istoryworld
The first dynasty
In the early centuries, and again in the closing stages of ancient Egypt, the capital is at Memphis, near modern-day Cairo. But at the peak of Egyptian power, during the period from about 2000 to 1200 BC, the city of Thebes - several hundred kilometres up the Nile - is a place of greater importance. The pyramids remain today to show the early greatness of Memphis, in the period known as the Old Kingdom. Similarly the temples of Karnak and Luxor are witness to the ...
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Toltecs
The Toltecs lose control of their empire during the 12th century, when both Tula and Chichén Itzá are destroyed. But the Toltecs are not immediately replaced by another ruling dynasty in central Mexico. Instead the region lapses into a prolonged period of chaos and anarchy. Not until the 14th century does a migrant tribe create a base, at what is now Mexico City, from which they will establish the last and the most powerful of the Indian empires of central America. They are the Aztecs.
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Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb
Direct provocation of this kind is untypical of Shah Jahan, but it becomes standard policy during the reign of his son Aurangzeb. His determination to impose strict Islamic rule on India undoes much of what was achieved by Akbar. An attack on Rajput territories in 1679 makes enemies of the Hindu princes; the reimposition of the jizya in the same year ensures resentment among Hindu merchants and peasants. At the same time Aurangzeb is obsessed with extending Moghul rule into the difficult terrain of southern ...
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Greek and Roman gods
In both Greece and Rome the many gods of the pantheon have their own local shrines. The most important of these are magnificent buildings, set in elaborate architectural precincts. Famous examples are the temple to Apollo at Delphi, and the Parthenon, sacred to Pallas Athene, in Athens. Priests attend to the needs of the god, whether by preparing ceremonial food or drink or by decorating and anointing the cult statue, and they supervise the temple rituals. The role of ordinary worshippers consists largely in bringing ...
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The Book
The books of the Jewish Bible are believed to have been written over several centuries, beginning in the 10th century BC - by which time the Hebrews are settled in Canaan, or Palestine. But in many parts the scribes are writing down a much older oral tradition. It is thought that some of the events described may go back as far as the 18th century BC. The holiest part of the Bible for Jews is the first five books, known as the Torah ('instruction' or ...
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Baroque Rome
The Baldacchino rises above an altar at which only the pope conducts mass. Visible between the columns, from the point of view of the congregation, is Bernini's other dramatic contribution to the interior of St Peter's. This is a golden tableau, a piece of pure theatre, above the altar at the far end of the church. Its central feature is the papal throne of St Peter, held aloft among the clouds.Sculpted golden rays stream up from St Peter's throne towards heaven. In an extra dimension ...
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Mute monuments
Some pre-literate societies have left tantalizing traces of their religion. Stonehenge in southern England, constructed from about 3000 BC (and therefore contemporary with the start of Egyptian civilization), has prompted endless speculation about its original purpose. Similarly, from around 1000 BC, the temple platforms and the pyramids of the Olmecs, in America, provide evidence of religion without our knowing precisely what that religion was. Climbing up to a temple or altar, as also in the ziggurats of Mesopotamia from about 2000 BC onwards, is a ...
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The architecture of empire
As well as setting in place the administrative structure of the empire (and adopting Zoroastrianism as the state religion), Darius proves himself the greatest builder of the Achaemenid dynasty. In 521 he moves his capital to Susa, building there an audience hall and a palace. An inscription found at Susa reveals his pride in his far-flung empire of craftsmen. In 518 he moves them all - stone cutters, masons, carpenters, sculptors - some 250 miles (400 km) to the southeast, to start work on an ...
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Karnak and Luxor
These temples are built and added to over a long period. But the grandeur which now remains is mainly from the two centuries after 1500 BC (much of it designed to celebrate the military victories of pharaohs of the New Kingdom, as is the extraordinary rock-cut temple of Abu Simbel). Greek architecture will later refine the ponderous elements in this ancient Egyptian style, slimming the fat pillars, formalizing the decoration, introducing better balance and proportion. As a result the most lasting of all architectural conventions ...
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Dost Mohammed
Kabul is taken in 1818 by an Afghan tribe, the Barakzai, led on this occasion by Dost Mohammed - the twentieth but the most forceful of the twenty-one sons of the tribal chieftain. Civil war against supporters of the Durrani continues for several years, until in 1826 the country is safely divided between Dost Mohammed and some of his brothers.Dost Mohammed receives the greatest share, in a stretch from Ghazni to Jalalabad which includes Kabul. He soon becomes accepted as the leader of the nation, ...
