TY  - BOOK
AU  - McNeill, WIlliam H.,
TI  - A world history
SN  - 9789715691635 [paperback]
PY  - 1979///
CY  - New York
PB  - Oxford University Press
KW  - World history
N1  - Includes index; Contents: Part I Emergence and definition of the major old world civilizations to 500 B.C. — Part II Equilibrium among the civilizations 500 B.C.-A.D. 1500 — Part III The dominance of the west — Part IV The onset of global cosmopolitanism — Bibliographical essay, Part IV — Index; Adult
N2  - "Human societies, distinguished from one another by differing styles of life, are very numerous, and have existed from pre- and proto-human times throughout mankind's history. Civilizations are unusually massive societies, weaving the lives of millions of persons into a loose yet co-periods of time that are very long when measured by the span of an individual human life. Being both massive and long-lived, civilizations must perforce also be few. Indeed, from the time when human societies first attained civilized complexity and size, no more than four different major civilized traditions ever co-existed in the Old world; and in the New, where Amerindian development remained always weak and retarded, no more than three distinct civilizations ever emerged." —Preface
ER  -