Can you do a piece on the life of a average slave in Rome vs Athens/Thebes/Corinth (your choice) (If the differences are measurable that is) Thanks Metatronyt
Good thing you made this video, I saw the title just as I was getting ready to turn on my time machine and go back to try and annoy Socrates by asking him endless questions.
Can you imagine people from 1000 years in the future finding this articles and saying "people from the 2000's didn't understand the past." What a good example we're leaving to the next generations. Good video as always, mate.
It's a cycle that has existed for a while, every future generation likes to believe they have become greater than the last and will look down on the past.
More like "People from 2000's didn't wash their hands, and there even were medical campaigns to teach people that hygiene is an important thing, as evident by the great 2019 virus plague." Because people never seem to understand the past and are prone to believe the craziest things about it.
Historian method changed many times in the past. At the beginning, until 1700, they only read annals and chronicles, which were written almost every time in cities, so they completely underestimated what happened outside. Then archaeology come and changed everything, then genomics, statistics, applied economics, and so on. So history you had at school still says middle age was a terrible age, while the amount of skeletons from this age, with evidence of starving, are much less than the ones in the roman period, which is seen as a golden age. The myth of the horrible, dark Middle Ages comes from enlightenment, to prove that without enlightenment nothing can be achieved. Such historian can't explain renaissance, which they kind of ignore or diminish, because of ideology. To add more disaster, in many high schools the teacher of history is never a historian, more commonly is history and philosophy (they believe ideas make history) or worst, teachers of literature, which is even worse, since they take for good whatever a romance says. For example, this is why in the UK people thinks that Romeo and Juliet story was plausible in Italy.Shakespeare took inspiration from several Italian sources, and added many things which were not true, neither plausible. Cappelletti (not Capuleti) were not a Verona's family, and since Cappelletti were guelph, while Montecchi were against, this would have been the political reason, not the blood. If the problem was only blood, more likely they would have been ally, meaning Romeo and Juliet were more likely to get FORCED to marry, to bind the two families. (If only Cappelletti were living in Verona, I mean). Of course, if you are into English literature, you think this is pure history, while the whole story was circulating (quite different thou) during Dante's time. Why? Because this is what a literature teacher is supposed to do. So, pop history is mostly the result of bad teachers, and obsolete research methods.
I was having this conversation with my dad the other day, he grew up in a house without any kind of central heating, no indoor toilet, no running hot water. It's bonkers that things invented by the Greeks and Romans (indoor plumbing, flushing toilets, underfloor heating) took so long become the norm for everyone. It's not like nobody in the middle ages had indoor toilets, running water etc, it was just rarer...
If you grow up in those circumstances then you're used to it, just like being born 2000+ years ago or today. You have to appreciate the simplicity of the past compared with today, at least I do. People talk about these phones, medicines, quality of life features and what not - I could honestly live without any of those, there are people even to this day that live like that depending on where in the world they are located. I'm not talking about some rich person in their 60's building a cabin in the woods. After all we're all here today because our ancestors did just fine with what they had. I'm sure people born 500-1000 years from now will look back at our time and laugh at how ridiculous we were.
Curse you for not making this video sooner! I just came back from Ancient Greece and it was a nightmare, I was in Athens and I asked some weird bearded guy called Socrates or something if he knew where I can charge my phone and instead of answering me like a normal person je started to question my motives for wanting to charge my phone by using bizzare comparisons with sailors, soldiers and somehow even managed to bring in the need for censoring Homer into the conversation. This went on for two hours, I finnaly ran away after he began talking about the moral qualities of rocks. Ancient Greece must be a hallucination, don't go there!
@@helvete_ingres4717 It was less that he was an enemy of the people and more that he was an enemy of the _wrong_ people who had political power. Athens was not a state free of corruption.
Also Socrates totally wanted to die. He was given an easy out during his trial but instead he intentionally sabotaged his defence so that he would go down in history as the philosopher killed for his beliefs. He did it for his legacy and that's why we remember him and not all the other philosophers of the same time.
As a Greek, I have to say that your channel is a real masterpiece to historical research! I have been following you for years and your videos are absolutely amazing.
Μολις διαβασα τον τιτλο εφαγα φρικη, κυριως γιατι ηταν σε βιντεακι του Μετατρον! Μεχρι το τελος του βιντεο γελαγα. Να ναι καλα το παλικαρι, μακαρι οι καθηγητες στο σχολειο να ειχαν το παθος του.
The fact that you might br Greek says nothing to me. These are all anti-Greek nonsences no place in human history was ever perfect. You all can go back to medieval period and before you knew it you would end up blind,tortured and then dead. Perhaps that period suits you all.
I remember reading a historical account where ancient Greeks loved to display physical prowess, where one commander climbed up a rope in armor using one arm only and then did a flip at the top of the wall. I don't know if the story is true, but that story always gave me the impression that the Greek armor had to be light enough for scaling walls, charging, et cetera.
They found a big ass rock that they dated back to during Ancient Greek times that a guy carved into it which said "(Greek name) lifted this rock with one hand above head " and it was about 200 pounds. So even back then there were ppl that were athletic as fuck.
@@theamericandream5917 - Or had really good press. He likely used two hands to get it high enough so he could use one to lift it over his head. Unless two buddies hefted it for him.
This is why movies and fantasy is nice. You would probably not tolerate to stand near him, cause he would most likely be stinking. Include smells in your fantasies and you will see most of the times, we are fantacising too romantically :D
I was a soldier in the US Army from 2000 to 2005. One day just for the fun of it I weighed myself in just my uniform and then again with all my equipment (flack vest, weapon, etc). The equipment added around 50 pounds.
Jesus Christ you picked an incredibly dangerous period to enlist. 50 pounds...oh man. What is the minimum expected equipment weight when deployed in combat and for how long (in miles) is it expected of you to carry that?
Some people can't sleep at night because they are up concerned and confused that some people don't want to be sheltered and pampered all the time, and would rather face risks and challenges once in a while. Thinking it is any of their business how other people want to live.
Good thing you're enthusiastic, because your vulnerability to diseases 2.5K years removed from what our immune systems are equipped to deal with would most certainly mean you're not coming back from that, so enjoy your stay for however long it manages to last.
@@leonardomarquesbellini If you are a descendent of people who lived through those plagues, you will have inherited their immune system adaptations. 2500 years is not very much time when speaking about evolutionary adaptations.
As a modern person who had heart surgery and type 2 diabetes I would definetly not want to time travel anywhere beyond a week to any place before 2000. However, as you said modern writers seem to think things were always bad in the past. Most of the plagues and disease happened in relatively short time periods. The reason the Black Death and the plagues of Justinian were so particularly terrible was that they just kept coming back over and over. Without a modern understanding of viruses from basically anytime before 1950 death by plague still kind of happened (see the Spanish Flu). Labour up until modern times was largely done by very poor or slave/servile classes throughout history until the industrial revolution gave some parts of the world the ability to limit the types of jobs needed for that kind of labour. Still there are people that live like that now (industrial near slavery in the 3rd world still is happening). We just love to give ourselves too much credit because technology advances and forget that we still have the same basic body type, brain capacity, and limits our ice age ancestors did.
Heart disease and diabetes are caused by the modern diet (seed oils and sugar respectively). If you went back in time, your health would improve dramatically in that respect. Knowing about germ theory and thus basic sanitation, you would have a major leg up. tbh I would consider it.
Brains are shrinking... In a couple of generations they won't be able to use even smartphones. Idiocracy would look like a Renaissence University in comparison.
@@grugnotice7746 Both existed well before modern diets, you can say they are largely caused by a modern diet, but saying they didn't exist before is just being stupid.
I may be wrong on this, but I always thought that a major reason for Sparta not having walls was to prevent the Helots from being able to fortify a position while the army was off on campaign.
Basically this, Ivan. The reason is entirely geographic. Firstly, any large army mustering anywhere is not going to have a chance in hell of being "secret". Word travels fast, and you'd know if an army was coming your way. Laconia is blessed with the kind of terrain that's not so easy to invade. The Spartans would simply raise the army, (and being that every able-bodied citizen was already full-time prepped for war, this was fast), and move to one of the various choke points you'd have to travel through to reach them, cut you off and wait there. It's a bit like trying to invade an inland sea that you can only reach via rivers. Find the river they're coming from and block it. If the terrain you're trying to invade only has a few little spots from which you can actually even assemble a 8-10,000+ composition of men, (the average size of hoplite armies), there's only so many places to actually try to fight the enemy too, and they'll be ready and assembled long before you are.
There is a story that when the persians arrived at sparta they didn’t believe that the village they saw before them was the infamous sparta, given that it didn’t even have any walls, And thus they moved on with their campaign without sacking the city
In my reading of ancient warfare, there is much mention of supply carts. It seems armies on the move travelled by foot and did not wear or carry all their equipment and supplies. Supply carts carried extra parts to repair weapons, food, tents, and various gear. Logistics has it seems, always been an important part of going to war. Many thanks Metatron. 👍👍
I laughed through the movie "300'. An entire army of Greek men and not a body hair on any of them. I was waiting for a disco ball to drop and an old Weather Girls song to start pumping that jam.
