Marwan Buonamore: Ancient Empires and the Influence of History | #32

This episode is all about history! Marwan and Tom discuss many different historical topics such as Ancient Rome, Greece, Babylon, Egypt, Antiquity, The Vikings, and World War II. We also discuss historic figures such as Hannibal Barca, Julius Cesar, Adolf Hitler, and Pericles.

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Transcript

Tom 0:00

Hello everyone, my name is Tom Driver, and welcome back to another episode of the Drive Program. Today my guest is Marwan Buanimore, and the main topic we talk about is history. So I actually have only met Marwan maybe once, and it was like four or five years ago, but I put out a post on social media asking if there was any history nerds out there that were willing to do a podcast episode about history. Marwan reached out to me and we jumped on a call with the sole focus on me asking him a bunch of questions about history. This was an extremely educational conversation. I was blown away by how much Marwan knew his stuff. In fact, Marwan is very well known on TikTok, and I wanted to talk to him about TikTok, and honestly, the history conversation was so interesting that I didn't want to waste any time talking about anything else. As I mentioned, he just knew a lot, and so I was able to ask him a bunch of questions about a bunch of topics in history that I've been dying to talk about. So we talked about ancient Rome and Julius Caesar, we talked about ancient Greece, we talk about ancient Babylon, we talk about Hitler and World War II, we talk about the Vikings and even some of China's history. So we kind of jump all around, but I think you'll find that this episode is just packed with gems of information. So I just want to say thanks again to Marwan for sharing. You absolutely killed it, man. And if you guys enjoy this episode, please send it around to some of your friends that uh are into history. Yeah, I hope you guys really enjoyed the episode. And here's a quick word from our sponsor. This episode is sponsored by Mama Bama and the Mod Canna. They sell CBD products online and are offering a 15% discount to listeners of the podcast. CBD can help relieve anxiety, reduce pain and inflammation, improve sleep, and have many other positive health benefits. Personally, I take CBD gummies every day to manage my stress levels and to help me fall asleep. Go to the modcana.com to shop for CBD-infused products like gummies, lotions, tinctures, and smokables. Please use code DRIVE DRIVE at checkout to support the podcast and receive a 15% discount. I'm going to provide some educational resources about CBD in the show notes, but if you are unsure if you should be consuming CBD, please consult with your doctor. Thanks everyone. This is episode 32 of the DRIVE program with guest Marwan. Okay, so as you just mentioned, uh I posted about history looking for just some history nerds. I've never really talked to hit about anyone about history on the podcast before. So you reached out to me and um yeah, what who's your like uh favorite historical figure then?

Marwan 3:05

Oh, favorite historical figure has to be Hannibal Barca of Carthage. Uh I'm really Yeah, I'm originally Tunisian, and like one of the only things that the country's even known for is Carthage. You know, it used to be like the ancient empire that was in Tunisia. And Hannibal was the guy um who like took the elephants, who like went over the Alps and like destroyed all the Roman armies. Like that, he he really was the progenitor of like the antiquitan idea of conquest. Like, this is the only person ever to really defeat the Roman Empire. Even you know, in in centuries after he did that and he died, the Romans would be like, Oh, you better eat your vegetables or else Hannibal's gonna come, you know, knocking under your bed or something. Like he really was a super terrifying figure for them. And I think it's amazing how how modern-day, you know, contemporary historians will think about the ancient times like, oh, it's very European-centric. Like, oh, we have Rome, we have Greece, we have France. Like, no, a lot of what the major empires were back then was North Africa and like the Middle East. You have like Lebanon, you have like the Assyrians, Babylon, Carthage, all these places that are kind of wiped away because the Romans conquered them, and you know, history written by the victor. And so Romans really never really mentioned them in their in their you know history on it, so they don't get spoken about that much, but I find it super interesting.

Tom 4:16

Well, man, I can already tell you know a lot. This is exciting. So you you mentioned the antiquitan idea of conquests. What what is that?

Marwan 4:25

So back then, a lot of so a lot of tribes existed. Countries didn't exist and they had territories, and a lot of those territories were just unconquered, they were like, you know, no man's land type type deal. Um, and you had all these tribes that were like nomadic, they would frequently venture off to find a new place to settle. The original settlements that existed in Europe and North Africa consisted of like the Etruscans, you had the Greeks, you had the Carthaginians. And again, the Carthaginians were Punic, and so they came from Lebanon. The area that is known as the Middle East, and you've got the Fertile Crescent and all that area, that's where the civilization, first of all, you know, originated. And so, because all of those civilizations there kind of went through all the resources, they wanted to find new lands to explore, you know, new things to find to trade and new people to meet. Um, they would send these boating, you know, ex uh expeditions throughout the Mediterranean. And frequently from Tyre, which is in Lebanon, which is known as Phoenicia, they would settle in places like you know, Sicily or Greece or Cyprus or Carthage, which is modern-day Tunisia. And so, because of that, they established a maritime empire. And especially based out of uh, you know, Carthage being a huge port where you know they have a lot of trade coming in. You had a lot of different civilizations trying to trade with the Carthaginians because the Carthaginians ruled the waters of the Mediterranean at the time, because they had like the best ships, they had the best trade routes, and they were able to, you know, reach various lands because of those trade routes. And so they were able to not necessarily conquer in the sense of like, I am in this country and you I own you, and you have to bow to me, type of conquering, but really the influence. So they were able to reach with their you know, trade tender rules a lot of different civilizations that existed in the Mediterranean. So that was one of the first real civilizations that begun to encompass and group together a lot of the people that lived out and around the borders of the Mediterranean, antiquity, right? Right, and this is like you know, but before Jesus Christ, you're looking at like yes, 800, 900 years BC.

Tom 6:22

Yeah, yeah, because I I've heard people talk about antiquity a lot, and I never really pieced it together. So that what you're saying is that was kind of all of the uh the tribes in this area, right, that came out out of um the Fertile Crescent early on.

Marwan 6:35

Okay, yeah, yeah, and then and that's one of the main ones because you also had the Greeks at the time as well, right? So the Greeks also had, I mean, if you've ever watched the movie Troy, the Greeks obviously had influence with um Turkey and and they and they had a lot of uh you know fighting going on over that, and uh as well as the Persians. So there was trade and and and sort of exchanges going on between civilizations before, but this is the first time that it would kind of have been established that far west in the Mediterranean.

Tom 7:00

Who's your favorite historical figure from either Greek like the Greek Empire or the Roman Empire?

Marwan 7:08

Okay, so for the Roman Empire it'd have to be Julius Caesar, it has to be there's there's no way around him being the one of the most fantastic and and and uh accredited and and interesting person that ever existed for the Romans. He really changed, yeah. I mean, he turned the Roman, he turned he turned Rome from a republic into an empire, and no one had ever done that before. And then for the Greeks honestly, people are gonna say Leonidas, they're gonna say Themistocles. I say Pericles. I like Pericles because he was one of the only Greeks that was known to contest the ideas of his own comrades. And so Pericles was one of those esteemed Athenian soldiers who, again, was existed in the Peloponnesian War. Um, he existed in a lot of the fighting that went on with the Persians, and and he was also a thinker. He was one of the only Athenian leaders and generals that sought after the ideas of Socrates and of Plato and of you know Herodotus and all these old thinkers of the time. You know, back then they were like the only way is the way of either democracy, and democracy is influenced by war. But he he also thought that thinking played a great part of it. And so he took a lot of the ideas that these scholars presented and used them in his warfare and in his conquest and in his leadership. And I thought that was great.

