Suchergebnisse

The paradox of agriculture and its impact on China and western civilization -- Ancient philosophy : Chinese versus western -- The nomads -- Contrasting medieval China and Europe -- China and medieval Europe : cultural orthodoxy and creativity -- The nomad apogee of power -- Modernization

A theory of the margin has long featured in the work of medieval historians. Marginal regions are taken to be those of poor soil or geographical remoteness, where farmers experienced particular difficulties in grain production. It is argued that such regions were cultivated only when demographic pressure intensified in the thirteenth century, but that a combination of soil exhaustion and demographic decline resulted in severe economic contraction by the end of the fourteenth century. Marginal regions are seen not just as sensitive barometers of economic change but as important catalysts in that change. Despite the importance placed by historians on the general theory of the margin, this book represents the first detailed study of a 'marginal region'. It focuses upon East Anglian Breckland, whose blowing sands are among the most barren soils in lowland England. Drawing upon a wide range of sources, this study reconstructs Breckland's late medieval economy, and shows it to be more diversified and resilient than the stereotype depicted in marginal theory

1. Defining settlement 'resilience' and 'vulnerability' and introducing the historiography -- 2. The theoretical framework -- 3. Parasite or stimulant : the divergent impact of the city of Florence upon its surrounding rural hinterlands, 1300-1580 -- 4. Settlement decline before the black death : dealing with pressure on resources in two regions of medieval Cambridgeshire, 1200-1340 -- 5. Village communities and commercialisation : the rise of large tenant farmers and its impact on settlements in the Dutch River area, 1300-1600 -- 6. A North Sea coastal area under pressure of land consolidation : transition from a farmers' republic to an unequal polder society in the oldambt of Groningen, 1700-1900 -- 7. Exploring long-term inequality and agro-towns in the Kingdom of Naples, 1600-1900 : a comparative study in Apulia -- 8. Conclusion.

This edited volume represents the research results of two international conferences organized and sponsored by the Annemarie Schimmel Kolleg: "Environmental Approaches in Pre-Modern Middle Eastern Studies" and "Material Culture Methods in the Middle Islamic Periods". The following work consists of three parts, which correspond to the themes of the aforementioned conferences (Contributions to Environmental History and Material Culture Studies) and a third which bridges the gap between the two approaches (Practice and Knowledge Transfer). The present contributions cover a wide range of such topics as urban pollution, local perceptions of weather, rural estate economy, Sufi understandings of nature and the body and mind, houses and socialization, text and gardens, local know-how and interdependence in medieval Syrian agriculture, crop selection and the medieval agricultural economy.

This omnibus brings together some old and some recent works by Jos Gommans on the warhorse and its impact on medieval and early modern state-formation in South Asia. These studies are based on Gommans' observation that Indian empires always had to deal with a highly dynamic inner frontier between semi-arid wilderness and settled agriculture. Such inner frontiers could only be bridged by the ongoing movements of Turkish, Afghan, Rajput and other warbands. Like the most spectacular examples of the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal Empires, they all based their power on the exploitation of the most lethal weapon of that time: the warhorse. In discussing the breeding and trading of horses and their role in medieval and early modern South Asian warfare, Gommans also makes some thought-provoking comparisons with Europe and the Middle East. Since the Indian frontier is part of the much larger Eurasian Arid Zone that links the Indian subcontinent to West, Central and East Asia, the final essay explores the connected and entangled history of the Turko-Mongolian warband in the Ottoman and Timurid Empires, Russia and China.

"In A History of Water Engineering and Management in Yemen, Ingrid Hehmeyer describes the three-way relationship between water, land, and humans from ancient to medieval and premodern times. As illustrated in case studies from four sites, individual ecosystems necessitated different engineering and management approaches in order to make good use of the scarce water resources for both irrigated agriculture and domestic consumption. Material remains and written sources provide the evidence for a comprehensive examination of continuity and change; technical and managerial struggles, failures, and successes; the question of technology transfer; the impact of the religion of Islam on water use and allocation; and people's reactions in times of severe crisis."-- Back cover

Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Dedication -- Table of Contents -- List of Figures -- List of Tables -- Acknowledgments -- Chapter 1 15,000 Years of Climate Change in the MENA: Big history, big questions -- Big questions and big history -- A minimalist framework/theory -- Road map -- Notes -- Chapter 2 Climate Change from the Younger Dryas to the Little Ice Age -- Notes -- Chapter 3 The Origins of Agriculture, Drought, and Ancient Empires -- Younger Dryas and the origins of agriculture -- The agrarian ancient world -- Ubaid and the Sahara -- The ascent and disruption of the Sumerians -- Akkad, the old kingdom, and Indus (end of the third millennium BCE) -- Egyptian dynasties -- The end of the Bronze Age (late 2nd millennium BCE) -- Notes -- Chapter 4 Drought and Political-Economic Transformations in the Ancient Near East1 -- The argument -- The model -- Climate -- Notes -- Chapter 5 Cooling, Water Scarcity, and Societal Crises in Ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt -- Water scarcity -- Center-hinterland conflict -- Regime transitions -- De-urbanization/population growth problems -- Trade networks and crises -- Evaluating the trade data -- Testing the hypotheses -- Notes -- Chapter 6 Environmental Fragility in THE MENA from Late Antiquity to Early Modern Eras -- Roman Empire(s) and Late Antiquity Ice Age -- The economic decline of Iranshahr - transitional period to Medieval Ice Age -- The emergence of Islam -- The "Big Chill," Seljuk Turks, and the crusades - the Medieval Ice Age -- The Black Death - transitional period to the Little Ice Age -- The Ottoman Empire - the Little Ice Age (LIA) -- Summarizing impacts in Late Antiquity through the early Modern era -- Notes -- Chapter 7 Global Warming in the MENA Today and in the Coming Decades -- Why the MENA is likely to be a ground zero for global warming -- Food insecurity.

