europe

Introduction

Map/Still:Europe.


* Europe.

Europe is the second smallest of the world's seven continents, covering an area of about 4 million square miles (10.4 million square kilometers). Nevertheless Europe has more people than any other continent except Asia and Africa. Despite its size, it has had a great influence on the world. The peoples and culture of Europe have spread to many other regions of the world.


Land

Europe is bounded on the north by the Arctic Ocean and on the west by the Atlantic Ocean. The Mediterranean, Black, and Caspian seas form most of the southern boundary. Dividing Europe from Asia to the east are the Ural Mountains. The British Isles, Iceland, and many islands in the Mediterranean and Arctic are grouped with Europe.

Jutting from Europe into the seas are the Scandinavian, Iberian, Italian, Balkan, and Jutland peninsulas. No part of Europe is more than 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) from sea water, and in Western Europe the seacoast is never more than 450 miles (725 kilometers) away. The sea has had an immense effect on the continent's climate and on its human culture.

Europe has scarcely any desert, and a greater proportion of its land is suitable for farming than in any other continent. It has large forests from which useful timber can be cut, and it is rich in coal and iron.


The regions of Europe
Western Europe

Western Europe, which includes the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, and Austria, is heavily populated, with many large cities. It is also the industrial core of the continent. The region has many natural resources. The coal and iron deposits support industry. The wide expanses of fertile and adequately watered flat land support farming. Mountain streams provide water power, while the many wide rivers and the seas they drain into encourage trade and travel.


Northern Europe

Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, and Iceland are the countries of Northern Europe. They are referred to as the Nordic countries, or Norden. The term Scandinavia is often used for the whole area, but technically it covers only the countries of Norway and Sweden on the Scandinavian peninsula . The Arctic Circle touches all Nordic countries except Denmark.

Glaciers have created a rocky, often barren landscape. The western seacoast has deep inlets called fjords that are lined with steep banks. The island country of Iceland has many volcanoes. The region of the Nordic countries is sparsely populated compared to the rest of Europe. Most people live along the coast or in the river valleys. Agriculture, fishing, dairying, food processing, forestry, and mining are major occupations.


Southern Europe

The countries of southern Europe, also called Mediterranean Europe, are Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Turkey. These countries occupy the Iberian, Italian, and Balkan peninsulas in the Mediterranean Sea. Mountain ranges separate these countries from the rest of Europe. Italy, Greece, and Turkey have frequent volcanic eruptions and earthquakes. Spain and Portugal occupy a large, high, dry plateau that is separated from France by the Pyrenees Mountains. The small country of Andorra is situated on the south slopes of the Pyrenees, between France and Spain. Before about 1600 European civilization was centered on these lands, but shortages of mineral and fuel resources slowed down development of industry. Tourism is popular in these areas.


Eastern Europe

Eastern Europe is by far the largest of Europe's regions. The Ural Mountains that separate Europe from Asia run through Russia. That country therefore lies partly in Europe and partly in Asia. To the west of Russia are the Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and the Slavic republics of Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova. To their west and south are Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, and Albania. Much of this region is a vast plain subject to extremes of climate. Eastern Europe is rich in mineral resources such as coal, iron ore, petroleum, natural gas, and bauxite.


Mountains

Most of the mountains in Europe are old and worn except for the Alpine system that dominates the south-central region. The Alps lie in parts of nine countries. Among them is the highest mountain in Europe, Mont Blanc, which rises to a peak of 15,771 feet (4,807 meters) in France near the borders with Italy and Switzerland. The Apennines continue the Alps down the Italian Peninsula. The Carpathians extend into Eastern Europe. The Pyrenees form a stout barrier between the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and the rest of the continent. The low chain of the Urals stretches 1,550 miles (2,500 kilometers) north to south to form Europe's eastern boundary.


Plains

The European plain occupies about half the continent and is one of the largest plains in the world. This glacier-flattened area sweeps from the Pyrenees Mountains across northern Europe to the Ural Mountains in the east. In Western Europe the plain is narrow, but in Russia it expands to more than 2,000 miles (3,200 kilometers) wide. The plain makes Europe the lowest of all the continents in average elevation above sea level. Much of Europe's farmland is concentrated in this region.

