.

IRON

The introduction of iron occurred in comparatively recent times. At first it was a scarce, and therefore a very precious, metal. The Egyptians seem to have made little use of iron before 1500 B.C. They called it "the metal of heaven," as if they obtained it from meteorites. In the Greek Homeric poems, composed about 900 B.C. or later, we find iron considered so valuable that a lump of it is one of the chief prizes at athletic games. In the first five books of the Bible iron is mentioned only thirteen times, though copper and bronze are referred to forty-four times. Iron is more difficult to work than either copper or bronze, but it is vastly superior to those metals in hardness and durability. Hence it gradually displaced them throughout the greater part of the Old World. [2]

FIRST STEPS TOWARD CIVILIZATION

During the prehistoric period early man came to be widely scattered throughout the world. Here and there, slowly, and with utmost difficulty, he began to take the first steps toward civilization. The tools and weapons which he left behind him afford some evidence of his advance. We may now single out some of his other great achievements and follow their development to the dawn of history.

3. DOMESTICATION OF ANIMALS AND PLANTS

HUNTING AND FISHING STAGE

Prehistoric man lived at first chiefly on wild berries, nuts, roots, and herbs. As his implements improved and his skill increased, he became hunter, trapper, and fisher. A tribe of hunters, however, requires an extensive territory and a constant supply of game. When the wild animals are all killed or seriously reduced in number, privation and hardship result. It was a forward step, therefore, when man began to tame animals as well as to kill them.

DOMESTICATION OF THE DOG

The dog was man's first conquest over the animal kingdom. As early as the Age of Metals various breeds appear, such as deerhounds, sheep dogs, and mastiffs. The dog soon showed how useful he could be. He tracked game, guarded the camp, and later, in the pastoral stage, protected flocks and herds against their enemies.

THE COW

The cow also was domesticated at a remote period. No other animal has been more useful to mankind. The cow's flesh and milk supply food: the skin provides clothing; the sinews, bones, and horns yield materials for implements. The ox was early trained to bear the yoke and draw the plow, as we may learn from ancient Egyptian paintings. [3] Cattle have also been commonly used as a kind of money. The early Greeks, whose wealth consisted chiefly of their herds, priced a slave at twenty oxen, a suit of armor at one hundred oxen, and so on. The early Romans reckoned values in cattle (one ox being equivalent to ten sheep). Our English word "pecuniary" goes back to the Latin pecus, or "herd" of cattle.

[Illustration: EARLY ROMAN BAR MONEY A bar of copper marked with the figure of a bull. Dates from the fourth century B.C.]

THE HORSE

The domestication of the horse came much later than that of the cow. In the early Stone Age the horse ran wild over western Europe and formed an important source of food for primitive men. This prehistoric horse, as some ancient drawings show, [4] was a small animal with a shaggy mane and tail. It resembled the wild pony still found on the steppes of Mongolia. The domesticated horse does not appear in Egypt and western Asia much before 1500 B.C. For a long time after the horse was tamed, the more manageable ox continued to be used as the beast of burden. The horse was kept for chariots of war, as among the Egyptians, or ridden bareback in races, as by the early Greeks.

OTHER ANIMALS DOMESTICATED

At the close of prehistoric times in the Old World nearly all the domestic animals of to-day were known. Besides those just mentioned, the goat, sheep, ass, and hog had become man's useful servants. [5]

PASTORAL STAGE

The domestication of animals made possible an advance from the hunting and fishing stage to the pastoral stage. Herds of cattle and sheep would now furnish more certain and abundant supplies of food than the chase could ever yield. We find in some parts of the world, as on the great Asiatic plains, the herdsman succeeding the hunter and fisher. But even in this stage much land for grazing is required. With the exhaustion of the pasturage the sheep or cattle must be driven to new fields. Hence pastoral peoples, as well as hunting and fishing folk, remained nomads without fixed homes. Before permanent settlements were possible, another onward step became necessary. This was the domestication of plants.

AGRICULTURAL STAGE

The domestication of plants marked almost as wonderful an advance as the domestication of animals. When wild seedgrasses and plants had been transformed into the great cereals—wheat, oats, barley, and rice—people could raise them for food, and so could pass from the life of wandering hunters or shepherds to the life of settled farmers. There is evidence that during the Stone Age some of the inhabitants of Europe were familiar with various cultivated plants, but agriculture on a large scale seems to have begun in the fertile regions of Egypt and western Asia. [6] Here first arose populous communities with leisure to develop the arts of life. Here, as has been already seen, [7] we must look for the beginnings of history.

4. WRITING AND THE ALPHABET

PICTURE WRITING

Though history is always based on written records, the first steps toward writing are prehistoric. We start with the pictures or rough drawings which have been found among the remains of the early Stone Age. [8] Primitive man, however, could not rest satisfied with portraying objects.

[Illustration: VARIOUS SIGNS OF SYMBOLIC PICTURE WRITING 1, "war" (Dakota Indian); 2, "morning" (Ojibwa Indian); 3, "nothing" (Ojibwa Indian); 4 and 5, "to eat" (Indian, Mexican, Egyptian, etc.).]

He wanted to record thoughts and actions, and so his pictures tended to become symbols of ideas. The figure of an arrow might be made to represent, not a real object, but the idea of an "enemy." A "fight" could then be shown simply by drawing two arrows directed against each other. Many uncivilized tribes still employ picture writing of this sort. The American Indians developed it in most elaborate fashion. On rolls of birch bark or the skins of animals they wrote messages, hunting stories, and songs, and even preserved tribal annals extending over a century.

SOUND WRITING; THE REBUS

A new stage in the development of writing was reached when the picture represented, not an actual object or an idea, but a sound of the human voice. This difficult but all-important step appears to have been taken through the use of the rebus, that is, writing words by pictures of objects which stand for sounds. Such rebuses are found in prehistoric Egyptian writing; for example, the Egyptian words for "sun" and "goose" were so nearly alike that the royal title, "Son of the Sun," could be suggested by grouping the pictures of the sun and a goose. Rebus making is still a common game among children, but to primitive men it must have been a serious occupation.

[Illustration: MEXICAN REBUS The Latin Pater Noster, "Our Father," is written by a flag (pan), a stone (te), a prickly pear (noch), and another stone (te).]

[Illustration: CHINESE PICTURE WRITING AND LATER CONVENTIONAL CHARACTERS]

WORDS AND SYLLABLES

In the simplest form of sound writing each separate picture or symbol stands for the sound of an entire word. This method was employed by the Chinese, who have never given it up. A more developed form of sound writing occurs when signs are used for the sounds, not of entire words, but of separate syllables. Since the number of different syllables which the voice can utter is limited, it now becomes possible to write all the words of a language with a few hundred signs. The Japanese, who borrowed some of the Chinese symbols, used them to denote syllables, instead of entire words. The Babylonians possessed, in their cuneiform [9] characters, signs for about five hundred syllables. The prehistoric inhabitants of Crete appear to have been acquainted with a somewhat similar system. [10]

LETTERS

The final step in the development of writing is taken when the separate sounds of the voice are analyzed and each is represented by a single sign or letter. With alphabets of a few score letters every word in a language may easily be written.

[Illustration: CRETAN WRITING
A large tablet with linear script found in the palace at Gnossus, Crete
There are eight lines of writing, with a total of about twenty words
Notice the upright lines, which appear to mark the termination of each
group of signs.]

EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHICS

The Egyptians early developed such an alphabet. Unfortunately they never gave up their older methods of writing and learned to rely upon alphabetic signs alone. Egyptian hieroglyphics [11] are a curious jumble of object- pictures, symbols of ideas, and signs for entire words, separate syllables, and letters. The writing is a museum of all the steps in the development from the picture to the letter.

PHOENICIAN ALPHABET

As early, apparently, as the tenth century B.C. we find the Phoenicians of western Asia in possession of an alphabet. It consisted of twenty-two letters, each representing a consonant. The Phoenicians do not seem to have invented their alphabetic signs. It is generally believed that they borrowed them from the Egyptians, but recent discoveries in Crete perhaps point to that island as the source of the Phoenician alphabet.

[Illustration: EGYPTIAN AND BABYLONIAN WRITING Below the pictured hieroglyphics in the first line is the same text in a simpler writing known as hieratic. The two systems, however, were not distinct; they were as identical as our own printed and written characters. The third line illustrates old Babylonian cuneiform, in which the characters, like the hieroglyphics, are rude and broken-down pictures of objects. Derived from them is the later cuneiform shown in lines four and five.]

DIFFUSION OF THE PHOENICIAN ALPHABET

If they did not originate the alphabet now in use, the Phoenicians did most to spread a knowledge of it in other lands. They were bold sailors and traders who bought and sold throughout the Mediterranean. Wherever they went, they took their alphabet. From the Phoenicians the Greeks learned their letters. Then the Greeks taught them to the Romans, from whom other European peoples borrowed them. [12]

[Illustration: THE MOABITE STONE, (Louvre, Paris) Found in 1868 A.D. at Diban east of the Dead Sea. The monument records the victory of Mesha king of Moab, over the united armies of Israel and Judah about 850 B.C. The inscription, consisting of 34 lines is one of the most ancient examples of Phoenician writing.]

5. PRIMITIVE SCIENCE AND ART

FOUNDATIONS OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE

We have already seen that prehistoric men in their struggle for existence had gathered an extensive fund of information. They could make useful and artistic implements of stone. They could work many metals into a variety of tools and weapons. They were practical botanists, able to distinguish different plants and to cultivate them for food. They were close students of animal life and expert hunters and fishers. They knew how to produce fire and preserve it, how to cook, how to fashion pottery and baskets, how to spin and weave, how to build boats and houses. After writing came into general use, all this knowledge served as the foundation of science.

COUNTING AND MEASURING

We can still distinguish some of the first steps in scientific knowledge. Thus, counting began with calculations on one's fingers, a method still familiar to children. Finger counting explains the origin of the decimal system. The simplest, and probably the earliest, measures of length are those based on various parts of the body. Some of our Indian tribes, for instance, employed the double arm's length, the single arm's length, the hand width, and the finger width. Old English standards, such as the span, the ell, and the hand, go back to this very obvious method of measuring on the body.

CALCULATION OF TIME; THE CALENDAR

It is interesting to trace the beginnings of time reckoning and of that most important institution, the calendar. Most primitive tribes reckon time by the lunar month, the interval between two new moons (about twenty- nine days, twelve hours). Twelve lunar months give us the lunar year of about three hundred and fifty-four days. In order to adapt such a year to the different seasons, the practice arose of inserting a thirteenth month from time to time. Such awkward calendars were used in antiquity by the Babylonians, Jews, and Greeks; in modern times by the Arabs and Chinese. The Egyptians were the only people in the Old World to frame a solar year. From the Egyptians it has come down, through the Romans, to us. [13]

[Illustration: STONEHENGE On Salisbury Plain in the south of England: appears to date from the close of the New Stone Age or the beginning of the Bronze Age. The outer circle measures 300 feet in circumference; the inner circle, 106 feet. The tallest stones reach 25 feet in height. This monument was probably a tomb, or group of tombs, of prehistoric chieftains.]

EARLY DRAWING AND PAINTING

The study of prehistoric art takes us back to the early Stone Age. The men of that age in western Europe lived among animals such as the mammoth, cave bear, and woolly-haired rhinoceros, which have since disappeared, and among many others, such as the lion and hippopotamus, which now exist only in warmer climates. Armed with clubs, flint axes, and horn daggers, primitive hunters killed these fierce beasts and on fragments of their bones, or on cavern walls, drew pictures of them. Some of these earliest works of art are remarkably lifelike.

[Illustration: HEAD OF A GIRL (Musée S. Germain, Paris)
A small head of a young girl carved from mammoth ivory. Found at
Brassempouy, France, in cave deposits belonging to the early Stone Age.
The hair is arranged somewhat after the early Egyptian fashion. Of the
features the mouth alone is wanting.]

[Illustration: PREHISTORIC ART
SKETCH OF MAMMOTH ON A TUSK FOUND IN A CAVE IN FRANCE
CAVE BEAR DRAWN ON A PEBBLE
BISON PAINTED ON THE WALL OF A CAVE
WILD HORSE ON THE WALL OF A CAVE IN SPAIN.

Later he pictured an aurochs—later he pictured a bear—
Pictured the sabre toothed tiger dragging a man to his lair—
Pictured the mountainous mammoth hairy abhorrent alone—
Out of the love that he bore them scribing them clearly on bone—
KIPLING.]

EARLY ARCHITECTURE

A still later period of the Stone Age witnessed the beginnings of architecture. Men had begun to raise huge dolmens which are found in various parts of the Old World from England to India. They also erected enormous stone pillars, known as menhirs. Carved in the semblance of a human face and figure, the menhir became a statue, perhaps the first ever made.

As we approach historic times, we note a steady improvement in the various forms of art. Recent discoveries in Egypt, Greece, Italy, and other lands indicate that their early inhabitants were able architects, often building on a colossal scale.

[Illustration: A DOLMEN Department of Morbihan, Brittany. A dolmen was a single chambered tomb formed by laying one long stone over several other stones set upright in the ground. Most if not all dolmens were originally covered with earth.]

[Illustration: CARVED MENHIR
From Saint Sernin in Aveyron, a department of southern France.]

SIGNIFICANCE OF PREHISTORIC ART

Their paintings and sculptures prepared the way for the work of later artists. Our survey of the origins of art shows us that in this field, as elsewhere, we must start with the things accomplished by prehistoric men.

6. HISTORIC PEOPLES

RACES OF MAN

At the dawn of history the various regions of the world were already in the possession of many different peoples. Such physical characteristics as the shape of the skull, the features, stature, or complexion may serve to distinguish one people from another. Other grounds for distinction are found in language, customs beliefs, and general intelligence.

CLASSIFICATION OF RACES

If we take complexion or color as the basis of classification, it is possible to distinguish a few large racial groups. Each of these groups occupies, roughly speaking, its separate area of the globe. The most familiar classification is that which recognizes the Black or Negro race dwelling in Africa, the Yellow or Mongolian race whose home is in central and eastern Asia, and the White or Caucasian race of western Asia and Europe. Sometimes two additional divisions are made by including, as the Red race, the American Indians, and as the Brown race, the natives of the Pacific islands.

THE WHITE RACE

These separate racial groups have made very unequal progress in culture. The peoples belonging to the Black, Red, and Brown races are still either savages or barbarians, as were the men of prehistoric times. The Chinese and Japanese are the only representatives of the Yellow race that have been able to form civilized states. In the present, as in the past, it is chiefly the members of the White race who are developing civilization and making history.

INDO-EUROPEANS AND SEMITES

Because of differences in language, scholars have divided the White or Caucasian race into two main groups, called Indo-Europeans and Semites. [14] This classification is often helpful, but the student should remember that Indo-European and Semitic peoples are not always to be sharply distinguished because they have different types of language. There is no very clear distinction in physical characteristics between the two groups. A clear skin, an oval face, wavy or curly hair, and regular features separate them from both the Negro and the Mongolian.

PRINCIPAL INDO-EUROPEAN PEOPLES

The Indo-Europeans in antiquity included the Hindus of India, the Medes and Persians dwelling on the plateau of Iran, the Greeks and Italians, and most of the inhabitants of central and western Europe. All these peoples spoke related languages which are believed to be offshoots from one common tongue. Likeness in language does not imply that all Indo-Europeans were closely related in blood. Men often adopt a foreign tongue and pass it on to their children.

PRINCIPAL SEMITIC PEOPLES

The various Semitic nations dwelling in western Asia and Arabia were more closely connected with one another. They spoke much the same type of language, and in physical traits and habits of life they appear to have been akin. The Semites in antiquity included the Babylonians and Assyrians, the Hebrews, Phoenicians, and Arabs.

