BC: Qin Shi Huang unifies China, end of Warring States period; marking the beginning of Imperial rule in China which lasts until 1912. Construction of the Great Wall by the Qin dynasty begins.

The Archaic expansion differed from the Iron Age migrations of the Greek Dark Ages, in that it consisted of organised direction (see oikistes) away from the originating metropolis rather than the simplistic movement of tribes, which characterised the aforementioned earlier migrations. Many colonies, or apoikia ( Greek: ἀποικία, transl. "home away from home"), that were founded during this period eventually evolved into strong Greek city-states, functioning independently of their metropolis. Iron Age Italy [ edit ] Etruscan civilization in north of Italy, 800 BC Babylonia was an Amorite state in lower Mesopotamia (modern southern Iraq), [33] with Babylon as its capital. [ citation needed] Babylonia emerged when Hammurabi created an empire out of the territories of the former kingdoms of Sumer and Akkad. [33] AD: Death of Roman Emperor Augustus Caesar (Octavian), ascension of his adopted son Tiberius to the throne.

Share

Humphries, Mark (2017). "Late Antiquity and World History". Studies in Late Antiquity. 1 (1): 8–37. doi: 10.1525/sla.2017.1.1.8. ISSN 2470-2048. Ancient technological progress began before the recording of history, with tools, use of fire, [177] domestication of animals, and agriculture all predating recorded history. [178] The use of metals and the ability to make metal alloys was foundational for later technologies to develop. [179] Medical knowledge, including the use of herbs to treat illnesses and wounds as well as some surgical techniques, advanced during antiquity. [180] An early very important development that allowed for further advancement was writing, which allowed humans to record information for later use. [181] MacGregor, Neil (2011). A History of the World in 100 Objects. New York: Viking. pp.221–226. ISBN 9780670022700. c. 400 BC: Rise of the Garamantes as an irrigation-based desert state in the Fezzan region of Libya.

Clist, Bernard. (1987). A critical reappraisal of the chronological framework of the early Urewe Iron Age industry. Muntu. 6. 35-62. Classical antiquity, also known as the classical era, classical period, classical age, or simply classical history or antiquity, [1] is the period of cultural history between the 8th century BC and the 5th century AD [note 1] comprising the interwoven civilizations of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome known together as the Greco-Roman World, centered on the Mediterranean Basin. It is the period in which ancient Greece and ancient Rome flourished and wielded huge influence throughout much of Europe, North Africa, and West Asia. [2] [3] The Sasanian Empire began when the Parthian Empire ended in AD 224. Their rulers claimed the Achaemenids as ancestors and set up their capital at Ctesiphon in Mesopotamia. Their period of greatest military expansion occurred under Shapur I, who by the time of his death in AD 272 had defeated Roman imperial armies and set up buffer states between the Sasanians and Roman Empires. After Shapur, the Sasanians were under more pressure from the Kushans to their east as well as the Roman then Byzantine Empire to its west. However, the Sasanians rebuilt and founded numerous cities and their merchants traveled widely and introduced crops such as sugar, rice, and cotton into the Iranian plateau. But in AD 651, the last Sassanid emperor was killed by the expanding Islamic Arabs. [47] Hittites [ edit ] Largest expansion of Kingdom of Armenia under Tigranes the Great BC – 100 AD: Bantu speaking communities in the great lakes region of Africa develop iron forging techniques that enable them to produce carbon steel. [21] The precise end of the Republic is disputed by modern historians; [note 2] Roman citizens of the time did not recognize that the Republic had ceased to exist. The early Julio-Claudian Emperors maintained that the res publica still existed, albeit under the protection of their extraordinary powers, and would eventually return to its full Republican form. The Roman state continued to call itself a res publica as long as it continued to use Latin as its official language.Wiesner-Hanks, Merry E. (2015). Concise History of the World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-107-69453-8. Conventionally, it is taken to begin with the earliest-recorded Epic Greek poetry of Homer (8th–7th-century BC) and ends with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD. Such a wide span of history and territory covers many disparate cultures and periods. Classical antiquity may also refer to an idealized vision among later people of what was, in Edgar Allan Poe's words, "the glory that was Greece, and the grandeur that was Rome". [4] BC: Death of Spartacus. End of the Third Servile War, a major slave uprising against the Roman Republic.

BC: An alliance between the Babylonians, Medes, and Scythians succeeds in destroying Nineveh and causing subsequent fall of the Assyrian empire. Towards the end of the 2nd millennium BC, the Shang were overrun by the Zhou dynasty from the Wei River valley to the west. The Zhou rulers at this time invoked the concept of the Mandate of Heaven to legitimize their rule, a concept that would be influential for almost every successive dynasty. The Zhou initially established their capital in the west near modern Xi'an, near the Yellow River, but they would preside over a series of expansions into the Yangtze River valley. Zhou administration was decentralised, with local elites responsible for collecting tribute and providing military support to the Zhou rulers. [106] Terracotta Warriors from the time of Qin Shi Huang BC: Sangam literature (Tamil: சங்க இலக்கியம், Canka ilakkiyam) period in the history of ancient southern India (known as the Tamilakam)

The Achaemenid Empire was founded by Cyrus the Great, who first became king of the Persians, then conquered the Medes, Lydia, and Babylon by 539 BC. The empire built on earlier Mesopotamian systems of government to govern their large empire. By building roads, they improved both the ability to send governmental instructions throughout their lands as well as improving the ability of their military forces to be deployed rapidly. Increased trade and upgraded farming techniques increased wealth, but also exacerbated inequalities between social classes. The empire's location at the centre of trading networks spread its intellectual and philosophical ideas throughout a wide area, and its religion, while not itself spreading far, had an impact on later religions such as Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. [42] Cyrus' son Cambyses II conquered Egypt, while a later emperor, Darius the Great, expanded the empire to the Indus River, creating the largest empire in the world to that date. [43] But Darius and his son Xerxes I failed to expand into Greece, with expeditions in 490 and 480 BC eventually failing. [44] The Achaemenid dynasty and empire fell to Alexander the Great by 330 BC, and after Alexander's death, much of the area previously ruled by the Cyrus and his successors was ruled by the Seleucid dynasty. [45] Assimilation of Baltic and Aryan Peoples by Uralic Speakers in the Middle and Upper Volga Basin (Shaded Relief BG) The kingdom of Magadha rose to prominence under a number of dynasties that peaked in power under the reign of Ashoka Maurya, one of India's most legendary and famous emperors. During the reign of Ashoka, the four dynasties of Chola, Chera, and Pandya were ruling in the South, while Devanampiya Tissa (250–210 BC) controlled Anuradhapura (now Sri Lanka). These kingdoms, while not part of Ashoka's empire, were in friendly terms with the Maurya Empire. An alliance existed between Devanampiya Tissa and Ashoka of India, [95] who sent Buddhist missionaries to Sri Lanka. [96] Libourel, Jan M. (1973). "A Battle of Uncertain Outcome in the Second Samnite War". The American Journal of Philology. Johns Hopkins University Press. 94 (1): 71–8. doi: 10.2307/294039. ISSN 1086-3168. JSTOR 294039.