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Lee Berman · 14 Jan 2011, 20:07 · from 2011-January.txt.gz

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From: severiansola at hotmail.com (Lee Berman)
Date: Fri, 14 Jan 2011 15:07:54 -0500
Subject: (urth) (no subject)
Message-ID: <SNT123-W54E0D04FBA702599D8ED52CFF30 at phx.gbl>

>David Stockhoff- Interestingly, both are possibly related to fertility---but the irrigation 
>cultures handed down more of our mythical material than did the slash-and-burn cultures. So 
>I agree there: better to drown and cover the world in green than to burn in satanic sterility.

Excellent anthropological point. And so true. Oral traditions are nice, but for longevity and 
accuracy, they are inferior to writing systems. And writing always originated in river-based 
civilizations not jungle-based tribal cultures (well, there are the seaside Phoenicians but 
they needed to develop writing for their trade between river civilizations).

I'm not aware of studies of the mythical supremacy of fire among swidden agricultural tribes
but I bet there are some interesting contrasts to irrigation-based societies.

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