Jose Betancourt
World History
10/26/12
Dr. Andrews
Eurasia
Social Hierarchies:
500 B.C.E-500 C.E
During this time civilizations were becoming more
stable and the same civilizations, which were becoming more stable, were having
strict rules and laws that were there to aid them in control of their surplus.
One other interesting fact that was becoming a reality of the ancient times and
the hierarchies were the idea of education. “Emperor Wu Di established an
imperial academy where potential officials were trained as scholars and
immersed in Chinese classical texts dealing with history, literature, art and
mathematics, with an emphasis on Confucian teachings”(WOTW.156). This is simply
the most interesting fact of the time in my own view of the reading. To want
and to desire knowing about the past, understanding the present rules was
probably a desire that rose in the minds of the ancients because people were
not constantly working anymore. There was more time to think, to understand,
and to study certain aspects of reality.
Although
all may seem perfect and ideal, the world that people lived in from 500 BCE to
500 CE was also a world in which people suffered a lot due mostly to lack of
knowledge regarding the making of laws and being able to change the laws
because of ones status. The other reason that surely affected the people during
the Eurasian empires and the inventions of the hierarchies were the natural
catastrophes. “Towards the end of the second century C.E., wandering bands of
peasants began to join together as floods along the yellow river and resulting
epidemics compounded the misery of landlessness and poverty”(159). It is simply
clear that during this time the reason to join a group and create families were
because been alone would cause either death or hunger in the case of those who
chose to live an individual life (not having support was probably not an option
for those who lacked the basic resources).
Some
other idea that prevailed during the Eurasian Social Hierarchies was the Caste
system. Where people and humans were organized into hierarchies decided usually
by the birth. In modern understanding, those ideas are atrocious. In the past
the reasons of having those hierarchies were to control and to have few amounts
of people on top of the hierarchy. Sort of like a kingdom. In this case how much money or
property parents left for their children divide the classes. Even though the
caste system seems like some atrocious way of doing hierarchy, there were some
reasons to have the caste system. One of the main reasons that it is very interesting
of why the Indian hierarchies had a caste system is because the “Caste
represented a means of accommodating the many migrating or invading peoples who
entered the subcontinent”(164). The caste system in these terms was different
for the Chinese. For the Chinese, “The Process of assimilation was quite
different in china, however; incorporation into Chinese cavitations meant
becoming Chinese ethnically, linguistically, and culturally”(164). This means
that the caste system had reasons at least in the past. That does not mean that
the caste system is justified. At least in the present there is no need for India
or china to have a caste system, although some countries may still hold those
‘religious” beliefs, that honestly harm the psychological state of the women
and children of the countries in which the caste system is practiced.
Lastly,
The Eurasian hierarchies of were also characterized by religious,
philosophical, and political ideals that somehow shaped the society and culture
of the times.
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