Day of Empire Essay

Day of Empire Essay

In Day Of Empire, Amy Chua throughout the book explains the rises and falls of the most powerful hyper powers, large empires being able to maintain large areas while being stable in history. Her thesis of the book states tolerance was the rise and fall of the first empires in history. Where tolerance is the cause and decline of an empire. The empires had tolerance, Chua explains in her book that tolerance is the freedom of the people to do as they please and coexist with each other no matter the religion or even ethnical background which is what led to the rise of the empires. At the same time, tolerance led to the decline through the intolerance of the leaders as well as too much tolerance, where as the more a empire became diverse the harder it was to become unified and help fix problems. Intolerance where as leaders changed as time went on the more ignorant and greedy they became, they wanted things their way as well as to their standards. They set rules and made the people change their way of life which led to the fall of the hyperpower because of the rebellion of the people and other powers conquering. The great Persian empire ruled from 559 to 330 BCE founded Cyrus the great. Cyrus was very tolerant towards religion and explored alternative cultures as well as allowing the conquered people to join him. In 550 BCE, Cyrus defeated Astyages (his grandfather) and took over Assyria, Mesopotamia, Syria, Armenia and Cappadocia. In 539, Cyrus became the ruler of the largest empire to ever exist after conquering Lydian, Median, and Babylonian. Cambyses took over the empire after Cyrus died and ruled from 530-522 BCE, expanding the empire. Darius the great ruled from 522-486 BCE. Darius helped the empire increase in tolerance. He encouraged the people to do what they wanted. When he conquered people he encouraged them to join him and benefitted off them joining by increasing diversity throughout the kingdom and used their skills and resources to help the kingdom as well. As to the fall of the empire, Xerxes (Darius' son) played a major role in the fall. He as very intolerant to the people. Darius wanted a more unified empire while Xerxes didn't follow his footsteps. He treated the Egyptians harshly which caused them to revolt against him and was called "Villian Xerxes." In 482 BCE, Babylon rebelled against him and sent his son in law to ransack temples and give land to the Persians. The true fall of the empire is when Greece invaded the empire and people turned to him to be a ruler since Xerxes was such a foul leader. Chua's thesis in the first chapter is supported because she shows that the tolerance of the Persians lead to it's rise and the leaders intolerance lead to is disintegration. The empire had many different social, political, and economical effects. The Achaemenid kingdom grew its kingdom using a political strategy “decapitating” where the new leadership is replaced by his own. Diversity was encouraged. The Achaemenids were religiously tolerant, helping other religions such as the Jews. The Achaemenid’s rule resulted in a taxation system, communication system, a unified currency, and even mail services. The Greek empire also had many impacts during the time. Using tolerance, Alexander created the biggest army the world has ever known. The Greeks also became one of the richest empires in the world by using the skills and talents of the people they conquered instead of killing them. In 753 BCE, the Roman Empire was founded by Romulus and was so successful that the empire lasted for more than two millennia. The Roman Empire is an example of how an empire can fail, due extreme intolerance which is what led to conflict between the Christians and the pagans. But due to tolerance, Rome had grown and became the largest state in Europe by 275 BCE. Tolerance was a dramatic role in the growth of Rome. The cultural and religious tolerance of the empire, made foreigners want to be Roman, which essentially made Rome one of the most successful civilizations to ever exist. The main sources of intolerance of the empire, came from Christianity. During 300 CE, Christianity spread across the empire. The people were intolerant of the religion, but as it grew across the empire it became the main religion, while it started to become intolerant to others. Many of the other religions in the empire began to rebel and riot against Christianity become so widely accepted and eventually splitting the empire and that lead it to the fall of the empire. Chua explains that the rise and fall of the Roman Empire was due to tolerance which is her thesis, tolerance built up Rome but as time went on a single religion doomed the fall of the empire by people revolting against the empire for forcing a religion on them. Rome was an economic globalization with open markets, and free trade. Rome became an free-trade zone trading goods to other continents. Rome’s economy extended to the Far East, traveling even to the Silk Road. Items travelled as