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150-694: The Christian quarter contains about 40 Christian holy places and one of the most important communities of Christianity in Israel and holy places for Christians in the world . First among them is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre , Christianity's holiest place. Most of the residents of the Christian quarter remain Christians however their numbers have dwindled. The Christian Quarter was built around

300-589: A "manipulation" of the facts. Members of the Palestinian Christian community claim that such statements attempt to hide the discrimination that Arab Christians face within Israel due to alleged discrimination against Arabs as well as the effect of the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza on the Christian population in these areas. Recently, there has been a steady undercurrent of Arab Christians who seek deeper integration into Israeli society. Under

450-620: A Catholic church and monastery in Haifa, leading to protests by the local Christians and clashes at the site between them and the extremists. From 2018 to 2023, a total of 157 attacks on Christian sanctities in Israel by extremist Jews were documented. Gabriel Naddaf argues that Israel is the only country in which Christian communities have been able to thrive in the Middle East. However, there has also been criticism by Palestinian Christians of this claim, with such statements being called

600-871: A German naturalist, Peter Simon Pallas , as a valley that once connected the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, and subsequently was proposed as a natural boundary between continents. By the mid-19th century, there were three main conventions, one following the Don, the Volga–Don Canal and the Volga, the other following the Kuma–Manych Depression to the Caspian and then the Ural River, and the third abandoning

750-643: A Semitic term for west , this being either Akkadian erebu meaning 'to go down, set' (said of the sun) or Phoenician 'ereb 'evening, west', which is at the origin of Arabic maghreb and Hebrew ma'arav . Martin Litchfield West stated that "phonologically, the match between Europa's name and any form of the Semitic word is very poor", while Beekes considers a connection to Semitic languages improbable. Most major world languages use words derived from Eurṓpē or Europa to refer to

900-818: A boundary along the Terek and Kuban rivers, so southwards from the Kuma and the Manych, but still with the Caucasus entirely in Asia. However, most geographers in the Soviet Union favoured the boundary along the Caucasus crest, and this became the common convention in the later 20th century, although the Kuma–Manych boundary remained in use in some 20th-century maps. Some view the separation of Eurasia into Asia and Europe as

1050-423: A college degree (ranging from 13% for Haredi to 45% for Hiloni ), compared to 18% for Christians (based on a sample of 375). The percentage of Arab Christian women who are receiving higher education is also higher than that of other groups. The rate of students studying in the field of medicine was higher among Christian Arab students than that of all other sectors. In 2013, Arab Christian students were also

1200-582: A common currency, the euro , and participate in the European single market and a customs union . A large bloc of countries, the Schengen Area , have also abolished internal border and immigration controls. Regular popular elections take place every five years within the EU; they are considered to be the second-largest democratic elections in the world after India's . The EU is the third-largest economy in

1350-473: A community of 3000 people. The Baptist Village ( Kfar HaBaptistim ), north of Petah Tikva , was established in 1955 as a farming community with "a boarding school for orphans ... now used mainly for conferences and camps." Jehovah's Witnesses have been present for decades in Israel. By 1999 it was estimated there were about 850 Jehovah's Witnesses in Israel. In 2020, there were 1,957 active members, organised in 31 congregations , while 3,653 people attended

1500-605: A community of around 1,000 Coptic Christians , and small branches of Protestants . The number of Christians in Israel is higher than in the Palestinian territories. Israeli Christians are historically bound with neighbouring Lebanese , Syrian , and Palestinian Christians . The cities and communities where most Christians in Israel reside are Haifa , Nazareth , Shefa-Amr , Jish , Mi'ilya , Fassuta and Kafr Yasif . The Christian communities in Israel run numerous schools , colleges, hospitals, clinics, orphanages, homes for

1650-438: A crusade gained momentum, promising indulgences for sins. Despite conflicts with Byzantine leaders, they captured Antioch and eventually Jerusalem. The conquests were marked by brutality and savagery against Muslims and Jews. The Second Crusade (1147-1148 CE) followed a generation later and aimed to recover lost territories. It faced internal strife and external betrayals, and resulted in failure. The Third Crusade (1189-1193 CE)

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1800-552: A higher proportion of Arab Christian students chose to study fields such as law , medicine , computer sciences , mathematics , engineering and architecture . In 2023, the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics revealed that Arab Christian women were the most highly educated demographic in Israel. According to a 2016 study by the Pew Research Center , 33% of Jews (based on a sample of 3,020) have

1950-406: A large land mass completely or almost completely surrounded by water at its borders. Prior to the adoption of the current convention that includes mountain divides, the border between Europe and Asia had been redefined several times since its first conception in classical antiquity , but always as a series of rivers, seas and straits that were believed to extend an unknown distance east and north from

2100-704: A major Christian shrine to build a mosque. In one incident during 2014, a flag of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant was installed in front of a church in Nazareth. There has also been increasing incitement and violence by the Muslims against Christians who voice their support for the Israel Defense Forces. In a recent case, the son of Gabriel Naddaf, a prominent Eastern Orthodox priest who

2250-757: A new gate in the Old City walls, in the area of the new development. The gate was called the New Gate . Many of the streets function as typical oriental bazaars or suqs, with the David Street and Christian Quarter Road most prominent among them. Though formally separate from the main bulk of the Christian Quarter, which houses mostly Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic sites, the Armenians consider their adjacent Armenian Quarter to be part of

2400-763: A precise eastern boundary of Europe arises in the Early Modern period, as the eastern extension of Muscovy began to include North Asia . Throughout the Middle Ages and into the 18th century, the traditional division of the landmass of Eurasia into two continents, Europe and Asia, followed Ptolemy, with the boundary following the Turkish Straits , the Black Sea , the Kerch Strait , the Sea of Azov and

2550-802: A process of Arabization in which they abandoned Aramaic and Greek in favor of Arabic . During the middle ages the Holy Land was the scene of several military campaigns between Christians and Muslims. Following the Byzantines' confrontation with the Seljuk Turks and the fear of Turkish expansion, the Byzantine sought aid from the Western Christians. Pope Urban II proposed a holy war, the First Crusade in 1096. The call for

2700-711: A residue of Eurocentrism : "In physical, cultural and historical diversity, China and India are comparable to the entire European landmass, not to a single European country. [...]." During the 2.5 million years of the Pleistocene , numerous cold phases called glacials ( Quaternary ice age ), or significant advances of continental ice sheets, in Europe and North America, occurred at intervals of approximately 40,000 to 100,000 years. The long glacial periods were separated by more temperate and shorter interglacials which lasted about 10,000–15,000 years. The last cold episode of

2850-685: A result, the Reconquista took the greater part of eight hundred years, in which period a long list of Alfonsos, Sanchos, Ordoños, Ramiros, Fernandos, and Bermudos would be fighting their Christian rivals as much as the Muslim invaders. During the Dark Ages, the Western Roman Empire fell under the control of various tribes. The Germanic and Slav tribes established their domains over Western and Eastern Europe, respectively. Eventually

