A few years ago I made a long video on Pytheas of Massalia's journey, which became my favorite video. Looking back on it and looking at some of the comments I thought it could be improved so I am releasing this updated & improved version. Let me know what you think of it and is it the first time you see it or did you also watch the original from 2 years ago? Changes to the video include: -Additional information and clarification on various points. -10 mins of new content added to the Amber Coasts chapter. -Improved audio and voiceover. -Editing/animation fixes.
What a fantastic effort. Very rare for a RUclips video from a channel of your size. Again, a worthwhile channel that seems to be buried by the "Almighty Algorithm" Thanks for your efforts and for posting.
This was very interesting! I'm over 60 years old and try to learn something new everyday... You have given me a new lesson today... Very good video thank you
Love these videos.. With regards to the 'burning of Amber' - "harpiks" (Danish) is what we call tree resin, a good number of the trees we have up here give off a resin that when dried looks very much like unpolished amber in colour and is quite hard - has been burnt for various reasons; be they health related, religious (nature religions) and even as incense. I'd very much assume this is the "amber" they were burning. Kind of thought of burning resins and incense as the [ancient] historical equivalent of bringing out the good tableware for guests.
Aristotle knew that the Earth was round, but stupidly, he decreed that the Sun could not be the centre of the solar system. It had to be the Earth. He rejected those astronomers who had said ghe Sun was at the centre. He also rejected Democritus' belief in atoms.
Just read the Rihla and now I am on Il Milione again; damn, the work of Pytheas could have been awesome. Did not notice him on Polybius, but he trashtalks so many previous authors, whose work do not even survive, that it was impossible to remember that jab at Pytheas. Great video!
During the summer, basking sharks migrate to the waters between Britain and Ireland, and come be found in Scottish and Northern Irish coasts. Granted they do live in the Mediterranean coasts they can only be seen easily when in Britain. That means he could've seen those massive and wonderful creatures during his voyages. I can only imagine his awe to such beasts.
One thing I wanted to say about jellyfish is that in my younger days, I was a British soldier in Germany. In 1974, we crewed a yacht around the Baltic islands of Denmark. The shallow seas were full of jellyfish.
@@alfredoaohansen7468 I can't remember the names. I think one was once the home of Hans Christian Andersen. The islands between Jutland and the Copenhagen island in the Baltic sea?
Nice, I always love discovering a new history focused channel! Wonderfully researched, well presented, and with lots of snippets of great every day information or context sprinkled in. Also fantastic use of visual elements, and other voices for quotes. Your way of presenting and your style are very pleasant as well, and your voice is a joy to listen to. I learned a lot and look forward to exploring your channel more. Thank you for your work!
Yeah, that stood out, didnt it? Even though - thanks to our pakistani, indian, turkish, vietnamese ect, new citizens, british cuisine has massively improved. Chinese dumplings alone....🙄
They didn't have modern medicine or technologies that large amounts of money could buy that would make a meaningful difference in your longevity. So long as you could afford enough steady good quality and fresh food and not having to sleep out in the cold or the wet or work with some kind of toxic material, you were basically on the same level as everyone else. In fact you might even be on a better level than the ultra wealthy since they had certain practices that we now know to be pretty detrimental to your health. He probably just had good genes, if he actually did live that long.
Ictis is Vectis, the Isle of Wight. It famously connects back to the mainland at low tide and when I lived there, it was considered a challenge to walk between the two if you dared. It is also directly inbetween England and France and matches Diodorus’s description perfectly. The Romans also used the Island to do the exact same thing during their Empire, leaving behind beautiful mosaic floored Villas which can still be seen today.
@@StoutProper Perhaps not avid enough? Pytheas was the first documented traveller to have reached the British Isles. His prominence particularly derives from that.
Thank you for this. It is the best information on Pytheas I have ever seen. How amusing that even more than two thousand years ago the people of Britain were known to be old fashioned! We don't change much.
What a wealth of detail and strenuous analysis. I will put forth that you rate as lofty a spot in youtube historian annals even on a level of History With Cy, Wanax, History Time, and the other scholarly channels. 🤩 Oh,when the subject about the wealthiest amber merchants burning amber for warmth, it made me think of wealthy businessman trope where he shows off by lighting cigars with lit $100 bills. Maybe they were showing off for company. 🤭 Also I just now wondered, because other resins have a nice fragrance, perhaps it served as a type of incense. I seriously don't know. It just occurred to me. 🤔
Great work! Very believably told - far from the sensationalism we so often meet when describing this time and far as well from the dry "accademic orthodoxy" which seems to have no room for different alternative narratives. Gives a good idea of what we can say and speculate with what certainty based on what few sources.
