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Are we on the cusp of the 3rd age of Migration?
Posted on 4/8/19 at 8:54 am
Posted on 4/8/19 at 8:54 am
LINK
First era destroyed all but one of what we consider the first western civilizations:
Second great era of migration destroyed the Roman Empire:
There is no example in history of these migrations making the civilization 'stronger'. There is also (except Egypt) no example of great migrations being permanently defeated.
First era destroyed all but one of what we consider the first western civilizations:
quote:
At least twice in human history, mass movements of people across continents destroyed powerful, sophisticated civilizations and precipitated millennium-long dark ages. Considering the immigration crisis in the Americas, unrest in the Middle East and sea-level rise in Asia, we could be on the cusp of the "Third Age of Migration." If so, we ignore the past at our existential peril.
During the late Bronze Age, a thriving group of city-states flourished in the Eastern Mediterranean, with complex social and legal structures, economic specialization, global trade and written diplomatic treaties. This global system created wealth, stability and security for nearly a millennium. You know the names from high school history books: Mycenae, Crete, Cyprus, Ugarit, the Hittite Empire and, of course, Egypt.
quote:
Today, the ruins of this once-great civilization bespeak a horror of fire, war, death and destruction.
quote:
These refugees attacked, destroyed, and pillaged Ugarit, Crete, Cypress, Hattusa (the capital of the Hittite Empire), Babylon, Canaan and pretty much everything in their path. The only regional power able to resist their onslaught was Egypt, which fought them off twice. By 1175 BC that entire civilization had been destroyed, ushering in the “Greek Dark Age” lasting more than 700 years.
Second great era of migration destroyed the Roman Empire:
quote:
The Second Age of Migration hastened the fall of Rome. Since our Western civilization is rooted in Roman law and culture, the modern relevance is immediately apparent. From the 2nd to the 4th centuries CE, Germanic Gothic tribes in their hundreds of thousands were on the move across Roman Europe, sometimes as invaders but more often as refugees from the Huns.
Forced by the sheer weight of their numbers, the Emperor Valens allowed the Goths to settle in Roman territory. They were considered Roman foederati ("allies," almost "citizens") and many served in the legions. But drought and climate change made it inconvenient for the Romans to live up to their commitments, so they extorted the Goths, sometimes taking Gothic children in payment for food.
Naturally, rebellion ensued. At the Battle of Adrianople in 378 CE, the Romans, along with Valens, were slaughtered. Then in 410 CE, reacting to yet more Roman abuse, the Visigoth Alaric I, formerly a Roman general, sacked Rome. Finally, in 476 CE, the last Roman emperor of the west, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed by a Germanic-Gothic prince named Odovacar, who sent the imperial regalia to Constantinople. And that was that.
There is no example in history of these migrations making the civilization 'stronger'. There is also (except Egypt) no example of great migrations being permanently defeated.
14
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:07 am to cokebottleag
I wonder why they never talk about the Islamic Conquests or the Mongol conquests as an "Age of Migration".
What about the mass movements of Europeans to the new world from the 1600s-early 1900's, especially in the 19th Century?
What about the mass movements of Europeans to the new world from the 1600s-early 1900's, especially in the 19th Century?
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:09 am to kingbob
quote:
What about the mass movements of Europeans to the new world from the 1600s-early 1900's, especially in the 19th Century?
Well, the early new world migration was in a different context. There was no civilization here. These people were more accurately described as pioneers and settlers who tamed an untamed land, and turned it into a great civilization.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:11 am to cokebottleag
quote:1850-1914 is referred to as the age of mass migration, and the US is the superpower it is today in large part due to this age. 40% of US population growth during the late 1800s came from immigration.
There is no example in history of these migrations making the civilization 'stronger'
I’m not minimizing the reality that immigration has caused structural issues in some civilizations in the past, but claiming that it’s never made a civilization stronger is just plain stupid.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:14 am to MrCarton
quote:
There was no civilization here
bullshite
ETA:
99% of the native population was killed by disease between 1500 and 1600. So, while there was civilization here before, by the time the Europeans got to North America, much of it was empty. They're still finding ruins all over the place, though. There are even potential Mayan ruins being unearthed as far north as Georgia. There's stone monuments all over the place in the northeast and Great Lakes that no one knows the source of. There's all kinds of mysteries left behind because the Natives died (or were killed), and the Europeans didn't bother to try to learn about the native civilizations until everything was beyond gone and overgrown or plowed over.
The Meso-American civilizations may have been pre-Bronze Age without knowledge of the wheel, but they were clearly complex civilizations. Heck, in Cortez's time, the Aztec capital was larger than just about every city in Europe!
This post was edited on 4/8/19 at 9:23 am
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:23 am to funnystuff
quote:
1850-1914 is referred to as the age of mass migration, and the US is the superpower it is today in large part due to this age. 40% of US population growth during the late 1800s came from immigration.
I think this is an important topic, but rarely are all of the key details around this era discussed.
There were many valid arguments against allowing mass European migration to the united States. It's undeniable that it escalated the political divide between the north and the south, which culminated in a war that ended once and for all, the attempt at federalism.
