What I mean is, when the human population was very low, did they all speak the same (or similar) language when they were located around the same area before humans started venturing out of Africa?

This is a question I've had for a long time. How do huge places become completely abandoned? For example: The pyramids of egypt, the Aztec structures, Babylon, the Coliseum/Ancient Rome, etc. Theres many other examples but those are just a few. Do entire populations just decide to leave? How can something so big get completely abandoned and not discovered for centuries?

The Battle of Britain has been a very interesting subject for me. Can you suggest any books about it?

Screaming... My best guess is this is not accurant, for several reasons. Primarly because he has a massive of chance of dying very quickly due to his location in the battle (no doubt many footsoldiers of the opposing force would be directly targetting this fellow also).

Where would such an individual really be positioned? Not in the vanguard surely. However if there were such warriors, with an accurate account of them leading, litterally, their armies into battle... who were they?

How did the common folk viewed the Crusades back then?

The crown prince of Austria-Hungary, is assassinated by Serbian nationalists in Sarajevo starting the chain of events which led to World War 1. However, when I look at maps from World War 1, Serbia is it’s own country, a Kingdom that had broken off from the Ottomans 40 years earlier. I am incredibly confused as to whether or not Serbia was part of Austria-Hungary, and if not why and how the Austria-Hungarian crown prince could have been killed in Serbia if it was not part of the empire. Please help me out here.

I qualified question with "Eurocentric" account because I came across a Historical sociologist named Ricardo Duchesne.

Having been familiar with Academics like Jack Goody in explaining Medieval African development, I take for granted that different cultures have unique experiences to explain different trajectories of development.

Thus, Ricardo Duchesne taking these into account, while arguing that a Eurocentic view of history can still be fair, I at first thought his basic thesis on the "Great Divergence" of Western Civilization being much earlier is plausible if not close to the truth. For instance his points on the relative geographic isolation of Chinese and Sub Saharan Africa, along with the role of Indo-European Nomadic stratification.

The problem though is when his subsequent work and associations is less about investigating the factors behind this and more about writing of attempts of Cultural Marxism eliminating Western Identity, closer looks at his comments in his papers, blogs discussions, and responses to criticism unrelated to his first book basically proves Turchin's criticism correct on his ideology affecting his work.

My question then, is, are there any other academics who take a similar approach in defining unique Western traits in explaining the scientific revolution or other developments in the West compared to other civilizations like China?

Hello all, I am looking for a list (an index?) of all textual Greco-Roman works. If anyone knows of a "full" list, please shoot me a link.

Hi, this question came up among friends and in my university class this semester and I’ve heard a few different takes.

To preface, I'm familiar with the fact that the term “Indian” derives from early reports sent back by European settlers of the inhabitants of North America when the settlers believed incorrectly that they had arrived in the West Indies after sailing from Europe. With that in mind, I understand that Indian is the “incorrect” name insofar as the inhabitants of North America were actually members of various tribes, not inhabitants of India.

I have heard arguments that the term “Native Americans” is more accurate and corrects the mistake that early European explorers made. I’ve also heard that ultimately, the best approach is to refer to these individuals most accurately by calling them by their tribal names; whether Comanche, Cherokee, or Powhatan, etc, and that a broader term is not appropriate. I’ve also heard arguments made by some that it is the right of the descendants of these cultures to decide which name best describes their history; whether “Indian”, “Native American”, or otherwise.

My university professor (an individual with amazing credentials, numerous well-regarded publications, and a high degree of respect in the historical community) suggested that the term “Indian” is a misnomer but has unfortunately been adopted by history as the correct name for this particular group of people - that is, the inhabitants of North America prior to settlement by Europeans. In her view, the Cherokee or Powhatans of the 17th century would be no better served by a term such as “Native American” seeing as “America” itself is a name given by some Italian merchant who happened to first draw the continent on a map. She argues essentially that history doesn’t care if we may prefer some different term than “Indians” today. The “right name” in this case just happens to be the product of a mistake.

Is she right? Would love any feedback, context, or clarification. My professor’s take struck me as somewhat insensitive but I’m not certain that such an opinion isn’t warranted. The fact may be that “Indians are Indians”, plain and simple, regardless of the mistake early European explorers may have made.

Everything about 18th dynasty Egypt is fascinating and there's quite a lot of information to be obtained with a quick Google search but most of what I've found on The Amarna Period focuses on Akhenaten and his new capital, Aketaten. But what happened to Thebes during this mass...exodus? It's estimated that 80,000 people lived in the city at the time. Surely, not everyone could have made the journey south, right? Was Thebes still functioning as city, and if so, who was present representative of Akhenaten's rule?

For example, if I was a British Admiral in the Napoleonic wars who needed to land a large number of troops on a French island to attack a fort, would I be able to requisition or develop specialized boats, artillery, or tools for my men to use on the beaches?

