All language subtitles for History of the World in Two Hours 2011 1080p BluRay x265 RARBG (1080p_24fps_H264-128kbit_AAC).inglés

what if we could tell you everything

the entire history of the world

now what if we told you we could do it

in just two hours

we're going to tell the whole story

from the big bang

to the present day

how the planet prepared for the rise of

man

how the stone age

led to the steam engine

how the first seeds

sprouted into cities

and civilizations

everything is connected

and the path

leads to you

it took history 13.7 billion years to

unfold we'll show you everything you

need to know in the next two hours

this is our infant universe

everything that will ever exist

everything that will ever happen

all begins here within this tiny bundle

of energy

smaller than an atom

and right now history as we know it is

about to mysteriously begin

for reasons we may never know

our universe suddenly erupts

in a millionth of a millionth of a

millionth of a millionth of a millionth

of a millionth of a second

it went from a size smaller than an atom

to bigger than a galaxy

whoosh

what you're seeing is

energy and it's one key to understanding

everything that will unfold in the next

two hours

within a fraction of a second the big

bang creates all the energy that will

ever exist

all the energy that will power the stars

that will fuel anything that ever lives

all the energy that you will ever

consume

dates back to the beginning of time

when you put gas into your car

you're tapping energy that was created

during the big bang

you're tapping the energy of the

universe itself

we're only a few minutes into our two

hour journey

but already 380 000 years have passed

you are about to witness the birth of

your original ancestors

the first atoms

this

is hydrogen

the universe will use it to make

everything in the world around us

hydrogen is like a baseball team you say

what player do i want to start my team

with well if i want to start a universe

i want to start it with hydrogen because

from that with a lot of heat a lot of

pressure you can build more kinds of

atoms

the first atoms blast through the early

universe

then luckily for us they don't spread

out evenly

because in those tiny pockets with more

atoms gravity the great sculptor of the

early universe

begins to work its magic

the first galaxies are beginning to form

revealing a timeless secret of the

universe

throughout history

whenever more matter and energy can be

drawn together in one place

more complex things can emerge

we have

all of these urban centers around the

planet

where so much

creativity so much art so much science

so much culture came about because of

all these opportunities for things to

interact with each other

really in a sense

where there is stuff new stuff can

develop and where there isn't anything

nothing much can develop

300 million years after the big bang

inside of forming galaxies

gravity continues to squeeze together

clouds of gas and dust

causing pressure and heat to violently

rise

when the temperature reaches 18 million

degrees fahrenheit hydrogen atoms slam

together

creating a new element helium

and radiating bursts of energy

the first stars are born

suddenly there were these new beacons of

light

shining forth

pouring energy into the universe

let there be light

but something is missing from this early

universe

there are billions of stars

yet not a single planet

to form planets

and eventually people

to take the next leap that would make

all of history possible

the universe needs more to work with

than just hydrogen and helium

the complicated elements the heavier

things that we build stuff out of for

example iron or life built out of carbon

and things like that they're actually

manufactured in stars

we may see stars like our own sun as

sources of light

but there is something bigger happening

deep inside

stars are element factories

they fuse hydrogen into helium

helium into lithium forging 25 of the

most common elements we'll need to live

including carbon

oxygen nitrogen and

iron so

more than 12 billion years ago

stars are already creating the element

that will spur the iron age

allow for the building of cities

and the creation of some of mankind's

most famous monuments

but a look at the statue of liberty

reveals the next challenge awaiting the

early universe

while the statue's frame is iron

her skin requires an element too heavy

to be made in stars

for lady liberty to have material for

her skin

for there to be gold for wedding rings

or uranium for nuclear reactors

some elements had to be created another

way

stars don't have enough energy to do the

job but if the element factory isn't

powerful enough

how about

blowing up the factory

just a few million years after the first

stars formed some of them exploded wham

these explosions known as supernovas are

the biggest blasts in the universe since

the big bang

providing the extra boost of energy

needed to fuse heavier elements

in the fiery blast of their own

destruction

stars create uranium

gold

all the rest of the elements that will

fill our world

including copper

the periodic table of the elements is

really sort of a library of matter in

the universe

those are your building blocks

everything is coming out of that

particular chemistry set

supernovas are absolutely necessary for

us to be here you know we have iron in

our blood

we have little bits of old supernova

therefore just floating around through

us

we are all stardust

copper and tin bronze age without

supernovas there's no bronze age

go to any supermarket and buy a

multivitamin and go and look in the

ingredients you'll find copper you'll

find zinc you'll find selenium you'll

find all sorts of elements that can only

be made in a supernova

the elements made by stars will become

the seeds of life on earth

and the drivers of human history

but the journey has just begun

before there can be life

the universe has to build us

a suitable home

to build a proper house

you have to assemble the right materials

all in one place

you know when planets form it's the same

thing just the materials that you have

at hand that's going to dictate the kind

of house that your planet's going to be

to get enough of the right material in

the right place all at once takes a very

long time

over the next eight billion years

more than half of history as we know it

the element factories continue their

work

stars explode

and are reborn

each generation with more heavy elements

than the last

until 4.6 billion years ago

finally there are enough materials

gathered for the next step on the path

to us

a new star is born

this is our sun

it's so massive that it's gathered up

99.9 percent of the gas and dust in the

solar system

but there's still just enough left

behind for gravity to build some other

things

like planets

the third one out from this star

will be our home

by the time earth emerges just over four

and a half billion years ago

two-thirds of the history of the

universe has already passed

the first sunrises sweep across a

foreboding alien planet

a world spinning so rapidly that a day

lasts only six hours

when you go back to the early earth

right after the planet formed you really

have to think of the earth as another