3000-594: A small Protestant community, composed of both Arab Christians , who changed their religious affiliation to Protestant teachings and European and American residents moving to the area, and divided in several denominations. According to 2020 estimates, Protestants make up less than one in ten of Christians in Israel. The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East is a province of the Anglican Communion , whose Bishop of Jerusalem has its seat in

3150-600: A town with a Christian majority, was spared devastation after agreeing to halt resistance and surrender, and because Israel did not want to visibly provoke an outcry in the Christian world . According to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, since the reunification of Jerusalem after the Six-Day War (1967), the Christian as well as Jewish and Islamic holy sites were opened for multinational pilgrims by

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3300-743: Is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere . It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east. Europe shares the landmass of Eurasia with Asia, and of Afro-Eurasia with both Asia and Africa . Europe is commonly considered to be separated from Asia by

3450-607: Is a small community of Hebrew Catholics . Around 30% of Christians in Israel are adherents of the Eastern Orthodox Church , mostly to the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem , which has jurisdiction over all Israel and Palestine. Eastern Orthodox Christians in Israel and Palestine have many churches, monasteries, seminaries, and other religious institutions all over the land, particularly in Jerusalem. Israel also has many followers of

3600-401: Is also evidence that Homo sapiens arrived in Europe around 54,000 years ago, some 10,000 years earlier than previously thought. The earliest sites in Europe dated 48,000 years ago are Riparo Mochi (Italy), Geissenklösterle (Germany) and Isturitz (France). The European Neolithic period—marked by the cultivation of crops and the raising of livestock, increased numbers of settlements and

3750-634: Is and has been rapidly on the decline. In addition, increasing numbers of Christian leaders and community members are pointing to Muslim violence as a threat to their way of life in Arab majority cities and towns. Sons of the New Testament as a party and a national movement has been met with wide admiration from the Jews of Israel, harshly negative scorn from the Muslim Arabs, and mixed reactions from

3900-488: Is closest to Anatolia (or Asia Minor), but is considered part of Europe politically and it is a member state of the EU. Malta was considered an island of North-western Africa for centuries, but now it is considered to be part of Europe as well. "Europe", as used specifically in British English , may also refer to Continental Europe exclusively. The term "continent" usually implies the physical geography of

4050-582: Is cognate to the Arabic Nasrani . The Israeli Declaration of Independence , issued in 1948, describes the country as a Jewish state but clearly extends religious freedoms to all of its inhabitants by stating that the State of Israel will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education and culture; it will safeguard

4200-526: Is cognate with "Nazarenes") in the middle of the area was later to become the "Christian Quarter". The convention of the boundaries of the Christian Quarter have originated in its current form in the 1841 British Royal Engineers map of Jerusalem , or at least Reverend George Williams ' subsequent labelling of it. The city had previously been divided into many more harat ( Arabic : حارَة , romanized :  Hārat : "quarters", "neighborhoods", "districts" or "areas", see wikt:حارة ). The table below shows

4350-562: Is generally considered a transcontinental country divided entirely by water, while Russia and Kazakhstan are only partly divided by waterways. France, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain are also transcontinental (or more properly, intercontinental, when oceans or large seas are involved) in that their main land areas are in Europe while pockets of their territories are located on other continents separated from Europe by large bodies of water. Spain, for example, has territories south of

4500-402: Is regarded as being pro-Israel, was severely beaten. Naddaf has experienced considerable hostility from Muslims in recent years. A 2015 study estimated that some 300 Christians were from a Muslim background in Israel. A 2016 study by Pew research points to the convergence of political views of both Muslims and Christians over issues like– Israel cannot be a Jewish state and a democracy at

4650-550: Is sometimes considered to mark the end of antiquity; alternatively antiquity is considered to end with the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 CE; the closure of the pagan Platonic Academy of Athens in 529 CE; or the rise of Islam in the early 7th century CE. During most of its existence, the Byzantine Empire was one of the most powerful economic, cultural, and military forces in Europe. During

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4800-422: Is somewhat arbitrary and inconsistent compared to any clear-cut definition of the term "continent". The current division of Eurasia into two continents now reflects East-West cultural, linguistic and ethnic differences which vary on a spectrum rather than with a sharp dividing line. The geographic border between Europe and Asia does not follow any state boundaries and now only follows a few bodies of water. Turkey

4950-655: Is the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Jerusalem, where the Bishop has its seat and that is the only congregation in Israel. The Association of Baptist Churches in Israel , established in 1965, is part of the Baptist World Alliance , is the home mission for Baptist churches in Israel and the "largest network of evangelical churches in the country", counting 18 churches, 1000 baptized members and

5100-477: Is the largest and most populous , spanning 39% of the continent and comprising 15% of its population. Europe had a total population of about 745 million (about 10% of the world population ) in 2021; the third-largest after Asia and Africa. The European climate is affected by warm Atlantic currents, such as the Gulf Stream , which produce a temperate climate , tempering winters and summers, on much of

5250-632: Is the third largest religion in Israel , after Judaism and Islam . At the end of 2022, Christians made up 1.9% of the Israeli population, numbering approximately 185,000. 75.8% of the Christians in Israel are Arab Christians . Christians make up 6.9% of the Arab-Israelis . Ten Christian churches are formally recognized under Israel's confessional system, for the self-regulation and state recognition of status issues, such as marriage and divorce :

5400-1155: The Armenian Apostolic Church , the Armenian Catholic Church , the Chaldean Catholic Church , the Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East , the Greek Orthodox Church , the Latin Catholic Church , the Melkite Greek Catholic Church , the Syriac Catholic Church , the Syriac Maronite Church , and the Syriac Orthodox Church . However, the practice of religion is free, with no restrictions on

5550-440: The Brigham Young University , sponsored by the LDS Church, established the BYU Jerusalem Center , that has been since active and growing. Jewish Christians are not considered bona-fide Jews under Israel's Law of Return (see Rufeisen v. Minister of the Interior ). The Hebrew Christian movement of the 19th and early 20th centuries consisted of Jews who converted to Christianity as a result of Protestant missionary activity. It

5700-435: The British following the defeat and collapse of the Ottoman Empire at the end of the First World War . The British established an administration in the region called Mandatory Palestine . Following the Balfour Declaration (1917) and the visit of the Zionist Commission to Mandatory Palestine (1918), local Christians participated in forming groups which opposed Zionism , called the Muslim-Christian Associations . During

