Includes bibliographical references and index.

Origins -- Small kingdoms and mighty empires in the Near East -- The legacy of Greece -- Hellenistic diffusion -- The rise of Rome -- The pax romana -- The making of Europe -- The carolingian world : Europe in the early middle ages -- Revival, recovery, reform and expansion -- Life in Christian Europe in the high middle ages -- The creativity and vitality of the high middle ages -- The crisis of the later middle ages -- European society in the age of the renaissance -- Reform and renewal in the christian church -- The age of religious wars and European expansion -- Absolutism and constitutionalism in western Europe (ca 1589-1715) -- Absolutism in Eastern Europe to 1740 -- Toward a new world-view -- The expansion of Europe in the eighteenth century -- The changing life of the people -- The revolution in politics, 1775-1815 -- The revolution in energy and industry -- Ideologies and upheavals, 1815-1850 -- Life in the emerging urban society -- The age of nationalism, 1850-1914 -- The west and the world -- The great break : war and revolution -- The age of anxiety -- Dictatorships and the second World War -- Cold war conflicts and social transformations, 1945-1985 -- Revolution, rebuilding, and new challenges : 1985 to the present.