num_pages: 256
description: A truly welcome and refreshing study that puts earthquake impact on history into a proper perspective. --Amos Nur Emeritus Professor of Geophysics Stanford University California and author of Earthquakes Archaeology and the Wrath of God Since antiquity on every continent human beings in search of attractive landscapes and economic prosperity have made a Faustian bargain with the risk of devastation by an earthquake. Today around half of the worlds largest cities  as many as sixty  lie in areas of major seismic activity. Many such as Lisbon Naples San Francisco Teheran and Tokyo have been severely damaged or destroyed by earthquakes in the past. But throughout history starting with ancient Jericho Rome and Sparta cities have proved to be extraordinarily only one Port Royal in the Caribbean was abandoned after an earthquake. Earth-Shattering Events seeks to understand exactly how humans and earthquakes have interacted not only in the short term but also in the long perspective of history. In some cases physical devastation has been followed by decline. But in others the political and economic reverberations of earthquake disasters have presented opportunities for renewal. After its wholesale destruction in 1906 San Francisco went on to flourish eventually giving birth to the high-tech industrial area on the San Andreas fault known as Silicon Valley. An earthquake in Caracas in 1812 triggered the creation of new nations in the liberation of South America from Spanish rule. Another in Tangshan in 1976 catalysed the transformation of China into the worlds second largest economy. The growth of the scientific study of earthquakes is woven into this far-reaching history. It began with a series of earthquakes in England in 1750. Today seismologists can monitor the vibration of the planet second by second and the movement of tectonic plates millimeter by millimeter. Yet even in the 21st century great earthquakes are still essentially acts of God striking with much less warning than volcanoes floods hurricanes and even tornadoes and tsunamis. 13 black-and-white illustrations
language: English
title: Earth-Shattering Events: Earthquakes, Nations, and Civilization
publisher: Thames & Hudson