Love the "armor weight 40 pounds!" Type stuff about any historical period. They say the entire suit weighs so much and was encumbering, yet my plate carrier without any mags in it weights 22 pounds (11 pounds each steel plate)
Yeah, they act like the average kit any human can carry and still be effective as a soldier somehow magically changes. It was proven time and time again that the average infantry soldiers carry roughly the same amount. From ancient Greece to Rome, medieval men at arms and knights, samurai, WW1, WW2, current day.
Modern combat load is about 70 lbs. More in cold weather. Ammo, grenades, and your extra weapon, like a mortar tube, machine gun ammo, or any shoulder fired weapon weighs a ton
@@CrizzyEyeshis point is that the weights are roughly the same, and that people can only carry so much while still being able to travel long distances/be effective in combat. The only reason loads are heavier today is because of a) better weight distribution (putting all of the weight in easier to carry areas) b) vehicles (horses also can only carry so much) and c) guns and ammunition require far less movement and far less flexibility in combat
Today there is still a myth that an ordinary citizen in ancient Greece was highly sophisticated and highly educated, practiced philosophy and was an atheist or at least an agnostic. In reality, this idealized depiction of the Greeks only concerned a small part of their philosophers and not their entire people, but modern people still love the story for an unknown reason that has remained a mystery to me because people are usually not willing to tell about it.
@@blacktigerpaw1 Plus the draconic and abusive warrior training which includes encouraged theft and sanctioned murder of a slave (well if you didn't get caught)
@@gilgameshkingofheroes5903 must be from Epicuereus tetrapharmakón "against the fear of divine punishment" Apathy was """tolerated""" but open denial or disregard of religion could be a death sentence Socrates was accused also of preaching disregard for the gods of the polis
Have you heard of the "Radium girls" in the 1920's? Their job was to paint the numbers on watch faces - with radium paste. They had to 'point' the brushes with their lips, as other methods were 'more wasteful and time-consuming'. Several of them took to wearing the stuff as make-up, and were considered very glamourous at the time. Other toxins commonly ingested in fairly recent history are lead and mercury. English candies used to use such ingredients to make them look more colourful. Arsenic was also used to dye cloth green. We have a sad history of poisoning ourselves, mostly through sheer ignorance.
@@edstar83 I have noticed that the spanish-speaking😃 people who live in Greece are the only ones who can easily learn and speak greek correctly with perfect accent as well. On the other hand, this is almost impossible when it comes to people from slavic-speaking😝 or germanic-speaking🤪 countries regardless of how many years they live here.
I empathize with his frustration *so much!* He handles it better than I do; the "filthy middle ages" fallacy ( at like, only 1:16 into the vid) would have sent me pacing and flailing my arms, clutching at my forehead, and beseeching the heavens for divine strength, or wisdom, or retribution, or something, anything! I get enough of that on a daily basis as it is, dealing with adults who seem unable to comprehend even the simplest concepts. Like "when it rains, things get wet" (exaggerated for humourous effect, but not by much). I can't envision a world where I would willingly subject myself to such horrors. Just the thought makes me want to curl up in the fetal position
Interesting video! Yes, more on Greeks and hoplites please! The Hellenistic Period too (my favorite, and often even more misunderstood than Classical Greece and Rome).
13:16 I had a medieval history professor who didn't understand the terrain/geographic advantages to fortifying Constantinople/Byzantium and merely understood the defensive merit in 1 dimension and that was in terms of big walls.
I usually can't stand debunk videos, but this is actuallt quite good. You don't only have knowledge, but also a sense of proportion most youtubers lack. Thank You
I teach philosophy in France and despite everything you said, I'd love to go back there and become an Epicure disciple if I could. What a strange society that was... Plato was sold as a slave before even starting to write stuff.
@@SetuwoKecik Yeah... that multiculturalism worked out really well for the Achaemedid Persians... oh wait... no it didnt... Now Western Civilization is repeating their mistakes...
There is nothing wrong with multiculturalism Just mass immigration combined with poverty and the housing crisis That is causing all The issues in the eu
Great video as always. Now, my usual nitpicking: as far as I know, the shield was called the “aspis”, and the term “hoplon” referred to the gear as a whole. The “Hoplite” would be “the equipped one” and the term “panoply” derives from what they called “full gear”(helmet, cuirass, shield and greaves), as “pan”=“whole” or “all”. Please correct me if I am mistaken. 😉
I've found that a lot of people have bizarre views of history like we've degraded from back in the day because they simply don't know stuff. When The Passion of the Christ came out, my friend, who I met when we both got our PoliSci degrees, said it affected her because "How could people in the past do that to others?" I had this wtf moment in my head like "You-you mean you _didn't know_ about all the messed-up sh*t that people did historically? What?" How do you make it through a political science degree _without_ learning this stuff?
@@nelus7276 I mean you can be affected by a movie like The Passion of Christ about the hedonistic nature of men and still be aware that historically men have created misery for other men and women for as long as humans have existed.
I distinctly recall in my classics class that Ancient Greece was basically a long set of brutal wars with gentle sprinkling of slightly less brutal wars.
@@findingbeautyinthepain8965 If not for the Art of war, World history would be 12 page comic book. They teach children not to settle their differences with threats and violence, yet the most refined successful mature adults of the world rely upon settling their differences through violence and threats
@@godetonter4764 What exactly is your point here though? Yes, psychopaths tend to climb quickly through political and financial power hierarchies, because of their lack of empathy and often narcissistic worldview that allows them to cruelly carve their way to corrupt and predatory positions whose structure has itself been built over generations by similar people. How does this delegitimize how people are taught in schools not to choose violence first and foremost? The vast majority of people aren't psychopaths, and therefore generally wish to avoid said violence, in order to protect the people around them and actually make life liveable without constant fear of violence. Is that such a hard concept to grasp? And I'd hardly call most of these individuals "refined". It's easy to surround yourself with wealth when you've stolen that wealth from the unfortunate and enslave your nation so you can eat fancy meals with equally self-absorbed individuals. I think you are confusing actual intellectual refinement with sheer hedonistic narcissism and sadistic pleasure-seeking. Mate you need a reality check, and probably a brain scan too, you might be a psychopath yourself.
@@godetonter4764 That’s so true! I remember thinking I hated history until my early 20’s because we only learned Military history in school. I remember being super interested in learning about the full truth of slavery, and all we learned was when it started, when it ended, and that it was bad, despite half my class being wealthy black girls with elite parents. (I mention the black students’ economic station, because the elites are usually catered to.) It wasn’t until I did my own research on every day people’s real lives when I realized I love history.
@@godetonter4764 That's a bit of a simpleminded Nietzschean view of things. The "most refined, successful, mature adults of the world" make a lot of effort to avoid conflict, and to mitigate its destructiveness when it does happen. Warrior cults are parasitic on civilization, and the more educated versions that some places had in history were mostly due to a lack of economic development. Smart, driven people today can get ahead in life without being malicious to others.
11:51 ~ "If you're a pacifist, you're gonna hate this world, regardless of when you were born." The East Asian region -- comprising China, Japan, Korea and Vietnam -- was a pretty peaceful place for nearly a millennium since the 9th or 10th Century AD. After all, during this period the region was geopolitically very stable. Would have been a nice place for pacifists, at least relatively speaking.
As a Greek the title freaked me out! Luckily i watched through all of it and was laughing by the end. Thank you Metatron for pointing out the uniformed. Keep up the excellent work you are doing and never stop being a Rome fanboy.
What is strange about this article is that they don't mention the most obvious: democracy in Athens was only for free men. You wouldn't want to be a slave or a woman in ancient Athens. As a woman, you were beter off in Sparta. As a slave, it didn't matter.
@@BladeValant546 but as Frans stated, you had more rights as a woman in sparta, than in Athens middel class in sparta, who do you think build the weapons and armor for the Spartans, cause the Spartans werent working the forges, those werent spartans, but they still had rights
Sure, life for women in ancient Greece was a bit more like life for them in a modern Arabic country, i.e it wasn’t so bad. The biggest threat, as always before the age of anti-biotics, was childbirth with a mortality of something like 15%.
Democracy in Athens was managed by people who had skin in the game. Random homeless peoples who understood nothing about the political climate were not permitted a vote for good reason. Even in the modern Internet days people don't know who or what they're looking for.
Nice video Raffaello!. Personally I would like to see more of your videos about the Classical and Hellenistic era! Wouldn't mind to see a future about the Byzantine Empire/Eastern Roman Empire from you.
Agreed. Very nice video. As a modern soldier one will be carrying quite a bit of weight in just brass from the shell casings. 2016, the marine corps times reported a new standard for strength and endurance. An average Marine Corps infantry officer should to be physically able to carry 152 lbs. for nine miles. That load might sound extreme, but from 1st hand experience one can end up carrying up to 100 lbs or more if he is a bigger fellow. I'm 6ft 1in & about 200lbs, my pack weight was normally around 80lbs but at times would be around 120lbs or more.
I remember in 9th grade we had 2 schol days per week where we had to carry 20kg (45lb) weight of books to school. It was the worst school year of our lives, but when a 14 year old can carry this weight just on their shoulders an adult who was either trained to be a soldier or worked their ass off on fields should be able to carry 70lb distributed over different body parts.
you are correct on the Minoan toilet. The earliest "plumbing" would be the Indus river valley peoples around 2000 B.C.E. Plumbing is quite old. oh and to add the Minoan's were around 3500 B.C.E.
