1. I. History and Governments
A. Ancient Greece
1. Physical geography naturally shaped the development of Ancient Greece.
a) Greece’s many mountains, islands, and seas isolated early communities and kept them fiercely independent.
2. Greek civilizations lived near the Aegean Sea for the fishing.
a) Wealthy through trade.
b) Independent territories called city-states developed throughout Greece.

2. I. History and Governments
c) Shared the same language and culture.
3. The people of Athens introduced the world’s first democracy, a political system in which all citizens share in running the government.
a) Learning and the arts also thrived in Athens.
b) Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle were great thinkers.
4. During the mid-300s, warfare weakened the Greek city-states.
a) Philip II of Macedonia conquered Greece.
b) Alexander the Great made even more conquests.

3. I. History and Governments
c) Alexander’s empire stretched from Greece to Egypt and as far east as India.
d) After Alexander died and his empire was broken up into smaller kingdoms, the Romans conquered them by 130 B.C.
B. The Roman Empire
1. Rome became a dominant power on the Italian Peninsula.
a) Rome became a republic, government in which people choose their leaders in 509 B.C.
b) Rome was led by 2 consuls who were elected by the citizens.

4. I. History and Governments
c) Senators served for life.
d) Code of laws.
2. About 200 B.C., Roman armies began seizing territories throughout the Mediterranean region.
a) The conquered were invited to become Roman citizens.
3. As the Roman Republic expanded, it evolved into the Roman Empire.
a) The first emperor, or all powerful ruler, was Augustus, who gained that position in 27 B.C.

5. I. History and Governments
b) Augustus’ rule brought a period of peace known as the Pax Romana.
C. Christianity
1. During the Pax Romana, Christianity was developing in Palestine in the eastern part of the Roman Empire.
a) Jesus taught a message of love and forgiveness.
b) Fearing unrest, the Roman authorities executed Jesus.
c) Christians believe that Jesus rose from the dead three days after being crucified.

6. I. History and Governments
2. Peter and Paul established the Christian church in Rome.
a) Rome persecuted Christians at first, but then adopted Christianity as its official religion in A.D. 392.
D. Rome’s Decline
1. By the late A.D. 300s, the Roman Empire was in decline.
a) Rivals struggled to become emperor, and Germanic groups attacked from the north.
b) About A.D. 395, the empire was divided into eastern and western parts.

7. I. History and Governments
c) The eastern part remained prosperous and eventually became the Byzantine Empire.
d) The western part was overthrown in A.D. 476 by Germanic groups.
2. Rome had great influence on Europe and the West.
a) It later influenced the United States.
b) The Latin language of Rome influenced languages like French, Spanish, Italian, and Romanian.
c) Architecture was also influenced.
E. A Christian Europe

8. I. History and Governments
1. During the Middle Ages, Christianity held a central place in people’s lives.
a) The Roman Catholic Church headed by the pope.
b) The Eastern Orthodox Church headed by the Byzantine Empire’s emperor.
c) Roman Catholic Church spread Roman culture to Germanic groups while the Byzantine Empire spread Greek and Orthodoxy to Slavic groups.
F. The Middle Ages
1. About A.D. 800, a Germanic king named Charlemagne united much of western Europe.

9. I. History and Governments
a) After his death, his kingdom broke apart.
b) Feudalism sprang up in the 1000s.
c) Kings gave land to nobles and the nobles gave military service in return.
d) Most western Europeans were poor peasants who farmed the lands for the rich land owners.
G. The Crusades
1. The Christian faith united Europeans.
a) The religion of Islam was on the rise.
b) Muslims gained control of Palestine, the holy land of Christianity.
c) Nobles in western Europe gathered armies starting in the 1000s to take back the holy land.

10. I. History and Governments
d) These crusades were only partly successful and Muslims recaptured the region.
2. The Crusades had a major impact on Europeans.
a) Trade greatly increased.
b) Feudalism gradually withered away.
c) Many of these kingdoms became Europe’s modern day nation-states.
3. Muslim-Christian conflict arose again in Spain in the late 1400s.
a) Spanish rulers forced out Muslims and united the country in 1492.
4. In the 1300s, Europeans were battling the bubonic plague (the black death).

