Environmental Thought in Antiquity

Something that I have never thought about in the ancient world is the idea of air pollution. In the Ultimate Rome documentary, Mary Beard discovers that there are high levels of, methane as a result of biomass burning or deforestation. I found this really interesting because this is an issue our own environment faces with the constant burning of coal, natural gas, and oil. These gases were preserved in deep layers of ice in the artic due to the expansion of the population and the Roman empire.

This documentary comparatively tied in well with the Winiwarter article when it mentions “what causes the most dangerous damage to the environment?” The video mentions population growth leading to air pollution along with this article that explains that maybe the human population is the main reason for the pollution of our rivers, seas, and air. Humans are known to cause considerable amounts of pollution on this earth, but this is something that has not just occurred recently, but instead, pollution dates back to the ancient Roman days. 

To relate this to the Ancient Ecological Narratives and Herlihy readings, the Romans began to use the environment and world around them to best serve and fulfill their needs, which was one of the very problems expressed in these readings. I interpreted "The Ode to Man" and "Gaia's Revenge" as expressing hatred towards mankind for taking advantage of the precious place we call home, and the Romans used their environments for personal gain, not caring what resulted. 

            After reading “Attitudes Toward the Environment in Medieval Society,” I was fascinated with Herlihy’s interpretation of the Genesis narrative. He discusses (with references to Lynn White, Jr.’s understanding) “ecological triumphalism, [which is] a sense that in their dealings with the material world, men need only consult their immediate self-interests” (102). Though this might seem fine to some, it is a terrifying thought: all of nature is now subject to man’s rule, and there appears to be no one who is divinely slated to advocate on behalf of nature. Additionally, even as someone who has been raised in a Christian Church, I found it interesting that the Earth was cursed “as a direct consequence of Adam’s sin,” and this was not something that I had considered prior to this reading (103).

            Herlihy continues his discussion on the Genesis narrative by quoting passages of scripture from the third chapter of Genesis. Verse nineteen concludes the chapter by stating, “In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return to the ground.” While this might be slightly grotesque, I find it happily ironic that man—the responsible agent for cursing both humanity and nature—must return to nature as the final act of his life by being buried or cremated. Either way, the natural world consumes humanity and overcomes the party who originally caused the “rebellious” curse (103). Finally, Herlihy provides a fantastic analogy: “By God’s curse, earth was rebellious to man, its appointed master, just as man had been to God” (103). Understanding this quotation through a more comical lens, though humans might sometimes think that the Earth is not wanting to cooperate with them (mom’s tomato garden will not grow, etc.), we ought to remember that we as humans were the ones who instigated the curse that produced the thorns and thistles that make gardening so difficult!

The “Ancient Ecological Narratives” were also interested to me, as well, particularly the portion of “Gaia’s Revenge”. I think it was interesting that this article frames the Trojan War as being a way to alleviate population increase on Earth. By starting a war that would result in the death of hundreds of fighters and innocence, the environmental problems that come with overpopulation would be reduced. The fact that this told to be “the will of Zeus” shows how important the natural world is to even the most powerful of the gods, as it is their creation, after all. 

Moodle Forum Post Week 1:

The Ode to Man

Antigone by Sophocles

Though Antigone is a tragedy the focus is on the narrative of the characters and the conflict of the men. The except we were given for analysis provides quite powerful insight into the perspective of the ancient civilizations on the forces of nature and, as a whole, the environment. The passage opens with a direct statement of the rape and exploitation of Gaia, the maternal figure of the earth in mythology. Mankind is classified as “terrible” because of the possession of the earth which is personified as a woman whose bounty and generosity we benefit from. Active verbs reveal the power man seems to have over the land with choices like “traps…conquer…tames…rules...” (Sophocles 332-83).

moodle forum post 1.docx

Around the middle of the video, they go and observe a silver mine. I know gold use to be the main currency back then, so at what point did silver become another currency, and why did they decide silver was worth making a currency. When silver came in as a currency, was gold used much less or still around the same amount? What was the difference between the two currencies? 

       I also found the eschatological attitude very interesting. The fathers found the earth overcrowded and procreation no longer necessary. I also think it is interesting that people way back then were ok with interpreting the Bible differently or acknowledging that certain things, in this case, the idea of "increase and multiply, and fill the earth," no longer apply, when people in the modern world struggle with accepting different interpretations or change to the Bible. The fact that there was an aversion to not only sex but marriage and procreation was an idea I never knew about. Augustine had said that if man no longer existed that would actually be a good thing because that means the predestined number of saints was met as well as the population of the City of God. They already were under the impression that maximum expansion and population had been reached as far back as the ancient world. The fact that the human population went on to grow to 7.8 billion is amazing. I also think it's interesting that couples wanted one or two children back then and we are now getting to the point in the modern world where more and more families are having none, one, or two children, but there was a long period of time when people had many many more. 

      Because I watched the video first it never occurred to me that there were pagan priests within the Roman empire that were actively encouraging men and women against marriage. Therefore it starts to make sense that the Romans not only wanted to project power and permanence through architecture but also through the communities that they conquered as well. By claiming these cities and spaces as Roman they physically expanded their empire without causing deliberate mass overpopulation. Though there was overpopulation in their cities, as evidenced by the data gathered about medieval Italian cities stemming from sources of Roman wealth and power, the Romans actively tried to stop overpopulation and the lack of natural resources it would cause. Having never thought about the Romans in this context it was fascinating to see how shifting ideologies about nature influenced empires in different ways.