Tom 8:19

Whoa, that's awesome, dude. Yeah, I've been reading a lot about Socrates and stuff. So if he uh if he took a lot of Socrates' teachings into consideration, you know, he must have he must have understood the way then. Absolutely. Wait, let's go talk about Julius Caesar for a second, because like I said, I've never talked about history on the podcast. I know a decent amount about Julius Caesar, but like let's talk about him as if I don't know anything. What what is his story?

Marwan 8:44

Oh man, the story of Julius Caesar. You know, there's a story that you can read about in books, or there's a story that you can um study uh in modern day, you know, like like you know, Shakespeare wrote a big book about uh Julius Caesar, but him as a person, I you know, I like to look at Julius Caesar as more of an idea, as I do than a person. As a person, I mean, he's a man from Rome who lived to be about 50 and who was murdered by his own countrymen because of his own ideas. But I like I like I love Julius Caesar because of his ideas. The things that he did and and how far he brought the Roman Empire was, you know, un unequivocally one of the greatest things that had ever happened in that time period. So, I mean, let's look at his major accomplishments, right? He was a Roman general, his main task was to conquer Gaul, and Gaul was France. Uh, there were a lot of tribes there, you know, Rome was trying to expand. A lot of those tribes were able to defeat the Roman Empire in a lot of battles. Um, and so Julius Caesar was such a great military leader that he was able to convince his men not to fight for him, but to fight for themselves. And so, because of that self-sense of pride, they were able to roll through every single um, you know, Gaulic army that they even faced. And so, little by little, he was able to have all these military victories in France. And eventually, when Rome had heard about this, remember, he was just a general. When they heard about this, they recalled him, they thought he was becoming too powerful. His, I mean, he was able to bring bands of Gaulish people to fight for him, which had been unheard of at that time, you know. Like people hated the Roman Empire, they didn't want to fight with them, let alone trade with them. But these guys wanted to fight alongside Julius, they really believed in him. And so Rome had heard about that and thought that he was becoming too powerful. They recalled him over from Gaul and they said, Hey, we have other work for you to do. So they brought him back to the empire. Um, and they said, if you, you know, they said if you don't come back now, you're gonna be in trouble type deal. Um, and then Caesar said, No, I'm almost done. I haven't conquered all of uh France yet. Give me some more weeks, give me some more time to do this. And they said, No, if you ever cross this line, it was the Tiber River. If you ever cross this line, then you will not be welcome back in Rome. You will now be an enemy of Rome. And so Julius Caesar, being the you know, vanguard that he is, basically said, This army likes me more than they like the Roman Senate, so I'm gonna do whatever the hell I want. And so he crossed over the Tiber River, came back into Italy. Um, and when he was there, he had had so much power and fame that he ended up being able to change the whole government style of Rome from a republic back when they had, you know, they had three rulers that were trying to rule one another. Um, and he turned that into an empire where he was the dictator. And that's why you have a lot of um different European countries referring to their kings as Caesar. For example, in ancient uh Germany, they would call their king, not ancient, but like contemporary Germany, they would call them Kaisers. Now, Kaiser comes from Caesar. Now look at the Russians, they have the word for king is Tsar, which comes from Caesar. You know, Caesar was one of the first main kings of Europe. Um, and he did that by just being such a vehement believer in his own values and being such a charismatic leader that he was able to convince anyone to basically be on his side. And that's not even to mention what he did in Egypt. You know, he expanded the Roman Empire over to Egypt, he had his little fling with Cleopatra. A lot of the Roman influence that was in Egypt was a in large part to uh Caesar's conquest over there. He even fought his own uh uh you know countrymen. You have Octavius, who he, you know, had to fight just to be able to assume his own army and so that he would be seen as the sole ruler of the Roman Empire at that time.

Tom 12:08

Do you think he was a morally just ruler, or do you think that he took all this power by force and it was not justified?

Marwan 12:16

I think that's a great question. A lot of people will have ambivalent views on that. I think, based off what he did, I don't think he did it for the grandiose of himself. And why do I say that? I say that because even after he died, people continue to be emperors, and Rome continued to be a great civilization because there was an empire, because there was power uh that was held by one man that assumed power over the whole empire. And so when you have numerous people that are leading an empire, you always have some sort of ambivalence issues, right? Like people are not going to get along and everything. Um, he brought in the idea of a dictator can still have democratic values and still provide the best for everyone. Now, that is not to say that there were failures like that. I mean, you have the Emperor Nero, you have Caligula, you have Claudius emperors who were not good for the empire, who were basically batching crazy and who got a lot of people killed. But the idea of a government-centric ruling body that was successful was first coined by Caesar. Um, and he saw a lot of great success in that. He was also known to be somewhat I wouldn't say humble, but understanding of his position. He was somewhat modest, right? He would always say, I do this for Rome. I do this for Rome. I don't do it for myself. Actually, one of the reasons that he was murdered on the Ides of March uh in 44 AD were because the others, people in the Senate, thought he was doing it for himself. And that's why they all murdered him. But he has always said, No, no, I do this for Rome, I don't do this for my own glory. And you believe him? I believe him to an extent. I believe that he did appreciate being the emperor of Rome, but I don't think he did everything for his own personal gain. Why? Because he had no riches, he didn't keep anything.

Tom 13:53

So, what do you think would have happened if he had worked with the Roman Empire and didn't cross back over and was just more willing to kind of work with them? Do you think that Rome would have lasted longer? Do you think that he played a part in their downfall? Or were they kind of already doomed, whether he did that or not?

Marwan 14:14

I think that at this time, this was so, so this was, you know, you're looking at around right around the age of Jesus Christ. Um a little bit after that. This was not the time that Rome began falling. This was theround the time that Rome began rising. And I think that's because it became an empire. Again, an empire, an emperor isn't always what's best for a civilization or for an emperor or for an empire, but I think that what Rome had and the out of power that they had, the land they accomplished, had you know had been able to succeed and to conquer and all that. Um, I think at the time, an emperor was needed. Um, the whole idea of a triumvirate where they had three ruling people that were governing you know everything about Rome wasn't working, which is why they were having a lot of failures. I mean, if you look at just the map of Rome before and after Jesus Christ, you can see the sheer size um and and and the uh power that the that the empire had in Europe and in other continents. And that was in large part because it was an empire.

Tom 15:06

Okay, so once once the the ruling structure of the three leaders kind of crumbled and is switched over to an empire, what did that mean as far as a governing body? Because didn't they set up other types of of governing bodies, not just a dictator, right?

Marwan 15:22

Right, right. They initially had um, you know, they had the triumber and they had the senate. Um, and so the uh senate was essentially a group of it was a governing body of individuals that were selected or the most influential people that existed in in Rome.

Tom 15:36

Is the Senate an idea that came from Greece, or is this original idea from Rome? That's actually a good question.

Marwan 15:42

I don't I think it actually might have come from Greece. I know Greece was the one that invented democracy, and I know they had the idea of a governing body ruled by a few, they had an oligarchy, so I think it might have come from Greece.

Tom 15:51

Okay, because I know I know Rome adopted a lot of Greek ideas. I'm just curious which ones are new to Rome or which ones are adopted from from Greek.

Marwan 16:01

Pretty sure the influence did come from Greece originally. I mean, even Romans' gods come from Greece mythology, but you know, yeah.

Tom 16:08

Okay, so then they set up the Senate body, and what was the other part of their government style? The triumvirate and you had the senate, and then now, as opposed to a triumvirate, you had an emperor and you still have the senate. Okay, so how do those two bodies do you know how they like work together or how they made decisions?

