Disputed Statements

The Late Modern Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States 1945

1945, the end of the Second World War, is the most common boundary, though some historians prefer 1914, the outbreak of the First World War, as the true close of the long nineteenth century, treating 1914 to 1945 as a distinct era of crisis in its own right.

Source The Oxford History of the Twentieth Century

The Maya Civilization, Civilizations

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States -2000

The Preclassic period, when settled village life and the earliest monumental construction begin, is conventionally dated from around 2000 BCE, though the date rests on scattered archaeological evidence that is revised as excavation continues.

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica

The Middle Kingdom of Egypt, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States -1782

This atlas's existing description places the Middle Kingdom's close around 1650 BCE at the end of the fragmenting 13th Dynasty, while this source dates its structural end to about 1782 BCE.

Source Middle Kingdom of Egypt, World History Encyclopedia

The Mongol Conquests, Events

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Death Toll, Low Estimate

Currently States 30000000.000000

Estimates for the Mongol conquests' total death toll range roughly 30 to 60 million (perhaps 10 percent of the era's world population), and the uncertainty is very high: medieval sources are sparse, often hostile court chronicles, and modern figures are extrapolated from regional population data before and after conquest. Some regions (Khwarezmia, Persia, northern China) are estimated to have lost 50 to 75 percent of their population; China's population fell from roughly 120 million around 1200 to about half that by the late 1300s.

Source The Cambridge Medieval History

The Mongol Conquests, Events

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Death Toll, High Estimate

Currently States 60000000.000000

Upper bound of the same estimate; see death-toll-min's StatusNote.

Source The Cambridge Medieval History

The Mongol Empire, Polities

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States 1260

The unified empire's end is dated variously to 1259, the death of Great Khan Mongke, after which effective unified rule ceased, to 1260, the succession war between Kublai and Ariq Boke that followed, or to 1368, the fall of the Yuan dynasty in China, the last of the successor khanates to hold the imperial title. This entry uses 1260 as the conventional close of genuinely unified rule, before the khanates hardened into separate states.

Source The Cambridge Medieval History

The Neo-Assyrian Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States -912

This source itself notes contested founding dates for the Neo-Assyrian Empire, with some scholars proposing 934 BCE and others dating its true founding to 745 BCE under Tiglath-Pileser III, against the 912 BCE used here and the 911 BCE in this atlas's existing description.

Source Neo-Assyrian Empire, World History Encyclopedia

The Neo-Assyrian Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States -612

This source notes an alternative end date of 610 BCE alongside the 612 BCE fall of Nineveh used here; this atlas's existing description uses 609 BCE.

Source Neo-Assyrian Empire, World History Encyclopedia

The Neolithic Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States -10000

Conventionally opened around 10,000 BCE with the beginnings of farming in the Fertile Crescent; the transition happened at very different calendar dates in different regions.

Source Wikipedia tier 2

The Neolithic Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States -2000

Conventionally closed around 2,000 BCE; regions reached the Bronze Age, and so left the Neolithic, at very different times.

Source Wikipedia tier 2

The Neolithic Revolution, Events

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Year

Currently States -10000

The date is an approximation drawn from the earliest well dated farming sites in the Fertile Crescent. The transition unfolded gradually over centuries rather than at a single moment, and began thousands of years later in other regions of the world.

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica

The Old Babylonian Empire, Polities

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States -1894

The First Dynasty of Babylon is conventionally founded in 1894 BCE by Sumu-abum, though the city's political importance genuinely begins with Hammurabi's unification campaigns roughly a century and a half later. Chronologies of this period, the high, middle and low Mesopotamian chronologies, can differ by more than a century, unresolved because no fixed astronomical anchor exists for dates this early.

Source The Cambridge Ancient History

The Old Babylonian Empire, Polities

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States -1595

1595 BCE is the conventional date of the Hittite sack of Babylon that ended the dynasty, subject to the same chronology uncertainty as the start date.

Source The Cambridge Ancient History

The Ottoman Empire, Polities

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States 1299

The traditional founding date of 1299 or 1300, attributed to Osman I, rests on later Ottoman chronicles rather than contemporary records, and the empire's precise origins remain a subject of scholarly reconstruction.

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica

The Paleolithic Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States -3300000

Conventionally dated from the earliest known stone tools, roughly 3.3 million years ago; the exact starting point shifts as earlier tool finds are dated.

Source Wikipedia tier 2

The Paleolithic Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States -9700

Conventionally closed with the end of the Pleistocene epoch, about 11,650 years before present; the boundary is geological rather than cultural and its calendar date depends on the dating convention used.

Source Wikipedia tier 2

The Post-Classical and Medieval Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Start Year

Currently States 476

476 CE, the conventional end of the Western Roman Empire, is the most common starting point, but some historians prefer 500 CE as a round marker, and the transition itself is regional and gradual rather than a single dated boundary.

Source The Cambridge Medieval History

The Post-Classical and Medieval Period, Eras

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns End Year

Currently States 1453

1453, the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople, is the traditional endpoint, but some historians prefer 1492, Columbus's first Atlantic voyage, or 1500 as a round marker for the beginning of the early modern period. There is no single agreed transition.

Source The Cambridge Medieval History

The Printing Revolution, Events

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Year

Currently States 1440

Gutenberg's exact date of invention is not precisely documented. Historians generally place it between 1440 and 1450, with his printed Bible, completed around 1455, as the first securely dated major product of the press.

Source Encyclopaedia Britannica

The Punic Wars, Events

Standing Scholarly debate

Concerns Death Toll, Low Estimate

Currently States 150000.000000

Refers specifically to the Third Punic War's final siege and destruction of Carthage (146 BCE), not the three Punic Wars combined. Ancient sources (via Appian) put Carthage's population at the siege's start anywhere from roughly 200,000 to 700,000, with about 50,000 survivors enslaved after the city fell; modern historians regard the ancient figures as likely inflated and treat any resulting death-toll estimate as an order of magnitude, not a count.

Source The Cambridge Ancient History