During the Iran-Contra scandal in the 1980s I used to joke that if a pollster called and asked me where Nicaragua (home of the Contra rebels) was, I wouldn’t have an answer. It’s amazing that I could be so geographically ignorant (and this was just one example) and still view myself as an educated adult.[1]
For me, that has changed. Now that I am studying history, I am aware of the importance of geography. How can I understand Irish rebellions if I don’t know where the Pale and Ulster are? How much can I learn about the woolen industry in Languedoc if I don’t know where Languedoc is and whether it could raise its own sheep?
I am a convert. (That’s why I include two geography websites on the right-hand side of this blog.) Yet some of the most fundamental geographical insights come from outside the field of history. The chief outside influence, I venture to say, is evolutionary biologist Jared Diamond, whose remarkable book Guns, Germs, and Steel reestablished geography as a major force in shaping history.[2]
Image: Queen Elizabeth I, a leading sovereign of the early modern period.
Historians are troubled by “periodization.” Periodization means dividing history into chronological eras such as the Middle Ages and the Modern Era, and the dither is about the early modern period. To some of my readers, this fuss may be about as exciting as the grammarians’ debate over the Oxford comma (whether to put a comma before “and” in a series). But I can assure you it is more complicated and possibly more important. If you’re willing to come along for the ride, let’s begin.
In the nineteenth century, Renaissance scholars (who held a lot of sway) decided that the Renaissance launched the modern era. They divided European history into “ancient” (from about 776 B.C.—the first Greek Olympic games—to the sack of Rome in 476 A.D.) and “modern” (from the Renaissance —1300 to 1500 or so—to today. Between the two they squeezed in the Middle Ages, which were not considered worthy of much attention.
But that “periodization” wasn’t satisfactory as time went on. Around the 1970s, the term “early modern” crept in. According to historian Jerry Bentley, the cause was the expansion of American higher education in the 1950s and 1960s, which led to the production of many Ph.D.s and a tendency to specialize in smaller and smaller topics. ”The notion of early modern Europe was a principal beneficiary of this specialization,” he says. [1]
I used to think that the advent of factories marked the start of the Industrial Revolution. But there were factories operated by slaves in the West Indies a century before the Industrial Revolution began around 1750. Those factories were called plantations.
While the factory—“a building or set of buildings with facilities for manufacturing”—did typify the Industrial Revolution, such a construction had appeared a century earlier in Barbados in the West Indies. By the 1660s, English owners of sugar plantations had developed an “agro-industry,” fueled by slave labor.
The consumption of sugar skyrocketed in England in the seventeenth century, and the English in Barbados (and soon, Jamaica) took advantage of the demand. In his 1985 book Sweetness and Power, Sidney W. Mintz described a system he calls “the closest thing to industry that was typical of the seventeenth century”—Barbados sugar plantations.[1]
The plantations were not just agriculture; they involved a highly complex process that started with sugar cane planting and ended with at least partially refined sugar.Slaves planted and harvested the cane, extracted its juices, and boiled those juices into products of various levels of refinement, from molasses to sugar. A typical plantation had one or two extraction mills, a boiling house, a curing house, a distillery, and a warehouse.
“The heat and noise were overpowering, there was considerable danger involved, and time was of the essence throughout, from the moment when the cane was perfect for cutting until the semicrystalline product was poured into molds to drain and be dried,” Mintz wrote.[2]
A few years ago, at a used bookstore in Leonardstown, Maryland, I picked up How to Study History. [1] Written by two well-known historians, Norman F. Cantor and Richard I. Schneider, it was published in 1967 and reflects views about history that prevailed when I was in college. They differ quite a lot from those I’m being taught now, as I will point out.
But first, you’ve got to love this book! It was written to give undergraduates a play-by-play description of how to study history. Somewhat patronizingly, it reminds the student “to carry with him [yes, him; it’s 1967] at all times a pen and some kind of note paper” and, ”as a general rule, avoid group study.”[2] But it also helps the student distinguish between demonstrable proof and inferential proof and analyze both literary and artistic primary sources.
It sets high standards. The book includes two sample papers by freshmen. Overall comment on one: “A superior paper, yet you can do better. Try to be even more concise and to the point. B+.”[3] It’s been a long time, I believe, since superior papers received a mere B+
From an 1840 Austrian book in the British Library online collection.
The United States is experiencing a period of low birth rates, primarily reflecting late marriages (aided by effective birth control techniques).[1] While low birth rates may harm the U.S. by holding back the number of productive workers, most historians of Europe have worried more about the Malthusian potential of overpopulation to outpace food production than about having too few people.
In fact, late marriages throughout much of European history prevented overpopulation.
Historians (and other social scientists) have compared family composition in northwestern Europe with families in other parts of the world, from southern Europe to China. Three academic papers, when combined, provide persuasive evidence that the family model of northwestern Europe not only prevented Malthusian excess but may have helped spark the Industrial Revolution.
Let me begin with John Hajnal’s 1982 article in Population and Development Review. Hajnal compared the age of marriage in preindustrial northwestern Europe (using figures from Denmark primarily, backed up by others), with those in India, China, and other parts of Europe. He found that late marriage—over age 26 for men, over age 23 for women—was the norm in northwestern Europe as early as the 1600s, while early marriage—before age 26 for men and before age 21 for women—was typical in the other areas studied.
