# Early and Ancient civilizations and peoples thread



## Deleted member 134556 (Dec 23, 2020)

I find early communities fascinating, not just Egypt, Mayan, and Greece and Rome, but cultures and communities that existed everywhere in the world too. Use this thread to share ancient tribes, people, groups, or civilizations you think are interesting, or that you are descended from.

Be respectful and polite about the subject and towards each other.


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## Yakamaru (Dec 23, 2020)

@KimberVaile will love this thread.


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## Frank Gulotta (Dec 23, 2020)

Nabateans are very interesting. They were nomadic (i think), but their city of gathering and worship (Petra) looks like something from 16th century Italian renaissance. It's baroque way before it was cool, around 300 BC. Such treasures hidden in midst a very desolated rocky place is eerie, I would love to visit.


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## KimberVaile (Dec 23, 2020)

Yakamaru said:


> @KimberVaile will love this thread.


Always up to having a nice discussion about Rome and Greece. I concur, most excellent thread!


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## Attaman (Dec 23, 2020)

While I've gushed on here about stuff like Ancient Egypt (both pre- and early-Dynastic) and the Scythians before, I've recently had a bit of an infatuation with the Copper Age and the various civilizations that cropped up in that era. 

Because... like, that's something a lot of people don't realize about the late Neolithic and very early Bronze Age (which the Copper Age tends to include both of): It wasn't like there was some magical switch of "Cave men in furs and caves" to "Egyptian, Roman, Chinese, et al civilization". There was a hell of a transitionary period which included major cities and proto-cities in places like Mesopotamia, Indus Valley, and so-on doing things like "walled cities of a few thousand persons" all the way up to "cities of tens of thousands with functional plumbing and minimal social stratification". Linen has been around for almost ten thousand years at this point.

And this doesn't even get into some of the wonders if you include American civilizations (which is a bit of a grey area as while technically they didn't surpass a lot of the _material_ transitionary stuff they _readily_ blew past the societal requirements), which adds to the list of places / works Tenōchtitlan and the Andén terrace farms.


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## fawlkes (Dec 23, 2020)

Being a blue-eyed ginger from Central Scotland, I would say that my roots are most likely Celtic or Scandinavian. We have traced our family back to the middle part of the 1500s, to sheep farmers in the Dumfries area of the borders. Going down another line though, we get into the Welsh side of the family, which has been less prominent through our family, but it's still there.

Going back to early Britons, Picts and Celts, there's a ton of information out there about the peoples who are/were native to this little island of ours. We know that the Romans really disliked the naked, blue people north of their settlements. They wouldn't dare stray into the forests of Galloway for fear of vanishing and only their head turning up, being delivered via being thrown into/over the Antoine/Hadrian's Wall (depending on the year).
 Though the Antoine Wall has almost been entirely deconstructed, there were a lot of very good and informative historical programs giving out the history, location and remaining pieces of the wall. Would highly recommend, unless you're Central Italian, and then you might end up on a stake.


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## Sam Wamm (Dec 23, 2020)

the earliest human civilisations on the planet existed when ancient gigantic mammals walked the earth and as you can expect people worshipped them as gods especially since the larger animals tended to be gentle creatures.

they saw them as respectable leaders and followed their exmple because they were strong enough to change the world for the better.

herd animals like mammoth were seen as the loyal protectors of humans because humans would follow the herds and forrage alongside them with the mammoth's huge size providing physical protection and the humans' superior senses, awareness and observation skills being able to warn the mammoths of incoming threats.

unfortunately this symbiotic relationship ended when the humans started hunting the mammoths for food and as a result humanity as a whole almost went extinct about 20 or so times as each human culture following the old ways observed the temporary successes of the soon to be extinct rival tribes and followed suit.

this is the real reason why we are the only human species to survive to today. our greedy nature we inheritted from our ape ancestors almost got us killed.

luckily however this coincided with the poles shifting and the environment planet wide became more to our liking removing the need for us to keep warm with animal furs and thus increasing our agility and enabling us to even take on our natural predator at the time the sabre tooth tiger.

we were lucky. that's why we're here. without luck on our side our species was destined to die.

humans are a mistake of mother nature, not a superior species.


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## KimberVaile (Dec 26, 2020)

fawlkes said:


> Being a blue-eyed ginger from Central Scotland, I would say that my roots are most likely Celtic or Scandinavian. We have traced our family back to the middle part of the 1500s, to sheep farmers in the Dumfries area of the borders. Going down another line though, we get into the Welsh side of the family, which has been less prominent through our family, but it's still there.
> 
> Going back to early Britons, Picts and Celts, there's a ton of information out there about the peoples who are/were native to this little island of ours. We know that the Romans really disliked the naked, blue people north of their settlements. They wouldn't dare stray into the forests of Galloway for fear of vanishing and only their head turning up, being delivered via being thrown into/over the Antoine/Hadrian's Wall (depending on the year).
> Though the Antoine Wall has almost been entirely deconstructed, there were a lot of very good and informative historical programs giving out the history, location and remaining pieces of the wall. Would highly recommend, unless you're Central Italian, and then you might end up on a stake.


It's a bit of a exaggeration to say the Romans generally feared the Picts and other native Scottish tribes as much as finding them a nuisance. The Romans often successfully fought multiple skirmishes across the wall and outside it, that costed the native tribes more than it did the Romans.
The primary reason the Romans never advanced far past Hadrian wall (with the exception of Antoine's wall), was largely due to the Picts being more integrated with the forested areas, so that they could seamlessly retreat and disperse into the woods. Whenever the Picts fought the Romans in pitched battles, such as Battle of Mans Graupius, the conflicts ended in decisive Roman victories. In this battle particularly, the Picts lost near 10,000 to the Roman losses of 400.

What can be attributed to the Picts I think, was their ability to conduct guerilla warfare so early on, which historically has proven to be a very powerful defensive strategy. It slowed the Roman advance enough that they were never completely conquered or assimilated and is partially what led to the construction of Hadrian's Wall.

Though, Severus's invasion of Scotland had come rather close to succeeding, however, his death and his successors death due to illness halted the campaign, thus the status quo was reenacted. The Romans proved quite brutal however, and before the death of Serveruss's son, there was great fear among the remaining tribes they'd be subject to complete extermination. The results of the campaigns were evident however, as the raiding parties sent by the Scottish tribes afterwards paled compared to what they used to be able to muster.


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## Frank Gulotta (Dec 27, 2020)

Sam Akuchin Wamm said:


> people worshipped them as gods


Citation needed


Sam Akuchin Wamm said:


> humans are a mistake of mother nature, not a superior species.


Nature makes no mistakes. It merely bounces between different unbalances and slowly but surely balances them back, in endlessly creative ways. A species of ants becomes way too invasive? a species of mushrooms will zombify entire colonies for its own benefit.
In a way I find it very arrogant to think humanity is so special. Yeah it self-reflects, big deal.


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## Fallowfox (Dec 27, 2020)

Attaman said:


> the Scythians



I like Scythian art. I have wondered whether Islamic interlace is influenced by it.



Frank Gulotta said:


> Citation needed
> 
> Nature makes no mistakes.



Nature did invent gonorrhoea and haemorrhoids, so, maybe a few mistakes!



KimberVaile said:


> Antoine's wall


Antonine?


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## KimberVaile (Dec 27, 2020)

Fallowfox said:


> I like Scythian art. I have wondered whether Islamic interlace is influenced by it.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Forgot to spell check. Supposed to be Antonine's wall.


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## Frank Gulotta (Dec 28, 2020)

Celts


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## Fallowfox (Dec 30, 2020)

KimberVaile said:


> Forgot to spell check. Supposed to be Antonin*e's *wall.



No apostrophe needed in the name; just 'Antonine'. 

To use an apt example, you'd call a giant US border wall the 'Trumpian wall', or 'Trump's wall', but you wouldn't call it 'Trumpian*'s* wall'.


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## Deleted member 134556 (Dec 30, 2020)

KimberVaile said:


> Always up to having a nice discussion about Rome and Greece. I concur, most excellent thread!


Tell me a bit about Rome's military and combat strategies, and their most popular weaponry.


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## Deleted member 111470 (Dec 30, 2020)

I live in the oldest city in Europe - it is said that people settled here some 8,000 years ago. I try to go up on the hill where the ruins lie, at least once a month. There's just something else about threading on such ancient grounds. I can't help but wonder - what people walked there all that time ago? Did they also enjoy the view of the area like I am now? I wonder what their struggles must have been, or what their celebrations were. 

Thracians were the first to settle there - at least this is what is said. Then Romans. On the hill there is a big water reservoir. In the northern wall, there is a hidden tunnel leading out of the citadel that once stood there.

I love visiting that hill.


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## KimberVaile (Dec 30, 2020)

Nexus Cabler said:


> Tell me a bit about Rome's military and combat strategies, and their most popular weaponry.


But of course! I can give you a quick rundown on why the Romans were so dominant on the battlefield.

The Marian reforms of 107 BC is largely what is credited with bringing about the classical legion. There were a great many changes from this but, the most pertinent change was the change from militia to full time professional soldiers. Becoming a solider became a career, and full time career, and that was potentially quite profitable for many poorer citizens.

And of the key points of warfare, they relied heavily on organized command. They used groupings called Legions which consisted of 4000 to 5000 men, and every 80 men within that group had it's own centurion, who command their own respective sub groups of men. This concept extends to 8 men who are commanded by a Contubernium, who was superseded by the centurion (80 men) who was superseded by the Cohort(480), so on. This increased organization made giving unit wide actions like say, everybody forming in a testudo to protect against projectiles, nearly instant. It also made them very mobile and severely cut down on the need for supply lines. This increased organization was used for aforementioned formations like the testudo , forming a wedge formation to penetrate enemy lines during a charge and to disorganize the enemy battle line, to make an orderly march or counter march, or to all throw pilums at the oncoming hoard of enemies. The  pilums were javelins but with a special feature, the pilums tip was purposely made soft so that it would bend when it stuck into something. So if it impacted a shield, it would snap and bend inside the shield and render the shield too cumbersome to use. If the target was lightly armored, these javelins would often immediately kill the victim.

The Romans also often gradually switched out its front line men when they become too exhausted or losses had begun to occur, the second line men in orderly fashion would take the place of the front line men, who would fall back to the end of the line. The Roman military also had great talent in military engineering, they were not just capable of building siege towers or battering rams, but they were often able to build, in relatively quick fashion, fortified walls, bridges and other defensive constructions in relatively short notice. Caesar famously won the battle of Alesia against Vercingeotirx using two sets of walls built around the settlement, one to entraps the city, and the second to defend against reinforcements from the Gauls. The battle was fought on what is estimated to be three to on odds and was a decisive victory for Caesar .

The Legions get special attention, but the Roman Cavalry also deserve attention for it's functions of defending the left and right flanks of the Roman Legion, the Calvary was mainly used to flank the enemy and bombard them with javelins and skirmishing. And they often played decisive roles in battle for that.
Auxiliaries also deserve mention as well, as they were inherently the most flexible part of the army. They served mainly as light/ medium cavalry, archers or if they were equipped with melee weapons would first fight in front of the legions.
The Auxiliaries usually were non Roman citizens who played the roles of cavalry or archers, or as a way to tire out the enemy as front lines men, making the impact of the Roman legions on enemy lines that much more deadly.

Hope that helps a bit!


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## Attaman (Dec 30, 2020)

I will note, if looking into the military tactics, equipment, et al of the Roman Empire, that there's some fairly strong arguments to be made that the Legion was less exceptionally _disciplined_ (at least, how we'd see it in the modern sense of the word) versus exceptionally _organized_. This is not to argue that they were _undisciplined_ or _wreckless_ (as further clarified in the essay, particularly where the author reposted it to other sites), or that their state of less-than-perfect discipline was _exceptional_ (most powers within the region at the time of the Republic operated under similar principles re:Armies), nor to underplay how big of an advantage their organization (from logistics to officers) provided the Legion, merely that the popular conception of Rome as "The rock upon wish barbarian hordes crashes" is probably inaccurate to some degree. 

Likewise that the role of an ass-ton of javelins can never be underestimated.


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## KimberVaile (Dec 30, 2020)

Attaman said:


> I will note, if looking into the military tactics, equipment, et al of the Roman Empire, that there's some fairly strong arguments to be made that the Legion was less exceptionally _disciplined_ (at least, how we'd see it in the modern sense of the word) versus exceptionally _organized_. This is not to argue that they were _undisciplined_ or _wreckless_ (as further clarified in the essay, particularly where the author reposted it to other sites), or that their state of less-than-perfect discipline was _exceptional_ (most powers within the region at the time of the Republic operated under similar principles re:Armies), nor to underplay how big of an advantage their organization (from logistics to officers) provided the Legion, merely that the popular conception of Rome as "The rock upon wish barbarian hordes crashes" is probably inaccurate to some degree.
> 
> Likewise that the role of an ass-ton of javelins can never be underestimated.


The Romans were very well organized, and as well, quite disciplined. The author himself mentions decimation, (which as the name implies involves the execution of 1 out of 10 soldiers of the entire legion, chosen at random.) Though it does not mention the heavy uses of lashes for thievery, or disobedience, or being crucified for desertion, nor use of execution for severe disobedience.

One huge weakness in that argument is that it invokes heavily on Caesar's own accounts, who was comparatively a very magnanimous general when faced with other generals, such a Crassus, who was exceedingly feared rather than loved in any capacity and under Crasus, there was nary a single instance of such extreme disobedience that was seen by the tenth legion. Casear was well known for being exceedingly lenient, famously rather than decimating a legion mutinying for late pay, he berated them, and convinced them to rejoin his campaign. Caesers leniency can also be seen in instances of accepting the legions of Pompey and his other enemies into his ranks. It can be argued he did this for self gain, but it would hardly explain why he spared so many of the Roman senators that had initially tired to have him killed for treason. That move after all, ended up causing his own death.

Every other example cites battles before the  Marian reforms aka pre-107 BC, these were the Roman forces before they were overhauled into professional soldiers, to simplify why that is so crucial. I could hardly say Caesar's style of generalship wasn't successful, but to blanketly say this implies the Romans were not disciplined is not accurate in any capacity. This is especially true when you look at Crassus, who was a fairly successful general who fought plenty of battles himself. He wasn't as talented as Caeser, sure, but his generalship was starkly different, he'd be far less inclined to reward disobedience, no matter how unexpectedly successful it was, compared to Caeser.

It is telling that after the end of the Republic, and Caeser's death that the few examples of such blatant disobedience are relegated to very specific, sparse cherry picked examples.  And not so coincidentally those examples are Generals who did not stick with the brutal enforcement of discipline within the legion and thus are why they stick out as examples to the contrary. Generals have the leeway to influence their army's internal culture and policy and some did so successfully and to great effect. Others, not so much. Regardless, the overwhelming account as by both Roman sources and outside sources was complimentary towards their superior discipline. Fear can be a powerful motivator, albeit an often brutal one.

The Romans rightfully were, of superior discipline more often than not, though, that was not the only factor in why they were often better matched than their opponents.


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## Attaman (Dec 30, 2020)

KimberVaile said:


> The Romans were very well organized, and as well, quite disciplined. The author himself mentions decimation, (which as the name implies involves the execution of 1 out of 10 soldiers of the entire legion, chosen at random.) Though it does not mention the heavy uses of lashes for thievery,, or disobedience, or being crucified for desertion, nor use of execution for severe disobedience.


It should be noted that execution is mentioned in the essay: Torquatus' execution of his own son for disobeying orders re:dueling being the most prominent, which is also an example of both severe disobedience (specifically: Defying orders in a manner that directly compromised the performance and capabilities of the Legion) and exactly what the essay was talking about (Decius engaged in such duels in pursuit of his own _Virtus_). 