planet

the sun would have looked out over

a hellacious scene of just molten lava

in places you would see rafts of black

volcanic rock

within the liquefied rock

the elements are all in a jumble

something has to bring order out of this

chaos

and once again that something is gravity

lighter material drifts toward the

surface

and forms a solid crust

while heavier material sinks toward the

center

forming a molten iron nickel core

this churning liquid metal creates a

magnetic field that reaches out into

space

like a force field it will protect our

future home from the sun's deadly

charged particles soon this magnetic

field will allow for life to grow

and later guide the explorers who will

connect two halves of the world

but for all this to unfold

the earth will need a critical partner

four and a half billion years ago

an object the size of mars smashes into

the planet at 25 000 miles per hour

earth swallows up much of the impactor

but a spray of molten debris is whipped

off into space

within as little as a year

gravity gathers this debris into a

secondary sphere in orbit around the

earth

where it has been ever since

the formation of the moon was an

incredibly important event in earth's

history and in fact its creation over 4

billion years ago is really important to

the earth's climate today

the moon keeps earth steady

its gravitational pull prevents the

planet from wobbling

saving us from wild climate swings

and the collision that formed the moon

leaves earth tilted on its axis

giving the planet a key ingredient to

life

seasons

having seasons is very very important

for the evolution of life on the earth

and having some stability in the tilt of

those axes

that's very very important also for

maintaining life on the earth

the moon's gravity also begins to slow

earth's rotation

which will eventually lengthen our days

from 6 hours

to 24.

[Music]

4.4 billion years ago

too hot on earth for liquid water to

exist

but there's water vapor

steam in the atmosphere

the trick is how to get it out of the

sky

onto any world where you hope to have

life

a little rain must fall

for millions of years

as the planet cools

rain pours down

forming puddles

lakes

and eventually our oceans

by 3.8 billion years ago

our planet has a moon and permanent

oceans

but it hardly resembles the place we now

call home

to become the stage for all of human

history

earth needs an oxygen-rich atmosphere

fertile continents for people to

discover and develop

who will create our modern world

there's a trillion of them crawling on

your skin right now

we're telling the history of the world

in two hours from the big bang

to the present day

and our modern world holds important

clues to the story

in fact structures like this

hide a mysterious link to the first life

on earth

3.8 billion years ago

beneath the surface of our primeval

oceans

the revolution is taking place

six simple elements including hydrogen

from the big bang and oxygen carbon and

nitrogen created by stars have combined

to form the key substances that will

make up all life

including us

the most spectacular is dna

within its spirals hide the secret codes

of life

seven hundred thousand years after the

planet first formed

life on earth

begins

we stand not on the shoulders of giants

but of tiny organisms

bacteria

we're very egocentric we think that we

animals

run the world but in fact we are very

late entrance

it was an empire of bacteria long before

animals animals come along and we like

to think that we wiped out that empire

well we would be dead if we wipe out

that empire

i have within me an entire zoo of

bacteria

in fact each one of us has more bacteria

living in our bodies than there are

people on the planet

for billions of years

microbes like these

will have earth to themselves

like our infant universe the first life

is small

simple and full of possibilities

the secret of how it explodes into all

the incredible forms we see today

including us goes back to the beginning

of time

as we've seen all the energy that will

ever exist was created in the big bang

all creatures need to grab their share

of this energy to survive

the more we harness

the more efficiently we use it the more

complex we can become

and almost all of our share of the big

bang's energy

is beamed to us by the sun

two and a half billion years ago some

very special bacteria figure out how to

consume the sun's energy to live

in doing this they also create the most

important waste product in the history

of the world

oxygen

soon oxygen will remake our world

but first it has another important job

to do

earth's ancient seas are full of iron

particles and everyone knows what

happens when oxygen meets iron

here i'm a little bacterium i've

produced this oxygen molecule and here's

a big piece of iron clump i rust it

this rusted iron collects on the

seafloor

billions of years later these huge

deposits will be raised up

to become major sources of the world's

iron and steel

it was these iron deposits that later on

drove the industrial revolution

in this way the brooklyn bridge

and the other early landmarks of the

industrial age are a direct link to some

of the first life forms on earth

once there's no more iron left in the

sea to rust

these ancient bacteria have a mission to

complete

they create so much oxygen

that it fills the oceans

and escapes into the atmosphere

and from then on we have a very

different planet from all the other

planets in the solar system

now

life takes a giant leap

for the first time

some bacteria learn to live on oxygen

every human breath is a ritual

two and a half billion years old

life tends to stick with what works even

over the course of billions of years

oxygen is a game changer

by taming its power life has found a

better way to energize itself

20 times more efficient than anything

used on earth before

what life does with all this new energy

will be the story that leads to us

over the next two billion years life

becomes more complex

skies become blue

and so do the oceans that reflect them

large solid continents appear

earth is beginning to look more like the

place we now call home

550 million years ago

as the planet celebrates its 4 billionth

birthday

oxygen levels in the atmosphere have

risen from next to nothing to as much as

13

take a deep breath

because life on earth is about to go

wild

this is the cambrian explosion

biology's version of the big bang

right after you have abundant oxygen

you get size and complexity and oxygen

lets you do that

it's in this breathtaking span of

roughly 30 million years that most of

the major animal groups evolve

by 500 million years ago the first bony

fish have evolved in the seas

these fish are our direct ancestors

though they look nothing like us

they evolve the body parts that will

make our own bodies possible

including a spine and a mouth with jaws

and teeth

we owe a great deal to our fish

ancestors in fact all vertebrates today

really represent modifications of the

original fish body plan

for the first four billion years of

earth's history plants and animals have

stuck to the seas

but that all begins to change

with oxygen comes an ozone layer

protecting us from dangerous radiation

[Music]

