The author takes readers on a fascinating journey back to A.D. 100, where a bolt of sky blue silk is carried by successive caravans from China to Rome along the ancient Silk Road. The narrators include a brave, young caravan leader from China; a merchant and his preteen son from Turkmenistan; a gifted camel guide from the Middle East; a family of women from Egypt; and citizens in Rome.
This stimulating, uniquely organized, and wonderfully readable comparison of ancient Rome and China offers provocative insights to students and general readers of world history. The book's narrative is clear, completely jargon-free, strikingly independent, and addresses the complete cycles of two world empires. The topics explored include nation formation, state building, empire building, arts of government, strategies of superpowers, and decline and fall.
In this important new book the renowned historian Serge Gruzinski returns to two episodes in the sixteenth century which mark a decisive stage in global history and show how China and Mexico experienced the expansion of Europe. In the early 1520s, Magellan set sail for Asia by the Western route, Cortes seized Mexico and some Portuguese based in Malacca dreamed of colonizing China. The Aztec Eagle was destroyed but the Chinese Dragon held strong and repelled the invaders - after first seizing their cannon. For the first time, people from three continents encountered one other, confronted one other and their lives became entangled. These events were of great interest to contemporaries and many people at the time grasped the magnitude of what was going on around them. The Iberians succeeded in America and failed in China. The New World became inseparable from the Europeans who were to conquer it, while the Celestial Empire became, for a long time to come, an unattainable goal. Gruzinski explores this encounter between civilizations that were different from one another but that already fascinated contemporaries, and he shows that our world today bears the mark of this distant age. For it was in the sixteenth century that human history began to be played out on a global stage. It was then that connections between different parts of the world began to accelerate, not only between Europe and the Americas but also between Europe and China. This is what is revealed by a global history of the sixteenth century, conceived as another way of reading the Renaissance, less Eurocentric and more in tune with our age.
"Previous scholarship held that the image of China did not penetrate North America until after trade was established between Canton and the East Coast in 1784. In The Dragon and the Eagle, A. Owen Aldridge reveals that a lively curiosity about oriental culture existed before the middle of the eighteenth century, and that a good deal of information about it was available even during the War for Independence." "Aldridge surveys attitudes and opinions about all aspects of Chinese life and culture expressed in American fiction, history, travel accounts, sermons, poetry, essays, correspondence, memoirs, and references in periodicals. He indicates that between 1760 and 1825 several entire books about China were published in America, together with a host of short pieces in newspapers and magazines. By the end of the eighteenth century, practically every idea or element of concrete information about China in print in London or Paris had reappeared in some form or another in the United States." "The history of these initial dealings shows in many ways a clash of contrasting cultures. This book uncovers some extraordinary instances of the relationship: Benjamin Franklin at the age of thirty-two publishing in his Philadelphia newspaper an analysis of the thought of Confucius; Thomas Jefferson including a Chinese novel on a reading list of 200 books for his brother-in-law; Thomas Paine comparing Confucius and Christ as great moral teachers; Philip Freneau composing a poem hailing the first voyage of an American vessel to the Far East; the American Philosophical Society enquiring into the contents of a Chinese book unearthed in the midst of a camp of American Indians in Pennsylvania; and a shocked American sea captain viewing the corpses of Eurasian babies floating down the river in Canton." "Aldridge confines his remarks to literary and intellectual texts before the eighteenth century and emphasizes authors in English who have been previously neglected. A bibliography of American imprints referring to China, 1760 to 1826, appears in the appendix."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved
The Eagle and the Dragon takes the reader on an epic journey of thousands of miles by sea and land across three continents. When Senator Aulus Aemilius Galba is tapped to lead the first Roman mission to China, he anticipates an easy path to fame and fortune. Gaius Lucullus sees a bright military future, but his reluctant centurion Antonius Aristides would rather be somewhere else. Translators Marcia Lucia and her brother Marcus were taken from their village in China to serve the Han court, abused and despised, hiding a horrible secret. A notorious Arab pirate, with a Roman price on his head and crucifixion in his future, shadows the entourage, seeking the wealthy prize of their treasure-laden ships. But Fate has other plans for these unlikely companions, sending them together on a journey that will take them thousands of miles by sea and land across the tapestry of the mysterious worlds at the close of the first century. From the storm-tossed Indian Ocean to the opulent Hanaean court, from the wild grassy steppes north of China to the forbidding peaks of the Pamir Mountains of Bactria, they fight for their lives, hoping to find the road that will lead them back to Rome.
Will the great innovations of the twenty-first century be American or Chinese? Who is winning the innovation race? And what are the implications for the people of other nations? There is a contest for technological supremacy occurring across the Pacific - a contest of historic importance, for its outcome will shape the world during the coming century and the winner will claim not just economic, military, and political ascendancy, but also superiority in their values and system of government. For those who grasp that technological innovation underlies economic strength, this book unravels some of the most important, but least well understood dimensions of American and Chinese competition. In a succinct, informative, and evidence-based manner, it analyzes whether China can match American levels of invention and innovation. Along the way, it draws conclusions for other nations caught between the Eagle and the Dragon - nations like Australia, Japan, and Korea - who are weighing the advantages of strategic alliances and trade links with both great powers. There has never been more a more important time to understand the implications of escalating American and Chinese competition. For those who believe technological innovation underlies economic strength, this book presents the facts in a straightforward but compelling manner.
In 36 BC, Li Bi was the Prefect of Zhangye province in Han Dynasty China. He was called out of a comfortable retirement to join a military expedition against his old enemies the Xiongnu as cavalry commander. He would rather stay home in his new villa and enjoy the carnal pleasures with youngest wife Qingling. His past however beckons him and leaves him no choice. There are Romans in the Xiongnu army and perhaps, old comrades. Meanwhile as he prepares his men he writes a book about another war fought right around the world in Belgica. He traces the adventures of a young Centurion named Livy as he fights for Julius Caesar against the Belgae in 57BC. Livy leads Caesars band of mounted scouts armed with composite bows. The war is brutal but Livys life is complicated by the many exotic and seductive women he meets on the campaign trail. Caesar sends him on ever more dangerous missions but Livys understanding of the art of war sees him trough each encounter with the brave and determined enemy. The campaign climaxes at the River Sabis where Bodougnatus, King of the Nervii and 100,000 blood thirsty barbarians set up an elaborate ambush for the unwary Roman Army. Can Caesars vaunted tactical skills save the Roman Army from annihilation? Will Livys vaunted good luck finally run out? Meanwhile Li Bi rides west to face Chanyu Zhizhi, King of the Western Xiongnu with his newly raised cavalry armed with repeating crossbows. How will his Chinese troops fare against crack Roman infantry?
"The world may know Chris Duffin as 'The Mad Scientist of Strength,' but you wouldn't have ever guessed that if you saw the scrawny kid skinning rattlesnakes and chasing dragonflies in the early '80s. The story of his unconventional life will take you from ... tales of murder, trauma, heartbreak, and survival deep in the Pacific Northwest wilderness all the way to an idealization of the self-made man--still flawed, but never broken"--Dust jacket fla
A relay of courageous adventure-seekers forms caravans to transport precious items including a special blue silk along the Silk Road in the year 100 A.D.