5850-527: The Carolingian Renaissance of the 9th century. From that time, the term designated the sphere of influence of the Western Church , as opposed to both the Eastern Orthodox churches and to the Islamic world . A cultural definition of Europe as the lands of Latin Christendom coalesced in the 8th century, signifying the new cultural condominium created through the confluence of Germanic traditions and Christian-Latin culture, defined partly in contrast with Byzantium and Islam , and limited to northern Iberia ,

6000-408: The Coptic Patriarchate of Jerusalem and the Ethiopian Patriarchate of Jerusalem, while the Franciscan Monastery of St Saviour (often called by its Italian name, San Salvatore) is the seat of the Custody of the Holy Land . The west–east David Street and north–south Christian Quarter Road, or simply Christian Road, are the principal market streets. Several hotels, including the Casa Nova Hotel and

6150-414: The Don (ancient Tanais ). But maps produced during the 16th to 18th centuries tended to differ in how to continue the boundary beyond the Don bend at Kalach-na-Donu (where it is closest to the Volga, now joined with it by the Volga–Don Canal ), into territory not described in any detail by the ancient geographers. Around 1715, Herman Moll produced a map showing the northern part of the Ob River and

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6300-409: The Ecumenical Patriarchate after the Council of Chalcedon in 451 AD (which would be part of the Eastern Orthodox Church after the Great Schism ), and were known by other Syrian Christians as Melkites (followers of the king). Helena, mother of Constantine I was responsible for the beautification or construction of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem , and the Church of Eleona on

6450-439: The European population at the time. The plague had a devastating effect on Europe's social structure; it induced people to live for the moment as illustrated by Giovanni Boccaccio in The Decameron (1353). It was a serious blow to the Roman Catholic Church and led to increased persecution of Jews , beggars and lepers . The plague is thought to have returned every generation with varying virulence and mortalities until

6600-410: The Greek Catholic hotel, were built by the churches as places for religious visitors and pilgrims to stay. The quarter also contains museums , including one about the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate. In the southwestern part of the quarter there is a pool called Hezekiah's Pool or Patriarch's Pool that was traditionally used to store water for the area. The area originated as "Haret en-Nasara" (Nasara

6750-460: The Greeks and Phoenicians gave rise to early Mediterranean cities. Early Iron Age Italy and Greece from around the 8th century BCE gradually gave rise to historical Classical antiquity, whose beginning is sometimes dated to 776 BCE, the year of the first Olympic Games . Ancient Greece was the founding culture of Western civilisation. Western democratic and rationalist culture are often attributed to Ancient Greece. The Greek city-state,

6900-400: The Inquisition against heretics. In the Iberian Peninsula , the Reconquista concluded with the fall of Granada in 1492 , ending over seven centuries of Islamic rule in the south-western peninsula. In the east, a resurgent Byzantine Empire recaptured Crete and Cyprus from the Muslims, and reconquered the Balkans. Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest city in Europe from the 9th to

7050-409: The Iron Curtain , with NATO in the West and the Warsaw Pact in the East . This divide ended with the Revolutions of 1989 , the fall of the Berlin Wall , and the dissolution of the Soviet Union , which allowed European integration to advance significantly. European integration is being advanced institutionally since 1948 with the founding of the Council of Europe , and significantly through

7200-442: The Irtysh River , a major tributary of the Ob, as components of a series of partly-joined waterways taking the boundary between Europe and Asia from the Turkish Straits, and the Don River all the way to the Arctic Ocean. In 1721, he produced a more up to date map that was easier to read. However, his proposal to adhere to major rivers as the line of demarcation was never taken up by other geographers who were beginning to move away from

7350-427: The Israeli War of Independence (1947-1949), Christians experienced mixed treatment from the Israeli forces. Generally, most Christians were allowed to remain in their homes. In other cases, however, Christian villages were depopulated, razed, and had their residents expelled, such as in Iqrit and Kafr Bir'im . Massacres of Christians were conducted at the villages of Eilabun and Al-Bassa . Nazareth , at that time

7500-419: The Mediterranean Sea —namely, Ceuta and Melilla —which are parts of Africa and share a border with Morocco. According to the current convention, Georgia and Azerbaijan are transcontinental countries where waterways have been completely replaced by mountains as the divide between continents. The first recorded usage of Eurṓpē as a geographic term is in the Homeric Hymn to Delian Apollo , in reference to

7650-490: The Megalithic Temples of Malta and Stonehenge , were constructed throughout Western and Southern Europe. The modern native populations of Europe largely descend from three distinct lineages: Mesolithic hunter-gatherers , descended from populations associated with the Paleolithic Epigravettian culture; Neolithic Early European Farmers who migrated from Anatolia during the Neolithic Revolution 9,000 years ago; and Yamnaya Steppe herders who expanded into Europe from

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7800-484: The Melkite Greek Catholic Church (60% of Arab Christians in Israel). Some 40% of all Israeli Christians are affiliated with the Melkite Greek Church, and some 30% with the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem . Smaller numbers are split between the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem , with 13% of Christians, as well as an unknown number of Russian Orthodox Christians, about 13,000 Maronites and other Syriac Christians, 3,000 to 5,000 adherents of Armenian churches,

7950-418: The Mount of Olives ; sites of Christ's birth and ascension, respectively. The Melkites, during the late Roman period and under the Byzantine Empire were Hellenised , and abandoned Western Aramaic languages in favor of Greek . By the 7th century, Jerusalem and Byzantine Syria Palaestina was a major center of Greek and Christian culture in the Orient. Following Muslim conquests , Christians underwent

8100-427: The Neandertal valley in Germany ) appeared in Europe 150,000 years ago (115,000 years ago it is found already in the territory of present-day Poland ) and disappeared from the fossil record about 40,000 years ago, with their final refuge being the Iberian Peninsula. The Neanderthals were supplanted by modern humans ( Cro-Magnons ), who seem to have appeared in Europe around 43,000 to 40,000 years ago. However, there

8250-412: The Old City of Jerusalem . The church is considered to be the holiest site for Christians in the world. In contrast to other groups of Christians in the Near East such as the largely Assyrian Nestorians , the vast majority of Christians in Judea (later renamed Syria Palaestina ) were under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the emperors of the Roman Empire and later Eastern Roman Empire , as well as

8400-432: The Pechenegs and the Cuman-Kipchaks , caused a massive migration of Slavic populations to the safer, heavily forested regions of the north, and temporarily halted the expansion of the Rus' state to the south and east. Like many other parts of Eurasia , these territories were overrun by the Mongols . The invaders, who became known as Tatars , were mostly Turkic-speaking peoples under Mongol suzerainty. They established

8550-409: The Pontic–Caspian steppe of Ukraine and southern Russia in the context of Indo-European migrations 5,000 years ago. The European Bronze Age began c. 3200 BCE in Greece with the Minoan civilisation on Crete , the first advanced civilisation in Europe. The Minoans were followed by the Myceneans , who collapsed suddenly around 1200 BCE, ushering the European Iron Age . Iron Age colonisation by