plants make the move first

around 400 million years ago animals are

ready to take the leap

among the first ashore are the

amphibians

whose descendants will include us

the most amazing thing about animal

evolution ever for me personally is

that moment that first amphibian

walks out of the primeval ocean

onto land

and takes a big gulp of air

kind of like great great great great

great great grandpa coming out of the

ocean and seeing this fantastic world

it's like hey

i can live here look at those trees look

at those bugs there's food here i can do

this

eventually humans will conquer every

imaginable terrain

but before we can do that

our ancestors must first cut their final

tie to the water

mating season

like modern frogs they have jelly-like

eggs that would dry out on land

but some amphibians eventually solve the

problem

they evolve a new form of egg

with a shell that keeps the moisture in

this allows us to carry the ocean with

us

on to land and signals the evolution of

amphibians

into reptiles

you could be three four five hundred a

thousand miles away from water and still

have the water in that egg in order to

birth

that is the key

it cuts that final tie to the ocean

that way we could colonize the rest of

the land

[Music]

300 million years ago

life flourishes in massive tropical

swamps

where planet earth is cooking up a

surprise

as plants die here

they are buried

compacted

and cooked

energy created in the big bang

and radiated by the sun to plants on

earth

is now locked away underground

as coal

a gift to be opened by human beings

millions of years in the future

250 million years ago

an apocalypse unfolds

the biggest spike in volcanic activity

since the early days of the planet

the atmosphere is choked with carbon

dioxide

and the diversity of animal life spawned

in the cambrian explosion

is stopped dead in its tracks

more than 70 of all species on earth go

extinct in the worst mass die-off in

history

the permian extinction

extinction is a recurring character in

the story of planet earth

five times in the last 500 million years

some cataclysm wiped out the dominant

species

it's a reshuffling of the deck that

allows new creatures to take hold

new creatures

like the dinosaurs

[Music]

dinosaurs will reign for the next 160

million years

during that time the first hardwood

forests appear

and

after more than four billion years the

moon's gravity finally settles earth

into a 24-hour day

at the start of the dinosaur era the

continents are clustered together into a

single landmass we call pangaea

but now they start to break apart

africa separates from south america

the vast atlantic ocean opens up

creating what will become one of the

defining barriers of human history the

gulf between the old and new worlds

the undisputed stars of the dinosaur era

are animals like triceratops and t-rex

but there are some important creatures

scurrying around their feet

if we were to trace our lineage back far

enough we would come to really small

shrew-like mammals

surrounded by these titans of reptile

life

during that time mammals we were living

on the fringes we were maybe stealing

dinosaur eggs maybe just eeking out in

existence

so the dinosaurs kind of held us back

the biggest headline of the history of

dinosaurs which is 160 million years is

that we lost

mammals lost

we couldn't get much bigger than a small

cat

for 160 million years all the

medium-sized medium big big gigantic and

stupendous animals were dinosaurs for

that whole time

they beat us

fair and square

but the deck is about to be reshuffled

[Music]

65 million years ago

a six mile wide object likely an

asteroid

slams into the earth

a dust cloud blocks out the sun

temperatures plummet

every creature on land weighing over 50

pounds goes extinct

the rain of the dinosaurs

is over

the greatest gift that the dinosaurs

ever gave us was dying

when they

went extinct it gave the mammals time to

rise

it doesn't take long after the

disappearance of the dinosaurs for the

first true primates to appear

like their later versions including us

these mammals have evolved

forward-facing eyes

allowing for accurate depth perception

and flexible hands with five digits

they have five fingers just like us

which means we can grasp things if you

think about other animals that don't

have digits organized the way ours are

their ability to hold things to

manipulate objects is much more limited

50 million years ago

our primate ancestors are evolving on a

planet that is warming

it's so hot

there are jungles at the poles

[Music]