Just found this channel the other day and I am hooked! Glad to see someone as fascinated and knowledgeable about history as I am. You just got a new sub Mr. Metatron 😎👍
Some truth to it but that's not the middle ages. More Elizabethian and it was more like several times a year, with wipedowns and face washing and frequent hand bathing. A bath in May and a nuptial tie in June. Medieval folks might have recoiled at that, depending on where they were from.
@@matthewlaurence3121if you ever had to live through SoCal water restrictions, you might be surprised at the mileage you can get out of a washcloth and a sink full of hot water.
Hello Metatron, as excellent as usual. Can you consider making a video/reaction about Oversimplify video about the first punic war. Or maybe you yourself making video about the first Punic war. I surprise how little the first Punic war video there are in YT
What people don't understand about ancient warfare is that ancient warfare had way less casualties than modern war. This is because most people naturally try to not kill each other intentionally. The further they are away from the one they are "shooting at" the more accurate they become. It's a psychological thing. This is one of the reasons for why snipers tend to have a high kill count.
Warriors were bred for killing. Carthaginians slaughtered tens of thousands of Romans at Cannae with swords and spears IN A DAY. Such scale of violence would only come back with Napoleon and the first world war. And at that time, it was killing with firearms and artillery, not with one's hands.
On the other hand medicine was relatively bad compared to mdoern medicine. While nowadays quite some wounds can be healed back then it would have been a death sentence.
@@GamingKnight0820 The ancient Greek battles weren't that big either, nowhere near the size of Roman battles for example. I don't know the casualty rates during those periods, but during the medieval period losing 5% of an army was considered taking heavy losses. We remember the battles where armies were wiped out because they were so rare.
About the weight of the Hoplon, well you have to take into account that things were hand made back then. Someone could say "hey, I want it thicker, I don't mind if it's heavier", and the artisan would just make it thicker and heavier.
Modern armor can be very heavy, it's not unheard of that US Army/Marines infantry teams or specialized heavy weapon teams could exceed 110+ pounds on a good day. The basic equipment itself (of which I have worn) vest, plates, ammunition (depending on type and amount) and weapon with a basic ruck sack can easily exceed 70 lbs. At times it might been easier to wear full plate armor, that would have been lighter, though the ballistic protection may be a bit lacking, lol.
Wonderful video, thanks. Let's not forget Herodotus who basically went around gathering stories and tales and legends but got so many things wrong that his "history" is mostly just anecdote. Fun reading but not history in the modern sense.
looking at the fact that amny known greek ppl lived for almost 80 years it is sick to think it was bad xd. As a fun of ancient greece i love this type of stuff.
Ciao Raffaele !! Sono Greg un ragazzo di 12 anni di Torino che e INNAMORATO della storia. Sei bravissimo ! continua cosi' un giorno potresti fare un video sulla organizzazione degli eserciti vichinghi ciaooooo 😄😃😃😃😃😃
I think it also depends on the kind of time travel. I would prefer to be able to travel and just witness events as a spectator (and be able to come back to my time) rather than end up in the role of an inhabitant of that time.
I already know where I'm time traveling to: sunny 1983! You ever look at the Billboard charts from then? Every. Single. Song is a classic! No filler! You look at just about any other year and there's lots of stuff that we've all rightly forgotten about by now. But not 1983! Banger after banger after banger.
If I was to argue with anyone about life in Greece, I'd stick with just a single word: Galen. Sure, Galen wasn't perfect, but considering his time period, AND how far our own medical treatments have come in the last 150 years, Galen was the father of modern medicine and could very well have lived as the perfect doctor for the 19th century.
They don't even try to think this through do they? Every soldier ever carried about the same weight because that is the weight health men can carry for long distances. If they could carry more they would bring more with them. Anything above that weight gets left behind because exhausted men can't fight.
Also, Spartans had helots (slaves) to farm their lands. The sheer numbers of helots that the conquest of Messenia added to the stockpile (guess what, they had too little land to farm, so they went to war), meant that Spartans needed to be trained well to keep those ~10 slaves per Spartan citizen in line. Try keeping a group ten times larger than yours from revolting successfully without military training and experience.
easy one guy going regularly to gym and training box will easily crush 10 regular soyboys graineates on street 😂 it would be enough to hit 2 and all the rest would escape right away... that's why Teutonic knights could have 13 Knights per castle and defend easily from pagan raids that's why Spartans kept subjects in fear terrorising them at night or randomly killing in woods for own safety
@@Szymek25 That's one analogy, I guess. The Spartans indeed had an annual "culling of the herd" where their boys turned into men through killing helots.
@@Szymek25 Someone has not heard of the invention of the pointy stick that can kill lions and mammoth multiple times the strength of a normal human being, even the most badass warrior will die from one well/lucky placed shank by one of the 10 soyboys. The Spartans only maintained their slaves through psychology and nothing else.
I’d love to time travel with the Metatron! He’d regal me with endless tales of historical cheek clapping near and far!! It would be the best because the Metatron is the best!!!!
I wish I could say I am glad I watched this before executing my travel plans, but, well, I always got plenty of time. 😉 3:37 Oh boy. That is wrong in both directions. 12:29 There are no surviving historical records of 404 BC. It's like it never existed. 😜 It's a web of conspiracy. 12:44 I wish more people were aware of the first sentence today, when people are told by their government what their enemy is like while alternative versions are suppressed. This is, of course, closely related to the well-established saying: _History is written by the winners._
Always great moments when they judge ancient people with modern standards. Next week we'll learn Caesar and Napoleon were complete idiots because they didn't use tanks and stealth fighters !
Just got into your channel, so I apologize for being late to the party. However, per your comment on modern soldiers, I'm a retired United States Marine Corps Officer and we routinely carried 100lb (45 KG) packs on long marches. Sometimes significantly higher. Even when we 'dropped packs' and went with an assault bag, I would still have my primary weapon system, ammo, water, food, IFAK, body armor, etc. I would have been ecstatic to just have a sword and bronze breastplate to worry about. My back also probably wouldn't hurt like it does now....
Nice vid there sir. Assumptions...though some might say that when dealing with the past, especially the distant past, there is a certain level of inherent assumption.
I am so impressed with your work! ... so gladly I subscribe. You have a great way to engage people in history. What you are doing is very important. Thank you.😅
One thing they don’t mention about ancient battles is the casualtie rate was much lower on average. In most cases it was two armies running into each other back and forth into one got to tired or injured and turned back or surrendered. The actual death toll was normally not massive. Meanwhile WW1 we’re losing hundreds of thousands a day It was normally only when a army completely broke in the middle of a battle that so many would die
Greek poleis used to settle their disputes with battles on prearranged dates and places, they didn't pursue the routing enemy or take prisoners of war; casualties were low. During the Peloponnesian War this changed, as Athens and Sparta often took punitive action against disloyal cities.
I remember back in college I got my professor very excited and awake. I was an art history minor, and was taking a History of the Renaissance class for an easy history credit. I made a comment about the "Florentine Renaissance" and his eye lit up and he said, "What do you mean by that?" So I explained that at the time we consider the Renaissance to be in full swing in Florence, Northern Europe was still struggling with the new ideas of 3 point perspective and human anatomy. The Renaissance lasted a few hundred years because it took that long for the ideas to spread, not because there were 300 years worth of ideas. People think of history, ESPECIALLY THE MIDDLE AGES, as some sort of global culture and that just because things were a certain way in 600 AD, they were also the same way in a different area, 400 years later...because "The Dark Ages."
Yea, they pretty much didn't have the internet to share idea's back then. We didn't get the internet and climate change until Bob Dole invented them (sarcasm).
It's so simple to understand this though. "People in the year 2020 believed in Corona vaccines." That statement is about an actual global phenomenon. But still, some did, some didn't. Some ares had more people that did, some fewer. Or just compare like this: "Many gladiators died in the colloseum." "Many boxers, footballers and race car drivers died in those violent public spectacles of the 20th century."
okay i watched the video (as a woman i didnt think ancient greece is for me anyway) and here are some things i'd like to add, agree with everything you say Medicine: article points out that it wasnt until the 5th century that Greek medicine really took the form we know it for. you rightly point out that its still a long time ago, and I'd like to add further that this would've been the CLASSICAL AGE which is the time period that I think most people would associate with Ancient Greece. Warfare: I can't see why the average Ancient Greek would even be a pacifist, the cultural context doesn't strike me as conducive to that sort of thinking. It can be more helpful to think of hoplites as a class of people who could afford the armor and farmed when they weren't at war (ancient peoples liked to fight war in summer so it didn't mess with their crop cycle and Greeks are no exception) than farmers who were forced to figure out a way to arm themselves. it was a privilege to be a hoplite. Also, no they didn't have uniforms in the traditional sense (though their armor would've been decorated) EXCEPT for Sparta that was known for all of its soldiers wearing red cloaks or tunics that gave them a uniformed appearance. proper hoplite warfare shouldnt be confusing no matter what you wore because formation was everything. The author also presents the wealthy serving in higher positions in the military differently than I would phrase it, generally the wealthy/elite/aristocratic classes had higher positions and leadership roles in EVERYTHING. Democratic Athens is the closest you get to an exception to this rule. Sparta: I agree with your points about the geographic location of Sparta made walls unimportant to them. Their most prominent enemies either had to cross through large swathes of Greek territory and fight through other city states (Attica, Corinth, etc.) like the Achaemenids or approach by sea and still have to made a trek inward by land. The quote about not needing the walls is not from 404 BC, but first century AD from Plutarch and attributed to the mythological founder of Sparta. By this time there was already a mythical concept of Sparta in public conciousness, though their iconic laconic way of speaking and wit is attested in contemporary sources Also attributing Spartiate's ability to just focus on their military to the fertility of the Peloponnese is weird. They also kind of just breeze through the fact that there was an entire state-owned population of slaves (helots) much larger than the actual citizen body of Sparta that did everything for them. The plague: They do note it was during the Peloponessian War which is nice, but a major contributing factor is that the population in rural Attica was evacuated to Athens, and the city became so overcrowded (according to Thucydides) that people had to make living quarters in the walls themselves. No brainer that such conditions would be the breeding ground for plague outbreaks.
