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Video Description
The textbooks say settled “civilized” peoples are the free and clever ones, while horse riders are the violent outsiders. Professor Jiang flips that picture on its head. He argues the steppe peoples conquered empire after empire precisely because they were the open, energetic, and cohesive culture. From the Yamnaya to Genghis Khan, he traces how grass, horses, and cattle forged the history’s greatest warriors — until gunpowder finally changed the odds.
Full Video Transcript
okay so today we are going to discuss civilization versus the steps okay civilization versus the steps
the steps are the grasslands and you people often refer to them as barbarians okay so in china we
refer these people as like yamanyan barbarians and in school you’re taught that there are major
differences between civilization and barbarians right so um the first major difference is that in
civilization you are allowed intellectual freedom because only by reading books only by going to
school only by learning how to think can you be free to think okay um and in the steps we think
of them as emotional slaves they are unpredictable they are violent okay second thing is that we
think of civilization as open and curious we love knowledge we seek to gain more knowledge therefore
uh we are innovative okay whereas the steps people they are static okay because they are insular
they’re close-minded okay and the last thing is that we think civilization leads to wealth and
prosperity only can you be only if you are civilized can you be truly be happy okay and
wealthy and we think that the steps people are poor and therefore unhappy that is the general
understanding of the difference between civilization and the barbarians okay the problem
is that this creates a misunderstanding and we can’t really explain why is it that throughout
human history the steppes people have been the greatest conquerors okay so the classic example
is Genghis Khan how is it that Genghis Khan was able to not only conquer China okay which is one
consider one of the greatest civilizations in the world but also um baghdad another great
civilization okay but what’s interesting is that throughout human history this has been a consistent
consistent pattern where the barbarians conquered the civilized people okay so this is a problem
how is that how is that if in civilization they’re so free they’re so smart they’re so open they’re
They’re so curious, innovative, and so prosperous.
Why is it that they keep on losing out the steps people?
And the answer is because your traditional understanding
is completely wrong, okay?
And I will show you that it’s actually the opposite.
It is the steps people who are open, curious, and innovative.
And it is the slicing people who are close-minded,
who are static, and who are unhappy, okay?
that’s my argument to you today all right so let’s go over um some of my uh points before i show you
the ppt okay all right so let’s discuss how civilization starts so last class we understand
that there’s a major river and on top of this major river you have a city developed okay remember
that people we come together for religious purposes we have settlements in order to celebrate
nature celebrate God celebrate our religion or belief system and over time
what happens is that this system becomes unequal it becomes hierarchical and
therefore we leave but there are some places that are strategic for trade
purposes and therefore people don’t want to leave because you can generate a lot
of wealth and prosperity in these places and so they become um major cities okay so the first city
in world civilization is york okay and over time they become more and more prosperous they build
canals uh they learn farming they develop their own mythology okay and then what happens is that
as the population grows and grows they go off and colonize other places along the trade route okay
maybe upstream and then downstream as well and then what happens is that the cities these city
states are now in competition with each other and they have a system of competition called open
cooperative competition okay this is a very important concept because this concept is what
gives us innovation so you have these three things in place open cooperation competition you’ll be
very innovative open just means that you want to learn you want to grow you want to learn from
others cooperation means that you are in contact with others so you that you are learning the best
practices from other people competition means that you’ll be better than they are okay so in this
system of city states you have massive innovation and we see this throughout human history okay
so think of china when was china the most innovative it was during the chunqiu right the
spring autumn period that’s where we’re getting confucius from drawings okay all the great ideas
came from this period of the chunchu okay this is also true for mesopotamia this is also true for
egypt as well okay and eventually what happens is that the city states um all merge into an empire
because during this process of innovation one city will be more innovative innovative than the others
and therefore they will conquer the others what’s interesting often is that it is a city that is
most disadvantaged that conquers the other cities because you’re forced to be more innovative so in
china the classic example is the qing right the qing was in the mountains they had lower population
they were poorer they’re more isolated and therefore that they’re more innovative than
and the Dao, the Chu, the Wei dynasties.
And this is true also throughout human history.
And so now you have an empire.
And at first, this empire is extremely innovative.
Why?
For three reasons.
The first thing is that it now has scale.
It has size.
Therefore, it’s able to draw in more resources.
Second is the idea of standardization.
Centralization just means that now you’re using the same monetary system.
You’re using the same laws.
You’re using the same communications network, okay?
That allows for better use of resources.
The last is the idea of centralization,
meaning that you have one place controlling all activities elsewhere.
That allows you to build canals.
That allows you to build temples.
That allows you to undertake massive public works projects, okay?
So in the beginning of the empire,
there’s massive consolidation of innovation,
which leads to tremendous innovation, okay?
