How did geography influence the rise of European civilizations,

>>1702150
>doggerlan :-DDD

One thing to point out is that there wasn't any real civilization until they invented iron axes to clear out the forests. This occurred around 800 a.d.

>>1702150
Doggerland looks so comfy, why even live if it can't be there?

>>1702171
Bullshit.

How are you defining 'real civilization'.

Having the mediterranean for communications really helped southern Europe.

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The Mediterranean was always a huge trade conduit and technology spread quickly to this area via the silk road or the Mongols, not to mention being a center of innovation in its own right.

From the time of Charlemagne onwards new innovations opened up Europe to agriculture. The area around the Netherlands, northern Germany, northern France and Southern England became a population center, most of europe was quite densely populated too.

In the 13th century trade expanded in the North sea and joined the Mediterranean.

Dense population suitable for manufacturing, extensive trade, full exposure to old world technology, all this gave them an edge over similar population centers in northern India and China which were also having their own renaissance at the time. Being just a few decades ahead gave European navies a huge advantage over other the other civilizations they encountered.

>>1702180
Cities. States. A power structure that extends beyond simple clan arrangements. Advanced agriculture. Written language.

>>1702184
Plus all the mild climate around it.

>we will never known what ancient settlements may have existed at those long submerged river mouths now under the sea

>>1702192
get ur fuckin scuba gear m8 we fancin orselfs a TRIP

>>1702189
The Olmecs did it with stone tools, no iron axes required.

Europe was more or less keeping pace with India and China and the middle east. What really made them take off was their easy access to the new world. Once they got there and started colonizing and extracting resources, they could blow all the other civilizations out of the water.

>>1702199
Olmecs lived in a different environment.

>>1702202
They had to surpass other civilizations before they could use new world resources and the economic benefits of colonialism were not significant until the 18th century which is when you start to see timber and massive cotton imports, even then it was a small proportion of the economy. It is overwhelmingly due to european technology and economic strength.

>>1702199

This anon >>1702209 is correct. Northern European civilization really jump-started once they started clearing out the forests. I'm not saying that's all there is to it, but it was one important change in events that allowed the Europeans to have more agriculture, more population, more advanced civilization.

>>1702209
What? Did stone age Europe lack stone or something?

Geography alone absolutely cannot explain the whole rise of the West over other Eurasian civilization (it can't explain the printing press, the Scientific Revolution, or the development of heavy cannon, for example), but it can explain parts of it. The West's naval dominance for example was due to a long Atlantic coast connected with the Mediterranean, encouraging the development of sturdier and more maneuverable ships, while isolation from the Indian Ocean and Silk Roads encouraged the trade-driven exploration that eventually lead to the colonisation of the Americas and influence over the Indian Ocean. Also stuff like England's vast reserves of coal made possible the industrial revolution.

>>1702186
>Kanem Empire
>landlocked
>dry savanna/desert area
Maybe this is why it didn't last long.

What about climate? Western Europe has mild oceanic climate. How important was that?

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>mfw Doggerland was Atlantis
>mfw i comprehended my Nordic-Hyperborean heritage

Finally the pieces fall together...

>>1702171
Bullshit.

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Reminder

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>>1702194
>>1702192
Some part aren't that deep, but there's the currents and the cold water.

>>1702242
You can't just say 'bullshit' and nothing else. Please explain why and how it is bullshit, otherwise I will just laugh at you.

I have no idea if this is right but it seems like there are a lot of calm rivers in Europe. This is integral for civilization and a massive pre-industrial boon to advanced commerce/complex trade. This seriously incentives complex society.

On the commerce side seas like the Mediterranean and big inland lakes are probably also great, but rivers are you next best bet.

>>1702236
It appeared to contribute to the agriculturally rich region I mentioned and productivity in western Europe in general.

Northern India, China and western Europe all have different environments, not sure what the advantages/disadvantages were. Maybe India had more disease due to the hot climate.

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>>1702262
Europeans accomplished much more than Subsaharian Africans, your arbitrary definition of a civilization means nothing.

Plus there were civilizations in Southern Europe since the Bronze age: Myceneans, Minoans.

Cucuteni people in Romania, some Italian cultures and Iberians also almost were civilization themselves.

Monumental architecture was widespread in Western Europe.

>>1702231
India has a coastline of about 7 500 km
Europe has about 66 000 km

India had sea trade since ancient times, but most of the continent in landlocked. meanwhile most of Europe isn't to far from the sea.

>>1702270
Do you mean navigable rivers?

How does the Rhine and Danube compare to the Nile, Tigris, Euphrates, Indus, Ganges, Pearl, Yangtze and Yellow rivers do you think?

What about smaller rivers like the Seine and Thames? Are they more frequent in Europe?

Maybe Europe is unique in that it is cool with a lot of rainfall.

>>1702270
This seems to have helped China also to some extent.
In Europe you have many close rivers that can be linked with canals.

>>1702171
Aah yes because bronze axes and fire can't clear out forests.

>>1702218
To be honest I'm not sure how relevant iron is. Innovations like three field crop rotation and the heavy plow seem more relevant.

Iron is also quite broad, Iron had been around since ~1200 BC, perhaps some innovations in metallurgy improved iron and steel tools in the early middle ages and you mean this specifically.
>>1702220
I meant a different environment as in a different temperature, different plants etcetera... Not sure how you interpreted that as meaning there are no stones in Europe.