Words do change meaning over the centuries, and they often switch from a specific meaning to something more generic. The words for spear: ‘longche’, ‘xyston’ and ‘dory’ come to mind.
@@sirrathersplendid4825 I can't really say this happens all that much in Greek. Words have retained their meaning over the centuries, even if the grammar's changed drastically. As per your example, longche and dory wasn't quite the same thing. Longche was the edge of the spear, while dory was the whole weapon itself. As for the xyston, it was a very specific name for a spear that pertained to the way it was manufactured, meaning scratched out to be pointy. Some better examples for your point would be aggelos (angel) and katalavaino (to understand). These have certainly changed meaning since ancient times, but even these are pretty easy to trace out since their form hasn't really changed all that much which makes the roots they came from evident
@@MrPSyman3 - There are ancient texts where all three terms I mentioned for spear are used almost interchangeably, presumably for stylistic reasons to avoid repetition. It’s also not unknown for ancient words for weapons to gain their modern specific definition only in the 19th/20th century, whereas they were used less precisely in their day.
Well presented again Magister. I personally would not travel to ancient Greece but not for the reasons they had given. I would prefer to travel to Karahan Tepe or Gobleki Tepe to find out who built it. I love ancient Greece and was obsessed with Sparta as a child. The weak argument they gave could be used for any point of history without any context. I was impressed by your inclusion of the modern military weight carriage. The UK Army conducted a study into Load Carriage and determined that the modern soldier is carrying the most weight than a soldier at any other point in history. Full bronze armour would be a gift by comparison to the more modern armours worn. As for the shield, that is roughly the same weight as a modern rifle or machine gun depending on the scale given. I do despair when I read these pseudo historical pieces that try and equate historical cultures with modern ones. I firmly believe we have advanced as time progresses but we have also regressed. Humanity is a creature with amnesia. We learn loads but then forget what we have learned. Being able to time travel would be fantastic but also dangerous.
"Here's why you wouldn't want to live in ancient Greece: *bunch of reasons why you wouldn't want to live before the 1960-70's*" I guess technically it's correct?
"You had to buy your own gear." As opposed to modern Russia or Afghanistan where the government does buy you gear but then sells it on the black market instead of giving it to you, and you need to raid the local hiking store for equipment.
Ok, it clearly is not 70lbs for only armour and weapons, but I can see 70lbs total equipment being reasonable. I've carried slightly less than 60 on a camping trip in the mountains. It was really bad for my shoulders and I was slowed quite a bit, but I managed and I'm not very strong also.
I love how the website meant to help us learn, is not even sure about their own words. Like did the article not do research before posting it? Yeah I can see why this one was picked for debunking.
I mean lets be honest. If you took your average modern day schlub and transported him back in time like in some bad Japanese isekai novel. Realistically he'd either die or be a slave for the rest of his days, because that's just how ancient greeks and the ancient world in general, rolled.
@@julietfischer5056 Skallagrim did a whole video about why travel to the middle ages would probably suck. I'm sure it would be doubly so for Ancient Greece.
Depends on if you have useful skills or not (and if you magically get their language or can learn it at all). If you are a medic of any qualification, an engineer, or a chemistry teacher, for example, you'll likely do well. Basically, practical knowledge would have you set up well.
@@tommyfishhouse8050 eh. It was a bit more complex than that. Metic (non-citizen free) women could hold more rights (like financial operations and even court representation) than citizen-women in Athens. It is a rather complex matter, but let's just say that Ancient Greeks didn't limit their women in rights because of belief in their inferiority, but because they viewed rights in a different light than us, modern people (right to vote or be a part of legal system was seen as more of a burden before community, rather than a benefit). I could recommend Sarah Pomeroy's "Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity" as a foundational study into the matter of women's rights in the Antiquity. P.S. But to answer your question, if an educated woman happens to time-travel to Athens, she has a pretty good chance of becoming one of the most famous Hetaira - perhaps even a better decision than being free, Metic owner of a business enterprise of some kind.
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SUBTITLES , PLEASE!
please please do a video Samnite (gladiator type) i am absolutely fascinated with gladiators and real history
please please do a video Samnite (gladiator type) i am absolutely fascinated with gladiators and real history
Can you do a piece on the life of a average slave in Rome vs Athens/Thebes/Corinth (your choice)
(If the differences are measurable that is)
Thanks Metatronyt
please please do a video Samnite (gladiator type) i am absolutely fascinated with gladiators and real history
Good thing you made this video, I saw the title just as I was getting ready to turn on my time machine and go back to try and annoy Socrates by asking him endless questions.
Better disguise yourself as a boys
Just like Bill and Ted. Philosophise with him dude😂😂😂
most excellent
He would've just asked you a bunch of counter-questions.
Tiktok it or it never happened
Can you imagine people from 1000 years in the future finding this articles and saying "people from the 2000's didn't understand the past." What a good example we're leaving to the next generations. Good video as always, mate.
They will probably conclude that there was an obvious propagandistic agenda portraying the past as such.
It's a cycle that has existed for a while, every future generation likes to believe they have become greater than the last and will look down on the past.
Articles are about the worst source of information about us lmao.
More like "People from 2000's didn't wash their hands, and there even were medical campaigns to teach people that hygiene is an important thing, as evident by the great 2019 virus plague." Because people never seem to understand the past and are prone to believe the craziest things about it.
Historian method changed many times in the past. At the beginning, until 1700, they only read annals and chronicles, which were written almost every time in cities, so they completely underestimated what happened outside. Then archaeology come and changed everything, then genomics, statistics, applied economics, and so on. So history you had at school still says middle age was a terrible age, while the amount of skeletons from this age, with evidence of starving, are much less than the ones in the roman period, which is seen as a golden age. The myth of the horrible, dark Middle Ages comes from enlightenment, to prove that without enlightenment nothing can be achieved. Such historian can't explain renaissance, which they kind of ignore or diminish, because of ideology. To add more disaster, in many high schools the teacher of history is never a historian, more commonly is history and philosophy (they believe ideas make history) or worst, teachers of literature, which is even worse, since they take for good whatever a romance says. For example, this is why in the UK people thinks that Romeo and Juliet story was plausible in Italy.Shakespeare took inspiration from several Italian sources, and added many things which were not true, neither plausible. Cappelletti (not Capuleti) were not a Verona's family, and since Cappelletti were guelph, while Montecchi were against, this would have been the political reason, not the blood. If the problem was only blood, more likely they would have been ally, meaning Romeo and Juliet were more likely to get FORCED to marry, to bind the two families. (If only Cappelletti were living in Verona, I mean). Of course, if you are into English literature, you think this is pure history, while the whole story was circulating (quite different thou) during Dante's time. Why? Because this is what a literature teacher is supposed to do. So, pop history is mostly the result of bad teachers, and obsolete research methods.
I love when you debunk nonsense Metatron, and love your humor alot.
I was having this conversation with my dad the other day, he grew up in a house without any kind of central heating, no indoor toilet, no running hot water. It's bonkers that things invented by the Greeks and Romans (indoor plumbing, flushing toilets, underfloor heating) took so long become the norm for everyone.
It's not like nobody in the middle ages had indoor toilets, running water etc, it was just rarer...
If you grow up in those circumstances then you're used to it, just like being born 2000+ years ago or today. You have to appreciate the simplicity of the past compared with today, at least I do. People talk about these phones, medicines, quality of life features and what not - I could honestly live without any of those, there are people even to this day that live like that depending on where in the world they are located. I'm not talking about some rich person in their 60's building a cabin in the woods. After all we're all here today because our ancestors did just fine with what they had. I'm sure people born 500-1000 years from now will look back at our time and laugh at how ridiculous we were.
Curse you for not making this video sooner! I just came back from Ancient Greece and it was a nightmare, I was in Athens and I asked some weird bearded guy called Socrates or something if he knew where I can charge my phone and instead of answering me like a normal person je started to question my motives for wanting to charge my phone by using bizzare comparisons with sailors, soldiers and somehow even managed to bring in the need for censoring Homer into the conversation. This went on for two hours, I finnaly ran away after he began talking about the moral qualities of rocks. Ancient Greece must be a hallucination, don't go there!
The fact you understood him shows that Ancient Greeks were americans!!!!!!
tbf, I don't think the ancient Greeks could stand him either, considering how it all turned out
@@helvete_ingres4717 It was less that he was an enemy of the people and more that he was an enemy of the _wrong_ people who had political power. Athens was not a state free of corruption.
Also Socrates totally wanted to die. He was given an easy out during his trial but instead he intentionally sabotaged his defence so that he would go down in history as the philosopher killed for his beliefs. He did it for his legacy and that's why we remember him and not all the other philosophers of the same time.
