title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: More recently Dario Sabbatucci has given a different interpretation of the meaning of "Stator" within the frame of his structuralistic and dialectic vision of Roman calendar, identifying oppositions, tensions and equilibria: January is the month of Janus, at the beginning of the year, in the uncertain time of winter (the most ancient calendar had only ten months, from March to December). In this month Janus deifies kingship and defies Jupiter. Moreover, January sees also the presence of Veiovis who appears as an anti-Jupiter, of Carmenta who is the goddess of birth and like Janus has two opposed faces, "Prorsa" and "Postvorta" (also named Antevorta and Porrima), of Iuturna, who as a gushing spring evokes the process of coming into being from non-being as the god of passage and change does. In this period the preeminence of Janus needs compensating on the Ides through the action of Jupiter "Stator", who plays the role of anti-Janus, i.e. of moderator of the action of Janus.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Some epithets of Jupiter indicate his association with a particular place. Epithets found in the provinces of the Roman Empire may identify Jupiter with a local deity or site (see syncretism).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In addition, many of the epithets of Zeus can be found applied to Jupiter, by "interpretatio romana". Thus, since the hero Trophonius (from Lebadea in Boeotia) is called Zeus Trophonius, this can be represented in English (as it would be in Latin) as Jupiter Trophonius. Similarly, the Greek cult of Zeus Meilichios appears in Pompeii as Jupiter Meilichius. Except in representing actual cults in Italy, this is largely 19th-century usage; modern works distinguish Jupiter from Zeus.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Marcus Terentius Varro and Verrius Flaccus were the main sources on the theology of Jupiter and archaic Roman religion in general. Varro was acquainted with the "libri pontificum" ("books of the Pontiffs") and their archaic classifications. On these two sources depend other ancient authorities, such as Ovid, Servius, Aulus Gellius, Macrobius, patristic texts, Dionysius of Halicarnassus and Plutarch.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: One of the most important sources which preserve the theology of Jupiter and other Roman deities is "The City of God against the Pagans" by Augustine of Hippo. Augustine's criticism of traditional Roman religion is based on Varro's lost work, "Antiquitates Rerum Divinarum". Although a work of Christian apologetics, "The City of God" provides glimpses into Varro's theological system and authentic Roman theological lore in general. According to Augustine, Varro drew on the pontiff Mucius Scaevola's tripartite theology:


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Georg Wissowa stressed Jupiter's uniqueness as the only case among Indo-European religions in which the original god preserved his name, his identity and his prerogatives. In this view, Jupiter is the god of heaven and retains his identification with the sky among the Latin poets (his name is used as a synonym for "sky".) In this respect, he differs from his Greek equivalent Zeus (who is considered a personal god, warden and dispenser of skylight). His name reflects this idea; it is a derivative of the Indo-European word for "bright, shining sky". His residence is found atop the hills of Rome and of mountains in general; as a result, his cult is present in Rome and throughout Italy at upper elevations. Jupiter assumed atmospheric qualities; he is the wielder of lightning and the master of weather. However, Wissowa acknowledges that Jupiter is not merely a naturalistic, heavenly, supreme deity; he is in continual communication with man by means of thunder, lightning and the flight of birds (his auspices). Through his vigilant watch he is also the guardian of public oaths and compacts and the guarantor of good faith in the State cult. The Jovian cult was common to the Italic people under the names "Iove", "Diove" (Latin) and "Iuve", "Diuve" (Oscan, in Umbrian only "Iuve", "Iupater" in the Iguvine Tables).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Wissowa considered Jupiter also a god of war and agriculture, in addition to his political role as guarantor of good faith (public and private) as "Iuppiter Lapis" and "Dius Fidius", respectively. His view is grounded in the sphere of action of the god (who intervenes in battle and influences the harvest through weather).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In Georges Dumézil's view, Jovian theology (and that of the equivalent gods in other Indo-European religions) is an evolution from a naturalistic, supreme, celestial god identified with heaven to a sovereign god, a wielder of lightning bolts, master and protector of the community (in other words, of a change from a naturalistic approach to the world of the divine to a socio-political approach).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In Vedic religion, Dyaus Pitar remained confined to his distant, removed, passive role and the place of sovereign god was occupied by Varuna and Mitra. In Greek and Roman religion, instead, the homonymous gods "*Diou-" and "Διϝ-" evolved into atmospheric deities; by their mastery of thunder and lightning, they expressed themselves and made their will known to the community. In Rome, Jupiter also sent signs to the leaders of the state in the form of auspices in addition to thunder. The art of augury was considered prestigious by ancient Romans; by sending his signs, Jupiter (the sovereign of heaven) communicates his advice to his terrestrial colleague: the king ("rex") or his successor magistrates. The encounter between the heavenly and political, legal aspects of the deity are well represented by the prerogatives, privileges, functions and taboos proper to his "flamen" (the "flamen Dialis" and his wife, the "flaminica Dialis").


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Dumézil maintains that Jupiter is not himself a god of war and agriculture, although his actions and interest may extend to these spheres of human endeavour. His view is based on the methodological assumption that the chief criterion for studying a god's nature is not to consider his field of action, but the quality, method and features of his action. Consequently, the analysis of the type of action performed by Jupiter in the domains in which he operates indicates that Jupiter is a sovereign god who may act in the field of politics (as well as agriculture and war) in his capacity as such, i.e. in a way and with the features proper to a king. Sovereignty is expressed through the two aspects of absolute, magic power (epitomised and represented by the Vedic god Varuna) and lawful right (by the Vedic god Mitra). However, sovereignty permits action in every field; otherwise, it would lose its essential quality. As a further proof, Dumézil cites the story of Tullus Hostilius (the most belligerent of the Roman kings), who was killed by Jupiter with a lightning bolt (indicating that he did not enjoy the god's favour).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Varro's definition of Jupiter as the god who has under his jurisdiction the full expression of every being ("penes Iovem sunt summa") reflects the sovereign nature of the god, as opposed to the jurisdiction of Janus (god of passages and change) on their beginning ("penes Ianum sunt prima").


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The Capitoline Triad was introduced to Rome by the Tarquins. Dumézil thinks it might have been an Etruscan (or local) creation based on Vitruvius' treatise on architecture, in which the three deities are associated as the most important. It is possible that the Etruscans paid particular attention to Menrva (Minerva) as a goddess of destiny, in addition to the royal couple Uni (Juno) and Tinia (Jupiter). In Rome, Minerva later assumed a military aspect under the influence of Athena Pallas (Polias). Dumézil argues that with the advent of the Republic, Jupiter became the only king of Rome, no longer merely the first of the great gods.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The Archaic Triad is a hypothetical theological structure (or system) consisting of the gods Jupiter, Mars and Quirinus. It was first described by Wissowa, and the concept was developed further by Dumézil. The three-function hypothesis of Indo-European society advanced by Dumézil holds that in prehistory, society was divided into three classes:


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: At least for the three main functions, people in each station in life had their religious counterparts the divine figures of the sovereign god, the warrior god, and the industrius god; there were almost always two separate gods for class 1, and sometimes more than one for class 3. Over time gods or, groups of gods might be consolidated or split, and it is unclear that there were ever any strict separations of all function.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The sovereign function (1) embodied in Jupiter entailed omnipotence; thence, a domain extended over every aspect of nature and life.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The three functions are interrelated with one another, overlapping to some extent; the sovereign function, although including a part that is essentially religious in nature, is involved in many ways in areas pertaining to the other two. Therefore, Jupiter is the "magic player" in the founding of the Roman state and the fields of war, agricultural plenty, human fertility, and wealth.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Apart from being protectress of the arts and craft as Minerva Capta, who was brought from Falerii, Minerva's association to Jupiter and relevance to Roman state religion is mainly linked to the Palladium, a wooden statue of Athena that could move the eyes and wave the spear. It was stored in the "penus interior", inner penus of the "aedes Vestae", temple of Vesta and considered the most important among the "pignora imperii", pawns of dominion, empire. In Roman traditional lore it was brought from Troy by Aeneas. Scholars though think it was last taken to Rome in the third or second century BC.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The divine couple received from Greece its matrimonial implications, thence bestowing on Juno the role of tutelary goddess of marriage ("Iuno Pronuba").


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The couple itself though cannot be reduced to a Greek apport. The association of Juno and Jupiter is of the most ancient Latin theology. Praeneste offers a glimpse into original Latin mythology: the local goddess Fortuna is represented as milking two infants, one male and one female, namely Jove (Jupiter) and Juno. It seems fairly safe to assume that from the earliest times they were identified by their own proper names and since they got them they were never changed through the course of history: they were called Jupiter and Juno. These gods were the most ancient deities of every Latin town. Praeneste preserved divine filiation and infancy as the sovereign god and his paredra Juno have a mother who is the primordial goddess Fortuna Primigenia. Many terracotta statuettes have been discovered which represent a woman with a child: one of them represents exactly the scene described by Cicero of a woman with two children of different sex who touch her breast. Two of the votive inscriptions to Fortuna associate her and Jupiter: " Fortunae Iovi puero..." and "Fortunae Iovis puero..."


