引言自古以来，中国人就养成了对历史的尊重和探索之风。在历代的官修正史中，不但有对本国历史的详细记载，而且留下了对周边乃至更加遥远的世界所做的描述。随着时代的发展和科技的进步，我们对今天的世界有了更为详尽和准确的了解。然而，探索昨天世界的欲望不但没有因此而减弱，反而变得更加强烈。这是因为，人们越来越深切地认识到，影响今天生存与发展的所有重大问题都有历史根源。比如，人类文化的多样性是怎样形成的？民族国家及其边界和领土主权是怎样演变至今的？为什么欧洲能够很容易整合在一起，形成欧盟那样的组织，而亚洲就很难做到？中东和平乃至巴以关系为什么那样难以解决？为什么……要找到解答这些问题的正确答案，要以这些答案为基础，去科学地预测和把握未来，就离不开对世界历史的学习与探索。科学研究告诉我们：地球上的生命起源于大约39亿年前。能够直立行走的南方古猿存在于约550万—100万年前。人类可能由南方古猿的一支或若干支脱胎而来。人类社会的进化是以加速度的形式进行的。起初工具制作技术的微小进步至少以几十万年计，但进入磨制石器时代，进化的速度加快到以千年计。在工业文明时代，进化的速度已快至以几十年或几年计。尽管如此，同地球上生命进化的时间相比，同人类未来的历史相比，我们人类的发展还处在自己历史的开端或童年时期。因此，我们要对历史怀有一种敬畏之心。历史是国民教育不可或缺的一门学科。自然界的过程叫自然史。人类社会形成和发展的过程是人类史，它是人们世代所进行的活动的总和。根据不同的划分标准，历史可以分成若干阶段。如以工具或生产力的进步为标准，世界历史可以分成石器时代、金属器时代、机器时代等阶段；以文明或文化形态为标准，可以分成采集与狩猎的前文明时代、农业文明与游牧文明时代、工业文明时代；以社会形态为标准，可以把人类史分成史前社会、奴隶社会、封建社会、资本主义社会、社会主义社会，等等。作为人类的一种自我认识形式，历史的价值在于满足人们的精神发展需求。假如人类没有历史，我们将不知道自己是谁，从何处来，现在在何处，将来到何处去，更不知道我们已经做了什么，应该做什么，我们甚至连时间观念与语言文字都要缺乏，将倒退回仅凭本能行事的纯粹动物祖先的状态。历史与现实、未来虽然是三个独立的时间概念，但在现实生活中，三者却是一个不可分割的整体。历史是过去的现实，现实是历史的继续，未来是现实的投射。现实已逝，它只存在于我们对过去的追念中。没有我们的追忆，没有我们的历史重建，过去就不存在，而未来也只是未知数，历史是人们判断现实和预测未来的唯一依据。目前，国内外研究世界历史的大型成果已不鲜见，包括剑桥三史（《剑桥古代史》《新编剑桥中世纪史》《新编剑桥世界近代史》），以及刚刚出版的、中国人自己编写的大型多卷本《世界历史》。此外，较小规模的世界史著作也有不少，从单卷本到两卷本、三卷本、六卷本，以及系列丛书，等等。但是为了学习的便利，人们还需要一种简明扼要的、通俗易懂的，同时又包含了世界史研究最新成果的读本类书籍。《简明世界历史读本》正是为了满足读者的这一需要而撰写的。参与读本写作的都是多年从事世界历史研究的知名学者。书中讲述的历史，在时间上，可以上溯到史前时代。在内容上，囊括了二三百万年前人猿揖别后，人类的起源与进化过程；文明的产生与国家的形成；各大洲的王朝兴衰与战争风云；科学艺术的精华与宗教的影响力；环境、反恐与人类今天面临的各种新挑战，等等。既有对人类历史进程的总体把握，也有对重大历史事件和时代关怀的专题性阐述，使读者能够清晰、系统、连贯、扼要地了解世界历史发展的整体脉络和主要问题。中国史是世界历史不可或缺的组成部分。读本在叙述整个人类历史发展过程时，把中国史的相关内容很自然地糅入其中，使人们能够更加清晰地看到中华文明在人类历史上所处的位置，同时也启发人们在全球视角下，对本国历史进行深深的思考。比如书中写道，15世纪中国明朝的郑和下西洋，揭开了人类大航海时代的序幕，却未能成为引领以后世界历史发展的先驱。今天，中国正在以前所未有的自信和速度，大步走向世界。越来越多的中国人走出国门，同异域文明接触和互动；越来越多的国内外资金和商品，在中国境内外流动和周转；越来越多的国际事务，需要中国去参与和发声。因此，世界比任何时候都更需要了解中国，中国也需要全面深入地了解世界。不但要了解世界的今天，还需要更深入地了解世界的昨天。愿《简明世界历史读本》成为你了解世界、认识自己、沟通中外、丰富知识的好伴侣。武寅2014年10月

Introduction Since ancient times, Chinese has cultivated a respect for history and a wind of exploration. In the official history of the past dynasties, there are not only detailed records of the history of the country, but also descriptions of the surrounding and even more distant worlds. With the development of the times and the advancement of science and technology, we have a more detailed and accurate understanding of today's world. However, instead of being weakened, the desire to explore yesterday's world has become stronger. This is because there is a growing awareness that all the major problems affecting survival and development today have historical roots. For example, how did the diversity of human cultures come about? How did nation-states and their borders and territorial sovereignty evolve to this day? Why is it so easy for Europe to integrate into an organization like the EU, while Asia is so hard to do? Why is peace in the Middle East and even Palestinian-Israeli relations so difficult to resolve? Why...... To find the right answers to these questions, and to scientifically predict and grasp the future based on these answers, it is inseparable from the study and exploration of world history. Scientific research tells us that life on Earth originated about 3.9 billion years ago. Australopithecus that could walk upright existed about 5.5 million to 1 million years ago. Humans may have been born from one or more of Australopithecus. The evolution of human society is carried out in the form of acceleration. At first, small advances in toolmaking technology measured in the hundreds of thousands of years, but in the grinding stone age, the rate of evolution accelerated to thousands of years. In the era of industrial civilization, the rate of evolution has been measured in decades or years. Nevertheless, our human development is still at the beginning of its own history or in its childhood, compared with the time of the evolution of life on Earth and the future history of mankind. Therefore, we need to have a sense of reverence for history. History is an indispensable subject in national education. The process of nature is called natural history. The process of the formation and development of human society is human history, which is the sum of the activities carried out by people from generation to generation. History can be divided into several stages according to different classification criteria. If the progress of tools or productivity is used as the standard, world history can be divided into Stone Age, Metal Age, Machine