This made me think of Bill and Ted
As a Greek, I have to say that your channel is a real masterpiece to historical research! I have been following you for years and your videos are absolutely amazing.
Ακριβώς έτσι φίλε. Το τυπάκι κάνει γαμάτα βίντεο.
Μολις διαβασα τον τιτλο εφαγα φρικη, κυριως γιατι ηταν σε βιντεακι του Μετατρον! Μεχρι το τελος του βιντεο γελαγα. Να ναι καλα το παλικαρι, μακαρι οι καθηγητες στο σχολειο να ειχαν το παθος του.
Χρόνια τώρα από τα αγαπημένα κανάλια ο Metatron!
The fact that you might br Greek says nothing to me. These are all anti-Greek nonsences no place in human history was ever perfect. You all can go back to medieval period and before you knew it you would end up blind,tortured and then dead. Perhaps that period suits you all.
Παμε ομαδα metatron!
I remember reading a historical account where ancient Greeks loved to display physical prowess, where one commander climbed up a rope in armor using one arm only and then did a flip at the top of the wall. I don't know if the story is true, but that story always gave me the impression that the Greek armor had to be light enough for scaling walls, charging, et cetera.
Well. Armor isn't as heavy once worn if properly trained. Your body develops muscle and also you get used to the changes in balance.
Depends on the armor. Linothorax was probably lighter than bronze cuirasses, and both were lighter than Mycenean armor.
That was the result of rowing for months to get to the battle
They found a big ass rock that they dated back to during Ancient Greek times that a guy carved into it which said "(Greek name) lifted this rock with one hand above head " and it was about 200 pounds. So even back then there were ppl that were athletic as fuck.
@@theamericandream5917 - Or had really good press. He likely used two hands to get it high enough so he could use one to lift it over his head. Unless two buddies hefted it for him.
Watching Diogenes at work would be worth the trip back in time.
As long as you don't stand between him and the sunlight.
@@fransbuijs808 or downwind when he tosses a featherless chicken at you.
@@peterwindhorst5775 Or in front of him when he's choking his "featherless chicken" in the public marketplace.
Not when he starts jacking off in public
This is why movies and fantasy is nice. You would probably not tolerate to stand near him, cause he would most likely be stinking. Include smells in your fantasies and you will see most of the times, we are fantacising too romantically :D
I’m an old guy who has always had a keen interest in the periods of history on which you focus. Thank you for well presented entertaining videos.
I was a soldier in the US Army from 2000 to 2005. One day just for the fun of it I weighed myself in just my uniform and then again with all my equipment (flack vest, weapon, etc). The equipment added around 50 pounds.
Jesus Christ you picked an incredibly dangerous period to enlist.
50 pounds...oh man. What is the minimum expected equipment weight when deployed in combat and for how long (in miles) is it expected of you to carry that?
Nothing would stop me from at least visiting any era of Ancient Greece if I could. I am currently learning both the Modern and Ancient Greek language.
Even Greece during the Ottoman occupation would be interesting.
Some people can't sleep at night because they are up concerned and confused that some people don't want to be sheltered and pampered all the time, and would rather face risks and challenges once in a while. Thinking it is any of their business how other people want to live.
Good thing you're enthusiastic, because your vulnerability to diseases 2.5K years removed from what our immune systems are equipped to deal with would most certainly mean you're not coming back from that, so enjoy your stay for however long it manages to last.
NIKA!
@@leonardomarquesbellini If you are a descendent of people who lived through those plagues, you will have inherited their immune system adaptations. 2500 years is not very much time when speaking about evolutionary adaptations.
As a modern person who had heart surgery and type 2 diabetes I would definetly not want to time travel anywhere beyond a week to any place before 2000.
However, as you said modern writers seem to think things were always bad in the past. Most of the plagues and disease happened in relatively short time periods. The reason the Black Death and the plagues of Justinian were so particularly terrible was that they just kept coming back over and over. Without a modern understanding of viruses from basically anytime before 1950 death by plague still kind of happened (see the Spanish Flu).
Labour up until modern times was largely done by very poor or slave/servile classes throughout history until the industrial revolution gave some parts of the world the ability to limit the types of jobs needed for that kind of labour. Still there are people that live like that now (industrial near slavery in the 3rd world still is happening).
We just love to give ourselves too much credit because technology advances and forget that we still have the same basic body type, brain capacity, and limits our ice age ancestors did.
Heart disease and diabetes are caused by the modern diet (seed oils and sugar respectively). If you went back in time, your health would improve dramatically in that respect. Knowing about germ theory and thus basic sanitation, you would have a major leg up.
tbh I would consider it.
Brains are shrinking... In a couple of generations they won't be able to use even smartphones. Idiocracy would look like a Renaissence University in comparison.
@@grugnotice7746 >muh sneed oils!
@@grugnotice7746 Both existed well before modern diets, you can say they are largely caused by a modern diet, but saying they didn't exist before is just being stupid.
@@ne0nmancer While these things did exist well before the modern age, they weren't used as heavily in the distant past as they are now.
I may be wrong on this, but I always thought that a major reason for Sparta not having walls was to prevent the Helots from being able to fortify a position while the army was off on campaign.
In my opinion it was more of a reason that, Spartans come to you, you would be dumb to go to them...That changed pretty quickly though.
Basically this, Ivan. The reason is entirely geographic. Firstly, any large army mustering anywhere is not going to have a chance in hell of being "secret". Word travels fast, and you'd know if an army was coming your way. Laconia is blessed with the kind of terrain that's not so easy to invade. The Spartans would simply raise the army, (and being that every able-bodied citizen was already full-time prepped for war, this was fast), and move to one of the various choke points you'd have to travel through to reach them, cut you off and wait there.
It's a bit like trying to invade an inland sea that you can only reach via rivers. Find the river they're coming from and block it.
If the terrain you're trying to invade only has a few little spots from which you can actually even assemble a 8-10,000+ composition of men, (the average size of hoplite armies), there's only so many places to actually try to fight the enemy too, and they'll be ready and assembled long before you are.
@@chriskalogrias926 Not that quickly
There is a story that when the persians arrived at sparta they didn’t believe that the village they saw before them was the infamous sparta, given that it didn’t even have any walls,
And thus they moved on with their campaign without sacking the city
In my reading of ancient warfare, there is much mention of supply carts. It seems armies on the move travelled by foot and did not wear or carry all their equipment and supplies. Supply carts carried extra parts to repair weapons, food, tents, and various gear. Logistics has it seems, always been an important part of going to war. Many thanks Metatron. 👍👍
I laughed through the movie "300'. An entire army of Greek men and not a body hair on any of them. I was waiting for a disco ball to drop and an old Weather Girls song to start pumping that jam.
Lol, it's raining body landscaped young men.
Love the "armor weight 40 pounds!" Type stuff about any historical period. They say the entire suit weighs so much and was encumbering, yet my plate carrier without any mags in it weights 22 pounds (11 pounds each steel plate)
Yeah, they act like the average kit any human can carry and still be effective as a soldier somehow magically changes. It was proven time and time again that the average infantry soldiers carry roughly the same amount. From ancient Greece to Rome, medieval men at arms and knights, samurai, WW1, WW2, current day.
@@gusty9053 And if you under that amount today? you for sure stack some extra amunition up to that level
Modern combat load is about 70 lbs. More in cold weather. Ammo, grenades, and your extra weapon, like a mortar tube, machine gun ammo, or any shoulder fired weapon weighs a ton
@@gusty9053 Not sure what you mean, modern soldiers definitely are the greatest pack mules of any period in human history.
@@CrizzyEyeshis point is that the weights are roughly the same, and that people can only carry so much while still being able to travel long distances/be effective in combat. The only reason loads are heavier today is because of a) better weight distribution (putting all of the weight in easier to carry areas) b) vehicles (horses also can only carry so much) and c) guns and ammunition require far less movement and far less flexibility in combat
Today there is still a myth that an ordinary citizen in ancient Greece was highly sophisticated and highly educated, practiced philosophy and was an atheist or at least an agnostic. In reality, this idealized depiction of the Greeks only concerned a small part of their philosophers and not their entire people, but modern people still love the story for an unknown reason that has remained a mystery to me because people are usually not willing to tell about it.
Most working class people had limited rights, and women in Athens had no rights at all. Sparta was a standout in that regard.
I've never heard anyone say regular Greeks were sophisticated/educated/et cetera, especially atheist. Sounds made up.
@@bigguy7353
Well, greece does have an image of being very smart and sophisticated but I don't know where the atheist part is coming from
@@blacktigerpaw1
Plus the draconic and abusive warrior training which includes encouraged theft and sanctioned murder of a slave (well if you didn't get caught)
@@gilgameshkingofheroes5903 must be from Epicuereus tetrapharmakón "against the fear of divine punishment"
Apathy was """tolerated""" but open denial or disregard of religion could be a death sentence
Socrates was accused also of preaching disregard for the gods of the polis
Metatron almost breaks:
"This is some Top-Tier High-Level Multitasking"
Have you heard of the "Radium girls" in the 1920's? Their job was to paint the numbers on watch faces - with radium paste. They had to 'point' the brushes with their lips, as other methods were 'more wasteful and time-consuming'. Several of them took to wearing the stuff as make-up, and were considered very glamourous at the time. Other toxins commonly ingested in fairly recent history are lead and mercury. English candies used to use such ingredients to make them look more colourful. Arsenic was also used to dye cloth green. We have a sad history of poisoning ourselves, mostly through sheer ignorance.
we still get poisoned, lobbying exists
I really enjoy your content. Thank you for adding reason to these times. Long live Metatron!
