History Summarized in a Few Depressing Statements

[True Blue Door]

1. Anatomically modern humans existed seven times longer than all of recorded history with no written language, no architecture, and leaving behind nothing but a few stone totems, a few beads, and some cave paintings.

2. Stretches of time equivalent to that between the Scorpion King and John F. Kennedy, passed in a single inhabited cave with no apparent cultural or lifestyle changes.

3. Most people since the advent of agriculture were drunk all the time and died before age 30. That is, the minority who even survived childhood.

4. The vast majority of generations who ever lived had no choice whatsoever in their profession, food, religion, or government, and never knew choices were even possible.

5. For most people, history consisted of the handful of fables their mothers told them as little children, and their lineage going back a few generations. Other than this, the past never existed, and neither did the future.

6. Want to know what life was like in the Middle Ages for ordinary people living under knights? Ask Mexicans who live under drug cartels.

7. The Byzantine Empire had 99 emperors, covered vast swaths of Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa, and survived for over a thousand years. From memory, name one of those 99 and state one decent thing he did.

8. Archaeological soil layers usually contain pottery shards, coins, scraps of cloth, and the residues of agriculture. The archaeological soil layer in Italy corresponding to the 5th century AD...is almost nothing but ashes and weapon fragments.

9. If Genghis Khan ruled today, his proportional death toll would completely erase every single person from North America and most of South America combined.

10. You know Stalin's purges, where he randomly massacred every last person he suspected of even being capable of disloyalty, their families, and often their ancestral towns and villages? That kind of thing happened about twice a decade in the Late Roman Empire, for three hundred years. And then it stopped because...see #8.

[Smarmie Doofus]

1. Sheeeezzz. Thanks. I'm going back to bed.

I mean.... what's the point?

[Old Crow]

2. Amazing material

May I ask from where you've gleaned this (assuming you didn't just whip these observations off the top of your head)? Could you recommend a book or two that contains more information along these lines?

Oddly enough, I don't find this information depressing. As bleak as the national and international situation often looks here on DU, this post makes clear that, viewed differently, we've been given more ability to live our lives in positive manners than 99.99% of those who came before us. We've each been given an opportunity that ought not be wasted.

[True Blue Door]

16. Edward Gibbon - History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.

I like paper books, but it's available for free and unabridged on the internet:

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/25717/25717-h/25717-h.htm

Good point about the present.

[ReRe]

3. I hope you've got a link for this...

... I'd like to read more about it.

[True Blue Door]

17. Most of it's probably here:

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/25717/25717-h/25717-h.htm

The other stuff is just off the top of my head from years of reading. Or, I'm embarrassed to say, Wikipedia.

[ReRe]

24. Well, I understand where you're coming from...

... "years of reading' sounds like me. Except recently, hubby takes the book from my lap, shoves me on down in the bed and turns out the light. Gutenberg is goooooood..

[rpannier]

4. #10

See much of Chinese History
The Han, the Yellow Emperor, The Sui, The Tang, Mongol Rule...

[True Blue Door]

18. I especially like how the first Chinese emperor kicked off the founding of China

by burning almost all books written before that point, and burying the scholars alive. That was a nice way to begin a nation.

[rpannier]

28. Ahhh Yes, the Legalists

Fan Sui, Li Ssu and the rest of the bunch. Some of the World's Earliest Teabaggers

[Old Crow]

5. #7.

Theodosius II, 408-450 AD. Issued an edict stating that all chairs should have four legs and not five, as was then common. We all owe our four-legged chairs to Theodosius.

What else ya got?

(OK, I'm going back to bed now for a nap.)

[True Blue Door]

19. Awesome.

Reading the histories of the Byzantine Empire, you get the sense that they should pretty much all just be renamed Joffrey and given a number. Joffrey 1, Joffrey 2...Joffrey 76... Wouldn't be far off the mark in most cases.

[90-percent]

6. remarkably interesting, if not unsubstantiated. But I read it on the Internet and thus believe

every word. We're a lot closer to living lives pursuing life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness than we ever were, except for some occasional setbacks brought about by mean stupid selfish ungenerous Oligarch's.

In some respects, it wouldn't take a hell of a lot to right this runaway train of end of the world doom. All it would take is to use our wonderful powerful brains in a more generous community minded make the next generation happier than the previous manner. All we need to do is collectively think as much about morality and co-existence as we do about computer programming, pop singers, pro sports and financial machinations.

"The Arc of the Moral Universe Is Long But It Bends Toward Justice"

Interesting stuff. Thank you.

-90% Jimmy

[True Blue Door]

20. Well, if you want substantiation...

You can start here:

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/25717/25717-h/25717-h.htm

But if you want full and detailed bibliography, it ain't that kind of party. I like reading and talking about history, but that doesn't mean I'm going to put actual work into it.

