1177 B.C.: When Civilization Collapsed | Eric Cline

50 years ago I remember my Dad joking about how future archeologists would look at our ruins and think that Barby Dolls were fertility goddesses and TV sets were religious altars.

Wow. Dr. Cline was my professor for Greek History 18 years ago at George Washington University. It was one of the hardest classes I ever took. Dr. Cline offered me no quarter; either I learned a ton of history or I failed. I studied my ass off, got an A on the final, and earned the most difficult 'C' I'd ever receive. It is great watching him now and knowing that I was learning from one of the preeminent experts on this time period in the academic world.

Dr Cline is one of a few Lecturers that are able to keep my interest throughout the entire lecture. His ever-changing tone and interesting facts mixed with a bit of dry humor make it an easy listen. I wish I had more teachers like this while in school.

This was excellent. You can tell someone is a true master of their trade or area of expertise when they can explain the material so simply and elegantly. Bravo.

Cline is a rare academic, one that can make complicated themes understandable. At the same time make it fun, engaging and makes you want to investigate more.

Just having an amateur interest in history and retired railway conductor I found this info very relevant to our human activity today. I think the video shown at the beginning was probably the same in 1200 BC. Just different technology. Your use of modern analogy, including jokes, and common language made this lecture a pleasure. Thank you. I was employed on the Santa Fe Railway formed by a man in 1869 , Cyrus K. Holiday, who had a vision of trade with Asia. That vision is still a main stay of what we now call intermodal freight traffic or trade. The Santa Fe completed it’s transcontinental link from Chicago to LA and California ports by 1888. Now the BNSF Ry calls the Santa Fe mainline the southern “Transcon”. However, a large portion of the freight is now carried in containers adapted to be loaded onto large container ships on both east & west coast of the U.S. Some of the freight is trans-global, in that containers are off loaded on one coast onto trains. Then transported across the US and reloaded onto container ships too large to navigate the Panama Canal. Then transported to either Europe, Africa and Asia and visa-versa. It forced the railway systems to modernize and the Santa Fe had that vision to have the infrastructure to adapt to the change and increase in freight traffic. They were a bit slow to pick up the ball, but were way ahead of other railway companies in moving priority freight trains on their passenger mainlines much more efficiently. BNSF take over just boosted the investment needed to speed the mainline up even more on the Santa Fe route. So how much evidence has archeology uncovered to show an evolution of methods of transporting raw material and high value trade items? The tin from Afghanistan would have been a tough trip with heavy loads to meet the demand to make bronze. Camels? Carts? Elephants? Were trade routes trampled down hard and leaving a permanent impression in the earth, then paved over by Roman road system? We can only guess, 🤔 I guess?

The Tojan war is a fascinating thing because of the cleverness of Homer's epic. This man sung a lie so big, so enthralling that here it is thousands of years later and we have not forgotten the truth. We don't know exactly where the war was fought, that's unimportant, we remember the important aspects. Men of Greece waged a war that lasted for many years and it was so terrible that even when it was over it was not over for the soldiers. They were so scarred by the war that they became lost, unable to truly return home for many years if at all. Thousands of years ago, Homer sung about PTSD... and mocked the very reason why the men paid such a terrible price.

He makes the old cultures come alive, sublime!

I was a history major, Middle Eastern and North African studies, and I keep coming back to this lecture. There’s so much incredible information here. Unfortunately, it helps us to understand where we’re headed.

I love watching someone teach this subject who thinks this is as much fun to learn about as I do. 🥰

wow, thank you Eric Cline ... and everyone else on camera. This was a breath of fresh air. None of you is "full of yourselves". You are humble, intellectual, succinct, and accessible. Just want to let y'all know it is recognized and appreciated.

This must be the most viewed video about archeology on YT, 2.3 million people at least opened it. Not surprising, this man is amazing!

Dr Cline got me into history and archeology. Edit - The guy is a hell of a writer and lecturer, totally keeps you engaged.

What I really, really love about this video is that it made me finally understand archeology, and how close it is to forensic science!

By far one of the greatest talks, I never wanted it to end. Just absolutely astounding.

I read his book, and I wish I had had this narrative before I read it. I have worked on scientific literacy projects, and teaching storytelling is an underrated approach to helping people hang theories and evidence together. As much as I love methods, I think they may need to be a secondary priority in sharing STEM with the general public.

i love these old-time tweets he reads off those clay slabs

Historians come in all breeds some are magical clerks who can take all works of a time and spin them into something cohesive and congruent, some are detectives who can infer so much out of so little and still be accurate, others are bards/artists who can take the mundane and bring them to life in a way no one else can. With ancient (might as well be Pre-) history you find the detectives en masse, but to actually bring life to a time so empty of literature takes talent of all three, and bravo to you sir.

Fascinating lecture, thanks to Eric Cline for putting it together and the Long Now Foundation for hosting it. I especially found the earthquake sequence to be interesting as I had not heard of this before in the context of the late bronze age collapse. Not sure yet if it's in his book but I had the thought that earthquakes would have wrought havoc on the un-reinforced masonry and mud-brick walls that the cites of these civilizations depended on for protection. This would have helped the sea peoples (or any other invaders in that period) to undermine, batter down or otherwise assault those settlements. I bet someone could write a paper just on that, and I would love to read it.

Thank you, Long Now Foundation. Great presentation! Did read some of Mr. Cline's book. It is a serious book. His fun humor comes across in his lecturing. I think the details of ancient civilization are so interesting, even more interesting than the theories about it. The high points of his view on the fall of the ancient nations caught in a perfect storm of challenges are much more accessible in this talk compared to the very densely written book.