As a greek who has been following and enjoying your channel for quite some years now, i just want to say thank you, Raffaello.
As a Spaniard, whoever wrote this article is a malaka re.
@@edstar83 💀
@@edstar83 I have noticed that the spanish-speaking😃 people who live in Greece are the only ones who can easily learn and speak greek correctly with perfect accent as well. On the other hand, this is almost impossible when it comes to people from slavic-speaking😝 or germanic-speaking🤪 countries regardless of how many years they live here.
Can we take a moment to just appreciate the exasperating torture this man puts himself through so that we don't have to?
I appreciate it. He doesn't say "educate yourself". He educates us.
All this effort to debunk an article probably made by an AI
Secretly, he loves it. :)
I empathize with his frustration *so much!* He handles it better than I do; the "filthy middle ages" fallacy ( at like, only 1:16 into the vid) would have sent me pacing and flailing my arms, clutching at my forehead, and beseeching the heavens for divine strength, or wisdom, or retribution, or something, anything!
I get enough of that on a daily basis as it is, dealing with adults who seem unable to comprehend even the simplest concepts. Like "when it rains, things get wet" (exaggerated for humourous effect, but not by much).
I can't envision a world where I would willingly subject myself to such horrors. Just the thought makes me want to curl up in the fetal position
I have, so I appreciate his work.
Interesting video! Yes, more on Greeks and hoplites please! The Hellenistic Period too (my favorite, and often even more misunderstood than Classical Greece and Rome).
I thought this article was going to be about ancient Greek perversity. The Greek had so many sick practices that make Weinstein look like a boy scout
13:16 I had a medieval history professor who didn't understand the terrain/geographic advantages to fortifying Constantinople/Byzantium and merely understood the defensive merit in 1 dimension and that was in terms of big walls.
I usually can't stand debunk videos, but this is actuallt quite good. You don't only have knowledge, but also a sense of proportion most youtubers lack. Thank You
Thank you very much for new video about Ancient Greece !
I teach philosophy in France and despite everything you said, I'd love to go back there and become an Epicure disciple if I could. What a strange society that was... Plato was sold as a slave before even starting to write stuff.
I'd prefer living in Achaemedid Persian Empire than whatever Greek city states had to offer.
@@SetuwoKecik Yeah... that multiculturalism worked out really well for the Achaemedid Persians... oh wait... no it didnt... Now Western Civilization is repeating their mistakes...
@@givemeanameman1 Achaemenid empire lived centuries longer than pathetic 12 years of a ethnostate country called Najis Germany though.
@@givemeanameman1 Yikes people like you are a blight.
There is nothing wrong with multiculturalism
Just mass immigration combined with poverty and the housing crisis
That is causing all The issues in the eu
Great video as always. Now, my usual nitpicking: as far as I know, the shield was called the “aspis”, and the term “hoplon” referred to the gear as a whole. The “Hoplite” would be “the equipped one” and the term “panoply” derives from what they called “full gear”(helmet, cuirass, shield and greaves), as “pan”=“whole” or “all”. Please correct me if I am mistaken. 😉
I've found that a lot of people have bizarre views of history like we've degraded from back in the day because they simply don't know stuff. When The Passion of the Christ came out, my friend, who I met when we both got our PoliSci degrees, said it affected her because "How could people in the past do that to others?" I had this wtf moment in my head like "You-you mean you _didn't know_ about all the messed-up sh*t that people did historically? What?" How do you make it through a political science degree _without_ learning this stuff?
Ahaha, yes exactly. So many people have no clue. Personally I like to bring up everything I know about tribal warfare.
@@nelus7276 I mean you can be affected by a movie like The Passion of Christ about the hedonistic nature of men and still be aware that historically men have created misery for other men and women for as long as humans have existed.
@@sarahalderman3126 women also did awful and inhumane things so let's not typecast our comments.
@@sarahalderman3126 The women deserved it! Have you even lived with a woman before? They are unbearable! LOL
Unlike political science, political engineering actually exists.
Your friend is clueless by design.
I distinctly recall in my classics class that Ancient Greece was basically a long set of brutal wars with gentle sprinkling of slightly less brutal wars.
Well most history classes mostly focus on war and battles so that’s not surprising.
@@findingbeautyinthepain8965 If not for the Art of war, World history would be 12 page comic book. They teach children not to settle their differences with threats and violence, yet the most refined successful mature adults of the world rely upon settling their differences through violence and threats
@@godetonter4764 What exactly is your point here though?
Yes, psychopaths tend to climb quickly through political and financial power hierarchies, because of their lack of empathy and often narcissistic worldview that allows them to cruelly carve their way to corrupt and predatory positions whose structure has itself been built over generations by similar people.
How does this delegitimize how people are taught in schools not to choose violence first and foremost? The vast majority of people aren't psychopaths, and therefore generally wish to avoid said violence, in order to protect the people around them and actually make life liveable without constant fear of violence. Is that such a hard concept to grasp?
And I'd hardly call most of these individuals "refined". It's easy to surround yourself with wealth when you've stolen that wealth from the unfortunate and enslave your nation so you can eat fancy meals with equally self-absorbed individuals. I think you are confusing actual intellectual refinement with sheer hedonistic narcissism and sadistic pleasure-seeking.
Mate you need a reality check, and probably a brain scan too, you might be a psychopath yourself.
@@godetonter4764 That’s so true! I remember thinking I hated history until my early 20’s because we only learned Military history in school. I remember being super interested in learning about the full truth of slavery, and all we learned was when it started, when it ended, and that it was bad, despite half my class being wealthy black girls with elite parents. (I mention the black students’ economic station, because the elites are usually catered to.) It wasn’t until I did my own research on every day people’s real lives when I realized I love history.
@@godetonter4764 That's a bit of a simpleminded Nietzschean view of things. The "most refined, successful, mature adults of the world" make a lot of effort to avoid conflict, and to mitigate its destructiveness when it does happen. Warrior cults are parasitic on civilization, and the more educated versions that some places had in history were mostly due to a lack of economic development. Smart, driven people today can get ahead in life without being malicious to others.
"we went disease ridden 3 years ago" damned it feels like yesterday.
Well, the ones who profitted really didn't want to let it go.
@@HenshinFanatic they still don't.
Never again. Resist the next plandemic
"Medieval people were dirty"
I see this person has never gone to a Walmart.
11:51 ~ "If you're a pacifist, you're gonna hate this world, regardless of when you were born."
The East Asian region -- comprising China, Japan, Korea and Vietnam -- was a pretty peaceful place for nearly a millennium since the 9th or 10th Century AD. After all, during this period the region was geopolitically very stable. Would have been a nice place for pacifists, at least relatively speaking.
Simply as a woman i wouldnt want to live in any other age
As a Greek the title freaked me out! Luckily i watched through all of it and was laughing by the end. Thank you Metatron for pointing out the uniformed. Keep up the excellent work you are doing and never stop being a Rome fanboy.
Don't worry. He didn't mention all the appalling stuff they did.
What is strange about this article is that they don't mention the most obvious: democracy in Athens was only for free men. You wouldn't want to be a slave or a woman in ancient Athens. As a woman, you were beter off in Sparta. As a slave, it didn't matter.
It did matter tho, slaves weren't hunted for sport everywhere.
Only spartan women....if you werent spartan but the middle class or slave you had no rights. Sparta was not 300.
@@BladeValant546 but as Frans stated, you had more rights as a woman in sparta, than in Athens
middel class in sparta, who do you think build the weapons and armor for the Spartans, cause the Spartans werent working the forges, those werent spartans, but they still had rights
Sure, life for women in ancient Greece was a bit more like life for them in a modern Arabic country, i.e it wasn’t so bad. The biggest threat, as always before the age of anti-biotics, was childbirth with a mortality of something like 15%.
Democracy in Athens was managed by people who had skin in the game. Random homeless peoples who understood nothing about the political climate were not permitted a vote for good reason. Even in the modern Internet days people don't know who or what they're looking for.
Nice video Raffaello!. Personally I would like to see more of your videos about the Classical and Hellenistic era! Wouldn't mind to see a future about the Byzantine Empire/Eastern Roman Empire from you.
2:42 did not expect to see my hometown in this video, thank you😊
Another gem of a video! Εύγε, φίλτατε!
Agreed. Very nice video. As a modern soldier one will be carrying quite a bit of weight in just brass from the shell casings. 2016, the marine corps times reported a new standard for strength and endurance. An average Marine Corps infantry officer should to be physically able to carry 152 lbs. for nine miles. That load might sound extreme, but from 1st hand experience one can end up carrying up to 100 lbs or more if he is a bigger fellow. I'm 6ft 1in & about 200lbs, my pack weight was normally around 80lbs but at times would be around 120lbs or more.
I can't wait until future Cracked articles are about how horrible it was to be an ancient Cracked writer. "They had to wear 300 lbs of internettes!"
