Recently I have been posting quite a lot about the History Bloggers' Guild. This as taken up a lot of space and my number of history-related posts have been going down. To stop this I am getting 2 new goals. More "old-fashioned" posts, and more traffic. So here goes.
How to start? I haven't done this in a while. Well let's start with the Middle Ages. People so often just forget about the rest of the world when talking about the Middle Ages. They only think of what was happening in Europe. Why is this? Is it because all our schools put so much emphasis on European history?
This is just an announcement, so many of my linked blogs have not posted since Monday 14. It doesn't seem like meer coincidence. If you have one of those blogs and are reading this, please tell me why.
3 comments:
Our modern history begins in the middle ages -- in Europe. By 'we', I mean those of us who live in liberal republics. It was the 'Power vs Ideology' struggle of the middle ages that laid the groundwork for our modern political theories. In Europe, there were two power centers -- the state, which controlled political power; and the church, which controlled ideology. In Asia, (including Byzantium), these things (power and ideology) were (and still are in China) consolidated in the state thus resulting in totalitarian regimes. Now, I'm not trying to say that the medieval kingdoms weren't autocratic, but the intellectual groundwork was in place for challenging the authority of the existing states when the time came. This is why the European Middle Ages are important if you want to understand where we came from.
Sorry I can't be more detailed, but I heard that lecture back in 1997. Be glad I remember that much.
Reign of Sovereigns: Just read your comment on Back IV: Some Old Traditions and it triggered further thoughts. I posted them to my blog if you're interested...http://thiswildride.blogspot.com/2005/03/have-we-been-here-before.html.
Great blog, Scriptor. I've got you linked on my blogroll, This Wild Ride/
A very simple and direct explanation: the United States was created by former British colonies. Prior to colonization and later independence, US history is British history, and British history is European history. There may have been paper and printing in China centuries before Europe, and Great Zimbabwe may have been the first to make iron, but if it had no impact on, or was unknown in, Europe, it really didn't figure in "our" history or contribute to our development.
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