[Illustration: RACE PORTRAITURE OF THE EGYPTIANS Paintings on the walls of royal tombs. The Egyptians were painted red, the Semites yellow, the Negroes black, and the Libyans white, with blue eyes and fair beards. Each racial type is distinguished by peculiar dress and characteristic features.]

[Illustration: Map. Distribution of SEMITIC and INDO-EUROPEAN PEOPLES]
PEOPLES OF UNCERTAIN RELATIONSHIP

At the opening of the historic period still other parts of the World were the homes of various peoples who cannot be classed with certainty as either Indo-Europeans or Semites. Among these were the Egyptians and some of the inhabitants of Asia Minor. We must remember that, during the long prehistoric ages, repeated conquests and migrations mingled the blood of many different communities. History, in fact, deals with no unmixed peoples.

STUDIES

1. On an outline map indicate the areas occupied in antiquity by Semites and Indo-Europeans.

2. Find definitions for the following terms: society, nation, state, government, institution, culture, and civilization.

3. Explain the abbreviations B.C. and A.D. In what century was the year 1917 B.C.? the year 1917 A.D.?

4. Look up the derivation of the words "paper" and "Bible."

5. Distinguish between the three stages of savagery, barbarism, and civilization, and give examples of existing peoples in each stage.

6. Can you name any savages still living in the Stone Age?

7. What stone implements have you ever seen? Who made them? Where were they?

8. Why should the discovery of fire be regarded as of more significance than the discovery of steam?

9. Why has the invention of the bow-and-arrow been of greater importance than the invention of gunpowder?

10. How does the presence of few tameable animals in the New World help to account for its tardier development as compared with the Old World?

11. What examples of pastoral and agricultural life among the North American Indians are familiar to you?

12. Give examples of peoples widely different in blood who nevertheless speak the same language.

13. In the classification of mankind, where do the Arabs belong? the Persians? the Germans? the inhabitants of the United States?

14. Enumerate the most important contributions to civilization made in prehistoric times.

FOOTNOTES

[1] There are still some savage peoples, for instance, the Australians, who continue to make stone implements very similar to those of prehistoric men. Other primitive peoples, such as the natives of the Pacific islands, passed directly from the use of stone to that of iron, after this part of the world was opened up to European trade in the nineteenth century.

[2] Iron was unknown to the inhabitants of North America and South America before the coming of the Europeans. The natives used many stone implements, besides those of copper and bronze. The Indians got most of their copper from the mines in the Lake Superior region, whence it was carried far and wide.

[3] See the illustration, page 45.

[4] See the illustration, page 14.

[5] In the New World, the only important domestic animal was the llama of the Andes. The natives used it as a beast of burden, ate its flesh, and clothed themselves with its wool.

[6] The plants domesticated in the New World were not numerous. The most important were the potato of Peru and Ecuador, Indian corn or maize, tobacco, the tomato, and manioc. From the roots of the latter, the starch called tapioca is derived.

[7] See page 2.

[8] See the illustration, page 14.

[9] Latin cuneus, "a wedge".

[10] See page 71.

[11] From the Greek words hieros, "holy," and glyphein, "to carve" The Egyptians regarded their signs as sacred.

[12] Our word "alphabet" comes from the names of the first two letters of the Greek alphabet, alpha (a) and beta (b).

[13] See page 186 and note 2.

[14] The Old Testament (Genesis, x 21-22) represents Shem (or Sem), son of Noah, as the ancestor of the Semitic peoples. The title "Indo- Europeans" tells us that the members of that group now dwell in India and in Europe. Indo-European peoples are popularly called "Aryans," from a word in Sanskrit (the old Hindu language) meaning "noble."

CHAPTER II

THE LANDS AND PEOPLES OF THE EAST TO ABOUT 600 B.C. [1]

7. PHYSICAL ASIA

GRAND DIVISIONS OF ASIA

Ancient history begins in the East—in Asia and in that part of Africa called Egypt, which the peoples of antiquity always regarded as belonging to Asia. If we look at a physical map of Asia, we see at once that it consists of two very unequal divisions separated by an almost continuous mass of mountains and deserts. These two divisions are Farther and Nearer, or Eastern and Western, Asia.

[Illustration: Map, PHYSICAL MAP OF ASIA.]

FARTHER ASIA

Farther Asia begins at the center of the continent with a series of elevated table-lands which rise into the lofty plateaus, known as the "Roof of the World." Here two tremendous mountain chains diverge. The Altai range runs out to the northeast and reaches the shores of the Pacific near Bering Strait. The Himalaya range extends southeast to the Malay peninsula. In the angle formed by their intersection lies the cold and barren region of East Turkestan and Tibet, the height of which, in some places, is ten thousand feet above the sea. From these mountains and plateaus the ground sinks gradually toward the north into the lowlands of West Turkestan and Siberia, toward the east and south into the plains of China and India.

CHINA

The fertile territory of central China, watered by the two streams, Yangtse and Hoangho, was settled at a remote period by barbarous tribes. The civilization which they slowly developed in antiquity has endured with little change until the present day. The inhabitants of neighboring countries, Korea, Japan, and Indo-China, owe much to this civilization. It has exerted slight influence on the other peoples of Asia because the Chinese have always occupied a distant corner of the continent, cut off by deserts and mountains from the lands on the west. As if these barriers were not enough, they raised the Great Wall to protect their country from invasion.

[Illustration: THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA The wall extends for about fifteen hundred miles along the northern frontier of China. In 1908 AD it was traversed for its entire length by an American Mr. W. E. Geil. He found many parts of the fortification still in good repair, though built twenty one centuries ago.]

Behind this mighty rampart the Chinese have lived secluded and aloof from the progress of our western world. In ancient times China was a land of mystery.

INDIA

India was better known than China, especially its two great rivers, the Indus and the Ganges, which flow to the southwest and southeast, respectively, and make this part of the peninsula one of the most fertile territories on the globe. Such a land attracted immigrants. The region now known as the Punjab, where the Indus receives the waters of five great streams, was settled by light-skinned Indo-Europeans [2] perhaps as early as 2000 B.C. Then they occupied the valley of the Ganges and so brought all northern India under their control.

INDIA AND THE WEST

India did not remain entirely isolated from the rest of Asia, The Punjab was twice conquered by invaders from the West; by the Persians in the sixth century B.C., [3] and about two hundred years later by the Greeks. [4] After the end of foreign rule India continued to be of importance through its commerce, which introduced such luxuries as precious stones, spices, and ivory among the western peoples.

NEARER ASIA

Nearer, or Western Asia, the smaller of the two grand divisions of the Asiatic continent, is bounded by the Black and Caspian seas on the north, by the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, and Indian Ocean on the south, eastward by the Indus River, and westward by the Mediterranean and the Nile. Almost all the countries within this area played a part in the ancient history of the Orient.

COUNTRIES OF NEARER ASIA

The lofty plateaus of central Asia decline on the west into the lower but still elevated region of Iran. The western part of Iran was occupied in antiquity by the kindred people known as Medes and Persians. Armenia, a wild and mountainous region, is an extension to the northwest of the Iranian table-land. Beyond Armenia we cross into the peninsula of Asia Minor, a natural link between Asia and Europe. Southward from Asia Minor we pass along the Mediterranean coast through Syria to Arabia. The Arabian peninsula may be regarded as the link between Asia and Africa.

INFLUENCE OF GEOGRAPHICAL CONDITIONS

These five countries of Nearer Asia were not well fitted to become centers of early civilization. They possessed no great rivers which help to bring people together, and no broad, fertile plains which support a large population. Armenia, Asia Minor, and Syria were broken up into small districts by chains of mountains. Iran and Arabia were chiefly barren deserts. But two other divisions of Nearer Asia resembled distant India and China in the possession of a warm climate, a fruitful soil, and an extensive river system. These lands were Babylonia and Egypt, the first homes of civilized man.

8. BABYLONIA AND EGYPT

THE TIGRIS AND THE EUPHRATES

Two famous rivers rise in the remote fastnesses of Armenia—the Tigris and the Euphrates. As they flow southward, the twin streams approach each other to form a common valley, and then proceed in parallel channels for the greater part of their course. In antiquity each river emptied into the Persian Gulf by a separate mouth. This Tigris-Euphrates valley was called by the Greeks Mesopotamia, "the land between the rivers."

PRODUCTIONS OF BABYLONIA

Babylonia is a remarkably productive country. The annual inundation of the rivers has covered its once rocky bottom with deposits of rich silt. Crops planted in such a soil, under the influence of a blazing sun, ripen with great rapidity and yield abundant harvests. "Of all the countries that we know," says an old Greek traveler, "there is no other so fruitful in grain." [5] Wheat and barley were perhaps first domesticated in this part of the world. [6] Wheat still grows wild there. Though Babylonia possessed no forests, it had the date palm, which needed scarcely any cultivation. If the alluvial soil yielded little stone, clay, on the other hand, was everywhere. Molded into brick and afterwards dried in the sun, the clay became adobe, the cheapest building material imaginable.

BABYLONIA AN EARLY CENTER OF CIVILIZATION

In Babylonia Nature seems to have done her utmost to make it easy for People to gain a living. We can understand, therefore, why from prehistoric times men have been attracted to this region, and why it is here that we must look for one of the earliest seats of civilization. [7]

LOWER AND UPPER EGYPT

Egypt may be described as the valley of the Nile. Rising in the Nyanza lakes of central Africa, that mighty stream, before entering Egypt, receives the waters of the Blue Nile near the modern town of Khartum. From this point the course of the river is broken by a series of five rocky rapids, misnamed cataracts, which can be shot by boats. The cataracts cease near the island of Philae, and Upper Egypt begins. This is a strip of fertile territory, about five hundred miles in length but averaging only eight miles in width. Not far from modern Cairo the hills inclosing the valley fall away, the Nile divides into numerous branches, and Lower Egypt, or the Delta, begins. The sluggish stream passes through a region of mingled swamp and plain, and at length by three principal mouths empties its waters into the Mediterranean.

[Illustration: PHILAE The island was originally only a heap of granite bowlders. Retaining walls were built around it, and the space within when filled with rich Nile mud, became beautiful with groves of palms and mimosas. As the result of the construction of the Assuan dam, Philae and its exquisite temples are now submerged during the winter months, when the reservoir is full.]

EGYPT THE GIFT OF THE NILE

Egypt owes her existence to the Nile. All Lower Egypt is a creation of the river by the gradual accumulation of sediment at its mouths. Upper Egypt has been dug out of the desert sand and underlying rock by a process of erosion centuries long. Once the Nile filled all the space between the hills that line its sides. Now it flows through a thick layer of alluvial mud deposited by the yearly inundation.

ANNUAL INUNDATION OF THE NILE

The Nile begins to rise in June, when the snow melts on the Abyssinian mountains. High-water mark, some thirty feet above the ordinary level, is reached in September. The inhabitants then make haste to cut the confining dikes and to spread the fertilizing water over their fields. Egypt takes on the appearance of a turbid lake, dotted here and there with island villages and crossed in every direction by highways elevated above the flood. Late in October the river begins to subside and by December has returned to its normal level. As the water recedes, it deposits that dressing of fertile vegetable mold which makes the soil of Egypt perhaps the richest in the world. [8]

EGYPT AN EARLY CENTER OF CIVILIZATION

It was by no accident that Egypt, like Babylonia, became one of the first homes of civilized men. Here, as there, every condition made it easy for people to live and thrive. Food was cheap, for it was easily produced. The peasant needed only to spread his seed broadcast over the muddy fields to be sure of an abundant return. The warm, dry climate enabled him to get along with little shelter and clothing. Hence the inhabitants of this favored region rapidly increased in number and gathered in populous towns and cities. At a time when most of their neighbors were still in the darkness of the prehistoric age, the Egyptians had entered the light of history.

9. THE BABYLONIANS AND THE EGYPTIANS

INHABITANTS OF BABYLONIA

The earliest inhabitants of Babylonia of whom we know anything were a people called Sumerians. They entered the Babylonian plain through the passes of the eastern mountains, three or four thousand years before the Christian era. Here they formed a number of independent states, each with its capital city, its patron god, and its king. After them came Semitic tribes from the deserts of northern Arabia. The Semites mingled with the Sumerians and adopted Sumerian civilization.

HAMMURABI, KING OF BABYLONIA, ABOUT 2000 B.C.

Of all the early Babylonian kings the most famous was Hammurabi. Some inscriptions still remain to tell how he freed his country from foreign invaders and made his native Babylon the capital of the entire land. This city became henceforth the real center of the Euphrates valley, to which, indeed, it gave its name. Hammurabi was also an able statesman, who sought to develop the territories his sword had won. He dug great canals to distribute the waters of the Euphrates and built huge granaries to store the wheat against a time of famine. In Babylon he raised splendid temples and palaces. For all his kingdom he published a code of laws, the oldest in the world. [9] Thus Hammurabi, by making Babylonia so strong and flourishing, was able to extend her influence in every direction. Her only important rival was Egypt.

[Illustration: TOP OF MONUMENT CONTAINING THE CODE OF HAMMURABI (British Museum, London) A block of black diorite nearly 8 feet high, on which the code is chiseled in 44 columns and over 3600 lines. The relief at the top of the monument shows the Babylonian king receiving the laws from the sun god who is seated at the right.]

The origin of the Egyptians is not known with certainty. In physical characteristics they resembled the native tribes of northern and inhabitants eastern Africa. Their language, however, shows of Egypt close kinship to the Semitic tongues of western Asia and Arabia. It is probable that the Egyptians, like the Babylonians, arose from the mingling of several peoples.

MENES, KING OF EGYPT, ABOUT 3400 B.C.

The history of Egypt commences with the union of the two kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt under Menes. An ancient tradition made him the builder of Memphis, near the head of the Delta, and the founder of the Egyptian monarchy. Scholars once doubted these exploits and even regarded Menes himself as mythical. Recently, however, his tomb has been discovered. In the gray dawn of history Menes appears as a real personage, the first of that line of kings, or "Pharaohs," who for nearly three thousand years ruled over Egypt.

[Illustration: Map, EGYPTIAN EMPIRE About 1450 B.C.]

THE PYRAMID KINGS, ABOUT 3000-2500 B.C.

Several centuries after Menes we reach the age of the kings who raised the pyramids. Probably no other rulers have ever stamped their memory so indelibly on the pages of history as the builders of these mighty structures. The most celebrated monarch of this line was the Pharaoh whom the Greeks called Cheops. The Great Pyramid near Memphis, erected for his tomb, remains a lasting witness to his power.

[Illustration: TWO FAMOUS PHARAOHS
Khufu (Cheops) builder of the Great Pyramid
Menephtah the supposed Pharaoh of the Exodus]

[Illustration: THE GREAT PYRAMID The pyramid when completed had a height of 481 feet. It is now 451 feet high. Its base covers about thirteen acres. Some of the blocks of white limestone used in construction weigh fifty tons. The facing of polished stone was gradually removed for building purposes by the Arabs. On the northern side of the pyramid a narrow entrance once carefully concealed, opens into tortuous passages which lead to the central vault. Here the sarcophagus of the king was placed. This chamber was long since entered and its contents rifled.]

[Illustration: THE GREAT SPHINX This colossal figure, human headed and lion bodied, is hewn from the natural rock. The body is about 150 feet long, the paws 50 feet, the head 30 feet. The height from the base to the top of the head is 70 feet. Except for its head and shoulders the figure has been buried for centuries in the desert sand. The eyes, nose and beard have been mutilated by the Arabs. The face is probably that of one of the pyramid kings.]

