What Took Down These Three Ancient Civilizations?

When it comes to piecing together what happened to civilizations that no longer exist, it can be challenging to solve the mystery. But research into Angkor, the Akkadian Empire, and even the Norse of Greenland, is helping us see that these three groups of people separated through time and geography mat have all met their ends through a common enemy - Mother Nature.

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[generaledelogu]

It's so cool how we can look at sand layers and tree rings to make a pretty accurate guess as to what happened to old civilizations that seem to have just vanished

[KnowledgeCat]

Archaeology is a fantastic intersection of various scientific fields. It’s amazing to see how they all come together to uncover the past!

[ronkirk]

The methods scientists have used to discover and chart paleoclimate trends is nothing short of amazing. Tree ring widths and sand deposition in ocean sediments are easy concepts to grasp and make sense, but oxygen isotope ratios in insects, who would have thunk it!

[YoJesusMorales]

I really like seeing several fields of study converge like this, it's really cool.

[chrismeandyou]

"Fall of Civilizations" is the best youtube channel EVER on this topic

[Chris-hxom]

I'd love to see you do a take on the Late Bronze Age collapse of civilization around the Mediterranean. Been a bit of a mystery for a while.

[iamchair]

Hello! Iraqi person! here at 0:57 Tell is supposed to be تل which means “hill” so if you convert it to English it wouldn’t be Tell Leilan but instead it would be Leilan hill

[BrownP]

@6:42
So, what you're telling me is that the norse called Greenland "greenland" because it actually looked like a greenland when they arrived?

*_Whoa._*

[kingace]

My second favorite ancient civilization that collapsed mysteriously is The Vinland Norse. Around 1000 AD, settlers led by Leif Eriksson became the first Europeans to settle in the American Continents. Consensus is lacking on the _why?_ but all agree that the Viking "Empire" was stretched to thin.

My first is the Axum State/Empire. And honorable mention to the infamous collapse of Roanoke Colony (the first English colony in the Americas).

[Locuts]

Kind of terrifying when you realize we nicknamed a period “the little ice age” which was caused by a drop of 1 to 2 degrees, and global warming is projected to increase global temperatures by 1 to 4 over the next 50 to 100 years 😬

[jamesmcgarity]

I just have one thing to say: "Damn, I love me some SciShow!"

[iDk-dpbi]

The case of the Greenland Norse is a bit more complicated than that presented in the video. While their society was ultimately ended by the drop in temperature, it was already unstable and on the verge of collapse. Firstly, the Norse did not adapt well to their environment. The two large settlements on Greenland supported few people because they may have refused to eat fish - only a few fish bones out of thousands of others in middens have been found - or whales, despite the abundance of them. This suggests in a dependency on Skyr (many Skyr huts have been uncovered) made from goats and sheep, which required the vast cultivation of hay. Norse Greenlanders also reared cattle, the most prestigious food source that could survive in Greenland and which required an even larger amount of hay for little to no meat. Their cattle would have to stay indoors for 9 months of the year and were half starved for 6.

The lack of resources in Greenland prompted annual summer visits to the Canadian coast where iron, wood, and other impossible to collect materials could be harvested, but it came at the expense of their brief growing season.

The Greenland Norse were also a violent people and disputes with each other led to death or maiming so any solution to their environmental concerns could not have been reached. Additionally, armed conflict with the Proto-Inuit/Dorset people became increasingly fierce. The Little Ice Age and this combination of factors, as well as others, were the cause of the society’s collapse.

If you’re curious about this sort of thing, I’d really recommend Jared Diamond’s “Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail” (2005) as it has 4 chapters on just Greenland Norse, and many other societies both past and present. Beware that it is an old book and doesn’t go into the scientific detail on the Little Ice Age, like this video did (thoroughly enjoyed it), and was written before isotopic analysis has suggested that they did eat fish - up to 80% by 1300s. He also takes a ‘euhemeristic’ approach to the Vinland Sagas which leads to some unconvincing evidence.

[nuklearboysymbiote]

Archaeology really making all the other sciences team up

[stagger]

This are some interesting stuff here 👍🏻

[liamobrien]

The two Norse settlements in Greenland were found to be empty way before 1721. The western settlement was discovered to be unoccupied circa 1350s/1360s. Eastern settlement not until circa 1450.

[lesleyghostdragon]

My favorite part was the dog at the end 💖🤓

[DanielSolis]

For more on this topic, check out "Four Lost Cities" by Annalee Newitz. It gave me new insight into what we really mean by "lost" and "city."

[SMunro]

What took down a Civilization?
1. Drought
2. Increased Rain/Drought extremes.
3. Extreme Cold

[jackprier]

Ancient bugs and their O2 isotopes as a proxy for temperature is wonderful-

[shaider]

Weird, I just watched PBS Spacetime’s video on the Silurian Hypothesis: a serious thought experiment on how to detect previous civilizations on Earth. It turns out it is very difficult to detect in the geologic record.