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| TIME-LINE | European History | European Politics | European Literature | European Philosophy/Religion | European Mathematics/Science | India | Indian Historical Milestones | China | Chinese Historical Milestones | Japan | Japanese Historical Milestones | Native American | Native American Historical Milestones |
| Pre-Classical | Genesis
Exodus Job |
bet. 1500 - 1200 B.C. - Rig Veda | c. 1550 B.C. - Aryans destroy Indus Valley civilization and settle
in N. India.
c. 800 B.C. - Aryans expand southwards. |
c. 3500 B.C. - Earliest Chinese city at Liang-ch'eng chen (Lung-shan
culture).
c. 1600 B.C. - First urban civilisation in China, Shang Bronze Age culture. c. 1027 B.C. - Shang dynasty in China overthrown by Chou. 771 B.C. - Collapse of Chou feudal order in China. |
c. 660 B.C. Jimmu, legendary first emperor of Japan. | c. 25,000 B.C. - Amerinds cross Bering Strait.
c. 7000 B.C. - Amerinds reach southern-most tip of South America.. 700 B.C. - 900 A.D. - Mesoamerican Theocratic period. c. 500 B.C. - First hieroglyphic writing in Mexico (Monte Alban). |
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| Classical
783 B.C. - 200 A.D. |
Herodotus, Histories
Thucydides, Peloponnesian War Livy, Early History of Rome Polybius, Histories (The Rise of the Roman Empire) Plutarch, Caesar Plutarch, Cato the Younger Tacitus, Annals |
Plato, Republic
Aristotle, Politics Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics Recommended translation: Martin Ostwald, Library of Liberal Arts edition. |
Homer, Illiad
Homer, Odyssey Aeschylus, Agamemnon Aeschylus, Libation Bearers (Choephroe) and Eumenides Sophocles, Antigone Sophocles, Oedipus Rex Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus Euripedes, Hippolytus Euripedes, Bacchae Euripedes, Electra Aristophanes, Frogs Aristotle, Poetics |
Plato, Symposium
Plato, Phaedo Plato, Meno Aristotle, Metaphysics (recommended translation: W.D. Ross in McKeon’s The Basic Works of Aristotle ) |
Euclid, Elements Book I
Lucretius, On the Nature of Things Plato, Timaeus Ptolemy, The System of the World Aristotle, Physics Ptolemy, Almagest |
c. 600 B.C. - Brihad-Aranyaka Upanishad
c. 600 B.C. - Katha Upanishad bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - Kapila, selections from Sankhya Pravachana Sutra bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - Ptanjali, Yoga Sutra bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - Mimamsa Sutra, Jamini and Shlokavartika, Kumarila Bhatta bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - Selections from Vaisheshika Sutra bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - Selections from Kama Sutra 2nd or 3rd cent. B.C. bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - ImalakirtiSutra bet 6th and 3rd cent. B.C.? - Diamond Sutra and Heart Sutra c. 1 A.D. - Mahabharata: Bhagavadgita 2nd or 3rd cent. B.C. - Ramayana c. 200 B.C. - Institutes of Manu c. 100 - Dhammapada |
486 B.C. - Death of Siddhartha Gautama.
322 B.C. - Chandragupta founds Mauryan Empire. 262 B.C. - Asoka, Mauryan emperor, converted to Buddhism. 185 B.C. - Demetrius and Menander, kings of Bactria, conquer north-western India. |
Ancient Period
551-479 B.C. - Confucius, Analects Ta-hsueh, The Great Learning Chung-Yung, Doctrine of the Mean 6th or 4th cent. B.C. - Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching 479-438 B.C. - Mo Tzu bet. 399 and 295 B.C. - Chuang Tzu, Inner Chapters 371-289 B.C.?- Mencius, Works 298-238 B.C. Writings of Hsun Tzu |
c. 650 B.C. - Introduction of iron technology in China.
403 - 221 B.C. - "Warring States period in China. 221 B.C. - Shih Huang-ti, of Ch'in dynasty, unites China. 202 B.C. - Han dynasty reunites China. 141 B.C. - Wu-ti, Chinese emperor, expands Han power in eastern Asia. c. 138 B.C. - Chang Chien explores central Asia. c. 112 B.C. - Opening of "Silk Road" across Central Asia linking Chima to West. |
1185 - Minamoto warlords supreme in Japan.