Marwan 16:24

Yeah, so it it changed from a triumvirate and then it became consuls. So it would the number of ruling people would always change. It went from at one point there were two, there were consuls. Um, two people who like one would rule the financial part and one would rule the you know military part. You can kind of look at this like a frat, right? You have the EVP, you have the IVP, and then after that, you have the executive council, which was essentially the triumvirate. You know, and then these these two would never work hand in hand. You had a certain number of years where there was a consulate, and you had a certain number of years where there was a triumvirate. After that, you had an emperor, so you can see that as the president. Now, the president has his executive council, which was the Senate. They would work with each other, they would all essentially try to you know appease, either appease the emperor if he was crazy, or work with him to get what they wanted done. They would work hand in hand with one another, but ultimately the emperor had all the say.

Tom 17:14

Hmm. They were like, okay. Interesting. I'm gonna jump all around with the questions. I'm sorry, it's just I don't I don't I for as far as history goes, like I've been very interested in the past six months to a year, but I I really didn't study it too carefully in college or anything. So, how did the how did Christianity affect the Roman Empire? And and I I'm pretty sure that Christianity basically grabbed a lot of Greek culture as well and traditions as well, right? And mixed them with like Jewish traditions, right? And then so how did that how do those two cultures come together and and how did it affect the Roman Empire, in your opinion?

Marwan 17:49

I actually love this question because I have a lot of historical theories about what would have happened if if uh if certain things happened. But basically, Christianity in of itself, as we know, was uh a result of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and the teachings of Jesus Christ and and a lot of the ideas that came around at that singular man. So at the time that Jesus lived, you had obviously Roman uh Roman occupiers in Judea. And so that whole area, Judea, was under Roman occupation. Pretty sure Pontius Pilate was the name of the Roman secretariat or the guy who ruled that area. Over time, remember that Rome believed in their own Roman gods that were taken from Greek mythology. Um, and Jesus of Nazareth was going around talking about how you know he had these ideas and he was doing all these miracles. Again, I don't know, I don't know too much about Christianity, but I do know about the legend and the facts and the story of what happened in history. And so, because of all these, people began believing him. And so Rome uh saw that and were kind of like, well, we don't like this guy's teachings. We want everyone to be Roman. Remember, we are the rulers of this area, you guys are our subordinates, you have to be the Roman way, you have to abide by our guidelines, you have to obey us in that sense. Um, Jesus was teaching individuals to think freely and to think of other ideas and to follow him essentially, and to follow the true beliefs of God that he was teaching everyone. Obviously, he was betrayed by uh Judas, I think his name was, handed over to Pontius Pilate, um, who then crucified him. Now, the idea of a cross, the the whole cross that we have, uh that you see Jesus crucified on, that was a Roman method of torture and of death. So the Romans had been crucifying people for years before Jesus was ever crucified. But because of the legends and all of the, you know, the stories and the things that happened and the miracles that happened to Jesus after he was um crucified, that's where he became a martyr. And that's where Christianity really took hold in that area. It took hold insofar as there were so many rulers that it changed the idea of Rome that Romans had of occupying territories. There were so many people that believed in Jesus' teachings and in Christianity that Rome started thinking, okay, maybe we shouldn't make every conquered territory that we have have to abide by our laws. Maybe they can believe freely as they wish, and we just, you know, we just get our taxes from them, or or they have to give us however much money every month or something. So they have they were changing the way they were taxing people because of that idea. Once Emperor Constantine came into the scene, I think this is in about the fourth century AD, he truly believed in Christianity. He became baptized, he became a Christian, and because of that, they would push the idea of Christianity to the rest of the Roman Empire. And so the Roman Empire back at home was now Christian because of Emperor Constantine. He believed in it and he wanted everyone to convert to Christianity. At this time, you have to remember that the Roman Empire was huge. They had territories in all of Europe, in the Middle East, in the Caucasus, in North Africa. So now all of these territories are having Christianity pushed on them, and they have all become Christian. And so that was one of the main reasons why Christianity became such a huge religion, because the Roman Empire that had now become Christian was you know pushing forward the idea that you all have to convert to Christianity to everyone that either was Roman or that lived under Roman sovereignty. That was one of the first main great pushes of Christianity to the whole world that as we go.

Tom 21:05

So, what are your theories? You said you had a couple theories about uh if things had played out differently or something.

Marwan 21:10

This is my connection from Hannibal over to Christianity, and I just love this. This is gonna sound maybe crazy, but I'm gonna make it streamline. So, Hannibal Barca from Carthage had attacked Rome and had defeated the Roman Empire, had defeated the whole Roman army. He was outside of Rome, he could have taken the city, you know, he could have sieged it, he could have destroyed the Roman Empire as we knew it. And this was in two like the third century BC. What did Hannibal do? He waited and waited and waited and waited for Rome to essentially secede and say, Okay, we give up, you can have us. Now, as opposed to taking the city, which again, he had murdered not murdered, he had uh conquered 140, 50,000 Roman soldiers months before this. Why did he never take Rome? If he had taken Rome, Rome never would have arisen to the power and The amazing empire that we know it to be. Now, if Rome had never been a great power in the Mediterranean, then they never would have conquered Judea. And if they never conquered Judea, they never would have had the authority nor the reason to crucify Jesus. And if they had never crucified Jesus, Jesus never would have become a martyr. And furthermore, Christianity never would have become the religion of the Roman Empire. There would have been no Roman Empire. And if there was no Roman Empire, Christianity would not have been pushed to hundreds of different countries throughout the world. I think that because Hannibal Barca did not take Rome, Christianity became a major religion in the ancient world. Wow. Okay, so wait, why didn't Hannibal Barca take Rome? Again, this is because I mean, you know, Roman historians don't write a lot about Carthage. There are numerous ideas why. Some say he didn't have the siege equipment, some say he was too weak, some say that Carthage, the Senate in Carthage didn't want Hannibal to do that, to murder more people, even though he definitely should have, since they were going to retaliate and defeat them anyway. There were a lot of reasons, but the main reason that they think is because he didn't have the wants nor the tools to do so.

Tom 23:03

This all happened way before like the Roman Empire was at its full height, right? So, okay, I thought he maybe led to the downfall of Rome, but this he just he just conquered a big chunk of it earlier on and then let him be.

Marwan 23:17

This was before Rome was an empire. This was around 200 BC when Rome was just a city. And because they had and then remember in the third Punic War, this is the second Punic War, and the Third Punic War, after Hannibal had been called back to Carthage after not taking Rome, they amounted another attack, defeated Carthage, and assumed all the lands that Carthage had. Remember that Carthage was the original empire. Now all those lands that belonged to Carthage now belong to Rome, and the Roman Empire began to form.

Tom 23:43

Is the Roman Empire the best empire of all time? Define best. I don't know. You define best. Okay, for its time. Is the Roman Empire the most powerful empire compared to empires like the Britain Empire, uh, the current United States Empire, maybe 100 years ago, or there's a couple other ones I feel like it could give it a run for its okay. How about what are other empires that you think could give Rome a run for its money as the best or the most powerful?

