What historical event, or events, do you believe most influenced and shaped the world we know today?

When detailing your events, also describe how the world could have been different if the end result of the event you describe would have changed.

Columbus discovering the New World, for obvious reasons. What would the world be like without America or Brazil? To go even further into it, where would the top NAZI leaders go once they had to leave Germany (assuming Britain and the U.S.S.R. would have won without America's support)? After that, who would there have been to stop the U.S.S.R. from complete world domination post W.W. II?

Um lets see the fall of the soviet union is my vote.

The Battle of Thermopylae.
Without this sacrifice the Greek cities wouldn't have had time to prepare for the advancing Persians and would have been utterly defeated. Thus, Western civilisation as we know it would probably not have happened (shortly after the Golden Age of Greece began). Europe would have been influenced by Persian culture and may never have developed into what it is today.

Battle of Marathon

Think. Had they failed at MArathon, the Athenians would have fallen. With no Athens, there's no Athenian Philosphy. No Athenian Philosophy, no Athenian Democracy. No Athenian Democracy, say good-bye to the modern world as we knew it.

To think the entire fate of the world fell into the outcome of one single battle.:eek:

writing and mathmatics
Not really events ... more discoveries.
I think discovery has played a larger role in shaping the world.
Event, I guess maybe the dropping of the atomic bomb.
For such a localized event it still shakes the world and overshadows our future.

Some things I think are important

* Columbus discovering America (Wester power was made becuase Europe discovered America more than anything else).
* Lifes of Budha, Jesuschrist, Mahoma ---- changed the world (probably Mahoma more than any other else becuase Islam spreaded quickier than any other)
* Genhis Khan's world conquest.
* American/French Revolution

It's very hard to choose only one.

Originally posted by Amenhotep7
Battle of Marathon

Think. Had they failed at MArathon, the Athenians would have fallen. With no Athens, there's no Athenian Philosphy. No Athenian Philosophy, no Athenian Democracy. No Athenian Democracy, say good-bye to the modern world as we knew it.

To think the entire fate of the world fell into the outcome of one single battle.:eek:

Marathon was an incredibly minor battle, if you could call it that. The Persians landed in Attica, sacked it for 5 days with no encounter of the Athenians, and got on their boats and left. Marathon was when the Greeks came along to the very last of the Persian forces were yet to get on their ships.

For me, the most importnat events were:

- Battle of Ecbatana 550BC Cyrus II the Great founded the Persian Empire after it.
- Battle of Thermopylae
- Final division of the Roman Empire 395 (the West was doomed to fall, so I wouldn't say the fall of it was major)
- Initial expansion of Islam
- Fall of al-Andalus
- Genghis Khan uniting the Mongols 1206
- Conquest of Constantinople 1453
- Christopher Columbus' official discovery of the New World 1492
- French Revolution
- American Revolution
- World War I and II
- Fall of the Soviet Union

Just out of curiosity, why do you name the French Revolution, but not American Revolution?

Originally posted by Godwynn
Columbus discovering the New World
Er ... there were already people there. :crazyeye:

We had a similar thread like this before.
For me, it's still:

1451 AD The Great Law of Peace of the Iroquois

Oops! Did I call it MArathon? I meant Thermopylae.:blush:

discovery of electricity and subsequently computers.

I would agree with the battle of Thermopylae. I would also suggest
1) Mohammed's ministry and military success at Medina, which resulted in a vast Muslim empire that preserved most of the writings of classical antiquity (Aristotle, Plato, etc.) that later returned to Europe and stimulated the Renaissance.
2) The fall of Constantinople in 1453-- the death of the Roman Empire and all that...
3) The Battle of Trafalgar, which prevented Napoleon from invading the British Isles.
Many more, of course, but this will do for now...:)

Originally posted by Moss321
Just out of curiosity, why do you name the French Revolution, but not American Revolution?