They also point out that there was a disproportionate use of discipline to correct for Legionnaires being _too aggressive_ behavior as opposed to _insufficiently aggressive. _Which, while definitely a definition of discipline, runs contrary to the usual expectation / portrayal of the Legion as a place where people Obeyed All Orders (no matter how costly) and cowards were forced to adapt (Specifically: Your issue wasn't "The soldiers were told to hold this position and instead ran away", but "The soldiers were told to hold this position and instead _broke ranks and advanced because fuck you I'mma be a war hero")_. 



KimberVaile said:


> One huge weakness in that argument is that it invokes heavily on Caesar's own accounts, who was comparatively a very magnanimous general when faced with other generals, such a Crassus, who was exceedingly feared rather than loved in any capacity and under Crasus, there was nary a single instance of such extreme disobedience that was seen by the tenth legion. The only other source used is Casear was well known for being exceedingly lenient, famously rather than decimating a legion mutinying for late pay, he berated them, and convinced them to rejoin his campaign.


I will note that Caesar is far from the only source used in the essay (if one of the two main primary sources, the other Polybius), as in addition to aforementioned two we get Livy, Plutarch, as well as more general (as well as more modern) sources in the forms of Lendon, Barton, et al.

Admittedly, I will also note that their essay - by their own admission - is aimed predominantly at Mid-Late Republic Roman Legionnaires, and that they also acknowledge some moderate to significant changes in the Legion's operation after but a century or so into the Empire. 



KimberVaile said:


> Caesers leniency can also be seen in instances of accepting the legions of Pompey and his other enemies into his ranks. It can be argued he did this for self gain. but it would hardly explain why he spared so many of the Roman senators that had initially tired to have him killed for treason. That move after all, ended up causing his own death.


The author comments on this: It could very well be that Caesar's own grasp of _Virtus_ made it too difficult for him to scold the legions too harshly for following what... frankly was a thoroughly baked in societal expectation. Which goes right on back to the point being made that Discipline (or _Disciplina_, as it were) often times was _not_ first and foremost among the Legion and its officers, but _Virtus_.



KimberVaile said:


> Every other example cites battles before the  Marian reforms aka pre-107 BC, these were the Roman forces before they were overhauled into professional soldiers, to simplify why that is so crucial. I could hardly say Caesar's style of generalship wasn't successful, but to blanketly say this implies the Romans were not disciplined is not accurate in any capacity.


I will stress again that the argument is not "They were unruly mobs", but "Their discipline was nothing exceptional, and indeed has some obvious points where if anything close to the reputation would have prevented excessive losses, and was instead supplemented heavily by an amazing level of organization and working within the system in which they operated" (You could make an argument for them being exceptionally disciplined, for example, not in the modern sense but in the fact that they could operate in large formations _at all_ when one of the key points of Roman society was the display of individual valor and strength).



KimberVaile said:


> And not so coincidentally those examples are Generals who did not stick with the brutal enforcement of discipline within the legion and thus are why they stick out as examples to the contrary.


I feel like pointing out that if the Legions' discipline was as legendary as proclaimed, we would not have repeated examples of soldiers _pleading_ with their officers to Get On With It and start the fight _now_, _hurry hurry hurry_. One prominent example from the essay being Paullus (no, the other Paullus) having to purposefully tire out his forces so that they were in no condition as to defy his orders to put off the engagement until a later time. Or of a general's own son deserting his post so that he might engage in some duels. Or of advances being sloppy against Hannibal so as to be the first into battle. Or so-on, or so-on.

In a sense the above is _not_ mutually exclusive from discipline (you can remain in formation and remember your drills while also defying orders and advancing ahead of the main formation to be the first in battle)... but it also has _things to say _as to where the discipline was (see: Organizational, routine) versus where it's often portrayed (see: Hard men who can make hard decisions).


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## JuniperW (Dec 30, 2020)

This isn’t about any ancient civilisations in particular, just my thoughts about the subject in general.

When you look at ancient cultures (or any culture, really), the most important thing to keep in mind is that the people belonging to it were just as human as you are. That is to say that they were complex beings capable of both kindness and cruelty.
No culture is better or worse than another. We’re all different. We’re all trying to realise our place in the world somehow, whether that be through science, religion or folklore.

And P.S., aliens didn’t build the pyramids or any of that other nonsense the History Channel likes to show after 3 AM. We grossly underestimate the achievements of ancient civilisations.


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## KimberVaile (Dec 30, 2020)

Attaman said:


> It should be noted that execution is mentioned in the essay: Torquatus' execution of his own son for disobeying orders re:dueling being the most prominent, which is also an example of both severe disobedience (specifically: Defying orders in a manner that directly compromised the performance and capabilities of the Legion) and exactly what the essay was talking about (Decius engaged in such duels in pursuit of his own _Virtus_).
> 
> They also point out that there was a disproportionate use of discipline to correct for Legionnaires being _too aggressive_ behavior as opposed to _insufficiently aggressive. _Which, while definitely a definition of discipline, runs contrary to the usual expectation / portrayal of the Legion as a place where people Obeyed All Orders (no matter how costly) and cowards were forced to adapt (Specifically: Your issue wasn't "The soldiers were told to hold this position and instead ran away", but "The soldiers were told to hold this position and instead _broke ranks and advanced because fuck you I'mma be a war hero")_.


I am aware, the core conceit is that they are overly aggressive and often break rank. my main disagreement though, is that when the author specifically focuses on Roman discipline but the majority of the content refers to the Polybian period, and that period was before the Marian reforms. It's not that I don't agree that the Roman concept of Virtus had a large influence on the Roman Army as a whole, it is more, that the Virtus overriding discipline was far more prevalent pre Marian reforms, and after the reforms, this overt aggressiveness was overridden by their discipline and often kept formation despite the concept of Virtus still being present more often than not.
This overt aggressiveness was far more a product of the per-marian reforms, where the soldiery were still militia, their tactics different, ethos different. The disciplinary measures less severe. The Roman Republic for most of it's life used the manipular/Polybian army, and I do readily agree, what the author says applies to that system. Though, it is not accurate when applied to the post-marian legionary system they used.

Which is where my core disagreement lies. I think including Caesar into the same fold holds a lot of potential for an inaccurate portrayal, especially when in the same era of Caesar, there was Crassus, who upheld the traditional idea of Roman discipline, even if he was far less kind as a general.



Attaman said:


> Admittedly, I will also note that their essay - by their own admission - is aimed predominantly at Mid-Late Republic Roman Legionnaires, and that they also acknowledge some moderate to significant changes in the Legion's operation after but a century or so into the Empire.


The other sources refer to the manipular formation, save for Caesar's own source of course. I agree on pre marian sources mainly cause the manipular Roman army was indeed like that, there is no disagreement about that fact. Part of this was due to how the pre marian army was organized. What I find inaccurate was throwing Caesar into the ring with the manipular army, when his generalship at time was largely an exception, his army used the Marian legion, and Caesar was essentially alone compared to the other generals at the time in how he enforced discipline. Which I think is a crucial distinction. The legions both during Caesar age and after rarely exhibited this behavior. Caesar in many ways was the notable exception.


Attaman said:


> I will stress again that the argument is not "They were unruly mobs", but "Their discipline was nothing exceptional, and indeed has some obvious points where if anything close to the reputation would have prevented excessive losses, and was instead supplemented heavily by an amazing level of organization and working within the system in which they operated" (You could make an argument for them being exceptionally disciplined, for example, not in the modern sense but in the fact that they could operate in large formations _at all_ when one of the key points of Roman society was the display of individual valor and strength).


The post Marian reform legionaries do mirror in many ways our modern interpretations of discipline. I remarked that most of the sources point to the Manipular Roman army largely because the Manipular Roman army and the post Marian legions have very vast gulfs in differences. Similar in many ways of course, but also crucially different in many ways. I'd er on the side of saying, yeah they hold up to the modern definition of discipline. A lot of the post Marian accounts would bolster that interpretation. The post marian legion was successful at least in part for it, and being able to temper themselves to stay in formation. So, of course I would agree with the argument if it only applied to the Manipular army, but the same cannot be said for the post Marian legions.



Attaman said:


> I feel like pointing out that if the Legions' discipline was as legendary as proclaimed, we would not have repeated examples of soldiers _pleading_ with their officers to Get On With It and start the fight _now_, _hurry hurry hurry_. One prominent example from the essay being Paullus (no, the other Paullus) having to purposefully tire out his forces so that they were in no condition as to defy his orders to put off the engagement until a later time. Or of a general's own son deserting his post so that he might engage in some duels. Or of advances being sloppy against Hannibal so as to be the first into battle. Or so-on, or so-on.
> 
> In a sense the above is _not_ mutually exclusive from discipline (you can remain in formation and remember your drills while also defying orders and advancing ahead of the main formation to be the first in battle)... but it also has _things to say _as to where the discipline was (see: Organizational, routine) versus where it's often portrayed (see: Hard men who can make hard decisions).


Because that concerns the Manipular Roman army, which did suffer from the aforementioned faults of being overaggressive. This type of army was used during the pre marian reforms, and partially due to being militia and having less severe disciplinary methods, would suffer from the aforementioned lack of discipline. Part of why the Marian reforms were so huge was due to success of the new systems mechanics in instilling discipline. Before the reforms, there was indeed an issue with over aggressiveness.


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## JuniperW (Dec 30, 2020)

Also...this is the perfect opportunity for me to bring up the Minoans and their distinct sense of fashion! 

This video tells you a lot of interesting stuff about them (totally not linking this because it’s by my favourite YouTuber)


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## Fallowfox (Dec 31, 2020)

As Rome is being discussed, ideas such as 'celtic' and 'germanic' being distinct people groups from ancient history were first conceived by the Romans. 
They are probably untrue, however; many of the people who Roman sources identified as 'germanic' spoke celtic languages.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 1, 2021)

JuniperW said:


> Also...this is the perfect opportunity for me to bring up the Minoans and their distinct sense of fashion!
> 
> This video tells you a lot of interesting stuff about them (totally not linking this because it’s by my favourite YouTuber)


I'm glad somebody brought up the Minoans! I have a bit to say about them, so I appreciate that you have given me the opportunity to do so.
Notably, they were among some of the first advanced civilizations, with surprisingly complex architecture, and their own writing system. They lasted quite a while too, cropping up within the midst of the Bronze age at around 2000 BC though some might say it was 3000 BC, which is a date that is harder to verify due to less sources being available. That would have put them at the tail end of the copper age.

Some notable things about them was their understanding of the sciences, they helped inspire Greeks in terms of philosophy, mathematics and art. There were sources that indicated they had an understanding of plumbing, knew how to bring heat to their water, and may have even had an understanding of steam power. They like the Greeks were quite advanced for their time, and the Minoans were crucial to inspiring the Greeks to create their own innovations. They needed a base to build off of and Minoans had provided that to them. Without the Minoans, Greece would not be nearly as relevant to western culture as they are today. I think they deserve as much credit as the Greeks for helping shape Western culture, and I think it's a shame they are so often overlooked!


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## Attaman (Jan 1, 2021)

I must vaguely disagree with "They like the Greeks were quite advanced for their time", but it should be noted that one of the big reasons for this is that many people aren't aware of a lot of the oldest Civilizations and Proto-Civilizations because _they literally pre-date the written word_. In some cases by millennia or more. Çatalhöyük, for example - while not one of these contendors - came about approximately nine thousand years ago, meaning that St. Martin's Church in England was closer to the first (historically preserved) examples of writing than Çatalhöyük was to the written word.

A good example of a contemporary to Minoan civilization is the Indus Valley Civilization, specifically examples like Harappa and Mohenjo-daro. I know I gushed about these before, but it's rather impressive thinking about these what with the latter proto-city having examples of a functional city-wide sewer system, individual water supplies for many houses / buildings, and even one of the earliest examples of indoor heating via hypocausts... about 4600 years ago. When you ask people to think "Society 2500 BCE", the typical first thought is "Not anything like that".

This is by no means meant as a knock on Minoans. Or Greeks, for that matter. Just to point that... like, there were definitely settled civilizations outside the Mediterranean with a hefty list of accomplishments. Many of whom either faded into history due to one factor or another (such as the environment simply making any effort to preserve something over a span of ~4000+ years implausible at best for less malicious / purposeful examples; or the purposeful destruction of cultural items seen countless times by countless polities), misattribution (Kerma society was, until relatively recently, long believed to be _Egyptian_ in some fashion or another, as one example), the simple lack of records (Consider, for example, that in many cases of the oldest civilizations our understanding comes from what amounts to looking at prehistoric receipts and working backwards from what we know of a mix of human nature and what little architecture or evidence remains), etc.

I guess what I'm saying is that history is amazing, and people should probably stop taking societies at their words when they say "We brought civilization to [region]" when often times what they mean is "We broke what was there and put our stuff there instead".


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## KimberVaile (Jan 1, 2021)

Attaman said:


> I must vaguely disagree with "They like the Greeks were quite advanced for their time", but it should be noted that one of the big reasons for this is that many people aren't aware of a lot of the oldest Civilizations and Proto-Civilizations because _they literally pre-date the written word_. In some cases by millennia or more. Çatalhöyük, for example - while not one of these contendors - came about approximately nine thousand years ago, meaning that St. Martin's Church in England was closer to the first (historically preserved) examples of writing than Çatalhöyük was to the written word.
> 
> A good example of a contemporary to Minoan civilization is the Indus Valley Civilization, specifically examples like Harappa and Mohenjo-daro. I know I gushed about these before, but it's rather impressive thinking about these what with the latter proto-city having examples of a functional city-wide sewer system, individual water supplies for many houses / buildings, and even one of the earliest examples of indoor heating via hypocausts... about 4600 years ago. When you ask people to think "Society 2500 BCE", the typical first thought is "Not anything like that".
> 
> ...



I tend to agree that civilizations that predate the first writing systems impact our perspective, it makes it hard to understand what really happened, which is unfortunate. Though, on the other hand, I do think Sumerians deserve a great deal of credit for being among the first civilizations to develop a consistent writing system, as having information record in that way was crucial to the development of culture, science and so on.
Sumer's development of cuneiform was instrumental in allowing human knowledge to really compound and layer on each other. Changing the emphasis away from learning via word of mouth was critical towards human development, so I do feel the emphasis on civilizations that had a writing system has some merit. Of course there is debate if Sumer was truly the first to develop a consistent writing system, but I digress.
I do feel it is unfortunate civilization that predate writing have so little known about them, though I feel having a writing system is crucial to being an advanced civilization, in my opinion.

Well, when I mention the Minoan civilization, and mention that they were "among some of the first advanced civilizations", it was not intended as a put down against middle eastern civilizations or eastern ones. The Indus Valley Civilization was also quite advanced for their time and were contemporaries of the Minoans and the Egyptians. Like the Minoans, the Indus Valley Civilization was also fairly advanced, though it should also be considered for every civilization that had such a large hand in determining the development of civilization, such as the Egyptians, the Indus Valley Civilization and the Minoans, ect, there were dozens more that just kept to themselves, which is fine. Not every civilization is obligated to be the peak of technology, nor should it be expected.

It really isn't so much a competition between the Minoans, and the Indus Valley Civilization so much as ideas simply spreading past borders, which happens often in history, certain ideas will be adopted and developed in a slightly different path from it's source, wherever that source may be. It doesn't always happen 100% of the time, but it is why you'll see a few civilizations within the same age come up with similar technologies. Of course this assume both civilization have similar technological capabilities, hence why both the Minoans and the Indus Valley civilization had very similar technologies in some areas, where as it may be absent from other civilizations. Though, this can also be attributed to a lack of interest as well on the part of some civilizations. That is also possible.

I have a natural interest in Greece, so, it is why I went out of my to mention the Minoans, it is not that I have a total disinterest in civilization outside the Mediterranean region, just that personally I have always had a strong interest in that region, so I've always been inclined to learn as much as I could. So, I naturally gravitate towards it a little more. I am aware to civilizations outside of the region, but I can freely admit my knowledge of that area has slightly less focus by me. But I have no issue reinforcing that the Indus Valley was a historically significant civilization that had brought important contributions to humanity.

