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The Story of Civilization

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The Story of Civilization
AuthorWill Durant
Ariel Durant
LanguageEnglish
SubjectHistory
PublisherSimon and Schuster
Publication date
1935-1975
ISBNISBN 0-671-21988-X Parameter error in {{ISBNT}}: invalid character

The Story of Civilization by Will and Ariel Durant (ISBN 0-671-21988-X) is an eleven-volume set of books. It was written over a lifetime, and it totals two million words. The series is incomplete: in the first book of the series (Our Oriental Heritage, which covers the history of the East through 1933), Mr. Durant stated that he wanted to include the history of the West through the early 20th century. However, the series ends with The Age of Napoleon since the Durants died before any additional volumes could be completed.

Series Outline

Khufu's Pyramid (4th dynasty) and Great Sphinx of Giza (c.2500 BC or perhaps earlier)

I. Our Oriental Heritage (1935)

This volume covers "The Orient." In 1935, this term referred to all of history east of Greece or earlier than Homer.

  1. The Establishment of Civilization
    1. The Conditions of Civilization
    2. The Economic Elements of Civilization
    3. The Political Elements of Civilization
    4. The Moral Elements of Civilization
    5. The Mental Elements of Civilization
    6. The Prehistoric Beginnings of Civilization
  2. The Near East
    1. Sumeria
    2. Egypt
    3. Babylonia
    4. Assyria
    5. A Motley of Nations
    6. Judea
    7. Persia
  3. India and Her Neighbors
    1. The Foundations of India
    2. Buddha
    3. From Alexander to Aurangzeb
    4. The Life of the People
    5. The Paradise of the Gods
    6. The Life of the Mind
    7. The Literature of India
    8. Indian Art
    9. A Christian Epilogue
  4. The Far East
    1. The Age of the Philosophers
    2. The Age of the Poets
    3. The Age of the Artists
    4. The People and the State
    5. Revolution and Renewal
  5. Japan
    1. The Makers of Japan
    2. The Political and Moral Foundations
    3. The Mind and Art of Old Japan
    4. The New Japan
File:PICT4534.JPG
Bust of Pericles after Cresilas, Altes Museum, Berlin

II. The Life of Greece (1939)

This volume covers Ancient Greece.

  1. Aegean Prelude: 3500-1000 BC
    1. Crete
    2. Before Agamemnon
    3. The Heroic Age
  2. The Rise of Greece: 1000-480 BC
    1. Sparta
    2. Athens
    3. The Great Migration
    4. The Greeks in the West
    5. The Gods of Greece
    6. The Common Culture of Early Greece
    7. The Struggle for Freedom
  3. The Golden Age: 480-399 BC
    1. Pericles and the Democratic Experiment
    2. Work and Wealth in Athens
    3. The Morals and Manners of the Athenians
    4. The Art of Periclean Greece
    5. The Advancement of Learning
    6. The Conflict of Philosophy and Religion
    7. The Literature of the Golden Age
    8. The Suicide of Greece
  4. The Decline and Fall of Greek Freedom: 399-322 BC
    1. Philip
    2. Letters and Arts in the Fourth Century
    3. The Zenith of Philosophy
    4. Alexander
  5. The Hellenistic Dispersion: 322-146 BC
    1. Greece and Macedonia
    2. Hellenism and the Orient
    3. Egypt and the West
    4. Books
    5. The Art of the Dispersion
    6. The Climax of Greek Science
    7. The Surrender of Philosophy
    8. The Coming of Rome
Epilogue: Our Greek Heritage
File:Julius caesar.jpg
Bust of Julius Caesar

