Asimov's Chronology of The World PDF

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Asimovs
CHRONOLjOGY
OF THE
WORLD
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Over 15,000,000,000 Years

of History at a Glance
»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»»>
450,000,000 TO 370,000,000 YEARS AGO 17,000,000 TO 5,000,000 YEARS AGO
The beginning of amphibia The beginning of hominids
370,000,000 TO 300,000,000 YEARS AGO 5,000,000 TO 4,000,000 YEARS AGO

The land-based egg • the beginning of the The australopithecines • bipedality
reptiles
4,000,000 TO 2,000,000 YEARS AGO

300,000,000 TO 220,000,000 YEARS AGO
Genus Homo • stone tools
The beginning of the mammals
2,000,000 T0 1,600,000 YEARS AGO

220,000,000 T0 100,000,000 YEARS AGO
Homo erectus
The beginning of the placental mammals
100,000,000 TO 70,000,000 YEARS AGO 1,600,000 T0 1,000,000 YEARS AGO

The end of the australopithecines
The beginning of the primates
70,000,000 TO 65,000,000 YEARS AGO 1,000,000 TO 500,000 YEARS AGO

The end of the dinosaurs
The use of fire • cooking
65,000,000 TO 40,000,000 YEARS AGO 500,000 TO 300,000 YEARS AGO

The beginning of monkeys Neanderthals
40,000,000 TO 30,000,000 YEARS AGO 300,000 TO 200,000 YEARS AGO

The beginning of apes Ice Age • burial
30,000,000 T0 17,000,000 YEARS AGO 200,000 TO 50,000 YEARS AGO

The beginning of anthropoid apes The beginning of "modern humans"
50.000 TO 30,000 YEARS AGO 3000 TO 2500 B.C.
The end of the Neanderthals
The calendar • the pyramids • the Sumerian
flood • the epic of Gilgamesh • Crete
30.000 TO 25,000 YEARS AGO
Modern humans reach Australia and the 2500 TO 2000 B.C.
Americas
Sargon and the first Empire • feudalism
• navies •
Indus civilization
25.000 TO 20,000 YEARS AGO • Indo-Europeans
Art • lamps
2000 T0 1500 B.C.

20.000 T0 14,000 YEARS AGO
The charioteers • Hammurabi of Babylon
The domestication of the dog and law-codes • the rise of Assyria •
volcanic explosion of Thera • end of the
14.000 T0 12,000 YEARS AGO Indus civilization • China in the Bronze Age
(12,000 T0 10,000 B.C.)
Herding
1500 T0 1200 B.C.
Egyptian Empire at its peak • monotheism
10.000 TO 8000 B.C. • Age
Iron • Trojan War • Israelites enter
End of the Ice Age • the beginning of Canaan
agriculture • the beginning of warfare
• cities and civilization
1200 T0 1000 B.C.
8000 TO 7000 B.C. Peoples from the sea • the alphabet • the
coming of the Dorians • feudalism in China
Rivers and irrigation • city-states
7000 TO 6000 B.C. 1000 TO 900 B.C.
Baskets • pottery • textiles David and Solomon • the beginning of

Biblical writing Phoenicians penetrate into
•
the Atlantic Ocean • Caste system in India

6000 TO 5000 B.C.
• Olmecs in Mexico
Rise of Sumeria • priest-kings and religion
• ships
900 TO 800 B.C.
5000 TO 4000 B.C. First Assyrian Empire • Yahwism in Israel
Fermentation and alcoholic beverages
•Homer's Iliad and Odyssey • Carthage
• metallurgy founded • "Zero" invented in India • Israel
splits into Israel and Judah
4000 TO 3500 B.C.

Bronze age
800 TO 700 B.C.
• the wheel • oars • plows •
rise of Egypt Second Assyrian Empire • end of Israel and

survival of Judah • Olympic Games
3500 TO 3000 B.C. established in Greece • Greece colonizes the

Mediterranean shores • rise of the
Writing and history • nations • dyes Etruscans • Rome founded
700 TO 600 3.C. 350 TO 300 B.C.
Assyria reaches its height, and falls • rise Philip II and the Macedonia
rise of
of Chaldea and Media • Phoenicians • Alexander the Great and the fall of Persia
circumnavigate Africa • Yahwism in the • Battles of Issus and Gaugamela • Plato and
ascendant in Judah • rise of Lydia • Aristotle in Athens • Rome develops the

militarization of Sparta • rise of tyrants in legion • Mayans appear in North America
Greece • rise of Carthaginian Empire • first
Emperor in Japan 300 TO 250 B.C.

Ptolemaic Egypt and the Museum and
600 TO 550 B.C. Library at Alexandria * Euclid • Hellenistic
Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldean Empire kingdoms • translation of tht Bible into
• Jews in Babylonian captivity
• coins used Greek • Achaean and Aetolian League in
in Lydia • Cyrus and the rise of Persia
• Greece • Archimedes in Syracuse • Rome
Thales and the rise of science in Ionia • the defeats Pyrrhus and wars with Carthage •
growth of democracy in Athens • the Maurya dynasty in India

Etruscans at their peak
250 TO 200 B.C.
550 TO 500 B.C. Ptolemaic Egypt at its height • Eratosthenes
The Persian Empire at its peak • Zarathustra and Apollonius • Antiochus III and
Seleucid Empire at its height • Sparta tries
and Zoroastrianism • Jews return to Judah
to reform and fails • Hannibal and the
and the founding of Judaism • mystery
religions in Greece • continued growth of
Second Punic War with its Battles of Cannae
Athenian democracy • Rome expels its king, and Zama • fall of Carthage and of Syracuse
• China under the Chin dynasty
and Roman Republic is founded • Jainism
and Buddhism in India • Confucianism and
Taoism in China • Pythagoreanism in Greece 200 T0 150 B.C.
• rise of Nubia in Africa
Rome defeats the Hellenistic kingdoms and
is supreme in the Mediterranean region
500 TO 450 B.C. • and the Seleucid
decline of Macedonia
Graeco-Persian war • Battles of Empire • Judea under the Maccabees
Thermopylae, Marathon, Salamis, and revolts against the Seleucid Empire • rise of
Plataea • Syracuse versus Carthage in Sicily Parthia • Hipparchus and Greek astronomy
• decline of Persians and Etruscans
150 T0 100 B.C.
450 TO 400 B.C. End of Carthage • slave uprisings in Rome
Pericles and Athens' Golden Age • • the Gracchi try to reform Rome and fail
Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, • Marius destroys invasion of Cimbri and
Herodotus, Socrates • Peloponnesian War Teutones • Maccabean kingdom established
and Alcibiades • Xenophon and the Ten in Judea • China under the Han dynasty
Thousand • fortification of Jerusalem •

Rome at the head of the Latin League 100 TO 50 B.C.
Pompey leads Roman armies to take over
400 TO 350 B.C. eastern region of the Mediterranean end •
Sparta peak • Agesilaus in Asia Minor

at its of the Seleucid Empire and the Maccabean
• Epaminondas and the rise of Thebes • the kingdom • civil war in Rome • rise of Julius
fall of Sparta • Syracuse at its peak • Rome Caesar, who conquers Gaul • Parthia defeats
sacked by the Gauls Roman army in Mesopotamia

50 T0 1 B.C. 300 TO 350
Caesar establishes dictatorship and is Constantine and the Christianization of
I
assassinated Mark Antony and Octavian
•
the Roman Empire • Council of Nicea and
divide Empire • Mark Antony and the rise of Arianism • the founding of
Cleopatra • Octavian wins the war final civil Constantinople • Brahmanism regains
and establishes the Roman Empire in place ascendancy in India • the Huns begin to
of the Republic • Herod rules over Judea
move westward
and Jesus of Nazareth is born
1 TO 50 350 TO 400
Germans defeat Romans in Teutoberg Forest Huns conquer the Ostrogoths and establish
an empire in Europe • Visigoths defeat
•Jesus of Nazareth crucified amid messianic
hopes of the Jews • St. Paul and the
Romans at the Battle of Adrianople and the
supremacy of the Roman legion comes to an
founding of Christianity • Rome conquers
end • Theodosius and the final split of the
southern Britain • China is the world's most
Empire into a western and eastern portion
advanced nation
• Korean independence
50 T0 100
400 TO 450
Jews rebel against Rome and the Second
Temple is destroyed • Britain rebels against Visigoths sack Rome
establishment of
•
Rome and is reconquered • kingdom of German kingdoms in Gaul, Spain and north
Aksum flourishes in east Africa Africa • Britain returns to
paganism • Attila
brings the Hunnish Empire to its peak • rise
of the Papacy • the walls of Constantinople
100 T0 150 are built the Polynesians complete their
•
Trajan conquers Dacia spread over the Pacific Islands

and Mesopotamia
and the Roman Empire is at its peak • a
second Jewish rebellion against Rome fails
• paper invented in China 450 TO 500
Aetius defeats Huns at the Battle of Chalons
•end of the Hunnish Empire • "fall" of the
150 TO 200
West Roman Empire • Theodoric establishes
Marcus Aurelius and the beginning of the Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy • Clovis
Roman decline • stirrup invented in India establishes the Frankish kingdom in Gaul •
Anglo-Saxons invade Britain • Chichen Itza

founded by Mayans
200 TO 250
Rise of Christianity, of Mithraism, and of
Manichaeism • Rome falls into anarchy • 500 TO 550
end of Parthia and the rise of Sassanid Persia
Ostrogothic kingdom at its peak • Justinian I
rules in Constantinople, puts an end to
250 TO 300 Plato's Academy, builds the cathedral of

Hagia Sophia, codifies Roman law • his
Rise of the Goths • recovery in Rome under general Belisarius reconquers North Africa,
Claudius and Aurelian • Diocletian
II Italy, and the Spanish coast • the rise
of the
reorganizes the Empire and there is a last Slavs, Bulgars,and Avars • Chosroes I and
persecution of Christians Sassanid Persia at its peak
550 TO 600 800 TO 850
Lombards invade Italy • Pope Gregory I Decline of the Frankish realm •
establishes the celibacy of the Catholic establishment of West and East Frankish
clergy • end of Arianism • St. Augustine kingdoms • Viking raids at their peak •
and the conversion of England to growth of European feudalism • Bulgarians
Christianity • Ireland in its golden age establish kingdom • Magyars begin raiding
• Avars at their peak • rise of the Khazars central Europe • Vikings penetrate Russia •
• birth of Mohammed Abbasid Empire and T'ang China begin to
decline • first Mayan civilization collapses
600 TO 650
850 TO 900
Chosroes II of Persia nearly conquers the
East Roman Empire, which recovers under Alfred of England fights off the Danish
Heraclius • Islam founded and the Arabs invasion • Vikings discover and settle
sweep out of Arabia to conquer Persia, Iceland Kievan Russia founded
•
Syria, and Egypt • end of the Avars • • Byzantine Empire regains vigor •
Khazar Empire established • T'ang dynasty Bulgarians converted to Christianity

established in China • Srivijaya established after the Byzantine fashion
in Indonesia • Toltecs in Mexico
900 TO 950
650 TO 700 East Frankish line comes to an end • Otto I
Ommayad Caliphate has its capital at crowned Emperor and establishes "Holy
Damascus and is at its peak, ruling from
Roman Empire" • he defeats Magyars at the
Battle of Lechfeld and ends their threat •
India to the Atlantic • its attack on
Constantinople fails when the Byzantines Viking raiders establishNorman dukedom •
use Greek
Moorish Spain at peak under Abd er-Rahman III
fire end of Celtic Christianity in
•
• Papacy bottom • Bulgarian kingdom
hits
England • Venice has its first doge
at peak • end of T'ang dynasty in China
700 TO 750 950 T0 1000

Muslims invade Spain and the Frankish
End West Frankish kingdom and
of
kingdom but are stopped by Charles Martel
founding of the Capetian line of French
at the Battle of Tours • Muslims fail again to kings • horseshoes, horse collars, and
take Constantinople • rise to power of the
moldboard plow come into use, increasing
Carolingian "Mayors" in the Frankish
food supply of northern Europe Moorish
•
kingdom • Khazars peak T'ang
at their •
Spain begins to decline • kingdoms of
China peak
at its • Mayas in North America
Denmark, Sweden, and Norway established
at their peak
• Vikings discover and settle Greenland
• Leif Ericsson lands in Vinland in North
750 TO 800 America • kingdoms of Hungary, Bohemia,

and Poland established • Russia and Serbia
Pepin becomes king of Franks • foundation converted to Byzantine version of
of the Papal States Charlemagne crowned •
Christianity • Fatimid Egypt at its peak
Emperor, and Frankish realm is at its peak China under the Sung dynasty
• • Japan
• end of the Lombard kingdom •
coming of under the Shogunate
the Vikings • Ommayad Caliphate taken
over by Abbasids with a new capital at
Baghdad • Harun ar-Rashid and the
1000
Abbasid Empire at its peak Millenarianism
1000 T0 1050 •Khmer Empire in Cambodia • birth of
Denmark conquers England and Genghis Khan • Aztecs gain power
under
is
Canute • Macbeth in Scotland • Brian Boru
in Mexico
drives Vikings out of Ireland • rise of
Normandy • rise of Venice • Christian drive 1200 TO 1250
to retake Spain from the Moors increases in
Genghis Khan founds the \'ast Mongol
intensity • Kievan Russia at its peak • Basil
Empire, conquering northern China and
brings Byzantine Empire to a peak,
II
Western Asia • under his sons, the Mongols
destroying Bulgarian kingdom • rise of
invade Europe, taking over Russia and
Seljuk Turks • Tale of the Genji written in
driving into Germany, but retire when the
Japan • Mayans enter final decline
new Khan dies • end of the Angevin
Empire John of England forced to sign the
•
1050 T0 1100 Magna Carta • Sicily flourishes under

Emperor Frederick II • Alexander Nevsky
William of Normandy ("the Conqueror") keeps Novgorod out of Mongol grip
invades and takes over England •
• Papacy at its peak under
Innocent III
Domesday book • final end of Celtic •Fourth Crusade sacks Constantinople and
Christianity • conflict over investiture Venice is at its peak • Albigensian crusade
between Emperor Henry IV and the Popes •
beginning of decline of the Holy Roman
Empire • Normans take over southern Italy
1250 T0 1300
• Seljuk Turks defeat Byzantines at the Battle The Mongol Empire is at its peak under
of Manzikert • Byzantine Empire begins Kublai Khan • Marco Polo of Venice visits
slow decline • rise of the Assassins • the the Mongol dominions and writes an
First Crusade takes Jerusalem
supernova • influential book that first acquaints medieval
in the constellation of Taurus observed in Europe with the far more advanced
China, but not in Europe civilizations of the east • the beginning of
the English Parliament England conquers •
Wales and adopts the longbow • the Sicilian

1100 T0 1150 Vespers • Pope Boniface VIII attempts to
establish supremacy of the Papacy •
Civil war in England • German "Drang nach
Osten" (push against the Slavs to the east) Thomas Aquinas • medieval France strong
• Abelard and Heloise • Norman
under Philip IV • independence of
Sicily at its
Switzerland established • Byzantine Empire
peak • city life revives in northern Italy
feebly restored • the final crusades
• Gothic cathedrals built • Second Crusade
is European scholars translating
a fiasco •
Arabic versions of Greek books of science 1300 T0 1350

• Cumans at the peak of their power
Scotland preserves its independence at the
• magnetic compass and gunpowder
may Battle of Bannockburn • beginning of the
have come into use in China
Hundred Years War between England and
France, with English victories at Sluys,
Crecy, and Poitiers • gunpowder comes
1150 T0 1200
into use at Crecy • the Black Death strikes
Henry II founds the Angevin Empire Europe • fall of Boniface VIII
and
• Richard the Lion-Heart and the Third establishment of Papacy at Avignon
Crusade • England begins to penetrate • Dante, the Divine
Comedy, and the
Ireland • end of the Norman kingdom in beginning of the Renaissance • the rise of
Italy • Moors in Spain driven farther south Swiss mercenaries • establishment of
in Spain • Serbian kingdom established
• Saladin of Egypt reconquers Jerusalem
(continued on next page)
Lithuania • rise of the Ottoman Turks 1500 T0 1550
• Mali Empire in Africa is at its height
• Mongol Empire declines rapidly Ottoman Empire at its peak under
Suleyman the Magnificent, who conquers
Hungary and lays siege to Vienna •
1350 T0 1400 Emperor Charles V, ruling over both the
John Wyclif and the question of Church Holy Roman Empire and Spain, is the most
reform • Chaucer and The Canterbury Tales powerful Christian monarch in Europe
• Martin Luther and the Protestant
•
the Great Schism of the Papacy •
Scandinavia united under Margaret Reformation • France and Empire begin
• Poland and Lithuania form dynastic union struggle in Italy, decline of the Italian
• Dmitri Donskoi of Muscovy defeats the Renaissance • Michelangelo and Raphael
Mongols • Murad I of Ottoman Empire • Henry VIII and Anglicanism • Portugal
establishes Janissaries and takes over much establishes first world overseas Empire
of the Balkans • Tamerlane establishes new •Spanish conquistadors destroy the
Mongol Empire in Asia • China under the Aztec civilization of Mexico and the Inca
Ming dynasty • Majapahit Empire in civilization of Peru • Ferdinand Magellan
Indonesia leads expedition that first circumnavigates
the Earth Copernicus and Vesalius
•
produce modern astronomy and anatomy,

1400 T0 1450
respectively, and begin the "Scientific
Henry V of England renews Hundred Years Revolution" • Safavid Persia founded
War, wins Battle of Agincourt, and brings • Mogul Empire founded in India • Ming
France to the brink of defeat • Joan of Arc China declines
and the French recovery • artillery
overcomes the longbow • Henry the
Navigator of Portugal begins exploration
1550 T0 1600
down the coast of Africa • Great Schism
healed and Papacy recovers • Florence at its Spain under Philip II peak • England
at its
peak under the Medicis • Jan Hus burned at destroys Philip's "Invincible Armada",
the stake and the Hussite wars convulse however, and Spain enters decline
• Netherlands revolts against Spain
Germany • Tamerlane dies and his empire
declines • China explores Indian Ocean • Elizabeth of England rules over Golden
• Incas establish Empire in South America Age of literature, including Shakespeare's
plays • Mary, Queen of Scots, executed
1450 T0 1500 • Huguenots in France and the

St,Bartholomew's Day Massacre • Henry IV
The Ottoman Sultan, Mehmed II, takes becomes king of France • Counter-
Constantinople • Portugal completes Reformation and the work of the Jesuits
circumnavigation of Africa and reaches halts advance of Protestantism • Gregorian
India • and Aragon unite to form
Castile calendar established • Tycho Brahe and the
Spain, drive the Moors out of Granada, and best naked-eye astronomical observations
subsidize Columbus's voyage of discovery •Ivan the Terrible defeats the Tatars and
of the American continents • Spain and absorbs their territory, begins the advance
Portugal drive Jews out of the country into Siberia • Ottoman Turks defeated at the
• Hundred Years War ends • Louis XI Lepanto • Safavid Persia at its peak
Battle of
of France destroys Charles the Rash of under Abbas I • Mogul India at its peak
Burgundy War of the Roses in England
•
under Akbar • Portuguese establish base at
• Papal luxury and Savonarola's
puritanism Macao in China •Japan under Hideyoshi
•invention of printing and the start of invades Korea • Manila founded in the
modern times • Ivan III and the unification Philippine Islands • Songhai Empire
of Russia • Songhai Empire in Africa destroyed at Timbuktu
1600 T0 1650 favor of William and Mary, Protestant
The Thirty Years War, the climax monarchs • New Netherlands conquered
of the Wars
of Religion, devastates by England and becomes New York
Germany • Tilly
• Anton van
sacksMagdeburg • Gustavus Adolphus of Leeuwenhoek discovers
Sweden wins the Battles of Leipzig and microscopic life • Ottoman Empire
lays
Lutzen • war ended by Treaty of siege to Vienna in last burst of aggression,
Westphalia, but is then defeated and driven out of

which the Netherlands wins
at
its independence • Dutch Hungary • Elector Frederick William
found New
Netherlands on American coast • Miguel militarizes Brandenburg • Peter I begins
Cervantes writes Don Quixote • Richelieu of task of modernizing Russia, and conquest of
France struggles to centralize French power Siberia is completed • Aurangzeb is last
under the king and his successor, Jules strong Mogul Emperor of India • Manchu
Mazarin, does the same • Louis XIV China is at its peak under K'ang Hsi
• Dutch
becomes king of France • Quebec is establish settlements in South Africa
founded and French North Africa (Canada)

established • Galileo in Italy puts the
ScientificRevolution in high gear, uses the 1700 T0 1725
telescope to study the heavens, overthrows
War of the Spanish Succession • British
Aristotelian physics, and is silenced by the general, Duke of Marlborough, defeats
Inquisition • England under the Stuarts French at Battle of Blenheim and elsewhere
rebels against Charles I, who is defeated • England deserts coalition and Louis XIV is
and executed, leaving Oliver Cromwell in saved • England and Scotland unite to form
power • England establishes colonies in Great Britain • George I succeeds to British
Virginia and New England • William
throne, leaves governments in the hands of
Harvey establishes circulation of the blood, Robert Walpole, so that Great Britain
founds modern physiology • house of becomes limited Parliamentary monarchy
Romanov gains Tsardom of Russia • Taj with a modern party system • Defoe's
Mahal by Shah Jahan of India • Ming
built
Robinson Crusoe and Swift's Gulliver's Travels
dynasty in China comes to an end and •
Fahrenheit and the mercury thermometer
China is under Manchu rule • Dutch • Elector Frederick III of Brandenburg
control East Indies • Portuguese and becomes King Frederick I of Prussia • his
Spanish Empires in decline son, Frederick William I, builds up
magnificent Prussian army • Charles XII
becomes King of Sweden and wins
spectacular victories against Russia,
1650 T0 1700 Denmark, and Poland, but is in the end
defeated by Peter I of Russia at the Battle of
Louis XIV establishes absolutism in France,
Poltava • rapid decline of the Mogul Empire
builds Versailles, racks Europe with wars,
and dominates the continent • French
literary golden age— Corneille, Racine,
Moliere, La Fontaine • French explore 1725 TO 1750
Mississippi Valley and claim it ("Louisiana") Frederick II of Prussia uses his father's army
for France • Charles II restored as English to gain Silesia
from Austria, but Maria
king • English colonies established in Theresa manages to keep Austria from
Carolinas, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania disintegrating • Great Britain defeats
• Isaac Newton establishes laws of motion, attempt of the "Young Pretender" (Bonnie
the light spectrum, the reflecting telescope, Prince Charlie) to regain the throne • Russia
the law of universal gravitation, and invents explores and later settles Alaska •
Nader
calculus • the "Age of Reason" is in high Kuli of Persia is the last of the old-style
gear • James II of England driven out in Asian conquerors
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire • Adam
1750 T0 17 75
Smith and John Locke • William Herschel
The Seven Years War (called the French discovers the planet Uranus • Cavendish
and Indian War in North America) ends discovers hydrogen • factory system
with Great Britain driving France out of established • Mozart and Haydn • Goethe
Canada and India • British Empire and Schiller • Poland wiped off the map by
becomes dominant political unit worldwide two more partitions • Captain Cook
• Frederick II uses his military genius to discovers the Hawaiian Islands • Great
save Prussia from onslaught of powerful Britain begins to settle Australia
coalition but is greatly helped by the sudden
death of Elizabeth I of Russia • France is
notable for reformers who try to improve

French society — Voltaire, Rousseau, 1800 T0 1820
Montesquieu • George III rules in Great
Napoleon dominates Europe after his great
Britain • Britain adopts Gregorian calendar
victories at Austerlitz, Jena, and Friedland
and North American
faces unrest in
• but Great Britain remains an enemy and
colonies over taxation in view of the
destroys a French-Spanish fleet at the Battle
expense of the Seven Years War
of Trafalgar, at which Admiral Nelson dies
• Captain Cook explores the Pacific and
•Napoleon invades Russia and loses his
crosses the Antarctic Circle • Watt invents a
army to the Russian soldiers and winter,
practicalsteam engine, beginning of the
slows and declines rapidly, is finally
Industrial Revolution • Benjamin Franklin
defeated at the Battle of Waterloo by the
invents the lightning rod and the Franklin
British general, the Duke of Wellington, and
stove • Lisbon destroyed by gigantic
goes into exile at St. Helena • Louis XVIII
earthquake and tidal wave • First Partition
restored as King of France • the United
of Poland by Prussia, Austria, and Russia
States buys Louisiana from France and
• Catherine II of Russia defeats Ottoman
doubles its territory • it fights Great Britain
Turks and Russia gains its present-day
to a draw in the War of 1812 • Fulton builds
European boundaries under • British
the first practical steamboat • Romantic
Robert Clive slowly gain preponderance of
power over India
poets — Shelley, Keats, Byron, Scott
• Spanish American nations revolt against
Spain and eventually establish their
independence • Manchu China in decline
• Kamehameha unites the Hawaiian islands
1775 T0 1800
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette rule
France inefficiently and drive it into near-
1820 T0 1840
bankruptcy • France erupts in the "French
Revolution," establishes a republic together Great Britain begins to expand the
with a "Reign of Terror," executes both king franchise, increasing democracy, abolishes
and queen, and must face the vengeful slavery in its possessions, and establishes
monarchs of Europe as a result • rise of modem postage system • Dickens writes
Napoleon Bonaparte, who begins to win his novels • French revolt evicts aristocratic
remarkable victories for France • Lavoisier monarchy of Charles X, establishes middle-

founds modern chemistry • the British class monarchy under Louis Philippe
colonies in North America revolt against • France begins to build African Empire in
Great Britain and, under George Algeria • Daguerre invents photography

Washington plus the help of France, win • Victor Hugo and Honore Balzac • Austria's
their independence • they work out a prime minister Metternich is the fount of
constitution that still forms the basis of European reaction after the fall of Napoleon
American government • Gibbon writes The • Flans Christian Anderson's fairy tales
• Greece gains its independence from the the process he defeats
Denmark, Austria,
Ottoman Empire • increasing friction and France, so that Germany becomes the
between American free states and slave
dominant land power in the world • Italy
states • United States advances rapidly in
absorbs Venetia and Rome and gains its
technology • Texas
overrun by Americans
is
present boundaries • Napoleon III
and declares itself independent of Mexico
abdicates and the Third Republic is founded
• Belgium
becomes independent in France • Hungary breaks loose and
Austria becomes a dual nation, Austria-

Hungary • Alexander II of Russia liberates
1840 T0 1860 the serfs and seeks other forms of
then fights a war with the
liberalization,
Louis Philippe driven out of France as
is
Ottoman Empire but a European coalition
part of the Revolutions of 1848, which shake
prevents him from gaining a victory
all of western
Europe • a Second Republic is • Turgenev, Tolstoy, and Dostoievsky
established, but Napoleon III becomes
• the United States fights a tremendous civil
president, executes a coup and becomes
war, in which the northern free states win,
Emperor • Dumas writes his historical
preserve the Union, and liberate the black
novels • Italy, with the help of France,
slaves • after the war President Lincoln is
unites its partsand becomes the Kingdom
assassinated the United States fights the
•
of Italy • Mettemich is driven out of Austria
Indians in the west, and Chicago burns
• an attempt to unify Germany fails • Great down • Gilbert & Sullivan operettas begin
Britainwars on China, forces it to accept
to be written • Thomas Edison invents
the opium trade, and founds Hong Kong
the phonograph and the electric light
• Darwin and
Wallace advance the theory of • European powers
begin the partition of
evolution by natural selection • Crimean Africa and even Belgium builds a huge
War pits Great Britain and France against
African Empire • Japan begins a successful
Russia and prevents further Russian
policy of westernization • Canada becomes
expansion Charge of the Light Brigade
•
a dominion
• United States fights
Mexico and gains the
southwest and California, also the southern
half of the Oregon Territory
• gains its T0 1890
present 48-state boundary, and friction over
Bismarck forms alliances that successfully
slavery worsens • Mormons establish
isolate France • Tsar Alexander II of Russia
themselves in Utah • discovery of gold in
is assassinated
Tchaikovsky • Great
•
California accelerates the settlement of the
Britain struggles with Irish home rule • the
west • Sepoy Mutiny in India is crushed by
turbulent Balkan nations win freedom from
Great Britain, putting an end to the Mogul
the Ottoman Empire • Mark Twain writes
Empire, and takes over all of India directly
Huckleberry Finn • in the Sudan, the Mahdi
• France settles in Indo-China • T'ai Ping
wins victories and destroys a British army
civil war in China weakens it and opens it to
• radio waves discovered
'European exploitation • Commodore Perry
forces Japan to open itself to trade with the
rest of the world • British settling in New T0 1900
Zealand and war with the Maoris
The British Empire at its peak • Michelson-
Morley experiment upsets the science of
physics • William II becomes German
1860 T0 1880 Emperor and retiresWilliam's Bismarck •
incapacity allows a French— Russian alliance

Otto von Bismarck in Prussia brings about to be formed, ending France's isolation
German forming German
unification,
Empire under Prussian King William I • in
(continued on next page)
• Roentgen discovers x-rays • Becquerel automobiles by mass production • Mt. Pelee
discovers radioactivity • Thomson erupts in Martinique • Peary reaches the
discovers the electron • Planck works out a North Pole
quantum theory, founding modern physics
• Zeppelin invents the airship • Freud
founds psychoanalysis • the Zionist 1910 T0 1914
movement starts among Jews • Dreyfus Unrest becomes acute in the polyglot
Affair in France exposes French anti- Austro-Hungarian Empire • Serbia is
Semitism Marconi invents radio
•
especially hostile • the heir to the Austro-
• Spanish-American War ends with the
Hungarian throne, Franz Ferdinand, is
United States gaining the Philippine Islands assassinated by Serbian terrorists
and Puerto Rico • Hawaii becomes an • Germany supports Austria* • Russia
American possession • British under supports Serbia • no one wants war, but no
Kitchener defeat Mahdists in Sudan one can stop it • Great Britain reduces
• Italians defeated by Ethiopians • trouble
power of House of Lords to a virtual zero
between the British and the independent • Rutherford proves the existence of the
Boer Republics in South Africa Japan • nuclear atom • Italy invades Libya and
defeats China and begins to compete with absorbs Empire • Balkan wars
it into its
the European powers in exploiting that land evict Ottoman Empire almost entirely from
• Boxer Rebellion in China crushed by a
is Europe • China overthrows Manchus and
European coalition • the United States endeavors to establish a republic, but is
insists on an Open Door policy in which all victimized by "warlords" • United States
powers may trade equally with China adopts direct election of the Senate • Titanic
• United States beats down Philippine sinks on
maiden voyage • motion
its
rebellion • automobiles come into use pictures become popular • Amundsen
reaches South Pole
1914 T0 1920
1900 T0 1910 World War I: Germany and Austria-
Boer War — Great Britain wins and annexes Hungary fighting Great Britain, France, and
the Boer Republics but grants Boers full Russia • Germany pushes westward
liberty within South Africa • Queen Victoria invading Belgium, is stopped by the Allies
dies after reign of 63 years • Great Britain at the Marne River, and a long stalemate
makes alliances with Japan, France, and follows • in the east, Russia wins victories
Russia • Europe divided into two over Austria-Hungary but loses to
antagonistic alliances • crises in the Balkans Germans • British attempts to attack Turkey
and Morocco threaten war
in • Germany at Gallipoli fail • German reliance on
begins to build modern navy to the distress unrestricted submarine warfare brings in
of Great Britain • Japan, in a surprise attack the United States on the Allied side • Russia
on the Russian far east fleet, starts the dissolves in revolution • Tsar Nicholas II
Russo-Japanese war • to the world's abdicates, is killed, and a Communist

astonishment, Japan wins, absorbs Korea government is established • after one last
and drives Russia out of Manchuria • a push westward, Germany surrenders
revolution in Russia forces the Tsar to make • President Wilson dominates
peace talks
some concessions and establish a kind of and sets up League of Nations, which the
parliamentary government • the United United States refuses to join • Austria-
States under Theodore Roosevelt forces Hungary broken up • Emperors Charles of
Panamanian independence and builds the Austria-Hungary and William II of
Panama Canal • Wright brothers invent the Germany abdicate • Yugoslavia and
airplane, and Ford produces cheap Czechoslovakia appear as nations
1920 T0 1930 Union labors to advance economically
United States returns to under "Five Year Plans" • Edward VIII
isolation,
establishes prohibition of alcohol, and succeeds to throne and abdicates to marry a
suffers great growth of crime • Lindbergh divorcee • most of Europe is Fascist •
crosses the Atlantic by plane independence movement in India under

• Kellogg-
Briand pact • southern Ireland becomes Mohandas K. Gandhi
dominion Italy establishes Fascist
•
government under Mussolini • Germany 1939 T0 1945

under Weimar Republic experiences
World War II begins • Germany wins
inflation, humiliation, and the rise of Adolf
enormous initial victories, smashing
Hitler • in Russia, now
the Soviet Union,
Poland, occupying Norway and Low
Lenin dies and Josef Stalin gains power
• Turkey fights
Countries, and defeating France, all in first
off Greek invaders, puts an
year • Soviet Union, having signed a pact
end to Ottoman Sultanate, and reorganizes
with Germany, defeats Finland and takes
under Mustapha Kemal • Chinese Republic
over Baltic States • Great Britain rescues
splits between Chiang Kai-shek, a
army at Dunkirk and wins air-Battle of
conservative, and Mao Tse-tung, a
Britain • Germany takes over Balkans and
Communist • stock market in New York
invades the Soviet Union, which suffers
crashes in 1929
great losses but fights back • Great Britain
wins North Africa but falls
initial victories in
back before German general, Erwin Rommel

• Japan strikes the United States
1930 T0 1939
successfully at Pearl Harbor • United States
Great Depression envelopes world, goes to war against Germany and Japan
stimulating unrest • Japan takes over • Japan wins enormous victories
for six
Manchuria and invades other portions of months, taking over the Philippines,
China, paying no attention to world Malaya, and the Dutch East Indies • the
indignation and leaving the League of United States wins the Battle of Midway and
Nations • Italy attacks and absorbs Ethiopia begins to island-hop toward Japan •
into its Empire • Hitler becomes German Germany reaches Stalingrad, is defeated
Chancellor, initiating violent anti-Semitism there, and begins a long forced retreat back
•Germany is rearmed under repressive across Russia • Allies land in North Africa
Nazi rule • Germany absorbs Austria and and Great Britain wins the Battle of El
Czechoslovakia, with Great Britain and Alamein • Italy is invaded and Mussolini is
France responding only weakly • the overthrown • in gathering defeat, Germany
Munich surrender • a Spanish civil war slaughters six million Jews in the Holocaust
results in a Fascist Spain under Francisco • Germany
surrenders, Mussolini is
Franco • United States fights depression executed. Hitler commits suicide United
•
with "New Deal" under Franklin D. Roosevelt States develops nuclear bomb, uses two
• prohibition repealed • isolation continues over Japan, which surrenders, ending
• Stalin's repressive regime in the Soviet World War II
Asnviovs
CHRONOLOGY
OF THE
WORLD
$
.)
Books by ISAAC ASIMOV published by HarperCollins
Measure of the Universe (1983)
Asimov's Chronology of Science and Discovery

(1989)
Asimov's History of the World (1991)

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Asimovs
CHRONOLOGY
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ISAAC ASIMOV
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ASIMOV'S CHRONOLOGY OF THE WORLD. Copyright © 1991 by Isaac Asimov.
All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this
book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written

permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles
and reviews. For information address HarperCollins Publishers, 10 East 53rd

Street, New York, N.Y. 10022.
FIRST EDITION
Designed by Alma Orenstein
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Asimov, Isaac, 1920-

Asimov's chronology of the world/lsaac Asimov.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-06-270036-7
1. Chronology, Historical. 1. Title. II. Title; Chronology of the world.
D11.A76 1991
902'.02— dc20 91-55007
91 92 93 94 95 DT/RRD 10 987654321
DEDICATED TO
Human history: A dark and turbulent stream of folly,
illuminated now and then by flashes of genius.
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CHRONOLOGY
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INTRODUCTION
The year 2000 is coming. In just a few years, it tional year. Where would the world be in 2000?
will be here, and people look forward to it with a Where would / be in 2000?
mixture of elation and dread. Will it mark the That last question always made me nervous.
beginning of a new and happier era, or will it Even when I was quite young, I was aware that
mark a turning point that will lead us and the in the year 2000 I would be 80 years old, and
world downward misery?to that that fact would never change. I also knew
Why do we pick on the year 2000 as something that 80 was a bit over the average life expectancy
to pin our hopes and fears on? Because it is "a of human beings, so that there was a less than
round number." even chance I would be alive in 2000.
A year that ends in a "0" is bound to seem I have made it to 1989, however (as write I
significant; one that ends in "00," even more sig- this), and I am person
in reasonable health for a
nificant; and one that ends in "000" most signifi- my age, so that, at the moment, the chances ap-
cant of all. As usually conceived, a year ending pear a bit better, than I had once thought, that I
in "0" begins a new decade; one ending in "00," will still be alive in 2000. 1 hope so. Like everyone
a new century; and one ending in "000," a new else, I am caught up in the mystique of the "000"
millennium. and I would like to see its coming.
This is not exactly true, of course. If we begin
counting with some year that we call "1," then But what do we mean by the year 2000, anyway?
the tenth year is "10" and the years 1 to 10 make The Earth is billions of years old, and the Uni-
up the first decade. It is the year "11," therefore, verse is far older still. Why, then, has the number
that marks the beginning of the second decade. of the years still not reached 2000?
By similar reasoning, it is the year 101 that marks That is because we arbitrarily start the count-
the beginning of the second century, and "1001" ing at a particular recent point in history that
that marks the beginning of the second millen- seems unique to us.
nium. We could, counting in any year.
after all, start
This means that the year 2000 will be the final The French Revolutionaries, about two centuries
year of the twentieth century and the second mil- ago, were so elated over having established a
lennium, and it will be on January 1, 2001 that new republic, in which they felt a new era of
we begin the twenty-first century and the third liberty, equality, and fraternity would begin, that
millennium. they declared the year 1792 to be the year 1 of the
To persuade humanity to accept that bit of Republic. That system only continued for about
mathematical logic is, however, hopeless. On 14 years, but if it had taken hold and had been
January 1, 2000, there will be the full clamor and adopted by all the world, what we call 2000
noise that will mark the beginning of a new mil- would have turned out to be the year 208 of the
lennium and all the pedantic voices that will say, Republic.
"No, no, we must wait another year," will be In the same way, in certain official documents,
drowned out and ignored. Americans not only give the year as it is ordinar-
So we must make the best of it, for even I, ily accepted, but also count the years from the
who know better, accept the mythic value of 2000 Independence of the United States in 1776. The
and never think of 2001. Even when I was a teen- year we
2000 would be the year 224 of U.S.
call
ager, caught up in the reading of science fiction, independence.

I realized that 2000 (not 2001) was the science fic- The Moslems count from the moment when
2 ASIMOV'S CHRONOLOGY OF THE WORLD
their prophet, Mohanimad (570-632), fled from especially as we only know dates with reasonable
the Arabian city of Mecca to Medina in the year accuracy for a few thousand years into the past.
we call 622. That is their year 1. What is more,
they use a lunar calendar in which the year is So, where did the year-numbers that we use
only 354 days long and the year we call 2000 will come from?
be the year 1421 since the Hegira (i. e., 1421
-
It began about the year 535, when a scholar
A.H.). named Dionysius Exiguus (500-560) studied the

The Greeks of Asia began
count the years
to Bible and decided that Jesus had been born 535
from 312 B.C. (i.e., 312 years before the year we years earlier, in 753 A.U.C.
call "1"), for that was when their ruler, Seleucus About two and a half centuries later, the pow-
I(358-281 B.Cl), began his reign. This "Seleucid erful monarch, Charlemagne, »who ruled over
Era" became popûlar for a while and, if it had much of western Europe, decided that it would
continued to this day, the year we call 2000 be much more pious to count the years from the
would be 2312 of the Seleucid Era. To put it an- birth of Jesus than from the founding of the
other way, the year we call 1688 would have been heathen city of Rome.
the year 2000 of the Seleucid Era. For that reason, 753 A.U.C. became A.D. 1
The Romans eventually counted the years (where A.D. stands for Anno Domini, which is
from the founding of Rome, which they placed Latin for "in the year of the Lord"). Earlier dates
in the year we call 753 B.C. They called that year are listed as "B.C." ("Before Christ"), so that
1 A.U.C. (which stands for Anno Urbis Conditae, Rome was founded in 753 B.C.
meaning, in Latin, "the year of the founding of The
use of this "Christian Era" spread
the city"). That was used Europe generally for
in throughout Europe, and then, after 1400, when
centuries and, if it were still used today, the year European guns and ships increasingly domi-
we call 2000 would be 2753 A.U.C. The year we nated the world, this system of counting the
call 1247 would have been 2000 A.U.C. years became worldwide and is now used every-
Why not count the years from the beginning where (except for various religious ceremonies
of the world, or of the Universe? For one thing, when other older eras are used.)
until quite recently, people didn't have the faint- Unfortunately, Dionysius Exiguus was wrong
est notion as to when the world began. The Jew- in his calculations. The Bible does not give a clear
ish rabbis, after studying the Bible thoroughly, statement of chronology anywhere in the usually
decided that the world began in 3760 B.C. Thus, accepted books it includes. It was therefore easy
the year we call 2000 would be 5760 of the "Jew- for Dionysius to make a mistake.
ish Mundane Era" (where mundane is from the According to the Bible, Jesus was born when
Latin word for "world"). The year 1760 B.C., was Herod I ruled over Judea, but Herod I, we are
the year 2000 of the Jewish Mundane Era. certain, from historical records of the time, died
About 1650, James Ussher (1581-1656), a in 749 A.U.C. Jesus had to be born no later than
bishop of the Anglican church, also studied the that year, which is 4 B.C. of the Christian Era.
Bible and came up with the year 4004 B.C. as the He may have been born earlier still, perhaps
year of the creation of the world. This was long even as early as 20 B.C. We don't really know.
accepted by Protestants, and most Protestant Bi- Therefore, if we are really counting from the
bles give that date above the account of the crea- birth of Jesus, the year we call 2000 is really
tion at the very beginning of the Bible. In that something between 2004 and 2020, and the real
case, the year 2000 would be the year 6004 of the year A.D. 2000 may already have passed.
Christian Mundane Era. However, it is useless to worry about these
Nowadays, of course, scientists believe the things.The year we plan to call 2000 is 2000 to
Universe came into being billions of years ago, the whole world, and everyone is looking for-
but it would be silly to try to number our years ward to it with excitement and trepidation.
in the billions. It would be entirely inconvenient. might be interesting, then,
It to cast our eyes
1 5,000,000,000 YEARS AGO 3
back to see how we got to where we are today by And I think it would be amusing to start at the
jumping from period to period, using round very beginning, the time when the Universe
years to mark the boundaries of the gaps, those began.
years that end with one or more zeros.
15 , 000 , 000,000
YEARS AGO
There is a temptation to say 15,000,000,000 panding Universe that now exists.
B.C., but that would really be foolish. The dif- This origin of the Universe, as a relatively
ference between 15,000,000,000 years ago and small volume of matter that exploded, was first
15,000,000,000 B.C. is not quite 2000 years, and advanced in 1927 by a Belgian astronomer,
what is 2000 years in 15 billion? Georges Edward Lemaitre (1894-1966). The ex-
Besides, the year Tm discussing now is not plosion was called a "big bang" in 1948 by the
certain. It is an approximation, and it may be as Russian-American physicist, George Gamow
large as 20,000,000,000 years ago. Without wor- (1904-1968).
rying about that too much, let us say that about Almost astronomers accept the big bang
all
15,000,000,000 years ago, the Universe came into in principle but the actual time is only known
being, and I will continue to use the phrase approximately. Scientists are also arguing the
"years ago" until we reach times much nearer details of what happened in the instants imme-
the present. diately after the explosion, but that need not con-
Naturally, we go back in time to see
can't cern us here.
when this happened and how it happened. We One question that everyone is bound to ask
can only study the Universe as it is today and try about the big bang is: Where did the original glob
to deduce, from that, how it came into being. that exploded come from? Are we forced to say,
By observation, we know that the Universe at this point, that the only possible explanation
consists of clusters of galaxies, each cluster con- is that it was created by some force, or entity,
taining anywhere from few dozen to a few

a that lies outside what we consider the laws of
thousand individual galaxies. Each galaxy is a nature and is, therefore, "supernatural"?
cluster containing anywhere from a few billion to Not necessarily. In 1973, the American physi-
a few trillion stars. cist, Edward P. Tryon, suggested that according
All the clusters seemed to be receding from to quantum theory (which is one of two basic,
each other, judging by the nature of the light and so far entirely successful, theories for ex-
they send us. If we look backward in time (like plaining the Universe), it is possible for the initial
running a motion picture film in reverse) the blob to have arisen out of nothing more than a
clusters of galaxies would be seen to be ap- "quantum fluctuation" in the vacuum.
proaching each other and coming closer and Again, the details do not concern us. Let us
closer together. At some time in the past they simply say that the Universe seems to have come
must have existed as an extremely tight ball of into being 15,000,000,000 years ago through the
matter that exploded and gave rise to the ex- operation of natural law.
15,000,000,000 TO 4,600,000,000
YEARS AGO
By 10 billion years after had come into exis-
it gravitational field (because of the increasing den-
tence, the Universe had become a mighty extent sity of matter in the nebula) intensified, and this,
of galaxies, almost as large as we see about us in turn,hastened the further contraction. The ki-
today. netic energy of the matter falling inward was
However, even after 10 billion years, our Sun converted to heat, so that the center of the cloud
and its family of planets did not yet exist. Other became hotter and hotter and more and more
planets circling other stars undoubtedly existed, compressed until the combination of heat and
and some planets may conceivably have borne pressure brought about a process of "nuclear fu-
life, evolved intelligence, and developed techno- sion," which converted hydrogen into helium.
logical civilizations. Some of these may still exist, Fusion produced enormous energies that
and others may develop in the future. Yet we turned the center of the contracting nebula into a
know nothing of them, at least so far, and we glowing mass of extremely hot material. The Sun
must concern ourselves with the only inhabited had been born.
world we know our own. — On the outskirts of the cloud, turbulent eddies
In the place of our Solar system —
our Sun plus and subeddies brought together particles that
all the worlds and bits of matter that circle round built up bodies much smaller than the Sun, with
it — there was once a vast cloud, or "'nebula" (the centers that could not grow hot enough and com-
Latin word dust and gas. This
for "cloud"), of pressed enough to ignite nuclear fusion. These
was first suggested by the German philosopher, bodies on the fringes remained cool on the sur-
Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), in 1755, and then, face, therefore, and became planets. Satellites,
independently, by the French astronomer, Pierre asteroids, comets, and all the other bodies of the
Simon de Laplace (1749-1827), in 1798. Solar system also formed.
The process by which the nebula drew to- And, of course, among the bodies that formed
gether to form the Sun and planets was described was the Earth, third planet from the Sun.
by Laplace, but his explanation was inadequate One obvious question that arises from this
toaccount for all the facts. In 1944, this "nebular quick description is: How
do astronomers know
hypothesis" was modified by the German astron- that the Solar system assumed its present form
omer, Carl Friedrich von VVeizsacker (b. 1912). 4.6 billion years ago, and not substantially before
Since then, and with further modifications, sci- or after.
entists are fairly assured that they have the Beginning in 1896, with a discovery by a
mechanism essentially right. French physicist, Antoine Henri Becquerel
The original nebula was slowly rotating about (1852-1908), it was found that certain substances
its axis (we are safe in saying this since all objects are radioactive and break down very slowly (in
we have been able to observe in the Universe some cases) and with great regularity, to other
appear to rotate). The nebula also had a gravita- substances. Thus, uranium breaks down to lead
tional field, as do all objects containing mass. at such a rate that half of any uranium being
Under the pull of the gravitational field, the neb- studied breaks down to lead in 4.5 billion years.
ula slowly contracted. As it contracted, the speed Other materials break down even more slowly,
of rotation increased in accordance with the "law and, of course, some break down more quickly.
of conservation of angular momentum," which By studying the content of uranium and lead
has never been observed to be violated. in rocks, one can estimate the length of time that
In addition, as the nebula contracted, the particular samples of rock have remained solid
4,600,000,000 TO 3,500,000,000 YEARS AGO 5
and essentially undisturbed from the extent to existed as a nebula for 10 billion years, why isn't
which uranium has broken down. It is hard to it still nebula today? What made it start to con-
a
find a rock on Earth that has been solid and un- tract suddenly?
touched for much over 3 billion years, for the That is hard to answer. The Orion nebula,
early history of the Earth must have been quite which still exists today, 15 billion years after the
wild and volcanic. However, the Moon, a smaller formation of the Universe, is only now beginning
and, therefore, more sedate body, has rocks that to contract and form stars. Other nebulas still
reveal an age of over 4 billion years. Meteorites remain nebulas.
which, presumably, have been left unchanged One possibility is that a supernova —a huge
since they settled out of the original nebula, yield star explosion — took place fairly close to our
a date of 4.6 billion years. Astronomers feel con- original nebula. The shock wave pressed the neb-
fident, then, that the Solar system formed that ula together on the side toward the supernova
long ago. and intensified the gravitational field there. That
Another question is: Why did the Solar system may have been enough to start the condensation
form so late? Or so early? After all, if the nebula going.
4,600,000,000 TO 3,500,000,000
YEARS AGO
For a over a billion years, the young Earth
little carded as insufficient. They might have been
may have circled the Sun without life on its sur- samples of life formed by Satan in a failed at-
face. tempt God, and so on.
to imitate
That is not surprising. After all, we know for As early as 1570, however, a French scholar,
certain that the Moonhas no vestige of indige- Bernard Palissy (1510-1589), was suggesting that
nous life even today, although it is just as old as relics in the soil {fossils, from a Latin word mean-
Earth is. Mars seems to be dead also, while ing "to dig") represented early forms of life that
Venus and Mercury can't possibly have life as we were now extinct. Thisbecame more likely as the
know it. The chances are small that any object in fact that the Earth was of great age became more
the Solar System, other than Earth, bears life. apparent.
We know, of course, that Earth possesses life By 1859, the British biologist, Charles Robert
now, but how we
be sure that Earth pos-
can Darwin (1809-1882), had worked out a complex
sessed life 3.5 billion years ago? description of the mechanism by which life
To begin with, people have been finding relics slowly changed its form in a "biological evolu-
in the soil ever since ancient times, relics that tion" under the driving force of natural selection.
seemed to be the remains of living things not Eventually, when rocks could be dated accu-
quite like the living things we are accustomed to rately, it could be seen that some fossils were
today. When most
people took it for granted that hundreds of millions of years old.
the Earth was only a few thousand years old or Even the oldest fossils, however, were com-
so, some bizarre explanations were offered. plex organisms, and they must have been pre-
The remains might be of animals that died in ceded by simpler organisms. The fossils, after all,
the Flood described in the Bible. They might rep- consist chiefly of the hard parts of organisms:
resent samples of life formed by God and dis- shells, bones, and teeth. The simpler organisms.
however, may not have possessed hard parts and the microscope. In them, he found circular struc-
might not, therefore, have left behind easily rec- tures thatwere about the size of prokaryote cells.
ognized fossils. What's more, there were signs of smaller struc-
The simplest free-living organisms today are tures within these objects that resembled the
microscopic one-celled life-forms called "bacte- kind of structures that existed inside bacteria.
ria." The oldest rocks in which these prokaryote
Bacteria are "prokaryotes," from Greek words traces have been found may be as much as 3.5
meaning "before the nucleus." They are called billion years old and that is what tells us that life
thisbecause in ordinary, much larger cells (such —
must have existed that long ago at least. It may
as those making up our own bodies), there are even have existed at somewhat earlier periods.
small nuclei containing the machinery that The question arises, of course, as to how these
makes it possible for cells to multiply. In bacteria, prokaryotes were formed? When the Earth first
the reproductive machinery is scattered through- came into existence, it must have had, or devel-
out the tiny cell no nucleus. Alter-
and there is oped, an atmosphere and an ocean. These must
natively, the bacterium may be viewed as all have contained very simple molecules: nitrogen,
nucleus. carbon dioxide, methane, ammonia, water, and
Some prokaryotes contain "chlorophyll," a so on. In order for these very simple molecules
complex compound that makes it possible to gain to form the much more complex molecules that
energy from sunlight and, by this energy, to characterize even the simplest forms of life, en-
break down water to hydrogen and oxygen. The ergy must have had to be added.
hydrogen combines with carbon dioxide to form That, in itself, is no problem. The early Earth
cell components, and the oxygen is released into —
must have been rich in energy the internal heat
the air. These chlorophyll-containing prokary- of the Earth manifesting itself as volcanoes and
otes are bluish in color and are called "cyanobac- hot springs, lightning in the atmosphere, ultra-
teria" (where cyano is from the Greek word for violet light from the Sun, and so on.
"blue"). Just exactly what the steps were, however,
Beginning in 1954, the American paleontolo- whereby simple molecules plus energy became
gist, Elso Sterrenberg Barghoorn (1915-1984), the complex molecules of life, have, it must be
managed to locate traces of what looked like pro- confessed, not yet been worked out. But in any
karyote remains in very old rocks. He shaved case, whatever the mechanism, life existed on
thin slices of such rocks and studied them under Earth 3.5 billion years ago.
3,500,000,000 TO 1,400,000,000
YEARS AGO
For about 2 billion years after formed on
life molecules that were built up from the small mol-
Earth, it remained prokaryote in nature. Never- ecules of the air and ocean.
theless, the environment changed. That would mean that bacteria could not grow
If only ordinary bacteria had existed (and, per- beyond the mass that could be supported by the
haps, to begin with, they were the only life-form rate of formation of these organic molecules. Life
of consequence), they would have had to obtain concentration may have been thin, indeed.
their energy from simpler, nonliving organic Once cyanobacteria appeared, however, mak-
3,500,000,000 TO 1,400,000,000 YEARS AGO 7
ing use of chlorophyll systems that had slowly The prokaryotes not only became much more
developed in some fashion, the energy of visible numerous, then, but they also had much more
light became available. Visible light is more copi- energy at their disposal — at least, those that spe-
ous than ultraviolet light; it is also less energetic cialized inoxygen-handling did.
and, therefore, easier to handle. Organic mole- With much more energy available, cells could
cules, formed by the use of chlorophyll, were afford to become larger, and still be able to sup-
stored within the cells, which thus gained their port themselves.
own food supply so that they could multiply to a This increase in size mightcome about in two
much greater extent than if they had to depend ways: the cells might simply become larger with-
upon the independent and random effects of ul- out becoming notably more complex; or pro-
traviolet light on the world outside their cells. karyote cells might combine so that a given cell
The cyanobacteria multiplied vastly, for that might contain some components that were spe-
reason, and ordinary bacteria, unable to form cialized in one way, and other components that
their own food from visible light, made do by were specialized in another way.
ingesting the cyanobacteria and making use of This second development may have taken
the food those other organisms had manufac- place, a view strongly supported in recent years
tured. Bacteria also multiplied for that reason. by the American biologist, Lynn Margulis (b.
In otherwords, life might still consist only of 1938), and it resulted in the production of large,
prokaryotes, but after 2 billion years of existence, complex cells containing nuclei, which specialize
prokaryote life on Earth was much denser and in reproductive machinery; mitochrondria,
much more numerous than it had been in the which specialize in oxygen-handling; ribo-
earlier stages. somes, which specialize in protein manufacture;
What's more, because of the activity of cyano- cilia, which specialize in movement; chloro-
bacteria in combining carbon dioxide with hydro- plasts, which specialize in chlorophyll-content;
gen from water, and expelling the excess oxygen, and so on.
the atmosphere was changing. The carbon diox- These more complex cells are called eukxiryotes
ide content was going down and the oxygen con- (from Greek words meaning "good nuclei," be-
tent was going up. cause separate nuclei are partitioned off inside
At the start, both bacteria and cyanobacteria the cell). The eukaryotes turned out to be more
got their energy for day-to-day living by splitting successful than prokaryotes or (which may not
the food molecules (formed by the cyanobacteria be the same thing) they at least turned out to be
through the use of the energy of the Sun) into capable of further development. Thus, although
smaller molecules. The energy thus obtained was prokaryotes still exist today, all cells, except for
comparatively small. Once oxygen existed in the bacteria of various sorts, are eukaryotes, includ-
atmosphere in substantial amounts, however, ing the cells of our own body.
chemical mechanisms were developed to com- The eukaryotes have been lo-
earliest signs of
bine the food molecules with oxygen. This re- cated in rocks that are about 1.4 billion years old,
leased up to 20 times as much energy as mere so that eukaryotes have only existed during the
splitting released. last 30% of Earth's existence.
1,400,000,000 TO 800,000,000
YEARS AGO
For the 600 million years of their existence,
first karyotic cell, eukaryotes, after cell division,
eukaryotes remained as single cells, so that life began to cling together and form "multicellular
on Earth was unicellular, even 4 billion years organisms."
after the planet had been formed. Some five Again, we don't know the details, but in 1930,
had passed, and there
sixths of Earth's existence a German paleontologist, Georg J. E. Gurich,
was nothing more complex on the planet than and, in 1947, an Australian paleontologist, R. C.
something the equivalent of an amoeba. Sprigg, found traces of multicellular life in rocks
However, just as different types of prokary- that were as old as 800 million years.
otes had combined to form a more complex eu-
800/000,000 TO 600,000,000
YEARS AGO
For the first 200 million years of their existence, By that time, though, evolution had produced
multicellular animals were more or less like mod- a considerable complexity of multicellular life. Bi-
ern jellyfish and worms, consisting of soft tissue organisms into
ologists could divide multicellular
only. This left little in the way of traces. two "kingdoms," plants and animals. Each of
As the oxygen content of the atmosphere con- these kingdoms could be divided into many
tinued to climb, and as energy continued to be- broad divisions called "phyla" (singular ''phy-
come more available, it became possible for lum," from a Greek word for "tribe"). Each phy-
organisms to "invest" in hard parts that served lum possesses a distinctively different body plan.
as weapons, offensive and defensive. There are about a score or so of different ani-
About 600 million years ago, animals with mal phyla, and already, in the first tens of mil-
shells and other hard parts proliferated and lions of years after the fossil record had become
began to leave behind fossils that were large copious, examples could be found of every phy-
enough to be seen without a microscope and lum but one. The one phylum that had not yet
clear enough to show shapes that would allow —
appeared and that, therefore, was the last to
deductions to be drawn about their functioning. —
appear happened to be the one to which we
From that point on, the course of evolution could belong.
be made out quite well.
550,000,000 70 450,000,000 YEARS AGO 9
600,000,000 TO 550,000,000
YEARS AGO
The phylum to which we belong is "Chordata,” there are early embryonic stages in which gill
and we are "chordates.” slits begin to develop, but then wither away.
The body plan of the chordates, which makes Thirdly, all chordates have, at some time dur-
them distinct from all other phyla, includes three ing their embryonic development, an internal
unique characteristics. stiffening rod of a tough, light, flexible, gelati-
In the first place, chordates have a central nous substance that runs down the back. This is
nerve cord that ishollow, and that runs along a notochord (Greek for "back-string”), which gives
the back. In all other phyla, the nerve cord, if it the phylum its name.
exists, is solid, and runs along the abdomen. These represent the minimum requirements
Secondly, all chordates have throats that are for even very primitive chordates, the first of
perforated by through which water can
gill slits which, from which all others (including our-
be passed. From that water, food can be filtered selves) have evolved, seems to have made its ap-
out, and oxygen can be absorbed. These are not pearance about 550 million years ago. Chordates
present in other phyla. Even in land chordates, have existed on Earth, therefore, only during the
such as ourselves, which do not possess gills. last eighth of its existence.
550,000,000 TO 450,000,000
YEARS AGO
Even after Earth had endured for nine tenths of ture, and (except for those smaller organisms
its present length of existence, all life upon it that can fly) is essentially two-dimensional.
existed in water. The earth's land surface re- The water environment is very stable. On
mained sterile for about 100 million years after land, there are variations that subject organisms
the last of the phyla, the chordates, had ap- to a temperature range far greater than exists in
peared. the sea. There are also wind and storms on drv
This not so surprising, for the dry land is a
is land that offer more violence than almost any-
much harsher environment than the sea. Water thing that happens in the ocean.
is essential to and, on land, the problem of
life, Finally, life in water is protected from the
getting and retaining water is a serious one. Life more energetic radiation of the Sun, while life on
is adapted to obtaining oxygen from solution in land is exposed to it, particularly to the Sun's
water. On land, mechanisms have to be devised ultraviolet rays. It may be that it was not until
to dissolve atmospheric oxygen in water, without enough oxygen had accumulated in the air to
losing too much water in the process. produce an ozone layer in the upper atmosphere
Then, too, in water, gravity is a minor force, (ozone is an energetic form of oxygen), which
since water buoyancy does much of the work. blocked most of the ultraviolet rays, that life be-
On land, gravity is a major force and motion is came possible on land.
more difficult, requires greater energy expendi- The result is that, even today, the world's
waters are substantially richer in life than is the not capable consider the long-range future.
of)
world's land. Short-range adventure is all that concerns them.

The question arises: With all the disadvan- Then, too, the tides tend to move life-forms
tages of land life, why
should any life ever have toward the shore, and any organism that could
left the ocean and the waters generally? Why has resist drying out during low tide had an advan-
the land not remained sterile to this day? tage. With time, adaptations would make it pos-
The answer is probably the result of popula- sible to live out of water more or less
tion pressure. Life is so rich in the ocean that the permanently.
eat-or-be-eaten competition is extraordinarily Plant life may have begun to cling to the land
high. If some forms of life could manage to make about 450 million years ago. The development of
it on land, they would find an empty environ- roots anchored them to the grgund; the develop-
mental niche in which they could multiply se- ment of stems lifted them higher toward the Sun,
curely. Of course, that would be only a short- which was the source of energy. Water could be
term gain, for eventually the land population absorbed from the ground and they would flour-
would increase to the point where competition ish in an environment which, harsh though it
would become high there as well. However, ex- might be, would at least have the advantage of
cept for human beings, life-forms do not (and are lacking predators.
450,000,000 TO 370,000,000
YEARS AGO
For 80 million years, perhaps, plant life on land cartilage in the case of the sharks and their rela-
flourished without serious problems with animal tives, or bone in the case of the fish proper. Bone,
life. Plants would compete with each other, of a form of calcium hydroxyphosphate, is unique
course, each growing higher to gain a lion's share to chordates and doesn't occur in other phyla.
of sunlight. Each spread roots to get as much Fish developed two pairs of limbs that helped
water as it could, leaving as little as possible for in propulsion. They also developed gas chambers
others. or "swim bladders," which lowered their densi-
The golden age could not last forever, just the ties and helped them be buoyant.
same. Where plants existed, animals would In most fish, the two pairs of limbs were small
eventually follow. By 370 million years ago, there and made up largely of thin, flexible plates called
was enough plant on land surfaces to make it
life "fins." Some types of fish, however, had strong,
profitable for animals to seek them out as a new if stubby, limbs, with the fins only present as
and as yet untouched food supply. fringes. Such fish could support themselves on
The first animal life to reach the land were their limbs if caught out of water and could, for
various members of the phylum "Arthropoda" instance, flop from one pool to another across
(Greek for "joint-footed"), such as spiders, scor- land, if they had was particularly useful
to. This
pions, and primitive insects. Then larger animals if a pool was drying up and becoming brackish
followed, some to feed on plants, some on the and a second, deeper and larger pool, which of-
arthropods. fered a better chance at life, was nearby.
By 370 million years ago, the chordates had Gradually, fish evolved into organisms that
developed as fish, which now dominated the lived in water in the early part of their life but
seas. They had internal skeletons, made up of became acclimated to land life as adults. Their
370,000,000 TO 300,000,000 YEARS AGO 11
fins became legs; their swim bladders became one way or another, and rarely have irregular
lungs. They became "amphibians" (from Greek shapes. In air, however, the medium is tenuous
words meaning "double life"), which first ap- and an irregular shape does not interfere with
peared about 370 million years ago and whose fastmovement.
modern descendants are frogs, toads, and sala- That is why, for instance, human
beings have
manders. hands with which to manipulate the Universe
Fish and amphibia belong to abranch of the about them, while dolphins (whose ancestors
chordates thatmake up almost all of the phylum. were land animals that returned to the sea) have
They belong to the subphylum "Vertebrata" and not. Dolphins have brains at least as large and as
They are so-called
are, therefore, "vertebrates." well-developed as our own, and must be highly
because they have backbones composed of a se- but their flippers simply cannot per-
intelligent,
ries of bones called "vertebrae" (from a Latin form the manipulative tasks so easy for our
word meaning "to turn," because the human hands.
head turns on the topmost vertebrae.) Furthermore, the foundation of all technology
It is from the amphibia that all modern land is fire, and while fire can exist in an atmosphere
vertebrates (plus some that were originally land rich in oxygen, it cannot exist in water. Hence,
vertebrates but had returned to the sea) have de- no technological civilization is conceivable, at
—
scended including us. least in our terms, except on land. That is why
This emergence on land was of the highest dolphins, although they and their ancestors have
importance. Water is so viscous a medium that it been brainy for longer than we and our ances-
tends to enforce streamlining on any organism tors, have never developed a technological civili-
that wishes to move quickly within it. Fast-mov- zation.
ing sea organisms are smoothly "fish-shaped" in
370,000,000 TO 300,000,000
YEARS AGO
The conquest of land by the amphibia was only wastes into special membranes. Such eggs could
partial. Amphibia had to lay their eggs in water, be laid on land under dry conditions, and the
and spend their early life there. This continued organism that emerged could live on land from
for about 70 million years after amphibia first the start.
made theirappearance. The organisms with such a land-based egg
About 300 million years ago, however, certain could finally be considered as totally adapted to
amphibia developed an egg that was surrounded land, requiring only enough water to replace
by a protective shell of thin limestone. The shell what they unavoidably lost in getting rid of
was permeable to air, but not to water. Air could wastes. These first true land-vertebrates be-
reach the developing embryo inside, but water longed to the class "Reptilia." They are "rep-
could not leave it. tiles" (from the Latin word "to creep," since the
A small reservoir of water was present inside most successful reptiles in existence today are the
the egg, together with an elaborate system of snakes).
mechanisms that allowed the embryo to tuck
300,000,000 TO 220,000,000
YEARS AGO
During the first 80 million years of reptilian exis- word is from the Greek because
for "breasts,"
tence, some developed certain characteristics mammals feed their young on milk developed in
that resembled organisms like ourselves. They the mother's breasts.
were not particularly successful in the evolution- The dominant land-animals in the world today
ary scramble, but by about 220 million years ago, are mammals, including ourselves, of course.
they had evolved into animals that had differen- However, at the time that mammals first made
tiated teeth, as we do; that had hair; that were their appearance, they were small shrew-like
warm-blooded; that laid eggs containing partially organisms, which were not nearly as successful
developed embryos (and eventually went on to as the reptiles, and which developed into a wide
develop mechanisms for giving birth to the em- variety of nonmammalian species, some of them
bryos themselves); and that produced milk to extraordinarily large and powerful.
feed their young. The only reason the mammals survived at all
Such hairy, warm-blooded organisms with ad- in the face of the great reptiles (the best-known
vanced child-bearing mechanisms, belong to the of which are the "dinosaurs") is that they were
class “Mammalia" and are "mammals." The small enough to hide and remain inconspicuous.
220,000,000 TO 100,000,000
YEARS AGO
Forsome 120 million years after mammals first the mother's bloodstream into the embryo's
came into existence, they either laid eggs, or gave bloodstream across the placenta, while wastes
birth to live, but immature, embryos. Their de- diffused in the opposite direction. (There was no
scendants today include the duck-bill platypus direct connection between the blood of mother
and various marsupials, such as kangaroos and and embryo.) The embryo could develop within
opossums, which are found chiefly in Australia the body until it was in a comparatively ad-
and, in a few cases, in the Americas. vanced state.
About 100 million years ago, however, some Such organisms are "placental mammals."
mammals improved the child-bearing system The dominant land organisms of today, includ-
and made it more complex. The embryo re- ing ourselves, are placental mammals. However,
mained within the mother's body, nourished by these, when they first appeared, were also small
a placenta (from Greek words meaning "flat cake" and of little account compared to the ruling di-
because of its shape). Food could diffuse from nosaurs.
70,000,000 TO 65,000,000 YEARS AGO 13
100,000,000 TO 70,000,000
YEARS AGO
Some 30 million years after the placental mam- delicately manipulative hands, and, most impor-
mals first made their appearance, a new subdivi- tant of all, larger brains for their body size.
sion or "order" evolved. These were the However, the first primates that made their
"primates" (from the Latin word for "first," since appearance continued to be small organisms
the order includes human beings). whose survival depended on their ability to hide
The primates included a group of organisms and to go unnoticed.
that had better vision than other orders, more
70,000,000 TO 65,000,000
YEARS AGO
Some five million years after the primates first cially small animals, survived.
made theirappearance, a biological revolution Some mammals survived the catastrophe and
took place. The dinosaurs all died out in a com- found themselves in a world that was suddenly
paratively short period, about 65 million years empty of important competitors.
ago, as did other giant reptiles and many other Had the catastrophe not taken place, it seems
types of organisms. likely that the mammals would have continued
Evidence has been accumulating since 1980 to be a group of small creatures of little impor-
that there was a collision of a comet with the tance. As it was, however, thanks to the catastro-
Earth. The collision, according to this theory, did phe, mammals could expand into the niches left
not do much to harm the Earth itself, but it set empty. They developed species that bulked huge
off tidal waves and conflagrations and, in addi- (though never quite as huge as the largest dino-
tion, threw so much dust into the upper atmo- saurs) and could continue the development of
sphere as to block the rays of the Sun for a primates in the direction of eyes, hands, and
considerable period. Most forms of life, espe- brains.
65,000,000 TO 40,000,000
YEARS AGO
The primates remained small creatures of little manipulating objects with greater ease. Their fin-
account for some 25 million years after the catas- gers and toes had nails rather than claws, so that
trophe. Those that existed resembled the lemurs the softer, more sensitive parts of the digits could
that are now found Madagascar, for instance.
in be exposed for the task of handling and manipu-
About 40 million years ago, however, a subor- lating.
der of primates developed, which are called the What's more, looked like those of
their faces
“Anthropoidea" (from Greek words meaning little human beings, hence the name of the
"man-like"). suborder. Their descendants today are "mon-
The anthropoidians could sit up easily so that keys," a word which may possibly come from
they could use their forepaws for handling and homunculus, which is Latin for "little man."
40,000,000 TO 30,000,000
YEARS AGO
About 10 million years after the monkeys ap- rock of Gibraltar and is called "Barbary ape." The
peared, one group developed into a super-family Barbary ape is not a member of Hominoidea, but
named "Hominoidea," from a Latin word for because of their taillessness, Hominoidea were
"manlike." These looked even more like human also called "apes." To indicate that the Homi-
beings than monkeys did, for they lacked tails. noidea more closely resemble human beings than
A tailless monkey that exists today is to be the Barbary ape does, the former are called "an-
found in north Africa ("Barbary") and on the thropoid apes."
30,000,000 TO 17,000,000
YEARS AGO
The first anthropoid apes were rather small, like are termed the "great apes." Indeed, the largest
modern gibbons and stayed so for some 13 mil- primate that ever existed was one called "Gigan-
lion years. About 17 million years ago, however, topithecus" (Greek for "giant ape"), which was
the subfamily "Ponginae" evolved. (The word is about nine feet tall and may have tipped the scale
from a Congolese term for apes.) at a thousand pounds. The largest living great
This new subfamily produced species that ape is the gorilla, which is over five feet tall and
were larger than other primates; therefore, they may weigh 500 pounds.
5,000,000 TO 4,000,000 YEARS AGO 15
The great apes were the most intelligent pri- organisms, which cannot develop a technology.
mates to have appeared up to that time, as is Elephants have larger brains, too, but they also
indicated by the size of their brains. The gorilla have much larger bodies. It is the ratio of the
has a brain that weighs up to 19 ounces, the brain's mass to the body's mass that seems to
chimpanzee one of 13.5 ounces, and the orang- count, so that the elephant is apparently not as
utan one of 12 ounces. Dolphins, porpoises, and intelligent as the great apes.
whales have larger brains, but they are sea
17,000,000 TO 5,000,000
YEARS AGO
The great apes may be called "pongids." Any more than that of a chimpanzee. Indeed, the first
pongid, however, that resembles modern human hominids probably split off the chimpanzee line.
beings more than it resembles any ape, living or The first hominids were more slightly built
extinct, may
be called a hominid (from the Latin than chimpanzees, however, so that their ratio of
word for "man"). brain mass to body mass may have been twice as
The first hominid seems
have developed in
to great as that of a modern chimpanzee and four
eastern or southern Africa about 5 million years times that of a modern gorilla. These first hom-
ago, so that hominids have existed on Earth only inids were, therefore, probably more intelligent
in the last one thousandth of the planet's exis- than any of the pongids.
tence. What most clearly made thehominids re-
first
The hominids were comparatively small,
first semble human beings more than they resembled
perhaps four feet tall. They were no taller than any ape was that the first hominids could walk
the chimpanzees of today, and their brains may upright as easily and efficiently as we do.
have been only 15 ounces in weight, not much
5,000,000 TO 4,000,000
YEARS AGO
Itused to be taken for granted that human beings Of the separating characteristics, however,
all
were utterly different from all other animals. bipedality —

the ability to walk on two legs
Human beings used reason, had big brains, seems the most important. We are not the only
could talk, didn't have tails, had very little hair, bipedal animals, but most other bipedal animals
and so on. As human knowledge of the animal are horizontal, with tails sticking out behind the
kingdom increased, many of the differences legs and heads in front. We, on the other hand,
seemed less important. The anthropoid apes had are vertical.
no tails; elephants and dolphins had large brains Bears and chimpanzees can walk on their hind
and no hair, and so on. legs in a vertical position as we do, but they are
clearly uncomfortable in doing so, and prefer the "Australopithecus" from a Latin-Greek word
four-legged posture. combination, meaning "southern ape." It's a
What makes it possible for human beings to poor name because Australopithecus is a hom-
walk comfortably and permanently on two legs is inid and not a pongid, but you couldn't know
that the spinal column, just above the pelvis, that 60 years ago from a skull alone. It was only
bends backward. It assumes a shallow S-shape in after fragments of thigh bones and pelvises were
us, and this allows us to remain generally vertical uncovered that the ability of Australopithecus to
without trouble. This S-shaped spinal column walk upright was understood.
adds a little spring and bounce to the human Since 1924, other remains have been found of
walk, too. such hominids, and it is now believed that they
There is clearly some advantage to getting on existed as at least four different species, lumped
your hind legs. It lifts your head and major sense together as "australopithecines."
organs higher so that you can spot food, or dan- The best remains of the earliest of these spe-
ger, at a greater distance. It also frees your fore- cies was found in 1974, when a large fraction of
limbs from the task of supporting the body; and the skeleton of an australopithecine was located
they can be used, instead, for holding food, or a in east-central Africa by an American anthropol-
weapon, or a baby. ogist, Donald Johanson. It seemed to be the skel-
We know about these hominids through
early eton of a woman, so it was nicknamed "Lucy."
the fossilized remains of their bones and teeth. It was at least 3 million, and possibly 4 million
Thus, a skull that was human-looking except for years old.

its extraordinarily small size was found in a Lucy isan example of Australopithecus afaren-
South African quarry in 1924. It was brought to sis, so-called because Afars is the name of the
an anthropologist, Raymond Arthur Dart (1893- region where the remains were found. Appar-
1988), whorecognized it as belonging to a primi- ently, then, east-central Africa may have been
tive hominid and, in 1925, suggested it be called the cradle of the hominids.
4,000,000 TO 2,000,000
YEARS AGO
For about 3 million years (60% of the full length Undoubtedly, australopithecines could do
of hominid existence), the only hominids that ex- anything that chimpanzees could do. We can be
isted were the various species of australopithe- reasonably certain they used tree branches and
cines,who, as far as we know, were confined to long bones as clubs. They could surely throw
eastern and southern Africa. rocks or use them as anvils, with another rock as
Very likely, they lived much as chimpanzees hammer. And, if they happened upon a pebble
do today. They may have used tools, but not in that was pointed or sharp-edged, they could use
any way markedly beyond what other animals that, too.
could do. For example, sea otters routinely About 2 million years ago, however, one of
smash shellfish against a rock they keep for the the hominid varieties became rather closer to the
purpose on their abdomens as they float belly- modern human than to any of the other austra-
up. Chimpanzees have been observed to strip lopithecines. It was sufficiently similar to us to be
leaves from twigs and then use the bare twigs as placed into our genus. ("Genus," plural "gen-
devices with which to capture termites. era," from a Latin word for "race," is a group of
2,000,000 TO 1,600,000 YEARS AGO 17
related species.) Our genus is Homo (Latin for ing the face look less ape-like.
“man"), and this hominid is the oldest member What's more, members of this species may
we know of genus Homo. have possessed the beginning of "Broca's convo-
In the 1960s, the English anthropologist, Louis lution" in their brains, so that they might have
S. Leakey (1903-1972), his wife, Mary, and
B. been capable of making a larger variety of sounds
their son, Richard, located remains of this oldest than the australopithecines could.
member of genus Homo in the Olduvai Gorge, in But why habilis? Why "able?"
east Africa, in what is now the nation of Tanza- The reason that H. habilis was the
is first spe-
nia. cies, as far as we know,
with a brain sufficiently
The hominid thus uncovered was named agile to conceive of shaping stone. H. habilis was
Homo habilis (Latin for "able man"). H. habilis was not content with merely finding a rock that hap-
smaller than some of the larger species of aus- pened to suit his needs. He chipped away at one
tralopithecines. In fact, in the summer of 1986, a rock with another to make tools of various kinds
set of fossil remains of H. was discovered
habilis for chopping, scraping, cutting, and so on. This
that was some 1.8 million years old. It was the was the birth of technology.
firsttime that both skull fragments and limb H. habilis was hominid to use its
the first
bones of the same individual of that species had hands to their full potential. Perhaps the neces-
been located, and they seemed to represent a sity of dealing with his hands in a deft way made
small, light adult, about 3.5 feet tall, and with it useful to have a still larger brain and led to its
arms that were surprisingly long. evolution.

Nevertheless, H. habilis, though small, had a H. with rock tools and a larger brain,
habilis,
more rounded head than any of the australo- was more formidable than the australopithe-
pithecines and a larger brain, one that was nearly cines. Indeed, H. habilis may have been the first
half as large as that of a modern human being. hominid to have become a hunter rather than a
The skull bones were thinner, the hands were scavenger. H. habilis, like the australopithecines,
more like modern hands, and the feet were com- seems to have been confined to eastern and
pletely modern. The jaw was less massive, mak- southern Africa.
2,000,000 TO 1,600,000
YEARS AGO
After 400,000 years, H. habilis evolved to the made much better stone tools than
that H. erectus
pointwhere he could be given a new species had been made before, and that he was an enor-
name. About 1,600,000 years ago. Homo erectus mously successful hunter. A tribal hunting party
existed. of these hominids could take on the biggest ani-
was the first hominid to be as large
H. erectus mals they could find —
even the mammoth.
and as heavy as modern human beings. He could H. erectus was the first hominid to expand its
attain a height of as much as 6 feet, and could range beyond Africa. It made its way into Asia,
weigh over 150 pounds. undoubtedly in the course of pursuing the game
The brain was larger, too, with a weight of 30 herds. It eventually reached all the way to the
to 40 ounces; up to three quarters the size of the Pacific and to some of the islands off southeast-
modern human brain. It is not surprising, then. ern Asia.
In fact, the first discoveries of the remains of named his find Sinanthropus pekinensis (Greek for
H. erectus were made in Java, where the Dutch "China-man from Peking").
anthropologist, Eugene Dubois (1858-1940), dis- Eventually, it was recognized that both sets of
covered a skullcap, a femur, and two teeth in remains, along with some others, were all of the
1894. No hominid with so small a brain had as same species and deserved
belong to genus
to
yet been discovered, and Dubois named it Pithe- Homo. Dubois's term, "erectus," was kept even
canthropus erectus (Greek for “erect ape-man.") though hominids had been walking erect for 3.5
A similar find was made near Peking (now million years by the time H. erectus had evolved.
called Beijing), beginning in 1927, by a Canadian This, after all, had not been known in Dubois's
anthropologist, Davidson Black (1884-1934). He time.
1,600,000 TO 1,000,000
YEARS AGO
By 1 million years ago, the australopithecines, strong competition among them.
which had lived on Earth for 4 million years, In that competition, the members of genus
were extinct. All were gone. Homo, with their better stone tools and their
It seems safe to guess that since the australo- higher intelligence (meaning they could work
pithecines shared their territory with H. ha-
first better in cooperation), had an enormous advan-
bilis and then H. erectus, and since they all tage. seems very likely, then, that the austral-
It
probably ate the same food, there would be opithecines were killed off by genus Homo.
1,000,000 TO 500,000
YEARS AGO
About 600,000 years ago, the Earth entered the chill in the air made it more important to do
first of a series of "ice ages," which it had expe- something to ameliorate the cold of the night par-
rienced in the most recent period of its existence. ticularly. hominids might well
In earlier times,
When the glaciers were at their peak, so much have fallen asleep wherever they happened to
water was withdrawn from the sea that the sea- be, though they might have climbed into the
level dropped as much as 300 feet, exposing the branches of a tree for greater security, as the pon-
continental shelves under the shallower sections gids do.
along the coastlines. It was the formation of such Now, however, they began to make shelters
land-bridges that made it easy for H. erectus to by building up stones to break the wind, or by
wander from Africa into Asia, and then from suspending hides from a central pole. Or else, if
Asia into the Indonesian islands. they found a suitable cave, they may have found
The cold weather enforced new habits. The shelter within it, where rain or snow would not
500,000 TO 300,000 YEARS AGO 19
follow, and where the force of the wind was at fire showed signs of dying down.
least weakened. Fire, after all, gave when it was other-
light
The first traces of H. erectus in Asia were found wise dark, and warmth when it was otherwise
in a filled-upcave near Beijing. That cave showed cold. This made it possible to extend activity into
still another way in which H. erectus learned to nighttime and winter, and for hominids to ex-
fight cold. The cave near Beijing had traces of tend their range outside the tropics, for the first
camp fires. This means that fire had been ''dis- time.
covered" by 500,000 years ago. (Recently, indi- Fire was also useful as protection against other
cations have been reported that make it seem animals, even the fiercest. A fire in a cave, or
possible that fire was in use a million years earlier within a circle of stones would keep the preda-
still.) tors away. If they weren't sufficiently intelligent
The use of fire marks off genus Homo from all to stay away in the first place, a close brush with
other organisms. Every human society in exis- a fire would teach them better at once, if they
tence now, however primitive it might be, under- were at all teachable.
stands and makes use of fire. No living creature Then, too, fire made it possible to cook food.
other than human beings or their immediate This more important than it might appear.
is
ancestors ever uses fire in even the most primi- Meat was made more tender, and tastier, if
tive fashion. roasted. What's more, roasting killed parasites
Fire was not really "discovered," of course, and bacteria so that the meat was safer to eat.
since its was obvious ever since Earth's
existence Fire also made some plant foods, otherwise too
atmosphere gained enough oxygen to sustain a hard to eat, soft and edible.
fire, and Earth's land surface developed a forest- At first, of course, fire could be obtained only
cover that could burn. This means that fire has after had been started by natural means. Once
it
existed for 400 million years. one had a fire, it had to be kept burning contin-
Forest fires, if caused by nothing else, could uously, and if it ever died out, then the search
be caused by lightning bolts. From such fires, for another fire had to be instituted at once. If
then as now, any animal capable of fleeing would there were not a nearby tribe from which fire
flee. could be obtained (assuming they were friendly
By the "discovery" of fire, then, we really —
enough to grant it and they probably would be,
mean its taming. At some time, H. erectus learned for it might be their turn next), then it would be
how to retrieve some burning object from the necessary to wait for a natural fire again, and
edge of a naturally caused fire, and how to keep hope that conditions could be such that some
it alive by feeding it fuel whenever the stolen could be taken home safely.
500,000 TO 300,000
YEARS AGO
By 300,000 years ago, hominids had developed Germany. The hominids that left their fossilized
who not only matched modern human beings in bones there were called "Neanderthal men."
total weight but in brain-weight as well. Their skulls were distinctly less human than
The first trace of such hominids was located in our own. They had pronounced eyebrow ridges,
1856 in the Neander Valley ("Neanderthal") in large teeth, protruding jaws, a retreating fore-
head, and a smoothly receding chin — all rather sis,but they resembled us so closely, except for a
resembling H. Neanderthals were shorter
erectus. few details of the skull, that they came to be con-
and stockier than we, and more muscular. Their sidered members of our species. Homo sapiens
brains were as large as ours, or even a little (Latin for “wise man"). Nevertheless, they are
larger, but were differently proportioned, heav- thought of as a subspecies and are termed Homo
ier in back and lighter in front. sapiens neanderthalensis. It will be simpler to call
They were at first termed Homo neanderthalen- them "Neanderthals."
300,000 TO 200,000
YEARS AGO
By now H. erectus was extinct, perhaps killed, in generally, simply dead lying where they
left their
its turn, by the brainier and stronger Neander- had fallen, so that they were scavenged by car-
thals. This meant that the Neanderthals were rion-eaters and what was left over rotted.
now the only hominids on Earth. They made The fact that Neanderthals buried their dead,
their way into Europe, so that they were the first thus preserving them from scavengers, if not
"Europeans." from decay bacteria, tends to show that they val-
The Neanderthals lived during glacial times ued life somehow, and felt affection and care for
and hunted the mammoth, the woolly rhinoc- individuals even though they were dead. Some-
eros, and the giant cave bear. Their stone tools times, the dead were old and crippled and could
were greater in variety, and more delicate and only have lived on with the loving help of others
precise than had ever been seen before. They def- of the tribe.
initely knew how to start fires where no fire had What's more, food and flowers were often
existed before. buried with the corpse, which may mean that
The Neanderthals were the first hominids to Neanderthals felt that, in some way, life contin-
bury their dead. Earlier hominids, like animals ued on after death.
200,000 TO 50,000
YEARS AGO
Toward the end of this period, "modern man," smaller than that of the Neanderthals, but
little
whose formal species name is Homo sapiens sapi- were larger in the forepart. This, we are free to
ens, appeared on the scene. Exactly where he think (but don't really know), gave modern man
originated, we don't know. Modern men were an intellectual advantage and made him better
taller, more slender, and less muscular than the able to indulge in abstract thought and elaborate
Neanderthals. The brains of modern men were a speech.
25,000 TO 20,000 YEARS AGO 21
50,000
TO 30,000
YEARS AGO
For 20,000 years, perhaps the two varieties of inids, but of human
beings or of people, for it
Homo sapiens coexisted. They may even, on occa- will be understood that all people on Earth
sion, have interbred. By about 30,000 years ago, today, and for the last 30,000 years, are members
however, the Neanderthals were gone. Once of a single species. Homo sapiens sapiens, and can
again, the less advanced was, presumably, freely interbreed whatever the superficial differ-
wiped out by the more advanced. ences in appearance and behavior might be.
From this time on, we will not speak of hom-
30,000
TO 25,000
YEARS AGO
Until this time, hominids had been confined to time, all the land was penetrated as far as Tierra
what is called the "World Island" —
Africa, Asia, del Fuego at the southern tip of South America;
and Europe, together with some offshore is- and Tasmania, the island off the southeastern
lands. coast of Australia.
Sometime before 25,000 years ago, human was the only continental mass to
Antarctica
beings took advantage of a low sea-level at the remain out of bounds of human penetration until
height of one of the periodic glaciations to cross contemporary times.
25,000
over into North America and into Australia. In
TO 20,000
YEARS AGO
Human beings, as hunters, developed rituals to in northern Spain, when daugh-
his 12-year-old
improve their success. One way, apparently, was ter, who was with him, spied paintings on the
to draw pictures of animals being successfully dimly lit ceiling and cried out "Bulls! Bulls!"
hunted, in the conviction, perhaps, that life There were paintings of bison, deer, and other
would imitate art, or that the spirits that ani- animals, in red and black, drawn perhaps as long
mated animals would be mollified in this way as 20,000 years ago.
and would cooperate. So excellent was the art that many people re-
In 1879, a Spanish archeologist, Marcellino de fused to believe itwas truly ancient. Many felt it
Sautuola (d. 1888), was excavating Altamira cave to be a fraud of some sort, and a modern hoax. It
was only with the finding of other caves, and drawn. The
that allowed the cave paintings to be
other examples, that the art was finally accepted bow and arrow may also have been invented.
as ancient. This allowed animals to be attacked from a
By that time, people may also have invented greater distance and, hence, with greater secu-
the lamp, which provided a portable light that
oil rity.
could be carried easily from place to place, and
20,000 TO 14,000
YEARS AGO
Fossilremains of dogs have been found in puppy as food, and parents might oblige.
human-occupied caves; the oldest date back It would quickly have turned out that dogs,
some 14,000 years. being hunters and pack animals, would accept a
How dogs came to be domesticated is not human master as the pack leader. The dog would
known. My own guess is that children were re- go hunting with his master, help in tracking and
sponsible. A child could form a close bond with killing the game, and would then wait for the
a puppy that had been abandoned, or that was human being to take what he wanted and be sat-
picked up after the mother was killed, either in isfied with a minor share for himself.
self-defense or as food. Once the bond was In this way, human beings, for the first time,
formed, the child would object to the use of the obtained the services of another species.
14,000 TO 12,000
YEARS AGO
The domestication of the dog may have led to the In the 18,000 years since modern men had
notion of other forms of domestication. By 12,000 made appearance (three fifths of their entire
their
years ago, goats may have been domesticated in history), they had obtained their food by gather-
the Middle East. ing plants and hunting animals, as hominids had
The goats would be cared for, fed, and en- done for millions of years, and as other predators
couraged to reproduce. They could supply milk, had always done.
butter, and cheese. By dint of judicious culling, Now, for the first time, human beings had dis-
they could produce meat as well. What's more, covered a way of hoarding food (in the form of
since goats ate grass and other substances hu- domesticated herds of animals) and of making it
mans found inedible, the food supply was in- available for use without hunting. It meant a
creased at no cost. (Dogs had to be given food great increase in security and allowed an increase
that would otherwise fill human stomachs.) in population.
10,000 TO 8,000 B.C. 23
(We have now reached a point where we can B.C. From now on, we
count the years
then, will
switch to the usual method of marking the years. as "B.C." and, eventually, of course, as "A.D.")
What I have called "12,000 years ago" is 10,000
10,000 TO 8,000 B.C.

During this period, the last period of glaciation to see that water was supplied when the plants
that Earth has experienced (so far) was drawing needed it, and, finally, when the grain was ripe,
to its close.The glaciers were receding, and harvested itand roasted it for food. The grains
Earth's climate was beginning to approach what could also be ground into a
flour that kept with-
it is today. out spoiling for a long time if the outer layer was
With the glaciers gone, great changes came removed. The flour could then be baked into a
about. The Sahara Desert, for instance, once a nourishing, long-lasting, hard, flat bread.
lush grassland, began to dry out and become a In the process, naturally, enough grain would
desert. The land-bridges joining Asia with North be saved and set aside for seed for the next grow-
America in the north, and with Australia in the ing season.
south, were drowned. The people, who had now This period, in which herding and agriculture
occupied the Americas and Australia were sepa- came into use, is "New
Stone Age" or
called the
rated from the main population on the World Is- (in Latin) the "Neolithic Age." The advances in
land and would remain separated for over 9000 this period are sometimes referred to as the
years. "Neolithic Revolution."
The shores Ocean were gradually
of the Arctic The invention of agriculture, like that of herd-
being cleared of a permanent ice-cover, and the ing, supplied more food for the population en-
people we now know as Inuits (Eskimos), Lapps, gaged in it. Agriculture, however, was far
and Siberians were drifting northward. superior to herding in this respect. Animals con-
The region we now know as the Middle East, vert plant life doing so, they
into meat, but in
the land that borders the eastern Mediterranean preserve only a small amount of the energy avail-
Sea, the Caspian Sea, and the Persian Gulf, was able in the plants. If human beings feed on plants
the most advanced technologically. Why that directly, much more food energy is available to
should be is not certain, but it is the people of them than if they feed on animals that feed on
that region who first domesticated the dog, and plants.
then the goat. And it is they who would make Agricultural populations, therefore, increased
further advances. markedly and, in fact, the invention of agricul-
The most important advance involved the do- ture led to the first "population explosion" of
mestication of plants. With the retreat of the gla- mankind. The hominid population, which had
ciers and the changing of the climate, large been increasing very slowly through all the mil-
stands of wild grain grew throughout the Middle lions of years of their existence, quickly moved
East. upward once agriculture was established. The
Somewhere about 8000 B.C., in what is now population of the world reached about 5 million
northern Iraq, people learned how to cultivate by this time.
the grains which we now know as wheat and There were disadvantages, of course. Farming
barley. They planted seeds deliberately, pulled was tedious and back-breaking work, which had
up competing plants ("weeds"), frightened off none of the glamor and excitement of hunting;
animals that might want to eat it, did their best and it is easy to believe that farmers looked back
on the tales of the hunting of their ancestors, and There had to be an endless search for new
viewed the hunting of those neighbors of theirs ground, with a return to old grounds only after
who were not engaged in agriculture with a cer- enough time had been given them to recover.
tain nostalgic envy. They must have viewed ag- For nomads, there could be no possessions
riculture as a kind of slavery foisted upon them, that were not portable; nothing that could not be
which even the use of animal labor didn't do abandoned at need; nothing that would corre-
much to mitigate. spond to "home," except for temporary sites.
It is not surprising that so many agricultural Some such sites, to be sure, if particularly
communites "Golden Age," when
told of a well-situated, might have gained a kind of semi-
human beings hunted and gathered in freedom permanence, and it would be in those places
and comparative idleness, and wondered what where it would be easier to develop agriculture
had happened to evict them and force them to since the growing of plants would be useless if
earn their bread by the sweat of their brow. The nomads did not remain where they were for at
Hebrew tale of Eden and of the sin that caused least a few months.
God to curse man with agriculture is the best- Once agriculture had been established, how-
known of these tales. ever, there was no question of "temporary" or
Then, too, Adam's first two sons are depicted even "semipermanent" sites. Now there were
as Cain, a farmer, and Abel, a herdsman. The plots of land that had been cleared of weeds, that
farmers increased in population faster than the had been planted, that had to be tended, and that
herdsmen did, since the farms supplied much could not be moved. One might not even be able to
more food than the herds did, so we can well abandon one plot for another because not all
imagine that areas devoted to farming spread, plots were equally desirable. You needed good
and steadily took up space that had earlier been soil and a ready supply of water, and if that was
freely used by herdsmen. (The same thing hap- what you had, you held on to it. What's more, as
pened in theAmerican west, when the farmers the population grew, the whole fertile region was
settled the land and fenced in their plots to the divided up into family plots. You had to hang on
discomfiture of the cowboys.) No wonder the to yours.
Bible pictures Cain as killing Abel. Furthermore, because plots were, above all,
how people might dislike farm-
Yet no matter immovable, farmers, unlike all preceding gener-
ing and no matter how they might long for a ations, had to adopt a completely sedentary life.
happier, freer day, there was no way in which They had to stay in one place. The notion of
agriculture could be abandoned. The population "property" arose for the first time.
of an agricultural region quickly reached a height In a way, this, too, added to security, since
that could not be supported in any other way. To there was no need to find a new source of food
abandon agriculture and to try to feed the popu- periodically with, always, the chance of not find-
lation by herding or hunting meant mass starva- ing a satisfactory one till half the tribe had
tion. Agriculture, with all its faults, gave people starved. Now, there was the reliable plot that
a reasonable chance of full stomachs. had supported you all your life, that had sup-
Agriculture brought another change, too. ported your father before you and your son after
Hominids had been wandering people ("no- you.
mads"), seeking out plants, or following game. Agriculture meant another change, too. In the
Even when herding began, the herdsmen had to days of nomadism, one roving band might meet
wander good pasture for their animals. In
to find another and there might be a quarrel as to which
fact, the word nomad is from a Greek word for band had the right to exploit the area. The matter
"pasture." might degenerate to a mutual display of force.
Herdsmen or hunters could not remain in one The force, however, could rarely be deadly, be-
place, for the plant life would all be eaten, and cause it would quickly become apparent that one
the animal life would be killed or scared off. band was stronger than the other. The weaker.
10,000 TO 8,000 B.C. 25
foreseeing inevitable defeat, would retreat, aban- meant less individual space, less freedom of
It
don the area, and search for another. There was movement, more complicated arrangements for
nothing in any one area that was worth their bringing in food, disposing of wastes, providing
lives. for the common defense —
but it all led to greater
Farmers, however, did not have the choice of security. As in almost every case, people were
retreating. They grew food and usually pos- willing to trade freedom for security.
sessed stores to feed them over the winter, when The city, plus the surrounding farms that be-
plant life did not grow. Other farmers, whose longed to the city-dwellers, made up a commu-
harvest had for some reason failed, or nomads, nity that came be called a "city-state."
to
who did not engage in agriculture, might well Once a city-state was a going proposition, and
view the stores with greedy eyes and see no rea- a reasonable security was established, it was usu-
son why they should not appropriate it if they ally possible togrow more food than could easily
could. be consumed, if everyone worked at it. There-
The defending their immovable
farmers, fore, it became possible for some people not to be
farms, now had no choice but to stand and fight. farmers, but to do other kinds of useful work.
They had to risk defeat, to be followed by death Some people might be artisans, specializing in
or enslavement, since the alternative was to the manufacture of tools and ornaments; some
abandon their farms and die of starvation or sell might be soldiers or merchants or supervisors.
themselves into slavery in return for food. They did their work in return for food, while
Thus, the coming of agriculture also meant, farmers paid with food for the services of these
eventually, the coming of organized warfare. specialists. In short, a differentiated society came
If farmers had to fight, and they learned soon into being.
enough they would have to, it was only prudent All benefitted and the standard of living ad-
to take measures to make defeat less likely. It vanced. Thus, the invention of agriculture had
would have been most risky to remain scattered initiated a drive toward "urbanization" by 8000
among their farms where they could easily be B.C., a trend that is still continuing at breakneck
destroyed a family at a time. speed today all over the world.
Instead, the natural move was to collect to- In Latin, the word for a city-dweller is civis.
gether, setting up homes in a tightly packed fash- The adjective derived from civis is civilis, and the
ion, homes from which they could move noun derived from civilis is civilization. In other
outward farms by day and return by
to their words, "civilization" is the way of life in a society
night. It was to those homes they could fly at the that has advanced to the point of building cities.
first sign of a threatened attack and, fighting to- It would seem then that after modern man
gether, they might hold off the enemy. made his appearance, four fifths of his history
The chances of doing so were increased if they was spent in a precivilized state, and it was only
set their home on an elevation so that the enemy as the final fifth dawned thathe became civilized.
would have to hurl their missiles upward, while Nor did civilization spread at once to all men.
the defenders hurled them downward. The Itbegan in isolated spots here and there, and
homes should include a spring that would serve from those spots spread out wider. It was not till
as a dependable water supply and there would recent times that it has spread to virtually all the
have to be food-stores. And, of course, it would Earth.
help if a wall were built about the homes. The beginning came in the Middle East. In
In short, once agriculture was instituted, the northern Iraq, for instance, there are the remains
''city" was sure to follow. of a very ancient city, founded perhaps in 8000
Prior to agriculture, human beings had B.C., at a site called Jarmo. low mound into
It is a
grouped together in tribes (i.e., extended fami- which, beginning in 1948, the American archeol-
lies) and had wandered. After agriculture, they ogist, Robert J. Braidwood, dug carefully. He
grouped together in cities, and stayed put. found the remains of foundations of houses built
up of thin walls of packed mud and divided into Another city that may date back to the earliest
small rooms. It may have held no more than 100 days of agriculture is Jericho, near the Jordan
to 300 people. River.
8000 TO 7000 B.C.

Technological advances tend to diffuse outward. early agriculture was also practiced, was the Nile
For instance, group of people begin engag-
if a River.
ing in agriculture and are seen to be better off By 7000 B.C., then, city-states were beginning
as a result, other people, who have occasion to be established along the course of the Eu-
to observe this, begin to adopt agriculture them- phrates and the Nile.
selves. There is, of course, a catch. When it rains, it
A
person who has occasion to travel may ob- rains over the fields in which crops are grow-
all
serve something in one place and carry the news ing. The farmer doesn't have to do anything. If
of it to another. the farmer depends on the river, however, he
Therefore, both herding and agriculture (and can wait indefinitely and find that the water in
other technological advances that came later) the river is not likely to come to the crops of its
spread outward from their original sites. own accord (except when the river floods, and
In the case of agriculture, the spread was to- then the coming of water is disastrous.)
ward river banks. This made sense. The original It is necessary, then, for the farmer to dig irri-
sites where agriculture would be invented might gation ditches into which the river-water can
have been in the shadow of a mountain range. flow to water the crops. He must labor to keep
The incoming winds, forced upward, would the ditches dredged so that they won't silt up
cool, and its load of water vapor would drop as and lose their function. He must also build levees
rain. tohold the river back at times when it shows a
Reliable rains good harvest, but rains
meant a tendency to flood.
could never be counted upon to be reliable year Once again, then, farmers must accept addi-
after year. There were bound to be dry years and, tional labor as payment for increased security.
therefore, poor harvests and famine. Irrigating the land is community en-
clearly a
One way out was to cultivate the land near a deavor, and it must be carefully organized and
large flowing river. The river was a dependable supervised. The city, in such cases, becomes
and perpetual fresh-water supply, and no one more necessary than ever.
would have to depend on the fickle rain. The river cities were only beginning to be im-
The nearest large river to the places in north- portant in 7000 B.C. The older cities still held
ern Iraq where early agriculture was practiced pride of place. Jericho, in particular, had grown.
was the Euphrates River and its twin, the Tigris It extended over an area of 10 acres and had a
River. The nearest large river to Palestine, where population of about 2500.
7000 TO 6000 B.C. 27
7000 TO 6000 B.C.

Despite the fact that the pace of advance in the weave. Baskets could not be used to carry flour
early millennia of civilization seems glacially or olive oil, for instance, or, most important,
slow to us, the rate of movement was much water.
greater than it had been in precivilized times. In- It might seem natural to daub baskets with
deed, the rate of change, the rate of diffusion of clay, which, upon drying, would cake the holes
old advances and the rate of invention of new and make the basket solid. The dried mud, how-
advances has increased steadily with time from ever, would tend to fall away, especially if the
the earliest days of hominids down to the very basket were shaken or struck. If the basket were
present. placed in the sunlight and allowed to heat there,
By 6000 B.C., then, the practice of agriculture the mud would harden further and the basket
had spread west and north into Asia Minor and might then become fairly serviceable.
Greece. Nor was it just a matter of diffusion. But, then, why need the basket? Why not sim-
There was independent invention, too. Rice was ply begin with clay, mold a container out of it,
beginning to be cultivated in southeastern Asia. and let it dry in the sun. You would then have a
New cities were overtaking the old. There pot made crude earthenware
of — but these
was, for instance, a city at a site known to us would be soft and not durable.
now as Catalhuyuk, in south central Asia Minor. As even stronger heat was required, the
It may first have been settled in 6700 B.C., but it earthenware was placed in fire. Fired earthen-
was at its peak in 6000 B.C., when it may have ware (especially after methods for building par-
been the largest city in the world. This was ticularly hot fires were worked out) became hard
shown in the early 1960s when the site was ex- pottery, and production represents the first
its
cavated by the British archeologist, James Mel- use of fire for something other than light, heat,
laart. It covered 32 acres. or cooking.
Remains found at Catalhuyuk showed the By 6000 B.C., pottery was a well-established
prominence of pottery. Pottery is an outstanding product. Pottery made it possible not only to
sort of relic at these ancient sites of civilization. carry liquids but to cook meat in boiling water.
This is partly because pottery was important and In thisway, stews and casseroles came into exis-
partly because, unlike other objects that may tence to supplement roasts.
have been equally important, pottery easily sur- The notion behind the weaving of twigs into
vives over long periods of time. baskets could be applied to fibers that were much
Pottery arose out of the need to carry things. thinner, provided they were sufficiently strong.
The natural carry-alls are the hands and the Flax produces a fiber suitable for the purpose and
arms. Both are limited in their scope. What is flax was being cultivated well before 6000 B.C. It
needed something that is larger than hands or

is may well have been the first plant cultivated for
bent arms. Objects might be carried in hides, but a purpose other than food.
hides are inconvenient and heavy. Gourds might Flax fibers could be woven together to form a
do, but they had to be taken as they came. Even- long thread, which we call "linen." (The impor-
tually, human beings learned to weave twigs or tance of a linen thread as an example of some-
reeds into baskets. These were light and could be thing long and straight, can be gathered from the
made any shape.
in fact that the word "line" comes from linen.)
Baskets would, however, only be useful in By now; the use of farms along river banks
carrying solid, dry objects made up of particles was becoming much more important, and rivers
considerably larger than the interstices of the became important in other ways, too. The first
use of linen may have been to interweave them versing it be found. It must have been
had to
in such a way as to form nets for fishing. observed long, long before that wood floats. By
Eventually, very fine nets were made in — 6000 B.C., people seemed to have learned to lash
other words "cloth" or "textiles" (from a Latin logs together to form rafts. This would keep
word "weaving"). The formation of cloth
for them safely on the surface of quiet bodies of
from linen and, eventually, from other plant or water and enable them to fish more efficiently
animal fibers, such as cotton or wool, revolution- than from the shore. By paddling, in fact, with
ized clothing. their hands —
if nothing else —
they could even
were light materials. They were flexi-
Textiles cross small stretches of water.
ble, porous, and could be easily cleaned. They About this time, too, the wild ox had been
have remained the preferred material for clothing tamed, and this was the ancestor of modern do-
ever since. mestic cattle, which became perhaps the most
Life by a river meant that some means of tra- important food animal in the world.
6000 TO 5000 B.C.

In the course of this period, a new group of peo- sure that all the affairs of the city would remain
ple, the Sumerians, began to enter the Tigris- prosperous.
Euphrates valley. Civilization had existed there A priestly hierarchy was established to serve
for some 3000 years by this time, but the Sumer- as the bureaucracy of the city-state. Temples
ians picked up the ball and carried it much fur- were built as homes for the gods and priests, as
ther. They were the first to develop what we repositories forgovernment records, storehouses
might refer to as a "high" civilization. for grain, and so on. Religion had become insti-
Where they came from, we don't know. Their tutionalized and made to support the state,
language is not related to any other, so that we which has been its usual function ever since.
can't trace relationships. We can only be grateful The same advances in river agriculture and as-
to them. sociated religious institutions were now in full
For instance, they found the beginnings of ag- swing along the Nile River, too.
riculture along the river bank and took it over, There were advances in other parts of the
and by 5000 B.C. had established working city- world as well. In the Andean region of north-
states along the lower course of the Euphrates western South America, the llama and alpaca
river, beginning to make full use of irrigation. (small American relatives of the camel of Asia
The southeasternmost portion of the valley is and Africa) were domesticated. In Mexico, cotton
usually referred to as "Sumeria" at this time. and avocados were grown. Dates were grown in
(The Bible calls it "Shinar.") south Asia, and in the steppes north of the Black
To make sure that the cities were properly or- Sea, the horse was domesticated.
ganized and their complexities working effi- Along the Euphrates, too, people learned how
ciently, the rulers of theSumerian city-states had to make use of the wind to power ships. By
to gain unquestioned authority. The logical way hoisting sails, wind was trapped against a large
was to associate the ruler with the divine. He area and this tended to drive ships forward when
became a priest-king, capable of interceding with there was no current, or even against a current.
the gods on behalf of his people, in order to make
5000 TO 4000 B.C. 29
5000 TO 4000 B.C.

James Ussher had calculated that the Creation that the entire period ofhominid history prior to
had taken place in 4004 B.C., toward the end of 4000 B.C. might be termed the "Stone Age." This
this period. It was a ludicrously late date for the phrase was first used by the Roman poet, Titus
event. By 4004 B.C., civilization had been pro- Lucretius Carus (95-55 B.C.), about 60 B.C., and
gressing for 4000 years; and human beings of the was then reintroduced in 1834 by the Danish ar-
modern type had been in existence for at least cheologist, Christian Jurgenson Thomsen (1788-
24,000 years. 1865).
About 4000 B.C., the Sumerians founded the Occasionally, pebbles were found that were
city of Ur at the mouth of the Euphrates. (In not like other pebbles. These unusual pebbles
those days, the Euphrates and the Tigris entered were shiny and were heavier than ordinary
the Persian Gulf separately. In the 6000 years ones. What's more, if these shiny pebbles were
since, however, has filled in the gulf for about
silt struck with a stone hammer, they did not split
150 miles, so that the remains of Ur are now that or shatter as ordinary pebbles did, but under-
far from the sea. In those 150 miles of silt, the went simple distortion of shape. They were
a
Tigris and Euphrates have flowed together and "malleable."
now the combined river flows 50 miles or so into These unusual pebbles are examples of "met-
the retreated coastline of the Gulf.) als." There are dozens of different metals
For considerable periods of time, Ur was the known, but most of them remain in combination
most important city in Sumeria, and may have with nonmetallic substances and form the ordi-
been the largest city in the world. (World popu- nary rocks and pebbles all about us. Only those
lation may have reached 85 million by 4000 B.C.) metals that are inert and tend not to combine
Our knowledge of Ur, and of Sumeria in general, with other substances are likely to be found free.
arose in the 1920s, thanks to the work of the Brit- The three inert metals most likely to be found
ish archeologist, Charles Leonard Wooley (1880- free are rare, even for metals. These are copper,
1960). silver, and gold. Their rareness is shown by the
By people in the Middle East had
this time, fact that the very word metal is from a Greek term
learned about the fermentation of grape juice and meaning "to search for."
of soaked barley (probably by accident to begin Metal nuggets, when
found, were used almost
with), so that wine and beer were beginning to exclusively for ornaments after being pounded
come into use. Undoubtedly, these drinks were into attractive shapes. (The lure of ornamenta-
popular because they induced intoxication and, tion must have preceded metals, too, and shaped
in moderation, this felt good. wood, bone, and shells were probably also used
Such beverages were important in another for the purpose. Metals were more durable, how-
way, although the early drinkers could scarcely ever, were considered more attractive, and were
be aware of it. Alcohol tended to kill microorga- — an important consideration — rare.)
nisms, so that drinking wine and beer was safer It was only when human beings discovered
than drinking water which might be contami- that metals could be obtained from special rocks
nated with human or animal wastes. called "ores" that they became common enough
An important advance had its beginnings for other purposes.
now. For some two million years, ever since Copper is substantially more common than
H. habilis had come on the scene, the most ad- silver and gold, and it exists in certain ores to a
vanced material for the manufacture of tools and far greater extent than silver and gold do. The
weapons were stones of one sort or another, so most common copper ore is a kind of copper car-
bonate, which i&'blue and which contains (as the spread outward. A third river valley was devel-
name indicates) carbon as well as copper. oping into a home for city-states. This was the
Undoubtedly, the discovery of metal ores was Indus river, which flows through what we now
accidental at first. A wood fire might have been call Pakistan. In 1921 and 1922, remains of such
built on a bed of rock that happened to contain an early civilization were found along that river
copper ore. Under the heat of the fire, the carbon by the British archeologist, John Hubert Marshall
in the wood and in the ore would combine with (1876-1958).
oxygen in the ore and in the atmosphere to form
the gas, carbon dioxide, which would escape,
leaving metallic copper behind. Some observant From this point on, as known events multiply
person might notice the reddish globules among and as history unfolds in increasing detail, I shall
the ashes of the fire,and, eventually, the circum- consider progressively smaller intervals of time.
stances were understood. The ores were In addition, I will divide each interval into
searched for and deliberately treated in such a events taking place in particular geographic sec-
way as to obtain metal. tions. I won't follow any fixed order in doing so,
Here was another use of fire. It made possible but will be guided roughly by the necessity of
''metallurgy" — the obtaining of metals from their telling a connected story so that a region of cen-
ores. tral importance will be considered first. Natu-
Like such advances in early times, knowl-

all rally, I will have to be the judge as to what is of
edge of the new technique diffused outward central importance, and I cannot help but attach
slowly. In this case, diffusion stopped at the edge particular importance to those historical events
of the ocean. Metallurgy never reached the peo- which have influenced Western culture, which is
ple in the Americas or in Australia; nor did those my cultureand that of most of my readers and —
people happen to discover the technique inde- which, in good truth, has more strongly influ-
pendently. enced the world as a whole in the last several
Meanwhile, civilization itself continued to centuries than has any other.
4000 TO 3500 B.C.

was hard and might survive quite a long period
SUMERIA of use (with care) without being blunted, copper
When copper was obtained from ore, it meant was much softer and every minor use bent and
that there was a much greater supply for orna- blunted it.
mentation, but it was not, at first, very useful as Not all be the same, how-
copper seemed to
a material for tools. ever. Copper obtained from some ores was
This might well have seemed disappointing to harder than from others. The reason was that
early metallurgists. After all, ifsharp-edged
a copper ore is not necessarily pure; it might be
piece of rock blunted its edge, that edge cannot mixed with rocks that, on being heated, released
be restored without laborious chipping. More another substance that would mix with copper to
likely, the rock tool has to be discarded and a form an "alloy."
new one must be shaped. If a sharp-edged piece At first, such mixtures consisted of copper
of copper is blunted, however, it can simply and mixed with arsenic, but arsenic is poisonous and
easily be beaten sharp again. people who worked with it fell sick. Such mixed
The difficulty was, however, that while stone ores were abandoned, therefore (perhaps the
4000 TO 3500 B.C. 31
first known
case in which worker safety was a cut down on friction However,
considerably.
factor in technology). rollers had to be picked up from the back and put
Fortunately, another type of ore mixture was down again in front and that quickly grew tire-
discovered that also resulted in the forming of some.
hard copper. In this case, it was the use of tin ore The use of wheels at the ends of two axles,
that did the trick,and the hard copper was ac- one front and one back, suspended from leather
tually a copper-tin alloy. The alloy was called straps that were attached to the sledge, might
“bronze" (possibly from a Persian word for "cop- allow the sledge to while the wheels always
roll
per"). remained attached. About 3500 B.C., animal-
Bronze was hard enough to compete with drawn wheeled carts were in use in Sumeria.
rock, could hold an edge better, and could be The Sumerians began
alsouse oars to pro-to
beaten back into shape if necessary. pel ships against the Euphrates' current when
The Sumerians began to use bronze tools and, the wind refused to cooperate.
about 3500 B.C., entered the "Bronze Age." To Instead of simply digging little holes in the soil
be sure, bronze was used sparingly at first, and and dropping seeds into the ground, the Sumer-
stone continued to be the most common material ians began to use plows dragged by donkeys or
for tools.As a result, the early centuries of the oxen. These had a sharp edge that scraped up
Bronze Age are sometimes called the "Chalcol- the soil, loosening and aerating it. Seeds, which
ithic Age" (which is Greek for "copper-stone could be scattered through the loose soil, then
age"). grew more easily and rapidly.
Another enormous advance introduced by the
clever Sumerians was the wheel. Its first use may
possibly have been as the "potter's wheel." In EGYPT
making pottery, clay was, to begin with, molded Egypt was very fortunate in its possession of the
into shape by hand, with the result that the Nile. Not only was it a source of
water for a rain-
shape was not necessarily smooth or symmetri- less land, but it flooded annually and fertilized
cal. The pots were likely to be ugly and wobbly. the land in a kind of automatic irrigation.
Someone in the Mideast, however, had the In addition, its was gentle and there
current
inspiration of setting the clay on a flat rock with were no storms, so that it was easy to float on it
a depression at the center of the lower surface safely. What's more, the river flows almost due
that might pivot on a projection beneath and be north, while the wind almost always blows due
set to turning rapidly. If a blob of clay is set on south. Therefore, a boat can be carried smoothly
the flat rock, a touch of the hand would produce down (northward) by the current, and re-
river
a smooth and symmetrical curve. Making use of turned up river (southward) by means of sails.
a potter's wheel produced beautiful pottery in far Egypt lacked forests, but it had luxuriant
less time than anything produced by hand. stands of reeds (called "papyrus") along the river
The existence of the potter's wheel made it in those days, and the reeds could be used in
possible to see a way of simplifying transport. bundles to build a boat. (When Moses was set
It was always possible to pile objects on some afloat in the Nile River, according to the Biblical
sort of wooden sledge and then drag it along the account, he was placed in a little boat, or "ark,"
ground. That meant that most of the work done made of "bulrushes" — that is, of papyrus.)
was simply spent in overcoming the friction that This particularly easy form of communication
resisted the drag. Even the use of oxen rather served to unite the various city-states along the
than men could not make it anything but a slow Nile, giving them a common language, a com-
and arduous labor. mon culture, and a common world-outlook. The
It could be made easier if crude rollers, such ease of trade enriched them all and the region
as wooden logs, were placed under the sledge. had long periods of peace such as no other region
The rollers turned rather than dragged, and that ever experienced.
The city-states of the Nile delta, a triangular

section in the north, formed a loose union called ELSEWHERE
“Lower Egypt" (since it was down river), while Cities were beginning to make their first begin-
the city-states of the narrow Nile south of the ning in China, some 45 centuries after they had
delta, which was upstream, was "Upper Egypt." begun to appear in the Middle East. These cities
appeared along the lower course of the Hwang-
Ho River.
3500 TO 3000 B.C.

wanted to say. It was the first system of writing
SUMERIA in the world.
In Sumeria, which was the most advanced and The Sumerians made the marks of their writ-
complex civilization in the world at this time, life ing by punching a stylus at an angle into soft
had to be more complex, too. People had to keep clay, and then baking the clay to make the writ-
track of the grain they produced, of how much ing permanent. This made wedge-shaped marks,
they traded, of what other products they manu- and it was later called cuneiform, from Greek
factured, and of what was contributed to the words meaning "wedge-shaped."
common fund ("taxes"). The marks began as crude pictures of what-
It became more and more difficult to keep it ever was being talked about; however, as time
all in mind, and it was necessary to keep score. went on, the symbols became more stylized and
Almost anyone can think of making some sort of somewhat simpler and lost their pictorial repre-
mark in the ground to stand for each basket full sentations. Nevertheless, each symbol stood for
of fruit and, then, eventually, counting the a word, more or less, so that there were always
marks in order to know how many baskets had hundreds and even thousands of different sym-
been delivered. bols that someone had to memorize if one
As memory became strained, such marks were wanted to read and write.
indeed made, and the Sumerians had begun this This meant that the literates were always a
practice soon after 3500 B.C. Different marks small minority of the population, and a small
might be made for numbers of different size, so and highly valued class of people arose, the
that there wouldn't be too many unit-marks to "scribes," who undertook to read and write for
count. The Sumerians worked out number sys- the general population.
tems based on 12, 60, and 360 eventually, be- Writing made an enormous difference. It was
cause these numbers could be divided evenly in a kind of frozen speech. Thoughts and records
many ways and this lessened the chances of hav- remained much more permanent when written
ing to work with fractions. To this day, we have than when transmitted by the spoken word.
12 units to the dozen, 60 minutes to the hour, If carefully copied, now and then, writing
—
and 360 degrees to the circle all dating back to and remains more precise
persists indefinitely
the Sumerians. than the memory of the spoken word usually
Aside from numbers, there might be special is.
marks that meant "fruit," "grain," "man," and This meant that each generation could learn,
so on. By 3100 B.C., the Sumerians had a system more preciselyand more quickly, the accumu-
of writing that could communicate anything they lated experience and wisdom of the previous
3500 TO 3000 B.C. 33
generation. The rate of advance quickened as a form. The Egyptian writing is called hieroglyphic
result. (from Greek words meaning "priestly writing"),
Furthermore, the records kept in writing give because the Greeks later came into contact with
us a reasonably exact version of events that took it, mostly, in Egyptian temples. The Egyptian
place in the past, complete with names, places, writing was brushed onto thin, flexible sheets of
and details (provided we allow for self-serving papyrus pith.
lies). In order to understand what went on in a As in Sumeria, there was a multiplication and
society without writing, we must try to interpret growth of city-states along the river. As city-
matters from the artifacts they left behind from — states enlarged their boundaries and grew more
their art, their pottery, even their garbage. populous, their territories were bound to run
Therefore, a society that possesses writing is into each other and their interdependence grew.
"historic." One that does not is "prehistoric." In As the occasion for antagonism increased with
other words, human history begins with Sumeria mutual crowding, the need for cooperation also
not long before 3000 B.C. Thus, the first 5000 increased. The irrigation system could not be
years of civilization were prehistoric and only the controlled efficiently in bits and pieces. Different
last 5000 have been historic. city-states had to act together.
Indeed, human beings could now be divided The city-states of the triangular Nile delta,
into two classes — the settled, literate, technolog- downstream, formed a loose union known as
ically advanced city-dwellers, and the tribal no- "lower Egypt," while those upstream to the
mads who lacked agriculture and writing. south of the delta made up "upper Egypt."
Frequently, the tribal peoples attempted to in- About 3100 B.C., the two regions were united
vade and take over the far richer territories of the under the rule of Narmer (known as Menes, to
city-dwellers, but when they did, they also took the Greeks). He was intelligent enough to found
over the culture, so that even when the city- a new capital, Memphis, at the southern end of
dwellers lost, civilization usually won, even the delta, right on the border of Upper and
though a "dark age" might be temporarily expe- Lower Egypt, so that neither region would seem
rienced. to be dominating the other. It kept the two halves
Beginning in 3000 B.C., for instance, a group together long enough to establish a national
of people called Akkadians drifted into the Ti- identity.
gris-Euphrates valley along the northern fringes Narmer was the first king of the "First Dy-
of Sumeria. They spoke a language entirely un- nasty." (An Egyptian priest, Manetho, about 250
related to Sumerian, one of a group that we B.C., wrote a history of Egypt and divided its
call "Semitic" today, because the people who dynasty representing

rulers into dynasties, each
speak it are described, by the Bible, as having a family whose members ruled over Egypt for a
been descended from Shem, the oldest son of period of time.)
Noah. The union was probably carried out by force,
The Akkadians adopted aspects of Sumerian but, if worked, for the Egyptian city-states
so, it
culture. They adopted the Sumerian system of shared a common language and culture. They
writing, for instance, and modified it to make it melted together with less trouble than might
suitable for their own language. The region, after have been expected and formed a "nation." It
3000 B.C., is sometimes referred to as "Sumer- was the first nation the world had seen.
Akkad" for that reason. Partly, this worked because Egypt was
bounded by a desert on the west, by the Red Sea
on the east, by the Mediterranean Sea on the
EGYPT north, and by a more or less impenetrable jungle
Egypt quickly picked up the notion of writing on the south. For a long time, the only route over
from the Sumerians, but invented a different set which possible invaders might come was from
of signs, as complicated, in its way, as the cunei- Asia by way of the Sinai peninsula, and for a long
time they didn't come. Egypt could, therefore,

develop in peace, something other nations rarely ASIA MINOR
had a chance to do. Asia Minor is the peninsula in western Asia that
is now occupied by the nation of Turkey. It may
also be called Anatolia. Catalhuyuk had flour-
CANAAN ished there, but that town had declined and dis-
appeared, and other city-states now existed
Canaan is the land along the shore of the eastern
there. In the northwest corner, the first signs of
end of the Mediterranean Sea. It was among the
a city began to appear that was eventually to be
oldest centers of civilization for it was there that
known as Troy.
Jericho had existed. It was located between the
civilizations of Egypt and of Sumer-Akkad, and
its people served as middlemen in trade between
these two sections. That always means prosper- ELSEWHERE

ity, since middlemen can skim the profits in To the east of Sumeria, was Elam, with its capital
either direction. at Susa, which was beginning to absorb Sumer-
An alternate name for Canaan, especially for ian civilization. Still farther to the east, agricul-
along the shore, was "Phoenicia." This was
cities ture was beginning on the Indus River in what is
used by the Greeks from their word for "purple," now Pakistan. Farther east still, the city-states of
because in purple dye was man-
later centuries a the Hwang-Ho in China were growing.
ufactured there. The northern portion of Canaan Civilization was moving into Europe, too, for
came to be called "Syria" in later times; this again the island of Crete, which lies south of Greece,
being a Greek name, taken from that of a tribe was beginning to be affected by civilization from
that lived in the region. Egypt.
3000 TO 2500 B.C.

you wanted to be sure of planting and harvesting
EGYPT at the right times.
Once union had been achieved, without undue The phases of the Moon were particularly con-
bloodshed, Egypt became the most prosperous venient. The month was neither too long nor too
and most advanced nation in the world. As an short, and the cycle of phases could be followed
example, the calendar, essentially the one we use easily. It turned out that there were 12 new
today, was invented in Egypt, probably in this moons in the cycle of the season (12 months to
time period. the year), but this was not exact. Every once in a
People have always been aware of the alter- while a 13th month had to be added to the year
nation of day and night, of the cycle of the to keep it even with the seasons. This began with
Moon's phases, and of the cycle of the seasons the Sumerians, and eventually, a 19-year period
(the day, the month, and the year, respectively). was worked out in which certain years had 12
In the days of hunting and gathering, atten- months and certain others had 13, and this kept
tion had to be paid to the cycles because animals reasonably exact pace with the seasons, but it
underwent seasonal migrations and it wouldn't was complicated. This calendar was passed on to
do to be caught by surprise. In the days of agri- the Greeks and to the Jews, and is still used
culture, the cycles were even more important if today in Judaism.
3000 TO 2500 B.C. 35
The Egyptians, however, went by the flooding ture Pyramid." The base
called the "Step
is is an
of the Nile, which took place once a year (be- oblong about 400 by 350 feet, and the top is al-
cause of the melting of ice in mountain ranges to most 200 feet high.
the south, but the Egyptians didn't know that). The Step Pyramid was the first large stone
Close observation showed that the time from structure ever built and, since it still exists, it is
Nile flood to Nile flood averaged 365 days, so the the oldest large human-made structure in the
established a year of 365 days divided world today.
into 12 months of 30 days each (paying no atten- The Step Pyramid set a fashion
and, for a cou-
tion to the phases of the Moon) plus five extra ple of centuries afterward, the pharaohs kept the
days that belonged to no month. people busy in their spare time building more
This "solar calendar" may have been worked and more elaborate pyramids. Far larger blocks
out some time about 2800 B.C. With some modi- were used than in the case of the Step Pyramid,
fications, it is still used today. and the structures were built with smooth reced-
Thanks to the Nile, and to the unification of ing sides from a square base, and then faced with
the nation, food production was efficient and co- slabs to make the sides smooth and bright. (The
pious and the Egyptian rulers could put the peo- outer facing is long since gone, but the underly-
ple to work on public projects designed to show ing blocks remain.)
the greatness of the ruler and, through him, of The climax came when the pharaoh, Khufu
the nation and the people. They were also in- (Cheops, to the Greeks), of the Fourth Dynasty,
tended to serve as memorials to their power and supervised the construction of the "Great Pyra-
to impress, suitably, both foreigners and future mid," the largest of all, in about 2530 B.C. When
generations. that pyramid was finished, its square base was
Thus, the Egyptian rulers built elaborate 755 feet on each side, so that it covered an area
houses (or "palaces," as we now call them). In- of 13 acres. was composed of 2,300,000 large
It
deed, the ruler eventually came to be referred to blocks that weighed on the average of 2.5 tons
as pharaoh, which is the Greek version of an apiece. The whole structure reached its upper-
Egyptian word meaning "big house." most point at a height of 481 feet.
The Egyptian rulers also built elaborate tombs This was Egypt at an early climax of its power
for themselves in which their mummified bodies and its population, which may have numbered
could be preserved. The feeling was that if the about 2 million people.
king's body were preserved so that it could live Afterward, the fad for such large, vainglorious
forever in the afterworld, the nation that he rep- structures did not persist for long. They took too
resented in god-like splendor would also flour- much time and too much work, even for Egypt;
ish, and all Egyptians would benefit. For that however, the pyramids still stand today as a re-
reason, the pharaohs had oblong objects ("mas- markable testimony to what could be done with
tabas") built as secure tombs where they might the simplest of tools, by sheer human muscle and
lie, along with a sampling of their precious pos- ingenuity. It would be a hard job to pile up those
sessions that would be kept safe from the depre- rocks even today.
dations of tomb robbers. (Nevertheless, the
depredations always took place.)
In 2650 B.C., when Zoser, the first king of the SUMERIA
Third Dynasty came to power, they decided to In 3000 B.C., the Sumerian cities were prosper-
build a particularly elaborate tomb as a memorial ous. The city of Uruk (the Biblical "Erech"),
to his greatness.His councillor, Imhotep, super- about 75 miles upstream from Ur, was perhaps
vised the building of six mastabas of stone, one the leading Sumerian city of its time and was
on top of the other, each smaller than the one ruled by the legendary Gilgamesh. He is sup-
below. Because these setbacks were like steps a posed to have built a brick wall about the city
giant might use in climbing to the top, the struc- that was six miles in circumference.
Temples were then in the process of becoming older scraps also survive, from which much of
“ziggurats." These were made of brick and were the epic can be reconstructed.
square or rectangular. Each had a smaller struc- The hero is Gilgamesh, who had been king of
ture on it and a still smaller one on that. There Uruk, to whose historic personality the fictional
might be five or more stages making it a kind of tale of the epic was added. A close friend of his
''step pyramid." Ziggurats had no internal cham- had died, and he decided to try to find the secret
bers, but there were external stairs that the of immortality. After a complicated search, he
priests ascended and descended. came upon Ut-Napishtim, who, at the time of the
The Biblical tale of the Tower of Babel refers to Flood, had built a large vessel in which he had
the building of a tall ziggurat, and the tale of saved himself and his family. Not only was Ut-
Jacob's dream of angels ascending and descend- Napishtim saved, but the gods also gave him the
ing a ladder stretching from Earth to Heaven may gift of eternal life. Ut-Napishtim directed Gilga-
also have been inspired by one. mesh to the whereabouts of a certain magic
However, the Sumerian cities received a rude plant. If Gilgamesh obtained the plant and ate it,
shock from which they may never have com- he, too, would be immortal. He found the plant,
pletely recovered, and by 2500 B.C., Sumeria had but, before he could eat it, it was stolen by a
definitely fallen behind Egypt in wealth and serpent and Gilgamesh remained mortal.
prosperity. What had happened was an un- It is clear that from that epic of Gilgamesh,
looked-for natural disaster. which must have been popular throughout the
When Woolley was exploring the remains of Middle East, the Hebrews eventually got their
the Sumerian cities, he came across a layer of silt, tale of Noah, and part of their tale of Adam and
11 feet thick, with no relics or artifacts anywhere Eve.
in it. He decided that the silt must have been laid Sumeria's population may have been as high
down by a huge flood. as 1.25 million before the Flood, and rather less
After all, do flood occasionally, and

rivers than that afterward. As the various city-states
sometimes they flood to an unusual height, if tried to recover from the catastrophe, there was
rains are particularly heavy or winter snows in a tendency for each to try to grab as much terri-
the mountains melt at an unusual rate. If this is tory as possible from a devastated neighbor.
combined with a neglected set of levees, the re- So while Egypt was building its pyramids in
sult can be unmitigated disaster. Woolley esti- peace, the Sumerian cities were beginning a se-
mated that the silt he had found had been ries of wars among themselves, in which first one
produced by a flood that was 25 feet deep and and then another would gain a brief advantage.
that covered a stretch of land 300 miles long by As is always the case in such internecine strug-
100 miles wide. In short, virtually all of Sumeria gles, however, the net result was to weaken all
may have been covered, and this may have taken sides and lay the region open to easy conquest
place in 2800 B.C. by an outsider.
The death-rate must have been very high; and
to the Sumerians, very few of whom knew much
about the world outside of Sumeria, it must have
CRETE
seemed that the whole world was covered with The island of Crete entered the Bronze Age about
water, and that the flood was a universal deluge. 2600 B.C., when the "Minoan" civilization (the
A Sumerian legend of the Flood sprang up, first in Europe) was established. The name is de-
and this turned out to be the world's first known rived from the legendary Minos, who was de-
epic. Our most complete version dates from a scribed as ruling over Crete in the Greek myths.
time more than 2000 years after the Flood, but
2500 TO 2000 B.C. 37
2500 TO 2000 B.C.

of history. The people he ruled were not uniform
SUMERIA in language and culture, but comprised a heter-
In the period after 2500 B.C., warfare among the ogeneous realm. This is called an “empire" (or
Sumerian cities continued to weaken them all. imperium in Latin, from their word imperator for a
Three cities were chiefly involved Lagash, — military leader). Sargon of Agade was, therefore,
Umma, and Kish, These cities formed a south- the first “imperialist," the first empire-builder.
east-to-northwest line in the region between the Sargon died in 2279 B.C., but the Akkadian
Tigris and the Euphrates. The winner was Lugal- Empire reached its zenith under Sargon's grand-
zaggisi of Umma, who, 2375 B.C., took over
after son, Naramsin, who reigned from 2254 to 2218
Kish and Lagash, as well as Ur and Uruk. By 2350 B.C.
B.C., all Sumeria was under his control.
of Empires, however, tend to be unstable. One
Meanwhile, in Akkad, north of Sumeria, there group of people (in this case, Akkadians) rules
was a ruler named Sargon of Agade (the leading over others. Those who are ruled resent it, of
city of Akkad). Legends grew about him in later course, and seek occasions
overthrow the rul-
to
generations, including one in which, as a baby, ers. Much of the strength of an empire, there-
he was supposed to have been found in a small fore, must be expended on suppressing revolts.
boat floating on the river. (The legend, famous in Furthermore, nomadic tribes along the bor-
the Middle East, was taken over by the Biblical ders of the empire are quite likely to invade in
writers and applied to Moses.) search of loot. Usually, the better organized and
Sargon gained control of Kish and, about 2340 the more advanced technology of the empire can
B.C., he easily defeated Lugalzaggisi and united take care of such raids, but, all too often, the
all of Sumer and Akkad under his rule. He then submerged nationalities make common cause
went on to conquer Elam and the mountainous with the tribal incursion, and the empire, trying
lands to the east, as well as the upper reaches of to counter force from abroad and disaffection
the Tigris-Euphrates, and Canaan to the west. from within, may topple. In this way, the Akka-
His dominions spread from the Mediterranean dian Empire came to an end about 2180 B.C., less
Sea to the Caspian Sea in the north, and to the than 40 years after the death of Naramsin.
Persian Gulf in the south. It included all the civi- For thousands of years to follow, one of the
lized regions ofwestern Asia. themes in history has been the struggle of settled
Sargon's victories might well have been the city-dwellers against nomadic tribesmen. Be-
result of novel military techniques. The Sumeri- cause histories are written by the city-dwellers,
ans had used lances for thrusting, and had de- the tribesmen are usually described as “sav-
fended themselves with large shields, which ages," from a Latin word meaning “people who
made their armies slow-moving and only effec- live in woods" (i.e., They
rather than in cities).
tive at close quarters. Sargon's armies used are also called “barbarians," from a Greek word
spears for throwing, and bows and arrows as referring to anyone who does not speak Greek
well. He could attack at longer range, and with (i.e., of an alien culture). In this book, I shall refer
greater mobility and speed, and the Sumerians to them simply as “tribesmen" or “nomads,"
were helpless before him. (Military victory terms which do not carry derogatory implica-
through the use of novel weapons and tactics has tions. After all, tribesmen are still people and
been a periodic feature of warfare ever since.) can, at times, be decent and kindly; and it is well-
Sargon of Agade was the first great conqueror known that civilized people can, for all their civ-
be incredibly brutal at times. So, there's

ilization, to support the king in the fight against the no-
no use in treating the struggle as a simple case of bles.
good versus evil. In Egypt, about 2400 B.C., when the pyramid
The fall of the Akkadian Empire allowed the mania was passing, the central power began to
Sumerian cities to recover and to control their weaken, and by the year 2000 B.C., Egypt was
own destinies once more. Gudea of Lagash, who just beginning to recover from a period of feudal-
ruled from 2144 to 2124 B.C., was a prominent ism in which both the economy and military
Sumerian leader in this period. He was a great power declined.
patron of the arts, and a religious reformer as
well.
Then, Ur took the leadership once again and, CRETE
in 2000 B.C., reached a height of power. Accord- The Cretans of this period were in the "early Mi-
Hebrew legend, the patriarch Abram (later
ing to noan period." They did not yet have the wheel,
Abraham) was a native of Ur, and, about 2000 and writing only began to appear toward the end
B.C., left the city to travel westward, ending in of the period. Their forte, however, was ship-
Canaan. ping.
Ships were by now venturing into the Medi-
terranean Sea. Egyptian vessels, for instance,
EGYPT went as far as Lebanon, on the coast of Canaan,
Egypt also experienced a period of decline after to collect wood from the fabled cedar forests of
2500 B.C., but not because of foreign conquest. that land and back to Egypt. It was far
to bring it
In any realm, there is a certain tension be- easier to float the logs over water in ships, than
tween the central ruling power (the king) and the to try to transport them overland in carts. The
various subsidiary officials (the nobility) that rule ships did not, however, venture into the open
over different parts of the country. sea, where there were no landmarks to guide
When a weak king sits on the throne, the no- them and where storms might sink them. In-
bles are almost certain to take over power in their stead, they hugged the coast of the eastern Med-
own districts and to ignore the dictates of the iterranean from Egypt to Lebanon and back
king. This further weakens the king,and the again.
move toward a decentralization of power accel- Crete, as the first island civilization, had the
erates. A period in which the nobles are powerful advantage in that the strong civilizations in
and the central ruler is weak
sometimes re- is Egypt and western Asia did not possess the kind
ferred to as a period of "feudalism" (from an Old of ships that could threaten it. For that reason,
German word for "property," because the power its city-states could unify in peace and remain
of the nobility depends on the land they control). unwalled. Crete's own ships could carry on trade
In general, history seems to show that a na- —
with islands to the north islands so thickly
tion under a strong central power is better off strewn over the sea that the ships were never out
economically, and stronger militarily, than it is of sight of land for long.
when it is feudal. Under feudalism, endless Crete, by controlling the trade of the eastern
struggles among the nobility sap the strength of Mediterranean, prospered and established the
the region. first thalassocracy (from Greek words meaning
It may seem to some that decentralization "rule of the seas"), in which power rested with a
leads to greater freedom, and so
does for the it — navy rather than an army.
nobles. Replacing one central tyrant by dozens of
petty tyrants does nothing for the people. In fact,
the petty tyrants, being closer to home, are usu- INDIA
ally more unbearable, and history demonstrates In this period, the Indus River civilization was at
that the usual tendency is for the middle classes its peak. Two cities, in particular, have been ex-
2000 TO 1500 B.C. 39
cavated at the sites of Mohenjo-Daro on the tites are the first Indo-European people to enter
lower Indus, and at Harappa, further upstream. the stage of history.
Both cities were built in a checkerboard pattern, Terms like "Indo-European" and "Semitic"
with brick houses, a central citadel on a hill, and refer only to languages, however, and do not
surrounding farms with an extensive canal sys- necessarily refer to physical relationships. Amer-
tem. ican Blacks speak an Indo-European language,
but are of African descent just the same.
Historians in the past have been all too willing
to give Indo-Europeans and Semites racial char-
HITTITES and, since the historians usually spoke
acteristics
Toward the end of this period, a group of people Indo-European languages, they let the Indo-Eu-
known us as Hittites
to wandered into Asia ropeans have all the best of it, making wars be-
Minor. Their language was not related to the Se- tween them a combat of good Indo-Europeans
mitic one spoken by the Akkadians, for instance. versus evil Semites. That sort of racism is (or
Instead, the language was one of a group that should be) quite passe by now, and there will be
we, today, call "Indo-European," and the Hit- none of it in this book.
2000 TO 1500 B.C.

gions. The horses, with hoofs thundering and
EGYPT manes tossing, were fearsome sights. The foot-
At the opening of Egypt had estab-
this period, soldiers were sure to break and run, and the rac-
lished a centralized government once again. This ing charioteers could overtake them, spear them,
was the "Middle Kingdom" under the rulers of trample them, and wipe them out.
the 12th Dynasty (as opposed to the "Old King- About 1720 B.C., such charioteers reached
dom" of the pyramid-builders). Egypt, whose people, till now, had not had oc-
Under the most powerful monarch of this Dy- casion to fight an invading army. The chari-
nasty, Sesostris III, who ruled from 1878 to 1843 oteers, who were called "Hyksos" by the
B.C., Egypt's government was reorganized into Egyptians (and who included not only the origi-
three parts, each with a governor. Sesostris also nal Indo-Europeans but contingents of previ-
extended Egyptian power into Nubia, the region ously conquered tribes), came thundering in
along the Nile River south of Egypt (which is across the Sinai Peninsula, the one vulnerable
now northern Sudan). chink in Egypt's armor.
Some time after 2000 B.C., however, the Indo- The Hyksos had no difficulty. The appalled
European tribes east of the Caspian Sea put the Egyptians were easily defeated. The Middle
horse to a new use. They had trained them to Kingdom came to an end and, for the first time,
drag a light chariot with large wheels, consisting Egypt fell under foreign domination. The Hyksos
of nothing more than a platform on which two did not try to hold the entire length of the Egyp-
men could stand. One man held the reins and tian Nile. There were too few of them. They had
controlled the horse, while the other carried a won by not by their numbers.
their chariots,
spear or a bow and arrow. Therefore, they established their capital in the
This amounted to a new weapon. There northeast portion of the delta near the Sinai Pen-
would be a racing cloud of such charioteers bear- insula,from which direction they had come.
ing down on the foot-soldiers of the civilized re- They quickly adopted Egyptian culture.
Twodynasties of Hyksos kings ruled over the At first,the laws of a society are its customs
Egyptians, the 15th and 16th dynasties. It may and traditions; and people referred to the old
have been at this time that certain Canaanites men of the society for guidance as to what those
entered Egypt and were treated kindly by customs and traditions might be. Dissatisfaction
Egypt's Asian rulers. This may have given rise to grew, however, along with the suspicion that
the Biblical tale of Joseph and his brothers. those who "remember" the
ruled a land could
Upriver, in the city of Thebes, however, the laws in such a way as to benefit themselves. The
Egyptians retained a center of power, and its rul- clamor grew, then, for a written law-code, and
ers reigned as the 17th Dynasty. Slowly, the the "Code of Hammurabi" is one of the oldest
Egyptians developed a charioteer contingent for known examples, and is certainly the oldest that
their own armies, and when the 18th Dynasty we have in such detail.
came to power, with dynamic pharaohs, the

Hyksos were defeated. By 1570 B.C., a century ASSYRIA
and Hyksos had made their ap-
a half after the
Meanwhile, upper valley of the Tigris-Eu-
in the
pearance, the Egyptians, under Ahmose, who
phrates, the Amorites founded another kingdom
ruled from 1570 to 1546 B.C., drove them out of
with its capital at the Akkadian city of Ashur.
the land.
The kingdom itself was also known as Ashur,
The Egyptians followed them across the Sinai
and the later Greeks called it Assyria. It's most
Peninsula and annexed Canaan, hoping it would
important early king was Shamshi-Adad I, who
serve as a buffer against future invasions.
ruled from 1749 to 1717 B.C. After his time, As-
By 1500 B.C., then, the "New Kingdom" was
syria fell under the domination of Hammurabi of
established. This was also called the "Egyptian
Babylon.
Empire," because it ruled over Asians as well as
However, about 1530 B.C., a century and a
Egyptians.
half after the death of Hammurabi, Babylonia
and Assyria alike were conquered by charioteers
BABYLONIA from the north, a group called "Kassites" in the
later histories.
After 2000 B.C., the Sumerians rapidly declined
and passed out of history, although the language
persisted for 2000 years and remained known to MITANNI
scholars (as Latin is today) before dying out alto- At this time, certain charioteers called "Hurri-
gether. ans," whose language was neither Indo-Euro-
New invaders took over the Tigris-Euphrates pean nor Semitic, settled down west of Assyria,
valley, adopting Sumerian culture and adding founding the kingdom of Mitanni, in what is
some of their own. A tribe known as the "Amo- now northwestern Iraq.
rites," speaking a Semitic language, took over a
small Akkadian town named Bab-ilum (Akka-
dian for "gate of God") about 1800 B.C., and
HITTITES
made it their capital. It then entered a 1500-year Farther west still, in eastern Asia Minor, the Hit-
period of greatness. The later Greeks called it had now founded a strong kingdom, Hatti,
tites
Babylon, and the region that had been thought under Labarnas I, who ruled from 1680 to 1650
of as Sumeria for 3000 years came to be called B.C.
Babylonia.
In 1728 B.C., Hammurabi (d. 1686 B.C.) be-
came king in Babylon and spread his rule over all
CRETE
of Babylonia. He is remembered, in history, Crete reached the peak of power in this pe-
its
chiefly because a stone pillar, dating back to his riod. It dominated the Aegean Sea and its coast-
reign, still exists. It is inscribed with a law-code. lines.
2000 TO 1500 B.C. 41
By 1600 B.C., invading from the north

tribes
entered the land we now call Greece, and they INDIA
were the people we call Greeks. (They them- The charioteers invaded Asia by 1500 B.C., and
selves called the land Hellas, and themselves put an end to the Indus civilization, which may
Hellenes. The name “Greece” was first used by have had a population of 1 million at its peak.
the Romans.) The invaders of India called themselves “Ar-
The early Greeks had as their chief city, My- yans,” from their word for “noble.” They spoke
cenae, in the northeast corner of the Peloponne- an Indo-European language known as “San-
sus (the southernmost peninsula of Greece) and skrit.” It is because they brought this language
are, therefore, referred to as Myceneans. At its into India, while other charioteers spread related
height, however, Crete held the Myceneans in languages westward into Europe, that we call the
subjection. (Thus, there are well-known Greek language-family “Indo-European .
legends of Minos of Crete demanding annual Occasionally, Indo-European languages are

hostages from Athens until the Athenian legend- referred as “Aryan languages,” and Indo-Euro-
ary hero, Theseus, ended it.) peans are spoken of as “Aryans.” Events in mod-
What really put an end to Cretan power, how- ern times, however, have brought this term into
ever, was a natural catastrophe. total disrepute and it is no longer used.
About 80 miles north of Crete was the island
of Thera. It was the center of a flourishing Mi-
noan civilization, and was a busy trade center. CHINA
The island, however, happened to be the top By 1500 B.C., China had entered the Bronze Age,
of a volcano sticking out of the sea, though it and was ruled by the Shang dynasty, the first
gave no signs of life, and no one suspected its that can be considered historical. It was chiefly
nature. centered in what is now northern China. By
Then, about 1500 B.C., it exploded with a now, China had system of writing, as complex
its
thunderous roar, the most violent volcanic explo- as that of Babylonia or Egypt. The Shang dynasty
sion that we know of in historic times. A rain of may have ruled over 5 million people, so that
ashes on Crete, and tsunamis (“tidal waves”)
fell China was already more populous than any king-
struck its shores, and also the shores of Greece, dom in the west, a situation that was to continue
which may have given rise to Greek legends con- down to the present day.
cerning a great flood. Where Thera had been,
there was only a hole in the sea bottom; and it
was this explosion that may have given rise to PACIFIC ISLANDS
the Greek legend of Atlantis. By 1500 B.C., the people of southeastern Asia
Crete was greatly weakened by this explosion were beginning to spread out to nearby Pacific
and the Minoan civilization tottered to its end, islands, a process which was to continue for
thereafter. nearly 3000 years.
1500 TO 1200 B.C.

Akhenaton was succeeded by his son-in-law,
EGYPT Tutankhamen, who reigned from 1362 to 1352
Egypt continued to be the world's leading power B.C. Under him, the old religion was restored.
under the 18th Dynasty. Tuthmosis III, who He is best-known today because his tomb hap-
reigned from 1504 to 1450 B.C., led Egyptian ar- pened to be the only one that was not rifled by
mies into Asia in 1483 B.C., and conquered Ca- robbers. It was discovered, intact, in 1922, with
naan. He then marched farther northward and all that had been buried with him, a find of the
defeated Mitanni. He also led his army far up the importance for archaeologists.
first
Nile, adding those regions to his dominions. A new and vigorous dynasty arose, the 19th,
Tuthmosis III won his victories by the skillful and Rameses II, who reigned for 67 years, from
use of charioteers. The conquered, as is often the 1304 to 1237 B.C., strenuously defended the
case, had learned from the conquerors and gone boundaries of the Empire. In 1298 B.C., he
them one better. He is called "Tuthmosis the fought a violent and bloody battle in Syria
Great" by some historians, who usually make against the Hittites. Both sides claimed victory,
use of "the Great" as a way of indicating success- but the general feeling is that it was the Hittites
ful —
campaigns though greatness in
military who had won. (By tradition, Rameses II is the
peace and humanity might seem a better excuse Pharaoh under whom the Israelites were en-
for the characterization. slaved and in whose court Moses grew to man-
By 1450 B.C., then, Egypt had reached its hood. However, there is nothing outside the
maximum expansion. It was at that time the Bible to support this.)
strongest, wealthiest, and most advanced nation In 1200 B.C., then, the Egyptian Empire was
in the world, and its population may have still going concern, still
a the leading power on
reached 3 million. Earth apparently, although its very victories
His son and grandson, Amenophis II, who were destroying it.
reigned from 1450 to 1425 B.C., and Amenophis This frequently happens. A nation is victo-
III, who reigned from 1417 to 1379 B.C., main- rious and seems unstoppable, but, as it extends
tained the empire and engaged in magnificent its boundaries, it has more and more land which
architectural achievements. Thebes, their capital, it must guard. The people of the conquering na-
became the greatest city in the world. tion grow war-weary, a large share of the sea-
Then came Amenophis IV, who reigned from soned soldiers have died in battle, and the
1379 to 1362 B.C. He found something that inter- defeated nations constantly rebel. The victorious
ested him far more than either war or architec- nation becomes a mere shell —
imposing on
still
ture. He is the we know (as a historic

first person the outside, but rotten and hollow inside. A
figure and not as a legend) who was a "monothe- puncture of that shell anywhere is likely to bring
ist" and believed in a single God — in his case, the whole structure down in collapse. That was
the Sun-god, or "Aton." He renamed himself the threatened case with Egypt in 1200 B.C., and
"Akhenaton" ("servant of Aton") and founded a with many other realms in later times.
new capital between Memphis and Thebes which
he called Akhetaton ("place of power of Aton").
The priestly caste fought him bitterly, and so ASSYRIA
did the people, who wanted their old ways, and Mitanni's defeat by Egypt made it possible for
while this fight went on, Egypt's power was ne- expand again.
Assyria, to the east of Mitanni, to
glected and the Empire declined. Two successive Assyrian kings, Shalmaneser I,
1500 TO 1200 B.C. 43
who reigned from 1274 to 1245 B.C., and Tukulti- up of an iron-nickel alloy that was unusually
ninurta I, who reigned from 1245 to 1208 B.C., hard.
managed to conquer all the Tigris-Euphrates val- It was possible to form iron from rocky ores
ley. (Tukulti-ninurta I may possibly have in- just as one could form copper and tin from ores.
spired the reference to “Nimrod" as a great Iron ores, however, required considerably hotter
hunter in the Bible. The Assyrian kings were de- temperatures in smelting, and charcoal rather
voted hunters, and much artwork was devoted than wood had to be used for the task. Even
to their pursuit of dangerous animals.) then, the iron that was formed (without nickel)
By 1200 B.C., the Assyrian Empire seemed wasn't hard enough for the tasks expected of it.
large and powerful and had begun its policy of Carbon had to be added to make “steel."
waging war with deliberate frightfulness, sack- About 1300 B.C., the technique for smelting
ing cities and killing their inhabitants indiscrimi- and carbonizing iron was developed in the Cau-
nately, in order to sap the will of their enemies casian foothills. This was under the control of the
and to have them half-defeated even before the Hittites, who picked up the technique. The Hit-
battle began. This sort of thing works for a time, tite kings carefully maintained a monopoly over
but it breeds a fearful and never-ending hatred, the new technique for they recognized its impor-
which those who practice frightfulness often tance in war weapons.
have to pay for in the end. This marked the beginning of the “Iron Age"
and, once the Hittite Empire was destroyed, their
monopoly was broken and the use of iron, begin-
HITTITES ning in 1200 B.C., started to spread.
The Hittites had become a great power under
Suppiluliumas I, who
reigned from 1375 to 1334
B.C. Under his son, Mussilish II, who reigned GREECE
from 1334 to 1306 B.C., the Hittites raided Baby- With Crete shaken by the catastrophe
to its core
lon and were then at the peak of their power. of the explosion of Thera, the Mycenean Greeks
Under Muwatallish, who reigned from 1306 to were able to take over the island and Crete was
1282 B.C., the Hittites fought the Battle of Ka- never again to play an important role in history.
desh against Rameses II, and won, but the vic- The Myceneans attempted to spread eastward
tory was a costly one. They recovered and into Asia Minor as well, taking advantage of the
continued to rule over most of Asia Minor, de- havoc created by the Phrygian invasion. The
stroying and absorbing Mitanni, but they had commercial city of Troy in the northwest corner
been crucially weakened. of Asia Minor was besieged and destroyed. This
About 1200 B.C., as a result, when tribesmen was eventually magnified into a great 10-year
called “Phrygians" invaded Asia Minor, the Hit- war, and the poetry of Homer made the incident
tites lacked the strength to fight them off and world-famous. The siege took place about 1200
their empire came to an end, after over a century B.C.
and a half of power. Before the Hittites passed
out of history, however, they had accomplished
an important feat. ISRAEL
For 1500 years, men had fought with bronze The foundations for religions
Israelites laid the
weapons, but there was something tougher and that are now the most important in the world.
harder known. There were pieces of a gray-black They which contains their
also created the Bible,
metal occasionally found which, when beaten legends, history, poetry, and ethical teachings. It
into plowshares, swords, knives or lance-heads, has proved to be the most important and influ-
made for tools and weapons that were far supe- ential book ever written.
rior to those made out of bronze. These lumps of Their legends describe a period of slavery in
metal were actually meteorites and were made Egypt. There they may have picked up monothe-
ist notions trom Akhenaton. About 1200 B.C., From the west came the wave of invaders, My-
when Egypt had the appearance of strength,
still ceneans and Phrygians, that had struck Asia
but was past its peak, groups of Israelites man- Minor, and now were landing on the Canaanite
aged to escape from the land (the "Exodus") coast. They were the (who eventually
Philistines
under the legendary leadership of Moses, and to gave the land its name of Palestine.) By 1200
join other tribes that were invading Canaan. Ca- B.C., Canaan was virtually in anarchy, and Jeri-
naan was no longer being held by a weakening cho, which had existed for nearly seven thou-
Egyptian Empire. sand years, was temporarily destroyed.
The Israelites were coming from the east.
1200 TO 1000 B.C.
EGYPT ISRAEL
Rameses III Dynasty ruled Egypt from
of the 20th For two centuries, the invading Israelites from
1188 to 1156 B.C. He had to face the turbulent the east and the invading Philistines from the
invaders who had wrecked Asia Minor and Ca- west tore at Canaan. For a while, the Philistines,
naan. They attacked from the sea, and the Egyp- who had iron weapons, dominated the Israelites
tians called them "People from the Sea." and Canaanites alike; however, about 1000 B.C.,
With a supreme effort, the Egyptians defeated the Israelites had gained iron weapons for them-
the invaders, but the strain of doing so finally selves. David, of the southern tribe of Judah,
wore them out. By 1000 B.C., the Egyptian Em- managed to seize the Israelite throne and to de-
pire was no more, and Egypt remained a minor feat the Philistines, who effectively disappeared
power thereafter. The great days were gone, from history thereafter.
leaving behind only the imperishable monu-
—
ments the pyramids, the sphinx, the obelisks,
and the colossal statues and temples all of —
which served to impress later generations. PHOENICIA
The Canaanites, having most of
lost control of
their land, maintained themselves only on the
ASSYRIA Lebanese coast, which the later Greeks called
Assyria reeled back under the hammer blows of "Phoenicia." Their most important city was, at
the Phrygians, but then, under Tiglath-Pileser I, first, Sidon.
who reigned from 1116 to 1078 B.C., it was resur- Since the Cretan thalassocracy had vanished,
gent and built up its empire again — for the third the sea was open to any seamen brave enough to
time. venture forth, and this the Phoenicians did. They
After Tiglath-Pileser's death, however, a new were, in fact, the first to venture out into the
wave Arameans, came
of Semitic tribesmen, the open sea far from the sight of land. This may be
flooding into the Tigris-Euphrates valley and because they discovered how to tell direction on
into Syria. By 1000 B.C., the Assyrians had fallen clear nights. It was obvious that the Sun rose in
back — for the third time. the east and set in the west and that, when it was
high in the sky in the middle of the day, it was
always to the south. What the Phoenicians may
have noticed was that, by night, the Big Dipper
1200 TO 1000 B.C. 45
was always to the north, and that gave you your sus (in particular, the old Mycenean city of
directions. Sparta, the home of the beautiful
legendary
By 1000 B.C., the Phoenicians were beginning Helen, over whom the Trojan War was supposed
to flourish through sea-trade. to have been fought).
The Phoenicians, located as they were be- A number of Greeks, now called lonians, sur-
tween Babylonia (with its complicated cuneiform vived in eastern Greece, notably in Athens. Oth-
writing) and Egypt (with its equally complicated ers fled themainland and settled on the Aegean
hieroglyphic writing), could not trade easily un- islands and on the coasts of Asia Minor. The cen-
less they could handle both languages. Life tralportion of that coast came to be known as
would have been far easier for them
they could
if "Ionia."
have worked out a simpler writing code. By 1000 B.C., the Aegean Sea was surrounded
Attempts had been made as
in this direction by Greek cities on all its shores and islands but,
early as 1400 B.C., but without total success. By nevertheless, Greece went through a period in
1000 B.C., however, the Phoenicians had an al- which civilization receded. It took a while for the
phabet, each letter representing a consonantal new invaders to learn civilized ways, and so
sound, and, using that alphabet, any language there followed a "dark age" for Greece.
could be written down simply.
Writing was developed independently in a va-
riety of places; in Sumeria, in China, and in ETRUSCANS
southern Mexico, for instance. The alphabet, Just as the Greeks fled the mainland
escape to
however, was developed only once, by the the Dorians, so it may be that some people of
Phoenicians. All alphabets in use today, however Asia Minor fled by sea to escape the Phrygians.
different they may seem, are clearly descended By 1000 B.C., such refugees had reached the
from that of the Phoenicians. western shores of Italy. They were later known
as "Etruscans", and they represented the first
civilization in Italy. Their language has never
PHRYGIA been deciphered, however, and we know little
By 1000 B.C., the Phrygians in Asia Minor had about them.
settled down and become civilized. Indeed, they
flourished, as we can see from the later Greek
legend of the Phrygian king, Midas, with his INDIA
"golden touch." Obviously, the Greeks thought In India, by 1000 B.C., the Indo-European tribes
of him, enviously, as a wealthy king. were spreading down the Ganges river, and
were writing poetry. The oldest surviving poetry
of this sort is the "Rib Veda," which contains
GREECE over a thousand hymns to various gods.
The sack of Troy was the last important feat of
the Mycenean Greeks. The turmoil of invasion
struck Greece itself when new Greek-speaking CHINA
tribes, They had
the Dorians, invaded Greece. In China, by 1000 B.C., the Shang dynasty had
iron weapons, and the bronze-weaponed Myce- been replaced by the Chou dynasty. At this time,
neans could not stand before them. The Dorians the nobles grew to be important. China became
took over the southern and eastern Peloppone- feudalist, and that continued for centuries.
46
ISRAEL
David, who
B.C., extended Israelite territory
the South to
north.
1000
^
ASIMOV'S
from Egypt in
the upper Euphrates River in the
The entire eastern coast of the Mediterra-
nean Sea was Israelite, and this has always been
remembered by the Jews as their '^natural bound-
TO
reigned over Israel from 1000 to 960
aries." This, in fact, is one of the miseries of his-

tory. Every nation remembers how things were
—
CHRONOLOGY OF THE WORLD
900 B.C.
EGYPT
Soon breakup of the Israelite kingdom,
after the
about 918 B.C., an Egyptian army, under Shesh-
onk ("Shishak" in the Bible) of the 22nd Dynasty,
who reigned from 935 to 914, B.C. sacked Jeru-
salem and the Temple.
ASSYRIA
,
was going through a process of recovery.

at the time of its maximum extent and power,
Assyria
which is what it considers just and natural. Nat- By 900 B.C., it was busy restoring its control over
urally, there are overlappings in every direction Babylonia and other regions that it had con-
and the territorial quarrels never end. trolled before the Phrygian invasion.
David established the capital of Israel at Jeru-
salem, which has remained a holy city to impor-
tant segments of the world's population ever
GREECE
since. Greece had broken up into separate city-states.
Solomon, David's son and successor, reigned This was a natural consequence of the mountain-
from 962 to 922 B.C. He attempted no further ous nature of the land, where each valley con-
conquests, but lived in luxury and, largely, in sidered itself a separate political unit.
peace. He built a temple to the Israelite god; one The city of Athens, however, managed to
that was unique in the ancient world because it bring under its control the peninsula of Attica, so
contained no sculptured representations of any that it was large for a Greek city-state. Even so,
god-figure. On the whole, his reign was looked it was only about 1000 square miles in area, about
back upon as a golden age. as large as the American state of Rhode Island.
The people conquered by David, however, the Monarchy went out of fashion in Greece, with
Moabites, the Edomites, the Ammonites, and so some exceptions at the fringes. In most of the
on, were all restive. In fact, David and Solomon city-states, the rule was held by a few important
—
were Judeans of the southern tribe of Judah families. (These were oligarchies —
Greek for "rule
and the northern tribes resented the Judean by the few.")
domination.
In 922 B.C., after the death of Solomon, the
Israelite kingdom (with the help of Egyptian in-
PHOENICIA
trigue) broke in two —
Israel in the north and The Phoenicians were by now ranging the length
Judah in the south. The separated kingdoms of the Mediterranean Sea. It may have been the
could not hold on to the subject nations and, by wonder-tales they brought back from the myste-
900 B.C., the brief period of Israelite glory was rious western portion of the Mediterranean that
gone. inspired Homer to write the tale of Odysseus'
By 900 B.C., some Israelite writing had ap- travels in the Odyssey.
peared that was later be incorporated into

to The Phoenicians had established trading posts
the Bible. The Song of Deborah is an example on the western shores and, by 900 B.G., may
of this. even have ventured past the Strait of Gibraltar
900 TO 800 B . C 47
out into the Atlantic Ocean. Tin ores were being but serves also to prevent anyone from
cuirties)
exhausted in western Asia (the first case of a nat- moving out of it. This destroys ambition and en-
ural resource disappearing), and the Phoenicians terprise, and prevents from making full
a society
may have gone to Cornwall ("the Tin Islands") use of gifted individuals. India's caste system
to find new sources. They kept the location secret acted to slow necessary change, and to enforce a
to preserve their monopoly. certain stagnation.
INDIA NORTH AMERICA

At about this period, the castesystem was com- The important civilization to arise in North
first
ing into existence in India. This divided the pop- America was that of the Olmecs, who flourished
ulation into a hierarchy of positions, depending in southern Mexico. It was at its peak in 900 B.C.,
on birth, marriage, and occupation. This gave and its most startling artifacts were colossal
everyone a place (which has its comforts and se- heads about nine feet high.
900 TO 800 B.C.

her as much more powerful than she really
ASSYRIA was.
Assyria continued to grow stronger after 900 B.C.
Under Ashurnasirpal II, who reigned
from 883 to
859 B.C., the Assyrian army went out on annual ISRAEL
campaigns and fought battles in which the killing Israel, under its king Ahab, who ruled from 874
of prisoners reached a sadistic peak. Ashurnasir- to 853 B.C., had to face Assyria, and it was done
paTs son, Shalmaneser III, who reigned from 859 in combination with other nations of the west.
to 824 B.C., continued the campaigns. These included Judah, which, in this century,
By now the Assyrians had learned the tech- was virtually an Israelite puppet, and Aram (bet-
nique of making good iron in quantity, and their ter known as Syria). In 854 B.C., the coalition
army was the first to be completely outfitted with actually defeated Assyria in battle, and won
iron weapons. In addition, the Assyrians had some breathing room, but that just meant that
learned how to mount and The
control a horse. Syria and Israel turned against each other, and
chariot disappeared in warfare, since cavalry was Ahab died in battle against Syria. By 800 B.C.,
faster and more maneuverable. It was these ad- the situation looked quite dark. Assyria was, at
vances that were responsible for Assyrian victo- the moment, quiet, but surely it would rise
ries. again.
However, Assyria grew war-weary and there Meanwhile, Israel and Judah were not truly
were revolts that forced it, once again, to pause The writers of the
monotheistic. Bible tried to
in itsexpansion. Toward 800 B.C., the Assyrian make monotheism the stern belief of Moses and
king was a minor, and his mother, Sammuramat, David, but even if it were, the people did not
was the head of the government. Al-
effective follow them any more than the Egyptian people
though she wasn't much of a warrior, it seemed had followed Akhenaton. The Israelites, like the
so unusual to have a woman the head of a na- Egyptians, didn't want austere monotheism and
tion so devoted to war that the Greeks built preferred the colorful rites of gods involved with
their legend of Semiramis about her, describing the realities of agriculture and daily life.
The Yahwists (those who believe in Yahweh way 814 B.C., the city of Carthage
to Spain. In
as the single god of the Jews) were always a mi- was founded near the site of modern Tunis.
nority at this time, and were, in fact, persecuted
—
by the kings who found them rigid and ex-
INDIA
treme, and getting in the way of practical politics.
The outstanding Yahwists of this century were Some time before 800 B.C., Indian mathemati-
Elijah and Elisha. The Bible, written in later times cians began to use a symbol for "zero." Until that
by Yahwists, present them as wonder-working was done, there seemed no way of reasonably
prophets and their opponents as villains. Thus, limiting number symbols to a very few. With the
Ahab, the king who actually stopped Assyria for zero, we can easily distinguish between 1, 10,
a while, painted in the darkest colors in the

is 100, and so on. Without the zero, separate sym-
Bible, along with his wife, Jezebel. His victory bols are needed for "one," "10," and "100." With
over Assyria isn't even mentioned. the zero, we can easily distinguish between 23,
203, and 230. Without the zero, it is much more
complicated.
GREECE The use of the zero symbol, and the concept
By 800 B.C., Homer (concerning whom next to of positional notation in numbers, spread out-
—
nothing is known not even if he really existed) ward from India, but (believe it or not) took 2000
had written the Iliad and the Odyssey, two over- years to come into use in Europe, although the
whelming masterpieces that are as alive and as idea was simple and the advantages were ob-
popular now as they were when they were first vious and enormous.
written. The Greek language and these two epic
poems were among those factors that held to-
gether thenumerous city-states of Greece.
URARTU
About the same time, Hesiod was writing This (the Biblical "Ararat") was a kingdom estab-
Theogony, which was an important guide to lished about 835 B.C. in the foothills of the
Greek mythology and to the ancient aristocratic Caucasus, north of Assyria. It had been where
Olympian gods, led by Zeus, god of the sky and iron-smelting was first developed some four cen-
of storms. turies earlier, and it was still rich in iron and
copper mines.
PHOENICIA
Phoenicians continued to set up trading centers
along the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea, all the
800 TO 700 B.C.

Mediterranean shore were finally subdued. Ara-
ASSYRIA maic Syria was conquered in 732 B.C., and van-
After a 50-year period of comparative weakness, ished from history (although other people were
Assyria gained still another renewal of strength to inhabit the land which would be called Syria
— its last and greatest — thanks to Tiglath-Pileser down to the present day).
III, reigned from 745 to 727 B.C. He began

who Tiglath-Pileser was succeeded by Shalma-
III
the process whereby the kingdoms along the neser V, who reigned from 726 to 722 B.C., and
800 TO 700 B.C. 49
then by the king of a new dynasty, Sargon

first
II, who reigned from 722 to 705 B.C. Sargon de- GREECE
feated Israel in 722 B.C. and Urartu in 714 B.C., The Greek city-states, with their population
and both nations vanished from history as well. booming as they emerged from their dark-age
In 700 B.C., then, the Assyrian Empire in- period, took advantage of Phoenician subjection
cluded all the Tigris-Euphrates region and all the to Assyria, and became the new sea-traders and
eastern shore of the Mediterranean. It was the navigators of the period. In particular, they
most powerful political-military entity the world searched for colonies that might absorb their sur-
had yet seen. plus population. Greek city-states sprang up
along the shores of the Black Sea, in Sicily and in
southern Italy, in North Africa, and so on. they
ISRAEL AND JUDAH found competition was not from the Phoeni-
it
If
During the period of Assyrian weakness, Israel cians themselves, but from the expanding power
gained strength and, under Jeroboam II, who of Carthage.
reigned from 783 to 748 B.C., David's old empire In the end, Greek colonies occupied most of
was almost reconstituted. Even Judah was a vas- the Mediterranean shores. The most notable col-
sal state of Israel. It was, however, an illusion. ony, perhaps, was Syracuse, on the western
Once Assyria regained its strength and was on shore of Sicily, which was founded in 735 B.C.
the march again, Israel could not stand. Israel Within Greece itself, Sparta, in the south,
was attacked and its capital, Samaria, was taken fought a long war with Messenia to its west, de-
after a three-year siege in 722 B.C. Sargon had feating it and enslaving its people. In 700 B.C.,
begun a new policy of deporting the aristocracy Sparta had become the largest city-state in
of a conquered nation, leaving the remnant lead- Greece, and it was on its way to becoming the
erless and incapable of rebellion. This was cruel, dominating military force in the land.
but not as cruel as Assyrian massacres and muti- The Greek Olympic Games were held in honor
lations had been in the past. of Apollo every four years at Olympia in the
Israel's aristocracy was deported and the na- western Peloponnesus. It developed into the
tion disappeared from history. There were leg- most joyous festival in the Greek calendar, with
ends for 2000 years afterward that the "ten lost athletic contests and cultural competitions. It
tribes of Israel" had formed a mighty kingdom lasted for days and was open to all Greek-speak-
somewhere in the hidden depths of Asia, but the ing cities. Wars were suspended so that all might
deportees had merely been moved a short dis- compete peacefully.
tance, had intermarried with the surrounding The first Olympic games were supposed to
population, and had lost their identity. have been celebrated in 776 B.C., and eventually
As 700 B.C. approached, Judah was still in- the Greeks counted the years by so many "Olym-
tact, but it was clearly next on the Assyrian time- piads." Together with the Greek language and
table of conquest. the Homeric poems, the Olympic games were
the third factor holdmg the Greeks together.
PHOENICIA
The Phoenician city-states were also conquered CIMMERIANS
by Assyria and, under that nation's harsh rule, In the fertile plains north of the Black Sea (which
the Phoenician sea-trade withered. However, the we now call nomadic
the "Ukraine"), various
Phoenician colonies in the west remained inde- tribesmen appeared and impinged upon the set-
pendent and, indeed, gained greater freedom of tled kingdoms to the south.
action as a result. About 750 B.C., for instance, the Cimmerians
appeared and eventually occupied the peninsula
of Crimea on the northern shore of the Black Sea.
"Cimmeria.") way out of the burning city, with his father, wife,
(''Crimea" may be a distortion of
They soon expanded into Asia Minor and helped and son. Aeneas was described as having trav-
eled from Troy to the west coast of Italy by way
the Assyrians defeat Urartu.
of Carthage. In Carthage, he met Queen Dido,
the legendary founder of the Phoenician colony.
ETRUSCANS (The fact that Carthage was founded four centu-
power expanded along ries after the fall of Troy rather spoils the story.)
In this period, Etruscan
A
loose union of Needless to say, the story was pure fabrica-
the west-central coast of Italy.
though was taken as seriously by later
city-states, each ruled by a king, was being
tion, it
formed. On the Tiber River, at the southern rim generations as the tale of Adam and Eve was.
Aeneas may have its faint kernel
of Etruscan power, the city of Rome was
Still, the story of
founded. The traditional date was 753 B.C. of truth in its reflection of the coming of the
In later times, the history of Rome was traced Etruscans from Asia Minor to western Italy.
Rome was, at the start, a town that was either
back to Troy. When the city was taken by the
under Etruscan domination.
Mycenean Greeks, the hero Aeneas, made his Etruscan or, at least,
700 TO 600 B.C.

Assyria now
reached the greatest extent of its
ASSYRIA territory and power.
Under Sennacherib, who succeeded Sargon II, Under Esarhaddon's successor, Ashurbanipal,
and who reigned from 705 to 681 B.C., the Assyr- who reigned from 669 to 627 B.C., the city of
ians attacked Judah, and, in 701 B.C., after hav- Nineveh, which had been established by Sen-
ing devastated the land, they laid siege to nacherib as Assyria's capital, was further beauti-
Jerusalem. Unlike Samaria, Jerusalem was not ac- fied and enlarged. It was the largest city in the
world at that time. Within Ashurbanipal estab-
tually taken, and unlike Israel, Judah was not
it,
lished the largest library the world had yet seen,

wiped out. The Bible describes this as the result
of a miracle, but miracles are less common in real one that contained over 22,000 clay tablets.
than in religious legends. What happened
life
However, the last century of endless Assyrian
was that Sennacherib was faced with threats campaigning, even though victorious, had taken
its toll. Ashurbanipal was forced to fight off re-
from Egypt and revolts at home so that he was
ready to accept a simple capitulation and a large bellions in Babylonia, in Elam, and in Egypt, and
tribute from the Judeans and leave them in peace the Assyrians, while again victorious, were
as an Assyrian puppet nation. brought to the edge of exhaustion.

Sennacherib's son and successor, Esarhad- Fifteen years after the death of Ashurbanipal,
Assyria found itself fighting rebels again and this
don, who reigned from 680 to 669 B.C., attacked
Egypt. For four centuries, Egypt had been a time, could not gather the strength it needed.
it
minor power, living on its past glories and barely Nineveh fell in 612 B.C., and the strategy of
able to hold its own against the Libyans to the frightfulness recoiled on Assyria terribly, for it
west and the Nubians to the south. was wiped out mercilessly by the people who
In 671 B.C., it fell to Assyria, which occupied fought against it. This time there would be no
the northern portion of the nation, as once the recovery ever. By 600 B.C., Assyria, which had
Hyksos had done nearly nine centuries earlier. seemed to be untouchable in its enormous power
700 TO 600 B . C .
51
only a quarter century before, had been thor- Cyaxares then ruled over the Median Empire,
oughly wiped out, and vanished from the pages which included all the territory from eastern Asia
of history. Minor, where six centuries earlier the Hittites
had ruled, stretching north of the Tigris-Eu-
phrates and eastward into the dim stretches of
CHALDEA central Asia. bulked much larger on the map
It
The Chaldeans had dominated Babylonia for than the Chaldean Empire, but it was loosely or-
over two centuries but had lived in the shadow ganized and not very powerful militarily.
of Assyria. They had rebelled on several occa-
sions but were beaten, and Babylon was tempo-
rarily destroyed by an angry and vengeful EGYPT
Sennacherib. Egypt had remained under Assyrian rule for half
At the death of Ashurbanipal, however, the a century, and Psamtik I, a native Egyptian, was
Chaldean governor, Nabopolassar, who was in governor of Egypt on behalf of Assyria from 664
power from 625 to 605 B.C., saw his chance and, B.C. As Assyria weakened, he declared Egypt
in alliance with tribesmen to the north and east independent and founded the 26th dynasty, rul-
of Assyria, he attacked. The Assyrians, worn ing until 610 B.C.
out, fell, and Assyria was wiped out. He invited Greeks into the country. They set
When Nabopolassar died, his even more ca- up trading posts on the coast, and their mercan-
pable son, Nebuchadrezzar II (630-562 B.C.) suc- tile enterprise redounded to the benefit and pros-
ceeded. Nebuchadrezzar founded the Chaldean perity of Egypt.
empire (also called the Neo-Babylonian Empire) Psamtik I was succeeded by his son, Necho II,
and by 600 B.C., he ruled over much of the terri- who reigned from 610 to 595 B.C. II Necho
tory that Assyria had ruled over in 700 B.C. dreamed of reestablishing the Egyptian Empire
and sought to take advantage of the death of Na-
bopolassar. He led an Egyptian army into Judah
MEDIA and Syria, but the new Chaldean king, Nebu-
The Medians (orMedes) were a group of tribes chadrezzar, was more than a match for Necho.
who lived in what is now northwestern Iran. At the Carchemish in northern Syria,
Battle of
They first made appearance in history at
their the Egyptians were badly defeated and fled back
about the time the Chaldeans did, but remained to Egypt.
obscure for two centuries. They hung along the Egypt was fortunate in that Nebuchadrezzar
eastern rim of the Assyrian Empire, and were, chose not to stretch his dominions unnecessarily
for much of the time, a client kingdom of the and left Egypt to itself. In 600 B.C., therefore,
Assyrians. Egypt was able to look forward to a period of
About 625 B.C., the Medes were united under peace.
a vigorous king, Cyaxares, who reigned from 625 Necho indulged in at least two large projects
to 585 B.C. (Cyaxares was the Greek version of that we can admire today. First, he labored to
his name. His Median name was more like build a canal thatwould connect the Nile River
"Uvakhshtra," but I will use the Greek versions with the Red Sea, so that Egypt would have a
of the various Mideasterners of the time since river outlet to the east, as well as the north. He
they are better known in this form to the western didn't succeed, but it was a noble try.
public.)Cyaxares reorganized the Median army Second, he hired a Phoenician fleet to attempt
and he, like Nabopolassar of Chaldea, took the the circumnavigation of Africa. The fleet suc-
opportunity of AshurbanipaTs death to rebel ceeded in the task, taking three years to do so.
against Assyria. In alliance, the Medes and Chal- The Greek historian, Herodotus (484-425 B.C.),
deans destroyed Assyria. writing a century and a half later, tells us that the
Phoenicians reported that when they rounded

CIMMERIANS AND SCYTHIANS
Africa in the south, the noonday sun was in the
north. Since it was the experience of men in the The Cimmerians had not plunged southward
civilized areas of the world North Tem-
(in the into Asia Minor entirely of their own volition.
perate Zone) that the noonday sun was always in They were pursued by another set of Indo-Euro-
the south, Herodotus considered this report to pean nomads, the Scythians, who were skilled
be against the laws of nature and disbelieved it. horsemen. The Scythians were the first of a long
We know, however, that the Earth, being series of nomadic horsemen, in fact, who swept
spherical, would have the noonday sun always from Asia into the Ukraine to plague the settled
in the north when viewed from the South Tem-
regions to the south and (eventually) to the west.
perate Zone. The Phoenicians would not have Undoubtedly, the Cimmerians and the Scythians
reported so apparently nonsensical a phenome- inflictedenough damage on Assyria to contribute
non if they had not actually observed it. It is importantly to the decline and fall of that power.
because they did that we know they were suc- In western Asia Minor, the Cimmerians were
cessful at sailing around Africa. opposed by Lydia, a kingdom that was tributary
to Assyria. The Cimmerians were defeated by the
Lydians, and were also harried by the Scythians.
JUDAH After the defeat, the Cimmerians melted into the
After the siege of Jerusalem, Judah remained a surrounding population and vanished from his-
loyal Assyrian puppet. Under the rule of Menas- tory. (Nomadic tribes, however impressive their
military victories, are comparatively
usually
sah, from 692 to 639 B.C., Judah paid its tribute
and enjoyed a half century of peace. For this, and small in number. Once stopped, they intermarry
because Menassah further kept the peace by with the people about them, accept the sur-
practicing religious toleration, he was vilified in rounding culture, and lose their identity.)
the Bible. As for the Scythians, they were pushed back
As Assyria declined, however, Judah declared by Cyaxares of Media and retired northward to
itself independent again, and, under Josiah, who the Ukraine, where they remained a danger.
reigned from 640 to 609 B.C., Yahwism won a
temporary victory in Judah. Jerusalem was made
the center of all worship, and all subsidiary cult
LYDIA
centers were wiped out. A book of the law, our Once Cimmerians had destroyed Urartu and
the
present biblical book of Deuteronomy, centered Phrygia, and had themselves been defeated,
on Yahwism, was prepared and was "rediscov- Lydia was without a rival in western Asia Minor,
ered” in the Temple with great publicity and at- especially after Assyria fell. The Lydian king,
tributed to the hand of Moses. Judah's territory Gyges, had fallen in battle against the Cimmeri-
expanded and, for a while, Judah dreamed of ans in 648 B.C., but by 600 B.C. Lydia was a
reestablishing David's Empire as Egypt was strong kingdom under Alyattes, who had begun
dreaming of reestablishing its own. his reign in 619 B.C. By that time, the Lydians
When Necho II marched northward through were dominating the Greek city-states on the Ae-
Judah, Josiah opposed him and died in battle. gean coast of Asia Minor, but the Lydian rulers,
The Egyptian victory was short-lived, however, like the Egyptian rulers of the time, admired
for waiting in the north was the powerful Nebu- Greek culture and treated the Greeks' cities leni-
chadrezzar. ently.
By 600 B.C., Judah, its brief dream of glory

gone, found itself a puppet again. Now it was
the Chaldean Empire that was master.
GREECE
Sparta. Sparta had to face the city of Argos to
its north in a competition for control of southern
700 TO 600 B.C. 53
Greece. For a while, Argos, under its king, Phei- but the Spartans later devised the legend that it
don, seemed to have the upper hand, but with had been instituted two centuries earlier by the
Pheidon's death, about 650 B.C., Argos' power legendary Lycurgus, just to give it greater au-
faded. thenticity.
Sparta then had to face a revolt by the en-
slaved Messenians to their west. The Messenians Athens. In Athens, things moved in the oppo-
were defeated and reenslaved in 630 B.C.
finally The monarchy was abolished in
site direction.
Sparta, which had had a bad fright, decided that 683 B.C., and Athens placed itself under an oli-
the only way to maintain its supremacy was to garchy, from which an "archon" ("ruler") was
establish a thoroughly militaristic state and to chosen each year.
train its citizens for the sole task of fighting. The trouble with an oligarchy is that they usu-
The Greeks had already developed the notion ally slanted the social and economic milieu so as
of the "hoplite" (from a Greek word for armor) as to benefit themselves, and the common folk out-
a result of their endless intercity fighting. The side the oligarchy suffered. There was a clamor
hoplite was a heavily armed foot-soldier, with a to have a written law-code, therefore, one that
lance in his right hand for throwing, a shield on the oligarchy could not twist to its own service.
his left arm, a sword at his side, a helmet on his Such a writtencode was worked out by Draco
head, and armor encasing his body and legs. For about 620 B.C. It was a harsh system of laws with
some centuries, these hoplites were the best and heavy punishments for even trifling offenses
most valued soldiers in the Mediterranean area, (hence, the word "draconian" for severe treat-
and were frequently used by non-Greek monar- ment).
chies as mercenaries. The peasantry continued and to sink
to suffer
What the Spartans did was to intensify hoplite further into debt. Furthermore, as Athens en-
training. The Spartan aristocracy was reserved gaged in commerce more and more heavily, a
for war. Boys were placed into barracks at the middle class of traders and businessmen ap-
age of seven and made into complete soldiers. peared who joined with the oppressed peasantry
They were trained to fight in close order and to against the oligarchs.
attack and defend in unison so that the line was
a "phalanx" (a Greek word meaning /isf). What's Elsewhere. In general, when an oligarchy be-
more, they were expected not to retreat but to came too oppressive, some politician managed to
fight to the death. The result was that Spartan put himself at the head of the downtrodden
soldiers almost invariably won their battles and lower classes and made himself master of the
Sparta became the military leader of Greece. city. The Greek word for master is tyrannos, and
A second result was that Sparta was subjected this becomes "tyrant" in English. A tyrant is not
to a merciless caste system, and Spartan society necessarily a vicious or unjust ruler, but it came
hardened into an unchanging mold that could to mean that because tyrants, however well-
not change with the times. Thus, Sparta, alone meaning, were not backed by hereditary "right"
among the city-states of Greece, remained a and therefore had to use force to remain in
—
monarchy it had two kings, in fact, so that it power. In addition, power corrupts. Although
was a "dyarchy." The kings, however, served tyrants might begin their rule decently, they
primarily as army leaders, rather than as rulers. often used their power for their own aggrandize-
A third result was that cultural activity, in ment and financial profit.
which Sparta had, until then, been as active as In this period,however, Corinth was an ex-
the other Greek city-states, ceased entirely. ample of a city under a benevolent tyranny. Cyp-
Thereafter, Sparta had nothing to contribute to selus ruled the city from 657 to 627 B.C., and he
later generations in the way of literature, art, or was succeeded by his son, Periander, who ruled
philosophy. from 627 to 586 B.C. These tvrants ruled well,
By 600 B.C., Spartan militarism was in place. saw to it that the peasants were treated decently.
patronized art and literature, and encouraged

commerce, so that Corinth prospered and be-
ETRUSCANS
came Greece's major seaport. The Etruscans continued to flourish in western
On the Asia Minor coast, the Greek city-states Italy and were beginning to expand northward
squabbled with Lydia, and suffered some losses, toward the Po River valley. The city of Rome con-
but Lydian rule, in the end, proved light, and the tinued to live under its (legendary) kings. The
cities led a flourishing cultural life. fifth of these kings was Tarquinius Priscus, who
In Sicily and Italy, Greek city-states were ruled from 616 to 578 B.C. He was an Etruscan,
spreading along the shores. In Sicily, however, and this points to the fact that, even a century
the Greek city-states in the east encountered Car- and a half after its foundation, Rome was still
thaginian power in the west; while in Italy, the essentially Etruscan.
Greek city-states in the south encountered Etrus-

can power in the north.
CHINA
China continued to be divided into feudal king-
CARTHAGE doms but, by 600 B.C., it had entered the Iron
With Phoenicia first in the grip of Assyria and Age.
then of Chaldea, the western Phoenician colonies
went their own way. By 650 B.C., Carthage had
own navy and, thanks to its flourishing com-
JAPAN
its
No true historical writings can be found Japan
for
merce, could hire plenty of mercenary soldiers.
until several centuries later, but Japanese legends
It dominated and protected the other Phoenician
state that the first Emperor, Jimmu, began to rule
colonies. It controlled virtually all the north Afri-
in 660 B.C.
can coast west of Egypt, together with western
Sicily and the other western-Mediterranean is-
lands: Sardinia, Corsica, and the Balearic islands.
It had bases on the coast of Spain as well.
600 TO 550 B.C.

completed, it was 300 feet tall, well below the
CHALDEAN EMPIRE height of the Great Pyramid.
Under Nebuchadrezzar II, the Chaldean Empire Nebuchadrezzar also builtan elaborate palace
was at its peak in this period. Babylon, his capi- that rose in stages like a ziggurat. (Legend has it
tal, which had been rebuilt since its destruction that he did it to simulate a mountain because a
by Sennacherib a century before, was enlarged Median princess despised the flat plain of Baby-
and beautified, so that it gained the height of its lonia and longed for the mountains of home.) On
importance now, and became, for a time, the the terraces, he planted gardens. These were the
greatest city in the world. famous "Hanging Gardens of Babylon," later
Nebuchadrezzar completed a large ziggurat in considered one of the Seven Wonders of the an-
Babylon. It had stood for a long time unfinished cient world, along with the pyramids of Egypt.
and had served as the inspiration for the Biblical Nebuchadrezzar is sometimes, and rather de-
story of the Tower of Babel. The ziggurat did not, servedly, called "Nebuchadrezzar the Great,"
however, aspire to reach heaven. When it was but appreciation of his feats is limited because of
600 TO 550 B.C. 55
his relationship to Judah, where he had to fight

repeated rebellions. Finally, in 586 B.C., he took LYDIA
Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple that Solo- In this period, Lydia madeadvance in
a great
mon had built nearly four centuries earlier. This economic affairs. Metals, such as gold and silver,
meant that he was vilified in the Bible, and the were commonly used as media of exchange.
appellation of ''Great" has difficulty surviving They were valuable, so that small quantities
that. could be exchanged for large quantities of com-
He also laid siege to the city of Tyre, the only modities, and those small quantities were easily
portion of Phoenicia that had not submitted to portable.
him. The siege lasted from 585 to 573 B.C. and The difficulty was that each piece of gold had
was not successful. to be weighed so that its value could be calcu-
Nebuchadrezzar II died in 561 B.C., and there lated. There was always the haunting fear, be-
were no successors capable of maintaining the sides, that the gold or silver might be intermixed
Empire. In 555 B.C., Nabonidus came to the with less valuable metals.
throne. He was a capable archeologist, fascinated The Lydian kingdom therefore issued "coins,"
by Babylonian and Sumerian antiquities, but he pieces of gold, silver, or an alloy of the two,
was not much of a ruler, and disaster was on its which were stamped with its weight and value,
way. and had a picture of the king or some other de-
sign that indicated it to be official, and guaran-
teed its The use of these coins greatly
purity
MEDIAN EMPIRE accelerated trade and added to the wealth of
The Median Empire had established its western Lydia. The idea was quickly adopted by sur-
border on the Halys River in the center of Asia rounding nations.
Minor, and on the other side of the river was Alyattes of Lydia died in 560 B.C. and was
Lydia. succeeded by his son, Croesus, who reigned
War broke out between Cyaxares of Media from 560 to 546 B.C. Under him, Lydia reached
and Alyattes of Lydia, but it was a cautious one. the peak of its prosperity. So fervently did the
After a couple of years, the two squared off for Greeks admire the wealth of Croesus (as two cen-
the deciding battle when, suddenly, a total turies before they had admired the wealth of
eclipse of the Sun took place. So seriously did Midas of Phrygia) that "rich as Croesus" is still a
both armies take this to be a dire warning from commonly used synonym.
the gods, that the battle was broken off at once Croesus admired the Greeks just as greatly.
and the two nations made peace. He poured wealth into the oracle at Delphi and
The chief result is that the date of this aborted made it a kind of religious center of the Greek
event in human history that
battle is the earliest world.
we can confidently say happened on a partic-
ular day, and no other. Modern astronomers,
movements of the Sun and the
calculating the JUDAH
Moon, have worked out the day of the eclipse After the death of Josiah, in 609 B.C., Judah en-
and we know the incident took place on May 28, gaged in dynastic struggles and intrigued with
585 B.C. Egypt against the Chaldean Empire. Nebuchad-
and were recorded
Earlier eclipses took place, rezzar 11 lost patience and laid siege to Jerusalem.
(notably in China), but we don't know of any He carried through to the bitter end, where
it
significant human events that took place on those Sennacherib, a little over a century before, had
days, other than the sighting of the eclipse. not. Nebuchadrezzar took Jerusalem and de-
Shortly after the battle, Cyaxares died and was stroyed Solomon's Temple.
succeeded by his son, Astyages, who reigned Nebuchadrezzar then deported the chief fam-
from 584 to 550 B.C. ilies of Judah into Babylonia as, a century and a
had been
half earlier, the chief families of Israel ruler of Persia. He turned out to be an excellent
deported into Assyria. That should have been the and ambitious general. He rebelled against the
end of Judah, as the earlier deportation had been Median central government and, in 550 B.C.,
the end of Israel. took Ecbatana, the Median capital, and became
A strange thing happened, though, for the ruler of Media himself.
Chaldean treatment of the Jews was benign and The name "Median Empire" disappeared
they prospered in Babylonia. What's more, the from the map, thereafter, and, in its place, there
prophetic movement remained strong and pre- appeared the "Persian Empire" or, sometimes,
served Jewish national feeling. The prophet Jer- to distinguish it from other Persian Empires later
emiah had denounced non-Yahwistic practices in history, the "Achaemenian Empire." Nothing
bitterly in the time after Josiah, and the destruc- much, however, had changed except the name.
tion of Jerusalem seemed to bear him out. The Medes continued to occupy their provinces
In Babylonia, therefore, the Jews finally and to live much as they had always lived. In-
adopted Yahwism and, with that, modern Juda- deed, the Greeks often referred to the inhabitants
ism was born under the guidance of the prophet of the Persian Empire as "Medes."
Ezekiel. The Bible began to be compiled and ed-
ited; and the early legendary books show many
signs of Chaldean influence, and include many
EGYPT
of the legends of creation and early history Egypt had glow of prosperity under its
a twilight
worked up by the Babylonians from the time of 26th dynasty. Under Ahmose ("Amasis" to the
the Sumerians onward. (The Jews tried to con- Greeks) Egypt was at peace. Ahmose was fasci-
nect themselves with Sumeria through Abraham, nated by Greek culture and made alliances with
as the Romans tried to connect themselves with Lydia and with some of the Greek city-states in
Troy through Aeneas.) order to protect Egypt from the ambitious Per-
sians.
PERSIA
East of Babylonia was the land that had once GREECE
been called Elam. It had often fought with Baby- Ionia. The Greek cities in Asia Minor were the
lonia and had finally been destroyed by Ashur- intellectual leaders of Greece during this period.
banipal of Assyria, not long before Assyria itself In the cities of Miletus and Ephesus, in partic-
was destroyed. ular, there grew up a group of philosophers (Greek
Elam became
After the destruction of Assyria, for "lovers of wisdom") who turned to the study
part of the Median Empire and was called of the physical universe on its own terms, with-
"Ears." To the Greeks, it became "Persis" and out reference to the supernatural or to myths.
we call it "Persia." The city of Susa, once the The first of these, by tradition, was Thales of
Elamite capital, was now the capital of Persia. Miletus (625-547 B.C.) who tried to reason out
The people of the Persian province were very the fundamental structure of the universe, and
similar in language and culture to those of the who studied electricity and magnetism. He also
main Median provinces, and they are often re- apparently studied Babylonian astronomy and
ferred to together as "the Medes and the Per- was able to predict the eclipse that stopped the
sians." war between Lydians and Medians in 585 B.C.
The line of kings who ruled in Persia, under Anaximander of Miletus (610-547 B.C.) and
Median domination, were called the "Achae- Anaximenes of Miletus (fl. 545 B.C.) followed
menians," from a legendary ancestor, Achae- Thales, and began the practice of using logic
menius. About 558 B.C., Cyrus (585-529 B.C.), carefully to back up their conclusions.
sometimes called "Cyrus the Great," became The Ionian cities shared in the Greek trend of
600 TO 550 B . C . 57
the period, in that oligarchies were displaced by loponnesian League” and dominated virtually all
tyrants. of Peloponnesus. Sparta was by this time fixed in
Thiswas also true of the Aegean islands, its social structure as an unpleasantly mean-spir-
where Sappho of Lesbos (fl. 610-580 B.C.) was ited oligarchy, with its particularly numerous
an outstanding poet of her times. Little of her and particularly ill-treated slaves ("helots”).
work survives, but later Greeks compared her fa- What's more, Sparta interfered in other Greek
vorably with Homer. city-states, wherever it could, in order to over-
throw tyrants and reinstate oligarchies.
Athens. Athens was in a state of
In 600 B.C.,
deep economic turmoil and the oligarchic rule Elsewhere. The town of Sicyon in northern Pe-
was so unpopular with the common people that loponnesus was ruled by a capable tyrant named
a revolt was threatened. Cleisthenes from 600 to 570 B.C. He interested
Fortunately, the man hour was Solon
of the himself in the oracle at Delphi, just across the
(630-560 B.C.). He was elected archon in 594 Gulf of Corinth, defeated those nearby towns
B.C. and was a kindly liberal who arranged to that tried to control and set it up as an inde-
it,
ease the burden of debt on the ordinary people pendent shrine. Thanks to this, and to gifts from
and set a limit on the amount of land that could Croesus of Lydia, Delphi became the most im-
be owned by the rich. He gave the poor a greater portant oracle in Greece and the nearest thing to
say in the government, reformed the currency to a religious center.
encourage trade, and set up a kinder and gentler In Sicily, the first clash between Greeks and
law-code that guaranteed the right of every citi- Carthaginians took place about 580 B.C.
zen to bring his case to court.
It was all a step in the direction of democracy
('"rule of the people”). Many of the conservative ETRUSCANS
nobility fought it viciously, however, so that By 550 B.C., the Etruscans were approaching the
there was no confidence among the people that peak of their power. Northward they had ex-
Solon's reforms would long survive. tended their sway throughout the Po River val-
It wasn't surprising, then, that the people ley; and southward, they reached the Greek
turned to Peisistratus, who became tyrant of Ath- cities near Neapolis (known in modern times as
ens in 567 B.C. Naples). The city of Rome was, in 550 B.C., ruled
by their sixth king, Servius Tullius, who may also
Sparta. By 550 B.C., Sparta had formed a "Pe- have been an Etruscan.
550 TO 500 B.C.

ics and left his son, Belshazzar, in charge of his
CHALDEAN EMPIRE army, with the responsibility of defending a dis-
Nabonidus of Chaldea was more interested in ar- affected land.
cheology than in affairs of state — or, for that mat- When the Persians, under one of Cyrus's gen-
ter, the national religion. For this reason, the erals, attacked, Babylon could not mount an ef-
Marduk were opposed to him, which
priests of fective resistance. It fell in 539 B.C., and both
meant that much of the populace was, too. Na- Nabonidus' and Belshazzar died soon after. The
bonidus went off hunting for his antiquarian rel- Chaldean Empire was destroyed only three-quar-
—
ters of acentury after its founding, and only a (550-486 B.C.) and is sometimes called "Darius
quarter of a century after the death of the great the Great."
Nebuchadrezzar. Under Darius I, the Persian Empire was at the
peak of its power. It was by far the largest Empire

that had been seen up to that time, since it in-
LYDIA cluded all of civilized Asia from the Aegean Sea

to theborders of India, in addition to Egypt. Its
Croesus of Lydia noted the progress of Cyrus
east-west width was about 3000 miles, and it
with alarm. He had formed an alliance with Na-
was the realm that compared in area to mod-
first
bonidus of Babylonia, and when Babylonia fell,
ern nations, such as the United States. Its popu-
he felt he would have to take strong action on his
lation may have been as higTi as 13 million
own. There is a tale to the effect that he sent a
enormous for the times.
messenger Delphi to inquire of the oracle what
to
However, the primitive nature of transporta-
would happen if he attacked Cyrus. The oracle
tion and communication in those days made this
responded at once that if he attacked Cyrus "a
very size a weakness. It took a long time for the
great Empire would fall." Croesus assumed the
Persian monarch to find out what was happening
Empire that would fall would be the Persian.
at various places in his dominions, and a long
He attacked and was driven back. Cyrus then
time for him be able to react appropriately.
to
led his army into Lydia and, even though he was
Darius did his best to overcome this problem.
outnumbered by the Lydians, his handling of the
complete victory. He was the
He organized the Empire into 20 "satrapies,"
battle won him a
each under an administrator called a satrap (from
first general to make skillful use of mounted
a Persian word meaning a "protector"). He built
archers. He took Sardis, and Lydia disappeared
an elaborate road system along which messen-
from history. The great empire that fell had been
gers could speed, with relay-stations for horses.
Croesus' own.
He reorganized finances and built a new capital
Delphi's message has stood ever since as the
city, Persepolis, deep in the south-central sec-
typical "Delphic" or "oracular" utterance, which
tion of the Empire.
would come true no matter what happened.
In the days of the Median Empire, a religious
reformer, Zarathrustra (628-551 B.C.) — known
EGYPT as Zoroaster to the Greeks — had been preaching
in central Asia. In his view, the Universe was
Ahmose II died in 526 B.C., and his son suc- divided between two powers equal in strength.
ceeded him, reigning as Psamtik III. Almost at One was Ahura Mazda, who represented light
once, the Persian storm broke. Cyrus of Persia and goodness; the other was Ahriman, who rep-
was, by then, dead, but his son, who reigned as resented darkness and evil. The eternal cosmic
Cambyses II from 529 to 522 B.C., invaded war between the two produced no clear victory,
Egypt, won a battle at the borders and that was but the struggle was so equal that the interven-
enough. Egypt was once again under foreign tion of human beings on one side or the other
domination. might be all that was needed for a decision.
Human beings should, therefore, be persuaded
to be ethical and virtuous, thus helping to bring
PERSIAN EMPIRE about the victory of the good.
Cyrus having founded the Persian Empire and
II, Zoroastrianism flourished after the reformer's
taken over Chaldea and Lydia, died in 529 B.C. death, and, by 500 B.C., it was the predominant
fighting the tribesmen in central Asia. His son, religion in the Persian Empire, replacing the
Cambyses, succeeded, and took Egypt. older beliefs of Babylonia and Assyria (though
Cambyses died in 522 B.C. and was succeeded the Egyptians, at this time, persisted more firmly
by his brother-in-law, who reigned as Darius I in their religion).
550 TO 500 B.C. 59
Xenophanes of Colophon (560-478 B.C.) was

JUDAH a skeptic. He denounced the immorality of the
After the fall of the Chaldean Empire, the Jews gods in the Greek myths, and objected to the
of Babylonia petitioned to be restored to Judea. way in which they were made humanlike. By 546
The Persian government, which proved to be as B.C., he found his views displeased those
lenient toward its heterogenous population (pro- around him and he left Ionia and went to south-
vided they accepted Persian overlordship and ern Italy, where the cities made up Magna Graecia
paid their tribute) as the Chaldeans had been, (Latin words meaning "Great Greece").
granted the wish and some Jews returned to Off the Ionian coast is the island of Samos,
Judah. Other Jews, however, remained in Baby- which remained free of Persia for a while. From
lonia and, ever since, there has always been a 535 to 522 B.C., it was ruled by a tyrant. Poly-
large percentage of the world's Jews outside the crates, who built up a navy and, for a while,
Jewish homeland. These outside Jews are the ruled the eastern Mediterranean. important An
Diaspora (from a Greek word for "dispersion"). philosopher, Pythagoras of Samos (580-500
The Jews who returned to Judah managed to B.C.), who was the first to actually use the word
build a new temple in Jerusalem. This was com- "philosopher," found the atmosphere of Samos
pleted about 515 B.C. and by 500 B.C., there was oppressive and also migrated to Magna Graecia.
a new Judah (or "Judea," to use the Greek term The departure of Xenophanes and Pythagoras
— which I shall do from now on) that was but a showed how the intellectual life of Ionia was de-
shadow of the old one, but which gave the Jews clining under Persian rule.
a homeland again. This time, and forever after,
the Jews were Yahwists, and Judaism was a Athens. At Athens was under the ty-
this time,
going concern. rant Peisistratus, who ruled Athens from 567 to
Indeed, as the Persian Empire was estab- 521 B.C., with few breaks. He was one of the
lished, a nameless prophet, whose writings were better tyrants, keeping Solon's reforms, protect-
attributed to (who had actually lived
Isaiah ing the peasantry, beautifying Athens, keeping
nearly two centuries earlier) and who is therefore the peace, editing the Homeric poems into the
known as "second Isaiah" preached a new doc- form in which they now exist, encouraging in-
trine.Not only was Yahweh the only god of the dustry and trade, and, in general, ruling hu-
Jews, he was the only god of all humanity. It was manely.
monotheism taken to its logical extreme, and it Hedid encourage a change in religion, how-
was from the second Isaiah that true monotheism ever. The old Olympian religion the gods that —
descended to later Jews and, through them, to appear in the works of Homer and Hesiod
the Christians and Muslims. tended to be rather sapless and bland. The peo-
ple found much greater satisfaction in "mystery
religions," which promised salvation and bliss in
GREECE the afterworld for those who accepted their ritu-
Ionia. When Persia defeated Lydia, it absorbed als. The rituals were kept secret {mystery is from
the Ionian cities into Empire. It was less leni-

its the Greek word for "secret") and some remain
ent than Lydia had been, and it made sure that secret to this day.
only those tyrants ruled over the Ionian cities There were the Eleusinian mysteries, focused
who were totally subservient to Persian wishes. on Demeter, the goddess of agriculture; there
Intellectual life continued, however. Heracli- were also mysteries involving Bacchus, the god
tus of Ephesus (540-480 B.C.) emphasized the of the vine; and others involving Orpheus, a
importance of change and thought fire was the semidivine musician. All involved ecstatic or or-
fundamental substance of the universe. (If we giastic beha^?ior and dealt with death and rebirth.
substitute for "fire" the modern term "energy," Between the excitement of the rites and the
he was not so far wrong.) promise of an afterlife, the mystery religions
were very satisfying and fulfilling to the emo- Greek Italy. Pythagoras of Samos left the east
tional needs of people. and settled in Croton, a city located on the Italian
Peisistratus encouraged because it further
this toe. There he developed his rather semimystical
broke down the power of the nobles who had view of life and founded what was almost a mys-
reserved for themselves the priestly functions in tery religion. He was important in science and
the old religion. mathematics, discovering irrational numbers and

After Peisistratus died in 527 B.C., Hippias the Pythagorean hypothesis. Either he or a pupil
and Hipparchus, his sons, succeeded as joint ty- of his was the first to suggest that the Earth
rants.They were less capable, and opposition to might move through space.
them grew. Hipparchus was assassinated and Croton meanwhile fought bitterly with Sy-
the frightened Hippias tightened his rule, which baris, another Greek city farther north, and in
simply increased the opposition. 510 B.C., Sybaris was defeated and destroyed.
A liberal nobleman, Cleisthenes (570-505 By 500 B.C., the process of Greek colonization
B.C.), a grandson of Cleisthenes, the tyrant of had come to an end. The available positions on
Sicyon, headed the democratic opposition to the shore in the east were now preempted by the
tyrant. He attained the help of Sparta, which was powerful Persian Empire. In the west, it came to
always ready to move against tyrants, and over- an end because of the enmity of Carthage.
threw Hippias, driving him into exile.
Sparta expected the reestablishment of an oli-
garchy, but Cleisthenes went his own way, fur-
CARTHAGE
ther reorganizing theAthenian government and In 535 B.C., the Carthaginian navy, in alliance
spreading power to so many of the citizen popu- with the Etruscans, defeated Greek ships off the
lation that we can call Athens a democracy, island of Corsica at the Battle of Alalia. Greek
thereafter. expansion was blunted and further colonization
It was the important democracy in the
first ceased. This was the first decisive sea battle in
civilized world, but it was highly imperfect. It history.
was a democracy only for its citizens, who had to By 500 B.C., the stage was set for a struggle
be of native Athenian birth on both sides. For- between Carthage and the Greek cities, just as in
eigners had only limited rights, and slaves (of the east, the stage was set for a struggle between
whom there were many) remained slaves and Persia and the Greek cities.
without rights, however "free" Athens might be.
Cleisthenes also established "ostracism," a
system whereby anyone thought to be dangerous
ETRUSCANS
to the state could be banished for 10 years with- The Etruscans were entering a period of decline
out loss of citizenship or property. (The name triumph of the Battle of Alalia, be-
after the brief
was scratched on pieces of broken pottery, ostra- cause Celtic tribes from north of the Alps were
kon in Greek; hence the name of the practice.) drifting into Italy and placing pressure on the
northern frontiers. The Etruscans were less able
Sparta. Cleomenes 1, one of the two kings of to keep watch on the south, where revolts broke
Sparta, reigning from 521 490 B.C., helped
to out.
drive Hippias out of Athens. Sparta then tried to Rome, for instance, grew restive under its sev-
prevent the establishment of a democracy in Ath- enth and last king, Tarquinius Superbus {Tarquin
ens, but failed at this. the Proud in English.) He, too, was of Etruscan
By 500 B.C., the two most important powers origin. Romanlegends claim that the rape of a
in Greece were Athens and Sparta, with Athens Roman noblewoman, Lucretia, by Sextus Tar-
comparatively free, democratic, and bursting quinius, the son of the king, was the spark that
with artistic energy; and Sparta, militaristic, en- started the revolt. This is probably mere ro-
slaved, and intellectually empty. mance, but, in any case, something started it.
550 TO 500 B.C. 61
In 509 B.C., Tarquin was expelled and Rome B.C.) who came known
to be as the Buddha ("en-
became an oligarchy under the rule of two con- lightened one"). Buddhism also lacked a Creator,
suls, annually elected. The two consuls each but stressed virtuous living, and preached the
checked the other from becoming too powerful, rebirth of a soul over and over until, through
as in the case of the Spartan kings. Also, as in earned merit, the final reward of nirvana (peace-
Sparta, the two consuls had, as their chief func- ful nonexistence) was attained. By 500 B.C., Bud-
tion, leading the army to war,
while the actual dhism was spreading vigorously over India.
government was in the hands of a Senate, con-
sisting of the leading families {patricians, from a
Latin word meaning "fathers"). CHINA
In China during this period, schools of ethics ap-
peared. One, supposedly founded by Lao-tzu
CELTS (concerning whom nothing nonlegendary is
An Indo-European people, called Keltoi (Celts) known) started about 565 B.C. It is called Taoism,
by the Greeks and Gauls by the Romans had and eschewed all form, ritual, and ceremony. It
lived north of the Alps since before 1200 B.C. taught that only right living was important.
They had expanded westward into what is now Toward the end of the century, Kung Fu-tzu
France and Spain and northward into the British (551-479 B.C.), or "Confucius," in Latinized
Isles. By 500 B.C., they were beginning to seep form, also taught morality and ethical behavior.
across the barrier of the Alps into Italy. It is odd that in this century important reli-
gious reforms had arisen, apparently indepen-

dently, across the entire width of civilization
INDIA from China to Sicily.
Aryan tribes (the Sinhalese) had, by 500 B.C., There was Confucianism and Taoism in
reached the island of Ceylon (now known as Sri China; Jainism and Buddhism in India; Zoroastri-
Lanka) off the southern tip of India. In doing so, anism in Persia; Judaism in Judea; Mystery reli-
however, they did not completely displace the gions in Greece; Pythagoreanism in Italy; and,
pre- Aryan population. for good measure. Rationalist Philosophy in
There were revolts against the religion of Ionia.
Brahmanism that had been brought in by the Ar-
yans, with its developing multiplicity of gods, its
complicated ritual, and the caste system, that AFRICA

was now fully developed. New religions, there- South of Egypt, Nubia absorbed some of the cul-
fore, appeared on the scene. ture of Egypt. At times when Egypt was particu-
One new religion that developed was Jainism. larly weak, Nubian raiders would make their
It does not involve a Creator, but considers all way northward. About 750 B.C., Nubian rulers
life to be sacred and preaches asceticism. Jainism even set themselves up as Egyptian pharaohs,
did not prove very successful. Even today, it is but were driven out by the Assyrian invaders.
confined almost entirely to India and to those of About 500 B.C., Nubia had its capital at the
Indian descent. Within India there are some 3 city of Meroe, about 275 miles south of the pres-
million Jains. ent border of Egypt. Meroe had entered the Iron
More successful was Buddhism, founded in Age, and was the center of a prosperous region,
northern India by Siddartha Gautama (563-483 concerning which little is now known.
500 TO 450 B.C.

Persian Empire. He was not ready to resume the
GREECE attack on Greece 480 B.C.
until
Athens. The Ionian cities rebelled against Per- The interval from 490 to 480 B.C. was spent by
sia in 499 B.C., and, for a while, did well. They the Athenians under the leadership of Themis-
appealed for help to other Greek cities, and Ath- tocles (524-460 B.C.) in strengthening their navy.
ens sent 20 ships, while five more arrived from Those opposing him were ostracized so that Ath-
the island of Euboea, north of Athens. The loni- ens could continue on the path chosen without
ans,under the leadership of the city of Miletus, partisan bickering.
dashed eastward and burned Sardis, the former In 480 B.C., a large Persian army of about
capital of Lydia. 100,000 (greatly exaggerated beyond that by

Persia's slow bulk, however, finally gathered Greek accounts) crossed into Thrace and
its armies and struck back. The island of Cyprus marched southward through Greece. In August,
was taken, the Ionian armies were defeated, their 480 B.C., at Thermopylae, a narrow pass just
fleet sunk, Miletus was destroyed, and its surviv- south of Thessaly, they were held up by a band
ing inhabitants deported. Ionian leadership in of Greeks. The Persians forced their way through
science and culture vanished. while a contingent of 300 Spartans, fight-
at last,
Darius of Persia then planned to punish Ath- ing under their king, Leonidas (half-brother and
ens for having helped the lonians. In 492 B.C., successor of Cleomenes I) resisted and died to
Persian forces entered Europe for the first time the last man. That was Sparta's finest hour. The
and took over Thrace along the western shore of Persians then invaded Athenian territory and
the Black Sea, where Bulgaria is now located. The burned Athens, while the Athenians fled to the
Persians forced the kingdom of Macedonia, just islands. The Persians were now at the peak of
to the south of Thrace, into puppethood. their power.
In 490 B.C., a Persian force was sent across At Salamis, however, a small island just west
the Aegean Sea, compelling the submission of of Athens, the Greek fleet met the Persian fleet
the Aegean islands, including Euboea. The ex- in September, 480 B.C., and destroyed it. In the
pedition landed on Marathon in Athenian terri- narrow strait, the clumsier Persian ships could
tory, but it lacked cavalry. The more heavily not easily maneuver.
armored Athenians, under Miltiades (554-489 Xerxes returned to Persia, leaving the fighting
B.C.) attacked the Persian forces and beat them. to his generals. In 479 B.C., the Greeks under the
It was the first clear indication that Greek infan- Spartan general, Pausanias (d. 470 B.C.)
try armor and tactics were superior to that of the smashed the Persians at the land battle of Pla-
Persians. A
runner, Pheidippides, ran from Mar- taea, just north of Athens. Once again, Greek
athon to Athens to bring the good tidings to the military organization proved superior to that of
Athenians, dying after he had delivered the mes- the Persians, and the attempt to conquer Greece
sage, according to the story. The distance from was abandoned by the Persian Empire.
Marathon Athens, a little over 26 miles, has
to Athens then formed an alliance with the Ae-
ever since been that of the long-distance “mara- gean islands and the Ionian cities, which, in
thon race." 478 B.C., were freed of Persian domination. By
The Persians withdrew. In 486 B.C., Darius 450 B.C., Athenian influence extended over
died and was succeeded by his son, Xerxes, who all the coasts and islands of the Aegean
had to deal with various rebellions within the Sea. Athens, between 460 and 457 B.C., also built
500 TO 450 B.C. 63
stout walls about the city and about its port, Athens by sea and Sparta by land. A contest be-
Piraeus, and connected the two with a pair of tween the two was inevitable.
long walls that extended the necessary five-
mile distance. Behind these walls and with its Sicily. The Greek cities of Sicily and Italy did
navy controlling the eastern Mediterranean, not participate in the war against Persia. To them
Athens felt secure. it seemed far away, and there was a nearer
Athens continued to advance toward a com- enemy at hand — Carthage, which controlled the
plete democracy (for its citizens) with govern- eastern third of the island of Sicily.
ment offices filled by lot in many cases. The Greek cities of Sicily fought among them-
In 460 B.C., a liberal nobleman, Pericles (495- selves, and Carthage was ready to take advan-
429 B.C.), became the virtual ruler of Athens, tage of the situation. In 480 B.C., a Carthaginian
and under him, the city entered a period of great army advanced eastward in Sicily. However, in a
intellectual, literary, and artistic merit. The first battle near Himera, on the northern shore of the
of Athens' great tragedians, Aeschylus (525-456 island, the Greeks won a great victory. Tradition
B.C.) wrote his trilogy concerning Agamemnon says that this battle took place on the same day
(who had led the Greek army against Troy) in as the Battle of Salamis, but that sounds too good
458 B.C. to be true. In any case, Carthage was defeated in
Outside Athens, Greek literature also flour- the west even as Persia was defeated in the east.
ished, of course. Great poets included Anacreon By 450 B.C., Syracuse emerged as the most
of Tos (570-488 B.C.), Simonides of Ceos (556- important city in Sicily.
468 B.C.), and Pindar of Thebes (522-438 B.C.).
Sparta. Sparta had shared in the triumph over PERSIAN EMPIRE

Persia, but somehow the victories of Athens at The Persian Empire lost some coastal territory in
Marathon and Salamis seemed to outweigh the the far west to the Greeks, but that seemed a
gallant Spartan defense at Thermopylae and its small matter and, on the map, the Persian Em-
victory at Plataea. (The clever Athenians were pire looked as large and as formidable as ever.
much better at self-promotion than the stolid The population of Greece at this time may
total
Spartans were.) have been 2.5 million, while that of the Persian
What's more, in 464 B.C., an earthquake Empire was 14 million.
wreaked destruction in the city of Sparta, and the Nevertheless, Persian self-confidence was
helots of Messenia seized the opportunity to re- smashed. In any battle with the Greeks, whether
volt. It took the Spartans three years to end the by land or sea, the Persians were half-defeated
revolt. Cimon (510-451 B.C.), the son of Mil- before the start. The Athenians, on the other
tiades, who had won the battle of Marathon, was hand, did not scruple to send troops to help re-
then influential in Athens. He believed Athens gions rebelling against the Persians, or to attack
should maintain friendly relations with Sparta, the island of Cyprus, for instance. By 450 B.C.,
and persuaded it to offer to help the Spartans to then, the Persian Empire, for all its size, was in
beat down their slaves. Sparta, out of suspicion decline.
and pride, rather churlishly refused the help,
thus antagonizing Athens.
It took Sparta quite a while to recover from ROME
this disaster, which gave Athens a chance to In this period, Rome fought off
attempts to
all
build its walls without interference and to orga- restore the monarchy, and battled endlessly with
nize its Aegean influence. neighboring cities, usually with success. The
By 450 B.C., Sparta was itself again, and it common people, or "plebeians,"
struggled
could be seen that Greece now had two masters: against the patrician rulers and, by threatening
was establishing itself as a leader among the

tosecede and form a separate city, they managed
to get certain reforms. "Tribunes" were ap-
Latin cities to their south.
pointed which would guard plebeian rights by The Etruscans, however, were fading rapidly,
chiefly because of the expanding presence of the

crying veto ("I forbid") when the Senate passed
laws they considered hurtful to the people. Gauls in northern Italy.
By 450 B.C., Rome had a written law-code and
450 TO 400 B.C.

Athens grew in population, including 50,000
GREECE citizens, and also perhaps 100,000 slaves.
Athens, under Pericles (often referred to as "Per- For all its freedom (for citizens) at home, how-
iclean Athens") was at the peak of its golden age, ever, Athens became increasingly tyrannical out-
the most brilliant seen up to that time and for a side its borders. By 448 B.C., what had been an
long time afterward. The great tragedians flour- Aegean alliance had become an Athenian Em-
ished. In addition to Aeschylus, there was Soph- pire. The money contributions from Athens' al-
ocles (496-406 B.C.), who

wrote Oedipus Rex, lies were used to help beautify Athens. When
and Euripides (484-406 B.C.), who wrote Medea. any ally objected to this and tried to leave the
Herodotus (484-424 B.C.) wrote a world his- alliance, it was brutally beaten back into line. The
tory, concentrating on the Persian Wars, and is result was that resentment against Athens grew
known as "the father of history." Thucydides steadily.
(d. 401 B.C.) wrote history less charmingly, per- Then, Athens
too, fell into the trap of overcon-
haps, but was the first to make an effort to be fidence and engaged unnecessary military ad-
in
objective. ventures. A large force was sent to Egypt to help

Phidias (490-430 B.C.) was the greatest sculp- an Egyptian rebellion against Persia in 456 B.C.,
tor of the age. He carved the statue of Zeus that and that force was wiped out. Athens suffered
stood at the stadium where the Olympic Games land defeats at the hands of Sparta, Corinth, and
took place, and which was considered one of the Thebes, and though these did not shake their
Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. He also power they had a weakening effect.
at sea,
supervised the construction of the great temples Athens, by playing the role of master of
of the Acropolis. This included the Parthenon, Greece too openly and too undiplomatically,
dedicated to the patron goddess of the city, Ath- frightened and angered other cities, and caused
ena, and widely considered one of the most them to turn to Sparta. In 431 B.C., war between
beautiful buildings ever constructed. Sparta and Athens broke out. It was called the
Among its philosophers was Anaxagoras "Peloponnesian War."
(500-428 B.C.), an Ionian who had emigrated to Athens did not attempt to fight the Spartans
Athens, and who was accused of impiety for stat- on land, since they were sure to be defeated in
ing that the Sun was not Apollo's divine chariot, that case. Instead, theAthenians crowded inside
but was a blazing rock as large as the Pelopon- the walls that encased Athens and Piraeus. There
nesus. Hippocrates (460-377 B.C.) was the first they huddled, and waited for their navy to har-
physician of note and is often called the "father ass the Spartans and wear them down.
of medicine." Finally, there was Socrates (470- Unfortunately, the ancient world knew very
399 B.C.), perhaps the most influential philoso- little about hygiene, and a plague struck Athens
pher who ever lived. in 430 B.C., spreading rapidly and killing per-
450 TO 400 B.C. 65
haps a third of the population, including Pericles however, all of Greece, including Sparta, was fa-
himself in 429 B.C. Athens was badly weakened tally weakened by the long war. The Athenian
by this, and the war degenerated into a kind of playwright, Aristophanes (450-388 B.C.) wrote
stalemate, in which both sides won nondecisive politicalcomedies (like the famous Lysistrata,
victories —
the Spartans under Brasidas (d. 422 produced in 411 B.C.), which bitterly portrayed
B.C.), and the Athenians under Cleon (d. 422 the anguish of a senseless war raging on and on
B.C.). — with only victims and no true victors.
A peace was established in 421 B.C. It was
called ''the Peace of Nicias," because the Athe-
nian general, Nicias (d. 413 B.C.), negotiated it. PERSIAN EMPIRE
It didn't last, however, and the war broke out The Persian Empire continued to look formidable
again. Athens was now under the influence of on the map. It crushed revolts in Egypt, and it
Alcibiades (450-404 B.C.), who was brilliant, but interfered skillfully in the Peloponnesian War, in
erratic. He suggested that a great expedition be such a way as to enfeeble Greece and reduce its
sent against Syracuse so that the resources of the danger to her.
west could be turned against Sparta. It was a Nevertheless, inner turmoil continued and
foolish idea, but Alcibiades might have carried it there was the dynastic quarreling that destroys
off. However, he was accused of impiety just be- so many monarchies where no fixed system of
fore the expedition sailed. After it had sailed, in succession is worked out. Every time a ruler dies,
415 B.C., he was called back to stand trial. Fear- there is apt to be a civil war between different
ing conviction, Alcibiades defected to Sparta and claimants for the throne.
taught the dull Spartans how to fight against the Thus, when Darius II, who had ruled from 423
Athenians much more effectively. to 404 B.C., died, his older son began a reign that
Without Alcibiades, the Sicilian expedition endured from 404 to 359 B.C., and his younger
went on, with Nicias in command. He was an brother, Cyrus (called "Cyrus the Younger"), re-
uninspired general, who made all the wrong de- belled.
cisions, and the Athenian forces were eventually With the end of the Peloponnesian war, there
wiped out. This broke Athens' spirit, as Persia's were many Greek soldiers who suddenly had no
had been by the battles of Salamis and Plataea. employment, and they were willing to sign on as
Nevertheless, Athens fought on. Persia saw mercenaries to whomever would pay them.
that it was to its advantage to help bring about Cyrus hired 10,000 Greeks under a Spartan gen-
the destruction of Athens as the most expansion- eral and marched them eastward to make war.
ist city in Greece. Therefore, Persia began a pol- The Greeks, along with Cyrus's Persian con-
icy of paying subsidies to Sparta, and Sparta, in tingents, were led deep into the Empire, and
return, agreed to let Persia have the Greek cities there, not far north of Babylon, they fought the
on the Asia Minor coast. hosts of Artaxerxes II Cunaxa in
at the Battle of
As long as the Athenian navy remained intact, 401 B.C. They fought well, but Cyrus was killed
however, Athens could not be defeated. Fortu- and that meant the revolt was over and that the
nately, for itself, Sparta found an admiral, Ly- 10,000 Greeks were stranded a thousand miles
sander 395 B.C.), who was capable of fighting
(d. inside Persia.The Persians managed to kill the
at sea. In 404 B.C., Lysander defeated and de- Spartan general by treachery, and felt that the
stroyed the Athenian navy at Aegospotami, not Greeks could now be scattered and wiped out.
very from the ancient site of Troy.
far The Greeks, however, under an Athenian
Athens could fight no more. She was forced to general, Xenophon (431-352 B.C.), held to-
accept defeat, pull down her walls, change her gether, fought off all Persian attempts to destroy
democracy into an oligarchy, and bow to Spartan them, and made their way northward to the
domination. Black Sea in March 400 B.C.
By 400 B.C., Sparta was master of Greece; By 400 B.C., the Greeks could see how far the
apparently imposing structure of the Persian Em- seed from which two world-religions were to
pire had decayed. They could see that if they sprout.
could but unite, they might bring that Empire Just as the Jews had been influenced by the
crashing down. But the catch was that they Chaldean legends of the Creation, the Flood, and
would have to unite, and could not. early history, so they were now influenced by
Zoroastrian ideas. They could not accept the ex-
good and evil in eter-
istence of dual principles of
JUDEA nal and uncertain conflict. They did not wish to
The Jerusalem and its Jewish inhabitants

city of envisage evil as being as powerful as good. They
lived quietly under the Persian Empire, but there did, however, accept Satan as a counterpart of
was the constant danger that they would be God, and, though he was nev,er pictured as equal
wiped out by hostile neighbors, or, possibly, lose to God, the vision of a good-versus-evil conflict
their identity by intermarrying with them. did enter Judaism as a result.

In 445 B.C., however, Jerusalem came under
the rule of Nehemiah, who had been a high offi-
cial in the Persian government. By 439 B.C., he
ROME
managed to obtain permission to rebuild the Rome had become the head of the ''Latin
walls of Jerusalem. League," a combination of cities to its south. The

About that time, or soon after, the scribe, Latin League now rivaled the Etruscan confeder-
Ezra, arrived. He brought with him the early ation of cities to the north.
books of the Bible and, in a series of revival meet- By 400 B.C., Rome was rising rapidly and the
ings, persuaded the Jews to separate themselves Etruscans were declining even more rapidly, but
from their non-Jewish wives and to live by the the Celtic tribes of Gauls in the north were now
tenets of the Judaistic laws and rituals. That advancing southward in force and were threat-
made it possible for Judaism to survive and, if it ening to engulf them both.
never became a world-religion, it did serve as the
400 TO 350 B.C.

B.C. as well as its alliances. A new
Athenian-
GREECE dominated naval league arose, although it was
Sparta. Sparta was master of Greece after the weaker than it had earlier been. Moreover, and
battle ofAegospotami, but she proved to be as what was far worse, the Athenians, ever-mindful
undiplomatic and tactless in emphasizing her of the Sicilian defeat, no longer had the courage
leadership as Athens had been. All the Greek to undertake risks, so that their foreign policy
cities who had turned against Athens, now remained very cautious.
turned against Sparta; and Sparta was then com- Culturally, however, Athens continued to
pelled, as Athens had been, to use force con- shine. Socrates had been executed in 399 B.C. for
stantly tokeep the other Greeks in line. his unpopular teachings, although his pupil,
Athens took advantage of Spartan involve- Plato,continued to teach and to describe his ver-
ment in the difficulties of mastery, to kick out the sion of Socrates' views in a series of Dialogs that
conservative nobility who had imposed a narrow have been popular reading, among the scholarly,
and oppressive oligarchy on them, and restore ever since, right down to the present day.
the democracy. Athens rebuilt its walls in 393 One of the Spartan kings was now Agesilaus
400 to 350 B.C. 67
II(444-360 B.C.), who had come to the throne in ta's side in the Peloponnesian War, but now it
399 B.C. He was small and lame, and he epito- turned anti-Spartan with a vengeance.
mized all the Spartan virtues and shortcomings. In 364 B.C., a Theban general, Pelopidas (d.
He was brave and resolute to an extreme, but he 364 B.C.) managed to seize the citadel and expel
was stubborn and short-sighted. the Spartan garrison. The Thebans then made an
He led an army into Asia Minor in 395 B.C. alliance with Athens against Sparta, and the
and ravaged the territory at will. This further Athenian fleet defeated the Spartan ships, so that
proved, if this was needed, that Persia was soft Sparta no longer controlled the sea.
and ready to fall, but Agesilaus had to come back Sparta was willing to make a peace settlement
to Greece to deal with those cities that were with Thebes and Athens, for despite her victories
trying to combine against Sparta, and lost the and mastery, she was suffering the fate of all
chance to win great victories. military powers who didn't know when
Persia fell back on her best weapon —
money. to quit. Continual wars had been a serious
It could use the money to persuade Sparta to do drain on her soldiers, so that there were fewer
things Persia's way. A
Spartan negotiator, skilled Spartan warriors than there had been,
named Antalcidas, negotiated the "Peace of An- and those that still existed were war-weary.
talcidas" in 386 B.C. (It was also called the Sparta, however, would not give up the show
"King's Peace," the king being Artaxerxes II, of of mastery.
course.) When Epaminondas (410-362 B.C.), the The-
By the Peace of Antalcidas, all Greek cities ban ambassador, showed up to sign the peace for
were supposed to be free. This meant that Sparta the Boeotian League, Agesilaus II refused to
insisted on all alliances and leagues being dis- allow it. Each Boeotian would have to sign
city
solved (except for its own hold over the southern separately, and Epaminondas refused this de-
half of the Peloponnesus, of course). The inten- mand.
tion of making all the cities free sounded good, Therefore, the Spartans sent an army under
but it was a device to weaken all of Greece to the Agesilaus' co-king, Cleombrotus I (who had been
benefit of Sparta (and, even more so, to the ben- reigning since 380 B.C.) to beat the Thebans and
efit of Persia). force their capitulation.
under the leadership of
In particular, Sparta, The Spartans encountered the Thebans at
the aggressive and (as we would say today) Leuctra, west of Thebes, and there Epaminondas
hawkish Agesilaus II, forced its domination on planned a new type of battle. He did not line up
Thebes. his soldiers in a straight line three or four deep,
the kind of phalanx the Greeks were accustomed
Thebes. Thebes, a city about 35 miles north- to, and in the use of which the Spartans were
west of Athens, was prominent in Greek legend. perfect.
The famous Oedipus had been the king of up his left wing till it was 50
Instead, he built
Thebes, for instance. About 550 B.C., Thebes had soldiers deep. It was intended to have a massive
formed a league of cities in neighborhood
its weight that would crush the Spartan right wing
("Boeotia"), which it dominated. This had not where its best fighters would be massed. The
been carried through peacefully, and Thebes had center of the army was set back, and the right
had to fight for 50 years before the Boeotian wing was set back still further. The center would
League was established. strike the Spartans when they were already de-
By the Peace of Antalcidas, the Boeotian moralized, and the right would do so in time to
League would have to be broken up, but this the finish the havoc.
Thebans refused to do. In 382 B.C., a Spartan The Spartans were so used to winning by their
contingent, therefore, occupied the Theban cita- usual tactics that they didn't try to adjust to the
del and dissolved the League by force. Thebes new set-up. In 371 B.C., the battle of Leuctra was
had been anti-Athenian and had fought on Spar- fought and it went exactly as Epaminondas had
hoped. The Spartans were crushed. A thousand and was not important in history. In 371 B.C.,
Spartan soldiers (whom Sparta simply could not Jason of Pherae (a town in central Thessaly) suc-
afford to lose) died, including King Cleombrotus ceeded in uniting Thessaly and, for a moment, as
himself. Sparta fell, it looked as though Jason might con-
That one defeat sufficed to put an end to Spar- ceivably unite Greece under his leadership. In
tan mastery, as defeat is bound to do once a mil- 370 B.C., however, Jason was assassinated, and
itary power has been reduced to a shell. Never the chance passed.
again were the Spartans to be conquerors. They
lost their grip on everything but Sparta itself and
Syracuse. Syracuse was not involved in the in-
a small bit of surrounding territory. They had
ternal battles in Greece. It had to fight the Car-
trouble maintaining even that.
thaginians.
The Theban victory merely reduced Greece to Soon after 400 B.C., Dionysius I (430-367
chaos, however. None of the cities would accept
B.C.) became tyrant of Syracuse. He beat the Car-
Theban domination any more than they had ac- thaginians and, by 383 B.C., he had seized con-
cepted Athenian or Spartan domination. Fighting
trol of five sixths of Sicily and had restricted
continued endlessly with no one city able to es- western He also seized con-
Carthage to the tip.
tablish power over the others.
trol of many of the Greek cities in Italy and even
One Greek, Isocrates of Athens (436-338
extended his control over Epirus, a tribal area
B.C.), could see clearly what was happening. He
northwest of Greece that was slowly being pen-
knew that the cities were destroying themselves etrated by Greek culture.
and that they must unite to prevent that destruc-
At this moment, Syracuse was the strongest of
tion. He saw that the only hope for unification
the Greek city-states, and Dionysius was the
was have them engage in
to large common
some
most powerful man in Greece. It was at least con-
policy, and he suggested that they unite in a war
ceivable that he might have been able to serve as
against the Persian Empire. It was a matter of
the leader of a united Greece.
solving the problems of war by additional war,
However, he was defeated by the Carthagin-
but nothing else seemed possible.
ians in 381 B.C., and never fully recovered from
By 350 B.C., then, the Greek cities were in a
that. He died in 367 B.C., and his son, Dionysius
virtual state of anarchy, and it was clear (though
II, who reigned till 343 B.C., lacked his father's
they could not see it for themselves) that they
ability. By 350 B.C., Syracuse was clearly in de-
would all fall to some outside power.
cline.
Despite this endless fighting, the intellectual
brilliance of Greek culture continued in this pe-
riod. Democritus of Abdera (460-370 B.C.), for
instance, put forward the notion of "atomism,”
EGYPT
claiming that matter consisted of fundamen-
all Egypt did not under Persian rule.
rest quietly
tal, irreducible particles. This was not accepted After the Battle of Marathon and the death of
by the other philosophers of the time, but he was Darius I, Egypt had rebelled but the rebellion had
correct. Cnidus (400-350 B.C.) made
Eudoxus of been crushed. After the "March of the Ten Thou-
important advances both in mathematics and as- sand" had revealed the inner weakness of Persia,
tronomy. Egypt had rebelled again, with greater success.
One more native dynasty of pharaohs was es-
Thessaly. Thessaly was a plain in northeastern tablished in 380 B.C., the 30th, and under three
Greece that was important in Mycenean times. of these rulers it almost seemed as though Egypt
The legendary Jason, of Argonaut fame, and was reborn. The last of these pharaohs was Nec-
Achilles, greatest of the Greek heroes at Troy, tanebo, who reigned from 360 to 343 B.C. He was
were Thessalians. In later times, however, Thes- the last native pharaoh in a line stretching back
saly was out of the current of Greek development to Narmer 25 centuries earlier.
350 TO 300 B.C. 69
for the Etruscan cities were falling to the Gauls.

PERSIAN EMPIRE Rome, too, fell to the Gauls in 390 B.C., and
The Persian Empire, even minus Egypt, still was sacked. The Gauls eventually withdrew after
looked vast on the map. In 358 B.C., an energetic exacting tribute. (Roman tales of having defeated
king, Artaxerxes III, came to the throne and the Gauls may be taken as patriotic nonsense.) It
reigned till 336 B.C. He managed to bring back took Rome considerable time to recover.
under his control various rebellious provinces, In 380 B.C., Rome began the construction of a
and prepared an expedition to retake Egypt as wall about the and by 350 B.C. it was still
city,
well. laboring to revive its alliances and to regain what
power it had possessed before the coming of the
Gauls.
ROME The sack of the city had, by the way, de-
Rome, after a war of 10 years, had conquered and stroyed its archives. All tales about what went on
taken the Etruscan city of Veii, just to its north, before 390 B.C., are, therefore, strictly legendary,
which demonstrated the weakening of Etruscan although, being romance, they are very interest-
power. Indeed, that power had come to an end. ing and are easy to remember.
350 TO 300 B.C.

that palace turmoil gave him his opportunity. In
MACEDONIA 359 B.C., Perdiccas died in battle, leaving only
III
Macedonia lay to the north of Greece. It spoke a a young son as heir. Philip served as regent and,
Greek dialect and was absorbing Greek culture, in 356 B.C., he (as uncles sometimes did) took
even though the Greeks themselves considered over the throne and began to reign as Philip II.
the Macedonians as outsiders. They had re- By then, he had conquered and quieted the
mained a monarchy and did not take part in the tribal areas north of Greece, and all the area from
war against Persia, but accepted Persian domi- the Black Sea to the Adriatic Sea was under his
nation when Darius and Xerxes attacked Greece. control. He reorganized his army, setting up a
During the Peloponnesian War and thereafter, phalanx that was an enormous improvement
Macedonia, which remained at peace, grew pros- over the Theban version. With long spears, held
perous. The great Greek tragedian, Euripides, up or resting on the rank before, the new Mace-
spent his last years at Macedonia, as a haven of donian phalanx resembled a giant hedgehog. It
quiet. could maneuver (when thoroughly trained) and
While Thebes was briefly master of Greece, it it was supported by cavalry. Philip also made use
interfered with the political infighting in the of the catapult and other newly invented forms
north and, to insure quiet in Macedonia, they of siege machinery. This made it possible to bat-
brought back with them, as hostage, Philip (382- ter down walls and force entry, rather than hav-
336 B.C.),the 13-year-old brother of the Mace- ing to sit down for a prolonged period waiting
donian king, Perdiccas III. In Thebes, the shrewd for the besieged city to starve to death.
young Philip closely observed the manner in had married Olympias of Epirus, thus
Philip
which the Thebans fought their wars. In particu- strengthening his hold on that Adriatic kingdom.
lar, he studied the Theban phalanx. In 356 B.C., Olympias gave birth to a son named
When Philip returned to Macedonia, he found Alexander (356-323 B.C.). According to the tale.
Alexander was born on the same day that some it was not the leader. Philip honoring Sparta's
II,
vandal had burned the Temple to Artemis in past, left it to itself —

but he never invaded Per-
Ephesus (one of the Seven Wonders of the An- sia. He, too, failed, for in 336 B.C., he was assas-
cient World). When asked why he had done this, sinated.

the vandal said it was to make his name immor- The 20-year-old Alexander succeeded as Alex-
tal. For that reason, his name was stricken from ander III, and Philip's dominions rose in revolt at
all records, but it was remembered just the same. once against what was, presumably, a young and
It was Herostratus. incapable king. Alexander quickly showed why
Philip II now turned southward, feeling he he was eventually to be known universally as
could gradually increase his strength as the "Alexander the Great." With phenomenal speed
Greek cities continued their endless and useless and unerring design, he crushed all revolts,
fighting. Gold mines had been discovered in dashed southward, defeated Thebes, destroyed
Macedonia and that meant that Philip could bribe the city, and spared Athens the same fate, so he
various Greek leaders to be on his side. said, only for the sake of its services against the
The Athenian orator, Demosthenes (384-322 Persians.
B.C.) saw the danger of Philip and inveighed Then, 334 B.C., he crossed over into Persia.
in
against him in masterly orations, called "Philip- Artaxerxes had reconquered Egypt in 343 B.C.,
pics" (a term still used to represent any vitriolic so that Persia was intact again, but he had died
and eloquent oratorical attack on someone or in 336 B.C., and was succeeded by the weak Da-
something). The Athenians cheered while De- rius III (d. 330 B.C.). There was no way in which
mosthenes spoke, but they were no longer the Persia, no matter how large an army it brought
dynamic people of the previous century. They against him, could hope to withstand the Mace-
did nothing, particularly since other orators, like donian phalanx and the creative tactics of Alex-
Aeschines (389-314 B.C.) and Isocrates pointed ander.
to the Persian Empire as the greater foe. In 333 B.C., Alexander defeated Persia at the
It was only when had taken over all of
Philip Battle of Issus in the northeast corner of the Med-
northern Greece that Athens stirred to the dan- iterranean coast. He
then marched south to take
ger and made an alliance with Thebes against over Syria, Phoenicia, and Judea, although the
him. In 338 B.C., the Macedonians met the The- city of Tyre resisted a savage siege for seven
ban-Athenian army at Chaeronea, west of months. Tyre was finally taken and destroyed,
Thebes. Philip II won a total victory, while his and that brought Phoenician history to an end.
18-year-old son, Alexander, led a cavalry charge Only Carthage, far to the west, remained to re-
that clinched matters. The Theban elite troops, mind the world of Phoenician greatness.
like the Spartans at Thermopylae, died to a man, In 331 B.C., Alexander had conquered Egypt
and 33 years after the battle of Leuctra, Thebes' and established the town of Alexandria at the
mastery was as dead as Sparta's. northwest corner of the Nile delta. That same
Philip II now forced himself on Greece as year, he fought the battle of Gaugamela east of
leader of a united league, which was to follow Once again, the Persians were
the Tigris River.
Isocrates' plan and conquer Persia. (Isocrates had thoroughly smashed and they could resist no
died, according to the tale, on the day of the bat- more. Alexander pursued the broken Persian
Chaeronea, at the age of 98.) Where Pericles
tle at army that, in despair, struck down Darius III and
of Athens, Agesilaus of Sparta, Epaminondas of left him, dying, to be found by the pursuer. Alex-
Thebes, Jason of Pherae, and Dionysius of Syra- ander was merely the more enraged: when he
cuse had all failed to unite Greece, Philip II as- caught up to the army, he savagely punished the
pired to succeed. assassins.
Of the Greek only Sparta refused
city-states, In he allowed Persepolis to be
330 B.C.,
to join the league. It was powerless but it clung burned as revenge for the burning of Athens by
to its past. It would not join any league in which the Persians a century and a half earlier. In 326
350 TO 300 B.C. 71
B.C., he finally reached India at the extreme east- own population and enterprise declined as
ern boundary of the Persian Empire. He won a Greeks went east and south, hoping to make
last big battle at the Hydaspes River over the In- their fortune in the new lands.
dian king, Porus. After that, his army rebelled
and refused to follow him any further east.
Reluctantly, Alexander returned to Babylon, GREECE
which he had chosen as his capital. He dreamed While Alexander was Greeks con-
off in Asia, the
of a fusion of Greeks and Persians to rule the tinued (in a much more subdued way) to fight
world. He established a common currency over each other. Sparta actually won some victories
the Empire, established Greek as the official lan- but was beaten by Macedonian forces under An-
guage, founded many cities, and began to plan a tipater (397-319 B.C.), the old general left behind
campaign against Carthage. by Alexander to keep Greece in order. When An-
However, Alexander was much given to wild tipater sent messages to Alexander describing
feasts during which he ate and drank far too the outcome of the wars in detail, Alexander dis-
much. On June 13, 323 B.C., he died after one missed it impatiently as "a battle of mice."
such feast. He was only 33 years old, but he had In 322 B.C., the year after Alexander's death,
established the greatest Empire the world had the Macedonians, who had navy of their
built a
yet seen. was the old Persian Empire, plus
It own, destroyed the Athenian fleet at Amorgos,
Greece, and it had a population of about 20 mil- one of the Aegean islands. That was an end, for-
lion. ever, of Athenian sea-power, a century and a half
Alexander, however, left no heirs capable of after the battle of Salamis.
carrying on his work, only a series of generals By 300 B.C., it was clear that individual Greek
who had learned the art of war under him and city-states would never again be important pow-
his father, Philip. The generals naturally fought ers in the world. Their day was done.
among themselves for the control of the Empire. However, Greece remained an intellectual
There followed 30 years of confused fighting, giant. Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), a pupil of Plato,
every bit of it as senseless as the wars between had tutored the young Alexander, and was one
the Greek cities, but on a far larger scale and far of the greatest of the ancient philosophers. He
bloodier. It came to an end with the battle of produced a virtual encyclopedia covering all
Ipsus in central Asia Minor in 301 B.C. knowledge of the times, and he organized the
As a result of all the fighting, it turned out that laws of logic. He founded the "Lyceum," a
no general was to control Alexander's Empire. school that concentrated more on what we would
Rather, the Empire fell apart into fragments mak- today call science than Plato's Academy did.
ing up what came to be known as "the Hellenis-
tic kingdoms."
Most of the Asian dominions were held by the SYRACUSE

general Seleucus (358-281 B.C.), who established Syracuse was falling back before the increasing
the "Seleucid Empire" in 312 B.C. and reigned as strength of Carthage, which now took over most
Seleucus I. Egypt was held by the general, Pto- of Sicily, except for Syracuse itself. It took a
lemy (364-282 B.C.), who reigned as Ptolemy I. firmer grip on the island of Corsica and ex-
Macedonia and Asia Minor were fought over panded its holdings on the Spanish coast, so
more strenuously, and these represented smaller that, by 300 B.C., it had reached the peak of its
fragments of the Empire. power.
In some ways, the spectacular conquest of the In 317 B.C., however, Agathocles (361-289
Persian Empire by a handful of Greeks and B.C.) took control of Syracuse and called himself
Macedonians further helped ruin Greece. Greek king of Sicily. (Monarchies were now the rage
culture spread out over all the eastern among the Hellenistic kingdoms.) He stopped
Mediterranean and far into Asia, but Greece's the Carthaginians from destroying Syracuse by
leading an army North Africa and threaten-

into contact with Europeans. In 321 B.C., after Alex-
ing Carthage itself. The Carthaginians, panicky, ander's death, an Indian chieftain, Chandra-
were willing to make peace in Sicily and that gupta, began the process of unifying India.
saved Syracuse. Under him, a union of considerable portions of
on the southern coast of what is now
Massilia, the peninsula took place for the first time.
France, where Marseille is now located, was also In 305 B.C., he successfully held off an invad-
being pressed by Carthage. It survived, how- ing army sent into India by Seleucus I, the suc-
Alexander in Asia. Chandragupta
ever, and a Massilian named Pytheas, about 300 cessor to
B.C., carried through the greatest of the Greek became a Jainist late in life, dying about 297 B.C.
voyages of exploration. He ventured out into the The Mahabharata, the great Indian epic, which
Atlantic and brought back reports that made it finally attained a lengthseven times that of the
clear that he had visited Britain and Scandinavia. Iliad and Odyssey combined, was reaching some-
thing like its modern form by 300 B.C., though it

continued to be developed and lengthened for
ROME additional centuries.
Rome recovered from the sack by the

finally
Gauls, and it was beginning to develop the
Roman “legion," a very flexible fighting device
CHINA
thatwas much more adaptable to rough terrain China continued to be a collection of warring
than the Macedonian phalanx was. It could states. However, Taoist and Confucianist
tighten itself into a phalanx, but it could also thought was being systematized, and Ch'u
loosen itself into a formation that flowed about Yuan, the earliest of the great Chinese poets to
obstacles. be known by name, was writing his works.
Rome was fighting, now, mastery of cen-
for
tral Italy against the tribes of the Samnites, long
settled there, but by 300 B.C. it had not fully
NORTH AMERICA
accomplished its goals. By 3000 B.C., the earliest Mayan civilization was
appearing in southern Mexico and in Central
America.
INDIA
When Alexander the Great fought battles on the
banks of the Indus, that was India's first major
300 TO 250 B.C.

was the first real approach to a modern univer-
EGYPT sity. Through the Museum, Alexandria quickly
Under Ptolemy I, and his son, Ptolemy II (308- became the intellectual center of the world.
246 B.C.), who came throne in 285 B.C.,
to the Euclid (fl. 300 B.C.) systematized Greek geom-
Egypt was prosperous and reasonably peaceful. etry there, organizing it into a logical whole in a
The two Ptolemies beautified Alexandria, their textbook that has been used, with various modi-
capital, and established a Museum (a temple fications, to this day —
surely a record for longev-
dedicated to the Muses, who were thought of as ity in textbooks. Aristarchus (320-250 B.C.) made
the divine inspiration of art and science), which his astronomic observations and suggested that
300 TO 250 B.C. 73
the Earth moved about the Sun and not vice The Seleucid Empire established the first chro-
versa (though this notion was not accepted at the nology that counted the years steadily and with-
time). He also tried to determine the distance of out regard to the reign of any king or other type
the Sun and Moon from the Earth. Herophilus of ruler. It began with the year we call 312 B.C.,
(355-280 B.C.) and Erasistratus (304-250 B.C.) which was the year in which Seleucus estab-
studied anatomy sensibly, by the dissection of lished himself in Babylon.
cadavers, until Egyptian religious susceptibilities Actually, that was the last important event in
put an end to this practice, and set back the study Babylon's history. Seleucus began the building of
of human anatomy for over a thousand years. a new capital, Seleucia, on the Tigris River, 40
The Ptolemies also founded a library in con- miles north of Babylon, because he wanted one
junction with the Museum, which eventually be- that was more Greek than Babylon was. As Se-
came the one the world was to see prior
largest leucia grew, Babylon declined into ruins and,
to the invention of printing. At its height, it con- eventually, disappeared altogether.
tained several hundred thousand rolls of papy- A second capital was built in the far west of
rus. the Seleucid dominion, in Syria near the Mediter-
The Pharos, a lighthouse named for the pen- ranean coast. It was called Antioch, in honor of
insula on which it stood, was built in Alexandria Seleucus' father, Antiochus.
harbor. It was about 440 feet high, and a fire was By 250 B.C., under a grandson of Seleucus I,
kept burning at its top to guide ships at night. It who ascended the throne as Antiochus II (287-
was considered one of the Seven Wonders of the 246 B.C.), in 261 B.C., the Seleucid Empire still
Ancient World. (One that I haven't yet men- seemed enormous, but its hold over the eastern
tioned is the "Mausoleum," an elaborate monu- territories was growing weak.
ment erected in the Asia Minor town of
Halicarnassus —
the birthplace of Herodotus the
historian — in honor of a ruler named Mausolus.
It was raised by his widow, Artemisia, after her
JUDEA
husband's death in 352 B.C.) Judea passed without trouble from Persian con-
Alexandria was, for a time, the largest city in trol to Alexander's to that of the Ptolemies.
the world, and the most cosmopolitan. In addi- Ptolemaic Egypt was tolerant of diverse views
tion to its Egyptian and Greek population, it also and Judea was left in peace. Indeed, many Jews
contained numerous Jews. moved on to Alexandria where opportunities for
The first two Ptolemies controlled not only all advancement were more numerous.
ofEgypt and eastern Libya, but also Judea, and In Judea, Hebrew was no longer the language
much of the coastline of Syria and Asia Minor. It of everyday life. It had been supplanted by Ara-
was the Egyptian Empire of a thousand years maic, which, however, was close enough to He-
earlier reborn, except that its government was brew so that one language could be easily
Greek and Macedonian, and not native Egyptian. learned by those who spoke the other.
By 250 B.C., Ptolemaic Egypt was the most In Alexandria, however, the resident Jews
prosperous and the strongest nation in the learned Greek and, eventually, the Bible could
world. It's population was approaching 4 million not be understood by them. About 270 B.C.,
as compared with the 3 million at the height of then, the project of translating the Bible into
the old Egyptian Empire. Greek began. Since 70 scholars were in charge of
the project, the translation was called the Septii-
agint, from a Latin word for "seventy."
SELEUCID EMPIRE By 250 B.C., then, the Bible could be read by
To begin with, the Seleucid Empire resembled anyone speaking Greek, which meant that it had
the Persian Empire in its extent on the map been opened to the most advanced civilization on
minus Egypt and Asia Minor. Earth at the time. It was an important step in
making Judaism known (through its daughter- moved into Asia Minor, where they established
religions) worldwide. the kingdom of Galatia in the central region of
the peninsula.
Other sections of the peninsula became more
GREECE or less independent as the Seleucid forces proved
Affairs inGreece and Macedon were particularly insufficiently powerful to hold them. South of
chaotic as various generals fought for control of the Black Sea was the kingdom of Pontus. To the
Macedonia itself. Finally, in 276 B.C., nearly half south of Pontus was Cappadocia, and to the east
a century after Alexander's death, the Macedon- of both was Armenia. All, even including Gala-
ian rule was stabilized by Antigonus II (319-239 tia, were more or less Hellenized, with the upper
B.C.). classes, at least, speaking Greek.

The Greek squabbled, but now
city-states still
leagues of cities were being formed. In northern

Greece, the Aetolians, until then not a factor in
EPIRUS
Greek history, established the “Aetolian Epirus (located where Albania now stands) was
League." In the Peloponnesus, the "Achaean the from which Olympias, Alexander's
land
League" was established, led by Aratus of Sicyon mother, had come. In 195 B.C., Pyrrhus (319-272
(271-213 B.C.). Unfortunately, the two leagues B.C.), a second cousin of Alexander, began to
fought each other, which played into the hands rule over Epirus. He had military ability and,
of Macedon. under him, Epirus, for a few years, became an
The island of Rhodes, in the southeastern Ae- important nation.
gean Sea, fought off Macedonian conquest and He fought in Italy and in Sicily with some suc-
set up a giant statue of the Sun-god in celebra- cess. In the end, however, he failed. In 272 B.C.,
tion. This "Colossus of Rhodes" was still another he died in battle in the Greek city of Argos. By
of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and 250 B.C., Epirus was obscure again.
Rhodes was for a while the leading trade-center
in the east.
In 250 B.C., the existence of the two leagues SYRACUSE
and the prosperity of Rhodes gave Greece a faint Hiero II (308-216 B.C.) became king of Syracuse
shadow of its former eminence. in 270 B.C. and, under him, Syracuse had a last
So did the continuing intellectual life. Impor- breath of prosperity. This twilight glow of Syra-
tant schools of philosophy were being estab- cuse was brightened by the presence within it of
lished. Epicurus of Samos (342-270 B.C.) had Archimedes (287-212 B.C.), the greatest mathe-
founded a school in Athens in 306 B.C. His phi- matician and scientist of the ancient world. He
losophy, Epicureanism, studied ways of maxi- worked out the principles of the lever and of
mizing pleasure by acting in moderation. Zeno of buoyancy, advanced a method for representing
Citium (335-263 B.C.), established a school in extremely large numbers, and introduced many
Athens about 300 B.C. Since the school was on a mathematical innovations.
porch {stoa in Greek), the philosophy was called
"stoicism." It condemned emotion and called for
a stern life of devotion to virtue and duty. ROME
From 298 to 290 B.C., the Romans fought the
Samnites for a third time, and this time, they
ASIA MINOR won and became the masters of all central Italy.
The Gauls, who had ravaged northern and cen- They also defeated the Gauls in the north and
tral Italy a century earlier, attacked Macedon in began to annex the Greek cities on the Italian
279 B.C., and moved where they
into Greece, coast.
were fought by the Aetolian League. They then The city of Tarentum, in the Italian heel, felt
250 TO 200 B.C. 75
they had good cause to fear that Rome's expan- own, and
the south, began to build ships of their
sion would finally reach them. They called for with these they fought the Carthaginians on an
help to Pyrrhus of Epirus, just across the narrow equal basis.
southern opening of the Adriatic Sea. In 250 B.C., the war was still continuing, but
Pyrrhus, always eager for war, entered south- by now, five centuries after the city had been
ern Italy with 25,000 men and 26 elephants. (Ever founded, it was clear that Rome was a world
since Alexander's penetration into northwestern power. It had defeated one Hellenistic army, and
India, the Hellenistic monarchs had been using if the Hellenistic kingdoms continued their suici-
elephants in their battles, more for prestige than dal warfare with each other, it was only Rome
anything else. The elephants were rarely of any that would benefit.
use. Unlike horses, elephants were far too intel-
ligent to face the possibility of being wounded
just because some man was urging it to do so. It INDIA
was all to easy to panic elephants into hasty re- The Maurya dynasty, founded by Chandragupta,
treat to the ruin of their own army.) reached its peak under Asoka, who came to the
Pyrrhus defeated the Romans in battles in 280 throne in 265 B.C. He controlled all of India ex-
B.C. and again in 279 B.C., but at such a dreadful cept for the extreme southern part, and could
cost that, after the second, he said, "Another easily have conquered that. However, he was so
such victory and I will return without a man to sickened by the slaughter of battle early in his
Epirus." This gave rise to the phrase "Pyrrhic career that he refused to fight any more.
victory," for one that is bought at so great a cost He was completely tolerant where religious
as to amount to a defeat. matters were concerned, but he was a Buddhist
Pyrrhus then retired into Sicily where he himself, and an ardent one. He encouraged the
fought the Carthaginians. Then, on returning to sending of missionaries to Burma and to Ceylon
Italy, he was finally defeated by the Romans in and that began the process by which Buddhism
275 B.C., and had to go back to Epirus. Rome ceased to be a local Indian cult and became a
then took over the Greek cities in the south, inworld religion. In fact, although Buddhism vir-
cluding Tarentum. tually disappeared within India, eventually, it re-
This brought the Romans in Italy, and the Car- mained popular outside its native land,
thaginians in Sicily, face to face. War between throughout much of eastern and southeastern
them was inevitable. In 264 B.C., the "First Punic Asia.
War" began. ("Punic" was Latin for "Phoeni- In 250 B.C., India, under Asoka, was at peace
cian.") The Carthaginians controlled the sea but and prosperous.
the Romans, with help from the Greek cities in
250 TO 200 B.C.

was a weak king. By 200 B.C., Egypt was begin-
EGYPT ning to decline.
Under Ptolemy who
reigned from 246 to 221
III, Greek science continued, however. Eratos-
B.C., Ptolemaic Egypt reached the height of its thenes of Cyrene (276-196 B.C.) was put in
power. He, however, was succeeded by Ptolemy charge of the Library at Alexandria in 225 B.C.
IV, who reigned from 221 to 205 B.C., and who He made a map of the known world and calcu-
lated the size of the Earth's globe correctly, giving however, instead of opposing Macedonia, it saw
it a circumference of 25,000 miles. He was also its enemy as Sparta, which, a century and a quar-
the attempt to set up a consistent world-

first to ter after the battle of Leuctra, was showing sur-
wide chronology for all nations, counting the prising signs of life.
years from the Trojan War. (It was about this In 245 B.C., Agis IV (263-241 B.C.) came to
time, also, that the Greeks began to number the the Spartan throne.By that time, the Spartan sys-
years according to the Olympiads.) tem was moribund and Agis wished to reform it.
Apollonius of Perga (262-190 B.C.) was the He was a liberal who wanted to redistribute the
greatest mathematician of this period. He ex- land and revive the state. The few landowners
tended Euclid's work, dealing with the conic sec- who profited by ruined economy
Sparta's
tions, curves that included the ellipse, the howled objections and, in 241.B.C., Agis was put
parabola, and the hyperbola. on trial and executed.
In 235 B.C., Cleomenes III came to the throne.
He married Agis's widow and also embarked on
SELEUCID EMPIRE a plan for reform. He did it by first leading out
After 250 B.C., it seemed that the Seleucid Em- his army and defeating the Achaean League.
pire was breaking up. In 248 B.C., the eastern Then, with the prestige gained, he forced reform
portions of the Seleucid Empire broke away. In on Sparta. He continued to win victories and, for
what is now Iran, Arsaces I (who may have been one unbelievable moment, it seemed that Sparta
of Scythian origin) set up the Parthian Empire, was reestablishing its power over southern
so-called because it was centered on the Persian Greece.
province of Parthia. The Achaean League betrayed Greece by call-
To the east of Parthia, Diodotus (d. 239 B.C.) ing in Macedonia. Antigonus III (263-221 B.C.),
set up the kingdom of Bactria, about where Af- who had begun his reign in 227 B.C., brought his
ghanistan is now located. army south and defeated Sparta at the battle of
Minor, in 263 B.C., Eumenes I (d. 241
In Asia Sellasia in 222 B.C. Cleomenes III fled to Egypt
B.C.) made himself king of Pergamum, a land where he died in 219 B.C.
located where once the kingdom of Lydia had In 207 B.C., the Spartan liberal Nabis (d. 192
stood. B.C.) deposed the last kings and took control of
In 223 B.C., however, Antiochus III (242-187 Sparta. He carried through to completion the re-
B.C.) became the Seleucid king and, in a series of forms of Agis IV and Cleomenes III, abolishing
campaigns, he managed to force the various debts, redividing the land, and even freeing the
areas that had broken away to return to the Em- slaves. For this, of course, he was looked upon
pire. By 200 B.C., the Seleucid Empire seemed to with horror as a villainous revolutionary by the
have returned to its former extent. In view of the surrounding cities.
decline of Egypt, it now seemed that the Seleucid
Empire must be the strongest power on Earth
and Antiochus III insisted on being called "Anti- ROME
ochus the Great" as a result. This was an illusion, Rome finally defeated Carthage in the First Punic
however, for the effort Antiochus took to restore War and, in 241 B.C., Carthage accepted a losing
the Empire had merely weakened it further. peace. Carthage had fought well, however, and
the peace was not catastrophic for them. Rome
took over Sicily — all except for Syracuse which
SPARTA remained independent under Hiero II.
Macedonia was not particularly strong at this In 238 B.C., Carthage fell into disarray when
time and it could not keep the Greeks from fight- its mercenary soldiers remained unpaid and,
ing each other even at this date. The Achaean therefore, revolted. The mercenaries were even-
League was at the height of what power it had; tually crushed, but Rome took advantage of Car-
250 TO 200 B.C. 77
thage's preoccupation by taking over the islands known) in 202 B.C., and lost a battle for the first
of Sardinia and Corsica. time.

Carthage made up for its losses by expanding Carthage was defeated catastrophically, and a
its holdings in Spain, where Hamilcar Barca vengeful Rome enforced a ruinous peace on it.
(270-228 B.C.), who had fought particularly well Carthage had to give up its navy and all its terri-
in the closing years of the First Punic War, super- tory, except for that immediately around the city.
vised the Carthaginian dominions. After Hamil- Rome took over Spain, established a firm grip on
car Barca died in 228, his son-in-law, Hasdrubal, those cities that had joined Hannibal after Can-
took his place. When Hasdrubal was assassi- nae, and took over all of Italy to the Alps.
nated in 221 B.C., Hamilcar's son, Hannibal By 200 B.C., Rome was supreme in the west-
(247-183 B.C.), only 25 years old at the time, took ern Mediterranean. The only comparable pOwer
over. As it turned out, Hannibal was the most remaining (at least in appearance) was the Seleu-
remarkable Carthaginian in history. cid Empire.
Rome, jealous of Carthaginian advances in
Spain, demanded that Carthage remain south of
the Ebro River and that it refrain from harming SYRACUSE
Saguntum, a Greek city south of that river. Hiero II had kept the peace with
of Syracuse
Hannibal, however, destroyed Saguntum and Rome throughout a long reign. In 215 B.C., soon
then sent his army of 50,000 men, 9000 cavalry, after the Battle of Cannae, he died. His succes-
and 37 elephants on a march through southern sor, Hieronymus, felt that Carthage was a sure
Gaul, and over the Alps into Italy. In 218 B.C., winner and switched sides.
he defeated Roman armies in northern Italy in Rome, however, still had the strength to deal
two battles and marched on southward. with Syracuse. In 214 B.C., a Roman fleet ap-
The Romans opposed him at Cannae in south- peared to lay siege to the city. Syracuse fought
eastern Italy. Hannibal, with inferior numbers, back valiantly for three years, with a great deal
carried through a perfectly planned battle, how- of help from Archimedes, who is supposed to
ever, and simply wiped out the Romans, killing have invented war weapons for the Syracusians
50,000 out of 86,000. It was the greatest Roman to use (including a large lens to set the Roman's
catastrophe since the sack by the Gauls, and, for wooden ships on fire).
a while, it seemed as though Roman destruction In 211 B.C., however, Syracuse was taken and
was at hand. Archimedes was killed by a Roman soldier, even
However, the Romans held on grimly, and though the Roman general, Marcus Claudius
Hannibal lacked support from the home govern- Marcellus (268-208 B.C.), had particularly or-
ment, where the conservatives of Carthage dis- dered that his life be spared.
liked the Barca family even more than they
feared Rome. Without being able to obtain rein-
forcements, Hannibal fought on in Italy for
INDIA
years. The Romans never dared to attack him di- India under Asoka may have had a population of
rectly. 30 million, considerably higher than that of any
Finally, a young Roman general, Publius Cor- Hellenistickingdom. In 236 B.C., however,
nelius Scipio (236-184 B.C.) triedsomething dar- Asoka died, and the Mauryan Empire disinte-
ing. Like Agathocles, a century earlier, he led an grated.
army into north Africa and threatened Carthage
itself.The Carthaginians, in a panic, sent for
Hannibal, who loyally came back home.
CHINA
There, with his best men long dead, and with In 221 B.C., China was under the
finally unified
some others bought off by Rome, Hannibal faced Ch'in dynasty. The first emperor of the dynasty
Scipio at Zama (the exact site of which is not was Shih Huang Ti (259-210 B.C.). Like India at
this time, China may have had a population of that eventually became the Great Wall of China.)
about 30 million. It was meant as a barrier against the nomadic
Shih Huang Ti was anxious to wipe out the tribes to the north. The wall was not intended to
traces of the long feudal past and to begin history keep people out, as much as to keep out their
anew. For that reason, he ordered all books to be horses. Tribesmen without their horses were not
destroyed except for scientific works, and for terribly dangerous.
those in the hands of official scholars. He also The Ch'in dynasty did not remain in power
supervised the building of an earthen mound long. In 202 B.C., the Han dynasty replaced it,
across the northern border. (This was something but China remained united.
200 TO 150 B.C.

was the last Greek general of ancient times to win
ROME victories. When he died in 184 B.C., it was in
Philip V of Macedon (238-179 B.C.) had become battle.
king in 221 B.C. He sided with Carthage after Antiochus III of the Seleucid Empire felt that
Hannibal's victory at Cannae, but a Roman fleet it was up him to take
to care of the upstart Ro-
was sent across the Adriatic (the First Macedon- mans. He felt no doubt he could. In 192
that
ian War) and that prevented Philip from doing B.C., he invaded Greece, but was defeated by the
anything much to help Hannibal. Romans in Thessaly. When Antiochus, chas-
Romedid not forget, and in 200 B.C., with tened by this, returned to Asia, the Romans fol-
Carthage disposed of, it found an excuse to turn lowed him, entering Asia for the first time.
on Macedon. Greece, anxious to be free of There, the Romans defeated Antiochus deci-
Macedonian domination joined Rome, which ac- Magnesia on the
sively in 190 B.C. at the battle of
cepted the Aetolian League, the Achaean coast of Asia Minor. As a result, Antiochus III
League, Athens and Rhodes as allies. In 197 was forced to abandon all of Asia Minor, which
B.C., Philip V was beaten at Cynoscephalae in was divided among various Greek kingdoms.
Thessaly, and this Second Macedonian War Hannibal, who had sought refuge in Asia
ended with Macedon reduced to subservience to Minor from the vengeance of the Romans, knew
Rome. that the only way he could keep from falling into
The Roman general, Titus Quinctius Flamini- their hands was to commit suicide, which he did
nus (227-174 B.C.), then declared all the Greek in 183 B.C.
cities independent. This was, of course, a sham. In 178 B.C., Philip V of Macedon died and was
They had come under the tight supervision of succeeded by Perseus (212-165 B.C.), who pre-
Rome. In fact, the first use the Greek cities made pared carefully war of vengeance against
for a
of their "freedom" was to beg Rome to destroy the Romans. The Third Macedonian War started
Nabis, the Spartan liberal who had freed the in 171 B.C., and, for a while, Perseus did well.
slaves. The Romans obliged, drove Nabis out of In 168 B.C., however, at the battle of Pydna on
Sparta, and that city finally came to an end as an the Aegean coast of Macedonia, the Roman
independent state. legion met the Macedonian phalanx for the
The Achaean League was now under the rule last time. The Roman legion won. Macedonia
of Philopoemen (253-184 B.C.), who is some- was utterly defeated and was broken up into
times called the "last of the Greeks" because he four republics. The Macedonian monarchy had
200 TO 150 B.C. 79
come to an end two centuries after Philip II had memory remained, ghost-like, to animate later
made it great. empires.
By 150 B.C., there was no question that Rome
was the strongest power in the western world,
and Greece found itself under a domination by SELEUCID EMPIRE
Rome that was far tighter than the earlier one Antiochus III died in 187 B.C., defeated and hu-
under Macedon. miliated, and the Seleucid Empire, which he had
While Rome never developed the level of cul- restored, promptly fell apart. Parthia, Bactria,
ture Greece had displayed, the playwrights, and Armenia were all independent again and
Titus Maccius Plautus (254-184 B.C.), and Pub- Asia Minor had been lost in addition. The Seleu-
lius Terentius Afer (186-159 B.C.), better known cid dominions had been shrunk to the Tigris-
in English as ''Terence," were now writing Euphrates valley and Syria.
dramas (They are not forgotten. Wil-
in Latin. Antiochus IV (215-164 B.C.), a younger son of
liam Shakespeare's A Comedy of Errors and the Antiochus III, came throne in 175 B.C. An
to the
Broadway musical A Funny Thing Happened on energetic ruler, he didn't bother with the eastern
the Way to the Forum are both based on plays by holdings, which would always cost much more
Plautus.) to regain than they were worth. It seemed to him
An important accomplishment of the Romans that it made much more sense to invade Egypt,
was that of road-building. They built straight, which had declined to an even further extent
wide, well-paved roads, along which their ar- than the Seleucid Empire had.
mies could march swiftly. It meant that Rome Antiochus IV invaded Egypt in 171 B.C. and
could shift forces from one part of its realm to did well. In fact, he was about to take Alexandria
another with unprecedented speed, which gave in 168 B.C., when a Roman ambassador ordered
it a great advantage over its enemies. There were him to return to Asia or face war with Rome.
also highways for commerce and ordinary travel, When Antiochus IV asked for time to consider
of course. Since the roads fanned out from Rome Roman ambassador drew a circle
the matter, the
as the hub, we have the saying, "All roads
still around Antiochus and ordered him to make up
lead to Rome," when we are discussing an inev- hismind before he stepped out of the circle.
itable result. The humiliation was complete. Antiochus
Even more important, if insubstantial, was the gave in, abandoned Egypt, and undertook a fu-
Roman devotion to the law. The laws were tile campaign in the east after all. In the course of
worked out in great detail and were intended to that campaign, he died in 163 B.C.
apply to Romans and non-Romans alike. Legal By 150 B.C., both Egypt and the Seleucid Em-
opinions were binding and precedents were im- pire were at the total mercy of Rome.
portant. In short, Roman law has been the foun-
dation of European law (and to some extent,
now, even world law) ever since. EGYPT
It was through Roman law that the Roman Egypt was ruled by Ptolemy V
in this period
realm was so much more stable than earlier em- (210-180 B.C.), who became king in 203 B.C.,
pires. The Romans rarely lived up to their ideals and by Ptolemy VI (d. 145 B.C.). It was a time
fully, but even an imperfect adherence to law, when Egypt ground steadily to the Seleucid
lost
rather than to the arbitrary whims and dictates of Empire, and might well have been absorbed al-
a ruler, makes for a quieter and saner society. together were it not for its subservience to Rome
Those who lived under Rome found life better and for the protection it was afforded in return.
than it would be outside Rome and, on the Alexandria continued to be intellectually im-
whole, were content to remain Roman. For this portant. Ctesibius, a Greek engineer, invented
reason, Rome held together for centuries and its the water-clock in this period, and it was the
most advanced timepiece of ancient times. (Drip- and what was left of the Seleucid Empire simply
ping water, slowly and regularly, lifted a float lacked the strength to force Judea back into sub-
that carried a marker that pointed out the hours.) mission.
JUDEA PARTHIA
While Judea was under Ptolemaic Egyptian rule, When Antiochus IV of the Seleucid Empire
it was peaceful. With Antiochus III, however, it marched eastward on his last campaign, it was to
passed from Egypt to the Seleucid Empire. The move against Mithradates I of Parthia, who
Seleucids were less tolerant and more anxious to reigned from 171 to 138 B.C. Mithradates re-
have their realm Hellenized. There were Jews mained on the defensive until Antiochus IV died,
who were willing to Hellenize, and Judea was and he then moved eastward into Bactria and
split between them and the old-fashioned fun- westward into Media.
damentalists. By 150 B.C., all of the old Persian Empire east
Antiochus IV, after his humiliation by the Ro- of the Tigris-Euphrates valley was in Parthian
mans, needed a victory of some sort badly. hands, and we can speak of the "Parthian Em-
Therefore, he turned on the Jews and decreed pire." It was the eastern two thirds of the Persian
that the Temple in Jerusalem be made Greek, empire, reconstituted one and three-quarter cen-
that a statue of Zeus be erected within it, and turies after the death of Alexander the Great. It
that sacrifices be made in the Greek fashion. Fur- was Persian in language and culture and Zoroas-
thermore, copies of the Bible were to be de- trian in religion.
stroyed, Jewish dietary regulations ended, the
Sabbath abolished, and circumcision forbidden.
The Jews resisted, and the books of Daniel and PERGAMUM
Esther were written at this time to encourage Pergamum gained territory as a result of the de-
such resistance to tyranny and persecution. feat of Antiochus III of the Seleucid Empire by
In 168 B.C., the resistance turned violent. The the Romans. All of the western third of Asia
focus of that was an aged priest, Mattathias (d. Minor was theirs and they were a kind of rebirth
166 B.C.), and his five sons. They were supposed of Lydia.
to be descended from a man named Hashmon, Pergamum prospered and was careful to
so they are sometimes called ''Hasmoneans." maintain subservient relations with Rome. In 159
One of the sons was Judah Makkabi (d. 160 B.C.) B.C., Pergamum came under the rule of Attalus
or, Greek, Judas Maccabeus ("the Ham-
in II (220-138 B.C.), who established a library sec-
merer"), so they are also called the "Macca- ond only to that in Alexandria. Because the
beans." Egyptians would not let Pergamum have papy-
Conservative Jews rallied round the Hasmo- rus, they developed the use of stretched animal
neans, and Judas Maccabeus showed himself to skins. These weremore permanent than pa-
far
be a capable warrior. He beat the Seleucid forces pyrus, but much more expensive, too. The skins
in several battles and, in 165 B.C., managed to are called "parchment" (a distortion of "Perga-
reenter Jerusalemand seize the Temple. The mum").
Temple was purified, and rededicated. Anti-
ochus IV died in 163 B.C.,
and, thereafter, the
Seleucid power was reduced to virtually nothing, GREECE
and what little existed was wasted on dynastic At this time, the only Greek region to retain a
struggles. certainindependence was the island of Rhodes.
By 150 B.C., although the rebellion was still Since they were a little tactless in expressing this
going on and Judas Maccabeus was dead, his independence, openly defying Roman control,
brother Jonathan (d. 142 B.C.) was High Priest the Romans set up the island of Delos as a tax-
150 TO 100 B . C . 81
free trading center, and the competition sent classes of brightness (“magnitudes"), prepared
Rhodes into a decline. the map, and discovered the precession
first star
Hipparchus of Nicaea (190-120 B.C.), who of the equinoxes. Most important of all, he
worked in Rhodes in this period, was the great- worked out a mathematical system for predicting
est astronomer of ancient times. He measured planetary motion on the assumption that all the
the distance of the Moon with surprising accu- heavenly bodies revolved about the Earth — as
racy, made use of latitude and longitude in map- they certainly appeared to be doing.
ping the Earth and the sky, divided the stars into
150 TO 100 B.C.

centuries, the city of Carthage finally perished
ROME and, as a people, the Phoenicians were gone.
By 150 B.C., Rome was becoming Hellenized Meanwhile, the remnant of Macedonia was
thanks to the influence of Scipio (who had de- stirring across the Adriatic Sea. A Roman army
feated Hannibal) and his friends. The Stoic phi- was sent there and Macedonia was annexed to
losopher, Panaetius of Rhodes (180-109 B.C.), Rome. Because the Greeks had shown sympathy
taught in Rome. Polybius (200-118 B.C.), a Greek for Macedonia, the Romans sacked the city of
historian, was a friend of Scipio and wrote a his- Corinth in 146 B.C. It was then the most prosper-
tory ofRome covering the period of the Second ous city in Greece, and, with that defeat, the last
Punic War and thereafter. Even Romans were be- spark of Greek vitality was snuffed out. The
ginning to write in the Greek fashion. Gaius Achaean League was dissolved, and Greece was
Lucilius (180-102 B.C.) wrote the first Latin sat- annexed to Rome.
ire. By 133 B.C., Rome had extended its domin-
There were people, of course, who objected to ions westward to include all of Spain except for
Hellenization and demanded that Rome cling to the northwestern quarter. In the east. Attains III
its old ways. The outstanding person on this side of Pergamum (170-133 B.C.) died in 133 B.C.
was a sour and cantankerous conservative, Mar- without heirs, after having reigned for five years.
cus Porcius Cato (234-149 B.C.), usually known He realized that it was inevitable that Rome
as "Cato the Censor." would take over the kingdom. Therefore, he left
Carthage, in 150 B.C., still existed and, within it to Rome hoping that the transition
in his will,
the narrow limits set by Rome's unforgiving de- would at least be made peaceably. It was (more
sire for revenge, it was even prosperous. Rome or less), and Roman dominion now extended
harassed endlessly (under the urging of Cato),
it into Asia.
and, in 149 B.C., they demanded that Carthagin- Rome, however, was suffering from the rapid
ians leave their city and settle inland. This the acquisition of territories.The overseas posses-
Carthaginians finally refused to do. sions were administered by Roman officials who,
Rome sent an army against Carthage, which far from home, were not as subject to the severity
held out for three heroic years in the "Third of the law as they might have been under the
Punic War." Finally, in 146 B.C., Rome beat them eyes of the Senate and the populace. The prov-
down. The was burned to the ground, its
city inces, therefore, were looted and money poured
surviving population was enslaved, and its terri- into Rome, corrupting (as money often does) all
tory was annexed to Rome. After six and a half it touched.

