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The Romans looked upon the New Kingdom the way we look at the Romans. And the New Kingdom looked upon the Old Kingdom the way we view the New Kingdom.

ashark 9y ago
I've got Lichtheim's 3-volume Literature of Ancient Egypt. The time between the earliest and latest entries in that collection? Something like 2400-2500 years (IIRC). And (again IIRC) it stops a few hundred years shy of crossing the BC/AD boundary. It spans 4-5 related, but distinct, major civilizations living on roughly the same land, only the last couple of which are recent enough to squeeze onto the leading edge of where we usually start the narrative of recorded history. The "ancient world" had its own ancient world.
- jerrylives 9y ago
  Absolutely. Even before the Pyramids, imagine being an ancient nomadic human circa 5000-4000 BCE and coming across the ruins of Göbekli Tepe. Also another perspective fun fact: Stonehenge is older than the Pyramids
  - nerfhammer 9y ago
    They wouldn't understand how old it is. They would just say "huh, some people must have been here long ago."
    - jerrylives 9y ago
      I think you underestimate our ancestors
    - bbctol 9y ago
      They'd be more likely to say "Some gods lived here long ago."
  - avenoir 9y ago
    A little off topic. Gobekli Tepe is a really fascinating find. The size of the pillars, the inscriptions, the intricate designs of the pottery and jewelry (with cleanly drilled holes in them) give a glimpse of a sophisticated civilization with architecture and farming at a time when humans are supposed to be hunter-gatherers. Graham Hancock has a few very interesting books on this. He seems to believe that humans basically go through periods of amnesia or better put get periodically wiped out, lose their bearings and start over again. We become just like that ancient human circa 5000 BC looking at the ruins of Gobekli Tepe. Or the modern human looking at the Pyramids all over the ancient world and trying to piece history together.
    - Turing_Machine 9y ago
      A more recent example: the Mississippian Culture in North America. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippian_culture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippian_culture By the time Europeans penetrated to most of these areas, the cultures were nothing but legends. Only the mounds remained.
    - sooheon 9y ago
      Gobekli Tepe is awesome, but Mr. Hancock is a hack. He may begin with facts, but takes them to unfounded conclusions which "challenge mainstream science" (read: contain no discernible falsifiable thesis, recede ever into knowledge gaps, and are defined primarily by being anti-establishment).

ashark 9y ago

I've got Lichtheim's 3-volume Literature of Ancient Egypt. The time between the earliest and latest entries in that collection? Something like 2400-2500 years (IIRC). And (again IIRC) it stops a few hundred years shy of crossing the BC/AD boundary. It spans 4-5 related, but distinct, major civilizations living on roughly the same land, only the last couple of which are recent enough to squeeze onto the leading edge of where we usually start the narrative of recorded history. The "ancient world" had its own ancient world.

jerrylives 9y ago
Absolutely. Even before the Pyramids, imagine being an ancient nomadic human circa 5000-4000 BCE and coming across the ruins of Göbekli Tepe. Also another perspective fun fact: Stonehenge is older than the Pyramids
- nerfhammer 9y ago
  They wouldn't understand how old it is. They would just say "huh, some people must have been here long ago."
  - jerrylives 9y ago
    I think you underestimate our ancestors
  - bbctol 9y ago
    They'd be more likely to say "Some gods lived here long ago."
- avenoir 9y ago
  A little off topic. Gobekli Tepe is a really fascinating find. The size of the pillars, the inscriptions, the intricate designs of the pottery and jewelry (with cleanly drilled holes in them) give a glimpse of a sophisticated civilization with architecture and farming at a time when humans are supposed to be hunter-gatherers. Graham Hancock has a few very interesting books on this. He seems to believe that humans basically go through periods of amnesia or better put get periodically wiped out, lose their bearings and start over again. We become just like that ancient human circa 5000 BC looking at the ruins of Gobekli Tepe. Or the modern human looking at the Pyramids all over the ancient world and trying to piece history together.
  - Turing_Machine 9y ago
    A more recent example: the Mississippian Culture in North America. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippian_culture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippian_culture By the time Europeans penetrated to most of these areas, the cultures were nothing but legends. Only the mounds remained.
  - sooheon 9y ago
    Gobekli Tepe is awesome, but Mr. Hancock is a hack. He may begin with facts, but takes them to unfounded conclusions which "challenge mainstream science" (read: contain no discernible falsifiable thesis, recede ever into knowledge gaps, and are defined primarily by being anti-establishment).