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In 1882 though R. Mowat published an inscription in which Fortuna is called "daughter of Jupiter", raising new questions and opening new perspectives in the theology of Latin gods. Dumezil has elaborated an interpretative theory according to which this "aporia" would be an intrinsic, fundamental feature of Indoeuropean deities of the primordial and sovereign level, as it finds a parallel in Vedic religion. The contradiction would put Fortuna both at the origin of time and into its ensuing diachronic process: it is the comparison offered by Vedic deity Aditi, the "Not-Bound" or "Enemy of Bondage", that shows that there is no question of choosing one of the two apparent options: as the mother of the Aditya she has the same type of relationship with one of his sons, Dakṣa, the minor sovereign. who represents the "Creative Energy", being at the same time his mother and daughter, as is true for the whole group of sovereign gods to which she belongs. Moreover, Aditi is thus one of the heirs (along with Savitr) of the opening god of the Indoiranians, as she is represented with her head on her two sides, with the two faces looking opposite directions. The mother of the sovereign gods has thence two solidal but distinct modalities of duplicity, i.e. of having two foreheads and a double position in the genealogy. Angelo Brelich has interpreted this theology as the basic opposition between the primordial absence of order (chaos) and the organisation of the cosmos.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The relation of Jupiter to Janus is problematic. Varro defines Jupiter as the god who has "potestas" (power) over the forces by which anything happens in the world. Janus, however, has the privilege of being invoked first in rites, since in his power are the beginnings of things ("prima"), the appearance of Jupiter included.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The Latins considered Saturn the predecessor of Jupiter. Saturn reigned in Latium during a mythical Golden Age reenacted every year at the festival of Saturnalia. Saturn also retained primacy in matters of agriculture and money. Unlike the Greek tradition of Cronus and Zeus, the usurpation of Saturn as king of the gods by Jupiter was not viewed by the Latins as violent or hostile; Saturn continued to be revered in his temple at the foot of the Capitol Hill, which maintained the alternative name "Saturnius" into the time of Varro.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: A. Pasqualini has argued that Saturn was related to "Iuppiter Latiaris", the old Jupiter of the Latins, as the original figure of this Jupiter was superseded on the Alban Mount, whereas it preserved its gruesome character in the ceremony held at the sanctuary of the Latiar Hill in Rome which involved a human sacrifice and the aspersion of the statue of the god with the blood of the victim.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The abstract personification Fides ("Faith, Trust") was one of the oldest gods associated with Jupiter. As guarantor of public faith, Fides had her temple on the Capitol (near that of Capitoline Jupiter).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: "Dius Fidius" is considered a theonym for Jupiter, and sometimes a separate entity also known in Rome as Semo Sancus Dius Fidius. Wissowa argued that while Jupiter is the god of the "Fides Publica Populi Romani" as "Iuppiter Lapis" (by whom important oaths are sworn), Dius Fidius is a deity established for everyday use and was charged with the protection of good faith in private affairs. Dius Fidius would thus correspond to "Zeus Pistios". The association with Jupiter may be a matter of divine relation; some scholars see him as a form of Hercules. Both Jupiter and Dius Fidius were wardens of oaths and wielders of lightning bolts; both required an opening in the roof of their temples.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The functionality of Sancus occurs consistently within the sphere of "fides", oaths and respect for contracts and of the divine-sanction guarantee against their breach. Wissowa suggested that Semo Sancus is the "genius" of Jupiter, but the concept of a deity's "genius" is a development of the Imperial period.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Some aspects of the oath-ritual for Dius Fidius (such as proceedings under the open sky or in the "compluvium" of private residences), and the fact the temple of Sancus had no roof, suggest that the oath sworn by Dius Fidius predated that for "Iuppiter Lapis" or "Iuppiter Feretrius".


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Augustine quotes Varro who explains the "genius" as "the god who is in charge and has the power to generate everything" and "the rational spirit of all (therefore, everyone has their own)". Augustine concludes that Jupiter should be considered the "genius" of the universe.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: G. Wissowa advanced the hypothesis that Semo Sancus is the genius of Jupiter. W. W. Fowler has cautioned that this interpretation looks to be an anachronism and it would only be acceptable to say that Sancus is a "Genius Iovius", as it appears from the Iguvine Tables.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Censorinus cites Granius Flaccus as saying that "the Genius was the same entity as the Lar" in his lost work "De Indigitamentis". probably referring to the "Lar Familiaris". Mutunus Tutunus had his shrine at the foot of the Velian Hill near those of the Di Penates and of Vica Pota, who were among the most ancient gods of the Roman community of according to Wissowa.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Dumézil opines that the attribution of a Genius to the gods should be earlier than its first attestation of 58 BC, in an inscription which mentions the "Iovis Genius".


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: A connection between Genius and Jupiter seems apparent in Plautus' comedy "Amphitryon", in which Jupiter takes up the looks of Alcmena's husband in order to seduce her: J. Hubeaux sees there a reflection of the story that Scipio Africanus' mother conceived him with a snake that was in fact Jupiter transformed. Scipio himself claimed that only he would rise to the mansion of the gods through the widest gate.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Among the Etruscan "Penates" there is a "Genius Iovialis" who comes after "Fortuna" and "Ceres" and before "Pales". Genius Iovialis is one of the "Penates" of the humans and not of Jupiter though, as these were located in region I of Martianus Capella' s division of Heaven, while Genius appears in regions V and VI along with Ceres, Favor (possibly a Roman approximation to an Etruscan male manifestation of Fortuna) and Pales. This is in accord with the definition of the Penates of man being Fortuna, Ceres, Pales and Genius Iovialis and the statement in Macrobius that the Larentalia were dedicated to Jupiter as the god whence the souls of men come from and to whom they return after death.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The god of nighttime lightning has been interpreted as an aspect of Jupiter, either a chthonic manifestation of the god or a separate god of the underworld. A statue of Summanus stood on the roof of the Temple of Capitoline Jupiter, and "Iuppiter Summanus" is one of the epithets of Jupiter. Dumézil sees the opposition Dius Fidius versus Summanus as complementary, interpreting it as typical to the inherent ambiguity of the sovereign god exemplified by that of Mitra and Varuna in Vedic religion. The complementarity of the epithets is shown in inscriptions found on "puteal"s or "bidental"s reciting either "fulgur Dium conditum" or "fulgur Summanum conditum" in places struck by daytime versus nighttime lightning bolts respectively. This is also consistent with the etymology of "Summanus", deriving from "sub" and "mane" (the time before morning).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: "Iuppiter" was associated with Liber through his epithet of "Liber" (association not yet been fully explained by scholars, due to the scarcity of early documentation).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In the past, it was maintained that Liber was only a progressively-detached hypostasis of Jupiter; consequently, the vintage festivals were to be attributed only to "Iuppiter Liber". Such a hypothesis was rejected as groundless by Wissowa, although he was a supporter of Liber's Jovian origin. Olivier de Cazanove contends that it is difficult to admit that Liber (who is present in the oldest calendars—those of Numa—in the "Liberalia" and in the month of "Liber" at Lavinium) was derived from another deity. Such a derivation would find support only in epigraphic documents, primarily from the Osco-Sabellic area. Wissowa sets the position of "Iuppiter Liber" within the framework of an agrarian Jupiter. The god also had a temple in this name on the Aventine in Rome, which was restored by Augustus and dedicated on September 1. Here, the god was sometimes named "Liber" and sometimes "Libertas". Wissowa opines that the relationship existed in the concept of creative abundance through which the supposedly-separate Liber might have been connected to the Greek god Dionysos, although both deities might not have been originally related to viticulture.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Other scholars assert that there was no Liber (other than a god of wine) within historical memory. O. de Cazanove argues that the domain of the sovereign god Jupiter was that of sacred, sacrificial wine ("vinum inferium"), while that of Liber and Libera was confined to secular wine ("vinum spurcum"); these two types were obtained through differing fermentation processes. The offer of wine to Liber was made possible by naming the "mustum" (grape juice) stored in amphoras "sacrima".


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Sacred wine was obtained by the natural fermentation of juice of grapes free from flaws of any type, religious (e. g. those struck by lightning, brought into contact with corpses or wounded people or coming from an unfertilised grapeyard) or secular (by "cutting" it with old wine). Secular (or "profane") wine was obtained through several types of manipulation (e.g. by adding honey, or "mulsum"; using raisins, or "passum"; by boiling, or "defrutum"). However, the "sacrima" used for the offering to the two gods for the preservation of grapeyards, vessels and wine was obtained only by pouring the juice into amphors after pressing. The "mustum" was considered "spurcum" (dirty), and thus unusable in sacrifices. The amphor (itself not an item of sacrifice) permitted presentation of its content on a table or could be added to a sacrifice; this happened at the "auspicatio vindamiae" for the first grape and for ears of corn of the "praemetium" on a dish ("lanx") at the


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Dumézil, on the other hand, sees the relationship between Jupiter and Liber as grounded in the social and political relevance of the two gods (who were both considered patrons of freedom). The "Liberalia" of March were, since earliest times, the occasion for the ceremony of the donning of the "toga virilis" or "libera" (which marked the passage into adult citizenship by young people). Augustine relates that these festivals had a particularly obscene character: a "phallus" was taken to the fields on a cart, and then back in triumph to town. In Lavinium they lasted a month, during which the population enjoyed bawdy jokes. The most honest "matronae" were supposed to publicly crown the "phallus" with flowers, to ensure a good harvest and repeal the "fascinatio" (evil eye). In Rome representations of the sex organs were placed in the temple of the couple "Liber Libera", who presided over the male and female components of generation and the "liberation" of the semen. This complex of rites and beliefs shows that the divine couple's jurisdiction extended over fertility in general, not only that of grapes. The etymology of "Liber" (archaic form "Loifer, Loifir") was explained by Émile Benveniste as formed on the IE theme *leudh- plus the suffix -es-; its original meaning is "the one of germination, he who ensures the sprouting of crops".