Oops. But the French Revolution had a much more important impact :D

The Beginning of the Earth and universe, whether by God's Creation or by Big Bang, is the event that most shaped the world, in my honest opinion. If that didn't happen, would we even be here discussing what the event that most shaped the world is/was? I don't think so. Would any of the other significant events that you mentioned, and others that WEREN'T mentioned, ever occur had the beginning of Earth and the universe not happened? I highly doubt it. ;) :p :D :)

the whole chain of Abrahamic relgions

and the advent of paper in china

Originally posted by Ribannah
Er ... there were already people there. :crazyeye:

We had a similar thread like this before.
For me, it's still:

1451 AD The Great Law of Peace of the Iroquois

I know there were already people there, but had Columbus not discovered it, the British/French/Spanish/Portuguese (Sp?) would not have expanded as large as they have been, and everything else is explained in my first post...

the development of Agriculture, ~4000 BC

The advent of Montheism.

Originally posted by Godwynn
I know there were already people there, but had Columbus not discovered it, the British/French/Spanish/Portuguese (Sp?) would not have expanded as large as they have been, and everything else is explained in my first post...
You forgot the Dutch. :p

But if Columbus' expedition had failed, another would have succeeded shortly after. He didn't even use the best technology.


(Big Bang, Agriculture and Monotheism all happened well before 4000 BC - do they count? Also, the last two aren't events, and neither are paper, electricity and computers.)

Battle of Hastings 1066

CivI

I've passed by the street that it happened many times. Perhaps the single most important shot in history, the assasination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, 1914, triggering not only World War I, but subsequently World War II, and in effect shaping civilization for the past 100 years.

The climactic changes in the 13th century, followed by subsequent famine, and then of course successive waves of the bubonic pandemic lasting about 140 years. The depopulation helped to spark higher wages, a growth of the bourgeois and possibly the Renaissance.

I would say Thermopylae. People got here before me, so it would be pointless to post the same thing over and over again. Other notables:

-Teutoburger Wald, 9 AD
-Battle of Poitiers, 732 AD
-Battle of Hastings, 1066 AD

...A few centuries later through my un-learned period...

-Battle of Yorktown, 1783 AD
-Battle of Waterloo, 1814 AD
-Loss of Lee's orders at Gettysburg and subsequent recovery by the Union, 1863 AD
-Assasination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, 1914 AD
-Battle of Cambrai, 1917 AD (not necessarily history changing in itself, but was first use of tanks, something that continues to shape modern warfare to this day)
-Development of the Atomic Bomb, 1940's AD
-Fall of the Soviet Union, 1991 AD
-9/11, 2001 AD

I would say the Battle of Talas, or if Mu Sangui didn't betray the Ming Dynasty.

One major batle unmentioned is trafalgar. It led to royal navy supremacy for 100 years and the spread (for good and bad) of the british empire.

Britain colonization

something nobody's mentioned before:

Spanish Armada's defeat at the hands of British naval forces, destroyed any control Spain had over Latin America, and removed Spain as a world power

Yep, and that was the reason that there were so few years between teh defeat of the Armada (end of XVI century) and the independence of Latin American countries (begin of the XIX centuy) :p

The renaissance of course, it shaped the upsurge of the western world and the western world shaped the whole world after that.

So the upsurge of western civilization and the fall of the Arabs.

1) The birth of Christ.
2) John F. Kennedy's decision to naval blockade Cuba instead of launching an airstrike.
3) The assasination of John F. Kennedy.

The first, self-explanatory.
The second, because we are talking about the end of the world or not.
The third, because that murder is the root of the kind of people Americans are and the way the United States is, today. The U.S. is the most influential nation on Earth, and perhaps in history, on the rest of the World.

Originally posted by ellie
One major batle unmentioned is trafalgar. It led to royal navy supremacy for 100 years and the spread (for good and bad) of the british empire.

I agree. Without Trafalgar, Napoleon may have indave England, and who knows what would be Europe today?

I doubt he would have invaded England, especially not in the wake of winning trafalgar. Napoleon's army was half way to Ulm by then and would be all but tied up on the continent for another 2 years after the engagement. Of course there's no garuntee that Russia and Prussia would continue fighting if Britain looked threatened, but if we assume they were an invasion of England looked highly unlikely.

In two years anything could have happened, and it's not like the RN didn't have any more ships :p I think it would have dented British naval supremacy to some degree, but not a great deal, after all, precedent had been set in previous engagements. Plus to another degree, the supremacy gained at Trafalgar caused a general lethargy in the Navy and tradition played a bigger part than talent or new technology for much of that period. Though it lasted 100 years, it was a supremacy bought highly in terms of complacency and conservatism which cost the RN dear IMO.

