Technically the sciences today (all of them) are subsets of metaphysics (philosophy). A PhD for any discipline = doctor of philosophy of (insert discipline here)

Adding to this, animals were (and are) massive disease vectors: if large numbers weren't present, that alone cuts down the risks dramatically.

Just as an example, one of the worst outbreaks in history came from the horses of nomads around China.

The Egyptians were around for so long, there are texts from them where they are telling the history/doing archeology about centuries old Egyptians.

History until fairly recently can be described as the great deeds of great men. As such, if you were of the elite, you'd learn about the deeds of your family and how they related to where you lived. Books/manuscripts were rare and expensive. It would be rare to read/possess them. For the man on the street, probably the old way would be via plays. This changes with the printing press.

As for asia/south america. No idea

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Some have touched on school in the ancient world so, I'll go to the Medieval West, starting in around the 8th/9th century and beyond for a bit...

School was most often run by the church or church adjacent institutions [like a monastery or, a group of monks/priests in the employ of a King, say] and as such would require study or religious texts, as well as the "seven liberal arts" - the Trivium and the Quadrivium, if you've heard of those.

The trivium was grammar, logic, and rhetoric. In studying this, most fledgling monks or lay people would probably be reading a lot of Aristotle and perhaps a smattering of Cicero or other Latin writers. Meanwhile, the quadrivium included arithmetic, astronomy, geometry, and music. Here again, classical authors would have been read and preserved, along with some late antique and medieval writers as well.

Starting in around the 11th/12th centuries, monastic schools started to develop into larger institutions, which eventually gave rise to the earliest universities [oversimplifying some]. The seven liberal arts still made up the core of one's education which could lead to a bachelor's degree. A Master's degree might focus more on the quadrivium, or an area within that, and after attaining an MA, one could study theology, medicine, or law at higher levels.

So as you can sort of see - you wouldn't see people studying history as its own field. History would come up when studying theology, when reading for rhetoric and grammar, and in other ways tangentially, but it was not a focus.

Historiography is the study of the study of history. Congratulations on making it to this level of nerd 😆.

It’s technically the history of writing about history, so oral histories would be a different thing. But to learn about the way people in the past interpreted and spread their own history, that’s the term you should Google.

One weird thing that I learned at some point and has stuck in my brain is that people in the Middle Ages in Europe, while they obviously knew biblical history and Greco-Roman history, they only knew it in broad strokes and didn’t really concern themselves with the daily life of people in long ago history. So, they would imagine King David as living like a contemporary European king in a castle and dressing in the type of clothes they themselves wore. But maybe that was only the laymen of the time?

History before it was history was just current events.

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“These are the people you hate now. Commit them to memory for the test.”

The Bible was for a long time regarded as the most relevant historical text. Also if you go really far back, it was also common for myth to be treated as the source of historical knowledge.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/may/12/why-are-sweden-and-finland-not-yet-in-nato-and-does-the-alliance-want-them

The Guardian has a decent article on why Finland didn't immediately join NATO after WW2, and also explains Sweden too.

In a nutshell, Finland wanted to avoid possibly provoking the USSR into war. Joining NATO could be possibly interpreted as a threat, because NATO was effectively a force to push back the USSR's expansion during the Cold War. As such, Finland saw it prudent to go with a compromise. They didn't officially join NATO, losing out on some of the benefits of being in NATO (like protection in case of invasion), in exchange for being able to be friendly with NATO and the USSR at the same time. After all, it'd be hard for Finland to claim that they were at peace with the USSD if they were members of what was effectively a "fuck the USSR" club.

This arrangement used to make sense, because back then the USSR was somewhat weary of war. They'd need at least some tangible, somewhat justifiable reason to go to war. A country like Finland, which literally borders the USSR, joining NATO could easily be turned into a reason for war. By not joining NATO, Finland was demonstrating to the USSR that they weren't a threat.