AFTER THE PYRAMID KINGS

For a long time after the epoch of the pyramid kings the annals of Egypt furnish a record of quiet and peaceful progress. The old city of Memphis gradually declined in importance and Thebes in Upper Egypt became the capital. The vigorous civilization growing up in Egypt was destined, however, to suffer a sudden eclipse. About 1800 B.C. barbarous tribes from western Asia burst into the country, through the isthmus of Suez, and settled in the Delta. The Hyksos, as they are usually called, extended their sway over all Egypt. At first they ruled harshly, plundering the cities and enslaving the inhabitants, but in course of time the invaders adopted Egyptian culture and their kings reigned like native Pharaohs. The Hyksos are said to have introduced the horse and military chariot into Egypt. A successful revolt at length expelled the intruders and set a new line of Theban monarchs on the throne.

THE EGYPTIAN EMPIRE

The overthrow of the Hyksos marked a new era in the history of Egypt. From a home-loving and peaceful people the Egyptians became a warlike race, ambitious for glory. The Pharaohs raised powerful armies and by extensive conquests created an Egyptian Empire, reaching from the Nile to the Euphrates.

IMPERIAL SPLENDOR OF EGYPT

This period of the imperial greatness of Egypt is the most splendid in its history. An extensive trade with Cyprus, Crete, and other Mediterranean Islands introduced many foreign luxuries. The conquered territories in Syria paid a heavy tribute of the precious metals, merchandise, and slaves. The forced labor of thousands of war captives enabled the Pharaohs to build public works in every part on their realm. Even the ruins of these stupendous structures are enough to indicate the majesty and power of ancient Egypt.

RAMESES II, ABOUT 1292-1225 B.C.

Of all the conquering Pharaohs none won more fame than Rameses II, who ruled for nearly seventy years. His campaigns in Syria were mainly against the Hittites, a warlike people who had moved southward from their home in Asia Minor and sought to establish themselves in the Syrian lands. Rameses does not appear to have been entirely successful against his foes. We find him at length entering into an alliance with "the great king of the Hittites," by which their dominion over northern Syria was recognized. In the arts of peace Rameses achieved a more enduring renown. He erected many statues and temples in various parts of Egypt and made Thebes, his capital, the most magnificent city of the age.

[Illustration: HEAD OF MUMMY OF RAMESES II (Museum of Gizeh) The mummy was discovered in 1881 AD in an underground chamber near the site of Thebes. With it were the coffins and bodies of more than a score of royal personages. Rameses II was over ninety years of age at the time of his death. In spite of the somewhat grotesque disguise of mummification, the face of this famous Pharaoh still wears an aspect of majesty and pride.]

DECLINE OF THE EGYPTIAN POWER

Rameses II was the last of the great Pharaohs. After his death the empire steadily declined in strength. The Asiatic possessions fell away, never to be recovered. By 1100 B.C. Egypt had been restricted to her former boundaries in the Nile valley. The Persians, in the sixth century, brought the country within their own vast empire.

10. THE PHOENICIANS AND THE HEBREWS

THE PHOENICIANS

The Phoenicians were the first Syrian people to assume importance. Their country was a narrow stretch of coast, about one hundred and twenty miles in length, seldom more than twelve miles in width, between the Lebanon Mountains and the sea. This tiny land could not support a large population. As the Phoenicians increased in numbers, they were obliged to betake themselves to the sea. The Lebanon cedars furnished soft, white wood for shipbuilding, and the deeply indented coast offered excellent harbors. Thus the Phoenicians became preeminently a race of sailors. Their great cities, Sidon and Tyre, established colonies throughout the Mediterranean and had an extensive commerce with every region of the known world.

THE HEBREWS

The Hebrews lived south of Phoenicia in the land of Canaan, west of the Jordan River Their history begins with the emigration of twelve Hebrew tribes (called Israelites) from northern Arabia to Canaan. In their new home the Israelites gave up the life of wandering shepherds and became farmers. They learned from the Canaanites to till the soil and to dwell in towns and cities.

PERIOD OF THE JUDGES

The thorough conquest of Canaan proved to be no easy task. At first the twelve Israelitish tribes formed only a loose and weak confederacy without a common head. "In those days there was no king in Israel, every man did what was right in his own eyes." [10] The sole authority was that held by valiant chieftains and law-givers, such as Samson, Gideon, and Samuel, who served as judges between the tribes and often led them in successful attacks upon their foes. Among these were the warlike Philistines, who occupied the southwestern coast of Canaan. To resist the Philistines with success it was necessary to have a king who could bring all the scattered tribes under his firm, well-ordered rule.

REIGNS OF SAUL AND DAVID

In Saul, "a young man and a goodly," the warriors of Israel found a leader to unite them against their enemies. His reign was passed in constant struggles with the Philistines. David, who followed him, utterly destroyed the Philistine power and by further conquests extended the boundaries of the new state. For a capital city he selected the ancient fortress of Jerusalem. Here David built himself a royal palace and here he fixed the Ark, the sanctuary of Jehovah. Jerusalem became to the Israelites their dearest possession and the center of their national life.

[Illustration: Map, CANAAN as Divided among THE TRIBES]

REIGN OF SOLOMON, ABOUT 955-925 B.C.

The reign of Solomon, the son and successor of David, was the most splendid period in Hebrew history. His kingdom stretched from the Red Sea and the peninsula of Sinai northward to the Lebanon Mountains and the Euphrates. With the surrounding peoples Solomon was on terms of friendship and alliance. He married an Egyptian princess, a daughter of the reigning Pharaoh. He joined with Hiram, king of Tyre, in trading expeditions on the Red Sea and Indian Ocean. The same Phoenician monarch supplied him with the "cedars of Lebanon," with which he erected at Jerusalem a famous temple for the worship of Jehovah. A great builder, a wise administrator and governor, Solomon takes his place as a typical Oriental despot, the most powerful monarch of the age.

[Illustration: A PHOENICIAN WAR GALLEY From a slab found at Nineveh in the palace of the Assyrian king, Sennacherib. The vessel shown is a bireme with two decks. On the upper deck are soldiers with their shields hanging over the side. The oarsmen sit on the lower deck, eight at each side. The crab catching the fish is a humorous touch.]

SECESSION OF THE TEN TRIBES, ABOUT 925 B.C.

But the political greatness of the Hebrews was not destined to endure. The people were not ready to bear the burdens of empire. They objected to the standing army, to the forced labor on public buildings, and especially to the heavy taxes. The ten northern tribes seceded shortly after Solomon's death and established the independent kingdom of Israel, with its capital at Samaria. The two southern tribes, Judah and Benjamin, formed the kingdom of Judea, and remained loyal to the successors of Solomon.

[Illustration: Map, SOLOMON'S KINGDOM]

DECLINE OF THE HEBREW POWER

The two small Hebrew kingdoms could not resist their powerful neighbors. About two centuries after the secession of the Ten Tribes, the Assyrians overran Israel. Judea was subsequently conquered by the Babylonians. Both countries in the end became a part of the Persian Empire.

11. THE ASSYRIANS

GREATNESS OF ASSYRIA, 745-626 B.C.

Assyria, lying east of the Tigris River, was colonized at an early date by emigrants from Babylonia. After the Assyrians freed themselves from Babylonian control, they entered upon a series of sweeping conquests. Every Asiatic state felt their heavy hand. The Assyrian kings created a huge empire stretching from the Caspian Sea to the Persian Gulf, the Mediterranean, and the Nile. For the first time in Oriental history Mesopotamia and Egypt, with the intervening territory, were brought under one government.

CHARACTER OF ASSYRIAN RULE

This unification of the Orient was accomplished only at a fearful cost. The records of Assyria are full of terrible deeds—of towns and cities without number given to the flames, of the devastation of fertile fields and orchards, of the slaughter of men, women, and children, of the enslavement of entire nations. Assyrian monarchs, in numerous inscriptions, boast of the wreck and ruin they brought to many flourishing lands.

[Illustration: AN ASSYRIAN
From a Nineveh bas-relief. The original is colored.]

SARGON II, 722-705 B.C.

The treatment of conquered peoples by the Assyrian rulers is well illustrated by their dealings with the Hebrews. One of the mightiest monarchs was an usurper, who ascended the throne as Sargon II. Shortly after his succession he turned his attention to the kingdom of Israel, which had revolted. Sargon in punishment took its capital city of Samaria (722 B.C.) and led away many thousands of the leading citizens into a lifelong captivity in distant Assyria. The Ten Tribes mingled with the population of that region and henceforth disappeared from history.

[Illustration: ANCIENT ORIENTAL EMPIRES
Map, THE ASSYRIAN EMPIRE about 660 B.C.
Map, LYDIA, MEDIA, BABYLONIA and EGYPT about 550 B.C.]

SENNACHERIB, 705-681 B.C.

Sargon's son, Sennacherib, though not the greatest, is the best known of Assyrian kings. His name is familiar from the many references to him in Old Testament writings. An inscription by Sennacherib describes an expedition against Hezekiah, king of Judea, who was shut up "like a caged bird in his royal city of Jerusalem." Sennacherib, however, did not capture the place. His troops were swept away by a pestilence. The ancient Hebrew writer conceives it as the visitation of a destroying angel: "It came to pass that night that the angel of Jehovah went forth, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians an hundred fourscore and five thousand; and when men arose early in the morning, behold, these were all dead bodies." [11] So Sennacherib departed, and returned with a shattered army to Nineveh, his capital.

[Illustration: AN ASSYRIAN RELIEF (British Museum, London)
The relief represents the siege and capture of Lachish, a city of the
Canaanites, by Sennacherib's troops. Notice the total absence of
perspective in this work.]

DOWNFALL OF ASSYRIA, 606 B.C.

Although Assyria recovered from this disaster, its empire rested on unstable foundations. The subject races were attached to their oppressive masters by no ties save those of force. When Assyria grew exhausted by its career of conquest, they were quick to strike a blow for freedom. By the middle of the seventh century Egypt had secured her independence, and many other provinces were ready to revolt. Meanwhile, beyond the eastern mountains, the Medes were gathering ominously on the Assyrian frontier. The storm broke when the Median monarch, in alliance with the king of Babylon, moved upon Nineveh and captured it. The city was utterly destroyed.

[Illustration: THE ISHTAR GATE, BABYLON Explorations on the site of Babylon have been conducted since 1899 A.D. by the German Oriental Society. Large parts of the temple area, as well as sections of the royal palaces, have been uncovered. The most important structure found is the Ishtar Gate. The towers which flank it are adorned with figures of dragons and bulls in brilliantly colored glazed tile.]

PARTITION OF ASSYRIA

After the conquest of the Assyrian Empire the victors proceeded to divide the spoils. The share of Media was Assyria itself, together with the long stretch of mountain country extending from the Persian Gulf to Asia Minor. Babylonia obtained the western half of the Assyrian domains, including the Euphrates valley and Syria. Under its famous king, Nebuchadnezzar (604-561 B.C.), Babylonia became a great power in the Orient. It was Nebuchadnezzar who brought the kingdom of Judea to an end. He captured Jerusalem in 586 B.C., burned the Temple, and carried away many Jews into captivity. The day of their deliverance, when Babylon itself should bow to a foreign foe, was still far distant.

12. THE WORLD EMPIRE OF PERSIA

CYRUS THE GREAT, 553-529 B.C.

Not much earlier than the break-up of the Assyrian Empire, we find a new and vigorous people pressing into western Iran. They were the Persians, near kinsmen of the Medes. Subjects at first of Assyria, and then of Media, they regained their independence and secured imperial power under a conquering king whom history knows as Cyrus the Great. In 553 B.C. Cyrus revolted against the Median monarch and three years later captured the royal city of Ecbatana. The Medes and Persians formed henceforth a united people.

[Illustration: THE TOMB OF CYRUS THE GREAT The mausoleum is built of immense marble blocks joined together without cement. Its total height including the seven steps is about thirty five feet. A solitary pillar near the tomb still bears the inscription 'I am Cyrus, the King, the Achaemenian.']

CONQUEST OF LYDIA BY CYRUS, 546 B.C.

The conquest of Media was soon followed by a war with the Lydians, who had been allies of the Medes. The throne of Lydia, a state in the western part of Asia Minor, was at this time held by Croesus, the last and most famous of his line. The king grew so wealthy from the tribute paid by Lydian subjects and from his gold mines that his name has passed into the proverb, "rich as Croesus." He viewed with alarm the rising power of Cyrus and rashly offered battle to the Persian monarch. Defeated in the open field, Croesus shut himself up in Sardis, his capital. The city was soon taken, however, and with its capture the Lydian kingdom came to an end.

CAPTURE OF BABYLON, 539 B.C.

The downfall of Lydia prepared the way for a Persian attack on Babylonia. The conquest of that country proved unexpectedly easy. In 539 B.C. the great city of Babylon opened its gates to the Persian host. Shortly afterwards Cyrus issued a decree allowing the Jewish exiles there to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the Temple, which Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed. With the surrender of Babylon the last Semitic empire in the East came to an end. The Medes and Persians, an Indo-European people, henceforth ruled over a wider realm than ever before had been formed in Oriental lands.

CAMBYSES, 529-522 B.C.

Cyrus was followed by his son, Cambyses, a cruel but stronghanded despot. Cambyses determined to add Egypt to the Persian dominions. His land army was supported by a powerful fleet, to which the Phoenicians and the Greeks of Cyprus contributed ships. A single battle sufficed to overthrow the Egyptian power and to bring the long rule of the Pharaohs to a close. [12]

DARIUS THE GREAT, 521-485 B.C.

The reign of Darius, the successor of Cambyses, was marked by further extensions of the frontiers. An expedition to the distant East added to the empire the region of the Punjab, [13] along the upper waters of the Indus. Another expedition against the wild Scythian tribes along the Danube led to conquests in Europe and brought the Persian dominions close to those of the Greeks. Not without reason could Darius describe himself in an inscription which still survives, as "the great king, king of kings, king of countries, king of all men."

[Illustration: DARIUS WITH HIS ATTENDANTS Bas-relief at Persepolis. The monarch's right hand grasps a staff or scepter, his left hand, a bunch of flowers. His head is surmounted by a crown, his body is enveloped in the long Median mantle. Above the king is a representation of the divinity which guarded and guided him. In the rear are two Persian nobles, one carrying the royal fan, the other the royal parasol.]

[Illustration: ROCK SEPULCHERS OF THE PERSIAN KINGS The tombs are those of Darius, Xerxes, and two of their successors. They are near Persepolis.]

ORGANIZATION OF THE PERSIAN EMPIRE

It was the work of Darius to provide for his dominions a stable government which should preserve what the sword had won. The problem was difficult. The empire was a collection of many peoples widely different in race, language, customs, and religion. Darius did not attempt to weld the conquered nations into unity. As long as the subjects of Persia paid tribute and furnished troops for the royal army, they were allowed to conduct their own affairs with little interference from the Great King.

THE SATRAPAL SYSTEM

The entire empire, excluding Persia proper, was divided into twenty satrapies, or provinces, each one with its civil governor, or satrap. The satraps carried out the laws and collected the heavy tribute annually levied throughout the empire. In most of the provinces there were also military governors who commanded the army and reported directly to the king. This device of intrusting the civil and military functions to separate officials lessened the danger of revolts against the Persian authority. As an additional precaution Darius provided special agents whose business it was to travel from province to province and investigate the conduct of his officials. It became a proverb that "the king has many eyes and many ears."