—
Moreover, Roman victories were pouring invaded Italy nearly three centuries before.
slaves into Italy, and this invariably led to the On the southern shores of the Mediterranean,
loss of the dignity of labor. The small farmer, Rome wanted Numidia, that portion of the coast
whose fields had been badly damaged by the that lay west of dead Carthage. Here, however,
long Second Punic War, found himself forced off they had to fight Jugurtha, a Numidian ruler who
the land, with his place taken by large estates run won battles by bribing Roman generals. (After
by slaves. all, if a society grows corrupt, all elements share
The impoverished farmers, unable to compete in the poison, and it is not to be expected that
with slaves, flocked into Rome which developed generals will be more honest than anyone else.)
a large and unruly population of poor people on In the end, though, Jugurtha was taken out by
what we would today call “welfare.” a low-born Roman general, Gaius Marius (157-
Nor were the slaves contented with their lot 86 B.C.) and his aristocratic lieutenant, Lucius
(and why should they be?). There was a slave Cornelius Sulla (138-78 B.C.). This was done in
rebellion in Sicily in 135 B.C., which took three 105 B.C. and Numidia was annexed.
years to put down. Some 200,000 slaves were in But now a new danger
threatened Rome. Ger-
rebellion and, in the end, 20,000 of them were manic tribes, called the Cimbri and the Teutones,
crucified —a very common Roman form of exe- were ravaging Europe north of the Alps. Begin-
cution for those who rebelled against the state. ning in 113 B.C., these tribes were moving into
Partieswere forming in Rome, which repre- the Roman sphere of influence. The two armies
sented different economic interests as they had sent to stop them were defeated; and, by 105
in Athens in Solon's time, four and a half centu- B.C., they were beginning to threaten Italy, and
ries earlier. There were the upperclass ”Opti- had defeated a third force sent against them. The
mates” (from a Latin word meaning the "best” Romans had never forgotten the sack by the
i.e., the most powerful) and the people's party Gauls, three centuries earlier, and they were in a
or "Populares.” They struggled with each other panic.
at elections when, increasingly, money was used They turned to Marius, the conqueror of Ju-
to bribe voters, and violence was used to strike gurtha, and he raised a new kind of army. It was
them with fear. In this period, the city of Rome an army of the low-born, who found life much
began to dissolve into anarchy. easier and better in the army than out of it, so
It was enormously clear that Roman govern- that they were satisfied to become professional
ment and society badly needed reforming (as soldiers. Furthermore, since Marius made it plain
Sparta had needed it, on a much smaller scale, that theirgood life was his responsibility, they
the century before). Two brothers, Tiberius Sem- were loyal to him rather than to the state. (Other
pronius Gracchus (163-133 B.C.) and Gaius Sem- generals learned to do this, too, and the armies
pronius Gracchus (153-121 B.C.), attempted to became as dangerous to Rome's people and
put through land reform, to limit the size of es- Rome's rulers as to Rome's enemies.)
tates, to smooth out the disparity of wealth, and Nevertheless, Marius' army did its job. In two
What happened (as with Agis III and Cleo-
so on. separate battles, in 102 B.C. and in 101 B.C., he
menes IV of Sparta) was almost inevitable. The completely wiped out the invading tribes.
conservatives hired thugs, and first Tiberius and A second slave rebellion in Sicily, at this time,
then Gaius were assassinated. was also quelled, although with difficulty.
Rome rounded out its dominions along the In 100 B.C., despite corruption within, and as-
northern coast of the Mediterranean by taking sault from outside, Rome was clearly master of
over the coastal regions that lay between Spain the entire Mediterranean area from the Atlantic
and Italy. This was the coast of Gaul (which took Ocean to the Euphrates River. Any portion of it
up the area of modern France) and which was that was not actually Roman was a servile pup-
populated by tribes related to those Gauls who pet.
150 TO 100 B.C. 83
to the Nile, and to the unremitting labor of its

GERMANS peasantry, a rich land. However, it remained free
The German tribes seem
have existed in north-
to only because of its equally unremitting devotion
ern Germany and southern Scandinavia as early to Rome.
as 500 B.C. They tended to expand west and
south at the expense of the Celts. They spilled
over into Roman consciousness in 113 B.C.; and PONTUS
although the initial assault upon Rome was com-
Pontus, in eastern Asia Minor, along the Black
pletely demolished, the Germans remained
Sea coast, was still far enough from the Roman
north of the Alps and west of the Rhine river.
core to be independent. In 115 B.C., Mithradates
Rome would hear from them again.
VI (d. 63 B.C.), sometimes called “Mithradates
the Great," came to the throne. He sent expedi-
tions across the Black Sea to what is now the
PARTHIA Crimea, and annexed the Greek cities there.
In 141 B.C.,Mithradates I of Parthia captured the They gladly agreed to this because they needed
Tigris-Euphrates valley from the Seleucid Em- help against the Scythian tribesmen to the north.
pire, and established a new capital at Ctesiphon, His attempt to expand westward against Bi-
just across the river from Seleucia. The Seleucid thynia and southward against Cappadocia were
Empire, with its capital at Antioch, was now con- stopped by Rome, since both lands were Roman
fined to Syria. Even over that miserable remnant, puppets, and forced Mithradates back. By 100
dynastic quarrels clouded an increasingly worth- B.C., then, Pontus was a considerable eastern
less throne.
power and Mithradates had developed a deadly
hatred of Rome.
JUDEA CHINA
Such was the weakness of the Seleucids that, in
Under the Han dynasty, about 110 B.C., the
in
141 B.C., the last of the Maccabean brothers,
Chinese, under the Emperor, Wu Ti, advanced
Simon (d. 134 B.C.) could finally establish the
south of the Yangtse River and annexed all of
independence of Judea. He and his descendants
what is now southern China. In 108 B.C., Korea
served as both king and high-priest.
was conquered. Wherever Chinese armies estab-
The Judeans took over the petty regions on its
lished themselves, Chinese culture followed.
borders under John Hyrcanus (175-104 B.C.), Si-
Chinese culture was as attractive in the east as
mon's successor. By 100 B.C., when Alexander
Greek culture was in the west.
Jannaeus (d. 76 B.C.) was ruling over Judea, it
than modern
A Chinese explorer, Chang Ch'ien (d. 114
was broader in its extent Israel is.
B.C.), traveled to Bactria, at this time, to obtain
help against the Hsiung-nu (Huns) north of the
Great Wall. This was the first contact between
EGYPT China and the west — and thus began the west-
Ptolemaic Egypt continued its decline in this pe- ern appetite for silk, for instance.
riod. Cyrenaica, the eastern portion of what is At about this time, the Chinese may have
now Libya, was given to a younger Ptolemy, and learned that magnetized needles point north and
the island of Cyprus to still another. Both por- south. (As Greek science at this time was slow-
tions eventually fell to Rome. ing,Chinese science was advancing. The time
Ptolemies, all continued to rule
incapable, was approaching when China would be the tech-
over the Nile valley; and Egypt remained, thanks nological leader of the world.)
100 TO 50 B.C.
established Armenia as an important power for
PONTUS the only time in its history.
In 88 B.C., Mithradates VI of Pontus, seeing that He married the daughter of Mithradates VI of

Rome was absolutely intent on limiting his Pontus. While Mithradates kept the Romans
power, decided to take the offensive. He swept busy, Tigranes built a capital for himself, which
westward in a surprise attack and drove the Ro- he named Tigranocerta, and moved into Cappa-
mans out of Asia Minor, arranging to kill as docia in central Asia Minor. By 72 B.C., however,
many Roman civilians as possible. (He is sup- Mithradates' repeated defeats sent him fleeing
posed to have killed 80,000, but this may be a for safety into Tigranes' dominions.
Roman atrocity story.) The Roman general, Lucius Licinius Lucullus
The Greek cities, or at least some of them, in- (117-58 B.C.), followed Mithradates into Ar-
cluding Athens, rallied to his aid, but the sur- menia and there he defeated Tigranes twice.
prised Romans finally struck back. Sulla, who Then Gnaeus Pompeius (106-48 B.C.), usually
had helped beat Jugurtha of Numidia, defeated known "Pompey," replaced Lucul-
in English as
Mithradates in several battles in Greece. Sulla lus and continued the push against Tigranes.
took Athens by storm and this, four centuries Mithradates fled to the Crimea and died there in
after the battle ofMarathon, was the last military 63 B.C., at which time Tigranes surrendered.
action in which Athens participated. Sulla drove Pontus was then annexed by Rome, but Ti-
him back into Asia. granes was allowed to continue to rule over Ar-
As they had pursued Antiochus III a century menia provided he remained a loyal puppet of
before, so now the Romans followed Mithradates Rome, which, for the rest of his life, he did.
VI.The Pontine monarch had to give up his navy
and pay an immense tribute. The Greek cities
who had sided with him had to pay, too. SELEUCID EMPIRE
Mithradates continued to
In his later years, The Seleucid Empire by now was all but dead.
fight Rome whenever he could, and he was re- For a time, it was held in the grip of Tigranes of
peatedly defeated. Armenia, but after Tigranes was defeated, a Se-
leucid prince, Antiochus XIII, ruled from 69 to 64
B.C., but only over Antioch.
ARMENIA Pompey, advancing southward from his vic-
After Urartu had been destroyed by the Assyr- tories in Armenia, saw no point in continuing the
ians and the Cimmerians about 700 B.C., a group charade. He annexed Syria to Rome and the Se-
of people who came to be known as Armenians leucid Empire, after two and a half centuries of
moved into the area about 600 B.C. They re- existence, came to an end.
mained subject to the Persian Empire, then to
Alexander, then to the Seleucid Empire.
Once the Seleucid Empire broke up, two Ar- JUDEA
menian kingdoms gained their independence. In After the reign of Alexander Jannaeus, diedwho
95 B.C., the two were united under the energetic in 76 B.C., Judea entered a period of dynastic
rule of Tigranes (140-55 B.C.), sometimes called

I struggles. This continued until the approach of
'Tigranes the Great." He expanded his realm Pompey in 63 B.C. He had just annexed Syria,
southward at the expense of Parthia, which was and seemed to him

it that annexation was a sure
temporarily weakened by dynastic struggles, and cure for any kind of disorder. Therefore, Judea
100 TO 50 B.C. 85
was annexed to Rome, and the Maccabean king- The first civil war was won by Sulla, who re-
dom came to an end a century after the Macca- turned from fighting against Mithradates to win
bean revolt. a battle at the very gates of Rome in 79 B.C. He
then established a conservative dictatorship that
was supposed to grant the Roman Senate its old
EGYPT prerogatives.
Egypt was the last of the Hellenistic kingdoms to however, died in 78 B.C., and the civil
Sulla,
remain under rulers of its own. To be sure, those war resumed. The reformers continued to lose
rulers (the last Ptolemies) were utterly incompe- and the conservatives to win. In 73 B.C., a third
tent and ruled only because they were com- slave rebellion broke out, under the leadership of
pletely subservient to Rome. a gladiator from Thrace named Spartacus (d. 71
In 51 B.C., Ptolemy XII (112-51 B.C.) died, B.C.). It raged over two years before
Italy for
and his daughter, Cleopatra VII (69-30 B.C.), being put down by Pompey and by Marcus Licin-
along with her brother, Ptolemy XIII (63-47 ius Crassus (115-53 B.C.). Crassus was Rome's
B.C.), ascended the throne. It was totally unex- richest man, who had gotten rich by business
pected for a woman but Cleopatra was to
to rule, practices so questionable he would probably
allow Egypt a last gasp of importance. have felt right at home on Wall Street.
Hero of Alexandria, who may have done his The two made themselves consuls, and Pom-
work in this period, was perhaps the most ingen- pey cleared the Mediterranean Sea of pirates that
ious of the ancient engineers. He built all kinds were infesting it. Pompey then set out eastward
of clever mechanical devices, which were treated to finish off Pontus and Armenia and to annex
as amusing tricks in his time. He is best known various eastern regions.
for his invention of a very primitive steam en- In Rome, another reformer, Lucius
in 64 B.C.,
gine. Water was placed in a closed vessel from Sergius Catalina, attempted to force reform on
which two bent pipes extended. The water was Rome by, if necessary, rebellion. He was de-
boiled, the steam whistled out, and the device feated by the orator, Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-
turned just like a water-sprinkler. However, 43 B.C.), whose eloquence was so one-sided
nothing came of any of his inventions. Society and effective that Catalina (like Nabis of Sparta)
wasn't ready for them. has gone down in history as an unprincipled
villain.
Pompey and Crassus were now joined by
Gains Julius Caesar (100-44 B.C.), a charming
ROME and infinitely capable playboy, who was staked
Rome continued to have internal troubles. Her by Crassus and who finally made his money by
Italian allies, attempts at re-
disappointed that all looting Spain. The three formed a triumvirate
form had been defeated, rebelled in 91 B.C. That (Latin for "three-man combination"). Caesar got
war went on for three years; and although the himself assigned as governor of the Gallic areas
Italian allies were forced back into line in the end, in northern Italy and along the Mediterranean
theRomans felt it necessary in 88 B.C. to grant coast. It was his intention to conquer Gaul.
Roman citizenship to all Italians. In 58 B.C., Caesar began his campaign. He
Continued attempts to bring about reforms, was 44 years old and had no experience in war-
with continued conservative resistance, led to vi- fare, but turned out, rather unexpectedly, to be a
olence. Marius, of the lower classes, was on the general of the first rank. Although it took him 7
side of the Populares. Sulla, the aristocrat, was years, by 51 B.C. all of Gaul —
right up to the
an Optimate. Both had armies loyal to them —
Rhine River had become Roman, and, in the
rather than to Rome. When either dominated, process, Caesar never lost a battle.
there was a reign of terror against those of the In the course of the campaign, in 54 B.C., he
other side. even crossed the English Channel and recon-
noitered the island of Britain, though he didn't armies who were then in the east, but he knew
remain. they would come back, for Parthia was the only
By 50 B.C., then, despite the battles with Pon- target left.
tus and Armenia in the east, despite insurrection Sure enough, when the Triumvirate was
and civil war at home, Rome was stronger than formed and Caesar went off to find success and
ever, and the only civilized nation on its borders glory in Gaul, Crassus headed eastward to find
that dared be independent was the Parthian Em- the same in Parthia. Phraates III had by then
pire in the east. died, and it seemed fair to count on the usual
The outstanding philosopher of the time was period of Parthian turbulence. However, in a sur-
Poseidonius (135-51 B.C.), a friend of Cicero. He prisingly short time, one of Phraates' sons, Or-
repeated Eratosthenes' observations and came odes (d. 36 B.C.), had established himself on the
out with a considerably smaller estimate of throne.
Earth's size —acircumference of 18,000 miles. In 54 B.C., Crassus reached the upper Eu-
This was altogether wrong, but it was accepted phrates, which was the border between Syria
by other scholars and, in the end, had a powerful and Parthia, and planned to follow the Euphrates
influence on history, since it played a role in the downstream toward the center of Parthian
discovery of America. power. He was persuaded by a guide (who was
The Roman Marcus Terentius Varro
scholar, apparently in Parthian pay) to move farther east
(116-27 B.C.), a friend of both Pompey and Cae- into the desert, however. There he came across
sar, wrote copiously, and initiated the manner of the Parthianarmy waiting for him at Carrhae, 50
counting the years from the founding of Rome so miles beyond the river. The Parthians, strong in
that what we call 53 B.C., he called 700 A.U.C. cavalry, destroyed Crassus' army and killed
This remained the most popular way of number- Crassus.
ing the years for centuries. It was Rome. Until then,
a turning point for
Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (70-25 B.C.) wrote on when they were defeated, whether by Pyrrhus,
architecture, one variety of technology in which or by Hannibal, or by Mithradates, they did not
the Romans outstripped the Greeks. accept defeat but continued to fight until the
enemy was beaten and, eventually, its homeland
was absorbed. This time, it was different. The
PARTHIA Romans let it go. There were future wars against
Parthia, thanks to dynastic problems, lost the Parthians, but never of the old, relentless
ground to Tigranes of Armenia, but the loss was fashion.
regained when Tigranes was defeated by the Ro- What it amounted to was that the Romans
mans. had, by 50 B.C., found a limit — in the east, at
King Phraates III, who ruled from 70 to 58 least.
B.C., backed off from opposition to the Roman
50 TO 1 B.C.
for elections at the time, and the conservatives
ROME feared that Caesar would throw his influence on
Crassus was dead and Caesar was returning in the side of the people. They rallied desperately
triumph from Gaul. The city of Rome was in around Pompey, who was jealous enough of
chaos with the kind of gang warfare that passed Caesar to let himself be used as a foil against him.
50 TO 1 B . C . 87
The Senate, therefore, ordered Caesar to return Pontus and, on August 47 B.C., the Romans
2,
to Rome without his army. won so easy a victory that Caesar sent a message
Caesar knew that if he did that he would be to Rome that said, simply, Veni, vidi, vici ("1
tried on trumped-up charges and probably exe- came, saw, and won").
cuted. When he reached the small Rubicon River He then returned to Rome in 46 B.C. He spent
in northern Italy, which was the boundary of his a year defeating the conservatives, first in Africa,
Gallic province, he had to make a decision. On then in Spain, and in September, 45 B.C., he re-
the night of January 10, 49 B.C., he decided to turned to Rome as absolute master. He then
cross with his army. 'The die is cast," he said, began the task of reform. He increased the num-
meaning the gamble had been taken, and, ever ber of Senators, instituted a distribution of land,
since, "to cross the Rubicon" has meant to take and widened the Roman citizenship. He even re-
an irrevocable step. formed the calendar. With the help of a Greek
Pompey dared not face Caesar and his battle- astronomer from Egypt, Sosigenes, he set up the
hardened legions, and he fled to Greece, where "Julian calendar," in which there were 365 days
he thought the legions in the east would support to the year divided into months of 30 or 31 days,
him. Most of the Senators, together with other with every fourth year a leap year containing 366
conservatives, went with him. days.
Caesar followed him in 48 B.C., and the two The conservatives, however, though beaten,
Roman generals met at Pharsalia in southern were not all dead. On March 15 (the "ides of
Thessaly. There Caesar won, as he won all his March") 44 B.C., a group of conspirators, led by
battles, and Pompey fled to Egypt, which was Marcus Junius Brutus (85-42 B.C.) and Gaius
not Roman territory and where he thought he Cassius Longinus (d. 42 B.C.) assassinated Cae-
would be safe. Egypt, however, did not want to sar.
fall afoul of Caesar and so, at the order of Pto- The conspirators, however, were not ready to
lemy XII, Pompey was killed when he landed. capitalizeon the assassination. Caesar's lieuten-
Caesar was continuing to follow Pompey and ant, Marcus Antonius (81-30 B.C.), better known
landed in Egypt where he found the Egyptian to us as "Mark Antony," raised the people
queen, Cleopatra. She was young and, appar- against the conspirators, who left Rome hur-
ently, beautiful. Caesar stayed there three riedly.
months, fighting off the Egyptian army, and per- Caesar's great-nephew, a 19-year-old youth
haps making Cleopatra his mistress for the named Gaius Octavius (27 B.C.-A.D. 14), ar-
while. During the fighting that went on in Alex- rived in Rome, too. He considered himself Cae-
andria between Roman and Greek forces, a fire sar's adopted son, changed his name to Gaius
broke out at the Library which destroyed many Julius Caesar Octavianus, and was usually re-
valuable books. ferred to as "Octavian."
(There were periodic misadventures of this Mark Anthony and Octavian joined with a
sort that ended by wiping out a large majority of Roman Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (d. 12
general,
the ancient books, so that our knowledge of the B.C.) to form the "Second Triumvirate" in No-
ancient world is distressingly sketchy. Until the vember, 43 B.C. They followed the conspirators
invention of printing, books were always few, for to Greece in 42 B.C., and, at Philippi in eastern
copying them was an enormous task, and those Macedonia, Cassius was defeated and killed him-
few were subject to loss in the various disasters self. Later, Brutus was tracked down, defeated,
that have filled history.) and he also killed himself.

When Caesar left Egypt, it was to meet a son The three victors then divided the Empire
of Mithradates VI of Pontus. This son was Phar- among themselves. Octavian took the west, in-
naces, who reigned over Pontus from 63 to 47 cluding Rome, where the political power was.
B.C., and who now foolishly dared to challenge Mark Antony took the east where the money
Rome. Caesar's army met him at Zela in western was. Lepidus took Africa, where nothing was.
Mark Antony encountered Cleopatra at Tarsus closed for the time in over 200 years to indi-
first
on the southern coast of Asia Minor in the sum- cate that the realm was at peace, but actually
mer of 41 B.C. He intended to force money out there was fighting going on at the borders, par-
of her, but fell in love instead. ticularly east of the Rhine River in Germany.
In the west, Sextus Pompeius (75-35 B.C.), About then, also,Augustus refounded Car-
the son of Pompey, had a fleet and managed to thage, since the site was a supremely useful one
be a successful pirate, till Octavian's general, for trade. Earlier, the Gracchi and Julius Caesar
Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa (63-12 B.C.), de- had attempted to do this, but it was Augustus
feated and destroyed him in 36 B.C. When Lepi- who carried it through. It was not the old Phoen-
dus extend his own power to Sicily,
tried to ician Carthage, but a new Roman one. Before
Octavian had him imprisoned and took over Af- long itprospered and became one of the great
rica himself. He was now supreme in the west. cities of the Empire.
Mark Antony's fortune was quite different. By 1 B.C., the Empire was at relative peace
He was defeated by Parthia in 36 B.C. and had a and had been for 30 years. This was the Pax Ro-
hard job getting back to safety in Armenia. He mana (the "Roman Peace") in which, for a while,
then returned to Alexandria where he lived a life the Mediterranean world was free of the endless
of ease and luxury with Cleopatra, even though torments of cities and nations fighting each other
he had married Octavian's sister as a way of in- endlessly.
suring peace between the two leaders. Despite the horrible confusion of the civil
Octavian was easily able to turn Roman public wars, this period was the golden age of Latin
opinion against Mark Antony by describing him literature.
as a slave of a foreign monarch and as planning Cicero's public addresses and philosophical
to give half of the realm to Egypt. War
Roman tracts were published in the most elegant Latin
between them was inevitable and, on September style ever written. Caesar wrote his Commentaries
2, 31 B.C., the greatest naval battle of ancient on the Gallic wars which, in prose style, was sec-
times was fought at Actium off the west coast of ond only to Cicero.
Greece. Agrippa won it for Octavian. Antony Publius Vergilius Maro (70-19 B.C.), better
and Cleopatra fled to Egypt and, when Octavian known as "Vergil" to us, wrote the Aeneid in the
came for them with his army in 30 B.C., they last decade of his life. It was the supreme exam-
killed themselves. ple of Latin poetry, for all that it was a rather
The Roman civil wars, which had begun with pale imitation of Homer. Quintus Horatius Flac-
Marius and Sulla, 50 years before, were over. Oc- cus (65-8 B.C.), or "Horace," wrote satires and
tavian was the absolute ruler of Rome. He an- odes. Publius Ovidius Naso (43 B.C-A.D. 17), or
nexed Egypt as a personal possession, and "Ovid," wrote Metamorphoses, probably the most
three centuries after the death Alexander
of attractive of all the retellings of the Greek myths.
the Great, the last remnant of his empire was Gaius Valerius Catullus (84-54 B.C.) wrote pas-
gone. sionate love poems.
Octavian, without altering the forms of the Titus Livius (59 B.C.-A.D. 17), or "Livy,"
Republic, managed to modify them so that he wrote a long history of Rome of which only about
was the supreme authority, holding all the im- a quarter survives. The first 10 books, dealing
portant posts. On
January 23, 27 B.G., Octavian with the time before the Gallic sack of Rome in
was named Augustus Caesar. He was the "Im- 390 B.C., survives, and comprise the source of all
perator" (i.e., the generalissimo of the armies), the romanticized and patriotic legends of the
meaning "Emperor" in English. In 27 B.C., then, early city.
the Roman Republic came to an end and the Titus Lucretius Carus (90-53 B.C.), or "Lucre-
Roman Empire came into being, with Augustus tius," wrote a long poem dealing with Epicurean
as the first Emperor. philosophy and the atomism it espoused. Lucre-
In 19 B.C., the Temple of Janus had been tius, more than anyone, was responsible for the
50 TO 1 B . C . 89
survival of the concept of atomism into early to fight the Romans as once Judeans had fought
modern times. the Seleucids — never noticing that Rome was
enormously stronger than the declining Seleucid
Empire had been a century and a half earlier.
JUDEA Herod kept those nationalists in check, for the
After Crassus' defeat by the Parthians, there sake of saving Judea from destruction, and he
were those in Judea who advocated a switch in was hated for that, too. His unpopularity in
allegiance to Parthia and rebellion against Rome. Judea, and the clear memory of the assassination
However, Antipater (d. 43 B.C.), a native of Idu- of his father, turned him tyrannical in his old
mea (the region south of Judea that had been age.
conquered by the Maccabees and forcibly con- He died in 4 B.C. Some time before he died,
verted to Judaism), was high in the government Jesus of Nazareth was born.
and was pro-Roman, feeling that the Parthian
was only temporary.
victory
Once Julius Caesar was in control of Rome, he PARTHIA
showed his gratitude to Antipater by making him The Parthian drive to the Mediterranean in 40
governor of Judea. B.C. had brought the Parthian Empire to the
Antipater was assassinated in 43 B.C., at a peak of its power, but it didn't stay there long.
time when Caesar had been assassinated the pre- One of Mark Antony's generals, Publius Venti-
vious year and all was still chaos in Rome. The dius (91-37 B.C.) drove them out of the Roman
Parthians seized their chance and marched west- provinces by 38 B.C.
ward, taking Syria and Judea, and reaching the Mark Antony wished to win a victory for him-
Mediterranean. selfand, in 36 B.C., invaded Parthia, but he was
Antipater's son, Herod (73-4 B.C.), some- never quite as good a general as he thought he
times called "Herod the Great," south to
fled was, and he barely got out alive.
Egypt, and took measures to ingratiate himself After that, Parthia lost itself in the usualmo-
with both Mark Antony and Octavian. Even- rass of dynastic fighting. In 20 B.C., Augustus
tually, things quieted in Rome and the Parthians entered into negotiations with Phraates IV of Par-
had moved out of the Roman provinces; thus, in thia (who reigned from 37 to 2 B.C.) and ar-
39 B.C., Herod was back in Judea as king. He ranged to have the battle flags, which had been
remained king for the rest of his life and man- captured from Crassus 33 years earlier, returned
aged to keep the peace. He supported Mark An- to Rome. That seemed to wipe out the disgrace a
tony while Antony was strong, and, when little.
matters began to shift toward Octavian, Herod By 1 seemed an unspoken agree-

B.C., there
prudently shifted in the same direction. ment between Rome and Parthia to coexist, and
Herod kept Judea prosperous. A great builder, about the only remaining source of friction was
he enlarged and beautified the Temple. He was Armenia, which lay between the two and which
Jewish in religion and carefully held to Jewish both tried, periodically, to snatch.
ritual. However, he was an Idumaean and not a [From this point on, all dates, given in simple
Judean, and the Judean nationalists hated him numbers, may be taken as A.D. If dates before
for that. A.D. 1 must be mentioned, B.C. will be added.]
The more extreme Judean nationalists wanted
1 TO 50
In 37, Tiberius was succeeded by his grand-
ROMAN EMPIRE son, Caligula (12-41). He ruled only four years
Under Augustus and his immediate successors, before being assassinated and, in 41, the throne
the Empire was consolidated. Thrace and Moesia went to his uncle, Claudius (10 B.C.-54), a
(located where one finds modern Bulgaria) were younger brother of Germanicus. Under him, the
added to the Empire, so that the northern bound- southern portion of the island of Britain was an-
ary ran along the Rhine and the Danube from the nexed to the Empire.
North Sea to the Black Sea. Those regions of Asia Later Roman historians recorded the private
Minor which still had kings of their own, such as lives of these early Emperors with the emphasis
Cappadocia, were annexed to the Empire. On —

on seaminess of all kinds intrigues, poisonings,
the southern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, sexual orgies, sadistic whims, and so on. Tales
Mauretania (where Algeria and Morocco are now were told of the sexual enormities of the aged
located) was annexed. Tiberius and of Claudius's queen, Valeria Mes-
In one place only was there a hitch. The prov- salina (22-48), of the poisonous intrigues of Au-
ince of Gaul, which had been Roman for only gustus' queen, Livia Drusilla (58 B.C.-29), of the
half a century, was, to some extent, insecure be- lunatic behavior of Caligula, and so on.
cause the German tribesmen east of the Rhine How far these tales can be trusted is doubtful.
could, and sometimes did, raid across the river. Gossip-mongers then were no more reliable than
Roman forces, therefore, moved east of the they are now, and the historians who retold
Rhine with the intention of bringing Germany, these stories were conservatives who resented
conquered, into the Empire. They made their the Empire and looked back to an idealized Re-
way slowly to the Elbe. However, in the Teuto- public that had never actually existed.
berg Forest, the Germans, under Hermann (18 The stories were seized on by the later Chris-
B.C.-19), or "Arminius", in Latin, ambushed tians to show how wicked the pagan Emperors
three Roman legions under Publius Quintilius were and, of course, they have appealed to the
Varus (d. 9) in 9, and wiped them out. prurient in all modern times, they were
ages. In
Augustus, a cautious man, doubted that it popularized by Robert Ranke Graves (1895-1985)
would be worthwhile to scrape up the men and in his books /, Claudius and Claudius the God,
money to renew the attempt at conquest, so Ger- which were then made into a popular television
many was abandoned, and the Rhine remained feature.
the frontier, thereafter. Like the battle of Car- An outstanding writer of this period was Lu-
rhae, 62 years before, the battle of the Teutoberg cius Annaeus Seneca (4 B.C.-65), who, among
Forest set a limit to Imperial expansion. other works, wrote a series of tragedies that spe-
In 14, Augustus was succeeded by his step- cialized in blood and rant. (Shakespeare's Titus
son, Tiberius (42 B.C.-37). Tiberius did attempt Androniciis is an example of what is called a "Se-
to punish the Germans, at least. His nephew, necan tragedy.")
Germanicus (15 B.C.-19), was in Germany, and, Pomponius Mela (b. 5 B.C.) was the most im-
beginning in 14, he carried out a raid that de- portant geographer of the period. He was the
feated Hermann and recovered the battleflags first North
to divide the Earth into five zones:
that had been lost by Varus. Frigid, North Temperate, Torrid, South Temper-
Tiberius, as cautious as his stepfather, con- ate, and South Frigid.
sidered that to be enough, and pulled the army

back west of the Rhine.
1 TO 50 91
Caligula. He received a high position in Judea in

JUDEA 37 and was eventually made king in 41. A tactful
Philo of Alexandria (13 B.C.-48) was a Jew, living and capable man, he managed to placate both the
in Alexandria in this period. He did his best to Jews and the Romans. Had he lived a full life, he
reconcile Judaism with Greek thought, especially might have brought on an era of peace and saved
that of Plato, but, within Judea itself, the nation- Judea. However, he died, quite suddenly, in 44,
who would have nothing to do with Greek
alists, and the chance passed.
and Roman ways, were gaining strength. About Jew named Saul (d. 65), who was
46, a
The Judeans were living with the constant a Roman citizen and took the Romanized name
mystical excitement of the expectation that a de- of Paulus or, in English, Paul, was converted to
scendant of David (who had ruled the land a Christianity. Paul realized that it was important
thousand years before) would arise. He would be to make converts among the Gentiles, who far
the "Messiah” (meaning "the anointed one," a outnumbered the Jews, and that great obstacles
phrase frequently used for a king or high-priest, to such an aim were the Jewish dietary laws and
since they were anointed with oil as part of the the insistence on circumcision. Therefore, Paul
ceremonies with which they began their office). abandoned both, and asked the converts merely
The Messiah, once he came, would, more or less to follow the teachings of Jesus. In this way, by
miraculously, make Judea and independent,
free 50, Christians began to grow in numbers at the
and would lead a world revival in which all men price of being so fundamentally different from
would turn to Judaism. Jews that they could no longer be considered
Many men were thought one time or
of, at merely a Jewish sect.
another, as the hoped-for Messiah, and Judea
was in a constant state of semi-insurrection as a
result. The ruling groups in the land rather des-
perately tried to suppress all would-be Messiahs BRITAIN
lestRome lose patience and crush the land. The island of Britain was inhabited by Celtic
One preacher of this period who was viewed tribes closely akin to those of Gaul. It first en-
as the Messiah by those who followed him was tered the purview of history when Caesar in-
Jesus of Nazareth. He was actively preaching in vaded the island in 55 B.C., and again in 54 B.C.
29, during the reign of Tiberius. When he en- Caesar did this to persuade the Britons not to
tered Jerusalem, to the noisy acclaim of the na- help their Gallic kinsmen in their resistance to
tionalists, the high-priest and his party grew Rome. Caesar's demonstration worked in that re-
nervous indeed. They tried Jesus for heresy and spect and he made no attempt actually to occupy
abandoned him to the Romans, who considered the land.
him a rebel against the state because of his Mes- Britain thrived thereafter on trade with Roman
sianic claims. Therefore, they punished him with Gaul. A Britonic chieftain in southern England
crucifixion, which was the usual penalty for such who maintained friendly relations with Rome
rebellion. was Cunobelinus (d. 43), who was Shakespeare's
That might have been the end for Jesus, as it Cymbeline.
had been for other suppressed Messiahs, but The death Cunobelinus was followed by
of
Jesus' followers eventually insisted he had re- tribal rivalries, and the Romans took advantage
turned to life after three days and had then been of that. Immediately after Cunobelinus' death, a
taken up to heaven. They continued to view him Roman general, Aulus Plautius, and 40,000 men
as the Messiah (or Christos in Greek, which be- invaded the island. It was not an easy conquest,
came "Christ" in English). His followers even- however. One of Cunobelinus' sons, Caratacus
tually took to calling themselves Christians. (also called Caractacus and Caradoc), fought on
Herod Agrippa I (10 B.C.-44), a grandson of resolutely and was not defeated and captured till
Herod I, was a friend of the Roman Emperor, 51.
By that time, it was clear the Romans were in an ardent reformer who labored to put through a
Britain to stay. redistribution of land, to abolish slavery, to put
limits to usury, to establish a fair price policy,
and so on.
CHINA Naturally, the merchants and businessmen
In this period, China had reached a level of so- who profited from the inequities of society pro-
phistication in which government officials were voked revolts, in one of which, in the year 25,
expected to take tests that indicated their qualifi- Wang was killed. The Han dynasty was restored
cations for office. to the throne.
In 9, Wang Mang, who had been serving as At about this time. Buddhism was introduced
regent for some Emperors of the Han dy-
child to China, where it spread rapidly.
nasty, took the post of Emperor himself. He was
50 TO 100
Finally, the general, Titus Flavius Vespasianus
ROMAN EMPIRE (9-79), or "Vespasian," became Emperor in 69
In 54, Claudius died, and was succeeded by his and held on to power. He was followed by his
great-nephew, Nero (37-68), a spoiled young sons, Titus (39-81), who
reigned from 79 to 81,
man who fancied himself an artist. and then Domitian (51-96), who reigned from 81
In 64, a great fire destroyed much of Rome. to 96.
Nero hastened back from a vacation to supervise In 79, during the brief reign of Titus, Vesu-
the fire-fighting, but, according to a story, he vius, which had not been active in the memory
could not resist exercising his artistry by singing of man, and was not even thought of as a vol-
a song about the burning of Troy while accom- cano, suddenly erupted. Its lava and ashes
panying himself on a lyre, as he watched the buried the town of Pompeii and Hercula-
flames from his palace window. That gave rise to neum. (Many centuries later the excavation of
the story that "Nero fiddled while Rome Pompeii gave people notions as to the daily
burned." life in the early Roman empire and served as a
The blame for the fire was placed on the new strong push toward the creation of the science of
sect of Christians who seemed to the Romans to archeology.)
be atheists, since they denied the existence of all Domitian was assassinated in 96, and an el-
pagan gods. What's more, they were constantly derly senator, Marcus Cocceius Nerva (30-98)
predicting that the Earth would be destroyed by was chosen to become Emperor. He was the first
fire when Jesus returned in "the second com- of the five "good Emperors," who tried to rule
ing." They might impatiently have started the humanely and avoid arbitrary behavior. Nerva
job prematurely, the Romans thought, and a lived only a short time after being made Em-
number of Christians were executed. peror, but he lived long enough to adopt Marcus
Palace intrigues made it clear to Nero that he Ulpius Traianus (53-117), or "Trajan," who be-
was going to be murdered, so he committed sui- came Emperor in 98. This started a fashion of
cide in 68. For the first time, there was no heir having the Emperor adopt some worthy young
that could be traced back to Augustus, and dif- man and groom him for succession.
ferent people tried to seize the post and failed. In 100 A.D., the Empire was still at peace and.
50 TO 100 93
Rome, pros-
despite the occasional confusion in In 67,however, Nero sent Vespasian to Judea.
perous. Further imperial expansion had not He went about the job methodically, but met fu-
taken place since the conquest of Britain half a rious Judean resistance. He was further hindered
century before. by the fact that Nero killed himself in 68. Vespa-
In this period, Cornelius Tacitus (56-120) was sian left Judea in order to claim the Emperorship
the most important of the Roman writers. He for himself, but his son, Titus, remained in
wrote a history of Rome from the death of Nero charge of the army.
to the death of Domitian. He also wrote a book In May, 70, Titus placed Jerusalem under
about the German tribes, praising them highly, siege, and on August 28, after Jerusalem had
not so much that they deserved the praise, but been weakened by famine, it was taken and the
because he wanted to contrast them with a Rome Second Temple was destroyed after six centuries
he felt was falling into moral decay. of existence, and a thousand years after Solomon
The Greek writer, Plutarch (46-120), born in had constructed the first. There was never to be
Chaeronea where, nearly four centuries earlier, a third.
Philip of Macedon had destroyed Theban power, Other parts of the city held out for another
wrote a series of biographies of important Greeks month and some fortresses in Judea held out still
and Romans. He did them in pairs, comparing longer. The stand was the town of Masada
last
and contrasting them. Plutarch's pleasant anec- on the western shores of the Dead Sea, 35 miles
dotal way of writing biography kept his Parallel southeast of Jerusalem. It was not until 73 that
Liveswidely read right down to the present. the Romans could take it, and the last defenders
Another widely read writer of this period was — 960 men, women, and children — killed them-
Gaius Plinius Secundus (23-79), or "Pliny." He selves rather than surrender.
wrote an encyclopedic Natural History in which Because of the rebellion, the largest Jewish
he inserted, indiscriminately, everything he had temple in Alexandria was destroyed and many
ever read. He was overcredulous and gave much Jews were killed there, too.
information, but he was so interesting that he It was an utter disaster for the Jews, although
continued to be read avidly for many centuries. in the quiet that followed, the Old Testament fi-
He died during the eruption of Vesuvius, which nally reached its present form as the result of the
he was observing, overcuriously, from too close labors of pious Jews such as Johanan ben Zakkai,
a distance. who were allowed to continue their work at Jam-
Marcus Valerius Martialis (40-103), or "Mar- niah in the ruined land. The New Testament also
tial," wrote biting, satirical, and sometimes reached its present form by 100.
obscene epigrams, while Marcus Fabius Quinti- Those Judeans who had become Christians
lianus (35-100), or "Quintilian," wrote on edu- were expecting Judea to be destroyed as part of
cational techniques. the preliminaries to the Second Coming and they
The greatest engineer of the time was Sextus did not fight, but withdrew. As a result, they
Julius Frontinus (30-104), who wrote two vol- were execrated as traitors by those Judeans who
umes on Roman aqueducts and summarized had fought and survived, and Jewish conver-
Greek and Roman engineering techniques. sions to Christianity stopped.
On the other hand, Paul was traveling
through Macedonia and Greece, even on to
JUDEA Rome, preaching and converting Gentiles every-
In 66, Judea finally exploded. The nationalists, where he went.
still waiting for the Messiah, seized the Temple Thus, Christianity became a Gentile religion,
and then drove the Roman garrison out of Jeru- albeit with Judaistic roots: and, by 100, the
salem. The Judeans won the first couple of bat- groundwork,was laid for Christianity to become
tles over the unprepared Romans, and were con- a world religion, while Judaism remained a
vinced that miracles were on the way. small, nationalist cult.
ing a military force under Gnaeus Domitius Cor-

BRITAIN bulo (d. Armenia. Corbulo invaded Ar-
67) to
As was the case with Judea, Britain did not take menia in 58. After 5 years, Parthia accepted a
kindly to Roman rule. compromise that Corbulo had offered at the very
In 60, the ruler of the tribe of the Iceni (in what start. Tiridates might remain as king of Armenia,
is now Norfolk) died, and left part of his posses- but he was to agree to swear allegiance to Rome.
sions to the Emperor Nero, in the hope that the By 100, that compromise was still holding, but
Romans, in return, would protect his wife, Bou- it was interesting that Rome was willing to com-
dicca, and his two daughters. promise. Earlier in its history, it routinely aimed
No such thing! The land was appropriated en- for complete victory.
tirely, the daughters were raped, and when *
Boudicca objected, she was whipped. As a result,

she roused her people to revolt, and the rebels
INDIA
burned Colchester, destroyed London, and killed About 78, Kanishka, a member of a nomad tribe,
every Roman
they could find. the Kushans, established his rule over the north-
It took a while for the Romans to gather their ern part of India and over Bactria, which now lost
army and defeat Boudicca, who killed herself. all traces of Hellenization. Kanishka was a patron
The entire structure of the Roman occupation of Buddhism, but was tolerant of other religions.
was shaken and matters had to begin all over. He had contacts with China and encouraged the
The confusion in Rome after Nero's death penetration of that land by Buddhism.
made things worse, and it was not till 77 that a
Roman army under Gnaeus Julius Agricola (40-
93, who was father-in-law of the Roman histo-
CHINA
rian, Tacitus), could land in Britain and subdue Pan Ch'ao was Chinese Emperor from 74 to 94.
the island as far north as what is now mid-Scot- He extended Chinese control far into what is
land. After that, the southern two thirds of Brit- now Sinkiang and into Central Asia. China, at
ain was again Romanized, a process that was this time, was extended to the boundaries of Ku-
well along by 100. shan India and of Parthia. There was now, for
the first time, a solid belt of civilization from the
Atlantic to the Pacific across Eurasia: The Roman
PARTHIA Empire; Parthia; Kushan India; and Han China.
In 51,Volegases I succeeded to the Parthian This encouraged trade across the entire 6000-mile
throne and reigned until 78. There had been expanse — particularly, the silk trade.
peace between Rome and Parthia for nearly half

a century, but Volegases thought it was now a
good time to make an attempt to seize Armenia, AFRICA
which had been in contention between Parthia By 100, the kingdom of Aksum (or Axum), in
and Rome for two centuries. For the purpose, he what is now northern Ethiopia, had been estab-
placed his brother, Tiridates (d. 73), on the Ar- lished, probablythrough the influx of Sabseans
menian throne. from southwestern Arabia (the modern Yemen.)
The Roman emperor, Nero, reacted by send-
100 TO 150 95
100 TO 150
adopted son, Publius Aelius Hadrianus (76-138),
ROMAN EMPIRE or "Hadrian."
Trajan, the second of the “good Emperors," was Hadrian did not by any means follow the ex-
the first Emperor not to have been born in Italy; pansionism of Trajan. In his reign, the Roman
he was born in Spain. Empire went over, definitely, to the defensive.
Under Trajan, the Roman Empire had a last Hadrian voluntarily withdrew from areas in
spasm of expansion. Trajan crossed the lower which he felt Rome was overextended. He aban-
Danube and, after two campaigns, annexed doned the Tigris-Euphrates valley, for instance,
Dacia to the Empire in 107. and let it return to Parthian rule.
Dacia was located in what is now Romania (or He also built a 72-mile wall ("Hadrian's Wall")
Rumania). The very name, Romania, testifies to across the narrowest part of Britain between 122
the fact that it was once part of the Roman Em- and 127. This was to keep the northern Piets out
pire, and the Romanian language is even today of Britain, but it also indicated that the Romans
related to Latin and is considered one of the "Ro- would make no serious effort to advance farther
mance languages." north.
Meanwhile, Parthia had another long period Antoninus Pius (86-161) became Em-
In 138,
of disorder, until, finally, in 109, Osroes I became peror and his 23-year reign was almost without
king of Parthia and decided to break the Arme- incident, so smoothly did the Empire seem to tick
nian compromise that had been set up by Cor- along.
bulo. He installed a new king of Armenia, who In 150, the Roman Empire was at the height of
swore allegiance to Parthia. the "Pax Romana" and, 16 centuries later, the
Trajan led an army into Armenia and annexed British historian, Edward Gibbon (1737-1794),
it to the Roman Empire in 114. He then turned whose Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire may be
southward and marched through the Tigris- the greatest history ever written, judged it to be
Euphrates valley, annexing that oldest of all civi- the time when humankind was happiest.
lized areas to the Empire. It became the prov- In this period, Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus
inces of Mesopotamia and Assyria. In 117, he (69-122), known to us as "Suetonius,"'
wrote
reached the Persian Gulf and, looking out to sea, biographies of the early Emperors that were filled
muttered, "If only I were younger!" with sensation and sex and that have remained
At that moment, the Roman Empire was at its popular ever since. Decimus Junius Juvenalis
maximum extent, having grown from a single, (57-127), or "Juvenal," wrote savage satires on
sacked city 500 years before. The Empire Roman life.
stretched out over an east-west length of 3200 Epictetus (55-135) had been a Greek slave, but
miles. Its population was about 40 million, and was freed by his master and became the out-
China had a population of about 60 million. Add standing exponent of Stoicism in this period.
another 35 million in India, and perhaps 4 million Christianity had its interpreters who tried to
in Parthia, and it would appear that more than place it with Greek philosophy. Justin
in accord
three quarters of the world's population was in (100-165) was an important Christian Platonist of
the civilized band across Eurasia. Those portions the period. He opened the first Christian school
of the world not yet civilized contained perhaps to operate in Rome, and because he eventually
40 million people all told, so that the total world died for his-'Cause, he is usually referred to as
population of the time was 180 million. "Justin Martyr."
Trajan died in 117 and was succeeded by his Some Christians moved in the direction of the
who could Temple as it was

remember the
more mystical philosophies and tended to aban- still
don the Judaistic roots altogether. Gnosticism before it was destroyed. The military leader
was a kind of meld of Christianity with Zoroas- called himself Simeon Bar-Kokhba ("son of a
trianism, which gained a certain temporary im- star"),perhaps indicating messianic status.
portance in this period. The rebellion started in 131, and it continued
as fiercely and as stubbornly as the first rebellion
had; however, by 134, the Romans had won
JUDEA again.
In 116, the Jews in Gyrene rebelled, excited per- Judea was completely emptied of Jews, and
haps by some messianic hope. It was another di- the new Roman town was built. Nevertheless,
Jews numbers)
lived in Galilee, and*(in small
saster. Gyrene was a city in northeastern Libya
still
that was the one remaining place in the Empire in various cities of the Empire. Quite a few lived
where Jews lived in considerable numbers in in the Tigris-Euphrates valley, which was now
peace and prosperity. The rebellion, which was Parthian again, and was outside the Empire.
completely beyond sense, resulted in the eradi-
cation of that Jewish community.
The rebellion came in the last year of Trajan's
CHINA
life, and his successor, Hadrian, may have had
About Chinese eunuch, Tsai Lun (50-118),
105, a
the rebellion in mind when he passed through invented a technique for using such substances
Judea in 130. Jerusalem lay in ruins still, but the as tree bark, hemp, and rags to make a thin, flex-
Jews treated even those ruins with veneration. ible, white sheet upon which one could write.
Therefore, Hadrian decided to build a new city Slowly, the process spread westward; and, in Eu-
on the site, one that was completely Roman and rope, because of the similarity of the new mate-
pagan. rial to Egyptian papyrus, the Europeans gave it
When news reached the Judeans, they
this that name, which became "paper" in English.
It is impossible to overestimate the importance
broke into revolt again. The spiritual leader was
Akiba ben Joseph (40-135), who was an ancient of paper to a literate society.
150 TO 200
again attempting to take over Armenia. The Ro-
ROMAN EMPIRE mans did well in the field, but the soldiers re-
Marcus Aurelius (121-180) became Emperor in turned afflicted with plague. Sickness spread
161, alongwith a co-Emperor, Lucius Aurelius over the Empire, weakening it, as a plague had
Verus (130-169). Marcus Aurelius was a con- weakened Athens during the Peloponnesian War
vinced Stoic, who viewed duty as an ultimate six centuries earlier.
good. He worked hard at being a rational and Then, in 167, Germanic tribesmen poured
benevolent Emperor, and Verus was perfectly across the Roman such inva-
borders for the first
willing to leave all the hard work to him. sion since the Cimbri and Teutones over two and
Marcus Aurelius could not, unfortunately, a half centuries earlier. Marcus Aurelius man-
reign in peace. He was compelled, in 162, to send aged to drive them back but only with the great-
an army eastward because the Parthians were est of difficulty.

150 TO 200 97
Marcus Aurelius was the last of the “good Em- useful, but when Rome seemed weak, there was
perors." When he died in 180, he broke the rule the natural temptation to increase benefits by
of succession by adoption, which had worked so looting. In 167, when the plaguewas raging
well in the 80 years since Nerva. Instead, Marcus through the Empire, the Marcomanni (one of the
Aurelius' son, Commodus (161-192), succeeded. Alemanni group, apparently) assailed the Roman
He neglected his duties and grew unpopular. He borders. Though Marcus Aurelius beat them off,
was assassinated in 192 and, after a year of tur- that effort, too, helped weaken the Empire, and
moil, a provincial general, Lucius Septimius Sev- paved the way for further attempts.
erus (146-211), became Emperor.

By now, the Pax Romana was about over, and
life was becoming increasingly severe.
PARTHIA
In this period, Lucius Apuleius (124-174) In 161, Vologases (who reigned over Parthia
III
wrote popular romances and fantasies of men from 148 to 192) felt that with two emperors
being turned into animals, and of visits to the reigning in Rome, there was bound to be dissen-
Moon. sion and paralysis. Therefore, he seized Ar-
menia.
He had guessed wrong. Marcus Aurelius sent
GREECE a capable general, Avidius Cassius (d. 175) east-
Greece was no longer a political power of any ward. Cassius followed Trajan's route of half a
kind. Indeed, it was only a dream of the past. An century before.
Emperor, such as Hadrian, looked back to Greek In 165, he took Seleucia. It had been founded
times nostalgically, and showered gifts on Ath- nearly four and a half centuries before as a Greek
ens. city, and it was still a Greek city, large and pros-
Nevertheless, what science still existed in the perous. It had a population of about 400,000 and
Empire was Greek. Claudius Ptolemaeus ("Pto- was the largest Greek city outside the Roman
lemy"), a Greek in Alexandria, summarized Empire. Cassius saw it only as a Parthian city and
Greek astronomy about 150, and his writings sur- had it burned. That put an end to Seleucia and to
vived into modern times. Galen (129-199) was Hellenism in the east.
the last great physician of ancient times. He also took Ctesiphon, and it is possible that
By 200, though, Greek learning was fading, the Romans might again have tried to annex the
and was being replaced by mystic philosophies, Tigris-Euphrates valley, but Cassius' soldiers
by irrationalities such as astrology, and by East- were falling sick in large numbers of an epidemic
ern religions. Nevertheless, it never quite died, (possibly of smallpox), which was raging in Par-
and it remained to inspire later generations and, thia. He had to retreat and take the army and the
eventually, to help give rise to a new and still smallpox back to the Empire. The whole Empire
greater burst of science and learning. was devastated by the plague, and that plague
(combined with the Marcomanni invasions)
weakened the Roman Empire past the recovery
GERMANS point. Its population declined and never quite
The had defeated and destroyed

Germans regained its pre-plague peak.
Roman legions in 9 and had since been benefiting The next Parthian king, Vologases IV (who
by the nearness of the Empire. By the time of reigned from 192 to 208), tried to take advantage
Marcus Aurelius, there were the Franks, who of the disarray that followed the assassination of
lived east of the lowermost Rhine. South of them Commodus and invaded Roman territory. Sep-
were the Burgundians, and still farther south, timius Severus hurried eastward, and, for the
the Alemanni. third time, a Roman army took Ctesiphon, and
The Germans found trade with the Empire sacked it thoroughly.
INDIA CHINA
In India, about this time, a very primitive stirrup A serious rebellion by the "Yellow Turbans,"
had been invented, one of leather into which the aimed at the corrupt rule of court eunuchs, weak-
big toe could be placed to help a rider keep him- ened the Han Empire; and, by 200, it was clearly
self steady on the horse. winding down to its end.
200 TO 250
Christianity seemed dangerous, since Christians
ROMAN EMPIRE refused to grant any worship to the emperor.
After the death of Septimius Severus in 211, a This made them seem and under De-
rebellious,
period of near-anarchy prevailed in the Roman cius (201-251), who reigned as Emperor from 249
Empire, as emperors followed each other rap- to 251, there was the first general persecution of
idly. Few of them died in bed, and succession Christians.

was usually by military coup. In addition to Christianity, Mithraism was
In 212, Septimius Severus' son, Caracalla growing stronger in the Roman dominions. It
(188-217), reigning from 211 to 217, extended was of Persian origin and included worship of a
Roman citizenship to all inhabitants of the Em- sun-god, with great celebrations of the "Day of
pire who were not slaves. By this time, though, the Sun" on December 25, marking the winter
the citizenship didn't mean much beyond the solstice, when the Sun began to rise in the sky
privilege of saying "I am a Roman citizen." Citi- again. (The Christians finally adopted the day as
zens no longer participated in the government in Christmas, since the celebration was too popular
any way, and their chief function was to pay an to fight.) Mithraism was very popular with the
inheritance tax (which Caracalla might have had troops and had many of the emotional values of
in mind). Christianity, but it had a fatal flaw. It was closed
In 248, Rome had existed 1000 years (it was to women. This meant that Mithraist husbands
1000 A.U.C), and the anniversary was celebrated were apt to have Christian wives and, therefore,
with great pomp. Marcus Julius Philippus was Christian children.
Emperor then, reigning from 244 to 249. He is There was also Manichaeism, propounded in
termed "Philip the Arabian" by historians be- this period by the Persian preacher, Mani (216-
cause his father was from a Roman province, just 276). This had some of the elements of Christian-
*
south of what had been Judea, a province that ity in it, but it accepted the Zoroastrian view of
was at the northwest corner of the Arabian pen- the existence of principles of good and evil of
insula. equal strength.

As emperors found themselves facing only the One last school of non-Christian philosophy
certainty of Germanic invasions from abroad and was advanced by Plotinus (205-270), who added
conspiracies at home, and seemed sure to die various mystical notions to Platonic thought to
either in battle or at the hand of an assassin, they produce "Neoplatonism."
demanded more security and encouraged On the brighter side, there appeared one last
emperor-worship. Perhaps they felt safer as major work of original mathematical importance
gods; however, as it happened, it did them no to be written by a Greek. The mathematician was
good. Diophantus (210-290, possibly), whose book

Under these circumstances the growing sect of dealt with what we now call algebra. It was the
250 TO 300 99
first significant work to be published on that sub- people speak of the "Sassanid Empire," or the
ject. "New Persian Empire" or the "Neo-Persian Em-
By 250, the combination of anarchy at the top, pire." Actually, it would be simplest to call it
of increasing tribal invasions, and of the coming Persia.
of eastern religions, made it seem as though the In 241, Ardashir was succeeded by his son,
Roman Empire was rapidly approaching its end. who ruled as Shapur from 241 to 272. It was
I
clear, by then, that the change was for the worse

as far as the Roman Empire was concerned. The
PERSIA new Sassanid line was more capable than the old
If the Roman Empire seemed threatened with Arsacid line of Parthia had been, and that made
collapse, the Parthian Empire did collapse. Persia the more dangerous enemy.
Persis, the old province from which Cyrus had
arisen eight centuries earlier, rested uneasily
under the Parthian monarchy. It wanted old Per- JAPAN
sian values and resented Parthian tendencies to- The Emperor, Sujin, came to the throne in 230
ward Hellenization. and records began to be kept, though much of
By 211, the most influential leader in Persis what was written about the period continued to
was Ardashir (d. 241), a grandson of a local ruler be legendary.
named Sassan, so that Ardashir and his descen-
dants can be called "Sassanids." In 224, Ardashir
rose in rebellion and by 228, he had defeated and
AFRICA
killed Artabanus V, who
reigned from 213 to 224 By 250, Axum had become a major trading cen-
as the last Parthian ruler. Ardashir occupied Cte- ter, and was particularly active in the ivory
siphon and declared himself king. traffic.
The region remained as it had been. Lan-

guage, religion, and culture generally did not
change. was only a change in dynasty, ac-
It
SOUTHEAST ASIA
tually, as had been true eight centuries earlier Funan was located in what is now Cambodia. It
when the Median Empire had changed to the was subject to the influence of both India and
Persian Empire. However, the new dynasty re- China and, by 245, was important enough to
ceived a new national name. In place of Parthia, warrant a visit by a Chinese mission.
250 TO 300
time of Augustus. With time, they drifted south-
GOTHS ward until, by 300, they formed a rather large,
The German tribes north of the Danube were loosely bound realm Poland and
in what is now
now more restless than ever. Increasing popula- the Ukraine. In Poland, they lorded over the
tion may have been driving them south, or pres- primitive Slavs, who were a peaceful folk who
sure from the westward movement of the were easily enslaved. (Some people think the
tribesmen of central Asia, or both. word comes from "Slav.") In the
"slave"
The most important of the Germanic tribes at Ukraine, they dominated the Sarmatians, Asian
this time were the Goths. They may have origi- tribesmen who, over the centuries, had slowly
nally dwelt in what we now call Sweden in the displaced and absorbed the Scythians.
The Goths split up into two groups: the “Os- seized the eastern Roman provinces. Meanwhile,
trogoths" to the east, and the "Visigoths" to the the western provinces of Britain, Gaul, and Spain
west. About 250, the Goths flooded into Dacia, also broke away, declaring a new emperor over
crossed the Danube, and visited destruction on those regions.
the Balkan peninsula. In 267, they sacked Ath-
ens, Sparta, and Corinth.
Other German tribes invaded other portions
ROMAN EMPIRE
of the Empire, and Roman cities began to build In 268, the Roman Empire was at a low point and
walls about themselves since the frontiers seemed have fallen into fragments. In that
to
seemed to have become porous. year, however, Claudius II (214-270) became

Roman Emperor, the first .really capable one
since the death of Septimius Severus, half a cen-
PERSIA tury before.
Persia found the disarray in Rome, and the des- In 269, and again Claudius II won tre-
in 270,
peration with which the Roman Emperors were mendous victories over the Goths, slaughtering
fighting off the Goths and other Germanic tribes, them and driving the remnants beyond the fron-
an opportunity too good to ignore. They attacked tiers. (Some Goths became Romanized and set-
Armenia, the perennial bone of contention be- tled within the Empire.) The Emperor was called
tween Parthia and Rome and, by 251, were in "Claudius Gothicus" because of his victories.
control there. They even penetrated and took Claudius II died in his bed (unusual for the
Syria. period) in 270, and succeeding him was the
The Roman Emperor at the time was Valerian, equally capable Aurelian (215-275). When de-
who reigned from 253 to 260. In 258, he marched tachments of Goths thought that, with Claudius
east after having spent some years fighting the II gone, it was safe to raid the Empire once more,
Germanic invaders. Aurelian defeated them just as handily as Clau-

He managed Antioch and drove the
to retake dius had.
Persians out of Syria, but at Edessa in northeast- He then strengthened the northern border by
ern Syria, he lost a battle to the Persians (this was abandoning Dacia (a century and a half after it
fairly close to Carrhae, where, three centuries had been taken by Trajan). Dacia, north of the
earlier, the Romans had lost to the Parthians). In Danube, was an exposed position, and the
in
the course of the battle. Valerian was taken alive, Empire, it was thought, would be better off if it
but died in captivity. maintained the Danube itself as the northern bor-
When that happened, Shapur of Persia I felt der.
the Roman east was open to him and led his In 271, Aurelian began the task of building a
army However, he was stopped
into Asia Minor. wall about Rome — a city that had had no need of
at this point by the action of an Arab chieftain, one for five centuries.
Septimius Odenathus (d. 267), who ruled over Only then did he feel it safe to leave for the
eastern Syria. Odenathus was left in peace by a east to deal with Zenobia. By 273, he had retaken
weakened and distracted Rome, but a strong Per- Asia Minor, destroyed Palmyra, Zenobia's capi-
sian rule over the region would have been dan- tal, and captured Zenobia herself.
gerous to him. Therefore, he raided eastward He then moved westward and, in 274,
into the Tigris-Euphrates valley, taking advan- brought the western provinces back into line.
tage of the fact that the Persian army was in Asia Aurelian was then hailed as Restitutor Orbis —
Minor. that is, "the restorer of the world." Certainly, he
Shapur was forced to leave Asia Minor to meet had restored the Roman Empire, leaving it weak-
this new menace. In 267, Odenathus was assas- ened, but intact, by the time it was his turn to be
sinated, but his widow, Zenobia (d. 275), as ca- assassinated in 275.
pable as he, declared herself independent and In 284, the period of near-anarchy and fre-
300 TO 350 101
quent changes of Emperor came, at least tempo- with Diocletian on the throne, it looked as
still
rarily, to an end. A general named Diocletian though Rome had weathered all its difficulties
(248-316) became Emperor, and he was the first, and was again strong and united, having lost
since Marcus Aurelius a century before, to have only Dacia.
both a long reign and a quiet death.
Diocletian totally reorganized the Roman Em-
pire. He wiped out the last vestiges of the old JAPAN
Republican rule, converting the Empire into the Confucianism reached Japan about 285.
type of monarchy common in the east, where the
king is absolute. He abandoned Rome and set up
his capital in Nicomedia in northwestern Asia
NORTH AMERICA
Minor. In order to make the Empire easier to The Mayan was, by 300, arising in
civilization
rule, he divided it into a western and eastern central America, and pre- Aztec civilizations were
half. He chose a co-Emperor to rule the west, to be found in Mexico.
while he himself ruled the east. (He made sure,
however, that the co-Emperor was subservient to
him.) What's more, each Emperor chose a "Cae- PACIFIC OCEAN
sar" who would assist him and serve as his suc- About 300, the Polynesians, based originally in
cessor —akind of Vice-Emperor. (This system islands fairly close to Asia and Indonesia, were
looked good, but it never worked.) beginning the series of long voyages that would
As a result of all the disorders of the last cen- take them to all the scattered islands in the Pacific
tury, the Roman economy was and the
in ruins Ocean.
Empire was badly wounded. However, by 300,
300 TO 350
this world less alluring and the promise of the
CHRISTIANITY next world more desirable. And again, the
By the time of Diocletian, perhaps 10% of the Church, which was strengthening its organiza-
population of the Roman Empire was Christian. tion and efficiency, even as the Empire was los-
It was an important 10%, for the Christians ing its own, seemed increasingly to be a rock of
tended to be fervent in their beliefs, while the security in a troubled, miserable world.
non-Christian majority tended to be lukewarm, Most of the Christians were concentrated in
or even indifferent. the east, near where the religion had been born,
The causes of Christian growth were several. and where the people were more sophisticated
For one thing, the imminent disintegration of the and more used to philosophy and to theology.
Empire, which had seemed likely and even al- There were many bishops and theological teach-
most inevitable after the death of Septimius Sev- ers and disputants in the east.
erus, made appear that the things of the world
it In the west, there was a smaller percentage of
were indeed coming to an end and that the pre- Christians in the population, and only one im-
dicted second coming of Christ (the new form of portant bishop, the one in Rome. He, by tradi-
messianism) was soon to take place. tion, was a successor of St. Peter, who was
Then, too, the decay of society and the in- supposed to have been the first bishop of Rome.
creasing hardships suffered by humanity made This was important for, in the time to come.
when disputations and argument rocked the was The treatment of prisoners and
legal reform.
east, the west remained firm in the doctrines ad- slaves became more humane, in line with Chris-
vanced by the bishop of Rome (who eventually tian views, and he put an end to gladiatorial con-
However, offenders against sexual
came to be called the ''Pope" in English, from the tests.
Italian word for "father"). morality were treated more severely —

again in
The increasing number of Christians inspired line with Christian views. (However, the land
successive waves of repression. The firmest and did not become more moral as a result, for
most drastic of these was launched by Diocletian repression of immorality did as little long-term
in 303. However, repression never succeeded in good as repression of Christianity.)
repressing. Instead, if anything, it accelerated Constantine continued to make use of German

the rise of Christianity. It was so with Diocle- tribesmen who were willing to accept Romaniza-
tian's repression as well. Christianity grew still tion, and inducted them into the army, which
stronger. thus became less and less Roman and more and
—
more German a bad thing in the long run.
Constantine also demonstrated that a strong
ROMAN EMPIRE Emperor could overpower the Church. As long
In 305, Diocletian abdicated, and remained in as Christianity was a more or less outlawed reli-
peaceful and happy retirement till he died a nat- gion, the bishops could fight among themselves
ural death in 313. His system of two Emperors on points of doctrine and establish what came to
and two Caesars broke down at once, however. be called "heresies" (from a Greek word for "to
His abdication was the signal for various generals choose," meaning "to choose your own point of
to fight for the throne. This boiled down to a view"). There were endless quarrels and polem-
fight between one general, Constantine (d. 337, ics as a result.
sometimes called "Constantine the Great") in the Once was under a more
the Christian religion
west, and another, Maxentius (d. 312) in the east. or less Christian Emperor, however, the Emperor
In 312, Constantine invaded Italy, defeated could say which point of view was indeed a her-
Maxentius, and marched on Rome. Maxentius esy, and which point of view was "orthodox"
opposed him again at the Milvian Bridge that (from Greek words meaning "true opinion").
spanned the Tiber River. It occurred to Constan- The heresies might continue, but the power of
tine that since even Diocletian had failed to sup- the state would then be behind what had been
press the Christians, might be good politics to
it declared orthodox.
get those enthusiasts on his side. Therefore, he The coming of Christianity to power did not
spread the news that he had seen a glowing cross mean an end to persecution. Not only did the
in the heaven and placed Christian insignia on Christians instantly begin to persecute the pa-
his soldiers' shields. He won the battle (which he gans, denying to them what they had demanded
might have done anyway), and with the Edict of for themselves (the usual way of the world), but
Milan in 313, he allowed Christians free exercise one group of Christians would cheerfully and ef-
of their religion. After that, the Christians rallied ficientlypersecute another group.
to his side, and he was unstoppable. In 325, for instance, a council of bishops was
By that time, Armenia had already, in 303, held at Nicaea in northwestern Asia Minor.
made Christianity its official religion so that it Under Constantine's strong direction, the views
became the first Christian nation. The Roman of an Alexandrian deacon, Athanasius (293-373),
Empire under Constantine followed as the sec- sometimes "Athanasius the Great", were
called
ond, although Constantine did not allow himself declared orthodox, and those of another Alexan-
to be actually baptized a Christian until he lay on drian deacon, Arius (250-336), were declared he-
his death bed. retical. The former view, "Catholicism", was
Constantine continued the reforms of Diocle- thus given an advantage over "Arianism." (The
tian and labored to strengthen the Empire. There two disagreed over the nature of the Trinity.)
300 TO 350 103
There were occasions, however, where Arian-

ism had the power of the state behind it, to say PERSIA
nothing of the fact that other heresies developed. In 309, Shapur 11 (d. 379) of Persia was born. His
There was, assuredly, far less religious peace father had died just before his birth, and the Per-
after Rome became Christian than before. sians recognized the unborn infant as king at
Constantine, like Diocletian, preferred to keep once, which he remained for all of his life. He
his capital in the east. However, he wanted a was 17 when Constantine
died and, anticipating
new capital. He chose the site of the city of By- that there would follow confusion, he began his
zantium, on the European side of a narrow strait, first war against Rome. He won some successes,
the Bosporus, which separated Europe from but even though the sons of Constantine were
Asia, because it had an excellent harbor and a fighting each other, their fortified positions on
position that could be made very strong, if a the borders held against Shapur and, by 350, that
good wall was built, and if there was a strong first war had ended in a virtual draw.
navy to control the sea.

He rebuilt beautified by appropriating
it, it
work from Rome and from other parts of the Em-

art-
GOTHS
pire, and renamed it after himself so that in — In 350, the Ostrogothickingdom, in what is now
Poland and the Ukraine, had reached its fullest
English it became Constantinople, although it
extent of size and power under a king named
was also called, sentimentally. New Rome. It be-
came the capital of the Roman Empire on May Ermanaric (d. 376). The Visigoths, for their part,
11, 330.
now occupied what had been the Roman prov-
ince of Dacia.
Constantine died in 337 after a reign of 31
years, the longest since Augustus, over three
centuries earlier. He had three sons, who divided HUNS
the Empire among themselves. They were the A central Asian nomadic people, the Hsiung-nu,
first Emperors who were brought up with a
had been raiding Chinese territory for many cen-
Christian education, but they behaved just as
turies. The Great Wall of China was built to keep
badly as the earlier pagan Emperors. them out, and the Chinese were increasingly ef-
They fought each other and, by 351, the sec- fective at fighting them off. By 350, the Hsiung-
ond son, reigning as Constantins II (317-361) nu, either through population growth or through
was in firm, solitary control. The Empire was still
the realization that they weren't getting any-
united, and seemed still strong. where against the Chinese, began to drift west-
Technology continued to advance, which it ward instead. To the Europeans, once they
often does when all else seems to be falling apart. arrived there, the nomads were known as
Water mills were coming into greater use so that "Huns."
power existed, at least potentially, wherever run-
ning water was to be found. Glass was being
manufactured with greater proficiency, and AFRICA
looms for weaving cloth with patterns had finally About 350, the increasingly prosperous Axum in-
reached Europe from China where this had been vaded Meroe to the north and destroyed it.
invented perhaps four centuries before. Soap, Axum was now the sole civilized power south of
too, was coming into use, and this may have Egypt. Christianity was penetrating it, and that
been a Celtic invention. forged a link between it and Egypt.
Alchemy, a very primitive and often mystical
prelude to chemistry, was making itself felt. The
important alchemist, a Greek named Zosi-
first
INDIA
mus, had perhaps completed his work during About 320, the Gupta Dynasty united northern
this period. India and dominated neighboring portions of the
dynasty was Chan-

ruler of the the ancient Hindu religion ofBrahmanism began
region. The first
ascendancy, for Samudragupta was a
dragupta I, who reigned from 320 to 330. Under to regain
his son, Samudragupta, who reigned from 330 to devout Brahman.

380, the dynasty was at its height. At this time.
350 TO 400
German Franks who had crossed the
tribe of
HUNS Rhine River and invaded Gaul. Julian staged
The Huns, on shaggy Asian ponies, crossed
their three raids east of the Rhine to make sure that
the Ostrogothic frontier and entered Europe in the Franks would not return quickly.
374. They virtually lived on their horses, and Once he became Emperor, Julian did what he
could maneuver with a speed that left their foes had longed to do all along. He abandoned the
helpless. What was important was that they had Christian religion in which he had been raised
adopted and greatly improved the Indian notion and returned to paganism. He dreamed of re-
of the stirrup. The Huns had metal stirrups into creating the glorious days of Plato and Aristotle,
which the whole foot could be thrust. This fixed now six centuries in the past. As a result, he is
them firmly to their horses so that they could not known in history as ''Julian the Apostate," from
easily be thrown off. Without stirrups, a horse- a Greek word meaning "defection."
man could only cast a spear, or shoot an arrow. Julian's dream was unattainable, of course,
With stirrups, a horseman could thrust with a since paganism in Roman society was just about
spear and the full weight of man and horse would a corpse and could not be resurrected. Nor was
be behind it. his secular rule successful. He fought Persia and
The Ostrogoths could not stand against the invaded the Tigris-Euphrates once again, hoping
Huns. Ermanaric, who had ruled over their large to take Ctesiphon for Rome a fourth time, but he
territory, was (according to legend) forced to kill died in battle in 363 (perhaps being killed by a
himself in despair at seeing his kingdom vanish Roman soldier who happened to be a Christian).
under the thundering hooves of the Hunnish His successor was Jovian (331-364), a Christian,
horsemen. and the issue was never again in doubt. Chris-
The Huns spread over the plain that stretched tianity spread steadily through the Empire, and
from the Caspian Sea to what is now Hungary Julian's last words are supposed to have been,
(that name is no accident); and the Visigoths, "Thou hast conquered, O Galilean."
who lived just across the Danube from the Ro- Jovian agreed to an unfavorable peace in order
mans, clamored in terror to be allowed across the to rescue his army and bring it back to the Em-
river. The Romans allowed the Goths to enter, pire,then died in 364.
but it was not entirely an act of mercy, for the Valentinian I (321-375) succeeded Jovian and
Roman officials plundered the Goths and prof- appointed his brother, Valens (328-378) as co-
ited in this manner. Emperor. When Valentinian I died in 375, he was
succeeded by his two sons: Gratian (359-383)
and Valentinian II (371-392).
ROMAN EMPIRE It was Valens who ruled in the east, and it was
Constantins died in 361 and a cousin, Julian

II he who had to face the crisis created by the Visi-
(331-363), became Emperor. Julian was a capable goths who had entered the Empire to escape
general who, even as a young man, defeated the from the Huns.
350 TO 400 105
The Visigoths, angered by mistreatment by not from Rome itself, but from Milan in north-
Romans, had gathered arms and had begun to western Italy.
raid farming areas for the food that Roman offi- This was not unprecedented. Ever since the
cials were willing to sell them only at impossible time of Marcus Aurelius, two centuries earlier,
prices. Valens rushed his army to Adrianople, multiple Emperors had become more and more
about 150 miles west of Constantinople. (Adri- common. Nevertheless, until this time, when
—
anople had been founded by Hadrian hence, its there was more than one Emperor, at least one
name.) of them was a capable man, and there were al-
There, in 378, the Romans and Goths fought. ways times when one man might, like Theodos-
Valens, overconfident, did not wait for reinforce- ius, take over the entire job. The two sons of
ments to reach him. He didn't even wait to rest Theodosius, however, were both incompetent,
his soldiers. He attacked at once. The Goths, and the Empire was never to be united again
moreover, were, for the most part, on horses, although, of course, no one would have guessed
and they had stirrups (so much they had learned this at the time. In any case, from this point on,
from the Huns). we must speak of the "West Roman Empire" and
The result was that the Romans were slaugh- the "East Roman Empire."
tered and Valens himself was killed. The Battle Despite this, a superficial observer in 400
of Adrianople put an end to the Roman legion. It would have noted that the Empire, despite all the
had been the strongest fighting force in the west civil wars, all the tribal invasions, and all the Per-
since the battles with Pyrrhus six and a half cen- sian attacks, was still intact and seemingly as
turies before, but now there followed a long pe- strong as ever. This, however, was all facade. As
riod in which the key to victory lay in the cavalry. so frequently happens, the outside looks good
The situation was like that in the days when long after the inside has shriveled.
the Hyksos took Egypt 2000 years earlier, only One leading Christian of the period was Eu-
then, soldiers were dragged behind the horse in sebius Hieronymus (347-420), known to us as
chariots, whereas now they bestrode the horse "St. Jerome." His greatest achievement was to
with stirrups. translate the Bible into Latin, a task he completed
The Goths could not follow up their victory in 405. The Latin version is called the Vulgate
properly. They could not take the fortified towns (from a Latin word for "the common people").
of the Empire. In addition, Theodosius I (347- Until then, the Bible used by Christians was the
395), sometimes called "Theodosius the Great," Greek Septuagint, which had been prepared six
became Emperor in 379, and he shrewdly en- and a half centuries earlier. Jerome went back to
couraged the Goths to quarrel among them- the Hebrew and prepared a version available to
selves, soothed them with honeyed words, gave the people in the west, where Christianity was
them land to settle on, and encouraged them to weakest, and that greatly helped growth there.
enroll in the Roman army. The result was that he Another was Ambrosius (339-397), known to
managed to control the Empire and keep it quiet us as "St. Ambrose," who was bishop of Milan
during his reign. from 374, and who was the most powerful prel-
Theodosius was an ardent Christian and, with ate of his time. He was a strong force for intoler-
him, there' began an active persecution of pa- ance and set the standard in that respect. When
gans. He put an end to the Olympic games in the Emperor Theodosius punished a bishop for
394, after they had been part of the Greek tradi- burning a Jewish synagogue, Ambrose rebuked
tion for nearly 12 centuries. him. Nor would he allow any moves for a reason-
Theodosius died in 395, but before his death able attitude toward pagans or Arians. He did
he had arranged to have the Empire divided be- order Theodosius to do penance for angrily or-
tween his two sons. The elder, Arcadius (377- dering a massacre of the people of Thessalonica
408), ruled the east from Constantinople. The in Greece, who had revolted, but that was only
younger, Honorius (384-423), ruled the west. because the slaughtered people were orthodox.
PERSIA INDIA
Shapur having been king from birth to death,
II,
The Gupta dynasty continued with Chandra-
reigned for 70 years, a record only a few mon- gupta II, who reigned from 380 to 415. Brahman
archs have surpassed. His long reign was filled philosophy was developing notably at the time,
with periodic wars against the Romans. Only and that aided the recovery of Brahmanism.
the one in which Julian was killed was truly
successful. Jovian, to army, had

extricate his
given up all recent Roman conquests in the
KOREA
east and had agreed that Armenia was to be Korea, which had been under Chinese influence,
under Persian influence, and not Roman, thus was able to shake it China had been com-
off, as
reversing a situation that had existed for four posed of competing states ah war among them-
centuries. selves since the end of the Han Empire a century
Nevertheless, when Shapur II died in 379, and a half before. It may be at this time that Japan
Persiahad not scored a really decisive victory, attempted to secure footholds in Korea, under an
and the monarchs who succeeded him were Empress, semilegendary at best, whose name
weak. was Jingo.
400 TO 450
the feeble Honorius. (Stilicho was one of the
VISIGOTHS Vandals, another set of Germanic
who were
The Visigoths, after their victory at Adrianople, tribesmen.) In the war of German against Ger-
were under a leader named Alaric (370-410), and man, Stilicho beat Alaric in northern Italy, and
were living in what had once been Epirus, the Alaric was forced to withdraw.
land of Pyrrhus nearly seven centuries earlier. It It was clear, however, that Italy was not safe,
was a time when various leaders of Germanic and Honorius moved his capital to Ravenna,
tribes were given high posts at Constantinople, near the Adriatic coast. It was surrounded by
but Alaric had been passed over. Angered, he led marshlands and was easily defensible.
his men into raids toward Constantinople. The Since the fight against Alaric was diverting the
city was secure behind its walls, so Alaric turned limited resources of the West Roman Empire,
southward into Greece. other tribesmen took advantage of the situation.
was a Christian, although of the Arian
Alaric A group of Sueves and Vandals, who were north
variety (as most of the Germanic tribes within the of Italy, crossed the Alpsand invaded Italy. Stil-
Empire were, at the time), and he put an end to icho defeated them, too, and drove them out,
the Eleusinian mysteries. In this way, another which just about exhausted the Romans.
remnant of paganism was destroyed. On December 31, 406, other Sueves and Van-
The two halves of the Roman Empire were at dals crossed the Rhine River and moved into
such enmity with each other that each was con- Gaul. This was nothing new. Germanic invaders
tent to see the tribesmen destroy the other. The had been punching through the Roman bound-
East Roman Empire got rid of Alaric and his Vi- ary lines ever since Marcus Aurelius nearly two
sigoths by encouraging him westward.
to turn and a half centuries before. To this point, how-
Alaric invaded Italy in 400, but he was met by ever, the Romans had managed to fight them off
Stilicho (365-408), who was the power behind and drive them back.
400 TO 450 107
Now it was Germanic

different. This time the Germanic kingdoms be established. It was
to
tribesmen who entered the West Roman Empire friendly to the Romans and was allied with the
were never driven out. The tribesmen took the Empire, and even fought battles at its side. How-
land, made the laws, dominated the native Ro- ever, within the Kingdom of Toulouse, it was the
mans, and turned them into peasants and serfs. Visigoths who were the land-owning aristocrats
It might be noticed that there was little or no and the native Romans who were the peasantry.
popular resistance to the Germanic invasions. This was only 40 years after the Visigoths had
The Germans were opposed by Roman forces Danube River as
crossed the suppliants, seeking
(often also German). If those forces failed, there Roman help and protection.
were no guerrilla bands, no people's insurrec-
tions. The common people were so cowed by
a century and a half of tribal incursions and VANDALS
civil wars that it seemed to make no differ- The Vandals in Spain had been roughly handled
ence to them any longer exactly who oppressed by the invading Visigoths, and had been badly
them. weakened. In 428, however, a new leader, Gais-
The Sueves and Vandals crossed Gaul with eric (d. 477), sometimes called Genseric, proved
scarcely any opposition and, by 409 B.C., were to be the most capable of all the German tribal
settling down in Spain. (The region of "Andalu- leaders of his time.
sia" in southern Spain is a reminder, with the V The West Roman Empire was under the rule
missing, of a time of Vandal domination.) of another nonentity at the time. This was Val-
This successful invasion was blamed on Stili- entinian III (419-455), who had come to the
cho, who had done everything he could to pro- throne as a 6-year-old in 425. The real power was
tect Italy at least. In August 408, he was in the hands of two generals, Flavius Aetius (d.
executed. The German tribesmen, who made up 454) and Bonifacius (d. 432), who hated each
much of the "Roman" army, deserted in indig- other. Bonifacius lost out and was put in charge
nation, and Alaric, still waiting not far outside of the African province with Carthage as its cap-
Italy, seized his chance. He marched into Italy ital. It kept him away from Italyand the center of
again and, in 410, his soldiers actually took what power existed there, and he was furious.
Rome. Bonifacius decided to seek help among the
For the first time since the sack by the Gauls, German tribesmen, and the Vandals, unhappy in
exactly eight centuries before, Rome was in for- Spain, were ready to supply that help in their
eign hands. Alaric remained only six days, then own way.
marched into southern Italy where he died of In 428, Gaiseric and some 80,000 Vandals were
fever. The taking of Rome, however, was news carried in Roman ships to Africa. There, Gaiseric
that shook the Empire. Rome had for so long quickly showed that his idea of helping Bonifa-
—
been unassailable and now it was taken with- cius was to take over the African province for
out even the ability to put up a respectable fight. himself.
The Visigoths then trekked into Spain where In 431, he took Hippo, where Aurelius Augus-
they fought successfully against the German tinus (354-430), known
us as "St. Augustine,"
to
tribes that were already there. Afterward, they was bishop. Augustine had been baptized a
moved into southwestern Gaul, and there settled Christian in 387 by Ambrose of Milan. He was
down and made it into a land of their own. They the most influential Christian writer and thinker
established their capital in 418 at the Gallic city of since St. Paul, four centuries earlier, and few
Toulouse, so that their realm is sometimes re- Christians have equaled his importance since. He
ferred to as the "Kingdom of Toulouse." Reign- was an able writer, the first to write an important
ing over them from 418 to 451, was Theodoric I, autobiography. He skillfully expounded Chris-
a son of Alaric. tian theology and explained why it was that the
The Kingdom of Toulouse was the first of the Christian Empire was so weak when the Pagan
Empire had been so strong. He died in 430, just By now sole ruler, was
450, Attila, ready to
before the Vandals took the city. attack the West Roman Empire itself.
Gaiseric took Carthage in 439 and established
what was, under him, the strongest of the Ger-
manic kingdoms. In 450, he was still on the
WEST ROMAN EMPIRE
throne, having lost none of his vigor in his old The West Roman Empire had no history of its
age, and he had developed a navy of his own. own in this period. For 50 years, it kept trying to
The Vandals of Carthage were the only Germanic fight off German invaders, usually by making
kingdom to be strong at sea. use of German commanders and soldiers itself.
The Empire usually failed, under a line of singu-

larly incompetent Emperors, so that the territory
BRITAIN it controlled grew less and less.
Britain was the last province to be added to the By 450, the only general it hadwho might be
Roman Empire and to stay Roman for centuries considered Roman was Aetius. He was the last
— for over three and a half, in fact. It was also towin victories in the west and has sometimes
the only portion of the Roman Empire to be en- been called ''the last of the Romans" for that rea-
tirely separated from the rest of the realm by the son.

sea.
When was being plagued by the Visi-
Italy
goths, the Sueves, and the Vandals, Stilicho was
PAPACY
forced to draw on whatever troops were avail- After the time of Theodosius, the Emperors in
able, and he called upon the legions stationed in the west were feeble indeed, and usually were
Britain to come to Italy. They left Britain, begin- hidden away Ravenna. That left the Bishop of
in
ning in 407. The withdrawal was undoubtedly Rome, the Pope, as the only prestige-filled figure
thought to be temporary at first, but it turned out to be present in Rome, a city which still had the
to be permanent. mystique of Empire about it, though it had long
Britain had not been very Christian under lost its glory.
Rome — it was farthest removed from the Chris-

tian centers, and, without the legions, it quickly
lost its Roman veneer. Britain reverted to its EAST ROMAN EMPIRE
Celtic culture. The very fact that the West Roman Empire was
They were not allowed to remain in peace, so weak at this time protected the East Roman
however. The Piets in the north of Britain, who Empire. The Germanic tribesmen found the
had never been under Roman rule, seized the western provinces such easy targets that there
opportunity to raid southward and to spread seemed no sense in picking a fight in the east.
devastation. By 450 B.C., the British ruler, Vor- The East Roman Empire was now rich and ur-
tigern, was looking abroad for help, as Bonifacius banized. Constantinople was now the largest
had, and with the same results. and wealthiest city in the western world.
Theodosius II (401-450), who came to the
throne in 408 as a 7-year-old, was not a strong
HUNS ruler, although he had a very intelligent sister,
In 433, two brothers, Attila (406-453) and Bleda Pulcheria (399-453), who served as co-Empress.
(d. 445), began to rule over the Huns. The Huns Under him, a written code of laws was prepared
were still expanding in all directions. Most im- in 438.
portant was their expansion into Germany, Beginning in 413, and taking 34 years to com-
which drove some of the German tribes across plete, a triple set of walls was built across the
the Rhine and led to the establishment of the landward approaches to Constantinople. Be-
Germanic kingdoms. tween those walls and the Roman navy, it was
450 TO 500 109
felt that Constantinople would be impregnable

by land and sea and, as long as Constantinople KOREA
existed, that enemy victories elsewhere could al- Korea was divided into three kingdoms at this
ways be reversed. time, of which the northernmost, Koguru, under
In 450, while the West Roman Empire was Changsu, was now at the height of its power. It
crumbling, the East Roman Empire remained in- moved its capital from the Yalu River at the
tact. northern boundary of the peninsula to Pyong-
yang in the center. Buddhism was introduced
into Korea at this time.
PERSIA
Persia lacked strong kings in this interval. Chris-
tianity was making itself felt in Persia, but Chris- PACIFIC
tians were bound to feel sympathetic to Rome, a About this time, the Polynesians reached Ha-
traditional enemy for four centuries now. As a waii, their northernmost outpost.
result, the Persian monarch introduced periods
of persecution for Christians. This was more or
less successful, for Persia never turned Christian.
450 TO 500
stroyed it. Some of the inhabitants, fleeing from
HUNS the devastation, took refuge among the swampy
In 451, Attila led his Huns westward across the lagoons to the west, and there they made the first
Rhine River and into Gaul. It was the first time settlements of what became the city of Venice.
(and the last) that central Asian tribesmen pene- Attila then moved southward toward Rome
trated west of the Rhine. To be sure, most of his and there was no resistance worth mentioning.
forces were Ostrogoths, for the Huns had ruled In Rome was Pope Leo (400-461), sometimes
I
over the Ostrogoths for 80 years now. called "Leo the Great," who had attained the Pa-
Aetius of Rome, in alliance with Theodoric I, pacy in 440. He left Rome and came to meet At-
the aged king of the Visigoths, and with some tila in full papal regalia, asking that Rome be left
other Germanic groups, marched north to op- unharmed. turned back (according to the
Attila
pose Attila. The armies met on the Catalaunian story) because of the superstitious awe he felt at
Plain, about 100 miles east of Paris. the Pope's majesty. That is, however, so unlike
Aetius, maneuvering cleverly, won the battle Attila, that it is much easier to believe that the
— the last great victory of West Roman arms. Pope brought with him a sizable gift of gold for
Theodoric died in the fight. the Hunnish leader. Nevertheless, the story of
Attila was forced to leave Gaul as the result of Leo's facing down of Attila did much to raise
his defeat, but he was by no means wiped out. papal prestige further.
He turned toward Italy, where his looting was so Attila left Italy and, in 453, married again, cel-
terrible that he was called ''the Scourge of God," ebrated overenthusiastically, and died that night
the whip with which God was punishing the sins in his tent. As soon as he was gone, the German
of Italy. tribesmen who made up the bulk of his army

In 452, he laid siege to Aquileia, a city at the revolted. The Huns could not withstand that,
northern tip of the Adriatic Sea. He took and de- and they simply disappeared from history (i.e..
those who
weren't killed intermarried with the gain too much power, had him killed in 454, and
surrounding peoples). was himself by Aetius's soldiers in 455.
killed
After that, the West Roman Emperors were
only a series of do-nothings who had the name
VANDALS of Emperor but none of the power, while various
In the aftermath of the Hunnish invasion of Italy, generals fought for control of Italy.
Gaiseric, the leader of the Vandals in North Af- The Germans in Italy wanted land and power,
rica, mounted an expedition of his own against as their kinsmen in Gaul, Spain, and North Af-
Italy. In June 455, his ships reached the mouth of rica had. When the Romans refused to grant this,
the Tiber. There was no opposition and, for two the Germans simply took it. Their leader,
weeks, the Vandals efficiently removed all that Odoacer (433-493), forced the Emperor, Romu-
was movable and valuable for carting off to Car- lus Augustulus, a boy who* had come to the
thage. There was no useless destruction, no sad- throne in 475, to abdicate on September 4, 476.
isitic carnage, but the bitter Romans, writing Nor did Odoacer bother to name another puppet
about the event have so distorted it that the word Emperor. He simply allowed the title to lapse, so
"vandal" is now applied to anyone who indulges that there was no Emperor at all in the west, five
in senseless or malicious destruction. centuries after Augustus had become Rome's
In this way, Carthage (a different Carthage, of first Emperor.
course) finally had its revenge on Rome for the For this reason, 476 is usually given as the
destruction that had been visited on it six centu- date of "the fall of the Roman Empire." This is
ries earlier. Carthage remained strong until the wrong in two ways. In the first place, the West
death of Gaiseric, in his eighties, in 477. Roman Empire had been disintegrating for seven
decades and 476 was just one more step in that
disintegration. In the second place, there was
VISIGOTHS still an Emperor in Constantinople (his name was
After the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, Theo- Zeno and he reigned from 474 to 491); and, if
doric was succeeded by his eldest son, Thoris-
I there was no Emperor in Italy, then Zeno became
mond, who, in 453, was killed by one of his the ruler of the entire Empire — in theory, at
brothers, who then reigned as Theodoric II (426- least.
466). Theodoric II expanded his dominion south- Certainly in 476, no one thought that the Em-
ward into Spain. pire had fallen. The empire was still there. It was
In 466, Theodoric was, in turn, killed by one

II just being ruled differently.
of his brothers, who reigned as Euric I (d. 484). Nevertheless, looking back on it, it is clear that
Under him, the Visigothic kingdom reached its the West Roman Empire, which was intact in
peak. It controlled almost all of Spain as well as 400, had vanished by 500.
southern Gaul. He had a written code of laws Roman
technology worsened, too, as roads
prepared and, under him, some Roman values and aqueducts decayed and were not repaired,
continued. and as industries declined.
In 500, even with Euric gone, the Visigothic
kingdom seemed strong.
OSTROGOTHS
WEST ROMAN EMPIRE The Ostrogoths had been under Hunnish control
The West Roman Empire was in fragments. The for 80 years and had formed the bulk of the Hun-
West Roman Emperor at Ravenna scarcely ruled nish army at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains.
any land outside of Italy, and even the home After Attila's death, they rebelled and regained
peninsula was shaky. Valentinian III, afraid that their freedom. They settled down in the East
Aetius, after his victory over the Huns, might Roman Empire, south of the Danube River,
450 TO 500 111
where, a century earlier, the Visigoths had hid- Visigoths, the Ostrogoths, or the Vandals, and
den from the Huns. where the Franks ruled, Roman civilization was
The Ostrogoths were converted to Arian not preserved even to the extent that it was in
Christianity. The Vandals and the Visigoths were the other German kindoms.
also Arians, and this created a gulf between them Clovis, himself, was pagan, but his wife, Clo-
and the Roman natives over whom they ruled, tilda (470-545), a princess of the Burgundians
who were Catholic. (another Germanic tribe) was Christian. Appar-
As Odoacer grew more powerful in Italy, the ently, Clovis was an affectionate enough hus-
East Roman Emperor, Zeno, sought ways of band (or a weak enough one, despite his ferocity
weakening him, and it seemed to him that the in war) to give in to her nagging. In 493, he
easiest thing to do would be to send the Ostro- turned Christian, and forced his tribesmen to fol-
goths westward. In this way, they would get rid low suit.
of them and would start a war in Italy that might What was particularly important was that Clo-
weaken the German tribesmen all around. tilda was Catholic, and so Clovis was converted
However, the Ostrogoths were under the to Catholicism. The Franks were the only Catho-
leadership of a particularly capable leader, Theo- licGermanic tribe at this time. All the others in
doric (454-526) — sometimes called "Theodoric the west were Arian. This meant that the sub-
the Great” and, by the Germans, "Dietrich.” merged Romans supported Clovis in his quarrels
Theodoric led his Ostrogoths into Italy. There —
with the other Germanic tribes and that was of
he fought Odoacer in two battles and won both. infinite use to him.
Odoacer was forced to retreat into Ravenna. In
493, however, Theodoric enticed Odoacer into
emerging from his lair and had him killed. BRITAIN
In this way, Italy became an Ostrogothic king- In 456, a party of Jutes from what is now Den-
dom. mark Danish peninsula is still called Jutland
(the
in English to this day) landed in Kent, in the
southeasternmost portion of Britain. They had
FRANKS been summoned by Vortigern to protect the land
The Franks were a Germanic tribe just east of the against the Piets. They promptly protected it by
Rhine who, even in the time of Julian, had car- taking over Kent. By 477, other Germanic tribes-
ried through serious raids inio Gaul. When the men, the Saxons, were also coming to Britain.
Huns took over Germany, many Franks fled into In 500, the situation was this: the Saxons and
Gaul and fought with Aetius against the Huns. Jutes were entrenched in southeastern Britain;
The rulers of the Franks were descended from the Franks were in northern Gaul; the Visigoths
a leader named Merovech, so that they were were in southern Gaul and Spain; the Ostrogoths
called the "Merovingians.” In 481, a 15-year-old were in Italy; and the Vandals were in North Af-
Merovingian named Clovis (466-511) succeeded rica. Nowhere was there an inch of territory
to the leadership of the Frankish tribes. Though under Roman rule.

young, Clovis was intent on war and aggrandize-
ment.
In northern Gaul, there remained a region that
EAST ROMAN EMPIRE
was ruled, still, by Romans. Its capital was at The East Roman Empire, at this time, was no
Soissons, and its ruler was Syagrius (430-486). In great model of success. It could not keep the
486, Clovis beat Syagrius in one quick battle and West Roman Empire from falling to the Germanic
took over Soissons. The last land in the
bit of tribes. If anything, the East Roman Empire
west that might be considered Roman was gone. helped the Germans in order to remove imperial
Clovis then spent 10 years consolidating his competition in Italy. This worked but it did them
power. The Franks were less civilized than the no good.
In 468, the East Roman Emperor, Leo I (400- eastern and northern frontiers against the Heph-
who had become Emperor in 457, sent a talites, who were Asian tribesmen, probably re-
474),
naval expedition against Gaiseric, but that was lated to the Huns.
useless. Gaiseric defeated them easily.
However, in 500, the East Roman Empire was
still entirely intact.
INDIA
By Gupta dynasty had petered out, and
500, the
India began to go through another period of
PERSIA small and competing states.
The East Roman Empire was helped by the fact
that Persia was under a series of comparatively
weak rulers. It was preoccupied with internal re-
NORTH AMERICA •
ligious questions involving the conflict between About 500, the city of Chichen Itza was founded
Zoroastrians and Christians and in fighting on its by the Mayans in Yucatan.
500 To 550
commentaries on Aristotle and other philoso-
OSTROGOTHS phers, which survived in the west during a pe-
Theodoric did his best to run the Ostrogothic riod when the classical works themselves were
kingdom in Italy in a fair way. The Ostrogoths lost. In the end, he was executed by Theodoric in
owned a third of the land, but the Romans one of his tyrannical moods.
owned two thirds, and were treated
the other
decently. Although Theodoric was an Arian, he
tolerated Catholics and (the acid test) he even
FRANKS
kept the Jews from being mistreated. He let the Clovis, with a firm base in northern Gaul, contin-
Romans run the civil service and treated his own ued to expand kingdom. About 500, he de-
his
people as though they were military allies of feated the Burgundians, his wife's kinsmen, who
Rome. He remained friendly with the East had earlier seized eastern Gaul, and, in 507, he
Roman Emperor and did not try to infringe on defeated the Visigoths and drove them out of
his power. He kept Italy under Roman law and Gaul. By the time of his death in 511, Clovis was
did his best to preserve Roman civilization. master of virtually all of Gaul, founding the
was, in fact, better off under Theodoric
Italy Frankish kingdom. He made his capital at Paris
than it had been since the time of Marcus Aure- in 508.
lius three and a half centuries earlier. Unfortu- Such was the power of the Frankish kingdom
nately, Theodoric grew old and, in his old age, now, and in centuries to come, that Gaul was the
turned suspicious and cruel. In 526, he died, and one province in the west that lost its name. It was
his successors (as so often happens) were far less Gaul no more, but eventually became "France,"
capable than he. Thus, the Ostrogothic kingdom from the word "Frank." In German, the land is
began to decline. called "Frankreich" ("realm of the Franks").
The spark of classical learning in Italy was
last The Franks at this time, however, had the cus-
represented by Anicius Boethius (480-524), who tom of dividing property among their sons, in-
served Theodoric in Italy. He understood Greek stead of leaving it intact to one of them. Thus, on
(a rare accomplishment by then) and prepared Clovis's death, his four sons each inherited a
500 TO 550 113
portion of the Frankish kingdom and, was in-

as Justinian set about rebuilding the city, and a
evitable, theyfought each other. This happened new cathedral called Hagia Sophia ("Holy Wis-
over and over and kept the Franks from becom- dom") was completed in 537. It had a magnifi-
ing stronger than they were. cent dome, so cleverly designed and so skillfully
pierced with windows that all the interior was
bathed in sunlight. It gave the impression that it
EAST ROMAN EMPIRE had no support, but was suspended invisibly
In 518, the East Roman Empire finally got a from heaven.
strong Emperor, Justin I (450-527). He was an The East Roman Empire was also raising the
Gothic ances-
old, illiterate peasant, possibly of technique of mosaic art to new heights at this
try, but he associated his clever nephew with time, using new kinds of ceramic tiles in a greater
himself. When he died, in 527, his nephew be- variety of colors.
came Emperor as Justinian I (483-565), some- Then, too, Justinian bribed two Persian monks
times called "Justinian the Great." He was who had lived in China to return there and then
forceful and intelligent,and his wife, Theodora come back with silkworm eggs secreted in hollow
(500-548), of lowly origin, was even more force- bamboo canes. About 550, Constantinople began
ful and intelligent. its own silk production, and from those smug-
The two were convinced Catholics and, in 529, gled eggs descended all the silkworm caterpillars
they closed down Plato's Academy, which still supporting the European silk industry ever since.
taught pre-Christian philosophy to the few who Constantinople may have had a population as
would listen. It had been in existence for over large as 600,000 people at this time, while Rome
nine centuries. With its closing, the last voice of had decreased to an impoverished population of
paganism was silenced. Justinian also put an end less than a tenth that number.
to the annual appointment of consuls. Meanwhile, Justinian was involved in plans
put scholars to work preparing a new law-
He for a great offensive westward to win back the
code. In 529, they came up with 12 volumes of a western provinces and restore the Empire.
well-organized legal system. This was the "Code In 535, Belisarius was placed in command of a
of Justinian," and was followed by a 50-volume fleet of some 500 and
ships that carried soldiers
collection of legal opinions. It has remained one horses toward Carthage. The Vandal power had
of the bases of European law generally in all the greatly declined since the death of Gaiseric a half-
centuries since. The Code of Justinian was writ- century before. Belisarius had no trouble, in 534,
ten in Latin, but it was the last production of the defeating Gelimer, who was then the Vandal
East Roman Empire that was in this language. king. With that, the Vandal kingdom in North
Increasingly, the language of the East was Greek, Africa disappeared after a over a century of
little
so that some people called it the "Greek Em- existence. Arianism was wiped out and Carthage
pire," which, however, should not be allowed to became Roman again.
obscure the fact that to the very end of its exis- When Belisarius returned, a victor, to Con-
tence, the realm considered itself the Roman Em- stantinople, Justinian sent him out to Italy. In
pire and spoke of its people as "Romans." 535, he took Sicily,marched into Italy and moved
In 532, there were bloody riots in Constanti- all the way up to Rome, while the Ostrogoths
nople over horse races, of all things, though the (without the firm hand of Theodoric, who had
different factions disagreed in politics as well. died nine years before) seemed helpless. Belisar-
Justinian would have fled, but Theodora would ius took Rome, held off a counterattack by the
not allow him to. They used a general, Belisarius Ostrogoths and then marched to Ravenna,
(505-565), who had distinguished himself placed it under siege, and took it in 539.
against the Persians, to put an end to the riots, Justinian didn't want Belisarius to be too suc-
which he did. Some 30,000 people were killed, cessful, lest he harbor dreams of succeeding the
and Constantinople was virtually in ashes. throne. He recalled him in 540, therefore, to fight
off thePersians in the east. In 544, Belisarius was The Bulgars intermarried with the more numer-
sent back to Italy where the Ostrogoths were ous Slavs, whose society completely asssimilated
doing better in his absence, but Justinian with- them. The Bulgars were more aggressive than
held reinforcements and Belisarius could not the Slavs, however, and in Justinian's time began
achieve much. The Ostrogoths retook a virtually raiding southward.
ruined and depopulated Rome in 546, and Beli-
sarius was recalled once again in 548.

One 554 retrieved the south-
last offensive in
AVARS
ern third of Spain and placed it in East Roman Behind the Bulgars came the Avars, another set
hands. of Asian tribesmen who were very much like the
By 550, it almost looked as though the Roman Huns, and who, by 550, had -set up an empire
Empire would be restored, but the strain of war similar to the one the Huns had built a century
and conquest stretched Justinian's realm to the earlier. It was theircoming that served as the
limit. driving force that pushed the Slavs and Bulgars
into the East Roman Empire.
BRITAIN
The Germanic invaders of Britain, usually re- PERSIA
ferred to as the "Saxons," continued to flood into After 500,war between the East Roman Empire
the land. They were stopped for a while when and the Persians seemed endemic. The Persians
they were defeated in a battle at Mount Badon won some victories, but, in 528, Belisarius de-
(the place and the time are not exactly known), feated them in the first of the victories that re-
so that the Britons won a half-century respite. By vealed his military genius.
550, however, the Saxons were pressing west- In 531, Chosroes I (d. 579) became the Persian
ward again. monarch. He was the most capable of all the Sas-
Nevertheless, that momentary flash of light sanids, and to the Persians he was known as
for the Britons gave immortal (but en-
rise to the "Khosrow Anushirvan" ("Chosroes, the Immor-
tirely fictional) romance of King Arthur and his tal Soul").
Knights of the Round Table. He attempted to achieve peace with the East
Roman Empire since the periodic wars solved
nothing and weakened both. Such a peace was
SLAVS AND BULGARS signed in 533, but it was of no use. Justinian took
Even while the East Roman Empire was return- advantage of the quiet in the east to start his of-
ing to the west, there were new incursions of fensive in the west, and the success of that offen-
tribesmen closer to home. The Slavs of eastern sive raised fears that he might grow strong
Europe had been dominated first by the Ostro- enough to overwhelm Persia. Therefore, another
goths and then by the Huns. Now new Asian war began in 540.
tribesmen were appearing, and some Slavs fled The Persians reached the Mediterranean, as
southward across the Danube to avoid them. the Parthians had done six centuries before, and
They were peasants, rather than warriors, but sacked Antioch. Belisarius, who was between his
where they went, they settled down and stayed, two stays in Italy, pushed the Persians back. At
so that today the nations of Bulgaria and Yugo- this point, a plague struck both sides indiscrimi-
slavia speak Slavic languages and not the Greek nately in 542, and the war seemed more sense-
that was spoken there in Justinian's time. less than ever. In 545, Justinian bought peace in
Mingled with the Slavs were some Asian return for something like a ton of gold.
tribesmen who had come westward. They had Chosroes I was civilized enough to accept the
earlier lived along the Volga, and the words pagan Greek philosophers who had left Athens,
"Volga" and "Bulgar" may be of the same origin. sorrowing, after Justinian had closed the Acad-
550 TO 600 115
emy. When they grew homesick for Greece,

Chosroes allowed them to return, but only after JAPAN
he had extorted a promise from the reluctant Jus- In 538, Buddhism madeappearance in Japan,
its
tinian to do them no harm. having been brought there by Korean missionar-

ies.
CHINA
Through almost Liang Wu-Ti
this entire period, AFRICA
ruled in South China. He was a devout Buddhist, Axum expanded further, and took control of
and under him. Buddhism continued to spread Yemen in southwestern Arabia.
through southern China.
550 TO 600
were the Lombards. There was no resistance
ITALY worth mentioning, but the Lombards were not
After Belisarius was Narses (480-574)
recalled, numerous and they could only absorb the inte-
was sent to Italy in 551 to continue the fight rior of northern Italy and the interior of southern
against the Ostrogoths. Narses was a eunuch Italy. The East Roman Empire retained central
and was already 71 years old at the time. He was Italy (including Rome), plus the toe and the heel
the only eunuch in western history to shine as a of the Italian boot.
military leader. In fact, he accomplished what Be- By 600, Italy was divided into three parts.
lisarius had failed to do, although, to be sure, There were Lombards, with their capital at Pavia
Justinian supported him more than he did Beli- in northern Italy, which they had taken in 572.
sarius. After all, a eunuch could not compete for There were the East Romans with their capital at
the throne. Ravenna was called
(their portion of central Italy
In 552, Narses finally defeated the Ostrogoths the "Exarchate of Ravenna"). And there was the
in the last pitched battle in a bitter war that had Pope in Rome.
lasted over a quarter of a century. By 554, the last
Ostrogoths were driven out of Italy. They van-
ished from history only 28 years after the death
of the great Theodoric. PAPACY
It was this war that finally ruined ancient In 590, Gregory I (540-604), sometimes called
Italy. Until then, Roman had contin-
civilization "Gregory the Great," became Pope. He was a
ued in diluted form, but now the "Dark Age" stern reformer, devoted to the eradication of
clamped down on Italy, as it had already fixed graft and dishonesty, and to the promotion of
itself on Spain, Gaul, and Britain. social justice. He encouraged missions abroad to
Even so, Narses ruled Italy well for well over convert pagans, he supported the celibacy of the
a decade. In 567, two years after the death of clergy, and under him the "Gregorian chant" en-
Justinian, his successor, Justin II (d. 578), recalled tered church music.
Narses, who
was, by then, 87 years old. Gregory was the most powerful personality in
Without Narses at the helm, Italy was vir- the Italy of his time and he was the real leader of
and the next year, a new wave of
tually helpless the resistance to the Lombards. The Lombards
Germanic tribesmen poured over the Alps. These were Arian Christians, but, by 600, had been
converted to Catholicism, thanks to Gregory's la-
bors in that direction.

IRELAND
Ireland had never been part of the Roman Em-
pire, but it had been converted to Christianity,
SPAIN beginning about 432, as the result of the labors of
In 568, Leuvigild (d. 586) became the Visigothic Patricius ("Saint Patrick"), a missionary from
king of Spain and with that a certain recovery What developed was called the "Celtic
Britain.
was made, after the defeats in the north by Church," one that differed in some respects from
Clovis and in the south by the East Roman Em- orthodox Catholic doctrine.
pire. He expanded his realm by conquering the In this period, Ireland was experiencing a kind
Sueves, who had held northwestern Spain for of golden age in which learning flourished and
over a century and a half. Southward, he also missionaries such as Columba (521-597) and Col-
forced the East Romans back till they held only umban (543-615) spread Celtic Church doctrines
the immediate shore. through England and the Frankish territories.
In 586, Recared I succeeded and
to the throne By 600, Ireland was at its height. It was the
he turned Catholic, forcing all the Visigoths to do only place in the west where Greek was under-
the same. stood, and it seemed for a while that Celtic Chris-
By 600, Arianism had just about been wiped tianity might prove a possibly successful
out everywhere, nearly three centuries after it competitor against orthodox Catholicism.
had been condemned at the Council of Nicaea.
FRANKS
BRITAIN/ENGLAND
In the Frankish kingdom, the sons, and then the
By now, there were seven Germanic kingdoms in
grandsons, of Clovis fought each other con-
western Britain. The Jutes were established in
stantly, but in the shifting of boundaries, two
Kent. To the west of Kent were three Saxon king-
chief areascame to exist.
doms: Essex, Wessex, and Sussex. To the north
On the east was Austrasia ("eastland"), from
of Kent were three kingdoms of the Angles (Ger-
which the Franks had come and which was
manic invaders related to the Saxons and Jutes):
largely Frankish in culture. On the west was
East Anglia, Mercia, and Northumbria. It was the
"Neustria" ("new land"), which Clovis had con-
Angles who gave a new name to Britain. It be-
quered and which still bore the faint twilight of
came "Angle-land" or "England."
Roman culture. Austrasia was to be the nucleus
In 600, Kent in the southeast, longest settled,
of the future Germany; Neustria of the future
and closest to Europe, was the strongest of the
France.
new realms. It was under Ethelbert (d. 616).
Meanwhile, the story goes. Pope Gregory, in
Rome, came across three children who had been
captured and enslaved. He thought them excep- AVARS
tionally handsome and asked of what people The Avars struck westward at this time, as the
they were. He was told they were Angles and Huns had a century and a half before. The Avars,
said, "Not Angles but angels." (He said it in however, struck at the Franks, who were a much
Latin, where the pun also works.) hardier foe than the Romans had been in the time
He sent a missionary, Augustine (d. 604), to of Attila. They won some territory, but had such
convert them. Augustine arrived in Kent in 596, a hard time of it that they attempted no further
and began the process, eventually successful, of adventures in that direction. Still, they reached
converting England. He became the first Arch- the Baltic Sea and, by 600, their realm was the
bishop of Canterbury (the capital of Kent). peak of its expansion.
600 TO 650 117
in 590 with the help of the Emperor Maurice

KHAZARS (539-602) of the East Roman Empire, who had
To the north of were Turkish tribes,
Persia, there himself gained the throne in 582. The two re-
related to the Huns and Avars. The westernmost mained friends and that seemed a chance of es-
of these, dwelling on the shores of the Caspian tablishing peace.
Sea, were the Khazars. They had been pressing
against the Persians, but had been driven back.
In 600, nevertheless, they remained a menace, as ARABIA
the Avars were. Arabia did not play much of a role in history
prior to this period. The northernmost section,
Nabatea, was controlled by the old Persian Em-
EAST ROMAN EMPIRE pire, then by Alexander, then by the Seleucid
In this period, the Balkans continued to suffer Empire, and then by Rome. Occasionally, its
invasions by the Bulgars and the Avars. In 558, trading cities made their mark — Petra and Pal-
the Bulgars penetrated to the walls of Constanti- myra. It wasNabatean, Philip the Arabian,
a
nople and were defeated by Belisarius in his last who was the Roman Emperor when the thou-
victory. In 591, it was the Avars who reached sandth anniversary of the founding of Rome was
those impenetrable walls and were then driven celebrated.
back. In southwestern Arabia, there was the Sa-
By 600, the East Roman Empire still looked baean kingdom. (The Biblical Queen of Sheba
formidable on the map. It still held North Africa, may have ruled there.) It was from Sabaea that
parts of Italy, the Spanish coast,and the islands the kingdom of Axum was founded and Sabaea
of the western Mediterranean, but it had been was, in turn, dominated by Axum for a period of
exhausted past the possibility of any new expan- time.
sive adventures. Mecca, located at an oasis in west central Ara-
bia near the Red Sea, lying midway between Na-
batea and Sabaea, was a holy city to the Arabs. It
PERSIA contained the Ka'bah ("cube"), with a black
Just as the East Roman Empire was plagued by stone in the wall, undoubtedly a meteorite, and
invasions of Bulgars and Avais, so Persia was that was the holiest shrine in Arabia.
plagued by invasions of Turks and Khazars. The About 570, Muhammad (570-632) was born
Persians beat them back, but they, too, were se- in Mecca. By 595, he married a rich widow, and
riously weakened. The war with Rome continued this gave him the leisure to meditate. By 600, he
sporadically, both contestants being increasingly was devising a new religion based on his under-
winded and staggering. standing (rather imperfect) of Judaism and
Chosroes II (d. 628) came to the Persian throne Christianity.
600 TO 650
Chosroes II, furious at this, soon declared war
PERSIA on the assassin, a minor military officer, Phocas
Emperor Maurice in Constantinople, the friend (d. 610), whp had made himself Emperor. (Un-
of Chosroes II of Persia, was assassinated in 602. doubtedly, Chosroes II didn't want to miss the
chance of using good excuse to defeat

this as a tinople, had been retaken for the Empire by
and shatter the East Roman Empire since it was Belisarius 80 years before.
now falling to pieces under the inept rule of Pho- was governed by a capable general named
It
cas.) Heraclius (575-641), and his ships carried him to

This taskwas made easier by the fact that the Constantinople in 610. He was declared Emperor
people of Syria and Egypt were largely Mono- in place of the lynched Phocas.
physites, who believed that Jesus was wholly di- took Heraclius a dozen years to reorganize
It
vine. The official Catholic view, as held in the army and to rebuild what was left of the Em-
Constantinople, was that Jesus was both human pire. Then, in 622, he readied his counterstroke.
and divine, and that he suffered as a human. He did not attempt to attack Chosroes II head
People might have agreed to disagree on this on. Instead, he made use of the Empire's control
point, but the times were against it. The Mono- of the sea. His ships carried his army to Issus at
physites were persecuted relentlessly by the the junction of Asia Minor and Syria, where
Catholic Emperors at Constantinople, and the Alexander had defeated the Persians nine centu-
hatred of the Monophysites in return was such ries before. Hastily, Persian forces on the spot
that they would not fight and die for the sake of rallied to meet the East Roman forces, but Hera-
the Emperor. They would as soon be ruled by clius won
January 623, then marched toward
in
Ctesiphon as by Constantinople. Armenia. Chosroes, afraid his army would be

Consequently, when the war began in 603, the trapped, evacuated Asia Minor.
Persians found it easy going at first. By 608, the Even as he did so, Chosroes called on the aid
Persians had reached Antioch and most of Syria of the Avars, who were anxious, in any case, to
was in their hands. The Persians began to call share in the loot. They poured south into the
their monarch Khosrow Parvez ("Chosroes the Balkans and, in 626, were at the walls of Con-
Victorious.") stantinople. Chosroes II had to seize the oppor-
In 613, Chosroes II took Damascus, and in tunity. He raced back into Asia Minor, returning
614, he took Jerusalem. In Jerusalem, he seized to his position across the straitfrom Constanti-
the "True Cross," the one on which Christians nople. Heraclius, he hoped, would be forced by
believed that Jesus was crucified. In 615, he in- the danger to his capital to march out of Persia.
vaded Asia Minor, and in 616 he took Egypt. By In July 626, the Avars attacked, but Heraclius
617, he stood across the narrow strait from Con- did not return to protect the city. He trusted in
stantinople, and the Empire of Darius I (of 11 its walls, and continued his own campaign, in
centuries before) was finally restored, nine and a which he steadily defeated the Persians. When
half centuries after Alexander the Great had de- the Avars found they could not breach the walls,
stroyed it. they retreated, and Chosroes II was forced to
It looked as though it were now the turn of leave Asia Minor a second time. In December
the East Roman Empire to follow the path to ob- 627, Chosroes II and Heraclius met in battle and,
livion that the West Roman Empire had taken a for one last time, Greek-speaking soldiers fought
century and a half earlier. Persian-speaking soldiers. The Greek-speakers
won this last battle as they had won the first at
Marathon, 11 centuries earlier.
The war was over. Heraclius recovered the
EAST ROMAN EMPIRE True Cross and restored it to Jerusalem in 629.
The advances of Chosroes II panicked the
initial That same year, Chosroes II was killed by his
people of Constantinople and, in 610, Phocas own soldiers.
was killed by them. There still remained one sub-
stantial (and strongly Catholic) province of the
Empire and that was North Africa, with its capi-
tal at Carthage, which, fortunately for Constan-
600 TO 650 119
(586-644), the second Caliph, were also invading

ARABIA Persia,which the exertions of the war just com-
While the grand drama of the last Roman-Per- pleted had reduced to a staggering wreck. The
sian war was going on, Muhammad in Arabia last Sassanid king, Yezdigird III, could not find
was having an exciting time of it, too, although the means to defeat the Arabs. By 642, all of Per-
on a much smaller scale. sia had fallen to the Arab hosts.
He was preaching the new religion of "Islam" Also in 642, Omar's general, Amr-ibn-al-As
("submission" —
i.e., to the will of God) but was (d. 663),completed the conquest of Egypt. (Her-
not having much success with his fellow towns- aclius had died in 641; his great reconquest gone
men in Mecca. On June 15, 622, he was forced to for naught.)
flee to Medina, 220 miles north of Mecca. This is There is a story that Omar ordered the library
the Hegira ("flight"). at Alexandria destroyed on the grounds that if
In Medina, he gathered a following of "Mus- the books agreed with the Koran (a collection of
lims" ("those who
submitted") and, ever since, Muhammad's sayings, and the holy book of the
the Muslim calendar counts its beginning from Muslims), they were superfluous; if they dis-
the date of the Hegira —
but on a strictly lunar agreed, they were pernicious. In either case, the
basis, 354 days to the year. books ought to be destroyed. This may not be
War began between Muslims of Medina
the true. It is not likely there was much left of the
and the nonbelievers in Mecca; on November 1, library after three centuries of Christian control,
630, Mecca submitted and became Muslim. By when so many Christian leaders were utterly
the time Muhammad died in 632, he was in con- hostile to pagan learning.
trol of all of Arabia. By 650, then, Sassanid Persia was gone, after
Muhammad had sent messages to both Hera- four centuries of existence, while the East Roman
clius and Chosroes II ordering them to become Empire was reduced to Asia Minor, the Balkans,
Muslims or be destroyed. Naturally, there was and the western provinces in North Africa and in
no answer from either. Italy. Since the lost provinces were never to be
Abu Bakr (573-634) became the first Caliph regained, it is not customary to speak of what
("successor") on Muhammad's death, and with was left as the East Roman Empire any longer. It
him, expansion began at once. Arab forces, a became the "Byzantine Empire" to western his-
very mobile light cavalry, fighting with fanatical torians, the name being taken from Byzantium,
belief in their new religion, invaded both the East the city on whose site Constantine I had founded
Roman Empire and Persia. Constantinople over three centuries before. To
army against them, an army
Heraclius sent an the inhabitants of Constantinople, however, the
of heavy cavalry that was completely outmaneu- land remained "the Roman Empire," no matter
vered by the Arabs and was totally destroyed at how small and weak
was to become.
it
the battle of Yarmuk (in what had once been The Arab advance was not all destructive,
Judea) in 636. The Syrians, who were still Mo- however. The Arabs introduced the windmill to
nophysites and whohated Constantinople,
still Europe at about this time. It was a very useful
did not resist and all of it was taken. Jerusalem power source that had been known for centuries
fell a second time in 638, and the True Cross, in Persia.
restored only nine years before, was taken a sec-
ond time and was never to reappear again.
The East Roman Empire, which had expended AVARS
its last ounce of strength fighting off the Per- After their failure at Constantinople, the Avars
sians, simply lacked the ability to fend off this declined rapidly. Like the Huns before them,
new conquest which came so closely on the heels they were only a small military clique that de-
of the first. permanent loss.
This time, it was a pended on the peasantry they dominated. Once
Meanwhile, the Arabs, now under Omar defeat lessened their military prestige, the under-
lings rebelled, and the power of the aristocracy At this time, there lived a cleric named Isidore
faded quickly. of Seville (560-636), who published a diluted ver-
To the east, however, the other Asian tribes- sion of Pliny's encyclopedia. Almost worthless as
men, the Bulgars, Khazars and Turks, either held science, it nevertheless was highly popular and
their power or were gaining it. encouraged the spirit of inquiry. Isidore strongly
approved of astrology, however.
FRANKS
In 629, Dagobert (605-639), a great-great grand- ENGLAND
son of Clovis, came to the Frankish throne. He The seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in England
was the last vigorous Merovingian, and the last (the "Heptarchy") kept fighting each other, with
to rule, for a time at least, over a united Frankish power between Northumberland and
shifting
realm. Whenhe died, however, the kingdom Mercia. Under Northumberland's lead, the Celtic
was divided between his two sons. In 650, both Church reached its peak in England.
those sons were still on their respective thrones
— one of Austrasia, the other of Neustria. They
and their descendants were all weak and are re- KHAZARS
ferred in the French language as "rois faineant" As and Persia weakened, the
the Avars declined,
("do-nothing kings"). There were, however, Khazars expanded and began to develop their
strong advisers who were the true rulers of the power north of the Caucasus. They now gov-
Franks. erned the Ukraine, which had in the last 13 cen-
Dagobert, for instance, had an adviser, Pepin turies seen the power of the Cimmerians, the
of Landon (d. 640), who was "Mayor of the Pal-
Scythians, the Sarmatians, the Ostrogoths, the
ace" (or, as we would say today, "Prime Minis- Huns, and the Avars successively come and go.
ter"). He was a capable man who kept the Franks
strong.
INDIA
PAPACY Through most of this period, the important ruler
in India was Harsha (590-647), who began his
In an attempt to win back the loyalty of the peo-
rule in 606. Once again, he unified the northern
ple of Syria and Egypt during the Persian war,
sections and even spread his influence south-
Heraclius and the Patriarch of Constantinople,
ward. He was a convinced Buddhist, in an India
Sergius (who served in the post from 610 to 638),
that was returning more and more to Brahman-
had worked out a compromise with Mono-
ism. For the first time, firm diplomatic ties were
physitism. The compromise was called Mono-
established between India and China.
thelitism, and might have worked in a more rea-
sonable age. The Monophysites would not accept
When Harsha died in 647, his realm splin-
tered, and by 650, India was again a chaotic mix-
it, however.
ture of smaller states.
The Roman Pope, Honorius I, who held the
At an Indian scientist, Brahmagupta
this time,
position from 625 to 638, was tempted to be rea-
sonable, but he couldn't carry the establishment (598-665), was the most important mathemati-
cian in the world, applying algebraic methods to
with him. Theological disputes between Rome
astronomical problems, to follow the paths of the
and Constantinople continued, and worsened.
planets across the sky.
SPAIN
The Visigothic kings of this period were as in- CHINA
competent as their Merovingian contemporaries Dynasty was replaced by the still
In 618, the Sui
among the Franks. more successful T'ang Dynasty. The second of
650 TO 700 121
the T'ang Emperors, T'ai Tsung (d. 649), came to

power 627 and reestablished the unity of
in SOUTHEAST ASIA
China, which had been threatening to fail as the At this time, what now
is the Vietnamese coast
Sui dynasty had declined. Chinese unity has was occupied by Champa and, to its west, was
more or been maintained ever since.
less Chenia. Both managed remain outside
to
He put an end to the disintegrating nature of Chinese political control, although they could
aristocratic rivalry for power, and restored the not help but absorb Chinese culture.
custom of requiring officials to pass public ex-
aminations that qualified them for their posts
(which opened government service to wider sec- INDONESIA
tions of the populace). He defeated the Turks in At about realm called Srivijaya was
this time, a
the west, established relations with Tibet and established in Sumatra, and this soon extended
India, and, in general,has been considered the engaged in sea trade with both
itself to Java. It
best and most successful of all the Chinese em- India and China, and it accepted Buddhism.
perors.
In his Nestorian Christians reached
reign,
China. These followed the teachings of Nesto- TIBET
rius, who believed in two natures of Jesus, huge plateau north of the Himalayan
Tibet, the
human and divine, but considered them more mountain range, had now coalesced into a king-
weakly linked than the Catholics did. Nestorian- dom. It had become important enough for a
ism lost out to Monophysitism in Syria and in Chinese princess to be given as wife to the first
Egypt, but it spread eastward into Persia where king of Tibet.
it retained importance even after Persia had
fallen to the Arabs. They even managed to estab-
lish themselves, to some small extent, in India NORTH AMERICA
and China. The Toltec people may have been spreading over
Science flourished, too. Ch'ao Yuan-fang southern Mexico at this time.
wrote on the causes and symptoms of disease in
610, and this was far ahead of anything in the
west at the time.
650 TO 700
—
over doctrinal issues with the same result: it
OMMAYAD CALIPHATE weakened all concerned.

Othman, the third Caliph, ruled from 644 to 656. was killed in the course of the quar-
In 661, Ali
He established the official version of the Koran, reling and Muawiya (602-680) became Caliph.
but was killed during a rebellion and was suc- He was a second cousin of Muhammad and,
ceeded by Ali (600-661), who was Muhammad's among his ancestors, was one named Ommaya.
son-in-law, and who reigned from 656 to 661. Muawiya and his family are, therefore, called the
Ali's succession was disputed, and it quickly "Ommayads," and the government they headed
developed that Muslims, just like Christians, is the "Ommayad Caliphate."
fought each other relentlessly over power and Ali's death split the Muslim world in two, and
that split has never been healed. Those who ac- "Farsi"), the rest of the Caliphate learned to read
cepted Muawiya and all who followed him are and write Arabic, since a Muslim had to be able
the Sunnites (from an Arabic word meaning “the to read the Koran, and it was forbidden to trans-
orthodox way"). Those who clung to Ali and late it from Arabic into any other language.
considered everyone since to have been usurpers

are the "Shiites" (from an Arabic word meaning
"sect"). BYZANTINE EMPIRE
Muawiya moved government out
the seat of The Byzantine Empire was shaken by the pro-
of Arabia and established it at Damascus in Syria. gressive loss of Syria, Egypt, and North Africa.
It was more centrally located there and nearer the
All that was left was Asia Minor (which was con-
centers of civilization. stantly being raided by the Moslems), the Balkan
The internal quarrels did not prevent the Mus- peninsula (which was constantly being raided by
lims from continuing to expand their sway. They the Bulgars), Sicily, and parts of Italy.
penetrated eastward to the extreme borders of Nevertheless, it held on grimly. In 673, the
the Empires of Darius I and Alexander the Great. Muslims placed Constantinople under siege and
They took Kabul in 664 and Samarkand in 676. maintained it for nearly half a year before leav-
They reached the Indus River and stood at the ing. They returned in subsequent years; how-
western border of Tibet. ever, by 677, the Byzantines had developed a
They also advanced westward in Africa into
chemical mixture with a naphtha base that
regions that neither the Persians nor the Mace- burned on contact with water. (It was suppos-
donians had ever trod. The Muslims swept over edly developed by an alchemist of Greek or Syr-
northern Africa to the Atlantic Ocean; Carthage, ian origin named Callinicus, concerning whom
the last holdout, fell in 698. Once again, Carthage nothing else is known.) In that year, the Byzan-
was destroyed, as it had been by the Romans tines used the "Greek fire," spurting it out of
eight and a half centuries earlier. This time it wooden tubes into the water, and burning any
never revived. ships with which it then made contact. Their fleet
The Muslims had, in 670, established Kairo- destroyed, the Muslims made peace, and here at
wan, 85 miles south of Carthage, as their North last their advance was stopped.
African capital. Later on, Tunis, which had been
a suburb of Carthage, became the most impor-
tant city of the region.
BULGARS
In 700, then, the Ommayad Caliphate
was The Bulgars had been striking into the Byzantine
stretched from Tibet to the Atlantic Ocean. It
world had yet Empire since the time of Justinian, a century and
the most extensive Empire that the
a half before. With the Moslems at the gates of
seen, although the T'ang Empire in China ex-
Constantinople, the Bulgars raided more steadily
ceeded it in population.
than ever. Finally, in 680, they defeated a Byzan-
The Ommayad Caliphate differed from the
tine army and settled in the region south of the
other Empires of Western Asia in the fervor of its
faith. The nations it had conquered lost part of
Danube, which is now Bulgaria.
their identity. Zoroastrianism in Persia vanished

(though some Zoroastrians fled to India where
they still exist today as "Parsees," a distortion of FRANKS
"Persians"). The Merovingian kings of the Frankish realm
In same way, Christianity disappeared
the continued on their do-nothing way, and the
from Syria, Egypt, and North Africa (though realm might well have fallen apart but for the
some exist today as "Copts," this being a distor- strong leadership of Pepin of Heristal (d. 714),
tion of "Egypt"). All accepted Islam, and al- who was the grandson of Pepin of Landen, and
though Persia clung to the Persian language (or who was Mayor of the Palace from 687.
700 TO 750 123
itybegan to vanish from England, too, though it

SPAIN remained significant for a time in Ireland and
The only Visigothic king Spain who was of any
in Scotland.
account at all in this period was Wamba, who
reigned from 672 to 680, keeping the kingdom in
order.
ITALY
Venice, which had first been founded by refu-
gees from the Hunnish invasion three centuries
ENGLAND earlier, and had added more refugees when the
In 654, Penda of Mercia, the last important pagan Lombards had, entered a century earlier, was
king in England,was killed in battle. His son, now beginning to thrive as a seaport. Its first
who succeeded, was Christian; and with that, "doge" ("duke") was chosen in 697. It acknowl-
paganism disappeared in England. edged the overlordship of the Emperor at Con-
What's more, in 664, Oswiu of Northumber- stantinople, and was thus part of the Exarchate
land (d. 670), whose armies had killed Penda, of Ravenna.
and who was now the strongest ruler in England,
called the "Synod of Whitby," a gathering of
churchmen at a town 40 miles northeast of York. KOREA
There, the Celtic and Roman priests stated their During this period, Korea was under the rule of
respective cases, and Oswiu decided in favor of the southern kingdom of Silla, which forced Jap-
Roman Catholicism. With that, Celtic Christian- anese invaders out of the peninsula.
700 TO 750
had been mostly under weak rule for some two
OMMAYAD CALIPHATE centuries and was no match for the fervent Mus-
Under Walid I, who ruled from 705 to 715, the lims. In July 711, the Muslims won a total victory,
Ommayad Caliphate Non-Muslim

flourished. and Roderick fled the battlefield into oblivion. He
subject peoples were becoming Muslims at a is sometimes called "the last of the Goths," for
great rate, for the Caliphate had a good way of the Goths now disappeared from history, three
bringing that about. They used neither force nor centuries after Alaric had taken Rome, and fol-
persuasion; they merely taxed non-Muslims and lowing the disappearance of the Ostrogoths a
not Muslims, and the people followed their century and a half earlier.
pocket books. By 715, all of Spain except for the mountains
Also, under Walid Muslims moved into Eu-
I, on the northern coast was in Muslim hands. In
rope. In 711, the Muslims of North Africa, under Sulayman (674-717) became the Om-
that year,
Tariq ibn Ziyad (d. 720), crossed the narrow strait mayad Caliph and, under him, the caliphate was
of Gibraltar and entered Spain (thus, reversing at its height, stretching 4500 miles from east to
the trek of the Vandals from Spain to North Af- west.
rica nearly three centuries before). It was at this It seemed appropriate then to make another
time that Gibraltar (Jebel al-Tariq, or "the Mount attempt to take Constantinople. Since the last at-
of Tariq") got its name. tack 40 years earlier, seven Emperors had ruled
At the time of Roderick (d. 711)

this invasion, in Constantinople and there had been constant
was the Visigothic king of Spain, but the land infighting. However, just as the Muslims ad-
vanced for their second offensive, a strong Em- became the caliph. This founded a new dynasty
peror, Leo III (680-741), sometimes called "Leo and began the "Abbasid Caliphate."
the Isaurian," came to the throne. He reorga-
nized the Empire and launched a strong defense,
complete with Greek fire. In a year, the Muslims BYZANTINE EMPIRE
were driven off. After the Muslims had been driven from Con-
However, if the front door had been slammed stantinople, Leo III reformed the religious life of
shut, there was still the back door to Europe. The the Empire. He objected to the superstition and
Muslims stood at the Pyrenees in Spain, and miracle-mongering that filled Byzantine Chris-
across the Pyrenees were the Franks. In 732, a tianity at the time,and also to the vast number
Muslim general, Abd-er-Rahman (d. 732), led his of monks who were immune to military service
forces into the Frankish kingdom, and what is and taxation.
now southern France quickly fell to him. Therefore, Leo forbade the statues and paint-
Ruling the Franks as Mayor of the Palace since ings that served as the core of the miracles, and
714 was Charles Martel (688-741) —
that is, demanded adherence to the Biblical injunction
"Charles the Hammer" —
who was the son of against idolatry. He took up an "iconoclastic"
Pepin of Heristal. Whereas the Muslims had their ("image-breaking") position. His son, Constan-
usual light cavalry, Charles Martel gathered his tine V Copronymus (718-775), or "dung-name"
heavy cavalry: large horses bearing armor over because, as a baby, he had defecated during bap-
their bodies, who carried knights in armor with tism, became Emperor in 741. Constantine con-
stirrups that heldthem tightly to their horses. (It tinued the iconoclastic policy. It created a great
was this sort of heavy cavalry that has given us deal of controversy, and even rebellion, but he
our picture of King Arthur's knights but that — held firm.
was two centuries earlier and there was no such
cavalry then.)
The two armies met between Tours and Po- PAPACY
itiers in what is now west central France. It was When movement began in Con-
the iconoclast
the most important battle in that region since that stantinople, Gregory II (669-731) was Pope, hav-
of the Catalaunian Plain nearly two centuries being gained the post in 715. He condemned
fore. Again, the defenders won and the invaders iconoclasm and turned toward the Lombards for
were stopped. The Muslim horsemen dashed help. The Lombards were ruled by Liutprand
vainly against the immovable wall of Frankish (d. 744), under whom the Lombard kingdom
knights. That night, feeling their attacks were reached its peak of power. He had brought the
costing them soldiers to no purpose, the Muslims Lombards in southern Italy under his rule, and
retreated. The back door had been slammed shut he was content to join with the Pope and use that
also. as an excuse to subdue the Exarchate of Ravenna,
Back in Damascus, the Ommayad dynasty had which lay between the northern and southern
increasing problems after the double failure at Lombard areas. In 728, he took Ravenna itself,
Constantinople and at Tours. For one thing, as temporarily.
conversions to Islam took place, the tax base nar- Gregory III (d. 741), who succeeded to the pa-
rowed, and it became necessary to tax Muslims, pacy in 731, was even more firmly anti-iconoclast
something which wasn't popular. Non-Arabs de- than his predecessor had been. He excommuni-
manded equal treatment with Arabs; there were cated all the iconoclasts, including Emperor Leo
rebellions and civil wars. In 750, the Ommayad III, and he considered himself independent of
army was defeated by one under Abu-l-Abbas, a the Emperor after that. In 741, when Gregory III
descendant of Abbas, an uncle of Muhammad. died, his successor, Zacharias (d. 752), accepted
The Ommayad family was almost all wiped out, the Papacy without any reference to the Emperor
after less than a century of rule, and Abu-l-Abbas — four centuries after the Roman Emperor, Con-
700 TO 750 125
stantine I, had placed Christianity in power in became a monk, took the name of Boniface, and
the Empire. spent his life in spreading Christianity success-
By now, though, the Popes were rather ner- fully among several of the pagan German tribes
vous about the Lombards. They had asked for east of the Frankish realm. He also helped per-
Lombard help against the Byzantines, but the suade Carloman to become a monk, and served
Lombards seemed just as dangerous. Occasion- as an intermediary between Pepin and the Pope
ally, therefore, the Popes asked the more distant in the former's plan to become a king.
(and, therefore, safer) Franks for help, but

Charles Martel had his hands full with the Mus-
lims and with other problems, so that he refused
to get himself into an Italian quagmire.
KHAZARS
Liutprand died in 744, but his successor, Ais- The Khazars were now at the peak of their
tulf (d. 756), took Ravenna again; and this time, power, their realm stretching from the Caspian
the Exarchate came to an end. The Byzantine Sea to the Danube, and well to the north of Mos-
hold on central Italy was lost forever, two centu- cow.
ries after Belisarius had taken Rome. Except for About 750, the Khazar aristocracy accepted Ju-
the extreme southern areas, Italy was now en- daism as their religion, partly because they
tirely Lombard, and the Pope needed help more feared they would be hounded by Rome or Con-
than ever before. stantinople if they turned Christian or by Bagh- —
dad, if they turned Muslim.
FRANKS
After the Battle of Tours, Charles Martel spent
CHINA
the rest of his life harrying the Muslims and The T'ang Empire reached its peak under Hsuan
trying to force them completely back beyond the Tsung, the sixth Emperor of the dynasty, who
Pyrenees. reigned from 712 to 756. Under him, China was
died in 741. However, before he did, just
He prosperous and peaceful. He encouraged educa-
tion, while poetry and art flourished. True por-
as though he were a monarch, he divided the
Frankish kingdom between his sons who were, celain was developed, the first clock escapement
of course, only to serve as Mayors of the Palace, was designed, and printing on paper came into
for Merovingian nonentities still held the throne. use.
went to his son, Carloman (715-754), China was, in this period, clearly the most
Austrasia
and Neustria to his son Pepin the Short (714- technologically advanced nation in the world,
and was to remain so for centuries. Ch'ang An
768). The king, at the time, was Childeric III
the
Stupid (d. 754). (the modern Sian) may have been the largest city
Carloman abdicated and became a in the world at the time, with Constantinople
In 747,
monk, and Pepin became sole Mayor of the pal- second.
ace in the Frankish realm.

Pepin, however, wanted to be king. For over
a century, his ancestors had been the real rulers
of the Franks and he was tired of having the fact
JAPAN
The one person who In Japan, the 45th Emperor, by the tra-
Shomu,
of power, but not the title.
could give him the title was the Pope and the — ditional count, ruled from 724 to 749. It was a
Pope needed help against the Lombards. period of great cultural activity. Shomu and his
It was clear that a deal could be made.
Empress were ardent Buddhists and, under him.
Buddhism became almost a state religon. His
In this period, the most important cleric was
He capital city was Nara, and in he built a temple
an English missionary, Wynfrid (675-754).
it
that is, to this day, the largest wooden building

in the world. In it, he built a 530-foot seated fig-
NORTH AMERICA
ure of Buddha out of bronze, one of the two larg- The Mayas in Yucatan were at their peak at this
est bronze figures in the world. time. Very little is known of their history.
750 TO 800
"Frankish Empire," as we may now call it, thus
FRANKISH EMPIRE absorbed northern and central Italy.
The deal between Pepin and the Pope was struck South of the Papal States, the Duchy of Bene-
in 752. Pepin, with Papal permission, was elected vento still existed, independent of the Franks,
King Pepin I by the Frankish nobles, and Child- and continued a faint twilight of Lombard rule.
eric III was forced to abdicate. That was the end In the next quarter-century, Charlemagne sub-
of the Merovingian monarchy, two and three- dued the still-pagan Saxons to the east, forcing
quarter centuries after Clovis had become king. Christianity on them. He also invaded Spain and
That year a new Pope had begun to reign, Ste- annexed a strip ("the Spanish March") south of
phen II (d. 757). He actually came to the Frankish the Pyrenees.
realm and anointed Pepin king. This was the As the 700s came was clear that
to a close, it
start of the ''Carolingian dynasty" from Carolus Charlemagne's Frankish Empire was by far the
(the Latin version of Charles), who was Pepin's strongest Christian power that Europe had seen
father. since the time of Theodosius four centuries ear-
Pepin sent an army into Italy to de-
In return, lier. It included all the western lands that recog-
feat the Lombards in 754 and, again, in 756. In nized the religious headship of the Pope, except
756, Pepin gave the Pope the land that had made for the British Islesand the Duchy of Benevento.
up the Exarchate of Ravenna. (He had no legal Pope Leo III (d. 816), who had gained the
right to do this, but, then, the Pope had no legal throne in 795, had troubles. He was driven from
right to make From this point on, what
a king.) his position by riots and conspiracies, and he was
was the Exarchate of Ravenna became the "Papal accused of various crimes. He escaped to the
States," and the Pope was a secular ruler as well Frankish realm and, in 800, Charlemagne
as a religious leader. brought him back to Rome and restored him to
Pepin completed the task of driving the Mus- his Papal position.
lims behind the Pyrenees. As happened, there was no Emperor in
it
When Pepin 1 died, in 768, the kingdom was Constantinople at the time, but only an Empress,
divided between his two sons, Carloman (d. 771) and it might be maintained that the Imperial
and Charles (742-814). After Carloman's death, throne was really vacant. Besides, even if there
Charles ruled alone. Charles is usually called were an Emperor in the east, there ought to be
"Charlemagne" (French for "Charles the one in the west as well, in line with the custom
Great"). established on the death of Theodosius.
In 773, Charlemagne invaded Italy again. De- On December 25, 800, Pope Leo III crowned
siderius (d. 774) had become King of Lombardy Charlemagne the Emperor of Rome, and once
in 757, and now Charlemagne defeated him and again there was an Emperor in the west except —
carried him off into imprisonment. Desiderius that the east did not recognize Charlemagne's
was the last king of the Lombards, two centuries promotion.
after they had entered Italy. Charlemagne's Charlemagne ruled over his Empire with a
750 TO 800 127
tight fist, and over the Pope as well. He encour- This may have been partly due to population
aged the revival of learning and, for a time, one pressure, or to internal feuds that resulted in
could speak of a "Carolingian Renaissance." exile for those defeated. Or it may have simply
The leading light of the Carolingian Renais- been the discovery that raiding foreign coasts
sance was an English scholar, Alcuin (732-804), was an easier life than trying to live off a harsh
who established a school in Charlemagne's capi- countryside.
tal at Aachen, and who reformed educational By Europe was beginning
800, the rest of to
procedures in the Empire. He developed a way learn what "Viking" raids were like.
of writing letters compactly and neatly, which
gave rise to "Carolingian minuscule," or what
we now called "small letters" as opposed to cap-
ENGLAND
itals. He taught Charlemagne to read, as an In this period, Mercia was the strongest power in
adult, but the poor Emperor could not manage to England under its king, Offa, who reigned from
persuade his aged fingers to form the letters 757 to 796. He was one Christian king who was
properly so as to write. not subject to Charlemagne, and who could (and
did) correspond with him on equal terms.
Hard times were coming, however, for, in
SPAIN 787, the Scandinavian raiders (Danes from
first —
When the Abbasids took over the Caliphate in Denmark) reached the southeastern tip of Kent.
750 and slaughtered the Ommayads, one Om- In 794, they first struck areas of Britain that lay
mayad Abd ar-Rahman (731-788), es-

prince, north of the Saxon kingdoms, in what is now
caped and made his way to Spain. There he Scotland.
established an Ommayad
dynasty that did not The leading English scholar of the time was
acknowledge the sovereignty of the Abbasids. Bede (673-735). He wrote a history of Anglo-
Abd ar-Rahman made his capital at Cordova Saxon England, pointed out the inadequacies of
and ruled well. He tolerated Christians to a the Julian calendar, held the Earth to be a sphere,
greater extent than Muslims would have
by far and (an original suggestion) maintained that the
been tolerated in any Christian land. What's tides were influenced by the phases of the Moon.
more, he treated the Jews kindly. The Jews, who
had been bitterly persecuted by the Visigoths,
remained pro-Muslim in Spain, therefore, and
IRELAND
many served in high political posts. The Irish were the first Europeans to explore the
Abd ar-Rahman had to withstand attacks by northern Atlantic since the time of Pytheas of
Charlemagne and, while he was driven back a Massilia, a thousand years earlier. About 790,
bit, he was never defeated in the sense that the Irish monks may even have reached Iceland,
Lombards and Saxons were defeated. about 600 miles northwest of Ireland. It was un-
In northern Spain, Christian fighters estab- inhabited and (to be honest) not very habitable.
lished small states and chose kings. The Irish might have made a better go of it,
however, if Ireland's golden age had continued;
however, in 795, the Vikings attacked its coasts
SCANDINAVIA and, soon enough, Ireland was at their mercy. Its
Scandinavia played little or no part in civilized golden age came to an end.
history until about this time, although the Goths,
and possibly other Germanic tribes, may have
originated there and traveled southward by land.
BYZANTINE EMPIRE
In the late 700s, however, Scandinavian raiding Under Constantine V and his son, Leo IV (749-
parties began to radiate outward by sea in all di- 780), who became Emperor in 775, the Byzantine
rections. Empire advanced. It took back the island of Cy-

prus from the Muslims, and it fought success- pyrus and parchment disappeared from the Mid-
fully against the Bulgars. It lost the Exarchate of dle East.
Ravenna, however, first to the Lombards, and The Muslims were beginning to take over the
then, by way of the Franks, to the Pope. scientific lead in the west. An
Arabian alchemist,
Leo IV's son, Constantine VI (770-797), was a Abu Musa Jabir (721-815), known in the west as
child and under the influence of his mother, "Geber," was the best of his time. He described
Irene (752-803). She was a vicious woman, who ammonium chloride, prepared strong acetic acid
had one thing in her favor with much of the pop- and weak nitric acid. He worked with dyes and
ulace. She was against iconoclasm. She unseated varnishes, and dealt with methods of refining
her weak son in 797, took over the throne herself, metals. Most of all, he described his experiments
and brought back the icons and paintings that clearly and carefully. Later alchemists usually did
had been outlawed some 80 years before. not follow Jabir's good example.
She was still on the throne in 800 when Char-
lemagne was crowned Emperor in the west, and,
of course, she absolutely refused to recognize the CHINA
Pope's right to make an Emperor. In the course The T'ang Empire was now past its best days.
of her weak and intrigue-filled reign, the Bulgars China was attacked and raided by Tibetans from
grew strong again. the west and by various Turkish tribes from the
north. About 800, a group of Turkish people,
known as the Uighurs, established a large realm
ABBASID CALIPHATE in the regions north of China, in what is now
Once the Abbasids gained control, the Muslim Mongolia and southern Siberia, but they re-
world strengthened again. It was not fully united mained fairly friendly with the Chinese.
(in fact, it would never be fully united again), for
the Caliphate did not control Spain or Morocco.

Still, the rest of the vast Empire remained firm
JAPAN
and there was reasonable internal peace. The Japanese Emperor, Kammu, who reigned
Since Damascus was associated too closely from 781 to 806, conducted campaigns in north-
with the deposed Ommayads, the second Ab- ern Japan against the Ainu. These were a non-
basid Al-Mansur (710-775), who as-
Caliph, Mongolian people who may conceivably have in-
cended the throne in 754, began the building of a habited the islands before the Japanese arrived.
new capital on the Tigris River in 762. This was They have more pronounced beards than the Jap-
Baghdad. It was near Ctesiphon, which dwin- anese have, and consequently are sometimes
dled and died as a result, as a thousand years called the "hairy Ainu.'" The Japanese north was
earlier, Babylon had dwindled and died when brought under Imperial sway by these cam-
Seleucia was built. paigns.
In 786, Harun ar-Rashid (765-809), became the
fifth Abbasid Caliph. He achieved immortal
fame, long after his death, because he figures in PACIFIC
a number of tales that were eventually collected At about this time, Polynesians reached
the
in what is popularly known as The Arabian Nights. Easter Island, and the Maoris reached New Zea-
The Muslims were, at this time, picking up the land. This represents the farthest expansion of
use of paper from the Chinese, so that both pa- prehistoric people in the Pacific islands.
800 TO 850 129
800 TO 850
FRANKISH EMPIRE SPAIN

The Frankish Empire did not remain powerful for During this period. Abd ar-Rahaman II (788—852)
long after Charlemagne's death in 814. It re- ruled over Muslim Spain, coming to the throne
mained intact under his successor, Louis I the in 822. He pushed the Franks out of the Spanish
Pious (778-840), because he happened to be March and fought off the Christians in the small
Charlemagne's only son. Louis I was, however, northern kingdoms. He also put down Christian
a weak king who spent much of his reign trying rebellions within his own dominions.
to divide up his realm among four sons, three of
whom survived him.
ENGLAND
The Carolingians, apparently, hadn't learned
a thing from the Merovingian experience, since
The kingdom of Wessex, along England's south
shore, had not loomed large in the land till now.
the result was merely a series of wars of the sons
against their father and against each other, each In 802, however, Egbert (d. 839) became king of
son being convinced that he was being cheated. Wessex. He had been forced into exile earlier by
In the course of these wars, all the Imperial Offa of Mercia. He returned after Offa's death,
up by Charles weakened and
administration set and defeated, conquered, and absorbed Mercia,
was perverted, and all his attempts at reviving which, in this way, disappeared from the map.
learning withered. He made Wessex the strongest of the Saxon na-
died, the fighting continued
Louis tions, and remained so after his death in 839.
it
Even after I
until a settlement was reached at the Treaty of

By 850, however, Wessex was bracing itself to
Verdun in 843. meet the increasingly fearsome Danish raids and
invasions.
By this settlement, the second son, Louis II
the (804-876), ruled over the eastern

German
third of the Empire. The youngest son, Charles
SCANDINAVIA
II the Bald (823-877), ruled over the western
In the 840s, the Viking raids were in full swing.
third. Lothair (795-855), the eldest son, ruled
I
over the middle third, and had the title of Em-

The Vikings controlled the Atlantic Ocean and
was meaning- could sail wherever they wished and move up
peror which, after Charlemagne,
any river without fear of opposition. While the
less.
The oaths taken by the opposing armies were Danes ravaged the eastern coast of England, the
which Norse took over much of Scotland and Ireland.
in two languages: East Frankish, from
In Ireland, they founded Dublin in 841.
German was to descend; and West Frankish,
The long coastline of the Frankish Empire lay
from which French was to descend. Lothair's
portion in the middle was called Lotharingia
open to them. In 845, one group of ships sailed
p'Lothringen" in German; Lorraine in French), up the Elbe River to Hamburg, which they de-
stroyed, while another group sailed up the Seine
and it remained more or less in contention be-
River to lay siege to Paris. Some of the Viking
tween the two outer halves in later ages.
"West ships even found their way into the Mediterra-
For a while, we will speak of the
nean.
Franks" and the "East Franks."
The Viking raids disorganized the
further
Frankish Empire, which was rapidly sinking
under the weight of internal wars. The central
governments were helpless to stop the raids, ar.d what is now Yugoslavia. Bulgaria was strength-
the stronger local nobility had to take on the duty ening even as the Frankish Empire was weaken-
of fighting off the Vikings and withstanding ing.
sieges.
As a result, people grew used to turning to
local magnates for safety and security, and the MAGYARS
magnates grew accustomed to disregarding a dis-
East of the Bulgars were the Magyars, another
tant and helpless king or emperor. This helped
Asian nomadic tribe who were now crowding the
establish feudalism in western Europe, so that
Khazars eastward toward the Caspian Sea. They
the lands that Charlemagne had strongly con-
were also called Ugrians, and
has been dis-
this
trolled became a crazy-quilt of a turbulent nobil-
torted to "Hungarians," perhaps because, at
ity endlessly fighting among themselves, when their height, they frightened the west Europeans
they weren't fending off raids or brutalizing the
as much as the Huns had several centuries ear-
peasantry. The darkness of the Dark Ages con-
lier.Another indication of their frightfulness is
tinued, and in 850, the helpless people of west-
seen in the fact that "Ogre" is also derived from
ern Europe could only pray: "From the fury of
"Ugrian." In 850, however, they were still occu-
the Norsemen, good Lord, deliver us."
pying the Ukraine in relative peace.
BYZANTINE EMPIRE RUSSIA

The Byzantine Empire continued to waste its The Slavs in what is now westernRussia had
strength on theological quarrels. During the been under the heel of the Ostrogoths, the Huns,
830s, iconoclasm was restored; then, in 843, it
the Avars, the Bulgars, the Magyars, and others.
was beaten down again. There were no particu- Now it was
the turn of the Vikings to dominate.
larly strong Emperors in this period, and the Em- These Vikings, who by 850 were beginning to
pire had all it could do to fight off the Muslims penetrate the deep land-mass of Russia, were
on the east and south, and the Bulgarians on the Swedes, whose land faced the Baltic Sea (as op-
north. posed to the Danish Vikings, who faced the At-
lanticOcean). The stolid Slavs were used to these
periodic changes of masters, and merely worked
and bred patiently, in time outlasting and out-
BULGARIA numbering all their conquerors.
In 802, the Bulgarians gained monarch

a strong
in the person of Krum (d. 814). Krum was able to
extend his rule north of the Danube River and set ABBASID CALIPHATE
up an empire over the region now occupied by Haroun ar-Rashid was succeeded by his two
Bulgaria, Rumania, and Hungary. sons, of whom the second was al-Mamun (786-
In 811, Krum fought the Byzantines and de- sometimes "Mamun
833), called the Great." He
feated them in a great battle in which the Byzan- came Caliphate in Baghdad in 813. Under
to the
tine Emperor, Nicephorus (who had become
I him, the Abbasid Caliphate reached its height.
Emperor in 802), lost his life. Krum then fought He established a "House of Knowledge" in Bagh-
his way to the outskirts of Constantinople and dad. There scholars translated into Arabic the
laid siege to it in 813 and again in 814; however, great scientific works of the Greeks, including
he died in the course of the second siege. those of Aristotle, Galen, Euclid, Ptolemy, and
His son and, afterward, his grandson suc- so on. Most of these were now
completely un-
ceeded him. They made peace with the Byzan- known to the western Europeans. It was the
tines, but continued to expand westward into Arabs who preserved the ancient learning until
850 TO 900 131
the west Europeans were ready to receive it.

Even under Mamun, however, the Caliphate
CHINA
The T'arig Empire was also in decline at this time
was beginning to fall apart. The North African
and, by 850, the influence of Zen Buddhism had
lands west of Egypt were too far away to control,
and they became independent Muslim nations. It risen. encouraged introspection and contem-
It
was these Muslims, rather than the essentially plation, a kind of escape from an increasingly
difficult external world. Conditions might have
peaceful Mamun, who continued the Muslim ex-
pansion in the Mediterranean Sea. Muslim refu- been worse had not the Uighur Empire to the
gees from Ommayad Spain conquered Crete in north been destroyed at this time by inflowing
825, and North African Muslims invaded Sicily

Turkish tribes. The Tibetan Empire also disinte-
in 827 and advanced steadily against stiff Byzan-
grated, and the chaos across the borders pre-
tine resistance. By 850, the Byzantines were vented a concerted attack on China.
clinging only to Syracuse and a few other spots
on the eastern coast.
Other islands were taken, too: Sardinia, Cor-
JAPAN
sica, and the Balearic islands. The Mediterranean
The decline of the T'ang Empire was noted in
Sea was now completely dominated by the Mus- Japan, which sent a twelfth and last embassy to
lims, who raided the Italian coast freely. In 846, China in 838. They judged that China was no
they raided Rome itself. longer in a position to teach Japan, and the pe-
After the death of Mamun, his brother, al- riod of eager adoption of Chinese culture came to
Mutasim (794-842), became Caliph in 833. He, an end.

in order to protect himself against conspiracies
and military coups, set upbodyguard
a personal
consisting of Turks whom he could count on to
NORTH AMERICA
The collapse of the first period of Mayan civiliza-
be faithful only to him. By 850, the Abbasid
Caliphate was entering its decline. Guatemala took place at about
tion in this time.
The Mayan civilization underwent a second

\
growth farther north in Yucatan.
850 TO 900
This was shown in 885, when the Vikings
WEST FRANKS made the greatest of all their raids, coming up

the Seine as they had come 40 years before, but
The Carolingian rulers of the West Franks were
greater strength. They laid siege to Paris and
by now every bit as incompetent as the later Mer-
in
Charles the Fat did absolutely nothing. Paris was
ovingian rulers had been.
Charles the Fat (839-888), a great- defended by Eudes (860-898), the Count of Paris.
In 879,
For a whole year, he organized the defense and
grandson of Charlemagne, became king of the
the Vikings were held off.
East Franks. He was crowned Emperor in 881,
Count Eudes became the hero of the nation,
and was made king of the West Franks in 884.
For three years Charlemagne's Empire seemed
and when, much too late, Charles the Fat ap-
peared on the scene, it was not to fight, but to
unified again. That, however, was only appear-
bribe the Vikings with money and to offer them
ance. Charles the Fat was weak and the
real
hands of the great nobles. a province to plunder.

power rested in the
The contrast was too great. Charles the Fat

was deposed in 887 and the Frankish Empire ENGLAND
broke up finally and forever. England was, in a way, the first line of defense
In 893, a cousin of Charles the Fat came to the against the Vikings. The Danes sacked Canter-
throne. Fie was Charles the Simple (879-929), bury and London in 851, Winchester in 860, and
and that was even worse than being fat. York in 866. The eastern half of England was
completely under Danish domination. In 871,
however, Alfred (849-899), sometimes called
EAST FRANKS "Alfred the Great," became king of Wessex, the
The East Franks were ruled by monarchs as in- one Saxon kingdom that kept up a desperate de-
capable as those who were in power over the fense against the Danes.
West Franks. They had problems not only with In 878, even Alfred was on the point of giving
the Vikings, but with Moravian invaders from up after suffering a severe defeat. clung to He
the east. hope, however, gathered another army, won a
victory over the Danes, and began to press them
back. He even built a navy to attack them at sea
PAPACY — the first English navy. In 866, Alfred regained
The Papacy was at a low point when the Muslims London.
were raiding and looting Rome in 846. However, Rather than keep on fighting to the ruin of the
in 858, Nicholas I (820-867), sometimes called kingdom, Alfred agreed that, if the Danes ac-
"Nicholas the Great," became Pope. Under him cepted Christianity (which they did), he would
there was a recovery. divide the kingdom with them. They would take
Nicholas was a strong supporter of the idea the northeast and he the southwest.
that Popes were supreme over all of Christen- During his troubled reign, Alfred, like Char-
dom, not only over other ecclesiastical officials, lemagne a century before, tried to stimulate
but over secular rulers as well. learning. He encouraged the translation of useful
He supported the "False Decretals" that were Latin works into Old English (the term now used
supposed to be a list of rulings issued by the for the Anglo-Saxon language). He even did
early Bishops of Rome. These established a Col- some of the translations himself. He reorganized
lege of Cardinals to assist the Papal executive. the legal system as well.
This helped centralize the Church, and make it a
kind of absolute monarchy under the Pope. (It
was later discovered that these decretals were SCOTLAND
forgeries produced not long before Nicholas' The impact of Viking raids on the northern por-
time; hence, they were called "false." However, tion of Britain forced the scattered tribes there to
the College of Cardinals remained in existence.) unite in their own The
defense. Piets combined
Nicholas also supported the so-called "Dona- with the Scots (a tribe who had
originally come
tion of Constantine." According to this, Constan- from northern Ireland), about 850, to form the
tine I had been cured of leprosy by Pope nation we now call Scotland.
Sylvester I (who reigned from 314 to 335) and, in By 900, was
going concern although it was
it a
gratitude, he had given the Pope the whole of small and weak, hemmed in by the Vikings to
the West Roman Empire —
another invention, of the north and the Danes and English to the
course. south.
After the death of Nicholas I in 867, however,
the Papacy declined again; and, by 900, it seemed
drowning in insignificance and corruption. SCANDINAVIA
While the Viking sea-rovers were fighting in the
British Isles and along the shores of the Frankish
850 TO 900 133
kingdoms, and were even beginning to penetrate realm spread out widely over the east-European
Russia, they were also making their way across plain. Kiev eventually became the capital of the
the sea to a new land. Russian state under the Varangian princes, so
ANorse chieftain, Ingolfur Arnarson, set sail that, in this period, one can speak of "Kievan
in 874, and landed in Iceland. By that time, the Russia."

Irish monks who had once dwelt in the island
had died out or left. The Norse colonization that
followed the discovery was, however, perma-
MAGYARS
nent, and Iceland became a new Scandinavian The Magyars were moving westward at this
land. time, squeezing the Bulgars outward, and estab-
lishing themselves in what is now Hungary.
MORAVIA
Moravia (located where Czechoslovakia is now)
BYZANTINE EMPIRE
was the first Slavic state of note. It had been part At this time, the religious conflict between Rome
of Charlemagne's Empire, but had become inde-
—
and Constantinople that is, between the Pope
pendent after Charlemagne's death. and Patriarch— sharpened. A particularly strong
The prince of Moravia, Rastislav, made a Patriarch, Photius (820-894), held office from 858
treaty with the Byzantine Empire in 862, and the to 867 and again from 877 to 886. (The reason for
next year two Greek monks were sent to Mora- this on-and-off business was that the Patriarch
via.These were two brothers, Cyril (827-869) could always be deposed by an Emperor and
and Methodius (825-884). In order to translate then reseated by the next; whereas, since Char-
the Bible into the Slavic tongue, the brothers in- lemagne, the Pope had no Emperor with any
vented an alphabet, based on that of Greek. This power over him.)
Photius and Pope Nicholas excommunicated
the "Cyrillic alphabet" and is still used today
I
is
by several Slavic nations, notably Russia. each other and, for a while, the western and east-
By 900, Moravia was Christian and was taking ern halves of Christianity were split apart in what
is called a "schism" (from a Greek word meaning
advantage of the weakness of the East Frankish
realm to mount raids deep into it. "to split").
In 865, a Russian raid under Viking leadership
attacked Constantinople for the first time. It was
RUSSIA repulsed.
Macedonian (812-886) be-
the
The Slavs of northern Russia dealt in furs, and In 867, Basil I
hunters and trappers fanned out over the Arctic came Emperor, founding the "Macedonian Dy-
nasty," under which the Byzantine Empire had a
wastes in search of fur-bearing animals. A Viking
band, under Rurik (d. 879), founded the town of new burst of energy. Basil I rebuilt the army and
Novgorod ("new town") in the area and ruled navy, reorganized the legal system and, in gen-
(There legend that the Slavs them-
a eral, put the Empire on its feet.
over it. is
selves, despairing of not being able to rule them-

The Byzantines drove back the Arabs in east-
selves, asked to be dominated by the Vikings,
but ern Asia Minor and extended Byzantine holdings
bands southern Italy. The new Byzantine navy also
that sounds very unlikely.) The Viking
in
fought successfully against Muslim pirates in the
were called "Varangians," though an alternate
Mediterranean. However, Syracuse fell to the
name was "Rus" from which "Russia" is sup-
posed to have obtained name.
its Muslims in 865, though the Byzantines still clung
kinsman named Oleg
(d. desperately to a few strong points on the eastern
On
Rurik's death, a
912) succeeded to the throne. He
ruled not only coast of Sicily.
was succeeded by his son Leo VI the
over Novgorod, but over Kiev, nearly 600 miles
Basil I
Wise (866-912) in 886. Leo VI fired Photius and

to the south. From the start, then, the Russian
put an end to the schism with Rome. By 900, tiie depend on mercenaries for protection, the Caliph
Byzantine Empire seemed in better shape than at had come to be at the mercy of his Turkish body-
any time since the Muslim conquests of three and guards. It was this which helped make it possible
a half centuries earlier. for the Byzantine Empire to stage a recovery at
this time. The Muslims had some victories, how-
BULGARIA ever. There was not only the conquest of Syra-

cuse, as, in addition, they acquired Malta in 869.
In 852, Boris I (d. 907) became king of Bulgaria.
They also continued to shine in science. Mu-
In 865, he was converted to Christianity. For a
hammad ibn AI-Khwarizmi (780-850) wrote a
while, he hesitated as to whether to adopt the
book entitled Urn al-jabr wa'l muqabalah, meaning
Roman or Constantinopolitan rites, but in the
"the science of transposition and cancellations."
end, he chose the latter.
This gave us "al-jabr" or, in English, "algebra,"
The Byzantine Empire also managed to see to
as the name of that branch of mathematics. Al-
it that the Slavs living in the Balkans adopted
Khwarizmi's own name was distorted to "algo-
Christianity according to the Constantinopolitan
rithm," which came to mean
method of cal-
"a
rites. The thought was that by making them
culating." Al-Khwarizmi picked up the Hindu
Christians of this sort, they would be tamed. A
notion of zero and used it for writing numbers
feeling of awe for the holiness of Constantinople
with positional notation. For this reason, such
would keep them from attacking. By and large,
numbers came to be known later on as "Arabic
this didn't work.
numerals" in the west.
In 893, Boris's son, Symeon I (d. 927), some-
Al-Battani (858-929), knownwest asto the
times called "Symeon the Great," became ruler
"Albategnius," was the best of the Arabian as-
of Bulgaria. He was the first Bulgarian ruler to
tronomers. He improved on Ptolemy in several
adopt the title of "Tsar" (the Slavic version of
ways, got the most accurate value yet for the
"Caesar"). This meant there were two monarchs
length of the year and for the tilting of Earth's
calling themselves Emperors in the east. A third
and perfected spherical trigonometry.
was in the west — Arnulf (850-899), a nephew of axis,
Charles the Fat.

Symeon's and the fact that he was a
religion, CHINA
great admirer of Greek culture, did not prevent
The T'ang dynasty was now in its last years.
him from making war on the Byzantine Empire,
however.
JAPAN
ABBASID CALIPHATE The Japanese period devised a simpler
in this
The Abbasid Caliphate was in fragments now form of writing than the Chinese had, writing by
and the Caliph himself was more and more a symbols that stood for syllables rather than for
figurehead. As often happens to monarchs who whole words.
900 TO 950
was only six years of age in 899 when he became
EAST FRANKS king, and was still only 18 when he died in 911.
The king of the East Franks, as the century He left no heirs and he was the last Carolingian
opened, was Louis III the Child (893-911). He to rule over the East Franks, a century after the
900 TO 950 135
death of Charlemagne. (However, members of for that, sohe determined to make peace, rather
the Carolingian line continued to rule the West as Alfred of England had done with the Danes.
Franks and some continued to receive the empty Provided the Norsemen turned Christian, and
title of "Emperor.") swore allegiance to him, he offered to give them
The East Frankish nominated Conrad
nobility the land about the mouth of the Seine, which, in
of Franconia to rule the nation as Conrad I (d. any case, they occupied, and from which they
918), but he wasn't much good at it, especially as could not be driven out.
he had to face Magyar raids from the east. Rollo agreed and the region about the mouth
He died in 918, and Henry I the Fowler (876- of the Seine, some 50 miles northwest of Paris,
936) was elected. He received his nickname from became known as "Normandy."
the fact that when the news of the election Charles the Simple did not gain the kingship
reached him, he was hunting birds (fowls) with of the East Franks, and his reign continued to be
a hawk. He was the strongest East Frankish king a weak and futile one. In 950, his son was reign-
in 40 years and, in 933, was the first to defeat the ing as Louis IV (921-954) — one more weak and
Magyars in battle. It did not stop the Magyar incompetent Carolingian.
raids, but it did cause them to call a temporary Despite the fragmentation and misery in the
halt. West Frankish realm in this period, there was a
Henry I saw to it that the kingship remained monastic revival at the Abbey of Cluny in the
in his family. He
arranged to have the nobility east central portion of the land. There was a strict
choose his oldest son, by his second wife, as his observance of monastic discipline, and this Clu-
successor. When Henry died in 936, that son suc- niac movement spread and produced prelates
ceeded him as Otto I (912-973), sometimes called who greatly strengthened the Church.
"Otto the Great."
Otto proved even stronger than his father,
and was indeed the strongest monarch in west-
MAGYARS
ern Europe since the death of Charlemagne a In 906, theMagyars conquered and destroyed the
century and a quarter earlier. He beat down all Moravian kingdom, and, in its place, they
opposition to him within the East Frankish realm formed a strong state where once the Avars had
and brought the nobility to heel. He was still on ruled three centuries before. They spent the next
the throne in 950, and he had his eye on the 50 years raiding the East Frankish realm, spread-
Imperial title that so far had graced only Carolin- ing destruction, so that they are still remembered
gians. as "ogres" in western legends. They were de-
feated by Henry the Fowler in 933, but that
stopped them only temporarily. In 950, they
WEST FRANKS were still a terrible threat to the Franks to their
Over the West Franks, Charles the Simple, a west and the Bulgarians to their south.
great-great-grandson of Charlemagne, was ruler,
and he had to face the last great raid of the Vi-
kings in 911. The leader was one Hrolf the Gan-
SPAIN
"walker") because, according to the The Muslims Spain had largely come from
in
ger (i.e.,
story, he was so tall and heavy no horse could Mauretania, that portion of North Africa south of
carry him. His name in the West Frankish lan- Spain (whose name lingers on in "Morocco").
guage was Rollo. For this reason, the Spanish Christians called the
Charles the Simple was not in much of a po- Muslims "Moros," or, in English, "Moors."
sition to withstand these Vikings, or Norsemen,
Moorish Spain reached its peak under Abd er-
particularly since he wanted to gain the kingship Rahman III (891-961), its eighth ruler. He be-
came king 912 and was still king in 950. He
of the East Franks once his distant cousin, Louis
in
the Child, had died. He needed all his attention pacified the country, kept it strong, advanced its
agriculture and industry, and encouraged learn-

ing. His capital, Cordova, had about half a mil-
BULGARIA
lion population and was the strongest and largest Symeon of Bulgaria had dreams of winning Con-
city in Europe except for Constantinople itself. stantinople and, from 913 to 924, he raided
Cordova was the center of European learning, for southward on a number of occasions, penetrat-
there the old books of the Greeks and Romans ing to the walls of the The walls were, as
city.
were preserved and translated. usual, unbreachable, and Symeon had no navy.
In the interests of peace, Abd er-Rahman III The Byzantine Empire fought back by encour-
recognized the existence of the Christian nation aging the Patzinaks (or Pechenegs), a new wave
of Leon in the northwest. It had expanded in size of Asian tribesmen moving into Europe, to attack
and power, but its eastern portion, centered Bulgaria from the east. The Serbs, a Slavic people
about the city of Burgos, broke away and became who were in control of the Adriatic hinterland
independent after 930. The county of Burgos (the Byzantines themselves still occupied the
eventually became the kingdom of Castile. Abd coasts), also fought the Bulgarians in the west.
er-Rahman III helped both nations, since he felt, In 926, however, the Bulgarians defeated the
shrewdly, that if there were more than one Serbs decisively, and, in 927, when Symeon
Christian nation in the north, they would fight died, his son, Peter, made peace with the Byzan-
each other rather than the Moors. He was right, tines in order that he might deal more effectively
but that only worked well, as a strategy, as long with raids by the Magyars from the north and
as the Moors themselves remained united. the Patzinaks from the east.
ENGLAND RUSSIA
Kievan Russia was interested in trade with the
In the decades following the death of Alfred the
Great, the English slowly absorbed the Danish
more advanced nations to the south, particularly
with the Byzantines. In 941, a huge flotilla of
sections peacefully. The Danes were not very dif-
Russian ships crossed the Black Sea to attack
ferent from the Saxons in language and culture,
Constantinople and force favorable trade terms
and once the Danes had accepted Christianity,
the two peoples fused rather easily.
on the Byzantines. The Byzantines, however, to-
tally destroyed the Russian ships by making use
In 950, Edred (d. 955), a grandson of Alfred,
of Greek Fire for the purpose. It was its last use.
was on the throne, and England was clearly on
the way to being a united kingdom for the first
time since the Saxon invasions began five centu- BYZANTINE EMPIRE
ries before.
Despite attacks from the Bulgarians and Rus-
The English kings held a vague rule over Scot- sians, the Byzantine Empire in this period re-
land as well, and Scotland was slowly becoming mained strong. They fought well in eastern Asia
Anglicized in language and culture. Minor against the Muslims, and they strength-
ened their position in southern Italy. They de-
feated the Muslims in 916 at the Garigliano River,
PAPACY
and forced them out of Italy forever.
In this period, the Papacy struck bottom. It was
the plaything of the Roman nobility, and its in-
fluence dwindled almost to nothing. There were CHINA
14 Popes between 900 and 950. Agapetus II, who The T'ang dynasty came to an end in 907, and
was in office from 946 to 955, was somewhat bet- China fell into disunity again. It was some time
ter than some of those who preceded and fol- however, that the Chinese discov-
in this period,
lowed him. —
ered gunpowder perhaps as early as 919.
950 TO 1000 137
now Inner Mongolia, plus the northern prov-

MONGOLS inces of China itself. In 938, the Khitan Mongols
The Asian nomads north of China and Persia chose Peking (now called "Beijing") as their cap-
were Turkish to the west and Mongol to the east. ital.
The Asian invaders of Europe were largely Turk-

ish, though the Huns may have been Mongol.
The Mongols enter history definitely, how- JAPAN
ever, in 907, when the fall of the T'ang dynasty In this period, the Fujiwara clan was dominating
made it possible for a tribe known as the Khitan political life in Japan. Fujiwara Tadahira was dic-
Mongols to surge southward to conquer what is tator until his death in 949.
950 TO 1000
entered into the cruder Germanic world. The By-
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE zantine princess introduced the use of forks
Otto king of the East Franks, responded to a
I, when dining, for instance.)
Magyar invasion in 954; and, in August 955, he The Empire, as refounded by Otto, was
defeated the Magyars totally in the battle of Lech- viewed as the reestablishment of the Roman Em-
feld in what is now Bavaria. That put an end to pire in the west, even more so than in the case of
Magyar raids forever and greatly increased Ot- Charlemagne over a century and a half before.
to's prestige. He also defeated the Slavs and ad- Because it was created by the Pope, it was distin-
vanced his eastern frontier from the Elbe River to guished from the old Empire, which had been
the Oder River. founded by pagans, and was spoken of as the
But Otto was dreaming of the Imperial crown. "Holy Roman Empire." It is usually referred to
In 951, he had led an expedition into Italy and by that name in history books.
made himself king of the Lombards, but Pope Otto's successes in Italy inspired future Holy
Agapetus II refused to crown him Emperor. Roman Emperors to consider Italy as part of their
In 955, however, a new Pope, John XII (937- dominions and, because this distracted them
964) was elected. He was having trouble with a from the German core of the state, this had a
minor Carolingian, Berengar II (900-966), and deleterious effect on the Empire.
he called on Otto for help. That was exactly Thus, Otto's son, who came to the throne as
what Otto wanted. He led a strong second expe- Otto II (955-983) in 973, campaigned in southern
dition into Italy in 961 and the Pope, in return Italy, and Otto's grandson, Otto III (980-1002),
for his help, crowned him Emperor on February who came to the throne as a child in 983 (and
2, 962. was the son of the Byzantine princess) actually
Otto confirmed the rule of the Pope over the settled in Rome and tried, unsuccessfully, to re-
Papal States, but claimed the right to ratify Papal vive its past glories.
elections and, indeed, Otto freely deposed some
Popes and named others. In a third expedition to
Italy that began in 966, he penetrated into the
FRANCE
Byzantine south and obtained a Byzantine prin- The West Franks were still ruled by Carolingians
cess as the wife of his son. (This had its impor- after the Carolingian line had come to an end
tance, too, for it meant that Byzantine refinement among the East Franks in 911. The West Frank
Carolingians had no power, and the last of them,

Louis V the Do-Nothing, died in 987 at the age of
PAPACY
20,with no direct heir. The Carolingian line, During this period, the Popes were weak and
which had come into prominence with Pepin of were under the complete domination of the Holy
Landon three and a half centuries earlier, and Roman Emperors.
had reached its peak with Charlemagne, would In 996, Gregory V (972-999) became Pope. He
never rule again. was a cousin of Emperor Otto III, and was the
During the reigns of the last of the Carolin- first German pope. He was succeeded in 999 by
gians, the most powerful nobleman among the Sylvester II (945-1003), the first French pope,
West Franks was Hugh the Great (d. 956), who who had been a tutor of Otto III, and who was a
was Count of Paris, and who overshadowed the learned mathematician and scientist.
kings who were nominally his superior, just as He understood Arabic, which was necessary,
the Carolingian Mayors of the Palace over- since the ancient Greek books existed only in Ar-
shadowed the last Merovingian kings. abic translations at this time.
Hugh the Great died in 956, but his son Hugh
Capet (938-996), so-called because of cape he a
liked to wear, inherited his title and his power.
SPAIN
After Louis V died, the French nobility gathered Abd ar-Rahman III died in 961, and while his
and elected Hugh Capet as king. successors maintained Moorish domination of
With Hugh Capet's election, we need no the land, under Hisham II (965-1013), who
longer refer to the land as the West Frankish began his reign in 976, Muslim Spain was begin-
realm. We can "France."
call it ning to decline.
The Emperor Otto III recognized Hugh Ca-
pet's title and, in return, Hugh surrendered Lor-
raine to the Emperor. (Lorraine was the remnant ENGLAND
of the middle kingdom inherited by Charle- In England, Edgar (944-975), a great-grandson of
magne's oldest son, a kingdom which had been Alfred the Great, became king in 959, and was
fought over and disputed by the East and West the first Saxon ruler to be recognized as the king
Franks ever since.) of England.
all
Hugh Capet died in 996 and was succeeded by Edgar died in 975, and, after the short reign of
his son, Robert II the Pious (970-1031). his older son, his younger son, Ethelred II the
Somewhere in this period, horsecollars came Redeless (968-1016), became king in 978. "Rede-
into use. Thisallowed a horse to be hitched to a less" means "unadvised" but the sobriquet is
plow in such a way that the pressure of the strap usually given as "Ethelred the Unready," which
was against its shoulders and not its windpipe. is not a good translation of "Redeless" but which
This meant that the horse could pull with all its conveys something just the same, for Ethelred
strength and the heavy moldboard plow could be was also unready to meet the emergencies of the
pulled through the damp, dense soil of north- time. In his reign, a fresh Danish invasion took
western Europe with much greater efficiency place and he was unable to do much about it.
than before. This, combined with iron horse-
shoes (which also came into use at this time)
to protect horse's hooves, greatly increased
DENMARK
the food supply in northern Europe. This, Harold II Bluetooth (910-985) was the first ruler
in turn, increased the northern population and of Denmark to make his mark on history. He was
led to the centers of European power moving converted to Christianity in 960. His son, Sven I
northward. Forked-Beard (985-1014) ascended the throne in
985, and it was he who directed new raids
against England.
950 TO 1000 139
NORWAY RUSSIA
Olaf Trygvasson (964-1000) became king of
I In 957, aRussian princess named Olga (890-969)
Norway in 995. He tried, without much success, visited Constantinople and was converted to
to ward off the strong Denmark of Sven I. He Christianity. Her son, Sviatoslav (d. 972) became
began the process of the conversion of Norway ruler ofKievan Russia in 964. He defeated the
to Christianity. Khazars and put an end to their realm. He also
A notable Norwegian of the time was Eric power briefly
defeated the Bulgarians, so that his
Thorvaldsson, usually called ''Eric the Red" from extended to the Danube; however, he was then
the color of his hair. In 982, he was exiled from defeated by the Byzantines, and was killed in
Norway for some offense and he decided to take warfare against the Patzinaks.
the opportunity of sailing westward from Ice- His three sons ruled in rapid succession, his
land. He came upon huge ice-covered land. He
a youngest becoming king in 980. He was Vladimir
sailed about it and found that the southwestern I the Saint (956-1015), who supervised the con-
shore was not completely bleak. He called the version of Russians en masse to the Constantin-
place "Greenland" (to make it sound more attrac- opolitan version of Christianity.
tive), and by 985 was collecting colonists in Ice-
land. In 986, a colony was founded on that

southwest shore.
HUNGARY
From Greenland, Eric's son, Leif Ericsson, and their defeat, the
After the battle of Lechfeld,
sailed westward and, in 1000, reached a land he Magyars settled down in what is now Hungary.
called "Vinland," by which, perhaps, he referred In 997, Stephen I (977-1038) became king and
to the island we now know
Newfoundland. In
as encouraged the Christianization of Hungary,
this way, the American continents were first choosing the Roman version over that of Con-
reached by Europeans. It was only a temporary stantinople.
attainment, however, and did not gain the atten-
tion of Europe's civilized centers.
SERBIA
The Serbians at this time adopted the Constan-
SWEDEN tinopolitan version of Christianity.
Olof Skutkonung (d. 1022) became king of Swe-
den, and began the Christianization of the coun-
try.
BULGARIA
Most of this period was spent by Bulgaria in
fighting off raids by Magyars, Patzinaks, and
BOHEMIA Russians. In 976, however, Samuel (d. 1014) be-
Bohemia is the westernmost part of what is now came Tsar of Bulgaria and began the process of
Czechoslovakia, and is the westernmost Slavic rebuilding the nation. He supervised its restora-
region of Europe. Under Boleslav II, who reigned tion to power.

from 967 to 999, the processes of Christianization
of Bohemia proceeded.
GHAZNI
In western Asia, Arabic dynamism had burnt to
POLAND a low ebb, and it was the Turks who were becom-
Poland became an important power under Boles- ing the cutting edge of Islam. Thus, in 977, a
law I the Brave (967-1025), who became king in Turkish slave, Subuktigin, founded a kingdom in
992. Ghazni, which spread out over what is now Af-
ghanistan. In 994, he was succeeded by Mahmud
who conquered In January 965, however, the last Byzantine

the Idol-Breaker (970-1030),
and fortress in Sicily was taken by the Muslims and,
Khorasan (in what is now northeastern Iran)
invaded northern India. four centuries after Belisarius had retaken the is-
land, imperial rule ended there forever.

In 976, Basil II was old enough to rule in his
EGYPT own name, and he spent years putting down the

great magnates who had gained power during
Egypt had broken away from the Abbasid Cali-
his minority.
phate after the time of Mamun the Great, and, in
968, it came under the control of the Fatimid
Dy-
nasty. These were Shiites, who claimed to be de-
scended from Ali, the fourth Caliph, who had
CHINA
China south of the domain
In 960, that portion of
married Muhammad's daughter, Fatima (hence,
name of the dynasty). of the Khitan Mongols came under the rule of the
the
Under the Fatimids, Egypt experienced a pe- Sung dynasty. Sung T'ai Tsung, who reigned
riod of power for the first time since the early from 960 to 997, unified all of China south of the
Ptolemies, 12 centuries before. Little by little, Mongol domain but could not take back what
had been lost in the north. His son. Sung Chen
they gained ground in North Africa, and took
over Sicily from its earlier Moslem conquerors. Tsung, accepted the inevitable and made peace
al-Hakim (985-1021) became the Fa-
In 996, with the Mongols, giving up the north.
Under the Sung dynasty, China it
that part of
timid ruler of Egypt. Because he claimed to be a
god and because his temperament was erratic, he controlled did well. Books were printed, paper
was called al-Hakim the Mad— although to some money was used, art flourished, and the govern-
Muslim sectaries ever since he has been con- ment instituted a humane welfare system. Trade
sidered divine. Under him, Fatimid Egypt was at and commerce expanded and the population of
its height, for he controlled all of North
Africa China, at 60 million, reached what had been its
and Syria in addition to Egypt. maximum in the days of the Han Empire, eight
The greatest scientist in his realm was Alha- centuries before.
zen (965-1039), who studied optics with greater

precision than anyone before him. He explained
the working of lenses and the nature of the rain-
JAPAN
bow. Unfortunately, he also vaingloriously Fujiwara Michinaga became Shogun (Regent) in
claimed he could devise a machine that would 995 and under him, the Fujiwara clan was at its
most powerful. In his time, the Emperors were
regulate the flooding of the Nile. Al-Hakim or-
dered him to build such a machine on pain of complete nonentities. It was a time of a literary
execution and Alhazen had to pretend to go mad flowering, but the warrior families were growing
and to keep that up till al-Hakim was safely dead. more powerful again.
BYZANTINE EMPIRE AFRICA

The Byzantine Empire continued to be strong. It Arabs controlled the ‘western shores of the Red
reconquered Crete in 961. In 963, a five-year-old Sea and traded in gold, ivory, and slaves. In
boy became Emperor as Basil II (958-1025). His western Africa, north of the Gulf of Guinea,
positionwas respected and, during his minority, there was the flourishing kingdom of Ghana. It
strong and loyal generals continued to lead the had iron weapons and it produced gold, which
Empire on to victory. The Byzantines took Cy- was its most important export. It was at its peak
prus and beat the Muslims in eastern Asia Minor at about 1000.
and in Syria.
1000 TO 1050 141
INTERLUDE — 1000
The year 1000 had a certain significance. To those The Christians believed that it was Jesus who
who were alive as 1000 approached, it was clear was the messiah, but since his coming did not
that that year would mark the thousandth anni- result in the kind ofworld they expected, they
versary of the traditional year of the birth of began to assume there would be a "Second Com-
Jesus, and that anniversary had the potentiality ing,” something for which they are also still wait-
of being particularly significant. ing.
Itcame about this way. In the early civiliza- The Book of Revelation, the last book of the
tions, 1000 was usually the highest number given New Testament, in a confusing statement (Chap-
a specific name, since there was little occasion in ter 20:1-3), says that Satan has been bound for a
early times to count anything that was more than thousand years and will then be loosed, after
a few thousand. which there will be a final battle in which good
Consequently, when the Biblical writers will finally overcome evil and the world will then
wanted to make use of a large number, the word come to an end, to give way to a perfect and
"thousand” was what was often used. Thus, eternal new heaven and new earth.
Psalms 90:4 reads: ”For a thousand years in thy The account is so confusing that there is really
sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as no hope of making sense out of the Book of Rev-
a watch in the night.” elation as a whole. Still, one might interpret the
What that means is that God is eternal and is term "thousand years” to mean an indefinitely
not limited by time. Any
period of time, however long time. Others, however, accepted the phrase
large, means nothing to God, but the largest literally and felt that the old world would end
number word the psalmist had was "thousand,” and the new one would begin a thousand years
so that's what was used. It is natural, therefore, after the birth of Jesus. For them, the coming of
that readers of the Bible would attach more im- 1000 was a time of hope and fear.
portance to that particular number than it de- However, the year 1000 passed as any other
serves. year did, and life and the world continued to
The number "thousand” eventually showed move right along. Nevertheless, in every gener-
up messianic thought, the feeling among the

in ation, therehave been those who have expected
Jews that a king of the line of David would some- an imminent end to the world, in the Biblical
day return and rule the whole world. Naturally, sense, and, on a number of occasions, specific
such a messiah never showed up, and the Jews dates have been predicted. None of these predic-
are still waiting. tions have come true, however.
1000 TO 1050
942. That same year, Ethelred consented to the
ENGLAND slaughter of Danes in England by the Saxons,
In 1002, Ethelred Unready) married Emma
II (the intending by this act of terrorism to frighten off
(d. 1052), who was the daughter of Richard I the
the Danes of Denmark, who had once again been
Fearless (922-996), the Duke of Normandy from raiding England.
It was Sven Fork-

entirely counterproductive.
IRELAND
beard of Dennaark, who had just conquered Nor-
way, had had a sister killed in the slaughter and Brian Boru of Munster (941-1014), who had been
was furious. Therefore, Sven took a fleet to En- high king of Ireland since 1002, led the Irish re-
gland and ravaged to his heart's content. Eth- sistance to the Vikings, who had dominated the
two centuries. In 1014, at the
elred eventually fled to Normandy, and Sven Irish coastline for
battle of Clontorf, on the outskirts of Dublin, the
was accepted by the English as their king in 1013.
Sven died almost immediately afterward, but Vikings were defeated, and their position in Ire-
his son, Canute (d. 1035), often known as "Can- land declined rapidly thereafter. However, Brian
ute the Great," stepped into his shoes. He was was killed as the battle ended and there followed
acknowledged king of England in 1017; and, a period of anarchy in Ireland.
since Ethelred had died the year before, Canute

married his widow, Emma, as a way of strength-
ening his legitimacy on the throne.
NORWAY
After the death of Canute of Denmark, Norway
Canute was a good king against whom the
English had no complaints. He completed the broke away from Danish domination and, in
Christianization of Denmark, and ruled over a 1046, was ruled by Harold III Haardraade (1015-
northern empire that included England, Den- 1066), meaning "severe ruler." He had fled Nor-
mark, and Norway. way when it had been defeated and he served for
He died in 1035. His two sons, who succeeded a while inKievan Russia, and then in Constanti-
in turn, were incompetent, and, in 1042, the son
nople. He was nearly seven feet tall, and very
of Ethelred and Emma returned to England from handsome, and in both places he got in trouble
Normandy and reigned as Edward III (1003- over his success with royal women. He came
1066). He was gentle and religious (he was called back to independent Norway finally, with a Rus-
"Edward the Confessor") but he was also incom- sian princess as wife, and with considerable
petent, and he relied a great deal on Norman wealth. In 1050, he founded Oslo.
advisers, since his mother was Norman and he
had spent his youth in Normandy.
This alienated the Saxon nobility, the strong-
FRANCE
est of whom was Godwin, earl of Wessex (d. The early Capetian kings (Hugh Capet and his
1053).
immediate descendants) had a rough time of it.
France was broken up into provinces, each of
which was governed by a nobleman who ac-
SCOTLAND knowledged the king in only a very offhand and
Scotland was still fighting off Viking raiders at limited way. In the time of Henry I (1008-1060),
this time. Malcolm II MacKenneth (953-1034) Hugh Capet's grandson, who came to the throne
began to reign in 1005, and went through the in 1031, the Capetian power was at a low ebb.
formality of accepting Canute as his overlord. There was several of the French nobility who
His grandson, Duncan I (d. 1040), succeeded were stronger than the king.
him, but he was not a strong king and there was The population of France by 1000 had been
a blood feud between him and the wife of his restored to what it had been in Gaul in the time
general, Macbeth Macbeth rose against

(d. 1057). of Hadrian (nine centuries earlier), and in En-
him and, in 1040, Duncan was killed in battle and gland, it was now twice what it had been in
Macbeth was accepted as king. He was, on the Roman Britain.
whole, a capable one, and Shakespeare's play,

"Macbeth," gives a very distorted account of this
period of history.
1000 TO 1050 143
sen and he reigned as Conrad II (990-1039). Con-

NORMANDY rad II and his son and successor, Henry III the
Normandy was a province of France, and its Black (1017-1056), lifted the Holy Roman Empire
duke acknowledged the overlordship of the King to its most strongly centralized position. They
of France, but that was Nor-
just a legalistic form. kept the nobility under control, and continually
mandy was well tightly run by its dukes,
and insisted on Church reform. In this way, how-
who usually had considerably more power than managed to rouse increasing
ever, they resent-
the contemporary French kings. ment among the nobles and the bishops.
Duke Richard II the Good (d. 1027) kept Nor-
mandy strong and prosperous. Emma, who had
married, Ethelred the Unready, and then,
first,
PAPACY
later, Canute of Denmark, was his sister. Richard The Popes, during were weak and,
this period,
II died in 1027 and was succeeded by his son, sometimes, corrupt. There was, however, an in-
Robert I the Devil (d. 1035), who received his creasingly strong movement toward church re-
cognomen because of his cruelty and unscrupu- form. There was a push toward ending "simony"
lousness. He kept his nobles in line, however. In (the purchase of ecclesiastical office), toward the
1034, Robert undertook the task of a pilgrimage abolition of "lay investiture" (where kings and
to Jerusalem. On way
back, in 1035, he died,
his other rulers appointed bishops for political rea-
leaving only an eight-year-old illegitimate son, sons or in return for payment), and toward the
William (1028-1087) as heir. enforcement of the celibacy of the clergy (so that
Robert had made the nobility swear allegiance high church officials not use their offices to en-
to the young William, but after he was dead, rich and promote their children).
there was a strong temptation to forget the oath. The Church reformers also tried to suppress
After all, Duke William II the Bastard was young the continual fighting among the nobility, which
and illegimate. However, Henry I of France pro- impoverished all the land and endlessly in-
tected him (feeling it good idea to

might be a creased human misery. In 1049, a new Pope, Leo
have a Duke of Normandy who would be grate- IX (1002-1054), supported by Emperor Henry III,
ful to him). who was a relative, and took up the cause of
As William grew however, he turned
older, reform. With him, the Papacy began to climb out
out to be strong, capable, and quite ruthless. of the pit into which it had fallen.
When he was old enough, he ground down the

nobles mercilessly and made himself feared and
obeyed. He was removed, of
a first cousin, once
VENICE
Edward the Confessor, and since Edward had no Since Belisarius' wars, five centuries earlier, Ven-
children, William felt that he ought to inherit the ice had been friendly toward the Byzantine Em-
crown of England, on Edward's death. pire and had more or less acknowledged its
overlordship, provided it was left much to

pretty
itself. By 1000, Venice's trade had made it rich
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE and strong and it dominated the Adriatic Sea and
Otto died without direct heirs in 1002, and his
III the northern part of its eastern coast (Dalmatia).
second cousin was chosen to succeed him (not This meant that it was, in actual fact, indepen-
without trouble) and reigned as Henry II the dent, though remained culturally bound to the
it
Saint (973-1024). He was eventually made a saint east. Thus, when the Venetians began to con-
because he had been interested in monastic re- struct their greatest church, St. Mark, in 1043,
form and because he founded new monasteries. they did so in the tradition of Byzantine architec-
He also fought against Poland, but with only lim- ture. And, of course, the city's past connection
ited success. gave it special trading privileges in Constantino-
On his death in 1024, another cousin was cho- ple that served to enrich it further.
whole, was beginning to develop

Italy, as a
flourishing city life, particularly in the northern

RUSSIA
half. Italy had been the last of the west European
The power of Kievan Russia reached a peak
provinces of the Roman Empire to experience the under the rule of Yaroslav I the Wise (980-1054),
coming of darkness, and it was the first province who mounted the throne in 1019. He built a ca-
(ifMoorish Spain is excepted) where the dark- thedral, produced the earliest known written
ness was now beginning to lift. Russian law code, and extended his sway over
all the Russian lands from the Black Sea to the
Baltic Sea. He used his daughters as a way of
MOORISH SPAIN cementing relations with western states. One

married into the Hungarian royal family, one
By 1031, only 70 years after the end of the great
married Harold Haardraade of Norway, and one
reign of Abd er-Rhaman III, the Ummayad Cali-
even married Henry I of France.
phate collapsed in Spain when the last Caliph,
Hisham III (975-1036), died. Moorish Spain
broke up into competing fragments, which had HUNGARY
to call on African tribes for help against the in- was a
After the death of Stephen I in 1038, there
creasing power of the Christians to the north. weakened
period of dynastic rivalry that greatly
The Africans were good fighters, but they did
the nation.
nothing for Moorish Spain's intellectual and cul-
tural life, so Moorish civilization declined.
BYZANTINE EMPIRE
Basil brought the Byzantine Empire to a new
II
CASTILE peak of power. It was far smaller than it had been
Ferdinand I of Castile (1017-1065), sometimes under Justinian, but that had its bright side, too.
called "Ferdinand the Great," became king in It meant there were no outlying provinces that
1035. He conquered Leon to the west, and ex- were disaffected and that had to be held onto at
tended his overlordship over Navarre in the east, great cost.
so that all northern Spain was under his rule. He Asia Minor was secure, for the Muslims could
took advantage of the disarray among the Moors not match the Byzantine armies at this time. On
to reconquer territory in the south. He began the the Balkan peninsula, however, the Bulgarian
Christian reconquest of Spain, and it was against kingdom under Samuel was a great danger, and
him that the African tribes were called in. it was against him that Basil II turned his arms.
For a while, the struggle swayed this way and
that, but in 1014, at the battle of Balathista, in
BOHEMIA AND POLAND what is now southwestern Bulgaria, Basil II man-
At this time, these two new Slavic powers com- aged to send troops around the flank of the Bul-
peted vigorously for domination. Bretislav I of garian army and, at a crucial moment, attacked
Bohemia (1005-1055), who became king in 1034, its rear. The Bulgarians collapsed and Basil II
made inroads on Poland, while Casimir I of Po- took 15,000 prisoners. In a horribly atrocious act,
land (1016-1058) reversed the situation. For that Basil II blinded 99 out of every 100 of their eyes,
reason, Bretislav I and Casimir I were each called leaving 150 single-eyed men to guide the rest
"the Restorer" by their respective nations. back to Samuel. The Bulgarian ruler had a stroke
was Emperor Henry III who
In actual fact, it and died two days later.
at the sight
kept them embroiled, and who prevented either The Bulgarians were completely beaten. All
side from getting too strong. Weak and compet- the Balkans to the Danube River was annexed to
ing Slavic powers to the east of the Empire were the Byzantine Empire, and the Bulgarians began
exactly what Henry III wanted. to melt into the general population. Basil II came
1000 TO 1050 145
to be known as “Bulgaroktonos" ("slayer of the Ibn Sina (980-1037), known west as "Avi-
to the
Bulgarians.") cenna." He was the most important of all the
Then, in 1018, the Byzantines defeated the Muslim physicians. His works, based on the the-
Lombards at Cannae, where, nearly twelve and ories of Hippocrates and Galen, were the most
a half centuries before, Hannibal had inflicted a important medical textbooks for centuries.
great defeat on Rome. As a result, the Byzantine At about this time, the Muslims were learning
hold on southern Italy was strengthened. how to prepare and concentrate sugar from sug-
On December 15, 1025, the old Bulgar-Killer arcane.
died, and there was no one quite like him to re-
place him.
Constantine VIII (960-1028), the younger WEST AFRICA
brother of Basil survived him and, in 1028,
II, The Almoravids were a confederation of North
when he died, he was succeeded by his daughter African tribes who, at this time, spread their
Zoe (980-1050), and by three husbands she mar- power over what is now Morocco and Algeria. It
ried successively. She died in 1050 and up to that was they who were called into Spain by the col-
work in training
time, Basil's the army and in lapsing Moors to fight off the resurgent Chris-
developing good generals kept the Byzantine tains.
Empire doing well despite internal revolts, and
despite attacks by Patzinak raiders on land and
Muslim pirates at sea. One of the factors in By- BURMA
was the leadership of Har-
zantine victories at sea
In 1044, a kingdom was founded east of India
old Haardraade, who was eventually to become
that developed into Burma.
the Norwegian king.
SELJUK TURKS KOREA

To guard against tribal invaders from Manchuria,
Another Turks came south from Turkis-
tribe of
Korea borrowed the notion from China of build-
tan, the region north of the civilized Middle East.
ing a great wall across the narrowest part of the
They were the Seljuk Turks, so-called after the
peninsula.
grandfather of their leaders, who were Toghril
Beg (990-1063) and Chagar Beg, two brothers.
From 1037, they defeated the Ghaznavid mon-
arch and developed a realm of their own in what
JAPAN
is now Afghanistan and northern Iran.
In 1015, a Japanese noblewoman, Shikibu Mura-
In 1010, the Persian poet, Firdawsi (935-1020),
saki, wrote a long novel The Tale of the Genji,
wrote a long epic poem dealing with the legend- which long preceded any novels in the west. It
ary and historical tales of the Persian kings up to
can still be (and is) read today.
the Islamic conquest. It is the great Persian na-
tional epic and contains the legends Rustam,
of
the Persian Hercules. He dedicated the book to NORTH AMERICA
Mahmud of Ghazni. The Mayan civilization began a second, and this
Another important Persian of the period was time final, decline in this period.
1050-1100
old was killed that they broke. William became
ENGLAND King William I of England, and was forever after
and known as "William the Conqueror." He spent

Edward th6 Confessor, who had no heirs
the next six years subduing the Saxons in the
expected none, favored his first cousin, once re-
moved, Duke William II of Normandy, as his west and north.
William then set up a firm, centralized govern-
successor. The Saxon nobles, however, pointed
ment, making sure that all landholders owed al-
out that William was of illegitimate birth, and
over legiance to him, directly and absolutely.
that they didn't want a Norman to be king
any Moreover, he refused to yield any power over
them in case.
When Godwin Wessex, the most powerful
of the English church to the Pope.
In 1085, he made a detailed survey of all the
of the Saxon nobles, died in 1053, his son, Harold
(1022-1066) succeeded him and he, too, domi-
property in England ("the Domesday Book ) in
nated the weak Edward. About 1064, Harold was order that he might be able, more efficiently, to
going by ship through the English Channel and tax and administer the kingdom.
After his death, his oldest son became Duke
was driven ashore in Normandy by a storm. Wil-
Normandy. He was Robert Curthose (1054-II
liam took him prisoner and forced him to swear of
an oath to help William get the throne, but Har- 1134) or "short pants," so-called because he had
old later claimed the oath was void since it was short legs. William's second son became William
wrung from him by force. IIRufus (1056-1100) or "red" because of the color
Edward died in January and Harold was
1066, of his hair, king of England. The third son,
voted King Harold II of England. His younger Henry Beauclerc (1068-1135), meaning "good
brother, Tostig (d. 1066), who ruled Northum- scholar," got money.
bria, had rebelled and had been driven into exile.

William II ruled England as firmly as his father
Now he returned with Harold Haardraade of had, but his cruelty made him unpopular and, in
Norway advantage of the confusion of the
to take 1100, he was by an arrow in a hunting ac-
killed
succession. Haardraade was leading one last Vi- cident. It may well have been an assassination.
king invasion three centuries after the sea-rovers
had become the scourge of northwestern Europe.
Harold Haardraade might be called "the last of
SCOTLAND
the Vikings." Macbeth, who had won his crown by defeating
England was forced to lead his Duncan was, in
in battle, turn, defeated and
Harold II of
army to the north where he beat and killed Tostig killed by Duncan's son in 1057. That son reigned
and Harold Haardraade after a very hard battle over Scotland as Malcolm III Canmore (1031-
at Stamford Bridge. Word reached Harold 11, 1083). He was married to a niece of Edward the
however, that even as the battle was being Confessor, and she was a strong influence for
fought, Duke William II was landing a force in the continued Anglicization of Scotland and the
southern England. abandonment of the Celtic rites of Christianity in
Harold hastened southward, driving his army favor of the Roman.
to utter weariness and then, without giving them Malcolm had to go through a form of acknowl-
a chance to rest, hurled them at the Normans on edgment of the overlordship of William I and
October 14, 1066, at the Battle of Hastings. William II after the Norman conquest of England,
Weary as they were, the Saxons gave a good but managed to maintain Scotland's political in-
account of themselves and it was only after Har- dependence.

1050 TO 1100 147
He died in 1093 and was succeeded by his of office, and of engineering the election of one
younger brother, Donalbane (Donald the Fair), who would prove an Imperial puppet. Henry IV
under whom Celtic Christianity made its last tried to do this.
stand nearly six centuries after it had been intro- The Pope, however, knew that he could ex-
duced by the Irish monks. Donalbane died in communicate the Emperor and absolve the nobil-
1098, and Malcolm's oldest son, Edgar (1075- ity from any allegiance to him. The Pope tried to
1107), then succeeded. do that.

Henry IV's move didn't work, while the
Pope's did, for Henry's nobility were only too
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE anxious to rise against him. Henry IV, in danger
After Conrad and Henry III had succeeded in
II being overthrown by his nobles, dashed over the
centralizing the government and establishing the Alps into Italy in mid-winter to where the Pope
Imperial dignity, there seemed a chance that the was staying at a castle in Canossa in northern
Empire might develop into a strong nation, as Italy. On January 21, 1077, the Emperor pre-
England and France were in the slow process of sented himself to the Pope as a penitent in the
doing. snow. He waited three days, and the Pope had
Unfortunately, however, when Henry III died no choice but to accept the penitence and declare
in 1056, his son and heir, who reigned as Henry the nobility to be on their allegiance again. Al-
IV (1050-1106), was only six years old, and it was though it looked as though Henry IV had been
10 years before he could wield the royal power humiliated, he had actually succeeded in outma-
on his own. By that time, however, the great no- neuvering the Pope.
bles, both secular and clerical, had taken over, Henry IV continued to fight his nobles and the
and the Imperial power would never again be Pope, however; and, in 1100, the war was still
what it was under Henry III. continuing, to the great harm of the Holy Roman
Because much of the royal revenue had been Empire.
appropriated by the nobility, Henry IV tried to
use the Church as a source of money. By selling
Church offices, he could get the resources he PAPACY
needed. The Church, however, was against this; At the beginning of this period, the Papacy was
it would not allow "lay investiture." It did not still weak, and the most important event was the
want laymen (and even the Emperor was a lay- final break between Rome and Constantinople.
man in the eyes of the Church) to appoint The two branches of the Church had been quar-
Church officials. They wanted that left entirely to reling with each other periodically since the Lom-
the Church hierarchy —
meaning, in the last anal- bard conquest of five centuries before, when the
ysis, the Pope. Pope had to seek help from the Franks rather
Beginning in 1075, therefore, there was a than from the East Romans.
strong conflict between Emperor and Pope over The enmity arose out of the fact that the two
thismatter of lay investiture, for the Emperor felt branches spoke different languages (Latin in the
he could not rule without the money he could west and Greek in the east), that there was a
abstract from candidates for clerical posts. This political struggle for dominationbetween the
further distracted the Emperor's attention from Latin Pope and the Greek patriarch, and that
German affairs and prevented the coalescence of there were certain doctrinal differences that
Germany into a nation. What was worse, Henry would seem tiny to most people but that loomed
IV ran into the opposition of unusually strong very large to the ideologues on both sides.
Popes, which made the controversy even more Always the continuing differences had been
severe. patched up in the name of necessary unity in the
Henry IV was aware that earlier strong Em- face of the overriding Muslim threat. In 1054,
perors had had no hesitation in forcing Popes out however, the quarrel gained so much in intensity
that it each side that the Muslims were

seemed to knight, made their way to southern Italy and
preferable to the other form of Christianity. The proved excellent leaders of mercenary forces.
result was the ''Great Schism." Christianity di- The best of them was the fourth son, Robert
vided into the Roman Catholics (whose influence (1015-1085), who has been known in history as
spread over all of western Europe from Spain to Robert Guiscard ("Robert, the Clever").
Poland) and the Greek Orthodox (whose influ- Robert's feats paralleled those of his contem-
ence spread over the Byzantine Empire and Rus- porary, William of Normandy, and the two were
sia). The division has never been healed to this the most capable of the Normans. In some ways,
day. Robert was even more remarkable, in fact. Where
In 1056, there was a turning point. Henry III William was the leader of the best-organized land
died, and the Imperial power decreased. And in in western Europe, Roger was merely the leader
Rome, a dynamic monk named Hildebrand of a mercenary band. Nevertheless,
rag-tag
(1020-1085), became the power behind the Roger defeated both the Lombards and the By-
throne for several of the Popes of the period. He zantines.
took advantage of a child Emperor and of the The last of the Lombard power was wiped out
growing Imperial weakness to increase the by him, and when he took Bari in the Italian heel
power of the Papacy. in April 1071, the Byzantines lost their last foot-
By 1061, Pope Alexander II (d. 1075) was hold in Italy, five and a third centuries after Beli-
elected without Henry IV having been given any sarius had invaded the land. This meant that all
role to play (he was still only 11 years of age at of southern Italy transferred its religious alle-
the time). Alexander II was a friend of William of giance from Constantinople to Rome. This fur-
Normandy and blessed his enterprise of con- ther exacerbated Constantinople's anger with
quering England. Rome and made it more nearly impossible to heal
Hildebrand himself was elected to the
In 1073, the Great Schism.
Papacy, taking the name of Gregory VII. It was Robert made friends with the Papacy, and al-
his notion that the Pope was the final court in lied himself with Pope Gregory VII against the
Christendom; that the Pope could not err; that all Emperor Henry IV. In 1084, Robert Guis-
in fact,
secular princes, including theEmperor, owed the card drove the Emperor out of Rome and sacked
Pope allegiance; and that the Pope could depose the city. This created so much anti-Papal feeling
kings and emperors at will. in Rome had to rush Gregory out of
that Robert
No Emperor could endure such claims, and the city and keep him in his own capital of Sa-
the Emperor Henry IV and Pope Gregory VII lerno till Gregory died.
fought each other until Gregory's death in 1085. Robert Guiscard spent the last part of his life
The war continued under Gregory VITs succes- campaigning across the Adriatic Balkanin the
sors. peninsula, but died in 1085 before he could com-
pletely destroy the Byzantine Empire.
Robert's youngest brother, Roger (1031-1101),
SOUTHERN ITALY was sent to Sicily to see if he could take it from
During this period, southern Italy was divided the Muslims. It took 30 years, but by 1091, the
between the Duchy of Benevento, which was a Muslims were totally evicted from Sicily, two and
last remnant of the Lombards, who had invaded three-quarter centuries after they had first en-
Italy five centuries before, and the lands still far- tered it. In 1090, Roger also took Malta from the
ther south thatwere controlled by the Byzantine Muslims.
Empire. The Lombards and Byzantines fought By 1100, Roger was recognized as Roger I,
each other, and there was enough confusion to king of Sicily, and all of Sicily and southern Italy
make it possible for adventurers to rise to the were under Norman domination. The region
heights. then came to be as efficiently ruled as was En-
The sons of Tancred of Hauteville, a Norman gland under the other conqueror, William.
1050 TO 1100 149
The island of Sardinia represented another of Castile (1018-1065), sometimes called “Ferdi-
loss for the Muslims, for it was taken by the Ital- nand the Great," and it was organized as a
ian city-state of Pisa in 1052, after having been in county. By 1100, it had formed the nucleus of the
the hands of the Muslims for three centuries. present nation of Portugal.
Some time in this period, crossbows came into
use and gave the bow and arrow a greater range
and penetration than it had ever had before. It POLAND
fired slowly, however, as the stiff bow had to be Under Boleslaw 11 the Bold (1039-1081), who
cranked into a state of required tension. began his reign in 1058, Poland had some spec-
tacular successes. army penetrated
Boleslaw's
into Russia as far as Kiev, and a relative was
FRANCE placed on the Russian throne. The turbulent Pol-
During this period, France was ruled by Philip I ish nobility drove Boleslaw from the throne in
(1052-1108), who came to the throne in 1060. He 1079, however, and his younger brother Vladi-
increased the strength of the central government slav I chose the quiet life. By 1100, Poland was
against the resistance of the great feudal barons, back within its borders.
but throughout his reign, he was overshadowed
by Normandy, which was, in theory, part of his
kingdom, but which was, in fact, independent RUSSIA
and usually at war with him. After the death of Yaroslav the Wise, Russia
went through a period of disintegration, during
which it was all it could do to fight off the Patzi-
MOORISH SPAIN naks and Cumans on the east and the Poles and
The Almoravids from Africa won a victory over Hungarians on the west.
the Christians in 1086, but that was of little real
use to the Moors for the Almoravids used their
victory to make Moorish Spain part of their Afri-
HUNGARY
can empire. After a long period of weakness following the
death of Stephen I, Laszlo 1 (1040-1095) came to
the Hungarian throne in 1077. He initiated a
CASTILE push southwestward which, by 1100, had carried
Alfonso VI the Valiant (1040-1109) had come to Hungarian control to the Adriatic seacoast, tak-
the Castilian throne in 1072. In the early part of ing over what are now called Croatia and Bosnia.
his reign, he advanced into Moorish territory. He also expanded into Transylvania in the east
When he took Toledo in central Spain, the Moors and found it to his interest to support Pope Greg-
called in the Almoravids. That stopped the Chris- ory VII against the Emperor Henry IV.
tian expansion for a time. Helping Alfonso VI at
times was Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar (1043-1099),
known as “El Cid" (“the lord"). He helped only SELJUK TURKS
at times, for he consulted his own interests and Tughril Beg, who headed what had become a Sel-
sometimes fought on the side of the Moors. Even juk Turkish empire, entered Baghdad in 1055 and
so, he became the national hero of Christian was given the title of Sultan (“ruler") by the Ca-
Spain. liph, who still held his state in that city although
he was utterly powerless.
In 1063, Tughril Beg died and was succeeded
PORTUGAL by his nephew. Alp Arslan (1030-1072). Alp Ar-
In west-central Spain, the city of Coimbra was slan inherited one of the aims of Tughril Beg,
captured from the Moors in 1064 by Ferdinand 1 which was to crush Fatimid Egypt and bring it
back into the Sunnite Fatimid Egypt had

fold. From then on, there began a reign of terror
weakened greatly since the death of al-Hakim, against Sunnites. Nizam al-Mulk was assassi-
and the conquest seemed a feasible project. nated in 1091 and Malik Shah died a natural
Alp Arslan cleared his rear by taking over death in 1092. As happened so often after the
Georgia and Armenia south of the Caucasus and death of a strong leader, Malik Shah's four sons
then prepared to march against Egypt in 1071. fought each other for the throne and, in the pro-
However, a Byzantine army was moving to re- cess, the Seljuk Empire fell apart.
take Armenia, and in August, 1071, Alp Arslan
met that army at Manzikart in eastern Asia
Minor. He smashed the Byzantines in what was BYZANTINE EMPIRE
a catastrophic defeat for them, and overran most In 1056, the last of the Macedonian line died. She
of the interior of the peninsula which was, for a was Theodora (980-1056), a niece of Basil II, and
time, called “Rum" (that is, "Rome"). it was in her reign that the final break came be-
Alp Arslan died in a minor skirmish in 1073 tween Rome and Constantinople.
and was succeeded by his son, Malik Shah (1055- In the decades that followed, nothing but di-
1092), who was the greatest of the Seljuk Turks. sasters struck the Byzantines. The Normans in
His Persian vizier, Nizam al-Mulk (1019-1093), southern Italy put an end to Byzantine dominion
whom he had inherited from Alp Arslan, was an there. The Seljuk Turks took Armenia. The Cu-
administrator of genius. mans poured into the Balkans and were driven
Malik Shah was not interested in war, but ex- back only with difficulty.
panded his realm by diplomacy, eventually con- In 1068, Romanus IV Diogenes (d. 1071) be-
trolling virtually allMuslim territories in
the came the Byzantine Emperor. He had to face the
Asia. He was the strongest Muslim ruler since Byzantine nobility who hated the
hostility of the
Mamun two and a half centuries earlier. new Emperor more than they did any of the ene-
Malik Shah was interested in literature and mies outside the realm.
science, built mosques in his capital of Isfahan, When Romanus IV marched eastward to re-
and patronized Omar Khayyam, who wrote capture Armenia, he had a demoralised and di-
poetry and (being a mathematician as well as a vided army under him. At the Battle of
poet) reformed the calendar. Under his rule, Manzikert against the Seljuk Turks, which the
there was peace and religious toleration. Byzantines ought to have won, a number of By-
In 1090, however, a Shiite fanatic, Hasan Sab- zantine officers deserted and the Byzantine army
bah (d. 1124),founded a terrorist group dedi- was defeated with great slaughter. It was the
cated to the murder of enemy leaders. It was worst military defeat suffered by the Byzantines,
hard to fight them for those entrusted with the or their Roman predecessors, since the Battle of
task of murder were fanatical enough to believe Adrianople seven centuries before.
they would enter heaven as a result and were not The interior of Asia Minor was permanently
the least concerned with whether they would be lost; and, since this was the source of the best
caught and slaughtered in their turn. It was fighting men Byzantine Empire, it ceased
in the
thought that they were fed hashish to increase being a world power. From that moment on, it
their disregard of death and were therefore called could exist only by appealing for help to the na-
"hashishim" ("hashish eaters"). This was dis- tions of the west.
torted to "assassin" and political murderers have Even might not have helped, considering
this
been called assassins ever since, while the mur- that the much-weakened Empire continued to in-
der itself is an assassination. The Assassins took volve itself in and internal disorders.
intrigues
over a mountain stronghold and the leader was, Not until 1081 did a strong and determined Em-
therefore, known as the "Old Man of the Moun- peror come to the throne. This was Alexius I
tain." Comnenus (1048-1118), who began a process of
1050 TO 1100 151
reform and conciliation. Even he had all he could for a war against the Muslims in the east. This
do to hold off complete defeat. came be called
to from the Latin word
a crusade,
Robert Guiscard was in what had once been for "cross" (by way of Spanish), because those
Epirus and had defeated the Byzantines there. who promised to go east pinned crosses to their
The Byzantines were defeated also by the Cu- garments to show the religious nature of their
mans, who (like so many before them) reached determination.
the walls of Constantinople but could not pass What followed was the "First Crusade." It in-
them. cluded masses of peasantry led by Peter the Her-
The deaths of Robert Guiscard and Malik Shah mit. They were totally ignorant of what they
helped the Byzantines, but even so Alexius was were doing, attacking inoffensive Jews, pillaging
forced to ask for help from the west. the lands they crossed, and being attacked in
self-defense by those living there. A number of
them finally flooded into Constantinople, and
CRUSADES the horrified Byzantines quickly ferried them into
West Europeans had long made pilgrimages to Asia Minor where the waiting Turks promptly
Palestine, even when it was under Muslim rule. annihilated them.
The Muslims, more tolerant than the Christians In however, more organized armies
1096,
of the day would have been had the position made their way eastward. They were not led by
been reversed, allowed it. However, when the monarchs (who happened to be excommunicated
Seljuk Turks took over Palestine with a new Mus- by the Pope at this time) but by lesser nobles.
lim fanaticism, conditions worsened, and atroc- Among the leaders was Robert Curthose, son of
ity stories abounded. These stories were spread William the Conquerer, and Bohemund of Tar-
by Peter of Amiens (1050-1115), usually called entum (1058-1111), son of Robert Guiscard.
“Peter the Hermit," and sentiment began to When they reached Constantinople, Alexius
build for the rescue of Palestine. was dismayed. He had wanted a select corps of
Urban II (1035-1099) had been trained at mercenaries, who would fightunder his banner
Cluny and had become Pope in 1088. He contin- and at his direction. Instead, he got an unruly
ued Gregory VITs policy of diehard opposition to flood of some 30,000 westerners who despised
the Emperor and the insistence on the indepen- the Byzantines as effeminate heretics.
dence and the supremacy of the Pope. He could Alexius I tried to force the armies to swear
see that the Papacy's moral force would be allegiance to him, which they eventually did,
greatly increased, and its pretensions would though they had no intention of honoring it. Al-
more nearly be accepted, if it got behind a popu- exius then ferried them into Asia Minor and
lar movement such as war against the Muslims. waited to see what would happen.
What's more, it was clear that the endless The Crusaders could not possibly have lasted
fighting among the feudal barons in western Eu- long against a united Seljuk realm, but it was
rope was ruinous, and often resulted even in the their good fortune that the Seljuk Empire had
destruction of churches and monasteries. It disintegrated, that the Fatimid Egyptians had
seemed a practical endeavor, too, for Sicily
and taken Jerusalem in 1098, and that the Muslims
Sardinia had recently been freed from the Mus- were too busy fighting among themselves to pay
lims and the Christian power in Spain was ad- much attention to the Crusaders. Even as splin-
vancing against the Moors there. Why not, then, ters, the Muslims could take care of a peasant
channel this surplus fighting energy into a war to rabble, and they almost took care of the Crusad-
defeat the Muslims in Asia? ers, too, who, in some ways, were a bit of a noble
When Urban II received Alexius Ts appeal for rabble.'
help, he held a meeting at Clermont in south The crusaders worked way
south
their
central France on November 26, 1095, and called through Syria and into Palestine and finally took
Jerusalem on July 15, 1099, after a five-week the size of the army and saw that those who re-
siege, under the leadership of Godfrey of Bouil- mained were better trained. Prices were con-
lon (1060-1100). They subjected the inhabitants trolled and state banks were established.
of Jerusalem to a barbarous massacre and set up As is almost always the case, the reforms were
a feudal kingdom. opposed by conservatives who had profited by
the injustices the reforms were attempting to cor-
rect. Inertia and tradition were on the side of
WEST AFRICA these conservatives. In 1076, Wang An-Shih re-
The Almoravids attacked Ghana in 1076 and tired in frustration and by 1100, the reforms,
sacked its capital city. Ghana declined thereafter. though not dead, had been much weakened.
Other states in the area were converted to Islam. The Sung Empire was, by this time, by far the
One, notably, was Mali at the bend of the Niger most populous nation in the world, with 150 mil-
River. lion people.
An interesting event indicates the scientific
superiority of China over the West at this time.
CHINA On July 4, 1054, the light from an exploding star
During this period.Sung China was under the in the constellation Taurus reached the Earth. The
influence of a great reformer and idealist, Wang star brightened to where it was two or three
An-Shih (1021-1086), who was also a great times as bright as the planet Venus at its bright-
writer. He cut the budget, and, at the same time, est. For three weeks, it was bright enough to cast
raised the salaries of officials to promote honesty. a shadow and to be visible in daylight. Chinese
He fostered government loans to farmers at rea- and Japanese astronomers reported the event
sonable rates of interest so that they would not (which we now call a "supernova”) in detail, but,
be compelled to go to loan sharks. He improved so low was the state of Western astronomy, no
and made milder the collection of taxes. He cut report of the phenomenon appeared in Europe.
1100 TO 1150
ernment, but was ruined when his only son
all
ENGLAND died at sea in 1120. Henry I had a daughter, Ma-
After the death of William II, who had no chil- tilda (1102-1167), and he forced his barons to
dren, his younger brother seized the throne, swear allegiance to her. After Henry I died in
reigning as Henry I. It should have gone to Wil- 1135, however, the barons would not allow a
liam's older brother,Robert Curthose of Nor- woman sovereign and rallied to Stephen (1097-
mandy, but Robert was not on the scene. He was 1154), who was Henry Ts nephew. There fol-
returning from the First Crusade and, by the time lowed a prolonged civil war that reduced En-
he got back, the deed had been done. gland to chaos. Stephen was a good-natured but
Naturally, therewas war between the two weak king, and the barons grew in power, to the
brothers, but Henry was by far the abler man accelerating misery of the people.
and, at the Battle of Tinchebray in Normandy on A leading English scholar of the time was
September 28, he won. Robert was im-
1106, Adelard of Bath (1090-1150). He translated Eu-
prisoned for the rest of his long life and Henry I clid and al-Khwarizmi from Arabic into Latin,
ruled over both England and Normandy. and made use of Arabic numerals.
Henry I built a strong, though repressive, gov-
1100 TO 1150 153
Conrad III was not a very successful monarch,

SCOTLAND as it happened. He had to fight with the Welfs,
In this period,David I (1082-1153), the youngest which meant confusion, and he went off crusad-
son of Malcolm Canmore, became king of Scot- ing, which left the Empire to even further chaos.
land in 1124, and the Anglicization of the county In this period, however, the Germans were
continued. David I had spent his youth in the expanding eastward. (This was the "Drang Nach
court of Henry I, and throughout the civil war Osten"; or "the push to the east.") It was led by
that followed, he fought on the side of Matilda men
such as Albert I the Bear (1100-1170), who
against Stephen. carried out raids against the Wends, a Slavic peo-
ple who lived east of the Elbe River. Albert estab-
lished the city ofBrandenburg east of the Elbe
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE and became the first Margrave of Brandenburg.
Henry IV died and was succeeded by his
in 1106
son, who reigned as Henry V (1081-1125), and
who had married Matilda of England. Henry V PAPACY
continued the policies of his father and kept up The Popes, in this period, were not strong. In-
the fight with the Pope. Henry V was more for- deed, the strongest religious leader of the time
tunate in this respect than his father had been, was a monk named Bernard (1090-1153), who, in
for he faced weaker Popes. In 1122, the long 1115, had become the abbot of Clairvaux, a mon-
quarrel was finally settled in a complicated com- astery about 60 miles north of Dijon.
promise that would clearly not be long-lasting, Bernard of Clairvaux was a reformer, whose
for the Emperor and Pope were bound to con- force and eloquence made it possible for him to
tinue to quarrel over who was the overlord of admonish kings and popes and to be listened to
western Christianity. when he did. He might easily have been Pope
Henry V died in 1125 without direct heirs. Lo- himself, but he preferred to remain an abbott.
thair, Duke of Saxony (1075-1137) was elected as Bernard was a mystic, and was opposed, as a
Emperor and reigned as Lothair II. He was much theologian, by Peter Abelard (1079-1144), who
more subservient to the clergy than the two Hen- was a charismatic teacher at the University of
rys had been. Since he had no son, he planned Paris. Abelard was an unrelenting logician and
to have, as his successor, his son-in-law, Henry insisted that theological matters be solved by rea-
X the Proud of Bavaria (1100-1139), who was a son.
member House of Welf. Opposed were, of
of the Abelard had a famous love affair with Heloise
course, the members (by marriage) of the house (1098-1164), a pupil of his. He married her but
to which the Henrys had belonged. They were kept the fact secret to avoid hampering his cleri-
Swabians, or Waiblingen. cal career. Heloise's uncle had Abelard castrated
There turned out to be, therefore, a continuing in reprisal.
feud between the Welfs (on the side of Papal Bernard was far more powerful than Abelard
power) and the Waiblingen (on the side of Im- and continued to denounce him. If Abelard had
perial power). This made itself felt in Italy, too, not died in 1142, Bernard would undoubtedly
where the two sides were known as the Guelphs have seen that a trial which was in progress
and the Ghibellines. would have ended with the condemnation and
When Lothair II died in 1138, the throne went execution of Abelard.
to Conrad III (1093-1152), who was a nephew of
Henry V and, therefore, a Swabian. One of his
castles in Swabia was known as Staufen, so Con- NORMAN ITALY
rad III was the first Emperor of the house of Hoh- Roger II (1095-1154), a son of Roger who had I
enstaufen, all of whom were to be tightly conquered Sicily, became Count of Sicily in 1105
wedded to the notion of Imperial domination. and gained the title of King in 1130. Through
shrewdness and he made Sicily more

ability,
prosperous than it had been since Roman times FRANCE
a thousand years before. He extended his rule Louis VI (1081-1137) was the son of Philip I, and
over parts of southern Italy, and even captured came to the throne in 1108. He was called both
the island of Corfu and established his power Louis the Fat from his appearance, and Louis the
over much of what is now Tunisia. He had a Wide-Awake from his behavior. He indulged
Central Mediterranean Empire, which he ruled in no far-flung adventures,
but concentrated
with toleration, for most of his subjects were on consolidating his power over his own
Muslims and Greek Orthodox Christians. lands, weakening and limiting the feudal rulers,
Intellectual life was vibrant. The presence of and supporting the growing middle class, the
Muslim scholars helped in the translation of townspeople and merchants. He felt that they
many Greek classics from Arabic to Latin. Alche- would, in turn, support a central monarchy
mists in southern Italy, working in the Arabic as a way of opposing the oppression of the local
tradition, learned how to distil alcohol and how nobility.
to form weak nitric acid. A medical school was Louis also picked his advisers from the lower
founded in Salerno, the first of its kind since the nobility, from the clergy, and from the towns-
disintegration of the West Roman Empire six cen- men, avoiding the great nobles who had strength
turies earlier. of their own, for he wanted those who helped
him to depend on him alone for safety and
power.
NORTHERN ITALY His most important minister was an abbot
Northern Italy was developingsystem of city-
a named Suger (1081-1151), who strongly encour-
states of a type not seen since the days of ancient aged Louis VI in the path he had chosen and who
Greece, 15 centuries earlier. The city of Pisa on lived long enough to serve as an adviser to Louis
Italy's west coast was, at this time, rather impres- VTs successor as well. Suger also encouraged the
sive as a trading center and for the fact that it had development of a new type of cathedral struc-
seized control of the islands of Corsica and Sar- ture, which concentrated the weight of the build-
dinia. ing on certain outside buttresses of masonry,
Florence, in the interior, about 50 miles east of thus allowing the wall itself, which did not have
Pisa, had been recognized as a city-state in 1138, to support the weight, to be pierced by numer-
and farther north there were prosperous cities ous windows. In this way, the cathedral could be
such as Genoa, Modena, Mantua, Parma, Padua, built very tall and the interior could be filled with
Bologna, and, especially, Milan. The merchants light.
formed a middle class in these cities such as was Those who
clung to the old ways called these
not to be found as powerful elsewhere in western new-style structures "Gothic" in derision (mean-
Europe just yet. ing they were barbaric), but these same Gothic
Venice, particularly, grew rich and powerful cathedrals became the glory of their times and
in these times, because its control of the Adriatic have not lost their luster since.
Sea made it essential in carrying crusaders (and Louis VI died in 1137, and his son, Louis VII
goods) eastward and then westward. It also suc- the Young (1120-1180), succeeded. He was only
ceeded in establishing trading bases throughout 16 at the time, but he had Suger to advise him.
the eastern Mediterranean, making it commer- He married Eleanor of Aquitaine (1121-1204),
cially powerful almost in the modern sense. who was then only 15, and it seemed a marriage
Important schools were springing up in north- made in heaven. Aquitaine was the southwest-
ern Italy, including, notably, a law school at Bo- ern portion of France, the most cultured part,
logna. with a mild climate. It was the haunt of trouba-
dours who sang of love and chivalry. Aquitaine
had picked up the notion of tales of love and
1100 TO 1150 155
romance from the Arabs and the troubadours in-

troduced itEurope.
to ARAGON
All might have been well if Louis VII had not Aragon, a region east of Castile, was ruled by
been pushed into the crusading movement by Alfonso I the Battler (1073-1134) at this time. He
Bernard of Clairvaux (over Suger's strong objec- managed to unite his kingdom with the neigh-
tions), and if Queen Eleanor had not thought boring regions of Navarre and Catalonia; and, by
thatCrusades would be romantic. By 1150, when 1150, the Christian nations of Spain were three
he had returned from the Crusade, which had in number: Portugal on the west, Aragon on the
been a disaster, Louis VII found his life and his east, and Castile, the largest, in the center.
marriage darkened.
POLAND
MOORISH SPAIN Boleslaw III Wry-Mouth (1085—1138) became
The Almoravids, who had saved Moorish Spain king of Poland in 1102. Under him, Poland had
from the advancing Christian states, had become another period of expansion. Boleslaw struck
soft. Another Berber tribe, the Almohades, had northward against the Pomeranians (a Slavic
taken over their North African empire and had tribe) and forced them to accept Christianity. Po-
been invited into Spain in 1145. Once again, re- land, by annexing much of Pomerania, reached
sistance to the Christians in the north stiffened. the Baltic Sea. Boleslaw died in 1138, however,
and by 1150, his weaker successors were pushed
eastward by the German "drang nach Osten."
CASTILE
Alfonso VII (1104-1157) succeeded to the throne
of Castile in 1126 and, for a while in the 1140s, RUSSIA
he actively resumed the southern drive, but that Vladimir (1053-1125) became ruler of Russia in
II
only succeeded in bringing in the Almohades, 1113, and spent most of his reign in fighting the
and Alfonso VII was stopped. Cumans, who were now peak of their
at the
In Spain, as in Sicily, there were Moslem strength, with their realm stretching from the
scholars who made it possible for the great Greek Aral Sea to the borders of Hungary.
classics to be translated from Arabic to Latin.
Gerard of Cremona (1114-1187) worked in To-
ledo and translated Aristotle, Ptolemy, Hippo- BYZANTINE EMPIRE
crates, Galen, and Euclid. He and other Under Alexius Comnenus; under his son, John
I
translators finally brought as much of Greek sci- II Comnenus (1088-1143), who became Emperor
ence and culture as had survived to the attention on Alexius' death in 1118; and under John's son,
of western Europe, and this began an intellectual Manuel I Comnenus (1122-1180), the Byzantine
recovery after six centuries of darkness. Empire had a last pale period of grandeur.
It remained weak and had to ask for help from
the West now and then. Nevertheless, John II

PORTUGAL destroyed the Patzinaks, who were, however,
Portugal was under Afonso Henrique (1109- merely replaced by the Cumans. The Comneni,
1185) at this time. He managed to establish the in general,thanks to the disruptions inflicted on
independence of the country from Castile. He the Muslims by the crusaders, were able to re-
called himself king in 1143, and both Castile and gain about half of Asia Minor. The interior of the
the Pope were forced to recognize his royal title. peninsula remained Turkish.
By 1147, he had taken Lisbon, which eventually Manuel I, in particular, was enamored with
became the capital of Portugal. the west. He married
Western princess, the sis-
a
ter-in-law of the Holy Roman Emperor, affected
adherence to the Western chivalric ideal, and a German, marched eastward by separate routes.
even considered the possibility of religious re- Unlike the First Crusade, this Second Crusade
union with Rome (something his subjects would was led by monarchs.
never have accepted). In 1150, Constantinople Both armies reached Constantinople. The Ger-
was still a large and wealthy city, and the most man army moved directly into the interior of Asia
cultured in Europe. Minor, where it was destroyed by the Turks, al-
though Conrad III got back to the Empire safely.
The French army marched along the Asia Minor
CRUSADES sea-coast, which was still Byzantine, but, in the
The establishment of the ''Crusader States" process, Louis VII lost all his zeal'for fighting. He
along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean, in visited Jerusalem but made no move to recon-
Palestine and Syria, was intolerable to the Mus- quer Edessa and, in 1149, went back to France.
lim world. Itwas only a matter of time before If the First Crusade had been high drama, the
some strong leaders would emerge to unify the Second was farce.
Muslims (to a degree, at least) and begin a coun-
terattack. In 1144, Zangi of Mosul (1084-1146)
captured Edessa, the northernmost of the Cru- CHINA
sader States. In 1114, the Khitan Mongols
northern China
in
The news of this shook western Europe, and were overthrown by another group of tribal peo-
Bernard of Clairvaux took the lead in preaching ple, who took over the northern provinces and
the necessity of another Crusade. Louis VII was came to be known as the Chin Dynasty. The
attracted to the idea, and his wife, Eleanor of Sung Dynasty continued in the south.
Aquitaine, was even more attracted, seeing it as About this time, the magnetic compass came
a chance for romance and for the troubadour into use in sea-voyages, and,by 1150, gunpow-
ideals of adventure and chivalry. She insisted on der may have actually been used in battle (to
going along with all the court. frighten horses by the noise of the explosion).
The Emperor Conrad III also decided to go Neither discovery was reasonably nor properly
crusading and, in 1147, two armies, a French and exploited.
1150 TO 1200
the throne in England, Normandy, and Anjou as
ENGLAND Henry (1133-1189) on Stephen's death.
II
The civil war between Matilda and Stephen Eleanor of Aquitaine, who now despised
ended in 1153. Stephen was weary and near Louis VII, thanks to his failure in the crusade,
death, and his only son had just died. He asked had divorced him. He was glad to see her go
only that he be allowed to remain on the throne even meant losing Aquitaine, since she had
if it
till his death. This was granted him and he died
given him only daughters and he was sick of her
the next year. sharp tongue. Eleanor, as though to do maxi-
Matilda did not assume the throne. After the mum harm to Louis, married Henry II of England
death of her first husband, the Emperor Henry at once. (She was 30 and he 19.) This meant that
V, she had married Count Geoffrey of Anjou Henry II added Aquitaine to his dominions. He
(1113-1151), a French province to the south of claimed Brittany, too, so that in addition to En-
Normandy. By him, she had a son, who assumed gland, he ruled over three fifths of France. For
1150 TO 1200 157
the French provinces, to be sure, he accepted the festering wound received in a minor battle in
overlordship of the King of France but he didn't 1199. He was succeeded by his younger brother,
take that too seriously. His dominions made up John 1 Lackland (1167-1216).
the "Angevin Empire" (from "Anjou").
Eleanor did for him what she had not been
able to do She gave Henry sons, two
for Louis. WALES
of whom survived their father. However, Henry Wales had maintained its Celtic language and
II couldn't abide her sharp tongue any more than
culture despite seven centuries of invasions by
Louis could, but he had a better trick than di- Saxons, Danes, and Normans. It remained se-
vorce. He kept her in prison from 1173 to 1185. cure in its mountain fastnesses. Henry II made
Henry II's father, Geoffrey, was sometimes the first serious expeditions into Wales and
known as Geoffrey Plantagenet, because he is forced its princes to accept English overlordship,
supposed to have worn a broom plant ("planta but this was largely a matter of form. Wales re-
genet") in his bonnet when he went on a pilgrim- mained Welsh.
age. The nickname was eventually supplied to
those who were in direct male descent from him
so that Henry II might be considered the first SCOTLAND
Plantagenet monarch of England. William the Lion (1143—1214), son of David I, be-
Henry II put a quick end to the anarchy that came king of Scotland in 1165. He was captured
prevailed in Stephen's time, bringing the nobility by the English in one of the raids that Scottish
to heel. He had less success in asserting suprem- forces mountedagainst the English north, and
acy over the clergy. In this, he was opposed by was forced to accept English overlordship, but
his old friend,Thomas Becket (1118-1170), who this, too, was little more than a formality. Scot-
turned into an enemy once Henry had seen to it land remained Scottish.
that he was made Archbishop of Canterbury in
1162. Henry had expected a compliant tool and,
instead, he got a firm upholder of the Church. IRELAND
Even so, Henry II might have won out but, in Ireland had remained in tribal anarchy since the
a fit of rage over Becket's intransigence, he cried Vikings had been driven away a century and a
out hasty words that four of his knights assumed half before. Some of England's Norman barons,
to be orders. They assassinated Becket in 1170 trying to find greater freedom than Henry II's
and Henry, suspected of having a hand in the strong rule allowed them, went to Ireland in 1169
deed, had to do penance and back down in his to make their fortune (as Robert Guiscard had
attempt to dominate the English Church. done a century before in southern Italy).
Henry II revised England's law courts, its trea- Henry II, not wanting an independent Nor-
sury, its tax system, and did what he could to man Ireland, followed in 1171 and made sure
encourage trade. What he couldn't do was to that those sections of Ireland that were subdued
control his obstreperous wife and his rather un- remained subject to the English crown. This was
pleasant children. The last 16 years of his reign done under Papal authority for, some years ear-
were filled with family wars. lier, in 1154, Pope Adrian IV (1100-H59), who
Henry II died in 1189 and was succeeded by had just become Pope, and who was the only
his oldest son, Richard I (1157-1199). He was Englishman ever to achieve that post, had
known as Richard Coeur de Lion ("Lionheart") awarded Ireland to Henry 11.
and he was indeed a large, magnificent fighter, The English established themselves at first
—
and a good general but he was a poor king. He only about the area of Dublin. Other parts of Ire-
spent his reign in fighting and neglected his land remained outside the English orbit for a
kingdom except when it was necessary to gouge long time. Indeed, eventually, the Dublin area
money out of it. He died at last as a result of a was fenced in with palings to keep out the un-
subdued Irish. It is from this that the expression preferred a weak Emperor to a powerful one. The
arose "beyond the pale," meaning "outside the cities formed "the Lombard League" under the
accepted limits of polite society." leadership of Milan, and resisted Frederick reso-
lutely.
At Legnano, northwest of Milan, Frederick's
DENMARK knights met the Italian pikemen in 1176. The
Under Valdemar I (1131-1182), sometimes called pikemen were foot-soldiers with long spears, a
"Valdemar the Great," who became king in 1157, kind of throwback to the Macedonian phalanx.
Denmark expanded eastward after a war with They stood firm and the Imperial horsemen suf-
the Wends. As a result, the city of Copenhagen fered losses. The Italian cavalry then circled the
in eastern Denmark became more centrally lo- Imperial forces on either flank and won the bat-
cated and became steadily more important. tle. It was the first time that foot-soldiers had
Valdemar's successor, Canute VI (1163-1202) stood up to cavalry since the Battle of Adrian-
continued to make conquests against the Wends. ople, eight centuries earlier.
Frederickwent crusading in his old age and
I
died in Asia Minor in 1190. He was succeeded by

SWEDEN his son who reigned as Henry VI (1165-1197).
Under Erik IX the Saint (d. 1160), who became When Henry died, his son and heir, Frederick,
king of Sweden in 1150, Sweden
expanded
also was only three years old. A period of confusion
eastward. Raiders crossed the Baltic Sea and es- and civil war followed, with several claimants to
tablished Swedish dominion over what is now the Imperial throne fighting it out.
southwestern Finland. Erik began the process of Meanwhile, though, the "drang nach Osten"
bringing about the Christianization of the area, was continuing. Henry the Lion of Saxony (1130-
for which deed he was eventually made a saint. 1195) founded the port city of Lubeck on the Bal-
In 1194, Scandinavian voyagers discovered tic Sea, east of the Elbe River in 1159.
Spitzbergen. This was the farthest northward
point at sea yet reached by explorers.
PAPACY
The Popes in this period were caught between
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE the Emperor in the north and the Norman king-
Frederick I Barbarossa (1123-1190), or "Red- dom in the south, to say nothing of a partially
beard," was the nephew of Conrad III and suc- recovered Byzantine Empire in the east. Alex-
ceeded him in 1152. He was the first to refer to ander III (1105-1181), who became Pope in 1159,
his realm, officially, as the "Holy Roman Em- managed best. He organized opposition to Fred-
pire." Frederick was a capable Emperor and erick Barbarossa, encouraged the Lombard
might have achieved much if he had concen- League, and was the beneficiary of the Imperial
trated on Germany. The trouble was that he in- defeat at Legnano. He also forced Henry II of
herited the quarrel of the Emperors with the England to back down from his attempted con-
Popes and he spent much of his abundant ener- trol of the English clergy by skillfully exploiting
gies on expedition after expedition into Italy in the mistake of the assassination of Becket.
an attempt to establish a domination over the Pa- The war in Germany gave the Papacy its
civil
pacy. best chance. With the quarreling candidates for
However, not only was the Papacy hostile, the Imperial office unable to pay any attention to
and not only did the nobility inside the Empire Italy, a particularly strong Pope gained that office
continue to oppose the Emperor so that their in 1198. This was Innocent III (1160-1216), who
own importance would grow, but, in addition, intended to maintain the supremacy of the Pope
the cities of northern Italy had grown strong and with all the vigor at his command.
1150 TO 1200 159
turned enemy even as he turned king. The en-

SOUTHERN ITALY mity grew more marked when both went crusad-
William I the Bad (1120-1166), who became king ing.
in 1154, lost the Norman possessions in Africa
between 1158 and 1160 and was succeeded by his
son, William II the Good (1154-1189). He in turn SPAIN
was succeeded by his first cousin, Tancred of
Alfonso VIll (1155-1214) became king of Castile
Lecce (d. 1194), who
was, however, of illegiti-
in 1158, when he was but a child of three. Once
mate birth. Emperor Henry VI had married
grown, he attacked the Spanish Muslims vigor-
Constance of Sicily (1154-1198), the sister of Wil-
ously. However, the Almohades, who were then
liam I, so that Henry's son (still a baby) was also
at the peak of their strength, defeated him in
the first cousin of William I — and legitimate. 1195, so that southern Spain remained in Muslim
Tancred and Emperor Henry VI fought it out
hands as the century closed.
and, when Tancred died in 1194, Henry saw to it
that his little son was crowned King of Sicily.
That was the end of the independent Norman
kingdom after the existence of a century, during
BYZANTINE EMPIRE
which, thanks to efficient Norman rule, it was Manuel I Comnenus continued to instill some
probably the richest kingdom in Europe. strength into the Byzantine Empire. It was his
hope reconquer the interior of Asia Minor and
to
reverse the decision of Manzikert a century ear-
VENICE lier.
Venice had enriched from the crusades and

itself
In 1176, therefore, Manuel I led an army east-
had become a complete commercial oligarchy, ward. While his army was strung out, passing
with the doge elected from among the leading through a defile near a place called Myrio-
families. It was not a hereditary title.
cephalon, Muslims, who were waiting in am-
bush on the heights on either side, swooped
down and destroyed it. The chance to regain
FRANCE Asia Minor was forever lost.
Louis VII, during the second half of his reign, Manuel I died in 1180 and, after him, there
was completely overshadowed by Henry II of En- were dynastic problems and the strength of the
gland, who controlled more of France than Louis Empire rapidly declined. In 1195, Alexius 111 (d.
himself did. Louis did what he could, therefore, 1211), a great-grandson of Alexius I, gained the
to aid the enemies of Henry. He sided with Arch- throne by deposing and blinding his older
bishop Becket and, even more important, he en- brother, who had reigned as Isaac II (1135-1204).
couraged Henry's sons to rebel against him. The hatred between opposing members of the
Louis VII died in 1180, and was succeeded by family was stronger by far than their fears of
his son who reigned as Philip II (1165-1223). He either the Westerners or the Turks.
was the shrewdest of the Capetian line yet to

ascend the throne and the most successful mon-
arch of his time, so that he came to be called BULGARIA
"Philip Augustus." Bulgaria, which had been subdued by Basil 11
He continued his father's policy of encourag- nearly two centuries before, seized the opportu-
ing Henry's sons to rebel against him, and did it nity that followed the death of Manuel. Two
so effectively that, when Henry died in 1189, he brothers, Ivan Asen and Peter Asen (d.
(d. 1196)
did so in despair. Henry's successor, however, 1197), gathered forces and rose in rebellion. They
till then a friend and co-conspirator of Philip, called in the Cumans for help and, by 1200, there
was once more an independent Bulgaria south of fering from and were exhausted, Saladin's
thirst
the lower reaches of the Danube River. army attacked and wiped them out.
The Crusaders were left without an army, and
Saladin simply rolled up the Crusader States. He
SERBIA took Jerusalem itself on October 2, 1187. (Despite
the Christian behavior when
they took Jerusalem
The Serbians were Slavs who lived west of Bul-
nearly a century before, the civilized Saladin al-
garia along the Adriatic Sea.
lowed no sack.) Before long, the crusaders held
In 1168, they came under the rule of Stephen
only the cities of Antioch, Tyre, and Tripoli.
Nemanya I (d. 1200), who encouraged the adop-
tion of the Constantinopolitan form of Christian-
Saladin then fought new crusaders from the
west and died which there were the
in 1193, after
ity. Thus, the Serbians became Greek Orthodox
usual dynastic struggles so that Egypt was soon
in religion,while the closely related Croats and
weakening again.
Slovenes to their northwest became Roman Cath-
olics.
The Byzantines had controlled Serbia since the CRUSADER STATES

time of Basil II, but once Manuel I died, and By-
zantine power plummeted, Serbia established its
Saladin's capture of Jerusalem sent a shock wave
through western Europe. A new crusade, the
independence and competed with Bulgaria for
"Third Crusade," was led by the three most
control of the northern Balkans.
powerful kings of western Europe: Frederick Bar-
Stephen Nemanya I abdicated and entered a
barossa of the Holy Roman Empire; Philip Au-
monastery in 1196. His son reigned as Stephen
gustus of France; and Richard the Lion-Heart of
Nemanya II (d. 1228) and obtained the title of
England.
king.
Frederick Barbarossa marchedland by
through Hungary. He reached Constantinople,
where Isaac II was reigning, and crossed into
EGYPT Asia Minor. There Frederick, now about 67 years
The Fatimid dynasty in Egypt came an end in to old, drowned in a small stream, while bathing,
1171, after it had been in existence
for two cen- and his army broke up.
turies. A Kurdish Sunnite took over power. His Philip of France and Richard of England went
name was Salah ad-Din Yusuf ibn Ayyub (1138- by sea, but they had been quarreling at home and
1193), commonly known in western countries as they continued to quarrel even more bitterly
Saladin. while they were both engaged against the com-
Very carefully, Saladin managed to unify var- mon Muslim foe.
ious Muslim factions and
extend his govern-
to When they arrived in Palestine, they found a
ment over Syria and northern Iraq. What he was crusader force laying a lackadaisical siege to
doing was to reach the point where he could Muslim-held Acre. Richard, who loved a good
present the Crusader States with something that fight, pressed the siege with vigor and Acre fell
they had not hitherto had to face —
a united Mus- on July 12, 1191. The flamboyant English king
lim region under a resolute leader. was joyful and arrogant over the matter, treating
In 1187,he was ready, and he attacked. The Leopold V
of Austria (1165-1197) with great con-
crusaders advanced to meet him, but forethought tempt. Philip of France, in a fit of overwhelming
was never their strong point, and they managed jealousy, abandoned the Crusade and returned
to get themselves into a waterless area at Hattin, to France.
just west of the Sea of Galilee. Their water supply Richard then marched southward toward Je-
ran out and Saladin placed his troops in such a rusalem, maintaining strict discipline, and de-
way that the crusaders could not make their way feated Saladin in battle. By 1192, he was within
to any water source. Then, when they were suf- sight of Jerusalem, but Saladin had been retiring
1200 TO 1250 161
slowly and was destroying all provisions en

route. Richard realized that if he laid siege to CAMBODIA
Jerusalem, with no water for the soldiers and no The Cambodian Empire, with its capital at Ang-
fodder for the horses, and with discipline becom- kor, was known as the "Khmer Empire" in an-
ing an increasing problem, he would be wiped cient times. Under Jayavarman VII (1120-1215),
out. Therefore, Richard made peace and returned who came to the throne in 1181 and rebuilt Ang-
to England. kor, Cambodia reached its greatest extent and
At least, he Near Vienna, he
tried to return. power, ruling over what is now Cambodia, Laos,
was captured by forces of Leopold of Austria, and parts of Burma and Malaya. He built tem-
whom he had most offended at Acre. Emperor ples, hospitals, and highways, and stimulated
Henry VI (1165-1197), son and successor of Fred- the spread of Buddhism in the land.
erick Barbarossa, forced Leopold to disgorge
Richard into Imperial custody, and then set a
—
high ransom for his release a ransom that had
JAPAN
to be paid by Richard's subjects. Civil war raged in Japan in this period and, by
The Third Crusade, though it failed to recap- 1185, the land was in the grip of military feudal-
ture Jerusalem, did restore a coastal strip to the ism once more. At this time, Zen Buddhism was
crusaders. entering Japan from China.
INDIA MONGOLS
Mu'izz-ud-Din Muhammad (d. 1206) ruled in In this period, a child named Temujin (1162-
Ghur (which is in what is now Afghanistan), so 1227) was born in Mongolia. From lowly begin-
that he is often called Muhammad of Ghur. In nings, he slowly began to gather forces about
1175, he began the conquest of northern India, himself. There was no way of telling during his
taking Delhi in 1193. He was the first to establish youth that he was the most remarkable military
a Muslim empire in India, and this led to the leader the world would ever see. Other great
spreading of Islam into northwestern India, the conquerors, such as Alexander, Hannibal, and
region now known as Pakistan. Caesar, had inherited armies and a long military
tradition.Temujin had to create his own army
CHINA and develop his own strategies, which far sur-
passed anything that had gone before.
The Chin dynasty and the Sung dy-
in the north
nasty in the south were at war. In 1161, the Sung
forces defeated the Chin by making use of gun- NORTH AMERICA
powder, still using it only to scare the enemy About 1200, the Aztecs were beginning to attain
horses. power in Mexico, displacing the Toltecs.
1200 TO 1250
in thevery center of what is now the "Mongolian
MONGOLS People's Republic" (also known as "Outer Mon-
By 1206, Temujin had united the Mongolian golia"). He adopted the name of Genghis Khan
tribes and formed a large empire just north of ("Supreme Emperor").
China. He established his capital at Karakorum In 1211, Genghis Khan went to war with the
Chin Empire in northern China. He had taught direction.They tended to dissolve in panic even
himself and his generals how to move speedily before they were struck.
and decisively in battle, how to attack
the flanks This happened to Muhammad. News kept
and rear, and how to obstruct all escape routes. reaching him of rapid advances, of the spreading
That sufficed for open battle in the fields, but of unparalleled devastation, and, finally, he
there was the Great Wall, which was a formida- heard that the Mongols had passed him and were
ble obstacle, and the Chinese cities themselves
—
advancing from his rear. In a panic, he fled and
had strong walls. Genghis Khan had to learn fled —
and fled, as once Darius III had fled from
from the Chinese how to develop and improve Alexander fifteen and a half centuries before.
methods for laying siege to cities and for batter- The Mongol armies followed remorselessly,
ing down walls. as the Macedonian armies had followed Darius.
By 1215, he had taken Beijing and had forced By February 1221, Muhammad had been
the Chin Empire to accept his overlordship. The cornered and had no choice but to kill him-
systematic way in which the Mongolian armies self. The entire Khwarezmian Empire became
destroyed cities and killed people indiscrimi- Mongol.
nately frightened potential adversaries so badly Genghis Khan then sent forces to reconnoiter
that they were half-defeated before they were at- the land to the west. The Mongol general, Sabu-
tacked. Cities began to give up at once when the tai (1172-1245), led his army west of the Caspian
Mongols approached. This saved lives in the long Sea and, in 1223, the Mongols faced a combined
run, which may have been Genghis Khan's in- force of Russians and Cumans. The Mongols sent
tention. envoys to arrange peace. The envoys were killed,
In 1218, Genghis Khan sent ambassadors into whereupon the Mongols attacked and wiped out
Persia to deal with Ala-ad-Din Muhammad, who the opposing army, then returned to the main
had set up
"Khwarezmian Empire" in 1200
a Mongol concentration in Asia.
over Persia and stretches of central Asia to the Genghis Khan spent the next few years fight-
north. Genghis Khan's purpose was to set up ing in northern China. He died in 1227. In the
trade relations, but Muhammad injudiciously space of 20 years, after putting himself at the
had the ambassadors mistreated. This was, in head of a united Mongolia, Genghis Khan
fact, more than injudicious, for Genghis Khan had an empire stretching the full width
built
did not accept insults. of Asia, from the Pacific Ocean to the Caspian
Genghis Khan had developed a system of Sea.
espionage him know exactly what
that let The conquests did not stop with the death of
was going on in any land on his borders, Genghis Khan, however. Under the reign of his
where its armies were located, and what their son, Ogodai Khan (1185-1241), the conquest of
state of readiness was. When he sent his own northern China and Korea was completed by
army into one of these lands, his troops moved 1234, and the Mongols then attacked Sung
on their hardy desert ponies with the accent China. This was the hardest campaign the Mon-
on speed. His army moved in separate contin- gols undertook and, though they won many bril-
gents over ground that had been thoroughly liant battles, the Sung Chinese were still
reconnoitered. Communication among the doggedly resisting in 1250.
contingents was maintained by riders dash- Meanwhile, however, the Mongols struck
ing to and fro between them, and they all westward under Sabutai and, in December 1237,
came together at the site of battle. Nothing so they were back in Russia. Their espionage service
speedy was seen in war before the twentieth had given them full information concerning the
century. land, and they had no trouble. They crossed the
The result was that the enemies of Genghis frozen rivers and, in a matter of months, they
Khan were usually attacked long before they had hurtled through Moscow and taken over the
were ready and, generally, from an unexpected northern part of the land.
1200 TO 1250 163
Carefully, they consolidated their rule and Ogodai was succeeded by Mangu Khan (1208-
then, in November 1240, they aimed at the chief 1259), a grandson of Genghis Khan, and he ruled
center of Russian power in the Ukraine. They over an Empire that included northern China,
crossed the frozen Dnieper River, took Kiev on Mongolia, central Asia, Persia and Russia and —
December 6, and destroyed it. That put an end to that was still expanding.
Kievan Russia some four centuries after it had
come into existence.
Sabutai then led his armies westward into cen-
tralEurope. He knew the situation there. He ENGLAND
understood the rivalries among the various na- In 1200, John I was ruling over England and over
tions and the division between the Holy Roman an Angevin Empire that was still intact. John I,
Emperor and the Pope. He knew he could take however, was neither a successful warrior nor
care of the nations one at a time and that none diplomat, and he was facing the shrewd Philip
had armies capable of standing against the well- Augustus of France. By 1204, John had lost all
disciplined, lightning-fast Mongols. the provinces of northern France, even Nor-
Europe had faced Asian nomads before. There mandy, although portions of Aquitaine in south-
had been the Cimmerians in Assyrian times, the western France remained English. Thus, the
Huns in late Roman times, the Avars and Mus- Angevin Empire had lasted only half a century,
lims in Frankish times, the Magyars, Patzinaks, but its disappearance had advantages for En-
and Cumans in recent centuries, but never before gland. The barons, who had always had strong
had there been anything like the Mongols. ties to their estates in Normandy and elsewhere
On March 3, 1241, the Mongols smashed a in France, now found their holdings to be mostly
Polish army at Cracow. Panicky refugees fled English, and had to turn their attention to En-
westward, and the Mongol army followed. On gland.
April 9, 1241, they faced a large army consisting John did not, of course, give up the provinces
of Germans, Poles, and Bohemians, and wiped easily. However, he was weakened by fighting
them out at the Battle of Liegnitz (in what is now the clergy at a time when the Pope was the un-
southwestern Poland). Two days later, another precedentedly strong Innocent III. John was ex-
Mongolian army destroyed a Hungarian army a communicated in 1209 and had to give in,
hundred miles northeast of Budapest. accepting the Pope as overlord —
merely a form
Sabutai again rested his forces while he of words, of course. Furthermore, he was de-
planned a campaign into western Europe. He feated by Philip of France at the Battle of Bou-
knew that there was nothing there that could vines in northeastern France on July 27, 1214.
possibly stop him, and at the end of 1241, his After that, there was no hope of recovering the
armies started westward. They were approach- lost provinces.
ing Vienna and Venice, when the news reached John's defeats at the hands of the Pope and of
him that Ogodai Khan had died. Custom decreed the French led to an uprising of the barons and,
that the armies return so that a successor could on June 15, 1215, John was forced to sign the
be elected. The armies streamed back through "Magna Carta" ("the Great Charter"), which
the Balkans, annihilating Serbian and Bulgarian guaranteed the rights of the nobility, and of free-
armies, almost without having to slow their gal- men generally, against encroachment by the ar-
lop. bitrarypower of the crown. Among other things,
They never returned to central Europe. To the John had to agree that there would be no taxation
central Europeans, the Mongols were like an un- without the agreement of a council of barons;
bearable lightning bolt that had flashed and and that there should be no arrests, or imprison-
gone. It was, however, the death of a Mongol ment, or punishment, without trial. The king of
ruler far in the east, and nothing the Europeans England did not generally pay much attention to
did, or could have done, that had saved them. the Magna Carta, but it was always there to ap-
peal to, and it set a precedent that was eventually reigned as Frederick II, though, as far as pos-
to have its effect. sible, he continued to live in Sicily.
John died in 1216, and his nine-year-old son Under Frederick II, the struggle with the Pa-
succeeded as Henry III (1207-1272). Henry III pacy continued. Frederick was forced to go cru-
was a weak king, dominated by the clergy, and sading by an excommunication, but did it in his
the fight against arbitrary acts by the king or his own style. The with the Pope continued
fight
ministers continued. after Frederick returned from Palestine, and the
Among the English scholars of the time was Pope did not hesitate to encourage Frederick ITs
Alexander Neckam (1157-1217), who first son to rebel against his father.
brought the magnetic compass (known for a long The quarrel was at its very height when the
time in China) to the attention of the west. Mongol attack devastated eastern and central Eu-
Robert Grosseteste (1168-1253) brought Byz- rope. The Mongols were, in fact, encouraged to
antine scholars (from an Empire which had been make their attack by their knowledge of the tur-
shattered by crusaders) to England to translate moil in the Empire. It was only Ogodai's death
Aristotle from the original Greek, bypassing the that kept both Emperor and Pope from having to
possible errors in the Arabic versions. face these undefeatable tribesmen.
The University of Oxford, which had been On was winning when
the whole, the Papacy
founded on the model of the University of Paris Frederick II died in 1250. The long fight that had
a half-century earlier, yielded an offshoot in 1209 begun with Henry IV, one and three-quarter cen-
that became the University of Cambridge. turies earlier, had broken the Imperial strength.
From then on, even when the Empire was under
a strong ruler, it remained subservient to the
SCOTLAND Pope.
Alexander Frederick II, throughout his reign, encouraged
(1196-1249) became King of Scot-
II
land in 1214. He sided with the English barons the intellectual life and, being virtually an athe-
against King John of England, since a ist,found himself as much at home with learned
weak En-
glish king meant that he would not have Jews and Muslims as with learned Christians. He
to admit
English overlordship. spoke many languages, wrote poetry, kept a pri-
vate zoo, and, about 1245, wrote a book on fal-
conry that was first-rate natural history. He
founded the University of Naples in 1224.
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE The most famous scholar at his court was Mi-
Frederick (1194-1250), the son of Emperor Henry chael Scot (1175-1235). He
Arabic translated
VI, was not yet three years old when his father
commentaries on Aristotle, which contributed
died, and others disputed the Imperial throne. greatly to building an understanding of Aristote-
Frederick s mother, however, was Constance of lianism in the West. Elsewhere in Germany, Al-
Sicily (1154-1198), the daughter of Roger II, who bertus Magnus was perhaps the
(1193-1280)
had ruled over Sicily and southern Italy. Con- greatest scientist of his times. He was particularly
stance took her son to Sicily, where he was interested in mineralogy and was the first to de-
crowned King of Sicily and placed under the pro- scribe arsenic exactly.
tection of Pope Innocent III.
Otto IV (1174-1218), of the Welf fam-

In 1198,
ily, had been recognized as Emperor, but
Otto TEUTONIC KNIGHTS
was defeated (along with John of England) at the The Teutonic Knights were a military order of
Battle of Bouvines by Philip Augustus of France.
knighthood that had begun in the Crusader
In 1215, Otto IV was forced to abdicate, and Fred-
States. Their activities were transferred first to
erick, now 20, ruled over Germany as well as Hungary, where they fought the Cumans, and
Sicily. He was crowned Emperor in 1220 and then (in 1225) to the Baltic Sea coast, where they
1200 TO 1250 165
served as the sharp edge of the German "drang out to be a strong anti-imperial force. Gregory IX
nach Osten." died in 1241, even as the Mongols were racing
Under the patronage of the Emperor Frederick through central Europe.
they fought the Prussians, a Baltic people,
II, Two years later, when theMongol threat had
who were slowly Christianized and Germanized. receded. Innocent IV (d. 1254) became Pope, and
German towns were founded all along the south- carried on the fight against Frederick II.
ern shore of the Baltic Sea. Riga was founded in
1201, while Koenigsberg and Memel were
founded soon after 1250.
VENICE
The Mongols passed to their south and the
In this period, Venice also reached the
peak of its
Teutonic Knights escaped the nightmare of hav-
ing to withstand them. However, they did re-
power when it perverted the Crusading move-
ceive a temporary check in 1242, when they were
ment into an attack on the Byzantine Empire
rather than the Muslims. The Mongols were ad-
defeated by Russian forces on Lake Peipus on the
vancing toward their city when the death of Ogo-
eastern border of what is now Estonia.
dai pulled them back.
The greatest Italian mathematician of the pe-
PAPACY riod was Leonardo Fibonacci (1170-1240), whose
explanation and use of Arabic numerals finally
This was the “high noon" of the Papacy. Inno-
cent III, under whom the Papacy reached its peak
began the process of having them replace the
of power, consolidated his hold on the Papal
much clumsier (but time-honored) system of
States, bullied kings and Emperors, and encour-
Roman numerals.
aged the Crusading movement, not only against
the Muslims in western Asia, but against here-
sies in Europe. FRANCE
About two orders of "friars"
this time, too, Philip II Augustus of France had established his
("brothers") were founded, which served as use- power over the northern portion of his kingdom
ful tools of the Catholic hierarchy, bringing reli- by defeating John of England and the Emperor
gion closer to the people, especially in the Otto IV at the Battle of Bouvines.
Southern
growing towns. There were the Franciscans, who France, however, remained semi-independent
followed the teachings of Francis of Assisi (1182- and continued its pleasant Provencal culture,
1226) as early as 1209; and the Dominicans, who complete with poetry and troubadours. It had
followed the teachings of Domingo (Dominic) de also become the home of religious reformers who
Guzman (1170-1221) as early as 1215. opposed clerical corruption, preached lives of
Honorius III became Pope on Inno-
(d. 1227) poverty and virtue, and believed in the existence
cent Ill's death in 1216. He had been tutor to of a principle of evil equal in power to that of the
young Frederick II, and he was willing to crown principle of good. (This was a "Manichaean her-
him Emperor and to permit him to unite Sicily esy.")
and southern Italy to the Empire. He kept urging It was taken up by much of the southern no-
him to go on a crusade. bility who saw in anticlericalism a way of confis-
In 1227, Gregory IX (1170-1241) became Pope. cating church lands for their own benefit.
He was a nephew of Innocent III and, although The reformers were called Waldensians be-
friendly to Frederick II at first, he had lost pa- cause they followed the teachings of Peter Waldo
tience with him for always managing to find an (d. 1218), and Albigensians, because they existed
excuse not to go on a crusade. He excommuni- in large numbers in the town of Albi in southern
cated Frederick, who then went on a crusade. France.
The feud between them, however, continued Innocent III was horrified at the reform move-
and grew ever worse as the Dominicans turned ment in southern France. When Philip II refused
to riskmoving south, because he felt the main

danger lay in England and the north. Innocent SPAIN
preached a crusade against the southern heretics. The climax of the long fight for the Christian re-
The northern French nobility, seeing the chance conquest of Spain came on July 16, 1212, when
for loot, moved southward, and Philip II did Alfonso VIII of Castile defeated the Almohades
nothing to stop them. smashingly at the Battle of Las Navas do Tolosa
What followed was a bitterly cruel war, an ex- in southeastern Spain. Ferdinand III the Saint
ample of how terrible wars of religion could be. (1201-1252) continued the advance and took Cor-
After all, if someone didn't believe as you did, he doba (Abd er-Rahman Ill's capital) in 1236 and
could easily be considered a slave or a willing ally Seville in 1248.
of the Devil and, therefore, need not be treated Muslim strength Spain was broken and
in
with even the most rudimentary humanity. they retreated to the southern corner of Spain
There is a story that Simon de Montfort (1165- just north of the Strait of Gibraltar. There, Span-
1218), who led the northern crusaders, was ish Islam survived as the "Kingdom of Gran-
asked, on the taking of a town, how the heretics ada."
were to be distinguished from the true Catholics.
Montfort said, "Kill them all. God will know his
own." POLAND
As a result of this crusade, Provencal culture Poland was cut off from the Baltic Sea by the
was largely destroyed and southern France (ex- conquests of the Teutonic Knights. It was also
cept for those portions still ruled by England) devastated by the Mongol invasion, after which
came under the domination of the King in Paris. it became more open to German penetration
died in 1223, after a reign of 43 years,
Philip II from the west.
and was succeeded by his son, who reigned as
Louis VIII (1187-1226), and who continued the
takeover of the south. HUNGARY
Fie was succeeded by his son,
reigned as who Andreas II (1175-1235), who became King of
Louis IX (1214-1270). Louis IX was only 12 years Hungary in 1205, had a genius for failure. His
old when he reached the throne, but he was extravagance ruined the finances of the kingdom
brought up by a capable mother, Blanche of Cas- and enabled the great nobles to force him in 1222
tile (1188-1252), who trained him to be virtuous. to yield them power. he went crusading
In 1217,
By and he was, and, after his death, he
large, to Acre in Palestine, but accomplished nothing.
was canonized, so that he became "Saint Louis." As though that weren't enough, Hungary was
Fie was very religious, of course, and shared devastated by the great Mongol raid of 1241.
in the heightened fear of heresy that had arisen
as a result of the crusade in southern France.
Pope Gregory IX gave the Dominican friars the BULGARIA
special task of sniffing out heresy and dealing Bulgaria reached a peak of strength under Ivan
with it, and this was the beginning of the noto- Asen II (d. 1241), who became king in 1218, and
rious "Inquisition," which did so much to dis- who expanded his realm to include all the north -
courage freedom of thought and to fasten ern Balkans from the Black Sea to the Adriatic
conformity on the minds of the people. Louis IX Sea. Soon after he died in 1241, however, the
supported the Inquisition and was also markedly Mongols passed through the land on their way
anti-Semitic. back to Mongolia. Bulgaria staggered and went
He was still on the throne when the Mongols into decline.
were ravaging central Europe, but France felt
nothing of the distant alarm.
1200 TO 1250 167
ice. The crusaders didn't want to do but they

RUSSIA couldn't get to Palestine otherwise.
it,
Poland, Hungary, and Bulgaria, though they had Meanwhile, the Byzantine Empire was in the
felt the force of the Mongol blows, saw them
throes of civil war, and Alexius (d. 1204), the son
leave They could recover. But not
forever. of one of the- competing candidates for the
so Russia. The Cumans had been destroyed throne, appealed to the crusaders for help. Dan-
and disappeared from history. So had Kievan dolo insisted that help be given because he could
Russia. see advantages in it for Venice. The crusaders
was the "Khanate of the Golden
In their place agreed and arrived at Constantinople in 1203.
Horde," a Mongol state with its capital at Sarai, That meant they were inside those enormous
on the lower Volga. The Mongols were a new walls.
aristocracy that levied tribute on the Russians. The crusaders installed Alexius as a puppet
Only in the far north did the Russians them- Emperor and, when the city rebelled, the crusad-
selves retain some sort of control. There Alex- ers sacked it brutally on April 12, 1204. Constan-
ander (1220-1263) was the military commander tinople fell to foreigners for the first time since it
of the forces of Novgorod from 1236. He recog- had been founded by Constantine nearly nine
nized that resistance to the Mongols was worse centuries before.
than useless, and he forced the Novgorodians to Uncounted cultural treasures were destroyed.
pay tribute to them. He
labored to prevent any Ancient Greek literature had still been intact
insurrections against them and, as a result, the there, though it had been destroyed everywhere
Mongols treated him with respect and allowed else. The crusaders destroyed it in Constantino-
the north Russians to rule themselves (except for ple, too, and most of the classical heritage of an-
paying tribute). cient Greece was forever lost.
Alexander showed that he could face other The Byzantine Empire broke up into frag-
enemies successfully. In 1240, he defeated the ments. A "Latin Empire" was set up with its cap-
Swedes at the Neva River (near where Leningrad ital at Constantinople and with Baldwin of
now stands) and from then on he was known as Flanders (1172-1205) as the Emperor. In theory,
Alexander Nevski ("Alexander of the Neva"). In it controlled Greece and the regions around Con-
1242, he defeated the Teutonic Knights in a battle stantinople, but different parts of it were under
on the ice of Lake Peipus, on the eastern border the control of different crusaders and the Latin
of Estonia. Emperor did not have much power.
Despite these local successes, Russia was in Venice took the island of Crete and all the is-
decline and, as long as they remained under the lands rimming Greece west and east, besides
Mongol yoke, they also remained unaffected by having trade concessions within the Latin Em-
the winds of change in western Europe, some- pire. Thus, Venice reached the peak of its power
thing which has dictated the course of Russia's and, when Dandolo died in 1205, he was buried
history ever since. in Constantinople.
The Byzantines salvaged a few fragments
themselves. They ruled the "Empire of Nicaea"
BYZANTINE EMPIRE in northwestern Asia Minor and the "Despotat
A new crusade had been preached by Innocent of Epirus" in what is now Albania. There was
III in 1202, and the Venetians agreed to ferry an also the "Empire of Trebizond" along the south-
army Crusader States on certain condi-
to the eastern shore of the Black Sea.
tions. They wanted the crusaders to take Zara on Bulgaria retained its position in the northern
the Dalmatian coast. It was a possession of the Balkans.
King of Hungary and the Venetian doge, Dan- All the fragments of the Byzantine Empire,
dolo (1107-1205), who was 95 at the time and whether Byzantine or Latin, were now minor
blind to boot, wanted it as a trading base for Ven- powers at best.
exchange for the captured city.The crusaders re-

CRUSADER STATES fused, marched on Cairo, met with disaster, and
The Crusade, which was diverted against Con- had to leave, having neither gained Jerusalem
stantinople and which, instead of weakening the nor kept Damietta.
Muslims, had destroyed the Christian power that In 1228,came the "Sixth Crusade" by the Em-
had been Europe's bulwark against the Muslims peror Frederick II. He saw no point in fighting
for five and a half centuries, is usually considered since he felt no holy impulse to slay the infidel.
the "Fourth Crusade." There was also the "Albi- Instead, he negotiated with them. In 1229, he
gensian Crusade" in southern France at this persuaded the Muslims to cede Jerusalem, Beth-
time. In addition, there was a "Children's Cru- —
lehem, Nazareth all the Holy ^Places to the —
sade" in 1212, in which a large contingent of chil- Crusader States, together with a corridor to the
dren from France and Germany swarmed coast and a promise of peace.
southward, imagining that they could recapture However, the religious leaders among the
Jerusalem. Some of them reached Marseilles, Christians opposed a peaceful solution bitterly,
where unscrupulous seamen took them on board especially since Frederick II was opposed by the
and sold them into slavery. Pope. Hostilities continued, therefore, and the
At the urging of Innocent another contin-
III, Muslims took Jerusalem once again in 1244.
gent of crusaders set forth in 1218. This was the This brought Louis IX into the field. He led
"Fifth Crusade." They planned to go to Egypt the "Seventh Crusade" to Egypt and there was
and capture a base there from which Palestine an almost comic repetition of the disastrous Fifth
could then be attacked. They captured the Egyp- Crusade. Damietta was taken, the march to Cairo
tian port of Damietta in 1219 and the Egyptian was a disaster, and, by 1250, the French army
rulers offered to give the crusaders Jerusalem in was destroyed and Louis IX was a prisoner.
1250 TO 1300
defeated the Turks, and established a khanate
MONGOLS there under Hulagu (1217-1265), a younger
At this time, the Mongolian Empire was the one brother of Kublai Khan. In 1256, the Mongols de-
superpower of the world. Every other nation was stroyed the sect of the Assassins who had kept
a minor power in comparison. Even the Sung the Sunnite Muslims of the region in terror for
Empire of China was finally subdued and ab- a century and a half. The Mongols simply
sorbed in 1279. swarmed up the various mountain fastnesses
Khan (1215—1294), a grandson
In 1260, Kublai and wiped out everyone they found there.
of Genghis Khan, was ruler of the vast Empire. In 1258, the Mongols took Baghdad and put a
He made his capital at Shang-tu ("Xanadu" to final end to the Abbasid Caliphate, which had
Europeans) and, adopting Chinese culture, he existed for five centuries, albeit it had been en-
became a Chinese Emperor. tirely powerless for the last four of them. The
During his reign, the Mongols invaded what Mongols also deliberately destroyed the intricate
is now northern Vietnam in 1237 and fought canal system that had kept the Tigris— Euphrates
on and off, for 30 years, without making a
there, valley a rich agricultural area for some 5000
permanent conquest. years.
Meanwhile, in western Asia, the Mongols had (The Mongols showed some signs of construe-
1250 TO 1300 169
live thinking, too, for Hulagu Khan sponsored

the construction of a large and, for its time, well- EGYPT
equipped astronomical observatory in north- Egypt had successfully resisted the Fifth and Sev-
western Persia.) enth Crusades, but it had sunk low since the
The Mongols went on to penetrate Syria, but days of Saladin a half-century before. The Egyp-
in 1259, Mangu Khan and the main Mongol
died, tian rulersremained in power by the help of a
armies had to return to Mongolia again, A rela- personal bodyguard of slaves, the Arabic word
tively small contingent, without Hulagu, was left
for which was "Mameluks."
to face an Egyptian army that far outnumbered
Almost inevitably, as was the case of the Turk-
them. At Ain Jalut in Palestine, near Nazareth, ish bodyguard of the Abbasid Caliph four centu-
the Mongols were badly defeated. Though the ries earlier, the Mameluks grew more powerful.
defeat was not a disastrous one for the Mongols, One of the Mameluk generals was Baybars
it did destroy their reputation for invincibility, (1223— 1277), and it fell to him to defend Egypt
and was, in fact, their first definite defeat in their against the Mongols. It was he who won the Bat-
half-century career of conquest. tle of Ain Jalut. Thereafter, his prestige was
such
In 1274, and again in 1281, Mongol fleets at- that he had no difficulty having himself
in
tempted to invade Japan. In both cases, landings crowned Sultan. Like Saladin before him, he
were made and the Mongols won some victories, then swept up the Crusader States so that by
but then had to leave because typhoons threat- 1268, only a few strong points remained in cru-
ened to destroy their fleets. The Japa- sader hands.
nese called these storms "kamikaze" ("divine
winds").
The Mongol Empire reached its limits then in ENGLAND
its failure to subdue Syria, Indochina and
Japan, Henry III of England was weak and incompetent,
but even so it was the largest contiguous empire and engaged in expensive and unsuccessful for-
the world had yet seen. eign ventures. He also ignored the provisions of
Stretching, as it did, from central Europe to the Magna Carta, so that the barons and the mid-
the Pacific, allowed free passage of ideas and,
it dle classesgrew more and more discontented. A
to some extent, of trade and travelers over the "Great Council" was established in 1258, there-
huge expanse of Asia. This facilitated the passage fore, whose agreement had to be obtained before
of technological knowlege from China to Europe the King could make important decisions.
— in particular, gunpowder. This Great Council developed into Parliament.
During the reign of Kublai Khan, a Venetian Leading the reform group was Simon de Mont-
merchant, Marco Polo (1254-1324), with his fa- fort (1208-1265), theson and namesake of the
ther and uncle, traveled the width of Asia and Frenchman who had led the crusades in southern
stayed at the Mongol court from 1275 to 1295. On France. In 1265, he summoned a Council that
his return. Polo wrote a book in 1298 that de- consisted of two knights from each shire, and
scribed his travels, and the wealth and power of two burgesses (property-owning citizens) from
the regions he visited. Though many disbelieved each town. This was the first Parliament worthy
him, his descriptions were accurate, and they of the name.
brought to Europe a vision of a civilization richer The conservatives were led by Henry Ill's ca-
and more advanced than their own. pable son, Edward (1239-1307). In 1265, Edward
Khan died in 1294,
Kublai and
a grandson, and Montfort fought a battle in which Montfort
Timur Khan (1267-1307), succeeded him. Under . was killed. Edward took over the government
him the Empire was still intact but he held power and, when Henry III died in 1272, Edward suc-
only over China. The outer portions, which were ceeded as Edward I. (As it happened, Edward
under other Mongolian descendants of Genghis was off crusading when his father died, so he
Khan, became virtually independent. was not actually crowned till 1274.)
At that time, Wales still had princes and a ally they became the typical timepieces in the
Celtic language of its own, and still maintained a town churches.
certain independence, eight centuries after the
Saxons had entered the land and begun to drive
the Celts westward. Llywelyn (d. 1282), the na- SCOTLAND
tive prince of Wales, had sided with Montfort Alexander III (1241-1286) had become King of
and had done what he could to weaken the En- Scotland in 1249. He had gotten rid of the last
glish crown. In 1282, he was at open war with Norsemen in the islands off the coast of Scotland,
England. and defeated an attempted invasion by Haakon
Edward I led his army into Wales and won. IV of Norway (1204-1263).
Llywelyn died in battle and his brother, David, Alexander had married the daughter of Henry
was executed. Welsh independence was at an III, and was therefore Edward Ts brother-in-law.
end and, in 1284, when a son was born to Ed- Alexander's daughter, Margaret, had married
ward I, that infant was made the Prince of Wales. Eric II of Norway (1268-1299), who had mounted
Ever since then, the eldest son of a reigning Brit- the throne in 1280. Margaret had a daughter by
ish monarch has been known by that title. him, another Margaret (1283-1290), and when
In the course of the war, Edward I became Alexander died in 1286 (his horse ran off a cliff
aware of the deadliness of the "long bow," for some reason), his three-year-old granddaugh-
which was a weapon as tall as a man and that ter was the only heir left him.
required a hundred pounds of pull to draw This child was the first cousin (once removed)
it back to the ear. If that could be done, it of Edward Ts son, Edward, the Prince of Wales
shot arrows with extraordinary force and quick- (1284-1327), and the two were betrothed. The
ness. Edward I adopted the weapon for his own idea was that once they were married, they
army. might have a son who would then rule over both
In 1290, Edward I expelled the Jews from En- England and Scotland. However, when Margaret
gland. They had been useful moneylenders to
as ("the maid of Norway") was sent by ship from
the king, for Christians (in theory) were not al- her home in Norway to Scotland, she died en
lowed to engage in that business. The north Ital- route. Now who was to rule Scotland?
ians were doing so, by now, in fine disregard of There were various claimants, but the two
Church teachings, so the Jews were no longer most important were descendants of David I,
needed. who had ruled Scotland a century and a half be-
In the latter part of his reign, Edward I was fore. One was John Baliol (1249-1315), and the
deeply engaged in attempting to establish En- other was Robert Bruce (1210-1295). Edward I
glish domination over Scotland. was asked to make the decision and chose Baliol,
The most important English scholar of the pe- feeling he would be the more subservient to En-
riod was Roger Bacon (1220-1292), who upheld gland. Baliol was crowned in 1292, but was not
the principle of experimental science. He at- subservient enough. Edward I invaded Scotland
tempted to write a universal encyclopedia of in 1296, defeated Baliol, drove him out of the
knowledge, suggested the Earth might someday country, and declared himself King of Scotland.
be circumnavigated, pointed out the deficiencies William Wallace (1270-1305) led a Scottish re-
of the Julian calendar then being used, worked bellion against Edward I, however. Wallace's
on optics, and may have invented spectacles. He forces were badly defeated on July 22, 1298, at
was the westerner to mention gunpowder.
first the Battle of Falkirk in central Scotland. Edward
In England, and elsewhere in Europe, me- I used the deadly longbow for the first time on
chanical clocks (powered by slowly falling this occasion. Even so, Wallace continued to fight
weights) were coming into use at this time. They a guerrilla war that kept the English off balance.
were not more accurate than the best water-
clocks, but they were far less messy, and gradu-
1250 TO 1300 171
the Genoese in the course of the war and, while

SICILY
in prison, he dictated his book of travels to a
When Frederick died in 1250, his son reigned
II fellow-prisoner.
as Conrad IV (1228-1254). The Papacy, which In northern Italy, Taddeo Alderotti (1223-
had fought so strenuously against Frederick II, 1295) was
the most important physician in west-
was determined no one of his line would
that ern Europe, writing commentaries on Herodo-
rule the Empire. They made war against Conrad tus, Galen, and Avicenna.
and he was never able to establish himself as
Holy Roman Emperor, up to the time of his death
in 1254. PAPACY
Another son of Frederick II, Manfred (1232- The Popes, in this period, were deeply involved
1266), who was illegitimate, struggled to gain the in the politics of southern Italy and of Sicily, and
rule over southern Italy and Sicily at least. He their main involved their struggle against
effort
won some successes, but the intransigent
Pope the descendants of Frederick II.
Urban IV (1200-1264), offered the crown to In 1294, however, Boniface VIII (1240-1303),
Charles of Anjou (1226-1285), a younger brother became Pope. He, like Gregory VII and Innocent
of Louis IX of France. III, believed the Pope ought to be supreme in
Charles accepted, invaded southern Italy and Christian Europe (and in the whole world, once
defeated Manfred, who died in battle in 1266. everyone had accepted Catholic Christianity).
The son of Conrad IV, Conradin (1252-1268), The Popes had defeated the Holy Roman Em-
then tried and, at the age of only 15, also died in pire, and Boniface had nothing to fear in
VIII
battle against Charles of Anjou. That left, as the either Germany or Italy. He had, however, the
only descendant of the Hohenstaufens, Con- misfortune of facing strong kings in both En-
stance, thedaughter of Manfred, and therefore gland and France, and they refused to give in to
the granddaughter of Frederick II. Boniface VIITs claim of supremacy.
Charles of Anjou was not a popular king, Nevertheless, in 1300, Boniface VIII declared a
however. He brought in French officials who "Great Jubilee" and Rome was filled with cele-
lorded it over the Sicilians and he moved his cap- brants. Enormous sums of money were collected
ital Naples, calling himself King of Naples. In
to and the Papacy reached its highest pitch of ap-
1282, therefore, in the Sicilian capital of Palermo, parent power.
a revolt broke out on March 30, 1282 at the hour In this period, also, Thomas .Aquinas (1225-
of vespers. Some 2000 French were massacred 1274) had built a philosophic structure that suc-
and the occasion was called “the Sicilian Ves- cessfully combined Aristotelian philosophy and
pers." Catholic theology. He applied careful reasoning
Constance, Frederick IPs granddaughter, had to the process and this helped rehabilitate the
married Pedro III of Aragon (1239-1285), some- value of reason, which had so long been subor-
times called "Pedro the Great." The Sicilians dinated to faith. His system remains the basis of
called Pedro III to rule over them. He defeated Catholic doctrine to this day.
Charles and became King of However, the
Sicily.
great days of Naples and Sicily, which had flour-
ished under the Normans and under Frederick CASTILE
II, were over. In 1252, Alfonso X the Wise (1221-1284), became
King of Castile. With him, the reconquest contin-
ued with the capture of Cadiz in 1262; however,
VENICE by and large, the war with the Muslims sputtered
In this period there was
prolonged contest be-
a in low gear for a while. The long struggle had
tween Venice and Genoa. Marco Polo, after he helped ruin Spanish agriculture and had con-
had returned from China, was taken prisoner by verted Spain into a land of soldiers who were
keenly aware of the Christianity they had so long England had had to do. In fact, Alfonso Ill's
fought to preserve and extend. This laid the concessions are called "the Magna Carta of Ara-
groundwork for the military excellence and religon." In 1291, Alfonso's younger brother, James
gious intolerance that was to come. II (1264-1327), became King. In 1295, he allowed
Alfonso was noted for his scholarship and his a younger brother to reign as Frederick II
still
encouragement of learning, for the schools he (1272-1337), King of Sicily, while James took
founded, and for the law codes he sponsored. He over Corsica and Sardinia.
wrote poetry, studied alchemy, and was there- The Aragonese alchemist, Arnold of Villanova
fore granted his cognomen, which not many rul- (1235-1311) was the first to notice that wood
ers earned. burning with poor ventilation gave rise to poi-
He is most famous sponsoring the publi-
for sonous fumes (carbon monoxide). He was also
cation of a new formulation of planetary motions the first to prepare pure alcohol.
based on the Earth-centered astronomy of Hip-
parchus and Ptolemy. The necessary mathemat-
ics was so complicated that Alfonso is supposed PORTUGAL
to have remarked that if God had asked his ad- Afonso (1210-1279) became King of Portugal
III
vice, he would have recommended something in 1248 and, in his reign, final victories over the
simpler. (He was right, for the true structure of Muslims were achieved and Portugal gained its
the planetary system was simpler.) A crater on present borders (now unchanged in seven cen-
the Moon, “Alphonsus," is named in his honor. turies). He was succeeded in 1279 by his son,
Alfonso's reign was not successful, politically. Diniz the Worker (1279-1325), who encouraged
He was forced to make concessions to the nobil- agriculture and commerce and who, in 1294, ini-
ity and to debase the coinage. His attempts to tiated a long-term treaty with England. Even
gain territory were not successful. He was suc- more important, he encouraged ship-building,
ceeded in 1284 by his son, Sancho IV (1258- with the help of experts from Venice and Genoa
1295), and then by his grandson, Ferdinand IV and began Portugal's sea-going traditions. He
(1285-1312). founded the University of Lisbon, which later
moved to Coimbra.
ARAGON
Under James I the Conqueror (1208-1276), who FRANCE
became King of Aragon in 1214, Aragon com- Louis IX died in 1270, while he was engaged in
pleted its part of the reconquest with the capture the Eighth Crusade (his second), one that was
of the Valencian coast by 1245. While doing so, even more foolish and wrong-headed than his
Aragon also reached across the sea to take the first one. He was succeeded by his son, who
between 1229 and 1235. This was
Balearic Islands reigned as Philip III the Bold (1245-1285), who,
the beginning of an Aragonese Empire in the in turn, was succeeded by his son in 1285, who
western Mediterranean. ruled as Philip IV the Fair (1268-1314).
The Empire was extended by Pedro III, who Philip IV was on the style of
a strong king
took over Sicily. (Aragon had fought for a long Edward I of England, and a sense of nationhood
time to free from foreign domination, but
itself ("nationalism") grew strong in both kingdoms.
had no hesitation, when opportunity offered, to Indeed, a rather inconclusive war was waged be-
impose its domination on others. This is a com- tween the two monarchs. In the course of it,
mon trait of virtually all nations.) Philip IV made
with Scotland in 1295,
a treaty
Pedro's son, Alfonso III the Generous (1265- based on mutual antagonism toward England,
1291), succeeded to the throne in 1276. He was and dose relations between the two powers were
forced to grant wide privileges to his nobles, as to continue for a long time.
Alfonso X of Castile and, for that matter, John of More important was a growing conflict be-
1250 TO 1300 173
tween Philip IV and Pope Boniface VIII. In 1296, After Rudolf's death, there was another
Boniface VIII had forbidden any rulers to tax the squabble over the title, but by 1298, Rudolf's son,
clergy without papal consent. This would cripple Albert (1235-1308) was Holy Roman Emperor,
I
French finances, and Philip IV, in retaliation, im- having fought off the claims of Adolph of Nassau
posed an embargo on the export of precious met- (1250-1298) to the title.
als — which would cripple Papal finances.
The quarrel was growing steadily worse.
In 1269, a French scholar, Peter Peregrinus de- SWITZERLAND
scribed his experiments with magnets (which
The Great Interregnum that followed the end of
were an example of the experimental method
Roger Bacon was advocating). Peter Peregrinus
the Hohenstaufens made it possible for some
parts of the Empire to achieve greater
indepen-
studied magnetic poles and the manner in which
dence of the central authority. The people of the
these attracted and repelled each other. He
Alps Mountains, in what is now known as Swit-
showed how a magnetized needle, pivoted on a
zerland, were in good position to do this, for it
card with a graduated circular scale, could be
was hard to invade the mountains and the people
used to tell direction at sea. This laid down the
of Switzerland could carry on a firm and effective
technological background for the forthcoming
guerrilla war in a territory in which they were at
age of exploration.
home and an invader was not. In 1291, three can-
tons, Uri, Schwyz (from which Switzerland gets
HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE its name), and Unterwalden formed a confeder-
ation designed to defend their independence.