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The relationship of Jupiter with freedom was a common belief among the Roman people, as demonstrated by the dedication of the "Mons Sacer" to the god after the first secession of the "plebs". Later inscriptions also show the unabated popular belief in Jupiter as bestower of freedom in the imperial era.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Scholars have been often puzzled by Ve(d)iove (or Veiovis, or Vedius) and unwilling to discuss his identity, claiming our knowledge of this god is insufficient. Most, however, agree that Veiove is a sort of special Jupiter or anti-Iove, or even an underworld Jupiter. In other words, Veiove is indeed the Capitoline god himself, who takes up a different, diminished appearance ("iuvenis" and "parvus", young and gracile), in order to be able to discharge sovereign functions over places, times and spheres that by their own nature are excluded from the direct control of Jupiter as Optimus Maximus. This conclusion is based on information provided by Gellius, who states his name is formed by adding prefix "ve" (here denoting "deprivation" or "negation") to "Iove " (whose name Gellius posits as rooted in the verb "iuvo" "I benefit"). D. Sabbatucci has stressed the feature of bearer of instability and antithesis to cosmic order of the god, who threatens the kingly power of Jupiter as "Stator" and "Centumpeda" and whose presence occurs side by side to Janus' on January 1, but also his function of helper to the growth of the young Jupiter. In 1858 Ludwig Preller suggested that Veiovis may be the sinister double of Jupiter.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In fact, the god (under the name "Vetis") is placed in the last case (number 16) of the outer rim of the Piacenza Liver—before "Cilens" (Nocturnus), who ends (or begins in the Etruscan vision) the disposition of the gods. In Martianus Capella's division of heaven, he is found in region XV with the "dii publici"; as such, he numbers among the infernal (or antipodal) gods. The location of his two temples in Rome—near those of Jupiter (one on the Capitoline Hill, in the low between the "arx" and the Capitolium, between the two groves where the asylum founded by Romulus stood, the other on the Tiber Island near that of "Iuppiter Iurarius", later also known as temple of Aesculapius)—may be significant in this respect, along with the fact that he is considered the father of Apollo, perhaps because he was depicted carrying arrows. He is also considered to be the unbearded Jupiter. The dates of his festivals support the same conclusion: they fall on January 1, March 7 and May 21, the first date being the recurrence of the Agonalia, dedicated to Janus and celebrated by the king with the sacrifice of a ram. The nature of the sacrifice is debated; Gellius states "capra", a female goat, although some scholars posit a ram. This sacrifice occurred "rito humano", which may mean "with the rite appropriate for human sacrifice". Gellius concludes by stating that this god is one of those who receive sacrifices so as to persuade them to refrain from causing harm.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The arrow is an ambivalent symbol; it was used in the ritual of the devotio (the general who vowed had to stand on an arrow). It is perhaps because of the arrow and of the juvenile looks that Gellius identifies Veiove with Apollo and as a god who must receive worship in order to obtain his abstention from harming men, along with Robigus and Averruncus. The ambivalence in the identity of Veiove is apparent in the fact that while he is present in places and times which may have a negative connotation (such as the "asylum" of Romulus in between the two groves on the Capitol, the Tiberine island along with Faunus and Aesculapius, the kalends of January, the nones of March, and May 21, a statue of his nonetheless stands in the "arx". Moreover, the initial particle "ve-" which the ancient supposed were part of his name is itself ambivalent as it may have both an accrescitive and diminutive value.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Maurice Besnier has remarked that a temple to "Iuppiter" was dedicated by "praetor" Lucius Furius Purpureo before the battle of Cremona against the Celtic Cenomani of Cisalpine Gaul. An inscription found at Brescia in 1888 shows that "Iuppiter Iurarius" was worshipped there and one found on the south tip of Tiber Island in 1854 that there was a cult to the god on the spot too. Besnier speculates that Lucius Furius had evoked the chief god of the enemy and built a temple to him in Rome outside the "pomerium". On January 1, the "Fasti Praenestini" record the festivals of Aesculapius and Vediove on the Island, while in the "Fasti" Ovid speaks of "Jupiter" and his grandson. Livy records that in 192 BC, "duumvir" Q. Marcus Ralla dedicated to Jupiter on the Capitol the two temples promised by L. Furius Purpureo, one of which was that promised during the war against the Gauls. Besnier would accept a correction to Livy's passage (proposed by Jordan) to read "aedes Veiovi" instead of "aedes duae Iovi". Such a correction concerns the temples dedicated on the Capitol: it does not address the question of the dedication of the temple on the Island, which is puzzling, since the place is attested epigraphically as dedicated to the cult of "Iuppiter Iurarius", in the "Fasti Praenestini" of "Vediove" and to Jupiter according to Ovid. The two gods may have been seen as equivalent: "Iuppiter Iurarius" is an awesome and vengeful god, parallel to the Greek "Zeus Orkios", the avenger of perjury.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: A. Pasqualini has argued that Veiovis seems related to "Iuppiter Latiaris", as the original figure of this Jupiter would have been superseded on the Alban Mount, whereas it preserved its gruesome character in the ceremony held on the sanctuary of the Latiar Hill, the southernmost hilltop of the Quirinal in Rome, which involved a human sacrifice. The gens Iulia had gentilician cults at Bovillae where a dedicatory inscription to Vediove has been found in 1826 on an ara. According to Pasqualini it was a deity similar to Vediove, wielder of lightningbolts and chthonic, who was connected to the cult of the founders who first inhabited the Alban Mount and built the sanctuary. Such a cult once superseded on the Mount would have been taken up and preserved by the Iulii, private citizens bound to the "sacra Albana" by their Alban origin.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Victoria was connected to "Iuppiter Victor" in his role as bestower of military victory. Jupiter, as a sovereign god, was considered as having the power to conquer anyone and anything in a supernatural way; his contribution to military victory was different from that of Mars (god of military valour). Victoria appears first on the reverse of coins representing Venus (driving the quadriga of Jupiter, with her head crowned and with a palm in her hand) during the first Punic War. Sometimes, she is represented walking and carrying a trophy.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: A temple was dedicated to the goddess afterwards on the Palatine, testifying to her high station in the Roman mind. When Hieron of Syracuse presented a golden statuette of the goddess to Rome, the Senate had it placed in the temple of Capitoline Jupiter among the greatest (and most sacred) deities.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Although Victoria played a significant role in the religious ideology of the late Republic and the Empire, she is undocumented in earlier times. A function similar to hers may have been played by the little-known Vica Pota.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Juventas and Terminus were the gods who, according to legend, refused to leave their sites on the Capitol when the construction of the temple of Jupiter was undertaken. Therefore, they had to be reserved a "sacellum" within the new temple. Their stubbornness was considered a good omen; it would guarantee youth, stability and safety to Rome on its site. This legend is generally thought by scholars to indicate their strict connection with Jupiter. An inscription found near Ravenna reads "Iuppiter Ter.", indicating that Terminus is an aspect of Jupiter.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Terminus is the god of boundaries (public and private), as he is portrayed in literature. The religious value of the boundary marker is documented by Plutarch, who ascribes to king Numa the construction of temples to Fides and Terminus and the delimitation of Roman territory. Ovid gives a vivid description of the rural rite at a boundary of fields of neighbouring peasants on February 23 (the day of the Terminalia. On that day, Roman pontiffs and magistrates held a ceremony at the sixth mile of the Via Laurentina (ancient border of the Roman "ager", which maintained a religious value).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: This festival, however, marked the end of the year and was linked to time more directly than to space (as attested by Augustine's apologia on the role of Janus with respect to endings). Dario Sabbatucci has emphasised the temporal affiliation of Terminus, a reminder of which is found in the rite of the "regifugium".


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: G. Dumézil, on the other hand, views the function of this god as associated with the legalistic aspect of the sovereign function of Jupiter. Terminus would be the counterpart of the minor Vedic god Bagha, who oversees the just and fair division of goods among citizens.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: Along with "Terminus", " Iuventas" (also known as "Iuventus" and "Iuunta") represents an aspect of Jupiter (as the legend of her refusal to leave the Capitol Hill demonstrates. Her name has the same root as Juno (from "Iuu-", "young, youngster"); the ceremonial litter bearing the sacred goose of Juno Moneta stopped before her "sacellum" on the festival of the goddess. Later, she was identified with the Greek Hebe. The fact that Jupiter is related to the concept of youth is shown by his epithets "Puer", "Iuuentus" and "Ioviste" (interpreted as "the youngest" by some scholars). Dumézil noted the presence of the two minor sovereign deities Bagha and Aryaman beside the Vedic sovereign gods Varuna and Mitra (though more closely associated with Mitra); the couple would be reflected in Rome by "Terminus" and "Iuventas". Aryaman is the god of young soldiers. The function of "Iuventas" is to protect the "iuvenes" (the "novi togati" of the year, who are required to offer a sacrifice to Jupiter on the Capitol) and the Roman soldiers (a function later attributed to Juno). King Servius Tullius, in reforming the Roman social organisation, required that every adolescent offer a coin to the goddess of youth upon entering adulthood.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: In Dumézil's analysis, the function of "Iuventas" (the personification of youth), was to control the entrance of young men into society and protect them until they reach the age of "iuvenes" or "iuniores" (i.e. of serving the state as soldiers).


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: A temple to "Iuventas" was promised in 207 BC by consul Marcus Livius Salinator and dedicated in 191 BC.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The Romans considered the Penates as the gods to whom they owed their own existence. As noted by Wissowa "Penates" is an adjective, meaning "those of or from the "penus"" the innermost part, most hidden recess; Dumézil though refuses Wissowa's interpretation of "penus" as the storeroom of a household. As a nation the Romans honoured the "Penates publici": Dionysius calls them "Trojan gods" as they were absorbed into the Trojan legend. They had a temple in Rome at the foot of the Velian Hill, near the Palatine, in which they were represented as a couple of male youth. They were honoured every year by the new consuls before entering office at Lavinium, because the Romans believed the Penates of that town were identical to their own.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: The concept of "di Penates" is more defined in Etruria: Arnobius (citing a Caesius) states that the Etruscan Penates were named Fortuna, Ceres, Genius Iovialis and Pales; according to Nigidius Figulus, they included those of Jupiter, of Neptune, of the infernal gods and of mortal men. According to Varro the Penates reside in the recesses of Heaven and are called "Consentes" and "Complices" by the Etruscans because they rise and set together, are twelve in number and their names are unknown, six male and six females and are the cousellors and masters of Jupiter. Martianus states they are always in agreement among themselves. While these last gods seem to be the Penates of Jupiter, Jupiter himself along with Juno and Minerva is one of the Penates of man according to some authors.


title: Jupiter (mythology)

text: This complex concept is reflected in Martianus Capella's division of heaven, found in Book I of his "De Nuptiis Mercurii et Philologiae", which places the "Di Consentes Penates" in region I with the "Favores Opertanei"; "Ceres" and "Genius" in region V; "Pales" in region VI; "Favor" and "Genius" (again) in region VII; "Secundanus Pales", "Fortuna" and "Favor Pastor" in region XI. The disposition of these divine entities and their repetition in different locations may be due to the fact that "Penates" belonging to different categories (of Jupiter in region I, earthly or of mortal men in region V) are intended. "Favor(es)" may be the Etruscan masculine equivalent of "Fortuna".


title: Methanol

text: Methanol (also called methyl alcohol and wood spirit, amongst other names) is an organic chemical and the simplest aliphatic alcohol, with the formula CHOH (a methyl group linked to a hydroxyl group, often abbreviated as MeOH). It is a light, volatile, colourless, flammable liquid with a distinctive alcoholic odour similar to that of ethanol (potable alcohol).


title: Methanol

text: A polar solvent, methanol acquired the name wood alcohol because it was once produced chiefly by the destructive distillation of wood. Today, methanol is mainly produced industrially by hydrogenation of carbon monoxide.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol consists of a methyl group linked to a polar hydroxyl group. With more than 20 million tons produced annually, it is used as a precursor to other commodity chemicals, including formaldehyde, acetic acid, methyl tert-butyl ether, methyl benzoate, anisole, peroxyacids, as well as a host of more specialised chemicals.


title: Methanol

text: Small amounts of methanol are present in normal, healthy human individuals. One study found a mean of 4.5 ppm in the exhaled breath of test subjects. The mean endogenous methanol in humans of 0.45 g/d may be metabolized from pectin found in fruit; one kilogram of apple produces up to 1.4 g of pectin (0.6 g of methanol.)