8700-408: The Russian Orthodox Church , mainly through interfaith marriages and immigration from the former Soviet Union (1989–1990s). Oriental Orthodoxy in Israel is represented mainly by adherents of the Armenian Apostolic Church , represented by the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem , and adherents of the Syriac Orthodox Church . Since the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948, there has been

8850-406: The Serbian Principality (later Kingdom and Empire ), and the Duchy of Croatia (later Kingdom of Croatia ). To the east, Kievan Rus' expanded from its capital in Kiev to become the largest state in Europe by the 10th century. In 988, Vladimir the Great adopted Orthodox Christianity as the religion of state. Further east, Volga Bulgaria became an Islamic state in the 10th century, but

9000-414: The Siege of Jerusalem . This distinction is in the process of being formalized into law, as the Likud government is currently drafting legislation to grant this request. This new attitude is founded largely by the perception by some that only in Israel the Christian population is growing due to natural increase and no state persecution, seeing the entire Middle East, except Lebanon, as where Christianity

9150-438: The St. George's Cathedral of Jerusalem. Other prominent Episcopal churches in the Holy Land include the Christ Church in Jerusalem (built in 1849, it is inside the Jaffa Gate of the contested Old City of Jerusalem) and the Christ Church in Nazareth (built in 1871); they were both built during the Ottoman rule of the Holy Land. The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East counts 35,000 members, scattered all over

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9300-472: The Vatican reacted with a rare official complaint against the Israeli government's inaction. In June 2015, an auxiliary building of the Church of the Multiplication was significantly damaged by an arson attack and its walls defaced by Hebrew graffiti, bearing the words "the false gods will be eliminated" (quoted from the Aleinu prayer). This attack was labelled as "terrorism" by Israeli officials. In June and July 2023, Jewish extremists repeatedly stormed

9450-426: The decline of the Roman Empire , Europe entered a long period of change arising from what historians call the " Age of Migrations ". There were numerous invasions and migrations amongst the Ostrogoths , Visigoths , Goths , Vandals , Huns , Franks , Angles , Saxons , Slavs , Avars , Bulgars , Vikings , Pechenegs , Cumans , and Magyars . Renaissance thinkers such as Petrarch would later refer to this as

9600-465: The fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 CE, Christian consolidation of Europe in the wake of the Migration Period marked the European post-classical Middle Ages . The Italian Renaissance spread in the continent a new humanist interest in art and science which led to the modern era . Since the Age of Discovery , led by Spain and Portugal , Europe played a predominant role in global affairs with multiple explorations and conquests around

9750-432: The last glacial period ended about 10,000 years ago. Earth is currently in an interglacial period of the Quaternary, called the Holocene . Homo erectus georgicus , which lived roughly 1.8 million years ago in Georgia , is the earliest hominin to have been discovered in Europe. Other hominin remains, dating back roughly 1 million years, have been discovered in Atapuerca , Spain . Neanderthal man (named after

9900-517: The polis , was the fundamental political unit of classical Greece. In 508 BCE, Cleisthenes instituted the world's first democratic system of government in Athens . The Greek political ideals were rediscovered in the late 18th century by European philosophers and idealists. Greece also generated many cultural contributions: in philosophy , humanism and rationalism under Aristotle , Socrates and Plato ; in history with Herodotus and Thucydides ; in dramatic and narrative verse, starting with

10050-457: The watershed of the Ural Mountains , the Ural River , the Caspian Sea , the Greater Caucasus , the Black Sea , and the waterway of the Bosporus Strait . Europe covers about 10.18 million km (3.93 million sq mi), or 2% of Earth's surface (6.8% of land area), making it the second-smallest continent (using the seven-continent model ). Politically, Europe is divided into about fifty sovereign states , of which Russia

10200-402: The "Dark Ages". Isolated monastic communities were the only places to safeguard and compile written knowledge accumulated previously; apart from this, very few written records survive. Much literature, philosophy, mathematics, and other thinking from the classical period disappeared from Western Europe, though they were preserved in the east, in the Byzantine Empire. While the Roman empire in

10350-461: The 12th centuries, with a population of approximately 400,000. The Empire was weakened following the defeat at Manzikert , and was weakened considerably by the sack of Constantinople in 1204 , during the Fourth Crusade . Although it would recover Constantinople in 1261, Byzantium fell in 1453 when Constantinople was taken by the Ottoman Empire . In the 11th and 12th centuries, constant incursions by nomadic Turkic tribes, such as

10500-401: The 12th to the 15th centuries, the Grand Duchy of Moscow grew from a small principality under Mongol rule to the largest state in Europe, overthrowing the Mongols in 1480, and eventually becoming the Tsardom of Russia . The state was consolidated under Ivan III the Great and Ivan the Terrible , steadily expanding to the east and south over the next centuries. The Great Famine of 1315–1317

10650-444: The 18th century. During this period, more than 100 plague epidemics swept across Europe. The Renaissance was a period of cultural change originating in Florence , and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The rise of a new humanism was accompanied by the recovery of forgotten classical Greek and Arabic knowledge from monastic libraries, often translated from Arabic into Latin . The Renaissance spread across Europe between

10800-496: The 19th century, European countries sought to expand their influence in Jerusalem and began constructing several structures in the Christian Quarter. The Ottoman authorities attempted to halt European influence and established rules for buying land in the area, but personal interventions from the heads of those countries, including Wilhelm II of Germany and Franz Joseph of Austria , led to construction of some buildings for those countries' religious and secular authorities. At

10950-400: The 50 years of peace that followed are known as Golden Age of Athens , the seminal period of ancient Greece that laid many of the foundations of Western civilisation. Greece was followed by Rome , which left its mark on law , politics , language , engineering , architecture , government , and many more key aspects in western civilisation. By 200 BCE, Rome had conquered Italy and over

11100-710: The Armenians , who, unlike the majority of Christians in Jerusalem, Israel and Palestine , are neither Arab nor Palestinian . Gates 1. Jaffa 2. Zion 3. Dung 4. Golden 5. Lions 6. Herod 7. Damascus 8. New ( Double, Single, Tanners ' ) Al-Mawazin 31°46′42.5″N 35°13′45.84″E  /  31.778472°N 35.2294000°E  / 31.778472; 35.2294000 Christianity in Israel Christianity ( Hebrew : נצרות , romanized :  Natsrút ; Arabic : المسيحية , romanized :  al-Masīḥiyya )

11250-612: The British Isles, France, Christianised western Germany, the Alpine regions and northern and central Italy. The concept is one of the lasting legacies of the Carolingian Renaissance : Europa often figures in the letters of Charlemagne's court scholar, Alcuin . The transition of Europe to being a cultural term as well as a geographic one led to the borders of Europe being affected by cultural considerations in