After the extinction of the Hohenstaufen line, so
little was the title of Emperor thought of, that 15
years (the '"Great Interregnum") passed before

any Emperor was named. During that period,
HANSEATIC LEAGUE
the affairs of the Empire were allowed to drift; Many northern German towns, plus a few in
however, in 1273, Rudolf of Hapsburg (1218- Sweden, Denmark, and England, formed a com-
mercial league in this period. The "hansas" or
1291) was finally chosen as Emperor Rudolf I.
Rudolf was a minor figure of the aristocracy "guilds" of the various artisans of the cities made
and was chosen chiefly in order to prevent Ot- the agreement, which was called, therefore, the
takar II of Bohemia (1230-1278), sometimes "Hanseatic League." They controlled trade in the
Baltic and North Seas and were, for a time, an
called "Ottaker the Great" from reaching the
throne. Under Ottakar, Bohemia had expanded important commercial power.
and had become an important power. However,
Bohemia was the one Slavic area of the Empire,
and the German population did not like the TEUTONIC KNIGHTS
thought of a Slavic Emperor. The Teutonic Knights, in this period, were firmly
Ottakar did not give up the possibility of the in control of Prussia and had penetrated the Bal-
Imperial title tamely, but he was defeated. He tic States (the modern Estonia, Latvia, and Lith-
retained his core provinces of Bohemia and Mo- uania). The Knights were busily converting the
ravia, but Austria, which was to their south and Lithuanians, the last pagan people of Europe.
which he had briefly controlled, was taken over
by Rudolf for his own family. It was with Austria
that the Hapsburgs were thereafter identified. BOHEMIA
Rudolf gave up all claim to Italian territory and On the death of Ottakar, his son, Wenceslas 11
was subservient to the Pope. From this time on, (1271-1305), became king in 1278. Under him,
in fact, there was no further quarrel of note be- Bohemian power receded somewhat but it was
tween Emperor and Pope. The Papacy had won. still the most important state in the region, for
Poland and Hungary had not yet recovered from to promise that the Empire would reunite with
the Mongol incursion. western Christianity and would accept the dom-
ination of the Pope. He agreed to this in 1274,
but after his death in 1282, the people forced Mi-
RUSSIA chael's son, Andronicus II (1260-1332), to re-
Russian continued prostrate under the Golden scind the union. To the bitter end, the Byzantine
Horde, but Moscow, near the northwestern lim- people would accept neither the Pope nor Roman
its of the Golden Horde's realm, was beginning Catholicism.
to recover somewhat.
CRUSADER STATES
BYZANTINE EMPIRE The Eighth Crusade was conducted by Louis IX,
The fragments of the old Empire continued be to who was joined by Prince Edward of England
weak, but in Asia Minor, Michael Paleologus (later to be Edward I). The crusaders landed in
(1224-1282) gained power as the Emperor of Ni- Tunis in 1270, but Louis IX died soon afterward
caea. He was an able man and might have done and nothing was accomplished. After that, fur-
much had he lived a few centuries earlier. As it ther crusading ventures that were occasionally
was, he managed to retake Constantinople in attempted were largely futile.
1261, and reigned as Michael VIII. Once again, The last Christian stronghold in Palestine was
after a half-century hiatus, a Byzantine Emperor Acre, and when it fell in 1291 (a century after
reigned in Constantinople. The city and the Em- Richard the Lion-Heart had taken it) the Cru-
pire were only a shadow of what had been, and sades were over. Two centuries of effort had
would steadily lessen as apower. Nor did Mi- ended in no territorial gain.
chael regain everything. Parts of Greece still be- However, the crusaders had encountered a
longed to western adventurers, and the islands more advanced civilization than their own. They
still belonged to Venice. brought back sugar and silk and many other
Michael VIII realized he could not keep his products (including new methods of fortifica-
throne without help from the west. In his des- tion), and taught Europe to covet Eastern luxu-
perate search for that help he even went so far as ries and skills.
1300 TO 1350
Meanwhile, Robert Bruce (1274-1329), grand-
ENGLAND son and namesake of the claimant to the Scottish
In 1305, Edward I finally captured the Scottish throne in Edward Ts time, had taken over Scot-
rebel, William Wallace, and had him executed. tish leadership and had virtually driven English
He then prepared for another campaign to force forces out of the land. Only the castle of Stirling
Scotland into the English orbit, but died in 1307, in central Scotland remained in English hands,
even as he was marching northward. and itwas under siege. Edward II was forced to
His son and successor, who reigned as Ed- lead an army into Scotland to relieve it, but many
ward II (1284-1327), was an indolent king, who of the disaffected barons would not go with him.
wanted only to enjoy himself. He had favorites The two armies met at Bannockburn, a few
to whom he granted money and power, thus an- miles south of Stirling. Edward II, with no sense
tagonizing the barons generally. of tactics, arranged his army so that his longbow-
1300 TO 1350 175
men had no chance to fire properly. Without the more slowly.The longbowmen could send five
deadly arrows supporting them, the English cav- arrows forward while the crossbowmen were
alry was thrown back by the Scottish pikes and, sending one. On top of that, the haughty French
in the end, the English were completely de- knights wouldn't even give their crossbowmen a
feated. The Battle of Bannockburn was the only chance, but rode them down in their foolish de-
major battle the Scots won over England, but it sire to ride at the English line.
was enough. Scottish independence was as- The result was that the French were riddled
sured. and smashed with longbow fire, while there was
The defeat made Edward II more unpopular very little damage to the English. There had been
than ever. His wife, Isabella (1292-1358), hated victories of foot-soldiers over cavalry in recent
him for neglecting her. (Edward II was homosex- fighting, but this was the first case in which the
ual, forone thing.) Isabella and her lover, Roger victory was so devastating. The thousand years
de Mortimer (1287-1330), forced Edward II to ab- of cavalry domination of the battlefield, since the
dicate in 1327, and then saw to it that he was Battle of Adrianople, was done with. The foot-
mistreated and murdered in prison soon after. soldier had won back his importance. Since
His son, 15 years old, reigned as Edward III heavy cavalry was the fighting tool of the aristoc-
(1312-1377). By 1330, Edward III took matters racy, who alone could afford the horses and
into his own hands, hanged Mortimer, kept his armor, it meant that the feudal aristocracy was
mother confined, and began his personal rule. beginning its decline, while the common man
Edward III had to acknowledge Scottish inde- was to grow more and more important.
pendence, but France was constantly encourag- Edward III had some primitive "bombards" at
ing Scotland to invade England, while the French Crecy, the earliest cannon. They only served to
king did his best to take over such English terri- help frighten the French horse, but they were a
tory as still existed in southwestern France since portent of things to come. Gunpowder had been
the time when the Angevin Empire had been es- picked up from China by way of the Mongols,
tablished two centuries before. but the Europeans were not content merely to
In 1338, England and France went to war over explode it. They instantly began to devise metal
rivalries that included Edward Ill's claim to be cannon from which the force of gunpowder
the rightful King of France. The result was what could hurl a heavy cannonball. They were in-
came to be called "The Hundred Years War." venting a kind of chemically powered catapult,
Edward won a great naval battle at Sluys off which would lend a new violence to warfare.
what is now the coast of the Netherlands. The Edward III, after his victory at Crecy, went on
French fleet was destroyed, which gave the En- to take Calais, on August 4, 1347. It was just
glish control of the English Channel and made it across the narrowest part of the English Channel
possible for Edward III to bring an English army and could be used as a convenient base for raid-
into France at will. ing France. Meanwhile, Edward's son, who was
Edward III took advantage of this ability and Edward, Prince of Wales (1330-1376), set up his
did bring an army into France. He met a much base at Bordeaux in the southwest. This region
more numerous army at Crecy, in northeastern still belonged to England as part of the heritage
France,, on August 26, 1346. The French heavy of Eleanor of Aquitaine two centuries earlier. The
cavalry, however, were undisciplined and al- — Prince of Wales (who, in later history, was called
—
though wearied by their march overconfidently "the Black Prince," supposedly because of the
prepared to charge. The English had carefully ar- black armor he wore) was thus able to raid France
ranged their line, with the longbowmen given from its other extremity.
every opportunity to shoot freely. Meanwhile, in China, there had arisen a new
The French had no experience with the long- strain of the Plague,perhaps as early as 1333. It
bow. They had crossbowmen, who could shoot was called "the Black Death" and was the most
as powerfully as the longbowmen, but much deadly epidemic known to have befallen human-
ity in historic times. It was brought to Europe in

1347 by a Genoese ship that had been trading in IRELAND
the Crimea. The still-surviving remnant of the The English hold on west central Ireland weak-
crew of the ship was barely alive and from them ened in this period, partly because England's at-
the disease began to spread rapidly through Italy tention was entirely on France, and partly
and then through other parts of Europe as well. because the Black Death caused havoc among the
It worked rapidly. Within 24 hours of the first English in Ireland, as well as among the Irish.
symptoms, death might follow. It was the great- The became more unruly, and the English
Irish
est single disaster that was ever known to have hold more precarious.
struck humanity, for in the space of a few years 9
it may have killed up to a third of the population
of Europe, and perhaps done equal damage, if FRANCE

not more, in Africa and Asia. Philip IV (as will be explained shortly) defeated
As the population dropped, a labor shortage the Papacy, as the various Emperors from Henry
made the common man more important, and this IV to Frederick II had notoriously failed to do. He
was another blow to the aristocracy. Social struc- was not all-powerful, however.
tures broke down under the strain, and mysti- He quarreled with England over Flanders, a
cism rose. The use of distilled liquor, supposed districtwhich was along the coast of what is now
to prevent the disease (or make one care less), Belgium and northeastern France. Flanders was
came into fashion, and alcoholism fastened itself economically tied to England, which produced
on Europe to an extent that never again fully re- wool that Flanders wove into cloth.
ceded. The Church suffered, too, since the edu- The French wanted the prosperous Flemings
cated minority died as quickly as the illiterate. (the inhabitants of Flanders) more under their
The oddest aspect of this tragedy is the light it control, so a French army of heavy cavalry en-
sheds on human stupidity. While France and En- tered Flanders to bring that about. They attacked
gland each suffered immensely from the Black the Flemish foot-soldiers at Courtrai in what is
Death, the war between them went on without now northwest Belgium on July 11, 1302.
thought of cessation. The heavy cavalry found itself impaled on the
However, the life of the mind also goes on. pikes of the steady Flemings and were massa-
The greatest English scholar of the period was cred. This was an even better example of the vic-
William of Ockam (1285-1349). He is best known tor of infantry over cavalry than the Battle of
for "Ockam's razor" — the dictum that of two ex- Legnano had been a century and a quarter ear-
planations that account equally well for a partic- lier, but was not as spectacular as the the Battle
ular phenomenon, that one
be chosen that
is to of Crecy, which would take place nearly half a
begins with the fewer assumptions. century later.
For one thing, the victory was partly due to

the fact that the Flemings had carefully chosen a
SCOTLAND boggy area and the French knights were too stu-
Robert I Bruce, the victor at Bannockburn, died pid to understand that their horses would be
in 1329 andwas succeeded by his son, David II stuck in the mud. Two years later, in a battle that
(1324-1371), who was incompetent. He attacked wasn't on boggy ground, it was the French who
England while Edward III was off in France, but beat the Flemings.
he lost the Battle of Neville's Cross in northern Despite the Battle of Courtrai, Philip IV, when
England on October 17, 1346 (the longbowmen he died in 1314, left France at a peak of power.
again). David II was taken prisoner and was not His oldest son, Louis X the Stubborn (1287-
released for 11 years. 1316), ruled fortwo years and died in 1316, leav-
ing only a daughter. He was the first French king
since Hugh Capet, three and a third centuries
1300 TO 1350 177
earlier, to die without having

a son to succeed During this period,Aragon was involved with
him. However, his wife was pregnant. A na-
affairs in southern Italy, and Portugal was in-
tional council decreed that only a male
devolved in dynastic problems.
scended from males could inherit the French
throne, so everyone waited for the Queen to de-
livêr. It was
son who was, in theory, John
a I,
PAPACY
but he died at the age of five days.
Boniface VIII's arrogance reached megalomaniac
Philip TV's second son then ruled as Philip V heights in 1302. He issued a bill, entitled “Unam
the Tall (1294-1322). He
died in 1322, leaving Sanctam, in which he made the most imperi-
only two daughters. Consequently, Philip IV's
ously possible claim to being superior to all
third son ruled as Charles IV the Fair (1294-
Christian rulers, and to be, in effect, ruler of the
1328). When
he died, in 1328, he left only a Earth, responsible only to God.
daughter. With him, the direct Capetian line
Philip IV, who didn't fear
God, let alone the
came to an end three and a half centuries after Pope, sent a henchman, Guillaume de Nogaret
Hugh Capet had been crowned. (1270—1313) to Rome. With the help of some
Now who would become King of France? Roman opponents of the Pope, Nogaret pene-
Philip IV had had a younger brother, Charles of
trated the Pope s bedroom in his summer palace
Valois (1270-1325), who had a son, Philip of Va- at Anagni in 1303. Nogaret threatened Boniface
lois (1293-1350). Philip of Valois was the
son of with death, took him prisoner, and tried to force
the son of Philip III and became king as Philip VI
him to resign. Boniface didn't resign and faced
the Fortunate. He was a member of the House of
down all threats with resolution. Nogaret finally
Valois, but he was still descended from Hugh
fled, fearing a Roman mob, but Boniface
VIII
Capet. died soon after, on October 11, 1303, apparently
To this, Edward III of England objected. Philip of humiliation.
IV's daughter, Isabella, was Edward
mother. Ill's He had found that the new national states like
He was more closely related to Philip IV than England and France would not bow to him, and
Philip of Valois was, and the fact that Edward that their people would rather cling to their kings
Ill's descent was through a woman
was unim- than to a foreign Pope. After Boniface VIII, there-
portant in his eyes. The restriction of the French fore, thePopes might have spiritual force
still
throne to descent by males had only been for- and might still be able to work through sympa-
mulated after Philip IV's death, specifically to ex- thetic secular rulers, but they could never again
clude Edward from the throne. The French,
III claim true power over the nations.
however, did not want an English king, what- Boniface VIII was succeeded by Benedict XI
ever arguments in his favor might exist. (1240-1304), who died within a year. Then Philip
That was one of the reasons for the beginning VI managed to maneuver a Frenchman to the Pa-
of the Hundred Years War. Having lost at Sluys, pacy. He reigned as Clement V (1260-1314) and
at Crecy, and at Calais, Philip VI (scarcely “For- was a French puppet.
tunate") died in 1350, with France in a shambles. He gave his consent, for instance, to Philip
IV's brutal suppression of the Knights Templar
(which had begun as an order in the Crusader
CASTILE States and had grown into an extremely rich in-
Alfonso XI (1311-1350) became King of Castile in when
stitution its members began to serve as
1312. For one last time, the Moors in the south moneylenders and businessmen). Philip IV cov-
called on African warriors for help. Alfonso de- eted their money. After he had destroyed them
feated them in 1340, and that was the last at- by false accusations and torture, he expropriated
tempted African penetration of Europe. From their funds. He also stripped the assets of the
then on, the tide flowed the other way. Alfonso Jews in France, and then sent them into exile in
XI died in 1350, while laying siege to Gibraltar. 1306.
Clement V avoided the hostile Roman mobs lies However, it was becoming the
of the city.
by taking up residence in 1309 in the city of Avi- cultural leader of Italy and of Europe.
gnon on the Rhone River in southeastern France. Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) wrote The Divine
It was a Papal possession but was surrounded Comedy, which was completed in 1321. It was the
by French territory. Clement V appointed first great and enduring work of literature to be
enough French cardinals to make sure that addi- written in one of the new languages (in this case,
tional French Popes would succeed him. He was Italian) that had grown out of Latin. As Dante
indeed succeeded by John XXII (1245-1334) in founded Italian poetry, Giovanni Boccaccio
1316; Benedict XII (d. 1342) in 1334;and Clement (1313-1375) founded Italian prose, writing short
VI (1291-1352) in 1342. All were French and all stories that were, and remained, world-famous.
were puppets of the French king, even when that Francesco Petrarca (1304-1374), usually known
king was laid low by English victories. in English as "Petrarch," wrote sonnets, while
Giotto di Mondone (1276-1337), usually known,
like Dante, by his first name, was a great archi-
VENICE tect and painter.
In this period, Venice was
warring with
still At this period, there began, first in Florence,
Genoa over which was to control trade with the then in the rest of Italy, and then in western Eu-
east. For a while, Venice was getting the worst of rope generally, a revival of learning, literature,
it, and Genoa was at the height of its power. and art that came to be called the "Renaissance"
(French for "rebirth"). Scholars became inter-
ested in the science, literature, and art of the an-
MILAN cientworld and took to calling the time between
After the Battle of Legnano, Milan grew prosper- the ancient world and their own, "the Middle
ous and became the chief commercial city of Ages" or "the Medieval period." The men of the
Lombardy, in north-central Italy. In 1312, the Renaissance became more interested in the life of
Visconti family gained control of the city. this world rather than in the life to come and
The mechanical clock to strike 24 hours of
first dealt with people, rather than God and angels.
equal length during the day (disregarding the They were "humanists."
changes in length of daylight and darkness in the
course of the year) was installed in a Milan
church in 1335. NAPLES
Elsewhere in northern Italy, the medical Robert, grandson of Charles of Anjou,
the
school at Bologna was flourishing. One of its reigned over the Kingdom of Naples in southern
graduates was Mondino de Luzzi (1275-1326), Italy from 1309 to 1342. He was succeeded by his
who finally took up anatomy where it had been granddaughter, Joanna I (1326-1382). Naples did
left off by Galen eleven and a half centuries be- not very much share the intellectual and com-
fore. He actually did his own dissections and, in mercial ferment that was stirring in that part of
1316, wrote the first book in history to be devoted Italy north of the Papal States.
entirely to anatomy. It had its errors, but it was
by far the best treatment of the subject up to that
time. HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE
In this period. Emperors were drawn from fami-
lies other than the Hapsburgs and nothing much
FLORENCE was accomplished, except for arguments and
In central Italy, roughly halfway between Milan fighting between candidates for the largely hon-
and Rome, Florence was struggling to gain orary and intrinsically worthless title.
strength and territory. This was hampered by the Henry VII of the House of Luxembourg (1275-
continuing in-fighting between the leading fami- 1313) became Emperor in 1308, and he was fol-
1300 TO 1350 179
lowed by Louis IV of the House of Wittelsbach northern Germany and in what is now southern
(1283-1347). Both Henry VII and Louis IV led Sweden. He kept both the nobility and the clergy
expeditions into Italy to no great effect. under his thumb.
Then Bohemia finally got its chance. In 1347,
Charles IV (1316-1378) became King of Bohemia
and was eventually recognized as Emperor. He
POLAND
was more interested in Bohemia than in the Em-
In 1333, Casimir III (1310—1370), sometimes
pire. He founded the University of Prague in
called "Casimir the Great," became King of Po-
1348, the first university in central Europe.
land. He was a shrewd ruler who did not allow
his ambition to rise beyond his means. He made
SWITZERLAND peace in the west, where he knew he was not

likely to beat the
Teutonic Knights, Bohemia, or
The mountain cantons were theoretically ruled
Hungary, and gained some territory in the east
by the Hapsburgs. The legend of William Tell
against the Russiansand the Lithuanians.
and his shooting of an apple off his son's head at
He welcomed the Jews, who had been driven
the demand of the Austrian viceroy belongs to
out of England and France, since he needed a
this period, but it is probably merely patriotic
middle class of merchants and tradesmen. He
fiction.
had no sons, however, or other male heirs and
Leopold I, Duke of Austria (1293-1326), a
he made an agreement with the king of Hungary
grandson of the Emperor, Rudolph I, sent an
to pass the throne to the Hungarian monarch's
army into the mountains. The Swiss had consid-
son, provided he would agree to respect the
erably fewer soldiers, but they knew the region.
rights of the Polish nobility.
They where they knew the
lay in wait at a point
This went far toward making the monarchy
Austrians must pass along a narrow road be-
elective and the nobility uncontrollable, thus
tween a mountain and a lake. They then came
making it probable that Poland would head to-
down upon them from the mountainside and de-
ward anarchy and helplessness.
stroyed them on November 15, 1315. This was
the Battle of Morgarten, near the border of
Schwyz.
Over the next few decades, other cantons LITHUANIA
joined the original three. Lithuania, the region east of Poland, came to be
ruled in 1316 by Gedymin (1275-1341), who or-
ganized it as a nation. Its capital was Vilna, and
TEUTONIC KNIGHTS like Poland, Lithuania turned eastward for ex-
The Teutonic Knights managed to fight off Po- pansion against the weak Russian principalities.
land and, in 1346, they took over Estonia after it Gedymin and his son, Olgierd (d. 1377), who
had successfully revolted against the Danes. succeeded to the throne in 1341, expanded over
With that, the Knights reached their maximum much of what is now Byelorussia and the west-
territorial extent. ern Ukraine.
DENMARK HUNGARY
Denmark was under the rule of Valdemar IV Under Charles I (1288-1342), who became king
(1320-1375), a strong and aggressive king who in 1310, Hungary finally recovered from the
had gained the throne in 1340. He sold Estonia Mongol laid. Charles improved finances, encour-
(which was in revolt and, he felt, not worth the aged trade, and made peace with his neighbors,
trouble of keeping) to the Teutonic Knights, but, particularly with Poland. He was succeeded in
for the rest, he spread Danish rule over parts of 1342 by his son, Louis (1306-1382), sometimes
1
called “Louis the Great/' who was a patron of alone), and partly it was the walls of Constanti-
learning. nople. In 1350, John VI (1292-1383), a great-
grandson of Michael VIII, was Emperor.
RUSSIA
The Golden Horde interfered with
less and less OTTOMAN TURKS
the Russian principalities. Provided they paid In Asia Minor, a new power was rising. Asia
tribute, they might otherwise do as they liked. In Minor or most of it had been under the Seljuk
1328, Ivan I Kalita (1304-1341), or “Moneybags," Turks for nearly three centuries, but internal di-
became Grand Prince of Moscow. He made sure visions — plus attacks by the crusaders, the Mon-
to pay his tribute promptly and he was even will- gols, and even the Byzantines times — hadat
ing to collect the tribute from other principalities greatly weakened it.
and see to it that they were turned over to the In the northeastern section of Asia Minor, a
Mongols. As a result, he was a favorite of theirs border chieftain who was named Osman (1258-
and they were perfectly willing to allow Moscow 1326),began to gather power about 1300. Those
to grow at the expense of its immediate neigh- who were ruled by himself and his descendants
bors. were called “Osmanli Turks" or, by distortion,
Ivan's older son, Simeon II, succeeded in 1340 “Ottoman Turks." He took over scraps of terri-
and followed his father's policy, which was ig- tory that Byzantines controlled in Asia
the
noble, but which worked. Moscow was far Minor, and his son Orkhan I (1288-1360), who
enough eastward to avoid the grasp of the ex- succeeded to the throne in 1326, completed the
panding Poles and Lithuanians. Its growth en- job.
abled it to gain in influence and to head toward By 1345, the Ottoman Empire included all of
becoming the dominant city of the nation. northwestern Asia Minor. John VI, the Byzantine
Emperor, was foolish enough to call on their help
"
in his battle with another claimant to the throne.
SERBIA They responded to his call in 1354 and settled on
In the Balkans, became an important
Serbia the Gallipoli peninsula. In this way, the Turks
power under Stephan Dushan (1308-1355), who first entered Europe.
came to the throne in 1331. He took advantage of

the fact that the Byzantine Empire, what there
was of it, even in these days of its decrepitude, AFRICA
spent most of what small energies it had in civil The Mali Empire was at its height in this period,
war and dynastic fighting. Stephen had no trou- the largest native African empire yet to have ap-
ble in taking most of northern Greece, and made peared. The city of Timbuktu was entering a pe-
his way nearly to Constantinople. He married his riod of prosperity and greatness.
daughter to the Bulgarian tsar, who recognized
Serbian overlordship. By 1350, almost all the Bal-
kans was under his control. PERSIA
This period was one Mongol
of the decline of the
rule (the “Il-Khans"), which came to an end in
BYZANTINE EMPIRE 1349, a century and a quarter after Genghis Khan
The Byzantine Empire, by which is now meant had conquered the region.
only the regions about the Constantino-
cities of
ple, Adrianople, Salonika, and Sparta, declined
steadily. That it continued to exist at all is amaz- CHINA
ing. Partly, it was a victory for tradition (like the Here, too, the period was one of the decline of
car without an engine that ran on its reputation Mongol rule, and by 1350, it was clearly only a
1 350 TO 1400 181
matter of time before the last tattered remnants

of Mongol officialdom would be ejected from the NORTH AMERICA
land.
In 1325, the Aztecs founded the city of Tenochti-
tlan, the precursor of what is now Mexico
City,
the most populous city in the world.
1350 TO 1400
had had enough of the longbow. They stayed in
ENGLAND their fortified towns and refused to fight. The
The English continued to raid the French coun- weather was consistently bad and Edward was
tryside mercilessly, Edward III in the northeast; losing his men to disease.
Edward, Prince of Wales (the Black Prince) in the He army to the very walls of Paris in
led his
southwest. March 1360. Even here, the French refused to
John II the Good (1319-1364) was now King of fight. They simply waited— and it worked.
France after the death of his father, Philip VI, in
On
April 14, 1360, the day after Easter, it grew un-
1350. John II sought out the Prince of Wales at usually cold and a tremendous hailstorm bat-
Poitiersand there, on September 19, 1356, a great tered the exposed English army. That broke
battle was fought. Again, the French had the ad-
Edward Ill's spirit and both sides were ready for
vantage of numbers, but again they fought in dis- peace.
organized fashion without any notion of a A was signed on May 8, 1360, in Bre-
treaty
unified battle plan. Feeling that the trick was to tigny, a village in Normandy. By its terms,
use infantry, the French knights dismounted, but France gave up all the territory that England had
that did them no good against the terrible long- conquered, particularly Aquitaine in the south-
bow. west and Calais in the northeast. They also
The English not only won the battle in another agreed to pay an enormous ransom for King
lopsided victory, but they captured most of the John, who wasn't worth it. On the other hand,
French nobility, including King John himself. Edward III gave up his claim to be the King of
As if were not enough, the French suf-
that France.
fered a terrible peasant rebellion, for the whole Edward III then went home, and fought no
weight of the war and its devastation had fallen more. The Black Prince remained in the south-
on them. With John in captivity, and France vir- west, meddling in Spanish affairs, but he even-
tually ruined, John's son, the Dauphin Charles tually grew and returned home also.
ill
(1337-1380), managed to hang on. (The eldest On the whole, England seemed to be doing
son of the French king began to be called the well, thanks to the booty from France. Neverthe-
Dauphin in this period, from association with the less, Edward Ill's continuing need for money
to
recently acquired Dauphine, a region in what is pay his soldiers and to keep them supplied with
now southeastern France. John II, in the lifetime food and arms played into the hands of Parlia-
of his father, was the first Dauphin, and Charles ment, which held the purse strings.
was now the second.) The Black Death did terrible damage, of
Once again Edward III marched into France to course. England's population, which stood at
win one final victory and to take over the crown. nearly 4 million when the Black Death struck,
Here, however, success eluded him. The French declined to less than 3 million. There was a labor
shortage and the attempt of the upper class to He was suspected of having arranged the death
keep the laborers from profiting by this created a of his uncle Thomas, Duke of Gloucester, and he
great deal of discontent. sent into exile his first cousin, Henry of Boling-
At this time, William Langland (1330-1400), broke (1366-1413), the son of John of Gaunt.
wrote 'Tiers Plowman," which denounced the In 1399, Bolingbroke returned with ships and
luxury and corruption of the aristocrats and men, while Richard was off on a futile expedition
clergy and took up the cause of the peasantry. A to Ireland. The nobility flocked to Bolingbroke
priest named John Ball (d. 1381) was even more and Richard II found he had no friends. He was
extreme in his hatred of the upper classes, and deposed, and the next year he was killed. Henry
preached inflammatory egalitarian sermons that reigned as Henry IV.
got him excommunicated and, eventually, exe- In this period, there flourished the greatest
cuted. poet the English language had yet produced.
John Wyclif (1330-1384) was a great scholar This was Geoffrey Chaucer (1342-1400), who
who and the cor-
disliked the ritual, the luxury, was patronized by John of Gaunt, and later by
ruption of the Church. He wanted a Church that Richard II. His greatest work, read today, is
still
was less materialistic, more virtuous, and closer The Canterbury Tales, a series of 23 short stories
to the people. He wanted the Bible to be trans- gathered from Boccaccio and other sources, and
lated into English so that it would be accessible told in heroic couplets. It was written in "Middle
to the people, and such a Bible was prepared. English" and must be translated to be accessible
Wyclif's followers were called "Lollards" to English-speakers today.
(from a Dutch word meaning "mumblers" be-
cause, presumably, they were always mumbling
prayers). The Lollards disapproved of monaster- SCOTLAND
ies and nunneries as hives of vice, and they had Robert II (1316-1390) gained the throne in 1371.
a strongly nationalistic spirit that didn't want to He was the son of the daughter of Robert Bruce.
be led by the Pope who was, after all, a foreigner. His father was William Stuart, so Robert II was
While all this social ferment was going on, Ed- the first representative of the House of Stuart.
ward III grew senile and the Black Prince grew That was about all that he need be remembered
very ill. The latter died in 1376, the former in for. His son, Robert III (1337-1406), succeeded to
1377, and the son of the Black Prince sat on the the throne in 1390.
throne as Richard II (1367-1400). He was only 10 Scotland remained independent because Ed-
years old at the time, and he had several uncles ward III had been preoccupied with France, and
who quarreled with each other over who was to Richard II with internal politics.
run the country. The two chief uncles were John
of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster (1340-1399), and
Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester IRELAND
(1355-1397). The end result was that no one ran The English hold on the Irish Pale had grown so
the country very well. precarious that Richard II, in 1398, undertook to
In 1381, there was a peasant's revolt under lead an army into Ireland to reduce it to subser-
Walter ("Wat") Tyler. was much less intense
It vience. He was far too incompetent, however, to
than the one in France, and the young Richard II achieve anything beyond keeping the Pale going.
showed courage in facing it down, but it was His absence merely gave Henry Bolingbroke a
repressed cruelly. Efforts at reform were turned chance to invade England and seize the throne.
back.
Richard grew old enough to rule personally,
II
but he had no great competence. He tried to seize FRANCE

more power than he could handle, thus offend- France had experienced three great defeats at the
ing powerful nobles, including his own relatives. hands of smaller English forces: the naval Battle
1350 TO 1400 183
of Sluys, and the land Battles of Crecy, and Po- King who fought among themselves. In France,
itiers. France had been raided by brutal armies
as in England, there were social tensions.
till the countryside was a mass
of ruins. The But things were, again, worse in France. In
peasantry had revolted and been smashed into England, the King was merely overthrown. In
even worse ruins. Moreover, King John was in France, the King remained on the throne but ex-
captivity in England, enjoying himself, while a perienced lengthening periods of madness, so
beaten, half-destroyed France tried to raise the that now he is known in history as "Charles the
money that was demanded as his ransom. And Mad."
all this less than 40 years after the death of the
powerful Philip IV.
Fortunately, for France, John II died in 1364, CASTILE
and his son, the Dauphin, ascended the throne Alfonso XI, who had fought off the last African
as Charles V
the Wise. Charles was, as his cog- invasion of Spain, had two sons. One was legiti-
nomen indicates, a wise king, a cautious one mate and succeeded to the throne as Pedro
and a kindly one, who eschewed luxury in the (1334-1369), usually known in history, for good
interest of the common good, who patronized reason, as Pedro the Cruel. He had an older
scholars, and who, most of all, found just brother, Henry of Trastamara (1333-1379), who,
the soldier he needed in Bertrand du Guesclin however, was and was, therefore,
illegitimate
(1320-1380). not qualified to sit on the throne. Henry didn't
Du
Guesclin was defeated by the Black Prince see the force of that, and was determined to try
in Spain; however, in France itself, he carried on to supplant his brother. There was civil war be-
a war of attrition, avoiding open battles, but raid- tween them.
ing shrewdly and winning small engagements France supported Henry of Trastamara and
that wore down the English. Little by little, he England supported Pedro the Cruel. On April 3,
won back for France the territory she had given 1367, two Spanish armies, one supported by the
up. By 1380, when Charles V and du Guesclin Black Prince and the other by Bertrand du Gues-
died, France was almost free of the enemy, but fought at Navarrete in north-central Castile.
clin,
at a terrific cost. Between war and revolts and the Once again, the English longbows did their job
Black Death, her population had declined from and the battle ended as a victory for the Black
13 million to 9 million. Prince and Pedro.
Charles V's civilian adviser was his chaplain, However, Pedro alienated the Black Prince,
Nicole d'Oresme (1325—1382). He was a thought- who returned to France with nothing to show for
ful economist (perhaps the best in the Middle his adventure but a bout of illness that slowly
Ages), who dealt with taxation in a sensible way grew worse. The war between the Castilian
civil
and opposed debasement of the coinage as doing half-brothers continued and, on March 14, 1369,
long-term harm in return for short-term good. at Montiel in central Castile, there was another
He translated some of Aristotle into French. He battle. This time, Henry of Trastamara not only
worked out ways of showing variable magni- won, but he managed to kill Pedro with his own
tudes in graph form, made useful observations hands.
on falling bodies, and denounced astrology as Henry ruled Castile as Henry II, and remained
superstition. a staunch ally of the
French, defeating the En-
Charles V's son came to the throne in 1380 at glish in a naval battle in 1372 that gave France
the age of 12, as Charles VI (1368-1422). He was control of the Channel again, for a while.
called Charles the Well-Beloved at first, and with Henry saw to it that his son married a princess
a young king on the throne both in France and in of Aragon to bring those two Spanish kingdoms
England there was a period of peace because nei- closer together. That son became King of Castile
ther country was in a position to fight. In France, in 1379 as John (1358-1390). His second wife
I
as in England, there were powerful uncles of the was a Portuguese princess, and so he tried to
annex Portugal as another step in uniting the The result was that for the next few decades
peninsula, but that failed. He was succeeded by there were two Popes, one in Avignon and one
his son, Henry III (1379-1406) in 1390. in Rome. Each castigated and excommunicated
the other. The monarchs of Europe sided with
whichever one was politically advantageous for
PORTUGAL them, so that the Papacy became a pawn that
Ferdinand I of Portugal (1345-1383) died in 1383, everyone used and no one respected.
and his only legitimate child was Beatriz, who In 1400, the "Great Schism," as it was called,
had married John I of Castile after John's first still existed. Benedict XIII (1328-1423) was the
wife had died. Therefore, John claimed the Pope at Avignon, having been elected to the post
throne of Portugal. However, Ferdinand I had in 1394. Boniface IX (1355-1404) was the Pope at
half brother, John of Avis (1357-1433), who, like Rome, having been elected in 1389.
Henry of Trastamara, suffered under the handi-
cap of being illegitimate. Again, like Henry of
Trastamara, he thought this should not prevent MILAN
him from becoming king. He had married Phi- Milan was at the peak of its power under the rule
lippa, the daughter of John of Gaunt of England, of Gian Galeazzo Visconti (1351-1402). Little by
and that meant he could count on English aid. little, he made himself supreme in northern Italy,
In 1385, at the Battle of Aljubarrota in west gathering in the neighboring towns. All he
central Portugal, John of Avis, with English help, needed was Florence, which was under a shrewd
defeated John of Castile. That established Portu- commercial oligarchy, and virtually all of Italy
gal's independence beyond dispute, and John north of the Papal states would be his. He died
reigned as John I, sometimes called "John the of plague, however, before he could attain that
Great." goal and the inevitable dynastic squabbling
On May 9, John signed the Treaty of
1386, among his sons undid his work.
Windsor with England, renewing the alliance be-
tween the two nations, and that alliance was
never broken thereafter. VENICE
Venice finally defeated Genoa in 1381 and, there-
after, Genoa was never again a threat. However,
PAPACY a far stronger enemy was in the field. The Otto-
The Papacy was now at its lowest point in three man Turks were now bulking large. Venice
centuries. For over 70 years, the Popes had been signed a treaty with them in 1388. (As long as the
in Avignon. They were Frenchmen who lived in Venetians could be assured of profitable trade,
great luxury and who lent themselves to the po- they didn't care about small matters such as reli-
litical aims of French kings at a time when France gion.) However, as the Turks grew stronger and
was in ruins.
itself Venice did not, it was clear that the treaty would
Urban V (1310-1370), who was the Avig- last no longer than the Turks wished.
nonese Pope from 1362 to 1370, visited Rome,
found it a decrepit slum, and left in a hurry. His
successor, Gregory XI (1329-1378) visited Rome HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE
in 1378 and
would have left also, but died before Itseemed clear that the Holy Roman Empire was
he could do that. A number of his cardinals were condemned to anarchy as long as the death of
with him and they found themselves forced to each Emperor meant a civil war among the claim-
elect a Pope in Rome or else be torn apart by a ants to the throne. In 1356, then, the Emperor
Roman mob. Naturally, those cardinals who hap- Charles IV arranged an agreement on the
pened to be in Avignon elected a Pope of their "Golden Bull."
own. When an Emperor died, seven "electors"
1350 TO 1400 185
would choose the next Emperor. They included back under their control. Leopold of Swabia led
three archbishops (of Mainz, of Trier, and of Co-
an army of 6000 Austrians into Switzerland and
logne) and four secular rulers (the County Pala-
a battle was fought at Sempach in central
Swit-
tine of the Rhine, the Duke of Saxony, the zerland on July 9, 1386.
Margrave of Brandenburg, and the King of Boh- The Swiss were outnumbered nearly four to
emia). The Emperor would be chosen by a simple
one. The Austrians were heavily armed, how-
majority without delays, and there was no men-
ever, and grew tried. When gaps and irregulari-
tion of either the towns or the Pope being in-
ties appeared in their line as the weaker
failed to
volved in the election. keep up, the Swiss charged those points and
The whole thing never worked well. The vot- smashed the Austrians. (There is a tale that a
ers were for sale. The Emperor was usually pow-
Swiss fighter, Arnold von Winkelried, deliber-
erless except for what strength his own realm
ately gathered as many enemy pikes as possible
gave him, and the townsfolk were bitterly resent- into his own body, thus creating a gap that could
ful of being cut out of the process. On the whole,
be exploited, but this may
be another fiction.)
the Holy Roman Empire remained an anarchy. After that, the Austrians gave up. In 1394,
In 1378, Charles IV died and was succeeded
they signed a truce with the Swiss and made no
by his son, Wenceslas IV (1361-1419), who was further attempts to disturb them in their moun-
acomplete do-nothing. He could only sit and tains.
watch as the towns rebelled and the nobility
went their own way. In 1400, he was deposed for
incompetence and drunkenness, and in those HANSEATIC LEAGUE
days a monarch had to be very incompetent and The Hanseatic League fought off the power of
drunk indeed to be deposed for those reasons. Valdemar IV of Denmark and, in 1370, signed the
However, Wenceslas didn't accept the deposi- Peace of Stralsund, which marked the peak of the
tion and managed remain on the throne. (He
to League's power. It gave the League a monopoly
was not the "Good King Wenceslas" of the song, of the Baltic trade and a strong hand in Scandi-
by the way. That was a king of Bohemia who navian politics. After that, though, it entered a
died in 929.) slow decline.
BOHEMIA TEUTONIC KNIGHTS

The Emperor Wenceslas was also King Wences- The Teutonic Knights at this time held their own
las II of Bohemia, but he was just as incompetent on the southern and eastern shores of the Baltic,
and drunken a king as he was an Emperor, and but Poland was growing stronger and, after this
there was growing social tension in his land. period, the Teutonic Knights, like the Hanseatic
There were those who, as in England, opposed League, entered a slow decline.
churchly luxury and ritual and wanted to sim-
plify religion, make it more virtuous, and bring it
closer to the people. The leader in these views, DENMARK
in Bohemia, was Jan Hus (1373—1415), who had Valdemar IV was the father of Margaret (1353-
read the writings of Wyclif and was much influ- 1412). When Valdemar died in 1375,
Margaret's
enced by him. son, only five years old, reigned as Olaf II (1370-
1387). Margaret was the wife of Haakon VI
(1340-1380), who had become King of Norway
SWITZERLAND 1355. When Haakon died
in
in 1380, Olaf II became
The Swiss victory at Morgarten did not totally Olaf V of Norway, with Margaret as regent in
discourage the Hapsburg princes from attempt- both lands.
ing to bring the upstart mountaineers of the Alps In 1387, Olaf died unexpectedly, and Margaret
became queen of both countries. What's more, France. Nevertheless, Poland could never pull its
Albert, King of Sweden (1340-1412), was unpop- weight because its turbulent nobility rarely al-
ular with the Swedish nobility. Margaret sided lowed the Polish king to act with decision.
with the nobility and was asked by the Swedes
to take over the rule of the country. In 1389, Mar-
garet defeated Albert's army and became Queen RUSSIA
of Sweden.
In 1339, Dmitri (1350-1389), the grandson of Ivan
Thereafter, she ruled a United Scandinavia
I Kalita, became Grand Duke of Muscovy at the
Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland,
age of 9. When he grew older, he managed to
and even the dying colony at Greenland.
stay in the good graces of the Golden Horde and
Greenland had a population of 3000 at its
to absorb the Russian principalities in the north,
peak, but the weather was growing colder, and
until Muscovy ruled almost all of Russia between
agriculture was virtually impossible. The Inuit
the territory directly held by the Golden Horde
(or Eskimos) were migrating southward along
to the south, and the Novgorod,
territory of
the western coast of the island and knew better
which spread widely over the almost unpopu-
how Then, too, the Black
to live off sea-life.
lated Russia far north.
Death weakened the colony and put an end to
Then, when it seemed that the Golden Horde
sea communication with Scandinavia. By 1400,
was having internal troubles, Dmitri stopped his
the Greenland colony was fading away.
tribute. That meant war, and the Tatars (as the
On the map, Scandinavia, ruled from Copen-
European Mongols were coming to be known)
hagen, was now the largest country in Europe,
allied themselves with the Lithuanians.
at least in area. Its population, however, was
Dimitri, however, met the Tatar army at Kuli-
only about 1.25 million (having dropped half a
kovo on the upper course of the Don River and
million thanks to the Black Death).
attacked them before the Lithuanian contingents
could arrive. Dmitri won a complete victory on
POLAND September 8, 1380, and was known as "Dmitri
Donskoi" thereafter.
Another large power appeared east of Germany.
It was not a conclusive victorv, because the
Lithuania had continued to grow at the expense
Tatars quickly recovered, Dmitri had to continue
of the Russian principalities. In 1377, Jagiello
fighting both them and the Lithuanians till his
(1351-1434), the son of Algierd, had become
Grand Duke of Lithuania, ruling over lands that
death; and his son, Vasily I (1371-1424) who suc-
ceeded in 1389, had to continue doing so with
stretched from nearly the Baltic Sea to nearly the
indecisive results.
Black Sea, and eastward nearly to Moscow.
Jadwiga (1374-1399) became Queen
In 1384,
Still, the Battle of Kulikovo was the first time
the Russians had beaten the Tatars since they
of Poland, which lay immediately to the west of
had arrived in Russia a century and a half before,
Lithuania and was only one third of its area. Ja-
and the aura of Tatar invincibility was broken.
giello and Jadwiga were married in 1386 and the
Furthermore, it was clear that if Russia were to
two realms were united, rather loosely at first.
Lithuania completed its conversion to Christian-
rid itself of its Tatar overlords, would be the
it
ity and did so to the Roman ritual and not the Grand Dukes of Moscow who would lead the
way.
Russian. Jadwiga died in 1399, but Jagiello con-
tinued to rule both realms under the Polish name
of Wladislaw II.
The combined realm, usually referred to sim- OTTOMAN EMPIRE
ply as "Poland," was second only to Scandinavia As the Tatars in Russia showed signs of fading,
in area inwestern Europe. Its population was 7 the Ottoman Turks emerged as the leading mili-
million, almost equal to that of war-ravaged tary power in the east. Murad I (1326-1389) be-
1350 TO 1400 187
came the Ottoman ruler in 1361, succeeding sade against the Turks, which Pope Boniface IX
Orkhan.
(1365-1404) preached heartily. The knights of
Murad organized an elite corps of ^^^nissar-
I
western Europe, mostly French, gathered in
ies (from a Turkish word meaning "new Buda, the capital of Hungary, and then pressed
troops"). These were drawn from Christian sub- down the Danube to Nicopolis, in north-central
jects, who were converted to Islam, given Spar- Bulgaria. They met the Turkish on
forces there
tan military training, and subjected to celibacy so September 25, 1396. The French knights fought
would not distract their minds from
that families
as they had fought at Crecy, charging forward in
wars. They quickly became the most feared and
an undisciplined unorganized fashion. The Turks
effective troops in Europe. met them in a business-like manner and virtually
Under Murad Ottoman realm spread
I, the wiped them out.
eastward through Asia Minor, and westward It looked as though nothing could
stop the
into the Balkans. The Turks took Adrianople in
1362 and then all of Thrace. They moved farther
—
Turks yet something did.
north and took Sofia, the Bulgarian capital in

1385. The climax came on June 15, 1389, when BYZANTINE EMPIRE
the Turks fought the Serbs at Kossovo in south- The Byzantine Empire was shrinking steadily at
ern Serbia. Only 35 years before, the Serbs under this time. Manuel II (1350-1425) had become Em-
Stephen Dushan had dominated the Balkans, but peror in 1391, and heroically withstood the Ot-
now it was the Turks who emerged as rulers of toman siege. He tried to get help from the west,
the region. but the crusade failed at Nicopolis and Constan-
Murad I was
assassinated in the course of bat- tinople seemed doomed.
tle and his son, Bayazid I (1360-1403),
suc-
ceeded. The conquered regions, assuming that a
strong ruler might be succeeded by a weaker suc- MONGOLS
cessor, rose in revolt, but Bayazid was no weak- In this period, the Mongolian Empire crumbled
ling. He crushed the revolts, though it was 10 away. The Mongols were ejected from China,
years before he was ready for new conquests. In and in Persia they became Muslims and melted
1395,he placed Constantinople under siege and into the population. Only in Russia did the
kept up that siege for years. He also passed be- Golden Horde, or Tatars, remain in power, and
yond the Balkans to attack Hungary. that was the least advanced portion of what had
Sigismund (1368-1437) became king of Hun- been the Mongol Empire. Even the Tatars were
gary in 1387. He made a poor king, for his ener- weakening. Increasingly, they ignored the Rus-
gies were taken up by his personal ambitions in sian principalities in the northand west (except
Poland and Bohemia. Since he was the son of to collect tribute when they could) and concen-
Emperor Charles IV and a half-brother of Em- trated on the steppes in the south and east, pay-
peror Wenceslas, he also had his eye fixed on the ing little attention to the gathering Russian
Imperial throne. strength.
Hedid realize one thing, though. With the For a while, it looked as though this would be
Balkans gone, and the Byzantine Empire reduced reversed when Tokhtamish became leader of the
to the city of Constaninople and a couple of small Golden Horde in 1377. He withstood the defeat
outlying districts, and with Constantinople itself by the Russians at Kulikovo, reorganized,
under siege, it was now Hungary who was the smashed back, and captured Moscow on August
defense of Europe against the Muslims. And the 23, 1382, sacking it.
Muslims now, in the form of the Ottoman Em- Meanwhile, though, in central Asia, another
pire, were more dangerous than they had been conqueror had appeared on the scene. He was
in seven centuries. Timur (1336-1405), often called "Timur Lenk"
Therefore, Sigismund tried to organize a cru- (i.e., Timur the Lame," or, in western distor-
tion, 'Tamerlane" or Tamburlaine"). In 1364, he

was the prime minister of a Mongol Khan in cen- CHINA
tral Asia. By 1369, he had overthrown the Khan In southern China, Chu Yuan-Chang (1328-
and become the ruler himself. Beginning in 1381, 1398), a peasant, slowly worked his way up the
he conquered Persia, following the same tactics scale. He joined rebel forces who were fighting
of terror that Genghis Khan had used over a cen- against the decaying Mongol dynasty, discov-
tury and a half before. He massacred those who ered that he had military ability, and grew stead-
resisted so as to make sure that many strong ily more important. He captured Nanking in
points would give in without resistance. 1356, and, over the districthe ruled, he estab-
Tamerlane had helped Tokhtamish reestablish lished an orderly and prosperous government.
Tatar strength in Russia, but when Tokhtamish's In this way, he came to be recognized as the
notions of expansion infringed on Tamerlane's national leader against the Mongol rulers. He
domain, there was a war between the two. continued to win victories and, in 1368, he de-
The war of Mongol against Mongol was a long clared himself the Emperor of a new "Ming
first
and difficult one, lasting 10 years, but in the end dynasty." Before the year was over, the Mongol
it was Tamerlane who won. (He never lost, just monarch had fled China, and their control over
as Genghis Khan never lost.) China ended after a mere century of rule.
In the course of the war, Tamerlane invaded All of China was united under Chu Yuan-
Russia, but he did not remain there. He was sat- Chang, as it had not been under a native dynasty
isfied merely with having smashed his enemies since the end of the T'ang Empire over four and
and then he left in search of new prey. His blows a half centuries earlier. Chu Yuan-Chang died in
did more to destroy the Tatars in Russia than any 1398, and was succeeded by his grandson, Chu
the Russians of the time could possibly have de- Yun Wen.
livered. Tamerlane had made sure that the future
in Russia belonged to the Russians.
In 1387,Tamerlane took Baghdad, and then, JAVA
in 1398, he invaded northern India. He visited Java was the center of the Majapahit Empire,
the land with incredible destruction, including a which reached its peak at this time. It controlled
horrible sack of Delhi on December 17, 1398. most of what is now Indonesia. It had been es-
Then he left it. What he intended to accomplish tablished with the help of Chinese troops, but
besides experiencing the sheer pleasure of de- once power had been achieved, the Chinese were
struction, no one can tell. In 1400, he turned west expelled. After Hayam Wuruk (1334-1389), ruler
again. of the Empire, died, the realm rapidly declined.
1400 TO 1450
Leading the English forces was Henry "Hotspur"
ENGLAND Percy (1364-1403), who was immortalized by
The reign Henry IV was constantly troubled
of Shakespeare in his play Henry IV, Part One.
with revolts and border warfare. The Scots in- Owen Glendower (1359-1416), a Welshman
vaded and were defeated at the Battle of Homil- who represented the last spark of Welsh nation-
don Hill in northern England on September 14, alist resistance to the English (he is also a char-
1402, through the use of the English longbow. acter in Henry IV Part One), fought
, a successful
1400 TO 1450 189
guerrilla war in themountains of Wales from enough to seem sure losers and the carefully pur-
1402 to 1409, but was finally defeated, and the
suing French blocked him at Agincourt, not far
land was pacified. from Calais.
The northern noblemen, under the leadership
Henry V chose a careful battle line, a short
of Hotspur Percy, revolted, thinking they had
distance that was flanked on either side by heavy
been insufficiently rewarded for helping Henry
woods. This narrowed the fighting area and
IV to the throne. They were defeated at the
battle made the
French three-to-one superiority in
of Shrewsbury in west central England
on July numbers of not much use to them. The ground
21, 1403, and Hotspur died in combat.
in front was soaked with the steady
rains and
Henry IV died in 1413, worn out by all this,
would surely bog down the heavy cavalry
that
and was succeeded by his son, who reigned as
that made up the bulk of the French
forces. The
Henry V (1387-1422).
English had only 9000 men, but 8000 of them
Henry V realized that continual civil war were longbowmen.
would destroy the kingdom, and it was his inten-
The French general apparently wanted to fight
tion to unify it. With this end in view,
he struck a defensive battle,
outwaiting Henry and forcing
at divisive elements inside the country, conduct- him out of his secure line. The French knights,
ing a severe campaign against Lollardy, the doc- however, who hadn't learned a thing from a cen-
trines of which were causing social
unrest. In a tury of losses between Courtrai and
Nicopolis,
four-year campaign, he wiped out the Lollards,
observed the small numbers of English, their lack
or at least forced them underground. The
most of cavalry, their miserable appearance,
prominent Lollard was John Oldcastle (1377- and
1417), who had been a friend of Henry V when
—
wanted to charge nothing but charge.
Charge they did. They bogged down in the
he was Prince Hal and not yet king, but who
mud and the terrible flights of yard-long arrows
would not cease being a Lollard so that, in the from the English longbows began— and the
end, he was hanged and burned. (This is sup-
French were slaughtered. The Battle of Agincourt
posed to have inspired Shakespeare to give was most lopsided and astonishing victory
the
Prince Hal the immortal Sir John Falstaff as a
the English ever won, but the credit goes
not so
roystering friend who was, in the end, rejected,
much to English valor as to French stupidity.
inShakespeare^s two Henry IV plays.) This was unfortunate for the English, since they
Outside the land, Henry V^s eyes turned to believed it was entirely a matter of valor; thus,
France again. The French king, Charles VI, was when the French stopped being stupid, the
mad, and the kingdom was being torn apart by En-
glish never figured out what had
gone wrong
civil war. It seemed to Henry V a good
time to with their valor.
attack once more, reviving national pride, and
Henry England, and then returned to
left for
persuading the English to bury their differences France in 1417, spending two careful years
sub-
in a common fight against a foreign enemy.
duing Normandy; while the French, lost in shock
Henry V declared war on France in April 1415, over Agincourt, did virtually nothing to
inter-
and sailed for Normandy on August 10, 1415, fere.
with an army of 12,000 men. He captured the
Henry V forced the helpless French
In 1420,
port city of Harfleur by September 22, but the
government to sign a treaty in which mad King
weeks of siege had resulted in riddling his army Charles VI named Henry as his heir, disinherit-
with casualties and disease, and the victory ing his son, the Dauphin Charles
(1403-1461) in
seemed Pyrrhic. the process, and implying his illegitimacy.
On October 10, Henry began a race to Calais He
also gave Henry his daughter, Catherine
(1401-
where he could find safety, rest, and, perhaps, 1437), as wife. Now it was only a matter of wait-
reinforcements from England. The weather was ing for the mad king to die, and Henry would
be
horrible. There was ceaseless rain and Henry's
king of England and France.
army dwindled further. Finally, it was weak While waiting for Charles VI to die, Henrv V
cleaned up more portions of northern France, fell Richard was a second cousin of Henry VI and,
sick, and it was he who died in 1422. He was through his mother, had a better claim to the
succeeded by his 9-month-old son, who reigned throne than Henry VI had. This began the rivalry
as Henry VI (1421-1471), and who, as it turned between the Yorkists, who were descended from
out, inherited his maternal grandfather's ten- Edward III through Edmund, Duke of York
dency toward insanity. (1342-1402), and the Lancastrians, like Henry IV,
Henry V's younger brother, John, Duke of Henry V, and Henry VI, who were descended
Bedford (1389-1435), was an uncle of Henry VI from Edward III by way of John of Gaunt, Duke
and was a skilled soldier. He won another battle of Lancaster.
at Verneuil in southern Normandy on August 17, Richard of York adopted a policy of concilia-
1424, using longbowmen against heavy cavalry. tion toward the Irish, treating them honorably,
Verneuil, however, was fated to be the last great and pacifying the land in that manner,
longbow victory the English were to win over the
French, who after that, began to learn their les-
son.
FRANCE
Back England, however, various other un-
in With all the disasters of the past 70 years, France
cles of the King, together with other high noble- needed but one thing to strike bottom and that
men, were fighting each other over the right to was civil war. It got that, too.
control the land in the name of the royal child. One fought for control of mad
of those who
Just as the victories of Edward III were lost in the Charles VI was Philip the Bold of Burgundy
political infighting during the reign of Richard II, (1342-1404). He was a son of John II and an unde
so now the victories of Henry V were lost in the of Charles VI.John II had made Philip the Duke
during the reign of Henry VI.
political infighting of Burgundy, which gave him east central
Added to this was the fact that France finally France, plus some of what is now western Ger-
learned how to counteract the longbow. The re- many, together with the Low Countries or the
sult was that the English were forced out of Netherlands (which includes the modern Neth-
France more quickly than they had forced their erlands and Belgium).
way in. The Netherlands was an extraordinarily rich
area; commercial city-states rivaled in wealth
its
SCOTLAND those of northern Italy. Philip the Bold was as

strong a ruler as Charles VI was weak, and Bur-
Robert III was succeeded in 1406 by
of Scotland
gundy had, for the most part, escaped English
his son, James I (1394-1437). He had been cap-
depredation. It was stronger than France and
tured by the English in that same year, when he
was virtually independent. France had had to
was 12 years old, and was kept prisoner by
deal with a too-strong Normandy four centuries
Henry IV. Henry V released him in 1423, and he
earlier, and now it had to deal with a too-strong
was finally crowned in 1424. In 1437, however,
Burgundy.
he was assassinated and was succeeded by his 7-
The cities of the Netherlands, like those in
year-old son, who reigned as James II (1430-
Italy, were rich enough to support a flourishing
1460). By were to be six
a strange fatality, there
art. The great Netherlandish artist of this period
Jameses who ruled over Scotland, and every one
was Jan van Eyck (1395-1441). The Netherland-
of them became king as a minor. This helped
ish and writer, Thomas a Kempis
ecclesiastic
keep Scotland in constant turmoil.
(1380-1471), was also of outstanding importance.
He wrote Imitation of Christ in 1424.
IRELAND Philip the Bold died in 1404 and was suc-
English rule in Ireland continued precariously ceeded by his son, John the Fearless (1371-1418),
until 1449, when Richard, Duke of York (1411- who was a survivor of the Battle of Nicopolis. He
1460), arrived as Viceroy there. was first cousin to Charles VI, and he found him-
1400 TO 1450 191
self opposing Louis, Duke of Orleans (1372- be done. On

the other hand, the French had been
1407), who was a younger brother of Charles VI.
defeated so often that they seemed to lack the
John the Fearless arranged to have Louis of Or-
spirit to fight.
leans assassinated in 1407 and, after that, the
two Then, in 1429, astrange thing happened. A
factions were at war with each other.
young woman from eastern France appeared be-
Louis's son, Charles of Orleans (1394-1465),
fore the Dauphin and said that God had
led the pro-war, anti-English party, while sent her
John to save France.
ofBurgundy led the anti-war, pro-English party. Her name was Jeanne Dare (usually mistran-
The result was that when Henry V invaded
slated as Joan of Arc). The Dauphin, after
France, he had the help of the Burgundians, some
consideration, decided he had nothing to lose,
so that he was not merely fighting France, so
but he sent her to Orleans with an armed escort. It
was allied with half of France to fight the other
turned out that she was just the psychological lift
half.
the French needed. The French soldiers,
feeling
The Agincourt might have changed
Battle of
that God might be on their side now, fought
things. Charles of Orleans was taken prisoner
with
at new vigor. The English soldiers, fearful that Joan
Agincourt and was kept in England for 25 years.
was some sort of witch, were a little readier to
That put him out of action. As for John of Bur-
back off than they had been before. Thus, the
gundy, the English triumph was so great as to
French attacked and the English retreated from
make him nervous, and he might have changed Orleans. That was the turning point of
his policy and ended the civil war but, in
the
1419, Hundred Years War.
he was assassinated at the direction of the Dau-
Joan led the Dauphin to Rheims, where he
phin. This was foolish, for John was succeeded
was crowned and became Charles VII officially.
by his son, Philip the Good (1396-1467), who, in
Joan was soon captured by the English, however,
view of the assassination, could not turn toward and, in 1431, was burned as a witch in Rouen,
the Orleanist faction, but now had no choice but
the capital of Normandy, while Charles VII
with the English alliance.
to stick
made
no attempt to save her.
When Charles VI died in 1422, the Dauphin However, he didn't need her any more. The
called himself Charles VII, but he was not
French knew the English could be beaten, and
crowned in the Cathedral of Rheims. This had Charles VII set about reorganizing his army,
get-
been the traditional site of crowning since the ting rid of the old notion of fighting by
knightly
time of Clovis, nine centuries before, but it was
charges and slowly developing an artillery corps.
in English hands. As long as the Dauphin was
Gunpowder and cannon had existed for a cen-
not crowned in Rheims, he had to remain the tury, since the Battle of Crecy and a little
before,
Dauphin, and nothing more. The English child- but they had been used haphazardly, and
can-
king, Henry VI,was crowned King of France to non were far too apt to explode and kill the gun-
forestall Charles, but Henry was crowned in ners rather than the enemy.
Paris and that, too, didn't count. Charles was intent on improving cannon, and
The Dauphin remained in Bourges in central on training gunners and having them fight in an
France, virtually powerless. Meanwhile, in 1428,
organized fashion, as though they were a bunch
the Duke of Bedford had sent an army to lay
of trained longbowmen— except that the
cannon-
siege to Orleans at the northernmost point of the balls they fired were far more deadly
than the
Loire River. If that fell, it might have meant that arrows from the longbows. The cannonballs
the south of France would surrender, and all the.
could batter down stone walls so that sieges
land would be conquered. lasted a very short time. What's more, the En-
Perhaps not, of course, because England, glish, under the impression that any English-
still
smaller and populated than France, had
less man could beat 10 Frenchmen, didn't understand
stretched its resources to the limit, going as far that artillery made a difference. They stopped
as it had, and it was possible nothing more could
winning victories and couldn't figure out why.
(Shakespeare's Henry VI, Part One gives a ridicu- navigation at Sagres, at the extreme southwest-
lously distorted picture of this period of history.) ern This became a haven for ex-
tip of Portugal.
By 1435, Philip of Burgundy could see that the perienced navigators. It was a place where ships
wind had and he made his peace with
shifted, were built according to new designs that would
France. After that, England had no chance at all. make them fit open ocean; where new
for the
In 1436, the French had retaken Paris, and after aids to navigation were devised and tested;
that they began the fight to retake Normandy. where crews were hired and trained; and where
In 1450, the British sent an expeditionary force expeditions down the African coast were care-
larger than any they had yet sent to France, and fully planned.
it did them no good. At the Battle of Formigny in After 1420, Portugal won and lost battles in
Normandy on April 15, 1450, it was the English Africa and against Castile, but that didn't matter
longbows against the new French artillery the — much. What counted were those ships inching
French won. By the end of the year, the English their way down the African coastline year after
were cleared out of Normandy and out of all year. Although Henry never went on the ships
northern France except Calais, and they held on himself, he has gone down in history as "Henry
to only small parts of the southwest. the Navigator," and with him there began the
great "Age of Exploration" that was utterly to
change the world.
PORTUGAL For a quarter century, the Portuguese skirted
In this period, Portugal, a small portion of Eu- the western edge of the great Sahara desert, the
rope in the farthest southwest, undertook a largest in the world; however, they had
in 1445,
course of action that was to bring her to astonish- passed beyond the desert to a point of land that
ing heights. was green with growing things, and they called
Her victory over John I with ex-
Castile filled it "Cape Verde" (Cape Green). Until then they
pansionist notions. In 1415, he invaded Africa had been going steadily westward as the coast of
and took Ceuta, just across the Strait of Gibraltar. Africa took them farther and farther away from
Fighting at Ceuta was his third son, Henry "the Indies" (i.e., the Far East), but Cape Verde
(1394-1460), and Africa became that son's pas- was the westernmost point of Africa. After that,
sion ever after. the ships trended eastward, ever eastward.
Europe had developed a great demand for The Portuguese were making discoveries in
products from the Far East, fed by the crusading the Atlantic itself. In 1421, the island of Madeira
experience and by Marco Polo's tales of eastern (meaning "wooded") was discovered; and, in
magnificence. Europeans wanted sugar, pepper, 1432, theAzores (the Portuguese word for
and other spices, as well as silk and other luxu- "hawks") were found. The Azores were 1300 ki-
ries. Now that the Mongol Empire had broken lometers west of Portugal, and had the Portu-
down, trade with the Far East wasn't easy, espe- guese but known, they were one third of the way
cially since the Ottoman Empire stood squarely across the Atlantic Ocean.
across the route. At every step of the way, there But everything, however inspiring, can have
were tariff charges, and the prices of Eastern lux- its unhappy aspects. In the fertile land south of
uries went sky-high. And Portugal was at the the Sahara, the Portuguese found people of a
end of the line. new race. They seemed primitive, and certainly
It occurred to Henry that if ships could find they were not Christians. seemed proper to the
It
their way around Africa to the Far East, they Portguese to enslave them. The black tribes, who
would bypass the Ottoman Empire, and those fought and enslaved each other, saw nothing
luxuries would become far cheaper and more wrong in trading captured slaves to the Portu-
available. guese in exchange for what the Portuguese ships
In 1420, therefore, Henry founded a center for could offer them. Black slaves were brought to
1400 TO 1450 193
Lisbon for the time in 1434, and the evil of

first ing insults at each other. The next year Alex-
black slavery was fastened on Europe and, even- ander V was succeeded by John XXIll (d. 1419),
tually, on the American continents. and there were still three Popes.
Another Council was held at Constance in
southwestern Germany in 1414. After three years
ARAGON of deliberation, all three Popes were deposed and
Aragon continued to turn its face eastward, Martin V (1368-1431) became Pope in 1417. Al-
something it had done since the Sicilian Vespers, though Benedict XIII of Avignon still refused to
a century and a half before. resign, he was ignored, and Martin V was ac-
Alfonso V the Magnanimous
(1396-1458) be- cepted by all. The Great Schism was healed, after
came King of Aragon in 1416. He already con- 30 years, and the Avignon papacy came to an
trolled the Balearic Islands, Sardinia, and Sicily. effective end, after a century. The whole episode,
He managed to seize the kingdom of Naples, too, however, had made the Papacy a laughing-stock
so that under him the Aragonese Empire was at in Europe, and it took a while for the institution
its peak. to recover from that.
Martin V managed to resume control over the
Papal States and began the process of fighting
CASTILE
While Portugal looked toward Africa, and Ara-
against the Conciliar movement —
that is, against
the notion that Councils were more authoritative
gon looked toward Italy, Castile, larger than than the Pope. He was succeeded by Eugene IV
either, also had the urge to expand. In 1402, a
(1383-1447), who became Pope in 1431, and who
Castilian expedition occupied the Canary Islands continued the fight against Councils.
about 1300 kilometers southwest of Spain. Nicholas V (1397-1455) became Pope in 1447;
Henrydied in 1406 and his one-year-old
III
son succeeded as John II (1405-1454).

by then, the Conciliar movement was dead ex- —
cept when the Pope himself called and controlled
a Council. This was a step backward, in a way,
for needed reforms in the Church were not put
PAPAL STATES through, and that laid the groundwork for future
The Papacy time was struggling to pull
at this disaster.
itself out of the Great Schism, and it seemed that
the only way to do so was to find some authority

greater than the quarreling Popes of Rome and of FLORENCE
Avignon. The feeling arose that a council of high The northern Italy fought each other
cities of
churchmen should get together and decide who endlessly, with ups and downs that can scarcely
should be the Pope. It would be almost like add- be followed, much as the Greek cities had fought
ing a kind of Parliament to the Papal monarchy. each other 18 centuries earlier. There were the
In 1409, a Council was held at Pisa that was same temporary victories of one over another
attended by 500 churchmen, together with dele- and the same long-term weakening and defeat of
gates from the various western European na- all. Andthe Italian cities continued to flourish in
tions. After careful deliberation, they decided to the artistic sense, just as the Greek cities had
depose both Gregory XII of Rome (1325-1417), done.
who had been Pope since 1406, and Benedict XIII The comparison is not exact, however. Flor-
of Avignon, who had long held his post there, ence might be viewed as the Athens of Renais-
and to start afresh with Alexander V (1339-1410) sance Italy, but its great forte was banking,
as their own nominee. Since neither of the two which had developed, in the modern sense, in
older Popes would resign, Europe was now northern Italy first.
treated to the spectacle of three Popes, all shout- Since war interfered with banking prosperity.
it is not surprising that Florence's leading anyone wishing to enter the city in order to see if
banker, and the richest man in Italy, Giovanni de they would develop plague. Eventually, the
Medici (1360-1429), should be the leader of the waiting period was standardized at 40 days.
peace party in Florence. Thus, the idea was instituted of a "quarantine"
His son, Cosimo de Medici (1389-1464), grew (from the French word for "forty"), one of the
even richer and became the head of the govern- earliest hygienic measures against the spread of
ment Giovanni, Cosimo was careful
in 1434. Like disease.
to use his riches in such a way as to make himself
popular with the people. He even put through a
progressive income tax that placed the burden of HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE .
the state on those best able and relieved

to pay, In 1410, Sigismund, a half-brother of drunken
the poor. If Florence was the Athens of Renais- King Wenceslas, became the ruler of the Empire,
sance Italy, Cosimo played the part of Pericles. though Wenceslas lived on until 1419 and in-
Cosimo not only patronized learned Italians; sisted on keeping the title. Sigismund labored to
he also encouraged scholars from dying Constan- put an end to the Great Schism. This he suc-
tinople to come to Italy with whatever Greek ceeded in doing, thanks to the council of Con-
learning they could bring with them, so that they stance, which he had called into existence against
could translate it into Latin. Papal wishes.
One outstanding Greek scholar of the time Sigismund's support of conciliar reform in
who came to Italy was Bessarion (1403-1472), general failed, however. In addition, the Council
who labored, vainly, to effect a union of the alienated Bohemia by its treatment of the reli-
Greek and Roman churches. He was named a gious reformer, Jan Hus, leading to war in Bo-
cardinal in 1439, and he translated works of Ar- hemia and a further weakening of the Empire.
istotle and Xenophon. Sigismund was king of Hungary and Poland,
The greatest Florentine artist of the century too, though this did not add strength to his Im-
was the sculptor Donatello (1386-1466). Though perial throne. His defeat at Nicopolis by the
not a Florentine, Leone Battista Alberti (1404- Turks did add weakness, however.
1472) was an example of the "Renaissance man," Sigismund died in 1437, leaving only a daugh-
one who excelled in many directions. He was an ter. That daughter was married to Albert of
excellent painter and sculptor, as well as an ar- Hapsburg (1397-1439), the great-great-great-
chitect and musician. He was also a mathemati- grandson of Rudolph of Hapsburg, who had
cian, and worked out the laws of perspective (so been Emperor a century and a half earlier. Albert
essential for realistic art). became Emperor Albert II, and was the fourth
Hapsburg to serve as Emperor. There was never,
after this, an Emperor who was not a Hapsburg.
VENICE Albert II died in 1438, and was succeeded by
Venice was now
beginning to fight the Ottoman his second cousin, who reigned as Frederick III
Turks. In 1423, the Venetians bought Thessalon- (1415-1493). He was the last Emperor to be
ica, in northwestern Greece, from the Byzantine crowned by the Pope, six and a half centuries
Empire, but in 1430, lost it to the Turks. after the first such crowning of Charlemagne.
At this time, though, Venice defeated Milan Since the Holy Roman Empire was, in itself, a
and took over a sizable section of northeastern cipher, and since the Emperors were henceforth
Italy, a region which be known as "Ve-
came to drawn entirely from the Hapsburgs of Austria,
netia." This addition to Venice's territory was not we will consider later events in the Holy Roman
entirely a blessing. It involved her in land wars Empire under the heading of "Austria," and in-
in Italy and prevented her from exerting her full clude other headings where significant events in
effort against the Turks. the Empire involve sections other than Austria.
In 1403, Venice imposed a waiting period on Even though the Holy Roman Empire was
1400 TO 1450 195
moribund politically, the life of the mind contin- those who

followed his teachings, were outraged
ued to shine brightly there. and, by 1419, they had risen in rebellion, and
Nicholas of Cusa (1401—1464) was a German there followed the "Hussite wars."
scholar and ecclesiastic with astonishingly mod- Outstanding on the Hussite side was John
ern ideas. He held that the Earth turned on its Zizka (1376-1424), who developed the use of
axis and moved around the Sun; that space was wagons with armored sides, and holes through
infinite, and were other suns with
that the stars which small cannon could be aimed. When Zizka
planets circling them; that plants drew suste- found a good position for battle, he placed his
nance from the air; that the behavior of the pulse wagons in a circle and, when the enemy at-
was a valuable diagnostic device. Until then, tacked, he fired his cannon. He had invented a
spectacles were used only with convex lenses to kind of primitive system of tanks.
correct for far-sightedness. Nicholas of Cusa was Zizka's cannon drove back the enemy (who
the first to make them with concave lenses for usuallyoutnumbered him greatly). His pikemen
near-sighted people. Far from getting into trou- and cavalry would then charge and Zizka won
ble for his unusual views, Nicholas of Cusa was every battle he fought with the Imperials.
made a cardinal in 1448. Zizka died in 1424 of the plague. The Hussites
The Austrian mathematician and astronomer, continued to win victories, however, using his
Georg von Peurbach (1423-1461), made use of tactics, but then they fell out among themselves.
Arabic numerals in preparing a new table of Zizka's followers were extremists who fought
planetary motions. He clung rigidly, however, to against the moderate Hussites as well as against
the Earth-centered astronomy of the ancient the Imperial forces.
Greeks. By were quieting down. Though
1450, things
Hussites remained in existence, the great days of
victories were gone and there were only sputter-
BOHEMIA ings. A Bohemian named George of Podebrady
When Sigismund forced the Council of Con- (1420-1471) seized Prague in 1448 and was the
stance on an unwilling Church, he saw it not effective ruler of the land. He was a moderate
only as a means of enforcing Papal unity on west- Hussite and he labored to bring about a reconcil-
ern Christendom, but on ending various heresies iation between the Hussites and the Catholics.
that were troubling the Church. The one that was
most bothersome in his own dominions was the
Wyclif-like teachings of Jan Hus, who wanted a POLAND
simpler, more virtuous church. He was getting Jagiello (Wladyslaw II), who now ruled over Po-
into more and more trouble with the church hi- land-Lithuania, turned against the Teutonic
erarchy and becoming more and more popular Knights. Included in the army he mustered was
with the Bohemian people (who were also be- a Bohemian contingent under John Zizka, who
coming more aware of the fact that they were was later to achieve so much in the Hussite wars.
Slavic, and not German). There were also contingents from the Russian
Sigismund invited Jan Hus to attend the coun- principalities and even from the Tatars.
cil where he might discuss his views. Hus felt On July 15, 1410, battle was joined at Tannen-
that would be suicidal behavior, so Sigismund berg, just south of the Teutonic Knights' territory
gave him a safe-conduct. Therefore, Hus at- in Prussia, and there the Knights were badly de-
tended the Council, was questioned and cross- feated. Wladyslaw II followed it up by devastat-
questioned repeatedly, was placed in prison and, ing raids into Prussia, but he had to desist
finally,on July 6, 1415, despite his safe-conduct, because the unruly Polish nobility (there was no
was burned at the stake. other kind) were making trouble in his rear. In
It was a mistake. Hus, dead, was more pow- 1411, a peace treaty was signed in which the Teu-
erful than Hus, alive. The Hussites of Bohemia, tonic Knights gave up Samogita (the modern
Lithuania) but nothing more. From this time on, The respite was
strophic defeat in Asia Minor.
though, the Knights were no longer an expansive only temporary and the Emperors continued to
force. try desperately to get help.
The Emperor, John VIII (1390-1448), who had
gained the throne in 1425, traveled to Italy and
HUNGARY attended the Council of Florence in 1439. Once
again, he offered to heal the schism between
At this time, Hungary fulfilled its role as Chris-
eastern and western Christianity and to accept
tian bulwark against the Turks, thanks largely to
Papal primacy. Again, it was no use. The Byzan-
one man, Janos Hunyadi (1407-1456).
tine people simply wouldn't accept the Pope.
Distrusting feudal levees as disorderly and
undisciplined, Hunyadi set about training a reg-
They would rather have the Turks.
In 1450, the Turks were advancing on Con-
ular army he could rely on. With that, in the
stantinople again, and it didn't look as though a
1440s, he attacked the Turks and almost drove
them out of the Balkans, in what is sometimes second miracle would take place.
described as "the last Crusade."
The climax came in 1444, when Hunyadi ad-
vanced through Bulgaria. The Venetian fleet had
MONGOLS
agreed to go to the Dardanelles to keep the Turks Tamerlane invaded Syria in 1400 and there he
from shipping reinforcements into the Balkans. met the Mamluks of Egypt who, nearly a century
The Venetian fleet, however, didn't get to the and a half earlier, had inflicted the first defeat on
the Mongols. This time, though, that did not
Dardanelles, so a large Turkish army moved into
Bulgaria. At Varna on the Black Sea, on Novem-
happen. Tamerlane destroyed them and took Da-
ber 10, 1444, the Turks completely defeated Hun- mascus.
yadi's troops.
He then marched into Asia Minor. Bayezid I,
This meant that the Turks stayed in the Bal- the Turkish ruler, was forced to abandon the
kans, but Hunyadi had managed at least to keep siege of Constantinople that he had been press-
them balance and to win precious time for
off
ing, in order to meet the new danger from the
east. The Battle of Angora in central Asia Minor
central Europe.
was fought on July 28, 1402, and once again Tam-
erlane won completely. He
captured Bayezid
himself and never released him.
ALBANIA
Then, in 1405, Tamerlane decided to rebuild
Albania (the ancient Epirus) suddenly experi-
the Mongol Empire by conquering China, but he
enced a short, bright moment in history at this
died on his way eastward. His Empire at once
time. George Kastrioti (1405-1468), an Albanian,
fell apart, though fragments remained under
was, in his younger days, a hostage to the Turks
some of his descendants.
and turned Muslim. Later, he returned to Al-
A grandson of Tamerlane, Ulugh Beg (1394-
bania, became Christian again, and, beginning in
1449), ruled at Samarkand, in what is now Uz-
1444, held off the Turks and kept Albania vir-
bekistan, and which had been Tamerlane's capi-
tually independent. He was known as "Skander-
tal. He succeeded to the throne in 1447.
beg" ("Lord Alexander") to the Albanians, who
His real fame was in astronomy, however. He
made him their national hero.
founded a university in Samarkand in 1420 and
built an astronomical observatory in 1424 that
was the best in the world at that time. His work,
BYZANTINE EMPIRE however, was completely unknown in western
Constantinople had been saved from the Turkish Europe and did not influence scientific develop-
siege that seemed certain to succeed in 1400, only ment there. He was assassinated by his son in
because the Turks suffered an unexpected cata- 1449, and Mongol astronomy died with him.
1400 TO 1450 197
Yung-lo, however, died in 1424, and the new

OTTOMAN EMPIRE Emperor was not interested in sea-voyages.
The Ottoman Empire was all but shattered by Cheng Ho may have died about 1433 and the
Tamerlane. Tamerlane had divided Asia Minor voyaging stopped.
among three of Bayezid's sons, to keep the Turks It is an odd coincidence of history that China
fighting among themselves. One of them, on the Pacific Ocean and Portugal on the Atlantic
Mehmed (d. 1421), won out over the others, re- Ocean both began a period of exploration at
stored the Empire to unity, and by 1413 was nearly the same time. China combed the Indian
reigning as Mehmed I the Restorer. Ocean and reached the east coast of Africa, while
Murad became Sultan in 1421, but the Otto-
II
Portugal crept down the west coast of Africa.
man weakening that had followed Tamerlane's If were considered a race, one would have
this
invasion was still apparent. When Murad II been forced to bet on China. China had a popu-
turned his attention to the Balkans, he was lation of perhaps 85 million and Portugal had 1
forced to fall back before Janos Hunyadi and million. China had more and better ships, a
Skanderbeg. However, the Battle of Varna re- somewhat earlier start, and made far more
stored his position to a great extent and, once sweeping trips. China was, in addition, the most
again, the Turks could look toward their inter- technologically advanced country in the world at
rupted campaign against Constantinople. this time.
But what Portugal had that China didn't have
was the will to explore. That was why, in the
CHINA end, when the two nations met at last, it was on
In this period, Chinese admiral, Cheng Ho
a Ihe Chinese coast and not on the Portuguese
(who was a eunuch and the first one of his kind coast.
to distinguish himself since Narses of the East Yet Cheng Ho's voyages weren't a total loss,
Roman Empire, nearly nine centuries before), either. They facilitated Chinese penetration into
conducted a series of seven naval expeditions southeast Asia, both culturally and in the way of
under the Emperor Yung-lo, who wanted to ex- emigration, and did encourage trade.
tend China's sea-trade.
In 1405, Cheng Ho set forth with 300 ships
and 27,000 men and visited Southeast Asia, In- JAPAN
donesia, and Ceylon. The "Noh" drama was becoming popular among
On his second voyage in 1409, he returned to the intellectual classes at this time.
Ceylon and there got into a battle with the Cey-
lonese, defeated them, and brought their king
back to Nanking as a captive. SOUTH AMERICA
A third voyage, in 1411, took him as far as the The Incas were establishing an empire in the An-
Persian Gulf. On his fourth voyage, he returned dean area of Peru, one which grew to have a
to the Persian Gulf, then moved on to the Red population of 12 million people. They had a well-
Sea, visiting Mecca and Egypt. On his last three developed civilization, but they never developed
voyages, he revisited many of these places. writing.
1450 to 1500
up was not easy at first, for
the Balkans. That
OTTOMAN EMPIRE Janos Hunyadi managed to win one last victory
The Ottoman Empire had now entirely recovered in 1456 and drove him away from Belgrade.
from defeat at the hands of Tamerlane, and was However, Hunyadi died soon after, and, in 1468,
undoubtedly the most powerful nation in Eu- so did Skanderbeg, and after that there was no
rope. one to dispute the Balkans with Mehmed.
In 1451, Mehmed II the Conqueror (1432- There were still remants of Greek-ruled and
1481) succeeded to the throne on the death of Western-ruled land. Southern Greece, including
Murad II. It was his intention, immediately, to Athens, was gathered up by Mehmed by 1460,
go on with the long-delayed business of taking and the Empire of Trebizond, the very last di-
Constantinople. luted remnant of the Roman Empire, was taken
In that city, Constantine XI (1404-1453) had in 1461. Mehmed then took various Greek is-
become Emperor in 1448. He was still "Roman lands that the Venetians had ruled for two and a
Emperor," but his Empire consisted of the de- half centuries, including Euboea.
cayed city and a few remnants here and there. The only holdout was the island of Rhodes,
He was a capable ruler who would have done which was defended by the Knights of St. John,
very well four centuries earlier, but now could a western group that had originated during the
only have the privilege of dying with his Empire. Crusades and that had held Rhodes for over a
Mehmed II surrounded Constaninople with century and a half.
overwhelming forces, perhaps up to 150,000 Mehmed even took Otranto on the Italian
men, against only 10,000 that Constantine could heel, just across the strait from Albania, on Au-
oppose him with. All that Constantinople had gust 11, 1480, but the next year he died. Mehmed
was its enormous Those walls had resisted
walls. was succeeded by his son, Bayezid II (1447-
all assaulters for a thousand years (the crusaders, 1512), who was not a warlike monarch. He with-
who had taken Constanople two and a half cen- drew the Turkish outpost in Otranto, feeling it
turies earlier, had done so from within the walls). would cost too much to defend.
Against those wall, however, Mehmed II had
brought huge cannons that were the best artillery
in Europe.
The siege began on April 6, 1453 and, by May PORTUGAL
29, the walls had been battered down. The Turks Despite the Ottoman strength and victories, the
entered and Constantine XI died, fighting to the real cutting edge of Europe lay with Portugal.
last. After the discovery of Cape Verde, the African
end of the West Roman Empire
Just as the coast trended southeastward, and the feeling
nearly a thousand years earlier is taken as the was that thehump of Africa had been passed and
end of ancient times and the beginning of the that the ships would now be heading for the In-
Middle Ages, so the end of the last remnant of dies. And, indeed, by 1470, they had reached a
the East Roman Empire is often taken as the end part of the African coast that led them due east-
of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modern ward. They hastened onward, and, in 1472, the
times. navigator, Fernando Po, discovered the island
Mehmed made Constantinople the capital of
II that bears his name. That island was something
the Ottoman Empire (its name eventually coming like 1300 miles east of Portugal, and the naviga-
to be "Istanbul"), and then proceeded to clean tors were clearly well on the way to the Indies.
1450 TO 1500 199
But then the African coast turned southward then merely a religion of one rather small corner
once more and showed no signs of turning east of the world, spread their influence worldwide.
again. For a while, the Portuguese were dis-
heartened and the attempt to reach the Indies
languished.
In 1481, however, John IIthe Perfect (1455- CASTILE/ARAGON
1495), a grandnephew of Henry the Navigator, Castile was in a state of
semi-anarchy at the be-
came Portuguese throne. He was an ener-
to the
ginning of this period and this was at its worst
getic king, perhaps the greatest in Portuguese
during the reign of Henry IV (1425-1474), who
history, and he urged the navigators to go on.
became king in 1454. Henry IV had no sons,
They did so, following the African coast south- but when he died in 1474, he had a daughter,
ward for 1600 miles past Fernando Po. Joan, who was married to Afonso V of Portugal
Then, in 1487, a Portuguese navigator, Bartho- (1432-1481). He also had a half-sister, Isabella
lomeu Dias (1450-1500), traveled farther south (1451-1504), who was married to Ferdinand
than any of his predecessors when a severe
(1452-1516), the son of John Aragon (1397-
II of
storm struck and drove him still farther south. 1479). Castile had to choose between two prin-
When the storm lifted, he found himself in the cesses, each of whom was married to someone
open sea with no sign of land anywhere. He who was a foreign king, or who would soon be a
sailed eastward —
and struck nothing. He then foreign king.
turned northward to retrace his route and on Castile chose Isabella,and she became Isabella
February 3, 1488, he reached land, but the coast I of Castile. When John II of Aragon
died in 1479,
was running east and west. Somewhere the Isabella's husband became Ferdinand II of Ara-
southerly trendmust have ended and the coast gon.
—
must have turned eastward and he had missed Castile and Aragon were united only through
the turning point in the storm. being ruled by Ferdinand and Isabella. Each re-
He turned west and found the turning point. tained its own laws and customs, but they never
He called it 'The Cape of Storms" and returned separated again, and after this time, the two to-
to Portugal with the report. John II changed the
gether were considered to be a united nation
name "The Cape of Good Hope," but died in
to named Spain. It will be referred to as so from this
1495, and didn't live to see the "good hope" re- point.
alized. The combination strengthened each, and the
He was succeeded by Manuel I the Fortunate fact was that both Isabella and Ferdinand were
(1469-1521), who pressed ahead even more vig- very capable monarchs and worked well to-
orously. On July 8, 1497, Vasco da Gama (1460- gether, so that Spain rapidly grew in power. The
1524) left Portugal with four ships. He rounded Spanish monarchs reached an agreement with
the Cape of Good Hope and actually reached Cal- the Pope in 1482 that left them very much the
icut in India on May 22, 1498. He finally returned masters of the Spanish Church.
to Portugal at the end of August 1499, with a Meanwhile, the notorious Spanish Inquisition
huge load of spices. (He had also lost more than was set up, also under royal control, and it
half of his men to scurvy, which now became the helped make sure that Spaniards wouldn't have
scourge of long ocean voyages, during which dangerous thoughts. The first and most noto-
food consisted of items such as hard tack and salt rious Grand Inquisitor was a Dominican monk,
pork, with little chance of vegetables, fruit, or Tomas de Torquemada (1420-1498), appointed in
fresh meat.) 1487. His name has become synonymous with
After 80 years of trying, Portugal had indeed cruelty and repression.
bypassed the Turks, and this began the process The monarchs then set about unifying the rest
whereby Europe, till then merely a peninsula off of the peninsula. Granada, the small Muslim
the western side of Asia, and Christianity, till monarchy in the extreme south of Spain, all that
was left of the old Moorish domination of the had no good records of the Viking explorations
land, was the obvious target. of five centuries earlier.
It took 11 years, for the Muslims fought When John II refused funds on these grounds,
fiercely, and, in the course of the campaign, the Columbus tried Spain. Spain was at first reluc-
Spanish army developed the discipline and tant, but once Granada had fallen, Ferdinand and
professionalism that made it the finest in Chris- Isabella were in a festive mood and felt they
tianEurope. Finally, on January 2, 1492, Granada could risk a small sum, especially if that would
surrendered, and after nearly eight centuries not forestall Portugal (of whom they were under-
one acre of Spain remained under Muslim con- standably envious) in reaching the Indies.
trol. Therefore, Ferdinand and Isabella supplied
Spain then, at Torquemada's insistence, ex- Columbus with and allowed
three small ships
pelled the Jews, as England and France had done him a crew of convicts who were willing to
before them, in order to get rid of another alien chance the voyage for the privilege of being re-
presence, and another source of unauthorized leased from jail. On August 3, 1492, Columbus
thought. Portugal, under Spanish pressure, then sailed off westward.
expelled its Whereas the Jews of
Jews in 1496. Seven weeks later, across unbroken seas, but,
England and France traveled to Germany and Po- fortunately, without experiencing storms, the
land to become the ''Ashkenazim;” the Jews of ships reached land. It was not the Indies, as Co-
Spain and Portugal traveled to the Muslim lands lumbus believed it was to his dying day, but one
of Africa and Asia to become the "Sephardim.” of the islands of the Bahamas. He explored other
Meanwhile, a Genoese navigator, best-known islands, left some men to settle on one of them,
to us by his Latinized name of Christopher Co- and headed back home. When he passed Portu-
lumbus (1451-1506) had come to Spain. gal, the magnanimous John II greeted him with
He thought it wasteful to try to reach the In- warm ceremony, and he reached his home port
dies by sailing around Africa. By studying the old in Spain on March 13, 1493.
Greek geographies, he decided that the Earth The result of the discovery meant, among
had a circumference of only 18,000 miles (instead many other things, a grand intermingling of bi-
of the actual 25,000). By studying Marco Polo, he ology that began at once. Columbus brought
thought Asia extended considerably farther east horses to the new continent, and brought back
than it did. Therefore, he thought sailing west- pineapples to Europe.
ward across the Atlantic Ocean should bring By the year 1500, Columbus had made two
ships to the Far East in a mere 3000 miles, a voy- more voyages. In the course of the third, in 1498,
age much shorter than sailing around Africa. he sighted the coast of what we now call South
Of course, in circumnavigating Africa, one America, south of the island of Trinidad.
could hug the coast and set up depots on land The Portuguese shared in these early Ameri-
for rest and resupply, whereas Columbus's route can discoveries. A Portuguese navigator, Pedro
would involve unbroken ocean travel, so that, Alvares Cabral (1468-1520), circling the bulge of
even if shorter, it would surely be much more Africa, circled toowide and, on April 22, 1500,
difficult and dangerous. encountered the westernmost bulge of South
The Portuguese geographers (then the best in America, which we now call Brazil.
the world) pointed this out when Columbus ap- Thus, by 1500, Portugal had reached India,
plied to John II of Portugal for funds. They were and Spain had reached the American continents.
also quite sure that Asiawas much farther off to Europe, without knowing it, had embarked on
the west (they were right!) and that trying to sail its conquest of the world. For this reason, Co-
that distance across open water, instead of going lumbus's voyage in 1492, rather than the fall of
around Africa and hugging the coast, was suici- Constantinople in 1453, is sometimes considered
dal. They didn't, however, count on the presence the beginning of modern times.
of unknown continents en route. After all, they There was, of course, danger that Portugal
1450 TO 1500 201
and Spain might battle over the new lands their

Charles VII, the despised Dauphin in the days
ships had reached and, to avoid that. Pope Alex-
before Joan of Arc, had become the king who
ander VI (1431-1503), a Spaniard by birth and
ousted the English (he was known as "Charles
therefore particularly interested in the matter, the Well-Served"). He died in 1461, and his son
drew a line from the North Pole to the South Pole became king as Louis XI (1423-1483).
down the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. All non-
Louis XI was not a martial king, but he was a
Christian lands to the east of the line were to be
practical one. In 1464,
he founded a postal ser-
Portuguese, and non-Christian lands to the
all vice that was the forerunner of such things in
west were to be Spanish. The next year, Spain Europe generally. He was also a shrewd king, at
and Portugal agreed to move the line a bit to
the west to give Portugal enough room to circle
his best in diplomacy — in the crucial bribe at the
rightmoment, in the clever lie. The long ordeal
the African bulge, and the new line cut through
of France had left its higher nobles virtually
the South American bulge, which Cabral was independent of the king and Louis had to
soon to discover, so that Portugal had that bulge bring them down. This he did, slowly, in his
both by agreement and by discovery. own way.
It has always been customary for
conquering The more important of the recalcitrant nobles
nations to disregard the rights of the nations they were, of course, the Dukes of Burgundy, who*
conquered, but the “Line of Demarcation" was had sided with the English in the time of Henry
the first time when such disregard was officially V, a half-century earlier.Burgundy was the rich-
applied to the entire non-Christian world. It was est and most civilized land in Europe and, under
a sign of Europe's vaulting ambition, and of its
Philip the Good, it continued to be more power-
calm assumption that non-Christians (and Chris- ful than France. Philip the Good died in 1467
and
tian heretics, for that matter) had no human his son, Charles (1433-1477), became Duke of
rights.
Burgundy. This Duke is usually referred to as
Charles the Bold, though he is often called
Charles the Rash.
FRANCE Charles the Rash, a third cousin of Louis XI
In 1450, England stillheld portions of the south- (both were great-great-grandsons of John II of
west coast, the last bit of the land which Henry France, who had been taken prisoner at the battle
II had obtained when he married Eleanor of of Poitiers more than a century earlier), was
Aquitaine, just three centuries earlier. short-tempered, hasty, and favored action over
An English army landed near Bordeaux in Oc- thought— the precise opposite of Louis XL What
tober, 1452, under John Talbot, Earl of Shrews- Charles wanted was to make Burgundy an inde-
bury (1384-1453), the last of the great English pendent nation and himself a king. What Louis
generals of the Hundred Years War. It was even- wanted was to make Burgundy a part of France
tually met by the French army with its artillery. and make its dukes servants of the French mon-
At the Battle of Castillon, east of
Bordeaux, on archy.
July 17, 1453, the English were totally defeated For a while, it was Charles who had the upper
and Talbot was killed. The Hundred Years War hand. He extended and strengthened his realm,
was over (after 116 years, actually, though there roared through French territories, and even took
were long stretches in which there was little Louis prisoner at one time. In 1473, he seemed
fighting). The only thing that England had on the point of receiving his longed-for kingship
gained from all that fighting was the city of Ca- from the Holy Roman Emperor. Louis, however,
lais,which remained English. patiently worked away in his own sly fashion,
The Hundred Years War, having ended in winning over Charles's allies to his own side and
1453, is another reason for those who want to raising new adversaries to him. When Charles,
consider that year as the beginning of modern in his efforts at
expansion, decided to take over
times. the Swiss cantons, Louis saw to it that the Swiss
were supplied with the money they needed to sance to France, but it also started the process
resist. whereby the Renaissance was killed in Italy.
Charles acted with typical rashness. In 1476,
he captured a Swiss position, and, in a moment
of rage, hanged all the Swiss he had taken pris-
ENGLAND
oner. This, naturally, infuriated the Swiss be- Frustrated by the defeat in France, and given lee-
yond any possibility of forgiveness. way by Henry VI, the English

the incapacity of
The Swiss had pikemen, whereas the Burgun- nobles fought each other, and the members of
dians had cavalry and artillery. The Swiss, how- the royal family engaged in dynastic squabbling,
ever, had a way of marching onto a field and to the detriment of prosperity generally.
beginning to fight at once even as they reached In 1450, there was a brief rebellion of small
the Three times, they caught the Burgundi-
site. farmers from southeastern England, led by one
ans and defeated them before the latter could get Jack Cade (d. 1450). It was quickly crushed. In
their artillery and horsemen into play. In the 1455, however, the War of the Roses began and
third battle, at Nancy in the Burgundian terri- that was not so easily handled.
tory, on January 5, 1477, Charles was killed. On one side of the war was mad and feeble
Charles left, as his only heir, a daughter, Mary King Henry VI and his forceful wife, Margaret of
of Burgundy (1457-1482), and his realm fell Anjou (1430-1482). They, and those who fol-
apart. The Netherlands remained true to his lowed them, were the Lancastrians, and their
daughter and they were the richest part of the symbol was a red rose. On the other side was
duchy. Most of the rest, however, was gathered Richard, Duke of York, and his followers, who
up by Louis XI. were the Yorkists and whose symbol was a white
During the time of Louis XI and Charles the rose. It is for this reason that the civil war be-
Rash, Francois Villon (1431-1465) was the out- tween the two factions is known as the War of
standing poet. He was a rogue and a thief but the Roses.
posterity remembers only his lyrics. His best re- Richard of York was killed in the course of the
membered work is 'The Ballade of the Ladies of various battles that followed, with ups and
Bygone Times," with the refrain "But where are downs for both houses. Finally, however, the
snows of yesteryear?" Yorkists gained the upper hand and Richard's
Louis XI died in 1483, and his son ruled as son was accepted as king in 1461, ruling as Ed-
Charles VIII (1470-1498). The Duke of Brittany ward IV (1442-1483).
died in 1488, and left only a daughter, Anne of That by no means ended the civil war. Discon-
Brittany (1477-1514), as heir. Charles VIII mar- tent with Edward was as sharp as with Henry,
ried her so that he might absorb Brittany into the and Louis XI of France shrewdly fomented that
French kingdom and then wandered off into Italy discontent and supported anyone who would
in 1494 on a fool's errand, trying to annex Naples continue the war, since it was quite obvious that
which he claimed he had inherited. an England occupied with civil war would not
He and died in 1498, leaving no direct
failed, bother France.
heirs. The kingdom went to his second cousin, On May 3, 1471, however, Edward IV won the
once removed, who reigned as Louis XII (1462- Battle of Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire. In the
1515). Louis XII was the son of Charles of Orle- battle, Henry VTs son was killed. Henry VI, him-
ans who was captured at the Battle of Agincourt, self, was taken prisoner and was quietly killed
three fourths of a century earlier. Louis XII di- shortly therafter. The Lancastrians were now all
vorced his wife to marry Anne of Brittanyand to either dead or in exile, and Edward IV was safe
keep the duchy in the family. He, too, then grew on his throne.
entangled in Italy. Edward IV died in 1483, however, and disor-
The Italian adventure helped bring the Renais- ders began at once. He left as his heir his oldest
1450 TO 1500 203
son, 12 years old, who was Edward V (1470- moved, so that the throne became truly stable for
1483), and
younger son, Richard of York. As
a the time since the death of
first Edward III, a
regent, there was Edward IV's younger brother,
century and a quarter earlier.
Richard of Gloucester (1452-1485). He was an Henry VII made one move to participate in the
able soldier, honest and popular. (Shakespeare,
excitement of the new age of exploration. In
in his play Richard 111, drew a completely
false 1497, he sent out an Italian navigator, Giovanni
picture of the king, in line with the political real-
Caboto (1450-1499), better known by the English
ities of his time.)
version of his name, John Cabot, to explore west-
Foreseeing trouble, and knowing that Edward ward. In two expeditions, the second with his
IV's marriage to Elizabeth Woodville (1437-
son Sebastian Cabot (1475-1557) in 1498, the
1492), the mother of the children, had been irreg- coasts ofwhat are now called Newfoundland,
ular since he had been betrothed to someone else Nova Scotia, and New England were explored.
at the time,Richard of Gloucester had no trouble He was the first European (if we exclude the Vi-
having the children set aside and having himself kings whose discoveries never became known to
crowned as Richard III. Europeans generally at the time) actually to
Yet the dynastic problems continued, espe- touch the coast of North America.
cially when the royal children were heard of
no The discoveries were not followed up, but the
more and it was rumored that Richard III had time was to come when England would base her
had them killed. The only Lancastrian remaining claims to North America on these voyages.
was Henry Tudor of Richmond (1457-1509), who The best-known piece of English writing in
was descended on his mother's side from John of this period was Morte d' Arthur, finished about
Gaunt and who was a half-second-cousin of 1470 by Thomas Malory, which gave us the leg-
Henry VI. Louis XI helped Henry Tudor on his ends of King Arthur and his Knights of the
usual trouble-making principle and, at the crucial Round Table, much as we know them today.
time, Richard III was abandoned by several of John Skelton (1460-1528) was the most important
those who were supposed to be fighting on his English satirist of the day, lampooning court life
side. in the time of Henry VII and his successor.
At the Battle of Bosworth in central England, Important in the technological side of litera-
on August 22, 1485, Richard III was defeated and ture was the work of William Caxton (1422-
killed, and Henry Tudor became king as Henry
1491), who
brought the German invention of
VII. He married Elizabeth (1465-1503), the printing with movable type to England, where
daughter of Edward IV, so that his heir would the printed material appeared in 1476. Cax-
first
combine the houses of Lancaster and York. With ton printed Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and Ma-
that, the Wars of the Roses was over. lory's Morte d' Arthur in 1485.
The chief result of the Wars of the Roses was
that it most of the ancient nobility of
killed off
the kingdom and left the king that much more SCOTLAND
powerful. Henry VII and his immediate succes- James died in 1460 and was succeeded by his
II
sors were virtually absolute, and Parliament, 8-year-old son, James III (1452-1488). The new
which had grown quite powerful when money reign was a crazy-quilt of feudal disorder, as dif-
was needed for the wars in France, was now ferent noblemen sought to control the King and
completely cowed and was under the royal the country. Finally, James fled to England, ob-
thumb. tained the help of Edward IV, and, with English
Henry VII was a cautious, miserly monarch help, was seated on the throne, but was assassi-
who kept England at peace and avoided reckless nated in 1488.
expenditures. He saw to it that all possible claim- He was succeeded by his 15-year-old son, who
ants to the throne, real or pretended, were re- reigned as James IV (1473-1513).
Savonarola denounced Alexander VI and per-

IRELAND sauded many people to join his movement. The
In 1494, England tightened its hold on Ireland, artistocrats, the well-to-do, and the higher clergy
setting up rules to the effect that no Irish parlia- all turned against him at last, because he made
ment could meet or pass laws without the con- life too uncomfortable for them. He was even-
sent of the English king, and that all laws passed tually tried for heresy, convicted after torture,
by the English Parliament should hold in Ireland then finally hanged and burned on May 23, 1498.
as well.
NAPLES
PAPACY
In this period, Naples and Sicily were ruled by
The Popes of this period lived comfortable lives,
Ferdinand I (1423-1494), who was of the royal
not very austere, and were chiefly interested in
line of Aragon, being an illegitimate son of Al-
nepotism (from the Latin word for "nephew").
fonso V of Aragon. Ferdinand I died in 1494,
That is, they made sure they enriched their
without direct heirs, although Ferdinand II of Ar-
"nephews" (which often meant their illegitimate
agon was his first cousin (and brother-in-law)
sons) and their families generally.
and might have inherited.
They also involved themselves more or less
However, Charles VIII of France, was a great-
deeply in the feuds of the various Italian city-
grandson of Louis of Anjou, who had called him-
states, as did, notably, Sixtus IV (1414-1484),
self Louis II of Naples, though he had never
who became Pope in 1471. Some also took pains managed actually to rule the land. Charles used
to beautify Rome, which had sunk very low dur-
this to claim the throne of Naples after Ferdi-
ing the Avignonese period. Again, this was true,
nand's death, and he marched into Italy in 1494.
notably of Sixtus IV, who was responsible for the
This was the beginning of troubles for Italy.
"Sistine Chapel."
The first known cases of the disease we now
The loss Constantinople to the Turks
of
call syphilis army while it was
struck the French
caused all the Popes of the period to try to preach
in Naples, and it spread widely through Europe
crusades, but this fell flat every time. The mania
thereafter. Some of Columbus's crew were there,
for crusades had passed. It was a period when
too, and the suggestion has been made that the
monarchs were interested in preserving their
disease was picked up in America and brought
own realms and robbing, if they could, those of
back to Europe. However, the disease called
their neighbors. Distant Palestine now held no
"leprosy" in the Middle Ages, which seems to
interest to them.
have become rare afterword, may have actually
More influential, for a time, than any of these
been syphilis, so perhaps it was a new name, not
Popes was a Dominican friar, Girolamo Savona-
a new disease, that came in as the 1400s ended.
rola (1452-1498), who was a passionate reformer.
He bitterly denounced the semipagan life-style of
the Popes and higher clergy. He also denounced
the materialistic, humanistic, consumer-oriented
FLORENCE
lives of the citizens generally. Cosimo de Medici died in 1464 and his son, Piero
In Alexander VI (1431-1503) became
1492, the Gouty (1414-1469), took his place, but he was
Pope. Of Spanish birth, he was the Pope who set practically an invalid and he died after ruling for
up the Line of Demarcation, dividing the world five years.
between Spain and Portugal. He was the most Under his Lorenzo de Medici (1449-
son,
notorious of the Popes, a byword for his luxury 1492), better known as "Lorenzo the Magnifi-
and nepotism (though probably the stories are cent," Florence reached its peak.
exaggerated, as they almost always are, in these Florentine artists of the period include Fra An-
cases). gelico (1400-1455); Filippo Lippi (1406-1469); his
1450 TO 1500 205
son and namesake, Filippino Lippi (1457-1504);

less had its Prominent among the
artists, too.
and Sandro Botticelli (1445-1510).
Venetian artists of the time were Jacopo Bellini
The most astonishing Renaissance man of all
(1400-1470) and his two sons, Gentile Bellini
time, however, was Leonardo da Vinci (1452-
(1429-1507) and Giovanni Bellini (1430-1516).
1519). His ''Last Supper" fresco was completed
around 1497 and his "Mona Lisa," perhaps the
greatest of all paintings, within the next decade. AUSTRIA
In addition, he was who de-
a first-rate scientist Frederick of Austria was Emperor Frederick III of
signed parachutes and elevators, speculated on the Holy Roman Empire at this time, but the Em-
aircraft, and studied the flight of birds and
the pire was so feeble that it had to fear Burgundy, a
swimming of fish. He also studied the muscles mere dukedom. When it seemed that Charles the
and bones of human beings, dissecting some 30 Rash of Burgundy was intent on forcing a royal
cadavers, and speculated usefully on falling
titleout of the Emperor, Frederick was so
bodies, the structure of the earth, and the nature frightened at the possible consequences that he
of fossils.
literally fled their
conference at night.
Unfortunately, he kept his ideas to himself, Once Charles died at Nancy, however, Fred-
writing them in code in voluminous notebooks
erick was quick to arrange a marriage between
thatwere not published until 1898. On the other Charles's daughter, Mary, and his own son,
hand, by keeping quiet, he stayed out of trouble. Maximilian (1459-1519). This did not enable him
business activity was helped along by
Italian
to gather in all of
Burgundy, for Louis XI rapidly
the mathematician, Luca Pacioli (1445-1517),
rounded up much of it. However, the rich Neth-
who was born in Florentine territory and who erlands remained with Mary and, therefore,
invented double-entry bookkeeping. came be Maximilian's, as did a section just
to
west of Switzerland called "Tranche Comte"
("Free Country" of Burgundy).
MILAN In this way, Frederick began Austria's pol-
III
Milan also had a golden age at icy of gathering in additional territory, not
this time. Ludov- by
Moro military conquest, but by marriage.
ico il (1452-1508) became Duke of Milan in
1481 and encouragedand literature. He was a
art was not willing to have the
Naturally, France
particular patron of Leonardo de Vinci. How- Netherlands and Tranche Comte become Aus-
trian. However, Maximilian defeated the
ever, the French invasion put an end to that and, French
by 1500, Ludovico was a prisoner of the French at the Battle of Guinegate, south of Calais, on
(and died in that condition) while Milan itself August 7, and that settled that.
1479,
was, at least temporarily, controlled by France. When Mary of Burgundy died in 1482, the
Netherlands no longer wanted to be ruled by an
Austrian without their own Queen, but Maximi-
lian managed to retain control even so. In
VENICE when Frederick III died, Maximilian became
1493,
Venice fought the Turks at this time, but was far Holy Roman Emperor as Maximilian I.
outweighed by the mighty Ottoman Empire. None of Frederick Ill's policies had strength-
Venice lost almost all her winnings of the Fourth ened the Empire, incidentally; they strengthened
Crusade, but her holding in Italy reached its only Austria.
maximum extent when
she acquired some fur- The Netherlands continued produce impor-
to
ther territory after beating the city-state of Fer- by the way, such as Roger van der
tant artists,
rara. In the eastern Mediterranean Sea, Venice Weyden (1399-1464) and Hieronymus Bosch
retained the island of Crete and, in 1489, it ac- (1450-1516). The latter was particularly well-
tually acquired the island of Cyprus in addition. known for his paintings of imaginative monstros-
Primarily a commercial city, Venice neverthe- ities.
Much more important to the world than any- was soon to come, could very likely not have
thing that Frederick III, or any monarch, did in emerged without printing.
this period, was the accomplishment at Mainz (in Printing utterly changed the world and it
the central regions of the Empire) of a German (along with the fall of Constantinople, the end of
inventor,Johann Gutenberg (1400-1468). the Hundred Years War, and the discovery of the
Gutenberg worked out the technique of print- —
American continents all of which took place in
ing by the use of movable type. The same type, this period) marks the transition from medieval
representing various letters, could be arranged to modern times. Printing, one must surely sus-
and rearranged indefinitely and used to print up pect, was the most fundamental of these
any number of books much more rapidly than changes.
they could be copied by hand. Moreover, if the Printing made itself felt in science at once, by
printing was correct, any number of copies could the way. The outstanding astronomer of the pe-
be made that were free of error. riod was the German scholar, Johann Muller
The Chinese had this notion before the Euro- (1436-1476), who called himself “Regiomon-
peans did, and the news of it may have reached tanus." He produced a table of planetary mo-
Europe in Mongolian times. The point is, tions and had it printed, so that he was the first
though, that even if the concept was not original to use the new
technique for a scientific purpose.
with Europeans, it was more widely employed He was also the first to write a book on trigonom-
by them. This was not because Europeans were etry, treating the subject independently and not
more intelligent or ingenious than the Chinese as a mere adjunct to astronomy. In 1472, he was
(one could easily argue the reverse), but because the first to make objective observations of a
the Europeans had the alphabet and the Chinese comet, instead of viewing it merely as an object
did not. Far fewer symbols sufficed in Europe; of dread.
thus, the matter of movable type was far more
practical in Europe.
In 1454, Gutenberg put out a Bible in double BOHEMIA
columns, with 42 lines of Latin to the page. He
Bohemia was quite exhausted after the Hussite
produced 300 copies of 1282 pages, and thus pro-
wars but the strong rule of George of Podebrady
duced the Gutenberg Bibles. Those that remain
was of benefit. Since he was a moderate Hussite,
of the original 300 Bibles are now incredibly valu-
the Pope went through the motions of deposing
able.
him and encouraged the King of Hungary to at-
Although Gutenberg did not make a business
tack him, but George defended himself ably till
success out of his invention, others did. Printing
he died in 1471. He was succeeded by Ladislas
meant cheap books and cheap books made liter-
II, who was no relation, but who was the son of
acy worthwhile. By 1500, up to nine million
the King of Poland. He was a weak ruler and
printed copies of 30,000 different works were in
under him, Bohemia declined.
circulation. The base of scholarship broadened;
the views and discoveries of scholars could
quickly be made known to other scholars.
This was particularly true in the case of scien- HUNGARY
tific investigations. With the spread of printing, The forcefuldays of Janos Hunyadi continued
reports of scientific investigations, observations, after his death, when his son, Matthias Hunyadi
and theories could spread the length and breadth (1443-1490), was chosen to be king of Hungary
of Europe rapidly. Each new finding served as a and reigned as Matthias the Just. Matthias in-
basis for still newer findings. Science became not tended to take over Bohemia and Austria and
the product of individuals working more or less face the Turks with a united Central Europe. This
in isolation, but the product of a scientific com- he was unable to do. He could not defeat George
munity. In fact, the Scientific Revolution, which of Bohemia, and though Matthias occupied Vi-
1450 TO 1500 207
enna in 1485 and made it his capital, that con-

quest was not permanent. RUSSIA
He was a great patron of the arts, built a valu- The Tatars were still a factor in Russia. As late as
able library, reformed taxation and was, in gen- 1451, they appeared under the walls of Moscow.
popular monarch. When he died
eral, a in 1490, In 1462, however, Ivan III (1440-1505), some-
however, his realm fell apart. Ladislas II, who times known as "Ivan the Great," became Grand
was ruling Bohemia weakly, took over Hungary, Prince of Muscovy. In 1471, he married Zoe, the
too,and ruled it just as weakly. Placing different niece of Constantine XI, the last Byzantine Em-
nations under a single rule may forge a strong peror. By the marriage, Ivan III (and all his suc-
military bastion if the ruler is strong, but mere cessors) claimed to be the heirs of the Byzantine
size of territory is of no use if the ruler is weak. Empire and to be the protectors of the Orthodox
Church everywhere. Ivan took the title of Tsar
("Caesar"), rebuilt the Kremlin in Moscow, mak-
SWITZERLAND ing use of Italian architects, and put on much of
Switzerland's victories over Charles the Rash of the pomp and panoply of the Imperial throne.
Burgundy and further victories over the Holy Moscow was declared to be the "third Rome,"
Roman Empire brought their military reputation after Rome itself and Constantinople.
to a peak by 1500. They apparently could not lose Ivan III also expanded Muscovy's territory by
a battle and their mere approach to a battlefield
attacking Novgorod in two wars and annexing it
sowed panic in the hearts of their adversaries. at the conclusion of the second in 1478. This
Other nations began to hire Swiss mercenaries as turned Muscovy into Russia, for Moscow now
once, 19 centuries earlier, nations had hired controlled the northern half of what is now Eu-
Greek mercenaries. ropean Russia. It was a largely unpeopled half,
however. Although Russia had become the larg-
est nation in Europe
POLAND ever since, its
in area, as
has remained
it
population was only 7 million as

At this time, Poland was ruled by Casimir IV compared with France's 12 million.
(1427-1492), who had become
king in 1447. He Ivan III cleaned up whatever small principali-
was not a warrior, and he was not an educated ties were left in northern Russia and, in
1480, he
man, but he was a patient diplomat after the type refused to pay tribute to the Tatars. Once more,
of Louis XI of France. He could fight when he they invaded and aimed for Moscow, but this
had to, however. The Prussians had revolted time Ivan fended them off and made his refusal
against the Teutonic Knights and had asked for to tribute stick. After two and a half centuries,
help from Casimir. Casimir offered it, and the heart of Russia was free of the Tatar yoke.
though the war was unmarked by great successes Thereafter, war with Poland brought some
on either side, it ended with a peace treaty on gains in the west, including the city of Smolensk.
October 19, 1466, in which Poland gained an out- Ivan III was surely the most successful Russian
let to the Baltic Sea. monarch since the old Kievan days.
was Casimir's son, who, as Ladislas
It II,
reigned over Bohemia and Hungary. Another of

Casimir's sons, John Albert (1459-1501), suc- WEST AFRICA
ceeded to the Polish throne in 1492, on the death The Songhair Empire, along the middle Niger
of his father. River, was now at the height of its power.
1500 TO 1550
holy city of Mecca. By the time Selim I died in
OTTOMAN EMPIRE 1520, he had more than doubled the size of the
The Ottoman Empire, in 1550, controlled Asia Ottoman Empire.
Minor and the Balkans, and had the best army He was succeeded by his son, who
reigned as
and the most efficient government in Europe. In Suleiman I the Magnificent (F495-1566) and,
1512, the relatively mild Bayezid II was forced to under him, the Ottoman Empire reached its
abdicate by his youngest son Selim (1467-1520), peak. In 1521, he took Belgrade and sent raiding
who reigned as Selim I the Grim, and whose parties to terrorize Hungary. This time there was
character fully justified the description. He made no Hunyadi to stop the Turks, as there had been
sure that all possible competitors for the throne, 80 years before.
especially his brothers, were defeated, captured, Suleiman next tackled the island of Rhodes
and killed. that had, so far, defied attempts of the Turks
all
He then turned east. The Turks were Sun- to take it, and whose sea-raiders threatened his
nites, but Persia had just come under a new dy- lines of communication. He landed troops on the
nasty that was Shiite. To Selim, who was island on June 25, 1552, and began the siege of
fanatical in religion, this was unbearable, espe- the city. The city contained only 700 Knights of
cially since Persia supported Turkish subjects in St. John, plus 6000 other troops, but it had the
eastern Asia Minor who had rebelled against best fortifications in the world at that time.
him. Suleiman fought for half a year and, in the
Selim invaded Persian territory and, at Chal- process, lost half of his beseiging forces, who
diran in Armenia, he won a hard-fought battle numbered somewhere between 100,000 and
on August 23, 1515. He then marched as
far as 200,000. The defenders had lost three fourths of
Tabriz in northwestern Persia and annexed the their much smaller number before Suleiman ob-
upper portion of the Tigris-Euphrates valley to tained a surrender by offering to let them leave
the Ottoman Empire. Rhodes with all the honors of war. He kept his
He might have gone further, but the Mame- promise and the surviving knights moved to
luks of Egypt forced themselves on his attention. Malta, where they have remained ever since.
From the time they had been defeated by Tam- With Rhodes taken, and the east quiet, thanks
erlane over a century earlier, they had occupied to Selim'scampaigns, Suleiman could now move
themselves, for the most part, in internal squab- massively westward. He invaded Hungary and,
bling. Their efforts at taking over the east Medi- on August 29, 1525, faced the Hungarian troops
terranean islands of Cyprus and Rhodes had at Mohacs on the Danube in the southern part of
nor could they make heading against the
failed, their land. Suleiman had the superior artillery,
Ottoman Turks. Now, however, the Mameluk consisting of cannon that were chained together,
ruler of Egypt, Kansu al-Gauri formed
(d. 1516), and the Hungarians finally broke and fled. Their
an alliance with the Persians and brought an were killed and the
leaders, including their king,
army into Syria. land was defenseless. For two centuries it had
Selim turned south and met the Egyptians at been the bulwark of Christianity versus Islam,
Merj-Dabik in northern Syria. There on August and now it had been shattered.
24, 1516, al-Gauri was quickly defeated and Most of Hungary was put under John Zapolya
killed.With that, Selim took Syria and invaded (1487-1540), who was chosen to be king, and
Egypt. By 1517, he had taken all of Egypt along who was willing to serve as a Turkish puppet.
with the Red Sea coast of Arabia, including the The western and northern sections of Hungary
1500 TO 1550 209
were taken over by Austria, which had now suc-

Joanna (1479-1555), the older daughter of Ferdi-
ceeded to the role of bulwark against the Mus-
nand and Isabella of Spain, who had no sons to
lims.
inherit their land. Obviously, if this couple
The Holy Roman Emperor invaded Hungary had a
son, he would be a Hapsburg who would
to take over the rest of it and
rule
John Zapolya called over Austria, the Netherlands, Spain, and any
for help to Suleiman. Suleiman responded
and other lands in Europe that either Austria or Spain
led an army into Hungary a second time.
Zapo- owned, to say nothing of Spain's growing do-
lya joined him. Suleiman took Buda on
Septem- minions in the Americas.
ber 8, 1529, and marched on to Vienna, which
he It happened. Philip the Handsome
actually
placed under seige on September 27. This
was died unexpectedly in 1506 at the age of 28. His
the high point of the Ottoman advance, for Su- wife, Joanna, who loved him desperately,
leiman could not take the and
city, and with winter who was rather mentally unstable to begin with,
coming on, he was forced to retreat. (The Austri- went completely mad, and stayed mad for the
ans found coffee beans in the abandoned Turkish
remaining half-century of her life, so that she is
and coffee drinking was thus intro- known in history as Joanna the Mad (Juana la
duced to western Europe.) Loca). In 1500, however, she had given birth
to a
In the end, the situation
remained as it was son, Charles (1500-1558), who was not mad and
before the second invasion. Suleiman kept most
who grew up to inherit all that land and to be-
of Hungary, and Austria retained the northern
come the most powerful Hapsburg in the history
and western rim. Zapolya remained puppet king of that family.
of Hungary till his death in 1540. He ruled as Charles I of Spain in 1516, when
After that, Suleiman renewed the battle with his grandfather, Ferdinand II, died. In
1519, he
Persia, but with inconclusive results. was elected Holy Roman Emperor as Charles V,
Meanwhile, there were sea-fights all over the and it is by this title that he is known to history.
Mediterranean Sea. The dominant figure was Emperor Charles V, with his possessions scat-
Khayr ad-din (d. 1546), known as ''Barbarossa," tered over western Europe, ruled over 26 mil-
all
or "Redbeard" to the Europeans. He was a North
lion people as compared with Suleiman's
27
African pirate who felt he would be safer and million. They were worthy opponents of each
stronger he made an alliance with Suleiman.
if
other. To be sure, Charles V could not face
Sulei-
He did, and eventually took over both Algeria man without knowing that behind him he had a
and Tunis, so that virtually all of North Africa deadly enemy in the form of France (but then
became tributary to the Ottoman Turks. Khayr Suleiman knew that behind him he had a deadly
ad-din remained the terror of the Mediterranean enemy form of Persia).
in the
Sea till his death in 1546. But Charles V had another disadvantage. As
By 1550, then, the Ottoman Empire was the he started his imperial career, the German lands
largest and strongest Islamic Empire that the
were torn in two by a religious dispute, one that
world had seen since the decline of the Abbasid was more important to the history of Europe
Empire seven centuries earlier. than Charles V and Suleiman the Magnificent
put together.
AUSTRIA Wyclif and Hus had inveighed against the cor-

ruption, venality, and luxury of the Church, and
Frederick IITs greatest coup was marrying his they had been silenced; however, as long
as
son, Maximilian, to Mary of Burgundy, and thus abuses continued, other reformers were sure to
adding the Netherlands to the dominions of the arise.
Hapsburgs. Maximilian, in his turn, did some- To money, the Church was now selling
raise
thing analogous with his son, Philip (1478-1506).
"indulgences;" that is, documents assuring that
Philip, called "Philip the Handsome," appar- dead souls in purgatory would be released if liv-
ently with justification, was married in 1496 to ing relatives would only pay the prices set
for
such indulgences. Some of the sellers of indul- different ones. All were united only in that they
gences, notably a Dominican monk named Jo- denied the authority of the Pope and wished to
hann Tetzel (1465-1519), were quite shameless in abolish the intricate churchly hierarchy and rit-
their commercialization of the process. they came to be called "Protes-
ual. All together,
AnAugustinian monk, Martin Luther (1483- tants." The movement was the "Protestant
1546), was offended by this rank conversion of Reformation" to Protestants and the "Protestant
spirituality into amoney-making device and by Revolt" to Catholics.
various other flaws that he saw in Church admin- For a while it looked as though all Germany
istration and behavior. On October 31, 1517, he might turn Protestant, but the attacks on the con-
nailed 95 theses to the church door at Wittenberg stituted authorities of the church got the peas-
in Saxony — the usual way of challenging others ants excited. They thought it was an attack on all
to debate with him over the various points of abandon
authority and, in 1524, they rose in wild
view he was expressing. to destroy the landowners and aristocrats who,
Luther had going for him what previous re- for as long as anyone could remember, had
—
formers had had nationalism. Wyclif had ap- treated them worse than animals.
pealed to English nationalists who objected to Luther, aware that he needed the protection
money forever flowing into the Italian coffers of of the Princes who hoped, through Protestant-
the Pope. Similarly, Hus appealed to Bohemian ism, to obtain various portions of the rich lands
nationalism, and now Luther appealed to Ger- and other properties Church, dared not
of the
man nationalism. support the peasants. Therefore, he wrote pam-
However, Luther had, in addition, something phlets denouncing the peasants in unmeasured
Wyclif and Hus had not had. Luther had the terms. He retained the friendship of the princes,
printing press. Wyclifs and Hus's views were but when the peasant revolt was suppressed
only broadcast with difficulty, so that a great with the utmost brutality, the survivors turned
many people knew little detail about their argu- against the reformer who, they felt, had betrayed
ments. Luther, however, had the gift of vigorous them, and remained stubbornly Catholic there-
and powerful prose that appeared as printed after.
pamphlets. These spread the length and breadth (The Teutonic Knights, who were now re-
of Germany much faster than they could be sup- stricted to eastern Prussia, turned Protestant in
pressed. In no time, everyone was aware of, and 1526.)
debating, the new views. Charles V was urged by the Catholic Church
Wyclif had his Lollards and Hus his Hussites and,
to take strong action against the Protestants
and both were troublesome to suppress, but it indeed, he would have liked to do just that, but
was as nothing to the crowds of "Lutherans" that France was keeping him busy, and continued to
now followed the teachings of the new reformer. keep him busy to the end of his reign. And when
Like Hus, Luther attended a great convoca- France let up for a while, then Suleiman kept him
tion, the Diet of Worms (a city on the mid-Rhine) busy.
on April 17 and 18, 1521. There he upheld his The greatest German artist of the period was
views vigorously. He had a safe-conduct, but the Albrecht Diirer (1471-1528). He was not only a
memory what had happened to Hus a century
of painter but produced woodcuts and etchings of
earlier was a vivid one and Luther was spirited the highest quality.
away to safety by Frederick III the Wise of Sax- The mineralogist, Georgius Agricola (1494-
ony (1463-1525), who was a political and reli- 1555), summarized all that was known at the
gious reformer, a patron of the arts, and, wonder time about mining in De Re Metallica, published
ofwonders, believed in religious toleration. the year after his death.
Other religious reformers arose to preach Lu- The astronomer, Peter Apian (1495-1522),
theran doctrines, or more radical ones, or merely pointed out in 1540 that comets' tails always
1500 TO 1550 211
pointed away from the Sun. This was the first VIII's enterprise, since,
while Naples was at the
scientific observation concerning comets,
other other end of Italy, Milan was immediately adja-
than their position in the sky.
cent to southeastern France.
A kind of mad dance followed. France con-
quered Milan in alliance with Spain, but France
FRANCE
and Spain then quarreled and a Spanish force
Charles VIII had invaded Italy in 1494 in order to
drove the French out of Milan. In 1508, France
lay claim to Naples, thanks to a particularly
fee- joined a coalition against Venice, but the coali-
ble geneaological argument. This initiated
50 tion broke up, and again Spanish forces
chased
years of fighting on Italian soil by French, Ger-
France out of Italy.
mans, and Spaniards. It utterly destroyed Italian Then the French charged into Italy under a
prosperity.
new commander, Gaston de Foix (1489-1512),
The Italians, being much more sensible than who was Duke of Nemours and nephew to Louis
most, never seemed to see the glory of war, at
XII. He showed real talent even though
he was
least not since Roman times. They hired
merce- only in his early twenties, but he was killed dur-
nary armies to do their fighting. ing an attack at Ravenna.
The mercenaries gave good service as long as France also lost the Battle of Guinegate against
they were paid, but they saw no virtue in losing
the English in 1513 (the English had briefly in-
their lives in a
hopeless cause. Therefore, when vaded The French spurred their horses so
again).
two mercenary armies faced each other, and one eagerly in retreat that the fracas was called "the
was worse position, it recognized
in a distinctly
Battle of the Spurs." One Frenchman who
did
defeat and marched away. If there was a clash, it
not retreat so eagerly and who had fought well
lasted no longer than it took for one side to real-
at Ravenna was the Chevalier Pierre de
Bayard
ize it was losing. Casualties were low and the
(1473-1524), known as "the knight without fear
civilianpopulation was scarcely hurt. and without reproach."
But then came the French, Germans, and Louis XII died in 1515 and was succeeded by
Spaniards. They fought by night, as well as by his cousin (and son-in-law), who reigned
as
day, in winter as well as insummer. They fought Francis I (1494-1547). Francis could see plainly
even in a bad position in the hope that the enemy that Charles VIII and Louis XII had, in 20 years
would make a mistake. They fought to the of fighting in Italy,
accomplished and gained
bitter end sometimes, even when they were
nothing. Thereupon, Francis I proceeded to do
losing. And they had bad tempers, and looted
precisely the same thing himself.
and killed without stint as payment for the At first, he won a victory. Invading Milan, he
risks they took. To the Italians, it must have found himself facing the Swiss, who were fight-
seemed like the incursion of the Mongols ing as mercenaries for Milan. They were met at
had seemed to their victims three centuries Marignano, just south of Milan on September 13,
earlier.
1515. As usual, the Swiss attacked with fantastic
Charles VIII conquered Naples, indeed, but speed so that Francis could not put his artillery
couldn t maintain himself and left, having into play. The hard-fought battle was called off
achieved nothing. He died in 1498, and was suc- at nightfall. The next morning, the Swiss lunged
ceeded by Louis XII (1462-1515), who was his again, but this time Francis knew what to expect
second cousin once removed, and the son of and he had The Swiss pike-
his artillery ready.
Charles of Orleans, who had been taken prisoner men suffered great losses and had to retreat.
at Agincourt. Through his grandmother, Louis Their two-century record of invincibility was de-
XII was a great-grandson of Gian Galeazzo, Duke stroyed.
of Milan, so he marched into Italy to claim that In 1516, Francis made peace with Charles 1 of
dukedom. That made more sense than Charles Spain, who had not yet become Emperor, and
Milan was left in French hands provided France known for Pantagruel (1532) and Gargantua (1534).
gave up its claim to Naples. Racy, irreverent, occasionally obscene, lustily sa-
That seemed to be reasonable enough, but nei- tirical, and always warmly human, Rabelais is
ther party was serious. By 1521, they were again responsible for the adjective "rabelaisian," which
at war. describes expansive lustiness.
In 1522, 8000 Swiss troops, nowon fighting A French surgeon of the period was Ambrose
the French side, attacked the Spanish-German Pare (1510-1590), who served with the French
troops at Bicocca, near Milan. They would not army under Henry and found that, instead of
II
wait for the French artillery to be set up, since brutally cauterizing and disinfecting gunshot
they believed in attacking swiftly. They did, but wounds with boiling oil, it was kinder and more
the Imperial forces had arquebuses, which were effective to tie off severed arteries, to use sooth-
primitive guns that a man could carry. The Swiss ing ointments, and to practice cleanliness. He
were mowed down and the world learned that wrote up his methods in 1545 (in French, since
pikes could not stand against handguns. That he knew no Latin) and is considered the father of
was the end of pikes as a major weapon. modern surgery.
The fortunes of war wavered back and forth
and when, in 1524, the French laid siege to Pavia
to the southeast of Marignano, the Imperial army
SWITZERLAND
approached on a stormy night from an unex- Switzerland, at this time, in addition to supply-
pected direction. On February 24, 1525, the Battle ing mercenaries for the Italian wars, played an
of Pavia began with the French completely sur- important part in the Reformation.
prised. In addition, the Imperials had handguns Huldrych Zwingli (1484-1531), a priest from
and the French did not. The French were com- Zurich, had developed views like those of Luther
pletely defeated, and Francis I was wounded and and, in 1520, began preaching them.
captured. His views did not precisely match those of Lu-
Francis I was taken to Spain and freed only ther, and this was important. Whereas the Cath-
after he had signed a treaty giving up all claims olics had a supreme authority in the person of
in Italy and surrendering all Burgundian territory the Pope, who could decide what was orthodox
that Louis XI had garnered. Naturally, once Fran- and what was not, the Protestants, in repudiat-
cis I got back to France, he repudiated the treaty ing the Pope, had no supreme authority of their
on the obvious grounds that it had been extracted own. This meant that Protestantism divided itself
under duress. into sects and subsects, which produced great
By 1529, Charles V had to cancel the treaty variety and freedom, but weakened the move-
and sign a new one giving up any claim to the ment as a whole.
Burgundian territory France had taken. After all, The Swiss cantons in the north and west fol-
Suleiman was at the gates of Vienna and Charles lowed Zwinglian teachings, while the others
V couldn't afford to haggle. clung to Catholicism. There were even battles be-
Nevertheless, wars between France and the tween the two sorts of cantons, an early example
Hapsburgs continued, and remained inconclu- of what came to be known as "the wars of reli-
sive. Francis I died in 1547, and was succeeded gion." At the Battle of Kappel, south of Zurich,
by his son, who reigned as Henry II (1519-1559). on October 11, 1531, the Zurichers were defeated
Under him the wars still continued. and Zwingli was killed.
One pleasant side-effect of the Italian wars Another reformer of the time was John Calvin
was that they accelerated the transfer of Renais- (1509-1564), a Frenchman, who in 1536 wrote a
sance thinking to France, and through France, to powerful treatment of Protestant theology, one
western Europe generally. that was farther removed from Catholicism than
The liveliest French writer of this period was Luther's views were. That year he came to Ge-
Francois Rabelais (1483-1553), who is best neva, a Swiss city which had just turned Protes-
1500 TO 1550 213
tant. In 1538, he was banished, but he returned (1443 1513)became Pope in 1503. He was intent
triumphantly in 1541 and set up a theocratic gov-
on increasing his power over the Papal States,
ernment in the city, which made it one of the
and was much more an Italian prince than a
most important Protestant centers in Europe.
priest, even to the point of being a great patron
Switzerland contributed an important scientist of art.
in this period— Paracelsus (1493-1541). He de- Following him was Leo X (1475-1521), who
clared that alchemy's chief purpose was the
de- was the son of Lorenzo the Magnificent of Flor-
velopment of cures for disease, and he insisted ence and who became Pope in 1513. He, too, was
on using mineral compounds for that purpose a great patron of and had so extravagant a
art,
even though they were clearly toxic. However,
life-style, that he nearly drove the Papacy
into
he denounced ancient medicine with unmea-
bankruptcy. It was under his rule that the Prot-
sured violence and laid the groundwork for new
estant Reformation began. Leo apparently had
concepts in medical science.
no comprehension of the seriousness of the situ-
ation and was satisfied with excommunicating
Luther. He dismissed the whole thing as just an-
NETHERLANDS other argument among monks, not understand-
On the whole, the Netherlands flourished under
ing the vast change that the printing press had
the Emperor Charles V, as they had under the
brought such arguments.
to
Burgundian dukes. Nevertheless, Protestantism He was followed by Clement VII (1478-1534),
was spreading in the
northern provinces, while
the south remained Catholic. The people of the
—
another Medici the illegitimate son of the
younger brother of Lorenzo the Magnificent. He
northern provinces are frequently spoken of as was another Pope who patronized art and played
Dutch, while those of the southern provinces are the part of an Italian prince. Nor was he a clever
Flemish. one, for he made an alliance with France at a time
A
leading humanist and Renaissance figure in when the Emperor Charles V was in control of
northern Europe was Desiderius Erasmus (1466- Italy, and that was just asking for trouble.
1536), a Dutch writer and satirist who favored The commander of French forces (the "Con-
reform of the Church from within, and who re- stable") had been Charles, Duke of Bourbon
fused to break away and join the Protestants. His
(1490-1527), who had won the Battle of Marig-
best-known writing is his satire. In Praise of Folly, nano for Francis I. When the Constable lost favor
published in 1509. with the king, however, he took deep umbrage
The greatest biologist of the time was the and turned traitor, signing up with Charles V. In
Flemish anatomist, Andreas Vesalius (1514- 1527, he led a German and Spanish army toward
1564), who was court physician to Emperor Rome, intending to take it and force the Pope to
Charles V, and who did his own dissections. He give up his French alliance.
published the result in his book, De Corporis Hu- Unfortunately, Bourbon was killed at the first
mani Fabrica ("On the Structure of the Human assault, and the soldiers, taking Rome, and
lack-
Body"). It was published in 1543, and was beau- ing a firm hand at the controls, sacked the
city
tifully illustrated by the Flemish painter Jan Ste- with every circumstance of horror. Rome re-
phan van Calcar (1499-1545). Vesalius's findings ceived far worse treatment at the hand of Chris-
finally replaced Galen's work that had held sway tian soldiers (some were Lutherans, but most
for over 13 centuries. were Catholics) than ever it had received at the
hands of Goths and Vandals 11 centuries before.
The sack of Rome is considered to mark the
PAPACY end of the Italian Renaissance and to have been
The Papacy in this period continued on its luxu- the time when Italy fell into the shadow of for-
rious semipagan way even as Italy collapsed eign domination from which it was not to emerge
under the impact of foreign armies. Julius II for a long time.
Perhaps the decline would have come about self to the ways of those cultures, a view it was
in any case even without the foreign invasions. difficult to get stay-at-home doctrinaires to ac-
European expansion, led by Spain and Portugal, cept.
to the shores of distant continents, had made the And before the Italian Renaissance died, it
Atlantic and Indian Oceans the highways of burned into a blaze so bright that nothing like it
trade.The Mediterranean Sea had been bypassed has been seen since. It was the "High Renais-
and lost the importance it had had for 25 centu- sance."
ries, ever since Phoenician times. Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564), usually
Yet despite the damage done by war, by her- known by his first name, was certainly among
esies,and by economic decline, the Papacy con- the greatest artists who ever lived. He was en-
tinued on its way. thusiastically patronized by all the Popes of the
Clement VII died in 1534, and was succeeded period, from Julius II on. He painted the ceiling
by Paul III (1468-1549), another Pope whose of the Sistine Chapel between 1508 and 1512. He
main concern was his family, and who was a pa- sculptured famous statues of David and Moses,
tron of the arts. By this time, however, the Prot- and produced numerous other examples of the
estant Reformation had been going on for a greatest art.
quarter of a century, and it was clear that some- Raphael Sanzio (1483-1520), also known by
thing would have to be done. The Catholic his first name, produced beautiful paintings; and
Church would have to undertake a reform pro- Benvenuto Cellini (1500-1571) was a goldsmith
gram and launch a determined counterattack who achieved exquisite work. In his spare timê,
against Protestantism. Therefore, Paul III called Cellini engaged in criminal activities of various
for a Church Council to attend to such matters, sorts. He wrote an excellent autobiography in
and it opened at Trent in northern Italy on De- Italian (though it wasn't published till 1728). It's
cember 31, 1545. It continued for years. reliability is uncertain, though. In it, he claimed
Paul died in 1549 and, in 1550, Julius III

III to have been the one who shot and killed Bour-
(1487-1555) became Pope. bon during the initial assault on Rome.
The Papacy, however, was not the only spear- Venice contributed first-class painters in this
head of the "Counter-Reformation," the counter- period: Tiziano Vecelli (1490-1576), usually
attack against Protestantism. In Spain, a soldier, known as Titian, who was patronized by Charles
turned mystic and religious enthusiast, Ignatius V; and Jacopo Robust! (1515-1594), better known
of Loyola (1491-1556), established a new reli- as Tintoretto.
gious order in 1540, the "Society of Jesus," or the Italy also shone in literature at this time. The
"Jesuits" as they were commonly known. They Florentine diplomat, Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-
were to become a great educational force and 1527), having lost his position as a result of the
were the cutting edge of a stern and efficient at- turbulent politics of the time, wrote up his theo-
tempt to drive back the Protestants. ries of government in The Prince in 1513. He was
In addition, Christianity (chiefly in its Catholic a pragmatic, highly practical political theorist,
form) was now beginning to spread beyond Eu- who attached the greatest importance to a firm
rope. The Spanish and Portuguese had intro- and orderly government. He felt that even harsh
duced Christianity among the Native Americans measures aimed at achieving this end should be
of the New World. Even more dramatically, a carried through since such harshness comes no-
Spanish missionary, Francis Xavier (1506-1552), where near matching the evils brought on the
a friend of Ignatius of Loyola, devoted his life to public by a weak government. He has generally
the Far East. He achieved conversions to Chris- received a bad press for this and the word "ma-
tianity in India and Japan and died even as he chiavellian" has come to describe actions charac-
was attempting to enter China. He maintained terized by cunning, duplicity, and bad faith
that Christianity among people of ancient and which is extremely unfair to the sensible Machia-
advanced non-European cultures must adapt it- velli.
1500 TO 1550 215
Another Italian diplomat, Baldassare Castig-

Henry VIII did invade France in the early days
lione (1478-1529), wrote a book. The Courtier, in and even won the Battle of the Spurs at Guine-
which he described his ideal of courtly life. It gate, but that didn't amount to much. Afterward,
drew a picture of aristocratic manners that served Henry VIII and Francis I met near Calais on June
as an upper-class etiquette book, and was popu-
7, 1520, at what today would be called a "summit
lar throughout Europe.
meeting" to arrange for peace. It was all carried
The Italian diplomat and poet, Ludovico out with the utmost magnificence, so that it was
Ariosto (1474-1533), is best known for his epic
called the Field of the Cloth of Gold," but it was
Orlando Furioso, published in 1516, and expanded far more show than substance and also
didn't
in 1532. Set in the time of Charlemagne, it is
con- amount to much.
sidered the best poetry of the sort that appeared
Henry VIII was an ardent Catholic and wrote
during the Italian Renaissance. a book attacking Luther's views. Pope Leo X
re-
Two Italian mathematicians graced this pe- warded him with the title "Defender of the
riod. Niccolo Tartaglia (1499-1557) was, in
1535, Faith," which English monarchs have kept ever
the first to work out a general solution for what
since even though reality made that grotesque,
are called ''equations of the third degree." He
at least from the Papal point of view.
tried to keep his method secret, but the other
But Henry found himself with a terrible dy-
mathematician of the period, Girolamo Cardano nastic problem. He felt he needed a son to carry
(1501—1570), who, like Villon and was a
Cellini, on the succession, and Catherine of Aragon had
scapegrace in private life, wormed it out of him had only one child who outlived infancy and
and published it in 1545. On his own, Cardano that was a daughter named Mary (1516-1558).
worked out methods of solving "equations of the Nor was Catherine likely to have additional
fourth degree," and recognized the importance children in the future, for she was six years
of negative and imaginary numbers in the solu- older than Henry and by 1527 was
42 years
tions of equations.
old. Besides all this, Henry had fallen in love
with young woman named Anne Boleyn
a
(1507-1536) and wanted to marry her and have
ENGLAND her provide him with a legitimate son. (He
In 1509, Henry VIII (1491-1647), son of Henry had an illegitimate one, but that did him no
VII, came to the throne. He was 18 years old, tall,
good.)
strong, handsome, a wrestler, a poet, and hap- He needed a divorce from Catherine of Ara-
pily married to Catherine of Aragon, the intelli- gon, and for this he relied on his Chancellor
gent and capable younger daughter of Ferdinand (whom we would call a "Prime Minister" today),
and Isabella (and the aunt of the boy who was to Thomas Wolsey (1475-1530). He was Archbishop
become Emperor Charles V). of York and Wolsey realized that En-
a Cardinal.
All seemed well. Henry VIII was a descendant gland was not strong enough to play a decisive
of both the Lancastrians and the Yorkists, most role in the European wars, but could maintain
of the turbulent ancient nobility were dead, par- "the balance of power," always siding with the
liament was cowed, and Henry VIII was virtually weaker and thus preventing the stronger from
an absolute monarch. overwhelming Europe. In a divided Europe, En-
It was almost inevitable that Henry VIII would
gland would find safety. That remained English
remember the glory days of Edward III and policy for centuries.
Henry V, and long to play a big part in the wars The divorce was more than Wolsey could
between Francis I and Charles V. However, the manage, however. The Pope's permission was
days of the longbow were gone. These were the needed for that, and the Pope was Clement VII,
days of French cannon, Spanish handguns, and who was the prisoner of Charles V after the sack
Swiss pikes, and the English were not strong of Rome —
and Charles V was the nephew of
enough to compete. Catherine of Aragon. As a result, Wolsey fell
from grace, and Henry looked for some way of The most important English artist of the pe-
going over the Pope's head. riod was the German-born Hans Holbein the
An English prelate and reformer, Thomas Younger (1497-1543), whose portraits of Henry
Cranmer (1489-1556), was willing to agree with VIII, Thomas More, Desiderius Erasmus, and nu-
the king that Catherine of Aragon's prior mar- merous other members of the English court make
riage to Henry's older brother (who died young the period live for us.
and whose marriage had never been consum- Meanwhile, though, Henry VIII still needed a
mated, according to Catherine) rendered her son, and had fallen out of love with Anne Bol-
later marriage invalid. eyn, and into love with one of her maids of
Therefore, Henry VIII divorced Catherine honor, Jane Seymour (1509-1537). Therefore, he
without Papal permission and married Anne Bol- had Anne executed on May 19, 1536, and married
eyn on January 25, 1533. Anne gave birth to a Jane the next day.
child in the course of the year, but to Henry's Jane Seymour did give him that son, Edward
unbounded chagrin, it was another daughter, (1537-1553), and she then died almost immedi-
Elizabeth (1533-1603). ately afterward.
Having defied the Pope in this matter, Henry Henry married three more times, divorcing
VIII had to push through an "Act of Supremacy" his fourth wife, executing the fifth, and some-
in which he established an Anglican Church, how allowing the sixth to outlive him. He had no
with himself as its kept almost all the
head. It further children, and it is for his six wives that he
doctrines of Catholicism, but it was a national is best known to later generations.

church, not an international one. This was the In his last decade, Henry VIII was diseased,
beginning of the process that made England into suffered an accident in a tournament that nearly
a Protestant country. killedhim and probably addled his brains, and
This was a deadly blow to the greatest English became grotesquely fat. He ended his reign not
humanist of the time, Thomas More (1478-1535). as the hopeful Prince Charming he had been at
He was a a statesman, scholarand author, a lov- the start, but as a sadistic monster.
ing father, and a totally winning gentleman. His In 1546, Henry VIII authorized the building of
best-known work is Utopia, an early example of ships and coastal defenses. He didn't live to see
science fiction, which described an ideal govern- much happen, for he died on January 28, 1547,
ment. The name came from a Greek word that but he had begun the English naval tradition.
—
meant "nowhere" More's sardonic comment He was succeeded by Jane Seymour's son, a
and it gave us the word "utopian," meaning im- sickly 9-year-old boy, who reigned as Edward VI.
possibly idealistic. It was published in 1516.
He served Henry VIII in various posts and
was finally made Chancellor after Wolsey's fall, SCOTLAND
much against his will. More could not accept While Henry VIII was invading France
no pur- to
Henry as head of the Church and, as a result, the pose, early in his reign, the Scots, who were al-
imperious monarch had his head cut off in 1535. lied with France, invaded England. The two
On the other hand, another English scholar nations met at the northern tip of England at
was William Tyndale (1494-1536), who was an Flodden on September 9, 1513. The Scottish army
ardent Protestant. Martin Luther had translated were mostly pikemen, who had a strong position
the Bible into German, fixing the literary form of and who intended to fight a defensive battle. The
the language. Tyndale followed the example of English had some artillery, however, and shot at
Wycliffe and translated the Bible into English, be- the Scots from a distance. The galled Scots had
ginning in 1525. For this and for his Protestant to charge and were cut down. The Scottish king,
views, he was burned at the stake. It was as dan- James IV, was killed in the course of the battle,
gerous at the time to be too Protestant as to be as were many of his nobles.
insufficiently Protestant. James IV had married Margaret Tudor (1489-
1500 TO 1550 217
1541), a daughter of Henry VII, and their one- that Far Eastern islands, such as Java and
year-old son, also James (1512-1542),
Min-
was now danao, are Muslim today.) On February 2, 1509,
King James V of Scotland.
however, Diu on the west Indian coast near
at
When he was grown, and Henry VIII was in Bombay, Almeida destroyed the Arab fleet and,
his last years, James V also made war on En-
with that, gained control of the Indian Ocean for
gland,and the result was similar. The two armies Portugal.
met at Solway Moss in the northwestern tip of
he was replaced by Afonso de Albu-
In 1509,
England. Again, the English won a crushing vic-
querque (1453-1515), who strengthened Almei-
tory. James V survived but he had
a mental da s bases and founded new ones along the
breakdown and died three weeks later. Once shores of the Indian Ocean. He conquered Goa
again, an infant
was heir, thistime a 1 -week-old on the west Indian shore in 1510, and made it his
baby, named Mary (1542-1587), who was the Far Eastern capital. He
captured Malacca in Ma-
great-grandaughter of Henry VII, a fact which laya in 1511,
and a Portuguese ship reached Can-
was to have great importance later on. ton on the south China coast in 1517. In
1542,
James V's wife was Mary of Guise (1515- another Portuguese ship, driven by a storm,
1560), a member of a powerful French family.
made the first European landing in Japan.
She ruled the country as regent while the young
child was sent off to France to be reared there.
The ties between France and Scotland were thus SPANISH NORTH AMERICA
stronger than ever.
Spain, at home, was almost entirely occupied
with wars in Italy, fighting on behalf of her king,
Charles I (the Emperor Charles V) against
PORTUGAL France. But Spain, too, was establishing a world-
Having reached the Far East, Portugal became wide Empire, and one that soon became larger
the great trading nation of the world, displacing
than that of the Portuguese.
Venice. Despite its small size and population,
Columbus died in 1506, having made four
Portugal became the first true world power: the voyages in all to the "new world" but exploration
first nation anywhere and anytime to have a true continued. Spain took over the islands of the
overseas empire. West Indies (the very name attests to Columbus's
This was made possible by two facts. First, misconception of the nature of his discovery).
Portugal had the best ships in the world, which They occupied Puerto Rico in 1510 and Cuba in
meant that she could have untroubled commu- 1511. They founded Havana in 1515.
nications between coastal points that were far In 1513, Juan Ponce de Leon (1460-1521),
gov-
apart, bringing supplies and reinforcements at ernor of Puerto Rico, went slave-hunting west-
will. Second, Portugal had gunpowder and iron
ward, and discovered the coast of Florida on
cannon both on its ships and at its coastal bases, Easter Sunday (he named it after the holiday
before which the large populations of distant which, in Spanish, "Pascua Florida").
is
continents were helpless. Another explorer, Vasco Nunez de Balboa
The first Portuguese viceroy of the overseas (1475—1519) was in Panama in 1513. It was also
territories was Francisco de Almeida (1450-1510), being settled by the Spanish, and Balboa wan-
who left Portugal with 21 ships in March 1505. dered inland in search of gold. He did not know
He set up bases on the east African coast, and that Panama was a narrow isthmus running east
here and there on the Indian coast. He even and west.
reached Malaya. The Atlantic Ocean Panama's north, and
lay to
The Arabs tried to stop him, of course, for when Balboa crossed the isthmus, he found him-
they had a long history of trading over the Indian self looking at what had the appearance
of an-
Ocean, and they themselves had reached the In- other ocean in the south. He called it the "South
donesian islands long before. (It is for this reason Sea."
By 1517, the Spanish were exploring Yucatan ther rich civilizations, but by 1550, Spain had ex-
and finding evidence of the past civilization of plored and controlled the southern half of the
the Mayas. The biggest prize in North America, continent of North American (and claimed own-
however, came two years later. ership of all of it).
Hernando Cortes (1485-1547), with 11 ships

and 700 soldiers, set sail from Cuba in February
1519 and explored the Mexican interior. There he
SPANISH SOUTH AMERICA
found the Aztec civilization centered about its In 1531, the Spanish explorer, Francisco Pizarro
capital at Tenochtitlan, under its king, Monte- (1475-1541), with 180men, 27 horses, and two
zuma II (1466-1520). cannon, reached Peru in South America. There
Cortes had very few men, but he had horses he encountered the Inca civilization, and the
and he had firearms, while the Aztecs had nei- story was the same as in Mexico. By 1533, the
ther. Furthermore, the Aztecs were ruling over Spaniards had destroyed the Inca civilization.
other tribes who were delighted to rebel and side They expanded southward and claimed all of
with the Spaniards. In addition, the Aztecs had South America except for the eastern bulge of
the frightful misconception that the Spaniards Brazil which, by the Line of Demarcation, be-
were gods. Cortes, therefore, conquered the Az- longed to Portugal.
tecs, and the Spaniards had no qualms about de- How much of the bulge belonged to Portugal
stroying the civilization. (After all, the Aztecs was, of course, not clear at the time, and the
were not Christians.) By the summer of 1521, it most significant exploration of the northern
was all over. Tenochtitlan was destroyed and reaches of South America, through land that was
Mexico City was established on its ruins. eventually recognized as Portuguese, was carried
Thereafter, Spanish adventurers moved through by a Spaniard.
northward to explore the continent and search Francisco de Orellana (1490-1546) had been
for the kind of wealth they found among the Az- with Pizarro's band when it had conquered Peru
tecs. Panfilo de Narvaez (1480-1528) explored the and appropriated its wealth, (de Soto, who was
northern shore of the Gulf of Mexico west of Flor- to discover the Mississippi River, had also served
ida in 1527. His expedition was wrecked in a with Pizarro.) Pizarro had set up an expedition to
storm on its return, but one of the party, Alvar explore the land eastward of the Inca dominions,
Nunez Cabez de Vaca (1490-1560), was thrown and Orellana, having reached the headwaters of
ashore in what is now Texas. He didn't find his a river, felt it would be easier to go ahead than to
way back Mexico City till 1536, where he told
to return over the Andes mountain range, which he
tales of having seen vast herds of bison. had already crossed on his journey eastward.
Hernando de Soto (1500-1542) led an explor- From April 1541 to August 1542, he pro-
ing party deep into what is now the southeastern gressed down a river which, as it happens, is by
United States in 1539. On June 18, 1541, he and far the greatest in the world in terms of water
his men became the first Europeans to set eyes volume. His report mentioned tribes which, it
upon the Mississippi River, probably some miles seemed to Orellana, were led by women. This
south of what is now Memphis, Tennessee. They reminded people of the Amazons, the women
explored westward. On May 21, 1542, de Soto warriors of Greek legend, and the river was
died, was buried in the river, and the rest of the named the Amazon River.
party returned to Mexico. The claims of Spain to the Americas were vast
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado (1510-1554) — all of both continents except for Brazil. It was
explored what is now the southwestern United larger than any Empire the world had seen, even
States, between 1540 and 1542. He and his men the Mongol Empire, but Spain could only control
were probably the first Europeans to see the key points at first and, as it turned out, it could
Grand Canyon. never control it all.
None of these explorations uncovered any fur-

1500 TO 1550 219
on through good weather he called it the "Pacific

PORTUGUESE SOUTH AMERICA
Ocean."
Portugal established bases and settlements
on However, the Pacific Ocean was far larger
the Brazilian coast, but the most important
expe- than anyone could have expected and it
dition made under was
their auspices was by an Ital- sadly free of land. For 99 days, the ships
sailed
ian, while the most important Portuguese
through unbroken water and the men nearly
navigator of this period sailed for Spain.
died of hunger and thirst. Finally, they reached
The Italian navigator was Americus Vespucius
Guam where they caught their breaths, then
(1454-1512), to use the Latinized version of his
sailed westward to what afterward came
to be
name. He sailed to the South American coast known as the Philippine Islands. There, on April
while Columbus was still alive, first for Spain 27, 1521, Magellan was killed during a skirmish
and then for Portugal. He was convinced that
with the natives.
what he saw could not be the Asian coast de-
The expedition continued westward, how-
scribed by Marco Polo. He was the first to
main- ever, and a single ship with 18 men
tain, in 1504, that what had been
aboard,
discovered was under the leadership of Juan Sebastian de Elcano
a hitherto undiscovered continent, and
that an- (1476-1526), finally arrived back in Spain,
other ocean separated it from Asia, which on
was September 7, 1522. The first circumnavigation of
much farther away. the globe had taken three years, and, if the
loss
This was convincing to some. A German geog-
of life can be set aside, the single returning ship
rapher, Martin Waldseemueller (1470-1520),
carried enough spices to make the voyage a com-
iri 1507, that the new
continent be plete financial success.
named America in Vespucius' honor. This was The voyage showed was one ocean,
that there
eventually done. At first, it was applied only to
with the continents set in it like huge islands.
the southern region, since the north might
still The circumference of the Earth was shown to be
be part of Asia. Eventually, though, people
25.000 miles, as Eratosthenes had proposed sev-
spoke of South America and North America, and
enteen and a half centuries before, and not
the thin strip connecting the two was Central
18.000 miles as Columbus had thought.
America.
The Portuguese navigator who did not sail for
Portugal was Ferdinand Magellan (1480-1521). FRENCH NORTH AMERICA
Believing himself to have been mistreated by the Itoccurred to Francis I of France, who was in the
Portuguese government, he turned to Spain, midst of his bitter war with Charles V of the Em-
where he pointed out that if one traveled west of pire and of Spain, that there was no
reason to
the Line of Demarcation far enough, Asia would
allow the lucrative trade with the Far East to
re-
be reached without having violated treaty obli- main in Portuguese hands. Magellan had just
gations.
found a way of getting around South America to
Charles Vthought it worth the chance and Asia (the "Southwest Passage"), and perhaps
outfitted Magellan with five ships. The ships left
there was a way around North America
(the
Spain on September 20, 1519 and what followed
"Northwest Passage"), too.
was probably the greatest sea-voyage in history. Therefore, Francis commissioned an Italian
Magellan nosed his way down the coast of South navigator, Giovanni da Verrazano (1485-1528),
America, looking for a way of getting past it and, to explore the northern coast of North
America,
finally, on October 21, 1519, found what we now where Spanish had not yet penetrated.
forces
call "The Strait of Magellan."
In January, 1524, Verrazano sailed westward
For five weeks, he made his way along the and, on March 1, he reached the coast of what is
straitthrough constant storms until it opened now North Carolina and explored northward.
into an ocean and the storms ceased. It was Bal-
On April 17, he entered what is now called New
boa's South Sea, but as Magellan sailed on and York Bay. He continued northward as far as
Newfoundland, but found no way through the their reigns, Denmark and Norway also turned
continent. He returned to France on July 8. Lutheran.
The next year Francis was captured at Pavia,
and it was 10 years before he could think of the
Northwest Passage again. This time, he sent out POLAND
a French navigator, Jacques Cartier (1491-1557), In this period, Poland was ruled by Sigismund I
to continue the search. Cartier, with two ships (1467-1548), who was successful in war against
and 61 men, left France on April 20, 1534, and the fading Teutonic Knights and held his own
reached Newfoundland on May 10. He rounded against the Russians. He promoted learning, but
Newfoundland on the north and entered a large also institutionalized serfdom m the land. (Serfs
ocean inlet on August 10, 1534. This was the day were peasants who were bound to the land and
dedicated to Lawrence, so he named it the
St. could not leave the domain of their overlord —
“Gulf of St. Lawrence." condition that was not very far removed from
He penetrated the Gulf into the St. Lawrence outright slavery.)
River on two succeeding voyages and called the By far, the most important Pole of this period
regions round about "Canada," by mistaking a was Nicolaas Copernicus (1473-1545), who is
Native American word. He realized it was no best-known by this Latinized version of his
Northwest Passage and returned with that news. name.
Francis I then lost interest in the matter, but in Copernicus felt that it was much easier to ex-
later years, Cartier's voyages were the basis for plain the motion of the planets in the sky on the
the French claims to Canada. assumption that they (and the Earth, too) circled
the Sun, rather than that they (and the Sun) cir-
cled the Earth. Some ancient Greek astronomers
had had that idea 16 centuries before, but Co-
SWEDEN pernicus made it more vital by working out the
The Union Kalmar had lasted one and a third
of necessary mathematics of this "heliocentric the-
centuries, more or less uneasily. Christian II of ory."
Denmark (1481-1559) was the last king of a He long hesitated to publish it for fear of
united Scandinavia, having come to the throne in arousing the anger of the Catholic Church (and
1513. He was
anxious to curb the unrest that was of the Protestants, too, for that matter, for they
endemic in Sweden, which did not enjoy being were no more sympathetic to iconoclastic scien-
ruled from Copenhagen. Therefore, Christian tific theories than the Catholics were — even less,
brought an army into Sweden, defeated those perhaps). The manuscript circulated in hand-
its
rebels who wanted an independent nation, and, written form but, eventually, Copernicus let him-
on November 8, 1520, executed eight leaders of selfbe persuaded. Finally, in 1543, his book was
the rebellion in theSwedish capital of Stockholm. published and he was supposed to have been
This was called the "Stockholm Bloodbath" by handed the first copy on his deathbed.
the Swedes, and it enraged them. Under a Swed- The work of Copernicus in astronomy, of Ves-
ish nobleman, Gustavus Vasa (1496-1560), the alius in anatomy (his book was published the
nation rose, defeated the Danes in 1523, and same year) and of Tartaglia and Cardano in alge-
gained its independence. Gustavus Vasa ruled as bra began the "Scientific Revolution," in which
Gustavus I and, his reign, Sweden turned Lu- Europe at the very start of modern times stepped
theran. boldly forward and placed itself far beyond and
As for Christian he was deposed by the
II, ahead of the science of ancient Greece, of medi-
Danes in 1523 and was succeeded by his son, eval Islam, and even of China.
Frederick I (1471-1533), who was in turn suc-
ceeded by his son, Christian III (1503-1555), both
of whom ruled over Denmark and Norway. In
1500 TO 1550 221
RUSSIA INDIA
At this time, Russia and Poland struggled in con-
The Mongols were not yet down. There was
fused wars and the boundary between a
them great-great-grandson of Tamerlane, who was
moved eastward and westward about the dis-
named Babur (1483-1530) and who counted him-
puted city of Smolensk.
descendant
self a in the thirteenth generation of
Ivan died in 1503, and was succeeded by
III
Genghis Khan.
his son Basil (or "Vasili") III
(1479-1533). In his He was striving to build a
reign, Russia continued its slow
kingdom in Central
consolidation of Asia, which he failed at first,
power. When he died in 1533, he was succeeded being unable to
make much headway against the Uzbeks, who
by a 3-year-oId son who reigned as Ivan
IV now dominated the region. In 1504, however, he
(1530-1584) but who did not assume power on
captured Kabul and turned southward for
his own behalf easier
till 1547. prey.
In 1519, he
began to raid India and, in 1526,
PERSIA he pit his relatively few men against
a large In-
dian army. Babur, however, had artillery
Persia had not which
been under the rule of a
really
he had obtained from the Turks, while the Indian
native dynasty since its fall to the Arabs nine cen-
army had nothing more advanced than ele-
turies earlier. Since then, it had been
ruled by phants. On April
Arabs, Turks, and Mongols.
21, 1526, Babur's army
smashed the Indians that faced him at Panipat,
In 1502, however, Shah Ismail
(1487-1524) 50 miles north of Delhi. On April 24, he took
came to power. He traced his descent from an
Delhi, and on May 4, he took Agra. He had es-
ancestor named Safi al-Din, so that the dynasty tablished the "Mogul Empire" (a distortion
he founded of
is the "Safavid."
Mongol") in India. Two more successful battles
Safi al-Din, according to a legend fostered by gave him all of northern India.
the dynasty, was descended from Ali, the fourth On Babur's death in 1530, his son, Humayun
Caliph. He was the last Caliph to be recognized
(1508-1556) succeeded to the Mogul throne. In
as legitimate by the Shiites, and so Shah
Ismail his time, there was great confusion
as he was
was a Shiite. He saw to it that the Persians, too,
defeated by an Afghan ruler, Sher Shah
became Shiites, and they have remained part of (1486-
1545), and had to flee to Persia. After Sher
that Islamic sect ever since. Shah's
death, however, Humayun returned to
Delhi.
The time had come, however, when Oriental All through this period,
however, the Portu-
potentates, however powerful, had to deal with
guese had bases on the coast, particularly at
Europeans. The Portuguese took Hormuz at the Goa,
and the Moguls lacked the power to drive them
southeastern opening of the Persian Gulf in 1507 out.
and used it as a depot for trade with Persia and
Arabia.
Persia's Shiism got it into trouble with the CHINA
Turks who were fanatical
Sunnites and there was Chia Ching (1507—1566) had become Emperor
half a century of war between them. Persia also of
China in 1522. He was the 11th Emperor of the
had to deal with a new wave of tribesmen from Ming dynasty. It was a time of decline, as Chia
Central Asia, the Uzbeks, who harassed their Ching was far more interested in alchemy (and
northern frontier. in possible elixirs of life) than in state business.
In 1524, Tahmasp (1514-1576), the son of Is-
I
The Mongols were again raiding China and even
mail, succeeded to the Persian throne and, under
laid siege to Beijing itself several times.
him, Persia retreated under Turkish blows.
The Man-
chus to the northeast (in what is still called
Manchuria ) also threatened, and Japanese pi-
rates raided the Chinese coast.
It was also at this time that the Portuguese

were nosing along the coast. The first Portuguese
JAPAN
mission reached Peking in the year in which Chia In 1542, the Portuguese landed in Japan. It was
Ching became Emperor. characteristic of the Japanese that they alone of
the nations encountered by Europeans in this
century took note of firearms and began to adopt
BURMA them.
In 1519, Portuguese traders had reached Burmese
ports, and, in the 1540s, Portuguese mercenaries
participated in the wars between competing Bur-
mese factions.
1550 TO 1600
minded Catholic who used Spanish power for
SPAIN the purpose of defeating Protestantism wherever
Spain was now power in Europe
the strongest he found it, consuming Spain at tasks too great
and, possibly, in the world. It had an extensive for its strength.
overseas Empire. It had the best generals, and He did conclude the war with France satisfac-
the most thoroughly trained army, one that won torily. At the Treaty of Cateau-Cambresis, near
almost all its battles. It also had a strong king the border of France with the Netherlands,
whose only interest was in ruling. signed on April 3, 1559, the 50-year war came to
But there were problems. It had a population an end. It was a Spanish victory. Spain kept all
of only 7 million (compared with France's 16 mil- its territories to the east of France, and France
lion). Many Spaniards who would have made ex- gave up all claims to any part of Italy.
cellent military leaders left for the American In other respects, Philip was less fortunate. In
possessions.The Spanish economy was weak 1567, the Netherlands broke into revolt, and that
and no measures were taken to strengthen it. struggle occupied Spain all through Philip's reign
In 1556, Charles V
abdicated (he died in 1558) and beyond, bleeding it white.
and, like Diocletian twelve and a half centuries Then, too, in Philip's eagerness to leave noth-
earlier,he was probably happier in retirement ing in Spain that detracted in any way from pure
than he had ever been as Emperor. Catholicism, he turned against those Muslims
Charles's younger brother, Ferdinand (1503- who still lived in Spain and who had been con-
1564), inherited Austria and the lands it ruled, verted to Catholicism. They had kept their cul-
together with the Imperial crown, so that he ture and traditions (other than their religion) and
reigned as the Emperor Ferdinand I. were called "Moriscos," or "little Moors." He
To his son, Philip (1527-1598), Charles left was also suspicious of Jews who had been con-
Spain and the Spanish dominions overseas, plus verted to Catholicism; they were called "Mar-
the Netherlands, Tranche Comte, Milan, and Na- ranos" ("Pigs"). In both cases, they were
ples. In this way, Philip II of Spain owned signif- suspected of secretly practicing their old reli-
icant territories all along France's eastern border. gions. In 1569, the Moriscos, who were more nu-
was one of the most intelligent and
Philip II merous than the Marranos, revolted and were
hard-working monarchs in history, and, in his cruelly put down. Eventually, all doubtful con-
person, a gentleman. He was, however, a single- verts were either killed or expelled from the
1550 TO 1600 223
country to the great weakening of

Spain, for it which are
cost the nation many hard-working
still extant) and hundreds of other
people of works. He was
the second greatest writer of
ability.
Spain s golden age." (The one writer who sur-
Philip's greatest victory was over the Turks, passed him did so with a single book.)
who weredefeated at sea in the battle of Lepanto
The Spanish physician, Michael Servetus
on October 7, 1571. The victory did
not bring (1511-1553) was one of the pioneers in establish-
much in the way of immediate results, but did
it ing the principle of the circulation
shatter the legend of Turkish invincibility. of the blood.
However, he also had Unitarian views, denying
On the other hand, it gave rise to a dangerous
the divinity of Jesus; and when he
feeling of invincibility in Philip's incautiously
mind. There placed himself within the reach of
was an undeclared sea-war between Spain John Calvin in
and Geneva, Servetus was burned at the stake,
England through much of his reign and Philip's crying
out his beliefs to the last. Calvin burned
indignation against English piracy (which as many
is what copies of his writings as he could find,
itwas, despite England's use of the so that
less-threat- Servetus' theory on the circulation
ening term "privateering") was compounded of the blood
by wasn't discovered for a long time.
the fact that England was Protestant. He pre-
pared a huge fleet, often referred to as "the In-
vincible Armada," and sent it, in 1588, to secure PORTUGAL
the English Channel so that a Spanish army from Portugal was smaller and less populous than
the Netherlands could cross and invade England. Spain, so that it more easily overextended
The Armada was smashed, partly by English itself.
By now, Portugal and its empire were already
ships, and partly by storms. in
decline.
Philip
died in 1598, his accomplishments
II
Sebastian (1544-1578) became King of Portu-
I
having fallen far short of his aims in his
42-year gal in 1557, at the age of three. He
reign. Spain imported a great deal was educated
of gold and by the Jesuits and grew up with the
silverfrom her American colonies, but all this glittering
thought of a Crusade against the infidels.
vanished in the need to support Spanish armies, In
1578, he led an army into Morocco and
and none went to the real strengthening of died in
battle there, his army smashed.
the Spanish economy. It was Spain's
rivals He had no children and his uncle, Henry
England, France, and the Netherlands— that
(1512-1580)' who had been regent during
learned how to run their economies and Sebas-
that tian's minority, became king.
grew rich in overseas trade.
He was 66 years
old, a cardinal of theChurch, and had no heirs.
In 1598, Philip was succeeded by his son, who When he died in 1580, seven different candidates
reigned as Philip III (1578-1621). claimed the throne, one of whom was
The greatest Spanish painter of this period Philip II of
Spam, whose wife was Sebastian's aunt. Philip
was born on the island of Crete. He was Domen- II
sent in his army, and that settled things.
ikos Theotokopoulos (1541—1604), but is Portugal
univer- was united with Spain under a single king.
sally known as "El Greco" ("The Greek"). For
Crete the time since the Visigoths, eight and a
first
was a Venetian possession at that time and El half
centuries earlier, the Iberian peninsula
Greco studied under Titian in Venice, then in was a sin-
gle political entity.
1577 went to Spain. He spent the rest of his life
Philip as Philip
in Toledo, painting on religious themes and char-
II, I was careful to
of Portugal,
leave the nation to its local customs and to rule
acteristically elongating the human body.
through Portuguese officials, but Portugal's
In this period, too, mo-
Lope de Vega (1562-1635) rale declined and its empire
withered.
began remarkable career, shortly after serving
his
While Portugal was still independent, how-
in the ill-fated Spanish Armada. He is perhaps
ever, remarkable achievement in establishing
its
the most prolific writer who ever lived. He is a world empire was reflected in
its literature
supposed to have written 1800 plays (450 of when the Portuguese poet, Luiz Vaz de Camoes
(1520-1580), described the voyage of Vasco da land was which water-

laced with canals along
Gama in epic poetry in The Lusiads, published in craft could move. The Netherlanders were a sea-
1572. going people who built ships of a new kind, with
large and effective cannon. The Spaniards had
older and far less effective ships. This meant that
NETHERLANDS the Netherlanders could wipe the neighboring
The cities of the Netherlands continued to be the seas clean of Spanish ships, carry on a privateer-
most prosperous in Europe outside of Italy. ing and piratical war against Spanish shipping
Philip II of Spain, under whose dominion the and commerce, and sometimes even relieve be-
Netherlands now fell, got scant joy of that, how- sieged cities. While the Netherlanders controlled
ever, for the region was hostile to him. the sea. Alba could not put an end to the rebel-
The Protestantism that had made considerable lion.
headway in the northern provinces of the Neth- Furthermore, Alba knew nothing about run-
erlands was of the more radical Calvinist type, ning the country. When he tried to impose new
though the southern provinces remained Catho- taxes, many people who would endure oppres-
lic. The Netherlandish Protestants feared Philip's sion and religious persecution rose against him
ardent Catholicism, and the possible introduc- in wild abandon to protect their pocketbooks.
tion of the Inquisition. Even aside from religion, Alba had to leave the country, a failure, at his
the Netherlanders (Catholic and Protestant alike) own request in 1573. What's more, the Spanish
feared Philip's centralizing tendency, his desire policy of terror had succeeded in uniting all the
to make all decisions himself, and to ignore the provinces. Catholic as well as Protestant, against
Netherland provinces had long en-
privileges the Spain.
joyed. The presence of arrogant Spanish garri- Philip then sent in his half-brother, Don
II
sons was also a source of irritation. John of Austria (1547-1578), another illegitimate
Philip's viceroy over the Netherlands was an child of Charles V. Don John had beaten the
illegitimate daughter of Charles V, his half-sister, Turks at Lepanto and gained great fame, but he,
Margaret of Parma (1522-1586). She had to face too, failed to suppress the revolt.
the Netherland nobility, of whom the chief was When Don John died in 1578, Philip appointed
William of Orange (1533-1584), usually known Allesandro Farnese, Duke of Parma (1545-1592),
as "William the Silent," for he was no chatterbox. and that was a wise choice. Parma was not only
Margaret was willing to make some conces- a great general, but he knew how to govern. By
sions to appease the Netherlanders, but Philip abandoning senseless terror, he lured the south-
was not. She was relieved of her position in 1567 ern Catholic provinces out of the revolt.
and, in her place, Philip sent a hardened soldier, The northern provinces, however, the chief of
Fernando Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alba which was Holland, remained intransigent. They
(1507-1582). signed the Union of Utrecht among themselves
Alba had fought successfully for Spain in in 1579 and eventually declared themselves in-
many battles (and, in later was to defeat the
life, dependent, though Spain did not recognize that
Portuguese and allow Philip II to become king of independence. The northern provinces make up
Portugal as well as of Spain). He came to the what is now known as "The Netherlands,"
Netherlands with a determination to be hard and though they can also be referred to, more famil-
to adopt a policy of terror. The Netherlanders iarly, as "Holland" or as "the Dutch Republic."
would seem to have had no chance against him. The southern provinces are usually referred to
Albawon every pitched battle and, what's more, as "the Spanish Netherlands."
when he took a city, he slaughtered the garri- The Dutch made William of Orange their
sons. "stadtholder" (the equivalent of a president). He
The Netherlanders had one thing going for had maintained a steady and resolute resistance
them, however. In the north, particularly, the to the Spaniards, though he rarely won a battle.
1550 TO 1600 225
Philip offered a reward for his assassination

II
(1512-1594), which was his Latinized name, in-
and, on July 10, 1584, William was, indeed, as- vented new way
a of depicting the spherical sur-
sassinated. He was succeeded by his son, Mau- face of the Earth on a flat sheet of paper. It
rice ofNassau (1567—1625), who kept up just as distorted size more and more as one went farther
steady and resolute a resistance. north and south of the Equator, but the direction
The English, who feared Philip IPs designs on of travel remained accurate as shown. This new
their own
Protestant nation, were openly aiding "Mercator projection" was of enormous help to
the Dutch by now. The aid was mostly financial, navigators.
but in 1585 an English army under Robert Dud-
(1533-1588), was sent to the
ley, Earl of Leicester
Netherlands. Leicester was a favorite of the En- ENGLAND

glishqueen, but he was also incompetent and Edward VI, the son for whom Henry VIII had so
accomplished nothing. Still, this was enough to ardently longed, had had a seven-year-reign in
stiffen further Philip IPs determination to crush which powerful nobles pulled the realm in differ-
England by way of the Armada. ent directions, but under whom England grew
Maurice, meanwhile, showed far greater apti- more Protestant.
tude for war than his father had. He won battles, His chief minister toward the end of his reign
and Parma died of wounds in 1592. Philip II died was John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland
in 1598, with the revolt as strong as ever and with (1502-1533). He had had competing noblemen
Maurice on the offensive. It was clear that Spain executed and strove for complete control of the
had no chance of crushing the revolt, but it kept land after the King's death. Lady Jane Grey
on fighting. (1537-1554), a great-granddaughter of Henry VII
The misery of rebellion and war did not keep and a first cousin, once removed, of Edward VI,
the Netherlanders from making advances in had married one of Northumberland's sons.
other directions. Peter Brueghel (1564-1638) was What's more, she was Protestant. Therefore,
a Fleming and one of the great painters of the Northumberland declared her queen, very much
century. He specialized in busy, exuberant paint- against her will.
ings of peasant life, of Biblical scenes, and of The plan failed. Mary, the older half-sister of
fantasy. A number of his descendants were suc- Edward VI, and the daughter of Henry VIITs first
cessful painters as well. wife, Catherine of Aragon, was the logical heir to
The development of Netherlands' sea-power the throne, and she was a favorite of the people,
in response to the war with Spain meant that the who viewed her as a mistreated innocent. She
Netherlands could engage busily in the task of had no trouble being acclaimed Queen Mary I,
exploring the world's oceans. The Dutch naviga- and she promptly had Northumberland exe-
tor, Willem Barents (1550-1597), explored the cuted. Lady Jane Grey, totally innocent of any
Arctic coasts of Europe to see if the Far East wrong-doing, was executed the next year.
might be reached by a northern route. He failed However, if Mary had had an unfortunate
in that, but he discovered Spitzbergen in 1596 (it childhood and youth, she also had an unfortu-
had been reached by the Vikings, seven centuries nate reign. She was a convinced Catholic (one
earlier) as well as Novaya Zemlya, islands north reason why Northumberland had tried to ex-
of western Siberia. clude her from the throne) and was intent on
The outstanding Dutch scientist of the period restoring England to the Catholic fold. On July
was Simon Stevinus (1548-1620), who served in 25, 1554, she married Philip, her first cousin,
the army of Maurice of Nassau. He studied the once-removed, who was soon become the
to
pressure of liquids and founded the science of ultra-Catholic Philip II of Spain, and who was
hydraulics. He also demonstrated the impossibil- detested by most of the English. She was in love,
ity of some kinds of perpetual motion. but he wasn't. He stayed in England long enough
A Flemish geographer, Gerardus Mercator to get her pregnant, he thought (and so did she).
but that turned out to be a false alarm, to Mary's nized Mary as England's queen and dismissed
great humiliation. Elizabeth as a usurper.
Mary's attempt to restore Catholicism led her Yet Elizabeth, although she flirted with mar-
to condemn and burn at the stake many promi- riage, never consented to such a thing. Two of
nent Protestants, including Thomas Cranmer, her stepmothers had died in childbirth and she
the Archbishop of Canterbury, who had ar- had seen wives mistreated by her father, and saw
ranged the legalisms that had permitted Henry Mary become a pawn in the hands of her hus-
VIII to divorce Mary's mother. The Protestants, band. She wanted no man to have power over
therefore, called her "Bloody Mary," and since her and she wanted no adventures with child-
they won out in the end and wrote the accounts, birth, so she stayed single and, as far as official
that is how she has gone down in history. knowledge went, virginal. (She was called the
She managed to get into war with France on "Virgin Queen," though many, with reasonable
the Spanish side for no other reason than her cause, doubted the literal truth of that.) The na-
love for Philip and, in the course of it, the French tion, as a result, spent 45 years worrying over
under Frangois de Lorraine, Duke of Guise what would happen when Elizabeth died.
(1519-1563), took Calais in 1558. It was the last Elizabeth put an end to the religious swings in
remnant of the English conquests in France, and England by adopting a kind of compromise pro-
the English had held it for 211 years. (Mary said gram that was mildly Protestant and completed
that when she died they would find the word the establishment of the Anglican Church. It did
"Calais" written on her heart.) not satisfy everybody. There were the "Puritans"
She died in 1558 and was succeeded by her who wanted a more radical Protestantism, puri-
half-sister, Elizabeth, daughter of Anne Boleyn, fying the Anglican church of what it retained of
who ruled as Elizabeth I. Catholic rituals. There were other groups, too,
Elizabeth was 25 years old when she suc- who were "Separatists" and didn't want
be to
ceeded to the throne. She was beautiful, where part of either Catholicism or Anglicanism but
Mary had been where Mary
plain; intelligent, would go their own way. And, of course, there
had been ordinary; stronger-willed than any man remained many Catholics.
who served her, where Mary was a slave to On the whole, Elizabeth took a mild approach
Philip; and as fortunate as Mary was unlucky. and did not go out of her way to persecute, ig-
She was the most capable and popular monarch noring dissent if the dissenter were quiet about
England was ever to have, and Henry VIII need it. She did, however, react violently to any indi-
not have looked for a son. cation that anyone, particularly if Catholic, was
Her one problem was that she was unmarried. plotting treason, and planning to put Mary,
The question of marriage filled the first half of Queen of Scots, on the throne. Then there were
her reign with turmoil, since it seemed unnatural the tortures and executions typical of the times.
to people of the time to have an unattached Her reign was golden age of literature, one
a
woman rule them, and it deprived the realm of of the greatest the world has seen.
the possibility of having a direct heir. To name a few, and hastily, Edmund Spenser
Mary, the Queen of Scotland (1542-1587), (1553-1599) wrote the epic The Faerie Queen in
usually known as "Mary, Queen of Scots" was 1590. Thomas Kyd (1558-1594) wrote the enor-
Elizabeth's first cousin, once removed, and was mously popular The Spanish Tragedy, a play deal-
next in line for the throne if Elizabeth died with- ing with blood and revenge, in 1587. Christopher
out children. Since Mary was Catholic, there Marlowe (1564-1593) wrote such plays as Edward
were many both inside and outside England who II, Dr. Faustiis, and The Jew of Malta. Towering
wanted her to be Queen, as soon as possible, and above them all was William Shakespeare (1564-
were willing to go to any lengths to get rid of 1616), who, wrote such plays as
in this period,
Elizabeth. In fact, the Catholic powers of Europe Romeo and Juliet, Richard III, Henry Fourth, Part
— the Pope, Spain, France — more or less recog- One, and Henry V. If anyone can be considered
1550 TO 1600 227
the greatest writer who ever lived, it is Shake- go to war. He began to outfit a huge fleet of
speare.
ships, usually referred to as the "Invincible Ar-
In nonfiction,
Raphael Holinshed (d. 1580) mada," which was to force its way through the
published a popular history of the British Isles in English Channel to the Netherlands and from
1577, which Shakespeare used as reference for there carry Parma's army into England. Once
his historical plays. Thomas North (1535-1603), Parma s army landed in England, there was little
translated Plutarch into English in 1579, and chance the English would be able to resist him,
from it Shakespeare drew the material for his but the trick was to make the transfer, in the face
Roman plays. of the English ships.
In science, there was William Gilbert (1544- Alvaro de Bazan, Marquis de Santa Cruz
1603), who was one of the early experimentalists. (1526-1588), was an experienced seaman, who
He studied magnetism and was the first to sug- might conceivably have accomplished the task,
gest that the Earth itself was a magnet, explain- but the project ran into trouble at once. Between
ing the working of the magnetic compass on that April and June 1587, Drake carried out one of his
basis. He was the English scientist to accept
first most remarkable raids. He sailed into Cadiz har-
the Copernican view of the planetary system. bor and destroyed 33 Spanish ships. He then
During Elizabeth's reign, English ships carried sacked Lisbon, took a Spanish treasure ship, and
on an undeclared war against the Spanish pos- destroyed much of the supplies needed for the
sessions in the Americas and against Spanish Armada, including a vast quantity of barrel
ships that carried goods (including gold and sil- staves of seasoned timber needed for the casks
ver) to Europe. It was very profitable for the En- that were to hold water and provisions. The
glish privateers (though risky, of course), and ships could be replaced, but the timber couldn't
Philip II complained bitterly to Elizabeth about it. be. Nevertheless, the project was not aban-
Elizabeth, who was an expert at keeping a doned.
straight face, insisted she had nothing to do with To make matters worse, Santa Cruz died on
it, and Philip could only fume until he
was ready January 30, 1588, and Philip II, for some reason
for a full-scale war with England. known only to himself, entrusted his job to
The chief English privateer was Francis Drake Alonso Perez de Guzman, Duke of Medina Si-
(1543-1596), who, on one raid against the Span- donia (1550-1619), a loyal and trustworthy sub-
ish possessions, sailed around South America, ject, who happened to know nothing about sea-
discovering the sea-lane, now called "Drake
Strait," that lies between South America and
faring. He tried earnestly to avoid the task but —
Philip II would take no denial.
Antarctica. He then raided the undefended west- On July 12, 1588, the Armada left Spain— 130
ern coast of the Americas, sailing as far north as ships of all kinds, manned by 8500 seamen and
San Francisco Bay. He ended up by continuing to carrying 19,000 troops and 2431 guns. When the
sail westward and returned to England in 1580, Armada entered the Channel, the English ships
becoming the second person to circumnavigate opposing them were smaller and fewer, but more
the Earth. He was laden with Spanish booty on maneuverable, with better guns and with better
his return and Queen Elizabeth boarded his ship seamanship. Both sides ran out of ammunition,
and knighted him then and there, taking her but the English could slip into port and renew
share of the loot for the national treasury. Philip their supplies, while theSpaniards could not.
II was, understandably, infuriated.
The Spanish fleet was unable to make it to the
What's more, Mary, Queen of Scots, who had Netherlands, through a combination of unfavor-
been a prisoner of Elizabeth for years, and who able winds and English harassment. It was
had been the focus of plots against Elizabeth for forced to- sail into the North Sea and eventually
every one of those years, was finally executed at around the British Isles, plagued by storms all
Elizabeth's orders on February 8, 1587. the way. Only half the original fleet returned to
That was the last straw for Philip II. He had to Spain. Philip 11, to give him credit, took the de-
feat and treated the beaten Medina

stoically, ginia, disappeared, perhaps as a result of Native
Sidonia with the utmost kindness and consider- American hostility. Two products of North
ation. America were, however, brought back for En-
Elizabeth was still on her throne in 1600, fad- glish use by Raleigh. One was the potato that
ing slowly, her subjects increasingly uneasy over eventually became a valued addition to the Eu-
the succession. ropean diet. The other was tobacco, which might
be considered the Native American's revenge,
since in the next few centuries it has undoubt-
ENGLISH NORTH AMERICA edly killed more Europeans than the number of
It is not surprising that with England becoming a Native Americans the Europeans killed.
major sea-faring nation, its ships and navigators Although Spain claimed all of North America,
became prominent in the exploration of the its effective control along the east coast did not
world's oceans. Thus, Richard Chancellor (d. extend as far north as Roanoke. The English ex-
1556), in his search for the Northwest Passage, plorations and settlements were not interfered
entered the White Sea and reached the Arctic with by Spain, however much they might have
coast of Russia at Arkhangelsk. wanted to do so. Nevertheless, Spain strength-
The major effort, however, was in connection ened its hold on the American continents from
with the Northwest Passage, the attempt to find Florida southward, as Portugal did on Brazil,
a way around North America. both nations making a permanent cultural con-
Martin Frobisher (1535-1594), searching for it, quest of the land. Rio de Janeiro was founded in
discovered Baffin Island, west of Greenland, in Brazil in 1568; and Buenos Aires in what is now
1576, and caught sight of Greenland itself in Argentina in 1580.
1578. That vast, ice-covered land had been for- Among the Native Americans as yet un-
gotten by Europeans since the failure of the Vi- touched by Europeans, the perhaps legendary
king colony a century and a half earlier, but now Hiawatha (about 1570) is supposed have
to
it entered the European purview permanently. brought about the formation of the Iroquois Con-
Another English navigator, John Davis (1550- federacy in what is now New York State. This,
1605), explored the water passage between however, like all Native American cultures, was
Greenland and Baffin Island, and this is still doomed before the overwhelming European ad-
known as "Davis Strait" today. vance that was on its way.
The English navigator, Humphrey Gilbert
(1539-1583), established an English colony in
Newfoundland in 1583. This was the first English SCOTLAND
settlement in North America. Mary, the infant daughter of James V, was
In 1584, and again in 1587, under the sponsor- Queen of Scotland almost from her birth, but
ship of Walter Raleigh (1554-1618), a half-brother when she was five, her French mother, Mary of
of Humphrey Gilbert and a favorite of Elizabeth Guise, sent her to France, where she married the
I, ships landed colonists at Roanoke Island in French prince who eventually succeeded to the
what is now North Carolina, though at the time, throne as Francis II (1544-1560). She was deliri-
the English called that entire stretch of North ously happy in France, but Francis II died at 16
American coast "Virginia" in honor of Elizabeth (she herself being 18 at the time), and she was
Ts virginity. The first child of English parentage then forced to return, in tears, to Scotland.
to be born on the territory of what is now the After her French experience, she hated Scot-
United States was Virginia Dare, who was born land's cold weather, its poverty, its primitive-
inRoanoke in 1587. ness, and its rude and boorish nobility.
The attempt at settlement did not succeed, Moreover, while she was gone, Calvinism had
however. The colonists, including young Vir- made great inroads in Scotland. The most influ-
1550 TO 1600 229
ential person in the land was now John Knox vengeful Philip II of Spain,
she did. Neverthe-
if
(1513—1572), a fiery preacher who was second less, she was finally persuaded as a matter
of her
only to Calvin himself in his upholding of Calvin-
own life and death to take action, so she had
ist doctrine. Naturally,
he denounced Mary con- Mary executed in 1587.
stantly and violently since she was, and re-
James VI grew to manhood on the uneasy
mained, a Catholic.
Scottish throne and married Anne of Denmark
In July 1565, Mary married Henry Stuart, Earl (1574-1619), by whom he had two sons and a
of Darnley (1545-1567), a first half-cousin, both
daughter, but that was only duty. He was ho-
being great-grandchildren of Henry VII. The fact
mosexual and had only male favorites.
that Mary's husband also had a claim on
En- He did not respond beyond a purely formal
gland's throne made her an even greater threat
protest at the execution of his mother. For one
to Elizabeth of England.
thing, he had been brought up a Calvinist and
Darnley, however, was a weak and worthless was out of sympathy with his mother's Catholi-
man. Jealous of Mary's cultivated Italian secre- cism. For another, he realized that his mother's
tary, David Rizzio (1533-1566), Darnley had
the death made him heir to the English throne and
man stabbed in front of Mary in March 1566, he wanted to do nothing to offend Elizabeth, lest
when she was six months into her pregnancy. she choose someone else as a successor.
Mary was not
He
him this and
likely to forgive knew he would need Elizabeth's
that, as a Scot,
once her son, James (1566-1625) was born, she consent, or the English would never accept him.
needed Darnley no more. The house in which In 1600, then, he was waiting, even more anx-
Darnley was sleeping on February 9, 1567, was iously than the English people, for Elizabeth's
blown up and he was killed. There is a general death.
feeling that Mary herself had arranged the mat-
Animportant Scottish mathematician of this
ter, or that she had had her new lover,
James period was John Napier (1550-1617). An ardent
Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell (1535-1578), arrange Calvinist, he labored to produce new and fearful
it. (She married Bothwell, who was Protestant, weapons any invasion by Philip II. In
to repel
and he was as worthless a husband as Darnley this, he did not succeed, but he did invent
—
was Mary had no luck with men.)
"log-
arithms" in 1594, and prepared tables of them
The indignant Scottish nobility forced Mary's which proved vitally important to the mathemat-
deposition and her one-year-old son became king ical computations of the day.
as James VI (still one more infant succession).
Mary tried to regain her throne but, in 1579, she
was forced to flee to England where Elizabeth IRELAND
kept her imprisoned for 19 years. In 1594, the Irish rebelledand sought Spanish
Even as a prisoner, she was a deadly danger help. The English had never held more than the
to Elizabeth, since the Catholic powers of Europe
west-central portion about Dublin, and during
recognized Mary as the legitimate Queen of En- the long involvement of England in France, the
gland. The Pope excommunicated Elizabeth and Irish had gone their own way for the most
part.
indicated it would be no sin to assassinate her. Since England turned Protestant, the Irish stayed
Moreover, inside England there were plots in Catholic as a nationalist reaction. (It is possible
plenty to replace Elizabeth with Mary, and Mary that England had stayed Catholic, Ireland
if
herself was an active participant in some of them. would have turned Protestant.)
Elizabeth was reluctant to act against another The possibility of Spanish interference was
queen and a kinsman (remembering that she her- troublesome, and Elizabeth sent the young favor-
self had been in similar danger when her older iteof her did age, Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex
sister, Mary I, had been Queen of England) and
(1566-1601), to Ireland to handle the matter.
fearing the consequences, especially from a There he faced Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone
(1540-1616). Essex had proved himself on pre- In 1565, Menendez established the city of St.
vious occasions to have some ability, but he was Augustine in Florida, the oldest city of European
no match for Tyrone in the latter's native bogs. origin to exist in the territory of what is now the
Essex was defeated, and came back to England, United States.
pouting and resentful, to put the blame on oth- If the Huguenots could not peace in
find
ers. Elizabeth would not listen, and when he North America, however, neither could they find
tried to raise a rebellion against her, she had him peace or toleration in France. In 1562, even as
imprisoned and executed. Coligny was sending colonists to North America,
a series of religious wars between Huguenots
and Catholics turned France info chaos.
FRANCE There were 10 years of indecisive fighting,
In 1550, Henry II, the son of Francis I, was King with the Huguenots generally getting the worst
of France. He had married Catherine de Medici of it, and then proposals were made for a com-
(1519-1589), a great-granddaughter of Lorenzo promise peace.
the Magnificent. She had little power over Henry Henry, Prince of Navarre (1553-1610), was the
II, who was ruled by his mistress, Diane de Poi- most important Protestant leader. Although only
rier (1499-1566), but she eventually had four 19 years of age, he was descended in the direct
sons, and she ruled them. line of male descent from Louis IX. That meant
Henry II died in 1559, when a lance splinter that if Henry IPs sons all died without children
penetrated the eyehole of his golden helmet dur- (and one was already dead), Navarre would be
ing a joust, and was succeeded by his 15-year-old heir to the throne.
son, Francis II (the husband of Mary, Queen of Henry of Navarre, therefore, was to marry
Scots). He died in a year and was succeeded by Margaret of Valois (1553-1615), the sister of
his younger brother, Charles IX (1550-1574), Charles IX, and the Huguenots were to be given
who was 10 years old at the time of his accession. freedom of worship in certain specified cities.
The Reformation was spreading in France. Onthe night of August 23, 1572 (St. Bartholo-
The bulk of the population remained Catholic, mew's Day), on the eve of the marriage, the
but a strong minority became Calvinist. The Catholics struck at the unsuspecting and cele-
French Calvinists were called "Huguenots" (the brating Huguenots. Coligny was killed and so
origin of the name is uncertain), and these met were thousands of other Huguenots in Paris and
with persecution from the start. A large percent- in the provinces. This "Bartholomew's Day Mas-
age of the nobility turned Huguenot, however. sacre" was celebrated by the Pope joyfully, and
The leading Huguenot, Admiral Gaspard de the grave Philip II was said to have smiled for the
Coligny (1519-1572) thought of responding to only time in his life on hearing the news. Henry
persecution by establishing a colony on the of Navarre saved his life by instantly announcing
American coast. There, Huguenots might prac- his conversion to Catholicism.
tice their religion freely. (This was the first at- Charles IX died without children on May 30,
tempt to use the American continent as a haven 1574, and he was succeeded by his younger
from religious persecution.) brother, who reigned as Henry III, and who fled
were placed on
In 1562, therefore, colonists from his post as King of Poland (with a good
the coast of what is now South Carolina, but supply of the Polish crown jewels) at hearing the
grew homesick and were taken to England by a news.
passing English ship. In 1564, another group of Henry III was not likely to have children since
colonists were placed in northern Florida, but the he was homosexual and showed no interest in
Spaniards, under Pedro Menendez (1519-1574), women even for the sake of an heir. His one re-
killed them all. (Not because they were French- maining brother, who was now Francis, Duke of
men, he explained, but because they were Prot- Alencon (and now Anjou), had carried on a long-
estants.) time romance with Elizabeth of England, but he
1550 TO 1600 231
never married her or anyone else, and died in duced his personal essays between 1572 and
1584. After that, it seemed certain that Henry of 1588, which were
Navarre (who had turned Protestant again, once
civilized, tolerant, and skepti-
cal.His cool style influenced later writers in En-
he was safely out of Catholic hands) was going
gland as well as in France. The greatest poet of
to reign as soon as Henry III died.
the period was Pierre de Ronsard (1524-1585),
Since the French, as a whole, would not tol-
who was patronized by Charles IX.
erate a Protestant king, and since Philip
II of More influential than either among the unso-
Spain would not either, the religious wars con-
phisticated were the works of the French
as-
tinued, as indecisive as ever. The leader on
the trologer, Michel Nostradamus (1503-1560).
Catholic side was not the king but Henry, Duke
He
published a series of verses in 1555, supposedly
of Guise (1550-1588), the son of the conqueror
of foretelling the future. They were written in so
Calais. It was Henry of Guise who had
planned vague and mystic a style that they could be inter-
the Bartholomew's Day massacre and who had preted in almost any fashion. He did, however,
personally seen to the death of Coligny. It was forecast the death of a French king in a golden
he who called in Philip II and for a
of Spain, C3ge, and Henry II s death soon after, in a way
while he was far more powerful and popular
that seemed to be just that, lent Nostradamus
than the weak king, Henry III.
enormous prestige and made him popular right
Henry responded by having Henry of Guise down into our own time.
assassinated on December 23, 1588. That made
The French mathematician, Franciscus Vieta
Henry III the target for the Catholic zealots and
(1540-1603), turned Catholic when Henry IV did.
he was assassinated on August 1, 1589 by a Cath- He labored as a cryptographer for Henry IV, de-
olic monk, Jacques Clement (1564-1589).
ciphering the secret messages of Philip II of
Therefore, Henry of Navarre was King Henry Spain. The angry Philip accused France of sor-
IV, but the more extreme Catholics, under
cery and complained to the Pope. Vieta, in a
Charles, Duke of Mayenne (1554—1611), younger
book on algebra in 1591, first used the x's and y's
brother of Henry of Guise, continued to fight, with which we are so familiar today.
with the continuing help of Philip II. Jean Nicot (1530-1600) was French ambassa-
On March 14, 1590, Henry IV won the battle dor to Portugal from 1559 to 1561. He learned of
of Ivry, west of Paris, and then laid siege to Paris tobacco there and introduced it to France. The
itself. Spanish troops entered the city to
defend poisonous alkaloid in tobacco, known as "nico-
it, and Henry realized that while
he could not be tine," derives its name from him.
defeated, neither could he win. He was not in-
clined to spend his life fighting, so in 1593, sigh-
ing "Paris is well worth a mass," he turned PAPACY
Catholic again. The Council was interrupted by Paul IV
of Trent
Henry IV's capable councillor, Maximilien de (1476—1559), who became Pope in 1555 and who
Bethune, Due de Sully (1560-1641), remained a did not want any council telling him what to
do.
Huguenot but continued to serve his king. He believed in the iron fist, so that he extended
On April 15, 1598, Henry IV issued the Edict the power of the Inquisition, set up an Index of
of Nantes, in which the Huguenots were given forbidden books, and established a ghetto in
toleration in certain cities and were protected Rome within which the Jews were imprisoned
from actual persecution provided they stayed out and humiliated.
of Paris and a few other specific places. With
Under Pius IV (1499-1565), who succeeded in
that, the religious civil wars in France were over
1559, the Council of Trent was reconvened and it
after three and a half decades of useless fighting.
completed its work in 1563. It redefined and clar-
The greatest French writer of this period was ified the basic Catholic philosophy and did away
the essayist, Michel Eyquem de Montaigne with many of the abuses that had inspired the
(1533-1592). From the quiet of his estate, he pro- Protestant Reformation half a century before. It,
and the activity of the Jesuits, allowed Catholi- salem Liberated"), an epic poem published in
cism to regain some lost ground, but nothing suf- 1581, dealing with the First Crusade, four centu-
ficed to end the Church altogether.
split in the ries earlier.
Pius V (1504-1572), who became Pope in 1566, The composer, Giovanni Pierlugi da
Italian
was an ascetic and a reformer. With him, the Palestrina (1525-1594), wrote church music in
time of the Renaissance Popes —
luxurious, sem- the medieval fashion.
ipagan, and indifferent to religion was defi- — The Italian scholar, Giordano Bruno (1548-
nitely over. Pius V wiped out all vestiges of 1600), had ideas very similar to those of Nicholas
Protestantism in Italy and took an extreme Cath- of Cusa a century earlier. Bruno was more vehe-
olic stand on heresy, making wide use of the In- ment in expressing them, and times had grown
quisition, urging on Philip II to the harshest harder, what with the Protestant Reformation
measures in the Netherlands, and excommuni- and the more active fight against heresy. As a
cating Elizabeth of England in 1570. It was he result, he was burned at the stake in Rome on
who urged the naval offensive against the Turks February 17, 1600, a martyr of science and de-
that ended with a victory at the Battle of Lepanto fiant, like Servetus, to the end.
in 1571.
Gregory XIII (1502-1585), who became Pope
in 1572, continued the policy of reform and hard-
VENICE
nosed antiheresy. He was the Pope who cele- Venice was declining markedly. Her last success-
brated the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre jubi- ful offensive action took place in this period.
lantly. He is best known, though, for his reform With the help of Spain and the Papacy, she de-
of the calendar. Since Julius Caesar's time, 16 feated the Turks in the great Battle of Lepanto in
centuries earlier, there had been a leap year 1571. However, she lacked the ability to follow it
every four years without fail. That made the year up and gave up Cyprus to the Turks in 1573. Her
slightly too long, so that the vernal equinox, and only important eastern possession after this was
the date of Easter which depended upon it, was the island of Crete (or Candia, as the Venetians
and earlier in the cycle of seasons,
falling earlier called it).
and both would eventually mark mid-winter

rather than the beginning of the spring.
With the help of astronomers, Gregory XIII AUSTRIA
authorized the dropping of 10 days in 1582, and Austria and the Holy Roman Empire also de-
of allowing only 97 leap years, instead of 100, clined markedly in power now that Spain was no
every 400 years. The Protestant and Orthodox longer part of the Emperor's dominions. It was
nations hesitated to adopt a Papal reform, but chiefly concerned, at this time, with the rivalry
eventually they did, and the world today lives by between the Protestants in the north and the
the "Gregorian calendar." Catholics in the south. The division was as much
Sixtus V (1520-1590) became Pope in 1585. He political as religious, since many of the virtually
reorganized the finances and economy of the independent states of the Empire had leaders
Papal states, fixed the College of Cardinals at 70 who turned Protestant so that they could be free
members, and enforced the new system of the of Papal interference and so that they could ap-
Council of Trent. propriate Church lands.
Clement VIII (1536-1605) became Pope in On September 25, 1555, the Peace of Augs-
1592. burg (in Bavaria) allowed individual princes to
During this period, the Italian poet, Torquato choose either Lutheranism or Catholicism and to
Tasso (1544-1595), was outstanding. He was then force their choice on their people. No pro-
paranoid enough to be confined to a madhouse vision was made for freedom for Calvinist wor-
for some years but he nevertheless produced a ship.
magnificent work in Gerusalemme Liberata ("Jeru- After that, there were some decades of relative
1550 TO 1600 233
religious peace and sporadic warfare with the

island ofHven. Once Frederick died in 1588, his
Turks. In 1564, Ferdinand I died and
was suc- source of funds began to dry up and he
ceeded by his son who reigned as Maximilian spent his
II last years in Germany.
(1527-1576). He was, in turn, succeeded by
his Frederick's 11-year-old son succeeded to the
son Rudolf II (1552-1612).
throne in 1588 as Christian IV (1577-1648).
The German alchemist, Libavius (1560-1616),
published a book on alchemy in 1597, which
es-
chewed mysticism and was the first chemical SWEDEN
textbook worthy of the name. However, he
could Sweden was beginning to follow a program of
not quite abandon the alchemical belief
that it expansion. Under Eric XIV (1533-1577), it
was possible to turn base metals into gold took
over Estonia. Eric XIV exhibited increasing
("transmutation"). signs
of madness, however, and was deposed in 1568.
His half-brother succeeded as John III
(1537-
1592). He tried to reimpose a diluted form
SWITZERLAND of Ca-
tholicism on the country, but failed. In
Switzerland was still driven by religious unrest 1592, his
son Sigismund (1566-1632) succeeded, s'igis-
with Zwinglian cantons in the north. Catholic
mund had already been chosen King of Poland
cantons in the south, and Calvinist Geneva in the
five years earlier. He was Catholic, however, and
west.
the Swedes deposed him in 1599.
Itproduced an important scholar at this time,
Konrad von Gesner (1516-1565), who did his
best to accumulate in one set of volumes all
there POLAND
was to know about natural history, as Pliny had In 1550, Sigismund II(1520-1572) was on the Pol-
done more than 16 centuries earlier, but with ish throne. Under him, Protestantism made great
greater discrimination. He wrote these volumes gains. However, the Counter-Reformation
in the last 15 years of his life
and
and died in 1565 the Jesuits fought back, and Poland, in the
because he would not, as a doctor, abandon his end,
remained Catholic.
patients during an attack of the plague in Zurich
On July 1, Union of Lublin wiped
1569, the
—thus, he died of it, too. out all signs of Lithuania as an independent
na-
tion. Until then, for over a century
and a half,
Poland and Lithuania had existed in a dvnastic
DENMARK union, sharing a king, but maintaining a
certain
Denmark was ruled at this time by Frederick II legalistic separation in laws and customs.
Now,
(1534—1588), who becameking in 1559 and is re- however, the two became a single countrv under
membered chiefly as the patron of Tycho Brahe the name of "Poland."
(1546-1601), the greatest astronomer of his day,
Sigismund died in 1572, and left no immediate
and the last important astronomer before the in- heirs. The Polish throne, which, in
any case, was
vention of the telescope revolutionized the sci- becoming increasingly elective, now became al-
ence forever. together so.
Tycho was the first to study a nova carefully In 1573, Henry of Anjou, the
younger brother
(inventing the term, which meant "new" and re- of Charles IX of France, bought the
throneby
ferred to a new star in the heavens, of the type bribing the electors. The reason for his
doing so,
which nowadays we call a "supernova"). He aside from the pleasure of being king,
was Hen-
studied a comet carefully and showed that it lay ry's desire to bring Poland into
alliance with
beyond the Moon. He also prepared the best France. However, Henry did not enjoy the
throne
star-map yet. With appropriations from Freder- of Poland any more than Mary, Queen
of Scots
ick II, he had built the best astronomical obser-
had enjoyed the throne of Scotland, and for
vatory the world had yet seen on the Danish much the same reasons. When news reached
Henry had died and that

in 1574 that his brother Sea, which was the logical door to the rest of the
he himself was Henry III, King of France, he took world, was blocked by Sweden and Poland,
all the crown jewels he could carry and fled Po- however, and though Ivan fought them for most
land, returning to France. (The Poles were well of his reign, the results were not satisfactory and
rid of him, even with the jewels.) he remained shut off. Reaching the Caspian Sea
Poland continued to be increasingly anarchic. was of no use for that was landlocked. Russia
In 1587, Sigismund III, the son of John III of Swe- had only one seaport, Arkhangelsk, but that was
den and a nephew of Sigismund II, was elected on the Arctic Ocean and was, for much of the
to the throne of Poland and, five years later, be- year, frozen and useless.
came King of Sweden as well. He had been edu- In 1553, however, English ships were recon-
cated by the Jesuits and he did what he could to noitering in the north to see if there way
was a
wipe out the vanishing Protestantism of Poland. around Asia to the Far East in that direction. One
Though deposed in Sweden in 1599, he remained ship, under Richard Chancellor, made its way to
King of Poland. Arkhangelsk. It was welcomed jubilantly and the
crew was taken overland to meet Tsar Ivan in
Moscow. The Muscovy Company was founded
RUSSIA in England and trade between the two nations
Russia began a period of enormous expansion. was instituted.

Between 1552 and 1556, under Tsar Ivan IV the Ivan IV even made a proposal of marriage to
Terrible, the Russians finally wiped out the Tatar Elizabeth of England, which was not accepted. It
kingdom to the east, taking Kazan, which had would have been one of the most colossal mis-
been the Tatar capital for over a century, and matches that could be imagined (though George
then driving down the full length of the Volga Bernard Shaw once stated that if the marriage
River to the Caspian Sea. had gone through, Ivan would quickly have be-
This did not mean that Russia, after three cen- come Ivan the Terrified).
turies, was finally rid of the Tatars. There still Russia found an opening, however, if not to
remained a Tatar kingdom in the south, centered the sea, then to the east. In 1579, the Stroganov
in the Crimea and stretching up into the Ukraine, family was establishing a business empire in
which it disputed with Poland. The southern Ta- eastern Russia along the Urals, dealing in furs
tars were not entirely helpless either, but ad- mostly, but there were Tatars east of the Urals
vanced to Moscow in 1555 and, again, in 1571. who were danger to their enterprises. They
a
Both times, however, they were driven back. hired a Cossack to take care of the matter. (The
Ivan was forced to fight the Russian nobility Cossacks were horsemen in the south, who had
("boyars"), whose unruliness virtually insured found relative freedom in the no-man's land
anarchy, as it did in Poland. Ivan's chosen where Russia, Poland, and the Ottoman Turks
weapon was terror, for he killed almost indis- met and disputed for mastery. The Cossacks
criminately. He was not called "the Terrible" for were something like the legendary cowboys of
nothing. In 1570, he took Novgorod, which he the American west centuries later.)
believed was and sub-
rebelling against him, In 1581, the Cossack, Yermak Timofeyevich
jected it to a sack that could be compared to those (d. 1584), with 840 men, moved east of the Urals
carried out by the Huns and Mongols. In 1581, in the first Russian invasion of Asia. For at least
he even, in a fit of rage, killed his son. He re- 2000 years, nomadic tribesmen from Asia had
pented this action and mourned it, but that poured in successive waves into the land which
didn't bring his son back to life. He did reduce eventually became Russia, and now for the first
his realm to order, but it was the stillness of time, the tide flowed the other way. Yermak had
death more than anything else. firearms, of course, which the Asian tribes had
What Russia needed, then and afterward, was not, and the result was what it had been in Mex-
a warm weather opening to the sea. The Baltic ico and Peru a half-century earlier. The Russians
1550 TO 1600 235
occupied the Khanate of Sibir just east of

the Venice held. Pope Pius V organized a
Urals and the entire northern portion "Holy
.
of Asia League" in which Spanish ships joined the Vene-
eventually received that name ("Siberia/' in En- and the whole was put under Don John
tian fleet
glish).
of Austria (who was later to fail in the
Ivan IV died in 1584, and since he had killed Nether-
lands).
his worthy son, he was succeeded
by a feeble- The two met at Lepanto, on October 7,
fleets
minded younger one who reigned as Fyodor I 1571, near the opening of the Gulf of Corinth,
(1557-1598). All of Ivan IV's terror now went for
not far from the site of the Battle of
nothing, for as soon as a weak hand was at Actium,
the where Octavian had bested Mark Antony 16 cen-
Tsarist helm, the boyars became turbulent
again turies earlier. The now was
and their rivalries and intrigues once more weak-
battle very much like
the battle then, for it was fought with galleys,
ened the land.
rowed by oarsmen. The Christians had a few
In 1589, an independent patriarchate
was set guns and some light armor, but except for that,
up in Moscow
so that the Russian Church was the battle might have been fought between
no longer dependent on the leadership of the Pa- the
Romans and the Carthaginians. The battle was
triarch of Constantinople who was, in any case, fought as a series of single combats between
under the thumb of the Ottoman Turks.
ships that tried to ram and board each other.
Fyodor died in 1598, and he was the last of the Don
John had 227 galleys, and the Turkish admiral
Varangian rulers who had taken over Russia
h^d 270 somewhat smaller ships with less expe-
seven centuries earlier.
rienced seamen.
It was necessary to elect a
new ruler now, and It was a smashing Christian
the choice
victory.The Turks
on Boris
fell Godunov (1551-1605), lost 223 galleys to 13 for the Christians, and
who was Fyodor s brother-in-law. His reign was 15,000 Christian galley slaves were freed. It was
made miserable by the machinations of the boy- the last important battle of this type ever
to be
ars.
fought.
The Christian navy did not follow up this suc-
cess because it was too late in the season.
They
OTTOMAN EMPIRE retired to wait for the spring. During the
the Turks madly built new galleys and the
winter,
Chris-
Suleiman the Magnificent died on September 5, tian offensive was not effectively renewed,
partly
1566, having reigned for 46 years. He had been
because of Philip's preoccupation with the Neth-
the tenth consecutive forceful and capable ruler
erlands, France, and England. The
Venetians,
of the Ottoman Turks over a period of two and
not of a mind to fight the Turks all by them-
three-quarter centuries. Few monarchies have selves, gave up Cyprus in March 1573, and
had such a stretch of able rulers, and now the signed a peace with the Ottoman Empire in Feb-
Turkish good fortune ended. The Ottoman Em- ruary 1574.
pire was never to have another ruler like any of
However, if the Battle of Lepanto did not have
the first 10.
any short-term effects, it did prevent the Turks
An indication ofwhat was happening was the from proceeding to the domination of the central
fact that Suleiman was succeeded by a son who and western Mediterranean Sea; it destroyed
went down in history as Selim II the Sot (1524- their reputation for invincibility; and it marked
1574). However, even if Selim was a drunkard the beginning of the decline of the Ottoman Em-
and an incompetent, the Ottoman Empire did pire.
not fall apart at once. Its were too
institutions Selim was succeeded by
II his son, Murad III
strong to allow that, and it continued smoothly
(1546-1595) in 1574, and he in turn was suc-
for a time despite the weak hand at the helm.
ceeded by Mehmed III (1566-1603) in 1595. De-
During Selim's reign, the Turks went to war spite gradual decay, the Turks at this time were
with Venice over the island of Cyprus, which continuing to expand eastward to the Caucasus
mountain range and the Caspian Sea and re-
tained their hold on Hungary. JAPAN

The Japanese at first welcomed the coming of
Christianity that resulted from the missionary ac-
PERSIA tivity of Francis Xavier, feeling it would bring
In 1587, Abbas I (1571-1629), sometimes called European trade with it. Xavier's attempt to adapt
"Abbas the Great," became Shah of Persia. By to local custom, however, was not followed by
that time, Englishmen had reached the land. An- those missionaries who came after him, and their
thony Jenkinson traveled through Russia to reach intolerance —
combined with their attitude of su-
Persia in 1561. periority to Japanese ways — created furious op-
Abbas was the greatest of the Safavids. He position.
made peace with the Turks in order to be free to During this period, Japan was finally unified.
handle the Uzbeks to the north. They were de- The beginning was made by Oda Nobunago
feated in 1597. (1534-1582), who, in 1568, seized Kyoto, the seat
He then set about building a new army, with of the Emperor (who reigned but did not rule),
artillery after the fashion of the Turks, so that he and made himself dictator of central Japan. He
could finally battlethem on equal terms. In this, broke the power of the Buddhist monasteries and
he had the help of two Englishmen, the brothers, initiated a period of castle-building.
Anthony (1565-1635) and Robert Shirley (1581- Oda's chief general was Toyotomi Hideyoshi
1628). (1537-1598). After Oda's assassination in 1582,
Hideyoshi made himself dictator and, by 1590,
all Japan was his. This meant that a whole class
INDIA of Japanese warriors was suddenly unemployed.
In 1556, Akbar (1542-1605), the son of Humayun To keep them busily engaged elsewhere so that
and the third of theMogul Emperors, came to they would not plot to seize power for them-
the throne which he was to occupy for nearly 50 selves (something that had been going on in
years. He extended the limits of the Empire well Japan for centuries), Hideyoshi planned to con-
into central India and established a policy of reli- quer China by way of Korea.
gious toleration. In 1592, Korea was invaded and occupied, but
in July the Korean fleet engaged the Japanese
ships. Two of the Korean ships were low-slung
CHINA and were covered with iron armor, as designed
The Ming Empire was now declining militarily, by the Korean admiral, Yi Sung Sin. These were
although its cultural achievements remained the first ironclads in history, which almost single-
high. handedly destroyed the Japanese fleet.
A Portuguese settlement was established at At a Korean request, the Chinese sent an army
Macao, in southern China near Canton, in 1557, into Korea and the Japanese were penned up at
and it has remained Portuguese to this day. Pusan in the southeast. In 1597, they broke out
Japan was conducting a campaign in Korea that again; however, in November 1598, the Koreans
met with Chinese resistance and that further won a second great naval battle in the course of
weakened Chinese power, even as the Manchus which Yi Sung Sin was killed. By that time, Hid-
in the northeast were growing stronger. eyoshi had also died, and the Japanese left
An earthquake took place in Shansi in north- Korea. (One wonders what would have hap-
eastern China on January 24, 1556, which was pened if the Chinese had taken up the matter of
reported to have killed 830,000 people. If this is ironclads, improved them further, and built a
accurate, it is the worst earthquake from the fleet of them.)
standpoint of loss of life in recorded history. In 1600, another general, Tokugawa leyasu
1600 TO 1650 237
(1543-1616), seized control of a united Japan and

named). Manila, its present capital, was founded
established the Tokugawa Shogunate.
on May 19, 1571.
PHILIPPINE ISLANDS AFRICA

For nearly 50 years after Magellan had reached
In 1591, a force ofSpanish and Portuguese mer-
the islands and died there, neither the Portu-
cenaries, in the pay of Morocco and using
fire-
guese nor the Spaniards had seriously attempted
arms, defeated the forces of the Songhair
a settlement. was not until 1565 that the first
It
Empire. The black culture at Timbuktu was de-
Spanish settlement was made there at the order
stroyed.
of Philip II (for whom the islands were then
1600 TO 1650
of the changing position of Mars in the
AUSTRIA sky to
work out the Three Laws of Planetary Motion in
The Holy Roman Empire, dominated by Austria, 1609 and 1619. He showed that the orbits of the
consisted now of Protestant states and Catholic
planets (including that of Earth) were ellipses,
states. In theory, each side was supposed
to with the sun at one focus. He showed how the
leave the other alone, and there was to be a mu-
speed or orbital motion varied with a planet's
tual toleration. Neither side, however, trusted varying distance from the Sun, and how the pe-
the other.
riod of revolution of each planet was related to
In 1608, the Protestant states formed an average distance from the Sun.
its
"Evangelical Union," headed by Frederick IV This was a vast improvement on the picture as
(1574-1610), Elector of the Palatinate, a German drawn by Copernicus three quarters of a century
stateon the middle Rhine. In response, the Cath- earlier. model of the planetary system is
Kepler's
olic states formed a Catholic League in
1609 still accepted today and undoubtedly corre-
under the leadership of Maximilian I, Duke of sponds with reality. When Kepler prepared ta-
Bavaria (1573-1651). The stage was all set for a bles of planetary motions based on his Laws,
religious war; all that was needed was a spark.
which proved the best tables yet, he called thern
The spark was supplied in the Austrian do- the "Rudolphine Tables" after his patron.
minions. Austria was Catholic, of course, but Kepler also studied the newly invented tele-
after the Turks had taken Hungary, Bohemia had
scope and worked out its optics in detail, estab-
fallen under Hapsburg control, and the Bohe- lishing the modern science of optics in so doing.
mians were largely Protestant. In 1612, when Rudolf II
died without children,
Under Rudolf IPs comparatively mild rule, the his younger brother, Matthias (1557-1619), suc-
Protestants were not too badly treated. In fact, ceeded. Matthias was already 55 and was also
Rudolph II was a scholar who is best remem- childless. He was
strongly Catholic, but he tried
bered today for being the patron of the German to keep the peace between the two
religious par-
astronomer, Johannes Kepler (1571-1630), who ties. However, he planned to leave his dukedom
was a Protestant. and the Imperial throne to his first cousin, once-
Kepler was a student of Tycho Brahe in the removed, Ferdinand (1578-1637), and that was a
latter's last years. He used Tycho's observations different matter.
Ferdinand had been educated by the Jesuits Christian IV lost battle after battle to Tilly and
and was an uncompromising Catholic of the to Wallenstein and, on June 7, 1629, was glad to
most narrow type. There was no hope that he make peace even at the cost of giving up Hol-
would be tolerant and, even before he became stein.
Emperor, he was made King of Bohemia in 1617. All seemed well for Austria now. Ferdinand,
Things were darkening for the Bohemians. firm in his position as Emperor, was supreme in
On May 23, 1618, the Bohemians in Prague Bohemia again. The Protestant states of Germany
threw their Catholic governors out a window were either defeated outright or were pusillani-
("the defenestration of Prague"). The Evangelical mously maintaining neutrality. Denmark had
League, now led by Frederick V of the Palatinate burned its fingers. It didn't look as though it
(1596-1632), after the death of his father in 1610, would take very much, now, to clear the Empire
at once sent troops into Austria, and this was the of Protestants altogether and return it to the
start of what came to be called "The Thirty Years Catholic fold. In fact, by the Edict of Restitution
War." on March 29, 1629, the smashing of Protestant
The Bohemians elected Frederick V their king congregations and worship had begun.
on August 26, 1619, and three days later (Mat- But France, working harder than ever, found
thias being dead by now) Ferdinand was elected a new Protestant champion in the person of Gus-
Emperor Ferdinand II. Ferdinand II secured the tavus II Adolphus of Sweden (1594-1632). Gus-
help of Spain and of Maximilian of Bavaria, and tavus Adolphus was busy fighting Poland at the
prepared to bring Bohemia back within the Haps- time, but France work out a truce in
managed to
burg orbit. that war. They then gave Gustavus Adolphus a
Maximilian's Netherlands-born general, Jo- healthy subsidy and pointed southward.
hann Tserclaes, Count von Tilly (1559-1632), Gustavus Adolphus landed in Germany on
marched to Bohemia and on November 8, 1620, July 4, 1630, exuding self-confidence. Ferdinand
defeated Frederick totally and forced him to flee. of Austria, hoping to keep Germans from rally-
Frederick's 10 weeks as king were over and done ing to the Swedish king, fired Wallenstein,
with, and he remained in exile for the rest of his whose depredations had made him hateful.
life. Tilly then conquered the Palatinate, and its Tilly, however, was laying siege to the Prot-
electoral vote for Emperor was transferred to estant city of Magdeburg throughout the winter
Maximilian of Bavaria. and early spring of 1630-1631. Gustavus Adol-
The Austrians and the Catholics seemed to phus, moving very quickly, took Frankfurt on the
—
have done very well too well, perhaps, for they Oder on April 13, 1631, hoping that his approach
alarmed France, which, although it was a Catho- would cause Tilly to lift the siege and turn to-
lic nation, didn't want to see Austria grow too ward him.
powerful. Tilly didn't do that. He kept up the siege, took
Denmark
France encouraged Christian IV of the city of Magdeburg on May 20, 1631, and sub-
to intervene. He was a Lutheran and he was also jected it to a merciless sack, killing 25,000 out of
Duke of Holstein, which was a German region its 30,000 inhabitantsand burning it to the
just south of Denmark. That gave him an interest ground. Genghis Khan could not have done bet-
in how things went in Germany. Danish troops ter, though he would have done it more quickly.
invaded Germany in the summer of 1625. Saxony, a Protestant state, had tried to stay
Austria, for its commissioned Albert von
part, neutral, but whatever it did, either Tilly or Gus-
Wallenstein (1583-1634), a Bohemian-born gen- tavus Adolphus would ravage it. Saxony decided
eral, to lead its armies. He fed and paid his army to join the Protestant King of Sweden and Tilly —
by stripping the countryside, and this began the ravaged it, taking Leipzig itself on September 15,
custom, war, of systematically looting the
in this 1631.
land and of callously beggaring and killing civil- Gustavus Adolphus rushed to meet him and
ians. the two armies faced each other four miles north
1600 TO 1650 239
on September 17. What those who op-

of Leipzig
peace with the Protestants, nor a powerful Wal-
posed the Swedish king were not quite aware of
lenstein in Bohemia. His best way of avoiding
was that he was a military leader of the first rank. both was to arrange for the assassination of Wal-
He had helped devise lighter muskets that were lenstein, and that took place on February 25
easier to carry and could be swung into
action 1633.
more quickly. He also made the artillery lighter
The Swedes remained in the field even with-
and more mobile. He introduced cartridges for out Gustavus Adolphus, but on September
6,
muskets so that there would always be just the
1634, at Nordlingen in southwestern Germany,
right amount of gunpowder for firing,
and he they fought an Imperialist army that included a
improved and standardized the quality of the strong Spanish force. The Spaniards fought with
gunpowder itself. their usual methodical ferocity and the
All this was hastening the disappearance
Swedes
of were almost wiped out.
infantry masses that were needed to make their
All the work of Gustavus Adolphus was
weight felt behind spears or pikes, as had been
now
threatened, and the French who, till then, had
the custom since the Greeks and Macedonians 19
paid others to do the fighting against Austria,
centuries earlier. Instead, the "battle-line" was
were forced, at last, to take a direct hand in the
coming into being, a relatively thin outspreading action.
of soldiers, since there was no need for a massive This meant that the Empire was faced with a
weight to make contact. The soldiers let the bul- formidable new enemy. When Ferdinand II died
lets make the contact for them. in 1637, his son, who became Ferdinand III
In short, everything Gustavus Adolphus did (1608-1657), and who had helped push for Wal-
made for great mobility, greater maneuverability,
lenstein s assassination, began to think of peace.
greater speed.
It was clear that the cruelty of a religious war in
This proved itself at the Battle of Leipzig, in which each side thought the other was in league
which the Swedes turned agilely in this direction with the devil was destroying Germany to the
and that, halting each attempted Imperial attack, benefit of no one but France.
and then swooping in to capture the unwieldy Ferdinand III was unwilling to allow Protes-
Imperial artillery. Tilly's army was smashed and tants in his own was now prepared
realm, but he
driven into flight. to have them left in peace elsewhere in
Germany.
Gustavus
1632. Adolphus then led his army freely His eagerness for peace was increased when the
over Germany and, in a battle on April 15, 1632, Swedes, under a capable general, Lennart Tor-
Tilly was killed. The Emperor Ferdinand, how- stenson (1603-1651), defeated the Imperialists on
ever, had now placed Wallenstein in charge of
November 2, 1642, near Leipzig.
his army again and Gustavus Adolphus maneu-
Peace negotiations were opened in 1643, but
vered to meet him. The two armies met at they dragged on for years. Germany, which had
Lutzen, not far west of Leipzig on November 16, been badly damaged by the marching and coun-
Wallenstein was a redoubtable fighter, but termarching of armies, was further mangled dur-
he was narrowly beaten and had to withdraw. In ing the years of negotiation while the various
the course of the battle, however, Gustavus parties maneuvered for advantage. The popula-
Adolphus was killed, which was a disaster for tion of the Empire had declined from 22
million
the Protestants. to perhaps 17 million, and starvation reached
the
Even so, Wallenstein, who was no fool, could pitch where cannibalism was reported. It was the
see that 15 years ofwar had brought no result worst European devastation since the Mongols
worth the slaughter and he felt that a compro- had dashed in four centuries earlier.
mise peace might be best. He tried to organize At last,' on October 24, 1648, a treaty of peace
one that would leave him in a powerful position was signed at Munster in the district of West-
in Bohemia. The intransigent Emperor Ferdi- phalia in northwestern Germany.
nand, however, wanted neither a compromise By this "Treaty of Westphalia," Sweden ob-
tained sections of the German and

Baltic coast, The accomplishments of the Dutch in the Far
France obtained bases in western Germany. The East at this time were mainly due to the enter-
conditions inside Germany were restored to prise of Anthony van Diemen (1593-1645). Van
what they were in 1618 (all that fighting and hor- Diemen, as the administrator of the Dutch Indo-
ror for nothing!), except that Bavaria kept the nesian realm, sent the Dutch navigator, Abel Jans-
while the Palatinate was turned
electoral dignity, zoon Tasman, on an exploring expedition to the
into an eighth electorate. Switzerland and the south of the East Indian islands.
United Netherlands were recognized as indepen- In 1642, Tasman discovered an island he called
dent nations owing no allegiance to the Emperor. Van Diemen's Land, but which has since been
The Protestant states (including, for the first renamed in his honor as Tasmania. He also dis-
time, those that were Calvinist) were to be left covered New Zealand (named for the Dutch
alone, but there was no provision for the tolera- province of Zeeland) and the Fiji Islands. In the
tion of Protestants in Bohemia or in any other course of his voyage, he circumnavigated Aus-
part of the Austrian dominions. tralia, but without happening to touch its shores.
The Thirty Years War was the last of the sig- In 1644, however, he did sight sections of the
nificant wars of religion. A century and a third Australian coast, which he called "New Hol-
after Martin Luther had begun the Reformation, land," but which he did not recognize as a con-
Europe settled down at last to the inevitable tinent.
that the continent was to be permanently divided The Dutch also formed the Dutch West India
between Catholics and Protestants. Company and went exploring and adventuring
The Thirty Years War brought cultural life on the American coastline, obtaining bases in
in Germany to an ebb. However, a German assome of the lesser islands of the West Indies.
tronomer of note in this period was Johannes (That this could be done in the very teeth of the
Hevelius (1611-1687). In 1647, he published a Spaniards indicates the decline of Spanish
magnificent map of the Moon, and he was the power.)
first to detect the phases of the planet. Mercury. In 1609, an English navigator in the employ of
the Netherlands, Henry Hudson (d. 1611), ex-
plored what is now called the Hudson River. (He
NETHERLANDS later went on, in English employ, to explore what
Once Spain had taken over Portugal, they closed is now called Hudson Bay, and died there.)
the port of Lisbon to Dutch ships. What might In Dutchman, Peter Minuit (1580-
1626, a
have seemed an economic blow at the Nether- 1638), bought the island of Manhattan from its
lands proved, however, to spur them into a native inhabitants for the equivalent of $24. The
golden age. city of New Amsterdam was founded then, and
The Dutch had ships that were better than the region around the Hudson River became the
those of the Spaniards and Portuguese, and they colony of NewNetherlands.
decided to sail to the Far East themselves, instead In addition, Willem Corneliszoon Schouten
of trading by way of the Portuguese as they had (1580-1625) was the first to explore the coasts of
done up to that point. Tierra del Fuego southern tip
(the island off the
They formed the Dutch East India Company of South America, which had been sighted by
in 1602. They seized the island of Mauritius in Magellan nearly a century earlier). In 1615, he
the Indian Ocean (which they named for their named the southernmost point of the island
stadtholder, Maurice of Nassau). They also took Cape Horn after his home town of Hoorn. (The
Ceylon and Malacca from the Portuguese, seized fact that Tierra del Fuego is horn-shaped is pure
bases on the islands of Java and Sumatra, and coincidence.)
founded Batavia on the Javanese coast in 1619 The Netherlands was in a golden age cultur-
(naming the city for the old Latin name for the ally as well. There was a burst of artistry not far
Netherlands). second to that of the Italian Renaissance: Peter
1600 TO 1650 241
Paul Rubens (1577-1640), well-known

for his put an end to the stadtholdership, three
plump and overflowing damsels; Anthony Van quarters
of a century after William the Silent
Dyck (1599-1641), a student of Rubens, who had estab-
also lished the post. For a time there
painted in England, and many of whose was a "Dutch
paint- Republic."
ings of English showed the trim,
courtiers
pointed beard fashionable at the time,
so that
such a beard has been called a "Van Dyck"
ever DENMARK
since; Franz Hals (1585-1666),
whose "Laughing Christian IV of Denmark had an unusually
Cavalier" is world famous; Jan Vermeer long
(1632- reign of 60 years, but it was a reign
1675); and, most of all, Rembrandt van doomed to
Rijn frustration. Christian intervened in the Thirty
(1606-1669), who may well be the most famous Years War in 1625 and was soundly trounced.
painter in the world who was not an Italian. He
then had to watch Sweden (which had
Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) was a been a
prolific writer possession of Denmark not so long before) inter-
who set the basis for international law. Jan Bap- vene, be victorious, and attain great-power
tista van Helmont (1580-1640) was the sta-
first to tus. In 1643, Christian
study different gases in detail and
made war on Sweden out
discovered and was roundly trounced again.
of jealousy
carbon dioxide; he also studied the growth
of However, he managed to retain his hold on
plants and was the first to conduct quantitative Norway and rebuilt Oslo, its capital, after it had
studies in biology. Willerbrord Snell
(1580-1626) been destroyed by fire in 1624. He named
made key discovery in light refraction. The
a the
rebuilt city after himself so that
Dutch were particularly well-versed in optical became Chris-
it
tiania.
Eventually, though, it
work, and a Dutch optician, Hans Lippershey became Oslo again,
so he didn't win out there, either.
(1570-1619), constructed the first telescope in
1608.
In 1609, the Netherlands had concluded a 12- SWEDEN
year truce with Spain that was growing weary.
Gustavus II Adolphus became King of Sweden in
In 1621, when the truce expired,
Spanish forces 1611. In his reign, Sweden grew prosperous,
tried to renew the struggle, but the Netherlands owing to his labors and to those of his chancellor.
was now exceedingly prosperous, with a first- Axel Gustaffson Oxenstierna (1583-1644),
class fleet,
while Spain, involved with the Thirty
whose
wisdom guided Gustavus and who ran the coun-
Years War, was near the end of its resources.
try while Gustavus was off to the
In 1648, the
war and after
independence of the Netherlands Gustavus was dead. Oxenstierna's diplomacy
was recognized. The long 80-year war with Spain saw to it that Sweden benefitted from its military
was at last crowned with success, and a small victories.
nation with a population of about 1.5 million had
Under Gustavus, Sweden reached its peak.
become world power.
a
Gustavus took the eastern shores of the Baltic
Maurice of Nassau had died in 1625 and had Sea
in 1617, and blocked Russian
access to the sea.
been succeeded as stadtholder by his younger He defeated Poland in the 1620s and took over
brother, Frederick Henry (1584-1647). He was much of Latvia. He intervened in the Thirty
successful in war, beating the Spanish in several
Years War and, as a result, Sweden obtained var-
and assuming nearly monarchical status.
battles
ious portions of the German Baltic coast and even
He did not quite live to see independence for- a holding on the North Sea west of Denmark.
mally recognized, dying the year before the
The Baltic Sea was being turned into a Swedish
Treaty of Westphalia. He was succeeded by his
lake.
son, William II (1626-1650).
Sweden even attempted to establish settle-
In 1650,however, William II died of smallpox, ments on the North American coast as the Neth-
leaving a pregnant wife to whom a son was later
erlands was doing. In 1637, the "New
born. That was not enough for the Dutch, who
Sweden
Company" was organized; and, in 1638, a group
of Swedish settlers left for America, with Peter Netherlands border. The French won and the
Minuit (the purchaser of Manhattan Island) at its military leadership of Europe passed from Spain
head. They settled in what is now Delaware, es- to France.
tablishing atown at the site of what is now Wil- Spain's material decline was lightened by the
mington. They brought with them the 'dog production of one of the world's greatest books.
cabin," which had been invented in the Scandi- Don Quixote de Mancha was written in 1609,
la
navian north and which eventually became the with a second part in 1619, by Miguel de Cer-
legendary homes of American pioneers. vantes (1547-1616), who had been wounded at
Gustavus Adolphus was succeeded by his the Battle of Lepanto and had lost the use of his
daughter, Christina (1626-1689). She was an ec- left hand.
centric woman, best-known today having
for Don Quoxite de la Mancha is considered by
contributed to the death of the great French phi- many tobe the first true novel in the western
losopher, Rene Descartes (1596-1650), by forcing world and, perhaps, the best. Its humor and wit,
him to lecture to her at dawn in the drafty and to say nothing of its humanity, sparkles even
cold palace during the Swedish winter. Poor Des- today and even through translation. Its satire
cartes died of pneumonia on February 1, 1650. killed an entire class of worthless literature de-
voted to knight-errantry. Cervantes' one book
(he wrote other things of little account, to be
SPAIN sure) is sufficient to lift him high above all other
Philip III died in 1621 and was succeeded by his Spanish writers — even above Lope de Vega and
son, Philip IV (1605-1665). Spain was now fading his 1800 plays.
rapidly. Its economy was faltering, and its agri- Diego de Silva Velazquez (1599-1660) was the
culture was declining. In trade, it was increas- greatest Spanish painter of the period, well-
ingly outclassed by the English, the French, and known for his portraits of Philip IV and others of
the Dutch. It continued to be militarily active, his court. Bartolome Esteban Murillo (1617-1682)
and involved itself in the Thirty Years War out of was another successful Spanish painter of the
a feeling of family unity with the Austrian Haps- time.
burgs and out of a continuation of Philip IPs anti-
Protestant policies. This accomplished nothing
but the acceleration of the decline.
PORTUGAL
growing weakness and increasing
Spain's Although Philip promised to rule Portugal, by
II
governmental inefficiency brought about a great way of Portuguese officials under Portuguese
revolt in Catalonia in eastern Spain in 1640, law, and largely kept his promise, his successors,
where the tradition of an independent Aragon a Philip III and Philip IV, put Portugal under
century and a half earlier still lingered. It took increasingly heavy-handed Spanish control. Por-
nearly two decades to crush the rebellion and, tugal grew increasingly discontented and demor-
while it was going on, Portugal took advantage alized. Parts of its overseas Empire began to slip
of Spain's preoccupation and also rebelled in No- away and fall into Dutch hands.
vember 1640. That rebellion Spain was not able to Portuguese revolts against Spain were put
crush, and Portugal regained its independence down until 1640, when Spanish attention was oc-
permanently after having been Spanish for 60 cupied entirely with the Catalonian revolt. On
years. December 1, 1640, Portugal seized the opportu-
Disaster piled on disaster until the over- nity to revolt and to choose as its king John of
strained fabric of the Spanish economy and soci- Braganza (1604-1656), a great-great grandson of
ety ruined even the Spanish army, which could the Portuguese king, Manuel I, who had ruled a
no longer keep up with the changes in military century and a quarter earlier. The new king
technology. On May 19, 1643, Spanish and reigned as John IV.
French forces battled at Rocroi at the French- France and England at once recognized Por-
1600 TO 1650 243
tuguese independence (since that weakened

Richelieu had made war against La Rochelle,
Spain, with which both had long been
at enmity) a city on France's west coast, which was Hu-
and their help enabled Portugal to invade
Spain guenot, and almost independent. It was
and defeat it in battle in 1644. With that, not Ri-
Portu- chelieu's intention
guese independence was assured, although
to destroy the Huguenots,
merely to deprive them of any war-making abil-
Spain stubbornly refused to recognize it
for an- ity. Despite English help and a stout resistance
other quarter-century.
on the part of the Huguenots, La Rochelle
was
taken by French forces in 1628, and
the Hugue-
FRANCE nots were reduced to a tolerated sect,
rather than
to a state within a state.
On May 14, 1610,Henry IV was assassinated by Despite the fact that Richelieu was
a mentally unbalanced defrocked monk, fighting
Francois and defeating the Huguenots, the nobility
Ravaillac (1578-1610). Henry was succeeded by was
able to win the influence of the Church
over to
his nine-year-old son, whoruled as Louis XIII their side against Richelieu because
the Cardinal
(1601-1643). The regency was held by his was fighting Catholic Spain with
mother, Marie de Medici (1573-1642), a distant even more fer-
vor than he was fighting Protestant La
relative of Catherine de Medici. Rochelle,
and because he was subsidizing Gustavus
Louis XIII was a weak, depressed individual, Adol-
phus against Catholic Austria.
in more or less constant ill-health,
and was prob- For a while, it seemed that they had
ably homosexual. per-
However, he could lead an suaded Louis XIII (who also suffered a crisis
army when he had to, and he was bright enough of
conscience over the subsidizing of
to take control away from his Gustavus
mother and to Adolphus) to discharge Richelieu. The conspira-
choose a brilliant manas his principal adviser tors, with Marie de Medici at
their head, were
and to stick by him. The adviser, who had been absolutely certain of Richelieu's downfall
a protege of Marie de Medicis at first, was
and
were already gleefully counting their gains when
Armand-Jean du Plessis, Due de Richelieu, who Louis XIII came to the reluctant realization
became a Cardinal in 1622. that
Richelieu was making him strong and
It was Richelieu's design
that the
to destroy those nobility would make him weak.
forces inside France that disputed power
On November
with 11, 1630, he decided by his minister and
to stick
the king— the great nobles on the one hand,
and the conspirators suddenly and unexpectedly
the armed Huguenot had existed since
cities that found they had lost. That incidence was referred
the religious wars. Outside France, his aim
was to as "the day of the dupes."
to weaken the Hapsburgs who, in
Austria and Richelieu, by the way, was a patron of
litera-
Spain, were standing at every French border.
To ture and had aspirations to be a literary
do that, although he was a Catholic and a Cardi- figure
himself. He founded the French
nal, he was perfectly willing to make
Academy in
alliances 1634, and it has governed the French
with, and to subsidize, those Protestant language
powers and French literature ever since.
who would fight the Hapsburgs. Under his direc- Richelieu did not live to witness the end
of the
tion, France kept the pot boiling in the Thirty Thirty Years War. He died on December
Years War and did it so successfully that the 4, 1642.
Louis XIII, as though not daring to live long
after
Hapsburg cause was ruined and France emerged the death of the adviser he absolutely
depended
as the leading power in Europe —
though at a on, died on May 14, 1643.
frightful cost to the German people. The French army had meanwhile been reor-
Inside France, Richelieu's steady attempts to
ganized and revitalized. Just before he died,
Ri-
bring the nobility under control roused wild op-
chelieu appointed Louis d'Enghien
(1621-1686)
position to him on their part, and conspiracy to command the French army
on the border of
after conspiracy was leveled at him. This reached the Spanish Netherlands. He was only
its climax in 1630. 21 years
old, but he was a good choice.
The Spaniards took advantage of Richelieu's This period saw the beginning of France's
death, and of the fact that Louis XIII was on the golden age of literature. Great plays were written
point of death, to anticipate that France would by Pierre Corneille (1606-1684), the creator of
enter a period of near-anarchy, and felt that this French classical tragedies. Indeed, the French ad-
was an appropriate time to invade. They crossed hered so closely to the Greek and Roman models
the border and aimed at Paris. that they have always thought very little of
They paused to lay siege to the city of Rocroi, Shakespeare, whose works transcended the rigid
just on the French side of the border, and d'En- rules set up by the Greeks.
ghien moved His cavalry defeated the
in quickly. In science, France was also preeminent now.
Spanish cavalry, and that left 18,000 Spanish in- The French scholar, Marin Merse’nne (1588-1648)
fantry which, for a century and a half, had served as a one-man connecting link among the
seemed invincible. Direct French attacks failed, scientists of Europe. He wrote voluminous letters
so d'Enghien stood off and made use of his artil- to places as far as Constantinople, reporting on
lery, plus captured Spanish guns. When the scientific work he had heard about, asking for
Spanish infantry had been sufficiently punished, information and making suggestions. It was an
a French advance swept them from the field and invaluable service.
virtually annihilated them. That marked the Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655), another French
passing of Spanish military superiority and ush- scholar, strongly supported the atomistic philos-
ered in a period when it was the French army ophy of Democritusand Lucretius, and kept it
that dominated Europe. alive for his contemporaries. He described and
Louis XIII, despite his distaste for women, in- named the aurora borealis and, in 1631, he
cluding his wife, Anne of Austria (1601-1666), watched the planet Mercury cross the face of the
who was the sister of Philip IV of Spain, had Sun. It was the first planetary transit to be
managed to father two sons. The older of these viewed.
succeeded to the throne at the age of five as Louis Rene Descartes (1596-1650) published his phi-
XIV (1638-1715). Anne of Austria was regent, losophy in 1637, which began by establishing his
and she employed as her chief minister Jules Ma- own existence: "I think, therefore I am," and
zarin (1602-1661), who had worked for Riche- continued from there. In mathematics, he in-
lieu. Richelieu had recommended him as his vented analytic geometry in an appendix to that
successor, and Mazarin had Anne's complete book, a system of interconverting algebraic equa-
trust. tions and geometric figures. He died in Sweden,
Mazarin continued Richelieu's policies both thanks to Queen Christina's callousness.
inside and outside France, and helped bring the Pierre de Fermat (1601-1665) was a lawyer
Thirty Years War to a successful conclusion (for who worked on mathematics only in his spare
France) in 1648. time. He is sometimes called "the world's great-
But now the nobility, free of the overpowering est amateur." He was one of the pioneers in the
genius of Richelieu, rose in rebellion. With them, study of the theory of numbers.
there rose some of the middle class as well, who Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), working with Fer-
wanted some kind of government other than that mat, founded the theory of probability, the work
of the monarch's irresponsible will. The insurrec- beginning with a consideration of a gambler's
tion was known as the Fronde (from a word of a uncertainty as to how to bet. Pascal also invented
child's slingshot, a word that originally arose out the first mechanical calculator in 1649 —
a very
of contempt). simple one, to be sure.
Mazarin worked under the disadvantage of Pascal was a Jansenist, a follower of the prin-
being an Italian, so that French national fervor ciples advanced by a Netherlands theologian,
could easily be built up against him. However, Cornelius Otto Jansen (1585-1638). Jansen was a
he fought back skillfully and, by 1650, the Fronde Roman Catholic, but he inveighed against the Je-
was almost under control. suits and the Counter-Reformation, and in some
1600 TO 1650 245
respects his thoughts were tinged with

Protes- been with Champlain on the latter's journey,
tantism. The feud between the
Jansenists and Je- crossed Lake Huron and Lake Michigan and
suits divided France especially, and almost as was
the first European to reach what is
badly (though without actual warfare) as now the
the Hu- American Midwest.
guenot-Catholic feud had done. Pascal spent the
Richelieu, when he came to power,
last years of his life writing encour-
essays supporting aged these explorations and settlements in New
Jansenist views, and his book Pensees France. The river that drains Lake
Thoughts was Champlain
( ) brilliant enough impress
to into the St. Lawrence River is called
succeeding generations as the Richelieu
much as his mathe- River in his honor.
matics had.
The French, at this time, also made settle-
ments in some of the small West Indian islands,
notably Guadelupe and Martinique. The
FRENCH NORTH AMERICA fact that
they could do so without Spain being able
During the last years of the reign of Henry IV, to stop
them is evidence of the extent of Spain's decline
the French established a permanent
settlement in by this time.
North America at the site of Cartier's exploratory
By 1650, New France was a going concern, but
voyages three quarters of a century earlier.
one source of weakness was its refusal to receive
The man responsible was Samuel de Cham-
French Huguenots. This meant that Huguenots,
plain (1567—1635). On second voyage to
his looking for religious freedom, went to other
North America parts
in 1604, he helped found the city of the North American continent, taking
of Port Royal with
in Acadia (the peninsula now them what skills they possessed, together with a
known as Nova On his third voyage, he
Scotia). strong animosity toward New France.
founded the city of Quebec on the St. Lawrence
River on July 3, 1608, and that served as a nu-
cleus for "New France" in what is now south- PAPACY
eastern Canada.
The Papacy was learning that it was living in a
he discovered the body of water now
In 1609,
harsher world, and one in which its secular
called "Lake Champlain" in the northern
reaches power, at least, had sadly diminished. Paul V
of New York State. On this occasion, the
party of (1552-1621), who had become Pope in 1605,
Algonquins that accompanied Champlain en-
placed Venice under an interdict in 1606.
countered a group of Iroquois. Since the found- That
meant that the sacraments and other clerical ser-
ing of the Iroquois Confederacy
40 years before, vices would be withheld in its territory.
the Iroquois had established their domination Venice
was not much amenable to Papal pressure at any
over neighboring tribes and were accustomed to
time, but now it was so indifferent to
the action
winning. When they fought the Algonquins,
(and life within it went on in so undisturbed
they were winning also, but then Champlain and a
fashion) that Paul V had no choice but to
his men
joined the fight on the Algonquin side.
remove
the interdict. It had been a favorite
The Iroquois found themselves facing muskets weapon of
the medieval Papacy, but, after
1606, it was never
for the first time and had to flee. As a result, the used again.
Iroquois were usually anti-French from then on,
The Thirty Years War broke out while Paul V
something that had its importance in time. was Pope, but he was not enthusiastic about war
In 1611, Champlain founded a new settlement
as a means of healing the Protestant
breakaway,
further upstream on the Lawrence River, one
St. and he was very cautious in his support of
that became the nucleus of Montreal. By 1615, he
Aus-
tria.
reached the northern extension of Lake Huron His successor, Gregory XV (1554-1623)
ar-
and became the first European ever to see any of ranged for secret elections to the Papacy, reduc-
the Great Lakes. ing the possibilities of open interference.
In 1634, Jean Nicolet (1598—1642),
He
who had strongly supported missionary activity, and
that
did more to win back some of the losses Catholics of astronomy — but, of course, the Earth moved
suffered in the Reformation than war did. about the Sun anyway and even the Pope could
His successor, Urban VIII (1568-1644), fol- not change that fact. Although the Papacy had
lowed Richelieu's policies. He wanted Catholi- won a short-term victory over Galileo, it was
cism to win out over Protestantism, of course, Pyrrhic, for Copernicanism advanced to univer-
but he didn't want the Hapsburgs to become too sal acceptance despite the Church's thunders.
powerful. The Hapsburgs were in control of Ital- It is the strength of Catholicism, however, that
ian territory both north and south of Papal States the Church learns from its mistakes. The trial of
and they might too easily reduce the Pope to a Galileo soon proved a very bad mistake and the
puppet. With memories of such Emperors as Church, while refusing to admit it had been
Henry IV and Frederick II, Urban VIII main- wrong, was very cautious, thereafter, about op-
tained a neutrality in the Thirty Years War that posing scientific findings.
brought him much criticism from the more ex- In 1644, Urban was succeeded as Pope by In-
treme Catholics. nocent X (1574-1655), who
dismissed Urban's
Urban VIII is best remembered, however, for careful neutrality, and substituted a pro-Spanish
his hostility to Galileo Galilei (1564-1642). Galileo bias. The result was that he denounced, in un-
was one of the greatest scientists in history, and measured tones, the Treaty of Westphalia, which
he helped make Italy glitter even in the debased ended the Thirty Years War in a compromised
and oppressed political climate under which it peace. No one on either side, however, paid at-
now suffered. tention, and this demonstrated, in dramatic fash-
As a 17-year-old, Galileo had discovered the ion, the decline of Papal power.
principle of the pendulum — that its period of In addition to Galileo, Italian scientists of the
swing was roughly constant whatever the width period included Evangelista Torricelli (1608-
of the swing. In the 1590s, he had studied bodies 1647), who was the first to measure
pressureair
rolling down an inclined plane and had found in 1643 and, in so doing, invented the barometer.
that the rate of movement was independent of The Venetian physician, Sanctorius (1561-1636),
the weight of the body and that the speed of was the first to attempt to measure the tempera-
movement increased at a constant rate. This ture of the human body (using a primitive air-
killed Aristotelian physics, which had held sway thermometer) as a diagnostic device.
in European thought for 19 centuries. An important Italian painter of the period was
His fame reached its height, however, when Guido Reni (1575-1642).
he became the first to turn the newly discovered
telescope on the heavens. He discovered myriads
of stars too dim to see without a telescope; moun- ENGLAND
tains and on the Moon; the satellites of
craters Elizabeth died on March 23, 1603, after naming
I
Jupiter; the phases of Venus; and the spots of the James VI of Scotland as her heir. She may not
Sun. He strongly supported the Copernican no- have liked doing so, but he was descended from
tion of the Earth going around the Sun and wrote Henry VII both by way of his father and of his
a book in 1632 (in Italian, for even nonscholars to mother. Any other choice would have started dy-
read) in which he presented the Copernican sys- nastic squabbling, which no one wanted.
tem very persuasively and made the supporters James raced to London to take on the new
of the older Earth-centered system look foolish. position before anyone changed his mind, and
Urban VIII, who had been a friend of Galileo, he became king of England as James I. Thus it
was persuaded that the book poked fun at him, was that though England had tried to control the
so Galileo was brought before the Inquisition. On throne of Scotland since the time of Edward I,
June 22, 1633, under threat of torture (but not the three centuries earlier, when it came time for a
actual use of he was forced to renounce any
it), single monarch to rule over both nations, it was
views that were at variance with the older form a Scottish king and not an English one who did
1600 TO 1650 247
was not a true union of nations, however.

so. It
ing people, though
The two remained separate in law and custom
new and technically better
translationshave been produced. The King
and were united only dynastically.
James Bible and the works of William Shake-
The new reign was not popular with the En-
speare stand at the peak of English literature
glish, who had a long tradition of
despising the and, perhaps, always will.
Scots, and James I did not have the knack
of mak- The English Parliament, which had been
ing himself personally popular as Henry
VIII and cowed under the Tudors, became restive under
Elizabeth I had done. There were plots to
de- James I. They objected to James Ts pro-Spanish
throne him, but none succeeded.
bias and to his attempts at being absolute,
The most notorious was the ^^Gunpowder espe-
cially since he did with a Scottish accent.
it
plot," in which a group of Catholics
planned to James, on the other hand, wanted no dissent. He
blow up Parliament and the King on November
wanted everyone to be Church of England, for
5, 1605. An anonymousrevealed the plot,
letter instance, and
said openly that he would harry all
and a search party
on November 4 discovered dissenters out of the land. When Parliament
barrels of gunpowder, with one of the
conspira- drew up a petition insisting
on their right to de-
tors, Guy Fawkes (1570—1606) on
guard. Ever bate matters of importance, and maintaining
since, every November 5 has been celebrated that
by the king must take the opinions of
Parliament
the English as "Guy Fawkes Day." under advisement, James tore that page out of
James I had one characteristic that served the the Parliamentary journal.
good of England, though many people were dis-
James I died on March 27, 1625, and his son
satisfied with it. He was aman of peace and res- became Charles I of England (and Charles I of
olutely refused to go to war. He did his best to Scotland as well). The new king married Hen-
establish peace with Spain, for instance. There rietta Maria six weeks after his father's
death.
was even an attempt to arrange a marriage be- Parliament, however, had grown more in-
tween James Ts son, Charles (1600-1649) to a
tractable. It had resented James's treatment
Spanish princess, but this was carried through and
it had leaders such as
John Eliot (1592-1632),
with such ineptness that it failed. Thereupon
who were spoiling for a showdown. Parliament
Charles was betrothed to Henrietta Maria (1609-
called for the impeachment of Charles's chief
1669), a sister of Louis XIII of France. She was, of
minister, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham
course, a Catholic.
(1592-1628). He had been one of James's favor-
James I even resisted the temptation to inter- ites and was a complete incompetent
vene in the Thirty Years War, though there might
who failed
at everything he tried. (It was he who
have seemed reason to do so. The "Winter
had bun-
gled the plans for a Spanish marriage, for in-
King," Frederick V of the Palastinate, who was
stance.) In reply, Charles imprisoned Eliot
driven into humiliating exile in 1619, was mar-
and
other leaders, but Parliament refused to
transact
ried to Elizabeth (1596-1662), the daughter
of any business while they remained imprisoned.
James I. James refused to lift a finger to help his Since only Parliament could vote the taxes
that
daughter, as once he had done nothing to help would raise the money Charles needed, he was
his mother. forced to release the Parliamentary leaders.
One great accomplishment of his reign, by the Making war did not improve matters. Buck-
way, was the translation of the Bible into the En- ingham led an expedition for the relief of La Ro-
glish version used for centuries afterward. The chelle in 1627, when Richelieu was attacking that
54 scholars who worked at it made use of earlier Protestant Being Buckingham, he failed mis-
city.
English versions, particularly that of Tyndale, erably; and, while he tried to set a second
expe-
and created a literary masterpiece. The "Autho- dition into motion, he was, in 1628,
assassinated.
rized Version," as it was called (or, more popu- Meanwhile, Parliament was drawing up new
larly, "The King James Bible") was completed in petitions demanding various rights. On March 5,
1611. It is, to this day, the Bible to English-speak-
1629, Eliot was again arrested, along with
eight
other members. Eliot died in prison and the other whether the King took action in this matter or
eight gave in. Parliament was dissolved and not; and that it not be dissolved without its own
Charles determined to rule without Parliament.
I consent.
He raised money by various devices that harked Then, October 1641, the Irish, too, broke
in
back to old feudal customs. This greatly angered into rebellion. More than ever, now, Charles
the nation, but was not actually illegal. needed money with which to raise, pay, and
One chief adviser to Charles I at this time was equip an army to handle the Scots and the Irish,
William Laud (1573-1645), the bitterly anti-Puri- and more than ever Parliament was unwilling to
tan bishop of London. Charles made him Arch- give him one —
lest he raise an army and use it
bishop of Canterbury in 1633. Another adviser on Parliament itself. On December 1, 1641, Par-
was Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford (1593- liament passed a "Grand Remonstrance," list-
1641). Strafford, from 1633 to 1639, was lord dep- ing all their grievances through the length of
uty of Ireland, and he set about trying to increase Charles's reign.
English influence in that island, where Richard II Charles I, driven beyond endurance, tried to
and the Earl of Essex had failed. He was making arrest the Parliamentary leaders and even
progress of a sort, but, naturally, he embittered marched into Parliament with some soldiers on
the Irish. January 4, 1642, to carry through the arrest per-
All might have been well, if there was no un- sonally. The leaders had gone into hiding, how-
usual need for money, but for some reason, a ever, and Charles I merely made himself look
foolish attempt was made
push the Church of
to ridiculous by this useless action. Matters grew
England upon Scotland, which preferred its own steadily worse and, on August 22, 1641, an out-
brand of Calvinism. right civil war began. The Parliamentarians were
The Scots rebelled and their forces moved into popularly called "Roundheads" because they
northern England. wore their hair short. Those fighting for the king
Charles nowsimply had to have money in were "Cavaliers."
substantial amounts, so he reconvened Parlia- For two years, the fighting was indecisive,
ment on April 13, 1640 for the first time in 11 with neither side disposing of well-trained sol-
years. It refused to vote money until Parliamen- diers. One Parliamentarian, Oliver Cromwell
tary grievances were settled, and he dissolved it (1599-1658), turned out to be a first-rate general,
on May 5. Therefore, that Parliament was called however. He trained an excellent army (popu-
the "Short Parliament." larly called"The Ironsides") and, on July 2, 1644,
Charles still needed money, however, so he a battle was fought at Marston Moor, near York,
was forced to convene another Parliament on where the Ironsides showed their mettle and
November 3, 1640, and this one came to be called won. This put northern England into Parliamen-
the "Long Parliament." Parliament seemed un- tary hands.
perturbed at the Scottish advance, and they The King kept fighting, however, and royalist
made demands that Strafford be impeached. leaders even held Scotland for a time. Mean-
Charles had no choice but to give in, and first while, Archbishop Laud was executed
March, in
Strafford and then Laud were sent into imprison- 1644, and England moved steadily toward Puri-
ment in the Tower. Strafford was executed on tan control.
May 12, 1641. Cromwell continued to train soldiers and to
Kings had been hounded before this, and their set up a standing army of men who would make
favorites executed (as had been true of Edward a profession of fighting.
II, for instance), but usually it was the nobility, On June 14, 1645, a second major battle was
who were on the attack. Now, in England, there fought at Naseby, in central England, one in
was something new. The middle classes were ris- which Cromwell's forces disastrously defeated
ing and making themselves felt. Parliament de- the Royalists and smashed any Royalist hope for
manded that it be convened every three years. victories. Royalist strongholds surrendered, and
1600 TO 1650 249
Charles I himself fell into the hands of a Scottish 4004 B.C. This was taken seriously by
force on May Christians
5, 1646, and was eventually turned for centuries, and is believed by
over to the Parliamentarians in return for a unsophisticated
sum people even today.
of money.
Through this period, the English
golden age
After that, the Parliamentarians broke up into of literature continued. Shakespeare
a set of (Quarreling produced
groups. Cromwell, however, his great tragedies: Hamlet, Othello,
had the only good army and he beat all comers. Macbeth, King
Lear, Antony and Cleopatra between
Eventually, it seemed to Cromwell that as 1600 and 1607
long Ben Jonson (1572-1637) produced Volpone in
as Charles I was alive (though imprisoned), he 1605 and The Alchemist in 1610. John
would serve as the center of conspiracies de- Webster
(1580-1625) produced The Duchess
signed to restore him to full power. of Malfi in
1613. Francis Beaumont (1584-1616)
Therefore, Charles was tried in late January, and John
Fletcher (1579—1625) wrote a number of
1649, before a Parliament from which Cromwell's plays in
collaboration.
army had excluded all waverers, and which kept
As the Puritans
grew stronger, however, the
a watchful eye on those who remained.
Charles I stage dimmed. The theater was
was condemned and, on January 30, 1649, was considered by
the Puritans to be a haunt of immorality
executed. Europe was horrified. (That was and vice,
the and the playhouses were shut down. Eventually'
usual way of things. If a ruler killed 100,000 of they would be reopened, but the great
days of
his subjects, it was considered an item in just poetic tragedy were over.
history; but 100,000 subjects killed one king,
if
Among
the poets of the time were Michael
was
there a tidal wave of revulsion and shock.)
Drayton (1563-1641) who wrote about Agincourt
Cromwell then turned to England's outposts. in 1606, his verses beginning, "Fair stood the
In September 1649, he went to Ireland.
For five wind for France." John Donne (1572-1631)
centuries, ever since the time of Henry II, English
wrote, "Never send to know for whom the bell
control of Ireland had been loose and limited.
tolls, it tolls for thee" in
1623. John Suckling
Cromwell, however, in the space of nine months
(1609-1642) fought under Gustavus Adolphus
passed through the island like a whirlwind, cap-
and under Charles I and wrote the ballad that
turing every fortress that resisted, and massa-
begins, "Why so pale and wan, fond lover?"
in
cring every garrison. When he returned
to 1638. Richard Lovelace (1618-1657) fought
England in May under
1650, all of Ireland, for the first Charles and, while in prison in 1642, wrote,
I
time, was prostrate, and had finally been con- "Stone walls do not a prison make. Nor iron bars
quered by England.
a cage." Robert Herrick (1591-1674)
New sects continued wrote,
to arise. George Fox "Gather ye rosebuds while you may. Old time is
(1624-1691) founded "The Society of Friends" in still a-flying."
1647. This was a religious group that eschewed
Then, of course, there was John Milton (1608-
all ritual and any priesthood, but
held that any 1674), a poet second only to Shakespeare,
individual could be inspired by God. They took
who,
in addition to noble verse in this
period, wrote
no oaths, were pacifists, and egalitarians. Be-
Areopagitica in 1644, a prose defense of
liberty of
cause Fox bade those who listened to him to the press, so eloquent as to be an
immortal doc-
"quake at the word of the Lord," they were ument of democracy.
called "Quakers" in derision. As so often hap-
George Chapman (1559-1634) wrote poems
pens, however, the word was adopted by those and plays but is best-known for having trans-
it was intended to ridicule and was used with lated Homer's Iliad and Odyssey into
English
pride.
rhyme, completing both by 1616. These were
the
Another aspect of religion involved an Irish- standard translations for over two centuries.
Anglican bishop, James Ussher (1588-1656), who
Among the essayists were Robert Burton
utilized Biblical data to argue, in 1650, that the
(1577-1640), who wrote The Anatomy
of Melan-
Earth and the Universe were created by God in choly in 1621. He used his discussion
of melan-
choly as a way of dealing with every subject

under the sun in a sprightly manner. ENGLISH NORTH AMERICA
More important still was Francis Bacon, who, England continued North Ameri-
to explore the
in 1620, wrote Novum Organon, in which he can coastline. In 1602, Bartholomew Gosnold (d.
pleaded passionately for experimentation and in- 1607) sailed along the shores of what we now call
duction. His philosophy eventually led to the New England. William Baffin (1584-1622) ex-
foundation of the Royal Academy, which for plored the western coast of Greenland, so that
years would be the most prestigious fellowship his name is given to Baffin Island and Baffin Bay.
of scientists to befound anywhere. Yet Bacon He reached a latitude of 77.75°, a mark that stood
could not accept Copernicus, but clung to Greek as the record for Arctic venturing’ for many years.
astronomy. More important even than exploration was
Inigo Jones (1573-1652) graduated from de- settlement.
signing stage settings to becoming an architect In 1606,two groups of Englishmen, one in
who designed palaces and chapels for the royal London and one in Plymouth, obtained official
family. He founded English classical architec- permission to colonize the eastern coast of North
ture. America. The London Company sent out its first
The most famous English scientist of the pe- boatload of colonists on December 19, 1606.
riod was William Harvey (1578-1657), who was On April 16, 1607, they reached the entrance
court physician for both James I and Charles I. It of Chesapeake Bay. The land to the north of the
was he who worked out the mechanism of the opening, they called "Cape Charles" and the
circulation of the blood, founding the modern land to the south "Cape Henry" after the sons of
science of physiology as he did so. He presented King James. Sailing into the Bay due west, they
his work to the world in a small book published came upon the wide mouth of a river they called
in 1628. the "James River" after the king himself. Finally,
And yet perhaps more important than any- on May 13, 1607, they chose a site 25 miles up-
thing else in this period was an advance that had stream and settled "Jamestown."
nothing to do with politics or literature. It formed the nucleus of the colony of Virginia
Marco Polo had written that, in China, black and it was the first permanent English settlement
stones were burned and, indeed, even in Europe, in what is now the United States. It didn't look
there were pockets of exposed "coal" (the fossil- as though it would be permanent at first, and it
ized residue of forests that had flourished was only the enterprise and will of one of the
hundreds of millions of years ago). settlers, John Smith (1580-1631), and the help
By 1600, as it happened, much of England's of the Native Americans that kept it going. Even
forest cover had been cut down and what was so, the settlers were about to return to Eng-
left had to be preserved for use by the navy, land when, on June 8, 1610, three ships arrived
which consisted of wooden ships, with tall with 300 new colonists and ample stores of all
wooden masts. kinds.
England had, perforce, to turn to coal as a John Rolfe (1585-1622) learned Native
In 1612,
wood-substitute for heating houses. By 1650, two American methods of growing and curing to-
million tons of coal were being mined and used bacco; thus, the Virginia colony had a product
each year, and this was 80% of the coal produc- that it could sell at a profit and that would make
tion in the world, generally. It was coal that itprosperous. In 1619, the Virginia colonists set
eventually fueled the Industrial Revolution, and up a House of Burgesses. This was the first
it was England's coal-production that insured elected representative assembly in an English
that the Industrial Revolution would begin in colony overseas, and it set the fashion for other
that country rather than elsewhere. colonies that would be founded and for the na-
tion that grew out of them.
1600 TO 1650 251
Less happily, a boatload of blacks was brought

home in American where they could be free and
to Virginia in 1619, and the
institution of black yet be English, too.
slavery was introduced.
Ninety-nine Dissenters left Plymouth and
As the population in Virginia grew, the colo-
crossed the Atlantic on the "Mayflower."
nists spread out over the Native American lands They
are usually called the "Pilgrims" in
and, in general, American
showed a disregard for their usage. They landed at Cape Cod on
rights since, after they were "heathens" and
all,
November
9, 1620, then settled on the shore west of
the cape
"savages." On March 22, 1622, the Native Amer- in a region called "Plymouth," after
icans attacked
the port thev
and killed some of the population, had left.
including John Rolfe. The colonists recovered Again, the initial settlers barely survived the
and inflicted a far worse slaughter on the Native hard winter and did so only with the help
Americans. of
Native Americans. By the fall of 1621, they
This pattern of White aggression, followed were
by doing well enough to celebrate the harvest with
the Native American striking back, followed
by a a three-day feast, giving thanks to
God. (It is still
crushing counterattack and further encroach-
commemorated in the American holiday of
ment, was to take place over and over again
for Thanksgiving.)
more than two and a half centuries.
Other settlers began to found towns in the
Further English colonization
of the North area, which came to be known as
American coast was stimulated by religious dif- Massachusetts
from a Native American name for a place in the
ferences. Catholics labored under various disabil-
region. Salem was founded in 1626.
ities inProtestant England, but Charles I was not
An English Puritan, John Winthrop (1588-
terribly anti-Catholic (he had a Catholic
wife). He 1649), organized a large party of settlers and, in
gave permission, therefore, to George Calvert,
1630, 17 ships carrying nearly a thousand people
Lord Baltimore (1580-1632), who had converted
sailed to Massachusettsand established Boston,
to Catholicism some years
before, to send out named for the English town from which a group
colonists, including Catholics, to Virginia. Balti-
of the settlers had come. The river at
more died before that could be carried through, whose
mouth Boston was founded was named the
but on March 27, 1634, 220 colonists (including
Charles River after Charles I.
both Protestants and Catholics) under the lead-
The colonists did not intend to lose the advan-
ership of Baltimore's son, Cecilius Calvert (1605-
tages of education and culture because of being
1675), established a settlement north of Virginia.
in a comparative wilderness. On
October 28,
The new colony was named "Maryland" in 1636, a school was founded just north of the
honor of the Queen.
Charles River and two and a half years later it
Inevitably, there was friction between Catho- was named "Harvard Collge" after John Harvard
lics and Protestants and, in 1649, the colony (1607-1638), a clergyman who, on his death, be-
passed a Toleration Act," in which all people
cjueathed to the school the sum of pounds
700
who accepted the Trinity— the idea that God ex- and 400 books. Harvard was the first institution
ists persons— would have freedom of
in three
of higher learning to be established in the
English
worship. This still excluded Unitarians and Jews, colonies. In 1639, a printing press was set
but it set an example of toleration that would
up in
Massachusetts and that, too, was the first of its
grow. kind in the colonies.
It was not only the Catholics, but the Dis- Meanwhile, two Englishmen, Ferdinando
senters (more Protestant than the English Gorges (1566-1647) and John Mason (1588-1635)
church) who found uncomfortable in En-
life settled north of Massachusetts, and,
beginning
gland. Some fled to the Dutch Republic to find in 1629, towns were springing up on
the coasts
religious peace. When they found their children
of what came to be known as Maine and
speaking Dutch, they decided to try to make a
New
Hampshire (the latter after the English county of
Hampshire where Mason had spent most of his In 1632, Sigismund III died and was succeeded
life). The colony of Massachusetts managed to by his son Wladyslaw IV (1595-1648), who was
establish its rule over Maine, but New Hamp- in turn succeeded by his son, John II Casimir
shire remained independent. (1609-1673). On the whole, the wars of this pe-
In 1635, settlers from Massachusetts estab- riod— against the Swedes in the west, the Rus-
lished settlements along the Connecticut River sians the northeast, and the Cossacks and
in
and about these the colony of Connecticut devel- Turks in the southeast — had been inconclu-
all
oped. sive and had served to continue the slow weak-

Of course, although the settlers in Massachu- ening of Poland.
setts had come there to find religious freedom for
themselves, they were not ready to accord it to
others. There was the case of Roger Williams
RUSSIA
(1603-1683), for instance, who believed in such Tsar Boris Godunov was plagued not only by the
radical notions as complete religious freedom restless boyars, but by the appearance of some-
and, far worse, that American land belonged to one who claimed to be Dmitri, a son of Ivan IV
Native Americans. the Terrible. The real Dmitri had, in actual fact,
Therefore, he was driven out of Massachusetts died in 1591, but in those days there were no
on October 9, 1635, and in June 1636, he founded photographs, and there were few opportunities
the town of Providence to the south. This formed for ordinary folk to see important people. Impos-
the nucleus of the colony of Rhode Island. ture was, therefore, simple. One had only to de-
The northern English colonies of Connecticut, clare one's self to be a royal personage, and
Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut anyone dissatisfied with those in actual power
were separated from the southern English colo- would believe the declaration.
nies of Virginia and Maryland by the Dutch col- Boris Godunov
died in the fight against the
ony of New Netherlands and by the small "False Dmitri" in 1605, and two other imposters
settlement of New Sweden. appeared shortly afterward. What with these
During the English civil war, the northern col- Dmitris, who easily gained followers, and the
onists supported Parliament and the southern rival boyar families, and the eagerly interfering
colonists supported the King, a kind of fore- Swedes and Poles, the period was called by the
shadowing of the difference that was to separate later Russians "the Time of Troubles." On Octo-
the two regions thereafter. The population of the ber 8, 1610, the Time of Troubles touched bottom
northern colonies was nearly five times that of as Sigismund III and his Polish troops entered
the southern ones, which was also a foreshadow- Moscow and occupied the Kremlin. Sigismund
ing of the difference in economic strength that even declared his son Wladyslaw (who later suc-
was to come. ceeded him) to be the Tsar.
At this, however, the Russian people rose in a
fury of xenophobia and, in 1612, those Poles who
POLAND did not manage to get out of Moscow were mas-
For a while, Poland (under Sigismund III) sacred.
seemed have grown stronger, but it was only
to In that same year, a national assembly elected
because Russia itself was verging on anarchy. Po- Michael Fyodorovich Romanov (1596-1645) as
land took full advantage of this and, in 1610, Pol- Tsar. He was the first cousin, twice removed, of
ish forces even entered Moscow temporarily. Ivan the Terrible. Michael was only 16 years old
However, when Gustavus Adolphus fought and was always dominated by others in the fam-
against Poland, the Poles were forced to retreat ily. However, Russia had had enough anarchy
in the west, while a Russian recovery forced and it clung to the Tsar. That made it possible for
them to retreat in the east as well. Michael (or for those who controlled him) to in-
1600 TO 1650 253
crease the Tsar's authority, to

force the boyars all the shores of the Black Sea
more nearly into submission, and to (including the Cri-
further en- mean
slave the peasantry.
which were its tributaries), both
Tartars,
shores of the Red Sea, and all of
In 1645, Michael died North Africa to
and was succeeded by the border of Morocco.
his son (also 16 years old On the map, it looked
at the time) who extremely impressive, but it was slowly
reigned as Alexis rotting
I (1629-1676). just the same.
Through all the Time of Troubles and through
the weak reign of Michael
1, Russia, while just
barely surviving at its heart, had
its pioneers rac-
ing eastward in Siberia, collecting PERSIA
furs, and ex-
ploring the vast stretches of land
that opened Under Abbas I, Persia reached
peak of a
before them. By 1637, they had strength. It beat the
Ottoman Empire and ad-
actually reached
the Pacific Ocean, and Russia became
what vanced to Baghdad and beyond.
it has
remained ever since — the largest nation, in area, The English were continuing to make
their
in the world. Of
course, the Siberia the Russians presence felt, however. In 1600, they
had estab-
had conquered was, at that time, virtually lished the East India Company
empty to make it pos-
only a quarter of a million people in all sible for them to
trade with the Far East
the vast
expanse. As a result, the Tsar in
Moscow ruled independently of the Portuguese. In
1622, the
over about 12 million people as compared English merchants cooperated with
with a Persian
France's 19 million. army to oust the Portuguese who had
held Hor-
muz over a century. In return, the English
for
gained trading privileges in Persia. This,
OTTOMAN EMPIRE with even earlier gains in India, was
together
the begin-
The principal enemy of the Ottoman Empire ning of English influence in the East.
at
this time was Persia which, under
Abbas I, was Abbas I died in 1629, and
was succeeded by
dangerous indeed. The Persians took the his son, Safi I (d. 1642), and
with that Persia
area
south of the Caucasus and much of the began a rapid decline. The Ottoman
Tigris- Empire won
Euphrates valley from the Turks. back what it had lost to Abbas. In
1642, Safi's
In 1623, the 14-year-oId Murad IV son, Abbas II (1633-1666),
(1612-1640) succeeded to the
became Ottoman Sultan, and as he grew up throne.
it
seemed as though the Turks might have a war-
rior at their head again. He
suppressed revolts
within the Empire and eventually, by
1638, well INDIA
after Abbas I had died, the Ottoman
Empire took Akbar died in 1605, and
his son, Jahangir (1569-
back the districts it had lost to Persia.
Murad IV 1627), ruled in his place. He carried
then set about reforming the Ottoman army, on his fa-
but ther's policies but his effectiveness
that effort came to an end with his was ruined by
death in 1640. his addiction to alcohol and
He was succeeded by his ineffectual brother, opium. During his
reign, the English East India
Ibrahim I (1615—1648), and in 1648, when Company defeated
Ibra- the Portuguese at Surat in 1612, and
him was deposed, his six-year-old son reigned gained trad-
as ing privileges in their place. The
Mehmed IV (1642-1693). In 1645, a war with first fortified
post on the Indian coast was established
Venice began over the island of Crete, which by the
was English on the southeastern coast in
still a Venetian possession.
1640. It grew
into the city of Madras.
Despite its decline in the 80 years since the
Jahangir's son, Shah Jehan (1592-1666), suc-
death of Suleiman the Magnificient, however,
ceeded to the throne of the Mogul Empire
the Ottoman Empire was in
still intact. It controlled He
Asia Vlinor,
1628. is best known
having directed the
for
all the Balkans up through Hungary, building of the Taj Mahal, beginning
in 1632, in
honor of his dead wife, Mumtaz Mahal. It was

completed in 1648.
JAPAN
The Japanese, having encouraged Western trad-
ers and the spread of Christianity for a while,
CHINA grew fearful of the consequences, and during
The Ming dynasty, the last native Chinese line of this period, early in the Tokugawa shogunate,
Emperors, came to an end in 1644 and the Man- they drove out all foreigners (except for a few
chus seized control, ruling as the Ch'ing dy- Dutch traders confined to the island of Deshima
nasty. The Manchu custom of shaving the head in Nagasaki harbor) and completely erased
and leaving a central queue of hair was imposed Christianity. A was estab-
policy of isolation
on the Chinese as well, and that remained as the lished, and even rifles were abandoned as de-
central characteristic of cartoon versions of Ori- tracting from traditional samurai methods of
entals among the westerners of future years. warfare. (This is the most remarkable example in
history of a technological advance being deliber-
ately abandoned, but happened only because
it
INDONESIA Japan was effectively isolated. Had there been a

During Dutch were rapidly dis-
this period, the threat from the outside world, there is no ques-
placing the Portuguese from all their Indonesian tion but that the rifles would have been kept.)
holdings, leaving them only the eastern portion
of the relatively small island of Timor.
The Dutch maintained their growing monop- AFRICA
oly fiercely and, in 1623, they killed some 10 En- The Dutch and the French were establishing
glishmen on the island of Amboina (along with themselves here and there on the African coast,
10 Japanese and one Portuguese) for allegedly replacing the rapidly declining Portuguese posi-
planning to take over the island. This embittered tions. The French established a post on the coast
relations between England (which called it the of the island of Madagascar in 1626, for instance.
"Amboina Massacre") and the Dutch for a con-

siderable period of time.
1650 TO 1700
for England under Cromwell, which was inde-
FRANCE pendently hostile to Spain. The French faced a
Mazarin, France's Prime Minister, though lack- Spanish army under Louis de Conde. Conde,
ing Richelieu's charisma, was a skillful leader under his earlier title of d'Enghien, had defeated
and managed to survive the dreary fighting, and the Spanish at Rocroi, but had rebelled at the
bring the Fronde to an end in 1653. The war with time of the Fronde, as, indeed, had Turenne.
Spain, however, the one portion of the Thirty However, though Turenne gave in and was rec-
Years War that had not been settled by the Treaty onciled to Mazarin, Conde preferred to join the
of Westphalia, continued. Spaniards.
French army was led by Henri de
In 1658, the was Turenne who proved the superior gen-
It
la Tour d'Auvergne, Vicomte de Turenne (1611- eral, and, in the "Battle of the Dunes" near Dun-
1675). That army included an English contingent kirk, he virtually wiped out the Spanish army,
1650 TO 1700
255
thus confirming the decision of

Rocroi. Spain had status of their
no choice but to agree to peace, and the own, but depended entirely upon
Treaty of the King. As a result,
the Pyrenees Louis XIV, through a long
was signed on November 7, 1659. reign, remained the ideal
By the of absolute royal
terms of the treaty, Louis XIV married
power, and was admired and imitated
Maria Theresa (1638-1683), the daughter by every
of king in Europe— except those of
Philip IV of Spain, France also England, who
gained some ter- had a legislature to dispute with.
ritory at the
Pyrenees and along the border of the
There was a down-side to this, of course.
Spanish Netherlands.
While the King of France lived in Versailles in a
The main result,however, was that Spain was fairyland palace, he became totally
broken as a great power, and Louis XIV was se- divorced from
the French people and moved about in a vacuum
cure on his throne. He was now 21
years old, but which, in the end, was
Mazarin retained power until his death on fatal. Moreover, although
March the aristocracy was no longer turbulent and re-
9, 1661. Then Louis XIV took over.
The work of bellious, it had also become
Richelieuand Mazarin had made him an absolute thoroughly useless
and wasteful and, when the emergency
monarch. There was no law controlling him came,
and that proved to be a change for the worse.
he loved it, although he was personally
affable Louis XIV's chief minister was
and by no means a tyrant. Jean-Baptiste
Colbert (1619-1683), who labored to
Louis XIV remembered the years reform the
of the system of taxation and make
Fronde with distaste and indignation. He more just and
it
wanted equitable (and, therefore, yielding more reve-
to leave the Paris he had been
forced to flee at nue). He tried to
one point, and he wanted to tame the
model France on the example of
aristocracy the Netherlands, trying to increase
and make them harmless. its wealth by
encouraging trade, agriculture, and industry.
His father, Louis XIII, had had a He
hunting also tried to build up the navy
lodge in Versailles, about 20 miles west and encourage
of Paris. overseas trade and overseas bases and
There, Louis XIV settle-
built a vast palace, so expensive ments.
that itsbuilding virtually bankrupted the nation.
Everything he did was designed to strengthen
He moved into it in 1682, and, with him, he
France and to make it more prosperous. In
brought his court, which included a thousand every-
thing he succeeded, or would have
noblemen, their families, and attendants. At the succeeded
but for one thing. He needed peace,
Palace of Versailles but Louis
was all the glitter, all the so- XIV, with notions of "glory," wanted to be
filled
ciety, all the
pleasures and wealth that anyone a conqueror and was constantly
could want (except for plumbing, which engaged in war-
didn't fare. This consumed money
Nothing could so frighten any of the court
exist).
much more quickly
than Colbert could supply it, even when
more than to be banished from Versailles and to Louis
was winning.
be forced to rusticate on their estates.
One war that Louis XIV fought within France
What's more, Louis XIV invented an elaborate
he won in appearance but lost in reality.
system of etiquette revolving about himself at The Hu-
guenots still lived in France even though
every moment of the day. Trivial tasks and hon- their
last armed had been taken 60 years earlier by
city
ors were apportioned to the aristocracy,
which Richelieu. Now, Louis XIV felt he could
then competed not for active power in govern- only be
strong if there were no organized dissent
ing, but over who had the right to sit, in the
or to stand, nation, even unarmed and powerless
or to go through a door with one side dissent.
open, or On October 18, 1685, therefore, he revoked
both sides, or who preceded whom, or who han-
the Edict of Nantes, which had been
dled this object or that object. The entire established
court by his grandfather, nearly 90 years earlier.
was reduced concern over pecking order.
to
The
French Huguenots were suddenly treated
In this way, Louis XIV carefully reduced with
the extreme harshness in an effort to force
aristocracy to cardboard figures, and ran the them to
gov- turn Catholic. The result was that 50,000 Hu-
ernment with middle-class people who had no
guenot families fled France and went to England,
the Netherlands, Germany and North America. Louis took more territory than the treaties gave
They represented an industrious middle class him and there was no one to stop him.
whose disappearance weakened France. Further- Louis XIV might profitably have stopped at
more, wherever the Fiuguenots went, they car- this point. He had defeated, without too much
ried with them their abilities, which, coupled difficulty, the Hapsburgs of Austria and Spain,
with the anti-French animus, greatly increased thus doing what the French monarchs from Fran-
the strength of France's enemies. cis I on had been unable to do. At sea, thanks to
Louis XIV's foreign wars started when Philip Colbert, he had become as strong as England or
IV of Spain died in 1665. Louis XIV, on dim dy- the Netherlands, and his overseas dominions
nastic grounds, claimed the Spanish Netherlands were expanding.
and, in 1667, invaded it and also Franche-Comte, The beginning of decline came when he
a portion of the old Burgundian lands in the east moved to Versailles in 1682, and revoked the
that belonged to Spain. The war showed
still Edict of Nantes in 1684, but neither action looked
how powerful the French army had become for it bad at the time.
succeeded everywhere. Nevertheless, England, In 1685, however, Charles, the Elector of the
the Netherlands, and Sweden united as a Triple Palatinate, died, and again Louis XIV made use
Alliance to oppose Louis, who thereupon made of dynastic arguments to claim the land. How-
peace, on May 2, 1668, with the Treaty of Aix-la- ever, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes had
Chapelle in western Germany. He returned most offended all the Protestant powers of Europe,
of the conquests, keeping only about a dozen for- who formed a league against him, and who were
tified posts at the Spanish Netherlands border. joined by the Catholic Hapsburgs, because of
Louis XIV did not enjoy having the fruits of their own hatred of Louis. Louis XIV's enemies
war snatched from him. Of those who had op- were growing more numerous and stronger.
posed him, the Netherlands was the most easily Again, however, Louis's armies won most of
reached. What is more they had served as a ref- the battles in a war that started on September 25,
uge for those who wanted to abuse Louis in 1688. The French began by invading the Palatin-
safety and publish political pamphlets satirizing ate and devastating it systematically, as though
him. Even the fact that the Netherlands was a it were the Thirty Years War all over again.
republic offended him. Therefore, in March 1672, Nevertheless, by September 1697, Louis was
he declared war on the Netherlands. willing to sign the Peace of Ryswick in south-
He had an easy time of it at first. Much of the western Netherlands. By this treaty, the situation
southern portion of the Netherlands was taken, was largely restored to what it had been before
and Amsterdam itself was only saved when the the war began.
Dutch opened the dikes and flooded the land. The chief long-term consequence of the war
Once again, however, a coalition against Louis rested with Louis XIV's lack of understanding of
XIV was formed, and he was forced to fight in the importance of naval strength. Colbert had
Germany. He still kept winning, though Tur- died in 1683 and Louis had not taken care of the
enne, his best general, died in action on July 27, navy thereafter. On May 29, 1692, the French
1675. fleet attacked the combined forces of England
Finally, a series of treaties at Nimwegen in the and the Netherlands at La Hogue, near Cher-
southern Netherlands put an end to the fighting. bourg, and was roundly trounced. This put an
The Netherlands kept all its territory, but had to end to the attempt of France to become a domi-
promise neutrality. Spain was the big loser. This nant naval power, and also put an end to Louis
time France took Franche-Comte, which had XIV's vague plan of landing an army in England.
been first Burgundian and then Spanish for (Louis XIV thus failed in the same task Philip II
nearly three centuries, plus additional fortified of Spain had failed in a century earlier.)
posts on the Spanish Netherlands border. Later, Louis XIV had made a surprisingly generous
1650 TO 1700 257
because he was waiting for a larger prize.

treaty
ered four satellites of Saturn, a gap in Saturn's
Charles II of Spain was dying and would leave ring, and a reasonably correct understanding
of
no and Louis XIV intended, yet again, to
heir,
the scale of the Solar system, including a clear
attempt, on dynastic grounds, to expand his do-
notion of the distance from the Earth to the
minions. This time he would take over all of planet Mars and to the Sun. With Jean Richer
Spain and its vast possessions around the world.
(1630—1696), Cassini showed that the Earth was
That would surely make him the most powerful not a perfect sphere but was an oblate spheroid
monarch on Earth. with an equatorial bulge.
On November 1, 1700, Charles II died, and all The French Denis Papin (1647-1712)
physicist,
of Europe held its breath. invented the pressure cooker in 1679, and was
The reign of Louis XIV saw French literature the first to toy with the possibility of making
at its peak. Corneille was still writing tragedies, steam pressure do work. Bernard de Bovier de
and had been joined by Jean Racine (1639-1699), Fontenelle (1657-1757) was the first important
who wrote tragedies on classical themes, such as science writer, putting out a popular book on
Andromaque in 1667 and PhMre in 1677. Jean-Bap- astronomy for the layman in 1686, and living to
tistePoquelin (1622-1673), far better known as within five weeks of his hundredth birthday.
Moliere, wrote comedies that were the best the
world had seen since Aristophanes, 2000 years
earlier. His masterpiece, Tartuffe, was produced
in 1667. By some, he is considered the greatest of FRENCH NORTH AMERICA
all French writers.
The French continued to explore the region about
Jean de La Fontaine (1621-1695) is best known the Great Lakes. In 1678, a French missionary,
for his rendition of classic fables into French
Louis Hennipen (1626-1702), had discovered Ni-
verse between 1668 and 1694. Frangois de La agara Falls in 1678 and was mightily impressed.
Rouchefoucauld (1613-1680) had fought on the Even before that, a fur trapper, Louis Joliet
side of the Fronde and is best known for his cyn-
(1645-1700) and a Jesuit missionary. Father
ical aphorisms, published in 1665, that held
Jacques Marquette (1637-1675), explored Green
human nature up to the light in a most unflatter- Bay, an arm of Lake Michigan, and then found
ing manner. their way upper Mississippi River. They
to the
Charles Perrault (1628-1703) translated chil- traveled 700 miles downstream and turned back
dren's stories (Tales of Mother Goose), such as only because they were reluctant to face the trou-
"Red Riding Hood," "Sleeping Beauty," and ble that might follow if they found themselves in
"Puss in Boots." Spanish territory.
Jean Baptiste Lully (1632-1687) was an Italian- However, their explorations were enough
to
born musician who founded French opera. Lully show that the Great Lakes did not offer a way of
worked with Moliere and was strongly patron- getting through the continent to the Pacific by a
ized by Louis XIV. He died after accidentally water route, for the Mississippi River headed
stabbing himself in the foot with a long rod he southward, not westward.
used for his conducting. One who was still hopeful, however, was
In science, therewas the astronomer, Jean Pi- Robert Cavalier de la Salle (1643-1687). In 1677,
card (1620-1680), who was the first, in 1671, to he followed in the footsteps of Marquette and
measure the Earth's size more accurately than Er- Joliet, but didn't turn back. On April
9, 1682, he
atosthenes had done 2000 years earlier a mea- — stood at the mouth of the Mississippi where it
surement that was useful in the development of entered the Gulf of Mexico and formally claimed
the theory of universal gravitation. The Italian- for France the lands watered by the Missis-
all
born astronomer, Giovanni Domenico Cassini sippi River, which included, if he but knew, all
(1625-1712), in the course of the 1670s, discov- the middle third of what is now the United
States. He called the territory Louisiana in honor 1653) of the Netherlands. The English ships won
of Louis XIV. most of the engagements, and this marked the
France now controlled a vast area in North beginning of the decline of the Netherlands,
America, stretching from Labrador, through the which made peace on April 3, 1654, agreeing to
Great Lakes, to the Gulf of Mexico, and penning respect the Navigation Act.
the English colonies in a strip of the eastern In 1657, Cromwell, basing his decision on a
coast.However, the appearance on the map was verse in the Bible, allowed Jews to return to En-
misleading. By 1700, the French population in its gland. They had been kept out since the time of
enormously stretched-out claims was 12,000, Edward I three and a half centuries earlier.
while the population of the much more compact Cromwell died on September 3, 1658, and
strip of English colonies was over 200,000. there was no one who could take over. His son,
Richard Cromwell (1616-1712), had no talent for
itand, after a period of uncertainty, England
ENGLAND turned, more or less gratefully, to the son of the
Cromwell had not yet succeeded in establishing executed monarch. Charles II promised religious
stability in England at the beginning of this pe- freedom, no revenge, and no upsetting of prop-
riod. He continued to win battles (indeed, he erty settlements that had been reached during
never lost one) but there remained enemies. the Civil War and Commonwealth period. He
The son of Charles I had been crowned in was proclaimed King on May 8, 1660, and en-
Scotland as Charles II of Scotland (1630-1685) tered London on May 20. Thus began the period
and as Charles II of England as well, and he had of "The Restoration."
raised an army and had invaded England. Crom- With relief, England turned from Puritan aus-
well defeated him at the Battle of Worcester in terity and began a period of Restoration license.
west-central England on September 3, 1651, and The lofty Shakespearean tragedy was gone and
Charles II returned into exile in France. Restoration comedies, filled with sexual innu-
On December 16, Cromwell took the
1653, endo and social satire, filled the stage.
final step of seizing dictatorial power and making Among the writers of such comedieswere
himself “Lord Protector" of England, Scotland, George Etherege (1635-1692), who began the
and Ireland. genre with Love in a Tub in 1664; William Wycher-
By this time, England and the Netherlands, ley (1640-1716), who produced The Country Wife
which had long felt a community of interests as in 1675; Thomas Shadwell (1642-1692) and his
Protestant powers, threatened first by Spain and Epsom Wells in 1672; Thomas Otway (1652-1685)
then by France, were the leading maritime pow- and and Colly Cibber
his Venice Preserved in 1682;
ers and competed with each other for trade, par- (1671-1757) and his Love's Last Shift in 1696. The
ticularly in the Far East. The Amboina Massacre best of them was William Congreve (1670-1729),
had embittered the English and now, in 1652, who produced The Old Bachelor in 1693, and The
there began the first of three naval wars with the Way World in 1700.
of the
Netherlands. The greatest living English poet was still John
Itbegan because the English had passed a Milton, who completed his masterpiece. Paradise
"Navigation Act," on October 9, 1651, forbidding Lost in 1665, and followed it with Paradise Re-
importation of goods into England except in gained and Samson Agonistes (both in 1671).
English vessels or in vessels of the country pro- John Dryden (1631-1700) wrote dramas, in-
ducing the goods. This eliminated the Dutch cluding All for Love, a retelling of Shakespeare's
middlemen, and the Netherlands found that in- Antony and Cleopatra, which proved Shakespeare
supportable. did not need retelling. He also wrote an anti-
The war pitted Robert Blake (1599-1657) Puritan satire, Absalom and Achitophel in 1681. His
against Maarten Harpertszoon Tromp (1598- poem that has best survived to this day is "Alex-
1650 TO 1700 259
ander's Feast," written in 1697. Andrew Marvell

London in April, 1665. (Newton was one of those
(1621-1678) is best remembered for his "To His who the city, working out a preliminary
fled
Coy Mistress," written in 1652. form of the law of universal gravitation at his
In prose writing, John Bunyan (1628-1688)
mother's farm.) Then, on September 2, 1666, a
wrote one of the all-time best-sellers while in fire broke out in London that devastated
the city.
prison for unauthorized preaching. The book
It offered a chance for rebuilding the city along
was Pilgrim's Progress,
published in 1678. An- rational lines, but the claims of property were
other surprise best-selling book was the amiably
paramount and it was rebuilt as it had been.
discursive The Compleat Angler by Izaak Walton
However, St. Paul's Cathedral was redesigned
(1593-1683), published in 1653. by Christopher Wren (1632-1723) and recon-
The English philosopher, Thomas Hobbes structed in great majesty.
(1588—1679) published Leviathan in 1651, express- A second naval war with the Netherlands,
ing his belief in the necessity of a strong central
from 1665 to 1667, was again marked by English
government, including an absolute monarch. It victories. However, the effects of the Plague and
is not surprising that he stayed in
France during the Fire led Charles II to retire the fleet prema-
the English Civil War.
turely during peace negotiation to save money.
John Locke (1632—1704), on the other hand, This led to a Dutch raid up the Thames River in
published An Essay Concerning Human Under- June 1667, which brought them nearly to Lon-
standing in 1690, in
which he argued in favor of a don. On July 21, 1667, peace was signed with the
constitutional government, with a division of British making gains at Dutch expense in North
powers, and emphasis on civil liberties and on America.
freedom of thought and belief. His philosophy Charles II was grateful to Louis XIV for his
had a strong influence on the men who founded support when he had been in exile and was sym-
the United States of America.
pathetic to Catholicism. (His younger brother,
Charles II was
interested in science and, in James, had turned Catholic, and Charles ac-
1662, chartered the Royal Society of London, cepted Catholicism on his deathbed.) In May,
which became a major center of scientific ad- 1670, Charles made a secret treaty with Louis XIV
vance in Europe. to support France in its planned invasion of the
Robert Boyle (1627-1691) invented an air Netherlands and to work toward the reestablish-
pump capable of producing a vacuum and ment of Catholicism in England in return for a
worked out the laws of gases. He also led the subsidy that would make him more independent
way in substituting chemistry for medieval al- of Parliament.
chemy. Robert Hooke (1635-1703) studied English ships did support France in the war
springs, and was an early microscopist, giving against the Netherlands, and this was the third
the name to the "cells" that make up living tis- Anglo-Dutch war. However, public opinion rose
sue. steadily against helping France, and England was
Of course, there was the greatest scientist who forced to retire from the war.
ever lived, Isaac Newton (1642-1727), who It was a time of considerable
uneasiness on
worked out the binomial theorem and invented the part of many English toward what they con-
calculus, who designed the first reflecting tele- sidered a Catholic menace. An English dema-
scope and studied light spectra, who worked out gogue, Titus Oates(1649-1705), seized the
the laws of motion and of universal gravitation, occasion to fabricate details of an elaborate Cath-
and who, in 1687, wrote the greatest scientific olic plot to overthrow the government. There fol-
book ever written, Philosophiae Naturalis Principia '
lowed a wild witch-hunt, in which suspicion

Mathematica (Mathematical Principles of Natural Phi- became equivalent to conviction, and about 35
losophy). people were wrongfully executed on fabricated
On a less happy note, a great plague struck evidence. As Oates's tale became wilder, and im-
plicated too many, it finally burned itself out. interested in the throne of England for itself, but
(Oates was imprisoned for life in 1685 when a he saw it as a chance for expanding the resistance
Catholic king succeeded, and was pardoned in to Louis XIV, whom he never forgave for the in-
1689, when a Protestant king succeeded.) vasion of the Netherlands.

