Part 1 (1/2)

A General History for Colleges and High Schools.

by P. V. N. Myers.

PREFACE.

This volume is based upon my _Ancient History_ and _Mediaeval and Modern History_. In some instances I have changed the perspective and the proportions of the narrative; but in the main, the book is constructed upon the same lines as those drawn for the earlier works. In dealing with so wide a range of facts, and tracing so many historic movements, I cannot hope that I have always avoided falling into error. I have, however, taken the greatest care to verify statements of fact, and to give the latest results of discovery and criticism.

Considering the very general character of the present work, an enumeration of the books that have contributed facts to my narration, or have helped to mould my views on this or that subject, would hardly be looked for; yet I wish here to acknowledge my special indebtedness, in the earlier parts of the history, to the works of George Rawlinson, Sayce, Wilkinson, Brugsch, Grote, Curtius, Mommsen, Merivale, and Leighton; and in the later parts, and on special periods, to the writings of Hodgkin, Emerton, Ranke, Freeman, Michaud, Bryce, Symonds, Green (J. R.), Motley, Hallam, Thiers, Lecky, Baird, and Muller.

Several of the colored maps, with which the book will be found liberally provided, were engraved especially for my _Ancient History_; but the larger number are authorized reproductions of charts accompanying Professor Freeman's _Historical Geography of Europe_. The Roman maps were prepared for Professor William F. Allen's _History of Rome_, which is to be issued soon, and it is to his courtesy that I am indebted for their use.

The ill.u.s.trations have been carefully selected with reference to their authenticity and historical truthfulness. Many of those in the Oriental and Greek part of the work are taken from Oscar Jager's _Weltgeschichte_; while most of those in the Roman portion are from Professor Allen's forthcoming work on Rome, to which I have just referred, the author having most generously granted me the privilege of using them in my work, notwithstanding it is to appear in advance of his.

Further acknowledgments of indebtedness are also due from me to many friends who have aided me with their scholarly suggestions and criticism.

My warmest thanks are particularly due to Professor W.F. Allen, of the University of Wisconsin; to Dr. E.W. Coy, Princ.i.p.al of Hughes High School, Cincinnati; to Professor William A. Merrill, of Miami University; and to Mr. D. H. Montgomery, author of _The Leading Facts of History_ series.

P. V. N. M.

COLLEGE HILL, OHIO, July, 1889.

GENERAL HISTORY.

GENERAL INTRODUCTION: THE RACES AND THEIR EARLY MIGRATIONS.

DIVISIONS OF HISTORY.--History is usually divided into three periods,-- Ancient, Mediaeval, and Modern. Ancient History begins with the earliest nations of which we can gain any certain knowledge, and extends to the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, A.D. 476. Mediaeval History embraces the period, about one thousand years in length, lying between the fall of Rome and the discovery of the New World by Columbus, A.D. 1492. Modern History commences with the close of the mediaeval period and extends to the present time. [Footnote: It is thought preferable by some scholars to let the beginning of the great Teutonic migration (A.D. 375) mark the end of the period of ancient history. Some also prefer to date the beginning of the modern period from the capture of Constantinople by the Turks, A.D.

1453; while still others speak of it in a general way as commencing about the close of the 15th century, at which time there were many inventions and discoveries and a great stir in the intellectual world.]

ANTIQUITY OF MAN.--We do not know when man first came into possession of the earth. We only know that, in ages vastly remote, when both the climate and the outline of Europe were very different from what they are at present, man lived on that continent with animals now extinct; and that as early as 4000 or 3000 B.C.,--when the curtain first rises on the stage of history,--in some favored regions, as in the Valley of the Nile, there were nations and civilizations already venerable with age, and possessing languages, arts, and inst.i.tutions that bear evidence of slow growth through very long periods of time before written history begins.

[Footnote: The investigation and study of this vast background of human life is left to such sciences as _Ethnology, Comparative Philology_, and _Prehistoric Archeology_.]

THE RACES OF MANKIND.--Distinctions in form, color, and physiognomy divide the human species into three chief types, or races, known as the Black (Ethiopian, or Negro), the Yellow (Turanian, or Mongolian), and the White (Caucasian). But we must not suppose each of these three types to be sharply marked off from the others; they shade into one another by insensible gradations.

There has been no perceptible change in the great types during historic times. The paintings upon the oldest Egyptian monuments show us that at the dawn of history, about five or six thousand years ago, the princ.i.p.al races were as distinctly marked as now, each bearing its racial badge of color and physiognomy. As early as the times of Jeremiah, the permanency of physical characteristics had pa.s.sed into the proverb, ”Can the Ethiopian change his skin?”

Of all the races, the White, or Caucasian, exhibits by far the most perfect type, physically, intellectually, and morally.

[Ill.u.s.tration: NEGRO CAPTIVES, From the Monuments of Thebes. (Ill.u.s.trating the permanence of race characteristics.)]

THE BLACK RACE.--Africa is the home of the peoples of the Black Race, but we find them on all the other continents, whither they have been carried as slaves by the stronger races; for since time immemorial they have been ”hewers of wood and drawers of water” for their more favored brethren.

THE YELLOW, OR TURANIAN RACE.--The term Turanian is very loosely applied by the historian to many and widely separated families and peoples. In its broadest application it is made to include the Chinese and other more or less closely allied peoples of Eastern Asia; the Ottoman Turks, the Hungarians, the Finns, the Lapps, and the Basques, in Europe; and (by some) the Esquimaux and American Indians.

The peoples of this race were, it seems, the first inhabitants of Europe and of the New World; but in these quarters, they have, in the main, either been exterminated or absorbed by later comers of the White Race. In Europe, however, two small areas of this primitive population escaped the common fate--the Basques, sheltered among the Pyrenees, and the Finns and Lapps, in the far north; [Footnote: The Hungarians and Turks are Turanian peoples that have thrust themselves into Europe during historic times]

while in the New World, the Esquimaux and the Indians still represent the race that once held undisputed possession of the land.

The polished stone implements found in the caves and river-gravels of Western Europe, the sh.e.l.l-mounds, or kitchen-middens, upon the sh.o.r.es of the Baltic, the Swiss lake habitations, and the barrows, or grave-mounds, found in all parts of Europe, are supposed to be relics of a prehistoric Turanian people.

Although some of the Turanian peoples, as for instance the Chinese, have made considerable advance in civilization, still as a rule the peoples of this race have made but little progress in the arts or in general culture.

Even their languages have remained undeveloped. These seem immature, or stunted in their growth. They have no declensions or conjugations, like those of the languages of the Caucasian peoples.