PERSIAN ROADS

Darius also established a system of military roads throughout the Persian dominions. The roads were provided at frequent intervals with inns, where postmen stood always in readiness to take up a letter and carry it to the next station. The Royal Road from Susa, the Persian capital, to Sardis in Lydia was over fifteen hundred miles long; but government couriers, using relays of fresh horses, could cover the distance within a week. An old Greek writer declares with admiration that "there is nothing mortal more swift than these messengers." [14]

UNION OF THE EAST UNDER PERSIA

The political history of the East fitly ends with the three Persian conquerors, Cyrus, Cambyses, and Darius, who thus brought into their huge empire every great state of Oriental antiquity. Medes and Persians, Babylonians and Assyrians, Lydians, Syrians, and Egyptians—all were at length united under a single dominion. In the reign of Darius this united Orient first comes into contact with the rising power of the Greek states of Europe. So we may leave its history here, resuming our narrative when we discuss the momentous conflict between Persia and Greece, which was to affect the course, not alone of Persian or Greek, but of all European history. [15]

[Illustration: Map, THE PERSIAN EMPIRE AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT (About 500
B. C.)]

STUDIES

1. On the map Physical Map of Asia, section 7. Physical Asia, topic Grand Divisions of Asia, see what regions of Asia are less than 500 feet above sea level; less than 3000 feet; less than 9000 feet; less than 15,000 feet; over 15,000 feet.

2. On an outline map of the Orient indicate eight important rivers, two gulfs, three inland seas, the great plateaus and plains, the principal mountain ranges, two important passes, and the various countries and cities mentioned in this chapter.

3. On an outline map draw the boundaries of the Persian Empire under Darius, showing what parts were conquered by Cyrus, Cambyses, and Darius, respectively.

4. For what were the following places noted: Jerusalem; Thebes; Tyre; Nineveh; and Babylon?

5. For what were the following persons famous: Hammurabi; Rameses II; Solomon; Cyrus; Nebuchadnezzar; and Darius?

6. Define and illustrate these terms: empire, kingdom, province, tributary state, satrapy.

7. Identity these dates: 606 B.C.; 539 B.C.; and 540 B.C.

8. Why was India better known in ancient times than China?

9. What modern countries are included within the limits of ancient Iran?

10. Why was a canal through the isthmus of Suez less needed in ancient times than to-day?

11. Can you suggest any reasons why the sources of the Nile remained unknown until late in the nineteenth century?

12. What is the origin of the name Delta applied to such a region as Lower Egypt?

13. Comment on the statement: "Egypt as a geographical expression is two things—the Desert and the Nile. As a habitable country it is only one thing—the Nile."

14. Why did the Greek traveler, Herodotus, call Egypt "the gift of the Nile"?

15. Distinguish between Syria and Assyria.

16. What is the exact meaning of the words, Hebrew, Israelite, and Jew? Describe some features of Assyrian warfare (illustration, page 35).

17. What modern countries are included within the limits of the Persian Empire under Darius?

18. Trace on the map facing page 40 the course of the Royal Road, noting the countries through which it passed.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter ii, "The Founders of the Persian Empire: Cyrus, Cambyses, and Darius."

[2] See page 16.

[3] See page 39.

[4] See page 125.

[5] Herodotus, i, 193.

[6] See page 8.

[7] It is interesting to note that Hebrew tradition (Genesis, ii, 8-15) places Paradise, the garden of God and original home of man, in southern Babylonia. The ancient name for this district was Edin (Eden).

[8] The problem of regulating the Nile inundation so as to distribute the water for irrigation when and where it is most needed has been solved by the building of the Assuan dam. It lies across the head of the first cataract for a distance of a mile and a quarter, and creates a lake two hundred and forty miles in length. This great work was completed in 1912 A.D. by the British officials who now control Egypt.

[9] See page 50.

[10] Judges, xvii, 6.

[11] 2 Kings, xix, 35. See Byron's poem, The Destruction of Sennacherib.

[12] See page 29.

[13] See page 21.

[14] Herodotus, viii, 98.

[15] See chapter v.

CHAPTER III

ORIENTAL CIVILIZATION [1]

13. SOCIAL CLASSES

REDISCOVERY OF THE ORIENT

Our present knowledge of the Orient has been gained within recent times. Less than a century ago no one could read the written records of the Egyptians and Babylonians. The decipherment of the Rosetta Stone, which contained an inscription in both Greek and hieroglyphics, led to the understanding of Egyptian writing. Scholars later succeeded in interpreting the Babylonian cuneiform script. Modern excavations in the valleys of the Nile and the Euphrates have now provided them with abundant material for study in the shape of books and inscriptions. As these are gradually deciphered, new light is being thrown on all features of ancient Oriental civilization.

[Illustration: A ROYAL NAME IN HIEROGLYPHICS (ROSETTA STONE) The cut shows the symbols contained in one of the oval rings, or cartouches, for Ptolemaios, the Greek name of King Ptolemy. Each symbol represents the initial letter of the Egyptian name for the object pictured. The objects in order are: a mat, a half-circle, a noose, a lion, a hole, two reeds, and a chair-back. The entire hieroglyph is read from left to right, as we read words in English.]

[Illustration: THE ROSETTA STONE. British Museum, London. A block of black basalt, three feet seven inches in height, found in 1799 A.D., near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile.]

THE KING AS AUTOCRAT

The Oriental peoples, when their history opens, were living under the monarchical form of government. The king, to his subjects, was the earthly representative of the god. Often, indeed, he was himself regarded as divine. The belief in the king's divine origin made obedience to him a religious obligation for his subjects. Every Oriental monarch was an autocrat. Every Oriental monarchy was a despotism.

THE KING'S DUTIES

The king had many duties. He was judge, commander, and high priest, all in one. In time of war, he led his troops and faced the dangers of the battle field. During intervals of peace, he was occupied with a constant round of sacrifices, prayers, and processions, which could not be neglected without exciting the anger of the gods. To his courtiers he gave frequent audience, hearing complaints, settling disputes, and issuing commands. A conscientious monarch, such as Hammurabi, who describes himself as "a real father to his people," must have been a very busy man.

[Illustration: AN EGYPTIAN COURT SCENE Wall painting from a tomb at Thebes. Shows a Pharaoh receiving Asiatic envoys bearing tribute. They are introduced by white robed Egyptian officials. The Asiatics may be distinguished by their gay clothes and black, sharp pointed beards.]

NOBLES AND PRIESTS

Besides the monarch and the royal family there was generally in Oriental countries an upper class of landowners. In Egypt the Pharaoh was regarded as sole owner of the land. Some of it he worked through his slaves, but the larger part he granted to his favorites, as hereditary estates. Such persons may be called the nobles. The different priesthoods also had much land, the revenues from which kept up the temples where they ministered. In Babylonia, likewise, we find a priesthood and nobility supported by the income from landed property.

THE MIDDLE CLASS

The middle class included professional men, shopkeepers independent farmers, and skilled craftsmen. Though regarded as inferiors, still they had a chance to rise in the world. If they became rich, they might hope to enter the upper class as priests or government officials.

WORKMEN AND PEASANTS

No such hopes encouraged the day laborer in the fields or shops. His lot was bitter poverty and a life of unending toil. If he was an unskilled workman, his wages were only enough to keep him and his family. He toiled under overseers who carried sticks and used them freely. "Man has a back," says an Egyptian proverb, "and only obeys when it is beaten." If the laborer was a peasant, he could be sure that the nobles from whom he rented the land and the tax collectors of the king would leave him scarcely more than a bare living.

SLAVES

At the very bottom of the social ladder were the slaves. Every ancient people possessed them. At first they were prisoners of war, who, instead of being slaughtered, were made to labor for their masters. At a later period people unable to pay their debts often became slaves. The treatment of slaves depended on the character of the master. A cruel and overbearing owner might make life a burden for his bondmen. Escape was rarely possible. Slaves were branded like cattle to prevent their running away. Hammurabi's code [2] imposed the death penalty on anybody who aided or concealed the fugitives. There was plenty of work for the slaves to perform—repairing dikes, digging irrigation canals, and erecting vast palaces and temples. The servile class in Egypt was not as numerous as in Babylonia, and slavery itself seems to have assumed there a somewhat milder form.

[Illustration: TRANSPORT OF AN ASSYRIAN COLOSSUS A slab from a gallery of Sennacherib's palace at Nineveh. The immense block is being pulled forward by slaves, who work under the lash.]

14. ECONOMIC CONDITIONS

FARMING

Such fruitful, well-watered valleys as those of the Nile and the Euphrates encouraged agricultural life. Farming was the chief occupation. Working people, whether slaves or freemen, were generally cultivators of the soil. All the methods of agriculture are pictured for us on the monuments. We mark the peasant as he breaks up the earth with a hoe or plows a shallow furrow with a sharp-pointed stick. We see the sheep being driven across sown fields to trample the seed into the moist soil. We watch the patient laborers as with hand sickles they gather in the harvest and then with heavy flails separate the chaff from the grain. Although their methods were very clumsy, ancient farmers raised immense crops of wheat and barley. The soil of Egypt and Babylonia not only supported a dense population, but also supplied food for neighboring peoples. These two lands were the granaries of the East.

[Illustration: PLOWING AND SOWING IN ANCIENT EGYPT]

MANUFACTURING

Many industries of to-day were known in ancient Egypt and Babylonia. There were blacksmiths, carpenters, stonecutters, workers in ivory, silver, and gold, weavers, potters, and glass blowers. The creations of these ancient craftsmen often exhibit remarkable skill. Egyptian linens were so wonderfully fine and transparent as to merit the name of "woven air." Babylonian tapestries, carpets, and rugs enjoyed a high reputation for beauty of design and color. Egyptian glass with its waving lines of different hues was much prized. Precious stones were made into beads, necklaces, charms, and seals. The precious metals were employed for a great variety of ornaments. Egyptian paintings show the goldsmiths at work with blowpipe and forceps, fashioning bracelets, rings, and diadems, inlaying objects of stone and wood, or covering their surfaces with fine gold leaf. The manufacture of tiles and glazed pottery was everywhere carried on. Babylonia is believed to be the original home of porcelain. Enameled bricks found there are unsurpassed by the best products of the present day.

TRADE

The development of the arts and crafts brought a new industrial class into existence. There was now need of merchants and shopkeepers to collect manufactured products where they could be readily bought and sold. The cities of Babylonia, in particular, became thriving markets. Partnerships between tradesmen were numerous. We even hear of commercial companies. Business life in ancient Babylonia wore, indeed, quite a modern look.

MONEY

Metallic money first circulated in the form of rings and bars. The Egyptians had small pieces of gold—"cow gold"—each of which was simply the value of a full-grown cow. [3] It was necessary to weigh the metal whenever a purchase took place. A common picture on the Egyptian monuments is that of the weigher with his balance and scales. Then the practice arose of stamping each piece of money with its true value and weight. The next step was coinage proper, where the government guarantees, not only the weight, but also the genuineness of the metal.

[Illustration: EGYPTIAN WEIGHING "COW GOLD">[

COINAGE

The honor of the invention of coinage is generally given to the Lydians, whose country was well supplied with the precious metals. As early as the eighth century B.C. the Lydian monarchs began to strike coins of electrum, a natural alloy of gold and silver. The famous Croesus,[4] whose name is still a synonym for riches, was the first to issue coins of pure gold and silver. The Greek neighbors of Lydia quickly adopted the art of coinage and so introduced it into Europe. [5]

BANKING

The use of money as a medium of exchange led naturally to a system of banking. In Babylonia, for instance, the bankers formed an important and influential class. One great banking house, established at Babylon before the age of Sennacherib, carried on operations for several centuries. Hundreds of legal documents belonging to this firm have been discovered in the huge earthenware jars which served as safes. The Babylonian temples also received money on deposit and loaned it out again, as do our modern banks. Knowledge of the principles of banking passed from Babylonia to Greece and thence to ancient Italy and Rome.

15. COMMERCE AND TRADE ROUTES

ASIATIC COMMERCE

The use of the precious metals as money greatly aided the exchange of commodities between different countries. The cities of the Tigris- Euphrates valley were admirably situated for commerce, both by sea and land. They enjoyed a central position between eastern and western Asia. The shortest way by water from India skirted the southern coast of Iran and, passing up the Persian Gulf, gained the valley of the two great rivers. Even more important were the overland roads from China and India which met at Babylon and Nineveh. Along these routes traveled long lines of caravans laden with the products of the distant East—gold and ivory, jewels and silks, tapestries, spices, and fine woods. Still other avenues of commerce radiated to the west and entered Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. Many of these trade routes are in use even to-day.

[Illustration: Map, ANCIENT TRADE ROUTES]

COMMERCE WITH EUROPE

While the inhabitants of Babylonia and Assyria were able to control the caravan routes of Asia, it was reserved for a Syrian people, the Phoenicians, to become the pioneers of commerce with Europe. As early as 1500 B.C. the rich copper mines of Cyprus attracted Phoenician colonists to this island. [6] From Cyprus these bold mariners and keen business men passed to Crete, thence along the shores of Asia Minor to the Greek mainland, and possibly to the Black Sea. Some centuries later the Phoenicians were driven from these regions by the rising power of the Greek states. Then they sailed farther westward and established their trading posts in Sicily, Africa, and Spain. At length they passed through the strait of Gibraltar into the Atlantic and visited the shores of western Europe and Africa.

[Illustration: Map, PHOENICIAN AND GREEK COLONIES]

PHOENICIAN IMPORTS AND EXPORTS

The Phoenicians obtained a great variety of products from their widely scattered settlements. The mines of Spain yielded tin, lead, and silver. The tin was especially valuable because of its use in the manufacture of bronze. [7] From Africa came ivory, ostrich feathers, and gold; from Arabia, incense, perfumes, and costly spices. The Phoenicians found a ready sale for these commodities throughout the East. Still other products were brought directly to Phoenicia to provide the raw materials for her flourishing manufactures. The fine carpets and glassware, the artistic works in silver and bronze, and the beautiful purple cloths [8] produced by Phoenician factories were exported to every region of the known world.

PHOENICIAN VOYAGES OF EXPLORATION

The Phoenicians were the boldest sailors of antiquity. Some of their long voyages are still on record. We learn from the Bible that they made cruises on the Red Sea and Indian Ocean and brought the gold of Ophir— "four hundred and twenty talents"—to Solomon. [9] There is even a story of certain Phoenicians who, by direction of an Egyptian king, explored the eastern coast of Africa, rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and after three years' absence returned to Egypt through the strait of Gibraltar. A much more probable narrative is that of the voyage of Hanno, a Carthaginian admiral. We still possess a Greek translation of his interesting log book. It describes an expedition made about 500 B.C. along the western coast of Africa. The explorers seem to have sailed as far as the country now called Sierra Leone. Nearly two thousand years elapsed before a similar voyage along the African coast was undertaken.

PHOENICIAN SETTLEMENTS

Wherever the Phoenicians journeyed, they established settlements. Most of these were merely trading posts which contained the warehouses for the storage of their goods. Here the shy natives came to barter their raw materials for the finished products—cloths, tools, weapons, wine, and oil—which the strangers from the East had brought with them. Phoenician settlements sometimes grew to be large and flourishing cities. The colony of Gades in southern Spain, mentioned in the Old Testament as Tarshish, [10] survives to this day as Cadiz. The city of Carthage, founded in North Africa by colonists from Tyre, became the commercial mistress of the Mediterranean. Carthaginian history has many points of contact with that of the Greeks and Romans.

16. LAW AND MORALITY

BABYLONIAN CONTRACTS

It is clear that societies so highly organized as Phoenicia, Egypt, and Babylonia must have been held together by the firm bonds of law. The ancient Babylonians, especially, were a legal-minded people. When a man sold his wheat, bought a slave, married a wife, or made a will, the transaction was duly noted on a contract tablet, which was then filed away in the public archives. Instead of writing his name, a Babylonian stamped his seal on the wet clay of the tablet. Every man who owned property had to have a seal.