Charles II died on February 6, 1685, and since On November 5, 1688, William III landed in
he had no legitimate children, he was succeeded England, and James II, finding that he had no
by his brother, who reigned as James II (1633- support, fled the land on December 11. This sec-
1701), and as James VII of Scotland. It was clear ond deposition of a Stuart, being carried
that this would be a different reign, for James II through, unlike the first, without bloodshed,
was a harsh and tactless Catholic, intent on re- was called "The Glorious Revolution."
establishing Catholicism in England. In 1689, Parliament offered the crown to Mary
There was an instant rebellion against him led and the regency to William. When William in-
by James Scott, Duke of Monmouth (1644-1685), sisted on the kingship, the rule was made joint
who was an son of Charles II and a

illegitimate — the only joint rule in English history. They
Protestant. It was crushed at the Battle of Sedge- were William III and Mary II of England, and, in
moor in southwestern England on July 6, 1685. general, one speaks of "William and Mary."
James, then, used his Lord Chancellor, George Part of the agreement was an establishment of
Jeffries (1645-1689), to institute a reign of terror a "Declaration of Rights" in which it was made
against anyone suspected of Monmouth sympa- clear just what rights Parliament had. England
thies, one that was far worse than anything Titus became a "limited monarchy," for the royal
Oates had brought about. Monmouth himself power had limitations that were carefully spelled
was executed with deliberate cruelty. None of —
out and this at a time when monarchy else-
this made James II popular, but apparently he where in Europe was following the lead of Louis
didn't care. XIV and becoming absolute.
In 1687, James II, declared religious liberty in James II hadn't given up altogether. He at-
England, thus freeing Catholics from disabilites. tempted to regain the throne by way of an inva-
This was, in itself, enlightened, but there were sion of Ireland, where the Catholic population
few Englishmen who didn't see it as only the first could be counted on to support him. He landed
step toward establishing a religious tyranny in there in March 1689, but, despite fighting well,
reverse. he was beaten on July 11, 1690 at the Battle of the
Matters grew to a crisis on June 10, 1688, Boyne, north of Dublin, and his chances were
when son was born to
a him. James IPs Catholi- forever lost. Since then, Irish Protestants in the
cism had been endured because his daughters north, who
supported William III, of the House
were Protestant, and it was thought that they of Orange, have been known as "Orangemen."
would succeed. With a new son, however, who Meanwhile, William was organizing a coali-
would surely be brought up Catholic, the Crown tion against Louis XIV, with whom war broke out
might become permanently Catholic. With that in 1689. English participation in the war was not
possibility in everyone's mind, conspiracies very remarkable, for William was a poor general,
against James II multiplied rapidly. though a determined one.
James IPs older daughter, Mary (1662-1694), At home, Scotland had been restless and the
was married to William III (1650-1702), Stadt- Highlanders had supported James II. They were
holder of the Netherlands, and William Ill's given till December 31, 1691, to take an oath of
mother had been the sister of James II. As the allegiance to William. All did so except the
nephew and son-in-law of James II, it seemed MacDonald clan of Glencoe, who were delayed
that William III, a confirmed Protestant, was the by bad weather and who took the oath on Janu-
logical candidate to replace James II, and he was ary 6, 1691. A company of soldiers commanded
approached for the purpose. by a Campbell, who was a hereditary foe of the
William III was willing. He wasn't particularly MacDonalds, were at Glencoe in apparent peace
1650 TO 1700 261
but they used the delay as a pretext for killing

The line was extended when Charles 11
40 of the MacDonalds, including the head
of the granted the coastline south of Virginia to eight of
house. This Massacre of Glencoe” was a
deep his loyal courtiers. It had been avoided
earlier
embarrassment to William III.
because of Spanish claims, but no one worried
The English discovered how to raise money
about Spain any longer.
without immediate taxation. The Bank of En-
In 1670, settlements began
on that coast,
gland was set up on July 27, 1694. It could lend
which came known as "Carolina” from the
to be
money to the government to meet emergencies, Latin version of Charles II s name. Eventually,
and be paid back with interest when the emer-
the region was divided into two colonies;
gency was over. This meant that England had a North
Carolina and South Carolina. The chief port
steady source of of
money and was financially sta- South Carolina was founded in 1670 and was
where other nations, even France, were al-
ble
named Charleston, also in honor of the king.
ways flirting with bankruptcy. It gave England
Meanwhile, Quakers, too, were seeking
enormous power, for she could always subsidize freedom of worship for their ultrademocratic re-
other nations to fight for her.
ligious sect.They suffered considerable persecu-
William III now set about organizing resis-
tion even in the American colonies, though
tance to Louis XIV's plan to absorb Spain on the
they
were harmless enough. Four Quakers were
death of Charles II of that country.
hanged in Boston between 1659 and 1661, merely
for the crime of being Quakers.
ENGLISH NORTH AMERICA William Penn (1644-1718) was a notable
Quaker, and the son of a British admiral who had
In the course of the Anglo-Dutch naval wars, it been instrumental in helping to restore the
seemed logical to England to take over the Dutch crown to Charles II. Some Quakers had estab-
colony of New Netherlands. Under the dynamic lished themselves in New
Jersey and, in 1681,
leadership of Peter Stuyvesant (1610-1672), New Charles II gave Penn the right to the territory on
Netherlands was thriving and had absorbed New the other side of the Delaware River, west
of
Sweden in 1655, but it could scarcely resist an New Jersey.
English fleet without help from the homeland.
Penn traveled to North America and bought
Four ships under James of York (who was land from the Native Americans, coming to an
later to be James II of England) sailed across the
agreement with them that was not solemnized
Atlantic and, on August 19, 1664, entered the
with oaths because Quakers did not believe in
harbor of New Amsterdam and demanded its oaths. (It was pointed out that this treaty
later
surrender. New Amsterdam had no choice but to with the Native Americans was the only one not
do so, and it became the city of New York, in solemnized with oaths, and it was also the only
honor of the Duke. The northern part of the col- one not quickly violated by the colonists.)
ony received the name as a whole. There, in 1682, Penn founded the city of Phil-
The southern part, east of the Delaware River, adelphia.
was awarded by the Duke of York to two of his Naturally, colonial history was not merely a
friends. One of them was George Carteret (1610-
tale of foundings of colonies. There were
troubles
1684), who had held his native island of Jersey as well.
for two years against Cromwell. His section of
In 1675, the Native Americans of New En-
the colony was named New Jersey in conse- gland, tired of colonial encroachments and of
quence. The city of Newark was founded in 1666. being subject to Puritan rulings, broke into rebel-
At the end of the second Anglo-Dutch naval lion. This was called "King Philip's War,”
after
war in 1667, the Dutch Republic accepted the sur- the Christian name
of the Indian leader. Meta-
render. English colonies now extended all along comet (1639-1676). By now the European settlers
the North American coast from Maine to Vir- were twice as numerous as the Native Americans
ginia.
of the region and the war took the usual course.
There was a surprise attack by the Native Amer- to the great indignation of the Massachusetts
icans, followed by an overwhelming counter- colonists.
attack by the colonials that crushed the rebellion. Probably the best-known event in early colo-
In 1676, there was a rebellion of the colonials nial history also took place in Massachusetts, in
themselves in Virginia. Under Nathaniel Bacon the town of Salem. It was a time when Europe
(1647-1676), the colonials rose against the royal was going through a lunatic period of witch-
governor, William Berkeley (1606-1677). The hunting. Thus, perhaps 40,000 "witches" were
aims of the rebels were not entirely idealistic, for executed in England during the 1600s mostly —
they wanted more and better killings of the Na- harmless old women. The disease spread to New
tive Americans. Bacon achieved some success, England.
but died of natural causes, whereafter the rebel- In 1692, agroup of silly teenagers in Salem,
lion was put down. fearing punishment for some prank or other, pre-
This was the first example of rebellion against tended to be possessed and under the influence
constituted authorities in the English colonies. In of witchcraft. Within half a year, as a result, 13
the course of the rebellion, Jamestown was women and six men were hanged {not burned).
burned, and it never quite recovered. The capital About 50 people were in prison, awaiting trial.
of Virginia was moved, in 1692, to Williamsburg, By that time, prisoners were accusing everyone
named for William III. The College of William and respectable pillars of the community were in
and Mary was founded there on February 8, danger. This, combined with the fact that the in-
1693. It was the second institution of higher fluential preacher and president of Harvard Col-
learning in the colonies. lege, Increase Mather (1639-1723), had come out
When James II became king, he had no liking strongly against witch-hunting, put a stop to the
for the Puritan colonies in the north. He estab- madness.
lished the "Dominion New England," combin-
of By this time, incidentally, the English had also
ing all the colonies from New Hampshire to New occupied some of the lesser islands off the North
Jersey, and placed it under Edmund Andros American continent. Some of them became im-
(1637-1714), who was as overbearing and tactless portant producers of sugar, to which Europeans
as his royal master. Once James II was deposed, now were becoming addicted, and important
the colonists kicked out Andros at once and re- users of black slaves.
turned to their separate existences.
Until 1689, the French and English colonists in
North America had not fought with each other. NETHERLANDS
They were far enough apart
be able to ignore
to After the death of William II in 1650, the Dutch
each other without trouble. Both, however, were allowed the hereditary stadtholdership to expire
expanding, and a sense of competition grew, es- and become the "Dutch Republic." They chose
pecially since the French were Catholic and the John De Witt (1625-1672) as "Grand Pension-
English, for the most part, Protestant. ary." He, with the help of his brother Cornelis
When England and France went to war in De Witt (1623-1672), saw the Netherlands safely
1689, it was reflected in fighting in North Amer- through the naval wars with England, and main-
ica that was called "King William's War." Mas- tained Dutch prosperity, though the decline was
sachusetts did the major fighting. A fleet of 14 beginning and was accelerated by the threatened
vessels sailed from Massachusetts in May 1690, attack of Louis XIV.
under the command of William Phips (1651- Indeed, as the French armies swept through
1695). On May 11, 1690, it bluffed Port Royal (the the southern portion of the Dutch Republic, the
French colony of Acadia) into sur-
capital of the frightened Dutchmen lynched the DeWitt broth-
rendering. Massachusetts then annexed Acadia ers on August 17, 1672, and recalled the son of
but at the end of the war, in 1697, the prov- William II to serve as stadtholder. That son was
ince was given back to France by the English, William III, who had been born a few months
1650 TO 1700 263
after his father died, and who was now 22 years thodox, he was excommunicated from his
old. He managed syn-
to gain allies and hold off the agogue.
French sufficiently well for the Netherlands
to The most important Dutch painter of this pe-
survive the war without loss of territory.
riod was Jan Vermeer (1632-1675).
The Dutch dominions overseas were in no
danger from Louis XIV, who could not dispute
the sea with the Dutch. On the Dutch
island of SPAIN
Mauritius, however, an event took place that
in Philip IV died in 1665, leaving behind
more recent times would have been considered a a broken
nation, with Portugal gone, Catalonia
tragedy that human beings would have barely re-
labored tained, and military reputation shattered. He
its
hard to prevent, but which was little regarded
also left behind a four-year-old son, who reigned
then. The dodo, a flightless pigeon, as large as a
Charles II (1661—1700), but who was so sickly,
turkey, which could be found only on
Mauritius, and so near to feeble-mindedness, that he was
was needlessly driven to extinction. The last one
yearly expected to die. He surprised everyone by
died in 1681, leaving behind only the well-known
living to be an adult. However, though he mar-
phrase "dead as a dodo."
ried twice, he had no children.
In 1677, William married Mary, the older
III
When Charles II, after a long illness, died on
daughter of James II and, in 1688, this led to his November 1, 1700, Europe had to face the over-
being called in by the English to be their king.
As riding question of who would
on the next sit
King of England, he carried on the bitter feud
throne of Spain. There were three candidates
with Louis XIV. for
the succession.
The Netherlands continued to produce impor- Louis XIV was the half-brother-in-law of
tant scientists. Huygens (1629-1695)
Christian Charles II of Spain and his mother had been
discovered, in 1656, that the planet, Saturn, was
Charles II s aunt. Louis did not expect to become
encircled by a ring and that it had a large satellite,
King of Spain himself, and his son was sched-
which he named Titan. In 1657, he devised the
uled to succeed him, as was his older grandson.
pendulum clock, the first timepiece capable of He had, however, a younger grandson, Philip of
measuring time consistently to within a minute. Anjou (1683-1746), however, who was a great-
This was absolutely essential to the further prog- grandson of Philip IV of Spain.
ress of physics. Huygens also maintained
that As for the Emperor Leopold I (1640-1705), he
light was a wave motion in opposition to
New- was a nephew of Philip III of Spain and a full
ton's belief that it was a stream of tiny particles.
brother-in-law of Charles He claimed the II.
Anton van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723) was the throne for his younger son, Charles.
greatest of the early microscopists. He ground
Finally, the elector, Maximilian II of Bavaria
perfect little lenses and, in 1676, was the first to
(1662-1726), was
grandson of Philip IV, and he
a
see microorganisms, living things too small to
offered his son, Joseph Ferdinand.
see with the unaided eye. He also observed
Since no one but France wanted Philip of
sperm cells and, in 1683, even caught a glimpse Anjou, and no one but Austria wanted Charles
of tiny bacteria for the first time. Another micro-
of Austria, the logical choice the Bavarian, was
scopist, Jan Swammerdam (1637—1680) discov-
but he died in 1699, before Charles II did.
ered red blood corpuscles in 1658, and studied
As Charles II of Spain lay dying, the French
insects in great detail, founding the modern sci-
somehow persuaded him to leave his land to
ence of entomology. Philip of Anjou, who was therefore declared
The Dutch-Jewish philosopher, Baruch Spi- king. This caused Louis XIV to exult that the Pyr-
noza (1632-1677), published important books on enees mountain range between France and
(the.,
philosophy in the 1670s, following the teachings Spain) were no more.
of Descartes. Because his views on the rational
view of the Universe seemed godless to the or-
was Francesco Redi (1626-1697), who proved, in

PORTUGAL 1668, that maggots did not arise from dead meat
Portugal, free once more, was ruled by John IV, ("spontaneous generation") but arose from the
who spent his reign fending off attempts by eggs of flies. It was an important early example
Spain to reassert its authority over Portugal, and of the usefulness of experimentation in biology.
doing so successfully. On February 13, 1668, The Italian microscopist, Marcello Malpighi
Spain finally recognized Portuguese indepen- (1628-1694), discovered microscopic blood-ves-
dence. sels ("capillaries") connecting veins and arteries.
In 1654, Portugal also drove the Dutch out of This completed Harvey's earlier work on the cir-
the Brazilian coast, one of the few cases where culation of the blood.
Portugal regained a lost portion of its empire. Antonius Stradivarius (1644-1737), in the
When John IV died in 1656, he was succeeded 1680s and 1690s, produced the best violins ever
by his older son, Afonso VI (1643-1683), and, made. A "Stradivarius violin" is, to this day, the
after that monarch's deposition in 1667, by a ultimate in musical instruments.
younger son, Pedro II (1648-1706). Portugal re- Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1715) was the
mained close to England; and a daughter of John composer of this period. He pro-
greatest Italian
IV, Catherine of Bragaza (1638-1705) married duced 115 operas and established the form of the
Charles II of England in 1662, but had no chil- opera overture.
dren.
SAVOY
PAPACY
Savoy was a duchy in the northwestern corner of
The most important Pope of the period was In-
Turin. In 1650, Charles
Italy, with its capital at
nocent XI (1611-1689), who became Pope in
Emmanuel II (1638-1675) was its ruler and was
1676. He
reorganized the Papacy's financial situ-
succeeded by his son, who reigned as Victor
ation and was rigidly honest himself. What was
Amadeus II (1666-1732). Savoy was, at this time,
most unusual for a Pope of this period was his
virtually a French puppet, and its importance lay
recognition that there had to be religious tolera-
in the future. Eugene of Savoy (1663-1736), a sec-
tion since force alone would bring not unity but
ond cousin of Victor Amadeus II, was unable to
devastation. Therefore, he disapproved of Louis
obtain preferment from Louis XIV and, in a dud-
XIV's revocation of the Edict of Nantes (a far cry
geon, switched allegiance to Austria, something
from the Papal celebration of the St. Bartholo-
that, in the end, did Louis XIV enormous harm.
mew's Day Massacre a century earlier).
He spent his efforts in fighting Louis XIV,
who wanted the French Church to be more under
his own control than the Pope's. In 1682, Louis
VENICE
XIV called an assembly of French churchmen, Venice was still fighting wars with the Ottoman
who argued that a general council was superior Empire. A long 21-year war over Crete, ended in
to the Pope and that the Pope could not dictate 1669, with the loss of Crete by Venice to the
to sovereigns. It also maintained that the power Turks.
of the Pope was limited and that his decisions But then, Venice managed to conquer
in 1684,
were not irrevocable. parts of the Peloponnesus. As the war contin-
Under Innocent XII (1615-1700), who became ued, an important tragedy, not involving human
Pope in 1691, Louis XIV backed down from this life, took place in 1687. The Parthenon, the most
position, however, probably because he wanted beautiful remnant of ancient Greece was still es-
Papal support for the inheritance of Spain by his sentially intact although it had been built 2000
grandson. years earlier. The Turks, however, stored gun-
An important Italian scientist of the period powder in it, and the Venetians, bombarding
1 650 TO 1 700 265
Athens, struck the building. The gunpowder

ex- tember 12, 1683, there was a battle outside Vi-
ploded and the Parthenon was left a ruin.
enna which remained inconclusive until
John
Sobieski led his cavalry in a wild attack that
sent
OTTOMAN EMPIRE the Turks into panicky flight. Vienna was
saved.
The Ottoman Empire, having made this su-
In this period, the Ottoman Empire showed a preme effort and failed, simply receded in ex-
surprising burst of vigor, due not to any sudden haustion. The Austrian army pursued
appearance of a vigorous Sultan, but rather the
retreating Turks and gradually gained the
through a group of ministers ("grand viziers") upper
of hand. On September 2, 1686, the Austrians took
the Albanian-born Koprolu family. The
first of Buda, the Hungarian capital, and on August
these, Koprolu Mehmed (d. 1661), 12,
reorganized 1687, in a battle near Mohacs (where the
the Janizzaries Turks
and the finances. He and his son, had smashed the Hungarians over a century and
Fazil Ahmed(1635-1676), brought about the de- a half earlier), it was now the Turks
feat of Venice and the taking of Crete in
who were
1669. defeated by Charles of Lorraine.
The Turks also fought vigorously but without
The Austrians then invaded the Balkans, cap-
outstanding success against the Poles and the
tured Belgrade and overran Serbia. The
Russians. The most astonishing stroke, however, Turks,
with a supreme effort, drove them out. But
in
came in an offensive against Austria. 1697, when
the Turks tried to counterattack in
This arose out of a continuing fight between
Hungary again, they were met by the Austrians
Austria and the Ottoman Empire over Hungary,
under Eugene of Savoy (1663-1736), who vir-
compounded by confused fighting by the Hun- tually annihilated them.
garians against the Austrians and against each
Turkey was forced to sign the Treaty of Kar-
other.
lowitz, north of Belgrade, on January 26, 1699.
Kara Mustafa (1634-1683), the brother-in-law For the first time, the Turkish tide in Europe
re-
of Fazil Ahmed, became Grand Vizier in 1678. ceded. All of Hungary was freed after a century
On March 31, 1683, he and the Sultan, Mehmed and a half under the Turks, but not totally. It
IV, led a large force into Hungary and beyond. became part of Austria. Poland and Venice also
The Austrians retired before them and, on July gained territory. Now, at last, the Turkish de-
14, 1683, the Turks
had reached Vienna, with cline was even on the map. The Ottoman
visible
perhaps 150,000 men, 10 times the number that
Empire never threatened central Europe again.
were inside Vienna under the leadership of
Charles of Lorraine (1643-1690).
Somehow it was as though the days of Sulei- AUSTRIA
man the Magnificent of a century and a half ear- In this period, Austria was totally involved in
lier had suddenly returned. Once again, the fighting Louis XIV on the west and the Turks on
Turks were in the heart of central Europe. This the east. The Emperor throughout this period
time, though, the Turks were short of heavy ar-
was Leopold I, who established absolutism after
tillery and the defense was very rigorous.
Even the fashion of Louis XIV, and who labored to
get
so, as September opened, the Turks were making
the Spanish throne for his family.
breaches in the fortifications and the fall of Vi- The greatest German scientist of this period
enna seemed only a matter of time. was Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716). In
The Austrians, however, had made an alliance 1673, he invented a calculating device that could
with Poland even as the Turkish force had set
multiply and divide as well as add and subtract.
out, and Poland was under the rule of one of its
In 1684, he worked out the mathematical
system
rare forceful kings, John III Sobieski (1629-1696).
of independently of Newton, though
calculus*',
Faithful to his treaty, John Sobieski brought an
there was a long and ugly controversy over
the
army of 30,000 Poles to Vienna by forced matter. In 1700, he studied binary notation.
marches, covering 220 miles in 15 days. On Sep-
BRANDENBURG SWEDEN
Brandenburg, a state in eastern Germany, with For nearly a century after the death of Gustavus
Berlin as its capital,played a rather obscure role Adolphus, Sweden aspired to a position as a
prior to this period. In 1618, the Elector of Bran- great power, one to which her population and
denburg, John Sigismund (1572-1619), had ab- economic strength did not really entitle her.
sorbed the province of Prussia, which lay outside Charles X Gustavus (1622-1660) became King
the boundaries of the Holy Roman Empire, and of Sweden after Queen Christina's abdication in
which had been part of the dominion of the now- 1654. He was her half-first-covsin. He managed
defunct Teutonic Knights. He and his Electorate to gain Livonia from Poland after taking Warsaw
were Calvinists. in 1656. He Skane in 1658. This

also took over
John Sigismund's son George William (1595- was the southernmost part of Sweden, and it had
1640) became Elector in 1619 and did his best to been retained by Denmark when Sweden won its
remain sensibly (if pusillanimously) neutral dur- independence nearly a century and a half earlier.
ing the Thirty Years War. His son, Frederick Wil- His son, Charles XI (1655-1697) became King
liam (1620-1688), became Elector in 1640. It was of Sweden in 1660 and, in imitation of Louis XIV,
under him that Brandenburg began to grow he made himself absolute, although he joined al-
prominent, and he is usually known as the liances against the French king. He was defeated
"Great Elector." by Brandenburg at the Battle of Fehrbellin in
Frederick William built up a standing army 1675.

and, in this way, began a militaristic tradition At the death of Charles XI, Sweden was still
that was The Brandenburg army had

to continue. the strongest power in the north and still looked
its first test in 1656, during a war between Swe- very impressive on the map. Succeeding him,
den and Poland. To keep Brandenburg safe, the however, was his 15-year-old son, who reigned
Great Elector allied himself with Sweden and, in as Charles XII (1672-1718). The surrounding na-
a three-day battle in July 1636, the Swedes took tions of Denmark, Poland, and Russia, all of
Warsaw. The Brandenburgers did well in that whom had been defeated at one time or another
battle,but Frederick William refused to advance by the king's father or grandfather, now allied
farther into Poland. themselves for the purpose of taking advantage
Thereafter, Frederick William artfully chose a of the boy-king and of gaining territory at Swe-
policy of changing allies as changing conditions den's expense.
made it necessary, trying always to make a gain A
Swedish scientist of this period was Olof
out of each change. Rudbeck (1630-1702). He discovered the lym-
Finally, when
the Swedes, tired of this duplic- phatic vessels, a portion of the blood-circulating
ity, invaded Brandenburg in 1675, Frederick Wil- machinery, and demonstrated them to Queen
liam defeated the Swedes at the Battle of Christina in 1653, using a dog for the purpose.
Fehrbellin, about 30 miles northwest of Berlin. It
was the time the Brandenburger army had

first
won a battle on its own. Frederick William wasn't

DENMARK
strong enough, however, to force the Swedes to Frederick III (1609-1670), who
succeeded his fa-
give up Pomeranian territory north of Bran-
the ther, Christian IV, in 1648, and his son and suc-
denburg, which they had won in the Thirty Year cessor, Christian V (1646-1699), were both
War, three decades earlier. mauled by Sweden. Christian V, imitating Louis
In 1688, Frederick William was succeeded by XIV, made himself absolute.
his son, the Elector Frederick III (1657-1713), Two Danish scientists should be mentioned.
who kept the electorate on the side of Austria Nicolaus Steno (1638-1686) was a skilled anato-
against Louis XIV. mist who was the first modern to maintain that
certain rocky fossils dug out of the ground, and
1650 TO 1700 267
which bore the appearance of living things, had

Tsar's officials did not penetrate effectively.
indeed once been alive, and had petrified after The
escaped serfs dreaded more than anything else
death.
the expansion of Russian power in the region.
The Danish astronomer, Olaus Roemer (1644-
In 1670, therefore, the Cossacks and
serfs re-
1710), was the first to get a reasonable value
of belled under the leadership of Stepan
the speed of light, by studying the manner ("Stenka")
in Razin 1671) and, for a year, spread rapine and
(d.
which Jupiter's satellites went into eclipse, earlier
slaughter over the Volga River valley and to the
or later than scheduled, depending on the
chang- east.
ing distance between Earth and Jupiter.
Western notions were already beginning to in-
filtrate Russia, however, and Alexis
sent against
the rebels an army that had been trained to
POLAND some
extent, at least, in western weapons and
tactics.
The Turks invaded Poland in 1672, but John So- The wild, undisciplined rebels could not stand
bieski led a Polish army to Chotin on the Dniester against them. The rebellionwas crushed and, on
River, at the border of the Ottoman domain and June 16, 1671, Stenka Razin was brutally exe-
destroyed it. The Polish king at the time was Mi- cuted, though he remained an outlaw-hero in the
chael (1640-1673), who reigned since 1669. He memory of ordinary Russians.
was the son-in-law of Emperor Leopold I and And time in the east, more and more
all this
was opposed by the anti-Hapsburg faction, of of Siberia was being penetrated and
whom the chief was John Sobieski. coming
under Russian control. Russian pioneers had, in
As it happened, Michael died the day before fact, reached the Pacific Ocean and,
beginning in
the battle at Chotin, and John Sobieski raced to
1670, had established themselves along the
Warsaw and had himself elected king as John III. Amur River, on the border of Manchuria.
He then defeated the Turks again in 1673, when By the time Alexis died, in 1676, Russia was
they tried a second invasion; and a third time
completely recovered from the Time of Troubles.
when he put an end to the siege of Vienna in While Russia was still no match, militarily, for
1683.
her more advanced western neighbors, the abil-
But John Sobieski was the last strong king Po- ity of her people to be resolute and
long-suffering
land was to have. After his death in 1696, Poland
on defense was beginning to make itself felt.
went rapidly downhill. Alexis was succeeded by his oldest son, Fy-
odor III (1661-1682), who was only 15 years old.
He was the first Tsar to receive even the begin-
RUSSIA
nings of a western education, since he had been
During the reign of Tsar Alexis, there was a long taught Polish and Latin. He encouraged the fur-
war between Russia and Poland, in which Russia ther exposure of Russia to western culture,
sought revenge for Polish meddling during the against the fiery objections of the conservatives.
Time of Troubles. It ended in 1667, with Russia In his reign, there was war, for the first time,
having gained Smolensk permanently. They also between Russia and the Ottoman Empire. The
gained the eastern Ukraine beyond the Dnieper Turks did well, but Kara Mustafa was planning
River, plus Kiev, the old Russian capital. This his push toward Vienna and he wanted
peace on
meant that Russia's borders now abutted those the Russian front. Therefore, he agreed to
let
Ottoman Empire.
of the
Russia have parts of the Ukraine that the Turks
The war was devastating to the Ukraine, and had until then occupied, provided those parts
the Cossack horsemen, who dominated it as a were to be kept unpopulated so that there would
kind of no-man's land between Poland, Russia, be no friction between the nations. Russia took
and the Ottoman Empire, grew rebellious. Add the area, but keeping it unpopulated was not
to that the fact that serfs who ran away from
possible (and probably not even desired).
serfdom tended to go to the Ukraine where the Fyodor died in 1682, still only 21. He had a
younger brother, Ivan (1666-1696), who was 16 ken anyone less dynamically energetic than him-
and mentally deficient. There were those who self.
wanted Ivan's half-brother, Alexis' son by a sec- Peter was fascinated by ships, by carpentry,
ond wife, to reign instead. He was Peter (1672- by doing things with his hands. It was his clear
1725), who was only 10 years old, but tall, intention to seize Russia by its collective beard
healthy, and intelligent. and drag it, kicking and screaming, if necessary,
Ivan had a sister, Sophia (1657-1704), who into the new
century about to begin.
was also Peter's half-sister. She was 25 years old For this reason, he continued his education
and ambitious. She wanted Ivan to be Tsar, be- outside Russia. In 1697, he [eft for a tour of
cause he would be more easily handled. There- France, England, and the Netherlands, under an
fore, she arranged to have the Streltsy (the palace incognito (that fooled nobody), and exposed Eu-
guard) riot in favor of Ivan. Some of Peter's party rope to the ferocity of his desire to learn, and to
were massacred, but Peter himself was spared. his capacity for alcohol.
The result was that Ivan and Peter were made co- He would have stayed longer, learning more
Tsars as Ivan V and Peter I, while the real power about the west and gaining allies, however, in
lay with Sophia, as regent. 1698, news reached him that the Streltsy had re-
She remained regent for seven years, during volted.
which time there were two quite unsuccessful In a rage, he dashed back to Russia and, with
campaigns against the Crimean Tatars, and a a flurry of executions and
he destroyed
exiles,
treaty in the Far East. the corps. He made it quite plain that in anger
The Russian pioneers on the Amur River were and cruelty, he could be as supernormal as he
6000 miles from home and were facing a strong was in everything else. He was no man to trifle
China. The only reason they had managed to es- with, and Russia learned the lesson.
tablish themselves on the Amur in the first place Peter, with his interest in ships, needed an
was that the Manchu rulers of China were dis- outlet to the ocean.Even before his trip to the
tracted by a revolt in the south. Once the Man- west, his glance had rested on the Black Sea,
chus had settled matters there, they sent an army which was blocked by the Crimean Tatars,
north. The Russians were vastly outnumbered, against whom Sophia had failed twice. In 1695,
and resistance was clearly useless. In August of even before he had traveled west, he had
1689, therefore, they signed the Treaty of Ner- launched an offensive against Azov, the north-
chinsk (an outpost just north of Mongolia). By ernmost Black Sea port. It failed because he
that treaty, the Russians agreed to evacuate the lacked the ships to blockade the city. So he built
Amur valley, and did so. It was the first impor- and sailed them down the Don River to
the ships
tant land contact between a European power and Azon and, on July 28, 1696, took it. It wasn't
China. enough to open the Black Sea to him, but it was
In that same month, young Peter, now 17, a start.
strong and forceful, had gathered a group loyal However, the boy-king, Charles XII, was on
to himself, and overthrew Sophia. He became the Swedish throne now and Peter was eager to
the effective ruler of Russia, although he care- occupy those Swedish lands that would place
fully preserved the co-imperial title for his him on the Baltic Sea, so he made peace with
brother, until the latter's death in 1696. Turkey in 1700.
Peter recognized, more than any Russian be-
fore him, that Russia was doomed to defeat at
the hands of its western enemies as long as it INDIA ^
remained technologically backward. It had to In 1658,Aurangzeb (1618-1707), the third son of

learn from the west and adopt western ways. Shah Jahan, became the ruler of the Moghul Em-
Peter, therefore, began an intense program of pire. He was a pious Muslim, and almost para-
self-education that would undoubtedly have bro- noid in his distrust and suspicions. It was his
1700 TO 1725 269
ambition to rule over a united India, and he al- Ch'ing Emperors, and under him Manchu China
most achieved this aim. Only the extreme south- was at its height. He united all of China, and
ern tip of India was left unconquered. even took the island of Taiwan, where diehards
He would also have liked to evict the Euro- of the Ming dynasty had maintained themselves
peans on his coastline; in 1685, for instance, he for 40 years.
seized the English base at Surat. However, there He forced the Russians to abandon the Amur
was no way he could fight the English ships and River district by the Treaty of Nerchinsk in 1689;
the English retained their hold, here and there. and, by 1699, he was in control of Mongolia. Be-
The French also arrivedon the coast, estab- tween the Russians on the north and the Chinese
lishing themselves at Chandernagor on the on the south, the Mongolian region was trapped
northeastern coast in 1670. The English, unwill- and could never again serve as a reservoir of rov-
ing to leave any part of the coast to France uncon- ing mounted tribesmen.
tested, established a base near Chandernagor K ang Hsi was interested western science,
in
that grew to be the city of Calcutta. The French, and tolerated the Jesuits in order that he might
playing the same game, occupied Pondicherry, learn from them. They worked up new calendars
south of the English base at Madras. By 1700, the and improved observatories. He also supported
stage was set for an Anglo-French confrontation Chinese scholars and Chinese art.
over the control of Indian trade. isn't often that able rulers
It appear in clusters,
Aurangzeb's continual wars were weakening but as the 1600s drew to a close there were able,
the nation. He persecuted the Hindus relent- forceful rulers over China, India, Russia, and
lessly,which encouraged revolts that had to be —
France all at the same time.
repressed, adding further devastation. The later
decades of his rule initiated a decline of the
Moghul Empire, which was papered over by Au- SOUTH AFRICA
rangzeb's strong will and energy, but would On April 1652, the Dutch arrived
6, in southern
surely lead to a breakdown after his death. Africa, a century and three quarters after the Por-
tuguese navigators had first sighted the Cape of
Good Hope. The Dutch established a settlement
CHINA there, in 1652, which became Capetown. During
In 1662, K'ang Hsi (1654-1722) began a 60-year the next half-century, the Dutch spread out over
reign over China. He was the most able of the the coast and moved inland.
1700 TO 1725
had fought well at the siege of Vienna, and had
FRANCE beaten the Turks in Hungary.
With Charles II of Spain dead, and with Louis In England, William III died on March 19,
XIV's grandson prepared to succeed him as 1702, but that was just as well. He was a bad
Philip V, a "Grand Alliance" was formed to make general and might have botched things. As it
sure that Spain did not become a French puppet. was, he was succeeded by his sister-in-law Anne
The chief members of the Alliance were Austria, (1665-1714), who was James IPs younger daugh-
England, and the Dutch Republic. ter. She left military matters in the hands of John
Austria's general was Eugene of Savoy, who Churchill (1650-1722), later the Duke of Marlbor-
French-Bavarian force that was slightly larger.

ough. He was the husband of Anne's favorite,
Sarah Churchill (1660-1744), and, like Eugene of The next day, the two armies met at Blenheim on
the Danube River in western Bavaria.
Savoy, he was a general of the first rank. He had
helped crush Monmouth's rebellion and had Marlborough and Eugene worked in perfect
coordination (they always did, something that
been close to James II, but had abandoned him
for William III when that seemed the wisest thing was not usually true of two generals with sepa-
rate armies), and between them managed to
to do.
Since William III left no heirs who qualified as shatter the French army, and virtually wipe it
stadtholder of the Netherlands, it became a re- out.

As a result of the battle, Bavaria was indeed
public again under Anthonie Heinsius (1641—
1720).Heinsius had, in any case, been governing knocked out of the war and was taken over by
the land while William was King of England. Austria. The French army received a terrible
The "War of the Spanish Succession" began in blow to its prestige. It was, after all, the first
great defeat suffered by the armies of Louis XIV
1701, when Eugene of Savoy led an Austrian
army into Italy. On May England en-
15, 1702, Marlborough returned to the Netherlands
tered the war, and Marlborough landed in the and, for two years, there was stalemate as the
Dutch Republic and invaded the Spanish Neth- Dutch continued to keep Marlborough hobbled
erlands. Marlborough discovered, however, that — despite the display at Blenheim of what he
the cautiousDutch would not allow him to take could do.

chances and were constantly preventing him But then, on May 23, 1706, Marlborough
from carrying through daring strokes that he forced the French into battle at Ramillies in the
would undoubtedly have carried to a successful Spanish Netherlands. He feinted at the French
left, and when the French switched some re-
conclusion.
September 1702, Bavaria entered the war on
In serves from the right, he launched his main at-
the French side. It was France's plan now to send tack at the weakened right; the French were
an army into Bavaria and, using that as a base, to again badly defeated. This victory made it pos-
threaten Vienna and force Austria out of the war. sible for Marlborough to take over the Spanish
Marlborough could see that the French would Netherlands.

do this, and he knew that what he had to do was During that same year, Eugene maneuvered
brilliantly and quickly in Italy, totally confusing
to take his troops from the Netherlands to Ba-
varia and there, in combination with Eugene of the less able French commanders, beating them
Savoy, defeat the French army, knock Bavaria at Turin on September 7, 1706, and driving them
out of the war, and save Austria. out of Italy altogether. Louis XIV, feeling his age
In order to he had to keep his plan
do that, and dazed by this unexpected turn of events,
secret from the Dutch, who would otherwise began to consider making peace.
have moved heaven and earth to keep him from On July 11, 1708, Marlborough faced a French
leaving the Netherlands. If his army were de- army at Oudenarde in the Spanish Netherlands
stroyed in Germany, after all, the Netherlands for a third major battle. Eugene was with him,
would have Louis XIV themselves, and

to face and opposed was the French commander, Louis
they could scarcely imagine that they would sur- Joseph, Duke de Vendome (1654-1712), a capa-
vive in that case. ble fighter. By now, though, the French leader-
April Marlborough set out south-
1704, ship was frightened of Marlborough and
In
ward, with the unsuspecting Dutch having no Vendome was hampered The result
in his plans.
idea of what he was planning. While he marched was a bloody battle which Marlborough won. He
southeastward, Eugene of Savoy kept the French then laid siege to the city of Lille and took it on
and Bavarians busy and off-balance. On August December 11, 1708. Marlborough was now
12, 1704, Marlborough and Eugene combined
standing on French soil.
forces in Bavaria and had 56,000 men against a Louis XIV asked for terms. The most impor-
1700 to 1725 271
tant demand of the Allies was that Spain be Savoy obtained the island of Sicily, which, a
transferred from Louis's grandson, Philip, to an few years later, it exchanged for the lesser, but
Austrian ruler. Louis was chastened enough to closer, island of Sardinia. From this point on.
be willing to agree to that. However, Philip was Savoy became the "Kingdom of Sardinia."
in possession of Spain and the Allies demanded For Louis XIV, the major gain was that his
that Louis XIV use French troops to drive him grandson, Philip, retained Spain and the Spanish
out. Louis, in anger,
refused this further de- overseas colonies. To be sure, Louis had to prom-
mand, and the war continued, through a winter ise that France and Spain would never be ruled
that was the coldest anyone could remember and by the same person, but there was the feeling
that put all of western Europe through an agony that a sense of family would keep the two nations
of frost and famine. allied.
On September 11, 1709, Marlborough and Eu- Louis XIV was now coming to the end of his
gene fought the French a fourth time, at Malpla- reign. He died on September 1, 1715, having
quet, on the French frontier with the Spanish been king for 72 years, the longest reign in mod-
Netherlands. For one last time, Marlborough ern times. He had outlived his son and his older
won, but it was the hardest battle he had yet grandson. His successor was his five-year-old
fought, and he actually lost more men than the great-grandson, who reigned as Louis XV (1710-
French did. 1774). A nephew of Louis XIV, Philippe, Duke of
The war was, by now, very unpopular in En- Orleans (1674-1723), served as regent.
gland. Marlborough's victories were entirely too As a result of the War of the Spanish Succes-
costly to celebrate, and the last year's winter had sion, French finances were in a perilous state. A
been the last straw. To the English, it seemed Scottish financier, John Law (1671-1728),
that the best war was one fought by the navy, thought he had a way out. He would offer shares
and that land battles should be fought, and high in a company would finance the settling of
that
casualties suffered, by other powers whom En- the lower Mississippi River Valley. The money
gland would subsidize. invested and the profits made would then pay
Besides, Queen Anne had quarreled with off the nation's debts. This scheme sounded
Marlborough's wife. For this reason, Marlbor- good and it was adopted in 1717.
ough was recalled on December 31, 1711, and People who expected to make great profits
England virtually abandoned the war, leaving its poured their money The money
into the scheme.
allies in the lurch. received from those coming in later was used to
There was nothing to do now but make peace, pay the interest of those who came in earlier and
and Louis XIV got better terms than he had who made the big profits that had been prom-
been offered in 1708. The Treaty of Utrecht ised. This lured still others to come in. The price
(in the Dutch Republic) was signed on April 11, of the stocks was bid up and up (such schemes
1713. are, therefore, called "bubbles," because stock-
By its terms, France was finally forced to ac- prices expanded like —
bubbles and usually burst
cept the fact that the English would be ruled by like bubbles).
a Protestant king and to quit supporting the Those who were content with reasonable prof-
Catholic descendants of James II. England gained its and sold out, did well, but the temptation was
land in North America. Then, too, the English always to remain in and make still more and —
had captured Gibraltar from Spain on August 4, more. Eventually, though, the money stopped
1704, and they kept that, too (and still have it coming in since there wasn't an infinite supply,
today). nor were profts coming in from the Mississippi.
Austria obtained the Spanish Netherlands, As soon as there began to be a problem paying
which had been Spanish for a century and a half. interest, everyone tried to sell their shares at
It was called the "Austrian Netherlands" from once and, in 1720, the bubble burst. A few had
this point on. gotten rich; most lost their shirts.
peaceful transfer of power from one party to an-

France was left worse off than it had been be-
fore the financial excitement had begun. other in Great Britain. It set the fashion for other
The artificiality of court life at Versailles, by such cases in Great Britain, in the future United
and in other nations that engage in free
the way, was reflected in the work of France s States,
and peaceful election procedures.
best-known painter of the period, Antoine Wat-
who painted delicate scenes of A burning question was what to do about the
teau (1684-1721),
pastoral life and of gallantry, all idealized and succession once Queen Anne died. She had had
romanticized. 17 children but all had died young. The nearest
heir was Anne's half-brother James Edward
(1688-1766), whose birth had been the occasion
ENGLAND/GREAT BRITAIN of the overthrow of James II. After James II had
While the War of the Spanish Succession was died in exile in 1701, his son, then 13 years old,
going on, an important change took place in the was considered to be James III by his supporters
British Isles. and came to be known as the "Old Pretender"
Since Jameshad become King of England a
I
because he eventually had a son who w'as the
century before, England and Scotland had been "Young Pretender."
two separate countries ruled by the same king The Tories rather hankered for James Edward,
a dynastic union. On May 1, 1707, however, the but he was Catholic and the British wouldn't
two countries were unified as “The United King- have him.
dom of Great Britain." From now on, therefore, James I of England had had a daughter, Eliza-
we speak of Great Britain and of the British,
will beth, who had married Frederick V of the Pala-
instead of England and Scotland and the English tinate (the ill-starred "Winter King" who had
and Scottish. been defeated at the very start of the Thirty Years
The two nations kept their own laws and reli- War). They had had a daughter, Sophia (1630-
gious establishments, but they had a single par- 1714), who had married Ernest Augustus (1629-
liament and a single flag. The flag ("The Union 1698), the Elector of Hanover, a state in western
Jack") combined the cross of St. George for En- Germany. When Ernest Augustus had died in
gland and the cross of St. Andrew for Scotland. 1698, his son, George Louis (1660-1727), had be-
Great Britain was by now divided into two come Elector.
parties: the Whigs and the Tories. Both names Thus, George of Hanover was the great-
originated as terms of abuse applied by one to grandson of James I, and a second cousin of Wil-
the other. liam III, Mary II, and Anne. The Whigs sup-
The Tories were isolationist and wanted to ported the "Hanoverian succession"; and since
fight naval wars only. They supported royal George was a Protestant, that made him the log-
power and the Anglican Church and were ical choice for the British people generally.
against religious toleration. By and large, they Anne died on August 1, 1714, and George of
were a conservative party. Hanover became George I of England. He arrived

The Whigs were more liberal, favoring Parlia- in England on September 18, 1714, and formed a
ment as against the monarch. They supported —

government one made up of Whigs, naturally.
Marlborough and the war. George I was not exactly a popular king. He
By 1710, however, the country was sick of was a fat, dull German, who had no personal
Marlborough's bloody battles, victories though magnetism, spoke no English, and showed no
they might be, and Queen Anne had shifted her interest in Great Britain. He would much rather
own sympathies to the Tories after she had quar- have stayed Elector of Hanover. Yet even so, the
reled with Sarah Churchill who was, of course, a British had no choice. It was Protestant George
profound Whig. or nothing.

The Parliamentary elections that year were To be were numerous "Jacobites,"
sure, there
won by the Tories, and this represented the first who supported James ("Jacobus" in Latin), par-
1700 to 1725 273
ticularly in Scotland, where the House of Stuart on behalf of the Tories, denouncing Marlborough
was considered Scottish, but there weren't and Isaac Newton with equal fury, and publish-
enough. James landed in Scotland in 1715, but ing another all-time best-seller in the form of Gul-
the Jacobite rising that then took place fizzled liver's Travels in 1726.
and quickly came to nothing. Essays of a gentler type that were largely pro-
Oddly enough, France was going
just as Whig were written by Joseph Addison (1672-
through the Mississippi Scheme, Great Britain 1719) and Richard Steele (1672-1729) in The Spec-
was going through a very similar "South Sea tator and other journals of opinion published in
Bubble." In this case, the money was supposed the 1710s.
to come out of the slave trade with the Spanish The greatest English poet of this period (who
colonies in South America.
wasn't as favorable for
The Treaty of Utrecht —
was also a satirist it was a great time for satire)
this as had been hoped, was Alexander Pope (1688—1744). He published
but there was, nevertheless, a buying frenzy in Essay on Criticism in 1711, and the mock-epic The
1720 that, of course, ended in a bust that impov- Rape of the Lock in 1712. He also translated Ho-
erished many and doubt upon the hon-
that cast mer's Iliad and Odyssey into heroic couplets be-
esty of the government, including even the king tween 1715 and 1726.
himself. A poet of lesser but very popular in his
sort,
The scandal might have had unimaginable time, was Isaac Watts (1674— 1748), who wrote
consequences, but one of the Whigs, Robert Wal- 600 hymns. His best-known lines are, perhaps,
pole (1676-1745), managed to keep things "For Satan finds some mischief still/For idle
steady, to sacrifice a few of the worst offenders hands to do."
to appease the fury of the multitude, and to re- The best-known playwright of the period was
organize the government. He was placed in Nicholas Rowe (1674-1718), in whose play. The
charge of finances, and became Prime Minister in Far Penitent, produced in 1703, the character of
1721. "the gay Lothario" appears.
It turned out to be fortunate that George I was The greatest English musician of the day was
so little interested in the British
government that the German-born George Frederic Handel (1685-
he was willing to let Walpole do all the work, 1759). His opera, "Rinaldo" was a great success
and then rubber-stamp it. This began the modern in London in 1711, and he remained in England
system of rule in Great Britain, in which the mon- thereafter.
arch is a figurehead and it is the Prime Minister In philosophy, there was the Irish-born,
that really runs the nation. Walpole, in that George Berkeley (1685-1753), who
published
sense, was the first Prime Minister of Great Brit- Treatise Concerning the Principles of Hw?ian Knowl-
ain. While the rest of Europe, under the spell of edge in 1710. He rejected materialism and argued
Louis XIV, turned to absolutism. Great Britain against Newton and the concepts of calculus
moved, very slowly, to be sure, toward represen- (and was not entirely wrong in doing so).
tative government and democracy. In science, Edmund Halley (1656-1742) ap-
In this period, Daniel Defoe (1660-1731), a plied the principles of gravitation to comets and,
pamphleteer of considerable ability, whose satir- in 1705,maintained that a comet last seen in 1682
ical writings got him in and out of trouble with appeared periodically every 76 years and would
the government, turned to fiction as he ap- next appear in 1758. (It did, and has been known
proached his sixtieth birthday. In 1719, Defoe as Halley's comet ever since.) In 1718, he also
published Robinson Crusoe, which turned out to showed that the "fixed stars" were not fixed, but
be one of the world's all-time best-sellers. He also slowly changed their position relative to each
published Moll Flanders in 1722. other in the sky.
An even more skillful satirist, one of the three Thomas Newcomen (1663-1729), in 1712, pro-
or four most remarkable in history, was Jonathan duced the steam engine that could be used
first
Swift (1667-1745). He was a biting pamphleteer commercially for pumping water out of mines. It
such "Newcomen sippi, in partthanks to the stimulus of Law's

was fearfully inefficient but
Mississippi Scheme. Mobile was founded in
engines" remained in use in considerable num-
1702, Natchez in 1716, and New Orleans
in 1718.
bers for half a century before something
better
New Orleans flourished and, in 1722, it was
came along. Abraham Darby (1678-1717), in
than char- made capital of all the vast Louisiana Territory.
1709, was the first to use coke, rather
coal, to smelt iron. Since coke is prepared from
The French also established posts in the upper
Mississippi, and the regions that are now Illinois
coal, and charcoal from wood, the new
technique
spared the forests.
and Indiana. One such post, established in 1701,
eventually became Detroit.
Newcomen^s engine and Darby s coke were
harbingers of the Industrial Revolution, which
was now looming on the horizon. NETHERLANDS
The Netherlands did well in the War of the Span-
BRITISH AND FRENCH ish Succession, but its golden age was over. It
NORTH AMERICA declined rapidly after the war and became a
The War of the Spanish Succession embroiled the minor power. It kept its overseas possessions, of
course; and, on a planet in which there was less
British and French colonies in North America,
where the British colonials called it "Queen and less to discover, the Dutch admiral, Jacob
Anne's War." Roggeveen (1659—1729), came across an isolated
island in 1722, west of South America. Because
In July 1710, 4000 British soldiers, with expe-
(like Florida, two centuries earlier) the island
was
rience in theEuropean war, arrived in New En-
gland. They were led north against Port Royal in
discovered on Easter Sunday, it was named
Acadia. On October was taken a sec-
16, 1710, it "Easter Island." It was inhabited, and was re-
ond time, this time permanently, and was remarkable for the presence of tall statues of dis-
tinctive appearance but of unknown origin and
named Annapolis Royal, after Queen Anne.
By the Treaty of Utrecht, Great Britain re- purpose.
Hermann Boerhaave (1668-1738) was the fore-
ceived the peninsula of Acadia, which was re-
("New Scotland ). Britain most European physician of his time. He pub-

named Nova Scotia
shores of Hudson Bay, where lished a popular textbook on physiology in 1708
also gained the
and one on chemistry in 1724, and was known as
furs could be obtained.
In the British colonies themselves, Yale Uni- the "Dutch Hippocrates."
Gabriel Daniel Fahrenheit (1686-
versity was founded in New Haven, Connecticut In 1714,
in 1701. In 1710, the"Pennsylvania rifle" was 1736), a German-born Dutch physicist, devised
brought into use by the German immigrants who the first mercury thermometer. It was the first
reliable device for measuring temperature and
settled west of Philadelphia (the "Pennsylvania
Dutch"). In these rifles, the barrel was lined with was of inestimable use to science. The "Fahren-
spiralgrooves that set bullets to spinning and heit scale" (32 degrees for the freezing point of
allowed them to travel straighter and farther than water and 212 degrees for the boiling point of
when from smoothbore muskets. However,
fired water) is still in use in the United States, but not
muskets remained popular because muzzle-load- elsewhere.
ing was slower and more difficult in rifles than in
muskets.
France continued to develop those sections
SPAIN
that were left to her. Just northeast of Nova Sco- After the War of the Spanish Succession, Philip
which was V settled down as King of Spain, the first of the

tia was Cape Breton Island, still
French. There, France built a strongly fortified Bourbon dynasty. On the whole, the Spanish
post called Louisberg, after Louis XIV. It also Bourbons were no more competent than the later
began to form settlements in the lower Missis- Hapsburgs had been.
1700 to 1 725 275
Spain was concerned that the French in Loui- Spanish Netherlands, had to face a serious re-
it
siana might expand southward into Spanish ter- volt in Hungary, which ended in 1711 only after
ritory. Thus, Spain established Albuquerque in Austria had made some concessions to the reb-
1706 and San Antonio in 1718 as a way of empha- els.
sizing their presence and possession. The Emperor Leopold had died in 1705, soon
I
after the War of the Spanish Succession had
PORTUGAL started, and was succeeded by his older son, Jo-

seph I (1678-1711). When Joseph died in 1711, 1
A trade agreement between Portugal and Great
he was succeeded by his younger brother,
Britain was put through on December 27, 1703.
Charles VI. Charles VI, as a younger son, had
Portugal imported British wool and woolens and
been the logical Hapsburg candidate for the
exported port wine in return. This increased Por-
throne of Spain. Once he became Emperor, how-
tuguese prosperity and made port wine a favored
ever, his allies were not interested in seeing the
drink of the British upper classes.
thrones of the Empire and of Spain combined as
Peter II of Portugal was succeeded by John V
in the days of Charles V more than a century and
(1689-1750) in 1706. Portugal naturally fought
a half earlier. This, more than anything else, was
against Spain in the War of the Spanish Succes-
the reason Philip V was allowed to keep Spain by
sion and, therefore, with the allies. As a result,
the Treaty of Utrecht.
at theTreaty of Utrecht, Portugal was awarded
After the conclusion of the War of the Spanish
the Amazon River basin as part of Brazil against
Succession, Austria could turn its attention to
the competing claims of Spain. Brazil, conse-
Turkey again. After all, it still had Eugene of
quently, became by far the largest nation, in area,
Savoy, the greatest general in Austrian history.
in Latin America.
Eugene laid siege to Belgrade in 1717, it being
the strongest Turkish base in the Balkans.
PAPACY Though a Turkish relief army (10 times the size
Pope Clement XI (1649-1721), who became Pope of Eugene's) approached, Eugene attacked and
in 1700, tried to keep a low political profile, but won. Eugene was wounded in ac-
In the battle,
the Papal States were invaded during the War of tion for the thirteenth and last time, Belgrade
the Spanish Succession. The Pope was ignored was taken on August 21, 1717, and the Ottoman
by both sides. Clement was succeeded by Inno- Empire was forced to sign another disadvanta-
cent XIII (1655-1724) in 1721. geous treaty the next year.
Antonio Lucio Vivaldi (1678-1741) was the A great German composer of the period was
most prominent Italian composer of this period, Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), one of the
and is particularly known for his violin concer- greatest in history, and as popular today as ever,
tos. for time has not in the least diminished the

impression he leaves as a giant of music.
VENICE
In 1718, Venice lost the Peloponnesus to the BRANDENBURG/PRUSSIA
Turks, and its great days were completely done. Frederick III, Elector of Brandenburg, the son of
Aside from its own territory in northeastern the Great Elector,had his ambition of continuing
Italy, Venice retained only some strips of the Dal- to preside over the aggrandizement of Branden-
matian coast and some islands off it. burg. What he wanted was to become a king, but
for that he needed the Emperor's permission.
As the War of the Spanish Succession was
AUSTRIA approaching, Frederick III realized that Bran-
While Austria was on the winning side of the denburg, with its comparatively large and well-
War of the Spanish Succession, and gained the trained army, would be a welcome addition to
the Austrian forces against Louis XIV, and he

was prepared to charge a high price. In short,
POLAND
what he asked in exchange for an alliance with Augustus, Elector of Saxony (1670-1733) since
1694, wanted to be King of Poland, too. He
was
Austria was a royal crown. What's more, he
didn't want it in Brandenburg, where he would called Augustus the Strong, partly because he
be subject to the Emperor (at least in theory); he was strong and partly because he had a prodi-
wanted it in Prussia, which lay outside the gious number of illegitimate children (something
boundary of the Holy Roman Empire. that could scarcely be managed by a weakling).
In return for the promise of 8000 troops, and a In order to be acceptable to the Poles, he con-
Prussian vote on the Austrian side on all impor- verted from Lutheranism to Catholicism, which
tant matters facing the Empire, Emperor Leopold

alienated his Lutheran Saxon people, and caused
agreed. On January 18, 1701, Frederick III of his Lutheran wife to leave him. Fie became King
I
Brandenburg became King Frederick I in Prussia. of Poland in 1697, but it did him no good, for his
The word "in" implied that he was king only reign was more troubled than would be expected
even for a Polish king.
when he was in Prussia, but that in Brandenberg
he was still elector. That, however, was a distinc- His troubles started in 1700 when he joined an
tion that was soon lost. Brandenburg became alliance against Charles XII of Sweden and took
"Prussia," and will be referred to as that from part in a war against him. In the course of the
now on, and Frederick was King o/ Prussia. war, he was driven from the throne in 1704, and
Frederick of Prussia died in 1713, just six
I
restored to it in 1709; however, off the throne or
weeks before the Treaty of Utrecht was signed, a on the throne, it made no difference. He had no
treaty out of which Prussia got very little except power.
the kingship. His son succeeded to the throne as
Frederick William I (1688—1740). Frederick Wil-
liam was careful not to go to war, but he built
I
up the army enormously, trained it to the last

SWEDEN
inch, and saved his money, all of which was to While the War of the Spanish Succession was
be of inestimable use to his successor. raging in western Europe, an even more spectac-
He also promoted the nation's prosperity by ular one was being fought in eastern Europe. It
down the expense of the court, living centered on Sweden and on boy-king, Charles
its
cutting
simply, and reforming tax policies. He freed the XII, who, at age 15, had succeeded to the throne
serfs, —
encouraged education, and except for the in 1697.
harshness with which he trained his soliders to Against Charles, there was built up an alliance
become fighting machines, and for his boorish of Peter I of Russia (who wanted the Swedish
—
manners he was a good ruler. territories that kept him from the Baltic Sea), Au-
He would walk the streets of Berlin unat- gustus II of Poland (who wanted those portions
tended, and greet the citizens, but he also carried of Swedish territory that kept /n'm from the Baltic
a stout stick with which to administer correction Sea), and Frederick IV of Denmark (who wanted
when he felt it was needed. As a result, the Sweden weaker so that Denmark could dominate
streets emptied when he took his walk, to his the Baltic Sea).
puzzled surprise. Once he noted someone slink- In mid-June 1700, all three allied powers in-
ing into an alley just too late. He called him back vaded Swedish territory.
and asked him why he was leaving in that man- Charles XII, now
age 18, proved at once he
ner. The man said, "Because I fear you, your was no mere boy, as Alexander had once done in
Majesty." similar circumstances 2000 years earlier. On Au-
"Fear me?" cried the King, wielding his stick gust 4, 1700, Charles invaded Zealand, the island
lustily, "You're suppose to love me, scum! Love on which Copenhagen stood, and raced for that
me!" city. The Danes, astonished at the quickness and
1700 to 1725 111
force of the reaction,gave in at once and signed named). He also constructed a fleet for use on
a peace, finding themselves defeated by Sweden the Baltic.
for the fourth time and more quickly than ever By August 9, 1704, Peter had recaptured
before. Narva, which he had lost four years earlier, and
Charles XII, then landed on the eastern shore massacred every Swede there.
of the Baltic Sea on October 6, and decided to On January 1, 1708, Charles XII was ready (far
relieve the city of Narva on the northeastern too late) to turn to Russia. He crossed the Vistula
boundary of Estonia. It was being besieged by River with 45,000 men and marched eastward to-
40,000 Russians, and Charles XII had only 8000 ward Moscow. For over half a year he drove east-
Swedes with him, but the Swedes were well- ward, while Peter 1 instituted the careful Russian
trained and the Russians were a mere rabble. On policy that was to deal with future invaders as
November 20, 1700, in the middle of a snow- well. He avoided and slowly yielded
battle
storm, Charles wiped out the Russian force. ground, destroying food and crops and anything
(Tsar Peter had left the scene of the battle before else that might be useful to the Swedes as he
it started, probably because he knew what was went. It was a "scorched earth" policy.
going to happen.) By September 1708, the Swedes were terribly
Charles XII felt that in a matter of three short on food and were not anxious to have to
months, he had wiped out the two weaker mem- face a Russian winter. Charles XII then made a
and that he was now ready to
bers of the alliance second mistake. Instead of retreating while he
march against what he thought was the main had a chance, he turned south to march into the
enemy, Poland. Therefore, he turned away from Ukraine where the weather might be milder and
Russia and its bumbling, make-believe army. where he expected to get the help of Ivan Ste-
This was his fundamental mistake, for he al- panovich Mazeppa (1644-1709), a leader of the
lowed the victory at Narva to persuade him to Cossacks.
underestimate Russia and, what was far worse, Then, instead of waiting till he had gathered
to underestimate, totally, Peter. Peter had no inadequate arms and supplies, he raced on with-
tention of letting one defeat dishearten him. out them, leaving it to one of his generals,
While Charles XII bent his attention on Poland, Adam Loewenhaupt, to gather supplies on
Peter had time to reorganize his army. the Baltic coast and bring them to him in the
As a matter of fact, Charles XII spent five Ukraine.
years in Poland and in Saxony, totally destroying Meanwhile, Peter was doing everything cor-
Augustus's armies. Augustus was forced to ab- rectly. In September and October, even as
dicate the Polish throne and Charles XII chose Charles was marching southward, the Russians
Stanislaw Lesczynski (1677-1766) as king, know- fended off a Swedish strike at the new capital of
ing he could be counted on to be a Swedish pup- St. Petersburg so effectively that the Tsar could
pet. feel sure there would be nothing that would go
Meanwhile, though, Peter was pushing into on in the north to distract him from his main task
the Baltic provinces and achieving his war aims. of pursuing Charles.
In 1702, he marched along the Neva River from Then, Peter sent a force into the Ukraine to
Lake Ladoga to the Baltic Sea, and on that river burn Mazeppa's capital and harry the Cossacks.
he began to build a new capital. He wanted to This, too, was done so effectively that Mazeppa
get out of Moscow with its dark traditionalism had to flee, and could bring only a handful of
rooted in the medieval Russian past and the men to Charles.
Mongol experience. He wanted a capital on the Finally, on October 9 and had a con-
10, Peter
Baltic Sea, facing the nations of Europe. It was to tingent ofhis army attack Loewenhaupt and the
be his "window to the west." On May 16, 1703, supply train he was bringing to Charles. Loew-
he founded the city and named it St. Petersburg enhaupt was badly mauled and he had to burn
(in honor of the saint after whom the Tsar was his supplies to keep them out of Russian hands.
SO that on October 21, when he reached Charles, held Charles had not faced Peter. Peter himself
if
itwas with 6000 men but without supplies. at one time growled, in the course of the war,
The stars, too, fought against Charles. The "Charles thinks he is Alexander, but he shall find
winter of 1708-1709, which tortured western Eu- that 1 am no Darius."
rope height of the War of the Spanish

at the The war ended with the Treaty of Nystadt (on
Succession, tortured Russia, too, and the Swed- the Finnish coast). It was signed on August 30,
ish army had to fight through a terrible Russian 1721, and, by it, Russia got the Baltic states, but
winter after being constantly harassed by

all, returned Finland. The war put an end to Sweden
Peter's men. By the spring, Charles had only as a great power, after a century of conquests,
20,000 men, less than half the army he had and it made Russia a great power in Sweden's
started with. (That he had even so many is a place.
tribute to his skill at handling men, and to the

professionalism of the Swedish soldiers.) What
was much worse, though, was that he had only
RUSSIA
34 artillery pieces and almost no gunpowder. Almost lost in the successful course of the "Great
Peter stalked Charles patiently and, finally, Northern War" against Charles XII of Sweden
when he decided the time was right, he con- was a painfully inept interlude on Peter's part
fronted the Swedish king on June 28, 1709, at against the Ottoman Empire.
Poltava, east of theDnieper River in the Ukraine. In the Ottoman Empire after the disaster at
Charles XII had recently been wounded in the Poltava, Charles XII did manage to talk the Turks
foot and had to be carried in a litter. With very into making war on Russia in 1710.
little ammunition, Charles XII had to have a Peter, his head in the clouds after Poltava,
quick victory. attacked at once, but Peter saw

He marched into what is now Romania, and care-
what was happening. He withstood the attack lessly be trapped against the
allowed himself to
stolidly and then, moment, hurled

at the crucial Pruth River by a larger army of Turks. Had the
in 40,000 fresh troops with plenty of guns and Turks pressed their advantage, Peter would
ammunition and the Swedes simply crumpled. surely have had to surrender and been taken
Charles XII managed to get away and flee to the prisoner. He seemed at this time to have been
Ottoman Empire, but the rest of his army were dazed into helplessness by the sudden change of
either killed or captured and an admiring Europe fortune.
called the conqueror, "Peter the Great," which is However, Peter had a mistress, Catherine, a
how he has been known ever since. peasant girl from Livonia who was actually illit-
Everything Charles had done now fell apart. erate, but who was a comfortable, sensible per-
The Russians drove into Poland, restored Augus- and the only one who could
son, very intelligent,
tus as King of Poland (but playing a new role as unfailingly handle the Tsar in his more brutish
Russian puppet), and, in 1713, conquered Fin- moods. She was with him at the Pruth and she
land. took over. She dickered with the Turks, who, in
Charles XII spent five years in Turkey trying any case, strongly disliked the captious, hector-
to get the Ottoman Empire to fight the Russians ing Charles, and were in no mood to do him
and, in 1714, managed to return to Sweden. favors, and managed to get Peter off in exchange
There he promptly took war again, battling
to for a favorable treaty. (Otherwise, who knew
against Denmark until on December 11, 1718, on how the fortunes of war might turn.) The treaty
the Norwegian front, he was killed by a Danish was signed on July 21, 1711, in which Russia re-
bullet (or perhaps by a Swedish one, since the turned some of its southern conquests to the Ot-
Swedes knew that there would never be peace as toman Empire. The next year, in a fine show of
long as Charles Xll was allowed to live). gratitude, Peter married the illiterate peasant
Charles Xll has often been compared to Alex- woman, and made her second wife.
his
ander the Great. The comparison might have Peter was unusually tall (closer to seven feet
1725 TO 1750 279
than to six) and was strong and overflowing with Belgrade to Eugene of Savoy, recaptured the Pe-
energy, both constructively and destructively. loponnesus from Venice, and had their victory
He forced Russia along with him, reorganizing, over Peter the Great.
revitalizing, and reforming her government, her
towns, her army, her navy, her industries, her
aristocracy. He decreed that the traditional Rus- PERSIA
sian beards had to come off, for instance (at least This was a time of confusion for Persia, with in-
among who were not peasants and serfs),
those vasions by the Afghans unsettling it badly. In
and shaved some men with his own harsh hand. 1722, Peter the Great took advantage of the situ-
He was cruel to his son, Alexis (1690-1718), ation to annex portions of the coast of the Cas-
who had been brought up by his mother, Eu- pian Sea.
doxia (1669-1731), whom Peter hated and had
divorced (or said he had divorced), to be every-
thing Peter was not. Alexis was a weak, old-fash- INDIA
ioned young man who believed in the old Aurangzeb died and the Moghul Empire
in 1707
medieval ways. Frightened to death of his brutal rapidly disintegrated after over a century and a
father, he tried to renounce the succession and to half of strength. Aurangzeb was the last of the
enter a monastery, but was forbidden. He then great Mongol warriors who traced their descent
fled the land and hid in Italy, in 1716, but Peter's from Genghis Khan, nearly five centuries earlier.
agents tracked him down and brought him back. Moghul Emperors continued to sit on the
Peter knew that his son, whether in a monastery, throne in Delhi, 10 of them in fact, but their
or abroad, or anywhere but in his grave, would power was nil. Nevertheless, even ceremonial
be used by the conservatives to undo all his re- power is important. In 1717, the British East
forms and put Russia back into the dark age. India Company managed to get various eco-
Therefore, he had his son executed in 1718. Being nomic concessions, including freedom from cus-
Peter, he had him tortured first. toms duties, from the do-nothing Moghul
Not all of Peter's reforms were useful. Not all Emperor, Farrukhsiyar, a great-grandson of Au-
of them took. Still, without him, Russia, and rangzeb.
therefore Europe, and therefore most probably
the world, would have taken a completely differ-
ent path. CHINA
Toward end of the reign of K'ang Hsi, China
the
invaded and conquered Tibet in 1720. The
OTTOMAN EMPIRE Chinese Empire was now more extensive,
Mehmed IV, who had nearly taken Vienna, was stronger, and more prosperous than at any time
succeeded in 1703 by his son, Ahmed III (1673- since Kublai Khan had been on the throne over
1736). It was in Ahmed's reign that the Turks lost four centuries earlier.
1725 TO 1750
repeating itself. A quarter-century earlier,
AUSTRIA Charles II had been dying and the ques-
of Spain
Charles VI, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire tion of succession had arisen. Charles VI had
and Archduke of Austria, must have felt history been one of the candidates.
Now was Charles VI who contemplated his

it brutal man whose good time was get-
idea of a
own death some day and the question, he knew, ting together with other low brows for an eve-
would arise as to what would happen to Austria ning of smoking and drinking, Frederick was a
and all the territories over which it ruled. Unlike delicate youngster who was fond of literature
Charles II of Spain, Charles VI of Austria had had and music, and who seems to have been homo-
a son, but he died young. Charles VI also had sexual.
daughters, the oldest being Maria Theresa (1717- Frederick was so mistreated by his shouting,
1780), but would Europe allow a woman to rule abusive father that, with a beloved male compan-
the Hapsburg dominions? ion, he tried to run away in 1730 (as Alexis, the
He spent most of his reign trying to get other son of Peter the Great, had tried 14 years earlier).
nations to agree to allow his daughter to rule Frederick's planwas betrayed and he and his
over an intact Austria, and they all signed the friend were captured. Frederick was forced to
agreement. So when, on October 20, 1740, watch while his lover was executed and, for a
Charles VI died, and Maria Theresa, who was while, looked as though Frederick William
it
then 23 years old, became Archduchess of Aus- would kill his son as Peter the Great had done.
tria, Hungary, and Queen of Bohemia.
Queen of However, Frederick gave in abjectly, and he was
But would she remain so? Other candidates allowed to live.
made themselves known at once. There was On May William I died,

31, 1740, Frederick
Charles Albert (1697-1745), Elector of Bavaria. and his son, now 28 years old, became Frederick
He was the great-great grandson of Ferdinand II, II of Prussia. He aspired to be a "benevolent des-
who had been Emperor during much of the pot;" that he would be an absolute monarch,
is,
Thirty Years War. Charles Albert had promised but he would use his power for the good of his
to accept Maria Theresa as ruler of Austria, but people. He abolished torture, censorship, and re-
that was when Charles VI was alive. Now he was ligious discrimination (he had no religion of his
dead, it was a different story. Augustus III (1696- own) and did what he could to encourage science
Saxony, and the son of Augus-
1763), Elector of and culture. What he most wanted, however,
tus the Strong of Saxony and Poland, was the was to show his dead father that he was a warrior
son-in-law of Joseph I, who had been Charles after all. And here he succeeded, for he turned
Vi's older brother and predecessor. Even Philip out to be a general of unusual talent.
V of Spain had some dim dynastic claim. When, five months after Frederick became
But it was none of these who struck the first king. Emperor Charles VI died, it was Frederick
blow against Maria Theresa and made her reign who moved at once. He didn't claim the Austrian
a mixture of tragedy and triumph. throne; he wasn't interested in that. What he
wanted was Silesia, which lay to the northeast of
Bohemia, and just to the south of Prussia, and
PRUSSIA which was a Protestant province. Frederick had
It was Prussia. some vague legal claim to it, but he didn't really
Frederick William I of Prussia continued to care whether he had such a thing or not. He sim-
build his he had one of 80,000 men
army until ply planned to take it.
out of a total population of 2.5 million. No other On December 16, 1740, Frederick II invaded
nation in Europe had so large a percentage of its Silesia and began "The War of the Austrian
this
population in the army. Furthermore, they were Succession." Maria Theresa at once appealed to
better trained than any other army
Europe in all the kings who had agreed to recognize her as
and, what's more, Frederick William had accu- ruler of the Austrian realm for help in repelling
mulated a tidy financial surplus with which to the invasions. She got not one reply.
pay and supply his army. On April 10, 1741, the Austrians managed a
His problem was his son, Frederick (1712- counterattack, and battle was joined at Mollwitz
1786). Whereas Frederick William was a gruff. in central Silesia. The Austrian cavalry drove off
1725 TO 1750 281
the Prussian cavalry, and Frederick was per- Charles of Lorraine (1712-1780). He was Maria
suaded by his officers to leave the battlefield, lest Theresa's brother-in-law, and a grandson of the
he be captured. After he was gone, the superbly Charles of Lorraine, who had defended Vienna
trained Prussian infantry withstood all attacks against the Turks 60 years earlier.
and won the battle. Frederick never forgave the The Emperor Charles VII died on December
officers who had persuaded him to leave, and 27, 1744, and his son, Maximilian Joseph (1727-
never again left a battlefield while the outcome 1777), who succeeded as Elector of Bavaria, had
was still uncertain. no particular desire to be the Emperor. On April
As soon as it seemed that Austria was losing 22, 1745, he bowed out of the war and promised
the war, Charles Albert of Bavaria invaded Bo- to support Maria Theresa's husband, Francis of
hemia gobble up his share of the Austrian car-
to Lorraine (1708-1765) for the Imperial throne.
cass. Since Bavaria had fought with France in the The French were still in the war, however,
War of the Spanish Succession, France, together and on May 10, 1745, they, under Marshal Saxe
with Spain, joined Bavaria. The Franco-Bavarian (an illegitimate son of Augustus II of Saxony and
army took Prague on November 26, 1741, and Poland, who had fought Charles Xll) faced a Brit-
Charles Albert was declared King of Bohemia. ish army under William Augustus, Duke of Cum-
On January 24, 1742, he was declared Emperor berland (1721-1765), a son of George 11. This was
Charles VII. at Fontenoy in the Austrian Netherlands near the
It looked as though Austria were falling apart, French border. It was not a very skillful battle,
but Maria Theresa went to Hungary, where as and the French had the better of it.
Queen of the land she made an emotional appeal In that same year, Frederick II won an unbro-
to the nobility, who responded with enthusiasm. ken series of victories over Austria even when he
An Austrian army with strong Hungarian contin- was outnumbered, or caught unaware, or put at
gents then invaded Bavaria and captured Munich a disadvantage. He began
be called "Frederick
to
on the same day that Charles Albert had been the Great" in consequence. Maria Theresa was
declared Emperor. The new Emperor had to dash forced to make a second treaty of peace with him
back to Bavaria, while the French who were still at Dresden Saxony on December 25, 1745.
in
in Prague were put under siege. Once again, she agreed to let him keep Silesia.
That was about the best that Maria Theresa On he recognized Maria Theresa's hus-
his part,
could do, so she made peace with Prussia on band as Emperor Francis I, a post to which he
June 11, 1742. By the Treaty of Breslau (the capi- had been elected on September 13, 1745.
tal of Silesia), she let Frederick have Silesia, plan- The general treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, on Oc-
ning to get it back some time in the future. She tober 18, 1748, ended the War of the Austrian
then concentrated on driving out the French and Succession and, except for Silesia, restored
Bavarians. everything the way
was when Maria Theresa
it
This she did successfully, more so since

all the had first succeeded to the throne. She had saved
a British army with German troops from Hanover her realm against enormous odds.
and Hesse marched to her assistance. There, Frederick 11 was the big winner. Not only had
George II of Great Britain (1683-1760), who was he gained Silesia, but he had made Prussia into a
leading the army personally, managed to defeat major power and, for what that was worth, had
the French at the Battle of Dettingen on June 27, gained undying military fame for himself.
1743. It was the last time a British king ever led
his troops on the battlefield.
On the whole, Austria was now doing so well GREAT BRITAIN
that Frederick II grew a little nervous about his George 1 died on June 1, 1727, and was suc-
ability to keep Silesia. Therefore, he made an al- ceeded by his son, who reigned as George 11 (and
liance with France, and reentered the war. Aus- who was the future victor at the Battle of Dettin-
tria, however, continued fighting well under gen). George 11 was as little interested in govern-
ing Great Britain as his father had been. Since his in 1788, leaving —
no heirs and, with that, the
highly intelligent wife, Caroline of Anspach house of Stuart came to an end, a century and
(1683-1737), was as good friend of Walpole, the three quarters after it had gained the throne of
latterremained as Prime Minister. England.
Great Britain experienced the beginnings of a In Great Britain during this period. Pope was
religious revival in 1729, when two brothers John still writing poetry, publishing "Essay on Man"
Wesley (1703-1791) and Charles Wesley (1707- in 1733. Handel was still composing music, with
1788), together with a few other kindred spirits, The Messiah completed in 1742.
founded Methodism (a name that, like so many Henry Fielding (1707-1754) followed Defoe in
other popular ones, began as a term of derision). the development of the novel’, publishing his
Great Britain was involved in the War of the masterpiece, Tom he had
Jones, in 1749. Earlier
Austrian Succession largely because it was in the published Jonathan Wild in 1743, as a way of pok-
Hanoverian interest and George II was, like his ing fun at the extremely popular Pamela, pub-
father, a Hanoverian at heart. lished in 1740 by Samuel Richardson (1689-
An event much closer to home came when 1761), about an impossibly virtuous servant-girl.
Charles Edward Stuart, the "Young Pretender" Tobias George Smollett (1721-1771) began his lit-
(also called "Bonnie Prince Charlie"), came to erary career with The Adventures of Roderick Ran-
Scotland on July 13, 1745, to spark a Jacobite up- dom, published in 1749.
rising on behalf of his father, who still called him- The most successful play of the period was The
self James III. Beggar's Opera, staged in 1728,and written by
The Highlanders rose in his favor, marched John Gay (1685-1732). Thomas Gray (1716-1771),
southward, and took Edinburgh on September wrote "Elegy Written in a Country Graveyard"
17, 1745. Toward the end of the year, the Ja- in 1750 ("The paths of glory lead but to the
cobites invaded England and reached Derby, grave").
only about 120 miles north of London, on De- The most prominent artist of the period was
cember 4. William Hogarth (1697-1764), who completed A
However, there had been no general Jacobite Rake's Progress in 1735.
rising in England itself, the Pretender's army was David Hume (1711-1776) was a skeptical phi-
dwindling, and strong British forces under the losopher, writing An Enquiry Concerning Human
Duke of Cumberland (who had just lost the Bat- Nature in 1748. To the pious of the time, he
tle of Fontenoy) were moving northward. The sounded very much like an atheist, and it is a
Pretender was forced to retreat. mark of how greatly things had changed, in
Cumberland met up with the Pretender's Great Britain at least, that he suffered no partic-
army at Culloden Moor, on April 16, 1746. The ular persecution.
battle was one-sided. Not only were the starving In science, the astronomer, James Bradley
and outnumbered Highlanders crushed, but the (1693-1762), discovered the aberration of light,
prisoners were killed, the wounded were and used it to determine the speed of light much
rounded up and killed, and devastation was more accurately than Roemer had done a half-
spread throughout the Highlands to teach all century before. Stephen Hales (1677-1761) was
concerned to revolt no more. Cumberland earned the first to measure blood pressure and, about
the name of "Butcher" for that. 1705, recognized that plants obtained their nour-
The Battle of Culloden was called "the last bat- ishment through some component of the atmo-
tle," for it was the last armed conflict on land to sphere.
be fought in Great Britain. It was also the last The great difficulty in long-distance naviga-
dynastic struggle in British history. Charles es- tion was the inability to determine longitude. For
caped France by September 20, 1746. After his
to that, a timepiece was needed that would keep
father died in 1766, Charles considered himself good time on a swaying deck. The British gov-
"Charles III," but he died in drunken obscurity ernment offered 20,000 pounds for one, and the
1725 TO 1750 283
prize was eventually won by John Harrison hold in the region, though, by founding Halifax
(1693-1776), who built a series of such timepieces in Nova Scotia in 1749.
beginning in 1728. With that, navigation became Another and more important battle of a com-
more certain. pletely different sort was fought in New York.
John Kay (1704-1764) patented a "flying shut- There, a publisher, the German-born John Peter
tle" in 1733 that halved the time and effort in Zenger (1697-1746), attacked the corruption of
weaving. This was another premonitory rumble the New York governor and his cronies in his
of the forthcoming Industrial Revolution. newspaper. The governor had him arrested for
libel and the trial took place in August 1735. A
Scottish-born lawyer from Philadelphia, Andrew

BRITISH NORTH AMERICA Hamilton (1676-1741), appeared for Zenger, and
The first American colonial to achieve European argued that truth was no libel and that the free-
fame was Massachusetts-born Benjamin Franklin dom to publish the truth was the natural right of
(1706-1790) of Philadelphia. He was accom- a free-born Englishman. Zenger was acquitted
plished in all directions. He started the first cir- and this was an important victory for freedom of
culating library in America, in 1731, and the first speech and the press in a world that has rarely
fire-fighting company in Philadelphia in 1736. In tolerated either anywhere.
1749, he founded an academy that eventually be- The Methodist revival in Great Britain reached
came the University of Pennsylvania. He put out the colonies. The British preacher, George White-
a yearly "Poor Richard's Almanac" that made field (1714-1770), brought the word to Georgia in
him Rich Benjamin. He invented the "Franklin 1738, and reached New England in 1740. He was
stove" in 1742, which is the basis of furnaces to joined in this by the Connecticut-born hell-fire
this day. And he was a scientist who studied preacher, Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758).
electrical phenomena. By 1750, the British colonies had a population
Meanwhile, another British colony was of 1,500,000, of whom 250,000 were Black slaves.
founded. A British humanitarian, James Edward Boston was the largest city, with a population of
Oglethorpe (1696-1785), was sorry for those who 15,000.
were impoverished, and imprisoned for debt. He
obtained permission from George II to establish
a colony for such people south of the Carolinas, FRANCE
in an area over which Spain could no longer exert Through much of this period, the French govern-
control. ment was run by Andre-Hercule de Fleury (1653-
On February 12, 1733, the city of Savannah 1743), an elderly but capable cardinal who kept
was founded and the colony was named "Geor- the peace, by and large, until Frederick II began
gia," in honor of the king. (Oglethorpe was the his wars. He worked closely with Walpole of
only colonial founder to live long enough to see Great Britain, another lover of peace.
the colonies, including Georgia, gain their inde- Under him, France was largely prosperous
pendence.) and Louis XV remained popular. (He was called
The War of the Austrian Succession was in those early years, "Louis the Well-Beloved.")
fought in North America, too, where it was Louis, however, lacked his predecessor's energy.
known as ''King George's War." The New En- He was the one French king who spent his whole
gland colonials aimed for the French base, Louis- life at Versailles and he was totally removed from
berg, on Cape Breton Island. On March 24, 1745, the French people. When
Fleury died in 1743, at
an expedition was sent north under William Pep- the age of 90, Louis came under the influence of
perell (1676-1759) and, on June 17, the fort sur- mistresses, luxury increased and he grew unpop-
rendered. At the end of the war, however, ular.
Louisberg was given back to the French, as once The shortcomings of the absolute and artificial
Port Royal had been. The British expanded their government of France made this the beginning of
an age of acid commentary and social protest in pensable to those who studied electrical phe-
France. (It was Age of Reason" be-
called ''the nomena at this time.
cause Isaac Newton had made it popular to at-

tempt to explain the behavior of the Universe by
reasoning rather than by religious faith and au-
SPAIN
thority.) Philip V died in 1746 and was succeeded by his
Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron Montes- son, who reigned as Ferdinand VI (1713-1759).
quieu (1689-1755), published The Spirit of Laws in Spain took part in the War of the Austrian
1748. He supported Locke's theory of separation Succession as an ally of France. By the treaty that
of powers and praised the British system of gov- ended it, Ferdinand's half-brotKer Charles (1716-
ernment as opposed to French absolutism. 1788) was given the rule of Naples and Sicily,
The great satirist (possibly the greatest who while his son Philip (1720-1765) ruled over the
ever lived), Francois Marie Arouet (1694-1778), small Italian state of Parma. These dynastic
who wrote under the name of Voltaire, was be- achievements no longer had the importance they
ginning to publish his penetrating analyses of had had however.
in earlier centuries,
human folly, especially in the case of the reli- In Spanish South America, Montevideo (in
gious establishment. He, too, praised the British what is now Uruguay) was founded in 1726.
system of government as far superior to that of
the French.
In science, in 1736, Pierre Louis Maupertuis PORTUGAL
(1698-1759) helped to establish the oblate spher- Portugal remained at peace at this time under the
oid shape of the Earth by surveying areas in Lap- rule of John V. He established a court in the style
land to determine the curvature of Earth's sur- of Versailles (as far as Portugal could afford it),
face in the far north. One of those who and did his best to be a miniature Louis XIV.
accompanied him was the French mathemati-
cian, Alexis Claude Clairaut (1713-1765), who
studied, in detail, the shapes of rotating bodies.
PAPACY
After the death of Pope Innocent XIII in 1740,
Benedict XIII (1649-1730) succeeded. He was a
scholar who left administration in the hands of
NETHERLANDS an unpopular cardinal, Nicolo Coscia, who used
In the closing stages of the War of the Austrian his power to enrich himself.
Succession, French armies, after their victory at He was succeeded by Clement XII (1652-
Fontenoy, were again approaching the Nether- 1740), whocontinued to labor for the suppres-
lands. Again, as in the crisis of Louis XIV's invasion of Jansenism. At this time, too. Freemasonry
sion, three quarters of a century earlier, the was becoming prominent. It was a secret organi-
Dutch abandoned their republican form of gov- zation of no great importance, but it gave its
ernment and turned to the House of Orange for members the pleasure of being part of an "inner
a stadtholder. They chose a great-great-grandson circle" and of a kind of bonding ritual that in-
of William the Silent, a first cousin twice-re- creased the feeling of self-importance. (Such
moved of William III, and he became stadtholder "fraternal organizations" are very common
in 1748 as William IV (1711-1751). today, especially in the United States.) The very
The Dutch physicist, Peter van Musschen- secrecy, however, led people to suspect that the
broek (1692-1761), discovered a way of storing organization was a satanic cult, or a revolution-
electricity in unprecedented concentration in a ary brotherhood, or anything else that was evil.
water-filled metal-lined glass container. This dis- Under Clement Church, suspecting her-
XII, the
covery, made inLeyden in 1746, produced what esy, began an ardent anti-Freemasonry cam-
was called a "Leyden jar," which became indis- paign.
1725 TO 1750 285
Benedict XIV, who succeeded in 1740, was a "Hats." The Caps favored peace, while the Hats
devotee of learning, encouraged science, put a still hungered for glory. The Hats had their way
brake on censorship, and practiced conciliation during the War of the Austrian Succession, when
toward secular He had much in common
rulers. they managed to maneuver a war of revenge
with those monarchs of the time who are listed against Russia. Sweden lost quickly and had to
as "benevolent despots." give up more territory in Finland.
SARDINIA SWITZERLAND
Sardinia (previously Savoy) was ruled since 1730 The perennial conflicts between Protestant and
by Charles Emmanuel II (1701-1773). He was a Catholic cantons continued, with Protestant
skilled soldier who fought on the side of Austria Berne winning out to a degree.
in the War of the Austrian Succession and More important, however, were Swiss contri-
achieved some minor gains for Sardinia as a re- butions to mathematics and science. The Swiss
sult. Sardinia was primarily a military state, and family of the Bernoullis were an amazing collec-
by some has been referred to as "the Prussia of
it tion ofmathematicians and physicists. The most
Italy." However, it was never as strong as Prus- important of these was Daniel Bernoulli (1700-
sia, or, for that matter, as militarized. 1782), who studied fluid flow in 1738 and was the
attempt to explain the behavior of gases
first to
by supposing them to consist of tiny, rapidly

NAPLES moving particles.
In 1735, Austria ceded Naples and Sicily to Spain The Swiss mathematician, Leonhard Euler
in order to allow a Bourbon to sit on the throne, (1707-1783), was one of the greatest who ever
but only on the condition that Naples and Spain lived, and was certainly the most prolific.
never have the same king. Though he went blind in later life, that did not
The Neapolitan throne went to a young son of diminish his prolificity. He worked in both Rus-
Philip V of Spain, who
reigned as Charles IV. He sia and Prussia, stimulating the growth of science
was a "benevolent despot," and gave Naples one in both countries and contributing to such varied
of its rare periods of good government. During areas as calculus, hydrodynamics, and topology.
his reign, excavations began of Pompeii, buried
under the ashes of erupting Vesuvius almost 17
centuries earlier, and information concerning the POLAND
daily life of Romans of that time was obtained. The had brought Poland to
assault of Charles XII
This was the beginning of the modern science of the brink of utter ruin. Gustavus II had been
archeology. kicked out by Charles XII, and replaced by Stan-
islaw Leszczynski, who served as a Swedish
puppet. He was kicked out by Peter the Great,
SWEDEN and Gustavus II was brought back, to serve as a
After the hectic reign of Charles XII, many Russian puppet.
Swedes had had enough of "glory," recognizing In 1733, when Gustavus II died, Stanislaw
it to be a high-sounding name for misery and Leszczynski wanted to return as king and was
death. Charles XII was succeeded by his sister, supported in this by France. The son of Augustus
Ulrika Eleanora (1688-1741), who in 1720, after a II, on the other hand, wanted to rule as Augustus
two-year reign, abdicated in favor of her hus- III, and he was supported by Russia. The choice
band, who reigned as Frederick I (1676-1751). for Poland, therefore, was between a puppet of
The king was deprived of power in this pe- France and a puppet of Russia.
riod, and Sweden was run by the nobility, who There was a dreary "War of the Polish Succes-
were divided into the parties of the "Caps" and sion" that was fought, in desultory fashion and
chiefly in Italy, between 1733 and 1735. Gustavus coast was explored and mapped. The most
III ended up as king and Stanislaw
Leszczynski northerly point of Siberia was rounded by sledge
retired to France, where Louis XV (who had mar- by S. Chelyuskin in 1743, and is called Cape
Chelyuskin in his honor.
ried his daughter in 1725) pensioned him off into
a life of ease. (It was the treaty at the end of this
war that brought Bourbon monarchs to the
throne in Naples and in Parma.)
OTTOMAN EMPIRE
As king, Augustus III did precisely nothing There were in period minor wars with Russia
this
and allowed Poland to continue to decline. and Persia, but, on the whole, the Ottoman Em-
pire stagnated.
RUSSIA
After-the death of Peter the Great in 1725, there
PERSIA
was a succession of rulers who were short-lived, The Safavid Dynasty came to an end after two
weak, or both. Peter's second wife ruled for two and a third centuries, with Abbas III (1731-1736),
years as Catherine I, until her death in 1727. She who died at the age of five. The power was ac-
was succeeded by Peter's 12-year-old grandson, tually in the hands of Nader Kuli, a Turk, who
Peter II (1715-1730), and in 1730, he was suc- had married the aunt of Abbas III after having
ceeded by Anna (1693-1740), who was the begun life as a robber chieftain.
daughter of Ivan V, Peter the Great's half-brother He showed a talent for fighting and, under
and co-Tsar. Anna's great-nephew, an infant, him, Persia had one last spasm of conquest. He
followed as Ivan VI (1740-1764). He was quickly defeated the Afghans and the Turks and took
replaced, that same year, by Elizabeth (1709- over territories between the Caspian and Black
1762). Elizabeth was the daughter of Peter the Seas, which the Turks and the Russians had ear-
Great and Catherine I, and was the first strong lier occupied.
ruler in sixteen years. In 1736, he made
himself actual ruler of Persia
During Russia strengthened its
this interval, and, being a Sunnite, he tried to force the Per-
control of Poland in the War of the Polish Succes- sians to denounce their Shiite version of Islam.
sion. Russia also warred against Turkey in 1736, He failed in that, of course.
regaining Azov on the southern coast, which He invaded northern India in 1738, defeated
Peter the Great had been obliged to surrender the army of the weak Moghul Emperor in 1739,
when he was trapped by the Turks. and took Delhi, which he then treated almost as
The most important event of this period for badly as Tamerlane had done three and a half
Russia, however, were the explorations of Vitus centuries earlier. He returned with incredible
Jonasson Bering (1681-1741), a Dane in the Rus- loot,including the Peacock Throne and the Koh-
sian service. Peter the Great, in his final year, i-noor Diamond (a Persian expression meaning
had sent out Bering to see whether Siberia was "mountain of light").
connected to North America. It wasn't (at least he conquered Bokhara and other re-
In 1740,
not since the end of the Ice Age some 10,000 gions east of the Caspian Sea, and his empire
years earlier). In August, 1728, Bering sailed reached its maximum extent. However, his reli-
through what is now the "Bering Strait," which gious bigotry and his growing paranoia caused
separates Siberia and Alaska. The ocean to the him order executions at the slightest suspi-
to
south of it is the "Bering Sea." cion. This, and the strain his continual warfare
Bering explored the Siberian and Alaskan placed on the economy of the nation, caused
coasts and discovered the Aleutian Islands. Rus- seething discontent; in June 1747, he was assas-
sia's claim to Alaska was based on Bering's dis- sinated by his own soldiers.
coveries. Nader Kuli was the last great Asian conqueror

Under the Tsarina Anna, the Siberian Arctic of the old type.
1750 TO 1775 287
INDIA AFGHANISTAN
The invasion Nader Kuli accelerated the de-
of The Afghans had been driven out of Persia by
cline of the Moghul Empire. Bengal in the north- Nader Kuli, but Nader had also virtually de-
east was virtually independent and southern stroyed what was left of the Moghul Empire;
India was a patchwork of states that fought each when he died, Persia itself collapsed. With both
other. The result was that both Great Britain and Persia and India out of action, Afghanistan could
France found ways of insinuating their own in- fill the vacuum. In 1747, Ahmad Shah (1722-
fluence over local rulers. 1773), one of Nader Kuli's generals, made him-
In Joseph Frangois, Marquis Dupleix
1741, self master of Afghanistan, and the nation's
(1697-1763), was made governor-general of the modern history may be considered as dating
French possessions of the Indian coast, and he from this time.
infused new energy into the effort of making
India French.
When the War of the Austrian Succession CHINA
broke out, France suggested that India be kept Under the Emperor Ch'ien Lung (1711-1799),
neutral territory, but Great Britain refused. In who came to the throne in 1735, China continued
1746, Dupleix took Madras from the British, but strong and prosperous. It controlled Sinkiang,
when the war ended in 1748, Madras was re- and the realm was at its most extensive in mod-
turned. ern times. Its population was rising rapidly now,
The rivalry between the two powers contin- and it stood at about 225 million, just 10 times
ued, and India itself had almost nothing to say that of France.
about it. By 1750, the French controlled most of
southern India through the local rulers, while
British power was concentrated in the northeast.
1750 TO 1775
XV's mistress. Since France
polite letter to Louis
PRUSSIA and Austria had been fighting almost continu-
Maria Theresa of Austria did not give up hope of ously since Charles VIII's invasion of Italy over
regaining Silesia. She knew that Frederick II of two and a half centuries before, their sudden al-
Prussia and his successes in the War of the Aus- liance astonished all of Europe.
trian Succession had made Europe nervous (as This
meant, however, that Great Britain,
Louis XIV's successes three quarters of a century which had been fighting France even longer than
earlier had done), and she labored to build an Austria had, had to switch also, and, in the end,
alliance against him. it supported Prussia.
Thus, she came to an agreement with Eliza- Frederick II was perfectly aware of what Aus-
beth of Russia, who had a particular hatred of triawas doing, and he also knew it would take
Frederick. Not only that, but with the help of her France and Russia time to gear up for war; thus,
clever prime minister, Wenzel Anton von Kaun- it would be best for him not to wait, but to strike
itz (1711-1794), shemanaged to persuade France at once. He did so, and began what came to be
to join her in alliance. To help put this through, called "The Seven Years War."
the proud Maria Theresa was forced to write a On August 19, 1756, Frederick II moved south
and invaded Saxony, taking its capital, Dresden, beaten. The Prussians had to flail away until their
on September 2. He then moved into Bohemia losses were pretty heavy as well, and they were
where he defeated the Austrians and laid siege then too exhausted to pursue the retreating Rus-
to Prague, on May 6, 1757. sians.
But then things went wrong. He actually lost By the end of 1758, Frederick II had driven
a battle to the Austrians at Kolin, east of Prague, back all Swedes, observing the
his enemies. (The
and, on June 18, 1757, had to retreat. By that situation, returned to Sweden without bothering
time, the French were sending an army eastward to wait for a defeat.) However, even victories can
and the Russians were sending one westward be costly. Frederick II had lost 100,000 men alto-
while the Austrians were attacking northward. gether, and though he might replace their
The Swedes, too, had landed on the Baltic coast bodies, he couldn't replace their superb training.
and showed signs of pushing southward. Fred- On August 1, 1759, France was defeated at the
erick, attacked from every point of the compass, Battle of Minden, just south of Hanover, by
was forced to dash with his army first in one troops that contained a large British contingent.
direction, then in another, to keep off whichever This was the only British contribution to Freder-
enemy seemed, at that moment, to be the most from a steady supply of money.
ick's cause, aside
dangerous. By 1760, however, the Allies were again con-

On October 18, 1757, he left a small force in verging on Prussia. This time, the Russians ac-
Berlin to defend the capital, and moved toward tually managed to get into Berlin on October 9,
the French army. On November 5, he maneu- 1760,and burn it, but they left hurriedly at the
vered them into battle at Rossbach in western news that the dreaded Frederick was approach-
Saxony. The French tried to march around Fred- ing with his army.
but Frederick's army was much more
erick's left, Even was giving out. Prussia, for
so, Frederick
maneuverable; and he arranged it so that when all its trained army and for all the military genius
the French finished their march, they found his of its king, was a small country and it could not
artillery trained upon them and his cavalry indefinitely fight off three different nations, each
charging their right flank. The Battle of Rossbach one considerably larger than itself. (Prussia had
smashed the French. Those who were not killed, a population of 4 million compared to the 56 mil-
fled in panic, while Frederick's losses were very lion for his three enemies.)
light. During 1761, there seemed no way in which

With as little delay as possible, Frederick II he could much longer stave off defeat with his
then marched east into Silesia, where the Austri- dwindling, worn out army. Then fate took a
ans had been making good progress. On Decem- hand. On January 5, 1762, Elizabeth of Russia
ber 6, he met them at Leuthen, just west of the died and was succeeded by her nephew, Peter III
Silesian capital at Breslau. There again, Frederick (1728-1762). Peter III was mentally erratic and
II, by brilliant maneuvering, managed to bring was a wild admirer of Frederick. He not only
his forces to bear at Austrian weak points and to abandoned Russia's allies, but he offered to re-
destroy the enemy army. The double victory at join the war on Frederick's side.
Rossbach and Leuthen retrieved the situation for After that, there was nothing to do but to
Frederick II, and calling him "the Great" seemed make peace. The Treaty of Hubertusberg in Sax-
more than ever appropriate. ony left things as they had been. Prussia kept
The Russians were still advancing westward, Silesia, and Austria was finally reconciled to that.
but, as usual, they moved slowly and ponder- Austria never made any further attempt to get it
ously. On August 25, 1758, Frederick met them back.

at Zorndorf, near the Oder River in central Prus- But Frederick IIhad had enough. He fought
sia. Frederick beat them, but the Russians no more wars. In 1772, he gained important ter-
showed him another one of their specialties,an ritory through the First Partition of Poland, but
occasional inability to know when they were did so without war.
1 750 TO 1 775 289
as it grew. He is considered the father of modern

AUSTRIA embryology for that reason.
During this period, Austria's history was bound
up with Prussia. Austria didn't exactly win the
Seven Years' War, but neither did it lose. Maria FRANCE
Theresa had lost Silesia in the first few months of Although France lost the Seven Years' War, she
her reign, but since then she had lost nothing lost it to a greater extent overseas than in Europe.
further. Maria Theresa was as successful, in her In fact, her territory expanded
Europe as she in
way, as Frederick II had been in his. She was, in annexed the province of Lorraine in 1766, and
fact, the most competent "Emperor" of the Holy bought the island of Corsica from Genoa in 1768.
Roman Empire since Charles V, over two centu- France, in this way, finally attained her modern
ries earlier. Her husband, Francis, who was Em- European boundaries.
peror in name only, died in 1765, and Maria Louis XV died on May 10, 1774, after a reign
Theresa's son become Emperor as Joseph II of 59 years. He and his great-grandfather, Louis
(1741-1790) — in name only, at least while Maria XIV, had ruled over France for 131 years together
Theresa lived. — a record in history for two successive reigns.
In 1772, Austria gained territory in the First Louis XV's son had died in 1765 and his grand-
Partition of Poland, and did so without war. son succeeded him as Louis XVI (1754-1793).
Austria, at this time, began to burst into mel- The advocates of political and social reform
ody on a grand scale. The operatic composer, wrote busily in this period, always under the
Christoph Willibald Gluck (1714-1787), working threat of political repression, but somehow sur-
in Vienna, revolutionized opera by insisting on viving under Louis XV, whose absolutism was
the drama taking an equal role with the music. tempered by indolence and by a certain easy-
His best-known "reform opera," as it was called, going attitude.
was Orpheus and Eurydice, produced in 1762. Voltaire was at the height of his fame, writing
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) and an amazing a history of the reign of Louis XIV, which was
child prodigy, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756- published in 1751, later publishing his greatest
1791), were beginning their musical careers in Vi- satire, Candide in 1759, and always serving as a
enna at this time, too. one-man crusader for justice. For a while, he
Elsewhere in Germany, there was the start of spent time with Frederick II of Prussia, but there
a literary golden age with Gotthold Ephraim was disagreement on the question of how great
a
Lessing (1729-1781). He broke with the French a poet Frederick should be considered, and Vol-
dramatic tradition and moved toward the less taire thought it might be safer to leave.
orderly, but more powerful, Shakespearian The French philosopher, Jean Jacques Rous-
mode. He is best known for his tragedy, Emilia seau (1712-1778), was an odd individual, para-
Galotti, published in 1772and Minna von noid enough to quarrel with everyone,
Barnhelm in 1763. His dramatic poem, Nathan particularly with those who tried to help him.
the Wise, in 1779, was a plea for religious toler- Nevertheless, he wrote very highly regarded
ance. books. In The Social Contract, published in 1762,
This dramatic technique was carried on by Jo- he maintained that government must reflect the
hann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832), then at will of the people, and in Einile, published the
the beginning of his career, with the tragedy, same year, he propounded his theories of edu-
Goetz von Berlichingen, published in 1773. cation. He was probably the most influential of
The German scientist, Kaspar Friedrich Wolff all the French social critics.
(1734-1794), pointed out in 1755 that eggs or On a smaller scale, the playwright, Pierre Au-
sperm did not contain miniature organisms (as gustin Caron
Beaumarchais (1732-1799),
de
most had thought) but were made up of undiffer- wrote The Barber of Seville, first performed in 1775.
entiated material that developed and specialized It was very popular, the more so, perhaps, be-
cause had a distinct anti-aristocratic flavor,

it now only because it had been of Papal origin.
which became even more pronounced in Beau- This change also took place in the British colonies
marchais' next play, The Marriage of Figaro, first in North America. By now, 11 days had to be
performed in 1784. dropped from the calendar, and to many unso-
Denis Diderot (1713-1784) was a pamphleteer phisticated people it seemed that 11 days were
who conceived the notion of preparing a huge being cut off their life. There were riots in which
encyclopedia that would give proper weight to people shouted "Give us back our 11 days." On
the new age of science and technology. The first the other hand, landlords charged for a full quar-
volume appeared in 1751 and the twenty-eighth ter, so the people zvere, in a way, cheated.
and last volume in 1772. Diderot worked with Great Britain's participation in the Seven
superhuman energy under the greatest difficul- Year's War, as far as Europe itself was con-
ties. He was definitely atheistic and it showed. cerned, was largely financial since she subsidized
His collaborators, including the French mathe- Frederick the Great and let him endure the casu-
matician, Jean Le Rond D'Alembert (1717-1783), alties. However, Britain also fought France both
fell away The work was
for fear of persecution. in North America and in India, and it was the
banned in 1759, but Diderot continued to work first war in which particular combatants had
clandestinely and virtually alone. It was the first fought simultaneously on three different conti-
of the great modern encyclopedias and did much nents. Therefore, it has been considered the first
to shatter medieval ways of thought. "world war" by some people.
A more specialized encyclopedia was pre- George II died on October 25, 1760, and was
pared by George Louis Leclerc, Count de Buffon succeeded by his grandson, who reigned as
(1707-1788), who, beginning in 1749, and con- George III (1738-1820).
tinuing to publish volume after volume for the George III, unlike the first two Georges, was
rest of his life,turned out a 44-volume work. In thoroughly English and led an exemplary private
it, he was the first to suggest that the Earth might life. He was very stubborn, however, and lacked
be much older than the Bible indicated and that tact.Furthermore, his mother, a German prin-
it was formed by natural processes rather than by cess, disapproved of the manner in which
divine action. Naturally, he had some difficulty George and George II had left the government
I
with the authorities as a result. in the hands of their ministers, and she con-
Other French scientists of the period included stantly urged her son to "be a king" that is, to —
Rene Antoine Ferchault de Reaumur (1683- be absolute.
1757), who, in 1752, showed that digestion was a However, George III knew better. There could
chemical, and not a mechanical process; and the be no absolutism in Great Britain after what had
mathematician, Joseph Louis Lagrange (1736- happened to Charles I and James II in the pre-
1813), who began to publish important work on vious century. However, he did try to pack Par-
the calculus of variations in 1755. liament with members favorable to himself, so
Among the French artists of the period was that he could at least have compliant legisla-
a
the painter, Jean Baptiste Greuze (1725-1805), ture. His moves in this direction centered about
and the sculptor Jean Antoine Houdon (1741- John Wilkes (1725-1797), who had made critical
1828), well-known for his busts of the great fig- remarks about the King, and whom George III
ures of his time —
from Voltaire to Benjamin insisted on having expelled from Parliament in
Franklin. 1764. Wilkes was repeatedly reelected and re-
peatedly expelled. Although George III won out
in the short term, it created so much anger
GREAT BRITAIN among the population that, in the end, the free-
In 1752, Great Britain finally adopted the Grego- dom of election, as well as freedom of speech and
rian calendar, which had been in existence for of the press, was established.
170 years, and which had been shunned until But George 111 had a problem that was even
1750 TO 1775 291
harsher and more intractable than that of John publishing The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle in
Wilkes. The problem lay with the colonies, 1751 and The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker in
whose anger was rising with each year that 1771, for instance.
passed. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) prepared the first
Yet despite problems at home and on the great English dictionary in 1755. He also pub-
North American seaboard, the British reach over- lished a romance, Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia, in
seas continued to grow stronger. At this time, in 1759. His greatest fame, though, came through
fact, the Pacific Ocean, the largest geographical the biography written of him by his friend, James
unit on Earth short of the planet itself, was thor- Boswell (1740-1795).
oughly explored by a British navigator. Lawrence Sterne (1713-1768) wrote a large,
He was James Cook (1728-1779), usually rambling, and lovable novel. The Life and Opinions
known as "'Captain Cook," who was the most of Tristram Shandy, published between 1761 and
famous navigator since Magellan, two and a half 1767. Oliver Goldsmith wrote a novel. The Vicar
centuries earlier. His Pacific explorations were in- of Wakefield, in 1766, and a play. She Stoops to Coh-
tended for geographical and scientific purposes quer, which was produced in 1773. That play was
only, and he was the first of the really scientific the first after Shakespeare to retain its popularity
navigators. to this day.
he made the first of his three voyages
In 1765, Horace Walpole (1717-1797), son of Robert
a
across the Pacific. He discovered the Admiralty Walpole, who served as British Prime Minister
Islands and the Society Islands (named for his under the first two Georges, published The Cas-
sponsors, the British Admiralty and the Royal tle of Otranto in 1764, establishing the "gothic
Society). He also circumnavigated New Zealand, novel," which has retained its popularity to this
explored its shores, and landed in Australia. He day.
was the first to gain a notion of the size and po- Philip Dormer Stanhope, Fourth Earl of Ches-
sition of this last of the inhabited continents to be terfield (1694-1773), is known for his Letters to his
opened to Europeans, and to observe its load of Son, published in 1774, beautifully written,
plants and animals that were like none elsewhere worldly wise, and making much sense, albeit
on Earth. short on ideals. It was a sort of guide to how to
Between 1772 and 1775, in his second voyage. get ahead in the world without actually being a
Cook took his ship through southern waters to villain.
the Antarctic Circle. (The men on board his ship A much graver work was that of the British
were the first known human beings to reach and jurist, William Blackstone (1723-1780), ,
who
cross the Antarctic Circle.) In doing so. Cook made with his Commentaries on the
legal history
proved the nonexistence of any vast southern Laws of England, published between 1765 and
continent, other than Australia, in the South 1767. He was the first to lecture on English law
Temperate Zone. at Oxford.
As a result of these voyages, the oceans of the The great English portraitists of the period
Earth, except the polar regions, had been entirely were Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788), whose
opened. best-known painting is The Blue Boy, which was
Great Britain was active culturally.’^ Smollett done about 1770. Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792)
was still writing copiously in this period, trans- was also coming into prominence at this time, as
lating the works of Cervantes and Voltaire, and was George Romney (1734-1792) and the Ger-
man-born John Zoffany (1733-1810).
Great Britain was leading the world, now, in
* Culture is universal and all nations have their writers,
science and technology. Joseph Black (1728-1769)
and thinkers. However the culture of the English
artists,
studied carbon dioxide in detail in 1754 and
language is that of the writer of this book and, probably,
of most of its readers. Therefore, it is that which is best
showed it to be a constituent of the atmosphere.
known to us, and most easily discussed. He also clarified the notion of "latent heat" in
1760, a concept important in theimprovement of selves pinned against the ocean by the French
the steam engine. Henry Cavendish (1731-1810) organization of the interior.
isolated and studied hydrogen in 1766, while Jo- New France and Louisiana were still under-
seph Priestley (1733-1804) discovered and stud- populated. There were only 80,000 French in the
ied oxygen in 1774 and Daniel Rutherford (1749- entire vast area, but they were all under a single
1819) identified nitrogen in 1772. rule, whereas the population of 2 million or so
In medicine, James Lind (1716-1794) discov- under British colonial rule was divided among 13
ered that adding citrus fruits to the diet pre- colonies (15, if Nova Scotia and Newfoundland
vented scurvy and, in 1758, began a campaign to are counted).
get the British navy to take advantage of this sim- Some felt that a united front against the
ple and incredibly useful fact. It took only 40 French was necessary and among these were
years for the brass hats of the Navy to see the Benjamin Franklin, who was now more famous
point. than ever. In 1752, he flew a kite into the clouds
As everyday world was concerned,
far as the of a gathering thunderstorm and showed that the
however, by far the greatest event of this period lightning carried electricity identical in nature to
was the work of the engineer, James Watt (1736- that formed in the laboratory. By 1753, he had
1819). In 1764, he was asked to repair a Newco- devised grounded lightning rods to be placed on
men steam engine and, in doing so, he began to top of buildings. These bled off the electric
think of ways of improving its efficiency. He saw charge and prevented its buildup into a devastat-
that most of the energy was wasted, heating and ing lightning stroke.
reheating the water to form steam. It occurred to For the first time in history, a natural catastro-
him to have two chambers, one always hot and phe, the lightning bolt (always peculiarly associ-
one always cold. By 1769, he had a practical ated in the popular imagination with divine
steam engine, one that was much more efficient artillery) was tamed by the application of scien-
than anything that had preceded it. At that mo- tific principles. Until then, prayer was the only
ment we might consider the Industrial Revolu- remedy, and when lightning rods finally began
tion to have begun, and the world began to to go up on churches, it was a clear indication
change enormously. that the secular attitude was beginning to win
Watt's steam engine was a source of power, out over the religious — in material matters at
but something had to be developed that was least.
worth powering. The British inventor, Richard When the colony of New York sent out an
Arkwright (1732-1792), also in 1769, patented a invitation for delegates from other colonies to
device that would spin thread by mechanically meet in Albany to discuss united action against
reproducing the motions ordinarily made by the the French, Franklin was there. The "Albany
human hand. Another inventor, James Har- Congress" met on June 19, 1754, and Franklin
greaves (d. 1778), patented the "spinning jenny" made a proposal.
in 1770, a device which enabled spinning to be The colonies as a whole were
be governed to
conducted on multiple wheels, producing more by a governor-general appointed and paid by the
thread with far less labor. This was the beginning King, and he was to rule with the aid of a "grand
of the mechanization of the textile industry (and, council," consisting of delegates from each col-
eventually, of almost everything else). ony. The proposal was accepted and signed on
July 4, 1754, but it never came to fruition. The
colonies felt it gave too much power to the King,
COLONIAL NORTH AMERICA and the British government felt it gave too much
In 1750, the French were beginning to establish power to the colonial delegates. Had the sugges-
bases in the Ohio Territory, the region between tion been accepted, it might have changed the
the Ohio River and the Great Lakes. This dis- history of the world — but it wasn't.
turbed the British colonists, who could see them- Meanwhile the French had advanced into
1750 TO 1775 293
what is now
western Pennsylvania and had es- men North America. One young general was
to
tablished Fort Duquesne (named for the French James Wolfe (1727-1759).
governor-general of New France) at the junction Wolfe was second in command of an expedi-
of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers. tion that was sent against the important French
Virginia had claims to the territory, and its base at Louisberg (which the colonials had taken
governor, Robert Dinwiddie (1693-1770), sent in King George's War, but which had been given
out a small force under a young surveyor, back), and it fell on July 27, 1758. The British also
George Washington (1732-1799), to warn off the took Fort Frontenac at the eastern end of Lake
French. Ontario on August 27, and Fort Duquesne
On May 28, 1754, Washington encountered a (where the war had started) on November 24.
group of Frenchmen and, with the rashness of The British built a new fort at what had been Fort
youth (he was only 21), he attacked them and Duquesne's site. They named it Fort Pitt for the
killed 10, taking the rest prisoner. This was the minister, and that was the beginning of Pitts-
first “The French and Indian War,"
battle of burgh.
which merged soon enough with the Seven Years Pitt's campaign plans for 1759 included a
War that began two years later. Washington's three-pronged attack that was to culminate in the
forces were eventually defeated and the French taking of Quebec. First, Fort Niagara was to be
remained at Fort Duquesne. taken at the western end of Lake Ontario. That
To take care of matters, the British govern- was carried through on July 25, 1759. Then Fort
ment sent two regiments to Virginia under Gen- Ticonderoga, near the southern end of Lake
eral Edward Braddock (1695-1755). They arrived Champlain, was to be taken, and that was done
on April 14, 1755, and then marched toward Fort on July 26. Meanwhile, as the New York colony
Duquesne. There, at the Battle of the Mononga- was being made secure, James Wolfe, with 9000
hela on July 9, 1755, they were ambushed by a British soldiers and some colonials, moved up
smaller number of French and Indians. the St. Lawrence River and, on June 26, 1759,
Braddock tried to fight European fashion with had taken up a position four miles downriver
the soldiers lined up neatly and volleying on from Quebec.
command. The French and Indians fought guer- Montcalm had 14,000 men and Quebec stood
rilla fashion from behind trees, and they cut on a height that made it apparently impregnable
down the British easily. George Washington and to the British down at the foot of the steep hill.
his Virginia contingent got behind trees them- For two months there was a stalemate and it
selves and covered the retreat, or none of the seemed that the British would have to retreat
British would have gotten out alive. Braddock rather than face a Canadian winter; however, on
died of his wounds. September 12, they found a footpath that led up
With the beginning of the Seven Years War in to the height.That night, Wolfe sent his men
1756, the British and French got down to the clambering up the path and, on the morning of
North American war in earnest. The French sent September 13, they were lined up in front of the
out Louis Joseph de Montcalm (1712-1759), a ca- city.
pable general, who arrived in New France on Montcalm, surprised, attacked them at once,
July 23, 1756. For a year, the French had it all but the British won the battle, and in the course
their own way. of it both Montcalm and Wolfe were killed. The
In Great Britain, however, the energetic Wil- British took Quebec on September 18, 1759, after
liam Pitt (1708-1778) managed to be in charge of it had been French for a century and a half.
the government by dint of great and inspiring By the Treaty of Paris, signed on February 10,
oratory, though George II disliked him intensely. 1763, France gave up all but a few island scraps
Pitt determined to leave Europe to Frederick the of its North American dominions. All of Canada,
Great and to concentrate Britain's major effort in and all of Louisiana east of the Mississippi River
North America. He sent new generals and new was ceded to Great Britain. Spain ceded Florida
to Great Britain but, for itself, obtained all of Lou- fective enough to bring distress to British busi-
isianawest of the Mississippi. ness.

Meanwhile, the North American interior was Clearly, theStamp Act would not work, and
beginning to be penetrated. The British colonies, the British repealed it on March 18, 1766. The
confined to the eastern seaboard for a century British then tried other ways of taxing the colo-
and a half, were venturing west of the Allegheny nies, doing so very lightly — not so much for rev-
Mountains. Leading the way was Daniel Boone enue at the moment, as to maintain the principle
(1734-1820), who, as early as 1767, had passed that they could tax the colonies if they wished.
through the Cumberland Gap (named for That was the very principle the colonies wanted
"Butcher" Cumberland of the Battle of Culloden) to fight.
into what is now Kentucky. And, even as the Matters finally focused themselves on a tea
French were forced to give up control of Louisi- tax, of which the British East India Company had
ana, a settlement that eventually became St. ahuge oversupply it wished to get rid of. The tax
Louis was founded on the mid-Mississippi River was so low as to be trivial, but the colonials,
in 1763. nevertheless, promptly boycotted tea. When
The were thus freed of the
British colonists ships carrying tea, intended for sale with tax
French menace and might have felt grateful to added, arrived in Boston harbor, a party of Mas-
Great Britain for this, but their dominant feeling sachusetts colonists, led by Samuel Adams
was that, with France gone, they no longer (1722-1803), who was already agitating for out-
needed Great Britain and should be left to them- right independence, disguised themselves as In-
selves. dians, boarded the ship on December 16, 1773,
The British, on the other hand, had greatly and dumped the tea into Boston harbor. This was
increased the national debt as a result of the ex- the "Boston Tea Party."
penses of war and the subsidization of Frederick George III was outraged and Boston was
the Great. Ways of decreasing the debt had to be placed under military occupation. This
considered. Since much had been
of the outlay frightened the colonies. It frightened even many
put into the war in North America, it was felt who disapproved of the militant radicalism of
that the British colonies there, having benefitted Massachusetts. Twelve of the colonies got to-
greatly by the British victory, should help pay for gether in a "Continental Congress" in Philadel-
it in the form of tariffs on imported goods and in phia on September 4, 1774, and sent petitions for
direct taxes, too. a redress of grievances to Great Britain, but to no
The colonials, however, didn't like taxes any effect, George III was stubborn and would not
more than anyone else did, and they strongly yield, so that matters moved toward an explo-
objected to the taxes being placed on them by a sion.
Parliament in which they had no representation The American by the way, were be-
colonies,
and could not argue their own case. Men arose, ginning to have a richer cultural life. The first
like James Otis of Massachusetts (1725-1783) and important colonial painter, Benjamin West of
Patrick Henry of Virginia (1736-1799), to de- Pennsylvania (1738-1830), went to Great Britain
nounce British actions on taxes as tyrannical and in 1763, became a close friend of Joshua Rey-
to talk about the rights of Englishmen. nolds, and eventually succeeded him as presi-
On March 22, 1765, the British passed a dent of the Royal Academy.
"Stamp Act" whereby colonials were to pay for
special stamps to be placed on legal papers,
newspapers, licenses, and a variety of other sub- NETHERLANDS
jects. The stamps, of course, would cost money During this period, the Netherlands was under
that would go into the British treasury. There the rule of William V, who had become stadt-
was a storm of anger in the colonies and there holder in 1751 at the age of three. Even when
followed boycotts of British goods that were ef- grown, he was a weak ruler, but at least the
1750 TO 1775 295
Netherlands managed to stay neutral in the

Seven Years War. SPAIN
Ferdinand VI of Spain died on August 10, 1759.
He had no children and his nearest heir was his
SWEDEN half-brother, Charles IV of Naples. Spain, how-
Sweden had been a limited monarchy since the ever, was preferable to Naples from the stand-
death of Charles XII over half a century before. point of royal prestige, so Charles IV abdicated
In 1771, however, the son of Adolphus Frederick as King of Naples, leaving that to a younger son,
became king and ruled as Gustavus III (1746- and became Charles III of Spain.
1792). In 1772, he forced a change, making him- Charles continued playing the part of "benev-
self absolute. However, he tried to reign as a ''be- olent despot" in Spain as he had in Naples. He
nevolent despot," abolishing torture, declaring established a stronger absolutism and, in so
freedom of religion and of the press, and so on. doing, found it necessary to reduce the role of
The outstanding Swedish scientist of the pe- the Church, an international institution not ame-
riod was Karl Wilhelm Scheele (1742-1786), who nable to absolute control. He even expelled the
isolated a number of chemical substances includ- Jesuits. He also did his best to stimulate com-
ing lactic acid, uric acid, hydrogen sulfide, hy- merce.
drogen cyanide, and several new chemical however, he let family inter-
In foreign affairs,
elements. He
discovered oxygen before Priestley ests tie him to France, with whom he was allied
did, but publication of the discovery was delayed in the Seven Years War against England. He
by the negligence of the publisher and Scheele ended up losing Florida to England, but gaining
lost the credit. the western half of Louisiana from France.
The Swedish philosopher, Emmanuel Swe-
denborg (1688-1772), turned to mystical works
on Biblical interpretation late in his life. Although PORTUGAL
he remained a Lutheran, his teaching led to the On July 31, 1750, John V of Portugal died, and
formation of the "New Church," often called the was succeeded by his son, whoreigned as Joseph
"Swedenborgians." I (1714-1777). Joseph I was totally uninterested
in the business of government. He found in Se-
bastian de Carvalho (1699-1782), known to his-
DENMARK tory as Marquis de Pombal, someone who was
In this period, Denmark was ruled by the men- willing to take over the task, and to do so effec-
tally unstable Christian VII (1749-1808), who be- tively through Joseph's entire reign.
came king in 1766. In 1770, his physician, Johann Pombal was a "benevolent despot's minister,"
Friedrich, Count Struensee (1737-1772), gained like Struensee of Denmark, but much more suc-
sufficient influence to become his all-powerful cessful. Pombal was dictatorial and hard, but he
minister. He be a "benevolent despot' s-
tried to did his best to encourage trade and industrv and
minister," introducing freedom of the press, and to improve Portugal's economic situation.
improving the condition of the poor. On November 1, 1755, however, a natural di-
However, he also became the Queen's lover, saster intervened. An earthquake, perhaps the
and the aristocrats, who wanted to keep their most violent of modern times, struck Lisbon,
privilege and their power, used this fact to Portugal's capital, demolishing every house in
mount a successful conspiracy against him. the lower part of the city. A tsunami (or "tidal
Christian VII had Struensee arrested, tortured, wave") swept in from the ocean. Two more
and finally executed on April 28, 1772. earthquake shocks followed and fires broke out.
Sixty thousand people were killed and the citv
was left a scene of devastation. The shock was
felt over an area of one and a half million square
miles, doing substantial damage in Morocco, as

well as in Portugal.
TUSCANY
Pombal, with remarkable energy, organized Tuscany, of which Florence was the capital, was
relief — obtaining supplies, building shelters and no longer under the rule of the Medici, the house
tents, setting up and ordering in
hospitals, having become extinct in 1737, three centuries
troops to help. He then went on to supervise the after its rise to prominence under Cosimo. There-
rebuilding of the city, creating a more beautiful after, Francis of Lorraine, the husband of Maria
Lisbon in the place of the old. Theresa, was Grand Duke of Tuscany. After he
Pombal's fist grew even tighter and heavier became Emperor Francis II in 1745, he turned
thereafter. He destroyed aristocratic families who over the Grand Duchy to his son, who reigned as
were conspiring, or merely suspected of conspir- Leopold I (1747-1792).
ing, against the king, and he drove out the Je- Leopold was another of the "benevolent des-
suits. pots" and he reformed Tuscany. He encouraged
trade and industry and abolished serfdom, so
that Tuscany was better off than at any time since
PAPACY Lorenzo the Magnificent, three centuries earlier.

Added to the French writers of social criticism
Clement XIII (1693-1769) became Pope in 1758,
was the Italian writer Cesare Bonesana Beccaria
and had to withstand the storm against the Je-
(1738-1794), who published Crimes and Punish-
suits from those Catholic countries governed by
ment in 1764 in which, for the first time, punish-
the Bourbons: France, Spain, and Naples. By
ment was considered rationally as a way of
1768, all three nations had expelled the Jesuits,
reducing crime and rehabilitating criminals, in-
and Portugal had done so, too. The trouble was
stead of having it exemplify the wrath of God
that the Jesuits were incompatible with royal ab-
and the revenge-lust of man.
solutism, since they were an international agency
The outstanding Italian scientist of the period
who were primarily faithful to the Pope.
was Lazzaro Spallanzani (1729-1794), who, in
There was remorseless pressure on Clement
1768, showed that even microorganisms did not
XIII to dissolve the Jesuit order altogether. He
arise through spontaneous generation. Broths in
resisted, but his successor, Clement XIV (1705-
which microorganisms appeared to arise sponta-
1774), was compelled to do it out of fear that the
neously remained sterile if they were boiled until
national churches would become so powerful
all microorganisms already there were killed, and
that they would break away from Rome alto-
if it were then sealed so that no microorganisms
gether if he did not conciliate them as the En-— from without were allowed to enter.
glish Church had broken away two and a third
The Italian playwright. Carlo Goldoni (1707-
centuries earlier. Therefore, the Jesuit order was
1793), introduced comedy after the style of Mo-
abolished (temporarily, anyway) on July 21,
liere into Italy, and wrote about 150 plays.
1773.
POLAND
NAPLES Poland was going steadily downhill under Au-
Ferdinand I (1751-1825), the eight-year-old son gustus 111. He died in 1763, and Russia engi-
of Charles IV, became King of Naples in 1759, neered the election of Stanislaw II Poniatowski
when his father became King of Spain. While he (1732-1798). Stanislaw attempted to institute re-
was ruled by the regency, his father's liberal reforms, but neither the Polish aristocracy nor the
forms were continued. In 1767, however, Ferdi- Russians would allow that.
nand came of age and, the next year, he married
1 The Russians wanted the Poles to grant reli-
a conservative wife and fell under her influence. gious freedom to the Orthodox portion of the
Naples returned to despotic misrule. population, while the Prussians wanted it for the
1750 TO 1775 297
Protestants. Pressure in this direction gave rise On was killed, possibly

July 17, 1762, Peter
to a rebellion by the Polish Catholics, and this with Catherine's knowledge, and in September
created such turbulence that Frederick II of Prus- she was crowned, and proceeded to rule as a
sia fearedmight produce a general war in east-
it "benevolent despot," particularly in the early
ern Europe, and he wanted no further wars. part of her reign. In this, she was hampered by
Therefore, he defused tensions by engineering the conservative Russian nobility.
an agreement between Prussia, Austria, and She interfered steadily in Polish politics, plac-
Russia, whereby each took over a border district ing Russian weight against any reform that might
of Poland. In this way, each profited and Poland strengthen the Polish state.
would be weakened and less likely to bring about The Ottoman Empire, meanwhile, had
a war. watched for two centuries as Russia had grown
This agreement, reached on August 5, 1772, from a weak grand duchy to a giant state stretch-
was "The First Partition of Poland." Prussia ob- ing across Europe and Asia. They did not want it
tained West Prussia, which connected the Bran- to grow stronger still, and so they viewed with
denburg heartland with East Prussia and made concern Russia's increasing interference in Po-
the kingdom more compact. Austria took Galicia land.
in the Polish southwest and Russia took a curved In October 1788, the Ottoman Empire, there-
strip of northeastern Poland. fore, declared war on Russia.
was, however,
It
Austria had the lion's share, obtaining Russia which seized the initiative, invading the
2,700,000 people, largely Catholic, which more Caucasus and the Balkans, and supporting rebel-
than made up for the loss of Protestant Silesia a lions in Greece and Egypt against the Ottoman
Maria Theresa, remem-
third of a century earlier. overlords.
bering Poland's rescue of Vienna, a century ear- Catherine had in her service Alexander Vas-
II
lier, had a crisis of conscience; however, as ilievich Suvorov (1729-1800), the greatest general
Frederick II remarked cynically, she took her in Russian history. He displayed his abilities in
share even while she was weeping. 1773 by defeating the Turks in Bulgaria in spec-
As for Poland, it lost one third of its territory tacular fashion.
and half its population. Despite the victories in the field, however,
things turned out badly for Russia at home. In
1773, a Cossack named Yemelyan Ivanovich Pu-
RUSSIA gachov (1726-1775), who had fought in the
Peter III, whose accession to the throne in 1762 Seven Years War, in Poland, and against the
saved Frederick II of Prussia from defeat, was a Turks, now said he was Peter III, Catherine IPs
total incompetent. He was married to a German dead husband, and claimed he had escaped from
wife, Sophia Augusta (1724-1796), who was as imprisonment. His rebellion was fueled by pop-
intelligent as he was stupid, and as hard-working ular discontent and, for a year, he rampaged over
as he was lazy. On her marriage, in 1745, it had eastern Russia as Stenka Razin had done a cen-
been necessary for her to be converted to the tury earlier. Finally, it took Suvorov himself to
Russian Orthodox faith, which she did with stamp out the rebellion. By that time, Russia was
equanimity, taking the new name of Catherine. eager for peace with the Turks and ready to give
Being married to Peter was no suitable life for generous terms.
her, especially since she was quite certain Peter The peace treaty was signed at Kuchuk Kain-
intended to get rid of her. Catherine struck first, arji in Bulgaria, on July 16, 1774. Russia gained
and on July 9, 1762, she led a palace revolt that very little in the way war had
of territory, but the
overthrew Peter and made her ruler of Russia as exposed the weakness of the Turks. There was
Tsarina Catherine II (eventually to be called now no question but that Russia was the stronger
"Catherine the Great" —
the last ruler to be gen- power and that there would be further trials of
erally known by such a title). strength.
V
Meanwhile, Austria's own concerns over 1774) of the British East India Comany showed
growing Russian strength might have led to an- remarkable enterprise in capturing the capital of
other war, but Frederick II, a fanatic for peace a French-backed Indian ruler in the south and
now, headed that off by arranging the First Par- then, with a few hundred men, withstanding a
tition of Poland. siege by thousands.
Western thought was penetrating Russia to This was enough to raise British prestige and
the point where the first western-style scientist lower that of France, and France recalled its gov-
appeared in that land. He was Mikhail Vasiliev- ernor-general, Dupleix, in 1754, blaming him for
ich Lomonosov (1711-1765). He was the first to the failure. However, there was no other French-
note the atmosphere of Venus. He observed the man in India with anything like his ability and,
freezing of mercury metal, suspected matter to in 1756, when the Seven Years War began in Eu-
consist of atoms, and had modern ideas about rope, Dupleix' absence was fatal to French plans.
combustion. He also made the first good map of The ruler of the Bengali region in the northeast
Russia, wrote on Russian grammar and reformed was independent, thanks to the utter ruin of the
it, and, with Euler, helped found the University Moghul Empire by the invasions of Persians and
of Moscow. Afghani. On
June 20, 1756, the ruler of Bengal,
with French encouragement, took Calcutta,
which was under British control. Those British
OTTOMAN EMPIRE who were trapped in the city, 146 of them accord-
The war with Russia from 1768 to 1774 showed ing to the later story, were imprisoned in a small
Ottoman weakness, which the governments subterranean dungeon without ventilation in the
under Osman III (1699-1757), who became Sul- summer heat and humidity of India. This was the
tan in 1754, and Mustapha III (1717-1774), who so-called "Black Hole of Calcutta" and, by morn-
succeeded him in 1757, were unable to correct. ing, 123 of them were dead. This gave Great Brit-
ain all it needed for the strongest reprisals.
PERSIA On January 2, 1757, the British recaptured Cal-

cutta and, on March 23, 1757, Clive captured the
The period of anarchy that followed the death of
French base at Chandernagore just across the
Nader Kuli came to an end when Karim Khan
river from Calcutta. This meant that the British
(1705-1779), who had been one of Nader Kuli's
could now pursue the forces of the Bengali ruler
generals, was able to establish his rule over most
inland without fear of being cut off by the
of Persia in 1750, and to give it a quarter century
French.
of peace and relative prosperity. He allowed the
Clive did just that. He pursued the Indian
British to establish a factory at Bushire on the
forces and met them about a hundred
at Plassey,
shore of the Persian Gulf in 1763.
miles north of Calcutta. The Indian army was
50,000 in number, with 53 guns manned by
AFGHANISTAN Frenchmen. Clive had at his disposal 1100 Euro-
Afghani forces, under Ahmad Shah, invaded peans, 2100 Indians, and 10 guns. A sudden rain-
northern India nine times, taking Lahore in 1752 storm wet the powder of the French guns, while
and Delhi in 1761. By 1773, when Ahmad Shah Clive kept his guns covered. Beside that, Clive
died, his empire included not only Afghanistan had already bought off part of the Indian army.
but eastern Persia and northwestern India as Clive's cannonade, after the rainstorm, easily
well. started an Indian retreat —

one that turned into
panic.
The Battle of Plassey put all of Bengal under
INDIA British control.
By 1750, France was in virtual control of India's The British went on to take the chief French
southern coasts, but in 1751 Robert Clive (1725- base at Pondichery on January 15, 1761. By the
1775 TO 1800 299
Treaty of Paris, Pondichery was returned to the committed suicide on November 22, 1774. (He
French, but their taste for warfare in India was was of a melancholy disposition, and had tried to
forever gone, and the British had it all their own kill himself before when he was a young man.)
way thereafter.
The Moghul Emperor, Shah Alam II (1728-
1806), who had gained his position in 1759, had
BURMA
no real power over Bengal, but the British used The British-French was not confined to
rivalry
him to gain the appearance of legality. They per- India alone. East of northern India was Burma
suaded him to give the British East India Com- which, in the 1750s, was being united by a war-
pany full control over the collection of taxes in rior named Alaungpaya (1714-1760), who had
Bengal. The Company was then virtually a sov- begun life as a minor village functionary. In his
ereign state of its own and its officers enriched conquering career, he was supported by the Brit-
themselves outrageously at the expense of the ish East India Company and opposed by the
Indians, as the Indian rulers themselves had French. His victory was, therefore, a British vic-
done previously. tory. He founded Rangoon in 1755.
When Clive finally returned to Great Britain,
he was tried before Parliament for corruption.
When he thought of what he could have done, CHINA
however, he said, 'T stand astonished at my own Manchu China, still ruled by Ch'un Lung, was
moderation." He was exonerated in 1773, but still at the height of its strength.
1775 to 1800
pensions and lived luxurious and parasitic lives.
FRANCE To reform the nation, those parasites would have
Louis XVI and queen, Marie Antoinette
his had to economize, and to expect them to do so
(1755-1793), who had married in 1770, were was hopeless. Despite the taxes wrung out of
marked for disaster. Louis XVI was a gentle ruler those least able to pay, then, the French govern-
of exemplary morals, but he was not very intelli- ment was always teetering at the edge of bank-
gent and had no will. Marie Antoinette had no ruptcy.
viciousness about her, and was pretty and could Then, to make matters worse, France could
easily have made herself popular, but she was not help hankering after revenge against Great
idle, and wasteful. She was the
thoughtless, Britain for demolishing France's overseas Empire
daughter of Maria Theresa, the Austrian queen in North America and India. When the British
(who constantly and uselessly warned her to be colonies in North America rebelled against Great
more circumspect in her behavior, lest she come Britain, France chose to support the colonies, and
to a bad end), and the French had, by now, a went war against Great Britain.
to
long history of hating Austrians. This was a double mistake. By supporting the
Louis XVI tried, insofar as it lay within him, colonies, they taught many Frenchmen that it
to be a "benevolent despot," and he chose some could be considered virtuous to rebel against a
ministers who tried to reform the finances of the government. Second, France spent money it
nation, but was a useless task, for the society
it didn't have so that, at the end of the American
resisted reform. The aristocracy and the clergy War of Independence, France was worse off than
weren't taxed, and many of them drew large ever.
Charles Alexandre de Calonne (1734-1802), the Estates-General unnecessary. Merely to have

who became finance minister after that war, remembered its existence would have seemed an
could only keep the government afloat by con- insult to the king.
tinuing to borrow and by building up a higher But now absolutism had come
an impasse,
to
and higher deficit. for the absolute monarch had no money.
Meanwhile, in 1785, Marie Antoinette got en- The middle classes of the Third Estate were
tangled in a scandal involving a very expensive eager for the chance to do something. They paid
necklace, one she had refused as too expensive taxes, at least, and felt themselves to be hard-
considering the governmental deficit. However, working and useful members of society. They
some swindlers, using a Marie Antoinette look- hated the parasitic First and Se'cond Estates and
alike, fooled Louis Rene Edmond de Rohan felt a burning anger at being looked down upon
(1734-1803) into buying the necklace on the as social inferiors.

Queen's behalf and then absconded with it them- What's more, the people who were being cho-
selves. When the Queen was approached for the sen for the Third Estate knew well that there was
money, she denied any knowledge of the affair a legislative body in Great Britain that had exe-
and insisted that Rohan and others be put on cuted one king and kicked out another and that
trial. now had the monarchy tamed and limited, while
Marie Antoinette seems to have been com- keeping the finances of the kingdom on a strong
pletely innocent, but the matter was so badly and stable basis. And Great Britain, what's more,
handled and her reputation as a careless wastrel had been made strong enough by that legisla-
was so great that she ended up with the public ture, to beat France on three continents.
ready to believe anything bad about her that — The Estates-General met on May 5, 1789. The
she had really tried to get her hands on the neck- old system was to have each estate vote as a unit.
lace and defraud the jewelers and Rohan. From In that case, the nobility and clergy would always
then on, she was personally despised by increas- outvote the Third Estate by two to one, and noth-
ing numbers of the French people who would ing would be done.
refer to her only as "the Austrian woman" or as The delegates of the Third Estate were 600 in
"Madame Deficit." number, compared to 300 of each of the other
By were desperate and, on Feb-
1787, matters two. The Third Estates wanted to vote by indi-
ruary 22, 1787, an "assembly of notables" was viduals, therefore, so that a few liberal peers and
called to deal with the problem; however, the clergy could join the Third Estate and allow re-
notables were precisely those who didn't and form to win out.
wouldn't pay taxes, and who insisted on their The king met the Estates-General, with the
pensions, so they did nothing. clergy and nobles in the place of honor at his
Finally, desperation grew to the pitch where right, and the Third Estate on his left. (Ever since
the only thing people could think ofwas to call a then, people have spoken of "rightists" as those
meeting of the Estates-General. This was a me- who support authority, and "leftists" as those
dieval legislative body in which three estates who would break with authority.)
met: the First Estate being the higher clergy; the When it looked as though the king would not
Second Estate being the aristocracy; and the allow votes by individuals, the Third Estate left
Third Estate being the middle class made up of and established a "National Assembly" of its
lawyers, merchants, and so on. (The common own on June 17, 1789. Some clergymen and no-
people, or peasantry, were not represented.) bles,anxious for reform, joined the National As-
The Estates-General had last met in 1614, one sembly.
and three quarter centuries earlier, when Marie It was rumored that the king would now dis-
de Medici was regent for the young Louis XIII. band the Estates-General and return everything
After that, the gradual rise in absolutism, thanks to what it was. At this, a Parisian mob rose,
to Richelieu, Mazarin, and Louis XIV, had made under the instigation of a journalist, Camille Des-
1775 TO 1800 301
moulins (1760-1794), and stormed the Bastille, a doom was sealed. (Charles I had fought Parlia-
government prison in Paris that was the very ment with English armies, at least.)
symbol of royal absolutism and despotism. They Meanwhile, the other European monarchs
seized the prison, and this act is considered to were getting very uneasy. All this unrest and
represent the beginning of "The French Revolu- revolution in France was setting a bad example.
tion." It might spread, and their own thrones and necks
Some French noblemen, headed by Charles (they always remembered Charles I of England)
Philippe, count of Artois, Louis XVTs youngest might be at risk.
brother, put class ahead of nation and became On August 27, 1791, then, not long after Louis
traitors at once, leavingFrance in order to get XVI had been brought back and put into virtual
foreign armies to invade France and kill French- imprisonment, the rulers of Prussia and Austria
men, so that their own privileges might be made met at Pillnitz in Saxony, and issued a warning
secure. to the French to do no harm to Louis XVI. On
On the other hand, many of the nobility February 7, 1792, Austria and Prussia actually
began, on August 4, voluntarily to surrender formed an alliance against France. For half a cen-
their privileges. On August 27, a "declaration of tury, they had been bitter enemies, but this was
man," embodying many liberal no-
the rights of forgotten in the face of revolution that threatened
tions was propounded. And all over France, the both. What followed is called "The War of the
peasants were revolting, and burning down the First Coalition."
mansions of the noblemen who had ruled and A Prussian army under Karl Wilhelm Fried-
tyrannized them. rich, Duke of Brunswick (1735-1806), a nephew
On October 5 and 6, a Paris mob marched to of Frederick the Great, moved against France.
Versailles to bring Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, Since the Revolution had destroyed the disci-
and the royal children to Paris, where they could pline of its armed forces and since most of the
be with their people. The government never re- aristocratic officers had either decamped or were
turned to Versailles. It had served as the royal in prison, it didn't seem as though the French
seat for 107 years, three kings had spent part or could do anything to stop the invasion.
all their reigns there, but from now on, it would On August 10, 1792, the panicky Revolution-
be merely a museum piece. aries, fearful that the invaders might somehow
By July 14, 1790, France had a constitution (a rescue the French royal family and use them to
written charter defining the government and its legalize the invasion, deprived the king of what
powers — somethingGreat Britain didn't have powers he had retained and confined him to a
but that the Americans had introduced just three fortress-like building called the Temple. (It had
years earlier).The constitution established a lim- once belonged to the Knights Templars, about
ited monarchy and a legislature. It meant there five centuries earlier.)
would be fiery speeches, a division into parties, By September 2, 1792, the panic had risen to
and the kind of wordy conflict that the French, the point where people who were imprisoned on
unlike the British and Americans, were not ac- suspicion of treason were subjected to hasty
customed to. trials and killed. A revolutionary, George Jacques
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were not Danton (1759-1794), was the leading spirit in
happy with this, of course, and, on June 20, 1791, this, hoping to inspire the French into a fury of
they tried to flee the country. They did it, how- opposition to the invasion. These "September
ever, with the same clumsiness and lack of sense massacres" marked the beginning of what was
that they did everything else. They were caught called "The Reign of Terror."
and brought back. Since it was clear that if they The French and Prussian armies met at Valmy
had managed to get out of France, they would on September 20, 1792, about 100 miles east of
have with foreign armies of inva-
tried to return Paris. They did not actually make contact, for a
sion, they were considered traitors and their fog arose, and brought both forces to a halt. The
French guns, manned by experienced gunners Revolution, one man slowly won control by mid-
who were low-born, so that they had not de- 1793. This was Maximilien de Robespierre (1758-
serted, set up a vigorous cannonade. The Duke 1794). He saw to it that Marie Antoinette was
of Brunswick, whose heart was apparently not in tried and, on October 16, 1793, executed; that the
the fight, retreated. Girondist leaders were executed on October 31;
Militarily speaking, it was a trifle, but it put and that even Jacobins with whom he disagreed,
heart into the Revolutionaries, who treated it as including Demoulins and Danton, were all exe-
a great victory. cuted by April 6, 1794. Under Robespierre, the
The Revolutionaries now in control of France Reign of Terror was at its peak, but there was at
were Republicans, but they were divided into least only one man giving orders.
moderates and extremists. The moderates were Third, during this Reign of Terror, a skilled
the Girondists, because many of them came from army officer and ardent Republican, Lazare Ni-
the Bordeaux region called the Gironde. The ex- colas Carnot (1753-1823), labored successfully to
tremists were the Jacobins because they met in a put some order into the French army, and to de-
monastery on the Rue St. Jacques. vise tactics that suited the new forces, who were
A National Convention met on September 21, ardent in attack, but poor in and discipline.
skill
1792, and declared the King deposed. With that, On August 23, 1793, the French government
the French Republic came into existence. The decreed mass conscription and built up large ar-
Prussians, still reluctant to fight, continued to re- mies of untrained men, which were hurled at the
treat. In the southeast, the French armies took smaller armies of the invaders and which actually
Nice and Savoy. In the northeast, they temporar- pushed them back.
ily took Brussels. The British were laying siege to Toulon,
These successes made it possible for the France's great naval base on the Mediterranean.
French to put Louis XVI on trial for treason in It went on for nearly four months until, in De-
December, 1792. He was convicted, and was ex- cember of 1793, a 24-year-old colonel managed to
ecuted on January 21, 1793. get his plan accepted. This drove off the British
At this. Great Britain (horrified, and choosing and saved the base. The colonel was Napoleon
not to remember Charles I) ousted the French Bonaparte (1769-1821), and he was promoted to
ambassador. Thereupon, France declared war on brigadier-general as a result.
Great Britain, Spain, and the Netherlands, and At the height of the Revolution, Frenchmen
found herself at war with virtually all of Europe. took to calling each other "Citizen" and "Citizen-
In addition to that, there were revolts inside ness" to avoid all indication of rank. They
France by those who still felt loyal to the mon- worked up a new calendar, counting from Sep-
archy, or by those who were
upset by the eco- tember and with names for
21, 1792 as the year 1,
nomic hardships that came because of war and of the months referring to the kind of weather to be
the breakdown of the normal governmental expected. They even tried to establish a "God-
structure. Finally, the Republican revolutionaries dess of Reason" to replace Christianity but Ro- —
were fighting among themselves, and this cre- bespierre, who in private life was very proper
ated further confusion. and conventional, would not allow that.
Why wasn't France crushed? Three reasons: On June 26, 1794, the French won a battle at
First, it just happenedwere no great
that there Fleurus, south of Brussels, and the Allies were
generals among the allies. There was no longer driven out of the Austrian Netherlands. The
any Frederick the Great among the Prussians, no Austrian Netherlands, having been Austrian for
longer any Eugene of Savoy among the Austri- 80 years, and under Hapsburg rulers for over
ans, and it was the Prussians and Austrians who three centuries, were never to be either Austrian
were, at this time, bearing the burden of the anti- or Hapsburg again.
French struggle. Robespierre had, however, raised hosts of
Second, amid the blood and confusion of the enemies, for every French politician feared he
1 775 TO 1800 303
might be the next to be executed. They conspired aristocrats who had France and who were
fled
and rebelled against Robespierre and, on July 17, more ardently anti-French than any foreigners.
1794, he was denounced, voted against, arrested, They considered Louis XVTs son to be the right-
and executed. The Reign of Terror came to an ful king, "Louis XVII." When he died in im-
end, though the Revolution did not. prisonment on June 8, 1795, the emigres
The French armies, amid this turnover, con- considered Louis XVTs younger brother to be
tinued to be surprisingly successful. In the early king as Louis XVIII.
months of 1795, a French army under Jean In Germany, the Austrians found a fairly good
Charles Pichegru (1761-1804) invaded the Neth- general in the person of Archduke Charles (1771-
erlands and found the Dutch fleet immobilized in 1847), a younger brother of the Emperor Francis
the frozen harbors. The French cavalry actually II (1768-1835), who had succeeded on the death
captured the ships. (Imagine if the Duke of Alva of his father, Leopold II, in 1792. Charles held off
had had such a stroke of luck two centuries ear- the French generals, Jean Baptiste Jourdan (1762-
lier.) The stadtholder, William V, fled to Great 1833) and Victor Moreau (1763-1813).
Britain and the French founded the "Batavian Re- In Italy, it was another affair altogether. Barras
public" inMarch 1795. had rewarded General Bonaparte for his services
The French government was now in the hands in controlling the Parisian mob by giving him one
of moderates, of whom the most important was of his mistresses, Josephine de Beauharnais
Paul Francois de Barras (1755-1829). The Jacobins (1763-1814), with whom Bonaparte had fallen in
were still a force, of course. A leading Jacobin love. They were married on March 9, 1796, and
was Francois Noel Babeuf (1760-1797), who was Barras then rewarded Bonaparte further by put-
looking not merely for political reform but for ting him in charge of the French army in Italy
social egalitarianism. He was, in fact, the first which meant he had to leave his bride of only a
socialist of the modern type. Under the leader- few days.
ship of Babeuf and others of the sort, a mob gath- On March 17, 1796, Bonaparte took command
ered and prepared to move on the Tuileries and of a ragged army that was short of food and,
put an end to the new leaders. almost at once, it became obvious that an amaz-
Paul Barras called on General Bonaparte, who ing new military leader had appeared on the
happened to be in town. Although he had been scene. His specialty was speed and instant deci-
a Jacobin, he knew the direction in which ambi- sion, and he was facing old Austrian generals
tion called him. On October 5, 1795, he had his who were slow and indecisive.
men turn their guns on the advancing Parisians. There followed Bonaparte's "First Italian
They fired, killed 200, wounded twice as many Campaign." In 17 days he won four battles, de-
more, and that was an end to movements by the feated two armies, and took all of Lombardy. By
Parisianmob. In general, the Jacobin leaders the spring of 1797, he had conquered all of north-
were pardoned with the new moderation,
in line ern Italy and was crossing the Alps into Austria
but the line was drawn at Babeuf. He was exe- itself. Austria decided it had had enough and
cuted on May 27, 1797. was willing to make peace terms.

By November 3, 1795, Barras had formed a Bonaparte, scorning to consult Paris, made the
collective government of five men, of whom he —
terms as though he were king and, considering
was chief, called the "Directory," and it was his ability, who was there to dispute that with
fairly stable. Revolts within France had been put him? No one did.
down and France seemed no longer in danger. It The treaty, signed at Campo Formio at the
was fighting now for conquest and for the spread northeastern boundary of Italy, forced Austria to
of its new revolutionary ideas. cede the Austrian Netherlands to France, and
The opponent at this time was Austria,
chief recognized the existence of a new "Cisalpine Re-
whom France was fighting both in Germany and public," which included all of northern Italy and
Italy. There were also the French "emigres," the which was a French puppet.
In return, Bonaparte handed Venetia to Aus- parte was going, and, grimly, he followed him
tria. way, the Venetian Republic came to
In this there.
an end, 11 centuries after the first doge had been The French army easily defeated the Mamluk
elected, and six centuries after it had reached its army of Egypt, which was still fighting in medi-
peak of power with the capture of Constantino- eval fashion, at the battle of the Pyramids on July
ple in the Fourth Crusade. 21, 1798. That, however, did them very little
In the aftermath of these events, French ar- good, for on August 1, 1798, Nelson reached the
mies occupied Rome in February 1798, estab- mouth of the Nile River, where the French ships
lished the “Roman Republic," and carried Pope were anchored, and virtually destroyed them all.
Pius VI (1717-1799) into captivity. In April, the That meant that Bonaparte's army in Egypt was
French occupied Switzerland and established the stranded there and, as a matter of fact, it never
"Helvetic Republic." returned to France as a fighting force.
Against all odds, then, France was trium- Bonaparte continued to win victories in Egypt
phant. The only enemy left in the field was Great and but they were sterile and could
in Syria,
Britain, which France could not touch as long as come to nothing. On August 24, 1799, Bonaparte
the English Channel existed and the British navy decided he had no choice but to abandon his
controlled the sea. army and make his way back to Erance, for
However, that control was suddenly put in France's enemies were triumphing in Italy, and
jeopardy in the summer of 1797, when the British his own was being unfaithful. (The British
wife
navy was disrupted by a general mutiny. This thoughtfully saw to it that Bonaparte received
was not surprising since the navy subjected its the news about his wife.) Again, Bonaparte man-
treatment that was simply barbaric. The
sailors to aged to evade the British fleet, and was back in
mutiny was crushed and conditions in the navy France on October 8, 1799.
henceforth improved, but it did take some time The foolish Egyptian campaign did obtain an
for the British to recover. incredible gift for however. A
archeologists,
Meanwhile, Bonaparte, who always had a French soldier came across a broken stone in-
weakness for the grandiose and, who like all suc- scription dating back to 197 B.C. It was found
cessful generals, dreamed of being a second near the town of Rosetta and was therefore called
Alexander the Great, had a plan. If it were too "the Rosetta stone." It contained what was pre-
dangerous to attack Great Britain directly, he sumably the same inscription in Greek and in
might at least take advantage of its naval confu- each of two forms of Egyptian hieroglyphics.
sion to cross the Mediterranean and attack Eventually, the Greek served as a key to the un-
Egypt. This renewal of the crusades would not derstanding of the Egyptian language, and that
be intended to regain Palestine but to attack India made it possible to read many of the old inscrip-
and rebuild France's overseas empire. tions in the temples and on the pillars that still
It was a hare-brained notion, but the Directory existed.
agreed to it, largely to get a general who was too While Bonaparte was absent in Egypt, how-
good, and had grown too popular (and was ever, the nations of Europe, led by Great Britain
therefore a danger to themselves), out of the and Russia, formed another anti-French coalition
country. and the "War of the Second Coalition" began. It
Bonaparte left France in May and landed in was fought chiefly in Italy.
Egypt in July 1. The British caught a glimpse of In charge of the new campaign was the Rus-
what Bonaparte was planning and they sent their sian general, Suvorov, who was now 70 years
admiral, Horatio Nelson (1758-1805), possibly old, but who had lost none of his ability. In a
the best admiral of all time, to intercept Bona- succession of victories, he drove the French out
parte. He had been sent out a little too late to of Italy by the end of 1799. (Had he been in the
succeed at that, but Nelson knew where Bona- prime of life, and with a good army at his com-
1775 TO 1800 305
mand, would have been interesting to see what

it Alexandre Cesar Charles (1746-1823), who dis-
he could have done against Bonaparte.) covered, in 1787, the manner
which gas vol-
in
As it was, however, Suvorov could not force ume changed with temperature and indicated the
the Austrians to cooperate properly, and he gave possible existence of an absolute zero of temper-
up his command and died the next year. On the ature. The mathematician Lagrange continued
whole, because of the lack of cooperation be- his work and, in 1788, published Analytical Me-
tween the Allies, the war was a failure. Once chanics, in which all of mechanics was interpreted
Bonaparte was back in France, it dribbled to a as algebra, rather than as geometry.
halt. Antoine Laurent de Jussieu (1748-1836) was a
Meanwhile, Bonaparte, smarting from the fail- botanist who, in 1789, modified Linnaeus' classi-
ure of his Egyptian campaign, managed to turn fication of plants, basing it on more natural phys-
public resentment against the Directory for the iological divisions. His system has been used
loss of Italy. On November 9, he carried through ever since. The French physician, Philippe Pinel
a coup that put an end to the Directory, after it (1745-1826), was placed in charge of an insane
had been in control of France for four years. asylum in 1793 and introduced, for the first time,
He established 'The Consulate," in which humane methods for dealing with the mentally
three men, as "consuls" were to rule France. In ill. He removed their chains, put an end to vio-
actual fact, Bonaparte, as the First Consul, was lent punishments, and kept careful case histo-
virtually dictator of France by the constitution ac- ries.
cepted on December 24, 1799. In technology, most spectacular French

the
This period was a most fruitful one for French achievement was the development of the hot-air
science. Antoine Laurent Lavoisier (1743-1794), balloon by Joseph Michel Montgolfier (1740-
undoubtedly the greatest chemist of all time, in- 1810) and his brother, Jacques Etienne Montgol-
troduced quantitative methods into chemistry, fier (1745-1799). They sent up their first balloon
demonstrating the law of conservation of mass on June 5, 1783 in their small hometown. By No-
(the quantity of mass does not change percepti- vember, they were demonstrating a more elabo-
bly in the course of chemical reactions). He rate version in Paris before crowds that included
worked out the composition of the atmosphere, the king and queen, as well as Benjamin Franklin
and correctly explained combustion as chemical of the United States. Jacques Charles was the first
—
combination with oxygen all of this being done to use hydrogen, rather than hot air, as a lifting
by 1774. By 1787, he had shown that animal res- agent for balloons. The first person to be carried
piration was a form of combustion, and he had aloft by was Francois Pilatre de Rozier,
a balloon
devised the modern system of chemical nomen- who became an aeronaut on November 10, 1783,
clature. and was the first to die in an airflight accident on
Lavoisier was also themost notable scientific June 15, 1785. Jean Pierre Francois Blanchard
victim of the French Revolution. He had married (1753-1809) invented the parachute in 1785.
a daughter of an important executive of the harsh The French physician, Joseph Ignace Guillotin
tax-collecting organization which was, above all, (1738-1814), invented a heavy, mechanical axe-
hated by the French people. As a result, La- head that fell and beheaded cleanly and quickly.
voisier was executed on May 8, 1794, at the It was meant to be a humane substitution for the
height of the Reign of Terror. (When he was ar- uncertain beheading by the executioner's hand,
rested and pleaded that he was a scientist, not a and the brutality of other methods of execution.
politician, the arresting officer said, "The Repub- Its use during the Reign of Terror gave the instru-
lic has no need of scientists," surely a statement ment a cachet of horror that it didn't deserve.
worthy of inclusion in anyone's list of stupid The French Revolutionaries decided to replace
statements.) the antiquated system of weights and measures
In addition, to Lavoisier, there was Jacques with something regular and simple for the en-
couragement of trade and industry. Beginning in ing. This did more harm than good, since it
1790, a committee eventually produced the met- roused colonial anger as nothing else did.
ric system, a group of related measures that rose On May 10, 1775, a Second Continental Con-
and fell by multiples of 10. So rational is the sys- gress met in Philadelphia and, on June 15, ap-
tem that it was eventually adopted by the whole pointed George Washington as commander-in-
—
world except for the United States. chief of the colonial forces.
The great French painter of the period was On June 17, 1775, a British force in Boston,
Jacques Louis David (1748-1825), who painted in under the command of William Howe (1729-
a neoclassical style with almost photographic 1814), attempted to drive the colonials from
precision. heights across the river from Boston. They suc-
ceeded at the Battle of Bunker Hill, but only after
suffering appalling losses.
UNITED STATES Washington's army then laid siege to Boston
In 1775, Boston was under the military control of and, on March 17, 1776, Howe realized that it
the British general, Thomas Gage (1721-1787), was useless to keep his army there when it might
who decided in April that he must confiscate the be better used elsewhere to crush the revolt.
guns and powder being accumulated by the Mas- Therefore, he evacuated Boston and, from that
sachusetts colonials in Concord, to the west of moment, almost all of New England was free of
Boston. British control forever.
On April 19, he sent a contingent of soldiers Sentiment in the colonies was rising, now, in
to do the job. The colonials, forewarned, were favor of complete independence from Great Brit-
ready. There was shooting at Lexington, then at ain. Important in this cause were the brilliant
Concord, and the British were driven back by the pamphlets of English-born Thomas Paine (1737-
embattled farmers. The ''War of American Inde- 1809), whose 47-page Common Sense, published
pendence" had begun. in 1776, converted George Washington, among
The rebelling colonials faced a difficult situa- many others, to a decision in favor of indepen-
tion. Many colonials were loyal to the old coun- dence. Inside the Second Continental Congress,
try and many more were not much interested Samuel Adams of Massachusetts and his cousin,
one way or another. Those who actually wanted John Adams (1735-1826), led the fight for it.
to resist British authority by force of arms were On July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Con-
very much Furthermore, the co-
in the minority. gress, under the chairmanship of John Hancock
lonials were short on arms and they had no of Massachusetts (1737-1793), adopted and
trained soldiers or generals. signed a "Declaration of Independence" estab-
The British had their difficulties, too. They lishing "The United States of America." While
had 3000 miles of ocean to cross and, even the Declaration was not really effective until the
though they controlled the sea, that was a con- end of the war, customary to consider the
it is
siderable barrier. What's more, the colonial terri- United States an as independent nation from that
tory was large and difficult to hold against day. It will be referred to as the United States
determined guerrilla opposition. Meanwhile, in from this point on in the book, and its people
Europe, there were nations, especially France, will be called "Americans."
who were willing to capitalize on British preoc- The British, however, were of no mind to ac-
cupation, and Great Britain was reluctant to turn quiesce in this. Howe, who had withdrawn his
its back on them. Furthermore, the notion of army to Halifax in Nova Scotia, now brought it
beating down the colonials (who were also Brit- back to the United States, landing in Staten Is-
ish, for most part) was not popular with the
the land in New York harbor on July 2.
British people and George III had to hire German On August 22, 1776, Howe, fighting in Brook-
mercenaries ("Hessians") to do part of the fight- lyn, defeated Washington's army in the Battle of
1 775 TO 1800 307
Long Island, but Washington drew it off in good other two advances? St. Leger was stopped by
order. Howe then pursued, and Washington, de- Nicholas Herkimer (1728-1777) at the Battle of
feated several more times in minor engagements, the Oriskany, seven miles west of Utica, New
was forced to retreat across New Jersey in No- York, on August 6, 1777, and he turned back.
vember and December of 1776. (Herkimer died in action.)
The American army was eventually safe on That left only Burgoyne, who was advancing
the western side of the Delaware River, but southward from Canada as he was supposed to
things looked bad. The army was melting away do. He was, of course, unaware that no one was
and there were not many who believed the coming to meet him from either the south or the
Americans could stand against a professional west. He struggled on through trackless forests,
British army anyway, so that it was just a matter and was running short of supplies. His attempt
of time before the rebels were mopped up. Wash- to get some at Bennington, Vermont, was beaten
ington had only survived thus far because Howe off by John Stark (1728-1822). Burgoyne then
(his heart not in the war) had pursued slowly. found himself fighting American forces who
Therefore, Washington planned a Christmas were growing in number. The Americans were
surprise. On Christmas night, he quietly re- nominally under Horatio Gates (1728-1806),
crossed the Delaware river, and fell upon Tren- though the driving force was that of Benedict Ar-
ton, where 1400 Hessians were sleeping off their nold, who was the best general on the American
Christmas dinners. They were killed or captured, side.
and the stunning stroke forced the British out of Having lost several battles, Burgoyne realized
New Jersey, showed that the Americans could that if he continued to try to press forward, not a
fight, and roused American spirits everywhere. British soldier would stay alive.On October 17,
The British worked out an elaborate plan in- 1777, therefore, at Saratoga, New York, he sur-
tended to cut New England off from the rest of rendered the 5700 men he had left to American
the nation. Howe was to travel northward from forces that were now three times that number.
New York. Another general, John Burgoyne Gates, rather than Arnold, got the credit for this
(1722-1792), was to come southward from Can- American victory.
ada, while a third officer, Harry St. Leger (1737- For a British army to surrender on the field of
1789), was to come east from Lake Ontario. AH battle was unusual. For them to surrender to a
were to meet at Albany. With radical New En- bunch of ragged provincials was a thunderbolt.
gland isolated, the rest of the country, which was This was the turning point of the war. To the
not very revolutionary, could be made to see rea- Americans, it was a triumph that made up for
son and there would then be time to turn on New the loss of Philadelphia.
England and smash it. The French, moreover, who had been secretly
The only trouble was that it didn't work. helping the Americans in order to get back at the
Howe was not given his order to move north, at British, now openly recognized American inde-
least not in any unequivocal way. Howe thought pendence.

it would be better to take Philadelphia, the Amer- Meanwhile, European volunteers were flock-
ican capital. He took his army by sea to Chesa- ing to the American side. The most important
peake Bay, brought it up the Delaware River, was a French nobleman of liberal and idealistic
defeated Washington, and took Philadelphia on beliefs, Marie Joseph de Motier, Marquis de La-
September 17, 1777. fayette (1757-1834), who was only 19 years old.
Washington was forced westward to Valley He was willing to pay his own way, and, far from
Forge, where he spent a hard winter, with his demanding privileges, served as Washington's
army virtually starving, while the British were subordinate so loyally that Washington looked
resting comfortably in Philadelphia. upon him as a son.
That was well for Howe, but what about the Another volunteer was Friedrich Wilhelm
Steuben (1730-1794), a German soldier of for- Hudson River, north of New York, and now
tune, who had fought in the Seven Years War, planned surrender that important strong point
to
and who trained the American forces at Valley to the British. The treason was caught on Sep-
Forge. He managed to givethem a feeling of tember 23, 1780 before it could be carried through
order and discipline, cursing them liberally in and a British go-between, John Andre (1750-
German, with a special subaltern at his side to 1780), was hanged, but Arnold escaped.
curse them in English when he ran out of Ger- The success of the British in the south, Ar-
man oaths. nold's treason, and the French to be
failure of the
Benjamin Franklin was in Paris, with his of any military help to the Americans cast a pall
American clothes and American manners (an art- of gloom over the new nation.' However, there
fully assumed patriarchal simplicity that com- were positive developments, too. George Rogers
pletely won over the admiring French Clark (1752-1818), and a small force of Virgini-
aristocracy, with their powdered hair and silk ans, had swept the British out of the Ohio Valley
stockings). Cleverly, he pushed them toward in February 1779. Then, too, on September 23,
helping the United States. By February 6, 1778, 1779, the American naval captain, John Paul
France had made an alliance with the United Jones (1747-1792), who had been preying on
States, and military help began to flow openly. British shipping, defeated the British warship,
By June 17, 1778, Great Britain and France were Serapis.
at war. Nevertheless, the British had to be stopped in
On
June 18, Henry Clinton (1738-1795), who the south, and Washington placed Nathaniel
had been born in Newfoundland, and who now Greene (1724-1786) of Rhode Island in charge of
commanded the British army, decided to evacu- that task.
ate Philadelphia and to concentrate his army in Greene did not win any victories, but he ma-
New York to meet the French threat. Washington neuvered the British into wearing themselves out
followed the British army across New Jersey and uselessly against him and against American
attacked them at Monmouth on June 28, 1778. guerrilla forces. Except for a few coastal cities,
The newly trained American army showed its Georgia and the Carolinas were back in Ameri-
worth and would have won the battle but for the can control.
treasonable behavior of Charles Lee (1731-1782) Charles Cornwallis (1736-1805), who was
who refused to attack at a crucial moment. Lee commanding the British forces in the south,
was a British-born American officer who (it moved into Virginia in 1781. He conducted raids
turned out after the war) had been in British pay. that reduced the colony to chaos and forced the
The British now decided to turn their attention Virginia legislature, along with the Governor,
to the south, which was the least revolutionary Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), who had written
part of the nation. the Declaration of Independence, to flee the cap-
They took Savannah, Georgia, on December ital in order to avoid capture.
19, 1778, and in 1780 won battles in South Caro- was being hounded by
Cornwallis, however,
lina, where Gates acted in so pusillanimous a Lafayette, whose army was growing and who
manner that he lost his reputation. Until then, was handling it well. As the summer wore on,
some had thought of him as a possible replace- therefore, 'Cornwallis decided to get to the coast,
ment for Washington. where he could obtain reinforcements and sup-
Worse yet, Benedict Arnold, chafing at the plies from the British navy. He made it to York-
number of occasions in which he had been mis- town on August 1, 1781.
treated, overlooked, and underappreciated, and Lafayette, with the aid of French forces under
pushed by his pro-British wife, finally decided to Jean Baptiste de Vimeur, Count de Rochambeau
switch over to the British side. He had asked (1725-1807), advanced to lay siege to Yorktown,
Washington for command over West Point on the and for once, the French fleet managed to do
1 775 TO 1800 309
something. Under Frangois Joseph, Count de to form empires, to set up puppet states, and to
Grasse (1722-1788), French ships had actually war on each other in competition for territory.
fought off the British and had come to Yorktown. What's more, the Northwest Ordinance decreed
Cornwallis was horrified to see French forces there was to be no slavery in the Ohio Territory.
both on land and sea. Vast problems remained, however, involving
Loyal to the core, Lafayette did not push the the interrelationships of the states. How were
siege Washington had a chance to arrive. By
till they to trade with each other? How were they to
September 14, there he was, with additional use rivers that formed boundaries between
troops, and Cornwallis' situation deteriorated. states? How were they to treat with foreign na-
On October 19, 1781, he had no choice but to tions and with the Indian tribes?
surrender. A second British army had surren- Some had gath-

12 delegates from five states
dered to the Americans, and even George III rec- ered at Annapolis, Maryland on September 11,
ognized that there was no use in fighting any 1786, but could do nothing. Alexander Hamilton
further. of New York (1755-1804) urged that a new and
The Treaty of Paris was signed on September broader convention be called to establish some
3, 1783. Great Britain recognized the indepen- document that would form a more workable
dence of the United States and all the territory union than had the Articles of Confederation.
from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River His suggestion was accepted.
and north to the Great Lakes was American. The new "Constitutional Convention" met in
However, Great Britain kept Canada and ceded Philadelphia on May 25, 1787. They worked
Florida and the Gulf Coast to Spain so that the through the summer in secret and, finally, after
United States did not have access to the Gulf of a number of compromises had been accepted,
Mexico or to the mouth of the Mississippi River. they prepared and signed the Constitution of the
The United States now existed under the "Ar- United States. This set up a federal government
ticles of Confederation," which had been ac- in which the individual states voluntarily gave
cepted by the various states on November 15, up some of their rights to a national President
1777, but the arrangement was a weak one. The and a national legislature. It is this that repre-
individual states held so much power that they sents the true foundation of the United States of
were almost independent of each other, while America.
the Congress, which supposedly governed the had to be ratified by at least nine of the 13
It
nation, was just about helpless. It didn't even states, and the ninth to do so was New Hamp-
have the power of taxation but had to depend shire on June 21, 1788. The United States, as con-
upon contributions from the states who, of stituted at present, dates from that day.
course, were never eager to pay. There seemed Under the Constitution, the United States had
good reason to think that once the war was over to elect a President and Vice-President for four-
and the states were not held together by the year terms; chosen for the posts were George
overriding threat of Great Britain, they would fall Washington of Virginia and John Adams of Mas-
apart. sachusetts.
One thing the weak Congress did was of the George Washington, as first President of the
utmost importance, however. It passed "The United States of America, was sworn in on April
Northwest Ordinance" on July 13, 1787. That es- 30, 1789, just 10 and weeks before the be-
a half
tablished the rules for admitting new states. ginning of the French Revolution. Washington
Three to five states would eventually be formed and Adams were reelected in 1792.
in theOhio Territory (in the end, five states were Throughout his two terms, Washington had
formed), and all would enter on equal terms with to deal with the pressures produced by the
the original states in all respects. Thus, there French Revolution. Technically, the alliance with
would be no competition among the older states France still existed, but some argued that it had
been made with the French king, whose execu- a “cotton gin" (short for “engine"). This plucked
tion put an end to it. Washington presented no the cotton fibers from the seeds mechanically and
arguments. He simply knew that the nation was increased the production of cotton 50-fold. Cot-
in no position to involve itself in a European war ton-growing became profitable, indeed, and
and he labored to keep the United States neutral. hordes of slaves were needed for the cotton-
To this, he was successful, though after John fields. Slavery had been withering in the United
Adams was elected second president in 1796, States under the weight of moral disapproval and
there was what amounted to a short-lived naval the lack of great profitability, but now it sud-
war with France in 1798. denly gained a new lease on life in the United
In 1800, John Adams failed to win reelection States and the seeds of future tragedy were
and Thomas Jefferson became the third President sown.
of the United States. In culture, the United States lagged, since it
Clearly, the United States was a going con- did not have much of an aristocracy who could
cern, but it might not have been without techno- be relied on to patronize the arts. Nevertheless,
logical advance. The source of such advance was John Singleton Copley of Massachusetts (1738-
in Great Britain, where the Industrial Revolution 1815) was an outstanding portraitist, who did
was beginning. Great Britain, however, was of paintings of Samuel Adams and John Adams,
no mind to export its expertise, but preferred, among others. He went to Great Britain in 1774
rather, to keep it as much monopoly as
a British and remained there, thereafter.
possible. Therefore, they kept the new ma- Philip Morin Freneau of New York (1752-
chinery secret and forbade British engineers to 1832) was the first notable American poet.
leave the country. The United States, on the
other hand, openly offered rewards for any who CANADA
would defect with the necessary information.
The rebelling American colonies hoped to per-
Samuel Slater (1768-1835), who had been an
suade or force Canada to join them, but failed. In
apprentice of Richard Arkwright, had memo-
the winter of 1775, forces under Benedict Arnold
rized, in detail, the new machinery. He
textile
and Richard Montgomery (1736-1775) tried to
was willing to defect, so he disguised himself as
take Montreal and Quebec. They failed; Mont-
a farmer and managed to get to the United States
gomery died and Arnold was wounded.
in 1789. By 1790 he was supervising the construc-
Even when the American colonies won their
tion of textile mills containing the new machinery
independence, Canada remained firmly British.
in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
The territory it controlled was extended by explo-
Meanwhile, the American inventor, Oliver
ration. Scottish-born Alexander Mackenzie
Evans (1755-1819), was constructing the first
(1764-1820) established himself in what is now
practical steam engines in the United States by
Alberta and followed what is now the Mackenzie
1787. Thus, the United States was entering the
River to its mouth at the Arctic Ocean in 1789. In
Industrial Revolution and was making itself eco-
1793, he crossed the Rocky Mountains to the Pa-
nomically independent of Great Britain. Without
cific Ocean in what is now British Columbia.
such economic independence, political indepen-
The British navigator, George Vancouver
dence alone would have done the nation no par-
(1757-1798), who had sailed with Cook, explored
ticular good.
the coast of British Columbia and circumnavi-
A technological advance of another sort took
gated what is now Vancouver Island between
place in the south. There the production of cot-
1792 and 1794.
ton, greatly needed by the new textile mills in
Great Britain and in New England, was ham-
pered by the difficulty of plucking the cotton GREAT BRITAIN
from the seeds. On March 14, 1794, the Massa- The war ofAmerican Independence was liberat-
chusetts-born Eli Whitney (1765-1825) patented ing for Great Britain as well. The failure of British
1 775 TO 1800 311
policies greatly weakened the prestige of George The general attitude of unrest and rebellion
IIIand made it impossible for him to dominate that followed the War of American Indepen-
the government as he had planned. dence and the French Revolution did not leave
His prime minister, Frederick, Lord North Great Britain untouched. On April 15, 1797, the
(1732-1792), served only because he was a favor- sailors of the British navy began a rebellion, in
ite of George III and was compliant with all his which they demanded better treatment. One can
wishes. He carried no real weight with Parlia- only sympathize with them for they were poorly
ment. After the surrender of Cornwallis at York- paid, poorly fed, and were treated like animals,
town. Lord North's prestige had sunk to such a being consistently flogged for little or no reason.
level that a motion of lack of confidence in him The British government quelled the rebellion by
failed by only nine votes. When it looked as the end of June. However, realizing that with the
though there would be another vote, in which he French triumphing on land. Great Britain's only
might do even worse. Lord North resigned. That security lay in its navy. Since unhappy sailors
set a precedent that a prime minister, regardless were an unreliable prop, conditions were slowly
of royal support, could only serve while he had improved. The sailors were even fed lime juice,
the confidence of Parliament. at last, to prevent scurvy, and British seamen
The natural successor was Charles James Fox have been known as "limeys" ever since.
(1749-1806), whom George III detested. For one Rebellion also broke out in Ireland in 1795, fed
thing. Fox, along with the aged William Pitt, had largely by the hope that the French would send
supported the cause of the rebelling colonies. soldiers. James Napper Tandy (1740-1793) was a
On April 2, 1783, Fox and North formed a co- leading spirit among the Irish, and a French fleet
alition government and established a joint min- of 43 ships and 15,000 men under Louis Lazare
displeased everyone without exception.
istry that Hoche (1768-1797) did set out to help. The
The coalition fell when it tried to introduce a bill French fleet was scattered by a storm, however,
that would reform the government of India and and the Irish, fighting alone, and without ade-
make the British East India Company responsible quate leadership were beaten by the British at the
to the Britishgovernment. It was rejected and a Battle of Vinegar Hill on June 12, 1798. The rebel-
new ministry was needed. lion was then suppressed over the next year with
George III, on the principle of anyone-but- brutal violence.
Fox, chose William Pitt, Jr., the second son of Where the arts of peace were concerned, the
William Pitt. William Younger was only
Pitt the greatest British dramatist of the period was Rich-
24 years old when, on December 16, 1783, he ard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816), whose two
became Prime Minister. He finally pushed most important plays. The Rivals in 1775 and
through Indian reform on August 13, 1784, but The School for Scandal in 1777, are still revived
only after there had been new elections. today.
In 1788, George III began to suffer bouts of A number of poets were making their mark at
insanity, which grew worse with time. It is now William Cowper (1731-1800) is best re-
this time.
believed that he suffered from an inborn disease membered today for his humorous ballad, "His-
called porphyria, which could produce pain, tory of John Gilpin," written in 1785.
overexcitement, and delirium. It may conceiv- Robert Burns (1759-1796) is regarded as the
ably be that early moderate symptoms exacer- Scottish national poet. Many of his effective and
bated George and stubbornness,
Ill's irascibility ever-popular lyrics were written in Scottish dia-
caused him to refuse to consider compromise so- lect.Such virtually universal favorites as "Auld
lutions with the Americans and, as much as any- Lang Syne" and "Coming Through the Rye" are
thing else, led to the establishment of the United his; perhaps the most quoted poem is "To a
States. Mouse" ("The best-laid plans of mice and men /

In 1793, war began with the French Republic, Gang aft a-gley").
and that preoccupied British minds thereafter. William Blake (1757-1827) wrote deceptively
simple lyrics of great beauty, perhaps his most posed to the French Revolution in the last decade
quoted line being 'Tyger! Tyger! burning bright / of his life.
In the forests of the night." In science. Great Britainproduced important

A
group of romantic poets, hymning the joys advances. The Hanover-born astronomer, Wil-
of nature, included Samuel Taylor Coleridge liam Herschel (1738-1822), startled the world in
(1772-1834), whose masterpiece was "The Rime 1781 with his discovery of Uranus, the first
of the Ancient Mariner," inspired by Cook's Ant- planet to be discovered in historic times. His ob-
arctic voyage, and published in 1798 in a collec- servations in the 1790s showed the existence of
tion of poems. Lyrical Ballads. Joining him in that double stars that moved about a center of grav-
endeavor was VVilliam Wordsworth (1770-1850), ity, in accordance with Newton's law of gravita-
whose most notable contribution to the book was tion. He also showed that the Sun was no more
"Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern the center of the Universe than the Earth was,
Abbey." but that it moved relative to the stars.
Frances ("Fanny") Burney (1752-1840) was a Henry Cavendish was still actively working,
pioneer among women novelists, publishing and in 1784, showed that hydrogen, on burning,
Evelina anonymously in 1778. It was a great suc- formed water. In 1798, he was the first to pro-
cess. duce an accurate figure for the mass of the Earth.
Among other writers was Edward Gibbon James Hutton (1726-1797) published Theory of the
(1737-1794) whose The History of the Decline and Earth in 1785. It founded the modern science of
Fall of the Roman Empire, written between 1766 geology and establish the eons-Iong age of the
and 1788, is certainly among the greatest and Earth in defiance of Biblical chronology.
most popular historical works ever penned. The Dutch-born physician, Jan Ingenhousz
Adam Smith (1733-1790) published Inquiry into (1730-1799), showed in 1779 that plants took up
the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations in carbon dioxide, released oxygen, and put to-
1776, arguing that business activity and trade gether the complex substances making up plant
ought not to be hampered by governmental reg- Because of this, the pro-
tissue, in the light only.
ulation, but demanding laissez faire (French for cess came to be known as "photosynthesis,"
"let people work"). It was the most influential from Greek words meaning "to put together by
book on economic and political science ever writ- light."
ten. Thomas Robert Malthus (1766-1814) pub- For the average man, the greatest scientific ad-
lished Essay on Population in 1798. In it, he vance of the period, however, was one carried
pointed out that population invariably rose faster through by the British physician, Edward Jenner
than the food supply, so that numbers had to be (1749-1823). By 1798, he had clearly demon-
kept down by famine, disease, and war. This was strated that inoculation with cowpox ("vaccinia")
an early example of modern sociological writing induced a mild disease that produced immunity,
and helped inspire later theories of evolution. not only to further attacks of cowpox itself, but
The British philosopher, Jeremy Bentham to its dreaded and supremely dangerous cousin,
(1748-1832), in his Introduction to the Principles of smallpox. Within a year, smallpox deaths were
Morals and Legislation (published in 1789), pro- rapidly declining. "Vaccination" was the first
posed a utilitarian philosophy, suggesting that real victory gained by medicine over infectious
all legislation, and human conduct, too, is, or disease, and a really frightful one that killed large
should be, aimed at promoting pleasure or di- numbers, including Louis XV of France, and very
minishing pain, to produce "the greatest happi- often disfigured where it did not kill.
ness of the greatest number." Yet the great world-changing phenomenon
The British statesman, Edmund Burke (1729- continued to be Watt's steam engine. Watt, in
1797),wrote eloquently in support of the Ameri- 1781, devised mechanical attachments that con-
can revolt, and supported the colonies against verted the in-and-out motion of a piston into the
George III. He was, however, ferociously op- rotary motion of a wheel. This made the steam
1775 TO 1800 313
engine a flexible source of power for machinery 1797, and made war on Great Britain. Again,
in general and, by 1800, there were some 500 Spain was defeated.
such engines chugging away in Great Britain. The outstanding Spanish painter of this period
In 1790, Richard Arkwright began to make use was Francisco Jose de Goya (1746-1828). He was
of the steam engine to power his textile ma- the official painter to the king. He
perhaps,
is,
chinery. He was employing thousands of em- best-known today for his nude painting com-
ployees,and became the first “capitalist" of the monly known as "The Naked Maja."
new industrial age. The "factory system" was In North America, Spain continued to retain
coming into being as men, women, and children its hold on its territories. In California, which it
began to move from the farms into the mills. controlled,San Francisco was founded in 1776
and Los Angeles in 1781.
NETHERLANDS
PORTUGAL
Things grew stormy in the Netherlands in this
period. King William V was pro-British, but with
On February 24, 1777, Joseph I died and his
daughter succeeded to the throne, reigning as
the American colonies in revolt, he could not
Maria I (1734-1816). Pombal was relieved of his
keep the Netherlands from joining the general
duties and the royal absolutism that he had fos-
European war against Great Britain. As a result,
tered receded, while the aristocracy regained its
the Netherlands lost some of its possessions in
both the West and East Indies.
privileges. In 1792,Maria suffered bouts of insan-
ity and her son, John (1767-1826), took over con-
The pro-French Patriots Party opposed Wil-
trol of the government as regent. The French
liam and drove him out of his capital in 1785. He
Revolution was in progress now and Portugal
could only return with the help of Prussian forces
took drastic measures to repress revolutionary
in 1787. Then, however, came the French Revo-
thought.
lution and, in 1795, the French took over the na-
tion and established the Batavian Republic.
William V fled on January 18, 1795, was stripped
AUSTRIA
of his title of stadtholder on February 23, and
In 1777, Maximilian III Joseph, elector of Bavaria,
eventually died in exile.
died and left no The question was who was
heirs.
to succeed him. Austria and Prussia each sup-
ported different candidates and there followed a
SPAIN comic-opera affair called "The War of the Bavar-
Spain participated in the War of American Inde- ian Succession." Maria Theresa and Frederick II
pendence and, as a result, got back Florida. It did both mobilized armies, which stared at each
not, however, manage to take back Gibraltar. other. Neither monarch could stomach the no-
Charles III of Spain died on December 14, tion of another war in their old age. Eventually,
1788, and his son succeeded him as Charles IV without a battle, a compromise peace was
(1748-1819), just in time to have to face the crisis- reached on May 13, 1779.
ridden period of the French Revolution. On November 13, 1780, Maria Theresa died
Charles IV could not handle the business of and her son, Joseph II,
after a reign of 40 years
government himself, so he allowed matters to be who had already become the Holy Roman Em-
run by his wife's lover, Manuel de Godoy (1767- peror, while remaining without power, now be-
1851), who was every bit as incompetent as the came Archduke of Austria as well, and gained
king. After Louis XVI was executed in 1793, considerable power.
Spain joined in the war against France and suf- He was, of all the "benevolent despots," the
fered defeats. Godoy made peace in 1795, and most extreme. He closed the monasteries and
then, in a reversal, allied Spain with France in tried to secularize education. He abolished serf-
dom. He declared religious freedom, even (won- work out the properties and limitations of rea-
der of wonders) extending it to the Jews. He tried son. The former's most important book was The
to abolish aristocratic privileges. All this, how- Critique of Pure Reason, published in 1781.
wanted to do by fiat. He, as the absolute
ever, he Among the German scientists of this period
monarch, would give freedom, but would stay was Martin Heinrich Klaproth (1743-1817), the
absolute. first German to accept Lavoisier's "New Chem-
His reforms just didn't work. They were too istry." In 1789, he discovered a new
metal he
sudden, and didn't take into account the natural named for Herschel's new planet, Uranus. Klap-
inertia of society,even among those who were to roth called the metal "uranium."
be benefited. What's more, he was no Peter the
Great would could put through unwanted re-
forms by means of his overflowing energy and
PRUSSIA
brutality. He died on February 20, 1790, in bitter Frederick II on August 17, 1786,
of Prussia died
disappointment, having petulantly withdrawn having reigned for 46 years and having kept the
all his attempted reforms. peace in the second half of his reign. He left no
He was succeeded by his brother, who heirs, but was succeeded by his nephew, who
reigned as Leopold II. He was also a reformer, reigned as Frederick William II (1744-1797).
though considerably more moderate than Joseph Frederick William II joined Austria in the ini-
II had been. Leopold had to face the French Rev- tial attack on the French revolutionaries, but he
olution but died in 1792 and was succeeded by was far more interested in the Polish situation,
his son, Francis II (1768-1835), under whom the where he participated in two more partitions of
war against France began in earnest. Poland that erased that nation from the map and
While Francis II lost to Bonaparte in Italy, he greatly increased Prussian territory. It was ques-
gained Venetia and a further section of Poland. tionable, however, whether Prussia was really
In Austria at this time, Haydn and Mozart strengthened by adding to its population some
were still the musical stars. Haydn wrote sym- millions of highly reluctant Poles. Even Warsaw
phonies, masses, and, in 1798, the oratorio, "The was a Prussian city by the time Frederick William
Creation." Mozart wrote the operas Marriage of II died on November 16, 1797, and was suc-
Figaro in 1787, Don Giovanni in 1787, and The ceeded by his son, who reigned as Frederick Wil-
Magic Flute in 1791, along with hosts of other re- liam III (1770-1840).
markable compositions.
In Germany generally, Goethe continued to
write. He settled in Weimar in 1775 and made it
PAPACY
Germany's cultural center. He wrote the play, Pius VI (1717-1799) became Pope in 1775, and it
Egmont, dealing with the rebellion of Nether- was a devastating reign for the Papacy. In his
lands against Spain. Also working in Weimar first 10 years, Pius had with Joseph II of
to deal
was Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805), who was a Austria, who was ferociously anticlerical. Then,
writer of the first rank, though overshadowed by after Joseph II died, the problems of the French
Goethe. He wrote The Robbers in 1781. He also Revolution and its anticlerical tendencies rose to
wrote Years War between
a history of the Thirty haunt him.
1791 and 1793, and based his drama-trilogy Wal- The worst came when the territory of the
lenstein, published in 1800, on incidents in that Papal States was invaded by Bonaparte. The
war that had been fought a century and a half French occupied Rome on February 15, 1798, and
earlier. declared a Roman republic. In 1799, Pius VI was
The great German philosophers of the period carried into France by French troops and died a
were Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) and his pupil, prisoner, being succeeded in 1800 by Pius VII
Johann Gotlieb Fichte (1762-1814). Both tried to (1742-1823).
1775 TO 1800 315
An important Italian scientist of the period

was Luigi Galvani (1737-1798). Experimenting SWEDEN
with static electricity stored in Leyden jars, he Gustavus III went to war with Russia in 1788,
found that frog muscles, freshly removed from a and was promptly attacked by the ever-jealous
frog, twitched when touched by an electric Denmark. Despite winning a naval victory, Swe-
spark. This was the first indication of an inter- den got nothing out of it. It weakened Gustavus
connection of life and electric charge. By 1791, he Ill's popularity and the coming of the French
showed that muscles twitched when they made Revolution also dampened his enthusiasm about
simultaneous contact with two different metals, being a "benevolent despot." He died on March
such as brass and iron. 19, 1792, after being shot masquerade
at a ball by
an assassin.
He was succeeded by his son, who reigned as
SARDINIA Gustavus IV Adolphus (1778-1823), and who
In 1773, Sardinia came under the rule of Victor forgot all about "benevolence" in his fear of the
Amadeus III (1726-1796). He joined Austria in revolutionary tide that was sweeping out of
the War of the First Coalition against France, France.
and, as a result, his territories were occupied by
Bonaparte in 1796.
Victor Amadeus
died in that year and was suc-
POLAND
ceeded by his son, Charles Emmanuel IV (1751- Poland, truncated by the First Partition of 1772,
1819), who was forced to cede all his mainland attempted, far too late, to reform its government
territories to France in 1798. He retired to his is-
and to set up monarchy with the
a hereditary
land of Sardinia where the British fleet could pro- power of preventing the anarchy that was de-
tect him. stroying the land. The trouble was that Russia
was determined to prevent any reform, and
France, which was the traditional defender of Po-
NAPLES land, was falling into bankruptcy and revolution.

On May 3, 1791, the Poles actually produced a
Ferdinand I of Naples also joined Austria in the
new constitution that might have made their
War of the First Coalition against France. On De-
government viable. Austria and Prussia accepted
cember 21, 1798, the French invaded Naples and
it, but Russia did not.
drove him to Sicily. He returned, temporarily, in
On May Russia invaded Poland, and
14, 1792,
1799, but clearly his kingdom was at the mercy
Prussia, in order to prevent Russia from taking
of France.
the entire country, invaded it also. Russia and
Prussia then carried through the Second Partition
of Poland (Austria was not involved this time) on
SWITZERLAND January 23, 1793. What was left of the nation,
Switzerland was hostile to the French revolution- perhaps one-third of what had existed twenty
aries, but decided to stay neutral. That did not years earlier, had to accept Russian domination
keep the land out of trouble. During the War of of its foreign policy.
the Second Coalition, Switzerland was the battle- The Poles rose in despair on March 24, 1794,
ground between Suvorov of Russia and the under the leadership of Thaddeus Kosciuszko
French general, Andre Massena (1758-1817). (1746-1817), who had fought on the side of the
Eventually, Massena won. On
February 9, 1798, Americans in the War of American Indepen-
the French declared Switzerland the "Helvetic dence.
Republic" and reorganized it on revolutionary The Poles drove the Russian garrison out of
principles. On April 26, France annexed Geneva. Warsaw, but their situation was hopeless. They
could not possibly fight the Russians and Prus- in protest of the annexation. This led to war be-
sians simultaneously. On October 10, 1794, the tween Russia and the Ottoman Empire in 1787.
Polish forces were defeated by the Russians and Suvorov, as might be expected, won victories
Kosciuszko fell, seriously wounded. wherever he led his army, but the Turks man-
Then, on October 24, 1795, there was a Third aged to fight off the Austrians and to defeat those
Partition of Poland, in which Austria partici- Russian generals who were not Suvorov. John
pated, and Poland vanished from the map. Paul Jones, the American naval hero, was now
In the three partitions, Russia took the eastern fighting for the Russians, and defeated the Turk-
half of the nation, a region that had once been ish fleet in the Black Sea in two engagements in
Lithuania. Its half was actually occupied by June 1788.
Slavic peoples who had once been part of Kievan The Russians were distracted when Sweden
Russia and who had been taken over by Lithu- took advantage of the situation to invade Finland
ania in the years after the Mongol invasion had in 1788, and Russia therefore grew willing to seek
paralyzed Russia. It was Prussia and Austria that peace with Turkey. The Treaty of Jassy, a town
actually divided the Polish-speaking population on what is now the Rumanian border, gave Rus-
between themselves. sia the Black Sea coast east of the Dniester River.
This meant that Russia had now gained the
boundaries in Europe that it has retained, more
RUSSIA or less, ever since.
During the War of American Independence, Catherine II died on November 17, 1796, hav-
Catherine II of Russia sponsored the notion of a ing reigned 34 years. She was succeeded by her
''League of Armed Neutrality," demanding that son, who reigned as Paul I (1754-1801).
neutral ships be allowed to trade freely. It pro- With Poland successfully partitioned, and the
posed, too, that blockades had to be supported wars with Turkey and Sweden successfully con-
by ships that actually blocked ports and could cluded, Paul I had a chance to take part in the
not simply be announced as existing (a "paper War of the Second Coalition, in which Suvorov
blockade") in order to justify the sinking of neu- recaptured Italy from the French while Bonaparte
tral ships at will. This was an anti-British mea- was in Egypt.
sure since Great Britain controlled the seas and Under Paul I, Russia also advanced south of
was the one power that could effectively destroy the Caucasus, annexing Georgia in 1800.
neutral shipping. Such proposals helped orga-
nize Europe against Great Britain and contrib- OTTOMAN EMPIRE
uted significantly to the establishment of
In this period, the Ottoman Empire continued to
American independence.
decay. It lost ground to Russia in the Crimea and
Catherine II also wished to drive the Ottoman
the Balkans. It was helpless to stop Bonaparte in
Empire out of the Christian Balkans and, to that
Egypt and Syria, both of which were under Ot-
end, she held what we would today call a "sum-
toman overlordship.
mit meeting" with Joseph II of Austria, who vis-
Selim III, who became sultan in 1789, at-
ited Russia in 1780 for that purpose. They set up
tempted to introduce reforms, both economic
an alliance to take the Balkans, and to then divide
and military, along western lines. He felt the in-
it between Russia and Austria.
fluence of the French Revolution, and set up a
In 1783, Catherine made the first move by an-
system of embassies that, for the first time, main-
nexing the Crimea. This was the last region that
tained contact with the European powers.
was still controlled by the Tatars and was the last
bit of the conquests of the Mongols that had
begun five and a half centuries earlier. AFGHANISTAN
Naturally, the Turks did their best to persuade After the death of Ahmad Shah Afghan-
in 1773,
the Crimean Tatars to rise against the Russians istan was ruled by weaker successors and the na-
1775 TO 1800 317
tion declined in power. In 1798, a long war began

with Persia that weakened both nations. CHINA
China was still powerful under the Manchus,
PERSIA and had forced recognition of its suzerainty on
In this period, Persia
Burma and Nepal; however, in this period, they
continued to be ruled by
incompetents who were forced to fight and suppress a series of re-
could not prevent Russian ad-
bellions. That damaged the Chinese economy
vances south of the Caucasus Mountains into the
region which came to be called 'Transcaucasia."
and seemed to presage a coming decline.
INDIA PACIFIC
Charles Cornwallis, who had
surrendered at In Captain Cook's third and last voyage from
Yorktown, was appointed governor-general of 1776 to 1779, he was commissioned to explore the
India on February 23, 1786, and there he did a far northern Pacific. He sailed the full north-
good job. He introduced important reforms in south length of the ocean, discovering the Ha-
line with Pitt's "India Act." Cornwallis saw to it waiian Islands on the way. After following the
that British officials were well-paid and were for- Alaskan and Siberian coasts as far as ice would
bidden to engage in private business. This permit, he returned to Hawaii. There he, like Ma-
tended reduce corruption and to lower the
to gellan two and a half centuries earlier, was killed
temptation for British officials to enrich them- in a scuffle with the natives. This last voyage
selves at the expense of the Indian people. took place during the War of American Indepen-
Cornwallis did not, however, believe the In- dence, and Benjamin Franklin, who fully appre-
dians could govern themselves; thus, they were ciated the scientific importance of Cook's
work,
excluded from decision-making positions and arranged that he should not be molested by
were treated as though they were children. American privateers.
Cornwallis engaged in war against those sec- One of those who accompanied Cook on this
tions of India whose were hostile to Great
rulers voyage was William Bligh (1754-1817). Bligh was
Britain. Notable in this respect was Tippu Sultan later given command of the ship Bounty on a voy-
(1750-1799), who became ruler of Mysore in age to Tahiti in 1787. His harsh discipline pro-
southern India in 1783 and who had been trained voked a famous mutiny led by the mate, Fletcher
by the French. He was defeated by the British in Christian, in April 1789. Bligh and some loyal
two wars that ended with his death in 1799. The men were placed in an open boat where it was
British then kept Mysore as a protectorate and expected they would die. However, Bligh man-
controlled almost all of southern India. aged to sail the boat 4000 miles westward to
In thesecond war, the British forces were led safety in the island of Timor in the East Indies.
by Richard Wellesley, Lord Mornington (1760- Christian and the mutineers, together with Tahi-
1842). He became
governor-general in 1798, and tian women, landed uninhabited Pitcairn's
in the
pressed the war against Tippu Sultan since it was Island, where their descendants live to this day.
felt possible that Bonaparte might somehow
reach India from Egypt. In the last battles of the

war, Wellesley's younger brother, Arthur AUSTRALIA
Wellesley (1769-1852), did particularly well. There are various kinds of punishment for
Meanwhile, France's conquest of the Nether- crimes, or social misbehavior. One of those not
lands made the island of Ceylon, a Dutch posses- frequently employed is transportation to some
sion, seem fair game to the British. In 1795, the far-off region.Thus, Russia sent convicts to Si-
British sent an expedition toCeylon and easily beria, and Great Britain, in this period, began to
defeated the Dutch; in 1798, Ceylon became a send them to Australia.
British crown colony. The first shipload of convicts to Australia
came on January 26, 1788, when 11 ships carry- In 1793, the first free settlers arrived. In 1794,
ing 520 male convicts and 197 female convicts sheep-raising began, and the land proved favor-
landed at Botany Bay on the southeastern shore able to that line of endeavor.
of Australia near where the city of Sydney now
stands.
1800 TO 1820
they attacked again. The Battle of Marengo
FRANCE ended with complete Austrian defeat, and
a
As 1800 opened, Napoleon Bonaparte was dicta- northwestern Italy was again in Bonaparte's
tor of France. As First Consul, his term was for hands.
10 years, and the other two consuls were his ap- In Germany, the Austrians were defeated by
pointees and had no say in anything. He reorga- the French general Victor Moreau, at Hohenlin-
nized the government with a sure hand and den in southern Bavaria on December 3, 1800.
quickly produced an efficiency that France had Beaten in both Germany and Italy, Austria had
never seen before. Much of his system has per- to make peace, and the Treaty of Luneville, in
sisted in France to this day. Lorraine, was signed on February 9, 1801. By its
Bonaparte would have, at this point, wel- terms, the situation in Italy was restored to what
comed peace, but only on his own terms. Russia it had been before Suvorov had unsettled mat-
had left the Second Coalition in anger at Aus- ters.France also annexed all the German territory
tria's lack of cooperation, but Austria was still in west of the Rhine River. Spain was forced to cede
the field. had regained most of Italy, thanks to
It the Louisiana territory west of the Mississippi to
Suvorov, and was anxious to take the remaining France, which thus regained (temporarily, at
French strongholds. Austria had placed Genoa least) some of the North American Empire it had
under siege, for instance, and Bonaparte's gen- lost40 years earlier.
eral, Massena, who had taken Switzerland two In Egypt, things did not go so well for France.
years earlier, was forced to surrender the city on The army that Bonaparte had left behind was still
June 4, 1800, after it had undergone agonies of at a dead end. The French general, Jean Baptiste
famine. Under such circumstances, peace was Kleber (1753-1800) was a competent man who,
unthinkable for Bonaparte. He had to take ac- even as late as March 20, 1800, defeated the
tion. Turks and took Cairo. On June 14, 1800, how-
Therefore, Bonaparte launched his "Second ever, on the day of Marengo, Kleber was assas-
Italian Campaign." He crossed the Alps in May, sinated by an Egyptian and after that the end was
1800, and was too late to save Genoa, but he just a matter of time.
reached Marengo, about 50 miles north of that A British-Turkish force made an amphibious
city. There he found himself facing an Austrian landing at Abukir, near Alexandria, on March 8,
army under Michael Friedrich von Melas (1729- 1801. In July, the force took Cairo and in August
1806) on June 14, 1800. it took Alexandria. On August 31, 1801, the
Bonaparte was outnumbered and apparently French army in Egypt surrendered and was al-
hadn't expected to encounter the Austrians when lowed to go back to France.
he did. The Austrians had the better of it at first, Once the Egyptian matter was cleaned up, it
and Melas, thinking he had won, was marching was possible for France and Great Britain to make
off, when reinforcements reached the French and peace; they did so by the Treaty of Amiens on
1800 TO 1820 319
March 27 1802, By its terms. Great Britain gave

, parte. As
was put at the time, "It was worse
it
up all its conquests except Trinidad, which it had than a crime; it was a blunder."
taken from Spain, and Ceylon, which it had Bonaparte decided that there would be no end
taken from the Netherlands. There was general of conspiracies unless it was clear that if he were
peace in Europe after 10 years of war. killed, some member of his family would auto-
Bonaparte seized the opportunity on August matically succeed him. He would have to be a
2, 1802, to make himself Consul with the
for life, crowned monarch. Therefore, on December 2,
right to choose his successor. This meant that he 1804, he had himself crowned Emperor of the
was a king, without the title. French, and he reigned as Napoleon I. (From this
Bonaparte went about the works of peace. He point on, he is known as Napoleon, rather than
reorganized Germany, shuffling states and cities Bonaparte.)
and bishoprics, reducing the Holy Roman Em- Napoleon's coronation marked the final end
pire to the faintest possible of echoes. He orga- of the French Republic, which had lasted only 12
nized a new law code for France, the "Code years. Napoleon established a royal court and
Napoleon," which combined the principles of —
made his generals into noblemen but the nobil-
the old Roman law of Justinian, some 13 centu- ity depended on ability and achievements, rather
ries earlier, with the new principles of the French than upon birth, and the new monarchy was far
Revolution. This code was his most permanent more efficient than the old.
achievement, for it still holds, with revisions, in Napoleon might have accomplished a great
France today. It has also influenced the legal sys- deal if he could only have stopped fighting, but
tem of much of the rest of the world, as far he couldn't.
—
away, even, as Japan although Great Britain The peace with Great Britain was a very un-
and the United States continued to follow their easy one and it only lasted a little over a year.
own legal system based on the English "common Neither side trusted the other, and trivial differ-
law." ences were allowed to fester. On May 16, 1803,
Bonaparte's achievements in war and peace Great Britain and France were again at war.
did not, however, make him universally popular. As long as these two were the only enemies,
There were still republicans who resented his there was not much that either could do; it was a
reinstitution of something very like a monarchy, case of the elephant versus the whale. Great Brit-
and there were royalists who wanted a legitimate ain could blockade the French coast, but smug-
king. Bonaparte grew a bit paranoid over the gling was always possible. As for France,
matter. With the help of his efficient and merci- Bonaparte began to collect ships with which to
less minister of police, Joseph Fouche (1759- carry an army to Great Britain, but he knew he
1820), an old Jacobin, he uncovered a number of couldn't do it in the face of Great Britain's control
conspiracies or supposed conspiracies, hanging of the English Channel.
some of the suspects, sending others fleeing into Slowly, though. Great Britain gained allies.
exile. General Moreau, the victor of Hohenlin- There was Austria, of course, chafing over hav-
den, had to flee to the United States, for instance. ing been defeated by Napoleon twice. And there
To strike terror into the hearts of the royalists, was Russia and Sweden, each of which feared
Bonaparte had an inoffensive member of the the continuing growth of Napoleon's strength.
royal family, Louis Antoine Henri, Duke d'En- By 1805, they were ready, and "The War of the
ghien (1772-1804), kidnapped. He had been liv- Third Coalition" began. Napoleon had to face
ing quietly in Baden, a German state just east of them with only the dubious help of his various
the French border, but was dragged away by puppet regimes.
French forces, given a mockery of a trial and, on Napoleon's main army was concentrated in
March 20, 1804, was executed. The deed was so northern France, where it was uselessly threat-
clearly without justification that it turned out to ening to invade Great Britain. The only other
be a great piece of propaganda against Bona- considerable French army was under Massena in
northern Italy. It was for this army that the coa- At the same time, Napoleon dethroned Ferdi-
lition aimed. nand I of Naples, who had to flee to Sicily again
Napoleon realized this; therefore, he planned and hide behind the British fleet. Napoleon
to do the unexpected. He took the large army he began to make royalty out of his family. His
had built up in northern France and marched it brother, Joseph (1768-1844), became King of Na-
quickly and secretly toward Bavaria (as once ples, and his brother, Louis (1778-1846), became
Marlborough had done a century earlier), so that King of Holland (i.e.. The Netherlands).
he could strike at unprepared Austria directly. On July 12, Napoleon organized the western
This was Napoleon's "First Austrian Campaign." part of Germany as the "Confederation of the
One Austrian army, totally unaware that Na- Rhine," which remained, of course, a French
poleon was speeding on his way toward them, puppet. In fact, virtually all of western Europe
invaded Bavaria in a leisurely way. They were was now either French or French-controlled.
near Ulm on the upper Danube. Another Aus- On August 6, Holy Roman Empire
1806, the
trian army was well to the south, and a Russian came to an end, almost exactly a thousand years
army was far to the east, but the racing French after Charlemagne had been crowned. Francis II
managed to get between Ulm and the other ar- of Austria was the last Holy Roman Emperor, but
mies and, on October 17, 1805, after a quick Bat- he didn't stop being an Emperor. In 1804, he had
tle of Ulm, the entire Austrian army that was proclaimed himself Francis I, Emperor of Aus-
located therewas forced to surrender. tria, because he didn't want to be simply an
On October 30, Massena defeated the Austri- Archduke once Napoleon had become an Em-
ans in northern Italy, and Napoleon was moving peror.
his own meneastward into Austria itself. Despite Napoleon's great victories of 1805,
At Austerlitz, about 75 miles north of Vienna, and his reorganization of the map of Europe, he
Napoleon awaited the onslaught of the Austrians had suffered a loss that year that more than cost
and the Russians. (The Austrian and Russian him he had won in his victories.
all
Emperors were in the field as well as Napoleon, On October 21, 1805, the British fleet under
so the battle that followed sometimes called the
is Nelson caught the combined French and Spanish
"Battle of the Three Emperors," but more prop- fleets off Cape Trafalgar near Gibraltar. Nelson's
erly it is the "Battle of Austerlitz.") 27 ships attacked the 33 Franco-Spanish ships

On December 1805 (the first anniversary of
2, with such great skill that all but 11 of the enemy
Napoleon's Imperial coronation), the battle was ships were sunk or taken, while the British lost
fought. Napoleon so distributed his army that he not one ship.
tempted the allies to fall on his right wing, which Nelson died of a gunshot at the moment
they did. When they were fully committed, he of victory, but he had insured British control of
attacked the allies in the center, split their line in the sea and while that was true,Napoleon
two, and encircled the The Austrian and
left half. could never defeat Great Britain and was sure of
Russian armies were hopelessly defeated and strangulation himself, however long it might
scattered, and Austerlitz proved to be Napo- take.
leon's greatest victory. On land, there was still Prussia. Prussia had
On December 26, 1805, the Austrians had no not fought against France since the early days
choice but to make a losing treaty with Napoleon of the First Coalition, 14 years earlier. Prussia
for the third time. This time it was Pressburg
at still, however, basked in the memory of the
(now known as Bratislava in southern Czechoslo- victories of Frederick the Great half a century
vakia). Austria had up Venetia, which it
to give before and was foolishly confident that could
it
had gained eight years earlier, and France an- beat Napoleon, as it had beaten the generals of
nexed northwestern Italy. Austria recognized Louis XV.
Napoleon as King of Italy, and had to promote Prussia had not joined the Third Coalition in
several German rulers to the title of king. 1805, when it might have done some good, but
1800 TO 1820 321
now, in 1806, worried about Napoleon's fiddling agreed to an alliance with France against Great
with the map of Germany, it decided to fight Na- Britain.
poleon when it was too late. Napoleon was now master, or dominant part-
Napoleon still had his army in southern Ger- ner, of all the European nations, and was at the
many after the defeat of Austria, and knowing of peak of his power. He had done it all in 11 years,
Prussian preparations, he lunged rapidly north- from the time when, as a lean and hungry gen-
ward on October 8. eral, he had entered Italy.
Six days later, he encountered the slow-mov- He might have stopped now, but there was
ing and overconfident Prussians and, on October still Great Britain to deal with. In fact, even if he
14, there was a double battle. Napoleon fought a had offered Great Britain generous terms, it is
Prussian army at Jena, in west Saxony, while his likely that those terms would not have been ac-
general, Louis Nicolas Davout (1770-1823), en- cepted. Great Britain would not make peace with
gaged a larger Prussian army nearby at Auer- any power controlling all of Europe; not as long
stadt. In both cases, the Prussians were smashed as it had a dominating navy and control of the
and their armies disintegrated. Napoleon rushed seas.
eastward, occupied Berlin on October 24, and the The only way Napoleon could fight Great Brit-
"Prussian campaign" was over. ain was by economic pressure, and this he at-
Of course, that still which had
left Russia, tempted to do. While he was in Berlin, he
supported Austria in the previous year, and had published the "Berlin Decree" on November 21,
supported Prussia now. On November 30, 1806, 1806. This declared a blockade of Great Britain,
therefore, Napoleon moved eastward to Warsaw which he lacked the ships to enforce, and de-
(which had been in Prussian hands for 11 years, clared Europe closed to British trade (the "Con-
since the Third Partition) in order to keep an eye tinental system," this was called). He reinforced
on the Russians. thisby the "Milan Decree" after Tilsit, on De-
Russia moved to attack and, on February 8, cember 17, 1807, which he insisted that Russia
1807, the two armies met at the Battle of Eylau in join.
East Prussia. It was a drawn battle and both sides was a mis-
Actually, the Continental system
had to pull away. It was the first time that Na- take. It harmed Europe more than it harmed
poleon had fought a large battle without a defi- Great Britain, and the need for trade with lands
nite victory. overseas, which Great Britain controlled abso-
There was, however, a return match on June lutely, was so great that smuggling took place
14, 1807, at Friedland, a little to the east of Eylau. everywhere and there just weren't enough sol-
This time, Napoleon did win, and the next day diers to guard the entire coastline of the conti-
he took Koenigsberg, in East Prussia. All of Prus- nent.
sia was now in his hands, and Russia asked for was one
Portugal, being strongly pro-British,
terms. place where trade continued. Therefore, Napo-
On July 7 to 9, Napoleon and Alexander
1807, leon forced Spain to allow a French army to pass
I had a summit meeting at Tilsit on the Niemen through it to Portugal. This army under Andoche
River that marked the boundary between Prussia Junot (1771-1813) took Lisbon on December 1,
and Russia. 1807, and the Portuguese royal family fled to Bra-
Prussia had to give up all the land it had taken zil.
during the Second and Third Partitions of Poland Spain, however, remained a center for smug-
and out of it, plus the Austrian part of the Third gling that undermined the Continental system.
Partition, the "Grand Duchy of Warsaw" was Napoleon felt that he could not trust the
Spanish
constituted as, of course, a French puppet. Prus- royal family. In March, 1808, he forced Charles
sia also had to give up all her territory west of IV, and his son, Ferdinand (1784-1833), to give
the Elbe River, to reduce her army, and to pay a up their claims to the Spanish throne, which he
large indemnity. Russia lost no territory but then handed over to his brother, Joseph, who.
till had been King of Naples. Napoleon

then, campaign" he acted with typical energy, taking
then made one of his more flamboyant generals, Madrid from the Spaniards and clearing the
Joachim Murat (1767-1815), King of Naples. This countryside.
was done because Murat was married to Napo- Moore found himself cut off from Portugal.
leon's sister, Maria (1777-1820), and was there- He had to get his army safely out of the country
fore the Emperor's brother-in-law. and he headed for La Coruna in the northwest-
This interference with Spain was a military ern corner of Spain. He reached the port and de-
mistake, Napoleon's second. His first military feated a French force, making evacuation
mistake had been his hare-brained expedition to possible, but was killed in action there on Janu-
Egypt, but that had been minor and the damage ary 16, 1809.
had been contained. The Spanish adventure was Yet despite Napoleon's success in Spain, the
much worse, however. There was no need for it. guerrilla war still continued and Wellington was
The Spanish royal family was totally subservient still in Portugal.
to Napoleon, and when he displaced them, he While the guerrilla Spain was in its
war in
stirred up a hornet's nest. The Spanish King and early stages, Napoleon held a congress at Erfurt
Prince were totally worthless, but the Spanish in Saxony, one which was designed to show the
people, at this time, decided they would rather power of the new Europe. He was there in full
have a worthless king of their own, than a wor- display along with any number of German kings
thier one imposed on them from outside. —
and princes all puppets. There he intended to
On May 2, 1808, they rose in rebellion and make an attempt to force Alexander of Russia to
there followed years of guerrilla war that bled take a still harder line against Great Britain, but
France needlessly. (The word guerrilla came into Alexander found himself rather disillusioned
use on this occasion. It is Spanish for "little war," with Napoleon. He was tired of Napoleon's pos-
one that is fought by small bands of hit-and-run turings and the Continental system was hurting
nonprofessionals. Russia.
The were only too willing to encourage
British Besides, Napoleon had a foreign minister,
the rebellion and sent in money and arms. Even- Charles Maurice de Talleyrand (1754-1838), the
tually, they sent in troops, under Arthur Welles- clearest-minded French politician since Riche-
ley, who had done well in India, and who was lieu, two centuries earlier. Talleyrand could see
eventually made Duke of Wellington, by which that Napoleon was simply unable to stop grab-
he is usually referred to in history. This
title bing for more and more and that, sooner or later,
began what the British called "the Peninsular he would grab too much and would topple. Anx-
War," since it was fought in the Iberian penin- ious to save France from that disaster, he negoti-
sula. ated secretly with Alexander to try to force
Napoleon began experience difficulties. On
to Napoleon to stop.
July 19, 1808, a French army in western Spain Prussia and, to some extent, Austria were
was forced to surrender to the Spaniards (the chastened by their defeats in 1805 and 1806
first surrender of a Napoleonic army) and were and were busy reforming their government and
then brutally done to death. Wellington defeated trying to make their armies more efficient and
the French under Junot in Portugal on August 21, more nearly modeled on the principles which
1808, and would have done even better if he had Napoleon himself followed.
not been hampered by his superiors. Friedrich Karl von Stein (1757-1831) was par-
Another British army under John Moore ticularly active in reforming Prussia and when
(1761-1809) advanced from Portugal toward Ma- Napoleon forced him to resign his posts in 1808,
drid; however, by this time, Napoleon was suffi- he fled to Austria and then to Russia, maintain-
ciently annoyed by what was going on to enter ing unyielding opposition to Napoleon wherever
Spain himself in the fall of 1808. In this "Spanish he went. The Austrian ambassador to France,
1800 TO 1820 323
Kelmens Wenzel von Metternnich (1773-1859), What Napoleon still lacked, however, was an
was also watchful for any hope of resisting Na- heir, which Josephine, his wife of 13 years, could
poleon. not supply. He
divorced her in 1809, therefore.
The gathering Napoleonic trouble in Spain In 1810, he forced the proud Hapsburgs of Aus-
gave Austria that hope, and it was fed by the tria supply him with a new wife. She was
to
British who were always ready to give money to Marie Louise (1791-1847), the daughter of Fran-
any nation who would be willing to fight Napo- cis 1 of Austria, so that the French, who had guil-
leon. lotined an Austrian queen 17 years earlier, now
On April 9, 1809, then, Austria invaded Ba- had another one.
varia French puppet) and Napoleon had to
(still a On March son was born to Napo-
20, 1811, a
hasten back eastward from his unfinished labors leon, and the child was given the title of "King
in Spain. On April 16, he was in Germany for of Rome."
this "Second Austrian Campaign" and, in seven All now seemed and Napoleon must
well,
days of fighting, he forced his way to Ratisbon surely have felt he had everything he could want
(Regensburg, in German) in eastern Bavaria. In (except for an end to the annoying guerrilla war
the process, he had sufficiently shaken up the in Spain), but relations with Russia were deteri-
Austrian army to make it possible for him to con- orating.
tinue his advance and to march straight to Vi- Russia was not comfortable with the existence
enna and take it, without a fight, on May 13, of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw. They did not like
1809. Napoleon's marriage to an Austrian princess.
An Austrian army was on the north bank of They were annoyed that Napoleon was not will-
the Danube, however, and Napoleon tried to get ing to give them a free hand against the Ottoman
at them on May 21 by forcing his way across the Empire. And they did not like the Continental
river at Aspern and failed. The Battle of Eylau, a system.
year and a half earlier, had been a draw, but this It seemed to Napoleon that it was necessary to
Battle of Aspern was a defeat, the first important teach the Russians a lesson. He envisaged a light-
defeat that Napoleon had suffered when he him- ning slash into Russia, a defeat of the Russian
self had been directing operations, and it was a armies, the occupation of Moscow and Russia —
defeat handed him by the Austrians, whom he would become as humble and compliant as the
despised. Prussians and Austrians. In thinking this, he
Napoleon made more careful plans, crossed made his third, and greatest, military mistake. It
the river on July 5, 1809, and, at Wagram, north was, indeed, a fatal one.
of Vienna, he massed artillery with the greatest In May, Napoleon began to assemble an
1812,
concentration ever seen up to that time. He de- army in Poland and managed to add to his
feated the Austrians, who had to ask for peace French masses contingents from Austria, Prus-
for a fourth time. sia, Poland, and Italy.
Peace was made at Schonbrunn, a royal palace On June 24, 1812, a huge army of about
in a Vienna suburb, and Austria gave up still 600,000 men crossed the Niemen River and in-
more territory and agreed to join Napoleon in an vaded Russia. What then happened was exactly
alliance against Great Britain. Napoleon's hold what had happened when Charles Xll of Sweden
on central Europe seemed stronger than ever. invaded Russia a century earlier. It is impossible
By the end of 1809, Great Britain was in con- to believe thatNapoleon had not studied the
trol of Portugal, and the islands of Sardinia and campaigns of Charles Xll, yet he did not seem to
Sicily (and, of course, it controlled the sea). Swe- have learned anything from them. What ailed
den, Russia, and the Ottoman Empire were neu- Napoleon was that, by this time, he simply could
tral. All the rest of Europe seemed firmly under not conceive of defeat.
the Napoleonic thumb. Napoleon advanced and the Russians re-
treated, scorching the earth as they did so.The with Napoleon as long as there was a single
treat
French took Mohilev on July 23 and Smolensk on Frenchman on Russian soil.
August 17. The Russians fought, but retreated as Napoleon remained in Moscow for five weeks
they did so. They did now allow themselves to and then, on October 19, realized there was
be trapped. nothing he could do but leave, go back to Smo-
On August 29, 1812, Mikhail Ilarionovich Ku- lensk, and enter winter quarters. There he would
tuzov (1745-1813) took over the command of the gather reinforcements and be ready for another
Russian armies. He had been defeated at Auster- advance in the spring.
litz, but largely because he had been overruled It was not Kutuzov's intention to let this hap-
by the Emperors of Russia and Austria. Grimly, pen. He proceeded avoiding

to follow a policy of
he continued to retreat. outright combat but constantly harassing the re-
Napoleon pressed on. He did not turn south treating French columns and attacking isolated
as Charles XII had done but continued to aim for bands in such a way that the French army found
Moscow. Kutuzov was prepared to let him take it could only retreat without being molested,
Moscow but it was psychologically impossible for along the precise route by which they had ad-
him to do so without a fight. At Borodino, then, —
vanced the route where the retreating Russians
100 miles west of Moscow, Kutuzov made his had destroyed everything.
stand. A bloody battle was fought there on Sep- The weather worsened as the French
tember 7, 1812. More men were killed in battle marched. The snow began to fall and the cold
on that day than in any battle in history up to began to close in. There would be no chance to
then (or for a hundred years thereafter). When it halt at Smolensk; they would have to get out of
was over, the French held the battlefield and the the terrible country altogether. The French army
Russians retreated. became a disorderly mob that knew only that it
Because of this, the Battle of Borodino is ac- was marching and suffering endlessly.
counted a French victory, especially since three By December 8, 1812, Napoleon abandoned
Russians died for every two Frenchmen. How- what was left of his army in Russia and raced
ever, the Russians could replace their losses, and back to Paris to raise a new one. Only 10,000 of
the French could not. With only 95,000 men left his soldiers made it out of Russia. The last to
in the invading army, not quite one sixth of the leave was Michel Ney (1769-1815), not the best
starting mass, and with no hope for reinforce- of Napoleon's generals, but certainly the bravest.
ments, Napoleon staggered into Moscow on Sep- He stepped across the border marching back-
tember 14, 1812. He was convinced that, despite ward, firing at the pursuing Russians.
his enormous losses, he had achieved his aim Russian soldiers did not pursue the French
and that the Russian government would now after they had crossed over into Poland. They
have no choice but to ask for terms. were too worn out themselves. Besides, they
Things, however, did not go well. In the first didn't have to. Prussia rose in revolt against Na-
place, Moscow was deserted and, once the poleon and kept the French garrisons in Ger-
French arrived, it began to burn. It would not do many busy. After some months, required for
as a comfortable place to spend the winter. recovery, Russian units joined them.
Second, Kutuzov was outside with at least In April 1813, Napoleon returned to Germany
110,000 Russians, who were more
a great deal with a new army of 200,000 soldiers. They were
accustomed to hardship than the French, and inexperienced, however, the scrapings at the bot-
whose numbers were sure to increase, so that tom of the barrel. His veterans were lying dead
Moscow would not be even an uncomfortable on a dozen battlefields, and in particular, were
place to remain in for very long. strewn over the wastes of Russia.
And third, the Moscow brought
occupation of Napoleon was still a brilliant fighter and won
no word from Alexander of Russia. He would not victories, partly because of his brilliance and
1800 TO 1820 325
partly because hisopponents flinched before The powers gathers at "The Con-
victorious
him. Still, his army was brittle and kept failing to gress of Vienna" from September 1814 to June
meet his demands. He asked for an armistice on 1815, to redraw the map of Europe after 25 un-
June 4, and got one. He spent about 10 weeks believable years of revolution and war. Many
training his army, but that did him no good for heads of state were present, including Alexander
the allies who were fighting him used the armi- I of Russia, who was the undoubted star of the
stice to even better advantage. Moreover, by Au- occasion since everyone knew that the Russian
gust 12, 1813, Austria had joined a war against campaign had destroyed Napoleon. Russia's rep-
Napoleon for the fifth time. utation in Europe never stood higher than at that
On August 26, 1813, Napoleon won one more moment.
great battle at Dresden in Saxony, but the French At the Congress of Vienna, France was not
army wasn't going to be able to take much more. badly treated. This was partly because the Allies
On October 16-19, 1813, there came the three- had returned it to Louis XVIII, the younger
day Battle of Leipzig in Saxony (also called "the brother of Louis XVI who had been executed 22
Battle of theNations" because so many national years earlier; and the Allies wanted to make sure
armies were fighting, mostly against Napoleon). that hewould stay on the throne of a reasonably
It turned out to be a great and crucial defeat for prosperous and stable France. Partly, too, it was
Napoleon, though, even now, he was able to get the result of the brilliant diplomacy of Talley-
his army out of the battlefield and avoided hav- rand, as he carefully played the Allies against
ing to surrender. each other.
By French troops had to be
this time, also, The Europe was redesigned so that
rest of
called out of Spain, and Wellington helped them France was surrounded by stronger states than
on their way with all his might. By October 31, before, and so that the victors would be re-
1813, Spain was clear of the French. Napoleon warded. However, even while the Congress was
had been driven back to the borders of France on continuing, the unbelievable news reached them
every side. that on March 1, 1815, Napoleon had landed in
The Allies offered Napoleon peacehe would
if southern France. The French people flocked to
be willing to rule over France alone. Madly, Na- him and, on March 20, 1815, he was in Paris and
poleon refused, and on January 1, 1814, the Al- Louis XVIII had fled again. The Empire was re-
lies invaded France. stored and Great Britain, Russia, Austria, and
Napoleon twisted and turned and showed all Prussia formed a new alliance against Napoleon.
his military brilliance. Whatever could be done The Duke of Wellington was placed in overall
with his worn-out and shrinking army, he did, command.
but the Allies were too strong and there was a Napoleon was forced and on June 14,
to fight
limit even to Napoleonic miracles. he crossed over into Belgium. The climactic battle
On March 31, 1814, the Allies marched into was at Waterloo, a few miles south of Brussels,
Paris, and on April 11,Napoleon abdicated. He on June 18, 1815. It was a hard-fought battle be-
had ruled France for 13 and a half years, and had tween the French and the British, but Napoleon
had the most remarkable military career of any- was not at his best and he dared not risk the
one since Genghis Khan, six centuries earlier; Imperial Guard under Ney at the crucial mo-
however, it had all shrunk to nothing less than ment. Then the Prussians under the aged Geb-
two years after he had made the colossal mistake hard Leberecht von Blucher (1742-1819) arrived,
of invading Russia. even while the issue was in doubt, and that was
Napoleon was sent to rule the small island of the last straw. The French army collapsed, and
Elba, near the island of Corsica, where he had the very word "Waterloo" has ever since been
been born 45 years earlier. Elba was made an used to mean any catastrophic and final defeat.
independent nation for him. The Battle of Waterloo put an end, at last, to
the struggle between England and France that In 1815, Francois Magendie (1783-1855) was
had been continuing seven centuries since the
for given the task of finding whether a nourishing
time of Henry II of England. The British and food could be made out of gelatin obtained from
French were never to fight a great land battle otherwise inedible cuts of meat, since France was
again. short on food after a quarter century of revolu-
OnJune 21, Napoleon abdicated a second tion and war. He showed that that was not pos-
time, and on July 15, he was taken by a British sible; that food could taste good and seem filling
warship to the isolated island of St. Helena in the and yet not be nourishing and not maintain life.
south Atlantic, where he remained in exile till his This laid the groundwork for the modern science
death on May 5, 1821. of nutrition.
Louis XVIII was again restored to the throne Michel Eugene Chevreul (1786-1889), who
but he made no attempt to return France entirely lived for over a hundred years, studied the chem-
to the "ancien regime" ("old government") that ical structure of fats, and isolated fatty acids in
had prevailed before 1789. He compromised with 1809. In 1815, he identified the sugar in diabetic
reality, and allowed a certain amount of repre- urine as glucose.
sentative government. There was, however, a In biology, Marie Francois Savier Bichat (1771-
party of "Ultra-Royalists," who did want the old 1802) studied the various tissues making up liv-
ways fully restored. Leading it was Louis's ing organs, published a book on the subject in
younger brother, who was heir to the throne. 1800, and founded the science of histology.
Despite the furor of the Napoleonic era, the Georges Leopold Cuvier (1769-1832) was
gatherings and marchings of armies, the great probably the greatest biologist of his time. He
victories and defeats, science made steady prog- was the first to classify the fossils, showing that
ress in France. they were extinct animals that, when living, fell
Etienne Louis Malus (1775-1812) discovered into the same groups that present-day life-forms
polarized light in 1808, which made it necessary did. He founded the science of paleontology (the
to view light as consisting of tiny transverse study of extinct forms of life).
waves, moving up and down at right angles to Jean Baptiste de Lamarck (1744-1829) studied
the direction of the light ray. In 1811, he received invertebrate animals (those without bones) from
a British medal for his work, despite the fact that 1815 to 1822 and founded modern invertebrate
Great Britain and France were at war. In 1814, zoology. In 1809, he was the first to suggest a
Augustin Jean Fresnel (1788-1827) worked out mechanism for biological evolution, one that de-
the mathematical basis of such transverse waves. pended on the "inheritance of acquired charac-
Jean Baptiste Biot (1774-1820) showed in 1815 teristics."Thus, a creature who stretched his
that solutions of certain organic substances could neck to reach leaves would pass a longer neck on
affect polarized light in either of two ways. This to its offspring. The theory was wrong but it
led to new methods of chemical analysis. In 1803, stimulated thought on the matter.
he had pointed out that meteorites did fall to the In technology, Joseph Marie Jacquard (1752-
earth and that reports of such events were not 1834) invented the "Jacquard loom" in 1801.
old wives' tales. Punch cards directed rods to pass through (or
Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac (1778-1850)
In 1809, which produced a
not) in certain fixed patterns,
worked out the law of combining volumes, corresponding pattern in the cloth being woven.
showing that gases combined in small whole To change the pattern, one merely designed a
numbers of volumes, which leant solid support new punch-card. This, in a sense, was the first
for the atomic theory of matter being worked out primitive step toward computers.
in Great Britain. In 1811, Bernard Courtois (1777- Nicolas Appert (1752-1841) tried to develop a
1838) discovered iodine, while Louis Jacques method something Napo-
for preserving food,
Thenard (1777-1847) discovered hydrogen per- leon needed for his armies. Appert heated food
oxide in 1818. to kill all the microorganisms in it, then sealed
1800 TO 1820 327
the container. He
published his method in 1810 edly, offered to sell all of Louisiana for 15 million
after Napoleon had rewarded him with 12,000 dollars. At the moment, the Peace of Amiens ex-
francs. Appert had thus invented the process of isted between Great Britain and France but it
canning food, which altered the eating habits of might break down at any moment, and the
the world and, in those places where the method French would far rather that the United States
was used, winter ceased to be a starving time. had Louisiana than that the British have it. (Be-
Theophile Rene Hyacinthe Laennec (1781- side, the sale to the United States might sow dis-
1826) invented the stethoscope in 1816, some- cord between it and Great Britain, which France
thing which (with improvements) soon became would also welcome.)
indispensable to physicians. The United States could not turn down the
Perhaps the most successful French writer of bargain and the agreement was signed on April
the period was Anne Louise Germaine de Stael 30, 1803, just two weeks before war broke out
(1766-1817), whose writings so irritated Napo- again between Great Britain and France. This
leon, for whom she did not hide her contempt, more than doubled the size of the United States,
that he sent her into exile during his reign. She which now stretched from the Atlantic Ocean to
lived to see him overthrown and was able to re- the Rocky Mountains. Nor did the "Louisiana
turn to France. Purchase" cause trouble with Great Britain,
which was relieved to get Bonaparte out of North
America. Indeed, British bankers lent the United
UNITED STATES States the money with which to make the pur-
In 1800, Thomas Jefferson was elected third pres- chase.
ident of the United States. By that time, three Jefferson sent out an expedition to explore the
new stateshad been added since the acceptance new territory, one that was led by Meriwether
of the Constitution: Vermont, Kentucky, and Lewis (1774-1809) and William Clark (1770-
Tennessee (the 14th, 15th, and 16th states, re- 1838). On May 14, 1804, the "Lewis and Clark
spectively). Ohio became the 17th state in 1803, Expedition," with 40 men, started at St. Louis
Louisiana the 18th in 1812, Indiana the 19th in and moved up the Missouri River. They crossed
1816, Mississippi the 20th in 1817, Illinois the 21st the Rocky Mountains and went down the Co-
in 1818, and Alabama the 22nd in 1819. lumbia river, reaching the Pacific Ocean on No-
The United States found itself in the odd po- vember 15, 1805. (The mouth of the Columbia
sition of being the world's most important neu- River had been discovered, in 1791, by the Amer-
tral nation during the Napoleonic wars. This had ican navigator, Robert Gray (1755-1806). He had
both its advantages and disadvantages. named the river for his ship.)
In 1801, for instance, Bonaparte had forced The Lewis and Clark expedition was back in
Spain to cede Louisiana, the large area west of St. Louis on September 23, 1806. They were the
the Mississippi, to France. It could only be of use first to cross the full width of what is now
to France if there were peace. If there continued the continental United States. The region west of
to be war with Great Britain, it would surely fall the Rockies that they explored was the "Oregon
to the British. Territory." The United States claimed it on the
As for the United States, it had to have the basis of Gray's voyage and the Lewis and Clark
mouth of the Mississippi River and the city of expedition, but Great Britain claimed it, too.
New Orleans located near that mouth. With the [Lewis and Clark, by the way, received enor-
mouth of the Mississippi in foreign hands, mous help from a Native American woman, Sa-
whether Spanish, French, or British, the trade cagawea (1786-1812), who acted as their guide.]
routes of the western part of the nation could be Another explorer was Zebulon Montgomery
strangled. Jefferson sent negotiators to work out Pike (1779-1813). In 1805, he explored the north-
a purchase price for New Orleans and Bona- ern reaches of the Mississippi River in what is
parte's representatives, suddenly and unexpect- now Minnesota. In 1806, he explored what is
now Colorado and discovered the mountain now When Jefferson's second term came to its close,
known as Pike's Peak on November 15, 1806. he retired, and James Madison (1751-1836), one
The new American land was the site of an of the important devisers of the Constitution, be-
earthquake on December 15, 1811, the most vio- came the fourth President of the United States.
lent in the United States in historic times. It oc- He eased the embargo, refusing trade only with
curred near the site of what is now New Madrid, —
Great Britain and France but there wasn't much
Missouri. The area was then so thinly populated of anyone else to trade with, so it didn't help.
that not one fatality was reported. If it happened It was difficult for the United States to sit still
today, tens of thousands would probably die. under such treatment. It was a large country, far
There were disadvantages to neutrality, too. larger than any European country except Russia.
Both France and Great Britain wanted to stop the Its population had reached 7.3 million, two and
United States from trading with the other side, a half times what it was at the end of the War of
so that British and French privateers both began American Independence. It was gaining in in-
to seizeAmerican vessels on suspicions of trad- dustry and it was producing large quantities of
ing with the enemy {their enemy, not that of the cotton, which was needed by the British textile
United States). factories. It was steadily beating back the Native
Since Great Britain was far more powerful at Americans and it was even engaging in aggres-
sea, she did far more damage to American ship- sive foreign policy.
ping than France did. What's more. Great Britain The aggressiveness came about in this fash-
added another refinement to the mistreatment of ion. The North African coast west of Egypt con-
American ships. Great Britain treated its sailors tained the "Barbary States": Morocco, Algeria,
with great cruelty and a number of them de- Tunis, and Tripoli (the modern Libya). These
serted to American ships. There they received were nominally under Ottoman overlordship at
higher pay, better treatment, and no language this time, as they had been for two and a half
barrier. centuries, but they were virtually independent.
The took to stopping Amer-
British, therefore, They practiced piracy, capturing European ves-
ican ships on the high seas to search them for sels and enslaving crews and passengers. The
deserters. (They needed all the able seamen they European powers, totally absorbed in the Napo-
could get in the life-and-death struggle with Na- leonic conflicts had no time to do anything about
poleon, where only the British fleet made resis- it and simply paid "protection money" to the pi-
tance possible.) Often, the British would take rates to keep their ships safe.
native-born Americans who, they claimed, were The United States paid protection money to
British. The United States protested such inci- each of the Barbary States; however, in 1801,
dents but was powerless to stop them. Tripoli, feeling the United States was weak
On June 22, 1807, when Napoleon was at the enough to pay more protection money, declared
height of his power and was about to meet with war on it. Although Jefferson was a man of
Alexander I of Russia at Tilsit, Great Britain felt peace, this could not be endured. Ships were
desperate. A British warship actually stopped an sent into the Mediterranean and Tripoli was
American warship and demanded the right to bombarded into submission by June 4, 1805.
search her. There was a battle and the British (That is why the United States Marine hymn re-
killed three American sailors, wounded 18, then fers to "the shores of Tripoli.")
searched the ship and carried off four men they There were new young people in Congress
considered deserters. who were demanding strong action against the
All that President Jefferson could do was to themselves the "War Hawks"
British (they called
declare an embargo, forbidding American ships — and that started the use of "hawks" for those
to trade with anyone. This damaged the United who were ready to risk war, and "doves" for
States far more than it damaged its enemies. those who strove for peace). The War Hawks fi-
1800 TO 1820 329
nally had their way

and, on June 18, 1812, the the Americans did not. In 1813, however, an
United States declared war on Great Britain, and American captain, Oliver Hazard Perry (1785-
the “War of 1812“ began. 1819), supervised the building of ships; then, on
It came at a particularly bad time for Great September he forced the surrender of
10, 1813,
Britain, since six days later, Napoleon invaded the British ships at the Battle of Lake Erie. Perry's
Russia, and
Russia fell. Great Britain would be
if report of the outcome began: “We have met the
left completely alone in her fight against the all- enemy, and they are ours," one of the great bat-
powerful French conqueror. With that in mind. tle reports. This made the north secure for the
Great Britain had already given in to many of the United States.
American demands, but in those days it took six In 1814, however, Napoleon had abdicated,
weeks for news to cross the Atlantic Ocean, and and Great Britain, annoyed at this petty war it
the war was on before the news of conciliation couldn't seem to put an end to, launched a three-
arrived. pronged invasion designed to crush the United
The Americans intended to conquer Canada, States.
but they did not have a well-trained army, and The prong was to come down from Mon-
first
its performance on the Canadian frontier was treal toward New York, following Burgoyne's
dismal. The northeastern states, which were on route of nearly 40 years before and cutting off
the front line, had suffered so much from the disaffected New England. The second was to
embargo, and were so against the war, that they strike at the American center and its key port of
refused to fight. In the west, far from advancing Baltimore. The third was to strike at the south
into Canada, Detroit was lost to the British with- and take New Orleans.
out a struggle, through the sheer incapacity of The northern prong, however, met with disas-
the American general, William Hull (1753-1825). ter, for a British fleet on Lake Champlain was
He was and sentenced to be
court-martialed forced to surrender to the Americans under com-
shot, but Madison pardoned him for his services mander Thomas Macdonough (1783-1825) on
in the War of American Independence. September 11, 1814 at the Battle of Plattsburg. No
The only bright spot during the first months British invasion from the north was now pos-
of the war were the feats of the small American sible.
navy. In single combat, the American ships de- The central prong did better. On August 24,
feated the British ships during those months, to the British invaders actually took Washington
the amazement of all Europe and to the embar- and set fire to the public buildings. President
rassment of the British. In particular, the Ameri- Madison and Congress had to flee the city.
can ship Constitution, at first under the command (When the Presidential Mansion was afterward
of Isaac Hull (1773-1843), William Hull's brother, painted white to hide the char marks, it became
defeated the British Guerriere in a completely one- known as “The White House.")
sided battle. In a later battle, the Constitution was The British went on to Baltimore and the Brit-
hailed as “Old Ironsides" by its jubilant crew as ish ships bombarded Fort McHenry in its harbor,
cannonballs bounced off its stout wooden struc- on the night of September 13-14, 1814. If Fort
ture without damage. The ship still exists and McHenry surrendered, the British would land
has been known by that name ever since, to the their army and take the city, with possibly disas-
point where its real name is all but forgotten. trous results for the Americans. Fort McHenry,
However, the British navy, though it might be however, withstood the bombardment and the
inferior, ship for ship, to the American navy, was British fleet had to sail away. The central prong
overpowering in its numbers and its blockade of had failed.
the United States steadily tightened. An American lawyer, Francis Scott Key (1779-
But there came cheering news from the Great 1843), was waiting on a British ship in the harbor
Lakes. The British had ships on those lakes and throughout the night, trying to negotiate the re-
lease of an American prisoner and was in agony battle between the United States and Great Brit-
since he didn't know whether the cessation of Waterloo in that same year
ain, as the Battle of
the bombardment meant that the Americans had was the last between France and Great Britain.
surrendered or whether the British had given up. In 1818, the United States settled the border
It depended on whether the American flag was between itself and Canada by peaceable agree-
still flying over the fort when dawn came. He ment with Great Britain. That border, from the
wrote a four-stanza poem on the bombardment, Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains, has remained
which was eventually entitled "The Star-Span- the same ever since.
gled Banner," and which became the American James Monroe (1758-1831^ was elected the
national anthem. fifth president of the United States in 1816, and
Both Great Britain and the United States had was reelected in 1820 almost by acclamation. The
had enough by now and, on December 24, 1814, nation seemed to have weathered all its storms.
the Treaty of Ghent, in Belgium, was signed. It In 1820, however, a new issue arose — black slav-
left everything exactly as it had been at the begin- ery.
ning of the war, and it didn't mention the issues The American writer to receive serious
first
over which the war was supposedly fought, but attention in Europe was Washington Irving,
things were settled anyway. Great Britain was (1783-1859). His best known work was The
very careful in its treatment of American ship- Sketchbook, published in 1819, which contained
ping thereafter, and the United States never his still-famous stories "Rip Van Winkle" and
again attacked Canada. "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow."
The British public at first considered the Noah Webster (1758-1843) published an enor-
Treaty of Ghent a base surrender to the United mously popular spelling book and, in 1806, pub-
States, but the southern prong of the invasion lished the first American dictionary. He went far
was still in progress, and, on December 13, a Brit- toward making American spelling and usage a
ish fleet was nosing its way up the Mississippi language in its own right.
River toward New Orleans. William Ellery Channing (1780-1842), a liberal
Andrew Jackson (1767-1845) was in charge of clergyman, was a leading Unitarian in 1819; and
the defense of New Orleans, and had built up while Unitarians were always small in numbers,
bales of cotton as breastworks behind which Channing made their influence felt far and wide.
American sharpshooters waited with their rifles. It has continued so, since.
On January 8, 1815, 10 days after the Treaty of In technology, Robert Fulton (1763-1815) built
Ghent had been signed but long before news of the first commercially successful steamship. By
it could reach the United States, the British turning a wheel powered by a steam engine, it
charged the breastworks. They were picked off could move easily against wind and current. In
neatly. In half an hour, 2000 British soldiers had time, it completely revolutionized sea transpor-
been killed or wounded, including three gen- tation.
erals. American casualties were 21. It was Agin- Eli Whitney in 1801, having invented the cot-
court (which had been fought exactly four ton gin in the previous decade, fulfilled a con-
centuries earlier) in reverse. The British sailed muskets. The story goes that he
tract for 10,000
away. machined all the parts with such precision that
When the news of the Battle of New Orleans muskets could be assembled out of parts taken at
reached the United States, it made the War of random. This represented the invention of inter-
1812 seem a victorious one. When reached
it changeable parts and was the first step toward
Great Britain, it reconciled British public opinion mass production and the assembly line.
to thepeace treaty, especially when Napoleon
suddenly took over France again for the
"Hundred Days" before Waterloo finished him.
The Battle of New Orleans was the last land
1800 TO 1820 331
that it was
business to protect those who were
its
CANADA exploited and maintained that all bargaining
During this period, the northern reaches of Can- —
should be one-on-one one starving worker fac-
ada were explored. Beginning in 1818, two Brit- ing one rich and powerful mill-owner. Further-
ish navigators, John Ross (1777-1856) and more, government protection was absolutely
if
William Edward Parry (1790-1855), explored the required, it went to the rich and powerful, since
Arctic Ocean shore of Canada and eventually every sign of protest was considered "Jacobin-
sighted just about all the islands in the Canadian ism."
Archipelago that lay off that shore. Of course, financiers flourished. was even
It
Canada suffered from an American invasion possible for Jewish financiers to do well. The
during the War of 1812. The Americans captured Rothschilds were an example. The first important
York (later called Toronto) on April 27, 1813, and member of the family was Mayer Amschel Roths-
burned parts of it. This was used as an excuse by child (1744-1812), who
helped the British subsi-
the British to burn Washington the next year. dize anti-Napoleonic armies. His second son,
The Americans won no substantial victories, and Nathan Mayer Rothschild (1777-1836) founded a
the largest set-to was the drawn Battle of Lundy's branch of the firm in London. He learned the
Lane, where the American officer, Winfield Scott results of the Battle of Waterloo before anyone
(1786-1866), distinguished himself. The war else through the skillful use of carrier pigeons
ended with Canada still firmly in British hands. and was able to order his financial dealings on
There were to be no further battles between the the basis of that knowledge.
United States and Canada thereafter. Naturally, the poor and the suffering were
driven by desperation to violence. There were
movements to destroy the new machinery that
GREAT BRITAIN seemed, to the downtrodden, to have disrupted
During Great Britain was preoccu-
this period. an earlier and ideal Great Britain (the past always
pied almost entirely with the great war against seems ideal) of yeoman farmers and cottage in-
Napoleon and, to a lesser extent, with the war dustry. Between 1811 and 1816, there were bands
against the United States. In common with the of "Luddites" (the origin of the name is uncer-
rest of Europe, though perhaps not to the same tain), who rioted and tried to destroy machinery.
extent, the British government entered a period They were strongly repressed and, eventually
of reaction out of fear and hatred of the French (when prosperity returned), the movement died
Revolution and what it had led to. Thus, for a out. (The name is still sometimes used for those
period after Napoleon's downfall, the conserva- who turn blindly against technological advance.)
tive Tory party maintained a tight control of the There was also the beginning of a strong
land. movement toward Parliamentary reform and to-
came an economic depres-
In 1815, with peace ward widening the electorate so that Parliament
sion. Unemployment was made worse by the de- would not be the spokesman of the commercial
mobilization of the army. and landed interests only. The journalist, Wil-
What's more, the coming of the Industrial liam Cobbett (1763-1855), was outstanding in
Revolution meant the multiplication of mills and this movement, and was driven abroad twice in
factories in which workers were forced to labor consequence. (In his younger days, however,
as long as possible and were paid as little as pos- Cobbett inveighed harshly against the French
sible. Since women could be made to work for Revolution and the American democracy.)
less than men, and children for less than adults, An idealist reformer, Robert Owen (1771-
woman and became common and
child labor 1858) advocated socialism, urging factory reform
conditions were hellish. Nor were workers al- and the control of factories by the people who
lowed to combine into unions and bargain for worked in them. He set an example of how mills
better treatment. The government did not feel could be run decently and with consideration for
workers. Thus, he stopped employing children, ments, such as sodium and potassium, in 1807,
he arranged old age and sickness insurance, and making use of the new technique of electrical cur-
even worker education. He spent his fortune rents. John Dalton (1766-1844) established the
freely, but his example had little chance of alter- atomic theory of matter in 1808. William Smith
ing entrenched greed and privilege. (1769-1839) studied geological strata and pub-
A British banker, David Ricardo (1772-1823), lished a map in 1815 that showed how strata
wrote about economics and pointed out clearly could be identified by their fossil content. Wil-
the conflicting interests of various classes. This liam Hyde Wollaston (1766-1828) developed a
gave rise to the notion of “class struggle" which, method for working platinuro and discovered
indeed, became more important as time went on. two elements, palladium and rhodium, in 1804;
The climax in protest came on August 16, while in 1803, Smithson Tennant (1761-1815) had
1819, when a crowd of about 60,000 people gath- discovered the elements iridium and osmium.
ered at St. Manchester to protest
Peter's Field in The astronomer, William Herschel, was still
unemployment and high food prices and to call active. In 1805, he demonstrated that the Sun
for Parliamentary reform. Many of them were was no more the center of the Universe than the
women and children, and the gathering was Earth was, but that it was moving relative to the
peaceable. Nevertheless, the army was sent in other stars. He was also the first to get an idea
against the "Jacobins" and the place was cleared, of the shape of the vast star system we call the
at the cost of 11 killed and 500 hurt. The reform- galaxy; and, in 1800, he was the first to detect
ers called the incident the "Peterloo Massacre" in infrared radiation.
army
derision of the kind of "Waterloo" that the William Murdock (1754-1839) pioneered gas-
was now fighting against impoverished unarmed lighting in 1800, and celebrated the Peace of
men, women, and children. Amiens by a spectacular display of gas lights. By
There followed by December a series of re- 1807, some London streets were gas-lit. (Side-
pressive acts designed to hobble the newspapers, effects are important. Efficient night-time illumi-
curtail public gatherings, give increased powers nation acted to reduce crime.)
to magistrates, and so on. In 1814, George Stephenson (1781-1848) built
This sort of thing was even worse elsewhere his first steam locomotive, a land transport vehi-
in Europe. It was the reaction of ruling classes cle that could be driven along rails by the action
who, in the wake of the French Revolution and of a steam engine. This was to revolutionize land
the Napoleonic wars, saw themselves forever transportation as steamships were to revolution-
threatened with the guillotine by even the mild- ize travel by sea.
est of protests. British writing was Wordsworth
flourishing.
George Ill's illness had progressed to the was still writing, producing, "I Wandered Lonely
point where he was declared unfit to govern in as a Cloud" in 1804, and "Intimations of Immor-
1811, and England was put under the Prince of tality" in 1808. Coleridge published "Xanadu"
Wales as Regent. The period from 1811 to 1820 and "Christabel" in 1816. A lesser light was Rob-
is, therefore, called the "Regency." In 1820, ert Southey (1774-1843) who, like Wordsworth,
George III finally died after a 60-year reign, turned from youthful liberalism to arch-conser-
which had seen Great Britain's worst failure in vatism with age and success. He is chiefly re-
modern times connection with the rebelling
in membered for his poems "The Battle of
colonies in North America, and its greatest suc- Blenheim" and "The Inchcape Rock."
cess in connection with the long and victorious Then there were the three great Romantic
war against Napoleon. George Ill's son reigned poets of the period, all short-lived. George Gor-
as George IV (1762-1830). don, Lord Byron (1788-1824), published the first
In Thomas Young (1773-1829)
science, two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage in 1812,
worked out the wave theory of light in 1802. and found himself suddenly famous. His many
Humphrey Davy (1778-1829) isolated new ele- poems were climaxed by his masterpiece Don
1800 TO 1820 333
Juan, the first part of which was published in was union between the two so that
a legislative
1819. Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) created the nation became the "United Kingdom of Great
scandals with his atheism and with his abandon- Britainand Ireland."
ment of his wife and elopement with his mis- This meant that the British Parliament would
tress, but wrote such well-known works as now have Irish representatives as well as Scottish
“Ozymandias" in 1817 and "Ode to the West ones. This, however, meant little or nothing to
Wind" in 1819. John Keats (1795-1821) wrote the bulk of the Irish, since only Protestant repre-
"On First Looking into Chapman's Homer," sentatives could sit in Parliament and the Catho-
"Ode to a Nightingale," and "Ode on a Grecian lic Irish majority was left out in the cold.
Urn." As was another insur-
a matter of fact, there
Walter Scott (1771-1832), a Scottish poet, hav- rection in Ireland in 1803, again in hope of French
ing made his name with poetic epics such as The help that never arrived. It's leader was Robert
Lay of the Minstrel in 1805, turned to prose with Emmet (1778-1803), who was arrested and
Waverley in 1814, the first modern historical hanged.
novel, and his masterpiece, Ivanhoe in 1819.
Thomas Moore (1779-1832), an Irish poet, wrote
such ever-popular verses as "Believe me, if All NETHERLANDS
Those Endearing Young Charms," "The Last Under the French Revolutionaries and Napoleon,
Rose of Summer," and "The Minstrel Boy," and the Netherlands was first the Batavian Republic,
earned his greatest fame with his poetic drama and then the Kingdom of Holland.
Lalla Rookh in 1817. On July 5, 1806, Napoleon made his brother,
On a much lower scale, yet not to be despised, Louis, the King of Holland —
the result of which
Jane Taylor (1783-1824) wrote the children's clas- was that the British took over the Dutch posses-
sic verse "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" in 1810. sions in South Africa.
Austen (1775-1813) introduced
In prose, Jane Louis actually took his role seriously and tried
the "novel of manners," which utterly ignored to govern with the benefit of his people in mind.
the Napoleonic turmoil to deal with men and This bothered Napoleon who felt that Louis
women of the gentry and the problems of getting wasn't doing enough to see to it that the Dutch
married. Her masterpiece Pride and Prejudice was adhered to the Continental system and refrained
published in 1813. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley from illegal trade with Great Britain. Rather than
(1797-1851), first the mistress, then the second comply, Louis abdicated and left the kingdom in
wife of the poet, published the ever-popular 1810, whereupon, on July 9, Napoleon an-
1810,
Frankenstein in 1818. Some consider it to be the nexed the Netherlands to France. That did no
first modern science fiction story. good, however. The smuggling continued.
Among the British painters of the period were At the Congress of Vienna, the Netherlands
Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) and was restored to its legitimate ruler. William V,
John Constable (1776-1837), both of whom were who had been stadtholder of the Netherlands
effective landscape artists. until the French conquest of 1795, had died in
The most renowned actor of the period was exile in 1806. His son, William (1772-1843), who
Edmund Kean (1789-1833), who was an enor- had fought against Napoleon at the Battles of
mous hit in Shakespearean roles, beginning with Jena and of Wagram, was therefore made the
his "Shylock" in 1814. ruler. He would have been Stadtholder William
VI, but the Netherlands was made a kingdom so
he became William I, King of the Netherlands.
IRELAND To his realm, what had been the Austrian
After the Irish rebellion of 1798, Prime Minister Netherlands was added, so that the "Low Coun-
William Pitt felt it necessary to bind Ireland more tries" were once more united as they had been
closely to Great Britain. On January 1, 1801, there before the revolt against Philip II of Spain, two
and a half centuries earlier. This was done to cre- the Spanish in Venezuela as early as 1811 and
ate a stronger barrier in the northeast against who achieved independence of the northern tier
French expansionism. This created problems, of nations in Spanish South America by 1819. He
however, for the southern region (which came to was the first president of an independent Colom-
be called "Belgium") was Catholic and partly bia in that year. The nation of Bolivia is named in
French-speaking; whereas the northern region his honor.
was Protestant and Dutch-speaking. In addition, Bernardo O'Higgins (1778-1842), drove the
the government favored the northern region eco- Spaniards out of Chile and became the first pres-
nomically and made Dutch the official language ident of that nation in 1817. Fighting with O'Hig-
to the discontent of the Belgians. gins was Jose Francisco de San Martin (1778-
1850), who made possible the independence of
SPAIN Argentina.
Charles IV, the Spanish king who had been de-

posed by Napoleon remained alive in exile, but HAITI
he had abdicated in favor of his son, who, after
the French were driven from Spain, was restored
A slave on the island of Hispaniola
rebellion
(which now contains the two nations of Haiti and
as Ferdinand VII.
the Dominican Republic) came under the control
He was an utterly reactionary monarch who
of a Haitian black named Francois Dominique
relied on the Church and the army to repress any
manifestations of the slightest touch of liberal-
Toussaint L'Ouverture (1743-1803), who gained
control of the entire island by 1801, and tried to
ism. As a result, Spain seethed with discontent
establish a fair rule over blacks and whites alike.
throughout this period.
France, which had controlled the island,
The painter, Goya, produced some of his most
would not allow that, however, and Bonaparte
powerful paintings in this period, dramatizing
sent in an army of 25,000 under Charles Victor
the guerrilla war against the French.
Emmanuel Leclerc (1772-1802). Leclerc could ac-
complish nothing against the black guerrillas. He
SPANISH AMERICA offered to negotiate with Toussaint L'Ouverture.
Spain, even as late as the French invasion of When the Haitian leader accepted the offer, Le-
1808, when ithad grown virtually moribund, still clerc had him treacherously seized and sent to
held its American possessions almost intact after France where he died a prisoner on April 7, 1803.
three centuries. Meanwhile, the Haitians resumed fighting
The Spanish colonies in the American conti- and yellow fever fought on their side. Leclerc
nents had long been dissatisfied, however. Span- died, and the French army withered and those
ish rule was repressive and the "creoles," who survived fled the island forever in Novem-
. American-born people of Spanish descent, and, ber 1803.
of course, the "mestizos," who were of mixed One of Toussaint L'Ouverture's aides, Henri
Spanish and Native American descent, had little Christophe (1767-1820) seized control of Haiti,
to say in the government. The example of the making himself King Henri I in 1811. By 1809,
successful rebellion of the British colonies in however, the Spanish-speaking eastern portion
North America 30 years earlier had not been lost of the island had thrown by the
off the control
on the Spanish colonies, and the confusion in French-speaking western blacks and the two na-
Spain during the Peninsular War gave them their tions of the island came into being.
\
chance.
Beginning in 1809, there were movements for
independence throughout Spanish America. PORTUGAL
Among the leaders of those revolts was Simon The royal family of Portugal had fled to Brazil in
Bolivar (1783-1830), who was fighting against November, 1807, when the French army had
1800 TO 1820 335
taken over their land. At the end of the Napo- first distinction between atoms and molecules.
leonic wars, they were still there Queen Maria, — Alessandro Volta (1745-1827) invented the
who was still mad, and her son, the Regent John. chemical battery in 1800, and produced the first
John had raised Brazil to the rank of a king- continuous electric current, soon to be put to ex-
dom that was united with Portugal under a com- cellent use by such men as Humphrey Davy.
mon monarch, so when Maria died in 1816, her The outstanding Italian composer of the pe-
son became John VI, King of Portugal and Brazil. riod was Gioacchino Antonio Rossini (1792-
He liked it and didn't return to Portugal
in Brazil, 1868), best known for his opera The Barber of Se-
till 1821. There he found considerable contro- ville, staged in 1816. The violin virtuoso, Niccolo
versy between the constitutionalists who wanted Paganini, revolutionized the technique of the in-
a limited monarchy, and the absolutists who strument and fascinated audiences with the vigor
wanted an absolute one. of his playing.
ITALY PAPACY
After the fall of Napoleon, Italy was reconsti- Pius VII was Pope during Napoleonic times. He
tuted on its old basis and was placed in the grip felt it necessary to come to some agreement with
of reactionary rulers. Thus, Ferdinand I, who Bonaparte avoid the sad fate of his predeces-
to
had remained in Sicily while Napoleon con- sor. In 1801, he accepted a "Concordat," which
trolled Italy, was made King of Naples again in Church in France. The
reestablished the Catholic
December 1816, and immediately established the French bishops, however, were to be appointed
darkest absolutist rule. by the French government and would be paid by
Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia, who had lost them. The Pope had to agree to give up the
his lands on the mainland to Bonaparte in
Italian Church property that had been appropriated by
1796, had died that year, and his son succeeded the Revolutionary government and to limit his
as Charles Emmanuel IV (1751-1819). He re- own with the French church.
ability to interfere
mained on the island of Sardinia, safe behind the Even so, Napoleon modified the Concordat in
but abdicated in 1802 and entered a
British fleet, his own favor, and while Pius VII was at the cor-
monastery. His younger brother, who reigned as onation of Bonaparte as Emperor, Bonaparte in-
Victor Emmanuel I (1759-1824), was brought sisted on placing the crown on his own head. In
back to the mainland after Napoleon's fall. 1808, Rome was occupied by the French, and the
Genoa was added to his territory so that Sardinia Papal States were annexed to France in 1809. Pius
would be a stronger barrier against French ex- VII, like his predecessor, was then kept under
pansionism. He instituted a reactionary regime, detention in France, but he was restored by the
too, and so it was all over Italy. victorious Allies in 1814, and the Papal States
The Italians, however, had had a taste of were given back to him by the Congress of Vi-
greater freedom and more efficient government enna.
under the French, by whom they had also been He revived and restored the Jesuits and was,
united, more or less, into larger realms. They on the whole, on the side of the counterrevolu-
began to want more liberty and a national union. tionaries who were trying to pretend that the
The small states of Italy, all of whom were, more French Revolution had never happened.
or less, under the smothering influence of Aus-
tria, no longer satisfied them.
In this period, Italian scholarship continued. SWITZERLAND

Giuseppe Piazzi (1746-1856) sighted the
In Sicily, Switzerland, which had been under Napoleonic
first known asteroid, Ceres, on January 1, 1801. domination, was restored to its former status by
Amedeo Avogadro (1776-1856), in 1811, worked the Congress of Vienna, and it went through the
out "Avogadro's hypothesis," which offered the period of reaction common everywhere. It ac-
cepted a principle of perpetual neutrality, and and she would take her place as a fifth reaction-
has clung to it and remained at peace ever since. ary "great power" in Europe.
Culture in Austria and in the rest of Germany
was flourishing, even under the reaction.
Goethe, still active, produced his masterpiece,
AUSTRIA the poetic drama Faust, in 1808. Schiller wrote his
The Holy Roman Empire was past restoration plays The Maid of Orleans in 1801 and William Tell
even by the Congress of Vienna, but Austria, be- in 1804.
cause of its repeated, and finally successful, wars In music, Beethoven turned out his great sym-
against Napoleon, had emerged with increased phonies, the Third ("Eroica") in 1804 and his
prestige and dominated the regions that had Fifth and Sixth ("Pastoral") in 1808, together
once been that Empire. It was the largest state in with many other pieces that established him in
central Europe, and all of Germany and Italy was the minds of many as the greatest composer who
under its influence. ever lived.
Its prime minister was Klemens von Metter- Franz Peter Schubert (1797-1828) was the orig-
nich, who had been Austrian Ambassador to inator of the German "Lieder" ("art songs") in
France in Napoleon's time, and who had put 1814. In his short life, he composed more than
through the marriage between Napoleon and the 500 songs. Carl Maria von Weber (1786-1826)
Austrian princess, Marie Louise. After Napo- wrote nine operas and many other works.
leon's was Metternich who served as the
fall, it In prose, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
orchestra leader of the symphony of reaction. (1770-1831) wrote in opposition to Kant, optimis-
He insisted on censorship and espionage, on ticallysupporting reason as the essence of hu-
the endless hounding of the least indication of manity. On the other hand, Arthur
liberal feeling, and on the establishment of a Schopenhauer (1788-1860) was a complete pes-
principle of no-change. He
organized the "Ger- simist who felt that human life was dominated
manic Confederation," a kind of substitute Holy by the irrational.
Roman Empire, which was a loose gathering of The brothers, Jacob Ludwig Grimm (1785-
the 38 German states (there had been 300 before 1863) and Wilhelm Carl Grimm (1786-1859), col-
the French Revolution), including those portions lected folk tales, and Grimm's Fairy Tales was pub-
of Austria and Prussia were German-speak-
that lished between 1812 and 1815. They have been
ing. He kept that Confederation under his tight part of the heritage of childhood ever since. Jacob
control, and it was supposed to protect Germany Grimm began the publication of a great work on
against such outer enemies as France and Russia German grammar in 1819, and this was one of
and, of course, the inner enemy of liberalism. the foundations of modern philology, the study
Metternich also felt that the powers of Europe of languages.
ought to get together periodically in "Con- In science, Johann Wilhelm Ritter (1776-1810)
gresses" to settle outstanding problems, particu- discovered ultraviolet radiation in 1801. Joseph
larly those arising from the dangers of liberalism. von Fraunhofer (1787-1826) discovered, in 1814,
The such Congress was held at Aix-la-
first that the solar spectrum was crossed by hundreds
Chapelle (Aachen, in what is now Germany) be- of dark lines. These "spectral lines" in later years
tween October 1 and November 15, 1818. The proved to be of the very first importance to ad-
rulers of Russia, Prussia, and Austria, together vances in both chemistry and astronomy. Carl
with the British Foreign Secretary, Robert Stew- Friedrich Gauss (1777-1855) was making ad-
art, Viscount Castlereagh (1769-1822), and the vances in every branch of mathematics from an
Duke of Wellington, were all there. The business early age and is considered by many to have been
of the Congress was to re-admit France into the the greatest mathematician who ever lived.
family of nations. She would pay off her indem-
nity, the army of occupation would be removed.
1800 TO 1820 337
Finland, at which point Denmark, always hostile

PRUSSIA to Sweden, joined the war on the Russian side.
Frederick William III of Prussia never recovered The Swedish army foresaw disaster. On
from his defeat by Napoleon and his humiliation March 13, 1809, it organized a coup that over-
afterward. From that point on, he cowered in the threw Gustavus IV and forced him into exile. His
shadow of, first, Alexander of Russia, and then uncle became king as Charles XllI, and he made
Metternich of Austria. peace with Russia and Denmark at the cost of
At the Congress of Vienna, Prussia gained giving up Finland to the former.
considerable territory in the Rhineland, in West- Since Charles Xlll had no heirs, he adopted a
phalia, and in western Saxony. This was de- French general, Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte
signed to put a stronger power on the eastern (1763-1844) as his son. (Apparently, this was be-
border of France. cause Bernadotte had treated Swedish prisoners
of war in Germany in a humane manner.) Berna-
dotte agreed, became
Lutheran, and adopted
a
DENMARK the name of Charles John.
Denmark had found on the wrong side of
herself Napoleon may have thought that Sweden
Great Britain during the Napoleonic Wars. When would now adopt a prp-French policy, but Ber-
she tried to join with other Baltic powers to pro- nadotte, who had never been enamored of Na-
tect her neutral shipping against Great Britain, poleon, saw that it was time to turn against
the British sent a fleet into the Baltic Sea. Napoleon after the disaster in Russia. Sweden
On April 2, Admiral Nelson fought the
1801, participated in the 1813 campaigns against Na-
Battle of Copenhagen, in which a Danish fleet poleon in Germany, and it also invaded Norway,
was destroyed. Nelson did this in defiance of or- which belonged to pro-French Denmark.
ders from his cautious superior. Then, in Sep- As a result, when Napoleon fell, the Congress
tember of 1807, when it seemed that Denmark of Vienna awarded Norway to Sweden as com-
might join the French-Russian alliance after the pensation for Sweden's loss of Finland to Russia.
meeting at Tilsit, the British bombarded Copen- On February 5, 1818, Charles XIII died, the
hagen. After that, Denmark naturally remained member
last of the Vasa dynasty that had ruled
pro-French. Sweden for nearly three centuries. Bernadotte
The was that at the Congress of
final result succeeded as Charles XIV and followed the usual
Vienna, pro-French Denmark was made to cede reactionary policy of Europe of the time.
Norway to anti-French Sweden, thus breaking a One outstanding chemist of this period was a
connection that had lasted, on and off, since the Swede, Jons Jakob Berzelius (1779-1848). His
time of Canute, nearly eight centuries earlier. skillful experimentation firmly established Dal-
In a more peaceful pursuit, the Danish physi- ton's atomic theory of matter, and he was the
cist, Hans Christian Oersted (1777-1851), dem- first to begin working out a reasonably correct
onstrated the connection between electricity and table of atomic weights. He also suggested the
magnetism in 1820. This was a major step toward modern system of symbols for the chemical ele-
the modern age of electricity. ments.
SWEDEN POLAND
Sweden had been part of the Third Coalition At the Congress of Vienna, Poland again disap-
against Napoleon. When Napoleon was victo- peared from the map. The Grand Duchy of War-
rious, defeating first Austria, then Prussia, and saw, which had existed for six years, from 1807
coming to an accommodation with Russia at Til- to 1813, was divided up again among Prussia,
sit, Gustavus IV of Sweden remained anti-Napo- Austria, and Russia. It was Russia which got the
leon. This meant that Russia felt free to invade lion's share.
and Prussia, signed up simply in order to please

RUSSIA him, but it never came to anything. It was just
Paul I, who ruled Russia in 1800, was an erratic talk.
and possibly mentally unbalanced person, as The first Russian poet of importance appeared
would not be surprising if he were really the son in this period. He was Vasily Andreyevich Zhu-
of the mentally unbalanced Peter 111 (and he kovsky (1783-1852).
might have been). It seemed clearly unsafe to
leave him harsh Napo-
in charge of Russia in the
leonic times; and on March 24, 1801, he was as-
sassinated in the course of a coup, perhaps with
SERBIA
his son's consent. That son succeeded to the The Ottoman Empire had weakened sufficiently
throne as Alexander 1 (1777-1825). for theBalkan nations to begin agitating for free-
Alexander was only 24 years old at this succes- dom. They were still Christian and the general
sion, had been educated by a Swiss liberal, Fred- unsettlement of the period gave them hope.
eric Cesar de La Harpe (1754-1838), and began While the Ottoman Empire was busily engaged
his reign in a clear attempt to be a "benevolent with Russia, the Serbs were rebelling under Kar-
despot." He abolished torture, eased censorship, ageorge (1762-1817). They succeeded temporar-
granted amnesty to political prisoners, and so ily. However, after the Turks made peace with
on. He even made it easier to liberate serfs. How- Russia in 1812 (because the Turks were anxious
ever, he found himself involved in a series of to turn their attention to the Balkans and Russia
wars and this (as it always does) took precedence was anxious to turn its attention to the oncoming
over reform. Napoleon), the Turks exerted their full strength
There was, for instance, a war with Persia against Serbia, which they reoccupied. Kara-
from 1804 to 1813 that ended with Russia taking george fled.
Georgia and other Transcaucasian regions. In 1817, Serbia rose again, this time under Mil-
Then, in 1806, Turkey, with French en- osh Obrenovich (1780-1860). The Turks won
couragement, declared war on Russia. (France again but saw the uselessness of trying to make
was fighting Russia at the time.) Russia had the victory complete. They allowed Obrenovich
somewhat the better of it, and by the time it was to become the hereditary prince of Serbia as Mil-
over on May 28, 1812, just in time for Russia to osh I, provided he accepted the sovereignty of
turn its attention to Napoleon's invasion, Russia Turkey, which he did.
had gained the province of Bessarabia. A section of the coast, Montenegro, inhabited
In 1808, Russia invaded Finland and encoun- by a population closely allied to the Serbs, had
tered very little Swedish resistance. The Con- never been completely conquered by the Turks,
gress of Vienna confirmed Russia's possession of and during the period it was recognized as fully
Finland and also awarded it almost all of the independent.
Grand Duchy of Warsaw. Therefore, in 1815, Clearly, the Ottoman hold on the Balkans was
Russia reached its maximum size in Europe. weakening rapidly.
More peacefully, Russia was expanding its
holdings along the Alaskan coast and was mov-

ing southward even as far as northern California.
Sitka was founded in 1804. OTTOMAN EMPIRE
After the fall of Napoleon, Alexander I grew The reforming Sultan, Selim III, was deposed in
more reactionary and also more mystical. On July, 1807, and (after some dynastic struggling)
September 26, 1815, he tried to establish a "Holy his nephew, Mahmud II (1785-1839), became
Alliance" in Europe whereby the nations were to Sultan in 1808. In the early years of his reign he
establish Christian principles in their dealings had to face war with Russia and the rebellions of
with each other. Various nations, notably Austria the Serbs.
1800 TO 1820 339
squadron into the Mediterranean Sea and forced