Other low-lying lands are soaked with water, such as the great Pripet Marshes of Belarus and Poland and the coastal marshes of Germany and The Netherlands. Near the northern edge of the plain in Russia is Europe's largest lake, Lake Ladoga, which has an area of 6,826 square miles (17,678 square kilometers).


Rivers

Western Europe's most important rivers are fed by melting snows from the mountains. The Rhine in Germany and The Netherlands carries more commercial traffic than any other river. The Seine flows past Paris to the English Channel. France's Rhone and Italy's Po empty into the Mediterranean.

Central Europe's greatest waterway is the Danube, which flows eastward to the Black Sea and has inspired composers with its beauty. The Elbe runs through Germany to the North Sea. Poland has the Oder and Vistula, which empty into the Baltic.

Europe's longest river at 2,193 miles (3,530 kilometers) is Russia's beloved Volga, which drains into the inland Caspian Sea. It and other Eastern European rivers like the Don may freeze over in winter. In Northern Europe rivers tend to be shorter and more rapid. They are important as sources of electric power.


Climate

Except for the extreme north, Europe has a temperate climate. Thanks to Gulf Stream winds from the Atlantic Ocean, winters in western Europe are not nearly so cold as they are on other continents at the same distance from the equator. This moist and moderate climate extends hundreds of miles inland because the mountain ranges are not large enough to block the winds.

Eastern Europe has a continental climate with winters that are very cold and summers that are hot, especially in the southeast. In general, the eastern regions are drier than the west. The lands closest to the Mediterranean have their own type of climate with hot, dry summers and mild winters.


Plants and animals

The Arctic coast has only shrubby vegetation. Evergreen forests of pine, spruce, fir, and larch cover much of Scandinavia and northeastern Europe. To the southeast lie the grasslands of the steppe. The rest of Europe, except near the Mediterranean, was once a mixed forest including both evergreens and broad-leaved trees such as oak, beech, and chestnut. This forest is now mostly gone. Over the centuries people chopped down trees and used the cleared land for farming and other human activities. Plants that do not need much water, such as olive and cypress trees, grow in the Mediterranean region.

Many large animals, including even lions, roamed Europe in historical times but have disappeared due to human activity. Such animals as the gray wolf and the beaver now survive only in a few remote areas, and the European bison lives only in small managed herds. Domestic cattle and sheep have replaced them on the land. In northern Europe, reindeer live in both wild and domesticated herds.


People and culture

Europe is densely populated and heavily developed. In some countries, such as Belgium and the United Kingdom, more than 90 percent of the population lives in cities and towns. Almost one eighth of the world's population (about 700 million people in 2001) lives in Europe.


Language

The vast majority of Europeans speak languages that can be divided into three main groups. These are the Romance, Germanic, or Slavic groups; they are all part of a larger family known as the Indo-European languages.

Romance languages are used mostly near the Mediterranean. Among Romance languages are French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Romanian. Germanic languages are used in the north and northwest. Among them are German, Netherlandic, English, and most Scandinavian languages. Slavic languages are spoken in the east. Among them are Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, Czech, and Serbo-Croatian. Greek, Albanian, Latvian, and Lithuanian are among the European languages that belong to other groups.

A second family of European languages is the Uralic, which includes Hungarian, Estonian, Finnish, and Sami (Lapp). Basque, which is spoken on the French-Spanish border, is related to no other language now used.


Religion

One or another branch of Christianity is the traditional religion in almost every European country. Most Italians, Spaniards, Portuguese, French, Austrians, Hungarians, Poles, Belgians, and southern Germans are Roman Catholic. Protestantism is preferred in Scandinavia, northern Germany, the British Isles, and The Netherlands. Eastern Orthodox Christians are widely dispersed throughout Greece and many Slavic countries. For most of the 20th century the practice of religion was discouraged by Communist governments in several Eastern European countries. Since the fall of those governments in the early 1990s, religion has returned to many of the countries.

