Ancient Egypt Archives - Page 5 of 6 - Tales of Times Forgotten

Were Ancient People Conscious?

In 1976, the American psychologist Julian Jaynes (lived 1920 – 1997) published a controversial book titled The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. In this book, Jaynes claimed that human beings were not conscious of their own thoughts until around 1000 BC and that stories about gods speaking to people originated from people hearing their own inner voices and mistaking them for the voices of external deities telling them what to do.

Jaynes’s claims were regarded as fringe, baseless, and bizarre even when he first proposed them back in the 1970s and today they are almost universally regarded by psychologists as the debunked relic of an earlier, less scientific stage in the development of modern psychology. Nonetheless, Jaynes’s hypothesis of the bicameral mind has garnered something of a cult following among non-scholars and has had considerable influence in popular culture, so I suppose it is worth writing a lengthy rebuttal to it.

Was Hypatia of Alexandria Black?

A lot of people today seem to have quite a fascination with the subject of race in the ancient world. I frequently encounter questions on Quora asking whether various historical figures from ancient times were “Black” or “white.” Elsewhere online, I often encounter claims about the racial identities of people from ancient times.

Back in September 2019, I wrote an article in response to various articles I had encountered claiming that the Roman emperor Septimius Severus was Black. In that article, I concluded that, while you could certainly describe Septimius Severus as what we today would call a “person of color,” it would be misleading to describe him as Black without any kind of careful qualification.

Another historical figure from ancient times whose racial identity seems to provoke a great deal of controversy is the early fifth-century AD Neoplatonist philosopher and mathematician Hypatia of Alexandria, who is often cited (quite anachronistically) as an example of a Black woman who excelled in STEM. In this article, I will answer the question: “Was Hypatia of Alexandria really Black?”

No, the Romans Did Not Just “Steal” All the Greek Deities

Lots of people seem to wrongly assume that the Romans “stole” the Greek gods and just renamed them. People often portray this as though it were an act of plagiarism, like one student copying another student’s homework. It is easy to see how they have gotten this impression, since they know the Greeks came first and that the names of the Greek and Roman deities are used today interchangeably. The problem is that this is not at all what actually happened.

In reality, the ancient Greeks and Romans originally had separate deities with different names, different mythologies, and different attributes. These deities were worshipped in different and unique ways that were specific to the culture in which they were venerated. In other words, the Romans had their own deities. Then, due to immense Greek cultural influence in Italy, the Romans gradually came to identify their own native deities with the Greek ones.

In the process, the Romans adopted the traditional stories and distinctive divine attributes belonging to the Greek deities and attributed them to their own deities as well. Eventually, by around the first century AD or thereabouts, the Greek and Roman deities had become largely indistinguishable from each other and they were widely seen as the same deities only with different names.

Eight Things That Would Surprise Most People about Life in the Ancient World

There are a whole lot of things that would surprise most people about what life was like in ancient times. As historians sometimes say, “The past is a foreign country.” When reading about the past, we learn about people whose lives were, in many ways, utterly different from our own. Here are a few facts about life in the ancient world that would probably instantly shock a modern person travelling into the past.

Who Was Ozymandias?

Many people are familiar with the name Ozymandias through the famous poem “Ozymandias,” written in 1818 by the English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley (lived 1792 – 1822), but not everyone is aware that Ozymandias was actually a real ancient Egyptian pharaoh. In fact, chances are, you probably learned about Ozymandias in world history class, but you learned about him under a different name.

How Did Cleopatra Really Die?

Cleopatra VII Philopator of Egypt was the last ruler of an independent Egypt in ancient times to wield actual sovereign authority. Although she ruled Egypt, she was of almost exclusively Greek ancestry. After her suicide on 10 or 12 August 30 BC at the age of around thirty-nine, Egypt was annexed by the Roman Republic (soon to be Roman Empire). Her death is often used by modern historians to mark the end of the Hellenistic Era in Egypt. In spite of all the historical significance that is ascribed to her death, however, we still do not know exactly how she committed suicide.

The most popular story about the death of Cleopatra is that she supposedly committed suicide by allowing an Egyptian asp to bite her on the breast. This event has been depicted in countless paintings, plays, books, and films. Indeed, Cleopatra’s death with an asp at her breast has become one of the most iconic death scenes in all of history. Despite its eternal popularity, however, this story is probably nothing more than a fanciful legend.

Fake and Misattributed Ancient Quotes

People who have been following my website for a while may recall that I wrote an article about real ancient quotes that have been misunderstood or misinterpreted back in August 2018. Now I am going to treat a whole different beast: quotes attributed to people from ancient times that are entirely misattributed. Misattributed quotes of this nature are absolutely rampant on the internet and in popular books of wise quotations. I cannot possibly hope to address all of them in this article, because there are far too many, but I will address a few of the more popular ones.

Why Do So Many Ancient Sculptures Have Their Noses Missing?

Ancient sculptures can be puzzling sometimes and they tend to generate a lot of questions. One question that I have frequently encountered is “Why do so many ancient sculptures have their noses missing?” It is a simple question, but one that a lot of people are interested in hearing the answer to.

Misconceptions about the Library of Alexandria

The Great Library of Alexandria is by far the most famous library that existed in the ancient world. At its height in the third century BC, it attracted renowned scholars from all over the Hellenistic world. It is likely that it held more scrolls than any other library in the Mediterranean at the time. Many people today see this library as a symbol of everything the ancient world accomplished.

As a result of the Great Library’s fame, however, it has become heavily mythologized. Many of the things that many people today believe about the library are simply not true. For instance, contrary to what you may have read on the internet, the Library of Alexandria was not the first library ever built, its famous destruction is not the primary reason why so many texts from ancient times have been lost, and it was certainly not deliberately destroyed by religious obscurantists of any kind.

What Evidence Is There for the Existence of Alexander the Great? Quite a Lot.

One of the things that bothers me the most about the internet are all the pernicious articles claiming that such-and-such well-attested historical figure from ancient times actually never existed at all. One of the most annoying claims out there on the internet is that there is no evidence for the existence of Alexander the Great. This claim is blatantly ridiculous, but yet I have seen multiple people on the internet claiming it, repeatedly and in earnest. In this article, I intend to offer a sound debunking of this assertion by presenting some solid evidence for the existence of Alexander the Great.