III. Caesar and Christ (1944)

  1. Introduction: Origins
    1. Etruscan Prelude: 800-508 BC
  2. The Republic: 508-30 BC
    1. The Struggle for Democracy: 508-264 BC
    2. Hannibal Against Rome: 264 BC-202 BC
    3. Stoic Rome: 508-202 BC
    4. The Greek Conquest: 201 BC-146 BC
  3. The Revolution: 145-30 BC
    1. The Agrarian Revolt: 145-78 BC
    2. The Oligarchic Reaction: 77]]-60 BC
    3. Literature Under the Revolution: 145-30 BC
    4. Caesar: 100-44 BC
    5. Antony: 44-30 BC
  4. The Principate: 30 BC-AD 192
    1. Augustan Statesmanship: 30 BC-AD 14
    2. The Golden Age: 30 BC-AD 18
    3. The Other Side of Monarchy: AD 14-96
    4. The Silver Age: AD 14-96
    5. Rome at Work: AD 14-96
    6. Rome and Its Art: 30 BC-AD 96
    7. Epicurean Rome: 30 BC-AD 96
    8. Roman Law: 146 BC-AD 192
    9. The Philosopher Kings: AD 96-180
    10. Life and Thought in the Second Century: AD 96-192
  5. The Empire: AD 146-AD 192
    1. Italy
    2. Civilizing the West
    3. Roman Greece
    4. The Hellenistic Revival
    5. Rome and Judea: 132 BC-AD 135
  6. The Youth of Christianity: 4 BC-AD 325
    1. Jesus: 4 BC-AD 30
    2. The Apostles: AD 30-95
    3. The Growth of the Church: AD 96-305
    4. The Collapse of the Empire: AD 193-305
    5. The Triumph of Christianity: AD 306-325
Epilogue
The Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, a city considered holy by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

IV. The Age of Faith (1950)

This volume covers the Middle Ages.

  1. The Byzantine Zenith: AD 325-565
    1. Julian the Apostate: 332-63
    2. The Triumph of the Barbarians: 325-476
    3. The Progress of Christianity: 364-451
    4. Europe Takes Form: 325-529
    5. Justinian: 527-65
    6. Byzantine Civilization: 337-565
    7. The Persians: 224-641
  2. Islamic Civilization: AD 569-1258
    1. Mohammed: 569-632
    2. The Koran
    3. The Sword of Islam: 632-1058
    4. The Islamic Scene: 632-1058
    5. Thought and Art in Eastern Islam: 632-1058
    6. Western Islam: 641-1086
    7. The Grandeur and Decline of Islam: 1058-1258
  3. Judaic Civilization: AD 135-1300
    1. The Talmud: 135-500
    2. The Medieval Jews: 500-1300
    3. The Mind and Heart of the Jew: 500-1300
  4. The Dark Ages: AD 566-1095
    1. The Byzantine World: 566-1095
    2. The Decline of the West: 566-1066
    3. The Rise of the North: 566-1066
    4. Christianity in Conflict: 529-1085
    5. Feudalism and Chivalry: 600-1200
  5. The Climax of Christianity: 1095-1300
    1. The Crusades: 1095-1291
    2. The Economic Revolution: 1066-1300
    3. The Recovery of Europe: 1095-1300
    4. Pre-Renaissance Italy: 1057-1308
    5. The Roman Catholic Church: 1095-1294
    6. The Early Inquisition: 1000-1300
    7. Monks and Friars: 1095-1300
    8. The Morals and Manners of Christendom: 700-1300
    9. The Resurrection of the Arts: 1095-1300
    10. The Gothic Flowering: 1095-1300
    11. Medieval Music: 326-1300
    12. The Transmission of Knowledge: 1000-1300
    13. Abélard: 1079-1142
    14. The Adventure of Reason: 1120-1308
    15. Christian Science: 1095-1300
    16. The Age of Romance: 1100-1300
    17. Dante: 1265-1321
Epilogue: The Medieval Legacy
Venus of Urbino by Titian, one of the Renaissance's most distinguished artists

V. The Renaissance (1953)

This volume covers the Renaissance.

  1. Prelude: 1300-77
    1. The Age of Petrarch and Boccaccio: 1304-75
    2. The Popes in Avignon: 1309-77
  2. The Florentine Renaissance: 1378-1534
    1. The Rise of the Medici: 1378-1464
    2. The Golden Age: 1464-92
    3. Savonarola and the Republic: 1492-1534
  3. Italian Pageant: 1378-1534
    1. Milan
    2. Leonardo da Vinci
    3. Tuscany and Umbria
    4. Mantua
    5. Ferrara
    6. Venice and Her Realm
    7. Emilia and the Marches
    8. The Kingdom of Naples
  4. The Roman Renaissance: 1378-1521
    1. The Crisis in the Church: 1378-1521
    2. The Renaissance Captures Rome: 1447-92
    3. The Borgias
    4. Julius II: 1503-13
    5. Leo X: 1513-21
  5. Debacle
    1. The Intellectual Revolt
    2. The Moral Release
    3. The Political Collapse: 1494-1534
  6. Finale: 1534-76
    1. Sunset in Venice
    2. The Waning of The Renaissance
  7. Envoi
Luther at age 46

VI. The Reformation (1957)

This volume covers the Protestant Reformation.