EGYPT a peace on Algeria on American terms.
After the French were driven out of Egypt, Mu- In 1816, with the Napoleonic wars over, with
hammad Ali was made viceroy
(1769-1849), the Congress of Vienna done, and with the
(''pasha") of Egypt by the Ottoman Empire American example before their eyes, a British
which was the nominal ruler of the land. Mu- squadron bombarded Algiers and forced it to sur-
hammad Ali now proceeded to reorganize Egypt. render some 3000 European slaves. From that
On March 1, 1811, he massacred the Mamluks, point on. Barbary piracy was at an end.
who had been running Egypt for five and a half
and began to organize a more modern
centuries,
army. He also improved irrigation methods,
WEST AFRICA
planted newcrops, reorganized governmental The black nations of Ashanti and Dahomey re-
administration, and even tried to introduce insisted European penetration for a time, fighting
dustry. them off.
On behalf of the Turkish sultan he crossed
over into Arabia in 1811 to defeat the Wahhabis,
SOUTH AFRICA
a puritanical Moslem had recently been
sect that
Twice during the Napoleonic Wars, the British
founded and that had taken control of Mecca and
took the Cape Colony at the southern end of Af-
Medina, the two holy cities of Islam. By 1818,
rica. At the end of the wars, British possession of
Muhammad Ali had placed the eastern shore of
the region was confirmed and British settlers
the Red Sea under his control.
began entering the country.
PERSIA INDIA
During this period, Persia lost the Transcauca- During this period. Great Britain extended its
sian region to Russia and failed in an attempted control over all of India, directly or indirectly.
invasion of Afghanistan.
t
SOUTHEAST ASIA
Much of the Dutch Indonesian
territory in the
NORTH AFRICA archipelago was taken over by the British during
The Barbary States of Morocco, Algeria, Tunis, the Napoleonic wars; however, after those wars
and Tripoli found that their profitable piratical were over, it was returned to the Netherlands. In
activities brought them into conflict with the 1819, Thomas Stamford Raffles (1781-1826)
United States. American ships bombarded Trip- founded Singapore, and the British widened
oli, and when one ship, the Philadelphia, ran their hold in Malaya.
aground and was taken by the Tripolitans, an In 1815, on the Indonesian island of Sum-
American officer, Stephen Decatur (1779-1820), bawa, east of Java, a dormant volcano, Tambora,
in a daring raid, blew it up. A soldier of fortune, suddenly ceased being dormant and exploded in
William Eaton (1764-1811), with a party of Arabs the most drastic volcanic eruption the world had
he had recruited in Egypt, marched overland to seen since the destruction of Thera 33 and a half
Derna and occupied it on April 27, 1805. The centuries earlier. The top 4000 feet of the volcano
ruler of Tripoli had to make peace on June 4, was blown into the upper atmosphere. Not only
1805, on American terms, and the American did thousands of islanders die, but the dust in
ships went on to bombard Tunis on August 1, the upper atmosphere blocked so much of the
1805. Sun's light that 1816 was an unusually cold year.
In 1815, Decatur, who had won naval victories In New England, it snowed at least once in every
over the British in the War of 1812, took another month of the year, including July and August.
The New Englanders called 1816 'The Year With- Cook on the latter's ill-fated visit to the islands.
out a Summer" and "Eighteen Hundred and After his uncle's death, Kamehameha gained
Froze to Death." control of northern Hawaii, extended his rule
first over the entire island, then over all the
neighboring islands. By 1810, he was Kameha-
CHINA meha I, autocratic ruler of the Hawaiian islands.
Manchu China had now begun to de-
definitely
He allowed foreigners to settle in the islands and
cline, but penetrations by Europeans continued
put an end to human sacrifice, thus beginning to
to be resisted. A British ambassador was sent to
draw Hawaii into the outside world.
Peking in 1816, but he was sent away without On his death in 1819, his son succeeded as
being received. Kamehameha II (1797-1824). Kamehameha II
As of 1800, by the way. Canton was probably continued to put an end to primitive Hawaiian
the largest city in the nation, and in the world,
religious practices and allowed the entry of
with a population of 1,500,000. London, the larg- American missionaries.
est European city had a population of only
864,000 in that year and New York had only
65,000. AUSTRALIA
The island of Tasmania was settled in 1803, and
JAPAN in Australia itself there movement into the
was a
Japan likewise continued to remain isolated. In

interior, accompanied by much killing of the Ab-
origines.
1804, a Russian ambassador made his appearance
in Japan, and got nowhere.
NEW ZEALAND
HAWAII British missionaries began to appear in the is-
Kamehameha (1758-1819), the nephew of the lands of New Zealand at this period.
Hawaiian chieftain, had negotiated with Captain
1820 TO 1840
Great Britain's economic strength, its spread-
GREAT BRITAIN ing world empire, its control of the sea, and its
Great Britain at this time, thanks to the defeat of unassailability behindocean rampart, made it
its
Napoleon and to the role played by the British possible for it to afford humanitarian impulses.
navy and by British money in that defeat, was While Foreign Secretary Viscount Castlereagh
the dominating power in the world, much as worked with the autocratic governments of Eu-
Spain had been in the reign of Philip II two and rope (and made himself unpopular with liberals
a half centuries earlier, and as France had been in doing so), he did try to prevent them from
in the reign of Louis XIV a century and a half using unnecessary force and labored to allow
earlier. However, since Great Britain had no some liberal movements to continue undis-
army to speak of, she didn't exert her influence turbed.
by direct military attack on the European conti- Thus, in October 1820, at the second of Met-
nent, but indirectly through economic influence, ternich's Congresses, at Troppau, Austria (now
worldwide. Opava, Czechoslovakia), Metternich wished to
1820 TO 1840 341
take military measures crush rebellions in

to Great Britain had "corn laws," which imposed
Spain and Italy, and Castlereagh dissented. This dues on imported grain. This kept the price of
happened again in the 1821 Congress, the third, basic foods high, to the benefit of the relatively
at Laibach, Austria (now Ljubljana, Yugoslavia). few landlords who grew British grain and who
Military action was taken despite the British dis- didn'twant to compete with cheaper grain from
sent, but the united front of reaction had been abroad. It worked to the harm, on the other
broken. hand, of the relatively many consumers who
Castlereagh committed suicide in a fit of found they could not afford to satisfy their hun-
depression on August 12, 1822, and was suc- ger.
ceeded by more liberal politicians. William Huskisson another
(1770-1830),
The new Foreign Minister was George Can- member of the cabinet, was an advocate of free
ning (1770-1827), who had fought a duel with trade, maintaining that the profit to the nation as
Castlereagh in 1809, which both had survived. a whole arising out of increased trade would far
Canning broke altogether with the Metternich outweigh the loss of short-term profits to a few.
system of no-change whatever. Canning was He succeeded in reducing duties on certain im-
willing to recognize the newly independent Latin ports in the early 1820s and, therefore, in taking
American nations, which had sprung out of the the first step toward free trade.
corpse of the Spanish colonial system, for in- There were even movements toward allowing
stance, and that made it impossible for any move workmen to combine with each other in order
to be taken to force them back into submission, that they might more effectively bargain with fac-
since Great Britain controlled the sea. tory owners. This was not allowed to go too far,
More ticklish was the matter of revolts in the but trade unions began to come into being.
Balkans against the Ottoman Turks. Even though Another liberal cause was "Catholic emanci-
this was a case of Christian people fighting pation." Catholics were ineligible to sit in Parlia-
against the domination by Muslims, the Metter- ment, which meant, for one thing, that Irish
nich system required that the rebels be crushed delegates sitting in Parliament were Protestant.
lest they set bad examples elsewhere. Canning These simply didn't represent the Irish, who, ex-
supported the Balkan rebellions, too, and made cept in the northeastern counties, were almost
his policy clear at the Congress of Verona (then unanimously Catholic.
part of Austria) in October 1822, which was held "Catholic Associations," working to achieve
soon after he became Foreign Minister. This emancipation, grew in Ireland and it was clear
strengthened British dissent ruined Metternich's that there would never be peace there until this
"Congress system" and no more such meetings took place. The leader of the movement, Daniel
were held after Verona. Thereafter, the reaction- O'Connell (1775-1847), a Catholic, was the most
ary nations had to work individually, which popular man in Ireland.
meant a weakening of their effectiveness. [In England, John Henry Newman (1801-
Inside Great Britain, Robert Peel (1788-1850), 1890) led the "Oxford movement," which
the Secretary of Home
reformed the
Affairs, stressed the relationship of Anglicanism to
criminal code, reducing the number of death Roman Catholicism.]
penalties. It was easier to convict criminals where In January 1828, the Duke of Wellington be-
lesserpunishments were involved, so that actual came Prime Minister. He was a reactionarv, but
punishment became more certain, and criminal he could see that Catholic Emancipation would
action more deterred, when the penalties were have to become a fact, or there would be civil war
made lighter. In addition, in 1829, Peel set up the again in Ireland. In March and April 1829, Cath-
first disciplined police force in the Greater Lon- olic Emancipation was pushed through Parlia-
don and this also had a deterrent effect on

area, ment against the bitter opposition of the die-hard
crime. (London police are called "bobbies" to this reactionaries who supported Wellington in other
day, in PeeTs honor.) respects.
O'Connell, who had previously been elected ready in Parliament saw no need for changing a
to Parliament but had not been allowed to take situation that benefited them, but the British peo-
his seat, was now again elected and was able to ple wanted reform. Therefore, when the Reform
sit in Parliament. Catholics had to agree, how- Bill was defeated on March 22, 1831, Earl Grey
ever, to deny the Pope any power to interfere in had the Parliament dissolved so that there would
British domestic affairs, and to swear they had be a new election.
no intention of overturning the established An- Even with the narrow franchise, the Whigs
glican Church. won again, more widely than before, and a sec-
Meanwhile, George IV was an increasingly ond Reform Bill was passed. This time, it was
unpopular monarch. He was secretly and ille- accepted by the House of Commons; however,
gally married to a Roman Catholic woman he the House of Lords, which was not elected and
could not acknowledge and he had been forced was not amenable to public opinion, rejected it
to marry Caroline of Brunswick (1768-1821), a on October 8, 1831.
German Protestant princess he abominated. He Now, however, this clear refusal to follow the
left her after the birth of a daughter in 1796. Once obvious will of the people produced riots and
he became King, however, she tried to be recog- commotions. When a third Reform Bill was pro-
nized as Queen, which George IV was deter- posed, the House of Commons passed it by a
mined not to allow, and there was a very nasty larger majority than before on March 23, 1832,
and scandalous fight over the matter. The British but still the House of Lords objected, and now
public, which was not enamored of Caroline, the disorders grew to the point where one could
supported her anyway, out of the greater dislike easily imagine the nation to be on the brink of
they had for George. revolution.
George IV died on June 26, 1830, and since his Earl Grey came King William IV and asked
to
daughter had predeceased him, he was suc- him to appoint new peers who would pledge
ceeded by his younger brother, who reigned as themselves to support the Bill; enough of them
William IV (1765-1837), the first British king not so that the House of Lords would give its assent.
to be named George in 115 years. The King refused, but Earl Grey threatened to
The strains of Catholic Emancipation had resign and the King knew he could not find any
splintered the Tory party and, in 1830, the Whigs Tory who could form a ministry that would not
won a Parliamentary majority. Charles, Earl Grey be certain to be voted down at once by the House
(1764-1845), became Prime Minister and he was of Commons.
devoted to Parliamentary reform. The King had to give in, but he didn't appoint
In general, the only people who had influence the peers. Instead, he persuaded the peers that
in the voting procedure were people with land or already existed to withdraw their opposition,
money (or both), and they tended to vote Tory. and the Reform Bill became law on June 4, 1832.
Ordinary voters were sufficiently few in number The result was that the franchise was ex-
to be easily bribed. In some cases, a landed pro- tended to the middle class, and representation in
prietor could force a vote in his district for any- Parliament was more fairly distributed. The
one he wanted, or may himself even have had members were more independent, the voters
the sole vote. Great Britain was rich in "pocket could be less easily bribed, and, most important
boroughs" (an election district that was in some- of all, it was made clear that the House of Lords
one's pocket) or even "rotten boroughs," with no could not defy the popular Great Britain
will.
voters except a landowner. The new industrial more closely approached a democracy, and had
towns often had no representation at all. done it without violent revolution.
What was needed was to extend the franchise Other reforms took place, too. As a result of
so as to allow the middle class to vote. The dele- the tireless fight of William Wilberforce for half a
gates had to be distributed more evenly among century. Great Britain abolished slavery in all its
the population. Naturally, those delegates al- possessions on August 23, 1833, less than a
1820 TO 1840 343
month after Wilberforce had died at the age of account. Finally, letters should be paid for by the
73. They did it in a reasonable fashion, in stages,
sender, not the receiver, since the sender was
and with compensation for slave-owners. It was usually more anxious to send a letter than the
most successful, but it was a lesson that was lost receiver was to receive it.
on the United States. All this was carried through on January 10,
Other laws dealt with the abuses of the factory 1840, and that was the foundation of the modern
system. They forbade the employment of chil- postal system. The original charge was one
dren under nine years of age and limited the penny for any letter under half an ounce to be
work hours of older children to nine hours a day, delivered from any point to any other in Great
and still older children to twelve hours a day. Britain or Ireland.
They also ordered some schooling for children The greatest British scientist of this period,
under 13. It was a very inadequate law, but even and one of the greatest of all time, was Michael
this was fought bitterly by the stone-hearted con- Faraday (1791-1867), who was virtually self-
servatives. educated. He
liquefied chlorine gas in 1823, thus
Much was left undone, of course. Even with founding the study of low temperatures. In 1833,
the extension of the franchise, the large majority he worked out the laws of thus tying
electrolysis,
of the British population could not vote and together electricity and chemical change. He in-
could not rely on Parliamentary delegates paying vented the concept of magnetic lines of force. His
attention to their needs. Trade unions advanced greatest achievement came in 1831, when he
such notions as an eight-hour day, but got no- showed how to convert
mechanical energy into a
where. continuous electric current. This eventually
Earl Grey did resign on July 9, 1834, but the made electricity the product of burning fuel, so
reform movement continued, and the terms that it became cheap enough for everyday use in
"Whig" and "Tory" now gave way to the much quantity.
more descriptive "Liberal" and "Conservative." William Sturgeon (1783-1850) produced the
There were attempts to make society less harsh first crude electromagnet in 1823. John Frederick
on those who were impoverished and who were Daniell (1790-1845) devised the first reliable elec-
incapable of supporting themselves. There were tric battery, which began the process of making
attempts to reform local governments, as the na- small, electrified gadgets possible.
tional government had been reformed, laws to Charles Babbage (1792-1871) began, as early
permit civil marriages, and so on. as 1822, to consider the possibility of devising a
William IV died on June 20, 1837, and al- machine that would solve complex mathematical
though George III had had many children, there problems through punched-card instructions,
was only one grandchild, and she was a woman store partial solutions, and print out final conclu-
who succeeded to the throne at 18, becoming sions. He
invented the various techniques of
Queen Victoria (1819-1901). In 1840, she married modern computers, but had only mechanical de-
her first cousin, Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha vices, gears and levers, to use for the purpose,
(1819-1861), and it was apparently a love-match. and that was simply not good enough. Babbage
In that same year, Rowland Hill (1795-1879) ended in frustration, but the story of modern
introduced important reforms in postage. He ar- computer construction must start with him.
gued that postage should cost less because that William Prout (1785-1850), in 1824, demon-
would encourage business communication and strated that hydrochloric acid (a strong acid till
the increased prosperity that resulted would in- then thought to have no possible connection with
crease tax revenue, generally, to an extent that occurred naturally in stomach juices. Earlier,
life)
would far more than make up for the loss in he had suggested that all atoms were built up out
postal revenue. He also suggested that the pay- of hydrogen atoms, the simplest. Scientific
ment be independent of distance to reduce the knowledge of the time did not support the no-
time, labor, and expense of taking distance into tion, but it was eventually found that "Front's
hypothesis" represented a brilliant insight into series of popular essays under the pen-name of
subatomic structure. Elia. The Essays of Elia were published in 1823,
Richard Bright (1789-1858) studied a serious and a second series in 1833. Thomas De Quincey
kidney disease and reported on it in 1827. It is (1785-1859) made himself famous with Confes-
known as "Bright's disease" to this day. Joseph sions of an English Opium Eater, published in 1821.
Jackson Lister (1786-1869) developed an achro- Walter Scott was still writing, publishing The Tal-
matic microscope, with lenses that did not pro- isman in 1825, and a nine-volume Life of Napoleon
duce colored blurs to the viewer. It was only with in 1827.
this new type of microscope that it became pos- Among Hunt (1784-1859) is
the poets, Leigh
sible to study bacteria in detail. best remembered today for his small poems
Charles Robert Darwin (1809-1882) made his "Abou Ben Adhem" and "Jenny Kissed Me,"
name as a naturalist with a report on his findings published in 1837, while Felicia Dorothea He-
in the course of a five-year scientific round-the- mans (1793-1825) is most remembered for "Cas-
world cruise. His book, A Naturalist's Voyage on abianca" ("The boy stood on the burning deck /
the Beagle, published in 1839, not only indicated When all but he had fled") and "The Landing of
his keenness as an observer, but laid the ground- the Pilgrim Fathers." Thomas Hood (1799-1845)
work for something that was to make him, to is best known poem, "Faithless
for his pun-filled
many people, the greatest biologist in history. Nelly Gray," published in 1829. Alfred, Lord
The first successful railroad opened for regular Tennyson was beginning his long career, and the
commercial use in 1825 in Great Britain. They most popular of his early poems was "The Lady
quickly spread to other countries and the gallop- of Shalott," published in 1832.
ing horse was finally replaced as the best mode
of rapid, long-distance transportation after
nearly 4000 years. FRANCE
British explorers were active in the polar re- While Great Britain was slowly liberalizing its
gions.James Clark Ross (1800-1862) located the franchise and moving away from reaction,
North Magnetic Pole on the Arctic shore of Can- France was doing the reverse. In 1820, a compli-
ada on June 1, 1831. Edward Bransfield (1795- cated system of voting was introduced which
1852), in 1820, sighted the Antarctic Peninsula. gave added weight to the wealthy who could be
This was the first glimpse of the Antarctic conti- counted on to vote for reaction. In addition,
nent, though it was of a portion that lay north of everything was done to hamper the expression
the Antarctic Circle. James Weddell (1787-1834) of opinion.
sailed into an inlet south of the Antarctic Circle, In 1822, the Council of Verona, with Canning
which is now known Weddell Sea.
as of Great Britain in opposition, authorized France
In literature, Charles Dickens (1812-1870) to send troops into Spain to repress a liberal
was, in the eyes of many, the most successful uprising there. France, which only a quarter-
and best novelist of all times. He made his repu- century before had thrown off its chains,
tation as a young man with The Pickwick Papers, now accepted the task of restoring the chains on
published in 1836; Oliver Twist in 1837; and Nich- another people.
These were more effective
olas Nickleby in 1838. OnApril 17, 1823, a French force crossed over
in denouncing abuses and helping to correct into Spain, seized Madrid, defeated the Spanish
them than anything political and social reformers liberalson August 31, and replaced the king on
could do. Edward Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873) the throne where he could take his full revenge.
wrote his most successful novel. The Last Days of On September 16, 1824, Louis XVIII died, and,
Pompeii, in 1834. since he had no children, his younger brother
In nonfiction, Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) succeeded as Charles X (1757-1836). He was the
wrote French Revolution in 1837 in a florid, but first Bourbon king of France to be named any-
effective style. Charles Lamb (1775-1834) wrote a thing other than Louis in 214 years. Thirty-five
1820 TO 1840 345
years earlier, Charles X, as Count de Artois, had to replace the one they had lost to the British two
fled France the day after the taking of the Bastille. thirds of a century earlier.
Now he was king and was determined, as far as The ruler of Algiers
had slapped the French
possible, to turn back the clock to the day before consul's face on April 30, 1827, and would not
the taking of the Bastille. apologize. French ships, therefore, put Algiers
He had law passed that would compensate
a under a blockade and toward the end of June
the nobility for their loss of property in the Rev- 1830, armed forces were landed there. Algiers
olution. This meant that the present owners of was taken on July 5, 1830, and over the next 17
the property would have to pay, and they were years the entire nation was subdued.
largely rich men of the upper middle class that The new king, Louis Philippe, rapidly lost
would have supported Charles X if he had not popularity with the revolutionaries who had in-
alienated them in this manner. stalled him. He was uninterested in the plight of
The result was that when there were elections, the workers and sought the support of the upper
even by the system designed to make them un- middle class who had turned against Charles X.
fair, they resulted in a victory for those op-
still The workers rebelled in Lyons in 1831 and in
posed to Charles. Paris in 1834. These rebellions were put down
On August 8, 1829, when
Charles failed to get with severity and, in September 1835, Louis Phi-
a legislature he wanted, he chose as his minister lippe, like Charles X before him, decided that the
Auguste Jules de Polignac (1780-1847), who was way to turn off discontent was not
allow it to
to
as reactionary as the king, but who
could not A strict press censorship was ap-
be expressed.
carry the votes of the legislature. Therefore, the plied and measures were taken to assure that
king dissolved the legislature and new elections anyone acting against the government would be
were held on May 16, 1830. The result was still very rapidly tried and very surely convicted.
unfavorable to the king. Great French scientists of the period included
Charles then dissolved that legislature, and Andre Marie Ampere (1775-1836), who, in the
contrived the "July ordinances," which estab- 1820s worked out the mathematical and experi-
lished a complete censorship of the press and mental details of the electromagnetic phenomena
changed the election laws to make it impossible announced by Oersted. Nicolas Leonard
earlier
to elect anyone but extreme conservatives. At Sadi Carnot (1796-1832), son of the Carnot who
this, Paris rose in revolt, on July 28, in "the July figured importantly during the French Revolu-
Revolution." On August 2, Charles X abdicated tion, studied the efficiency of steam engines from
and fled the country for the second time, this a theoretical point of view in 1824, and was the
time dying in exile in 1836. first to what has since come to
catch a glimpse of
The new revolutionaries turned to Louis Phi- be called "the second law of thermodynamics."
lippe, the Duke of Orleans (1773-1850). He was Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier (1768-1830), added
the great-great-grandson of the Duke of Orleans to the gathering knowledge of thermodynamics
who had been Regent during the childhood of (the study of the interaction of work and energy)
Louis XV. Louis Philippe's father had abandoned by publishing Amh/tical Theory of Heat, a detailed
his privileges as Duke of Orleans and had taken study of heatflow, in 1822. Antoine Jerome Bal-
to callinghimself Philippe Egalite ("Philip Equal- ard (1802-1876) discovered bromine in 1826.
ity") and even voted for the execution of Louis Evariste Galois (1811-1832), who died young in a
XVI, but was himself guillotined in November duel, spent the last night of his life scribbling out
1793. the foundations of a powerful mathematical tool
Now Philippe Egalite's son was chosen, not as called "group theory."
King of France, but "King of the French" to show Jules Dumont D'Urville (1790-1842) sighted
that he was the choice of the French people. the shoreline of Antarctica south of Australia in
Even as Charles X was fleeing, however, the 1840. Beginning in 1821, Jean Frangois Champol-
French were beginning to gather a new Empire lion (1790-1832) deciphered the Egvptian hiero-
glyphics of the Rosetta Stone, uncovered in The coming of photography undoubtedly caused
Egypt a quarter-century earlier, and in this way artists to seek ways of revealing their subjects in
opened Egyptian history to the modern world. a way the camera could not.
In technology, Louis Jacques Daguerre (1789- In music. Hector Berlioz (1803-1869) was a
1851) finally produced the first reasonably prac- leading exponent of romanticism. So was the Pol-
tical photographs by 1839, and photography ish-born Frederic Frangois Chopin (1810-1849),
quickly became a vitally important adjunct to who lived in Paris after 1831, was another of the
portraiture and astronomy. loves of George Sand, and whose compositions
Marie-Henri Beyle (1773-1842), who fought in remain enormously popular to this day.
Russia, and who wrote under the pseudonym of
"Stendhal," was one of the most important of the
Romantic school in France, his best-known work NETHERLANDS
being Red and Black, published in 1830. Even The union of the Netherlands with Belgium did
greater was Victor Marie Hugo (1802-1885), who not last long. When news of the July Revolution
wrote Notre Dame de Paris in 1831, the best of his in France reached the Belgians, they could not be
early novels. Honore de Balzac (1799-1850), a held back. On August 25, 1830, the Belgians
particularly prolific writer, wrote numerous nov- asked for self-rule. A month later, the people of
els of which the best known is Le Pere Goriot, Brussels drove out the Dutch troops and, on Oc-
published in 1834. Between 1832 and 1837, he tober Belgium proclaimed its independence.
4,
also wrote a series of ribald tales which were On October 17, the Dutch bombarded Antwerp
published as Droll Stories. Amandine Aurore Lu- and, after that, there was no chance of reconcili-
cille Dudevant (1804-1876), writing under the ation.
masculine name of George Sand, wearing men's Great Britain did not want the Belgians to turn
clothing and smoking cigars, wrote a series of for help to the newly revolutionary France.
novels in which she was an early champion of Therefore, persuaded the rest of Europe to ac-
it
what we now call "feminism." One of her lovers, cept Belgian independence even if that upset the
Alfred de Musset (1810-1857) was an important decision of the Congress of Vienna. Russia,
French poet of the time. which might have been the hardest to persuade,
Alexis Charles de Tocqueville (1805-1859) was farthest away, and was having its own trou-
gained fame with his penetrating and prescient bles in Poland.
work On American Democracy, the first part of As king, the Belgians chose Leopold of Saxe-
which was published in 1835. Anthelme Brillat- Coburg (1790-1865), who had been married to
Savarin (1755-1826) made a name for himself in George IV's daughter, and who was still living in
an even more out-of-the-way fashion (but one Great Britain. He was an uncle of both the future
that was particularly French) by writing The Phys- Queen Victoria and the future Prince-Consort Al-
iology of Taste on food. It was published in 1825. bert.
Among the French artists of the period, Eu- The Netherlands did not recognize Belgian in-
gene Delacroix (1798-1863) and Jean Baptiste dependence till 1838, and they made some efforts
Corot (1796-1875) were the most memorable. to force the Belgians back, but with both France
Honore Daumier (1808-1879) was a skilled cari- and Great Britain against that, the attempt could
caturist whose greatest fame arose from the fact not succeed. On April 19, 1839, a final settlement
that one of his caricatures of Louis Philippe was was reached as to boundaries, and that has re-
so wounding that it cost him six months in mained to the present day.
prison. All threepioneered "Impressionism," \
which moved away from the meticulously realis-

tic, order to give impressions of light and form
in SPAIN
that, presumably, embodied more than could be Troops mutinied against the reactionary Ferdi-
expressed by catching a frozen moment of time. nand VII in January 1820. For a while, Spain
1820 TO 1840 347
turned but at the behest of the Congress

liberal, Bolivia and Peru were united in a confedera-
of Verona, French forces entered Spain, quelled tion in 1835, but both Argentina
and Chile to the
the rebellion, and put Ferdinand Vll back in south feared the combination would be too
power. He ruled harshly till his death on Septem- strong and, in the fighting that followed, the
ber 19, 1833. union came to an end.
He had no sons and, by the rules of Bourbon Colombia occupied all the northwest end of
succession, the throne had to go to the most South America, but divisive forces were too pow-
closely related male, which meant to Ferdinand's erful. By 1830, the eastern end had broken away
brother, Charles, or "Don Carlos" (1788-1855). as Venezuela, and the southwestern end as Ec-
Shortly, before his death, though, Ferdinand VII uador.
was persuaded by his fourth wife, Maria Chris- Central America was at first under Guatema-
tina (1806-1878), whom
he had married in 1829, lan domination but by 1840, the southern portion
to break that rule and to direct that his daughter broke away and became El Salvador, Honduras,
reign as Isabella II was only
(1830-1904). Isabella Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. Panama remained
three years old and her mother served as Queen part of Columbia.
Regent. When Mexico achieved its independence in
The Conservatives backed Don Carlos, and 1821, the rebel commander Augustin de Iturbide
Maria Christina was forced to seek support (1783-1824) took command and called himself
among the Liberals, so that she granted a consti- Emperor Augustin I. By 1823, he was forced from
tution of sorts. There followed a five-year civil the throne and on October 4, 1824, Mexico was
war War." The Queen-Regent
called the "Carlist proclaimed a federal republic. One of the leaders
received help from Great Britain, France, and of the revolt against Augustin I was Antonio
Portugal. In 1839, Don Carlos had to accept de- Lopez de Santa Anna (1794-1876). He became
feat and went off into exile in France. President of Mexico in 1833.
Among the West Indian Cuba and
islands,
Puerto Rico remained Spanish, while Haiti was
LATIN AMERICA independent, and Santo Domingo (now the Do-
The Spanish-speaking nations of North and minican Republic) oscillated among indepen-
South America were sorting themselves out dence, Spanish control, and Haitian control.
under the protection of the British fleet against
any attempt to reassert any form of European
dominion (except for British economic control, of PORTUGAL
course.) When Spain rebelled in 1820 and tried to set up a
Argentina and Brazil fought over Uruguay liberal government in 1820, Portugal did the
and, on February 20, 1827, Argentina won a de- same. A liberal constitution was set up, and John
The matter was then settled by Brit-
cisive battle. VI, who was still in Brazil, was invited to come
ish mediation, which allowed Uruguay to back and rule as a constitutional monarch.
become independent in 1828. Great Britain also John VI did so, but Brazil had by now declared
claimed the Falkland Islands in the far south, a its independence, and John VI left his eldest son
claim that Argentina never accepted. behind to rule Brazil as Pedro I (1798-1834). His
Chile was immersed in civil war but retained second son, Miguel (1802-1866), started a civil
its identity. war in Portugal in 1823, to turn the government
Paraguay, landlockedfrom the start, was back to the conservatives.
under a kind of "benevolent despot," Jose Gas- John VI died on March 10, 1826, and left the
par de Francia (1766-1840), who deliberately iso- throne to Pedro I of Brazil. However, Pedro I
lated the country to keep it independent of would not leave Brazil, so he passed the Portu-
Argentina. He abolished the Inquisition, and also guese throne on to his seven-year-old daughter,
abolished titles and aristocratic privileges. who reigned as Maria II (1819-1853).
Miguel was ready for another try at absolut- posed to Jews and Protestants (which one might,
ism and, in May, 1828, he overthrew Maria and after all, was strongly opposed to any
expect),
declared himself king. liberal tendencies in Italy. He condemned the
At that, Pedro of Brazil abdicated his Brazilian Carbonari, for instance, a secret society that had
kingdom and returned to Europe to restore been developing in Italy to espouse liberal ideas
Maria. With the help of Great Britain and France, and to fight the domination of Austria.
he succeeded. Miguel was defeated in 1834, His successor, Pius VIII (1761-1830), had no
while Maria was restored to her throne. choice but to accept the July Revolution in
France; however, Gregory XVI (1765-1846), who
became Pope in 1831, and who faced a nationalist
ITALY uprising in the Papal States, had no hesitation in
The uprising Spain in 1820, which had set off
in calling in Austrian troops to suppress it. In 1832,
a revolt in Portugal, did the same in Italy. The he put out an encyclical condemning freedom of
Neapolitan people rose and forced Ferdinand I to speech and religion, and denouncing revolts, for
grant them on July 13, 1820. How-
a constitution any reason whatever, against established gov-
ever, the Congress meetings at Troppau and Lai- ernments.
bach established the principle that foreign troops
should be used, if necessary, to put down such
dangerous rebellions against constituted author- SWITZERLAND
ity (Great Britain dissenting). Austrian troops
While Switzerland did not suffer any revolts in
marched into Naples and put everything back as
the wake of France's "July Revolution," there
it was without any trouble.
was a tendency in a number of the 23 cantons to
In Sardinia, Victor Emmanuel I was forced to
abdicateon March 12, 1821, and a constitution
liberalize their constitutions. This tendency may
have been encouraged by the fact that Switzer-
was worked out for the nation, but within a
land had become a haven for those prominent
month, Austrian troops had put an end to that,
political figures who, for one reason or another,
too.
fled their own countries.
In 1831, after the news of successful rebellions
in France and Belgium, there were risings in
Modena, Parma, and the Papal States, and all
were put down by Austria. A quiet of despera- AUSTRIA
tion was restored throughout the peninsula. Austria continued to be the fount of reaction for
opera continued to be preeminent.
Italian central Europe. While
could do nothing about
it
Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848) wrote 75 operas of the July Revolution in France, or the Belgian
which Lucia di Lammermoor, written in 1835, and breakaway, largely because of British opposition,
La Fille du Regiment, written in 1840, are the most itkept a tight hold on Italy and Germany, and,
popular. The operas of Vincenzo Bellini (1801- of course, labored to keep Austria and its domin-
1835) include Norma, written in 1831. ions totally free of liberalism. Metternich's sys-
tem had declined a bit after the Congress of
Verona, since no further congresses were held,
PAPACY and since Prussia was increasingly aspiring to be
The Papacy had been as frightened by the French the leader of that portion of Germany outside
Revolution and the Napoleonic wars as the sec- Austria, but Metternich's grip was still effective.
ular monarchs. The Popes, too, turned conser- Francis on March 2, 1835, having
I died
vative and participated in the reactionary policies reigned 43 years, and having been the last Holy
common at this time. Leo XII (1760-1829), who Roman Emperor. He was succeeded by his son,
became Pope in 1823, in addition to being op- who reigned as Ferdinand I (1793-1875), and
1820 TO 1840 349
who was feeble-minded. Under him, Metternich versity as a way of maintaining their prestige, led
continued to be the real ruler of Austria. to an active scholarship that often rose above the
The Hungarian-born mathematician, Janos reactionary tendencies of the time, so that Ger-
Bolyai (1802-1860), worked out a non-Euclidean many came to dominate the advance of science
geometry in 1823, a revolutionary generalization during the nineteenth Century.
of a field in which Euclid had been venerated as Among German scientists of the period were
absolute truth for 2000 years. However, Bolyai's Georg Simon Ohm who, in 1827,
(1789-1854),
work was not published until 1831. demonstrated "Ohm's Law," which related cur-
rent intensity, voltage, and resistance. Friedrich
Wilhelm Bessel (1784-1846) was the first to deter-
PRUSSIA mine the distance of a star. Justus von Liebig
One Germany a jig-
of the difficulties of having (1803—1873) developed methods for the elemen-
saw puzzle of independent states, some of them tary analysis of organic materials in 1831. Fried-
quite small, was that each one would set customs rich Wohler (1800-1882) was the first, in 1828, to
duties in an attempt to raise revenues for itself. synthesize an organic compound out of inorganic
This choked trade and commerce and worked for precursors. Matthias Jakob Schleiden (1804-1881)
the harm Beginning in 1819, Prussia en-
of all. and Theodor Ambrose Schwann (1810-1882), be-
couraged the existence of a customs union (a tween them, showed, in 1838 and 1839, that all
"Zollverein"); that is, a kind of free-trade area living things were made up of cells.
within Germany among all the states that joined. In the field of literature, the aged Goethe com-
In the following two decades, the Zollverein pleted the rather difficult second part of Faust in
spread to include almost all of Germany outside 1832. Heinrich Heine (1797— 1856) wrote lyrics
of Austria and, within it, Prussia was the obvious thathave been popular in Germany ever since,
leader. including "The Two Grenadiers" and "The Lor-
This led to a feeling that there ought to be elei." Carlvon Clausewitz (1780-1831), who had
German unity in other ways; that Germany been captured at the Battle of Jena and who had
ought be a nation like France or Great Britain.
to fought on the Russian side against Napoleon in
The July Revolution in France rather encouraged 1812, made his fame with one of the best-known
this kind of view which looked toward change, books on military science. On War, published
but, on the whole, reaction continued to prevail. posthumously in 1833.
Thus, when
William IV of Britain died, and Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847) composed his
Victoria became Queen, the dynastic connection ever-popular overture to "The Midsummer
with Hanover was broken after a century and a Night's Dream" in 1826 when he was only 17. He
quarter. A woman could not be King of Hanover. also wrote his Italian Symphony in 1833, and a
Ernest Augustus (1771-1851), a younger brother variety of other works. Giacomo Meyerbeer
became King of Hanover. He
of Victoria's father, (1791-1864) wrote operas both in German and in
set up a system of absolutism which was unpop- French.
ular among Germans generally, but it persisted
because Metternich supported it, and persuaded
Prussia to support it, too. DENMARK
On June 7, 1840, Frederick William III of Prus- Frederick VI of Denmark swam against the reac-
siadied after a reign of 43 years, which included tionary tide, introducing a liberalizing breath of
the humiliations of 1807 and the revolt of 1813. air into the land, especially after the July Revo-
His son succeeded as Frederick William IV (1795- lution in France. He set up provincial assemblies
1861). and began a system of representative govern-
The existence of many separate states in Ger- ment. He died on December 3, 1839, and was
many, each of which tended to establish a Uni- succeeded by his son, who reigned as Christian
VIII (1786-1848). Under him, the pace of liberal- enemy any nation at any time regardless of
in
ism slowed. whether this would do Russia any good or not.
Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) was Nicholas's reign opened with another war,
Denmark's greatest writer of the period, and his when Persia attacked Russia's new Transcauca-
fairy tales, which began to be published in 1835, sian territories in 1825. The Russians counterat-
became, and remained, world-famous. They in- tacked, won victories, and, at the peace treaty on
cluded such deathless classics as "The Ugly February 22, 1828, gained new Transcaucasian
Duckling," "The Princess and the Pea," "The territories, including portions of Armenia. After
Emperor's Clothes," "The Nightingale," and so this, Persia made no further efforts to engage Eu-
on. ropean powers in war.
There was also a brief war between Russia and
the Ottoman Empire in 1828 and 1829 in connec-
SWEDEN tion with a Greek revolt.
Throughout this period, Charles XIV, the former The real test came in Poland, however. After
General Bernadotte, was King of Sweden. Al- Russia had absorbed most of the Grand Duchy of
though in early life he had been a liberal French- Warsaw, had given the Poles a certain amount
it
man of Revolutionary era, he was a

the of self-rule, in theory. The Tsar was not Tsar in
conservative king and fell in with the reactionary Poland, but merely the "King of Poland." Con-
mood of the times. He played the role of an ab- stantine, Nicholas's elder brother, ruled as com-
solute monarch as nearly as he might. Neverthe- mander in chief of the Polish forces, and though
less, he kept the peace and Sweden prospered he ruled with a heavy hand, he rather sympa-
under his rule. thized with the Poles. He
married a Polish
During his reign, in 1832, the Gota Canal, woman and it was partly for that reason that he
which cut across southern Sweden from Gote- had given up the throne of Russia.
borg to Stockholm, was completed. The Poles, however, dreamed of indepen-
dence, and this dream was excited by the July
Revolution in France. They had the idea that a
RUSSIA Revolutionary France might come to their aid,
Alexander I died on December 13, 1825. He had and they were horrified at a report that Nicholas
no children, but he did have two younger broth- was considering the use of Polish troops to sup-
ers: Constantine (1779-1831), and Nicholas press the French revolt.
(1796-1855). Constantine was the actual heir, but On November 29, 1830, the Poles rose. They
he had no desire for the job and, in 1822, had fought well and fiercely, but they had no help
renounced it in favor of Nicholas. and could not withstand Russia by themselves.
The renunciation was kept secret, however, The Russians drove the Poles back and took War-
and, on December 26, 1825, there was an upris- saw on September 8, 1831. Constantine died in
ing on the part of some of the military in favor of the course of the revolt, a victim of an epidemic
Constantine, who was thought to show signs of of cholera that swept Europe at this time.
liberalism. This "Decembrist rebellion" was The result of this revolt was that Poland lost
promptly crushed by Nicholas, who showed no its privileged status and was made an integral
signs of liberalism at all, and who reigned as part of Russia. It was subject, therefore, to a pro-
Nicholas I. cess of "Russification." meant that
Still, it also
Nicholas I was the very personification of re- Nicholas, deeply involved in Poland, had to give
action and absolutism. He hated and feared lib- up any wild plans he might have had for repress-
eralism as Philip II of Spain had hated and feared ing liberal reforms in western Europe.
Protestantism two and a half centuries before. Reaction didn't prevail in Poland only, of
Like Philip, Nicholas felt it his duty to attack the course. All over Russia, censorship was clamped
1820 TO 1840 351
down, and the bureaucracy grew. The secret po-

lice flourished, with their main purpose
the GREECE
maintenance of autocracy and the crushing of Part of Russia's plan to inherit the Balkans from
dissent. The Orthodox Church, properly subser- the Ottoman Empire lay in the encouragement of
vient to the Tsar, was the only form of religion revolts, and the Balkan peoples were quite ready
supported, and the treatment of Jews grew more to be encouraged.
harsh. On October 5, 1821, the Greeks in the Morea
Yet one form of novelty can penetrate even the (the ancient Peloponnesus, where Sparta had
thickest curtain and the most merciless repres- been the strongest military power in the Greek
sion —
technological advance. Liberalism might world 22 centuries earlier) revolted, and slaugh-
not enter, but western technology did. The first tered every Turk they could find. The Turks
Russian railroad, from St. Petersburg to a sub- promptly returned the compliment by slaughter-
urb, was built in 1838. ing every Greek they could find.
And Russia's expansion to the west had
if
The Russians at once threatened the Ottoman
reached its end with the absorption of Finland Empire with war, but Metternich warned Alex-
and Poland, it still continued in the direction of ander I of the dangers of supporting rebellion
the fading Ottoman Empire and into the vacuum anywhere, even of Christians rebelling against
of central Asia north of Iran and Afghanistan. Muslims. Russia, therefore, backed off.
Russian enterprise swept even farther afield. The Greeks declared their independence on
A Russian exploring expedition under Fabian January 13, 1822, even without Russian help, but
Gottlieb Bellingshausen (1778-1852) circled the they had a rough time of it. They had to face the
world in Antarctic waters and discovered two Ottoman forces, who had the help of the power-
frozen islands, "Peter I Island" and "Alexander I ful Muhammad and they made
Ali of Egypt,
Island" in 1820 and 1821. This was the first land things worse by fighting among themselves. By
to be found south of the Antarctic Circle. 1826, it looked as though the Greek revolt might
Russia was backward in science; however, in be crushed.
1829, Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevski (1792-1856) Christian Europe, however, not only thought
worked out a system of non-Euclidean geometry of the Greeks as Christians, but also thought of
independently of the Hungarian mathematician, them as the heirs of the ancient Greeks who had
Bolyai. Lobachevski did his work after Bolyai, devised the culture that Europe had inherited. It
but published first, and usually gets the credit for was the Greeks against the Persians once again;
the discovery.The Estonian-born Karl Ernst von itwas Marathon and Thermopylae. A wave of
Baer (1792-1876) discovered the mammalian egg pro-Greek feeling was sweeping over the Euro-
in 1827 and published a book on the subject in pean intellectual classes. Lord Byron went to
1828, which founded the modern science of em- Greece to help them fight, and he died there.
bryology. In the end, the European governments could
In this period the greatest Russian poet was not Even Russia felt its appetite for expan-
resist.
Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin (1799-1837), sion overcoming its theoretical objections to re-
who wrote Eugene Onegin in 1833 and The Queen bellion.Great Britain did not want Russia to act
of Spades in 1834. Second only to Pushkin as a alone, so it joined in, more to keep an eye on
Romantic poet was Mikhail Yurevich Lermontov Russia than anything else.
(1814-1841). Both Pushkin and Lermontov died There was a strong Turkish-Egyptian fleet at
in duels. Nicolai Vasilievich Gogol (1809-1852) Navarino on the western shore of the Morea. On
was a novelist who wrote "The Inspector Gen- October 20, 1827, a combined British-Russian
eral" in 1836. In music, therewas Mikhail Iva- fleet and quickly destroyed it.
challenged it
novich Glinka (1804-1857) who, in 1836, wrote A In 1828, Russia declared war on the Ottoman
Life for the Tsar, the first important Russian opera. Empire and advanced nearly to Constantinople,
but her armies were by then badly weakened by opening of the Red Sea as a military base for her-
disease, and she did not try to take the city. At self to protect those communications. The British
the Treaty of Adrianople, on September 14, 1829, then made it an important part of their foreign
Russia received the right to occupy the provinces policy to safeguard the Ottoman empire from
of Moldavia and Wallachia (making up much of Russia.
the modern Rumania). On July 1, 1839, Mahmud II died andwas suc-
Greece was declared independent by the ceeded by his son who reigned as Abdulmecid I
treaty, but was given boundaries that included (1828-1861).
very little space more than the Morea. By now,
Serbia had also virtual independence, and so did
Moldavia and Wallachia. PERSIA
By this time, Persia was not a truly independent
nation. It could maintain its existence only by
OTTOMAN EMPIRE walking a tightrope between Russia and Great
It was clear to Sultan Mahmud II that the Otto- Britain.
man military could no longer serve the Empire. The tightrope was sometimes dangerous. The
He tried to form a new kind of army corps to British were penetrating Afghanistan, and so
replace the Janissaries. When the Janissaries rose Russia persuaded Persia to invade Afghanistan
in revolt at this, he had loyal troops bombard in 1837. The attack was a failure and, the next
their barracks and the Constantinopolitan mob year, under British pressure, Persia gave up the
gladly did the rest. Anywhere from 6000 to invasion.
10,000 Janissaries were slaughtered. They ceased
to be a power in the Ottoman Empire after four
centuries of existence. AFGHANISTAN
This, in however, did not help the Ot-
itself, Afghanistan was also forced to walk a tightrope
toman government. It turned out to be helpless, between Russia and Great Britain. The important
not only with respect to the Christian European Afghanistani ruler of the time was Dost Mo-
powers, but also to their own too-powerful sub- hammed (1793-1863), who had taken the throne
ject, Muhammad Ali of Egypt, whose son, Ibra- in 1826 and whom the British did not trust. They
him (1789-1848), proved to be an excellent felt he was too pro-Russian and tried to replace
military leader. him with Shah Shoja (1780-1842), who had ruled
In return for his services in the course of the over Afghanistan a generation before.
Greek revolt, Muhammad Ali, in 1832, de- through their coup.
In 1839, the British carried
manded under his jurisdic-
that Syria be placed Dost Mohammed was captured and sent into im-
tion. The Ottoman government refused, and prisonment in India, and Shah Shoja ascended
Ibrahim swept through Syria and far into Asia the throne.
Minor by the end of the year.
The Ottoman ruling house might have been
overthrown but once again Russia interfered, at WEST AFRICA
which western Europe also interfered to prevent British expeditions fought the Ashanti, begin-
Russia from having it all its own way. Hostilities ning in 1824. It was not until 1831 that they were
were ended when the European powers induced securely in possession of the coast, which came
the Sultan to let Muhammad Ali have Syria. to be known "Gold Coast."
as the
Meanwhile, the British were becoming more The British explorer, Alexander Gordon Laing
anti-Russian. They resented Russian expansion (1793-1826), reached Timbuktu on August 1,
into the Balkans and into Central Asia, feeling 1826. He was the first European to reach that
that this threatened their communications with city, and he was killed there.
India. Great Britain secured Aden at the southern Meanwhile, philanthropic American groups
1820 TO 1840 353
had sent liberated slaves back to Africa. There, in fundamentalism in reaction to the introduction of
1822, they settled well west of the Gold Coast western ideas. They fought the Sikhs between
and named the settlement Monrovia, after James 1826 and 1831, and lost, but remained anti-West-
Monroe, who was then fifth president of the ern.
United States. It was the nucleus of a nation that
came to be called Liberia (from the Latin word for
“freedom,"), and it was the only portion of the BURMA
African continent that was never, at any time, Burma was expanding eastward into Siam and
controlled by any European nation. westward into India. In 1824, the British, defend-
ing India, fought the "First Burmese War." The
British had won the war by 1826, and took over
SOUTHERN AFRICA the Burmese coast.
In this period, Shaka (1787-1828) was supreme
over the Zulu nation. A brilliant fighter, he had
established new tactics and new weapons and SIAM
had made of his army an irresistable force that Rama III (d. 1851) became king of Siam in 1824
lorded it over a wide area of southernmost Africa and opened the nation, West-
at least a crack, to
in the early 1820s. His method of proceeding, ern influence. He signed a trade treaty with
however, was to destroy to an even greater ex- Great Britain in 1826 and one with the United
tent, proportionally, than had been the practice States in 1833. He spent most of his reign trying
of Genghis Khan or Tamerlane. to expand over the Indochinese peninsula, and
Finally, his deadly insistence on executions in in fighting off Burma. By 1829, he was in control
great numbers, and for little or no reason, of Laos, but had lost Cambodia to Vietnam.
aroused sufficient fear to bring about his assassi-
nation on September 22, 1828.
The old Dutch settlers of South Africa, the INDONESIA
"Boers" (from a Dutch word for "farmers"), were In 1830, the Dutch put down the last native revolt
at odds with the dominating British, who had against their rule.
taken over in Napoleonic times. They decided to
move northward, away from the areas controlled
by the British, where they might establish realms CHINA
of their own. The had found it very profitable to trade
British
This they did in the "Great Trek" between with China in opium. The demand for opium
1835 and 1837. They could carry this through in was great and the payment, in silver, was wel-
reasonable safety because the massacres of Shaka come. The Chinese government, under Min-ning
had largely emptied the region, and because, in (1782-1850), who had become the sixth emperor
the aftermath of Shaka's death, the Zulus were of the Manchu dynasty in 1821, frowned on this,
fighting among themselves, and were paying lit- for China could not endure the harm that opium
tle attention to the Boers. did its population, nor could it long maintain the
drain of the silver payments.
Both the effect of the drugs and the drain of
INDIA silver helped accelerate the decline that China
continued
In India in this period, British control was now experiencing. Nevertheless, the British
to grow firmer, and various Western innovations were firm in maintaining the opium trade for
such as roads, canals, and steamships were intro- their profit and were even ready to use force, if
duced. Laws were revised, and education on necessary.
Western lines was introduced. Looking back on this from our vantage point,
The Muslims of northern India felt the pull of and knowing the harm drugs can do, we must
Stand appalled at British behavior in this connec- states. The free states were also wealthier
tion. (though the slave states couldn't get it through
their heads that this was because they were free
states) and could therefore industrialize them-
JAPAN selves instead of clinging to low-profit, slave-run
Japan's policy of isolation was becoming a source agriculture.
of great irritation to the west. Whalers and other Still, many of the free-state representatives
seafaring men were sometimes wrecked on the were in no mood to upset things by insisting on
Japanese coast, and the sailors were then treated the freeing of southern slaves,and the American
barbarously by the Japanese. It was felt that some presidents were equally intent on keeping things
sort of contact would have to be made with the quiet, so that, in general, the slave states, stub-
Japanese government to put an end to this prac- bornly set on keeping their way of life, were little
tice, but all attempts at this time were without disturbed. Moreover, representation in the
success. United States Senate was two for each state, re-
In 1837, the American ship Morrison tried to gardless of population, so that as long as the
enter Japanese ports, but was driven off by hos- number matched those of the free,
of slave states
tile action. the slave states could feel secure, and didn't have
to depend entirely on the lukewarmness of the
free-state representatives.
UNITED STATES In 1820, however, there were two possible
Until this time, the United States and the colo- states applying for entrance. There was Maine in
nies that had preceded had been of interest to
it the far northeast. It had been part of Massachu-
Europe. In colonial times, it had participated in setts, although it was separated from the latter
European wars. The War of American Indepen- by a corner of New Hampshire, and it now
dence had become a European war, and, in the wanted to be a state on its own, and Massachu-
Napoleonic era, the United States had been an setts was willing to allow this. As part of Massa-
important neutral and had ended by fighting chusetts, Maine had been free and there was no
Great Britain. question that it would remain free as an indepen-
After the war however, the United
of 1812, dent state.
States retreated behind the ocean and concerned The other applicant for statehood was Mis-
itself only on occasion with European matters. souri, which was borderline geographically and
What really began to preoccupy the United could be either free or slave — but the slave states
States totally was the issue of Black slavery. The were absolutely determined that it be slave in
northern states had by this time outlawed slavery order to keep the balance.
within their borders —
an easy task since they Eventually, on March 3, 1820, the "Missouri
were industrial and commercial states who Compromise" was reached. Maine entered the
needed skilled laborers rather than slaves, and Union on March 15, 1820 as a free state, while
whose agricultural areas were turning increas- Missouri entered as a slave state on August 10,
ingly to machinery rather than to slaves. The 1821. Now there were 24 states, 12 free and 12
southern states, however, were primarily agri- slave.
cultural and found slaves particularly useful on Furthermore, any new state north of the lati-
the cotton plantations. tude of Missouri's southern border would be
By 1820, there were 22 states, 11 free and 11 free,and any state south of that latitude would
slave. The free states, while smaller in area, were be slave. The land available to the north was
larger in population, and this disproportion was much larger,be sure, but the slave states
to
growing. It meant that the number of represen- looked forward to additional annexations of ter-
tatives of the free states in the lower house of ritory in the south.
Congress was greater than those of the slave For the moment, the matter seemed settled.
1820 TO 1840 355
but anyone whothought about it would realize Adams in 1824, was triumphantly elected as sev-
that the moral issues involved in slavery were so enth president of the United States. Until then,
great that the matter could never be really settled the party founded by Thomas Jefferson had been
in a civilized nation (especially one that prized first the "Republican" and then the "Democratic-
itself on its "freedom") short of emancipation. Republican" party. Jefferson, Madison, Monroe,
Meanwhile, the nation reinforced its isolation and John Quincy Adams had all been Republican
with what was called "The Monroe Doctrine," or Democratic-Republican. With Jackson, how-
because it was enunciated by President James ever, the name of the party became simply the
Monroe on December 2, 1823. It was, however, "Democratic Party," and it has kept that name
written by the Secretary of State, John Quincy ever since.
Adams (1767-1848), the son of John Adams, who Jackson was indeed an example of a true Dem-
had been the second president. ocrat, of "the common man." He was the first
This came at a time when the Congress of Ve- president not to be of the plantation or commer-
rona had sent French troops into Spain to crush cial aristocracy. He was
western frontierman of
a
the rebellion there, and it seemed possible that limited education, but he was intelligent and
troops might also be sent to the Americas to re- forceful, knew what he wanted, and went after
store the rebellious Spanish colonies to their al- it.
legiance. There was trouble north and south for him.

In the Monroe
Doctrine, the United States for- The commercial north wanted high tariffs that
bade any interference anywhere in the Western would make it possible for them to sell their
Hemisphere by any European nation. The United products at high prices without fear of competi-
States would not, in return, interfere in Europe. tion with Europe's cheaper products. The agri-
It is doubtful that the United States had any cultural south wanted low tariffs that would
right to tell other nations what to do, but it was allow them to buy cheaper products from
a perfectly safe attitude to take. Great Britain had abroad.
already made it clear that it would not allow in- In 1828, a very high tariff was passed, and the
terference with the newly free nations, and since south was so indignant at this that South Caro-
no one would try to argue with the British navy, lina even threatened to "secede" (i.e., to leave
the United States was free to make its pro- the Union). Andrew Jackson promised the use of
nouncement. force if they tried, and there can be no doubt that
Meanwhile, the United States was growing he meant it.
rapidly in population and prosperity. The Erie Fortunately, cool heads carried the day. A
Canal was opened in 1825. It connected the Great new and lower tariff was passed and the contro-
Lakes with the Hudson River and it made New versy was resolved.
York City the nation's greatest port and its Another economic problem was the Bank of
most populous city. The first public railroad, the United States. United States eco-
It lent the
the Baltimore and Ohio, began operations on nomic stability, but it did so on terms that, again,
July 4, 1828. pleased the commercial institutions and dis-
What's more, the notion of democracy, at least pleased the farmers. In this case, Jackson was on
for male white people, was gaining force. In the side of the farmers and he managed to de-
1824, the presidential election was the first in stroy the Bank of the United States.
which the popular vote was important nation- The result was a sharp depression that came
wide. John Quincy Adams did not gain a major- only after he had left office, so that it was the
ity of that popular vote but was declared elected following president, Martin Van Buren (1782-
as sixth President by Congressional action, in ac- 1862), the eighth, who had to suffer the results
cordance with the Constitution. and be denied reelection.
This offended many, and in 1828 Andrew The question of the Bank led to the formation
Jackson, who had garnered more votes than of a new anti-Jackson party, the "Whig party,"
in memory of the British party that was just los- important religious movement to be entirely
ing its name. American in origin.
Nor was the slavery issue settled. In the Sen- The greatest American scientist since Franklin
ate, the standoff continued. Arkansas entered was Joseph Henry (1797-1878). He was the first,
the Union as a slave state on June 15, 1836, while in 1831, to construct powerful and practical elec-
Michigan entered as a free state on January 26, trom.agnets. That same year he invented the elec-
1837. That made it 26 states, 13 slave and 13 free. tric motor and, in 1835, the electric relay. Second
Public opinion was polarizing, however. In only to Faraday, Henry paved the way for our
the free states, an “abolitionist" movement (fa- modern electrical age. Samuel Guthrie (1782-
voring the immediate abolition of slavery with- 1848) discovered chloroform in 1831.William
out compensation to the slave-owners) was Beaumont (1785-1853) published a careful study
beginning to grow stronger. An outstanding ab- of stomach function in 1833, since he had had the
olitionist was William Lloyd Garrison (1805- good fortune to initiate a long-time study of a
1879), who founded the abolitionist paper. The patient who survived a gunshot wound that left
Liberator, in 1831.Another was Wendell Phillips him with a natural abdominal opening to his
(1811-1884). Both were active in Boston, a center stomach.
of abolitionist sentiment. In the Middle West, In technology, Cyrus Hall McCormick (1809-
there was Elijah Parish Lovejoy (1802-1837), who 1884) patented a mechanical reaper in 1834. This
was killed by a mob in Illinois in 1837. was adopted widely in the farming states of the
Although the abolitionists were never great in north, where there were no slaves to make labor
number, they were loud and articulate and they so cheap as to seem to obviate the need for ma-
sent a thrill of horror through the slave states, chines. It marked the beginning of the industrial-
which consistently exaggerated their numbers ization of agriculture and strengthened the free
and power. states as opposed to the slave states.
The southern slave-owners suffered one of the Charles Goodyear (1800-1860), through a for-
curses of their position in their fear of slave in- tunate accident, found in 1839 that rubber,
surrections and the boundless revenge of those heated with sulfur, improved its properties
they so grossly misused. Actually, such insurrec- greatly. Such "vulcanized rubber" did not turn
tions were surprisingly rare; however, in Au- stiff and brittle in the cold, or soft and sticky in
gust, 1831, a slave, Nat Turner (1800-1831), led a the heat. The vast present-day uses of rubber
revolt of 75 blacks, killing 50 whites altogether. would not be possible without Goodyear's dis-
The rebellion was snuffed out at once and an covery.
orgy of hangings followed, but the thrill of terror Samuel Colt (1814-1862) patented the revolver
lingered with every slavemaster. or "six-shooter" in 1836, and this greatly in-
United States saw the birth
In this period, the creased the deadliness of sidearms.
of a new religious sect. Joseph Smith (1805-1844) In 1836, the Swedish-born John Ericsson
reported visions, and maintained that on Sep- (1803-1889) invented the screw propellor, which
tember 22, 1827, near Palmyra, New York, he enabled ships to be steam-driven by a device
had found golden plates inscribed with “Egyp- under the waterline, rather than by a huge, vul-
tian" writing. by mystical means,
Translated nerable paddle-wheel along the sides. The screw-
these became the Book of Mormon, published in propellor made steam-driven warships a practi-
1830. It purported to be a history of Jews who cal reality. In the 1830s also, "Lucifer matches"
had reached America while fleeing from the
Babylonian conquest 24 centuries earlier. Those
were coming into use — pieces of
with chemicals that could be made to burst into
wood tipped
who believed this formed "The Church of Jesus flame through friction, thus doing away with the
Christ of Latter-Day Saints," or, as they were flint-and-steel, and similar devices, that had been
popularly termed, "Mormons." It was the first used for thousands of years.
1820 TO 1840 357
An American navigator, Charles Wilkes satisfiedwith the British. Trouble arose between
(1798-1877), explored the Antarctic coast in Jan- the popularly elected legislatures of the land and
uary 1840, as others had done before him. the British crown-appointed rulers.
Wilkes, however, grasped the fact that he was In 1837, there were rebellions in Montreal and
sighting a continent, rather than merely this or in Toronto, the latter being led by William Lyon
that bit of land. Mackenzie (1795-1861). They weren't serious
In this period. New England experienced the problems, and the authorities could have han-
beginning of a golden age of literature. William dled them easily, but American volunteers who
Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) published a volume of felt anti-British flocked in to help. In the process,
poetry in 1821 that made him the first American an American managed to be killed by a loyal Ca-
poet to attract European attention. Henry Wads- nadian who had the bad judgment to boast about
worth Longfellow (1807-1882) wrote “The Psalm it while in New York State. The Canadian was
of Life" in 1839, the best-known of his early arrested and murder. Great Britain de-
tried for
works. Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894) manded he be freed, but the United States said it
wrote “Old Ironsides" in 1830, a poem credited couldn't tell a state what to do. Fortunately, the
with saving that ship from being dismantled. The man on was acquitted and
trial blew over. it all
leading light of this New
England school was These small and unimportant revolts might
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882), who pub- have been followed by other worse ones, but
lished his first essays in 1836. Outside of New Great Britain had learned from its earlier mis-
England was Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), who takes —
something nations rarely do.
published “To Helen" in 1831 and “To One in On May 20, new
1838, the British appointed a
Paradise" in 1834. governor, John George Lambton, Earl of Durham
On a lesser scale was Clement Clarke Moore (1792-1840), who treated the rebels leniently and
(1779-1863) who, in 1823, published “A Visit who, on February 11, 1839, wrote a report rec-
from St. Nicholas," a poem that forever fixed the ommending that Canada be allowed a form of
picture of Santa Claus in American minds; and representative government. This “Durham re-
John Howard Payne (1791-1852), whose fame port" was treated seriously, and that meant that
rests entirely on one haunting poem, “Home, Canada was remain loyal to the
to British mon-
Sweet Home," written in 1823. archy to this day.
The true American literary phenomenon of
the age, however, was James Fenimore Cooper
(1789-1851), whose novels of pioneers and Na- TEXAS
tive Americans were infinitely popular in Europe When Mexico gained its independence in 1821,
as well as in the United States. His most success- itsnortheasternmost province, Texas, was al-
ful book. The Last of the Mohicans, was published most uninhabited. Even as Mexico was becoming
in 1826. independent, however, Americans were begin-
Popular in another way were the McGuffy ning to migrate into the province; and, by 1834,
Readers put out by William Holmes McGuffey there were 20,000 Americans in Texas as com-
(1800-1873). Out of these, generations of Ameri- pared with only 5000 Mexicans.
can children were taught, and of them at least In 1831, Mexico had abolished slavery, but
120 million copies were sold. most of the Americans were from the slave
states, had brought their slaves with them, and
intended to keep them.
CANADA Mexico's president, Santa Anna, was stronglv
After the War of 1812, Canada was never again opposed to allowing the Americans to do as they
to be really in danger from the United States. wished in Mexican territory. Since he was clearlv
This meant that it could concentrate on being dis- planning to take action, the Americans [led by
Samuel (“Sam") Houston (1793-1863), a recent achieving complete surprise. Yelling "Remember
immigrant] declared themselves independent of the Alamo," the Texans virtually destroyed the
Mexico on March 2, 1836. Mexican forces in 20 minutes. They took Santa
Meanwhile, however, Santa Anna had led a Anna prisoner and he had no choice but to sign
Mexican army of about 4000 men northward and, a treaty recognizing Texan independence on May
on February 23, 1836, had begun a siege of the 14, 1836.
Alamo, an old chapel in San Antonio that was The United States recognized Texan indepen-
occupied by 187 American Texans. This small dence on March 3, 1837; France did so in October
group of men held off Santa Anna's army for 12 1839; and Great Britain in November 1840.
days and died to the last man. Texas wanted to join the' United States, and
Sam Houston then gathered a force of 750 men many in the United States wanted that, too, but
and lured Santa Anna into pursuing him with important voices in the free states made them-
1600. Houston retreated to the San Jacinto River selves heard against it. They didn't want any
and, on April 21, 1836, waited until the Mexican more slave territory in the United States, so that
troops were enjoying a siesta and fell upon them. the question of annexation hung fire.
1840 TO 1860
government had not learned from that. Guizot
FRANCE simply forbade the banquet.
The leading political figure in France during the Thereupon, the barricades went up in Paris.
1840s was Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot The people found weapons, and the fighting
(1787-1874). Foreign minister and later premier, began, as the authorities vainly tried to restore
he was no autocrat. He believed in representative order. On February 24, Louis Philippe abdicated
government, but felt, as the British Tories of the and his 18-year reign was at an end. He was the
time did, that only the well-to-do had enough of last French king to have been descended from
a stake in society to be trusted with the vote. To Hugh Capet, who had come to the throne eight
vote, in other words, one had to pay a certain and a half centuries earlier.
minimum in taxes. Guizot's attitude was that A "Second Republic" was proclaimed and the
anyone could become eligible to vote if he merely question arose as to exactly what form it would
took the trouble to become rich. take. There were moderate republicans, who
meant, though, that those who were not
It didn't want anything very different from what
rich felt uncared for, and in hard times that was they had had under Louis Philippe, but there
particularly true. France was industrializing itself was also Louis Blanc (1811-1882), who was a So-
in the 1840s and was doing well; however, in cialist and wanted "work-
to see factories (or
1846, a sharp depression hit France, and the de- shops") established that were run by the workers
mand for an extension of the franchise and an themselves. In fact, such workshops were estab-
end to corruption and bribery of legislators rose lished, but it was done hurriedly and ineffi-
steeply in intensity. ciently, and the conservatives made every effort
Banquets were arranged in early 1848 at which to insure that they would not work and they —
such demands would be made, and a particularly didn't. [Another radical of the time was Pierre
large one was arranged for February 22, 1848. Joseph Proudhon (1809-1865), who is considered
The British had defused such feelings by passing the father of anarchism, since he was opposed to
the Reform Bill 16 years earlier, but the French all forms of government without exception.]
1840 TO 1860 359
The outcry of the leftists frightened the better- coup on December 2, 1851 (the date having been
off enormously. For the first time, the conserva- carefully chosen as the 46th anniversary of the
tives had cause to fear the "Red menace" that — Battle of Austerlitz, Napoleon Ts greatest vic-
is, the Socialists (who had a red flag as their tory).
banner) — rather than that old faded bogie, the He madehimself dictator, used the troops to
Jacobins. repress demonstrations against him, and, on De-
On
June 23, when street-fighting was becom- cember had a plebiscite set up, in which the
21,
ing fierce, they called on the army. Troops under French people would vote for or against him. (In
Louis Eugene Cavaignac (1802-1857), whose fa- doing this, he invented all the tactics of persuad-
ther had voted for the execution of Louis XVI, ing and forcing and tricking people into voting
suppressed the leftists bloodily, and this was fol- for him would be used by later dictators.) He
that
lowed by a strong reaction that might just as eas- . obtained 92% of the vote.
ily have existed under Charles X, one that was A new constitution was promulgated on Jan-
complete with press censorship and the rough uary 14, 1852, which put all power in the hands
crushing of dissent. of Bonaparte and made him virtually absolute
A new was devised calling for a
constitution ruler of the nation. It was a tiny step from that to
strong president, and an election was arranged. having himself announced as Emperor on De-
Two candidates ran. One was Cavaignac, who cember 2, 1852, the 48th anniversary of the day
would not have been a bad choice, but his treat- on which Napoleon I had become Emperor.
ment of the riots had earned him the name of Thus, France came under the "Second Em-
"butcher" and many would not vote for him pire" and Bonaparte called himself Napoleon III.
under any circumstances. Opposed to him was Napoleon II was the title now given the son of
Louis Napoleon Bonaparte (1808-1873), nephew Napoleon I, who had never ruled, and who had
of the Emperor Napoleon, and son of Louis Bo- died in 1832; so that, by Napoleonic mythology,
naparte, who had been King of Holland and had Napoleon III had already been emperor for 20
fled the country rather than harm it. He was also years when he was crowned.
the grandson of the Empress Josephine, since his Napoleon III was intelligent enough to do all
mother was Josephine's daughter by her first he could to promote prosperity. He reorganized
marriage. banking, initiated a system of public works that
Louis Napoleon was a man of limited ability, created jobs, and passed laws to improve the lot
especially as compared with his famous uncle. of workmen in order to lessen their enthusiasm
He had taken part in the revolts in Italy in 1830 for socialism. In particular, he beautified Paris
and 1831, and had twice fecklessly attempted and built long, straight boulevards. (There was
coups in France in 1836 and in 1840. He had considerable sense to this. Narrow and crooked
failed at everything, but now his opportunity streets are easily barricaded and made to order
had arrived. He had, magic name for
after all, a for street fighting. On a long, straight boulevard,
those Frenchmen who thought back nostalgically the bullets unimpeded and a mob is easily
fly
to military "glory," and who had not had to live suppressed.) Napoleon III also made concessions
through it, or who had a very selective memory. to the Church, so that he was sure of having the
On December 10, 1848, he was elected with 75% clerical party with him.
of the vote. In 1855, there was an International Exposition
Bonaparte then spent the next few years care- in Paris, akind of "World's Fair" in imitation of
fully repressing all and establish-
liberal activity the first such celebration four years earlier in
ing a more conservative government than Louis London. It was designed to display the progress
Philippe's had been. Since his term only ran for that France was making in technology and also,
four years and he was forbidden to succeed him- you may be sure, to serve as a showpiece for the
he tried to get that constitutional require-
self, glories of the Second Empire.
ment changed. When he failed, he carried out a On January 30, 1853, Napoleon III had mar-
ried aSpanish noblewoman, Eugenie de Montijo jected to an unaccounted-for gravitational pull.

(1826-1920), who became the Empress Eugenie. As a result, the planetNeptune was discovered.
She was beautiful, and made a fine appearance In literature, Victor Hugo was still writing, but
as the Empress, but had had a strict religious his outspoken opposition to Napoleon III (whom
upbringing and was a total enemy of liberalism. he aptly called "Napoleon the Little") forced him
The two had a child on March 16, 1856, who into exile. The most popular writer of the period
came to be known as the 'Trince Imperial," so was the extremely prolific Alexandre Dumas
that Napoleon III had provided himself with a (1802-1870), whose most successful novels were
successor. The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte
Napoleon III even managed to find a way to Cristo,both published in 1844. His son, also Al-
have a successful foreign policy, at least in his exandre Dumas (1824-1895), published La Dame
first decade. Where Louis Philippe had kept aux Camelias from which the opera La Traviata
the peace to the point where many Frenchmen was eventually derived.
had scorned him as pusillanimous, Napoleon Eugene Sue (1804-1857), who played an active
111 had to calm Europe and convince them that role in the Revolution of 1848, and who, like
another Napoleon did not mean another drench- Hugo, went into exile when Napoleon III came
ing of the continent with war. What he had to to —
power, wrote long novels socialistic, anti-
do was find a small war that would satisfy the clerical, and replete with scenes of poverty, such
glory-mongers at home without frightening every- as The Mysteries of Paris in 1843, and The Wander-
one abroad. ing ]eiv in 1845.
Therefore, he managed to join Great Britain in Romanticism of Dumas and
In contrast to the
a minor war against Russia in 1854, and then, in Sue, Gustave Flaubert (1821-1880) wrote realisti-
1859, engaged in minor war against Austria. By
a cally. His first novel, Madame Bovary, published
1860, he seemed to have done very well indeed in 1857, brought him before the court on the ac-
and was at the height of his popularity and pres- cusation of immorality. (He was acquitted.) Pros-
tige. per Merimee (1803-1870) wrote the play Carmen
In science during this period, Louis Pasteur in 1846, from which the opera was eventually
(1822-1895), who was one of the greatest
to be developed.
scientists in history, discovered by 1848 that crys- Hector Berlioz was still composing, writing
tals turning the plane of polarized light were the music for The Damnation of Faust in 1846.
asymmetric in structure. This was a first step to- Charles Francis. Gounod (1818-1893) wrote an-
ward understanding the three-dimensional other operatic treatment of the legend Faust in
structure of molecules. 1859, and that is surely one of the most popular
In 1849, Armand Hippolyte Fizeau (1819- operas now extant. In a lighter mood, Jacques
1896) and Jean Bernard Leon Foucault (1819- Offenbach (1819-1880) wrote comic operas, such
1868) were the first to measure the speed of light as Orpheus in the Underworld, produced in 1859.
in laboratory settings, rather than through astro- Among French artists of the period were Jean
nomical observations. Foucault, in 1851, was the Francois Millet (1814-1875), whose best-known
first (believe it or not) to demonstrate that the paintings are perhaps The Angelus, The Gleaners,
Earth really rotated on its axis. and The Man with Another was Jean Bap-
the Hoe.
Claude Bernard (1813-1878) showed, in 1843, tiste Corot (1796-1875), whose paintings were
that digestion took place in the small intestine to Impressionistic. A writer about art who was well-
a greater extentthan in the stomach. In 1856, he known at this time was Theophile Gautier (1811-
discovered glycogen, a form of starch in the liver 1872).
of animals.
Urbain Jean Joseph Leverrier (1811-1877) cal-
culated the position of an undiscovered planet,
in 1846, from the fact that Uranus was being sub-
1840 TO 1860 361
liberals took heart. On March 18, Milan, the cap-

ITALY ital of Austrian Lombardy, rebelled. On
March
At the beginning of this period, in 1840, Austria 22, Venetia declared itself a republic, and Sardi-
was in complete control of Italy. The northeast- nia declared war on Austria.
ern portion, Lombardy and Venetia, were ac- Pope Pius IX declared himself to be neutral
tually part of the AustrianEmpire, and had been since the Church, being international, had to
so since the time of the Congress of Vienna. The hold itself above the struggle. This instantly lost
rest of Italy was under local rulers who were en- him all liberal Italian sympathy. He was forced to
tirely subservient to Austria. The only portion of grant some sort of constitution, but as Rome it-
Italy that had independence was Sardi-
a hint of selfbroke out in insurrection, he had to flee
nia in the northwest, and it had been beaten by Rome for Neapolitan territory on November 25.
Austria in 1830. That changed his view on things utterly. There-
Nevertheless, there were rising demands all after, through a long reign as Pope, he remained
over Italy for a united country under some form a hard-bitten conservative.
of representative
government. The loudest voice The Austrians, of course, were not idle. They
was that of Giuseppe Mazzini (1805-1872), who called upon one of their best generals, Joseph
had been conspiring for years to overthrow Radetzky (1766-1858), who had fought against
the various despotisms that were grinding Napoleon and who was now 82, but whose abil-
down Italy. He was in exile in England now, but ity was undimmed.
continued to try to spark rebellion in Italy in Radetsky strengthened the ''Quadrilateral,"
favor of a united, democratic Italian republic. four bases in Lombardy-Venetia that were too
Though he never succeeded, he kept the hope strong for the ill-equipped Italians to storm, and,
alive. at the appropriate time, struck out. On July 24-
That hope seemed to sharpen when Pius IX 25, 1848 (by which time the Naples revolt had
(1792-1878) became Pope on June 15, 1846. He collapsed), he fought the Sardinian army at Cus-
was known to be somewhat liberal and, after a tozza, on the western border of Venetia, and
series of reactionary Popes, he seemed to be a defeated it. With that, Radetsky reoccupied
breath of fresh air. He at once instituted a series Lombardy and laid siege to Venice.
of reforms, reducing censorship, declaring an For a while, there was an armistice, during
amnesty for political prisoners, and introducing which a Roman republic was proclaimed on Feb-
useful changes in financial and judicial proce- ruary 9, 1849, after the Pope had fled. Sardinia
dures. He even established a council of clerics to tried touse the quiet interval to get French help,
advise him. but the French were occupied with the disorders
Then, in 1848, matters came to a head. Partly, that had followed the 1848 upheaval.
the 1848 revolution France was to blame.
in Liberal pressure, however, forced Charles Al-
France had undergone ferment and had set Eu- bert of Sardinia to fight again, even without
rope ablaze in 1789 and in 1830. Now, in 1848, it French help, and, on March 23, 1849, Radetzky
did it for a third (and last) time. beat him even more decisively at the Battle of
Even before the overthrow of Louis Philippe, Novara in western Lombardy. Charles Albert
there were uprisings in the kingdom of Naples. was forced to resign in favor of his son, who
The despicably reactionary Ferdinand II tried to reigned as Victor Emmanuel 11 (1820-1878).
get Austrian help and, when he failed (for Aus- Only then did France send an expeditionary
tria was having internal troubles of its own), he force to Italy. That was not to oppose Austria,
was forced to grant a constitution. Constitutions however, but to support the Pope, because Pres-
were also granted in Tuscany and in Sardinia. ident Bonaparte felt the need to gain the support
When the 1848 revolution in France produced of French Catholics. The French destroyed the
effects in increasingly restless Austria and con- Roman and an embittered Pius IX
republic, re-
vulsed even that bastion of conservatism, Italian turned to Rome on April 12, 1850.
By then, all was over and Italy was again itand the Austrians retreated. On June 24, there
under the Austrian heel, exactly as before. was another battle at Solferino, near the Venetian
Yet not exactly, either. In Sardinia, Camillo border, and again there was an uninspiring
Benso, Count di Cavour (1810-1861) grew pow- melee in which the French got the better of it.
erful, becoming prime minister in 1852. He was It was clear, however, that there was nothing
a liberal who admired the British system of gov- Napoleonic about Napoleon Ill's war-making
ernment and wanted to introduce it to Sardinia. abilities, and, to his credit, Napoleon III realized
He wanted, too, to bring in improvements in ag- this fact. Also to his credit, he was sickened by
riculture, build railroads, bring about banking re- the bloodshed and was eager to make peace, es-
form, and so on. He also had his eyes fixed on pecially since the Quadrilateral lay ahead and
the problem of unifying Italy. It could be done Napoleon III rightly doubted his ability to win
only with French help, and Cavour meant to get against a stubborn Austrian defense there.
it. On Napoleon III met with the
July 11, then,
Thus, in 1855, he joined Great Britain and new, young Austrian Emperor and agreed on a
France in a war on Russia. Sardinia had no inter- peace. Lombardy was to go to Sardinia, and Aus-
est in the war itself and got nothing material out tria was to keep Venetia.
of it, but it gained good will from the two west- The process of the unification of Italy had
ern powers. It also gave him a chance, at the begun.
peace conference, of talking about the need for At this time in Italy, Giuseppe Fortunino Fran-
Italian unity. cesco Verdi (1813-1901) was writing what were,
Then, on January 14, 1858, there was an assas- as a group, the most popular operas ever pre-
sination attempt on Napoleon III and the Em- sented. Rigoletto was staged in 1851; II Trovatore
press Eugenie. An Italian radical named Felice in 1852; La Traviata in 1853; and he continued
Orsini (1819-1858), who had broken with Maz- writing through the end of the century.
zini and who may have been mentally disturbed, Animportant chemist of the time was Stanis-
threw bombs at the carriage carrying the royal lao Cannizzaro (1826-1910) who, in 1859, intro-
couple. The Emperor and Empress escaped, but duced Avogadro's hypothesis to the chemical
two people were killed and about a hundred world, something that made it possible to tackle
were wounded. Orsini was executed two months the problem of molecular structure with greater
later, but Napoleon III, who was no great hero, understanding.
was badly shaken. Between his anxiety to avoid Ascanio Sobrero (1812-1888) discovered nitro-
further attempts on his life, and his memory of glycerine in 1847. Recognizing its shattering ex-
his own younger days when he fought on the plosiveness and fearing itsuse for destructive
side of Italian rebels, he felt he had better help purposes, he engaged in no further research in
the Italians. He had a meeting with Cavour on that direction. It did not help, of course. Others
July 20, 1858, to make the necessary arrange- repeated the discovery and, being untroubled by
ments. idealistic concerns, pushed on.
In 1859, the Sardinians prepared for a fight
and needed a way of making the Austrians look
like the aggressors. This the Austrians supplied AUSTRIA
by demanding, on April 23, 1859, that Sardinia Italy's was not Austria's only problem.
unrest
demobilize. Sardinia refused, and the War of Ital- Hungary, which Austria had seized from the Ot-
ian Unification began. toman Empire a century and a half earlier, was
The French, under Napoleon III himself, in- seething as well, and increasingly resented the
vaded Lombardy at the side of the Sardinians heavy weight of Austrian control.
and, on June 4, 1859, there was a battle at Ma- This Hungarian nationalism was most effec-
genta, west of Milan. The generalship on both tively articulated by Lajos (Louis) Kossuth (1802-
sides was inept, but the French had the better of 1894). All through the 1840s, his speeches and
1840 TO 1860 363
writings kept Hungarians feverish. (Oddly olutions in France and but Hungary was
Italy,
enough, although he felt it wrong for Austrians right on his border. Here, at least, he could use
to dominate Hungarians, he insisted that Hun- his army to help him play the role he always
garians must dominate the minorities, such as longed for, that of policeman of the world in
Croats and Slovenes, within Hungary one of — favor of reaction. A Russian army moved into
the many occasions in which people are liberal Hungary, and by August 9, 1849, the last rem-
on their own behalf, but conservative where oth- nant of Hungarian resistance was crushed. Aus-
ers are concerned.) tria had survived its revolutionary unrest.
When news of the revolution of 1848 in France Thereafter, Austria tried to Germanize its em-
arrived, Kossuth's anti-Austrian eloquence grew pire by doing everything it could to discourage
sharper, and there were also demonstrations in the use of non-German languages and to down-
Vienna Metternich, that symbol of reac-
itself. play non-German culture.
tion, was forced to resign his posts and flee to Austria went on to play an ignoble part in the
England. (He returned to Vienna in 1851, and war that England and France were to conduct
lived quietly there till his death in 1859.) against Russia in 1855. Austria showed itself to
The Emperor, Ferdinand I, was obliged to be on the side of Russia's enemies only six years
grant a constitution on April 25, 1848, setting up after thankfully accepting Russian help in its own
representative government. The Czechs also de- troubles. However, though it didn't actually fight
manded representative government for them- in the war, Austria remained mobilized, and that
selves and, in June, held the first "Pan-Slav was a strain on its finances. Then, in 1859, there
congress." It stressed the equality of all peoples, was the disastrous war with France and Sardinia.
since Germans usually held an article of
it as Clearly, Austria was no longer dominant in cen-
faith, then and afterward, that Slavs were intrin- tral Europe.
sically inferior to themselves. In this Johann Strauss, the Elder
period,
The Austrian government, however, now (1804-1849) was popular in Vienna for his
gave power to Alfred Windischgratz (1787-1862), waltzes and marches, of which the most popular
a leader of the Austrian reactionaries, and he was was the "Radetzky March." He was destined to
equal to the occasion. He bombarded Prague and be far outshone by his son and namesake, how-
put an end to the Czech uprising on June 17, ever. From Hungary, there was Franz Liszt
1848. Then on October 31, 1848, he bombarded (1811-1886), a composer and pianist, best re-
Vienna into submission, even as the revolt in membered for his "Second Hungarian Rhap-
Italy was put down by Radetzky. sody."
Windischgratz saw the need for a new young The Hungarian physician, Ignaz Philipp Sem-
Emperor, since Ferdinand I had been hopelessly melweiss, in 1847, tried to force doctors in a hos-
compromised by his connection with the hated pital under his direction to wash their hands in
Metternich. On December 2, 1848, Ferdinand I strong chemicals before attending women in
abdicated. His heir was his younger brother childbirth. The death rate from childhood fever
Francis Charles, who declined in favor of his 18- went down as a result. The doctors, however,
year-old son, who reigned as Francis Joseph I resented having to wash their hands and used
(1830-1916). the Hungarian rebellion as an excuse to get rid of
The next step was to quiet Hungary. An Aus- their Hungarian tormenter. The death-rate from
trian army under Windischgratz invaded Hun- fever promptly increased again, but that didn't
gary on January 5, 1849, and took Budapest seem to bother them.
easily. However, Kossuth set up a "Hungarian
Republic" in the eastern part of the country and
gave Nicholas I of Russia his chance.
this, at last, PRUSSIA
Nicholas I had not been able to do anything Frederick William IV, who had become King of
about the 1830 revolutions, or about the 1848 rev- Prussia in 1840, was a thorough-going conserva-
tive. Even more, he was a medievalist, who in royal familiesthan in the general public, per-
looked back longingly at the Holy Roman Em- haps as a result of inbreeding) and his younger
pire, and who accepted the primacy of Austria as brother became effective head of the state. When
part of the medieval heritage. Frederick William IV died on January 2, 1861, his
Lacking the will to accept any form of repre- brother ruled as William I (1797-1888).
sentative government, or the ability to impose Meanwhile, Germany was becoming ever
his own desires on the land, he vacillated until more prominent in science in this period. Julius
overtaken by events. Robert Mayer (1814-1878) and Hermann Ludwig
The news of the February 1848 revolution in Ferdinand von Helmholtz (1821-1894) contrib-
Paris set off restless uprisings throughout Ger- uted to the establishment, by 1847, of the "law of
many, as well as in Austria. In Austria, the upris- conservation of energy," also known as "the first
ings were divisive, with Hungary, Bohemia, and law of thermodynamics." It may be the most fun-
Italy seeking greater freedom from the dominant damental of all scientific generalizations. Rudolf
Germans; however, in Germany outside Austria, Julius Emmanuel Clausius (1822-1888) worked
the uprisings were unifying, expressing the de- out the "second law of thermodynamics" in
sire for a greater German state. 1850, demonstrating that the amount of usable en-
On March 15, 1848, there were riots in Berlin. ergy, energy that iscapable of being converted to
Frederick William IV, unable (to his credit) to work, is constantly decreasing, so that the Uni-
shoot down his people, made concessions, verse "running down."
is
though he found it completely humiliating to do Robert Wilhelm Bunsen (1811-1899) and Gus-
so. He fell between two stools. It was too little tav Robert Kirchhoff (1824-1887) together
for the German and too much for Austria.
liberals worked out the technique of "spectroscopy,"
By 1850, the Hungarian revolt had been whereby each element could be identified by the
crushed and Austria felt strong enough to make characteristicwavelengths of the radiation it
it clear that she would take military measures, if emitted when heated. Spectroscopy proved to be
necessary, to reverse the position in Germany. enormously useful not only to chemists, but to
What's more, Nicholas I of Russia, horrified at astronomers as well.
the thought of giving in to German liberalism in Friedrich August Kekule von Stradonitz
any way, strongly backed Austria. (1829-1896) worked out a way of indicating the
On November 19, 1849, Prussia gave up any structure of organic molecules in 1858 — some-
thought of heading any sort of union, although thing that brought order into a field that until
Frederick William IV had been offered the crown. then had been steeped in confusion. To be sure,
(Frederick William said that he would not pick the system showed the structure in two dimen-
up a crown from the gutter, meaning by the peo- sions only.
ple's will rather than that of God.) At a meeting The veteran chemist, Liebig, was still at work.
in Olmutz in Moravia, Prussia bowed to Austrian In 1855, he began to experiment with chemical
demands. Later Prussian historians referred to fertilizers. Eventually, these did away with the
this as "the humiliation of Olmutz" but, in actual ubiquitous manure pile on every farm, thus get-
fact,what could Frederick William IV have done ting rid of sickening odors and of a potent source
against both Austria and Russia? of infection of such diseases as typhoid fever and
After that, conservatism ruled in Prussia and cholera.
in the rest of Germany. The revolutions of 1848 Christian Friedrich Schonbein (1799-1869) dis-
had been everywhere a failure, it seemed in — covered ozone in 1840, and guncotton in 1845.
France, in Italy, in Austria, and in Germany The latter pointed the way to the replacement of
and a flood of German liberals fled abroad, foul and smoky gunpowder, after five centuries,
United States.
chiefly to the by various smokeless powders. These were just
In 1858, Frederick William IV went insane as deadly, if not more so, but at least the battle-
(madness seems to have had a higher incidence field became visible and needless deaths through
1840 TO 1860 365
blind gropings on the part of commanders might

diminish. In connection with battlefields, Johann
wanted the vote — one one they
that counted,
wouldn't be terrorized out of making, one
Nikolaus von Dreyse (1787-1867) devised the they could use frequently. They wanted to qual-
first breech-loading "needle guns").
rifles (called ify as possible members of Parliament even if
These could be much more quickly loaded from they had no money and had to be paid.
behind and fired than the older guns that had to (These things were all considered at the time
be loaded through the muzzle. The Prussian by respectable members of society as revolution-
army adopted the needle gun at once. ary ruin; however, except for the annual election
Rudolf Carl Virchow advanced the cell theory of Parliaments, they have all long since been ac-
of life by showing that diseased cells developed cepted in Great Britain, without the sky having
from normal ones with no discontinuities. He fallen.)
said "all cells come from cells." Those who supported the Charter, the "Char-
In 1857, in the Neanderthal valley of the Ger- tists," began to petition Parliament with greater
man Rhineland, a digger discovered part of a and greater vehemence. The government an-
skull, and some long bones, that looked human swered with arrests, with imprisonment, and
— but not quite. The skull had a sharply sloping with transportation to Australia. The movement
forehead and very heavy eyebrow ridges. Other reached its peak in 1848, with the news of revo-
such bones were eventually unearthed and lution on the Continent. The British government,
"Neanderthal man" had been discovered the — agitated by what was happening in Europe,
first evidence of human beings that were more chose to regard Chartism as revolution, which it
primitive than "modern man." was not. It was a peaceful appeal, except for oc-
The most influential German philosopher of minor disorders. Nevertheless,
casional rather
the time was Karl Heinrich Marx (1818-1883), the government refused to budge, and merely
who, with Friedrich Engels (1820-1895), pub- strengthened repression and, because it was not
lished The Communist Manifesto in 1848. This ad- a revolution. Chartism was defeated.
vanced socialist thinking and gave body to much (About this time, incidentally, the British were
that was to take place afterward. fighting "The First Opium War" in China. This
A musical giant of the period was Richard set the pattern for the kind of imperialist wars
Wagner (1813-1883), whose operas already in- that the British (and, to a lesser extent, other Eu-
cluded The Flying Dutchman in 1843, Tannhauser ropean countries) were to fight in Africa and Asia
in 1845, and Lohengrin in 1848. for many years. Such wars were fought far away,
by professionals, and scarcely affected the home
country. Casualties were relatively few and the
GREAT BRITAIN end was usually victory over poorly equipped
The Paris Revolution of 1848 had its effect even and poorly organized enemies so that the British
on Great Britain, in a peculiarly British way. Empire kept expanding and expanding.
British workmen were dissatisfied with the Chartism, by increasing the self-consciousness
Reform Bill of 1832, for it had left them still disen- of labor, led to another surge of trade-unionism,
franchised and disregarded. As early as May, and to increasing agitation against the Corn Laws
1838, a "People's Charter" had been drawn up that kept landowners and laborers starving.
rich
with six demands for further Parliamentary re- The workmen themselves could not have put
form: (1) universal manhood
suffrage, (2) equal on sufficient pressure but there were prosperous
electoral districts, (3) vote by secret ballot, in- manufacturers who actually had compassion and
stead of a show of hands, (4) annually elected could empathize with poverty, who took up the
Parliaments, (5) payment of Parliamentary mem- cause, and who actually believed that the Corn
bers, and (6) removal of property qualifications Laws were not only morally wrong, but were
for Parliamentary members. harmful to the national economy. Leaders of
In short, workmen wanted democracy. They these were Richard Cobden (1804-1865), who
had been born poor and remembered, and John Henry John Temple, Lord Pal-
foreign secretary,
Bright (1811-1889). Both were also against Great merston (1784-1865), a strong liberal at home,
Britain's imperialist foreign policy. though an imperialist abroad, reacted with to-
Further pressure against the Corn Laws came tally British pride. He sent a squadron of ships to
with a disaster in Ireland. There, the callous Brit- Greece, blockaded Athen's port city of Piraeus,
ish disregard for the Irishhad forced the peas- and seized Greek ships until Greece was forced
antry into increasing poverty, all the more so to give in.
because their numbers were increasing. They Both France and Russia protested this British
had come to subsist almost entirely on potatoes, behavior, and so did British conservatives in the
and if anything happened to the potato crop, House of Lords (who didn't^ consider a North
there was bound to be starvation. African Jew to be "British").
fungus disease) struck the
In 1845, a blight (a Palmerston, however, rose in the House of
Irish potato crop and the food supply dwindled Commons and made an all-night speech on July
drastically. In the years that immediately fol- 8, 1850, in which the burden was that in ancient
lowed, one third of the Irish population either times a Roman citizen could be inviolate any-
starved to death, died of disease that their fam- where in the known world merely by proclaim-
ished bodies could not fight off, or escaped by ing himself to be a Roman citizen ("civis
emigration to the United States. Romanus sum"). Similarly, in the much wider
The British allowed this to happen. Partly, it modern world, a British subject must be inviolate
was the callousness of the times that ascribed simply by proclaiming himself a British subject.
such calamities to the will of God, and allowed Great Britain would protect its subjects, however
pious men to shrug their shoulders and go their unlikely they might be, and wherever they might
way. Partly, it was because there was no televi- be.
sion to bring the sights of misery to the living This was met with thunderous approval and
rooms of the comfortable. Palmerston remained foreign minister, though it
Even so, there were some British who were had seemed certain he would have to be re-
uneasily conscious that Corn Laws that kept food moved. The government, however, which dis-
artificially high in price were outrageous in a time approved of the high-handed way in which
of famine. On June 6, 1846, the Corn Laws were Palmerston conducted foreign affairs, simply
repealed and Great Britain entered a period of waited for the next opportunity. At the end of
increasing free trade —to the general enrichment 1852, they fired him when he incautiously ap-
of the nation. proved Bonaparte's making himself Napoleon III
Nor did the submit to starvation with
Irish without consulting the rest of the government (or
nothing but despair. There was wild resentment, the Queen).
and attempts at angry action against the British, The 1850s were a turbulent decade, with a war
which were put down, of course, but it was clear with Russia, another with China, and a danger-
that the Irish would never be pacified. ous mutiny in India, all of which will be de-
In 1850, British self-confidence and British as- scribed in appropriate places.
surance of being something special in the world Great Britain continued to advance in democ-
made itself felt in surprising fashion. It involved racy. In June, 1858, property qualifications for
David (Don) Pacifico, who was Jewish and who members of Parliament were removed (some-
had been born in North Africa. He was, how- thing that had been one of the demands of the
ever, a British subject. Chartists).
He had done business in Greece and he was There was also the case of Lionel Nathan
owed money by the Greek government. When Rothschild (1808-1879). He had been elected four
he pressed his claims, his house was burned by times (in 1847, 1848, 1852, and 1857), and four
an anti-Semitic mob in Athens in December 1849. times he had been denied his seat because he
He appealed to the British government and the would not take his oath "as a Christian" for the
1840 TO 1860 367
simple reason that he was not a Christian, but a were worked Bessemer process inaugu-
out, the
Jew. In 1858, when he was elected a fifth time, rated the age of cheap steel and of all the con-
the disabilities that prevented Jews from partici- structions that made possible.
pating in political life were removed. He took his George Cayley (1773-1857) was the first to
seat. work out modern aerodynamics and to visualize
Great Britain competed with Germany in this airplanes as they would truly look once an en-
period for world leadership in science. gine could be devised that was sufficiently pow-
Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace erful and light. In 1853, he constructed the first
(1823-1913) independently worked out a scheme unpowered plane, or "glider," that was capable
of biological evolution through natural selection. of carrying a man. He forced his coachdriver to
This postulated small random variations in every test it. The test was successful, and the coach-
generation of a species, some of these variations driver survived.
better fitting the species' way of life than others George Whitworth (1803-1887) learned to pro-
did. The would survive
variation for the better duce accurate devices for manufacturing stan-
in the long run, while others would not. Dar- dardized machine parts. He introduced the
win's book. The Origin of Species, published in standardized screw thread in 1841. He took up
1859, and detailing his views, revolutionized bi- where Eli Whitney had left off and greatly ad-
ology and joined the books by Copernicus, Ves- vanced the day of mass production.
alius, and Newton among the truly seminal The explorer, James C. Ross, who had earlier
scientific works. Evolution is now the central fact discovered the North Magnetic Pole, went on to
in biology. The science would simply not make the Antarctic region. In 1841, he sailed into what
sense without it. is now known as Ross Sea and discovered the
James Prescott Joule (1818-1889) worked out Ross Ice Shelf, a vast ice-overhang extending far
work and heat in 1847, sharing
the equivalence of out into the Antarctic Ocean.
with Mayer and Helmholtz of Germany the Exploration of another kind was carried out by
honor of establishing the law of conservation of Henry Creswicke Rawlinson (1810-1895). In
energy. William Thomson (1824-1907), who be- 1846, he scaled the heights of a cliffside at Bisitun
came Lord Kelvin in later life, worked out the in Persia. Suspended from a rope, he carefully
concept of absolute zero and the absolute scale of copied an inscription placed there at the order of
temperature in 1851. In 1852, he and Joule Darius I, who had reigned 23 centuries earlier. It
worked out the "Joule-Thomson effect," which was Old Persian, Assyrian, and Elamitic.
in
proved of key importance in the liquefaction of Using modern Persian as a guide, Rawlinson de-
gases. ciphered the languages, and provided the key
In 1856, William Henry Perkin (1838-1907), which opened Babylonian history to the world.
while still by accident, the
a schoolboy, isolated, In 1843, the Great Britain, the first ship that
first synthetic dye. Having done so, he left school could be considered a modern ocean liner, was
and proceeded, with rare initiative and business launched. It was 322 feet long.
acumen, to establish the synthetic dye industry. A British artist of the period was Edwin Henry
George Boole (1815-1869) published An Inves- Landseer (1802-1873), well-known for his animal
tigation of the Laws of Thought in 1854. In this book, painting. His Stag at Bay was painted in 1846.
he applied symbols of logic, working out its laws Both he and John Everett Millais were successful
inmathematical fashion. This came to be called portraitists.
"Boolean algebra." Charles Dickens continued to be the most suc-
On the technological side, Henry Bessemer cessful British writer of the period. He published
(1813-1898) devised the "blast furnace" in 1856. the infinitely popular A
Christmas Carol in 1843;
In this, carbon was burned out of cast-iron by a his masterpiece David Copperfield in 1849; and A
blast of air, and the process was stopped at the Tale of Two Cities in 1859. William Makepeace
stage when the product was steel. Once the bugs Thackeray (1811-1863) was a distant second with
Vanity Fair, published in 1848 as his best-known and "The Bridge of Sighs" in 1844.
Shirt" in 1843
work. A prolific writer was Anthony Trollope Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) wrote his "Soharab
(1815-1882), whose 50 novels include Barchester and Rustum" from an old Persian epic in 1853.
Towers, published in 1857. Dante Gabriel Rosetti (1828-1882) wrote "The
Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881), who was later Blessed Damozel" in 1850.
to achieve fame as a statesman, wrote novels in
his younger days, the best-known being Sibyl,
published in 1845. George Meredith (1828-1909)
NETHERLANDS
published The Ordeal of Richard Feverel in 1859. William I, whose inflexible conservatism had lost
Peter Mark Roget (1779-1869) prepared the him Belgium, now lost his popularity. He abdi-
first edition of his Thesaurus of English Words and cated on October 7, 1840, and went into exile,
Phrases in 1852. It has been a valued reference spending his last years in Berlin, where he found
work ever since. life more congenial. He was succeeded by his
Several women novelists made their mark. son, who had fought in Spain under Wellington,
Charlotte Bronte (1816-1855) published Jane Eyre and who reigned as William II (1792-1849).
in 1847. It was and best of the modern
the first William II was more liberal than his father. He
“Gothic romances." In the same year, her sister, was tolerant in religion and spent the profits
Emily Bronte (1818-1848) wrote the less success- earned from the Indonesian colonies wisely. The
ful, but more highly regarded Wuthering Heights. liberals wanted a more representative govern-
Thomas Carlyle was still writing, publishing a ment, however, and, in the wake of the 1848 rev-
biography of Oliver Cromwell in 1845. Another olution in France, William II felt it expedient to
historical writer of the period was Thomas Bab- grant a constitution insuring that.
ington Macaulay (1800-1859) who, in the 1850s, He
died on March 17, 1849, and was suc-
wrote five volumes on the reigns of James II and ceeded by his son, who reigned as William III
William III. (1817-1890). William III opposed the new consti-
Among the British poets, Tennyson was writ- tution, but ruledunder it with a parliamentary
ing steadily, publishing The Princess in 1847, and form of government.
succeeding Wordsworth as Poet Laureate on the
latter's death in 1850. Tennyson wrote Maud in
1855, and turned out many short pieces that have BELGIUM
retained their popularity ever since, "The Splen- ThiS)Was a quiet period for Belgium. It weathered
dor Falls," "Break, Break, Break," "The Brook," the storm of 1848 with scarcely a tremor, for its
"The Ballad of the Revenge," and so on. government was liberal enough to expand the
Robert Browning (1812-1889) was also turning franchise and double the number of eligible vot-
out popular poems such as "My Last Duchess," ers.
"Home Thoughts from Abroad," and, most of all
perhaps, the light-hearted "The Pied Piper of Ha-
melin." His wife, Elizabeth Barrett Browning SPAIN
(1806-1861) wrote Sonnets from the Portuguese in Isabella was Queen of Spain during this pe-
II
1850 and "Aurora Leigh" in 1856. Edward riod, and the nation was troubled by insurrec-
FitzGerald (1809-1883) translated the Rubaiyat of tions and by military rule. The Queen was not
Omar Khayyam, the Persian poet-mathematician popular, both because of her conservatism and
who had lived over seven centuries earlier. It was because of her scandalous private life. (She was
a free translation and was great poetry in its own a liberal where sex was concerned.)
right. A rather farcical incident came on October 10,
Thomas Hood (1799-1845) wrote some strong 1846, when the Queen's younger sister married
poems dealing with poor unfortunate women of the youngest son of Louis Philippe of France. The
those unfeeling times, such as his “Song of the Queen had no children at the time (she was get-
1840 TO 1860 369
ting married on the same day), and Great Britain The religious philosopher, Soren Aabye Kier-
had a vision of a son being born to Isabella's sis- kegaard (1813-1855) published Either/Or in 1843,
ter,one who would inherit the crown of both under pseudonym and went on to write other
a
France and Spain. books, in addition. He founded Existentialist phi-
The War of the Spanish Succession had been losophy in which the individual was viewed as
fought to prevent such an eventuality a century having to make conscious choices between exist-
and a half earlier, but France was relatively ing alternatives. He favored a stricter Christian
weaker now than it was then, and Spain was way of life.
much weaker, so the situation was by no means
as crucial.The matter poisoned the atmosphere
between Great Britain and France, but it all came SWEDEN
to nothing when, a little over a year afterward, Charles XIV, who had
once been General Berna-
Louis Philippe was kicked off his throne anyway. dotte, died on March 8, 1844, and was succeeded
by his son who reigned as Oscar I (1799-1859).
He introduced mild reforms, liberating trade
PORTUGAL from medieval restrictions, allowing more rights
Maria II died on November 15, 1853, and was to women, and so on. He grew more conserva-
succeeded by her son who reigned as Peter V tive after the revolutionary year of 1848, how-
(1837-1861). During his reign, Portugal took ever.
steps toward industrialization. In 1856, it had its A
leading Swedish chemist of the period was
first railroad and its first telegraph line. Carl Gustav Mosander (1797— 1858), who puzzled
out the chemical nature of some of the rare earth
minerals, discovering five new elements in the
SWITZERLAND early 1840s. The most famous Swede of the pe-
During this period, Switzerland went through a riod, however, was the coloratura soprano, Jo-
civil war one between the Catholic and
in 1847, hanna Maria ("Jenny") Lind (1820-1887), the
the Protestant cantons. The Protestant cantons "Swedish nightingale." During the 1840s and
were the winners almost at once, and, on Sep- 1850s, she was the darling of the stage in Great
tember 12, 1848, a new constitution went into Britain and the United States.
effect, establishing a federal union that was mod-
eled on that of the United States.
RUSSIA
Russia was untouched by the revolutions of 1848,
DENMARK but Nicholas I intervened in Austria and helped
Christian VIII died on January 20, 1848, just be- crush the Hungarian revolutionaries there. Rus-
fore the storm of revolution broke over the con- sia alsoexpanded steadily in central Asia, ad-
tinent. His son succeeded him as Frederick VII vancing into what was once called Turkestan and
(1808-1863), and defused any serious trouble by approaching India more and more closely, to the
granting a constitution that set up a representa- consternation of the British.
tivegovernment. Russia retained its ambition to sweep up all it
The problem of Schleswig and Holstein threat- could of the Ottoman Empire. In 1853, the ques-
ened, however. The German revolutionaries tion arose as to who was to protect the Christian
wanted to incorporate these provinces into a Holy Places. Russia was the protector of the Or-
united Germany, and Prussia was do the job.
to thodox clergy in Palestine; France was the protec-
Prussia was reluctant to do so, however, feeling tor of the Catholics. The two nations squabbled
that Austriashould take the lead in such things. over the matter, with the Ottoman Empire
The provinces, therefore, remained Danish for a squeezed between them.
time. Russia was the nearer of the two and, in Julv
1853, Russian forces began to strengthen their tip of the Crimean peninsula, where it jutted out
influence over the Romanian provinces, sending into the Black Sea.
in actual troops. France objected to this, and sent On
September 14, 1854, a British-French force
ships to encourage the Turks. The British, con- —
landed on the Crimean shore and since all the
cerned about India, also much preferred a weak fighting was confined to that peninsula, the con-
Ottoman Empire at Constantinople to a strong flict is known as "the Crimean War." In October,
Russia, and they sent ships as well. the allies began the siege of Sebastopol.
Attempts at settling the matter by compromise The generalship on the British side seemed to
and mediation failed, and, on October 4, 1853, have been particularly incompetent, as is evi-
the Ottoman Empire, secure in the obvious sup- denced by the most famous incident of the war.
port it was getting from the two western powers, On October course of a battle at
25, 1854, in the
declared war on Russia. The Russians, however, Balaklava, a suburb of Sebastopol, a confusion of
destroyed the Turkish fleet in the Black Sea on orders sent a squadron of 673 light cavalry charg-
November 30. ing into the teeth of a firing Russian artillery to
To make up for this, the British and French no purpose whatever. Over a third of the men
moved their ships into the Black Sea on January were lost in half an hour.
3, 1854. The Russians thereupon broke off diplo- The incident was immortalized in Tennyson's
matic relations with Great Britain and France on poem, "The Charge of the Light Brigade," and it
February 6. Great Britain and France demanded was hailed as heroism. The point, however, was
that Russia evacuate the Romanian provinces. not that the soldiers were heroic but that the gen-
Russia did not answer directly, but, instead, de- erals were stupid. (If more generals were exe-
fiantly crossed the Danube and invaded Bulgaria cuted for stupidity, wars would be shorter and
on March 20, 1854. Upon this, the British and less bloody, and might stop altogether.)
French concluded an alliance with the Ottoman through the winter of 1854-1855, the siege
All
Empire on March 28 and declared war on Russia. continued and the Allied armies continued to
(This was the first time Great Britain or, as it once wither under the onslaughts of cholera.
was, England, had fought on the same side as The Crimean war was the first in which regu-
France since the Third Crusade, six and a half lar newspaper correspondents reported on
centuries earlier.) events, and the British public was outraged at the
Austria, unwilling to see the Russians becom- lack of medical treatment and at the general mis-
ing dominant in the Balkans (and ignoring the ery that the common soldiers had to suffer be-
help Russia had given her a few years earlier in cause of the incompetence and indifference of
connection with the Hungarian revolt) threat- the military leaders. This had always been true
ened to join the anti-Russian front, if Russia but now, for the first time, it was being publi-
didn't evacuate the Balkans. cized.
At this, Romania and
the Russians got out of Florence Nightingale (1820-1910), a nurse, ar-
the Austrians sent in troops instead. This was rived in the Crimea on November 5, 1854. More
not something the Russians forgot, and it created heroic than any soldier, and more intelligent
an antagonism that had important consequences. than any officer, she fought for the decent treat-
In a way, that ended matters. Russia had re- ment of the sick and wounded and became a hero
treated and the Ottoman Empire was safe for the to the British public. She founded the profession
moment. The British and French could go home of nursing, and her reports after the war initiated
with their mission accomplished, especially since the process whereby armies, for the first time,
their troops in the Balkans were suffering from were made to feel responsible for the health and
cholera. The British and French governments welfare of their soldiers.
felt, however, that it was necessary to keep the On January 26, 1855, some 10,000 Sardinian
Ottoman Empire safe by destroying the great troops arrived. They had no interest in the war
Russian naval base at Sebastopol at the southern as such, but the Sardinian Prime Minister Cavour
1840 TO 1860 371
felt it was the proper move

French and
to gain
backing for his plans to unify Italy.
British SERBIA
On March 2, 1855, Nicholas I died and was Serbia was torn by an irreconcilable feud be-
succeeded by his son, who reigned as Alexander tween two families, the Karageorgevich and the
II (1818-1881). The siege of Sebastopol went on Obrenovich. They took turns supplying the na-
for another half-year, as the Allies pressed on tion with a ruler, and each made it impossible for
despite the desperate resistance that Russian sol- the ruler of the other family to govern.
diers have always specialized in. The port was Alexander Karageorgevich (1806-1885) reigned
finally taken, at great cost, on September 11, from 1842 to 1858 and was then deposed and
1855. The siege had lasted nearly a year. replaced by Milosh Obrenovich (1780-1860). Ser-
Austria now
again threatened war if Russia bia remained neutral in the Crimean war.
didn't make peace, and Russia had to give up.
The Treaty of Paris, ending the conflict, was
signed on March 30, 1856. Great Britain got what MONTENEGRO
wanted. Russia agreed to keep its warships out
it
Montenegro was ruled by Peter II (1812-1851) in
of the Black Sea so that the Ottoman Empire the 1840s, and by Danilo I (1826-1860) in the
seemed safe. 1850s. It was strongly pro-Russian and received
Russia, however, was huge. If it didn't gain at an annual subsidy from Nicholas I of Russia. In
one end, gained at the other. In 1858, Russia
it
1852, the Turks invaded, and then left only as a
signed a treaty with China that gave it the east- result of the threat of Austrian reprisals.
ern bank of the Amur River,
an area where it had
been forced to give up to China nearly two cen-
turies before. China, however, had weakened BULGARIA
since then, and Russia's far Eastern presence had Bulgaria, which eight and a half centuries earlier
strengthened. had challenged the Byzantine Empire at its
founded Vladivostok, which
In 1860, Russia height, was still prostrate under the Ottoman
became and remained Russia's largest seaport on Empire, but nationalist feeling was swelling in
the Pacific Ocean. the 1850s.
At this time, Glinka was still composing and
the opera, Ruslan and Lyudmilla (based on a poem
by Pushkin), was staged in 1842. A Russian of OTTOMAN EMPIRE
the period who was a leading anarchist and who In 1840, the Ottoman Empire was still at war with
managed escape from exile in
to Siberia, was its erstwhile subject, Muhammad Ali of Egypt.
Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin (1814-1876). France was on the side of Muhammad Ali and
Great Britain, as usual in this period, was on the
side of the Ottoman Empire.
GREECE Great Britain managed to persuade Austria,
The reign of Otto I (1815-1867), a Roman Catho- Prussia, and Russia to join it in an ultimatum to
lic monarch in a Greek Orthodox country, was Muhammad Ali, on July 15, 1840, to accept rule
not a success. He tried to be an autocratic king, over Egypt and southern Syria and nothing
but an uprising in 1843 forced him to grant a more. Muhammad, relying on France, rejected
constitution. The parliamentary system that re- the ultimatum. Great Britain then bombarded
sulted wasn't any more successful. Beirut, landed troops in Syria, and drove Mu-
Greece got into trouble with Great Britain over hammad Ali out. France, under Louis Philippe,
the Don Pacifico affair in 1850, and then, again, chose not to fight, and Muhammad Ali had to
in 1854, when Greece tried to take advantage of settle forEgypt only.
the forthcoming Crimean war by attacking the It was clear, however, that the Ottoman Em-
Ottoman Empire. pire had weakened to the point where it was sim-
ply a pawn thrust this way and

by thethat United States and Canada east of the Rocky
competing ambitions of the European powers. Mountains was at the 49° parallel. This was ex-
Nicholas I of Russia did his best to convince tended to the Pacific Ocean, giving Great Britain
Great Britain that the Ottoman Empire ought to the northern half of the territory and the United
be partitioned among the powers as once Poland States the southern half.
had been, over half a century before. Nicholas Texas was another matter. There the United
referred to the Ottoman Empire as “the sick man States faced a weaker nation, and the territory at
of Europe" and, presumably, considered that it stake might well be divided into slave states.
ought to be put out of its misery. Therefore, Polk struck out ruthlessly.
Great Britain would not agree, however, and Mexico had never recognized the indepen-
fought the Crimean War (in alliance with France dence of Texas and resented the union with the
and Sardinia) to make sure the Ottoman Empire United States. In addition, the question of the
remained intact. boundary between Texas and Mexico was in dis-
pute. As a Mexican province, Texas extended
southward only to the Nueces River. The United
UNITED STATES States, however, extended its claim to the Rio
In the early 1840s, the United States was in the Grande, which doubled the size of the Mexican
mood for expansion. There were two areas province.
where this was possible. In the northwest, be- On March 24, 1846, an American force under
tween the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Zachary Taylor (1784-1850) crossed the Nueces
Ocean, was the Oregon Territory. It extended River and advanced into the disputed territory.
from the 42° parallel, south of which was Mexico, When the Mexicans resisted (and were defeated),
to the 54° 40' parallel, north of which was Rus- Polk promptly announced that Americans had
sian Alaska. been killed on American territory and Congress
The United States wanted it all. In fact, the declared war on Mexico on May 13, 1846. Thus
1844 election campaign that was run by James began the "Mexican War," which many in the
Knox Polk (1794-1849) included the slogan "54- free states denounced as unprovoked
hotly
40 or fight." The fighting was to be with Great aggression brought about by the lust for slave-
Britain, which also claimed the territory. Since state territory.
1818, there had been an uneasy joint occupation Zachary Taylor advanced 150 miles west of the
by the two powers. Rio Grande and finally beat the Mexicans at the
Then, too, in the southwest, Texas was still battle of Buena Vista on February 23, 1847. He
anxious to join the Union. The outgoing 10th was then held up because President Polk did not
President of the United States, John Tyler (1790- wish Taylor to become too popular, and ham-
1862), who had succeeded on the death of Wil- pered him constantly. The task of finishing the
liam Henry Harrison (the first Vice-President to war was given to Winfield Scott, a veteran of the
succeed in this manner), had no party and was War of 1812.
execrated by both Democrats and Whigs. He had On March 27, 1847, a month
Buena Vista,
after
nothing to lose and he brought about the annex- Scott landed at Verz Cruz on the Mexican Gulf
ation of Texas on March 1, 1844, three days be- Coast and took the city. That placed him a little
fore he left office. over 200 miles from the Mexican capital at Mexico
Polk succeeded as 11th President, but, despite City.
his campaign slogan, he was careful not to fight Scott then managed the very difficult progress
with powerful Great Britain, especially for terri- over mountainous territory to that capital. He
tory that would undoubtedly be carved into free won every battle, although usually outnumbered
states. (Polk was from Tennessee, a slave state.) and the Mexicans had the advantage of the ter-
On June 15, 1846, then, the Oregon territory was rain. On September 14, 1847, Scott took Mexico
cut roughly in half. The boundary between the City.

1840 TO 1860 373
Meanwhile, American forces had pushed their Henry Clay (1777-1852) was known as "The
way westward and, by the beginning of 1847, Great Compromiser." He had been instrumental
had taken Santa Fe and seized control of Califor- in working out the Missouri Compromise in
nia. 1820, and the Tariff Compromise in 1832. Now,
The Treaty of Guadelupe Hidalgo (a northern in his old age, he met his greatest challenge and
suburb of Mexico City) was signed on February hammered out the "Compromise of 1850,"
2, 1848. By its terms, the United States obtained which he introduced in Congress on January 29,
Texas to the Rio Grande, and the western terri- 1850, and which, by September 20, had become
tory, too, including California. law. Clay hoped that this would end the threat
Later on, in 1853, the United States purchased of secession and civil war forever, and while it
a strip of territory to the south of what it had did not do that, it did buy the nation some time.
gained in the treaty, in order that a railroad could By the provisions of the compromise, Califor-
be built through it. This was negotiated by the nia was allowed to enter the Union as a free state,
American minister to Mexico, James Gadsden but the possibility of the admission of further
(1788-1858), and is called the “Gadsden Pur- slave states was held open. The biggest advan-
chase." With that, the United States gained its tage that the slave states received was a stronger
final boundaries with both Canada on the north "fugitive slave" law, and this angered the anti-
and Mexico on the south. They have not been slavery people.
changed since. The point was that slaves did try to escape
Taylor's victories in the Mexican War led (as from slavery and whites who were antislavery
Polk had feared) to his election in 1848 as the 12th and abolitionist helped them. An "underground
President. However, Taylor died in office on July railway" was established that spirited slaves to
9, 1850, and was succeeded by his undistin- freedom in Canada. To the slave-owners this was
guished Vice-President, Millard Fillmore (1800- simply theft of valuable property and they de-
1874), as 13th President. manded the right to send agents to the free states
The acquisition of California couldn't have might seize blacks whom they
in order that they
come at a better time for the United States. On could claim as escaped slaves. This was much
January 24, 1848, when California was already like the practice of the British,
40 years earlier, of
under the firm control of the United States, but a stopping American ships in search of deserted
week before Mexico signed the treaty that trans- British sailors. That led to the War of 1812, and
ferred control legally, gold was discovered there. the activities of slave-owner agents roused the
There was a "gold rush" that had thousands of same fury in the hearts of the abolitionists.
Americans swarming across the continent in 1849 Another polarizing influence was the novel
("The Forty-Niners") in an effort to strike it rich. Uncle Tom's Cabin, written by Harriet Beecher
Of course, the new territories promptly exac- Stowe (1811-1896) and published in 1852. Its pic-
erbated the slavery question. Should slavery be ture of virtuous slaves, brutally mistreated by sa-
permitted in the new territories or not? The ar- distic masters (though treated well by kindly
gument reached a feverish height when Califor- ones), infuriated many beyond description and
nia, with its sudden access of population, thanks converted people, earlier indifferent on the sub-
to the gold rush, wanted to join the Union as a ject, into convinced antislavery enthusiasts.
state. Nor was it only the whites who worked for
There were, at this time, 15 free states and 15 abolition. Harriet Tubman (1820-1913) was a
slave states. (Texas had entered as a slave state.) black whohelped over 300 slaves escape through
If California entered as a free state, as it wished the underground railway, putting her own free-
to do, there was no obvious new slave-state can- dom and life on the line over and over. Frederick
didate to balance it, and the slave states were Douglass (1817-1895), an escaped slave who
furious at that. Again, there was talk of seces- eventually earned enough money to buy his free-
sion. dom, was a powerful advocate of abolitionism.
although he was not as extreme as some of the Harper's Ferry on the Virginia side of the upper
white doctrinaires, for he had a keen sense of the Potomac River, and tried to start a slave rebel-
possible. lion. It didn't work at all. He was caught at once
Through all this, the slave states felt ever more and executed, but it convinced the people of the
insecure and persecuted, and talk of breaking up slave states that the abolitionists were in control
the Union became louder. in the free states and that it was their intention
In order to mollify the slave states, territories to slaughter all the white people in the slave
were organized with permission to establish or statesand set up rule by the blacks.
eliminate slavery by vote. This was the "Kansas- There seemed no room for further compro-
Nebraska Act," which became law on May 30, mise. In 1860, the Democrati'c party nominated
1854. Its main architect was Stephen Arnold Stephen A. Douglas as its presidential candidate,
Douglas (1813-1861) of Illinois. but the slave states broke away and nominated
This seemed very democratic (if we can con- John Cabell Breckenridge (1821-1875), while oth-
sider voting for slavery to be democratic), al- ers nominated John Bell (1797-1869). With the
though it lent itself to horrible results. When it Democrats split three ways, the Republican party
looked as though a territory might become a nominated and elected Abraham Lincoln as the
state, violent men from free states and from slave 16th President.
states would invade the territory in order to vote That was in November 1860. The next month,
their sideand to do their best to terrorize the even before Lincoln could be inaugurated. South
opposition from voting. Carolina seceded from the Union, and the most
Kansas, to the west of Missouri, was in such a tragic period in the history of the United States
case, and, from 1854 to 1858, there was a virtual opened.
civil war in the territory between slave-staters The United States, in this period, lagged in
and free-staters. science but was flourishing in technology.
A debate for the Illinois senatorial seat at- A dentist, William Thomas Green Morton
tracted national attention in August 1857. Ste- (1819-1868), introduced the use of ether as an
phen A. Douglas was running on the Democratic anesthetic in 1846. Others had used anesthetics
ticket. In the field was a new antislavery party, before but it was Morton's demonstration that
the Republicans, who had replaced the moribund caught on and put an end to surgery as a form of
Whigs. Running as a Republican was Abraham exquisite torture.
Lincoln (1809-1865), who was firmly against any Samuel Finley Breese Morse (1791-1870) pro-
extension of slavery beyond the states in which moted a telegraph, the scientific principles of
it already existed. Douglas won the Senatorial which had been well worked out earlier by Jo-
election (by vote of the state legislature, not the seph Henry and others. Morse obtained a patent
people), but Lincoln won the debate. in 1840 and persuaded Congress to grant him
In that same however, the Supreme
year, $30,000, which he used to build a telegraph line
Court, under Roger Brooke Taney (1777-1864), from Baltimore to Washington. In 1844, the first
in what was called the "Dred Scott decision," telegraph message in history was sent "What —
ruled that Congress could not keep slavery out of hath God wrought?" The telegraph was quickly
any territory. Only the territory itself could do used to deliver the news of the 1844 election and
that after it had become a state. The ruling further it was an adjunct to military operations, for the
held that the descendants of slaves could not be- first time, in the Mexican war.
come citizens. Taney had a splendid record oth- In 1846, Elias Howe (1819-1862) devised the
erwise, but his name was forever stained by that first sewing-machine. It was the first
practical
one unfortunate decision. product of the Industrial Revolution specifically
Then, on October 19, 1859, a half-mad aboli- designed to lighten women's household tasks.
tionist named John Brown (1800-1859) seized Elisha Graves Otis (1811-1861) invented the first
1840 TO 1860 375
elevator with a safety guard designed to bring it his Familiar Quotations in 1855, and, through
safely down even if the cable suspending it many editions, it has been an indispensable ref-
broke. He demonstrated such an elevator in New erence book ever since.
York City in 1854, getting in himself, rising sev- Stephen Collins Foster (1826-1864) was the
eral storiesup, and ordering the cable to be cut. most successful songwriter of his time, and per-
It was the elevator, along with cheap steel, that haps of any time, for "Old Folks at Home" may
made skyscrapers possible. well be the most popular American ballad ever
In 1859, Edwin Laurentine Drake (1819-1880), written, while "Oh, Susanna," "Old Black Joe,"
dissatisfied with the petroleum resources in sur- "Jeannie with the Light-Brown Hair," "Camp-
face deposits, decided to drill for oil. He sunk an town Races," and others do not fall far behind.
oil well near Titusville, Pennsylvania, and (on Lost in the struggle over slavery, the burgeon-
August 29) struck oil. This was the beginning of ing fight for women's rights is often scanted.
a procedure that was to revolutionize the human Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815—1902) organized a
use of energy. A liquid fuel like oil is easier to convention to discuss the rights of women at
transport than coal, is easier to ignite and con- Seneca Falls, New York in 1848. Lucy Stone
trol, and is suitable for use in internal-combus- (1818-1893)was not only an ardent abolitionist,
tion engines. but she was against the conventional enslave-
Literature continued to flourish in New En- ment of women as well. She kept her birth name
gland. Emerson's essays, published in 1841 and through marriage as a protest against the sub-
1842, gave him an international reputation. mergence of feminine individuality, and a
Longfellow wrote "The Village Blacksmith" in woman who does the same, even today, is still
1841, Evangeline in 1847, The Song of Hiawatha in sometimes called a "Lucy Stoner." Amelia
1855, and The Courtship of Miles Standish in 1858. Bloomer (1818-1894), another strong advocate of
Among the poems of John Greenleaf Whittier women's rights, campaigned for sensible cloth-
(1807-1892) that are popular today are
still ing for women, and devised the roomy trousers
"Maud Muller" and "The Barefoot Boy," both that came to be called "bloomers."
published in 1856. James Russell Lowell (1819- Indigenous American religious sects contin-
1891) wrote "The Vision of Sir Launfal" in 1848. ued to develop. A religious leader, William Miller
Among the prose writers of New England, (1782-1849), managed to convince himself and a
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) published The number of others that close reading of the Bible
Scarlet Letter in 1850 and The House of Seven Gables indicated that the Day
Judgment would come
of
in 1851. He also wrote a number of stories that in 1843. Many sold their property and waited for
would today be called science fiction. Henry the glorious moment of the Second Coming, only
David Thoreau (1817-1862), a close friend of to be disappointed, of course. Out of his views,
Emerson, wrote Walden in 1854. however, the "Seventh-Day Adventists" and
Outside New England, Herman Melville "Jehovah's Witnesses" eventually developed.
(1819-1891) wrote his great classic of whaling, Brigham Young (1801-1877), a convert to Mor-
Moby Dick, in 1851. Edgar Allan Poe wrote "The monism in 1832, took over the leadership of the
Gold Bug" in 1843, which was the first modern movement in 1844 after the murder of Joseph
mystery story, and "The Raven," which must Smith in Illinois. To avoid further persecution.
surely be in the running for the most popular Young led his co-religionists across the Missis-
American poem ever written. sippion February 4, 1846, and trekked west-
Thomas Bulfinch (3 796-1867) collected the an- ward. They reached the region of the Great Salt
cient and medieval myths and legends into The Lake in what is now Utah on July 24, 1847. It was
Age of Fable, published in 1855. Usually known as then Mexican territory but became American the
Bulfinch's Mythology, it is still popular today. John following year. The Mormons established a theo-
Bartlett (1820-1905) published the first edition of cratic community in the region that for years was
virtually independent of outside control. The

Mormon way of life attracted the sometimes pru- ARGENTINA
rient attention of the rest of the Christian world Argentina was, at this time, ruled dictatorially by
through its practice of polygamy (for men only, Juan Manuel de Rosas (1793-1877). Under him,
of course.) Argentina was unified. He attempted to take
On a lighter note, Phineas Taylor Barnum over control of Uruguay as well. He had to fight
(1810-1891) was the great showman of the age. Brazil, which was supported by France, and
He opened a show in New York City in 1841, in Rosas was defeated and deposed in 1852. In his
which he displayed all sorts of curiosities, some place rose Justo Jose de Urquiza (1801-1870), the
real, some faked. ('There's a sucker born every first constitutional president of Argentina.
minute" is his famous conservative estimate of

the situation.) He stage-managed Jenny Lind's
wildly successful concert tour in the United CHILE
States. Under Manuel Bulnes (1799-1866), who was
In 1843, Daniel Decatur Emmett (1815-1904) president from 1841 to 1851, and his successor,
organized the first "negro minstrel" show, a very Manuel Montt (1809-1880), who was president
popular form of entertainment, in which white until 1861, Chile was peaceful and prosperous.
men in blackface presented unflattering stereo- Railways and telegraph lines were built and there
types of black behavior. Emmett wrote a number were advances in education and cultural activi-
of popular songs for these shows, including ties.
"Dixie," which became the virtual national an-

them of the slave states.
Abner Doubleday (1819-1893), an army officer PARAGUAY
who served in the Mexican War, is often credited Paraguay was ruled by Carlos Antonio Lopez
with originating, in 1840 or thereabouts, the rules (1790-1862) in this period. Its isolation was
of a game that eventually developed into base- ended and it retained its independence against
ball. This may be a myth. the expansive tendencies of Argentina and Bra-
zil.
CANADA
The two chief provinces of Canada, Upper Can- PERU
ada, (now Toronto) and Lower Canada (now Peru was under Ramon Castillo (1797-1867). He
Quebec), were united on July 23, 1840 by the abolished slavery and respected the civil rights of
"Union Act" passed by the British government. the Native Americans.
By 1846, all the boundary questions with the
United States were settled and "British North
America" took on the shape it has today, extend- COLOMBIA
ing, like the United States, from the Atlantic to Colombia was of interest to the rest of the world
the Pacific. There was still no effective union be- chiefly because northwestern limits
its extended
tween all parts of the nation, however, nor a def- into Central America and included the region of
inite form of representative government. Panama. What made Panama of interest, espe-
cially to Great Britain and the United States, was
the fact that it was a narrow isthmus, separating
BRAZIL the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean by as little as 40
Brazil was monarchy in the western
the only miles of land. A canal across it would greatly
hemisphere south of Canada in this period. lessen the time it took to sail or steam from Eu-
Pedro II, a younger brother of Maria II of Portu- rope to the Far East, or from the Atlantic coast of
gal, reigned as Emperor of Brazil. the United States to the Pacific coast.
1840 TO 1860 377
Naturally, it mattered who would control the gua for himself as a possible place for a rail link
canal, and on April 19, 1850, Great Britain and between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. He or-
the United States camean agreement on the
to ganized opposition to Walker, who was forced
matter. The agreement was negotiated by John out of Nicaragua. Walker later returned, and was
Middleton Clayton (1796-1856), then the Ameri- finally shot by a firing squad in Honduras on
can Secretary of State, and Henry Lytton Bulwer September 12, 1860.
(1801-1872), a British diplomat. By this “Clay- The whole Walker incident was a comic opera
ton-Bulwer Treaty," both sides agreed not to affair, but one that, following the Mexican War,
build an exclusive canal, but to keep any that was went a long way toward creating a deep suspi-
built open to nationals of both countries. Neither cion in Latin America concerning American mo-
was to fortify the canal or to seek control of tives and intentions toward them.
neighboring regions.
The rulers of Colombia were amenable to this,
perhaps because the treaty didn't mean much at MEXICO
the time. The state of technology in 1850 did not Santa Annasurvived the disastrous war with the
permit either nation to build a canal over the United States and even ruled Mexico again in
fever-ridden tropical territory of Panama and, in 1853. In 1855, however, he was deposed once
point of fact, none was built for well over half a and for all. One of those deposing him was Ben-
century. ito Pablo Juarez (1806-1872), a liberal who
wished to reorganize Mexico and weaken the
power of the Church. He became President of
VENEZUELA Mexico in 1858.
Venezuela was going through a turbulent period
because of the rivalry of two leaders, Jose Anto-
nio Paez (1790-1873) and Jose Tadeo Monagas ETHIOPIA
(1784-1868). Ethiopia, which had retained a good deal of its
Christian orientation through the centuries when
the Muslims had dominated northern Africa, had
CENTRAL AMERICA its first modern ruler in Tewodros (Theodore) II
At this time. CentralAmerica was the scene of (1818-1868). He came throne in 1855, uni-
to the
the activities of an American soldier of fortune, fied the land, and did his best to introduce some
William Walker (1824-1860). Born in Tennessee, modernization. He abolished the feudal system
he went to California in search of gold in 1850, and tried to bring the Ethiopian church under
then thought he might further dismember Mex- royal control.
ico. In 1853, he invaded Lower California and
declared it independent of Mexico. His effort to

set up a second Texas failed, however, and he EGYPT
went on to Nicaragua in 1855. Joining a revolu- Muhammad and his son Ibra-
Ali died in 1849,
tionary group, he seized control, declared him- him, had died the year before. Egypt then moved
self President of Nicaragua and, since he came away from attempts at conquest and began its
from a slave state, he restored slavery to the first gropings toward becoming a member of the
land. Amazingly, he was recognized by the European community of nations. Like Panama,
United States, under President Franklin Pierce Africa offered a narrow isthmus between oceans.
(1804-1869). A canal across the Suez isthmus would link the
The American railroad magnate, Cornelius Mediterranean and Red Seas, and, therefore, the
Vanderbilt (1794-1877), opposed this develop- Atlantic and Indian Oceans. The sea route from
ment, not out of concern for the Nicaraguans, Great Britain to India would be cut in half.
you may be sure, but because he wanted Nicara- A canal across the isthmus of Suez had been
attempted on several occasions in ancient and Colony, was, in 1854, recognized as independent
medieval times. At no time had such a venture by Great Britain also.
proved a practical success; however, it was time
to try again.
Mohammad Said had become
(1822-1863) PERSIA
viceroy of Egypt ("Pasha" or "Khedive" are the In this period, Persia was buffeted from the north
Muslim titles) in 1854. He had been educated in by Russia and from the south by Great Britain.
Paris and tried, without much success, to intro- Under Naser od-Din (1831-1896), who became
duce western ways into Egypt. In 1856, he the ruler of Persia in 1848, there began some at-
granted a concession to a French company to tempts at modernization of the land.
build a Suez canal. This was opposed by the Ot- In 1844, a young man, Ali Mohammed (1820-
toman Sultan who feared it would make Egypt 1850), who called himself "Bab" ("The Gate"),
too strong. It was also opposed by Great Britain developed a variation of Shiism that came to be
who feared it would make France too strong. called "Babism." He was executed in 1850. How-
Work began on April 19, 1859, however, ever, another version was taken up by Mirza Ho-
under the guidance of a French diplomat, Ferdi- sayn Ali Nuri (1817-1892), who called himself
nand Marie, Vicomte de Lesseps. Baha' Allah ("Glory of God"), and it was then
called "Baha'ism". It has since become a world
religion, albeit a small one.
LIBERIA
Liberia was established as an independent re- AFGHANISTAN
public on July 26, 1847. It was recognized as such
In 1840, the British were in control of Afghani-
by Great Britain and then by other powers. Its
stan, and puppet ruler, Shah Shoja, was on the
a
independence was respected, partly because
throne. In 1841, however, the Afghanis rose in
(since it was founded by American initiatives) the
revolt and the British garrison in Kabul was sur-
United States took an interest in it.
rounded. The British agreed to leave the country,
but on the way out, they were trapped on Janu-
ary 13, 1842, and slaughtered almost to a man by
SOUTH AFRICA the Afghani.
South Africa, in this period, was involved in a In April 1842, the British sent a punitive ex-
three-way fight: British versus Boers, and both pedition into the land. took Kabul on Septem-
It
versus Bantus. Although a number of Boers had ber 15, and destroyed portions of it. However,
trekked northward, there remained others in the the British East India Company felt it would not
south, particularly in Natal, a coastal province to be safe to attempt to maintain an occupation of
the northeast of Capetown. The British won and the wild and mountainous country since it would
Natal was made a British colony on August 8, be too far from British centers of power. There-
1843, whereupon additional Boers trekked north- fore, they withdrew and "the first Afghan War"
ward. was over.
Both the British and the Boers drove back the That didn't mean the British wanted to see
Bantus, annexing their lands. Afghanistan in anyone else's hands. In 1856,
In 1852, the British recognized the Transvaal when Persia tried to invade Afghanistan, Great
(lying north of Natal) as an independent Boer Britain forced an end to the invasion.
state. It became the "South African Republic" in \
1856, with Marthinus Wessels Pretorius (1819-

1901), the son of one of the leaders of the Great INDIA
Trek, as its first The "Orange Free
president. Great Britain controlled virtually all of India at
State," lying between Transvaal and the Cape this time, but they did so only with the use of
1840 TO 1860 379
Indian troops, who outnumbered the British for what was left of his life. The Moghul Empire
troops by a ratio of 13 to 2, The officer corps, of came to an end two and a third centuries after it
course, was entirely British, and they treated the had been founded, and a century and a half after
Indians, quite as a matter of course, as inferior the death of the last powerful Moghul.
beings. The Indian troops could not be expected The British East India Company had lost the
to enjoy such treatment, and they didn't. confidence of the British government and lost its
About 1857, a new type of cartridge was intro- control over India. The country came under the
duced, made of greased paper that had to be bit- direct rule of the British crown on August 2,
ten before being loaded. The grease consisted of 1858.
animal fat.
The Hindu soldiers believed the grease to con-
tain beef fat, which their religion would not allow BURMA
them to put into their mouths. The Muslim sol- The "Second Burmese War" in 1852-1853 saw
diers believed it to contain pork fat, which could another British victory. The British took Rangoon
not be put into their mouths. The British might on April 12, 1852, and, by year's end, had an-
have announced the use of sheep fat, but they nexed southern Burma. A new ruler, Mindon
believed that simple punishment would settle Min (1894-1878), carefully maintained peace
the matter. with Great Britain during his reign and estab-
On May near Delhi, 85
10, 1857, at a garrison lished Mandalay, in the northern part of the
Indian soldiers (called "sepoys" from a Hindi country, as his capital.
word for "army") sat in prison for having refused
to use the cartridges. It was Sunday and, while
the British were at church, Indian soldiers re- SIAM
leased the prisoners and then began to kill all the Mongkut (1804-1868), known as Rama IV after
British they could find. This began the "Great his death, became king in 1851. He planned the
Sepoy Mutiny." westernization of Siam, made a treaty with Great
The sepoys marched to Delhi, put themselves Britain on April and then made treaties
18, 1855,
under Bahadur II (1775-1862), who was then the with other nations, including one with the
figurehead Moghul Emperor, and proceeded, on United States on May 18, 1856.
May 11, to slaughter all the British they could By carefully playing off Great Britain on his
find in the city. west in Burma and France on his east in Indo-
The revolt spread, and at Cawnpore, about China, he made each one reluctant to see the
250 miles southeast of Delhi, 211 British women other gain control, and he preserved Siam as an
and children were killed on June 27. independent nation. He is the king made famous
By now, the British were assembling punitive by the book Anna and the King of Siam, and by the
forces. They retook Cawnpore on July 16, discov- musical. The King and 1, which was made from it.
ered evidence of the massacre, and took full re-
venge. In mid-September, the British retook
Delhi and battles in its streets raged for nearly a INDOCHINA
week. Lucknow, where the rebels were strong- France, which was building an empire in Africa,
est, was about 50 miles east of Cawnpore, and it gained holdings in the Far East as well. In 1858,
was not taken until March 16, 1858. By June 29, it obtained a strong foothold in Indochina by
the revolt was entirely at an end. seizing control of Saigon.

It had taken the British a little over a year to
quell the mutiny, and the reprisals were very

harsh. Bahadur II was deposed, tried, convicted CHINA
(although he was over 70 and could not have British insistence on gaining huge profits by sell-
dared oppose the rebels), and sent into Burma ing opium to the Chinese led to resistance by the
Chinese government, which didn't want a drug the Perry who had won the Battle of Lake Erie,
culture fastened on its population. The British 40 years earlier.
wanted the money and this led to "The First Perry sailed into Tokyo harbor with four ships
Opium War," one which is, in hindsight, a mat- on July 8, 1853. He insisted on seeing some im-
ter of staggering and callous drug-pushing important official, threatening to land otherwise
morality on the part of the British. and deliver messages at cannon-point. The
his
By May 24, 1841, the British took Canton, and, official came, and Perry delivered his message,
for the rest of the year, bombarded various then withdrew to give the Japanese time for con-
Chinese seaports. On June 19, 1842, the British sideration.
took Shanghai and worked their way up the In February 1854, he returned to Tokyo with
Yangtze River. China was forced to make peace; seven ships, with samples of western products
on August 19, 1842, it ceded Hong Kong to Great and, of course, with the ships' cannons.
Britain, agreed to trade with her on British terms, The Japanese were intelligent enough to bend
and to pay a $20 million indemnity. with the wind. On March 31, 1854, they signed a
This began a long period during which the treaty with the United States, regularizing trade
vast land was continually encroached upon by and promising better treatment of shipwrecked
European powers, and the decline of the Manchu sailors.
Empire after this was rapid. After that, Japan passed through some years
"Extraterritoriality" was established, whereby of uncertainty, with some government leaders
foreign people living inChina could only be tried strongly antiforeign and wishing to regain and
by their own foreign courts and be ruled by their maintain isolation, while others favored learning
own foreign laws. China was required to extend from the foreigners and developing Japan on
toleration to Christians. western lines.
Acombination of Imperial humiliation and
Imperial corruption led to a wild rebellion in
China. It was called the "T'ai P'ing Rebellion," PACIFIC ISLANDS
and was the bloodiest and most devastating civil The French were actively exploring the Pacific
war in history. It produced a great loss of life, Ocean in this period and annexing territory.
perhaps 20 million altogether, and it further Their major annexation was that of New Cale-
weakened the Chinese Empire to the point, in- donia in 1853.
deed, where it could scarcely defend itself
against any foreign enemy. Only the fact that it
was too large a meal for digestion by even the AUSTRALIA
omnivorous Great Britain allowed it to keep its The was being explored ever
interior of Australia
independence. since the southeastern coast had been settled.
Edward John Eyre (1815-1901) explored the de-
sert areas of southern Australia in the early
JAPAN 1840s, but was unable to reach the central regions
Japan's two and a half centuries of isolation came of the continent. John McDouall Stuart (1818-
to a sudden end in the 1850s. 1866), after six attempts to reach the central re-
The United States, which wanted trade, and gion, succeeded in 1860. In his sixth and final
which wanted its shipwrecked sailors treated de- journey, he crossed the continent from south to
cently when they washed up on Japanese shores, north.
decided to take strong measures. In March 1852, In August 1850, the British government gave
President Fillmore authorized a naval expedition the Australians considerable self-rule, including
to Japan. It was commanded by Matthew Gal- elected legislatures for the various provinces. By
braith Perry (1794-1858), a younger brother of then, the number of nonconvicts in the Austra-
1860 TO 1880 381
lian population far outnumbered the number of proceed entirely peacefully. New Zealand was al-
convicts and in 1851, the legislature of New ready occupied by the Maoris, a Polynesian peo-
South Wales forbade the arrival of any further ple, and the "First Maori War" continued from
convicts from Great Britain. Other provinces fol- 1843 to 1848. It was not an intense war and the
lowed, and the British acceded to this. Maoris were finally defeated.
On August 9, 1851, gold was discovered in In the 1840s and 1850s, Great Britain granted
Australia and there was an influx of people from considerable self-government to the New Zea-
all over the world. Population grew rapidly, and
landers. They (and the Australians) were so far
the continent entered the world community. The from Great Britain that it really made no sense
first steamship arrived in 1852, railroads were for the British to try to govern them with a tight
built, and the isolation of the land was much less- reign. The lesson of the value of loose control
ened. learned from the misadventures of George III al-
Not all was rosy, of course. The native Aborig- most a century earlier also played its part. As a
ines were treated as miserably as the natives of result, both Australia and New Zealand re-
Africa and the Americas when those regions mained loyal to the Crown.
came under European sway.
HAWAII
NEW ZEALAND In the 1840s and
1850s, Great Britain, France, and
On January 22, 1840, the first British colonists the United States all agreed that Hawaii was not
arrived in New Zealand, which was almost ex- tobe annexed by any of them. It remained inde-
actly on the opposite side of the globe from Great pendent, therefore. American missionaries,
Britain. however, remained active there, exerting their
The growth of this new British colony did not form of cultural imperialism.
1860 TO 1880
hard von Moltke (1800-1891), a military theorist,
PRUSSIA/GERMANY who was the first to realize the importance of
The "humiliation of Olmutz" had come and railroads in connection with troop movements.
gone, Frederick William IV had gone mad and Until then, right through the Crimean war and
died, and now William I ruled Prussia. Under various colonial wars, armies marched along
him were three remarkable men. roads that were sometimes close to impassable
One was Albrecht Theodor Emil von Roon and where progress was always slow and tiring.
(1803-1879), who became Minister of War in In a country with a good rail network, however,
1859. He undertook to reorganize the Prussian soldiers could be moved in greater quantities and
army. There was to be a universal three-year ser- at greater speeds while they were sitting down.
vice for young Prussian men and a permanent As a result, Prussia began to build the kind of
reserve to defend the country. Von Roon made rail network that would be useful in war. This
the state the servant of the army as Frederick would make possible, Moltke foresaw, speedy
William I had done a century and a quarter ear- mobilization, and speedy concentration. This
lier. would, in turn, lead to battle lines perhaps
Working with him was Helmuth Karl Bern- hundreds of miles long, with millions of soldiers.
Such masses could only be controlled by means marck could now count on Russia to remain neu-
of the telegraph, and telegraph lines were also tral in what he was planning for the future.
developed with that in mind. His next step was to see to it that Austria was
Moltke worked it all out while other nations excluded from any project for the unification of
remained stuck with the tactics of Napoleonic Germany. If Germany was to be unified, then it
times. would have to be under Prussian leadership
The third and most remarkable of the three only. Therefore, when Austria called for a gath-
was Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck (1815- ering of German rulers in August 1863, to reform
1898), who became Prime Minister (or ''Chancel- the Germanic Confederation, Bismarck refused
lor") of Prussia on September 22, 1862, and who to allow William I to attend. Without Prussia, the
remained in that office for a quarter of a century Congress came to nothing.
thereafter. He was the real ruler of Prussia while Itwas next necessary to entangle Austria in
he held that office. some way that would force war between her and
Bismarck was a master of diplomacy. He knew Prussia at a time and occasion of Prussia's choos-
exactly how to hoodwink other nations, when to ing. Denmark handed him the chance for that.
take a chance and when to draw off, when to be In 1848, the German revolutionaries had tried
a bully and when to smile. He orchestrated all to make Prussia seize Schleswig and Holstein
that was to follow. William I was only the figure- from Denmark, but Prussia had funked the mat-
head; Roon and Moltke were only the arms. It ter. Now things had changed.
was Bismarck who was the brain. On March 30, 1863, Denmark, counting on
Bismarck did not have an easy task in the goal British support, foolishly reorganized Schleswig
he set himself of securing a united Germany to make it a more integral part of the Danish
under firm Prussian control. There were many kingdom. Denmark was now dealing, however,
inside Prussia who were against militarization not with the timid Frederick William IV, but with
and against the autocracy it implied. They Bismarck.
wanted representative government, and they On January 16, 1864, Bismarck engineered an
wanted the legislature to control the funds going alliance with Austria, which wasn't very enthu-
to the army. Bismarck had to override them. siastic about it. An ultimatum was sent to the
In addition, William I was a cautious monarch Danes which was designed to be very difficult for
who was afraid that Bismarck would land Prus- the Danes to agree to, and by February 1, the two
sia in disaster, and Bismarck had to override German powers invaded Denmark. Actually, it
him, too. He managed, however, for he did was Prussia that did most of the work, for Bis-
not become known as the "Iron Chancellor" for marck wanted the Prussian army to get the exer-
nothing. cise, and was perfectly content to let the
His first move came February 1863, when
in Austrians more or less skulk in the rear.
the Poles rebelled against Russia once again. Bis- The Prussian army did its work to perfection
marck at once sent a representative to the Rus- and Denmark never had a chance. The British
sian Tsar to assure him that Prussia would tried to bring about peace, but Bismarck easily
cooperate against the Poles. (After all, there were outmaneuvered them and on August 1, Denmark
bothersome Poles in the eastern parts of Prussia, gave up. The Treaty of Vienna (Bismarck was
too.) Half the Prussian army was sent to the Pol- willing to let the Austrians have the empty honor
ish frontier and that made
impossible for Great
it of hosting the treaty negotiations) was signed on
Britain and France to intervene usefully on behalf October 20, 1864. By it, Schleswig and Holstein
of the Poles. The Russians were grateful for this. became the joint possession of Prussia and
(For some reason, the Russians often succumbed Austria.
to feelings of gratitude, something the Prussians This was precisely what Bismarck wanted. In
and Austrians were rarely troubled with.) Bis- the first place, it displayed to the world that Prus-
1860 TO 1880 383
sia was now, for the first time in history, an equal On June 15, 1866, Moltke sent three armies
partner with Austria inside Germany. For an- southward on separate railroads and coordinated
other, produced a
it situation in which Prussia their activity by telegraph. The Austrians, on the
would surely have an excuse to quarrel with Aus- other hand, never dreamed of using either rail-
tria at whatever time was most convenient. Bis- roads or telegraph wires, and were caught by
marck had no fear of the result. The joint surprise.
operations in Denmark had made it quite ob- The armies met at Koniggratz in Eastern Bo-
vious that the Prussian army was far superior to hemia on July 3, 1866. If Moltke's plans had
that of Austria. worked perfectly, the Austrian army would have
In October, 1865, Bismarck met with Napo- been destroyed. However, the trouble with new
leon III and hinted that France would profit if technology is that it sometimes doesn't work.
Prussia beat Napoleon III was fool
Austria. There was a failure in the telegraph so that the
enough to believe Bismarck and thought, be- Prussian armies did not move simultaneously as
sides, that Austria would win, or that, at worst, they should have, and a courier had to gallop 20
the war would last a long time and weaken both miles to deliver the necessary order. That saved
to France's benefit. the Austrians from utter destruction.
Napoleon III, therefore, agreed to stay neu- The Prussian confusion was made up for by
tral. Alexander II remembering Prus-
of Russia, the needle-gun, which gave the Prussians a
sia's help against the Poles, also remained much heavier and more rapid fire. The Austrians
neutral. Then, on April 8, 1866, Bismarck entered were not routed, but they were so decisively de-
into an alliance with the new nation of Italy, feated that the war was over as far as they were
which hated Austria for past oppressions, and concerned.
which still felt there was Italian territory under Napoleon III, who found that the Austrians
Austrian sway. (They called it "Italia irredenta," were beaten, and beaten very quickly, too, so
or "unredeemed Italy," and it consisted mainly that Prussia now bestrode central Europe trium-
of the cities of Trent and Trieste.) phantly, tried to make the best of it. He at-
Austria was thus and Bis-
effectively isolated tempted tomediate a peace that was as favorable
marck was ready to find an excuse for war in to Austria as possible, and Bismarck was willing
anything Austria chose to do in Schleswig-Hol- to have him try, but the peace was to be the kind
stein. he himself would dictate. Napoleon III had to
By June 1866, Bismarck had produced suffi- back down and, trying to save himself somethiiig,
puzzled Austrians to find
cient irritations for the asked for the advantages Bismarck had promised
themselves facing war with no clear way of back- him after defeating Austria. Bismarck gave him
ing out. Most of the smaller German states, pre- exactly nothing.
ferring a bumbling Austria to a superefficient At the Treaty of Prague on August 23, 1866,
Prussia, sided with Austria, but their help was Austria was excluded from German affairs. All
ineffective. Prussia had no worries as long as the the northern German states were herded into a
rest of Europe (meaning France, in particular) "North German Federation," which was under
stayed out. strict Prussian domination. The southern Ger-
Moltke was ready. He had carefully watched man states of Bavaria, Wurttemburg, and Baden
what had gone on in the American Civil War, were allowed a confederation of their own, but
where the Americans on either side had, more or there was little they could do by themselves, and
less awkwardly, developed all the modern ad- Bismarck's shadow lay over them.
juncts of war that Moltke had been working out. Bismarck's greatest gift, however, was in
It had served as a test case for him and he im- knowing v^hen to stop. This was something
proved his own plans in the light of what had Charles XII of Sweden and Napoleon 1 of France
gone on across the ocean. had not known. Having defeated Austria, Bis-
marck had his goal and he did not want to go poleon with impunity because they thought they
beyond it and humiliate the defeated nation. In- were still living in the time of Frederick the
deed, the telegraph accident that had kept the Great. Now it was France that thought it could
battle of Koniggratz from being a total cataclysm face Bismarck with impunity because it thought
was to Bismarck's advantage. (Even accidents it was still living in the time of Napoleon I.
worked on his behalf.) Bismarck took no territory Napoleon III did not want a war, probably,
from Austria but instead cultivated friendship but he had grown more incapable than ever as
with it once it was clear that Prussia, not Austria, age and illness were settling down upon him,
would dominate Germany. It was necessary, and he could not withstand the general French
after all, to keep Austria from seeking revenge. pressure for a glorious war. After all, they were
Bismarck grew more powerful within Prussia so used to winning battles.
also. Nothing succeeds like success; and the On July 15, 1870, therefore, France declared
quick, painless, and total victories over Denmark war on and that started the "Franco-
Prussia,
and Austria had made him popular. He now saw Prussian War." At once, Prussia mobilized, mak-
his way clear to achieve final union of all the ing full use of its railroads, and concentrating its
German states (minus Austria), for, in his way, forces with amazing speed. The French made
there stood only France. partial use of their rail network and had not yet
Bismarck began to maneuver in masterly fash- fully mobilized when the Prussians were com-
ion against France. Napoleon III, in an attempt pletely ready.What's more, Prussian intelligence
tostrengthen France to match Prussia's rapidly knew exactly where all the French Armies were,
growing might, had made unskillful attempts to and had a plan of campaign that had been orga-
absorb Belgium or Luxemburg, and Bismarck nized by Moltke with complete efficiency. The
saw to it that this came to the attention of Great French knew nothing of the Prussian plans, and
Britain, which had not yet forgotten the first Na- had no plan of their own. The result was an utter
poleon. Great Britain, therefore, moved into and humiliating disaster for the French, with the
sympathy with Prussia, which already had the Prussians winning every battle.
neutrality of Russia, the alliance of Italy, and the The climax came on September 1, 1870 at
cowed subservience of Austria. If France fought, Sedan, near the Belgian border, only seven
she would have to fight alone. weeks after the war had begun. It was another in
The trick was, then, to make sure that France the monotonous series of Prussian victories. This
would seem to be the aggressor. Bismarck began time, the French army surrendered and Napo-
a campaign designed to irritate the French by de- leon III, who was on the scene, surrendered as
liberately making Prussia seem dangerous to her. well and was taken prisoner.
Beginning in 1868, he moved to make a Ho- By September 19, 1870, Paris was placed
henzollern prince, a member of the Prussian under siege, but the city resisted with a courage
royal family, become a king of Spain. It never and tenacity that saved a good deal of French
came to pass and, if it had, it would scarcely have pride. It was not until January 28, 1871 that the
mattered, considering how unimportant Spain city was taken. Another epic was the resistance
had become, but the French became bellicose in- of the French fortress at Belfort in Alsace, which
deed over it, as Bismarck intended. What's more, held out against a superior German force for 105
in the diplomatic exchanges that followed, Wil- days. The French finally marched out with their
liam I rejected the demands of the French ambas- weapons on their shoulders and their flags
sador and Bismarck deliberately altered the flying, the only French force that had held its
^
wording of a telegram reporting the fact (the own.
"Ems telegram") to make it all sound even more Just the same, despite Paris and Belfort,
insulting to the French. France had lost the war in a defeat more disgrace-
It was an old situation in reverse. In 1806, the ful than any since it had faced Henry V of En-
Prussians had been confident they could face Na- gland four and a half centuries before. They were
1860 TO 1880 385
forced to sign the Treaty of Frankfurt on May 10, The Kulturkampf was petering to an end by
1871, by which they had to cede Alsace and half 1880. In a way, both sides won. The state
of Lorraine (which, together, became famous as stopped trying make life miserable for Catho-
to
"Alsace-Lorraine") to the Prussians. They also lics, and Catholics made no serious attempt,
had to pay an indemnity of 5 billion francs and thereafter, to oppose the state. It was live and let
to endure a Prussian army of occupation until the live, and Bismarck was satisfied with that.
indemnity was paid. Besides, a secular opposition had arisen that
It was a mistake for Bismarck to take Alsace- Bismarck could see might be a more dangerous
Lorraine, perhaps his only mistake. He did his opponent than the Catholics. Soon after 1860, so-
best to pacify France thereafter, as he had paci- cialists had been organizing into parties, and
fied Austria. He even encouraged it to find colo- those socialists who espoused the economic the-
nies for itself in Africa and Asia. Nothing was of ories of Karl Marx were in the lead within the
any use. The loss of Alsace-Lorraine (which Bis- movement by 1870.
marck didn't really need) was not forgotten and In May and June of 1878, there were two at-
it made of France an intransigent and unforgiv- tempts made to assassinate the Emperor, neither
ing enemy. successful, and both by radicals who, as it hap-
Bismarck had now attained his great end. By pened, were not socialists. On October 19, 1878,
January 18, 1871, Bismarck the Conqueror had these attempts nevertheless, provided an excuse
persuaded all the awed and grateful German for strong antisocialist laws, with draconian pun-
states to agree to the establishment of a "German ishments and rigorous enforcement. Socialist ac-
Empire" to include all of Germany outside Aus- tivity retreated into the dark and became
tria, with King William I of Prussia becoming Em- conspiratorial.
peror William I of Germany as well. Meanwhile, Germany was rapidly becoming
As an added humiliation to France, the new industrialized, quickly passing France and com-
German Empire was proclaimed in the Hall of ing to rival Great Britain. It and
increased its iron
Mirrors at Versailles, the very center from which steel production phenomenally, became one of
Louis XIV had dominated Europe nearly two the great commercial powers of the world, and
centuries earlier. its cities grew rapidly. It was clear that, both mil-
The German Empire was not a completely un- itarily and economically, Germany had suc-
itary state. While it was unified by the German ceeded to the mastery of Europe the position —
language and a common literary heritage, the held in the time of Louis XIV by France, and in
north and east was Protestant, while the south the time of Philip II by Spain.
and west was Catholic. Prussia itself, which To make doubly sure of this, Bismarck pro-
dominated the Empire, was largely (but not en- ceeded to build a series of alliances designed to
tirely) Protestant. make sure that France would remain isolated, for
Bismarck was determined that there be no only France could be counted on to remain for-
force within Germany that could effectively ever antagonistic to the power that had so humil-
counter the supremacy of the state. It seemed to iated her in 1870.
him that the Catholic church, which was inter- In the summer of 1871, William 1 of Germany
national in character, and under a non-German and Francis Joseph what was then called
of
head, was decade of the Ger-
suspect. In the first Austria-Hungary met, and friendship between
man Empire, then, strong measures were taken them was established. Austria-Hungary took on
against the political influence of Catholics. This the role of loyal subordinate to Germany and
was the "Kulturkampf" ("cultural war"). maintained it thereafter.
The Jesuits were expelled on June 25, 1872, Russia feared the strength of this new alliance
civil marriages were made obligatory. Catholic and felt it would be best to join it. Alexander 11
religious orders were dissolved, education was of Russia visited Berlin in 1872 and William 1 vis-
put under the control of the state, and so on. ited St. Petersburg in 1873. By June 6, 1873, the
“Three Emperors League" was formed, in which Ferdinand Julius Cohn (1828-1898) published
the Emperors of Germany, Austria-Hungary, a three-volume work on bacteria in 1872. He was
and Russia presented united front against
a the first to try to classify bacteria into genera and
France (and against socialism, too). Italy joined species and may be said to have founded the sci-
in September when Victor Emmanuel II visited ence of bacteriology.
Vienna and Berlin. France was now totally iso- Wilhelm Max Wundt (1832-1920) es-
In 1879,
lated, and Bismarck had reached his peak. tablished the first laboratory to be devoted en-
And yet this plastering together of nations tirely to experimental psychology.
could not work one thing, Austria-
forever. For Wilhelm Richard De-
In mathematics, Julius
Hungary and Russia were at irreconcilable odds dekind (1831-1916) worked out a new and more
in the Balkans, where each wanted mastery. logical way numbers in
of dealing with irrational
There were recurrent crises in which Bismarck 1872. In 1874, Georg Cantor (1845-1918) began to
had to choose between Austria-FIungary and introduce his views of infinity and beyond, in-
Russia, and the pull of a common "Germanism" cluding "transfinite numbers," which repre-
inclined him toward Austria-Hungary. sented an infinite number of different infinities.
During this turbulent period, German science In technology, Nikolaus August Otto (1832-
continued to make strides. August Wilhelm von 1891) devised the first practical internal-combus-
Hofmann (1818-1892) had taught in Great Britain tion engine with power coming from explosions
and had inspired Perkin to make the experiment within the engine and not from steam outside. It
that had led to synthetic dyes. When Hofmann was to revolutionize transport vehicles. In 1876,
retired to Germany in 1864, he continued the Karl von Linde produced the first modern re-
study of synthetic dyes and founded the German frigerator, making use of liquid ammonia for the
Chemical Society. Thanks to him, Germany ov- process.
ertook France and Great Britain, and had as- Heinrich Schliemann (1822-1890) was an en-
sumed the lead in the field of organic chemistry. thusiast who set out to dig up Priam's Troy, de-
Thus, Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von stroyed 2000 years earlier. He located remains of
Baeyer (1835-1917) discovered barbituric acid in a number he chose, one
of buried cities at the site
1863, derivatives of which formed the well- of which might well have been the Troy of the
known "sleeping pills" of later years. Baeyer also famous siege. Schliemann, working unscien-
synthesized indigo, one of the water-fast natural tifically, destroyed far more than he preserved,
dyes in 1878; and his pupil, Karl James Peter but he gave an enormous boost to modern
Graebe (1841-1927), had synthesized alizarin, archeology.
another such dye, in 1869. Kekule was still active Wagner continued to be an outstanding figure
and, in 1865, worked out the structural formula in German music in this period. He completed
of the important benzene molecule. his four operas of the Ring of the Nibelungen in
Wilhelm Pfeffer (1845-1920) worked with 1876 and they have remained a giant product of
semipermeable membranes in 1877 and studied the musical world ever since. Johannes Brahms
osmotic pressure. Using this technique, he was composed his first two symphonies in 1876 and
the first to obtain reliable molecular weights for 1877, and also produced numerous other works.
the huge protein molecules. Wilhelm Friedrich Karl Marx published the first volume of his
("Willy") Kuhne was the first, in
(1837-1900) ponderous analysis of the economics of capital-
1876, to use the word "enzyme" in connection ism, Das Kapital, in 1867.
with the catalysts found in living tissue. In 1869,
Paul Langerhans (1847-1888) discovered patches
of cells in the pancreas, which have since been ITALY
called the "islets of Langerhans." These even- The conclusion of the Franco-Austrian war of
tually played an important role in the develop- 1859 did not make the Italians feel grateful to
ment of the treatment for diabetes. Napoleon III. By that war, he had made sure that
1860 TO 1880 387
Sardinia gained Lombardy from Austria; how- States, north and south of Rome remained
itself,
ever, his abrupt ending of the war left Venetia in outside the kingdom for it was garrisoned and
Austrian hands, and he had helped himself to defended by French troops.
Nice and Savoy on the western borders of Sardi- On March Kingdom of Italy was
17, 1861, the
nia as payment uncompleted job. There-
for the proclaimed. Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia be-
fore, he gained the fury and disgust of Italians. came the first King of Italy, and its capital was in
Napoleon III had, in other words, managed to Turin, but was shifted to Florence in 1865.
strengthen a power at his southeastern border Cavour, with the Kingdom of Italy estab-
and yet make it his enemy, too. lished, died on June 6, 1861, but he could not
The unification of Italy didn't stop once France have died entirely peace for the unification
at
halted the war, however. Now that Sardinia had was not complete. Venetia was still held by Aus-
doubled its size and strength by the absorption tria (thanks —
as the Italians saw it to the pusil- —
of Lombardy, the small states of northern Italy lanimity of the French) and Rome was guarded
Parma, Modena, and Tuscany promptly threw — by French forces.
out their Austrian-puppet rulers and joined the Italy allied itself with Prussia on May 12, 1866,
growing nation. Sardinia, to avoid trouble, asked feeling it stood to gain if Prussia made war on
Napoleon III for his blessing, and Napoleon had Austria. Whenwar between Prussia and
the
no choice but to accept the situation. Austria began on June 16, 1866, Italy honored its
Even Romagna, the northernmost portion of treaty obligations eagerly and declared war on
the Papal States, joined Sardinia. That left the Austria on June 20.
rest of the Papal States and the kingdom of Na- On June 24, the Italians were promptly de-
ples still outside. feated at the Second Battle of Custozza (where
On May 5, 1860, an Italian adventurer, Giu- the Austrians had beaten them once before, 18
seppe Garibaldi (1807-1882), took over. He had months earlier). On July 20, they also lost a naval
fought in South America, in Italy, and in France, battle at Lissa Island in the Adriatic. These losses
and now he took a thousand "Redshirts" and didn't matter, however, since Austria lost the
sailed from Genoa, Sardinia's chief port. He was war.
secretly encouraged by the Sardinian Prime Min- As a result of the Treaty of Vienna, Italy an-
ister, Cavour. Garibaldi's troops landed in Sicily, nexed Venetia.
were greeted with enthusiasm by the population, When the Franco-Prussian war began on July
and easily defeated Neapolitan forces who were 15, 1870, Italy was entirely on the side of the
not eager to die for their despot's cause. Prussians, of course. After its initial defeats,
Garibaldi then crossed into Italy itself, with France hurriedly withdrew its troops from Rome
the quiet aid of the British fleet,and marched on August 19; and as soon as the French disaster
triumphantly toward Naples, which he took on at Sedan reached Italian ears, they marched into
September 7, 1860. Francis II (1836-1894), who Rome on September 20. Rome became the capital
had succeeded his father, Ferdinand I, only the of the Kingdom of Italy on October 2, 1870.
year before, fled. He was the last Bourbon king In the 1870s, Italy struggled for moderniza-
of Naples; the only Bourbon monarchs remaining tion. It army, created a navy, built
reorganized its
were reigning in Spain. railroads, and encouraged trade. It could not

That left the Papal States. There was an upris- help remaining weaker than the northern na-
ing there on September 8, and Cavour immedi- tions, however.
ately sent Sardinian troops southward. Papal On January 9, 1878, Victor Emmanuel II died,
forces were defeated on September 18, and the after a reign that had seen enormous successes
Sardinians marched to the Neapolitan border. because Italy had chosen allies who had won bat-
On October 21, 1860, Naples and Sicily joined tles, even when Italy itself had not. He was suc-
Sardinia and, on November 4, most of the Papal ceeded by his son, who reigned as Humbert or
States. The westernmost section of the Papal Umberto I (1844-1900).
Meanwhile, Verdi was still actively writing him send out and receive diplomats, who
also let
operas. La Forza del Destino was staged in 1862 were to have the same immunities as secular dip-
and Aida Amilcare Ponchielli (1834-1886)
in 1871. lomats. He had the full ownership of the Vatican
is best known today for his exuberant "Dance of and other papal places, was not to be bound by
the Hours" from his opera, La Gioconda, pro- any laws but his own, and was to receive an an-
duced in 1876. nual grant from the Italian treasury.
Pius IX would accept none of this but re-
mained intransigent. He regarded himself as a
PAPACY "prisoner of the Vatican," which view his succes-
Throughout this period. Pope Pius IX, who had sorswould also hold for a period of time. Pius IX
started his rule with such signs of liberalism, had died on February 7, 1878, having been Pope for
been made more and more rigidly conservative 32 years, the longest papal reign in history. He
as a result of adversity. His claims for papal was succeeded by Leo XIII (1810-1893), whose
power escalated, even as the eastern portion of more liberal and tolerant attitude began a process
the Papal States melted away forever and joined of healing.
Sardinia, and even though he was left only with
the western province of Rome (and that only by
the grace of its French garrison). AUSTRIA/AUSTRIA-HUNGARY
On December 8, 1864, he published an encyc- Hungary had remained restless after its forcible
lical in which he denounced both nationalism repression in 1849. Austria had to be concerned
and socialism. He came out against religious tol- about the possibility that Hungary would rise
eration and insisted that the Church must not be again whenever Austria might be militarily
controlled by the state. The Church, instead, preoccupied. The war with France in 1859 was
should have sole control of education and should difficult for Austria to fight because it had to keep
have the last word on culture and science. Essen- looking over its shoulder, so to speak, to see
tially, it demanded the repeal of the nineteenth what Hungary was doing. That necessity also
century. hampered Austria war against Prussia.
in its
Then, from December 8, 1869 to October 20, Austria felt that some sort of compromise had
1870, even as the last traces of the secular power to be made. This came to pass in October 1867
of the Papacy were vanishing after eleven centu- and was called the "Ausgleich [Settlement] of
ries, Pius IX held the Vatican Council. It was the 1867." It set up a "dual monarchy." The western
first such council since the Council of Trent three half, in a large crescent, remained Austria. The
centuries earlier. eastern half, more compact and nestled within
Its climax came on July 18, 1870 (two months Austria like a nut in a half-shell, became the
before the Italians took over Rome) when the Kingdom of Hungary. Francis Joseph I ruled
dogma of papal infallibility was declared. Ac- both nations, being the Emperor of Austria and
cording to this, when the Pope spoke in his Papal the King of Hungary. They also had in common
capacity on matters of faith or morals, he could the ministries of foreign affairs, of war, and of
not be wrong. This served to increase anti-Papal finance, so that they were a pair of Siamese twins
feelings in all secular institutions, including the — joined in some respects, separate in others.
government even Catholic powers.
of It helped Both nations had legislatures and cabinets of
institute the Kulturkampf in Germany. their own. The nation as a whole came to be
On May 13, 1871, the new Italian nation tried called "Austria-Hungary," and the amazing
to mollify thePope, giving him royal honors and thing about it was that it worked, after a fashion.
full freedom to perform his religious duties. It In the Austrian portion, the German-speaking
made his person inviolable, let him have free in- population was supreme, though they made up
tercourse with Catholics all over the world, and only a third of the population. The Slavic peoples
1860 TO 1880 389
in Bohemia and in the southeast were vehe- haunting "Die Moldau," one of a series of sym-
mently dissatisfied with the compromise because phonic poems composed between 1874 and 1879.
they didn't see why the Hungarians should get
what they didn't get.
As for the Hungarians, having gotten a certain FRANCE
measure of freedom, they were even less willing At the beginning of this period, Napoleon III had
than the Germans of Austria to share it. They had his power shaken by the war with Austria.
were quite determined to see that their own Slavs Although it was a victory for France, it was clear
and Romanians remained firmly under the that this was not a brilliant Napoleonic smash.
Hungarian thumb. Napoleon III did not enjoy a situation in which
Thus while the Ausgleich worked, it bore he was obviously to blame if things did not work
within it the seeds of enormous trouble. well, and he set about sharing the responsibility.
Once Bismarck completed his task and formed The period from 1860 on, then, is known as
the powerful German Empire, Austria-Hungary the "Liberal Empire." He increased the power of
moved into the German shadow. It still had its the legislature and allowed them to debate mat-
ambitions in the Balkans, and it still confronted ters more freely, and to have more say in finan-
Russia, but now it depended entirely on German cial matters. This would have been a wise move
support for success. if Napoleon III had been a more capable ruler,
During one important Austrian

this period, but he continued to make mistakes and his liber-
scientist was Ludwig Edward Boltzmann (1844- alization only allowed the opposition to form and
1906), who, in 1871, worked out the kinetic the- grow.
ory of gases independently of work done at about There was the problem of Mexico, for in-
the same time in Great Britain. He interpreted stance. It had failed to pay its debts and, in 1861,
the behavior of gases in terms of the tiny speed- Great Britain, France, and Spain decided to col-
ing and rebounding molecules that made them lect those debts by force, and sent an expedition
up. He also pictured the concept of entropy as a which placed troops ashore at Vera Cruz. The
measure of the disorder of a system. United States, which had not minded attacking
The botanist, Gregor Johann Mendel (1822- Mexico itself a decade and a half earlier, did not
1884), published his researches on pea plants in want to see anyone else doing the same. The
1865, and founded the modern science of ge- United States was, however, engaged in a civil
netics. His work, however, was ignored for a war and, short of protesting, could do nothing.
generation. The British and Spaniards quickly withdrew,
Austria at this time, and all the world, in fact, however, for they did not think the debt-settle-
lay under the spell of the "waltz king," Johann ment was worth getting embroiled in a Mexican
Strauss the Younger (1825-1899), who wrote the quagmire, and they feared what might happen if
most popular waltzes the world has ever known, the American Civil War were to end in a Union
over 150 of them. The most popular of all is "The victory.
Beautiful Blue Danube," composed in 1867. Oth- Napoleon, with his gift for making mistakes,
ers are "Artists Life," "Tales from the Vienna hung on and tried to set up a French-dominated
Woods," "Wine, Women and Song," "Wiener- "Mexican Empire." This proved to be a costly
blut," and so on. He wrote comic operas, too, of Napoleon
error (like that of I in Spain), which
which by far the most famous is "Die Fleder- weakened France and made it and its Emperor
maus," composed in 1874. look ridiculous before the world. It also earned
Also Austrian by geography, but Czech in cul- him the enmity of the United States, which did
ture, was Bedrich Smetana (1824-1884), whose survive the Civil War.
most popular opera is The Bartered Bride, com- Then, by taking over the defense of Rome
posed in 1866. He is also remembered for the against the new nation of Italy, he hoped to win
credit withFrench Catholics, but he also earned later. He was the last monarch France was to
new hatred from Italy. have.
In 1863, when the Poles revolted against the When the news of Sedan reached Paris, the
Russians, he made gestures as though to help the Parisians invaded the Imperial palace and a
Poles, but he was far away and, in between him "Third Republic" was declared. By September
and the Poles, was Bismarck's Prussia, which 19, the city was surrounded by two Prussian ar-
was firmly on the Russian side. All Napoleon III mies, but it withstood a siege, for over four
achieved, therefore, was to gain the enmity of months until there was no food left in
virtually
Russia. the city and the people were starving. Gambetta
When Prussia defeated Austria in 1866, while had escaped from the city by balloon and was
France did nothing, Napoleon III looked foolish organizing resistance in the provinces. He and a
once again. Napoleon III then tried to pick up mining engineer, Charles Louis de Freycinet
Belgium or Luxemburg as the "compensation" (1828-1923), led a fight so desperately gallant
he imagined Prussia would let him have. Bis- against overwhelming force that they helped res-
marck refused brusquely, and all Napoleon cue France from absolute disgrace.
gained was humiliation and the suspicious en- By the time Paris gave up, however, all resis-
mity of Great Britain. tance had been crushed, and Bismarck allowed
France was effectively isolated, then, as the the French to move on to develop their republic,
1860s drew near the end, and there could be no feeling,no doubt, that this would keep them
question but that this was due to Napoleon Ill's weak and in turmoil.
pathetic fumbling. The opposition grew. The The French elected Louis Adolph Thiers
government won the elections in 1869, but only (1797-1877) as the first head of the Third Repub-
by a majority of 57%, and no fewer than 30 out- lic on February 16, 1871. He had had a long
right republicanswere elected to the legislature. career. He had opposed Charles X, was in
What's more, labor was growing more socialistic. Louis Philippe's cabinet in various positions
Trade-unions were spreading and so were for 10 years, but lost his post when he was
strikes. too vehemently in favor of Muhammad Ali.
The most prominent French republican at this Now he was the head of the government and
time was Leon Gambetta (1838-1882), who de- it was he who had to present the treaty that
manded universal suffrage, freedom of the press, cost France Alsace-Lorraine. was accepted by
It
the right of assembly to express grievances, trial a wide majority of the delegates; they had no
by jury, separation of church and state, and no choice.
standing army. Thiers was a conservative republican, how-
Napoleon IIIcould think of no way of saving ever, and many in Paris who had withstood the
the situation but by conducting one of his canned siege, and who felt the peace treaty to be a hu-
plebiscites, in which as many as possible were miliation, wanted a more radical government.
bludgeoned into voting "yes" on the question of On March 1, they set up a "Commune" in Paris,
whether they favored the government or not. On consisting of a wide variety of different (and
May 8, 1870, the plebiscite gave Napoleon III an loudly disagreeing) radicals who were lumped
82% majority which was, under the circum- together as "Communards."
stances, meaningless, but which gave the gov- The French government, however, had the
ernment the courage to declare war on Prussia 10 army. It had failed miserably against the Prus-
weeks later. sians, but it was perfectly capable of slaughtering
By September 2, 1870, four months after the its own unarmed people. While the occupying
plebiscite, Napoleon III had surrendered at Prussians watched (no doubt with cynical amaze-
Sedan and was forced to abdicate. He fled to ment), the French army took Paris, destroyed the
Great Britain where he died a little over two years Commune (which had only lasted 11 weeks), and
1860 TO 1880 391
then indulged in more or less indiscriminate ex- he deliberately allowed it to appear that there
ecutions and slayings. might be a new German-French war. It panicked
After that, France felt it had had enough of France, and it also upset Great Britain and Rus-
republican confusion, and a national assembly sia, neither of whom
wanted to see France made
was which the monarchists had the
elected in into a German puppet altogether. They made
majority. It looked as though the Third Republic known to Bismarck, who eased off,
their position
would be shorter-lived than the first two. The and who may have decided, then, that he
trouble was that there were three kinds of mon- couldn't count on Russia and that he would be
archists. The “Legitimists" wanted Henri Dieu- better off without Austria-Hungary in any Balkan
donne d' Artois, Count of Chamh ord (1820- trouble.
1883), who was the grandson of Charles X. The MacMahon ruled under a constitution that
"Orleanists" wanted Louis Philippe Albert, gave the president great power, and he used
Count of Paris (1838-1894), who was the grand- those powers vigorously for conservative causes.
son of Louis Philippe. The "Bonapartists" He used them too vigorously, in fact, and grew
wanted a Bonaparte. steadily more unpopular. On
January 30, 1879,
For a while, it looked as though there might he resigned, although his seven-year term still
be a general agreement to let Chambord rule as had a year to run.
"Henry V" and then, since he had no children, Francois Paul Jules Grevy (1807-1891), who
to allow Paris to succeed as "Louis Philippe II." had been a strong leader of the opposition in the
However, Chambord insisted that he would not last years of Napoleon III, was elected third Pres-
rule unless France would accept the white flag of ident of the French Republic over Gambetta. He
pre-Revolutionary France in place of the tricolor. had always favored a weak executive and, under
It was by an idiotic demand such as that that the him, the powers of the President declined until it
Third Republic was saved. ebbed to figurehead status. It was the legislature
Thiers gained the title of President on August headed by the Prime Minister that would rule
31, 1871, and managed to organize finances in France, and, with that, the Third Republic be-
such a way that the large indemnity the Prus- came a going concern.
sians had set was paid off and the last bit of the Yet there was one event in France that was
German occupying force was out of the country more important to the world than anything that
by September 16, 1873. Napoleon III or Bismarck did, or could do. In
Thiers, his work done, resigned on May 24, 1865, Louis Pasteur enunciated the "germ theory
1873, and the very conservative Marie Edme Pa- of disease" which maintained that infectious dis-
trice Maurice de MacMahon was elected. He had ease was the growth and spread of
result of the
fought in the Crimean War, had led the French microorganisms. It was the most important sin-
army to victory against Austria in 1859, and had gle medical advance the world had ever seen, for
taken Paris from the Commune. He had also lost the new view of disease it made possible led to
disgracefully to the Prussians. the doubling of the average life-span and —
MacMahon was a monarchist who saw it as helped bring on a fearful population explosion
his task to pave the way for Chambord and Paris the world over.
to —
succeed to the throne first one, then the Pierre Eugene Marcelin Berthelot (1827-1907)
other. But again Chambord saved the Republic by studied the heat developed by chemical reactions
insisting on the white flag. That was monarchy's and was one of those who founded the study of
last chance. "thermochemistry" in the 1860s. He was also the
With the Republic established, France began first to go systematically about the practice of
looking about for allies since it was quite certain synthesizing organic compounds that did not
it could never stand up to the German Empire Emile Lecoq de Boisbaudran
exist in nature. Paul
alone. Bismarck was annoyed and, in April 1875, (1838-1912) discovered the element gallium, the
properties of which offered strong support to the only grand opera The Tales of Hoffman was pro-
periodic table of the elements that had just been duced only after his death in 1875. Clement Phi-
worked out in Russia. Louis Paul Cailletet (1832- libertLeo Delibes (1836-1891) was the first to
1913) was the first, in 1877, to liquefy the gases make the writing of ballet-music a major preoc-
oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon monoxide. Of the cupation. He is best known for his music to the
gases then known, only hydrogen remained ballet, Coppelia, written in 1870.
unliquefied. Charles Camille .Saint-Saens (1835-1921)
In 1878, Paul Bert (1833-1886) studied the ag- wrote the opera Samson and Delilah in 1877, but
onizing disease, bends, which sometimes para- hismost often-heard work is his lively "Danse
lyzed and even killed those working under high Macabre," composed in 1874.*
air-pressure underwater. He found it was
brought about by nitrogen that dissolved in the
bloodstream at high pressure, then bubbled out RUSSIA
when the pressure was lowered again. He This new Alexander II, was quite different
tsar,
pointed out that pressure must be decreased from his father. By Russian standards, he was
slowly and by stages. This new view greatly surprisingly liberal. For one thing, on March 3,
eased the task of building bridges and underwa- 1861, he put through an edict that freed the serfs,
ter tunnels. who until then had been bound to the soil and
In the field of literature, Hugo still towered, had been no better than slaves. It is an odd fact
publishing his masterpiece, Les Miserables, in of history that backward, autocratic Russia freed
1862. Alphonse Daudet (1840-1897) is best re- its serfs at just about the time that the progres-
membered published in
for Tartaron de Tarascon, sive, democratic United States freed its slaves;
1872. Emile Edouard Charles Antoine Zola and that Russia did it peacefully while the United
(1840-1902) published harsh realistic novels such States had to fight a terrible civil war. (To be sure,
as L'Assommoir in 1877, and Nana in 1880. the Russian serfs were not much better off mate-
Jules Verne (1828-1905) found his book Five rially after they had been emancipated, but
Weeks in a Balloon, published in 1863, unexpect- then, truth to tell, neither were the American
edly popular. He went on to write other works slaves.)
such as A Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864), Alexander II also took a more liberal attitude
From the Earth to the Moon (1865), Twenty Thousand toward the Poles than his father had, and at-
Leagues Under the Sea (1870), Around the World in tempted to set up the limited self-rule that had
Eighty Days (1873), and so on. He was the first existed before the revolt of 1830. Granting a little
science fiction writer in the sense that he was the freedom has its dangers, however; it whets the
first to make a good living out of that type of appetite and more is wanted. There were student
writing as his main production. demonstrations in Poland in favor of complete
The great French poets of the time were Paul independence; the Russian government overre-
Verlaine (1844-1896) and Jean Nicolas Arthur acted by attempting to draft the students into the
Rimbaud (1854-1891). Among the French artists Russian army.
of the period were great Impressionists: Paul Ce- At this, demonstrations became revolts in Jan-
zanne (1839-1906), who is the chief founder of uary 1863. It was not 1864 that the
until May
modern art; Hilaire Germain Edgar Degas (1834- revolt was suppressed, and Russia had a free
1917); Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919); hand to do so only because Prussia made it so
Edouard Manet (1832-1883); and Claude Monet plain that they were ready to join Russia in sup-
(1824-1906). pressing Polish nationalism that Great Britain,
In Georges Bizet (1838-1875) com-
music, France, and Austria could not risk the chance of
posed the opera Carmen in 1875. It is certainly interfering (even though all three were quite anti-
one of the most popular of all operas, though it Russian at the time).
was a failure when first presented. Offenbach's The result was that Poland was once again re-
1860 TO 1880 393
pressed, and its autonomy withdrawn. Russian Great Britain, on the other hand, favored the
was made obligatory schools and other
in all Ottoman Empire had been doing for de-
as it
forms of Russification were enforced against — cades. Besides, it had bought up shares in the
Polish Catholicism, for instance. Suez Canal on November 25, 1875, and that
Within Russia, there were further reforms, would give it a much shorter route to India, and
however. The judiciary system was modernized what suited her needs best in that respect was a
in 1864 and municipal government was put into
weak, but stable and friendly, Ottoman Empire.
the hands of the towns themselves in 1870. In Austria, too, was against the revolt, because it
1874, there was an army reform, with military didn t want Serbia to get too strong (Austria had
service made universal instead of being just for Slavs of its own in the area) and it didn't want
the lower classes. Russia to dominate the Balkan peninsula.
Yet the policy of Russian expansion did not Germany, under Bismarck, wanted peace be-
change. In the late 1860s and early 1870s, Russia cause it was allied with both Russia and Austria-
absorbed Bokhara and Khiva in the regions north Hungary and didn't want to have to alienate
of Persia and Afghanistan. Even Russia, how- either. Nevertheless, all attempts to mediate the
ever, could recognize that some regions were dispute had failed by May 1876. In fact, the situ-
simply too far distant to be worth the effort of ation had grown worse by then, because an in-
administration. In 1867, Russia sold Alaska to the surrection against the Ottoman Empire broke out
United States. in its Bulgarianprovince as well.
Russia's policy of friendliness with Prussia, Serbia, taking advantage of the Bulgarian in-
out of gratitude for the latter's help against the surrection, and wanting to take over Bosnia and
Poles, caused Russia to be neutral during the Herzegovina, decided to being things to a head
wars of Prussia against Denmark, Austria, and by declaring war on the Ottoman Empire on June
France. Indeed, the French defeat was seized 30, 1876. Montenegro also declared war on July
upon by Russia to get out of the Black Sea limi- 2. The two powers were certain that the big
tations thathad been placed on it after the Cri- Slavic brother, Russia, would support them.
mean War. On March 13, 1871, Russia However, it took time for Russia (always slow)
announced that she would not consider herself to react, especially since it had to make sure it
bound to keep the Black Sea neutral. France would not set off too large a war if it did so. And
was in no position to object; Prussia didn't care; while the Russians tested the waters, the Otto-
Austria-Hungary would now do nothing without man Empire beat the Serbs who, on September
Germany; and Great Britain didn't wish to deal 1, gave up.
with the matter all by herself; so Russia got away Ottoman forceshad meanwhile suppressed
with it. the revolts in Bosnia-Herzegovina and in Bul-
Then came a sudden crisis in the Balkan pen- garia with such wild force that the atrocitv tales
j
insula. In July 1875, there was a revolt in the that reached Great Britain created enormous
Ottoman provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, anger against the Turks. British efforts to aid the
which lay between Serbia and Austria-Hungary. Ottoman Empire were compromised as a result,
The population of Bosnia and Herzegovina were and it became politically necessary to find some
Slavic and related to the Serbs, so the Serbs way of getting them out of the Balkans without
strongly supported the rebellion, hoping to add weakening them too much.
those provinces to its own territory. British and Russian diplomats met in Constan-
Russia supported the revolt, because
also tinople on December 12, 1876, and then again on
there was increasing "Pan-Slav" feeling in Rus- January 15, 1877, to work out a way of doing this.
sia. Some Russians felt that it was Russia's right Great Britain made it clear that Russia might take
and duty to support Slavic aspirations every- punitive action against the Ottoman Empire, but
where. Some even felt that all Slav areas should it must not blockade the Suez Canal or make any
be added to Russian territory. attempt to take Egypt, or even Constantinople.
Having gone so far, the British waited to see Herzegovina, and it was clear that Ottoman sov-
what would happen. ereignty in the Balkans was to be reduced to a
Russia declared war on the Ottoman Empire shadow and that Russia would be the real master
on April 24, 1877, and opened a two-pronged of the peninsula. Russia also helped itself to
attack, one in the Balkans and one in the Cauca- some territory along the eastern shores of the
sus region, attacking the Turks both in the west Black Sea, and inflicted a large indemnity on the
and the east. Ottoman Empire as well.
In the Balkans, the Russians swept through Neither the British nor the Austrians would
Romania, crossed the Danube, and then came up accept this. After a period of diplomatic wran-
hard against Plevna, in north-central Bulgaria, gling, there was meeting at Berlin (the "Con-
a
not far south of the river. The Russians might gress of Berlin") from June 13 to July 13, 1878,
easily have bypassed Plevna, but for some rea- at which attempts were made to settle matters.
son, they decided to take it. Disraeli, Great Britain's Prime Minister, led the
It took them five months to do so, during anti-Russian forces, while Bismarck announced
which time they suffered 30,000 casualties. himself a disinterested party and offered to act as
Worse than stubborn Turkish defense
that, the an "honest broker."
gained sympathy for the Ottoman Empire. As a result of the Congress of Berlin, the
Plevna was finally taken on December 10, 1877, a Treaty of San Stefano was The indepen-
revised.
Pyrrhic victory; and, during the winter, Russian dence of Serbia, Montenegro, and Romania was
forces also advanced in the Caucasus, reaching indeed recognized by all of Europe, but Bulgaria
Erzerum in Turkish Armenia. was divided into three parts and given only the
In January 1878, after the fall of Plevna, the most limited autonomy. The Ottoman presence
Russians resumed their advance, defeated the in the Balkans was strengthened well beyond the
Turks, and reached the outskirts of Constantino- limits of San Stefano, and Russian influence in
ple by the end of the month. the Balkans was made minimal. Austria-Hun-
The prospect that Russia might take Constan- gary was given the right to garrison and maintain
tinople, despite the earlier understanding with order in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and in a strip of
Great Britain, produced an anti-Russian fury in land between Serbia and Montenegro. Russia
that country. This was the time of the famous was given a portion of the province of Bessara-
music-hall song that went: bia, along the eastern border of Romania, as com-
pensation. For Great Britain took the island
itself.
We don't want to fight, but, by jingo, if we do.
of Cyprus, which lay directly north of the Suez
We've got the men, we've got the ships, we've got
Canal, and which would thus be a useful British
the money, too.
And the Russians shall not have Constantinople. base.
The settlement left a great deal of dissatisfac-
As it happens, "jingo" is simply a common tion behind. Serbia and Montenegro feared the
euphemism for "Jesus"; however, because of advance of Austria-Hungary into Bosnia-Herze-
that song, "jingoism" has come to mean a policy govina. Russia felt deeply humiliated at having
of bellicose bluster. its treaty revised by an arrogant Great Britain,
The Russians, however, had had enough, and and particularly resented Austria-Hungary's ad-
they were by no means eager to take Constanti- vance into the Balkans. Russia had not forgotten
nople at the cost of war with Great Britain. The Austria's ingratitude at the time of the Crimean
Ottoman Empire had also had enough, and Rus- War. From this point on, Russia and Austria-
sia dictated the Treaty of San Stefano (a suburb Hungary could never be reconciled and the Bal-
of Constantinople) on March 3, 1878. Turkey had kan situation was an open sore between them.
to accept the independence of Serbia, Montene- The seeds of disaster had been sown.
gro, and Romania, and the virtual independence Meanwhile, the wave of liberal discontent that
of Bulgaria. Reforms were promised for Bosnia- had been sweeping Europe since the French Rev-
1860 TO 1880 395
olution nearly a century earlier finally reached a chemist of no mean Modest

attainments, also).
Russia. In part, the reforms of Alexander II had Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881) composed the
made many Russians hungry for more. Then, the opera Boris Godunov in 1874.
Russians attempt to force the Ottoman Empire
to grant liberal reforms in the Balkans seemed
ironic to those who noted that those same re- GREAT BRITAIN
forms did not exist in Russia. On the other side, Throughout this period.
Great Britain, secure be-
the buckling of Russia to international pressure hind its control of the sea, continued its "splen-
at the Congress of Berlin displeased the Russian did isolation," seeking no allies who might divert
jingoists. it from its pursuit of its own interests, a policy
it
Since there was no opportunity in Russia for had maintained since the Battle of Waterloo a
open and rational opposition, the dissatisfied half-century earlier.
groups were forced to go underground, to con- By and large, it maintained its prosperity.
spire, and to engage in terrorist activity. The Rus- London, the epitome of the "great city" of the
sian giant was beginning to stir feverishly. nineteenth century (as Babylon, Rome, and Con-
Yet, despite backwardness, Russia contrib-
its stantinople had been the epitomes in earlier
uted to science and art. Dmitri Ivanovich Men- times), was building subways in the 1860s.
deleyev (1834-1907) was one of the top-ranking One hear approach to war, however, came in
chemists of world history. He introduced the connection with the United States, which, in
proper manner of arranging the chemical ele- 1861, plunged into civil war.
ments in order of increasing atomic weight in The British government was entirely in sym-
such a way that similar elements fell into distinct pathy with the new Confederate States of Amer-
rows. This was the ''periodic table" of the ele- ica, a union of 11 southern slave states. They
ments, which he introduced in 1869. He used the recognized a state of belligerency almost at once,
periodic table to project the existence of certain which was nearly tantamount to accepting the
undiscovered elements and to predict what their Confederates as a sovereign nation.
properties would be. These predictions quickly Almost American Civil War,
at the start of the
proved to be absolutely correct, to the amaze- the British threatened war, and only the inter-
ment of the chemical world. Mendeleyev's invention of the dying Prince-Consort, Albert, and
sights laid the groundwork for modern notions the good sense of Abraham Lincoln, kept the
of atomic structure. peace. The British government, however, contin-
Alexander Mikhailovich Butlerov (1828-1876), ued to supply arms to the Confederacy whenever
in the 1860s, contributed to the new notions of that was possible, and even put British shipyards
organic chemical structure. at their disposal. The Confederates could order
This period was the golden age of Russian lit- superior craft, which they could then use to har-
erature. Ivan Sergeyevich Turgenev (1818-1883) ass American merchant-men and drive them
published Fathers and Sons in 1862. Fyodor Mik- off the high seas. A British-built Confederate
haylovich Dostoyevsky (1821-1881), published ship, Alabama, was particularly effective in this
Notes from the Underground in 1864; Crime and Pun- respect.
ishment in 1866; The Idiot in 1868; and The Brothers two new ships were being prepared
In 1863,
Karamazov in 1879. Lev (Leo) Nikoayevich Tol- for the Confederates, ships so advanced that the
stoy (1828-1910) published War and Peace United States felt it could no longer tolerate this.
(thought by some to be the greatest novel ever The American minister to Great Britain, Charles
written) between 1865 and 1869, and Anna Kar- Francis Adams (1807-1886), warned the British
enina between 1875 and 1877. bluntly that if those ships were handed over to
In music, Alexander Porfiryevich Borodin the Confederate States, that would mean war.
(1833-1887) composed Prince Igor, containing the Great Britain backed off. The United States
"Polovetsian Dances," in the 1860s (and he was might well win the American Civil War, and if
they did, the nation would end with a large, of a stake in society to make them less ready to
trained army that could take Canada without adopt radical tactics. It was a case of the carrot as
trouble. Great Britain decided it did not want to well as the stick.
fight avengeful United States. Disraeli pushed for electoral reform; then, and
Second, although the British government was on August 15, 1867, a Second Reform Bill was
pro-Confederate, the British people were not. passed that doubled the electorate, including
They were thoroughly antislavery and they dem- many portions of the labor force.
onstrated against the Confederate states even After that there was a period in which Disraeli
though the American blockade of the Confeder- of the Conservative Party and William Ewart
acy had cut off cotton supplies and thrown many Gladstone (1809-1898) of the Liberal Party bat-
of the British demonstrators out of work. It was tled for power and took the Prime Ministership
one of the all too few examples of the victory of in alternation. Disraeli became Prime Minister for
ideals over money that history has to offer. the first time on February 29, 1868, but at the end
After the American Civil War was over, with of that year, the Liberals won an election, and
an American victory, the United States de- Gladstone became Prime Minister for the first
manded reparation for the damage that British- time on December 9, 1868.
built ships, especially the Alabama, had done to Ireland was increasingly restless now, and
American shipping. There were hard feelings Gladstone felt it was time to liberalize British
over this "Alabama claims" controversy, and ex- rule.The British oppression of Ireland was be-
tremists on both sides demanded intransigence. coming too similar to the Russian oppression of
The matter, however, was put up for arbitration Poland for the more liberal portion of British pub-
before an international group, meeting in Ge- licopinion to endure it.
neva. The decision went against Great Britain, To begin with, the Anglican Church was the
which apologized, agreed to a tighter definition established church in Ireland and was supported
of neutrality, and, on December 15, 1871, further by taxes that were eventually wrung out of the
agreed to pay $15.5 million in reparations. Irish peasantry, who were almost unanimously
It was a marvelous example of settling dis- Catholic (except in the northeast). On July 26,
putes by some means other than war, and of a 1869, Gladstone forced through the "Disestab-
nation admitting it was in the wrong without the lishment Act" by which the Anglican Church
sky falling. It is tragic that international disputes was no longer the official church of a non-Angli-
are not more often settled in so sane and civilized can people. This was not easily done. The Angli-
a manner. can clergy and most Conservatives were bitterly
Internally, Great Britainhad to face the prob- opposed. Their "antidisestablishmentarianism"
lem of electoral reform again. The reforms of 1832 added a famous long word to the English lan-
had left labor without a vote, and continuing in- guage. The House of Lords, in fact, refused to
dustrialization had multiplied the number of pass the act until, once again, the creation of new
workers. The pressure to extend the franchise Liberal peers was threatened.
had grown stronger since Chartism had been Another cause of Irish discontent was the fact
suppressed in 1848, and something had to be that the land was owned by Englishmen who
done. lived in England. They were not there on the
The leading conservative in a government spot; they did not witness the people's misery,
which came into power in 1866 was Benjamin and could therefore peacefully ignore it. They felt
Disraeli, who had been a novelist of moderate no need to make improvements; their only con-
repute in his younger days. He was forced to do cern was to extort rents from the miserable peas-
what other intelligent conservatives, such as Bis- antry, and this could be done by agents. The
marck, would do. He decided that to defeat so- agents were on the spot but they could be as
cialism, it was not sufficient to repress. One had wished, since they could al-
freely brutal as they
to grant labor, and the people generally, enough ways claim they were only "following orders"
1860 TO 1880 397
and would simply be

that they fired and replaced tired of reform. When enough people have been
if they showed mercy. granted sufficient reform to make conservatives
One such agent, Charles Cunningham Boycott of them, they are usually content to stand pat.
(1832-1897), was so notorious for his exactions To them, "liberal" becomes a dirty word. On
that, in 1880, he was ostracized by the entire February 21, 1874, the Liberal party was defeated
community. No one would talk to him and no in an election, and Disraeli became Prime Minis-
one would deal with him. It was a most effective ter for a second time.
nonviolent personal punishment and could Disraeli was intelligent enough to continue re-
scarcely be countered. It added the word "boy- forms when necessary, but he also saw to it that
cott" to the English language. Great Britain assumed an activist foreign policy
On August 1, 1870, an "Irish Land Act" was and that pleased the Imperialist-minded portion
passed which ameliorated some of these abuses, of the public. Liberals as well as Conservatives,
but by no means even came close to removing workmen as well as landowners.
them entirely. In fact, they gave the British a con- Thus, on November 25, 1875, Disraeli, on his
venient sense of virtue. Disorders could now be own responsibility, committed the British gov-
suppressed with a clear conscience on the ernment to the purchase of 44% of the shares of
grounds that there was no longer any reasonable the new Suez Canal. This initiated Great Britain's
cause for such things. penetration of Egypt and gave it new holdings
It was also necessary to improve the educa- on the new and shorter route to India.
tional system
Great Britain. Industrial nations
in A shorter route meant a firmer British grip on
found it necessary to educate their population India. Since the Moghal Empire had come to an
massively if they were to possess the literacy and end a decade and a half earlier, Disraeli felt it
understanding required for them to run the ma- appropriate to have Victoria crowned "Empress
chinery of the new industrial age. Nevertheless, of India," which pleased her very much.
the Britishwere behind the United States and There was considerable opposition in Great
Germany in this respect. Something had to be Britain to that. After all, the title was un-British
done, especially since the franchise had been and even anti-British, if one considered Emperor
broadened. It was dangerous to have uneducated Napoleon I. The agreement was made, therefore,
people doing the voting. (As Disraeli said, "We that Victoria would never use the title in Great
must educate our masters.") Britain. There she would remain Queen only.
On August 9, 1870, reform was introduced Then came the crisis in the Balkans and the
into the school system. "Board schools" con- Russo-Turkish War. Disraeli forced the Russians
trolled by local governments were set up. The to back down and had his way (plus the island of
local governments could control fees, and decide Cyprus) and returned from Berlin at the peak of
whether attendance was to be made compulsory. his glory. He had even done it all without war
What's more, education was made secular. De- (barring a few colonial wars that scarcely affected
nominational religious instruction was not al- the British at home).
lowed in state-supported schools. But there was a bad harvest in 1879, and a
The army was reformed in 1871, and the prac- decline in prosperity. When Disraeli (now the
tice of selling army commissions to any idiot with Earl of Beaconsfield) called for a new election to
money was abolished. The radical notion of ap- serve as a sign of approval, he got defeat instead.
pointing only competent officers to lead British On March 8, 1880, Gladstone became Prime Min-
soldiers into war was adopted. The lessons ister for the second time.
learned from incompetent leadership in the Cri- During Great Britain continued to
this period.
mean War were made use of (never sufficiently, be active in' science. James Clerk Maxwell (1831-
however). 1878) worked out the kinetic theory of gases
The judicial system was reformed in 1873. independently of the work of Boltzmann in
By then, however, the country had grown Austria-Hungary. In 1873, he also presented the
world with "Maxwell's equations." These (1837-1909) first attracted attention with Atalanta
formed the basis of electromagnetic theory and in Calydon, published in 1865.
showed the existence of "electromagnetic radia- Among the prose writers, George Meredith
tion," of which light itself is the most familiar was still active, publishing The Egoist in 1879.
manifestation. William Wilkie Collins (1824-1889) was one of
William Huggins (1824-1910) was the first as- the early mystery writers, publishing The Woman
tronomer to put spectroscopy to major use. In inWhite in 1860, and The Moonstone in 1868.
1863, he showed that the same elements that ex- Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) wrote such novels as
isted on Earth existed in the stars, another im- Far from the Madding Crowd in 1874 and The Return
portant indication that the laws of nature were of the Native in 1878. Mary Ann Evans (1819-
universal in scope. He
devised methods of pho- 1880), writing under the male pseudonym of
tographing spectra and using the Doppler-Fi- "George Eliot," wrote a number of novels of
zeau effect, in 1868, to show from Sirius's which the most familiar is Silas Marner, published
spectrum that it was receding from the Solar sys- in 1861.
tem. On the lighter side, Edward Lear (1812-1888)
William Crookes (1832-1914) discovered the wrote nonsense and popularized the
in the 1870s
element thallium in 1861. In 1875, he devised the five-line "limerick." Charles Lutwidge Dodgson,
"Crookes' tube," an evacuated tube through writing under the pseudonym "Lewis Carroll,"
which an electric current could be forced. The wrote the deathless children's classics Alice's Ad-
radiation that resulted, which had been named ventures in Wonderland in 1865, and Through the
"cathode rays," could then be studied in detail Looking-Glass in 1872. They are supposedly the
and proved highly important in yielding new in- most quoted works in English, after the Bible and
sights into the structure of matter. Shakespeare.
In 1868, Joseph Norman Lockyer (1836-1920), Great Britain lagged in music, but this period
studying spectral lines obtained from the Sun's saw the beginning of an amazing collaboration
corona during an eclipse, decided it was due to between the poet and playwright, William
an unknown element he named "helium." Schwenk Gilbert (1836-1911), and the composer,
Charles Darwin was still active and, in 1871, Arthur Seymour Sullivan (1842-1900). Singly,
he finally dared apply the principles of evolution they were minor figures, but together they pro-
by natural selection to human beings, publishing duced the immortal "Gilbert & Sullivan comic
The Descent of Man. In 1876, Herbert Spencer operas," the best ever written and as popular
(1820-1903) applied evolutionary ideas to soci- today as they were a century ago. Their first hits
ety, not always correctly. It was he who popular- were Trial by Jury (1875), H.M.S. Pinafore (1878),
ized the term "evolution" and the phrase and The Pirates of Penzance (1879).
"survival of the fittest." Charles Wyville Thom- The outstanding British artist of the period
son (1830-1882) in a cruise of the ocean between was the American-born James Abbott McNeill
1872 and 1876, showed conclusively that life oc- Whistler (1834-1903). One of the best-known
cupied the entire ocean from top to bottom. paintings, as far as the general public is con-
In 1872, George Smith (1840-1876) deciphered cerned, one he painted in 1872, popularly
is
the cuneiform tablets containing the epic of known as "Whistler's Mother." John Tenniel
Gilgamesh. (1820-1914) is a cartoonist and illustrator, best
In literature, Tennyson was still active, work- known for his illustrations for the two "Alice"
ing through the 1860s and 1870s on The Idylls of books by Lewis Carroll.
the King, his Victorian conception of the legends
of King Arthur. Browning wrote his greatest

work The Ring and the Book in 1868-1869. Mat- BELGIUM
thew Arnold published Dover Beach in 1867. A Leopold I of Belgium died on December 10, 1865,
younger poet, Algernon Charles Swinburne and was succeeded by his son, who reigned as
1860 TO 1880 399
Leopold (1835-1909). Leopold II was rightly

II bella'sarmies were defeated and, on September
suspicious of the ambitions of Napoleon III and, 19, 1868, she fled to France and was declared
in general,feared Belgium might be crushed be- deposed.
tween France in the West and Prussia in the east. A new liberal constitution was devised. Uni-
Great Britain shared those fears, not wishing versal suffrage, together with freedom of the
to see either Belgium or the Netherlands, right press and religion, was announced, and the hunt
across the narrow sea from itself, to be domi- was on for a new ruler. Bismarck offered a Hoh-
nated by either France or Prussia. Once the enzollern prince for the purpose and this was the
Franco-Prussian War was in progress. Great immediate occasion of the Franco-Prussian War.
Britainmore or less forced a guarantee of Belgian Having achieved his aim, Bismarck withdrew the
neutrality on France and Prussia. offer. On December 30, 1970, the throne was of-
Meanwhile, Leopold II was growing interfered to the son of Victor Emmanuel II of Italy.
ested in the development of central Africa (the He accepted and ruled as Madeo I, but after two
"Congo") as a personal, rather than a national, years in which the Spaniards simply refused to
project. accept a foreign king, he gave up and abdicated
In this period, Ernest Solvay (1838-1922), a on February 12, 1873.
Belgian chemist, patented a method of forming A Spanish Republic was declared, but it had
sodium bicarbonate (the "Solvay process") in no peace. There were still those who wanted the
1861. Eventually, he became the world supplier kingship to go to a descendant of Don Carlos,
of the material. who had been the younger brother of Isabella II,
so that a Carlist civil war raged for a second time.
In 1875, however,
son the of Isabella
NETHERLANDS mounted the throne as Alfonso put anXII. He
II
During this period, the Netherlands continued to end to the Carlist resistance and another new
be ruled by William III. The great issue in the constitution was put into effect in 1876. The gov-
Netherlands, as in Belgium at this time, was ernment was placed under Antonio Canovas del
whether education would be in the hands of the Castillo (1828-1897), and Spain for a time settled
state or the various religious organizations. down period of reasonably good government
to a
Among the Dutch scientists of the period
was under a limited monarchy with a representative
Jacobus Henricus van't Hoff (1852-1911) who, in legislature.
1874, when little more than a school-boy, worked
out the three-dimensional structure of organic
compounds. His structures finally demonstrated
molecular asymmetry and explained the behavior
PORTUGAL
Pedro V of Portugal died in 1861 and was suc-
of polarized light in passing through certain sub-
ceeded by his younger brother, who reigned as
stances.
Luis (1838-1889). During this period, by and
I
Johannes Diderick Van der Waals (1837-1923)
large, Portugal experienced some quiet. In 1868,
improved the understanding of the gas laws in
1873.
slavery was abolishedPortuguese-owned col-
in
onies. (The abolition of slavery in the United
States made it difficult for any European nation
SPAIN to keep them, since they could no longer point to
"free" America as justification.)
This was a turbulent period for Spain. Isabella II
continued to be indifferent to the nation and to

interest herself in her own elaborate love life.
There was a constant rough-and-tumble among DENMARK
different ministers, all of whom were ineffective. Frederick VII of Denmark died on November 15,
A liberal uprising finally took place in 1868. Isa- 1863, and was succeeded by his first cousin, once
removed, who reigned as Christian IX (1818-

1906). GREECE
Christian IX gained the throne just in time to independent Greece did not, by
In this period,
have Denmark bowled over by the Prussian jug- any means, control all the Greek-speaking areas
gernaut. He lost Schleswig and Holstein in the in theOttoman Empire. Its ambition was to
process and spent the rest of this period fighting annex those areas, and for that foreign help was
to maintain a conservative government against needed. The Greek king, Otho I, counted on
the gradually strengthening liberal forces within Austria. He backed Austria in its war against
the kingdom. France in 1859, which Austria lost. Between that,
and the fact that he had no heir, the Greeks tired
of him and deposed him on October 23, 1862,
SWEDEN sending him back to his native Bavaria.
Under Charles XV, who was reigning at the be- The Greeks tried to get a British prince to rule
ginning of this period, Sweden gained represen- them and failed. They then turned to a younger
tative government. He died on September 18, son of Christian IX of Denmark, who ruled quite
1872, and was succeeded by his brother, who successfully as George I (1845-1913).
reigned as Oscar II (1828-1907). During his reign, One territorial gain was made by Greece on
Sweden began the process of industrialization. June 5, 1864, when the British turned over to
The Swedish inventor, Alfred Bernhard Nobel them the Ionian islands off their northwest coast.
(1833-1896), produced dynamite in 1866 by mix- These islands were supposed to have made up
ing nitroglycerine with diatomaceous earth. It the kingdom of the legendary Odysseus 2000
was an explosive that revolutionized construc- years before, and the British had ruled them
tion methods in the world, since it retained the since Napoleon's fall in 1815.
shattering power of nitroglycerine while being In 1866, the island of Crete (Greek-speaking
sufficiently difficult to ignite, making it safe to but Ottoman-ruled) rebelled, and in 1878 there
use. was an uprising in Greek-speaking Thessaly, also
At this time, Norway began to grow restless Ottoman-ruled. The Greeks, seeing a chance of
under Swedish domination, even though that fulfilling their expansionist aspirations, declared
was The Norwegian playwright,
relatively mild. war on the Ottoman Empire on February 2, 1878,
Henrik Johan Ibsen (1828-1906), made Norwe- when it was at the point of total defeat at the
gian literature prominent with such plays as Peer hands of the Russians. However, Great Britain
Gynt 1867 and A Doll's House in 1879. Edvard
in and Austria were not ready to see the Ottoman
Hagerup Grieg (1843-1907) was a Norwegian Empire fall apart too rapidly, and the Greeks got
composer, noted for the music he wrote for Peer nothing out of it at this time.
Gynt in 1876.
SERBIA
SWITZERLAND Serbia tried to take advantage of unrest in Bos-
Switzerland had virtually no history to speak of nia-Herzegovina in this period, and declared war
in this period, but a Swiss chemist, Johann Fried- on the Ottoman Empire, Montenegro joining it.
rich Miescher (1844-1895), working in Germany, The two Slavic powers were, however, defeated
discovered nucleic acids in 1869. The importance by the Ottoman Empire and, although at the
of the discovery was not understood then, or for Congress of Berlin the independence of Serbia
many decades afterward, but the time was to and Montenegro was officially recognized, they
come when it would become a central concern in made no territorial gains.
biochemistry.
1860 TO 1880 401
The outgoing President of the United States,

BULGARIA James Buchanan (1791-1868), in an amazing dis-
Bulgaria rose in revolt in 1876, but this was put play of pusillanimity, did absolutely nothing
down with great cruelty by the Ottoman Empire. while the Confederacy organized for war, seizing
At the Congress of Berlin, parts of Bulgaria re- American military installations throughout their
ceived a very limited amount of self-rule. states.
Lincoln became president on March 4, 1861,
and Fort Sumter in the harbor of Charleston,
ROMANIA South Carolina was still held by American
As a result of the Congress of Romania,Berlin,
("Union") forces. On April 14, the fort was bom-
lying north of Bulgaria, became an independent barded into submission and the "American Civil
nation, under the rule of Carol I (1839-1914), a War" had begun. Four more states had by now
German prince. seceded, including Virginia, and the capital of
the Confederacy was moved to Richmond.
The Union had a much greater population
OTTOMAN EMPIRE than the Confederacy, 22 million free people to 7

million free people plus 3 million slaves. The
Abdul Aziz (1830-1876) became Sultan in 1861.
Union also had a much better railway network, a
As a result of association with Great Britain and
thriving industry, and
The Confederacy,
a navy.
France in the Crimean War, the Ottoman Empire
however, had better officers and hardier soldiers
underwent a certain amount of westernization.
and needed to fight a defensive war only. The
Abdul Aziz died as the crisis began in the Bal-
Confederacy asked only to be left to itself,
kans, and he was succeeded, in 1876, by Abdul
whereas the Union had to invade and conquer.
Hamid II (1842-1918).
The Union learned its lesson almost at once.
Things were looking bad, with Russia seem-
Marching west from Washington, the Union
ingly on the point of declaring war, and the Ot-
forces met the Confederate forces at Bull Run, 25
toman Empire tried to obtain the sympathy of the miles west of Washington. They were routed and
west by presenting the nation with a liberal con-
fled back to Washington. A Confederate general
stitution proclaiming true democratic principles.
at the battle pointed to another Confederate gen-
After the crisis was over, however, and the Ot- eral, Thomas Jonathan Jackson (1824-1863) and
toman Empire found had survived surprisingly
it
said, "There stands Jackson, like a stone wall."
well, thanks to the Congress of Berlin. Abdul
Jackson became known as "Stonewall Jackson"
Hamid II dismissed the legislature, ignored the for the remaining two years of his life, and this
constitution, and returned to absolutism.
to the point where people scarcely remember his
true given name.
General Winfield Scott, hero of the Mexican
UNITED STATES War, was commander-in-chief of the army. He
As 1860 closed, the United States had a popula- was a Virginian who was loyal to the Union. He
tion of 32 million (and its largest city. New York, foresaw a long war and he wanted a blockade
had one of 805,000), but the Union seemed to be and an attack down the Mississippi River, which
breaking up. South Carolina had seceded and six would split the Confederacy in two. That would
more slave states of the deep south joined it. The slowly strangle it at the cost of time, but rela-
"Confederate States of America" was set up in tively little blood.
Montgomery, Alabama, on February 8, 1861, and Scottwas absolutely right, but his suggestion
Jefferson Davis (1808-1889), who had been Sec- was impractical. The blockade was indeed estab-
retary of War under Pierce and was a Senator lished and was tightened as time went on, but
from Mississippi, was elected as the Confederate public opinion in the Union wouldn't sit still for
President the next day. a long, roundabout war. They wanted a direct
attack on Richmond, Virginia, the heart of the coln, however, knew and he gently put
better,
Confederacy. Seward in his place and taught him to be a loyal
George Brinton McClellan (1826-1885) was subordinate thereafter. Lincoln handed back the
put in charge of training an army for the pur- diplomats with an apology. The diplomats went
pose. He was an excellent trainer, but a miserable on to Europe, but accomplished nothing after all,
fighter, without an atom of initiative. While he so that the United States was saved a war over
spent half a year endlessly polishing his army, nothing, one that might have destroyed it.
things happened elsewhere. For one thing, there Meanwhile, in the west, Ulysses Simpson
was nearly a war with Great Britain. Grant (1822-1885) was doing well for the Union.
The British ruling class was pro-Confederate In February, 1862, the forces he led took two forts
since they saw an independent Confederacy as a on the Cumberland and Tennessee River, and
British client state, and the rest of the United cleared Tennessee. On April 6 and 7, 1862, he
States as being sufficiently weakened by the de- won hard-fought battle at Shiloh, near the
a
fection of the Confederacy to represent no threat southern border of Tennessee. He was, however,
any longer to British commercial interests. The hampered by incapable superiors.
British government, therefore, recognized the On April 24, 1862, the Union admiral, David
Confederate States as belligerents immediately, Glasgow Farragut (1801-1870), took New Orle-
and it was clear they intended to trade with ans. The Mississippi was being pinched north
them. and south, and the Confederacy might be cut in
That was bad enough, but what followed was two. This was precisely what Scott had recom-
worse. The Confederacy sent two diplomats, mended, but he had wanted to see a major effort
James Murray Mason (1798-1871) and John Sli- put into it. Instead, the Mississippi drive had
dell (1793-1871), both United States senators been turned into a sideshow, while large armies
prior to secession, to Great Britain and France on were massing for bloody battles in Virginia.
the British steamship Trent in order to negotiate The gathering blockade, which Scott had also
for outright recognitionand military aid. An recommended, was put at risk on March 8, 1862.
American warship, under Charles Wilkes, the The Confederates had raised a sunken warship,
discoverer of Antarctica, stopped the Trent and the Merrimack, put armor plating on it, renamed
removed the diplomats, taking them to the it the Virginia, and sent it out. In the harbor, it
United States and internment. This was precisely proceeded to destroy the blockading Union ves-
the sort of thing, in reverse, that had caused the sels which were, of course, wooden. The Union
United States to go to war with Great Britain in cannonballs had no effect on the Merrimack's
1812. The British government, seeing its chance armor, and the Union had panicky visions of the
to destroy the Union, was careful to take violent Merrimack destroying the entire union navy
umbrage, and to send an angry note designed to piecemeal and then bombarding Union ports.
provoke war. However, Prince Albert, Queen However, on March 6, a Union ironclad, the
Victoria's husband, who lay dying of typhoid, Monitor, had put out to sea and, on March 9, the
clung to sanity and peace. He softened the
still Merrimack and the Monitor fought it out to a
note to the point where the Americans could ac- draw. Both ships did nothing more in the war,
cept it. but the fight marked the end of wooden war-
To be were Americans who wanted
sure, there ships. There had been ironclads before, the first
war, too, thinking it would bring the Confeder- having been used by the Koreans in their war
acy back into the Union to face a common enemy against Hideyoshi of Japan two centuries earlier.
(not a chance, actually). The Secretary of State, It was this Civil War battle, however, that caught
William Henry Seward (1801-1872), who the imagination of naval officers everywhere.
thought of himself at this point as the potential Each nation with a navy began to build ironclads.
power behind the throne, was one of them. Lin- In mid-March 1862, McClellan, at the direct
1860 TO 1880 403
orders of President Lincoln, and with the great- France to aid the Confederacy openly (as the sur-
took his well-trained army
est reluctance, finally render at Saratoga had persuaded France to help
to Virginia by sea. What followed was tragic for the American revolutionaries openly nearly a
the Union. Not only was McClellan lacking in century earlier).
drive and but he was facing Robert Ed-
initiative, As for Lincoln, he was planning to gain the
ward Lee (1807-1870), probably the best general support of liberals in Great Britain and France
the United States ever produced. He, with Stone- (and everywhere in Europe) by liberating the
wall Jackson, formed the greatest team of gen- slaves. He could not do it, however, while he
erals since Marlborough and Prince Eugene over was being defeated by the Confederacy, since it
a century and a half earlier. would then appear like a move of desperation.
Jackson, by marching a relatively small body He had to wait for an important victory so that it
of troops up and down the Shenandoah Valley, would seem like an act of magnanimity.
immobilized four times as many Union troops, That victory ought to have come in Maryland,
defeating them in detail, and keeping them from for by the sheerest accident, McClellan had man-
joining McClellan by feinting at Washington. Na- aged to learn Lee's complete plan of campaign.
poleon could not have done better. He knew exactly where and when Lee planned
Meanwhile, McClellan, facing Lee, was con- to have his army and what he intended to do
stantly at the edge of victory, since he invariably with it. Any moderately capable general, with
outnumbered the Confederates greatly and since this information, would have had Lee at his
his well-trained army performed well when it mercy, would have destroyed the Confederate
was allowed to. McClellan's leadership was so army, and might have gone a long way toward
cowardly, however, that he constantly estimated ending the war then and there. However, the
the Confederate forces at two to three times their egregious McClellan moved so slowly and fought
actual numbers and was forever on the point of so irresolutely at Antietam, Maryland, on Sep-
retreat. After three and a half months, Mc- tember 17, 1862, that the greatly outnumbered
Clellan's offensive had clearly failed, although Lee could still manage to disengage and move
(since he could always manage a masterly re- quietly back across the Potomac.
treat), he avoided actual disaster. Since Lee had to retreat, Lincoln called it a
The "Army of the Potomac," which McClellan victory and, on September 23, 1862, issued the
had trained, was therefore placed under John "Emancipation Proclamation," freeing all slaves
Pope (1822-1892), who had won some victories in Confederate hands (but not those in areas oc-
out west. On August 29, 1862, Pope sought out cupied by Union armies) on January 1, 1863.
Lee and Jackson to destroy them. He did not McClellan was freed of his command a second
wish to imitate McClellan's caution, so he at- time and never fought again.
tacked heedlessly at the Second Battle of Bull Now the army was hands of Ambrose
in the
Run. Lee played him properly, caught him by Everett Burnside (1824-1881), perhaps the least
surprise on his left flank, and sent him reeling capable general ever to command a major Amer-
back to Washington with heavy losses. Mc- ican army. To his credit, he announced his own
Clellan, heading another army, might have res- incapacity, but wasn't believed. (He is remem-
cued the situation by coming to Pope's aid, but it bered today chiefly for his magnificent side-whis-
was not his intention to do so. He undoubtedly kers that were called "burnsides" after him, a
wanted Pope to lose, and he got what he wanted. word which got reversed to "sideburns.") Lin-
An unhappy Lincoln put the army back under coln said of him later on that he could snatch
McClellan. defeat from the very jaws of victory.
Meanwhile, Lee was following up his victory On December Burnside fought Lee
13, 1862,
by invading the Union. A defeat of the Union on at Fredericksburg, Virginia, about halfway be-
Union soil might persuade Great Britain and tween Washington and Richmond. Here, Burn-
side sent his men

charging the heights on which who opposed some out of idealistic dis-
the war,
Confederate artillery was mounted. There were taste for death and destruction, and others out of
13 charges, each of which was shot into near- outright pro-Confederate sympathies. The latter
annihilation. It was the worst Union defeat of the were called "copperheads" after the poisonous
war and Burnside was withdrawn from com- snake that (unlike the rattlesnake) strikes with-
mand. out warning. The leading Copperhead was an
In thewest meanwhile, the Mississippi River Ohio Congressman of slave-state descent, Clem-
had been taken by the Union, all except for ent Laird Vallandigham (1820-1871), who fought
Vicksburg, Mississippi. Ulysses Grant was in the war tirelessly.
charge of the campaign to take it. It was a firmly Then, had to’ impose conscrip-
too, Lincoln
held, nearly impregnable position, but Grant was tion, when volunteers were simply not plentiful
the very opposite of McClellan. Henever gave enough to fill the army. This was resented, of
up, and each failure merely taught him what not course. The climax came in New York where
to do, so thathe tried something else. Irish immigrants somehow got the idea that they
Replacing Burnside in the east was Joseph were to be drafted in order that blacks might take
Hooker (1814-1879). On May 1, 1863, he met the their jobs at lower wages. Four days of rioting
team of Lee and Jackson at Chancellorsville, just (July 13-16, 1863) broke out in which numerous
about six miles west of Fredericksburg. As usual, inoffensive blacks were killed and millions of dol-
the Union forces far outnumbered the Confeder- lars of damages were inflicted.
ates, but by that time, the Union generals so It seemed to Lee that a Confederate victory on
feared Lee that they were half-paralyzed before Union soil, added to the series of Union disasters
the battle even started. Hooker remained on the in Virginia, would enormously strengthen Cop-
defensive and was crushed. perhead sentiment in the Union and increase to
On May however. Stonewall Jackson went
2, the boiling point the seething resentment over
out at night to reconnoiter and was shot by his the hardships the war had brought. The Union
own men who were unaware of his identity. He would have to face the fact that endless fighting
died on May 10, an irreparable loss to the Con- was silly when the Confederacy was ready to
federacy. stop at any time, provided the Union simply
The Union had suffered defeat after defeat in agreed to leave them alone.
Virginia, but it is important to realize that despite With that in mind, Lee, after Chancellorsville,
the defeats, was growing steadily stronger,
it decided to invade the Union again. On June 15,
economically. It was prospering, selling its wheat 1863, Lee crossed the Potomac River into Mary-
worldwide, receiving in return whatever it land a second time, and was into south-central
needed for the war effort. The Confederacy, in Pennsylvania by June 28. On that day. Hooker
contrast, was stagnant, its cotton penned up at was relieved of command and George Gordon
home by the blockade. The Union had a growing Meade (1815-1872) was put in charge of the
rail network that could bring up reinforcements Army of the Potomac.
and supplies wherever necessary. The Confed- On June 30, contingents of the opposing ar-
eracy had a much smaller one and couldn't even mies met near Gettysburg, more or less by acci-
make repairs to what it had, so that its soldiers dent. As more and more units poured into the
were semistarved at all times. Immigrants area, there came to be the three-day battle of Get-
poured into the Union, looking for high wages, tysburg, the greatest battle ever fought in the
and they made up a third of the Union forces. Western Hemisphere.
None arrived in the Confederacy. On the first day, July 1, the Confederates had
Still, the Confederacy didn't have to conquer. somewhat the better of it, but Lee was fight-
They just had to wait till the Union grew tired of ing blind, because his cavalry, commanded by
and it was not inconceivable that that
fighting, James Ewell Brown ("Jeb") Stuart (1833-1864),
might happen. There were many in the Union was off on some quixotic mission of its own.
1860 TO 1880 405
unaware that the unplanned battle was taking might be forced to surrender, which would be a
place. stunning blow to Union morale.
On two armies fought to a draw,
July 2, the By now, though, Lincoln finally had his man.
but the Union forces could afford a draw against He had tried McClellan, Pope, McClellan again,
Lee, after so many defeats. Lee could not afford Burnside, Hooker, and Meade, and had found
one. A draw would mean retreat and that was each of them wanting. But now he had Grant,
not what he was after. He had to win. and he put him in complete charge of all the ar-
On July 3, therefore, Lee sent in 15,500 fresh mies west of the Alleghenies. Grant hurried to
men under George Edward Pickett (1825-1875), Chattanooga, replaced Rosecrans with Thomas,
to break the Union lines. The Union forces, how- and, in an aggressive offensive on November 24-
ever, had their artillery in place, and waited. 25, defeated Bragg, relieved Chattanooga, and
There followed ''Pickett's Charge," perhaps the sent the Union army once more into Georgia.
most glamorous single action of the war. It was Meanwhile, on November 19, 1863, a ceme-
like the Charge of the Light Brigade, nine years tery was being dedicated at Gettysburg where
earlier, but on a much larger scale. The Union those who died in the great battle might be bur-
guns roared. Three fourths of Pickett's men ied and remembered. President Lincoln at-
were casualties and the remainder staggered tended, and after the great orator, Edward
back in stunned disarray. On July 4, Lee had to Everett (1794-1865), had delivered a carefully
retreat. memorized 13,000-word speech for two hours,
Had Meade now counterattacked, he might Lincoln stood up and delivered his "Gettysburg
have destroyed Lee's army, but his own army Address" in only three minutes. There is, how-
had been badly mauled, and Meade lacked the ever, no question that this little speech was one
grim determination to pursue. Lee's army made of the greatest, if not the greatest, in history.
its way safely back to Virginia. By the end of 1863, the Confederacy was
However, the battle of Gettysburg was a clear penned up in the southeastern coastal states, and
Union victory. Lee had finally been defeated and the blockade had reduced it to near-starvation.
that was the turning point of the war. And on About the only bright spot for the Confederacy
that same July 4, 1863 of Lee's retreat. Grant took were the actions of privateers on the excellent
Vicksburg and the Mississippi River was com- ships that had been built in Great Britain before
pletely in Union hands. the United States threatened war and put a stop
The Confederacy managed one more great vic- to it. The chief of these privateers was the Ala-
tory, however, one that did not involve Lee. bama under Raphael Semmes (1809-1877), which
William Starke Rosecrans (1819-1898) had led was still at large at the end of 1863. These Con-
a Union army into the northwest corner of Geor- federate ships wrought formidable havoc on
gia, near Chickamauga Creek. There, on Septem- American shipping.
ber 19/ 1863, Confederate forces under Braxton On March 9, 1864, Lincoln put Grant in charge
Bragg (1817-1876) attacked. In the Battle of of all the Union armies, and Grant prepared a
Chickamauga that followed, the Confederates two-pronged advance. He would lead the army
plunged through a gap in the Union line. It in Virginia and his trusted subordinate, William
might have been a complete disaster but a contin- Tecumeseh Sherman (1820-1891), would lead it
gent of Union forces under George Henry in Georgia. It was Grant's intention to end the
Thomas (1816-1870), like Scott a Virginian who war by making use of Union superiority in men
was Union, withstood the Confeder-
loyal to the and armaments, to hit the Confederate armies at
ate attack firmly and this allowed the Union army whatever cost, to bore in and bore in regardless
to get away good order. Thomas was known
in of losses— no retreat if defeated —
until the Con-
as the "Rock of Chickamauga" as a result. How- federacy gave up. And that was precisely what
ever, the Union army was now penned up in he proceeded to do.
Chattanooga in southeastern Tennessee and On May 4, 1864, Grant moved south. In a
month he reached the neigh-

of bloody fighting, And on September 1, 1864,Sherman took At-
borhood of Richmond. Lee fought with enor- lanta, Georgia. Clearly, the Confederacy was on
mous skill, but Grant kept boring in and its last and Lincoln won reelection as enthu-
legs,
receiving reinforcements. There were no rein- siasm suddenly began to rise in the Union.
forcements for Lee and he grew weaker and By the end of the year, Sherman had marched
weaker, while Grant grew stronger and stronger. through Georgia from Atlanta to Savannah,
Lee tried to divert Grant by feinting an attack which he took on December 21, 1864.
on Washington. This had worked against Mc- Lee was made general-in-chief by Jefferson
Clellan two years before. It didn't work with Davis on February 3, 1865, but there was vir-
Grant. He what happened to Wash-
didn't care tuallynothing to be general-ih-chief over. Sher-
ington; he wasn't going to take his hand from man was advancing from the south, and when
Lee's throat. Lee tried to break Grant's grip on Petersburg on
Meanwhile, Sherman was slogging toward March 25, he failed.
Atlanta in the same dogged fashion. Lee finally gave up Petersburg and retreated,
While both campaigns were going on, the trying to joinone other ragged Confederate army
election of 1864 took place. Never before had a to the south. All attempts were foiled and, on
Presidential election had to be carried on in war- April 9, 1865, with absolutely no alternative, Lee
time, and in the most desperate war ever to be surrendered to Grant at Appomatox Court
fought on American soil, too. Lincoln would House, Virginia. Except for cleaning up some
have surprised no one, at home or abroad, if he scraps here and there, the American Civil War
had postponed the election on the ground of the was over with a Union victory.
national emergency, but he did not. Civil war Then, on April 14, 1865, President Lincoln was
and desperation notwithstanding, the Constitu- shot by a half-mad Southern-sympathizing actor,
tion had to be upheld and the metronome-like John Wilkes Booth (1838-1865), and died the next
regularity of elections had to continue. The op- day. He was succeeded by his Vice-President,
position must have its full chance of defeating Andrew Johnson (1808-1875), who became the
him. Of all Lincoln's acts, setting that precedent 17th President of the United States.
may have been the greatest service he did for the During the war, the American national debt
nation. went from $64 million to $2,773 million. The first
Running against Lincoln was McClellan, income tax was established in August of 1861.
under whom the war would surely have fallen Three new states were added: Kansas on January
apart and the nation with it. Yet it looked as 19, 1861; West Virginia (carved out of Virginia)
though McClellan might win the election. During on June 20, 1863; and Nevada on October 31,
the entirecampaign. Grant kept the city of 1864. That made 36 states altogether.
Petersburg, about 20 miles south of Richmond, The Civil War was the first to be photo-
under siege, and Lee's army with it. He was graphed. Matthew B. Brady (1823-1896), work-
slowly and surely strangling Lee, but it didn't ing in the field with primitive equipment, took
look it from far away, and the siege did Lincoln excellent photographs, which helped make the
no good. public aware of photography as a contribution to
However, on June 19, 1864, the Union war- the recording of everyday life.
ship Kearsarge finally sank the Alabama off Cher- Even while the United States was fighting the
bourg, France. On August 5, 1864, Farragut Confederacy so bitterly, there were regiments
attacked Mobile, Alabama. The harbor was lit- fighting Native Americans in the west.
tered with mines, or "torpedoes" as they were There were literally hundreds of battles of all
called, but Farragut shouted, "Damn the torpe- sizes as the United States carried through a vir-
does! Full speed ahead!" and took Mobile. Just tually genocidal war that killed off most Native
about the last breathing hole of the Confederacy Americans and put the remainder on reserva-
was closed. tions.
1860 TO 1880 407
The best remembered battle is, of course, an fied on December 13, 1865, abolished slavery.
American defeat. A small detachment led by The 14th Amendment, ratified on June 13, 1866,
George Armstrong Custer (1839-1876) attacked made all people born in the United States (in-
the Sioux under Crazy Horse (1842-1877) at the cluding blacks) citizens with full rights. It also
Battle of the Little Big Horn on June 25, 1876, and stated that no person could be deprived of life,
were wiped out to a man, a poor way of celebrat- liberty, or property without due process of law.
ing the centennial of American independence, (Eventually, it was decided that a corporation
which came nine days later, (The defeat had no was a person under the protection of this amend-
great ramifications. The Sioux were defeated a ment and it was used to protect businesses
half-year later.) against legislative action designed to correct cor-
An Apache leader in the southwest, Cochise ruption and abuse.) The 15th Amendment, rati-
(1812-1874) held off American forces in the fied on February 26, 1869, gave blacks the vote,
1860s, but had to give in at the end. Then, too, though many states quickly worked out ways of
in 1877, Chief Joseph (1840-1904) of the Nez keeping them from voting just the same.
Perce, showed himself to be a much better gen- During this time, the Radicals and President
eralthan the Army officers sent against him, but Johnson were at daggers drawn, and the fight
he had only 300 warriors to start with, and the came to a climax on February 24, 1868, when
sheer weight of numbers finally brought him Johnson was impeached (i.e., accused of crimes
down. and misdemeanors) by the House of Represen-
All NativeAmerican resistance was futile in tatives, the only Presidential impeachment in
the long run. The advance of the white man was history. He was then tried by the Senate with the
sustained and irresistible. Chief Justice presiding. Two thirds of the Senate
In the west, this was the era of the “cowboy," (i.e., 36 votes out of 54) had to be against Johnson
the brief establishment of a nomadic way of life The Radicals got only 35 votes and
to convict.
that centered on large herds of cattle roaming the Johnson was acquitted.
grasslands. Some of the names of the scouts, One important event of Johnson's term that
trappers, and marshals of the time are still re- had nothing to do with "Reconstruction" (the re-
membered with a thick layer of idealistic fiction- habilitation and the readmission to the Union of
alization. Among them were William Frederick the ex-Confederate States) came on March 30,
("Buffalo Bill") Cody (1846-1917); Christopher 1867, when the United States, for $7.2 million,
("Kit") Carson (1809-1868); James Butler ("Wild bought Alaska from Russia. This was negotiated
Bill") Hickok (1837-1876); William Barclay for the United States by Secretary of State Se-
("Bat") Masterson (1853-1921); Wyatt Barry ward, and Alaska was derided as "Seward's
Stapp Earp (1848-1929); and so on. There were Folly" for a time.
also outlaws (some of whom were also subjected In 1868, Grant was elected the 18th President.
to idealistic fictionalization), such as William Although a great general. Grant was a poor poli-
("Billy the Kid") Bonney (1859-1881) and Jesse tician and a poor judge of men where military
Woodson James (1847-1882). affairs were not concerned. The eight years of his
was dominated by
After the war. Congress two terms in the White House were a time of
"Radical" Republicans who wanted to treat the great corruption.
conquered Confederacy as though it were enemy There were "robber barons" among business-
territory. Leading them was Thaddeus Stevens men, who fleeced the public with their rascally
(1792-1868) of Pennsylvania. President Johnson, financial manipulations. Examples were Daniel
who was from Tennessee, wanted gentler treat- Drew (1797-1879), Jason ("Jay") Gould (1836-
ment, but he lacked tact and was anything but a 1892), James Fisk (1834-1872), and Cornelius
smooth politician. Vanderbilt (1794-1877).
The Radicals put through three amendments There were politicians who ran crooked citv
to the Constitution. The 13th Amendment, rati- machines, such as the infamous William Marcy
("Boss") Tweed (1823-1878), who, with his gust 1, By the end of Grant's administra-
1876.
sidekicks, the "Tweed Ring," skimmed $200 mil- tion, there were 38 states in the Union.
lion out of New York City (the equivalent of $5 The United States was also beginning to pick
or $6 billion today, probably). That the Tweed up territory overseas. On August 28, 1867, the
Ring was defeated was largely the result of the United States annexed Midway Island, and on
mordant and witty cartoons of the most impor- February 17, 1878, it took over Pago Pago in the
tant cartoonist in American history, Thomas Nast Samoan Islands. These were coaling stations,
(1840-1902). His depiction of Tweed and his cro- needed to fuel ships, particularly warships, mak-
nies aroused public anger, and Tweed died in ing the long trans-Pacific run.^
jail. one time, when he tried to escape,
In fact, at In 1876, the Republican candidate, Rutherford
he was recognized by someone who had seen Birchard Hayes (1822-1893), and the Democratic
Nast's caricatures, and brought back. Nast in- candidate, Samuel Jones Tilden (1814-1886),
vented the Democratic donkey and the Republi- ended up in a disputed election (the only one in
can elephant, and was the first to picture Santa American history). Tilden had the majority of the
Claus in the form we now find familiar. popular vote and won 184 electoral votes to
There were even manipulators and bribe ac- Hayes's 165. There were, however, 20 electoral
ceptors in Congress up to Grant's secretary and votes that were in dispute for a variety of rea-
his Vice-President, although Grant himself sons. Objectively, they should probably have
seems to have been honest. gone to Tilden, but a partisan arbitration board
There were technological advances in Grant's awarded all 20 to Hayes, who therefore won 185
administration. Six days after he was inaugu- to 184. To avoid trouble, Tilden patriotically ac-
rated, the rail network stretched from sea to sea cepted the loss.
as the first transcontinental railroad tracks were Part of the deal that gave Hayes an unde-
completed with the driving in of a golden spike served presidency was the end of Reconstruction
in the railbed at Ogden, Utah. in the South. The last Federal troops were with-
Christopher Latham Sholes (1819-1890) pa- drawn on April 24, 1877, and the ex-Confederate
tented the typewriter on June 23, 1868. Its ser- states went back to their accustomed ways. The
vices to the writing profession and to office work blacks were no longer slaves, but it was only the
generally were enormous. It was also the device name that was lacking. They had no rights worth
that was the first, eventually, to bring women mentioning and the rest of the nation looked the
out of the home and into the office. other way.
George Westinghouse (1846-1914) invented Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931), the greatest
the air-brake in 1869. could stop trains in case
It inventor the world ever saw, continued the
of emergency more effectively than anything else American preeminence in
rise to technological
could and contributed greatly to rail safety. Also the world. He invented the phonograph in 1878
in 1869, John Wesley Hyatt (1837-1920) produced and the electric light in 1879. He also devised
celluloid, the first synthetic plastic. electricgenerating stations that could take on
Most important of perhaps, Alexander
all, ever-changing loads and deliver a reliable electric
Graham Bell (1847-1922) invented the telephone current.
and patented it on February 14, 1876.The Cen- Edison clung to direct-current, but George
tennial Exposition, celebrating a hundred years Westinghouse favored electrical technology on
of American independence, was held in 1876, an alternating-current basis and developecl Ni-
and a working telephone was the prize exhibit. agara Falls as a generator of such currents. The
There were also disasters. On October 8, 1871, fight between them was a bruising one, but
the great Chicago fire burned down much of the Westinghouse won.
city. James Buchanan Eads (1820-1887) had in-
After the Civil War, Nebraska entered the vented the diving bell for work under water (and
Union on March 1, 1867, and Colorado on Au- it became more practical once Paul Bert of France
1860 TO 1880 409
had worked out the cause and prevention of the Little Women, published 1868-1869 by
in
bends). Eads built the first bridge across the Mis- Louisa May Alcott (1833-1888), has remained pe-
sissippi at St. Louis, Missouri, between 1867 and rennially popular. Horatio Alger, Jr. (1832-1899)
1874. The German-born John Augustus Roebling wrote a series of moralistic rags-to-riches stories
(1806-1879) and his son, Washington Augustus of virtue rewarded, beginning in 1869, that were
Roebling (1837-1926), labored through the 1870s widely popular in their time, but have been
on the Brooklyn Bridge, connecting Manhattan largely forgotten since.
and Brooklyn. It was the first great suspension Lewis ("Lew") Wallace (1827-1905), who was
bridge. a general in the Civil War, is far better remem-
The United States lagged in pure science as bered today as the author of Ben Hur, published
compared to the European scientific giants of in 1880. Edward Everett Hale (1822-1909) wrote
Germany and Great Britain. Americans who the touching tale Man Without a Country in 1863,
wished graduate training in science had to go to to encourage patriotism.
Europe. There were signs, though, that this In poetry in that same year of 1863, Longfel-
would not be ever so. The Massachusetts Insti- low wrote "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere,"
tute of Technology (MIT) was founded in 1861, and Whittier wrote "Barbara Frietchie," both
and in that same year Yale was the first American with the encouragement of patriotism in mind.
university to award a Doctor of Philosophy Walt Whitman (1819-1892) was becoming fa-
(Ph.D.) degree. mous for the free verse in his Leaves of Grass
Even so, the United States turned out one (loudly denounced by some), but he also wrote
first-class theoretical physical chemist in the per- the conventional and touching "O Captain, My
son of Josiah Willard Gibbs (1839-1903). Between Captain" on the death of Abraham Lincoln. Julia
1876 and 1878, he published a series of papers Ward Howe (1819-1910), an active abolitionist,
that established chemical thermodynamics on a and feminist, is not remembered for this
pacifist,
firm foundation. He also formulated the "phase so much, as for the fact that she wrote "The Bat-
rule," which is particularly important in physical tle Hymn of the Republic" in 1862.
chemistry. An influential work of nonfiction was Progress
Henry Augustus Rowland (1848-1901), in the and Poverty, completed in 1879 by Henry George
1870s, manufactured the best gratings that had (1839-1897), who advanced the notion of a "sin-
yet been seen, and they raised the art of spectros- gle tax" on land.
copy to new heights of delicacy and precision. Two of the artists working in the United States
The greatest American writer of this period (or at this time were Winslow Homer (1836-1910)
possibly of any period) was Samuel Langhorne and Thomas Eakins (1844-1916). Daniel Chester
Clemens (1835-1910), a western writer who French (1850-1931) was beginning to make a
wrote under the pseudonym of "Mark Twain." name for himself as a sculptor, carving the fa-
He came to public notice with his sketch "The mous statue of the Minute Man at Concord, Mas-
Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" sachusetts in 1873.
in 1865, and then to runaway success with his A
well-known composer of the period was
The Innocents Abroad, a hilarious account of his James A. Bland (1835-1899), who wrote such pe-
travels overseas. He published Roughing It in rennial favorites as "Carry me Back to Old Vir-
1872, and then, turning to fiction, wrote the clas- ginny," "Oh, Dem Golden Slippers," and "In
sic Tom Sawyer in 1876. the Evening by the Moonlight." (Bland was
Also a westerner was Francis Brett ("Bret") black, and his achievements were unusual in his
Harte (1836-1902), best remembered for his sto- day.) Just before Stephen Foster died in 1864, he
ries "The Luck of Roaring Camp" and "Outcasts composed' his most haunting song, "Beautiful
of Poker Flat," both appearing in 1870. More in Dreamer."
the mainstream was Henry James' (1843-1916) American preoccupation with religion contin-
Daisy Miller in 1879. ued. Mary kaker Eddy (1821-1910) founded
Christian Science in 1866 and wrote Science and and landed troops Vera Cruz on December 17,
in
Health as its Taze Russell
basis in 1875. Charles 1861, in order to extort debt payments.
(1852-1916) founded Jehovah's Witnesses in Napoleon III of France planned to go further
1877, preaching the imminent Second Coming, than that. He wanted to establish a Mexico that
and over a century later his followers still con- was under French domination. Great Britain and
sider it imminent. Spain, who foresaw entanglements with the
Other beginnings were made. Barnum opened United States, left on April 8, 1862, and Napo-
his first circus in 1871, labeling it "The Greatest leon felt he had a free hand.
Show on Earth." And in 1872, Yellowstone Park He quickly found it wasn't easy. It took the
in Wyoming was established as the first national French, even with reinforcements, a year to fight
park. On a much smaller scale. Central Park in their way into Mexico City, which they took on
Manhattan was opened to the public in 1876. June 7, 1863 (three weeks before the Union vic-
tory at Gettysburg made it certain that the Civil
War would end with the United States intact).
CANADA Napoleon III then persuaded the Archduke
Maximilian (1832-1867), a younger brother of
On March 29, 1867, Ontario, Quebec, New
Francis Joseph I of Austria, to take the Mexican
Brunswick, and Nova Scotia became four prov-
throne. He came to Mexico City on June 12, 1863,
government given the name of
inces of a federal
and called himself Emperor of Mexico. Maximi-
"The Dominion of Canada" on July 1.
lian was an earnest
a liberal and, apparently,
The northern and western portion of Canada
man who intended to be a good ruler, but he
("Northwest Territories") was still owned by the
never had any power that did not depend on the
Hudson Bay Company, which had been founded
French military.
in 1670. The Company was bought out, however,
Juarez, though forced to leave his capital,
on November 19, 1869, for $1.5 million.
fought a guerrilla war against the French and
The Native Americans of the Northwest Ter-
against those Mexican conservatives who gladly
ritories, fearing its takeover by the Canadians,
joined the invaders. What's more, the United
launched a rebellion under Louis Riel (1844-
States would not recognize Maximilian, but held
1885). For a brief time they penetrated as far
firmly with Juarez as legal ruler of Mexico.
south as what is now Winnipeg, but this "Red
River Rebellion" was quickly dispersed.
When the Civil War ended in 1865, the United
Other provinces joined the Dominion: Mani-
States began to demand a French withdrawal
from Mexico with increasing force and increas-
toba in 1870, British Columbia in 1871, and Prince
ing impatience. Veteran American soldiers,
Edward Island in 1873.
hardened in war, and under tested generals,
lined up at the Rio Grande, and Napoleon III
quailed. Maximilian's wife, Carlota (1840-1927),
MEXICO raced to Europe to plead with Napoleon 111 and
Juarez, who was elected President in January with the Pope; when she found she could do
1861, tried to establish a liberal, democratic gov- nothing, she went mad and remained mad until
ernment. The previous rulers of Mexico, how- she died 60 years later.
ever, had managed to empty the treasury so that Napoleon III withdrew his troops on March
it was impossible for Mexico to make payments 12, 1867, and Maximilian should surely have left
on the European loans that had accumulated with them. Unfortunately, Maximilian had the
over time. Juarez suspended such payments for idea that the people of Mexico were on his side
two years; he had no choice. and he refused to abdicate. He was captured by
The European creditors Great — Britain, Juarez' troops on May 15, 1867, and was exe-
France, —
and Spain took advantage of the cuted June 19.
United States' preoccupation with the Civil War Juarez died in 1872 and was succeeded as
1860 TO 1880 411
president by Sebastian Lerdo de Tejada (1827- Peruvians, who drove out the president who had
1889), one of his supporters. In 1876, however, signed the treaty. The next president declared
Porfirio Diaz (1830-1915), who had also fought war on Spain on January 14, 1866, and persuaded
for Juarez, seized power and was then formally Ecuador to thenorth and Chile to the south to
elected President in 1877. He established a stable join him in this. Spanish ships bombarded Val-
government at the price of imposing a dictator- paraiso, Chile and Callao, Peru in March, but
ship. then, since the United States was not amused,
Spain abandoned the war. The United States me-
diated a peace in 1871.
PARAGUAY
Paraguay, at the time the only landlocked South
American nation, fought a particularly melan- ARGENTINA
choly war in this period. Argentina faced not only the inevitable difficul-
In 1862, Francisco Solano Lopez (1827-1870) ties that arose because of the war with Paraguay
succeeded his father as president of Paraguay. between 1865 and 1870, but also a problem in
Like his father, he was an autocratic dictator and, attaining unity. The province of Buenos Aires
worse yet, had dreams of establishing an over- (including the city itself) was the most populous
lordship over a much wider territory. He went to and developed province, and it had the tendency
war, therefore, quite unnecessarily, with Brazil, to try to dominate the land. The other provinces
Argentina, and Uruguay. resented this. The matter was not settled until
The war continued for eight years until Lopez 1880, when the city of Buenos Aires was sepa-
was captured by Brazilian soldiers and was shot rated from the province and made the capital as
on March 1, 1870. In those eight years, Paraguay a federal district, rather like Washington, D.C. in
was almost annihilated as a nation. The Para- the United States.
guayan population was reduced from 1,400,000
to about 221,000, of whom only 29,000 were adult
males. CHILE
Under the presidency of Jose Joaquin Perez
(1800-1889), who ruled from 1861 to 1871, and
PERU his successor, Chile was reasonably democratic,
Although the French invasion of Mexico was the progressive, and peaceful, but for the nearly
most serious infraction of the Monroe Doctrine comic-opera war with Spain in 1866. Under Ani-
during the time of the American Civil War, it was bal Pinto (1825-1884), however, Chile declared
not the only one. war on Bolivia and Peru on April 5, 1879 ("War
Spain had never recognized the independence of the Pacific"), which was a more serious affair.
of Peru, and there was a constant sputtering of
controversy between the two nations. Spain
complained that Peru was mistreating Spanish COLOMBIA
immigrants, and, in retaliation, some Spanish Like Argentina, Colombia had to overcome de-
ships seized the tiny Chincha Islands just off the centralizing tendencies, but managed to form a
central Peruvian coast on April 14, 1864. This was federal union of its various provinces on May 8,
worse than it sounds, for the islands were cov- 1863.
ered with guano, the excrement of sea-birds,
which was very valuable as fertilizer and an im-
portant source of revenue for Peru. VENEZUELA
A treaty in which Spain recognized Peru's in- In Venezuela, the situation was the reverse of
dependence was then signed on January 27, and Colombia. There, the exis-
that in Argentina
1865. It contained provisions unacceptable to the tence of an overpowerful central government
raised dissatisfaction. It was eased into a federal fighting lasted 10 years before Spain managed to
union about the same time that such a union was restore order. The United States was sympathetic
established in Colombia. with the Cuban rebels but did not intervene di-
rectly. After all, Spain had owned Cuba all along,
which meant it didn't come under the Monroe
BRAZIL Doctrine. Besides, the United States was busy
Brazil, the one nation south of the Rio Grande quarreling with Great Britain for having aided
that was of Portuguese rather than Spanish cul- American rebels. For the United States, at the
ture, was also the only one that was not a repub- same time, to aid rebels against Spain would
lic at this time (if one doesn't count the artificial have marred its case.
and brief "Mexican Empire" briefly set up by Na-
poleon III).
Under the rule of Pedro II, Brazil continued DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

stable and prosperous. There was an expansion- The Dominican Republic, the eastern two thirds
ist tendency into Uruguay to the southeast that of the island of Hispaniola, had for a time been
didn't work, and an alliance with Argentina and dominated by Haiti, making up the western
Uruguay that fought the appalling war with Par- third. It had broken free, but in 1861, still fearing
aguay. Haiti, the Dominican Republic asked Spain to
After 1870, there was a strong movement to- take over the land again. (It had been under
ward freeing slaves in the nation. It was even- Spanish rule in earlier times.) The United States
tually accomplished without war and without might not have permitted this to take place if it
compensation to slave-owners. were not fighting the Civil War.
As an historical footnote, Pedro II visited the Spain ruled so harshly that the Dominican Re-
United States in 1876, the first crowned head public rebelled and, on May 1, 1865, regained its
ever to visit that nation. He attended the Centen- independence. With the Civil War just ended,
nial Exposition and was shown the newly in- Spain thought it prudent not to object to this.
vented telephone. He put the receiver to his ear The Dominican Republic still felt insecure
and dropped it with the surprised exclamation, and, beginning in 1868, it put out feelers con-
"It talks!" There could have been no more effec- cerning the possibility of being annexed by the
tive advertisement for the device. United States. President Grant felt a rather naive
pleasure at the possibility, and urged that the
Dominican Republic be taken into the fold. The
CENTRAL AMERICA Senate, however, did not want to take over a
The region in this period, and for a considerable depressed peasantry, a corrupt ruling class, and
time afterward, waschaos over various at-
in a troubled western border. It refused to accept an
tempts to unify it; attempts that were steadily annexation treaty and the Dominican Republic
thwarted by the continuing rivalry between dif- remained independent.
ferent sections. Here no reasonable solution was
reached; no federal system was agreed on.
EGYPT
Egypt was still, dominions
in theory, part of the
CUBA of the Ottoman Empire, and was ruled by a Vice-
Although Spain had lost all its mainland colonies roy, Ismail (1830-1895), who succeeded his
in the Western Hemisphere, it retained the own- uncle. Said, in 1863. Egypt was at this time in an
ership of Cuba, which it had first settled two and era of prosperity since the American Civil War
a half centuries earlier. Spanish rule, however, had cut off the supply of American cotton to Eu-
was harsh and was perceived by the Cubans to ropean factories, thanks to the Union blockade of
be unjust. In 1868, they rose in revolt, and the the Confederate States. The result was that Egyp-
1860 TO 1880 413
tian cotton sold in all available quantities for pre- the financial control of Great Britain and France,
mium prices. acting in cooperation.
This meant that not only did Ismail have
money, but he could easily borrow more, and
banks were willing to lend it to him at high inter- ETHIOPIA
est rates. Ismail used the money to finance the Theodore was still ruler of Ethiopia at the begin-
building of the Suez Canal. He also built irriga- ning of Between 1864 and 1866, hav-
this period.
tion canals, railroads, bridges, telegraphs, and ^^8 grown offended with the British government,
schools, in an attempt to modernize the country. he began to throw British consular officials and
All this was very worthy, but it was at the cost British missionaries into jail.
of complete financial chaos. When Ismail came to In 1868, some 32,000 British and Indian troops
power, Egypt's national debt was 7 million under Robert Cornelis Napier (1810-1890), who
pounds. Fourteen years later, in 1876, it stood at had been active in suppressing the Sepoy mu-
nearly 100 million pounds. It didn't help that Is- tiny, landed on the Red Sea coast and moved into
mail was also an expansionist who tried to the interior. On April they defeated Ethiopian
10,
spread Egyptian influence southward into Sudan forces and Theodore committed suicide. The in-
and who, in 1875, went to war with Ethiopia. vading troops marched on to Magdala in north-
After all, even small wars are very expensive. ern Ethiopia, which had been Theodore's capital,
On November 17, 1869, the Suez Canal was and took it on April 13, freeing the British pris-
officially opened. Present at the elaborate festivi- oners. The British troops then left the country.
ties were Francis Joseph I of Austria and the Em- In 1872, Johannes IV (1831-1889) became king
press Eugenie of France. On that occasion, also, of Ethiopia and fought against Ismail of Egypt
the premiere of Giuseppe Verdi's Aida was pre- between 1875 and 1879.
sented. It was no coincidence at all that the plot
involved the conquest of ancient Ethiopia (the
region we now call Sudan) by ancient Egypt. TUNIS
The Sudan was conquered, at least temporar- Tunis, nominally part of the Ottoman Empire,
ily, by Egyptian forces under the command of was, Egypt, heavily in
like debt to European
British generals, notably Charles George Gordon bankers. was inevitably going to be
It under Eu-
(1833-1885), who had fought in the Crimean War ropean control, but the question was whether it
and in China. The conquest of Sudan led to the would be France or Italy that would do the con-
suppression of the slave trade there. trolling. France was the stronger power, but Italy
The use of British generals was one of the felt a traditional interest in Tunis because it was
marks of the penetration of British influence into the site of dead Carthage, which Rome had de-
Egypt. In November 1875, Ismail desperately feated 2000 years earlier. By 1880, the issue still
needed money with which to make payments on had not been settled.
his debt. Therefore, he sold his 176,000 shares in
the Suez Canal to Great Britain for 100 million
francs. This coup was carried through by Dis- CONGO
raeli, and Great Britain was nov/ the largest sin- A French-born American explorer, Paul du
gle shareholder of the Canal, even though it did Chaillu (1831-1903), explored Central Africa (the
not own an absolute majority of the shares. Congo) in the late 1850s and early 1860s and
This did not settle Ismail's troubles by any brought the gorilla to the world's attention for
means. His creditors, especially Great Britain and the time in Stories of the Gorilla Country,
first
France, kept pressing, and on February 18, 1879, which he published in 1868. He gave the world a
he was deposed by the Ottoman sultan. Ismail's rather exaggerated idea of the animal's ferocity,
son, Muhammed Tawfiq (1852-1892) became however.
Viceroy. By that time, though, Egypt was under In 1876, Leopold 11 of Belgium organized a
committee for the exploration and “civilization" killed in action by the Zulus. If there had ever
of the region. been hope for a Bonapartist restoration, it died
with the Prince Imperial.
In 1867, diamonds were discovered in South
WEST AFRICA Africa and, as luck would have it, the site in
Germany, France, and Great were pene-
Britain question was not clearly in either Boer or British
trating this region. German traders were estab- The British took it and, in
territory. 1871,
lishing themselves on the Cameroon coast; the founded the town of Kimberly to serve as a dia-
French were pushing into Dahomey, and the mond center.
t
British were taking over portions of Nigeria. The In 1877, the British annexed the South African
process termed "the partition of Africa" was well Republic, which was Boer-controIIed, thus negat-
under way. ing their recognition of the country's indepen-
dence a quarter century before.
ZANZIBAR
On March 10, 1862, the British and French rec- MADAGASCAR
ognized the independence of Zanzibar, an island The Trench had been interested in Madagascar
off the east central coast of Africa, whose Sultan since the time of Louis XIV and had, on occasion,
also ruled the African coast north and south of attempted to penetrate the country and gain
the island. In 1873, the British forced the closing some control of it, usually in competition with
of the slave markets in Zanzibar. the British.
On August 8, 1868, Madagascar signed a
treaty with France that gave the French jurisdic-
EAST AFRICA tion over their own nationals on the island. After
East Africa was the site of the exploration activity that, French influence increased rapidly.
of the British missionary, David Livingstone
(1813-1873). In his effort to explore the regions
about the sources of the Nile in the 1860s, he was PERSIA
lost to the Western world for a time. In this period, both Russian and British influence
A British reporter, Henry Morton Stanley grew in the nation, and it was only the antago-
(1841-1904), was sent by The New York Herald to nism between the European powers that kept
find Livingstone. He did so in November 1871, Persia from falling to one or the other.
and greeted him with ^
characteristic British
aplomb: "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" He then
circled the shores of Lake Victoria and discovered AFGHANISTAN
Lake Edward. Afghanistan was also the scene of Russian-Brit-
ish rivalry. When the Afghani ruler, Sher Ali,
proved too pro-Russian for British liking, the
SOUTH AFRICA British sent in an invading force in November
Both the Boers and the British continued to fight 1878. This began the "Second Afghan War." It
the blacks, and, of course, both won their wars took two years of fighting before the British man-
and continued to absorb tribal territory and to aged to install a pro-British government.
reduce the blacks to servitude. The most violent
of the wars was that of the British against the
Zulus in 1879. It continued for half a year before INDIA
the Zulu power was broken. The most notable India was largely at peace in this period and the
event of the war came on June 1, 1879, when Britishcontinued with public works of all kinds.
Napoleon Ill's son, the Prince Imperial, was India experienced a time of prosperity during the
1860 TO 1880 415
American Civil War, when her cotton was much T'ai P'ing rebels and brought an end to
finally
in demand. The demand collapsed once the Civil that bitter rebellion in 1864. To the British, Gor-
War was over, but another period of prosperity don came to be known as "Chinese Gordon" and
came with the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, was hailed as a hero.
something that greatly augmented trade between T ung Chih (1856-1875) had become Emperor
Europe and India. in 1862 at the age of 6. The disasters of the T'ai
In 1877, Queen Victoria was declared Empress P'ing rebellion and the occupation of Peking had
of India and a most ceremonious celebration of taught the Chinese that some attempt ought to
this took place in Delhi. be made to modernize and westernize the coun-
try, but China's huge population and long tradi-
tion gave it an enormous inertia and made it

SIAM move.
difficult to
Rama V (1853-1910) succeeded his father in 1868 Even so, the Empire had learned that it could
at the age of 15 and began to rule in his own not assume a lord-of-the-universe attitude with
name in 1873. He continued his father's reform- the Europeans. In 1873, the Emperor, now 17,
ing policies and, in 1874, abolished slavery. He greeted foreign diplomats zvithoiit demanding the
completely reformed the administrative and fi- —
kow-tow an action in which the person ap-
nancial procedures of the government. He was proaching the throne had kneel and knock his
to
the first Siamese monarch to travel outside the head against the ground as a token of utter sub-
country, visiting India, for instance, to study admission.
ministrative procedures.
KOREA
INDO-CHINA Korea remained closed to foreigners even after
During this period, France gained control of the Japan had been opened up. A French expedition
area that now includes Kampuchea, Laos, and was repelled in 1866 and an American in 1871.
Vietnam, which came to be called "French Indo- Finally, on February 26, 1876, Japan forced a
China." treaty on the Koreans, recognizing its indepen-
dence from China and receiving trade conces-
sions.
MALAYA
During this period, the British were penetrating
Malaya and gaining control. JAPAN
The opening of Japan to European commerce did
not go smoothly at first. There were a number of
CHINA attempts by antiforeign elements in the land to
The T'ai P'ing rebellion had brought China to the eject foreigners. European vessels bombarded
brink of destruction. In the chaos that wrung the Japanese cities in reprisal on several occasions in
land, China was unable to resist European de- the early 1860s.
mands for trade concessions. It became increasingly clear tomost Japanese
Nevertheless, when the Chinese refused to ac- leaders, therefore, that blind resistance would
cept foreign ambassadors in Peking, British and get them nowhere; weight of power was
that the
French troops occupied the city on October 12, on the side of the Europeans. In February 1867, a
1860. The Emperor's summer palace was burned new Emperor, Mutsohito (1852-1912), mounted
under the direction of the British general, the throne." He made himself the symbol of mod-
Charles Gordon, who was later to fight in Ethio- ernization.
pia. Keiki, the Shogun (1837-1913), an official of a
Gordon then led Chinese armies against the line that had been the real rulers of the countrv.
and who had come to power that year, was States picked up Midway Island and a port in
forced to resign and the Shogunate came to an Samoa.
end. Keiki was the last Shogun of the Tokugawa
family, which had gained power in 1603. Before
that, other families had held the Shogunate since AUSTRALIA
1192, so that Keiki's resignation marked the end Australia was left very much to itself by Great
of a nearly seven-century tradition. Britain and it spent its time organizing its various
On January 3, 1868, Mutsohito assumed con- provinces and exploring the desert interior. The
trol of the nation. He greeted foreign dignitaries very last convicts arrived in western Australia in
and, in November of that year, he moved the 1867.
from the inland city of Kyoto, where the
capital There was even some expansionist feeling.
Emperor had reigned in secluded helplessness North of Australia is the large island of New
for centuries, to the east-coastal city of Edo, Guinea. The eastern part was not controlled by
which was renamed Tokyo. the Dutch, and some Australians thought it
The speed of modernization was astonishing ought to be British-controlled. In 1873, a British
thereafter. Feudalism was abolished. A postal captain, John Moresby, landed on the southern
service was established; education was made shore of the eastern part of the island. However,
universal and compulsory. Newspapers came Great Britain was not enthusiastic about taking it
into being. The first railroad was built in 1882. over and thought Australia ought to do the job.
Military service was organized on the German Australia wasn't entirely enthusiastic about it
model. The Gregorian calendar was established. either, so, at that time, it came to nothing. The
A treaty was signed with China as between town of Port Moresby now stands at the site of
equals in 1871; and, in 1876, a treaty was signed the landing, however.
with Korea opening that nation to Japanese
trade.
In 1877, there was the last die-hard rebellion NEW ZEALAND
of the old order. An army of samurai, the old During the 1860s, there was the "Second Maori
knightly class, objecting to the formation of an War," a guerrilla war in which the Maoris de-
army commoners, marched against the gov-
of fended themselves courageously, rather as the
ernment. This was the "Satsuma rebellion." The Native Americans in the western United States
samurai were defeated by the commoners, were doing at this same time. The war ended
trained in modern fashion, and feudal Japan was indecisively and the Maoris were not beaten
forever gone. down and made subordinate as were the Native
As another sign of what was to come, a Japa- Americans in the United States, the blacks in Af-
nese businessman, Yataro Iwasaki (1834-1885), rica, and the Aborigines in Australia. The Maoris
expanded his business and founded Mitsubishi were given the vote and became New Zealand
in 1873, a firm that was eventually to become a citizens of an integrated nation.
world power in finance and trade.
HAWAII
PACIFIC ISLANDS The United States continued to gain influence in
The various islands of the Pacific were picked up Hawaii. A treaty was signed between the United
by the European powers. France annexed the Statesand Hawaii on January 30, 1875, whereby
Loyalty Islands in 1864, and Tahiti in 1880. Great Hawaiian sugar could enter the United States
Britain annexed Fiji in 1874. Even the United duty-free.
1880 TO 1890 417
1880 TO 1890
Bismarck calculated, reduced the attraction of
GERMANY socialism.
In this decade, Germany still dominated Europe. Bismarck's feeling was that only European ter-
Although it was now firmly allied with Austria- ritory was worth anything, and that colonies
Hungary, and although Austria-Hungary and abroad, however soothing they might be to the
Russia were irrevocably at odds over the Balkans, pride and vainglory of the home country, meant
Bismarck continued to try to bind Russia into the a great deal of trouble. It meant endless wars
alliance, too, as a way of isolating vengeful with objecting natives; it meant shipping off
France. home talent to administer and defend the colo-
On June Bismarck succeeded in con-
18, 1881, nies; it meant straining the fabric of home soci-
cluding a three-year 'Three Emperors' League" ety.
between Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Rus- Indeed, far from wishing to have Germany
sia. It was kept secret and it applied very compli- seek colonies overseas, he encouraged France to
cated rules governing what might happen if the do so. That, he thought, would distract France
Ottoman Empire continued to disintegrate and into forgetting the loss of Alsace-Lorraine, and at
what Russia and Austria-Hungary might each the same time would dissipate French strength
get out of it. In 1884, the League was renewed by making it compete with Great Britain and en-
for three more years. gage in endless colonial wars.
On May Bismarck persuaded Italy to
20, 1882, Bismarck, however, didn't count on the
sign a five-year "Triple Alliance" with Germany strength of pride and vainglory in Germany. The
and Austria-Hungary, one that was renewed German people grew restless at the sight of the
afterward. Italy agreed to this because of its British and French spreading their control over
anger over France's policy in Tunis. various sections of the world, and began to de-
Neither Russia nor Italy was held to the Ger- clare their desire for what was eventually to be
man/Austro-Hungarian core very firmly. Russia called "a place in the sun" for themselves. (Nat-
still wanted more out of the Balkans than Aus- urally, such sun could only be ob-
a place in the
tria-Hungary was willing to yield, and Italy had tained at the price of depriving hundreds of
its claims on Austrian lands adjacent to Italy. millions of non-Europeans of their place in the
Nevertheless, under Bismarck's skilled diplo- sun, but this seemed to bother few Europeans.)
macy, and with Great Britain continuing its pol- Bismarck was eventually forced to adopt the
icy of isolation, France was prevented from imperialist view himself; and beginning in the
finding any significant allies. 1880's, Germany joined in the scramble for pieces
Bismarck continued to fight socialism inside of territory in Africa and the South Pacific. By
Germany by granting some of the benefits the that time, however. Great Britain and France had
socialists were demanding, but doing so while swept up much of what was available, and Ger-
retaining firm control over the army and the na- many was left with relatively small portions.
tional bureaucracy, so that the benefits granted William I of Germany died on March 9, 1888,
were paternalistic gifts and not rights, and could just short of his 91st birthday. He had played, in
be withdrawn at any time. Thus, he granted to all contentment, the part of Louis XIll to Bis-
labor financial insurance against such misfor- marck's Richelieu, and had always recognized
tunes as old age, accident, and medical emergen- that Bismarck was much more useful to Germany
cies. This amounted to social security and, as than he himself was.
He was succeeded b his son, who reigned as dicted, and here again its properties were exactly
Frederick III (1831-18F8). Frederick III was a lib- as predicted.
eral and very much opposed to Bismarck's Heinrich Hermann Robert Koch (1843-1910)
strong-arm tactics, but he was dying of throat can- cultured and studied bacteria after Pasteur had
cer even as he came to the throne. On June 15, advanced the germ theory of disease, and led the
1888, he was dead, after having reigned for 99 fight to identify the specific causes of given infec-
helpless days. He was succeeded by his 29-year- tious diseases. In 1882, for instance, he identified
old son, who reigned as William II (1859-1941). the bacterium that caused tuberculosis.
The German word for "Emperor" is "Kaiser," In 1885, Karl Friedrich Benz (1844-1929) built
their spelling of "Caesar," which they pro- the working automobile to be powered by an
first
nounced correctly as "KY-zer," rather than the internal combustion engine. It had three wheels.
English "SEE-zer." Thus, William I of Germany Gottleib Wilhelm Daimler (1834-1900) built the
and Francis Joseph I of Austria-Hungary were firstfour-wheeled automobile in 1887.
Kaisers. So was the Russian Emperor, though the Brahms, living in Vienna, wrote his third and
Russians spelled it "Tsar" or "Czar," from their fourth symphonies in 1883 and 1885, respec-
spelling of "Caesar." tively.
Itwas William II, however, who eventually The most important German writer of the pe-
became known the world over as the Kaiser. He riod was the philosopher, Friedrich Wilhelm
was lively and intelligent, but impulsive and Nietzsche (1844-1900), who had rather mystical
lacking in judgment. He said and did things, notions of the "superman," and was strongly an-
thoughtlessly, that hurt his own cause, and he tireligion. His most notable work was Thus Spake
had the faculty of offending people and turning Zarathustra, the first part of which appeared in
them against him. He was like Napoleon III come 1883. He had a mental breakdown in 1889 and
back to life. never recovered.
William ITs important deed as Emperor
first Gerhart Hauptmann (1862-1946) was begin-
was to force the resignation of Bismarck on ning to make a name for himself as a dramatist
March 18, 1890. Bismarck was 75 years old and and was eventually to win a Nobel Prize.
had been Chancellor for 28 years. It was time for
him to retire, perhaps, but greater care might
have been taken to preserve his pride. His ser- FRANCE
vices to Germany had been such that he certainly France, throughout this decade, remained the
didn't deserve to be kicked out as unceremoni- implacable enemy of Germany, an enmity that
ously as he was. was all the more bitter because France was per-
The point was that William II was eager to fectly aware that she could not fight Germany
play the role of Bismarck himself, but he was no —
alone and that she had no allies.
Bismarck. He wasn't even a tired 75-year-old Bis- By 1880, with Francois Paul Jules Grevy (1807-
marck, and under him Germany took a new and 1891) as president the Third Republic had lasted
disastrous path. 10 years and there seemed no longer any chance
Regarding German science during this de- of a monarchist revival of any kind. Grevy fa-
cade, Heinrich Rudolf Hertz (1857-1894) discov- vored a weak executive and he was against the
ered radio waves in 1888, and, by their existence, kind of nationalism that sought revenge on Ger-
demonstrated the validity of Maxwell's equa- many. Nor was he much of an imperialist. The
tions, and Maxwell's most important
verified fact that he wanted to be a weak executive, how-
prediction from those equations. Another type of ever, meant he couldn't force these mild views
verification came when Clemens Alexander on the nation.
Winkler (1838—1904) discovered a new element Under Grevy, France was secularized. The
he named "germanium." It turned out to be one power of the Church was reduced, the Jesuits
of the new elements that Mendeleyev had pre- were expelled, divorce was permitted, and edu-
1880 TO 1890 419
cation from age 6 to 13 was made compulsory, 1891) became Minister of War. He was popular
free, and secular, so that no religious classes with the soldiers since he was interested in their
were included. welfare and improved their living conditions. He
This was brought about chiefly by the driving was also a fiery speaker and made an impressive
force of Jules Francois Camille Ferry (1832-1893), figure on horseback. he gave rise to the
In fact,
who had been Mayor of Paris during the Com- expression of "man on horseback," which came
mune and who was Prime Minister from 1880 to to represent any military leader of Napoleonic
1881 and from 1883 to 1885. Ferry was also the aura who could bring about victory by his per-
strongest imperialist in France, and led the drive sonal genius.
for expanding France's colonial holdings abroad. Boulanger became so popular with the nation-
Tunisian tribesmen were accustomed to raid- alists and conservatives, and even with many lib-
ing into Algeria and to them it didn't matter that erals, that the government began to view him as
it had been French territory for half a century a danger. He openly advocated increasing the
now. France took advantage of this to outfit a power of the executive, and it seemed clear he
punitive expedition. On April 30, 1881, French was seeing himself in a Napoleonic role. There-
ships bombarded and seized Bizerte, while fore, he was ousted from the War Ministry on
French troops invaded Tunis from Algerian bases May 31, 1887, and even from the army itself in
on the west. By May 12, Tunis was a French pro- March 1888.
tectorate. Meanwhile, though, in February 1888, he had
The Ottoman Empire protested since, in the- been elected to the Chamber of Deputies. There
ory, it ruled over Tunis. Italy objected even more were new elections, and he won in three differ-
strenuously since it wanted Tunis for itself (and ent departments. By the end of January 1889, the
it joined the Triple Alliance out of anger at France situation had reached a point where the crowds
over Even Great Britain objected, for she
this). were clamoring for a coup.
disapproved of any imperialism that wasn't her Boulanger, however, was an empty man. He
own. Bismarck, however, gave France his firm was all appearance and no substance. When it
support and that settled the matter. came time actually to do something, he could
On February 5, 1885, France obtained a section not, and the magic moment passed. The clamor
of central Located west of the lower
Africa. for him began to die at once and on April 1, 1889,
Congo River, this region was called "French he left France and went to Brussels, where, be-
Congo." By the end of the decade, too, France fore long, he killed himself on the grave of his
was in control of the island of Madagascar and of mistress.
what came to be called French Indo-China. In the By 1890, with the ludicrous failure of Boulan-
course of taking over Indo-China, French forces ger, France felt all the weaker with respect to
managed to lose a minor skirmish Chinese
to the Germany.
and Ferry lost his ministerial position because of In this decade, an outstanding French chemist
that. was Ferdinand Frederic Henri Moissan (1852-
This steady expansion of the French Empire 1907), who isolated the element fluorine in 1886
did not, however, cause France to forget Alsace- and eventually won a Nobel Prize Henri
for that.
Lorraine, as Bismarck had hoped. Rather, it did Louis Le Chatelier (1850-1936) presented the
the reverse. France grew more and more restless world with "Le Chatelier's principle" in 1888,
over the lost provinces, since with French armies which predicted the nature of the change in equi-
on the move everywhere from westernmost Af- librium that would take place whenever the con-
rica toeasternmost Asia, it seem unbearable to ditions of a system were disarranged.
have been driven out of two provinces at home. In 1886, Paul Louis Toussaint Heroult (1863-
France wanted revenge and, for a while, it 1914) worked out method for the elec-
a practical
thought it had the man for the job. In 1886, trolytic production of aluminum. This converted
Georges Ernest Jean Marie Boulanger (1837- a seemingly rare metal into one that became both
common and cheap. (An American chemist in- In music, Delibes was still active, writing the
dependently worked out the same method at the opera, Lakme, in 1883. Cesar Franck (1822-1890)
same time.) wrote his "Symphony in D Minor," his only one,
In 1884, Louis Marie Hilaire Bernigaud de in 1889. Jules Emile Frederic Massenet (1842-
Chardonnet (1839-1924) forced nitrocellulose so- 1912) wrote a number of operas of which his best-
lutions through tiny holes. As the spray evapo- known is Manon, produced in 1884.
rated, it left behind the first ''artificial fiber," Zola was still actively writing, publishing Ger-
which was called "rayon." In that same year, the minal in 1885 along with many other works.
Russian-born bacteriologist, Ilya Ilyich Mechni- Jacques Anatole Francois Thjbault (1844-1924),
kov, recognized the importance of white blood writing under the pseudonym of "Anatole
cells in combating bacterial infection and even- France," was the wittiest French writer since Vol-
tually received a Nobel Prize for that. taire, a century and a quarter earlier. He wrote
Pierre Marie Felix Janet (1859-1947) studied Thais in 1890,and eventually won a Nobel Prize.
various psychoses and, by 1889, anticipated The most famous actress of her time was
some of the techniques of psychoanalysis. Sarah Bernhardt (1844-1923), who made success-
The French engineer, Alexandre Gustave Eif- ful tours throughout Europe and the United
fel (1832-1923), was responsible for the construc- States and, eventually, even played the male role
tion of the Eiffel Tower, a unique structure of Hamlet. She was at the peak of her career in
designed to be part of the Centennial Exposition thisdecade but continued to act into old age,
of 1889, which celebrated the hundredth anniver- even after one of her legs had been amputated.
sary of the French Revolution. was 984 feet tall
It
and was by far the tallest man-made structure

built up to that time, taller than the Great Pyra- AUSTRIA-HUNGARY
mid or any of the medieval cathedrals. Although IfFrance was Germany's enemy, Austria-Hun-
many Parisians were horrified at what they con- gary was her increasingly staunch ally. She fol-
sidered its ugliness (it looked as though it had lowed Germany's lead to the point where she
been built out of the parts of a monstrous "Erec- scarcely can be viewed as having a history of her
tor set") it has come to be the very symbol of own, except for the inevitable friction in the Bal-
Paris. kans. In this decade, there was a Bulgarian revolt
French painters of the decade include George and, therefore, another Balkan crisis.
Pierre Seurat (1851-1891), whose canvases were At home, tragedy continued to follow Francis
covered with innumerable specks of paint rather Joseph I. He was a stiff, ceremonious man who,
than with brush strokes. Eugene Henri Paul Gau- out of an overwhelming sense of duty, attended
guin (1848-1903) abandoned his stockbroker job to all the minutiae of being a king, just as Philip
in 1883 to engage in painting full-time. He even- II of Spain did three centuries earlier. Like Philip
tually traveled to the South Pacific islands and II, he was also very conservative, and was de-
his paintings of Polynesian scenes are his best- voted to the Church.
known productions. He had one son, theGrand-Duke Rudolf
Francois Auguste Rene Rodin (1840-1917) is (1858-1889), a liberal and anticlerical, who
one of the most popular sculptors of modern wanted to grant much more freedom to the sup-
times and is particularly known for "The pressed nationalities and to weaken the grip of
Thinker," produced in 1880, and "The Kiss" in the Church. His father, therefore, kept him from
1886. Working on a monumental scale, Frederic all official functions and had forced him into an
Auguste Bartholdi (1834-1904) produced the fa- unhappy marriage. Eventually, Rudolf could not
mous "Liberty Enlightening the World" (better bear his life and, on January 30, 1889, he and his
known as "The Statue of Liberty"), which was mistress killed themselves at the Imperial hunt-
presented to the United States in 1885 and now ing lodge of Mayerling.
stands in New York harbor. This was even worse than the death by exe-
1880 TO 1890 421
cution of Francis Joseph's younger brother, Max- a little liberalization merely sharpened their ap-
imilian. Rudolf's suicide created a great scandal petite for more.
and mother, the Empress Elizabeth (1837-
his Furthermore, the fact that in Russia there was
1898), who was, in any case, rather mentally un- no room for the orderly expression of dissenting
stable, never recovered from the shock and took opinion meant that dissent had to go under-
to traveling over Europe, feverishly, as a way of ground, and those who were most apt to carry
forgetting. on dissent under such dangerous conditions
The new heir to the throne was Francis Jo- were the extremists. Thus, Pyotr Alekseyevich
seph's one remaining brother, Charles Louis (d. Kropotkin (1842-1921), an able explorer and
1896). geographer, was radicalized by Russian oppres-
An important Austrian chemist of the period sion, fled to France, then Great Britain, and
was Karl Auer von Welsbach (1858-1929) who, wrote eloquent works supporting anarchy.
in 1885, discovered that fabric impregnated with Alexander II recognized, at least dimly, that
thorium nitrate and a bit of cerium nitrate would trying to contain the explosive forces, compress-
glow with a brilliant white light when heated. ing them more and more tightly, would merely
The use of such a "Welsbach mantle" about the bring about an increase in the internal pressures
flame of a kerosene lamp made those lamps ef- and make the explosion more violent when it
fective competitors of the new electric light for a came. Therefore, he approved a plan whereby
time. the local councils, up
1870 in various
set in
Josef Breuer (1842-1895) found it helpful, be- towns, might select representatives who would
ginning in 1880, to encourage patients with psy- discuss legislation with the tsar and his minis-
chological disturbances to talk freely of their ters. This would allow for an orderly expression
fantasies, sometimes with the aid of hypnosis. of dissenting opinion and supply a safety valve
This seemed to alleviate the symptoms. Sigmund that would keep opposition from turning to vio-
Freud (1856-1939), learning from Breuer and oth- lence and terrorism.
ers, began to use similar methods in 1887. It was too late. On the very day that Alex-
Samuel Teleki (1845-1916), a Hungarian ex- ander II approved the plan, March 13, 1881, he
plorer, discovered Lake Rudolf in east Africa in fell victim to a bomb attack while in a coach on
1888. the streets of St. Petersburg.

Johann Strauss was still making Vienna ring He was succeeded by his son, who reigned as
with his music. He wrote the operetta The Gypsy Alexander III (1845-1894). The assassination led
Baron in 1885, and one of his best pieces. The to just the reverse of what the terrorists' aims
Emperor Waltz, in 1888. For this waltz, Francis must have been. Alexander III considered the
Joseph I, who had turned against him when death of his father to have been the result of his
Strauss had married a Jewish widow, received deviating from autocratic principles. Therefore,
him back into favor. Josef Anton Bruckner (1824- Alexander III removed much of his father's re-
1896) and Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) were both forms, replaced with harsh repression, press-
it
important composers in this decade. Anton Leo- ing hard on all those who were not both Russian
pold Dvorak (1841-1904), an Austro-Hungarian and Russian Orthodox in religion. In particular,
subject, but Czech in his ethnic background, was he encouraged indiscriminate' attacks on Jews,
also becoming well-known. who began to flee to the United States in increas-
ing numbers.
A Polish Jew, Ludwik Lejser Zamenhof (1859-
RUSSIA 1917), appalled by this, devised an artificial lan-
The harsh autocracy in Russia and the manner in guage called "Esperanto" ("one who hopes") in
which the nation lagged behind the lands to the 1887. It had a simple spelling and grammar and
west drove many Russians to desperation. The Zamenhof hoped it would be adopted the world
reforms of Alexander II seemed too slow to them; over and that a universal language would lead to
an era of peace and mutual friendship among there was and the Fifth
the 1812 Overture in 1880,
peoples. It didn't work; nor has any invented Symphony in 1888. Nickolay Andreyevich Rim-
language proved to be useful since. (If the world sky-Korsakoff (1844-1908) wrote the opera Snow
ever adopts a world language and it may not — Maiden in 1882, Capriccio Espagnol in 1887, and the
it will probably be a somewhat modified En- symphonic suite Scheherezade in 1888.
glish.)
And still Russia advanced in central Asia. In
1884, the Russians took the city of Merv and the GREAT BRITAIN
frontier reached the line that exists today, march- While the nations of Europe were playing their
ing along the northern border of Afghanistan and intricate game of power politics, competing for
Persia. For a while, this brought on a crisis with position and forming alliances. Great Britain
Great Britain, which continued to be jittery over stood above it all. She was allied with none and
the security of India; however, neither side concerned with only two things: expanding her
wanted war, and the matter was adjusted peace- colonial empire overseas, and making sure that
ably in June 1886. no one power grew so strong in Europe as to be
Even nations that totally spurn the political able to threaten her. As long as the nations com-
and social ways of the west are usually willing to peted with each other on fairly even terms. Great
adopt western technology, since they see this as Britain could rest secure behind her navy
the path to wealth and strength. Even as Alex- which controlled the oceans of the world, and
ander III turned back to autocracy, he also pre- particularly those narrow bodies of water, the
sided over the further modernization of Russia. English Channel and the North Sea, that sepa-
In this, Sergei Yulyevich Witte (1849-1915) rated her from the turbulence of the European
was the leader. He was the Minister of Commu- continent.
nications and was particularly interested in rail- Great Britain had troubles at home, however,
roads. As rail lines were built across Russia, the and the chief of these was the Irish question.
coal and iron fields of remoter districts could be Ever since the great famine, the had grownIrish
exploited, and factories could be established. increasingly restless, and a greater and greater
This required the borrowing of capital, and that number of British had grown to feel increasingly
came chiefly from France, which expected a re- guilty.
turn, with substantial interest, as an industrial An Irish lawyer, Isaac Butt (1813-1879), had,
Russia grew wealthier. as early as 1873, coined "Home
Rule" as an
Industrialization, however, also meant the expression of Irish aspirations. After his death in
growth in the number of factory workers. These 1879, Irish nationalists were led by Charles Stew-
were treated miserably, as they always were in art Parnell (1846-1890). He was of English de-
the early days of industrialization, and they were scent and was a Protestant, but he identified
more aware and more likely to react than the himself completely with the oppressed Irish and
peasantry was. This meant radical dissent grew was idolized by them. He was a natural candi-
more rapidly and smoldered more dangerously. date for Parliament, being a Protestant, and once
Abroad there was another crisis when the Bul- there he fought skillfully for Irish causes by
garians revolted. carrying on an obstructionist campaign in Parlia-
An important Russian scientist at this time ment that made it difficult for it to do its busi-
was Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (1849-1936), who, in ness.
1889, studied the manner in which nerve action Gladstone, who wise to make conces-
felt it
controlled the flow of digestive juices in the sions to the Irish, saw to it that another Land Act
stomach. This work was eventually judged wor- was passed August 1881, which served to
in
thy of a Nobel Prize. lower excessive rents and to give Irish tenants
Tchaikovsky was still composing music. some security from being evicted as long as they
Among his many compositions in this decade. paid their rents. On the whole, as is true of so
1880 TO 1890 423
many reforms, it went

enough to displease
far the crown was still left to the British Parliament,
the conservative landowners, and not far enough in which there were to be no Irish members. Par-
to please the Irish peasantry. nell supported it, half-baked though it was, as at
The was made worse by those Irish
situation least a step in the right direction, but the Conser-
radicals who were angry enough to seek solace vatives bitterly opposed
and even some Lib-
it,
in terrorism. On May 6, 1882, two high English erals deserted Gladstone on this matter. The Bill
officials in were assassinated and, later
Ireland failed to pass and, on July 26, 1886, Gladstone
on, other terrorist attacks were committed, in- was forced out, and Salisbury came in as Prime
cluding the dynamiting of public buildings in En- Minister for the second time.
gland. This naturally led to a sudden increase in Parnell then fell on hard times. He was ac-
English oppression in Ireland, a determination to cused of having connections with terrorists on
root out resistance that was as terroristic in its April 18, 1887, a letter by him being presented as
own way as the deeds of the radicals, so that it evidence. It proved to be a forgery, and the
became terror versus terror. forger killed himself.
Gladstone was also pushing for increased de- But there was worse to come. Parnell had, as
mocracy in Great Britain itself. In 1884, his "Fran- his mistress, the wife of another man who, on
chise Bill"expanded the number of voters once December 24, 1889, filed for divorce, naming Par-
again; and, in 1885, the membership of Parlia- nell as co-respondent. This ruined his political
ment was so adjusted in his "Redistribution Bill" career. He retired, and died soon after.
that there was a far closer approach to the prin- During Gladstone's third stint as Prime Min-
ciple of having each member of Parliament rep- ister, there was a further liberalization of Parlia-
resent the same number of people. ment. Jews could be seated, but what about
Parnell managed being tarred by the
to avoid atheists? The question arose in connection with
terrorist brush and continued to turn Parliament Charles Bradlaugh (1833-1891), who was not
topsy-turvy. Annoyed by Gladstone's unwilling- only an atheist, but who wrote freely on birth-
ness (or inability) to go farther on the Irish prob- control. He was elected to Parliament in 1880 and
lem, he shifted support away from the Liberal then repeatedly reelected, but was not allowed to
Party and forced Gladstone out on June 9, 1885. take his seat because he refused to swear on the
Disraeli had died on April 19, 1881, and the Con- Bible. He would merely "affirm." In 1886, he was
servative party was now by Robert Cecil,
led allowed to affirm and take his seat and, in 1888,
Lord Salisbury (1830-1903), who had been For- a law was passed permitting affirmation gen-
eign Minister during the Russo-Turkish crisis of erally.
1878, and who was now Prime Minister. He was There was unrest among British labor as well
the last Prime Minister to be a peer and to rule as among the Irish. There was a huge dock strike
from the House of Lords. in the summer of 1889, and the coal miners
This was what Parnell wanted. He held the formed a union. Increasingly, laborers were un-
swing votes and Salisbury and Gladstone real- and the
willing to leave the rule to the Liberals
ized that neither could be Prime Minister without —
Conservatives that is, to the commercial and
him. They both vied for Parnell's support, and the landed classes. Unionism spread, and labor
Gladstone finally bid high enough to get it. Sal- was finding its own voice.
isbury (having been Prime Minister for only half Then, too, the policy of "splendid isolation"
a year) was out, Gladstone became Prime Minis- was beginning to wear thin. There was serious
ter for the third time on January 27, 1886. trouble in Egypt and the Sudan against a new
Therefore, Gladstone put forward a Home Muslim conqueror, and trouble Afghanistan
in
Rule Bill on April 8, 1886, but it was only another against Russian encroachment. This might come
partial step. A separate Irish Parliament would under the heading of colonial wars, something
be set up which would deal with local affairs, but Great Britain was used to.
anything involving the military, or commerce, or However, closer to home, both France and
Russia were strengthening their navies, and Brit- In 1884, Charles Algernon Parsons (1854-
ish security rested entirely on the overwhelming 1931) devised the first practical steam turbine,
superiority of its own sea-forces. On May 31, which had the capacity for moving ships faster
passed a “Naval
1889, therefore. Great Britain than the old propellers couldr Additional ad-
Defense Act," which provided that Great Britain vances in transportation included the work of the
would always build up its navy until it was at German-born British inventor, William Siemens
least as strong as the next two strongest powers (1823-1883), who pioneered the development of
combined. the electric locomotive, the first of which ran in
That was easy to say, but it was soon to prove northern Ireland in 1883. Johen Boyd Dunlop
not so easy to do. (1840-1921) patented the pneumatic rubber tire
In science in this decade, Frederick Augustus in 1888. Although it was used for bicycles to
Abel (1827-1902) and James Dewar (1842-1923) begin with, its application became essential to
pioneered the production of “cordite" in 1889, a automobiles, buses, and trucks.
mixture of nitroglycerine and nitrocellulose, with In music. Great Britain lagged, but there con-
petroleum jelly added. It could be formed into tinued to be the Gilbert & Sullivan operettas.
thick cords (hence its name) and it was safe to There was Patience (1881), lolanthe (1882), The Mi-
handle. Unlike gunpowder, it burned without kado (1885), and The Gondoliers (1889) to men- —
smoke. The use of smokeless powders cleared tion only the most popular.
the battlefield and it cut down the chances that Hardy was still writing, and The Mayor of Cas-
lives would be sacrificed because generals terbridge was published in 1886. Oscar Wilde
couldn't see what was happening. (1854-1900) began his career by writing poetry,
As another contribution to warfare, the Amer- but made with a collection of
his first hit in prose
ican-born British inventor, Hiram Stevens Maxim tales for youngsters, including The Happy Prince
(1840-1916), invented the automatic
first fully in 1888. Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson (1850-
machine gun in 1883. Whereas the Gatling gun 1894) followed the same pattern, publishing his
had to be cranked, the Maxim gun used the recoil charming A Child's Garden of Verses in 1885, and
of one bullet to eject the spent cartridge and load writing such prose classics as Treasure Island in
the next. Its usefulness against the native levies 1883, Kidnapped in 1886, and Dr. jekyll and Mr.
in non-European lands is attested to by the jin- Hyde in 1886.
gle: Henry Rider Haggard (1856-1925) wrote effec-
tiveadventure stories, such as King Solomon's
Whatever happens, we have got
The Maxim gun and they have not! Mines in 1885 and She in 1887. Arthur Conan
Doyle (1859-1930) published A Study in Scarlet in
Of course, the time was to come when “they" 1887, introducing what many believe to be the
got the Maxim gun, along with other weap-
too, most popular hero ever invented, Sher-
fictional
ons, and colonial wars stopped being quite so lock Holmes (with, it is not to be forgotten, his
much fun. friend and foil. Dr. John H. Watson).
Robert Abbott Hadfield found
(1858-1940) Walter Horatio Pater (1839-1894) published
that steel, to which 12% manganese had been the historical novel Marius the Epicurean in 1885.
added and which was heated and then It was set in the time of the Roman Empire. Rich-
quenched, was much harder than ordinary steel. ard Francis Burton (1821-1890), till then known
This was patented in 1883, and marked the be- as an explorer, translated The Arabian Nights into
ginning of the triumph of “alloy steel" with new English, unexpurgated, between 1885 and 1888.
and useful properties. S
John Milne (1850-1913) invented the modern

seismograph for measuring earth-vibrations, ITALY
and, with that, began modern seismology (the Italy liked to think of itself as a major European
study of earthquakes). power, along with Great Britain, France, Ger-
1880 TO 1890 425
many, Austria-Hungary, and Russia, but it was along with France, urging French Catholics to
clearly the weakest of the six. France's seizure of forget monarchism and support the republic.
Tunis was deeply humiliating to Italy, and led it He could not reconcile himself to Italy, how-
to make an alliance with Germany and Austria- ever, especially since Crispi was violently anti-
Hungary. clericaland went out of his way to offend the
Italy's adherence to the new alliance was car- Papacy. Not only did he secularize the schools,
ried through by Agostino Depretis (1813-1887), but he had a statue of Giordano Bruno (whom
who was Prime Minister through most of the the Church had burned in 1600) set up facing the
decade. He was a liberal at home, extending the Vatican. The harried Pope, in a weak moment,
franchise greatly in 1881. He was an imperialist even thought of the possibility of leaving Rome
abroad and searched for some area that had not — but did not.
yet been taken up by the stronger powers. He
found one on the African coast of the Red Sea,
where the Italians occupied the ports of Assab
and Massawa in 1885.
BELGIUM
When Belgium was rapidly industrializing itself in this
Depretis died in 1887, Francesco Cripi
decade, and expanding the franchise as almost
(1819-1901), his Minister of the Interior, suc-
all the European nations were doing at this time.
ceeded as Prime Minister. Crispi was a Sicilian
This meant the growth of a Labor party, the com-
by birth, an old revolutionary, who had per-
ing of strikes and socialism, and the demand for
suaded Garibaldi to lead his thousand men
universal male suffrage.
against Sicily and Naples. He had briefly been
The Belgian king, Leopold II, may have been
one of the leaders of the new Neapolitan republic
more interested in Central Africa than in Bel-
until it was taken into the new Kingdom of Italy.
Crispi held firmly to the Triple Alliance and to
gium, however. He made use of the explorer,
Henry Stanley, as his agent, to set up his power
a policy ofenmity with France. Forgetting his
along the Congo River. He fought off British and
own revolutionary past, he forcefully suppressed
Portuguese probes into the area and, on May 2,
socialist uprisings in He
organized the Ital-
Italy.
1885, he privately set up the "Congo Free State"
ian holdings along the Red Sea into the Italian
colony of Eritrea, and he began to push for a
(i.e., free for Leopold)and obtained its recogni-
protectorate over Ethiopia.
tion by the important European powers and by
the United States.
On the cultural front, Verdi was still writing,
producing his opera Otello in 1887. Pietro Mas-
The Congo Free State was 80 times the area of
Belgium, but it didn't really belong to Belgium at
cagni (1863-1945) turned out the one-act opera
Cavelleria Rusticana in 1890.
this time: it belonged solely
Leopold II. to
In 1887, a Belgian biologist, Edouard Joseph
Carlo Lorenzini (1826-1890), writing under
Louis Marie van Beneden (1809-1894), showed
the pseudonym of Carlo Collodi, published The
Adventures of Pinocchio in 1882.
that the number of chromosomes was constant in
the body cells of a particular species, but that
they were only half the usual number in the
PAPACY sperm cells and egg cells of the species. This
proved to be an important point in the develop-
Leo decade, continued his liberaliz-
XIII, in this
ment of knowledge of genetics.
ing policy after the dark reaction of Pius IX. He
labored to point out that there was no necessary
conflict between religion and science, that the
universe as revealed by science had to be the NETHERLANDS
work of God and was therefore consonant with In this decade, the Netherlands, too, broadened
true religion. He also lessened the enmity of the the franchise. There was a dispute over the na-
Church toward democracy and did his best to get ture of education. The liberals wanted it secular
ized and the conservatives wanted it to be con- nibal and Napoleon had managed to cross it.
trolled by religious bodies. One of the passes, the St. Gotthard pass (1.3
On November William III of the
23, 1890, miles high even at its ^lowest) was not used
Netherlands died after having reigned 41 years. much, with only a mule path crossing it for cen-
Succeeding him was his 10-year-old daughter, turies. The nineteenth century saw a road built
Wilhelmina (1880-1962), with her mother acting over it that was fit for carriages.
as regent. Switzerland, a nation which nestles amid the
Van't Hoff, who had worked out the three- Alps, built a nine-mile tunnel through it in the
dimensional structure of organic molecules, 1870s, then constructed a railway line through
worked on chemical thermodynamics in 1884, the tunnel. Finally, in 1882,’ it was possible to
particularly as itinvolved the behavior of solu- travel by train, in comfort, from Lucerne, Swit-
tions, and for this he eventually received a Nobel zerland to Milan, Italy. Other rail lines through
Prize. other passes were eventually built, too.
Vincent Willem van Gogh (1853-1890) is now The Swiss writer, Johanna Spyri (1827-1901),
considered the greatest Dutch painter since Rem- wrote Heidi in 1881 and it has remained popular
brandt, two and a half centuries earlier. At least, ever since.
this is the present opinion, when his paintings
sell for the tens of millions of dollars. In his life-
time, he was an however, and man-

utter failure, DENMARK
aged to sell only one painting for a trifling sum.
Under Christian IX, Denmark spent this decade
Beset by poverty and despair, he shot himself,
in peace and in rapid industrialization.
and died on July 29, 1890.
SPAIN SWEDEN
Under Alfonso XII, Spain's liberal constitution Under Oscar II, peace and industrialization was
worked and the nation had a period of unusual the lot of Sweden as well. There was a large
quiet and prosperity. He died of tuberculosis on Swedish emigration to the United States in this
November however, at the age of only
25, 1885, period.
28, leaving behind a pregnant wife, Maria Cris- While working toward his doctorate, the
tina (1858-1929). On May 17, 1886, she gave birth Swedish chemist, Svante August Arrhenius
to a son, who reigned as Alfonso XIII (1886- (1859-1927), devised a theory to explain some of
1941), but she remained as regent. For the rest of the intricacies involved in the passage of electric-
the decade, matters continued smoothly. ity through solutions. He felt that atoms and
atom groups could carry electric charges. This
was so revolutionary a thought that he barely
PORTUGAL passed his examination. However, as additional
The decade passed quietly for Portugal, as well evidence came in, it turned out that he was right,
as for its king, Luis (who was literally inclined
I and he eventually won a Nobel Prize for his
and translated Shakespeare into Portuguese). He barely passed doctoral dissertation.
died on October 19, 1889, having reigned 28 The greatest modern Swedish writer, it is usu-
years, and was succeeded by his son, who ally thought, is the novelist and playwright,
reigned as Carlos I (1863-1908). Johan August Strindberg (1849-1912), whose
early works caused him to be accused of blas-
phemy.
SWITZERLAND In Norway, which was still under the Swedish
The Alps, as had always protected Italy
a barrier, crown, Ibsen continued to turn out masterful
from the north, though conquerors such as Han- plays, including Ghosts (1881), An Enemy of the
1880 TO 1890 427
People (1882), The Wild Duck (1884), and Hedda it was clear that Bulgaria was an enemy of Rus-
Gabler (1890), among others. sia.
The Norwegian explorer. Nils Adolf Erik Nor- The Ottoman Empire was not enthusiastic
denskiold (1832-1901), penetrated 84 miles into about fighting endlessly in the Balkans and, on
Greenland Nansen (1861-1930),
in 1883. Fridtjof April 5, 1886, the union of Bulgaria and Eastern
another Norwegian explorer, was the first to Rumelia was virtually carried through. This dis-
cross Greenland. He and his party used skis to turbed Serbia, which feared that an expanding
cross about 260 miles of icecap and reached a Bulgaria might claim, and get, territory that Ser-
height of 1.7 miles. bia wanted for itself. Serbia, therefore, declared
war on Bulgaria, and was promptly defeated.
In the end, though. Prince Alexander could
BULGARIA not withstand the hostile pressure of Russia and,
Bulgaria, after having been given considerable on September 4, 1886, he abdicated. After a pe-
territory by the Russians at the conclusion of riod of confusion, during which there was a mo-
their war with Turkey in 1878, had been greatly mentary war crisis (squelched by Bismarck),
diminished by the Treaty of Berlin. The northern another German prince, on July 4, 1887, was per-
portion was called Bulgaria and was virtually in- suaded to take the Bulgarian throne. He reigned
dependent under Prince Alexander I (1857- as Ferdinand I (1861-1948). Russia refused to rec-
1893). Alexander I was one of the numerous Ger- ognize him, and he had a rocky time of it at first,
man princes that littered Europe. He was also a but he maintained himself over a now some-
nephew Alexander II of Russia and, therefore,
of what-greater Bulgaria.
a first cousin of Alexander III of Russia.
Middle Bulgaria, called “Eastern Rumelia,"
had only very limited self-rule, and southern Bul- GREECE
garia was still entirely Ottoman. Greece, still ruled by George
had been prom-
I,
Russia took it for granted that Alexander I ised additional territory in the north at the Con-
would be a reliable puppet. When he abolished gress of Berlin, but the Ottoman Empire was in
the liberal constitution soon after accession, it ap- no hurry to grant it. On July 2, 1881, continuing
proved and supported the step. Alexander I of Greek pressure had its result, however, and
Bulgaria did not, however, get along with Alex- Greece annexed Thessaly and part of Epirus,
ander III of Russia, and the enmity grew surpris- both Greek-speaking areas.
ingly intense, even to the point where Prince Greece was eager to take advantage of the Bul-
Alexander restored the liberal constitution for no garian crisis, but the European powers came
other reason, apparently, than to show his inde- down heavily on it, and even blockaded Greece
pendence of Russia. in May 1886 as a way of persuading it to keep the
On September 18, 1885, Eastern Rumelia rose peace.
in revolt against the Ottoman Empire and de-
manded union with Bulgaria. Wild enthusiasm
among the Bulgarian populace forced Prince SERBIA
Alexander to support the Eastern Rumelian reb- Serbia was ruled by Milan Obrenovich (1854-
els against his own cautious feelings. Russia, 1901) at the beginning of the decade. In 1881, he
which had wanted a “Greater Bulgaria" seven assumed the royal dignity and styled himself
years earlier, now, out of profound dislike for King Milan I.
Prince Alexander, opposed it. However, Great Hedid this with Austro-Hungarian support,
Britain, which had opposed a Greater Bulgaria for Russia's failure at the Congress of Berlin had
when it feared it would be a Russian puppet, convinced Milan that it would be more produc-
instantly changed its position, too, and favored tive to rely on Austria-Hungary instead. In this
the union of Bulgaria and Eastern Rumelia once period, therefore, Serbia became virtually an
Austro-Hungarian puppet. This roused national itself to healing its wounds and building up its
opposition, which made itself vocal with Nicola western half.