Consent, representation, and liberty: America as the last medieval society--or a footnote to Louis Hartz / Ivan Jankovic -- Canadian development assistance and mediated geopolitics / Katherine Reilly -- Right-wing populism and multiculturalism in Canada / David Laycock and Steven Weldon -- Not merely playing: game theory's subversive proclivities / Laurent Dobuzinskis -- The contribution of rhetorical analysis and discourse theory to the study of political ideologies: the cases of multiculturalism and environmentalism / Ian Angus -- Mobilizing political strategy: the global practices of taxpayer groups / Kyle Willmott -- Telling their stories: ideology and the subject of prairie agriculture / Katherine Strand and Darin Barney -- Laborlore and the ideology of the British Columbia labour bureaucracy, 1900-2015 / Mark Leier -- A reconnaissance of everyday working class ideology in British Columbia / Dennis Pilon.

This book attempts to understand the commercial and social history of erstwhile Bengal in terms of its links with it neighbouring countries in the northern region of the Bay of Bengal. It touches upon the key issues in both maritime and territorial history such as the early medieval trade revolution and its impact on the borders of Bengal.The discussion focusses on Southeast Bengal - the most economically developed area of Bengal in terms of transport networks, agriculture, artisan products and trade. Most of this area underwent two major transformations in the twentieth century: once as a result of the formation of East Pakistan in 1947 and a second time after the formation of Bangladesh in 1971. The volume concludes with certain major issues of concern between India and Bangladesh at the turn of the twenty-first century

Intro -- Contents -- Notes on Contributors -- List of Figures -- List of Tables -- 1: Introductory Remarks -- References -- 2: Grand Narratives in Premodern Economic History -- Great and Little Divergence (Julia Bruch) -- Urbanisation (Ulla Kypta) -- Population, Demography and Economic Growth (Ulf Christian Ewert) -- Commercial Revolution (Stephan Köhler, Tanja Skambraks) -- The Emergence of Capitalism (Stephan Köhler, Christian Scholl, Tanja Skambraks) -- Transaction Costs and Institutions (Ulla Kypta) -- Trust (Tanja Skambraks) -- Materiality (Julia Bruch, Tanja Skambraks) -- References -- 3: Introduction into the Study of Production -- Population (Ulf Christian Ewert) -- Labour (Niels Petersen) -- Research Topics -- Unfree Labour -- The Rise of Employment Contracts -- Payment by Geding and Time Wage in the Agrarian World -- Piece Rates and Time Wage in Urban Crafts -- Agriculture and Mining -- Manorialism and Landownership (Marco Veronesi) -- Manorialism and the Decline of Serfdom -- Rentengrundherrschaft (rent manorialism), Agrarian Capitalism and the Late Medieval Village -- Landownership -- Collective Goods, in the Middle Ages (Ulf Christian Ewert) -- Collective Goods in the Medieval World -- Definition and Typology of Collective Goods -- Problems of Provision, Maintenance and Management of Collective Goods -- Town and Country (Niels Petersen) -- Mining (Ivonne Burghardt) -- Crafts (Julia Bruch) -- Guilds -- Specialisation and Differentiation -- Knowledge and Innovation -- Services (Julia Bruch) -- References -- 4: Introduction into the Study of Markets -- Europe, c. 1300-1600: Commercialisation and the Market Economy (Angela Huang, Ulla Kypta) -- Price Data as a Historical Source (Mark Spoerer) -- The End of the Beginning: The Consumer Revolution (Eva Brugger) -- Elements of the Market (Angela Huang und Ulla Kypta).

Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Original Title Page -- Original Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Dedication -- Introduction -- Chapter 1: Reconstructing past climates -- Instrumental records -- Historical and archaeological data -- Environmental indicators -- Chapter 2: Climatic change in the Quaternary era -- The glacial/interglacial sequence -- The Younger Dryas event -- The Holocene optimum -- The medieval optimum and the Little Ice Age -- Twentieth-century warming -- Variability within the present climate system -- Chapter 3: The greenhouse effect and greenhouse gases -- The greenhouse effect -- Carbon dioxide -- Methane -- Nitrous oxide -- Chlorofluorocarbons -- Ozone -- Feedback mechanisms and the greenhouse effect -- Chapter 4: Predicting future climates -- Analogues from past climates -- General circulation models -- Validating GCMs -- Time-dependent models -- Greenhouse gas emission scenarios -- GCM scenarios for future climate -- Climatic variability -- Detecting the signal through the noise -- Chapter 5: The impact of global warming: sea level rise -- Measuring sea level -- The impacts of sea level rise -- Impacts on delta areas -- Impacts in tropical and subtropical areas -- The Antarctic ice sheets -- Responding to sea level rise -- Chapter 6: The impact of global warming on natural ecosystems and agriculture -- Carbon dioxide and plant growth -- Impact on ecosystems -- Tropical rain forests and climatic change -- Hydrological impacts -- Impact on agriculture -- World food supply -- Chapter 7: Responding to global warming -- The political framework -- Reducing greenhouse gas emissions -- Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Glossary -- References -- Index.