  1. From Wyclif to Luther: 1300-1517
    1. The Roman Catholic Church: 1300-1517
    2. England, Wyclif, Chaucer, and the Great Revolt: 1308-1400
    3. France Besieged: 1300-1461
    4. Gallia Phoenix: 1453-1515
    5. England in the Fifteenth Century: 1399-1509
    6. Episode in Burgundy: 1363-1515
    7. Middle Europe: 1300-1460
    8. The Western Slavs: 1300-1516
    9. The Ottoman Tide: 1300-1516
    10. Portugal Inaugurates the Commercial Revolution: 1300-1517
    11. Spain: 1300-1517
    12. The Growth of Knowledge: 1300-1517
    13. The Conquest of the Sea: 1492-1517
    14. Erasmus the Forerunner: 1469-1517
    15. Germany on the Eve of Luther: 1453-1517
  2. The Religious Revolution: 1517-64
    1. Luther: The Reformation in Germany: 1517-24
    2. The Social Revolution: 1522-36
    3. Zwingli: The Reformation in Switzerland: 1477-1531
    4. Luther and Erasmus: 1517-36
    5. The Faiths at War: 1525-60
    6. John Calvin: 1509-64
    7. Francis I and the Reformation in France: 1515-59
    8. Henry VIII and Cardinal Wolsey: 1509-29
    9. Henry VIII and Thomas More: 1529-35
    10. Henry VIII and the Monasteries: 1535-47
    11. Edward VI and Mary Tudor: 1547-58
    12. From Robert Bruce to John Knox: 1300-1561
    13. The Migrations of Reform: 1517-60
  3. The Strangers in the Gate: 1300-1566
    1. The Unification of Russia: 1300-1584
    2. The Genius of Islam: 1258-1520
    3. Suleiman the Magnificent: 1520-66
    4. The Jews: 1300-1564
  4. Behind the Scenes: 1517-1564
    1. The Life of the People
    2. Music: 1300-1564
    3. Literature in the Age of Rabelais
    4. Art in the Age of Holbein
    5. Science in the Age of Copernicus
  5. The Counter Reformation: 1517-65
    1. The Church and Reform
    2. The Popes and the Council
Epilogue: Renaissance, Reformation, and Enlightenment
Portrait of Galileo Galilei by Giusto Sustermans

VII. The Age of Reason Begins (1961)

This volume covers the Age of Reason

  1. The English Ecstasy: 1558-1648
    1. The Great Queen: 1558-1603
    2. Merrie England: 1558-1625
    3. On the Slopes of Parnassus: 1558-1603
    4. William Shakespeare: 1564-1616
    5. Mary Queen of Scots: 1542-87
    6. James VI and I: 1567-1625
    7. The Summons to Reason: 1558-1649
    8. The Great Rebellion: 1625-49
  2. The Faiths Fight For Power: 1556-1648
    1. Alma Mater Italia: 1564-1648
    2. Grandeur and Decadence of Spain: 1556-1665
    3. The Golden Age of Spanish Literature: 1556-1665
    4. The Golden Age of Spanish Art: 1556-1682
    5. The Duel for France: 1559-74
    6. Henry IV: 1553-1610
    7. Richelieu: 1585-1642
    8. France Beneath the Wars: 1559-1643
    9. The Revolt of the Netherlands: 1558-1648
    10. From Rubens to Rembrandt: 1555-1660
    11. The Rise of the North: 1559-1648
    12. The Islamic Challenge: 1566-1648
    13. Imperial Armageddon: 1564-1648
  3. The Tentatives of Reason: 1558-1648
    1. Science in the Age of Galileo: 1558-1648
    2. Philosophy Reborn: 1564-1648
Louis XIV King of France, by Hyacinthe Rigaud, 1701

VIII. The Age of Louis XIV (1963)

This volume overs the period of Louis XIV of France.