Jews live throughout Europe, but their numbers were greatly reduced in the Holocaust carried out by Nazi Germany during World War II. The only predominantly Muslim countries entirely in Europe are Albania and Bosnia and Herzegovina, but Muslims are found in many countries.


Education and health

Europe is a world leader in education and health. All countries have education requirements for children. Europeans are more likely to be able to read than residents of any other continent. Many universities have been in operation since the Middle Ages. Government-sponsored health care is the rule. A smaller percentage of the population die in infancy than on any other continent. People can expect to live longer lives in Europe than in any continent except Oceania.


Economy
Agriculture

Crops can be grown on almost 30 percent of European land. (For the United States the figure is 20 percent.) Europe is a great producer of cereals, roots, edible oils, fibers, fruit, and livestock From Europe comes 90 percent of the worlds's rye, 65 percent of the potatoes and oats, and 40 percent of the wheat. Much of the production of grain is concentrated in the band of flat land that runs across the continent's northern half between Great Britain and the Ural Mountains. The black earth belt of Ukraine is renowned for its fertility. The northern countries have a short growing season and therefore concentrate on livestock and dairying instead of farming. Mediterranean regions tend to be dry and grow fruits and vegetables. Some of the land is irrigated.


Forestry

Most of Europe's tree cover has been removed by human activity. Pollution has damaged many of the remaining forests. The best commercial forests are found in the taiga, or evergreen forest, of Northern Europe and on the slopes of mountains, especially the Alps. Russia, Sweden, Finland, Germany, France, and Poland are major wood producers. New forests have been planted in areas where the soil is not good for farming.


Fishing

Europe's long seacoast and many peninsulas, bays, and harbors have made fishing the traditional occupation of many Europeans. Fishing is now an industry, largely staffed by workers on trawler ships and seagoing fish-processing factories. Russia's catch is the largest, but Iceland's economy is the most dependent on fishing. A dispute over fishing rights between Iceland and Great Britain in the 1970s was called the Cod War. Other countries with large fishing industries are Norway, Denmark, and Spain.


Minerals

Deposits of iron in Western Europe provided the raw materials for the factories that contributed to the Industrial Revolution. Now the chief producers of iron are Russia, Ukraine, and Sweden. Europe produces almost one third of the world's iron ore. Other minerals extracted in Europe include copper, zinc, lead, bauxite (aluminum), potash, and sulfur. Except for Russia and Ukraine, European countries now have to import most of the minerals they need for their industries. Some mineral deposits, such as tin in England and copper in Sweden, are now used up after many centuries of mining.


Energy resources

Coal from Great Britain, Germany, France, and Belgium was the energy source that fueled the Industrial Revolution. Now much coal is also mined in Russia, Ukraine, and Poland. For many years no large petroleum deposits were known to exist in Europe outside Romania and the Soviet Union. In recent decades oil and gas fields have been discovered under the North Sea between Norway and Great Britain. These fields, mined from large platforms built in the middle of the sea, now satisfy much of Europe's demand. Many Nordic and Alpine countries rely heavily on hydroelectric power, which comes from dams that harness the flow of water in rivers. France gets most of its electricity from nuclear power plants.


Industry

Basic mineral processing is still a major activity in Eastern Europe. Russia and Ukraine are among the leading exporters of steel. The manufacturing belt of Western Europe extends from Great Britain across the English Channel to Belgium, The Netherlands, the Rhine and Ruhr valleys of Germany, northern France, Switzerland, and northern Italy. Much production has switched from heavy industry to high-quality machine and metal products, chemicals, appliances, and textiles made mostly from artificial fibers. Southern Europe has less industry than other regions. Since 1965 much of Europe has become postindustrial, meaning that more money is made in providing services than in producing goods.


Transportation

A good transportation system is a necessary part of a well-developed economy. The European tradition of quality road building goes back to the ancient Romans. Germany was the world pioneer in modern high-speed roadways with its network of autobahns built in the 1930s, originally for military use. Eastern Europe has lagged behind the west in road building.