Marwan 24:14

It's it's it you know it's very hard to say so because there aren't many. There really are not many. What you could look of you could look into the Persian Empire, you could look into the uh Mongolian Empire in terms of conquest, you could look at the Macedonian Empire. I mean, I mean, look at Alexander the Great, look at the territory that he conquered. Did it mean that he held it? No. Was there influence because he had conquered those countries? Yes. I think that the Roman Empire is the greatest empire for its time and for modern-day contemporary historic historical reasons, because of not only the influence of bringing all these different countries in with one another, but because of the events that happened after it. The fall of the Roman Empire led for so many other groups that had been under Roman occupation for so long want to be independent. And that's what really formed other countries. The French, I mean, the Gaulish people who lived under France was or lived under the Romans were like, we're so sick of being ruled by another country, let's make our own country, as opposed to being a tribe. So did the Germans, so did the Italians, so did the Spanish people. That's when we first started to see the forming of the modern day countries that we see today in Europe. So I think because of that, and because of other reasons, the Roman Empire was the best for its for its for its money.

Tom 25:19

Yeah. So what does make a good empire, its influence on maybe like future cultures, like the ideas that stick around, or is it surely, you know, the time period that it lasted for, or the size of it, or the um quality of life for its its citizens? Like what what kind of factors do you do you think about when you're considering what what makes an empire great?

Marwan 25:42

So in turn, you know, empires always fall. They always fall. There's never an empire that's lasted that long. And because of that, I think that what they leave behind is more important. I think that the influence they've had, um, how they change the world and how they personify their own values that they have in the empire onto other countries, and if they last, I think that if an empire can exist for however many hundreds of years, and for there to be influence continuing in that area based off the values of that empire, then that empire is extremely powerful. It's not just the land you conquer, right? Because I mean, look at look at Hitler, for example. You could say Hitler had an empire. You know, he had conquered France, he conquered Belgium, he conquered Poland, he conquered Czechoslovakia. Did it last? No. Was there lasting influence? You could say so, more because of the war, not because of him. So that's an empire that didn't last. But the Roman Empire was also an empire that didn't last. But there was so much more sustenance and value and things that the Roman Empire did and the footprint they left on the world that makes them that much more influential. So that's what I kind of base it off of.

Tom 26:43

So I think the Roman Empire did the best job of bringing together, like I said, some values from Greece and Egypt and um Judaism. But is there a debate to be made that the Greek Empire was actually more influential because uh so many of our ideas and our I think our are just the idea of written alphabets came from Greek, and there's there's so much, so many things today that we actually use from the Greek Empire. Is that is there a debate to be made there?

Marwan 27:10

It's really interesting you say that because when you really think about it, people in America and in Europe at least are taught about the values of the Greek Empire. We're taught about hey, the Greeks did this, and this is why we have this. But there are so many empires that are not spoken about that we take things away from. For example, alchemy, math, arithmetic, medicine, astrology. Where do all those come from? What empire do those come from?

Tom 27:36

I don't know. I I thought Greek or Egypt.

Marwan 27:39

No, no one ever learns this, but it's the Assyrian Empire, it's the it's Babylonian, it's the Middle East. The Middle East really was the cradle of civilization. You have all these numerous empires, the the Babylonian Empire, the Seleucid Empire, the Assyrian Empire. These are empires where we take classes that we have now are study material they taught us back then. Astronomy, uh, alchemy, arithmetic, math, literally math and science were taken from those empires. But because they were never written about in contemporary European history, a lot of those ideas were taken by Greek historians, because Greek historians back then during the empire would trade frequently with other countries. They were, they were, you know, maritime explorers, they would meet people from all over the place. They would write down the ideas that they learned from those places. And because of that, they were seen as the ones that came up with those ideas. Back then, they didn't have plagiarism, they didn't have um uh what's it called? They didn't have copyrights or whatever you call those nowadays. Back then you had an idea, you wrote it down. If it lasted, you were the one that had the idea. So I think that the Greek Empire is credited for having a lot of ideas. Um, and for, you know, nowadays we learn a lot of things that come from the Greek Empire in terms of things that we study in school. But they weren't the ones that came up with the ideas. They took a lot from China. They took a lot from, I mean, look at the Silk Road. Once the Silk Road became a real thing, the Renaissance that had changed all of Europe and who had brought Europe out of the dark ages were ideas that were kept in books, in secret, in hiding in Egypt, in Iraq, in Greece, in you know, in Beijing, in Kambulak, in in uh in any country that you see traveling from the Orient and the Middle East, those are the original cradles of civilization, where all the original ideas are written down there. The West was actually inhibited, they were inhibited in terms of ideas that they had. We're we study stuff that comes from the West, that comes from uh Western textbooks and that comes from you know historical anecdotes that come from Western history, but they weren't the original creators of all that. You know, it's just they were the ones that wrote it down. History is always written by the victor.

Tom 29:36

Okay, so the Assyrian and the Babylonian Empire, what years are are these like 500 before Christ or even further, a thousand? Yeah, these are empires that existed way, way, way, way, way before.

Marwan 29:48

I mean, you're looking at like 626 BC. The Neo-Babylonian Empire was the second Babylonian Empire, and that ended in 626 BC. So you're looking at probably like the 11th or 12th century BC.

Tom 29:59

What are the stories of the Babylonian Empire and I think you said the Assyrian Empire? What are the what are the what are the significant talking points or stories or mythology that that is interesting about these empires or these cultures?

Marwan 30:14

I know of a couple. I know that there is uh have you ever heard of Hammurabi's code? Oh, yeah, yeah, but I don't know that much about it. It's like uh it's the whole theory, and this is funny because modern day uh uh not modern day, but like contemporary law will kind of take from this, it's an eye for an eye. So back then, the only first codified law that they had was from the Babylonian Empire. Um, and it was the Emperor Hammurabi who said, Oh, if a guy takes your eye, then you should take his eye. If he takes your sheep, you should give him a sheep. If he sleeps with your wife, you should take his wife. Or, you know, they had like a whole book that would write down how you would equate any sort of uh legal issues. And so those are the kind of things that we're thinking about back then. The first original codified law book came from the Babylonian Empire. Um, you also have uh the first hanging gardens ever. Uh, they were huge on um architecture and in terms of like you know, beauty when it came to that note. And so you have the hanging gardens of Babylon. If you look up pictures of that, it's literally buildings that rise up hundreds of feet in the air with garden trees hanging down from like the tops of them. They the things they were doing back then were unheard of, but because they weren't really written about, because I mean they were so far in the past and historians didn't really care about them, or the books were burned, maybe in the Library of Alexandria's burning, but there's a lot to be uncovered there. And even I don't know that much about the Babylonian Empire. I just know of the things that came up out of it, um, and how a lot of those ideas were taken into uh different European uh empires and used as their own.

Tom 31:40

What do you think was in the Library of Alexandria that that was lost? Do you think that there really was Atlantis or a civilization in Egypt uh 10,000 years ago? Or what kind of knowledge do you think has been lost along the way?

Marwan 31:57

I think the kind of knowledge that I'm referring to now, in terms of ancient scriptures and ancient ideas, I I really think, and this may be like a conspiracy theory, but I really do think that thousands of years ago, we were way more technologically advanced than we were 2,000 years ago. I think that, I mean, I mean, look at the building of the of the pyramids in Egypt. It blows my mind to think that people who didn't even know what a wheel really was were able to build that. I think that back then they had technology, they had some sort of scripture, they had some sort of knowledge that the ideas were lost, and the way that they built those were lost. I think there were empires that were lost, there were civilizations that we don't know about because of the burning of the Library of Alexandria. Again, that's very, you know, it's very cryptic thinking, but but I really do think that a lot of what we don't know about the ancient world we never will know because of that burning. And it really is a shame. I think a lot of the ideas, a lot of the contemporary values that we could have learned, a lot of the ideas surrounding modern-day subjects like math and science and astrology, who knows what what else we might have learned if if you know those scriptures were not um written from this world.