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is also found in abundant quantities in star-forming regions of space and is used in astronomy as a marker for such regions. It is detected through its spectral emission lines.


title: Methanol

text: In 2006, astronomers using the MERLIN array of radio telescopes at Jodrell Bank Observatory discovered a large cloud of methanol in space across. In 2016, astronomers detected methanol in a planet-forming disc around the young star TW Hydrae using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array radio telescope.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is highly flammable. Its vapours are slightly heavier than air, can travel and ignite. Methanol fires should be extinguished with dry chemical, carbon dioxide, water spray or alcohol-resistant foam.


title: Methanol

text: Ingesting as little as of pure methanol can cause permanent blindness by destruction of the optic nerve. is potentially fatal. The median lethal dose is , "i.e.", 1–2 mL/kg body weight of pure methanol. The reference dose for methanol is 0.5 mg/kg in a day. Toxic effects begin hours after ingestion, and antidotes can often prevent permanent damage. Because of its similarities in both appearance and odor to ethanol (the alcohol in beverages), it is difficult to differentiate between the two; such is also the case with denatured alcohol, adulterated liquors or very low quality alcoholic beverages.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is toxic by two mechanisms. First, methanol can be fatal due to effects on the central nervous system, acting as a central nervous system depressant in the same manner as ethanol poisoning. Second, in a process of toxication, it is metabolised to formic acid (which is present as the formate ion) via formaldehyde in a process initiated by the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase in the liver. Methanol is converted to formaldehyde via alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) and formaldehyde is converted to formic acid (formate) via aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH). The conversion to formate via ALDH proceeds completely, with no detectable formaldehyde remaining. Formate is toxic because it inhibits mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase, causing hypoxia at the cellular level, and metabolic acidosis, among a variety of other metabolic disturbances.


title: Methanol

text: Outbreaks of methanol poisoning have occurred primarily due to contamination of drinking alcohol. This is more common in the developing world. In 2013 more than 1700 cases nonetheless occurred in the United States. Those affected are often adult men. Outcomes may be good with early treatment. Toxicity to methanol was described as early as 1856.


title: Methanol

text: Because of its toxic properties, methanol is frequently used as a denaturant additive for ethanol manufactured for industrial uses. This addition of methanol exempts industrial ethanol (commonly known as "denatured alcohol" or "methylated spirit") from liquor excise taxation in the U.S. and other countries.


title: Methanol

text: During the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) found a number of hand sanitizer products being sold that were labeled as containing ethanol but tested positive for methanol contamination. Due to the toxic effects of methanol when absorbed through the skin or ingested, in contrast to the relatively safer ethanol, the FDA ordered recalls of such hand sanitizer products containing methanol, and issued an import alert to stop these products from illegally entering the U.S. market.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is primarily converted to formaldehyde, which is widely used in many areas, especially polymers. The conversion entails oxidation:


title: Methanol

text: Methanol and isobutene are combined to give methyl "tert"-butyl ether (MTBE). MTBE is a major octane booster in gasoline.


title: Methanol

text: Condensation of methanol to produce hydrocarbons and even aromatic systems is the basis of several technologies related to gas to liquids. These include methanol-to-hydrocarbons (MtH), methanol to gasoline (MtG), methanol to olefins (MtO), and methanol to propylene (MtP). These conversions are catalyzed by zeolites as heterogeneous catalysts. The MtG process was once commercialized at Motunui in New Zealand.


title: Methanol

text: The European Fuel Quality Directive allows fuel producers to blend up to 3% methanol, with an equal amount of cosolvent, with gasoline sold in Europe. China uses more than 4.5 billion liters of methanol per year as a transportation fuel in low level blends for conventional vehicles, and high level blends in vehicles designed for methanol fuels. In recent years, however, most modern gasoline-using vehicles can use a variety of alcohol fuels, resulting in similar or higher horsepower, but for a simple change in the vehicle's software settings and possibly a 50 cent seal or tube part.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is the precursor to most simple methylamines, methyl halides, and methyl ethers. Methyl esters are produced from methanol, including the transesterification of fats and production of biodiesel via transesterification.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is a promising energy carrier because, as a liquid, it is easier to store than hydrogen and natural gas. Its energy density is, however, lower than methane, per kg. Its combustion energy density is 15.6 MJ/L (LHV), whereas that of ethanol is 24 and gasoline is 33 MJ/L.


title: Methanol

text: Further advantages for methanol is its ready biodegradability and low environmental toxicity. It does not persist in either aerobic (oxygen-present) or anaerobic (oxygen-absent) environments. The half-life for methanol in groundwater is just one to seven days, while many common gasoline components have half-lives in the hundreds of days (such as benzene at 10–730 days). Since methanol is miscible with water and biodegradable, it is unlikely to accumulate in groundwater, surface water, air or soil.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is occasionally used to fuel internal combustion engines. It burns forming carbon dioxide and water:


title: Methanol

text: Methanol fuel has been proposed for ground transportation. The chief advantage of a methanol economy is that it could be adapted to gasoline internal combustion engines with minimum modification to the engines and to the infrastructure that delivers and stores liquid fuel. Its energy density, however, is less than gasoline, meaning more frequent fill ups would be required. However, it is equivalent to super high-octane gasoline in horsepower, and most modern computer-controlled fuel injection systems can already use it.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is an alternative fuel for ships that helps the shipping industry meet increasingly strict emissions regulations. It significantly reduces emissions of sulphur oxides (SOx), nitrogen oxides (NOx) and particulate matter. Methanol can be used with high efficiency in marine diesel engines after minor modifications using a small amount of pilot fuel (Dual fuel).


title: Methanol

text: In China, methanol fuels industrial boilers, which are used extensively to generate heat and steam for various industrial applications and residential heating. Its use is displacing coal, which is under pressure from increasingly stringent environmental regulations.


title: Methanol

text: Direct-methanol fuel cells are unique in their low temperature, atmospheric pressure operation, which lets them be greatly miniaturized. This, combined with the relatively easy and safe storage and handling of methanol, may open the possibility of fuel cell-powered consumer electronics, such as laptop computers and mobile phones.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is also a widely used fuel in camping and boating stoves. Methanol burns well in an unpressurized burner, so alcohol stoves are often very simple, sometimes little more than a cup to hold fuel. This lack of complexity makes them a favorite of hikers who spend extended time in the wilderness. Similarly, the alcohol can be gelled to reduce risk of leaking or spilling, as with the brand "Sterno".


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is mixed with water and injected into high performance diesel and gasoline engines for an increase of power and a decrease in intake air temperature in a process known as water methanol injection.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is used as a denaturant for ethanol, the product being known as "denatured alcohol" or "methylated spirit". This was commonly used during the U.S. prohibition to discourage consumption of bootlegged liquor, and ended up causing several deaths. These types of practices are now illegal in the U.S., being considered homicide.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is used as a solvent and as an antifreeze in pipelines and windshield washer fluid. Methanol was used as an automobile coolant antifreeze in the early 1900s. As of May 2018, methanol was banned in the EU for use in windscreen washing or defrosting due to its risk of human consumption as a result of 2012 Czech Republic methanol poisonings.


title: Methanol

text: In some wastewater treatment plants, a small amount of methanol is added to wastewater to provide a carbon food source for the denitrifying bacteria, which convert nitrates to nitrogen gas and reduce the nitrification of sensitive aquifers.


title: Methanol

text: Carbon monoxide and hydrogen react over a catalyst to produce methanol. Today, the most widely used catalyst is a mixture of copper and zinc oxides, supported on alumina, as first used by ICI in 1966. At 5–10 MPa (50–100 atm) and , the reaction


title: Methanol

text: is characterized by high selectivity (>99.8%). The production of synthesis gas from methane produces three moles of hydrogen for every mole of carbon monoxide, whereas the synthesis consumes only two moles of hydrogen gas per mole of carbon monoxide. One way of dealing with the excess hydrogen is to inject carbon dioxide into the methanol synthesis reactor, where it, too, reacts to form methanol according to the equation


title: Methanol

text: In terms of mechanism, the process occurs via initial conversion of CO into CO, which is then hydrogenated:


title: Methanol

text: which is the same as listed above. In a process closely related to methanol production from synthesis gas, a feed of hydrogen and CO can be used directly. The main advantage of this process is that captured CO and hydrogen sourced from electrolysis could be used, removing the dependence on fossil fuels.


title: Methanol

text: The catalytic conversion of methane to methanol is effected by enzymes including methane monooxygenases. These enzymes are mixed-function oxygenases, i.e. oxygenation is coupled with production of water and NAD:


title: Methanol

text: Both Fe- and Cu-dependent enzymes have been characterized. Intense but largely fruitless efforts have been undertaken to emulate this reactivity. Methanol is more easily oxidized than is the feedstock methane, so the reactions tend not to be selective. Some strategies exist to circumvent this problem. Examples include Shilov systems and Fe- and Cu containing zeolites. These systems do not necessarily mimic the mechanisms employed by metalloenzymes, but draw some inspiration from them. Active sites can vary substantially from those known in the enzymes. For example, a dinuclear active site is proposed in the sMMO enzyme, whereas a mononuclear iron (alpha-oxygen) is proposed in the Fe-zeolite.


title: Methanol

text: Global emissions of methanol by plants are estimated at between 180 and 250 million tons per year. This is between two and three times larger than man-made industrial production of methanol.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol is available commercially in various purity grades. Commercial methanol is generally classified according to ASTM purity grades A and AA. Both grade A and grade AA purity are 99.85% methanol by weight. Grade "AA" methanol contains trace amounts of ethanol as well.


