Millennium : a history of the last thousand years

An engaging work by a prize-winning historian traces the progress and regress of the world's civilizations over the past thousand years and shows how the capacity of one people to influence another has shifted geographically. 35,000 first printing. World History Cover 1 Copyright page 8 Contents 11 Preface 15 Prologue: Prunier's Revisited 19 Part One: The Springs Of Initiative 29 1 Discrete Worlds: Some Civilizations A Thousand Years Ago 31 The Empire Of Sensibility 31 The Garden Of Islam 38 The Divided Heaven 48 The Civilization Of The Barbarians 60 2 The Cockpit Of Orthodoxy: Medieval Eastern Christendom 69 The Perfect Barbarians 69 The Clash Of Two Christendoms 73 The Business Of The Turks 83 The Rise Of The Third Rome 90 The Mad Planet 97 3 The Tower Of Darkness: Islam In The First Half Of Our Millennium 100 The Stones Of Iconium 100 The Serpent In The Garden 103 The Zengid Empire 107 The Fingers Of The Khan 111 The Auspicious Amir 118 Frontiers Of Islam 121 The View From The Mimbar 126 4 The World Behind The Wind: China And Her Neighbours From The Sung To The Ming 130 The Modest Pavilion 130 The Yaks' Tail-Bearers 133 The Lands Of Many Parasols 136 The Ming Menagerie 144 The Bright Dynasty 149 5 A Small Promontory Of Asia: Latin Christendom In The Late Middle Ages 155 The Stranger In The Glass 155 The Enlarged Horizon 159 Enemies Of Promise 163 The Divisions Of Latin Christendom 167 The Age Of Fool's Gold 176 The Errant Spirit 182 Part Two: The Springs Uncoiled 187 6 Shy And Retiring Empires: Expanding States In Late Medieval Africa And America 189 The Maya Renaissance 189 The Screen Of Hindsight 193 The Black Empires 195 An Empire Built On Sand 208 The Aztec Memory 212 The Frustrated Empires 226 7 The Reach Of Conquest: Imperialisms Of The Early Modern Period 230 The Turtle Armada 230 The Corners Of The Carpet 235 The Colour Of The Bear 245 The Impossible Empires 249 The Highway Of The World 258 8 The Touch Of Empire: Colonization On Early Modern Frontiers 262 Lands So Wonderful 262 The Pioneer Mind 266 The Involuntary Colonists 273 The Indigenous Victims 279 Touchpoints At The Rlm Of Empire 284 9 The Embrace Of Evangelization: Reform And Expansion Of Early Modern Religions 287 The Road To Bali 287 The Infidel Within 293 The Spiritual Conquests Of Christendom 302 The Scales Of Faith 310 10 The Tangle Of Trade: Early Modern Long-Range Commerce 313 Chinese Fortunes 313 Outcasts Of The Islands 325 The Venice Of The North 331 The Feast Of The Dead 334 The Age Of Irish Madeira 338 Part Three: The Atlantic Crisis 341 11 The Atlantic Chasm: Fissures And Fractures In The Atlantic World 343 The New Canaan 343 Self-Evident Truths 347 The Fine-Feathered Serpent 350 The Creoles Of Yankee Country 354 Riding The Crocodile 356 The Spittle Of Democracy 362 12 Voyages Of Bounty: The Redistribution Of World Resources 368 Empires Of The Dandelion 368 The Precious Commodities 375 The Industrious East 381 The Growl Of The Tiger 386 The Industrial West 390 13 The Chasm Spanned: The Survival And Revival Of Atlantic Links 398 The Era Of Elvis 398 The Habitat Of The Blue Bloom 403 Coming To America 408 Business Imperialism 415 Coming From America 421 14 The Mirrors Of Imperialism: Western Reflections Elsewhere In The World 427 Refracted Images 427 The Industrial Advantage 433 The Tomb Of Radamès 437 The Hidden Hippopotamus 443 The Meal Of The Man-Eaters 446 The Distorting Mirror 451 Part Four: The Twist Of Initiative 457 15 Graveyards Of Certainty: The Decline Of Confidence And The Erosion Of Empires 459 Empires Of Certainty 459 The Ordered Universe 465 The Obedience Of The Corpse 469 The Included Ape 474 States Of Nature 476 Eating People 483 16 The Stumblers' Alibis: Domestic Difficulties In The Modern West 490 The Skeleton Of