GENERAL HISTORY.
It was characteristic of the social groups of Asia that they early attained the limit of their development and settled into grooves in which their life ran for ages. (See under ASSYRIA, BABYLONIA ; CHINESE EM PIRE. ) After the rise of the great Medo-Persian Empire under Cyrus ( TV.) , Southwestern Asia was brought into con tact with the earliest European civilization. that of the Hellenic people. and a contest for suprem acy took place. (See GREECE; and PERSIA.) This terminated by the triumphant march of Alex ander the Great (q.v.) eastward to the Indus and the establishment of the Hellenistic kingdoms. The Roman Empire gathered in this Hellenized portion of the old East. The rise of Moham medanism created a new religio-secular power in the southwest which, when the warlike Turkish tribes from the interior became dominant in the Mohammedan world, wrested all of its Asiatic provinces from the weakened Eastern Empire. The Crusades (Eleventh to Thirteenth centuries) were the last, medlieval struggle for possession between the West and the East. The rise of the Ottoman power made Asia once more a matinee to Europe. (See 11 OHA AIMED ; CALIPH; ABBAS SIDES ; OM MIADS ; SELJ VHS ; CRUSAPES ; TURKEY.) The march of events in the southwest cut off the rest of Asia completely from the Western world, depriving the latter of even such incom plete knowledge of the vast Oriental continent as was possessed in antiquity, when there were trading routes to the farther East through Bac tria. The stationary character of Asiatic civili zation, and the lack of initiative. among the mass of the people, prevented the great social and political changes that make the general Con tinental history of Europe so full of meaning. Until the advent of the European powers there was little of this general history for Asia, ex cept in connection with the great waves of con quest which rolled over the continent. These are treated in the a rtieles GENGHIS KHAN NUBLAI )III AN; MONGOL DYNASTIES; TIMUR ; and MOGUL, GREAT.
A new era opened with the rediscovery of the East by Europe in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth centuries. Portuguese navigators and traders followed in the path of Vasco da Gama (1-197-98) and established factories at Goa and Macao, and in other places. Spain took possession of the Philippines in I5115, as a result of Magellan's epochal voyage across the Pacific. The Dutch were alto among the early corners. The pushing Western nations, in pursuit of commercial ad vantage, thereafter steadily increased their in fluence and gradually acquired control of depots or considerable territory in India, the East Indies, and China. In the middle of the Eight eenth Century- an apparently- insignificant phase of the Seven Years' War was fought out in India between the English, led by Clive, and the French, under Dupleix. The fate of that country of ancient and warring nations was deter mined by the English triumph. The advance of European influence may be followed in this work through the history of the different countries affected thereby. In the meantime, the expedi tion of the Cossack partisan leader Yermak across the Urals (I5S0-82) into what is now Si beria began the steady movement of Russia into Central Asia and across the continent to the Pacific. (See RussiA; and SIBERIA. ) These lat ter movements brought the impulse of Western life into the development of Asia, and with it the complications of European politics, the sharp rivalries for political influence in the interest of commercial expansion, and the active modern competition with railway and steamship. The rapid growth of world politics has given a new significance and unity to the history of Asia. The details of this later period of transforma tion may be followed in the histories of the sev eral countries, especially CHINESE EMPIRE, JAPAN, INDIA, and Rossm. See also the article FAR EASTERN QUESTION, and the references therewith.