  1. The French Zenith: 1643-1715
    1. The Sun Rises: 1643-84
    2. The Crucible of Faith: 1643-1715
    3. The King and the Arts: 1643-1715
    4. Molière: 1622-73
    5. The Classic Zenith in French Literature: 1643-1715
    6. Tragedy in the Netherlands: 1649-1715
  2. England: 1649-1714
    1. Cromwell: 1649-60
    2. Milton: 1608-74
    3. The Restoration: 1660-85
    4. The Glorious Revolution: 1685-1714
    5. From Dryden to Swift: 1660-1714
  3. The Periphery: 1648-1715
    1. The Struggle for the Baltic: 1648-1721
    2. Peter the Great: 1698-1725
    3. The Changing Empire: 1648-1715
    4. The Fallow South: 1648-1715
    5. The Jewish Enclaves: 1564-1715
  4. The Intellectual Adventure: 1648-1715
    1. From Superstition to Scholarship: 1648-1715
    2. The Scientific Quest: 1648-1715
    3. Isaac Newton: 1642-1727
    4. English Philosophy: 1648-1715
    5. Faith and Reason in France: 1648-1715
    6. Spinoza: 1632-77
    7. Leibniz: 1646-1716
  5. France Against Europe: 1683-1715
    1. The Sun Sets
File:Voltaire Largilliere.jpg
Voltaire, portrait after Nicholas de Largilliere

IX. The Age of Voltaire (1965)

This volume covers the period of "the enlightenment, as exemplified by Voltaire.

  1. France: The Regency
  2. England: 1714-56
    1. The People
    2. The Rulers
    3. Religion and Philosophy
    4. Literature and the Stage
    5. Art and Music
  3. France: 1723-56
    1. The People and the State
    2. Morals and Manners
    3. The Worship of Beauty
    4. The Play of the Mind
    5. Voltaire in France
  4. Middle Europe: 1713-56
    1. The Germany of Bach
    2. Frederick the Great and Maria Theresa
    3. Switzerland and Voltaire
  5. The Advancement of Learning: 1715-89
    1. The Scholars
    2. The Scientific Advance
    3. Medicine
  6. The Attack Upon Christianity: 1730-74
    1. The Atheists
    2. Diderot and the Encyclopedie
    3. Diderot Proteus
    4. The Spreading Campaign
    5. Voltaire and Christianity
    6. The Triumph of the Philosophes
Jean-Jacques Rousseau

X. Rousseau and Revolution (1967)

This volume centers on Jean-Jacques Rousseau and his times. It received the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction in 1968.

  1. Prelude
    1. Rousseau Wanderer: 1712-56
    2. The Seven Years' War: 1756-63
  2. France Before the Deluge: 1757-74
    1. The Life of the State
    2. The Art of Life
    3. Voltaire Patriarch: 1758-78
    4. Rousseau Romantic: 1756-62
    5. Rousseau Philosopher
    6. Rousseau Outcast: 1762-67
  3. The Catholic South: 1715-89
    1. Italia Felix: 1715-59
    2. Portugal and Pombal: 1706-82
    3. Spain and the Enlightenment: 1700-88
    4. Vale, Italia: 1760-89
    5. The Enlightenment in Austria: 1756-90
    6. Music Reformed
    7. Mozart
  4. Islam and the Slavic East: 1715-96
    1. Islam: 1715-96
    2. Russian Interlude: 1725-62
    3. Catherine the Great: 1762-96
    4. The Rape of Poland: 1715-95
  5. The Protestant North: 1756-89
    1. Frederick's Germany: 1756-86
    2. Kant: 1724-1804
    3. Roads to Weimar: 1733-87
    4. Weimar in Flower: 1775-1805
    5. Goethe Nestor: 1805-32
    6. The Jews: 1715-89
    7. From Geneva to Stockholm
  6. Johnson's England: 1756-89
    1. The Industrial Revolution
    2. The Political Drama: 1756-92
    3. The English People: 1756-89
    4. The Age of Reynolds: 1756-90
    5. England's Neighbors: 1756-89
    6. The Literary Scene: 1756-89
    7. Samuel Johnson: 1709-84
  7. The Collapse of Feudal France: 1774-89
    1. The Final Glory: 1774-83
    2. Death and the Philosophers: 1774-1807
    3. On the Eve: 1774-89
    4. The Anatomy of Revolution: 1774-89
    5. The Political Debacle: 1783-89
  8. Envoi
Napoleon in His Study by Jacques-Louis David (1812)

XI. The Age of Napoleon (1975)

This volume centers on Napoleon I of France and his times.