Greetings and salutations! Thank you sir for this excellent documentary about one of my heroes. I am an Icelander by the way and intrested i History and Navigation. All the best, Billi.
Just a note on the geography if he went up the channel between Scotland and Ireland, unless the weather was poor, not only would he have saw both sides of the coast it would have looked extremely close enough to travel too within a few hours. In addition that area along the coast has lots of inlets and harbours that start in County Down all the way up to Belfast. So it’s possible that either he did go there or actively choose not too (due to rumours of aggression) but that point of the journey would then have been very portentous and full of fear knowing how close they would have been. But in some ways that would be strange because those communities were likely strongly integrated to some extent and have been travelling backwards and forth (between down/Antrim/rathlin and islands in Scotland) if he landed in Scotland at any point anywhere around there and stayed for more than a day it would be very surprising that he wouldn’t have either collected stories (about those in down/antrim) or met travellers going back and forth.
I will come back to this video since it is too long to watch at the moment for me. But there had been trade in walrus tusks and maybe other items from the far northren seas for a long time.
Iceland is NW of Scotland, Svalbard is more like North North East......Good point on migrating birds though, this was a key feature of Polynesian navigation.
As for the location of the amber coast, the Cimbri were the Celtic tribes who lived in North Jutland and were neighbors with the Ingaevones and Western Teutones who were of the Germanic tribes.
When you said he could have tracked the time since the solstice in his measurements is that because he would have known how to calculate the sun height with this information or only later astronomers could use this information
In Homer we also find evidence of the aurora borealis, when the Iliad mentions Zeus’s “swaying halo” (Il. XVII, 547). Felice Vinci argues convincingly for an origin of the Homeric epics in the Baltic and northern Atlantic, due to the long summer days and near absence of night, as well as other points (including place names and so on that he argues nay have been copied to the Mediterranean much later). Assuming this to have some substance, and the Homeric epics to date back to c.1800 BC, and these stories to be known to Pytheas, his long voyage to Britannia and to the Arctic circle might have been informed by legends connecting to this earlier time and possibly recorded in Homer's epics (by whoever collected them of course). While controversial, in my mind this thesis holds considerable weight and seems to be supported by Plutarch later on, and links the Scandinavian Bronze Age to the beginnings of the Mycenaean civilisation, and would provide a motive for Pytheas' journey of discovery, even though there is no evidence in any writings that have not been lost, to this notion.
The map, according to Herodotus 430 bce looks like nothing to me as much as it looks like a fossil of a T-Rex skull. As to the mystery island of the Keltic tin market my very first thought was St Michael, but still I was surprised to see it listed as the first likely spot.
Sorry! There are a few additions throughout the video but the main chapter that I expanded on is the part about the amber coast, in case you just want to see what is new!
Regarding the names 'Thioth' ['people'] and 'Thiuthaesysael' being possibly connected with the Teutones, I'm struck by the similarities with the Egyptian god Thoth -- which the Egyptians probably pronounced more like Teuti or Tehuti, 'Thoth' being Greek transliteration of the Egyptian original. There's evidence that Egyptians made it to the territory that has been called Scotland, including a mention in the Latin text SCOTICHRONICON, which would have us believe that an Egyptian princess named Scoti was the source of the name. If, indeed, an Egyptian colony had been established centuries before the times of the Greek and Roman writers cited in this video, in the Brittanic lands (Britain, Ireland, Scotland, etc.), then they might have also ventured across the North Sea to give their 'Thoth'-like name to NE Denmark. Maybe . . .
At 1:09:46 you talk about the Scandinavian origin of the goth theory, but there isn’t a lot of evidence to support it, the main argument come from Jordan’s History of the goth, but the origin story he give to the goth is believe to be a fabrication as it is very similar to Greek and Roman mythology.
sorry, had to stop when you said that the Mediterranean Sea is relatively calm and that the Atlantic is rough. In fact it is the opposite. Being shallow, the effect of the wind on the Med Sea is to make short , high, choppy waves, which really slam into the boat and are uncomfortable and difficult to navigate in, given the Greeks basic steering capacity at the time. In contrast the Atlantic has slower moving waves, and has more the effect of raising & lowering the ship as if it was in a slow moving elevator. Storms on both seas would be difficult and hopefully kept their ships in port. I have sailed both seas in many different conditions, and I'd choose the Atlantic for ease & comfort over the Med anytime.
I’m not saying the Mediterranean is calm all the time but from what I could find, the Atlantic (especially the northern Atlantic) is generally considered rougher than the Mediterranean. The main point of that section was that ships built for the Mediterranean did not hold up as well in the Atlantic which is corroborated by the Caesar quote so I stand by my point.