11400-742: The Byzantine Empire. The Crusaders' actions accelerated the decline of the Byzantine Christians in the Eastern Mediterranean. Under the Muslim Ottoman Empire , Christians were considered dhimmis , non-Muslim subjects. Dhimmis were granted the freedom to practice their religion under certain conditions and were given a level of communal autonomy as outlined in the Millet system. In exchange for

11550-576: The Christian Quarter. The three Christian patriarchates of Jerusalem – the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate , the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem , and the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem – as well as the government of Armenia , have all publicly expressed their opposition to any political division of the two quarters. The central reasons for the existence of a separate Armenian Quarter is the distinct language and culture of

11700-567: The Christian world on a religious and theological basis. The center, currently located in Jerusalem , engages in Hebraic Bible Study for Christians, from both the local community and from abroad, has organized numerous interfaith praise initiatives, such as Day to Praise , and has established many fund-raising initiatives such as Blessing Bethlehem which aim to aid the persecuted Christian community of Bethlehem , in part, and

11850-524: The Christians themselves. Because of Israel's parliamentary system where each party must attain at least 2% of the popular vote, Sons of the New Testament must be supported by non-Christians to enter the Knesset . In 2008, Rabbi Shlomo Riskin , the chief rabbi of Efrat , established the Center for Jewish–Christian Understanding and Cooperation or CJCUC, the first Orthodox Jewish institution to dialogue with

12000-634: The Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which is the heart of the quarter, and Christian churches and institutions are spread across much of the quarter. Besides the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, there are the patriarchal seats of many Christian denominations, including the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem , which owns large tracts of the quarter, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem , the Greek Catholic Patriarchate of Jerusalem ,

12150-574: The Don altogether, following the Greater Caucasus watershed to the Caspian. The question was still treated as a "controversy" in geographical literature of the 1860s, with Douglas Freshfield advocating the Caucasus crest boundary as the "best possible", citing support from various "modern geographers". In Russia and the Soviet Union , the boundary along the Kuma–Manych Depression was the most commonly used as early as 1906. In 1958,

12300-622: The Early Middle Ages, and soon spread throughout Europe. A struggle for influence between the nobility and the monarchy in England led to the writing of Magna Carta and the establishment of a parliament . The primary source of culture in this period came from the Roman Catholic Church . Through monasteries and cathedral schools , the Church was responsible for education in much of Europe. The Papacy reached

12450-559: The East, especially relating to areas under Byzantine, Ottoman, and Russian influence. Such questions were affected by the positive connotations associated with the term Europe by its users. Such cultural considerations were not applied to the Americas, despite their conquest and settlement by European states. Instead, the concept of "Western civilization" emerged as a way of grouping together Europe and these colonies. The question of defining

12600-707: The Frankish tribes were united under Clovis I . Charlemagne , a Frankish king of the Carolingian dynasty who had conquered most of Western Europe, was anointed " Holy Roman Emperor " by the Pope in 800. This led in 962 to the founding of the Holy Roman Empire , which eventually became centred in the German principalities of central Europe. East Central Europe saw the creation of the first Slavic states and

12750-579: The French area. The Russians located themselves in the nearby Russian Compound . There was a natural desire for easy travel between the Christian Quarter and the new development, but at the time the Old City walls formed a barrier and travellers were forced to take an indirect path through either Jaffa Gate or Nablus Gate . In 1889, the Ottomans accepted the request of the European countries and breached

12900-520: The Great 's efforts to make Russia more European, ignored the whole boundary question with his claim that neither Russia, Scandinavia, northern Germany, nor Poland were fully part of Europe. Since then, many modern analytical geographers like Halford Mackinder have declared that they see little validity in the Ural Mountains as a boundary between continents. The mapmakers continued to differ on

13050-599: The Holy Places of all religions. Some ultra-Orthodox Jews have been reported to have a decades-old practice of cursing and spitting on Christian clergymen in Jerusalem, and there have been cases where churches and cemeteries were defaced by price taggers . When the doors of the Latrun Trappist monastery were set aflame and the phrase "Jesus was a monkey" was painted on its walls in September 2012,

13200-632: The Israeli authorities for the first time since 1948, when the Kingdom of Jordan took over the eastern half of the city. The Christian population in Israel has increased with the immigration of many mixed families from the former Soviet Union (1989-late 1990s), and through the influx of approximately 7,000 Christian Maronites from Lebanon in 2000. Recently, a further increase in Christianity came with arrival of many foreign workers and asylum seekers, some of Christian background (for instance from

13350-602: The Levant and North Africa and making inroads into Asia Minor . In the mid-7th century, following the Muslim conquest of Persia , Islam penetrated into the Caucasus region. Over the next centuries Muslim forces took Cyprus , Malta , Crete , Sicily , and parts of southern Italy . Between 711 and 720, most of the lands of the Visigothic Kingdom of Iberia were brought under Muslim rule—save for small areas in

13500-703: The Mediterranean Sea without the inclusion of any mountain ranges. Cartographer Herman Moll suggested in 1715 Europe was bounded by a series of partly-joined waterways directed towards the Turkish straits, and the Irtysh River draining into the upper part of the Ob River and the Arctic Ocean . In contrast, the present eastern boundary of Europe partially adheres to the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, which

13650-809: The Philippines , Eritrea , Ethiopia and South Sudan ). As a result, numerous churches have opened in Tel Aviv . As of 2013 , the Government - Christians Forum was formed in Jerusalem, under the umbrella of the Ministry of Public Security, to address the concerns of the Christian leaders and representatives in Israel, and in order to empower the relations between the government and Christian leaders and representatives in Israel. A 2021 survey by CBS found that 84% of Christians were satisfied with life in Israel. The survey also found Arab Christian women were

13800-801: The Soviet Geographical Society formally recommended that the boundary between the Europe and Asia be drawn in textbooks from Baydaratskaya Bay , on the Kara Sea , along the eastern foot of Ural Mountains, then following the Ural River until the Mugodzhar Hills , and then the Emba River ; and Kuma–Manych Depression, thus placing the Caucasus entirely in Asia and the Urals entirely in Europe. The Flora Europaea adopted

13950-509: The Tanais (the modern Don River) as the boundary. The Roman Empire did not attach a strong identity to the concept of continental divisions. However, following the fall of the Western Roman Empire , the culture that developed in its place , linked to Latin and the Catholic church, began to associate itself with the concept of "Europe". The term "Europe" is first used for a cultural sphere in

14100-551: The adoption of Christianity ( c. 1000 CE) . The powerful West Slavic state of Great Moravia spread its territory all the way south to the Balkans, reaching its largest territorial extent under Svatopluk I and causing a series of armed conflicts with East Francia . Further south, the first South Slavic states emerged in the late 7th and 8th century and adopted Christianity : the First Bulgarian Empire ,

