HISTORY OF SLAVERY

An evil of civilization

Slavery enters human history with civilization. Hunter-gatherers and primitive farmers have no use for a slave. They collect or grow just enough food for themselves. One more pair of hands is one more mouth. There is no economic advantage in owning another human being.

Once people gather in towns and cities, a surplus of food created in…

HISTORY OF THE SIKHS

A new religion in India: 16th century AD

Centuries of Muslim rule in north India prompt a reform movement within Hinduism. Nanak, son of a Hindu tax collector in the Punjab, leaves his family in about 1500 to take up the life of a wandering teacher. In doing so, he is part of a long-established tradition. He follows in the…

HISTORY OF SIERRA LEONE

Slavery and freedom: 17th – 19th century AD

The Sierra Leone river, with a natural harbour at its mouth where Freetown now stands, is one of the places where slaving ships of the European nations regularly put in to trade with local rulers for their transatlantic cargo. But it is also the site selected by a British abolitionist, Granville…

HISTORY OF SICILY

Hub of the Mediterranean: 8th c. BC – 8th c. AD

Sicily, a large fertile island at a pivotal point in the Mediterranean, is one of the world’s most desirable patches of land. Colonized by Phoenicians and Greeks, and fought over between Greeks, Carthaginians and Romans in the Punic Wars, its architectural and artistic remains bear witness to its past…

HISTORY OF THE SEVEN YEARS’ WAR

Preliminaries to war: AD 1748-1756

In the aftermath of the War of the Austrian Succession two intense rivalries threaten the precariously established peace. One is between the developing empires of France and Britain. This leads to outbreaks of warfare in India in 1748, in America in 1755 and in the Mediterranean in 1756 – when the French seize…

HISTORY OF THE SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD

Ancient marvels

Antipater, a Greek author living in the Phoenician port of Sidon, lists in one of his poems the most remarkable creations of mankind. They are seven in number: the pyramids of Egypt; the hanging gardens of Babylon; the walls of Babylon; the statue of Zeus at Olympia; the temple of Artemis at Ephesus; the mausoleum of Halicarnassus; the…

HISTORY OF SENEGAL

The Senegal and Gambia rivers: to AD 1894

For a vessel sailing down the west coast of Africa, the mouth of the Senegal river offers the first refreshing welcome after the parched territory of the western Sahara. Further south, round the difficult promontory of Cape Verde, is the even more enticing estuary of the Gambia. Here the channel is sufficiently…

HISTORY OF SCULPTURE

The art of our species

If Neanderthal man created any form of art, no traces of it have yet been found. But with the arrival of modern man, or Homo sapiens sapiens, the human genius for image-making becomes abundantly clear.

In the recesses of caves, people begin to decorate the rock face with an important theme in their daily lives, the…

HISTORY OF SCOTLAND

Skara Brae: c.2500 BC

In the extreme north of Scotland, in the Orkneys, a small neolithic community builds a village in about 2500 BC on a site already occupied for many generations. There is no wood on the island, so the walls of the one-room dwellings are of stone. So is the built-in furniture. There are stone beds and shelves…

HISTORY OF SCANDINAVIA

Northern hunters: from 10,000 BC

During the most recent glacial period (see Ice Ages) the entire Scandinavian peninsula is under a sheet of ice. As the ice cap begins to withdraw, about 12,000 years ago, hunter-gatherers move north in pursuit of reindeer.

The living survivors of the hunter-gatherers in these regions are the Lapps (or the Samit, their own name for…

HISTORY OF SAINT PAUL

Saul of Tarsus: AD c.10-c.35

Saul of Tarsus, known to Christians as St Paul, grows up in a strict Jewish family in the port of Tarsus, in what is now southern Turkey. As part of Asia Minor, this is a Greek-speaking town.

It is also within the Roman empire, and this family is distinguished enough to have been granted Roman…