Right, the "fertile crescent" was a cornucopia of abundance. It provide everything to support a rich food chain and allowed energy to be redirected from hunter

Right, the "fertile crescent" was a cornucopia of abundance. It provide everything to support a rich food chain and allowed energy to be redirected from hunter gathering towards agriculture and domestication. It's thought that the Sahara Desert is the result of human overgrazing and overfarming, which would create hardhsips which required problem-solving different than those in harsh climates with large seasonality. My US education is rife with hidden biases, I'm aware the British Empire fed it's engine through exploitation, but how did it start? The BE stole from India but that was because it had the muscle power already: my original thoughts were, if people lived in harsh climates and the food didn't jump into your basket, then there was more competition to survive in general, and those who could corral people to take over other resources were granted control of their own fiefdom. Rinse and repeat over royal generations and the bigger fish swallows the smaller, until they set sail around the world. This doesn't explain why Africa did not take a similar path in history.