as the continents drift the americas and

africa have almost fully taken shape

but in northern africa modern-day egypt

is submerged beneath an ancient sea

on the floor of that sea live small

shelled creatures called nomulitis

their shells made of calcium and carbon

pile up on the sea bottom over millions

of years where they form into limestone

limestone that will be used to build the

great pyramids

if you look closely at the pyramids

today

you can still see evidence that these 4

000 year old monuments are in fact

made of 50 million year old seashells

by 10 million years ago earth is

morphing into a world most of us would

recognize

the colorado river is carving out the

grand canyon

mountain ranges like the himalayas have

arisen

they're so tall they disrupt weather

patterns

setting the stage for a colder planet

the isthmus of panama emerges to connect

north and south america

cleaving the connection between the

atlantic and the pacific

disrupting ocean currents and tipping

the world even more towards an ice age

with the planet getting colder our

primate ancestors hang on in the tropics

but a new creature is coming in

that threatens to destroy them

seven million years ago

our primate ancestors lived safely in

the trees

but their neighborhood is about to be

invaded

this newcomer will have as profound an

effect on human history as any other

living thing on earth

it seems almost impossible to believe

but one of the most important things

that will lead to the emergence of us

is the emergence

of grass

the grasslands appear

almost simultaneously around the world

we get the african survivors

we get the eurasian stepped lands

we get the north american prairies

we get the great grasslands of argentina

appearing simultaneously around the

world

in eastern africa grasslands invade the

traditional woodland habitat of our ape

ancestors

with fewer trees and greater gaps

between them our ancestors have to adapt

apes notice that there's more and more

apes in the same tree and less and less

food

increasing incentives for apes to go

from one patch of food to a different

one separated by grasslands

now

one way to do it is to run like hell

the other way to do it is to extend

one's food sources into the grasslands

and seek out the foods that are

available there

and so some apes make the move down

into this stark new habitat

it's a landscape better suited to

primates that can walk on two legs

keeping their heads up above the tall

grasses to watch for predators

standing on two feet is a revolutionary

advance

because it frees up our hands

hands we will need to shape human

history

2.6 million years ago

early proto-humans or hominids

walk in earth whose rocks are loaded

with the element silicon

created in the cores of stars billions

of years before

silicon is the second most abundant

element in earth's crust

one of its chemical quirks is the

ability to bond with oxygen to form

crystals that combine into solid rocks

rocks that can be chipped and shaped

without shattering

hominids started doing this 2.6 million

years ago breaking cryptocrystalline

silicates to make sharp edges and people

use them for millions literally 2.6

million years

[Music]

simply having a modified stone with a

sharp edge on it now suddenly you have a

hammer

you have a crude cutting edge a simple

modified stone

means a human can suddenly do

a thousand more things than we could do

previously

that little extra bit of technology

enabled our ancestors to persist and

eventually turn into us

[Music]

