A SUMMARY
[Actually, this is a short summary. Most times when you see that term today ... they drag. And drag. AND DRAG. Am I right on this? Anyhoo, it's the twenty-first day of the month and I wanted to give myself a break as well as you, so I'm going with chapter twenty-one of Hendrik Willem van Loon's The Story of Mankind, one of my favorite books.
First winner of the Newbery Medal for outstanding children's literature in 1921, and the book's been updated since then of course -- last week I finished it again and I'm rereading an update from last year, but even if you're not a history minded person (and if you say you're not I kind of pity you). I love than van Loon originally wrote this book for his grandchildren and doesn't feel the need to talk down to them. If I had my druthers, schools would require this text.
The whole book, I mean, not just this 2 1/2 page chapter. The further back in time you go, you might disagree with some of it -- but even van Loon admits he doesn't know everything, or that he or we really can. But let's take a few moments today and delve into the beginning of time that we're reasonably aware of to about Alexander the Great. Enjoy.
David]
21. A SUMMARY
A SHORT SUMMARY OF CHAPTERS 1 to 20
THUS far, from the top of our high tower we have been looking eastward.
But from this time on, the history of Egypt and Mesopotamia is going
to grow less interesting and I must take you to study the western
landscape.
Before we do this, let us stop a moment and make clear to ourselves what
we have seen.
First of all I showed you prehistoric man--a creature very simple in his
habits and very unattractive in his manners. I told you how he was
the most defenceless of the many animals that roamed through the early
wilderness of the five continents, but being possessed of a larger and
better brain, he managed to hold his own.
Then came the glaciers and the many centuries of cold weather, and life
on this planet became so difficult that man was obliged to think three
times as hard as ever before if he wished to survive. Since, however,
that "wish to survive" was (and is) the mainspring which keeps every
living being going full tilt to the last gasp of its breath, the brain
of glacial man was set to work in all earnestness. Not only did these
hardy people manage to exist through the long cold spells which killed
many ferocious animals, but when the earth became warm and comfortable
once more, prehistoric man had learned a number of things which gave
him such great advantages over his less intelligent neighbors that the
danger of extinction (a very serious one during the first half million
years of man's residence upon this planet) became a very remote one.
I told you how these earliest ancestors of ours were slowly plodding
along when suddenly (and for reasons that are not well understood) the
people who lived in the valley of the Nile rushed ahead and almost over
night, created the first centre of civilisation.
Then I showed you Mesopotamia, "the land between the rivers," which was
the second great school of the human race. And I made you a map of the
little island bridges of the AEgean Sea, which carried the knowledge and
the science of the old east to the young west, where lived the Greeks.
Next I told you of an Indo-European tribe, called the Hellenes, who
thousands of years before had left the heart of Asia and who had in
the eleventh century before our era pushed their way into the rocky
peninsula of Greece and who, since then, have been known to us as the
Greeks. And I told you the story of the little Greek cities that
were really states, where the civilisation of old Egypt and Asia was
transfigured (that is a big word, but you can "figure out" what it
means) into something quite new, something that was much nobler and
finer than anything that had gone before.
When you look at the map you will see how by this time civilisation has
described a semi-circle. It begins in Egypt, and by way of Mesopotamia
and the AEgean Islands it moves westward until it reaches the European
continent. The first four thousand years, Egyptians and Babylonians and
Phoenicians and a large number of Semitic tribes (please remember that
the Jews were but one of a large number of Semitic peoples) have carried
the torch that was to illuminate the world. They now hand it over to the
Indo-European Greeks, who become the teachers of another Indo-European
tribe, called the Romans. But meanwhile the Semites have pushed westward
along the northern coast of Africa and have made themselves the rulers
of the western half of the Mediterranean just when the eastern half has
become a Greek (or Indo-European) possession.
This, as you shall see in a moment, leads to a terrible conflict between
the two rival races, and out of their struggle arises the victorious
Roman Empire, which is to take this Egyptian-Mesopotamian-Greek
civilisation to the furthermost corners of the European continent, where
it serves as the foundation upon which our modern society is based.
