Unit 1

• Characteristics of Neo-Confucianism


  • Confucianism sought to promote harmony in society by creating hierarchy and obedience
• Filial Piety


  Being good to one's parents; being kind to one's sons or daughters
• In Confucianism the relationship between parents and children was important
• Children must obey and respect their parents
• Parents likewise must be fair to their children (no cruelty)
• Confucius extended the idea of filial piety to all of the kingdom
• The emperor was the father to all his subjects and they were his children
• A military general was the father to his soldiers and they were his children
• A farm owner was the father to his servants and they were his children
• If everyone knew their place in society and followed orders, then harmony can be maintained
• This also extended the gender relations
• Women in China were seen as subservient (less important) to men
• Wives must obey their husbands and husbands must avoid cruelty to their wives
• Bureaucracy


  People whose job is to carry out the will of the emperor/king/president
• Bureaucrats


  • Tax collectors
  • Foreign ministers
  • Imperial guard
• The emperor creates the Civil Service Exam


  Song Dynasty
• Civil Service Exam


  A test that asks questions about Confucianism. Depending how well the test taker scored, that determined what position in the government they could have.
• Commercialization


  Orientating production around selling goods rather than personal use
• Between canal systems and Silk Roads, commercial expansion and trade was booming
• Banks, credit, paper money = easier to do business
• Popular items for export


  • Textiles (silk)
  • Porcelain (known by the West as china)
• Footbinding


  Women were subordinated, controlled, and physically confined
• Footbinding spreads in Song
• Footbinding


  Most common amongst non-peasant women (status symbol)
• Footbinding dies out in early 1900s
• Dar Al-Islam


  The "House of Islam"
• How did Islam grow?


  1. Military conquest (political)

  2. Missionaries (cultural/religious)

  3. Merchants (economic)
• As the Islamic world splits up into new governments and different territories split away from Abbasid control, the region remains united through their cultural and religious ties to Islam
• Dar Al-Islam grows to include parts of Africa, India, SE Asia, and even modern-day Spain
• In many ways, the region can be view as one cultural Islamic Empire despite this period of political fracturing (splitting apart)
• Fracturing of the Abbasid Caliphate


  As political power of the Abbasid Caliphs decline and revolts broke out in various parts of the Abbasid Caliphate, the government began to fracture (split apart)
• New groups rise to power to try to supplant (take over) the Islamic Empire from Abbasid control


  • Seljuk Turkish Empire (Central Asian Nomads)
  • Mamluk Sultanate (Slave empire in Egypt)
  • Delhi Sultanate (Islamic government in India)
• Mamluks


  Slave soldiers from Central Asia who were brought to Egypt and were able to take control of Egypt from the Abbasids
• House of Wisdom


  A grand library built in Baghdad by the Abbasids where ancient Greek, Roman, and Persian knowledge is preserved and fact-checked by Muslims
• Major contributions: translation of the great works of Greece and Rome into Arabic as well as medicine, science, and mathematic from places like India
• This knowledge would be passed on the future civilizations even in the non-Islamic world such as Europe
• Eventually gets destroyed by the Mongol invasion of the city of Baghdad in 1258
• Hinduism


  Remained the main religion of the native population in India
• Delhi Sultanate


  Islamic invaders that conquered Northern India, but native Indians remained Hindus and conversions were rare compared to other regions
• Changes in Buddhism


  Buddhism which formed in India spread to Southeast Asia and China and changed into three different branches: Theravada[original], Mahayan[east asian], and Vajrayana[tibetan]