silicon launches the first technological

revolution

the stone age

millions of years after it powers our

first handheld devices

another chemical quirk of silicon will

make it the height of technology once

again

the next leap towards becoming truly

human relies on a little-known secret of

our home planet

in the known universe it turns out earth

may have a rare and special power

of all the planets and moons in the

solar system we think that earth is

unique in the ability to sustain fire

other planets and moons have lightning

and lava

but only on earth do we have the two

critical things we need for fire to burn

a vast fuel supply in the form of plants

and trees

and an atmosphere full of oxygen to fan

the flames

if fire wasn't a possibility you'd have

nothing like like us running around

homo sapiens they made a world with fire

our ancestors have fire firmly under

control by eight hundred thousand years

ago

it's a skill that connects us back to

the very beginning

remember that all energy was created in

the big bang and all life is in a

competition for our share of this energy

using fire to cook is like having an

external stomach to break down foods

releasing more calories

giving us more energy

which in turn allows us to support

bigger brains

fire is also the ultimate gateway

technology

we will soon use it to turn clay into

pottery

metal into weapons

water into steam power

if you don't have fire you can't have

the internal combustion engine

no fire no metal no fire no rubber

it's a

technology that opens a world of

possibilities for creatures that know

how to use it

two

000 years ago

the modern human has fully taken shape

the larynx or voice box which is high up

in the throat in our ancestors descends

for the first time information can be

shared

between individuals

and across generations

humans have gained a critical advantage

over every other creature on earth

you can tell my grandfather said that

when the elephants didn't show up we go

off and hunted zebras

you know my aunt told me that her cousin

found this water hole on the other side

of that river

and we can all benefit and we can all

understand what they mean when they're

describing what they found out on that

landscape language

changes

humans from being like stand-alone

computers to being networked computers

where you can share information

now everyone doesn't need to depend on

one's own personal experience

one can borrow the personal experience

of anyone with whom one can communicate

that's a powerful advantage no other

creature has that

as a species humans become exponentially

smarter

the global game board has been set and

we are now ready to play

one hundred thousand years ago

man can move

we have agile hands and primitive tools

we can communicate and control fire

we are finally ready to expand out of

our african home

on a path millions of years in the

making

shifting continents have linked africa

and eurasia into the largest contiguous

land mass on earth

afro-eurasia

33 million square miles more than twice

the surface area of our entire moon

for early humans this means more than

half the land on earth can be reached

on foot

human dispersal was a crucial game

changer

we are one of the few primates that live

on more than one continent

simultaneously

so

what that means is that we're better

insulated from the kinds of things that

cause big mammals to become extinct than

other primates are it's extinction

insurance dispersal is extinction

insurance

but just as the world begins to open

itself up to man the planet turns on us

an ice age begins

now the planet will test us like never

before

by 50 000 years ago glaciers begin to

advance down from the north pole

at the same time humans continue their

conquest of the globe

arriving in china and australia

by 30 000 years ago homo sapiens reach

europe for the first time

by 20 000 years ago with the ice nearing

its most extreme the march of man

reaches the frigid tundra of northeast

siberia

despite the trials of the ice age

man endures

and develops the last skills we will

need to be truly human

the clues lie in these symbols

we have taken an intellectual leap

to think beyond the here and now

beyond what is simply needed to survive

we can only start saying we have an

organism that is human that is the same

as us when we start seeing evidence of

symbolic thought

it's when we start seeing a picture

of a cow

that everybody will recognize as the

picture of a cow

because only when we start seeing all of

those things can we say that is a human

people or creatures that think like us

that see the world in the same way as us

and from that moment on human history

was marked to be radically different to

any other species on this planet

now with huge amounts of the planet's

water locked up in ice

sea levels plummet by three to four

hundred feet

the last great barrier to the spread of

man is erased

we come across the bering land bridge

from siberia to north america

we are telling the history of the world

in two hours and in just one hour more

than 13 billion years have already

passed these years of preparation have

allowed man to finally emerge and spread

out across the planet

and human history as we know it

can truly begin

our history of the world began with the

beginning of time

the big bang

it has taken us on a journey of nearly

14 billion years

now as humans take center stage

it's important to remember

just how small a slice of history

we actually occupy

to make things simple imagine

compressing 14 billion years of history

down to just 14 years

on this scale

the earth would have existed only for

the past five years

so that's about a third of the history

of the universe

large complex creatures would have

developed seven months ago

on this scale dinosaurs went extinct

only about three weeks ago

the entire recorded history of humans

would span only the last three minutes

modern industrial societies the

industrial revolution effectively

six seconds ago

what this shows me is that we humans

have been around for only a very brief

instant

in the recorded history of the universe

mankind has waited billions of years for

our brief instant to shine

as the stars and our evolving planet

carried out the slow work of organizing

the elements

in a way that would make human history

possible

it's 10 000 bc

less than 100 000 years after expanding

out of africa man has reached south

america humans have met the adversity of

the ice age head on and rather than die

off we have adapted

become even more intelligent

and now we have colonized the entire

globe

from coast

to mountain top

from tundra

to desert

humans are there

our closest living ancestors chimpanzees

live in the tropics they only live in

the tropics humans have managed to

colonize the entire globe

ice age land bridges allowed man to

spread around the world

but now the ice begins to melt

and sea levels rise again

humans are trapped and separated in two

vast and unconnected hemispheres each

pocket of humanity left to make the best

of what it has been given

as the glaciers recede

they carve out lakes rivers and bays

the map as we know it emerges

in africa increased rainfall causes lake

victoria and lake albert to overflow

and form egypt's nile river

in eurasia other rivers emerge

the tigris and euphrates in mesopotamia

modern-day iraq

the indus in modern-day pakistan

and china's yellow and yangtze

these river valleys become critically

important for how human history will now

be played out following the retreat of

these ice sheets

these are the river valleys whose waters

and fertile soils

will allow the first seeds of

civilization to be planted

with temperatures warming after the ice

age

plants and animals are more plentiful

and man can finally choose to stop

moving

permanent settlements begin

populations grow

with more mouths to feed our ancestors

have to get clever

they had to find a way to increase the

amount of food they could get from the

surroundings

now one discovery forever changes the

planet and the path of mankind

we learned to plant seeds

and the seeds we sow come from the same

plants that millions of years earlier

spurred our evolution from ape to man

the unheralded hero of human history

grass a grass seed is tiny right it's no

food i can hunt a bison or i can take

grass

on a bison right

ironically grass seeds become the most

important food crops in the world but

they're the things that are ignored by

hunter for thousands and thousands of

years people don't start using them

until they absolutely have to use them

some of the species of grass that we are

most familiar with includes sugar cane

it includes wheat and rye and barley all

of the cereal crops are types of grass

so it's not just that beautiful green

lawn that we measure our middle class

success from

it's also the staple crop

upon which civilization depends

it is the majority of our calorie intake

once again it all goes back to the big

bang

central to the story of all life is our

competition for that energy created at

the beginning of time

just as oxygen gave us an edge

just as fire allowed us to consume more

calories

switching to farming is an energy

revolution

a hunter-gatherer needs 10 square miles

of territory to provide himself with

enough sustenance

enough energy in the form of plants and

meat to survive

a farmer can harvest the sun's energy so

efficiently he can fulfill his needs

using only a tenth of a square mile of

land

in the warming after the last ice age

farming begins to take hold in a half

dozen places around the globe

but by the fortunes of geography no

place in the ancient world has a better

concentration of plants and animals that

can be domesticated than the middle

east's fertile crescent

in the middle east we have this

remarkable

convergence of species that seem to have

been susceptible to domestication both

plants and animals

in terms of animals we're talking about

cattle pigs sheep and goats in terms of

plants two varieties of wheat rye barley

lentils figs all in this very small part

of the world

unlike the fertile crescent and the rest

of afro-eurasia

places like sub-saharan africa and the

americas have very few wild species that

can be easily domesticated

it's a critical difference

people blessed with the right mix of

plants and animals will become more

powerful and get a massive head start on

the road to the modern world

[Music]

