The Story Of... The Shapes of the Continents
One of the most surprising revelations in Guns, Germs
and Steel, revolves around simple, basic geography: the shape
of the continents themselves.
The product of millions of years of geological flux, continental
shape may have had a fundamental impact on the progress of human
||Europe was destined
to be a cultural melting pot
Continents that are spread out in an east-west direction, such
as Eurasia, had a developmental advantage because of the ease with
which crops, animals, ideas and technologies could spread between
areas of similar latitude.
Continents that spread out in a north-south direction, such as the
Americas, had an inherent climatic disadvantage. Any crops, animals,
ideas and technologies had to travel through dramatically changing
climatic conditions to spread from one extreme to the other.
Technologies such as gunpowder were able to migrate 6,500 thousand
miles from China, where they originated, to Western Europe, where
they reached their apogee, in a matter of centuries. The wheel,
on the other hand, developed in southern Mexico, never even managed
the 500-mile journey south to the Andes.
But the influence of continental formation runs even deeper than
Some have argued that coastlines, mountains and valleys may help
us understand something as fundamental as the differing historical
paths taken by Europe and China.
This is a puzzle which has occupied historians for generations.
Given that Chinese civilization had evolved for almost as long as
the civilizations of the Fertile Crescent, and by extension, Europe;
given that China had even developed a phenomenal navy capable of
trans-Pacific exploration nearly 100 years before Columbus set sail
for the Indies, how come Europeans were the ones who took over the
world – and not the Chinese?
Jared Diamond believes geographical phenomena can explain
these differing paths.
Chinese civilization was founded on the domestication of irrigation-dependent
crops. Rice grows in the wild along riverbanks and in swampy regions
where the grasses enjoy year-round partial submersion. In order
to replicate this environment, the earliest Chinese farmers had
to construct fairly complex systems of irrigation, supplied by the
Yangtze and Yellow rivers. This, it is argued, influenced the development
of two social phenomena. First, the establishment of a central social
organization and hierarchy, founded upon the construction and maintenance
of irrigation networks. Second, because of the geographic distribution
of the Yellow and Yangtze rivers – flowing almost parallel to one
another, from central China to the pacific coast – Chinese civilization
grew organically outwards, from one central-east heartland – a heartland
which controlled the mechanics of irrigation.
European civilization, on the other hand, was founded upon the domestication
of rainfall-dependent crops – wheat and barley, which will grow
anywhere, as long as it rains for part of the year. This, Diamond
argues, allowed farming communities, villages, towns and eventually
cities to emerge autonomously, all across Europe. There was never
any need for a central authority to control irrigation across the
continent. Instead, from its very inception, European society was
destined to become fragmented – independent, autonomous and competitive.
So what about the shape of the continents?
China is essentially a fertile basin, enclosed by a ring of insurmountable geographic obstacles – ocean to the east, desert to the north, mountains to the south and an enormous, man-made wall to the west. This centrally-organized culture, which could expand rapidly for thousands of miles right up to its natural borders, could exist quite happily in isolation providing irrigation agriculture was maintained. It had no need to compete with neighboring states. In fact, the basin of China was so vast, there were few neighboring states, and for thousands of years the Chinese empire progressed along its own isolated path.
Europe, on the other hand, with it four mountain ranges, five peninsulas, dozens of rivers, islands, and proximity to the coast of north Africa, was geographically destined to become a cultural melting pot. Independent, organically grown states emerged cheek by jowl, and were separated by distinct, but not insurmountable, geographical barriers.
In 1492, rejected by the King of Portugal for lack of funds, Christopher Columbus simply travelled to Portugal's neighbor and rival, Castile, and instead pitched for exploration funds there. Fuelled by the desire to compete, patrons and princes throughout Europe were prepared to invest in outlandish ventures, and provided Columbus with the necessary capital to explore new lands.
In China, the greatest treasure ships that the world had ever seen, were disbanded one day, on the whim of an Emperor. Unlike Columbus, the Admiral of the Imperial fleet, had no rival princes on whom he could call. There was little incentive for China to seek its fortune outside of its heartland – the Empire had everything it needed, right in its own backyard. And in such a vast nation ruled by the will of one man, there was simply no choice but to obey.
Simply put, the ramifications of basic geography could be profound:
Spain claimed the Americas instead of China, and Europe soon conquered
Where to next?
Get the "Story of..." Latitude
and Climate or Cities and Civilizations
Go to The World feature to get specific
information about each continent.