ch 12

I was surprised to find that the number of humps on camels backs were related to wear they are found!  I just always assumed a camel was a camel and no matter how many humps they had they were all found in the same places.  Not that this information is that important to what we are learning, I just found it interesting!  Pastoral societies are way more interesting to read about than the last few chapters in my opinion.  I find it odd to think about living in a small group with only kin!  I think I would go crazy.  However, as a girl I would say living in one of these groups sounds way better than a civilization because I would get way less restriction on what I could do.  It surprises me how well known the Mongols are considering they never tried to spread their culture.  I am learning about how pandemics spread in microbiology right now!  It’s a little gross to think that most diseases are started by animals transmitting it to humans.

ch 11

I was wondering when we were going to get to the Islam religion!  The Islam religion is easier to understand than some of the other ones we have already been over because it is a bit more like Christianity and Christianity is what I know most about.  Monotheism is a key for me to understand religious ways better.  It’s easier to focus on one thing for me.  A major problem I see in the Islamic community is the fact that they have no distinction between the religious laws and the state or civil laws.  In the quotes I feel like women are referred to as if they were animals who should be obedient.  I see even Islam women today completely veiled in public and wonder if they choose to be veiled or if it is still unacceptable for women in the Islam culture to be in public unveiled.  

ch 9

In the golden age of Chinese achievement there was some give and take as far as the women go.  I would say that overall their lives improved.  However, I do think the feet binding part sounds painful!!!!!  I had hear about the Chinese binding girls feet but I was a bit skeptical on if it actual happened nor did I know why.  After reading this in a history book I was almost shocked to discover it did happen and it happen so that the girls would be restricted inside to do inside chores.  On the positive side the girls started to see more property rights, education and there were even powerful paintings and statues of women created.  I think that painting and statues of women is a good sign of improved statues. 

I never knew that Buddhism wasn’t very popular in China at first.  I always thought that Buddhism and China just kind of went together.  Now that I’m taking more time to think about it, it makes sense that it was not a solid belief at first because it focused more individual enlightenment while China is very much about the society.

ch 10

haha I had no idea that the people living in the byzantine empire were forced to wear sandals and robes so that they would not look like Germanic peoples!  I do not know why I find this so funny but they were so afraid of barbarian attacks that no one in the empire could wear anything resembling a barbarian, like boots, trousers, animal skin clothing or have long hair.  It seems a bit over the top to me.  I know that most of the change in the west was for the best but there was so much deforestation and it just kind of saddens me that so much of nature is destroyed for human use.  

7 docs

I think the documents are becoming more reliable because education is growing.  I like Marco Polo’s piece because it seems like he saw and did a lot for himself, he is not just writing down stories he heard as much as some other documents we have read.  The pictures stood out to me in these documents because these are the first visual sources we have looked at so far that have a lot of animals in them.  I think that because in traveling along the silk roads and sand roads people started to depend more on animals in order to trade goods and cultures.

ch 7

Silk roads, sea roads and sand roads!  When I first read these words I did not fully understand what they meant.  I mean did they really have silk roads?  So the roads weren’t silk, but they were roads.  These roads linked trade among the diverse people in Eurasia.  Which I think is very good because along with goods they were able to share cultures and beliefs.  I think it created important diversity.  As far as the sand roads go, I do not think traveling across a desert to trade sounds very fun.

6 docs

The weakness in the Periplus of the Erythraean sea document is that it is anonymous.  However, there are not many documents like it so it is what we have to work with.  I am thinking that the information in this document came for a few different people because it seems a little unlikely that one person went to all these different places and traded with all these different items.  In these documents we also see the start of a belief in a God.  Which I personally think is a bit more believable than believing in Ares, Zeus and Poseidon.  I think the system for trading with gold that they describe is actually fairly smart considering they spoke different languages.