Russia 8 класс History (General History and History of Russia)

1. General history: 18th – early 19th century

Age of change · Enlightenment · States of Europe · International relations · European culture · Industrial revolution in Britain · American independence · French Revolution · Napoleonic Europe · The world outside Europe

• The Enlightenment – The Enlightenment (about 1680–1800) was a movement in Europe that said people should use reason and evidence, not only tradition, to understand the world and to run society. It grew out of the Scientific Revolution. Thinkers such as Locke, Montesquieu, Voltaire, Rousseau, Kant and Mary Wollstonecraft argued for natural rights, separation of powers, freedom of speech and religion, and government by consent. Ideas spread through books, newspapers, salons and the Encyclopédie. Some monarchs tried reforms (enlightened absolutism); the ideas also fed the American (1776) and French (1789) revolutions and later movements everywhere, including reformers in India.
• States of Europe, 1500–1800: Who Held the Power? – Between 1500 and 1800 European states grew stronger and the question was who holds the power. Spain became rich from American silver, but its king held on to power and spent it on wars. The Netherlands rose against Spain and became a trading republic. France made the king all-powerful (absolutism). England moved power from the king to Parliament. In the 1700s Prussia and the Habsburg lands had enlightened absolutism: reforms from above while the ruler kept control.
• International Relations in History: Wars, Alliances and Peace – International relations is the story of how states deal with each other. The Thirty Years' War (1618 to 1648) ended with the Peace of Westphalia, which made each state the ruler of its own land. In the 1700s great powers fought colonial wars and divided weak neighbours. Before 1914 two alliance camps turned one quarrel into a world war. In the 1930s giving in to aggression (appeasement) failed. After 1945 two blocs, new institutions such as the UN, and the end of empires shaped the world, and new powers and global problems define it today.
• The Age of Industrialisation – Before factories, merchants gave raw material to peasant families who spun and wove at home (proto-industrialisation). From the 1760s Britain built cotton mills, machines like the spinning jenny and James Watt's improved steam engine. Change was slow: hand labour stayed cheap and common. In India, weavers once supplied world markets; the East India Company controlled them through gomasthas, and Manchester cloth later flooded India. From 1854 Indian mills grew in Bombay and elsewhere, and small workshops also grew. Makers sold goods through labels, calendars and adverts, and swadeshi adverts appealed to national pride.
• The American Revolution (1763–1791) – Thirteen British colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America broke away from Britain and formed the United States. After the Seven Years' War (1756–63), Britain was deeply in debt and tried to tighten control: the Proclamation of 1763 limited westward settlement, and new taxes (Sugar Act, Stamp Act, Townshend Acts, Tea Act) were passed by a Parliament in which the colonists had no members. Colonists protested with the slogan "no taxation without representation", boycotts, the Sons of Liberty and the Boston Tea Party. Britain replied with the Coercive ("Intolerable") Acts, and fighting began at Lexington and Concord in 1775. Enlightenment ideas of natural rights and government by consent, spread by Thomas Paine's Common Sense, led to the Declaration of Independence on 4 July 1776. With help from France, Spain and the Dutch Republic, the Continental Army under George Washington won at Saratoga and Yorktown, and the Treaty of Paris (1783) recognised independence. The weak Articles of Confederation were replaced by the Constitution of 1787, with separation of powers, checks and balances and federalism, plus the Bill of Rights (1791). The new republic under Washington and Adams saw the first political parties. The Revolution inspired others, but rights were limited: slavery continued, Native nations lost land and women could not vote.

2. History of Russia: Peter the Great

Beginning of Peter I's reign · Northern War · Reforms of Peter I · Saint Petersburg and culture · Results of Peter's reforms

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3. History of Russia: era of palace coups

Palace coups · Economy and culture in mid-18th century · Foreign policy

• Russian Foreign Policy, 1725–1881 – From 1725 to 1881 Russia's foreign policy chased four goals: sea access (Baltic and Black Sea), balance among the great powers of Europe, support for Christian peoples in the Balkans, and safe, distant borders. Key events: the Seven Years' War, the Turkish wars of Catherine II, the sharing of Poland, Alaska's sale and the 1877–78 Balkan war.

4. History of Russia: Catherine II and Paul I

Domestic policy of Catherine II · Peasant war · Peoples of Russia in the 18th century · Economy in the second half of the 18th century · Foreign policy · Paul I · Culture of the 18th century

• Russian Foreign Policy, 1725–1881 – From 1725 to 1881 Russia's foreign policy chased four goals: sea access (Baltic and Black Sea), balance among the great powers of Europe, support for Christian peoples in the Balkans, and safe, distant borders. Key events: the Seven Years' War, the Turkish wars of Catherine II, the sharing of Poland, Alaska's sale and the 1877–78 Balkan war.

5. History of Russia: Alexander I

Reforms of Alexander I · Foreign policy and 1812 · Conservative turn and Decembrists

Coming soon

6. Our region

Local history 18th – early 19th c.

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