02research
7000–2900 BCE
Uruk and the first states
Water, grain, writing, and coerced labor made people and landscapes newly legible.
sources assemblingIn the research queue
A visual atlas of pre-industrial history
How Everything
Evolved
Our World in Data made the modern world legible. This project attempts the same thing for everything that came before it.
Explore the atlas ↓Before states10,000–3500 BCEFire · plants · animals · villages
First cities3500–1200 BCEWater · grain · writing · bronze
Iron & empire1200 BCE–500 CEMetal · money · armies · administration
Connected worlds500–1750 CEBelief · trade · steppe · ocean
Our working thesis
History is a sequence of domestications.
Humans domesticated fire, landscapes, water, plants, animals, metal, labor, information, belief, violence—and one another. Each system expanded what societies could coordinate. Each also created new dependencies and new ways to fail.
This is not a neutral encyclopedia. It is a source-traceable argument told through maps, timelines, models, and comparisons. Where the evidence is fragmentary, the uncertainty belongs in the explanation.
ecology→surplus→legibility→coordination→power
The atlas
History as systems
you can see.
Pages are published as their evidence and visuals become strong enough. Draft pages contain live, auditable work; research pages show the committed sequence.
11 pages in this view
01draft
500 BCE–476 CE
Rome
How an Italian coalition became a continental state—and why the Roman state survived its western court.
2 of 5 liveRead the page →
03research
4000–500 BCE
The cradles of civilization
Urbanism and states emerged by several routes—not from one civilizational recipe.
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04research
3300–1200 BCE
The Bronze Age world system
Tin, palaces, chariots, and ships connected distant societies into a fragile system.
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05research
1200–500 BCE
The Iron Age transformation
Iron mattered through institutions, fuel, skills, armies, and exchange—not as a magic metal.
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06research
550–330 BCE
Persia and territorial empire
Roads, satrapies, tribute, and negotiated rule made a new scale of empire possible.
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07research
475 BCE–220 CE
Qin and Han China
Competition, standardization, logistics, and legibility built an enduring imperial repertoire.
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08research
2600 BCE–550 CE
India from cities to empires
Monsoon ecologies, cities, states, religions, and trade moved on overlapping geographies.
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09research
3500 BCE–1500 CE
Steppe, horse, and mobile power
Mobility was an adaptation that repeatedly changed agrarian states, trade, and warfare.
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10research
30–800 CE
Christianity as infrastructure
Texts, cities, bishops, ritual, and charity made institutions that outlasted western empire.
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11research
610–1258 CE
The caliphates
Conquest, inherited administrations, Arabic, law, and trade made a connected imperial sphere.
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The publishing standard
Five ideas.
Five visuals.
Sources you can inspect.
- OpinionatedEvery page makes a coherent argument.
- Visual firstThe graphic must teach, not decorate.
- Quantitatively honestObservations, models, and unknowns stay distinct.
- Historically pluralCompeting explanations remain visible.
- Continuously revisedDrafts improve as evidence and criticism arrive.