Books in History in Art series

Ancient Islamic art can offer us insights to its history. This title examines what art reveals about history and simultaneously how history explains the art. It explores past civilizations through both the images it produced and cultural artifacts that remain. This title focuses on how art and architecture from a distinct period reflected life at the time, and how we can use the surviving art to understand how people used to live.

Gain a new perspective on the Middle Ages by examining the art that was produced during this time period. The title examines what art reveals about history and simultaneously how history explains the art. It explores past civilizations through both the images it produced and cultural artifacts that remain. Each title focuses on how art and architecture from a distinct period reflected life at the time, and how we can use the surviving art to understand how people used to live.

Starred Youth Services Book Review*2016 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Silver Award Winner*The earth shakes and cracks open. Volcanoes erupt. Continents freeze, bake, and flood. Droughts parch the land. Wildfires and hundred-year storms consume anything in their paths. Invisible clouds of disease and pestilence probe for victims. Tidal waves sweep ashore from the vast sea. The natural world is a dangerous place, but one species has evolved a unique defense against the hazards: civilization.Civilization rearranges nature for human convenience. Clothes and houses keep us warm; agriculture feeds us; medicine fights our diseases. It all works―most of the time. But key resources lie in the most hazardous places, so we choose to live on river flood plains, on the slopes of volcanoes, at the edge of the sea, above seismic faults. We pack ourselves into cities, Petri dishes for germs. Civilization thrives on the edge of disaster. And what happens when natural forces meet molasses holding tanks, insecticides, deepwater oil rigs, nuclear power plants? We learn the hard way how to avoid the last disaster―and maybe how to create the next one. What we don’t know can, indeed, hurt us. This book’s white-knuckled journey from antiquity to the present leads us to wonder at times how humankind has survived. And yet, as Author Gale Eaton makes clear, civilization has advanced not just in spite of disasters but in part because of them. Hats off to human resilience, ingenuity, and perseverance! They’ve carried us this far; may they continue to do so into our ever-hazardous future.The History in 50 series explores history by telling thematically linked stories. Each book includes 50 illustrated narrative accounts of people and events―some well-known, others often overlooked―that, together, build a rich connect the-dots mosaic and challenge conventional assumptions about how history unfolds.Dedicated to the premise that history is the greatest story ever told.Includes a mix of “greatest hits” with quirky, surprising, provocative accounts.Challenges readers to think and engage.Includes a glossary of technical terms; sources by chapter; teaching resources as jumping-off points for student research; and endnotes.Fountas & Pinnell Level Z+ color

Starred Youth Services Book ReviewVigliani and Eaton’s high-interest exploration of medicine begins in prehistory. The 5,000-year-old Iceman discovered frozen in the Alps may have treated his gallstones, Lyme disease, and hardening of the arteries with the 61 tattoos that covered his body―most of which matched acupuncture points―and the walnut-sized pieces of fungus he carried on his belt. The herbal medicines chamomile and yarrow have been found on 50,000-year-old teeth, and neatly bored holes in prehistoric skulls show that Neolithic surgeons relieved pressure on the brain (or attempted to release evil spirits) at least 10,000 years ago. From Mesopotamian pharmaceuticals and Ancient Greek sleep therapy through midwifery, amputation, bloodletting, Renaissance anatomy, bubonic plague, and cholera to the discovery of germs, X-rays, DNA-based treatments and modern prosthetics, the history of medicine is a wild ride through the history of humankind. Color throughout

Explore Roman art across the ages. Learn why the Romans built so many huge arches. This book is packed full of priceless works of art from this great civilization. Discover the beliefs, inventions, and materials that helped the art and culture of ancient Rome to develop. Full captions explain works of art in detail. A timeline summarizes the history of ancient Rome and key moments in the development of its art. Make your own version of an ancient Roman mosaic with the step-by-step instructions included in this book.