14250-482: The annual celebration of Lord's Evening Meal . Jehovah's Witnesses They have faced some religious persecution in the past century: for instance, in March 1997, a mob of over 250 ultra-orthodox Jews attacked one of their meeting halls. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is present in Israel with 338 members and three congregations. Israeli LDS congregants hold their Sabbath services on Saturday. In 1989

14400-422: The assurance of their safety and the protection of their property, individuals falling under the dhimmi category were required to pay a tax known as jizya , exclusive to dhimmis. Furthermore, dhimmis were bound by specific rules that didn't apply to Muslim citizens, including the prohibition from attempting to convert Muslims to their religious practices. The territory of present-day Israel came under control of

14550-471: The basis of many modern legal systems, funded the construction of the Hagia Sophia and brought the Christian church under state control. From the 7th century onwards, as the Byzantines and neighbouring Sasanid Persians were severely weakened due to the protracted, centuries-lasting and frequent Byzantine–Sasanian wars , the Muslim Arabs began to make inroads into historically Roman territory, taking

14700-832: The bill would not move forward. Six of the particular churches of the Catholic Church have jurisdiction within Israel: the Melkite Greek Catholic Church (by far the largest Catholic church in Israel), the Latin Church (by far the dominant Catholic church worldwide), the Armenian Catholic Church , the Chaldean Catholic Church , the Syriac Catholic Church and the Maronite Church . According to 2020 estimates, Catholics make up more than half of all Christians in Israel. The majority are of Arab descent, while there

14850-563: The boundary between the lower Don and Samara well into the 19th century. The 1745 atlas published by the Russian Academy of Sciences has the boundary follow the Don beyond Kalach as far as Serafimovich before cutting north towards Arkhangelsk , while other 18th- to 19th-century mapmakers such as John Cary followed Strahlenberg's prescription. To the south, the Kuma–Manych Depression was identified c.  1773 by

15000-697: The central figure of Christianity, lived in Roman Judea . The Gospels in the Bible describe Jesus as having been born in Bethlehem (today located in the Palestinian territories ) and grown up in Nazareth (today located in Israel). Christians believe that Jesus was crucified , died, and was buried, yet resurrected ; his empty tomb is believed to lie at the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre , in

15150-400: The church. While there, she identified a site in Jerusalem as Calvary, where Jesus was crucified, and the cave where Jesus was laid to rest. As a bold statement for Christianity in this part of the city, she oversaw the construction of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Over the centuries, additional religious institutions and churches were erected nearby, forming a community of Christians. In

15300-590: The continent The prevalent definition of Europe as a geographical term has been in use since the mid-19th century. Europe is taken to be bounded by large bodies of water to the north, west and south; Europe's limits to the east and north-east are usually taken to be the Ural Mountains , the Ural River , and the Caspian Sea ; to the south-east, the Caucasus Mountains , the Black Sea , and

15450-573: The continent. Chinese, for example, uses the word Ōuzhōu ( 歐洲 / 欧洲 ), which is an abbreviation of the transliterated name Ōuluóbā zhōu ( 歐羅巴洲 ) ( zhōu means "continent"); a similar Chinese-derived term Ōshū ( 欧州 ) is also sometimes used in Japanese such as in the Japanese name of the European Union, Ōshū Rengō ( 欧州連合 ) , despite the katakana Yōroppa ( ヨーロッパ ) being more commonly used. In some Turkic languages,

15600-424: The continent. Further from the sea, seasonal differences are more noticeable producing more continental climates . European culture consists of a range of national and regional cultures, which form the central roots of the wider Western civilisation , and together commonly reference ancient Greece and ancient Rome , particularly through their Christian successors , as crucial and shared roots. Beginning with

15750-640: The continents as the lands given by Noah to his three sons; Europe was defined as stretching from the Pillars of Hercules at the Strait of Gibraltar , separating it from Northwest Africa , to the Don, separating it from Asia. The convention received by the Middle Ages and surviving into modern usage is that of the Roman era used by Roman-era authors such as Posidonius , Strabo , and Ptolemy , who took

15900-534: The cross. This legend, widely recognized in Late Antiquity, is detailed in Jacopo de Varazze's 13th-century Legenda Aurea, which not only recounts the myth surrounding the cross but also commends Helena as an exemplary Christian within the Catholic Church . According to the legend, while en route to Jerusalem, Helena encountered three crosses, one of which was believed to be the cross of Christ, accompanied by

16050-585: The data recorded over the years, Arab Christians fared the best in terms of education in comparison to any other group receiving an education in Israel. In 2016 Arab Christians had the highest rates of success at matriculation examinations , namely 73.9%, both in comparison to Muslim and Druze Israelis (41% and 51.9% respectively), and to the students from the different branches of the Hebrew (majority Jewish ) education system considered as one group (55.1%). According to various reports, Arab Christians are one of

16200-584: The development of major commercial routes along the coast of the Mediterranean and Baltic Seas . The growing wealth and independence acquired by some coastal cities gave the Maritime Republics a leading role in the European scene. The Middle Ages on the mainland were dominated by the two upper echelons of the social structure: the nobility and the clergy. Feudalism developed in France in

16350-490: The elderly, dormitories , family and youth centers, hotels , and guesthouses. The Christian community in Israel is the one of the few growing Christian populations in the Middle East. Israeli Arab Christians generally have higher educational achievements and enjoy higher incomes. For Christians, the region that is today composed of Israel and Palestine is the Holy Land . According to traditional sources, Jesus ,

16500-658: The end of the 18th century, gave rise to radical economic, cultural, and social change in Western Europe and eventually the wider world. Both world wars began and were fought to a great extent in Europe, contributing to a decline in Western European dominance in world affairs by the mid-20th century as the Soviet Union and the United States took prominence and competed over dominance in Europe and globally. The resulting Cold War divided Europe along

16650-502: The end of the 19th century, there was no further free land for development in the Christian Quarter. In the same period, the Suez Canal had opened and many Christians travelled to the Holy Land. This led to intensified competition between the European powers for influence in Jerusalem. France built hospitals , a monastery , and hostels for visitors outside the Old City adjacent to the Christian Quarter - an area which became known as

16800-590: The epic poems of Homer ; in drama with Sophocles and Euripides ; in medicine with Hippocrates and Galen ; and in science with Pythagoras , Euclid , and Archimedes . In the course of the 5th century BCE, several of the Greek city states would ultimately check the Achaemenid Persian advance in Europe through the Greco-Persian Wars , considered a pivotal moment in world history, as

16950-437: The evolution of the area which was to become known as the Christian Quarter, from 1495 up until the modern system: During the 4th century, Emperor Constantine 's mother, Helena, journeyed to the Holy Land, aiming to engage in acts of charity and establish churches, particularly in locations associated with significant events in the life of Jesus Christ. During this period, a prominent narrative emerged about Helena's discovery of