Lol
I remember in 9th grade we had 2 schol days per week where we had to carry 20kg (45lb) weight of books to school. It was the worst school year of our lives, but when a 14 year old can carry this weight just on their shoulders an adult who was either trained to be a soldier or worked their ass off on fields should be able to carry 70lb distributed over different body parts.
you are correct on the Minoan toilet. The earliest "plumbing" would be the Indus river valley peoples around 2000 B.C.E. Plumbing is quite old.
oh and to add the Minoan's were around 3500 B.C.E.
Just found this channel the other day and I am hooked! Glad to see someone as fascinated and knowledgeable about history as I am. You just got a new sub Mr. Metatron 😎👍
Well done Raph! As a Greek i wish you never stop making excellent videos like this and every other topic you may choose in the future.
Metatron always dropping bangers
My sister reads this kind of articles and comes up with sentences like "in the middle ages, people would bathe only in their wedding night" lol
Some truth to it but that's not the middle ages. More Elizabethian and it was more like several times a year, with wipedowns and face washing and frequent hand bathing. A bath in May and a nuptial tie in June. Medieval folks might have recoiled at that, depending on where they were from.
@@matthewlaurence3121if you ever had to live through SoCal water restrictions, you might be surprised at the mileage you can get out of a washcloth and a sink full of hot water.
Hello Metatron, as excellent as usual. Can you consider making a video/reaction about Oversimplify video about the first punic war. Or maybe you yourself making video about the first Punic war. I surprise how little the first Punic war video there are in YT
Thank you for existing!!!!!
What people don't understand about ancient warfare is that ancient warfare had way less casualties than modern war. This is because most people naturally try to not kill each other intentionally. The further they are away from the one they are "shooting at" the more accurate they become. It's a psychological thing. This is one of the reasons for why snipers tend to have a high kill count.
Warriors were bred for killing. Carthaginians slaughtered tens of thousands of Romans at Cannae with swords and spears IN A DAY. Such scale of violence would only come back with Napoleon and the first world war. And at that time, it was killing with firearms and artillery, not with one's hands.
On the other hand medicine was relatively bad compared to mdoern medicine. While nowadays quite some wounds can be healed back then it would have been a death sentence.
I mean back then they had massive battles, it's only in the middle ages when they battle sizes decreased
Actually they do try to kill each other. Especially in the route. Where the real slughter happened
@@GamingKnight0820 The ancient Greek battles weren't that big either, nowhere near the size of Roman battles for example. I don't know the casualty rates during those periods, but during the medieval period losing 5% of an army was considered taking heavy losses. We remember the battles where armies were wiped out because they were so rare.
My time-travel tickets are non-refundable! Maybe if you had uploaded this a few weeks ago, I could've cancelled my trip.
Whether or not a time has been good to live in does depend on when and where, but also on who you may have been.
1:40 you don't have sewer to london, 1800s, but no, I'm sure italy smells like roses, because NOW wow, people wash every day, are so clean!
2:13 living in the SF Bay Area in modern day made me lol 🤣
About the weight of the Hoplon, well you have to take into account that things were hand made back then. Someone could say "hey, I want it thicker, I don't mind if it's heavier", and the artisan would just make it thicker and heavier.
This could be a great series "Don't Time Travel Here" and the whys, could have some great Horrible Histories vibes
Now, that is a good idea for a little series of videos.
Modern armor can be very heavy, it's not unheard of that US Army/Marines infantry teams or specialized heavy weapon teams could exceed 110+ pounds on a good day. The basic equipment itself (of which I have worn) vest, plates, ammunition (depending on type and amount) and weapon with a basic ruck sack can easily exceed 70 lbs. At times it might been easier to wear full plate armor, that would have been lighter, though the ballistic protection may be a bit lacking, lol.
Especially in combat zone. We weighed ourselves with all the gear and one guy who was 145 pounds weighed 225
Wonderful video, thanks. Let's not forget Herodotus who basically went around gathering stories and tales and legends but got so many things wrong that his "history" is mostly just anecdote. Fun reading but not history in the modern sense.
I needed this to help me with my first book based on ancient Greece. I definitely appreciate clarifying things
looking at the fact that amny known greek ppl lived for almost 80 years it is sick to think it was bad xd. As a fun of ancient greece i love this type of stuff.
For me, first stop in the Time Machine is Minoan Crete. I really need to know what the hey was going on. ✌️💕🌻
Seconded.
Ciao Raffaele !!
Sono Greg un ragazzo di 12 anni di Torino che e INNAMORATO della storia.
Sei bravissimo ! continua cosi'
un giorno potresti fare un video sulla organizzazione degli eserciti vichinghi
ciaooooo 😄😃😃😃😃😃
Thanks, metabro. Close one. I just had my time machine adjusted to ancient greek when I stumbled upon your video. Dodged a bullet.
2:42 _-Bartender, another round of Glyphid Slammers for the team!"_
_"LIKE THAT! ROCK AND STONE!"_
I think it also depends on the kind of time travel. I would prefer to be able to travel and just witness events as a spectator (and be able to come back to my time) rather than end up in the role of an inhabitant of that time.
I thought that's what we are doing when we watch Metatron videos.
My thought exactly. Observe without interaction. That way I couldn't be blamed for screwing things up! 😂
I already know where I'm time traveling to: sunny 1983! You ever look at the Billboard charts from then? Every. Single. Song is a classic! No filler! You look at just about any other year and there's lots of stuff that we've all rightly forgotten about by now. But not 1983! Banger after banger after banger.
too mainstream--boooo!
@@Kinuhbud when the mainstream was that good no one cared!
If I was to argue with anyone about life in Greece, I'd stick with just a single word: Galen. Sure, Galen wasn't perfect, but considering his time period, AND how far our own medical treatments have come in the last 150 years, Galen was the father of modern medicine and could very well have lived as the perfect doctor for the 19th century.
Naturopaths still use Galen. Allopathic medicine is the odd one out.
Keep up the good work, Metatron.
Very entertaining video! And so well commented.
They don't even try to think this through do they?
Every soldier ever carried about the same weight because that is the weight health men can carry for long distances.
If they could carry more they would bring more with them.
Anything above that weight gets left behind because exhausted men can't fight.
Also, Spartans had helots (slaves) to farm their lands. The sheer numbers of helots that the conquest of Messenia added to the stockpile (guess what, they had too little land to farm, so they went to war), meant that Spartans needed to be trained well to keep those ~10 slaves per Spartan citizen in line. Try keeping a group ten times larger than yours from revolting successfully without military training and experience.
It was just not farming they did. They did everything not deemed enough badass by Spartans.
@@ashutoshkukreti6706 True, the helots did cook and act as slingers on the battlefield too
easy
one guy going regularly to gym and training box will easily crush 10 regular soyboys graineates on street 😂
it would be enough to hit 2 and all the rest would escape right away...
that's why Teutonic knights could have 13 Knights per castle and defend easily from pagan raids
that's why Spartans kept subjects in fear terrorising them at night or randomly killing in woods
for own safety
@@Szymek25 That's one analogy, I guess. The Spartans indeed had an annual "culling of the herd" where their boys turned into men through killing helots.
@@Szymek25 Someone has not heard of the invention of the pointy stick that can kill lions and mammoth multiple times the strength of a normal human being, even the most badass warrior will die from one well/lucky placed shank by one of the 10 soyboys. The Spartans only maintained their slaves through psychology and nothing else.
I’d love to time travel with the Metatron! He’d regal me with endless tales of historical cheek clapping near and far!! It would be the best because the Metatron is the best!!!!
I'm so glad this turned out to be a debunking video , because when I first saw that headline I started wondering if you had lost your mind!
I wish I could say I am glad I watched this before executing my travel plans, but, well, I always got plenty of time. 😉
3:37 Oh boy. That is wrong in both directions.
12:29 There are no surviving historical records of 404 BC. It's like it never existed. 😜 It's a web of conspiracy.
12:44 I wish more people were aware of the first sentence today, when people are told by their government what their enemy is like while alternative versions are suppressed. This is, of course, closely related to the well-established saying: _History is written by the winners._
"great thinkers were allowed to just think"
Except when they were being executed for what they thought lol.
Always great moments when they judge ancient people with modern standards.
Next week we'll learn Caesar and Napoleon were complete idiots because they didn't use tanks and stealth fighters !
Just got into your channel, so I apologize for being late to the party. However, per your comment on modern soldiers, I'm a retired United States Marine Corps Officer and we routinely carried 100lb (45 KG) packs on long marches. Sometimes significantly higher. Even when we 'dropped packs' and went with an assault bag, I would still have my primary weapon system, ammo, water, food, IFAK, body armor, etc. I would have been ecstatic to just have a sword and bronze breastplate to worry about. My back also probably wouldn't hurt like it does now....
2:45 .....again.......palaces without TOILETS.
Kings and royals were crapping out of the windows.....literally.
This makes me want to go back and LIVE in Ancient Greece
Damn, there go my weekend plans.
Great video and breakdown of the article.
Nice vid there sir. Assumptions...though some might say that when dealing with the past, especially the distant past, there is a certain level of inherent assumption.
I am so impressed with your work! ... so gladly I subscribe. You have a great way to engage people in history. What you are doing is very important. Thank you.😅
I looked up List of Ongoing Wars on Wikipedia. It is not a short list.