Good video, however, I would like to point out that Strabo also writes this of Thule: "Now Pytheas of Massilia tells us that Thule, the most northerly of the Britannic Islands, is farthest north, and that there the circle of the summer tropic is the same as the Arctic Circle. But from the other writers I learn nothing on the subject - neither that there exists a certain island by the name of Thule, nor whether the northern regions are inhabitable up to the point where the summer tropic becomes the Arctic Circle." Therefore, Pytheas must have undoubtedly have described Thule as inhabited. Furthermore, I find it interesting that he describes these large storehouses, as early iron-age dwellings in scandinavia consisted of very long storehouses, and very long dwelling-houses with both humans and animals inhabiting different sections of the length of the building in order to stay warmer. The part you quoted about the people of Thule, I would also argue is definetely more likely to be about Thule than the people of northern Britain, because he specifies the meager sun-conditions. It might also have been a good addition to the video to mention how the scientists from the geoinformational department at the Technical University of Berlin mapped Thule to have been the rather large island of Smøla on the north-western-coast of Norway. It is also known that there were large dwellings scattered accross the island at the time, of the same type as I described above. From there, it would have been easy for him to sail along the coast to Hålogaland, close to where Bodø is, where the arctic circle is currently, however, I believe he referenced the sun as never setting abit imprecicely. It is more likely that he just saw the sun was very low. I live in Trondheim myself, and I can see for a large part of the summer, the sun seems to be above the horizon through midnight, but is simply behind the mountains, although mathematically it isn't. Lastly, having also sailed to Iceland, I can tell you that it is far easier to sail to Norway than it is to sail to Iceland, as the wind is more or less constant in an east-ward direction, and so are the ocean currents. If you sailed north from Britain with somewhat primitive sailing-vessels, it is more likely that you would have a strong eastward drift that he could have not accounted for with a GPS like we are able to today. Pytheas, having sailed straight north for 6 days, would more than likely have sailed north-east. I loved the video! Just some constructive criticism about your conclusions about iceland as Thule.
Why would Pytheus walk around Britain when horses could have been hired , purchased. He records chariots which must have been uncommon elsewhere for the simple fact he notes of them in Britain. Which also points to the fact of there being roads and large areas of cleared ancient forest to grassland, otherwise what use chariots? He tells of a large population well fed and mostly peaceful and he has free passage amongst all except in the far north. This would be deemed a height of civilisation and rare at the time for any population including the Greeks themselves.
One thing I wonder. Didn't the Greeks have any concept of ice? Or the word "ice" in their language? The must've known snow, and the glaciers of the alps. Frozen lakes. Their Olympus is and was snow covered. Why then did Pytheas chose such words, why did describing the frozen slushy Arctic sea give him such a hard time?
Good question, I think they must have known ice as a concept but I believe it would’ve been more the fact that the sea could freeze and the way it did in the form of pancake ice that felt alien to them
@@KobeanHistory To me it sounds like Pytheas had this feeling of being at the literal end of the ocean, where the elements change their qualities and the common laws of nature don't apply. He seemed to be shaken in aw.
The Greek word for ice is παγος pagos. You seem to think Greece is a warm country all year round no doubt because all the photos of Greece you have seen were taken in the summertime. I lived in northern Greece for 8 years in Thrace. Every winter about January the temperature went down to about -20C. Any clothes I might have hanging out to dry would freeze as stiff as a board. So I think just maybe the Greeks had some concept of ice and snow. The Aegean sea would become very rough and windy in winter but I never saw it freeze. Certainly lakes would have frozen.
Maybe he only made it to Britain after walking trough southern France, and heard some stories from the traders there that had buisness contacts with people from the baltics and scandinavia. The guy reminds me of Marco Polo.
Marine lung is the sink hole in the north poles in the middle of rupes nigra's pool and it's this sink hole with the two others one in bermuda triangle and the other somewere in the indian ocean is the reason of the tails by sucking the water in for 6 hours and ejecting the water for next 6 hours giving the ilusion of plane's water breathing in and out like marine lungs
this seems like a copy of another video on the subject , why is no one taking into account the study that found the Norwegian Island of Smøla as Thule, and that he might have sailed into the Trondheimsfjord. Smøla fits with the 6 days, description of the peoples and the island next to smøla is known as Tustna today
It’s a remastered video of the one I made 2 years ago. I don’t see any new compelling evidence in the study that stack up to the counters I have already given in the part of the video about why I don’t think it’s Norway. Apart from the similar sounding name of the nearby island, but that feels more like a coincidence to me.
