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Guns, Germs, and Steel: A Short History of Everybody for the Last 13,000 Years

Author:
Jared Diamond (author)
Language:
English
Original language:
English
Publisher:
Vintage Books
Categories:
Anthropology, biology, economics, history, mythology, religion, sociology and warfare
Publication year:
2005
Original publication year:
1997
ISBN:
978-0-099-30278-0
Pages:
480
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Images:
Back of Guns, Germs, and Steel.Spine of Guns, Germs, and Steel.Front of Guns, Germs, and Steel.
High-res images:
[Back (26.28 MB)] [Spine (6.02 MB)] [Front (24.32 MB)]
Table of Contents:
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  • PREFACE: Why Is World History Like an Onion?
  • PROLOGUE: Yali’s Question
    The regionally differing courses of history

PART ONE: From Eden to Cajamarca

  1. Up to the Starting Line
    What happened on all the continents before 11,000 B.C.?
  2. A Natural Experiment of History
    How geography molded societies on Polynesian islands
  3. Collision at Cajamarca
    Why the Inca emperor Atahuallpa did not capture King Charles I of Spain

PART TWO: The Rise and Spread of Food Production

  1. Farmer Power
    The roots of guns, germs, and steel
  2. History’s Haves and Have-Nots
    Geographic differences in the onset of food production
  3. To Farm or Not to Farm
    Causes of the spread of food production
  4. How to Make an Almond
    The unconscious development of ancient crops
  5. Apples or Indians
    Why did peoples of some regions fail to domesticate plants?
  6. Zebras, Unhappy Marriages, and the Anna Karenina Principle
    Why were most big wild mammal species never domesticated?
  7. Spacious Skies and Tilted Axes
    Why did food production spread at different rates on different continents?

PART THREE: From Food to Guns, Germs, and Steel

  1. Lethal Gift of Livestock
    The evolution of germs
  2. Blueprints and Borrowed Letters
    The evolution of writing
  3. Necessity’s Mother
    The evolution of technology
  4. From Egalitarianism to Kleptocracy
    The evolution of government and religion

PART FOUR: Around the World in Five Chapters

  1. Yali’s People
    The histories of Australia and New Guinea
  2. How China Became Chinese
    The history of East Asia
  3. Speedboat to Polynesia
    The history of the Austronesian expansion
  4. Hemispheres Colliding
    The histories of Eurasia and the Americas compared
  5. How Africa Became Black
    The history of Africa
  • EPILOGUE: The Future of Human History as a Science
  • Acknowledgments
  • Further Readings
  • Credits
  • Index

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