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Salisbury, Chamberlain and empire
The imperial conference held at the time of the queen's Diamond Jubilee, in 1897, is a much more weighty affair than its predecessor ten years earlier. This time the prime ministers of the colonies have made the long journey to attend the festivities in person. And the colonial secretary, Joseph Chamberlain (appointed to this office in 1895), is a man with a passionate commitment to strengthening the commercial and political ties between the increasingly self-governing colonies.His prime minister, Lord Salisbury, is a less ardent imperialist. ...
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The sculptures of Chartres
The earliest porch of Chartres cathedral - the triple entrance in the west façade - introduces Gothic sculpture in its most extreme form. Each of the biblical kings and queens stands on a tiny platform projecting from a tall, thin pillar. To suit their circumstance, their bodies are impossibly elongated within the tumbling pleats of their full-length robes. Yet their faces, by contrast, are realistic and benign. The result is an effect of ethereal calm, entirely in keeping with Gothic architecture. One of the Chartres ...
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Mosaic in the Roman empire
Mosaic spreads through the Hellenistic world, and is brought by Greek craftsmen to Italy - as revealed in the amazing examples from Pompeii (for example, the dramatic image of Alexander and Darius in battle). The Romans carry the art further afield. Soon, throughout the empire, rich villas have impressive mosaic floors. They are often laid by local craftsmen (invariably the tesserae are from materials of the surrounding district). Many of the views are charming scenes of life in and around a villa. The images are ...
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Strike and Slump
The government temporarily defuses the issue with a subsidy to keep up the level of wages, but this is due to end on 30 April 1926. A few days before this deadline the mine owners offer their final terms, which are so unacceptable to the miners that they interpret them as a lock-out.With the miners staying at home on May 1 the government declares a state of emergency. The TUC (Trades Union Congress) responds by calling a general strike, to start at midnight on May ...
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Longships
A swift design of boat powered by oars is developed in northwest Europe, from the 5th century onwards, when the Germanic tribes begin raiding by sea. It is best known, in a later form, as the Viking longship. This type of boat features already in the 7th century in the Sutton Hoo ship burial. The shape of the Sutton Hoo ship is known only from the traces left by its timbers in the earth, but a smaller boat of similar kind was found at Nydam ...
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The roots of Chinese culture
Most of the elaborate bronze vessels made in Shang times are for use in temples or shrines to ancestors. The richly decorated urns are for cooking the meat of the sacrificed animals. The most characteristic design is the li, with its curved base extended into three hollow protuberances - enabling maximum heat to reach the sacrificial stew. The bronze jugs, often fantastically shaped into weird animals and birds, are for pouring a liquid offering to the ancestor - usually a hot alcoholic concoction brewed from ...
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Michelangelo the sculptor
Early in 1499 a sculpture of the Virgin Mary, holding on her lap the dead Christ, is placed in one of the chapels of old St Peter's in Rome. This Pietà is still one of the most beautiful works of art in the mighty new St Peter's, completed a century later. It is by a sculptor who has just turned twenty-four - Michelangelo.The precocious genius receives a commission two years later in his home city of Florence. The authorities want a marble statue of David. ...
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Wives of Henry VIII
Less than three weeks after the annulment of the marriage to Anne of Cleves, and on the very day when Thomas Cromwell is executed, Henry marries one of Anne's ladies-in-waiting - the 19-year-old Catherine Howard. For a year Henry is enchanted with his young bride. Then he discovers that she has had affairs both before and during her marriage. She is beheaded in 1542. Finally, in 1543, he marries his third Catherine. Already twice widowed herself, and now aged thirty-one, Catherine Parr is an intelligent ...
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A year of high drama AD 1066
Edward the Confessor dies on January 5. He is buried the next day in his new abbey church at Westminster, which has been consecrated only the previous week. On the same day as the funeral there is a coronation, almost certainly carried out in the abbey. Harold, earl of Wessex, named as his successor by the dying Edward, is now king. His reign will last ten months. And it will include a strange omen - a bright long-haired star moving through the sky. The succession ...
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Moghul domes
Aurangzeb, Shah Jahan's son, does not inherit his father's passionate interest in architecture. But he commissions two admirable buildings in the same tradition. One is the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore, begun in 1673; even larger than his father's Friday Mosque in Delhi, it rivals it in the beauty of its domes. The other, begun in 1662, goes to the other extreme; the tiny Pearl Mosque in the Red Fort in Delhi, begun in 1662 for Aurangzeb's private worship, is a small miracle of white marble. ...
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