Early European History

This book aims to furnish a concise and connected account of human progress during ancient, medieval, and early modern times. It should meet the requirements of those high schools and preparatory schools where ancient history, as a separate discipline, is being supplanted by a more extended course introductory to the study of recent times and contemporary problems. Such a course was first outlined by the Regents of the University of the State of New York in their Syllabus for Secondary Schools, issued in 1910.

Since the appearance of the Regents' Syllabus the Committee of Five of the American Historical Association has made its Report (1911), suggesting a rearrangement of the curriculum which would permit a year's work in English and Continental history. Still more recently the Committee on Social Studies of the Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Education, in its Report (1916) to the National Education Association has definitely recommended the division of European history into two parts, of which the first should include ancient and Oriental civilization, English and Continental history to approximately the end of the seventeenth century, and the period of American exploration.

The first twelve chapters of the present work are based upon the author's Ancient History, published four years ago. In spite of many omissions, it has been possible to follow without essential modification the plan of the earlier volume. A number of new maps and illustrations have been added to these chapters.

The selection of collateral reading, always a difficult problem in the secondary school, is doubly difficult when so much ground must be covered in a single course. The author ventures, therefore, to call attention to his Readings in Ancient History. Its purpose, in the words of the preface, is "to provide immature pupils with a variety of extended, unified, and interesting extracts on matters which a textbook treats with necessary, though none the less deplorable, condensation." A companion volume, entitled Readings in Medieval and Modern History, will be published shortly. References to both books are inserted in footnotes.

At the end of what has been a long and engrossing task, it becomes a pleasant duty to acknowledge the help which has been received from teachers in school and college. Various chapters, either in manuscript or in the proofs, have been read by Professor James M. Leake of Bryn Mawr College; Professor J. C. Hildt of Smith College; Very Rev. Patrick J. Healy, Professor of Church History in the Catholic University of America; Professor E. F. Humphrey of Trinity College; Dr. James Sullivan, Director of the Division of Archives and History, State Dept. of Education of New York; Constantine E. McGuire, Assistant Secretary General, International High Commission, Washington; Miss Margaret E. McGill, of the Newton (Mass.) High School; and Miss Mabel Chesley, of the Erasmus Hall High School, Brooklyn. The author would also express appreciation of the labors of the cartographers, artists, and printers, to whose accuracy and skill every page of the book bears witness.