17100-410: The following two centuries it conquered Greece , Hispania ( Spain and Portugal ), the North African coast, much of the Middle East , Gaul ( France and Belgium ), and Britannia ( England and Wales ). Expanding from their base in central Italy beginning in the third century BCE, the Romans gradually expanded to eventually rule the entire Mediterranean basin and Western Europe by the turn of

17250-400: The height of its power during the High Middle Ages. An East-West Schism in 1054 split the former Roman Empire religiously, with the Eastern Orthodox Church in the Byzantine Empire and the Roman Catholic Church in the former Western Roman Empire. In 1095 Pope Urban II called for a crusade against Muslims occupying Jerusalem and the Holy Land . In Europe itself, the Church organised

17400-399: The idea of water boundaries as the only legitimate divides between Europe and Asia. Four years later, in 1725, Philip Johan von Strahlenberg was the first to depart from the classical Don boundary. He drew a new line along the Volga , following the Volga north until the Samara Bend , along Obshchy Syrt (the drainage divide between the Volga and Ural Rivers ), then north and east along

17550-416: The larger persecuted Christian community of the Middle East region and throughout the world. A 2012 survey indicated that Christians in Israel are prosperous and well-educated– but some fear that Muslim intimidation will provoke an exodus to the West. The Christian communities in Nazareth tend to be wealthier and better educated compared to other Arabs elsewhere in Israel, and Christians in Nazareth occupy

17700-532: The latter waterway to its source in the Ural Mountains . At this point he proposed that mountain ranges could be included as boundaries between continents as alternatives to nearby waterways. Accordingly, he drew the new boundary north along Ural Mountains rather than the nearby and parallel running Ob and Irtysh rivers. This was endorsed by the Russian Empire and introduced the convention that would eventually become commonly accepted. However, this did not come without criticism. Voltaire , writing in 1760 about Peter

17850-427: The leadership of Greek Orthodox priest Gabriel Naddaf , United Allies is a political party that advocates Christian enlistment in the Israel Defense Forces and a more distinct societal separation of Christians from Muslims. This separation is partly based on the purported fact that Christians in Israel are not technically Arabs, seeing as they were present in the holy land long before the Arab conquest, hallmarked by

18000-694: The majority of the top positions in the town: three hospitals and bank managers, judges and school principals and faculties. The socio-economic gap between the Christians wealth and Muslim poverty led sometimes to sectarian crises. Recently there has been an increase of anti-Christian incidents in the Nazareth area, inspired by the rise of jihadist forces in the Middle East. Many Christians have complained of being targeted by Muslims, whom they believe are trying to either drive them out of cities that have traditionally had large Christian populations, or to "persuade" them to convert. In 1999, for example, radical Muslims in Nazareth rioted as they attempted to wrest land from

18150-464: The millennium. The Roman Republic ended in 27 BCE, when Augustus proclaimed the Roman Empire . The two centuries that followed are known as the pax romana , a period of unprecedented peace, prosperity and political stability in most of Europe. The empire continued to expand under emperors such as Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius , who spent time on the Empire's northern border fighting Germanic , Pictish and Scottish tribes. Christianity

18300-425: The most educated demographic in Israel. Concern was expressed by the patriarchs, however, over extremist groups in Israeli society. In 2023, the Latin Patriarch—the head of the Latin Church in the Holy Land—alleged that a shift toward far-right politics under the premiership of Benjamin Netanyahu led to greater attacks on Christians. The president of Israel, Isaac Herzog and the Israeli chief of police condemned

18450-566: The most educated groups in Israel. According to data from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (2023), Arab Christians in Israel have one of the highest levels of educational attainment among all religious communities. Specifically, 55% of Arab Christians have completed college degree or postgraduate education . According to data from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics (2019), Arab Christian students were less likely than their Arab Muslim counterparts to pursue fields such as teacher training , business , or paramedical studies. However,

18600-441: The northwest ( Asturias ) and largely Basque regions in the Pyrenees . This territory, under the Arabic name Al-Andalus , became part of the expanding Umayyad Caliphate . The unsuccessful second siege of Constantinople (717) weakened the Umayyad dynasty and reduced their prestige. The Umayyads were then defeated by the Frankish leader Charles Martel at the Battle of Poitiers in 732, which ended their northward advance. In

18750-431: The originally Persian name Frangistan ("land of the Franks ") is used casually in referring to much of Europe, besides official names such as Avrupa or Evropa . Clickable map of Europe, showing one of the most commonly used continental boundaries Key: blue : states which straddle the border between Europe and Asia ; green : countries not geographically in Europe, but closely associated with

18900-444: The poetry devoted to it. An alternative view is that of Robert Beekes , who has argued in favour of a pre-Indo-European origin for the name, explaining that a derivation from eurus would yield a different toponym than Europa. Beekes has located toponyms related to that of Europa in the territory of ancient Greece, and localities such as that of Europos in ancient Macedonia . There have been attempts to connect Eurṓpē to

19050-471: The practice of other denominations. Approximately 300 Christians have converted from Islam according to one 2014 estimate, and most of them are part of the Catholic Church . About 20,000 Israelis also practice Messianic Judaism , usually considered a syncretist form of Christianity . They are mostly classified as being "without a religious affiliation" rather than being classified as either Jewish or Christian. Arab Christians are mostly adherents of

19200-497: The purported nails. The narrative describes three ailing individuals approaching the crosses, with the third person experiencing a miraculous healing upon touching the cross of Christ. The designated site of this discovery is said to be where the Basilica of the Holy Sepulcher was subsequently erected. Helena is also credited with the establishment of the Church of the Nativity . The cross of Christ and other relics linked to this discovery became subjects of subsequent controversies within

19350-417: The realisation of the European Union (EU), which represents today the majority of Europe. The European Union is a supranational political entity that lies between a confederation and a federation and is based on a system of European treaties . The EU originated in Western Europe but has been expanding eastward since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. A majority of its members have adopted

19500-463: The region while the Diocese of Jerusalem counts 7,000 members and 29 congregations. The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land is a Lutheran denomination, part of the Lutheran World Federation , that has congregations also in Jordan and State of Palestine . First recognized as an autonomous religious community by King Hussein of Jordan in 1959, the church currently has 2,500 members and six congregations. The cathedral church

19650-456: The remote regions of north-western Iberia and the middle Pyrenees the power of the Muslims in the south was scarcely felt. It was here that the foundations of the Christian kingdoms of Asturias , Leon , and Galicia were laid and from where the reconquest of the Iberian Peninsula would start. However, no coordinated attempt would be made to drive the Moors out. The Christian kingdoms were mainly focused on their own internal power struggles. As