1193 - Zen Buddhism order founded in Japan. 1333 - End of Minamoto shogunate: civil war in Japan. |
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| Early Medieval
0 - 600 A.D. |
Augustine, City of God | Hrotsvitha, Dulcitius | Mathew
John Romans Augustine, Confessions Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy |
bet. 4th and 5th cent. A.D. - Kalidasa, Shakuntala
bet. 4th and 5th cent. A.D. - Kalidasa, Kumarasambhava bet. 4th and 5th cent. A.D. - Kalidasa, Meghaduta (Cloud Messenger) |
78 - 102 A.D. - Kanishka, Kushan emperor, gains control of north
India.
320 A.D. - Chandragupta I founds Gupta Empire in northern India. 413 A.D. - Kumaragupta, great literary era in India. 480 A.D. - Gupta Empire overthrown. c. 520 Rise of mathematics in India: Aryabhata and Varamihara invent decimal system. c. 640 - Empire of Sri Harsha in northern India. |
Medieval Period
c. 179? I Ching Hexagrams, Shuo gua, Xici zhuan Ssu-Ma Ch'ien, Records of the Historian Writing of Han Fei Tzu 8th cent. - Liu-tsu t'an-ching, Platform Sutra of theSixth Patriarch |
9 A.D. - Wang Mang deposes Han dynasty in Cina.
25 A.D. - Restoration of Han dynasty. 91 AD - Chinese defeat Hsiung-nu in Mongolia. 105 - First use of paper in China. 150 - Buddhism reaches China. 184 - "Yellow Turbans" rebellions disrupt Han China. 220 - End of Han dynasty: China splits into three states. 304 - Hsiung-nu (Huns) invade China; China fragmented until 589. 589 - China reunified by Sui dynasty. 607 - Unification of Tibet. 617 - China in a state of anarchy. 624 - China united under T'ang dynasty. 658 - Maximum extension of Chinese power in central Asia; protectorates in Afganistan, Kashmir, Sogdiana and Oxus valley. c. 730 - Printing in China. 751 - Battle of Talas River: Sets boundary of China and Abbasid caliphate. 755 - An Lu-shan's rebellion in China. 853 - First book printed in China. 907 - Lat T'ang emperor deposed. 947 - Khitans overrun northern China, establish Liao dynasty. 979 - Sung dynasty reunites China. |
790 - Nineteen Mesoamerican cities erect calendric markers to commemorate
the beginning of a new cycle of time.
700 - 900 - Mississipian mound-builders in North America. |
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| Late Medieval
500 - 1500 A.D. |
Aquinas, Treatise on Law | Quest for the Holy Grail
Chaucer, Canterbury Tales Dante, The Divine Comedy |
Aquinas, Summa Theologica | c. 1000 A.D. - Ramanuja
after 1150 A.D. - Jayadeva, Gitagovinda 1300 A.D. - Madhva |
1175 - Muizzuddin Muhammad of Ghazni, founds first Muslim empire in
India.
1206 - Sultanate of Delhi founded. 1370 - Hindu state of Vijayanagar dominant in southern India. 1398 - Timur invades India and sacks Delhi. |
c. 1000 - Great age of Chinese painting and ceramics.
1038 - Tangut tribes form Hsi-hsia state in north-west China. 1126 - Chin overrun northern China; Sung rule restricted to south. 1234 - Mongols destroy Chin Empire. 1264 - Kublai Khan founds Yuan dynasty in China. 1275 - Marco Polo arrives in China. 1279 - Mongols conquer southern China. 1368 - Ming dynasty founded in China. 1405 - Chinese voyages in Indian Ocean. |
1200 - 1253 - Dogen, Shobogenzo | c. 1603 - Beginnings of Kabuki theatre in Japan. | Pre-Columbian
Popol Vuh Courlander,The FourthWorld of the Hopis (Excerpt: The Four Worlds) |
1150 - First Hopi settlement at Old Oraibi.
1344 - Building of Tenochtitlan. 750 - 1519 - Mesoamerican Militarist period. |
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| Renaissance
1250 - 1600 |
Machiavelli, The Prince | Shakespeare, King Lear
Shakespeare, The Tempest |
Galileo, Dialogue on the Two Chief World Systems | 1526 - Battle of Panipat: Babur conquers kingdom of Delhi and founds
Mughal dynasty.