title: Methanol

text: Methanol for chemical use normally corresponds to Grade AA. In addition to water, typical impurities include acetone and ethanol (which are very difficult to separate by distillation). UV-vis spectroscopy is a convenient method for detecting aromatic impurities. Water content can be determined by the Karl-Fischer titration.


title: Methanol

text: In their embalming process, the ancient Egyptians used a mixture of substances, including methanol, which they obtained from the pyrolysis of wood. Pure methanol, however, was first isolated in 1661 by Robert Boyle, when he produced it via the distillation of buxus (boxwood). It later became known as "pyroxylic spirit". In 1834, the French chemists Jean-Baptiste Dumas and Eugene Peligot determined its elemental composition.


title: Methanol

text: They also introduced the word "methylène" to organic chemistry, forming it from Greek "methy" = "alcoholic liquid" + "hȳlē" = "forest, wood, timber, material". "Methylène" designated a "radical" that was about 14% hydrogen by weight and contained one carbon atom. This would be CH, but at the time carbon was thought to have an atomic weight only six times that of hydrogen, so they gave the formula as CH. They then called wood alcohol (l'esprit de bois) "bihydrate de méthylène" (bihydrate because they thought the formula was CHO = (CH)(HO)). The term "methyl" was derived in about 1840 by back-formation from "methylene", and was then applied to describe "methyl alcohol". This was shortened to "methanol" in 1892 by the International Conference on Chemical Nomenclature. The suffix -yl, which, in organic chemistry, forms names of carbon groups, is from the word "methyl".


title: Methanol

text: French chemist Paul Sabatier presented the first process that could be used to produce methanol synthetically in 1905. This process suggested that carbon dioxide and hydrogen could be reacted to produce methanol. German chemists Alwin Mittasch and Mathias Pier, working for Badische-Anilin & Soda-Fabrik (BASF), developed a means to convert synthesis gas (a mixture of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen) into methanol and received a patent. According to Bozzano and Manenti, BASF's process was first utilized in Leuna, Germany in 1923. Operating conditions consisted of "high" temperatures (between 300 and 400 °C) and pressures (between 250 and 350 atm) with a zinc/chromium oxide catalyst.


title: Methanol

text: US patent 1,569,775 () was applied for on 4 Sep 1924 and issued on 12 January 1926 to BASF; the process used a chromium and manganese oxide catalyst with extremely vigorous conditions: pressures ranging from 50 to 220 atm, and temperatures up to 450 °C. Modern methanol production has been made more efficient through use of catalysts (commonly copper) capable of operating at lower pressures. The modern low pressure methanol (LPM) process was developed by ICI in the late 1960s with the technology patent since long expired.


title: Methanol

text: During World War II, methanol was used as a fuel in several German military rocket designs, under the name M-Stoff, and in a roughly 50/50 mixture with hydrazine, known as C-Stoff.


title: Methanol

text: The use of methanol as a motor fuel received attention during the oil crises of the 1970s. By the mid-1990s, over 20,000 methanol "flexible fuel vehicles" (FFV) capable of operating on methanol or gasoline were introduced in the U.S. In addition, low levels of methanol were blended in gasoline fuels sold in Europe during much of the 1980s and early-1990s. Automakers stopped building methanol FFVs by the late-1990s, switching their attention to ethanol-fueled vehicles. While the methanol FFV program was a technical success, rising methanol pricing in the mid- to late-1990s during a period of slumping gasoline pump prices diminished interest in methanol fuels.


title: Methanol

text: Between the 1960s and 1980s methanol emerged as a precursor to the feedstock chemicals acetic acid and acetic anhydride. These processes include the Monsanto acetic acid synthesis, Cativa process, and Tennessee Eastman acetic anhydride process.


title: Human history

text: Human history, also called world history, is the narrative of humanity's past. It is understood and studied through anthropology, archaeology, genetics, and linguistics. Since the invention of writing, human history has been studied through primary and secondary source documents.


title: Human history

text: Humanity's written history was preceded by its prehistory, beginning with the Paleolithic ("Old Stone Age") era. This was followed by the Neolithic ("New Stone Age") era, which saw the Agricultural Revolution begin in the Middle East around 10,000 BCE. During this period, humans began the systematic husbandry of plants and animals. As agriculture advanced, most humans transitioned from a nomadic to a settled lifestyle as farmers in permanent settlements. The relative security and increased productivity provided by farming allowed communities to expand into increasingly larger units, fostered by advances in transportation.


title: Human history

text: The earliest complex societies appeared in fertile river valleys. As farming developed, grain agriculture became more sophisticated and prompted a division of labour to store food between growing seasons. Labor divisions led to the rise of a leisured upper class and the development of cities, which provided the foundation for civilization. The growing complexity of human societies necessitated systems of accounting and writing. Hinduism developed in the late Bronze Age on the Indian subcontinent, while the Axial Age witnessed the introduction of religions such as Buddhism, Jainism, Taoism, and Zoroastrianism.


title: Human history

text: With civilizations flourishing, ancient history saw the rise and fall of empires. Post-classical history (the "Middle Ages" from about 500 to 1500 CE) witnessed the rise of Christianity, the Islamic Golden Age, and the Renaissance (from around 1300 CE). The 15th century introduction of movable type printing in Europe revolutionized communication and facilitated widespread dissemination of information, hastening the end of the Middle Ages and ushering in the Scientific Revolution. The early modern period lasted from about 1500 to 1800 CE. Events during this period included the Age of Discovery and the Age of Enlightenment. By the 18th century, the accumulation of knowledge and technology had reached a critical mass that brought about the Industrial Revolution and began the late modern period, which started around 1800 CE and continues.


title: Human history

text: The above scheme of historical periodization (dividing history into antiquity, post-classical, early modern, and late modern periods) was developed for, and applies best to, the history of the Old World, particularly Europe and the Mediterranean. Outside this region, including Chinese and Indian civilizations, historical timelines unfolded differently up to the 18th century. By that century, due to extensive international trade and colonization, the histories of most civilizations had become substantially intertwined. Over the last quarter-millennium, the rates of growth of population, agriculture, industry, commerce, scientific knowledge, technology, communications, destructive weapons, and environmental degradation have greatly accelerated.


title: Human history

text: Humans evolved in Africa from other primates. Genetic measurements indicate that the ape lineage which would lead to "Homo sapiens" diverged from the lineage that would lead to chimpanzees and bonobos, the closest living relatives of modern humans, somewhere between 13 million and 5 million years ago. The term hominin denotes human ancestors that lived after the split with chimpanzees and bonobos, including many species and at least two distinct genera: "Australopithecus" and "Homo". Other fossil specimens such as "Paranthropus", "Kenyanthropus", and "Orrorin" may represent additional genera, but paleontologists debate their taxonomic status. The early hominins such as "Australopithecus" had the same brain size as apes but were distinguished from apes by walking on two legs, an adaptation perhaps associated with a shift from forest to savanna habitats. Hominins began to use rudimentary stone tools  million years ago, marking the advent of the Paleolithic era.


title: Human history

text: The genus "Homo" evolved from "Australopithecus". The earliest members of "Homo" share key traits with "Australopithecus", but tend to have larger brains and smaller teeth. The earliest record of "Homo" is the 2.8 million-year-old specimen LD 350-1 from Ethiopia, and the earliest named species is "Homo habilis" which evolved by 2.3 million years ago. "H. erectus" (the African variant is sometimes called "H. ergaster") evolved by 2 million years ago and was the first hominin species to leave Africa and disperse across Eurasia. Perhaps as early as 1.5 million years ago, but certainly by 250,000 years ago, humans began to use fire for heat and cooking.


title: Human history

text: Beginning about 500,000 years ago, "Homo" diversified into many new species of archaic humans such as the Neanderthals in Europe, the Denisovans in Siberia, and the diminutive "H. floresiensis" in Indonesia. Human evolution was not a simple linear or branched progression but involved interbreeding between related species. Genomic research has shown that hybridization between substantially diverged lineages was common in human evolution. DNA evidence suggests that several genes of Neanderthal origin are present among all non-African populations, and Neanderthals and other hominins, such as Denisovans, may have contributed up to 6% of their genome to present-day humans.<ref name="10.1126/science.1209202"></ref>


title: Human history

text: "Homo sapiens" emerged in Africa around 300,000 years ago from a species commonly designated as either "H. heidelbergensis" or "H. rhodesiensis". Humans continued to develop over the succeeding millennia, and by 100,000 years ago were already using jewellery and ochre to adorn the body. By 50,000 years ago they exhibited many characteristic behaviors such as burial of the dead, use of projectile weapons, and seafaring. One of the most important changes (the date of which is unknown) was the development of syntactic language, which dramatically improved humans' ability to communicate. Signs of early artistic expression can be found in the form of cave paintings and sculptures made from ivory, stone, and bone, implying a form of spirituality generally interpreted as animism or shamanism. Paleolithic humans lived as hunter-gatherers and were generally nomadic. They inhabited grasslands or sparsely wooded areas and avoided dense forest cover.


title: Human history

text: The migration of anatomically modern humans out of Africa took place in multiple waves beginning 194,000–177,000 years ago. The dominant view among scholars (Southern Dispersal) is that the early waves of migration died out and all modern non-Africans are descended from a single group that left Africa 70,000–50,000 years ago. "H. sapiens" proceeded to colonize all the continents and larger islands, arriving in Australia 65,000 years ago, Europe 45,000 years ago, and the Americas by 21,000 years ago. These migrations occurred during the most recent Ice Age, when temperate regions of today were extremely inhospitable. Nevertheless, by the end of the Ice Age some 12,000 years ago, humans had colonized nearly all ice-free parts of the globe. Human expansion coincided with both the Quaternary extinction event and the extinction of the Neanderthals. These extinctions were probably caused by climate change, human activity, or a combination of the two.