one animal that gives any human who

containment an almost unbeatable edge

is the horse

it's a little-known fact that although

horses first evolved in the americas

they died out there along with many

other large mammals around 10 000 bc

there were at least three species of ice

age horses in north america maybe more

some as small as ponies some as big as

clydesdales they had involved in north

america for 40 million years they're

part of the whole history and then

they're gone

they're gone

these powerful potential allies

disappear before they can be used by the

first north americans

fortunately before that happened large

numbers of horses escaped back across

the bering strait land bridge and spread

out across the great grasslands the

steplands of central eurasia

a narrow escape that had a profound

effect on human history

around 4000 bc

nomadic people in central asia

learn to tame them for the first time

domesticated horses will be harnessed

across eurasia

advancing everything from work

to warfare

perhaps no other animal has had a bigger

influence on the course of human history

and the circle wouldn't be complete for

another 5 000 years

when christopher columbus would bring

horses with him on his second voyage to

the americas

his horses would be the first to set

hooves in the americas since the great

die-off over ten thousand years earlier

six thousand years ago

domestication of animals and plants sets

the stage for the next phase of human

history

like clouds of interstellar dust

gathering in material to form stars

a type of gravity is at work as places

like sumeria located in part of the

fertile crescent known as mesopotamia

draw in people support large populations

and spin up into centers of power and

innovation

by 3000 bc

some of these sumerian settlements can

truly be called

our first cities

of them uruk has around 50 000 people

living in less than one square mile

a population density that rivals

modern-day new york city

humans have become so efficient at

deriving energy from domesticated food

that this land area which would have

supported only a single hunter-gatherer

now can support thousands

but a change in diet also triggers a new

dependence

once you move to agriculture you are

depending for 80 90 of your calories on

perhaps one or two species in the case

of the middle east wheat and barley

in the case of wheat and barley they

both ripen at about the same time

humans have to gather the seeds at the

same time so now we have our food for

the year that has arrived in one hit

it's like getting your salary paid once

a year you need to record it you need to

plan because if inevitably your crop

fails

you have famine and you're not gonna

have another go for another 12 months

in these first cities

crops are king

to keep track of them our ancestors

developed the first writing

to protect them the first armies

and to administer them

the beginnings of politics

when you have hundreds or thousands of

people who are living together

there's simply too many people to sort

of run around and create a census it

creates a need for

government it creates a need for some

form of social and political hierarchy

planting seeds has set man on a new path

settlements have grown into cities

but to take the next epic step from city

to civilization

we'll need the help

of a very surprising creature

five thousand years ago

after wandering the earth for more than

a hundred thousand years

mankind has begun to settle down

we cluster near rivers

along the tigris and euphrates

the nile

the indus

the yellow and yangtze

civilizations are about to take off

but first they must all master one thing

trade

the more they exchange goods and learn

from other lands

the faster they grow

it seems that long-distance trade and

communication

is a necessary precursor to allow urban

civilization as we know it

and surprisingly

the first civilizations arise on the

back of a creature with a lowly

reputation in the modern world

the donkey

the donkey caravan is the interstate

highway and high-speed internet of its

day

their roots will lay the groundwork for

the modern world

moving not only goods like timber and

bronze but ideas and stories

the civilizations they connect will be

some of the first described in the bible

the caravan roots converge at the

persian gulf where they link up with

ships that carry goods to india

it essentially brought these

civilizations together into great

cultural and material exchange

and really was the beginning of the

trend towards globalization

it is a key to understanding how our

world works to this day

just like the first civilizations we

trade and form networks

these networks form hubs

and throughout history

being at that hub has meant one thing

the amount of ideas the amount of cargo

that passes through a region seems to

have a direct correlation to how

powerful and important they are

by 2000 bc

humans have gone from humble huts

to massive monuments

in africa great pyramids arise on the

banks of the nile

the first stages of stonehenge rise up

in ancient britain

and back in samaria artificial temple

mounds called ziggurats climb ever

higher toward the heavens

to cement these massive structures

together the builders of samaria turn to

a substance that oozes from seepages

along the euphrates river

it's called bitumen

used as asphalt in the modern world it

is the first petroleum product to be

exploited by mankind

while bitumen is highly prized the

lighter thinner substance oozing from

the ground along with it is considered a

nuisance by the ancients because it

catches fire so easily

the ancients call it naphtha

we

call it gasoline and it's one of the

first indications of the vast oil fields

that will one day turn the cradle of

civilization

into a center of wealth

and warfare

the legacy of these first civilizations

can be seen in surprising ways

the sumerian counting system was based

on the number 12 rather than 10

which is why we divide our days into two

12-hour blocks our hours into 60 minutes

and our minutes into 60 seconds

the sumerians also likely invented the

wheel which eventually leads to another

innovation that will change the course

of man

the chariot

thus bringing together the sumerian

invention of the wheel right with the

the domestication of the horse that had

occurred amongst these nomadic peoples

into this um really formidable piece of

military technology

around 1200 bc

a chariot driven clash of civilizations

cuts off trade routes for copper and tin

the metals we need to make bronze tools

and weapons but luckily

the stars have made us an alternative

iron

now metalsmiths make a crucial discovery

by working at higher temperatures they

can release the power of this ancient

metal

easier to sharpen and 700 times more

common on earth than copper

it is a game changer

humanity enters the iron age

as we reach the first millennium bc

history has taken us on a wild ride

from the initial blast of the big bang

to the formation of earth and its first

creatures

and the rise of man

we've seen the ice age create bridges to

spread mankind around the world

then strand us on different continents

leaving us to survive on what we have at

hand

so by 1000 bc the world remains a

divided place

the trade network that connects much of

eurasia and north africa

doesn't yet penetrate the planet's

driest deserts

across the vastest oceans

cut off by geography are people in

places like sub-saharan africa and the

americas

with few easy to domesticate plants and

animals of their own they remain tied to

more ancient ways of life

600 bc

the cavalry have arrived

humans ride into battle on horseback for

the first time

we've seen that just taming a horse

gives man a massive advantage

now pairing him with iron weapons makes

him nearly unstoppable

these advances in technology

they don't just make a fighting ability

possible they make empires possible

and that is the story of the next

