Map of the World 946 BC until 1000 AD

John Ballard came across this at Coming Anarchy. I like their title, Two Thousand Years of Political Geography, better than the official designation. It really is more about political geography than map-making.

Three or four pleasant music tracks play in the background. The transitions sounded clumbsy but no more so than what happens on the map. As this map illustrates, what we like to call progress is even more disjointed viewed retrospectively.

As I watched, my mind wandered with two flashbacks.
The first was a line I heard that stuck in my mind, described in this note from my old blog.

Contrasting old and new societies reminds me of something I heard years ago. Few people now remember Harry Golden, maverick Jewish publisher from the Sixties who wrote the Carolina Israelite.
Very witty guy.
I heard him speak once when I was in college. He delivered a great line: When Europeans were still roaming the forests, painting their bodies green, the Jews already had diabetes.

The other was something pointed out to me when I first arrived in Korea as a young GI.
In conversation about history with a Katusa soldier he politely reminded me that when Columbus discovered the New World, Seoul, the capital of Korea, was already many centuries old.

We had been discussing how different countries use natural resources. At that time the South Korean landscape was practically denuded of trees because during and following the Korean Conflict consditions were so harsh that most of the trees had been used for building or firewood. (Arbor Day was an important national observance and it had become illegal to cut trees.) 

He was not the first Korean to remind me that America is a new country in the history of the world. To measure her greatness, check back when people have lived here a thousand years or so and see how well she fares.

It is also significant that this "map" does not include the Americas or Australia and gives Africa very short shrift.