But over time, what happens is the empire
becomes the opposite of an open,
cooperative competition system.
Why?
Well, first of all, it becomes insular, okay?
Then it becomes secretive, and then it becomes a monopoly.
That’s what a bureaucracy is, okay?
You guys understand, okay?
All right?
when an empire reaches a certain point of growth, it becomes a bureaucracy and therefore it kills
all innovation. So this idea that civilization leads to innovation is wrong. Civilization
leads ultimately to corruption. Now, what’s interesting is that even though this is a
general rule of human development, it’s not always true. There are exceptions. So for example,
one civilization that we know that did not work out like this is something
called the Indus Valley civilization which is modern-day Pakistan and we’ll
discuss this later on but they were actually even though they had a city
state system they’re actually peaceful egalitarian and artistic okay they didn’t
go to war with each other they didn’t create a hierarchy they didn’t create a
bureaucracy and we’ll discuss later on why this is the case but there’s
something that you need to understand even though there are patterns to human
history there are always exceptions to the rule okay all right so um over time the empire breaks
down okay why because you have a hierarchy in place okay hierarchy bureaucracy the people are
at the bottom and if you are a person in empire your life sucks okay it really sucks because
you’re essentially a slave why well first of all the empire goes to war a lot in order to protect
its advantages okay so they can at any time just take you to war and you get
killed okay second is the problem of debt it’s very easy if you are a peasant
to fall in debt you owe rent to a landlord then you have to sell your
children okay so debt really sucks and the last problem is immobile
immobility which just means that you’re stuck where you are okay so the people
in the Empire their lives suck but they’re stuck where they are because of
war debt and immobility and as we discussed last class the bureaucracy
will develop a mythology in order to just justify why they are like this okay
but the very top it’s actually even more problematic because what happens is at
the top you will eventually have a problem of elite over production okay elite overproduction
just means that there are only a few limited spots for the elite and the elite have too many children
and therefore they fight okay they break up into different factions and each faction competes
against each other for the right to be the elite and because of this conflict at the very top you
you usually have three results, okay?
The first result is revolution,
where one elite tells the people
to overflow everyone else, okay?
So remember, what’s really important to understand is
the people do not create the revolution.
The people themselves do not rebel.
It’s always one faction of the elite
help working with the people
to overflow the other factions, okay?
That’s what a revolution is.
Second possible is civil war, okay?
Where the factions have different armies and they fight.
And the third possibility is just they go to war with the empire, okay?
But this is a common pattern in history.
Now, what’s really interesting is that as the empire falls,
the pastoral people come and take over the empire, okay?
The steppe people or the pastoralists.
Pastoralists just means that they don’t farm for a living.
They raise sheep, goats, and cows for a living, okay?
They come and they take over the empire.
why is this the case because these people are the best fighters in the world they have horses they
can they have they have their archers okay so they’re the best fighters in the world so what
often happens is one faction invites them to be mercenaries in the struggle and eventually they
recognize you know what we don’t have to fight for the prince we can take it or take over over
ourselves another thing that happens is the faction that invites the mercenaries don’t have
enough money to pay them off. So the mercenaries are just like, screw this, we’ll just take over
the empire ourselves, okay? And what’s important to understand is that throughout all this,
the pastoralists are always in control of the empire through three things, okay? Through trade,
through pillaging. So the pastoralists come and steal from the people and through being
mercenaries, okay? So this is a pattern throughout human history. So another question we have to ask
is why are the pastoralists so different from people of civilization and empire and the reason
is geography what i will show you is that people who are pastoralists grow up in a different
environment than the people of civilization empire and therefore they have developed a different
economy as well as mythology as well as culture okay all right all right let’s continue but we’re
clear so far right okay so um in the beginning we had agriculture why did we have agriculture
because as we discussed before uh people came together for religious purposes they built temples
and now you have to maintain the temples therefore you build farms around the temple
and develop agriculture okay but because of climate change and overpopulation people always
constantly forced to move to new places so agriculture was first up in the middle east
And then it went over to Europe and it went over to other places as well.
So it spread around the world.
So when they went to Europe, they could actually maintain their agricultural practices
because the climate and the geography and the terrain of Europe was conducive to agriculture.
