A General History for Colleges and High Schools | Page 3

the
Reign of Theodoric, c. A.D. 500 14. Europe in the Time of Charles the
Great, 814 15. The Western Empire as divided at Verdun, 843 16.
Spanish Kingdoms, 1360 17. Central Europe, 1360 18. The Spanish
Kingdoms and their European Dependencies under Charles V 19.
Europe in the 16th and 17th Centuries 20. The Baltic Lands, c. 1701 21.
Central Europe, 1801 22. Sketch Map of Europe showing Principal
Battles of Napoleon [Footnote: For the use of this map I am indebted to
the courtesy of Mr. D. H. Montgomery, author of "Leading Facts of
French History."] 23. Central Europe, 1810 24. Central Europe, 1815
25. South-Eastern Europe according to the Treaty of Berlin, 1878 26.
Europe in 1880

GENERAL HISTORY.
GENERAL INTRODUCTION: THE RACES AND THEIR EARLY
MIGRATIONS.
DIVISIONS OF HISTORY.--History is usually divided into three
periods,-- Ancient, Mediæval, and Modern. Ancient History begins
with the earliest nations of which we can gain any certain knowledge,
and extends to the fall of the Roman Empire in the West, A.D. 476.
Mediæval History embraces the period, about one thousand years in
length, lying between the fall of Rome and the discovery of the New
World by Columbus, A.D. 1492. Modern History commences with the
close of the mediæval period and extends to the present time. [Footnote:
It is thought preferable by some scholars to let the beginning of the
great Teutonic migration (A.D. 375) mark the end of the period of
ancient history. Some also prefer to date the beginning of the modern
period from the capture of Constantinople by the Turks, A.D. 1453;
while still others speak of it in a general way as commencing about the
close of the 15th century, at which time there were many inventions
and discoveries and a great stir in the intellectual world.]
ANTIQUITY OF MAN.--We do not know when man first came into
possession of the earth. We only know that, in ages vastly remote,
when both the climate and the outline of Europe were very different
from what they are at present, man lived on that continent with animals

now extinct; and that as early as 4000 or 3000 B.C.,--when the curtain
first rises on the stage of history,--in some favored regions, as in the
Valley of the Nile, there were nations and civilizations already
venerable with age, and possessing languages, arts, and institutions that
bear evidence of slow growth through very long periods of time before
written history begins. [Footnote: The investigation and study of this
vast background of human life is left to such sciences as _Ethnology,
Comparative Philology_, and Prehistoric Archeology.]
THE RACES OF MANKIND.--Distinctions in form, color, and
physiognomy divide the human species into three chief types, or races,
known as the Black (Ethiopian, or Negro), the Yellow (Turanian, or
Mongolian), and the White (Caucasian). But we must not suppose each
of these three types to be sharply marked off from the others; they
shade into one another by insensible gradations.
There has been no perceptible change in the great types during historic
times. The paintings upon the oldest Egyptian monuments show us that
at the dawn of history, about five or six thousand years ago, the
principal races were as distinctly marked as now, each bearing its racial
badge of color and physiognomy. As early as the times of Jeremiah, the
permanency of physical characteristics had passed into the proverb,
"Can the Ethiopian change his skin?"
Of all the races, the White, or Caucasian, exhibits by far the most
perfect type, physically, intellectually, and morally.
[Illustration: NEGRO CAPTIVES, From the Monuments of Thebes.
(Illustrating the permanence of race characteristics.)]
THE BLACK RACE.--Africa is the home of the peoples of the Black
Race, but we find them on all the other continents, whither they have
been carried as slaves by the stronger races; for since time immemorial
they have been "hewers of wood and drawers of water" for their more
favored brethren.
THE YELLOW, OR TURANIAN RACE.--The term Turanian is very
loosely applied by the historian to many and widely separated families
and peoples. In its broadest application it is made to include the
Chinese and other more or less closely allied peoples of Eastern Asia;
the Ottoman Turks, the Hungarians, the Finns, the Lapps, and the
Basques, in Europe; and (by some) the Esquimaux and American
Indians.

The peoples of this race were, it seems, the first inhabitants of Europe
and of the New World; but in these quarters, they have, in the main,
either been exterminated or absorbed by later comers of the White Race.
In Europe, however, two small areas of this primitive population
escaped the common fate--the Basques, sheltered among the Pyrenees,
and the Finns and Lapps, in the far north; [Footnote: The Hungarians
and Turks are Turanian peoples that have thrust themselves