Tom 33:07

Yeah, no, I mean Socrates talks a lot about a city of Atlantis, right? And then there's definitely a lot of uh evidence of some great flooding or something actually happening about eight or nine thousand years ago that could have wiped out a bunch of civilizations. So the floods in the Bible and in lot there are in lots of ancient cultures. Uh I think certain archaeologists are starting to prove that some big disaster did actually occur like eight or nine thousand years ago. So there very well could have been advanced, advanced civilizations living on this planet. And then I think they call it there's a book called The Fingerprint of the Gods. If you haven't read it, you should read it. It's um it's a book all about little evidence of stories, either through stories of cultures or archaeologists, you know, finding remains of what seems to be intelligent, you know, civilizations. But I guess all we can do is speculate.

Marwan 34:00

Yeah, that's a sad. I mean, I mean, they all I love hearing the stories about the lost city of land. I played this game called Assassin's Creed Odyssey, where you could play in Atlantis and they had all these theories about how uh you know how Atlantis came to be, what happened to it. I mean, yeah, there were natural natural disasters. I think that back then, because if you look at a lot of the ideas and and the myths that came out of Greek mythology, I mean, for example, they had the pillars of Hercules. They said that if you cross these two pillars, then you were at the end of the world. Again, that's all that they knew. And so these two pillars we know nowadays to be Gibraltar and another mountain that exists in northern Morocco. And when they say the end of the world, it's just the Atlantic Sea. But back then, what they might have perceived to be a city taken under the water might have been a legitimate city that would just flood it. People have been searching the Mediterranean forever to find it. So I definitely think it exists. I just don't know where the heck it could be.

Tom 34:50

Yeah, or how advanced they were, right? They could have been just a normal people, it might not be that interesting. So we've been talking a lot, like you said at one point about Western history. What does history look like from someone in China or an Eastern thinker? Uh, what are the big historical figures over there? And and why isn't it as talked about? I feel like China went through a bunch of different, they were overthrown their governments like a lot, right? And it seems like their history wasn't as well kept, maybe, or something. I I don't fully understand. Or maybe I just live in a Western society and that's why.

Marwan 35:27

But one thing, one thing I've discovered is that what uh when you go to because remember, I went to school in Europe and in America. So the things that I would learn here versus in Europe were a little bit different. I I've learned that in America, when you learn about history, you learn a lot about Western European history. Um, you don't learn much about East Asian history unless you take a specialized class that will teach you that. Let's look at let's look at a major historical event that occurred in Eastern Asia that could speak to this. Uh let's look at you ever heard of Genghis Khan? Yes, yes. Genghis Khan, right. So uh and again, this is the era of Marco Polo. Marco Polo was an Italian explorer who would frequent, you know, him and his father Niccolò Polo would frequent, you know, the Silk Road to go to to go discover the great riches and the spices and all the things that they had in Eastern Asia. Now, at the time in Eastern Asia, there was sort of a type of pseudo-war going on in China, where you had the Mongolian Empire, which was based out of Kambulak, um, which is known as Beijing nowadays. You know, they had the Mongolian Emperor there, they had the Kanganate, um, which was you know, Genghis Khan, it was as kids, Kublai Khan and Eric and Jingam Khan. And they were trying to essentially assume the territory of the uh Song dynasty, which was in southern China. Um, and so the ideas that were kept here, again, you have the ancient ways of fighting, the ancient ways of cooking, the ancient ways of building, and this is in reference to Eastern Asian culture. They were kind of warring in that idea because the Song dynasty had a lot of money, you could say, a lot of resources and money that were trying to be, you know, assumed over by the Mongolian Empire. The Mongolian Empire, again, was just a huge empire that would conquer everywhere and wanted to be the biggest and strongest because they believed in one empire under the great blue sky, um, as Genghis would say it. But when you look at the ideas that existed back there, I mean, in this time period, remember they had gunpowder, they had fireworks, they were the ones that invented gunpowder, they were the ones that invented fireworks, they had invented a lot of things, especially spice producing. You know, the whole Silk Road, the whole idea of it was to bring spices to Europe from China and from India, because they had those spices and they didn't have those in Western uh Western Europe. So not only did uh spices come out of that Silk Road trade, I think that the Silk Road is one of the main reasons that Europe came to be the biggest and most powerful continent that we know it to be. And that's because, you know, back then during this time, you have the 1300s, you have the 1400s, you have um the dark ages in Europe where everybody was uneducated. Uh, they believed in God and only God, and if something bad happened, it was because of God. Um, and no one really had any feeling of self-actualization. They didn't think you could do anything to change what was going on. They were not enlightened, they had no ideas, they could not think, they were not smart. When the Silk Road became, you know, came to be thanks to Marco Polo. You have all not only you have not only uh uh the spices and foods and great gems and animals that are coming from Eastern Asia, but you're having the ideas, you're having the ideas that produced the renaissance, right? You're having ideas of building, of math, of of science, of of you know, of of sculpting, like like these ideas that were lost for thousands of years in Western Europe. Because after the Roman Empire fell, Europe fell deep into an age of darkness, because a lot of you know the enlightened people were killed, and a lot of the antiquitan ideas that were taken by the Romans that would help educate people were just gone and they were replaced with religion. Religion, religion, religion, religion was everything. You know, you you pay your taxes to the church and hope that you die a nice life when you go to uh to heaven or hell, um, so be it. People had no idea or a volition to do anything real in the real world because they believed all of you know that everything, God will take care of it. We don't have to do anything, God will take care of it. If I'm poor, it's because God wants me to be poor.

Tom 39:05

That's kind of the idea. So I thought religion in Europe helped kind of provide structure for people's lives and eventually helped us kind of rise out and hit the Renaissance era, or did was it not a positive force?

Marwan 39:18

I mean, if you think structure is poor people are poor and the one rich king is rich, then yes, there was structure. But I mean, there was no reason to live, I would say, back then.

Tom 39:26

There really were people just were ignorant. Weren't they building uh after the Dark Ages all sorts of great like uh monuments and and cathedrals and things in the name of religion? Like, weren't weren't they, I guess, giving people jobs, but just they were putting together interesting goals and architecture and things like that? Or do you think overall those kind of advances would have happened with or without religion, and that's just the way it came?

Marwan 39:50

I mean, think of architecture. Where did the ideas come to build all those great mosques? Uh not mosques, uh, the church. Where did where did they get all those ideas from?

Tom 39:57

Probably Rome, yeah.

Marwan 39:59

From the Middle East, from from China, from you know, ancient scriptures. I'm just saying at the and this is also a time period that I love the Dark Ages, the Viking Age. Oh my god, I'm like obsessed with it right now. It's all I play in the Sass Creed. But when you think about the ideas they had back then, again, people weren't really, and this is like the 700s, 800s, they were not living good lives, they were not living lives where they were able to do anything outside of let me tend to the sheep, let me build this house, let me take this out to the trash, and then die. There was not much else to look forward to except for heaven.

Tom 40:32

Okay, so let's let's talk about the Vikings then. So after Rome fell, dark ages, this is when the Vikings flourished as a society, or so Rome fell in the 5th century AD.