@@KobeanHistory So you use feelings? You should assess and at least include the study and findings from Dieter Lelgemann - Professor of geodesy. Lelgeman special area is Greek messures in the antic. The study used all knowledge about Thule and concluded that it probably is Smøla. Einar Østmo at the University of Oslo (UIO) say that the conditions that Pytheas reported from Thule was simular to these in the west-coast of Norway in iron-age. Such as farming herbs, roots, using barns for drying harvest, climate, using honey and barley in making of the norse beer “Mjød” etc. The name Tustna also comes from Tust, a tool used for farming. 2.bp.blogspot.com/-zDE6TKCpKOQ/UWFjs9Y2qlI/AAAAAAAAArA/kjoUuBo3-rw/s1600/Ama+Ata+Veleia+Pytheas+thule+08.jpg
Τουλαχιστον ο Πυθεας εγραψε κατι ,οπως και ο κυριος του βιντεο δουλεψε ,οι υπολοιποι ολοι σχολιαζουμε τη δουλεια που εκαναν αλλοι ,πολυ ελληνικη συνηθεια αυτη,μηπως ειστε Έλληνες 😅😅😅😅
Not all, only the one with Massalia on it. By the way, the IJsselmeer was only created in 1932. In Roman times it was called Flevolacus, but it was much smaller (narrower) then.
@@bcvanrijswijk Seeing as BC is in your name , I feel like you might have a biased opinion… jokes aside, it’s not that deep, I have used both in the past.
![Tee Grizzley - Robbery 8 [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/34_vkNV6wrU/mqdefault.jpg)
A few years ago I made a long video on Pytheas of Massalia's journey, which became my favorite video. Looking back on it and looking at some of the comments I thought it could be improved so I am releasing this updated & improved version.
Let me know what you think of it and is it the first time you see it or did you also watch the original from 2 years ago?
Changes to the video include:
-Additional information and clarification on various points.
-10 mins of new content added to the Amber Coasts chapter.
-Improved audio and voiceover.
-Editing/animation fixes.
Wauw!
What a fantastic effort. Very rare for a RUclips video from a channel of your size. Again, a worthwhile channel that seems to be buried by the "Almighty Algorithm"
Thanks for your efforts and for posting.
Awesome! I loved this video. I listened to it several times on long car rides across states.
@@goose6604
And that would be a great idea. A great idea for while you're on a drive up the bush!!
This is an awesome presentation of interesting material, thanks! I've seen the first and this one and I'm saving them both for many rewatches:-)
i always found the tale of Pytheas fascinating and as a Greek that now lives in North Sweden i consider that i now live in hyperborea
This was very interesting! I'm over 60 years old and try to learn something new everyday... You have given me a new lesson today... Very good video thank you
I'm deeply impressed by the work you put into this. An excellent job interpreting complex sources.
Love these videos.. With regards to the 'burning of Amber' - "harpiks" (Danish) is what we call tree resin, a good number of the trees we have up here give off a resin that when dried looks very much like unpolished amber in colour and is quite hard - has been burnt for various reasons; be they health related, religious (nature religions) and even as incense. I'd very much assume this is the "amber" they were burning. Kind of thought of burning resins and incense as the [ancient] historical equivalent of bringing out the good tableware for guests.
"Did the ancient Greeks know the Earth was round?" YES
As round as a planisphere!
Aristotle knew that the Earth was round, but stupidly, he decreed that the Sun could not be the centre of the solar system. It had to be the Earth. He rejected those astronomers who had said ghe Sun was at the centre. He also rejected Democritus' belief in atoms.
It'd be so cool to read the original by Pytheas, one of my most admired ancient characters.
Just read the Rihla and now I am on Il Milione again; damn, the work of Pytheas could have been awesome.
Did not notice him on Polybius, but he trashtalks so many previous authors, whose work do not even survive, that it was impossible to remember that jab at Pytheas.
Great video!
Very thoroughly done. Very interesting
During the summer, basking sharks migrate to the waters between Britain and Ireland, and come be found in Scottish and Northern Irish coasts. Granted they do live in the Mediterranean coasts they can only be seen easily when in Britain. That means he could've seen those massive and wonderful creatures during his voyages. I can only imagine his awe to such beasts.
One thing I wanted to say about jellyfish is that in my younger days, I was a British soldier in Germany. In 1974, we crewed a yacht around the Baltic islands of Denmark. The shallow seas were full of jellyfish.
Baltic islands of Denmark? What are the names of those islands. I think you have mixed something up there
@@alfredoaohansen7468 I can't remember the names. I think one was once the home of Hans Christian Andersen. The islands between Jutland and the Copenhagen island in the Baltic sea?
@@colinp2238 You mean Bornholm then, probably.
@@alfredoaohansen7468 It was 50 years ago now.
