Ages Of Empires
24Oct06
I thought this was a stellar flash animation of the geographical evolution of various empires and peoples that ruled the Middle East. It’s 5,000 years of history in a 90 second clip; literally the cliff notes version of cartography for what has been the most strategic lanscape in human history. But keep in mind I do not post this in support of any of its various historical inaccuracies and/or shortcomings such as exact borders or the “Kingdom of Israel”, which are disputable. I think the overall objective here was to present geographical transformations in a visually stimulating and creative medium.
[h/t Khalidah]
5 Responses to “Ages Of Empires”
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I found it very interesting and informative at the same time … like an instant history lesson
i saw an earlier version of the video. i’m glad they added the sejuk empire (i suggested it in the comments), but i still am bothered by “the caliphate” empire. there were a whole lot of different competing political entities that called themselves the caliphate. technically, there was a caliphate all the way until 1918 with the dissolution of the ottoman empire.
what the video calls “the caliphate” is really the ummayyids. they did have a caliph, but so did the abassids, and all the other dynasties that followed.
the reason why this bothers me is that “caliphate” has become a political term lately. often used by uninformed people evoking the prospect of a radical theocracy like the taliban. but really it just is a general term for a form of government led by a caliph. referring to “the caliphate” in the video makes about as much sense as calling mideival europe “the kingdom” because the whole place was ruled by someone called a king.
the author does continue to develop and refine the video in response to comments at his site. i’m hoping he fixes the caliphate bit so that it will stop irritating my pet peeve. an earlier version i saw went into the future predicting a new iranian empire. he removed it because it was too political.
I thought you were posting about the game Age of Empires
NICE…very informative ..what’s interesting is we are mixes and remenants of all that has been, yet now we only admit to our current nationalities
I Like that
upyernoz: I think it was trying to split hairs when addressing the caliphate as it was one large islamic empire ruled by different people at different stages in its development such as the abbasyids, ummayids etc etc. and yeah I agree it is used in the western world more for a negative connotations of something taliban-like, the term jihad falls in that category too.
maha: great game but i was more of a starcraft player