I know all this sounds very complicated, but if you get hold of these
few principles, the rest of our history will become a great deal
simpler. The maps will make clear what the words fail to tell. And after
this short intermission, we go back to our story and give you an account
of the famous war between Carthage and Rome.
First winner of the Newbery Medal for outstanding children's literature in 1921, and the book's been updated since then of course -- last week I finished it again and I'm rereading an update from last year, but even if you're not a history minded person (and if you say you're not I kind of pity you). I love than van Loon originally wrote this book for his grandchildren and doesn't feel the need to talk down to them. If I had my druthers, schools would require this text.
The whole book, I mean, not just this 2 1/2 page chapter. The further back in time you go, you might disagree with some of it -- but even van Loon admits he doesn't know everything, or that he or we really can. But let's take a few moments today and delve into the beginning of time that we're reasonably aware of to about Alexander the Great. Enjoy.
David]
21. A SUMMARY
A SHORT SUMMARY OF CHAPTERS 1 to 20
THUS far, from the top of our high tower we have been looking eastward.
But from this time on, the history of Egypt and Mesopotamia is going
to grow less interesting and I must take you to study the western
landscape.
Before we do this, let us stop a moment and make clear to ourselves what
we have seen.
First of all I showed you prehistoric man--a creature very simple in his
habits and very unattractive in his manners. I told you how he was
the most defenceless of the many animals that roamed through the early
wilderness of the five continents, but being possessed of a larger and
better brain, he managed to hold his own.
Then came the glaciers and the many centuries of cold weather, and life
on this planet became so difficult that man was obliged to think three
times as hard as ever before if he wished to survive. Since, however,
that "wish to survive" was (and is) the mainspring which keeps every
living being going full tilt to the last gasp of its breath, the brain
of glacial man was set to work in all earnestness. Not only did these
hardy people manage to exist through the long cold spells which killed
many ferocious animals, but when the earth became warm and comfortable
once more, prehistoric man had learned a number of things which gave
him such great advantages over his less intelligent neighbors that the
danger of extinction (a very serious one during the first half million
years of man's residence upon this planet) became a very remote one.
I told you how these earliest ancestors of ours were slowly plodding
along when suddenly (and for reasons that are not well understood) the
people who lived in the valley of the Nile rushed ahead and almost over
night, created the first centre of civilisation.
Then I showed you Mesopotamia, "the land between the rivers," which was
the second great school of the human race. And I made you a map of the
little island bridges of the AEgean Sea, which carried the knowledge and
the science of the old east to the young west, where lived the Greeks.
Next I told you of an Indo-European tribe, called the Hellenes, who
thousands of years before had left the heart of Asia and who had in
the eleventh century before our era pushed their way into the rocky
peninsula of Greece and who, since then, have been known to us as the
Greeks. And I told you the story of the little Greek cities that
were really states, where the civilisation of old Egypt and Asia was
transfigured (that is a big word, but you can "figure out" what it
means) into something quite new, something that was much nobler and
finer than anything that had gone before.
When you look at the map you will see how by this time civilisation has
described a semi-circle. It begins in Egypt, and by way of Mesopotamia
and the AEgean Islands it moves westward until it reaches the European
continent. The first four thousand years, Egyptians and Babylonians and
Phoenicians and a large number of Semitic tribes (please remember that
the Jews were but one of a large number of Semitic peoples) have carried
the torch that was to illuminate the world. They now hand it over to the
Indo-European Greeks, who become the teachers of another Indo-European
tribe, called the Romans. But meanwhile the Semites have pushed westward
along the northern coast of Africa and have made themselves the rulers
of the western half of the Mediterranean just when the eastern half has
become a Greek (or Indo-European) possession.
This, as you shall see in a moment, leads to a terrible conflict between
the two rival races, and out of their struggle arises the victorious
Roman Empire, which is to take this Egyptian-Mesopotamian-Greek
civilisation to the furthermost corners of the European continent, where
it serves as the foundation upon which our modern society is based.
I know all this sounds very complicated, but if you get hold of these
few principles, the rest of our history will become a great deal
simpler. The maps will make clear what the words fail to tell. And after
this short intermission, we go back to our story and give you an account
of the famous war between Carthage and Rome.
Comments
Post a Comment