He means what we call 'det sydfynske øhav'
Everyone loves a good remaster! Great work, love the attention to detail ❤❤❤❤
Nice, I always love discovering a new history focused channel!
Wonderfully researched, well presented, and with lots of snippets of great every day information or context sprinkled in. Also fantastic use of visual elements, and other voices for quotes.
Your way of presenting and your style are very pleasant as well, and your voice is a joy to listen to.
I learned a lot and look forward to exploring your channel more. Thank you for your work!
I find it hilarious that complaints about how bad British food is show up in the earliest historical documentation of Britain.
At least we’re consistent! 😂
It’s traditional.
Yeah, that stood out, didnt it?
Even though - thanks to our pakistani, indian, turkish, vietnamese ect, new citizens, british cuisine has massively improved.
Chinese dumplings alone....🙄
What’s wrong with catering sausages, over cooked beans and soggy chips?
@@FischerNilsA thats not british cuisine then
356/350 to 260 BCE? Timeaus was remarkably long lived. Like a lot. 90-96 yrs. Impressive. He must have been wealthy AF.
They didn't have modern medicine or technologies that large amounts of money could buy that would make a meaningful difference in your longevity. So long as you could afford enough steady good quality and fresh food and not having to sleep out in the cold or the wet or work with some kind of toxic material, you were basically on the same level as everyone else. In fact you might even be on a better level than the ultra wealthy since they had certain practices that we now know to be pretty detrimental to your health. He probably just had good genes, if he actually did live that long.
Ictis is Vectis, the Isle of Wight. It famously connects back to the mainland at low tide and when I lived there, it was considered a challenge to walk between the two if you dared. It is also directly inbetween England and France and matches Diodorus’s description perfectly. The Romans also used the Island to do the exact same thing during their Empire, leaving behind beautiful mosaic floored Villas which can still be seen today.
Ictis is St Michael’s Mount, Kernow
Good luck walking to the Isle of Wight.
@@nodiggity9472 at certain times, you can.
@@vanbalzup6481 No you can't.
@@nodiggity9472 do you live there? I did. It was common knowledge.
Nice video, love the music choices, just a pleasant, relaxing retelling of a dude's travels.
Agreed!
I was so interested in ancient greece and great explorers as a kid and I never heard about this one!!
Amazing!!!
Forgotten? It is one of the most famous voyages in history and arguably the most famous in the ancient world. That said, excellent presentation!
Thanks, I meant it more as in the details are lost/forgotten and all thats left are the broad strokes
The Polynesians in Antarctica were pretty cool...
Never heard of it and I’ve been an avid reader of history and seafaring books
@@StoutProper Perhaps not avid enough? Pytheas was the first documented traveller to have reached the British Isles. His prominence particularly derives from that.
@@markaxworthy2508 before the Celts?
I LOVE how you present your informations!
You are saving/offering your viewers hours of searching and reading!
Thank you for this. It is the best information on Pytheas I have ever seen. How amusing that even more than two thousand years ago the people of Britain were known to be old fashioned! We don't change much.
What a wealth of detail and strenuous analysis. I will put forth that you rate as lofty a spot in youtube historian annals even on a level of History With Cy, Wanax, History Time, and the other scholarly channels. 🤩
Oh,when the subject about the wealthiest amber merchants burning amber for warmth, it made me think of wealthy businessman trope where he shows off by lighting cigars with lit $100 bills. Maybe they were showing off for company. 🤭
Also I just now wondered, because other resins have a nice fragrance, perhaps it served as a type of incense. I seriously don't know. It just occurred to me. 🤔
Thanks for the nice comment, it means a lot to me! :)
Yea, I imagine it would have smelt nice
Someone else drom Scandinavia commented that certain hardened tree resins looked a lot like unpolished amber and could be burnt like incense.
Great work! Very believably told - far from the sensationalism we so often meet when describing this time and far as well from the dry "accademic orthodoxy" which seems to have no room for different alternative narratives. Gives a good idea of what we can say and speculate with what certainty based on what few sources.
This is fascinating.
I liked your documentary very much. For the reasons elaborated in some of the commentaries. Call me lazy :D
Great work!
that was very interesting. thanx!
Greetings and salutations! Thank you sir for this excellent documentary about one of my heroes. I am an Icelander by the way and intrested i History and Navigation. All the best, Billi.
Great, informative, well researched documentary. Interesting discussion about 'Ictis'.Thank you.
Thanks!
The Bigouden country (the "beard" at Britanny's extremity) was called "Cap Caval" still one hundred years ago. Compare "Caval" with "Kabaion".
