Key Concept 3.2: Continuity and Innovation of State Forms and Their Interactions
I. Empires collapsed and were reconstituted; in some regions new state forms emerged.
A. Following the collapse of empires, most reconstituted governments, including the Byzantine Empire and the Chinese dynasties — Sui, Tang, and Song — combined traditional sources of power and legitimacy with innovations better suited to the current circumstances.
- Patriarchy
- Religion
- Land-owning elites
- New methods of Taxation
- Tributary systems
- Adaptation of religious institutions.
B. In some places, new forms of governance emerged, including those developed in various Islamic states, the Mongol Khanates, city-states, and decentralized government (feudalism) in Europe and Japan.
- Abbasids
- Muslim Iberia
- Delhi Sultanates
- In the Italian peninsula
- In East Africa
- In Southeast Asia
- In the Americas
C. Some states synthesized local and borrowed traditions.
- Persian traditions that influenced Islamic states
- Chinese traditions that influenced states in Japan
D. In the Americas, as in Afro-Eurasia, state systems expanded in scope and reach: Networks of city-states flourished in the Maya region and, at the end of this period, imperial systems were created by the Mexica (“Aztecs”) and Inca.
II. Interregional contacts and conflicts between states and empires encouraged significant technological and cultural transfers.Required examples of technological and cultural transfers:
- Between Tang China and the Abbasids
- Across the Mongol empires
- During the Crusades