And, I think that is a fair take away, I don't think it is at all bad to group the Minoans alongside the Indus Valley Civilization or the Egyptians, they all played very important roles. Is it unfair to place emphasis on big players such as the Indus Valley Civilization, the Egyptians, and Minoans over others? Well, I'd like to think not, but I suppose it hinges on what the individual finds important about history. If the goal is to better understand man, then maybe in some part is unfair, if the intent is to learn from contributors, triumphs and defeats, then perhaps not at all. I can't say it is inherently wrong to give some accolades to particular civilizations for advancing humanity where the credit may be due, so long as the nuances behind how they were able to do so are brought up in some fashion.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 2, 2021)

Incidentally the Latin characters I'm typing in right now are descended from Egyptian hieroglyphics; most writing systems are. 

Even scripts like Arabic and Norse Runes.


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## Simo (Jan 2, 2021)

"More than 3500 years ago, watermelon was already a favorite summer treat. An ancient DNA study has revealed that a leaf discovered almost 200 years ago in an Egyptian tomb belongs to a bona fide watermelon, New Scientist reports."

This means they were a very advanced civilization, full of high and noble ideas.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 3, 2021)

Simo said:


> "More than 3500 years ago, watermelon was already a favorite summer treat. An ancient DNA study has revealed that a leaf discovered almost 200 years ago in an Egyptian tomb belongs to a bona fide watermelon, New Scientist reports."
> 
> This means they were a very advanced civilization, full of high and noble ideas.


It's a sign Simo, of a certain Pharaoh skunk with a affinity for Watermelons. No doubt blood related.


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## Simo (Jan 3, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> It's a sign Simo, of a certain Pharaoh skunk with a affinity for Watermelons. No doubt blood related.


 Indeed!


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## KimberVaile (Jan 3, 2021)

Something I had been reading about recently that I'd like to share was a period of history referred to as the "Bronze Age Collapse". And of course, I'd love to speak a bit about it.

This was, the fall of most Bronze Age Civilizations which started around 1200 BC, at the time it included The Mycenaeans (the predecessors of the Greeks and successors of the Minoan civilization), the Hittites, and the Assyrians. Egypt was also crippled by it, but did manage to limp on for a while longer,r but it was never the same after the collapse and would progressively decline.

The reason for the collapse is still hotly debated, though I tend to view the collapse as a combination of different factors and there is of course geological, archeological and written sources that back up each factor. Chronologically the first factor involved a brutal 150-ish year long extended drought that heavily impacted the agricultural production of this region. The Mycenaeans, Assyrians, Hittites and Egyptians were all very interconnected in terms of trade, a much smaller scale version of international trade today if you will. So, when the drought was brought on, the food shortages became immediately apparent, and there were numerous peasant revolts that affected the Mycenaeans. Th further compound the already difficult effects of this drought, there were several vicious and intense earthquakes that happened in quick succession, and again I must stress, the archeological sites have extensive evidence of the walls of the city being fractured in particular ways that can only imply earthquakes.
The effected many cities of the Mediterranean, already dealing with food shortages and revolts, were put in further worse positions.

According to what was found fro archeological sites some of these cities were completely abandoned, perhaps the combination of not having adequate food and earthquakes proved good incentive to try elsewhere, perhaps it was seen as a sign from the gods that there cities were better abandoned. It's hard to know the exacts, but the result left many Mycenean cities abandoned, other coastal cities with lesser defenses were in turn raided by what Ramses III termed as 'the sea peoples". The Sea peoples are thought to be comprised of various different people from different regions, Mycenaean, Denyen, Peleset, Sherden, Tjekker, Weshesh are all thought to may have been these origins of these raiders.

It's hard to really know exacts, as Ramses the third's accounts were probably intended to bolster his own image, and had dealt with the declining role of his own authority. It may be more accurate to trust Ramses the II's account which simply included the Karkisha, Lukka, and Sherden people.

The rise of these so called Sea People however, are likely due to the rampant food shortages and the increasingly difficult conditions brought about by the droughts and subsequent string of earthquakes. In a sense, they were doing what the Vikings did, just much earlier on, and were likely motivated out of necessity, as the soldiers had often brought their families along with them. Indeed,, in these conditions piracy increasingly became common, and subsequently the trade networks between the remaining Mycenaeans, the Hittites, the Assyrians and the Egyptians ground to a halt, which only served to exacerbate the dismal conditions of each empire. About 100 years in, the Greek Dark ages would begin and written records dry up in this era, as most of the Myceneans lost the ability to read, I posit this has much to do with how difficult it was to merely survive at this point, and having to create new cities. The Dark ages would hang over Greece for a 350 dismal years, even with the end of the drought in sight, rebuilding what was lost proved difficult. Thoguh eventually the Greeks were able to recover economically. Egypt as mentioned would survive the collapse, and were able to successfully repel the invasion by the Sea Peoples, though the damage done by the Bronze age Collapse caused significant damage that would eventually undo Egypt's dynasty.

The Hittites were not as lucky, and would dissolve over the coming years due to the food shortages and the ailing economy, and the Assyrians, like the Egyptians, also nearly collapsed, but unlike the Egyptians, were able to recover and even benefited in the end from the collapse, having the opportunity to assimilate the lands of the Hittites with relative ease after a lengthy recovery and consolidation.

History is often not so simple, and the reasons behind such great events, such as the Bronze age collapse, are in all likelihood, a combination of events and happenings, rather than one single sole cause. One main takeaway that might be important to people in the modern time, is how delicate the system of international trade is, and what can happen once it is gone. Though, of course, today's interconnected world is far more complex, large and quick than the Bronze Age, but it would be unwise to think there exist no vulnerabilities in it. One need look no further than the 1973 oil crisis to see that the delicacies of international trade have hardly changed as much as you would think.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 4, 2021)

*I will primarily post my thoughts here to better organize my historical knowledge, and I do not expect many to read it all. *
I have begun to view this thread as a way to organize any new piece of history I have come across and record them to discern applicable lessons and knowledge from them.

Here, I want to look into the political instability caused by the Marian Reforms, and the remarkable resilience and sense of honor held by the Romans that kept the empire alive during a time where they rightfully should have been consumed by the conflict. Their recovery from near dissolution is impressive, though, the long term negative effects, could not be ignored. As severe concerns of corruption by outside organization such as the Praetorian Guard, the financial ruin, lack of stability, loss of life from the constant civil wars and the inflated pay of the army that would be over-corrected would lead to flaws that ended up overwhelming the Western Roman Empire.

_A history of political instability_
Rome had just emerged from the debilitating Crisis of the Third Century. Rome for all of it's might, always held a evident flaw. The army was not always loyal to Rome, but to their general. Though, this was not always the cause of civil war, it was not an uncommon reason. This was the main drawback that resulted from the Marian reforms of 107 BC. A successful and well liked general often could at times, make a claim as the head of the Roman empire. This was most famously done by Caesar and to a lesser known extent Sulla. I imagine this is at least partially why Roman Emperors joined their troops in battle and at times even fighting closely alongside them. I imagine part of it was to counteract this tendency. That and the Romans were exceptionally concerned with honor in battle and an honorable death. I recall there even being a Roman version of seppuku that taken up when a Roman commander dishonored themselves.

_*Prelude*_
Anywho! Not long before the crisis of the third century. (235–284 AD) There was _Year of the Five Emperors (193). _As the naming implies, 5 people were emperor in a year. The Praetorian guard themselves responsible for assassinating three of them within months of each other. Severus was declared emperor and the Praetorian guard seemed satisfied with this, but was contested by Pescennius and thus, a civil war started over it, with Severus eventually becoming the victor. Septimius Severus, who I mentioned before had won many decisive battles against the Scottish tribes in his favor, was put into a precarious position with the Roman army, who were increasingly demanding higher  pay and bribes from higher officials, which in addition to having to extensively grease the palms of the Praetorian Guard, put a greater strain on the empires fiances.

In addition to having to maintain the empires fronts against raids with quality troops and having to manage such a huge swatch of land, Severus was under immense pressure, and opted to try instead to have a co-emperor rule alongside him and manage the eastern half the empire. As far as I recall he named Albinus his co-emporer and established that precedent. Perhaps the biggest misstep in Rome's longevity was modifying the Roman army to be more defensive in nature, which when combined with pay that would later be lowered to nearly unlivable degrees, had led to the practice of mandatory conscription, caused harm to the quality of the Roman army.




​


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## KimberVaile (Jan 4, 2021)

_*Previous instances of Political Instability*_
The craziest part, is that this wasn't even a unique event, there was a succession crisis in 69 Ad called the _Year of the Four Emperors_ which entailed a civil war to determine who would be emperor after Nero's suicide. The Praetorian guard would end up assassinating the first successor Galba. Otho would become the emperor afterwards, only to have a former consul of Germania Minor Vetellius lead his legions from Germania minor in another civil war that challenged Otho (who commanded legions who had waged a victorious war in Germania). Otho, after losing a particularly important battle committed suicide out of interest of ending the anarchy. His reign lasted barely a few months as Legions from the Egyptian region proclaimed Vespsain emperor, which once again plunged Rome in civil war, and thankfully, Vespain made quick work of Vetellius, thus ending the civil strife.


So keep in mind, there had already been a civil war rather recently in 193 AD, with a great deal of worrying issue already rearing their head throughout the empire, yet, it seemed the issues were only just beginning.

_The Crisis of the Third Century._
The Crisis began when Severus Alexander was assassinated by his own troops. Maximinus would ascend the throne to replace him, purely by merit of his generalship, which was at odds with the senate, who felt a peasant had ascended to the throne. Despite Maxinius's success against the Germanic tribes, he had struggled exert total control of the empire. When he tried to return the Rome the gates were shut on him, and he began a siege, the siege took its tool however and his men were starving, so like Severus Alexander, he was assassinated.


Gordian the first proclaimed himself emperor before Maximinus's death, though, he would be decisively defeated at the Battle of Carthage about two weeks later. He would later hang himself after the defeat by forces loyal to Maximinus upon hearing of the death of his son Gordian the 2nd in the battle.

Pupienus and Balbinus were declared co emperors after the death of the Gordians, though they too would suffer from an ill fated demise. They quarreled and bickered quite a bit as co-emporers and after heavy disagreement and fighting, the Praetorian guards stripped them naked, dragged them through the street tortured them and executed them.
These men had  jeers and stones thrown at them, and were quite unpopular, which played a part in their grisly demise. Gordian the III would be the one that would eventually end up emperor without getting a knife to the back, though, he was under the heavy thumb of his advisory cabinet.

Still, even with a successor now in power, things worsened, there was a deadly plague that sapped the empire (Plague of Cyprian), more civil wars continued, Roman generals fought among themselves for control of Rome and neglected the borders of their empire, which exacerbated raids by enemy tribes and the Sassanids. This came to a head when Emperor Valerian was captured by the Sassanians in battle and later died in captivity. This caused the Roman empire to fracture into three empires by various ambitious usurpers. The Gallic Empire, Palmyrene Empire and Roman Empire respectively. This very well should have been the end of Rome, the split of the empire into three, the lack of response to the Gothic hordes and raids that had devastated Macedon. Yet, Rome had the grace of a remarkably strong emperor by the name of Claudius Gothicus. Named so due to his overwhelming victories against the Goths. The battle of Naissus would go down in history as one of the most complete and overwhelming victories in Roman history.

A feigned retreat by the Romans tricked the goths into pursing, only to be charged in the flank by Roman cavalry. Allegedly 50,000 Goths were among the casualties., with the remainder of the force doggedly pursued until surrendering. Claudius's reign was cut short however, and died of the plague, and despite Aurelian being named his successor Quintillus instead took power, or attempted to, the army would not accept him, and he was quickly deposed in favor of Aurelian. Aurleian proved to be as much of a brilliant commander as Claudius, and went on to crush the the Goths, Alamanni Vandals, and various other tribes that raided Roman lands in addition to reconquering the lands of Gallic Empire and Palmyrne.
For his great triumphs, he was awarded the title "Restorer of the World".

Not only had Rome recovered, but they seemed to experience something of a second wind. I posit one silver lining of the Marian Reforms was that generally, the most competent generals rise to the top, usually. This was the case with Claudius Gothicus, who was succeeded by the even more capable Aurelian. Unfortunately Aurleian would be assassinated by his officers, as they were misled by his secrecy into thinking they would be executed. His reign lasted a short 5 years, though he accomplished a great deal within those few years. Aurelian was pretty stiff against corruption, which caused a great deal of fear within his guard. Army corruption is likely another issue the empire had that led to it's downfall. Marcus Claudius Tacitus would succeed Aurelian after his death and would similarly inflict a series of devastating defeats against the Goths. His reign only lasted a year however, due to a fever, which cut his life short. It would seem things would soon revert to the chaos of the third century crisis as the successor Florianus was made emperor and killed with the same year by the army, due to the hot and draining climate of all things. His successor Probus also died via mutiny of the army, despite his very successful campaigns against the German Tribes. His reign lasted a meager 6 years. His successor Carus (A praetorian Prefect)fought the German tribes like his predecessor with similar success, though he died in a freak accident lightning strike, though he managed to inflict massive defeats on the Sassanians and capture their capital, and likely sack it. . His reign lasted 1 year. Carinus, the successor along with his co emperor Numerian. As is the usual going of things, Numerian was assassinated by the Praetorian prefect, though this time they were thankfully punished for their actions via execution. Diocletian was declared the new emperor.

Carnius of course attempted to resist this, but was defeated at the Battle of Margus, he would end up betrayed by his praetorian prefect, who defected, the head of the Praetorian killing Carnius in combat. Diocletian was the new emperor and under him, he had a brilliant general by the name of Galerius. Diolcetiains reign is what really marked the end of the crisis of the third century definitively and ushered in a more politically stable for Rome.  Galerius's campaigns agaisnt the Sassanians were short but overwhelmingly decisive. Local support helped give the Romans the elemtn of the surprise as well, the fir battle exacting a powerful victory for the Romans, but not to be undone, Galerous went about to put a decisive end to the war.

What followed was the battle of Battle of Satala.

Galerius was already an imposing figure and plenty bold, but what he did was something you'd expect out of a movie. Galerius, dressed like a peasant pretending to sell cabbage to the Sassanian army, entered the camp of the Sassanians King to scope out the weakness and layut of the camp. His efforts paying off, and allowing him to identify a weakness in the wall. Galerius returned with his army and attacked during the day, putting up ladders for the Romans to climb up to the camp, then assaulting the weakened wall, he formed a line directly to the Sassanian Kings camp. What followed was a complete defeat of the entire Sassanian army. The Romans apparently captured tons upon tons of the royal treasuse, the logistics of transporting this treasure proving more difficult than the battle itself, as some claimed.

*Takeaways from the events*

The Marian Reforms, for as brutally effective as they were for oiling the Roman War machine, was a contributer to the political instability within the empire, mainly the constant civil wars. While this is somewhat offset by remarkably competent military generals often becoming leaders within the empire, the civil wars ultimately led to the weakening of the empire, due to the depleted finances and loss of manpower. Additionally, corruption from within the army and the praetorian guard, particularly related to their increasing power and pay may have also caused great issue. The use of bribery to sate the army and in particular the Praetorian Guard, set a very dangerous precedent. Though, the over correction of this issue led to a huge lack of manpower, and conscription, which is psychologically disadvantageous in terms of army morale.

On a more positive note, the aggressive honor based merits of Roman culture while at times is incredibly destructive, particularly it had caused the death of Severus Alexander. This was due to his bribery of German Tribes so as to focus on the Sassanians solely, which outraged his army, who would prefer to punish them for their raids. This quality had also made them stubborn and incredibly resilient, even with what seemed to be the impending death of the empire, the Romans managed to turn it around and continue to win many decisive victories.


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## Deleted member 134556 (Jan 4, 2021)

I feel I should participate myself, and I believe the early Celtic people were fascinating.