And as a result, Europe maintained the cultural practices of the people of the Middle East.
okay and so they had egalitarian artistic and peaceful civilizations okay so why they were
peaceful is that first of all women were in control okay remember it’s the most natural thing
to have woman be part of the political class okay so women were in charge so if there was any
conflict the woman would just discuss it amongst themselves and come to a harmonious conclusion
okay they wouldn’t have to fight second thing is there was no money because there was no property
okay the agriculture is something that you work on together and you share you don’t there’s no
concept as private property okay so in other words no war no conflict so these are the three
distinct characteristics of early human society in an agricultural society women are usually in
command there’s no sense of private property everyone shares everything together and there’s
no conflict in the war people just discuss things and trade in order to reach a harmonious conclusion
okay so um what this changes is that the city grows and grows and then you haven’t have a large
city and so you need a proxy okay but in europe what’s really important to understand about europe
is that unlike china and egypt and mesopotamia it does not have a large river and therefore you
cannot grow a big city in europe okay so that allows them to maintain a pretty good life okay
so when they go to europe they’re able to maintain the same cultural practices but then they go to
the steps okay and the problem with steps is you cannot grow food because it’s all grassland okay
you cannot farm so now you have to change your cultural practice so what was happening is that
these people in the steps they start to trade with people with agriculture okay also you have people
in the agriculture who moved to the steppes and they brought with them cows and sheep and this
changed everything because you as a person you can’t eat grass but cows and sheep can so now
what you can do is you can base your entire economy around animals as opposed to agriculture
okay but there’s certain problems with cows and sheep okay the first problem is that they’re
expensive so now you have a concept of private property money and this concept didn’t really
exist before okay and so if i see someone with a cow i don’t have a cow what do i do i want to
go steal it right so this leads to conflict now war and conflict and because you have private
property and war and conflict you can’t have a system run by woman you need a system run by
man this creates a patriarchy okay so this is a very important principle in human history
these three things go together okay patriarchy money and war okay these three things always
go together patriarchy money and war okay so um this is changing the economy of the steps and
and it’s becoming different from agricultural societies.
And so now they need innovations
in order to deal with a new economy.
So let’s go over some of their major innovations.
The first major innovation that’s very important
is the idea of lactose tolerance.
You may not know this,
but most humans cannot drink milk naturally.
So you need to develop the enzymes to drink milk naturally.
And so they were able to do that
because they were forced to rely on cows and sheep
for their food, they had to learn how to drink milk.
But when they learned how to drink milk,
when they learned how to eat,
when they started eating meat, guess what?
They became stronger and taller, okay?
So for most of you in history,
the people of the Steppes were the tallest people
in the world, they were the strongest in the world, okay?
That’s the first major innovation
that changed their history.
The second major innovation is horse riding, why?
Because the steps are a huge area and it’s flat.
So you need to move around it a lot.
Also remember, cows and sheep eat grass.
So when they eat in this pasture
and they finish all their grass,
they have to move somewhere else, okay?
So the only way to protect your cows and sheep
from other people is to be mobile.
And so they learn how to domesticate horses, okay?
Which is a major innovation and it took a long time.
and you can imagine how hard that is to do because if horses see you what do they do they run away
so how do you train a horse to not run away and let the horse ride you well it takes a lot and
lot of effort but because they had to do it they managed to do it okay and so with the horse riding
now you can have another invention which is the wheel and the wagon wheel and wagon now you can
put all your stuff in a wagon and move from camp to camp okay you can cover the entirety of the
steps okay does that make sense okay and because of these three major innovations you now have a
different culture okay so let’s go over what makes their culture distinctive from other places okay
the first is the idea of patriarchy where um men are control and the reason why the control is
because in the steps war is a constant thing okay so the culture becomes very masculine very
aggressive it rewards aggression it rewards courage okay um the other thing is that we have
a patriarchy in place you can have more children okay when women are in charge women tend to
practice birth control because they want to make sure that every child is healthy and every every
child lives to adulthood okay they want to avoid the risk of dying in childbirth they want they
want to avoid the risk of their child dying young, okay?
But with men in charge, they basically get women to have as many kids as possible, okay?
Also remember, in this world, there’s a lot of conflict, so you need as many boys to fight
as possible, okay?
But then you have a problem then.
If you have a lot of children, you have a problem of inheritance.
Like when you die, your cows go to who, right?
Now let’s assume you have 100 cows, and you have like 10 boys.
if you give if you are fair and you give 10 cows to one boy well very quickly your family is going
to be poor and because in the steppes the weather is bad your cows are very likely to die well then
your entire family could be extinct in two or three generations so they invented a new concept
called primogeniture primogeniture primogeniture just means that the eldest boy inherits everything
that ensures that the family can stay wealthy, okay?
All right?
But now your problem is, wait a minute,
if the eldest boy inherits everything,
what do the other boys do?
Well, they have to go and steal other cows, okay?
And to do that, they form secret societies, okay?
Secret societies are just like,
they’re basically these gangs, okay?
These gangs of young men who get together to do what?
Well, they go steal cows and sheep,
and what else do they do?
They steal women, right?