Marwan 40:45

Uh, as you know, this is because it would split. And so you have the Eastern Roman Empire and you have the Western Roman Empire. Uh, the Eastern one was based out of Constantinople after the Emperor Constantine, and the Western one was based out of Rome. Now the Visigoths came and the Vandals came and the Ostrodoss came. These are all Germanic tribes who were super mad that the Romans tried to conquer them, saw that Rome was weak and invaded the whole entire empire that remained in the West and basically destroyed it and they eradicated it to the ground. Uh, and then this is when they say Europe fell into the dark ages, because now we have no more ideas from antiquity. Now we have no more structure. And now it was the age, this is now the age of small villages, of uh religious rulers, of the church, and of tribes. So, in the midst of all this, you have the Vikings who are based out of the Jutland, you know, Denmark, out of Norway, Sweden, who are looking at Europe. They see the amount of riches that all of these churches have because again, Roman Empire had a lot of money. All these tribes went in, took all Roman Empire's money and took them back to their countries. So now all these areas have a lot of wealth, and they most likely keep them within the churches. Now, the Vikings were farmers. They were called Norsemen because they were men from the north. They were just farmers. You know, they weren't really people that wanted to murder other people for fun, but they had noticed that their population was really rising in the cold, barren wasteland that they call Norway. You know, I mean, if you've been there before, it's nice now. Back then it was really hard to live in, um, especially to farm. You can't farm anything there. They've seen all these nice green pastures that existed in Europe, especially in England. And they were like, that's ripe further taking. We should just go there and take their stuff. Like, we're clearly bigger and stronger than them. They're starving, and all they believe in is this god. We don't have god, we have Thor and Odin. So we're obviously stronger than them. We have a god of war. They don't even have a god of war. Let's go invade them. And so you have for the next 200 years all of these Vikings invading countless settlements in Western Europe and especially in England. Um, and they were taking all the riches and taking them back over to where they were from. Now, over time, the Europeans became smart. You have kings in Paris, for example, who would see all of the Viking invaders, and they were like, Okay, these guys are coming for money, they're not trying to kill me. Maybe I can pay them to not kill me, but to protect me from the other Vikings. There was a famous story of a Viking called Rollo who came over to Normandy. Now, Normandy is named after Norsemen because Norse men land. And so Rollo said, You can have that land and I'll pay you if you protect me from the rest of the Vikings. And Rollo said, Yeah, sure, I'll do that. And so he protected them for decades and decades and decades, eventually became so powerful that France itself became, you know, the royal family there became descendants of Vikings. Now, what's even crazier is the Queen Elizabeth, right now, if you go back far enough, the Queen of England is a Viking. Because William the Conqueror, William the Conqueror was a descendant of Rollo. Rollo was the guy who was protecting all of Paris from the rest of the Vikings. His great-great-great-grandson was William the Conqueror. William the Conqueror in 1066 won the Battle of Hastings, which gave him the English throne. Now, all of the descendants after William the Conqueror will lead us to Queen Elizabeth II, which means she's a descendant of a Viking, which means she's a Viking, which is yeah.

Tom 43:51

That's crazy. That's crazy. Yeah, I didn't understand how much influence the Vikings had on modern day Europe like that.

Marwan 43:57

Huge, it's huge.

Tom 43:58

Yeah, is that one of one of the Main reasons you like them, or do you just like their culture and their belief system? Like, I know they get to battle it out in a war affair in their afterlife. Like, what is so what is so appealing about the Viking culture? Because a lot of people have been into it. I think there's a really good show about it too going on right now, which is why people like it.

Marwan 44:16

There are a lot. Vikings Last Kingdom, there's a lot of things going on with that.

Tom 44:19

Yeah.

Marwan 44:20

I think that their way of life is interesting. When I was a kid, I would learn about Vikings when I was in like boy, like eighth grade. And I was like, oh my god, so they're basically really scary people that come on a long ship and kill everyone. And I'm like, wait a minute, that can't be everything about them. Like, they're so cool, they have their own god, they have runes. Like, what? Let me learn more about them. Then I discovered they had this whole thing, they have so much culture when it comes to like what they do. They don't do it just to kill, they do it because they want influence, they want power, they want to take care of their kids, and they can't do that in a in a you know a Siberia-like country like like Norway back then. I mean, if you look at if you look at English right now, here's the influence the Rome, the the Vikings had. The English language right now is 33% French, and that is because of the Vikings. Because William the Conqueror, who again was descended from the Vikings, was the king of France. Now he spoke French. When he assumed the ownership of the English crown, again, he didn't know any English, so he was speaking French to everybody. So back then they had to learn French in the courts so much that they would speak Frenglish, they were mixing French and English. That influence still exists today in the English language, which is granted, you know, came out of the Viking expansionism in Western Europe. Well, I think that's that's crazy.

Tom 45:34

Yeah, that I didn't know that much about the Viking culture. I've I've never sympathized with them too much, uh, just because I I wasn't informed, you know what I'm saying, about their culture, about I knew some of their belief systems, but it seemed it seemed barbaric. I didn't really understand where they came from and and the fact that that they needed, you know, they didn't have very good farmlands and stuff like that, uh, up in Norway. That's interesting.

Marwan 45:59

To an extent it is barbaric. I mean, the way that everyone else saw it was barbaric. But when you think about it, everyone that lived in England and France at the time were also barbarians.

Tom 46:08

Yeah, that's true.

Marwan 46:09

Yeah.

Tom 46:10

Okay, here's an interesting question. I actually asked, I think I asked Charlie this one when when I talked to him last. If you had to be a soldier in a certain army, which one would you choose if you had to be a general in a certain army throughout history? Which would it choose? And if you had to be the dictator. So one of them is like on the ground, then you're a general or a dictator. Cause because you know, I I think about certain like warfares like with guns and stuff. Personally, I don't know if I'd want to be a soldier in like World War II or something, but that might be a fun place to be a general, you know. So I'm I'm just curious which which wars and which societies would you choose to be a part of for those three three sections?

Marwan 46:49

If okay, so first one was a foot soldier, right? If I could be a foot soldier, I would be a Viking. Okay, because they didn't have generals, they didn't have a real army, they just had people who were leaving their they were like knights, you know, they were like people that were fighting because they wanted to, and all that they won, all that they conquered, they took for themselves. They didn't answer to anybody, but they were foot soldiers, right? I would definitely be a Viking foot soldier. And you said uh general, if I had to be a general, yeah, a general. So I was in charge of soldiers. If I had to be a general, honestly, it's gonna sound so messed up. I wouldn't want to be one, but I know that the generals that benefited the most out of the war were the Nazis. Because I know I I don't I don't I'm not saying I want to be I do not want to be a Nazi, no, but in terms of generals who had the most power and the most freedom and the most ability to do what they wanted, they could go home see their family, they didn't even have to go to the war, they could sit at home. Nazi generals had that much leverage again. Photoscamer, I do not want to be a Nazi, not saying no, I understand what you're saying.

Tom 47:58

You're saying like quality of life out of all the generals in all of the armies, Nazis had it the best, probably. They had it, they easily had it the best. Didn't they all like get out of there before the war ended? Didn't most of them flee to like uh South America and stuff like that, and they were all kind of taken care of. Yep, yep. A lot of them fled too because they had the money to do so. And then this is maybe conspiracy territory, but isn't there a conspiracy that NASA actually absorbed like most of the like their scientists and generals over there? And and we brought a lot of them over to America. I have heard that.

Marwan 48:30

I have I have heard that there's a lot of theories around that. I mean, Argentina and South America at the time, a lot of them were fascists. They actually agreed with you know Hitler and Mussolini, so they were really welcoming to when those Nazis wanted to leave. We don't really know what happened to people again. We don't even really know if Hitler died. I mean, we know he died, but we don't know where or when. They just say that he died on a bunker uh with the Russian army outside. But there's still a lot of conspiracy theories about that. They had like stud doubles and stuff, like we never really know, which is super cool, by the way. It's messed up, it's like super cool. I like who how they got away with things like that back then.