Yeah, and some wars are not talked about, because it does not affect "us"
One thing they don’t mention about ancient battles is the casualtie rate was much lower on average. In most cases it was two armies running into each other back and forth into one got to tired or injured and turned back or surrendered. The actual death toll was normally not massive. Meanwhile WW1 we’re losing hundreds of thousands a day
It was normally only when a army completely broke in the middle of a battle that so many would die
@@user-bs7lj3th2v yeah pretty much once a army broke was when they started getting killed the most
Greek poleis used to settle their disputes with battles on prearranged dates and places, they didn't pursue the routing enemy or take prisoners of war; casualties were low. During the Peloponnesian War this changed, as Athens and Sparta often took punitive action against disloyal cities.
"now on watch mojo: top 10 reasons medieval age was rough."
Now on infographics show:
Top 10 strongest armies on Medieval Age.
I remember back in college I got my professor very excited and awake. I was an art history minor, and was taking a History of the Renaissance class for an easy history credit. I made a comment about the "Florentine Renaissance" and his eye lit up and he said, "What do you mean by that?" So I explained that at the time we consider the Renaissance to be in full swing in Florence, Northern Europe was still struggling with the new ideas of 3 point perspective and human anatomy. The Renaissance lasted a few hundred years because it took that long for the ideas to spread, not because there were 300 years worth of ideas.
People think of history, ESPECIALLY THE MIDDLE AGES, as some sort of global culture and that just because things were a certain way in 600 AD, they were also the same way in a different area, 400 years later...because "The Dark Ages."
Yea, they pretty much didn't have the internet to share idea's back then. We didn't get the internet and climate change until Bob Dole invented them (sarcasm).
It's so simple to understand this though.
"People in the year 2020 believed in Corona vaccines."
That statement is about an actual global phenomenon. But still, some did, some didn't. Some ares had more people that did, some fewer.
Or just compare like this:
"Many gladiators died in the colloseum."
"Many boxers, footballers and race car drivers died in those violent public spectacles of the 20th century."
okay i watched the video (as a woman i didnt think ancient greece is for me anyway) and here are some things i'd like to add, agree with everything you say
Medicine: article points out that it wasnt until the 5th century that Greek medicine really took the form we know it for. you rightly point out that its still a long time ago, and I'd like to add further that this would've been the CLASSICAL AGE which is the time period that I think most people would associate with Ancient Greece.
Warfare: I can't see why the average Ancient Greek would even be a pacifist, the cultural context doesn't strike me as conducive to that sort of thinking. It can be more helpful to think of hoplites as a class of people who could afford the armor and farmed when they weren't at war (ancient peoples liked to fight war in summer so it didn't mess with their crop cycle and Greeks are no exception) than farmers who were forced to figure out a way to arm themselves. it was a privilege to be a hoplite. Also, no they didn't have uniforms in the traditional sense (though their armor would've been decorated) EXCEPT for Sparta that was known for all of its soldiers wearing red cloaks or tunics that gave them a uniformed appearance. proper hoplite warfare shouldnt be confusing no matter what you wore because formation was everything. The author also presents the wealthy serving in higher positions in the military differently than I would phrase it, generally the wealthy/elite/aristocratic classes had higher positions and leadership roles in EVERYTHING. Democratic Athens is the closest you get to an exception to this rule.
Sparta: I agree with your points about the geographic location of Sparta made walls unimportant to them. Their most prominent enemies either had to cross through large swathes of Greek territory and fight through other city states (Attica, Corinth, etc.) like the Achaemenids or approach by sea and still have to made a trek inward by land. The quote about not needing the walls is not from 404 BC, but first century AD from Plutarch and attributed to the mythological founder of Sparta. By this time there was already a mythical concept of Sparta in public conciousness, though their iconic laconic way of speaking and wit is attested in contemporary sources
Also attributing Spartiate's ability to just focus on their military to the fertility of the Peloponnese is weird. They also kind of just breeze through the fact that there was an entire state-owned population of slaves (helots) much larger than the actual citizen body of Sparta that did everything for them.
The plague: They do note it was during the Peloponessian War which is nice, but a major contributing factor is that the population in rural Attica was evacuated to Athens, and the city became so overcrowded (according to Thucydides) that people had to make living quarters in the walls themselves. No brainer that such conditions would be the breeding ground for plague outbreaks.
9:54: The Shield is the "Aspis", as in "Argyraspides" for "Silver-Shields" for example. The whole equipment was called "Hoplon".
Indeed. Aspis literally means shield, to this day even, whereas hoplon (oplon) - nowadays at least - means weapon.
@@MrPSyman3 Thanks for pointing the typo out! Will fix it at once! :)
Words do change meaning over the centuries, and they often switch from a specific meaning to something more generic. The words for spear: ‘longche’, ‘xyston’ and ‘dory’ come to mind.
@@sirrathersplendid4825 I can't really say this happens all that much in Greek. Words have retained their meaning over the centuries, even if the grammar's changed drastically. As per your example, longche and dory wasn't quite the same thing. Longche was the edge of the spear, while dory was the whole weapon itself. As for the xyston, it was a very specific name for a spear that pertained to the way it was manufactured, meaning scratched out to be pointy. Some better examples for your point would be aggelos (angel) and katalavaino (to understand). These have certainly changed meaning since ancient times, but even these are pretty easy to trace out since their form hasn't really changed all that much which makes the roots they came from evident
@@MrPSyman3 - There are ancient texts where all three terms I mentioned for spear are used almost interchangeably, presumably for stylistic reasons to avoid repetition. It’s also not unknown for ancient words for weapons to gain their modern specific definition only in the 19th/20th century, whereas they were used less precisely in their day.
I have to admit that a video about Greece being brought to us by Atlas vpn is very thematic.
Well presented again Magister. I personally would not travel to ancient Greece but not for the reasons they had given. I would prefer to travel to Karahan Tepe or Gobleki Tepe to find out who built it. I love ancient Greece and was obsessed with Sparta as a child. The weak argument they gave could be used for any point of history without any context. I was impressed by your inclusion of the modern military weight carriage. The UK Army conducted a study into Load Carriage and determined that the modern soldier is carrying the most weight than a soldier at any other point in history. Full bronze armour would be a gift by comparison to the more modern armours worn. As for the shield, that is roughly the same weight as a modern rifle or machine gun depending on the scale given.
I do despair when I read these pseudo historical pieces that try and equate historical cultures with modern ones. I firmly believe we have advanced as time progresses but we have also regressed. Humanity is a creature with amnesia. We learn loads but then forget what we have learned. Being able to time travel would be fantastic but also dangerous.
Probably really strong group of men.
I mean when i personally think much on it, ww1 is one of the wars i would not want to be in. The idea of the trenches, just nope.
Even more than the romans? The romans other than armour, sword and shield carried a 30kg backpack
@Carelo the average weight of a combat soldier in Afghanistan was between 90lbs and 120lbs, so yes. The body armour worn is heavier than think.
@@jimmynaylor1759 ok
"Here's why you wouldn't want to live in ancient Greece: *bunch of reasons why you wouldn't want to live before the 1960-70's*"
I guess technically it's correct?
"You had to buy your own gear."
As opposed to modern Russia or Afghanistan where the government does buy you gear but then sells it on the black market instead of giving it to you, and you need to raid the local hiking store for equipment.
Ok, it clearly is not 70lbs for only armour and weapons, but I can see 70lbs total equipment being reasonable. I've carried slightly less than 60 on a camping trip in the mountains. It was really bad for my shoulders and I was slowed quite a bit, but I managed and I'm not very strong also.
Being a woman, I’m not that great on going back in time for most places
Its ok. Just tell them you identify as a man. I think theyll understand
I love how the website meant to help us learn, is not even sure about their own words. Like did the article not do research before posting it? Yeah I can see why this one was picked for debunking.
My guess is that they are on a tight schedule and have to put articles out as fast as possible or something. But who knows :)
Good point, that is possible. Beside that. Have a good rest of your day.
“It was a real interesting day, the sun rose and set.”
-Bilbo Baggins
Another good one, your videos always are , great cadence.
I mean lets be honest. If you took your average modern day schlub and transported him back in time like in some bad Japanese isekai novel. Realistically he'd either die or be a slave for the rest of his days, because that's just how ancient greeks and the ancient world in general, rolled.
Or be treated as a lunatic.
@@julietfischer5056 Skallagrim did a whole video about why travel to the middle ages would probably suck. I'm sure it would be doubly so for Ancient Greece.
Depends on if you have useful skills or not (and if you magically get their language or can learn it at all).
If you are a medic of any qualification, an engineer, or a chemistry teacher, for example, you'll likely do well. Basically, practical knowledge would have you set up well.
@@J_Warral And if you were a man. Because the Ancient Greeks had pretty strict gender roles.
@@tommyfishhouse8050 eh. It was a bit more complex than that. Metic (non-citizen free) women could hold more rights (like financial operations and even court representation) than citizen-women in Athens.
It is a rather complex matter, but let's just say that Ancient Greeks didn't limit their women in rights because of belief in their inferiority, but because they viewed rights in a different light than us, modern people (right to vote or be a part of legal system was seen as more of a burden before community, rather than a benefit).
I could recommend Sarah Pomeroy's "Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Classical Antiquity" as a foundational study into the matter of women's rights in the Antiquity.
P.S. But to answer your question, if an educated woman happens to time-travel to Athens, she has a pretty good chance of becoming one of the most famous Hetaira - perhaps even a better decision than being free, Metic owner of a business enterprise of some kind.