TheSpoiler
Member
Pieces of chinese history have been altered during the Three Kingdoms era, either morphed to fit propaganda, or just plain never recorded. I'm on mobile so i can't go into detail, but damn.
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Lost History
- Thread starter Walpurgis
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So much European pagan history and lore has to be pieced together with fragments thanks to Christianity. There's secondary sources that tried to describe pagan beliefs and practices, but they were written by Christians, so it's difficult to parse what's true and what's (intentional or unintentional) bias. Trying to do research for a story right now and keep running into this problem.
Thanks for that book recomendation, Chairman Yang.
And I'm going to read that lengthy Atlantic article tomorrow. Looking forward to it.
Thanks for that book recomendation, Chairman Yang.
And I'm going to read that lengthy Atlantic article tomorrow. Looking forward to it.viciouskillersquirrel
Member
Pagan lore would needed to have been pieced together from whispers and legends by now had Christianity never existed. The fact was that paganism was a fractious, decentralised thing that left a paucity of written records because there were never any holy books. Specifics of belief varied from place to place.So much European pagan history and lore has to be pieced together with fragments thanks to Christianity. There's secondary sources that tried to describe pagan beliefs and practices, but they were written by Christians, so it's difficult to parse what's true and what's (intentional or unintentional) bias. Trying to do research for a story right now and keep running into this problem.
Thanks for that book recomendation, Chairman Yang.
Priests were often there to perform ceremonies and songs rather than be repositories of any sort of canon. It might surprise you to learn that Julius Caesar was at one time the high priest of Jupiter, a position he was elected to, and nobody would ever have accused Julius Caesar of being a pious man. What writings we have are often poetry, songs and legends written by people with no religious function in life - they were simply part of a living culture where knowledge of these stories and beliefs were taken for granted (i.e. oral history, popular culture). Their expressions of belief that have any kind of lasting impact are therefore monumental or archaeological in nature.
In truth, by the time Constantine the Great made Christianity the faith of Rome, the Roman and Greek gods were already dying, being replaced by dozens of better structured mystery religions, including Christianity, but also including the cult of Sol Invictus and a version of classical paganism that centred around Jupiter to an almost monotheistic extent. Had Christianity never come along, we'd be talking about how Sol Invictus, Ahura Mazda or the overwhelming faith of Jupiter had eclipsed all the old gods.
If you're having trouble finding anything substantial, structured or on a par with the Bible, it's probably because it doesn't exist and likely never did.
Luckily for you, there is a book of poetry regarding the decidedly pagan fertility and luck god named Priapus, the Priapaeia.
It consists of pages and pages of dick jokes.
War...war never changes.
I was reading an ethics article about how a TON of modern medical science, in Europe at least, is based on a bedrock established by the Nazis. Much of their data, naturally, coming from subjects of... dubious consent.
I mean, it's fucked up to use that information, but isn't it worse to just ignore the good their sacrifices can result in? Do you acknowledge these people, thus giving the Nazi regime credit, or put a rug over it and downplay the deaths? No easy answers.
I've heard stories of Nazis who sold their human research in exchange for freedom from justice. Personally, in both cases, I would take the info. It's only practical. As for giving the Nazis credit, I would not. If I were tortured and ripped apart by Nazis and that research ended up in international hands, I would rather be forgotten than see those monsters be given credit. Besides, it might influence others to try similar methods after seeing the Nazis' success.
I'm not denying pagan beliefs would still be difficult to know without Christianity; you see that with all oral traditions in any culture. But Christianity certainly muddles things. Also, it wasn't the Greek and Roman pagan beliefs I was thinking of so much as the Scandinavian and Celtic beliefs of the past. I was already aware of what you said about the Greeks and Romans. That Caesar fact is not surprising, and I already knew how the likes of Zeus and Apollo were fading away while many new cults were springing up, with Christianity at first being seen as just another of these many cults.
Ultimately, northern places like Scandinavia adapted Christianity fairly* willingly (*I'm not an expert), doing so for the wealth or for peace, so I'm not sitting here going "Poor pagans." While aspects of their tradition got looked down upon due to Christianity, and some people were thought to be practicing witchcraft, it's nothing like what Native peoples in the Americas and such had to face when Christianity came there. Still, some of that history and belief is lost, and that would happen no matter what thanks to time and oral traditions. But they may have survived longer if not for Christian influence, is all I'm saying. They certainly wouldn't last forever, no, and the historical remains would still be little. It's hard to deny the influence Christianity had throughout all of Europe. Christianity was one contributing factor, but I think it was the more significant factor.
LookAtMeGo
Member
The people who built the sphynx before pharaoh carved his head on it.
Nikolai Voinov was a highly experimental musician in the early Soviet Russia era. He made crazy things like a musical performance via an entire town where things like battleship cannons of the coast performed the "percussion".
He also pretty much invented chiptunes in the 30's by cutting out waveforms on paper and then playing them at different speeds (ie pitches) and reading them optically. He pioneered several common chip audio techniques like pulse-width modulation and arpeggiated harmonies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7Zb4rso82M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXkEL-X3zXs
His laboratory was bombed by the nazis in WW2 so most of his archived work did not survive. The aforementioned town "orchestra" performance only exists as a reconstruction.