CODE OF HAMMURABI

The earliest laws were, of course, unwritten. They were no more than the long-established customs of the community. As civilization advanced, the usages that generally prevailed were written out and made into legal codes. A recent discovery has given to us the almost complete text of the laws which Hammurabi, the Babylonian king, ordered to be engraved on stone monuments and set up in all the chief cities of his realm. [11]

SUBJECT MATTER OF HAMMURABI'S CODE

The code of Hammurabi shows, in general, a high sense of justice. A man who tries to bribe a witness or a judge is to be severely punished. A farmer who is careless with his dikes and allows the water to run through flood his neighbor's land must restore the value of the grain he has damaged. The owner of a vicious ox which has gored a man must pay a heavy fine, provided he knew the disposition of the animal and had not blunted its horns. A builder who puts up a shaky house which afterwards collapses and kills the tenant is himself to be put to death. On the other hand, the code has some rude features. Punishments were severe. For injuries to the body there was the simple rule of retaliation: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a limb for a limb. A son who had struck his father was to have his hands cut off. The nature of the punishment depended, moreover, on the rank of the aggrieved party. A person who had caused the loss of a "gentleman's" eye was to have his own plucked out; but if the injury was done to a poor man, the culprit had only to pay a fine.

[Illustration: BABYLONIAN CONTRACT TABLET The actual tablet is on the right, on the left is a hollow clay case or envelope.]

IMPORTANCE OF HAMMURABI'S CODE

Hammurabi's laws thus present a vivid picture of Oriental society two thousand years before Christ. They always remained the basis of the Babylonian and Assyrian legal system. They were destined, also, to exert considerable influence upon Hebrew legislation. Centuries after Hammurabi the enactments of the old Babylonian king were reproduced in some of the familiar regulations of the laws of Moses. In this way they became the heritage of the Hebrews and, through them, of our modern world.

THE MOSAIC CODE

The laws which we find in the earlier books of the Bible were ascribed by the Hebrews to Moses. These laws covered a wide range of topics. They fixed all religious ceremonies, required the observance every seventh day of the Sabbath, dealt with marriage and the family, stated the penalties for wrongdoing, gave elaborate rules for sacrifices, and even indicated what foods must be avoided as "unclean." No other ancient people possessed so elaborate a code. The Jews throughout the world obey, to this day, its precepts. And modern Christendom still recites the Ten Commandments, the noblest summary of the rules of right living that has come down to us from the ancient world.

17. RELIGION

NATURE WORSHIP

Oriental ideas of religion, even more than of law and morality, were the gradual outgrowth of beliefs held by the Asiatic peoples in prehistoric times. Everywhere nature worship prevailed. The vault of heaven, earth and ocean, sun, moon, and stars were all regarded either as themselves divine or as the abode of divinities. The sun was an object of especial adoration. We find a sun god, under different names, in every Oriental country.

BABYLONIAN BELIEF IN EVIL SPIRITS

Another inheritance from prehistoric times was the belief in evil spirits. In Babylonia and Assyria this superstition became a prominent feature of the popular religion. Men supposed themselves to be constantly surrounded by a host of demons which caused insanity, sickness, disease, and death— all the ills of life. People lived in constant fear of offending these malignant beings.

MAGIC

To cope with evil spirits the Babylonian used magic. He put up a small image of a protecting god at the entrance to his house and wore charms upon his person. If he felt ill, he went to a priest, who recited a long incantation supposed to drive out the "devil" afflicting the patient. The reputation of the Babylonian priests was so widespread that in time the name "Chaldean" [12] came to mean one who is a magician. Some of their magical rites were borrowed by the Jews, and later by the Romans, from whom they entered Christian Europe. Another Babylonian practice which spread westward was that of divination, particularly by inspecting the entrails of animals slain in sacrifice. This was a very common method of divination among the Greeks and Romans. [13]

[Illustration: EGYPTIAN SCARAB The beetle, as a symbol of birth and resurrection, and hence of immortality, enjoyed much reverence in ancient Egypt. A scarab, or image of the beetle, was often worn as a charm and was placed in the mummy as an artificial heart.]

ASTROLOGY

Astrology received much attention. It was believed that the five planets, comets, and eclipses of the sun and moon exerted an influence for good or evil on the life of man. Babylonian astrology likewise extended to western lands and became popular among the Greeks and Romans. Some of it survives to the present time. When we name the days Saturday, Sunday, and Monday, we are unconscious astrologers, for in old belief the first day belonged to the planet Saturn, the second to the sun, and the third to the moon. [14] Superstitious people who try to read their fate in the stars are really practicing an art of Babylonian origin.

EGYPTIAN ANIMAL WORSHIP

Less influential in later times was the animal worship of the Egyptians. This, too, formed a heritage from the prehistoric past. Many common animals of Egypt—the cat, hawk, the jackal, the bull, the ram, the crocodile—were highly reverenced. Some received worship because deities were supposed to dwell in them. The larger number, however, were not worshiped for themselves, but as symbols of different gods.

MONOTHEISM IN PERSIA

In the midst of such an assemblage of nature deities, spirits, and sacred animals, it was remarkable that the belief in one god should ever have arisen. The Medes and Persians accepted the teachings of Zoroaster, a great prophet who lived perhaps as early as 1000 B.C. According to Zoroaster, Ahuramazda, the heaven-deity, is the maker and upholder of the universe. He is a god of light and order, of truth and purity. Against him stands Ahriman, the personification of darkness and evil. Ahuramazda in the end will overcome Ahriman and will reign supreme in a righteous world. Zoroastrianism was the only monotheistic religion developed by an Indo- European people. [15]

[Illustration: AMENHOTEP IV A striking likeness of an Egyptian king (reigned about 1375-1358 B.C.) who endeavored to introduce monotheism in Egypt by abolishing the worship of all gods except the sun god. This religious revolution ended in failure for after the king's death the old deities were restored to honor.]

HEBREW MONOTHEISM

The Hebrews, alone among the Semitic peoples of antiquity, were to develop the worship of their god, Jehovah, into a lasting monotheism. This was a long and gradual process Jehovah was at first regarded as the peculiar divinity of the Hebrews. His worshipers did not deny the existence of the gods of other nations. From the eighth century onward this narrow conception of Jehovah was transformed by the labors of the Hebrew prophets. They taught that Jehovah was the creator and ruler of the world and the loving father of all mankind. On Hebrew monotheism two world religions have been founded—Mohammedanism and Christianity.

EGYPTIAN IDEAS OF THE FUTURE LIFE

We do not find among the early Hebrews or any other Oriental people very clear ideas about the life after death. The Egyptians long believed that the soul of the dead man resided in or near the tomb, closely associated with the body. This notion seems to have first led to the practice of embalming the corpse, so that it might never suffer decay. If the body was not preserved, the soul might die, or it might become a wandering ghost, restless and dangerous to the living. Later Egyptian thought regarded the future state as a place of rewards and punishments. One of the chapters of the work called the Book of the Dead describes the judgment of the soul in the spirit world. If a man in the earthly life had not murdered, stolen, coveted the property of others, blasphemed the gods, borne false witness, ill treated his parents, or committed certain other wrongs, his soul would enjoy a blissful immortality.

[Illustration: MUMMY AND COVER OF COFFIN (U.S. National Museum,
Washington)]

BABYLONIAN AND HEBREW IDEAS OF THE FUTURE LIFE

Some Oriental peoples kept the primitive belief that after death all men, good and bad alike, suffered the same fate. The Babylonians supposed that the souls of the departed passed a cheerless existence in a gloomy and Hebrew underworld. The early Hebrew idea of Sheol, "the land of darkness and the shadow of death," [16] was very similar. Such thoughts of the future life left nothing for either fear or hope. In later times, however, the Hebrews came to believe in the resurrection of the dead and the last judgment, conceptions afterwards adopted by Christianity.

18. LITERATURE AND ART

THE EGYPTIAN BOOK OF THE DEAD

Religion inspired the largest part of ancient literature. Each Oriental people possessed sacred writings. The Egyptian Book of the Dead was already venerable in 3000 B.C. It was a collection of hymns, prayers, and magical phrases to be recited by the soul on its journey beyond the grave and in the spirit world. A chapter from this work usually covered the inner side of the mummy case.

[Illustration: THE JUDGMENT OF THE DEAD From a papyrus containing the Book of the Dead. The illustration shows a man and his wife (at the left) entering the hall in the spirit world, where sits the god of the dead with forty two jurors (seen above) as his assistants. The heart of the man, symbolized by a jar, is being weighed in balances by a jackal-headed god against a feather, the symbol of truth. The monster in the right hand corner stands ready to devour the soul, if the heart is found lighter than the feather.]

THE BABYLONIAN EPICS

Much more interesting are the two Babylonian epics, fragments of which were found on clay tablets in a royal library at Nineveh. The epic of the Creation tells how the god Marduk overcame a terrible dragon, the symbol of primeval chaos, and thus established order in the universe. Then with half the body of the dead dragon he made a covering for the heavens and set therein the stars. Next he caused the new moon to shine and made it the ruler of the night. His last work was the creation of man, in order that the service and worship of the gods might be established forever. The second epic contains an account of a flood, sent by the gods to punish sinful men. The rain fell for six days and nights and covered the entire earth. All men were drowned except the Babylonian Noah, his family, and his relatives, who safely rode the waters in an ark. This ancient narrative so closely resembles the Bible story in Genesis that we must trace them both to a common source.

[Illustration: THE DELUGE TABLET (British Museum London)
Contains the narrative of the flood as pieced together and published by
George Smith in 1872 A.D. There are sixteen fragments in the restoration.]

[Illustration: AN EGYPTIAN TEMPLE (RESTORED) The building extended along the Nile for nearly eight hundred feet. A double line of sphinxes led to the only entrance, in front of which were two obelisks and four colossal statues of Rameses II. Behind the first gateway, or pylon came an open court surrounded by a portico upheld by pillars. The second and third pylons were connected by a covered passage leading into another open court. Lower rooms at the rear of the temple contained the sanctuary of the god, which only the king and priests could enter.]

THE HEBREW BIBLE

All these writings are so ancient that their very authors are forgotten. The interest they excite is historical rather than literary. From Oriental antiquity only one great work has reached us that still has power to move the hearts of men—the Hebrew Bible.

EGYPTIAN ARCHITECTURE

Architecture, in Egypt, was the leading art. The Egyptians were the first people who learned to raise buildings with vast halls supported by ponderous columns. Their wealth and skill, however, were not lavished in the erection of fine private mansions or splendid public buildings. The characteristic works of Egyptian architecture are the tombs of the kings and the temples of the gods. The picture of the great structure at Thebes, which Rameses II completed, [17] will give some idea of an Egyptian temple with its gateways, open courts, obelisks, and statues.

[Illustration: AN EGYPTIAN WOODEN STATUE, (Museum of Gizeh) Found in a tomb near Memphis. The statue, which belongs to the age of the pyramid kings, represents a bustling, active, middle-class official.]

ARCHITECTURE IN BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA

The architecture of Babylonia and Assyria was totally unlike that of Egypt, because brick, and not stone, formed the chief building and Assyria material. In Babylonia the temple was a solid, square tower, built on a broad platform. It consisted usually of seven stages, which arose one above the other to the top, where the shrine of the deity was placed. The different stages were connected by an inclined ascent. The four sides of the temple faced the cardinal points, and the several stages were dedicated to the sun, moon, and five planets. In Assyria the characteristic building was the palace. But the sun-dried bricks, of which both temples and palaces were composed, lacked the durability of stone and have long since dissolved into shapeless mounds.

EGYPTIAN SCULPTURE

The surviving examples of Egyptian sculpture consist of bas-reliefs and figures in the round, carved from limestone and granite or cast in bronze. Many of the statues appear to our eyes very stiff and ungraceful. The sculptor never learned how to pose his figures easily or how to arrange them in an artistic group. In spite of these defects some Egyptian statues are wonderfully lifelike. [18]

[Illustration: AN ASSYRIAN PALACE (RESTORED) The royal residence of Sargon II near Nineveh was placed upon a high platform of brick masonry the top of which was gained by stairs and an inclined roadway. The palace consisted of a series of one storied rectangular halls and long corridors surrounding inner courts. They were provided with imposing entrances flanked by colossal human headed bulls representing guardian spirits. The entire building covered more than twenty three acres and contained two hundred apartments. In the rear is seen a temple tower.]

SCULPTURE IN BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA

Few examples have reached us of Babylonian and Assyrian sculpture in the round. As in Egypt, the figures seem rigid and out of proportion. The Assyrian bas-reliefs show a higher development of the artistic sense, especially in the rendering of animals. The sculptures that deal with the exploits of the kings in war and hunting often tell their story in so graphic a way as to make up for the absence of written records.

ORIENTAL PAINTING

Painting in the ancient East did not reach the dignity of an independent art. It was employed solely for decorative purposes. Bas-reliefs and wall surfaces were often brightly colored, The artist had no knowledge of perspective and drew all his figures in profile, without any distinction of light and shade. Indeed, Oriental painting, as well as Oriental sculpture, made small pretense to the beautiful. Beauty was born into the world with the art of the Greeks.

[Illustration: AN ASSYRIAN WINGED HUMAN HEADED BULL]

[Illustration: AN ASSYRIAN HUNTING SCENE (British Museum, London)
A bas relief from a slab found at Nineveh.]

19. SCIENCE AND EDUCATION

ARITHMETIC AND GEOMETRY

Conspicuous advance took place in the exact sciences. The leading operations of arithmetic were known. A Babylonian tablet gives a table of squares and cubes correctly calculated from 1 to 60. The number 12 was the basis of all reckonings. The division of the circle into degrees, minutes, and seconds (360°, 60', 60") was an invention of the Babylonians which illustrates this duodecimal system A start was made in geometry. One of the oldest of Egyptian books contains a dozen geometrical problems. This knowledge was afterwards developed into a true science by the Greeks.

ASTRONOMY

In both Egypt and Babylonia the cloudless skies and still, warm nights early led to astronomical research. At a remote period, perhaps before 4000 B.C., the Egyptians framed a solar calendar, [19] consisting of twelve months, each thirty days in length, with five extra days at the end of the year. This calendar was taken over by the Romans, [20] who added the system of leap years. The Babylonians made noteworthy progress in some branches of astronomy. They were able to trace the course of the sun through the twelve constellations of the zodiac and to distinguish five of the planets from the fixed stars. The successful prediction of eclipses formed another Babylonian achievement. Such astronomical discoveries must have required much patient and accurate observation.

GEOGRAPHY

Geographical ideas for a long time were very crude. An ancient map, scratched on clay, indicates that about eight centuries before Christ the Babylonians had gained some knowledge, not only of their own land, but even of regions beyond the Mediterranean. The chief increase in man's knowledge of the world in ancient times was due to the Phoenicians. [21]

PRACTICAL SCIENCES

The skill of Oriental peoples as mechanics and engineers is proved by their success as builders. The great pyramids exactly face the points of the compass. The principle of the round arch was known in Babylonia at a remote period The transportation of colossal stone monuments exhibits a knowledge of the lever, pulley, and inclined plane. [22] Babylonian inventions were the sundial and the water clock, the one to register the passage of the hours by day, the other by night. The Egyptians and Babylonians also made some progress in the practice of medicine.

[Illustration: A BABYLONIAN MAP OF THE WORLD A tablet of dark brown clay, much injured, dating from the 8th or 7th century B.C. The two large concentric circles indicate the ocean or, as it is called in the cuneiform writing between the circles, the 'Briny Flood.' Beyond the ocean are seven successive projections of land, represented by triangles. Perhaps they refer to the countries existing beyond the Black Sea and the Red Sea. The two parallel lines within the inner circle represent the Euphrates. The little rings stand for the Babylonian cities in this region.]