Originally posted by naervod
I would say Thermopylae. People got here before me, so it would be pointless to post the same thing over and over again.

IIRC the greeks were soundly defeated at Thermopylae and the Persians went on to capture Athens. In choosing a battle from that war that had significance to western history, I would choose Salamis.

The Norman conquest of 1066, cluminating at the Battle of Hastings. The establishment of the feudal system in England afterwards has had many far-reaching consequences, including a complete revolution with regards to property rights, legal systems, and just the overall recognition of individual rights in society that shaped much of Western thought, in a wide range of subjects ranging from law to philosophy to political science, since then.

While most of the previously listed events were important and, of course, if changed, could have altered history significantly, the events were mostly regional and "short lived" in effect. The consequences were if they hadn't happened the world would be different. Rather than say if Persia had defeated Athen, there would be no Athenian democracy (maybe), I would say "because Athens developed democracy...."

For obvious reasons, as you move forward in time, the potentially greater the significance of a single event. eg. The assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BC had less impact on the world than the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand in 1914, even though Caesar was a person of far greater influence and imporatnce.

Religion certainly has had an emormous impact on world history, but in many ways the world of those religions shaped their impact.

I've listed six "events" that because they did happen, had the most far reaching effect over a sustained period of time.

1. Domestication of plants and animals: permitted civilization to happen.

2. Roman Republic/Empire: 200BC to 1000AD? or 1200AD or 1453AD? defined/organized/maintained western culture and permitted/encouraged the spread of Christianity to all of Europe. Created a paradigm for post 1453 Europe.

3. Chinese Empire: 200 BC to ?? Functioned similarly to Rome for Asia

4. Islamic expansion 650 AD to 1500 and beyond to 2004. The mongol invasion all over again this time with staying power and culture. It is still with us today.

5. Global exploration 1480-1700: Reorganized the world into a new political order

6. American Revolution: made revolution fashionable and changed the the world's view on what a nation could be.

Originally posted by dnaquin

1. Domestication of plants and animals: permitted civilization to happen.


Darn this is the one I was going to choose, but I was a couple hours too slow. I remember in Social Studies class, how our Teacher emphasized this so much. Being able to stay in one spot and not be nomadic, helped create cities, which helped create 'specialists', which is what jump started science, philosophy, etc.

Another one that I was thinking about, specially with all these votes to the discovery of the 'new world', is when the Vikings in the first Millenium who landed in Canada were driven off by the Aboriginals that were already there. If the Vikings had been able to settle and colonize Canada and set up trade routes and then expand South, what ever came from Columbuses discoveries would have happend almost a thousand years earlier.

Most post so far have shown an extremely Eurocentric take on World history.
The event that most shaped the World till now in my opinion should be the event/events that lead to domination of the West over the East.
I am no expert on Eastern history but whatever caused the Chinese to stop their explorations and to isolate themselves wins my vote.

Unless you are religous, sentience of the human race. :D

What about the Big Bang?

What if the germans had stoped the D-Day landings?

Russia would have advanced more into Western Europe then.

Originally posted by dnaquin
3. Chinese Empire: 200 BC to ?? Functioned similarly to Rome for Asia


To: 1912 AD

Originally posted by Sir Og
I am no expert on Eastern history but whatever caused the Chinese to stop their explorations and to isolate themselves wins my vote.

What would have happened anyways if they didn't isolate themselves?

I left the end date for China open deliberately. A case could be made to extend the "influence on Asia" date past 1912 to 2004 even though the actual empire ended in 1912. The politics of the nation changed after 1912, but not it's significance.

The same applies to Rome and at what point do you say Rome and Byzantium ceased to be a significant organizing force in the region. I might choose one date, you another and Xen an entirely different one. The concept is more important that picking an actual date.

Originally posted by alex994

What would have happened anyways if they didn't isolate themselves?

Perhaps the people in the Americas would be speaking chinese instead of Spanish and English. It is very likely that the world would have been very different.