[lovemydog]

8. I tried googling the first sentence in order to find a source

but it linked to your post, lol.

Any way, thanks for that True Blue Door. If you happen to read this post and can provide a source or sources, much appreciated.

I love history. And I actually take some comfort in this depressing information, because it makes me feel a bit better than subscribing to some of the doom and gloom stuff I seem to always read about our present day.

No doubt we've got a lot of problems now. But let's also recognize that things have always been pretty darn bad for the large majority.

We have to keep fighting to improve them!

[True Blue Door]

21. I'm kind of hand-waving on the exact length of time for #1.

But just read any summary of anthropology covering pre-civilization humanity. People who looked exactly like us lived for tens of thousands of years on this planet and did nothing but carve some little figurines and draw stick figures on caves. Or at least nothing else that leaves any trace. Maybe they sang songs?

[Brigid]

9. For #7:

Justinian. He built the Haigia Sophia. And he married Theodora.

[lovemydog]

10. Nice! What's the Haigia Sophia?

I like learning stuff here.

[Brigid]

11. This is Hagia Sophia.

[img]http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagia_Sophia&h=3681&w=5514&tbnid=P98r0XppWo016M:&zoom=1&q=hagia+sophia&docid=9NEYfFdiI-CZLM&hl=en&ei=npIZVM-SNqnE8AHF14CIBg&tbm=isch&client=ms-android-verizon&ved=0CCQQMygAMAA[/img]

In Istanbul, what was then Constantinople. Built in the sixth century. Pretty impressive, huh?

[lovemydog]

12. Cool. Thanks.

Yeah, that looks sweet.

[malthaussen]

13. Obligatory musical link:

-- Mal

[lovemydog]

27. Damn. I thought They Might Be Giants wrote it.

That's a neat version, too.

[True Blue Door]

22. Good call. Architectural beauty is one of the few things I would credit the Byzantines on.

But Theodora...she basically told her husband she'd rather they all die than accept living a slightly less lavish lifestyle as non-monarchs. Or at least that's the reputation of history, but since we don't have anything else to go on...

[snooper2]

14. Genghis Khan is still alive today

He actually had a rap battle with the Easter Bunny recently

[FSogol]

15. "After the death of Christ, there was a period of readjustment that lasted approximately 2000 years"

Kurt Vonnegut on what our history would look like at some point in the future.

[madville]

23. I'm thankful to live in this era of human history

And also extremely thankful to be in the USA. Medicine has never been more advanced, people have never lived longer and knowledge has never been more accessible.

Most of the past pretty much sucked and I really look forward to the future and all the new and exciting stuff it will produce.

[alcibiades_mystery]

25. Disagree on the life expectancy thing

Large numbers of humans since agricultural development lived well into their 40's, 50's, and 60's...provided they survived birth and early childhood. The really low life expectancy numbers include infant and child mortality. If you reached 12 or 13, you had a good chance of making 50. We have pretty good evidence on lifespans in ancient Greece from the 5th century BCE on, and it was certainly well past 30 for most people who survived childhood.

[bhikkhu]

26. There's been plenty of argument over that

There's no argument that in prehistoric time it was perfectly possible for people to live well into old age, as happens now. Most of the best studies are still inconclusive, but some very good local studies support the 30-40 year average. Just from memory, there was a study I read of the pre-columbians in the valley of mexico, based on a burial ground survey, which found remains of adults averaged 30-40 years old. Other similar small-scope surveys in Europe, from Roman times up into the late middle ages find the same pattern. Before that, its anyone's guess, as records and solid evidence doesn't really exist.

But, assuming that for most of human history we lived as hunter-gathers, another method is to look at modern hunter-gatherer populations still living more or less traditional lifestyles. A very high infant mortality exists, but lifespan of those that survive childhood is more comparable to our own, 60's and 70's. It may be fair to say that lifespans were reasonable for most of human history, but dropped notably following the adoption of agriculture, and then have steadily risen in the past 200 years with technological advancement.

[intaglio]

29. A few points

1) the earliest Homo Sapiens remains have been dated to 195,000 years BP so humans have existed far longer than 7 time recorded history.

2) I presume you are talking about Theopetra cave but it is likely that it was used rather than occupied continuously.

3) Drunk all the time and died before 30. Drunk: do you know how difficult it is to get drunk on small beer? Although that is a silly point water was drunk but most fluid intake probably came from broths.

Died before 30: that statistic is heavily influenced by perinatal mortality, once you were past that period life seemed to have lasted pretty well; even poor people averaging 40 or 50 years.

4) For the vast majority of generations there were no professions - except, probably, holy man.