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$a CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA : INDIA, CHINA AND THE PEOPLES OF SOUTHEAST ASIA AND THE INDIAN OCEANAsia was the birthplace of several of the world s great early civilizations. These civilizations rivalled and in many ways surpassed the splendours of Egypt, the Middle East, Greece and Rome. There were large, well-built, clean and prosperous cities in India-Pakistan and China. Agriculture was well advanced, and irrigation techniques were the most sophisticated in the world. People had systems of writing and calculating, and developed extensive trade routes over land and water. This fifth volume of THE ATLAS OF HUMAN HISTORY looks at the emergence of organized civilizations in Asia and surrounding regions as their peoples moved from the Stone Age to the Bronze Age, and on into the Iron Age. The heartland of Asian civilization was China. Two thousand years ago there were probably more than 50 million people living in China - a population far greater than that of any comparable civilization. Today, there are more than 1,000 million Chinese, and despite all the changes their nation has experienced in the course of the 20th century, China today still brings to the modern world a vast cultural legacy from the past. Like other empires, the empire of China was a melting pot of different peoples, with different languages, beliefs and traditions. Yet China created a government and a culture that lasted, with few major changes, for 2,000 years - far outlasting the empires of Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome. This remarkable continuity, through a succession of ruling dynasties - including foreign rulers, such as the Mongols - is unmatched in human history. No other people could have built the Great Wall, to keep out `barbarians`. Equally astonishing is the range of cultural, scientific and industrial achievements of the Chinese people during that time. Their inventions gave them a technological lead over the West, which they did not lose until the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s. Civilizations of Asia also examines the origins of other areas which were home to peoples who now play a major role in the world economy, such as India, Iran, the nations of Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Japan and Korea. These lands were subject to invasions of peoples who brought their own cultures and beliefs, and also to the rise and fall of ruling dynasties. In often turbulent times, great religious and philosophical ideas developed - including Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, and Shintoism. Some of these creeds spread far from their origins, changing the lives on seven peoples, and bringing new inspiration to government and the arts. Throughout this book, detailed maps, pictures, and colour reconstru..tions illustrate the ways in which the peoples of Asia and neighbouring lands developed their cultures, where they travelled, traded and fought, and how they hel ed to shape the history of humankind.(libra)I
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