VJOURNAL SMART BOOK · Volume II · From the Middle Ages to space
History
Read the full story and watch it happen: six animated chapters from the Middle Ages to the space race.
Start readingVolume II picks up the story where Rome left off and follows it for about fifteen centuries, to the first footsteps on the Moon. Beside the text there is a living 3D picture: a castle that assembles stone by stone, a caravan crossing a globe, a press that really prints, a ship tracing its route, a beam engine with a turning flywheel.
Each paragraph belongs to one moment of that picture. Press play, drag the timeline, or tap a paragraph to see the moment again. History is more than heroes and dates, so we name causes and consequences, say how we know what we know, and mark legends and estimates as such. Every chapter ends with sources you can open yourself.
Contents
- 01The Middle AgesAD 476 – about 1500After Rome fell in the West, Europe built castles, towns and tall churches. A terrible illness called the Black Death killed very many people, but the first universities were growing at the same time.
- 02The Silk RoadAbout 130 BC – AD 1300Long ago, travellers with camels carried silk, spices and paper between China and the Mediterranean. They also carried stories, numbers and new ideas, so the roads joined faraway peoples.
- 03The Printing RevolutionAbout 1040 – 1520Before printing, every book was copied by hand and was very rare. Gutenberg’s printing press made many copies quickly, and ideas began to travel much farther.
- 04The Age of Discovery1492 – 1522Sailors in the 1400s and 1500s crossed oceans in small wooden ships. They connected the continents, but they also brought terrible diseases to the people of the Americas.
- 05Steam and the Industrial Revolution1712 – about 1880Machines driven by steam began to do work that people and animals had done before. Factories, trains, telegraphs and electric lamps changed how people lived.
- 06The Space Race1903 – todayA rocket goes up by throwing hot gas down. In just twelve years people went from the first satellite to walking on the Moon.
What follows
- Revolutions and empiresBeing written
- The World WarsBeing written
- The digital ageBeing written
- The history of scienceBeing written
VITON13 LAB
Keep studying on the LAB table
Open the chapter's experiment, timeline or map on VITON13 LAB, with your notes as a document beside it.
Open VITON13 LABAbout this book
Who is Volume II of this history textbook for?
It is written for readers from about twelve years old and for adults who want a clear, fair overview. Each chapter opens with a short version in simple words that younger children can follow.
How does the living 3D picture work?
Every chapter has five moments. You can play them in order, pause, turn the model with your finger or mouse, or tap a paragraph to replay the moment it describes. The picture is drawn live in your browser and is not a video.
Does the book show only the good sides of progress?
No. Voyages of discovery are told together with the epidemics and the slave trade that followed them, and the Industrial Revolution together with child labour and smoky cities. Where historians disagree, or numbers are only estimates, the text says so.
What comes after Volume II?
Volume III is planned to follow with revolutions and empires, the World Wars, the digital age and the history of science. Volume I, which runs from the Big Bang to the Roman Empire, is available to read now.