well as the skilled and talented people who wanted to be a part of Rome. Rome offered many opportunities for distant regions. One of Rome’s many achievements is its citizenship system, which helped many foreign people join Rome’s glory. Rome also had a major impact on religion. It spread Christianity to every part of its empire, making Christianity one of the predominant religions in the world. China’s Tang Dynasty was established in 618 CE because Emperor Taizong (Li Shimin) wanted to create a empire where the Chinese and barbarians would be equal, with this being his goal he became was the first emperor. Taizong became the first Chinese ruler to establish power over the steppes in 630 CE. Taizong was astonishingly tolerant of other religions. He welcomed Buddhism as well as new, religions that foreigners brought from the west. After his death, others were throned, but the next important figure in the empires history was Ming Huang. Along with Taizong, he was known for his tolerance of differences, like religious and cultural differences that came along with foreigners . Because of the tremendous amounts of tolerance throughout the empire, many groups began to disobey the Emperor, where he responded by depending on the foreign military. These groups began to feel manipulated as well as used and useless to the empire, they rebelled quickly on the Chinese , where this rebellion led to the fall of the Tang Empire slowly. The Tang Empire established tremendous amounts of economical achievements, because of their tolerance with foreign relations which is how the Chinese expanded their economic power, helping to extend the routes to Africa and more west. The dynasty was a center of learning and high art. Art and culture , was radiating and growing throughout entire Eastern Asia. The Tang Empire had an effects on other empires, such as the Umayyad caliphate in the Middle East. This helped create many foreign relations, affecting a lot of the world aside from the empire at the time. In the final chapter of part 1, Chua explains the Great Mongol Empire. Temujin, also known as Genghis Khan, began the Mongol Empire by uniting all the people of the steppe who used to fight with each other but became united through Genghis Khan’s tolerance. When he conquered new tribes, kingdoms, and groups, they were given a chance to become a part of the Mongols. Genghis Khan ruled the entire steppe by 1206, but decided to continue to keep conquering eastward. By 1215, his conquest of northern China was complete. When a new city was conquered, he obtained in the skill and talent of the people and way of life, using them to his advantage. Khan was also religiously tolerant, allowing anyone to worship whomever they desired. In 1227 when Genghis Khan died, the Mongolian empire was left to Ogodei, Khans third eldest son, who spent more than he gained, which led to the decision of conquering new lands. His decision to split the Mongols when attempting to conquer Europe and Southern china led to their downfall. Half of the army was sent to conquer Europe, and the other half to conquer southern China. Intolerance played a major role in their victory over Europe. The Europeans who were Christians saw the Mongol invasion as the Jew’s fault, which led to intolerance that lead to wars that divided Europe, making it easier to conquer for the Mongols. Later, Genghis Khan’s grandsons ruled the rest of the world, including the Middle East and southern China. The rule of the Great Mongol Empire ended in 1368 when the new Ming rulers, fueled by intolerance, sent the descendants of Khan running back to the steppe. The Mongols had an enormous impact on the world. Their tolerance of religions and ethnicities made it one of the most diverse empires ever known. Not only socially but economically, they had an impact on society and also trade. They conquered land of Asia, Europe, and also the Middle East more closely than ever before. Trading increased between the land, and cultural items spread from rapidly one place to another. The Mongols helped create the world as we know it. Day of Empire explains that letting people be diverse and free to do as they please but still have set rules is how an empire or group can rise up to be very powerful predominant group. The longer the group has control and power over its people as well as power in general it can allow the group to become a superpower controlling a lot of the land around it and the world in general. To become a hyper power the group needs to have military, technology, as well as economical dominance on a world scale which all of the empires throughout part one had. The fall of the empires had to do with too much tolerance, too much diversity led to un-unified people and created more fights and chaos along the people than good in the long run. Part One of this book is only the beginning of many other empires to come and follow in these footsteps. History repeats itself and our job is to learn from it and prevents major flaws from happening again.