Tom 49:03

It's kind of nuts. So, what what do you think? Why did he lose the war? Hitler, yeah, man.

Marwan 49:10

Hitler lost the war because he he he was too self-righteous, honestly. I mean, if you think about it, he started a war on two fronts. You know, I don't care what dictator this is, I don't care what general this is, you never start a war on two fronts. You not like he had already he had an allyship with Stalin in the in the Russian Empire, and that was to conquer Poland. After that, he started the war against Britain, France, England, Belgium, all the Western European countries. So if you're already fighting everyone on the West and you already don't have that many troops, why the heck would you start a war with Russia at the same time? Like he didn't have to. Stalin was his friend, I mean, ally. They were allies, they weren't supposed to fight each other. But Hitler's dumbass goes and starts a fight with Russia again during during winter, which is a mistake that Napoleon made. Like, did he not learn from Napoleon's first conquest of Russia? You never invade Russia in the winter. Hitler did the exact same thing. For what? Literally for what? And I mean, as a result of that, you have the Russian Empire and American and all their allies crushing Germany like a bug. Do I think that Hitler would have had a better chance if he had not invaded Russia? I think Hitler still eventually would have lost because of America's influence, because when America came into the war, they really turned the tides. But Russia played a huge, huge, huge role in overthrowing um the German dictator.

Tom 50:29

Well, what would happen if America never got involved?

Marwan 50:35

So that would mean that I mean that would mean you're saying like if Pearl Harbor happened and America didn't care?

Tom 50:40

Yeah, or it didn't happen. If Pearl, I mean, if America never because America let's just say we don't care.

Marwan 50:47

Yeah, I mean, if we didn't care, I defin I think that the Western Allied powers would have had so much more of a hard time defending themselves against Hitler. I think that even today, Germany might have been way more influential. I honestly think that because of the armies at the time, I mean, again, the only other army that could have defeated the German army was the French army, and the French surrendered in six weeks. So I don't really think there was a standing army that could have stood up against Hitler. Hitler might have honestly assumed power of a lot of Western Europe if not for America and Russia's influence.

Tom 51:19

And Russia, they wouldn't have put a stop to him, right? They would have just defended themselves, I assume. Or would they would they have potentially been able to overthrow him? You mean like if Russia had gotten involved and America didn't? Well, yeah, I guess. Well, maybe I don't know what exactly happened with between Stalin and Hitler through that time.

Marwan 51:37

So they were allied in the sense where they both wanted to uh equally invade Poland and have their own chunk of it. Again, Russia wanted to uh defend themselves against every other country. Russia was one of the countries, I mean, even when you look at the Cold War and World War I, they just want to defend themselves, they want nobody to enter Mother Russia. They're like, We are Russians, stay away from us, no one touch us. And they knew that with Hitler encroaching upon the border of Russia, that eventually it was going to be a problem. So they became allies and they said we'll never fight each other. Then Hitler broke that, and Russia was like, Okay, now I have to fight you for my own survival, basically. Hitler did it for an Russia did it for survival.

Tom 52:12

Okay, yeah. So once Hitler broke that, uh Russia would have still just defended themselves, they would have never stopped Hitler from taking over Europe, though.

Marwan 52:20

Yeah, yeah. They would not have, yeah, if Hitler had never started, I mean, if Hitler had stayed allies with Russia, maybe Russia would have helped him. They already began the war as his ally, they might have continued to be his ally and then helped him conquer the rest of Western Europe. You never really know.

Tom 52:33

Do you think Germany would have then wanted to go to war with the United States eventually if they conquered Europe?

Marwan 52:39

Yes.

Tom 52:39

Yeah. And then do you think they if we had let them take the time over there to conquer Europe, do you think they would have beat us?

Marwan 52:48

No. I don't think that at the time there was a strong enough invasion force for Germany to invade mainland America. I mean, look at the country, it's insane. Yeah, even if even if Hitler had had ownership of and you know how many video games came out of this where Hitler basically occupied all of Europe and then like occupied America and like was a ruler of the world. Like, those are all wrong. Like that's not that's not that easy. Like America funded. I mean, look at the amount of troops America had versus the German troops, they weren't gonna win. If Germany can't even defend themselves at home, how are they gonna invade America and and kill the hundreds of millions that existed there? Especially with the amount of allies that America had. We had Mexico, we had Canada at the time, not our best friends, but they would have helped us because it was mainland North America. I think that any video game where Hitler's rule of the world is stupid.

Tom 53:35

It never well, yeah. I mean, obviously, a huge flaw too was didn't a bunch of Jewish people fought in World War I and they would have fought probably in World War II if he didn't basically put them on camps. So he kind of he kind of just ignored a bunch of help that that he could have had in the war if he was just more open to having everyone fight, right?

Marwan 53:54

When you start a war against Jewish people, don't expect the Jewish people to help you win that war.

Tom 53:59

Yeah. But if it wasn't about that, if it was just about conquering Europe, right, they would have helped. They probably would have helped.

Marwan 54:06

If because again, remember, his idea was Germany used to be a great Germanic empire, and he wanted to restore that for the German people. He never really said, I hate this religion. But over time he became more and more cynical and said, Okay, only the Aryan people should be the ones ruling in Germany. Actually, screw all screw all the Jews, all the Muslims, all the poor, all the gays, all the if you have any sort of ailment, you go to a concentration camp, basically. That was where he really started to go batshit crazy, and that's when he started to move in that in that perception. Yeah.

Tom 54:35

Do you think if he wasn't like that, he would have he would have prevailed?

Marwan 54:41

This is also a very uh uh controversial point I'll make, but full disclaimer, I do not support the man. He was one of the most influential leaders and charismatic leaders that existed. The way he could rile up a crowd and make people support him and and and speak out in a way that invigorated people to want to come to arms is literally unseen. You don't see leaders like that. He was messed up in the head, he had a lot of horrible things that he did to the world and to people, but as a leader, strictly as a leader and as a charismatic speaker, one of the best that one of the best that exists in the 20th century. So I think that no matter what he was pursuing, he would have had people supporting him and he would have had an army at his side, just because he was so great at speaking and so great at influencing people, and he was so charismatic. He he was a born leader, he was just insane and a fanatical madman who was a murderer.

Tom 55:32

Yeah, man, he's so infamous. I mean, yeah, like I said, I don't know much about history, but I've just heard so many podcasts and books about him. It's wild, it's wild how how he just he stands for just the idea of evil, you know, in our in our modern society. Everyone will compare you to him and and just draw those conclusions about him or or about you based on him, you know, like people calling Trump a Hitler or whatever. He's just he's just embodies like the ultimate evil, you know, influencer, you know, kind of person. Yep, he does. We didn't say if you had to be the dictator of one empire, what which one would it be? Or a uh ruler, like a president or a dictator. You know what?

Marwan 56:13

I would pick a Khan in the Mongolian Empire. Okay, why they were seen as gods, like people were worshiping their feet. And again, this is in a time in a part of the world where you didn't really have democracy, you couldn't really vote or anything. This guy was a god, he was literally revered as a god. Whatever he wanted, he got. This guy had harems, he had a pleasure house, basically a building where they would have like 50 of the hottest girls that they had in the last territory they conquered, and they'd be like, Go in there, and if you're lucky, the con will kiss you. Like, what? Like I got that. Okay, I'll be a con. I'll be a con. That that's what I would be. If I had to be a dictator or a ruler of some sort of force, it'd be a con.

