The Cambridge World History, Part 1, Foundations

Comprehensive account of the intense biological, commercial, and cultural exchanges, and the creation of global connections, between 1400 and 1800.

Jerry H. Bentley (Edited by), Sanjay Subrahmanyam (Edited by), Merry E. Wiesner-Hanks (Edited by)

9781108407731, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 9 November 2017

512 pages, 15 b/w illus. 21 maps 2 tables
22.5 x 14.5 x 2.4 cm, 0.8 kg

'… gives us a view of the state of the art of a venerable field, with valuable surveys of early modern features of world lifeways from the importance of the environment and resources to disease, urbanization, and household structures.' Jeremy Adelman, Journal of World History

The era from 1400 to 1800 saw intense biological, commercial, and cultural exchanges, and the creation of global connections on an unprecedented scale. Divided into two books, Volume 6 of the Cambridge World History series considers these critical transformations. The first book examines the material and political foundations of the era, including global considerations of the environment, disease, technology, and cities, along with regional studies of empires in the eastern and western hemispheres, crossroads areas such as the Indian Ocean, Central Asia, and the Caribbean, and sites of competition and conflict, including Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Mediterranean. The second book focuses on patterns of change, examining the expansion of Christianity and Islam, migrations, warfare, and other topics on a global scale, and offering insightful detailed analyses of the Columbian exchange, slavery, silver, trade, entrepreneurs, Asian religions, legal encounters, plantation economies, early industrialism, and the writing of history.

1. Introduction Sanjay Subrahmanyam
Part I. Global Matrices: 2. 'Exhausting the earth': environment and history in the early modern world Robert Marks
3. Globalization of disease, 1300–1900 James Webb
4. Technological transitions Francesca Bray
5. Patterns of urbanization, 1400–1800 Peter Burke
6. Gender and sexuality Merry Wiesner-Hanks
Part II. Macro-Regions: 7. Eurasia after the Mongols Thomas T. Allsen
8. Continuity and change in the Indian Ocean basin Jos Gommans
9. The Americas in the age of indigenous empires Matthew Restall
10. Africa in world history, 1400–1800 Ray A. Kea
Part III. Large-Scale Political Formations: 11. The Iberian empires, 1400–1800 Jorge Flores
12. Imperial competition in Eurasia: Russia and China Laura Hostetler
13. The Islamic empires of the early modern world Giancarlo Casale
Part IV. Crossroads Regions: 14. Crossroads region: Central Asia Morris Rossabi
15. Crossroads region: Southeast Asia Michael Laffan
16. The Caribbean region: crucible for modern world history Alan Karras
17. Crossroads region: the Mediterranean Filippo de Vivo
Part V. Overview: 18. Political trajectories compared Jack Goldstone.

Subject Areas: Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 [HBLH], General & world history [HBG]