Pashich (1845-1926), who was violently opposed Succeeding President was James
Hayes
to Milan's policies. It was nationalist pressure Abram Garfield (1831-1881), who was inaugu-
that forced Serbia into a war with Bulgaria rated the 20th President on March 4, 1881. A little
in 1885, one in which it was quickly defeated over six months later, however, Garfield was
and from which it had to be rescued by Austria- shot by Charles Julius Guiteau (1840-1882) and
Hungary. died of his wounds.
The nationals won an election and forced a Guiteau was a disappointed office-seeker, and
liberal constitutionon the country, whereupon this threw into public awareness the viciousness
Milan abdicated in anger, on March 6, 1889. His of government employment procedures. With
13-year-old son succeeded, and reigned as Alex- each new administration, all government em-
ander I (1876-1903). ployees were subject to ousting, with new people
appointed out of purely political consideration.
For each job available, dozens of party hacks felt
ROMANIA they deserved it for whatever work they had
Newly independent Romania was ruled by Carol done toward the election. Presidents were
I (1839-1914), still another German prince. Al- hounded to madness by these even
harpies,
though it had been Russia that had obtained Ro- President Lincoln during the desperate days of
manian independence, it was with the intention the Civil War. Those hacks who did manage to
of making the country a Russian puppet. Carol I claw down themselves were, more often
a job for
feared that fate and, on October 30, 1883, he ar- that not, incompetent.
ranged a secret alliance with Austria-Hungary. A New York Senator, William Learned Marcy
This made it part of the Triple Alliance, and (1786-1857), had justified this by considering
made Romania another link in Bismarck's chain. that a political party was an army and that gov-
The arrangement was kept secret, however, out ernment office was what it was fighting for. He
of fear of the Russian reaction. said, "To the victor belong the spoils" (where
"spoils" are the possessions of the defeated
army). The office-seeking policy was, therefore,
OTTOMAN EMPIRE known as the "spoils system."
For the Ottoman Empire, territorial shrinkage Succeeding Garfield was his Vice-President,
continued. France had taken its Tunisian prov- Chester Alan Arthur (1829-1886), who became
ince in 1881; and Great Britain its Egyptian prov- the 21st President. He had been a cheap machine
ince in 1882. In the Balkans, it lost territory to but becoming president seemed to
politician,
both Greece and Bulgaria. change him. Under him, the notion of civil ser-
It was only two centuries earlier that an Otto- vice examinations to determine fitness for gov-
man army had stood at the walls of Vienna, and ernment position, with discharge only for cause,
now the European dominions of the Ottoman began to make progress.
Empire were reduced to an east-west strip across Arthur's change of attitude did not please the
the Balkans from Constantinople to the Adriatic Republican politicians and they did not renomi-
Sea, a strip lying to the south of Bulgaria, Serbia, nate him in 1884. Instead, they chose James Gil-
and Montenegro, and to the north of Greece. lespie Blaine (1830-1893), who was transparently
corrupt. In addition,one of Blaine's supporters,
a Protestant clergyman, Samuel Dickinson Bur-
UNITED STATES chard (1812-1892), gave a talk in which he ac-
After the national trauma of the Civil War, the cused Democrats of being involved in "rum,
United States continued self-imposed isola-
its Romanism and rebellion." This lost Blaine
tion from the problems of Europe, and devoted enough Catholic votes to cost him New York
1880 TO 1890 429
State and, therefore, the election. The Demo- Emma Lazarus, a Jewish woman born in New
cratic candidate, the reform governor of New York City. Its most famous lines are:
York, Grover Cleveland (1837-1908), was elected
and took office in 1885 as the 22nd President. He Give me your your poor.
tired,
was Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

the first Democrat
be elected since James
to
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore;
Buchanan, 28 years earlier. The Republicans had
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me.
won seven elections in a row. I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
In 1888, however, Cleveland was not re-

elected. He had more popular votes than his It was written in 1883, the year after the
rival, Benjamin Harrison (1833-1901), a grand- "golden door" started slowly to creak shut. Of
son of William Henry Harrison, the 9th Presi- course, it stands to reason that the United States
dent, but that didn't help. The British can't accept unlimited numbers of immigrants
Ambassador incautiously backed Cleveland and forever, but if selection there must be, it would
that cost the latter enough Irish votes to lose him be more sensible to discriminate on the grounds
New York and the election. Harrison was inau- of intelligence and industry, rather than on irrel-
gurated as the 23rd President in 1889. evant matters of appearance and national preju-
There were important changes taking place in dice.
the 1880s. Until then, immigration into the There were other changes. New York (and
United States had been essentially free. In fact, it London in Great Britain) began to have its streets
was welcomed as a source of cheap labor. Be- illuminated with electric lights in 1882. The first
sides, most of the immigrants were from the na- skyscraper, 10 stories high and with a framework
tions of northern and western Europe, who had that was partly steel, was erected in Chicago in
little trouble adjusting to the American way of 1885. The first skyscraper in Manhattan, 13 sto-
life. The quantities of Irish who had come in dur- ries high, was erected in 1889.
ing the 1840s and 1850s, fleeing from famine and The Washington Monument, a tall obelisk in
oppression, were Catholic and were, therefore, memory of the first President, was completed in
subjected to ill-treatment — but a least they spoke 1888. It had an aluminum cap that served as an
English. The from eastern and southern
influx exotic and expensive topping without the banal-
Europe, particularly the Jews fleeing from po- ity of gold, but turned out to be just the time
this
groms, who began arriving in the 1880s, were when aluminum was beginning to turn common
more troubling still. However, it was with the and inexpensive.
—
Chinese quiet, uncomplaining, industrious, There were disasters, too. In March of 1888,
willing to work at starvation wages, but with an New York experienced an unexpected three-day
unfamiliar appearance and culture that Ameri- — blizzard that isolated it from the world for a time
cans drew the line. and killed a number of people. On May 31, 1889,
There were riots in which Chinese were a dam burst upstream from Johnstown, Pennsyl-
slaughtered for the mere crime of being Chinese, vania, and a wall of water drowned several thou-
particularly in California where they were most sand people.
numerous. On May 6, 1882, the "Chinese Exclu- The American frontier was finally closed. The
sion Act" was passed, barring Chinese laborers last formidable Native American foe of the
from entering the United States for 10 years. This United States was an Apache chieftain called
was the beginning of an increasingly selective "Geronimo" (1829-1909), a nickname he had
immigration policy. been given by Mexicans. He carried on a skillful
It was also ironic because in 1886, the Statue campaign in 1885 and 1886, but was finally de-
from France) was erected in New
of Liberty (a gift feated and captured.
York harbor, where most of the European immi- Then, group of Sioux, reduced to
in 1890, a
grants arrived. It had a sonnet engraved on a semistarvation on their reservation, snatched at
plaque at its base, one that had been written by the belief that magic dances might cause the
white man to They tried to carry

disappear. It decade in which newspaper publish-
was a-
through the dances, but American forces killed ers were becoming very important. There had
Sitting Bull (1831-1890), who had been promi- been important publishers before, such as Hor-
nent in the defeat of Custer 14 years earlier. They ace Greeley (1811-1872), a quixotic liberal who
also killed about 200 men, women, and children, edited the New York Herald and who actually ran
and this inglorious "Battle of Wounded Knee" but who was badly beaten
for president in 1872,
was the end (and with it the age of the cowboy), and died almost immediately afterward. There
as the west began to turn increasingly to settle was also James Gordon Bennett (1795-1872),
farming communities. who was the first to sell newspapers for a mere
It was not only Native Americans who were cent apiece. By this he achieved high circulation
subjected to government suppression. The in- and had to labor to please the taste of the unso-
dustrialization of the United States led to a self- phisticated mass of the population. It was he
conscious labor movement, to strikes, and to who sent Stanley to find Livingstone.
by the European im-
Socialism, often brought in These were outshone, however, by Hungar-
migrants. The American government sided with ian-born Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911), who
the industrialist against the laborers just as firmly founded The New York World in 1883. He domi-
as European governments did. nated the newspaper world in the 1880s, but to-
In 1886, an organization called "The Knights ward its end, William Randolph Hearst (1863-
of Labor" had grown prominent. It had a mem- 1951) entered the newspaper field and was des-
bership of 730,000 and called 1600 strikes, mostly tined to eclipse Pulitzer.
for the purpose of establishing an eight-hour On a more humanitarian note, nurse Clarissa
work day. The industrialists could always hire Harlowe ("Clara") Barton, who had labored to
thugs, however, to break a strike by force, or if relieve suffering in the Civil War and in the
they wanted to economize, they could just as Franco-Prussian War, founded the American
easily make use of the police, without having to Red Cross in 1882 and served as its first presi-
pay out salaries. dent.
On May 1, was called against the
1886, a strike Booker Washington (1856-1915)
Taliaferro
McCormick Harvesting Machine Company. On was a black, who had been born a slave. He had
May 3, the police charged a crowd of peaceful educated himself under great difficulties and be-
strikers, killing six. On May 4, the strikers held a lieve that blacks could best advance by learning
protest meeting at Haymarket Square in Chicago. trades and professions and proving themselves
Again, the police charged in without provoca- good citizens until they were accepted by the
tion. This time, someone threw a bomb, and whites. (Those blacks who disagreed with him
seven policemen were killed. Eight strike leaders felt that acceptance through passive virtue would
were arrested. There was no evidence that any of come by Day
Judgment but not before.)
the of
them had thrown the bomb, but after a farcical Washington founded Tuskegee Institute in Tus-
trial, four were hanged, one killed himself in de- kegee, Alabama, in 1881, and spent the rest of
spair, and the remaining three were imprisoned. his life laboring in the cause of black education.
The Knights of Labor shriveled thereafter, but Elizabeth Seaman (1867-1922), who used the
the British-born Samuel Gompers (1850-1924) pseudonym "Nelly Bly," was a journalist who
founded the American Federation of Labor that did not fear difficult tasks. She spent 10 days in
year and kept it a fairly cautious organization. a lunatic asylum and wrote up her experiences in
In 1889 and 1890, North Dakota, South Da- 1887. She also set out to match Phileas Fogg's feat
kota, Montana, Washington, Idaho, and Wyo- in Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days and
ming were added to the Union, and there were actually bettered it. She did it in 72 and a quarter
now 44 states. By 1890, the population of the days and wrote it up in a book published in 1890.
United States stood at 63 million, higher than Thus was science fiction overtaken as has hap- —
that of any European nation other than Russia. pened on numerous occasions since.
1880 TO 1890 431
John Lawrence Sullivan was a prizefighter as a local anesthetic, deadening just the region
who won the heavyweight championship in 1882 about a minor operation, rather than putting a
in the last bare-knuckle fight. After that, prize person to sleep altogether.
fightswere conducted by the rules set up under In 1889, that universal inventor, Edison, in-
the supervision of John Sholto Douglas, Marquis vented a camera and some techniques that were
of Queensberry (1844-1900). These "Marquis of the first steps toward motion pictures. The Aus-
Queensberry rules" have governed prize-fight- tro-Hungarian-born Nikola Tesla (who was Croa-
ing ever since. Sullivan's colorful personality tian, ethnically), a great and embittered rival of
made this rather dubious "sport" popular in the Edison, worked out the electric transformer that
United States. made it possible to send electric currents long
The outstanding entertainer of the period was distances with comparatively little loss. This
Lillian Russell (1861-1922), whose well-uphol- worked only with alternating currents, not di-
stered charms made her as popular as an actress rect, and helped give Westinghouse his victory
could be in the days before motion pictures. over Edison.
The United States was slowly gaining ground In 1884, George Eastman (1854-1932) invented
in science. The German-born physicist, Albert a flexible photographic film. In 1888, he began
Abraham Michelson (1852-1931), had, as his pas- selling the Kodak camera (a nonsense word he
sion, the measurement of the speed of light. In made up to attract attention) which used this
1881, he invented the "interferometer" which flexible film. Users pointed the camera and
could compare, with the greatest delicacy, the pressed a button, then sent it to Eastman's fac-
comparative speed at which two rays of light, tory, which sent back photographs and a freshly
sent in different directions, would travel. By filled camera. It was a slow procedure but, for
measuring the difference in speed, he expected the first became possible for an unskilled
time, it
to detect the motion of the Earth against the un- amateur to take photographs, and it went a long
derlying fabric of the Universe. He ran these ex- way toward making photography a popular pas-
periments with great care and, in 1887, he and time.
his colleague, Edward Williams Morley (1838- Herman Hollerith (1860-1929), who worked in
1923), carried it through with enormous preci- the Census Bureau, developed a method in the
sion, yet found no difference at all in the speed 1880s for tabulating and sorting data with un-
of the two rays. precedented speed by making use of punched
The experiment was a "failure," but it was the cards and electric currents. He had an electro-
greatest failure in the history of science, for at- mechanical computing device that was approach-
tempts to explain it led to the theory of relativity, ing Babbage's dream of half a century earlier. It
one of the two great products of theoretical phys- was used to gather the data in the Census of 1890
ics in the course of the next century. Michelson and thereafter. Hollerith went on to found a com-
eventually received a Nobel Prize for his work on pany that eventually became International Busi-
light. ness Machines (IBM).
Charles Martin Hall (1863-1914) discovered Dorr Eugene Felt (1862-1930) and William Se-
the electrolytic isolation of aluminum, using the ward Burroughs (1855-1898) independently in-
same method that Heroult was using in France at vented mechanical calculating machines in 1885
thesame time, and entirely independently The and 1886.
method is now known as the "Hall-Heroult pro- Mark Twain was still writing and, in 1884,
cess." published his masterpiece. Huckleberry Finn,
William Steward Halsted (1852-1922), in 1890, which many people think is the greatest Ameri-
was the first surgeon to use rubber gloves during can novel ever written.
operations, thus greatly decreasing the chances JoelChandler Harris (1848-1908) caught the
of The Austrian-born Carl Roller
infection. black dialect in his retelling of animal tales in
(1857-1944) was the first, in 1884, to use cocaine Nights with Uncle Remus, published in 1883, to-
gether with several companion books. James himself famous with "Semper Fidelis" in 1888
Whitcomb Riley (1849-1916), using rustic dialect, and "The Washington Post March" in 1889.
wrote light-hearted poems for young people in
the 1880s. Ernest Lawrence Thayer (1863-1940)
wrote what some people think may be the best CANADA
“bad poem" ever written, which was Casey at the Canada developed a transcontinental railroad of
Bat, first published in 1888. its own. The last spike was driven on November
The best American poet of the period, how- 7, 1885, and it was opened to the public in May
ever, was Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (1830- 1887.
V
1886), who was a recluse and completely un- When Louis Riel, who had Red River
led the
known, since she did not try to publish her rebellion in 1869, returned to Canada in 1885 and
poems. She became famous only after her death. once more tried to stir a rebellion in the west, the
Also in this decade, the poet, Ella Wheeler Wil- new was used to rush troops westward
railroad
cox (1850-1919), produced works, but in her and the rebellion was quickly crushed. Riel was
case, these were published and brought her suc- hanged on November 16, 1885.
cess in her lifetime.
The English-born Frances Hodgson Burnett
(1849-1924) is best-remembered for her rather NEWFOUNDLAND
sticky Little Lord Fauntleroy, published in 1886, Newfoundland, Great Britain's oldest colony,
and Sarah Crewe in 1888. Francis Richard was not part of the Dominion of Canada. It pre-
("Frank") Stockton (1834-1902) wrote what may ferred to maintain a kind of precarious self-gov-
be the most famous puzzle story in history, "The ernment of its own. Labrador, the frigid, sparsely
Lady or the Tiger?" in 1882. inhabited region to the northeast of the province
Edward Bellamy (1850-1898) published a So- of Quebec, was under the control of Newfound-
cialist description of a utopia in Looking Backward, land, rather than of Canada.
in 1888. It was very dull, but it inspired a devoted
following.
Two successful sculptors, the Irish-born Au- MEXICO
gustus Saint-Gaudens (1848-1907) and Daniel Mexico, under Porfirio Diaz, had order and
Chester French (1850-1931), were becoming quiet, but Diaz built up an autocratic dictator-
well-known in the 1880s. Stanford White (1853- ship, controlling every aspect of national life. He
1906) was the best-known American architect of made sure that those in power, the landowners
the time and was fated to be the victim in a cele- and the Church, would be on his side by leaving
brated murder case. them in peace. Mexico had virtually no financial
John Singer Sargent (1856-1923) was a painter resources of its own after the disorders of the
who began his career in this decade. French occupation, so Diaz encouraged foreign
An important musician of the period was Ed- investment, especially from the United States.
ward Alexander MacDowell (1860-1908). Henry The money poured generous interest
in, at
Louis Reginald De Koven (1859-1920) was a rel- rates, so that foreign banks profited. So did Diaz
atively minor musician who made his mark, and his friends. The money was used to build
however, with the song, "Oh, Promise Me," railroads and bridges, to develop mines and irri-
which he wrote in 1889 and was included in his gation, all of which went to benefit the better-off,
opera Robin Hood in 1890. as land ownership became more and more con-
The most successful composer, however, was centrated in the hands of a few.
John Philip Sousa (1854-1932), the "March The lower classes gained nothing. They had
King." He composed about 140 military marches no education and were denied all participation in
altogether, and in this decade began to make politics. Any revolts were promptly repressed by
1880 TO 1890 433
the military, which was entirely under the con- Chile, the most advanced of the three nations,
trol of Diaz. exploited the area but was heavily taxed by Bo-
livia and Peru. Chile felt it might as well take the
land, and it did. Chile won the War of the Pacific

CENTRAL AMERICA handily, winning almost every battle. By April 4,
Efforts were still made to unify the area. Between 1884, a final treaty ceded the disputed desert area
1886 and 1889, there were meetings designed to to Chile, which has retained it, with minor ad-
set up constitutions and regional treaties. Con- justments, ever since. In doing this, it cut off
troversies between Guatemala and Salvador scut- Bolivia's sea-coast and made it a land-locked na-
tled the effort, however. tion, likeParaguay.
After the war, Jose Manuel Balmaceda (1840-
1891) became President in 1886. He tried to set
COLOMBIA up a stronger executive, combining that with an-
Like Mexico, Colombia came under conservative ticlericalism and public works.
rule. Rafael Nunez (1825-1894), like Diaz of Mex-
ico,had been liberal in his younger years, but
once he became President of Colombia in 1880 he PERU
moved farther and farther into the conservative Manuel Iglesias (1830-1909) had led the Peruvi-
camp. The constitution of 1886 replaced the fed- ans in the War of the Pacific, in which the Chi-
eral union with a strongly centralized govern- leans had even occupied the Peruvian capital of
ment and restored the power of the Catholic Lima for a time. Iglesias was blamed for the loss,
Church. was forced to resign in 1886, and was replaced
by Andres Avelino Carceras (1833-1923). Cac-
eros managed to get financial help by signing
VENEZUELA over profits from railroads and guano islands to
Venezuela, under Antonio Guzman Blanco foreign investors.
(1829-1899), also experienced a stern, centralized
dictatorship. As with Diaz of Mexico, Guzman
Blanco attracted foreign investment and modern- BOLIVIA
ized the land to the benefit of the bankers and Hilarion Daza, who was President of Bolivia dur-
the landowners. Guzman Blanco accumulated a ing the lost War of the Pacific, also had to pay for
fortune for himself. Unlike Diaz, however, Guz- that. He was overthrown in 1880, after the first
man Blanco encouraged education and was anti- reverses, and was replaced by Narcisco Campero
clerical. He secularized social life and declared (1813-1896), who couldn't do any better and was
religious toleration. out in 1884. Bolivia made up for its loss of sea-
coast by the building of a railroad, with Chilean
cooperation, which connected western Bolivia
CHILE with the now-Chilean coast.
Chile was fighting Peru and Bolivia in the
of War
the Pacific as the decade opened. Chile lies along
the narrow western slope of the Andes Moun- BRAZIL
tains and is a long, thin nation, rather snakelike The emancipation of the slaves in Brazil, without
on the map. Just to the north of Chile was a par- compensation, was completed on May 13, 1888.
ticularly dry desert that was an important source This, however, angered the landowners and
of nitrates, which were used in fertilizers and made them dissatisfied with Emperor Pedro II.
explosives. This strip of desert belonged to Bo- Republican sentiment had been increasing in anv
livia and beyond it to Peru. case, and the army had become disaffected be-
cause Pedro had been following a policy of

II Canada, seized the Suez Canal swiftly. On
lion in
peace. It might seem that a ruler who is peaceful September 13, 1882, he met a large army of Na-
and who liberates slaves is worth keeping, but tionalist Egyptians at Tall-al-Kabir, north of
that is not necessarily the way of the world. Cairo, and routed them with little loss. Two days
A coup led by Manuel Deodoro da
military later, Wolseley occupied Cairo. Urabi surren-
Fonseca (1827-1892) overthrew Pedro II on No- dered and was eventually banished to Ceylon.
vember 15, 1889, and Fonseca became the presi- Since the French had refused to participate in
dent of the new Republic of Brazil. There were the expedition. Great Britain declared the dual
now no monarchies anywhere among the inde- control, with France, over E^ypt at an end on
pendent nations of the American continents. November 9, 1882. From then on, Egypt was,
effectively, a British colony.
There was, however, greater trouble to come
EGYPT in Sudan, which lay south of Egypt and which
As western influence was rising in Egypt, there had been under Egyptian control, more or less,
arose a phenomenon with which world
the for half a century, ever since the time of Muham-
would become more familiar, non-European na- mad Ali.
tionalism —
that is, the objection off non-Euro- Rising to power in the Sudan was Muhammad
peans to European control. Ahmad ibn Abd Allah (1844-1885). He was a
A Muslim nationalist, Jamal ad-Din al-Afghani Muslim fundamentalist and a mystic. He be-
(1838-1897), not only inveighed against western lieved that the ruling Muslims in Egypt and
control, but urged the adoption of western meth- Sudan were renegades and that he alone was
ods to fight that control. An Egyptian army offi- destined to set things right. He announced this
cer, Ahmad Urabi (1839-1911), followed Jamal in March, 1881, and on June 18, called himself
ad-Din's teachings. He objected not only to west- "al Mahdi" ("the divinely guided one").
erners, but also to the fact that the highest ranks The Mahdi gathered a Muslim army about
in the Egyptian army were held by Turks and him, and as in the heady days of the first Muslim
other non-Egyptians. He popularized the slogan expansion, 12 centuries earlier, it swept all before
"Egypt for the Egyptians," and grew powerful in them in a state of religious exaltation. By 1883,
1881. two Egyptian armies had been wiped out. A
The Viceroy of Egypt, Tawfiq, could see that Third Egyptian army, this time under the com-
his rule would not last long, for he was steadily mand of a British general, William Hicks (1830-
forced to make concessions to Urabi. Therefore, 1883),was ambushed at al-Ubbayid in central
he called for help from Great Britain and France. Sudan on November 3, 1883, and was completely
Those nations responded with alacrity, and Brit- wiped out, Hicks included.
ish and French ships appeared off Alexandria on While this was happening, the Mahdi's forces
May 20, 1882. were taking Egypt's Red Sea ports, and the Brit-
This infuriated the Alexandrian population, ish were forced to order the evacuation of the
who on June 12 and killed some 50 Euro-
rioted Sudan, on January 6, 1884.
peans. The French were reluctant to indulge in The British then readied a punitive expedition,
direct confrontation, but the British were not. placed it under General Charles ("Chinese")
They bombarded Alexandria on July 11. At this, Gordon, who had done so well against the T'ai
Urabi declared Tawfiq a traitor and the national- P'ing rebels in China, and sent him south to set
ist movement hardened further. things straight. Gordon reached Khartoum, the
The British then proceeded to land 25,000 Sudanese capital, on February 18, 1884, and at-
troops, under Garnet Joseph Wolseley (1833- tempted to come to an understanding with the
1913), to protect the Suez Canal. Wolseley, who Mahdi. He offered him partial sovereignty over
had served all over the world since the Crimean Sudan, noninterference with the slave trade, re-
War and had even put down the Red River rebel- mission of taxes, and so on. The Mahdi refused
1880 TO 1890 435
it all and, instead, moved to place Khartoum elik. This time, it was Menelik who won out. On
under siege. May 2, 1889, Menelik signed a treaty with Italy.
Khartoum remained under siege for months, Italychose to interpret the treaty as having estab-
while the British government, under Gladstone, lished an Italian protectorate over Ethiopia, but
dithered. It was not until October that a relief this was not in Menelik's mind at all.
expedition under Wolseley began to be organized
but, by then, it was too late. There was no chance
it could fight its way Khartoum in time. On
to WEST AFRICA
January 26, 1885, the Mahdi took Khartoum and In West Africa in this decade, the European pow-
massacred the garrison, including Gordon. On ers were busily engaged in carving up the terri-
hearing this, Wolseley's relief column retreated. tory in a mutually agreeable way so as to
There was nothing to relieve. The loss of Khar- minimize the possibility of armed conflict over
toum and the death of Gordon contributed to uncertain boundaries. In addition to the huge
Gladstone's loss of power five months later. British and French segments, Germany took
The Mahdi's triumph was short-lived, how- over, by agreement, Togoland and the Camer-
ever. He died, possibly of typhus, on June 22, oons in 1884; and in 1885, Spain took over (the
1885, five months after he took Khartoum. His mostly desert) Rio de Oro.
followers remained in control of the Sudan, how-
ever, and Mahdism remains a living Muslim sect
to this day. EAST AFRICA
OnOctober 19, 1888, the Suez Canal Conven- While the British steadily expanded their hold-
tion was adopted by an international conference. ings, the Germans took over "German East Af-
The Suez Canal was proclaimed to be free and rica" in what is now Tanzania in 1885.
open to all vessels, both merchantmen and war-
ships, in peace and in war. Of course, since Great
Britain controlled both the seas and the canal, SOUTH AFRICA
there was no question but that it would close the The Germans occupied "Southwest Africa" in
canal when and as it pleased, if it felt it necessary 1885, too, and by the end of the decade, the Par-
to do so. tition of Africa was virtually completed.
This was carried through peacefully, but there
remained the possibility of conflict in one place.
ETHIOPIA The Boers in southern Africa considered them-
In 1884, Great Britain and France, as well as Italy, selves, with some reason, to be oppressed. The
were establishing themselves on the Red Sea British had annexed the South African Republic
coast, northeast of Ethiopia. The result was that in 1877 after they had earlier recognized its inde-
in addition to Italian Eritrea, the political divi- pendence. On December 30, 1880, the Boers re-
sions later known Somaliland and
as British volted, with Paul Kruger (1825-1904) one of the
French Somaliland were also being formed. guiding spirits behind the move.
Meanwhile, within Ethiopia, there was a civil The British government, under the peace-lov-
war between Johannes IV and one of the provin- ing Gladstone, did not wish to go to war over the
cial rulers, Menelik (1844-1913). Johannes IV matter and, on April 5, 1881, recognized the in-
won out and, in 1887, attempted to drive the Ital- dependence of the Republic again, but insisted
ians from the Eritrean coast, but he was dis- on an admission of the nominal sovereignty of
tracted by the Mahdi's incursions into northern Great Britain, as a face-saving device. On April
Ethiopia. On March 12, 1889, in fact, Johannes IV 16, 1883, Kruger became president of the rein-
was killed in a battle against the Mahdists. stated republic.
That was Menelik's chance. He fought against In 1886, gold was discovered in South Africa
Johannes IV's son, and the Italians backed Men- and the world witnessed another gold rush. Just
as Kimberley had been founded to exploit the essary, in outlying areas at least. This the British
diamond mines, so, now Johannesburg was residents in India fiercely opposed. It was all
founded to exploit the gold mines. right to have Indians tried by British judges, but
The outstanding British imperialist in South not vice versa.
Africa was Cecil John Rhodes (1853-1902), who This naturally offended the Indians. The var-
had come to South Africa in 1870 for his health, ious improvements that Great Britain had
and had made his fortune in the diamond fields. brought into the land — railroads, telegraphs,
He pushed hard to have Great Britain annex as newspapers — all made it possible for Indians in
much African territory as possible and dreamed all parts of the vast land to communicate with
of a solid British belt of territory from the Cape each other and to share views and aspirations.
of Good Hope Mediterranean Sea.
to the A liberal Briton, Allan Octavian Hume (1829-
In 1890, he became the Prime Minister of Cape 1912), convened an "Indian National Congress"
Colony. With him in the south and Kruger in the on December 17, 1885, one which was attended
north, both hard, intransigient men, there was by representatives from all over India. It called
bound to be an explosion. for various reforms. Similar meetings were held
every year in different cities, and the Indian na-
tionalist movement began to grow.
AFGHANISTAN
In this decade, Afghanistan continued the old
game of playing the Russians and British against BURMA
each other. It had become more dangerous than What was left of independent Burma in the north
ever because the Russians had now reached the came under the rule of Thibaw (1858-1916). His
Afghani border all along the line. strong-minded queen, Supayalat, urged him to
The trouble was that the line was not, at that resist British influence. He followed her advice
time, clearly defined and the Russians didn't and he could do it best by courting French
felt
want to define it because uncertainty meant they help. On October 22, 1885, the British sent Thi-
might be able to gobble up more territory. On baw an ultimatum to cease all anti-British activ-
March 30, 1885, there was a serious battle be- ity. The ultimatum was rejected and the "Third
tween Russian and Afghani forces at the border Burmese War" began.
town of Panjdeh. The Russians won the battle It By November 28, the British
didn't last long.
and, for a while, it looked as though they would had occupied Mandalay, Thibaw's capital. Thi-
invade Afghanistan in force. baw was deposed and sent into exile in India
The British (who had twice invaded Afghani- and, on January 1, 1886, all of Burma became
stan themselves) made it clear to the Russians British.
that if invaded Afghanistan that would mean
they
war with Great Britain. The Russians decided not
to chance it, and the dispute was settled peacea- INDO-CHINA
bly on June 18, 1886, and the border was more or In this decade, France completed the takeover of
less defined. what then began to be called "French Indo-
China."
INDIA
In George Frederick Samuel Robinson,
1880, EAST INDIES
Lord Ripon (1827-1909) became Viceroy of India. The themselves in northern
British established
He was a liberal of the Gladstone stripe and la- Borneo in 1888. The most important event in the
bored to increase self-government in India. He East Indies in this decade, however, had nothing
even tried to arrange to have Indian judges pre- to do with politics or imperialism.
side over trials of Europeans, when that was nec- The small island of Krakatoa, between the
1880 TO 1890 437
large islands of Java and Sumatra, seemed as Korea signed with Great Brit-
a similar treaty
harmless as the island of Thera had appeared 33 ain in 1883 and with Russia in 1884. For the rest
centuries before. Krakatoa, like Thera, happened of the decade, there was a tug of war between
to be a large dormant volcano, well-plugged with China and Japan over which was to have the
hardened lava, but with the possibility of ocean greater influence in Korea.
water making its way, finally, to the hot rocks at
its base. The water might then turn to steam and
build pressure to higher and higher levels until JAPAN

the entire island exploded. During the 1880s, the Japanese organized a west-
On May began to
20, 1883, volcanic activity ern-style government with parties, with a legis-
make itself evident at Krakatoa. It died away and lature, and with a peerage. They worked out a
returned several times and then, on August 26, constitution on February 11, 1889. They used as
it seemed serious. At 2 P.M., there was a black
a model not the government of Great Britain or
cloud of ash rising 17 miles into the air. At 10 the United States, but the government of Ger-
A.M., August 27, there came the explosion, the many. This helped cast Japan into a conservative
most severe the Earth had experienced since and militaristic mode.
Thera. Ash was thrown 50 miles into the air, and Economic expansion continued rapidly.
the sound was heard by ear 2200 miles away in Once the Japanese had developed a navy, it
Australia, while the sound vibrations were de- was noted that a disease called "beri-beri" af-
tected by instruments all over the world. flicted the sailors. A
Japanese physician, Kane-
Five cubic miles of rock were thrown high into hiro Takaki, suspected it might be the result of
the air. Near the volcano there was darkness for the sailors' drab diet of fish and rice. He added
two and a half days. The explosion set off tsu- meat and vegetables to the diet in some cases,
namis ("tidal waves"), which drowned 30,000 and beri-beri did not then develop. The dietary
people along the coasts of Java and Sumatra. Be- change was made mandatory and the beri-beri
cause of the dust in the upper atmosphere, there problem was solved. This was akin to the adop-
were unusually colorful sunsets for a couple of tion of citrus fruit juice in the British navy a cen-
years. tury earlier to solve the problem of scurvy. The
reason why dietary changes solved such problems
was still not understood, however.
CHINA The Japanese bacteriologist, Shibasaburo Ki-
These were continuing years of humiliation for tasato (1856-1931), worked for Koch in Germany
China as it watched lands long tributary to itself and, in 1889, isolated the bacterium that causes
being ripped away. Indo-China was taken by the tetanus and another one that causes anthrax.
French, Burma by the British, and Korea was de-
clared independent by the Japanese.
One constructive note was that the first rail- PACIFIC ISLANDS
road was built in China in 1888. It ran for 80 miles Just as Africa had been partitioned, so were the
from Tangshan to Tientsin. Pacific Islands. Germany annexed the Marshall
Islands and the Solomon Islands in 1885. Great
Britain took over the Cook
Islands in 1888, and
KOREA were in joint control, with France, of New Heb-
Korea was now open. It signed a treaty with the rides, in 1887. After Germany took over north-
United States on May 22, 1882. The United States eastern New Guinea in 1884, the British, under
had permission to trade and it had extraterritori- considerable Australian pressure, took over
ality, so that American traders were governed by southeastern New Guinea.
American law for crimes committed on Korean Dominion over the Samoan Islandswas
territory. shared by three powers: Great Britain, Germany,
and the United States, On November 8, 1880, the

King of Samoa died and there was a civil war. In
AUSTRALIA
1881, a new king was finally accepted, and all The Australians were excluding Chinese immi-
three European powers recognized him. gration as the United States was doing, and, in
In 1887, however, the Germans grew unsatis- 1888, the British upheld this practice. Australia
fied with the choice. They landed troops in was to be "a white man's country."
Samoa and installed a king of their own choos-
ing. The Samoans rebelled in 1888, and the
Americans objected forcibly to the German con-
NEW ZEALAND
duct. In 1881, New Zealand also barred Chinese im-
German and American warships eventually migration.
squared while the British tried desperately to
off, Refrigeration was world
altering the pattern of
make peace. What solved the matter was a ter- trade. Refrigerated railroad cars came into use
rific hurricane which swooped down upon the and that meant fresh meat could be shipped long
islands on March 15-16, 1889, and, quite impar- distances over continental regions. Refrigerated
tially, drove three American ships and three Ger- ships extended the range even further. It meant
man ships ashore. The fleets were too battered to that New Zealand meat, for instance, could be
fight and,on June 14, 1889, there was a peaceful shipped across the ocean.
agreement on the matter that restored the situa- In 1889, New Zealand adopted universal male
tion in Samoa as it had been before the German suffrage.
troops had invaded.
1890 TO 1900
interference. In all the world, the only nation that
GREAT BRITAIN seemed to be at once non-European and strong
In this period, Europe reached the peak of its was Japan, and that was at the price of adopting
power. Four centuries earlier, it had been a ma- much European technology and culture.
terially backward region, not to be compared in Of all the European powers. Great Britain, on
wealth and culture with the great empires of a world-wide scale, was predominant. The Brit-
Asia. It had been at the mercy of Asian invaders, ish Empire included roughly a quarter of the land
prostrate before the Mongols in the thirteenth area of the world, and roughly a quarter of its
century, and unable to fend off the Ottoman population as well. Its strong economy and its
Turks in the sixteenth century. strong navy made it the most influential nation
Yet by 1890, the American continents, Aus- in the world, and much of that part of the world
tralia, and New Zealand were ruled by the de- that it did not own outright, nevertheless, re-
scendants of Europeans. Virtually all of Africa mained under economic subjection to it.
and the had been carved up and

Pacific islands Yet of Great Britain's vast possessions, the
placed under European domination. In Asia, nearest posed the greatest problem and took up
large tracts such as Siberia and India were under an entirely disproportionate share of emotion.
the direct control of Europeans, while indepen- Gladstone, who had been Prime Minister three
dent nations such as the Ottoman Empire, Per- times, was over 80 when this decade began but
sia, Afghanistan, Siam, and China were under he was still fighting for Irish home rule. He
continual and increasing European pressure and added to this other reforms, such as a shorter
1890 TO 1900 439
workday, disestablishing the Church in Wales lee," the celebration of her 50 years on the
and Scotland, and so on. In 1892, he managed to throne. In 1897, there was the "Diamond Jubi-
get enough Liberal members elected so that they lee" to mark the 60th anniversary of her corona-
had the majority if the Irish Nationalists voted tion. She had presided over a long golden age of
with them. peace (except for colonial wars and the relatively
On August he became Prime Minis-
18, 1892, minor Crimean War) and prosperity. On the Dia-
ter for the fourth time and, on February 13, 1893, mond Jubilee, in fact. Great Britain seemed to be
he proposed a second Irish Home Rule Bill. In at an unchallenged peak from which she would
this one, there would be Irish representatives in never be moved.
the British Parliament, in addition to there being But history moves on and no peak can be per-
an Irish Parliament. In this way, the Irish could manent. Times change.
have some say in matters with which the Irish Thus, Gladstone's fight for Irish Home Rule
Parliament would be not be permitted to concern had split the Liberal party, since many Liberals
itself. On September 1, the Bill passed the House would not go along with him in this. That weak-
of Commons, but then, on September 8, the ening of the party, plus the fact that many labor-
House of Lords turned it down resoundingly and ers couldnow vote, made the time ripe for the
overwhelmingly. Over 90% of the Lords voted founding of a new party that would be more so-
against Home Rule. than the traditional parties, and more con-
cialist
That finally broke Gladstone, especially since, cerned with the rights and needs of the
as a man of peace, he didn't want to raise expen- workingclass.
ditures for the navy at a time when the rest of The man for the task was James Heir Hardie
the cabinet did want to do so. He resigned on (1856-1915), a coalminer, who had labored to or-
March 3, 1894 and, finally, at the age of 84, re- ganize his fellow-miners into unions, getting
tired from politics. himself fired and blacklisted for his pains. He
He was succeeded as Liberal Prime Minister was a socialist, a pacifist, a feminist, and, despite
by Archibald Philip Primrose, Earl of Roseberry all that, managed to gain a Parliamentary seat in
(1847-1929), who supported Gladstone's re- 1892. He went on found the "Independent La-
to
forms, but was against Irish Home Rule. He only bour Party." After Hardie lost his Parliamentary
lasted a year before being defeated in the House. seat, he politicized the organization on the lines
A new brought in the Conservative
election of the Liberals and Conservatives. In this way,
Party, with Salisbury assuming the post of Prime the Labour Party came into being.
Minister for the third time, on June 25, 1895. In the second half of the decade. Great Britain
Rather unexpectedly, the Irish problem dimin- had a comparative rest from internal problems,
ished, at least for some years, after the defeat of partly because the nation's attention was ab-
the second Home Rule Bill. For one thing, the sorbed by a series of crises abroad, all of which
Secretary for Ireland, who had a great responsi- will be taken up in due course under the appro-
bility handling problems that arose there,
for priate national headings.
was, during Gladstone's last Prime Ministership, The 1890s saw great achievements in science,
John, Viscount Morley (1838-1923). He was in in which British scientists fully participated.
sympathy with Gladstone's views and did his The first to attempt an explanation of the neg-
best to handle the Irish decently. Then, when his ative results of the Michelson-Morley experi-
term came to an end and the Conservatives came ment of the previous decade was George Francis
in, they followed a definite policy of passing rea- FitzGerald (1851-1910). He
pointed out, in 1895,
sonable laws that improved the lot of the Irish, that the result could be explained if it were as-
so that the feeling for Home Rule became less sumed that all objects in motion contracted in the
desperate. direction of motion in accordance with a certain
Queen Victoria's long rule continued. In 1887, equation relating the speed of motion to the
Great Britain had celebrated her "Golden Jubi- speed of light. The contraction would reduce the
length of the object to zero at the speed of light, ship, the Turbinia, that was capable of moving at
so that this “FitzGerald contraction" made it a speed of 35 knots with scarcely any vibration or
seem that motion faster than the speed of light in noise. At the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria,
a vacuum was impossible. when the British navy was holding a stately re-
John William Strutt, Lord Rayleigh (1842- view, the Turbinia, at top speed, flashed past
1919), and William Ramsay (1852-1916) discov- those ships. Nothing in the water could catch it.
ered the gas argon in 1894, and each received a Naturally, steam turbines became a popular item
Nobel Prize for the feat. Argon was a completely at once for shipbuilders.
inert gas and one of a hitherto-unknown family Arthur John Evans (1851-1941) was an arche-
of elements. Ramsay discovered helium on Earth ologist who, beginning in 18^4, conducted digs
in 1895 (it having been first detected in the sun in Crete that revealed details concerning the
30 years earlier) and it proved to be another early Minoan civilization that, until then, had
member of the family. Along with Morris Wil- only been hinted at in some
Greek myths.
of the
liam Travers (1872-1961), Ramsay discovered Among writers who continued actively, Oscar
three other members in 1898 —
neon, krypton, Wilde became a prominent playwright with such
and xenon. plays as Lady Windermere's Fan (1892), Salome
Dewar invented the "Dewar flask" (or "ther- (1894), and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895).
mos bottle") in 1892. In 1898, he succeeded in He was, however, outclassed by George Bernard
liquefying hydrogen temperature of only 20°
at a Shaw (1856-1950), who, in this decade, began to
above absolute zero. That left the newly discov- write plays that openly gibed at conventional at-
ered helium as the only gas still unliquefied. titudes, examples being Arms and the Man, Can-
In 1897, Joseph John Thomson (1856-1940) dida, Mrs. Warren's Profession (all published in
was able to show conclusively that cathode ray 1898), The Devil's Disciple and Caesar and Cleopatra
particles consisted of speeding particles carrying (published in 1900).
a negative electric charge and with a mass only Shaw was a prominent member of the "Fabian
1/1837 that of the lightest atom, hydrogen. The Society," a group of socialists who believed in a
new particle was named the "electron," a name slow and gradual victory for the system. (Hence,
firstproposed as the unit of electricity by George "Fabian," from Fabius, the Roman general who
Johnstone Stoney (1826-1911) in 1891. The elec- favored a slow and cautious way of fighting Han-
tron was the first "subatomic particle" (one nibal.) Other prominent members of the society
smaller than an atom) to be discovered. Thomson were Sidney James Webb (1859-1947) and his
won a Nobel Prize for this. wife, Beatrice Webb (1858-1943). The movement
Also in 1897, Ronald Ross (1857-1932) discov- never had much influence, but it brought social-
ered the causative agent of malaria, which turned ism to the attention of the intellectuals.
out to be a protozoan. It was the first case of an Kipling was still writing, with The Light That
infectious disease known to be caused by a non- Failed (1890), Barrack-Room Ballads (1892), The Jun-
bacterial agent. Ross also found that certain mos- gle Book (1894), and Captains Courageous (1897). So
quitoes carried the protozoan from one person to was Hardy, who published Tess of the D'Urber-
another, so that eradicating mosquitoes offered a villes and Jude the Obscure (1895).
(1891)
way of controlling the disease. This work, too, James Matthew Barrie (1860-1937) wrote pop-
was found worthy of a Nobel Prize. ular novels, such as The Little Minister (1893) and
Frederick Gowland Hopkins (1861-1947) dis- SentimentalTommy (1896), before turning to
covered tryptophan, an important amino acid, in drama. Arthur Wing Pinero (1855-1934) achieved
1900; while Francis Galton, in this decade, his greatest success with The Second Mrs. Tan-
worked out the use of fingerprints as an identi- queray (1893).
fying device. Herbert George Wells (1866-1946) burst on the
Charles Parsons put his steam turbine to star- scene with The Time Machine (1895), The Invisible
tling use in 1897. He had built a turbine-powered Man (1897), and The War of the Worlds (1898),
1890 TO 1900 441
proving himself to be a science fiction writer who

eclipsed even Jules Verne. Wells, too, was a GERMANY
prominent member of the Fabian Society. Bismarck was succeeded as chancellor by Georg
The Polish-born Joseph Conrad (1857-1924) Leo von Caprivi (1831-1899), whom William II
wrote novels of the sea, including Nigger of the chose because he thought he would be suffi-
'Narcissus" (1897) and Lord Jim (1900), among ciently obsequious and would allow the Emperor
others. to do things his own way.
George Louis Palmella Busson du Maurier William II tried to follow Bismarck's example
(1834-1896) wrote Peter Ibbetson (1891) and Trilby of conceding benefits to labor in order to weaken
(1894). The villain in the latter book, Svengali, socialism, but socialism spread anyway and a
became so well-known that the term is still used number of socialist delegates were elected to the
for anyone who controls a person of talent, and legislature.
does so with evil intent. Caprivi carried through trade agreements with
Israel Zangwill (1864-1926), who was Jewish, other countries which, essentially, put Germany
dealt with the Jewish experience in The Children in the position ofimporting food and raw mate-
of the Ghetto (1892) and The King of the Schnorrers rials and exporting manufactured goods. Natu-
(1894). rally, there would be low tariffs on the imported
The new kingdom of the Balkans offered a food and this undercut the relatively inefficient
source of completely idealized romance.
fruitful agriculturalists of Germany. The agriculturalists
Anthony Hope Hawkins (1863-1933), using the were placed in the opposition, therefore, and
pseudonym ''Anthony Hope," wrote The Prisoner they (especially the "Junkers" of eastern Ger-
of Zenda (1894) and Rupert of Hentzau (1898), set many) brought a great deal of archconservative
in a mythical Balkan kingdom; while Abraham pressure on the government.
("Bram") Stoker published a tale of Transylvan- Caprivi had no experience in foreign affairs
ian horror, Dracula, in 1897. and here he relied on a rather shadowy figure,
The poet, Alfred Edward Housman (1859- Friedrich von Holstein (1837-1909), who pre-
1936), wrote A Shropshire Lad in 1896, while Kip- ferred to work quietly, pulling strings behind the
ling wrote such well-known poems as "Danny scenes. Holstein had been a protege of Bismarck,
Deever," "Gunga Din," "The Road to Manda- but in Bismarck's later years, Holstein turned
lay," "The Ballad of East and West," and, most into an opponent. The disagreement came over
of all, "Recessional," written in 1899 after the Russia. Bismarck was determined to hold on to
Diamond Jubilee, and oddly apprehensive of Russia as much as possible, even as he recog-
Great Britain's decline. nized Austria-Hungary as Germany's chief part-
In James George Frazer (1854-
nonfiction, ner.
1941) wrote The Golden Bough, published in two To Holstein, this seemed foolish. Austria-
volumes in 1890, and greatly expanded later, Hungary and Russia were irreconcilable, and it
which was a study of ancient myths and rites that made no sense to him to waste energies on trying
were darker and more primitive than the familiar to mediate between the two when that was, in
Greek myths. any case, impossible. Of the two, it seemed to
Animportant illustrator of the period was the make much more sense to cling to loyal, partly
short-lived Aubrey Vincent Beardsley (1872- German, Austria-Hungary, than a Slavic and
1898), whose often grotesque but powerful illus- quite unpredictable Russia.
trations for such works as Wilde's Salome and Ar- Holstein somehow persuaded Caprivi and
istophanes' Lysistrata made him famous. William II to this policy, and when the time came
to renew the alliance with Russia, it was allowed
to lapse on June 18, 1890. The Russians were
upset and did their best to urge Germany into a
renewal, but the Germans were adamant in their
abandonment. Russia, now seeing a danger from Great Britain in economic strength. This didn't
Germany, and much alarmed, had to find new exactly please the British, but they were inclined
allies. to overlook that as long as they controlled the
To make up for the loss of Russia, it was Ger- sea. That confined Germany's economic power
many's intention to improve relations with Great mainly to the European continent, while Great
Britain and, if possible, to get it to join the Triple Britain still had the world at large.
Alliance. With this in mind, William II visited In June 1895, Germany opened the Kiel Canal,
London in state on July 4, 1891. However, Wil- which cut across the isthmus just south of Den-
liam II was not the man to sweet-talk anyone into mark and allowed easy access between the North
anything. He exuded far too much in the way of Sea and Baltic Sea for ships that would no longer
arrogance and vanity to impress the British, have to sail all around Denmark to do so. It had
whose ruling class always felt it owned the pa- obvious commercial possibilities, but Germany
tent on such things. Besides, England was not was thinking of it largely as a way of making sure
ready to give up its policy of isolationism. What that warships could be transferred between the
it amounted to, then, was that Russia was lost two seas rapidly at need. This increased the ef-
before Great Britain was gained, a blunder which fectiveness of the German navy, but Great Britain
Bismarck would never have made. was inclined to overlook that, too. After all, the
Feeling a little more isolated, therefore, than it German navy was still small, and Great Britain
had been, and facing the possibility of a two- did not regard it as a menace.
front war since it might be that France and Russia In fact, so careless was Great Britain about
would now act together if either of them were such matters that on July 11, 1890, they had
embroiled with Germany, Germany decided to given Germany the tiny island of Helgoland just
increase its army. To spare the drain on Ger- off the northwest German coast in return for Ger-
many's labor however, Caprivi accom-
force, many giving up certain of its claims in East Af-
panied the increase by reducing the three-year rica. The East African territory would have meant
training period to two. little to Germany but it built up Helgoland into a
The increase in the size of the army alarmed first-class naval base, and apparently the British
France and Russia and increased the pressure didn't foresee this.
pushing them toward an alliance. On the other In 1895, trouble arose between the British and
hand, the reduction in the period of service an- the Boers in South Africa. A on Boer
British raid
noyed the militarists in Germany, who also be- territory was frustrated. At this, William II had
came anti-Caprivi. In addition, William II was what seemed to him a brilliant idea. He would
troubled by the Chancellor's occasional tendency demonstrate to the British the dangers
to think for himself and forced him into resigna- of being isolated and would show them, fur-
tion on October 26, 1894. thermore, how annoying German enmity could
In his place, William II chose Chlodwig Karl be. The upshot, William II thought, would be
Victor zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfurst (1819-1901). that Great Britain would clamor for a German
Hohenlohe was 75 years old, good-natured, and alliance.
had a friendly relationship with the Emperor. Therefore, on January 3, 1896, William II sent
William 11 was confident that Hohenlohe a telegram to President Kruger of the Boer Re-
wouldn't dream of opposing the Imperial will public, congratulating him on repelling the raid.
and, indeed, he did not. Occasionally, he tried to The telegram achieved the opposite of what
keep William II from making an utter fool of him- William II had intended. The British government
self, but he usually failed. kept calm, but the British people exploded into
Having win Great Britain into friend-
failed to .. anger. Until then. Great Britain, accustomed to
ship, William II now undertook a series of enter- thinking that France was Great Britain's "natural
prises that gradually alienated it. Germany's enemy," had been well-disposed toward Ger-
industrialization was allowing it to overtake many, but all this was undone at a stroke by Wil-
1890 TO 1900 443
liam ITs foolish move. Indeed, many British were an equation that would describe the manner in
ready to give up isolation now, but they clam- which all wavelengths of radiation could be emit-
ored for an alliance against Germany. ted by a body that would produce them all (a
Worse yet was to come. In 1897, Alfred von "black body").
Tirpitz (1849-1930) was placed in charge of the Wien failed in this, but Max Karl Ernst Ludwig
German navy. It was his ambition, and William Planck (1858-1947) succeeded in 1900, by assum-
II went along with it eagerly, to strengthen that ing that energy could only be given off in fixed
navy by building many ships of the latest design. amounts. These energy-packets were extremely
On March 28, 1898, money was voted by the leg- tiny and Planck them "quanta." It turned
called
islature for this purpose, and the building of a out that Planck's "quantum theory" made it pos-
modern German navy was begun. It took a while sible to look at all of physical science in a new
for Great Britain to realize that Germany was ac- and much-improved way, so that everything be-
tually aiming to challenge it on the seas, but as fore 1900 is called "classical physics" and every-
that realization sharpened, the matter of the Kiel thing afterward is "modern physics." Both Wien
Canal and Helgoland came to be viewed in a new and Planck received Nobel Prizes work. for their
light,and the enmity felt by Great Britain toward In the life sciences, Emil Adolf von Behring
Germany grew steadily more intense. (1854-1917) discovered, in 1890, that it was pos-
On November 17, 1898, Germany began to sible toproduce an immunity against tetanus in
plan a railroad from Berlin to Baghdad in Iraq, an animal by injecting into it graded doses of
which was then part of the Ottoman Empire. blood serum from an animal already suffering
This was with the obvious intention of increasing from tetanus. The patient with tetanus develops
German influence in the Middle East, which an "antitoxin" that fights off the disease in
alarmed both Great Britain and Russia. healthy animals.
What's more, Germany was increasing its Behring next dealt in this way with diptheria,
meddling in China and that upset Japan. In a childhood disease that meant almost sure
short, where Bismarck had carefully secured the death. In 1892, he developed an antitoxin that
friendship of all the European powers but France produced immunity to the disease in the first
in the 1870s and 1880s, William II, in the 1890s, place, and helped fight it off if infection had al-
was managing to alienate all the European pow- ready taken place. Behring received a Nobel
ers with the exception of Austria-Hungary. Prize for this.
On October 16, 1900, Hohenlohe resigned Until this time, it was maintained that some
and, in his place, William II appointed Berhard chemical reactions characteristic of life could only
Heinrich Martin Karl von Bulow (1849-1929) to be performed by living cells. The fermentation of
the post of Chancellor. It didn't seem likely he sugar by yeast was an example. In 1896, how-
would improve matters. He was a friend of ever, Eduard Buchner (1860-1917) ground up
Holstein and he had promoted the Berlin-to- yeast cells, filtered the material, and obtained a
Baghdad railroad. nonliving solution that could produce the fer-
Science was flourishing in Germany. Wilhelm mentation. No enzyme, therefore, required a liv-
Konrad Roentgen (1845-1923), while working ing cell do its work, and for this Buchner
to
with cathode rays, discovered x-rays in 1895. received a Nobel Prize.
This discovery is usually considered to have ini- Germany shone in aeronautics. Otto Lilienthal
tiated a "Second Scientific Revolution", compa- (1848-1896) was the first to build practical gliders
rable to the one set off by Copernicus, and it capable of keeping a man in flight for an ex-
brought Roentgen a Nobel Prize. tended period. He flew his first glider in 1891,
Wilhelm Wien (1864-1928) demonstrated, in and gliding became a daredevil sport in the
1893, that the higher the temperature of a sub- had been in the 1790s. This
1890s, as ballooning
stance, the shorter the wavelength of the peak continued even though Lilienthal himself died
radiation that it produces. Wien tried to work out after a glider crash in 1896.
Ferdinand Adolf August Heinrich von Zeppe- (1867-1945), who produced a series of etchings
lin (1838-1917) labored to design a powered bal- between 1894 and 1898 that dramatized the life of
loon. He conceived the notion of confining the the poor and oppressed. The Russian-born Was-
balloon within a cigar-shaped metal structure, sily Kandinsky (1866-1944), working in Berlin,
both to give it greater strength and to streamline introduced abstractionism in art.
it, decreasing air-resistance. A light metal was

needed and aluminum had become cheap
enough for the purpose. On a gondola beneath,
there would be an internal-combustion engine
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY
that would power a propeller, leaving room, of Austria-Hungary was protected from external
course, for people. dangers by its reliance on Germany, but it had
Zeppelin flew his first craft of this sort on July internal problems that Germany could not help it
2, 1900. For the first time, human beings could weather. The Hungarian portion of the dual
move through the air against the wind. The de- monarchy managed to keep its minorities under
vice was called an "airship.” Since it could be control, but in the Austrian portion, the Czechs
directed — that is, since it was "dirigible” — it and the Poles were increasingly restless.
could be called by that name as well, and some- Austria's long-time Prime Minister, Eduard
times it was called a "zeppelin." von Taafe (1833-1895), had granted concessions
Rudolf Diesel (1858-1913) invented an inter- to the Czechs and Poles and brought some of
nal-combustion engine in 1897 that could use pe- them into the government. This was enough to
troleum fractions that were higher-boiling and satisfy those Czechs and Poles who were land-
cheaper than gasoline, and that required no elec- owners and conservatives, and kept things
tric spark for ignition, merely forceful compres- going.
sion. Such engines were heavy, but could be It aroused the furious opposition of the Ger-
used effectively in heavy vehicles such as buses, man nationalists, however, for they wanted no
trucks, and ships. concessions. It was also insufficient to satisfy the
In 1897, also, Karl Ferdinand Braun (1850- more nationalist Czechs and Poles, who clam-
1918) invented the oscilloscope, in which a beam ored for more reform. Taafe offered universal
of electrons could be made to scan a fluorescent male suffrage on October 10, 1893, but the Ger-
surface. The beam could be made to deviate from mans were horrified at giving non-Germans an
a straight line by varying the strength of an elec- equal vote, and the minorities scorned the offer
tromagnetic field. The oscilloscope was an ances- as insufficient. When the bill was rejected all
tor of the television screen. around, Taafe resigned on October 19, 1893.
In 1895, Karl Paul Gottfried von Linde (1842- He was succeeded by Kasimir Felix, Count
1934) devised a system of cooling that was effi- Badeni (1846-1909), who was of Polish origin. He
cient and automatic so that liquid air became not was, to be sure, a wealthy and conservative land-
merely a laboratory curiosity but a commodity owner, but he was conscious enough of his
that could easily be produced in tank-loads. origins to offer more concessions to the minori-
In music, Richard Georg Strauss (1864-1949) ties and, in consequence, roused more opposi-
was becoming prominent. The best-known of his tion to himselfon the part of the Germans. On
early works was Also Sprach Zarathustra, inspired the whole, he proved a failure and resigned on
by Nietzsche's book. November 28, 1897.
Among the poets of the decade were Richard There followed a period of what was almost
Dehmel (1863-1920), whose early poems dealt chaos, and it appeared as though the nation
with the miseries of the working classes, and Ste- might fall apart before some semblance of order
fan George (1868-1933), who labored success- was restored by the end of the decade. There was
fully to reinvigorate German poetry. even some question as to whether Hungary
Two artists of the decade were Kathe Kollwitz would agree to renew the relationship with Aus-
1890 TO 1900 445
tria when that renewal came due in 1897, but it It was possible for Jews to get along in Aus-
did.
0 tria-Hungary (Freud and Schnitzler, for instance,
The internal disruption kept Austria-Hungary were both Jewish) but anti-Semitism remained a
from pursuing an aggressive foreign policy and potent force. A Hungarian-born Jew, Theodor
on April 30, 1897, it came to an agreement with Herzl (1860-1904), was conscious of this and, on
Russia to keep things in the Balkans as they a trip to Paris in 1891, was shocked to discover
were. It was the best Austria-Hungary could that anti-Semitism was strong there as well.
manage. The Jews of the world traditionally dreamed
Personal tragedy continued to dog Francis Jo- of and longed for the homeland they had not had
seph I, whose long reign continued. The Em- for nearly 2000 years, but hardly anyone thought
press Elizabeth, for whom Francis Joseph of it as anything more than a dream and a sigh.
probably the tepid affection he could mus-
felt all Herzl, however, felt the need to escape from the
ter, was continuing the travels she had been un-
hate of the Gentiles and initiated a movement for
dertaking since the suicide of her son. In the reestablishment of that homeland. The move-
Switzerland, on September 10, 1898, she was as- ment was called "Zionism," from the Hebrew
sassinated by an Italian anarchist. To what end name of the hill on which Solomon had built his
thiswas done cannot be imagined for she was a Temple. He wrote pamphlet. The Jewish State,
a
harmless, half-mad woman with no political in- in 1896, and organized the first Zionist Congress
fluence whatever. in Basel, August 1897. Two
Switzerland, in
Meanwhile, in 1896, Francis Joseph's only sur- hundred delegates attended, some even from the
viving brother and the heir to the throne, had United States.
died of natural causes, and his oldest son, Fran-
cis Ferdinand (1863-1914), Francis Joseph's
nephew, had become the new heir to the throne. FRANCE
Francis Joseph disliked him intensely. There was no chance of any monarchist revival
An
important Austrian scientist of the decade after the Boulanger fiasco. The reasonable Pope
was Ernst Mach (1838-1916), whose philosophy Leo XIII saw that and moved, in a way, to rec-
of science had influence on the development of ognize the French Republic, and to take the atti-
the theory of relativity later on. He is best- tude that any government that had been
remembered today because his work on airflow and proved it could rule was legiti-
established
caused him to recognize the sudden changes that mate and had to be accepted. Not all Catholics
came when an object moved at the speed of agreed with this, of course.
sound. We now
speak of "Mach X," for a speed There was no shortage of problems for the na-
that is X times the speed of sound. tion, though. Corruption, which is endemic in all
Sigmund Freud became truly famous with his societies,erupted explosively in connection with
study of dreams. His book on the subject. The the projected building of a Panama Canal. This
Interpretation ofDreams, was published in 1900. was to be under the leadership of Ferdinand de
His theories of the unconscious and of the signif- Lesseps, who had successfully built the Suez
icance of sexual fantasies introduced as large a Canal.
revolution in thought as Darwin's book had done De Lesseps was the president of the Panama
four decades earlier. Company, and what the company needed was
Dvorak composed his most famous
In music, capital. They set up a stock lottery that raised 1.5
symphony. From the New World, in 1893. billion francs from those who bought chances
Among the writers, there was Arthur Schnitz- and were rewarded with stock that they expected
ler (1862-1931), who made his name with Anatol would make" them rich, rich, rich. It was the Mis-
in 1893; and Hugo von Hofmannsthal (1874- sissippi Bubble of nearly two centuries earlier
1929), whose poems and dramatic works were and it ended precisely the same way. The money
both successful. raised by the lottery was frittered away by mis-
management and being misappro-

through 17, 1895, he resigned and returned to his busi-
priated by scoundrels. In the end, the whole ness affairs that, in any case, had made him a
thing collapsed, and the money invested disap- very wealthy man. He was succeeded by Fran-
peared. cois Felix Faure (1841-1899), whose life was also
By 1892, the continuing uproar over this had hounded by the Dreyfus affair.
forced the government to take legal action The Dreyfus Affair involved Alfred Dreyfus
against any crimes that might have been commit- (1859-1935), a captain in the French army and a
ted, and it quickly became apparent that the Pan- Jew. In 1894, he was assigned to the War Minis-
ama Company had bribed legislators liberally to try where one Marie Charles, Ferdinand Walsin
allow the lottery to take place and to look the Esterhazy (1847-1923) was a disreputable fraud
other way as it was mishandled. It was made all who was acting as a German spy. Presumably,
the worse because it became apparent that the Esterhazy did it for the money he got out of it,
government had done its best to coverup and since hard to suppose that he ever acted out
it is
whitewash the corruption. Some of the principal of principle. The fact that there was a leakage in
money-handlers were Jewish bankers, which the Ministry became obvious in 1894, and Ester-
helped exacerbate French anti-Semitism. hazy forged a document that seemed to place the
It was a time also when anarchism was at its blame on Dreyfus.
most prominent. Anarchists had turned violent Ordinarily, it would have fooled no one, but
and the 1890s were a time of terrorism. Explo- Esterhazy had friends among the officers, while
sions and assassinations were commonplace and Dreyfus, as a Jew, made a good scapegoat. Drey-
it was then that the stereotype began of the fus was accused and convicted in a patently un-
bearded, wild-eyed anarchist, with a bomb (com- fair trial on December 22, 1894, and was
plete with sizzling fuse) in his hands. condemned imprisonment on Devil's
to life Is-
The president of the French Republic in the land off the coast of French Guiana.
first was Sadi Carnot (1837-
years of the decade The verdict was popular with the conserva-
1894), the grandson of the Carnot who was so tives and clericals among the French, and they
important in the First Republic. Carnot was a lib- gathered in mobs to howl against Jews.
eral who had worked toward railroad develop- Little by little, however, the liberals and anti-
ment and other public works. He had survived clericals began to be suspicious. The evidence
the Boulanger incident, and the Panama Scandal, was inconclusive and the malignant behavior of
but on June 24, 1894, he was assassinated by an the conservative officers had been too blatant.
few years later, the Austro-
Italian anarchist (as a The guilt of Esterhazy became more apparent
Hungarian Empress and a number of other polit- and, from 1896, the demand for a retrial became
ical notables were to be killed). louder and louder.
On a more quiet note, socialism was increas- The army closed ranks. It was clear that they
ing and so was trade-unionism. The possibility of had made a mistake out of prejudice, but they
general strikes was discussed, a united downing were not going to admit it. Better a miscarriage
of tools that, in theory, would more quickly bring of justice and the protection of a spy than the
down a repressive government than random as- admission of their own stupidity and hate.
sassination would. (As it worked out, however, One army officer, Georges Picquart (1854-
it proved very difficult to organize a general 1914), recognized Esterhazy's writing to be simi-
strike and, when one was tried, it usually lar to that on the document that had seemed to
aroused a great deal of antilabor sentiment, and establish Dreyfus's guilt. In all innocence, he
almost never worked unless the government was brought this to the attention of his superiors and
on its last legs already.) was promptly transferred to a post in Tunis. He
Carnot was succeeded by Jean Paul Pierre was eventually imprisoned.
Casimir-Perier (1847-1907), who
almost at once The forgery was exposed by others, however,
fell afoul of the ''Dreyfus Affair" and, on January and Esterhazy was forced to stand a court-
1890 TO 1900 447
martial. The Army acquitted him in January 1898, from the German alliance, it became possible for
as hastily as they had convicted Dreyfus. France to consider the possibility of substituting
The writer, Emile Zola, outraged at this, wrote forGermany. France had already been investing
the pamphlet J' Accuse ('T accuse") in which he money in the industrialization of Russia, and that
denounced army officers, by name, with enor- was a beginning.
mous power. For that, he was tried and sen- On
July 24, 1891, a squadron of French ships
tenced to a year in prison for the crime of telling visited St. Petersburg, just three weeks after Wil-
the truth. Zola appealed but, feeling he would liam Germany visited London. The French,
II of
lose, fled to England, where he remained for however, managed things better. They made a
nearly a year. big parade of Franco-Russian friendship, and
By now, the ‘Dreyfus Affair had become the Alexander III of Russia, that apostle of reaction,
dominating fact in French politics. On one side actually listened to a French band play the "Mar-
were the anti-Dreyfusards (the clericals, the con- seillaise," the hymn of revolution.
servatives, the militarists, the anti-Semites), who That began a long, slow round of discussions
wanted no new trial. Dreyfus was to remain between France and Russia. Russia was hesitant
guilty, Esterhazy innocent. tocommit itself, realizing that France was weaker
On the other side were the Dreyfusards (the than Germany. As for France, it was taken up by
liberals, the anticlericals, the Jews, the intellec- the Panama Scandal. On October 13, 1893, how-
tuals), championing the right of the individual ever, a Russian squadron finally returned the
against the machinery of the state. French visit by steaming into Toulon harbor for
The Dreyfusards grew steadily stronger, es- another love feast. By that time, the German ex-
pecially when one of the documents that had pansion of its army had frightened both France
strengthened the case against Dreyfus was found and Russia, and made them move a bit faster.
to have been forged by Hubert Joseph Henry On January 3, 1894, a Franco-Russian alliance
(1846-1898), the chief of intelligence, who was a was established, and they agreed to fight to-
friend of Esterhazy. He had to confess to the for- gether if war was forced on either of them by any
gery, was imprisoned on August 30, 1898, and member of the Triple Alliance. Finally, for the
committed suicide in jail the next day. The chief first time in a quarter of a century, France had an
of the General Staff resigned, and Esterhazy, ally, and Bismarck, who was still alive (he was to
who had prudently left France, returned in 1899 die in 1898) must have been chagrined indeed.
and admitted his guilt. No more than the Germans, however, were
Dreyfus now had to be tried again, but in Sep- the French able to come to any agreement with
tember 1899, he was declared guilty again but the British. The British strategy of isolation con-
"with extenuating circumstances" that were not tinued to hold through the 1890s, although the
described. His sentence was reduced to 10 years. beginning of German naval expansion, and the
President Faure, who had been an anti-Drey- troubles with the Boers in South Africa, were
fusard, had died earlier in the year and he was making it an increasingly shaky policy.
succeeded by Emile Francois Loubet (1838-1929), The intellectual life continued. In 1896, the
who was a Dreyfusard. Hoping to end the Affair, French physicist, Antoine Henri Becquerel
he remitted the sentence and pardoned Dreyfus. (1853-1908), found that a uranium compound
Eventually, of course, Dreyfus was entirely was the source of unexplained radiation. Some of
exonerated and all who had suffered on his be- the radiation he discovered in 1899 consisted of
half, including Picquart and Zola, were rehabili- speeding electrons, called "beta particles" even-
tated. The forces of conservatism and militarism tually. Becquerel received a Nobel Prize for this.
had suffered a bad blow which, after all, they The Pofish-born Marie Sklodowska Curie
had brought on themselves. (1867-1934) called this phenomenon "radioactiv-
In foreign affairs, France had better fortune. ity" and showed that thorium compounds were
Once Russia had been ousted, against its will. also radioactive. She and her husband, Pierre
Curie (1859-1906), discovered small quantities of

new elements in uranium ore that were far more RUSSIA
radioactive than uranium or thorium.
either The important foreign developments for Russia
These were polonium and radium, both iso- in this decade was its rejection by Germany and
lated in 1898. Her discoveries netted her two itsconsequent alliance with France.
Nobel Prizes, first one in physics, then one in On November 1, 1894, not long after the
chemistry. Franco-Russian pact had been put through,
The outstanding mathematician of his time, Alexander 111 died. His son succeeded, reigning
JulesHenri Poincare, (1854-1912) was also at his as Nicholas II (1868-1918). Nicholas II was
peak in this decade. gentle, peace-loving, an exemplary family man,
Among the writers, Edmond Euguene Alexis and no tyrant. However, he was not very intelli-
Rostand (1868-1918) attained his greatest success gent and had no firm grasp on events. His resem-
with his play, Cyrano de Bergerac, first staged in blance to Louis XVI of France in temperament is,
1897. in hindsight, almost frightening.
Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck The mere fact that Nicholas II was milder than
(1862-1949), who was Belgian-born, scored a his father, yet incapable of initiating reforms,
great success with the drama Pelleas and Melisande meant that opposition grew on both counts. A
(1892). This was considered the first great exam- Social Democratic party, Marxist in philosophy,
ple of what was called Symbolist drama. Frederic was formed in Russia in 1898.
Mistral (1830-1914) spearheaded the revival of Its intellectual leader was Georgy Valentino-
Provencal literature, the dialect of southern vich Plekhanov (1857-1918). Because of his writ-
France. Both Maeterlinck and Mistral earned ings, demanding reforms, and despite the fact
Nobel Prizes in literature, and so did Henry that he was actively antiterrorist, he had to leave
Louis Bergson (1859-1941), whose works de- Russia in 1880 to avoid arrest. In Geneva, Swit-
scribed his humanistic philosophy. zerland, where he remained for the most part
Among the French musicians of the period thereafter, he was converted to Marxism.
was Achille-Claude Debussy (1862-1918), best He was joined by another revolutionary exile
known for his symphonic poem Afternoon of a from Russia, Vladimir Ilich Ulyanov (1870-1924),
Faun (1894). There was also Gabriel Urbain Faure far better known under his assumed name of
(1845-1924), who wrote the incidental music to “Lenin." Lenin's older brother was hanged in
Pelleas and Melisande, and who was a strong influ- 1887, supposedly for being part of a conspiracy
ence on later French composers. to assassinate Alexander III, and
seems to this
Paul Abraham Dukas (1865-1935) composed have radicalized Lenin. He read Karl Marx and,
the ever-popular The Sorcerer's Apprentice in 1897. by 1889, had become a Marxist. In 1895, he trav-
The outstanding French artist of the period eled to Switzerland to meet Plekhanov, and was
was the tragic Henri Marie Raymond Toulouse- active in revolutionary circles thereafter.
Lautrec (1864-1901), whose legs were deformed The cultural life of Russia continued, of
because of childhood accidents. He painted pic- course. Pavlov, who had received a Nobel Prize
tures and posters of Parisian night-life. Henri Ju- for his work
physiology, went on to do even
in
lien Felix Rousseau (1844-1910) was a primitive more important work. Beginning in 1898, he
painter; one, that is, who had had little or no studied the "conditioned reflex." By ringing a
formal training. He concentrated on nonrealistic bell every time he fed a dog, he found he could
depictions of jungle scenes and wild animals. make the dog salivate just by ringing the bell. A
One of his better-known paintings is The Sleeping great deal of human behavior might result from
Gypsy, painted in 1897. such reflex conditioning.
Another Russian scientist, Dmitri Iosifovich
Ivanovski (1864-1920), narrowly missed a vital
discovery. Some diseases seemed to have no bac-
1890 TO 1900 449
terial cause, possibly because the agent, what- 1892, he was succeeded by Giovanni Giolitti
ever was, was too small to be seen under a
it (1842-1928).
microscope. In 1892, Ivanovski, working with to- Giolitti had experience in finance and it was
bacco leaves affected by such a disease, mashed thought he would find a way to deal with Italy's
them up and forced them through a very fine disordered budget. However, the banker he
filter designed to remove all bacteria. He found chose to run the reform that was needed turned
that the fluid he obtained caused
in this wây still out to be crooked, and Giolitti had to resign in
the disease. However, instead of concluding that 1893. In fact, he thought it wise to leave the coun-
the fluid contained subbacterial agents and get- try for a while.
ting the credit for their discovery, he decided that That brought Crispi back for a second time on
his filters were defective and let through bacteria. December 10, 1893. Misery and destitution had
Tchaikovsky was still active, writing his most led to peasant uprisings and Socialist strikes in
popular music, perhaps, in The Nutcracker Suite Sicily. Giolitti had been rather moderate in his
in 1892, and his greatest symphony, the Sixth, reaction to this, feeling government
that the
or Pathetique in 1893 (the year he died). Rimsky- should be neutral in such matters. Crispi, how-
Korsakoff wrote his often-heard Flight of the Bum- ever, who was a liberal, put them down with
blebee in 1900.Sergey Vasilievich Rachmaninoff brutal force. (As a liberal, we might suppose he
(1873-1943) gained fame with his Prelude in C- felt compelled to show that he wasn't "soft on
Sharp Minor (1892). socialism.")
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860-1904) be- However, he made Giorgio Sidney Sonnino
came famous for his short stories and for such (1847-1922) his Minister of Finance, and Sonnino
plays as 'The Seagull" (1896) and "Uncle Vanya" was a capable man. He reorganized the banks,
Konstantin Stanislavski (1863-1938), who
(1897). put an end to some of their unwise practices,
founded the Moscow Art Theater in 1897, and pushed through necessary taxation with a firm
produced Chekhov's plays, introduced an influ- hand, and kept Italy from going bankrupt.
ential new acting style. Sonnino would have done better still, had not
Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont (1867-1925), a Crispi, in a fury of imperialist enthusiasm, de-
subject of the Tsar, but Polish in the ethnic sense, cided to push Italy into an African adventure de-
eventually earned a Nobel Prize for his novels. signed to make Ethiopia part of an Italian
Another Polish winner of the Nobel Prize was Empire. The result was a humiliating defeat,
Henryk Adam Aleksandr Pius Sienkiewicz which will be described in due course, and an
(1846-1916), whose greatest work was Quo expense that almost disrupted Sonnino's wise
Vadis? published in 1896. measures. Crispi fell again on March 5, 1896.
Rudini then had a second trv j
at the Prime
Ministerial post and, realizing that enmity with
France was doing no good and a great deal
Italy
ITALY of harm, he came to an agreement with France
However much Italians might feel animosity toon September 30, 1896 that smoothed over the
ward France, this happened to be bad business. worst of the ill-feeling. On November 21, 1898,
By tying up with Germany and Austria-Hungary normal trade with France was reinstated.
and breaking off trade with France, a large Italian Meanwhile, however, internal unrest contin-
budget deficit was produced. This meant higher ued and martial law had to be proclaimed. Rudi-
taxes, which, of course, infuriated the populace, ni's cabinet fell and a general, Luigi Girolamo
and Crispi's government fell in 1891. Pelloux (1839-1924), became Prime Minister. He
The conservative Antonio Starabba Rudini di tried to continue harsh "law and order" devices,
(1839-1908), who succeeded, tried to avoid tax but that merely intensified opposition, and he
increases by reducing expenditures on the army resigned on June 18, 1900.
and navy, but that roused opposition, too. In The anger generated by martial law and by
Pelloux's repressions had as its effect a piece of By this time, it seemed that the newly discov-
anarchist terrorism, when the Italian king, Hum- ered electron might be a constituent of atoms. If
bert was assassinated on July 29, 1900. Suc-

I, so, argued Hendrik Antoon Lorentz (1853-1928),
ceeding him was his son, who reigned as Victor a strong magnetic field ought to affect those elec-
Emmanuel III (1869-1947). trons and alter the wavelength of the light that
During this period, the Italian electrical engi- atoms emitted.
neer, Guglielmo Marconi, was growing inter- A
student of his, Pieter Zeeman (1865-1943),
ested in the possibility of sending messages by showed experimentally in 1896 that this really
radio waves. He devised methods for converting took place, Lorentz and Zeeman both received
the waves into an electric current and receiving Nobel Prizes work.
for this
them by means of a long wire called an antenna. In 1895, Martinus Willem Beijerink (1851-
By 1898 he was sending and receiving signals 1931) repeated the experiment Ivanovski had
over a distance of 18 miles. In 1900, he obtained performed a few years earlier. He found that bac-
a key patent that might be considered as marking teria-free fluid could cause a disease in tobacco
the invention of what we now call “radio." plants and he postulated the existence of an
Verdi produced Falstaff in 1893. Giacomo An- agent too small to see. He called it a "filtrable
tonio Puccini (1858-1924) inherited Verdi's man- virus." {Virus is a Latin word meaning "poi-
tle,producing the operas Manon Lescaut (1893), son.")
La Boheme (1896), and Tosca (1900). Ruggero Hugo De Vries (1848-1935) studied the inheri-
Leoncavallo (1858-1919), produced the opera tance of physical characteristics in plants and
Pagliacci (1892). came to the conclusion, in the 1890s, that there
The outstanding Italian writer of the period were sudden changes on occasion; that an off-
was Gabriele D'Annunzio (1863-1938), who spring could possess a characteristic that was not
wrote poems, plays, and short stories, and who present in either parent. This he called a "muta-
was a successful swashbuckler and a major ec- tion." The study of mutations quickly showed
centric besides. them to be essential in the process of evolution.
By studying them, De Vries, in 1900, rediscov-
ered Mendel's law of inheritance first advanced a
PAPACY third of a century earlier.
Leo XIII, still Pope during this decade, showed Marie Eugene Francois Thomas Dubois (1858-
himself rather sympathetic to the cause of labor. 1940) discovered a skull cap, a thigh bone, and
He issued the encyclical Rerum novarum on May two teeth of a primitivehominid in Java in 1894.
15, 1891,which made the improvement of the life He called the hominid Pithecanthropus erectus
conditions of the workers a moral issue. ("erect ape-man"). Eventually, with the help of
further discoveries, such organisms
were said to
belong to Homo erectus. These were distinctly
NETHERLANDS more primitive human ancestors than the Nean-
The Netherlands joined the general European derthals were.
practice in this decade of expanding the franchise
and passing social legislation.
They also came to an agreement with the Brit- BELGIUM
ish in 1891 as to the division of Borneo, with the In Belgium, universal manhood suffrage was
Netherlands retaining most of it. The Nether- proclaimed on April 27, 1893, in the immediate
lands had to repress revolts in the East Indian wake of a general strike called to bring that
islands. about. The Belgian government diluted this by
As had been the case for centuries, the Neth- allowing plural voting. Some people, depending
erlands, though a small power, remained a major on various qualifications involving age, educa-
influence in science. tion, wealth, and so on, could have two or even
1890 TO 1900 451
three votes. Naturally, liberals demanded one aries of thePortuguese colonies were sharply de-
vote per person. fined and the interior was left to Great Britain.
On December 24, 1899, a system of propor- This setback was by no means as great as that
tional representation was set up by which minor- which afflicted Spain in this decade. Except for
ity views had the chance of representation in the the loss of Brazil, Portugal retained much of its
legislature. old Empire.
SPAIN SWITZERLAND
Switzerland's federal government was increasing
Spain suffered the same turmoil that much of Eu-
rope was feeling. There was the proliferation of
its powers at the expense of the cantons in this
decade. The federal government began to control
protest groups, a spread of socialism, and an in-
the railroads, coordinate measures of social se-
crease of terrorism.
curity, take charge of the penal codes, and so on.
Complicating matters in this decade was an-
other long Cuban rebellion, this time worsened
by American interference, together with the con- DENMARK
sequence of a short and disastrous war with the
Denmark was peaceful in this decade, though
United States in 1898, which will be described
there was socialist pressure for a more demo-
later.
cratic constitution.
The war ended with the loss of the last Span-
The Danish inventor, Valdemar Poulsen
ish possessions in the American continents
(Cuba and Puerto Rico) and in the Pacific (the
(1869-1942), was the first to patent a system of
wire recording in 1898, though that sort of thing
Philippine Islands and Guam). Of all the vast
did not become truly practical for half a century.
Spanish Empire that had existed up to less than
a century earlier, only the Canary Islands and
some spots on the West African coast remained SWEDEN
in Spanish hands.
Although the Swedish yoke was light, as yokes
Of course, must be understood that this was
it
go, and although a Norwegian, Johan Sverdrup
only a political loss. The Spanish language and
(1816-1892), had served as Prime Minister in the
Spanish culture remained widespread and im-
Swedish government, the Norwegian demand
portant in the world as the heritage of Spain's
for independence was growing.
once-great Empire.
An important Swedish writer, who was begin-
ning to make a name for herself in this decade,
was Selma Ottiliana Lovisa Lagerlof (1858-1940).
PORTUGAL A Norwegian writer, Knut Pedersen, writing
Portugal — whose king, Carlos I, was noted for under the pseudonym of "Knut Hamsun," was
his extravagance and was quite unpopular — was doing the same. Both Lagerlof and Hamsun
as restless as its neighbor Spain. eventually received Nobel Prizes in literature.
had possessions on the African southwest
It
coast in Angola and on the African southeast

coast in Mozambique that dated back over four GREECE
centuries. Portuguese imperialists attempted to The narrow isthmus on which Corinth stands
claim all two
the interior of Africa between the and which connects the Peloponnesus to the rest
colonies. This France and Germany seemed of Greece has always been an obvious shortcut
ready to allow, but not Great Britain, which for ships. In ancient times, ships used to be
wanted the territory for itself. Portugal was dragged across it in order to save the 200-mile
forced to back down in 1890. In 1891, the bound- trip around the Peloponnesus. Finallv, on An-
gust 6, 1893, a canal was opened that cut through the armed forces, and repressing the pro-Russian
the isthmus. nationalists.
Greece's Olympic games had come to an end His popularity in consequence quickly de-
15 centuries earlier, when Theodosius had shut clined and reached a particularly low level when,
it down as a pagan however, a
festival. In 1894, on August 5, 1899, he married his mistress,
French educator, Pierre de Coubertin (1863- Draga Lunjevica Masin (1867-1903). She was
1937), brought together a 12-nation conference at nine years older than he, a widow, and had the
Paris for the purpose of reviving the games. In reputation of having led a sexually adventurous
1896, the first modern Olympic Games were held life.
in Athens, and they have been held every four

years since except for periods when major wars
were raging. BULGARIA
Trouble was brewing on the island of Crete,
In the early years of the reign of Ferdinand I, the
however, which was Greek-speaking, but under
most powerful government figure in Bulgaria
Ottoman rule had rebelled in 1878 and
still. It
was Stefan Nikolov Stambolov (1854-1895). He
had received a measure of self-government, but
tried to carry on friendly relations with the Otto-
its people wished to become part of the Greek
man Empire, but that just intensified the hostility
kingdom. On
February 2, 1897, they rebelled
of Russia. Then, too, there were those in Bulgaria
again, and, on February 6, declared union with
Greece. Public opinion in Greece was wildly in
who wanted annex additional territory to the
to
south in Macedonia, which was still under Otto-
favor of union, and on February 10, Greek ships
man rule.
and troops set sail for Crete.
Stambolov tried to combat opposition by
Russia and Austria-Hungary did not want to
repression and was forced out of office on May
set off another Balkan crisis and put pressure on
31, 1894. On July 18, 1895, he was attacked on a
Greece to withdraw. Greece disregarded this,
Sofia street by Macedonian revolutionaries and
however, and declared war on the Ottoman Em-
killed.
pire on April 17. The Ottoman Empire, however,
With Stambolov removed, his pro-Ottoman
had been reorganized by German officers, and it
policies dead, and with the heir to the throne,
promptly defeated the Greeks, who had to ap-
Boris (1894-1943), converting to orthodox Chris-
peal to the European powers for help.
tianity, Russian friendship was regained.
The powers were eager to end the war and a
peace treaty was signed on September 18, 1897.
Crete was left still under nominal Turkish sover-
eignty, but an international force was left there OTTOMAN EMPIRE
to maintain the peace; and Prince George, a The Ottoman Empire, despite promises of reform
younger son of the Greek king, was made high and liberalization, did nothing to change its re-
commissioner of Crete. pressive policies. The Armenians, in northwest-
ern Asia Minor, grew increasingly restless,
particularly in view of the fact that the Balkan
SERBIA nations had managed to establish their indepen-
Alexander I, who had become king in 1889, con- dence of the Ottomans. All through the early
tinued the pro-Austrian policies of his father, 1890s there was increasing Armenian turbulence
Milan, who had abdicated. Alexander I was only and, in 1894, Ottoman forces put down the re-
13 when be became king, but on April 14, 1893, bellion with extreme cruelty. It amounted to an
when he was still only a teenager, he got rid of indiscriminate massacre.
the regency and ruled in person. He ruled dicta- Like the Bulgarian massacres of a decade ear-
torially,replacing the constitution with a more lier, this produced an outcry among British lib-
authoritarian one, bring back his father to lead erals. The result was that when the Ottoman
1890 TO 1900 453
Empire was next assaulted by its foes, British rents. Their wages were disposable but his prof-
protection was not forthcoming. itswere sacrosanct.
Even the Turks themselves grew rebellious at The workers went out on strike on May 10,
the lack of reform. Agroup, consisting, at
liberal 1894, under the leadership of Eugene Victor Debs
the start, mainly of Turkish exiles, formed a (1855-1926). Rail transportation was paralyzed.
group in 1896 that was popularly known as the The center of the strike was in the railroad hub
"Young Turks," and these began to push for con- of Chicago. The governor of Illinois was the Ger-
stitutional reform and enlightenment. man-born liberal, John Peter Altgeld (1847-1902),
who had already roused the conservatives to fury
by pardoning the three surviving Haymarket
Square "anarchists" on June 29, 1893. This was
UNITED STATES on the grounds (true enough) that they had not
In the election of 1892, Cleveland ran a third received a fair^rial. For this honest action, he was
time. On this occasion he defeated Benjamin eventually driven out of politics.
Harrison, andbecame the only president to serve However, he was still governor at the time of
two nonconsecutive terms. He was both the 22nd the Pullman strike and he maintained that the
and 24th presidents. Illinois National Guard could maintain order and
The United States had one of its periodic that he wanted no federal interference. President
depressions in 1893. (In those days, the word Cleveland, however, was guided by his attorney-
was "panic" and people referred to the "Panic of general, Richard Olney (1835-1917), who was on
1893," for instance. As a matter of cosmetic usage the board of directors of one of the struck rail-
that was changed to the milder word "depres- roads, and was scarcely impartial. Cleveland sent
sion." In later years when that, too, was associ- in the army. The strike was broken, with 34 strik-
ated with misery, the word was changed to the ers killed, and on December 14, 1894, Debs went
still milder "recession." When nothing else to jail for six months.
works, one can always back on euphemisms).
fall All this radicalized Debs and he became a so-
Naturally, a depression meant an increase in cialist. Under him a socialist party was organized
unemployment, hunger, and misery; and the in the United States.
government, at that time, felt little responsibility A nonsocialist liberal party was founded in
The government saw its
to relieve the suffering. 1891. It called itself the "People's Party" or the
role as that of keeping order, which usually "Populists." favored a graduated income tax,
It
meant the repression of any attempted protests the direct election of Senators, an eight-hour day,
by those suffering. a secret ballot, and so on. The Populist views
On May 1, group of about 20,000 un-
1894, a were rather like those of the British Chartists a
employed converged on Washington to plead half-century before, and sounded just as appall-
their case. They were under the leadership of ing to American conservatives as the Chartists'
Jacob Sechler Coxey (1854-1951). The conserva- had to the British conservatives.
tives were horrified at this, for they felt the un- Leading the Populists was Ignatius Donnelly
employed ought to starve quietly. However, it (1831-1901) who, in addition to being a liberal,
came to nothing. Only 600 actually reached had some odd notions about Atlantis and about
Washington and when Coxey tried to address Francis Bacon having written the plays of Shake-
them from the steps of the Capitol, he was ar- speare. Since his odd notions made no sense,
rested for trespassing. and his liberal notions made a great deal of
A more forceful protest was that of the people sense, his odd notions were popular and his lib-
working for the Pullman railroad company. eral notions were not. Another Populist leader
George Pullman, because of the depression, cut was James Baird Weaver (1833-1912), who ran
the wages of the laborers. However, they lived for president as a Populist in 1892 and won four
in Pullman-owned houses and he did not cut the western states with a total of 22 electoral votes.
Meanwhile, the United States and Great Brit- Spain on February 24, 1895, just as the Venezue-
ain had their last major war-crisis. The dispute lan crisis was approaching its worst stage. The
arose over the matter of Venezuela's boundary. rebellion came about because the Cubans found
The British owned territory (British Guiana) just Spanish rule corrupt, inefficient, and repressive,
to the east of Venezuela and the boundary was and because, in addition, Cuba depended almost
not clearly defined. The British and Venezuelan entirely on trade with the United States (almost
claims overlapped quite a bit, and it was clear all Cuban property of importance was American-
that the British would have it all their own way owned) and a depression in the United States
in a one-to-one confrontation. meant redoubled misery in Cuba.
Therefore, Venezuela appealed to the United The Spaniards went all out in trying to sup-
States and to the Monroe Doctrine in 1895. The press the rebellion. Under Valeriano Weyler
United States tried to arbitrate, but the British (1838-1930), the Spanish forces committed the
refused arbitration. Public opinion in the United kind of atrocities that almost always take place
States turned violently anti-British. when armed forces are turned loose on ill-armed
Cleveland's Secretary of State, Walter Quintin or unarmed rebels.
Gresham (1832-1895), died just as the dispute The American press made the most of this.
was heating up dangerously, and Cleveland ap- Hearst and Pulitzer were fighting circulation
pointed Richard Olney to the job. Olney had wars, and among the tools they used were huge
supplied an intemperate solution to the Pullman headlines, sensational articles and illustrations,
strike, and now he was just as intemperate to- and the spreading (and sometimes the inventing)
ward Great Britain. of grisly rumors. Color printing was coming in
On July 20, forwarded a note to Great
1895, he and, in 1896, colored comic strips were just being
Britain which was about as insulting and over- established. Yellow was prominent in the first
bearing as could be. The British could not ac-
it such comic strip, "The Yellow Kid," so that the
cept it without humiliation, and so they did not new way in which newspapers were exploiting
accept it. For a while, it looked as though a third the public came to be called "yellow journalism."
war between the United States and Great Britain Hearst, in particular, was extreme in foreign
was a possibility. policy and was a reckless imperialist. He had
A half-year of increasing tension passed and called for war against Great Britain in connection
then came trouble in South Africa between the with Venezuela and now he called for war
British and the Boers, and William IPs un- totally against Spain in connection with Cuba. Cleve-
necessary telegram of congratulations to the Boer land, however, held for peace.
president. Great Britain suddenly realized that Cleveland's term of office was coming toan
Germany, which was now beginning to modern- end, though. In 1896, the Democrats were
ize its navy, was the immediate enemy. Great stampeded by an eloquent speech made at the
Britain did not wish two enemies, Germany and convention by William Jennings Bryan (1860-
the United States, at the same time (and both 1925) and nominated him for president. The Re-
with navies). She had to choose one or the other. publicans nominated William McKinley (1843-
Germany was closer and, therefore, more dan- 1901). Bryan adopted most of the Populist plat-
gerous, whereupon Great Britain was suddenly form, gaining their votes, but scaring enough
all smiles toward the United States. easterners to lose the election. In 1897, McKinley
Great Britain agreed to arbitration, which became the 25th President.
handed Great Britain most of what it claimed, but McKinley was sure to take a harder line on
not all. From then on. Great Britain was careful Spain than Cleveland had done, and Spain did
never to quarrel with the United States again. its best to become placatory. They recalled Wey-
However, if the Venezuelan ended

crisis ler in October 1897. However, the American im-
peacefully, another crisis did not. The Cubans perialist press would not accept any Spanish
had broken out into a second rebellion against moderation and howled for action.
1890 TO 1900 455
McKinley, a weak man, could not withstand under George Dewey (1837-1917), sailed to Ma-
the pressure and sent the American battleship, nila. There, in a few hours, Dewey destroyed the
Maine, to Havana on the usual excuse of having Spanish fleet totally, with no damage whatever
to protect American lives and property. to his own ships.
Then, on February 15, 1898, the Maine, while In the Atlantic, another American fleet bottled
in Havana harbor, blew up with the loss of 260 up Spanish fleet in the port of Santiago, Cuba.
a
officers and men out of the 355 on board. No one In order to get at the fleet, a hastily prepared
has ever determined what caused the explosion. American army was sent to Cuba, landed east of
Since the warship, like any warship, carried ex- Santiago and marched on the city. They fought a
plosives, it could have been an accident. Or it couple of minor battles in which Theodore Roo-
might have been the act of a Cuban rebel anxious sevelt took part (a part that he later much exag-
to bring on a war between the United States and gerated). Soon, the American forces were so
Spain. The least likely explanation is that it was close to Santiago that the Spanish ships decided
a deliberate action of the Spaniards, since there to try to make a run out of the harbor. On July 3,
was nothing they wanted less than a war with 1898, they made their break, but the American
the United States. ships were waiting and this Spanish fleet was
Nevertheless, Americans (and the Hearst pa- also totally destroyed.
pers) at once concluded that was a Spanish
it There was no use in fighting any longer and
atrocityand the demand for war became shrill. Spain had to give in. The treaty of peace was
Spain did what it could to avoid war, but the signed in Paris on December 10, 1898. Spain
United States made no effort to gain the fruits of agreed to the independence of Cuba and ceded
victory without fighting. The United States in- the Philippine Islands, Guam, and Puerto Rico to
sisted on fighting, and on April 21, 1898 the the United States. (The next year, the Spaniards
“Spanish-American War" began. As it turned sold the Marianas Islands and a few other South
out, wasn't much of a war.
it Pacific bits of land to Germany).
The United States had a tremendous advan- Thus, the United States became an imperial
tage since it had built up an efficient navy with a power. In 1898, it annexed the Hawaiian islands
fleet in each ocean. Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840- peacefully.
1914), the president of the Naval War College, The Spanish-American war had endured less
had been an advocate of a strong navy and, to than four months and it was the last important
that end, wrote The Influence of Sea Power Upon war to be fought with gunpowder rather than
History, 1660-1783 in 1890, and other similar with the new smokeless powders. The United
books later on. He pointed out that in a world States had lost 385 soldiers to enemy bullets, and
comprised essentially of ocean, with the conti- over 2000 to disease.
nents large islands within that ocean, a nation In 1900, McKinley ran for reelection and won
that controlled the sea controlled the world. His easily over Bryan for a second time. This time,
view led to the building of a strong American Theodore Roosevelt was elected Vice-President.
navy. (His book also influenced William II of Ger- By 1900, the United States had a population of
many and helped the Germans decide to build a 76 million; and, thanks to its quick victory over
strong navy of their own.) Spain, it had come to be recognized as a "great
The Assistant Secretary of the Navy in 1898 power."
was Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919). He was an New York City, in 1898, absorbed what are
admirer of Mahan and, when temporarily in now the outer boroughs of Brooklyn, Queens,
charge during the Secretary's absence, Roosevelt Bronx, and Richmond (Staten Island). As Greater
ordered six warships in the Pacific to Hong Kong New York, it had a population of 3,500,000 and
to be ready to act against the Philippine Islands, was second only to London among the cities of
then a Spanish possession. the world. The United States now led the world
As soon as war was declared, those six ships. in coal, steel, and oil production. It had more
railroads, had 14,000 automobiles, and its navy

it himself forever famous in 1897 with a four-line
had shown what it could do. jingle that begins, "I never saw a purple cow."
A 45th state joined the Union Utah. In pop- — The American economist, Thorstein Bunde
ulation and wealth it had long been qualified, but Veblen, wrote The Theory of the Leisure Class in
the fact that its Mormon inhabitants practiced po- 1899, a relentless critique of upperclass behavior
lygamy (rather than adultery) horrified Ameri- that achieved considerable popularity. He coined
cans. In 1890, the Mormon Church disavowed the phrase "conspicuous consumption."
polygamy and, on January 4, 1896, Utah became Sousa was still active in music, and in 1897 he
a state. wrote what may be the most popular march ever
The most important American scientist of the composed, "The Stars and Strijaes Forever." Eth-
decade was the German-born Charles Proteus elberg Woodridge Nevin (1862-1901) wrote
Steinmetz (1865-1923), who worked out alternat- "Narcissus" in 1892, "Mighty Lak a Rose" in
ing-current theory in full detail. 1900, and his most famous composition, "The
In medicine, Theobald
Smith (1869-1934) Rosary," in 1898.
demonstrated, in 1892, that Texas cattle fever Charles Dana Gibson (1867-1944) was the
was caused by a protozoon parasite that was most successful illustrator of the decade. His
spread by blood-sucking ticks. Walter Reed "Gibson girl" became the model of feminine
(1851-1902) was sent to Cuba in the wake of the beauty. The men he drew were clean-shaven and
Spanish-American War to investigate yellow that put an end to the fashion of beards that had
fever, which had killed many American soldiers. swept the United States at the time of the Civil
He found that it, like malaria, was spread by War and the decades that followed.
mosquitoes. He eventually found the causative James A. Naismith (1861-1939) invented the
agent to be a virus. rules of the game of basketball in 1891, and they
In technology, Edward Goodrich Acheson have persisted without important change ever
(1856-1931) synthesized carborundum in 1891, since.
an abrasive second only to diamond and, of The Hungarian-born Harry Houdini (1874-
course,much cheaper. In 1894, the German-born 1926) made himself world-famous as an escape-
Herman Frasch (1851-1914) devised a new and artist. No prison cells, no locks, no chains, no
cheaper way of mining sulfur that gave strait-jackets seemed to be able to hold him.
the United States a virtually unlimited supply
of that element, and of the extremely impor-
tant sulfuric acid that could be made from it.
On a more mundane level. King Camp CANADA

(1855-1932) invented the safety razor
Gillette On August 6, 1896, gold was discovered along
and made the daily shaving ritual less a form of the Klondike River, in the Canadian northwest
blood-letting. near the Alaskan
boundary. The gold-fever
In writing, Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce (1842- struck Canada and the United States as it did in
1914) was Diogenes of cynicism, and
a veritable California a half-century earlier. Within three
wrote stories that were bitter and sometimes years, some 30,000 to 60,000 people flocked into
morbid. Stephen Crane (1871-1900) wrote The that forbidding Arctic area, a good proportion of
Red Badê of Courage in 1895. This was considered them dying en route. The Canadian town of
one of the best studies of men at war, though Dawson, which had contained a few houses at
Crane had never seen battle himself. the time of the discovery, became a city of 20,000
Katherine Lee Bates (1859-1929) wrote almost at once.
“America the Beautiful" in 1893, and although it The gold supply in the Klondike didn't last
is not the American national anthem, many peo- long. The production peaked in 1900 when $22
ple think it ought to be. Gelett Burgess (1866- million worth of gold at the prices of the day
1951) would be forgotten today had he not made were produced. Production declined rapidly
1890 TO 1900 457
thereafter, but, all told, about $175 million was American colony, would
it at least be an Ameri-
dug out of the cold earth. can protectorate.
NEWFOUNDLAND PUERTO RICO

The depression hit Newfoundland as it hit the
For four centuries, Puerto Rico had been Span-
United States, and it occurred to the Newfound-
ish. On July 25, 1898, in the course of the Span-
landers that they might be better off as part of
ish-American War, the under
naval force
Canada after all. In 1895, they suggested union
William Thomas Sampson (1840-1902), which
to Canada, but a depressed Newfoundland no
had destroyed the Spanish fleet at Santiago,
longer seemed appetizing to Canada and negoti-
landed in Puerto Rico. There was no Teller
ations fell through.
amendment for Puerto Rico, so by the terms of
the peace treaty, Puerto Rico became an Ameri-
can Colony.
MEXICO
In this decade, Mexico remained quiet and mis-
erable under the iron hand of Diaz.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
During this period, the Dominican Republic fell
CUBA heavily into debt, and serious questions arose as

to how those debts were to be repaid, and what
After the Cuban and the Amer-
rebellion of 1895,
ican victory over Spain in 1898, Cuba was
European powers might decide to do in order to
collect those debts. The memory of Mexico a
granted its independence, but there was doubt
third of a century earlier was still fresh in Amer-
as to how free it could be of the embrace of its
ican minds.
giant liberator.
There were strong elements among the Amer-
ican population, and in Congress, who opposed
imperialism and didn't want the United States to
CENTRAL AMERICA
acquire colonies, either because they thought it In this decade, further attempts were made to
morally wrong, or thought colonies would be unify Central America; however, although a
more trouble than they were worth. treaty of union was signed, it fell through by
When war with Spain seemed inevitable, November 25, 1898.
Henry Moore Teller (1830-1914), a Senator from
Colorado with Populist leanings, pushed
through the "Teller Amendment" in which Con- VENEZUELA
gress specifically denied any intention of annex- Between 1895 and 1899, there was a dispute be-
ing Cuba. As a result, the United States (perhaps tween Venezuela and Great Britain over the
regretfully) had to accept the independence of boundary between the former nation and British
Cuba, but it also felt responsible for helping the Guiana. The British wanted the boundary so far
Cubans starting a working government of their westward that they would have control over the
own. For that reason, John Rutter Brooke (1838- mouth of the Orinoco River, which would seri-
1926) served as military governor of Cuba, and ously hamper Venezuela's economy.
was succeeded, in this capacity, by General Venezuela called on the United States for help
Leonard Wood (1860-1927). and, after a period of crisis between Great Britain
Under American guidance, yellow fever began and the United States, Great Britain backed
to be eradicated, schools were organized, elec- down. The matter went to arbitration, and the
tions were held, and a government was set up. It decision came on October 3, 1899. Great Britain
did seem that if Cuba was not going to be an gained most of the disputed territory, but Vene-
zuela retained the mouth of the Orinoco River, had carried them over British-
to several victories
which was what counted. led forces in the previous decade, but this time,
On October 23, 1899, a Venezuelan general, the British had something new 20 machine —
Cipriano Castro (1858-1924), seized control of guns. Against their hail of bullets the Mahdists
Venezuela and established a repressive dictator- could not stand. Well over half their army were
ship. casualties; Kitchener suffered only 500. This was
the first indication of what the machine gun
could do.
BRAZIL Kitchener occupied Khartoum and then pro-
On February 24, 1891, Brazil adopted a federal ceeded up the Nile to Fashoda, about 400 miles
constitution, thus forming "the United States of south of Khartoum. He reached it on September
Brazil." 19, 1898, and found it occupied by French forces
under Jean Baptiste Marchand (1863-1934), a
general and explorer who had made his way
CHILE across the width of Africa from the vast French-
There was a brief Chilean civil war in 1891. Jose owned territories in the western Sahara.
Balmaceda, the president, who
favored a strong The British claimed the territory and on No-
executive, was overthrown by those who wanted vember 3, Kitchener brusquely ordered Mar-
a strong legislature. Balmaceda committed sui- chand to leave. Marchand refused to do so with-
cide. out orders from France and, for a while, it
The new rulers thought that the United States seemed that war was But just as the
inevitable.
had favored Balmaceda and a mob attacked the British had backed down in Venezuela, the
crew of the American warship Baltimore, which French now backed down in Egypt. The French
happened to be in the Valparaiso harbor. The were distracted by the Dreyfus Affair, and they,
United States demanded, and got, an indemnity too, realized that Germany was the real enemy
for the incident. and that it would play into German hands if
France allowed be embroiled with Great
itself to
Britain. (In short, William ITs bellicose and tact-
EGYPT less policies were uniting the rest of Europe
In 1892, Abbas Hilmi II (1874-1922) became Vice- against him.)
roy of Egypt, succeeding his father, Tawfiq. He On March France formally aban-
21, 1899,
was restive under British rule, and tried to use doned all claims to Egypt and the Nile Valley in
the French as a way of wriggling out of the Brit- return for additional portions of the Sahara Des-
ish grip. It did him no good. The British merely ert.
tightened their control. After all, they had to re- Meanwhile, Sudan was placed under the joint
main charge of the Suez Canal, and there was
in control of Great Britain and Egypt, and was
the unfinished business of the Mahdists in the known, for a period of time, as "the Anglo-
Sudan. The death of Gordon at Khartoum had to Egyptian Sudan."
be avenged.
The job was given Horatio Herbert Kitche-
to
ner (1850-1916). Beginning in 1896, Kitchener, ETHIOPIA
heading an army that was half British and half King Menelek of Ethiopia, who had now estab-
Egyptian, worked his way methodically up the lished his control over all the kingdom, made it
Nile River, and the climax came on September 2, clear on February 9, 1891, that he did not feel that
1898 at Omdurman, just across the river from the treaty with Italy gave the latter nation a pro-
Khartoum. There, Kitchener's 26,000 faced tectorate over Ethiopia.
40,000 Mahdists. The Italians, however, had strengthened their
The Mahdists fought with the same fury that hold on Eritrea by defeating invading Mahdists
1890 TO 1900 459
between 1891 and 1894. Italy also came to various

agreements with Great Britain, making certain WEST AFRICA
that the British would not object to Italian action During the 1890s, Great Britain, France, and Ger-
against Ethiopia. many peaceably settled the last boundary dis-
March 1895, then, the Italians felt ready and
In agreements.
began moving into Ethiopian territory. In Sep-
tember, Menelek declared war on Italy and gath-
ered his forces. On March 1, 1896, 20,000 Italians CENTRAL AFRICA
faced 90,000 Ethiopians at Adowa in northern During the 1890s, Great Britain, France, and Bel-
Ethiopia. The Italians didn't have Kitchener's gium peacefully worked out the boundaries of
machine guns for one thing, and they let them- the Congo.
selves be caught in separate brigades that could
be attacked separately. Therefore, the Italians
were heavily defeated and had to retreat with EAST AFRICA
only half their army left. During the 1890s, Great Britain, Germany, and
On October 26, 1896, Italy had to sign a treaty Portugal worked out the boundaries of their re-
recognizing Ethiopian independence. It was a spective possessions. The partition of Africa was
devastating humiliation for Italy. concluded without military action among the Im-
Ethiopia went on to make treaties with France perialist powers. The Fashoda crisis was the clos-
and with Great Britain, confining their control to est approach to that.
the coast and safeguarding the independence of
Ethiopia itself. Ethiopia also tried to make contact
with the French at Fashoda in order to extend its SOUTH AFRICA
influence northward, but there it failed. There was, however, military action between the
Imperialist and African armies. There was the
brief Italo-Ethiopian war as an example of that,
MOROCCO but the situation was much more dangerous in
Morocco had spent modern times largely in iso- southern Africa.
lation. fought off Portuguese invasions in the
It Under Cecil Rhodes, the British possessions in
sixteenth century, and managed to remain free South Africa were consolidated and strength-
when the rest of North Africa became part of the ened. Railroads were built and the economy
Ottoman Empire. Morocco also repelled French flourished. The Boers also strengthened their po-
raids in the 1840s when France was subduing Al- sition and Paul Kruger was reelected president of
geria. the South African Republic in 1893.
By the 1890s, however, Morocco's position In November Rhodes visited Kruger and
1894,
had become precarious under stifling European tried to arrange a customs union that would in-
pressure. Spain de Oro, the
controlled Rio clude both the Boer and British possessions.
stretch of African coast southwest of Morocco. Kruger, suspecting that this would just be a step
France controlled Algeria and the Sahara desert in the absorption of the Boers
by the British, re-
region all along Morocco's eastern border. fused. Rhodes did not give up; he merely de-
In 1894, Abd al-Aziz (1881-1943) became Sul- cided on stronger measures.
tan of Morocco age of 13. In the first years
at the First, he strengthened the British hold in
of his reign, there was an attempt to adopt Eu- neighboring areas of Africa. The section north of
ropean techniques to counter European penetra- the Boer territory was organized by the British on
tion which, on the whole, did not work. May 3, 1895 and named Rhodesia honor of
in
Rhodes. Its capital was Salisbury, which had
been founded in 1890 and named for the British
Prime Minister. Bechuanaland, west of the South
was added on to the British

African Republic, Natal, South Africa in 1893. His mistreatment
Cape Colony on November 11, 1895. The Boers and that of other Indians radicalized him and
were nowalmost completely surrounded by Brit- made him a great danger to the British Empire.
ish territory. Only a short boundary with Portu-
guese Mozambique on the east was left non-
British. MADAGASCAR
What's more, Rhodes felt he had allies within Madagascar was brought completely under
the Boer state. There were British settlers there, French control and was declared a French colony
"Uitlanders" to the Boers, and they were allowed on August 6, 1896.
no part in the government. Presumably, they
would be ready to rise against the Boers if given
leadership. PERSIA
Rhodes, therefore, had his friend, Leander Persia was reduced to obtaining loans from Great
Starr Jameson (1853-1917), lead 500 horsemen in Britain in 1892 by allowing itself to collect cus-
a raid into Boer territory on December 29, 1895. toms on the coast of the Persian Gulf as security.
This was done, apparently, with the knowledge A similar agreement in 1900 obtained a loan from
of the colonial Secretary in London, Joseph Russia with all other customs collections as se-
Chamberlain (1836-1914), who had been a liberal curity. In this way, Persia seriously compromised
but who had broken with Gladstone over the itsindependence.
question of Irish Home Rule. The Shah, Nasir ud-Din, was assassinated in
The "Jameson raid" was a fiasco. The Uitlan- 1896 and his son, Muzaffar ud-Din, reigned in
ders did not rise. The Boers were ready for Jame- his place.
son, trapped him neatly and arrested him on
January 2, 1896. William II of Germany then sent
his telegram of congratulations to
gratuitous AFGHANISTAN
Kruger, which set off an explosion of anger On March boundary between Rus-
11, 1895, the
among the British people. sia and Afghanistan was completely defined. In
Jameson was sent back to Great Britain to be the east, Afghanistan retained a strip of territory
tried and lightly punished for his thoroughly il- so that nowhere would the Russian boundary co-
legal act of war. Rhodes retired from politics. The incide with that of India.
blacks in southern Africa rose against the British
at the news of this British humiliation and were
beaten down only with difficulty. The Boers be- INDIA
came more intransigent,and Kruger was again India continued to become more self-consciously
reelected in 1898. The Jameson raid was a disas- Dadabhair Naoroji (1825-1917) was a
political.
ter in every respect. highly educated Indian who spent much of his
Kruger insisted on a hard line against the Uit- Great Britain and who, in 1892, was elected
life in
landers, who now began to petition Great Britain to Parliament, as the first Indian member. He
for a redress of their grievances. Both sides began was a vocal critic of British policies in India,
to prepare for war and "the Boer War" did, in maintaining that Great Britain was systematically
fact, begin on October 12, 1899. draining India's wealth for British benefit.
The British in South Africa were every bit as New religious sects arose in India that were
racist as the Boers, by the way. Not only did the non-Christian and that served as further vehicles
British treat the blacks as subhuman, but they for national revival.
extended such treatment to the Indians as well, Theosophy, a mystic farrago of ancient
forms
even those who were highly cultured and British- of occultism, was brought into modern promi-
educated. Thus, a young Indian lawyer, Mohan- nence by the Russian-born American, Helena Pe-
das Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948) arrived in trovna Blavatsky (1831-1891). It was then taken
1890 TO 1900 461
up by Annie Besant (1847-1933). Besant spent June of 1894, there were disorders in Seoul,
In
much of her life in India, and with her. Theoso- the capital of Korea, that had been, perhaps, in-
phy took on a strongly Hindu cast. cited by the Japanese. The Japanese promptly
Vivekananda (1862-1902) tried to achieve a fu- rushed troops in to maintain order, and so did
sion of western science and Indian spiritual the Chinese. By August China and Japan
1, 1894,
thought. He attended the World Parliament of were fighting the "Sino-Japanese War."
Religions in Chicago in 1893 as the Hindu repre- Since China and Japan were both non-Euro-
sentative and captivated that body with his elo- pean powers, Europe expected a comic-opera
quence. Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1839-1908) war with China, much larger and more populous
founded a new Muslim sect and claimed to be an than Japan, winning. What the Europeans didn't
incarnation of both Jesus and Muhammad — and quite grasp was that Japan had already modern-
had followers, of course. ized itself to the point where its army and navy
In 1898, George Nathaniel, Lord Curzon were far in advance of the Chinese.
(1859-1925), was appointed Viceroy of India. Japan won every battle. They destroyed the
Chinese navy in two encounters in the Yellow
SIAM Sea between Korea and China, one on September
The French 17, 1894, and the other on February 12, 1895. The
in Indo-China were ready to expand
their holdings westward into the kingdom of Japanese army fought its way through Korea and
Siam. Siam resisted but, in all likelihood, would penetrated into Manchuria. By March 9, 1895,
have been forced to submit were it not that Great they were ready to march on to Peking, but the
Chinese knew they were beaten and sued for
Britain did not want French forces at the border
peace.
of its Indian dominions. On
January 15, 1896,
Great Britain and France came to an agreement
The Treaty of Shimonoseki (a city in south-
in which both nations guaranteed Siam's inde-
western Japan, just across the strait from Korea)
pendence, and its existence as a buffer state.
was signed on April 17, 1895, and with it, Japan
began its career of military expansion. China had
to recognize the independence of Korea (which
CHINA meant an end to its influence there) and had to
By now the incapacity of theManchu dynasty cede to Japan the island of Taiwan (known as
was dear. Popular movements to overthrow it Formosa western powers) along with some
to the
had always been endemic, but they were grow- nearby islands. Japan was also to occupy the Liao-
ing more purposeful and serious. In particular, a tung Peninsula just west of Korea and was to
young man named Sun Yat-Sen (1866-1925) was receive a huge indemnity from China. Russia,
now involved. He had spent his teenage years in however, which had designs of its own on
Hawaii, where he was exposed to Western China, got France and Germany to go along with
thought and influence so that he eventually be- forcing Japan to abandon the Liaotung Peninsula
came a Christian. It was in Hawaii, among the an additional Chinese indemnitv.
at the cost of
j
Chinese there, he organized the
that, in 1894, The Sino-Japanese war showed that Japan
first of the associations with which he hoped to was an important military power, and that China
put an end to the Manchu dynasty. was completely helpless. Within China, the hu-
It was hard to set up an internal revolt against miliation was extreme and the demands for re-
a mass so large and populous as China, but ex- form increased in intensity. China, however,
ternal events helped. lacked the money and the means modernize
to
For some China and Japan had been
years, itself and could get what it needed only by selling
rivals as far as influence over Korea was con- itself to the European powers.
cerned. Korea had long been a Chinese vassal, The European powers seized chance to their
but now Japan was competing as it had done begin a further plucking of the Chinese chicken.
three centuries earlier under Hideyoshi. They loaned money to help China pay the Japa-
nese indemnity at the price of taking concessions tions of giving up their monopolies, however,
for themselves. and the Open Door policy didn't work.
The Russians had begun to build a Trans- The Chinese emperor, Tsai T'ien (1871-1908),
Siberian railroad in 1891, one that would con- in anguished response to all this, began a desper-
nect St. Petersburg and Moscow with Vladivos- ate program of reform and modernization, but it
tok, Russia's Pacific port, and knit the enormous didn't last long. The civil servants and the mili-
nation together. Its easternmost section would tary leaders of the decaying nation saw the threat
have to take a long detour around the Manchu- to their own power and placed that ahead of the
rian border. On June 3, 1896, therefore, Russia needs of the nation. On Septernber 22, 1898, the
concluded a secret treaty with China, by which Emperor's aunt, Tzu Hsi (1835-1908), the "Em-
Russia would also build a railroad across Man- press Dowager," seized control of the nation.
churia as a shortcut to Vladivostok. Stupid and malignant, she set her face entirely
This meant, really, that Russia would be against reform. She maintained an unyielding
deeply involved in Manchuria and that that prov- hostility to the oppressing nations, while doing
ince would become a Russian protectorate. Rus- absolutely nothing to strengthen China. This was
sia alsobegan to exert increasing influence on the a sure recipe for further disaster.
newly independent Korea. Such Russian activity
was viewed with the utmost hostility by Japan.
Two German missionaries were killed in the KOREA
province of Shantung, and Germany quickly
Korea, having gained "independence" as a result
used that, on November 14, 1897, as an excuse to
of the Sino-Japanese war, became an area for
occupy the easternmost portion of the province,
Russo-Japanese rivalry. The Korean queen was
a peninsula jutting into the Yellow Sea. That
assassinated on October 8, 1895, and the king
same year, Russia took the Liaotung Peninsula,
Russian legation. It
later fled for security to the
just across the strait from Shantung. The Japa-
seemed that the Russians had the upper hand,
nese had been forced to release it after the Sino-
but Japan was watching the situation closely, in-
Japanese war, but now the Russians built a
tending to choose the time for appropriate ac-
strong naval base. Port Arthur, at its tip.
tion.
Great Britain and France were by no means
behind in the seizing of commercial concessions,
and it seemed that a partition of China, along the
JAPAN
lines of the partition of Africa, might be well
under way. During this decade, Japan began a carefully
The one great military power that did not par- planned program of expansion. The first step
ticipate directly in the looting was the United was the defeat of China in the Sino-Japanese
States. On September 6, 1899, President Mc-
War, which gained Japan the island of Taiwan
Kinley's Secretary of State, John Milton Hay and the independence of Korea. There were then
(1838-1905), propounded the "Open Door pol- maneuverings within Korea to gain the upper
icy." This was to the effect that nations extorting hand over the Russians there. .
' concessions from China must not establish mon- Meanwhile, a Japanese pearl-fisher, Kokichi
opolies within spheres of influence but
their Mikimoto, learned how to culture pearls in oys-
should allow all nations equal trading rights. ters and, in this way, greatly increased the
In this way, the United States could get what it world's pearl supply.
considered its fair share of the loot without hav-
ing to indulge in any piracy. Great Britain was
willing to go along, because with its trading HAWAII
strength, it would get the lion's share even
felt it By 1890, the United States had a virtual protec-
in a free market. The other nations had no inten- torate over the Hawaiian Islands. Between Amer-
1890 TO 1900 463
ican missionaries and American businessmen, cure in the knowledge that Spain was heading
the Hawaiians sank into the background. for war with the United States.
On January 20, 1891, Lydia Liliuokalani (1838- In 1898, the Spanish-American War began
1917)became Queen of Hawaii, succeeding her and, on May 1, 1898, the Spanish fleet in Manila
brother. She was strongly anti-American and, on harbor was quickly destroyed by the American
January attempted to replace the consti-
14, 1893, ships under Dewey.
tution that had been devised by the American Dewey lacked the soldiers to take Manila it-
settlers for their own protection. She prepared self, however. He brought back Aguinaldo, who
one that would give her autocratic powers and gladly restarted his interrupted insurrection, but
make the Hawaiians a dominant force in their that wasn't enough. Dewey had to wait, and
still
own land. meanwhile fend off the ships of Great Britain,
The American settlers had no intention of al- France, and Germany which were nosing about
lowing this to happen, however. Under the lead- for anything they could get out of the Philip-
ership of Sanford Ballard Dole (1844-1926), they pines.The Germans were particularly aggressive
demanded American protection,and the Ameri- and Dewey had to threaten to attack them before
can ambassador brought in 150 armed men from they left.
a cruiser in theHonolulu harbor. was not until July 1 that American soldiers
It
Liliuokalani at once retreated from her posi- arrived and on August 13, 1898, American
tion, but it was too late. Dole declared her de- troops, in cooperation with Aguinaldo's irregu-
posed and set up a Republic of Hawaii, which lars,took Manila.
the American ambassador instantly recognized. By the terms of the Treaty of Paris that ended
When the non-imperialist Cleveland became the Spanish-American War, the Philippines
president a second time, he recalled the ambas- were ceded to the United States. The British Im-
sador and tried to restore Liliuokalani, but Dole perialist poet, Kipling, welcomed the United
refused to allow the restoration and Cleveland States to the ranks of the colonialist nations by
couldn't actually use force against an American writing a poem on February 4, 1899 that began:
on behalf of a non-American, especially when
American public opinion was on Dole's side. Take up the White Man's burden
The Republic of Hawaii was formally pro- Send forth the best ye breed
claimed on July 4, 1894, and the United States Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
recognized it on August 8. Liliuokalani withdrew
To wait in heavy harness
from public life and is best known today as the
On fluttered folk and wild
composer, in 1898, of the song "Aloha Oe."
Your new-caught, sullen peoples
On August 12, 1898, during the heady days of Half devil'and half child.
the Spanish-American war, the United States
annexed the Republic of Hawaii and it became an Kipling made it sound as though Americans
American territory. were going be sent to the Philippines to be
to
dutiful servants, cooks, and shoeshine boys to
the Filipinos. It was the other way around, as
PHILIPPINES Kipling well knew.
The Philippines had been under Spanish control As for the Filipinos, they were horrified that
for over three centuries and, in the 1890s, they their insurrection had merely served to switch
had grown restless indeed. An insurrection masters from Spaniards to Americans. They did
began, led by Emilio Aguinaldo (1869-1964). not want to be a burden to the white man; thev
The Spaniards managed to put an end to the wanted run their
to own country. The Filipinos
insurrection in 1897 and bribed its leaders, in- consequently began a guerrilla war against the
cluding Aguinaldo, to leave the country. They Americans that cost the United States a great deal
did so, but perhaps only because they were se- more than the Spanish-American war had.
work days, old-age pensions, the forced arbitra-

AUSTRALIA tion of labor disputes, and so on.
The various provinces of Australia worked out a
system of union through a federal convention
that met at Hobart, Tasmania, in January 1897.
ANTARCTICA
They established the “Commonwealth of Aus- On January 23, 1895, a Norwegian whaler com-
tralia." manded by Leonard Kristenson debarked a party
South Australia granted women's suffrage in on the Antarctica ice. For the first time in the
1894 and other Australian provinces followed in history of the world, human, beings stood on
due course. land inside the Antarctic Circle.
One of that party was Cars ton
Borchgrev-
E.
ink (1864-1934), who returned in 1898 and, with
nine other men, wintered in Antarctica, the first
NEW ZEALAND ever to do so. Borchgrevink put on skis and set
New Zealand had granted women's suffrage in off on the first attempt to penetrate southward
1893. They also engaged in progressive social ex- overland. On February 16, 1900, he reached a
perimentation, such as insisting on eight-hour point only 780 miles from the South Pole.
1900 TO 1910
ary 22, 1901, of Queen Victoria. She was in her
GREAT BRITAIN 82nd year, had been reigning for 63V2 years, and
The coming of the twentieth century may well had come to seem a permanent fact of life, the
have been a time of foreboding for many British, only monarch that all but the very oldest British
since brought a number of disquieting events.
it subjects could remember. It was the longest
In the first place, the Boer War had begun just reign of any British monarch and only Louis XIV
as the nineteenth century was ending (it will be of France, two centuries earlier, had ruled
described later, at the appropriate place), and it longer.
was not just another colonial war. The Boers put What's more, her long reign had been a time
up the very devil of a fight and, in its first stages, of almost unbroken prosperity and peace for
they did surprisingly well, to Great Britain's cha- Great Britain. During her reign. Great Britain's
grin. Worse yet, it seemed clear that the sympa- population had more than doubled, the Empire
thy of the world lay with the Boers and that Great had spread widely over the world and to be of
Britain was playing the role of villain for the first the British upper class was to feel that one was a
time since it had found
odds with most
itself at member of God's elect.
of Europe at the time of the War of American There may have been some superstitious feel-
Independence a century and a quarter earlier. ing that, with the passing of Victoria, things
Great Britain was not used to that and must have might never be so bright and sunny for Great
acutely felt the shortcomings of a “splendid iso- Britain again. If that superstitious feeling existed,
lation" that had left it without a friend, as the itturned out to be justified. The British golden
world enjoyed its discomfiture. age had passed.
Then, after the Boer War had turned definitely Succeeding Victoria was her oldest son, who
and heavily in the British favor, the first month reigned as Edward VII (1841-1910). He was al-
of the twentieth century saw the death, on Janu- ready 59 years old at the time that he came to the
1 900 TO 1910 465
throne and Victoria, who had never been fond of before the end of the year, one in which the state
him, had deliberately kept him out of public af- assumed control of and responsibility for second-
fairs until the last few years of her reign when
ary school education. This insured a rapid rise in
she had to face the fact that he would soon be the number of British students who received an
king.
education past the grammar school stage. In
Edward VII had, in consequence, lived the life 1904, he also arranged for an end to British iso-
of a man about town, interested in wine, food, lation within Europe itself, and not merely in the
women, sports, and all the other
yachting, Far East. This was something some French des-
gentlemanly pleasures. It seemed questionable perately wanted. The French were pleased to
as to how good a king he would make but, for- have Russia as an ally but they knew that Russia
tunately, by this time, all a British monarch had was technologically backward and war that, in a
to do was to make a dignified appearance and with Germany, it would contribute little beyond
say what he was told to say. Edward VII did that sheer mass. If France could get Great Britain on
well. its side, British control of the sea could be deci-
Another change coming over British society at sive.
this time was that Labour organizations were es-
The French Foreign Minister, Theophile Del-
tablishing themselves as a true political party by casse (1852-1923), had his heart set on the British
1900. At the head of the Labour Party was James alliance. He became foreign minister in 1898 and,
Ramsay MacDonald (1866-1937), who had been almost at once, pulledFrench troops out of Fa-
a member of the Fabian society, and who worked shoda and let Great Britain have its way in the
to build alliances between the Party and the var- Nile River valley. There followed years of deli-
ious labor unions. In 1900, only two Labour can- cate negotiations, in which the French ambassa-
didates were elected to Parliament, but in 1906, dor to Great Britain, Pierre Paul Gambon (1843-
there were 29. The party was growing. and a sympathetic British Foreign Secre-
1924),
Meanwhile, Salisbury, Prime Minister for the tary, Henry Charles Keith Petty-Fitzmaurice,
third time, was growing old and ill. In July 1902, Lord Lansdowne (1845-1927), labored to bring
he resigned, but not before he had presided over the alliance about.
the end of Great Britain's diplomatic isolation, Things looked up once Queen Victoria and
even though he had been a firm upholder of the Salisbury had left the scene. Balfour knew the
isolationist principle. value of alliances and Edward VII was openly
On
January 30, 1902, Great Britain signed an pro-French.
alliance with Japan. This Anglo-Japanese accord Lansdowne, having broken the ice by pushing
made sense. In the first place, Japan had shown through the Anglo-Japanese alliance, was now
itsstrength in the Sino-Japanese war in the pre- ready for the greater task of France. He saw to it
vious decade and Great Britain had liked what it that Edward VII made a visit of state to Paris.
had seen. Japan was the only power that was There, on May 1, 1904, Edward VII made a
strong in the Far East and that had no European speech in good French that was greeted with ec-
interests at all so that it would not directly com- stasy. It was Edward VITs greatest moment.
pete with Great Britain. Nor did it threaten any Once that was done, it became considerably
British positions in the Far East. In particular, easier to settle the various points of disagreement
Japan could be counted on to keep Russia busy, between France and England, especially since it
and Great Britain had been an enemy of Russia was at the expense of other people's property.
since the Crimean War, a half-century earlier. Thus, France agreed to let Great Britain do as it
Succeeding Salisbury as Conservative Party pleased in Egypt, while Great Britain agreed to
leader and as Prime Minister, on July 11, 1902, let France do as it pleased in Morocco. Mean-
was Arthur James Balfour (1848-1930), who was while, a war between Russia and Japan broke out
Salisbury's nephew. just as the negotiations were coming to a conclu-
Balfour pushed through an educational reform sion and France agreed not to help its ally, Rus-
sia, against Great Britain's ally, Japan. That also France, which now had an both
alliance with
pleased Great Britain. Great Britain and Russia, wanted the system to
The alliance between Great Britain and France be closed by having these two nations come to
(popularly called the "Entente Cordiale" or "cor- an understanding.
dial understanding" in order to avoid the word On August 31, 1907, an Anglo-Russian alli-
"alliance," which rang badly in British ears) was ance (or "rapprochement" to avoid, once more,
signed on April 8, 1904. the word "alliance") was announced. Again, the
however, did not necessarily add to
All this, bond of friendship was formed through the ex-
the popularity of Balfour. His educational reform change of other people's property. The Russians
gave too much power to the Church of England were to have a sphere of influence in northern
to suit those who were not Anglicans. What's Persia, the British in southern Persia, the Persian
more, there was a tangle of doubts over the cor- Gulf, and Afghanistan. Tibet was to be indepen-
rect policy on tariffs. Even the Entente Cordiale dent of both. The Russians were promised,
must have made some people nervous because rather vaguely, a better deal with respect to the
the French used it to move on Morocco at once, use of the straits at Constantinople.
precipitating a war crisis that will be described The French/British/Russian combination was
later. now a "Triple Entente," and it balanced the Tri-
Toward the end of 1905, Balfour resigned, and ple Alliance of Germany/Austria-Hungary/Italy.
Edward VII turned to Henry Campbell-Banner- Europe had been neatly divided into two armed
man (1836-1908), the Liberal party leader, who camps, and any crisis that occurred might be
then won massively in elections held in January, made more dangerous by having each side feel
1906. too strong to have to back down.
Campbell-Bannerman's cabinet included John What had led to this, to a large extent, was
Elliot Burns (1858-1943), the first person from Germany's determination to compete with Great
the ranks of labor to achieve cabinet rank. Also Britain at sea. The British wished to take some
in his were Herbert Henry Asquith
cabinet step to outreach the Germans and they built the
(1852-1928) and David Lloyd George (1863- Dreadnought, which was the first ship to be
1945). Lloyd George had been opposed to the equipped with big guns only. It had ten 12-inch
Boer War and had maintained that unpopular po- —
guns 12 inches being the diameter of the muz-
sition courageously. zle. It was launched on February 10, 1906 and it
Campbell-Bannerman adjusted various mat- literally needed to dread nought, since it could
ters that had aroused opposition to Balfour, mod- outshoot any ship in the world.
ifying theEducation Act, for instance, to give The trouble was that Germany at once began
non-Anglicans a better position. He also passed to build dreadnoughts of its own (the name came
prolabor acts, including workmen's compensa- to symbolize the entire class of big-gun battle-
tion in cases of job-related accidents. In addition, ships). What counted, then, at least in part, was
he adopted a conciliatory attitude toward the de- not the total number of ships in a navy, but the
feated Boers, winning their cooperation and as- total number of dreadnoughts, and in this re-
suring peace in South Africa. spect Great Britain and Germany started almost
Again, however, the most important event of even. Thus, the launching of the Dreadnought
his administration was an alliance. Russia had was actually a setback in Great Britain's attempt
lost the war with Japan disastrously and was to retain control of the sea.
plagued with serious revolutionary upheavals at Great Britain had to build ships more quickly
home. Suddenly, it seemed to Great Britain to be —
than ever but where was the money to come
a nation representing no great danger. In fact, as from? In 1909, Lloyd George, who was Chancel-
long as Russia felt defeated and in disarray, it lor of the Exchequer, and responsible for the
might be a good time to negotiate. Besides, budget, brought in a program that would soak
1 900 TO 19 10 467
the rich. In other words, he set up a tax system cade. In 1900, Frederick Gowland Hopkins
that would lean most heavily on those best- (1861-1947) discovered the amino acid, trypto-
equipped to pay, so that money could be raised phan, and worked out the concept of dietarily
without the conservative sport of squeezing the essential amino acids. In 1906, he clarified the
poor. vitamin concept, naming several diseases that
The House of Commons passed it, but the were caused by the dietary lack of vitamins. Both
House of Lords did not, nor did it look as if the Sherrington and Hopkins were eventually Nobel
Lords would ever pass it unless something dras- Prize winners.
tic was done. There was a general election in 1909 William Bateson (1861-1926) showed, in 1902,
and the Liberals won again, though with a re- that the laws of inheritance, worked out by Men-
duced majority. The stage was set for a struggle del and others for plants, held true for animals
with the House of Lords. as well. He also showed that characteristicswere
The Liberal movement did not go so far as to not always inherited separately. There were
consider women's suffrage, but women them- linked characteristics as well.
selves were becoming more militant. Under the Many continued to be active in
writers
leadership of Emmeline Goulden Pankhurst this decade. H. G. Wells wrote both science fic-
(1858-1928), the "suffragettes" withstood jeers, tion novels, such as First Men in the Moon (1901),
insults, and occasional prison sentences, but and novels of social commentary, such as Tono-
were making themselves heard. Bungay (1909). James M. Barrie wrote the plays
On May 6, 1901, Edward VIII died and, at his Quality Street (1901), The Admirable Crichton
funeral, the monarchs of Europe gathered. Even Pan (1904), What Every Woman Knows
(1902), Peter
William II of Germany was there. It was the last (1908), and The Twelve-Pound Look (1910). G. B.
great gathering of crowned heads, though no one Shaw's plays included Caesar and Cleopatra (1900),
realized that at the time. Succeeding Edward VII Man and Superman (1903), Major Barbara (1905),
was his son, who reigned as George V (1865- and The Doctor's Dilemma (1906). Kipling wrote
1936). Kim (1901). Israel Zangwill was a great success
In this decade, the New
Zealand-born physi- with an idealized picture of the United States in
cist, Ernest Rutherford (1871-1937), along with a his play The Melting Pot (1908), which added a
coworker, Frederick Soddy (1877-1956) showed, phrase to the language.
in 1902, that the radioactive elements, urani- Among the newer writers, Edward Morgan
um and thorium, changed into lead, by way of Forster (1879-1970) published A Roorn with a View
a series of breakdown products. For this dis- John Galsworthy (1867-1933) published
in 1908.
covery of "radioactive series," he eventually re- A Man of Property in 1906. This was the first novel
ceived the Nobel Prize. By 1909, he had found in his The Forsyte Saga, which eventually earned
that certain radioactive radiations, which he him a Nobel Prize in literature. Arnold Bennet
called "alpha rays," consisted of a stream of (1867-1931) published Old Wives' Tales in 1908.
helium atoms from which the electrons had been On a more popular level, Edgar Wallace (1875-
removed. 1932) with his Four Just Men, published in 1905,
John Ambrose Fleming (1849-1945)
In 1904, established himself as a successful and prolific
showed that a stream of electrons speeding writer of thrillers.
through a vacuum could be used as a rectifier, Amongthe writers for children, Helen Beatrix
converting an alternating electric current into a Potter (1866-1943) wrote The Tale of Peter Rabbit
direct one. This was a "diode," and it was the in while Kenneth Grahame (1859-1932)
1900,
first step in the development of an electronics wrote The Wind in the Willows in 1908. Kipling
technology. wrote the very successful Just So Stories in 1902,
In biology, Charles Sherrington (1857-1952) in a baby-talk fashion that does not appeal to
worked out the nature of reflex action in this de- everyone.
John Edward Masefield (1878-1967) wrote mans had brought it upon themselves. The "en-
poetry and stories in this decade that attracted circling" was not an action, but a reaction.
attention and eventually won him the poet lau- However, France, taking advantage of the fact
reateship. Alfred Noyes
(1880-1958) wrote that the Entente Cordiale had given it a free hand
poems that included the unabashedly sentimen- in Morocco, and confident that, with British
tal “The Highwayman" and "The Barrel-Organ." backing, it had nothing to fear from Germany,
In music, Edward William Elgar (1857-1934) is moved overhastily into Morocco. They negoti-
best-known for a series of marches written in this ated with the Sultan of Morocco in order to estab-
decade. It Pomp and Circumstance, with-
includes lish the basis of a protectorate and pointedly did
out which no college commencement would be not discuss the matter with Germany. Germany
complete. did not expect to take over Morocco itself, but it
There was an Irish literary revival featuring wanted an "open door" (to use the American
the poems and plays of William Butler Yeats phrase) and resented the fact that France would
(1865-1939), who won a Nobel Prize in literature, undoubtedly try to monopolize trade with Mo-
and John Millington Synge (1871-1909), whose rocco.
play. The Playboy of the Western World, was pro- William II, therefore, took the opportunity to
duced in 1907. visit Tangiers on the north Moroccan coast, and
there, on March 31, 1905, he made a speech call-
ing for the independence of Morocco and for an
GERMANY open door.
This decade saw the sharpening and intensifying This was the "First Moroccan Crisis," for it
of the enmity and antagonism between Germany placed Germany and France on a collision course
and Great Britain. over Morocco. The French quailed and seemed
Internally, Germany continued Bismarck's willing to back down a bit, but the Germans,
principle of Pensions were in-
paternalism. pressing their advantage, refused the offered
creased, health insurance extended, the hours of compromise. The British,nervous about German
labor reduced, and so on. Prosperity continued intentions, offered to set up discussions with
to rise and was quite clear that militarily, tech-
it France for unified action in case of the worst.
nologically, and economically, Germany was the Delcasse demanded that France trust Great Brit-
strongest power in Europe. Only the British navy ain's loyalty to the Entente and face up to Ger-
stood in the way of Germany becoming the lead- many. The rest of the cabinet, however, was not
ing nation in the world (as, a century earlier, it prepared to trustGreat Britain that far. What if,
had stood in the way of Napoleon and France.) at the last minute. Great Britain faded out of the
With that thought in mind, Germany's naval picture and
France face an angry Germany
let
buildup continued. On June 12, 1900, an addi- alone or with only the help that a bumbling and
tional naval bill set up a 17-year program that defeated Russia could give it? Delcasse was
would make the German navy second only to forced to resign his post and it seemed that
that of Great Britain and so strong that even France was about to cave in completely.
Great Britain would hesitate to face it. As happened, though, the Sultan of Mo-
it
Naturally, this made Great

anxious
Britain rocco had called for an international conference
and it responded with the Entente Cordiale with to settle the matter, and Germany, confident of
France and with the launching of the Dread- its case, and certain that France would grovel and
nought. The between France and Russia,

alliance Great Britain desert it, demanded that such a
completing the Triple Entente, gave rise to the conference be held. France, with no confidence
feeling within Germany that the land was being in such a conference, felt there was nothing else
"encircled" by enemies. It's hard to look at
its it could do and accepted.
the map and not admit there was something in The conference was held in Algeciras, on the
that, but it might also be argued that the Ger- southern coast of Spain just across from the strait
1900 TO 1910 469
from Tangier. Attending were not only Germany Friedrich Albertvon Bethman Hollweg (1856-
and France, but also Germany's allies, Austria- 1921), who had risen from the ranks of the bu-
Hungary and Italy, and France's allies. Great reaucracy. He was used to taking orders and, as
Britain and Russia. In addition, Spain attended Chancellor, his greatest talent lay in taking or-
as the host country, and so did the United States, ders from those who were more forceful and bel-
which temporarily abandoned its policy of steer- licose than he himself was.
ing clear of European quarrels, out of the sheer Germany was doing well in science. In 1905,
excitement of having become a great power. Albert Einstein (1879-1955), the greatest scientist
Between January 16 and April 7, 1906, the Al- since Isaac Newton, did three amazing things.
geciras Conference was conducted and Germany He established an equation that made it possible
was totally and disagreeably surprised. Germany to calculate the size of atoms. He
presented his
expected that Great Britain and Russia might join "special theory of relativity" that explained the
France in voting against them, but so did Spain Michelson-Morley experiment, established the
and the United States, and so, even, did Ger- speed of light in a vacuum as the greatest speed
many's ally, Italy. Only Austria-Hungary voted possible, showed mass and energy were in-
that
on the German side. terchangeable according to the famous equation
Holstein, William ITs evil spirit, wouldn't ac- e = mc^, and modified and improved Newton's
cept this diplomatic defeat and advised that the laws of motion. He also explained the photoelec-
matter be settled by war. The German govern- tric effect and made use ofquantum theory to do
ment, however, did not want war at this time so.This established the quantum theory as more
and Holstein was relieved of his position. than a mathematical trick and earned him, even-
The conference, in conclusion, paid lip service tually a Nobel Prize.
to Moroccan independence and to freedom of Hermann Walther Nernst (1865-1941), also in
trade, but, in actuality, it gave France control of 1905, worked out what is called "the third law of
Morocco. This was a clear victory for the Triple thermodynamics," showing that it is actually im-
Entente over the Triple Alliance. possible to reach absolute zero. This brought him
As though that were not bad enough, William a Nobel Prize, too.
IIhad another brainstorm. In November 1908, he Fritz Haber (1868-1934) had developed, by
gave an interview to a London newspaper in 1908, a method for forming ammonia out of the
which he described the German people as hostile nitrogen in the atmosphere. From ammonia, fer-
to Great Britain, while he alone stood staunch as and explosives could be easily made. This
tilizers
Great Britain's friend. Perhaps his idea was to "Haber process" meant that Germany need
frighten the British with the picture of German never fear a shortage of ammunition in wartime.
hostility and get them to cling to William as their Without it, nitrates would have to be imported
only protection. It didn't work, of course. The from places like Chile, and the British navy
British didn't for one minute believe in William would have prevented their delivery. Germany
ITs friendship. could not have fought a long war without Haber
However, the German people themselves re- but, because he was Jewish, there came a time
sented the interview. They did not want to be when Germany would show him monumental
cast in the role of villains just to make William II ingratitude.
look good. Demands increased that William II In 1906,August von Wassermann (1866-1925)
learn, or be made to keep his mouth
learn, to discovered a diagnostic test for syphilis. The Ger-
shut. This was an exceedingly embarrassing time man bacteriologist, Paul Ehrlich (1854-1915),
for the German government, which didn't dare went farther. He had worked with Behring on
speak roughly to the Emperor. diphtheria, and was searching for special com-
That may have been one of the reasons why pounds that would kill agents that caused dis-
Bulow resigned the Chancellorship on July 14, ease without much harming the human body. In
1909. Replacing him was Theobald Theodor 1909, he discovered "salvarsan," a specific agent
for syphilis. However, he had already received a Maeterlinck wrote The Blue Bird in 1908 and
Nobel Prize work in this field.
for earlier Sidonie Gabrielle Colette (1873-1954) began writ-
In writing, Thomas Mann (1875-1955) made ing her highly regarded novels. Debussy wrote
his name with Buddenbrooks, published in 1900. the opera Pelleas and Melisande in 1902. Among
Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) was a prominent the artists, Henri Emile Benoit Matisse (1869-
poet of the period, Frank Wedekind (1864-1918), 1954)and Maurice Utrillo (1883-1955) began to
a prominent playwright, and Wilhelm Lehm- make their marks in this decade.
bruck (1881-1919) a prominent sculptor.
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY •
FRANCE monarchy, universal

In the Austrian half of the
In the wake of the Dreyfus Affair, anticlericalism male suffrage was introduced on January 26,
in France had strengthened enormously and 1907.
there was a movement for the separation of In the Hungarian half, that possibility was
church and state, presided over by the Premier, used as a threat. The Hungarians had grown an-
Justin Louis Emil Combes (1835-1921). He had noyed over the fact that the army was one of the
received a religious education, but despite that unifying factors in the dual monarchy. The Hun-
(or perhaps because of it) became an ardent anti- garians wanted separate units with separate in-
clerical. signia, and this the Emperor, with some
The separation came into existence in Novem- justification, would not allow. After all, to have
ber 1904, and by its terms, the Concordat estab- two armies would simply ask for all kinds of con-
lished by Napoleon with the Church a century fusion and failure of cooperation. It would be a
earlier was nullified. All connection between recipe for disaster.
Church and State was broken and complete free- Therefore, theEmperor threatened to push
dom of religion was proclaimed. universal suffrage for Hungary, too, which
The forming of the Entente Cordiale and the would give the Slavic inhabitants of Hungary the
resolution of the First Moroccan Crisis in France's vote, and endanger the Hungarian domination.
favor had produced a wave of nationalist fervor At that threat, the question of a separate army
in France, however, and voices appeared calling was dropped in mid-1906.
for an aggressive foreign policy and even for the The important event in Austro-Hungarian
restoration of the monarchy. Among these reac- history in this decade involved Bosnia-Herzego-
tionaries were Charles Maurras (1868-1952), and vina, Austrian provinces northwest of Serbia and
Alphonse Marie Leon Daudet (1867-1942), the Montenegro. These were nominally ruled by the
son of the writer. Together they founded L' Action Ottoman Empire, though they had been made an
Francaise, which remained a showcase for their Austro-Hungarian protectorate at the Congress
views. of Berlin, three decades earlier.
In science, in this period, Charles Jules Henri This meant that the provinces were garrisoned
Nicolle (1866-1936) discovered, in 1909, that the by Austro-Hungarian troops and that, to all in-
disease typhus was spread by the body louse, tents and purposes, they were Austro-Hungar-
something that was hard to eradicate in a society ian territory. It seemed to Austria-Hungary that
where few people had access to the kind of life there was no reason not to make it official, so on
in which frequent washings and changes of October 6, 1908, it announced that Bosnia and
clothes were possible. Herzegovina had been annexed and were now
The French aviator, Louis Bleriot (1872-1936), integral parts of the Austro-Hungarian Dual
was the first to fly an airplane (invented in this Monarchy.
decade by a pair of Americans) over an important The Ottoman Empire protested, of course, but
body of water. On July 25, 1909, he flew across it was quite helpless in the matter. Serbia and
the Strait of Dover, from Calais to Dover. Montenegro, which had always looked at Bosnia-
1900 TO 1910 471
Herzegovina as potential portions of their own Great Britain was willing only on condition that
monarchies, were even more outraged at watch-
ing it move
out of reach into the Austro-Hungar-
the Ottoman Empire was willing — which it
wasn't.
ian gullet, but by themselves they were also Then, on January 12, 1909, Austria-Hungary
helpless. scored another coup. It persuaded the Ottoman
As for Russia, it was
quandary. The
in a Empire to accept the annexation in return for
Russian foreign minister, Aleksandr Petrovich payment. That put Austria-Hungary in an excel-
Izvolsky (1856-1919), had negotiated the rap- lent position because they bought the prov-
if
prochement with Great Britain the year before. inces from the Ottoman Empire, their legal
By its terms. Great Britain had indicated its read- owner, who had the right to complain?
iness to allow Russia to move freely out of and Serbia was and was arming and
still furious
into the Black Sea by way of the straits at Con- threatening war, assuming that Russia would
stantinople. stood to reason that it would help
It help it. Austria-Hungary was delighted at the
if Austria-Hungary, an interested party in all chance of going to war with little Serbia and wip-
matters involving the Balkans and the Ottoman ing it out, if Russia could be made to stay out.
Empire, were to also agree. On March 21, 1909, Germany warned Russia to
Therefore, Izvolski got in touch with the Aus- abandon Serbia and accept the annexation or
tro-Hungarian foreign minister, Alois Lexa von else; the hint was, Russia would have to face
Aehrenthal (1854-1912), and at a meeting on both Austria-Hungary and Germany in war.
September 16, 1908, they had come to some sort Russia had not yet recovered from the defeat
of agreement whereby Russia would not object if by Japan and by the internal chaos it had also
Austria-Hungary annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina, been suffering. It was in no shape to face a major
and Austria-Hungary would not object if Russia war, so it backed down and forced Serbia to back
made use of the straits at Constantinople. down, too. On March 31, 1909, Serbia accepted
The trouble was that Izvolski had either ex- the annexation.
ceeded his instructions or had simply neglected Austria-Hungary was triumphant and Ger-
to inform his government of what he had done. many may have felt that this was compensation
Three weeks after the agreement, Austria-Hun- for the loss at Algeciras. As was one
for Russia, it
gary did annex Bosnia-Herzegovina, and the more unbearable humiliation. All it could do was
Russian Prime Minister, Pyotr Arkadyevich Sto- to fire Izvolski in 1910, and to make up its mind
lypin (1862-1911), promptly ordered Izvolski to that if there was another crisis with Austria-Hun-
oppose the Austro-Hungarian move. gary over the Balkans, Russia would not back
Izvolski had no choice but to denounce the down again.
agreement he had made, to say that he was Outside the realm of politics, Sigmund Freud
duped or misunderstood, and to sing with the had foresaken the use of hypnosis in dealing
angels now by furiously backing the Serbians in with patients and used free-association instead,
their objections to the annexation. The matter at and the art of psychoanalysis came into use. His
once burgeoned into a full-scale crisis, for Ger- friend and associate, Alfred Adler (1870-1937),
many lined up behind Austria-Hungary (its only originated the term "inferiority complex" in
ally at the Algeciras Conference), while Great 1907. His version of psychiatric treatment was
Britainand France backed Russia. much briefer than Freud's.
Great Britain and France suggested another in- Karl Landsteiner (1868-1943) discovered the
ternational conference like that at Algeciras, but A, B, and O blood
groups that, for the first time,
Austria-Hungary felt it would surely be outvoted made it safe to use blood transfusions. He was
and wouldn't accept the suggestion. Izvolski awarded a Nobel Prize for this.
travelled to London permission for
to get specific In music, the Hungarian Bela Bartok (1881-
concessions on the Straits so that Russia might 1945) was writing his earliest pieces in this de-
salvage something out of the mess, but now cade. Another Hungarian, Franz Lehar (1870-
1948), inherited the mantle of Johann Strauss, Plehve seemed to set off strikes and demonstra-
writing, among other works, the operetta The tions all over Russia. There were meetings of
Merry Widow in 1905, containing 'The Merry angry reformers, even in St. Petersburg itself,
Widow Waltz," which may be the most popular who demanded representative government and
waltz not written by Strauss. Still another Hun- civil liberties.
garian, Ferenc Molnar (1878-1952) wrote the now, the uprisings had been of peas-
Until
drama Liliom in 1909. ants, and the articulate demands had been of-
fered by the intellectuals and professionals. But
now, Russia's factory workers were also becom-
RUSSIA ing involved. On Sunday, Jahuary 22, 1905, a
The situation in Russia was, in some ways, like group of workers, led by an Orthodox priest, G.
that in China a decade earlier. In Russia, as in Gapon, marched peaceably to the Winter Palace
China then, discontent among the people was to present petitions and to ask for reforms.
rising rapidly. In Russia, as in China then, the The crowd was met with gunfire. A hundred
government remained unmoved and uncompro- marchers were killed, several hundred wounded,
mising. And in Russia, as in China then, the gov- and the day was called "Bloody Sunday."
ernment suffered a bad defeat in war which The action was worse than useless for it
exacerbated internal unrest. The defeat was even started "the Revolution of 1905."
Unrest in-
inflicted by the same power in both cases: Japan. creased tremendously and, between October 20
The difference was that Russia was not then de- and 30, there was a great general strike that
scended upon by European harpies, but was brought the nation to a complete halt barely a
given a chance to recover. month after the peace treaty with Japan had pre-
The war in the Far East was brought on by sented the world with the spectacle of huge Rus-
rivalries in Korea and Manchuria, and in the sia having to cede territory to tiny Japan in order
question of which nation, Japan or Russia, was to buy peace.
to dominate there. Russia, throughout, treated The reactionary ministers of Nicholas II had to
the Japanese as a peculiar little oriental people resign and the liberal, Witte, who had been in
not even worth talking to, and the lesson Russia disgrace because of his liberalism, was rehabili-
received in consequence was a severe one. (The tated and made Prime Minister on October 30.
details will be given in a later section.) Along with that, it was proclaimed that Russia
The Russian Minister of the Interior, at the would have a constitution, a legislative body
time, was Vyacheslav Konstantinovich Plehve called a "Duma" ("a place of judgment"), an ex-
(1846-1904). He was in charge of suppressing all tended franchise, and civil liberties.
liberal dissent and he did so with the utmost cru- Many of the moderate reformers were satis-
elty. He labored to Russify the non-Russian ele- fied with this, but the Social Democrats didn't
ments of the nation, such as the Finns and the consider itenough and didn't trust the govern-
Armenians. He was also strongly anti-Semitic ment to do even what it said it would. They had
and his policies brought about a dreadful pogrom formed a "soviet" ("council") in St. Petersburg,
in Kishinev in the far southwest, in April 1903. but the members of this soviet were arrested on
He also supported war with Japan as a way of December 16, 1905. This was followed by a work-
uniting Russia in a burst of patriotic fervor. Con- er's uprising in Moscow that was repressed with
sidering all this, he was a natural target for ter- difficulty.
rorists and on July 28, 1904, less than a half year was dismissed on May 2, 1906, since, by
Witte
after the Russo-Japanese war had begun, he was then, with the war over and the more radical ele-
assassinated. ment suppressed, it was felt that things could
Already that war was turning disastrous and continue without him. He was succeeded by Ivan
the government didn't need serious trouble at Loggimovich Goremykin (1859-1917); on May 6,
home, but it got just that. The assassination of it was announced that the Tsar was still an auto-
1900 TO 1910 473
crat and that the Duma would

be selected in such
a way that it was bound to be controlled by the ITALY
government, and that it had only limited powers Italy had finally gotten over its outrage at the
over the budget. The Tsar could govern by decree French occupation of Tunis. On December 14,
when the Duma wasn't in session. In short, vir- 1900, in fact, Italy had come to an agreement
tually everything that had been promised was, in with France, accepting the Tunisian situation,
essence, taken away. provided Italy was given a free hand in Tripoli, a
On May 10, the first Duma
met. The radical large and mostly desert area between Tunis and
parties had boycotted the election but moderate Egypt, which was the last remnant of North Af-
reformers managed to win a great many seats rica that the Ottoman Empire could still consider
and they criticized the government loudly. In its own.
June, Stolypin became Prime Minister and he On June 28, 1902, Italy renewed its adherence
tried to introduce some reforms to ease the situ- to the Triple Alliance at which Germany also
ation. gave them a free hand in Tropoli. Almost imme-
A second election was held and the second diately afterward, however, Italy assured the
Duma met on March 5, 1907. This time the radi- French it would not join in any attack upon
cal parties had voted and the second Duma was, them. It also began to show bitterness over Ital-
therefore, more radical than the first. It was hast- ian areas ruled by Austria-Hungary, and it
still
ily dissolved on June 16 and a new election law voted on the French side at the Algeciras confer-
was passed that made it virtually impossible to ence.
elect radicals. However, Italy suffered a
constant state of dis-
A third Duma
met. It was conservative and order during this decade, with strikes and labor
everything returned to reaction. In the relative unrest a continuing fact of life. It was perhaps for
quiet that followed, with the Revolution of 1905 thisreason that Germany didn't seem overly
essentially a failure, Russia carried through the upset at Italy's wavering with respect to the Tri-
rapprochement with Great Britain in 1907, and ple Alliance. seem that Italy would be
It didn't
suffered humiliation over Bosnia-Herzegovina in much of a military factor in any case.
1908. Meanwhile, Marconi was continuing to work
Through all these upheavals, Chekhov wrote on radio in England. On December 12, 1901, he
his plays The Three Sisters in 1901, and The Cherry managed to send a radio signal from the south-
Orchard in 1904. Aleksey Maksimovich Peshkov west England, across the Atlantic Ocean,
tip of
(1868-1936), writing under the pseudonym of to Newfoundland, using balloons to lift his an-
"Maxim Gorky," was achieving fame with his tennae as high as possible. Before the end of the
stories, and for his radical views. (His native city decade, he received a Nobel Prize for his work.
of Nizhni-Novgorod is now called Gorky in his Puccini continued working, too, composing
honor.) the operas Madame Butterfly in 1904 and The Girl
Rimsky-Korakov was still composing and his of the Golden West in 1910.
Le Coq d'or was produced in 1909. Another Rus- Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936) was an outstand-
sian composer of the period was Aleksander Ni- ing Italian novelist and playwright in this decade
kolayevich Scriabin (1872-1915). and eventually received a Nobel Prize for litera-
Jean Julius Christian Sibelius (1865-1957) was ture. The painter, Amedeo Modigliani (1884-
the greatest of the Finnish composers. His best 1920), working in Paris, was noted for his elon-
known works are Finlandia (1899) and Valse Triste gated portraits.
(1903). The great tenor, Enrico Caruso (1873-1921),
became a world smash with his performance in
Rigoletto at the Metropolitan Opera in New York
in 1903.
PAPACY BELGIUM
Leo died on July 20, 1903, having been in the
XIII Leopold IPs personal empire in the Congo was
Papal chair for 25 years. Piux IX and he, taken administered in the cruelest possible way. Leo-
together, had ruled the Church for 57 years, an pold II, though wealthy enough, seemed to have
unprecedented length of service in a post to a perfect craze for amassing still more wealth and
which aged men usually succeeded. didn't care how he did it. He looted and terror-
The new Pope was Pius X (1835-1914). Pius X ized the Congolese in his mad clutching at the
was more conservative than Leo XIII. He fought rubber resources of the region. There was a
the "modernism" that attempted to find a syn- steadily rising demand for rubber because of the
thesis of traditional Catholicism with current growing importance of the automobile, and Leo-
thought. He was also against the Christian Dem- pold's agents didn't balk at murder and torture.
he had no liking for liberalism or for
ocrats, since Beginning in 1903, the Congolese situation
democracy, and he fought France's separation of was reported in British papers to the gathering
church and state. horror of those portions of the world population
that believed in humanity. Formal investigations
began in 1905 and Great Britain and the United
NETHERLANDS States strongly expressed their anger and disap-
The Netherlands had to fight strikes and labor proval. Belgium itself was embarrassed and,
unrest, too. Strikes in 1903, involving the rail- under mounting pressure, Leopold had to give
roads and the docks, induced enough paralysis up his private empire in 1908 and turn the Congo
to cause the government to use the army to break over to the Belgian The "Congo Free State"
state.
it up. ("free" only for Leopold, of course) became the
Science in the Netherlands continued to be re- "Belgian Congo."
markable. Lorentz, who had already received a Leopold II died on December 17, 1909, and
Nobel pointed out in 1904 that the failure
Prize, was succeeded by his nephew, who reigned as
of the Michelson-Morley experiment not only Albert I (1875-1934).
implied a FitzGerald contraction, but also an in-
crease in mass. Mass approached infinite values
as the speed of light was approached, and this, SPAIN
too, seemed to show that speeds faster than light Spain, having undergone the terrible humiliation
were impossible. of the defeat by the United States and the loss of
Heike Kamerlingh Onnes (1853-1926) all its island possessions in the western hemi-
achieved new records in attaining low tempera- sphere and in the Pacific Ocean, sought else-
tures and, in 1908, managed to liquefy helium at where for some sort of compensation.
only four degrees above absolute zero. He even- On October 3, 1904, France, which felt that the
tually received the Nobel Prize for this feat. Entente Cordiale had as good as put Morocco
In Willem Einthoven (1860-1927) in-
1903, into its pocket, signed a treaty with Spain. Offi-
vented the string galvanometer, an extremely cially, guaranteed the independence of Mo-
it
delicate device for detecting feeble currents. By rocco, but, in a secret clause, France promised
1906, he had applied the measurement to Spain the Mediterranean coast of Morocco, at
rhythmic currents produced by the beating heart. least. This accounted for Spain siding with
This was an "electrocardiogram," and it became France at the Algeciras Conference.
a valuable means of detecting heart abnormali- Spain, however, was in no position to act
ties. strongly in this respect until 1909, because, as in
Italy's case, internal unrest kept the nation off-
balance.
The Spanish painter, Fablo Picasso (1881-
1900 TO 1910 475
1973), settled in Paris in 1904 and began a career by his son, who reigned as Frederick VIII (1843-
that was to make him the most famous artist of 1912).
the twentieth century.
NORWAY
PORTUGAL On June 7, 1905, Norway, no longer able to en-
Unrest in Portugal was even greater than in dure Swedish rule, declared itself independent.
either Spain or Italy. On February 1, 1908, King A plebiscite was held, and the Norwegian people
Carlos I and his son, who was heir to the throne, voted heavily in favor of
independence.
were assassinated in the streets of Lisbon. In a remarkable example of calm acceptance of
Succeeding as king was Carlos's second son, the inevitable, the Swedish legislature agreed to
who reigned as Manuel II (1889-1932). Manuel this on September 24, and, on October 26, a for-
liberalized thegovernment but maintained the mal treaty of separation was signed. For five cen-
extravagant life-style of his father, and appar- turies, Norway had been ruled first by Denmark
ently the Portuguese had had enough. The Re- and then by Sweden and now, at last, it was an
publicans were growing stronger and had gained independent nation again.
majorities in an election held in 1910. On October Norway elected as
king Prince Charles of
its
4, 1910, there was a general rising and the next Denmark, a grandson of Christian IX of Den-
day Manuel and went into exile in Great
II fled mark, and a younger son of the prince soon to
Britain, where he remained for the rest of his life. become Frederick VIII of Denmark. Charles as-
The House of Braganza had come to an end after sumed the name of Haakon VII (1872-1957).
two and three-quarter centuries. Under Haakon, there was full democracy. The
The Republic of Portugal began with the pres- royal veto was abolished and women's suffrage
idency of Joaquim Teofilo Braga (1843-1914), a was established in 1907.
scholar, writer, and anticlerical.
SWEDEN
SWITZERLAND After Norway's breakaway, democracy advanced
in Sweden also. On December 8, 1907, Oscar II
Switzerland, which had been strictly neutral
of Sweden died, and was succeeded by his oldest
since 1815 and was determined to remain so,
come what might, built up an efficient little army
son, who reigned as Gustav V (1858-1950).
Selma Lagerlof wrote The Wonderful Adventures
that required training for everyone. This was to
of Nils in 1907.
make sure that no one would too lightly think of
The Swedish inventor Alfred Bernhard Nobel
violating its Switzerland remained
neutrality.
(1833-1896) $9,200,000 in his will for the pre-
left
democratic and prosperous in the process.
sentation of annual prizes in Physics, Chemistry,
One of the great early psychiatrists was a
Physiology and Medicine, Literature and Peace
Swiss disciple of Freud, Carl Gustav Jung (1875-
in his name. The first such prizes were awarded
1961), whose work tended to be rather mystical.
in 1901 and almost at once became the most pres-
He spoke of the "collective unconscious"
and
tige-filled awards in the world.
popularized the concepts of "introversion" and
"extroversion."
GREECE
The situation in Crete may have
DENMARK cupying European powers of Great Britain,
satisfied the oc-
It was decade for Denmark. The only

a quiet France, Russia, and Italy, but it didn't satisfy the
event of importance was that the king, Christian people of either Crete or Greece.
IX, died on January 29, 1906, and was succeeded The most important Cretan in this decade was
Eleutherios Venizelos (1864-1936). He had led

the Cretan insurrection of the previous decade SERBIA
and was now Minister of Justice under Prince The unpopular King Alexander I of Serbia, and
George, who was in nominal charge of Crete, his even more unpopular Queen Draga, along
though it was actually run by the occupying with a number of other people at the court, were
powers and was, in theory, still part of the Otto- massacred on June 10, 1903 by a military coup.
man Empire. That put an end to the House of Obrenovich that
On March another
30, 1905, Venizelos raised had ruled Serbia, on and off, for nearly a century.
insurrection and declared union with Greece. It A new monarch was chosen from the compet-
didn't do any good, of course, for the occupying ing Karageorgevich family and he reigned as
powers refused to allow the union. Prince Peter I (1844-1921). With him, the pro-Austro-
George, however, tired of trying to rule the un- Hungarian tendencies of the previous 30 years
rulable, resigned on September 25, 1906. disappeared. Peter I, who had been brought up
Then came the annexation of Bosnia-Herze- in France, was pro-French and pro-Russian, and
govina by Austria-Hungary along with the threat was entirely anti-Austro-Hungarian.
of war. Once again, the Cretans declared union If there was any doubt of this, it vanished with
with Greece, and this time the occupying powers the Bosnia-Herzegovina crisis. Serbia, nearly
threw up their hands. With a general European mad with outrage, desperately wanted to go to
war threatening, the question of whether Crete war with Austria-Hungary, but needed the back-
was to be part of Greece or not seemed relatively ing of Russia for this and Russia was in no posi-
unimportant. The occupying powers withdrew tion to go along. Although Serbia had to back
their forces in July 1909. Crete joined Greece, al- down, from that moment secret conspiratorial
though the union was not, even yet, officially societies began to be formed with the object of
recognized by the rest of Europe. On October 18, doing whatever harm they could, in whatever
1910, Venizelos became Prime Minister of manner they could, to Austria-Hungary.
Greece.
MONTENEGRO
BULGARIA The tiny principality of Montenegro, closely al-
There were continuing insurrections in Mace- lied ethnically with Serbia, received a constitu-
donia, the European territories south of Bulgaria tion and a representative government on
that were still part of the Ottoman Empire. This December 19, 1905.
put Bulgaria in a delicate position, for though it It was just as outraged as Serbia was at the
ruled itself in fact, there were still official ties to Austro-Hungarian annexation of Bosnia-Herze-
the Ottoman Empire. govina, but could do even less about it. On Au-
However, when the over Bosnia-Herze-
crisis gust 28, 1910, Prince Nicholas of Montenegro
govina arose, Bulgaria took the chance of an of- compensated himself for the loss by upgrading
ficial declaration of independence on October 5, his title to that of "King."
1908, and King Ferdinand took the title of
"Tsar." Ferdinand made sure he would have the
approval of Russia in this. He visited St. Peters- ROMANIA
burg on February 21, 1909, and the Russian In this decade, Romania was at the edge of war
court, smarting over the situation in the Balkans at one time or another with Bulgaria and with
and ready to make any friend there, received him Greece, to say nothing of having to combat a
with royal honors, recognizing Bulgaria's inde- peasant insurrection inside its boundaries. This
pendence and Ferdinand's title. The Ottoman sort of turbulence, however, had become perpet-
Empire then had no choice but to recognize Bul- ual in the Balkans ever since the Ottoman grip
garian independence on April 19, 1909. had begun to weaken nearly a century earlier.
1900 TO 1910 477
diale, France abandoned

OTTOMAN EMPIRE all claims in the region.
Great Britain and the Ottoman Empire argued
The Ottoman Empire continued to shrink as it over whether the Sinai Peninsula was part of
lost Bosnia-Herzegovina Austria-Hungary,
to Egypt or not, and, on May 3, 1906, the Ottomans
was forced to accept complete Bulgarian inde- were forced to give up the peninsula to Egypt.
pendence, and was in the process of losing Crete That left Great Britain facing only the gather-
to Greece. Inside the Empire, the Young Turk ing nationalist sentiment in Egypt, which was
demands for reform and constitutional govern- not yet strong enough to discommode the British
ment grew louder. seriously. The British
Consul-General, John
To begin with, the leading Young Turks Eldon Gorst (1835-1916), did his best to make the
worked from exile in Paris, Geneva, and Cairo, rule as lenient as possible.
but disaffection was reaching the army. In Ma-
cedonia, army units rebelled on July 5, 1908,
under Ahmed Niyzai (1873-1912). On July 24, ETHIOPIA
Abdul Hamid II, unable to repress the revolt, re-
Menelek continued maintain the indepen-
to
stored the Constitution of 1876, one that had
dence of Ethiopia, and defined all its frontiers
been granted when the Ottoman Empire had to
with Great Britain, France, and Italy.
secure the help of Great Britain against Russia
and that had been withdrawn when the help was
no longer needed.
This meant the election of a legislature, which
MOROCCO
produced a large majority for the Young Turks. The Entente Cordiale in 1904 and the Algeciras
The legislature met on December 17, 1908, but Conference in 1906 made it pretty clear that
then the problem of the minorities arose. The Ar- France was going to control Morocco.
menians, Macedonians, and Albanians had sup- Little by little France made use of continuing
ported the Young Turks, hoping that reform disorders in Morocco to expand its presence
might mean decentralization, but many of the there, especially when the death of Europeans
Young Turks were strong nationalists who was involved. They seized northwest Morocco in
wanted reforms for themselves, but not for the 1907, and bombarded Casablanca on August 4,
minorities. 1907. On February 8, 1909, France came to an
Confusion continued. There was a conserva- agreement with Germany, in which Germany
tive rebellion in Constantinople on April 13, agreed to allow France to exert a protectorate
1909, but it was suppressed by, among others, over Morocco, provided Germany received cer-
Enver Pasha (1881-1922), who emerged as the tain economic concessions.
leader of the Young Turks. He forced the depo- Meanwhile, Spain, in 1909, was finally taking
sition of Abdul Hamid II on April 26, 1909. Abdul over the northern coastline of Morocco, a strip
Hamid's younger brother succeeded and reigned that came to be called "Spanish Morocco." It had
as Mehmed V (1844-1918), but he was merely a to fight the Rif tribesmen in doing so, and they
puppet in the hands of the Young Turk leaders. made the occupation an expensive one for the
That many things had not changed, despite Spaniards.
the Young Turks, was indicated by a renewed
massacre of Armenians in 1909, and the brutal
repression of uprisings in Albania. SOUTH AFRICA
With storm clouds gathering over southern Af-
rica,Alfred, Viscount Milner (1854-1925), who
EGYPT was governor of British South Africa, met with
Great Britain consolidated hold on Egypt and
its President Kruger of the Transvaal at Bloemfon-
the Sudan in this decade. By the Entente Cor- tein, capital of the Orange Free State. (Transvaal
and the Orange Free State, together, are the Kimberley and the tide began to turn. On Febru-
“Boer Republics/') ary 18, another British force under Redvers
The conference, which was held from May 31 Henry Buller (1839-1908) relieved Ladysmith.
to June 5, 1899, got nowhere. Milner insisted on Now were on the offensive. They
the British
the immediate enfranchisement of Uitlanders invaded the Orange Free State, taking Bloemfon-
who had been in the Boer Republics for at least tein on March 13, 1900, overrunning the entire
five years and Kruger would not agree. Both republic and annexing it to British South Africa
sides refused to compromise, and both sides pre- on May 24.
pared for war. On October 12, 1899, war broke Mafeking was relieved on May 18, after hav-
out between Great Britain and the Boer Republics ing been under siege for seven months, and at
(the “Boer War"). home the British people went almost mad with
The were overconfident. They only had
British joy at the news of that final wiping out of the
25,000 troops on the spot and the Boers outnum- Boer successes.
initial
bered them. Furthermore, the Boer forces were Next, Transvaal was invaded. Johannesburg
all mounted, all sharpshooters, and all masters was taken on May 31, and Pretoria, Kruger's cap-
of the hit-and-run raid. What's more, they were ital, on June 4. (Kruger, who had gone to Europe
well-armed, since both the Germans and the seeking help, remained in exile for the four re-
French had been glad to do business with them. maining years of his life.) On
September 3, the
The Boer disadvantage was that they were not Transvaal was also annexed to British South Af-
disciplined and that, in the long run, the British rica.
could bring to bear overwhelming force. The Boers now resorted to guerrilla warfare
The Boers attacked at once, hoping to get and kept the British busy for a year and a half.
things settled before the British could build up The British, with 300,000 men and more on the
their forcesadequately and to manage a quick spot, took harsh measures. The Boer farms were
and favorable peace. Within a week they had Ma- systematically destroyed and the British orga-
feking and Kimberley, two British outposts on nized concentration camps into which Boer
the western border of the Boer Republics, under women and children were herded and in which
siege. By November 2, Ladysmith, on the eastern one sixth of those gathered died of disease and
border of the Boer Republics, was also under poor treatment.
siege. Vereeniging (on the
Finally, at the Treaty of
Through November and December, British at- Transvaal-Orange Free State border), signed on
tempts to relieve these beleagured places failed, May 31, 1902, the Boers gave in and accepted
and the world was rather amused to see the British rule.
mighty British Empire put to shame by a handful However, if the British could be ruthless in
of backwoods farmers. The trouble was, of war, they did, more than some nations, tend to
course, that the British had been so long at peace be generous in peace. There was no attempt to
that they had no experience at facing a resolute enslave the Boers, or to treat them as subhu-
and well-armed adversary and had to undergo mans. They were granted the vote and given the
on-the-job training. freedom to organize.
However, the British had endless resources, Thus, Louis Botha (1862-1919), who had
which the Boers had not. The British sent in new fought valiantly on the Boer side, now formed a
commanders, and reinforcements began to pour party organization in January 1905. By February
into southern Africa. What's more, they began to 26, 1907, he had won a majority in the legislature
build up their own cavalry with which to meet of the Transvaal province and became its Premier
the mounted Boers. on March This meant that the Boers, while
4.
OnFebruary 15, 1900, British forces under accepting British sovereignty, were still masters
John Denton Pinkstone French (1852-1925), who of their own territory.
J
had fought in the Sudan, managed to relieve In 1908, there was a Constitutional Conven-
1900 TO 1910 479
by February 3, 1909, had established a

tion that,
and On
failed.June 23, 1908, he tried again with
Union of South Africa^^ of which the British and the support of Russian soldiers. This time, he
Boers were equally citizens. In fact, on Septem-
succeeded temporarily, but the forces of reform
ber 15, 1910, in the elections held in the new
first managed Tehran on July 12, 1909 and to
to take
Union, the Boers elected a majority and Botha
depose him. He was succeeded by his son,
became the Prime Minister of the Union of
first
Ahmad (1898-1930), who was only 11 years old.
South Africa. The Boers, however, recognized Under him, the constitutionalists remained in
the Union to be a useful governmental organiza-
charge.
tion and remained loyal to the British Empire.
Meanwhile, to some
extent the fighting was
Boers and British continued to be alike in their over nothing for in the course of the Anglo-Rus-
tolerance for non-Europeans, for Asians as well
sian rapprochements on August 31, 1907, Russia
as for Africans.By now, Gandhi in South Africa and Great Britain more
or less carved the nation
had organized his campaign of passive resistance into spheres of influence.
—no terror, no violence, just a stubborn refusal A new resource was becoming available to the
to submit to racist laws. Persians, or at least to those who
could control it
economically. Baku in Russia offered thr richest
yield of oil at the time, but now oil vâs being
MADAGASCAR obtained on the Persian shores of the Persian
As part of the Entente Cordiale, Great Britain Gulf, and, in 1909, the British were exploiting it
gave up all claims to Madagascar, and France and oil was pouring through pipelines to the
was left in sole control. Gulf, as a new and growing source of world en-
ergy.
PERSIA
The ruler of Persia at the start of this
AFGHANISTAN
decade was
Mozaffar od-Din (1852-1907). After spending By the Anglo-Russian rapprochement of 1907,
his youth in the pursuit of pleasure, he became Russia agreed to keep hands off Afghanistan so
Shah in May 1896, without any experience at rul- that the nation was left entirely to British influ-
ing. His notion of statecraft was to obtain loans ence.
from Russia, handing over economic concessions

in return, and then spending the money on ex- INDIA
travagant European trips. The country was rap- Indian nationalism continued to grow, but it split
idly approaching bankruptcy and discontent in two. On December 30, 1906, the "All-India
deepened. Muslim League" was formed and, thereafter, the
December 1905, the discontent became a
In Muslims and Hindus of India increasingly felt
revolution and Mozaffar was forced to get rid of the differences between themselves, as well as,
his worst ministers and to agree to the calling of and sometimes more than, their common hostil-
a national assembly to draw up a constitution for
domination.
ity to British
a more liberal, representative government. It met The Indian poet, Rabindranath Tagore (1861-
on October 7, 1906, produced the necessary con- 1941), who also wrote novels and plays, com-
stitution, which Mozaffar signed and then, al- posed music, and painted, gained fame in this
most immediately afterward, and perhaps as a decade and eventually received a Nobel Prize in
result, died of a heart attack on December 30, literature.
1906.
He was succeeded by his son, Mohammed Ali
(1872-1925), who had no intention of honoring SIAM
the constitution. On December 15, 1907, he at- Siam continued to safeguard its independence
tempted a coup that would restore the autocracy. but, like Persia, it was being divided into spheres
of influence, in this case by the British on the punish the Chinese. It included Japanese, Rus-
west and the French on the east. sians, French, Germans, British, and Americans.
Eventually, up were involved in the ex-
to 18,700
pedition. There was, of course, no withstanding
TIBET them by the ill-equipped, ill-led Chinese.
Although Tibet had had expansionist periods in The city of Tientsin was taken on July 14, 1900.
the past, it had remained under vague Chinese Peking itself was taken on August 14 and the
control for at least two centuries. Because of its legations were relieved. The Dowager Empress
location on the plateau north of the Himalayas, and her court fled to the inland city of Sian and,
however, it was difficult to reach and was left on December 26, the Dowager'Empress accepted
mostly to itself. all European demands.
Great Britain saw it as a possible way station Anagreement, the "Boxer protocol" was then
for Chinese trade and as one more buffer be- reached on September 7, 1901. The Chinese had
tween Russia and India. Consequently, the Brit- to pay an enormous indemnity, and the payment
ish in India sent an expedition into Tibet in 1902 was to be made by handing out further conces-
under the Indian-born, Francis Edward Young- sions to the various powers. The legations were
husband (1863-1942). Younghusband entered enlarged, foreign garrisons were established here
the Tibetan capital, the "forbidden city" of Lhasa and there, and Russia just about took over all of
in 1904, and forced a treaty between Great Britain Manchuria.
and Tibet that defined the frontier and set up One European who blundered badly was, as
trade relations. China was not consulted and the one might expect, William II of Germany. In
Dalai Lama, the religious leader of Tibet, fled sending off troops to China, he urged them, on
temporarily to China. July 27, 1900, to behave in such a manner that
In 1906, the Chinese managed to secure a the Chinese would be afraid to even look at a
treaty with Japan that recognized Chinese suzer- German, as once Europeans had been afraid to
ainty over Tibet. The Chinese then tried to look at the Huns. In doing so, he handed a price-
tighten their grip on that province and the Dalai less propaganda advantage to his enemies who,
Lama fled again, this time to India. in not too many years, would routinely refer to
the German soldiers as "Huns."
The United States eventually returned half its
CHINA share of the indemnity to China and devoted the
There were some Chinese, driven to madness by rest to the education of 1100 Chinese students in
the heartless foreign vivisection of their land, the United States. It set an honorable example
who formed an antiforeigner organization called that the other nations did not follow.
"the Society of the Righteous Harmonious Fists," IfChina could now see the penalty of failure
with reference to the Chinese martial arts. The to adopt Western technology in countering West-
unsophisticated thought these arts made the ern strength, they could also see the success of
Chinese superior to western methods of fighting Japan, which did adapt what it needed, and was
and even made the Chinese practitioners imper- able to defeat Russia in 1904 and 1905. One result
vious to bullets. The name of the organization of that was China regained control, of a sort,
that
was transformed by western mockery into "Bc^x- over Manchuria.
ers" and what followed, encouraged and egged Indeed China now, at last, began to stumble
on by the Dowager Empress, was the "Boxer Re- toward reform. Education was improved, the
bellion." opium traffic was slowly suppressed, railroads
Chinese mobs attacked foreigners and laid were built, and there was a gradual movement
siege to foreign legations. Eventually, they killed toward representative government.
theGerman ambassador. In November 1908, the Dowager Empress and
An international expedition was prepared to the puppet Emperor both died. Succeeding to the
1900 TO 1910 481
Imperial Throne was the old Emperor's nephew, single-track Trans-Siberian railroad chug-chug-
P'u-I (1906-1967), He was only two years old and ging across the vast distance that separated
his father, the younger brother of the previous Vladivostok from Russia's European centers.
Emperor, was the regent. There was even a 100-mile gap in the railroad
On December 3, 1908, a constitution was that still existed in the vicinity of Lake Baikal.
adopted that provided for the election of a rep- What's more, the Russian naval forces in the
resentative legislature, but the new regent was in Far East, centered mostly at Port Arthur, south
no hurry to fulfill its terms. Meanwhile, Sun Yat- of Manchuria, were in poor shape, and were not
sen, now based in Japan, was building up his to be compared with the modern Japanese battle-
revolutionary societies, with which he hoped to ships.
overthrow the Manchu dynasty altogether. Even so, the Japanese felt their best chance
was to destroy Russian naval power in the Pacific
with a single lightning stroke, then drive into
KOREA Manchuria. Of course, it might follow, there-
As the decade opened, the Koreans were in the after, that the Russians would slowly reinforce
uncomfortable position of being dragged in op- themselves until, at last, their mass was irresist-
posite directions by the Russians and Japanese. ible, but the Japanese perhaps calculated that
The Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905 settled Russia was on the brink of internal chaos. If they
the matter, however. Russia, after its defeat, had thought that, they were right.
to withdraw from Korea, while the Japanese The Japanese therefore struck, without warn-
presence became more and more dominant. ing, at Port Arthur and elsewhere on February 8,
The Korean Emperor was forced to abdicate 1904, caught the Russian ships utterly by sur-
on July 19, 1907. His son succeeded as a mere prise, and put most of them out of action. The
figurehead. The Korean army was disbanded and Japanese then declared war on February 10. (It
though guerrilla forces fought the Japanese des- was a trick the Japanese would eventually try
perately in the southern provinces, the ending again, and, unbelievably, it would work the sec-
was foregone. On August 22, 1910, Hideyoshi's ond time, too.)
dream of three centuries earlier was fulfilled, and The Japanese then laid siege to Port Arthur,
Korea was annexed by Japan. and sent their army advancing through Korea
and into Manchuria. The Russians, despite all
their disadvantages, fought with stolid endur-
JAPAN ance and made the Japanese pay far more than
In this decade, Japan continued, with exemplary they had counted on.
skill, to follow its plan for expansion. It partici- On January 2, 1905, after a seven-month siege,
pated in the international expedition against the the Japanese finally took Port Arthur, but it cost
Boxers, thus increasing its standing as a modern them 60,000 Manchuria, the Rus-
casualties. In
"European-style" power, at least from the mili- sian general, Aleksey Nikolayevich Kuropatkin
tary standpoint. The Japanese diplomat, Tadasu (1848-1921), did what he could under the cir-
Hayashi (1850-1913), helped negotiate an cumstances. Between February 20 and March 9,
Anglo-Japanese pact in 1902, and Japan could there was a climactic battle at Mukden, Manchu-
then count on Great Britain keeping Europe ria. The Japanese won, but not by much, and
quiet, while Japan settled matters with Russia. they another 70,000 men there.
lost
It might seem that Japan had no hope of de- While all this was happening, the Russian Bal-
feating giant Russia, but Japan was not attacking tic fleet was making its way to the Far East, some
Russia itself but rather the end of the Russian through the Suez Canal, and most around the
tail. There were only 83,000 Russian troops in the Cape of Good Hope. It was a quixotic and worse
Far East and the Japanese did not expect they than useless task. On May 27, 1905, the Russian
would be easily reinforced, for Lhere was only a ships reached the Straits of Tsushima between
Japan and Korea, and there the Japanese ships renal glands. This turned out to be the first sub-
were waiting. The Japanese ships were faster and stance ever isolated that was later to be classified
more powerful and, under Heihachiro Togo as a "hormone."
(1846-1934), they annihilated the Russian fleet at
the Battle of Tsushima and that ended the war.
The Japanese had won, but they had virtually AUSTRALIA
exhausted themselves in the process. As for the The Commonwealth of Australia came into
Russians, with the Revolution of 1905 reducing being, officially, on January 1, 1901, the first day
the land to chaos, they did not wish to continue. of the twentieth century. Denrocracy was far ad-
President Theodore Roosevelt of the United vanced, for women's suffrage was granted in
States acted as mediator and the war was ended 1902, the first Labor government was established
with the Treaty of Portsmouth (in New Hamp- in 1904, and old-age pensions came into being in
shire) which was signed on September 6, 1905. 1909. However, immigration from China and
Russia was forced to cede Port Arthur to Japan was strictly excluded.
Japan, as well as the southern half of the island The British portion of southeastern New
of Sakhalin, which lay just north of the four large Guinea was turned over to Australia in 1905, and
islands of Japan. Russia also agreed to get out of was renamed "Papua." The Australians wanted
Manchuria and leave it as a Japanese sphere of it because, in the wake of the Russo-Japanese
influence. Japan also wanted an indemnity, but War, they suddenly began to feel uncomfortably
thisRussia absolutely refused to pay. Roosevelt close to the victorious Japanese. The German
argued Japan into giving in on this point, which presence in the Pacific Islands was also increas-
displeased the Japanese people enormously and ing, and the Australians, having fought along
led to demonstrations against the treaty in with the British against the Boers, now began to
Tokyo. build a naval force of their own.
The Russo-Japanese War came as a great In 1909, the capital of Australia was estab-
shock to the world. For the first time in over two lished at Canberra, which was made a federal
non-European power had defeated a
centuries, a district that was not part of any of the state gov-
European one and the lesson was not lost on the ernments.
non-European world. They were less than ever
willing to accept with resignation, the notion of
"white supremacy." NEW ZEALAND
Nor were the Europeans unaware of this. Rus- New Zealand had also contributed contingents
sia was not exactly popular with much of the rest who fought on the side of the British against the
of Europe, and there had been a tendency to root Boers. On September 26, 1907, New Zealand re-
for the Japanese because they
(as for the Boers) ceived Dominion status and, like Canada and
were viewed as the underdogs. Once it appeared Australia, ruled itself. It shared with the other
they were not the underdogs, however, Japan Dominions, and with Great Britain and its Em-
rapidly lost favor. They ceased to be seen as cute pire, the person of the monarch. Each dominion
orientals with parasols and fans, and began to be also had a Governor-General appointed by the
seen as sinister warriors with guns and ships. crown to represent the monarch and (like the
Germany had begun talking about the "Yellow monarch) was given only ceremonial duties.
peril" (the dangers of the aroused hordes of East
Asia) in the 1890s, and the phrase seemed more
appropriate now. PHILIPPINES
Not all things Japanese were martial. Jokichi When the Americans established themselves as
Takamine (1854-1922), educated in Japan, came the new masters of the Philippines, Aguinaldo
to theUnited States in 1890. In 1901, he isolated raised an insurrection against them, as he had
epinephrine (also called adenaline) from the ad- against the Spaniards in earlier years. He de-
1900 TO 1910 483
dared himself president of the “Philippine Re- his second inauguration on March 4, 1901. On
public" and attacked Manila on February 4, 1899. September 6, 1901, he attended the Pan-Ameri-
He was driven off and the Filipinos resorted to can Exposition at Buffalo, received a line of citi-
guerrilla warfare, carrying on the "Philippine In- zens and shook hands with each in proper
surrection." democratic fashion. One of the men waiting in
The American general in charge, Elwell Ste- line was Leon Czolgosz (1873-1901), an anarchist
phen Otis (1838-1909) and his second-in-com- who carried a loaded revolver concealed by a
mand, Arthur MacArthur (1845-1912), issued handkerchief. When he reached the president,
constant assurances that the insurrection had he McKinley died on September 14,
fired twice.
been put down, but it wasn't. They continued to and Czolgosz was hanged on October 29. Mc-
ask for more and more troops, until there were Kinley was thus another of the highly placed vic-
70,000 American soldiers in the Philippines and tims to fall to anarchist terror at the turn of the
yet the insurrection went on. century.
On March Aguinaldo was captured
23, 1901, McKinley's Vice-President, Theodore Roose-
and was forced to sign a declaration calling on velt, only 43 years old at the time, was now the
the Filipinos to lay down their arms —
but the in- 26th President of the United States.
surrection went on. Roosevelt carried on an aggressive and dy-
However, a civil government was devised for namic foreign policy. He helped negotiate an end
the Philippines and at its head was William How- to the Russo-Japanese War, and, for that, re-
ard Taft (1857-1930), a fair-minded man of integ- ceived a Nobel Prize for peace on December 10,
rity. His fairness and decency toward the 1906. American sympathies, which were with
Filipinos did more to end the insurrection than Japan at the outset, faded quickly with Japanese
all the force the soldiers could exert. victories, especially since the United States, and
Finally, in the summer of 1902, most of the the west coast particularly, definitely did not
fighting petered to an end, though some resis- want any Japanese immigrants, and those that
tance continued in the southern islands until were present were often mistreated.
1905. The Americans had lost 7000 casualties, as Roosevelt also used his influence to get Great
compared with 2200 in the Spanish-American Britainand France to agree to the Algeciras Con-
War, yet the Philippine insurrection is hardly ference, which the United States then attended,
mentioned in the history books, though the contributing by its vote to the German defeat.
Spanish-American War gets full coverage. There was a problem in connection with the
Once the Americans quelled the insurrection, Canadian boundary, along the southern "pan-
however, they set up an efficient government in handle" of Alaska. The Americans wanted the
which Filipinos participated. The Americans won boundary further inland from the Pacific coast,
over the Filipinos as the British won over the while the Canadians wanted American owner-
—
Boers by not treating them as defeated inferi- ship to be confined to the islands offshore. The
ors, but as human beings. dispute was handed over to an arbitration board
consisting of three Americans, two Canadians,
and a Briton. They met in London in September
UNITED STATES 1902.
The glow of the successful Spanish-American Roosevelt made it clear that if the board did
War made it easy for McKinley to gain reelection not decide in favor of the United States, the
in 1900. He ran against Bryan for a second time, Americans would take what they wanted any-
but Bryan's campaign of anti-imperialism didn't way. The Canadians refused to give in, but Great
suit the feelings of the time. The Socialist party experience in the Boer War,
Britain, after its was
ran a candidate, Eugene Debs, for the first time conscious of the dangers of isolation, and was
in this election. quite determined not to quarrel with the United
McKinley's luck, however, ran out soon after States for as long as the German danger endured.
The Briton on the board therefore voted with the United States quite clearly what advantage
United States, and that settled that. would accrue to it if, in case of need, it could
There was a problem with Latin American quickly shift warships from the Atlantic to the
Venezuela owed a great deal of money to
debts. and vice versa. What's more, Reed's work
Pacific
Germany and Great Britain, and the question in Cuba on yellow fever showed just how that
arose as to how Remembering the
to collect it. disease might be conquered.
case of Mexico, and of Napoleon IITs ill-fated The United States decided, therefore, to build
venture nearly four decades earlier, the two Eu- the canal on its own, without reference to Great
ropean nations consulted the United States, Britain. Great Britain, trapped in the Boer
still
which agreed to allow them to collect payment War, was in no position to make a fuss about it.
forcibly. On November 18, 1901, Secretary of State John
When Germany and Great Britain tried to do Hay had little trouble negotiating a treaty with
this, however, American public opinion made it- Julian Pauncefote (1828-1902) of Great Britain.
self felt very strongly against the use of European By this"Hay-Pauncefote Treaty," the canal,
force in the western hemisphere. Roosevelt when it was built, would be neutral and open to
therefore decided that when Latin American na- all shipping, but the United States would be able
tions owed debts that they wouldn't or couldn't to fortify and, in effect, to own it.
it,
repay, it would be the Americans who would The question was where, exactly, to build the
move in, customs, amass the necessary
collect canal. The narrowest part of Central America
money, and hand it over to the creditor nations. was in Panama, but there were hills there that
Force might still have to be used, but American would have to be dug through. A canal across
public opinion would not object to American Nicaragua would be four times as long, but it was
force, and would not be moved by any Latin- sea level all the way and Lake Nicaragua could
American objection that force was force whatever be made use of over a good part of the route.
the source. However, there was a powerful and deadly vol-
This was "Roosevelt corollary" to the
the canic eruption on the island of Martinique on
Monroe Doctrine and it made the United States May 8, 1902, and Americans grew very volcano-
the policeman of the western hemisphere. Thus, conscious. There were reports of volcanic activity
in 1905, American forces moved into the Domin- in Nicaragua, so Congress decided on a Panama
ican Republic and collected customs for two route on June 18, 1902.
years so that its debtors might be paid. The Isthmus of Panama was part of the nation
An even more serious question came in con- of Colombia. Colombia was rather dubious about
nection with a canal across Central America. It the canal, feeling that it would be an entering
had long been obvious that a canal across that wedge for American control over the nation. On
narrow region would make unnecessary for
it the other hand, the canal would be a source of
ships to make the long trip around South Amer- revenue for Colombia and, in any case, it was
ica and, as early as 1850, the United States and quite clear that if Roosevelt didn't get what he
Great Britain had come to an agreement that if wanted by negotiation, he would simply take it
such a canal was built, neither nation would try by force. Colombia therefore signed a treaty with
to monopolize its control. the United States on January 22, 1903, allowing
However, building the canal was out of the Panama Canal to begin.
the construction of the
question as long as yellow fever and malaria rid- However, Colombian public opinion was against
dled Central America. Thus, in 1879, the French it,and the Colombian Senate rejected the treaty.
under Ferdinand de Lesseps began an attempt to Roosevelt wasted no time trying to change Co-
build the canal and they found it couldn't be lombia's mind. The people of Panama were not
done. The venture collapsed in a maze of corrup- entirely satisfied with being part of Colombia and
tion that nearly destroyed the French republic. they had rebelled on various occasions. Now
The Spanish-American War showed the they suddenly saw the chance of a canal bringing
1900 TO 1910 485
money directly to
themselves rather than to the primary was established Wisconsin in 1903.
in
central government of Colombia.
None of this greatly purified democracy, but it
Roosevelt managed to make it clear to the Pan- did put some reins on the absolute control of the
amanians that, if they revolted, they would have land by politicians.
American cooperation. Several American war- Blacks continued to advance by inches. Wil-
ships were sent down on November 3, 1903 to liam Edward Burghardt Du Bois (1868-1963), a
patrol the waters off Panama in order to prevent black who had
obtained a Ph.D. in history from
Colombian ships from doing anything to put Harvard in 1895, helped found the "National As-
down a revolt. On November 4, right on sched- sociation for the Advancement of Colored Peo-
ule, came the revolt. The Panamanian rebels
ple" (NAACP) on May 31, 1909. This gave the
declared themselves independent and, on No- blacks a voice that could at least make itself
vember 6, the United States recognized that in- heard, even if it could rarely affect the stolid and
dependence. On November 18, the United States stony-hearted racism of the times.
signed with the Panamanians the same treaty Theodore Roosevelt made a gesture in this re-
they had earlier signed with the Colombians. spect that was not without risk. On October 16,
Work on
the canal began, and, under the di- 1901, just a month he became president, he
after
rection of the American army officer and sur- entertained the black educator, Booker T. Wash-
geon, William Crawford Gorgas (1854-1920), war ington, at dinner in the White House. There were
was declared on yellow fever and malaria and storms of protest over this act of common de-
was carried through effectively. cency, though there were few over Roosevelt's
On September 2, had quoted
1901, Roosevelt bullying tactics abroad.
an adage: "Speak softly and carry a big stick; you Even women's rights advanced. Several west-
will go far." His big-stick diplomacy sat well with ern states allowed women to vote in state elec-
the American people and he was triumphantly tions, and demands for women's national
victorious in the 1904 election. He was the first suffrage, on an equal basis with that of men,
American Vice-President to have succeeded to were mounting. Mary MacLeod Bethune (1875-
the post on the death of a president and to have
1955) was a black woman who, in this decade,
then gone on to win an election in his own right. pioneered the establishment of schools for black
Though imperialism and force was the Amer- girls.
ican rule of the day in foreign affairs, democracy A was won by Helen Adams
special victory
advanced at home. A "Progressive" movement, Keller (1880-1968), who was not only a woman,
the heir of the earlier Populists, worked toward but one who had become blind and deaf early in
greater public involvement in the machinery of With the help
life. of a dedicated teacher, Anne
government. By the "initiative," citizens could Sullivan Macy (1866—1936), Keller overcame
initiate the consideration of a law by a legislature these difficulties and wrote acclaimed biographi-
ifthey gathered enough signatures on an appeal. cal works in 1902 and 1908. Her glowing courage
By the "referendum," a law could be put to a and intelligence were beacons that lit the way
general vote of the people if the legislature toward a more human consideration of the hand-
turned it down, if, again, enough signatures icapped generally.
could be gathered. And by "recall," the people There was also a growing movement toward
could vote to remove a public official from office the prohibition of the sale of alcoholic beverages.
ifthey lost confidence in him. There was also the This might well be considered a noble aim, but
"primary" in which people voted for someone reliance was placed not only on persuasion and
they wanted to have nominated for office by a social pressure, but on the force of the law. The
political party. Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU)
The adopt both initiative and ref-
first state to was founded in 1874, and the Anti-Saloon
erendum was Oregon on June 2, 1902. Oregon League in 1893. The forces of "Prohibition"
also accepted recall in 1908. The first statewide gained major strength, however, in 1902, when
itcame under the dynamic leadership of a Meth- produced twice as much steel as Germany and
odist clergyman, James Cannon (1864-1944). four times as much as Great Britain.
Cities, towns, and even an occasional state began The United States continued to make strides
to go “dry," forbidding the sale of liquor. That in technology. Two brothers, Wilbur Wright
drinking continued, and even increased, despite (1867-1912) and Orville Wright (1871-1948), had
such laws, seemed to go unnoticed. worked with and were interested in plac-
gliders
Labor also gained. On May 12, 1902, a strike ing internal combustion engines on them. This
was called by anthracite coal miners under the would turn a propeller and allow the gliders to
leadership of John Mitchell (1870-1919) against move in directed flight. On December 17, 1903,
the owners who kept the wages extremely low at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville Wright
and took virtually no safety precautions to pro- piloted the first flight of a heavier-than-air flying
tect the livesand well-being of the miners. Chief machine. (Dirigibles were, of course, lighter than
counsel for the miners was Clarence Seward Dar- air.) On this day, then, the airplane was in-
row (1857-1938), who was to become famous as vented.
the doughty legal champion of many unpopular Henry Ford (1863-1947) introduced the notion
causes in which he fought on the side of human- of an "assembly line" in 1908, bringing the parts
ity. of an automobile along a line of men who each
The mine owners took a completely arrogant performed one task over and over in the proper
and intransigent position. One of them, George order. At one end of the assembly line were the
Frederick Baer (1842-1914), said, "The rights and parts and at the other end a finished automobile
interest of the laboring man will be protected and rolled off and could be driven away. In 1909,
cared for, not by the labor agitators, but by the Ford produced the "Model T Ford," the first au-
Christian men to whom God in his infinite wis- tomobile to be mass-produced and to be within
dom has given the control of the property inter- the range of affordability of people of moderate
ests of this country." Having thus announced the means. It was with that that the automobile age
divine right of mine owners, they waited for the really began.
government, as usual, to use its force to break Lee De Forest (1873-1961) improved on Flem-
the strike. ing's rectifier in 1906 by adding a third electrode
Roosevelt, however, put pressure on the mine inside the vacuum tube. It could then be used as
owners instead, and they buckled. The miners an amplifier and it became the ancestor of the
actually won a 10% raise when the strike came to "radio tubes" in all their varieties that made elec-
an end on October 21, 1902. tronic equipment practical.
Some capitalists, to be sure, had more on their At the same time, the Canadian-born Reginald
mind than divine right. The British-born Andrew Aubrey Fessenden (1866-1932) modulated radio
Carnegie (1835-1919), who had made his fortune waves so that their changing amplitude mim-
in steel in the ruthless manner of the times, re- icked that of sound waves. This was "amplitude
tired in 1901,and devoted the rest of his life to modulation" (AM). In this way, sound could be
philanthropy, endowing libraries, institutes of turned into appropriate radio waves and these
higher learning, and causes devoted to peace. back into sound. For the first time, one could
In 1908, Roosevelt
decided not to run for a hear words and music on a radio and this was
second elected term, and put forward William accomplished first on December 24, 1906. De For-
Howard Taft as his hand-picked successor. Taft est's triode and Fessenden's voice transmission
was easily elected and became the 27th President established radio as we know it.
of the United States. In an allied field, the German-born Emile Ber-

By 1910, the population of the United States liner (1851-1929) first devised the flat phono-
was 92 million. Its navy rivalled that of Germany graph record in 1904 to replace the cylindrical
in the race for second place to Great Britain. It one introduced by Edison. The flat record took
1900 TO 1910 487
up less room and held more sound so that the

1910), writing under the pseudonym of "O.
phonograph became a much more practical in- Henry, wrote a large number of short stories in
strument. this decade, the most famous being "The Gift of
In 1909, the Belgian-born Leo Hendrik Baeke- the Magi." Bierce published his Devil's Dictionary
land (1863—1944) produced the first thermoset- in 1906, which cannot be exceeded for bitterness,
ting plastic, which he named ''Bakelite" after though hits the target
it almost every time. Ed-
himself. It was the have major uses
first plastic to ward Arlington Robinson (1869-1935) was mak-
and it sparked the development of the modern ing a name for himself as a poet in this decade.
plastics industry.
It was also the decade of the
muckraker (a pe-
In the biological sciences, Walter Stanborough jorative term used by President Roosevelt to de-
Sutton (1877-1916) pointed out in 1902 that chro- scribe those who were intent on dealing with the
mosomes fulfilled the requirements of the Men- seamy side of American society). Joseph Lincoln
delian inheritance factors and that it was there
Steffens (1866-1936) wrote The Shame
of the Cities
scientists must look machinery of hered-
for the (1904), exposing municipal corruption. Ida Mi-
ity. The Russian-born Phoebus Aaron
Theodor nerva Tarbell (1857-1944) wrote History the of
Levene (1869-1940) discovered, in 1909, that the Standard Oil Company (1904), exposing the cor-
nucleic acids (which were eventually found to be
ruption of business. Upton Beall Sinclair (1878-
part of the machinery of heredity) contained a
1968) wrote The Jungle (1906), describing the
five-carbon sugar called ribose. And in 1907, horrors of the meat-packing industry and pro-
Thomas Hunt Morgan (1866—1945) began to work ducing many vegetarians in the process.
with fruit flies, studying their chromosomes and In children's literature, Lyman Frank Baum
explaining the presence of linked characteristics
(1856-1919), wrote The Wonderful Wizard of Oz,
in heredity. Morgan received a Nobel Prize for
which, with its numerous sequels, has remained
his work. perennially popular.
HowardTaylor Ricketts (1871-1910) found, in In art, Frederick Remington (1861-1909) fin-
1906, that Rocky Mountain spotted fever had as ished a career of painting made famous by his
its causative agent, a microorganism that, in
its western scenes.
organization, was partway between a virus and a In music, the Irish-born Victor Herbert (1859-
bacterium. Such organisms are now called "Rick- 1924) was producing such popular operettas as
ettsia" in his honor.
Babes in Toyland (1903) and Naughty Marietta
In literature, the first novel by Theodore (1910). George Michael Cohan (1878-1942) wrote
Dreiser (1871-1945), Sister Carrie, published in Johnny Jones (1904), Forty-Five Minutes from
Little
1900, was too shocking for the public of the time, Broadway (1905), and others, containing such
which didn't mind seeing sinners go unpunished songs as "Give My Regards to Broadway," "Yan-
in real life, but were scandalized at finding it in kee Doodle Dandy," "Mary's a Grand Old
books. Name," and so on. Irving Berlin (1888-1989)
Newton Booth Tarkington (1869-1946) made started writing his songs in this decade.
his first hit with Monsieur Beaucaire (1900). John Isadora Duncan (1878— 1927) was the most fa-
Griffith ("Jack") London (1876-1916) burst on the mous dancer of her day, and Florenz Ziegfeld
scene with The Call of the Wild (1903), The Sea-Wolf (1869-1932) began a type of show that featured
(1904), and other works. Edith Newbold Whar- skits, musical numbers, and many scantily clad
ton (1862-1937) published The Valley of Decision women with The Follies of 1907, which continued
(1902) and The House of Mirth (1905). Finley Peter in new productions year after year.
Dunne (1867-1936) wrote a series of humorous Many aspects American life had their begin-
of
commentaries which an Irish bar-keeper, "Mr.
in ning in this decade. The first Rose Bowl football
Dooley," commented on the affairs of the day in game was played in 1902 and the first World Se-
a perceptive way. William Sydney Porter (1862- ries of baseball in 1903. The "teddy bear"
was
introduced in 1902 and was named for Theodore

Roosevelt, who
once refused to shoot a bear MEXICO
dragged to him for the purpose. The Dfaz dictatorship continued throughout this
"The Great Train Robbery," the first movie to decade, and was as repressive as ever. However,
tell a story, was presented in 1903, and the first Dfaz was getting older and resentment among
subway in New York was opened in 1904. Ham- the Mexicans was rising. By 1910, Dfaz was hav-
burgers were first popularized at the St. Louis ing the greatest difficulty in keeping the lid
World's Fair of 1904 (designed to celebrate the forced down on the bubbling revolution within
city's centennial). Instant coffee was first intro- the pot.
duced at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo,
where McKinley was assassinated.
CUBA
CANADA In 1901, the United States withdrew its troops
Canada was displeased, as one might well imag- from Cuba, but under onerous conditions. On
ine, over the American victory in the dispute March 2, 1901, an amendment was added to an
over the Alaskan border, and over the fact that army appropriations bill. It had been formulated
the British delegate had voted with the Ameri- by Roosevelt's Secretary of State, Elihu Root
cans. There was nothing that Canada could do, (1845-1937), a dedicated worker for the arbitra-
however, but continue to develop its own vast tion of national disputes, and an eventual winner
interior. of the Nobel Prize for peace.
It was age of railroad building and of
a great The amendment was then offered to the Sen-
the exploitation of the rich mineral resources of ate by Orville Hitchcock Platt (1827-1905), so that
the Canadian west. On
September 1, 1905, Al- itwas known as the "Platt amendment." By its
berta and Saskatchewan were organized as prov- terms, Cuba had to cede Guantanamo Bay to the
inces. Under Wilfrid Laurier (1841-1919) who, as United States as a naval base; it couldn't transfer
the leader of the Liberal party, was Prime Minis- land to any power other than the United States;
ter of Canada during this decade, the nation with other powers, it couldn't make treaties that
flourished. the United States didn't approve of; it couldn't
Canada could not experience the uncompli- assume too great a foreign debt; and it had to
cated Imperial loyalty of Australia and New Zea- grant the United States the right to intervene
land. The province of Quebec was heavily French when it felt it necessary.
in language and thought, and its people felt little On June Cuba was compelled to in-
12, 1901,
loyalty, any, to Great Britain. Thus, during the
if clude the Platt amendment as part of its consti-
Boer War, Canada did not fight, officially, on the tution and, in effect, it made Cuba an American
side of Great Britain, but sent only volunteers. protectorate.
There was also the beginning of friction between The first president of Cuba was Thomas Es-
the French-speaking (Francophone) and English- trada Palma (1835-1908), who had been part of
speaking (Anglophone) Canadians over educa- the revolutionary movement against Spain for 20
tional policies and over the official use of English. years,and who assumed the presidency in 1902.
Robert Williams Service (1874-1958) was a He was a conservative and was reelected in 1906.
successful writer of popular verse in this period, The Liberal opposition claimed fraud and Palma
producing the well-known "The Shooting of Dan was forced to resign, but not before he had ap-
McGrew" and "The Cremation of Sam McGee." pealed to the United States.
He published collections of his verse in 1907 and The United States promptly sent troops. In
1909. 1908, Jose Miguel Gomez (1858-1921), a Liberal,
was elected president, and the American forces
withdrew on February 1, 1909. However, they
1900 TO 1910 489
were always poised to return and the Cubans did people in St. Pierre,
but one, had died. (A con-
not find that a comfortable thing to live with. victed murderer, who happened to be in an un-
derground cell, survived.)
The news of the eruption led, the next year, to
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC the American Congressional decision to build a
The Dominican Republic followed the frequent canal across Panama rather than across Nicara-
Latin-American policy of borrowing large sums gua, which was thought to have a volcano.
of money from European powers, which it
wasted in corruption and mismanagement, and
then found it could not easily meet the interest VENEZUELA
payments. The European powers, aware of this During decade, Venezuela was under the ty-
this
likelihood, loaned the money anyway, counting rannical rule of Cipriano Castro, who contracted
on the use of force, if necessary, to wring their large European debts that he used for his own
profits out of the impoverished land. benefit. In order to collect the debts. Great Brit-
By 1905, the Dominican Republic was, practi- ain, Germany, and Italy took united action in
cally speaking, bankrupt. The United States, in 1902 to blockade five of Venezuela's seaports.
order to prevent European intervention, inter- The United States forced the matter into arbitra-
vened itself in accordance with the "Roosevelt tion and the blockade was lifted in February
corollary." It sent in forces to control the Domin- 1903. was It this situation that led to the an-
ican customs for 50 years in order to gather the nouncement of the "Roosevelt corollary" with
money to repay the debts. (This was called "dol- the United States claiming the right to collect
lar diplomacy.") In 1907, the Dominican Republic
Latin-American customs when that was neces-
had to sign a treaty with the United States per- sary to pay off European debts.
mitting this. In 1908, Castro quarreled with the United
States and with the Netherlands, and relations
with both were broken off. It was then the turn
MARTINIQUE of theDutch to blockade Venezuelan ports.
Martinique had its first European visitor in the However, Castro's health was turning shaky and
person of Christopher Columbus himself in 1502. he traveled to Europe in search of medical treat-
Itwas overlooked by the Spaniards, however, ment.
and was first colonized in 1635 by French settlers. In his absence, the Vice-President,Juan Vi-
It remained French thereafter except for three cente Gomez (1864-1935), seized power on De-
brief war-time occupations by the British. On cember 19, 1909, and took his turn at being a
June 23, 1763, the woman who was eventually to harsh dictator, while Castro remained in exile for
be Josephine Bonaparte and Empress of France, the remainder of his life.
was born on Martinique and lived there until she
was 15.
There is on Martinique called Mt.
a volcano COLOMBIA
Pelee. It was considered dormant, though occa- The dominant event of the decade in Colombia
sionally it showed eruptive activity, once as re- was its failure to agree to a pact with the United
cently as 1851. At its foot was Martinique's States permitting the construction of the Panama
capital, St. Pierre. Canal. The United States therefore engineered a
In April 1902, Mt. Pelee began to show signs Panamanian insurrection, recognized it as an in-
of activity, but officials minimized the matter and dependent nation, made the treaty with it, and
there was no move to evacuate the city. Then, at began the construction of the canal. Colombia
7:50 A.M. on May 8, 1902, the volcano exploded. could do nothing to prevent it, but it felt a bitter
A cloud of steam, gas, and dust rolled down the resentment, of course.
mountain and in three minutes all the 30,000 After the Panama insurrection, Rafael Reyes
Prieto (1850-1921) became President of Colombia When Peary returned, he found that a former
in 1904. On
January 9, 1909, Reyes Prieto signed associate, Frederick Albert Cook (1865-1940),
an agreement with the United States, recogniz- claimed he had reached it on April 21, 1908.
ing the independence of Panama, but the Colom- There was considerable controversy over this
bian people were less forgiving than Reyes Prieto and, eventually. Cook's claim was disallowed
was, and he was forced to resign on July 8, 1909. and Peary's accepted. Recent analysis, however,
He was succeeded by the much more liberal has cast some doubt on the accuracy of Peary's
Carlos E. Restrepo (1867-1937). reports of progress, too.
Less spectacularly, the Norwegian explorer,
Roald Amundsen (1872-1928),’ had, in 1903, un-
PANAMA dertaken and completed the crossing of the Arc-
On February 13, 1904, the now-independent Pan- tic Ocean sea passage north of Canada from the
ama adopted a constitution which granted the Atlantic to the Pacific. He reached Bering Strait
United States the right of intervening whenever in August was the famous "Northwest
1906. This
it felt like it, so that it, too, became an American Passage" and, while it was a thoroughly imprac-
protectorate. Panama's first president was Man- tical waterway, it had, nevertheless, finally been
uel Amador Guerrero (1833-1909). Amador accomplished.
Guerrero, although Panamanian-born, had in his
earlier years been important in the Colombian
government. ANTARCTICA
Explorers were now penetrating far into the icy
cover of Antarctica. The British explorer Robert
ARCTIC Falcon Scott (1868-1912) led a party of men
The American explorer, Robert Edwin Peary sledging over the Ross Ice Shelf and, on Decem-
(1856-1920), spent years exploring
northern ber 13, 1902, reached a point only 500 miles from
Greenland. He proved Greenland to be an is- the South Pole. One of his colleagues, Ernest
land, and the northernmost portion of that island Henry Shackleton (1874-1922), tried again. On
(a region largely free of ice) is called "Peary January 9, 1909, his party of four men managed
Land" honor.
in his to reach a point only 100 miles from the South
In 1909, he organized an elaborate travel party Pole. Each man dragged his own sledge, and
of which successive members were to turn back they turned back only when it was clear that to
at periodic intervals until, at the end, Peary and travel farther would mean their food supply
a black associate, Matthew Hensen, made the would not last the return journey.
finaldash, reaching the North Pole, according to Only the last push remained to reach the
report, on April 6, 1909. South Pole.
1910 to 1914
with 1914 to 1920. I begin now with Austria-Hun-
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY gary, not because of the nation's prime impor-
This section does not span an entire decade be- tance, but because it was within its boundaries
cause an event took place in 1914 that was a turn- that the turning point took place.
ing point for the world. 1 therefore take up the Austria-Hungary's victory in the Bosnia-Her-
period of 1910 to 1914 now, and will follow it zegovina crisis was a rather hollow one. It had
1910 TO 1914 491
occupied territory that Serbia had coveted and, iron hand. He did not want self-rule for the Slavs
from then on, Austria-Hungary was forced to in the Austrian half of the monarchy either, since
watch the Balkans more carefully than ever, lest would
that certainly rouse Hungary's own Slavs,
Serbia grow strong enough to become annoying. and also the Romanian people in its eastern por-
In February 1910, Austria-Hungary came to a tion.
cautious agreement with Russia to maintain the So Austria-Hungary tottered on, relying on
status-quo in the Balkans, since neither one the strength of its ally, Germany, to protect it
wanted another crisis. In doing this, however, from harm. As for Francis
Ferdinand, his hoped-
the two powers reckoned without the Balkan na- for reforms didn't have a chance, and he, him-
tions themselves. self, seemed to be disliked by everyone.
In 1912, the Balkan nations, in alliance, at- In June 1914, Austria-Hungary was holding
tacked and defeated the Ottoman Empire, which army maneuvers in Bosnia, as much
impress to
had still controlled Macedonia and Albania, a the Serbians as anything else. Francis Ferdinand,
strip of territory across the Balkan peninsula. The as Inspector of the Army, attended the maneu-
Balkan nations then divided up the territory vers, even though he was warned he would not
among themselves, and Serbia assigned itself ter- be safe in Bosnian territory.
ritory thatbrought it to the Adriatic shores, south The region was riddled with extremists who
of the Austro-Hungarian possessions. were supported by the Serbian government, and
This Austria-Hungary would not allow. A Ser- one of them was Gavrilo Princip (1894-1918), a
bia with a sea-coast would develop overseas Bosnian who had been trained in terrorism by a
trade and might gain the friendship of Great Brit- Serbian secret society. When Francis Ferdinand
ain. Therefore, Austria-Hungary insisted on the and his wife were being driven through Sarajevo,
formation of an independent Albania on the sea- the Bosnian capital, on June 28, 1914, Princip
coast. That would keep Serbia landlocked. Serbia made two assassination attempts.
The second
would have liked to have defied Austria-Hun- succeeded and both Francis Ferdinand and his
gary on this, but it needed Russian help if it were wife were killed. (Princip was arrested, tried, and
to do so, and Russia did not wish to risk a crisis since he was under 20 at the
time of the assassi-
over this matter. Serbia had to give in. nation, he could only be sentenced to 20 years'
Francis Ferdinand, the heir to the throne, was imprisonment. However, he died of tuberculosis
perturbed by the situation, and he was shrewd in prison, though he lived long enough to see the
enough to see that Austria-Hungary must make results of what he had done.)
some concession to the Slavs. What he had in The world was generally horrified at this act
mind was the conversion of the Dual Monarchy of terrorism, but it was, after all, only one of
into a Triple Monarchy, with the Slavic regions many assassinations that had taken place in the
ruling themselves as the Hungarians did. last quarter century, and no one thought that any
This, however, was something that the aged real crisis would come about as a result.
Emperor, Franz Joseph, would not allow, and on Austria-Hungary, however, felt that Francis
his side were, of course, the German-speaking Ferdinand's assassination would be a golden op-
conservatives. Nor was Serbia pleased with the portunity to settle scores with Serbia once and
suggestion. The last thing it wanted was for the for all, and to reduce it to impotence. There was
Slavs to be so well-treated that they would be little doubt anywhere, and certainly none in Aus-
willing to remain part of the Hapsburg mon- tria-Hungary, that the assassin had been inspired
archy. by Serbia, so the world ought to be satisfied to
In the Hungarian portion of the Dual Mon- see Serbia punished.
archy, Istvan Tisza (1861-1918) became Prime Austria-Hungary obtained the approval of
Minister in 1913. He was a strong supporter of Germany and set about preparing a harsh ulti-
the Dual Monarchy, and he was firm in his insis- matum to Serbia. At first, Tisza of Hungary op-
tence that Hungary rule its minorities with an posed the policy of crushing Serbia for fear it
would lead to the annexation of more Slavs, should it have more? Undoubtedly, it was that
which he was shrewd enough to see would be which inspired William ITs speech.
most undesirable. When Tisza was assured that France was willing to compensate Germany
no new territory would be annexed, he went elsewhere in Africa, but the German foreign min-
along with the planned ultimatum. ister, Alfred von Kideren-Wachter (1852-1912)
On July 23, 1914, Austria-Hungary handed its was foolishly belligerent over the matter and an
ultimatum to Serbia. In brief, Serbia was to cease unnecessary "Second Moroccan crisis" arose.
all Austro-Hungarian activities, and any Serbian On July 1, 1911, the German gunboat. Panther,
officials Austria-Hungary disapproved of were to was sent Moroccan seaport. The
to Agadir, a
be fired. What's more, Austrian officials would supposed reason for its visit was to protect Ger-
work in Serbia to find those responsible for the man interests, but it was actually intended to
outrage. Serbia had 48 hours to accept. frighten France. That it did, and France immedi-
Serbia answered within the time limit, and ac- ately appealed to Great Britain, which came to its
cepted almost everything. What it could not ac- side more strongly than it had done in the First
cept, it was willing to arbitrate. Moroccan crisis. For a while, war seemed immi-
The not-quite-complete acceptance suited nent, but Germany accepted sections of African
Austria-Hungary, since it didn't want a total ca- territory farther southand abandoned Morocco
pitulation from which Serbia might later wiggle to France —
which it might have done at the start.
out. Austria-Hungary wanted a short military in- To much of the German public and to the Ger-
vasion that would inflict enough damage on Ser- man military, it seemed another German failure,
bia to teach it a lesson and keep it quiet and Kideren-Wachter was widely criticized for
thereafter. For this, they had Germany's backing, not being sufficiently firm. Germany (like Russia
and they were convinced that the Russians after Bosnia-Herzegovina) made up its mind that
would back down, as they had in the case of itsimply couldn't back down any further. It ac-
Bosnia-Herzegovina celerated the buildup of both its army and- its
On July 28, 1914, therefore, Austria-Hungary navy, which made Great Britain, France, and
declared war on Serbia and
marked the be-
that Russia even more uneasy than they had been be-
ginning of a cataclysm of a kind that no one in fore.
the world (and certainly no one in Austria-Hun- To be sure, the Socialists, presumably a party
gary) could have foreseen. devoted to peace and to greater popular partici-
pation in the government, were becoming
stronger in Germany. In the Reichstag elections
GERMANY in January 1912, the Socialists actually became
Germany was touchy and uneasy. German fears the largest single party in the legislature. How-
of being encircled by Great Britain and France on ever, the Socialistshad toned down their revolu-
the west, and by Russia on the east, grew. Ger- tionary fervor, which was why they got as many
many felt it unfair that each of those powers con- votes as they did. The consequence was that they
trolled huge segments of the world's land area, could not effectively oppose the Emperor, his
while Germany possessed very little. On August puppet Prime Minister, and his powerful military
27, 1911, William II, in a speech in Hamburg, advisers.
said, "No one can dispute with us the place in Thus, in December 1913, in the town of Za-
the sun that is our due." That phrase "place in bern in Alsace, a German military officer made
the sun" had been repeated frequently in Ger- insulting remarks about Alsatians. There was a
many. riot as a result and German soldiers wounded
The place in the sun was, indeed, being de- some and arrested others. There was a
Alsatians
nied Germany. Thus, France was continuing to furor over the high-handed actions of the sol-
advance in Morocco, and Germany resented that. diers, and the Reichstag voted 293 to 55 to cen-
France already had so much of Africa; why, then. sure the army. The German government simply
1910 TO 1914 493
ignored the vote and no moves were taken to The result was that on September 14, 1911,
discipline the officers concerned. Other nations while at the theater with Tsar Nicholas II, Stoly-
noted the ineffectiveness of the opposition in pin was shot and killed by an assassin.
Germany and the absolute military control of the A fourth Duma was elected in 1912; however,
land. It created a thrill of hatred in France, which under the prevailing electoral procedures, it was
also decided it would not be safe to back down merely a tool of the government.
in any future crisis. Meanwhile, the Russian court was creating
When Francis Ferdinand was assassinated in scandal that (as in the days of Louis XVI and
June 1914, Germany couldn't possibly refuse to Marie Antoinette, a century and a quarter earlier)
back the only reliable ally it had. Germany had was further unsettling the nation.
to support Austria-Hungary's declaration of war The oldest son of Nicholas II, the Tsarevich
on Serbia, and even the Socialists went along Alexis, suffered from hemophilia (which was
with this for they saw the Russian autocracy as true of several members of royalty in the early
their real enemy. twentieth century, thanks to a gene apparently
In science in this period, Hans Wilhelm Geiger inherited from Queen Victoria of England). The
(1882-1945), while working in Great Britain, in- Tsarina Alexandra, a devoted mother, was heart-
—
vented a device the famous "Geiger counter" broken over the failure of medical men to handle
— which detected the passage of a single sub- the disease, which constantly threatened the
atomic particle. Tsarevich with pain and death.
Max Theodor Felix von Laue (1879-1960) dem- Then she found a Siberian mystic, Grigory Ye-
onstrated that crystals acted as natural diffraction fimovich Rasputin (1872-1916), a complete char-
gratings with separations so fine as to be of latan who, however, was able to relieve the
atomic size. This made it possible to measure the Tsarevich's conditions, when no one else could.
ultra-tinywavelengths of x-rays and prove they Though dirty, unkempt, ignorant, and sexually
were light-like radiations. It gained Laue a Nobel promiscuous, he became a favorite of the Em-
Prize. press and powerful in the government. His influ-
Richard (1872-1942) worked on
Willstatter ence was entirely for the worse, and even the
plant pigments and elaborated the technique of conservatives found themselves horrified over
paper chromatography for the separation of the the situation and yet powerless to do anything
complex mixture of pigments he encountered. about it.
He demonstrated the presence of a magnesium In 1913, Russia celebrated the 300th anniver-
atom in the molecule of chlorophyll and, for all sary of the coming to power of the Romanov dy-
of this,he eventually received a Nobel Prize. nasty — a last glow of glory.
Richard Strauss continued to be an active com- On July 20, 1914, after the assassination of
poser, producing the operas Rosenkavalier in Francis Ferdinand, the French president, Ray-
1911, and Ariadne anf Naxos in 1912. mond Poincare (1860-1934), and the French
Prime Minister, Rene Viviani (1863-1925), visited
St. Petersburg and seized the opportunity to dis-
RUSSIA cuss the Serbian crisis. They decided to act to-
Russia continued to be in a state of instability. gether, as neither nation felt it could back down.
Pyotr Stolypin, who had become Prime Minister Austria-Hungary waited till the French politi-
after the 1905Revolution had put down the dis- cians were back in their own land (hoping that
orders with a firm hand, had emasculated the separation in space would make it more difficult
Duma, and turned to naught all the hopes of a for France and Russia to reach a common ground
reasonable constitution. He pursued the leftist of action), and only then did it send its fateful
opposition mercilessly, and he continued the ultimatum to Serbia.
process of Russification in Finland and else- Meanwhile, in the world of science and cul-
where. ture, the Russian physicist, Konstantin Eduar-
dovich Tsiolkovsky (1857-1935), had been writ- Bill" was passed by the House of Commons. By
ing on rocketry since 1903. By this period, he had it, the House of Lords could not veto any reve-
developed his ideas in detail. He was the first nue bill, and any other bill that passed the House
scientist to work out the requirements for space- of Commons three times would become law even
flight in rigorous mathematical fashion. if the House of Lords voted against it. Finally,
Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (1882-1970) was the maximum term of a PM was reduced from
writing ballet music such as The Firebird (1910), seven to five years.
Petrushka (1911), and The Rite of Spring (1913). Naturally, the House of Lords voted against
Marc Chagall (1887-1985) began a fabulous ca- the and the old threat arose that enough new
bill
reer in art in this decade. Both Stravinsky and peers would be formed to pass it. The House of
Chagall, though Russian-born, did most of their Lords gave in and, from that time, it became
work in France. merely a debating society, while the House of
Commons became the only effective governing
body in the nation as a whole.
FRANCE There next arose the question of Irish home
Internally, France was plagued by strikes, and rule once again. An Irish Home Rule bill was
externally its attention was focused on the Sec- proposed in 1912. Opposed to it were not only
ond Moroccan and on the increasing atmo-
crisis the Conservatives, but, even more bitterly, the
sphere of tension between itself and Germany. northernmost counties of Ireland, which were
In 1913, France finally began to strengthen its heavily Protestant and which did not want to be
army over the objections of the more liberal par- abandoned Leading these
to a Catholic Ireland.
ties. "Unionists" (who wanted to maintain the union
After the assassination of Francis Ferdinand, with Great Britain) was Edward Henry Carson
France reached an agreement for common action (1854-1935). The controversy continued until the
with Russia, and made up its mind not to back assassination of Francis Ferdinand, after which
down in this new Balkan crisis. everything had to be suspended until the crisis
Meanwhile, in 1910, the French chemist, was resolved.
Georges Claude (1870—1960), discovered that In the field of science, Ernest Rutherford es-
electric discharges through the noble gases pro- tablished the fact, in 1911, that the atom con-
duced light. This was the beginning of what sisted of a tiny nucleus at the center with almost
came to be called “neon lights." allthe atomic mass, plus a cloud of light electrons
Maurice Ravel wrote the ballet Daphnis and in the atomic outskirts. In 1913, Frederick Soddy,
Chloe in 1912. worked out the concept of isotopes, showing that
Romain Rolland (1866-1944) wrote Jean Chris- the atoms of a particular element could come in
tophe and its sequels, completing the cycle in several varieties differing in mass. And in 1914,
1912, and eventually receiving a Nobel Prize in Henry Gwyn-Jeffries Moseley (1887-1915)
literature.Marcel Proust (1871-1922) began his worked out the concept of atomic number in
cycle of Remembrance of Things Past in 1913, with which each element had a nucleus with a char-
Swann's Way. acteristic positive electric charge. The isotopes of
a given element might differ in mass, but were
identical in nuclear charge. These three discov-
GREAT BRITAIN eries created the beginning of the modern picture
In Great Britain, the immediate problem was the of atomic structure.
House of Lords. It was unelected, unresponsive In 1913, the metallurgist, Henry P. Brearly, in-
to public opinion, aristocratic and reactionary by troduced "stainless steel" (i.e., steel that would
its very nature, and an insurmountable stum- not rust) by adding sufficient chromium and
bling block for all reform legislation. nickel to the mixture.
On May 15, 1911, therefore, a "Parliament In the biological sciences, the Polish-born
1910 TO 1914 495
biochemist, Casimir Funk (1884—1967), advanced ian naval forces also seized
Rhodes and other is-
the notion of “vitamins" as a necessary part of lands in its neighborhood (the "Dodecanese,"
the diet and, in fact, invented the name. meaning "twelve islands") that were Greek-
In literature, the indefatigable G.B. Shaw pro- speaking portions of the Ottoman Empire.
duced both Androcles and the Lion and Pygmalioji The Ottoman Empire was by now facing war
in 1912. David Herbert Lawrence (1885-1930) in the Balkan peninsula and it had to put an end
published Sons and Lovers in 1913. Gilbert Keith to the fight
with Italy. On October 15, 1912, a
Chesterton (1874-1936) published The Innocence treaty was signed at Ouchy in Switzerland,
of Father Brown in 1911, thus initiating one of the whereby the Ottoman Empire ceded Tripoli and
great mystery series of all time. Hector Hugh the Dodecanese to Italy.
Munro (1870-1916), writing under the pseud- This soothed Italian pride, even
victory
onym "Saki," produced witty short stories, of though it was carried through against negligible
which the best known is, perhaps, "The Open resistance. Nor did the victory keep strikes, riots,
Window." Pelham Grenville Wodehouse (1881- and various kinds of unrest from continuing to
1975) was becoming well-known in this decade plague the land.
for his light-hearted novels. In the crisis that followed the assassination of
Jacob Epstein (1880-1959) was now beginning Francis Ferdinand, Italy kept carefully aloof.
toproduce his powerful but (in the eyes of some) Meanwhile, though, Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari
uncouth sculptures. (1876-1940) was carrying on the Italian musical
tradition. He composed the opera Jewels of the
Madonna in 1911.
ITALY
Italy was also looking for its place in the sun.
Having failed humiliatingly in Ethiopia 15 years PAPACY
earlier, eye was now on Tripoli, which lay
its In the aftermath of the crisis over the assassina-
between French Algeria and British Egypt. It was tion of Francis Ferdinand, Pope Pius X appealed
mostly desert and its undesirability was such that for peace on August but died that same
2,
neither Great Britain nor France wanted it, but month.
left it Ottoman Empire.
to the
To Italy it seemed fair game, and it took ad-
vantage of the Second Morocco crisis to act while SERBIA
the major powers had their attention elsewhere After the Bosnia-Herzegovina crisis, Serbia was
On September 28, 1911, Italy sent an ultima- ready to go to any lengths to sate its anti-Austro-
tum to the Ottoman Empire demanding a cessa- Hungarian feelings. It was even willing to form
tion of any attempts to interfere with Italian an alliance with Bulgaria, with which it ordinarily
The Ottomans naturally
infiltration of the region. felt in hostile competition. Russia, which was
rejected this and on September 29, Italy declared eager to arrange trouble for Austria-Hungary,
what is called the "Tripolitan war." By October backed the alliance.
11, Italian forces had occupied the coastal towns The difficulty was that while Serbia wanted
of the land. (Austria-Hungary must have seen the alliance to be aimed against Austria-Hun-
the effectiveness of this ploy of impossible ulti- gary, Bulgaria wanted it to be against the Otto-
matum, followed by quick war, with no outside man Empire.The Tripolitan war made the
interference. Presumably, they felt the same Ottoman Empire look particularly weak, and that
would happen to Serbia as to Tripoli.) settled the matter on Bulgaria's side.
Italy consolidated its coastal gains, and it was On October 8, 1912, Montenegro declared war
not till 1912 that it sent its forces into the interior. on the Ottoman Empire, the smallest Balkan
By October, the had a clear-cut victory
Italians state initiating the action as a gesture of defiance.
over greatly outnumbered Ottoman forces. Ital- On October 18, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Greece all
joined Montenegro and the "First Balkan War" and Alexander had to face the deadly crisis that
had begun. followed.
By the end of the year it was clear that the
Ottoman Empire was losing all along the line
and, on May 30, 1913, the Treaty of London BULGARIA
ended the conflict, with the Ottoman Empire Bulgaria, having done well Balkan
in the First
forced to give upremaining territory in
all its War, was defeated disastrously in the Second. It
Europe except for the area immediately around retired to nurse its wounds and to wait its chance
Constantinople. for revenge against Serbia. It did not, however,
The victors, however, immediately fell afoul take advantage of the crisis that followed the as-
of each other over the division of the spoils. Bul- sassination of Francis Ferdinand to act immedi-
garia, having won some startling victories, tried ately. It continued to wait.
togather in the lion's share of Macedonia. Serbia
might have allowed that if it could have gained
Albania and an outlet to the sea. Austria-Hun- GREECE
gary was adamant, however, on the indepen- Greece did well in the two Balkan wars, gaining
dence of Albania and on Serbia remaining Thessaly, including the important seaport of Sa-
landlocked. Serbia, therefore, had to make sure lonika in the north, and forcing the Ottoman Em-
grow too strong.
that Bulgaria didn't pire to recognize Crete's union with Greece.
On June 1, 1913, Serbia came to an agreement About the only unfavorable development was
with Greece, which also didn't want a too-strong that, in 1912, Italy had gained the Dodecanese
Bulgaria; on June 29, they attacked Bulgaria and from the Ottoman Empire, and Greece had now
the "Second Balkan War" began. Bulgaria, hav- no immediate hope of getting them. Greece
ing strained itself badly in the first war, could not would surely have annexed those islands had
withstand the attack, particularly since Romania they remained in Ottoman hands.
joined in, attacking from the north as Serbia at- On March 18, 1913, George I of Greece was
tacked from the west and Greece from the south. assassinated and was succeeded by his son, who
Even the Ottoman Empire joined in, attacking reigned as Constantine I (1868-1923).
Bulgaria from the east. It was all over on August
10, 1913, with the Treaty of Bucharest.
had to give up its extreme claims, and
Bulgaria ROMANIA
annexed only modest amounts of previously Ot- Romania seized the opportunity of the Second
toman territory, including the province of Thrace Balkan War in 1913 to join the anti-Bulgarian side
which gave it an opening to the Aegean Sea. and to gain a narrow strip of territory in the Bul-
Greece expanded northward and Serbia south- garian northeast as a result.
ward. Montenegro gained a strip of territory,
too, and Albania's independence was recog-
nized. The Ottoman Empire regained Adriano- ALBANIA
ple.
The independence of Albania was recognized by
Serbia and Montenegro, closely had
allied, the Treaty of London at the conclusion of the
doubled in size in less than a year, something First Balkan War in 1913.
Austria-Hungary did not like.
On June 24, 1914, Peter I of Serbia, whose
mental health was clearly making it impossible OTTOMAN EMPIRE
for him to rule, stepped down and his son, Alex-
Disasters continued for the Ottoman Empire. Be-
ander (1888-1934) was declared regent. Four tween 1911 and 1913, it lost Tripoli to Italy, and
days later, Francis Ferdinand was assassinated. Macedonia to the various Balkan nations. The
1910 TO 1914 497
Ottoman Empire was driven out of Africa at last

and almost out of Europe, some five and a half SPAIN
centuries after it had first left Asia and began to The Liberals were running Spain in this period.
take over portions of the neighboring continents.
The power of the Church was firmly limited, and
The loss of the Tripolitan War and the First freedom of religion was guaranteed for non-
Balkan War coup by the Young Turks on
led to a Catholics. The Liberal Prime Minister, Jose Ca-
January 23, 1913, and Enver Bey became the most nalejas yMendez (1854-1912), was, however, as-
powerful person in the Empire. That led to some sassinated on November 12, 1912, and the next
lightening of disaster for, in the Second Balkan year the Conservatives were back in power.
War, the Ottoman Empire retook Adrianople, The outstanding Spanish writer of the period
and kept it. was Miguel de Unamuno y Jugo (1864-1936), a
The Germans had long been engaged in train- philosopher and an outspoken republican.
ing the Ottoman armed forces and naturally
gained influence there as a result. In November
1913, a German general, Otto Liman von Sanders PORTUGAL
(1855—1929), was in charge of the Ottoman The new Portuguese republic seethed with un-
forces. The Russians were indignant at this, and
rest, since it turned out that the mere
substitu-
the French supported them, but it did little good. tion of a republic for a monarchy did not
In the crisis following the assassination of Francis
automatically solve all problems.
Ferdinand, the Ottoman Empire was virtually in
German hands.
SWITZERLAND
Switzerland was quiet in this period.
NETHERLANDS A Swiss chemist, J. Edwin Brandenberger,
The Netherlands was quiet in this period, except first produced the transparent wrapping mate-
for continued controversy over universal suffrage cellophane, in 1912.
rial, The Swiss painter, Paul
and secular education. Klee (1879-1940), was becoming prominent in
The Dutch physicist, Kamerlingh Onnes, who this period.
had earlier liquefied helium, discovered in 1911
that such metals as mercury and lead lost all elec-
trical resistance at temperatures of liquid helium DENMARK
— thus, discovering the entirely unexpected phe- Frederick VIII of Denmark died on May 14, 1912,
nomenon of superconductivity. and was succeeded by his son, who reigned as
Christian X (1870-1947). Christian X was the
older brother of Haakon VII of Norway.
BELGIUM In 1913, the Danish physicist, Niels Henrik
As in the
Netherlands, Belgium's problems of the David Bohr (1885-1962), applied quantum theory
period lay chiefly in the matter of universal suf- to the structure of the hydrogen atom. He
frage and secular education. showed that only certain orbits were possible for
The continuing and worsening friction be- the electron, and that shifting an electron from
tween France on the west and Germany on the orbit to orbit absorbed or emitted fixed amounts
east caused a certain uneasiness in Belgium. De- of energy. This made sense of spectral lines.
spite the fact that its policy of neutrality had been Also in 1913, Ejner Hertzsprung (1873-1967)
guaranteed by both France and Germany (and worked out the actual distance of certain Ce-
Great Britain, too), the Belgian government was pheid stars for the first time. This began the pro-
nervous enough to increase the size of its army cesswhereby the true scale of the Universe could
on August 30, 1913. be worked out.
lawyer, William Morgan Shuster (1877-1960),

SWEDEN who had handled the customs in the Philippines
Sweden was peaceful under Gustavus V, and after the Philippine Insurrection had been
continued to liberalize its government. quelled. Now he had arrived in Persia to put its
finances in order.
This was something
NORWAY They preferred
the Russians didn't want.
chaos so that they
a Persia in
Norway, as an independent power, continued to might freely interfere. In 1912, Shuster had to
be at peace, with a liberal government under leave, and the Russians remained in virtual con-
Haakon VII. trol of Persia until the assassination of Francis
Ferdinand.
EGYPT
Egypt was under the supervision of H. H. Kitch-
ener, who had reconquered the Sudan and who CHINA
had then served in India as commander-in-chief
After the death of the Dowager Empress, noth-
of the forces there.
ing could save the Ch'ing Dynasty. Anything at
He ruled Egypt with an iron hand, keeping
all would serve to set off an explosion, and what
the viceroy, Abbas II, from exerting any real
did it was an Imperial move in 1911 to nationalize
power. In fact. Kitchener was about to depose
the railroads. might have been considered a
It
Abbas II for his attempts to rally nationalist feel-
sensible move, but it roused the opposition of all
ing, when the assassination of Francis Ferdi-
the local chieftains who were running the rail-
nand, and what followed, swallowed up
roads at a considerable profit.
everything else.
Insurrections began in different places which
the confused central government, under a child
ETHIOPIA Emperor, could not handle. Sun Yat-sen, who
Menelek, who had preserved Ethiopia's indepen- was in the United States at the time, heard of the
dence against Italy, had suffered strokes that had disorders and hastened back to China, where he
made regency necessary. On May 15, 1911, his
a was elected provisional president of the revolu-
grandson, Lij lyasu (1896-1935), was proclaimed tionary regime.
Emperor, though Menelek lived on until 1913. Lij Sun Yat-sen had no army at his disposal, how-
lyasu had no capacity for the post. ever, and to find one, he had to deal with Yuan
Shih-k'ai (1859-1916), who had served the Em-
press Dowager well and who was the only
LIBERIA Chinese military leader to show any ability at all
Liberia was the only independent nation in Af- in the war with Japan and in the Boxer rebellion.
rica at this time, except for Ethiopia. It was, how- On February child-Emperor ab-
12, 1912, the
ever, virtually bankrupt. The United States, dicated and the Manchu rule came to an end after
which had an interest in it since it had been three centuries. In order to preserve unity. Sun
founded by American slaves, stepped in with fi- yat-sen resigned on February 13, and the next
nancial aid, and an international loan was ar- day Yuan Shih-k'ai became the first President of
ranged in June 1912. Liberia was an American the Chinese Republic.
protectorate at this time. Yuan Shih-k'ai was, in his own eyes, simply
an elected Emperor, however. Sun Yat-sen was
forced to flee to Japan and Yuan Shih-k'ai as-
PERSIA sumed dictatorial power over China. An attempt
The United States made an early appearance in at democracy had failed, or to be truthful, had
the Middle East, in the person of an American not even truly begun.
1910 TO 1914 499
president and who had decided he had made

JAPAN a
mistake letting it go.
The industrialization of Japan continued, but La Follette founded what came to be called a
there were no startling foreign policy
coups for "Progressive Party" on January 21, 1911, and it
some time after the end of the Russo-Japanese was clear thathe was going to try to run for pres-
war. On July 30, 1912, Mutsohito, whose reign ident in 1912. However, with Roosevelt suddenly
name was "Maiji," died and was succeeded by available, the Progressives turned to him.
his son, Yoshihito (1879—1926). His reign name The Progressives demanded all the new dem-
was "Taisho." ocratic procedures such as initiative, referen-
Japan, like Germany, was beginning to build dum, recall, primaries, direct election of
a new navy, one with a number of dreadnoughts,
Senators, recognition of labor unions, abolition
with which it could, when the time came, chal- of monopolies, and conservation of resources.
lenge the western powers. They nominated Roosevelt, while the organiza-
tion Republicans nominated Taft. The Democrats
nominated Wilson.
PHILIPPINES Against the Republicans' split vote, Wilson
On June 1, 1913, English became the won, with Taft running third (the only time in
official lan-
guage of the Philippines. American history when a sitting president was
outvoted by each of two rivals). Wilson became
the 28th President of the United States in 1913.
Even, before Wilson was inaugurated, the six-
UNITED STATES teenth amendment to the Constitution was rati-
Almost from the start. President Taft was in trou- on February 25, 1913. This permitted a direct
fied
ble. He didn't have the flamboyance and cha-
income tax, which, previously, the Supreme
risma of Theodore Roosevelt, and his Court had held to be unconstitutional. It began
conservatism didn't sit well with the more liberal the process of placing the tax-burden on the
Republicans of the midwest. A new tariff bill, shoulders of those best able to afford it, and to
passed at the beginning of Taft's administration, supply the government with enough income to
kept prices of imported goods high for the bene- undertake many socially important tasks.
fit of Eastern industrialists, and did nothing for Since the beginning of the Republic, Senators
almost anyone else. had been chosen by state legislatures, which
In this period, the American territory between were usually under the control of political ma-
Canada and Mexico was finally filled with states. chines, sometimes conservative, sometimes cor-
Oklahoma had entered the Union as a state on rupt, often both. Would-be senators, if they had
November 16, 1907. On
January 6, 1912, New money, could easily bribe legislators, so that the
Mexico became a state, and on February 14, 1912, Senate became a rich man's club dedicated to the
Arizona did. The United States now consisted of protection of the rich, and utterly indifferent to a
48 states, plus overseas possessions, the most public opinion that could neither elect nor re-
important of which were Alaska, Hawaii, Puerto move them.
Rico, and the Philippines. The seventeenth amendment to the constitu-
As Taft's administration came to a close, the tion, adopted on May 31, 1913, directed that all
anti-Taft insurgents within the Republican party Senators were to be elected by the vote of the
had as Robert Marion La Follette
their leader people, and for the first time Congress became a
(1855-1925), a senator from Wisconsin. Among democratic body.
the Democrats, a new leader arose in Woodrow Wilson also reformed the banking industry,
Wilson (1856-1924), who was a reform governor and a Federal Reserve System was set up on De-
of New Jersey. Complicating the situation was cember 23, 1913 that could regulate banks and
Theodore Roosevelt himself, who missed being control interest rates.
Labor was continuing to advance. Its most basis. Most important of all, an International Ice
radical arm was the Industrial Workers of the Patrol was established, in order to report, contin-
World (I.W.W.), known as the "Wobblies," ually, on the location of all icebergs in the North
which had been founded in 1905, and which by Atlantic traffic lanes.
1912 had reached a membership of 100,000 and Technology ^had its triumphs, too. The Wool-
was able to win a spectacular strike against the worth Building was completed in lower Manhat-
textile mills of Lawrence, Massachusetts. tan in 1912. It was by far the most spectacular
Labor had its martyrs. The Swedish-born Joel skyscraper that had yet been built, being 792 feet
Hagglund (1879-1915), usually known as '']oe tall.
Hill," was a labor leader and a songwriter who Motion pictures were becoming very popular.
firstused the expression "pie in the sky" as a Producers discovered that the individual actors
way of urging people not to endure oppression and actresses were idolized and that the public
on earth in the hope of a glorious hereafter. He would more readily flock to those films in which
was arrested in 1914 on a trumped-up murder they were featured. In this way, Mary Pickford
charge and was eventually executed. (1893-1979), Douglas Fairbanks (1883-1939), and
On a larger scale there was the case of a fire in Charles Chaplin (1889-1977) became the first
the Triangle Shirtwaist factory in New York on movie "stars." Another device for dragging in
March 25, 1911. It was a "sweatshop" in which the public was the cliffhanging serials, episodes
immigrant girls worked under conditions closely of which could be seen at weekly intervals. Pearl
akin to slavery. The doors were locked; no escape White (1889-1938) became famous in The Perils of
was possible; and 146 people, mostly young Pauline, a serial of this sort, produced in 1914.
women, were trapped and burned to death. The James Francis ("Jim") Thorpe (1886-1953) was
outrage at the callous brutality of the factory- a star of another sort, perhaps the greatest all-
owners helped push the demand for reforms. round athlete we have record of. He won spec-
A different kind of arrogance was marked off tacularly in the decathlon and the pentathlon at
for tragedy, too. The largest and most luxuri- the 1912 Olympic Games, but he later had his
ous oceanliner ever built up to that time, the Brit- medals taken away because of a trivial point over
ish ship Titanic, was on maiden voyage
its his amateur status. (It was easier, it seems, to be
from Southampton to New York. It had a double- puritanical with respect to him, since he was a
bottomed hull divided into sixteen separate Native American and therefore a member of an
watertight compartments. Four of these could underclass.)
be flooded and the remaining twelve would Treated as badly was Margaret Louise Sanger
stillkeep the ship afloat, so that the ship was (1879-1966) who, in this period, invented the
boastfully proclaimed to be unsinkable. phrase "birth control," and preached its tenets.
Shortly before midnight on April 14, 1912, the For doing this, she was vilified, persecuted, and
Titanic struck an iceberg, and five of its compart- subjected to the penalties of the law.
ments were slashed open. In two and a half On a lighter note, the foxtrot became a popu-
hours it sank, with a loss of 1513 lives, including dance
lar and the first crossword puzzle
in 1913,
many prominent Americans. was published that same year. The first elastic
Many errors were involved. The ship was bras were designed in 1914, and these eventually
going too fast in an effort to make a record run; freed women from the discomfort of corsets.
there were only enough lifeboat spaces for half As a testimony to the heedlessness of human
the people aboard and there had been no lifeboat beings, the last passenger pigeon in existence
ship close enough to help in time had no
drills; a
died in 1914, though these birds had flown across
radio operator on duty. the sky in countless millions in the previous cen-
As a result, new regulations were established tury.
for lifeboats and for lifeboat drills. Radio watch In science, Robert Andrews
Millikan (1868-
was to be maintained on all ships on a 24-hour 1953) had, in 1911, determined the electric charge
1910 TO 1914 501
on a single electron and, for the feat, was to win Irving Berlin wrote hismajor hit song,
first
a Nobel Prize. Elmer Verner McCollum (1879-
"Alexander's Ragtime Band," in 1911; Jerome
1967) discovered a vitamin present in some fats David Kern (1885-1945) wrote his first musical
in 1913. He began the habit of lettering the vita-
comedy score in 1912; and William Christopher
mins, calling his discovery "Vitamin A" and the Handy wrote his immortal "St. Louis Blues" in
one discovered by Ejkman, 17 years earlier "Vi- 1914.
tamin B." John Singer Sargent (1856-1925) was the out-
The life of electric light bulbs was greatly ex- standing American painter of the period; and
tended when William David Coolidge (1873- Reuben Lucius ("Rube") Goldberg (1883-1970)
1975) devised a method for drawing tungsten began to make his name part of the English lan-
into fine wires. Tungsten is very high-melting guage with his cartoon drawings of simple feats
and lasts far longer than any of the filaments performed by impossibly complicated mechani-
used in bulbs up to that time. Irving Langmuir cal means.
(1881-1957) extended the life even further by fill-
ing the bulbs with nitrogen rather than leaving it
in vacuum. In this period then, electric lights be- CANADA
came far more practical for everyday use. Canada's ambivalent attitude toward Great Brit-
George Washington Carver (1864-1943), who ain was shown in 1913, when a bill to contribute
was born a slave, was working as an agricultural toward the building of three dreadnaughts for
chemist in this period, pointing the way toward the British navy was defeated in the legislature.
the manufacture of many types of useful by-
products from such crops as peanuts and sweet
potatoes. MEXICO
Charles Franklin Kettering (1876-1958) intro- After having ruled Mexico with an iron hand for
duced the electric self-starter in
automobiles in 34 years, Porfirio Diaz was finally slipping. A
1912. This eventually did away with the difficult, Mexican liberal, Francisco Indalecio Madero
and sometimes dangerous, hand-crank, and (1873-1913), clamoring for social reforms and for
made it easy for automobiles to be driven even justice for the oppressed peasants, tried to run
by those who were not in prime strength. It was against Diaz for president in 1910, and was im-
with this innovation that the automobile became prisoned.
truly universal. Madero managed to escape, fled to Texas,
Willis Haviland Carrier (1876-1950) developed gathered funds and supporters, and set up a
the first modern
air-conditioning unit in 1911. A rebel government in Mexico in May 1911. Diaz
Swedish-born inventor, Gideon Sundback, pro- was finally forced to resign and went into exile in
duced the first slide-fastener (or "zipper") in Paris, where he stayed for the rest of his life.
1912. Diaz's exit meant a free-for-all among Mexican
Wharton wrote Etha?i Frame
Edith in 1911. generals for control of the nation, and events
Zane Grey (1875-1939) was beginning to write quickly slipped out of Madero's hands.
his popular series of western adventures with The winning general, Victoriano Huerta
Riders of the Purple Sage, published in 1912. (1854-1916), who had fought with Madero till
Vachel Lindsay (1879-1931) published "Gen- Diaz was overthrown, now wanted the power for
eral Booth Enters Heaven" in 1913, and "The himself. He had Madero arrested and, on Febru-
Congo" in 1914. Pound (1885-1972)
Ezra Loomis ary 22, 1913, had him killed. He then announced
and Amy Lowell (1874-1925) became known as himself as President of Mexico just as Wilson was
Imagist poets. Robert Lee Frost (1874-1963) pub- becoming the American President.
lished his poems, and Alfred Joyce Kilmer
first It was the universal custom among the nations
(1886-1918) published his unaccountably popu- of the world (including the United States) to rec-
lar "Trees" in 1913. ognize as legitimate any government that was in
effective control of a nation. The European pow-

ers had all quickly recognized Madero's rule, and NICARAGUA
now they recognized Huerta's rule just as Nicaragua was suffering the common Latin-
quickly. American problem of having debts it couldn't
Wilson refused to go along. He admired Ma- pay, so by the Roosevelt Corollary, American of-
dero, considered Huerta a butcher, and refused ficials took charge of the customs, with American
torecognize the latter's presidency. That initi- marines to guard them, of course. In July, 1912,
ated the American policy of refusing to recognize civil war broke out in Nicaragua, and American
governments on high moral grounds, a policy forces, on the spot, saw to it that a conservative
that sometimes needlessly complicated American candidate, Adolfo Diaz (1874-1964), was elected.
foreign policy.
The mere act of nonrecognition did not hurt
Huerta. If anything,
helped him, for Mexicans
it HONDURAS
naturally thought there must be something good In this period, American forces were also in Hon-
about a man who had earned American disap- duras to protect American interests in the face of
proval. Wilson, therefore, had to take amore ac- a civil war.
tive part in Mexican disorders, and support some
general who would oppose Huerta. His choice
fell on Venustiano Carranza (1859-1920), who PANAMA
was rebelling against Huerta, and American On more constructive
a note, the Panama Canal
arms flowed in Carranza's direction. was opened on August though the oc-
15, 1914,
This set up a delicate situation. Four sailors currence of occasional landslides kept it from
from an American warship were in Vera Cruz on being used to the full. Because of the situation in
an innocent errand, and were arrested but — Europe, the formal opening did not take place for
were immediately released, when it was found some years.
out who they were.
Wilson, however, wakened in the middle of
the and apprised of this "crisis," was
night ANTARCTICA
caught up in a sudden fury. At his orders, Vera Roald Amundsen, who had managed to com-
Cruz was bombarded and occupied on April 21, plete theNorthwest Passage a few years earlier,
1914, and, in the course of this, 400 Mexicans was now making preparations for his attempt to
were killed. All Latin-America was horrified at reach the South Pole. He planned to use dogs,
the action and even Carranza had to protest, or which could eat the food brought for human
face a loss of all support within Mexico. beings, and which could eat each other at need.
Nevertheless, Huerta was forced to resign on Robert Scott was also making the attempt, but he
July 15, 1914, and Carranza became President, used ponies, which required that bales of hay be
which was an ending that seemed happy for the brought along, and which died eventually, so
moment. that the men had to pull the sledges themselves.
Meanwhile, Europe, Austria-Hungary was
in Amundsen reached the South Pole on Decem-
on the point of sending its ultimatum to Serbia, ber 14, 1911, and returned safely. Scott reached
but neither the United States nor Mexico saw it on January 17, 1912, only to find
Amundsen's
much reason to be concerned over what might be marker already there. He and his party died in a
happening on the other side of the ocean. blizzard on the way back.
1914 TO 1920 503
1914 TO 1920
gust 1914. Germany did not hesitate todo this.
GERMANY It
1,
had accepted the fact for years that war would

When Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, eventually come and it had seemed to many Ger-
there was a chance that if Russia backed down, mans that if the war were delayed too long, the
Serbia would be quickly defeated, would have to encircling enemy powers would grow too strong
stop its anti-Austro-Hungarian activities, and to be defeated quickly. The war might, therefore,
everything would be quiet. just as well come now, and it should perhaps
Germany's role in this would be to make cer- have come sooner.
tain that Russia did not intervene. Russia, how- A declaration of war on Russia, however, was
ever, was in a terrible dilemma. It was by no not enough. There was France to the west, which
means ready for war, but it had backed down too was required by treaty to come to Russia's aid.
often, and it felt it could not afford to do so again. France might flinch at the last minute, but Ger-
It would have to take some action, if it were not many couldn't count on that. Germany had to
to look like a pitiful paper tiger. However, in assume the worst and act in accordance.
order to do something effective, and to make In fact, Germany had long made its plan for
sure it could resist if the Germans took the Aus- how to fight a two-front war against both France
tro-Hungarian side, Russia would have to mo- and Russia, in accordance with the strategy
bilize its army. worked out by Alfred von Schlieffen (1833-1913).
Therefore, Russia, after some hours of hesita- According to the "Schlieffen plan," the German
tion, began to mobilize. The trouble was, army was to come smashing through the Neth-
though, that because of Russia's huge size, its erlands and Belgium into northern France, turn-
lack of an efficient rail network, and the general ing on a hinge at the Alps, gathering in Paris and
inefficiencyand incapacity of its governmental trapping the French army. The French would be
apparatus, it would take Russia weeks, if not destroyed in a matter of weeks, and Germany
months, to mobilize. could then turn and tackle the Russian giant
Germany now had to make a quick decision. which would not, even then, have completed its
It was wedded to the notion of the "Blitzkrieg," mobilization. This could not be done in reverse,
the lightning war. This had worked under Bis- for while Germany was bludgeoning the Rus-
marck against Denmark, against Austria, and sians slowly into submission, France would have
then against France, and it should work now. time to prepare a strong counteroffensive.
If Germany struck quickly at Russia before it Therefore, as soon as Germany declared war
was mobilized, that bumbling nation could easily on Russia, it prepared to attack France. On Au-
be brought down. On the other hand, if Ger- gust 3, 1914, Germany declared war on France
many waited till Russia was completely mobi- and its army was already on the move.
lized, the sheer mass of Russian soldiery might Great Britain was hesitating. Its alliance with
be difficult to move, and although many defeats France and Russia made it necessary for it to join
might be inflicted upon the Russians, matters the war, but since the Battle of Waterloo, a cen-
would develop into a slow, bloody war, which tury earlier, it had engaged in only one land war
was what the Germans didn't want. in Europe and that was a minor one. The British
Germany sent an ultimatum to
Therefore, were reluctant to plunge into a major land war.
Russia, demanding that its mobilization cease. Yet the Germans had already pushed into Bel-
This was what Russia dared not do. When it re- gium, whose neutrality it (along with France and
fused, Germany declared war on Russia on Au- Great Britain) had guaranteed.
British
public opinion, already anti-German shut. Moltke, however, couldn't bring himself to
enough, was horrified at the wanton violation of allow any German territory to be lost, so he
Belgian neutrality, and the effect was made strengthened the southern wing at the cost of
worse when the German Chancellor, Bethmann- weakening the northern wing, which was to do
Hollweg, expressed surprise, with typical Impe- the swinging.
rial German insensitivity, Great Britain
that Even so, the Schlieffen plan seemed to be
should be making a fuss about "a scrap of working. On August 4, German
had forces
paper," as he termed the neutrality agreement. poured into Belgium, and within 10 days they
Great Britain declared war on Germany on had reached the French frontier, while French
August 4, 1914, and Austria-Hungary declared attempts at an offensive further south were
war on Russia on August 6, 1914. stopped in their tracks.
An assassination, then (like a score of others On August 14, German forces moved into
that had taken place in these decades) to which
France and the French soldiers were being beaten
was added the Austro-Hungarian desire for a as thoroughly as the Belgian soldiers were.
small, quick war it really didn't need, led to a The British had sent troops across the Channel
catastrophe. Add to this the further addition of and, on August 23, 1914, these met the Germans
an inability of the great powers to risk the loss of at Mons in Belgium near the French frontier.
face that would come with backing down, and
Un-
like the other combatants. Great Britain
did not
you had World War I, in which every European have a large conscript army, but those it did have
participant, winners and losers alike, was to lose
were very well-trained. They fought all the
enormously. harder because William II, with his unfailing feel
Meanwhile, however, Germany was attack- for the wrong phrase, had referred to Great Brit-
ing, and all depended on how well the Schlieffen ain s contemptible army." The army called
little
plan would work. The chances are that it would
itself the "Old Contemptibles" and
fought like
have worked exactly as planned, but it was tink-
fiends. Nevertheless, the Germans were
ered with and ruined by the German army chief,
unstop-
pable and the British had to retreat.
Helmuth Johannes Ludwig von Moltke (1848-
Moltke continued to make mistakes. Overes-
1916). He was the nephew of the Moltke who
timating the German advance in the north and
had run the Prussian army in Bismark's time, but
overjoyed at the Germans throwing back the
he lacked his uncle's genius.
French in the south, he sent more troops south-
In the first place, he decided to avoid
harming ward. Hearing also that the Russians, unpre-
British sensibilities by not invading the
Nether- pared though they were, were attacking in the
lands, and by confining himself to
Belgium east in loyal support of the French, he
alone. As detached
happened, Belgium was enough to
it
two army corps from the western front and sent
drive Great Britain into war, so Moltke
gained them eastward. They didn't arrive in the east in
nothing by this move. Actually, he lost, for
the time to influence the battle there, and their
German army was forced to squeeze through the ab-
sence had an important effect in the west,
narrow Belgian border and lost speed in conse- where
Moltke had gradually whittled the strength of the
quence.
swinging gate from 16 army corps to 11.
Second, the original plan had called for a weak
Even the German army, efficient as it was,
line of defense in the south, where
it was actually could run out of steam, and as August drew
hoped that France to a
would strike and advance. A close, that army,
French success there would draw more
after a month of continuous ad-
troops to vance, was gasping. Boththe French and the
the spot, to the weakening of the
all-important British, while unable actually to
northern end of the line, and would add stop the Ger-
those mans, were damage. Moltke's unin-
inflicting
additional French troops to the bag that
would spired leadership, moreover, was allowing
be closed as the German army wheeled gaps
itself to exist between different army
corps partly —
1914 TO 1920 505
through lack of proper communications and through, for the most part, with military stupid-
partly because there were fewer army corps lined ity), was insane all the way through.
up along the front than there should have been. After the Battle of the Marne, each side ex-
Already, seemed that Germany would be
it tended its northward in an attempt to out-
line
unable to sweep its armies past Paris, and that flank the other. By the end of 1914, a continuous
they were curving in such a way as to fall short. line bulging into northeastern France had been
The French commander-in-chief, Joseph established from the Swiss border to the English
Jacques Cesair Joffre (1852-1931), ably assisted Channel. Both sides had dug down into the long-
by Joseph Simon Gallieni (1849-1916), planned a est, bloodiest stalemate ever seen. Each side had
counterattack devised to take advantage of the suffered a million casualties by the time 1914 was
gap between two of the German army corps. The over, and that was only the beginning.
battle was fought at the Marne River, only 20 Meanwhile, what was Germany doing in the
miles northeast of Paris, for the seven bloody east?
days from September 5 to September 12, 1914. The French had on the Russians to in-
called
The Germans were stopped at last and thrown vade Germany at once; and Russia, largely un-
back. prepared, did so, displaying loyalty and
The Germans weren't thrown back far, but the stupidity in equal measures. Two armies, one
momentum of their advance had been stopped. under Pavel Karlovich Rennenkampf (1854-1918)
The Battle of the Marne was actually the decisive and the other under Aleksandr Vasilievich Sam-
battle of the war, and the most decisive since sonov (1859-1914), invaded East Prussia.
Waterloo. Had the Germans won it, they would Two German generals were sent eastward to
probably have taken Paris, and it is likely that take care of the invasion, when the general on
France would have had to give up. The Germans the spot proved inadequate. One was Paul von
would then have turned their full force on Russia Hindenburg (1847-1934), who was called out of
and driven it into collapse, and a peace with retirement for the purpose. The other was Erich
Great Britain, made to Germany's benefit, might Friedrich Wilhelm Ludendorff (1865-1937), who
then have been patched up. had shown great ability in the march through
Since the Germans were defeated, the light- Belgium.
ning war was lost. The Germans might still win It was however formidable the Rus-
clear that
— indeed, the odds seemed still in their favor sian armies seemed, they were ill-equipped, and
but now it would be a long war, which the Ger- their leaders were so naive as to send uncoded
mans hadn't planned on and didn't want. In messages back and forth so that the Germans
hindsight, it might have been well for Germany knew what they were doing at all times. Further-
if it had now tried to negotiate a peace asking more, a German officer. Max Hoffman (1869-
only endurable gains. The trouble was that both 1927), happened to know that the two generals
sides had worked themselves into such hatreds leading the Russian armies hated each other, and
(even before the war had started) that no peace would never cooperate.
was possible except on draconic terms, so that The Germans attacked Samsonov's army at
the war had to go on till one side was so beaten Tannenberg and, between August 26 and 30,
as to be forced to accept total defeat. 1914, completely defeated it, taking more than
Yet in only a month had
of war, each side 100,000 prisoners. Rennenkampf made no move
suffered about half a million casualties. Such to help and Samsonov, in despair, shot himself.
losses would not have been dreamed of even in On September 9-14, 1914, another German
a long war of the type fought against Napoleon. force under August von Mackenson (1849-1945)
To accept such losses in so short a time, and to annihilated Rennenkampf's army, taking 125,000
continue fighting, was insane; but World War I, prisoners. The German losses in the two battles
which started over very little (and was carried were negligible.
These hammerblows at the Russians assured stupidly. It was

the Charge of the Light Brigade
the Germans of never having their home territory expanded to cosmic proportions.
threatened from the east again for the duration During the year, the Germans added to the
of the war. The Russians never quite recovered, horror of war by initiating the use of poison gas.
and though they continued to fight in their usual The Second Battle of Ypres was fought from
stolid, unrelenting manner, they almost always
April 22 to May 25, 1915. On the first day, the
fought on the defensive, expecting defeat. Germans sent a cloud of chlorine gas from some
Nevertheless, this Russian advance into
initial 5000 cylinders rolling over the Allied lines. Those
East Prussia, had, in a way, won the war. It had lines collapsed, of course, but the Germans were
frightened Moltke into sending two corps east-
completely surprised by the unexpected success
ward from the western front. By the time those of the tactic. They were caught flat-footed and
corps arrived, two battles of annihilation
the were not prepared to plunge forward for a break-
were over and they were not needed, but their through, especially since plunging forward
lack in the west probably made just possible for would have placed
it
their own men within the poi-
the Allies to win the Battle of the Marne. son cloud. Quickly, the Allies prepared poison
But now that Germany faced a long war, gas of their own and both sides devised gas
which it had not planned for, ithad to improvise masks. Poison gas was horrifying, but never de-
a decision as to how to fight it. Should they make cisive, as a weapon of war.
their major push against France or against Rus- On the eastern front during 1915, the Ger-
sia? Moltke had been fired, and the new com- mans managed to fight their way through Poland
mander-in-chief, Erich Georg Anton Sebastian and, by the end of the year, had all of Poland and
von Falkenhayn (1861-1922), felt that the deci-
Lithuania. That the Russians were not com-
sion would be reached in the west and wanted
pletely defeated was through the efforts of
the
the major effort there.
Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolayevich (1856-1929),
Hindenberg and Ludendorff, however, a first cousin,
once-removed, of Tsar Nicholas II,
wanted to pursue the Russians and William II and one of the few capable generals on the Rus-
agreed with them. Therefore, Falkenhayn was
sian side. The Russian leaders, however,
forced to remain on the defensive in the west
with
impeccable stupidity, transferred him to the Cau-
while the eastern offensive continued. This was casus to fight the sideshow war against Turkey
the wrong decision. enabled France to survive
It
there.
in the west, and it did nothing crucial in the east, By 1916, the Germans, observing that the Al-
for Russia would, in all likelihood, have been lies had suffered many more
casualties than the
successfully pushed to dissolution and chaos Germans had in the course of the previous year,
with a lesser German effort. thought that it might be possible to win without
Through 1915, the stalemate in the west conan actual victory in the field. All that was re-
tinued. The use of the machine gun and
artillery quired was that the Allies should be maneuvered
gave an enormous advantage to the offense.
into suffering so many casualties that they
Nevertheless, generals, particularly on the Allied would
finally be too weak to fight. They were
to be bled
side, still seeming to live in the
Napoleonic era, white.
insisted on sending
their troops forward in a The German successes
hopeless attempt to break through the machine-
in the east made it pos-
sible to shift troops to the west, and the Germans
gun fire and the barbed wire that protected the
attacked at Verdun, south of the main
trenches. bulge
Advances were miniscule and, in the of the lines into France, where the
course of 1915, the French lines
Germans
600,000 men, lost extended northward in a little bulge of their
the British and French 1,500,000 men— yet the own.
lines at the end of 1915 were
just about where The French responded by sending
they were at the beginning. a dogged
general, Philippe Petain (1856-1951), to the
spot.
It is impossible to imagine a war fought more
Petain reorganized his men and set up the
watch-
1914 TO 1920 507
word, "They shall not pass!" Both sides brought Hungarians rather than the Germans. In the end,
up endless reinforcements and the battle was however, it failed to turn the tide of battle, and
fought from February 21 to December 18, 1916, Russian losses had now reached the point where
and ended about where it had begun. The French even Russians found it unendurable and the na-
were indeed made to bleed terribly, losing tion began to slide toward chaos.
542,000 men, but the Germans themselves lost On February 23, 1917, Nivelle started his her-
434,000. alded offensive and, unfortunately, it was like all
That the Germans were dissatisfied with this those that had preceded it. In five days, the
?nutual bloodletting was indicated by the fact that French lost 120,000 men, accomplished nothing,
Falkenhayn lost his job after Verdun and was re- and Nivelle was relieved of command.
placed by Hindenberg and Ludendorff, the archi- The French army had had enough (and much
tects of victory in the east (against a much weaker more than enough, in any sane man's opinion)
opponent, to be sure). and mutinied.
The British had, by now, a great many men on It was at this point that it might seem that
the
the frontand had actually established universal Battle of the Marne had been for nothing and that
conscription. Even while the battle of Verdun Germany was going to win the war. In the east,
was continuing, they fought a battle of their own Russia was dissolving into revolution. In the
at the Somme River in the north. The Battle of west, France seemed about to do the same. On
the Somme, fought from June 24 to November other fronts in Europe, the Germans were doing
13, 1916, ended in the same useless stalemate well. What could keep them from winning?
that was taking place at Verdun. The answer was Retain, who took the place of
But the British had thought of a way of Nivelle. Petain managed, with a mixture of firm-
countering the machine-gun by falling back on ness and kindness, to put an end to the mutiny,
the old device of armor. This time, it was not to while a tight French censorship kept all news of
be an armored man, but an armored vehicle with it from the outside world. This was a greater
ser-
a man inside and with treads that would enable vice than Petain's obstinacy at Verdun had been.
it to negotiate all kinds of terrain. These armored
Meanwhile, the British under Douglas Haig
vehicles (reminiscent of those Ziska had used in (1861-1928) launched another supremely costly
the Hussite wars, five centuries earlier) were and ineffective offensive in the north, but at least
kept secret in the course of their development; it served the purpose of helping further to
dis-
and, to mislead possible spies, were referred to tract the Germans from learning about the
as "tanks." The name was meaningless, but it French mutiny. By the time the Germans found
stuck. out that for two weeks the French soldiers had
On September 15, 1916, in the
course of the —
been refusing to fight it was too late. The
Battle of the Somme, the British used tanks for French were back at their guns.
the first time, but there were only 18 of them and But the Germans were themselves in a bad
they didn't do much. Nevertheless, their impor- way, too. The people at home had long since lost
tance grew rapidly. all enthusiasm for the bloody war. The British
By the end of the year, Joffre, worn out, was fleet controlled the sea and kept Germany under
succeeded by Robert Georges Nivelle (1856- a blockade that had brought the German popu-
1924), whose unbounded optimism made him lation close to starvation during the winter of
think he could break the stalemate. What's more, 1916-1917, and William II was finding it next to
he persuaded others that he could do so. impossible to run the country under the increas-
Meanwhile, on the eastern front, the Russians ingly horrendous conditions.
found another capable general, Aleksey Aleksey- What's more, the United States had now en-
evich Brusilov (1853-1926), who mounted an of- tered the war on the side of the allies, and the
fensive in the summer of 1916which won prospect of fresh, unworn American armies join-
surprising successes, albeit against the Austro- ing the fight daunted the war-weary Germans.
But by early 1918, the war in the east had they had not quite won the objectives Ludendorff
come to an end with a total German victory, and had mind.
in
—
Germany had a last chance to make one final Then, on July 15, Ludendorff ordered another
push that would crush the Allies in France before push. He was at the Marne where the Germans
the Americans could make their weight felt. The had lost nearly four years earlier, and there was
United States would then find itself facing a vic- now a Second Battle of the Marne." This time,
torious Germany and it might decide not to try he met not only the usual allied troops but
to fight a war, all by itself, an ocean away from
270,000 Americans as well, with another 54,000
home. Americans farther north. The Germans gave way
As many soldiers as possible were shipped and the last hope was gone. The victory had not
west and Ludendorff planned a great offensive come and the Americans were in the line in large
designed to crack the point where the British and numbers.
French armies joined. The British and French had The Allies now launched a counteroffensive
been under separate national commands all and, on August 8, 1918, they used tanks in quan-
through the war and they could not be counted tity. This time it was the German lines that
broke,
on to cooperate fully, so the juncture of the two and the Allies who advanced rapidly. Ludendorff
was a natural weak point. recognized that the war was over. He called Au-
The attack came on March 21, 1918, and the gust 8 a black day" for the German army.
great "1918 spring offensive" seemed to work. On October 3, 1918, William II, at what
Behind tremendous artillery barrage, Luden-
a
amounted to Ludendorff's orders, set up a con-
dorff hit the juncture, and broke through. Within
stitutionalmonarchy, realizing that only that, if
a week he had gained over 30 miles. No one had
anything, could survive the war. Prince Maximi-
seen an advance like this in the west since the lian of Baden (1867-1929), a noted liberal and
hu-
first month of the war, three and a
half years manitarian, was appointed Chancellor, and he
earlier.
set about the task of democratizing Germany
and
The Allies reacted with virtual panic. Great of negotiating for peace.
Britain and France agreed, for the first time, on a The situation, however, had gotten beyond
single overall
commander-in-chief for the West- that. On November 4, 1918, disorders in Ger-
ern Front. On April 5, 1918, they chose the
many amounted to a revolutionary situation. On
French general, Ferdinand Foch (1851-1929), for
November 9, 1918, William II abdicated, after
the post.
having ruled, without much talent for the job,
The Germans kept up the offensive, however. for 30 years. Maximilian also resigned and
Fried-
After a pause to regroup, they surged forward a
rich Ebert (1871-1925), a rather tame Socialist,
second time, and then a third. By June 3, the became Chancellor of what was now a German
Germans were at the French town of Chateau- Republic.
Thierry, just 50 miles east of Paris. was close
It In the course of the 51 months that the war
enough for Germany's biggest cannon to lob had German casualties amounted to
lasted,
shells into the city. The French government
was 1,800,000 dead and 4,250,000 wounded.
preparing to leave Paris as it had in the first
But though Germany had lost, the Allies had
month of the war. not really won. Russia was in a worse state
By that time, though, American soldiers were of
dissolution than Germany was. France and Great
fighting and winning in a wooded area
called Britainhad suffered as much as Germany had, if
BelleauWood, near Chateau-Thierry. not more, and they stood there gasping,
The German advance, magnificent though with
it only comfort the knowledge that, unlike the
their
looked on the map, and though drove the Al-
it Germans, they had not actually lost. In fact, the
lies to the edge of defeat, was not carried through World War I experience scarred the British and
without The Germans lost heavily both in
cost.
French worse than it had the Germans. The Ger-
men and material. They were exhausted, and mans at least had a defeat for which to seek ven-
1914 TO 1920 509
geance. The British and French knew only that

stopped the German advance. Even after it re-
they never wanted to fight again.
turned, however, it had little to do but put the
However, in the midst of even a cataclysmic best face on a frightful war, as different Premiers
war, life goes on. way to end the war victoriously.
failed to find a
Albert Einstein, in 1916, worked out the Gen- Finally, on November 16, 1917, Georges Cle-
eral Theory of Relativity, the most astounding menceau (1841-1929) became Premier. He was a
feat of scientific imagination since Newton, two long-time liberal and anticlerical. He had sup-
and a third centuries earlier. Einstein's general
ported Dreyfus and was, above all, anti-German.
relativity was, in fact, a correction and extension
He was 76 years old at the time, but it was not
of Newton's view of gravity. For the first time, for nothing that he was called "The Tiger." He
however, a set of "field equations" were worked assumed the Ministry of War as well as the Pre-
out that served to describe the Universe as a miership, and he drove hard for victory and
whole. Thus, Einstein had founded the science nothing but victory, fighting for a unified com-
of cosmology. mand until it was achieved under Foch.
During period Alfred Lothar Wegener
this When the war was over, it was Clemenceau
(1880-1930) elaborated on his idea that the con- who represented France at the peace conference,
tinents slowly drifted and that they had once and it was Clemenceau who held out for a harsh
been a single supercontinent which he called peace. He insisted on revenge and did his best to
"Pangaea" ("all-Earth"). This broke up, gradu- shiver Germany to bits.
ally forming the continental distribution that ex-
Meanwhile, in the world ofMonet, now
art,
ists today. He was wrong but was
in detail, in the twilight of his career, was spending years
eventuallyshown to be correct in concept. on the paintings of waterlilies that were to be his
Walter Baade (1893-1960) discovered Hidalgo, masterpieces, while Henri Emile Benoit Matisse
which, at the time, was the farthest asteroid was beginning
(1869-1954) his own career in art.
known, its orbit carrying it outward nearly as far Andre Paul Guillaume Gide (1869-1951) was
as Saturn. becoming known as a writer in this period.
Oswald Spengler (1880—1936) began his mon-
umental work. The Decline of the West, in 1918.
Influenced, undoubtedly, by the insanity of GREAT BRITAIN
World War I, he discussed the rise and fall of Although Great began World War I with
Britain
civilizations and predicted the decline and fall only a small volunteer army, it built it up rapidly
of the west. and had a compulsory draft in 1916. By the end
In 1919, Walter Adolf Gropius (1883-1969) of the war. Great Britain had mobilized 9 million
founded the Bauhaus school of architecture, men, a bit more than France had, and had suf-
which was extremely influential in the following fered 900,000 dead and 2 million wounded. In
decades. addition to fighting in France, the British had to
fight a war at sea.
The German main fleet was off the German
FRANCE coast in the North Sea, behind the fortified island
The history of France in this period is the history of Heligoland. It didn't dare come out to chal-
of World War I, for the western front, where the lenge the British, and the British fleet, for its part,
fighting was hardest and most even, and where remained in its fortified outposts on its side of
the decision was reached, was fought entirely the North Sea. They had no need to do more than
within that section of France that lay between keep the German fleet out of action.
Paris and the Belgian border. There were, to be sure, some 10 German war-
The civilian government of France moved, ships at sea when World War I began. Without a
temporarily, from Paris to Bordeaux on Septem- secure base, they proceeded to act as privateers,
ber 3, 1914, just before the Battle of the Marne trying to disrupt British merchant shipping and
pick off an occasional British By the war vessel. lic The United States, during the first
opinion.
end of 1914, those ships had been destroyed by part of World War I, was the world's most im-
the British fleet, and Germany had to rely on sub- portant neutral, as it had been during the Napo-
marines to achieve its ends at sea. leonic wars a century earlier. The United States
Vessels capable of remaining for a while under was more sympathetic to the Allied side than to
water had been experimented with since 1620, the German side to begin with, and it was doing
but it was only in 1886 that submarines were built a thriving business with the Allies. Submarine
with motors that could be run by electric storage warfare, therefore, threatened American trade.
batteries. Though such submarines had to sur- To the Germans it seemed that since the
face periodically to recharge their batteries, they United States did not object to the British block-
were able to travel a reasonable distance under- ade of Germany, they ought not object to the
water between charges. German blockade of Great Britain, just because
Submarines were hard to detect underwater in the Germans had no choice but to use subma-
those days and could approach ships without rines for the purpose. Logic is a poor tool when
warning. A ship might not know if it was in dan- the emotions are engaged, however.
ger until it was actually struck by a torpedo. Nor There was the case of the Lusitania, for in-
could submarines afford to give warning, for stance. was
It a British luxury liner that was
they are fragile vessels and easily sunk. Nor are carrying a war cargo, including guns and am-
they large enough to take on the survivors of a munition, from New York to Great Britain. Be-
torpedoing, who therefore must be left to drown. fore it left New York, the German embassy
For these reasons, submarine attacks seemed warned Americans not to travel on the ship since
both dishonorable and atrocious to those at- it was fair game for submarine
action. The warn-
tacked. ing was not heeded.
To be sure,
the warring nations had sub-
all On May 7, was hit, without
1915, the Lusitania
marines and were willing to use them. However, warning, by a German torpedo and 1,198 people
only Germany had to depend on them entirely, were drowned, including 124 Americans. The ef-
and only Great Britain was so dependent on fect on American public opinion was enormous
shipping and had so widespread a fleet as to and the Germans were forced to announce they
offer an overwhelmingly tempting target.
would stop unlimited submarine warfare.
The sea war, then, was between German sub- On May 31, 1916, there took place the only
marines and British merchant ships and war ves- great naval battle of World War I. The German
sels, and the onus of atrocity lay entirely on
the fleetunder Reinhold Scheer (1863-1928) moved
German side. out from their shelter. It consisted of 99 ships,
Meanwhile, though, the up an ef-
British built including 27 battleships. The British overheard
fective blockade that kept foodstuffs and raw ma- radio measages from Germany that gave the
terials from getting to Germany by sea. As a movement away, and the British Fleet, under
result,Germans felt the pinch and began to go John Rushworth Jellicoe (1859-1935), with 151
hungry. More serious still, from a military stand-
ships including 37 battleships, promptly moved
point, would have been the results if Germany
out to intercept the Germans.
had depended on nitrates from abroad for the
The Battle of Jutland was fought off the coast
manufacture of explosives. Germany would then of Denmark.
have run out of ammunition and would have
It marked the end of a long era.
It was the last
been forced to end the war. It was the Haber
major sea-battle to be fought by surface vessels
process, using the atmosphere as a source of the that were within sight of each other; and the
last
necessary nitrogen, that made possible for Ger-
it major sea-battle to be fought without airplanes.
many to fight on more
for three years. Tactically, the Germans did
surprisingly well.
Submarine warfare was fatal Germany,
to Their ships were individually better and their
however, because of its effect on American pub- shooting was more accurate. The British lost 14
1914 TO 1920 511
ships to the German 11 and suffered 6800 casu- such combats lost their apparent knightly qual-
alties to the German 3000. Strategically, how-
ity.
ever, it was a British victory, for the German Indiscriminate bombing of large cities from
fleet, less able to endure losses, was forced to the air began in World War I, too. The most spec-
never emerged again for the du-
retire to port. It
tacular incidents were the airship raids on east-
ration of the war. William II might as well not
ern England and on London in 1915 and 1916.
have built a fleet and gained the enmity of Great The British quickly developed antiaircraft guns
Britain, for all the good it did him.
and the airships became vulnerable. The Ger-
In the spring of 1917, submarine warfare was
mans used 80 airships in their raids and lost 73
resumed by Germany, and British shipping of them by the war's end. Airplane bombing
losses rose to astronomical heights. It did seem
raids on England began in November 1916 and
there was a real danger of the British being
continued sporadically to the end of the war, but
starved out. But then the Americans entered the had no significant effect on the course of fight-
war on the British side; and on May 10, 1917, a ing.
convoy system was established. Merchant ships The German colonies in Africa were, of
traveled in groups protected by destroyers.
course, involved in the war. Most of the German
Fewer ships were sunk, more submarines were colonies were cleaned up by the British and
caught and destroyed, and the submarine men- French before the end of 1914. However, in Ger-
ace receded. man East Africa, the German commander, Paul
World War I was war in which air-
the first von Lettow-Vorbeck (1870—1964), kept up a bril-
planes played a part. At first they were used only liant guerrilla campaign and was never defeated.
on reconnaissance, but the pressure of war It was only after he learned that
the war was over
forced them to move into belligerent action. that he finally surrendered his command on No-
In 1915, the Javanese-born Anthony Herman
vember 23, 1918.
Gerard Fokker (1890-1939) had invented a At home. Great Britain had to face a serious
method of firing a machine-gun so that the bullet situation in Ireland. The Irish were dissatisfied
went between the blades of the whirling propel- by the fact that the Home Rule question was
ler.Airplanes could then battle each in the air. postponed till after the war. Moreover, they
For a while, it seemed to mark a return to the could not help but feel that with Great Britain
days of knightly single combat, and those who totally preoccupied with the fighting in France,
succeeded in bringing down a number of enemy that was their opportunity to break loose.
planes were made into heroes. The Germans felt that trouble in Ireland, by
One of the pioneers of air-combat tactics was distracting the British,
would ease the situation
Max Immelmann (1890—1916). The greatest Ger- on the western front, and they did what they
man ace was Manfred von Richthofen (1892- could to encourage the Irish. The Germans did
1918), called “the Red Baron" from the color of not feel they could spare troops, but a German
his plane. He shot down 80 enemy planes and submarine brought
Roger David Casement
died in action. (1864-1916) to Ireland on April 12, 1916. He was
On the French side, Paul Rene Fonck (1894- an Irish Protestant who had been of great service
1953) was credited with shooting down 75 to the British government in a variety of human-
planes. The Canadian aviator, William Avery itarian causes, such as in his exposure
of the
Bishop (1894-1956), shot down
while the Brit-
72; atrocities against the blacks in theCongo. His
ish aviator, Albert Ball (1894-1956), shot down sympathies were with the Irish nationalists,
43.During the shorter American participation, however, and once World War I started, he
Edward Vernon Rickenbacker (1890-1973) shot turned immediately to the Germans for help.
down 26 planes. In any case, armed rebellion broke out in Dub-
Most “aces" were lost in action, and warfare lin on April was
24, 1916. It Easter Monday and
in the air quickly developed to the point where was, therefore, called the “Easter Rebellion." It
was suppressed within a week and Casement Siegfried Lorraine Sassoon (1886-1967) served
and others were tried and hanged on August 3. in World War and, in this period, began writ-
I,
However, fighting continued through the end of ing antiwar poetry. Rupert Brooke (1887-1914),
World War I and beyond. On one side were the who showed every sign of being a great poet
Irish nationalists, the ^^Sinn Fein” (”ourselves died in the war.
alone”),and its guerrilla force, the Irish Republi- Gustav Theodore Holst (1874-1934) wrote his
can Army. On the other was the British army and tone poem The Planets in 1918. They were astro-
its special constabulary force, the ”Black and logical, not astronomical, in inspiration.
Tans,” from the color of their uniforms.
On July 7, 1916, Asquith resigned as British
Prime Minister and David Lloyd George took his UNITED STATES
place. It was Lloyd George who represented the
From the American viewpoint, the installation of
British at the peace negotiations after the
end of Carranza as president of Mexico looked like a sat-
World War I. isfactory denouement to the crisis that had so
Meanwhile, Ernest Rutherford was continuing preoccupied Wilson at the start of his administra-
to work on subatomic physics. By
1919, he had tion, but it wasn't. Civil war continued,
and two
produced the first example of nuclear transmu- generals who opposed Carranza were Emiliano
tation of elements, turning nitrogen into
oxygen. Zapata (1879-1919), who strongly favored agrar-
This was the first human-induced nuclear reac- ian reform, and Francisco
("Pancho”) Villa
tion, and that sort of thing was to lead to enor-
(1878-1923), who strongly favored himself.
mously important consequences.
Wilson did not wish to interfere with this new
Einstein s general theory of relativity was Mexican civil war for World War I was raging in
scarcely known during the war. One copy of his Europe now, and that was far more important.
paper had been sneaked out by way of neutral
However, Villa, at least, needed American op-
Netherlands. In 1919, once the war was over, Ed-
position in order to increase his own
dington organized expeditions to check the posi- popularity
within Mexico.
tions of stars near the Sun during a total eclipse. Therefore, on January 10, 1916, Villa (to en-
Einstein's theory required that they be
displaced force that opposition) stopped a train in
in a certain fashion, and this theory
northern
was upheld. Mexico, took off 17 American engineers and
In 1920, H. G. Wells published his had
phenome- 16 ofthem shot without even bothering to make
nally successful Outline
of History.James Barrie up a reason. On March 9, 1916, he sent 400 raid-
produced such plays as A Kiss for Cinderella
(1916) ers into the bordertown of Columbus,
and Dear Brutus (1917). The Irish writer, New Mex-
James ico, burning the town and killing
19 Americans.
Augustine Joyce (1882-1941), published Portrait
This could not be ignored. Wilson forced
Car-
Young Man in 1916.
of the Artist as a
ranza to agree to allow American troops
to enter
William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) pub-
Mexico. On March 15, 1916, some 6000
lished his most successful novel. American
Of Human Bond- soldiers, under John Joseph Pershing (1860-
age, in 1915 and The Moon and
Sixpence in 1919; 1948), invaded Mexico.
and George Norman Douglas (1868-1952)
pub- Catching Villa, however, proved impossible.
lished South Wind in 1917.
Villa knew every
corner of the land, and the
John Buchan (1875-1940) published the most
Americans did not. What's more, the local
successful of his thrillers. The Thirty-Nine pop-
Steps in ulation was on
1915. The first stories of P. G.
and information could
Villa's side
Wodehouse featur- not be obtained from them. Even
ing Bertie Wooster and Jeeves, his worse, Car-
most familiar ranza had to take action against the United
and endearing characters, appeared in 1919. States
if he were to retain any
credibility with his peo-
Henry Havelock Ellis (1859-1939) was deeply
ple, and there was official Mexican
engaged in what eventually turned out to be interference
a with the American troops.
seven-volume Studies in the Psychology of Sex. Eventually, Wilson had to give up. The
danger
1914 TO 1920 513
of war with Germany was growing closer and ("Colonel") House (1858-1938), to Europe to see
closer and, on February 5, 1917, American forces if some peace could be arranged. It turned
sort of
were recalled from Mexico, leaving Villa still at out that every single one of the warring nations
large. wanted peace, but only if the other side made all
Meanwhile, the German use of submarines, the concessions.
and particularly the incident of the Lusitarna, was Still, Wilson ran for reelection in 1916 on the
greatly increasing the anti-German feelings of the slogan, "He kept us out of war." His opponent
American public. was Charles Evans Hughes (1862-1948), who
Germany was also strongly suspected of plans was the last presidential candidate for a major
forsabotaging American munitions factories that party to sport a beard. Wilson won, but only nar-
were supplying arms for the Allies. It was only rowly. It seemed that Hughes had offended
natural that they should do this, for we would Hiram Warren Johnson (1866-1945), the gover-
have done the same were the situation reversed, nor of California. Johnson did not labor to get
but that didn't make Americans like it any better. out the full Republican vote so that Hughes lost
was a movement for "pre-
Increasingly, there California, and the election.
paredness," for building up the American army In the spring of 1917, Germany resumed un-
and navy in preparation for coming to the aid of restrictedsubmarine warfare. When an Ameri-
the Allies. Theodore Roosevelt was the outstand- can ship, Housatonic, was sunk on February 3,
ing exponent of this. He attacked Wilson intem- 1917, the United States broke diplomatic rela-
pera tely as a weakling and coward. Other active tions with Germany.
advocates of preparedness were Henry Cabot Wilson Congress to pass a law per-
tried to get
Lodge (1850-1924), a senator from Massachu- mitting the arming of merchant ships, but a
setts, who and Henry Lewis
also hated Wilson, group of antiwar senators, led by LaFollette, fili-
Stimson (1867-1950), who had been Secretary of bustered death with endless, repetitious de-
it to
War under Taft. bate. Wilson, unfortunately, did not have the
Pacifists became unpopular. In the course of a trick of working with opposition. He was always
preparedness parade in San Francisco on July 22, certain he was right and simply would not com-
1916, a bomb exploded, killing 10 and injuring promise. He would remain stiff and unyielding
40. Two men, Thomas Joseph Mooney (1882- and lose everything rather than bend a little and
1942) and Warren K. Billings (1893-1972), were gain most of what he wanted.
arrested. They had had nothing to do with the What Wilson needed, then, was some act by
bombings, but they were labor leaders, socialists, Germany that would drive the American people
and pacifists, and those were crimes enough. into taking the actions that Wilson thought
They were sentenced to life imprisonment and would be necessary. This Germany supplied.
served nearly a quarter of a century before the The German Foreign Minister, Arthur Zim-
government admitted it had been wrong and re- mermann (1864-1940), thought he could per-
leased them. suade Mexico to make war on the United States
As part of the new epidemic and hatred and thus take its mind off Germany. In order
sweeping the nation, the Ku Klux Klan was re- to bribe Mexico into doing this, he prepared a
vived in the south about 1915 and revelled in its telegram that offered it Texas, New Mexico,
chance hide behind sheets and to hate blacks,
to and Arizona if it would go to war on the United
Jews, Catholics, and as many other people as States.
possible. The and decoded the tele-
British intercepted
Nevertheless, Wilson didn't want war and if gram. Scarcely able to believe their good fortune,
there were some way he could bring about a they turned it over to the United States on Feb-
peace that would be satisfactory to the Allies, he ruary 24, 1917. By March 1, the American gov-
would have been delighted. In 1915, and again in ernment was convinced that the "Zimmermann
1916, he sent his good friend, Edward Mandell Telegram" was legitimate and its indignation
was boundless, as was that of the