The Celts were a collection of tribes with origins in central Europe that shared a similar language, style, and religious beliefs generally around 1200 B.C. They spread throughout Britain, Ireland, France and Spain. Their legacy remains most prominent in Ireland and Great Britain, where traces of their language and culture are still prominent today. 





The existence of the Celts was first documented in the seventh or eighth century B.C. The Roman Empire, which ruled much of southern Europe at that time, referred to the Celts as “Galli," which is where we get the name "Gallic"

Across Europe, the Celts have been credited with many artistic innovations, including intricate stone carving and fine metalworking.

You've likely seen many artistic designs in jewelry and art that comes from Celtic origin


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## Perron The Fox (Jan 4, 2021)

I gotta agree with the point that writing makes a civilization more advanced. When your history is oral tradition, it's often misinterpreted or exaggerated. Not that exaggeration can happen with written history either, there's just less accountability with oral tradition. Overall a very well written and informed post, you put some real work into this.


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## Frank Gulotta (Jan 4, 2021)

Perron The Fox said:


> I gotta agree with the point that writing makes a civilization more advanced. When your history is oral tradition, it's often misinterpreted or exaggerated. Not that exaggeration can happen with written history either, there's just less accountability with oral tradition. Overall a very well written and informed post, you put some real work into this.


On the other hand, no scriptures puts memory to a lot more work, causing it to develop to high levels. Greek poets of the Homeric era were able to recite extremely long poems by heart. It's a feat probably nobody would be able to accomplish with google at their fingertips


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## Attaman (Jan 4, 2021)

I will point out as a counterpoint of the "You're less likely to be misinterpreted or suffer from exaggeration with writing" that... well: A great deal of our misconceptions re: Ancient Egypt specifically stem from writings and works of art they created. One of the chief examples being that there's _significant_ evidence to suggest that Pharaohs and their reigns were _far_ less violent than often depicted. 

Likewise, as is often said, history is written by the victors. The same very much holds true for song and oral tradition, yes, but that's just it: The same holds true.

Let alone that we need to define what "advanced" means as, like... I don't think anyone's going to argue with a straight face that the majority of Europe in the 15th century had particularly better sanitation or public health infrastructure than the likes of the Aztec Empire at the same time. As well as the debate inevitably brought as to whether an oral tradition / history relatively accessible to everyone is better / more advanced than one accounted for in records that less than 1% of the population would even be able to read were they able to access them (with a smaller percent of the population actually able to do so!).

Writing is required after a certain point of complexity as there's simply no way to preserve certain information or concepts via exercises, training, and oral recitation... but that certain point is significantly further along the progression of a civilization than most people think. Civilizations can and have accomplished limited-scale terraforming, complex metal tools and works of stonework art, and so-on literal centuries (if not millennia) before hammering out a written (or other physically interactive and preserved) language. Indeed, you could probably argue that more often than not historically writing did not determine the stage of a civilization but _how hard it was to eradicate signs of_ in its destruction / absence. A good example of this being that we still have records of a fair few of those Bronze Age civilizations mentioned due to surviving works and whatnot, but we know almost nothing of the Druids because of how thoroughly information was purged. Likewise a _lot_ of information as to the Andean South American civilizations was lost with the destruction of large numbers of Khipu.

Hell, for one final point: There's evidence to suggest that many of the first instances of writing were, at the time, predominantly there not for cultural or societal advancement reasons but _simple economic record-keeping_ (such as who gave tribute a temple and with what, or what was available for trade). Everything else was just... convenience branching.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 4, 2021)

Attaman said:


> I will point out as a counterpoint of the "You're less likely to be misinterpreted or suffer from exaggeration with writing" that... well: A great deal of our misconceptions re: Ancient Egypt specifically stem from writings and works of art they created. One of the chief examples being that there's _significant_ evidence to suggest that Pharaohs and their reigns were _far_ less violent than often depicted.
> 
> Likewise, as is often said, history is written by the victors. The same very much holds true for song and oral tradition, yes, but that's just it: The same holds true.
> 
> ...



Yet, during the Dark age of Greece, we know absolutely nothing, because nobody kept records. Where as, because of the Ancient Egyptian Sources, we can at least glean some sort of idea of what it was like. It is the difference between no knowledge and some knowledge that may have some biases. Unless you want to consider the Homer's Iliad a record. of any sort. But, that was the reality of what happens when all of your knowledge gets passed down orally, and sure, the Illiad is a fun tale, but it can scarcely be called accurate in any capacity. The Greeks at the time took the Illiad at face value though.
Historians have had a much harder time sorting truth from the Iliad than Egyptian records.

History is written by both the victors, and the defeated. Plenty of factions outside of the conflict between two nations could write and record their own accounts, the defeated, if not completely conquered, had their own accounts. In fact, most of our knowledge of the Roman-Partian conflicts have their own respective sources, each has many commonalities usually, with the main differences being the sizes of the respective armies in military conflicts.

As for literacy in the ancient world Greece was estimated to have at least a 33% literacy rate. The literacy rate in the European Medieval age dropped since then, but it was not always a case of only 1% of the population knowing how to read and often fluctated according to the respective civilization.

So, let's discuss 'Advanced' in terms of human betterment, societal advancement and technology.
15th century Europe had developed the printing press, that alone was a revolution for the European world, and allowed the average man the opportunity to educate themselves and would revolutionize European society in terms of education. the amount of potential power this gave the common man, the opportunities were vast, and it helped the stranglehold nobility held over them. An average person could feasibly close the knowledge gap the nobility had over them, and the invention likely helped to pave the way towards modern democracy

So in terms of technology? Yes, Europe was pretty far ahead of the Aztecs, if not for the printing press alone, the sheer amount of medical and scientific advances from Da Vinci would put out in Europe, Italy in particular, in a pretty high standing.
The Renaissance at this time was well under way, and people like Da Vinci were making great scientific advancements and more great advancements would follow during this time. Of course, I can also cover the more brutal and violent aspects of their techno,logy, with the ability to make ocean worthy craft with advanced navigation equipment like compasses and astrolabes that made it even possible for Cortes to reach Mexico. That's not even going into the powerful cannons his ships were armed with or his deadly arquebuses, nor the finely forged steel armor and sabers his company wielded. The Europeans generally speaking were remarkably advanced in a multitude of ways and it seems rather odd to go out the way to try and downplay it.

The argument isn't that a civilization can't be sophisticated without writing, impressive things were don without it, but writing inarguably facilitated the advancement of human knowledge. The great advantage of having a blacksmith be able to read from a tome containing all the intricacies of his craft to better his work, was invaluable. Many important disciplines were recorded in ancient times to preserve the intricacies of the craft. And whats more, for such technical profession there was little reason to embellish anything or portray it in a wildly inaccurate way. The manuals were meant to be practical. There might be more biases in personal accounts, sure, but historian today have been able to navigate away from the biases to find the truth in most cases.

I don't think most civilization set out with the idea in mind that they are the peak of technology, they usually innovate when they feel it is needed, and I don't think anybody is denying that. The benefits of writing and it's compilation of human knowledge was only found after the fact. Once that ground was broken and the advantages were clear, from what writing could bring however, most civilizations at least strived to adopt it, and it is hardly a coincidence most civilizations that were considered relatively advanced had a writing system of some sort.


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## Attaman (Jan 4, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> Historians have had a much harder time sorting truth from the Iliad than Egyptian records.


I am in the middle of DMing right now, but I'd like to point out that this is so not true that relatively recently we've rediscovered Pharaohs and reattributed feats because it turns out that a lot of the records for one were blatantly and explicitly plagiarized from another, sometimes to the point of literally stealing the stonework from one's tombs and monuments to use for another with minor adjustments.

Egyptology is a hell of a thing.


KimberVaile said:


> 15th century Europe had developed the printing press, that alone was a revolution for the European world, and allowed the average man the opportunity to educate themselves and would revolutionize European society in terms of education.


I would like to point out that you're talking about "Writing _when it reached the point of mass production and replication", _and that this is a bit of a non-sequitur about my point re:sanitation.



KimberVaile said:


> So in terms of technology? Yes, Europe was pretty far ahead of the Aztecs, if not for the printing press alone, the sheer amount of medical and scientific advances from Da Vinci would put out in Europe, Italy in particular, in a pretty high standing.


While I know Europe is being singled out because it's the one in comparison with the Aztec Empire... I would like to take a moment to point out that a lot of its information at this time was plagiarized from the Islamic world (which, humorously, a lot of _that_ was either plagiarized or taken from other civilizations both contemporary and ancient: Some of the Renaissance for example being the result of information that had temporarily been lost from Europe returning to it via interaction with Islamic and other societies that had managed to preserve it).



KimberVaile said:


> The Europeans generally speaking were remarkably advanced in a multitude of ways and it seems rather odd to go out the way to try and downplay it.


I'll point out that I specifically only mentioned that it'd be odd to call them more advanced in regards to health and sanitary infrastructure compared to the likes of the Aztecs (which is something that contemporary sources don't deny: The Spaniards who saw the Aztec capital were _floored_ by it, especially considering it was at the time one of the largest cities of the world whilst still accomplishing so much), and that this depends on what one considers the signs of advancement (Another example here being the percentage of this post being related to one's ability to conquer and kill another).



KimberVaile said:


> The great advantage of having a blacksmith be able to read from a tome containing all the intricacies of his craft to better his work, was invaluable.


I'm well aware of the difficulties in recreation of the likes of things such as Damascus steel.



KimberVaile said:


> There might be more biases in personal accounts, sure, but historian today have been able to navigate away from the biases to find the truth in most cases.


I feel like the "today" is a heavily lifting word: Bear in mind that, for over a century, the typical portrayal of Ancient Egypt was of a _Feudal_ society, a practical replica of Europe of old broken by a time of disorder / chaos only for history to repeat itself until the great Era of Enlightenment finally broke the mold.


KimberVaile said:


> and it is hardly a coincidence most civilizations that were considered relatively advanced had a writing system of some sort.


Again, this comes down to how much one wants to debate what "advanced" means. We have had civilizations that built cities for tens of thousands of people with heated bath houses, obvious government buildings, individual wells, functional city-wide plumbing and sanitation, with warehouses and artisanal districts and whatnot (serving as administrative centers of even larger swathes of population)... that have lacked writing. Or we have aforementioned Tenochtitlan, with 4km long aqueducts feeding into a floating city divided into twenty districts with a daily business of ~60,000 persons doing trade within it on a given day sporting zoos big enough to require ~300 persons to maintain and one of the largest man-made structures in the world (just talking about the city, not even getting into Aztec culture).

Which was something of my point: Writing, in and of itself, is not what makes a civilization more advanced. It might be a sign of other things that _do_ mark it so, but is not something in and of itself. Civilizations do not work like _Civilization_: There is not a singular hard path that marks "How good society do", and as such you can have a society which is significantly better in one or more areas (or generally better in numerous others), but is woefully behind in others (for example: Some of the first Egyptian dynasties offered more in the manner of welfare and disability protections / treatment than later ones, but most people don't look to them as being more advanced than what followed).


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## Kit H. Ruppell (Jan 4, 2021)

My roots are irrelevant. I didn't ask to be born at all, let alone from any particular lineage. However, as an artist and musician I do have some interest in the arts of the ancient world:


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## KimberVaile (Jan 4, 2021)

Attaman said:


> I am in the middle of DMing right now, but I'd like to point out that this is so not true that relatively recently we've rediscovered Pharaohs and reattributed feats because it turns out that a lot of the records for one were blatantly and explicitly plagiarized from another, sometimes to the point of literally stealing the stonework from one's tombs and monuments to use for another with minor adjustments.
> 
> Egyptology is a hell of a thing.


Yes, that is not a new thing, but it would be inaccurate to say every single written Egyptian source is false. More that, some records are questionable and are dire need of being corroborated with archeological evidence or with other written sources. As I recall, Egyptian culture believed strongly in words having literal power, as if simply saying something or inscribing it would cause such an event to happen. There was likely some attempt to modify records on that account or at least played some part. Yet, we still have a decent understanding of Egyptian society in spite of these offending records. It'd be a stretch to say we know absolutely nothing of them. But the task of discovering the truth of some of the matters will doubtlessly take more work.

And I mean, we do know literally next to nothing about the Dark Ages of Greece. I think we'd have a much better idea if people then had not lost their literacy and kept records. In most cases having records drastically improves our understanding of the past. Having the Illiad being accepted by a culture as truth of their past. Well, I don't want to sound pompous, but I think that speaks negatively of the use of word of mouth to spread information. At least in terms of say, advancing human knowledge. I suppose culturally speaking in has artistic benefits, but other than that, I do not find it a preferable method of transferring information.



Attaman said:


> I would like to point out that you're talking about "Writing _when it reached the point of mass production and replication", _and that this is a bit of a non-sequitur about my point re:sanitation.


Before that statement I clarified what I meant, when I referred to advanced civilizations, which included the categories of human betterment, societal advancement and technology. Which is why I mentioned the Printing Press, and you had specifically mentioned 15th century Europe, which was the century in which the printing press came around in Europe. I take it you mentioned the Aztecs to  question why most countries in Europe would be considered advanced. Which is why I extrapolated on my comparisons. I believe there is merit in considering many countries in Europe advanced during this century.


Attaman said:


> While I know Europe is being singled out because it's the one in comparison with the Aztec Empire... I would like to take a moment to point out that a lot of its information at this time was plagiarized from the Islamic world (which, humorously, a lot of _that_ was either plagiarized or taken from other civilizations both contemporary and ancient: Some of the Renaissance for example being the result of information that had temporarily been lost from Europe returning to it via interaction with Islamic and other societies that had managed to preserve it).



So, I would question why the word plagiarized would need to be used then. An interesting bit of history that helped pave the way to the Islamic Golden age, which had ushered in new learnings, was Al-Ma'mun, a caliph according to himself, had a dream where Aristotle appeared to him. Which had spurred the translation of as many Greek Works as possible, which included Greek mathematics, philosophy and troves of other literary works. He gained these Greek texts by making peace treaties with the weakened Eastern Roman Empire in exchange for copies of these works.
They still made advances based on the foundations of these works however. I wouldn't say plagiarize is the right word in either case, all things considered. As the technologies they copied, were eventually developed further respectively.

The Renaissance largely started in Italy, Florence in particular and one of the embers that had stoked the fire was works by Marcusus Vitruvius Pollio, a Roman mathematician. Not only had his books regarding architecture instrumental in spurring on the Renaissance, one of his works linked the proportions of the human body with mathematical principles, which inspired Da Vinci's Vitruvian man. These finding only fueled the desire to uncover old Roman and later Greek, texts. Though the Italians for some time would largely focus on relearning old Roman texts.
Additionally, Italy had little direct participation with the crusades, save for Venice in the fourth, which ironically targeted the Eastern Roman Empire. Most historian generally agree Italy was where the Renaissance had begun and it was largely started due to natural interest in Italy's forboding past, elaborate Roman ruins covered the countryside, Colosseum and temples that towered over it's inhabitants. The intrigue came rather naturally.


Attaman said:


> I'll point out that I specifically only mentioned that it'd be odd to call them more advanced in regards to health and sanitary infrastructure compared to the likes of the Aztecs (which is something that contemporary sources don't deny: The Spaniards who saw the Aztec capital were _floored_ by it, especially considering it was at the time one of the largest cities of the world whilst still accomplishing so much), and that this depends on what one considers the signs of advancement (Another example here being the percentage of this post being related to one's ability to conquer and kill another).


Before I even mentioned military I remarked on the medical advances, societal advances, and technological advanced. The fact Cortez could even cross an ocean and not die on the way, is remarkable, though yes, the conquest itself is feat, though not a very fun one. History has a particularly brutal side to it, and I see it as fruitless and counterproductive to hand wave the darker side of history away, a lot of human history revolves around warfare. Being able to adequately defend what you have, is just as important as a writing system or to make breakthroughs in biology. Especially in an age where warfare was so heavily glorified and death so normalized. Most of history was hard and brutal and forged largely hard and agressive people for the most part, and it'd be foolhearty to turn a blind eye to desensitized aggressors. If anything, the horrible brutality of the past should help people realize how lucky they are to live in a first world country.

