istoryworld
Pyramids and Temples
It seems impossible to imagine how the vast cross beams and ceiling stones of the Egyptian temples at Karnak and Luxor should have been settled into place without any lifting gear. But the method is the same as for the pyramids, except that a temple is not solid. Each stone slab is edged up an earth ramp and settled into position. This means that the growing temple becomes part of the ramp. When the structure is finally complete, the entire space between and around the ...
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Victoria, Albert and the Great Exhi....
The campaigns of the Chartists and of the Anti-Corn Law League take place during the years immediately after the accession to the throne of the 18-year-old Victoria, who succeeds her uncle William IV in 1837. Her reign of sixty-four years can later be seen as one of the defining periods of British history, matched only by that of another queen - Elizabeth I.Many elements contribute to the powerful brand image known as the 'Victorian age'. Some are economic, connected with Britain's leading role as the ...
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The Old Kingdom
Zoser's funerary example is taken to even more elaborate lengths at Giza by his successors a century later, in the 4th dynasty (c.2575-c.2465 BC). The three great pyramids at Giza are built between about 2550 and 2470 BC for Khufu, his son Khafre (probably also responsible for the sphinx) and his grandson Menkure. This is also the period when the Egyptian practice of mummification begins, aiming to preserve the body for life in the next world. The earliest known example of any part of a ...
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Ancient Anatolia
Anatolia, linking Asia and Europe, has a long and distinguished record as a centre of civilization - from one of the world's first towns (Catal Huyuk), through the successive periods of Hittites and Trojans, Ionians and Lydians, Romans and Byzantines. But the region acquires its present identity and name, as Turkey, more recently - with the arrival of Turkish tribes to confront the Byzantine empire in the 11th century AD.
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Sculpture as a public statement
The Romans develop very skilfully this Greek theme of a narrative frieze, using it particularly - since this is a militaristic society - for the important matter of publicizing Rome's victories. The outstanding example is the continuous strip, nearly 200 metres long, which circles its way up the marble column of Trajan in Rome. Dating from AD 113, it recounts in minute and realistic detail the emperor's successful campaign in Dacia (the region of modern Romania). But the type of sculpture which the Romans make ...
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Savonarola
In 1491 Savonarola becomes prior of the Dominican convent of San Marco in Florence. His powerful sermons, critical of decadence and luxury in both church and state (meaning papal Rome and the princely circle of the Medici) are already familiar in Florence, for he has been in the convent of San Marco on and off since 1482. In spite of his savage voice, Lorenzo the Magnificent encourages this incorruptible man of God. Contrary to rumour, Savonarola blesses Lorenzo on his deathbed in 1492.
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Five weeks to war
This action brings in the fifth of the European powers. Britain's Entente Cordiale does not commit her to come to the defence of France, and many in the German high command expect her not to do so. But the violation of the neutrality of Belgium introduces an element which the Germans have either overlooked or have considered insignificant. Britain was one of the powers guaranteeing (in 1831 and again in 1839), to protect Belgium as 'an independent and perpetually neutral state'.Under this obligation Britain declares ...
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Nadir Shah
Nadir Shah, in a reign of eleven years, devotes himself to conquest with the single-minded determination of Timur, the last great conqueror to sweep through these regions.First, after a long siege in 1736, he recovers Kandahar - the stronghold of the Afghan chieftains who have until recently been in possession of Isfahan. With Afghanistan safely back under imperial control, Nadir Shah is next tempted further east (like Timur before him) into the fabulously wealthy empire of India. The Moghul dynasty, possessing probably a greater number ...
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Cave paintings
Prehistoric cave paintings have been discovered in many parts of the world, from Europe and Africa to Australia. Africa has some of the earliest paintings and rock engravings to have been securely dated. Nearly 30,000 years old, they are discovered in 1969 on the rock face in a cave near Twyfelfontein in Namibia. But the most numerous and the most sophisticated of prehistoric paintings are on the walls of caves in southwest France and northern Spain. About 150 painted caves have been discovered in this ...
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Cranach and Holbein
On this first occasion Holbein stays only two years in England, but he paints a great many portraits during his visit - including the large series of coloured drawings now in Windsor castle. In 1528 he returns to Basel, but he is back in England by 1532. On this second visit, lasting till his death in 1543, he is frequently employed by Henry VIII.The most familiar image of the self-indulgent tyrant is Holbein's sturdy portrait of him. The future Edward VI is familiar too, as ...