  1. The French Revolution: 1789-99
    1. The Background of Revolution: 1774-89
    2. The National Assembly: May 4, 1789-September 30, 1791
    3. The Legislative Assembly: October 1, 1791-September 20, 1792
    4. The Convention: September 21, 1792-October 26, 1795
    5. The Directory: November 2, 1795-November 9, 1799
    6. Life Under the Revolution: 1789-99
  2. Napoleon Ascendant: 1799-1811
    1. The Consulate: November 11, 1799-May 18, 1804
    2. The New Empire: 1804-07
    3. The Mortal Realm: 1807-11
    4. Napoleon Himself
    5. Napoleonic France: 1800-1815
    6. Napoleon and the Arts
    7. Literature versus Napoleon
    8. Science and Philosophy under Napoleon
  3. Britain: 1789-1812
    1. England at Work
    2. English Life
    3. The Arts in England
    4. Science in England
    5. English Philosophy
    6. Literature in Transition
    7. The Lake Poets: 1770-1850
    8. The Rebel Poets: 1788-1824
    9. England's Neighbors: 1789-1815
    10. Pitt, Nelson, and Napoleon: 1789-1812
  4. The Challenged Kings: 1789-1812
    1. Iberia
    2. Italy and Its Conquerors: 1789-1813
    3. Austria: 1780-1812
    4. Beethoven: 1770-1827
    5. Germany and Napoleon: 1786-1811
    6. The German People: 1789-1812
    7. German Literature: 1789-1815
    8. German Philosophy: 1789-1815
    9. Around the Heartland: 1789-1812
    10. Russia: 1796-1812
  5. Finale: 1811-1815
    1. To Moscow: 1811-12
    2. To Elba: 1813-14
    3. To Waterloo: 1814-15
    4. To St. Helena
    5. To the End
    6. Afterward: 1815-40

Criticism

The Story of Civilization has been criticized by some for simplifications, rash judgements colored by personal convictions, and story-telling, and described as a careless dabbling in historical scholarship. Professor J. H. Plumb's opinion on the series was that “historical truth… can rarely be achieved outside the professional world [of historians].”[1]. Like Wikipedia, the series has been banned as a source for the game show Jeopardy! due to its frequent errors.[citation needed]

The counter to such criticism is that Durant’s purpose in writing the series was not to create a definitive scholarly production but to make a large amount of information accessible and comprehensible to the educated public in the form of a comprehensive "composite history." Given the massive undertaking in creating these 11 volumes over 50 years, errors and incompleteness have occured; yet for an attempt as large in breadth of time and scope as this, there are no similar works to compare.

As Mr. Durant says in his first work, Our Oriental Heritage, "I wish to tell as much as I can, in as little space as I can, of the contributions that genius and labor have made to the cultural heritage of mankind - to chronicle and contemplate, in their causes, character and effects, the advances of invention, the varieties of economic organization, the experiments in government, the aspirations of religion, the mutations of morals and manners, the masterpieces of literature, the development of science, the wisdom of philosophy, and the achievements of art. I do not need to be told how absurd this enterprise is, nor how immodest is its very conception" . . . "Nevertheless I have dreamed that despite the many errors inevitable in this undertaking, it may be of some use to those upon whom the passion for philosophy has laid the compulsion to try to see things whole, to pursue perspective, unity and time, as well as to seek them through science in space."


"Like philosophy, such a venture [as the creation of these 11 volumes] has no rational excuse, and is at best but a brave stupidity; but let us hope that, like philosophy, it will always lure some rash spirits into its fatal depths."

Footnotes

  1. ^ J. H. Plumb, New York Review of Books; quoted in Arnold Beichman, “Is History Only for the Historians?” The Christian Science Monitor, 28 October 1965.

See also

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