Age and other stages; Based on civilization or cultural form, it can be divided into pre-civilization era of gathering and hunting, agricultural civilization and nomadic civilization, and industrial civilization; Taking social formation as the standard, human history can be divided into prehistoric society, slave society, feudal society, capitalist society, socialist society, and so on. As a form of human self-knowledge, the value of history lies in satisfying people's spiritual development needs. If human beings had no history, we would not know who we were, where we came from, where we are now, where we are going, let alone what we have done and what we should do, and we will lack even a sense of time and language, and we will regress to the state of purely animal ancestors who acted only by instinct. Although history, reality and the future are three independent concepts of time, in real life, the three are an inseparable whole. History is the reality of the past, reality is the continuation of history, and the future is a projection of reality. Reality is gone, and it exists only in our remembrance of the past. Without our remembrance, without our historical reconstruction, the past would not exist, and the future is only unknown, and history is the only basis for people to judge reality and predict the future. At present, large-scale achievements in the study of world history at home and abroad are not uncommon, including the three Cambridge histories (Cambridge Ancient History, New Cambridge Medieval History, and New Cambridge Modern World History), as well as the newly published large-scale multi-volume "World History" compiled by Chinese himself. In addition, there are many works on world history on a smaller scale, ranging from single-volume to two-volume, three-volume, six-volume, and series of books, and so on. But for the convenience of learning, people also need a concise, easy-to-understand reading book that also contains the latest results of world history research. A Concise Reader of World History was written to meet this need. The participants in the writing of this book are well-known scholars who have been engaged in the study of world history for many years. The history told in the book can be traced back to prehistoric times. In terms of content, it covers the origin and evolution of human beings after the abdelion of apes two or three million years ago; the emergence of civilization and the formation of states; the rise and fall of dynasties and wars on all continents; the essence of science and art and the influence of religion; The environment, counter-terrorism and the new challenges facing humanity today, among others. It not only has an overall grasp of the process of human history, but also a thematic exposition of major historical events and the care of the times, so that readers can clearly, systematically, coherently and concisely understand the overall context and main issues of world historical development. Chinese history is an indispensable part of world history. When describing the development process of human history, the reader naturally integrates the relevant content of Chinese history, so that people can see the position of Chinese civilization in human history more clearly, and at the same time, it also inspires people to think deeply about their own history from a global perspective. For example, the book writes that Zheng He's voyage to the West in the 15th century of China's Ming Dynasty opened the prelude to the era of human exploration, but failed to become a pioneer in leading the development of world history in the future. Today, China is striding toward the world with unprecedented confidence and speed. More and more Chinese go abroad to contact and interact with foreign civilizations; More and more domestic and foreign capital and commodities are flowing and circulating inside and outside China; More and more international affairs require China's participation and voice. Therefore, the world needs to understand China more than ever, and China needs to understand the world comprehensively and deeply. Not only to understand the world today, but also to understand the world yesterday in a deeper way. May Concise World History Reader become a good companion for you to understand the world, know yourself, communicate with China and foreign countries, and enrich your knowledge. Wu Yin, October 2014（AI翻译）