The reason why Finland now wants to join NATO is because this arrangement no longer works. Putin has shown that he's willing to invade countries and start wars for next to no justifiable reason, as seen with Crimea and now Ukraine. The only thing between Finland and being invaded are mere whims. If they're going to get threatened, might as well get the protection.

>Significantly, they found Eadburg’s name passionately etched into the margins of the manuscript in five places, while abbreviated forms of the name appear a further 10 times. This suggests it is likely to have been Eadburg herself who made the marks. “I could understand why somebody might write someone else’s name once. But I don’t know why you would write somebody else’s name so many times like that,” Hodgkinson said. An Old English transcription, and tiny, rough drawings of figures – in one case, of a person with outstretched arms, reaching for another person who is holding up a hand to stop them – were also discovered etched on to the small book,

This has to be some of the worste sleuthing ever, a highly educated woman writing her own name over and over? Someone in charge of an Abby would be older and wouldn't still be practicing her signature, and people practicing their signature would likely want to see how they are doing, sort of like why people don't target practice in the dark.

And the real headslapper, "I could understand why somebody might write someone else’s name once. But I don’t know why you would write somebody else’s name so many times like that" only to have it immediately followed up by:

>in one case, of a person with outstretched arms, reaching for another person who is holding up a hand to stop them

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*Hebrew would be the proper term, though often clarified as "the Hebrew language" to distinguish it from the people and culture.

You can't use literacy was uncommon as a justification when we've already by definition filtered for someone who does write. Because this is about them writing.

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https://newrepublic.com/article/79470/1895-8th-grade-final-exam-i-couldnt-pass-it-could-you

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One important thing to know is that history as a subject or discipline in its own right was not really a thing before modern times.

History was not part of the "septem artes" of the medieval age, and in ancient Rome education in general was a rather deregulated, private affair by private teachers or tutors, who sometimes were slaves.

Higher education in Rome was also all about rhetorics and practical skills you would need for a career in politics, and even that was reserved for very high class people. Of course, some knowledge about the history of the realm would have been vital for the aspiring high class citizens, but mostly just to further their political "value" and not for its own sake.

In the middle ages, you had the first universities in Europe, the first one being in Bologna somewhere around 1080, but again, this early universities had no "history institutes" before the 18th century for the most part.

To put things into perspective, ordinary folk in this age would not even know what exactly their by far most important text did say, since the bible was not available in anything other than Latin, ancient greek and hebraic (or however you call that one in english...).

Some researchers in the middle age, mostly from a church background, would work with the texts of the classical philosophers of antiquity, but even that was a very exotic field of research.

Another point, of course the lense through which history is viewed was very different "back then", both in classic age and in early christian and muslim societies. Their was always a focus on the "success stories" of your own society and your own faith of course

Depends, mainly, on how wealthy you were.

I was thinking a young child that was practicing her name

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I know that when Harvard University was founded back in the 1600s it had a traditional curriculum, and that did not include history. There was a huge emphasis on classics though, however, which would’ve included Greek and Latin, and probably also some discussion of Greek and Roman history – they would’ve read Caesar and Livy so talking about that –and understanding Plato and the philosophers.

A lot of historical discussion would probably also occur in different religion classes or religious settings. Christian theologians, for example, would be expected to have some knowledge of the reformation and Luther, while Catholic seminarians were taught about the history of the church, Reformation and Counterreformation etc.

Well since there's only been colour since the 1950's, it's advanced lots. Before that, all monochrome. Jesus, before the 1920's, no sound! World War One was fought with people running around with "sound cards" like -BOOM-. -KAPOW-. -BLAM-. The Germans had improper translations of English and french- (soldier cards ....je swee sherrie,. Fish n chips lads! Or Canadian fish n chips, eh!)

The English and French had improper German translations (soldier cards....Auch dee strudel. Vissen nine!....rawss rawws Berliner!)

....all in black and white. At the end of the war they had a pianist who played ragtime and such....