====== History ======

This is my attempt at a cheat-sheet approach to remembering key historical or periods from the Big Bang all the way up to world war 2. I will divide this into several sections :

  * History of the Universe
  * History of Life
  * Pre-Civilisation Human History
  * Ancient Civilisations (3500BC-600BC)
  * Classical Civilisations (600BC-600AD)
  * Medieval Civilisations (600-1500)
  * Early Modern Period (1500-1800)
  * Modern Period & World Wars I & II (1789-1945)
  * Global Civilisation (1945-present)

Online History sources include
  * [[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_universe | Wikipedia History of the Universe ]]
  * [[http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/origins/universe.html | PBS Nova History of the Universe]]
  * [[ http://www.pbs.org/deepspace/timeline/index.html | PBS Deep Space Timeline]]
  * [[ http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Astronomy/Short_History_of_the_Universe | A short History of the Universe ]]

  * [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prehistoric_life | Wikipedia History of Life ]]
  * [[http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/link/history.html | PBS History of Life ]]
  * [[http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/exhibits/index.php | University of California Paleontology Online]]
  * [[ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Earth | Wikipedia History of the Earth]]

  * [[http://www.bartleby.com/67 | Encyclopedia of World History, Peter Stearns, 2001]]
  * [[ http://www.bartleby.com/86/ | A Short History of the World, HG Wells, 1922 ]]

===== History of The Universe =====

  * 13.7 Billion Years ago - Big Bang
    * - 10<sup>-32</sup> second after Big Bang (abb) - hyper-inflation
    * 10<sup>-32</sup> - 10<sup>-6</sup>second - inflation slows, gravity emerges followed by strong , weak and electromagnetic forces. Matter consists of fundamental particles including quarks, electrons, photons, and neutrinos.
    * 10<sup>-6</sup> - 1 second abb - hadrons (protons and neutrons) form
    * 3 - 20 minutes abb- deuteron, helium and lithium nuclei form. 3 times as much hydrogen than helium by mass. Only traces of other nuclei.
    * 300,000 years abb - expanding cloud of gas cools enough for electrons to associate with nuclei forming atoms
    * .5 - 1 billion years abb - earliest stars and galaxies form
    * 1 - 3 billion years abb - larger galaxies with black holes and quasars at their centre form
  * 7 - 10 billion years ago (bya)- Milky Way galaxy forms
  * 4.6 bya - Solar System forms
  * 3.7 bya - first life on Earth
  * 1.7 bya - multi-cellular life on Earth
  * ---------------------
  * 3.3 billion years from now - Milky Way collides with Andromeda
  * 6.3 billion years from now - Sun dies
  * 100 trillion years from now - Stars have all blown up and collapsed into black holes and neutron stars, or have withered into white dwarfs.
  * 10<sup>37</sup> years from now - After an epoch of proton decay, the only stellar-like objects remaining are evaporating black holes.
  * 10<sup>100</sup> years from now - Black holes have evaporated. Only fundamental particles remain:  photons of colossal wavelength, neutrinos, electrons, and positrons.

===== History of Life =====

  * Hadean Eon : 4.6 - 3.8 billion years ago (bya)
    * 4.6 bya - Earth forms
    * 4.4 bya - Earth's crust forms
    * 4 bya - Clouds, rain and oceans
  * Archean Eon : 3.8 - 2.5 bya
    * 3.8 bya - first life on Earth
    * 3.5 bya - photosynthesis starts
  * Proterozoic Eon : 2.5 bya - 550 mya
    * 2.4 bya - oxygen becomes significant component of the atmosphere
    * 1 bya - multicellular plants (algae) and animals
    * 770 - 750 mya - first ice age
  * before 550 mya is aka the Precambrian Period or Supereon. After 550 mya is aka the Phanerozoic Eon.
  * **Paleozoic (Primary) Era** : 550 - 250 mya
    * Cambrian - small shelled animals, corals
    * Ordovician - starfish, jawless fish
    * Silurian - land plants, ferns, sharks, fish
    * Devonian - first tetrapods - evolution of fish onto land
    * Carboniferous - reptiles, amphibians, spiders, conifers, amniotic eggs (340 mya), synapsids
    * Permian - synapsids (proto-mammalian reptiles) dominant. 
  * 250 mya - Extinction event, 83% of species die off
  * 300 mya - 250 mya - last supercontinent Pangaea exists
  * **Mesozoic (Secondary) Era** : 250 - 65 mya
    * Triassic - turtles, lizards, dinosaurs, mammals
    * 200 mya - Tr-J extinction event allows dinosaurs to start becoming dominant. Kills > 50 % of species.
    * Jurassic - squids, frogs, birds
    * Cretaceous - dinosaurs dominant, flowering plants, snakes, modern fish, toothed birds
  * 65 mya - Meterorite extinction event (off Yucatan peninsula) kills off most large animals
  * **Cenozoic Era** : 65 mya - present
    * Tertiary - mammals dominant, grasses, apes, hominids
    * Quaternary
      * Pleistocene (1.8 mya - 8000 ya) - mammoths, Neanderthals
      * Holocene (8000 ya - now) - modern humans

===== Human History Overview =====

  * 4 mya - earliest humans
  * ** Stone Age ** : 2.5 mya - 
    * Paleolithic
    * Neolithic
  * ** Bronze Age ** : 
  * ** Iron Age ** : 
  * ** Classical Era ** : 
  * ** Middle Ages **
  * ** Reformation & Renaissance **