Because, right?
I mean, what’s the most valuable commodity in the steppes?
Well, cows and women.
So that’s what you steal, okay?
So this creates a culture of war and conflict constantly.
All right?
And the third innovation is something called
the patron-client relationship.
And this is actually how, or patronage.
And this is what allows for the construction
of society in the steppes.
So remember, in a civilization, you have bureaucracy.
You have centralization.
But in the steppes, you can’t have that
because you can’t have that many people.
So you have a patron-client relationship.
And all that means is that it’s like a mafia, right?
I’m the big brother, you’re the little brother.
So maybe I have 100 cows, and you need cows.
So I lend you 10 cows, but now you are loyal to me, okay?
I’m the big brother, you’re the little brother.
And this creates the idea of tribes, okay?
Does that make sense?
What’s really important here is that in civilization,
bureaucracy maintains control over people over debt,
and so you become a slave.
But in the steppes, there’s no concept of slavery, okay?
You’re still a free, independent person,
but you just pay, you’re just loyal to your big brother.
So if your big brother needs you to do something,
you go do it for him, okay?
So there’s still a level of freedom in the steppes
that you don’t have in civilization,
And that’s why they’re such good fighters, okay?
All right, so these three things are major innovations.
But now that you have these innovations,
you need a new mythology to justify
or explain these innovations, okay?
And so what they had was,
they went from the Mother Goddess, okay?
So Mother Goddess, again, is the religion
of agricultural people, the sky god.
And the Mother Goddess wants you to be harmonious, okay?
To be kind and compassionate.
What does the Sky God want you to do?
The Sky God wants you to conquer and exploit, okay?
It wants you to destroy.
It wants you to kill.
It wants you to conquer, to steal, okay?
And also in this religion,
horses and cows are very important.
But as we discussed in the last class,
here grain and nature are very important, okay?
So you see how this works, right?
Now, what’s important to understand is that
because this system does not allow for the creation
of a bureaucracy, the steps always practice
open cooperative competition.
And it’s a system that forces you to be aggressive.
It forces you to be independent, okay?
And it forces you to work hard.
And that’s why people of the steppes
are the greatest warriors in human history.
And that’s why when the steppes people
encounter the empire civilization,
they usually are able to conquer the empire, okay?
Does that make sense, okay?
So the steppes are like a training ground for fighters.
And over time, the fighters have become more and more fierce.
And what’s ironic is those fighters who are the most fierce
can stay in the steppes.
Those fighters who have forced other steps,
they go conquer the empire, okay?
All right, it’s a constant pattern in human history.
All right, is that clear?
All right, any questions, guys, before I do the PPT?
Great.
Okay, guys.
Yes?
Sorry, can you speak to the mic, please?
So earlier you said that these people,
they inherit to their oldest son, right?
So my question is, like, is it, like, necessary for, or, so they must inherit their inheritance to the oldest son,
or is it like they have some kind of a system to determine which son can have the best of their inheritance?
Okay, yeah, so their general principle is always the eldest son, okay?
That’s to avoid conflict.
Because if you open up to say, okay, well, whoever is most brave,
Whoever is most noble, whoever is most wise, that means that they’ll just fight each other, okay?
This is what happened after the death of Genghis Khan, right?
So the general rule is you always give it to the eldest son.
But what if the eldest son has been manipulated by his siblings?
It doesn’t matter. It does not matter, okay?
All right. All right. So legacy of the steppes.
All right. So as I discussed, what’s happening is that Europe at first was just hunter-gatherer.
and they were spread out they did paintings in caves they had a pretty
easy life okay not an easy life but it was a free life and over time what
happened is that our culture would develop in the Middle East and it would
spread to Europe okay you can see the genetic change where the blue is
hunter-gatherer and the orange is farmers okay but then what happened in
in about 2500 BCE is the Steps people,
who we call the Yamnaya actually.
So different names, they’re Porto-Indo-Europeans,
the Yamnaya, you can refer to them as any, okay?
Steps, Yamnaya, Porto-Indo-European,
it doesn’t really matter.
But they go to Europe as well,
and they start mixing with the farmers.
What’s really important for our purpose to understand
is this, when the farmers went to Europe,
they went as families, husband, wife, children.
And so they integrate into Europe pretty peacefully, okay?
But when the pastoralists, the Yamnaya, went to Europe,
they went mostly as young men.
Therefore, that they kill the local man
in order to marry their wives, okay?
And so basically, from DNA research,
we know that it was a genocide, okay?
The European farming men were eliminated by the pastoralists, okay?
And we have to also remember that the pastoralists, they were stronger, okay?
They were taller, and they were more aggressive, okay?
All right, yeah, so this is another map that shows the same thing.