THE TEMPLE SCHOOL

The schools, in both Egypt and Babylonia, were attached to the temples and were conducted by the priests. Writing was the chief subject of instruction. It took many years of patient study to master the cuneiform symbols or the even more difficult hieroglyphics. "He who would excel in the school of the scribes," ran an ancient maxim, "must rise with the dawn." Writing was learned by imitating the examples supplied in copy- books. Some of the model letters studied by Egyptian boys of the twentieth century B.C. have come down to us. Reading, too, was an art not easy to learn. Dictionaries and grammars were written to aid the beginner. A little instruction was also provided in counting and calculating.

[Illustration: AN EGYPTIAN SCRIBE (Louvre, Paris)]

THE SCRIBES

Having learned to read and write, the pupil was ready to enter on the coveted career of a scribe. In a community where nearly every one was illiterate, the scribes naturally held an honorable place. They conducted the correspondence of the time. When a man wished to send a letter, he had a scribe write it, signing it himself by affixing his seal. When he received a letter, he usually employed a scribe to read it to him. The scribes were also kept busy copying books on the papyrus paper or clay tablets which served as writing materials.

THE TEMPLE LIBRARY

Every large city of Babylonia possessed a collection of books. Several of the larger libraries have been discovered. At Nippur, in Babylonia, thirty thousand clay tablets were found. Another great collection of books was unearthed in a royal palace at Nineveh. This Assyrian library seems to have been open for the general use of the king's subjects. The Egyptians also had their libraries, usually as adjuncts to the temples, and hence under priestly control.

WIDESPREAD POPULAR IGNORANCE

Learning and education were so closely limited to a few individuals that the mass of the people were sunk in deepest ignorance. Men could not pursue knowledge for themselves, but had to accept every thing on authority. Hence the inhabitants of Oriental lands remained a conservative folk, slow to abandon their time-honored beliefs and very unwilling to adopt a new custom even when clearly better than the old. This absence of popular education, more than anything else, made Oriental civilization unprogressive.

[Illustration: EXCAVATION AT NIPPUR Nippur was the ancient "Calneh in the land of Shinar" (Genesis, x, 10) Excavations here were conducted by the University of Pennsylvania during 1889-1900 A.D. The city contained an imposing temple, a library, a school, and even a little museum of antiquities.]

STUDIES

1. What was the origin of the "divine right" of kings?

2. Explain what is meant by despotism; by autocracy.

3. What European state comes nearest to being a pure despotism? What European monarch styles himself as an autocrat?

4. What do the illustrations on pages 38, 43 tell about the pomp of Oriental kings?

5. Why did the existence of numerous slaves in Egypt and Babylonia tend to keep low the wages of free workmen? Why is it true that civilization may be said to have begun "with the cracking of the slave whip"?

6. What light is thrown on the beginnings of money in ancient Egypt by the illustration on page 47?

7. Name some objects which, in place of the metals, are used by primitive peoples as money.

8. Interest in Babylonia was usually at the rate of 20% a year. Why is it so much lower in modern countries?

9. On the map, page 48, indicate the trade routes between eastern and western Asia which met in Mesopotamia.

10. The Phoenicians have been called "the English of antiquity." Can you give any reason for this characterization?

11. Why should the Phoenicians have been called the "colossal peddlers" of the ancient world?

12. What books of the Bible contain the laws of Israel?

13. What reasons can you suggest for the universal worship of the sun?

14. Define polytheism and monotheism, giving examples of each.

15. Describe the Egyptian conception of the judgment of the dead (illustration, page 56).

16. How many "books" are there in the Old Testament?

17. What is the Apocrypha?

18. How are the pyramids proof of an advanced civilization among the Egyptians?

19. What is a bas-relief? Select some examples from the illustrations.

20. From what Oriental peoples do we get the oldest true arch? the first coined money? the earliest legal code? the most ancient book?

21. Enumerate the most important contributions to civilization made in Oriental antiquity.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Webster, Readings in Ancient History, chapter 1, "Three Oriental Peoples as Described by Herodotus."

[2] See page 25.

[3] See page 6.

[4] See page 37.

[5] For illustrations of Oriental coins see the plate facing page 134.

[6] See page 4.

[7] See page 5.

[8] "Tyrian purple" was a dye secured from a species of shellfish found along the Phoenician coast and in Greek waters.

[9] See I Kings, ix, 26-28. The site of Ophir is not known, though probably it was in southern Arabia.

[10] See Ezekiel, xxvii, 12, 25.

[11] A monument containing the code of Hammurabi was found on the site of Susa in 1901-1902 A.D. See the illustration, page 25.

[12] Chaldea was another name for Babylonia.

[13] See page 148.

[14] The names of four other week days come from the names of old Teutonic deities. Tuesday is the day of Tyr, Wednesday of Woden (Odin), Thursday of Thunor (Thor), and Friday of the goddess Frigga. See page 304.

[15] Zoroastrians are still to be found in the East In Persia, now a Mohammedan country, there is a little band of devoted followers of Zoroaster, who keep up to this day the tenets of their ancient faith. In India the Parsees of Bombay are the descendants of those Persians who fled from Persia at the time of the Mohammedan conquest (page 376), rather than surrender their cherished beliefs and embrace a new religion.

[16] Job, X, 21.

[17] See page 28.

[18] See the illustrations, pages 27, 54, 58, 63.

[19] See page 13.

[20] See page 186, note 2.

[21] See page 48.

[22] See the illustration, page 46.

CHAPTER IV

THE LANDS OF THE WEST AND THE RISE OF GREECE TO ABOUT 500 B.C. [1]

20. PHYSICAL EUROPE

EUROPE A PENINSULA OF ASIA

The continent of Asia, projecting its huge bulk southwestward between the seas, gradually narrows into the smaller continent of Europe. The boundary between the two regions is not well defined. Ancient geographers found a convenient dividing line north of the Black Sea in the course of the river Don. Modern map makers usually place the division at the Ural Mountains, the Caspian Sea, and the Caucasus. Each of these boundaries is more or less arbitrary. In a geographical sense Europe is only the largest of the great Asiatic peninsulas.

PHYSICAL FEATURES OF EUROPE

But in physical features the two continents disclose the most striking contrasts. The sea, which washes only the remote edges of Asia, penetrates deeply into Europe and forms an extremely irregular coast line with numerous bays and harbors. The mountains of Europe, seldom very high and provided with easy passes, present no such barriers to intercourse as the mightier ranges of Asia. We miss in Europe the extensive deserts and barren table-lands which form such a feature of Asiatic geography. With the exception of Russia the surface, generally, is distributed into plains, hills, and valleys of moderate size. Instead of a few large rivers, such as are found in Asia, Europe is well supplied with numerous streams that make it possible to travel readily from one district to another.

CENTRAL AND NORTHERN EUROPE

The almost unbroken mountain chain formed by the Pyrenees, the Alps, and the Balkans, sharply separates the central land mass of Europe from the regions to the south. Central Europe consists, in general, of lowlands, which widen eastward into the vast Russian plain. Northern Europe includes the British Isles, physically an extension of Europe, and the peninsulas of Scandinavia and Finland, between the Baltic Sea and the Arctic Ocean. Twenty centuries ago central and northern Europe was a land of forests and marshes, of desolate steppes and icebound hills. The peoples who inhabited it—Celts in the west, Teutons or Germans in the north, Slavs in the east —were men of Indo-European [2] race and speech. They were still barbarians. During ancient times we hear little of them, except as their occasional migrations southward brought them into contact with the Greeks and the Romans.

SOUTHERN EUROPE

Southern Europe comprises the three peninsulas of Spain, Italy, and the Balkans, which reach far south into the Mediterranean. This great inland sea is divided into two parts near the center, where Africa and the island of Sicily almost touch each other across a narrow strait. The eastern part contains several minor seas, of which the one called the Aegean had most importance in Greek history.

21. GREECE AND THE AEGEAN

THE AEGEAN SEA

The Aegean is an almost landlocked body of water. The Balkan peninsula, narrowing toward the Mediterranean into the smaller peninsula of Greece, confines it on the west. On the east it meets a boundary in Asia Minor. The southern boundary is formed by a chain of islands, while the only opening northward is found in the narrow passage leading to the Black Sea. The coasts and islands of the Aegean thus make up a little world set off by itself.

[Illustration: Map, PHYSICAL MAP OF EUROPE]

CONTINENTAL GREECE

Continental Greece is a tiny country. Its greatest length is scarcely more than two hundred and fifty miles; its greatest breadth is only one hundred and eighty miles. Mountain ridges, offshoots of the Balkans, compose the greater part of its area. Into the valleys and deep gorges of the interior the impetuous sea has everywhere forced a channel. The coast line, accordingly, is most irregular—a constant succession of sharp promontories and curving bays. The mountains, crossing the peninsula in confused masses, break it up into numberless valleys and glens which seldom widen into plains. The rivers are not navigable. The few lakes, hemmed in by the hills, have no outlets except in underground channels. In this land of the Greeks no place is more than fifty miles from a mountain range, or more than forty miles from some long arm of the Mediterranean.

THE AEGEAN ISLANDS

From the Greek mainland to the coast of Asia Minor the traveler follows a route thickly studded with rocky islands. They are near enough together to permit the passage from one to another without losing sight of land. The Aegean islands thus served as "stepping-stones" between Greece and Asia Minor. [3]

WESTERN ASIA MINOR

Western Asia Minor resembles Continental Greece in its deeply indented coast, variety of scenery, and mild climate. The fertile river valleys of this region early attracted Greek colonists. They built here many flourishing cities, especially along the central coast, which came to be known as Ionia.

INFLUENCE OF GEOGRAPHICAL CONDITIONS

Greek history well illustrates the influence of geographical conditions on the life of a people. In the first place, mountain ranges cut up Continental Greece into many small states, separated from one another by natural ramparts. Hence the Greeks loved most of all their own local independence and always refused to unite into one nation under a single government. In the second place, the near presence of the sea made sailors of the Greeks and led them to devote much energy to foreign commerce. They early felt, in consequence, the stimulating effects of intercourse with other peoples. Finally, the location of Greece at the threshold of Asia, with its best harbors and most numerous islands on the eastern coast, enabled the country to receive and profit by all the culture of the Orient. Greece faced the civilized East.

22. THE AEGEAN AGE (TO ABOUT 1100 B.C.)

A PREHISTORIC CIVILIZATION

The Greeks of historic times knew very little about their prehistoric period. Instead of accurate knowledge they had only the beautiful legends preserved in ancient poems, such as the Iliad and the Odyssey. Within our own day, however, remarkable excavations have disclosed the remains of a widespread and flourishing civilization in times so distant that the historic Greeks had lost all sight of it. As in the Orient, [4] the labors of modern scholars are yearly adding to our knowledge of ancient life.

[Illustration: Map, AEGEAN CIVILIZATION]

[Illustration: EXCAVATIONS AT TROY The great northeast tower of the sixth city. The stairs at the right belong to the eighth city.]

SCHLIEMANN'S EXCAVATIONS AT TROY

The man who did most to reveal the prehistoric civilization of Greece was a wealthy German merchant named Heinrich Schliemann. An enthusiastic lover of Homer, he believed that the stories of the Trojan War related in the Iliad were not idle fancies, but real facts. In 1870 A.D. he started to test his beliefs by excavations at a hill called Hissarlik, on the northwestern coast of Asia Minor. Here tradition had always fixed the site of ancient Troy. Schliemann's discoveries and those of later explorers proved that at Hissarlik at least nine successive cities had come into existence, flourished, and passed away. Excavations completed in 1892 A.D. have shown that the sixth city in order from the bottom was the one described in the Homeric poems. It had powerful walls defended by towers, well-fortified gates, and palaces of stone. The marks of fire throughout the ruins indicate that the city must have been destroyed by a disastrous conflagration.

SCHLIEMANN'S EXCAVATIONS AT MYCENAE AND TIRYNS

The remarkable disclosures at Troy encouraged Schliemann to excavate other Homeric sites. At Mycenae, a prehistoric city of Argolis in Greece, he laid bare six rock-hewn graves, containing the skeletons of nineteen persons, men, women, and children. The faces of the dead had been covered with thin masks of gold, and their bodies had been decked with gold diadems, bracelets, and pendants. The other funeral offerings include gold rings, silver vases, and a variety of bronze weapons. At Tiryns, once the capital of Argolis, he uncovered the ruins of an extensive structure with gateways, open courts, and closed apartments. Characteristic of this edifice were the separate quarters occupied by men and women, the series of storerooms for provisions, and such a modern convenience as a bathroom with pipes and drains. In short, the palace at Tiryns gives us a clear and detailed picture of the home of a Homeric prince.

[Illustration: LIONS' GATE, MYCENAE The stone relief, of triangular shape, represents two lions (or lionesses) facing each other on opposite sides of a pillar. The heads of the animals have been lost.]

EVANS'S EXCAVATIONS AT GNOSSUS

But the fame of even Schliemann's discoveries has been somewhat dimmed by the excavations made since 1900 A.D. on the site of Gnossus, the ancient capital of the island of Crete. At Gnossus an Englishman, Sir Arthur Evans, has found the remains of an enormous palace, with numerous courts, passages, and rooms. Here is the royal council chamber with the throne on which the king once sat. Here are the royal magazines, still filled with huge earthenware jars for the storage of provisions. A great number of brilliant pictures—hunting scenes, landscapes, portraits of men and women—cover the palace walls. Buried in some of the chambers were thousands of clay tablets with inscriptions which, if ever read, will add new chapters to ancient history. [5]

[Illustration: THE VAPHIO GOLD CUPS (National Museum, Athens) These beautiful objects were found in 1888 within a "bee-hive" tomb at Vaphio in Laconia. The two cups are of beaten gold, ornamented with designs in repoussé work. The first scene represents a wild-bull hunt. The companion piece pictures four tame bulls under the care of a herdsman.]

[Illustration: SILVER FRAGMENT FROM MYCENAE (National Museum, Athens) A siege scene showing the bows, slings, and huge shields of Mycenaean warriors. In the background are seen the masonry of the city wall and the flat-roofed houses.]

ANTIQUITY OF AEGEAN CIVILIZATION

These discoveries in the Aegean enable us to place another venerable center of civilized life by the side of Babylonia and Egypt. As early as 3000 B.C. the primitive inhabitants of the Aegean were giving up the use of stone tools and weapons for those of metal. Bronze soon came into general use, as is shown by the excavations. The five centuries between 1600 and 1100 B.C. appear to have been the time when the civilization of the Aegean Age reached its highest development.

THE FINE ARTS

Remarkable progress took place during Aegean times in some of the fine arts. We find imposing palaces, often splendidly adorned and arranged for a life of comfort. Wall paintings, plaster reliefs, and fine carvings in stone excite our admiration. Aegean artists made beautiful pottery of many shapes and cleverly decorated it with plant and animal forms. They carved ivory, engraved gems, and excelled in the working of metals. Some of their productions in gold, silver, and bronze were scarcely surpassed by Greek artists a thousand years later. [6]

COMMERCE

There was much intercourse throughout the Mediterranean during this
period. Products of Aegean art have been found as far west as Sicily,
Italy, and Spain, Aegean pottery has frequently been discovered in
Egyptian tombs. Some objects unearthed in Babylonia are apparently of
Aegean workmanship. In those ancient days Crete was mistress of the seas.
Cretan merchants preceded the Phoenicians as carriers between Asia and
Europe. [7] Trade and commerce thus opened up the Mediterranean world to
all the cultural influences of the Orient.

