Richly illustrated, beautifully designed, and engaging, this introduction to the humanities offers a thorough yet accessible integrated exploration of Western civilization's cultural heritage -- with an emphasis on cultural achievements in the arts of literature, philosophy, religion, painting, music, sculpture, and architecture. Multi-cultural in approach and organized chronologically from the Renaissance to the present, it provides an historical (political, economic, and social) and cultural framework to help students understand how cultural achievements emerged from a specific time and place and how, in some instances, they reflected non-Western influences.