Railways originated in Great Britain, and now about one third of the world's rail miles are in Europe. Europe's rail system has suffered somewhat now that more people own cars and more goods are transported by truck. To combat this trend, European trains now run faster. France's electric TGV (Train à Grand Vitesse, meaning “high-speed train”) travels as fast as 186 miles (300 kilometers) per hour on specially prepared roadbeds and attracts many passengers. The Channel Tunnel linking Great Britain to the Continent by rail under the English Channel opened in 1994. Other long tunnels run under the Alps.

Rotterdam, at the mouth of the Rhine River, is the world's busiest seaport. Rivers such as the Rhine, Danube, and Volga are heavily used for bulk transportation of raw materials. Air transport is also well developed in Europe, and pipelines are used to move oil and natural gas.


History

The first inhabitants of Europe were human-like Neanderthal people who lived about 100,000 to 35,000 years ago. They used stone tools and fire but lived mostly in caves and got their food by hunting and gathering. Modern humans appeared about 40,000 years ago.

European civilization first arose in Greece after European people came into contact with older and more advanced cultures of the Middle East. European literature began with the epic poems of Homer, and European architecture reached new heights in the temple of the Parthenon in Athens. According to tradition, the city of Rome was founded in 753 BC. Within about 700 years the city-state controlled so many lands that it became an empire.

The Christian religion of the Middle East became the religion of the Roman Empire in 337 AD when Emperor Constantine the Great was baptized. Meanwhile to the north and west of the empire, Germanic and Asian tribes known as barbarians were gathering military strength. In 410 Alaric the Visigoth captured Rome.

After the fall of Rome came the Middle Ages. The Latin language of the Romans went through different changes in different places. Italian, French, Spanish, Romanian, and other Romance languages were the result. In place of Roman central government there arose the feudal system in which local lords ruled vassals. The vassals ruled serfs who were little more than slaves. Many small kingdoms arose during this period. A ruler named Charlemagne created a new empire by combining several of these kingdoms. From the remnants of his empire rose many of the nations of modern Europe. Vikings came from the north to settle in Normandy and the British Isles.

The Middle Ages were a time of deep religious belief. In 1054 Christianity split into the Roman Catholic church and the Eastern Orthodox church of Constantinople. Christian Crusaders went to the Middle East starting in 1095 on a quest to recapture the holy places of Christianity from the Muslims. In the middle of the 14th century came the Black Death, a plague that killed about one third of the people.

Printing from movable type was perfected by Johannes Gutenberg in Germany in the 1450s. Later in the century came European sea voyages to Asia and the New World. These developments helped usher in the Renaissance, which was a time of artistic and scholarly rebirth. The 16th century began with the art of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo and ended with the literature of William Shakespeare. It was also a time of great change in the Roman Catholic church, as many people broke away from the church during the Protestant Reformation.

From the 18th-century French movement known as the Enlightenment came the first modern encyclopedias and the ideas that led to the French Revolution of 1789. The wars of Napoleon I in the early 1800s brought widespread change to Europe. European countries established overseas empires in the 19th century.

Further change came with the Industrial Revolution, which began in England in the 19th century. Many factories and railroads were built during this period. Unfair treatment of workers inspired Karl Marx to formulate the philosophy of Communism. Communism dominated Eastern Europe for much of the 20th century. The rule of the dictator Joseph Stalin in Russia was particularly harsh.

The 20th century brought two world wars. Both began in Europe and pitted Germany and its allies against other Western countries. Both brought huge destruction and loss of life. In the second war, Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party caused immense suffering.

Following the end of World War II in 1945, most of the countries of Europe fell into two opposing groups. The Soviet Union dominated the countries of Eastern Europe, while the Western democracies joined with the United States and Canada in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The downfall of European Communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s ended what was called the Cold War.

In 1958, six countries of Western Europe (Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, The Netherlands, and Luxembourg) created the European Economic Community, known as the Common Market. Over the decades, the importance of the organization increased. A European Parliament and a European Court of Justice were created. In 1993 the European Communities were renamed the European Union. By the end of the century there were nine additional members (Austria, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom).