Posted by Adam Quinan on September 11, 2013 at 03:04:50 user Adam.
In Reply to: Re: Tarboard; a splendid place to be... posted by Peter Ceresole on September 11, 2013 at 01:41:23:
Throwing in the empire word just to see Peter C's frothing ;-)
A good many early empires and cultures came about because of their connection to some waterway and maintained their power because they were able to control and use that water for transport and in the case of rivers for agriculture. The Mesopotamians had their eponymous two rivers, the Egyptians their Nile. The Chinese had the Yangstse and the South east Asians had the Mekong. While the Greeks did not have a major river, they had the Mediterranean and all the islands so close together in the Aegean.
Obviously there are exceptions, the people's of central Asia used their command of horses to spread their empires and culture. Despite the Congo, no great empire arose in west central Africa and North American people developed no lasting state along the Mississippi nor the South Americans along the Amazon.