Greetings!
Currently Smoking: Pipe made by Petersen; Fine blend of private tobacco.
Well,in my studies of history, I learned a great deal about India, Central Asia, and Ancient China. I was especially fascinated with the history of India.I went from knowing precious little--to knowing much more, and being blown away by all of the interesting historical elements, legends, mythology, and cultural, technological, and engineering achievements of Ancient India--just to name a few. I was also propelled further, somewhat by a natural course, through making friends with people from India, or immigrants from India, as well as my explorations and personal discoveries gained through sampling the fine Indian cuisine. As I learned more, the more I wanted to know!
Initially, like most Americans here in the states--I had gone through the typical grade-school education, and learned far more than I cared to about Late Medieval, Renaissance and Enlightenment Europe, all of which was primarily focused on going through the same schedule of stops through history--a mention of the cradle of civilization in early Sumeria and Babylon, some mention of the Egyptian Pyramids, Moses and the Jews, then on to a bit about Greece and Rome, then flying up to England, France, a bit about Spain and Columbus, Renaissance Italy, and still more, more, more on England and France, a bit of Germany, then, *wham*. The American Revolution, and American history. Not that American history is dull or anything, but when it is recited and lectured over and over again, with yet more repetition of more England and France, it just gets old. Very old. I had become intellectually exhausted with the endless dynastic squabbling, the same old religious and philosophical arguments, over and over again that was all centered on the seeming "holy trinity" of America, Britain, and France.
Before long, my mind was racing to thoughts of...what about those ancient Germanic tribes Caesar talked about? And the ancient Celts? And...yeah, I love learning about Alexander the Great, but what's this about elephants and strange kingdoms in Central Asia and India? Who the hell are the Seluecid Empire? You can't imagine the utter shock and amazement I felt when I first discovered the *Byzantine Empire*. I had to go on an intellectual journey of discovery pretty much on my own from say, Junior High School, and all through High School. It was all I could do to strip and devour all these weird books on stuff I had never heard about from every local, county, and city library within an hour's drive from home. I was just fascinated endlessly about all the history and great stuff I was learning--and much of it was never even whispered about in school, or to be fair, only briefly glossed over, before returning to the aforementioned schedule of topics.
From my own continuous studies from Junior High School, and onward, I was laying the foundation for more to come once I entered college. Now, in college, to be honest, at least in the American system of education, they do a significantly better job than what is typically served up in high school--but again, they spend yet *more* fucking time going over the same shit I've been reading and being lectured on since I was in the damned Third Grade! Thankfully, however, there is more intellectual freedom and scope for advanced personal learning in college, and especially more so at the university level, once you get into third and fourth year university levels of study.
I was finally able to really dive into all this exotic stuff I'd only been able to sip from through much of my earlier years. It really opened the doors to learning that, whoa, there were really *more* cradles of civilization, like the Indus Valley Civilizations of India, and the Yangtse River Civilizations of Ancient China, too? Damn, you know? The Indian Harrapans had straight, layed out streets, plumbing, advanced schools, all kinds of stuff. Just amazing! It's been so much fun learning all this kind of thing.
Now, both in my studies of history--and in gaming, too--over I'd say the last 20 years or so there's been this gawd-awful fetishization of everything fucking Japanese. Now, don't get me wrong--I love Japanese people, culture and all that--but it's kind of strange. While in America, both educationally and culturally, while the lion's share is still focused on America, Britain, and France, it seems that whenever Asia is talked about...yeah, Japan, Japan, Japan. 24 fucking 7, it's all about Tokugawa, Ninja's, Samurai, Geisha girls, and how fucking amazing Japan is for going from a primitive medieval backwater to an advanced industrial nation in less than 60 years. All good and well, but then even in gaming...yeah, it's all about Samurai, Ninja's, and all the rest, all Japan, all the time. Japan's neat, but my studies in history in general, and Asian history as well, told me there was lots of other stuff going on besides Japan. I found myself wondering, well, Samurai are cool, but what was going on in China 2,000 years ago? Or in India? What kind of armies and wars were they having? Then I got all excited about learning more and more about the Mongols, and all the cool discoveries they did, and how they organized this huge empire, and amazingly, humbled the fuck out of every Muslim, Christian, and Chinese army that even thought for a second they could bring it to the Mongols. So, I was kinda jaded and tired of the American focus--I call it fetishization--of all things Japanese. It's like the Japanese are somehow our Asian versions of England. Well, in a metaphorical sense, fuck England and fuck Japan! What the hell about the Hanseatic League and the Poles, Latvians, and Russians? How about the Hungarians? And in Asia, again, what the hell was going on with the Chinese, Indians, and Mongolians? Not to mention the Koreans, Vietnamese, and others. Yeah, there was some pretty awesome kingdoms and such in ancient Vietnam, Thailand and south-east Asia, too. Lots of great history, different philosophy and religions going on, strange wars and different dynasties sometimes at least fighting over different things like the philosophy of Law in China, struggles between Buddism and Hinduism in India, wierd Eunichs and crazy Chinese Empresses having their husbands poisoned, or taking power as the regent mother, and all kinds of stuff going on in India.
I suppose to be more precise, I was drawn to the kinds of questions being asked in the pages of history about these other cultures and lands, that in Western Europe, America, and Japan weren't being asked--or the answers were all the same, over and over again, all dealing with the same kinds of questions. Having said all that, even in gaming, especially D&D, of course, there's historically been very little attention or focus on China or India, let alone Central Asia, and only some on even the Middle East. I found myself being drawn to asking different questions in gaming, in building campaigns and detailing my own World of Thandor, for example.
So, the currents of academic studies that have carried me along to go beyond Enlightenment Europe and America and Japan, and have led me to focus more on Ancient & Medieval History--I'm more into the ancient Greeks, Romans, the ancient Germans and Celts, the Byzantine Empire, the Parthians, the Vikings, the Saxons, the Dark Ages, and the ancient Indians, Mongolians, and Ancient China than more modern history. There's good reasons why my academic interest in European history pretty much ends largely by 1350 AD. In Asian history, that strange cut-off point in time is about 1400 AD. And well--I just love Nan Bread!:) Indian food is really awesome, too. I like many Asian Cuisines, Japanese, Thai, Chinese, Korean BBQ, but damn, Indian food is damned fine and delicious!
So, there you have it. Some of my thoughts and academic journeys on how I developed interests in ancient and medieval history--both European and Asian. That has all gradually informed me and inspired me a lot in doing some different things with game campaigns in D&D as well, which is a good part of the drive and inspiration that has led to creating this--hopefully interesting and entertaining blog.
Semper Fidelis,
Richard
Tuesday, October 18, 2011. 2348 hours.
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