1st millennium BC

It encompasses the Iron Age in the Old World and sees the transition from the Ancient Near East to classical antiquity.

In Greece, Classical Antiquity begins with the colonization of Magna Graecia and peaks with the conquest of the Achaemenids and the subsequent flourishing of Hellenistic civilization (4th to 2nd centuries).

Towards the close of the millennium, the Han dynasty extends Chinese power towards Central Asia, where it borders on Indo-Greek and Iranian states.

Early literature develops in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Sanskrit, Tamil and Chinese.

The term Axial Age, coined by Karl Jaspers, is intended to express the crucial importance of the period of c. the 8th to 2nd centuries BC in world history.

Close to 90% of world population at the end of the first millennium BC lived in the Iron Age civilizations of the Old World (Roman Empire, Parthian Empire, Graeco-Indo-Scythian and Hindu kingdoms, Han China).

Parthenon Aristotle Gautama Buddha Assassination of Julius Caesar Greek alphabet Wars of Alexander the Great Iron Age Assyrian Empire
From top left clockwise: The Parthenon , a former temple in Athens, Greece ; Aristotle , Greek philosopher; Gautama Buddha , a spiritual teacher and the founder of Buddhism ; Wars of Alexander the Great last from 336 BC to 323 BC; Letters of the Greek alphabet ; People working during the Iron Age ; Roman dictator, Julius Caesar is assassinated by the Roman Senate in 44 BC. (Background: A mural from the Assyrian Empire which dissolved in the 7th century BC)
Map of the Eastern Hemisphere in 1000 BC.
Map of the world in 1 AD, just after the end of the 1st millennium BC.
Relief of King Ashurbanipal of Assyria hunting a Mesopotamian lion , from the Northern Palace in Nineveh , c. 645 -635 BC
Map of the world in 323 BC
Augustus Caesar , the first emperor of the Roman Empire
Scythian gold plaque with panther (late 7th century BC)
The Parthenon , Athens (5th century BC)
The Victorious Youth (c. 310 BC), a preserved bronze statue of a Greek athlete in Contrapposto pose
" The Wrestler ", an Olmec era statuette, dated roughly 1400–400 BC
Lamassu facing forward. Bas-relief from the king Sargon II 's palace at Dur Sharrukin in Assyria (now Khorsabad in Iraq), c. 713–716 BC. From Paul-Émile Botta's excavations in 1843–1844.