title: Human history

text: Beginning around 10,000 BCE, the Neolithic Revolution marked the development of agriculture, which fundamentally changed the human lifestyle. Agriculture began independently in different parts of the globe, and included a diverse range of taxa, in at least 11 separate centers of origin. Cereal crop cultivation and animal domestication had occurred in the Middle East by at least 8500 BCE in the form of wheat, barley, sheep, and goats. The Yangtze valley in China domesticated rice around 8000 BCE; the Yellow River valley may have cultivated millet by 7000 BCE. Pigs were the most important domesticated animal in early China. People in Africa's Sahara cultivated sorghum and several other crops between 8000 and 5000 BCE, while other agricultural centers arose in the Ethiopian highlands and the West African rain forests. In the Indus Valley, crops were cultivated by 7000 BCE and cattle were domesticated by 6500 BCE. In the Americas, squash was cultivated by at least 8500 BCE in South America, and domesticated arrowroot appeared in Central America by 7800 BCE. Potatoes were first cultivated in the Andes Mountains of South America, where the llama was also domesticated.


title: Human history

text: There is no scholarly consensus on why the Neolithic Revolution occurred. For example, in some theories agriculture was the result of an increase in population which led people to seek out new food sources, while in others agriculture was the cause of population growth as the food supply improved. Other proposed factors include climate change, resource scarcity, and ideology. The effects of the transition to agriculture are better understood: it created food surpluses that could support people not directly engaged in food production, permitting far denser populations and the creation of the first cities and states.


title: Human history

text: Cities were centres of trade, manufacturing, and political power. Cities established a symbiosis with their surrounding countrysides, absorbing agricultural products and providing, in return, manufactured goods and varying degrees of political control. Early proto-cities appeared at Jericho and Çatalhöyük around 6000 BCE. Pastoral societies based on nomadic animal herding also developed, mostly in dry areas unsuited for plant cultivation such as the Central Asian steppes or the African Sahel. Conflict between nomadic herders and sedentary agriculturalists occurred frequently and became a recurring theme in world history.


title: Human history

text: Metalworking was first used in the creation of copper tools and ornaments around 6400 BCE. Gold and silver soon followed, primarily for use in ornaments. The need for metal ores stimulated trade, as many areas of early human settlement lacked the necessary ores. The first signs of bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, date to around 2500 BCE, but the alloy did not become widely used until much later.


title: Human history

text: Neolithic societies usually worshiped ancestors, sacred places, or anthropomorphic deities. Entities such as the Sun, Moon, Earth, sky, and sea were often deified. The vast complex of Göbekli Tepe in Turkey, dated 9500–8000 BCE, is a spectacular example of a Neolithic religious or civic site. It may have been built by hunter-gatherers rather than a sedentary population. Elaborate mortuary practices developed in the Levant during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B, in which certain high-status individuals were buried under the floors of houses and the graves were later re-opened for the skulls to be removed. Some of the skulls were then covered in plaster, painted, and displayed in public.


title: Human history

text: These societies developed a number of unifying characteristics, including a central government, a complex economy and social structure, systems for keeping records, and distinct cultures and religions. These cultures variously invented the wheel, mathematics, bronze-working, sailing boats, the potter's wheel, woven cloth, construction of monumental buildings, and writing. Polytheistic religions developed, centered on temples where priests and priestesses performed sacrificial rites.


title: Human history

text: Writing facilitated the administration of cities, the expression of ideas, and the preservation of information. Scholars recognize that writing may have independently developed in at least four ancient civilizations: Mesopotamia (3300 BCE), Egypt (around 3250 BCE), China (1200 BCE), and lowland Mesoamerica (by 650 BCE). Among the earliest surviving written religious scriptures are the Egyptian "Pyramid Texts", the oldest of which date to between 2400 and 2300 BCE.


title: Human history

text: Sumer, located in Mesopotamia, is the first known complex civilization, having developed the first city-states in the 4th millennium BCE. It was these cities that produced the earliest known form of writing, cuneiform script. Cuneiform writing began as a system of pictographs, whose pictorial representations eventually became simplified and more abstract. Cuneiform texts were written by using a blunt reed as a stylus to draw symbols upon clay tablets.


title: Human history

text: Transport was facilitated by waterways—by rivers and seas. The Mediterranean Sea, at the juncture of three continents, fostered the projection of military power and the exchange of goods, ideas, and inventions. This era also saw new land technologies, such as horse-based cavalry and chariots, that allowed armies to move faster. Trade increasingly became a source of power as states with access to important resources or controlling important trade routes rose to dominance.


title: Human history

text: The growth of cities was often followed by the establishment of states and empires. In Mesopotamia, there prevailed a pattern of independent warring city-states and of a loose hegemony shifting from one city to another. In Egypt, by contrast, the initial division into Upper and Lower Egypt was followed by unification of all the valley around 3100 BCE. In Crete, the Minoan civilization had entered the Bronze Age by 2700 BCE and is regarded as the first civilization in Europe. Around 2600 BCE, the Indus Valley civilization built major cities at Harappa and Mohenjo-daro and developed a writing system of over 400 symbols, which remains undeciphered. China entered the Bronze Age by 2000 BCE. The Shang dynasty (1766–1045 BCE) was the first to use writing, inscribing the results of divination ceremonies on oracle bones – ox shoulder blades and turtle shells.


title: Human history

text: Over the following millennia, civilizations developed across the world. By 1600 BCE, Mycenaean Greece began to develop. It flourished until the Late Bronze Age collapse that affected many Mediterranean civilizations between 1300 and 1000 BCE. In India, this era was the Vedic period (1750–600 BCE), which laid the foundations of Hinduism and other cultural aspects of early Indian society, and ended in the 6th century BCE. The Vedas contain the earliest references to India's caste system, which divided society into four hereditary classes: priests, warriors, farmers and traders, and laborers. From around 550 BCE, many independent kingdoms and republics known as the Mahajanapadas were established across the subcontinent.


title: Human history

text: In Africa, speakers of the Bantu languages began the Bantu expansion across central and southern Africa as early as 3000 BCE. Their expansion and encounters with other groups resulted in the spread of mixed farming and ironworking throughout sub-Saharan Africa, and produced societies such as the Nok culture in modern Nigeria by 500 BCE.


title: Human history

text: In the Americas, the Norte Chico culture emerged in coastal Peru around 3100 BCE. The Norte Chico built public monumental architecture at the city of Caral, dated 2627–1977 BCE. The later Chavín polity is sometimes described as the first Andean state. It centered on the religious site at Chavín de Huantar, a place of pilgrimage and consumption of psychoactive substances. Other important Andean cultures include the Moche, whose ceramics depict many aspects of daily life, and the Nazca, who created animal-shaped designs in the desert called Nazca lines. The Olmecs of Mesoamerica developed by about 1200 BCE and are known for the colossal stone heads that they carved from basalt. They also devised the Mesoamerican calendar that was used by later cultures such as the Maya and at Teotihuacan. Societies in North America were primarily egalitarian hunter-gatherers, supplementing their diet with the plants of the Eastern Agricultural Complex. They came together, seemingly voluntarily, to build earthworks such as Watson Brake (4000 BCE) and Poverty Point (3600 BCE), both in Louisiana.


title: Human history

text: From 800–200 BCE, the "Axial Age" saw the development of a set of transformative philosophical and religious ideas, mostly independently, in many different places. Chinese Confucianism, Indian Buddhism and Jainism, and Jewish monotheism all developed during this period. Persian Zoroastrianism began earlier, perhaps around 1000 BCE, but was institutionalized by the Achaemenid state during the Axial Age. New philosophies took hold in Greece during the 5th century BCE, epitomized by thinkers such as Plato and Aristotle.


title: Human history

text: Axial Age ideas were tremendously important for subsequent intellectual and religious history. Confucianism was one of the three schools of thought that came to dominate Chinese thinking, along with Taoism and Legalism. The Confucian tradition, which would become particularly influential, looked for political morality not to the force of law but to the power and example of tradition. Confucianism would later spread to Korea and Japan. Buddhism reached China during the Han dynasty and spread widely, with 30,000 Buddhist temples in northern China alone by the 7th century CE. Buddhism became the main religion in much of South, Southeast, and East Asia. The Greek philosophical tradition diffused throughout the Mediterranean world and as far as India, starting in the 4th century BCE after the conquests of Alexander the Great of Macedon. The Christian and Muslim religions are both based on the Jewish idea of monotheism.


title: Human history

text: The millennium from 500 BCE to 500 CE saw a series of empires of unprecedented size develop. Well-trained professional armies, unifying ideologies, and advanced bureaucracies created the possibility for emperors to rule over large domains whose populations could attain numbers upwards of tens of millions of subjects.


title: Human history

text: The great empires depended on military annexation of territory and on the formation of defended settlements to become agricultural centres. The relative peace that the empires brought encouraged international trade, most notably the massive trade routes in the Mediterranean, the maritime trade web in the Indian Ocean, and the Silk Road.


title: Human history

text: There were a number of regional empires during this period. The kingdom of the Medes helped to destroy the Assyrian Empire in tandem with the nomadic Scythians and the Babylonians. Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, was sacked by the Medes in 612 BCE. The Median Empire gave way to successive Iranian empires, including the Achaemenid Empire (550–330 BCE), the Parthian Empire (247 BCE–224 CE), and the Sasanian Empire (224–651 CE).


title: Human history

text: Several empires began in modern-day Greece. The Delian League, founded in 477 BCE, and the Athenian Empire (454–404 BCE) were two such examples. Later, Alexander the Great (356–323 BCE), of Macedon, founded an empire extending from present-day Greece to present-day India. The empire divided shortly after his death, but resulted in the spread of Greek culture throughout conquered regions, a process referred to as Hellenization. The Hellenistic period lasted from 323 to 31 BCE.


title: Human history

text: In Asia, the Maurya Empire (322–185 BCE) existed in present-day India; in the 3rd century BCE, most of South Asia was united to the Maurya Empire by Chandragupta Maurya and flourished under Ashoka the Great. From the 4th to 6th centuries, the Gupta dynasty oversaw the period referred to as ancient India's Golden Age. The ensuing stability contributed to heralding in an efflorescence of Hindu and Buddhist culture in the 4th and 5th centuries, as well as major advances in science and mathematics. In southern India, three prominent Dravidian kingdoms emerged: the Cheras, Cholas, and Pandyas.