American peo- American fired a shot against the Germans, but
ple. In all its history,
the United States had never by that winter there were over 100,000 Ameri-
had a square inch of territory taken from it by
cans in France, with more pouring into the coun-
force, and the thought that anyone
could con- try every day.
template such a possibility seemed to go against
At home, America went on a patriotism spree
cosmic law.
that went to cheap and ridiculous
lengths. As
Then, too, Russia had collapsed and seemed
many as 1500 pacifists were arrested and many
to be turning into a democratic republic.
That re- were thrown in jail. German books were thrown
moved the one ideological flaw in the notion of
out of German musi(^ out of the reper-
libraries,
helping the British and French. It no
longer toires, and German food out of the
meant helping the Russian despotism. menus. Bee-
thoven and Goethe were somehow
The United States recognized the new Russian confused
with the Kaiser and Ludendorff, and
government on March 22, 1917, the first nation sauerkraut
was renamed "liberty cabbage." People actually
to do so, and Wilson soon
began to describe kicked dachsunds.
World War I as something that would "make
the Wilson felt that the Allied war aims were
world safe for democracy." not
idealistic enough. The Russian
What's more, on March 21, 1917, a German revolutionaries
published the secret treaties that the Allies
submarine had sunk another American ship, had
made and it seemed they were as greedy as the
Healdton, and Wilson called a special session of Germans were. It was necessary to give the cause
Congress. It passed a war resolution and, on
April
a higher tone. On January 8, 1918, therefore, Wil-
6, 1917, the United States was at war with son published his "Fourteen Points,"
Germany. which
were intended to guide the peace once
The United States at once began to send the war
an was over.
"American Expeditionary Force" (AEF) to
Eu- Simply, the 14 points were:
rope, and not one American soldier
lost his life
in the crossing.
1. All treaties were to be arrived at in public and
The American contingents arrived in
first
published.
France on June 26, 1917. They were
under the 2. Freedom of the seas.
command of Pershing and he marched his troops
3. No economic barriers to prevent free trade.
through Paris on July 4, 1917, as an
Indepen- 4. As much disarmament
dence Day celebration. They marched as possible.
to the 5. Settlement of colonial claims, with
tomb of Lafayette, the great French volunteer consider-
in ation for natives.
the War of the American Revolution. Pershing 6. No interference with the
new Russian gov-
asked a fellow officer, Charles E. Stanton, to say ernment.
something appropriate, and he remarked,
sim- 7. Evacuation of Belgium.
ply, "Lafayette! We are here." No greater elo- 8. Evacuation of France and the return
quence, at any length, was possible. of Al-
sace-Lorraine.
The British and French wanted to
use the 9. Italy to gain Italian-speaking
American troops as they came across, parts of Austria-
feeding Hungary.
them into British and French divisions
as rein- 10. Freedom for
forcements. This Pershing prevented. Austria-Hungary's minorities.
He saw 11. Balkan boundaries to follow nationality,
that Americans, a few at a time in Allied divi-
and
Serbia to have access to the sea.
sions, would be used to no purpose and no 12. Freedom for Ottoman Empire's
credit. He insisted, instead, that the
Americans
minorities,
and free access to the straits.
would form their own divisions and
go into bat- 13. An independent Poland
tle as units under their with access to the
own commanders, and in sea.
this he was firmly supported by Wilson.
It was not until
14. A League of Nations to settle disputes and
October 23, 1917 that any
prevent war.
1914 TO 1920 515
These 14 points were mostly at the expense of majority by pandering to the desire of the British
Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman public for revenge. This made it difficult for him
Empire, but the Allies were unenthusiastic. They to push moderation.
were not delighted over public treaty-making, As for Clemenceau, moderation was the last
freedom of the seas, disarmament, and consid- thing he wanted. He was ready to squeeze Ger-
eration for colonial natives. It was all too noble many dry, not only for the damage it had in-
for them. flicted on France over the previous four years,
The Americans had time win a few battles
to but for what it had done to France in 1870 (some-
against the Germans before the war ended on thing Clemenceau remembered well).
November 11, 1918. The United States lost Wilson was particularly interested in the
115,000 soldiers, and 206,000 were wounded. League of Nations, which was his brain-child. It
Within a month. President Wilson was off to seemed to him that any imperfections in the
the peace conference, arriving in Europe on De- treaty that was being prepared could be ironed
cember 13, 1918. There he was met with the wild- out by the League afterward, and that a golden
est enthusiasm. He seemed to the cheering period of peace and prosperity would come
people to be the messiah from the west come to about, with all disputes settled by amicable dis-
solve all of old Europe's problems. He seemed to plays of reason in the public meetings of the
bring with him a vision of peace and justice. League.
It all went to Wilson's head. He had, in any It was only after the victors had squabbled out
case, the conviction that he alone knew what was the treaty (called the "Treaty of Versailles" be-
right, and now he seemed to think everyone else cause the meetings were held in the old palace of
thought so, too. the French kings, where, 49 years earlier, the cre-
However, he found out quickly enough that ation of the German Empire had been an-
when his idealism ran counter to any nation's nounced) that the Germans were allowed to see
selfish desires, the leaders and the people of that it. They were called in on May 7, 1919, and they
nation suddenly turned against him. protested vehemently at the many injustices they
He had to deal with Lloyd George of Great saw in it, but there was no way out. The Ger-
Britain and Clemenceau of France. These two, mans would have to sign, but they could make
with Wilson, made up the "Big Three." None of one last gesture of defiance.
the defeated powers were represented, of On June 21, 1919, the German fleet, sailing
course. Russia was not there, for the coming into British captivity, was scuttled by its own
of Communism had put it beyond the pale. The crews. If the Germans couldn't have their fleet,
lesser powers who had fought on the side of the neither could their enemies.
Big Three were there, of course, but they were The Germans signed the Treaty of Versailles
rarely listened to. on June 28, 1919 and, by its terms, Germany gave
Wilson found that Lloyd George and Clemen- up territory all round. All its African colonies
ceau were unmoved by him. Clemenceau, in par- passed into the hands of Great Britain or France.
ticular, was not impressed by the Fourteen It had to return Alsace-Lorraine to France. The
Points, muttering that even God had had only French could also exploit the coal mines of the
10. Saar, a small district, rich in coal, on the German
Lloyd George was for a moderate peace that border, to make up for the mines that had been
would make it possible for Germany to rejoin the ravished in its own northeast. Belgium and Den-
family of nations under conditions where it mark each got small strips of adjoining German
would no longer threaten Great Britain. How- territory.
ever, even as he arrived for the peace negotia- A was established that would
Polish nation
tions, there was the "khaki election" in Great include territory which Prussia had gained in the
Britain (so-called because the returning soldiers First Partition of Poland, a century and a half
voted in it) in which Lloyd George won a huge earlier. Poland had access to the sea at the Ger-
man Danzig, which was made into a "Free

city of
pointed by Wilson to the Supreme Court in 1916.
City." This meant that East Prussia, while
re- This met with considerable opposition, because
maining part of Germany, was cut off from the
Brandeis had committed the terrible crime of
rest by Polish territory. Some other parts
of Ger- being Jewish, but his appointment was con-
many were to be allowed to vote on whether to firmed anyhow.
remain part of Germany or not (and they all
Women were bobbing their hair. It began be-
voted to remain with Germany).
cause long hair was a safety hazard when work-
Germany was forced to have an army of no ing with machinery, as many women did
for the
more than 100,000 men, and a navy of not more
sake of the war effort. When the reason
than six warships. It was to be allowed no van-
sub- ished, short hair remained convenient
marines and no military aircraft. Heligoland and be-
was came common. Some women kept their hair
to be defortified, and the western
portion of Ger- long, but only as a matter of taste, and
many on the French border (the "Rhineland") not out of
was not to be fortified.
social necessity. Women also attained the greater
freedom of shorter skirts, and less elaborate un-
The United States Senate, however, would not
dergarments. A misuse of freedom came when
ratify the treaty, largely because
it didn't want smoking grew common among women, so that
the League of Nations — which, many senators they were subjected to the same ills of foul
odors
feared, would limit national sovereignty.
Wilson and disease to which men were accustomed.
absolutely refused to accept any changes; and Automobile traffic was becoming a major form
whereas he would have had most of what he
of transportation,and the first traffic lights were
wanted if he were willing to give up something,
set up in Cleveland on August
he ended with nothing. 5, 1914. In 1915,
motor taxicabs came into use in the United
He began a tour of the United States to push
States.
the treaty (still dreaming of the wild
crowds that Long-distance telephone lines now spanned
had greeted his trip to Europe), but he found
the the nation. On January 25, 1915, Bell
task frustrating. (the inven-
Moreover, he had a stroke that tor of the telephone) once again
put an end to the trip and left the United spoke to his co-
States worker Watson, as he had when it was first
virtually without a president for the in-
last year of vented. This time, however, they
his administration. were not on
different floors of a house. Bell was
Nor was in New York
only the Senate that was against all
it
and Watson was in San Francisco.
that Wilson now stood for. After
the heady ex- Daylight saving time was designed to
perience of the war, the American get peo-
people ple up earlier and to bed earlier
seemed disillusioned with the whole business during the long
summer days, thus using less energy for artificial
and returned to a firm isolationism, deciding
that light. It was introduced in
Europe could do whatever it wanted to do, Great Britain during
and the war years and came to the
that the United States United States in
should just mind its own 1918.
business.
Motion pictures continued to increase in
During the World War I period, life pop-
in the ularity. In 1915, the first of the
United States had undergone a great
movies. The
number of Birth of a Nation, made its
changes. The first woman to enter appearance. It had been
Congress was directed by David Lewelyn Wark
Jeannette Rankin (1880-1973) of Montana Griffith (1875-
(where 1948), who invented many of the
women could vote). She was elected in 1916 camera tech-
and niques, such as closeups, panshots,
was the only member of the House of fade-in and
Represen- fade-out, cross-cutting,
tatives to vote against entrance soft-focus, and so on,
into World War I. which have been used
The result was that she was defeated in motion pictures ever
for reelec- since.
tion in 1918.
The first radio broadcasting station
Louis Dembitz Brandeis opened in
(1856-1941), one of 1920.
the United States' greatest
lawyers, was ap- On January 29, 1919, the Prohibitionists finally
1914 TO 1920 517
won their victory when the Eighteenth Amend- 1956) developed methods for the quick-freezing
ment to the Constitution was ratified. The sale of of food. This kept it fresh over long periods of
intoxicating liquors was banned and, on October time and preserved the natural taste more truly
29, 1919, the Volstead Act, introduced by An- than canning did. It added another revolution to
drew John Volstead (1860-1947), defined an in- the modern diet.
toxicating liquor as anything containing more In literature, Edith Wharton published The Age
than Vi of 1% of alcohol. (It may be that Prohibi- of Innocence in 1920 and won a Pulitzer prize for
tion won
out at this time because of the popular it. Willa Cather published My Antonia in 1918.
conception that most breweries and distilleries Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941) gained his rep-
were run by people of German descent.) utation for naturalistic short stories with Wines-
The year 1918 saw the worst worldwide epi- burg, Ohio (1919).
demic (a "pandemic") suffered by the human Harry Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) was starting
species since the Black Death, five and a half cen- his writing career in this period and made his
turies earlier. A new strain of influenza swept the first big hit with Main Street (1920) and its satire
world. It was called the "Spanish flu" because of American small-town Booth Tarkington
life.
Spain suffered particularly badly, but it seems to published his studies of youngsters with Penrod
have had its beginning in China. It killed perhaps (1914) and Seventeen (1917). He won the Pulitzer
20 million people in the course of the year, in- prize with The Magnificent Arnbersons (1918).
cluding 500,000 in the United States. Far more On a lighter note, Ringgold Wilmer ("Ring")
people died of the flu in that year than were Lardner (1885-1933) wrote effective humor in
killed in the four years of World War I. You Know Me, At (1915) and Gullible's Travels
In science in this period, Harlow Shapley (1917).
(1885-1972) made use of the Cepheid yardstick Among American poets of the period, Ed-
the
worked out by Leavitt a few years earlier. By ward Arlington Robinson (1869-1935) was writ-
1918, he had demonstrated a size for our Milky ing such poems as Merlin (1917) and Lancelot
Way Galaxy that was, for the first time, not an (1920). Carl Sandburg (1878-1967) was writing
underestimate. (Actually, it was a slight overes- powerful free verse in his Chicago Poems (1915).
timate.) He was also able to show that the Sun Thomas Stearns Eliot (1888-1965), who became a
was not at the center of the galaxy, but well out British subject later in life, published Prufrock and
toward one end. Other Observations (1917). Edgar Lee Masters
Newton Lewis (1875-1946) ad-
In 1916, Gilbert (1869-1950) published The Spoon River Anthology
vanced a new way of looking at the manner in in 1915. Edna St.Vincent Millay (1892-1950)
which atoms clung together in molecules. He made her first mark with Renascence and Other
made use of the new notions of atomic structure Poems Alan Seeger (1888-1916) was an-
(1917).
and drew up a logical scheme of how electrons other promising poet who died in World War I
were shared by two adjoining atoms or were after writing the prophetic lines: "I have a ren-
transferred from one atom to another. dezvous with death / At some disputed barri-
Irving Langmuir worked out a similar scheme cade."
independently, and for his fundamental work on On alower note, Edgar Albert Guest
far
the interaction of metal surfaces with gas mole- (1881-1959) became the poet laureate of the av-
cules, he eventually received a Nobel Prize. He erage American with poems in a rustic dialect,
was the first industrial chemist to receive one. the first of which were collected in A Heap o'
Edward Calvin Kendall (1886-1972) isolated Livin' in 1916.
the hormone, thyroxine, from the thyroid gland George M. Cohan continued his musical ca-
in 1916. It became an important item in the med- reer with what was undoubtedly his most stir-
ical armory, the first hormone to be used in this ring song. Over There, to celebrate the entry of
manner. the United States into the war. Norman Rockwell
Beginning in 1916, Clarence Birdseye (1886- (1894-1978) began his career as a naturalistic
on the covers of 'The Satur-

painter, especially the Tsar. The soldiers would, supposedly, fight
day Evening Post," and became the best-known better, and the people at home would be invig-
painter in the United States. orated with new
enthusiasm, if the Tsar were at
A religious phenomenon of the period was the head of the army.
George Baker, a black revivalist preacher, who Actually, the Russian people had long since
founded his "Peace Mission" movement in 1919. abandoned that view of the Tsar, and his being
Calling himself "Father Divine," Baker became head of the army did not alter the military situa-
an important personage to many blacks for de- tion at all. What it did do was get the Tsar out of
cades.
Petrograd (the new Russian .equivalent of "St.
Petersburg," which had been discarded as too
German once the war started) and closer to the
RUSSIA
front. That left the Tsarina Alexandra in control
World War I started hopefully for the Russians. of the government and the baleful Rasputin in
Two armies invaded East Prussia and other ar- control of her.
mies invaded Galicia, the northeastern region of On June 4, 1916, the Russian armies under
Austria-Hungary. Though the Russians held Brusilov (a second capable
Russian general)
their positions in Galicia for a while, the armies
again took the offensive, and again the Russians
in East Prussia were destroyed by the beginning
made surprising advances against the Austro-
of September, 1914.
Hungarians. By September, however, the Ger-
The Russians fought on as stoutly as they mans had again sent sufficient reinforcements to
could in Austria-Hungary, but eventually the
Austria-Hungary and drove the Russians out.
Germans were able to send sizable reinforce- The Russians had lost another million men and
ments southward to stiffen the Austro-Hungar- were worse off than ever.
ians. By then, the Russians had used up
their Suspicions of treason darkened all over Rus-
supplies and were short of everything an army
sia, surfacing in the Duma and even in
court cir-
needed for fighting. A
cles. group of extreme conservatives among
By mid-1915, after a year of fighting, the Rus- the aristocracy decided the only way to restore
sians had been cleared out of Austria-Hungary
sense to the government was to get rid of Ras-
and most of Poland was in German hands. Back putin. He was invited to a tea party on the night
home, the Russian population had no trouble of December 29, 1916 and was fed poisoned
tea
seeing that the Russians were losing, not because
and cakes, but that didn't seem to affect him. He
they couldn't fight (no one ever accused Russian
was shot twice but that didn't kill him either.
soldiers of that), but
because the Russian leader- Finally he was shoved through the broken
ice of
ship was either thoroughly inept or actually
trea- the Neva River and was drowned.
sonous. Many thought the latter.
But Rasputin's removal didn't bring about any
Therefore, Nicholas II relieved the Grand
magic change, either.
Duke Nicholas of his post, though he was the
In March, 1917, there were strikes and
riots in
only bright spot in the Russian defeat, and
sent Petrograd, and the troops stationed there refused
him to the Caucasus to fight the Turks. Nicholas
to move against the rioters. With that,
II then took over the
the Tsar
leadership of the army him- could not govern. Nicholas II abdicated on March
self on September 15, 1915. 15, 1917, and the Romanov dynasty came to an
Unfortunately, Nicholas II, though a good and
end.
kind man in private life, had no discernible
tal- A provisional
government was set up in
ents at anything beyond that. There was
no way Petersburg under Prince Georgy Yevgenyevich
in which he could really lead the army. He
Lvov (1861-1925), but the strongest member of
merely drew on what was supposed to be the
the government was Aleksandr
mystical awe with which the Russians
Fyodorovich
regarded Kerensky (1881-1970), who joined as Minister of
1914 TO 1920 519
War in mid-May and who succeeded Lvov as Once was beaten, Keren-
the Kornilov effort
Prime Minister in July. sky found that he had put himself in the power
The new government proclaimed civil liberties of the Communists, who were getting stronger
for all, and tried to set up a democratic regime. as the desire for peace became overpowering.
Poland was promised independence, while Fin- On November 6, 1917, the Communists
land and Estonia were assured self-rule. All sorts ousted Kerensky (who escaped, going into exile
of social reforms were planned, too. for the rest of his long life) and took over the
The provisional government made one fatal government. Russia was using the old Julian cal-
mistake, however. They wanted to be loyal to endar at the time and the Julian date was October
their allies and to continue the war, but that was 24, 1917, so that the Russians speak of the "Oc-
impossible. The Russian army would no longer tober Revolution."
fight; the Russian people wanted only food and The new government was headed by Lenin.
peace, and the more radical socialists (then called Trotsky was the Foreign Minister, and the person
the Bolsheviks, and later Communists) promised in charge of minorities was Iosif Vissarionvich
to give them that. Dzhugashvili (1879-1953), who became far better
To the Germans, it seemed that their own pur- known by his pseudonym of "Joseph Stalin."
poses would be best served if the Communists The Communists nationalized everything they
were in power and moved for peace at any price. could. Church property was confiscated. The na-
For that purpose, they gathered up some of the tional debt was repudiated as having been in-
radicals who were living in exile in Switzerland, curred by the Tsar, not the people. (This was a
and hastened them by train across German terri- mistake, for it made deadly enemies out of all
tory to Russia. businessmen, bankers, and foreign governments
Among was Lenin. Joining him, from
these to whom Russia owed money.) On a smaller
exile in the United States, was Lev Davidovich scale, they introduced rationing and accepted the
Bronstein, who like most of the radicals, includ- Gregorian calendar as of January 31, 1918.
ing Lenin himself, used a pseudonym to protect What's more, with the Germans uncomforta-
himself and his family, and was better known as bly close to Petrograd, the capital of the nation
"Leon Trotsky." was moved to Moscow, from which Peter the
What Lenin wanted was to have the Commu- Great had taken it two centuries earlier, and
nists take over the government, to stop the war there it was to remain.
at once (even if that meant signing a separate The nation, however, was falling apart. Po-
peace), and then to distribute the land to the and Latvia had all de-
land, Finland, Estonia,
peasants and hand over the factories to the work- clared themselves independent. So had the
ers. Ukraine and Bessarabia (which was on the Ru-
Kerensky went in the opposite direction and manian border). The entire western border of
ordered a new offensive in Galicia. This got no- what had been the Russian Empire had become
where, and the Germans advanced and took a congerie of independent nations. That suited
Riga, coming perilously close to Petrograd. Bru- Germany perfectly, foresaw that they
for it
silov, who had done his best, was replaced by would all be German puppets and that Russia
Lavr Georgyevich Kornilov (1870-1918), who wounded, would withdraw into its
itself, fatally
thought the best thing he could do was to march Asian fastnesses and be a cipher in the Europe of
on Petrograd and overthrow the provisional gov- the future.
ernment. Nevertheless, Lenin had to make peace. He
This failed, because he couldn't get the sol- had promised peace and Russia was, in any case,
diers to follow him, since they just wanted to go incapable of making war. On January 4, 1918,
home. Second, Kerensky made common cause peace negotiations began, and Trotsky, who was
with the Communists against Kornilov. the negotiator for Russia, saw at once that Ger-
many was determined every last drop

to extract ears, intellectual life continued. Sergey Sergey-
of blood out of what it considered a Russian evich Prokofiev (1891-1933) made his first mark
corpse. In fact, by February 1, the Germans had on the musical world with his Sci/thian Suite,
signed a separate peace treaty with the Ukraine, which, when it premiered in Petrograd in 1916,
which the Russians always thought of as an in- was difficult to accept because of its nontradi-
tegral part of the land. tional style.
Trotsky, therefore, proclaimed that the war
was over, and that there would be no treaty of
peace. That also suited theGermans. They began AUSTRIA-HUNGARY
to advance again and moved within a hundred Austria-Hungary, which started the war on July
miles of Petrograd.
28, 1914, quickly found itself falling into the back-
Lenin thereupon overruled Trotsky and de- ground as a much larger war (than anything it
cided that Russia would have to give in so that a had envisaged) developed. All through World
core ofCommunist rule could be saved. Later on, War I, Austria-Hungary was completely in the
he was sure, all would be taken back, but for the shadow of Germany.
moment, Russia would have to bend its back to Austria-Hungary was, unable to fight
in fact,
the German whip. effectively at all. Its army was built on the Ger-
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (in what was be- man model, but it didn't have the German snap.
coming Poland) was signed on March 3, 1918. Most of the officers spoke German, but most of
The Germans, who later would loudly complain the enlisted men didn't understand either Ger-
of the injustice of the Treaty of Versailles, in- man or each other. What's more, those who were
flicted a much harsher treaty on the Russians
neither German nor Hungarian had no great ap-
(one that shows what they would have done to petite for dying for Austria-Hungary, so they
the west, had they won the war). All the Russian were easy to defeat and ever ready to surrender.
borderlands, including the Ukraine and Trans- The worst that can be said for the Austro-Hun-
caucasia, were confirmed as independent. Ger-
garian army was that, without German support,
man forces occupied Finland and the Ukraine, it invariably managed to outbumble the Rus-
and there were plans use the Ukraine's wheat-
to sians.
fields to counter the British blockade and feed
the anything were needed to set the tone of the
If
German people. (The Ukrainians might starve, of humiliation that Austria-Hungary was to experi-
course, but the Germans were very philosophical
ence throughout the war, it was that even the
about such things.) war against Serbia was a failure. It launched an
Now was the time for the great push in the invasion of the tiny nation but was thrown back,
west that would end the war in a German vic- and by the end of 1914, the Austro-Hungarians,'
tory.
at the cost of aquarter of a million casualties,
However, the great push in the west failed, found themselves defeated by the Serbians.
and the war ended in a German defeat. Instantly,
In 1915, it was a different matter. German aid
the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was no longer opera- drove the Russians out of Austria-Hungary, and
tive, but that didn't help the
Russians a bit. They Bulgaria entered the war on the Austro-Hungar-
were sunk in civil war, and the western powers,
ian side. That meant that Serbia was
attacked
furious at the separate peace that had
subjected from the west by Bulgaria as well as from the
them to the terror of the great 1918 spring offen-
north by Austria-Hungary. Against this, Serbia
sive, and dread over the possible spread of
in
could not stand, and by the end of 1915 it was
communism, intervened in the civil war on the smashed.
side of the "Whites" (the counterrevolutionaries)
On the other hand, Italy had come into the
and against the "Reds" (the communists.)
war in 1915 against Austria-Hungary, which now
Yet even with the world falling about Russian
had to fight on the Italian border. Then, in 1916,
19 14 TO 1920 521
there came the Brusilov offensive in

which once rendered and agreed to an armistice, leaving
again the Russians drove back the Austro-Hun- Germany to fight on alone for one more week.
garians. On November 11, 1918, the day when the Ger-
Inside the nation, thingswere disintegrating mans themselves surrendered, Charles aban- 1
fast. Austria-Hungary was an empty shell which doned all political authority. He didn't actually
was simply going through the motions of fight- abdicate, but amounted
it The
to the same thing.
ing a war because of unyielding German pres- Hapsburgs had joined the Hohenzollerns of Ger-
sure. The Foreign Minister, Leopold Berchtold many and the Romanovs of Russia in the ash-
(1863-1942), who had arranged the fateful ulti- heap of history, six and a quarter centuries after
matum to Serbia, was forced to resign on January the first Hapsburg Emperor.
13, 1915. The ultraconservative Austro-Hungar- Austria and Hungary were dealt with sepa-
ian Prime Minister, Karl von Sturgkh (1859- rately in the peace settlements that followed.
1916), was assassinated on October 21, 1916. Austria signed the Treaty of St. Germain on Sep-
Then, on November 21, 1916, Franz Joseph tember 10, 1919; Hungary signed the Treaty of
finally died. He had reigned for 68 years, longer Trianon on June 4, 1920. (All the treaties after
even than the reign of Victoria. He had become World War I were named for the Paris suburbs in
Emperor in the confused aftermath of the Revo- which the peace negotiators met.)
lutions of 1848, had survived the disasters of a Austria and Hungary became two separate
losing war with France and another with Prussia, nations, each consisting only of its core: the Ger-
had survived the near-split of the nation into a man-speaking core for Austria, the Hungarian-
dual monarchy, had survived a series of family speaking core for Hungary. The minorities were
tragedies, and died now in the midst of the worst shorn away.
disaster of and with his nation in dying con-
all, The new nation of Czechoslovakia was formed
vulsions of its own. out of northern Austria-Hungary. Polish regions
He was succeeded by the grandson of his became part of an independent Poland. Roma-
youngest brother, and the new Emperor reigned nian areas in the east joined Romania, and Slavic
as Charles I (1887-1922). areas in the south joined Serbia to form the en-
In 1917, German help on the Italian
arrived larged nation of Yugoslavia. Some Austrian re-
front, and Austria-Hungary won a huge victory gions were transferred to Italy.
over the Italians on October 24, but it wasn't Both Austria and Hungary had to pay repara-
enough. Italy held on, and the minorities within tions, and had to promise to limit their armies.
Austria-Hungary clamored for independence. What's more, Austria was forbidden to join with
Charles I tried to negotiate some kind of Germany, even though now that it had been
peace, but it wouldn't work, for Wilson's Four- shorn of its non-German territories, it might have
teen Points called for self-determination for Aus- made sense for the union to take place.
tria-Hungary's minorities and Charles wasn't
ready to preside over his nation's dissolution.
But it was dissolving anyway, and in despair ITALY
Charles offered, on October 16, 1918, a quadru- When World War began, Italy had been part of
I
ple monarchy made up of Germans, Poles, the Triple Alliance, along with Germany and
Czechs, and South Slavs (with Hungary to make Austria-Hungary, for 32 years. By the terms of
its own arrangements). The situation had gone that alliance, it might have been expected to join
too far for that, however. Tisza of Hungary was the two in the war.
assassinated on October 31, 1918, and Austro- Italy, however, was not really prepared for
Hungarian armies were collapsing on the Italian war. Nor was it enamored of fighting on the Aus-
front. tro-Hungarian side, since it had ambitions to
On November 3, 1918, Austria-Hungary sur- annex Italian-speaking parts of southern Austria-
Hungary. Finally, it wanted to let the two sides finally declared war on Germany on August 28,
bid for Italy's help. 1916, in the hope that this would stimulate the
The Prime Minister of Italy at the time World Allies into sending Italy more supplies.
War I began was Antonio Salandra (1853-1931), The Germans, however, who had honored
who took refuge in the legalism that the Triple their neutrality and refused to help Austria-Hun-
Alliance was a defensive one. Since Austria-Hun- gary on the Italian front, now took a more active
gary had invaded Serbia, that war was offensive part. They sent help southward, including a gen-
and Italy was not compelled to join. Therefore, eral, Otto Below (1857-1944). Below had fought
Salandra declared Italian neutrality. at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes, and he
Italy then spent 10 months in secret negotia- made preparations for a surprise attack.
tions to see what each side would promise. Here OnOctober 24, 1917, that surprise attack, pre-
the Allies had the advantage, for they could eas- ceded by an intensive artillery bombardment and
ily promise more Austro-Hungarian territory taking advantage of mist and rain, struck the Ital-
than Austria-Hungary could itself. After all, it is ian lines at the Austro-Hungarian town of Ca-
always easier to be generous when you are buy- paretto, which was nearly at the Italian border
ing something with someone money. The
else's (so little had either army achieved in two years
result was that, on April 26, 1915, the Allies and of fighting).
Italy agreed to the Treaty of London, which was Under the sudden onslaught of this "Battle of
kept secret, and which outlined all the territory Caporetto" (sometimes called the "Twelfth Battle
Italy was to have in the peace settlement. of Isonzo"), the Italian line crumpled. In three
Despite the bribes, it was not easy for Italy to weeks, the Italians were driven back 50 miles and
enter the war, for there was a strong neutralist found themselves near Venice. Some 40,000 Ital-
feeling in the nation. After anyone watching were
all, ians killed or wounded and 275,000 were
the progress of the first year of the war would taken prisoner. The defeat almost put Italy out of
require only a moderate amount of sanity to want the war and, had the Austro-Hungarian army
to stay out. been better equipped, the advance might have
The were anti-war, but one of
Italian socialists continued.
the loudest of them, Benito Mussolini, suddenly The Italian commander-in-chief,
Luigi Ca-
broke with the party and became stridently pro- dorna (1850-1928), was relieved of his command
war. In light of the man's later career and of the after the battle, and was replaced by Armando
knowledge we have of his character, we can be Diaz (1861-1928), who managed to keep the Ital-
quite certain he was bribed to do so. ian army intact and who organized a defense on
On May 23, 1915, then, Italy declared war on the new The Boselli cabinet was also forced
line.
Austria-Hungary, but not on Germany. out, and Vittorio Emanuele Orlando (1860-1952)
There was no point in trying to fight in the became the new Prime Minister.
Alps, so Italy could strike only northeastward to- In 1918, with Russia completely out of the
ward the Austro-Hungarian port city of Trieste war, and with Germany engaged in its do-or-die
(which Italy wanted The Isonzo River
for itself). offensive in the west,
Austria-Hungary was
flows into the Adriatic Sea near the Italian border
pushed by the Germans into one last offensive
there, and over the space of the next two years
on the Italian front. On June 15, 1918, that offen-
the Italians and Austro-Hungarians fought 11
sive was launched. Diaz, fighting skillfully
Battles of the Isonzo," which produced no sig- enough, managed to blunt that offensive by June
nificant advance in either direction and simply 25, but did not follow up with the immediate
piled up the casualties.
counterattack that Allied commander-in-chief,
After the first failures at the Isonzo, Salandra Foch, demanded.
was forced to resign in
June of 1916, and Paolo Instead, Diaz cautiously waited until he was
Boselli (1838-1932) became Prime Minister. He sure that the German spring offensive had failed.
1914 TO 1920 523
Then, he began his counteroffensive. The

in July,
was
that to sweep and, later, much of
first Italy
Austrians resisted with surprising effectiveness, the rest of Europe. Rafael Sabatini (1875-1950),
but now, finally, British and French troops were writing in English, made his first big success as a
in the line and even some Americans: On
Octo- writer of historical novels with Sea-Hawk (1915).
ber 24, 1918, when Austria-Hungary was, in any
case, on the point of death, the Italian forces
began the ''Battle of Vittorio Veneto," which PAPACY
forced Austria-Hungary out of the war. During World War I, Benedict XV (1854-1922)
Orlando and his foreign minister, Giorgio Sid- was Pope. There was nothing he could do but to
ney Sonnino (1847-1922), represented Italy at the push vainly for peace, and to do what he could
negotiations leading to the Treaty of Versailles. to carry out relief work. The decline of the politi-
At those negotiations, Italy was disappointed. It power
cal of thePapacy was indicated by the fact
got the Italian-speaking areas of Austria-Hun- that at the peace negotiation, the Papacy was not
gary, largely because there was nothing else to represented, nor was its advice sought.
do with them. That meant Italy gained the dis-
tricts of Trent and Trieste.
The Treaty of London, however, which had SERBIA/YUGOSLAVIA

preceded Italy's entrance into the war, had Serbia resolutely fought off the Austro-Hungar-
promised the Italians the Dalmatian coast along ian invasion at the start of World War I. It was
the eastern shore of the Adriatic. However, Pres- not until December 2, 1914, that the Austro-
ident Wilson would not hear of that. The Dal- Hungarians were able to take Belgrade, the Ser-
matian coast was Slavic and it had to be part of bian capital, even though it was just across the
an expanded Serbia. (The Allies might also have Danube River from Austria-Hungary. What's
been influenced by the fact that Serbia had more, the Serbians managed to retake it on De-
fought better than expected, and that Italy had cember 15.
not.) Furthermore, Italy received no part of the On October 14, 1915, however, Bulgaria, re-
German African colonies, which were divided membering its loss at Serbian hands in the Sec-
between Great Britain and France. ond Balkan War two years earlier, decided to
The result was that Italy came out of the war take advantage of the situation to even the score.
with no sense of having won glorious victories It joined the Central Powers and declared
war on
(Vittorio Veneta was practically a battle with a Serbia.
corpse), with the added bitterness of feeling that At that time, the Austro-Hungarians were in-
it had been cheated out of what it had
been vading Serbia again, this time with German help.
promised. All it had was an enormous national As those armies came down from the north, the
debt, a high cost of living, and the promise of Bulgarians struck from the east. Until that time,
further misery. The country was in a general the Serbians under Radomir Putnik (1847-1917)
state of resentment and shock, and disorders had done very well, but now they were outnum-
grew continually worse. bered two to one, and they had no choice but to
During the war, Ottorino Respighi (1879- retreat. They made their way to the Albanian
1936) was composing music, producing, notably, coast where some, in January 1916, were taken
"The Fountains of Rome" in 1917. Luigi Piran- off to the island of Corfu. Austro-Hungarian
dello (1867-1936) was writing, and was even- forces then occupied all of Serbia and Montene-
tually to win a Nobel Prize in literature. Vilfredo gro.
Pareto (1848-1923) was a sociologist, whose Trea- Serbian troops kept fighting during the re-
on General Sociology (1916) favored elitism and
tise mainder of the war under Allied command, how-
was strongly antidemocratic. It served as a phil- ever, in other parts of the Balkans.
osophical basis for the coming wave of reaction Serbia looked forward to the end of the war.
assuming Austria-Hungary's defeat. It wanted to That was probably a good idea, but the strongest
form, with Montenegro, a South-Slav kingdom, of the Ottoman leaders of the time, Enver Pasha,
which would be a Greater Serbia, including Bos- preferred to fight in the Caucasus on the north-
nia, Herzegovina, Croatia, and Slovenia
which were under Austro-Hungarian rule). The
(all of east frontier
— perhaps because gains there could
more easily be incorporated into the
Ottoman
Croats and Slovenes, however, were Catholic, realm.As it happened, though, it was a moun-
used the Roman alphabet, and had long been tainous area, where fighting was difficult, and
under central-European influence. They con- where the Ottoman army got nowhere.
sidered themselves more civilized than the other As for the British, they rushed troops to Cy-
South Slavs, many of whom were Orthodox, prus and to Egypt to protect the Suez Canal.
used the Cyrillic alphabet, and had long been Troops from India moved up the Persian Gulf
under Ottoman rule. and landed at the southern tip of Mesopotamia,
Despite these potential incompatibilities, rep- which was part of the Ottoman Empire. They
resentatives of the various areas carried through took Basra, an important oil center near the
negotiations on the island of Corfu and, on July mouth of the Tigris-Euphrates River, on Novem-
20, 1917, agreed to form a single nation, to be ber 23, 1914.
ruled by the Serbian king.
The main introduced by Turkey's en-
difficulty
Once war was over, Montenegro joined
the trance into the war was that it broke off sea-com-
Serbia on November 26, 1918, and King Nicholas
munications between the western Allies and
of Montenegro was ousted from the throne. On
Russia. This was serious, for Russia depended on
December 4, 1918, the "Kingdom of the Serbs, the west for supplies, and one of the many rea-
Croats, and Slovenes" was brought into being,
sons for Russia's dismal showing in World War I
though it came to be far better known as "Yugo- was that Russian soldiers lacked the arms and
slavia."
ammunition that might have reached them in
quantity if the Ottoman Empire were on the Al-
OTTOMAN EMPIRE lied side, or at least neutral.

Something had to be done about that, and this
At the World War I, the Ottoman Empire
start of
raised a dispute among the western Allies. To
was markedly pro-German. Two German cruis- some Great Britain, it seemed that the direct
in
ers, the Goeben and the Breslau, dashed
eastward fighting in France ought to be left to the
French,
through the Mediterranean Sea on August 4, while the British used their sea-power to deliver
1914. They did so before Great Britain had
ac- blows at the periphery. Winston Churchill, who
tually declared war, so British ships did not inter- was the First Lord of the Admiralty, was very
By the time Great
fere. Britain entered the war,
the cruisers could not be caught,
—
much in favor of this as a matter of fact, it was
and they ar- a British policy that had worked, in the long run,
rived safely in Constantinople.
in the battleagainst Napoleon.
That combined with the German victories
feat,
Naturally, the French wanted the British in
in Belgium and in East Prussia,
convinced the France, and the fighting there was so difficult
Ottoman government that it would be worth- and bloody that the British could not simply
while to back the Germans. Therefore, they
en- move out without losing the continent. The Rus-
tered the war on the side of the
Germans on sians,however, who were being driven back in
October 29, 1914. Even before the formal decla-
Poland, appealed for an allied offensive against
ration, the two German cruisers (now
part of the the Ottoman Empire to reopen communications.
Ottoman navy) had, without warning, bom-
Eventually, the British tried to do both. They
barded Russian ports on the Black Sea coast.
kept their strong presence in France, but they
Limon van Sanders, the Ottoman Empire's
also sent troops to force their way up the
German adviser, wanted the Turks to land at narrow
straits to
Constantinople. After a preliminary
Odessa and to push northward into the Ukraine.
naval bombardment, the Allied troops landed
on
1914 TO 1920 525
the Gallipoli peninsula on the European side of The British were also continuing to force their
the straits on April 25, 1915. way up the Tigris River. It was hard work, for
The force was none too large for the purpose, the supply lines were long, and here, too, there
but the real trouble was that it was ineptly han- was a divided command. The British were aim-
dled. There were troops from France and Aus- ing at Baghdad; however, at Kut, a hundred
tralia as well as from Great Britain and they did miles short of the goal, they were stopped, and a
not coordinate their attacks well. The British British army of 8000 (including 6000 Indian
army and navy were under separate leadership, troops) was forced to surrender on April 19,
too, and did not cooperate properly. In addition,
1916.
none of the people in charge were first-class. The British regrouped farther south and began
Added to all that, the reinforcements came in a new offensive in 1917. This time they defeated
small batches and were never in quite enough fhe Turks at Kut and took the city on February
quantity to do the job. 23, 1917. They went on to take Baghdad on
On the Ottoman side. Liman von Sanders con- March 11 and, by the end of the war, the British
ducted a brilliant defense that was ably seconded were in control of the Mosul oil fields, 220 miles
by an Ottoman general, Mustafa Kemal (1881- north of Baghdad, and all of Mesopotamia was
1938). under their occupation.
The campaign turned out to be an
Gallipoli In Arabia, the British and French had been
unequivocal disaster for the British, and by the negotiating with Arab chieftains in regions long
end of 1916 they withdrew. Winston Churchill subject to the Ottoman Empire. On June 5, 1916,
lost his job and it was many years before he re- the Arabs revolted. Husayn ibn Ali (1854-1931),
gained his influence. As for the Russians, they who ruled over the Hejaz (the western coast of
remained permanently cut off, and it is possible Arabia along the Red Sea, including the sacred
to argue that the Russian Revolution might not towns of Mecca and Medina), declared its inde-
have happened, or might have taken a different pendence on June 7. On October 19, 1917, he
course, had it not been for the British failure at declared himself king of all Arabia. The British,
Gallipoli. of course, supported him, and began an offen-
Elsewhere, the Ottoman Empire was less for- sive across the Sinai peninsula toward Palestine,
tunate. The fighting in the Caucasus continued, in order to preoccupy the Turkish forces and
but the Ottomans lost heavily and they vented keep the Arab revolt going.
their frustration by instituting a massacre of Ar- In 1917, the British were stopped at Gaza in
menians on the grounds that they were helping southern Palestine, and Edmund Henry Hynman
the Russians. Actually, what was really helping Allenby (1861-1936) was then put in charge of
the Russians was, first, Ottoman ineptitude; and, the offensive on June 28, 1917. Helping the Arabs
second, the fact that the Grand Duke Nicholas was
directly the British officer, Thomas Edward
was put in charge of the fighting there and that Lawrence (1888-1935), better known as "Law-
in Nikolay Nikolayevich Yudenich (1862-1933) rence of Arabia."
the Russians had one of their few competent gen- Allenby attacked the Ottoman forces with
erals. The Russians were deep in northeastern new vigor and with great skill. He moved stead-
Turkey when the abdication of the Tsar put an ily northward and, on December 9, 1917, he
took
end to the fighting. Jerusalem. It was the first time Jerusalem was in
Elsewhere, the British fought off attacks by Christianhands since the days of the Holy
Ottoman forces on the Suez Canal. This v/as Roman Emperor, Frederick II, nearly seven cen-
done without undue trouble but, in the early turies earlier.
stages of the Gallipoli campaign, the necessity of By the end of the war, Allenby had moved
keeping troops in Egypt for the Suez defense farther northward into Lebanon and Syria, and
stood in the way of sending sufficient reinforce- on October 30, 1918, the Ottoman Empire surren-
ments to the Dardanelles. dered.
In the peace negotiations that followed the gean Sea. only seacoast, thereafter, was on
Its
war, the Ottoman Empire was dealt with harshly the Black Sea. It had to reduce its army and pay
by the Treaty of Sevres. It lost all its territories reparations, too.
outside Asia Minor. Mesopotamia and Palestine
came under British control, and Syria and Leba-
non under French control. The Hejaz and Ar-
menia were granted independence. Greece was
ROMANIA
given a section of western Asia Minor about the
Romania was neutral at the start of World War I,
but it was tempted to join in on the Allied side,
city of Smyrna where, after five years, a plebi-
for if Austria-Hungary was defeated, then the
scite was to be held to determine whether it was
to remain with Greece or with Turkey.
large Romanian-speaking province of Transyl-
vania in eastern Hungary might be annexed.
The Ottoman Empire signed the peace on Au-
gust 10, 1920, but the Turkish nationalists, under
When the Brusilov offensive was gaining
Kemal Pasha, the hero of Gallipoli, had no inten- ground and the Russians were advancing into
tion of honoring the treaty.
northeastern Austria-Hungary in 1916, Romania
thought that Austria-Hungary was through and
it declared war on that nation.
BULGARIA Romania had miscalculated, however. Aus-

tria-Hungary might indeed have been on its last
Bulgaria was neutral at the start of the war, but
both sides wanted its aid desperately: the Ger- legs, but Germany wasn't. Germany declared
mans as a way of opening, the path to the Otto- war on Romania on August 27, 1916, and at once
man Empire, the western Allies as a way of
launched an offensive. Leading the German ar-
opening a path to Russia. In this case, it was the mies were Mackenson, the victor at Masurian
Germans who could bid higher, for the territory Lakes, and Falkenhayn, who had been relieved
coveted by Bulgaria was Serbian and Greek, and from his post as commander-in-chief.
earlier
Germany didn't mind giving They had no trouble in crushing the Romanians
that away.
Therefore, Bulgaria joined the fighting on the
and, within four months, Romania was occupied
German and out of the war.
on October 19, 1915, bringing the
side,
number of Central Powers to four: Germany,
On May 7, Romania was forced to sign
1918,
the Treaty of Bucharest. It yielded minor bits of
Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman
Empire. Bulgaria helped defeat Serbia in 1915. territory to Bulgaria and to Austria-Hungary. On
the other hand, it annexed Bessarabia on its
However, Allied forces were gathering at Sa-
lonika in northeastern Greece, and a Serbian western frontier. (The province had been Rus-
army was being rebuilt there. Italian forces sian, but Russia was in no position to prevent it.)
landed in Albania. In both places, it meant that When, half a year later, the Central Powers
Bulgarian forces had to continue fighting even were defeated, Romania obtained its reward. The
though Serbia was defeated and occupied. peace treaties assigned it Transylvania, and al-
There was a long stalemate but, in September, lowed it to keep Bessarabia. Thus, it had gained
1918, with the Central sizable provinces both on the west and east.
Powers clearly on their last
legs, an Allied thrust from Greece northward
into Bulgaria defeated the Bulgarian army com-
pletely. On September 29, 1918, Bulgaria surren- ALBANIA
dered. As it had been the last to join the Central Albania had only been independent a year when
Powers, it was the first to leave. World War I broke out. Although it was not itself
By the Treaty of Neuilly, signed on November if served as a battleground
between
27, 1919, Bulgaria had to cede to Greece its Thra-
Austro-Hungarian forces arriving in Albania
cian province, which was its opening to the Ae-
after having occupied Serbia and Montenegro,
19 14 TO 1920 527
and Italian forces arriving from across the Constantine I, he had come to
realizing that
Adriatic. the end of the line, abdicated on June 12. His
second son succeeded to the throne and ruled as
Alexander I (1893-1920). Alexander called in
GREECE Venizelos as Prime Minister, yet again, on June
Greece was neutral at the start of the war, which 26, 1917, and the next day Greece entered the
was perhaps the result of a cancellation of oppo- war on the Allied side.
views. The Greek Prime Minister, Venizelos,
site
was replaced on December 10, 1917 by
Sarrail
was in favor of entering the war on the side of the French general, Marie Louis Adolphe Guil-
Greek king, Constantine
the Allies, but the I, was laumat (1863-1940), who reorganized the rather
strongly pro-German. demoralized Allied force and brought it to fight-
Once Bulgariashowed signs that it would ing trim. In June 1918, he was in turn replaced
enter the war on the German side, however, by Louis Felix Marie Frangois Franchet d'Esperey
Greece grew uneasy. Bulgaria might well de- (1856-1942), who began once
at to organize an
mand territory and grow too strong. Venizelos, offensive. OnSeptember 15, 1918, the Allies
who had lost the Prime Ministership on March struck northward. By September 29, the Bulgar-
16, 1915, because he had advocated help to Great ian forces had been driven into a wild retreat and
Britain at Gallipoli, was back in power on August Bulgaria surrendered. Franchet d'Esperey contin-
22. He now suggested that the Allies send troops ued his drive northward to the Danube, forcing
to Salonika on the northeastern coast of Greece. the surrender of Hungary as well.
The Allies did land at Salonika on October 3, In the peace treaties that followed, Greece re-
1915, but Constantine stood firm against joining
I ceived the Bulgarian province of Thrace, cutting
the war, Venizelos was forced out again on Oc- Bulgaria off from the Aegean. It also received the
tober Even though Bulgaria joined the war and
5. city of Smyrna in Asia Minor.
Serbia was occupied, Greece remained officially
neutral. The Allied forces, therefore, found
themselves in an uncomfortable position and the BELGIUM
British were ready to leave, but the head of the Belgium was overrun by the Germans in the first
French forces, Maurice Paul Emmanuel Sarrail three weeks war and, except for an ex-
of the
(1856-1929), insisted on staying. treme western strip on the Channel, remained
What the Allies could do, thereafter, was to under German occupation to the end. Those Bel-
use their control of the sea to interfere with gian troops who retreated into France kept fight-
Greek commerce, and to intrigue to set up a ing under the leadership of Albert I, who led a
pro-Allies government. On September 29, 1916, contingent of troops forward in the final Allied
Venizelos established a pro-Allies provisional offensive of the war. In the peace treaties that
government in his native Crete, where he was followed, Belgium gained two small border re-
safe behind the British fleet. On October 9, 1916, gions from Germany — Eupen and Malmedy.
he came to Salonika.
The number of Allied troops at Salonika con-
tinued to but the British, French, and Ser-
rise, NETHERLANDS
bian troops were not under unified command, The Netherlands remained neutral throughout
and were inconclusive. The Al-
military actions the war, though it escaped occupation only be-
lies felt that nothing could be better done unless cause the Germans modified the Schlieffen plan
Greece joined the war officially. On June 11, in order to spare it. From a purely military stand-
1917, they demanded that Constantine I abdi- point, this was a German mistake.
cate, and Allied forces began to spread south- After his abdication, William II of Germany
ward into the heart of Greece. went to the Netherlands and took up his resi-
dence in Doom in the central regions of the na- end of the war, there were some Portuguese con-
tion. He remained there the rest of his life. tingents fighting on the western front.
SPAIN SWITZERLAND
Spain was neutral throughout World War I and, Switzerland remained neutral in World War I,
indeed, prospered because there was a great de- but it kept its army on a war footing, just in case.
mand for goods of all sorts on the part of the Being a landlocked nation, it suffered from a food
warring nations. shortage, but its industries expanded.
There were, however, troubles of other kinds.
Catalonia, the easternmost section of Spain, with
Barcelona as its had once been part of
chief city, DENMARK
Aragon, and had never been entirely reconciled Denmark remained neutral in World War
I, but
to its union with, and domination by, Castile, it lost an overseas possession as an indirect result
four and a half centuries earlier. Even its lan- of the war. Denmark, for two and a half centu-
guage, Catalan, though closely related to Span- ries,had owned three small islands that formed
ish, is not identical to it. During the war years,
part of the Virgin Island group lying east of
Catalonian unrest grew high, but the Spanish Puerto Rico. These were the "Danish West In-
government was in no mood to give in to de- dies."
mands for autonomy. The United States feared that a German vic-
What's more, the inhabitants of Spanish Mo- tory might force the transfer of those islands to
rocco were in a continuing state of rebellion, and Germany, and that a German base there might
the Spaniards got very little good out of this new threaten the newly opened Panama
Canal. The
bit of Empire with which they had burdened
United States, therefore, put pressure on Den-
themselves. mark to sell the islands, offering 25 million dol-
An outstanding Spanish writer of his period, lars for them. On August 4, 1916, Denmark
was Vicente Blasco Ibanez (1867-1928). He was agreed, and on January 17, 1917, the transfer to
an ardent republican who endured imprison- the United States became official.
ment on several occasions because of his views, On April 21, 1918, complete universal suffrage
and ended his life in voluntary exile. His most (for women as well as for men) was established
famous book was the antiwar novel. The Four in Denmark. On November 30, 1918, Iceland,
Horsemen of the Apocalypse, published in 1916. which had been a Danish possession for over five
centuries (and which had been a Norwegian pos-
session before that), was granted its indepen-
PORTUGAL dence. Its only connection with Denmark,
Portugal honored its long-standing treaty with thereafter, was that
shared the same king.
it
Great Britain when its legislature voted to declare By the Treaty of Versailles, a Danish-speaking
war on Germany on November 23, 1914, after strip of northern Schleswig, taken by Prussia
a
deciding that Great Britain and France would not
half-century earlier, was restored to Denmark,
be quickly crushed by the Germans. This action
partly on the principle of self-determination, and
was not immediately made effective, however,
partly, also, to punish Germany.
for there were strong pro-German
elements in
the army, which seized the government
and es-
tablished two brief military dictatorships, first
in NORWAY
1915 and then in 1917. In the interval between
Norway remained neutral in World War I, but
these two rightist regimes, Germany declared
suffered considerably. It was a sea-faring nation
war on Portugal on March 9, 1916, because some with a large merchant fleet, and many of its ships
German ships had been seized in Lisbon. By the were sunk during the war by German subma-
1914 TO 1920 529
rines. Nevertheless, Norway resisted the im- wreck. It recovered rapidly, but the city had suf-
pulse to go to war over it.
-
fered what may have been the largest single ac-

On February 9, 1920, Norway annexed Sval- cidental explosion in history.
bard (also known as Spitzbergen). It lay so deep
in the Arctic Ocean that, until then, no nation
had been tempted to own though it was used
as a base for fishing fleets
it,
MEXICO
by several nations.
An outstanding Norwegian writer of this pe- In the early part of this period, Mexico was in
riod was Sigrid Undset (1882-1949), who wrote turmoil over the private war of Pancho Villa with
on feminist topics and who, eventually, won a the United States, and over the American expe-
Nobel Prize in literature. ditionary force under Pershing that was sent into
Mexico to take Villa (but failed to do so).
Just before the American forces left, Mexico
SWEDEN adopted a new constitution on January 21, 1917.
It provided for democracy and
Sweden remained neutral during World War I
social reforms.
but it had
bad time of it. The British blockade
a There was to be universal suffrage, an eight-hour
of Germany had the effect of closing off the Baltic workday, a minimum wage, arbitration of labor
Sea. That put an effective stop to Swedish sea- disputes, land distribution, and curbs on the
trade, and the nation experienced a food short- power of the church and of the foreign owners of
age. Mexican national resources.
Mexico was especially sensitive to the matter
of oil, which it labored to keep in Mexican hands,
CANADA with control by foreigners to be only at the plea-
During the war, the sympathies of English- sure of the government. Naturally, American
speaking Canada were entirely on the side of and British oil companies were alarmed at the
Great Britain, and units were sent to Europe at radical thought of any nation (other than their
once to help in the fight. There they went into own) taking possession of its own natural re-
training and, by the Second Battle of Ypres in sources. They protested and were backed by
their government.
1915, they were at the front. In fact, the first use
of poison gas by the Germans struck a Canadian- Carranza was elected president under this
held portion of the Allied line. constitutionon March 11, 1917. Mexico remained
French-speaking Canada, however, was dead- neutral during World War I.
set against conscription. Its sympathy for France

did not, apparently, overcome its antipathy for
Great Britain. It was not until September 26, WEST INDIES
1917, that Canada established compulsory mili- Cuba declared war on Germany the day after the
tary service, and even then there were strong ele- United States entered the war, and then pros-
ments under the leadership of Wilfrid Laurier pered greatly on sugar sales to the United States.
(1841-1919) of Quebec who continued to oppose American marines remained in Haiti and in
it.Nevertheless, Canada supplied 640,000 sol- the Dominican Republic during this period, and
diers to fight alongside the Allies. both nations continued to be virtual American
A war-related disaster struck Canada on De- protectorates.
cember 6, 1917. A
French ship, carrying explo- On March 2, 1917, Puerto Rico
was made an
sives for export to Europe, collided with another American territory and Puerto Ricans became
ship in Halifax harbor. There was a fire and the American citizens. This made them eligible for
cargo of the French ship exploded. The explosion military conscription, and by the end of the war
killed 1600 people, wounded 6000 more, and left some 18,000 Puerto Ricans had entered the ser-
10,000 homeless. In a few minutes, Halifax was a vice.
—
French Somaliland on the Red Sea) was com-
CENTRAL AMERICA pleted. It had been over 20 years in the building.
Immediately after the United States entered
World War I, Panama declared war on Germany
—
on April 7, 1917. Four others Costa Rica, Nica-
AFRICA
ragua, Honduras, and Guatemala —
declared war In Africa during the course of the war, the Ger-
on Germany during the course of 1918. There man were rapidly cleaned up (all except
colonies
was no direct participation of any of these na- for the guerrilla war in German East Africa) and
tions in the war. were parceled out between Great Britain and
France. Belgium got some border districts to add
to the Congo. All this was confirmed at the peace
SOUTH AMERICA treaty.
During World War I, the South American nations

remained neutral, for the most part. Some sev-
ered relations with Germany, usually on the
PERSIA
ground that German submarines had sunk their Persia tried to remain neutral during World War
ships. Only Brazil actually declared war, on Oc- I,but this was disregarded. The Russians and
tober 26, 1917, thereafter serving as a source of Turks fought in her territory in a stalemated way.
supplies for the Allies. After the Russian Revolution, the Russian forces
withdrew but a small British force made its ap-
pearance. Persia had no effective government of
EGYPT its own in this period.
Great Britain kept tight control over Egypt during
World War I, in order that it might protect the
Suez Canal. Egypt also served as the base for the
AFGHANISTAN
British drive into Palestine and Syria. Afghanistan remained neutral throughout the
On October, 9, 1917, the Egyptian sultan, war, though Great Britain had to pay it subsidies
Hussein Kamil, died and was succeeded by his toovercome its Islamic leaning toward the Otto-
older brother, who reigned as Fuad I (1868- man Empire and, therefore, Germany.
1936).
INDIA
ETHIOPIA India contributed heavily to the British war ef-
The Emperor, Yasu, became a convert to

Lij fort, and Indian troops did much of the fighting
Islam in April 1916. This infuriated Ethiopia's in the Asian campaigns. As the war progressed,
Christian church and it also disturbed the British, however, the Indians began to clamor more and
French, and Italians, who feared that the Em- more loudly for home rule. Great Britain, anxious
peror might be drawing closer to the Ottoman to keep India in line, did work out a scheme for
Empire and, therefore, Germans.
to the home rule, but the Indians found it completely
The Ethiopian Church had no trouble in rous- insufficient. By the end of the war, India was a
ing enough opposition to depose the Emperor. powder keg ready to explode,
Succeeding him was Zauditu (1876-1920), Lij Ya-
su's aunt and a daughter of Menelik II. She chose
a regional governor, Ras Tafari (1892-1975), as SIAM
her heir. Ras Tafari attempted to liberalize the Siam declared war on Germany on July 22, 1917,
government and, in 1918, Ethiopia's first railroad and sent some soldiers to France in 1918. Siam
— from its capital in Addis Ababa to Djibouti (in hoped to be rewarded, once the Allies won the
1914 TO 1920 531
war, by the removal of some of

the European the drive to
controls on the economy of the nation.
makeitself the dominant power in
Certainly, eastern Asia and the western Pacific.
Germany had to abandon its privileges after the
war.
CHINA
JAPAN This period was one of increasing
anarchy in
China. The nation was falling apart
Japan greeted World into frag-
War I as a marvellous op- ments, each one ruled by some
portunity to increase particular mili-
its power in the western tary leader or "warlord." That
Pacific Ocean. Germany was the obvious candi- made it all but
impossible for China to face down Japan's
date for the initial blow, for it was
weaker in the determined drive
Pacific area than Great Britain,
to gain power at China's ex-
France, or Russia pense.
were. On August 15, 1914, then, two weeks after On August
the beginning of the war, Japan
14, 1917, China declared war on
presented Ger- Germany, feeling that this
many with an ultimatum, demanding that Ger- would gain it some
consideration at the peace treaty, but
man ships be withdrawn from the Pacific. that hope
went glimmering. The peace
Germany didn't answer, and Japan declared war treaties confirmed
the transfer of German-controlled
on August 23. Chinese areas
to Japan.
Japan laid seige to the German-controlled
Even Russia, which was itself in fragments
Chinese port of Kiaochow, and took it on as
No- a result of civil war and foreign
vember 7, 1914. She then proceeded to take intervention,
those could make headway against China. Outer
islands in the North Pacific Ocean
Mon-
that were golia (from where Genghis Khan and his armies
under German control — the Marianas Islands, had emerged to conquer most of Eurasia
seven
the Marshall Islands, the Caroline
Islands, and centuries earlier) had been under vague
Palau. All these were turned over to Chinese
Japan, offi- control. Now it fell under the sway
cially, by the peace treaties at the end of the war. of the Rus-
sian Communist government and
In addition, Japan took over the was organized,
German com- on November 16, 1919, as the Mongolian
mercial dealings in the Pacific, Peo-
and grew prosper- ple's Republic.
ous on the sale of munitions.
In theory, Kiaochow was part of China, so
when Japan took it over, China demanded its AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND
return to her own jurisdiction. This the Japanese Australia consistently refused to adopt
refused to allow. conscrip-
Instead,
Japan presented tion during World War I, but there
China, on January was a consid-
18, 1915, with the so-called erable flow of volunteers to fight at
"'Twenty-One Demands," which included terri- the British
side, notably at Gallipoli, and in the drive
torial grants and economic concessions
so great into Palestine and
that China would, in accepting them,
Syria. The same might be
become lit- said of New Zealand, and,
tle more than a Japanese
together, they
protectorate. Although formed the "Anzacs" (Australian-New
China refused to accept the demands, Japan con- Zealand
Army Corps.) New Zealand did manage to push
tinued to press them inexorably and seized
the through conscription on August 1, 1916.
opportunity of the war to persuade both Russia
While Japan took over the German islands
and the United States in
to recognize Japan's "spe- the North Pacific Ocean, Australia and
cial interests" in China. NewZea-
land took those in the South Pacific
After the Russian Revolution, Japan partici- Ocean. At
the peace treaties, Australia received
pated in the intervention by the western Allies in German
New Guinea, and New Zealand received Ger-
Russian affairs, landing soldiers in Vladivostok man Samoa.
on April 5, 1918.
Thus, Japan had used World War I skillfully in
1920 TO 1930
age, went into a state of panicky terror over Rus-
UNITED STATES sian communism. Alexander Mitchell Palmer
At the conclusion of World War I, the United (1872-1936), who was Attorney General from
States was the strongest nation in the world, 1919 to 1921, and his assistant John Edgar Hoo-
both economically and in terms of technological ver (1895-1972) presided over the "Red Scare,"
advance. was the great creditor nation, for the
It in which harassment, arrests, trials, and depor-
United States had lent a great deal of money to tation were the fates of many whose crime was
Great Britain, France, and other nations and, of that of pressing for social reform.
course, expected to get it back. It had suffered far The combination of the dislike of foreigners,
less than Europe had and, indeed, had thrived fostered by the patriotic fervor of the war years
on war business. The American population had and the fear of the infiltration of socialist ideas
reached 106 million by 1920, and those millions from abroad, gave rise to the feeling that immi-
were filled with pride and confidence in the na- gration ought to be controlled. During the first
tion's wealth and strength. century and a half of the existence of the United
A blow for democracy was struck when, on States, immigrants had flooded in freely and had
August 28, 1920, the nineteenth amendment to been more or less welcomed as a source of cheap
the Constitution was ratified. This allowed uni- labor and captive votes, if nothing else. In the
versal suffrage for women on the same basis as end, they added much to the vigor and variety of
for men. There were those who thought that al- American life.
lowing women to vote would reduce elections to But now the spaces in the United States had
fluffand trivia. Others thought that it would add diminished and more immigrants than before
purity and humanity to the process. Both were were arriving from eastern and southern Europe;
wrong. turned out that women voted very
It more were Catholic and Jewish. On May 19,
much as men did, with the same mixture of good 1921, an immigration act was passed that limited
sense and folly (all the more reason to treat both the numbers of immigrants of a particular nation-
sexes alike in this respect). ality to 3% of the numbers that had resided in the
ways, the United States did not do as
In other United States in 1910. Later laws steadily re-
well. The spurt of international concern that had stricted immigration further, and the open door
led to its participation in World War I and its that the United States had traditionally offered
attempt to help reorganize the world along lines the oppressed of the world slowly creaked shut.
of democracy and self-determination faltered. Wilson's failure to carry the United States with
Wilson's idealism had not taken hold. The Amer- him was plain, for in 1920, the Republican party,
ican people did not seem to desire a League of running against Wilson's internationalism, won
Nations that might limit American sovereignty the Presidential race easily even though its can-
and that might involve the United States in every didate was an abysmal party hack, Warren Gam-
tiresome dispute the world over. Therefore, the aliel Harding (1865-1923). He became 29th
United States never joined the League of Na- President of the United States without any visible
tions. The League might not have proven suc- qualification for the post — except that he was
cessful even if the Untied States had joined, to be handsome.
sure, but without American participation, failure Naturally, when a president is elected without
was certain. qualification for the job, but is popular for factors
Then, too, the United States, which had stood that have nothing to do with presidential ability,
up to German militarism with exemplary cour- government functionaries feel free to plunder the
1920 TO 1930 533
treasury, relying on the sure inability of the pres- A new level of criminal activity, partly con-
ident to know what is going on. Harding, there- doned by the public that
wanted its liquor, set-
fore, like some presidents before him, and some tled over the United States and has never
lifted.
him, presided over corruption and sleaze,
after
To this day, the best-known gangster of the
even while maintaining personal popularity.
1920s, the Italian-born Alphonse ("Scarface Al")
Even worse than governmental corruption Capone (1899-1947), remains an almost mythic
(which is always present, to some degree, in all
memory. Though his crimes were multitudinous,
governments) were the changes brought about in up to and including cold-blooded murder, it was
American life by the eighteenth amendment to through conviction for income-tax evasion that
the Constitution, the one that had fastened Pro-
he was finally put in jail.
hibition on the nation.
The history of Prohibition in the United States
To forbid the sale of alcoholic beverages, not during this decade is a monument to the danger
merely as a law, but as a Constitutional impera- of following the principles of self-righteous mor-
tive, was one thing; to enforce it was quite an- alism, undiluted by common sense.
other. It would have been difficult to enforce
Despite its renewed love affair with isolation-
under the best of circumstances, given the liking ism, the United States took the lead in one form
for alcoholicbeverages on the part of a large frac-
tion of the population, but the fact of the matter
of international activity —
the question of disar-
mament. It was anyone capable of
clear to
was that in the more sophisticated portions of the thought that to build up a heavy load of arma-
nation, there was no great evidence of any desire ments strained a nation's economy, contributed
to enforce the law at all. to inflation and to the impoverishment of its
peo-
Alcoholic beverages were illegally imported, ple, encouraged belligerence, and made greater
illegally manufactured, and
illegally distributed, the chances of war. Yet such was the feeling of
bought and sold to such an extent that
illegally
national insecurity that every nation favored dis-
virtually no one during the existence of Prohibi-
armament only for others, not for itself. Only the
tion was forced to do without. Even those who
United States, secure behind oceans and
its
ordinarily might not have had much desire to strong in its economy, was willing to have disar-
drink found the desire heightened by the risk mament all around.
and illegality of it. Drinking became the thing to There began a series of postwar disarmament
do.
conferences. Of these, the first was the "Wash-
The chief effect, then, of Prohibition on the ington Conference" held in that city between No-
average American was to inculcate a disrespect vember 12, 1921 and February 6, 1922. The
for law, even a contempt for it. This attitude United States, Great Britain, France, and Japan
spread rapidly and was something from which agreed to uphold the status quo in the Pacific and
the American public never recovered. to respect the territorial integrity of
China. The
Furthermore, the liquor that was produced, Anglo-Japanese alliance came to an end, being
without government regulation, was often of low replaced by this more general agreement.
quality and sometimes poisonous. The existence More important still, the powers agreed to
of illegal drinking places ("speakeasies," they limit their naval strengths. Where the large
bat-
were called) offered a far worse environment tleships were concerned the relative strengths
than the old saloons had. were to be Great Britain 5, the United States 5,
Those who manufactured, transported, and and Japan 3, since Great Britain and the United
sold illicit liquor ("bootleggers") ran certain risks, States had responsibilities in both the Atlantic
but made enormous profits. Inevitably, the busi- and the Pacific Oceans, while Japan was con-
ness was run by gangs (composed of "gang- cerned with the Pacific Ocean onlv. Howev'er,
sters," of course) who fought each other for the Japan, which rather resented the enforced inferi-
lucrative trade,and who made enough money to ority, was accepted as the third strongest
naval
corrupt the legislatures and the police. power in the world, and that was not bad for a
nation that, only 40 years earlier, had seemed a The was no way of collecting them
fact that there
cipher to Europeans. didn't seem to matter. The fact that even if the
On February 15, 1922, the International Court money could have been raised and paid back, the
of Justice (popularly known as the "World dislocation of the world economy that would
Court") was established at the Hague in the have resulted would have hurt everyone, includ-
Netherlands, and was intended to arbitrate inter- ing the United States, also did not seem to mat-
national disputes that might ordinarily lead to ter.
war. It seemed, therefore, that with the League In the end, then, the United States never got
of Nations and the World Court, a new era was its money back, and to Amerkans
seemed that it
dawning, a kind of return to Metternich's old the United States, like an innocent and honest
"Congress System," but a return that was based country boy, had been deceived and cheated by
more on democracy and less on autocracy. the clever, crooked Europeans. angry Ameri- An
However, the United States, having refused to can public decided they would not be fooled
join the League of Nations, also refused to join again. Next time, Europe could get itself out of
the World Court. its own messes.
The popularity of isolationism in the United On August 2, 1923, President Harding sud-
States was fed by the matter of the war debts. In denly died. Succeeding was his Vice-President,
order to finance the war. Great Britain and Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933). Coolidge had be-
France had sold their American investments back come nationally famous when, as Gov-
in 1919,
to Americans at a sacrifice, then borrowed huge ernor of Massachusetts, he had stood firm
sums from the United States at prevailing inter- against a strike by police who protested star-
est rates. The result was that the United States, vation wages and miserable conditions. That
which was a debtor nation at the beginning of seemed like a strong stand for "law and order"
World War I and owed $4 billion to the rest of at a time when the nation was trembling before
the world, ended it with a credit of $10 billion. the specter of communism and revolution. That
Great Britain and France, worn out and im- made him first Vice-President and now the 30th
poverished by the war, could not pay back the President of the United States.
debts in the foreseeable future and had trouble might have seemed an unenviable position,
It
even keeping up with interest payments. In the for the corruption that had flourished under
vengeful aftermath of victory, they had hoped to Harding exploded and became apparent to the
force enormous reparations out of Germany and public after Harding's death. Harding's Secretary
use that money to pay off the United States. of the Interior, Albert Bacon Fall (1861-1944)
Germany, however, was in no position to pay, had, for instance, secretly leased government oil
either, so Great Britain and France found them- lands at Teapot Dome to business men in return
selves irritated with the United States. After all for ample bribes. Everyone profited and the
Great Britain and France had lost millions in the American people lost. Fall was convicted and
war, and those shattered lives could never be re- eventually spent some time in jail. Other cabinet
gained. The United States, on the other hand, members were forced to resign under fire of one
had lost few lives and had spent only money. sort or another, but escaped actual conviction.
Now they wanted the money back. The United was clear,
It however, that Coolidge had noth-
States was the only great nation that had grown ing to do with the corruption. He was a quiet
richer and stronger as a result of the war. Did it man, with absolutely no charisma and a genius
now want to squeeze those nations that had for escaping notice. That was exactly what Amer-
nearly been destroyed in the common struggle? icans wanted, provided the nation continued to
To Europe, Uncle Sam began to seem like "Uncle be prosperous — as it did. Therefore, when Coo-
Shylock." lidge ran for election in 1924, he easily won a
Americans, however, being the creditors, had term in his own right.
the natural feeling that loans should be repaid. Despite speakeasies, bootleggers, gangsters.
1920 TO 1930 535
and general lawlessness, people were making of the period being Charles Augustus Lindbergh
money under Coolidge and having a good time. (1902-1974), a young aviator. Airflight lost most
We speak of this period as the "Roaring Twen- of its glamour once World War I was over. It
ties. There were no dangerous crises abroad remained useful, for the first transcontinental air-
and the United States could live in a peaceful, mail system was set upbut for the most
in 1920,
happy world of its own. part it carried the cachet of "stunting," of being
The stock market was booming and it seemed fit for daredevils only.
that anyone with a little money to spare could
Then, on May 20-21, 1927, Lindbergh flew a
buy stocks with a little down and the promise to one-engine plane The Spirit of Saint Louis, solo,
pay the rest later, watch it go up, sell it for a from New York to Paris in 33V2 hours, and had
higher price, use the money to pay off the pur- to stay awake all that time. Only 25 years old,
chase debt, and keep the surplus. Lindbergh won
$25,000 and the delirious adula-
It was very much like all the financial
"bub- tion of the world. It was Lindbergh's flight that
bles in modern history, for it was only possible established the airplane as an obviously practical
to make money in this way if everyone managed mode of transportation, although it was to be
more than they paid for it.
to sell their stock for
years before it could compete with trains and
Eventually, stock would reach some peak and ships.
investors would find no one to pay a higher price On a somewhat lesser scale, Gertrude Caro-
for it. They would then have no choice but to sell
line Ederle (b. 1906)became the first woman to
for what they could get in order to pay off at least
swim the English Channel, on August 6, 1926.
part of their own debt, and if enough decided to She performed the feat in I 41/2 hours, which was
do that all at the same time, the stock market two hours better than any man had managed up
would descend precipitously. However, this did to that time.
not happen during Coolidge's administration Motion pictures also made a major advance in
and the bubble of prosperity kept swelling and this decade, when the first picture with a signifi-
looking prettier all the time. cant sound track appeared in 1927. was The Jazz It
It was
decade in which games fit the mood
a Singer, starring A1 Jolson (1886-1950), and by the
of the American public and the great sports fig- end of the decade, the transition was complete
ures of the time gained an awesome ascendancy and silent movies were dead. In that same year,
in the American mind that has never faded, de-
the Academy Awards were handed out for the
spite the emergence of many great figures since. first time with Janet Gaynor (1906-1984)
winning
George Herman ("Babe") Ruth (1895-1948) as best actress, and the American-born German
was the undisputed king of baseball throughout actor Emil Jannings (1886-1950) as best actor.
the decade. He hit 60 homeruns in 1927 as a Walter Elias ("Walt") Disney (1901-1966) pro-
member of the New York Yankee team of that duced the first animated cartoon with sound.
year many, the best of all time) that also in-
(to Steamboat Willie, in 1928. Alfred Joseph Hitchcock
cluded Henry Louis ("Lou") Gehrig (1903-1941), (1899-1980) directed the first successful British
who played in 2130 consecutive games. talking picture. Blackmail, in 1929.
William Harrison ("Jack") Dempsey (1895- In the byways of entertainment, the Hungar-
1983) was heavyweight champion from 1919 to ian-born Erich Weiss (1874-1926), using the stage
1926, and replaced even the legendary John L. name of "Harry Houdini," completed a legend-
Sullivan as the epitome of the prizefighter. Rob- ary career as an escape artist, who, it seemed,
ert Tyre ("Bobby") Jones (1902-1971) dominated could not be held by chains or locks. Aimee Sem-
golf throughout the decade, as did William ple Macpherson (1890-1944) was then at the peak
Tatem Tilden (1893-1953) in tennis.
("'Big Bill") of her scandal-ridden career as a spectacular
re-
There was even a legendary racehorse towering vivalist (more a form of entertainment, in
the
over all others —
Man o' War (1917-1947). eyes of many, than anything approaching serious
There were heroes of other sorts, the greatest religion).
The Book-of-the-Month Club was instituted in Robert Stoughton Lynd (1892-1970) and his wife
1926, offering a way many people of moderate Helen Merrell Lynd (1896-1982) applied similar
means could build up their libraries. The "pulp sociological techniques to a midwestern Ameri-
magazines," containing quickly written, action- can town in Middletown (1929).
filled stories printed on cheap paper, and sold at Perhaps what attracted most attention to a sci-
monthly or shorter intervals for anything from a entific subject in this decade was a trial that took
dime to a quarter, was approaching their heyday. place in Dayton, Tennessee in July 1925. Tennes-
In 1926, the Luxembourg-born Hugo Gernsback see had passed a law forbidding the teaching of
(1884-1967) published the first magazine devoted biological evolution in the public schools and
exclusively to science fiction. John Thomas Scopes (1900-1970) was brought to
In science, Edwin Powell Hubble (1889-1953) trial for teaching it. It became a worldwide cause
was the firstdemonstrate the structure of the

to celebre, with the fundamentalist politician Wil-
universe as a whole in the form that is accepted liam Jennings Bryan most prominent on the side
today. He studied the distant galaxies and, by and Clarence Darrow on the
of Biblical creation,
1929, showed, as an observed fact, that the Uni- side of science. The trial cast a lurid light on the
verse was expanding in accordance with Ein- primitive beliefs of backwoods Americans and
equations of general relativity. Closer
stein's field made Tennessee a laughingstock to civilized peo-
to home, Clyde William Tombaugh (b. 1906) dis- ple everywhere.
covered the planet Pluto on February 18, 1930. Richard Evelyn Byrd (1888-1957) made use of
Joseph Davisson (1881-1958)
In 1925, Clinton the airplane as an exploring device, flying over
demonstrated that electrons, widely accepted as the North Pole in 1926 and over the South Pole
particles, also exhibited wave-like properties, as in 1929. He was the first man to visit both poles.
predicted some years earlier by a French scien- Among American novelists, Sinclair Lewis
tist. Davisson Nobel Prize for
later received a was at his peak,
publishing Babbitt (1922),
this, and it was quickly understood that all mat- Arrowsmith (1925), Elmer Gantry (1927), and Dods-
ter has both wave and particle properties. The worth (1929). Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (1896-
two go together. 1940) published his best-known novel. The Great
James Batcheller Sumner (1887-1955) showed, Gatsby, in 1925, and Theodore Dreiser published
in 1926, that the enzyme urease (and, therefore, his. An American Tragedy, also in 1925. Ernest
perhaps all enzymes) was a protein and he even- Miller Hemingway published The Sun Also Rises
tually received a Nobel Prize as a result. Another (1926) and A Farewell to Arms (1929). Thornton
Nobel Prize went to Hermann Joseph Muller Niven Wilder (1897-1975) published The Bridge of
(1890-1967) who, also in 1926, showed that x- San Luis Key in 1927, which won a Pulitzer Prize.
rays could induce mutations in fruit flies, some- William Cuthbert Faulkner (1897-1962), began
thing that greatly advanced the study of genetics writing his novels in this decade and he even-
—
and heredity and that also demonstrated the tually won a Nobel Prize in literature.
dangers of exposure to energetic radiation. Among the dramatists, Eugene Gladstone
In 1926, again, Robert Hutchings Goddard O'Neill (1888-1953) was at his peak of productiv-
(1882-1945) fired the first rocket to be powered ity, writing Anna Christie (1922), Desire Under the
by liquid fuel and liquid oxygen. It was a small Elms (1924), Strange Interlude (1928), and others.
device that made only a short flight, but it was Elmer Leopold Rice (1892-1967) wrote Street
the beginning of a developing technique that Scene in 1920, and it won a Pulitzer Prize.
eventually carried rockets throughout the Solar Edward Estlin Cummings ("e. e. cummings")
system. (1894-1962) wrote poems notable for the stylistic
Margaret Mead (1901-1978) studied the soci- trickshe played with typography. Stephen Vin-
eties of the South Sea islands and made a popular cent Benet (1898-1943) wrote the epic poem John
hit with her book Coming of Age in Samoa (1928). Brown's Body in 1928 and it won a Pulitzer Prize.
1920 TO 1930 537
Another important poet of the time was John

Aristide Briand (1862-1932), proposed in
Robinson Jeffers (1887-1962), whose Roa?i Stallion 1927
that France and the United States sign
a non-
was published The most important black
in 1925.
pact. His hope was that of luring the
poet of the period was John Langston Hughes
United States out of isolation and into some sort
(1902-1967).
of combination with France, that could
The successful nonfiction works of the period then be
directed against a possible resurgence of
include Story of Philosophy (1926) by William Ger-
many. His American counterpart. Secretary of
James ("Will") Durant (1885-1981), The Story State Frank Billings Killogg (1856-1937),
of did not
Mankind (1921) by Hendrik Willem Van Loon
want to tie the
United States specifically to
(1882-1944), and Microbe Hunters (1926) by Paul
France, and evolved the idea of a multilateral
Henry de Kruif (1890-1971).
nonaggression pact; one in which all nations
The writers of light fiction, essays, and verse would agree to renounce the use of war.
in this period include Robert Charles Benchley
The result was the Pact of Paris, more popu-
(1889-1945), Franklin Pierce Adams ("F. P. A.") larly known as the Kellogg-Briand Pact, signed
(1881-1960), Dorothy Parker (1893-1967), and on August 27, 1928, with some 23 nations join-
James Grover Thurber (1894—1961), all members ing. All agreed to outlaw war, and it seemed to
of the legendary "Algonquin Round Table"
many idealists that an indefinite period of uni-
which met at lunch to eat, drink, and witticize.
must be beginning. Kellogg received
versal peace
Anita Loos (1893-1981) published Gentlemen Pre-
the Nobel Prize for peace in 1929 and then
be-
fer Blondes in 1925, and Marcus Cook ("Marc")
came a judge of the World Court.
Connelly wrote The Green Pastures in 1930 and
However, most nations qualified their adher-
won a Pulitzer Prize for it.
ence to the Pact of Paris in some way. The United
Earl Derr Biggers (1884-1953) published The
States, for instance, ratified the treaty on
January
House Without a Key in 1925, introducing his fic-
15, 1929, but would not give up the possibility
of
tional detective, Charlie Chan. Frederic Dannay war in defense of the Monroe Doctrine, or in self-
(1905-1982) and Manfred Bennington Lee (1905- defense (itself being the sole judge of what con-
1971) published The Roman Hat Mystery in 1929, stituted self-defense). Secondly, no provision
using the pseudonym of "Ellery Queen" and in-
was made for enforcement. If any nation did go
troducing the fictional detective of that name. to war aggressively, no economic
penalties
It was a decade in which light opera
was pop- ( sanctions") were to be visited upon it. The re-
ular. Jerome David Kern (1885-1945) wrote
the sult was that the Kellogg-Briand pact was very
music for Show Boat in 1927, which included the much like Alexander Ts Holy Alliance of a cen-
song "OT Man River." Czechoslovakian-born tury earlier. It was high-minded, but it meant
Charles Rudolf Friml (1879-1972) wrote the nothing.
music for Rose Marie (1924) and The Vagabond King Coolidge might have run in 1928 for a second
(1925), including "Song of the Vagabonds" and elected term, but he chose not to. The Republi-
"Only a Rose." The Hungarian-born Sigmund cans nominated Herbert Clark Hoover (1874-
Romberg (1887-1951) wrote the music for The 1964), a mining engineer, a humanitarian, and an
Student Prince (1924), The Desert So 7 ig (1926), and honest and effective Secretary of Commerce
The New Moon (1928), including such songs as through the 1920s. The Democrats nominated
"Lover Come Back to Me" and
"Stout-Hearted Alfred Emanuel ("Al") Smith (1873-1944),
Men." George Gershwin (1898-1937) was writ-
who
was a Catholic of Irish descent. Smith was the
ing the music of a series of musical comedies, first Catholic to run for President on the ticket of
with perhaps his most popular song of the period a major party.
being "Someone to Watch Over Me." Smith s Catholicism brought out religious big-
As wore on to its end, the drive for
the decade otry at its ugliest. The Ku Klux Klan came
out in
peace sharpened. The French Foreign Minister, force against him in the South, for instance. Hoo-
ver won, taking some southern states that had After World War
however, the Labor Party,
I,
been voting Democratic for three-quarters of a which represented neither the landowners nor
century, and who now voted Republican rather the factory owners, grew strong. The Liberal
than for a Catholic Democrat. Hoover became the party, having broken up, the election held on
31st President of the United States. November 15, 1922, placed the Conservatives in
And then, seven months after Hoover's inau- power, but Labour won 142 seats, more than the
guration, the Roaring Twenties came to a roaring Liberals did, so that it was Labour that, for the
end. On October 24, 1929, the bubble burst and first became "the Loyal Opposition." The
time,
the stock market crashed. Some $30 billion dis- Liberals never regained their strength and from
appeared and a vast number of get-rich-quick this time on, power oscillated between Conser-
Americans found they had managed to get-poor- vatives and Labourites.
quick. Stanley Baldwin (1867-1947) was the Conser-
The joyride was over. vative Prime Minister from May 22, 1923. Great
Britain was plagued with high unemployment,
however, and increasing dissatisfaction, so that
GREAT BRITAIN on January 22, 1924, Labour actually won an elec-
Immediately after the end of the war, there was tion, and Ramsay MacDonald became the first
a British Parliamentary election in which all men Labor Prime Minister in British history, though
over 21 and all women over 30 could vote. The he needed the support of what Liberal members
result, on December 14, 1918, was a huge victory there were to maintain a useful majority.
for Lloyd George, who established a coalition It The Labour Party had vague
didn't last long.
government. He made use of his majority to set- Socialist leanings and it was the Conservative
tle the Irish question at last. strategy to portray them as radical revolution-
Most of Ireland was given self-rule as a do- aries, sometime that so frightened people
minion, and, on December 6, 1922, the "Irish throughout the western world as to cause them
Free State" was proclaimed. Left out-
officially to flee to strongly conservative parties and to
side the Irish Free State were six northern coun- seek security from the "Red Menace" even at the
were predominantly Protestant and that
ties that cost of giving up their liberties.
did not wish to be included in an independent The Russian Communists had established a
Catholic Ireland. They remained part of what "Communist International" (the "Comintern")
was now the "United Kingdom of Great Britain which was designed to promote world revolu-
and Northern Ireland." tion. The Comintern never succeeded in its aims,
This division of the land did not suit the Irish but its mere existence was a Godsend to anti-
Nationalists, but any union would not have democratic forces everywhere, for it was a handy
suited the Protestants of Northern Ireland, and bogeyman that frightened millions of people into
this disparity of views among the two opposing seeing the corrupting force of "Moscow gold" in
forces, each equally averse to compromise, re- every demand for reform, and in every misfor-
mained to plague the land. tune.
Once again, the question of Irish indepen- The leader of the Comintern in 1924 was Gri-
dence served to tear the Liberal party apart and gory Yevseyevich Zinoviev (1883-1936). A letter
this time it virtually destroyed it. For two centu- from him surfaced, one in which he urged British
ries, the British government had oscillated be- Labour to bring Communist revolution in
about a
tween Conservatives (or Tories) who
the Great Britain. Its authenticity was never estab-
represented the landed gentry for the most part, lished, and it is quite likely that it was a forgery,
and the Liberals (or Whigs) who represented the but it did the trick. On October 29, 1924, the Con-
commercial interests for the most part. The lower servatives won
smashing election
a victory, and
classes only slowly gained the vote, and, even Baldwin was Prime Minister again.
more slowly, political organization. Labor unrest continued, however, particularly
1920 TO 1930 539
among the coal miners. They went on strike on cles) ought be associated with other particles
to
May 1, 1926, and this quickly escalated into a with properties of an opposite nature in certain
general strike that lasted from May 3 to May 12 key respects. Dirac thus worked out the neces-
and involved millions of trade-union members. sary existence of "antimatter." For this, he even-
This was the closest Great Britain came to a rev-
tually received a Nobel Prize.
olutionary situation, and it wasn't very revolu-
Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett (1897-1924)
tionary at that.
Labour did not have its heart set used the Wilson cloud chamber to take tens of
on violence and the upper classes threw them- thousands of photographs of speeding subatomic
selves, with delight, into strike-breaking volun- particles. He was
actually able to catch nuclear
teerism. The was a failure and the
strike reactions taking place, as Rutherford had indi-
Conservative government was strengthened by rectlydemonstrated that they must. This, too,
the firmness with which it dealt with the lower
was worth a Nobel Prize.
classes.
In 1924, Edward Victor Appleton (1892-1965)
At the same time. Great Britain loosened its detected the layer of charged particles, or "ions,"
hold on those portions of its Empire that were that Kennelly and Heaviside had earlier postu-
settled by people of European descent its do- — lated would exist in the upper atmosphere. In
minions. These now included Canada, New- 1926, he detected ions in layers higher still (the
foundland, the Irish Free State, the Union of "Appleton layers"). These layers came to be re-
South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. In the ferred to as the "ionosphere."
course of an Imperial Conference held in October
Alexander Fleming (1881-1955) noted
In 1928,
and November 1926, these dominions were rec- that bacteria died in the presence of certain
ognized as essentially independent in every way. molds of the "Penicillium" family. He called the
They were united only in that all acknowledged active substance "penicillin." He did not follow
the British monarch and that all agreed, voluntar- it up, but eventually others did and its impor-
ily, to belong to a "British Commonwealth of Na- tance was such that Fleming was given a Nobel
tions" that would consult each other over their Prize for the discovery.
common interests. Charles Leonard Woolley (1880-1960) exca-
On July 2, 1928, women won the vote
finally vated ancient ruins in Mesopotamia and, in the
inGreat Britain, on equal terms with men. 1920s, learned much of what we now know of
In May, 1929, Labour, recovering from the Zi- Sumerian civilization. He wrote The Sumerians
noviev letter and from the failure of the General (1928) and Ur of the Chaldees (1929) concerning his
Strike, again won an election and MacDonald be- discoveries. Even more exciting was the work of
came Prime Minister a second time, again with George Edward Stanhope, Earl of Carnarvon
support from what Liberal members existed in (1866-1923) and Howard Carter (1873-1939),
Parliament. who discovered the tomb of Tutankhamen, a
Meanwhile, in science, Arthur S. Eddington, pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty. It was the only
who had led the scientific task force that had Pharaonic tomb that was found intact and with-
demonstrated the accuracy of Einstein's theory of out having been rifled by grave robbers, and that
general relativity, studied the physics of the made it immensely important to Egyptologists.
Sun's interior and showed that it had to be at a In literature, Shaw wrote Back to Methusaleh
temperature of millions of degrees. In 1924, he and
(1921) Saint Joan (1923). He also wrote The
related the mass of stars to their luminosities and Intelligent Wotnan's Guide to Socialism and Caphtal-
established the science of astrophysics on a firm ism in 1928. James Joyce published Ulysses in
basis. 1922; Forster published A Passage to India in 1924;
In the late 1920s, Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac and D. H. Lawrence published Lady Chatterley's
(1902-1984) investigated the properties of the Lover in 1928.
electron and, by 1930, came to the conclusion Aldous Leonard Huxley (1894-1963) pub-
that the electron (and, by extension, other parti- lished Antic Hay (1923), Point Counter Point
(1928),
and other novels as Adeline Virginia Woolf

well. strong presence in the Irish legislature after the
(1882-1941) published Orlando in 1928. Evelyn elections of September 15, 1927.
Arthur St. John Waugh (1903-1966) published Culturally, William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)
his first novel. Decline and Fall, in 1928. John won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1923, while
Boynton Priestley (1894-1984) scored a success Sean O'Casey (1880-1964) staged the dramas
with his novel The Good Companions (1929). Juno and the Paycock in 1924 and The Plough and the
Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie (1890-1976), Stars in 1926.
perhaps the most successful mystery writer of all
time, introduced her fictional detective, Hercule
Poirot, in The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920), FRANCE
and achieved enormous fame with Who Killed During the war, France had suffered enormous
Roger Ackroyd? (1926). Dorothy Leigh Sayers losses in lives and property. Half the Frenchmen
(1893-1957) introduced her fictional detective in their twenties who were alive at the start of
Lord Peter Wimsey in Whose Body? (1923). the war were dead by the end. France was there-
Among the poets, the American-born T. S. fore determined that Germany must pay. Deter-
Eliot, who had emigrated to Great Britain, pub- mination, however, wasn't enough. Germany
lished The Waste Land (1922). Robert Seymour couldn't and, what's more, wouldn't pay. It de-
Bridges (1844-1930) was poet laureate during faulted on its money payments and on its deliv-
this decade. ery of coal, by which it was supposed to make up
Alan Alexander Milne (1882-1956) wrote plays to France the damage to the coal-mining districts
and poetry for children and his Winnie-the-Pooh in occupied northeastern France during the war.
(1926) was, and has remained, enormously pop- On January 11, French and Belgian
1923,
ular. Also writing successfully for children was troops marched into northwestern Germany,
Walter de la Mare (1873-1956). therefore, and occupied the coal-rich Ruhr val-
An outstanding artist of the period was Au- ley, from which they tried forcibly to extract coal.
gustus Edwin John (1878-1961). The occupation did far more harm than good.
The Germans responded with strikes and passive
resistance and gained the sympathy of Great Brit-
IRISH FREE STATE ain and the United States, since France seemed
The leading Irish figure in the final struggle for to be acting with German-type highhandedness.
Irish independence was the American-born This period marked the height of the military
Eamon de Valera (1882-1975). He did not, how- ascendancy of France over Germany, but France
ever, accept the settlement that established the remained France had been beaten easily
fearful.
Irish Free State. He objected to the existence of in single combat with the Prussians in 1870, and
Northern Ireland and wanted a united nation. it had barely won a victory over Germany in 1918
Furthermore, he would not pledge allegiance to with the full help of Great Britain and the belated
the British monarch, but wanted a republic. help of the United States. France knew very well
He led the Republican party and maintained a that someday Germany would recover from its
strong opposition to William Thomas Cosgrave, present weakness and when that happened,
who had fought in the Easter uprising, but who France would not dare face the vengeful Ger-
was willing to accept the Irish Free State as the mans alone.
best that could be obtained, and who served as In 1925, France managed to come to an agree-
the president of its executive council. ment with Germany, through the Locarno Trea-
In 1927, De
Valera finally decided that swear- ties, that guaranteed the boundary between the
ing allegiance to the British monarch was but an two countries, but France developed treaties of
empty form of words and not worth convulsing alliance with Czechoslovakia and Poland in order
the nation over. He therefore joined its political that, if worst came to worst, Germany would
life. His party, still republican, maintained a have to fight on two fronts again. (Russia would
1920 TO 1930 541
have been the logical ally, as it was before World

"Fascio" harks back to the "fasces," the bun-
War I, but Russia's Communist government was dle of sticks containing an axe, which were
car-
ostracized from European affairs.)
ried by officials of Rome in ancient times to
In addition, France planned an elaborate de- symbolize the power of the state to punish and,
fensive line that would hold off a possible Ger- ifnecessary, to execute wrongdoers. In this way,
man invasion with minimum effort. Under the Mussolini harked back to ancient glories and in-
guidance of Andre Louis Rene Maginot (1877- dicated his approval of state force.
1932), who was Minister of War from 1922 to
Mussolini's system of government was there-
1924, and who received the post again in 1929,
fore called "Fascism" and it amounted to a roll-
the “Maginot Line" was begun in 1929. In the
back of democracy in order to
suppress dissent
end, it covered France's eastern frontier with
and the desire for reform. Where, throughout the
Germany from Switzerland to Belgium. It was latter half of the nineteenth century, the fran-
widely considered impregnable. However, the chise had expanded in European coun-
steadily
border with Belgium was not similarly defended. tries, with elections growing freer
and more
Partly, this was in order to save money, and meaningful, and the popularly elected legislature
partly,perhaps, in the conviction that Germany gaining power and granting civil rights. Fascism
would not dare again rouse world hostility by negated it all.
invading France by way of Belgium. In Fascism, one party was established, voting
Louis Victor Pierre Raymond de Broglie (1892- was meaningless exercise in agreement, the
a
1987) demonstrated, in 1923, that any subatomic legislature was a rubber stamp, all decisions were
particle had
have wave properties as well. This
to made by the leader, and all dissent was barred.
turned out to be correct and he eventually re- In many ways. Fascism followed the
political
ceived a Nobel Prize for this work. practices of Communism in Russia, but Fascism
was not revolutionary. Instead, it allied itself to
the ruling power of the state, to the businessmen
ITALY
and landowners, and protected the haves from
Dissatisfaction in Italy with the useless sacrifices the have-nots.
of the war and with the failure to gain much in
might seem that Fascism, under these cir-
It
the peace treaties boiled over. The national debt,
cumstances, would reap the continued hostility
unemployment, inflation, all meant times of mis- of the have-nots, but that was not so. By cultivat-
ery, and the more extreme Socialists turned ing a bellicose nationalism and a saber-rattling
Communist and wanted revolution. mentality. Fascism won over the very people it
The Communists did not come even close to was harming. They found many of the have-
that
succeeding, but the mere threat was enough to nots cheerfully wallowed in military spectacle
terrify the businessmen and landowners, who
and in the pleasure of howling safe threats. If any
were ready to turn to any group that seemed internal enemy could be found weak enough to
willing to put down
the dissatisfied lower classes attackand assault without fear of consequences,
by any means, including force and terror. so much the better. The illusion of power among
The rightists found their man in Benito Mus- those who wore uniforms, marched, chanted slo-
solini, the ex-Socialist who had been bought off gans, and beat up the defenseless more than
in 1915 and who had then become a war-hawk made up for the loss of actual power and the
and a nationalist. Shrewdly realizing where the disappearance of the right to think as they
path to power lay, Mussolini organized the "fas- pleased.
cio de combattimento" ("fighting band") in the The grew stronger as funds
Fascists in Italy
immediate aftermath of the war, in March 1919. poured in from those who had money and were
These were a group of thugs dedicated to brutal- anxious to buy safety. The Fascist bands quickly
izing those who wanted reform —
even peaceful abandoned any views that would be displeasing
reform. to their financial backers. They soon found
that
gratuitous beatings and were not only

atrocities who was brave only against the helpless, re-
pleasurable in themselves but were at once ex- mained safely in Milan, awaiting the result.
cused if the victims were stated to be Commu- Facta wanted to declare martial law, but King
nists. Victor Emmanuel III refused (thus condemning
Nor could Italy's democratic government, Italy to untold misery) and called on Mussolini to
weak and itself fearful of the left, effectively form a cabinet.
counter the growing power of the Fascists. Their In theory, the government was still demo-
unadventurous foreign policy also discredited cratic and Mussolini ruled over a coalition cabi-
them. net, but Mussolini had no intention of leaving it
There was the matter of Fiume, for instance. that way. He began at once to rearrange the elec-
Fiume is a seaport in the northern Adriatic Sea toral laws so that the Fascists would be sure of
very near the border between Italy and the gaining a majority at the next election and of re-
new nation of Yugoslavia. Both nations wanted taining it thereafter. He also labored to gain dic-
it, but President Wilson had refused to let Italy tatorial powers that would enable him to
have it and wanted to make it a free city, be- suppress all dissent.
longing to neither nation. On September 12, He tried to pursue a bellicose foreign policy in
1919, flamboyant Italian poet, Gabriele
the order to gain a fallacious gloss of power and
D'Annunzio, led a force of freebooters and glory. When an Italian general and some of his
seized the city. staff were killed on the Greek-Albanian border
This created a crisis.The western powers on August 27, 1923, Mussolini sent a stiff ulti-
pressured Italy and Yugoslavia to come to a set- matum to Greece on August 29, and on August
tlement and, on November 12, 1920, they agreed 31 he bombarded and occupied Corfu. It was pre-
to allow Fiume to be a free D'Annunzio,
city. cisely the Austro-Hungarian reaction to Serbia
however, would not abandon the city, so on De- nine years earlier, but was carried through more
cember 27, Italian forces bombarded the city and quickly and ruthlessly.
forced him out. Mussolini's Fascists denounced In this case. Great Britain placed pressure on
this as pusillanimous and, on March 3, 1922, Fas- Italy to withdraw and Mussolini pulled his forces
cist elements within Fiume seized the city, which out of Corfu. Despite that rather tame ending,
was then occupied by Italian troops. Italians could feel that their new government was
The result was to make the Italian government warlike. Add to this the frequent reminders of
seem feeble and unpatriotic, while the Fascists Roman glory and the organization of military pa-
seemed the strong upholders of military glory. rades, and Mussolini's popularity grew steadily.
The Italian government also came to terms Only once did he appear to stumble. The Ital-
with Greece whereby Rhodes and the Dode- ian Socialist Giacomo Matteoti (1885-1924) wrote
canese were eventually to be ceded to Greece, a book detailing the violence and illegality of the
and the Fascists denounced this loudly, too. Fascists. He denounced them vigorously in his
Meanwhile, Fascists were seizing city govern- speeches and the result was that on June 10,
ments that were controlled by leftists who had 1924, he was murdered by Fascist goons.
won elections legally. Mussolini felt ready to de- At this, those elements in the government that
mand to be made Prime Minister and to form a were still non-Fascist refused to participate in po-
Fascist government. Luigi Facta (1861-1930), litical affairs until the Matteoti affair had been
who was Prime Minister at the time, refused the explained and the murderers brought to justice.
demand. Mussolini, badly frightened, protested his in-
Thereupon, Fascist groups began to converge nocence, discharged those who were accused of
on Rome on October 28, 1922 This was later complicity, but then, as became clear that the
it
called "the March on Rome" and the impression anti-Fascists were not strong enough to harm
was given of a brave Mussolini leading his men him, he managed to scrabble together his cour-
against the government. Actually, Mussolini, age and to weather the storm.
1 920 TO 1930 543
The murderers of Matteoti were tried andac- sion, Pope slowly came to a meeting of
the
quitted or, in some cases, given light sentences, minds. Mussolini, in his younger leftist days,
while Mussolini introduced a rigid press censor-
had been strongly anticlerical, but he never ob-
ship, Independent labor unions were wiped out, jected to changing his principles when
and only the Fascist party was allowed to exist. neces-
sary, for the very good reason that he had
What's more the party existed only as the mouth- none.
Negotiations therefore took place in the Lat-
piece of Mussolini, whom
propaganda pictured eran palace in Rome and, on February 11, 1929,
as all-wise although actually he was a most
me- the "Lateran Treaties" were agreed to. By these,
diocre man except for his unusual ability to know
the Pope finally reconciled himself to the loss
of
which side of his bread was buttered. the Papal States some six decades earlier, recog-
By the end of the decade, Mussolini was in nized the Kingdom of Italy, and no longer con-
complete and total control of the country, and sidered himself a "prisoner of the Vatican." On
the conservative elements in Great Britain and
July 25, 1929, a reigning Pope left the Vatican for
France found this entirely to their liking. As long
the first time since 1870.
as Mussolini portrayed himself as the enemy
of In return, Pope was given a sovereign
the
Communism and as long as he produced an ap- state, Vatican City, which he could rule
without
pearance of order. Fascism was accepted as emi-
interference from Italy or any other nation. It was
nently respectable.
tiny, to be sure, 109 acres in area, or about one-
Mussolini was even praised for having im- eighth the size of Manhattan's Central Park. The
posed efficiency on what was essentially an easy- Pope also received an indemnity from Italy for
going people. "At least, he made the trains run the loss of the Papal States.
on time," was a common refrain. In 1926, Pius XI was the first to consecrate
In literature in this period, Albert Pincherie
Chinese bishops.
Moravia (b.1907) published his first novel. The
Indifferent Ones, in 1929, and received instant ac-
claim. GERMANY
Arturo Toscanini (1867-1957), who was surely
immediate aftermath of World War I, there
In the
among the greatest conductors who ever lived, was an attempt by the revolutionary "Sparta-
was a great proponent of democracy, and left cists" (named for the gladiatorial rebel, Sparta-
Italy in 1929, determined not to return as
long as cus, in the last century of the Roman Republic)
Mussolini maintained his repressive dictatorship to seize the German government. The
moderate
there. Fie was among the first, but far from the Socialists who controlled the
government called
last, to be driven westward by Fascism in
Italy in the army and the Spartacists were quickly
and elsewhere and who ended up in Great Brit- crushed. Their leaders, Karl Liebknecht (1871-
ain or the United States, to the impoverishment 1919) and Rosa Luxemburg (1870-1919), were ar-
of the nations they left and the enrichment of the
rested and murdered.
nations they joined. A national assembly then met in Weimar in
central Germany and worked out a constitution
that was adopted on July 31, 1919. The
PAPACY govern-
ment of Germany under this constitution was
Benedict XV died on January 22, and in his
1922, therefore popularly termed the "Weimar Repub-
place the Archbishop of Milan, Ambrogio Dami- lic."
anus Achille Ratti (1857-1939), was elected Pope, Throughout those first years, Germany had to
adopting the name of Pius XI. undergo humiliation after humiliation. The Al-
Pius XI took up a strong stand against Com- lied blockade remained in place for eight months
munism, more for its antireligious policies than after the armistice, while the German
population
for its social theories. With Mussolini, however, famished. The Republic also had to oversee the
who came to power soon after Pius XI's acces- cession of territory to Belgium and Denmark.
They had to see the German city of Danzig set up Genoa, at a time when
Mussolini had not yet
as a free port for use by the reconstituted nation seized power, and on April 16, 1922, the Treaty
of Poland. of Rapallo was signed. (The soon-to-be assassi-
The German people, embittered by all this, nated Rathenau was a leading spirit in the nego-
and by the Allied insistence on huge reparations, tiation of the treaty.)
slowly built up a mythology of the war in which Both nations benefited. Each side gave up any
they insisted they had not started the conflict and thought of reparations from the other. Germany
had not lost it. Actually, their glorious army had agreed to supply Russia with desperately needed
won, but had gone down to defeat only because manufactured goods in return for the raw mate-
traitors back home had stabbed it in the back. rials Germany needed. WhaTs more, German
This was totally false, of course, but the victo- military officers went to Russia to train the Rus-
rious Allies had not required German generals to sian army and, in the process, those officers ob-
sign the armistice terms, allowing socialist civil- tained a great deal of practice in handling men
ians to do so. That made it seem that the military and weapons that they could not have received
had remained stalwart and staunch and that only at home under the restrictions of the Versailles
cowardly leftists had accepted the armistice. Treaty.
As a result, the Weimar Republic was attacked Needless to say, France viewed with great
from the very start by vengeful militarists and concern this treaty between the two nations it
reactionaries and it was never more than half feared. It was one of the factors that drove it to
alive, always on the defensive, always in dis- occupy the Ruhr in January 1923. The Germans
grace. reacted, spontaneously, with passive resistance
Even as early as March 13, 1920, there was an and general strikes. This refusal to work was
attempted "putsch" (a German word referring to supported by the Weimar republic, which subsi-
a minor uprising) engineered by a reactionary dized the idle laborers by printing paper money.
politician, Wolfgang Kapp (1858-1922). Kapp This set off an inflation that spiralled out of sight
seized Berlin, declared himself Chancellor and so that by the end of 1923, an American dollar
prepared to restore the monarchy while the legal was worth four trillion German marks.
government fled the city precipitously. A general This, in turn, meant that the German middle
strike,however, forced Kapp out after four days, class that had frugally invested its money in sav-
and he had to flee to Sweden. ings, annuities, insurance, and investments,
Another tactic on the part of the reactionaries suddenly found it all worth nothing. An impov-
was to assassinate prominent democratic leaders erished middle class could not adopt the interests
of the Weimar Republic. Thus, Matthias Erzber- of the lower classes it had always despised and
ger (1875-1921), a Catholic liberal, was assassi- therefore turned to the far right, blaming every-
nated on August 29, 1921, and Walther Rathenau thing on the Versailles Treaty and the supposed
(1867-1922), a Jewish industrialist, was assassi- traitors within who had forced Germany to ac-
nated on June 24, 1922. cept defeat when it had really been victorious.
The assassins, and the perpetrators of other This brought to prominence a truly demonic
rightist atrocities, if caught at all, were dealt with figure. The Austrian-born Adolf Hitler (1889-
leniently by a reactionary judicial system inher- 1945) had lived a life of resentment and poverty,
ited from the monarchy, so that rebellions and until he found fulfillment as a soldier in World
crimes against democracy were actively encour- War I, during which he seems to have fought
aged. bravely. After the war, he devoted himself to re-
Meanwhile, Germany, ostracized from the building a nationalistic Germany and reversing
family of nations, had to find friends where it the defeat of 1918. He, too, held to the conspiracy
could and the logical choice was that other ostra- theory that Germany had been betrayed from
cized nation, Russia. Representatives of the two within, and he clung with psychotic firmness to
nations met at Rapallo, an Italian coastal city near the notion that it was the Jews who were the
1 920 TO 1930 545
enemy. This turned out, in the end, to be a per- (who was soon be Vice-President under Coo-
to
fect method for seizing power, since the Jews lidge in the latter's elected term). This "Dawes
were relatively few and defenseless, and by at- plan" ushered in a period of recovery and in-
tacking them those who resented defeat could creasing prosperity in Germany, and the mad
make themselves feel powerful and victorious threat of Hitler's Nazis seemed to diminish.
without taking any risk at all. With returning prosperity in Germany and
In 1919, Hitler joined a small crackpot group some healing of the wounds of war, there
called the National Socialist Workers Party. The seemed a chance of a general reconciliation.
word "national," German, is pronounced
in The German Minister of Foreign Affairs at this
"nah-tsee-oh-nal." From the first two syllables, it time was Gustav Stresemann (1878-1929) who
was called the "nah-tsee" party, or, in German was interested in coming to an understanding.
spelling, "Nazi." The French Prime Minister was Edouard Herriot
Hitler turned out to be an inspired orator, at (1872-1957) and both he and Aristide Briand
least as far as German ears were concerned, and were also interested in
an accommodation, as
he dinned into those ears his hatred of the Treaty was Ramsay MacDonald of Great Britain.
of Versaillesand of the Jews and found willing In October 1925, a series of treaties were
listeners. He grew stronger, and, in the after- signed by various European powers, including
math of the occupation of the Ruhr and inflation, Germany, at Locarno in southern Switzerland.
he thought he had enough followers to try a By the Locarno Treaties, Germany accepted its
putsch in Bavaria. new western borders with France and Belgium.
On November 8, 1923, with the help of the old While it did not quite accept its borders with
general, Ludendorff, he dashed into a Munich Czechoslovakia and Poland, it undertook to
beer hall in which Bavarian leaders were gather- make no changes without arbitration. Many Eu-
ing and attempted to take over. This "beer hall ropeans felt that the Locarno Treaties had finally
putsch" turned out to be a fiasco. The Bavarian healed the wounds by World War I and there
left
prime minister, Gustav von Kahr (1862-1934), was much talk of the "Spirit of Locarno." Strese-
who was himself a reactionary monarchist, easily mann and Briand shared the Nobel Prize for
suppressed the putsch. peace in 1926 and Germany was admitted to the
Hitler was sentenced to five years in jail,
tried, League of Nations on Septeijnber 8, 1926.
and served less than a year under conditions of Meanwhile, Ebert, the president of the Wei-
great comfort. The judicial system, as usual, saw mar Republic, died on March 19, 1925, and it was
nothing wrong with rebellion, if it was from the necessary to elect a successor. One candidate
right. Hitler, however, posed as a martyr. While was Paul von Hindenberg, the old German gen-
in prison, he wrote an autobiographical farrago eral of World War I, now 78 years old, reaction-
of nonsense entitled Mein Kampf ("My
wild ary, and still loyal to the monarchy. The other
Struggle"), dictating it to his fellow-prisoner and was the liberal socialist, Otto Braun (1872-1955).
putschist, Walter Richard Rudolf Hess (1894- It was a close election but Ernst Thalmann (1886-
1987). 1944) insisted on running on the Communist

After the inflation, however, it was clear to the ticket, and drew enough votes away from Braun
western powers that unless they did something to allow the election of Hindenberg.
to help Germany, they would simply never get With continuing prosperity, the Rapallo
their reparations. Germany was trying to reorga- Treaty with Russia was extended. On May 20,
nize its finances and the United States evolved a 1928, in new elections, the Socialists grew
plan to help out, by judicious loans and by set- stronger and the incendiary right wing distinctly
ting up what seemed a reasonable schedule of weaker. On
February 6, 1929, Germany signed
reparation payments. the Kellogg-Briand pact and the process of peace
The plan was evolved by Charles Gates Dawes and reconciliation seemed stronger than ever.
(1865-1951), an American lawyer and politician Then came the stock market crash in the
United States in October 1929, and everything "White Armies" under monarchist generals, and
began to change very much for the worse. by forces from outside Russia as well. Indeed,
In Werner Karl Heisenberg (1901-
science, the odds seemed against the survival of an intact
1976) interpreted the atom in detail in 1925, in Russian nation. It appeared sure to disintegrate
accordance with quantum theory, evolving “ma- into numerous quarreling independent units that
trix mechanics" in doing so. In 1927, he went on would have eliminated Russia as an important
to work out the existence of the "uncertainty factor in world history for an indefinite period to
principle," which is one of the fundamental —
come much as the Mongol conquest had done
properties of matter and which places an abso- nearly seven centuries earlier.
lute limit on the accuracy with which certain What saved Russia and the Communist gov-
measurements can simultaneously be made. In ernment was that it was operating from interior
1925, Wolfgang Pauli (1900-1958) demonstrated lines against the numerous forces on the periph-
the "exclusion principle," which dictated the ar- ery, and could switch easily from one front to
rangement of electrons in atoms and produced another. What's more, the opponents of the
the final justification for the periodic table of ele- Communist regime never united but attacked
ments. Heisenberg and
Both Pauli received separately and could be defeated one at a time.
Nobel Prizes for their work. Finally, Leon Trotsky displayed an unexpected
In this decade, Hans Spemann (1869-1941) ability in putting together the "Red Army" and
studied the manner in which the developing fer- beating it into a disciplined and hard-fighting
tilized ovum
organized itself in the course of em- entity.
bryonic development, and that also earned a Southward, the Red Army had to take the
Nobel Prize. Ukraine which had declared itself independent
In literature, Thomas Mann published The and had signed a separate peace with Germany.
Magic Mountain in 1924, and Erich Maria Re- The Ukraine had been occupied by the Germans
marque (1898-1970) published his antiwar All in 1918. After the armistice, the Germans left, but
Quiet on the Western Front in 1929. French forces landed in Odessa and White ar-
An outstanding musician of the period was mies struck northward from the Ukraine under a
Kurt Julian Weill (1900-1950) who, with Bertolt series of generals, of whom the most important
Brecht (1898-1956), a playwright and poet, was Anton Ivanovich Denikin (1872-1947).
turned out The Three-Penny Opera in 1928. The The Red Army defeated Denikin, however,
Austrian-born Arnold Franz Walter Schoenberg and took Kiev on February 3, 1919, then went on
(1874-1951) pioneered atonal music. to expel the French and take Odessa on April 8,
Ludwig Josef Johan Wittgenstein (1889-1951) 1919. Denikin fled into exile and his place was
was the most important philosopher of the pe- taken by Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel (1878-
riod, while Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886- 1928). He made some spectacular initial gains but
1969) was the most innovative architect. was forced back into Crimea in November 1920,
(Many of the German scientists, writers, and and fled to Constantinople. The Communists
scholars who were prominent in this period left were thereafter able to establish themselves
Germany in the next decade, emigrating mostly throughout the south in the Ukraine and the
to Great Britain and the United States.) Caucasus.
In the west, the Germans had occupied the
Baltic states in the last
year of the war. After the
RUSSIA/SOVIET UNION armistice, a White army under Nikolai Nikolay-
In theimmediate aftermath of World War I— and evich Yudenich (1862—1933) advanced nearly to
the story must be told in this section to make it Petrograd by October 19, 1919, but he was then
coherent —
no observer would have given much defeated by the Red Army and went into exile.
chance to the survival of the Communist regime, The kept their independence but
Baltic states
which was attacked on all sides by Russian Byelorussia remained Russian.
1920 TO 1930 547
In the north, the and French had

British Army counterattacked and drove the Poles back
landed on Russia's Arctic shores at Murmansk, pell-mell. It was only in Poland itself that the
where they were eventually joined by an Ameri- Polish army, stiffened by the arrival of a French
can contingent. The idea was to keep Allied war general, Maxime Weygand (1867-1965), man-
material from falling into German hands. The Al- aged to hold.
liedexpeditionary force remained there after the The Treaty of Riga was signed on March 18,
armistice in the vague hope of helping to over-
1921, and in it the Polish-Russian frontier was
throw the Communists. There was some fighting marked off. It was well to the east of the Polish-
but the British and Americans were not keen on speaking areas and a substantial quantity of
Arctic fighting and by October 12, 1919, they had Russian-speaking people were included in the
all left Russia. The Communists at once took over Polish state.
the northern area.
Meanwhile, as all this fighting was going on,
In the east, Siberia was, for a time, lost.
While the Communists had set up a constitution on July
Russia was
still in the war they had formed a
10, 1918. was democratic in form, but, in actual
It
Czech legion out of Austro-Hungarian pris- fact, the Communists were the only party that
oners, an army group that wanted to fight Aus- was permitted to exist and Lenin remained in
tria-Hungary and help establish an independent complete control of the party.
Czechoslovakia. After Russia left the war, the Finally, toward the end of 1922, after eight
Czech legion tried to make its way to Vladivostok years of war, revolution, civil war, and foreign
where they hoped to be taken back to Europe to intervention,*^ Russia was able to draw a peaceful
continue the fight. breath and to reorganize itself. It established a
In the disorders that followed, they took over series of "Soviet Socialist Republics" (where "So-
the Trans-Siberian railroad and helped establish viet ' meant nothing more disturbing than
White governments in Siberia. Meanwhile, the "Council" in English). There were the Russian,
Japanese had occupied Vladivostok. The White the Byelorussian, the Ukrainian, and the Trans-
armies in Siberia united under Aleksandr Vasili- caucasian Soviet Socialist Republics, and to-
yevich Kolchak (1873-1920) and his forces in- gether the land became the "Union of Soviet
vaded eastern Russia. Socialist Republics" or the "U.S.S.R." A shorter
The ex-Tsar Nicholas II and his family were version is the "Soviet Union." It was established
being held prisoner at Ekaterinburg in eastern on December 30, 1922.
Russia at this time. As Kolchak drew near, the Surprisingly, Russia was essentially intact
local Communist
functionaries feared that Nich- after all this. The westernmost tier of territory
olas might be liberated and that the anti-Com- Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and
munist forces would unite under him in a burst Bessarabia —
was lost, but all else was held.
of enthusiasm. In a panic, the Communists Far worse than this comparatively minor loss
therefore executed the entire family on July 16, of territory was the economic dislocation result-
1918, This turned out to be unnecessary for Kol- ing from all the disturbances. The Soviet Union
chak was defeated by the Red Army in January was shambles and there was no help
left a at all
1919,was forced to retreat, and was captured from the western Allies. Only Germany, itself
and executed. The Japanese did not evacuate
Vladivostok until October 25, 1922, but by then *
In the midst of all this turmoil, I was born on January 2,
all of Siberia had been retaken by the Commu- 1920 in an area of Russia that, by great good fortune, had
nists. been spared by the German invasion, the worst of the
Finally, Poland attacked Russia on April 25, revolutionary disturbances, and the active subjection to
the disorders of the civil war. It is not important, but
1920, in an attempt to take over the Ukraine and I just
thought mention it.
I'd
reestablish the large Polish nation that had ex-
t Less than two weeks after the establishment of the So-
isted in the late Middle ages. They drove to Kiev, viet Union, my parents left the country, with me, and
which they took on May 7. However, the Red emigrated to the United States.
ostracized, was willing to deal with the Soviet

Union and supply it with needed manufactured BELGIUM
goods. During this decade, Belgium followed the French
Lenin was forced to recede from the applica- closely in foreign policy. They participated in the
tion of pure Communist principles in May 1921, invasion of the Ruhr, for instance, and also in the
and to adopt certain capitalist notions (the "New Locarno Treaties.
Economic Policy") in order to reinvigorate the Internally, the nation struggled with a lan-
economy. This succeeded to a considerable ex- guage problem. Some three-fifths of the popula-
tent and the Soviet Union began an economic tion spoke Flemish, a language closely related to
recovery. Dutch. Most of the remainder spoke French.
The Soviet Union was clearly becoming a sta- French was the language of the capital, and had
ble entity and, one by one, the European nations the greater prestige, so that it had been the offi-
recognized it, beginning with Great Britain on cial Belgian language since the formation of the
February 1, 1924. Japan finally recognized the So- nation in 1830.
viet Union on January 21, 1925, and evacuated The notion of self-determination that had been
the northern half of the island of Sakhalin, the established in the aftermath of World War I made
last bit of Soviet territory they had held. Only the this dominance of a minority language a difficult
United States, among the important nations of thing to maintain, however, and, beginning on
the globe, steadfastly refused to recognize the January 1,Belgium began to establish bilin-
1922,
Soviet Union in this decade. gualism. Flemish was placed on a par with
The Soviet Union formed additional Soviet So- French, though friction between the two cultural
cialist Republics in its Central Asian territories. halves of the land continued.
Eventually, there were 15 constituent Soviet So- The Belgian astronomer, George Lemaitre
cialist Republics, of which the largest was the (1894-1966), pointed out in 1927 that the notion
Russian Federated Soviet Socialist Republic, of an expanding Universe implied that at some
which made up three-fourths of the area and half time in the far past, all the matter of the Universe
the population of the Soviet Union. must have existed in the form of a relatively
Lenin died on January 21, 1924, leaving no small, compact body. This body, which he called
clear system of succession. The result was that, a "cosmic egg," must have exploded to form the
for several years, there was intense jockeying for Universe that now exists. This was the genesis of
power, with the two leading candidates being the "big bang" theory of cosmic origins.
Leon Trotsky and Joseph Stalin.
By the summer of 1926, Stalin was definitely
in the ascendant. Trotsky continued to fight a NETHERLANDS
losing battle and, in January 1929, he was forced It was decade for the Netherlands, except
a quiet
into exile. for having to suppress a revolt in the East Indies
Stalin undertook an attempt to industrialize in 1926 and 1927. They maintained a moderate
the Soviet Union at whatever cost, initiating var- course in foreign relations, refusing to give up
ious "Five Year Plans," and established a tight William II of Germany, who had fled to the Neth-
dictatorship intended to suppress all dissent. The erlands,and maintaining the right of asylum.
decade ended with him in full and undisputed They also refrained from any movement that
control of the nation. would encourage the discontent among the
Dmitry Dimitriyevich Shostakovich (1906- Flemish-speaking people of Belgium, or to sug-
1975) gained his musical reputation with his first gest that Flemish regions be annexed to the
symphony performed in 1925. Netherlands.
Joseph Wilhelm Debye (1884-
In 1923, Peter
1966) worked out the behavior of salts in solution
by considering the interaction of ions carrying
1920 TO 1930 549
positive or negative charges. He also considered However, discontent continued in Catalonia,

those molecules that carried positive and nega-
economic distress alienated the middle class, es-
tive charges on different sections,
measuring pecially after the American stock market crash,
their "dipole moments." This was important and Primo de Rivera was ailing. On January 28,
enough to warrant
Nobel Prize.
a 1930, he resigned and died a little over a month
Pieter Cornelis Mondrian (1872-1944) was an
afterward. Spain returned to democratic govern-
important Dutch artist of the period. ment.
SPAIN
Spain continued to have trouble in its section of
PORTUGAL
Portugal drifted from one military government to
Morocco. There, it faced Abd el-Krim (1882-
another, either by coup or by election, and none
1963), who, though originally in the Spanish civil
could solve the financial chaos of the nation
service, became disillusioned with Spanish rule
and organized a rebellion. On July 21, 1921, he until, on April 27, 1928, Antonio de Oliveiro Sal-
azar (1899-1970) became minister of finance. He
defeated a Spanish army, killing some 12,000
men. He established a "Republic of the Rif," and was a scholar and a professor of economics and
he was able to bring order into the handling of
maintained it successfully for five years.
the national budget.
France, however, felt that any Moroccan suc-
cess in the Spanish portion of the land would
endanger French control of the rest. The French
therefore joined the Spaniards and sent 160,000
SWITZERLAND
men under Retain, the hero of Verdun, against Switzerland was the site of the League of Na-
the Moroccan rebels. Abd el-Krim was forced to tions, which met in Geneva. Switzerland aban-
surrender on May 27, 1926, and was sent into doned strict isolation to join the League, but
exile on the island of Reunion in the Indian obtained international guarantees of perpetual
its
Ocean. neutrality. Actually, this was convenient for
The rebellion in Morocco,
however, had everyone, for if there were to be a general Euro-
brought about considerable trouble in Spain it- pean war again, some neutral patch was needed
self. The movement in
separatist Catalonia where negotiations between the warring nations
sharpened, and attempts were made to follow might be carried on, even if only indirectly
theMoroccan example and to set up an autono- through Swiss intermediaries.
mous government.
The Spanish response was to turn to a military
dictatorship. A Spanish general, Miguel Primo AUSTRIA
de Rivera (1870-1930) suppressed the attempted Through the vagaries of history, Austria, in the
Catalan revolt firmly. Then, no doubt inspired by wake of World War I, had become a minor power
Mussolini's success in taking over the govern- with the great metropolis of Vienna as its cap-
ment of Italy, Primo de Rivera seized power in Vienna had grown as the center of a great
ital.
Spain on September 13, 1923, with the approval power, but had now had that cut out from under
of King Alfonso XIII. He set up what was essen- itself.
tially a Fascist government, complete with press The Austrian population was now almost en-
censorship, the suspension of trial by jury, the tirely German-speaking, and there was
a strong
dissolution of the legislature,and the harrying of sentiment in favor of union ("Anschluss") with
liberals. Primo de Rivera and Alfonso visited Germany— something that might have taken
Italy, where a treaty of friendship was signed on place in Bismarck's time, half a century earlier, if
August 7, 1926. Primo de Rivera also arranged Bismarck had not known better than to incorpo-
for cooperation with France against Abd el-Krim. rate millions of non-Germans into a greater
Ger-
many. The peace treaties, however, forbade

Anschluss lest Germany grow too strong. CZECHOSLOVAKIA
In its search for friends, Austria found Italy to The northern provinces of prewar Austria (Bo-
the south, which gave the illusion of strength, hemia and Moravia) spoke the Czech language,
and a treaty of friendship was signed with Italy and the northern province of prewar Hungary
on February 6, 1930. Inside Austria, there was (Slovakia) spoke a very closely related language.
growing friction between Socialists and right- These districts united on October 30, 1918, to
wing nationalists. Italy, of course, did everything form the new nation of Czechoslovakia.
to encourage the right wing and to set up a Fas- The president was Tomas Garrigue Masaryk
cist Austria. (1850-1937). During World War I, he had left
The most important Austrian scientist of the Austria-Hungary and fought against it in the in-
period was Erwin Schrodinger (1887-1961.) In terest of an independent Czechoslovakia. He
1926, Schrodinger interpreted the atom in terms helped form the Czech legion in Russia. As pres-
of quantum theory and worked out “wave me- ident, he respected the minority rights of the
chanics" which included the “Schrodinger wave non-Czech inhabitants of the land, and trans-
equation." His theory turned out to be equiva- formed the nation into a liberal democratic
lent to Heisenberg's matrix mechanics but was power. His foreign minister was his colleague
easier to use. Schrodinger earned a Nobel Prize and disciple Edvard Benes (1884-1948).
for his work. Czechoslovakia feared any attempt to recon-
stitute the old Austro-Hungarian realm, and for
that reason it formed a treaty of alliance with
HUNGARY other nations who had inherited Austro-Hun-
In the aftermath of World War I, Hungary came garian territory and didn't want that situation
under a Communist government led by Bela Kun disturbed. Czechoslovakia signed a treaty with
(1886-1939) that lasted only a few months. Yugoslavia on August 14, 1920, and with Ro-
On March 1, 1920, Miklos Horthy (1868-1957), mania on April 23, 1921. The three nations
an admiral who had fought well during World formed “the Little Entente" and it was their im-
War I, and who had led the forces that drove Kun mediate reaction that prevented the ex-Emperor
out of Hungary, became Regent of Hungary. The Charles from regaining the throne of Hungary on
very title of Regent implied that Hungary was two different occasions.
still a monarchy and that Horthy was holding An important Czechoslovakian scientist of the
office in the name of the absent king. On two period was Jaroslav Heyrovsky (1890-1957). In
different occasions, indeed, the ex-Emperor 1925, he worked out a delicate method for ana-
Charles tried to reestablish himself as King of lyzing solutions by means of an electric current
Hungary, but in each case, the hostility of the traversing a solution into which drops of mer-
surrounding nations that had been built up out cury were falling. This technique, which he
of the old Austria-Hungary prevented it. called “polarography," eventually earned him a
Horthy appointed Istvan Bethlen as Prime Nobel Prize.
Minister. Bethlen kept the job through the 1920s, Franz Kafka (1883-1924), died young of tuber-
though Horthy remained the real master of the culosis, and his fame rests chiefly on two novels
land. On April 5, 1927, a treaty of friendship was published posthumously. The Trial (1925) and The
signed with Italy and in Hungary, too, Italy did Castle (1926). Karel Capek (1890-1938) is best
what it could to encourage Fascism. known for his play, R.iI.R., a science fiction clas-
The Hungarian biochemist, Albert Szent- sic, which introduced the word “robot" (a Czech
Gyorgyi (1893-1986), isolated a substance from word for “forced labor") for mechanical huma-
adrenal glands in 1928. He called it “hexuronic noid workers. Jaroslav Hasek (1883-1928) is
acid" but it eventually turned out to be vitamin known for his antiwar satire. The Good Soldier,
C and this earned him a Nobel Prize. Schweik (1923).
1920 TO 1930 551
as Michael
YUGOSLAVIA I (b. 1921), became king at the age of
six.
Through the 1920s, the nation founded after
World War I as a kind of greater Serbia bore the
forbidding name Kingdom of Serbs,
of "the POLAND
Croats, and Slovenes." The Crown Prince, Alex-
Poland was reconstituted on November
a nation
ander, was Prince Regent, since his father, Peter
3, 1918, for the time since the Grand Duchy
first
I, was incapable of ruling. Peter died on August of Warsaw had existed a century earlier. The act-
lb, 1920, and his son became King
Alexander I. ing president of the nation during much of
1919
Yugoslavia formed part of the Little Entente, was Ignacy Jan Paderewski (1860-1941), a com-
with Romania and Czechoslovakia, but internally
poser and a great concert pianist, famous for his
it was in a wild state of
disorder. The Balkan "Minuet in G." He raised money for the cause of
tradition of ridding one's self of political
oppo- Polish independence by going on concert
tours
nents by the straightforward method of assassi-
during World War I.
nation continued. There were two assassination
The real power in Poland, however, was the
attempts on the King's life, for instance. general Josef Klemens Pilsudski (1867-1935),
What's more, the Serbs and Croats fought who during World War
had been imprisoned
I
each other viciously. The leader of the Croatian
first by the Russians, and then by
the Germans.
Peasant Party, Stjepan Radic (1871-1928), a
Pilsudski had grandiose notions for Poland.
strong advocate of Croatian autonomy, was shot
He wanted the Ukraine and drove eastward on
and wounded by a Serbian extremist, and died April 25, 1920, taking Kiev on May 7. Russian
on August 8, 1928. armies under Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachev-
The Croatian representatives left parliament sky (1893-1937) and Semyon Mihaylovich Bud-
at that, and set up a legislature of their
own in enny (1883-1973) counterattacked and the Poles,
the Croatian capital of Zagreb. They refused all
who had badly overextended themselves, fell
efforts of mollification by the king (who was
back all the way to Warsaw. Now it was the Rus-
Serbian).
sians who were overextended. Pilsudski, with
Alexander therefore abolished the legislature the advice of the French general, Weygand,
altogether, suspended the constitution, and, on counterattacked at Warsaw on August 16, 1920,
January 5, 1929, established a royal dictatorship. and the Russians back in disorder. At the
fell
He suspended all political parties, ruled by de- peace treaty on March 18, 1921, Poland didn't get
cree and, on October 3, 1929, officially changed the Ukraine, but they did get some Russian-
the nameof the nation to "Yugoslavia," attempt- speaking areas that then made up the eastern
ing to unify it by wiping out reference to its con-
half of the nation.
stituent parts.
There were some years of disorder before Pil-
sudski carried through a military coup on May
ROMANIA 12, 1926. He didn't take open command of the

government, but let his friend and puppet Ignacy
Romania formed part of the Little Entente, with Moscicki (1867-1946) be president, while he ran
Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. Its king, Ferdi- the nation from a less exposed position. Like
nand I, who had seen Romania through its part Mussolini, Pilsudski had been a Socialist in his
of World War I, which was first disastrous and earlier days,but became an oppressive rightist
then triumphant, died on July 20, 1927. His son once he gained power.
Carol (1893-1953) had renounced the throne,
preferring to live in peace with his mistress,
Magda Lupescu (1896-1977), apparentlywho GREECE
had an unsavory past and was viewed with dis- Alexander I of Greece, who had been made king
dain by many Romanians, Carol's son, reigning by the Allies in place of his father, the pro-Ger-
man Constantine, died on October 25, 1920 as on September 27, 1922 and who died less than
the result of a bite by his pet monkey. Constan- four months later. He was succeeded by his old-
tine took over the throne once again in Decem- est son (the elder brother of the ill-fated Alex-
ber. ander I) who reigned as George II (1890-1947). It
Meanwhile, Greece, like Poland, had grandi- also encouraged Mussolini to decide to hang on
ose notions. By the Treaty of Sevres at the con- to Rhodes and the Dodecanese, and to temporar-
clusion ofWorld War I, Greece was awarded the ily occupy Corfu.
region around Smyrna, a Greek-speaking city in Georgehad no power and was forced in his
II
western Asia Minor. Greece thought it could turn to abdicate on December 18, 1923. On May
help itself to more and that it might revive
kind a 1, 1924, Greece was proclairned a republic and
of Byzantine Empire once again. The Turks, the indefatigable Venizelos kept shuttling in and
however, under the strong nationalist leadership out of power, alternating with various military
of Mustafa Kemal, were of no mind to permit men.
this.
On June 22, 1919, the Greeks invaded Asia

Minor with British encouragement. At first they BULGARIA
were quite successful, but when Constantine re- Ferdinand of Bulgaria was forced to abdicate on
turned to the throne. Great Britain, remembering October 4, 1918, when Bulgaria surrendered to-
the old king's pro-German policies, withdrew its ward the end of World War I. He was succeeded
help. The Greeks, nevertheless, continued to by his oldest son, who reigned as Boris III (1894-
plunge eastward and, by September 16, 1921, 1943).
had nearly reached Angora in central Asia The Prime Minister was Aleksandur Stambo-
Minor. liyski (1879-1923), who
attempted to rule Bul-
But not quite. The Turks fought desperately garia in a liberal fashion, but was overthrown by
and stopped the Greeks, who found themselves a military coup on June 9, 1923, and was mur-
overextended. Mustafa Kemal built up the Turk- dered five days later. The remainder of the de-
ish forces, made settlements with the surround- cade was a time of turmoil and bomb outrages in
ing powers, including Russia, and on August 18, the land.
1922 began a powerful counteroffensive. The
Greeks retreated a great deal more rapidly than
they had advanced and, by September 11, 1922, ALBANIA
the Turks took Smyrna. Albania, the only European nation that was more
On July 24, the Turks signed the Treaty of than half Islamic, was proclaimed a republic on
Lausanne (in western Switzerland). This January 21, 1925, and Ahmed Zogu (1895-1961)
superseded the Treaty of Sevres so that Turkey was its president. On September he pro-
1, 1928,
was the only one of the Central Powers to con- claimed himself king and ruled as Zog I. During
tinue fighting and to force a revision of the peace this period Albania was to some extent an Italian
treaties. protectorate.
There followed a transfer of populations.
Some 1,400,000 Greeks in Asia Minor (whose
ancestors had been living there for three thou- ESTONIA
sand years) were forced to leave for Greece, Estonia, the northernmost of the three small Bal-
while 400,000 Turks had to leave Greece for Tur- tic proclaimed its independence from a
states,
key. It was a cruel and harsh uprooting of peo- disintegrating Russia on November 18, 1917. The
ples but it prevented endless quarreling in the Germans were occupying it and the other Balkan
future. states at this time.
The defeat in Asia Minor meant a final end for After the end of World War I, the Germans
Constantine who had to abdicate a second time left and the Estonians fought off an attempt of
1920 TO 1930 553
the Russians to take the land back.

Independence (1867-1951), with the help of Von der Goltz, who
was completely established in January 1919. later fought in Latvia. By October 14, 1920, Fin-
nish independence was completely established.
LATVIA An important Finnish architect of the period
was Gottlieb Eliel Saarinen (1875-1920), who em-
Latvia continued to be subjected to Russian
pres- igrated to the United States in 1923.
sure in January 1919, after Estonian indepen-
dence had been established. The Latvians were
helped by a German general, Rudiger von der DENMARK
Goltz (1865—1946). (The Allies didn't mind hav-
Denmark remained peaceful under Christian X in
ing German generals fighting their
ex-Ally as this period. It gained a small strip
of northern
long as that ex-AlIy was Communist.) It was
not Schleswig inhabited by Danish-speaking people,
untilAugust 11, 1920 that the independence of and this was formally incorporated into Denmark
Latvia was recognized by all.
on July 9, 1920.
The Danish biochemist Carl Peter Henrick
LITHUANIA Dam (1895-1976) discovered vitamin K in 1929,
and for this, he eventually received a Nobel
Lithuania independence was recognized by
s
Prize.
Russia on July 12, 1920 and its capital was set at
Vilna. On October 9, 1920, however, a
group of
Polish freebooters seized Vilna and would
not NORWAY
give it up. At the urging of the League of Na-
Norway, at peace under Haakon VII, continued
was held in Vilna on January
tions, a plebiscite
to annex small and disregarded
islands that
8, 1922, but since it was run by the Poles,
it might serve as bases for its merchant fleet. In
ended up in a Polish victory and Lithuania re- 1928 and 1929, it annexed Bouvet Island and
fused to recognize its validity.
Peter I Island in the Antarctic Ocean, and Jan
Vilna remained Polish, however, and Lithu-
Mayen Island in the Arctic Ocean.
ania was forced to use Kaunas as its capital. Re-
lations between Lithuania and Poland remained
hostile thereafter. SWEDEN
Lithuania, searching for compensation, engi-
Sweden remained at peace under Gustavus V.
neered an uprising in the German city of Memel
at the eastern tip of East Prussia on
January 11,
1923. Lithuania took over in accordance with
it OTTOMAN EMPIRE/TURKEY
the usual feeling among nations that two wrongs
With the end of World War I, the Ottoman Em-
make a right.
pire seemed to be on the verge of disappearing
On December 17,Antanas Smetona
1926, from the map. All its Asian dominions outside
(1874-1944) gained control of Lithuania in a coup Asia Minor were gone. Both the Italians and
and governed dictatorially thereafter. Greeks were ready to help themselves to por-
tions of Asia Minor. The western Allies had
moved into Constantinople, ostensibly to
FINLAND protect
the Straits, and the Armenians were in full revolt
Finland declared independence of Russia after
its in the northeast. On the throne was a new
Sul-
the Communist revolution, but had to undergo a tan, MehmedVI (1865-1926), who did his best to
civil war first, because home-grown Communists
cooperate with the Allies as the only way,
he
tried to take over the government with the help thought, of saving a remnant of his Empire*
of the Russians. Fighting against the Commu- The Ottoman Empire, however, had Mustafa
nists was Carl Gustaf Emil von Mannerheim Kemal, who had fought well at Gallipoli and in
the Caucasus during World War I. Kemal set up alphabet, the western calendar, and the metric
a nationalist government with its capital at An- system were all adopted. Turks were assigned
gora in central Asia Minor on April 23, 1920. He family names, and eventually Kemal adopted
came to agreements with Russia, settling the "Ataturk" ("leader of the Turks") as his own.
northeastern boundary of the Empire, then made No such westernization process had been seen
a deal with Italy (where Mussolini had not yet since Peter the Great had forcibly westernized
gained power) which evacuated Asia Minor. He the Russian upper classes two and a half centu-
could now concentrate on the Greeks. ries earlier.
He fell back before the Greeks, allowing them
to overextend themselves while he fought hard
and made the advance expensive for them. On SYRIA
August 18, 1922, he launched a powerful coun- After World War became a French man-
I, Syria
terattack, and, within a matter of weeks, drove date. This, in theory, meant that France was
the Greeks out of Asia Minor. merely charged with seeing that Syria set up a
On November 1, 1922, Mehmed VI was forced stable and responsible government and was then
to abdicate and was replaced by a cousin who to allow itgo its own way. In actual practice,
to
reigned as Abdul Mejid II (1868-1944). however, the mandating power usually acted
On July 24, 1923,Kemal forced a new treaty as though it were dealing with a colony and
with the Allies which restored the Ottoman ter- never let its charge go its own way until it was
ritories Europe about the city of Constan-
in forced to.
tinople, and required no payment of any Thus, Faisal, who had Arab revolt
led the
indemnities. The Allies evacuated Constantino- against the Ottoman Empire, and who had
ple on August 23. worked with Lawrence of Arabia, was pro-
On October 29, 1923, the Sultanate was abol- claimed king of Syria on March 11, 1920. France,
ished altogether and the line of Ottoman Sultans however, wouldn't have him and dethroned him
came to an end after six centuries. Abdul Mejid on July 25.
and all his family were banished on March 3, France also excluded from Syria the coastal re-
1924. What had been the Ottoman Empire now gion just north of Palestine, and set it up as the
became the Turkish Republic and is commonly separate state of Lebanon. The excuse was that
known as Turkey. On March 28, 1930, its cities Lebanon was the one region of the Middle East
and regions were given Turkish names officially. that was largely Christian, and had been since
Constantinople became Istanbul; Angora, the the time of the Crusades eight centuries earlier.
new capital, became Ankara; Smyrna became During the rest of the decade, Syria was usu-
Izmir, and so on. and the French did not
ally in a state of revolt,
Kemal, as President of Turkey, set about hesitate to use plenty of force (including two
unifying and modernizing the nation. Those Ar- bombardments of Damascus) in order to put it
menians who had not been slaughtered were ter- down.
rified into submission. The Greek population of
Asia Minor was driven out. Kemal then set about
his program of westernization. PALESTINE
He separated Church and state and intro- Balfour, who had
once been Prime Minister of
duced such western innovations as universal suf- Great Britain, was the nation's Foreign Minister
frage, political parties, a legislature, and religious during the concluding years of World War I. On
freedom (though he was careful to keep his own November 2, 1917, he put forth the "Balfour Dec-
power intact). He forced the Turks to adopt west- laration"which stated that a national home for
ern clothes: the men had to give up the fez, the the Jews would be set up in Palestine but that
women the veil. Western penal codes were this would not be allowed to affect the civil and
adopted; polygamy was forbidden. The Roman religious rights of non-Jewish residents.
1920 TO 1930 555
This was easy to say, but impossible to do. On December 14, 1927, Great Britain recog-
The Arabs of Palestine felt that any influx of Jews nized Iraq as independent, but maintained mili-
at all produced, in itself, an inadmissable effect tary bases in the country, so that it was
clear that
on their civil and religious rights. In addition, the the nation s independence would not extend to
British themselves were not terribly keen on the point of doing anything that Great Britain
carrying through the terms of the Declaration.
didn't want it to do.
The section of Palestine east of the Jordan
River was cut off from Palestine proper and was
not included in what was to be the Jewish na- PERSIA
tional home. It became 'Transjordan" and
was In the last years of World War I, Persia continued
placed under Abdullah ibn Hussein (1882-1951), in a state of confusion. Russian Communist
who had been another of the leaders of the Arab forces made
sporadic inroads, and the British did
revolt. On February 20, 1928, Transjordan
was what they could to take over the country in order
recognized as independent, but Great Britain to keep the Russians out.
was still the mandating power and retained its At this however, Reza Khan (1878-
point,
essential control despite the "independence."
1944) rose to prominence, playing the role in Per-
By the end of the decade, the Palestinians sia that Mustafa Kemal was playing in
Turkey.
were attacking the Jews fiercely, and the British On February 21, 1921, he carried through a
were restricting Jewish immigration. coup in Teheran, establishing a new government
with himself as Minister of War. He immediately
came to an understanding with Russia, which
ARABIA
agreed to leave Persia and to cancel all debts and
Central Arabia had been the domain of a Puritan-
indemnities.
ical sect of Muslims, the Wahabis, for over
a cen- Reza Khan then strengthened the army, im-
turyand a half. During the World War I years, a proved finances, put down various revolts, and
dynamic Wahabi leader, Ibn Saud (1880-1953) gradually accumulated power. On October 28,
had begun to expand his domination over the 1923, he became Prime Minister.
peninsula, taking advantage of the collapse of Shah Ahmad (1898-1930), the last of the Sa-
the Ottoman Empire. On October 13, 1924, he favid Shahs, who had ruled Persia for over four
took Mecca, and on December 5, 1925, he took centuries, did not enjoy being reduced to a fig-
Medina. urehead, and, in addition, was in bad health. He
Ibn Saud knew when to stop. He made no left and never returned. On December 13,
Persia
attempt to move northward against the British 1925, Reza Khan was declared the new Shah, and
and French mandates, nor against the region reigned as Reza Shah Pahlavi.
alortg Arabia's southern shore, where Great Brit-
Reza Khan continued to follow the lead of
ain maintained an interest. He made treaties with
Kemal in Turkey, attempting to westernize the
Great Britain, Turkey, Persia, and Transjordan, land technologically, building roads, beginning
and confined himself to strengthening the rule the construction of a railway, encouraging avia-
he already had. tion, and so on. He did not, however, try to wes-
ternize the land culturally and made no move to
shake the grip of Islam over Persia.
IRAQ
Iraq was under a British mandate. Faisal, who
had led the Arab revolt in alliance with Great AFGHANISTAN
Britain, and who had been briefly king of Syria Habibullah, the Amir of Afghanistan, was assas-
until the French rejected him, was now rewarded sinated on February 19, 1919, and was succeeded
by Great Britain, which made him king of Iraq on by his son, Amanullah (1892-1960). Afghanistan
August 23, 1921. continued to waver between Russia and Great
Britain and, for the moment, anti-British senti- Ethiopia they would respect its territory, but
ment was dominant. Habibullah may have been such assurances are easy to give.
assassinated because he was too pro-British and Meanwhile, Ras Tafari, who was heir to the
his successor did not intend to make that mis- throne, was power at the
steadily increasing his
take. He fought the British and didn't do very expense of the Empress Zauditu, and on October
were in
well, but the British no fighting mood, in 7, 1928, he took the title of "Negus" ("King").
any case. On August 8, 1919, they recognized the
full independence of Afghanistan.
Amanullah then went on to make treaties of LIBYA

friendship with Russia, Turkey, and Persia, and Though conquest of Libya had begun in
Italy's
proceeded to try to follow the lead of Mustafa 1911, it had never been carried through com-
Kemal and Reza Khan in modernizing and wes- pletely. It was part of Mussolini's aggressive pol-
ternizing his nation. Amanullah went about it icy to see that Libya was entirely subdued. This
too rapidly, however, and Afghanistan was too was on under the leadership of Pietro
carried
backward for the purpose. The nation revolted Badoglio (1871-1956) and the job was completed
against the innovations which it did not under- in 1930. It had taken nearly two decades.
stand, and Amanullah was forced to abdicate on
January 14, 1929.
The leader of the revolt against Amanullah TANGANYIKA
then became king as Nadir Shah (1880-1933). After World War I, Great Britain took over Ger-
man East Africa as a mandate and renamed it
Tanganyika on January 10, 1920. What had been
EGYPT British East Africa to its north became Kenya.
The Nationalist party Egypt continued to gain

of
strength, despite all British attempts to suppress
SOUTHWEST AFRICA
it. In the end. Great Britain granted Egypt a titu-
German Southwest Africa was taken over by the
lar independence on February 18, 1922, but kept
Union of South Africa as a mandate on May 7,
military control of the land. Great Britain also
1919, and became simply Southwest Africa. (It is
retained control of the Sudan, to the south of
known today as Namibia.)
Egypt.
INDIA
ETHIOPIA Mohandas Gandhi was emerging as the leader of
On September 23, was admitted to
1923, Ethiopia the Indian nationalists. He was unusual among
the League of Nations. This was opposed by nationalists everywhere in that he insisted on a
Great Britain, since, in Ethiopia, the institution policy of nonviolence and passive disobedience.
of slavery still flourished. In 1924, therefore, He had supported the British during World War
Ethiopia abolished slavery. I in the hope that Great Britain would then grant
Meanwhile, as one of the two independent na- greater self-rule to India.

tions of Africa (and one, that, unlike Liberia, was The reverse took place. Once the war was
not a special charge of the United States), Ethio- over, the British government decided to fight the
piaseemed fair game for European powers. To- nationalist movement by allowing the British-run
ward the end of 1925, Great Britain and Italy government to try sedition cases without juries
came to an agreement whereby each was to have and to intern people without trial. This sort of
contol over a section of the land. Great Britain in tyranny led Gandhi to proclaim a day of fasting
the north and Italy in the east. Ethiopia pro- and work stoppage.
tested, of course, and both nations assured Unfortunately, not all nationalists understood
1 920 TO 1930 557
Gandhi's devotion to nonviolence, and at Amrit-

sar in northern India rioting Indians, on
April 10, CHINA
1919, killed five Englishmen and beat an English- In order to fight the chaos of the war
lords and
woman. the threat of Japan, Sun Yat-sen accepted
the
In response, a British officer, Reginald Edward help of the Soviet Union, which, in
1924, gave
Harry Dyer (1864-1927), decided to teach the In-
up all the concessions that the Tsarist govern-
dians a lesson they would not forget and instill
ment had wrung out of China. A Soviet diplo-
them with fear. On April 13, 1919, he marched a mat, Mikhail Markovich Borodin (1884-1951),
troop of soldiers to Amritsar where 10,000 un-
arrived in China in 1923 to serve as an adviser to
armed Indians were assembled in peaceful pro- Sun.
test. The were ordered to shoot into the
soldiers At about this time, Chiang Kai-shek (1887-
crowd, without warning, and to do so until their
1975) became a power in Sun Yat-sen's Kuomin-
ammunition was exhausted. They killed about tang ("Nationalist") party, especially after Sun's
379 and wounded 1200, then marched away
death on March 12, 1925. Chiang Kai-shek built
without any attempt to care for those who were up his control of China with the help of a Soviet
wounded. general, Vasily Konstantinovich Blucher (1889-
A commission of inquiry condemned Dyer 1938).
and he was forced to resign from the service, but In 1927, however, Chiang Kai-shek discovered
the House of Lords praised him, public opinion
(assome years earlier Mussolini had) that money
treated him as a hero, and money was raised
would flood into his coffers if he came to an
with which to reward him.
agreement with conservative Chinese business-
After that, there was no chance of reconcilia- men. Chiang turned sharply to the right and dis-
tion between Great Britain and India. Gandhi
missed his Soviet advisers.
began a nationwide noncooperation movement The leftist portion of the Kuomintang at once
and civil disobedience, and kept it up relent- saw Chiang as the enemy. The Chinese Com-
lessly, despite and occasional im-
vilification munists, under Mao Tse-tung (1893-1976), the
prisonment by the British. There was some theoretician, and Chu Teh (1886-1976), the mili-
sentiment in Great Britain after a while to grant tary leader, held their ground in Fukien, a coastal
India dominion status, but after the Amritsar
province across the strait from Formosa, in what
massacre nothing but complete independence seemed to be a losing fight against Chiang's na-
would do for the dedicated nationalists. That was tionalists.
what Dyer had accomplished and Great Britain's
superpatriots had praised.
JAPAN
The Emperor Yoshihito was mentally disturbed
SIAM to the point where, in 1921, he was no longer
Siam's participation on the winning side in capable of ruling. His son, the Crown Prince Hi-
World War I finally paid off as the other nations rohito (1901-1989), became regent, and on De-
gave up extraterritorial rights: the United States cember 25, 1926, after the death of his father, he
in 1920, Japan in 1924, and the European nations
became Emperor.
in 1925 and 1926. Rama VI, under whom this was
During Hirohito's regency, Japan suffered a
taking place, died in 1925 and was succeeded by national disaster of the first magnitude on Sep-
his brother who reigned as Rama VII (1893- tember 1, 1923, when a great earthquake and fire
1941). struck Tokyo and nearby cities. Some 200,000
people were killed. Help was sent from abroad,
notably from the United States. There was a flash
of Japanese gratitude to the United States,
but it
did not last long for the United States continued
to forbid Japanese emigration, something that Party depended on the French Canadians for vic-
made plain its opinion that the Japanese were tory in elections.
inferior and undesirable non-whites. The dominant political figure in Canada at this
On January 20, 1925, Japan recognized the So- time was William Lyon Mackenzie King (1874-
viet Union and established diplomatic relations. 1950). As leader of the Liberal Party, he was
Thereupon, they evacuated the last bit of Soviet Prime Minister of Canada throughout the decade
territory they still held —
the northern half of the except for a few months in 1926. It was he who
island of Sakhalin. labored for Canada's greater independence and
Japan continued its imperialist attitude toward for its isolationism. In doing so, he managed to
China, sending troops into the province of Shan- maintain a national unity between the French-
tung on several occasions. and English-speaking portion of the land.
A
Canadian physician, Frederick Grant Bant-
ing (1891-1941), along with his American-born
AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND assistant Charles Herbert Best (1899-1978) iso-
Australia was given
mandate over the German
a lated insulin in 1922. When the body could not
ex-colonies in the South Pacific, except for Nauru manufacture that hormone, the severe disease
and Samoa, the mandate over which went to diabetes resulted. The discovery made it possible
New Zealand. to treat diabetes, and Banting received a Nobel
Both Australia and New Zealand
were charter Prize.
members of the League of Nations, emphasizing Davidson Black (1884-1934) discovered a
their increasing independence of Great Britain. tooth in a cave near Beijing in 1927. This was the
In 1927, Canberra became the seat of the Aus- first indication of "Peking man" and helped
tralian government. work out the ancestry of the human species.
Stephen Butler Leacock (1869-1944), an econ-
omist who taught at McGill University in Mon-
CANADA treal, was at the peak of his fame as a humorist
Canada labored to establish its essential indepen- in this decade.
dence decade. Like the other dominions
in this
of the British Empire, it demanded a seat of its
own League of Nations. The United States
in the MEXICO
and France were dubious at first, feeling that this At the decade, Carranza was presi-
start of the
would be handing the British Empire a multiple dent of Mexico and, by the new constitution,
vote, but it became clear, soon enough, that Can- could not succeed himself. In the competition for
ada saw its national interests as not necessarily succession, there was fighting among several
identical with that of
Great Britain. For instance, generals.
Canada began, in this decade, to send its own The winner was Alvaro Obregon (1880-1928),
diplomatic representatives abroad, to sign trea- who became president on September 5, 1920, by
ties on its own behalf, and so on. which time Carranza had been killed. One of the
In fact, Canada followed the lead of the losing generals was Adolfo de la Huerta (1883-
United States in adopting a strongly isolationist 1955) who raised a rebellion but was defeated.
policy and refused to follow the British lead
flatly The United States played the game of recognition
in getting involved in the war between Greece and nonrecognition in an attempt to see to it that
and Turkey in 1922. Canada was distinctly more American-owned properties in Mexico would not
independent in its foreign policy than were Aus- be confiscated. The United States did not recog-
tralia and New Zealand, for instance, largely be- nize Obregon until 1923, and then sided with
cause the strong French-Canadian minority was him against Huerta.
hostile to Great Britain and the ruling Liberal Obregon could not succeed himself and, in
1920 TO 1930 559
1924, Plutarco Elias Calles (1877-1945),

an ally of personal profit. By the end of the decade, his
Obregon, became president. Calles restricted popularity had vanished, though his power had
alien ownership of Mexican land and national-
not.
ized the petroleum industry, both of which ac-
tions infuriated American businessmen and,
therefore, the American government. Calles also
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
labored to separate church and state and to
The last of the American marines left the Domin-
weaken the power of the Catholic clergy. This
ican Republic on September 18, 1924, after an
infuriated the Vatican.
occupation of more than eight years. The
Relations v/ith the United States took a turn
Dominican Republic at once celebrated the res-
for the better when the lawyer and diplomat
toration of its independence by joining the
Dwight Whitney Morrow (1873-1931) was ap-
League of Nations.
pointed Ambassador to Mexico in 1927. En-
lightened and conciliatory, he smoothed ruffled
feathers and led the way to a compromise that
satisfied both parties.
NICARAGUA
Calles In Nicaragua, as elsewhere in Central America,
suppressed rebellions that
skillfully
were fomented by the Church and reached a rightist governments were supported by the
compromise with it in 1929. United States. On May 2, 1926, liberal forces
In 1928, Obregon argued under the leadership of Augusto Cesar Sandino
that the Constitu-
tional provision that (1893-1934) rebelled against the conservative rul-
prevented a president from
ers. The United States sent in the marines on
succeeding himself did not prevent him from
being reelected after an interval during which September 23, 1926, siding with the conserva-
tives on the usual excuse of protecting American
someone else was president. He was
on reelected
property.
July 1, was assassinated two weeks
1928 but
later. Calles therefore remained the dominant
For the rest of the decade, Sandino and his
figure in Mexican politics for several more years. followers (the "Sandinistas") carried on a guer-
The Mexican painter Diego Rivera (1886-1957) rilla war against the American forces.
achieved worldwide renown in this decade, for

his murals in particular, although his leanings to
the left made him unpopular with some. HONDURAS
In Honduras, Lopez Gutierrez,
a liberal, Rafasel
revolted against the conservative government in
CUBA August 1919. The American marines arrived on
In 1925, Gerardo Machado (1871-1939) became September 11, 1919. Gutierrez became president,
President of Cuba. He was a businessman who but when a conservative rebellion surfaced
began with the strong support of the middle against him, the United States sent in more ma-
class, which wanted order. However, sugar rines, who sided with the rebels, and on March
prices (on which Cuba's economy depended) 10, 1924 Gutierrez was killed.
were going down and Machado countered that For the remainder of the decade, the American
by restricting sugar production and attempting to forces made sure the Honduran rulers were ac-
stimulate a more diversified economy by raising ceptable to American business interests.
tariffs to cut down on imports. He also instituted
a program of public works to keep Cubans em-
ployed. PANAMA
He grew more with time, to be
dictatorial The United States negotiated a treaty with Pan-
sure, and was manifestly using his position for ama in 1926 that would place Panama automati-
cally atwar with anyone with whom the United

States was at war. It would also allow American PARAGUAY AND BOLIVIA
armed forces to carry on maneuvers in Panama- Paraguay and Bolivia quarreled over the Chaco
nian territory during peacetime. Territory, a district including western Paraguay
Since this was the equivalent of making Pan- and southeastern Bolivia. There was fighting in
ama an all-but-outright colony of the United 1928, and attempts at arbitration failed.
States, there was considerable Panamanian resis-
tance to it. Panama looked to the League of Na-
tions for a decision, but of course, none was PERU AND CHILE
*
forthcoming. No one League thought for

at the Peru and Chile were still arguing over the pos-
one second that the United States would admit session of the nitrate-rich section of the coast that
the League's jurisdiction or pay any attention to had been taken from Bolivia in the War of the
its decisions. Pacific half a century earlier. Finally, on June 3,
1929, the area was divided in half, the northern
part going to Peru, the southern part to Chile, a
solution that could have been reached decades
COLOMBIA earlier, had there been an unexpected outbreak
Colombia and the United States came to an of sanity.
agreement in 1921 that finally settled the matter
of the Panama revolt that had embittered rela-
tions between the two nations for 18 years. ARGENTINA
During much of this period, Argentina was
under the liberal rule of Maximo Marcelo Torcu-
ato de Alvear (1868-1942), who continued to
VENEZUELA bring about social legislation.
Venezuela remained under the dictatorship of Bernardo Alberto Houssay (1887-1971)
Juan Vicente Gomes in this period. The discovery worked on pituitary hormones in this period,
of oil enriched the nation, or, at least, the ruling and for this work eventually received a Nobel
classes of the nation. Prize.
1930 to 1939
This section ends with 1939 because in that year faced that was not the result of either a war or a
a second disaster, even greater than that of plague.
World War I, convulsed the world. Since the first The Great Depression forced nations into ac-
steps toward that convulsion were taken by tivities they might not have engaged in if pros-
Japan, we will start there. perity had continued.
Japan, for instance, as a result of its industrial-
ization had shown a large increase in population,
JAPAN more than doubling from 30 million, when it had
The stock market crash in the United States begun to enter the modern world 70 years before,
marked the beginning of the "Great Depres- to 65 million in 1930. The land seemed too nar-
sion." It was worldwide in scope and it was, row for the people and Japan's growing depen-
perhaps, the worst catastrophe humanity ever dence on imported food and raw materials
1930 TO 1939 561
seemed to make its security precarious. The com- in Manchuria decided that only the military
ing of the Great Depression oc-
worsened the situa- cupation of Manchuria would correct
tion,and Japan felt itself to be in a serious crisis. the situa-
tion.
There were those who believed that the
only On September 18, 1931, the Japanese set off
soluhon was for Japan to expand and
gain an two bombs outside Mukden, the largest
empire whose natural and labor resources city in
could Manchuria. They then claimed that the
be exploited for Japanese benefit. The Chinese
Japanese forces had attacked them, and, the
military believed this; particularly next day, oc-
the younger cupied Mukden.
ones, who were filled with semimystical
notions This event was the crucial turning
concerning Japan s destiny and who were point from
impa- the peace hopes of the 1920s to the
tient with the civilian leadership, relentlessly
which they re- gathering war clouds of the 1930s. The
garded as cowardly, if not outright treasonous. capture of
Mukden might be said to be the first military step
seemed to the military that, over the preced-
It
in the course of events that
ing two decades, Japan had thrown was to turn, finally,
away its best into World War II.
chances. The chaos in China that had
followed The Japanese government seems to have been
the Chinese revolution seemed to have offered caught by surprise by the action of the field
Japan a chance to establish a Chinese empire. com-
manders in Manchuria, but there was no way
Japan had made a move in that direction with
the they could stop Indeed,
Twenty-One Demands, but it had then backed
it. it would have been
dangerous to try. When
Tsuyoshi Inukai (1855-
down at the Washington Conference, where it
1932), who was the Japanese Prime Minister at
was forced to give assurance of respecting
the time, did try to moderate Japan's
Chinese territorial integrity and even to policies, he
accept was assassinated by right-wing fanatics on May
inferiority in naval strength.
15, 1932. Increasingly, in the next few years, ci-
The chaos in Russia after the Russian revolu- vilian politicians had to fear
tion had offered Japan
assassination if they
chance to build a Sibe-
a got in the way of militarists.
rian empire, but that had not been carried
As for the Chinese, they didn't resist. There
through with the proper determination. The
So- was no way they could stand up to the Japanese
viet Union had now retrieved all
its territory. army, and they had to count on rescue
But what about Manchuria, the large north- by the
League of Nations. The Japanese militarists,
eastern province of China that was just
north of however, didn't fear the League of Nations,
Japanese-owned Korea? Japan had been pene-
whose weakness they had correctly estimated!
trating that ever since the Russo-Japanese war, a They continued to spread their area of control,
quarter of a century earlier, when it had driven and within half a year had all of Manchuria. They
Russia out of the province.
set up an "independent" nation
During the warlord period in China, Manchu- they called
"Manchukuo," one they controlled as absolutely
ria was under the control of
Chang Tso-lin (1873- as they controlled Korea, or Japan itself.
1928). Under him, the province was being indus- They
imported P u-yi, the last baby-Emperor of China,
trialized. Chang fought against Chiang
Kai-shek, and made him the puppet ruler of Manchukuo.
which suited the Japanese because they wanted
The response of other nations to this case of
Manchuria to break away from China and form a naked Japanese aggression was muted. The
separate government that could be Japan-domi- only
nations with the power to interfere in
nated. However, Chang was also anti-Japanese; the Far
East were Great Britain and the United
therefore, the Japanese arranged for his assassi- States,
and Great Britain was perhaps aware of
nation on June 4, 1928. the fact
that she had built her Empire as
ruthlessly as
Chang's son, Chang Hsueh-liang (b. 1898), Japan was now building its. As for the
took over in Manchuria and decided to throw in United
States, it was lost in isolation
with Chiang Kai-shek. The younger Japanese
and could (or
would) do nothing but talk.
army officers who commanded army contingents To be sure, on January 7, 1932, the American
Secretary of State, Henry Lewis Stimson (1867- It is even possible that Japan's civilian leader-
1950), who was

outraged by the Japanese aggres- ship wanted this, but the young fire-eaters of the
sion, announced that the United States would army did not. They wanted a military dictator-
not recognize any situation, treaty, or agreement ship and the outright takeover of China as
that was brought about by methods contrary to quickly as possible.
the Kellogg-Briand pact. This was called the On
February 26, 1936, a week after the victory
“Stimson Doctrine." The United States, there- of moderates in an election, the military extrem-
fore, never recognized the existence of Manchu- ist struck. Makoto Saito (1858-1936), who had
kuo. been governor-general of Korea in the 1920s and
Unfortunately, the United States had a touch- Prime Minister in the time prior to the Manchu-
ing belief in the efficacy of nonrecognition, even rian conquest, was assassinated, along with sev-
though such a policy never accomplished any- eral others. The assassins were arrested, court-
thing by itself. Nonrecognition often seemed to martialed, and sentenced to death, but they had
be effective in Latin America, but only if it were accomplished their purpose. From then on, the
accompanied by the arrival of the United States military was in control and, with time, increas-
marines, or by overwhelming economic pres- ingly so. That meant outright war with China,
sure. Since neither was used against Japan, that and outright annexations of Chinese territory
nation could afford to live with nonrecognition were planned.
very comfortably. By that time, Germany had become a strong
The League of Nations, knowing it could do Fascist power, and had formed an alliance with
nothing, did what do-nothings usually do. It set Italy. On November 25, 1936, Japan joined the
up a commission of inquiry under the Indian- alliance. To Japan, the pact meant that she would
born British diplomat, Victor Alexander George be free to act as she pleased in China, for Ger-
Robert Lytton (1876-1947). The Lytton Commis- many would support her, and the western pow-
sion produced its report in September 1932. It ers, uneasily concentrating on the nearer danger
could not avoid branding Japan as an aggressor, of Germany, would not dare engage in Far East-
but it rather cravenly tried to spread the blame ern adventures. In this, Japan's calculations
and avoid offending Japan by declaring that proved to be correct.
China had been too intransigent in opposing Therefore, Japan struck again,and an outright
Japan. Japan was not mollified by this. Its re- war between China and Japan began. The Japa-
sponse, which came on May 27, 1933, was to an- nese didn't call it war, since they wanted to avoid
nounce that it was withdrawing from the League unnecessary international complications. To
of Nations. Japan, what followed was "the China incident."
The only nation to take effective action against On July 7, 1937, Japanese troops on night ma-
Japan was China itself, which declared a boycott neuvers near Peiping (also called Peking) at-
of Japanese goods. This seriously damaged Japa- tacked Chinese forces and, of course, claimed it
nese trade, and the only response that seemed was they who were attacked. By the end of the
possible was On
January 28, 1932,
further force. month, Japan had taken the two great cities of
some 70,000 Japanese troops landed at Shanghai, Peiping and Tientsin, and continued to advance
China's greatest port. They drove out the southward. By the end of the year, virtually all
Chinese troops, and, on March 5, 1932, forced of China north of the Yellow River was in Japa-
China to end its boycott. nese hands.
With Manchukuo now Japanese territory, and This is not surprising. Japan had an army
ripe Japanese settlement and exploitation,
for equipped with all the modern weapons, a strong
Japan might have let things go and used merely navy, a strong airforce, and a strong industrial
moderate pressure to encourage China to let it- base. China had a large army, but one that was
self be guided into those paths that would suit poorly trained and poorly equipped, and it had
Japanese businessmen. no industrial base capable of making a modern
1930 TO 1939 563
army. Nor did it have a navy or an airforce. Even

In 1938, Japan had
decide what to do next.
to
so, Japan found itself being spread thin,
and fur- To the military, the only way out seemed to be to
ther found that the Chinese were beginning to widen the war. But in which direction? North-
offer stronger resistance,
ward against the Soviet Union? Southward
Japan, therefore, left the northern area as it against the colonies of the western powers?
It
was, for a while, and struck at Shanghai again on
had to be one or the other. Even the most radical
August 8, 1937, using, as their excuse, the killing fire-eater did not believe Japan could manage a
of two Japanese marines. There followed
two strike both north and south at the same time.
months of very hard fighting that forced the Jap- On July 11, 1938, the Japanese tested the So-
anese into the humiliation of having to call for
viet possibility. There was a disputed hill,
reinforcements. It took the Japanese three
Changkufeng, where the borders of Korea, Man-
months to takeShanghai and, in their fury at the chukuo, and the Soviet Union met, and there the
Chinese for defending themselves efffectively, Japanese attacked the Soviet position. The fight-
they began the indiscriminate bombing of the es-
ing continued for a solid month and the
Japanese
sentially undefended Chinese cities. This
Japa- were forced to realize that 1938 was not 1905, and
nese policy of frightfulness added to the Chinese
that they were no longer fighting an incompetent
role asunderdog and to their stalwart stand at Tsarist bureaucracy. They abandoned the north-
Shanghai, which enlisted much of the world's ern drive and, from then on, concentrated on the
public opinion on China's side and against
southern drive.
Japan,
And, as it happened, events in Europe, as the
So out of control were the Japanese forces that decade drew to its close, played into Japanese
they bombed American and British gunboats on
hands, and made things look better and better
the Yangtse River near Nanking, The American
for them, despite what had now become a
stale-
gunboat Panay was sunk on December 12, 1937 mate in China,
by repeated Japanese dive-bombings. The United In the midst of all this, a first-class phvsicist
States objected strenuously and the Japanese was working in Japan, He was Hideki Yukawa
went through the motions of an apology and (1907-1981), He tackled the problem of the
paid an indemnity. Nor did Japan fear any worse
atomic nucleus, which was now known to con-
trouble, for Germany was becoming ever more
sist of protons and neutrons. The protons
all had
dangerous and the West dared not take their eyes positive electric charges and repelled each other
off her.
strongly. The neutrons had no charge and should
The Japanese took Nanking on December 13, not affect the repulsion.
1937, and subjected it to the worst sack the world In 1955, Yukawa
postulated the existence of a
had seen in a long time. Opinion against Japan hitherto-unknown force (now called the "strong
hardened further throughout the world. interaction"), which held the nucleus together
The Japanese continued to take Chinese cities despite the repulsion of the electric charges. For
along the coast, climaxing with the occupation
it this to work, Yukawa predicted the existence of
of Canton on October 21, 1938, and of Hankow particles of intermediate mass, more massive
on October 25, than an electron, but less massive than a proton.
By that time, the Japanese had been fighting This proved correct and Yukawa eventually re-
in China for nearly a year and a half and had
ceived a Nobel Prize, the first Japanese to get
swallowed all of China it could possibly digest, one.
Japan had expected, perhaps, that China might
surrender now and accept the position of a Japa-
nese colony, but it did not do so, China was re- CHINA
ceiving arms from the Soviet Union, and China's history during this period was largely
subsidies from Great Britain and the United concerned with the Japanese invasion,
States, Chiang Kai-shek, the most powerful Nation-
alist leader in China, did not effectively counter actively anti-Japanese. He finally released
the Japanese invasion for several reasons. In the Chiang on December 25, and accompanied him
first place, he couldn't. China simply didn't have back to Nanking. In Nanking, Chang was imme-
the power to resist effectively. diately placed under house arrest and kept there,
In the second place, he may have felt that while Chiang remained relatively indifferent to
Japan could not possibly conquer and control the Japanese menace.
more than a small part of the huge country and Japan, however, made the decision for
that she would be defeated by indigestion if not Chiang, when they struck at Peiping on July 7,
by force. If he thought this, he was right. 1937. Chiang was forced to fight a war. By the
In the third place, Chiang might have felt that end of the decade, he had lost a great deal of
he must first unify China and place all of it (at Chinese territory, but had achieved a stalemate.
least all of it that was not swallowed by the Jap- On November 20, 1937, the Chinese government
anese) under his own control. After that, he moved from the soon-to-fall Nanking and trans-
could fight the Japanese more effectively. ferred itself to the far western city of Chungking,
by the way, gives Chiang the benefit
All this, where it was steadily bombed, but which the Jap-
of the doubt. Throughout his life, he seems to anese army could never reach.
have been corrupt and incompetent, and this One Chinese writer who was well-known to
may be a sufficient explanation for his failure to westerners in this decade was Lin Yutang (1895-
deal with the Japanese invasion more suitably. 1976). In 1932, he founded the first western-style
In his drive for unity, Chiang fought with par- satirical magazine in China. He lived mostly in
ticular ardor against Mao Tse-tung's Commu- the United States after 1936, and his best-known
nists. The Chinese Communists defended book was The Importance of Living, published in
themselves strongly, but they were badly out- 1937.
numbered by the Nationalists and, in their sea-
coast province of Fukien, they were particularly
exposed to possible Japanese action. ITALY
In October 1934, Mao Tse-tung and Chu Teh Italy suffered from the Great Depression, as did
led the Communist forces out of Fukien. They every nation in the world. Fascist control of Italy
marched and, on occasion, fought for 13 months, made comparatively easy for Mussolini to en-
it
traveling some 6000 miles to the province of gage in attempts to increase the food supply by
Shensi in the far northwest, where they were out draining marshes, thus reducing the necessity
of reach of the Nationalists and Japanese alike. for imports. It was also easy to subsidize indus-
They lost half their army in the course of this trial expansion, to take over control of national
"Long March," which was the longest and fast- finances, and to decree cuts in wages.
est march of an army except for some of the Mon- One rather spectacular Italian feat was carried
gol sweeps of seven centuries earlier. through by the aviator, Italo Balbo (1896-1940).
Once in their new home, the Communists of- He led a fleet of Italian planes across the Atlantic
fered peace to Chiang and a united front against to Brazil in 1929and to the United States in 1933.
the Japanese. Chiang finally agreed reluctantly, This further demonstrated the practicality of
but he did not trust the Communists and, when- transoceanic air flight. Balbo was an early Fascist
ever he could, he chose to fight them rather than who had been involved on the "March on
the Japanese. Rome," but the popularity and accalim he gained
On December 12, 1936, Chang Hsueh-liang, in this way may not have entirely pleased Mus-
who had ruled Manchuria when it was invaded solini, who removed him from the public eye by
by Japan, acutally kidnapped Chiang Kai-shek sending him to be governor-general of Libya.
when he was visiting the city of Sian. He held All that was done, however, could not entirely
him for two weeks, trying to get him to be more counter the effect of the Great Depression. When
1930 TO 1939 565
a nation finds its domestic situation to be un- Satisfied that Italy would be able to handle an
happy, there is often the temptation to turn the Ethiopian conquest, Mussolini then tried to make
people's attention to foreign affairs. sure that neither Great Britain nor France, the
had carefully made friends with sur-
Italy
two great African powers, would interfere.
rounding nations weaker than herself and had The French Minister of Foreign Affairs was
encouraged them to turn Fascist. In 1933, with- Pierre Laval (1883-1945). He saw nothing partic-
out help from Italy, Germany came under Nazi ularly wrong in one more piece of African real
rule— a particularly virulent form of Fascism. It estate coming under European sway, especially
seemed to Mussolini that the new German gov- when he wanted to keep Italy in the anti-German
ernment would be useful to Italy. camp, for Germany was beginning to seem more
On June 14, 1934, the German dictator. Hitler, and more dangerous. Therefore, he virtually
had Venice to meet with Mussolini, but
visited gave Mussolini a free hand in Ethiopia.
they did not get along. Mussolini, longer in
Great Britain was a bit more reluctant to hand
power, and therefore more self-confident, had a over Ethiopia. Anthony Eden (1897-1977), who
tendency to posture, and overshadowed Hitler, was the British Secretary of State for Foreign Af-
to the latter's great annoyance. fairs, offered Mussolini some concessions. Mus-
There was further trouble when Germany solini rejected them, for he had made up his
made an effort in July 1934 to overthrow the Aus- mind that only the complete annexation of all of
trian regime and install a new government that
Ethiopia would him. However, the tone
satisfy
would be completely subservient to Germany. of the British negotiations convinced him that
Mussolini, however, considered himself Aus- though Great Britain might not approve of the
tria's protector and particularly didn't want a dy- Ethiopian conquest, it would not go to war over
namic and ferocious Germany on Italy's northern it.
border. He played an important role in prevent- Therefore, on October3, 1935, by which time
ing Austria from succumbing to Germany. Mussolini had built up his forces in Eritrea and
Mussolini, however, had no objection to Ita- Somaliland to an adequate pitch, Italian troops
ly's own aggrandisement and, for that, he had
launched a full-scale invasion of Ethiopia. It was
his eye on Ethiopia. Italy had the colony of Eri- by no means an even fight. The Italians had artil-
trea on the Red Sea coast, northeast of Ethiopia, lery, tanks, and planes. The Ethiopians had
and Italian Somaliland on the Indian coast, spears and bare feet.
southeast of Ethiopia. These would be useful By October 7, the Italians under Emilio de
bases for an invasion of Ethiopia. Then, too, Bono (1866-1944), one of Mussolini's early sup-
some 40 years earlier, Ethiopia had humiliated porters, had taken Adowa, the site of Italy's de-
Italy by defeating it in battle. Now, it seemed
feat in the earlier war with Ethiopia. Progress
Mussolini could even the score. What is more, he slowed thereafter, however, for Ethiopia had a
had the example of the successful Japanese inva- rough and undeveloped terrain. On November
sion of Manchuria to teach him how one could therefore,
8, was put under the
the invasion
attack a weaker power by surprise and without charge of Badoglio, who had cleaned up Libya
actually declaring war, and how one might easily and who was Italy's best general.
defy the moribund League of Nations. Italian forces, thereafter, advanced steadily
On December 5, 1934, Italy tested the resis- and took Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa, on
tance that Ethiopia might offer. An Italian de- May 5, 1936. Haile Salassie fled, going into exile,
tachment attacked Ethiopian forces at Walwal, first in Kenya, then
Great Britain; and on May
in
which was well within Ethiopia. Italy claimed, of 9, Italy announced the annexation of Ethiopia
course, that the place was part of Italian Somali- and the formation of "Italian East Africa." Victor
land and that it had been the Ethiopians who had Emmanuel 111 became Emperor of Ethiopia as
attacked. well as King of Italy.
All thishad not been done without some op- (1903-1944), visited Berlin on October 25, 1936,
position. On October 7, 1935, the League of Na- and came an agreement on the matter of Aus-
to
tions had declared Italy an aggressor nation, tria. What it amounted to was that Italy obtained
something that Mussolini contemptuously ig- a promise of continued German support in ex-
nored. The League voted sanctions (i.e., an eco- change for throwing Austria to the wolves. Mus-
nomic boycott) against Italy, but it was careful to solini boasted that Berlin and Rome would be a
do so painlessly. For instance, there were no oil new axis about which the Earth would revolve
sanctions and oil was one commodity that Italy and, thereafter, Germany and Italy (and later
had to have for the day-to-day conduct of the Japan as well) were called the "Axis powers."
invasion. Nor was the Suez Canal closed to Ital- Another untoward result of the Ethiopian
ian vessels, so supplies could reach the Italian campaign was that Mussolini came to the false
armies without trouble. In short, the League, conclusion that Italy's victory over a feeble, to-
under British and French control, went through tally unequipped foe meant that Italy had be-
the motions of opposing Italy, but was not seri- come a great military power.
ous about it. Consequently, when, in 1936, a furious civil
In fact, Laval in France, and Samuel John Gur- war began in Spain, with Fascist rebels fighting
ney Hoare (1880-1959), the British Foreign Min- the legal leftist government, Italy instantly
ister, attempted to reach a compromise plunged in to help the rebels. Mussolini was in-
agreement soon after the League's action on tent on turning the Mediterranean Sea, as far as
sanction, by which Ethiopia was to be cut up and possible, into a Fascist lake, to form a new kind
a major portion was to be given to Italy. How- of Roman Empire.
ever, public opinion flared up against so naked a The expense of that adventure further strained
display of imperial cynicism and the plan had to the Italian economy. Even worse than that, the
be dropped. were now not fighting barefooted Ethio-
Italians
Nevertheless, the conservative rulers of Great pians, but well-equipped Spaniards who,
Britian continued to be rather sympathetic to the throughout their history, have been notably
Fascists, viewing them as an anti-Communist combat. In March of 1937, the Italians
fierce in
bulwark. For this reason, they were ready to were badly defeated at Guadelajara and Bri-
compromise and let the aggressive Fascist pow- huega, and after that their actual contribution to
ers have at least some of what they demanded, the fighting was negligible. The illusion of power
particularly if they could be turned eastward. In they had gained in Ethiopia dissipated like dew
this way, hunger would be "appeased" and
their in the hot sun.
they would become respectable members of the The military disasters in Spain inevitably tied
family of nations. The policy turned out to be Italy even closer to Germany, and Mussolini
utterly wrong-headed. began to appear very much as Hitler's junior
With the annexation of Ethiopia and the suc- partner. It became necessary for Italy to curry
cessful defiance of the League and the western favor with the Germans in many ways. Since
powers, Mussolini reached the peak of his suc- Germany, like Japan, had withdrawn from the
cess. It was an unfortunate peak in a way, for League of Nations, Italy did so also on December
Italy had strained its financial resources even in 11, 1937. During 1938, Italy also began to adopt
a war against so small an opponent. Having be- the anti-Semitic policies that formed so promi-
come estranged from Great Britain and France, it nent a part of the Nazi ideology. (Little of Ger-
had to look for other friends and allies, and Mus- man demonism, however, could be grafted onto
solini's glance fell on Germany, which, now the easy-going, civilized Italians.)
under Fascist rule itself, had supported him in In an effort to mask his new role as Hitler's
Ethiopia. lackey, Mussolini raised the level of his bombast.
The Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs (who He talked about increasing Italian armaments
was also Mussolini's son-in-law), Galeazzo Ciano and expanding the Italian navy. He had crowds
1930 TO 1939 567
yelling for Nice, and Tunisia (all of

Corsica, ment produced that did not exist in nature in
which were French possessions). However, the
appreciable amounts. was named "techne-
It
west had its eyes fixed on Germany and, after
tium" from the Greek word for "artificial."
the Spanish adventure, no one feared Italian mil- Segre, who was Jewish, also emigrated to the
itary might.
United States in 1938.
Indeed, Mussolini found himself increasingly
certain that Italy was not prepared to fight
a
major war and he did his best to put a brake on PAPACY
Germany's mad rush toward conflict. Under Pius XI, the Catholic Church continued to
However, Hitler's successes in 1938, and the fight strongly against socialism and communism,
European territories he was able to absorb, since leftists regimes
were usually anticlerical. In
roused Mussolini's envy. He felt he had to show
general, the Pope called for economic and social
successful expansionism, too, and the one direc-
reforms, but the only governments willing to
tion in which that could be taken in Europe
in bring these about were leftist regimes in places
reasonable safety was in Albania. like Mexico and Spain. The Pope's words
were
Albania was, in any case, virtually an Italian
disregarded by those regimes that supported
protectorate so not much was required. On April him.
7, 1939 (Good Friday), Italian ships bombarded
In Spain, the Pope thorougly supported the
the Albanian coastline, and armed forces landed Spanish Fascist rebels, for instance, who would
and took over the nation. King Zog and his preg- certainly bring about no reforms. The Church
nant wife fled to Greece and, on April 12, Victor also came to an agreement with the German
Emmanuel III of Italy became King of Albania as
well. was anything but a heroic victory, and
It
—
Nazis on July 20, 1933 and whatever the
Church's views on the fanatical anti-Semitism of
the smallness of the enemy, the choice of the
the Nazis, they never managed to speak out
day, and even the pregnancy of the Albanian
loudly enough to exert any effect upon it.
queen, combined to cast Mussolini in an un- On February Pius XI died, and, on
10, 1939,
lovely light.
March 2, Eugenio Pacelli (1876-1958), who had
Mussolini had, in fact, reached the point been the architect of the agreement with the
where, on May 22, 1939, he formed a close mili- Nazis, became Pope, reigning as Pius XII.
tary alliance with Germany; and from that point
on, he could no longer call his soul his own.
A
top-ranking scientist of the period was En- ETHIOPIA
rico Fermi (1901-1954), who in 1934 bombarded
Haile Selassie I, as Emperor of Ethiopia, granted
uranium with neutrons in an attempt to form ele- the nation a constitution on July 16, 1931, one
ment #93, which does not exist in appreciable which introduced some western notions. Though
quantities in nature. he reserved the real power for himself, he intro-
The were confusing, but the Fascist
results duced some of the forms of parliamentary gov-
government, to Fermi's annoyance, announced ernment and engaged in an attempt to
success prematurely in a burst of vainglory. And modernize the country.
indeed, the research was sufficiently significant It all went for nothing, however,
for Italian
for Fermi to be awarded a Nobel Prize in 1938. forces invaded the country in 1935, occupied
it,
Fermi was anti-Fascist and had a Jewish wife, so and drove Haile Selassie into exile. On June
30,
after he got to Stockholm to collect his prize, he
1936, he spoke with sad dignity before the
left for the United States, remaining there the
League of Nations, calling on the powers to take
rest of his life. action against Italy
and warning them of God's
Emilo Segre (1905-1989), a student of Fermi's, judgment against them if they failed to act. The
bombarded the element molybdenum with neu- powers listened stonily and failed to act. They
tons and produced element #43 —
the first ele- must, apparently, have decided to await God's
judgment. As it happened, they had not long to Those who found the disorder distasteful or
wait. dangerous were veering to the right where
forces, including the army and the Church, were
waiting grimly.
ALBANIA On July 18, 1936, military garrisons in Spanish
Morocco and in a number of Spanish cities rose
Italy was in virtual control of Albania during this
in revolt. In Madrid, the Republic held firm,
period. King Zog tried to limit that control, but
however, and the different leftist factions joined
not successfully, for Mussolini did not hesitate to
to meet the common enemy. In Catalonia and in
use the Italian fleet to terrorize the nation. Zog
the Basque region, it was perfectly well under-
was unpopular with the Albanians them-
also
stood that if the rebels won, all hopes for auton-
selves for his dictatorial rule. Italy had no trou-
omy would disappear. Therefore, they clung to
ble, therefore, in invading and occupying the
the Republic.
country on April 7, 1939.
The under the leadership of Francisco
rebels,
Franco (1892-1975), coming in from the Canary
Islands, and Emilio Mola (1887-1937) in northern
SPAIN Spain, drove for Madrid. Mola said there were
After the resignation and death of Primo de Ri- four columns advancing on the capital and a
vera, King Alfonso proclaimed a restoration
XIII "'fifth column" of rebel sympathizers inside the
of the parliamentary government. However, his capital. From this remark, "fifth column" became
close alliance with the dictator had completely a phrase used for traitors who bored from within
destroyed his popularity in the country. Munici- on behalf of an external enemy.
pal elections on April 12, 1931 resulted in a vast Beginning in November 1936, the rebels laid
victory for the Republicans. On April 14, Alfonso siege to Madrid, but after four months of contin-
Spain and the Bourbon dynasty came to
XIII left uous fighting, they failed to take it and matters
an end, for a time at least. No descendants of settled down to a long, bloody war.
Hugh Capet ruledanywhere in the world for the Other nations joined in at once. Italy sent
first time since Hugh had become king of France troops and equipment and Germany sent air-
nine and a half centuries earlier. planes. The Soviet Union supported the Spanish
This was not a happy ending for Spain, how- government ("Loyalists"), but they were farther
ever. The new Spanish Republic faced insupera- away and their aid was considerably less effec-
ble problems. They established separation of tive. Nevertheless, those who sympathized with
church and state, granted religious liberty, na- the rebels made much of Soviet aid and did their
tionalized church property, and dissolved the Je- best to stigmatize the Loyalists as communists.
suit order. All this placed the power of the The result was that Great Britain took up the
Church unalterably against the Republic. attitude of "a plague on both your houses" and,
In addition, the Catalonian demands for au- followed by France, it took up a dim-witted pol-
tonomy sharpened and, on September 25, 1932, icy of refusing to help the Loyalists,even though
Catalonia became all but independent. the rebels were receiving massive help from the
Naturally, this increased the demands for Fascist powers. Even the United States found it-
autonomy in the Basque regions of northern self forced by its own policy of isolation (and by
Spain. its conservative factions) to help the rebels by
To make things worse, there were several va- failing to help the Loyalists.
rieties of leftists in Spain, not only socialists and Once again, then, as in Ethiopia, the Fascists
communists, but anarchists and syndicalists, were winning not so much through their own
many of whom found the Republic to be mvoing strength, as through the stupidity and timidity of
too slowly. Their demands and strikes reduced their opponents.
Spain to utter disorder. In March 1937, Italian forces in Spain were
1930 TO 1939 569
smashed by the Loyalists and, from that moment

on, Mussolini's dreams of military glory began to GERMANY
wither. On April 25, 1937, however, Germany The Great Depression struck Germany hard. Dis-
had its airplane pilots deliberately bomb the satisfaction with unemployment and with in-
Basque town of Guernica to no tactical advan- creasingly difficult times led to the strengthening
tage, but merely to give the pilots practice.
of the parties at the extremes, particularly of Hit-
Little by little, the rebels advanced, with the
ler s Nazis, who found it particularly easy to
Loyalists falling back only after ferocious fight-
blame everything on the Jews and on the Ver-
ing. On March 28, 1939, Madrid surrendered.
sailles Treaty.
The civil war lasted nearly three years and killed In 1928, there had been 12 Nazis in the Reichs-
750,000 people. Since Madrid withstood months tag. In 1930,
with the Depression on, there were
and years of bombardment and bombing, it could 107. The Nazi vote had climbed from 800,000
to
be seen that cities, held by resolute forces, made 6.5 million. By 1932, they had 230 seats.
enormously tenacious fortresses. That lesson Meanwhile, on March 21, 1931, a suggestion
was not learned very well, however, not even, at of a German-Austrian customs union had
crucial times, by the Germans, who are ordinar-
arisen. This would have improved the economies
ilyquick to learn important military lessons. of both countries. France, however, objected
As a result of the war, Spain was set up as one strenuously and the project was given up. The
more Fascist power, with Franco as dictator. lack of such a union weakened the economy of
France now found itself surrounded by three Fas- Austria and, on May II, 1931, the Austrian
cist —
powers Germany to the east, Italy to the Credit- Anstalt, a great banking firm, failed when
southeast, and Spain to the southwest —
each one France refused to lend it support. The economy
a firm enemy. Napoleon III could not have bum-
of all of central Europe virtually collapsed. By
bled more foolishly than the French leadership of
1932, there were 6 million unemployed in Ger-
this period.
many.
In 1937, Pablo Picasso painted what some con- It was impossible in this period for
the mod-
sider his most powerful work. It was entitled erate parties to have a reliable majority in the
Guernica, and was a heart-breaking depiction of Reichstag, and President Hindenburg had to rule
the senseless cruelty of war. Salvador Dali (1904- by decree. Hindenburg could do this only be-
1989) became famous in this decade for his sur- cause of his unparalleled prestige, but he was 85
realist paintings. His most famous one. Persis- years old in 1932. What would happen when he
tence of Memory, painted in 1931, showed the died? The German Chancellor, Heinrich Bruen-
limp, hanging watches that were forever after- ing (1885-1970), would be helpless without him.
ward associated with his name. On March 13, 1932, Hindenburg ran for re-
election, with Hitler
running against him. Hin-
denburg was reelected, but by a rather small
PORTUGAL margin. It was clear that Hitler could not
be ig-
On July 5, 1932, Salazar became Premier of Por- nored for much longer. Bruening resigned on
tugal and, in essence, its Fascist dictator. He May 30, when Hindenburg refused to decree a
modeled himself on Mussolini and established a land-reform measure that Bruening urged on
one-party government. him.
When the Spanish civil war broke out, Portu- Franz von Papen (1879-1969) was asked to be
gal ranged itself on the rebel side at once, and it Chancellor on May 31, however, after a few
was through Portugal that a great deal of the sup- months, it was clear he could not run the govern-
plies from Germany reached the rebels. ment. Kurt von Schleicher (1882-1934) followed
Once Franco had won his victory, Portugal and he couldn't run the government, either.
signed an alliance with Spain, but retained its There seemed to be no choice blit to ask Adolf
traditional alliance with Great Britain also. Hitler to assume the Chancellorship. This he did
on January 30, 1933, and at once he began a reign the German airforce during World War I, was
of terror. head of the German airforce now. He was a man
an election campaign carried
In the course of of ultimate greed and vanity, who affected hearty
out with extreme oratorical violence, the Nazis good fellowship.
arranged to have the Reichstag burned on Feb- Paul Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945), cleverest of
ruary 27, 1933, and, of course, blamed it on the the bunch, placed his intelligence entirely at the
communists. The now-senile Hindenburg agreed service of evil and was the head of the propa-
to a decree that suspended all civil liberties and ganda ministry. Heinrich Himmler (1900-1945)
the Nazi stormtroopers took over control of the was chief of the secret police. Martin Ludwig
streets. The Nazis, even at this extreme, got less Bormann (1900-1945) was Hitler's secretary and
than a majority of the vote, but that didn't mat- his evil genius (something that, in Hitler's case,
ter. On March 23, 1933, the Reichstag granted was surely totally superfluous). Bormann
powers, and with that Germany
Hitler dictatorial worked behind the scenes and remained almost
became Nazi, an unbelievably extreme form of unknown to the rest of the world.
Fascism. Nazi ideology invaded everything — business,
Germany was now; the first
the "Third Reich" finance, the judicial system, religion. Labor
having been the Holy Roman Empire and the unions were smashed, the separate federal re-
second having been Bismarck's German Empire. gions bound into a tight, centralized govern-
Hitler assumed the title of "Der Fuehrer" (The ment. All opposition was stamped out.
Leader) in imitation of Mussolini's "II Duce," Concentration camps were set up where anyone
which meant the same, as did Franco's later title, who was not a completely pure follower might
"El Caudillo." The greeting, "Heil Hitler," be- be imprisoned and tortured to death. Women
came commonplace and, indeed, virtually com- were ordered to have babies and to remain in the
pulsory. Germany descended into a nightmare kitchen. A foolish kind of Teutonic paganism,
world of paranoia and legalized brutality. straight out of Wagner's operas, was encour-
The nightmare fell heaviest on the Jews, who aged. Most of all, the nation was subjected to the
were subject to systematic harassment, theft, vi- unending drumming of militarism, parades, uni-
olence, imprisonment, torture, and death. On forms, and organized celebrations that dulled the
September 15, 1935, the Nazis established the mind and turned people into robots.
Nuremburg laws that deprived Jews of their citi- Nazi Germany turned on the rest of the world
zenship and denied them all human rights. In with a snarl. It intended to achieve economic self-
November 1938, after a German diplomat in Paris sufficiency, to trade with weaker powers only on
had been assassinated by a Jew, the Nazis began its own terms, and to abandon altogether any
the "Holocaust," a systematic program of killing quest for peace. A disarmament conference was
off the Jews, first in Germany, then in Europe, being held in Europe, and from this Germany
with the final intention, one must suppose, of withdrew on October 14, 1933, announcing at the
killing them off throughout the world. same time that it was withdrawing from the
Nor was the rest of the world quick to protest League of Nations.
this treatment of the Jews. After all, the oppres- As time went on, Germany denounced the
sion and persecution of Jews was nothing new. disarmament clauses of the Versailles Treaty on
It had been going on for 2000 years, so the Gen- March 16, 1935, but it had been rearming at top
tile world found it easy to be philosophical about speed before that. By the middle 1930s, Germany
it. was becoming an armed camp, and was well on
Around group of the
Hitler there gathered a the path toward becoming the strongest military
most terrifying villains who ever assumed com- power in Europe. Great Britain and France
plete power over a nation. Their names were looked the other way. They preferred to believe
soon to be famous throughout the world. Her- that Germany was building itself up as a power-
mann Goering (1893-1946), who had served in ful barrier against the Soviet Union. They were
1930 TO 1939 571
rather grateful to Germany for preparing a mili-

yet strong enough to brave Italian opposition, so
tary solution to the communist problem that the
he fell back, but it meant only a delay.
West was unwilling to undertake itself. On August 2, 1934, President Hindenburg fi-
Hitler did not intend to tolerate opposition to
nally died at the age of 87, and he no longer
himself from within the Nazi party, either. There
existed as a possible counterbalance to Hitler.
was a group within it that took the "socialist" Later in the month. Hitler assumed the presi-
portion of National Socialist" far too seriously. dency himself, though he retained the title of
These were led by Gregor Strasser (1892-1934) "Der Fuehrer." In the fashion of Napoleon III, he
who had, for a time, been the number-two man ran plebiscites at every major advance in power,
of the Nazi party, but who had fallen out with
and the entire machinery of the state was bent
Hitler in 1932. Another leader was Ernst Rohm toward making everyone vote, and vote for Hit-
(1887-1934), a vicious bully who led the storm ler. It had its success. People who would
have
troopers. Hitler had made the same discovery liked to resist lost heart in the face of enormous
that Mussolini and Chiang Kai-shek had made majorities who were apparently in favor of Hit-
that it was financially profitable to be on the side
ler. Foreign nations were also impressed.
of big business. Therefore, he had to get rid of
A plebiscite of this sort was held in the Saar
the troublesome antibusiness ideologues. Basin on January 13, 1935. The basin had been
On June 30, 1934, Hitler conjured up an imag- placed under League of Nations control in 1920
inary conspiracy against himself and struck. In and its coal mines had been used by France. Pro-
the course of the night, Rohm, Strasser, and doz-
visionhad been made for a plebiscite in 15 years
ens of others were seized and killed without trial. and now it came. The populace could vote for
Some, completely confused, thought it was a union with Germany, union with France, or con-
coup against Hitler, and went down crying out tinued administration by the League. The Saar
their "Heil Hitler."
was German-speaking and 90% of the voters ^
Hitler seized the opportunity to settle scores plumped for union with Germany. On March 1,
with others who had opposed him in earlier 1935, it became part of Germany, and this was
years or against whom he had a grudge. Thus, the first successful bit ofGerman expansion
Gustav von Kahr (1862-1934), a Bavarian politi- under The matter
Hitler. was dismissed by the
cian who had squelched the 1923 Beer Hall western nations. After all, the Saar had been Ger-
putsch, was shot. Kurt von Schleicher (1882- man to begin with.
1934), who had been the last Chancellor before In fa\:t. Great Britain was sufficiently undis-
Hitler and who had delayed HitleKs rise to turbed to make a deal with the Nazis on June 18,
power, was shot, and so on. 1935, one in which Germany agreed to keep its
After this "Blood Purge," as it was called. Hit- navy at no more than 35% of the British tonnage.
ler felt the internal situation in Germany to be It must have seemed to Great Britain that
as long
stableenough to allow a bit of foreign
adventure. as its navy was dominant in the Atlantic, nothing
The logical first prey, across the border, was Germany could do on the continent was impor-
to the south in Austria, where local Nazis were tant. William II couldn't win against the British
becoming ever more powerful. The Austrian navy, so how could Hitler?
chancellor, Engelbert Dollfuss (1892-1934), was a was dangerous
It World War I in this
to relive
close friend of Mussolini's and was himself a Fas- way, however. Airplanes had developed might-
cist who had up a one-party state in the land.
set ily, and an airforce might destroy a navy
or leap-
What the Nazis wanted was not just Fascism, frog it; and Germany was busily building an
however, but union with Germany. They at- airforce that would far outstrip those of Great
tempted a putsch on July 25, 1934; in the fracas, Britain and France. Great Britain did not bother
Dollfuss was shot and was allowed to bleed to to allow for this in its calculations.
death. The intervention of Mussolini, however, The Ethiopian was made to order for
crisis
saved Austria from annexation. Hitler was not Hitler. While Great Britain and France were
deeply involved with the Italian aggression, Ger- of War Wilhelm Keitel (1882-1946)
himself, with
many seized the opportunity, on March 7, 1936, as his chief aide. Walther von Brauchitsch (1881-
to denounce the Locarno pacts. It also sent its 1948) bcame Commander-in-Chief of the Army.
army into the Rhineland (that portion of Ger- Hitler rightly judged that neither of these men
many west of the Rhine River), which had been would ever have the nerve to disagree with him.
disarmed under the terms of the Versailles The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Konstantin
Treaty. von Neurath (1873-1956), a career diplomat, was
France was disturbed by brought
this, for it discharged and replaced by Joachim von Ribben-
the German army to the French border. Great trop (1893-1946) who. Hitler, knew, could be re-
Britain, however, was not concerned since it had lied on to do exactly as he was told.
its naval treaty, and France would not act with- Now Hitler was ready for the major tasks.
out Great Britain. Again, he was going to make an attempt to seize
Hitler got away with it. The German generals Austria. Hitler was much stronger than he had
had not wished reoccupy the Rhineland for
to been four years before and Mussolini was far
fear of a violent French reaction, but Hitler had weaker. In fact. Hitler knew that Mussolini
been certain that the western powers would not would not interfere with the Anschluss. It was
react. When, in fact, they did not, it gave Hitler simply a matter of bullying Austria and gambling
the definite feeling that he knew better than the that Great Britain and France would not inter-
generals. What's more, it gave the generals the vene.
uneasy feeling that perhaps Hitler did know bet- The Austrian Nazis followed orders and
local
ter. From this point on, the German military made demands and demonstrations. The Aus-
proved to be less and less of a restraining influ- trian Chancellor was called to Berlin and was
ence on Hitler. howled at by Hitler. Finally, on March 12, 1938,
The fact that Hitler had sided with Mussolini German forces marched into Austria. Austria did
in the Ethiopian crisis and that Mussolini needed not The population greeted the German
resist.
help, thanks to the financial strain of the Ethio- army and Hitler (who had been born in Austria)
pian conquest, led to a German-Italian alliance with wild enthusiasm, and it was now the turn
on October 21, 1936, and the establishment of the of the Austrian Jews to be subjected to the vilest
Rome-Berlin “Axis." treatment. Great Britain and France repeated
By that time, the Spanish Civil War had doing nothing.
their well-practiced specialty of
begun. This offered the western powers another Hitler had now gone beyond Bismarck and
chance to display their pusillanimity and lack of had added 6 million German-speaking people to
foresight. They did not miss the chance to do a Germany that was considerably stronger than
this. it had been under William II.
Italian troops did very poorly in Spain, while But he was not through. There were 3 million
the German airforce did very well. As the Span- German-speaking people living along the outer
ish Civil War continued, therefore, Italy grew rim of Czechoslovakia (the “Sudeten" area), ad-
steadily weaker and Germany steadily stronger, joining the German and Austrian frontier. Flitler
so that Mussolini was quickly being demoted to wanted them, The Sudeten Germans had
too.
the position of Hitler's puppet. developed a Nazi party of their own, complete
In early 1938, Hitler was ready to bring even with all the foul miasma of Hitler's ideology, and
the military and the foreign office under strict they began provoking incidents and blaming
Nazi control. The Minister of War, Werner Ed- them on the Czechs.
uard Fritz von Blomberg (1878-1946), and the Czechoslovakia, however, was not Austria. It
Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Werner von was democratic, had strong fortifications, and a
Fritsch (1880-1939), were accused of scandals sturdy army, and it wanted to fight.
and were removed. Hitler took over the Ministry Great Britain, however, kept aiming at ap-
1930 TO 1939 573
peasement, kept trying to give Germany enough Therefore, on March 15, 1939, he coolly ab-
non-British territory to keep it quiet, in the pa- sorbed the western half of what remained of "in-
thetic hope that Hitler could be made to behave dependent" Czechoslovakia, converting it into
himself. the "Protectorate of Bohemia-Moravia."
On July 26, 1938, the British sent one of their Hitler then went on, on March 21, to demand,
civil servants, Walter Runciman (1870-1949) to and to get, the city of Memel from Lithuania, a
Czechoslovakia, to see how much he could per- that
city had rather unrighteously
Lithuania
suade the Czechs to give up to Hitler. No com- taken from Germany some two decades earlier.
promise was possible, however. Hitler wanted This was followed by the now-familiar Hitlerian
his terms and would not yield an inch. paroxysm of attacks and demands, this time
The British Prime Minister, Arthur Neville against Poland. Hitler wanted the city of Danzig.
Chamberlain (1869-1940), went three times to He also wanted the right of passage across the
Germany and, for a while, it seemed he might "Polish corridor" that separated the bulk of Ger-
resist, but he didn't. He caved in. On September many from East Prussia.
29, 1938, Chamberlain, Hitler, Mussolini, and the Here, however. Hitler had made his first
French premier, Edouard Daladier (1884-1970), major mistake. He had taken western Czechoslo-
came to an agreement, without Czechoslovakia vakia. Except for that, all the lands he had taken
even being present to protest. over — the Ruhr, the Rhineland, Austria, the Su-
The surrender at Munich gave Germany the deten region, Memel— were inhabited by Ger-
entire Czech border area, containing 3.5 million mans. The city of Danzig was also inhabited by
people, of whom 700,000 were Czechs. All of Germans and, in fact, it had been under the con-
Czechoslovakia's fortifications were abandoned Nazis for almost as long as Ger-
trol of its local
and what was left was completely defenseless. It many itself. If Hitler had asked for it without
could continue to exist only as a German puppet. having taken western Czechoslovakia, he might
It was a despicable betrayal of a democratic have gotten it, and one more surrender might
country, and Great and France had
Britain have left the west truly helpless to resist.
reached new depths of disgrace. Chamberlain re- However, his taking of western Czechoslova-
turned to Great Britain, waving the piece of kia had meant the permanent end of British ap-
paper that represented the British craven surren- peasement of Hitler. Even the cold blood of
der and claiming that he had brought "peace British officialdomwas heated at this example of
with honor." Actually, he had brought neither. the utter contempt in which Hitler held all agree-
The British and French people, saved from war ments and his total lack of concern for British
at the moment, rejoiced at the surrender. self-respect. He had forced Great Britain to sur-
Inside Germany, Hitler had won again by bet- render at Munich, and then he couldn't even
tingon the pusillanimity of the west against the bring himself to stick to the terms of the surren-
prudent caution of his own generals. He now felt der for as long as six months.
that nothing could stop him and he wanted a And Hitler had done what? Czechoslo-
this for
war. He wanted a Bismarckian type of war, a vakia was a helpless German puppet now any-
quick victory with all expenses paid by the de- way. What had Hitler gained by taking it? One
feated power. He began planning for one. can only suppose that he didn't want any more
He no longer felt it necessary to soothe the bloodless victories. He wanted a quick, easy war,
feelings of the west. Since he was intent on war, and he meant to have it.
it didn't matter how he offended them. He was The British and French, unable to appease any
quite certain that their general paralysis of will longer, guaranteed the integrity of Poland on
would force them to give in at every point, or, March 31, 1939. On April 28, Hitler retaliated by
even they fought, their general reluctance to do
if denouncing the British-German naval treaty of
so would cast them down in quick defeat. 1935. It had served its purpose of keeping Great
Britain quiet and he had never intended to ob- under the cruel grip of a
culture declined sharply
serve it anyway. monstrous government. Many Germans (by no
The having guaranteed Poland, could
British, means Jews only) fled a land in which it was
not make that guarantee effective by direct ac- difficult and unsafe for any self-respecting
tion, and Germany knew that well. Poland was human being to remain. Nevertheless, there
on the other side of Germany and by the time were some flickers.
Great Britain could reach it, it would be de- Otto Hahncontinued to work with the neu-
stroyed. The only way of solving that problem tron bombardment of uranium that Fermi had
was to get the Soviet Union to help out, so Great begun. By 1938, he was convinced that the ura-
Britain set about obtaining a Soviet alliance. nium nucleus was being split in two. He did not
There were three problems here. First, Poland quite have the nerve to state this openly, since it
did not want Soviet help since it feared the Sovi- was so revolutionary a notion, but the idea
ets as much as it feared the Germans. Second, spread and led to nuclear weapons (and to
the British government disliked the Soviets in- Hahn's feelings that he ought to kill himself in
tensely, too, and were not in the mood to force remorse). He eventually received a Nobel Prize
Poland to accept Soviet help. Therefore, they for his work.
Union with the utmost reserve,
treated the Soviet Gerhard Domagk (1895-1964) discovered the
hoping it would decide to help on its own and antibacterial properties of a compound called
without much in the way of commitments from "Prontosil." This discovery in 1935 led to a whole
the west. family of "sulfa drugs" that were a new and po-
The problem was that the Soviet Union
third tent weapon against infection. In 1939, Domagk
knew very well that Great Britain had spent five received a Nobel Prize for this but was not al-
years mollifying Hitler in the hope that he would lowed to accept it. The 1935 Nobel Prize for Peace
turn against the Soviet Union. They felt certain had gone to Carl von Ossietsky (1889-1938), a
that Great Britainwould not hesitate to entangle German pacifist who was in a Nazi concentration
the Soviet Union in war with Germany and then camp. Hitler, offended by this, decided that no
step to one side. They did not fail to remember German scientists would thereafter be allowed to
how little help they had obtained from the west accept a Nobel Prize. (Domagk eventually got his
in World War I. prize once Hitler no longer existed to stop him.)
The Soviet Union, therefore, hedged its bets Otto Heinrich Waburg (1883-1970) worked on
by dealing with Germany also. Hitler found this enzymes involved in respiration during this pe-
useful, since he was perfectly willing to keep riod. He was the unusual case of a Jewish scien-
hands off the Soviet Union at the moment and tist who was allowed to continue working under
let it wait its turn. A

German-Soviet nonaggres- the Nazis because he was trying to find ways of
sion pact was signed in Moscow on August 23, curing cancer, and Hitler had a deadly fear of
1939. This stunned the world, and loud were the that disease. (As it happened, Warburg never
outcries against Soviet double-dealing. It is very found a cure and Hitler never developed the dis-
easy to argue, however, that if Great Britain had ease.)
treated with the Soviet Union honestly, the pact Thomas Mann left Germany in 1933 and even-
with Germany would not have been signed. Hit- tually came to the United States in 1938. During
ler and were both unprincipled, but the
Stalin this period, he published a trilogy dealing with a
British leaders had been abysmally shortsighted fictionalized version of the Biblical story of Jo-
and had played their cards stupidly. seph. This appeared between 1933 and 1936.
With the Soviet Union neutralized, Germany Rudolf Ditzen (1893-1947), writing under the
was ready. On September 1, 1939, German forces penname of Hans Fallada, published Little Man,
took Danzig and invaded Poland and Hitler had What Nozv? in 1932, and continued to write under
the war he wanted. World War 11 began. the Nazis.
In the Nazi era, science and other aspects of The Austrian-born Martin Buber (1878-1965)
1930 TO 1939 575
was the most influential Jewish scholar and phi- might have taken over Austria then and there,
losopher in Germany when Hitler came to but Mussolini sent army units to the Austrian
power. In 1938, he managed to get away and to frontier. Yugoslavia also reacted strongly,
emigrate to Palestine.
and
Hitlerbacked off. Austria temporarily retained its
independence.
AUSTRIA Dollfuss was replaced as Chancellor

by Kurt
von Schuschnigg (1897-1977), who continued
During this period, Wilhelm Miklas (1872-1956) Dollfuss's policy of slavish dependence on Mus-
was President of Austria. He was a figurehead solini. By 1937, however, Italy was itself
growing
who kept himself virtually invisible. more and more dependent on Germany. On
Fearing Germany to the north, Austria signed April 22, 1937, when Schuschnigg visited Mus-
a treaty of friendship on February
6, 1930, with solini in Venice, Mussolini broke the news
to him
Italy. Mussolini's price for keeping
Austria safe that Italy could not be counted upon to save
Aus-
was have the nation turn Fascist. This became
to
tria a second time and advised him
to compro-
easier as the Great Depression tightened its grip,
mise with the Nazis.
with the failure of Vienna's huge bank, the Schuschnigg resisted that, but on February 12,
Credit- Anstalt, on May 11, 1931. 1938, he was forced to visit Hitler at Berchtesga-
The man who could best serve Mussolini's den in theBavarian Alps (Hitler's vacation re-
purposes was Engelbert Dollfuss (1892-1934), treat), and there he was subjected to Hitlerian
who became Chancellor of Austria on May 20, rant.Schuschnigg tried to offer compromises,
1932. Barely five feet tall, he somehow symbol-
but no compromises would satisfy Hitler, who
ized the shrunken postwar Austria. His policy
wanted complete surrender.
consisted of cowering before Mussolini. Back in Austria, Schuschnigg tried to deal
With Hitler in power in Germany, Dollfuss with the remnants of the Social Democrats, but
faced increasing pressure from Austrian Nazis, they would have nothing to do with him. He
egged on by Germany. Dollfuss tried to fight tried to arrange a plebiscite, but Hitler would not
them by suspending parliamentary government, allow that. Nazi uprisings and disorders grew in
outlawing the Nazi party, and moving in the di- intensity and, on March 12, 1938, the German
rection of a one-party rule under his own party, army marched in.
which imitated Italian Fascism rather than Ger- President Miklas resigned; Chancellor Schu-
man Nazism. schnigg was imprisoned. The new ruler of Aus-
Dollfuss might have made common cause tria (under Hitler) was Arthur Seyss-Inquart
with the Social Democrats who were very strong (1892-1946), an Austrian Nazi who oversaw the
in Vienna and who were fiercely anti-Nazi, but
complete conversion of Austria to Nazism. In a
he didn't. Like all those who might have stood plebiscite held on April 10, 99.75% voted in favor
against Hitler in this fateful period, he persis- of union (the wonder is that anyone dared vote
tently chose the wrong course of action. Dollfuss against it) and Austria, for a time,
disappeared
decided to force the Social Democrats into line from the map of Europe.
and, from February 11-15, 1934, he actually bom- An outstanding Austrian scientist of the pe-
barded their strongholds in various Vienna dis- riod was Lise Meitner (1878-1968), who
worked
tricts. The Social Democrats were wiped out as a with Otto Hahn on the neutron bombardment of
political force, and Dollfuss established a Fascist uranium. She managed, for a time, to avoid the
state. anti-Semitism of the Nazis (for although she was
This did not keep Dollfuss safe, for without a a Jew, she was an Austrian national).
In 1938,
Social Democratic opposition to them, the Aus- however, with the German annexation of Aus-
trianNazis grew ever bolder. They staged a coup tria, she had to flee to Sweden.
There she pon-
on July 25, 1934. They took over the Chancellory, dered over the results of the work she and Hahn
shot Dollfuss, and let him bleed to death. They had done, and she, too, decided that the ura-
nium was being cloven in two and that "fission" Austria been absorbed when the German propa-
was taking place. Unlike Hahn, she did not keep ganda machine began drumbeat against
a steady
her conclusion to herself and the news reached Czechoslovakia. After a summer in which Hitler
the United States — with awesome consequences. raised and lowered tensions to suit himself, he
Richard Kuhn(1900-1967) isolated Vitamin beat the feeble Chamberlain of Great Britain into
\
and for this and other work, he was awarded a total surrender. Czechoslovakia was abandoned
Nobel Prize in 1938. By that time, however, Aus- and dismembered. Benes went into exile on Oc-
tria had been taken over and Kuhn could not, by tober 5, 1938.
Hitler's orders, accept the Prize, though he later The Sudeten areas went to Germany, while
did when Hitler was no longer able to prevent it. the southern sections of Slovakia (the eastern
Franz Werfel (1890-1945), who had been born portion of the nation) were absorbed by Hun-
in Prague when it was part of Austria-Hungary, gary.
wrote novels in this period of which the best What was left of Czechoslovakia was divided
known is The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, published into three parts. On
were the provinces
the west
in 1933. Since he was Jewish, he left for France in of Bohemia and Moravia, which were under the
1938. rule of Emil Hacha (1872-1945), who acted as
"president." To the east was Slovakia under
Josef Tiso (1887-1947), a Slovakian priest. Still
CZECHOSLOVAKIA further east was the Russian-speaking tip of
Throughout this period, Czechoslovakia, under Czechoslovakia, which became "Carpatho-
Masaryk as President, maintained its democratic Ukraine." All three parts were firmly under Ger-
form of government, while most of the other na- man control.
tions between France and the Soviet Union were There was no need to go further, but Hitler
turning Fascist to one extent or another. Masaryk (likeNapoleon a century and a half earlier) had
resigned because of age on December 13, 1935, no bounds to his appetite. Tiso of Slovakia ap-
and died on September 14, 1937. He was suc- pealed for full independence of Slovakia and this
ceeded by Benes, who continued to maintain was granted in the sense that he could call him-
Czech democracy. self Premier while German officials ran the land.
In the Sudeten areas along the rim of western Bohemia and Moravia were then annexed out-
Czechoslovakia, the German population turned right by Germany on March 15, 1939, and be-
Nazi after Hitler came to power in Germany. came the "Protectorate of Bohemia-Moravia." It
Under the leadership of Konrad Henlein (1898- was placed under Constantin von Neurath (the
1945), they committed all the gross provocations former German foreign minister) as "Protector."
and violences that were apparently inseparable And with Czechoslovakia in its turn dis-
that,
from Nazism. appeared from the map of Europe, while Hitler,
The Czechoslovak authorities tried to handle by this unnecessary act, put an end to British
the Germans both resolutely and fairly, but, of appeasement and embarked on a path whose
course, with Hitler and his henchmen howling in end he could no longer correctly foresee.
the background, and with the western powers
uneasily adverse to supporting the Czechs, it
was Czechoslovakia, feeling rather
a lost cause. HUNGARY
desperate for support, concluded a treaty of mu- Hungary continued under the rule of Admiral
with the Soviet Union on May 16,
tual assistance Horthy in this period. He remained in the back-
1935, and that allowed Germany to accuse ground and ruled through a series of Premiers.
Czechoslovakia of being a Soviet puppet. The nation maintained a close friendship with
After Germany had absorbed Austria, Fascist Italy, and rapidly turned Fascist itself. On
Czechoslovakia found itself with Germany both October 4, 1932, Gyula Gombos (1886-1936) be-
on the north and south. In fact, no sooner had came Premier. He was a markedly reactionary
1930 TO 1939 577
anti-Semite and under him Fascism was well- On April 23, 1935, a new Constitution was put
established. into effect that effectively wiped out parliamen-
Once came to power in Germany, how-
Hitler tary government and turned Poland into an es-
ever, Hungarians were not lacking who wanted sentially Fascist state. soon
Pilsudski died
a Nazi-like regime as well. Their leader was Fer- afterward on May 12, 1935, and was succeeded
enc Szalasi (1897-1946), whose views corre- by Edward Rydz-Smigly (1886-1941), an associ-
sponded with those of Hitler in every particular. ate of Pilsudski.
Hungary's situation became precarious as On the constructive side, Poland created the
Italy became part of the Axis, was quickly rele- port ofGdynia on the coast west of Danzig. It
gated to junior partner, and abandoned its pro- was a purely Polish city and lessened Polish de-
tection of both Austria and Hungary. Hungary pendence on Danzig, which was under Nazi con-
tried to strengthen its own home-grown Fascism, trol.
but when Germany absorbed Austria, and its As Hitler grew stronger, Poland's situation
army appeared on the western border of Hun- grew more precarious. Its Fascist leaders were,
gary, it was plain that Hungary would simply however, incapable of understanding the situa-
have to cooperate with Germany. tion and could focus only on possible gains of
In fact, it seemed to many Hungarians that it their own. It should have been dear to the blind-
might be profitable to play the jackal and pick up est that the destruction of Czechoslovakia would
what leftovers it could seize from Germany's result in Poland being surrounded on three sides
aggression. There was a Hungarian-speaking mi- by Germany, and that Poland was bound to be
nority in southern Czechoslovakia, just north of the next victim.
the Hungarian border, and when the western Nevertheless, Poland actually seized the op-
powers abandoned Czechoslovakia to the Ger- portunity of the Czech crisis to aid Germany and
mans, Hungary proceeded to absorb this region, to press for its own bit of loot, the city of
gaining 5000 square miles of territory with a mil- Teschen, which the Czechs had occupied during
lion inhabitants. the Polish-Russian war of 1920.
On March 15, 1939, when Germany absorbed Poland got Teschen, but then, in the summer
Bohemia-Moravia, Hungary absorbed the Carpa- of 1939, found itself the target of Hitler's raven-
tho-Ukraine, leaving only a rump Slovakia as ous fury. Poland accepted the guarantees of the
"independent." Hungary signified the extent to British and French, even though these were
which it had become a German puppet by with- largely worthless without the cooperation of the
drawing from the League of Nations on April 11, Soviet Union, and even though Poland would
1939, and then introducing all the paraphernalia not accept Soviet participation.
of Nazi anti-Semitic legislation. As Union, suspecting the
a result, the Soviet
Clearly, the British-French betrayal at Munich west's intention of embroiling it in a war with
had handed all of central Europe to Hitler. Germany and then stepping back, signed a pact
During this period, however, the Hungarian with Germany instead.
composer Bela Bartok was bringing his career to On September 1, 1939, German forces invaded
a successful close. Poland.
POLAND SOVIET UNION

At the beginning of this period, Poland was By was in complete control of the
1930, Stalin
under the strong control of Pilsudski, who did Soviet Union, and it was clear to him that world
what he could to come to some sort of agreement revolution was not in the cards, certainly not in
with the Soviet Union on the east and with Ger- the near future. In fact, Europe was turning
many on the west. But Poland, like most of Eu- sharply rightward and it was fascism, not com-
rope, was turning sharply rightward. munism, that was sweeping the continent.
It seemed to Stalin that his only safety lay in War and was accused of con-
against the Poles,
extending the hand of friendship, as far as it spiring with Germany and Japan and was exe-
would be accepted, to the other powers. This de- cuted, along with a large number of other
cision to strike formoderation became stronger generals.
when Hitler came to power in Germany and un- In this way, wiped out all opposition,
Stalin
leashed his anticommunist crusade. and even put the army under his complete con-
Stalin signed nonaggression pacts with all the trol. However, he had to make a heavy payment
nations on the western border of the Soviet for it. The spectacle of the purge displeased the
Union. He accepted the loss of whatever territory democratic elements in Europe and America with
had been lost after World War I. He managed to whom Stalin was hoping to join against the fas-
obtain the recognition of his government by the cist menace. It displeased the west so much, in
United States on November 17, 1933, after 16 fact, that it made Hitler seem more respectable
years of American nonrecognition. He even led than he would otherwise have seemed, and this
the Soviet Union into the League of Nations on encouraged the policy of appeasement. Then,
September 18, 1934, and began to support the too, the purge of the Army command weakened
status quo in Europe. it, and in the crisis to come, the Soviets had to
On May 2, 1935, the Soviet Union signed an pay for that in blood.
alliance with France. France, once again Soviet aid to the Loyalists during the Spanish
frightened of a resurgent Germany, felt the need Civil War was also distasteful to the west, and
to turn to a communist Soviet Union as, 40 years encouraged them to refuse to help the Loyalists
earlier it had turned to an autocratic Russian Em- themselves, though it was clear to any dunce that
pire. However, the alliance was not a very strong a Rebel victory was not in the interest of the
one. There were many in France who preferred west.
Hitler to Stalin. The same was true in Great Brit- The general feeling of "better dead than Red"
ain. poisoned the situation during the crises of 1938
growing moderate in his foreign policy,
Stalin, and 1939. The British and French could not bring
did not do the same internally, however. As is themselves to receive Russian help in return for
often the case with dictators who attempt to concessions to Stalin, and they preferred to bring
make their power absolute, he saw danger every- on war by concessions to Hitler. Stalin, tired of
where, even among his own followers, and, inwestern snubbing, turned to Hitler himself,
creasingly, he struck at dissent, even when signed the nonaggression pact on August 23,
slight, and even when imaginary. 1939, and thus sent Hitler into Poland on Sep-
Periodically, the Communist Party would be tember 1.
purged, and those who were considered as de- During this period, the tradition of Russian
viating from orthodox doctrine (as defined by literature continued under the Communists as it
Stalin),even if only in an imaginary way, were had under the Tsars. Mikhail Alexandrovich Sho-
expelled from the party and from all the privi- lokhov (1905-1984) was writing novels and even-
came with membership.
leges that tually won the Nobel Prize for literature. His
On December 1, 1934, Sergey Mironovich best-known novels are And Quiet Flows the Don
Kirov (1886-1934), one of Stalin's chief aides, and The Don Flows Home to the Sea, which were
was assassinated. That apparently detonated Sta- translated into English in 1934 and 1940, respec-
lin s paranoia. For four years he sought out ene-
tively. Boris Leonodovich Pasternak (1890-1960)
mies, triedthem to foregone conviction, and, for was also writing in this period and also won the
the most part, had them executed. A large num- Nobel Prize for literature. A third great Russian
ber of old Communists were wiped out in this writer of the period was Vladimir Vladimirovich
way. Nabokov (1899— 1977) who worked in France.
purge extended even to the Army.
In 1937, the In music, Shostakovich produced his Fifth
Tukhachevski, who had fought well in the Civil Symphony, perhaps the most-often played of his
1930 TO 1939 579
works, in 1937. Prokofiev returned to the Soviet coup was barely averted, barely,
In the end, a
Union in 1933, composed Peter and the Wolf in and the shaken French were in no condition,
1936, and the music for the film Alexander Nevsky thereafter, to take a strong line against Hitler.
in 1938. French politics was made up of many parties,
In science (if the term
used very loosely)
is each with a narrow band of policies and support.
there was Trofim Denisovich Lysenko (1898- The result was that in France only coalitions
1976), whose fallacious genetic theories on the could govern, and they fell apart almost as
inheritability of acquired characteristics fit what quickly as they formed. French cabinets followed
Stalin conceived to be the Communist ideology. each other in dizzying succession, although per-
Stalin backed him with his full might and a gen- sonalitieschanged much more than policies did.
eration of real geneticists, including Nikolay Iva- A French statesman who appeared in cabinet
novich Vavilov (1887-1943), were imprisoned or after cabinet in different posts, and who was
executed. Soviet biology was set back a genera- stronger and more decisive than most, was Jean
tion by this unwarranted subjection of science to Louis Barthou (1862-1934), who became Minister
ideology. of Foreign Affairs in 1934.Though 82 years old,
he went energetically to work building alliances
against the growing menace of Hitler's Germany.
FRANCE On October 9, King Alexander I of Yugo-
1934,
Paul Doumer (1857-1932) was elected president slavia was in Marseille, meeting with Barthou.
on May and was assassinated by a Rus-
13, 1931, There, a Macedonian fanatic gunned down
sian anarchist on May 6, 1932. He was succeeded the king, and since Barthou was in the line of
by the colorless and ineffectual Albert Lebrun fire, he died, too. It was a major loss for France,
(1871-1950). for he had no immediate successors who were as
France was divided sharply into Left and firmly anit-Nazi as he was.
Right in this period, with each side more inter- Barthou had been working toward an alliance
ested in fighting the other than in fighting the with the Soviet Union against Germany. It was
enemies who were arising outside of France. The taken up the month after the assassination by a
coming of Hitler did nothing to unite the French. cabinet headed by Gaston Pierre Etienne Flandin
In fact, many on
the Right were ready to turn to (1889-1958) and then by one headed by Laval,
Hitler rather than give in to the Left. which took over in May 1935. The Laval cabinet
France came to the brink of a Rightist coup carried through the alliance that month, for it
toward the end of 1933, when it was discovered had grown more urgent by the fact that Hitler
that the bonds sold by a Russian-born pseudo- had now openly declared that Germany would
financier, Serge Alexandre Stavisky (1886-1934), rearm. The pact, however, was not popular with
were worthless, and that there had been a gigan- the French Right, and neither Flandin nor Laval
tic fraud that had fleeced many workingmen of were enthusiastic over it, for both were in the
their life-savings. Stavisky fled and was found ranks of the appeasers later on. In fact, Laval lost
dead in January 1934. the Premiership because of his attempt, with
Stavisky was Jewish and the French Right Hoare of Great Britain, to divide up Ethiopia and
seized on that as a kind of reverse Dreyfus Affair. give a piece to Mussolini.
They claimed that he had been killed by French The menace of Hitler had, however, forced the
officialdom to conceal the fact that many in the leftist parties to combine (much against their will)
French government were deeply implicated in in a "Popular Front." This consisted of the mod-
the "Stavisky Affair" and had profited from it. erately leftist Radical Socialists, the more leftists
There were riots in Paris on February 6-7, 1934, Socialists, and the Communists. On Mav 3, 1936,
and the government made things worse by be- the Popular Front won an
and the cabi-
election
having just as though there was indeed a cov- net was headed by the Socialist, Leon Blum
erup. (1872-1950). Blum was an easy target for the
Right, since he was not only a Socialist, but a Jew Among the writers of the period was Louis
as well. Henri Jean Farigoule (1885-1972) who, under the
The Popular Front embarked at once on a pro- penname of Jules Romaine, was now at the
gram of social reform that was, of course, bitterly height of his fame. So was the popular novelist,
resisted by the Right. It was also hampered by Sidonie Gabrielle Colette (1873-1954). Rising to
the fact that the laboring classes (who were eager prominence at this time were the French play-
to see the reforms carried through more quickly wrights Jean Anouilh (b. 1910) and Jean Cocteau
and more extensively, and who felt that the gov- (1889-1934). Another playwright, Marcel Pagnol
ernment would support them) indulged in (1895-1974) is best known motion pic-
for three
strikes that weakened the economy and strength- tures he produced between 1931 and 1936: Mar-
ened the Right's resistance. ius, Fanny, and Cesar.
The Popular Front cabinet was too weak at
home, and too uncertain of support, to take a
strong line abroad. Thus, it had no choice but to GREAT BRITAIN
follow Great Britain's short-sighted policy with In the early 1930s, Great Britain was still pushing
regard to the Spanish Civil War, refusing the for disarmament. The sea-powers gathered for
kind of massive help to the Loyalists that the the London Naval Conference, which opened on
Axis powers were giving the Rebels. Nor would January 21, 1930. It attempted to limit and regu-
it do anything about the German absorption of late submarine production, and to scrap some
Austria. warships already built. The next year, however,
Blum was replaced by Camille Chautemps Japan's invasion of Manchuria put an end to
(1885-1963) in June 1937, and he, in turn, by Dal- meaningful naval disarmament, for clearly Japan
adier in April 1938. Both Chautemps and Dal- (a signatory of the 1930 agreement) had no inten-
adier were Radical Socialists and it was Daladier, tion of limiting its armaments.
along with Chamberlain of Great Britain, who Disarmament conferences were held in Ge-
participated in the Munich betrayal in September neva in the spring of 1932 and the summer of
1938. Daladier, unlike Chamberlain, was intelli- 1933, but they came to nothing. Hitler's rise to
gent enough to realize the disaster that had taken power in Germany in January 1933 put a final
place, and expected to be reviled and calum- end to any hope for any kind of disarmament.
niated when he returned to Paris. He was aston- In the meantime, however, the Statute of
ished when he found the people, willing to Westminster, passed by Parliament in December
accept anything rather than war, cheering him. 1931, formalized what had already been accepted
The Popular Front broke up after Munich, and informally. The self-ruling white-dominated por-
France continued glumly to play the role of ju- tions of the British Empire —
Canada, Newfound-
nior partner to Great Britain. France reluctantly land, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and
followed the British lead throughout the summer the Irish Free State —
were recognized as com-
of 1939 as the Polish crisis deepened, and finally pletely independent, their only connection to
found the abyss of war opening before it on Sep- Great Britain remaining a common allegiance to
tember 1, 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. the British monarch, who would be represented
The outstanding French scientists of the pe- in the dominions by figurehead governor-
riod were Frederic Joliot-Curie (1900-1958) and generals.
his wife, Irene Joliot-Curie (1897-1956), the latter Great Britain found itself unable to take a
being the daughter of Pierre and Marie Curie. In strong line against Japan in its invasion of Man-
1934, they were the first to form radioactive iso- churia (apart from a general reluctance, after the
topes that did not exist in nature, a discovery that horrible experience of World War I, to get in-
turned out to have immense usefulness in every volved in distant disputes that were not of direct
branch of science. For this, they received a Nobel concern to the security of the Empire), because
Prize. the Great Depression had hit Great Britain hard.
1930 TO 1939 581
Unemployment was rising rapidly and so was began placing a tariff on food imports to help
the national deficit. Any efforts to correct the sit- British farmers.
uation were bound to require sacrifices from Since was clear that the Depression was
it
workingmen, and MacDonald's Labour govern- worldwide and could be fought only on a world-
ment couldn't bring itself to take such action. wide basis, an International Economic confer-
On August 24, 1931, MacDonald resigned, ence was held in London in the summer of 1933.
and since no party was willing to take sole re- There was an attempt to stabilize world curren-
sponsibility for an economic disaster that was cies once more, but the United States was itself
worldwide and could not be dealt with on a na- going off the gold standard, and so the Confer-
tional basis alone, there seemed no choice but to ence Great Britain, as a result, continued
failed.
establish a coalition government of Labour, Lib- to raise trade barriers, as did other nations,
erals, and Conservatives. MacDonald, himself, something that did more harm than good.
was persuaded to continue as Prime Minister, to due course, the gold standard was aban-
In
the shock and anger of the Labour Party stal- doned the world over, and national currencies
warts. were subjected to the ebb and flow of economic
Taking over as leaders of the Labour party, or events and to the deliberate manipulation by
that portion of it that now filled the role of Op- governments as each tried to improve its own
was George Lansbury (1859-1940), an
position, share of international trade.
extreme pacifist, and Arthur Henderson (1863- On June MacDonald, finding he could
7, 1935,
1935), who had been Foreign Secretary under no longer even pretend he was heading the gov-
MacDonald, and who had labored strenuously ernment, resigned and Baldwin took over the
on the doomed cause of disarmament. Though Prime Minister's post in title, something he al-
he failed to achieve it, he won the Nobel Peace ready had done in fact. A few months later, a
Prize in 1934 for his efforts. general election confirmed the coalition govern-
In actual fact, MacDonald, in his declining ment in power, placing it more under Conserva-
years, lacked the strength to be the true leader of tivedomination than ever, to the point where it
the coalition government, which came to be in- might just as well be considered Conservative al-
creasingly dominated by the Conservatives together. The Labour Henderson's
Party, after
under Stanley Baldwin. death and Lansbury's resignation (since his un-
The coalition government, preoccupied with compromising pacifism simply didn't suit the
Great Britain's economic situation, did not wish time), came under the leadership of Clement
to take a strong stand in foreign affairs, and did Richard Attlee (1883-1967).
not. In fact, there were many in Great Britain Baldwin was not the man to inspire Great Brit-
who saw only the Left as a danger, who admired ain to leadership in world affairs. He affected
Mussolini, supported the Spanish Rebels, and stolidity in the face of all that was going on. He
felt that Hitler could be dealt with. There was did initiate a certain measure of rearmament in
even a small Fascist party in Great Britain, openly the face of the escalating German threat, but the
pro-Nazi and anti-Semitic, under Oswald Ernald British effort in this respect lagged far behind the
Mosley (1896-1980), a renegade Labourite, who German.
mimicked Hitler with unintentionally comic ef- British energies in 1936 were diverted by an
fect. His party played little role in British affairs. internal crisis thatwas peculiarly British in na-
The coalition government was forced to aban- ture. What happened was that George V died on
don the gold standard on September 21, 1931, January 20, 1936, after having reigned for a quar-
permitting an increase in the money supply that ter of a century, and was succeeded by his oldest
was accompanied by a declining value of the son, who reigned as Edward VIII (1894-1972).
pound against other currencies. This encouraged Edward VIII was an intellectual lightweight
British exports, but raised the possibility of infla- and a playboy. He had been
very popular as
tion. Great Britain also abandoned free trade and Prince of Wales, and he enjoyed being popular.
He approached the ceremonial duties of kingship Succeeding Edward VIII was his younger
with extreme distaste (though he must have brother, who reigned as George VI (1895-1952).
known all his he would be subjected to
life that George was the opposite of his brother. Retiring
them and should have been prepared for it), and and shy, and afflicted with a stammer in addi-
this at once placed him in the bad graces of the tion, he had never sought popularity or even no-
traditionalists of the British government. He tice. Becoming king unexpectedly, however, he
seemed to show signs of wanting to be an activist fulfilled all his duties admirably, serving the na-
monarch, expressing sympathy for miners in an tion as a rallying point, high above politics, in
—
offhand moment something that horrified the the difficult times to come.
government (not so much the sympathy, as that Once that was done, and 'George VI was for-
he should say anything at all). mally crowned on May 12, 1937, Stanley Baldwin
The real problem came in the fact that, al- felt he could retire, doing so on May 28, 1937.
though he was 42 years old at the time of his Baldwin was succeeded by Neville Chamberlain,
succession, he was a bachelor, and refused to who had scarcely more charisma than Baldwin
make a suitable match. In fact he was in love with and under whom the policy of appeasement, of
Wallis Warfied Simpson (1896-1986). attempting to tame Hitler by giving him some of
Wallis Simpson was another intellectual light- what he wanted, flowered poisonously.
weight, which bothered no one. She was also a This did not suit the Foreign Minister, An-
commoner and an American, which bothered a thony Eden (1897-1977), who had supplied what
few. What really put the fat in the fire, however, action the British took in the case of the Ethiopian
was that she had been divorced once, and was crisis. He resigned on February 20, 1938, and was
still married to a second husband from whom she succeeded by the appeasement-minded Edward
was in the process of getting a divorce. This ab- Frederick Lindley Wood, Earl of Halifax (1881-
solutely horrified the royal family, the Church of 1959).
England, the aristocracy, and many conservative There followed the German annexation of
British. Austria, with regard to which Great Britain did
The crisis dragged on all through the summer nothing. It was rearming in this period, with-
and fall (during which Hitler took the opportu- out much but the process lagged far
fanfare,
nity to reoccupy the Rhineland, with Great Brit- behind what the Germans were doing, and the
ain scarcely able to note the fact). It ended only extent of its growing strength was far from
when Edward VIII, who had never been formally enough to make Great Britain eager to withstand
crowned, abdicated on December 10, 1936. He the loudly shouting and forever-threatening Hit-
was the only British monarch who ever aban- ler.
doned the throne voluntarily. Great Britain played an ignoble part during
He probably did so with great relief, though the Czechoslovakian crisis, betraying the central-
the soap opera atmosphere of giving up a throne European democracy at Munich. After Hitler had
“for the woman love" was the sensation of the
I absorbed the remainder of Bohemia and Mora-
tabloids. He was granted the title of Duke of via, Great Britain was forced to abandon ap-
Windsor, married Mrs. Simpson in France in peasement and it gave guarantees of support to
June 1937, and settled down to an entirely use- Poland, which was the next on Hitler's hit list.
less and idle existence, forever estranged from Great Britain did very little, however, to insure
his family, and giving rise to strong suspicions, Soviet cooperation, and this made the Soviet-
now and then, that he, and even more so, the German pact possible.
new Duchess, sympathized with Nazi Germany. Great Britain as, in fact, in the mood to try to
(This may not be so. It is questionable if anything force Poland to give in somewhat to Germany,
outside themselves ever bestirred their mentali- but Hitler was tired of bloodless victories. What
ties to the point of sympathy or of any other emo- he wanted was a quick war that would establish
tion.) his military predominance in Europe and that
1930 TO 1939 583
would frighten France and Great Britain into total poet of recent times, was at the peak of his career
submission. in this period.
Therefore, when Hitler sent his army into Po- In nonfiction, Norman Angell (1872-1967)
land on September 1, 1939, Great Britain found wrote books supporting pacifism, revising his
itself, to its own considerable horror, forced into most famous book The Great Illusion in 1933, and
a declaration of war on September 3. winning the Nobel Peace Prize in that year. Ar-
British science continued to flourish in this pe- nold Joseph Toynbee (1889-1975) began his
riod. In 1932, James Chadwick (1891-1974) de- monumental, but flawed, A Study of History, pub-
tected the existence of the neutron, a particle lishing the first of 12 volumes in 1934. In the field
much like the proton but without electric charge. of science writing, Lancelot Hogben (1895-1975)
This made possible to explain the structure of
it published his popular Mathematics for the Millions
the atomic nucleus as a proton-neutron collec- and Science for the Citizen (1938).
(1936)
tion. In that same year, John Douglas Cockcroft John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946) was the
(1897-1967) built a particle accelerator that most widely read and influential economist of
brought about the first artificial nuclear reaction. the period.
Both Chadwick and Cockcroft earned Nobel
Prizes for their work.
By 1935, Robert Watson-Watt (1892-1973) had IRISH FREE STATE/EIRE
worked out a practical system for detecting the The ambitions of most of the population of the
direction and distance of approaching airplanes Irish Free State was to weaken and even abolish
by bouncing radio waves ("microwaves") off any ties with Great Britain, however theoretical,
them. This was referred to as "radio detection and to unite the island, absorbing Northern Ire-
and ranging," which was abbreviated as "radar." land. That wasn't as easy as it sounded, for the
This discovery was to be of crucial importance in majority in Northern Ireland was unalterably op-
a very few years. posed to union with the south, and the Irish Free
In literature, Aldous Huxley published his State was itself so economically dependent on
best-known book. Brave New World (1932), a dys- Great Britain that there was a distinct feeling
topia that probed the dark side of technological among many Irish that defying the British would
advance. Robert Ranke Graves (1895-1985) do more harm than good.
published his Suetonius-derived novels, I. Even so, there was a "tariff war" between the
Claudius and Claudius the God in James
1934. Irish Free States and Great Britain when the latter
Hilton published
(1900-1954) Good-Bye, Mr. nation turned protectionist. The Irish suffered
Chips in 1934. Dorothy Sayers published her badly as a result and matters were reconciled by
early paean to the cause of women's rights. a trade pact on Febbruary 17, 1936.
Gaudy Nights, in 1935, while John Ronald Reuel The Irish Free State took advantage of British
Tolkien (1892-1973) published his successful weakness and uncertainty during, and immedi-
fantasy adventure for children. The Hobbit, in ately after, the crisis over the marriage plans of
1937. Edward VIII and his abdication, to introduce a
Among the playwrights, Noel Coward pro- new constitution. Complete independence was
duced Private Lives in 1930 and Cavalcade in 1931. not established, but it came so close to it as to
The American-born T. S. Eliot, now a British cit- make no was nowhere
difference. Great Britain
izen, produced Murder in the Cathedral in 1935, a mentioned in the new constitution, and the office
verse drama about Thomas Becket. Emlyn Wil- of governor-general was abolished. In its place
liams (b. 1905) produced Night Must Fall (1935) there would be a president elected by national
and The Corn Is Green (1938). suffrage. What's more, the name of the nation
John Edward Masefield (1878-1967) became was changed from Irish Free State to "Eire" (the
poet laureate of England in 1930. Dylan Marlais Gaelic word for "Ireland").
Thomas (1914-1953), the most important Welsh Any hopes that Northern Ireland would join
Eire under itsnew constitution were dashed on tive measures to ameliorate the damage. Ever
February 9, 1938, when Northern Ireland voted since the Civil War, it had been Republican pol-
overwhelmingly to retain its ties with Great Brit- icy to play a more or less passive role in the na-
ain. However, putting Northern Ireland to one tion's economic affairs, leaving it to the business
side. Great Britain and Eire came to an agreement leaders to keep the nation's economy humming
on April 25, 1938, which granted Eire all it had at high speed. The policy worked as long as
taken. times were good, but when the global disloca-
The first new con-
president of Eire under the tions of World War I and the speculation spree of
stitution was Douglas Hyde (1860-1949). He was the 1920s had caused the economy to collapse,
Ireland's greatest Gaelic scholar, and he was a ordinary business procedures were completely
Protestant, chosen perhaps as an indication to unable to restart the stalled machinery, and if
Northern Ireland that it need not fear religious business was helpless, so was the government.
persecution. Northern Ireland's Protestants re- Indeed, in the aftermath of the stock market
mained unmoved, however. Their economy was crash, the Hoover administration took an action
stronger than that of Eire, and if religious preju- which, of all actions, was best calculated to pro-
dice failed to keep them separate, economic self- long and intensify the Depression. Since it
interest would not' seemed to the isolationists that the United States
An important Irish scientist of the period was must take care of itself and pay as little attention
Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton (b. 1903), who as possible to the rest of the world, they felt that
worked with Cockcroft in producing the first ar- would encourage home in-
raising tariff barriers
tificial nuclear reaction in 1932. He shared the dustries by reducing competition by foreign
Nobel Prize with Cockcroft. products. This should allow American business
torebound.
Senator Reed Smoot (1862-1941) and Con-
UNITED STATES gressman Willis Chatman Hawley (1864-1941)
In a way, the United which had a popu-
States, co-sponsored the "Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act,"
lation of 122 million in 1930, suffered more from which raised duties on raw materials by 50-100%
the Great Depression than did any other nation, insome cases. Many economists protested, but
psychologically, at least. The inexorable decline Hoover signed it into law on June 17, 1930.
in economic activity and in the standard of living, The results were devastating, since the United
the equally inexorable increase in unemploy- States did not (whatever the isolationists might
ment, was all the worse because of its contrast think) live in a world of its own. Other nations,
with the carefree decade of the 1920s that had their trade hurt by the new tariff, took retaliatory
just concluded. action at once, so that invisible barriers rose
The United States had seemed a world apart, everywhere, choking trade. In a world of nations
virtually untouched by the tragedy and devasta- that were growing increasingly economically in-
tion of World War 1, and indeed enriched by it. terdependent, these barriers hurt everyone. Be-
It was secure behind its oceans, wealthy and hind its barriers every nation watched economic
powerful beyond what would have seemed pos- activity dwindle so that the Great Depression in-
nineteenth century. It was surely the
sible in the tensified and became worldwide.
favored land of God, showing the crowded and As for the United States, 1300 banks failed in
miserable nations of the old world how to do 1930 and on July 28, 1932, the Dow-Jones average
business and how to live. of important stock prices hit 41.22, an all-time
Now, suddenly, be vulnerable, to see the
to low. Some 14 million Americans were unem-
wealth vanish, to see poverty and misery ad- ployed in 1932 and, as though an additional fris-
vance, was humiliating beyond words. son of horror was needed, Charles Lindbergh's
What's more, the Hoover administration infant son was kidnapped on March 1, 1932, and
seemed paralyzed and unable to take any effec- was eventually found dead.
1930 TO 1939 585
Acrowd of unemployed veterans of World paralyzed from the waist down, but in those
War I came to Washington in 1932, asking for days the media were sufficiently discreet to keep
their war bonuses. President Hoover called
them that fact unobtrusive.
criminals and communists and the army, under
Roosevelt was handsome man, with a ready
a
commanders who were later to achieve fame in smile, an impressive voice, and immense cha-
World War II, were ordered to clear them out. risma. He defeated Hoover in a landslide and
This was done and a hundred casualties were
became the 32nd President of the United States.
admitted. This was probably Hoover at his most
His inauguration, on March 4, 1933, came
disgraceful.
when the United States seemed to be in the very
Meanwhile, in 1931, when Japan began its oc- trough of the Depression. Although Roosevelt
cupation of Manchuria and engaged in open did not, and could not, solve the economic prob-
aggression against China, the United States, lost lems that beset the nation with the wave of a
in its isolationism, and bleeding badly at home,
hand, he worked an important psychological
was in no mood to take any action other than to change.
express moral disapproval, which didn't bother In the first place, Roosevelt brought to the of-
Japan in the least. Thereafter, Italy, and then fice of the Presidency a sense of invincible opti-
Germany, could see that a hyperactive foreign mism. There was about him nothing of the
policy would yield dividends and face only token
dourness that had marked Coolidge and Hoover.
opposition. Through the 1930s, then, the United He kept his cigarette holder at a jaunty angle,
States played the inglorious role of onlooker as and was at home with the press. He also ad-
the world prepared to go up in flames.
dressed the nation frequently on the radio, deliv-
The Hoover administration grew steadily ering what he called "fireside chats," and his
more unpopular in the country. The only eco- remarkable voice became familiar to all.
nomic measure of note it was able to take was In the second place, Roosevelt took action at
the establishment of the "Reconstruction Finance once. When Roosevelt became president, the fi-
Corporation" on February 2, 1932, which was de- nancial institutions of the nation were in a state
signed to make funds available to banks and rail- of near-total breakdown. Therefore, he closed
roads, in the hope that by helping them to their the banks as soon as his term began, had their
feet, they would be able to restart the economy
books audited, and then allowed those banks de-
and create jobs. This was part of the "trickle- clared sound to reopen. This may have done little
down" philosophy. If you help the rich and pow- for the banks, but did much
it for the public.
erful, some of the benefit, it was felt, would
There was a burst of general confidence in the
eventually trickle down to the poor and down- banks and a willingness to allow funds to remain
trodden. Nor was it felt that there was any need them
in more to help them than any-
that did far
for direct help to the poor and downtrodden thing the government did.
while they were waiting for the trickle. In the third place, Roosevelt abandoned the
By 1932, it seemed quite certain that Hoover philosophy that government should be strictly al-
would not be reelected, though the Republican lied with business and should help the general
party was bound to run him again, since to dis- population only indirectly through the coddling
own him would make disaster the more certain. of business. A new philosophy, in which govern-
Many Democrats struggled for the nomina- ment labored to help the population generally,
tion, but the one that got it, despite the difficulty
—
came into being the "New Deal."
of obtaining the required two-thirds majority (de- In awhirlwind of activity. Congress, driven
signed to give the southern states veto power by Roosevelt's boundless energy, passed legisla-
over the nomination), was Franklin D. Roosevelt, tion to help the farmers by paying for crop
con-
the popular governor of New York State, who trol to reduce surpluses that drove
down prices
had lost his race for vice-president in 1920. Roo- for produce. Farm mortgages were also
refi-
sevelt's bout with infantile paralysis had left him nanced. The United States was taken off the gold
Standard, thus allowing a moderate inflation and neighbor," rather than as a heavy-handed guard-
making it easier to pay off debts. A system ian of American business interests.
whereby the destitute could receive monetary Roosevelt could not do anything, however, to
"relief" was set up. Home mortgages were refi- undermine the strong current of American isola-
nanced. Securities exchanges were regulated to tionism. Although strongly opposed to the ag-
decrease the chances of "boom-and-bust" that gressiveness of Japan and Italy, and, in
had characterized the Coolidge-Hoover era. particular, to the policies of Adolf Hitler (who
Labor laws were passed that favored the right of had come to power in Germany only five weeks
laborers and put an end to the tight alliance of before Roosevelt's inauguration), he could not
government and business in the matter of strike- flout American public opinion by taking too ac-
breaking. tivist a position. He was reduced to sermonizing.
The 18th Amendment, which had saddled the In particular, the United States was suffi-
nation with the enforced prohibition of alcoholic ciently isolationist in mood, so that, like Great
beverages, was recognized and was
as a failure Britain and France, it failed to help the legitimate
repealed by the 21st amendment on December 5, government of Spain against the Fascist Rebels
1933. When in 1934, a drought ruined the Mid- under Franco. American Catholics were strong
west, creating a "dustbowl" that sent impover- supporters of Roosevelt and the New Deal, but
ished farmers out of the area, help reached them. they were also strong supporters of Franco's
By had pushed through social
1935, Roosevelt forces, seeing him as a "Nationalist" who sup-
security, whereby people during their working ported the Church against the anticlerical Loyal-
lives, paid sums into a fund, into which industry ists. Roosevelt could not afford to alienate so
also paid, that would then be translated into a large a segment of his own supporters and, while
monthly pension when the people reached their individual Americans fought as pro-Loyalist vol-
retirement years. Unemployment insurance was unteers in the "Abraham Lincoln Brigade," the
also set up. (All these measures met with un- government itself watched idly as the Loyalists
yielding and bitter opposition from the Republi- were finally defeated.
cans.) Again, while and many other
Roosevelt
Although the New Deal legislation did not American leaders bitterly denounced German
bring back the boom times of the 1920s, they anti-Semitic policies, there was no real move to
greatly relieved human suffering, and by giving accept Jewish refugees. The trouble was that
the population the sense that the government large segments of American public opinion were
cared for them and endeavored to help them, it not particularly favorable to Jews. Anti-Semitism
prevented what might otherwise have become was sufficiently widespread in the United States
dangerous antidemocratic movements. to diminish sympathy for the victims of Nazi big-
Such movements did exist. There was Huey otry.
Pierce Long (1893-1935), the demogogic, auto- Roosevelt ran for reelection in 1936, against
cratic, and corrupt governor of Louisiana, who the Republican nominee, Alfred Mossman Lan-
gained popularity by a program of public works don (1887-1988). It was a bitter contest with
and welfare. He was assassinated in 1935. There those who had benefited from the Republican
were fascist and anti-Semitic movements such as pro-business policies going all out to defeat Roo-
the one led by the Catholic priest, Charles Ed- sevelt — who had saved them from their own in-
ward Coughlin (1891-1979), and others led by capacities. The Literary Digest conducted an
people who were more extreme still. enormous straw showed Landon taking
poll that
Abroad, the United States recognized
finally every state outside the Solid South. However,
the government of the Soviet Union, after 16 they obtained their names from telephone books
years of pretending it didn't exist. Policy toward and automobile registrations, and Roosevelt's
Latin America was liberalizedand Roosevelt strength lay with those who could not afford tele-
stressed the role of the United States as a "good phones and automobiles.
1930 TO 1939 587
On November 3,1936, Roosevelt carried 46 of ceded it). In 1938, the Republicans gained in state
the 48 states, losing only Maine and Vermont. and congressional reactions. Roosevelt tried to
The Literary Digest went out of business soon pick out several of his more embittered enemies
after that and pollsters learned how conduct
to for defeat, but that did more harm than good as
polls in such a way as to get a smaller sampling, the local voters resented outside interference.
but one that was far more representative of the Meanwhile, there was the growing possibility
electorate. of war in Europe, and the stubborn isolationism
The great victory had its difficulties. Labor, of the American people kept Roosevelt from
which felt (quite rightly) that it had been a key doing anything to prevent it. In 1937, in fact.
element in Roosevelt's landslide, wanted its re- Congress passed a "Neutrality Act" that effec-
ward. The "Committee of Industrial Organiza- tively tied Roosevelt's hands as far as an active
tion" ("CIO") had been organized by John and far-sighted foreign policy was concerned.
Llewellyn Lewis (1880-1969) as a more activist The result was that, in 1939, when World War
offshoot of the conservative American Federation IIbroke out in Europe, the United States was on
of Labor (AFL). In 1937, then, the CIO initiated a the sidelines and all Roosevelt could do was to
rash of strikes that were intended to unionize the declare neutrality and hope for the best.
automobile and The "sit-down
steel industries. In science, the United States glittered in this
strike" came into being, in which workers re- decade. Ernest Orlando Lawrence (1901-1958)
mained in the factories, thus making it more dif- invented the cyclotron in 1930, which opened the
ficult for the factory owners to hire scabs to way to the study of atomic structure at a new
replace them. On the whole, this was embarrass- level of precision. He was awarded a Nobel Prize
ing for Roosevelt, who sympathized with labor, in 1939 for this.
but who realized that most Americans were not Harold Clayton Urey (1893-1981) isolated
activists and viewed the strikers as dangerous "heavy hydrogen" or "deuterium," and won a
leftists.
Nobel Prize in 1934. In 1932, Carl David Ander-
Roosevelt also had trouble with the Supreme son (b. 1905) discovered the positron, the first
Court, which had a rock-ribbed conservative ma- "antiparticle" be detected, and he won a
to
jority of six out of nine justices. At every oppor- Nobel Prize in 1936. Linus Pauling (b. 1901) ap-
tunity, they sourly declared New Deal measures plied quantum theory to chemistry, thus reorgan-
to be unconstitutional. izing and improving the entire subject, and he,
In desperation, Roosevelt suggested that for too, won Nobel Prize eventually. Isadore Isaac
a
each justice over retirement age, who did not re- Rabi (1898-1988) measured the magnetic proper-
tire, he be allowed to appoint an additional ties of atoms and molecules and won a Nobel
younger justice. This was widely considered a Prize.
device to "pack the Supreme Court" and the na- Guthe Jansky (1905-1950), in 1932, de-
Karl
tion turned against it, and rightly so. Roosevelt tected radio waves from space outside the Solar
suffered the greatest defeat of his political career system. This eventually led to the development
in this matter. radio astronomy,
off which revolutionized
In the long run, however, he won out, for sev- human knowledge of the universe. Clyde Wil-
did retire and Roosevelt had
eral of the justices liam Tombaugh (b. 1906) discovered the planet
the chance to appoint liberals, so that before his Pluto in 1930.
term was over he had the Supreme Court he During this decade,
Kendall isolated var-
E. C.
wanted, without having packed it. ious hormones of the adrenal cortex, including
He had other troubles, too. In 1937, there was "cortisone." In 1934, Robert Runnels Williams
another economic downturn
(now called a (1886-1965) worked out the molecular structure
"recession" to avoid the horrible word "depres- of Vitamin B,. In 1937, Conrad Arnold Elvehjem
sion" which had itself been adopted to avoid the (1901-1962) found that nicotinic acid ("niacin")
even more horrible word "panic" that had pre- cured pellagra. George Wald (b. 1906) worked
out the chemistry of vision and eventually won a born George Santayana (1863-1952) published
Nobel Prize for it. The French-born Rene Jules The Last Puritan in 1935.
Dubos (1901-1982) isolated tryothricin from soil Among the playwrights, O'Neill staged
bacteria and this was the beginning of the discov- Mourning Becomes Electra in 1931 and Ah, Wilder-
ery of antibiotics. During this decade, too, John ness in 1932. Clifford Odets staged Golden Boy in
Howard Northrop (1891-1987) crystallized var- 1937. Robert Emmet Sherwood (1896-1955)
ious digestive enzymes and eventually won a staged The Petrified Forest in 1935, Idiot's Delight in
Nobel Prize. 1936, and Abe Lincoln in Illinois in 1938. The last
In 1938, the Russian-born Vladimir Kosma two won Pulitzer Prizes.
Zworykin (1889-1982) invented the first practical Theodore Seuss Geisel (b. 1904), using the
television camera, while Edwin Herbert Land (b. penname of "Dr. Seuss," began a great career in
1909) invented Polaroid in 1932. Wallace Hume 1937 as a writer of children's verse.
Carothers (1896-1937) was the first to produce In art. GrantDe Volsen Wood (1892-1942)
Nylon in 1931, while Thomas Midgley, Jr. (1889- painted what may be the best-known contempo-
1944) produced Freon in 1930, and with it revo- rary American work of art, American Gothic, in
lutionized the air-conditioning industry. 1930. Alexander Calder (1898-1976) initiated the
Color movies reached the screen in 1938, and construction of "mobiles," freely rnoving con-
Walt Disney, in that year, produced the first full- structions, in 1932. Anna Mary "Grandma"
length animated feature. Snow White and the Seven Moses (1860-1961) took up painting in the 1930s,
Dwarfs. To distract the attention of a population when she was over 70 years old, and quickly be-
ground down by
the Depression, radio soap came famous as a remarkable "primitive."
operas became popular, the movies began to The most important American composer of
feature lavish musicals, and, for youngsters, car- the period was probably Aaron Copland (b.
toon books became popular and flourished. 1900).
At a somewhat higher level, paperback books
(only 25 cents in those days) brought reading to
a larger audience beginning in 1939. Night base- BELGIUM
ball was initiated in 1935, and that, too, meant a Belgium was naturally alarmed by the coming to
larger audience. power of Adolf Hitler and his Nazis in Germany.
The Empire State Building was erected in They embarked on a program of rearmament and
1931, and even after taller buildings were built, it did their best to suppress their home-grown Fas-
remained the symbol of New York, perhaps be- cists, who were subsidized by Mussolini.
cause of the final scene of the movie. King Kong, On February 17, 1934, Albert I of Belgium,
which was released in 1933. who had been considered a hero of World War I,
In literature, John Roderigo Dos Passos (1896- died, and was succeeded by his son, who reigned
1970) wrote his trilogy U.S.A. in this decade. Wil- as Leopold III (1901-1983). Leopold III did not
liam Saroyan (1908-1981) published The Daring aspire to hero status, but thought it would be
Young Man on Margaret
the Flying Trapeze in 1934. safer to declare neutrality and hide, in the hope
Munnerlyn Mitchell (1900-1949) published Gone that Germany would therefore ignore its exis-
With the Wind in 1936. was possibly the most
It tence and fight elsewhere. This hadn't worked in
successful novel ever written, and won a Pulitzer 1914, and there was no real reason to think it
Prize, but Mitchell never wrote anything else. would work now.
John Ernst Steinbeck (1902-1968) published Of Nevertheless, on October 14, 1936, Belgium
Mice and Men in 1937, and The Grapes of Wrath in emphasized its neutrality by ending its military
1939. The latter, which pictured the misery of the alliance with France. In this way, Belgium, like
dustbowl farmers, won a Pulitzer Prize. Erskine almost all of Europe, played into the hands of
Caldwell (1903-1987) published Tobacco Road in Hitler. Germany, of course, in 1937, guaranteed
1932 and God's Little Acre in 1933. The Spanish- the inviolability of Belgian territory as long as it
1930 TO 1939 589
did not take military actions against Germany,

liances with other Balkan powers, with Czecho-
but there were few things in the world as worth-
slovakia, and with France. A
union against the
less as Hitler's word. increasing danger of Germany seemed in the
When World War II began in 1939, Belgium
all works, but on a visit to Marseilles on October 9,
could do was to appeal for peace, roughly the 1934, Alexander was assassinated by an extrem-
equivalent of talking to a wall. ist in thepay of the Croats.
Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (1903- Alexander was succeeded by his 11 -year-old
1989), created his detective. Inspector Maigret, in son, who reigned as Peter II (1923-1970), with
1930. Simenon was one of the most highly re-
the actual reins of government in the hands of
garded and prolific mystery writers in existence. Paul (1893-1976), his first cousin once-removed.
As in the replacement of Albert I by Leopold III
in Belgium, the replacement of Alexander I by
NETHERLANDS Paul in Yugoslavia meant a move in the direction
The Netherlands had been untouched by World of appeasement.
War I and hoped to be ignored in any new war. There were moves for closer friendship of Yu-
Therefore, it spent the 1930s doing nothing that goslavia with both Italy and Germany, but oddly
might offend Germany. enough, the dictatorship was relaxed on August
26, 1939, and the government grew more demo-
cratic. The land was federalized, the Croats were
SWITZERLAND given greater autonomy, and Macek was made a
During this decade, Switzerland carefully main- vice-premier. However, six days later, Germany
tained its tradition of total neutrality
backed by a invaded Poland and World War II began.
modern, well-trained army. It tried to keep all
extremists at arm's length, suppressing home-
grown Nazis and opposing the admission of the GREECE
Soviet Union to the League of Nations. As was the case with most of Europe in this de-
In science, Paul Karrer (1889-1971) synthe- cade, Greece turned to the right. Venizelos had
sized a number of vitamins in this decade and made peace with Turkey and had tried to main-
won aNobel Prize in 1937. The Russian-born tain the republic that had been established in
Tadeusz Reichstein (b. 1897) also synthesized vi- 1924, but the world Depression created dissatis-
tamins and won a Nobel Prize. Paul Hermann faction and the grew steadily stronger.
royalists
Muller (1894-1965) discoverd the insecticide On November 24, 1935, George II returned from
DDT in 1939. exile and was once more King of Greece. Engi-
The Swiss theologian, Karl Barth (1886-1948), neering this return was the Greek general, Geor-
rallied churchmen against Nazi doctrines. gios Kondilos (1879-1936), who, in the course of
his life, had changed from a liberal republican to
a conservative royalist, and who attempted to
YUGOSLAVIA rule with the restored king as a figurehead.
Yugoslavia was under the strong dictatorship of George however, wanted the restoration of
II,
King Alexander I, who found that his greatest peace within Greece and planned to do this by a
home-grown problem was with the Croats in the general amnesty of the republicans. Kondilos op-
north. The Croats, led by Vladimir Macek (1879- posed this and the general yearning for peace
1964), were Catholic, used the Latin alphabet, forced him out of office.
and felt themselves more civilized than the dom- However, Greece did not remain long without
inant Serbs (who were Orthodox and used the army rule. loannis Metaxis (1871-1941), an ultra-
Cyrillic alphabet). The Croats demanded greater royalist general, became Prime Minister on April
autonomy. 13, 1936; and, on August 4 of that year, made
Abroad, Alexander labored to build up the al- himself dictator and established a Fascist regime.
He suppressed all opposition, relied entirely on ping out of his hands as the pro-Nazi "Iron
the army and drew closer to Ger-
for support, Guard" became more powerful. He dismissed
many. He also carried out economic measures Goga and took strong measures against the Iron
that benefited the workers and farmers and gen- Guard. Its leader, Cornelius Zelea Codreanu
erally maintained his popularity. (1899-1938), was killed while in custody. Never-
theless, Romania tried to play it safe by making
commercial agreements with Germany.
BULGARIA
Bulgaria labored in this decade to get out from
under the upon her by the
disabilities placed ESTONIA
post-World-War-I treaties. Slowly, she managed Estonia maintained a democratic government in
to rearm and, at the same time, come to agree- thisdecade, though the power of the govern-
ments with Yugoslavia and Greece, her two chief ment was strengthened in 1937, and placed a lit-
opponents in World War I. She attempted to re- tle closer to the Fascism that was now popular in
main friendly with both Germany and the West, Europe.
accepting arms from the former and loans from In 1934, she joined the Baltic pact with Latvia
the latter. Boris III remained king of Bulgaria in and Lithuania, providing for a common defense.
this decade. Fearful of the Soviet Union to the east, from
which it had only gained independence after the
Russian revolution, Estonia, like the other Baltic
ROMANIA nations, signed a nonaggression pact with Ger-
Carol had renounced the Romanian throne in
II many in 1939.
favor of his son, Michael, in 1925. He had also
divorced his wife (Michael's mother) and had
gone into exile to live with his mistress, Magda LATVIA
Lupescu (1896-1977). Now on June 6, 1930, he Latvia passed under the dictatorship of Karlis Ul-
returned to Romania. His renunciation of the manis (b. 1877-?) on May 15, 1934, and adopted
throne was revoked and he became king again, the paraphernalia of Fascism.
replacing his son. He lost no time in bringing
Madame Lupescu to Bucharest to share his
throne. LITHUANIA
There was constant irritation with the Soviet Lithuania was forced, in 1938, to recognize the
Union over Bessarabia, the province in Roma- Polish seizure of Vilna in the days after World
nia's northeast, which Romania had gained from War 1, though the nation always felt that Vilna
Russia after the Russian revolution. In 1933, was its capital. In 1939, was forced to
Lithuania
however, the Soviet Union, aware of Japan's ag- give up her Baltic seaport of Memel to Germany.
gressive movements in the Far East and the com- (It had been German before World War I.) Lith-
ing of power of Hitler in Germany, decided that uania had a Fascist cast in this decade and it
Bessarabia was too small a problem to be con- formed a Baltic pact with Estonia and Latvia.
cerned with and recognized Romania's posses-
sion of the province.
Carol II was an admirer and grad-
of Mussolini DENMARK
ually established a Fascist regime in Romania. Denmark, under Christian X, remained demo-
For a while, it even seemed that Romania might cratic throughout this decade of Fascist victory.
proceed to accept the Nazi doctrines of anti- It was virtually unarmed and it depended for its
Semitism, when an ultrarightist politician, Oc- safetyon its clear lack of hostile intent toward
tavian Goga (1881-1938), became Prime Minister anybody.
in late 1937. However, Carol 11 felt power slip- Copenhagen, in this decade, continued to be
1930 TO 1939 591
an important center of atomic physics because fact that it recognized the British monarch as its
Niels Bohr headed an institute for atomic studies own.
there.
Canada fought the Depression much as the
Karen Christence Dinesen Blixen (1885-1962), United States did. It established a New Deal of
writing under the pseudonym of 'Tsak Dinesen," own, and had
its to watch most of its measures
became a world-renowned writer with her Seven being invalidated by its Supreme Court. It also
Gothic Tales (1934) and Out of Africa (1937). suffered from sit-down strikes.
Two Canadian matters attracted world atten-
tion in this decade.
SWEDEN On May 28, 1934, five identical-sibling daugh-
Under Gustav V, Sweden, too, remained demo- ters were born to Elzire Dionne in Callander,
cratic,but did not rely for its safety, as Denmark Ontario. They all lived and the "Dionne quintu-
did, on transparent inoffensiveness. It carried on plets" became world-famous at once. So ruth-
a program of rearmament. lessly was their existence commercialized that
there was no chance whatever of any of them
leading a happy, or even a normal, life, and there
NORWAY is no question but that for them the circum-
Norway remained stances of their birth was tragic in the extreme.

the one expansionist Scandi-
navian country. In 1931, it attempted to annex In May, 1939, King George VI and Queen Eliz-
the eastern coast of Greenland, even though abeth of Great Britain visited Canada. It was the
first royal visit of a reigning monarch to the do-
Denmark had long claimed control of the entire
island. The World Court at Hague decided in minion, and the visit helped insure Canadian
favor of Denmark and Norway gave up its claim loyalty in the approaching ordeal, for the coming
at once. of war was beginning to seem more certain with
Under Haakon VII, Norway remained demo- each day.