The Aztecs deserve credit for their architecture and they are certainly impressive in that regard, I am not taking that from them. However, I tend to feel Europe at this time period having things like the printing press, scientific and medical breakthroughs in understanding the human body and related subjects to weigh very heavily into why they deserve the credit they do. I would go as far as to say the Renaissance was one of the most critically important eras in human history. I mean, we got the scientific method out of it, that was pretty big, and near the end we had Issac Newton. It's hard to not appreciate that.



Attaman said:


> I feel like the "today" is a heavily lifting word: Bear in mind that, for over a century, the typical portrayal of Ancient Egypt was of a _Feudal_ society, a practical replica of Europe of old broken by a time of disorder / chaos only for history to repeat itself until the great Era of Enlightenment finally broke the mold.


Partially accurate accounts give some idea of what happened rather than no accounts, which don't give much of anything. It is still nice to have these records in the end. Even the plagiarized & propagandized ones tell us about the society.



Attaman said:


> Which was something of my point: Writing, in and of itself, is not what makes a civilization more advanced. It might be a sign of other things that _do_ mark it so, but is not something in and of itself. Civilizations do not work like _Civilization_: There is not a singular hard path that marks "How good society do", and as such you can have a society which is significantly better in one or more areas (or generally better in numerous others), but is woefully behind in others (for example: Some of the first Egyptian dynasties offered more in the manner of welfare and disability protections / treatment than later ones, but most people don't look to them as being more advanced than what followed).


I'm not saying you absolutely require writing to be an advanced civilization, but I am saying that writing often follows along with advanced civilizations. I am also not saying it is always required to be an advanced society either, and I don't disagree with the core conceit, I tend to think some civilizations have their strengths and weaknesses in terms of technology. What I am saying however, is that, hmm, how would I term it? I tend to find civilizations with writing tend to often excel at more things compared to civilizations that have totally absconded writing. I wouldn't quite call writing  a multiplicative innovation, but I find it often allows many more technological areas and studies to shine brighter. You end up less hyper focused on some areas with little detriment for doing so. You can branch out and become good at many things.


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## Wodenofthegays (Jan 5, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> The Aztecs deserve credit for their architecture and they are certainly impressive in that regard, I am not taking that from them. However, I tend to feel Europe at this time period having things like the printing press, scientific and medical breakthroughs in understanding the human body and related subjects to weigh very heavily into why they deserve the credit they do. I would go as far as to say the Renaissance was one of the most critically important eras in human history. I mean, we got the scientific method out of it, that was pretty big, and near the end we had Issac Newton. It's hard to not appreciate that.



The major advances during the Renaissance that you're probably thinking of didn't happen until well _after_ the Aztecs were already well-and-gone, and they were pretty comparable to Europe in a lot of things save military theory and metallurgical ability, which makes sense considering they practiced heavily symbolic and hyper-focused warfare.

The printing press didn't become common in Europe until the Aztec Empire had been gone for 200 to 300 years, as an example.

The Aztecs and Incans specifically were also _part_ of the Renaissance and Enlightenment, as it were. They made huge contributions to art, literature, and the beginning of modern philosophy at the time. They even started some of the first major arguments towards a modern idea of human rights.

El Inca Garcilaso de la Vega's account, and critique, of De Soto's expedition into Florida and the Cuzco School come to mind as two examples. Aztecs were pretty important in causing shifts in the Catholic church, too.

That said, the Aztecs are very modern and not quite ancient or early, and I think bringing some attention to the actually early and ancient Mesoamerican cultures in modern education might be cool. Pyramid-building, huge cities, immense agricultural efforts, and impressive art and architecture hundreds of years before the peoples of most of Europe had even settled into agriculture in the middle of Mexico is pretty cool, I think.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 5, 2021)

Wodenofthegays said:


> The major advances during the Renaissance that you're probably thinking of didn't happen until well _after_ the Aztecs were already well-and-gone, and they were pretty comparable to Europe in a lot of things save military theory and metallurgical ability, which makes sense considering they practiced heavily symbolic and hyper-focused warfare.
> 
> The printing press didn't become common in Europe until the Aztec Empire had been gone for 200 to 300 years, as an example.
> 
> ...



Depends on what you refer to.
The Aztec empire fell around 1519 AD, and the printing press was introduced at around 1450 by an exiled German inventor in France, by this time it was also commercially viable. I suppose widely available is a bit vague, but by 1519 AD, famous events such as the "95 Theses" undertaken by Martin Luther, which relied heavily on the printing press, had already happened. Which I think puts the printing press past being a niche invention at the very least.

The European understanding of astrology, mathematics, ship craft and navigation are also evident, as they wouldn't have been able to reach the Americas without it. Similarly, Leonardo da Vinci was born around 1452, and he was crucial early figure in advancing the sciences, biology and medicine. Francis Bacon and the formation of the scientific method did come later, however, about 50 years after the fall of the Aztecs, and Issac Newton, more than 150 years after. Though, those last two were more related to a tangent about the importance of the Renaissance.

To the second point, I agree, with how the Spanish treated the now newly Aztec and Incan slaves inspired a human rights movement by Bartolomé de las Casas, and a few others as you mentioned. And sure, some of the Azxtec and Incan architecture served as cultural inspiration for the Renaissance.

That said, I certainly don't downplay the influence the Aztecs had, they deserve credit were credit is due, though, I would wonder why the Incans are less mentioned than the Aztecs. But yes, I agree they are important to learn of, though I tend to feel the issue is Us schools are a little too hyper focused on the US itself.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 5, 2021)

The Renaissance is a bit outside the remit of 'ancient' civilisation, but it's worth pointing out that many historians no longer regard the Renaissance as a single consorted phenomenon. 
The idea of the Renaissance as a sudden break from medieval Europe and a re-flowering and re-discovery of classics, is not wholly true- some of it is invention, much in the same way that ideas of Viking warriors wearing horned helmets is. 


It's a little strange that 'Europeans wouldn't have been able to reach the Americas without an understanding of Navigation' is stated, 
because the Norse reached the Americas centuries prior to this, and Christopher Columbus's arrival was actually a mistake- having thought he was sailing to the far East. 

Leonardo DaVinci as well, while his discoveries were astoundingly ahead of their time, did not actually go on to substantially influence academia while he was alive- because he wrote many of his ideas as cyphers and they remained unshared during his lifetime. 
His anatomical drawings, which would have advanced medical science considerably, wouldn't actually be widely circulated until about 2 centuries after he died.


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## Deleted member 134556 (Jan 5, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> much in the same way that ideas of Viking warriors wearing horned helmets is.


Ironically that concept was created by a Scandinavian Opera in the 1800's from what I've read.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 5, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> The Renaissance is a bit outside the remit of 'ancient' civilisation, but it's worth pointing out that many historians no longer regard the Renaissance as a single consorted phenomenon.
> The idea of the Renaissance as a sudden break from medieval Europe and a re-flowering and re-discovery of classics, is not wholly true- some of it is invention, much in the same way that ideas of Viking warriors wearing horned helmets is.


That really is just a misconception, if anything. There is some (mild at best) debate about when the Renaissance started but the overwhelming majority of historians consider Italy, Florence to be the start of it without exception. Most books, sources and other historians give the same reasoning with great consistency. That it had started in Italy with artists and scholars drawn to the area from both the Roman ruins and the well preserved Latin texts. With many scholars at the time mentioning with overwhelming consistency the book De architectura by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, initially simply copying the works extensively, before building on it. And as it happened the Italian city states, rich from trade, had the funds and time to explore these texts that were preserved right under their noses. Much of the Italian Upper Class in fact became very prominent patrons of art and literature during this time, which was crucial to the Renaissance happening. In fact, much of the Renaissance impetus is owed to the Medici family.

Contrary to the claim that the Renaissance was not a single era in Europe, historians separate the Renaissance into specific ages Early Renaissance, High Renaissance and Late Renaissance respectively, due to how the momentum of this age progressed and changed.
So, it is misinformed to claim the Renaissance had not got it's legs from rediscovering classics, and overwhelming amount of 14th century scholars spoke with great enthusiasm about the rediscovered Latin texts and had natural intrigue about the Roman ruins.


Fallowfox said:


> It's a little strange that 'Europeans wouldn't have been able to reach the Americas without an understanding of Navigation' is stated,
> because the Norse reached the Americas centuries prior to this, and Christopher Columbus's arrival was actually a mistake- having thought he was sailing to the far East.


Being able to sail straight east, west, north or south is much harder than it sounds without modern equipment, so yes, it was impressive. Columbus was under the belief that the world was round and that if he sailed west from Spain far enough he would eventually run into India, but was surprised there was another landmass. His navigational thinking was hardly wrong though. Additionally, the ships of the Europeans were large enough that complete colonies could be settled on these new landmass, which I would say is significant in of itself, and it is partially why previous settlement attempts by the Vikings had considerable more difficulty rooting in.  It speaks well of their shipcraft that something so large was ocean worthy. (compare this to the viking long ship, which was a much smaller craft.)



Fallowfox said:


> Leonardo DaVinci as well, while his discoveries were astoundingly ahead of their time, did not actually go on to substantially influence academia while he was alive- because he wrote many of his ideas as cyphers and they remained unshared during his lifetime.
> His anatomical drawings, which would have advanced medical science considerably, wouldn't actually be widely circulated until about 2 centuries after he died.


In some part that is correct, yes, though his engineering, art, hydrodynamics and some of his works on anatomy, had more immediate effects, though.


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## Frank Gulotta (Jan 5, 2021)

Wodenofthegays said:


> They even started some of the first major arguments towards a modern idea of human rights


How good were human rights in the aztec empire?


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## Wodenofthegays (Jan 5, 2021)

Frank Gulotta said:


> How good were human rights in the aztec empire?


About on par with Europe, actually!

They even shared a lot of the same flaws. For example, children were property in both Europe and the Aztec Empire.

However, one major difference was in that Europeans saw the limited system of rights as applying often only to Catholic or Protestant nobility from Europe, whereas Aztec systems of law and rule were pretty much universally applicable outside of targeted religious customs.

This is why Cortes can show up in Tenochtitlan and declare war on an entire empire and its system of alliances as subhuman rebels on behalf of a king that didn't even know this was happening while Moctezuma II and the Aztec elite had to extend undue courtesy to what they thought were foreign nobles.

This had actually probably been how Toltec/Mixtec/Nahua cultures had functioned since the Olmecs, more or less, as all of the evidence suggests they had been powerful, respected, intercontinental traders since before 1000 BCE. You can't build an empire on trade and alliances if your merchants and peasants have no rights and you don't extend any of those rights to foreign merchants and peasants, after all. The Aztecs were just the first to begin to codify it in written law almost 2500 years later.



KimberVaile said:


> To the second point, I agree, with how the Spanish treated the now newly Aztec and Incan slaves inspired a human rights movement by Bartolomé de las Casas, and a few others as you mentioned. And sure, some of the Azxtec and Incan architecture served as cultural inspiration for the Renaissance.



They didn't just inspire it; they were a fundamental part of it.

Natives were a large part of the reason Spanish law changed, and a major part of the reasons slavery was abolished. El Inca, again, is a big name in this, but he wasn't the only one. De las Casas was part of this movement, but you've also got to realize he was treating them as ignorant soon-to-be-Christians. People like El Inca and his contemporary native and mestizo writers and advocates saw them as people regardless of their relation to "la Santa fe católica" and the crown.



KimberVaile said:


> But yes, I agree they are important to learn of, though I tend to feel the issue is Us schools are a little too hyper focused on the US itself.



That's why we don't learn about the Incas too much. Tawantinsuyu is a little far south from the Rio Grande for it to be taught in the U.S.

Its also why we don't learn about the Olmecs or other ancient native empires and societies. If we learned about the empires, nations, and cultures that covered all of the U.S. for thousands of years, it belittles the legitimacy of the nation that propped up the idea of taming savage lands through pioneering spirit.


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## Frank Gulotta (Jan 5, 2021)

Wodenofthegays said:


> outside of targeted religious customs.


You mean human sacrifice? I personally think those are kind of a deal breaker


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## Attaman (Jan 5, 2021)

I'm going to have to be real: When one of the powers involved literally had religious authorities telling them "For fuck's sake stop murder-raping your way across the continent" (and, for that matter, responded with a big middle finger) and replaced the displaced, plague-ravaged population with chattel slavery that was often worked to death en masse so as to feed an insatiable appetite for silver... you probably don't want to stick your dick in a "Who was the bigger violator of human rights?" blender. Because at absolute best you're getting Mutually Assured Destruction. At _best_. 



KimberVaile said:


> Yes, that is not a new thing, but it would be inaccurate to say every single written Egyptian source is false.


This was not my point, though? My explicit point was that written word does not provide particular resiliency against misrepresentation, misinterpretation, (willfully and accidentally) inaccurate accounts, etcetera. Likewise what many people seem to call "necessities" of an advanced civilization seem to be unrelated to writing (except when it's being specifically used as a gate keeping attempt to exclude civilizations for its absence), that where writing starts to make significant differences is further along in terms of development than many people think, and that what counts as "advanced" in and of itself is quite variant.

For an example from myself of the lattermost: I do not consider "Can you murder your neighbors with a technological edge provided by advanced metallurgy" to be a requisite of an advanced civilization. Nor do I consider "Has a history of literature stretching back centuries / millennia". It would be difficult for me to pin down exactly what I _do_ consider a requisite (especially because one has to define how much by civilization we mean their _physical_ works and how much their _cultural_ ones), but I'd generally look more for things such as quality of life, establishment of rights and protections, complex skills and / or artificial skills with which to manipulate one's surroundings at a scale beyond what any one small tribe or village could accomplish (since scale also seems to be a matter many people consider: Barring isolated tribes who're notable more for their lack of outside contact than anything else, we tend to attribute sum populations at least in the four digit range when describing something in the terms of a civilization)...


KimberVaile said:


> As I recall, Egyptian culture believed strongly in words having literal power, as if simply saying something or inscribing it would cause such an event to happen.


Not... quite, but one must keep in mind that there's a reason Egypt is broken down into an ungodly number of Dynasties which are themselves broken down between the Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom, New Kingdom, and Late New Kingdom. There are some _serious_ adjustments that happen at times, like the short-lived attempt at Monotheism.


KimberVaile said:


> And I mean, we do know literally next to nothing about the Dark Ages of Greece. I think we'd have a much better idea if people then had not lost their literacy and kept records. In most cases having records drastically improves our understanding of the past.


Again, this comes down to why I stepped in: Records help a ton, but one has to keep in mind the biases that are involved in them and the chief advantage of such records seems to lay more in _resiliency_ than innately improved veracity or the like.



KimberVaile said:


> Having the Illiad being accepted by a culture as truth of their past. Well, I don't want to sound pompous, but I think that speaks negatively of the use of word of mouth to spread information. At least in terms of say, advancing human knowledge. I suppose culturally speaking in has artistic benefits, but other than that, I do not find it a preferable method of transferring information.


I feel like pointing out that much of the Roman and Greek epics which are frequently cited were... a different beast, from the actual historic and academic works of such eras. I forget who said as much, but effectively our understanding of Roman and Greek mythology is basically fourth-hand in a lot of areas and akin to filling in the blanks on modern Christianity with a bootleg copy of _Evangelion _that managed to avoid whatever caused the destruction of Christianity-adjacent other records.


KimberVaile said:


> I take it you mentioned the Aztecs to  question why most countries in Europe would be considered advanced.


I mentioned the Aztec specifically to refer to their city development, infrastructure, and hygiene / sanitation. The point to be made was that either one needs to understand that "advanced" is not a lump sum that can be measured linearly and objectively like some game of _Call to Power_... or that one needs to make arguments that those things _aren't_ qualifiers of advanced society. Admittedly the latter is potentially not as scaldingly hot a take as people might think: We generally consider the jump from hunter-gatherer to settled agrarian communities a huge milestone in civilization, and that by its nature kind of admits that drastic health disadvantages that came with such are compensated at best or irrelevant at worst.


