The Classical Period:
Directions, Diversities, and
Declines by 500 C.E.
Expansion and Integration
As Classical Civilizations decline major world
religions rise as a force to define the next
period
 Each civilization had to deal with expansion
and integration and how they dealt with
these issues helped determine how they fell
Integration
 Territorial
 Social

Decline of China
Internal Problems
 Decrease in Confucian intellectuals
 Increase in corrupt bureaucrats
 Increase in social unrest partly due to declining
resources from environmental damage (such as
deforestation, soil erosion, silted rivers)
 Increase in epidemics killing the population
 Threatened cultural unity with the introduction of
Buddhism
 Sui and Tang revive the empire briefly
 NO PERMANENT DISRUPTION
India’s Decline



India’s decline was less dramatic
Increase in invasions, led to an increase in
regional princes. In turn, central power
weakened. However, many invaders
integrated and even adopted some of the
religious views of the conquered people.
Hinduism cemented the culture and lessened
the fall but Islam would soon threaten it.
Fall of Rome





There were symptoms of decay after 180 CE
Internal problems
Drastic decrease in population (1 million –
250,000) due to plague and disease
Depressed society
Elite become more pleasure-seeking and so
no new culture is being created
Fall of Rome (contd.)








Diocletion tried to reverse the trend but couldn’t
Constantine thinks dividing the empire will help manage its
problems but that doesn’t work either
This leads to a split in the unity Mediterranean culture
Did not produce shared political culture or the bureaucratic
institutions of China nor did is have the religion to hold it
together as in India
Empire fell into 3 zones
Eastern Empire- Byzantium
N. Africa and Southern shores of Mediterranean
Western part of the Empire (with no sophisticated culture)



All civilizations suffered from outside
invasions
Rome fell to Germanic invasions
India fell to the White Huns and China
to another similar Central Asian group
called the Xiongnu
Cases of Expanded Empires
and their Influence





Southeast Asia
Gained access to civilization through contact
with India
Africa
Independent kingdom of Kush along the
upper Nile, which fell to Axum, which in turn
fell to Ethiopia
Axum and Ethiopia had contacts with the
Mediterranean civ.
Other Civilizations





Africa
Below the Sahara the major development was
a further extension of agriculture and the
development of regional Kingdoms (Ghana is
first state)
Asia (Japan)
Japan, by 200 CE, had established extensive
agriculture
Shintoism provided for worship of political
rulers and spirits of nature and by 700 CE
was able to unify Japan
Other Civilizations




Asia (Polynesian)
Reached Fiji and Somao by 1000 BCE
(via special canoes)
Central Asia
Herding people played large role in
trade, innovation and later invasion of
the classical societies
Other Civilizations





Europe
Europe is organized into loose kingdoms
Central America
Olmecs develop impressive agriculture but by
400 BCE had disappeared without a trace
Olmec successors- Maya and Inca both
develop in relative isolation and therefore
lacked some of the advantages of being able
to copy other civilizations but they were
sophisticated nonetheless

New Religious Map- the spread of
major religions was a vital result of
changes in the classical world