cratic and fought the Depression by methods
reminiscent of Roosevelt's "New Deal." These
NEWFOUNDLAND
methods were more or less successful.
Newfoundland had been governing itself since
1855. By 1933, however, the Depression, com-
FINLAND bined with incompetence and corruption in the

government, had the nation virtually bankrupt.
Finland maintained a democratic form of govern-
Newfoundland, therefore, voluntarily gave up
ment in this period, and, beginning in 1935,
its dominion status and became a British colony
joined the Scandinavian nations in a common
again. Under British rule, it slowly recovered.
block. It attempted also to find common grounds
with the three small Baltic nations.
The Finnish writer, Frans Emil Sillaupaa MEXICO
(1888-1964), won the Nobel Prize for literature in
On July 2, 1934, Lazaro Cardenas (1895-1970)
1939.
was elected President of Mexico, and he
launched a program of social reform. Land was
distributed to the peasants; church property was
CANADA nationalized; and the railways were taken over
The Statute of Westminister, adopted unani- by itsemployees.
mously by the British Parliament in 1931, made it Then, in 1938, the Mexican government expro-
official that Canada (as well as the other British priated the properties of the
American and Brit-
dominions) was an independent nation, except ish oil companies. The American and British
for its emotional ties to Great Britain and for the governments protested this action and the
United States demanded compensation. Mexico

refused and the matter remained still at an im- NICARAGUA
passe when World War II broke out in Europe. The Liberal revolt led by Agostino Sandino was
suppressed in 1933, and the next year Sandino
was killed.
CUBA In 1936, Anastasio Somoza (1896-1956) be-
The Cuban dictator, Machado, was forced out of came president, and the next year he established
office in 1933. Later that year, however, another a brutal dictatorship, which came down hard on
army officer, Fulgencio Batista y Zaldiver (1901- any dissent. In the classic style of such dictators,
1973), became working through figure-
dictator, he managed to enrich himself at the expense of
head officials. He embarked on what was the his impoverished people.
classic model for dictators in this decade: he en- Similar dictatorships were set up in other Cen-
riched himself enormously, while establishing a tral American republics: Honduras, El Salvador,
brutal regime that repressed all dissent in Fascist and Guatemala. The United States got along with
fashion. all of them very well.
In 1934, the Platt Amendment, which had
been forced on Cuba after the Spanish- American
War, was abrogated and Cuba was given its full BRAZIL
independence. The United States could do this In this period, leftist feelings were rising among
since it controlled Cuba economically and Batista homegrown Fascist
the poorer classes, while a
was perfectly willing to acquiesce in that, pro- movement was encouraged by Germany (there
vided the United States did not interfere with his were many ethnic Germans in Brazil).
dictatorship, something the United States was Getulio Donelles Vargas (1883-1954), who had
content not to do. led a revolt in southern Brazil, became president
in 1930 and remained in control throughout the
decade. By 1937, he imposed a new constitution
HAITI on Brazil under which he had dictatorial power.
In 1934, after Franklin Roosevelt became presi- Vargas denied that Brazil was Fascist, but it
dent, American armed forces,which had main- showed all the stigmata of that ideology.
tained a presence in Haiti for five years, were
withdrawn.
VENEZUELA
The Venezuelan dictator, Juan Vicente Gomez,
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC died on December 18, 1935, and Venezuela re-
In 1930, RafaelLeonidas Trujillo Molina (1891- turned to a democratic form of government.
1961) became the harsh and oppressive dictator —
Other nations in the region Colombia, Ecua-
of the Dominican Republic. He remained dicta- dor, and Peru —
were also reasonably democratic.
tor, whether actually filling the post of President
or not, throughout this period.
BOLIVIA
At this time, Bolivia engaged in the most serious
PANAMA South American war of the twentieth century.
During this decade, Panama was able to negoti- The territory under dispute was the Chaco, a re-
ate new agreements with the United States, gion lying between Bolivia and Paraguay. The
which lightened the heavy hand of American dispute had simmered for decades and, in 1932,
control that had existed since Panama had bro- itcame to open war. Seventy years earlier, Para-
ken away from Colombia under the management guay had shown its ability to fight ferociously
of Theodore Roosevelt. even in the face of virtual annihilation, and it
1930 TO 1939 593
now did the same. It won

the war in 1935, and (1884 1973), who had been the leading figure
ended up with the major portion of the Chaco. be-
hind the westernization of the land.
By the end of the decade, both Bolivia and
Paraguay were under dictatorial rule. Other
South American nations in the south Uruguay, — SYRIA
Chile, and Argentina^managed to retain
the A treatybetween Syria and France in 1936 called
forms of democracy.
for an end to the French mandate in three years,
^rid for Syria tobe admitted to the League of
Nations. The implementation of this treaty, as in
EGYPT
the case of the one between Great Britain and
This decade was one an increasing drive for
of Egypt, was delayed by the coming of World War
Egyptian independence. On April 28, 1936, King
II in 1939.
Fuad died and was succeeded by his son, Farouk
(1920—1965). Soon after Farouk^s succession, a
treaty between Great Britain and Egypt
was PALESTINE
signed in which Great Britain agreed to remove
Palestinianswere beginning to attack Jews as the
most of its forces, leaving a garrison at the Suez
decade opened and Great Britain found itself in a
Canal and maintaining a naval base at Alexandria
quandary. It had committed itself to the estab-
for no more than eight years. Egypt was
to be- lishment of a Jewish national state in Palestine,
come a member of the League of Nations which but it was in no mood to antagonize the millions
was, in a way, a recognition of its independence.
of Moslems in the Middle
East. Therefore, they
The coming of World War II, however, de- began a policy of restricting Jewish immigration
layed the implementation of the treaty.
into Palestine. This led to widespread Jewish
protests and, in view of the increasing anti-Semi-
tism of Hitler's Germany, Great Britain hesitated
UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA to make itself seem too anti-Semitic.
However,
With the Statute of Westminister in 1931, South any increase in Jewish immigration at once set
Africa became an independent nation but for its
off Arab protests.
grudging acceptance of the British monarch. The In 1937, the Britishworked out a plan to par-
Nationalist movement largely lost its reason for tition Palestine between Jews and Arabs and this,
existence with this development, and under the
predictably, displeased both sides. There fol-
stress of the Depression, there was a union be-
lowed a virtual civil war in Palestine between the
tween the imperialist-minded party of Smuts, Jews and the Arabs, with the British unable to
and the nationalists under Herzog. control matters.
An intransigent portion of the Nationalist In 1939, the British
proposed an independent
party under Daniel Francois Malan (1874-1959) Palestine in 10 years, with Jews and Arabs both
maintained a fight for Afrikaans domination of participating in the government. Again, both
South Africa. sides denounced the idea. The coming of World
War II suspended matters, especially as the Jews
recognized Germany as the greater enemy and
TURKEY closed ranks behind the British.
Under Mustapha Kemal, Turkey continued its
program of westernization that completely trans-
formed the nation without violence. Externally, HEJAZ/SAUDI ARABIA
Turkey made peace with its neighbors and joined The Arabian territories of Ibn Saud, who was
the League of Nations. King of the Hejaz and Sultan of Nejd, were
Kemal Ataturk died on November 10, 1938, named Saudi Arabia" in his honor on Septem-
and was succeeded as president by Ismet Inonu ber 22, 1932. Under the continued rule of
Ibn
Saud, a policy of technological modernization Gandhi was opposed on both sides of the In-
was implemented. Roads and railroads were dian spectrum. On the right, the Indian Muslims
built and airflight was introduced. had the "Muslim League" which was, to them,
the sole representative of their interests, not
Gandhi's "Congress Party." And on the left, the
IRAQ Subhas Chandra Bose (1897-1945),
nationalist,
Iraq, though mandate since World War
a British wanted complete independence for India at once
I, was virtually independent and became a mem- and was dissatisfied with Gandhi's program of
ber of the League of Nations in 1932. King Faisal passive resistance.
I of Iraq died on September 8, 1933, and was Things might have been worse had not the
succeeded by his son, who ruled as Ghazi I Japanese aggression in the east raised the threat
(1912-1939). of an eventual Japanese penetration of India.
An oil pipeline was opened in 1934, leading Most Indians preferred to cling to Great Britain
from the Mosul oil fields to the Mediterranean, at least sufficiently to be sure of her protection
and this marked the beginning of the Middle East against the Japanese.
as a great source of fuel oil for the world. Iraq
strongly backed the Arab cause in Palestine and
tried to establish a pan-Arab movement that
AUSTRALIA
would multiply Arab power in the world coun- In 1933, there seemed to be the possibility that
cils. Ghazi died in an automobile accident on Australia would break up into two nations as the
April 4, 1939 and was succeeded by his son, western half of the continent showed a disposi-
Faisal II (1935-1958), whose uncle served as re- tion to go its own way. The British parliament,
gent. however, refused to allow this. In 1937, Aus-
tralia, all too aware of the danger from an expan-
sive and aggressive Japan, began a program of

PERSIA/IRAN rearmament.
Persia adopted the name of Iran, officially, on
March 21, 1935. Iran began its efforts to control
its own oil resources, which were then largely
NEW ZEALAND
under the control of the British and Americans. In much of this decade. New Zealand was con-
trolled by the Labour Party, which fought the
effects of the Depression with social legislation of
AFGHANISTAN the New Deal type.
The Afghani king, Mohammed Nadir, was assas-
sinated on November 8, 1933. He was succeeded
by his son, Mohammed Zahir (b. 1914).
PHILIPPINES
Beginning United States planned for
in 1933, the
eventual Philippine independence. In 1935, the
INDIA islands gained a "Commonwealth" status (some-
Gandhi was beginning be more and more con-
to thing that in the British system might have been
cerned with the plight of the "untouchables" in called a "Dominion"). The Filipinos voted for
India — the casteless individuals who were president, and chose Manuel Luis Quezon y
treated as scarcely human. Molina (1878-1944), an experienced politician.
He continued to get his way, despite several At first there was a feeling among Filipinos for
jailings,by fasting and threatening to do so to complete independence as soon as possible, but
the death. The British dared not allow this, Japanese expansionism frightened them and they
knowing that Gandhi's death would lead to wild preferred to cling to the United States until that
disorders it might be impossible to contain. danger had passed.
1939 TO 1945 595
1939 TO 1945
redemption. Meanwhile, 1600
GERMANY engaged in the indiscriminate
German planes
bombing of Polish
Germany faced the future with supreme confi- cities, air fields, and troop concentrations and re-
dence on September 1, 1939. It was prepared for duced the nation to chaos. In three days the Pol-
war, and it knew that the British and French ish airforce and its small naval force in the
Baltic
were not. predicted that, at the invasion of Po-
It
were gone.
land, the British and French might huff and puff,
On September 17, the Soviet Union completed
but not actually go to war. This seemed all the the Polish debacle, which scarcely needed com-
more likely, since Germany had signed up the pleting, by invading from the east. On Septem-
Union on its own side so that the British
Soviet ber 19, German and Soviet forces met in central
and French had absolutely no way of directly aid- Poland.
ing Poland in any meaningful manner.
The city of Warsaw maintained a despairing
If, on the other hand. Great Britain
and France resistance, but savage bombing battered it into
did go to war, it might be only to avoid the loss
surrender by September 27, and all significant
of national "honor," and without any serious in-
Polish resistance came to an end, though some
tent to fight. If so, a really quick and devastating minor fortresses held out until October 5. The
campaign in Poland would soon deprive them of entire campaign, from first to last, had taken less
any reason to fight, and fright (if nothing else) than five weeks, and German losses were negli-
would impel them to make peace. gible. By September 29, the Germans and Soviets
So Germany, without warning, drove mas- had agreed to divide Poland into two pieces
sively into Poland on September 1, 1939. Proba-
roughly equal in area. Germany took the more
bly no major campaign in the history of warfare
populous west, which was mainly Polish. The
since the campaigns of Genghis Khan seven cen- Soviets took the less populous east, which was oc-
turies before went so smoothly, and was exe- cupied chiefly by Byelorussians and Ukrainians.
cuted so perfectly, or so ruthlessly. The Soviet Union also established domination
A million and a quarter Germans poured east- over the three small Baltic states and attacked
ward under their commander-in-chief, Walther Finland as the year drew to its end, finally de-
von Brauchitsch (1881—1948). A double develop- feating it and absorbing certain border areas.
ment was planned with armies plunging south- The Soviet Union did all this to expand its
ward from East Prussia under Fedor von Bock western borders in order to neutralize the sud-
(1880-1945) and other armies moving northward den vast increase German
in strength. Germany
from Silesia and Slovakia under Karl Rudolf Gerd allowed for before
it, it could settle matters with
von Rundstedt (1875-1953). Poland was flat and the Soviet Union, had
it to take care of Great
there were no natural barriers to slow the Ger- Britain and France, with which it was, after all,
mans. at war.
The Poles, having chosen to defend their bor- This war, however, did not seem to be much.
ders, rather than to fall back behind the river As Germany had expected, the British and
lines in central Poland,
played into German French, going to war with the greatest reluctance
hands. The German forces, with a three-to-one and apprehension, did absolutely nothing to
numerical edge and with an incomparably help Poland, and merely watched their only allv
stronger force of tanks and armor, simply cut be- crumble and disappear with devastating speed.
hind the Polish armies and, within 10 days, made The German victory was as one-sided and as
it certain that the Poles were smashed beyond complete as it was because Germany chose to
keep only a skeleton force on its western frontier. had no fear of France. He rightly felt that France
Had the French, with five times the strength of was and needed only a push to
ripe for defeat
that force, launched an attack then, even one that collapse. Great Britain was another matter, for
accomplished little directly, it would have forced Hitler faced the problem that had earlier faced
Germany to pull troops out of Poland. The Ger- Louis XIV, Napoleon, and Kaiser William II.
man time table would have been upset and Po- How could one defeat Great Britain when the
land might have had some breathing space. British controlled the sea and this made a land
However, it didn't happen. invasion impossible?
Judging correctly from this that war enthusi- Had any of the earlier three conquerors been
asm was low in Great Britain and nonexistent in able to send an army into Great Britain, the Brit-
France, Hitler felt he could take time out to digest ish would undoubtedly have been defeated but —
his Polish gains and to rest his army. What fol- none of them could. To be sure, William II had
lowed then was a winter of inactivity that was had submarines, which the first two had not, but
referred to sarcastically by those who wanted that had not been enough. Hitler also had sub-
sterner action against Hitler as "the phoney marines and, in addition, a magnificent airforce,
war." which had just shown its abilities in Spain and in
Hitler also seized the opportunity to fight a Poland and which was more numerous than the
psychological battle. He had had the Polish cam- combined air fleets of Great Britain and France.
paign recorded by movie cameras in such a way However, the airplanes, while far superior to
as to emphasize the strength and speed of Ger- the egg-crates of World War I, were still short-
man forces, and the devastating defeat of the range, and, to be effective in attacking Great Brit-
Poles. These were shown throughout Europe, as ain, Hitler would need as many bases as possible
were similar films of later German victories, and as close to Great Britain as possible.
everywhere they spread defeatism among those While Hitler pondered this problem in the
who opposed Germany, and imbued nations winter of 1939-1940, the question of Scandinavia
generally with the feeling that Germany was in- came up. Germany got its iron ore from Sweden
vincible and that surrender was the only alterna- and had to have it if it were to prosecute the war
tive to devastation. successfully. The iron ore reached Germany by
In one respect, however, victory exacted its way of the Baltic Sea, which was secure as long
toll. Hitler was a megalomaniac who eagerly took as the Union stayed neutral. It also
Soviet
credit for all that went right and, even more ea- reached Germany by ships that carried the iron
gerly, blamed others for all that went wrong. As ore through Norwegian territorial waters (with
a result of the events of 1938 and early 1939, he Norway's reluctant permission).
already considered himself a political and diplo- When the Soviet Union was fighting Finland
matic genius for the way in which he faced down that winter. Great Britain and France seemed far
the western powers (not taking into account that more eager to help the Finns against the Soviets
he had as his opponents a miserable set of gut- than they had been to help the Poles against the
less incompetents). Germans. The western powers were, even now,
Now, as a result of the Polish campaign, he more anti-Soviet than anti-German. No aid to
downplayed the importance of the well-oiled Finland was actually sent, but Germany viewed
German military machine and his excellent gen- with alarm the possibility of British-French
erals, and felt himself to be a military genius as forces basing themselves in Scandinavia.
well. This delusion never left him and he insisted In addition, the British talkedabout mining
on handling every aspect of the war himself and the territorial waters of Norway in order to pre-
of never listening to the advice of those who clude the shipment of iron ore by that route. In
knew more than he did. fact, on February 16, 1940, British ships entered
In now facing France and Great Britain, Hitler Norwegian territorial waters to rescue 299 pris-
1939 TO 1945 597
oners of war from a German ship, the Altmark. The Norwegian campaign showed the effec-
On April 8, British ships sailed eastward to begin tive way in which the Germans could use ships
mining operations. and planes to invade a land that was separated
By then, however. Hitler had decided on a from it by the sea, a feat that had to make the
northern campaign to make his supplies of iron British nervous. the process, however, the
In
ore secure and to establish air bases from which Germans lost their destroyer force and their fleet
northern England and Scotland could be at- was reduced handful of ships that could be
to a
tacked. used for raiding purposes but very little else.
On April 9, Germany invaded Denmark, since While Hitler took advantage of the way in
it was en route to Norway, and occupied it with- which the Anglo-French eyes were fixed on Fin-
out a shot being fired. land rather than on Poland, and while pinning
Germanships then carried troops into Oslo them down in Norway with rather minor forces,
fjord, where the Norwegians defended them- he had carefully assembled about 2.5 million men
selves fiercely but uselessly. airborneGerman on Germany's western frontier, with Brauchitsch
troops landed in Oslo and the taken on city was in overall command as in Poland.
April 10. Under the German general, Nikolaus Opposed to the Germans was
roughly equal
a
von Falkenhorst (1885—1968), German forces force on the French side of the border under the
spread quickly through the nation. overall command of Gustave-Maurice Gamelin
British and French troops, which had been as- (1872-1958), a conservative and unimaginative
sembled for possible aid to Finland, were sent to commander.
Norway instead and landed in the Trondheim The French had more tanks than the Germans
region in central Norway, beginning on April 14. did, but they were scattered widely among the
The Germans brought up reinforcements and, army groups, whereas the Germans had their
between that and the skillful use of their aircraft, tanks concentrated in the center under Rund-
they beat the Allied troops soundly and forced stedt.
them to return to their British bases on May 2. The French relied on the Maginot
keep line to
King Haakon VI and the Norwegian government the Germans out of Alsace-Lorraine, and put
went with them to set up a government-in-exile. most of their troops on the Belgian border, where
The Allies made a better showing in Narvik in they expected the Germans to come barreling
northern Norway. There, fighting continued down as they did in 1914. The hinge between the
from April 24 to May 28. The Allies, however, Belgian line and the Maginot line was lightly held
were forced to quit in the end because disaster because the Ardennes forest was there and that
was engulfing them in France. By June 9, they was thought to be so formidable a barrier as to
were gone and every square mile of Norway was require little defense.
in German hands, with a Norwegian Fascist, German equipment on the ground, and espe-
Vidkun Quisling (1881-1945), who had been cially in the air, was far superior to that of the
Norway's minister of defense between 1931 and Allies. What's more, the German army with
1933, as the nominal ruler. the smashing Polish victory behind them and the
Although many nations, both before and dur- daring Norwegian invasion clearly successful,
ing World War II, have been ruled by native trai- was eager to advance, while the British and
tors willing to serve as puppets for a conquering French, with eight months of inactivity and oc-
army, it is who
has lent his name to
Quisling casional defeat, could only be described as down-
serve as generic representative of all. Perhaps it in-the-mouth.
—
was the sound of the name it might seem that Belgium and the Netherlands had adequate
"quisling" means "to quizzle," which may be in- armies and defenses, but neither could stand up
terpreted as performing actions that make one against the Germans for long, and, such was
"queasy." their anxiety not to goad the Germans into at-
tacking, that they went out of their way not to The French now saw the danger, but it was far
coordinate their defenses with those of the Al- too late. Gamelin was relieved of his command
lies. Therefore, they stood out, weak and ex- and was replaced on May 19 by Maxime Wey-
posed. gand, who had a much-inflated reputation be-
The German plan was to pass through Bel- cause he had advised the Poles in their defeat of
gium as in 1914 ^nd this time, to make adequate the Russians 20 years earlier. There was nothing
room for the passage by passing through the Weygand could do to prevent the Germans from
Netherlands as well. The Allies, they hoped, reaching the English channel on May 20, 1940,
would leave their fortified border to come for- and trapping large numbers^ of French, Brit-
ward to meet them, and the Germans would ish, and Belgians along the coast of northern
then thrust overwhelmingly through the hinge France and Belgium. The only attack the French
between Belgium and the Maginot line, and, were able to mount that managed to stall the Ger-
turning right, trap the Allied armies in Belgium mans for even a moment was under the leader-
and northern France. ship of Charles de Gaulle (1890-1970), who was
Once again, German plans worked perfectly. an expert on armored warfare and had tried to
On May 10, the German planes began the terror get the French army to organize itself in small
bombing of the Netherlands and of Belgium. Para- ultramobile groups.The French generals had
troopers were dropped in key areas of both na- turned him down, but the Guderians and Rom-
tions, paralyzing any attempt at the organization mels of the German army had followed his ad-
of a useful defense. vice.
The Netherlands cut its dikes and flooded the Now the Germans began to compress the
country in their time-honored way of stopping pocket in order to trap or kill the hundreds of
invaders, but that did not stop the Germans. thousands of soldiers trapped there. It was a
French troops did, as foreseen by the Germans, choking maneuver that couldn't miss, for the Al-
advance into the Netherlands, but they were eas- lied soldiers had nowhere to go, no chance of
ily hurled back by the Germans. The Germans reinforcements, no hope of avoiding death or
demanded Dutch surrender and, on May 13, capture.
made it clear what the alternative was by brutally On May Leopold III of Belgium sur-
28, 1940,
bombing Rotterdam to destruction. The next rendered. Without warning the British and
day, the Dutch surrendered and Queen Wilhel- French, he ordered the Belgians to lay down their
mina and her cabinet fled to Great Britain. arms. What's more, he remained behind in Bel-
The fighting in Belgium continued, and the gium while the Belgian government fled to Great
Germans held back deliberately, to encourage as Britain, thus giving rise to the thought that he
much of the Allied armies as possible to enter was willing to serve as a German puppet.
Belgium. Rundstedt was meanwhile pushing The British and French were now squeezed
carefully through the Ardennes, waiting for the into a small pocket at Dunkirk, and it was clear
Allies to be fully committed to the Belgian cam- that nearly 400,000 soldiers, some five eighths of
paign. them British, had no choice but to surrender, and
On May Rundstedt went into high gear,
13, that in a very brief time.
driving through the supposedly impassable Ar- —
Nothing could stop it except Hitler. He now
dennes, destroying the French 9th Army, and proceeded to make his first mistake of the war
then pouring through in an unstoppable flood. for he ordered the German tanks to stop.
German planes bombed the roads behind the No one is really sure why he gave this order.
French forces, making confusion worse. Tank The usual thought is that Hermann Goering, the
corps turned northward to ride toward the En- vainglorious commander-in-chief of the German
glishChannel under the capable leadership of Air Force, wanted his share of the glory, and de-
Heinz Wilhelm Guderian (1888-1954) and Erwin manded that the pocket at Dunkirk be
last
Johannes Eugen Rommel (1891-1944). smashed by air rather than ground action. Hitler
1939 TO 1945 599
may have agreed because he felt it could be done France might have accepted defeat on the con-
and that his army might be spared any casualties tinent and its government might have retired to
at all so that
could continue the fight
it at full North Africa continue the fight from France's
to
strength against France and England. imperial possessions, but the French saw no
In any case, the tanks stopped and the Ger- point to that. They felt that Germany was
far too
man planes went into action. Coming to fight strong to be defeated and that Great Britain
them, however, was the British Royal Air Force, would, in a matter of weeks, join France in defeat
closer to home, and able to make more sorties. and all would be over.
For the first time in the war, the Germans tem- Therefore, the French surrendered on June 2,
porarily lost control of a crucial bit of air space. 1940. The French general, Charles Leon-Clement
Under the cover of the British planes, the Brit- Huntziger (1880-1941), met with the Germans in
ish forces at Dunkirk set up a defense perimeter the Compiegne Forest where, 22 years earlier,
and British ships came down the coast and across the Germans had been forced to accept defeat
the channel to pick up the soldiers. There were after World War The Germans made the
I.
850 ships altogether, of almost all

all kinds, French capitulate in the same railroad car and
manned by civilians who, in the course of eight then blew it up so that never again would it stand
days, managed to pick up 225,000 British soldiers as a monument to the 1918 surrender.
and 112,000 French and Belgian soldiers and to By June 21, 1940, all fighting in France ceased
carry them off to Great Britain out of the teeth of and Germany was in direct control of three fifths
the German army. of the nation, including the northern and west-
heavy equipment was lost, but the
All the ern coastlines. The rest was a wretched puppet
men were saved, and the absolute heroism of the French state with its capital at Vichy. It was
action, for all that it was a defeat coming at the under the leadership of Philippe Petain, now 84
end of a retreat, had the moral force of a victory. years old. Twenty-three years earlier he had been
Had Hitler not given his "stop order," those the hero of Verdun, but in dishonored old age,
338,000 men would have been prisoners and Brit- he was a German puppet.
ish disheartenment might have been so great as Out of the wreckage, Charles de Gaulle man-
to have made impossible what was to follow. aged to flee to Great Britain, where he carried on
But the war went on. The German units at the fight against Germany as leader of the "Free
Dunkirk faced about with exemplary efficiency French."
and made ready to defeat what remained of the Hitlerhad every reason to look upon the map
French forces. of Europe with satisfaction. He had been at war
On June 5, the Germans, from their line across for only 10 months and, except for the evacuation
northern France, attacked southward. The of Dunkirk, all the German military plans had
French tried to fight, and some units fought des- worked with watchmaker's precision. He had de-
perately and bravely —
but uselessly. They fell feated and occupied half of Poland, three fifths
back in disorder. The French government left of France, and all of Denmark, Norway, the
Paris for Bordeaux southwest on June 10.
in the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg. The
On June 13, Paris was declared an open (i.e., rest of the European continent, including the So-
undefended) city to save it from the fate of War- viet Union, consisted of nations that were either
saw and Rotterdam, and on June 14, 1940 the neutral or were German allies. On the other side
Germans marched in. of the world, Japan was a German ally, too.
Meanwhile, on June 10, Mussolini (who had Only Great Britain remained at war with Ger-
maintained a cautious neutrality now) de- till many, and across the Atlantic Ocean, the United
cided that Germany had won the war and that it States was hostile, but was hamstrung by isola-
was necessary to join now so that Italy might get tionism.
a share of the loot. It was a despicable act and it Itseemed only necessary to force Great Britain
seemed the last straw. to surrender, and Germany would be, without
question, the strongest military power on earth. verable, and were superior plane to plane to
With Germany at the head of a united Europe, those of the Germans.
even the United States might draw back and de- Most important of all was this: in the years
cide to cooperate. immediately before World War II, the British had
Great Britain, however, showed no disposi- invented radar and had set up radar posts. They
tion to surrender. The British government was always knew when the German planes were
now headed by Winston Churchill, who turned coming and where they were heading, and were
to the United States for help. The British fleet always ready for them.
was stretched thin trying to guard merchant The "Battle of Britain," in other words, was
ships, fight off U-boats, and protect themselves not to be so sure and easy a victory for Germany
against Italian ships in the Mediterranean and as it seemed.
Japanese ships in the Pacific. Even the French Nevertheless, during the month of August
fleet, which might conceivably be turned over to 1940, the Germans, regardless of losses and dif-
the Germans, was a deadly threat. ficulties, forced their way inward by dint of sheer
Roosevelt, using all his political skills and numbers of planes and bombed airfields and
charm, maneuvered Congress and public opin- communications centers throughout Great Brit-
ion into assisting Great Britain, turning over 50 ain. For this the Germans paid a heavy price, but
old American destroyers to British use, for in- Great Britain was also losing planes and pilots
stance. faster than they could be replaced.
Germany could not allow this sort of thing to Because some bombs had dropped on Lon-
continue, and it was clear that if Great Britain don, the British felt they had to retaliate and sent
chose not to surrender it must be invaded and bombers over Germany, beginning on August
crushed. There could be no invasion as long as 24. Berlin was bombed on three nights, and some
Great Britain controlled the English Channel and other cities were also hit. Damage was slight, for
the North Sea, but Germany had bases all along the British did not have many planes to spare for
the French and Norwegian coasts from which the purpose, but psychologically the effect was
their planes could fly. Hitler could use them to enormous. In the first year of the war, the Ger-
destroy the British air force, then go on to sink or mans had been untouched. Casualties and
totally
immobilize the ships of the British Navy, and he destruction had been the lot of German enemies,
could then invade Great Britain and take it over and not of Germans. But now the war was
in a week seemed a clearcut and rather
or so. It brought, however slightly, to the doorstep of
simple job, and Goering was sure that the Ger- German civilians, and Hitler reacted with blind
man planes under his command could do it. fury.
After all, the Germans had 2800 planes against He gave up bombing of airfields and com-
the
Great Britain's 650. munications centers, which had almost brought
Germany, however, labored under several Great Britain to its knees, and turned vengefully
disadvantages. First, they had to travel consid- to the bombardment of the cities, particularly
erable distances to reach the British skies, while London, which was spectacular but had no stra-
the British fought at home. Therefore, Germany tegic value. On September 7, 1940, the "blitz"
had toexpend much more gasoline than the Brit- began.
ish did, and gasoline was never in great supply. Day after day, the German bombers and
Then, too, if the battles took place over British fighters converged on London; and day after
soil, every British flier parachuting out of a day, the British planes rose to meet them. Lon-
stricken plane could go up in another. Every Ger- don was damaged, but the British spirit
terribly
man flyer downed was imprisoned. Skilled fliers remained unbroken under the bombings, and
were not in great supply either. Third, the British they exacted a fearful toll of German planes and
planes, if fewer in number, were more maneu- pilots.
1939 TO 1945 601
The greatest attack came on September 15, doubtedly, Hitler and the German generals knew
1940, when over 1000 bombers and 700 fighters what had happened to Charles XII of Sweden
swept over London, but the loss in German and to Napolean of France when they had in-
I
planes that resulted was better than two to one vaded Russia, but it didn't seem to bother them.
over the loss in British planes. Hitler intended an invasion on a far larger
Germany had meanwhile prepared barges in scale than could possibly have been carried
ports in northern France and in the Low Coun- through by Charles XII or Napoleon with their
tries, which were to carry a German army to the relatively few soldiers, marching mainly on foot
invasion of Great Britain on September 27. British and with communications not materially ad-
planes, however, destroyed most of them and, vanced beyond the system used by Genghis
by the end of September, itwas clear that the air Khan. Hitler had armor, vehicles, planes, and
bombardment had failed and that there could be and he intended to invade all along the
radio,
no invasion. line from the Arctic Ocean to the Black Sea.
Great Britain had won the Battle of Britain — at For this, even the German army was not
a fearful cost, to be sure, buthad won. And
it enough, however. Hitler would need troops
Hitler, one year after the war had begun, had
from allied nations. In the north, Finland was
suffered his first important defeat. There were ready to help since it was still enraged over the
further bombings of Great Britain through the Soviet assault in 1939 and wanted its lost territory
winter and early spring of 1940-1941, but they back. In the south, Hungary, Romania, and Bul-
were simply terror attacks, offering the Germans garia were German satellites and were ready to
no hope for the actual defeat of Great Britain, help.
despite the death and destruction they caused. As for the Soviet Union, Hitler had utter con-
In fact, the deliberate German frightfulness, as tempt for its fighting capacity. Its bad showing
well as continuing British gallantry, was steadily against Finland made it seem quite certain that it
eroding American isolationism and that did in- would collapse instantly before the German on-
credible harm to the German cause. slaught.
Hitler felthe had to make up for the defeat of All might have gone well had not the bum-
his plans against Great Britain by seeking further bling Mussolini, in his anxiety to achieve some
victories elsewhere. His eyes inevitably turned to 'glorious" victory that would in some way match
the east where stood the nation he regarded as what the Germans had been doing, attacked
his greatest enemy, the Soviet Union. The Soviet Greece in October 1940. There was no reason to
Union had kept its agreement with Germany loy- do so, except for his search for a cheap win, and
ally and had meticulously fulfilled its task of sup- he had not even bothered to arrange matters
plying materials the Nazis needed, but that did with Hitler. Predictably, Mussolini's army came
them no good. to grief, and Germany found that it would be
Hitler saw the Soviet Union as a vast space necessary to come to Mussolini's rescue, lest
occupied by Slavic submen who could be tor- Great Britain, which had come to the aid of
tured and enslaved into supporting a grand Ger- Greece, should establish a strong base there.
man Empire stretching at least as far as the Ural In order to take care of that task, it would be
Mountains, and before which a terrorized Great helpful if Yugoslavia, which lay between Ger-
Britain would be forced to surrender. The United many and Greece, could be persuaded to allow
States would then surely cower behind its oceans free passage of German troops. Under German
until the Japanese in Asia and the Germans in pressure, the Regent Paul agreed to an alliance
Europe could combine to crush it. with Germany on March 25, 1941.
So Hitler prepared tolaunch himself into the What followed was totally unexpected. There
illimitable spaces of the east, even while an em- were strong anti-German elements in Yugoslavia
battled Great Britain still stood in the west. Un- and on March 27, Regent Paul was overthrown;
under the 18-year-old king, Peter II, the alliance ish held Crete with a over 40,000 men. The
little
with Germany was repudiated. Germans, if they attempted to take the island,
Hitler, prepared instantly for war,
furious, would seem, superficially, to be going through a
and the German army responded with well-oiled rehearsal for the taking of Great Britain. In fact,
efficiency. On April 6, German planes,
1941, Crete seemed the sterner test for it was farther
with the usual lack of warning, bombed Belgrade from the Greek mainland than Great Britain was
with customary indiscriminate frightfulness. from France.
This brought the Yugoslavs into a state of the There was, however, a key difference. Ger-
utmost confusion. The German army columns many was in complete control of the air over
slashed in and, in 10 days, completed the con- Crete, and what British planes* were to be found
quest of the nation. The Yugoslavs surrendered on the island were forced to withdraw or to sub-
unconditionally on April 17. mit to destruction. Therefore, it was possible for
was even more impressive a conquest than
It the Germans, under Karl Student (1890-1978),
that of Poland had been. Whereas Poland had who had led the German conquest of the Neth-
been flat, with no natural obstacles, and where it erlands, to plan a paratroop assault on Crete.
had had to face a second enemy to its east, Yu- On May 20, 1941, the German assault began.
goslavia was a mountainous country that might It was by no means inexpensive, for the British
have been expected to offer a diehard resistance, inflicted heavy casualties and destroyed many
yet it went down at once. (However, the story of planes. Nevertheless, the Germans grimly re-
Yugoslavia did not end with its surrender.) doubled their efforts and eventually succeeded in
Meanwhile, even as the Germans had begun carrying through landings, establishing beach-
to overrun Yugoslavia, other German army units heads, and expanding them.
crossed the Bulgarian border into Greece and The fought hard. The British navy tried
British
promptly smashed the northern Greek armies to send in reinforcements and suffered heavy ca-
that had earlier had no trouble defeating the Ital- sualties. In the end, on May 31, 1941, the British
ians. were forced to evacuate a foothold on the Euro-
Other Greek units fought desperately to hold pean continent for a third time, and retired to
off the Germans while the British retreated Egypt.
southward. By April 23, however, the Greeks This was the
capture of a major piece of
first
were forced to surrender and it became question- territory by air assault alone, and there was gen-
able as to whether the British could retreat suc- eral astonishment that the Germans had been
cessfully or whether they would fall prisoner to able to do However, was so expensive
it. it a feat,
the Germans. and so many experienced paratroopers were lost,
The British general, Henry Maitland Wilson that Hitler never tried to repeat the tactic again.
(1881-1964), however, fought hard and maneu- The Balkan campaign, on the whole, once
vered successfully, so that on April 27, 43,000 again showed that the German forces were by far
British troops were taken off the southern Greek the best trained and best led in the world at the
coast and taken to the island of Crete. King time. All of the European continent west of the
George II and the Greek government also fled to Soviet Union was now in the grip of the German
Crete. Again, all heavy equipment was lost so army except for Sweden, Switzerland, Spain and
that it was a second, smaller Dunkirk. Portugal.
In general, however, one Dunkirk was was now ready for his assault on the
Hitler
enough. There was considerable dissatisfaction Soviet Union; and here the Balkan campaign,
over the second. short and enormously successful though it was,
There was no doubt among the British on had introduced dangerous delay.
a
Crete that the Germans would try to take the Had Italy not invaded Greece and done badly
island. With the New Zealand general Bernard there. Hitler could have made use of Hungary,
Cyril Freyberg (1889-1963) in command, the Brit- Romania, and Bulgaria, and launched his offen-
1939 TO 1945 603
sive in May. The need to clear up

April or
A German army under Fritz Eric von Manstein
Greece, where Italian failure had brought in Brit-
(1887-1973) entered the Crimea and took most of
ish troops and encouraged the Yugoslav
uprising it.By September 4, Leningrad had been sur-
against Germany, cost him two months of fight-
rounded and placed under siege.
irig/ so that he wasn t ready for his Soviet adven- At the beginning of October, the Germans in
ture the second half of June.
till
the center closed another trap at Vyazma and
still
Did that matter? Yes, it did. Itwas important Bryansk and captured 650,000 more men. By Oc-
for Germany to crush the Soviet Union before the tober 20, the Germans stood at Mozhaisk, only
winter weather set in. That might have been cer-
40 miles west of Moscow. The Soviet government
tain if the invasion had started on April
22; it was fled to Kuibyshev, far to the east (though
Stalin,
less certain on June 22.
if it started in a remarkable display of resolution,
remained
Nevertheless, Hitler had no qualms. He was in Moscow).
sure that the Soviet Union would collapse before
It looked as though Hitler's calculation had
winter. So certain was he that he made no plans
once more been correct and that the Soviet Union
for a winter campaign, and no effort to see
that was finished. Indeed, the German propaganda
his army would be issued winter clothes
and mill announced
October that the Soviet war
in
winterized vehicles. Hitler had been spoiled by was over. Certainly, to outside onlookers it
success and thought he had merely to will in
seemed over. The Soviet Union, in four months,
order to achieve —
even despite the failure in the had suffered 3 million casualties, half of them
Battle of Britain.
having been taken as prisoners of war.
At first, his confidence seemed
The justified. There were, however, several other things to
Soviet Union had no reason to be caught by sur- consider. First, never before had the German
prise. British intelligence, which had broken the
army had to advance quite so far or strain to hold
German secret codes and knew what was going on to quite so huge a territory. This alone
on, warned Stalin. Stalin's own spies warned
stretched their capacities to the uttermost.
him. Stalin, however, as paranoid as Hitler, pre-
Second, the Soviet Union did not collapse.
ferred to believe it all a plot to inveigle the Soviet The Russian people had a long history of unbe-
Union into a war with Germany for the benefit of lievable stolidity under pressure. Despite all its
Great Britain. Stalin, therefore, did nothing. At 3 losses, the Soviet Union had reserves available.
A.M. on June 22, 1942, when 3 million soldiers of Slowly, it had recovered from the initial shock,
the German army and its allies crossed the Soviet buying time with space, and organizing itself for
border and advanced along the entire front, the more effective resistance. What's more, the Ger-
Soviet Union was caught flatfooted. mans themselves saw to it that the Soviet peoples
German planes virtually destroyed the for- would not collapse. They were treated with such
ward air fleets of the Soviet Union, and, working barbaric frightfulness by the Germans that even
with their usual clockwork precision, the Ger- if the Russians had wanted to greet
the Germans
mans, under Brauchitsch and his usual subordi- as rescuers from oppression, they could not.
nate generals, encircled one Soviet army after They joined guerrilla bands instead.
another. Third, Hitler had started too late. By October,
By July 10, German
were in Minsk, tak-
forces the rains came and the primitive Soviet roads be-
ing nearly 300,000 prisoners and capturing vast came quagmires mud. The Germans relied on
of
numbers of tanks and guns. In the course of the wheeled vehicles, rather than on treaded ones,
next 10 days, another trap shut at Smolensk, and the wheels could not negotiate the mud.
with 100,000 more prisoners and more tanks. By What's more, the temperature was dropping and
the middle of August, the Germans were deep in the rains began to freeze under conditions where
the Ukraine. On September
Kiev fell to the
19, the German soldiers had only their summer uni-
Germans and virtually the entire Russian army forms to fight Soviet soldiers who were superbly
in the Ukraine, 665,000 men, surrendered. clothed for winter fighting.
Fourth, the shock of war had brought to the counterattack. The Germans fought back with
fore the more capable Soviet generals. Thus, enormous skill and force, but the astounded
Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov (1896-1974), as world watched as the Germans were forced to
good a general as any German, was now in fall back. They did not fall back very far, to be
charge of the defense of Moscow. sure, but when had the German armies in this
Fifth, Great Britain and the United States, war been forced to fall back at all?
frightened of a German victory over the Soviet The very day after the countrerattack was
Union, and what it might portend for the world, launched, the war took a surprising turn when
temporarily buried their suspicions of Commu- the Japanese bombed Pearl Flarbor in Hawaii so
nism and began to help the Soviet Union in a that the United States found itself at war.
major way. They began to supply the Soviets The response by Germany was absolutely flab-
with planes, weapons, medicines, and more. bergasting. The mistake of stopping the tanks at
The Germans continued to make some gains. Dunkirk, of bombing London instead of airfields
On November 22, they took Rostov at the mouth and communications centers, of invading the So-
of the Don River. But, wonder of wonders, the viet Union two months too late, were all as noth-
Soviets counterattacked and, on December 1, ing compared to the fact that on December 11,
1941, they retook Rostov. The Germans hadn't al- Germany declared war on the United States.
ways succeeded. They had failed at Dunkirk and Why? It was totally unnecessary. Hitler may
failed at the Battle of Britain, but in 26 months of have declared war as a gesture of solidarity with
war, the Germans had never once been forced Japan, hoping that, in return, Japan would de-
out of any position they had taken —
until now. clare war on the Soviet Union. However, Japan
Rundstedt, who was in command of the army did no such thing.
that had been driven out, at once resigned be- It might also be that Germany felt that the
cause, as he well knew. Hitler would instantly United States was too far away and too mired in
fire him (which he did). He was replaced by isolationist thinking to be much of an enemy, but
Walther von Reichenau (1884-1942), who, a little even if that were so, why unnecessarily multiply
over two years earlier, had taken Warsaw. enemies?
In the center, the German forces were now On the other hand, if Hitler had not declared
under Hans Gunther von Kluge (1882-1944), war on the United States, American public opin-
who continued to grind forward in increasingly ion, outraged by the sneak attack on Pearl Har-
horrible weather. By December 6, 1941, he had bor, might surely have insisted on war to the
wormed his way to within 25 miles of the center uttermost with Japan, concentrated and instant.
of Moscow. The Germans were in the outer sub- Europe might suddenly have seemed not our
urbs and the towers of the Kremlin could be concern, or at least as something to be taken care
made out in field glasses. But that was as far as of only after Japan had been properly punished.
they could go, and no orders from Berlin could American aid to Great Britain and the Soviet
make the soldiers advance any further. Union might have dwindled and German victory
In a fury. Hitler fired Brauchitsch and a num- in Europe (at least until the United States could
ber of other generals and took over personal turn its attention Europe-ward) might have been
command of the armies, working through Wil- assured.
helm Keitel (1882-1946), a field-marshal who was Hitler, however, made that impossible. By de-
frightened to death of Hitler and who functioned claring war on the United States, he gave that
only as a transmitter of orders. nation two wars to fight, and, as it happened,
But it was not just that the Germans could Roosevelt and his generals decided that Ger-
advance no further against Moscow. On Decem- many, and not Japan (despite Pearl Harbor), was
ber 6, 1941, the Soviets finally had assembled an the more immediate danger. The war against
efficient force, warmly dressed, with tanks ad- Japan was prosecuted vigorously, but the war
justed to the freezing weather —
and launched a against Germany received priority.
1939 TO 1945 605
Meanwhile, Germany's concern was the Rus- mies seemed over. The German Sixth Army
sian front. At Hitler's insistence, German troops under Friedrich Paulus (1890-1957) crossed the
set up "hedgehog areas" which were staunchly Don River at the point of its nearest approach to
defended and which wore down the Soviet coun- the Volga River. On August 23, 1942, Paulus
teroffensive. The Soviets made gains but they reached the Volga just north of the city of Stalin-
were relatively small. Leningrad remained under grad.
siege, suffering horribly, and most of the Ger- Paulus could take the city he could cut com-
If
man gains in Russia in 1941 were held. munications between central Russia and the oil
Germany waited come, for the
for spring to fields of the Caucasus and that might mark the
snow to melt, and for the ground to dry out. beginning of the end of the Soviet Union. The
There would then be another summer offensive. Soviet Union, painfully aware of this, made
However, it was not to be 1941 all over again. For ready for a to-the-death struggle for Stalingrad.
one thing, the Germans had suffered severe German armies were advancing also into the
losses for the first time, and those losses were of Caucasus. Rostov, which the Russians had re-
their best men. They had to dig up replacements taken eight months earlier as the first blow of
who were less well-trained. Furthermore, Ger- their winter counterattack, fell again to the Ger-
man morale declined. After two years of quick, mans on July 23, 1942, and this time the Germans
painless victories, the German had had
forces flooded far beyond. By August 23, they had pen-
their first taste of fierce fighting against an enemy etrated almost to the Caspian Sea and found
as ruthless as themselves, and they didn't like it. themselves among the highest peaks of the Cau-
The Soviet Union, however, having survived and casus.
having begun to fight the Germans on almost In the summer of 1942, the fortunes of Ger-
equal terms, was in a state of rising morale. many, and of its ally, Japan, seemed to be at their
So even though Germany was ready for an- height. The German army held all of Europe
other gamble, it was not going to attack all along from Brittany on the Atlantic Ocean to the Cau-
the front as it had the year before. It planned an casus mountain range, a width of 2300 miles. At
attack chiefly in the south, aiming at the grain- the same time, German forces in Egypt were
fields of the Ukraine and the oil wells of the Cau- threatening the Suez Canal. In the Pacific, Japan
casus. occupied all of eastern and southeastern Asia
On May 8, 1942, the new offensive began, and its fleets controlled the western half of the
with an attack on the Crimea. The Russians still Pacific Ocean.
held Sevastopol and, in the east, the Kerch pen- If this made it look as though Germany and
insula. Once again, however, the German steam- Japan were on the point of victory, appearances
crushed opposition. The Kerch peninsula
roller were deceiving. Germany and Japan had both
was taken easily and, after a three-week siege, strained their manpower and economies to the
Sevastopol fell on July 2 and the entire Crimean utmost, even while both Great Britain and the
pensinsulawas in German hands. Soviet Union were continuing to fight and
The Germans next poured across the straits the untouched United States was still mobilizing
into the Caucasus, and, farther north, into the its matchless power.
great eastward bend of the Don

VoronezhRiver. What happened in Egypt and in the Pacific we
on the Don River fell on July 6, 1942, and with will describe at appropriate points later, but in
that the Germans had advanced beyond their far- Europe itself, the fighting at Stalingrad grew into
thest mark in 1941 (though they remained short the largest land battle the world had ever seen,
of their record mark in central and northern So- either before or since.
viet Union). Hitler was almost insane determination
in his
The Germans occupied the bend of the Don, to take Stalingrad, partly for its undeniable stra-
but this time, the Russians withdrew in good tegic position, and partly because it bore Stalin's
order, for the days of trapping entire Russian ar- name. He threw in every division he could
against Russians who defended it as bitterly as tacking German army to relieve him. However,
Germany attacked. Each building in the city be- Manstein's army never reached Stalingrad and
came a and separate floors were at-
fortress, the supplies that were delivered to the trapped
tacked and defended. The city was pounded into Germans by air were woefully inadequate.
rubble by German guns, but the rubble was all The Germans caught in the Stalingrad pocket
the easier to defend, all the more difficult to at- fought on resolutely but hopelessly, and the So-
tack. viets slowly squeezed and squeezed, until fi-
The Germans were fighting at the end of a nally, on February 2, 1943, what was left of the
long communications line, constantly threatened German forces was forced to, surrender. Paulus
by Soviet guerrillas. The Germans were also himself went into captivity, the first time ever
forced to depend on satellite forces Ruma- — that a German field-marshal had surrendered.
nians, Hungarians, Italians — in relatively quiet To be sure, Manstein, in a brilliant display,
sectors north and south of Stalingrad so as beto defeated the Soviets in the eastern Ukraine in a
able to concentrate their own slowly dwindling month's fighting in February and March of 1943,
forces on the The satellite forces lacked
city itself. and retook Kharkov, but that wasn't enough.
the German commitment to the struggle and The Soviets kept pushing and virtually all the
could not be relied on in a crisis. German gains of the summer and fall of 1942
Meanwhile, the Russians, under Zhukov, were lost in the winter-spring Soviet offensive of
were quietly assembling troops to the east of Sta- 1942-1943.
lingrad, and were waiting for the time to coun- The Germans were fatally weakened. They
terattack. As the German supplies, fed by had lost 300,000 men at Stalingrad, and over a
inadequate communication lines, dwindled, and million men altogether. The Soviets had lost as
as the weather started turning cold, the Soviets many, but they were stronger than ever, thanks
moved into action. in large part to the suppliespouring into the na-
On November 19, 1942, the Soviets struck sition in ever-increasing volume from Great Britain
multaneously north and south of Stalingrad. The and the United States.
Satellite troops gave way at once and the Soviets The Soviets at the height of their 1942-1943
swept through in an encirclement that neatly counteroffensive had taken the city of Kursk
trapped Paulus's Sixth Army. For the first time south of Moscow and driven a wedge to the
in the war, a German army was trapped. westward. The Germans still felt they could re-
Paulus ought to have battled his way west- coup some of their losses in the summer of 1943.
ward, trying to break out of the Soviet ring and No more would there be an advance along the
all
to retire to a more easily defensible line. Hitler, line as in 1941, or even all along the southern half
however, overaccustomed to victory and con- of the line as in 1942. Now
what was planned
vinced that any trouble that arose was through was a pincer attack north and south of Kursk to
the cowardice of his generals, refused to allow do to the Soviets what they had done to the Ger-
retreat.Then, and afterward, his orders were in- mans at Stalingrad.
evitably that of holding fast, and this lay the On July 5, 1943, the Battle of Kursk began.
groundwork for ever greater disasters for Ger- Vast numbers of German tanks met equally vast
many. Nor could the generals defy Hitler for they numbers of Russian tanks in the greatest such
feared him too much. They went along, despair- battle in history. For the first time, a German
ingly, with the orders of a virtual madman who summer offensive was stopped in its tracks. The
was nowhere near the front and who studied Soviet tanks and planes beat back the German
maps without any understanding of local diffi- tanks and planes and then, also for the first time,
culties. the Soviet forces began a summer counteroffen-
Hitler ordered Paulus to cling to his position sive.
and promised that he would be amply supplied The Germans were now no longer able to
by air, while Manstein would lead a counterat- maintain any offensive action of importance. Not
1939 TO 1945 607
only were they being beaten by the sturdy Soviet naval response. ships were newly built and
Its
forces, who had improved under the
steadily very modern, better than the Allied ships on a
German blows, but the British and Americans one-to-one basis, but there were very few of
had moved into North Africa and were attacking them. Germany had
If an outright naval
tried
in Sicily.
battle, it would have been swept from the seas.
We will stop here. Instead, its ships were used as raiders of Great
The war against Germany, out-
details of the Britain's merchant fleet. Moreover, as in World
side the continent of Europe, and within it, too, War I, Germany had an ample supply of subma-
after the failure of Germany's Kursk offensive,
rines.
are better told from the perspective of Germany's Indeed, in the first months of the war, it was
enemies, and to them we will turn. German vessels that made the headlines. On
During World War II and, indeed, during the September 3, almost immediately after
1939,
entire 12-year period in which Hitler ruled Ger- Great Britain had entered the war, a British pas-
many, German science and German culture senger liner, the Athenia, was sunk without
sagged and dropped steadily to a low point. warning 200 miles west of Scotland. On Septem-
German scientists and cultural leaders fled the ber 17, a British aircraft carrier, the Courageous,
country to the west, weakening Germany tre- was sunk by German submarine. A German
a
mendously and strengthening its enemies. submarine even managed to make its way into
the British naval base at Scapa Flow off the north-
ern coast of Scotland on October 14. There it sank
GREAT BRITAIN the British battleship. Royal Oak, and got away.
When World War II started. Great Britain was Meanwhile, through the fall of 1939, a Ger-
not really in the mood for great land battles. She man pocket battleship, the Graf Spee, was scour-
remembered well the blood-letting of World War ing the South Atlantic, sinking or capturing
I, and wanted none of it. As a matter
of fact, eleven British ships.
since the end of the Hundred Years War, nearly The British navy, beaten and humiliated, felt
five centuries earlier. Great Britain had preferred it had to get the Graf Spee. On December
13, 1939,
to remain behind the wall of the sea and to let a British squadron cornered the German ship at
her ships do the fighting for her, while subsidiz- the mouth of the River Platte between Argentina
ing other powers to do the land-fighting. Even and Uruguay. The British ships were roughly
when land-fighting was unavoidable and had handled, but so was the Graf Spee, which had to
been carried through successfully by such gen- move into the neutral territory of Montevideo,
erals as Marlborough and Wellington, it was not Uruguay. There, the ship tried to make repairs.
popular with the British people. What was left of the British squadron was wait-
Therefore, Great Britain prepared to fight a ing for however, and reinforcements had ar-
it,
naval war against Germany. Immediately after rived. The Graf Spee had no hope of help and the
Great Britain entered the war on September 3, Uruguayans gave it only 72 hours of sanctuary.
1939, it instituted a naval blockade of the enemy. The captain had no choice but to
of the Graf Spee
That sort of thing had worked reasonably well in sink his vessel in order to keep it out of the hands
World War I, reducing the German people to of the British. Three days later, he killed himself.
hunger and misery. However, it was to work far This sea victory was a boon to British morale,
less well in World War II, when Germany, at which needed it badly. After all, in the first four
war, conquered vast
least in the first half of the months of the war, Poland had been divided by
tracts of Europe and despoiled them for the ben- Germany and the Soviet Union; the Soviet Union
efit of the German people so that the British had absorbed the Baltic States and was fighting
blockade merely served to help starve the con- Finland; and Great Britain and France had done
quered nations. nothing of any importance.
The Germans had no chance of an ordinary The British government was still in the hands
of those who, till the spring of 1939, had been he had nothing to offer "but blood, toil, tears,
appeasers. Chamberlain was still Prime Minister, and sweat."
and Halifax was still Foreign Minister. To be A kind of salvation came to Great Britain with
sure, Chamberlain had brought in Winston the rescue of its army from Dunkirk, and, there-
Churchill and had made him First Lord of the after, Churchill flew several times to France to
Admiralty, the position Chamberlain had held try to get it to continue the fight even if it were
before the Gallipoli disaster a quarter century beaten in France itself. He even offered, on June
earlier. Churchill, at least, had never been an ap- 16, 1940, to form a British-French union of na-
peaser of Hitler, though he had been an admirer tions with a common citizenship and economy,
of Mussolini in the latter's early days. but nothing was of any use. France was deter-
Chamberlain held on throughout the "phony mined to surrender, nor would it undertake to
war" when the British could still live with the continue the fight from outside Europe.
dream that the blockade would win the war for The fall of France left Great Britain in a grave
them. This notion was smashed when Germany quandary. Not only was it now exposed to air
raced through Denmark and made its successful attack by the German Air Force from bases in
landing in Norway in April 1940. When Great France, the Low Countries, and Norway, but its
Britain reacted with troops of their own in Nor- navy, on which Great Britain depended entirely,
way, Chamberlain crowed that Hitler "had was at terrible risk.
missed the bus." In the first place, Italy had joined the war,
He was wrong, however. It was Great Britain once it was certain that France was finished, and
who had missed the bus. The nation could en- the Italians had Mediterranean that
a fleet in the
dure Chamberlain no longer. He was voted out was by no means negligible. Great Britain had to
of office. He wanted Halifax to succeed him, but reinforce its Mediterranean fleet, therefore, and
that would have been disastrous for Halifax was send troops into Egypt to guard against an Italian
no better and no more charismatic than he. He invasion from Libya. That meant it would be
could not have held the confidence of the coun- much harder for the British fleet to protect the
try. merchant shipping in the Atlantic and thus pre-
Halifax, probably realizing this, declined the serve Great Britain's lifeline.
office and the King chose Winston Churchill as The greatest danger to Great Britain,
however,
Prime Minister. Churchill consistently bit off lay in the French Navy, much of which was at
more than he could chew, but the times required anchor in North African ports. By the terms of
precisely that. Churchill became Prime Minister the Armistice, France could keep its ships, but by
on May 10, 1940, just as the war acquired a now it was well-understood (at last) that Hitler
darker tinge than ever, and built a coalition gov- kept no treaties or agreements a moment longer
ernment that included Clement Richard Attlee than it suited him to do so. With all of France in
(1881-1967), the leader of the Labour opposition, his grip, he could squeeze it until the gasping
and Ernest Bevin (1881-1951), another strong La- French would agree to give up their ships to the
bour leader. Germans. With the French navy at his disposal.
was Chamberlain's sad fate
(It to die on No- Hitler might well do so much damage to the Brit-
vember 9, 1940, when the Battle of Britain was ish ships that an invasion of Great Britain would
raging and Great Britain's survival was still
still become feasible.
questionable. He saw the tragic consequence of On July 3, 1940, therefore, a British squadron
his appeasement policy but did not live to see the appeared off Oran in Algeria, where much of the
nation pull through.) French navy was at anchor. It gave the French
Churchill, as Prime Minister, did not speak ships the choice of joining the British, of letting
cheer to the nation. On May 13, with Germany itself be interned in some British port, or of scut-
bursting through the Low Countries, Churchill tling itself.
faced Parliament for the first time and said that The French ships refused all the alternatives
1939 TO 1945 609
and the British shipsopened fire at once. Three As the German he said,
airforce closed in,
French battleships were sunk and a French "Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties,
squadron at Alexandria was disarmed. It was a and so bear ourselves, that if the British Empire
sad moment. The French, who would not fight and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years,
the Germans, fought their old allies. Hitler had men will still say: This was their finest hour.' "
lost his chance at the ships but he made the most And, of course, it was.
of the propaganda victory offered him, of show- He made it London nor
plain, too, that neither
ing the French that it was really the British who any other British city would be declared open
were their enemies. and undefended, as Paris had been. He said,
On July 5, the Vichy government broke rela- ". . we would rather see London laid in ruins
.
tions with Great Britain and, thereafter, it in- and ashes than that it should be tamely and ab-
creased cooperation with Germany. However,
its jectly enslaved."
this would have come to pass anyway, and at The whole world rang with Churchill's elo-
least the British had deprived the Germans of the quence. It is very rare that a war can be fought
French fleet. and influenced by oratory, but insofar as it could
Soon, the Battle of Britain would begin. The be done, Churchill did it.
bombardment of Great Britain from the air was Yet more than words were still necessary. At
bad enough, but an even worse danger was the the very height of the Battle of Britain, the Italian
sinking of its merchant ships. By August 15, forces in Libya finally made their move on Sep-
1940, 2.5 million tons of British shipping had tember 13, 1940. Under Rodolfo Graziani (1882-
been sunk. Despite the fact that some Norwegian 1955), who had been viceroy of Ethiopia, five di-
and Danish ships had joined the British and that visions lumbered into Egypt along the coast. By
the French ships had been put out of action, the September they had reached Sidi Barrani, 50
16,
British navy was spread thin and it seemed that miles into Egypt. There they stopped and
Great Britain would starve long before Germany waited, not daring to move farther.
would. The British forces, far fewer in number, were
What saved the situation, at least temporarily, at Mersa Matruh, 70 miles farther east. The Brit-
was a deal whereby the United States transferred ish were hampered by the fact that on October
50 old destroyers to Great Britain. 28, Italy invaded Greece, and some of the British
Meanwhile, Great Britain had to deal with Af- forces in Egypt had to be sent to Crete and to
rica as well. On August 6, 1940, Italian forces Greece.
from Italian East Africa invaded British Somali- Nevertheless, on December 9, 1940, the Brit-
land, and by August 19 it had occupied the re- ish forces under Archibald Percival Wavell (1883-
gion. At this point, the Italian Empire reached its 1950) launched an attack. The British had only
greatest extent. one fourth the number in the Italian army, but
To anyone watching the war at the time, it they made up for it by surprise and speed. In
might well have seemed that Great Britain was two weeks, the Italians were thrown out of
on the edge of defeat, but now Churchill proved Egypt, losing 38,000 prisoners and great quan-
himself the voice of freedom and resolution. tities of war material.
When Hitler offered peace (on German terms, of The British plunged on. They entered Libya
course), Churchill refused the offer at once, and and, by the beginning of February 1941, all of
contemptuously. In a ringing speech on June 4, Cyrenaica, the easternmost province of Libya,
1940, he promised that the nation would fight was in British hands. The Italians had been
everywhere, for every inch of ground, and that forced back 500 miles, had lost 130,000 prisoners,
"we shall never surrender." He made it plain 400 tanks, and 1200 guns. The entire army that
that even if Great Britain itself were taken and had been sent by Mussolini to take Egypt had
were starving, the British Empire would continue been disrupted and forced into flight or surren-
the fight from the dominions and the colonies. der.
Meanwhile, the British were also acting ger. The "Battle of the Atlantic" was still being
against Italian East Africa. On
January 19, 1941, lost by Great Britain as the Germans instituted
British forces from the Sudan crossed into Ethio- "wolf packs," groups of a dozen or more sub-
pia, and sent the much more numerous Italian marines that lay in wait for merchant shipping.
forces flying. On April 4, 1941, the British took Far more tons of British shipping were sunk than
Addis Ababa; and on May 18, the last Italian Great Britain could possibly replace, even though
forces surrendered, and Italian East Africa, the British took to escorting merchant ships with
which had been so noisily established only five other ships modified to carry airplanes.
years before, was gone forever. Haile Selassie re- Surface raiders were also a,problem. The big-
turned to his capital and resumed his role as Em- gest danger was the Bismarck, a newly built Ger-
peror of Ethiopia on May 5, while Mussolini lost man battleship that was the largest and most
another 50,000 Italians as prisoners at virtually powerful warship in the world at the time. On
no cost to the British. May 18, 1940, it sailed out of its port in Gdynia,
To be sure, the British victories had been over Poland, and headed for the Atlantic Ocean. The
Italians and not over Germans, but any sort of entire British navy was at once ordered to de-
victory was badly needed in those dark days and stroy it.
the British were jubilant. What's more, the vic- A British squadron finally overtook the Bis-
tory was not meaningless. The immediate threat marck in the frigid waters of Denmark Strait be-
to the Suez Canal was lifted and the Red Sea tween Iceland and Greenland on May 24. The
became an undisputed channel for British rein- Bismarck, however, was not easy to deal with.
forcements for Egypt and the Middle East. One of its shells managed to penetrate the inte-
Nor was victory over the Italians confined to rior of the British battleship Hood (the largest of
the land. The British admiral, Andrew Brown the British warships, but rather antiquated) and
Cunningham (1881-1963), fought the Italian struck its ammunition supply, blowing up the
navy off the coast of Calabria on July 9, 1940, and ship with the loss of all but three of her 1500-men
inflicted serious damage on them at negligible crew. A new British battleship. The Prince of
cost to the British. Wales, was also badly damaged.
Cunningham oversaw the reinforcements and The Bismarck then proceeded westward, while
strengthening of the British-owned island of what was left of the British squadron, together
Malta south of Sicily in the mid-Mediterranean with reinforcements that joined pursued. On
it,
Sea. Although it was
be bombed endlessly
to May 26, 1940, the Bismarck was sighted 700 miles
during the course of the war, Malta remained west of Brest, France, and the British ships closed
British and served as an "unsinkable aircraft car- in again. For a whole day, the British ships
rier." pounded away at the Bismarck, trying to sink it.
Then, on November 11, 1940, Cunningham at- It was a hard job but, on May
finally, 28, it went
tacked the Italian fleet in the naval base of Tar- down with the loss of almost its entire crew of
anto and virtually destroyed it. On March 28, 2300.
1941, the British encountered what was left of the This preserved the picture of Great Britain as
Italian fleet off Cape Matapan in southern Greece dominating the sea, but it had been an expensive
and sank most of it. victory and the problem of the submarines re-
Thus, less than a year after Italy had entered a mained.
war had confidently assumed to
it be over, it had What's more, Germany now took over what
lost its Empire and its fleet and it played no fur- had been the Italian theater of war. German
ther significant mass role in military events, planes began to bombard British bases in Cyre-
though Mussolini continued his role as Hitler's naica, just as Wavell's forces were further de-
jackal. pleted by the necessity of having to send British
Nevertheless, victories over Italians, however units into Greece to fight the Germans, who were
useful, did nothing to decrease the German dan- clearly planning to invade the Balkans.
1939 TO 1945 611
March of 1941, the German general, Erwin

In million tons, but, little by little, countermeasures
Rommel, who had fought very well in France, were improving and the sinking of German sub-
reached Libya and took over the armed forces marines was increasing. By the end of 1942, 85
there, reducing the Italian generals to messen- German submarines had been sunk. The subma-
ger-boys. rines would be replaced, but skilled crews were
Rommel once attacked on March 24, 1941,
at harder to find. The cost to Germany was, there-
and within two months drove the British out of fore, increasing steadily.
Cyrenaica, although the British retained control The Allies, especially now that the United
of Tobruk on the Mediterranean coast. It re- States had entered the war, were becoming
mained under German siege but fought off all stronger in the air. On the night of May 30-31,
attacks. 1942, a thousand planes bombed Cologne. It was
Wavell, with most of his command
having the first time a thousand planes had been used at
been shifted to Greece, where it was soon fight- one time against Germany. From here on, the
ing a losing war with the Germans, could do bombing of Germany grew heavier and heavier,
nothing to stem RommeTs advance. He was re- while the German airforce, deeply committed to
lieved of his command on July 1, 1941, and was the war against the Soviet Union, could respond
replaced by Claude John Eyre Auchinleck (1884- only more and more weakly. The bombing of
1981). Germany did not, apparently, have much of a
Auchinleck launched an offensive on Novem- strategic effect —
the Germans kept fighting and
ber 18, 1941, and in the space of a month had —
producing war materiel but it did bring misery
relieved Tobruk, which had been under siege for to the German people who, till then, had seen
eight months, and drove Rommel out of Cyre- misery brought only to their enemies.
naica again. On land, however, the Germans seemed still
However, the losses in Greece and Crete in invincible. On January 21, 1942, Rommel took
April and May of 1941 had weakened the British advantage of British weakness in the eastern
navy in the Mediterranean Sea. What's more, the Mediterranean Sea by beginning a second offen-
Germans sent 25 submarines into the Mediterra- sive. The British were driven into retreat and, by
nean and multiplied their air attacks on Malta. February 4, Rommel stood at Gazala, not far west
The British aircraft carrier. Ark Royal, the only of Tobruk.
one in the Mediterranean, was sunk in Novem- Here there was pause while both sides built
a
ber 1941. In December, two midget Italian sub- up strength. On May 28, Rommel was ready to
marines penetrated Alexandria harbor and strike again and for two weeks there was a hard
damaged two British battleships, while other and inconclusive but in the end Rommel's
fight,
ships were sunk by mines. mastery of the art of war was not to be with-
The net result of all this was that by the end stood. OnJune 14, the British began to retreat
of the year, Auchinleck's successful
despite eastward. Again, they left Tobruk behind as a
counterattack, British strength in the Mediterra- fortified outpost, but this time, Rommel took it
nean was at alow point, and Germany was able without trouble on June 21, 1942. (And as an-
to ship supplies and reinforcements to Rommel other example of German invincibility, an am-
without very much trouble. phibious attack on the port of Dieppe in west
By 1942, Germany was increasingly occupied central France by British and Canadian troops
with the war in the Soviet Union, and the United was launched on August 19, 1942, and it met
States had entered the war. Nevertheless, the with complete defeat.)
Battle of the Atlantic continued to run in favor of The British continued to fall back far into
Germany. Submarines and surface raiders (in- Egypt until they made their stand at El Alamein,
cluding the Tirpitz, a sister ship of the sunken only 60 miles west of Alexandria, and only 200
Bismarck) had easy pickings. miles from the Suez Canal. At this time, the Ger-
Allied shipping losses in 1942 were just over a man forces in the Caucasus were about 1000
miles northeast of the Suez Canal. Undoubtedly, The Alamein was the turning point
Battle of El
anyone looking at the map might feel the dizzy- of the war against Germany. For the first time, a
ing prospect of the Germans closing a pincers British army had defeated a German army and
thatwould take in the entire Middle East. the defeat had been overwhelming. The Suez
However, maps don't tell the whole story. Canal and the Middle East were not to be threat-
Both in the Soviet Union and in North Africa, ened again.
Germany had stretched its forces just as far as Four days after the completion of the Battle of
they would go. Rommel was a thousand miles El Alamein came the Allied invasion of North
from his main supply base at Tripoli, and British Africa, and 11 days after that came the Soviet
airpower and seapower were increasing again counterattack at Stalingrad. With that triple di-
from their low point at the beginning of the year, saster, the Germans had lost the war some- —
so that it became progressively harder for Rom- thing the German generals were increasingly
mel to get reinforcements and fresh supplies. aware of, but which they could not convince Hit-
Meanwhile Auchinleck had been relieved of ler of (or, really, even dared to try).
his command in Egypt and a new general made With the invasion of North Africa, the British
his appearance on August 13, 1942. This was Ber- role in the war receded and it took up the post of
nard Law Montgomery (1887-1976). junior partner to the United States. For that rea-
With Rommel anxious to test out the new Brit- son, the events of the war after the Battle of El
ish commander, and with Hitler sending out re- Alamein are better told from an American per-
peated orders for him to take the Suez Canal, spective.
Rommel tried another advance on August 31, World War II swallowed up much of Great
1942. He stuck hard, but he was short of fuel and Britain's cultural activity, but there were some
the British now had control of the air. Rommel advances in science. The British mathematician,
fell back on his El Alamein defenses and he knew Alan Mathison Turing (1912-1954), an expert on
he could attack no more. He simply lacked the computers and codes, led a team that broke the
strength to plunge further eastward. His only German coding machine (which the Germans
hope was that the British would attack overcon- thought unbreakable), making use of work initi-
fidently, and, in some way, make an error that ated by Polish scientists. From early in the war,
Rommel could take advantage of. the British knew what the Germans were
exactly
Montgomery, however, was not to be hurried. planning and what they were doing. This, as
Every day made him stronger and Rommel much as anything else, led to Germany's defeat.
weaker. By October, the British army had been Turing's work was secret and he never re-
raised to the number of 150,000 men, while Rom- ceived the credit that was due him. Quite the
mel had only 96,000. What's more, Rommel was reverse. After the war, he was hounded into sui-
ill and flew back to Germany for treatment.
cide by a pitiless society that disapproved of his
OnOctober 23, 1942, Montgomery was ready homosexuality.
and began to attack with a ferocious artillery The Austrailian-British pathologist, Howard
bombardment. Rommel flew back form Germany Walter Florey (1898-1968), in collaboration with
as soon as the news of the British attack reached a German-British biochemist, Ernst Boris Chain
him, and he performed wonders in attempting to (1906-1979), labored to isolate the bacteriostatic
stop the British. However, he needed more than principle from bread mold, which Alexander
wonders. His gasoline supplies dwindled. British Fleming had earlier discovered.
planes bombarded him mercilessly. By Novem- In this way, penicillin was isolated and, before
ber 4, the Battle of El Alamein was over and Rom- the war was over, its antibiotic action did much
mel's task consisted in trying to withdraw what to prevent death from infected wounds. Florey,
was left of his army and to avoid surrender. This Chain, and Fleming shared a Nobel Prize in 1945
he did very skillfully, withdrawing the full width for this.
of Libya. The British biochemists. Archer John Porter
1939 TO 1945 613
Martin (b. 1910) and Richard Laurence Milling- tion of eastern Poland, therefore, that
was inhab-
tron Synge (b. 1914), developed the technique of ited by Byelorussians and Ukrainians, which
paper chromatography in 1944. This made it pos- Poland had seized from a helpless Russia in 1920.
sible to separate small quantities of complex mix- > By the nonaggression agreement, Stalin could
tures into individual components and eventually have had Lublin and Warsaw, too, but Stalin
earned them a Nobel Prize, too. gave them up to Hitler provided he could have a
Noel Coward staged Blithe Spirit in 1941. Clive free hand in the Baltic. Hitler allowed that
Staples Lewis (1898-1963) published the science temporarily.
fiction novels Perelandra in 1941 and That Hideous Therefore, Stalin pressured the helpless na-
Strength in 1945. He also published the allegorical tions of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania into sign-
Screwtape Letters in 1942. ing pacts that allowed Soviet troops to establish
Somerset Maugham published The Razor's bases there. This was carried through, very ob-
Edge in 1944. Eric Arthur Blair (1903-1950), using viously, in order to strengthen the Soviet posi-
the penname of George Orwell, published his al- tion against Germany in case Hitler turned on
legorical novel Animal Farm in 1944. him. Hitler knew this, but he had to finish with
the western powers before he could do anything.
The Soviet Union tried to establish bases in
SOVIET UNION Finland, too, but the Finns refused, and put
As World War II opened, the Soviet Union re- themselves into a war footing under Carl von
mained neutral. What Stalin undoubtedly hoped Mannerheim, who had fought. the Russians dur-
for was that Germany and the West would bleed ing the Russian Revolution and the Civil Wars.
themselves white, leaving an untouched Soviet The Soviet Union, therefore, attached Finland
Union to emerge from the war as the most pow- without warning on November 30, 1939, at-
erful state inEurope. tempting to carry on a German-style campaign of
This, however, proved to be a fantasy almost crushing victory.
at once. Stalin must have expected that Poland It The Soviet army had been ev-
didn't work.
would go down to defeat, but he could not have iscerated by Stalin's purge of the army command
thought it would happen as quickly as it did, or a few years earlier and it was, in any case, neither
as overwhelmingly. Nor could he have supposed as well-armed nor as well-led as the German
that Great Britain and France would not make a army had been. The Finns, unlike the Poles, had
move against Germany while Poland was being the advantage of a rugged terrain, winter
defeated. weather, excellent fortifications, and experienced
The Soviet Union had secretly insisted that it ski troops who could hit and run.
take half of Poland after its defeat, as the price of For two months, the Soviet Union suffered
entering into the nonaggression pact. Germany humiliating defeats at the hands of the Finns,
had agreed, knowing full well that it would exact while Great Britain and France, far more anxious
vengeance due time.
for this in to strike at the bumbling Soviets than at the for-
The Soviet Union marched into Poland on midable Germans, prepared to send an expedi-
September 17, 1939, since the alternative was tionary force to Finland. However, Norway and
clearly to watch Germany extend its power, in a Sweden, anxious to retain their neutrality, re-
matter of weeks, to the very borders of the Soviet fused to allow such a force to pass. (Just the
Union. Nevertheless, it was a propaganda mis- same, Stalin could not fail to see that the British
take for was viewed as a cowardly move.
it and French were his enemies and he drew all the
The Soviet Union felt the need to conciliate a closer to Germany, something that proved harm-
Germany that was clearly far more powerful than ful to the west and to the Soviet Union.)
it had thought and that was facing western pow- beginning on February 1, the Soviet
Finally,
ers thatwere far less resolute than the Soviets Union assembled overwhelming forces at the
had counted on. The Soviets kept only that por- Mannerheim Line just north of Leningrad and
began an unending artillery bombardment. The with Vyacheslav Mikhaylovich Molotov (1890-
Mannerheim Line broke and the Finns had to 1986), who was Foreign Minister of the Soviet
surrender on March 12, 1940. The Soviets kept Union. Hitler claimed that Great Britain was de-
their demands small, and merely took over the feated and that the Soviet Union could have its
area north of Leningrad, including the Manner- share of the British Empire, if it followed German
heim line, plus a few bases. orders. Because there was an air-raid in progress,
All thisconvinced the world that the Soviet the meeting had retired to an underground shel-
Union could not fight a modern war. Germany, ter.
in particular, developed the fatal notion that the Molotov asked, "If Great Britain is defeated,
Soviet Union would be easy to conquer one — why are we down here and whose are the planes
strong push and its jerry-built structure would overhead?" Molotov refused to accept the Ger-
collapse. Great Britain and the United States man terms, and the last chance the Soviet Union
shared that opinion. had of avoiding invasion disappeared.
As for the Soviet had received a real
Union, it The Soviet Union was obviously displeased
fright. It began a vast program to strengthen and when, in the spring of 1941, Germany invaded
modernize its armed force, but it didn't have and occupied the Balkans, although the Soviets
much time in which to do it, and it was too large made no move to stop them. Indeed, it was im-
and economically backward to be able to work possible to fail to see that Germany was prepar-
very quickly. ing for an invasion. Nevertheless, Stalin turned a
In addition, the Soviet Union tried to continue deaf ear to all warnings, refused to take any ac-
to strengthen its position vis-a-vis Germany. In tion, prepared no plan of defense, and made no
August 1940, after the fall of France, the Soviet move to protect the border. He continued
send to
Union annexed Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania war material to Germany and seemed convinced
outright, converting them into constituent re- that the Soviet Union would remain neutral.
publics of the Soviet Union. Germany, still occu- How someone as ordinarily paranoid as Stalin
pied with Great Britain, had to acquiesce to this, could persuade himself that Hitler would keep
but was furious. his word passes human understanding. The only
Then, on June 16, 1940, the Soviet Union de- possible explanation is that Stalin was paranoid
manded Romania give it back the province
that enough to think it was all a British plot.
of Bessarabia that Romania had seized after the In any case, on June 22, 1941, Hitler invaded
Russian Revolution. On
June 28, the Soviet all along the frontier and the Soviet Union, to-
Union annexed the province as a new republic, tally unprepared, suffered four months of incred-
taking also a piece of land to its northwest. ible disaster.
Northern Bukovina. And yet, unfortunately for Hitler, the Soviet
In addition, the Soviet Union signed a non- Union was large enough, and its people were
aggression pact with Japan in order to keep its resolute and fatalistic enough, to withstand di-
eastern flank free of trouble, and it proceeded to sasters that would have destroyed any other Eu-
go to all lengths to conciliate Germany and to ropean nation. Leningrad was encircled, but it
deprive it of any rational excuse to attack. (For continued to fight under appalling conditions
some reason,never occurred to Stalin that Hit-
it and would not surrender. Moscow was ap-
ler did not need a rational excuse to attack.) proached, but by that time the Soviet army had
By the fall of 1940, it was clear that Germany caught its breath, winnowed out the incompe-
was not going to crush Great Britain very tents, came up with reinforcements, and (with
quickly, and Hitler prepared to smash the Soviet the aid of a cold, cold winter) stopped the Ger-
Union in one mighty blow and then turn on mans nearly at the gates of the city.
Great Britain with a united and enslaved Europe The Soviet Union managed the mighty task of
behind him. transferring much of its industrial might far to
On November 12, 1940, Hitler met in Berlin the east, out of reach of the Germans. As the
1939 TO 1945 615
British, amazement, realized that the

to their volving torture, starvation, and killing resulted
bumbling Soviets were actually stopping the Ger- in the Soviet people being willing to fight to the
mans, even defeating them in spots, and inflict- death.
ing large casualties upon them, it seemed
During the war, Shostakovich composed his
worthwhile, after all, to send them supplies. Seventh Symphony in 1941. It was the "Lenin-
After the United States entered the war, the sup- grad Symphony" in honor of the encircled, bat-
plies expanded to a flood. tered city that never gave up. Aram Ilich
After the winter of 1941—1942, the Germans Khachaturian (1903-1978) composed Gayane in
attacked again and advanced into the south to 1942, which contains his well-known Sabre Dance.
Stalingrad and the Caucasus, but they were
stretched terribly thin and were just about ex-
hausted. The Soviets, who now had no supply JAPAN
problems, thanks to the Americans and British, By 1939, when World War began, Japan con-
II
could set up a counterattack that smashed the trolled almost all the Chinese seacoast. It had not
Germans and sent them hurrying westward in been able to absorb all the interior, for China was
spectacular defeat. too large for even Japan's voracious appetite. It
By February 2, Germans in
1943, the trapped was Japan's hope, however, that if all foreign
the Stalingrad pocket surrendered, and by the help was cut off from China, China would wither
spring all the German gains of the summer and and would be forced to accept Japanese domina-
fall of 1942 were gone. Of course, the Germans
tion.
had not forgotten how to fight, nor the German As happened, China
it still had two routes by
generals how to lead. In February and March which supplies could reach it. They were difficult
1943, the German general, Manstein, had man- routes indeed, one being along a primitive rail-
aged to stop the Sovietadvance in the eastern road from French Indo-China and one over the
Ukraine. He retook Kharkov, despite the fact that narrow, twisting Burma Road from British-
he was greatly outmanned by the Soviets. owned Burma. What supplies reached China
This, however, was only a temporary success were largely wasted by the inefficient and cor-
for the Germans and there were not to be many rupt Chiang Kai-shek, but even so, Japan wanted
more on the Soviet front. In July of 1943, the to put an end to the supplies altogether.
Germans tried one last offensive at Kursk, a very They also wanted a puppet and found one in
limited one, and it was stopped in its tracks. Wang Ching-wei (1883-1944). He had fought
Thereafter, the Soviets advanced steadily. alongside Sun Yat-sen and Chiang Kai-shek, but
They took Kharkov again on August 23, 1943; had defected, had given up hope of a united, free
Smolensk on September 25; Kiev on November China and had become strongly pro-Japanese.
6. By January 15, 1944, Leningrad was relieved The Japanese set him up as puppet ruler of China
and its long ordeal was over. As 1944 progressed, in March 30, 1940.
the Germans were being steadily driven out of Not long afterward, the Germans crushed
the Soviet Union and, in July, the British and France, and that gave Japan a golden opportu-
Americans landed in France. nity.Japan demanded the right to land forces in
The war thereafter is best treated from an Indo-China, and France had to give in. By the
American perspective. end of June, Japanese forces were in place and
The Soviet Union, by the way, suffered 20 mil- the supply line to China was closed.
lion casualties at least, and enormous losses in OnJuly 18, 1940, Great Britain, facing the su-
property. That it withstood it all was in pari due preme crisis of its national life, was forced to
to the mad
propensity of the Germans to mistreat close the Burma Road rather than face military
the Russians in their grip. Decent treatment action by the Japanese, and China was now com-
might have elicited a certain amount of willing pletely isolated.
cooperation. Pathologically cruel treatment in- But now the United States stepped in.
strongly urging American displeasure if Indo- and, to make things more impressive, a special
China was absorbed into the expanding Japanese envoy arrived on November 15, 1941. He was
Empire. On September 26, 1940, the United Saburo Kurusu (1888-1954).
States embargoed steel shipments to Japan, and While the American Secretary of State, Cordell
the next day Japan joined Germany and Italy in a Hull (1871-1955), earnestly endeavored to get
tripartite alliance. On April 13, 1941, Japan the Japanese out of French Indo-China, and to
signed a nonaggression pact with the Soviet have them recognize Chiang Kai-shek as ruler of
Union. China, the Japanese military men planned their
Meanwhile, under American urging, and the strike.
promise of American support. Great Britain had The Japanese had started tlie Russo-Japanese
reopened the Burma Road on October 18, 1940, war in 1904 with a sneak attack on the Russian
when the first fury of the German assault had Far East fleet and practically won the war at once.
passed and it seemed that Great Britain would They hoped to do the same thing to the United
not be invaded. On July 26, 1941, the United States and the United States, unbelievably, co-
States froze Japanese assets in the United States. operated with them.
was an economic war growing and
Clearly, there Because both Great Britain and the United
spreading between the two nations. States kept most of their navies in the Atlantic,
What's more, the United States did not object fighting the German submarines, the Japanese
to having American volunteers fly planes in navy in the Pacific was stronger than the com-
China against the Japanese. These were the bined British-American Pacific fleets.
"Flying Tigers" and were under the lead of a re- To make matters worse, the United States,
tired airforce officer, Claire Lee Chennault (1890- having watched Germany make surprise attacks
1958). on nation after nation, up to and including the
was clear to Japan, then, that if the Japanese
It Soviet Union, and having seen the Japanese
Empire was to expand further, the great enemy sneak attack on the Russian fleet less than 40
was the United States and only the United States. years before, nevertheless kept the American
Great Britain and the Soviet Union were both en- fleet in Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, at anchor, and
tirely engaged with the Germans and any other unready.
Pacific powers were inconsequential. If, some- On November 26, 1941, a strong Japanese fleet
how, the United States could be sufficiently dam- set out to sea, heading for Pearl Harbor. The
aged, then Japan might expand rapidly enough United States had broken the Japanese secret
to be untouchable even if the United States later codes and knew where all the ships of the Japa-
recovered. —
nese Fleet were ordinarily. The particular fleet
On
October 17, 1941, when the Soviet Union heading for Pearl Harbor kept radio silence, how-
seemed on the point of collapse (at least, Ger- ever, and other ships in Japanese home
waters
many thought it was), Japan got a new activist made use of the call signals of the missing ones.
Prime Minister, Hideki Tojo (1884-1948), who The Americans, therefore, did not know the
was ready for any action. Plans were made for Pearl Harbor attack was underway.
sudden surprise attacks on western territories in To be sure, at the last minute, radar informa-
the Pacific, particularly on the great American tion indicated the approach of airplanes, but it
naval base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. was Sunday, with everyone taking it easy so the
It was Japan's plan, then, to keep "peace ne- message was (yawn) ignored.
gotiations" in progress until they were ready to On the morning of Sunday, December 7, 1941,
strike.The United States, they felt, would not planes from the Japanese fleet struck and caught
fear war while negotiations were actually under the United States utterly and completely by sur-
way and they would keep their fleet at its base, prise. Of eight battleships present, three were
and unprepared. The Japanese ambassador, sunk, another capsized, and the rest seriously
Kichisaburo Nomura (1877-1954), kept talking damaged. Other lesser vessels were also dam-
1939 TO 1945 617
aged. The American airplanes were caught on ally. The British lost nearly 140,000 men, most of
the ground as well and 188 of them, more than them prisoners.
half, were destroyed. Over 4000 Americans were
Japan's big prize, however, was the Philip-
killed or wounded. pines. had been American for 43 years, and it
It
The American Pacific Fleet had been immobi- was guarded by an army of 130,000 men, includ-
lized for months, and it was only by the sheerest ing about 10,000 American regular soldiers. The
stroke of luck that the three aircraft carriers of the whole was under the command of Douglas
Fleet happened be absent from Pearl Harbor.
to MacArthur (1880-1964) who, by all accounts,
Had they been there and had they been struck, seems to have been enormously vain and arro-
the United States might have been made helpless gant, and the closest that the American military
for a considerably longer time. machine has ever come to producing a Napoleon.
With nothing, at the moment, to fear from the The day after Pearl Harbor, on December 8,
American Navy, Japan could move in all direc- the Japanese struck at Clark Field near Manila. It
tions. On December 10, Japan took the American is hard to believe, with the news of Pearl Harbor
island of Guam in the Carolinas. It took two ringing throughout the world, that the planes at
weeks of fighting and two assaults but, by De- Clark Field were unready, with the crews at
cember 23, 1941, they had Wake Island, an lunch or loafing about. More than half the planes
American possession in the mid-Pacific. By De- were destroyed.
cember 23, they had Hong Kong, forcing the sur- In the course of the month, Japanese troops
render of 12,000 British soldiers. landed at various places on several of the Philip-
Meanwhile, on December 8, Japanese troops pine Islands and had no trouble advancing.
had landed in northern Malaya. Under Tomo- MacArthur had to abandon Manila on December
yuki Yamashita (1885—1946), the Japanese 26, and led what was left of his army into the
pressed southward. Two British ships, the battle- Bataan Peninsula across the bay from Manila.
ship Prince of Wales and the battle cruiser Repulse, There the position was hopeless, for supplies
together with some destroyers, steamed north- were limited, the peninsula was crowded with
ward from Singapore to try to disrupt the Japa- noncombatant refugees, food was low, and the
nese landings. However, it was the Japanese Japanese attacked incessantly. MacArthur, how-
who controlled the and both British ships
air, ever, for all his personality defects, was a crack-
were sunk on December 10, 1941. The loss of erjack general and, for two months, his men
these ships on top of the loss at Pearl Harbor left fought off the Japanese in a better showing than
the Japanese in a better position than ever. anyone else had managed since Pearl Harbor.
The Japanese continued southward, with Roosevelt was unwilling to see MacArthur
command of the air and with ample supplies, taken prisoner by the Japanese, and he ordered
while the British, untrained for jungle warfare him out of the Philippines. MacArthur left on
and with serious supply shortages (most of March 11, 1942, and the command devolved on
everything was in the Atlantic and the Mediter- his aide, Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright (1883-
ranean), had to fall back. By the end of the 1953).
month, they were forced all the way back to Sin- The men on Bataan continued to fight though
gapore at the southern end of the Malay Penin- they were on starvation rations and many were
sula. down with tropical diseases. On April 9, no more
There, the found themselves very
British could be done and the Americans surrendered.
much in the position of the French at the Maginot The Japanese, then, with no consideration for
line. The Singapore guns were only adjusted to humanity (they believed that soldiers who sur-
fire to sea against a naval attack. They could not rendered were worthy of no consideration),
be used to defend against a jungle advance from drove them on a brutal march of 90 miles to in-
the rear. On February 15, 1942, the great British ternment. Many died on that march.
base at Singapore had to surrender uncondition- The island of Corregidor, south of Bataan, still
held on and it did not fallJapanese until

to the expand the perimeter of their control. They
May 6, 1942. In the next two weeks, other areas therefore attempted to establish themselves in
in the Philippines fell. New Guinea and in the Solomon Islands, which
The loss of the Philippines was tragic for the were under joint British/ Australian control.
United States, but the fighting did occupy the To do this, they probed the Coral Sea, which
Japanese for five months under the most difficult lies between northeastern Australia and the Sol-
circumstances, and the loss was no disgrace. It omons, and there they encountered an American
delayed the Japanese and gave the United States fleet. On May 7-8, 1942, the Battle of the Coral
time to rebuild. Sea took place.
While the fighting was going on in the Philip- It was the first which no ships
naval battle' in
pines, Japan had occupied Siam (which, after on one side ever saw the ships on the other. The
1939, had come to be known, officially, as Thai- entire fight was between planes from the carriers
land) and prepared to penetrate the British on the two sides. It was a drawn battle. The Jap-
crown colony of Burma. anese lost more planes, the Americans lost more
The Japanese, as everywhere else, advanced ships. What it meant, though, was that five
successfully, and the British fell back. The months after Pearl Harbor, the Americans had a
Chinese sent in the American general, Joseph naval force in the Pacific. Nevertheless, in the
Warren Stillwell (1883-1946), whom Roosevelt wake of the battle, the Japanese did establish
had assigned to work with Chiang Kai-shek — bases in the Solomons and did invade eastern
thankless task. Stillwell did what he could, but it New Guinea.
wasn't enough. By May 1942, the British were What's more, Japan prepared for one final
driven out of Burma. blow at the American navy, a blow designed to
The British had now to make ready to defend finish what Pearl Harbor had begun, and this
India, and the only way in which supplies could was under the command of Isoroku Yamamoto
still reach the Chinese was to fly them from (1884-1943), the architect of the attack on Pearl
northeastern India over high mountains. Harbor.
Nor were the Japanese done. Even while op- As the summer of 1942 was starting, Japan
erating in the Philippinesand in Burma, the Jap- had, in the space of half a year, established its
anese navy landed troops on various islands of domination over all of eastern and southeastern
the Dutch East Indies. The fall of Singapore made Asia, and was supreme over the western half of
the defense of the East Indies impossible and, by the Pacific Ocean. Japanese ships and soldiers
March 9, 1942, the Dutch islands were in the were inching across New Guinea and down the
hands of the Japanese. In the process, the Dutch lines of the Solomons, and were mopping up in
fleet was destroyed. Burma, so that Australia, New Zealand, and
During this time, the United States, avid for India were at risk.
some offensive action, managed a spectacular The rapidity of Japanese expansion had far
feat. On April 18, 1942, with the Pacific war at a outdone even that of Hitler's Germany, and it
low point, 16 planes under James Harold Doolit- was hard to think that only half a century before,
tle (b. 1896) took off from the aircraft carrier Hor- Japan had consisted of four islands off the
net and flew 800 miles to Japan, where they Chinese shore and had been, to all appearances,
bombed Tokyo and other Japanese cities. All the a comic-opera nation very much like the picture
planes had to land in China (one in Vladivostok), portrayed laughingly in Gilbert & Sullivan's The
or crashed in Japan. Not much damage was Mikado.
done, but it heartened the Americans and greatly But now Japan wished to nail down its victory
alarmed the Japanese. and make it permanent and the only way to do
The Japanese, feeling that no American air- that was to smash what was left of the American
craft carrier ought to come close enough to the fleet.
Japanese home islands to bomb them, decided to Admiral Yamamoto, therefore, assembled vir-
1939 TO 1945 619
tually the entire Japanese fleet,including 165 This was the first great naval defeat suffered
ships of all sorts, up to and including mighty by the Japanese, and it was at the hands of an
aircraft carriers and battleships. It seemed like an inferior (in point of numbers) American squad-
appropriate time to do this, for Yamamoto be- ron. The Battle of Midway was the turning point
lieved that the Americans had suffered more in of the PacificWar, and never again would the
the Battle of the Coral Sea than they actually had Japanese be able to fight on the offensive against
and that there were no American aircraft carriers the United States. Their six-month triumph was
to oppose the Japanese armada. over and, from this point on, Japan had to fight
The American Commander-in-Chief of the a defensive war against unrelenting and contin-
United States Pacific Fleet was Chester William uous American pressure. (Within a matter of five
Nimitz (1885-1966) and, since the Americans had months, the Germans had lost the battles of El
long since broken the Japanese codes, he knew Alamein and of Stalingrad and they, too, moved
what Yamamoto was planning. This time, there into a perpetual defensive.)
would be no sleeping at the switch. To be sure, the Japanese still tried. Landing on
Unknown to the Japanese,
Nimitz had three the northern shore of New Guinea, they crossed
aircraft carriers, one of which, though damaged the formidable Owen Stanley Mountains in Au-
at Coral Sea, had been put into functioning order gust of 1942, aiming at Port Moresby on New
in record time. This meant he would have as Guinea's southern shore. They never made it.
many planes available to him as the Japanese American and Australian forces stopped them
would have. In addition, Nimitz planned to fight between November 1942 and January 1943, and
the battle near the island of Midway (at the west- at last the Japanese had been defeated in jungle
ern end of the Hawaiian Archipelago) so that warfare.
land-based planes from that American posses- The remainder of the Pacific War can best be
sion could also be employed. told from an American perspective.
As a diversion, the
Japanese fleet sent a few
ships northward on June 3, 1942, to occupy the
islands of Attu and Kiska at the western edge of ITALY
the Aleutian island chain (which is part of If anything in a catastrophe as overwhelmingly
Alaska). They felt that the Americans, infuriated tragic as World War II can be said to have been a
by Japanese occupation of a portion of its home comic relief, that was supplied by Italy.
territory, would react by sending massive num- Italy, from the time of its unification in the
bers of ships northward, thus insuring the Japa- 1860s, had considered itself a "great power," but
nese victory in the mid-Pacific where it counted. it never developed the industrial strength to
The Americans, however, knew that the attack make it capable of fighting a great war. It consis-
on the Aleutians was a diversion and they let it tently lost wars but came out on top because it
go- managed to form alliances with powers that de-
On June 4, 1942, Midway began.
the Battle of feated the power that defeated Italy.
At first, the Japanese had things their own way. Its economic weakness and its military disabil-
Their planeswere more maneuverable than ities were well-known and the fact that the con-
American land-based planes, and American temptible buffoon, Mussolini, was able to face
losses were heavy. But then the planes from the down Great Britain in 1935 and 1936 and cast a
American aircraft carriers (the existence of which momentary shadow of "greatness"
over Italy
Yamamoto was not aware of) found the Japanese must, in hindsight, have been acutely embarrass-
fleet and, one after the other, destroyed the Jap- ing to the British leadership (though it is possible
anese aircraft carriers. The Japanese lost all four, that they were quite capable of simply not think-
while the Americans lost one of their three. That ing about it).
meant that the Americans ended with two air- In 1939, when Germany went to war, Italy
craft carriers to the Japanese none. trembled and remained out of it. Even if Musso-
lini was hypnotized by his success in the Ethio- had about 162,000 soldiers in the little country.
pian crisis, he had done very poorly in Spain. To the south was Greece, and it qualified as a
The Italian generals knew well the nation could small nation that could be mopped up for the
not fight a modern war. Galeazzo Ciano (1903- crime of being small.
1944), who was Mussolini's Foreign Minister, On October 18, 1940, in one of the most fateful
and son-in-law as well, was dubious about the decisions of the war, Mussolini, without consult-
German alliance, and so was King Victor Em- ing Hitler (he wanted to dazzle Hitler with war-
manuel III. like victories), and without warning, sent 10
As for Germany, it didn't mind Italy's remain- divisions into Greece to the accompaniment,
ing neutral. Germany had no illusions about Ita- once again, of donkey-brays of triumph.
ly's warlike capacities, and it felt that Italy did its The Greek army, however, was in the capable
part by merely existing as a potential enemy of hands of Alexandros Papagos (1883-1955), and it
Great Britain and France. This tied up the Brit- held the difficult mountain terrain with no trou-
ish-French fleets in the Mediterranean Sea and ble. The Italians were thrown back and, by the
forced Great Britain to divert some of its strength end of the year, had been forced far back into
to the Suez Canal and the Middle East. Albania.
Flowever, when Germany had, in rapid order, There was no glory. Pietro Badoglio, the Ital-
destroyed Poland, Denmark, Norway, the Low ian chief of staff who had conquered Ethiopia,
Countries, and even France, it seemed quite clear was forced to resign. The Greek victories thor-
to Mussolini that the war was over and that it oughly smashed any Italian pretensions to mili-
was safe to join in. In fact,seemed to the Italian
it tary expertise. The Yugoslavs were encouraged
ruling body generally that it would be unsafe not to resist Germany. The British began to send
to join in, for Italy, if it remained neutral a mo- troops into Crete and Egypt, and Hitler could
ment longer, would not get a share of the spoils. only grind his teeth at his ally's ineptitude.
On June 10, 1940, with the French army dying In fact. Hitler had
undertake a Balkan cam-
to
under the German hammer blows, Italy declared paign to rescue Italy and he lost two vital months
war on France and, with donkey-brays of before he could begin his invasion of the Soviet
triumph, sent 32 Italian divisions across the Union. The loss of two months put him at the
passes into southeastern France, where they gates of Moscow
only when winter had arrived,
were promptly hurled back by six French divi- and that eventually lost him the Soviet campaign
sions. and the war. What a consequence of Mussolini's
Nevertheless, Hitler allowed Mussolini to oc- stupid move.
cupy a small section of the French coast about Meanwhile, Italy lost all of Italian East Africa
the city of Nice, and another small section just to the British in early 1941, They
every inch of it.
south of Switzerland that made up Savoy, the were kicked out of Egypt and eastern Libya, and
home patrimony of the Italian royal family. Hitler had to rescue them again by sending in
In August 1940, Italian forces took British So- Rommel to supervise the fighting there. The Ital-
maliland, east of Ethiopia, against virtually no ians also lost their navy and, by mid-1941, were
resistance. In September 1940, Italian forces no longer independent entities in the war. Mus-
inched a small distance into Egypt and remained solini's function became that of meeting with Hit-
there in a state of paralysis. Neither development ler periodically and being forced to listen to the
supplied Italy with "glory" in the German sense. German leader speak endlessly and boringly on
Mussolini desperately wanted a smashing ad- his plans. No one
could possibly have devised a
vance against a weak neighbor to prove Italy's more subtle and unbearable punishment for
worth to itself and to Germany, and its eyes fell Mussolini than this.
on Greece. The Italiansfought on in Libya under the lead-
A year and a half before, Italy had occupied ership of Rommel and could share in the glory of
Albania in an inglorious invasion, and Italy now his successes (in whispers among themselves, for
1939 TO 1945 621
no one else would give them any credit). After who, 13 years had become a hero with
earlier,
the Battle of El Alamein, however, the Germans his solo flight from New York to Paris. Now he
and the Italians were swept completely out of parroted the German line, complete with anti-
Libya and the last bit of the Italian Empire was Semitic statements. To many Americans, he be-
gone. came a villain.
The Italians had also sent contingents to the Hitler's spectacular victories in the first year of
Soviet front to fight under German command. the war weakened the isolationist line,
greatly
None ever returned. since the American people grew increasingly
Allied forces invaded western North Africa afraid of a German world victory. Great Britain's
and, by May 1943, German and Italian forces resolute fight during the Battle of Britain, and
were forced to surrender in Tunisia and all of Churchill's oratory, won the sympathy of vast
Africa was free. Then, in July 1943, Allied forces numbers of Americans and the isolationists
invaded Sicily. began to seem nothing more than German pro-
The people had had enough. It was
Italian pagandists.
clear that Mussolini had led them to destruction. As a result, the isolationists could not stop
The King, who had supported Mussolini when Roosevelt's steady movement toward supporting
he had been made Emperor of Ethiopia, had now Great Britain, and his organization of a semi-
seen his Imperial title vanish, and he trembled global western hemisphere defense.
for his throne. The aristocracy trembled for their Roosevelt hastened American rearmament,
privileges, and the generals saw nothing but de- setting a goal of 50,000 planes a year. (Hitler de-
feat ahead. Ciano, who had been willing to go to rided that, but the United States achieved the
war when victory had seemed certain a mere goal.)
three years earlier, now deserted his father-in- On September 2, 1940, the United States
law and demanded a separate peace. picked up long-term leases on bases in British
Mussolini tried to resist, but on July 25, 1943, possessions in the western hemisphere in return
the Grand Council of Fascism deprived him of for transferring 50 American destroyers to the
his powers. Mussolini tried to fall back on the British —
destroyers badly needed to combat the
royal authority, but the king had no intention of submarine menace.
sharing Mussolini's destruction. He had him ar- On September 16, 1940, the United States es-
rested, and Mussolini's career came to an end and on March 11, 1941,
tablished a military draft,
after 21 years of bombast and incompetence. To a "Lend-Lease Act" was passed whereby the
be sure, he was later rescued by the Germans United States could give material supplies to any
and made the head of a Fascist Republic of Italy, nation that seemed to be vital to the defense of
but his powers were zero, and he was preserved the United States.
merely for a horrible end. On April 10, 1941, the United States landed
The fight for Italy after Mussolini's fall is best forces in Greenland and, on July 7, in Iceland,
told from an American perspective. two frozen lands that belonged to Denmark.
Such bases greatly simplified the antisubmarine
defense.
UNITED STATES (GERMANY) Roosevelt and Churchill formed a close per-
When World War II began in Europe, the United sonal friendship that endured through the war.
States remained neutral. There was a strong iso- On August 14, 1941, while the German army was
lationist movement that seemed to think that the cutting through the Soviet Union, the two met
United States should let the rest of the world de- on warships in the North Atlantic to outline war
stroy itself while it remained outside the fight. aims in a so-called "Atlantic Charter." Neither
The "America First Committee" were the ar- was to seek territorial aggrandizement; they
ticulate spokesmen of the isolationist viewpoint. would support self-determination and self-gov-
Its most notable leader was Charles A. Lindbergh ernment, freedom of the seas, equal access to
raw materials, the denunciation of force, and so Great Britain, however, did not want the di-
on. bloodbath and possible fail-
rect assault, fearing a
In short, by the summer of 1941, the United ure that would set back the war effort for years.
States was helping Great Britain in every imag- Besides, Great Britain had, for centuries, pre-
inable way, short of actually declaring war. That, ferred to strike at the periphery. Therefore, a
could prevent.
at least, the isolationists huge amphibious assault, the largest the world
Japan settled the matter on December 7, 1941, had yet seen, was aimed at French North Africa.
with its surprise attack on Pearl Harbor — which The assault consisted almost entirely of Amer-
put the United States at war. It is possible that, ican troops, since it was thought that the French
at this point,an infuriated American public opin- might not fight as hard against Americans as
ion might have demanded war to the utmost against the British. The invasion forces were
against Japan, leaving Europe to itself. However, under the overall leadership of Dwight David Ei-
for reasons he never made clear. Hitler declared senhower (1890-1969), a master at the art of per-
war, quite unnecessarily, on the United States on suading prima donna generals to act together.
December 10, 1941. The landings began on November 8, 1942,
The United States had now two major wars to soon after the Battle of El Alamein had driven
fight, and the political and military leadership Rommel out of Egypt. American troops landed in
made the decision that Germany was the greater Morocco and Algeria, but the hope that the
danger and should receive the lion's share of French would not resist was in vain. They fought
American effort. vigorously, and though they were defeated, the
Once the United States was in the war, the Americans did not have the easy occupation they
question arose as to how best to attack Germany. had expected.
It would, in any case, take several months for The French puppet government at Vichy
American forces to accumulate numbers, receive broke off diplomatic relations with the United
training, and become ready for battle. During States on November 9, and ordered French
those months, the United States was chiefly in- troops to continue resistance. Meanwhile, Ger-
volved with the Battle of the Atlantic and not man troops swept through the territories con-
doing too well. The Navy had not yet worked out trolled by Vichy, bringing all of France under
methods of convoy, and American ports on the German on November 11. There were
control
Atlantic coast blazed with light against which French ships in Toulon harbor in southeastern
merchant ships were easy targets for the German France that had so far been kept out of German
submarines. control. It seemed inevitable that Germany
In addition, therewas only one route whereby would now take them over, but on November 27,
the Soviet Union might be supplied by sea, and those ships were scuttled by their crews and Ger-
that was the dangerous journey into Arctic many did not get them.
waters and around Scandinavia to the Soviet A French naval Jean Louis Darlan
officer,
ports of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. By the end (1881-1942), who had always been anti-British
of year, however, the American ships were be- and had been member
a loyal of the Vichy pup-
coming more skillful at sinking submarines and pet government, happened to be in North Africa
the rate of new ship construction was increasing at the time of the invasion. Under American
rapidly. pressure, he changed his opinions, broke with
Also by the end of the year, American forces Vichy on November ordered an immediate
11,
were ready for an assault. The American instinct cease-fire, and declared himself chief of state in
was to strike at the heart of German strength, to French Africa. A French general, Henri Honore
dash across the English Channel and to strike at Giraud (1879-1949), who had never for a mo-
was certainly what Stalin wanted
France. This ment cooperated with the Nazis, was made head
something that would relieve the pressure on of the French armed forces in North Africa.
Stalingrad and the Caucasus. But what happened to de Gaulle?
1939 TO 1945 623
The trouble with de Gaulle was that he was Soviet Union? (That last may well have been in
the French Douglas MacArthur, and neither the mind of some of the military.)
Churchill nor Roosevelt could endure his arro- It hard to believe that Germany, having
is
gance. They would cheerfully have done away committed so many crimes against humanity,
with him if they could, but the Free French having killed and slaughtered without end, hav-
wanted de Gaulle and American public opinion ing made itself bitter and horrible to all the
resented making use of the Vichyite Darlan. As world, could have gotten away with anything
it happened, Darlan was assassinated on Decem- short of unconditional surrender. It might have
ber 24, 1942, but the problem of Giraud and de been wiser for Roosevelt to have adopted it as a
Gaulle remained. policy without announcing it, but, on the other
Eisenhower was deeply involved in the com- hand, there were uncounted millions who
plexities of politics in North Africa, and it kept wanted it said clearly.
him from acting quickly when swift military ac- The year 1943 saw the climax of the Battle of
tion was needed. The Germans had time to airlift the Atlantic. Hitler fired his submarine chief,
troops into Tunisia,and into Tunisia also came Erich Raeder (1876-1960), at the beginning of the
what was left of Rommel's army. The chance year and replaced him with Karl Doenitz (1891-
of taking Tunisia as Morocco and Algeria had 1980), who on the sinking of merchant
carried
been taken was lost. The Allies were going to ships with renewed energy. By March 1943,
have to fight against determined German resist- Great Britain was within three months of starva-
ance. tion.
OnJanuary 14 to 23, 1943, Roosevelt and The convoy system was constantly
Allied
Churchill, together with their chiefs of staff, met sharpened, however, and new ships were being
at Casablanca in Morocco to determine future built with increasing speed. On October 13, 1943,
strategy in the war. The Americans still wanted the Allies established a base at the Portuguese
a frontal assault on the Germans in France, but Azores, and the submarine threat receded after
Churchill wanted to continue operations on the that.What remained of the German surface raid-
periphery. From Africa, he suggested, the Allies ers was also damaged and put out of action, and
should strike underbelly" of Europe.
at the "soft the Allies were bombing Germany around the
(Once again, it turned out that Churchill, al- clock.
though indomitable when a desperate defense There remained land action, however, and at
was needed, unfailingly missed the point on the the beginning of 1943 that meant Tunisia.
offensive. There was no soft underbelly to Eu- Rommel struck first, with his customary ex-
rope, as the Allies were to find out.) pertise. The veteran German troops, strongly
Plans for winning the Battle of the Atlantic supported by air, drove against the green Amer-
were also laid out and Roosevelt declared that ican troops at Kasserine Pass in central Tunisia.
the Allies would accept only "unconditional sur- The Americans fell back in defeat.
render" by the Germans. There followed a period of reorganization. In
The insistence on unconditional surrender has charge of the American forces was placed George
been thought to be a mistake by military men Smith Patton (1885-1945), a flamboyant poseur,
who felt that it encouraged Germany to fight on second only to MacArthur. Patton liked to be
to the end. Those who opposed unconditional called "Old Blood and Guts," he sported two
surrender, however, never explained what the pearl-handled revolvers, and he unfortunately,
alternative would be. What would "conditional periodically made a fool of himself, for if his in-
surrender" mean? That Germany retain a Nazi telligenceextended an inch beyond the practice
government of some sort? That it come under the of war, he never showed any sign of it. Mont-
rule of right-wing generals? That it retain some gomery was in charge of the British forces.
of its conquests? That it retain enough strength The Allied forces were built up in strength,
to join with the Allies in a new war against the and the Americans had had their baptism of fire
atKasserine Pass, and had learned quickly. At- (1896-1984) carried through an amphibious land-
tempts by the Germans at further offensives in ing at Salerno, just south of Naples. The Ger-
February and early March failed and then, on mans promptly disarmed all Italian units and
March 20, began an offensive
1943, the Allies took over the country militarily, setting down for
northward, which slowly but inexorably drove a long and savage fight under the competent
the Germans back. By early May, the Germans leadership of Albert Kesselring (1885-1960).
had been driven into a cul-de-sac, and with no The Salerno beachhead was contained,
possibility of a Dunkirk-type rescue, they began though not wiped out, and step by step, the
to surrender. By May 13, 1943, it was all over. weary Allies had to force their way northward.
Germany had been driven out of Africa. Alto- By the end of the year, the Allies were only half
gether, Germany had lost over 200,000 men in way up the boot and there was no sign that fur-
the North African campaigns, and the British as ther advances would be any easier.
many, but it was the Allies that now held the Meanwhile, from November 28 to 30, 1943,
ground. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin met at Teheran
The Allies then began to put into action the in Iran. Stalin was told that the Allies would
decision at Casablanca to aim for the ''soft under- launch a direct assault on the heart of German-
belly" of Europe. Europe in May or June of 1944. Stalin promised
Halfway between Tunisia and was the
Sicily that a Soviet offensive would be made to coincide
fortified Italian island of Pantelleria. It was the with the invasion.
Italian equivalent of British Malta, which lay All through the first half of 1944, then, the
about 160 miles to the southeast. Malta had with- British Isles filled up with men and material in-
stood all bombardments from the Germans for tended amphibious invasion of
for the greatest
years, but now the Allied planes on homed in all times. It was something impossible to mask.
Pantelleria and, after a week of bombardment, The Germans knew it was coming. They didn't
the island surrendered on June 11, 1943. know exactly when, however, or exactly where,
There followed an intensive bombardment of and they lacked any ability to abort it.
Sicily, Sardinia, and Italy and, on July 9, the Through that first half of 1944, the German
Americans under Patton and the British under submarines and surface raiders were increasingly
Montgomery landed on the southeast vertex of punished and the air bombardment of Germany
the triangular island of Sicily. Montgomery grew heavier.
worked way up the east coast against hard-
his Advances in Italy continued heartbreakingly
fighting German resistance and managed to get slow, however. On January 22, 1944, the Allies
only half way up. Patton, however, rampaged tried an amphibious landing at Anzio, south of
through western Sicily and, by July 23, he turned Rome, in order to turn the German line. They
east to support Montgomery. The Germans were managed to make the landing stick, just barely,
now confined to the northeastern corner of the but it was not enough to help them fold up the
and they were pushed steadily back. On
island, Germans. There simply wasn't enough force to
August 17, all of Sicily was in the hands of the spare in view of all that was being accumulated
Allies. for the invasion of France.
By this time, Mussolini had been deposed and Nevertheless, a new offensive did drive the
imprisoned and had been succeeded by General Germans back and, on June 4, 1944, Allied troops
Badoglio, who, to prevent German reprisals, an- marched into Rome.
nounced he would continue the fight. In secret, Meanwhile, Germany was waiting for the in-
however, he signed an armistice with the Allies vasion. Hitler was certain it would strike at Ca-
on September 3, 1943, On that day. Allied troops lais, where the Channel was narrowest, and he
landed at the tip of the Italian toe. insistedon organizing the defenses with that in
By September 8, the armistice was made pub- mind, overriding any objections by Runstedt and
lic and Allied troops under Mark Wayne Clark Rommel, who were in charge in the field. The
1939 TO 1945 625
Allies, for various sensible

reasons (including fired altogetherand, of them, 1230 hit London,
perhaps their knowledge that Hitler expected killing over 2500 people and wounding nearly
them at Calais) intended to invade the Cotentin 6000.
Peninsula in Normandy. The V-weapons were not decisive, however,
On June 6, 1944 (''D-day"), 4000 transports es- for the Allies captured the sites from which they
corted by 600 warships and 9500 planes carried were fired before they could do more than hurt.
1/6,000 troops and their ecjuipment to France. In this, as in so many other ventures of Hitler, he
Advance was not rapid. The Germans had an reached out far and almost grasped the prize
intricate system of defenses and they fought then fell short. It happened at Dunkirk, at the
hard. (One wonders what would have happened Battle of Britain, at the Battle of the Atlantic, in
if the Allies had encountered the
German forces the Soviet Union, in Africa, and now with his
in their prime, instead of having to face the rem-
weapons. If
reprisal one were inclined to mysti-
nants left over after several million of the best cism one might suspect supernatural interven-
German soldiers were lying dead, strewn over but that
tion, is not really necessary. When
the killing fields of the Soviet Union. In the vain one deals with a megalomaniac madman like
glory of victory, few Americans have thought of Hitler, one expects decisions to be made with-
that, but it does no harm to remind ourselves of out regard for reality so, of course, things will
the fact.) go wrong.
It was not until June 27, 1944, that the great Things were going seriously wrong inside
French port of Cherbourg fell to the Allies. Germany, too. For some years, certain Germans
Meanwhile, Hitler launched his "secret weap- had felt that the only way to keep their land from
ons." He had been speaking of them for a long disaster was to assassinate Hitler. A number of
time as a way war around, no mat-
of turning the plans were made with that in mind, but none
ter how badly it might seem to be going. They
worked, for Hitler (with fears of assassination be-
were the "Vergeltungswaffe" ("reprisal weap- fore him) never kept to any schedule but was
ons"), and were abbreviated as V. forever changing plans evasively. Besides, the
The first of these was the V-1, which was a would-be assassins did not make plans that
pilotless plane, launched from catapults or air- would involve their own death. It seemed impos-
craft. It was about 25-feet long and 18-feet wide. sible to find a good way of killing Hitler and, at
Human pilots were not involved, so their use car- the same time, preserving the life of the assassin.
ried little risk, and furthermore these "Flying By 1943, the rot had entered the German
Bombs" could be built cheaply. Some 8000 were army. Generals who had been perfectly willing
launched against Great Britain, and an equal to fight for Hitler and to follow all orders as long
number against Belgium, beginning June 13, as that seemed to lead to victory now began to
1944. They flew at less than the speed of sound, change their minds as defeat began to seem more
so about half of them were shot down. Neverthe- and more inevitable. Hitler, lost in his megalo-
less, their use seemed a recrudescence of the Bat- mania, seemed clearly ready to lead Germany
tle of Britain, and British morale was badly into the abyss and since the military establish-
shaken. ment never had the guts to oppose him openly,
Matters grew worse with the V-2, the first conspiracy and assassination seemed the only
working missile. It was run by rocket power at way out.
speeds greater than sound so that it could not be German officer and war-hero (he
Finally, a
detected or intercepted before striking. It had had been badly wounded in combat), Claus
been developed by the German rocket engineer Schenk von Stauffenberg (1907-1944), undertook
Wernher von Braun (1912-1977) and it was to spearhead an attempt to kill Hitler at his
head-
47-feet long, burned alcohol and liquid oxygen, quarters in East Prussia. On July 20, 1944, he en-
and reached heights of 60 miles. The first V-2 was tered the headquarters with a briefcase filled
fired on September 7, 1944. A total of 4300 were with explosives designed to explode only after he
himself had gotten well away. He placed it near with Finland, which had fought on the side of
Hitler's feet, then made some excuse to leave and Germany for three years. This time the new So-
did so. viet army showed itself not to be the old one.
However, someone pushing close to Hitler to The Finns were forced to surrender on Septem-
look at a map, found the briefcase in his way, ber 4, 1944. At the same time, the Soviets were
and shifted it to the other side of a heavy wooden driving into Poland, reaching the river just across
Because Stauffenberg did not re-
table support. from Warsaw on October 7, 1944. There, the of-
main behind to suffer his own death, he could fensive had to come to a halt while the Soviet
not correct the matter. divisions rested and brought up supplies.
In time, the briefcase exploded, a number of In Italy, the Allies took Florence on August 12,
people were killed, and the headquarters was re- 1944, but could notadvance far beyond it. An-
duced to rubble. Hitler was hurt, but he was not other winter had to pass with the Germans in
killed. He managed to reestablish his ascen- control of northern Italy. Mussolini, who had
dancy, and saw to it that all the military men who been rescued by German troops on September
were in any way implicated were executed under 12, 1943, was head of this remnant of Italy (in
atrocious circumstances, hanging them by wire. theory) and had overseen the execution of those
Even Rommel was forced to commit suicide on who had overthrown him and who were in
October 14, 1944. He
did so on the promise that reach. Notably, his son-in-law, Ciano, was exe-
his family would be spared. cuted on January 11, 1944.
The embers of independence among the
last On September 3, 1944, the Allies took Brussels
Germany military were thus wiped out. Hitler and the next day they took Antwerp. Over two
was now absolute and he led Germany down the million Allied soldiers were now in France and
final declivity. they had cost the Germans the loss of half a mil-
Soon after the assassination attempt, the Al- lion in casualties, plus the loss of 200,000 men
lied forces broke out of their Normandy beach- isolated in coastal fortresses who would have to
head. They punched through which
a hole eventually surrender.
Patton's tanks raced. Where once Guderian and The Germans stiffened, nevertheless, and
Rommel had led their tanks west and north, Pat- Rundstedt was put back in charge as, by the fall
ton now led his south and east. of 1944, German forces in the west stood on their
The German general, Hans Gunther von own borders again, four years after they had
Kluge (1882-1944), who did his best to stem the smashed into the Netherlands, Belgium, and
tide and save his army, could not prevent the France. In the east, the German puppets were
Allies from taking Paris on August 25, 1944. He scrambling for safety, and surrendering to the
was promptly fired by Hitler who suspected him, Soviets. Only Poland, Germany's first conquest,
anyway, of complicity in the assassination at- remained to the Germans, and not for long.
tempt. Kluge killed himself soon after. The Allies tried to break into Germany, but
Meanwhile, another Allied invasion struck resistance in the Netherlands was stronger than
southern France's Rhone valley on August 15, expected. Hitler was planning one last offensive,
1944. The Germans, worn out, fell back rapidly. a repeat of what he had done in 1940. He wanted
By the end of August, British forces were enter- to puncture a hole at the hinge between British
ing Belgium. forces in the north and American forces farther
Meanwhile, the Soviets, in accordance with south. He would break through, swing north,
their word, were attacking in the east. Even and trap the British once again.
while the Americans were breaking out of the It was a reckless gamble and to anyone but
Normandy beachhead, the Soviets were complet- Hitler it was obvious that it could not work. The
ing the liberation of Byelorussia. They had cap- Germans were far weaker in late 1944 than they
tured Minsk on July 3, 1944. had been in mid-1940, and the enemy they faced
What's more, the Soviets had a return match now was more numerous, far better supplied.
1939 TO 1945 627
and enormously higher in morale than the arose from the fact that the Germans converted
enemy they had faced in the past. the conquered people, particularly Poles and
Nevertheless, on December 16, 1944, Rund- Russians, into slave labor, working and starving
stedt pushed forward, driving a bulge into the
them ruthlessly to death. Some five million such
was therefore called ''the Battle
Allied lines. This
slave laborers were made use of.
of the Bulge." The Germans advanced 50 miles
Nor did the Germans
scruple to plunder the
against steadily stiffening resistance and were
nations they had conquered in order to keep up
then driven back. After a month, it was all over. the diet and morale of the Germans in the face of
They were back where they had been and their the ever-tightening British-American blockade.
last chance, such as it was, had vanished.
Despite heavy air attacks, Germany's war pro-
The year 1945 saw the end. By the beginning duction was maintained and even expanded into
of March 1945, the Allies had reached the Rhine
1944.
River. When they found that a bridge at Rema-
Germany's most disgraceful and horrible act
gen had not been blown up, they crossed it of all was its deliberate destruction of the Jews of
quickly on March 7. Meanwhile, the Soviets had Europe. In response to the psychopathological
driven into Germany from the east. anti-Semitism of Hitler and other Nazi leaders,
In April and May of 1945,German resistance the Jews were systematically rounded up, sent
in Italy finally collapsed. The Germans surren- into concentration camps and killed. Some six
dered. Mussolini tried to escape into Switzerland million Jews perished in what has come to be
but was caught by Italian anti-Fascist partisans called the Holocaust." The closer the Germans
and, on April 28, 1945, was shot without
trial and came to defeat, the more madly they fought the
hung upside down for the derision of the public. one battle they could win against a helpless peo-
His mistress was also shot and hung up, which ple.
seems to have been rather excessive. It was a mistake, of course, even from a
At the beginning of the year. Hitler retired strictly practicalstandpoint, and leaving all con-
deep into a bunker in Berlin and, except for one siderations of morality and humanity to one side.
or two occasions, never emerged, while the ar- Millions of Jews survive in the world generally,
mies on either side came closer and closer to each and they most articulate people with long
are a
other.
memories. They have seen to it, and will con-
The Soviets reached Berlin on April 22, 1945, tinue to see to that the crimes of the
it, Germans
and had it surrounded on April 25. Also on the will long live in the consciousness of the world.
25th, elements of the Allied army and the Soviet
army met on the Elbe River.
There was nothing left for Hitler to do except THE UNITED STATES (JAPAN)
to avoid capture. On April 29, he married his After the Battle of Midway, the United States was
long-time mistress, Eva Braun. He appointed finallyready for a land counteroffensive against
Doenitz his successor, and, on April 30, he killed the Japanese. The Japanese farthest penetration
himself and his wife. Their bodies were burned. southeastward was to the Solomon Islands off
May 8, 1945 was the end of the war in Europe the northeast coast of Australia, and they were
(the date came to be known as V-E Day). Roose- building an airport on the island of Guadalcanal
velt did not live to see it. He died on April 12, from which Australia might be bombed.
1945, and the news of his death gave Hitler one On August 7, 1942, therefore, the United
last spark of joy, for his sick mind somehow States made
landings on Guadalcanal and the
thought this death might rescue him. (The sud- nearby island of Tulagi. Complete surprise was
den death of Tsarina Elizabeth of Russia had res- achieved, but it was not to be an easy victory.
cued Frederick the Great from certain defeat Quite the reverse. On August 9, a Japanese flo-
but history does not necessarily repeat itself.) caught an American naval force at the "Battle
tilla
That Hitler's Germany lasted as long as it did of Savo Island" between Guadalcanal and Tulagi,
and destroyed four American heavy cruisers, edly high, but after four days the Japanese were
while suffering virtually no casualties them- wiped out.
selves. Nevertheless, the American forces continued
This enabled the Japanese to bring in rein- to push their way grimly toward Japan, closer
forcements, and what followed was a bloody and closer, never losing a battle, though the costs
half-year battle that set the tone for the battles were high.
that were to follow. The Japanese never surren- In February 1944, they retook the Marshall Is-
dered but tended to fight to the death, increasing lands, and by June, they were in the Marianas.
American casualties. However, they also had the Guam, the one-time American possession in the
odd idea (disproved on a number of occasions, Marianas, which had been lost in the immediate
but never abandoned) that, somehow, shrieking, aftermath of Pearl Harbor, was retaken on Au-
yelling assaults would overwhelm the Americans gust 11, and on October 19, American forces
by the sheer force of Japanese fervor. As a result, landed in Leyte, one of the islands of the Philip-
the Japanese tended to waste their strength in pine archipelago. Over two years before, Mac-
piecemeal emotional charges and died in far Arthur had promised he would return, and now
greater number than they had fought with
if he did.
more attention to the art of war. In the process, the last of the Japanese navy
It was not until February 7, 1943, that the Jap- was destroyed intwo "Battles of the Philippine
anese managed to evacuate their remaining Sea," the first from June 19 to 21, 1944, and the
forces on Guadalcanal. second from October 21 to 22. That summer also,
The Americans then proceeded to move American planes began a systematic bombing of
slowly and grimly up the line of the Solomon Japanese cities that was to lay the land in ruins.
Islands. The American navy was being con- What's more, Japanese land armies were being
stantly strengthened and by mid-1943, there was driven back into Burma and into northern New
no chance any longer of the Japanese scoring any Guinea.
further major successes against it. Yet despite Japanese forces continued
all this,
On April 19, 1943, Yamamoto, the architect of fighting fanatically. On February 19, 1945, Amer-
Pearl Harbor and of the assault on Midway, flew ican forces came ashore on Iwo Jima, a small is-
to the Solomons to inspect Japanese installations land only eight square miles in area, and only
there. The Americans knew he was on the way 750 miles south of Tokyo. There were 22,000 Jap-
and shot down the bomber that was carrying anese troops on it who were well dug in and it
him. Since he was Japan's foremost strategist, his took almost a month to root them out.
death was equivalent to the loss of a battle for By now, Germany was on the brink of ruin,
the Japanese. and the three chief wartime leaders Roosevelt, —
The Americans now instituted a policy of "is- Churchill, and Stalin —
had met for a second
land-hopping," of not necessarily trying to take time. This meeting was at Yalta in the Soviet Cri-
every island the Japanese held, but of driving at mea on February 7, 1945. There they tried to
certain key installations, and doing so ever closer work out the postwar structure of Europe, and,
to the Japanese home islands. In November 1943, among other things, Stalin had promised that the
the United States began to strike at the central Soviet Union would join in the war against Japan
Pacific islands of the Gilberts, and on November 90 days after the end of the war in Europe. It
20, made a major assault
they on the tiny atoll of would take 90 days, after all, to maneuver the
Tarawa, some 3000 miles southeast of Tokyo. men and equipment from west to east across
Unfortunately, the Japanese defenses were 6000 miles of war-blasted Russian land on the
unexpectedly strong and the Americans were un- slow Siberian railroad.
aware that the waters about the atoll were too The United States had to welcome Soviet as-
shallow for landing craft so that the soldiers had sistance if that were absolutely necessary to de-
to wade ashore. American losses were unexpect- feat Japan at a lower cost in American lives, but
1939 TO 1945 629
it would clearly be preferable if, somehow, Japan Japan and that Soviet participation would be
could be forced to surrender before the Soviets nothing more than a formality. For the purpose,
came in, so that there would be no mistake as to the United States had a new and fearful weapon
which nation had accomplished the task and so at hand.
that the Soviets could not claim a share of the
Otto Hahn of Germany had discovered ura-
spoils of victory. nium had found the process
fission in 1938, but
On April 1, 1945, American forces landed in so hard to accept (since it seemed so unlikely in
Okinawa, the largest of the chain of Ryukyu is- light of the knowledge of the day) that he was
lands, which stretched from the Japanese home reluctant to announce it publicly. His partner,
islands to Taiwan. It was only 325 miles from Lise Meitner, driven out of Germany into Swe-
Japan. den because she was Jewish, had less to lose and
While the fighting continued, Germany was so was more daring. She presented the evidence
smashed into final surrender, but even that did to Niels Bohr, the Danish scientist, who carried
not break the Japanese will to fight. They made it to the United States.
use of “kamikaze" pilots (named for the "divine American physicists quickly confirmed the
wind" that had destroyed the Mongol invasion discovery and began to work on uranium fission
nearly seven centuries before). These were sui- as a new source of energy. The Hungarian phys-
cide planes loaded with explosives that were pi- icist, Leo Szilard (1898—1964), recognized the
loted into American ships in order to blow them possibility of developing a nuclear fission bomb
up. of enormous power and talked American scien-
Even this final bit of desperation didn't work, tists into keeping their work secret. He then
but was not until June 21 that the last bit of
it
talked Albert Einstein into writing a letter to
resistance on Okinawa was ended, and now President Roosevelt urging that a government
there remained only the task of invading the Jap- project be set up to develop such a bomb before
anese home islands themselves. Hitler did (a terrible task for the pacifistic Ein-
No one knows what would have happened if stein). Roosevelt established what came to be
such an invasion had taken place. All of Japan's known as the "Manhattan Project" on December
large cities were virtually destroyed. Millions 1941, the day before Pearl Harbor.
6,
lacked food and shelter. There was absolutely no Under the leadership of the Italian physicist
hope of victory, or even of staving off defeat for Enrico Fermi, a controlled nuclear reaction was
long except at the cost of further extreme destruc- set up in a huge pile of uranium and uranium
tion. oxide on December 2, 1942. That was the begin-
would make sense to suppose that Japan
It ning of the "atomic age," and now it was neces-
would now ask for peace before the invasion ac- sary to make a device small enough to be carried
tually took place and ultimate disaster befell it. by an airplane, and moreover one that would ex-
On the other hand, the Japanese had shown no plode only when the explosion was needed.
signs of breaking. Certainly, Okinawa had been The first such "nuclear fission bomb" (called
a dreadful fight and the battle for Japan itself an "atomic bomb" at the time) was put together
might be an even more dreadful one. under the leadership of J. Robert Oppenheimer
It would probably have seemed natural to (1904-1967) and was exploded, as an experiment,
hold off and give Japan a chance to surrender in Alamogordo, New Mexico, on July 16, 1945.
before actually committing American forces to Two more such bombs were then put together
the final invasion, but the United States had no for use against Japan.
time. The war in Europe had come to an end on On August 6, 1945, the day before the Soviets
May 7, 1945, and Stalin's 90-day promise meant were scheduled to join the war against Japan, a
that Soviet forces would join the war on August fission bomb was exploded over Hiroshima,
7. The United States needed to make it perfectly Japan (which had, until then, been spared bomb-
clear before that fatal day that it had defeated ing) and the city was levelled. The Soviets joined
the war the next day, on schedule, and the sec- ence, technology, and business, began to gain
ond bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, on speakers and to be on its way to becoming a
August 8. world language to an extent no other language in
The Japanese, faced with the double disaster history had ever approached.
of the fission bombs and of the irresistible ad- Some enthusiasts even began to speak of an
vance of a Soviet army into Manchuria, gave in. "American century," a world utterly dominated
The United States was satisfied for it had been by the United States, presumably in the interest
made perfectly clear that an American fission of peace and freedom. (The road to such a de-
bomb had capped an American war drive to force nouement unfortunately turned out to be an ex-
the Japanese into surrender, and it had, inciden- tremely rocky one.)
tally, put on an instructive demonstration of un-
precedented power that couldn't be lost on the

Soviet Union (and the rest of the world, too). AUSTRIA
The Japanese asked only that they be allowed If we exclude the principal fighters of World War
to keep their emperor. The United States agreed II — Germany, Japan, and Italy on the one side,
and the Japanese signed the surrender document and the United States, the Soviet Union, and
on September 2, 1945 (also known as V-J Day). —
Great Britain on the other we face a world of
World War II was over. nations, most of which were greatly affected, and
The nuclear fission bomb was not the only some quite victimized, by the vast convulsion.
American achievement during the World War II Austria, the first nation to fall victim to Nazi
years. In 1940, Edwin Mattison McMillan (b. aggression, differed from the rest in that its peo-
1907) and Philip Hauge Abelson (b. 1913) had ple spoke German and, for the most part, gladly
produced element 93 ("neptunium") and ele- considered themselves to be part of the Third
ment 94 ("plutonium") in the laboratory. In 1945, Reich. What's more, the Germans themselves
McMillan devised the "synchrocyclotron" that considered the Austrians to be German so that
provided new heights of energy with which to Austrians were no more mistreated than Ger-
explore the subatomic world. mans themselves. Of course, both Germans and
John William Mauchly (1907-1980) and John Austrians mistreated and eventually killed all the
Prosper Eckert, Jr. (b. 1919) were working on the Austrian Jews they could.
first all-electronic computer, which was com- Austria fought along with Germany all
pleted soon after the war ended. It was large, through World War II, under the rule of the
clumsy, slow, and very energy-consuming, but it home-grown Nazi Arthur Seyss-Inquart (1892-
was the harbinger of the "computer age." 1946), who was eventually hanged as a war crim-
Selman Abraham Waksman (1888-1973) iso- inal.
lated "streptomycin" in 1943 and coined the Nevertheless, it suited the Allies to consider
word "antibiotic." This joined penicillin as a Austria a separate and conquered nation, since
treatment against infection and was the van- there was no intention of allowing it to remain
guard for a whole army of germ-fighting sub- part of the German realm after the war. Soviet
stances. troops took Vienna on April 13, 1945, and soon
In 1944, Robert Burns Woodward (1917-1979) afterward, Austria was restored as an indepen-
synthesized quinine and began a career in which dent nation under leaders who, it was hoped,
he synthesized even the most complex of the nat- had not been tainted by Nazism. In the immedi-
urally occurring chemicals. ate aftermath of the war, however, it was divided
By the end of the war, in fact, the United into four parts, each of which was occupied by
States had taken the world lead in science, as it one of the powers who were counted on the vic-
had done years earlier in technology. The English torious side: the Soviet Union, the United States,
language, thanks to American domination of sci- Great Britain, and (because of de Gaulle) France.
1939 TO 1945 631
who had not participated in the Munich Accord,

CZECHOSLOVAKIA had no hesitation about denouncing it.
Czechoslovakia was the first non-German nation In 1945, the Soviet army advanced into
to fall under the Nazi tyranny, and the first to
Czechoslovakia and the land was freed, but it
experience German frightfulness. Czechs were remained under Soviet domination. The eastern
subjected to slave labor, concentration camps, tip of Czechoslovakia (known, before the war, as
execution, and to the general status of a brow- Carpatho-Ruthenia"), which was occupied by
beaten, subjugated, endlessly humiliated people. ethnic Ukrainians, was absorbed by the Soviet
Although there was a shadow government Union as part of the Ukrainian S.S.R.
under Hacha, the puppet who had come in after
the Munich surrender, the Nazis placed von
Neurath (who had been Hitler's Foreign Minister POLAND
some years before) in position as the "Reich Pro- Poland suffered more, in proportion, from Ger-
tector" and real ruler of the nation. He was rela- man brutality than did any other nation. Vir-
tively mild for a Nazi, and was replaced in tually all 3,350,000 Jews were killed, as were
its
September 1941 by Reinhard Heydrich (1904- some millions of non-Jewish Poles. Perhaps a
1942), a brutal sadist who was second in com- quarter of population was slaughtered.
its total
mand in the Gestapo, the Nazi secret police, and Poland suffered a double invasion at first, for
who had been organizing the mass destruction of while the Germans annexed the western half of
Jews. He established a reign of terror in Czecho- the Nation, the Soviets annexed the eastern half.
slovakia. On June 2, 1942, he was assassinated, The was this: the portion an-
difference, though,
presumably by the Czechoslovakian under- nexed by Germany was populated by ethnic
ground. Poles. The portion annexed by the Soviet Union
The Germans, tracing the perpetrators to the was populated largely by Byelorussians and
little town of Lidice, just northwest of Prague,
Ukrainians, living in an area that Poland had an-
took wholesale revenge. All the male inhabitants nexed after its victory
over the Soviets in 1920. In
of the village, about 200 of them, were shot, and a sense, then, the Soviets could maintain they
the women and children were sent away, most were only taking back their own.
never to return. A Polish government-in-exile was established
Such incredibly brutal actions were taken be- and, after France fell, in London. It was
in Paris
cause the Nazis felt that terror would discourage under the leadership of Wladyslaw Eugeniusz
clandestine actions against the German over- Sikorski (1881-1943).
lords. It never did, but it did succeed in mobiliz- Once Germany invaded the Soviet Union, it
ing horrified world opinion against the brutal took over what had once been eastern Poland in
monsters, and added one more stain to the hell- a matter of days, and the Soviet Union, too,
ish fabric that the rest of the world was to hold began support the notion of a Polish govern-
to
against the Germans for many long decades to ment-in-exile. The Soviets had difficulty in main-
come. taining good relations with Sikorski, however,
Benes, who had been
president of Czechoslo- for he had been a Polish general active in the war
vakia before Munich, labored in London to get against the Soviet Union in 1920.
the Britishand French to declare the Munich Ac- Moreover, the Soviets had slaughtered Polish
cord invalid. The Allies were reluctant to do this military men in Katyn Forest, near Smolensk, in
and shame themselves, but after the fall of 1940. (They denied it steadily for half a century,
France, the British recognized Benes as head of then admitted that they had indeed been respon-
the Czechoslovakian government in exile. In De- sible.) Sikorski, certain this was so, pressed the
cember 1943, Benes visited the Soviet Union and Soviet Union on the matter, and the Soviets grew
signed a 20-year alliance with them. The Soviets, hostile indeed.
The Soviets therefore set up a Polish govern- began. The agreement whereby the Soviet Union
ment-in-exile of their own under Poles of Com- gained the eastern half of prewar Poland in-
munist leanings. Sikorski died in an airplane cluded also (with German acquiescence) an over-
crash over Gibraltar on July 4 1943, and, there-
, riding Soviet influence in the Baltic states.
after, two Polish governments-in-exile were a
the After the fall need for
of France, Stalin felt the
source of perennial irritation between the Brit- greater security in covering the approaches to
ish-Americans on the one side and the Soviet Leningrad, and he translated influence into out-
Union on the other. It was the first premonitory right annexation. In July 1940, the three states
rumble of what eventually came to be known as were forced to accept Comrnunist rulers and
the ''cold war." were converted into three Soviet Socialist Repub-
In 1943, were despairing uprisings
there lics and made part of the Soviet Union.
among the Jews, who had been herded into ghet- In June 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet
tos in Warsaw and other Polish cities. These were Union and, within a matter of weeks, had over-
crushed, of course, and the Germans merely has- run the Baltic states. The Estonians, Latvians,
tened the progress of the Holocaust. and Lithuanians were willing to help the Ger-
On August 1, 1944, at the time when the So- mans and would have done so much more
viet armies had almost reached Warsaw, the readily if the Germans themselves had been will-
Poles in the city rose in rebellion. The Soviets, ing to cooperate. So certain were the Germans of
however, were catching their breath for their their own "race superiority," however, that they
next offensive and remained immobile, so that never felt the need to conciliate the non-German
the uprising was put down by the Germans. (It peoples they had overrun, something that con-
is possible that the Soviets were not entirely anx- tributed mightily to their ultimate defeat. The
ious for the Poles to win their own freedom.) Germans did, of course, extend the Holocaust to
The Germans were, however, on their last the Baltic states, killing nearly 300,000 Jews who
legs and,beginning in January 1945, the Soviet had lived there.
armies occupied all of what had been Poland, In 1944, the Soviet army was back and the Bal-
which was then reconstituted as an independent tic states resumed their status as Soviet Socialist
state under Soviet control. Republics. Their boundaries remained what they
Its borders were not what they had been, had been before the war except that a small dis-
though. The Soviet Union continued to keep the including the city of Vilna (or "Vilnius" to
trict
eastern districts of Poland that it had absorbed in the Lithuanians) was transferred to Lithuania.
1939, making the northern portion part of the Vilniuswas the ancient capital of the medieval
Byelorussian S.S.R., and the southern portion Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Poland had an-
part of the Ukrainian S.S.R. Poland was compen- nexed (over bitter Lithuanian protests) in the
it
sated for this by the cession to it of portions of aftermath of its war with the U. S.S.R. in 1920.
what had been eastern Germany.
(The Soviet Union annexed the northern por-
tion of what had been East Prussia, including the FINLAND
city of Konigsberg, in which Immanuel Kant had When the Soviet Union, in 1939, attempted to
once lived and worked, and which now became exert influence over Finland and to annex por-
"Kaliningrad.") tions of Finnish territory designed to protect the
overexposed position of Leningrad, the Finns re-
fused and made ready to resist.
THE BALTIC STATES On November 30, 1939, the Soviet Union
The three small nations of Estonia, Latvia, and launched an attack on Finland which, the Soviets
Lithuania, which had gained their independence hoped, would accomplish what Germany had ac-
from Russia immediately after World War I had complished three months earlier in Poland. No
ended, lost it again soon after World War II such thing. The Finns were better prepared than
1939 TO 1945 633
the Poles had been and the Soviet army was far it too hard. To be sure, when the Germans in-
from possessing the expertise and precision of vaded the Soviet Union, they forced the creation
the German army. The war lasted three and a of a small Danish force that joined in the inva-
half months and included several humiliating de- sion, and further forced Denmark to sign the
feats for the Soviets. The overwhelming weight anti-Comintern pact against the Soviet Union.
of the Soviet army won at last and, on March 12, King Christian X remained in the country,
1940, Finland agreed to peace and to the surren- making no secret of his anti-Nazi feelings.
Den-
der of minor portions of its territory west of Len- mark, in fact, refused to accept Nazification and
ingrad. It retained its independence, however. to abandon their free way of life. Most surpris-
Finland drew nearer to Germany, thereafter, ingly of all, they refused to allow the Jews of
in an effort to protect itself from further Soviet Denmark to be killed and many, if not all, of
aggression, and quietly allowed German troops them were shipped to Sweden, which was neu-
on its soil. This meant that when the Germans tral, and where they were safe.
invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, they After the Battle of Stalingrad, the Danes be-
were in place to attack the northern reaches of came even more open in their anti-German atti-
the land, and in this the Finns were perfectly tudes. In 1943, therefore, the Germans took over
willing to help. full Denmark, which responded at
control of
In the course of the war, the Finns advanced once by developing an efficient underground.
eastward into Karelia, many ofwhose people Full independence was restored after Germany
were ethnically Finnish. This was done without surrendered in May 1945.
too much difficulty since the Soviet Union was
utterly absorbed in fighting the Germans on the
approaches to Leningrad, Moscow, and the NORWAY
Ukraine. Norway was neutral as World War II began, but
The Finns did not attempt to move beyond it was a rickety neutrality. Germany needed to
Karelia, however, and after the Battle of Stalin- have Swedish iron ore, and part of it was ob-
grad they could see clearly that Germany was tained from ships travelling through Norwegian
going to lose, so they began to try to disengage waters along its long coastline. Norway
territorial
themselves for fear of Soviet reprisals. For once, permitted this to avoid offending the Germans.
however, the Soviets were careful, perhaps be- Then, too, Norway, although sympathizing
cause there was much sympathy in the United strongly with the Finns in their war against the
States for the Finnish people. (Finland had been Soviet Union, refused to allow passage of Allied
the only nation to pay back its American debts in troops who wished to go to the aid of Finland,
the aftermath of World War I.) On September 19, again to avoid offending the Germans.
1944, the Soviet Union made peace with Finland Great Britain, of course, objected to this pro-
on essentially the same terms that had been im- German behavior and on April 8, 1940, it began
posed on it in 1940. to mine Norway's territorial waters to prevent
iron ore from reaching Germany.
The Germans had already planned their attack
DENMARK and this was a perfect excuse. On April 9, 1940,
Denmark, completely inoffensive, was occupied the Germans invaded. Unlike Denmark, Norway
by the German army on April 9, 1940. It did not resisted, and Great Britain rushed to its aid.
try to defend itself and it was better treated than However, the Germans were not to be withstood
other nations that had been overrun by Germany and, by June 7, all of Norway was in its hands.
because of its nondefense, and because it was The Norwegian government, including King
viewed as "Nordic." Haakon VI, fled to Great Britain to establish a
It retained a semblance of self-government government-in-exile.
and the Germans refrained at first from pushing Throughout the war, the Norwegians main-
tained a firm resistance to the Nazis, engaging in Once Denmark was occupied by Germany, Ice-
many acts of sabotage (notably in preventing the land broke away altogether and, on June 17,
Germans from using heavy water, which was 1944, it became fully independent, with a repub-
available in Norway, and which could conceiv- lican form of government.
ably have been used in devising a workable nu- It could not, however, avoid involvement
bomb).
clear fission in World War II. Its position in the Atlantic
Norway remained under Nazi rule until the Ocean made it an absolutely vital base for the
very end of the war, for neither the Allies from British navy, which was trying to fight off the
the west nor the Soviets from the east penetrated German submarine menace. In May 1940, there-
the land. After Germany surrendered, however, fore, British occupied Iceland for use
forces
theGerman forces in Norway also surrendered, as a naval base. The Icelanders did not resist
and Norway regained its independence. this. The Americans eventually replaced the
British and remained there until World War II

was over.
SWEDEN
Sweden was the one Scandinavian power that
was able to remain neutral in World War II. Like EIRE
Norway, it sympathized with the Finns in their Eireremained neutral throughout World War II.
war against the Soviet Union and gave them Considering the course of Irish history, it is not
what material help it could. It too refused to surprising that the Irish people were not partic-
allow Allied troops to cross its territory in order ularly sympathetic to the British. In order to
to help Finland, for fear that would offend Ger- make Germans would have no
certain that the
many. excuse to bomb Eire, the Irish government made
Germany was satisfied to allow Sweden to re- it clear that no facilities of any kind would be
main neutral. Once it had established itself in granted to the British.

Norway and in Finland, Sweden's neutrality On
the other hand, in the past the Irish had
could do no harm. It even served a useful pur-
it taken the opportunity of British troubles to call
pose since the Swedes could act as mediators be- on help to the Spanish, French, or German ene-
tween the warring sides when that was mies of England or Great but not so in
Britain,
necessary. the present case. Irish neutrality this time was
Then, too, Sweden continued to supply iron strict on both sides and Germany received no
ore and other materials needed for the German help at all.
war machine. It also allowed Germans to cross (For one thing, had shown any sympa-
if Eire
its territory on the way to Norway or Finland. thy to the Nazis, there would have been a bitter
This was a rather pro-German neutrality, but it reaction in the United States, and Eire depended
was either that, or submitting to outright seizure. a great deal on the political and financial support
As the war began to turn against the Ger- of Irish- Americans.)
mans, the Swedes grew less cooperative, and the
right of German was for-
transit across the land
bidden in 1943. By that time, Germany was too
involved in its losing fight against overwhelming
THE NETHERLANDS
enemies to risk a battle against the
The Netherlands attempted to remain neutral
Swedes.
in World War II, as they had successfully man-
aged to do in World War I. This time, though,
they were not given the chance. The Germans in
ICELAND their westward offensive burst into the Nether-
AfterWorld War I, Iceland had had only a loose lands on May 10, 1940, and, in the space of six
union with Denmark, a kind of dominion status. days, crushed Dutch resistance and occupied the
1939 TO 1945 635
land. In doing so, they ruthlessly bombed Rot-

terdam for no other purpose than to terrorize BELGIUM
the Dutch into surrendering. The Dutch gov- Belgium was invaded by Germany at the same
ernment, together with Queen Wilhelmina, time the Netherlands was. It endured a losing
fled to Great Britain to set up a government-in- battle for 18 days and then Leopold III of Belgium
exile. surrendered his army without warning the Brit-
The Netherlands remained under Nazi rule for ish and French, even though the had con-
Allies
five years and although their underground resis- demned themselves to almost certain defeat by
tance was vigorous, it was also useless. Most of advancing out of their fortified positions in an
the Jews in the Netherlands were killed. One was attempt to aid Belgium.
Anne Frank (1929-1945), who
died in a concen- Moreover, Leopold III made no effort to fol-
tration camp. She kept a diary in those dark low the example of Haakon VII of Norway and
days, hiding from the Germans before her cap- Wilhelmina of the Netherlands and to escape to
ture, that was published after the war and be- Great Britain, though the remainder of the gov-
came world-famous. ernment did. Unlike Christian X of Denmark,
In September 1944, the Allied forces were ap- who also stayed with his people, Leopold gave
proaching from the west and strenuous battles the impression of being a Nazi sympathizer, so
were fought on Dutch soil at Nijmegan and Arn- that after the war he was not allowed to keep his
hem, in which the Germans resisted ferociously throne.
and, in the end, unsuccessfully. The Dutch went He was kept a prisoner in his palace but in
through their worst period at this time and dur- 1944, as the Allied armies approached Belgium,
ing the Battle of the Bulge that followed, food he was transferred to Austria, where he was
grew short and famine threatened. freed in 1945.
The end of the war came in May 1945, how- The independent Grand Duchy of Luxem-
ever, and the Netherlands regained its indepen- bourg, a mini-state located just south of Belgium,
dence. had the even tenor of its existence disturbed
An important scientific advance was made in when it, was invaded as Belgium and the
too,
the Netherlands during those war years. A Netherlands had been. The Grand Duchess
Dutch astronomer, Hendrik van de Hulst (b. Charlotte fled to Great Britain, leaving Luxem-
1918), found ordinary astronomical research im- bourg to be annexed to Germany and made an
possible and he immersed himself pen-and-
in integral part of the realm. (It was, of course, in-
paper work. He considered the behavior of cold habited by German-speaking people.)
hydrogen atoms and worked out the manner in On September 10, 1944, it was liberated by
which the magnetic fields associated with the Allied troops and the Grand Duchess was re-
proton and the electron in the hydrogen atom stored to a once-again independent Grand
were oriented to each other. They could line up Duchy.
in the same direction or in opposite directions.
Every once in a while, the atom would flip from
one configuration to another and, in so doing, it
would emit a radio wave 21 centimeters in FRANCE
length. For France, World War II was a time of unbeliev-
Any hydrogen atom ought to do so only
single able humiliation. From
the time of Richelieu to
once in 11 million years but there were so many that of Bismarck, a period of two and a quarter
such atoms in space that a continuing drizzle of centuries, it had been the strongest military
21-centimeter radiation ought to result. After the power in Europe. Under Louis XIV in 1700 and
war, such radiation was sought and found, and under Napoleon in 1810,had dominated Eu-
it
this helped enormously to advance the science of rope almost totally. In each case, it had been de-
radio astronomy. feated in the end, but only by British naval power
at the head of a land-based coalition of other This was made by the destruction of
easier
powers. much of the French fleet in the Mediterranean by
It was not Franco-Prussian war of
until the the British in July of 1940. Hitler, and the French
1870 that France was quickly defeated by a single rightists, used this to bestir French thoughts of
power — Prussia, at the head of a soon-to-be Britain as the old traditional enemy of the days
united Germany. And even then, France had re- of Edward III, Henry V, Marlborough, and Wel-
deemed itself in World War I, though, to be sure, lington. For a while, it even seemed as though
it was then fighting as part of a mighty France, finding subservience insufficient,
coalition. would
In 1940, however, France went down under actually make common cause with Hitler and de-
the German onslaught with a record very little clare war on Great Britain.
better than that of Poland. What's more, in defi- Petain and Laval met with Hitler on October
ance of its commitments to Great Britain, it made 24, 1940, and perhaps this was discussed at the
peace with Germany and was willing to set up a time. However, though Laval must surely have
puppet government under German domination. been in favor of that, Petain may have drawn
It might have gone on fighting from its Empire back from this final disgrace. It may also have
overseas, but it chose not to do so. been that Hitler did not urge it strongly since he
The puppet French government, in faint con- might easily have felt that French help was some-
trol of central and southeastern France, had its thing that he didn't need and didn't want to have
capital at Vichy, and its leader was the feeble to pay for.
Philippe Petain, the one-time hero of Verdun, Even Petain found Laval hard to stomach and
who was now 84 years old. relieved him of his duties in December 1940.
The real leader of Vichy, France was Pierre However, Laval was merely followed by other
Laval, who had brought about the Franco-Soviet pro-German Frenchmen, such as Gaston Pierre
Treaty of Alliance in 1935, but who was now Etienne Flandin (1889-1958) and Jean Francois
completely sold on the notion that Germany was Darlan (1881-1942). Laval went to Paris where he
the certain victor of the war and that France served as a German flunky outright.
could avoid total annihilation only by submitting Many of the prewar who had been
politicians
loyally and utterly to Germany's tyranny. Fie left of center, including Leon Blum, who had set
made no secret of the fact that he thought Great up the Popular Front in the 1930s, Edouard Da-
Britain would be forced into a similar peace of ladier, who had been one of the architects of the
submission in a matter of months, if not weeks. Munich surrender, and Maurice Gamelin, who
And, in time, Vichy collaborated fully in the had been the French Commander-in-Chief at the
slaughter of Jews, in sending off Frenchmen into outbreak of the war, were imprisoned. On Feb-
slave labor and so on. ruary 19, 1942, they were put on trial by Vichy as
The only bright spot in this dismaying picture "war criminals."
of national disintegration was Charles de Gaulle, They defended themselves ably, however,
the French general, who made Lon-
his way to and, after weeks, the trial was stopped, and
six
don, proclaiming that France had lost a battle but all the accused survived the war. (That was more
not the war. He set up a French government-in- than Laval did, for he was executed for treason
exile,but was so prickly and so incredibly insis- after the war was over.) It may be that by 1942,
tent on being considered a modern Joan of Arc, the Nazis were not so completely certain of vic-
that he was a constant source of misery to Chur- tory as they had been and that they were not
chilland Roosevelt. willing to set a precedent on the matter of "war
Meanwhile, in Vichy, the Third Republic that criminals." (If that was so, it did not, in the long
had existed since Napoleon Ill's downfall seven run, help them.)
decades before was dismantled and a Fascist gov- The turnabout came in November 1942, when
ernment to be run by French rightists was con- Allied forces invaded North Africa. Germany at
structed. once sent its armies into supposedly indepen-
1939 TO 1945 637
dent Vichy, and all the nation was under German of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but its popu-
control, although the fiction of a Vichy govern- lation was mostly ethnic Romanian. After World
ment was maintained. Laval had been forced War I, Transylvania was annexed by Romania,
back into the Vichy government even before that, but the province contained numerous ethnic
in April 1942, and remained there until the end. Hungarians as well.
Meanwhile, French resistance to the Nazis Hungary therefore applied to Germany and
was growing, especially after Germany's inva- Italy, who
placed pressure on Romania. On Au-
sion of the Soviet Union threw the French Com- gust 30, 1940, the northern half of Transylvania
munists into the underground, de Gaulle was ceded back to Hungary, which thus regained
organized the "Free French" into a more and most of the ethnic Hungarians of the region.
more effective force, despite lack of cooperation There was a price for this, of course, and Ger-
from Great Britain and the United States, and many now gained the right to move troops across
various portions of the French Empire began to Hungary so that they might reach Romania,
come over to the Free French side. strengthen German influence in the Balkans, and
The Allied forces invaded Normandy on June make ready for the climactic invasion of the So-
6, 1944, and by that time the French resistance viet Union. Hungary joined the anti-Comintern
had grown to a formidably helpful force, so that, pact in December 1940.
in the end, because of this and because of de Hungary continued to hang back from actual
Gaulle, France was considered one of the four participation in the war, however. When Ger-
victorious powers, along with the United States, many invaded Yugoslavia in April 1941, Hun-
Great Britain, and the Soviet Union, despite its gary refused to join the invasion, though invited
defeat in 1940. to do so by Hitler. The strains of taking the
De Gaulle was in Paris on August 25, 1944. By chance of infuriating the then all-powerful Hitler
October 1944, he was recognized as the head of had caused the Hungarian prime minister. Pal
the French government by Great Britain and the Teleki (1879-1941), to commit on April 2,
suicide
United States and a Fourth Republic was estab- 1941. Just the same, after Yugoslavia had been
lished. defeated, Hungary didn't mind annexing por-
/
tions of Yugoslavian territory to its south that

had been part of the Hungarian kingdom before
HUNGARY 1918.
Flungary, under the Fascist regime of Admiral Once Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, he de-
Horthy, had supported Nazi Germany and prof- manded Hungary supply troops for the So-
that
ited from the crises of 1938. In the wake of the viet front. This Hungary was obliged to do, for
Munich surrender, it absorbed the southern sec- Romania was supplying troops and there was the
tion of Slovakia, which contained ethnic Hungar- fear that if Hungary held back, northern Tran-
ians. sylvania would be given back to Romania as a
It was not, however, anxious be involved in
to reward. The supply of Hungarian manpower
World War II, and, to begin with, it refused to began on a small scale, but, as the first winter in
allow German troops to cross its territory. Then the Soviet Union began, and as Germany began
greed stepped in. to find itself in trouble, soldiers were squeezed
In the wake of the defeat of Poland, the Soviet out of the nation in wholesale quantities.
Union had forced Romania to cede the province This put it in the war completely and, by the
of Bessarabia. (Romania had taken the province end of 1941, Hungary was formally at war with
in 1918, when Russia had been too distracted by Great Britain and the United States, as well as
revolution to resist.) This seemed to offer Hun- with the Soviet Union.
gary a chance for further aggrandisement. Nevertheless, the Hungarian government
The province of Transylvania, just east of tried to keep its options open. They tried to pro-
Hungary, had been part of Hungary in the days tect Hungarian Jews against Nazi annihilation
and they did not hesitate with the west-

to deal viets counterattacked at Stalingrad. By mid-1943,
ern Allies secretly, especially after the Russian Romanian casualties in the Soviet Union had
offensive at Stalingrad virtually destroyed the reached the half-million mark.
Hungarian contingents in the German army by In 1944, the Soviet armies were approaching
January 1943. Romania, which surrendered on August 24 and
In March 1944, Germany decided that Hun- deposed Antonescu on September 12, 1944. (It
gary was no longer a reliable ally. German forces eventually executed him.) At the end of the war,
occupied the nation and forced the Nazification Romania regained the territory it had lost to
of the land, including, of course, the slaughter of Hungary and Bulgaria, but the Soviet Union, of
the Jews. course, kept Bessarabia and northern Bukovina.
The Soviet Army was approaching from the Romania remained under Soviet domination
east, however, and by April 4, 1945, the Germans thereafter.
had been cleared from Hungary. Hungary was
reduced to its pre-Munich borders and, at the
conclusion of the war, remained under Soviet BULGARIA
domination. Bulgaria, having fought with Germany during
World War I, was relying on the new powerful
Germany of Hitler to see to gained some
it that
ROMANIA of the territory it coveted at the expense of its
it
The first year of World War II was disastrous for neighbor nations. It therefore supported Ger-
Romania. It was forced to cede the northeastern many in World War II, joining the Axis in March
provinces of Bessarabia, and Bukovina to the So- 1941. It cooperated with the Germans in their in-
viet Union, Northern Transylvania to Hungary, vasion of Yugoslavia and Greece and, by Decem-
and part of its Black Sea coast to Bulgaria. This ber 1941, was at war with the United States and
was a loss of one-third of its territory, and in- Great Britain.
cluded most of its gains after World War I. The Soviet Union was another matter. The
As a result. King Carol was forced to abdicate Bulgarian people had a traditional friendship
a second time, on September 6, 1940, in favor of with the Russians, with whom they shared much
his son, Michael. A Romanian general. Ion An- of their culture, and Bulgaria therefore would not
tonescu (1882-1946), took over the nation and war against the Soviet Union. Ger-
join in the
established a thoroughly Fascistic dictatorship. many allowed this because Bulgaria was small
The policy that seemed logical to him was to cul- and had no common frontier with the Soviet
tivate German friendship so that the losses to Union.
Hungary and Bulgaria might be regained and to After the German disaster at Stalingrad, the
join in the invasion of the Soviet Union so that Bulgarians lost all war and the Ger-
interest in the
Bessarabia might also be regained. man grip tightened. Boris III of Bulgaria had an
Romania therefore joined the Axis in October interview with Hitler in August 1943, at which,
1940, and allowed German troops free transit presumably, he refused cooperate further.
to
across the nation. (It also began a program to kill Shortly thereafter, on August 28, he died under
and deport the Romanian Jews.) Once the Soviet circumstances that have remained uncertain, and
Union was invaded, it sent contingents to join was succeeded by his son, Simeon II (b. 1937).
the German forces and, in return. Hitler offered In 1944, however, the Soviet armies were com-
Romania a section of the western Ukraine just to ing ever closer to Bulgaria, which tried desper-
the northeast of Bessarabia, including the seaport ately to make peace. The Soviet Union, to deal
of Odessa. with it adequately, declared war on Bulgaria on
Romania had to pay a high price for this, for September 5, 1944, and Bulgaria surrendered at
itstroops lost heavily in the advance into the once. It remained under Soviet domination after
Ukraine and then more heavily still when the So- the close of the war.
1939 TO 1945 639
government fled to Great Britain to form a

ALBANIA government-in-exile.
Albania was under Italian domination as World Yugoslavia was then divided among its neigh-
War II opened and the land, the poorest and least bors. Italy got a portion of Slovenia in the north,
developed in Europe, remained quiescent while as well as the Dalmatian coast. Germany got the
the Italians used it as a staging ground for the rest of Slovenia,while Hungary and Bulgaria also
invasion of Greece on October 28, 1940. The got pieces. The northwestern portion of the na-
Greeks drove the Italians back and southern Al- tion, Croatia, was declared independent and was
bania was the battlefield between the two forces placed under Italian domination.
for over five months until Germany came to Then a strange thing happened once again.
Italy's rescue in April 1941. The wild, mountainous areas of Yugoslavia lent
After the collapse of Italy in 1943, Germany themselves to guerrilla action, and guerrilla
took over control of Albania and reestablished its fighters sprang up in the land. There were, in
"independence." By then, however, the Albani- fact, two of these movements. One were the
ans did not want the Germans around for they Chetniks, under Draza Mihajlovich (1893-1946),
did not wish to share in the clearly approach- whose forces were and wanted a re-
nationalistic
ing German disaster. Communist elements in turn to the type of government that Yugoslavia
Albania seized control in and the last
1944, had had before the invasion. The other were the
Germans left in October of that year. At the Partisans under Josip Broz, universally known as
close of the war, Albania was under Soviet dom- Tito (1892-1980), who was a Communist and
ination. who fought for the establishment of a Commu-
nist Yugoslavia.
The Soviet Union, of course, supported Tito,
YUGOSLAVIA and, indeed, it seemed that his group was more
Yugoslavia felt a strong enmity toward Italy, effective in fighting the Germans —
they were ac-
which longed to control Yugoslavia's Dalmatian tually seizing portions of the land and setting up
coast, as once the city of Venice had done. Italy's administrative systems of their own in the face of
invasion of Albania put Italian forces both to the the Germans and Italians. Effectiveness counted,
northwest and the southwest of the nation. Con- and the British and Americans, anxious to defeat
sidering that, and the fact that Germany in 1939 Hitler above all, switched their support to Tito as
and 1940 had won enormous victories, and that well.
the other nations bordering on Yugoslavia were On October 20, 1944, the Soviet forces in com-
more or less firmly committed to the German bination with Tito's Partisans reentered Belgrade
side, it seemed that Yugoslavia had no choice but and, thereafter, Yugoslavia was ruled by Tito
to go along with the dictates of fate. In conse- under the domination of the Soviet Union. The
quence, the Yugoslavian government joined the unfortunate Mihajlovich was taken into custody
Axis on March 25, 1941. and was, eventually, executed.
To the world's surprise, however, what fol-
lowed was a coup, two days later, in which the
government was overthrown. It was clear that GREECE
the new men in power would repudiate the Axis Greece's neutrality in World War II was shattered
connection. on October 28, 1940, when Italy invaded the
The Axis reacted quickly. On April 6, German land simply because Mussolini wished to score
and Italian troops invaded, with Hungarian and a victory similar to those that Hitler had
Bulgarian troops aiding them. Quickly, the land won. He failed abysmally and the Greeks swept
was subjugated and, by April 17, Yugoslavia had the Italians back, deep into Albania, holding
surrendered and the Germans were in appar- one-quarter of its territory and taking a total
ently complete control. King Peter II and the of 28,000 prisoners. But then Hitler sent his
armies southeastward to rescue the Italian dicta-

tor. PORTUGAL
Germany attacked on April 6, 1941, and, be- Portugalwas as Fascist as Spain and its govern-
fore theend of the month, the Greeks were de- ment was in complete sympathy with Germany
feated and the 60,000-man British force which (and even flew its flags at half-staff when news
had come to their aid were driven into the sea. of Hitler's suicide reached them). Nevertheless,
On April 27, the Germans were in Athens, and a it had a traditional alliance with Great Britain that
month later they took the island of Crete by aerial dated back to medieval times, so it remained
assault. neutral. (Besides, it was separated from the Ger-
King George II and the government fled into man army by the width of Spain and, as long as
exile in London. Spain maintained its neutrality, Portugal was
There was resistance inside Greece, though safe.)
not quite on the successful scale seen in Yugo- After the Battle of Stalingrad, Portugal
slavia. Again, there was a nationalist resistance thought it wise
shade its neutrality in the Al-
to
and a Communist one. lied direction. In 1943 it permitted the use of the
Athens was reoccupied by British-American Azores Islands, a Portuguese possession in the
forces on October 13, 1944, but there continued mid-Atlantic, as naval and air bases against Ger-
to be civil war between the two resistance forces, man submarines.
one that was not settled at the time that World Nevertheless, in the immediate aftermath of
War II came to an end. the war, the victorious nations, particularly the
Soviet Union, were not friendly.
SPAIN
Spain remained neutral during World War II. SWITZERLAND
This was strange in a way, since Franco, who Switzerland kept firmly to its traditional neutral-
controlled Spain after its civil war, was com- ity in World War II, although it was in a difficult
pletely Fascist in his sympathies and owed his position. After June of 1940, it was surrounded
power to the help he had received from Germany by Axis powers on every side. It relied, however,
and Italy. on its well-equipped army, which it
sturdy,
Nevertheless, the three years of civil war had hoped would give a good account of itself if it
devastated the nation and Franco knew well that were attacked, and on its usefulness to the war-
Spain could not risk the economic consequences ring powers as a patch of neutrality within which
of going to war. He helped the Axis in nonmili- indirect negotiations on matters of importance
tary fashion but, in October 1940, when he met could be carried out. As a result, it survived the
with Hitler at the French border, he refused to go war untouched.
any further.
Franco did, however, send a small contingent
of Spanish troops to fight alongside the Germans THE PAPACY
in theinvasion of the Soviet Union. The Pope throughout World War II was Pius XII.
Once the tide turned against Hitler in 1943, Considering his position deep in the heart of
Spain began to observe a strict neutrality and he Rome, neutrality seemed a sensible policy. In
was thus able to avoid punishment. Spain ended view of his spiritual position, however, there was
as a survivor of the war and as a Fascist state considerable dissatisfaction over the fact that he
under Franco despite the defeat of the greater never spoke out against the hideous policies of
Fascist dictators. Nevertheless, Spain, after the Nazi Germany, and, in particular, that he al-
war, was
subject to considerable hostility from lowed the Holocaust to proceed without a mur-
the victorious powers. mur.
1939 TO 1945 641
bered British forces were forced to surrender on

EGYPT August 19.
Egypt's striving toward independence had to re- In December 1940, however, the British coun-
main on hold during World War II in view of the terattacked the Italian invasion force in coastal
fact that a British army was massed on Egyptian Egypt and achieved such a monumental success
soil to protect the Suez Canal and the communi- that it was clear that Italy could never find any
cation line that passed through it. Undoubtedly, way of reinforcing its forces in Italian East Africa.
many Egyptians sympathized with the Axis, feel- Nor did the British think the Italian morale there
ing that through an Axis victory the British yoke could be high in view of events in the north. The
would be thrown off. Probably many felt that British confidently made ready an East African
such a victory was assured once France was de- offensive, therefore.
stroyed and Italy joined the war on the side of On January 15, 1941, British forces drove into
Germany. Italian East Africa from Sudan in the northwest
If so, that feeling was shattered when the and from Kenya southwest. Ethiopian re-
in the
bumbling Italian invasion of September 1940 was sistance forces joined them and they had little
thrown back catastrophically by the British under trouble.
Wavell. There may have been another flicker of By February were in Mogadiscio, the
26, they
hope in the summer of 1942, when Rommel capital of Italian Somaliland; and by April 6, they
reached El Alamein, but that autumn it vanished were in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia.
forever. The British, thereafter, were strong Haile Selassie was back on his throne on May 5,
enough to force King Farouk to put the govern- and by the end of 1941, all of Italian East Africa
ment into the hands of pro-British politicians. was under British control. Mussolini's Empire
When the war ended, however, Egypt was had lasted only five years.
ready to push for independence more strongly At the end of the war, Ethiopia was indepen-
than ever. In fact, in February 1945, when the dent once more and the former Italian colony of
Egyptian prime minister announced that Egypt Eritrea was annexed to it.
would declare war on the dying Germany, he
was promptly assassinated.
LIBYA
Libya, long a province of the Ottoman Empire,
ETHIOPIA had been an Italian colony since 1911. It was the
When World War opened, Ethiopia was still
II base from which Mussolini launched his ill-fated
firmly part of "Italian East Africa," which also invasion of Egypt on September 13, 1940. There-
included the Red Sea coastal area of Eritrea to the after, the tides of war swept into and out of Libya
northeast of Ethiopia, and Italian Somaliland, on several times after the Germans under Rommel
the Indian Ocean to the southeast of Ethiopia. took over the Axis army.
Once Italy joined the war in June 1940, it at- A climax was reached in the summer of 1942,
tempted to expand its holdings. Almost com- when Rommel penetrated east as far as El Ala-
pletely surrounded by Italian East Africa was mein, only 70 miles short of Alexandria. It was
British Somaliland, just east of Ethiopia on the by then impossible, however, for him to get the
Gulf of Aden. (To the north of British Somaliland supplies he needed in view of the increasing Al-
was a small district, French Somaliland, but lied air and naval power in the Mediterranean
France had surrendered and French Somaliland Sea.
was loyal to Vichy and would, if anything, help On October 23, the British began a new offen-
the Italians.) sive under Montgomery and, by November 12,
On August 6, 1940, Italian forces invaded Brit- Rommel had been driven back into Libya. The
ish Somaliland. The isolated and vastly outnum- pursuit continued and on January 24, 1943, the
British were in western Libya and took Tripoli, under the American General Eisenhower. It was
the Libyan capital. By the end of the month, Ger- felt that the French in North Africa might fight
man forces had been pushed out of Libya alto- against the British but might not choose to fight
gether and into the French colony of Tunisia. against Americans.
The amphibious operation that followed in-
volved 850 ships and was the largest of its kind
FRENCH NORTH AFRICA the world had yet seen. They landed on Novem-
At the start of World War II, the three North ber 8, 1942 in Morocco and Algeria, and there
African states of Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia was indeed only three days of fighting. As it hap-
had been French colonies since the nineteenth pened, Admiral Darlan, a Vichy stalwart, was in
century. After the fall of France, it was quite pos- North Africa at the time. As a legitimate repre-
sible for French forcescontinue fighting from
to sentative of the Vichy government, he signed the
North Africa. It was just across the Mediterra- surrender terms on November 11, and made it
nean Sea from France and much of the strong stick.
French fleet was based there, and could be With the Allied armies all about him, Darlan
counted on to keep it reasonably secure. found it expedient to change sides. He arranged
France did not choose this path, however, and to have all of French North Africa and French
North Africa, under the aged and conservative West Africa come over to the Allied side. In re-
general, Maxime Weygand, remained loyal to the turn, he was allowed to remain as chief of state
puppet government in Vichy. In fact, on July 3, in theFrench African colonies.
1940, Great Britain was forced to destroy part of There was expediency to this because it might
the French fleet at Oran, in Algeria, in order to encourage other Vichy officials to desert to the
make certain it would not fall into German Allied side, and because
kept Charles de
it
hands. Gaulle, whom neither Churchill nor Roosevelt
General de Gaulle, with the help of the Brit- could endure, out of command. Nevertheless, it
ish, tried to seize Dakar, the capital of French created a furor among who felt the deed
those
West Africa on September 22, 1940, but failed. might give the impression that though the West
De Gaulle did manage to pick up some scraps of fought Fascism in the abstract, they had no quar-
the French Empire in French Equatorial Africa, rel with Fascists, provided they gave lip-service
for instance, and in the western hemisphere, but to western policy.
these accessions were not the kind that made The problem was solved when Darlan was as-
much difference in the war. sassinated on December 24, 1942. Even then,
French North Africa was the real prize, for, if however, the Allies avoided de Gaulle and ap-
it could be swung to the Allied side, it could help pointed another French general of impeccably
cut off the German army in Libya. In addition, anti-Nazi antecedents, Henri Giraud, to succeed
French North Africa could be used as a staging him. This, of course, outraged the Gaullists and
area for invasions along the southern coasts of General Eisenhower had his hands full trying to
Nazi-dominated Europe. At least, this was Chur- keep everyone happy.
chill's feeling, for he was very much against a While all this was going on, military affairs
frontal attack across the English Channel on were neglected because of the political turmoil,
France where
itself, the Germans were very and the Germans, having been driven out of
strong and where there might be a catastrophe. Libya had time to set up defensive positions in
The Americans, who wanted to strike at the the French colony of Tunisia.
heart, gave in to Churchill on this, and a cam-
Between January 17 and 27, 1943, Churchill
paign against North Africa was planned. and Roosevelt and their staffs met at Casablanca,
It was arranged that the invasion
would be a coastal city of Morocco, and discussed what
predominantly American, and that it be placed was to come next. Again, the United States
1939 TO 1945 643
wanted to strike at the heart and again, Churchill to the fighting in North Africa, but a large anti-
demurred and preferred to use North Africa as a British party remained among the Afrikaaners of
base for striking at Italy, and again, he was de- Boer descent. After Hertzog's death, their leader
ferred to. was Daniel Francois Malan (1874-1959).
Finally, in mid-February, Americans
the Smuts won an electoral victory in 1943, but
under Eisenhower advanced into Tunisia from once the war was over, the Afrikaaners looked
the west and the British under Montgomery did forward to having their chance at power.
so from the east. The Germans fought doggedly,
and defeated the Americans in the first battle,
but they didn't have a chance in the long run. In PALESTINE
early May, the surviving soldiers, 275,000 of The coming of World War
meant that the Brit-
II
them, surrendered. ish, who controlled Palestine, had to placate the

No attempt was made by Germany to rescue Arab population, since Hitler's anti-Jewish pro-
them, Dunkirk-fashion. In view of the Allied paganda naturally made inroads among them.
command of the probably would not have
air, it Therefore, Great Britain turned against Jewish
worked, but the end result was that the Axis lost emigration into Palestine and took up other anti-
its African holdings ingloriously. Jewish positions as well.
This was in line with Hitler's madness. From Nor could the Jews, however fiercely Zionist
the first winter in Russia, to the very end, he they might be, do anything about it. Hitler and
insisted on an impossible policy of "no retreat" his Nazis were clearly the great and overwhelm-
and was willing to accept the death and im- ing enemy and anything the British did had to be
prisonment of uncounted Germans as a result. endured.
The German generals knew very well that this During the course of World War II, therefore,
was insanity, but they could only conspire ner- Palestine was relatively quiet, but by the end of
vously and, ill the end, ineffectively, and wer'- the war, pent-up passions were ready to make
destroyed. themselves felt.
UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA SYRIA

The Union of South Africa, although a member Syria was under French control at the start of
of the British Commonwealth of nations, did not World War II. When France fell, the French
feel an unalloyed loyalty to Great Britain at the forces in Syria remained loyal to Vichy. There
start of the war. The prime minister, James B. M. were 33,000 troops and German advisers
there,
Hertzog (1866-1942), had been a Boer general joined them. Great Britain could not endure an
during the Boer War and, like many of his com- anti-British force so close to the Suez Canal, es-
patriots, he had not forgotten that period. He felt pecially after the Germans had taken over all the
that South Africa, thousands of miles removed Balkan peninsula, including the island of Crete,
from the war theater, might well remain neutral. in the spring of 1941.
Jan Christian Smuts (1870-1950), who had On June 8, 1941, therefore, a force of British
also fought on the side of the Boers, had, how- and Free French invaded Syria. The French
ever, long ago made his peace with Great Britain, fought vigorously but on June 21, the British took
and he felt that South Africa should stand at Brit- Damascus and by July 12, the French forces in
ain's side. Smuts won out and South Africa de- Syria surrendered.
clared war on Germany on September 6, 1939. In the course of the invasion, the Free French
Hertzog thereupon resigned and Smuts became promised independence to Syria, and at the end
prime minister. of the war the Syrians had no trouble remember-
South African forces contributed significantly ing that.
might lead to the regaining of territories had

TURKEY lost toRussia over the past century.
it
Turkey, which had fought on the German side in Neither the Soviet Union nor Great Britain felt
World War I, declared its neutrality in World War inclined to permit any cooperation between Iran
II. On
June 18, 1941, however, a nonaggression and Germany, especially an important
since
pact was signed by Germany and Turkey. That route of supplies for the beleaguered Soviet army
freed Germany's hand further for the invasion of was by way of the Persian Gulf and up through
the Soviet Union, which began four days later. Iraq, Iran, and the Caucasus.
Turkey was tempted by the thought that a So- Iraq having been quieted in May 1941, British
viet defeat might make it possible for Turkey to and Soviet forces entered Iran on August 25,
extend its territory in the Caucasus, but caution 1941, the Soviets from the north and the British
held it back. Once it was clear that Germany was from the south. The Persian Shah, Reza Khan
about to be utterly crushed, Turkey declared war (1878-1944), whose dealings with Germany
on Germany on February 23, 1945, in the hope made him undesirable, was forced to abdicate on
that that might assuage Allied annoyance at their September 16, 1941, and was succeeded by his
not having helped earlier when that help could son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1919-1980).
have been useful. The British and Soviet forces promised, on
January 29, 1942, that they would leave Iran after
the war was over, with its independence and ter-
IRAQ ritory intact, and, eventually, they did so. Iran
was under declared war on Germany on September 1943.

Iraq British control when World War 9,
IIbroke out, but it had a government of its own

as well. Iraq did not fling itself into war on the
side of Great Britain but waited to see how the
AFGHANISTAN
war would go. After the fall of France, the Iraqi Afghanistan rem.ained neutral in World War II,
government thought it knew how the war would and was far enough out of the way to be quiet
go, and grew ever more reluctant to cooperate and unconcerned during its course.
with the British. They even began negotiations
with the Axis powers, feeling that in this manner
their full independence could be gained.
SAUDI ARABIA
On May Saudi Arabia remained neutral during World
2, 1941, Iraqis attacked British garri-
sons in the towns of Basra and Habbaniya near War II. Flowever, even as the war was begin-
the Persian Gulf. This was serious for it was an ning, it was coming to be realized that Saudi Ara-
bia and the other nations surrounding the
oil-producing area and Great Britain needed the
oil.What's more, a German airbase was being Persian Gulf were a rich source of oil, the richest,
set
up in Mosul in northern Iraq. as it turned out, in existence. Nothing much
The British sent in additional troops at

could be done about it during the war, but after-
once
and, by the end of May, Iraq was quieted, and ward Middle Eastern oil was to become a para-
was kept firmly in the Allied camp for the dura- mount concern of world economy and politics.
tion of the war.
CHINA
China passed through the years of World War II
IRAN
as a passive victim. The Japanese held large areas
Iran took no part in World War but
II at first, of northern and coastal China throughout the
once Germany invaded the Soviet Union, it war, but made no serious effort to extend their
began to feel that cooperation with Germany holdings, being busy elsewhere.
1 939 TO 1945 645
Nor was Chiang Kai-shek ever able to drive movement for an independent "Indonesia," led
them back, despite the fact that the United States by Achmed Sukarno (1901-1970).
held to the odd notion that he was a great mili-
tary leader and gave him what help it could.
Mao Tse-tung and his Chinese Communist FRENCH INDO-CHINA
forces, with their capital at Yenan in north-cen- Immediately Japan moved
after the fall of France,
tralChina, remained largely quiescent during the land and sea forces into Indo-China, something
war, too, but gathered their strength for a settle- France could not prevent. By the end of the year,
ment afterward. And, indeed, once the war was Japan was in virtual control of the land and that
over, the civil war between Chiang's Nationalists continued throughout the war. With the defeat
and Mao's Communists resumed at once. of Japan, France attempted to reinstate its own
domination, but there was a strong drive for in-
dependence led by Ho Chih Minh (1890-1969).
KOREA
Korea had been under harsh Japanese rule since
1910, but it was clear that the Allies intended to MALAYA
reduce Japan to the territorial area it had held On December 8, 1941, immediately after Pearl
when Commodore Perry opened it to trade less Harbor, Japanese troops landed in northern Ma-
than a century earlier. laya, then a British possession, and moved
That meant that once Japan surrendered, southward rapidly. The British quickly sent a
Korea would be independent again. So it was, in naval force to the scene, but the Japanese had
a manner of speaking, except that it was divided airpower at the time and the British did not. The
into two parts at the 38th parallel, with the Amer- battleship Prince of Wales and the battle cruiser
icans dominating the southern part and the So- Repulse were sunk on December 10. This was al-
viets the northern part. most as bad a blow to the Allied cause as Pearl
Harbor had been.
The British fell back, with scarcely a chance of
THE DUTCH EAST INDIES stopping the Japanese, who took the great naval
The Dutch had dominated the vast East Indian base of Singapore on February 15, 1942. The Brit-
archipelago for over three centuries, but they ish casualties (mostly prisoners) were 14 times
were no position to defend that prize from the
in and Malaya remained under
that of the Japanese,
Japanese in the months after Pearl Harbor. Japanese domination until the end of the war.
Japanese forces landed on the island of Ce-
lebes on January 11, 1942, and from there spread
out over the rest of the archipelago. They took THAILAND
Batavia, in Java, the largest of the East Indian Thailand found itself in a difficult position after
cities, on March 6, 1942, after defeating an Allied Pearl Harbor, since the Japanese were in Indo-
fleet in the Battle of the Java Sea between Febru- China to its east and were expanding rapidly
ary 27 and March 1, 1942. through the western Pacific Ocean against little
They finally moved into eastern New Guinea, effective opposition. On December 21, 1941,
which was under British and Australian rule, and therefore, Thailand signed a 10-year treaty of al-
there they were finally stopped. liance with Japan, and, on January 28, 1942, de-
The Dutch East Indies remained Japanese- clared war on Great Britain and the United
dominated throughout the war, and when Japan States. They did little or nothing in the way of
was defeated, it was clear that the people of the actual fighting, however, and when the war
islands were not willing to return to the situation ended, Thailand made its peace with the Allies
as it was before Pearl Harbor. There was a strong and escaped harm.
had won great victories in North Africa against

PHILIPPINE ISLANDS the Italians, became Viceroy of India. He contin-
As World War II approached, the Philippine Is- ued discussions with Indians fighting for inde-
lands were being groomed for independence by pendence and these settled nothing, too.
the United States. Immediately after Pearl Har- Fortunately, the Japanese found they had
bor, the Philippines were hit hard. The Japanese reached their limit in Burma. The lines of com-
struck on December 8, and even though the news munication were too long and too difficult to sus-
of the Pearl Harbor attack the day before had tain a major offensive against India, so that the
reached the Philippines, the Japanese neverthe- quarrel over independence could continue with-
less found American forces unready and were out the complication of a foreign invasion.
able to wipe out the American air force there. Once the war was over, however, it was clear
The American commander, MacArthur, chose that Indian independence could not be long de-
not to defend Manila, which was taken by the layed.
Japanese on December 26. The American forces
moved into the Bataan peninsula, where they
were finally forced to surrender on April 9, 1942. AUSTRALIA
On May 1942, the island of Corregidor, off the
6, Australia, of course, stood shoulder to shoulder
southern tip of the peninsula was also taken and with Great Britain and declared war on Germany
Japan controlled all of the Philippines. along with it. Australian armed forces partici-
A number of Filipinos were pro-Japa-
small pated in the early battles in Europe, notably in
nese, and out of them Japan built a puppet gov- the Mediterranean and in North Africa. When
ernment which was made into what they called Tobruk, in Libya, held out for eight months
an independent Philippine Republic in Septem- against a German
siege in 1941 before relief ar-
ber 1943. rived, the defense was largely Australian.
On
October 20, 1944, however, American After Pearl Harbor, however, Australia had to
troops landed in the Philippines once more and fear for itself. Among those taken prisoner at the
on March 4, 1945, Manila was recaptured. fall of Singapore on February 15, 1942, for in-
With the end of the war, progress was re- stance, were 15,000 Australians, and on February
sumed toward Philippine independence. 19 the Japanese bombed Darwin on the northern
Australian seacoast. The Japanese also moved
into eastern New Guinea, which was under Aus-
INDIA
tralian control, and in August 1942 were threat-
In India, the struggle for independence contin- ening Port Moresby on its southern coast, and
ued right through World War II. The British gov- were moving into the Solomon Islands to the
ernment in India placed the land at war with southeast as well.
Germany, just the same, and Indian troops par- Itwas only natural, then, that Australia
ticipated in the fighting in North Africa.
should turn away from the war inEurope and
Things grew tighter after Pearl Harbor, of look to own
its defense. In doing so, it formed
course, especially when the Japanese were pour- what was, in effect, a closer alliance
with the
ing into Burma. seemed then that they would
It
United States than with Great Britain. General
surely attack India, and Great Britain had to take
MacArthur set up his base of operations in Aus-
drastic measures to insure at least some Indian
tralia and, together, Australians and Americans
loyalty.
pushed the Japanese back in New Guinea.
The left-leaning British political figure Richard
Stafford Cripps (1889-1952) had headed a mis-
sion to India on March 23, 1942, but it failed to NEW ZEALAND
settle the outstanding disputes between India New Zealand's experiences in World War II ex-
and Great Britain. In October 1943, Wavell, who actly paralleled those of Australia. New Zealand
EPILOG 647
soldiers fought side by side with Great Britain in many had tried to capitalize on
The United
that.
Europe before Pearl Harbor, and fought in the States labored to avoid such a situation in World
Pacific in close alliance with the United States War II. In November 1941, most of the differ-
after Pearl Harbor. ences between the nations were settled, and on
May 22, 1942 Mexico declared war on Germany,
Italy, and Japan. It collaborated with the United
CANADA States in setting up a defense against any Axis
Canada, as the oldest of the British dominions, attack on the North American continent; one
did what was expected. They declared war on which, fortunately, never occurred.
Germany on September 9, 1939, and on Japan on The smaller nations of Central America and
Decembers, 1941. the West Indies all declared war on the Axis pow-
As always, however, there was the strong ers as a gesture of solidarity with the United
French minority in Quebec that was less than en- States, but were not much affected by the war
thusiastic about sacrificing for the British and except as suppliers of raw materials.
that stolidly repulsed attempts at establishing
all Many of the South American nations also
conscription. As a result, nearly to the end of the broke off diplomatic relations with the Axis,
war, Canadian participation in the actual fighting though none contributed anything substantial to
was entirelythrough volunteers. There were a the actual fighting.
considerable number of such volunteers, of
course, and Canadian soldiers lost heavily in a
failed British-Canadian attack on the French ARGENTINA
coastal city of Dieppe on August 19, 1942. Can- Of the nations in Latin America, Argentina was
ada also served as an important source of food the least affected by the notion of hemispheric
and other supplies for the beleaguered home solidarity. It declared itself neutral at the begin-
country. ning of the war, and held to that neutrality even
After the invasion of Normandy,became it after Pearl Harbor, to the annoyance of the
necessary to send some men overseas who had United States. The war years saw the beginning
not volunteered for the purpose. This further an- of the rise to power of Juan Domingo Peron
tagonized the people of Quebec and made it (1895-1974), who found his support in the labor-
plain that after the war was over, there would be ing class.
increasing danger that Canada might split into On January 27, 1944, when it was clear that
two parts. Germany was losing the war, Argentina finally
severed diplomatic relations with it. In Ger-
many's last days, Argentina declared war on it in
MEXICO order to avoid any peacetime reprisals.
Mexico and the United States had been at enmity
during the early years of World War I and Ger-
EPILOG
It was my original intention, when I began to and have ended it with V-J day — September 2,
write this history of the world, to carry it down 1945.
to the very day on which completed the manu-
I The reason for doing so became plain to me
script. I have, however, changed my mind. only as I was writing the book, for working on it
made it seem to me that prior to 1945 there were The fall of the Roman Empire introduced as
no discontinuities in history. By a historic discon- drastic a change, but it was a slow process and
tinuity, I mean something that fulfills the follow- affected western Europe primarily.
ing functions: The Mongol conquests of the 1200s upset al-
A most all of Eurasia but it passed after 50 years
1. must make everything after-
discontinuity
ward very different from everything before. and left amazingly little behind it.
2. A discontinuity must introduce such a total The coming of cannon and compass-guided
ships opened up the world to Europe and laid
change in a short period of time that the sud-
the groundwork, beginning in 1450, for the dom-
denness of the change can impress itself on
ination of the entire world by ’men of European
everyone.
descent; but it was a process that took several
3. A discontinuity should affect the entire world.
centuries.
Since change, in general, has been accelerat-
ing with time, it is not likely that any true discon- Now look at 1945, and consider what happened
tinuity could have taken place in early times. in the space of a very short time, a veritable in-
There is no question, for instance, that the dis- stant in history.
covery of the use of fire utterly changed human
life. So did the development of agriculture of — 1.Before 1945, all that human beings could do
—
herding of shipping of metallurgy. — in the way of rapine and destruction could not
In all such cases, however, the coming and the seriously affect our planet. recovered rapidly
It
progress of the change was so slow that in any from even the most destructive of wars. Since
one given generation, there could not have been 1945, however, we have accumulated nuclear
any real consciousness of change. What's more, weapons, which in the space of days (if used un-
such changes, when they came, began in one re- sparingly) can destroy civilization and, perhaps,
gion of the world and spread out so slowly as to compromise the very habitability of the planet.
affect other regions only after many years had
passed. 2. Before 1945,the economic processes of
all
Even more recent technological changes, such humanity, from the use of fire to the use of radio,
as the invention of the steam engine in the 1770s, had not endanger the environment
sufficed to
and the Industrial Revolution to which it gave seriously. Since 1945, however, the rapid ad-
rise,didn't represent a true discontinuity. For vance of industrialization and the vast multipli-
one thing, it took decades before it was quite cation of the use of fossil fuels has resulted in the
clear to the British that their life had changed dangerous pollution of air, water, and soil, and
forever, and
took a couple of centuries for the
it
consequences to reach all the rest of the world.

the possible creation of a greenhouse effect so —
that, again, the very habitability of the planet
Some nontechnological changes can take place may be compromised. This includes the use of new
faster and upset things more noticeably. The ca- artificial substances, such as chlorofluorocarbons
reer ofAlexander the Great and the victories he and which resist breakdown by natural
plastics,
won in the 300s B.C. completely and almost in- processes and which introduce new strains on
stantaneously changed the Greek world. Noth- the environment.
ing there was ever again the same, and the
change took no more than a decade to work itself 3. The human population of Earth has risen
out. steadily since the days of the early hominids, but
This change was drastic and sudden, but it prior to 1945, it more or less matched the exten-
was worldwide. It affected only the eastern
not sion of the human
range and took place slowly
Mediterranean and western Asia, so it was not a enough so that world society could adapt to it.
true discontinuity in the sense I mean. Since 1945, the rate of population increase has
EPILOG 649
increased and the world population has

itself and more secure, and enabled humanity to han-
more than doubled, while the use of energy and dle its problems better. This has continued faster
of resources generally has increased far more than ever, and such new postwar phenomena as
rapidly The planet groans under the weight
still. computers, television, jet planes, space flight,
of humanity, the forests and the wilderness are and medical techniques offer hope. And yet
disappearing, large numbers of living species are here, too, there is difficulty. Prior to 1945, tech-
being driven to extinction, and the ecological bal- nological advances spread outward from the
ance of the Earth is being compromised. Closer point of origin sufficiently slowly so that the
to us as individuals are the spectres of food short- changes could be absorbed without undue diffi-
ages and famine that would unbearably aggra- culty. Since 1945, new advances
spread over the
vate the serious problems of disease, violence, world almost at once, producing changes that
drugs, and social alienation that already exist. can only with difficulty be worked into our soci-
ety.
4. through the history of civilization, until
All
1945, there has been a tendency for imperial If ever there was a discontinuity in history,
growth, with larger and larger political units then, it was in 1945, and it would be entirely too
being built up. Since 1945, in a very short period jarring to attempt to continue this present history
of time, all the overseas European empires broke past that fearful break.
up and 'Third world" nations have become in- What is needed is a completely different book,
dependent by the dozens. (A generation after- one with a short prolog describing the nature of
ward, the Soviet empire broke up as well.) In a pre-1945 human history, and then examining the
way, this is a "freedom explosion" that might be effects of the discontinuity in detail. Post-1945
welcomed, but the change has been so rapid that history may
turn out to require a book nearly or
these new nations have developed neither the quite as long as this book, devoted to pre-1945
economic substructure nor the political maturity history.
to run their societies properly. Naturally, I want to do this second book my-
self; however, after 52 years as a professional
5. Still, not everything points to disaster. All
through the history of humanity, there has been
writer, and production of well over 465
after the
published books, I seem to begin to recognize a
a steady and accelerating advance in technology
limitation to my capacity for endless work. Well,
that has, by and large, made human life richer
we shall see . . .
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INDEX
1
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% I
I
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'
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Akkadians, 37 Alexander the Great, 70-71
A 33,
Alamo, 358 Alexandria, rise of, 72-73
Abbasid Caliphate, 124, 128, 130- Alaric, 106 Alfonso VI, 149
31, 168 Alaska Alfonso VII, 155
Abelard, Peter, 153 Canada and, 483-84 Alfonso VIII, 159, 166
Abolition movement, 356 purchase of, 407 Alfonso X, 171-72
Achaean League, 74, 76, 78 in World War II, 619 Alfonso XI, 177, 183
Actium, Battle of, 88 Alba, Duke of, 224 Alfred the Great, 132
Adams, John, 209, 306 Albania, 167, 196 Algebra, 98-99, 134
Adams, John Quincy, 355 independence of, 496 Algeria, 345, 642-43
Adams, Samuel, 294, 306 Italyand, 567, 568 Ali of Egypt, Muhammad, 339,
Adolphus, Gustavus, 238-39, Republic of, 552 351, 352, 371
241-42, 252 in World War I, 526-27 Alphabet, invention of, 45
Adrianople, Battle of, 105 in World War II, 639 printing and, 206
Treaty of, 352 Albany Congress, 292 Alsace-Lorraine, 385, 492, 515
Aegospotami, 65 Albigensians, 165-66 Altimira cave, 21-22
Aeneas, 50 Albuquerque, 275 Aluminum, 431
Aeschylus, 63 Alchemy, 103 Amazon River, 218
Aetolian League, 74 Alcibiades, 65 Amazons, legend of, 218
Afghanistan, 139, 161, 287, 316- Alcoholic beverages. See Ambrose, Saint, 105
17 Prohibition and Amenophis, 42
after World War I, 555-56 Temperance movement. American Revolution, 306-10
Britain and, 378, 414 Alcott, Louisa May, 409 Canada and, 310
Indian invasion by, 298 Alcuin, 127 Spain and, 313
Persia and, 279 Alderotti, Taddeo, 171 Amiens, Peace of, 327
Russia and, 352, 436 Alexander I, Czar, 321, 322-24, Treaty of, 318
in World War II, 644 338, 350 Amorites, 40
Agincourt, Battle of, 189, 191 Alexander II, Pope, 148 Amphibians, evolution of, 10-11
Agricola, Georgius, 210 Alexander II, Czar, 371, 385-86, Anatolia, 34
Agricola, Gnaeus Julius, 94 421 Anatomy, study of, 178
Agriculture, origin of, 23-25 reforms of, 392, 395 Anaxagoras, 64
Agrippa, 88 Alexander III, Pope, 158 Anaximander of Miletus, 56
Ahab, King, 47 Alexander III, Czar, 421-22, 447, Anaximenes of Miletus, 56
‘
Airplanes, 486, 511 448 Andersen, Hans Christian, 350

654 INDEX
Anderson, Sherwood, 517 Articles of Confederation,

B
Angevin Empire, 157, 163 309
Angles, 116 Aryans, 41 Babbage, Charles, 343
Anglican Church, 216 Ashanti, 352 Babylon, Hanging Gardens of, 54
Anglo-Dutch wars, 258, 259, 261 Ashkenazim, 200 Bacchus, cult of, 59
Animals, domestication of, 22 Ashurbanipal, 50 Bach, Johann Sebastian, 275
Anno Domini, computation of, 2 Ashurnasirpal, 47 Bacon, Francis, 250
Anouilh, Jean, 580 Aspern, Battle of, 323 Bacon, Roger, 170
Anschluss, 572, 575 Assyria, 40, 50-51 Bacteria, origin of, 6
Antalcidas, Peace of, 67 Ataturk, Kemal, 554, 593 Baha'ism, 378 •
Antibiotics, 612, 630 Athanasius, 102 Baker, George, 518

Antietam Battle of, 403 Athens, 53, 60 144-45
Balathista, Battle of,
Antioch, 73 empire of, 64-65 Balboa, Basco Nunez de, 217
Antipater, 71, 89 Periclean, 63, 64 Balearic Islands, 172
Antonius, Marcus, 87-88, 89 Atlantic Charter, 621 Balfour, Arthur James, 465-66
Apes, evolution of, 14-15 Atlantis, legend of, 41 Balfour Declaration, 554-55
Apian, Peter, 210-11 Atom bomb, development of, Balkans. See also Estonia, Latvia,
Apollonius of Perga, 76 629-30 and Lithuania.
Appomattox, surrender at, 406 Attila the Hun, 109-10
108, Christianity in, 134
Apuleius, Lucius, 96 Augsburg, Peace of, 232 Ottoman Empire and, 491
Aquinas, Thomas, 171 Augustine, Archbishop of rebellion in, 341
Arabia, 117, 119. See also Saudi Canterbury, 116 Russia and, 417
Arabia. Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Soviet Union and, 613, 614
Arabian Nights, 128 Hippo, 107-8 in World War II, 601-2, 632
Arabic numerals, 134, 165 Augustus Caesar, 88, 90 Baltimore, 251
Aragon, 172, 193, 199-201 Austen, Jane, 333 Barbarossa, Frederick, 158, 160-
Archimedes, 74, 77 Austerlitz, Battle of, 320 61
Ardashir, 99 Australia, 291, 317-18, 380-81 Barbary ape, 14
Argentina Commonwealth of, 464, Barbary States, 339
unification of, 376 482 Barley, cultivation of, 23
Uruguay and, 347 in World War I, 531 Barnum, Phineas Taylor, 376
in World War II, 647 in World War II, 646 Barth, Karl, 589
Argonauts, Jason and, 68 Australopithecus afarejisis, 16 Bartholomew's Day Massacre,
Argos, 52-53 Austrasia, 116 230
Arianism, 102-3 Austria Bartok, Bela, 471, 577
Ariosto, Ludovico, 215 Germany and, 571-72, 575-76 Barton, Clara, 430
Aristarchus, 72-73 Holy Roman Empire and, 194- Baseball, 376, 487
Aristophanes, 65 95 Basil II, 144
Aristotle, 71, 130 in World War II, 630 Baskets, development of, 27
Arius, 102 Austria-Hungary, 388-89 Batavian Republic, 303
Arkwright, Richard, 292 Serbia and, 476 Bateson, William, 467
Armada, 223, 227 in World War I, 491-92, 520- Batista y Zaldiver, Fulgencio, 592
Armenia, 525
84, 94, 150, 21 Bauhaus architecture, 509
Ottoman Empire and, 477, 452 Austrian Succession, War of, Bavarian Succession, War of, 313
Rome and, 95 280-81, 283, 284 Beardsley, Aubrey, 441
Russia and, 350 Automobiles, 516 Becket, Thomas, 157
Arnold, Benedict, 307, 308, 310 Avars, 114, 116, 119-20 Becquerel, Antoine Henri, 447
Arnold, Matthew, 368, 398 Avicenna, 145 Bede, 127
Arquebuses, 212 Avignon, 178 Beer, origin of, 29
Arthur, Chester Alan, 428 Aztecs, 161, 181, 218 Beethoven, Ludwig van, 336
INDEX 655
Belgium Blitzkrieg, 503 Brandenburg, 153, 266, 275-76

bilingualism in, 548 of Poland, 595 Braun, Eva, 627
Congo and, 474 Blixen, Karen Christence Dinesen Braun, Wernher von, 625
Franco-Prussian War and, 399 ("Isak Dinesen"), 591 Brazil
independence of,346 Bloomer, Amelia, 375 constitution of, 458
suffrage in, 450-51 Blum, Leon, 579-80, 636 Portugal and, 200, 275
in World War I, 527 Bly, Nelly, 430 Republic of, 433-34
in World War II, 598, 635 Boccaccio, Giovanni, 178 Uruguay and, 347
Belisarius, 113-14 Boeotian League, 67 Brearly, Henry P., 494
Bell, Alexander Graham, 408 Boer War, 460, 464, 466, 477- Brecht, Bertolt, 546
Bellamy, Edward, 432 79 Breslau, Treaty of, 281
Belshazzar, 57 Boers, 353, 378 Brest-Litovsk, Treaty of, 520
Benet, Stephen Vincent, 536 Boethius, 112 Bretislav I, 144
Benevento, Duchy of, 126 Bohemia, 179, 195 Breuer, Josef, 421
Benthan, Jeremy, 312 Boleslaw II, 149 Britain. See also England and
Benz, Karl Friedrich, 418 Boleslaw III, 155 Great Britain.
Beri-beri, 437 Boleyn, Anne, 215-16 Battle of, 600-601
Bering, Vitus Jonasson, 286 Bolivar, Simon, 334 Romans in, 91-92, 108
Berkeley, George, 273 Bolivia, 347, 433 British East India Company, 299,
Berlin, Irving, 487, 501 Bologna, 154, 178 379
Berlioz, Hector, 360 Bolsheviks, 519 British Guiana, 454
Bernard of Clairvaux, 153 Bolyai, Janos, 349 Bronstein, Lev Davidovich. See
Bernoullis, 285 Bonaparte, Napoleon. See Trotsky, Leon.
Berzelius, Jons Jakob, 337 Napoleon I. Bronte sisters, 368
Bessemer, Henry, 367 Boniface, Saint, 125 Bronze Age, 31
Bethune, Mary MacLeod, 485 Boniface VIII, 177 Brooke, Rupert, 512
Beyle, Marie-Henri ("Stendahl”), Boole, George, 367 Brown, John, 374
346 Boone, Daniel, 294 Browning, Robert, 368, 398
Bible Bormann, Martin Ludwig, 570 Broz, Josip (Marshal Tito), 639
editing of, 93 Borodino, Battle of, 324 Bruce, Robert, 174-75
Greek translation of, 73 Bosch, Hieronymus, 205 Bruckner, Anton, 421
Gutenberg, 206 Bosnia, 393, 470-71 Brueghel, Peter, 225
King James version of, 247 Boston Tea Party, 294 Bruno, Giordano, 232
Vulgate, 105 Botha, Louis, 478 Brunswick, Duke of, 301-2
Bierce, Ambrose, 456, 487 Sandro, 205
Botticelli, Brutus, 87
"Big bang" theory, 3 Boudicca, 94 Bryan, William Jennings, 454, 536
Billings, Warren K., 513 Boulanger, Georges, 419 Buber, Martin, 574-75
Bipedality, 15-16 Bourbon Dynasty, 274 Buchanan, James, 401
Birth control, 500 Bourgoyne, John, 307 Bucharest, Treaty of, 496
Bismarck, Otto von, 382-85, 417- Boxer Rebellion, 480 Buddhism, 75. See also Zen
18 Boxing, 431 Buddhism,
Socialism and, 417 Boycott, Charles Cunningham, in Cambodia, 161
Bismarck, sinking of, 610 397 in China, 92, 94
Bizet, Georges, 392 Braddock, Edward, 293 in India, 94
"Black Death," 175-76, 181-82 Bradley, James, 282 in Indonesia, 121
Blair, Eric, ("George Orwell"), Brady, Matthew B., 406 in Japan, 115, 125
613 Brahe, Tycho, 233, 237 in Korea, 109
Blake, William, 311-12 Brahmagupta, 120 Buenos Aires, 411
Blanc, Louis, 358 Brahmanism, 61, 103, 106 Bulgaria, 134, 136, 166
Bligh, William, 317 Brandeis, Louis Dembitz, 516 empire of, 130, 427
656 INDEX
Bulgaria (cont.) Cambodia, 99, 161 Catullus, 88

Balkan Wars and, 495-96 Cambridge, University of, 164 Cavalry, development of, 47, 105
independence of, 394, 476 Canada Cave paintings, 21-22
in World War I, 520, 526 bilingualism 488
in, Cavendish, Henry, 291
in World War II, 638 Dominion 410
of, Caxton, William, 203
Bulgars, 114, 122 exploration of, 310 Cellini, Benvenuto, 214
Bulge, Battle of the, 627, 635 French exploration of, 220 Cellophane, invention of, 497
Bunker Hill, Battle of, 306 rebellions in, 357 Celtic Christianity, 116, 120, 123
Bunyan, John, 259 in War of 1812, 331 Cervantes, Miguel de, 242
Burgundians, 111 in World War I, 529 Ceylon, 317. See also Sri Lanka,
Burgundy, Dukes of, 201-2 in World War II, 647 Cezanne, Paul, 392
Burke, Edmund, 312 Cannae, Battle of, 77 Chagall, Marc, 494
Burma, 145 Cannon, development of, 175, Ch'ai Yuan-fang, 121
Britain and, 299, 353, 379, 436 191 Chaldeans, 51, 57-58
Japan and, 618 Canossa, 147 Chamberlain, Arthur Neville,
Portugal and, 222 Canute the Great, 142 573, 582, 608
in World War II, 615-16 Cape of Good Hope, 199 Champa, 121
Burney, Frances, 312 Capetian Dynasty, 142, 177, 358 Champlain, Samuel de, 245
Burns, Robert, 311 Capetown, 269 Chancellorsville, Battle of, 404
Burnside, Ambrose Everett, 403 Capone, Alphonse, 533 Chandragupta, 72, 75
Burton, Richard Francis, 424 Caporetto, Battle of, 522 Chaplin, Charles, 500
Burton, Robert, 249-50 Caprivi, Leo von, 441-42 Chariots, 39
Byrd, Richard Evelyn, 536 Caracalla, 98 Charlemagne, 126-127
Byron, Lord, (George Gordon), Cardinals, College of, 132 Charles the Fat, 131-32
332-33, 351 Carloman, 125, 126 Charles the Rash, 201-2
Carlyle,Thomas, 368 Charles I, King of England, 247-
Carnegie, Andrew, 486 248
Carolingian Dynasty, 126, 138
C Charles II, King of England, 258-
Carrol, Lewis, (Charles 260
Cabot, John, 203 Dodgson), 398 Charles IV, Emperor, 179
Caesar, Julius, 85-87 Carthage Charles V, Emperor, 209-210,
Calculus, 265, 285, 290 naval battles of, 60 213
Calcutta, 269, 298 resettlement of, 88 Charles V, King of France, 183
Calder, Alexander, 588 rise of, 54 Charles VI, King of France, 183
Caldwell, Erskine, 588 Sicily and, 63 Charles VII, King of France, 191
Calendar Spain and, 77 Charles King of France, 211
VIII,
Egyptian, 35 Syracuse and, 68, 71-72 Charles X, King of France, 344
of French Revolution, 302 Cartier, Jacques, 220 Charles XII, King of Sweden,
Gregorian, 290 Caruso, Enrico, 473 276-278, 295
Hebrew, 34 Carver, George Washington, 501 Chartism, 365
invention of, 34-35 Casimir I, 144 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 182
Julian, 87 Casimir 179
III, Chekhov, Anton, 473
lunar, 34 Cassius, 97 Chenia, 121
solar, 35 Castiglione, Baldassare, 215 Chennault, Claire Lee, 616
types of, 1-2 Castile, Kingdom 199-201
of, Cheops' pyramid, 35
California, gold rush in, Catalhuyuk, 27 Chiang Kai-shek, 557, 561, 563-
373 Cather, Willa, 517 64, 615, 645
Caligula, 90 Catherine I, 278, 286 Chicago, fire of, 408
Calles, Plutarco Elias, 559 Catherine II (the Great), 297, 316 Chickamauga, Battle of, 405
Calvin, John, 212-13 Cattle, domestication of, 28 Child labor laws, 343
INDEX 657
Chile, 347, 433, 458, 560 Civil War, American, 395-96, Constantinople, 103, 174, 198. See
Ch'in Dynasty, 77-78, 156, 161, 401-6 also Istambul.
162 Clark, William, 327 rise of, 108-9
China Claudius I, 92 sack of, 167
Great Wall of, 78 Claudius II, 100 silk production in, 113
Japan and, 461, 563-64 Clay, Henry, 373 Constitution, of United States,
Open Door policy with, 462 Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, 377 309
railroads in, 437, 498 Cleisthenes, 60 Continental Congresses, 294,
sea exploration by, 197 Clemenceau, Georges, 509, 515- 306
Soviet Union and, 557 16 Cook, Captain James, 291, 317
Tibet and, 480 Clemens, Samuel, ("Mark Coolidge, Calvin, 534, 537
in World War I, 531 Twain"), 408, 431 Cooper, James Fenimore, 357
in World War 644-45
II, Clement V, 178-179 Copenhagen, 158
Chinese Exclusion Act, 429 Clement XII, 284 Copernicus, Nicolaas, 220
Ch'ing Dynasty, 254, 269 Cleopatra, 85, 87, 88 Copland, Aaron, 588
Chopin, FrMeric, 346 Cleveland, Grover, 429, 453 Copper, 29-31
Chou Dynasty, 46 Clive, Robert, 298-299 Coral Sea, Battle of the, 618
Christian Science, 409-10 Clovis, 111, 112-13 Corinth, 53-54
Christianity, 93. See also Papacy, Cluney, Abbey of, 135 Corneille, Pierre, 244
in Balkans, 134 Cochise, 407 Cornwallis, Charles, 308, 317
in Bohemia, 139 Cocteau, Jean, 580 Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de,
in China, 121 Code Napoleon, 319 218
under Constantine, 102- Coffee, 209 Corot, Jean Baptiste, 360
103 Colbert, Jean-Baptist, 255 Corsica, 289
inDenmark, 138, 142 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 312, Cortes, Hernando, 218
under Diocletian, 101-102 332 Cossacks, 267, 277
emperor-worship and, 98 Colette, Sidoni Gabrielle, 580 Costa Rica, 347
in Hungary, 139 Colorado, 408 Counter-Reformation, 214, 233
in Japan, 236 Colossus of Rhodes, 74 Coward, Noel, 613
Mithraism and, 98 Colt, Samuel, 356 Cowboys, 407, 430
in New World, 214 Columbia, 389-90, 484 Cowper, William, 311
in Norway, 139 Columbus, Christopher, 200 Crane, Stephen, 456
Platonists and, 95 Comintern, establishment of, 538 Crassus, 85, 86
in Russia, 139 Commune of Paris, 390-91 Crazy Horse, 407
in Serbia, 159 Communism. See also Socialism, Crecy, Battle of, 175
in Sweden, 139 in China, 557, 564 Crete, 38, 41
Zoroastrianism and, 96 in Hungary, 550 inBronze Age, 36
Christie, Agatha, 540 in Italy, 541-42 Greece and, 452, 475-76
Christmas, date for, 98 in Soviet Union, 518-20 Venice and, 167
Churchill, Winston, 524, 525 Compass, 83, 156, 164, 173, 227 inWorld War II, 602
North Africa and, 623, 642 Computers, 630 Crimean War, 370-71
as prime minister, 608-9 Confucianism, 101 Crispi, Francesco, 425
Roosevelt and, 621 Connecticut, settlement of, 252 Croesus, 58
World War II and, 600 Conrad, Joseph (Jozef Teodor Cromwell, Oliver, 248-49, 254,
at Yalta Conference, 628 Konrad Korzeniowski), 258
Churchill (Duke of Malborough), 441 Crossbow, invention of, 149
John, 269-271 Conservatives, 343 Crusade(s), 151-52, 156, 160-61,
Cicero, 85, 88 Constable, John, 333 167-68, 174
Cimbri, 82 Constantine, 102-3 Albigensian, 165-66
Cimmerians, 49-50, 52 Donation of, 132 Children's, 168
658 INDEX
Cuba, 217, 347, 412 Debussy, Achille-Claude, 448, Domesday Book, 146
independence of, 455, 457 470 Dominican friars, 165, 166
in Spanish-American War, 454 Declaration of Independence, of Dominican Republic,
United States and, 488 United States, 306 independence of, 412
in World War I, 529 Defoe, Daniel, 273 slave rebellion in, 334
Culloden, Battle of, 282 Degas, Edgar, 392 United States and, 484, 489
Cummings, E.E., 536 Delacroix, Eugene, 346 Domitian, 92
Cunaxa, Battle of, 65 Delaware, settlement of, 242 Donatello, 194
Cuneiform Delphi, oracle at, 57, 58 Donizetti, Gaefano, 348
decipherment of, 398 Demeter, cult of, 59 Donne, John, 249
development of, 32-33 Democritus, 68 Dorian invasion, 45
Cunningham, Andrew Brown, Demosthenes, 70 Dos Passos, John, 588
610 Dempsey, Jack, 534 Dostoyevsky, Fyodor, 395
Curie, Marie Sklodowska, 447-48 Denmark Douglas, Frederick, 373-74
Custer, George Armstrong, 407 constitution of, 369 Dowager Empress, 480
Cyanobacteria, 6-7 Norway and, 337 Doyle, Arthur Conan, 424
Cyaxares, 51 in World War I, 528 Drake, Edwin Laurentine, 375
Cyclotron, invention of, 587 in World War II, 597, 633 Drake, Francis, 227
Cyrus the Great, 56 Depression, Great Dreiser, Theodore, 487
Cyrus the Younger, 65 in Britain, 580-81 Dreyfus, Alfred, 446
Czechoslovakia in Canada, 591 Dryden, John, 258-59
founding of, 521 in Italy,464 Du Bois, William Edward
independence of, 550 in Japan, 56-61 Burghardt, 485
in World War II, 572-73, 576, inUnited States, 538, 584 Dumas, Alexandre, 360
631 Descartes, Rene, 242, 244 Duncan, Isadora, 487
Desmoulins, Camille, 300-301 Dunkirk, Battle of, 598-99
Detroit, settlement of, 274 Dunlop, John Boyd, 424
D Dewey, George, 455 Durant, Will, 537
Dias, Bartholomeu, 199 Diirer, Albrecht, 210
Dagobert, 120 Dickens, Charles, 344, 367 Durham report, 357
Daguerre, Louis Jacques, 346 Dickinson, Emily, 432 Dutch East India Company, 240
Daimler, Gottleib Wilhelm, Diderot, Denis, 290 Dutch West India Company, 240
418 Diemen, Anthony van, 240 Dvorak, Anton, 421, 445
Dali, Salvador, 569 Dinesen, Isak, 591 Dzhugashvili, Iosif Vissarionvich.
Daniel, Book of, 80 Diocletian, 100, 101 See Stalin, Joseph.
Dante Alighieri, 178 Dionysius Exiguus, 2
Danton, Georges-Jacques, 302 Diophantus, 98-99
Darby, Abraham, 274 Dirigibles, 444, 511
Dare, Virginia, 228 Disarmament conferences, E
533,
Darius, 58, 62, 65 580-81 Easter Island, 128, 274
Darrow, Clarence, 486, 536 Disestablishment Act, 396 Eastman, George, 431
Darwin, Charles, 298, 344, 367 Disney, Walt, 535, 588 Eddington, Arthur S., 539
Daudet, Alphonse, 392 Disraeli, Benjamin, 368, 396-97, Eddy, Mary Baker, 409-10
Daumier, Honore, 346 413 Edison, Thomas Alva, 408, 431
David, Jacques Louis, 306 Dodgson, Charles ("Lewis Edward I, 169-70, 174
David, King, 44, 46 Carrol"), 398 Edward II, 174-75
Dawes, Charles Gates, 545 Dodo, extinction of, 263 Edward III, 175, 181
"D-day," invasion of, 625 Dogs, domestication of, 22 Edward VII, 464-65
De Vries, Hugo, 450 Dole, Sanford Ballard, 463 Edward VIII, 581-82
Debs, Eugene Victor, 453 Dollfuss, Engelbert, 571, 575 Edward the Confessor, 142
INDEX 659
Egypt Eritrea. See Ethiopia. Federal Reserve System, 499

early history of, 31-32 Esperanto, 421-22 Feminism, 375. See also Suffrage,
independence of, 556 Estates-General, 300-301 women's.
Italyand, 609 Esther, Book of, 80 Ferdinand I of Castile, 144
nationalism in, 434 Estonia Ferdinand II, King of Spain, 199-
Sudan and, 413 independence of, 552-53 200
World War I, 530
in Soviet annexation of, 613, 614 Fermi, Enrico, 629
in World War II, 641 in World War II, 632 Feudalism, 130, 175, 176
Ehrlich, Paul, 469-70 Ethelbert, 116 Fichte, Johann Gotlieb, 314
Eiffel, Alexandre Gustave, 420 Ethelred II, 138, 141 -42 Fielding, Henry, 282
Einstein, Albert, 469, 509 Ethiopia Fillmore, Millard, 373
Manhattan Project and, 629 Britain and, 413 Finland
Eire. See Ireland. independence of, 458-59 independence of, 553
Eisenhower, Dwight David, 622, Italyand, 435 Russia and, 278, 493
642 modernization 377 of, Soviet Union and, 595, 613-14
El Alamein, Battle of, 612, 621 Mussolini and, 565-66 Sweden and, 337
El Greco, 223 in World War I, 530 in World War II, 632-33
El Salvador, 347 in World War II, 609-10, 641 Fisk, James, 407
Eleanor of Aquitaine, 154-55, Etruscans, 45, 50 Fitzgerald, F. Scott, 536
156-57 Euclid, 72 Flanders, 176
Electrocardiogram, 474 Eukaryotes, 7-8 Flaubert, Gustave, 360
Eleusinian mysteries, 59, 106 Euler, Leonhard, 285 Fleming, Alexander, 539
Elgar, Edward William, 468 Euphrates River, 26 Fleming, John Ambrose, 467
Elijah, 48 Euripides, 64 Florence, 178, 193-94
Eliot, George, (Mary Ann Evans), Evans, Mary Ann, (“George “Flying Tigers," 616
398 Eliot"), 398 Ford, Henry, 486
Eliot, T.S., 540, 583 Exodus, 43-44 Formosa, 461. See also Taiwan.
Elisha, 48 Eyck, Jan van, 190 Forster, E.M., 467, 539
Elizabeth I, 216, 226-28, 246 Eylau, Battle of, 321 5-6
Fossils,
Havelock, 512
Ellis, Ezekiel, 56 Foster, Stephen, 375, 409
Emancipation Proclamation, 403 Foucault, Jean Bernard Leon,
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 357, 375 360
Emmett, Daniel Decatur, 376 Fox, George, 249
F
Empress Dowager, 462 Fra Angelico, 204
Engels, Friedrich, 365 Fabian Society, 440 France, Anatole, (Jacques-
England. See also Great Britain Fahrenheit, Gabriel Daniel, Anatole-Frangois
and United Kingdom. 274 Thibault), 420
Bank of, 261 Fairbanks, Douglas, 500 France. See also Franks, French
civil war of, 248-249, 252 Falkland Islands, 347 Revolution, ami Napoleon.
North American empire of, 228 “False Decretals," 132 Balkan crisis and, 493, 494
English East India Company, 253 Faraday, Michael, 343 First Republic of, 302
Entente Cordiale, 466, 468 Farouk, King of Egypt, 593, 641 North American empire of,
Epictetus, 95 Farragut, David Glasgow, 402 219-20, 245
Epicurus, 74 Fascism Russia and, 447
Epirus, 74-75 in Germany, ’569-75 Third Republic of, 390-91
Erasmus, Desiderius, 213 541-43
in Italy, in World War II, 635-37. See
Eratosthenes, 75 Fatimid Dynasty, 140, 150, 160 also Vichy.
Eric the Red, 139 Faulkner, William, 536 Franche Comte, 205
Ericsson, Leif, 139 Faure, Gabriel, 448 Francis Ferdinand, assassination
Erie Canal, 355 Fawkes, Guy, 247 of, 491
660 INDEX
Francis I, 211-12, 215 Gainsborough, Thomas, 291 Ghazni, 139

North American empire of, Gaiseric, 107, 110, 112 Ghent, Treaty of, 330
219-220 Galileo, 246 Ghibellines, 153
Franciscan friars, 165 Gallipoli campaign, 524-25 Gibbon, Edward, 95, 312
Franco, Francisco, 568, 640 Galvani, Luigi, 315 Gibraltar, 271
Portugal and, 569 Gama, Vasco da, 199 Gide, Andre, 509
Franco-Prussian War, 384-85 Gandhi, Mohandas, 479, 556-57, Gilbert, Humphrey, 228, 424
Frank, Anne, 635 594 Gilgamesh, epic of, 35-36, 398
Frankfurt, Treaty of, 385 Garfield, James, 428 Giotto, 178
Franklin, Benjamin, 283, 292, 308 Garibaldi, Giuseppe, 387 Girondists, 302
Franks, 97, 111, 112-13, 116, Gaugin, Paul, 420 Gladstone, William, 396, 397,
126-27, 129 Gaul, 85-86. See also France and 422-23, 438-39
Frazer, James, 441 Franks. Gliders, 367, 443
Frederick I (Barbarossa), 158 Gaulle, Charles de, 598, 599, 623, Glinka, Mikhail, 351
Frederick King of Prussia, 160-
I, 636-37, 642 Gluck, Christoph Willibald, 289
61, 275-76 Gauss, Carl Friedrich, 336 Gnosticism, 96
Frederick II, Emperor, 164, 165 Gautier, Theophile, 360 Goa, 221
Frederick II (the Great), King of Gay, John, 282 Godunov, Boris, 252
Prussia, 168, 280-281, Gehrig, Lou, 534 Goebbels, Paul Joseph, 570
287-289 Geiger, Hans Wilhelm, 493 Goering, Hermann, 570
Fredericksburg, Battle of, 403-4 Genghis Khan, 161-63 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von,
Freemasonry, 284 Genoa, 178, 184, 289 289, 314, 336, 349
French Academy, 243 Genseric, 107, 110, 112 Gogh, Vincent van, 426
French and Indian War, 292-94 Geometry, 349, 351 Gogol, Nicolai, 351
French Revolution, 299-306 George, Lloyd, 466-67, 512, 515- Goldberg, Rube, 501
Great Britain and, 311, 331 538
16, Gomez, Jose Miguel, 488
Netherlands and, 313 George 272-73
I,
Gompers, Samuel, 430
Ottoman Empire and, 316 George II, 281-82, 290 Goodyear, Charles, 356
Portugal and, 313 George 290-91, 294, 310-11,
III, Gordon, George (Lord Byron),
Prussia and, 314 332 332-33, 351
Spain and, 313 George IV, 332, 342 Gorilla, 14
Switzerland and, 315 George V, 467 Gothic architecture, 154
United States and, 309-10 George VI, 582 Goths, 99-100, 103, 104, 105. See
Freud, Sigmund, 421, 445, 471 Georgia, settlement 283
of, also German tribes.
Friars, 165 German tribes, 82, 83, 96, 97, 99- Gounod, Charles Francis, 360
Friends, Society of (Quakers), 100. See also specific tribes, Goya, Francisco, 313, 334
249 e.g., Goths. Gracchus, 82
Frobisher, Martin, 228 Germanic Confederation, 336, Graf Spee, 607
Frost, Robert Lee, 501 382 Granada, Kingdom of, 166
Fujiwara, 137, 140 German-Soviet nonaggression Grant, Ulysses S., 402, 404-7,
Fulton, Robert, 330 pact, 574 412
Funan, 99 Germany Gratian, 104
Funk, Casimir, 495 unification of, 382-85 Graves, Robert, 90, 583
Fusion, nuclear, 4 in World War 503-9
I, Gray, Thomas, 282
in World War II, 595-606 Great Britain. See also England
Geronimo, 429 and United Kingdom,
G Gershwin, George, 537 in World War II, 607-12
Gettysburg, Battle of, 404-5 Great Wall, of China, 78
Gadsden Purchase, 373 Gettysburg Address, 405 Greece
Gage, Thomas, 306 Ghana, 140, 152 Balkan Wars and, 495-96,
INDEX 661
constitution of, 371 Haiti, 334 Henry, O., 487

Crete and, 475-76 Hal, Franz, 241 Henry, Patrick, 294
early settlement of, 41 Hales, Stephen, 282 Henry I, King of England, 152
Italyand, 620 Halifax, 283 Henry II, King of England, 156-
Republic of, 552 Halley, Edmund, 273 57
Roman conquest of, 78-79 Halsted, William Steward, 431 Henry King of England, 169
III,
in World War I, 527 Hamilton, Alexander, 309 Henry IV, Emperor, 147, 148
in World War II, 589-90, 601- Hammurabi, 40 Henry IV, King of England, 182,
2, 639-40 Han Dynasty, 78, 83, 91, 98 188-89
Greek fire, 122, 124, 136 Hancock, John, 306 Henry V, King of England, 189-
Greeley, Horace, 430 Handel, George Frederic, 273, 90
Greenland, 139, 186 282 Henry King of England, 190
VI,
Gregorian chant, 115 Hannibal, 77, 78 Henry VII, King of England, 203
Gregory I, 115 Hanseatic League, 173, 185 Henry VIII, King of England,
Gregory II, 124 Hapsburg Dynasty, 173, 194 215-16
Gregory III, 124-25 end of, 521 Heraclitus, 59
Gregory VII, 148 Switzerland and, 185 Heraclius, 118, 119
Gregory XIII, 232 Harding, Warren, 532-33 Herbert, Victor, 487
Griffith, David, 516 Hardy, Thomas, 424 Herculaneum, 92
Grimm brothers, 336 Hargreaves, James, 292 Hero of Alexandria, 85
Gropius, Walter Adolf, 509 Harold II, 146 Herod, 89
Grosseteste, Robert, 164 Haroun ar-Rashid, 128, 130 Herodotus, 51-52
Guadalcanal, Battle of, 627-28 Harper's Ferry, 374 Herophilus, 73
Guam, 219 Harrison, William Henry, 429 Herostratus, 70
Guatemala, 347 Harsha, 120 Herschel, William, 312, 332
Guelphs, 153 Harte, Francis Brett, 409 Hertz, Heinrich Rudolf, 418
Guernica, 569 Harvard University, 251 Herzegovina, 393, 470-71
Guillotin, Joseph Ignace, 305 Harvey, William, 250 Hesiod, 48
Guiscard, Robert, 148, 151 Hastings, Battle of, 146 Hess, Rudolf, 545
Guizot, Francois, 358 Havana, 217 Hessians, 306
Gunpowder, 156, 170, 455 Hawaii, 109 Hiawatha, 228
cannons and, 175, 191 discovery of, 317 Hieroglyphics, 33
cordite and, 424 independence 381
of, Hildebrand, 148
discovery of, 136 Republic of, 463 Himmler, Heinrich, 570
improvement of, 364-65 sugar trade 416 in, Hinduism, 103
Gunpowder plot, 247 U.S. annexation of, 455, 463 Hipparchus of Nicaea, 80-81
Gupta Dynasty, 103-4, 112 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 375 Hippocrates, 64
Gustavus, Charles X, 266 Haydn, Franz Joseph, 289, 314 Hirohito, 557-58
Gustavus I, 220 Hayes, Rutherford B., 408 Hiroshima, 629
Gutenberg, Johann, 206 Haymarket Square Riot, 430 Hitchcock, Alfred, 535
Hearst, William Randolph, 430 Hitler, Adolf, 625-26
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, death of, 627
336
H Mussolini and, 565-67
Heine, Heinrich, 349 rise of, 544-45, 569-74
Hadfield, Robert Abbott, 424 Heisenberg, Werner Karl, 546 in World War II, 595-606
Hadrian, 95 Helium, discovery of, 398 Hittites, 39
Hagia Sophia, 113 Helvetic Republic, 304 Hobbes, Thomas, 259
Hague, the, 534 Hemingway, Ernest, 536 Hogarth, William, 282
Haile Selassie, 565, 567-68. See Henry the Navigator, 192 Holbein, Hans, 216
also Ras Tafari. Henry, Joseph, 356 Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 357
662 INDEX
Holocaust, 570, 627 Huns, 103, 104 Innocent IV, 165

Baltic states and, 632 Hus, Jan, 185, 194, 195 Innocent XI, 264
France and, 636 Huxley, Aldous, 539-40, 583 Inquisition, 231-32
Hungary and, 637-38 Hyksos, 39-40 Dominican friars and, 166
papacy and, 640 Spanish, 199
Romania and, 638 Insulin, discovery of, 558
Holst, Gustav, 512 International Business Machines
I
Holstein, Friedrich von, 441-42, (IBM), founding of, 431
469 IBM. See International Business Ionia, 56-57, 62-63
*
Holy Roman Empire, 137. See also Machines (IBM). Iran. See also Persia.
Holy Roman Emperors, Ibsen, Henrik, 400, 426-27 in World War II, 644
e.g., Henry IV. Ice ages, 18-19, 23 Iraq. See also Persia,
Home Rule, for India, 530 Iceland independence of, 555
for Ireland, 422-23, 438-39, discovery of, 127 in World War II, 644
494 settlement of, 133 Ireland, 116, 203
Homer, 48 in World War II, 634 1594 rebellion of, 229-30
Homer, Winslow, 409 Iconoclasm, 124, 128, 130 Cromwell and, 249
Hominids, evolution of, 15-16 Ignatius of Loyola, 214 Home Rule and, 422-43, 438-
Homo erectus, 17-18 Iliad, 48 39, 494, 538
Homo habilis, 17 Immelmann, Max, 511 Normans in, 157-58
Honduras, 347, 559 Incas, 197 potato famine in, 366
Hoover, Herbert, 537, 584-85 Income tax, 406, 499 Richard II and, 182
Hoover, John Edgar, 532 India Vikings and, 127
Hopkins, Frederick Gowland, 467 British rule in,298-99 in World War I, 511-12
Hoplites, 53 caste system in, 47 in World War II, 634
Horace, 88 French interests in, 287, 298-99 Irish Free State, 538, 540, 583-
Hormones, discovery of, 482 nationalism in, 436 84
Horsecollars, invention of, 138 rebellions in, 378-79 Irish Land Act, 397
Houdini, Harry, 456, 535 in World War I, 530 Irish Republican Army, 512
Houston, Samuel, 358 in World War II, 646 Iron Age, 43
Howe, William, 306-7 India Act, 317 Irving, Washington, 330
Hsiung-nu. See Huns. Indo-China Isabella of Castile, 199-200
Hubble, Edwin Powell, 536 French interests in, 379, 415 Isidore of Seville, 120
Hubertusberg, Treaty of, 288 Siam and, 461 Islam, 119
Hudson, Henry, 240 in World War II, 615, 645 Isocrates of Athens, 68
Hugh Capet, 138 Indonesia Isonzo, Battles of, 522
Hughes, Langston, 537 British interests in, 339 Israel
Hugo, Victor, 346, 360, 392 Dutch interests in, 240, 254, Balfour Declaration and, 554-
Huguenots, 230-231, 243 339 55
inAmerica, 245 Java and, 188 lost tribes of, 49
Louis XIV and, 255-56 Indulgences, sale of, 209-210 Issus, Battle of, 70
Hume, David, 282 Indus River, 30 Istambul, 198. See also
Hundred Years War, 175, 201 Industrial Revolution, 292, 310, Constantinople.
Hungarians, 130 331, 648. See also Scientific Italo-Ethiopian War, 458-59
Hungary Revolution. Italy
Communism in, 550 Industrial Workers of the World Allied invasion of, 624
independence of, 521 (I.W.W.), 500 nationalism in, 361-62
Nazis in, 576-77 Influenza, 1918 pandemic of, North African campaign of,
Ottoman Empire and, 208-209 517 609-10
in World War II, 637-38 Innocent III, 158, 165-67 Tripoli and, 495
INDEX 663
unification of, 362, 387 Jerome, Saint, 105 Kay, John, 283
in World War 521-23 I, Jesuits, 214, 296, 385 Kean, Edmund, 333
in World War
II, 619-21 Jesus, 89, 91 Keats, John, 333
Ivan III (the Great), 207 Jezebel, 48 Keller, Helen, 485
Ivan IV (the Terrible), 234-235 Jimmu, 54 Kellogg-Briand Pact, 537, 562
Ivory trade, 99 Jingo, 106 Kelvin, Lord (William Thomson),
Iwo Jima, Battle of, 628 Joan of Arc, 191 367
I.W.W.. See Industrial Workers of Johannesburg, 436 Kepler, Johannes, 237
the World (I.W.W.). John of Gaunt, 182 Kerensky, Aleksandr, 518-19
John I, King of England, 163-64 Kern, Jerome, 501, 537
John II, King of France, 181 Kettering, Charles Franklin,
John VI, King of Portugal, 334-35 501
J
Johnson, Andrew, 407 Key, Francis Scott, 329-30
Jackson, Andrew, 355 Johnson, Samuel, 291 Keynes, John Maynard, 583
Jackson, Thomas Jonathan Joliet, Louis, 257 Khartoum, 435, 458
(“Stonewall”), 401-2 Jones, Inigo, 250 Khayyam, Omar, 145
Jacobins, 302, 303 Jones, John Paul, 308, 316 Khazars, 117, 120, 125
Jacobites, 272-73, 282 Jonson, Ben, 249 Khmer Empire, 161
Jainism, 61, 72 Jordan, 555 Kierkegaard, Soren, 369
James, Henry, 409 Joule, James Prescott, 367 Kiev, 136, 144, 163
James I, King of England, 246- Jovian, 104 Kilmer, Joyce, 501
47 Joyce, James, 512, 539 King, William Lyon Mackenzie,
James I, King of Scotland, 190 Judaism, 93. See also Holocaust, 558
James II, King of England, 260 dietary laws of, 91 Kipling, Rudyard, 440, 463, 467
Jamestown, founding of, 250 Khazars and, 125 Kitchener, Horatio Herbert,
Janissaries, 187, 352 Zoroastrianism and, 66 458
Jansen, Cornelius Otto, 244-45 Judea, 84-85 Klee, Paul, 497
Jansenism, 284 Jugurtha, 82 Klondike Gold Rush, 456-57
Japan Julian the Apostate, 104 Knights Templar, 177
annexation of Korea, 481 Julius II, 213 Knox, John, 228-29
China and, 461, 561-63 Jung, Carl Gustav, 475 Koch, Robert, 418
first emperor of, 54 Jussieu, Antoine Laurent de, Koran, 119, 122
isolationalism of, 254 305 Korea, 106, 109
Manchuria and, 561-62 Justin I, 113 annexation of, 481
Mongol invasion of, 169 Justinian, 113-15 in Russo-Japanese War, 481
Russia and, 465-66, 481-82 Code of, 113 trade with, 415, 437
Soviet Union and, 558 Jutes, 111, 116 in World War II, 645
United States and, 380 Jutland, Battle of, 510-11 Korzeniowski, Jozef Teodor
westernization of, 437 Juvenal, 95 Konrad, (“Joseph
in World War I, 531 Conrad"), 441
in World War 615-19
II,
Kosciuszko, Thaddeus, 315-16
Japanese, writing system for, 134 Krakatoa, explosion of, 436-37
Java, 121, 188, 240
K
Kropotkin, Pyotr Alekseyevich,
Jeffers, Robinson, 537 Kafka, Franz, 550 421
Jefferson, Thomas, 308, 327-28 Kamehameha, 340 Kruger, Paul, 435-36, 459-60
Jehovah's Witnesses, 375, 410 Kammu, 128 Krum, 130
Jena, Battle of, 321 Kandinsky, Wassily, 444 Ku Klux Klan, 513, 537
Jenner, Edward, 312 Kansas, statehood of, 374 Kublai Khan, 168-169
Jeremiah, 56 Kant, Immanuel, 314 Kuli,Nader, 286-287
Jericho, 34, 44 Karlowitz, Treaty of, 265 Kyd, Thomas, 226
664 INDEX
Leo III, 126 Louis XIV, 244, 255-57, 270-71

L
Leo X, 213 Louis XV, 271, 283-84, 289
La Fontaine, Jean de, 257 Leo XIII, 425 Louis XVI, 289, 299-302
La Rochefoucauld, Francois de, Leonidas, 62 Louis XVII, 344
257 Lepanto, Battle of, 223, 232, 235 Louis XVIII, 325, 326
La Salle, Robert Cavalier de, 257- Leprosy, 204 Louis the Pious, 129
258 Lermontov, Mikhail, 351 Louisiana Purchase, 327
Labor, Knights of, 430 Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim, 289 Lowell, Amy, 501
Labor unions, 331, 390 Leuthen, Battle of, 288 Lucilius, 81
in Britain, 423, 465, 539 Lewis, C.S., 613 Lucretius, 88-8*9
in France, 446, 580 Lewis, Meriwether, 327 "Lucy" (hominid), 16
in Germany, 570 Lewis, Sinclair, 517, 536 Luddites, 331
in Italy, 473 Liberia, 353, 378, 498 Luneville, Treaty of, 318
I.W.W, and, 500 Liberty," "Statue of, 420 Lusitania,510
in Netherlands, 474 Libya, 556, 641-42 Luther, Martin, 210, 213, 215
New Deal and, 586, 587 Liliuokalani, Lydia, 463 Lutheranism, in Scandanavia,
in Spain, 568 Lincoln, Abraham, 374, 402-6 220
United States, 430
in Lind, James, 292 Luxembourg, in World War II,
for U.S. miners, 486 Lindbergh, Charles A., 535, 584 635
Labour Party, 465 in World War II, 621 Luxemburg, Rosa, 543
Labrador, 432 Lisbon, 155 Luzzi, Mondino de, 178
Lafayette, Marquis de, 307, 308-9 earthquake of, 295 Lydia, 52, 55, 58
Lamarck, Jean Baptiste de, 326 University of, 172 Lysander, 65
Land, Edwin Herbert, 588 Lister, Joseph Jackson, 344
Landon, Alfred Mossman, 586 Liszt, Franz, 363
Langland, William, 182 Lithuania, 173, 179
Lao-tzu, 61 independence of, 553
M
Laplace, Pierre Simon de, 4 Soviet annexation of, 613, 614 Macao, 236
Laslo I, 149 in World War II, 632 MacArthur, Douglas, 618
Latin League, 66 Livingstone, David, 414 Macbeth, 142, 146
Latter-Day Saints, Church of, 356 Livy, 88 Maccabeus, Judas, 80
Latvia Lobachevski, Nikolai, 351 Macedonia, 69-71
independence of, 553 Locke, John, 259, 283 Mach, Ernst, 445
Soviet annexation of, 613, 614 Log cabin, invention of, 242 Machado, Gerardo, 559
in World War II, 632 Logarithms, invention of, 229 Machiavelli, Niccolo, 214
Laval, Pierre, 565, 579, 636-37 Lollards, 182, 189 Mackenzie, Alexander, 310
Lavoisier, Antoine Laurent, 305 Lombard League, 158 Mackenzie, William Lyon, 357
Law, John, 271 Lombards, 115, 126 Madagascar, 254, 414, 460
Lawrence, D.H., 495, 539 Lombardy, 362 Madison, James, 328-30
Lawrence, T.E., 525 London, Jack, 487 Magellan, Ferdinand, 219
League of Nations, 534, 549 Long 306-7
Island, Battle of, Maginot Line, 541, 597
Lebanon, 554 Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, Magna Carta, 163-64
Lee, Charles, 308 357, 375, 409 Magnesia, Battle of, 78
Lee, Robert E., 403-6 Lorraine. See Alsace-Lorraine. Magyars, 130, 135
Leeuwenhoek, Anton van, 263 Louis Philippe, 345, 358 Mahabharata, 72
Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm, 265 Louis VI, 154 Mahler, Gustav, 421
Leipzig, Battle of, 238-39, 325 Louis IX, 166, 168, 172, 174 Maine, settlement of, 251-252
Lemaitre, Georges, 548 Louis XI, 201, 202 Maine, explosion of, 455
Lenin, 448, 548 Louis XII, 202 Malaria, 440
Leo I, 109 Louis XIII, 243-44 Mali Empire, 180
INDEX 665
Malory, Thomas, 203 Mauritius, 263 Missouri Compromise, 354

Malpighi, Marcello, 264 Maxim gun, 424 Mistral, Frederic, 448
Malta, 208, 610 Mayans, 101, 112, 126, 131, 145, Mitanni, 40
Malthus, Thomas, 312 218 Mitchell, Margaret, 588
Mameluks, 169 Mai/flower,voyage of, 251 Mithradates I, 80
Mammals, evolution of, 12-13 Mazzini, Guiseppe, 361 Mithradates VI, 83, 84
Manchukuo, 561-62 McClellan, George, 402-3 Mithraism, 98
Manchuria, Japan and, 561-62 McCormick, Cyrus, 356 Mitsubishi, 416
Manhattan Project, 629-30 McKinley, William, 454-55, 483 Moghul Empire, 221, 253-54,
Manichaeism, 98 Mead, Margaret, 536 268-69, 279, 299
Mann, Thomas, 470, 546, 574 Meade, George Gordon, 404-5 Mola, Emilio, 568
Mannerheim, Carl von, 613 Median Empire, 51, 55 Moliere (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin),
Mao Tse-tung, 557, 564, 645 Medicis, 194, 204, 213, 296 257
Marathon, 62 Mellaart, James, 27 Molotov, Vyacheslav, 614
Marconi, Guglielmo, 450, 473 Melville, Herman, 375 Mondrian, Piet, 549
Marcus Aurelius, 96-97 Mendel, Gregor Johann, 389 Monet, Claude, 509
Marengo, Battle of, 318 Mendeleyev, Dmitri, 395 Mongolia, 128, 161-63
Margulis, Lynn, 7 Mendelssohn, Eelix, 349 Mongols, 137, 168-69, 221
Maria Theresa of Austria, 280-81, Mercator, Gerardus, 225 Monitor, 402
287-89, 296, 299, 313 Merovingian Dynasty, 111, 122, Monkeys, evolution of, 14
Marie Antoinette, 299-302 126 Monophysites, 118
Marie Louise of Austria, 323 Merrimack, 402 Monotheism, 42, 47
Marius, 82, 85 Metallurgy, 29-31 Monothelitism, 120
Marlowe, Christopher, 226 Methodism, 282, 283 Monroe, James, 330
Marne, Battle of, 505 Metric system, 305-6 Monroe Doctrine, 355, 537
Marquette, Jacques, 257 Metternich, Klemens von, 323, Roosevelt corollary to, 484
Marshall, John Hubert, 30 336, 348, 363 Montaigne, Michel Eyquem de,
Marshall Islands, 437 Mexico 231
Martel, Charles, 124, 125 independence of, 347 Montcalm, Louis Joseph de, 293
Martialis, Marcus Valerius, 93 Napoleon III and, 389, 410-11 Montenegro, 338
Marx, Karl, 365, 386 United States and, 372-73, Balkan Wars and, 495-96
Marxism, 448. See also 512-13 independence of, 394
Communism. in World War I, 529 Ottoman Empire and, 400
Mary I, Queen of England, in World War II, 647 Russia and, 371
("Bloody Mary"), 225-26 Mexico City, 181 Montesquieu, 283
Mary II, Queen of England, 260- Michelangelo, 214 Montezuma, 218
61 Midas, 45 Montgolfier brothers, 304
Mary Stuart, Queen of Scotland, Midway, Battle of, 619 Montgomery, Bernard Law, 612
226, 227 Midway Island, 408 Montreal, founding of, 245
Maryland, settlement of, 251 Milan, 178, 184, 205 Mooney, Thomas Joseph, 513
Masada, 93 French conquest of, 211-12 Moravia, 133, 135
Massachusetts, settlement of, Miletus, 56 More, Thomas, 216
251 Millennium, beliefs about, Mormons,
1, 98, 356, 375-76
Massenet, Jules, 420 141 Morocco
Masters, Edgar Lee, 517 Millet, Jean Francois, 360 French interests in, 477, 492
Matisse, Henri, 470, 509 Milne, John, 424 German interests in, 468-69,
Matteoti, Giacomo, 542-43 Milton, John, 249, 258 492
Maugham, Somerset, 512, 613 Ming Dynasty, 188, 221, 236, 254 Spanish interests in, 549
Mauretania, 90, 135 Minoan civilization, 36, 37, 41, 440 westernization of, 459
Maurice of Nassau, 225 Minuit, Peter, 240, 242 in World War II, 642-43
666 INDEX
Morse, Samuel, 374 Napoleon II, 359 Neutrality Act, 587

Moscow, 180 Napoleon 359-60
III, New Amsterdam, 240
Moses, 42 Bismarck and, 383-84 New Caledonia, 380
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, death of, 390 ''New Deal," 585-86
289, 314 empire of, 389 New England, 262
Muckrakers, 487 Italy and, 386-87 New France, 245
Muhammad, 117, 119 Mexico and, 389, 410-11 New Guinea, 416, 437
Murasaki, Shikibu, 145 Narses, 115 World War II, 618, 619
in
Muscovy, 186, 207 Nast, Thomas, 408 New Hampshire, settlement of,
Musset, Alfred de, 346 National Assembly of France, 300 251-252
Mussolini, Benito, 522 National Association for the New Hebrides, 437
Ethiopia and, 565-66 Advancement of Colored New Jersey, settlement of, 261
Greece and, 601-2 People (NAACP), 485 New Zealand
Hitler and, 565-67 National Socialists Workers discovery of, 240
rise of, 541-43 Party. See Nazis. Maori wars in, 381, 416
in World War II, 610, 619- Naval Defense Act, 424 settlement of, 128
21 Navigation Act, 258 suffrage in, 464
Mussorgsky, Modest, 395 Nazis, 544-45, 569-74. See also in World War I, 531
Mutsohito, 415-16 Germany, in World War II. in World War II, 646-47
Mycenae, 41 in Austria, 571-72, 575-76 Newcomen, Thomas, 273-274
Mystery religions, 59-60 in Czechoslovakia, 572-73, 576 Newfoundland, 139, 432
inHungary, 576-77 Newton, Isaac, 259
Poland and, 574, 577 Niagara, Fort, 293
Stalin and, 577-78
N Niagara 257
Falls,
Neanderthals, 19-20, 365 Nicaea, Council of, 102-3, 116
NAACP. See National Nebraska, statehood of, 408 Nicaragua, 347, 502, 559
Association for the Nebuchadrezzar, 51, 54-55, 55- Nicholas I, Czar, 350, 363, 364,
Advancement of Colored 56 369, 371
People (NAACP). Necho II, 51, 52 Nicholas Pope, 132
I,
Nabokov, Vladimir, 578 Nehemiah, 66 Nicholas II, Czar, 448

Nagasaki, 630 Nelson, Horatio, 304, 320 abdication of, 518
Namibia, 556 Neolithic Age, 23 execution of, 547
Nantes, Edict of, 231, 255, 256, Neoplatonism, 98 reforms of, 472-73
264 Neptune, discovery of, 360 Nicias, Peace of, 65
Naples, 57, 296 Nerchinsk, Treaty of, 268 Nicolet, Jean, 245
constitution of, 361 Nero, 92, 94 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 418
France and, 211-12 Nerva, 92 Nightingale, Florence, 370
Kingdom of, 178 Nestorius, 121 Nile River, 31-32
University of, 164 Netherlands, 190, 202, 205, 258 Nimitz, Chester William, 619
Napoleon I, 302-05, 318-27 after Napoleon, 333-34 Nimrod, 43
at Elba, 325 Austria and, 271 Nineveh, 50
as emperor, 319 Charles V
and, 213 Nitroglycerine, 362
law code 319 of, France and, 256 Nobel, Alfred, 400, 475
Portugal and, 321-22 Germany and, 598 Noh drama, 197
Russia and, 323-24 golden age of, 240-41 Normandy, 143
Spain and, 321-22 independence of, 224-25 Normans, 157-58, 148
at St. Helena, 326 Spain and, 270-71 North America
United States and, 327 in World War 527-28
I, English empire in, 228, 250-52
at Waterloo, 325-26 in World War II, 634-35 French empire in, 219-20, 245
wives of, 323 Neustria, 116 Spanish empire in, 217-18
INDEX 667
North Carolina, settlement of, 261 French Revolution and, 316 Paris
Northwest Ordinance, 309 Greece and, 351-52 German occupation of, 599
Northwest Passage, 219-20, 228, Montenegro and, 400 Pact of, 537
490 Russia and, 297 Treaty of, 293-94, 298-99, 309,
Northwest Territories, 410 Serbia and, 400 371
Norway in World War I, 524-26
Vikings and, 131
Denmark and, 337 Ottoman Turks, 180, 194, 205 Parker, Dorothy, 537
German invasion of, 597 Ovid, 88 Parma, Duke of, 224-225
independence of, 475 Owen, Robert, 331 Parnell, Charles Stewart, 422-23
in World War I, 528-29 Oxford, University of, 164 Parsons, Charles Algernon, 424
in World War II, 633-64
Parthenon, 64, 264
Nostradamus, Michel, 231
Parthia, 76, 79, 80, 86
Novgorod, founding of, 133
P Pascal, Blaise, 244-45
Nubia, rise of, 61
Pasteur, Louis, 360, 418
Numerals, Arabic, 134, 165 Pahlavi, Reza, 644 Pater, Walter, 424
Nuremburg laws, 570 Paine, Thomas, 306 Paternak, Boris, 578
Nursing, 370, 430 Pakistan, 161 Patrick, Saint, 116
Nylon, invention of, 588 Paleontology, 326 Patton, George, 623-24
Nystadt, Treaty of, 278 Palestine, 44 Paul the Apostle, 91
Jewish immigration to, 593 Pauli,Wolfgang, 546
in World War II, 643 Pauling, Linus, 587
O Palestrina, Giovanni Pierluigi da, Pavia, 212
232 Pavlov, Ivan, 422, 448
Ockam, William of, 176 Palma, Thomas Estrada, 488 Pax Romana, 88, 95
Octavian, 87-88 Panama, 217, 347 Pearl Harbor, 616-17
Odoacer, 110 constitution of, 490 Peary, Robert Edwin, 490
Odyssey, 46 independence 484-85
of, Peel, Robert, 341
Oglethorpe, James Edward, 283 United States and, 559-60 Pelee, Mount, explosion of, 489
Ohm, Georg Simon, 349 Panama Canal, 376-77 Pelopidas, 67
Okinawa, 629 building of, 484 Peloponnesian League, 57
Olmecs, 47 financing of, 445-46 Peloponnesian War, 64-65
Olympic games, 49, 105 opening of, 502 Penicillin, 612. See also
modern revival of, 452 Papacy, 101-2, 108, 132 Antibiotics.
Ommayad Caliphate, 121-22 church reform and, 143 Penn, William, 261
O'Neill, Eugene, 536, 588 Great Jubilee and, 171 Pepin of Heristal, 122, 124
Onnes, Kamerlingh, 497 Great Schism and, 184, 193 Pepin of Landen, 120
Opium Wars, 353-54, 365, 379- and, 148
infallibility Pepin the Short, 125, 126
80 Mussolini and, 543 Pergamum, 80
Oppenheimer, J. Robert, 629 nepotism and, 204 Pericles, 63, 64, 65
Oregon Territory, 327, 372 Protestantism vs., 212 Periodic table, 395
Orpheus, cult of, 59 in Spanish Civil War, 567 Peron, Juan Domingo, 647
Orwell, George, (Eric Blair), 613 in World War 523
I, Perry, Matthew Galbraith, 380
Ostrogoths, 100, 104, 110-11, 112 in World War II, 640 Perry, Oliver Hazard, 329
Otis, James, 294 Papal States, 126 Persepolis, 70
Otto I, 135, 137 Papermaking, 96, 128 Perseus, 78-79
Ottoman Empire, 186-87, 208-9 Paracelsus, 213 Pershing, John Joseph, 512, 513
Armenia and, 452 Parachute, invention of, 305 Persia, 56
Balkan Wars and, 393-94, 396- Paraguay, 347, 411 constitution of, 479
97 Pare, Ambrose, 212 Ionian rebellion vs., 62-63
decline of, 235-36, 553-54 Paris, Commune of, 390-91 oil interests in, 479
668 INDEX
Peru, 347 Pizarro, Francisco, 218 Franco and, 569

independence of, 411 Plague, bubonic, 175-76, 181- independence of, 155, 183-84,
Spanish conquest of, 218 82 242-43
War of the Pacific and, 433, Planck, Max, 443 industrialization of, 369
560 Plantagenets, 157 Napoleon and, 321-22
Petain, Philippe, 599, 636 Plato, 66 Republic 475
of,
Peter I (the Great), 268, 276-78 Platt Amendment, 488, 592 shipbuilding and, 172
Peter the Hermit, 151 Plattsburg, Battle of, 329 slave trade and, 192-93, 399
Petrarch, 178 Plautus, 79 in World War I, 528
Phalanx, 53 Pliny, 93 in World War II, 640
Pharaohs, 35, 68 Plotinus, 98 Pottery, development of, 27, 31
Pharos, 73 Plow, development of, 138 Pound, Ezra, 501
Phidias, 64 Plutarch, 93 Prague
Philadelphia, founding of, 261 Pluto, discovery of, 536, 587 defenestration of, 238
Philip, Duke of Burgundy, 190, Poe, Edgar Allan, 357, 375 University of, 179
192 Poincare, Jules Henri, 448 Press, freedom of, 283, 290, 295,
Philip King of France, 149
I, Poitiers, Battle of, 181 360
Philip II, King of France, 165-66 Poland Primates, evolution 13-14
of,
Philip II, King of Macedonia, 69- after Napoleon, 337 Princip, Gavrilo, 491
70 after World War I, 515-16, Printing
Philip King of Spain, 222-23
II, 551 in China, 125
Philip IV, King of France, 172- First Partition of, 288, 289, in England, 203
73, 176-77 297 in Germany, 206
Philip IV, King of Spain, 242 Nazis and, 577 Luther and, 210
Philippines, 219 Second Partition of, 315 in Massachusetts, 251
Japan and, 617-18 Third Partition of, 316 Probability, theory of, 244
Spain and, 237 in World War II, 574, 595-96, Prohibition, 485-86, 516-17, 533.
Spanish-American War and, 631-32 Temperance
See also
455 Polaroid, invention of, 588 movement.
United States and, 463, 482-83, Polish Succession, War of, 285- Prokaryotes, 6-7
594 286 Prokofiev, Sergey, 520, 579
in World War II, 628, 646 Polk, James Knox, 372 Protestantism, 210, 213
Philistines, 44 Polo, Marco, 169, 171, 200 in Austria,237-40
Philo of Alexandria, 91 Polybius, 81 Counter-Reformation and, 214
Phoenicians, 34, 44-45, 51-52 Polynesians, 101 in Netherlands, 224-25
Phrygians, 43, 44 Pompeii, 92 Papacy vs., 212
Picasso, Pablo, 474-75, 569 Pompeius, Gnaeus, 84, 85 inPoland, 233
Pickford, Mary, 500 Pompeius, Sextus, 88 Switzerland and, 212-13
Piets, 111, 132 Ponce de Leon, Juan, 217 Proudhon, Pierre Joseph, 358
Pilsudski, Josef Klemens, 551 Pontus, 83, 84 Proust, Marcel, 494
Pindar, 63 Pope, Alexander, 273, 282 Prout, William, 343-44
Pirandello, Luigi, 473, 523 Porter, William Sydney ("O. Provenge, 165
Pisa, 149, 154 Henry"), 487 Prussia, 165, 349
Pitt the Elder, William, 293 Portsmouth (N.H.), Treaty of, 1848 revolution 363-64in,
Pitt the Younger, William, 311 482 Brandenburg and, 275-76
Pittsburgh, founding of, 293 Portugal, 149, 192-93, 217, 223 Napoleon and, 320-21
Pius V, 232 Burma and, 222 Teutonic Knights and, 207
Pius IX, 361, 388 Brazil and, 219 Ptolemy (astronomer), 97
Pius XI, 543 constitutional reforms in, 347- Ptolemy I, 71
Pius XII, 640 48 Ptolemy II, 72
INDEX 669
Ptolemy III, 75 Redi, Francesco, 264

Romania
Ptolemy IV, 75 Reed, Walter, 456
Austria-Hungary and, 428
Ptolemy V, 79 Reformation. See Protestantism. Balkan Wars and, 496
Ptolemy XII, 85 Refrigeration, 438
independence of, 394, 401
Puerto Rico, 217, 347, 457, 529 Reichstag, burning of, 570 Russia and, 352
Pulitzer, Joseph, 430 Remarque, Erich Maria, 546 in World War I, 526
Pullman, George, 453 Rembrandt van Rijn, 241 in World War
Pullman strike, 453 II, 590, 638
Remington, Frederick, 487 Romanov Dynasty,
Punic Wars, 75, 76-77, 81 252-53, 493
Renaissance Rome
Puritans, 226, 248-49 in France, 202, 212 founding of, 50, 61
Pushkin, Alexander Sergeyevich, in Italy, 178, 213 Napoleon and, 314
351 Renoir, Pierre Auguste, 392 sack of, 107, 110
P'u-yi, 481, 561 Reptiles, evolution of, 11-12 Rommel, Erwin, 598, 611-12, 626
Pyramids, 35 Respighi, Ottorino, 523 Ronsard, Pierre de, 231
Pyrrhus, 74, 75 Revelation, Book of, 141 Roosevelt, Franklin D., 585-87,
Pythagoras, 59, 60 Reynolds, Joshua, 291, 294
621, 627
Rhode Island, settlement of, 252 at YaltaConference, 628
Rhodes, 80, 198, 208 Roosevelt, Theodore, 455, 483-86
Colossus of, 74
Q Russo-Japanese War and, 482
Rhodes, Cecil, 436, 459-60 Woodrow Wilson and, 513
Quakers, 249, 261 Ricardo, David, 332 Rosas, Juan Manuel de, 376
Quantum theory, 3, 443, 469, Richard (Lionheart), 157, 160-61
I
Roses, War of the, 202-3
546, 550 Richard II, 182 Rosetta Stone, 304, 345-46
Quebec, 245, 293 Richard III, 203 Rosetti, Dante Gabriel, 368
Queen Anne's War, 274 Richelieu, 243-245 Rossbach, Battle of, 288
Quintilian, 93 Richthofen, Manfred von, 511 Rostand, Edmond, 448
Quisling, Vidkun, 597 Rickenbacker, Edward Vernon, Rothschilds, 331, 366
511 Rousseau, Henri, 448
Ricketts, Howard Taylor, 487 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 289
R Riga, Treaty of, 547 Rubens, Peter Paul, 240-41
Rilke, Rainer Maria, 470 Rubicon River, 87
Rabelais, Francois, 212 Rimbaud, Arthur, 392 Rudolf I, 173
Racine, Jean, 257 Rimsky-Korsakoff, Nickolay, 422, Russia, 133. See also Soviet
Radar, 583 449, 473 Union.
Radio, 486, 516 Ripon, Lord (George Frederick Alaska and, 338
Raleigh, Walter, 228 Samuel Robinson), 436 Balkan crisis and, 493
Rameses II, 42 Rivera, Diego, 559 China and, 472
Rameses III, 44 Robespiere, Maximilien de, 302-3 civil war in, 520, 546
Rangoon, 299 Rockwell, Norman, 517-18 constitution of, 472
Rankin, Jeannette, 516 Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Finland and, 338
Rapallo, Treaty of, 544 487 Georgia and, 338
Raphael, 214 Rodin, Auguste, 420 Japan and, 465-66, 481-82
Ras Tafari, 530, 556. See also Haile Roentgen, Wilhelm Konrad, October Revolution of, 519
Selassie. 443 Rutherford, Ernest, 494, 512
Rashid, Haroun 130
ar-, 128, Rolland, Romain, 494
Rasputin, Grigory, 493, 518 Roman Empire, 85, 90, 105
Ravenna, 106 fall of, 110
Rayon, 410 laws of, 79 S
Reason, Age of, 283 legions of, 72, 105 Sabutai, 162-63
Red Cross, 430 roads in, 79 Safavid Dynasty, 221, 236, 286
670 INDEX
Saint John, Knights of, 198, 208 Schubert, Franz Peter, 336 Sholokhov, Mikhail, 578
Saint Louis, founding of, 294 Scientific Revolution, 220. See also Shostakovich, Dmitry, 548, 578,
Saint Peterburg, founding of, Industrial Revolution. 615
277 Scipio, 77, 81 Siam, 353, 415. See also Thailand,
Saint-Saens, Camille, 392 Scopes, John Thomas, 536 independence of, 379
Saladin, 160 Scots, Piets and, 132 Indo-Chia and, 461
Salamis, Battle of, 62 Scott, Walter, 333 Japanese invasion of, 618
Salem (Mass.)/ witch-hunt in, Scriabin, Aleksander, 473 in World War I, 530-31
262 Scurvy, 199 Sibelius, Jean, ,473
•Salerno, University of, 154 Scythians, 52 Siberia, settlement of, 253, 317
Samnites, 72, 74 Seaman, Elizabeth, 430 Sicily
Samoan Islands, 437-38 Seleucid Empire, 73, 76, 79 Allied invasion of, 624
San Antonio, founding of, 275 Seleucus, 71 Athens and, 65
Sand, George (Amandine- Seljuk Turks, 145, 149-51 Carthage and, 63
Aurore-Lucie Dudevant), Semitic languages, 33 Charles of Anjou and, 171
346 Semmelweiss, Ignaz Philipp, 363 Normans in, 148, 159
Sandburg, Carl, 517 Seneca, 90 Siddartha Gautama, 61
Sandinistas, 559 Sephardim, 200 Sidon, 44
Sandino, Augusto Cesar, 559 Septuagint, 73 Siemens, William, 424
Sanger, Margaret Louise, 500 Serbia Silesia, 280-81
Sanskrit, 41 Austria-Hungary and, 471, 476 Simpson, Wallis, 582
Santayana, George, 588 in Balkan Wars, 495-96 Sinclair, Upton, 487
Santo Domingo, 347 Bulgaria and, 427 Singapore, 339, 645
Sappho, 57 independence of, 159, 338, 394 Sinn Fein, 512
Sardinia, 285, 361-62. Ottoman Empire and, 400 Sino-Japanese War, 461
constitution of, 361 Russia and, 393 Sistine Chapel, 204
Italian unification and, 387 in World War I, 491-92, 520, Sitting Bull, 430
Kingdom of, 271 523-24 Slave trade, Portugal and, 192-93
Lombardy and, 362 Servius Tullius, 57 Slavery, 262, 283
Napoleon and, 315 Seurat, Georges, 420 in Brazil, 412
Pisa and, 149 Seven Years War, 287-89 in Britain, 342-43
Sargent, John Singer, 432 Seventh-Day Adventists, 375 Constitutional amendment on,
Saroyan, William, 588 Severus, Septimius, 98 407
Sassoon, Siegfried, 512 Seymour, Jane, 216 Emancipation Proclamation
Saudi Arabia, 593-94, 644. See Seyss-Inquart, Arthur, 630 and, 403
also Arabia. Shakespeare, William, 226-27, in Ethiopia, 556
Savannah (Ga.), founding of, 283 249 Haiti and, 334
Savonarola, 204 Shalmaneser III, 47 Liberia and, 353
Savoy, Duchy of, 264 Shang Dynasty, 41 in Ohio Territory, 309
Eugene of, 269-270, 275 Shanghai, 562-63 in Rome, 82
Kingdom of. See Sardinia. Shaw, George Bernard, 440, 467, in United States, 251, 354-56
Saxons, 111, 114, 116 539 Slavs, 99, 114, 130, 133
Sayers, Dorothy, 540 Sheba, Queen of, 117 Smallpox, 97, 312
Scarlatti, Alessandro, 264 Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 333 Smetana, Bedfich, 389
Schiller, Friedrich, 314, 336 Sheridan, Richard Brinsley, 311 Smith, Adam, 312
Schism, the Great, 147-48, 184, Sherman, William Tecumseh, Sobieski, John, 265, 267
193 405-6 Sobrero, Ascanio, 362
Schleswig-Holstein, 383, 384 Shih Huang 77-78
Ti, Socialism. See also Communism.
Schoenberg, Arnold, 546 Shiites, 122, 140, 150, 221 Bismarck and, 417
Schopenhauer, Arthur, 336 Shoguns, 140, 415-16 Disraeli and, 396
INDEX 671
Fabians and, 440 Spanish-American War, 455 in Denmark, 528

in France, 446 Sparta, 45, 49, 52-53 in Great Britain, 467, 539
in Germany, 385, 417, 441, Peloponnesian War and, 64-65 in Montana, 516
492-93 Thebes and, 67-68 New
in Zealand, 464
in Italy, 522 Spartacus, 85 in Norway, 475
rise of,359 Speech, freedom of, 283, 290 in United States, 485, 532
in United States, 453 Spencer, Herbert, 298 Sugar, 262, 529
Socrates, 64 Spengler, Oswald, 509 Sui Dynasty, 120-121
Solomon, 46 Spenser, Edmund, 226 Sukarno, Achmed, 645
Solomon Islands, 437 Spinoza, Baruch, 263 Suleiman, 208-9, 235
Solon, 57 Sri Lanka, 61. See also Ceylon. Sulfa drugs, 574
Somme, Battle of, 507 Stalin, Joseph (Iosif Sulla, 84, 85
Somoza, Anastasio, 592 Dzhugashvili), 519, 548 Sullivan, Arthur Seymour, 398,
Sophocles, 64 Nazis and, 577-78 424
Soto, Hernando de, 218 at Yalta
Conference, 628 Sumatra, 121
Sousa, John Philip, 432, 456 Stamp Act, 294 Sumeria, 28-30
South Africa, 269, 339, 414, 435 Stanley, Henry Morton, 414 Sumter, Fort, 401
diamonds in, 414 Stanton, Elizabeth Cady, 375 Sung Dynasty, 152, 156, 161, 162,
Republic of, 378, 435 Steam engine, development of, 85 168
Union of, 479 Steinbeck, John, 588 Sunnites, 122, 150, 160, 208, 221
in World War II, 643 Steinmetz, Charles Proteus, 456 Supernova, 152, 233
South America Stendhal, (Marie-Henri Beyle), Sweden, 233
independence movement in, 346 Finland and, 337
334 Sterne, Lawrence, 291 Norway and, 337
Portuguese empire in, 219 Steuben, Friedrich Wilhelm, 307- in World War I, 529
Spanish empire in, 218 8 in World War II, 634
South Carolina, settlement of, 261 Stevens, Thaddeus, 407 Swedenborg, Emmanuel, 295
South Sea Bubble, 273 Stilicho, 106, 107 Swift, Jonathan, 273
Soviet Union, 546-48. See also Stimson Doctrine, 562 Swinburne, Algernon Charles,
Russia. Stirrups, invention of, 98, 103 398
China and, 557 Stoicism, 95 Switzerland
Finland and, 613-14 Stone, Lucy, 375 Austria and, 185
German invasion of, 602-6 Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 373 Burgundy and, 201-2
Japan and, 558 Stradivarius, Antonius, 264 Franche Comte and, 205
in World War II, 613-15 Strauss, Richard, 444, 493 French occupation of, 304
Spain Strauss, Johann (the Elder), 363 French Revolution and, 315
Carthage and, 77 Strauss, Johann (the Younger), 389 independence of, 173
civil war of, 566-67 Stravinsky, Igor, 494 League of Nations and, 549
Franco-Prussian War and, 399 Strindberg, August, 426 mercinaries from, 212
Morocco and, 549 Stuyvesant, Peter, 261 neutrality of, 335-36
Napoleon and, 321-22 Sudan, 413, 435 Protestantism and, 212-13
North American empire of, Sue, Eugene, 360 railroads in, 426
217-18 Suetonius, 95 in World War I, 528
reconquest of, 144 Suez Canal, 377-78, 393 in World War II, 640
South American empire of, 218 Convention, 435 Sydney, founding of, 318
Vandals in, 107 Disraeli and, 413 Synge, John Millington, 468
in World War I, 528 opening of, 413 Syphilis, 204, 469-70
in World War 640 II, World War and, 525
I Syracuse, 49, 68, 71-72
Spanish Succession, War of, 270, Suffrage, women's Syria, 554, 643
274 in Australia, 482 Szent-Gyorgyi, Albert, 550
672 INDEX
Thales of Miletus, 56 Transjordan, 555

T
Thassaly, 68 Trans-Siberian Railroad, 462
Tacitus, 93 Thebes, 67-68 Trent, Council of, 231-232
Taft, William Howard, 483, 486, Theodora, 113 Trigonometry, 134, 206
499 Theodoric, 111, 112 Tripoli, 495
416
Tahiti, Theodosius, 105 Trollope, Anthony, 368
Taiwan, 461 Theogony, 48 Trotsky, Leon, 519, 546, 548
TajMahal, 253-54 Theosophy, 460-61 Troy, 43, 45
Takamine, Jokichi, 482 Thermopylae, 62 Trujillo Molina,. Rafael Leonidas,
Talbot, John, 201 Thibault, Jacques-Anatole- 592
Talleyrand, Charles Maurice de, Franôis, ("Anatole Tryon, Edward P., 3
322, 325 France"), 420 Tubman, Harriet, 373
Tambora, explosion of, 339-40 Third Reich. See Germany, in Tunis, 419
Tamerlane, 187-88, 196, 197 World War II. Tunisia, 642-43
T'ang Dynasty, 120-121, 125, Thirty Years War, 237-40 Turgenev, Ivan, 395
131, 136 Thomas a Kempis, 190 Turing, Alan Mathison, 612
Tanganyika, 556 Thomson, William (Lord Kelvin), Turkey. See also Ottoman Empire.
Tanzania, 435 467 Republic of, 554
Taoism, 61 Thoreau, Henry David, 375 westernization of,554
Tarentum, 74-75 Thorpe, James Francis, 500 in World War II, 644
Tarquinius Priscus, 54 Three Emperors League, 385-86 Turks, 128. See also Seljuk and
Tasman, Abel Janszoon, 240 Thucydides, 64 Ottoman Turks.
Tasmania, 240, 340 Thurber, James, 537 Turner, Joseph Mallord William,
Tasso, Torquato, 232 Tiberius, 90 333
Tatars, 186, 187 Tibet, 121, 279, 480 Turner, Nat, 356
decline of, 235 Ticonderoga, Fort, 293 Tuscany, 296, 361
Russia and, 316 Tiglath-Pileser, 44, 48 Tutankhamen, 42, 539
Taylor, Zachary, 372, 373 Tigranes I, 84 Twain, Mark (Samuel Clemens),
Tchaikovsky, Pyotr Ilich, 422, 449 Tigris River, 26 408, 431
Tea Party, Boston, 294 Timbuktu, 180, 352 Tyler, John, 372
Telegraph, 374 Tintoretto, 214 Typewriter, 408
Telephone, 408, 516 Titanic, 500 Typhus, 470
Tell, William, 179 Titian, 214
Temperance movement, 485-86. Tito, Marshal, (Josip Broz), 639
See also Prohibition. Titus, 92
Tennyson, Alfred, 344, 368, 398 Tocqueville, Alexis de, 346
U
Tenochtitlan, 181 Tojo, Hideki, 616 Ukraine
Terence, 79 Tokyo, earthquake of, 557 Khazars in, 120
Terror, Reign of, 302-3. See also Tolkien, J.R.R., 583 Red Army in, 546
French Revolution. Tolstoy, Leo, 395 in World War I, 520
Teutonic Knights, 164-165, 173, Toltecs, 121, 161 Ulm, Battle of, 320
179, 220, 266 Tories, 272, 342, 343 Ulyanov, Vladimir Ilich. See
decline of, 185, 195-196 Torquemada, Tomas de, 199-200 Lenin.
as Protestants, 210 Toulouse, Kingdom of, 107 Unamuno y Jugo, Miguel de, 497
Prussians and, 207 Toulouse-Lautrec, Henri, 448 "Underground railway," 373
Texas, independence of, 357-58 Tours, Battle of, 124, 125 Union of Soviet Socialist
Textiles, development of, 28 Toussaint L'Ouverture, Francois Republics. See Soviet
industrialization of, 292 Dominique, 334 Union.
Thackeray, William Makepeace, Toynbee, Arnold, 583 Unions. See Labor unions.
367-68 Trafalgar, Battle of, 320 United Kingdom, 272. See also
Thailand. 645. See also Siam. Trajan, 92, 95 England and Great Britain.
INDEX 673
United States decline 232

of, Volta, Alessandro, 335
Bank of, 355 Genoa and, 178, 184 Voltaire (Francis-Marie Arouet)
Civil War of, 395-96, 401-6 government of, 159 284, 289
Constitution of, 309 Italian unification
and, 387 Vulgate, 105
Declaration of Independence Napoleon and, 304
of, 306 Ottoman Empire and, 194, 205
French and Indian War in, Verdi, Giuseppe, 362, 388, 413,
292-94 425, 450
W
immigration to, 429 Verdun Wagner, Richard, 365, 386
inMexican War, 372-73 Battle of, 506-7 Wahhabis, 339
Revolution of. See American Treaty of, 129 Waldensians, 165-66
Revolution. Vergil, 88 Wales, 157, 170
in Spanish-American War, 455 Verlaine, Paul, 392 Wallace, Alfred Russel, 367
in War of 1812, 328-29 Vermeer, Jan, 241, 263 Wallace, William, 170
in World War I, 512-18 Verne, Jules, 392 Wallenstein, Albert von, 238-39
in World War II Verrazano, Giovanni da, 219-20 Walpole, Horace, 291
vs. Germany, 621-27 Versailles Walpole, Robert, 273
vs. Japan, 627-30 Palace of, 255 Walton, Izaak, 259
Ur, founding of, 29 Treaty 515
of, War of 1812, 328-29
Uranium, 314 Vesalius, Andreas, 213, 220 Washington, Booker T., 430, 485
Uranus, discovery of, 312 Vespasian, 92 Washington, George, 293, 306-10
Urartu, 48 Vespucius, Americus, 219 Wassermann, August von, 469
Ussher, James, 2, 249 Vesuvius, eruption of, 92, 93 Waterloo, Battle of, 325-26
Utah, statehood of, 456 Vichy, 636-37 Watt, James, 292, 312-13
Utrecht Great Britain and, 609 Watteau, Antoine, 272
Treaty of, 271, 274, 275 North Africa and, 622 Watts, Isaac, 273
Union of, 224 Petain and, 599 Waugh, Evelyn, 540
Syria and, 643 WCTU. See Women's Christian
United States and, 622 Temperance Union
V Victoria, Queen, 343, 415, 439, (WCTU).
464 Weber, Carl Maria von, 336
V-2 rockets, 625 Vienna Webster, Noah, 330
Valentinian, 104 Congress of, 325 Weill, Kurt, 546
Valerian, 100 Ottoman seige of, 209 Weimar Republic, 543-44
Valley Forge, 307 Vieta, Franciscus, 231 Wellington, Duke of, 325, 341
Van Buren, Martin, 355 Vietnam, 121, 168. See also Siam. Wells, H.G., 440-41, 467, 512
Van Dyck, Anthony, 241 Vikings, 127, 129-30, 132-33 West, Benjamin, 294
Vancouver, George, 310 Villa, Francisco ("Pancho"), 512- Westinghouse, George, 408, 431
Vandals, 107-8, 110 13 Westminister, Statute of, 591, 593
Vanderbilt, Cornelius, 377, 407 Villon, Francois, 202 Westphalia, Treaty 239-240
of,
Vargas, Getulio Donelles, 592 Vinci,Leonardo da, 205 Wharton, Edith, 487, 501, 517
Varro, Marcus Terentius, 86 Virchow, Rudolf Carl, 365 Wheel, invention of, 31
Vatican City, 543 Virgin Islands, Denmark and, Whigs, 272, 342, 343
Veblen, Thorstein, 456 528 in United States, 355-56
Vedas, 45 Virginia, settlement of, 250-51 Whistler, James Abbott McNeill,
Vega, Lope de, 223 Visigoths, 100, 105, 106-107, 110 398
Velazquez, Diego de Silva, 242 Vitamins, 495, 550, 576, 587 Whitman, Walt, 409
Venevento, Duchy of, 148 Vladivostok, 371, 547 Whitney, Eli, 310, 330
Venezuela, 454, 457-58 Volstead Act, 517. See also Wilberforce, William, 342-43
Venice, 109, 143, 154 Prohibition and Wilde, Oscar, 424, 440
Crete and, 167 Temperance Movement. Wilkes, John, 290
674 INDEX
William of Orange, 224-25 France and, 635-37

William I (the Conqueror), 146 Great Britain and, 607-12
Y
William II, Kaiser, 418, 441-43, Greece and, 601-2, 639-40 Yahwists, 48, 52
480 Hungary and, 637-38 Yale University, 274
William II, Rufus, 146 Iceland and, 634 Yalta Conference, 628
William King of England,
III, India and, 646 Yarmuk, Battle of, 119
260-61, 269-70 Indo-China and, 645 Yeats, William Butler, 540
William IV, King of England, Iran and, 644 Yellow fever, 456, 484
342, 343 Iraq and, 644 Yorktown, Battle of, 208-9
Williams, Roger, 252 Ireland and, 634 Young, Brighaih, 375. See also
Williamsburg, 262 Korea and, 645 Mormons.
Wilson, Woodrow Libya and, 641-42 Ypres, Battle of, 506
election of, 499 Luxembourg and, 635 Yucatan, 112
Fourteen Points of, 514-15 Mexico and, 647 Yugoslavia, 551
peace treaty and, 515-16 Morocco and, 642-43 in World War I, 523-24
reelection of, 513 Netherlands and, 634-35 in World War II, 601-2, 639
Theodore Roosevelt and, New Zealand and, 646-47
513 North Africa and, 609-12
Winthrop, John, 251 Norway and, 633-64
Wolfe, James, 293 Palestine and, 643
Z
Wolff, Kaspar Friedrich, 289 papacy and, 640 Zama, Battle of, 77
Wolsey, Thomas, 215 Philippines and, 646 Zanzibar, 414
Women's Temperance
Christian Poland and, 631-32 Zapata, Emiliano, 512
Union (WCTU), 485-86. Portugal and, 640 Zarathrustra, 58
See also Prohibition. Romania and, 638 Zen Buddhism, 131, 161. See also
Women's suffrage. See Suffrage, Saudi Arabia and, 644 Buddhism.
women's. Singapore and, 645 Zeno, 74, 110, 111
Wooley, Charles Leonard, 29 South Africa and, 643 Zeppelin, Ferdinand, Count
Woolf, Virginia, 540 Soviet Union and, 602-6, 613- von, 444. See also
Wordsworth, William, 312, 332 15 Dirigibles.
World War I, 503-9 Spain and, 640 Zero, notion of, 48, 134
naval battles of, 509-11 Sweden and, 634 Zhukov, Georgy, 604, 606
World War II Switzerland and, 640 Zhukovsky, Vasily Andreyevich,
Afghanistan and, 644 Syria and, 643 338
Albania and, 639 Thailand and, 645 Ziegfeld, Florenz, 487
Algeria and, 642-43 Tunisia and, 642-43 Ziggurats, 36, 54
Argentina and, 647 Turkey and, 644 Zimmermann, Arthur, 513-
Australia and, 646 Yugoslavia and, 601-2, 639 14
in Austria, 630 Wounded.Knee, Battle of, Zinoviev, Grigory, 538
Baltic states and, 632 430 Zionism, 445
Belgium and, 635 Wright brothers, 486 Zizka, John, 195
Bulgaria and, 638 Wyclif, John, 182 Zola, Emile, 392, 420
Canada and, 647 Dreyfus Affair and,
China and, 644-45 447
Czechoslovakia and, 631 Zoroastrianism, 58, 66, 96
Denmark and, 633
X
Zoser, 35
Egypt and, 641 Xavier, Francis, 214, 236 Zulus, 353, 414
end 630
of, Xenophanes, 59 Zwingli, Huldruch, 212
Ethiopia and, 641 Xenophon, 65 Zworykin, Vladimir Kosma,
Finland and, 632-33 Xerxes, 62 588
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Isaac Asimov was born in the Soviet Union in

1920, was brought to the
United States in 1923, and has been an American
citizen since 1928. He
was educated in the public school system of New York
and ob-
City
tained bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees from Columbia Uni-
versity.
He professor of biochemistry at Boston University School
is
of Medi-
cine but hasn't worked at it since 1958 (nor
has he been paid).
Asimov grew interested in science fiction at an early age and
sold his
first story to a magazine in 1938. His first book
appeared in 1950. Since
his first sale,he has written and sold nearly 400 pieces of short
fiction
and some 3000 essays. He has published over 465 books
of fiction and
nonfiction, covering every branch of science and
mathematics, history,
literature, humor, and miscellaneous subjects.
He lives in New York City and

married to Janet Jeppson Asimov,
is
a psychiatrist and science fiction writer.
He has two children by an
earlier marriage.
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The History of the World from
Its Origins to 1945^
As Only Isaac Asimov Cbuld Tell It
Isaac Asimov’s 450 works of fiction and him as one of

fact have' established
our greatest storytellers, as well as a writer of incredible breadth and scope.
Here, he turns his skill to the most fascinating tale of all: that of our world
and its people.
Going far beyond the basic and dates, here are the stories behind the
facts
history: the political intrigues and military strategies underpinning great
empires and nations... the scientific leaps and economic revolutions that set
the stage for the way we live today... the cultural links and influences that
affected the art, music, and literature of every society.
From the beginnings of agriculture to the rise of industry, from the origins
of tribal societies to the construction of modem democracies, from the
harnessing of fire to the discovery of nuclear fission, Isaac Asimov narrates
the world’s history with wit and style.
ISBN Q-Qb-E7DD3b-7
90000>
9 780062 700360

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mnniAnllUAi:i

Over 15,000,000,000 Years

370,000,000 TO 300,000,000 YEARS AGO 5,000,000 TO 4,000,000 YEARS AGO

4,000,000 TO 2,000,000 YEARS AGO

2,000,000 T0 1,600,000 YEARS AGO

100,000,000 TO 70,000,000 YEARS AGO 1,600,000 T0 1,000,000 YEARS AGO

70,000,000 TO 65,000,000 YEARS AGO 1,000,000 TO 500,000 YEARS AGO

65,000,000 TO 40,000,000 YEARS AGO 500,000 TO 300,000 YEARS AGO

40,000,000 TO 30,000,000 YEARS AGO 300,000 TO 200,000 YEARS AGO

30,000,000 T0 17,000,000 YEARS AGO 200,000 TO 50,000 YEARS AGO

2000 T0 1500 B.C.

7000 TO 6000 B.C. 1000 TO 900 B.C.

Baskets • pottery • textiles David and Solomon • the beginning of

the Atlantic Ocean • Caste system in India

4000 TO 3500 B.C.

rise of Egypt Second Assyrian Empire • end of Israel and

3500 TO 3000 B.C. established in Greece • Greece colonizes the

ascendant in Judah • rise of Lydia • Aristotle in Athens • Rome develops the

Emperor in Japan 300 TO 250 B.C.

growth of democracy in Athens • the Maurya dynasty in India

Thousand • fortification of Jerusalem •

Sparta peak • Agesilaus in Asia Minor

sacked by the Gauls Roman army in Mesopotamia

Trajan conquers Dacia spread over the Pacific Islands

Anglo-Saxons invade Britain • Chichen Itza

rules in Constantinople, puts an end to

250 TO 300 Plato's Academy, builds the cathedral of

Khazar Empire established • T'ang dynasty Bulgarians converted to Christianity

700 TO 750 950 T0 1000

• Leif Ericsson lands in Vinland in North

750 TO 800 America • kingdoms of Hungary, Bohemia,

1050 T0 1100 Magna Carta • Sicily flourishes under

Wales and adopts the longbow • the Sicilian

Arabic versions of Greek books of science 1300 T0 1350

produce modern astronomy and anatomy,

1450 T0 1500 • Huguenots in France and the

Westphalia, but is then defeated and driven out of

France struggles to centralize French power Siberia is completed • Aurangzeb is last

founded and French North Africa (Canada)

notable for reformers who try to improve

remarkable victories for France • Lavoisier monarchy of Charles X, establishes middle-

Great Britain and, under George Algeria • Daguerre invents photography

Austria becomes a dual nation, Austria-

incapacity allows a French— Russian alliance

Russo-Japanese war • to the world's abdicates, is killed, and a Communist

crosses the Atlantic by plane independence movement in India under

government under Mussolini • Germany 1939 T0 1945

back before German general, Erwin Rommel

Measure of the Universe (1983)

Asimov's Chronology of Science and Discovery

Asimov's History of the World (1991)

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Asimov, Isaac, 1920-

ager, caught up in the reading of science fiction, independence.

A.H.). named Dionysius Exiguus (500-560) studied the

taining anywhere from few dozen to a few

world's land. Short-range adventure is all that concerns them.

were utterly different from all other animals. bipedality —

Thus, a skull that was human-looking except for years old.

arms that were surprisingly long. evolution.