This is the memory palace.
I'm Nate Temeo How could it be that everything?
Literally everything people knew about ancient Egypt knew about that culture.
It was clearly so advanced clearly so Substantive literally clearly you couldn't miss it the pyramids you've seen them They're enormous and the Sphinx and the statues and temples and in the 1920s Everyone was seeing pictures in the newspapers of the treasures from the newly discovered tomb of Tutankhamen That there was a civilization with a run that lasted thousands of years.
So how could it be?
Thornwell Jacobs really couldn't get his head around it.
How could it be that everything anyone knew about that entire civilization came from fragments,
a few structures, a paltry handful of surviving objects,
and from literal fragments from Symbols written on crumbling papyrus found in pharaonic tombs,
or just a handful of tablets found in Egypt, or carved into stones at this one site, one place.
That was all that survived.
The sum total of all human knowledge about this extraordinary civilization came from just those few fragments.
It was incredible to think about.
Thornwell Jacobs would say that he felt like he was living inside a submarine.
Up would go the periscope and he'd look around for bed and take in what he could about the world.
But the view was always limited.
He could read books, but only so many.
He could visit a new city, but only get to so many museums or churches.
Only walk so many of its streets.
And he would know more about the world.