CCoommppaarraattiivvee CCiivviilliizzaattiioonnss RReevviieeww Volume 17 Article 4 Number 17 Fall 1987 10-1-1987 CCeennttrraall CCiivviillzzaattiioonn David Wilkinson University of California, Los Angeles Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/ccr RReeccoommmmeennddeedd CCiittaattiioonn Wilkinson, David (1987) "Central Civilzation," Comparative Civilizations Review: Vol. 17 : No. 17 , Article 4. Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/ccr/vol17/iss17/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Comparative Civilizations Review by an authorized editor of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact scholarsarchive@byu.edu, ellen_amatangelo@byu.edu. Wilkinson: Central Civilzation CENTRAL CIVILIZATION DAVID WILKINSON Today there exists on the Earth only one civilization, a single global civilization. As recently as the nineteenth century several independent civilizations still existed (i.e. those centered on China, Japan, and the West); now there remains but one. Central Civilization. The single global civilization is the lineal de- scendant of, or rather I should say the current manifestation of, a civilization that emerged about 1500 B.C. in the Near East when Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilizations collided and fused. This new fusional entity has since then expanded over the entire planet and absorbed, on unequal terms, all other previously independent civilizations. I label this entity "Central" civilization. The other independent civilizations that have existed are listed in Table 1: their absorption is illus- TABLE 1 A ROSTER OF FOURTEEN CIVILIZATIONS (in approximate order of incorporation into Central Civilization) Civilization Duration Terminus 1. Mesopotamian before 3000BC—c. 1500BC Coupled with Egyptian to form Central 2. Egyptian before 3100 BC- 1500 BC Coupled with Mesopo- tamian to form Central 3. Aegean c. 2700 BC—c. 560 BC Engulfed by Central 4. Indie c. 2300 BC—c. AD 1000 Engulfed by Central 5. Irish c. AD 450—c. 1050 Engulfed by Central 6. Mexican before 1100 BC—c. AD 1520 Engulfed by Central 7. Peruvian before c. 200 BC—c. AD 1530 Engulfed by Central 8. Chibchan ? —c. AD 1530 Engulfed by Central 9. Indonesian before AD 700—c. 1550 Engulfed by Central 10. West African c. AD 350—c. 1550 Engulfed by Central 11. Mississippian c. AD 700—c. 1590 Destroyed (Pestilence?) 12. Far Eastern before 1500 BC—c. AD 1850 Engulfed by Central 13. Japanese c. AD 650—c. 1850 Engulfed by Central 14. Central c. 1500 BC—Present Published by BYU ScholarsArchive, 1987 1 31 Comparative Civilizations Review, Vol. 17 [1987], No. 17, Art. 4 32 trated in Figure 1, where the horizontal axis roughly represents Mercator geography and the vertical axis time. Solid lines enclose named civilizations' careers, while five phases in the expansion of Central Civilization are separated by dashed lines. "Central" is a historical and positional nomenclature which deliber- ately avoids any specific geographic or cultural references, thereby indicating that this society is not to be characterized by references to a single river basin, and that its development has not been determined by FIGURE 1 THE INCORPORATION OF TWELVE CIVILIZATIONS INTO ONE 3500 ???? BC ???? 3000 ???? ???? BC < z = Z 2500 o BC Z Z< P< o 2000 H< PO , —_J ao.n N t/J — BC N ^O >i tu > > uj u 1500 9999 u BC z < 9999 PJ NEAR 1000 o EASTERN BC U< J PHASE OF CENTRAL 500 BC ??Z? ? ??Z? ? CIVILIZATION Zo 5AAA0DDD0 19 Zu9P 9 Z9u opNJ>0z<< J>zZoHxo0zU 9999 AD1 000 >DOoU_ SJ Xuw cu

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