Just a note on the geography if he went up the channel between Scotland and Ireland, unless the weather was poor, not only would he have saw both sides of the coast it would have looked extremely close enough to travel too within a few hours. In addition that area along the coast has lots of inlets and harbours that start in County Down all the way up to Belfast. So it’s possible that either he did go there or actively choose not too (due to rumours of aggression) but that point of the journey would then have been very portentous and full of fear knowing how close they would have been. But in some ways that would be strange because those communities were likely strongly integrated to some extent and have been travelling backwards and forth (between down/Antrim/rathlin and islands in Scotland) if he landed in Scotland at any point anywhere around there and stayed for more than a day it would be very surprising that he wouldn’t have either collected stories (about those in down/antrim) or met travellers going back and forth.
Wonderful video
I like the tin connection here. Buy Tin, in Britain... Lol
grand. nice one
Absolutely amazing video. It's incredible how much of a lost text can be unlocked by simply looking at what others commented on or quoted from it.
Kobe is very tender hearted
Danke! Mindful entertainment 🧠💡
Really enjoyed your video
Arctic in greek means Bear the land of the bears probably the polar bears ❤
Nice video.
Love the video! You got s new subscriber!
I will come back to this video since it is too long to watch at the moment for me. But there had been trade in walrus tusks and maybe other items from the far northren seas for a long time.
Underrated video 👍
Well done ty
Carthage, the original gatekeepers.....great idea.
Great video****
mate you put somuch work into this, golden work. i like albion better than england or britain.
Iceland is NW of Scotland, Svalbard is more like North North East......Good point on migrating birds though, this was a key feature of Polynesian navigation.
@8:40 Interesting where Atlantes was placed on the map. "Bright Insight" had a video showing "Atlantis" in that same area.
New subscriber 🎉❤
Wait until you hear about the Periplus of Scylax
As for the location of the amber coast, the Cimbri were the Celtic tribes who lived in North Jutland and were neighbors with the Ingaevones and Western Teutones who were of the Germanic tribes.
Oh yeah? Well i took the seat off my BMX and now i can do some cool ass tricks on it.
When you said he could have tracked the time since the solstice in his measurements is that because he would have known how to calculate the sun height with this information or only later astronomers could use this information
It’s possible Pytheas could have known how to do it at the time he took the measurements
In Homer we also find evidence of the aurora borealis, when the Iliad mentions Zeus’s “swaying halo” (Il. XVII, 547).
Felice Vinci argues convincingly for an origin of the Homeric epics in the Baltic and northern Atlantic, due to the long summer days and near absence of night, as well as other points (including place names and so on that he argues nay have been copied to the Mediterranean much later). Assuming this to have some substance, and the Homeric epics to date back to c.1800 BC, and these stories to be known to Pytheas, his long voyage to Britannia and to the Arctic circle might have been informed by legends connecting to this earlier time and possibly recorded in Homer's epics (by whoever collected them of course).
While controversial, in my mind this thesis holds considerable weight and seems to be supported by Plutarch later on, and links the Scandinavian Bronze Age to the beginnings of the Mycenaean civilisation, and would provide a motive for Pytheas' journey of discovery, even though there is no evidence in any writings that have not been lost, to this notion.
Troy was discovered in Anatolia, the war happened. Nothing to do with the Baltic and northern Atlantic.
The map, according to Herodotus 430 bce looks like nothing to me as much as it looks like a fossil of a T-Rex skull.
As to the mystery island of the Keltic tin market my very first thought was St Michael, but still I was surprised to see it listed as the first likely spot.
Bro I just watched the original last night you did this on purpose
Sorry! There are a few additions throughout the video but the main chapter that I expanded on is the part about the amber coast, in case you just want to see what is new!
@@KobeanHistory haha thanks, original was great I'll probably watch this in full too
Thanks!
Thule may have even been Svalbard, good stuff!!!
I thought it was Greenland.
Franz-Josef Land.
In my opinion. They could have or would have maybe been there or somewhere and this is how history is written
Regarding the names 'Thioth' ['people'] and 'Thiuthaesysael' being possibly connected with the Teutones, I'm struck by the similarities with the Egyptian god Thoth -- which the Egyptians probably pronounced more like Teuti or Tehuti, 'Thoth' being Greek transliteration of the Egyptian original. There's evidence that Egyptians made it to the territory that has been called Scotland, including a mention in the Latin text SCOTICHRONICON, which would have us believe that an Egyptian princess named Scoti was the source of the name. If, indeed, an Egyptian colony had been established centuries before the times of the Greek and Roman writers cited in this video, in the Brittanic lands (Britain, Ireland, Scotland, etc.), then they might have also ventured across the North Sea to give their 'Thoth'-like name to NE Denmark. Maybe . . .