Tom 56:50

Yeah, what are what else is interesting about the Mongol Empire then like that society?

Marwan 56:56

The idea that they believed in an afterlife, they believed in everyone meeting again in what was called the eternal blue sky. They were really good at fighting when you think about it.

Tom 57:05

Like these guys were pretty barbaric. Like they would they what are their weapons in their warfare like that?

Marwan 57:11

Like always horseback, they were always on horseback, had a lot of horses in in Mongolia, and so they were always they would train as a kid how to ride horses, how to shoot arrows off of horses, how to stab somebody off of horses, how to fight standing up on a horse. Like it was insane that we're learning back then. One of my favorite TV shows was Deadliest Warrior, where you would watch warriors from different civilizations fight each other, and I'm pretty sure they had a Mongolian guy fighting a Spartan, and the Mongolian guy won. Well, like this is a Spartan we're talking about, like guys who are living, breathing, killing machine, like in the Mongolian one.

Tom 57:41

Like it's nuts. I think it's nuts. Do you think Mongolians were the best fighters before guns? Or what is there any other warrior that would have beaten him, like a samurai, or I mean, if you think a Spartan would have lost?

Marwan 57:54

So with the Mongolians, you'd have to remove the horse. If you were they were the best horse riders, horse fighters that ever existed. You remove the horse, they're basically useless because they're just like a man. I mean, they knew like how to fight hand-to-hand combat, but like they weren't that good. I mean, if I can think of another type of warrior that would fight on horseback, like maybe an Apache. An Apache is a pretty scary opponent for a Mongolian rider. You also have, I mean, Vikings, Vikings had horses. Like, imagine a freaking Viking trying to kill, like, you dude, my Vikings were insane. They were like three minimum, and they were like, and they didn't care about death. And if you kill them, they were happy. If you kill them, they were like, Oh, I'm gonna go to Bahama. Like, what they wanted to die, like that's insane.

Tom 58:35

Well, dude, we've been talking for an hour and a half, man. This has been an awesome conversation. I'm usually I talk more during my podcast, but like I said, I don't know a lot about history, so I just I mostly sat back and I I learned a lot today. This is awesome, dude.

Marwan 58:48

Love that, man. History is one of my favorite things, so I'm glad you wanted to listen to it.

Tom 58:51

Yeah, do you have any other um is there anything that we didn't get to talk about that you wanted to bring up? What are you gonna name as the title of your podcast? I usually name them after the fact, so I definitely didn't come into this with an idea, but like reflecting on our conversation, I might name it Romans, Vikings, and we I don't know, I don't know. We jumped around so much. I mean, I would definitely basically like whatever we talked about the most, I would just throw in there. I wouldn't just be like history, you know, I would just be like the history of and pick probably like the three biggest topics we talked about. But I'm re I'm looking back on it and like I can't even I don't even know like time-wise which one we talked about the most. Definitely Roman Empire and the Vikings, and then whatever the third one was. Maybe um I don't know, I don't know, maybe just those two.

Marwan 59:42

You had a lot of Hitler and Christianity in there too, I think. Yeah, but those are balanced around, it's kind of crazy.

Tom 59:49

Or maybe, maybe, maybe like Roman Vikings and the Middle Ages or or the whatever time period we talked about the most. I don't know. I don't I just I haven't talked to anyone yet, so instead of diving deeply into like one topic, I just we just jumped all around with you. So I'm not quite sure, but once I once I look back and reflect on it, I think it'll come to me. But definitely, definitely Romans and Vikings. I'll throw in the title, I think.

Marwan 1:00:14

Because thinking about it, I'm thinking about all that we talked about, and if you want like of a thesis, you could because I feel like when we were talking, I was like writing paragraphs to a paper. Like, what would the thesis be? The things we learn about history really do reflect on what we know on modern day because people, and this is one of the main things I think about our educational system. We don't learn enough history, we don't learn. I mean, you said it yourself, like you love history, but just never really learn it that much. It's not important to people, and I think that history is one of the most important classes you can take. I mean, you're destined to keep making the same mistakes to see to keep living in darkness until you learn what happened in the past and can make changes and can make actions based off of what happened in the past, based off of experience. Historians are frequently some of the smartest people ever because they learned of things that happened in the past, things that we already know, as opposed to entering something without knowing anything. So I mean that I guess the main takeaway here is really, really, really important to just do your do your due diligence and learn history. If you don't learn history, you're gonna forever live in a time where you don't know what's gonna happen because you don't have any you don't have any um progenitors, right? So I think that America especially really needs to get their educational system to teach more history because without that, without you learn from it, I mean, what are you gonna do with any any other business degree, right?

Tom 1:01:31

Yeah, so first of all, maybe we'll call it Romans, Vikings, and the influence of history on modern times, right? Maybe that would be the type the good title. But yeah, dude, I totally agree. So I I've been very focused on the future. Like I said, I build, you know, software. I want to I want to build like a cool, like tech technology field gym someday, right? But the more I started focusing on like how to advance society in the future, I realize I really need to know the story of where we've come. I need to understand what technologies were crucial in the past, what cultures and civilizations. Like I don't even, I might not even want to build a company in America, right? I need to fully understand America's history, which we didn't even talk about at all, but I need to understand other civilizations and other ideas. And I really can't add to the pillar of what's going to happen in the future without fully understanding and appreciating where we've come from. And and you know, history doesn't repeat itself, but I think there's so many different patterns and trajectories that you you if you if you look backwards enough, you can start to see where we're heading in the future, right? And and we didn't talk about it really much, but I mean, there's a lot of similarities between the fall of Rome and modern day United States, and and our our culture is starting to is starting to look like it could be 150 years from now until the United States collapses or something. But it feels like we're starting to see some patterns emerge and come out, and that's some crucially important uh wisdom from the Roman Empire that I think that I'm still just beginning to learn about and that I need to understand, and that us as a society needs to really understand, you know.

Marwan 1:03:06

Yeah, I mean, shit, the way that we elect individuals nowadays as our president is taken from the Greeks and Romans. But yeah, absolutely, man. Um, like I said, I mean, this is this really was a great fruitful conversation. If there's ever been a point you want to keep talking about history, dude, I have I can never stop talking about it. So absolutely feel free not to be shy in that regard. But I really thank you for taking the time to listen, man.

Tom 1:03:25

Love talking about it. Yeah, man. Of course, yeah. Well, when um, whenever I get a guest that uh I really hit it off with, you know, I like to talk to him like every six months or a year. So we could check back in, you know, six months or a year from now and do another another update, talk about history again, dude, because uh I'm super interested in all this shit, and I don't and I I don't know almost anything about it, you know, comparatively.

Marwan 1:03:45

Yeah, by then I'll be TikTok famous. We'll see.

Tom 1:03:48

Oh, yeah. Yeah, man, I was gonna talk to you about that, but honestly, we were just having a good history conversation.

Marwan 1:03:53

I think history is cooler than TikTok. Fuck TikTok, dude.

Tom 1:03:56

Yeah, fuck TikTok. Hey, I'll put I'll put your username in in the show notes. People can go find your shit. But he's hilarious, guys. He's hilarious on TikTok. Check him out.

Marwan 1:04:05

It is forever, man.

Tom 1:04:06

All right, all right, all right. Yeah, take it easy, Marwan. It was great talking to you. Have a good one, bro. Yeah, peace. Peace.