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If the Library of Alexandria hadn't burned, my uncle says we'd all be speaking Greek and I can't stop thinking about it
My uncle Pete runs a used book stand in Pittsburgh and he told me over coffee that one fire in 48 BC set us back 1,000 years, which sounds dramatic until you think about losing all those scrolls. He said if it survived, we'd have had steam engines by 800 AD and I'd be reading this on a Greek tablet, which is a wild thing to say while eating a $4 diner omelette. Does anyone else have a relative who says stuff like this, or is it just mine?
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seth_singh208d ago
Oh man, your uncle Pete sounds like he'd get along great with my cousin who swears the pyramids were batteries. But here's the thing, the library didn't go up in one big fire, it fell apart over like 300 years of budget cuts and wars. And who's to say we'd all be Greek? Rome still would've done its thing. Still, losing all those scrolls hurts to even think about.
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