Pessimism 490 Nervous Disorders 496 Militant Tendencies 503 Today, The Struggle 512 Barbarism, Freedom, And Technology 517 The Enemy Bereft 522 17 The Casebook Of Failure: Fraying Edges Of The Atlantic 525 Tears For Argentina 525 John Bull's Second Childhood 532 The Mature Years Of Marianne 539 The Maggot In The Apple 546 18 Life After Empires: Decolonization And Counter-Colonization 550 The Hives Of Aladdin 550 The Roots Of The Mikongoe Tree 553 The Feasts Of Monsters 559 The Monument To Our Struggle 567 The Shade Of The Banyan 569 The Fate Of The New Europes 574 The European Reflex 578 19 The Maze Of God: Islamic Resurgence Late In The Millennium 581 The Face On The Moon 581 The Cycle Of Revival 588 Signs Along The Road 596 The Eye Of Islam 602 Part Five: The Pacific Challenge 605 20 The Watchers At Dawn: Modernization In Japan 607 The Eaters Of Whales 607 The Revolution Of The Samurai 614 The Floating Wharf 619 A Mark In The World 622 The Stump Of The Golden Pavilion 629 21 The Giant Awakening: Modernization Elsewhere In East Asia 634 The Confucian Kitchen 634 The Barrel Of A Gun 642 The Hall Of One Voice 647 The Clash Of Jade Pendants 652 The Ocean View 659 22 Riders Of The Surf: The White Pacific 663 The Lost Caravels 663 The New Mediterranean 669 Under Open Skies 678 The Surf Of History 688 23 The Revenge Of The East: Oriental Resilience And Western Culture 692 The Seaside Xanadu 692 The Tao Of Science 706 The Japaneseness Of Japan 713 Silver Columbia 720 Epilogue: Alice's Unvisited 725 1. Population Growth Will Be Contained 727 2. Rival Totalitarianisms Will Return 730 3. Big States Will Continue To Fragment 732 4. Cities Will Wither 737 5. Initiative Will Continue To Shift 739 Notes 742 Prologue 742 Chapter One: Discrete Worlds 743 Chapter Two: The Cockpit Of Orthodoxy 745 Chapter Three: The Tower Of Darkness 746 Chapter Four: The World Behind The Wind 747 Chapter Five: A Small Promontory Of Asia 748 Chapter Six: Shy And Retiring Empires 750 Chapter Seven: The Reach Of Conquest 752 Chapter Eight: The Touch Of Empire 753 Chapter Nine: The Embrace Of Evangelization 755 Chapter Ten: The Tangle Of Trade 756 Chapter Eleven: The Atlantic Chasm 758 Chapter Twelve: Voyages Of Bounty 759 Chapter Thirteen: The Chasm Spanned 761 Chapter Fourteen: The Mirrors Of Imperialism 762 Chapter Fifteen: Graveyards Of Certainty 764 Chapter Sixteen: The Stumblers' Alibis 766 Chapter Seventeen: The Casebook Of Failure 767 Chapter Eighteen: Life After Empires 769 Chapter Nineteen: The Maze Of God 771 Chapter Twenty: The Watchers At Dawn 772 Chapter Twenty-One: The Giant Awakening 774 Chapter Twenty-Two: Riders Of The Surf 776 Chapter Twenty-Three: The Revenge Of The East 778 Index 781 A 781 B 783 C 786 D 790 E 791 F 792 G 794 H 795 I 796 J 798 K 799 L 800 M 801 N 804 O 806 P 806 Q 808 R 809 S 810 T 813 U 815 V 815 W 816 X 817 Y 817 Z 817 Picture Credits 818 world,history;,world,politics world history,world politics Millennium is the most exciting sort of popular history. The narrative of Millennium begins in Japan in the year 1005 with a visit to the author of The Tale of Genji ... the same place it ends 990 years later. In between, it follows the civilizations of the world - from the eleventh-century Caliphate of Cordova to fourteenth-century Mesoamerica to fifteenth-century Russia to twentieth-century America - tracking the geographic drift westward of historical initiative from the eastern shores of the Pacific to the Atlantic and back again. In a single chapter, this book moves from the founding of the Ming Dynasty to sixteenth-century Amsterdam to the empires of the Inca and Aztec. Dazzlingly written, scrupulous in its scholarship, Millennium is a book on a grand scale, with more ambition, erudition, relevance, and enduring interest than any popular history ever written.