In the later decades, these migrants became political fodder for urbanite political machines.
It's true also that despite all of the protests about allowing massive immigration, almost all of it was from Europe, which was significantly less damaging than say, widespread sub Saharan African immigration.
There are a lot of angles to it, and og course we wouldn't be where we are today without the massive immigration from Europe, but that ignores where we could have been with a more tepid immigration policy.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:25 am to kingbob
quote:
I wonder why they never talk about the Islamic Conquests or the Mongol conquests as an "Age of Migration".
For starters, those were armies, not replacement settlers. Vienna is not the edge of white christian Europe, nor is Spain moorish. Some genetic legacy exists from the conquests, but for the most part, it was just a change in rulership.
In contrast, the Sea Peoples wiped out the early civilizations entirely, and replaced them wholesale. Same with Rome; the Goths (and Slavs, Franks, and others) moved in as whole family and tribal units that overwhelmed the local populations to completely change them forever.
quote:
What about the mass movements of Europeans to the new world from the 1600s-early 1900's, especially in the 19th Century?
It was not a case of hordes of lesser developed peoples migrating into more advanced empires and dissolving them from within. Literally the opposite.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:26 am to kingbob
quote:
99% of the native population was killed by disease between 1500 and 1600. So, while there was civilization here before, by the time the Europeans got to North America, much of it was empty
So not bullshite? Whether or not prehistoric societies once existed in the new world before settlers arrived is no relevant to my point.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:28 am to kingbob
It is easily explained by saying a Migration toward a superpower. none of your rebuttals are examples of migration toward a superpower. More of migration away from superpowers.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:30 am to CarRamrod
quote:
It is easily explained by saying a Migration toward a superpower. none of your rebuttals are examples of migration toward a superpower. More of migration away from superpowers.
But muh ancient Aztec empire?
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:31 am to cokebottleag
quote:
It was not a case of hordes of lesser developed peoples migrating into more advanced empires and dissolving them from within.
This was literally the arguments used by Nativists to get immigration reform successfully passed in the 1920s which, more or less, paused immigration up until Ted Kennedy's reforms in the 1960's.
If you look at how Europe's Absolutism and nanny state mentalities penetrated into America in that time, the Progressive Era was largely made possible by this new wave of European immigrant voters.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:32 am to MrCarton
quote:
So not bullshite? Whether or not prehistoric societies once existed in the new world before settlers arrived is no relevant to my point.
The Europeans brought the diseases and Cortez and Pizarro collapsed the Civilizations by conquest and wholesale slaughter.
It's only "prehistoric" because the Spanish killed them and burned all of their books. It's prehistory because the colonizers ERASED these civilizations from history!
This post was edited on 4/8/19 at 9:35 am
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:32 am to kingbob
quote:
you look at how Europe's Absolutism and nanny state mentalities penetrated into America in that time, the Progressive Era was largely made possible by this new wave of European immigrant voters.
Good point
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:36 am to kingbob
quote:
The Europeans brought the diseases and Cortez and Pizarro collapsed the Civilizations by conquest and wholesale slaughter.
The ancient civilizations you are referring to were at the end of a downward spiral before European "conquest".
Regardless of the details of encounters between primitives and Europeans, 99% of the American land mass was unexplored, untamed. Europeans explored and tamed what could not have been tamed by primitive, dying native populations.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:37 am to kingbob
quote:
It's only "prehistoric" because the Spanish killed them and burned all of their books. It's prehistory because the colonizers ERASED these civilizations from history!
I find this extremely hard to believe. It is a convenient explainer though.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:38 am to kingbob
quote:
Europeans didn't bother to try to learn about the native civilizations until everything was beyond gone and overgrown or plowed over.
Well they didnt have the luxury of performing archaeological work given their need to survive.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:39 am to cokebottleag
Importing Third World uneducated low IQ people with no real viable skills is a recipe for disaster. When you start mass importation of the Third World you will eventually become Third World.
This post was edited on 4/8/19 at 9:40 am
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:39 am to funnystuff
quote:
1850-1914 is referred to as the age of mass migration, and the US is the superpower it is today in large part due to this age. 40% of US population growth during the late 1800s came from immigration.
Legal immigration and mass illegal migration is not at all close to the same thing. And this important distinction is being purposefully eroded and washed over. It's something that needs to be discussed.
Legal immigrants coming here seeking opportunities and assimilating to our culture is vastly different than a mass of illegal migrants coming here with the stated purpose of non-assimilation and political power.
This post was edited on 4/8/19 at 9:41 am
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:40 am to cokebottleag
There are arguments to be made regarding immigration that don’t rely on hysterical hyperbole.
Try those.
Posted on 4/8/19 at 9:40 am to MrCarton
quote:
But muh ancient Aztec empire?
The Aztecs had far more advanced plumbing and irrigation systems than the Europeans did at this time. Thus, their cities were able to support FAR more people than the tiny cities that dominated most of Europe. Tenochtitlan housed 200k people and was arguably the 4th largest city in the World at that time, rivaling Constantinople and dwarfing Paris and London.
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