What you need to understand is this.
This movement is global, okay?
So the farmers went to Europe, but they also went to India and Iran, okay?
they basically went wherever they could go same thing with the yamnaya okay so this is the yamnaya
people they went to europe but they also look at this they also went to iran and india and we know
because we study the languages uh persian okay hindi and european languages they’re basically
the same languages so we know there had to be one common mother language to them okay so there’s
This is another map showing you the Yamnaya.
Again, they went to Europe, but they also went to India,
okay, as well as Iran.
And by mixing with local customs and religion,
they created new religions that had tremendous impact
on world civilization.
So in Iran, they will give birth to Zoroastrianism,
which we’ll discuss later on, okay?
And these are the Vestas,
which is the Bible of Zoroastrianism.
In India, they of course gave birth to Hinduism.
And these are the Vedas, which is the Bible of Hinduism.
We’ll discuss this later on in the semester,
but I want you to be aware of this, okay?
So again, we know that this happened at first
because of linguistic studies.
When we looked at different languages,
we discovered there are common words to them.
So let’s look at father, okay?
When Latin is pater, Greek, patris,
Persian, padar, Hindi, pita.
Pretty similar, okay?
Similar with mother.
Mother, matar, mitara, madar, mat.
So from different linguistic studies,
we know they have to be a common language to all of them.
And that’s why we hypothesize
about the Proto-Indo-Europeans.
This is a more stark example
where the Proto-Indo-European two is dua, okay?
And you can see how it spreads to other languages
in the Proto-Indo-European family
so that you go from toa to two in English, okay?
So all these languages are interrelated.
That’s why if you speak one, like English,
it’s pretty easy for you to learn
the other languages as well.
Whereas if you speak Chinese,
it doesn’t really help you
when you go learn other languages, okay?
All right, now linguists have done studies
of words that are distinct to Proto-Indo-European.
And these are the words that they discovered, okay?
Bull, cow, ox, ram, eel, dog, grain, cauldron,
wrestling, wealth, households, families, clans.
These words are unique to their culture.
And therefore, we’re able to group these words together
and discover there are four characteristics, okay?
First of all, they have lots of words for wheel.
They have words for dairy.
They don’t have farming terms.
And they have words for horse, okay?
That’s why we’re able to figure out
that these are nomadic pasturists.
therefore they must be from the steppes okay and then through archaeology and
the DNA studies were able to have a better understanding of who they are
okay and as I said they have to be pastoralists okay because of the way
they use words um so let’s talk about old Europe before the Amai come and
conquer them okay so this is Maria Gumbutas who is an American Lutheranian
anthropologist and she’s the first to hypothesize that old Europe must been
conquered by these people because she did a lot of archaeology and discovered
that their culture was primarily peaceful, it honored women, and it
espoused egalitarianism, okay? This is exactly what I said previously. And the
Yemenite people were completely different. They were a patriarchy, who had private
property and which was very aggressive okay um she wrote many books um the language of the goddess
and she like her work is amazing okay so if you have a chance please do study her work and um so
let’s write let’s read what she wrote okay so this is the mother goddess civilization something that
we thought we’d discuss a lot in this class the goddess in our manifestations was a symbol of the
unity of all life in nature her power was in water and stone in tomb in cave in animals and birds
snakes and fish hills trees and flowers hence the holistic and mythopoeic perception of all
the sacredness and mystery of all there is on earth okay so again this is a religion that
practice balance and harmony because everything is sacred therefore you cannot destroy life
without first getting permission from the mother goddess okay this culture took deep delight in
the natural wonders of this world its people do not produce lethal weapons or build forts
in unacceptable places as their successors did even when they were acquainted with metallurgy
instead they built magnificent tombs shrines and temples comfortable house in moderately
sized villages and created superb pottery and sculptures this was a long lasting period of
remarkable creativity and stability and age free of strife their culture was a culture of art okay
so this is a very nice place they don’t fight they’re egalitarian they practice art okay when
And what’s really important for us to understand is
they had writing systems, they had technology,
they just chose not to use it for war
because it was against their religion.
So they also had writing systems and they had symbols,
okay, and this is something that Maria Cumbuentes
has done a lot of research in, okay,
I won’t go into their writing system.
So when the United came,
they basically completely invert the culture.
So for example, the Europeans,
The old Europeans believed that the snake was a symbol of life, energy, and regeneration,
a most benevolent, not an evil creature.
It was the Yama who introduced the idea that the snake is a devil, okay?
All right, and that’s where we get the concept in the Bible from.
Black to them is a good color.
White is a bad color.
White because black symbolizes life.
White symbolizes death, right?
Black did not mean death or the underworld.