At 1:09:46 you talk about the Scandinavian origin of the goth theory, but there isn’t a lot of evidence to support it, the main argument come from Jordan’s History of the goth, but the origin story he give to the goth is believe to be a fabrication as it is very similar to Greek and Roman mythology.
sorry, had to stop when you said that the Mediterranean Sea is relatively calm and that the Atlantic is rough. In fact it is the opposite. Being shallow, the effect of the wind on the Med Sea is to make short , high, choppy waves, which really slam into the boat and are uncomfortable and difficult to navigate in, given the Greeks basic steering capacity at the time. In contrast the Atlantic has slower moving waves, and has more the effect of raising & lowering the ship as if it was in a slow moving elevator. Storms on both seas would be difficult and hopefully kept their ships in port. I have sailed both seas in many different conditions, and I'd choose the Atlantic for ease & comfort over the Med anytime.
I’m not saying the Mediterranean is calm all the time but from what I could find, the Atlantic (especially the northern Atlantic) is generally considered rougher than the Mediterranean. The main point of that section was that ships built for the Mediterranean did not hold up as well in the Atlantic which is corroborated by the Caesar quote so I stand by my point.
Why isn't this tought?
Vectis is the ancient name for the Isle of Wight. Very similar to Ictis.
Armorica.... F**K YEA!
Good video, however, I would like to point out that Strabo also writes this of Thule:
"Now Pytheas of Massilia tells us that Thule, the most northerly of the Britannic Islands, is farthest north, and that there the circle of the summer tropic is the same as the Arctic Circle. But from the other writers I learn nothing on the subject - neither that there exists a certain island by the name of Thule, nor whether the northern regions are inhabitable up to the point where the summer tropic becomes the Arctic Circle."
Therefore, Pytheas must have undoubtedly have described Thule as inhabited. Furthermore, I find it interesting that he describes these large storehouses, as early iron-age dwellings in scandinavia consisted of very long storehouses, and very long dwelling-houses with both humans and animals inhabiting different sections of the length of the building in order to stay warmer.
The part you quoted about the people of Thule, I would also argue is definetely more likely to be about Thule than the people of northern Britain, because he specifies the meager sun-conditions.
It might also have been a good addition to the video to mention how the scientists from the geoinformational department at the Technical University of Berlin mapped Thule to have been the rather large island of Smøla on the north-western-coast of Norway. It is also known that there were large dwellings scattered accross the island at the time, of the same type as I described above.
From there, it would have been easy for him to sail along the coast to Hålogaland, close to where Bodø is, where the arctic circle is currently, however, I believe he referenced the sun as never setting abit imprecicely. It is more likely that he just saw the sun was very low. I live in Trondheim myself, and I can see for a large part of the summer, the sun seems to be above the horizon through midnight, but is simply behind the mountains, although mathematically it isn't.
Lastly, having also sailed to Iceland, I can tell you that it is far easier to sail to Norway than it is to sail to Iceland, as the wind is more or less constant in an east-ward direction, and so are the ocean currents. If you sailed north from Britain with somewhat primitive sailing-vessels, it is more likely that you would have a strong eastward drift that he could have not accounted for with a GPS like we are able to today. Pytheas, having sailed straight north for 6 days, would more than likely have sailed north-east.
I loved the video! Just some constructive criticism about your conclusions about iceland as Thule.
I am still learning more towards Iceland but you make some good counter points, thanks for sharing them
The Aude river is very shallow and has strong currents.
Why would Pytheus walk around Britain when horses could have been hired , purchased. He records chariots which must have been uncommon elsewhere for the simple fact he notes of them in Britain. Which also points to the fact of there being roads and large areas of cleared ancient forest to grassland, otherwise what use chariots? He tells of a large population well fed and mostly peaceful and he has free passage amongst all except in the far north. This would be deemed a height of civilisation and rare at the time for any population including the Greeks themselves.
Circle of the Bear (ARTUR), King Arthur had a Bear with him
One thing I wonder. Didn't the Greeks have any concept of ice? Or the word "ice" in their language? The must've known snow, and the glaciers of the alps. Frozen lakes. Their Olympus is and was snow covered. Why then did Pytheas chose such words, why did describing the frozen slushy Arctic sea give him such a hard time?
Good question, I think they must have known ice as a concept but I believe it would’ve been more the fact that the sea could freeze and the way it did in the form of pancake ice that felt alien to them
@@KobeanHistory To me it sounds like Pytheas had this feeling of being at the literal end of the ocean, where the elements change their qualities and the common laws of nature don't apply. He seemed to be shaken in aw.