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Abu Simbel
When the pharaoh Ramses II decides to create a great monument to himself at the first cataract of the Nile (as if to dominate the defeated southern province of Cush), he conceives the earliest and probably the most impressive of all rock-cut shrines adorned with statuary.At Abu Simbel a sloping sandstone rock rises high above the Nile. Ramses' sculptors and labourers are given the task of hacking into the rock face - to expose first four colossal seated statues of the pharaoh himself (each some ...
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First Continental Congress
Fifty-six delegates from twelve colonies convene in Philadelphia. They are leaders of their own communities (George Washington is here for Virginia). Their voices will carry weight, and the message that they send to Britain is uncompromising. They state that the recent measures passed into law at Westminster violate natural rights (a theme developed two years later in the Declaration of Independence) and that as such they are unconstitutional. They declare their united support for Massachusetts. In more practical terms they announce a joint boycott, from ...
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Amphibious war against Japan
A significant step in the slow move north towards Japan is the US assault, in February 1944, of a strong naval base in the volcanic cluster of the Truk Islands. Eleven Japanese warships and more than 300 planes are destroyed here, in the first radar-guided night attack. After this it is clear that the next target must be the Marianas, a group of islands which the Japanese rightly regard as a crucial line of defence. From here US planes will be within bombing range of ...
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The spread of printing
During the early decades, German printing predominates. More books are published in Germany than anywhere else (by 1500 there are printers in some sixty German towns); German printers carry the craft secrets abroad; and foreign printers come to Germany to study as apprentices. The earliest typography is therefore in the black-letter style of contemporary German manuscripts. But by the end of the century the most fashionable and influential printing is being done in Italy, with a corresponding change in appearance.
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Greek vases
The red-figure style is a much more realistic convention. Many of the most popular scenes on vases involve mythical heroes or revelling satyrs. Such figures, to a Greek audience, seem natural if naked. The reddish-brown colour of the pottery is appropriate to Mediterranean skin, and a few linear additions to the figure provide convincing modelling for the limbs or for the suggestion of a thin garment. From about 530 to 480, the period considered the high point of the Greek ceramic achievement, the red-figure style ...
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Mastabas and pyramids
The Saqqara pyramid uses stone in small pieces, almost as if it were still mud bricks. But soon the pharaohs bring stone architecture to a peak of monumental grandeur in the pyramids at Giza. The first of these, the Great Pyramid, is built for the pharaoh Khufu from about 2550 BC. The stone is now cut in massive blocks, and the angle of the steps is filled in to give the true pyramid shape (see building methods in Egypt). This is the largest building ever ...
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Act of Supremacy
The Act of Supremacy demands public consent to the king's newly assumed role as head of the Church of England. Prominent figures in public life are required to swear on oath their acceptance of this new doctrine. A few brave men refuse to do so, among them the bishop of Rochester (John Fisher) and Thomas More. Thomas More holds a position of particular significance. A scholar of distinction, friend of Erasmus, author of Utopia, he has also been a close friend of Henry VIII and ...
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Baroque Rome
During these same years Bernini's great contribution to the exterior of St Peter's is also under construction. The open space in front of the church, where pilgrims gather to hear the pope's Easter address, needs to be enclosed in some way to form a welcoming piazza. Bernini achieves a perfect solution in the form of an open curving colonnade. The four concentric rows of columns provide covered walkways and a shape for the piazza, but they do so without closing it in - for there ...
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Herod and his successors
Herod proves a great builder. He founds new Roman cities, in particular Caesarea (now Qesari, on the coast south of Haifa), which later becomes the capital of Roman Palestine. And he creates a spectacular new Temple on the holy mount in Jerusalem (see the Temple in Jerusalem). But many of his actions are violent. In an outburst of jealousy he kills not only a favourite wife, Mariamne, but also her grandfather, mother, brother and two sons. He could well have been capable of the massacre ...
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The first Greek civilization
Their fortress palaces are protected by walls of stone blocks, so large that only giants would seem capable of heaving them into place. This style of architecture has been appropriately named Cyclopean, after the Cyclopes (a race of one-eyed giants encountered by Odysseus in the Odyssey). The walls at Tiryns, said in Greek legend to have built by the Cyclopes for the legendary king Proteus, provide the most striking example. At Mycenae it is the gateway through the walls which proclaims power, with two great ...
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