KimberVaile said:


> So, I would question why the word plagiarized would need to be used then.


Because a lot of people tend to like to forget that, much like even with the Roman and Greek empires (which tended to gobble up whatever was useful where their armies marched), that what we often consider 'modern' or 'flourishing in sciences and arts' Europe involved a _lot_ of copying from neighbors (copying that was sometimes improved upon, sometimes about a wash, and sometimes done sloppily). Because, for better or worse, a lot of Western education focuses on developments only accomplished in an area of space approximately defined as "North of Mediterranean, West of Istanbul, East of the Americas until ~1700's and even then only begrudgingly when from somebody not from aforementioned area", so a lot of people miss out on societies and societal discoveries from Africa to China to Mexico to...



KimberVaile said:


> Most historian generally agree Italy was where the Renaissance had begun and it was largely started due to natural interest in Italy's forboding past,


See above. The idea that global society was itself bettered and flourished in a new golden age with the Renaissance in Europe is a... fairly localized understanding of history. Which, again: Not necessarily something malicious or actively done. People write about where they came from, and invariably like to toot their own horns. But by sheer coincidence what counts as "advanced society" or "the advancement of civilization" tends to trend almost 1:1 with what one's own society accomplished.

Which, to cut off here since I'm starting to go fifty different directions and almost definitely shouting past you in a few spots, kind of feeds
back into my whole point that "advanced" civilization is heavily subjective and tends to include some hefty blinkers both purposefully and accidentally.


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## Frank Gulotta (Jan 5, 2021)

Attaman said:


> I'm going to have to be real: When one of the powers involved literally had religious authorities telling them "For fuck's sake stop murder-raping your way across the continent" (and, for that matter, responded with a big middle finger) and replaced the displaced, plague-ravaged population with chattel slavery that was often worked to death en masse so as to feed an insatiable appetite for silver... you probably don't want to stick your dick in a "Who was the bigger violator of human rights?" blender. Because at absolute best you're getting Mutually Assured Destruction. At _best_.


You can ping me, you know?

I find a big difference here and I'm surprised you've not caught it. Yeah a pope at the time (Paul 3d) is the first person in human history to declare a ban on slavery. Meanwhile the Aztec clergy made no qualms whatsoever about directly endorsing human sacrifice, mass ritual massacres AND slavery. I mean the Aztecs literally built a tower out of the skulls of sacrificed women and children. How do you compute these two facts and conclude that yeah they're totally equivalent?


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## KimberVaile (Jan 5, 2021)

Attaman said:


> This was not my point, though? My explicit point was that written word does not provide particular resiliency against misrepresentation, misinterpretation, (willfully and accidentally) inaccurate accounts, etcetera. Likewise what many people seem to call "necessities" of an advanced civilization seem to be unrelated to writing (except when it's being specifically used as a gate keeping attempt to exclude civilizations for its absence), that where writing starts to make significant differences is further along in terms of development than many people think, and that what counts as "advanced" in and of itself is quite variant.
> 
> For an example from myself of the lattermost: I do not consider "Can you murder your neighbors with a technological edge provided by advanced metallurgy" to be a requisite of an advanced civilization. Nor do I consider "Has a history of literature stretching back centuries / millennia". It would be difficult for me to pin down exactly what I _do_ consider a requisite (especially because one has to define how much by civilization we mean their _physical_ works and how much their _cultural_ ones), but I'd generally look more for things such as quality of life, establishment of rights and protections, complex skills and / or artificial skills with which to manipulate one's surroundings at a scale beyond what any one small tribe or village could accomplish (since scale also seems to be a matter many people consider: Barring isolated tribes who're notable more for their lack of outside contact than anything else, we tend to attribute sum populations at least in the four digit range when describing something in the terms of a civilization)...



I disagree, comparing Egyptian records with the lack of records at all in the Greek Dark Age, I would argue that written word is inherently more resistant to misinterpretation if just for the sheer fact that you can know the author of the sources most of the time. So you are better able to establishes ulterior motives, reasons and character. Hence, we were able to separate fabricated sources from truthful ones in regards to Egypt. It's much harder to trace back a oral source of information. The "friend of a friend of a friend of my cousin's dad" effect, starts to impact the quality of the information at some point, things are inevitably lost this way.

If you consider not being able to defend yourself unimportant to being advanced, then your days of being a civilization at all are numbered. So, I'd have to respectfully disagree with you. Considering how far back this was in history, defense is absolutely necessary.  It is also odd that military technology is always considered within the context of conquering and not defense. Well, I tend to consider technology, societal structure, human rights, and advanced disciplines/academics to be indicative of an advanced civilization. So, I agree partially with your designation at least. If I had to weigh the most impactful of the metrics mentioned, academics would probably take the top spot. Acadmeics is the most powerful tool a nation will have in their arsenal.



Attaman said:


> Again, this comes down to why I stepped in: Records help a ton, but one has to keep in mind the biases that are involved in them and the chief advantage of such records seems to lay more in _resiliency_ than innately improved veracity or the like.


Well as state above, I don't entirely agree. I mean, I would agree if resiliency went both ways, both in longevity and in resistance to inaccuracies.
This does not mean written records can't be inaccurate, but that the act becomes harder in some ways.



Attaman said:


> I feel like pointing out that much of the Roman and Greek epics which are frequently cited were... a different beast, from the actual historic and academic works of such eras. I forget who said as much, but effectively our understanding of Roman and Greek mythology is basically fourth-hand in a lot of areas and akin to filling in the blanks on modern Christianity with a bootleg copy of _Evangelion _that managed to avoid whatever caused the destruction of Christianity-adjacent other records.


In some ways, yes, the cultural of Greece and Rome in some ways changed how things were recorded. And, I do want to iterate, the Iliad was intended as a truthful telling of events in Greek history initially, but the act of orally passing it down warped so many of the details that only tiny bits of truth remain(ie, Troy was an actual city that was attacked by the Greeks). And, when you consider that the intent was to preserve history, I do genuinely think it reflects poorly as a system for that, even with the cultural lens of the Greeks. Also keep in mind, they used oral retelling of information due to the Greek Dark Ages, they literally could not write anything down due to nearly total illiteracy.



Attaman said:


> I mentioned the Aztec specifically to refer to their city development, infrastructure, and hygiene / sanitation. The point to be made was that either one needs to understand that "advanced" is not a lump sum that can be measured linearly and objectively like some game of _Call to Power_... or that one needs to make arguments that those things _aren't_ qualifiers of advanced society. Admittedly the latter is potentially not as scaldingly hot a take as people might think: We generally consider the jump from hunter-gatherer to settled agrarian communities a huge milestone in civilization, and that by its nature kind of admits that drastic health disadvantages that came with such are compensated at best or irrelevant at worst.



I don't think you're really grasping my stance here. While I do find the Aztec architecture to be advanced, I feel having just one remarkable feature isn't enough to qualify a civilization as truly advanced. You seem to interpret this as some sort of scientific formula on my part, when really, it's just a "whole being greater than the sum of it's parts," perspective.  I feel like there needs to have multiple social, technology and cultural high points to be considered 'advanced' in my eyes. Granted, I imagine you would still disagree with that notion, so, I feel like our individual perceptions of what makes an advanced society is pretty starkly different. Which I mean, it's fine to disagree, but I don't see the point in getting heated over a different viewpoint.



Attaman said:


> Because a lot of people tend to like to forget that, much like even with the Roman and Greek empires (which tended to gobble up whatever was useful where their armies marched), that what we often consider 'modern' or 'flourishing in sciences and arts' Europe involved a _lot_ of copying from neighbors (copying that was sometimes improved upon, sometimes about a wash, and sometimes done sloppily). Because, for better or worse, a lot of Western education focuses on developments only accomplished in an area of space approximately defined as "North of Mediterranean, West of Istanbul, East of the Americas until ~1700's and even then only begrudgingly when from somebody not from aforementioned area", so a lot of people miss out on societies and societal discoveries from Africa to China to Mexico to...



What people often forget rather, is that this copying, wasn't exclusive to the Greeks or Romans, it was done by every single civilization in history to one extent to another. It's a very human trait, after all, but I wouldn't for a second believe that discounts the individual advancements made after the appropriation of the idea. And, I dislike how this act of copying is given this dirty, negative connotation, when it shouldn't.
I realize that Western school system are at times imperfect, I mean duh, but I don't feel like I am being offensive when I gush about say, the Renaissance, or the Romans, or what made a particular era of history interesting to me personally. Honestly? I'm more concerned as to why nobody mentions the origins of Paper, the Compass, Gunpowder and the Printing coming from China. All four changed the course of history drastically after all. That's just my personal perspective on it though, but I am well aware other cultures made their own respective advancements, and of course they deserve mention for it when applicable.

I suppose I just wonder, if having a natural interest in Euro history now is considered unsavory due to the faults of the Western education system? I don't think a natural interest in that region should be equated to a purposely ignoring other achievements or seen in bad faith. That doesn't seem very fair.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 5, 2021)

Attaman said:


> See above. The idea that global society was itself bettered and flourished in a new golden age with the Renaissance in Europe is a... fairly localized understanding of history. Which, again: Not necessarily something malicious or actively done. People write about where they came from, and invariably like to toot their own horns. But by sheer coincidence what counts as "advanced society" or "the advancement of civilization" tends to trend almost 1:1 with what one's own society accomplished.
> 
> Which, to cut off here since I'm starting to go fifty different directions and almost definitely shouting past you in a few spots, kind of feeds
> back into my whole point that "advanced" civilization is heavily subjective and tends to include some hefty blinkers both purposefully and accidentally.



I didn't say other areas of the world benefited from the Renaissance specifically in that current historical timeline, a lot of the effects of the Renaissance were a slower burn than that. The full effect of the Renaissance was gradual and it took centuries to feel the full impact globally. In much of the same way that the Islamic Golden Age primarily benefited the Middle East(initially), the Renaissance's beneficiaries would mostly encompass Europe with some of it spread into parts of Africa and the Middle East (initially). The long term affects however, had a huge global impact, and it'd be just wrong to say that the scientific method, Da Vinci's findings in the medical field, or that Newtonian Physics had no global impact. That just, isn't correct in the slightest.

In the  long term, yes the Renaissance had huge global impact, downplaying Copernicus, Galileo or Issac Newton as a localized understanding of history seems very odd to me. I mean, the fact that we know that the earth is not the center of the universe is a lot bigger than you might think. I'd certainly say those figures were critical to the way our society is shaped now.

You're not shouting past me (I've addressed every point you brought up in a reasonable manner), more than you are simply not agreeing with what I said and at times misinterpreting it. Which is fine, you don't agree with what I consider an 'advanced civilization', but it should be understood our perspectives on it are different. I explained it requires a multitude of bright spots, previously, it really isn't a case of me arbitrarily cutting my definition of it as something uniquely Western. You've been disagreeing with posts I made since the start of the thread and I have disagreed with it in turn, and there are at least some attempts to remain civil. So, I suppose I would wonder why now, it is so worth getting frustrated over? I could be reading too much into it, and I don't think that initial part of the post was addressed to me, but I would like to say that I prefer this thread stay civil and that debates stay in good faith. If there is a particular element in the conversation that is causing evident frustration it is fine to agree to disagree with that individual point. And I mean, I don't think I ever disagreed with you that what is 'advanced' is fairly subjective. I'm just expressing my opinion, ultimately.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 5, 2021)

Frank Gulotta said:


> You can ping me, you know?
> 
> I find a big difference here and I'm surprised you've not caught it. Yeah a pope at the time (Paul 3d) is the first person in human history to declare a ban on slavery. Meanwhile the Aztec clergy made no qualms whatsoever about directly endorsing human sacrifice, mass ritual massacres AND slavery. I mean the Aztecs literally built a tower out of the skulls of sacrificed women and children. How do you compute these two facts and conclude that yeah they're totally equivalent?


Just in the interest of adding more context, Aztec war prisoners usually were fated to be slaves, and for the war prisoners in particular, it was not uncommon to be sacrificed. In fact, the Spanish Conquest of the Aztecs likely would not have succeeded without the the aid of the Confederacy of Tlaxcala and Totonacapan. Both cultures, which had existed alongside the Aztecs, had been faced with constant wars with the Aztecs and joined the Spanish largely out of spite for the Aztecs and how aggressive they were, not to mention, the aforementioned drawing of their people to be used as sacrifices. Other Mexican tribal cultures would swell into the Spanish ranks as well during the Siege of Tenochtitlan. It is at least fair to say, that the Aztecs made a great number of enemies before the Spanish arrived, which subsequently played a large part in their fall. Keep in mind, the majority of the opposing forces facing the Aztecs was by an overwhelming margin, other historical Mexican cultures.

Another interesting note, after Tenochtitlan's fall and the subsequent surrender of the Aztecs, the Tlaxcalans disdain and hate for the Aztecs was great enough that even after the surrender, they continued to attack and were the primary faction involved with the ensuing massacre in Tenochtitlan, not sparing women or children in the ensuing bloodbath.

To explain why they hated the Aztecs so much, the Aztec empire instead of assimilating the Tlaxcalans, kept them intact so they had a fresh supply of warriors to capture so they can sacrifice them. The conflicts between the Tlaxcalans  and the Aztecs are known as the Flowery Wars, and the primary purpose as previously mentioned was for fresh bodies to sacrifice(the Huejotzingo, and Cholula were also kept around and used for this same purpose), though these conflicts also served to train the Aztec Soldiers. Aztec soldiers were trained to capture rather than kill their opponents in their conflicts, so they were quite successful in obtaining victims to be sacrificed. These conditions are primarily what made the Atecs so unpopular, though their propensity to demand tribute from many of the other outlying tribes certainly wasn't very appreciated either.

Anyways, this post's intention here is not to put moral blame on either faction, but, to demonstrate that this dichotomy of X side good, X side bad, is more complex than those two binaries. Not all the atrocities commited during the war agaisnt the Aztecs were prepetrated by the Spanish, in fact the majority of the attackers were from other Mexican cultures who had suffered under the Aztecs. Nobody in these conflicts were blameless. Laying all the brutality and immorality on one single side is too reductive to be accurate.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 6, 2021)

Much of the mathematical developments and classical texts shared in the period known as the renaissance were reintroduced to Europe by way
of Islamic scholars such as Averroes, who even appears in paintings such as works by Raphael. 

So I'm not really sure about claims that the Islamic golden age and renaissance were consorted events restricted primarily to the middle east and europe respectively. 
Rather there is clear evidence of interactions- and there's more historical continuity that is often stressed. 

Historians now for example rarely now use the term 'Dark ages' to describe pre-renaissance Europe.



KimberVaile said:


> That really is just a misconception, if anything. There is some (mild at best) debate about when the Renaissance started but the overwhelming majority of historians consider Italy, Florence to be the start of it without exception. Most books, sources and other historians give the same reasoning with great consistency. That it had started in Italy with artists and scholars drawn to the area from both the Roman ruins and the well preserved Latin texts. With many scholars at the time mentioning with overwhelming consistency the book De architectura by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, initially simply copying the works extensively, before building on it. And as it happened the Italian city states, rich from trade, had the funds and time to explore these texts that were preserved right under their noses. Much of the Italian Upper Class in fact became very prominent patrons of art and literature during this time, which was crucial to the Renaissance happening. In fact, much of the Renaissance impetus is owed to the Medici family.
> 
> Contrary to the claim that the Renaissance was not a single era in Europe, historians separate the Renaissance into specific ages Early Renaissance, High Renaissance and Late Renaissance respectively, due to how the momentum of this age progressed and changed.
> So, it is misinformed to claim the Renaissance had not got it's legs from rediscovering classics, and overwhelming amount of 14th century scholars spoke with great enthusiasm about the rediscovered Latin texts and had natural intrigue about the Roman ruins.
> ...




