<Super Ignorant Take Ahead...> I remember being taught in American History class that Franklin, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson studied and admired Native American systems of government when drafting the Constitution but my kids weren't taught this (though to be fair American History was removed as a separate subject and no longer covered in depth in their schooling). Most 'mericans would say it comes out of enlightened Europe when John Adams cited the Mohawks, who he argued enjoyed “complete individual independence,” while tribal leaders brought major decisions like declarations of war to “a national assembly.” and Thomas Jefferson said “the only condition on earth to be compared with ours is that of the Indians, where they still have less law than we. The Europeans are governments of kites over pidgeons [sic].”
To me it seems today Persian history is so artificially removed from Greek popular history, but when my son and I explored Alexander the Great's history it lead to us exploring Persian history and feeling the popular narrative was manipulated from the reality with so much missing connections.
I responded negatively to a previous post on here about 'Islamic Golden Age History' because it artificially divides us when huge portions of that golden age thought was coming from Christians and recently conquered lands only tangentially 'Islamic' and again popular history Pigeon holing and artificially separating us all.
'Islamic Golden Age' thought is also much Christian mindset thought (though not Germanic western European post Roman Christian thought which somehow becomes all Christian according to historians). Persia IS one of the progenitors of Western thought alongside Greece (Alexander the Great adopted much from Persia along with lots and lots of other cross pollination). But we sure aren't given that impression from popular history.
Now today I learned Indian spices were influential in Roman food. But I was taught Europeans didn't covet Indian spices until way later. Why? What use does that narrative have? Over eighty percent of the 478 recipes in the fifth century Roman cookbook of Apicius included pepper and that cookbook was widely known about since the 1800s apparently.
OK too many words, and hopefully I didn't offend with my Islamic Golden Age stuff. I'm not trying to lesson the Importance of the Islamic world, but expand it. I just hate that today we self isolate and apply that isolating viewpoint to the past when it doesn't appear to have been the case.