19800-428: The same time (Christians: 72%; Muslims: 63%), US being too supportive of Israel (Christians: 86%; Muslims: 75%), Israeli government not making enough efforts to make peace with Palestine (Christians: 80%; Muslims: 72%). Israel has a population of 182,000 Christians. As of 2021, it is the only growing Christian community in the Middle East. In 2019, 77.5% of Christians in Israel were Arab Christians, representing 7.2% of

19950-422: The state of the Golden Horde with headquarters in Crimea, which later adopted Islam as a religion, and ruled over modern-day southern and central Russia for more than three centuries. After the collapse of Mongol dominions, the first Romanian states (principalities) emerged in the 14th century: Moldavia and Walachia . Previously, these territories were under the successive control of Pechenegs and Cumans. From

20100-457: The total Arab population in the country . Christian schools in Israel are among the best schools in the country, and while those schools represent only 4% of the Arab schooling sector, about 34% of Arab university students come from Christian schools, and about 87% of the Israeli Arabs in the high tech sector have been educated in Christian schools. In 2012, the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics noted that when taking into account

20250-446: The vanguard in terms of eligibility for higher education , as the Christian Arab students had the highest rates of receiving Psychometric Entrance Test scores which make them eligible for acceptance into universities, data from the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics show that 61% of Arab Christians were eligible for university studies, compared to 50% of Jewish, 45% of Druze, and 35% of Muslim students. Europe Europe

20400-505: The violence against Christians. The Israeli police chief stated the police conducted operations to "eradicate" the phenomena. However, Christians have said they do not necessarily feel protected by authorities. In March 2023, Knesset legislators Moshe Gafni and Yaakov Asher submitted a bill that would have banned proselytizing of Christianity in Israel. Due to an uproar from Evangelical Christians in America , who generally support Israel, Prime Minister Netanyahu announced that

20550-407: The waterways connecting the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea . Islands are generally grouped with the nearest continental landmass, hence Iceland is considered to be part of Europe, while the nearby island of Greenland is usually assigned to North America , although politically belonging to Denmark. Nevertheless, there are some exceptions based on sociopolitical and cultural differences. Cyprus

20700-445: The west and the north, transmitting newly acquired skills in producing copper artifacts. In Western Europe the Neolithic period was characterised not by large agricultural settlements but by field monuments, such as causewayed enclosures , burial mounds and megalithic tombs . The Corded Ware cultural horizon flourished at the transition from the Neolithic to the Chalcolithic . During this period giant megalithic monuments, such as

20850-416: The west continued to decline, Roman traditions and the Roman state remained strong in the predominantly Greek-speaking Eastern Roman Empire , also known as the Byzantine Empire . During most of its existence, the Byzantine Empire was the most powerful economic, cultural, and military force in Europe. Emperor Justinian I presided over Constantinople's first golden age: he established a legal code that forms

21000-399: The western shore of the Aegean Sea . As a name for a part of the known world, it is first used in the 6th century BCE by Anaximander and Hecataeus . Anaximander placed the boundary between Asia and Europe along the Phasis River (the modern Rioni River on the territory of Georgia ) in the Caucasus, a convention still followed by Herodotus in the 5th century BCE. Herodotus mentioned that

21150-419: The widespread use of pottery—began around 7000 BCE in Greece and the Balkans , probably influenced by earlier farming practices in Anatolia and the Near East . It spread from the Balkans along the valleys of the Danube and the Rhine ( Linear Pottery culture ), and along the Mediterranean coast ( Cardial culture ). Between 4500 and 3000 BCE, these central European neolithic cultures developed further to

21300-411: The world had been divided by unknown persons into three parts—Europe, Asia, and Libya (Africa)—with the Nile and the Phasis forming their boundaries—though he also states that some considered the River Don , rather than the Phasis, as the boundary between Europe and Asia. Europe's eastern frontier was defined in the 1st century by geographer Strabo at the River Don. The Book of Jubilees described

21450-410: The world. The place name Evros was first used by the ancient Greeks to refer to their northernmost province, which bears the same name today. The principal river there – Evros (today's Maritsa ) – flows through the fertile valleys of Thrace , which itself was also called Europe, before the term meant the continent. In classical Greek mythology , Europa ( Ancient Greek : Εὐρώπη , Eurṓpē )

21600-452: The world. Between the 16th and 20th centuries, European powers colonised at various times the Americas , almost all of Africa and Oceania , and the majority of Asia. The Age of Enlightenment , the French Revolution , and the Napoleonic Wars shaped the continent culturally, politically, and economically from the end of the 17th century until the first half of the 19th century. The Industrial Revolution , which began in Great Britain at

21750-422: Was legalised by Constantine I in 313 CE after three centuries of imperial persecution . Constantine also permanently moved the capital of the empire from Rome to the city of Byzantium (modern-day Istanbul ) which was renamed Constantinople in his honour in 330 CE. Christianity became the sole official religion of the empire in 380 CE, and in 391–392 CE the emperor Theodosius outlawed pagan religions. This

21900-399: Was a Phoenician princess. One view is that her name derives from the Ancient Greek elements εὐρύς ( eurús ) 'wide, broad', and ὤψ ( ōps , gen. ὠπός , ōpós ) 'eye, face, countenance', hence their composite Eurṓpē would mean 'wide-gazing' or 'broad of aspect'. Broad has been an epithet of Earth herself in the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European religion and

22050-428: Was eventually absorbed into Russia several centuries later. The period between the year 1000 and 1250 is known as the High Middle Ages , followed by the Late Middle Ages until c. 1500. During the High Middle Ages the population of Europe experienced significant growth, culminating in the Renaissance of the 12th century . Economic growth, together with the lack of safety on the mainland trading routes, made possible

22200-403: Was in response to Saladin's recapture of Jerusalem. Notable European leaders like Richard the Lion-heart fought in the Crusader, however they failed to recapture Jerusalem. The Fourth Crusade (1201-1204 CE) Initiated by Pope Innocent III, it faced financial and organizational challenges. Deviating from its intended path, the crusade sacked Zara and Constantinople , causing lasting damage to

22350-494: Was incorporated into the later parallel Messianic Jewish movement in the late 1960s. The number of Messianic Jews in Israel is estimated at around 20,000. In 2006, there were at least twelve Messianic congregations in Jerusalem. On 23 February 2007, Israel Channel 2 News released a news documentary about the growing number of Messianic Jews in Israel. Hebrew -speakers call Christians Notzri (also romanized Notsri ), which means Nazarene (originated from Nazareth). The word

22500-495: Was the first crisis that would strike Europe in the late Middle Ages. The period between 1348 and 1420 witnessed the heaviest loss. The population of France was reduced by half. Medieval Britain was afflicted by 95 famines, and France suffered the effects of 75 or more in the same period. Europe was devastated in the mid-14th century by the Black Death , one of the most deadly pandemics in human history which killed an estimated 25 million people in Europe alone—a third of

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