It was the color of fertility, the color of damp caves,
and rich soil of the womb of the goddess where life begins.
white on their hand was the color of death of bones okay and again when the
Anaya come they will invert this what’s really important understand is in this
society women are in control their power and agency and why well it turns out
that this book sex and dawn sex at dawn okay it turns out that women are just
better at managing social relationships than men are okay so this is sex at dawn
by christopher ryan and um he tried to show us that for most of human history women had sexual
agency and one piece of evidence is the fact that human men have larger penises in fact the largest
penises of all primates okay so gorillas are much bigger than we are we have bigger penises why
because um we have to compete in order to put our semen into a woman right because women have
multiple sexual partners. So that’s one major advantage of sexual freedom for women. Men have
bigger penises. Even when women had long-term intimate partners, husbands, they had sexual
partners. So the idea is that for most of human history, love and sex were not the same thing.
Love is intimacy. Sex is just fun. In some societies, women would have many husbands,
usually brothers. And that’s a way to maintain peace and harmony in your society. If a woman
is allowed to marry many brothers together.
All right, so the book looks at the militant people
where they practice sexual freedom for women.
And the explanation is that semen was essential
to human growth and development, okay?
So if a bride got married,
then all the men would come and impregnate her
because the idea is that semen is sacred
and they want to give her as much life as possible, okay?
All right, now you may be disgusted by this, okay?
But I think there’s a very good kind of argument, okay?
So the argument is that it’s not honorable
for a woman to love anyone except her husband
and that this evil being among them,
he himself was not sure that his son
who was there present was his son, okay?
So the system sucks because if you’re a guy,
how do you know that that person is your son?
And the natives respond by saying,
you french people okay so he’s talking about the french mission missionary you french people love
only your own children but we all love all the children of our tribe okay so that’s what humans
can do we can love each other there’s no limit to our love so in the system that we have today
a patriarchy we only love our own children but in their system the agent system everyone loved
each other’s children okay everyone loved all children and quite honestly in this system
it’s better to be a child right and in this system you would never ever develop depression
okay all right again women are just better politicians than men because women are more
willing to cooperate women have more emotional intelligence and women can use sex and gossip
as mechanism of control okay so this is all pretty common sense right all right but then question
then is if this world is so wonderful why did it collapse well there are three major issues with
with agriculture societies, okay?
The first major issue is that it’s static,
it does not innovate.
Second major issue is climate change.
If the weather changes on you, you’re screwed.
The third problem is disease, right?
Because you’re living close to animals,
you’re living close together,
so if a disease hits you, you’re all screwed, okay?
And that’s very different from the seps people
who live far apart from each other, okay?
All right, so we know that in Europe,
the farmer communities, the population went collapse, okay?
So this is the level of carbon dioxide in the air.
We can measure the level of carbon dioxide in the air.
We know that about the year 3,000 BCE,
the population collapsed, okay?
All right, it collapsed everywhere in Europe.
Why did this happen?
The plague, guys, okay?
That’s the problem with being a farmer.
You are always susceptible to the plague.
So we know that maybe, you know,
4,000, 5,000 years ago, a plague broke out, okay?
The Black Death, basically, by rats, okay?
And remember, in this world, we trade with each other.
So the Black Death was able to go everywhere
and wipe out farming communities, okay?
Even spread as far as China, okay?
But the thing, though, is the step-people are not as impacted
because they live far apart from each other.
So if one got the disease,
you’re not going to spread it to your entire family,
or sorry, your entire community.
Whereas a farming community, they will, okay?
So there’s this huge drop in the population
because of Black Death in Europe, okay?
That’s number one.
