Guns, Germs, and Steel is a brilliant work answering the question of why the peoples of certain continents succeeded in invading other continents and conquering or displacing their peoples. This edition includes a new chapter on Japan and all-new illustrations drawn from the television series. Until around 11,000 BC, all peoples were still Stone Age hunter/gatherers. At that point, a great divide occurred in the rates that human societies evolved....

"A sweeping global human history that describes the separate beginnings of the world's major civilizations and cultural movements -- Confuscianism, Islam, Judeo-Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism and Nomadism -- and the dramatic, sometimes ruinous, sometimes transformative effects of their ever closer intertwinement that has brought us to where we are today"--

"From a renowned historian comes a groundbreaking narrative of humanity's creation and evolution -- a #1 international bestseller -- that explores the ways in which biology and history have defined us and enhanced our understanding of what it means to be "human." One hundred thousand years ago, at least six different species of humans inhabited Earth. Yet today there is only one -- homo sapiens. What happened to the others? And what may happen to...

An epic detective story that offers a gripping expose on why the world is so unequal. Professor Jared Diamond traveled the globe for over 30 years trying to answer this question. Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book. Why did Eurasians conquer, displace, or decimate Native Americans, Australians, and Africans, instead of the reverse? Diamond dismantles racially based theories of human history by revealing the environmental factors actually responsible...

Inspired by Kenneth Clark's highly acclaimed mini-series "Civilisation", "Civilizations" surveys the history of art, from antiquity to the present, emphasizing the role art and the creative imagination have played in the creation of culture and civilization.

"A survey of walls throughout history and their role in shaping society."--Provided by publisher. From ancient times to the present, mankind has built barriers: against the elements, against predatory animals, against other humans. These edifices of mud, brick, and stone circle the globe. Frye examines the history of walls, and reveals the startling ways that barriers have affected our psyches. He questions: Did walls make civilization possible?...

The author tells the story of our most vital resource and how it has shaped our history, tracing three ages of water. The book spans five millennia, from ancient Mesopotamia to the parched present of the Sun Belt. As the author shows, every human society has been shaped by its relationship to our most essential resource. This narrative moves across the world, from ancient Greece and Rome, whose mighty aqueducts still supply modern cities, to China,...

"An insider's look into the decades of research behind Zecharia Sitchin's books as well as an in-depth overview of his theories and discoveries. Includes carefully selected chapters from the Earth Chronicles series as well as never-before-published letters, articles, and lectures. Each piece includes an introduction, offering context and insight into Sitchin's passionate work and revealing the man behind the theories. Explains the genesis of The 12th...

In a series of brief, readable vignettes, the authors bring to life international trade and its actors--merchants and bankers, pirates and privateers, sailors and slaves, traders and tree tappers. In the process they make clear that the seemingly modern concept of economic globalization has deep historical roots. This third edition includes new selections of African cocoa, silver and gold in Brazil and Mexico, the Rothschilds, the rise of Panama...