1539 - Death of Kabir Nanak, founder of Sikh religion. |
Modern Period
1472-1529 A.D. Wang Yang-ming, Instruction for Practical Living Chu Hsi, Learning of the Sage |
1550 - Mongol Altan-khan invades northern China; Japanese "pirate" raids in China. | Noh Theatre, Nonomiya (Forest Shrine)
Noh Theatre, Hagoromo (Angel Wing) 1645 - Miyamoto Mushashi, The Book of the Five Rings 1689 - Basho, The Narrow Road to the Deep North |
1492 - Arrival of Columbus to the New World.
1519 - The beginning of the conquest of Mexico by Cortez. 1539 - de Soto explores North America. 1540 - First contact between Hopi and Spaniards. |
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| Baroque
1600 - 1700 |
Hobbes, Leviathan | Voltaire, Candide
Moliere, Tartuffe |
Descartes, Meditations | 1653 - Taj Mahal, Agra, India, completed.
1690 - Foundation of Calcutta by English. |
1664 - Manchus found new dynasty in China.
1689 - Treaty of Nerchinsk between Russia and China. 1697 - Chinese occupy Outer Mongolia. |
1607 - Jamestown founded.
1620 - Pilgrims land at Plymouth Rck. 1622 - First major Indian retaliation. 1680 - Pueblo Revolt. |
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| Neo-Classical
1700 - 1800 |
Locke, Of Civil Government
Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, (all in appendix of Federalist Papers, Modern Library Paperback); Federalist Papers |
Swift,
Gulliver's Travels Racine, Phaedra |
Hume, Treatise of Human Nature | 1751 - French gain control of Deccan and Carnatic.
1761 - Capture of Ponticherry: British destroy French power in India. |
1778 - First treaty between U.S. and Indians. | ||||||||
| Romantic
1800 - 1850 |
Tocqueville, The Old Regime and the French Revolution
Hegel, Philosophy of History |
Rouseau, On the Origins of Inequality
Tocqueville, Democracy in America. (Recommended text: 1990 Vintage edition (Random House) Volumes I and II. Other editions may have different divisions of text.) Kant, Fundemental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals Required translation: Thomas K. Abbott, Library of Liberal Arts edition. |
Cervantes, +Don Quixote
Schiller, Mary Stewart |
Kant, Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics
Kierkegaard, Philosophical Fragments |
1817 - Foundation of Hindu college in Calcutta: first major centre
of Western influence in India.
1818 - Britian defeats Marathas and becomes effective ruler of India. |
1819 - Sequoyah invents Cherokee syllabary.
1824 - BIA established under Department of War. 1830 - Indian Removal Act followed by the "Trail of Tears." |
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| Post-Romantic
1850 - 1900 |
Kant, Idea of an Universal History
Herder, Ideas Toward the Philosophy of the History of Mankind Marx, The German Ideology Nietzsche, Uses and Abuses of History for Life |
Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts (1844) | Goethe, Faust
Chekhov, Uncle Vanya |
Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil (Kaufman translation recommended) | Darwin, Origin of Species | 1857 - Indian Mutiny.
1877 - Queen Victoria proclaimed Empress of India. |
1850 - T'ai-p'ing rebellion in China.
1898 - Abortive "Hundred Days" reform in China. |
1854 - Perry forces Japan to open trade with U.S.
1868 - End of Tokugawa Shogunate and Meiji Restoration in Japan. 1894-5 - Sino-Japanese War: Japan occupies Formosa. |
1868 - Fort Laramie peace conference.
1876 - Custer killed at Little Bighorn. 1887 - General Allotment Act. (Dawes Act.) 1890 - Massacre at Wounded Knee. |
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| Modern
1875 - 1940 |
Dilthey, Introduction to the Human Sciences | Decisions of the United States Supreme Court: Dred Scott v. Sandford (with Lincoln’s Springfield Speech); Plessy v. Ferguson; Brown v. Board of Education. | Kafka, A Hunger Artist
Wilde, Salome |
Freud, “Note on a Case of Obsessional Neurosis [the Rat Man]” in Three
Case Histories
Freud, “On Narcissism: An Introduction” and “Mourning and Melancholia” in General Psychological Theory |
1904 - Partition of Bengal: nationalist agitation in India.
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1900 - Boxer uprising in China.
