Kazakhstan, the largest country within the Eurasian Steppe, has been a historical "crossroads" and home to numerous different peoples and empires throughout history. Human activity in the region began with the extinct Pithecanthropus and Sinanthropus one million–800,000 years ago in the Karatau Mountains and the Caspian and Balkhash areas. Neanderthals were present from 140,000 to 40,000 years ago in the Karatau Mountains and central Kazakhstan. Modern Homo sapiens appeared from 40,000 to 12,000 years ago in southern and eastern Kazakhstan. After the end of the last glacial period, human settlement spread across the country and led to the extinction of the mammoth and the woolly rhinoceros. Hunter-gatherer communes invented bows and boats, used domesticated wolves and traps for hunting; the Neolithic Revolution was marked by the appearance of animal husbandry and agriculture, giving rise to the Atbasar, Kelteminar and Ust-Narym cultures. The Botai culture is credited with the first domestication of horses, ceramics and polished-stone tools appeared during this period.

The fourth and third millennia witnessed the beginning of metal production, the manufacture of copper tools, the use of casting molds. In the second millennium BCE, ore mining developed in central Kazakhstan; the change in climate forced the massive relocation of populations out of the steppe belt. The dry period which lasted from the end of the second millennium to the beginning of the 1st millennium BCE caused the depopulation of the arid belts and river-valley oasis areas. Following with the end of the arid period at the beginning of the first millennium BCE, nomadic populations migrated into Kazakhstan from the west and the east, repopulating abandoned areas; these included several Indo-Iranians known collectively as the Saka. During the fourth century CE the Huns controlled Kazakhstan, absorbing 26 independent territories and uniting a number of steppe and forest peoples into a single state; the Huns migrated west. The future Kazakhstan was absorbed into the Turkic Kaganate and successor states Several independent states flourished in Kazakhstan during the Early Middle Ages.

In the 13th century Kazakhstan was under the dominion of the Mongol Empire, remained in the sphere of Mongol successor states for 300 years. Portions of the country began to be annexed by the Russian Empire in the 16th century, the remainder absorbed into Russian Turkestan beginning in 1867; the modern Republic of Kazakhstan became a political entity during the 1930s Soviet subdivision of Russian Turkestan. Humans have inhabited Kazakhstan since the Lower Paleolithic pursuing the nomadic pastoralism for which the region's climate and terrain are suitable. Prehistoric Bronze Age cultures which extended into the region include the Srubna, the Afanasevo, the Andronovo. Between 500 BC and 500 AD Kazakhstan was home to the Saka and the Huns, early nomadic warrior cultures. At the beginning of the first millennium, the steppes east of the Caspian were inhabited and settled by a variety of peoples nomads speaking Indo-European and Uralic languages, including the Alans, Budini, Issedones/Wusun, Madjars and Sakas.

The names, relations between and constituents of these peoples were sometimes fluid and interchangeable. Some of them formed states, including Kangju in the east. Over the course of several centuries, the area became dominated by Turkic and other exogenous languages, which arrived with nomad invaders and settlers from the east. Following the entry of the Huns many of the previous inhabitants migrated westward into Europe, or were absorbed by the Huns. By 91 AD, according to Tacitus, the Huns had reached the Turan Depression, including the Atyrau region; the focus of the Hun Empire moved westward from the steppes into Eastern Europe. For a few centuries, events in the future Kazakhstan are unclear and the subject of speculation based on mythic or apocryphal folk tales, popular among various peoples that migrated westward through the steppes. From the middle of the 2nd Century, the Yueban – an offshoot of the Xiongnu and therefore connected to the Huns – established a state in far eastern Kazakhstan.

Over the next few centuries, peoples such as the Akatziri, Avars and Bulgars migrated through the area and into the Caucasus and Eastern Europe. By the beginning of the 6th Century, the proto-Mongolian Rouran Khaganate had annexed areas that were part of the east Kazakhstan; the Göktürks, a Turkic people subject to the Rouran, migrated westward, pushing the remnants of the Huns west and southward. By the mid-6th Century, the Central Eurasian steppes had become controlled by the Turkic Khaganate known as the Göktürk Khaganate. A few decades a civil war resulted in the khaganate being split, establishment of the Western Turkic Khaganate, under the Onogur tribes and Eastern Turkic Khaganate. In 659, the Western Turkic Khaganate was ended by the Tang Empire. Towards the end of the 7th Century, the two states were reunited in the Second Turkic Khaganate. However, the khaganate began to fragment only a few generations later. In 766, the Oghuz Yabgu State was founded, with its capital in Jankent, came to occupy most of the Kazakhstan.