title: Human history

text: In Europe, the Roman Empire, centered in present-day Italy, began in the 7th century BCE. In the 3rd century BCE, the Roman Republic began expanding its territory through conquest and alliances. By the time of Augustus (63 BCE–14 CE), the first Roman Emperor, Rome had already established dominion over most of the Mediterranean. The empire would continue to grow, controlling much of the land from England to Mesopotamia, reaching its greatest extent under Trajan (died 117 CE).


title: Human history

text: In China, the Qin dynasty (221–206 BCE), the first imperial dynasty of China, was followed by the Han Empire (202 BCE–220 CE). The Han dynasty was comparable in power and influence to the Roman Empire that lay at the other end of the Silk Road. Han China developed advanced cartography, shipbuilding, and navigation. The Chinese invented cast iron, and created finely wrought bronze figurines. As with other empires during the Classical Period, Han China advanced significantly in the areas of government, education, mathematics, astronomy, technology, and many others.


title: Human history

text: In Africa, the Kingdom of Aksum, centred in present-day Ethiopia, established itself by the 1st century CE as a major trading empire, dominating its neighbours in South Arabia and Kush and controlling the Red Sea trade. It minted its own currency and carved enormous monolithic stelae to mark its emperors' graves.


title: Human history

text: Successful regional empires were also established in the Americas, arising from cultures established as early as 2500 BCE. In Mesoamerica, vast pre-Columbian societies were built, the most notable being the Zapotec Empire (700 BCE–1521 CE), and the Maya civilization, which reached its highest state of development during the Mesoamerican classic period (c. 250–900 CE), but continued throughout the post-classic period. The great Mayan city-states slowly rose in number and prominence, and Mayan culture spread throughout the Yucatán and surrounding areas. The Mayans developed a writing system and were the first to use the concept of zero in their mathematics. West of the Maya area, in central Mexico, the city of Teotihuacan grew based on its control of the obsidian trade. Its power peaked around 450 CE, when its 125,000–150,000 inhabitants made it one of the world's largest cities.


title: Human history

text: Technology developed sporadically in the ancient world. There were periods of rapid technological progress, such as the Hellenistic period in the region of the Mediterranean, during which hundreds of technologies were invented. There were also periods of technological decay, as during the Roman Empire's decline and fall and the ensuing early medieval period. Two of the most important innovations were the stirrup (Central Asia, 1st century CE) and paper (China, 1st and 2nd centuries CE), both of which diffused widely throughout the world. The Chinese also learned to make silk and built massive engineering projects such as the Great Wall of China and the Grand Canal. The Romans were also accomplished builders, inventing concrete and perfecting the use of arches in construction.


title: Human history

text: Most ancient societies had slaves. Slavery was particularly prevalent in Athens and Rome, where slaves made up a large proportion of the population and were foundational to the economy.


title: Human history

text: The ancient empires faced common problems associated with maintaining huge armies and supporting a central bureaucracy. These costs fell most heavily on the peasantry, while land-owning magnates increasingly evaded centralized control and its costs. Barbarian pressure on the frontiers hastened internal dissolution. China's Han dynasty fell into civil war in 220 CE, beginning the Three Kingdoms period, while its Roman counterpart became increasingly decentralized and divided about the same time in what is known as the Crisis of the Third Century. The great empires of Eurasia all included large, powerful cities located on temperate and subtropical coastal plains. From the Central Asian steppes, horse-based nomads dominated a large part of the continent. The development of the stirrup and the use of horse archers made the nomads a constant threat to the more settled civilizations.


title: Human history

text: The gradual breakup of the Roman Empire, spanning several centuries after the 2nd century CE, coincided with the spread of Christianity outward from the Middle East. The Western Roman Empire fell under the domination of Germanic tribes in the 5th century, and these polities gradually developed into a number of warring states, all associated in one way or another with the Catholic Church. The remaining part of the Roman Empire, in the eastern Mediterranean, continued as what came to be called the Byzantine Empire. Centuries later, a limited unity would be restored to Western Europe through the establishment in 962 of a revived "Roman Empire", later called the Holy Roman Empire, comprising a number of states in what is now Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Czechia, Belgium, Italy, and parts of France.


title: Human history

text: In China, dynasties would rise and fall, but, by sharp contrast to the Mediterranean-European world, dynastic unity would be restored. After the fall of the Eastern Han dynasty and the demise of the Three Kingdoms, nomadic tribes from the north began to invade in the 4th century, eventually conquering areas of northern China and setting up many small kingdoms. The Sui dynasty successfully reunified the whole of China in 581, and laid the foundations for a Chinese golden age under the Tang dynasty (618–907).


title: Human history

text: The term "post-classical era", though derived from the name of the era of "classical antiquity", takes in a broader geographic sweep. The era is commonly dated from the 5th century fall of the Western Roman Empire, which fragmented into many separate kingdoms, some of which would later be confederated under the Holy Roman Empire. The Byzantine Empire survived until late in the post-classical or medieval period.


title: Human history

text: From the 10th to the 13th centuries, the Medieval Warm Period in the northern hemisphere aided agriculture and led to population growth in parts of Europe and Asia. It was followed by the Little Ice Age, which, along with the plagues of the 14th century, put downward pressure on the population of Eurasia. Some of the major inventions of the period were gunpowder, printing, and the compass, all of which originated in Asia.


title: Human history

text: The post-classical period encompasses the Early Muslim conquests, the subsequent Islamic Golden Age, and the commencement and expansion of the Arab slave trade, followed by the Mongol invasions of the Middle East, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe and the founding around 1280 of the Ottoman Empire. South Asia saw a series of middle kingdoms of India, followed by the establishment of Islamic empires in India.


title: Human history

text: In West Africa, the Mali Empire and the Songhai Empire rose. On the southeast coast of Africa, Arabic ports were established where gold, spices, and other commodities were traded. This allowed Africa to join the Southeast Asia trading system, bringing it contact with Asia; this, along with Muslim culture, resulted in the Swahili culture.


title: Human history

text: China experienced the successive Sui, Tang, Song, Yuan, and early Ming dynasties. Middle Eastern trade routes along the Indian Ocean, and the Silk Road through the Gobi Desert, provided limited economic and cultural contact between Asian and European civilizations.


title: Human history

text: During the same period, civilizations in the Americas, such as the Mississippians, Puebloans, Aztecs, Maya, Muisca, and Inca, reached their zenith.


title: Human history

text: Prior to the advent of Islam in the 7th century, the Middle East was dominated by the Byzantine Empire and the Sasanian Empire that frequently fought each other for control of several disputed regions. This was also a cultural battle, with Byzantine Christian culture competing against Persian Zoroastrian traditions. The birth of Islam created a new contender that quickly surpassed both of these empires. The new religion greatly affected the history of the Old World, especially the Middle East.


title: Human history

text: From their center on the Arabian Peninsula, Muslims began their expansion during the 7th century. By 750 CE, they came to conquer most of the Near East, North Africa, and parts of Europe, ushering in an era of learning, science, and invention known as the Islamic Golden Age. The knowledge and skills of the ancient Near East, Greece, and Persia were preserved in the post-classical era by Muslims, who also added new and important innovations from outside, such as the manufacture of paper from China and decimal positional numbering from India. Islamic civilization expanded both by conquest and on the basis of its merchant economy. Merchants brought goods and their Islamic faith to China, India, Southeast Asia, and Africa.


title: Human history

text: The Crusading movement was a religiously motivated European effort to roll back Muslim territory and regain control of the Holy Land. It was ultimately unsuccessful and served more to weaken the Byzantine Empire, especially with the sack of Constantinople in 1204. Arab domination of the region ended in the mid-11th century with the arrival of the Seljuk Turks, migrating south from the Turkic homelands. In the early 13th century, a new wave of invaders, the Mongol Empire, swept through the region but were eventually eclipsed by the Turks and the founding of the Ottoman Empire in modern-day Turkey around 1280.


title: Human history

text: North Africa saw the rise of polities established by the Berbers, such as the Marinid dynasty in Morocco, the Zayyanid dynasty in Algeria, and the Hafsid dynasty in Tunisia. The coastal region was known to Europeans as the Barbary Coast. Pirates based in North African ports conducted operations that included capturing merchant ships and raiding coastal settlements. Many European captives were sold in North African markets as part of the Barbary slave trade.


title: Human history

text: Starting with the Sui dynasty (581–618), the Chinese began expanding to the west. They were confronted by Turkic nomads, who were becoming the most dominant ethnic group in Central Asia. Originally the relationship was largely cooperative but in 630, the Tang dynasty began an offensive against the Turks by capturing areas of the Ordos Desert. In the 8th century, Islam began to penetrate the region and soon became the sole faith of most of the population, though Buddhism remained strong in the east. The desert nomads of Arabia could militarily match the nomads of the steppe, and the Umayyad Caliphate gained control over parts of Central Asia. The Hephthalites were the most powerful of the nomad groups in the 5th and 6th centuries, and controlled much of the region. From the 9th to 13th centuries, the region was divided among several powerful states, including the Samanid Empire, the Seljuk Empire, and the Khwarazmian Empire. The largest empire to rise out of Central Asia developed when Genghis Khan united the tribes of Mongolia. The Mongol Empire spread to comprise all of Central Asia and China as well as large parts of Russia and the Middle East. After Genghis Khan died in 1227, most of Central Asia continued to be dominated by a successor state, the Chagatai Khanate. In 1370, Timur, a Turkic leader in the Mongol military tradition, conquered most of the region and founded the Timurid Empire. However, Timur's large empire collapsed soon after his death with the Uzbek Khanate becoming the preeminent state in Central Asia.


title: Human history

text: In the aftermath of the Byzantine–Sasanian wars, the Caucasus and its diverse group of peoples gained freedom from foreign suzerainty. As the Byzantines and Sasanians became exhausted due to continuous wars, the Rashidun Caliphate had the opportunity to expand into the Caucasus during the early Muslim conquests. By the 13th century, the arrival of the Mongols led to the region being invaded once again.


