Pre-Industrial Societies

by Patricia Crone

Book Overview

One would not normally expect students of biology to dissect frogs without prior knowledge of frog anatomy; yet students of history are regularly expected to analyse pre-modern institutions and events without any prior knowledge whatsoever of the general anatomy of pre-industrial societies. Gifted students will often acquire considerable knowledge of their particular areas - own individual frogs, so to speak - but the extent to which these conform...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0631156623
• ISBN13: 9780631156628
• Release Date: January 1991
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Length: 228 Pages
• Weight: 0.65 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.6" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

thought proviking

I have to disagree with the two reviewers. I found the book very useful. When we think about the past, whether about our national heritage or about the historical past, we usually project onto it our contemporary assumptions about how things work. These assumptions spring from our experience of modernity--vast wealth; vast technological capabilities to shape our world; vast and pervasive power of the state; ample food supply being taken for granted, at least in the first world; 2% of the population involved in food production instead of upwards of 80%; an integrated culture such that farmers in remote corners of the country are watching the same movies and TV shows and listening to the same music as people in Manhattan; integrated economy, such that farms are no longer self supporting even in the realm of food production, but rather produce a single crop for market and buy their food at the grocery store like everyone else; social homogenization across vast spaces such that Californians, Floridians, and Mainers all think of themselves as Americans rather than identifying with the local culture. When we try to imagine the world view and life world of people as close to us in time as Washington and Jefferson--let alone Alexander the Great, Muhammad, or Charlemagne--we have to think all of this away. This is very difficult because modernity seems as natural to us as the air we breathe. Crone's book is a very useful extended thought experiment that makes it possible to do just this. It is a bit polemical at times--but that is just Crone.

Yes, if you can read only one book, read this one.

I agree with the reader below. So I would only add some more recommendations to read: "The world economy. A millennial perspective" by Angus Maddison; "Power and privilege: A theory of social stratification" by Gerhard Emmanuel Lenski; "The History of Government" by S.E. Finer; "World History. A new perspective" by Clive Ponting; and "The Phenomenon of Religion", by Moojan Momen.