It was founded by the Oguz Turks refugees from the neighbouring Turgesh Kaganate. The Oguz lost a struggle with the Karluks fo

Yaohua High School is a key school directly under the Tianjin Municipal Committee of Education, in the People's Republic of China. The school is located on Nanjing Road, Heping District, Tianjin; the first four buildings are built during the concession period with British style a new building has been added during the 90s while the latest development of the school has included several building complexes, accomplished around 2004-2005. It covered 35,000 square metres, an area of over 20,000 square metres adjoining to it has been added, its original floor space was 25,600 square metres. Some new buildings to be built will add an additional 39,000 square metres; the school buildings have an attractive combination of Western styles. At the center of the campus is the school library with a collection of 120,000 books, the Science Building is well equipped and the computer center has Internet access, there is an astronomical observatory. There are additional recreational facilities for both teachers and students, such as two equipped gymnasia, several basketball courts, one standard football field with a 400-metre track surrounding it, a swimming pool, a canteen and a dining hall that can serve 600 people at a time.

There is an auditorium, which can hold 1,380 people. Yaohua High School has a long history, fosters an honest and simple school spirit and aims to be a cradle of talents, its history can be traced back to the early 20th century. In 1927, Mr. Zhuang Lefeng, one of the directors of the Union of the Chinese Taxpayers in the British Concession in Tianjin, founded the Tianjin Public School in the British Concession to benefit Chinese children. In 1934 it was renamed as Yaohua School which means "to glorify China". In 1952 the name was changed to Tianjin No.16 Middle School and reverted to Tianjin Yaohua High School in 1988. In the past 70-odd years, both teachers and students in Yaohua have aspired to keep to the school motto: "Diligence, Simplicity and Honesty". Since its foundation, the school has trained over 30,000 graduates. Famous alumni include: Science and academia: Hao Yichun an academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences. Wu Xi academician at Duke University Politics: Zhou Nan vice-premier of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the former chief of Hong Kong Branch of Xinhua News Agency.

Literature and the Arts: Wang Qian a famous calligrapher and the deputy director of the Chinese Calligraphers' Association. Each year, over 500 graduates from Yaohua go on to colleges and universities, which are more than any other school in Tianjin. In 2000 and 2001, all Yaohua High School graduates were admitted to universities, of which 97% were top-ranked ones. From 1998 to 2000, students from the school continuously won first place in science subjects in the National Entrance Examination in Tianjin in 2000, when Yaohua students took the top four places in science subjects in the National Entrance Examination. In 1991, Lu Qiang, a Yaohua student, won the gold medal in Physics at the 22nd International Middle-School-Student Olympic Competition. In the last five years more than 500 students won first and third places in Tianjin at the National High-School-Student Competition in Mathematics, Chemistry, Biology and Computer Science. In the 1930s and 1940s, Qian Weichang, a prominent Chinese physicist and Zhang Xiaohu, a noted music theoretician taught here.

At present, there are 146 teaching staff. Ten of them are'Super Degree teachers' and 76 of them have'Senior Degrees'. There are 61 classes. 3,009 students are enrolled at the school. At the start of the 21st century, the municipal government and the Municipal Committee of the CPC emphasized that more schools should be set

The World Chess Championship 1886 was the first official World Chess Championship match contested by Wilhelm Steinitz and Johannes Zukertort. The match took place in the United States, the first five games being played in New York City, the next four being played in St. Louis and the final eleven in New Orleans; the winner was the first player to achieve ten wins. Wilhelm Steinitz won the match 10–5, winning his tenth game in the twentieth game of the match. There were five. There were a number of "unofficial" world championship matches held between the undisputed leading players of the day, but talk of an official World Championship did not occur prior to the 1866 match between Steinitz and Adolf Anderssen. Steinitz won that match and although he made no known reference to a "World Championship" at the time, in life he would sometimes backdate the tenure of his reign to the date of the Anderssen match. However, most historians now accept that the 1886 match between Steinitz and Zukertort was the first official World Championship match.

Though not yet an American citizen, Steinitz wanted the United States flag to be placed next to him during the match. He became a U. S. citizen on November 23, 1888, having resided for five years in New York, changed his first name from Wilhelm to William. Zukertort staked his rival claim to being the world's leading player by a number of tournament wins, notably Paris 1878 and London 1883. Steinitz did not compete in Paris, but at the London 1883 chess tournament, a prestigious 14-player, double-round, all-play-all tournament, Zukertort was the convincing winner with 22/26, ahead of Steinitz. They were followed by Joseph Henry Mikhail Chigorin. In many respects, the event resembled a modern-day Candidates Tournament, in that most of the world's leading players took part and the top two cemented their reputations as contenders for a world title; the following year saw the death of Paul Morphy and so nothing stood in the way of a first official World Championship match between the two rivals. As there was a degree of hostility between them, the match arrangements were somewhat protracted and lasted three years.