number two is climate change so we know that now and then there’s this huge
climate change and that destroys our culture forcing people to migrate and
this is what we suspect happened in old Europe as well okay and so what’s
happening now is that because your society is static because of disease
because of climate change the population in Europe went all the way down leaving
the opportunity to come invade okay and they did come invade so as you can
see uh when agriculture people came they came as families okay so the blue is the man the red is
the woman okay so uh one to one they go into europe but when the yanaya come they come as
young men okay so it’s mainly blue okay and of course what do young men do they come and they
steal your woman okay that’s what young men guys do you guys all right and over time what they will
do is slowly establish new cultures because what’s happening is that their culture is
blending with other cultures as well and why this is happening is the geography is different right
so in the steps they have a certain culture when they move to agriculture they now have to combine
their culture the local ones and this happens in um everywhere producing different cultures and
producing different languages as well okay so all of europe was radically transformed because of
this migration and again this migration it was basically a genocide so you look at britain okay
the people who built stonehenge are gone this is a farming agricultural community worship the
modern goddess okay then all this wonderful scientific technology that’s now lost to us
because what would happen is the m i would come and kill everyone okay so this is the blue is the
farmer people the reds of naya total genocide okay guys men and women were all killed why because
maybe they chose the men and women chose to fight together okay um in spain it’s a different story
because um what happened is that all the men would be replaced okay so the white chromosome is the
male chromosome so before the year 2000 bce uh you had a lot of blue right but as you can see if you
move further it’s all gone they killed all the men in spain okay when they went to india it’s
a different story because india indians in that time were more peaceful so they came to a settlement
where the new conquerors would be at the top society and the people would be and the locals
would be at the bottom okay so there was not much of a genocide but we had a caste system
created because of that okay and we know because if you look at the upper caste they all spoke
indo-european if you look at the lower caste people they spoke the local language dravidian
does that make sense so depending on the circumstance uh the result is different all right
okay this is a wonderful book called the horse the will and language written by david anthony
who’s a harvard anthropologist and he explains to us the anaya culture and why they were so dominant
okay so one thing um that is unique to the amnaya is their mythology it’s a mythology of violence
of struggle of dominance of conquest okay and how the mythology works is in the beginning there
were two brothers twins one named man and the other named twin they go around by the world
and they’re accompanied by a great cow eventually man and twin decide to create the world we now
inhabit to do this man had to sacrifice twin okay he had to kill his own brother the person he loved
in order to create the world and the gods thanked him for that the gods blessed him for that okay so
this is a world that is pretty violent okay um after the world was made the sky gods gave cattle
to third men the cattle were stolen by a three-headed six-eyed serpent okay the snake
third man entry and treated the storm got to help get the cattle back together they went to the
the cattle of the monsters, killed it,
and freed the cattle, okay?
So this is a mythology of struggle, okay?
And what’s really interesting is that
this mythology becomes the mythology of all new
proto-Indo-European civilizations,
including the Romans and the Mongolians, okay?
So this is Genghis Khan.
His mythology is what?
He kills his best friend to become
the leader of the Mongol people.
And what’s the Roman mythology?
Romulus kills his twin brother to found Rome, okay?
All right?
So that shows you that the Mongols and the Romans,
they come from the same culture, okay?
A culture based on violence and exploitation.
All right, so now Anthony talks about the economy.
Domesticated cattle and sheep started a revolutionary change
in how humans explored the Pontiac Caspian steppe
environment, because cattle and sheep were cultured,
like humans, they were part of everyday work and worry
in a way never approached by wild animals.
Humans identify with their cattle and sheep,
roll poultry about them,
and use them as currency in marriage gifts,
debt payments, and the calculation of social status, okay?
Now we have the beginning of money and property, right?
And they were grass processors.
They converted plains of grass,
useless and even hostile to humans,
into wool, fat, clothing, tents, milk, yogurt,
cheese, meat, marrow, and bone,
the foundation of both life and wealth.
Cattle and sheep herds can grow rapidly with little luck,
vulnerable to bad weather and theft,
they can also decline rapidly.
Herding was a volatile, boom-bust economy
and required a flexible,
opportunistic social organization.
So they lived in a world of tremendous volatility
because the entire world was a cattle.
If the cattle died because of a bad storm
or because of bad luck, they were completely screwed, okay?
So they were very aggressive people
and they were opportunistic as well.
That’s different from farmers who can just afford
to sit back and relax because nature
will grow the food for them.
Okay, the connection between animals, brothers,
and power was a foundation on which new forms
of male-centered ritual and politics developed
among Indo-European speaking societies.
This is why the cow and brothers occupied
such a central place in Indo-European myths
relating to how the world began, okay?
So this is a deeply patriarchal society, all right?
All right, participation in long-distance trade,
gift exchange, and a new set of codes requiring
public sacrifices and feasting
became the foundation for a new kind of social power.
Stock breeding is by nature a volatile economy.
Herders who lose animals always borrow
from those who still have them.
The social obligations associated with these loans
are institutionalized among the world’s pastoralists
as a basis for a fluid system of status distinctions.
Those who loan animals acquire power
over those who borrow them,
and those who sponsor fees obligate their guests.
Early Proto-Indo-European included a vocabulary
about verbal contracts bound by oaths used in later
religious rituals to satisfy the obligations
between the weak and the strong, okay?
All right, so the idea here is,
there’s no slavery in the system, okay?
But there is obligation, there is loyalty.
If I take you out for a meal, guess what?
Now you owe me a meal.
If I take you out for a meal, I’m now your big brother.
Okay?
And that’s what keeps the society cohesive.