[Illustration: A CRETAN GIRL (Museum of Candia, Crete) A fresco painting from the palace of Gnossus. The girl's face is so astonishingly modern in treatment that one can scarcely believe that the picture belongs to the sixteenth century B.C.]

DOWNFALL OF AEGEAN CIVILIZATION

Aegean civilization did not penetrate beyond the shores of Asia Minor, the islands, and the coasts of Continental Greece. The interior regions of the Greek peninsula remained the home of barbarous tribes, which had not yet learned to build cities, to create beautiful objects of art, or to traffic on the seas. By 1100 B.C. their destructive inroads brought the Aegean Age to an end.

23. THE HOMERIC AGE (ABOUT 1100-750 B.C.)

COMING OF THE NORTHERN BARBARIANS

The barbarians who overthrew Aegean civilization seem to have entered Greece from the north, perhaps from the region the Danube River. They pushed gradually southward, sometimes exterminating or enslaving the earlier inhabitants of the country, but more often settling peaceably in their new homes. Conquerors and conquered slowly intermingled and so produced the one Greek people which is found at the dawn of history. These Greeks, as we shall call them henceforth, also occupied the islands of the Aegean Sea and the coast of Asia Minor. The entire basin of the Aegean thus became a Greek world.

[Illustration: AEGEAN SNAKE GODDESS (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) A gold and ivory statuette found in Crete. Dates from the sixteenth century B.C. The goddess wears the characteristic Cretan dress, with low- cut jacket and full skirt with five plaited flounces. On her head is an elaborate crown.]

THE HOMERIC EPICS

The period between the end of the Aegean Age and the opening of historic times in Greece is usually called the Homeric Age, because many features of its civilization are reflected in two epic poems called the Iliad and the Odyssey. The former deals with the story of a Greek expedition against Troy; the latter describes the wanderings of the hero Odysseus on his return from Troy. The two epics were probably composed in Ionia, and by the Greeks were attributed to a blind bard named Homer. Many modern scholars, however, consider them the work of several generations of poets. The references in the Iliad and the Odyssey to industry, social life, law, government, and religion give us some idea of the culture which the historic Greeks received as their inheritance.

INDUSTRY

The Greeks as described in the Homeric epics were in a transitional stage between the life of shepherds and that of farmers. Wealth consisted chiefly of flocks and herds, though nearly every freeman owned a little plot of land on which he cultivated grain and cared for his orchard and vineyard. There were few skilled workmen, for almost everything was made at home. A separate class of traders had not yet arisen. Commerce was little followed. The Greeks depended on Phoenician sailors to bring to their shores the commodities which they could not produce themselves. Iron was known and used, for instance, in the manufacture of farm tools. During Homeric times, however, that metal had not yet displaced copper and bronze. [8]

SOCIAL LIFE

Social life was very simple. Princes tended flocks and built houses; princesses carried water and washed clothes. Agamemnon, Odysseus, and other heroes were not ashamed to be their own butchers and cooks. The Homeric knights did not ride on horseback, but fought from chariots. They sat at table instead of reclining at meals, as did the later Greeks. Coined money was unknown. Trade was by barter, values being reckoned in oxen or in lumps of gold and silver. Men bought their wives by making gifts of cattle to the parents. The art of writing is mentioned only once in the Homeric poems, and doubtless was little used.

[Illustration: A CRETAN CUPBEARER (Museum of Candia, Crete) A fresco painting from the palace of Gnossus. The youth carries a silver cup ornamented with gold. His waist is tightly drawn in by a girdle, his hair is dark and curly, his profile is almost classically Greek.]

LAW AND MORALITY

The times were rude. Wars, though petty, were numerous and cruel. The vanquished suffered death or slavery. Piracy, flourishing upon the unprotected seas, ranked as an honorable occupation. It was no insult to inquire of a seafaring stranger whether he was pirate or merchant. Murders were frequent. The murderer had to dread, not a public trial and punishment, but rather the personal vengeance of the kinsmen of his victim. The Homeric Greeks, in fact, exhibited the usual defects and vices of barbarous peoples.

HOMERIC GEOGRAPHY

The Iliad and Odyssey disclose a considerable acquaintance with peninsular Greece and the coasts of Asia Minor. Cyprus, Egypt, and Sicily are also known in part. The poet imagines the earth as a sort of flat shield, with Greece lying in the center. [9] The Mediterranean, "The Sea," as it is called by Homer, and its continuation, the Euxine, [10] divided the world into two equal parts. Surrounding the earth was "the great strength of the Stream of Ocean," [11] a river, broad and deep, beyond which lay the dark and misty realm of the mythical Cimmerians. The underworld of Hades, home of the dead, was beneath the surface of the earth.

[Illustration: Map, THE WORLD according to HOMER (900 B.C.)]

[Illustration: Map, GREEK CONQUESTS AND MIGRATIONS]

24. EARLY GREEK RELIGION

THE OLYMPIAN COUNCIL

We may learn from the Homeric poems what were the religious ideas held by the early Greeks. The greater gods and goddesses were not numerous. Less than a score everywhere received worship under the same names and in all the temples. Twelve of the chief deities formed a select council, which was supposed to meet on the top of snow-crowned Olympus. The Greeks, however, did not agree as to what gods and goddesses should be included in this august assemblage.

ATTRIBUTES OF THE DEITIES

Many of the Olympian deities appear to have been simply personifications of natural phenomena. Zeus, "father of gods and men," as Homer calls him, was a heaven god, who gathered the clouds in storms and hurled the lightning bolt. Apollo, a mighty god of light, who warded off darkness and evil, became the ideal of manly beauty and the patron of music, poetry, and healing. Dionysus was worshiped as the god of sprouting and budding vegetation. Poseidon, brother of Zeus, ruled the sea. Hera, the wife of Zeus, represented the female principle in nature. Hence she presided over the life of women and especially over the sacred rites of marriage. Athena, who sprang full-grown from the forehead of Zeus, embodied the idea of wisdom and all womanly virtues. Aphrodite, who arose from the foam of the sea, was the goddess of love and beauty. Demeter, the great earth- mother, watched over seed-time and harvest. Each deity thus had a kingdom and a function of its own.

[Illustration: GREEK GODS AND GODDESSES
ZEUS OTRICOLI, Vatican Gallery, Rome
HERA, Ludovisi Villa, Rome
APOLLO OF THE BELVEDERE, Vatican Gallery, Rome
APHRODITE OF CNIDUS, Glyptothek, Munich]

[Illustration: THE APHRODITE OF MELOS (Louvre, Paris) More commonly known as the "Venus of Milo." The statue was discovered in 1820 A.D. on the island of Melos. It consists of two principal pieces joined together across the folds of the drapery. Most art critics date this work about 100 B.C. The strong serene figure of the goddess sets forth the Greek ideal of female loveliness.]

CONCEPTIONS OF THE DEITIES

The Greeks made their gods and goddesses after themselves. The Olympian divinities are really magnified men and women, subject to all human passions and appetites, but possessed of more than human power and endowed with immortality. They enjoy the banquet, where they feast on nectar and ambrosia; they take part in the struggles of the battle field; they marry and are given in marriage. The gods, morally, were no better than their worshipers. They might be represented as deceitful, dissolute, and cruel, but they could also be regarded as upholders of truth and virtue. Even Homer could say, "Verily the blessed gods love not evil deeds, but they reverence justice and the righteous acts of men." [12]

[Illustration: THE FRANÇOIS VASE (Archaeological Museum, Florence) Found in an Etruscan grave in 1844 A.D. A black-figured terra cotta vase of about 600 B.C. It is nearly three feet in height and two an one half feet in diameter. The figures on the vase depict scenes from Greek mythology.

Calydonian boar hunt
Games at the funeral of Patroclus
Peleus Thetis and the gods
Pursuit of Troilus by Achilles
Animal scenes, sphinxes, etc.]

IDEAS OF THE OTHER WORLD

Greek ideas of the other world were dismal to an extreme. The after-life in Hades was believed to be a shadowy, joyless copy of the earthly existence. In Hades the shade of great Achilles exclaims sorrowfully, "Nay, speak not comfortably to me of death. Rather would I live on earth as the hireling of another, even with a landless man who had no great livelihood, than bear sway among all the dead." [13] It was not until several centuries after Homer that happier notions of the future life were taught, or at least suggested, in the Eleusinian mysteries. [14]

25. RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS: ORACLES AND GAMES

ORACLE OF APOLLO AT DELPHI

The Greeks believed that communications from the gods were received from certain inspired persons at places called oracles. The oracle of Apollo at Delphi in Phocis enjoyed the utmost veneration. It lay within a deep cave on the rocky side of Mount Parnassus. Out of a chasm rose a volcanic vapor which had a certain intoxicating power. The Pythia, or prophetess of Apollo, sat on a tripod over the steaming cleft and inhaled the gas. The words she uttered in delirium were supposed to come from the god. They were taken down by the attendant priests, written out in verse, and delivered to the suppliants.

INQUIRIES AT THE ORACLE

The fame of Apollo as the patron of inspiration and prophecy spread throughout Greece and penetrated to foreign lands. Every year thousands of visitors made their way to Apollo's shrine. Sick men prayed for health, childless men prayed for offspring. Statesmen wished to learn the fate of their political schemes; ambassadors sent by kings and cities sought advice as to weighty matters of peace and war. Above all, colonists came to Delphi in order to obtain directions as to the best country in which to settle. Some of the noblest cities of the Greek world, Cyrene and Byzantium, for example, [15] had their sites fixed by Apollo's guidance.

[Illustration: CONSULTING THE ORACLE AT DELPHI]

CHARACTER OF THE RESPONSES

The priests who managed the oracle and its responses were usually able to give good advice to their inquirers, because news of every sort streamed into Delphi. When the priests were doubtful what answer to give, the prophecy of the god was sometimes expressed in such ambiguous fashion that, whatever the outcome, neither Apollo nor his servants could be charged with deceit. For instance, when Croesus, the Lydian king, was about to attack Cyrus, he learned from the oracle that "if he warred with the Persians he would overthrow a mighty empire" [16]—but the mighty empire proved to be his own. [17]

THE OLYMPIAN GAMES

Athletic games were held in different parts of Greece from a remote period. The most famous games were those in honor of Zeus at Olympia in Elis. They took place every fourth year, in midsummer. [18] A sacred truce was proclaimed for an entire month, in order that the thousands of spectators from every part of Greece might arrive and depart in safety. No one not of Greek blood and no one convicted of crime or of the sin of impiety might participate in the contests. The candidates had also to prove that they were qualified for the severe tests by a long and hard training. Once accepted as competitors, they could not withdraw. The man who shrank back when the hour of trial arrived was considered a coward and was punished with a heavy fine.

THE CONTESTS

The games occupied five days, beginning with the contests in running. There was a short-distance dash through the length of the stadium, a quarter-mile race, and also a longer race, probably for two or three miles. Then followed a contest consisting of five events: the long jump, hurling the discus, throwing the javelin, running, and wrestling. It is not known how victory in these five events taken together was decided. In the long jump, weights like dumb-bells were held in the hands, the swing of the weights being used to assist the spring. The discus, which weighed about twelve pounds, was sometimes hurled more than one hundred feet. The javelin was thrown either by the hand alone or with the help of a thong wound about the shaft and held in the fingers. In wrestling, three falls were necessary for a victory. The contestants were free to get their grip as best they could. Other contests included boxing, horse races, and chariot races. Women were apparently excluded from the games, yet they were allowed to enter horses for the races and to set up statues in honor of the victors.

[Illustration: THE DISCUS THROWER (DISCOBOLUS) (Lancelotti Palace, Rome) Marble copy of the bronze original by Myron, a sculptor of the fifth century B.C. Found in 1781 A.D. on the Esquiline Hill, Rome. The statue represents a young man, perhaps an athlete at the Olympian games, who is bending forward to hurl the discus. His body is thrown violently to the left with a twisting action that brings every muscle into play.]

THE VICTOR'S REWARD

The Olympian festival was profoundly religious, because the display of manly strength was thought to be a spectacle most pleasing to the gods. The winning athlete received only a wreath of wild olive at Olympia, but at home he enjoyed the gifts and veneration of his fellow-citizens. Poets celebrated his victories in noble odes. Sculptors reproduced his triumphs in stone and bronze. To the end of his days he remained a distinguished man.

[Illustration: HERMES AND DIONYSUS (Museum of Olympia) An original statue by the great sculptor, Praxiteles. It was found in 1877 A.D. at Olympia. Hermes is represented carrying the child Dionysus, whom Zeus had intrusted to his care. The symmetrical body of Hermes is faultlessly modeled; the poise of his head is full of dignity; his expression is refined and thoughtful. Manly strength and beauty have never been better embodied than in this work.]

[Illustration: ATHLETE USING THE STRIGIL (APOXYOMENUS) (Vatican Gallery,
Rome)

Marble copy of the bronze original by Lysippus, a sculptor of the fourth century B.C. The statue represents an athlete rubbing his arm with a flesh scraper to remove the oil and sand of the palestra, or exercising ground. His slender form suggests quickness and agility rather than great strength.]

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE GAMES

There were few Greeks who at least once in their lives did not attend the festival. The crowds that gathered before and after the games turned the camp into a great fair, at which merchants set up their shops and money changers their tables. Poets recited their lines before admiring audiences and artists exhibited their masterpieces to intending purchasers. Heralds read treaties recently formed between Greek cities, in order to have them widely known. Orators addressed the multitude on subjects of general interest. The games thus helped to preserve a sense of fellowship among Greek communities.

26. THE GREEK CITY-STATE

NATURE OF THE CITY STATE

The Greeks in Homeric times had already begun to live in towns and cities. A Greek city, being independent and self-governing, is properly called a city-state. Just as a modern nation, it could declare war, arrange treaties, and make alliances with its neighbors. Such a city-state included not only the territory within its walls, but also the surrounding district where many of the citizens lived.

THE CITIZENS

The members of a Greek city-state were very closely associated. The citizens believed themselves to be descended from a common ancestor and so to be all related. They were united, also, in the worship of the patron god or hero who had them under his protection. These ties of supposed kinship and common religion were of the utmost importance. They made citizenship a privilege which came to a person only by birth, a privilege which he lost by removal to another city. Elsewhere he was only a foreigner without legal rights—a man without a country.

GOVERNMENT OF THE CITY-STATE

The Homeric poems, which give us our first view of the Greek city-state, also contain the most ancient account of its government. Each city-state had a king, "the shepherd of the people" [19] as Homer calls him. The king did not possess absolute authority. He was surrounded by a council of nobles, chiefly the great landowners of the community. They helped him in judgment and sacrifice, followed him to war, and filled the principal offices. Both king and nobles were obliged to consult the common people on matters of great importance. For this purpose the ruler would summon the citizens to the market place to hear the deliberations of his council and to settle such questions as making war or declaring peace. All men of free birth could attend the assembly, where they shouted assent to the decision of their leaders or showed disapproval by silence. This public assembly had little importance in the Homeric Age, but later it became the center of Greek democracy.

POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE CITY-STATE

After the middle of the eighth century B.C., when historic times began in Greece, some interesting changes took place in the government of the city- states. In some of them, for example, Thebes and Corinth, the nobles became strong enough to abolish the kingship altogether. Monarchy, the rule of one, thus gave away to aristocracy, [20] the rule of the nobles. In other states, for instance, Sparta and Argos, the kings were not driven out, but their power was much weakened. Some states came under the control of usurpers whom the Greeks called "tyrants." A tyrant was a man who gained supreme power by force and governed for his own benefit without regard to the laws. There were many tyrannies in the Greek world during the seventh and sixth centuries B.C. Still other states went through an entire cycle of changes from kingship to aristocracy, from aristocracy to tyranny, and from tyranny to democracy or popular rule.

