> Cataclysmic struggle between the eastern Rome and Persia opened the door for Arabs to stream through and build one of the greatest empires in history.
> Cities like Venice, Verdun, Utrecht, Prague and Mainz all did good business trafficking slaves to Arab lands, above all, women and children. It was the Vikings, however, who seized control of this lucrative business, eventually building trading stations along the Russian river systems flowing south towards the Black and Caspian seas that grew into towns such as Kiev and Novgorod.
The point is not the focus on their local history, but the exclusion of other peoples' history that enabled their own history in the first place.
Generally, the view taught in schools in the West is that "civilization" as we know it developed pretty much linearly on the axis Greece - Rome - Medieval Europe - Modern Europe/North America. Sure, there were some other civilizations in some obscure places like South America or China, we are given to understand, but they don't really count, they didn't have any lasting impact.
What is all too often neglected is that history doesn't work as simply as that. Greek culture developed in interaction with ancient Persia. Rome was also influenced by places like Carthage in North Africa. The Middle Ages in Europe weren't known as the "Dark Ages" for nothing - compared to contemporary Arabia, it looked pretty barbarous. (Arabian influences on medieval Europe are many and varied, ranging from architecture to food and weapons.) In 1793, the envoys of the first British diplomatic mission to imperial China were still viewed as "barbarians" [1].
Of course it is entirely justified to focus mainly on your own history. However, the danger of focussing too much on yourself is that you forget the achievement and importance of others, leading to unwarranted nationalistic pride.
A very good article! The author does a great job of painting a unified view of world history within the confines of his length restriction. Of course many things are only touched upon, and many others omitted entirely, but he certainly manages to broaden one's view of cultural and political history, and shows how the histories of different peoples interlink and influence each other even today.
Some of the Eurocentric focus on history is partly because of the lack of historical documents from South Asia. I know that in India for e.g., recording a history of the region was never a priority, infact some of of India's early history is only known because of Chinese travelers noting down stuff in their diaries.
In modern times, producing an "Official" History of their region is a major undertaking that all nation states engage in. This is where they get to 'correct' the existing biases/stereotypes but a lot of nations lack the interest and frankly survey expertise to produce a decent and accurate History. I'd say that the West in general has been very good at documenting (sometimes with overflowing negative bias) the history of the 'other' much more than the 'other' has been, at documenting their own history.
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[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 31.1 ms ] thread> Cataclysmic struggle between the eastern Rome and Persia opened the door for Arabs to stream through and build one of the greatest empires in history.
More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byzantine%E2%80%93Sasanian_war... ... I dimly knew these two empires fought but could not have named any of the episodes nor did I realize the direct link to the Muslim conquests.
> Cities like Venice, Verdun, Utrecht, Prague and Mainz all did good business trafficking slaves to Arab lands, above all, women and children. It was the Vikings, however, who seized control of this lucrative business, eventually building trading stations along the Russian river systems flowing south towards the Black and Caspian seas that grew into towns such as Kiev and Novgorod.
I knew about the Vikings and the Volga slave trade but did not know it previously extended to northern and central Europe; not sure if Wikipedia has a detailed article, but there's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_in_medieval_Europe#Sla...
Generally, the view taught in schools in the West is that "civilization" as we know it developed pretty much linearly on the axis Greece - Rome - Medieval Europe - Modern Europe/North America. Sure, there were some other civilizations in some obscure places like South America or China, we are given to understand, but they don't really count, they didn't have any lasting impact.
What is all too often neglected is that history doesn't work as simply as that. Greek culture developed in interaction with ancient Persia. Rome was also influenced by places like Carthage in North Africa. The Middle Ages in Europe weren't known as the "Dark Ages" for nothing - compared to contemporary Arabia, it looked pretty barbarous. (Arabian influences on medieval Europe are many and varied, ranging from architecture to food and weapons.) In 1793, the envoys of the first British diplomatic mission to imperial China were still viewed as "barbarians" [1].
Of course it is entirely justified to focus mainly on your own history. However, the danger of focussing too much on yourself is that you forget the achievement and importance of others, leading to unwarranted nationalistic pride.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macartney_Embassy
https://youtu.be/Yocja_N5s1I?list=PLBDA2E52FB1EF80C9
Only 42 videos of around 12 minutes. Gave me a good brush up on history.
In modern times, producing an "Official" History of their region is a major undertaking that all nation states engage in. This is where they get to 'correct' the existing biases/stereotypes but a lot of nations lack the interest and frankly survey expertise to produce a decent and accurate History. I'd say that the West in general has been very good at documenting (sometimes with overflowing negative bias) the history of the 'other' much more than the 'other' has been, at documenting their own history.