High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Arnold Joseph Toynbee CH (14 April 1889 – 22 October 1975) was a British historian whose twelve-volume analysis of the rise and fall of civilizations, A Study of History, 1934–1961, was a synthesis of world history, a metahistory based on universal rhythms of rise, flowering and decline, which examined history from a global perspective. A religious outlook permeates the Study and made it especially popular in the United States, for Toynbee rejected Greek humanism, the Enlightenment belief in humanity`s essential goodness, and the "false god" of modern nationalism. Toynbee in the 1918–1950 period was a leading British consultant to the government on international affairs, especially regarding the Middle East.