Christopher Columbus was not unique in his view the world was round. This is a popular myth.

Columbus incorrectly believed he landed in the far-east because he used an inaccurate world map based on estimates produced by Marco Polo. 
I'm not certain he ever realised that the landmass he reached was not Japan- or mythical islands believed to lie off of its coast. 

He described Cuba as being off the coast of Asia for example, up until his death.


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## Deleted member 134556 (Jan 6, 2021)

I'm noticing there is some aggression in this thread here and there, and I'm going to ask that everyone calms down. I figured this would be a subject that would spark debate, but I ask that everyone remember to be civil as best as you can. I made this thread to appreciate early civilizations and cultures and share what we like about them, not diminish them or compare them to others so much. I'm learning a lot reading all the replies, and I don't want this thread to derail and have to be closed.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 6, 2021)

Nexus Cabler said:


> I'm noticing there is some aggression in this thread here and there, and I'm going to ask that everyone calms down. I figured this would be a subject that would spark debate, but I ask that everyone remember to be civil as best as you can. I made this thread to appreciate early civilizations and cultures and share what we like about them, not diminish them or compare them to others so much. I'm learning a lot reading all the replies, and I don't want this thread to derail and have to be closed.



Main surprise is that discussion is mostly revolving around recent cultures!


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## Deleted member 134556 (Jan 6, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> Main surprise is that discussion is mostly revolving around recent cultures!


True, but still, I enjoyed learning what people had to say X3


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## Fallowfox (Jan 6, 2021)

Nexus Cabler said:


> True, but still, I enjoyed learning what people had to say X3



I suppose what is considered ancient is itself something worthy of discussion. 

Celtic speaking cultures could be regarded as ancient in most of Europe, because they had largely been assimilated or replaced by the time of the Roman Empire, but at the same time there are still living celtic languages today.


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## Deleted member 134556 (Jan 6, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> I suppose what is considered ancient is itself something worthy of discussion.
> 
> Celtic speaking cultures could be regarded as ancient in most of Europe, because they had largely been assimilated or replaced by the time of the Roman Empire, but at the same time there are still living celtic languages today.


True, this is a good way to look at it.

I'm unsure where we draw the line when something is to be considered ancient. It could be by a date, or by a series of events that need to take place.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 6, 2021)

Nexus Cabler said:


> True, this is a good way to look at it.
> 
> I'm unsure where we draw the line when something is to be considered ancient. It could be by a date, or by a series of events that need to take place.


I usually consider it >1kya. 

Indigenous Australians are probably the biggest example I suppose because they have a continuous culture of what, 60,000 years?


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## KimberVaile (Jan 6, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> Much of the mathematical developments and classical texts shared in the period known as the renaissance were reintroduced to Europe by way
> of Islamic scholars such as Averroes, who even appears in paintings such as works by Raphael.
> 
> So I'm not really sure about claims that the Islamic golden age and renaissance were consorted events restricted primarily to the middle east and europe respectively.
> ...


Not quite true, it depends on what age of the Renaissance. The earlier ages of the Renaissance primarily had focused on Roman and bit later Greek writings. The High Renaissance saw a stronger usage of Islamic mathematical texts in some cases.
And again, depends on the time during the Renaissance, near the start, it was more isolated to continents, much later (or during the High Renaissance, there was more collaboration, which reached a peak during the Later Renaissance.) This is why I said, initially, it was isolated to the respective regions, but much later would have more global effects.

There was always some level of interaction between the Europeans and the Islamic states, though, initially it was mostly restricted to trade. Later the ideas of the Renaissance would spread past continents, but keep in mind, it was still a pretty slow burn. It's not accurate to say the changes had happened overnight.

As for the last point, I never used the term Dark Age.



Fallowfox said:


> Christopher Columbus was not unique in his view the world was round. This is a popular myth.
> 
> Columbus incorrectly believed he landed in the far-east because he used an inaccurate world map based on estimates produced by Marco Polo.
> I'm not certain he ever realised that the landmass he reached was not Japan- or mythical islands believed to lie off of its coast.
> ...



You know what they say about assumptions.
"When you ASSUME, it means that you make an ass out of u and me."
It's a little joke, but I would appreciate that you be more considerate about what you assume.

I never said Columbus was unique in viewing the world as round, for starters

Secondly, there was a severe lack of understanding of the world at the time, and I really can't hold it against him too much that he was working with incomplete information. I mean, these seem like some pretty high expectations for somebody who was working with incomplete information.



Fallowfox said:


> Main surprise is that discussion is mostly revolving around recent cultures!


I mean, wasn't brought up by me, though you didn't seem shy about adding your own two cents about the topic regardless.


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## Perron The Fox (Jan 6, 2021)

It seems like the current atmosphere of this thread is people wishing to argue, which won't really lead anywhere. Perhaps we should focus more on the enjoyments of history instead of comparisons between what we may feel is superior.


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## Frank Gulotta (Jan 6, 2021)

Perron The Fox said:


> It seems like the current atmosphere of this thread is people wishing to argue, which won't really lead anywhere. Perhaps we should focus more on the enjoyments of history instead of comparisons between what we may feel is superior.


Let's bring back appreciation for ancient civs then!

For instance Romans were very spiritually open-minded, always happy to welcome other people's gods into their own pantheon if they liked them, instead of denigrating them, which all things considered is pretty rare in human history.


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## Furrium (Jan 6, 2021)

Transport of the ancient Slavs


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## Fallowfox (Jan 6, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> Not quite true, it depends on what age of the Renaissance. The earlier ages of the Renaissance primarily had focused on Roman and bit later Greek writings. The High Renaissance saw a stronger usage of Islamic mathematical texts in some cases.
> And again, depends on the time during the Renaissance, near the start, it was more isolated to continents, much later (or during the High Renaissance, there was more collaboration, which reached a peak during the Later Renaissance.) This is why I said, initially, it was isolated to the respective regions, but much later would have more global effects.
> 
> There was always some level of interaction between the Europeans and the Islamic states, though, initially it was mostly restricted to trade. Later the ideas of the Renaissance would spread past continents, but keep in mind, it was still a pretty slow burn. It's not accurate to say the changes had happened overnight.
> ...



Kimber, Greek and Roman writings were preserved and transliterated by Islamic scholars, then re-introduced to Europe through destinations such as southern Spain.
The works of Aristotle, for example, were widely transliterated in the Arab world, before these translations re-entered Europe. 
That's why these Islamic scholars feature in Renaissance art. Plato, Aristotle, Ptolemy- all transliterated. 
The subsequent works of figures such as Thomas Aquinas and Galileo were directly influenced by these transliterated texts and the comments those previous scholars made about them. 
It's interesting to note that the Iberian peninsula was an Islamic Caliphate, and that there were conquests as far North as central France before there were Viking raids on England- so the interaction of these cultures extends to centuries before the Renaissance. 

Anyway, please can you be a little bit less aggressive in your replies- because it's making the discussion unpleasant. :\

 I think you can see my point that Europeans didn't reach the new world in the Renaissance because of advanced navigational understanding. 
Rather, Europeans had already reached the Americas during the Viking age- and Columbus's subsequent journeys to Central America were the result of fateful navigational errors- rather than skill.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 6, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> Kimber, Greek and Roman writings were preserved and transliterated by Islamic scholars, then re-introduced to Europe through destinations such as southern Spain.
> The works of Aristotle, for example, were widely transliterated in the Arab world, before these translations re-entered Europe.
> That's why these Islamic scholars feature in Renaissance art. Plato, Aristotle, Ptolemy- all transliterated.
> The subsequent works of figures such as Thomas Aquinas and Galileo were directly influenced by these transliterated texts and the comments those previous scholars made about them.
> ...


I said that Islamic writing had an impact, but there are timeline nuances that need to be expanded upon. The start of the Renaissance in Florence was due to a rediscovery of Latin writings, and interest in Roman architecture, then later Greek writings. Now, there is a distinction to be made, the Latin writings derived from the Romans were very well preserved in Western Europe, but, as you mentioned the Greek Writings were less so, the Eastern Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire had access to these writings.

Notably the Ottoman empire via its predecessors was able to build on these Greek writings and they played a larger role past the start of the Renaissance.
In regards to Thomas Aquinas, historians usually consider him a medieval philosopher, since he was born before 1300, which is when Historians seem to agree the Renaissance had begun.  Though, I would agree, Galileo and Copernicus and other figures used texts from Islamic sources to aid in their contributions, but, it should be noted Galileo and Copernicus both came about much later, Galileo was born in 1564 and Copernicus in 1543 respectively. Mainly what I am trying to get across here was that the Renaissance started due to Latin texts initially, (it was Latin texts that were comparatively well preserved in Western Europe as opposed to Greek texts), but the Greek texts that the Islamic world held and built upon did help the momentum of the Renaissance as it drew on.

I am not doubting the interactions the Islamic world had with Europeans, because it was always present through trade well before even the Medieval age. Especially the Middle East, largely because much Chinese luxury goods had to go through that region to get to Europe. Trade with the Islamic world is actually what helped Venice and Florence to become so wealthy, which can certainly be argued to have helped in some way. Trade has always been a historically important aspect to every society.

Well, again, I do think you vastly underestimate how difficult it is to simply travel west while at sea without getting lost.  It was dizzingly  complex, involving the use of quadrants, astrolabes, cross staffs, hourglasses, nautical charts and magnetic compasses. I feel like it really does a disservice to the navigators at the time to say it took no particular understanding to accomplish this.  Keep in mind, you still had to keep your ship westwards to hit any landmass at all. Considering how easily you could get lost at sea (this happened quite a bit with unskilled navigators and was a pretty horrible way to die, honestly.) Some part of it was certainly luck, but I feel ability and technological understanding aided this as well. I mean, just knowing that there would eventually be land if they kept going west is fairly important too.

I don't think I was trying to be overly aggressive more, I would just prefer that blanket assumptions not be made. Though, I apologize if I came off as aggressive.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 7, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> I said that Islamic writing had an impact, but there are timeline nuances that need to be expanded upon. The start of the Renaissance in Florence was due to a rediscovery of Latin writings, and interest in Roman architecture, then later Greek writings. Now, there is a distinction to be made, the Latin writings derived from the Romans were very well preserved in Western Europe, but, as you mentioned the Greek Writings were less so, the Eastern Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire had access to these writings.
> 
> Notably the Ottoman empire via its predecessors was able to build on these Greek writings and they played a larger role past the start of the Renaissance.
> In regards to Thomas Aquinas, historians usually consider him a medieval philosopher, since he was born before 1300, which is when Historians seem to agree the Renaissance had begun.  Though, I would agree, Galileo and Copernicus and other figures used texts from Islamic sources to aid in their contributions, but, it should be noted Galileo and Copernicus both came about much later, Galileo was born in 1564 and Copernicus in 1543 respectively. Mainly what I am trying to get across here was that the Renaissance started due to Latin texts initially, (it was Latin texts that were comparatively well preserved in Western Europe as opposed to Greek texts), but the Greek texts that the Islamic world held and built upon did help the momentum of the Renaissance as it drew on.
> ...



On the subject of navigation, it's probable that the Vikings used feldspars, which polarise light, to determine the position of the sun and hence their heading from North- but nobody really knows. 
Christopher Columbus's method was to sale south until he intercepted the trade-winds, which blow consistently from east to west. 
If you go too far you end up too near the equator in a divergent wind zone that has light breezes- and that's where the phrase 'stuck in the doldrums' comes from. 

This all made me wonder how Polynesians navigated, because they achieved one of the widest ocean going distributions- and I think it was entirely based on reading the sea, stars, and traditions passed down by mouth. 
There's some discussion about whether Polynesians and South Americans had contact before Europeans reached the Americas- based on the fact that some genetic mutations are shared between these populations and their languages sometimes have common words.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 7, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> On the subject of navigation, it's probable that the Vikings used feldspars, which polarise light, to determine the position of the sun and hence their heading from North- but nobody really knows.
> Christopher Columbus's method was to sale south until he intercepted the trade-winds, which blow consistently from east to west.
> If you go too far you end up too near the equator in a divergent wind zone that has light breezes- and that's where the phrase 'stuck in the doldrums' comes from.
> 
> ...


Part of what makes the Viking expeditions to North America so interesting was the fact they were able to accomplish it without the advanced navigational equipment used in the late 15th century. They seemingly just 'did' it. Some theories like you mentioned have cropped up, but no real definitive answer, which is frustrating. They certainly accomplished this according to archaeological sites in Canada, but we've never been able to know exactly how they did it. We do know that the Vikings were talented in the ways of shifpcraft and navigation, but their navigational equipment was significantly less advanced then, than in the late 14th century. I suppose it's easy to just chalk it up to them just being significantly skilled navigators, but, I feel like there should be more to it than that.

The Polynesians are similarly not as well understood, I would hope as time passes these mysteries find an answers, but sometimes we are not so lucky.


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## JacobFloofWoof (Jan 7, 2021)

I descent largely from Greco-Roman ancestry by Italian immigrants from Sicily. I'm interested in the cultures, languages, spirituality, architecture, and innovations from ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome, Scandinavia/northern Europe/Celtic, north-Euro-Asiatic/Ural-Altaic/Siberian, south-east Asiatic, Semitic, Indo-European, Indo-American societies, and so on, that are impossible to recreate, or yet to be figured out by modern science, in regards to the various unfathomable architectures and innovations of course. I am really interested the spirituality of Siberians/Tuvans, Native Americans, northern Europeans/Celts as well as from ancient Rome and Greece, though I find Siberian, Asiatic, and Native American spirituality more pleasing/grounding since they seem less religiously motivated and more spiritual in comparison to European Pagan and middle eastern cultures. While I'm not well versed into any of these, I happen to take an interest.


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## Connor J. Coyote (Jan 7, 2021)

Hmm....... I debated whether or not I should reply to this thread.... but, I think I will.
(As - when I first saw this topic, this is what I thought of):
----------------------------------------------------
An ancient ceremonial shield with feathers depicting a coyote, an artefact from Mexico, which dates from the Aztec civilization..... and - it appears to be dated around the 14th century.

It sits in a museum (in Vienna) currently- which, some argue is not really appropriate, as it should be returned to Mexico, where there is more of a cultural identification with it (amongst the people).

But in any case - Vienna is where it currently sits, (inside a museum) taken there after its excavation.




The shield has a framework of reed splints, wood and leather, covered with agave paper to which the mosaic, consisting of feathers and sheet gold, is glued. Feathers are attached to the edge of the shield with several tassels of feathers hanging from the lower edge.

It was known that, in the Aztec culture - well qualified Aztec warriors were given the right to wear a coyote costume, when ever they went out in their efforts to defend their people's territory... and a coyote was selected as the defender of choice - given the fact that many Aztec featherworkers - called "the amantecas", did revere coyotes - as the symbol of a coyote god - that watched over the people.

And so, over the course of many centuries of Aztec civilization - they revered and honored the coyote for his tact, his skills, his ability to adapt to difficult environments, and his ability to defend, protect, (and stand up for) the people he is called upon to be an advocate for.

And thus - the shield above doesn't just represent magnificent craftwork - but also, an ancient god (of the canis latrans variety) - that the Aztecs believed would protect their warriors and their people.


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## KimberVaile (Jan 7, 2021)

Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I descent largely from Greco-Roman ancestry by Italian immigrants from Sicily. I'm interested in the cultures, languages, spirituality, architecture, and innovations from ancient Egypt, Greece, Rome, Scandinavia/northern Europe/Celtic, north-Euro-Asiatic/Ural-Altaic/Siberian, south-east Asiatic, Semitic, Indo-European, Indo-American societies, and so on, that are impossible to recreate, or yet to be figured out by modern science, in regards to the various unfathomable architectures and innovations of course. I am really interested the spirituality of Siberians/Tuvans, Native Americans, northern Europeans/Celts as well as from ancient Rome and Greece, though I find Siberian, Asiatic, and Native American spirituality more pleasing/grounding since they seem less religiously motivated and more spiritual in comparison to European Pagan and middle eastern cultures. While I'm not well versed into any of these, I happen to take an interest.