1911 - Chinese Revolution: Sun Yat-sen first President of new republic. 1926 - Chang Kai-shek begins reunification of China. 1934 - "Long March" of Chinese Communists begin. 1937 - Beginning of full-scale war between Japan and China. |
1904-5 - Russo-Japanese War; Japanese success stimulates Asian nationalism.
1910 - Japan annexes Korea. 1931 - Japanese occupy Manchuria. 1937 - Beginning of full-scale war between Japan and China. |
Post-Columbian
Neihardt, Black Elk Speaks |
1924 - Indian Citizenship Act. | ||||
| Post-Modern
1940 - |
Heidegger: “The Age of the World Picture” (including appendices), in
Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays, Harper & Row. Foucault, Madness and Civilization |
Kerouac, On the Road | +Lobachevski, The Theory of Parallels | 1947 - India and Pakistan independent.
1965 - Indo-Pakistan War |
1946 - Civil war in China.
1949 - Communist victory in China. 1966 - Cultural Revolution in China. 1971 - People Republic of China joins UN. 1976 - Death of Mao-Tse Tung; political re-orientation and modernization by Deng Xiao-ping. 1989 - Student pro-democracy demonstration crushed in Peking. |
Mishima, The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea | 1941 - Japan attacks U.S. at Pearl Harbor.
1942 - Japan overruns SE Asia. 1942 - Battle of Midway; U.S. halts Japanese expansion. 1945 - U.S. drops atomic bombs on Japan, forcing surrender. |
Erdrich, Tracks | 1962 - Indians allowed to vote in New Mexico.
1994 - White Buffalo is born in Janesville, WI. |
Disclaimer: Most of the course work for the program will be structured along a chronological time-line which corresponds to the history of Western European culture. There is not a clear and direct historical relationship between the developments of Non-Western Cultures and Western culture, but more importantly, chronological time does not have the same relevance in all cultures as it does in ours. Here is an outline of some alternative ideas concerning time. The definitions are not really adequate for illustrating complete cultural perspectives of "time" but should help show some important differences:
Magic Time - This seems to be described pretty well to an educated Western audience by Jung in his forward to Wilhelm's translation of the I Ching. The simultaneous occurrence of events in any given moment has a great significance in this perspective. We find this, not only in Chinese divination, but in the omens mentioned in our classical texts from Homer to Plato. Today, this perspective is very significant among most Native American cultures. For example, the appearance of the White Buffalo near Madison, WI has had an enormous pan-tribal effect in “Indian Country.” Even a modern manager may benefit from examining this perspective. Certainly everyone has made an intuitive judgment based on a seemingly unrelated event.
Mythic Time - This is best illustrated by Hindu scripture. Virtually all Hindu texts describe stories which occur in mythical times prior to the history of the people who told/tell them (according anthropologists, archeologists, comparative religion scholars, etc.) Time is important to these stories but is best understood in the context of the stories themselves. In other words, the "mythic time" is an important part of the myth. Looking into the development of these texts from an historical perspective can be a useful and interesting study, however, the texts really seem intended to transcend the historical context in which they were written. This perspective greatly expands the powers of the imagination: "What could be beyond what we are experiencing and/or can measure?" The vastness of the Hindu mythic perspective of time and universe has been attributed to some Hindus being such fine quantum physicists.
Rational Time - This is how we usually think about time. Certainly the history of Western civilization can be seen as a history of rational time. We have seen some relatively subtle changes occurring concerning our concept of time which became more dramatic with the invention of the clock. Written meter in music was used shortly after the invention of the clock. Even Christianity is within the context of measured time in that its most significant events are documented as "historical fact." It even reciprocates by creating a context for time itself because our dates are centered around the life of Christ. The historical linear time-line used as the structure for the MAPS courses can be seen as an exploration of "rational time" from the perspectives which we possess at this moment.
Integral Time - This concept has been proposed by Jean Gebser. One operating within this perspective has an awareness of all the above perspectives simultaneously. Gebser also includes what he calls an "Archaic" perspective which can be best described as pure being or being in the moment. Gebser describes human history as the “unfolding” of consciousness. He attempts to avoid the notion of “evolution” for its implication that something better is always replacing what came before it (though the idea of integration is presented by him as a better alternative - at least better suited for our time). Each perspective is to have an equal value in this new state of consciousness. Gebser’s presentation of this idea still seems to be contained within the framework of “rational time” because he sees one replacing the other throughout the course of human history. This makes his work still seem somewhat ethnocentric because all these perspectives coexist today.