title: Human history

text: Since at least the 4th century, Christianity, primarily Catholicism, and later Protestantism, has played a prominent role in the shaping of Western civilization. Europe during the Early Middle Ages was characterized by depopulation, deurbanization, and barbarian invasion, all of which had begun in late antiquity. The barbarian invaders formed their own new kingdoms in the remains of the Western Roman Empire. Although there were substantial changes in society and political structures, most of the new kingdoms incorporated existing Roman institutions. Christianity expanded in Western Europe, and monasteries were founded. In the 7th and 8th centuries, the Franks under the Carolingian dynasty established an empire covering much of Western Europe; it lasted until the 9th century, when it succumbed to pressure from new invaders—the Vikings, Magyars, and Arabs.


title: Human history

text: During the High Middle Ages, which began after 1000, the population of Europe increased as technological and agricultural innovations allowed trade to flourish and crop yields to increase. Manorialism, the organization of peasants into villages that owed rents and labor service to nobles, and feudalism, a political structure whereby knights and lower-status nobles owed military service to their overlords in return for the right to rents from lands and manors, were two of the ways of organizing medieval society that developed during the Middle Ages. Kingdoms became more centralized after the decentralizing effects of the breakup of the Carolingian Empire. In 1054, the Great Schism between the Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church led to the prominent cultural differences between Western and Eastern Europe. The Crusading movement attempted to gain Christian control of the Holy Land from the Muslims and succeeded for long enough to establish some Crusader states in the Levant. Italian merchants imported slaves to work in households or in sugar processing. Intellectual life was marked by scholasticism and the founding of universities, while the building of Gothic cathedrals and churches was one of the outstanding artistic achievements of the age.


title: Human history

text: The Mongols reached Europe in 1236 and conquered Russia, Poland, and Hungary. Lithuania cooperated with the Mongols but remained independent and eventually formed a union with Poland in the late fourteenth century.


title: Human history

text: The Late Middle Ages were marked by difficulties and calamities. Famine, plague, and war devastated the population of Western Europe. The Black Death alone killed approximately 75 to 200 million people between 1347 and 1350. It was one of the deadliest pandemics in human history. Starting in Asia, the disease reached the Mediterranean and Western Europe during the late 1340s, and killed tens of millions of Europeans in six years; between a quarter and a third of the population perished.


title: Human history

text: The Middle Ages witnessed the first sustained urbanization of Northern and Western Europe and it lasted until the beginning of the early modern period in the 16th century, marked by the rise of nation states, the division of Western Christianity in the Reformation, the rise of humanism in the Italian Renaissance, and the beginnings of European overseas expansion.


title: Human history

text: Medieval sub-Saharan Africa was home to many different civilizations. In the Horn of Africa, the Kingdom of Aksum declined in the 7th century. The Zagwe dynasty that later emerged was famed for its rock cut architecture at Lalibela. The Zagwe would then fall to the Solomonic dynasty who claimed descent from the Aksumite emperors and would rule the country well into the 20th century. In the West African Sahel region, many Islamic empires rose, such as the Ghana Empire, Mali Empire, Songhai Empire, and Kanem–Bornu Empire. They controlled the trans-Saharan trade in gold, salt, and slaves. West Africa became the world's largest gold exporter by the 14th century.


title: Human history

text: South of the Sahel, civilizations rose in the coastal forests. These include the Yoruba city of Ifẹ, noted for its art, and the Oyo Empire, the Kingdom of Benin of the Edo people centered in Benin City, the Igbo Kingdom of Nri which produced advanced bronze art at Igbo-Ukwu, and the Akan who are noted for their intricate architecture.


title: Human history

text: Central Africa saw the formation of several states, including the Kingdom of Kongo. In what is now modern Southern Africa, native Africans created various kingdoms such as the Kingdom of Mutapa. They flourished through trade with the Swahili people on the East African coast. They built large defensive stone structures without mortar such as Great Zimbabwe, capital of the Kingdom of Zimbabwe, Khami, capital of Kingdom of Butua, and Danangombe (Dhlo-Dhlo), capital of the Rozvi Empire. The Swahili people themselves were the inhabitants of the East African coast from Kenya to Mozambique who traded extensively with Arabs, who introduced them to Islam. They built many port cities such as Mombasa, Mogadishu, and Kilwa, which were known to Islamic geographers.


title: Human history

text: Seafarers from Southeast Asia colonized Madagascar sometime between the 4th and 9th century, creating what geographer Jared Diamond called "the single most astonishing fact of human geography". To reach Madagascar, the settlers crossed 6,000 miles of ocean in sailing canoes, probably without maps or compasses. A wave of Bantu-speaking migrants from southeastern Africa also arrived in Madagascar around 1000 CE.


title: Human history

text: In northern India, after the fall (550 CE) of the Gupta Empire, the region was divided into a complex and fluid network of smaller kingly states.


title: Human history

text: Early Muslim incursions began in the west in 711 CE, when the Arab Umayyad Caliphate conquered much of present-day Pakistan. Arab military advance was largely halted at that point, but Islam still spread in India, largely due to the influence of Arab merchants along the western coast.


title: Human history

text: The ninth century saw a Tripartite Struggle for control of northern India, among the Pratihara Empire, Pala Empire, and Rashtrakuta Empire. Some of the important states that emerged in India during this time included the Bahmani Sultanate and Vijayanagara Empire.


title: Human history

text: Post-classical dynasties in South India included those of the Chalukyas, Hoysalas, Cholas, Mughals, Marathas, and Mysores. Science, engineering, art, literature, astronomy, and philosophy flourished under the patronage of these kings.


title: Human history

text: After a period of relative disunity, China was reunified by the Sui dynasty in 589 and under the succeeding Tang dynasty (618–907) China entered a Golden Age. The Sui and Tang instituted the long-lasting imperial examination system, under which administrative positions were open only to those who passed an arduous test on Confucian thought and the Chinese classics. The Tang Empire competed with the Tibetan Empire (618–842) for control of areas in Inner and Central Asia. The Tang dynasty eventually splintered, however, and after half a century of turmoil the Song dynasty reunified much of China, when it was, according to William McNeill, the "richest, most skilled, and most populous country on earth". Pressure from nomadic empires to the north became increasingly urgent. By 1127, North China had been lost to the Jurchens in the Jin–Song Wars, and the Mongol Empire conquered all of China in 1279. After about a century of Mongol Yuan dynasty rule, the ethnic Chinese reasserted control with the founding of the Ming dynasty in 1368.


title: Human history

text: In Japan, the imperial lineage had been established by this time, and during the Asuka period (538–710) the Yamato Province developed into a clearly centralized state. Buddhism was introduced, and there was an emphasis on the adoption of elements of Chinese culture and Confucianism. The Nara period of the 8th century was characterized by the appearance of a nascent literary culture, as well as the development of Buddhist-inspired artwork and architecture. The Heian period (794 to 1185) saw the peak of imperial power, followed by the rise of militarized clans, and the beginning of Japanese feudalism. The feudal period of Japanese history, dominated by powerful regional lords (daimyos) and the military rule of warlords (shoguns) such as the Ashikaga shogunate and Tokugawa shogunate, stretched from 1185 to 1868. The emperor remained, but mostly as a figurehead, and the power of merchants was weak.


title: Human history

text: Postclassical Korea saw the end of the Three Kingdoms era, the three kingdoms being Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla. Silla conquered Baekje in 660, and Goguryeo in 668, marking the beginning of the Northern and Southern States period (), with Unified Silla in the south and Balhae, a successor state to Goguryeo, in the north. In 892 CE, this arrangement reverted to the Later Three Kingdoms, with Goguryeo (then called Taebong and eventually named Goryeo) emerging as dominant, unifying the entire peninsula by 936. The founding Goryeo dynasty ruled until 1392, succeeded by the Joseon dynasty, which ruled for approximately 500 years.


title: Human history

text: The beginning of the Middle Ages in Southeast Asia saw the fall (550 CE) of the Kingdom of Funan to the Chenla Empire, which was then replaced by the Khmer Empire (802 CE). The Khmer people's capital city, Angkor, was the largest city in the world prior to the industrial age and contained over a thousand temples, the most famous being Angkor Wat. The Sukhothai (1238 CE) and Ayutthaya (1351 CE) kingdoms were major powers of the Thai people, who were influenced by the Khmer.


title: Human history

text: Starting in the 9th century, the Pagan Kingdom rose to prominence in modern Myanmar. Its collapse brought about political fragmention that ended with the rise of the Toungoo Empire in the 16th century. Other notable kingdoms of the period include the Srivijayan Empire and Lavo Kingdom (both coming into prominence in the 7th century), Champa and Hariphunchai (both about 750), Đại Việt (968), Lan Na (13th century), Majapahit (1293), Lan Xang (1354), and Ava Kingdom (1364).


title: Human history

text: This period saw the spread of Islam to present-day Indonesia (beginning in the 13th century) and the emergence of the Malay states, including Brunei and Malacca. In the Philippines, several polities were formed such as Tondo, Cebu, and Butuan.


title: Human history

text: In Oceania, the Tuʻi Tonga Empire was founded in the 10th century CE and expanded between 1200 and 1500. Tongan culture, language, and hegemony spread widely throughout eastern Melanesia, Micronesia, and central Polynesia during this period, influencing east 'Uvea, Rotuma, Futuna, Samoa, and Niue, as well as specific islands and parts of Micronesia (Kiribati, Pohnpei, and miscellaneous outliers), Vanuatu, and New Caledonia (specifically, the Loyalty Islands, with the main island being predominantly populated by the Melanesian Kanak people and their cultures).


title: Human history

text: In northern Australia, there is evidence that some aboriginal groups regularly traded with Makassarese fishermen from Indonesia before the arrival of Europeans.


title: Human history

text: At around the same time, a powerful thalassocracy appeared in eastern Polynesia, centered around the Society Islands, specifically on the sacred Taputapuatea marae, which drew in eastern Polynesian colonists from places as far away as Hawaii, New Zealand ("Aotearoa"), and the Tuamotu Islands for political, spiritual, and economic reasons, until the unexplained collapse of regular long-distance voyaging in the eastern Pacific a few centuries before Europeans began exploring the area.


title: Human history

text: Indigenous written records from this period are virtually nonexistent, as it seems that all Pacific Islanders, with the possible exception of the Rapa Nui and their currently undeciphered Rongorongo script, had no writing systems of any kind until after their introduction by European colonists. However, some indigenous prehistories can be estimated and academically reconstructed through careful, judicious analysis of native oral traditions, colonial ethnography, archaeology, physical anthropology, and linguistics research.