SPARTA AND ATHENS AS TYPES OF THE CITY-STATE

The isolated and independent Greek communities thus developed at an early period many different kinds of government. To study them all would be a long task. It is better to fix our attention on the two city-states which held the principal place in Greek history and at the same time presented the most striking contrasts in government and social life. These were Sparta and Athens.

27. THE GROWTH OF SPARTA (TO 500 B.C.)

SPARTA AND THE PELOPONNESIAN LEAGUE

The Greek invaders who entered southern Greece, or the Peloponnesus, [21] were known as Dorians. They founded the city of Sparta, in the district of Laconia. By the close of the sixth century B.C. the Spartans were able to conquer their immediate neighbors and to organize some of the city-states of the Peloponnesus into a strong confederacy called the Peloponnesian League. The members of the league did not pay tribute, but they furnished troops to serve in war under Spartan leaders, and they looked to Sparta for guidance and protection. Thus this single city became the foremost power in southern Greece.

SPARTA A MILITARY CAMP

It is clear that the Spartans must have been an extremely vigorous and warlike people. Their city, in fact, formed a military camp, garrisoned by soldiers whose whole life was passed in war and in preparation for war. The Spartans were able to devote themselves to martial pursuits because they possessed a large number of serfs, called helots. The helots tilled the lands of the Spartans and gave up to their masters the entire product of their labor, except what was necessary for a bare subsistence.

GOVERNMENT OF SPARTA

Spartan government also had a military character. In form the state was a kingdom, but since there were always two kings reigning at once and enjoying equal authority, neither of them could become very powerful. The real management of public affairs lay in the hands of five men, known as ephors, who were elected every year by the popular assembly. The ephors accompanied the kings in war and directed their actions; guided the deliberations of the council of nobles and the assembly of freemen; superintended the education of children; and exercised a general oversight of the private life of citizens. The ephors had such absolute control over the lives and property of the Spartans that we may describe their rule as socialistic and select Sparta as an example of ancient state socialism. Nowhere else in the Greek world was the welfare of the individual man so thoroughly subordinated to the interests of the society of which he formed a unit.

THE SPARTAN BOY

Spartan education had a single purpose—to produce good soldiers and obedient citizens. A sound body formed the first essential. A father was required to submit his son, soon after birth, to an inspection by the elders of his tribe. If they found the child puny or ill-shaped, they ordered it to be left on the mountain side, to perish from exposure. At the age of seven a boy was taken from his parents' home and placed in a military school. Here he was trained in marching, sham fighting, and gymnastics. He learned to sing warlike songs and in conversation to express himself in the fewest possible words. Spartan brevity of speech became proverbial. Above all he learned to endure hardship without complaint. He went barefoot and wore only a single garment, winter and summer. He slept on a bed of rushes. Every year he and his comrades had to submit to a flogging before the altar of the goddess Artemis, and the hero was the lad who could bear the whipping longest without giving a sign of pain. It is said that boys sometimes died under the lash rather than utter a cry. Such ordeals are still a feature of savage life to-day.

THE ADULT SPARTAN

On reaching the age of twenty the youth was considered a warrior. He did not live at home, but passed his time in barracks, as a member of a military mess to which he contributed his proper share of food, wine, and money. At the age of thirty years the young Spartan became a full citizen and a member of the popular assembly. He was then compelled to marry in order to raise children for the state. But marriage did not free him from attendance at the public meals, the drill ground, and the gymnasium. A Spartan, in fact, enjoyed little home life until his sixtieth year, when he became an elder and retired from actual service.

EXCELLENCE OF THE SPARTAN SOLDIERY

This exclusive devotion to military pursuits accomplished its object. The Spartans became the finest soldiers of antiquity. "All the rest of the Greeks," says an ancient writer, "are amateurs; the Spartans are professionals in the conduct of war." [22] Though Sparta never produced great thinkers, poets or artists, her military strength made her the bulwark of Greece against foreign foes. The time was to come when Greece, to retain her liberties, would need this disciplined Spartan soldiery. [23]

28. THE GROWTH OF ATHENS (to 500 B.C.)

ATHENS AS A CITY-STATE

The district of Attica, though smaller than our smallest American commonwealth, was early filled with a number of independent city-states. It was a great step in advance when, long before the dawn of Greek history, these tiny communities were united with Athens. The inhabitants of the Attic towns and villages gave up their separate governments and became members of the one city-state of Athens. Henceforth a man was a Athenian citizen, no matter in what part of Attica he lived.

OPPRESSIVE RULE OF THE NOBLES

At an earlier period, perhaps, than elsewhere in Greece, monarchy at Athens disappeared before the rising power of the nobles. The rule of the nobility bore harshly on the common people. Popular discontent was especially excited at the administration of justice. There were at first no written laws, but only the long-established customs of the community. Since all the judges were nobles, they were tempted to decide legal cases in favor of their own class. The people, at length, began to clamor for a written code. They could then know just what the laws were.

DRACO'S CODE, 621 B.C.

After much agitation an Athenian named Draco was employed to write out a code for the state. The laws, as published, were very severe. The penalty for most offenses, even the smallest theft, was death. The Athenians used to declare that the Draconian code had been written, "not in ink, but in blood." Its publication, however, was a popular triumph and the first step toward the establishment of Athenian democracy.

LEGISLATION OF SOLON, 594-593 B.C.

The second step was the legislation of Solon. This celebrated Athenian was accounted among the wisest men of his age. The people held him in high honor and gave him power to make much-needed reforms. At this time the condition of the Attic peasants was deplorable. Many of them had failed to pay their rent to the wealthy landowners, and according to the old custom were being sold into slavery. Solon abolished the custom and restored to freedom all those who had been enslaved for debt. He also limited the amount of land which a noble might hold. By still another law he admitted even the poorest citizens to the popular assembly, where they could vote for magistrates and judge of their conduct after their year of office was over. By giving the common people a greater share in the government, Solon helped forward the democratic movement at Athens.

TYRANNY OF PISISTRATUS, 560-527 B.C.

Solon's reforms satisfied neither the nobility nor the commons. The two classes continued their rivalry until the disorder of the times enabled an ambitious politician to gain supreme power as a tyrant. [24] He was Solon's own nephew, a noble named Pisistratus. The tyrant ruled with moderation and did much to develop the Athenian city-state. He fostered agriculture by dividing the lands of banished nobles among the peasants. His alliances with neighboring cities encouraged the rising commerce of Athens. The city itself was adorned with handsome buildings by architects and sculptors whom Pisistratus invited to his court from all parts of Greece.

REFORMS OF CLISTHENES, 508-507 B.C.

Pisistratus was succeeded by his two sons, but the Athenians did not take kindly to their rule. Before long the tyranny came to an end. The Athenians now found a leader in a noble named Clisthenes, who proved to be an able statesman. He carried still further the democratic movement begun by Draco and Solon. One of his reforms extended Athenian citizenship to many foreigners and emancipated slaves ("freedmen") then living in Attica. This liberal measure swelled the number of citizens and helped to make the Athenians a more progressive people. Clisthenes, it is said, also established the curious arrangement known as ostracism. Every year, if necessary, the citizens were to meet in assembly and to vote against any persons whom they thought dangerous to the state. If as many as six thousand votes were cast, the man who received the highest number of votes had to go into honorable exile for ten years. [25] Though ostracism was intended as a precaution against tyrants, before long it came to be used to remove unpopular politicians.

ATHENS A DEMOCRATIC STATE

There were still some steps to be taken before the rule of the people was completely secured at Athens. But, in the main, the Athenians by 500 B.C. had established a truly democratic government, the first in the history of the world. The hour was now rapidly approaching when this young and vigorous democracy was to show forth its worth before the eyes of all Greece.

29. COLONIAL EXPANSION OF GREECE (ABOUT 750-500 B.C.)

THE GREAT AGE OF COLONIZATION

While Athens, Sparta, and their sister states were working out the problems of government, another significant movement was going on in the Greek world. The Greeks, about the middle of the eighth century B.C., began to plant numerous colonies along the shores of the Mediterranean and of the Black Sea. The great age of colonization covered more than two hundred years. [26]

REASONS FOR FOUNDING COLONIES

Several reasons led to the founding of colonies. Trade was an important motive. The Greeks, like the Phoenicians, [27] could realize large profits by exchanging their manufactured goods for the food and raw materials of other countries. Land hunger was another motive. The poor soil of Greece could not support many inhabitants and, when population increased, emigration afforded the only means of relieving the pressure of numbers. A third motive was political and social unrest. Greek cities at this period contained many men of adventurous disposition who were ready to seek in foreign countries a refuge from the oppression of nobles or tyrants. They hoped to find in their new settlements more freedom than they had at home.

CHARACTER OF THE GREEK COLONY

A Greek colony was not simply a trading post; it was a center of Greek life. The colonists continued to be Greeks in customs, language, and religion. Though quite independent of the parent state, they always regarded it with reverence and affection: they called themselves "men away from home." Mother city and daughter colony traded with each other and in time of danger helped each other. A symbol of this unity was the sacred fire carried from the public hearth of the old community to the new settlement.

COLONIZATION IN THE NORTH AND EAST

The Greeks planted many colonies on the coast of the northern Aegean and on both sides of the long passage between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Their most important colony was Byzantium, upon the site where Constantinople now stands. They also made settlements along the shores of the Black Sea. The cities founded here were centers from which the Greeks drew their supplies of fish, wood, wool, grain, metals, and slaves. The immense profits to be gained by trade made the Greeks willing to live in a cold country so unlike their own and among barbarous peoples.

COLONIZATION IN THE WEST

The western lands furnished far more attractive sites for colonization. The Greeks could feel at home in southern Italy, where the genial climate, pure air, and sparkling sea recalled their native land. At a very early date they founded Cumae, on the coast just north of the bay of Naples. Emigrants from Cumae, in turn, founded the city of Neapolis (Naples), which in Roman times formed a home of Greek culture and even to-day possesses a large Greek population. To secure the approaches from Greece to these remote colonies, two strongholds were established on the strait of Messina: Regium (modern Reggio) on the Italian shore and Messana (modern Messina) on that of Sicily. Another important colony in southern Italy was Tarentum (modern Taranto).

[Illustration: "TEMPLE OF NEPTUNE," PAESTUM Paestum, the Greek Poseidonia, was a colony of Sybaris The malarial atmosphere of the place led to its desertion in the ninth century of our era. Hence the buildings there were not used as quarries for later structures. The so called "Temple of Neptune" at Paestum is one of the best preserved monuments of antiquity.]

THE SICILIAN COLONIES

Greek settlements in Sicily were mainly along the coast. Expansion over the entire island was checked by the Carthaginians, who had numerous possessions at its western extremity. The most celebrated colony in Sicily was Syracuse, established by emigrants from Corinth. It became the largest of Greek cities.

OTHER MEDITERRANEAN COLONIES

In Corsica, Sardinia, and on the coast of Spain Carthage also proved too obstinate a rival for the Greeks to gain much of a foothold. The city of Massilia (Marseilles), at the mouth of the Rhone, was their chief settlement in ancient Gaul. Two colonies on the southern shore of the Mediterranean were Cyrene, west of Egypt, and Naucratis, in the Delta of the Nile. From this time many Greek travelers visited Egypt to see the wonders of that strange old country.

RESULTS OF COLONIZATION

Energetic Greeks, the greatest colonizers of antiquity, thus founded settlements from the Black Sea to the Atlantic Ocean. "All the Greek colonies" says an ancient writer, "are washed by the waves of the sea, and, so to speak, a fringe of Greek earth is woven on to foreign lands." [28] To distinguish themselves from the foreigners, or "barbarians," [29] about them, the Greeks began to call themselves by the common name of Hellenes. Hellas, their country, came to include all the territory possessed by Hellenic peoples. The life of the Greeks, henceforth, was confined no longer within the narrow limits of the Aegean. Wherever rose a Greek city, there was a scene of Greek history.

30. BONDS OF UNION AMONG THE GREEKS

LANGUAGE AS A UNIFYING FORCE

The Greek colonies, as we have seen, were free and independent. In Greece itself the little city-states were just as jealous of their liberties. Nevertheless ties existed, not of common government, but of common interests and ideals, which helped to unite the scattered sections of the Greek world. The strongest bond of union was, of course, the one Greek speech. Everywhere the people used the same beautiful and expressive language. It is not a "dead" language, for it still lives in modified form on the lips of nearly three million people in the Greek peninsula, throughout the Mediterranean, and even in remote America.

LITERATURE AS UNIFYING FORCE; HOMER

Greek literature, likewise, made for unity. The Iliad and the Odyssey were recited in every Greek village for centuries. They formed the principal textbook in the schools; an Athenian philosopher calls Homer the "educator of Hellas." It has been well said that these two epics were at once the Bible and the Shakespeare of the Greek people.

RELIGION AS A UNIFYING FORCE; AMPHICTYONIES

Religion formed another bond of union. Everywhere the Greeks worshiped the same gods and performed the same sacred rites. Religious influences were sometimes strong enough to bring about federations known as amphictyonies, or leagues of neighbors. The people living around a famous sanctuary would meet to observe their festivals in common and to guard the shrine of their divinity. The Delphic amphictyony was the most noteworthy of these local unions. It included twelve tribes and cities of central Greece and Thessaly. They established a council, which took the shrine of Apollo under its protection and superintended the athletic games at Delphi.

A NEW AGE

The seventh and sixth centuries before Christ form a noteworthy epoch in Greek history. Commerce and colonization were bringing their educating influence to bear upon the Greeks. Hellenic cities were rising everywhere along the Mediterranean shores. A common language, literature, and religion were making the people more and more conscious of their unity as opposed to the "barbarians" about them.

THE GREEK WORLD, 500 B.C.

Greek history has now been traced from its beginnings to about 500 B.C. It is the history of a people, not of one country or of a united nation. Yet the time was drawing near when all the Greek communities were to be brought together in closer bonds of union than they had ever before known.

STUDIES

1. On the map facing page 66 see what regions of Europe are less than 500 feet above sea level; less than 3000 feet; over 9000 feet.

2. Why was Europe better fitted than Asia to develop the highest civilization? Why not so well fitted as Asia to originate civilization?

3. "The tendency of mountains is to separate, of rivers to unite, adjacent peoples." How can you justify this statement by a study of European geography?

4. Why has the Mediterranean been called a "highway of nations"?

5. Locate on the map several of the natural entrances into the basin of the Mediterranean.

6. At what points is it probable that southern Europe and northern Africa were once united?

7. Compare the position of Crete in relation to Egypt with that of Sicily in relation to the north African coast.

8. Why was the island of Cyprus a natural meeting place of Egyptian, Syrian, and Greek peoples?

9. What modern countries are included within the limits of the Balkan peninsula?

10. Describe the island routes across the Aegean (map between pages 68- 69).

11. What American states lie in about the same latitude as Greece?

12. Compare the boundaries of ancient Greece with those of the modern kingdom.

13. What European countries in physical features closely resemble Greece? What state of our union?

14. Why is Greece in its physical aspects "the most European of European lands"?

15. What countries of Greece did not touch the sea?

16. Tell the story of the Iliad and of the Odyssey.

17. Explain the following terms: oracle; amphictyony; helot; Hellas; Olympiad; and ephors.

18. Give the meaning of our English words "ostracism" and "oracular."

19. Explain the present meaning and historical origin of the following expressions: "a Delphic response"; "Draconian severity"; "a laconic speech."

20. What is the date of the first recorded Olympiad? of the expulsion of the last tyrant of Athens?

21. Describe the Lions' Gate (illustration, page 70) and the François Vase (illustration, page 77).