The Greek word for ice is παγος pagos. You seem to think Greece is a warm country all year round no doubt because all the photos of Greece you have seen were taken in the summertime. I lived in northern Greece for 8 years in Thrace. Every winter about January the temperature went down to about -20C. Any clothes I might have hanging out to dry would freeze as stiff as a board. So I think just maybe the Greeks
had some concept of ice and snow. The Aegean sea would become very rough and windy in winter but I never saw it freeze. Certainly lakes would have frozen.
Maybe he only made it to Britain after walking trough southern France, and heard some stories from the traders there that had buisness contacts with people from the baltics and scandinavia. The guy reminds me of Marco Polo.
Wicker and Hyde boat builders.
Ive heard about a polar bear report. Has anyone else heard of this? Sorry if i missed it
I didn’t come across it in my research
Or Ictius/Mictius refer to the inhabitants,the Pictius
Where is the artic?
What is funny, is that Greek called some tribes Barbarians and never classified who they were,😂
It means "Around the ocean".
hyperborea
Ancient astronaut 😆
Marine lung is the sink hole in the north poles in the middle of rupes nigra's pool and it's this sink hole with the two others one in bermuda triangle and the other somewere in the indian ocean is the reason of the tails by sucking the water in for 6 hours and ejecting the water for next 6 hours giving the ilusion of plane's water breathing in and out like marine lungs
Epic cheese
Comment
Same
Strabo was an all time hater it seems.
A man after my own heart
@@theElectricthrusts imagine him with a twitter account. 😂
You forgot to mention the ancient Greeks on Moon and Mars. Come on dude
The roman travellers wen't all the way to Lapland
this seems like a copy of another video on the subject , why is no one taking into account the study that found the Norwegian Island of Smøla as Thule, and that he might have sailed into the Trondheimsfjord. Smøla fits with the 6 days, description of the peoples and the island next to smøla is known as Tustna today
It’s a remastered video of the one I made 2 years ago.
I don’t see any new compelling evidence in the study that stack up to the counters I have already given in the part of the video about why I don’t think it’s Norway. Apart from the similar sounding name of the nearby island, but that feels more like a coincidence to me.
@@KobeanHistory So you use feelings? You should assess and at least include the study and findings from Dieter Lelgemann - Professor of geodesy. Lelgeman special area is Greek messures in the antic. The study used all knowledge about Thule and concluded that it probably is Smøla. Einar Østmo at the University of Oslo (UIO) say that the conditions that Pytheas reported from Thule was simular to these in the west-coast of Norway in iron-age. Such as farming herbs, roots, using barns for drying harvest, climate, using honey and barley in making of the norse beer “Mjød” etc. The name Tustna also comes from Tust, a tool used for farming.
2.bp.blogspot.com/-zDE6TKCpKOQ/UWFjs9Y2qlI/AAAAAAAAArA/kjoUuBo3-rw/s1600/Ama+Ata+Veleia+Pytheas+thule+08.jpg
Τουλαχιστον ο Πυθεας εγραψε κατι ,οπως και ο κυριος του βιντεο δουλεψε ,οι υπολοιποι ολοι σχολιαζουμε τη δουλεια που εκαναν αλλοι ,πολυ ελληνικη συνηθεια αυτη,μηπως ειστε Έλληνες 😅😅😅😅
Gh3y
God, I hate Strabo.
Is this 2000 year old hate speech? RUclips will have to catch up.
this story is hidden because it does not fit the big lie.
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Knowing Greeks, the only way this happened was that they were trying to avoid paying taxes
And buy cigarettes.
You forgot to mention sth about gyros and a number of other stereotypes that could take me an hour to write down
@@ΑντώνηςΑντωνίου-ζ5χ I couldn't find an excuse to talk about how hairy their women are
@@ThugShakers4Christ omg how 🤡🤡you are
yall Greeks you just dont know it XD
The only people that went to Baltic were the Serbs. Stop Greece BS😂
I really don't like how the maps are all oriented from north, how can you really see if you use modern eyes.
I’m not sure what you mean by that?
Not all, only the one with Massalia on it.
By the way, the IJsselmeer was only created in 1932. In Roman times it was called Flevolacus, but it was much smaller (narrower) then.
Skip the music !!
BC
BC and BCE are both valid - more of a personal preference
bce? It's BC.
Down Vote.
Both are correct, it’s a matter of preference
For the woke it's bce, for lovers of our history and culture it's BC.
@@KobeanHistory
@@bcvanrijswijk Seeing as BC is in your name , I feel like you might have a biased opinion… jokes aside, it’s not that deep, I have used both in the past.
Hahhha S t u p i d question
The description of Ireland lol 😅
Ancient Greeks have horigins in Asia......but they were as Vikings, good sailors ....!