HEY! I know I said I would write about Taiwan in the next post, but, I have something I want to show you and talk about in this post. As you have probably guessed from the title, it is Ancient Civilizations. So, as you may or may not know, I love ancient history. Ancient culture, empires, civilizations, history, whatever it is, I love it. Except for some U.S. History and TX history. Anyway, I was watching this video earlier, and it is the most beautiful timeline of the rise and fall of Ancient Empires. I absolutely love it. It goes back in time form the start of humanity in Africa, and of humans traveling to other parts in Asia. Then the dynasties and empires and civilizations begin. It also lists the inventions and accomplishments as well as the population over time. It is just amazing.
So, let’s review the video. I promise you, if you watch this video for the whole time, and watch it to the end and pay attention to it, you will love Ancient history as much as I do. Starting from just 200000 BCE, when the humans started in Africa, the timeline progresses on to the future. I want to point out, that the development of humans began more in Asia and the eastern side of the world. A lot of the Empires fought over there, and it was like the fight for Asia. Who could rule all the land. Also, referring to yesterday’s post, humans reached China at around 109000 BCE. Near 3440 BCE Europe started, developing or settling more than the others. There are more names or “country” or land divisions in “Europe” than the others. Excluding North and South America. Then, at 3140 BCE, we see the first color on the map of Egypt for Advanced Civilizations. I wonder if there are present-day Egyptians today. I mean, I know that there probably are people who live in Egypt and are called Egyptians, but I wonder if there is some culture or traditions form the ancient Egyptians passed down to them, and I wonder if they can read hieroglyphics. Or is that just something from the past? I wonder… Of course, the Ancient Egyptians are built along the Nile river, becoming a river civilization. See, I still remember my lessons from class. Those lessons weren’t for nothing! Anyway, later we start seeing some new civilizations in what is Kuwait today, and what looks like Pakistan and some of India. Around 2157 BCE we see a lot of civilizations near the Middle East, particularly Iraq and Kuwait. Then, the minor highlight of yesterday’s post, the Xia dynasty appears in 2065 BCE. Skipping forward a couple hundred years, we get to Shang overthrowing Xia in “China”. At 1498 BCE we see an Advanced Civilization appear around India. I believe this labeled as Sanskrit. Along the way, Egypt has started to expand and after a few seconds, you see them conquering Syria. A while after that is just development in new civilizations rising and falling to others around them in around the Middle East, and some spreading in India. China is starting to split at this point. WOAH! Then at 514 BCE an Empire- I can’t see the name clearly- starts to take over. 313 BCE the Maruya Empire rises in India. The Seleucus turns into the Seleucid Empire, and then at 168 BCE, the Han dynasty starts to rule. And then, Jesus is born, turning BCE into CE. At 16 CE Xin overthrows Han, only causing Han to overthrow Xin in 28 CE. 100 CE- The Kushan Empire starts to expand. And at the same time, the Roman empire is expanding and rising in present Europe. Around 556 CE the Turkish Khaganate begins to take over. Then- I can’t see the name properly apologies for that- a new civilization starts to rise and grows fast in today’s Suadi Arabia, and started to move. Over time we start to see the basic, fight-for-the-most-land-and-rule-all-of-Asia part. And then, we see the power of the Mongol Empire. Going into the past to 1210 the Mongol Empire has started to grow and very quickly seeming by the video, it rules a lot of Asia, Russia, slowly taking parts of China, making its way to Europe, and so on. I have to point out though, as the Mongols were conquering, they never could take over India. You can still see India’s outline. It could not be taken over by the others. The Mongols were a very strong Empire as we can tell. They took over a lot of lands and conquered other empires very fast. Very impressive. I have to ask, what was the end of the Mongol Empire. I can see that their conquering stopped and they split. Was the split the reason? Eventually, the Mongols took over China, before it slowly came back. There is still no development in North and South America besides some growth in Mexico. Slowly, slowly, the Mongolian Empire reduced. Aha, now at 1588 the Mughal Empire started taking over India. Now, here comes the rise of the Maharashtra Empire soon. Above, Russia claims the land, as, Russia. Qing in China starts to expand. Spain starts to explore the North and South Americas. Now, at around 1740 the Marathas started to rise. Maratha Empire grew, and so did the Russian empire. The Russian Empire is basically almost covering all of the areas that is Russia today. 1830, the British empire came. Soviet Union, America, Canada, India, become themselves. I also want to point out that China has a label of Communists. Let’s rewind and check out where that started. Ok, so in 1933 there is a label of Republic of China. There was an area of Republicans and a small area of Communists before communists came over. Slowly, it just became China. So around 1953. Then we finish in 2016- when this map was made.
I know that this post was mostly an overview of the video, but I really wanted to share or note the key points in it. It does explain a lot of the Chinese History we talked about yesterday and shows exactly how it once began. It also answers some of my questions in the past post when the dynasties started. I loved this video. It was beautiful and so well made, I loved it. The growth and progress over time. How in the past everything were rise and fall. Seeing who the humans traveled at the start of humankind, not saying mankind, and how they grew. Just the basic growth and seeing how many empires started and ruled over the years. We always explain that the Mongolian Empire conquered many empires and was huge or that the Romans conquered a lot of Europe, but we need it put into perspective and actually visualized to see what they mean. To see an actual representation of what happened. Well, I am running out of time, and I hope to see you tomorrow continuing our talk about Taiwan and China and other topics with China. Bye!