Be proud, your ancestors accomplished many great things, enough that you have nuts like me gushing over their legacy. My first few posts here mostly covered Roman and Greek history. I was once told a while ago by a medium that I spent my past life as an archeologist uncovering Roman ruins during the Renaissance. I doubt it really meant anything, but on the off chance it were true, it'd explain some things about how utterly weird I am, lol.


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## JacobFloofWoof (Jan 7, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> Be proud, your ancestors accomplished many great things, enough that you have nuts like me gushing over their legacy. My first few posts here mostly covered Roman and Greek history. I was once told a while ago by a medium that I spent my past life as an archeologist uncovering Roman ruins during the Renaissance. I doubt it really meant anything, but on the off chance it were true, it'd explain some things about how utterly weird I am, lol.


I have some resentment towards my closer ancestors within the last few centuries, as they bred a group of unempathetic animals who disown each other's own blood, as I see sort of like a generational curse, literally the opposite of nepotism, but I can certainly appreciate my ancient ancestor's accomplishments and be proud of my heritage, and even adapt few of their spiritual/philosophical beliefs to sort of reconnect with my bloodline of the past, which eerily lines up today, in some aspects, with my ideology and ethos/lifestyle; I take a little pride in that. But remember, everyone who exists today should have some pride in their ancient ancestors, because they survived all the way to this day for their very existence, which people don't really come to the realization of, but we all have ancient dna, and our ancestors survived many generations, what they had to endure and go through to give us life today. I look at an ancient statue of a famous roman/greek, and say to myself, "this person whoever he or she may have been, gave life to me this many years later".


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## Fallowfox (Jan 8, 2021)

KimberVaile said:


> Part of what makes the Viking expeditions to North America so interesting was the fact they were able to accomplish it without the advanced navigational equipment used in the late 15th century. They seemingly just 'did' it. Some theories like you mentioned have cropped up, but no real definitive answer, which is frustrating. They certainly accomplished this according to archaeological sites in Canada, but we've never been able to know exactly how they did it. We do know that the Vikings were talented in the ways of shifpcraft and navigation, but their navigational equipment was significantly less advanced then, than in the late 14th century. I suppose it's easy to just chalk it up to them just being significantly skilled navigators, but, I feel like there should be more to it than that.
> 
> The Polynesians are similarly not as well understood, I would hope as time passes these mysteries find an answers, but sometimes we are not so lucky.



The Polynesian method is wave-reading (landmasses cause interference patterns in the sea), naked-eye astronomy and oral tradition.
Some pacific peoples use maps to represent wave-reading patterns.







Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I have some resentment towards my closer ancestors within the last few centuries, as they *bred a group of unempathetic animals who disown each other's own blood*, as I see sort of like a generational curse, literally the opposite of nepotism, but I can certainly appreciate my ancient ancestor's accomplishments and be proud of my heritage, and even adapt few of their spiritual/philosophical beliefs to sort of reconnect with my bloodline of the past, which eerily lines up today, in some aspects, with my ideology and ethos/lifestyle; I take a little pride in that. But remember, everyone who exists today should have some pride in their ancient ancestors, because they survived all the way to this day for their very existence, which people don't really come to the realization of, but we all have ancient dna, and our ancestors survived many generations, what they had to endure and go through to give us life today. I look at an ancient statue of a famous roman/greek, and say to myself, "this person whoever he or she may have been, gave life to me this many years later".



...alright then?

The idea of having direct bloodlines to ancient people groups can be pretty tenuous. Literally every human on earth will have one ancestor who worked on the great pyramids of egypt for example. 

Ancient people groups furthermore are often not clearly distinguished genetic groups. There's little evidence for example that peoples who spoke Celtic languages had a much greater genetic similarity to each other apart from the fact that they all lived in Europe. 

Most of Europe's genetic structure was established by the Bronze age- and those are cultures which are known only by the names of the pottery they left behind.


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## JacobFloofWoof (Jan 8, 2021)

This is my ethnicity estimate from different sites, if anyone else is interested in sharing theirs', please do, I'm very interested in this kind of stuff.


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## JacobFloofWoof (Jan 8, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> ...alright then?
> 
> The idea of having direct bloodlines to ancient people groups can be pretty tenuous. Literally every human on earth will have one ancestor who worked on the great pyramids of egypt for example.
> 
> ...


I don't think it could be said for every single person though, there are genetic differences in isolated rural communities who stuck together up to this day. I do not believe Tuvans, some Turkic-speaking, and Siberians had an ancestor who worked on the great pyramids, unless I am misunderstanding something here. We can say most of the world has a direct common ancient ancestor, considering Europe has been a melting pot for millenniums with various tribes from other continents, with the exception of various rural societies that have no connection whatsoever except within their own genetic groups, for instance, the relation between Siberia and indigenous Americans. Unless, you are going back to the very earliest peoples to say we're all basically the same, which isn't the case today. I'm on about classical and bronze era and distinguishing objectively different cultures, societies and their various accomplishments distinguished from other backgrounds of these eras. Just because we may have come from the same seed, it does not mean we didn't split and become our own people over time, with our own lineage of attainment as well as defeat. In other words, someone from northern Europe might have achieved something over hundreds of years in comparison to my people, even in regards to apparel, religion, philosophy, etc, and they can be proud of their distinct ethos from mine, because they held onto it. Yes, Greeks of today are a mix of different ancient Hellenic and few tribes from other European, west asian/middle eastern, north African, and likely Anatolian tribes, but they are Greek nonetheless, and hold onto their distinct ethos and accomplishments being that they are largely an apparent separate group from, let's say, Finland, and nobody else is holding onto that same pride.


I am curious, what is your exact argument here? If I'm correct, you are arguing that maybe I made the wrong assumption about my direct bloodline because they may had been intermixed with various communities in contrast to whom I associate with today, then maybe you are right, but I believe otherwise, because of scientific data that specifically says so in my genealogy, even if percentages vary slightly.


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## Wodenofthegays (Jan 8, 2021)

Just as a general PSA since this has become a part of the thread; please don't give access to anything that might provide access to your genetic makeup to anybody but reputable medical providers.

Its sensitive personal information for you and for all of your close family.



Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I don't think it could be said for every single person though, there are genetic differences in isolated rural communities who stuck together up to this day.



Not really. "Genetic differences" at a meaningful scale don't happen too quickly.



Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I do not believe Tuvans, some Turkic-speaking, and Siberians had an ancestor who worked on the great pyramids, unless I am misunderstanding something here.



You're not misunderstanding about what he said; you're just not accepting that humans are insanely closely-related and interconnected.

You are misunderstanding genetic science and "genetic ancestry," though.

The test you displayed is probably just a haplogroup analysis, and I promise you that if you do that test and you have a mother, grandmother, and/or great grandmother from one of these colored areas on this mtDNA haplogroup tree and distribution map...






you will get a map from that site that labels in a bunch of the same-color area from this mtDNA haplogroup tree and distribution map if that test has the sample to compare it to.

It doesn't track ancestry; it tracks recent mtDNA lines in ova-producing humans and they give you a vague guess on your ancestry based on what ancient peoples lived in the area that your test popped back as. As Jennifer Raff excelently points out in her article on Forbes, that's basically genetic astrology:







Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> We can say most of the world has a direct common ancient ancestor, considering Europe has been a melting pot for millenniums with various tribes from other continents, with the exception of various rural societies that have no connection whatsoever except within their own genetic groups, for instance, the relation between Siberia and indigenous Americans.



Rural societies don't have super distinct "genetic groups." A group of isolated Chinese hunter-gatherers from 4000 BCE is going to be astonishingly genetically identical to a group of Californian telemarketers in 2014. The unique genetic markers they might have had didn't get passed on, and the ones they did have that got passed on got passed on to everyone alive on the planet today and are, therefore, no longer unique genetic markers.



Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> because of scientific data that specifically says so in my genealogy



There is no such thing. You have been duped by online scams. My apologies for your loss

Edit: obvious and politically heavy asterisk on the word "from" when I talk about the map


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## JacobFloofWoof (Jan 8, 2021)

Wodenofthegays said:


> There is no such thing. You have been duped by online scams. My apologies for your loss
> 
> Edit: obvious and politically heavy asterisk on the word "from" when I talk about the map


I suppose my family duped me with their Sicilian surnames and immigration records too? I don't expect every single answer to be true, but the discussion is out of the scope of what I was trying to point out. I never said I didn't accept that people were interconnected by the human race, or that my grandparents down the line might have had a percentage of something else in the mix, however, I am stating a fact that people are ethnically, culturally, linguistically, militarily, etc, different than each other, and also have a right to take pride in their ancestors who made their efforts which fundamentally constructed their various communities, heritage and accomplishments distinct from others they branched off from.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 8, 2021)

Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I don't think it could be said for every single person though, there are genetic differences in isolated rural communities who stuck together up to this day. I do not believe Tuvans, some Turkic-speaking, and Siberians had an ancestor who worked on the great pyramids, unless I am misunderstanding something here. We can say most of the world has a direct common ancient ancestor, considering Europe has been a melting pot for millenniums with various tribes from other continents, with the exception of various rural societies that have no connection whatsoever except within their own genetic groups, for instance, the relation between Siberia and indigenous Americans. Unless, you are going back to the very earliest peoples to say we're all basically the same, which isn't the case today. I'm on about classical and bronze era and distinguishing objectively different cultures, societies and their various accomplishments distinguished from other backgrounds of these eras. Just because we may have come from the same seed, it does not mean we didn't split and become our own people over time, with our own lineage of attainment as well as defeat. In other words, someone from northern Europe might have achieved something over hundreds of years in comparison to my people, even in regards to apparel, religion, philosophy, etc, and they can be proud of their distinct ethos from mine, because they held onto it. Yes, Greeks of today are a mix of different ancient Hellenic and few tribes from other European, west asian/middle eastern, north African, and likely Anatolian tribes, but they are Greek nonetheless, and hold onto their distinct ethos and accomplishments being that they are largely an apparent separate group from, let's say, Finland, and nobody else is holding onto that same pride.
> 
> 
> I am curious, what is your exact argument here? If I'm correct, you are arguing that maybe I made the wrong assumption about my direct bloodline because they may had been intermixed with various communities in contrast to whom I associate with today, then maybe you are right, but I believe otherwise, because of scientific data that specifically says so in my genealogy, even if percentages vary slightly.



Everybody has 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great grandparents. 
Before long, everybody shares ancestors. 

We also possess ancestors from whom we have inherited zero dna, because of the process of recombination. There will be people only a score of generations ago in your family tree who you may have inherited no genes from. 

This is why most people can discover famous figures from history, like kings and queens, in their family trees. 

Unless you come from a population that has been completely isolated since before Ancient Egypt, then you're probably related to somebody who helped build them.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 9, 2021)

Thankyou @Wodenofthegays for describing genetic ancestry testing so well. 

I thought of an interesting example to illustrate. 

People might be interested in knowing whether they have Viking ancestors, so they produce DNA samples, and compare them to the DNA extracted from skeletons in a Viking burial site in Oxford. 

The results of the DNA testing show that both samples from English and Danish populations are very similar and almost equally akin to the Viking samples.

But this isn't because both of them share equal numbers of Norse ancestors. Almost all of the Danish group's ancestors are Norse, while only a small proportion of the English group's ancestors are. 
They're similar because both Danish and English populations are descended from a single bronze age population. 

A mixed-race Norwegian, who is half Nigerian, might then be tested and be told by the genetic testing company that she has the least similarity to the Viking samples of anybody who was tested- but she probably has more Norse ancestors than all of the English people who were tested.


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## Connor J. Coyote (Jan 9, 2021)

Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I suppose my family duped me with their Sicilian surnames and immigration records too? I don't expect every single answer to be true, but the discussion is out of the scope of what I was trying to point out. I never said I didn't accept that people were interconnected by the human race, or that my grandparents down the line might have had a percentage of something else in the mix, however, I am stating a fact that people are ethnically, culturally, linguistically, militarily, etc, different than each other, and also have a right to take pride in their ancestors who made their efforts which fundamentally constructed their various communities, heritage and accomplishments distinct from others they branched off from.


@Lupus Et Revertetur You absolutely have the right to be proud of your heritage and lineage; and it's certainly true that we all have mixes of DNA within our bodies - and that there are indeed many ethnicities that can fall under that umbrella (within each of us) But - if you identify with and celebrate your Sicilian background, and you feel that you're proud of that heritage (and with what those people have accomplished) - then, you shouldn't have to apologize to people for that either.... some of whom may feel you should be more "culturally open".

Unless you wish to engage in geneological reasearch in depth about your heritage, and would like to know "all there is to know" about your background, then - it's totally fine (I think) to take whatever information you currently have about yourself - and just celebrate it and enjoy it, for what it is also.


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## Miles Marsalis (Jan 9, 2021)

Fallowfox said:


> The Polynesian method is wave-reading (landmasses cause interference patterns in the sea), naked-eye astronomy and oral tradition.
> Some pacific peoples use maps to represent wave-reading patterns.
> 
> 
> ...


I've been following this thread but didn't feel the need to comment. However, I didn't know the specifics about Polynesian navigation techniques such as wave reading. Could you explain a bit more about them?


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## KimberVaile (Jan 9, 2021)

Lupus Et Revertetur said:


> I suppose my family duped me with their Sicilian surnames and immigration records too? I don't expect every single answer to be true, but the discussion is out of the scope of what I was trying to point out. I never said I didn't accept that people were interconnected by the human race, or that my grandparents down the line might have had a percentage of something else in the mix, however, I am stating a fact that people are ethnically, culturally, linguistically, militarily, etc, different than each other, and also have a right to take pride in their ancestors who made their efforts which fundamentally constructed their various communities, heritage and accomplishments distinct from others they branched off from.


Well, if anything, I would hope threads like this inspire you to learn more about who your ancestors were and their own history. History need not just be cautionary tales or things to avoid, but also a method to better understand yourself and our species. To learn history is also to know ourselves and our unique origins. So, if anything I encourage pride in the past.


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## Fallowfox (Jan 12, 2021)

Miles Marsalis said:


> I've been following this thread but didn't feel the need to comment. However, I didn't know the specifics about Polynesian navigation techniques such as wave reading. Could you explain a bit more about them?



Sorry I've been busy. 

I don't personally know much about wave reading beyond that it's a navigational technique- if anybody else does know more they might help explain. 

My layman's understanding is that landmasses deflect waves, and hence the pattern in the waves can be used to deduce the direction in which landmasses lie.


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## AniwayasSong (Jun 14, 2021)

Deleted member 134556 said:


> I find early communities fascinating, not just Egypt, Mayan, and Greece and Rome, but cultures and communities that existed everywhere in the world too. Use this thread to share ancient tribes, people, groups, or civilizations you think are interesting, or that you are descended from.
> 
> Be respectful and polite about the subject and towards each other.


I was born into a Native American society.
Put into modern parlance, a 'Reservation'.
Papa was Cherokee. Momma, Catholic Irish.
This was a shall I say, 'Delicate' relationship that gave 'Me', considerable grief, growing-up. Being the only daughter, youngest of three older brothers, I was automatically labeled as something Momma took full control over. To say I resented this would be the understatement of the century.
My heart and soul always felt closest to my Native Ancestry, and I fought tooth-and-claw against anything that tried to make me comply in contradiction to this Path!
I do have all respect and appreciation to EVERY culture and 'Path' others choose to follow. I'm not so arrogant or egotistical as to demand anyone adhere to mine-own.
For myself, there is a keenest to the Natural world. From the air we breath, the sky and clouds, Sun and Moon, water we drink and food(s) we eat. A 'Connectiveness' to the entire world we live in, that I just don't have all the words to express, yet resonates throughout my entire Being....
I weep for what modern humanity has chosen to throw-away, ignore, and deny.
We have lost far too much of ourselves in this artificial reality.


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