It’s sad to think that probably about 90% of writing from antiquity is lost. Then again, 100% of all history from before writing was invented is lost. And that’s by far the largest part of human history.
100% of all history from before writing was invented is lost
Not entirely true. Some aboriginal oral traditions have accurately described the Budj Bim and Tower Hill Eruptions that happened 37k years ago, and the dramatic rise in sea levels 7-10k years ago.
The oral traditions of aboriginal tribes is kinda crazy. During the European colonization of australia there are times where you get to see encounters from written documents by Europeans and the history recalled by oral and dance traditions recorded by aboriginals. They tend to match in everything but perspective and often the aboriginal depictions are often more detailed.
Yeah, some of the stuff that has been able to be confirmed via geological studies is just insane. It’s crazy to me how they aren’t more widely known for disrupting the idea of prehistory.
I wouldn’t say the idea of prehistory is disrupted per se. But we have to accept that it’s region-dependent. In any given region (recorded) history started when the oldest still available account was preserved.
Some regions are far better at preserving very old accounts than others.
While the aboriginals underwent and still endure settler colonialism it hasn’t been as long or quite as thorough as the Roman occupation and then christianization that the celts went through. Australia is also so much bigger than the UK, so it would be hard to complete a very effective act of genocide against spiritual or tribal leaders as they did to the druids.
Even so some Celtic oral traditions were still going on strong up till the 19th century, often being little changed over thousands of years.
And that’s by far the largest part of human history.
Eh… Depends how you measure the amount of ‘history’.
If just going by length of time, yes. But if you also take into account how many people exist at that time (how much history is happening per unit of time), then there’s an argument to be made that modern history is a much more significant portion, since our population sizes are so much larger than the relatively tiny populations in prehistory. The vast majority of people who have ever existed lived during the period of modern recorded history.
Idk what your classifying as the period of modern recorded history though. Maybe you could say that period started in the 2nd or 3rd millennium BC in the middle east, but that doesn’t mean it started everywhere. At that time there were tons of people who lived without writing, and that continues on until very recently. So even after history was “invented” only a fraction of people lived under societies that practiced it until ~200 years ago.
I’m not going to do all the math but it seems to me a majority of people who ever lived, were not a part of societies that recorded history.
I often wonder how much was lost just in the Library of Alexandria. Start combining that one place, with countless wars, fires and natural disasters throughout time and it boggles my mind thinking about it.
It’s sad to think that probably about 90% of writing from antiquity is lost. Then again, 100% of all history from before writing was invented is lost. And that’s by far the largest part of human history.
Lost and waiting to be found. Instead we spend money on wars 🤷
Not entirely true. Some aboriginal oral traditions have accurately described the Budj Bim and Tower Hill Eruptions that happened 37k years ago, and the dramatic rise in sea levels 7-10k years ago.
The oral traditions of aboriginal tribes is kinda crazy. During the European colonization of australia there are times where you get to see encounters from written documents by Europeans and the history recalled by oral and dance traditions recorded by aboriginals. They tend to match in everything but perspective and often the aboriginal depictions are often more detailed.
That’s actually amazing that information that old survived the telephone game
The local Aboriginals to me have oral stories about the most recent ice age.
If I had money I’d spend all my time learning from these people
Yeah, some of the stuff that has been able to be confirmed via geological studies is just insane. It’s crazy to me how they aren’t more widely known for disrupting the idea of prehistory.
I wouldn’t say the idea of prehistory is disrupted per se. But we have to accept that it’s region-dependent. In any given region (recorded) history started when the oldest still available account was preserved.
Some regions are far better at preserving very old accounts than others.
Blame the people who don’t look like them but run the country. Anglo fragility won’t give brown people have a chance.
What happened to the Celts’ oral traditions? How are indigenous Australians’ historical depictions still stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive?
(Is it because ignorant bozos like me are oblivious to them?)
While the aboriginals underwent and still endure settler colonialism it hasn’t been as long or quite as thorough as the Roman occupation and then christianization that the celts went through. Australia is also so much bigger than the UK, so it would be hard to complete a very effective act of genocide against spiritual or tribal leaders as they did to the druids.
Even so some Celtic oral traditions were still going on strong up till the 19th century, often being little changed over thousands of years.
Well… The Romanisation of Europe happened.
Which could be described as a genocide of Celtic people
Eh… Depends how you measure the amount of ‘history’.
If just going by length of time, yes. But if you also take into account how many people exist at that time (how much history is happening per unit of time), then there’s an argument to be made that modern history is a much more significant portion, since our population sizes are so much larger than the relatively tiny populations in prehistory. The vast majority of people who have ever existed lived during the period of modern recorded history.
You sure about that, this says that 117 billion people of our species have ever lived. Writing is around 5,000 years old, and initially was used for accounting so history doesn’t come around until later, whereas the species is 200,000 years old.
Idk what your classifying as the period of modern recorded history though. Maybe you could say that period started in the 2nd or 3rd millennium BC in the middle east, but that doesn’t mean it started everywhere. At that time there were tons of people who lived without writing, and that continues on until very recently. So even after history was “invented” only a fraction of people lived under societies that practiced it until ~200 years ago.
I’m not going to do all the math but it seems to me a majority of people who ever lived, were not a part of societies that recorded history.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimates_of_historical_world_population?wprov=sfla1
According to the wiki about half of all humans have lived in the last 2000 years.
I often wonder how much was lost just in the Library of Alexandria. Start combining that one place, with countless wars, fires and natural disasters throughout time and it boggles my mind thinking about it.