How can hundreds and even thousands of years of history, which includes entire civilizations, discoveries and characters, so confidently be explained? Not all of it could have happened the way it’s being taught to modern society, right?
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No, not all of it happened the way it’s being taught. Because there are missing pieces.
And the missing pieces are mainly things that were simply too “every day” to be included in art and literature. Let’s look at a contemporary example. If you looked at the New York Times’ food section, you would get a very skewed idea of what we, as a country, actually eat. Most of what they cover is far more exotic than what most people in New York or especially the whole country are actually eating. But that’s what’s written down.
In 2012 an 85-year-old woman named Marylin wrote an earnest (not a tongue-in-cheek) review of Olive Garden for a paper in Grand Forks North Dakota.
The internet found this and lost its MIND.
She wrote it, as she had written many other reviews for chain restaurants in her area because, well, there wasn’t anything else in the area. And it was a big deal when anything moved in. For the folks on the internet, it was “Well, everyone knows what an Olive Garden is! Why write about it?”
But Anthony Boudain came to a realization. Her reviews, over the decades, were what people, by and large, ACTUALLY ATE in this country when they went out. And she, unlike everyone else, was actually recording the experience. So he helped her publish a book of those terribly mundane dining experiences (including, I believe, a Taco Bell).
So much gets erased historically when it comes to the everyday. Because it’s not worth mentioning. It’s everyday.
When you picture a city in the U.S. circa 1900 how many peanut vendors do you picture? In Medieval times paper was expensive, so that snack you bought from a cart–it was either on a stick or wrapped in inedible pastry (when I say inedible, I mean it!)
So much of what we know from history are the extraordinary and the notable. It takes more digging and research to find the everyday. While it isn’t impossible to find, it gets more difficult.
This is just one aspect of how things get lost. I think other people will cover other aspects.
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