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I'm proud of /his/ for discussing this recurring topic properly for once.

Maybe it is because all the normies are out partying on a Friday.

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>>1702218
No, I don't buy it.
Tin from England doesn't just magically appear in the Mediterranean, and bronze age traders aren't going all the way to fucking Cornwall if there weren't already a decent number of people with things worth trading for there to trade with in the first place.
The entire existence of Bronze age Europe requires there to have been some kind of organizational societies in the north to give justification for trade routes to arise in the first place.

>>1702299
>Not sure how you interpreted that as meaning there are no stones in Europe.

I was being purposely dense to highlight that a change in climate and vegetation is meaningless so long as the people in question have the material to build tools.

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Most of Northern Europe remained isolated from the South until the early Middle Ages.
Northern Europe was covered by huge forests and had much colder climate.
Long distance trade was more difficult because of lack of roads and the presence of wild animals in the dense forests.
So less development, small settlements and lower population density for many centuries.
The more developed areas like the Rhineland were so because of Roman rule.

>>1702347
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/03/slaughter-bridge-uncovering-colossal-bronze-age-battle
>battle in northern Germany 1250 bc, bigger than Homers Troja
>your argument is invalid

>>1702372
>large scale warfare existed in some parts of Northern Europe.
>Northern Europe was less populated and developed than the South

there's no contradiction here. The point wasn't that the North didn't have any civilization at all..

>>1702372
>Ayo we had armies n battles n shiet

>>1702150
Superior white genes ofcourse :^)

>>1702279
Switzerland is entirely landlocked and it's the most developed coutnry.

>>1702463
thats a comparatively recent development, Switzerland was poorfag longtime.

>>1702463
Genua and Nice are close.
And Switzerland being prosperous id due to a lot of factors.
The point was that even the landlocked areas are relatively close, so trade doesn't have to go trough to many countries to reach the sea.

>>1702412
>The point wasn't that the North didn't have any civilization at all..
>what is the Urnfield culture?

>>1702279
Indonesia has 55 000km alone.

>>1702512
>Ideal agricultural conditions, and the mastering of wet-field rice cultivation as early as the 8th century BCE,[13] allowed villages, towns, and small kingdoms to flourish by the 1st century CE. These kingdoms (little more than collections of villages subservient to petty chieftains) evolved with their own ethnic and tribal religions. Java's hot and even temperature, abundant rain and volcanic soil, was perfect for wet rice cultivation. Such agriculture required a well-organized society in contrast to dry-field rice which is a much simpler form of cultivation that doesn't require an elaborate social structure to support it.

Hm, so why didn't the Indonesian archipelago become a world power?

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>>1702307

Interesting, that ancient Americans (particularly the Incas) had all that tin and copper right under their feet and if they had only developed it sooner, things might have turned out vastly different (though of course Old World diseases still would have fucked them).

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>>1702412
>>1702419

If you missed it, we just had a huge thread based on that link and the evidence is already pointing to all kinda long range connections between "civilized" Mediterranean Europe and what was previously thought of as back-woods-nothing-going-on-there, Northern Europe.

>>1702495
>civilization
>no writing

That's not how this works.

>>1702639
Holy fucking shit.
The Balkans literally lie only on copper.

>>1702688
Pedant.

>>1702495
A culture.

>>1702463
Switzerland happened to be in the middle of a land route that connected the major Mediterranean ports of the south to the major North/Baltic Sea ports to the north.

>>1702463
Switzerland was pretty poor until the industrialisation

>>1702372
Wow, what a bunch of savages.

>>1702150
Question stems from a false premise, that European civilizations were fated to greatness even in antiquity.

If you want to answer the question of why European nations and those with European superstrata/majority populations are TODAY leading the world in terms of measurable indices of development, you have to look at WHEN they started to assume their superiority.

This is called the Great Divergence and is a relatively recent event, about 600 years ago or so did it become clear that European powers would come to dominate in the many respects they have seen to fruition.

If you were living two thousand years ago, you might have been asking what was so special about any of a number of non-Northern/Western European geographies that enabled them to foster the growth of advanced civilizations.

>>1702279
>>1702512
It's not the amount of coastline that matters, though you could argue that it did give some advantage, the main thing is Western Europe's position in respect to the rest of the world. The harsh conditions of the Atlantic and its convoluted trade winds encouraged more sturdy and maneuverable ships which combined with a strong tradition naval warfare lead to the creation of far more advanced ships than the likes of Mediterranean galleys, Chinese junks or Indian Ocean dhows. They could sail against the wind and were sturdy enough and loaded with enough cannon to fight off up to 20 Chinese ships each or easily bombard a defenseless Indian Ocean port. Europe's position in relation to the Indian Ocean, which left them cut off from the biggest trading hub in Eurasia except through extortionate middle in Cairo and Venice, encouraged the age of exploration, the rounding of Africa and the colonization of Indian Ocean ports as well as the discovery and conquest of the Americas. Of course this was only one stage in the West's rise to power, which wasn't really absolute until the 18th or 19th centuries.

>>1702572
Java was at the center of the Eurasian economy, controlling the spice trade, and thus had no need to go off exploring or colonizing. Also Java is only one small island, the rest of Indonesia is fairly infertile. It hosted amazing civilizations but was never very big on the world state, despite its economic importance.

>>1702171
WEW

>>1702150
pure neandertol breeding land then with the melts people got pushed together like diamonds under pressure and shit went down