When he landed for the first time in Africa, in 1958, the great Polish reporter Ryszard Kapuscinski was literally dazzled:“The shock was the light, intense and bright. The ancient history of this continent is just as exotic as the debauchery of the sun. Because, to contradict a regrettable cliché, A
Three decades after the death of Muhammad in 632, his worst enemies take the reins of his community. His former companions, in fact, were torn in a civil war. Ali, the fourth caliph and cousin of the Prophet, finds himself isolated. Moawiya, governor of Damascus, of the Umayyad clan, seized power. H
Dom Miguel de Castro, by Jasper Beck, around 1643 (National Museum of Art, Copenhagen). Ambassador of the Kingdom of Kongo, he was sent to the Netherlands to request mediation in the dispute between his cousin the Count of Soyo and King Garcia II of Kongo • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS In the year of grace
Rats eating a fish head, Kawanabe Kyosai (1831-1889), Musée Guimet • RMN/SERVICE DE PRESSE Contrary to popular belief, the isolation of Japan from 1639 to 1854 was not absolute. In 1641, the Dutch received exclusive European commercial presence in the country, thanks to the construction of an ar
Chinas staggering rise to power does not spring from nothing, but from a past that is five millennia old. When the Europeans, led by Christopher Columbus, set off across the seas to conquer the planet, this ancient state-civilization then possessed an astonishing level of wealth and technicality. B
The year 2018 celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Meiji era, when Japan opened up to the world and to modernity. However, it was not light hearted. Because, for 200 years, this mysterious, almost secret country had closed its borders to foreigners. But in 1854 the American cannons forcibly tore
Print depicting Commodore Matthew Perry offering a railroad to the Japanese in 1853, by Utagawa Hiroshige (1797-1858) • WWW.BRIDGEMANART.COM “Having directly experienced the transition period of modern Japan makes a man feel prematurely aged; for although he now lives in modern times where the a
Quipu at the Larco Museum in Lima • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS In South America, the Incas built an immense empire whose expansion began at the beginning of the 15thth century. The Four Quarters Empire, or Tahuantinsuyu in the Quechua language, extended over the current territories of Colombia, Ecuador,
St. George (13th century), one of the rock-hewn churches in Lalibela, Ethiopia • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Established on the high plateaus of the Horn of Africa, near the western coasts of the Red Sea, the kingdom of Aksum imposed itself from the Ist century AD. AD as a trading partner in the great tra
Papermaking • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Papermaking Although the practice of writing in China is very old, it was slowed down for a long time by the use of materials such as bone, bronze or bamboo and wood tablets. Silk, better suited to writing, but very expensive, was also used from the Ve century BC.
Portrait of Saigo Takamori by Edoardo Chiossone • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS In February 1854, Commodore Matthew Perry landed in Japan to demand that this country put an end to the total isolation it had maintained for two centuries vis-à-vis foreign countries. On that day, the steam and steel of the Nor
Detail of the Huei Tzompantli, an Aztec skull tower dating from the end of the 15th century, discovered in Mexico City • AFP These are 119 new human skulls, impaled horizontally, which have just been exhumed in the basement of Mexico City, the ancient capital of the Aztecs, Tenochtitlán, which w
Samurai on horseback with his armor, saber and bow • WIKIMEDIACOMMONS 1. How did the samurai appear in Japan? The warrior caste of the samurai is linked to the history of the political organization of the country. In the middle of the IXth century, the Fujiwara family, supported by men-at-arms
In Luoyang (Henan, China), view of the excavations of the city, which was the capital of the Eastern Han and where the tomb of Emperor Liu Zhi is located • IMAGINECHINA VIA AFP An unsympathetic character emerges from oblivion in China with the discovery of his tomb. This is Liu Zhi, eleventh emp
Portrait of Ashoka Ashoka is the third emperor of the Mauryan dynasty, which, between the IVth and the IIth century BC. BC, dominated almost all of India, Pakistan and part of Afghanistan. With skill, and thanks to their military power, the Mauryas gradually spread from Pataliputra, the capital
View of the Taj Mahal at dawn • ISTOCK The Taj Mahal is one of the most famous works of art in the world and one of the emblematic constructions of the Mughal emperors dynasty in India. It is a majestic mausoleum and a place of pilgrimage erected by Shah Jahan, the fifth emperor of the Great Mug
The Bibi Khanum mosque, built between 1399 and 1404 in Samarkand, bears the name of one of Tamerlanes wives. • ISTOCKPHOTO Capital of the empire of Tamerlane, Samarkand (the city of stone, in Sogdian) was for centuries a crossing point of the Silk Road and the most important city of Central Asia
Angkor is both a sculpted music, a stone forest, a phantom basilica [...] buried under the tropical forest... For the archaeologist Bernard Groslier, one must imagine Versailles, Concorde, the Louvre, the Place des Vosges and all the most beautiful cathedrals…” In fact, one cannot understand the Khm
Lithograph from 1884 representing an Inuit family with their traditional equipment • ISTOCK From the XVIth century, the term Eskimo was used to designate a large part of the inhabitants of the arctic and subarctic regions of the globe. It is unclear whether this term originally meant raw meat ea
HMS Erebus and HMS Terror in the Arctic, by James Wilson Carmichael. 1847. National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London • WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Before the opening of the Panama Canal, the only way for ships to connect the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean was to skirt the American continent from th
After the execution in 1538 of the marshal, advance and Governor of Nueva Toledo, Diego de Almagro , at the end of the so-called War of Las Salinas, which pitted him against his old partner, Francisco Pizarro , his brother, Hernando, went to court, where he would be tried and sentenced, while his
Willem van Ruysbroeck was a Franciscan monk, better known in Spain as Guillermo de Rubruquis, sent by the King of France as ambassador to the Great Khan. A few days ago we narrated the travels of Julianus, a Dominican who in the Middle Ages traveled through Eastern Europe in search of Magna Hungary
Indonesia is officially the Republic of Indonesia, a country located in Southeast Asia. It is located between the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It includes more than 17,000 14 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, parts of Borneo and New Guinea. Indonesia is the largest island nation in the world
The independence of Catalonia is a movement that aims to establish a country in the region of Catalonia, which is currently in Spain. Various attempts at separation from Spain, often through war, have been made by Catalans throughout history. In the 21st century, however, the population has sough