Originally posted by Sir Og
Perhaps the people in the Americas would be speaking chinese instead of Spanish and English. It is very likely that the world would have been very different.
Perhaps. I sometimes think (after about 6 beers :D ) that this world we live in has already been manipulated by time travellers from the future, who somehow managed to convince the Ming emperors to throw away their chance at world domination... :crazyeye:

Maybe it was a intelling (but not desired) bet, because China seems far more stable and wasted no time in building overseas Empires but in reinforce their own terrirtories and attract more minorities to China mainstream.

Maybe the future will show us that it was more intelligent that building empires overseas.... maybe not.

Originally posted by Sir Og
Perhaps the people in the Americas would be speaking chinese instead of Spanish and English. It is very likely that the world would have been very different.
In Peru, some speak a derivative of Chinese.

Originally posted by yaroslav
Maybe it was a intelling (but not desired) bet, because China seems far more stable and wasted no time in building overseas Empires but in reinforce their own terrirtories and attract more minorities to China mainstream.

Maybe the future will show us that it was more intelligent that building empires overseas.... maybe not.
The Chinese weren't very advanced anywhere in China until the 1920's. Maybe, they are more stable, but by the time stability came, with Mao, they had no chance of building empires. Before then, warlords had continually fought for power.

Originally posted by pomsa
The Chinese weren't very advanced anywhere in China until the 1920's. Maybe, they are more stable, but by the time stability came, with Mao, they had no chance of building empires. Before then, warlords had continually fought for power.

thats not true, China has almost always been one of the most advance cultures of the world, its just in recent centuries that the west has surpassed China.

the Chinese had every chance to build empires and as history shows they did, just not an overseas one which they had no need or interest in.

and Mao did not bring stability to the country, China has a history of long periods of stability followed by short periods of instability because of civil and foreign wars

Mao's rule followed WW2 and a civil war so of course it would seem like stability came with Mao, but it actually came with the end of these devastating wars

Originally posted by pomsa
The Chinese weren't very advanced anywhere in China until the 1920's. Maybe, they are more stable, but by the time stability came, with Mao, they had no chance of building empires. Before then, warlords had continually fought for power.

On the contary, from the fall of the Roman Empire to 1722, the Chinese was better in almost everything then then Europeans until they isolated themselves, if they had reformed, china would be a different place today...

Originally posted by Revolutionary
thats not true, China has almost always been one of the most advance cultures of the world, its just in recent centuries that the west has surpassed China.

And most still consider Chinese culturer to be 1 of the most advanced, consider it, the culture is known all over the world...

The agricultural revolution. Hey we'ld still be hunter and gatherers still.

Originally posted by pomsa
The Chinese weren't very advanced anywhere in China until the 1920's. Maybe, they are more stable, but by the time stability came, with Mao, they had no chance of building empires. Before then, warlords had continually fought for power.

The Chinese were one of the most advanced of the ancient civilizations. The reason it didn't own much oversea colonies was because China saw no need in building one rather than that it was incapable. The Chinese Empire by the alleged lifetime of Jesus was already so huge that they saw no benefit in increasing further in size.

Originally posted by Dida
The Chinese were one of the most advanced of the ancient civilizations. The reason it didn't own much oversea colonies was because China saw no need in building one rather than that it was incapable. The Chinese Empire by the alleged lifetime of Jesus was already so huge that they saw no benefit in increasing further in size.
Ok, I mean they didn't apply that to everyday life. Hundreds of thousands of people starved, every year, even before the Glourious Revolution.

They saw no benefit because they were ruled by xenophobes who feared that expansion would bring more warlords to challenge them. They were already to fractured to really succed and control any colonies, minus those adjacent to the empire already (Indochina and Korea).

Originally posted by pomsa
Ok, I mean they didn't apply that to everyday life. Hundreds of thousands of people starved, every year, even before the Glourious Revolution.

They saw no benefit because they were ruled by xenophobes who feared that expansion would bring more warlords to challenge them. They were already to fractured to really succed and control any colonies, minus those adjacent to the empire already (Indochina and Korea).

On the contary, during the dynasties, food was quite plenitful. And what u say about them being ruled by xenophobes is false, the Emperors believed they have the world's best things in China, what would there be to gain if they sent expeditions to colonize lands?

When God said "let there be light"

I believe that the fall of the soviet union in 1991 was the even that shaped are world most today. With the fall of the communist enemy the world was able to unite as one for the cause of world prosperity.