And this is important because if no one’s a slave
and everyone’s free, then everyone is a great warrior
you’re fighting for yourself okay you’re not fighting because someone asked you to that’s
why in wars between empires and these people these people usually win okay because they’re much more
motivated all right wealth military power and a more productive hurting system probably brought
prestige and power to the identities associated with proto-indo-european dialects after 33 bce
the guest host institution extended the protections of old bound obligations to new social groups
an indo-european speaking patron could accept and integrate outsiders as clients without shaming
them or assigning them permanently to submissive roles as long as they conducted the sacrifices
properly praise poetry public fees encourage patrons to be generous and validated the language
the songs as a vehicle for communication with the gods regulated everything okay so another way of
saying this is that even though there are wealthy people and poor people they are still treated with
respect okay it’s a very egalitarian society okay and what keeps the system in place is the belief
in the gods okay the belief that if i do you a favor then you owe me in a favor we have a contract
now the gods oversee the contracts and what’s really important is that this is an open-ended
system so it’s easy for me to bring in more people into this system okay okay and that’s how and
that’s why again they were such an innovative cohesive and open society okay last thing we’ll
we’ll talk about are these young men
who enter secret societies, okay?
And they enter secret societies and become
you know, like these mafia gangs, okay?
The institution of the moribund, the warrior brotherhood
of young men bound by oath to one another
and to their ancestors during a ritually mandated raid
has been reconstructed as a central part
of proto-Indo-European initiation rituals, okay?
It’s a very important part of society
because these young men otherwise have no place to go, okay?
And if you want to know who they are,
They’re basically the Vikings, okay?
So the Vikings are the direct descendants of these people.
All right, all right, so let’s talk about the Mongols.
The Mongols conquered the world, most of the world,
and the question is, how did they do it, okay?
And I’ve already told the answer, okay?
Because the Steppe people have always been good
at conquering empires.
These are the Mongols.
The secret weapon, of course, is a horse archer.
This is like the ultimate weapon for most of human history.
You could not defend against a horse archer.
They were fast, they were strong,
and these were the best warriors in the world.
So, this has been considered a pattern in human history.
First, the Yamnaya came and conquered Europe,
India, and Iran, but then you have the Scythians, okay?
Same place, same people, same culture.
Guys, this is not a race of people.
This is a culture of people, okay?
remember at this time in human history genetic exchange is very common okay the scythians were
dominant then you have the medians who would later on give rise to the persian empire okay sorry oops
okay then you had sorry can you see this okay so now what’s gonna happen is is this you’re gonna
have you’re gonna so the steps people or around the grassland now china emerges as an empire okay
Okay, and this is the Han Empire.
And this is really the last Chinese dynasty.
Why? Because they are ethnically Chinese.
And they’re proud of who they are.
So what they’re going to do is,
they’re going to try to destroy the steppe people once and for all, okay?
So they move a huge army into the steppes to try to limit the threat.
And what happens now is, it forces a cascade effect
where these people are now forced to go westwards,
which forces them to conflict with people over here, okay?
And so you have this huge migration all the way to the Roman Empire.
okay okay so this is what the map shows us okay china forces the hans the shunnu westwards which
enforces these other groups to go elsewhere okay so again the strongest people stay in the steps
the weakest people go and conquer empires okay this is a process of constant innovation um the
han empire okay atilla han then you have the turks emerge um this is the mongol empire and as you can
see they conquer basically most of the world um and because they conquer most of the world and
the world is unified then you have the black death okay which wipes out most of europe as well about
a third of europe is wiped out in the black death okay and the last great conqueror is timber lane
okay timber the lane the great last great conqueror of this from the steps um and he
conquers most of the world okay so this is really important principle remember the steps before the
most innovative the most open the most aggressive the most courageous and that’s why they’re the
greatest conquerors in history okay but eventually what happens is we develop gunpowder okay and now
the steps will be conquered by civilization but this is the turning point in history the
invention of gunpowder and so now what’s going to happen is that civilization will now attack
the steps people and reduce the sub people a culture okay and that is it right okay any
questions guys um so so i was wondering like uh so the bambarians the steps are they capable of
developing uh religions because they are all conquering all around the world so it’s difficult
for them to like build up temples right okay so religions don’t require temples religion is just
collective belief so as i say as you keep on saying in this class all humans have a religion
okay a religion is just a world view understanding of how the world works that answers three
questions where do we come from why are we here where are we going okay even today even though
we’re atheists we’re still religious okay but we worship money materialism science so these people
the steps they worship the horse the sky god the cow they worship war they worship um courage and
bravery okay so every culture every person has a religion of some sorts because because you
because it’s impossible for you to understand the world and operate in the world about a religion
okay especially for groups okay any more questions okay great guys so we’ll so we’ll continue
our discussion of human history next class okay
Source: Predictive History