several millennia

with new technology and improved

logistics

empires spread

uniting massive land areas under a

central control

as empires grow

so do new beliefs

one interesting phenomenon we see with

the rise of these empires

is this idea of monotheism

this idea of a universal god that

develops over time and it's just a

phenomenon

judaism emerges from which we eventually

get christianity

and islam

buddhism and hinduism also arise

the five major religions today are all

rooted in this remarkable era

although empires spread

some great powers remain isolated

the rise of the himalayas 50 million

years earlier

has left china cut off from trading with

the rest of the world

but that is about to change

around 100 bc a chinese emperor sends an

envoy to the west in search of alliances

the routes he travels will become the

silk roads

a massive trade network that connects

china

across central asia to the roman empire

china has joined the world

as far as we know no chinese trader ever

met a roman no roman ever met a chinese

trader at least during this first period

of the silk roads but this vast trade

then began to explode between about 100

bc and about 200 a.d

we have three centuries of

trade and cultural exchange on a level

that has not been seen before in human

history

but this new human network also

unleashes

hidden dangers

by the beginning of the common era

great empires have risen and a massive

trading network connects most of europe

and asia

but the trade routes also carry an

invisible threat

disease

massive epidemics

that some blame for taking down both the

roman empire

and china's han dynasty

but these networks also lead to the

spread of religion

in 312 a.d the roman emperor constantine

converts to christianity paving the way

for it to become the dominant religion

of europe

and the west

three centuries later

islam also emerges

a religion that will for a time unify a

territory two and a half times larger

than rome ever was

arab trade will drive innovation for the

next thousand years and expand the

global network to places it has never

gone before

arabs are sitting in the middle of

afro-eurasia there are arab traders who

are sailing off to china there are arab

traders who are traveling all the way to

the atlantic ocean

so they are sitting in the middle

of the hub

one secret to arab trade

the camel

a creature whose ancestor like the horse

escaped across the bering land bridge

out of north america

a caravan of six camels can lug as much

as two tons of cargo as far as 60 miles

a day

twice the load of a donkey caravan

in half the time

for the first time

camel caravans open up reliable trade

routes across the formidable sahara

desert

leading to the formation of the first

states in west africa

arabic trade expands

moving salt from the sahara to rome

rice from eastern asia to india the

secrets of making paper out of china

into europe

and countless other inventions and ideas

around the world

where does our word for lemon come from

where does our word for coffee come from

they're all arabic

because the arabs brought a huge number

of food crops into europe

oranges citrus crops they come from

south china

yet they don't make it to the west until

the great age of the arabs

in islamic north africa one italian

merchant named leonardo fibonacci

becomes well schooled in the ways of

arab traders

he picks up on a simple but ingenious

counting system that originated in india

but is used extensively in the arab

world

his writings will spread this knowledge

to europe and around the globe

with everyone counting the same way

business and trade will explode

and because of fibonacci

people today still almost universally

use the numbers known as arabic numerals

but there is another idea arab traders

will spread

something even more influential

it originates in china around 800 a.d

a chinese alchemist in search of an

elixir for long life

instead stumbles upon chemistry that can

bring sudden death

he combines carbon and sulfur with

saltpeter a compound made of potassium

nitrogen and oxygen

forged in the stars these elements now

come together

to make gunpowder

the recipe for gunpowder eventually

moves west across the silk roads to the

islamic world

where muslim warriors use it to fire

cannonballs at christian crusaders

europeans pick up on the idea

embracing and perfecting gunpowder

weapons

1492 a.d

there are roughly 400 million people in

the world

but it is still divided in two

in the americas the civilizations of the

aztecs mayans and incas have all arisen

while halfway around the world in the

aftermath of the fall of rome

europe has cracked like an egg into

individual states

for italian-born christopher columbus

this means he can appeal for funding

from a succession of european rulers

until he finally convinces the king and

queen of spain to back his expeditions

it has taken all of earth's history

to make columbus's journey possible

for tacking into the wind he uses

triangular sails a technology copied

from the arabs

to guide him the compass and invention

from china

[Music]

and guiding the needle a magnetic field

formed with the core of the planet

itself

[Music]

although columbus is looking for a new

way to sail to india what he does

instead

is finally and forever connect the two

halves of the world

the voyage is not just significant in

american history

as you'll see it's a pivotal event in

all of human history

nothing will ever be the same

the end of the ice age marooned large

pockets of humanity on separate sides of

the globe for over 15 000 years

now that's all about to change

the voyage of christopher columbus in

1492 is taught as one of the most

significant events in american history

in fact it's one of the most significant

events in all of human history

prior to that voyage the great world

zones had existed largely in isolation

by crossing the atlantic columbus opens

up the vast american world zone these

two enormous continents of north and

south america with the millions of

people that are living there the

resources that are available

and for the first time people living in

eurasia become aware of this other part

of the world until the voyage of

columbus these people may as well have

been living on different planets so

isolated were they

a trade network that started with the

first civilizations connected europe

asia and africa

now reaches across the atlantic

in this vast new global network

new hubs will form and once again

power will shift

for most of the last 2000 years europe

hasn't been that important

then we get the age of columbus and what

do you know this is exactly the time

where we see the rise of the west this

is when the west starts taking over when

it gets itself smack bang in the middle

of the biggest exchange network the

world has ever seen

now foods that had been isolated on

disconnected continents begin to move

around the world

maize from the americas shows up in

egypt and china

potatoes from the andes proved perfectly

suited to the soils of ireland and

russia

the old fertile crescent grains like

wheat

begin to feed the americas

new foods mean more calories more energy

within three centuries of columbus's

voyage the population of the world will

more than double to 900 million

but the unequal hands dealt to the two

hemispheres

now play out in a deadly climax

european conquistadors

inheritors of the agriculture and

animals of the fertile crescent

and the trade spread along the vast

networks of the old world

come bearing guns

riding horses

and carrying infectious diseases

the result

slaughter

in the years following columbus's first

voyage 95 of the native population in

the americas will die

from european guns and germs

once the hemispheres are connected

nothing can ever be the same

take the incredible story of sugar

chemically it's the only source of fuel

for our brains

a substance we are programmed to crave

[Music]

