This volume offers a survey and overview of world history, starting with the earliest known human settlements and concluding in 1500, the early years of Europe's Renaissance, and in the Americas, the era of the Aztec and Inca empires. Following a summary of prehistoric cultures, the author covers the civilizations of the Fertile Crescent, ancient Egypt, civilization in the Indus and Yellow River valleys, early Mediterranean cultures, India's classical age, the rise of China's dynasties, classical Greek and Roman civilizations, the Islamic world, African kingdoms of the first millenium, Europe's middle ages, the Holy Roman Empire, the Crusaders and their clash with Turks, the Mongol invasion, and the humanism of the early European Renaissance.