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by inglor_cz 1405 days ago
"Europe was a backwater"

This sort-of goes too far. The Roman empire at its height was very much not a backwater. What is pretty unique about Europe is the subsequent enormous loss of civilizational complexity in the Early Middle Ages combined with the fact that it could, albeit 1000 years later, drag itself out of the hole again.
2 comments
Manuel_D 1405 days ago
Sure, but the British isles, which would eventually become a preeminent colonial power, still was a backwater even during the Roman Empire. France and Spain less so, but most of the Roman Empire's most developed regions were in the eastern Mediterranean. In his preface, he points out that from the span of human civilization from 2500BC to 2000 AD, Western Europe has been dominant for only a few centuries.
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barry-cotter 1405 days ago
The Eastern Mediterranean was rich and civilised long before and after Rome was a backwater. At the earliest Northern Italy, Germany and the Low Countries were at the technological frontier in the 1300s. Pretty long gap, quite a distance. Europe outside the Mediterranean only really became important in a way anyone else noticed with the Age of Exploration.
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