Just how isolated was the Inca Empire? Or Aztec Empire? For example, did the Incas know of the Aztecs? And if so, did they trade with them or have contact with them?

I just finished reading "Lawrence in Arabia" by Scott Anderson. One of the subtitles is "Imperial Folly" and he goes hard on that theme:

•) when he describes the dominant pattern of "throwing your forces at the strongest defended point", i.e. the cult of the offensive, the whole general stupidity of trench warfare,

•) the German "invade France super fast" plans involved troops moving faster than their supply train, both times,

•) when he describes Gallipoli, he says there were multiple other landing spots available on the peninsula, and they chose to land at the worst one;

•) leading up to Gallipoli, he says that British/French command nixed the idea of invading Syria (at Alexandretta, cutting the region off from Istanbul), solely because the French imperialists wanted to have possession of Syria after the war, so they needed French troops to be involved invading it, but no French troops could be spared, so the British troops in Egypt couldn't move on Syria, which is the stupidest thing I've ever learned about this stupid war

•) he says Lawrence and his Arabs were kept on more of a leash than they had to be because of that same reason

•) frankly trying to take Istanbul at all sounds incredibly stupid, especially from the sea

•) he knocks the British Indian troops not bothering to recruit Arabs on their way through Iraq,

•) and the crowning folly of the book, how the British promised Palestine/Syria to the Arabs, French and Jews simultaneously

He makes it sound like, at many points, commanders kept choosing the worst possible option. And then there's the whole stupid way the war started. I've always hated studying WW1 because it's just stupidity start to finish.

.....

So the question is: did anybody understand how stupid they were being? Generals? Emperors, ministers, secretaries? Soldiers? Nurses? Anyone?

Or I guess, is that theme of stupidity actually overblown and exaggerated?

When you think about it chinese dragons and european dragons have little to nothing in common.

European dragons have wings and are related to fire, chinese dragons don't have wings and are related to water. European dragons hoard treasure and are evil, chinese dragons are wise and often benevolent. European dragons are seen as animals, chinese dragons are like gods or nature spirits.

Both are very interesting mythical creatures, I just don't understand why we ended up thinking that they are the same kind of mythical creature

Hi to everyone. Does anybody know something about Philip Mazzei (in Italian Filippo Mazzei)? Do you think is him interesting or not? Sorry for my English, thank you all.

How many troops, vehicles, tanks and planes did the Nazi forces have during the Invasion of Poland? How did their size compare to Poland's troops, vehicles and planes?

Thanks in advance

I’ve been studying and researching a lot about 5th century Britain. In the History of the kings of Britain by Geoffrey of Monmouth, written in the 12th century. After Hengist betrays him at the treachery of the long knives, Vortigern flees and meets a child, Merlin. After a while, Merlin has a prophecy which goes on for a long time, but it starts with two dragons fighting. A white one and a red. Signifying the Saxons and the Britons.

So originally I understand this was in Latin so they were ‘draco’? But Vortigern and Merlin would have spoke in an old Brittonic language, and as I understand Dragon was ‘wyrm’. Wyrm also used to mean a lot of crawling things like snakes and others.

My question is. Is it possible that over the course of Ambrosius Merlinus having his prophecies(if he ever did)in the 5th century. To Geoffrey writing the accounts down, 700 years later, that there was a mistranslation and that the dragons Merlin saw, were actually some form of snake, or slow worm?

I understand that these prophecies are most likely all made up, because they have so much accuracy as to what is to come. With Uther and his brother coming back to kill Vortigern.

I’m guessing they didn’t eat the same kind of vegetables we do today (eiter because they were exported or weren’t “invented” yet). Also meat? If I remember correctly from school farm animals were expensive, so do they eat mear often?

I want to know if native americans (from both South and North Americas) did fight in other regions of the world like Europe, Africa or Asia. If so, did they write any kind of journal describing anything?

For example, (as far as I understand) after the death of Charles the Bold, parts of Burgundy were absorbed into the French state in the 15th century. Were there elites (or townspeople, religious houses, or anyone really) that had a specific sense of themselves as 'Burgundian' and resented French rule as being 'foreign'?

I know Alsace-Lorraine has a very contested history in 19th and 20th century events, but do we have evidence of late medieval people truly having a specific Burgundian identity which they wished to preserve? (and, in case the above questions are overly simplistic, if so, how might these differ from a modern sense of 'national' identity?)

(I hoped that Burgundy might be a good example, being less entangled in modern political contexts than other regions such as Scotland, but it's meant only as an example and hopefully is not limiting, as I'm more interested in the principles of medieval European communal identity than in the specifics of Burgundy per se.) I'd also really welcome any reading on how state-building, gradual centralisation, and senses of identity (particularly urban, community, or nascent national identity) overlapped in this period.

(reposted; apologies if the copy paste made formatting a bit funky)