Page:A General Sketch of Political History from the Earlist Times.djvu/54

 4 2 EARLY PEOPLES AND EMPIRES into Europe ; the Turks, of whom the Seljuks and Ottomans were only branches ; and the Mughals (Mongols, Moguls) and Manchus ; (y) probably Japanese and Malays ; (§) possibly, American races. (4) The primitive races of the Indian peninsula are commonly grouped as Dravidian ; these with the peoples of the Eastern Archipelago are sometimes called Negroid, as having signs of kinship with the pure negroes of Africa. (5) Before any of the races above enumerated appeared, there seem to have been human races scattered over Africa, Southern Asia, the Eastern Archipelago, and Australia, which never attained any appreciable degree of civilisation, and were generally exterminated, but survived here and there ; as the Pygmy tribes and Bushmen in Africa, and the aborigines of Australia and Tasmania. (6) Crosses between conquering and conquered races produced other races which cannot be definitely classified with any of the above groups. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTE TO CHAPTERS II. AND III The development of several peoples prior to 500 B.C. has been omitted in these chapters, as the account of them will come more conveniently in chapters where their history can be given con- secutively ; as of Rome in Chapter VI. and of India in Chapter XXIII. But for the sake of chronology, certain points may here be noted. China. The legendary history of China, with a probable basis of truth, begins nearly 3000 years B.C. It is not unlikely that the Chinese migrated eastwards, parting from the Sumerians some hundreds of years earlier. The first historical dynasty begins in 2356 B.C., according to the Chinese compilations ; and three dynasties are enumerated between 2205 B.C. and 250 B.C. The father of Chinese History and Moral Philosophy, Kung-fu-tse or Confucius, lived in the sixth century B.C. India. The Aryan invasion probably entered the Punjab not later than 2000 B.C., and had completely mastered the whole of Northern India, and a great part of the south before 1000 B.C. This may be taken as approximately the date of the Code of Manu, the Brahmin Book of the Law, which shows the organisation of society, govern- ment, and religion. This became much modified later, the teaching of Gautama or Buddha displacing the earlier doctrines and changing the system, probably during the sixth century B.C. Buddhist doctrines spread all over the far east. Darius of Persia seems to have obtained tribute from the Punjab.