The Black Sea and the Early Civilizations of Europe, the Near East and Asia

The Black Sea and the Early Civilizations of Europe, the Near East and Asia
Author: Mariya Ivanova
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 409
Release: 2013-08-26
Genre: History
ISBN: 1107032199

This book presents the first comprehensive overview of the Black Sea region in the prehistoric period. The Black Sea is a key transitional zone between Europe, Central Asia, and the Near East, which has long been divided by politics, language, and traditional boundaries of scholarly disciplines. This book cuts across disciplines and combines sources published in Eastern European languages with Western scholarly literature to give the Black Sea its rightful place in contemporary archaeological discourse.

The Black Sea

The Black Sea
Author: Charles King
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2005-07-21
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0191647772

The lands surrounding the Black Sea share a colourful past. Though in recent decades they have experienced ethnic conflict, economic collapse, and interstate rivalry, their common heritage and common interests go deep. Now, as a region at the meeting point of the Balkans, Central Asia, and the Middle East, the Black Sea is more important than ever. In this lively and entertaining book, which is based on extensive research in multiple languages, Charles King investigates the myriad connections that have made the Black Sea more of a bridge than a boundary, linking religious communities, linguistic groups, empires, and later, nations and states.

Oceanic Histories

Oceanic Histories
Author: David Armitage
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 339
Release: 2018
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1108423183

Freshly presents world history through its oceans and seas in uniquely wide-ranging, original chapters by leading experts in their fields.

The Routledge Handbook of the Byzantine City

The Routledge Handbook of the Byzantine City
Author: Nikolas Bakirtzis
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 719
Release: 2024-01-31
Genre: History
ISBN: 0429515758

The Byzantine world contained many important cities throughout its empire. Although it was not ‘urban’ in the sense of the word today, its cities played a far more fundamental role than those of its European neighbors. This book, through a collection of twenty-four chapters, discusses aspects of, and different approaches to, Byzantine urbanism from the early to late Byzantine periods. It provides both a chronological and thematic perspective to the study of Byzantine cities, bringing together literary, documentary, and archival sources with archaeological results, material culture, art, and architecture, resulting in a rich synthesis of the variety of regional and sub-regional transformations of Byzantine urban landscapes. Organized into four sections, this book covers: Theory and Historiography, Geography and Economy, Architecture and the Built Environment, and Daily Life and Material Culture. It includes more specialized accounts that address the centripetal role of Constantinople and its broader influence across the empire. Such new perspectives help to challenge the historiographical balance between ‘margins and metropolis,’ and also to include geographical areas often regarded as peripheral, like the coastal urban centers of the Byzantine Mediterranean as well as cities on islands, such as Crete, Cyprus, and Sicily which have more recently yielded well-excavated and stratigraphically sound urban sites. The Routledge Handbook of the Byzantine City provides both an overview and detailed study of the Byzantine city to specialist scholars, students, and enthusiasts alike and, therefore, will appeal to all those interested in Byzantine urbanism and society, as well as those studying medieval society in general.

The Prehistoric Maritime Frontier of Southeast China

The Prehistoric Maritime Frontier of Southeast China
Author: Chunming Wu
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 275
Release: 2021-10-05
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9811640793

This open access book presents multidisciplinary research on the cultural history, ethnic connectivity, and oceanic transportation of the ancient Indigenous Bai Yue (百越) in the prehistoric maritime region of southeast China and southeast Asia. In this maritime Frontier of China, historical documents demonstrate the development of the “barbarian” Bai Yue and Island Yi (岛夷) and their cultural interaction with the northern Huaxia (华夏) in early Chinese civilization within the geopolitical order of the “Central State-Four Peripheries Barbarians-Four Seas”. Archaeological typologies of the prehistoric remains reveal a unique cultural tradition dominantly originating from the local Paleolithic age and continuing to early Neolithization across this border region. Further analysis of material culture from the Neolithic to the Early Iron Age proves the stability and resilience of the indigenous cultures even with the migratory expansion of Huaxia and Han (汉) from north to south. Ethnographical investigations of aboriginal heritage highlight their native cultural context, seafaring technology and navigation techniques, and their interaction with Austronesian and other foreign maritime ethnicities. In a word, this manuscript presents a new perspective on the unique cultural landscape of indigenous ethnicities in southeast China with thousands of years’ stable tradition, a remarkable maritime orientation and overseas cultural hybridization in the coastal region of southeast China.

Ancient West Asian Civilization

Ancient West Asian Civilization
Author: Akira Tsuneki
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 226
Release: 2016-08-19
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9811005540

This book explores aspects of the ancient civilization in West Asia, which has had a great impact on modern human society—agriculture, metallurgy, cities, writing, regional states, and monotheism, all of which appeared first in West Asia during the tenth to first millennia BC.The editors specifically use the term "West Asia" since the "Middle East" is seen as an Eurocentric term. By using this term, the book hopes to mitigate potential bias (i.e. historical and Western) by using a pure geographical term. However, the "West Asia" region is identical to that of the narrower "Middle East," which encompasses modern Iran and Turkey from east to west and Turkey and the Arabian Peninsula from north to south.This volume assembles research from different disciplines, such as the natural sciences, archaeology and philology/linguistics, in order to tackle the question of which circumstances and processes these significant cultural phenomena occurred in West Asia. Scrutinizing subjects such as the relations between climate, geology and human activities, the origins of wheat cultivation and animal domestication, the development of metallurgy, the birth of urbanization and writing, ancient religious traditions, as well as the treatment of cultural heritage, the book undertakes a comprehensive analysis of West Asian Civilization that provided the common background to cultures in various areas of the globe, including Europe and Asia.These contributions will attempt to demonstrate a fresh vision which emphasizes the common cultural origin between Europe and West Asia, standing in opposition to the global antagonism symbolized by the theory of "Clash of Civilizations."

The Indo-European Puzzle Revisited

The Indo-European Puzzle Revisited
Author: Kristian Kristiansen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 357
Release: 2023-03-31
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1009261746

The Indo-European dispersal inalterably shaped the Eurasian linguistic landscape. This book offers the newest insights into this dramatic prehistoric event.

The World's Oceans

The World's Oceans
Author: Rainer F. Buschmann
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Total Pages: 447
Release: 2018-07-26
Genre: Science
ISBN: 144084352X

This single-volume resource explores the five major oceans of the world, addressing current issues such as sea rise and climate change and explaining the significance of the oceans from historical, geographic, and cultural perspectives. The World's Oceans: Geography, History, and Environment is a one-stop resource that describes in-depth the Arctic, Atlantic, Indian, Pacific, and Southern Oceans and identifies their importance, today and throughout history. Essays address the subject areas of oceans and seas in world culture, fishing and shipping industries through history, ocean exploration, and climate change and oceans. The book also presents dozens of entries covering a breadth of topics on human culture, the environment, history, and current issues as they relate to the oceans and ocean life. Sample entries provide detailed information on topics such as the Bermuda Triangle, Coral Reefs, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, Ice Melt, Myths and Legends, Piracy, and Whaling. Contributions to the work come from top researchers in the fields of history and maritime studies, including Paul D'Arcy, John Gillis, Tom Hoogervorst, Michael North, and Lincoln Paine. The volume highlights the numerous ways in which Earth's oceans have influenced culture and society, from the earliest seafaring civilizations to the future of the planet.