raw sugar comes mostly from sugar cane

once again a grass will play a central

role in the story of mankind

first cultivated more than six thousand

years ago in asia europeans discovered

sugar in the middle east during the

crusades

and carried it home

europe was hooked

but there's virtually nowhere in europe

where sugar can grow

then we have christopher columbus and

the discovery of the new world

and the spanish conquistadors yes they

initially are very interested in the

gold and the silver but really they just

want to make it rich they don't care how

they're going to make it rich and once

the gold and the silver has been looted

the next step is to open sugar

plantations

the spanish themselves

don't want to work in the sugar

plantations they start looking around

for a new labor force

and over on the other side of the

atlantic

there is a place where they can buy

slaves and if we look at the history of

slavery

the number one destination of slaves

from africa

are sugar plantations

so the history of sugar

shapes the development of history

through the middle east through the

crusades through the conquest of

mesoamerica

and even the history of slavery from

africa to the americas

in the year 1700 mankind has hit a wall

most humans continue to live simple

lives more like our ancient ancestors

than our own

when you think back to the world in 1700

most people were farmers most people

practice small scale subsistence

agriculture most manufacturing was done

in workshops

in 1700 it takes over a year for cargo

and information to circle the planet

longer than it would take us today to

get to mars

what's holding us back

is how we power our lives

in egypt of 2000 bc

90 of all work was done by human muscle

with animals kicking in the rest

[Music]

by 1700 in europe the majority of work

70

is still driven by human muscle

muscle power alone can't clear the path

to the modern age

but there's a breakthrough hidden

deep within the earth

as our history of the world in two hours

races towards a close

mankind has hit a wall

human progress is stalled by the limits

of our muscle

to break through we'll need a new way to

power our

lives and the entire history of the

world

remember that billions of years ago

iron from exploding stars was gathered

up into planet earth during its

formation

thousands of years ago man started using

this iron for tools and weapons

to keep our forges burning we began

cutting down our forests

now

300 years ago in britain iron is in high

demand and the trees are running out

the british need a new source of fuel

and thanks to the decayed remains of

ancient ferns they have one

coal

but coal itself won't power mankind into

the modern world

there's one more fateful twist in the

story

as the quest for coal takes miners ever

deeper into the ground

water begins flooding the tunnels

to pump out the water

a new invention is needed

in 1712 thomas newcomen produces a pump

powered by burning coal and driven by

steam

newcomen's machine is the first

practical steam engine

it is this combination energy and engine

fuel and machine that will free man from

the limits of his own muscle

[Music]

and change the world

the industrial revolution begins

along with political revolutions in

america and later france

this technological revolution forever

transforms the landscape of the world

and before long the atlantic world has

become the new economic therefore

cultural therefore political therefore

military leader and will utterly

dominate global geopolitics from that

moment to this

trains thunder across the countryside

by the 1870s the internal combustion

engine has arrived and the germans

invent its killer app

the automobile

oil the substance which the ancients

considered too flammable to be of any

use

becomes the most important commodity on

the planet

fueling even more innovation

the telegraph and telephone move

messages at lightning speed

with electricity

mankind reclaims the night from darkness

the hub of power has shifted

in 1800 europeans and their descendants

controlled 35 of the land on earth

by 1900 they control

85 percent

by the 20th century fossil fuels and the

internal combustion engine have

amplified everything

including warfare

that technology meant that military

power and military conquest was

something that could be international

international in a way that it had never

been before

in the 20th century almost three times

as many people are killed as a result of

war

as in the previous 2000 years of human

history combined

the application of the industrial skills

industrial technologies of the 18th

century reached their culmination i

think with these extraordinary events

and it's all being driven again by the

micro fossilized bodies of organic

entities that disappeared into ancient

swamps

millions and millions of years ago

the industrial revolution also allows

the human population

to explode

it has taken 200 000 years of human

history from the dawn of man to the year

1900

for the population to reach 1.6 billion

now within the hundred years of the 20th

century it nearly quadruples to more

than six billion

the 20th century is the most

extraordinary moment in human history

never before have we seen change on such

a scale

today humans number close to 7 billion

we are the dominant players on the

planet

we have learned to harness 50 000 times

more energy than our ancestors

just ten thousand years ago

this energy drives our fast-paced lives

and a literal world wide web

a network that as we have seen

has been in the making for as long as

humans have walked the earth

our two-hour story is coming to an end a

story that really began 14 billion years

ago

with a tiny universe where everything

was all in one place

then the big bang

all the energy that has ever existed

created in an instant

gravity sculpted our universe for

billions of years stars and supernovas

created all the elements we would

eventually need

then an extreme earth took shape and

settled into just the right conditions

to support life

as the planet evolved life competed for

energy and grew more and more complex

eventually the conditions were right for

our species to rise

we mastered stone and fire when the ice

age came we spread around the planet and

when the ice melted we were stranded on

different continents

we learned to bend plants and animals to

our will

we built cities

then civilizations

we created a vast network that linked

empires

joined continents

then crossed oceans

just when it seemed we had reached our

human limit we found the energy and

technology to carry us into the future

on earth the seeds of the past have

bloomed into a present filled with

energy

and creativity

the stories of billions of lives have

played out against the backdrop

of a universe almost too vast to

comprehend

in everything that we do in all that we

are

we remain living monuments to the past

as we continue to make history every day