Disagreement over the choice of venue was resolved when Steinitz persuaded Zukertort to accept the United States, his new place of residence, over London. This was due to the better conditions offered to the players by the American organizers. Zukertort was given the princely sum of $750 to make the trip across the Atlantic, the winner of the match was promised a quarter of the proceeds from the betting syndication; the match was to use the same chess clock as three years earlier, the time limit was determined as 30 moves in 2 hours, followed by another 15 moves in each subsequent hour. For the first time in chess history, a demonstration board measuring 1 metre square was erected above the players, so that the spectators could follow the game while seated. Play commenced on January 11, 1886 at 14.00 hours, in the Cartiers Academy Hall, No. 80, Fifth Avenue, New York City. After the first five games, the venue switched to St. Louis for a further four. With the match result still in the balance, the concluding chapter was played in New Orleans, by which time Zukertort was said to be living on his wits, physically fatigued and approaching mental breakdown.

Steinitz, on the other hand, appeared to be playing more robustly, with a bottomless pit of mental stamina. His strategic mastery took control of the match and he wrapped things up with a further six wins, four draws and just one defeat; the final game ended on March 29, 1886 when Zukertort tended his resignation and congratulated the new World Champion. In the aftermath, it was apparent. Two years Zukertort died of a heart attack; the winner would be the first to 10 wins, draws not counting. In the event of a 9–9 tie, neither player would be champion. Steinitz won. Slav Defence 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.e3 Bf5 4. Nc3 e6 5. Nf3 Nd7 6.a3 Bd6 7.c5 Bc7 8.b4 e5 9. Be2 Ngf6 10. Bb2 e4 11. Nd2 h5 12.h3 Nf8 13.a4 Ng6 14.b5 Nh4 15.g3 Ng2+ 16. Kf1 Nxe3+ 17.fxe3 Bxg3 18. Kg2 Bc7 19. Qg1 Rh6 20. Kf1 Rg6 21. Qf2 Qd7 22.bxc6 bxc6 23. Rg1 Bxh3+ 24. Ke1 Ng4 25. Bxg4 Bxg4 26. Ne2 Qe7 27. Nf4 Rh6 28. Bc3 g5 29. Ne2 Rf6 30. Qg2 Rf3 31. Nf1 Rb8 32. Kd2 f5 33.a5 f4 34. Rh1 Qf7 35. Re1 fxe3+ 36. Nxe3 Rf2 37. Qxf2 Qxf2 38. Nxg4 Bf4+ 39. Kc2 hxg4 40.

Bd2 e3 41. Bc1 Qg2 42. Kc3 Kd7 43. Rh7+ Ke6 44. Rh6+ Kf5 45. Bxe3 Bxe3 46. Rf1+ Bf4 0–1 Scotch Four Knights Game 1.e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 exd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 Bb4 6. Nxc6 bxc6 7. Bd3 d5 8.exd5 cxd5 9.0–0 0–0 10. Bg5 c6 11. Ne2 Bd6 12. Ng3 h6 13. Bd2 Ng4 14. Be2 Qh4 15. Bxg4 Bxg4 16. Qc1 Be2 17. Re1 Ba6 18. Bc3 f5 19. Re6 Rad8 20. Qd2 d4 21. Ba5 Rd7 22. Rxd6 Rxd6 23. Bb4 Qf6 24. Rd1 Rd5 25. Bxf8 Qxf8 26. Nh5 Qe8 27. Nf4 Re5 28.h4 c5 29.h5 Re4 30.c3 Qb8 31.g3 Qe5 32. Ng6?! 32... Qd6 33. Nf4 d3 34.b3 c4 35. Rb1 Kh7 36. Kh2 Qb6 37. Kg1 Bb7 38. Rb2? 38... Qc6 39.f3 Qc5+ 40. Qf2 Re1+ 41. Kh2 Qxf2+ 42. Rxf2 Bxf3 43.g4 Be2 44. Ng2 d2 45. Ne3 cxb3 46.axb3 Bxg4 0–1 Slav Defence 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.e3 Bf5 4.a3 e6 5.c5 a5 6. Qb3 Qc7 7. Nc3 Nd7 8. Na4 Ngf6 9. Ne2 B