He also pretty much invented chiptunes in the 30's by cutting out waveforms on paper and then playing them at different speeds (ie pitches) and reading them optically. He pioneered several common chip audio techniques like pulse-width modulation and arpeggiated harmonies.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7Zb4rso82M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXkEL-X3zXs
His laboratory was bombed by the nazis in WW2 so most of his archived work did not survive. The aforementioned town "orchestra" performance only exists as a reconstruction.
Isn't that the norm in Chinese history though? Each successive dynasty writes the history of the one before it?
davepoobond
you can't put a price on sparks
i never read anything about the sphynx existing in a form without the pharaoh head on it...
is that what its supposed to be?
LookAtMeGo
Member
Its a theory. There is geological evidence to support it.
Some think it was a lion or a jackal.
Wow, this is really cool!
The loss of music is huge too, similar to the loss of oral history. I'm surprised we have , as much pre 1500s music as we do, honestly, though my knowledge is limited to Western music history.
0.1.1.2.3.5.8.13.21.34.55
Banned
I'm continually amazed by modern archeological discoveries that continually one up the last and push known civilization deeper into the past. If only we could know the entire history of man... It would no doubt be fascinating.
China's forgotten fleet, they tried erase it from history back then:
http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/china_1000ce_mingvoyages.htm
Such badass ships, 600 years ago.
http://afe.easia.columbia.edu/special/china_1000ce_mingvoyages.htm
Such badass ships, 600 years ago.
Khalifa Jayy
Banned
Subbed. Some of this stuff is amazing.
OneEightZero
aka ThreeOneFour
This is good stuff. Subbed.
Pegosaurus
Banned
i thought you were going to bring up the stupid phantom time hypothesis
this stuff is real interesting though.
this stuff is real interesting though.
RustyNails
Member
This thread got me interesting in learning more about Central and South American history, so I started listening to this. I am only about an hour in, but it is quite interesting so far.
The speaker discusses how Civilization developed around the coast, river valleys and later highlands of Peru. The oldest stone city has been carbon-dated to about 3200 BC and archeological evidence has pointed to some interesting findings.
The river valley civilizations developed irrigation techniques to harness those rivers for agriculture. That is not the only thing they did though. They also grew cotton. They used this as a material for textiles, but perhaps more interestingly, they traded it to the coastal cities so that they could make nets to fish. The coastal cities traded the fish they caught for that cotton.
So we can clearly see a decently long-distance trade network happening, which is pretty impressive since this means that they most have a decent food surplus to have a good amount of labor go towards cotton production (The speaker didnt say that, I am just infering that though).
The highlands and even the amazon were also a part of this trade network. The Highland cities mostly hunted meat and then traded that meat for agricultural goods and goods from the amazon. So these highland cities might have been centers of trade because we find amazon goods in the valley and coastal cities and the other way around. It was also suggested that the highland stone cities also have domesticated alpacas and llamas by this point as well.
So yea, this seems like a pretty extensive trade network for this time.
Perhaps the most unique feature though is that there are no 'wealthy' buildings or elaborate burial grounds. Everyone buries their dead under their house and the houses seem to be fairly similar in terms of 'wealth' - meaning that the civilization might have been quite egalitarian. That is pretty impressive when a society produces cities, surpluses, and trade. Usually that is controlled by a few elite.
Another interesting feature was that there were no defensive walls or sign of defense, which could indicate that this was a surprisngly peaceful civilization. He never said it, but I am assuming this conclusion is reasonable because Peru does have a shit ton of stone (all their cities are made out of it), it doesnt take a genius to think up a wall, and if you have a shit ton of stone and threats from the outside, then it would make sense to build a wall around your city.
So yea, quite interesting so far.
Wow, that's actually really cool. It sounds like a paradise. I wonder what kept things so peaceful and stable. Fear of the gods, maybe?
I found some good stuff in this stupidly written Cracked article.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Wisdom
Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī aka Al-Jabr, the father of algebra was a scholar of the House of Wisdom in Baghdad.
13th-century Arabic translation of Materia Medica
Drawing of Self trimming lamp in Ahmad ibn Mūsā ibn Shākir's treatise on mechanical devices.
A page from al-Khwarizmi's Kitab al-Jabr
Al-Idrisi's map of the world (12th). Note South is on top.
A Fish Aficionado
I am going to make it through this year if it kills me
I wouldn't say much of the old Caliphate especially the Abbasid Caliphate is lost history, just neglected due to modern views of the Arab world post WWI.
There wasnt a whole lot of evidence of religion at that point. Of course, that doesnt mean they didnt have any. It could just mean that archeologists havent found any evidence. A religion did eventually spring up around a Fanged Diety, which the speaker argues is rather monotheistic. In this early period until about 1400 or 900 (forget which) he argues that the religion did help keep things peaceful because we eventually started to see social stratification and wealthy people starting around 1800, but there is still no evidence of walls or warfare.
The main religious city/site eventually went into disrepair and lost influence and we see the Fanged Diety change and morph into something new around 900 (forget the exact dates). You will like this less because we now see warfare, violence, and head-hunting. People hunted heads because they thought that they could seal people's souls in their heads and then use that head and that soul as a source of power that they would then control.
So yea, head-hunting, hanging heads from belts, hanging heads from shrines within houses. Quite a change from the peaceful non-warfare traders of the 3200-1800 BC.
One other thing that is pretty interesting is how El Nino has impacted Peruvian Civilization. Remember those coastal fishing cities? Well, those were abandoned in 1800 BC (think they were later resettled a bit like a thousand years later though) after a particularly bad El Nino just fuckin rocked them.
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