11. I. History and Governments
a) This led to a lack of people in the labor force.
b) Wages increased and this led to another force against feudalism.
H. The Renaissance
1. Interest in art and learning was revived.
a) Ways of thinking changed so much between 1350 and 1550 that this period was known as the Renaissance or “rebirth”.
2. The Renaissance thrived in Italian city-states like Florence, Rome, and Venice.
a) Success in trade led to the financing of poets, painters, and writers.

12. I. History and Governments
b) People also took an interest of the cultures of Ancient Greece and Rome.
c) Importance to the individual.
I. The Reformation
1. During the 1500s, the Renaissance idea of humanism led to think about religion in a new way.
2. In 1517, Martin Luther, a German religious leader, set out to reform, or correct, certain Church practices.
a) The Pope in Rome did not accept Luther’s ideas so Luther broke away from the Church.
b) Luther’s ideas sparked a religious movement called the Reformation, which led to new forms of Christianity known as Protestantism.

13. I. History and Governments
c) Northern Europe = Protestantism, Southern Europe = Catholicism.
3. Wars between Roman Catholics and Protestants soon swept through Europe.
a) The Reformation shattered the religious unity of Europe.
b) It also strengthened the power of monarchs who soon challenged the Church.
J. European Explorations
1. European seafarers began a series of ocean voyages that led to discoveries and trade.

14. I. History and Governments
a) Portugal and Spain led the way in exploration.
2. In the Americas, Spain grew wealthy from gold and other resources.
a) Christopher Columbus
b) Its success led to other countries like France, the Netherlands, and England joining in on the age of exploration.
c) European colonies in Asia, Africa, and the Americas.
d) Sadly, Europeans harmed the cultures in which they settled.
K. The Enlightenment

15. I. History and Governments
1. Educated Europeans turned to science as a way to explain the world.
a) Copernicus concluded that the sun was at the center of our solar system.
b) Galileo determined that knowledge could be obtained by observing and measuring the natural world.
c) These ideas sparked a revolution, or sweeping change, in the way people thought.
d) Reason dominated thought and this led to the 1700s being known as the Age of Enlightenment.
2. John Locke, an English enlightenment thinker, came up with the principle of life, liberty, and property.

16. I. History and Governments
a) Citizens can overthrow the government.
3. The people of France conducted a revolution in 1789.
a) They overthrew their king, executed him, and set up a republic.
b) Napoleon Bonaparte, a brilliant French general, gained power and made himself emperor.
c) His armies conquered much of Europe until an allied group of European nations defeated Napoleon in 1815.
4. Political revolutions continued in Europe throughout the 1800s.
a) By 1900, most countries limited the powers of rulers.

17. I. History and Governments
L. Industry and Conflict
1. An Economic revolution was also transforming Europe.
a) The Industrial Revolution started in Britain.
b) As it spread through Europe, it changed how people lived and worked.
2. People began using machines and building factories.
a) Produce goods faster at a lower cost.
b) Travel improved.
c) Food was produced at a higher rate which led to population growth.
3. Many people left farms to find work in cities.

18. I. History and Governments
a) Cities became overcrowded and life became grim.
4. The Industrial Revolution also made European countries more powerful.
a) New weapons and better strategies in war.
b) World War I ( ) and World War II ( ).
c) The holocaust, or mass killing of a certain ethnic or religious group, of the Jewish people in Europe left 6 million Jews dead.
5. After WWII, the U.S. and the Soviet Union (Russia) became rivals in the “Cold War”.
a) This war was not a war of bullets and bombs.

19. I. History and Governments
b) Western Europe allied with the United States, while eastern Europe allied with the Soviet Union.
c) The Soviet Union was a Communist nation which means it was a government that controls the ways of producing goods.
M. A New Era For Europe
1. In 1989, Eastern European nations forced their Communist governments out of power and then set up new democracies.
a) 1990, East and West Germany merged.
b) 1991, the Soviet Union broke apart.
2. In 1993, several democracies in Western Europe formed the European Union or EU.

20. I. History and Governments
a) The goal of the organization, which now includes Eastern European countries, was to unite Europe.
b) Goods can move freely over borders.
c) It also established the European Union currency known as the euro.