Something interesting I found as an older comment on an older Nerdwriter video; might be good to keep in mind for world building! Would honestly be cool to see more writers do.
THIS, THANK YOU
And if I may add, one thing that drives me BONKERS in fantasy world building is stuff like “Blah blah, this bad guy was locked away 10,000 years ago, awaiting the day when the prophecy says a champion would arise to fight him!!!!!”
BITCH, do you want to know what records we have on Earth from 10,000 years ago??
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LIKE THIS
We have no written memory of this time! Our earliest literary work is around 6,000 years old with Gilgamesh. We don’t even listen to scientists from 50 years ago telling us certain technology might be bad for us, but you think humanity would jump at a prophecy from before we had given up hunter-gathering?!
Please–for the love of whatever–fiction writers, think about realistic time spans! 70 years is a lifetime and is not actively talked about in day-to-day life all that often except in niche topics! Most orally transmitted knowledge passes out of memory in 120 years unless aided with writing as well as members of a society that are tasked with keeping certain information alive, and even then it’s often ignored. Who are your historians? Sure, maybe they’re immortals or have a longer lifespan (and then you should adjust your timelines accordingly). But why is anyone listening to them? If an academic came forward today and said an ancient Roman prophecy told them to beware the return of some Big Bad Guy, they would be thrown out of their university and featured on Ancient Aliens! And also, Rome’s fall is only 1,000-1,600 years ago (depending on how you count it). But within a couple hundred years of its fall, people in Britain thought giants had made their buildings. Until modern times, people in Britain thought one of the escaped princes from Troy was a founder of England! (Named Brutus, btw).
The OP’s point is very well taken. Most people today do not have exhaustive knowledge of their country’s history (or even their family’s history). There’s a lot of myth mixed in with fact and LOTS of conflicting accounts colored by ignorance or individual agendas. It’s also possible for them to just be flat-out wrong.
And for my sake please, please take into consideration actual human history. Our written culture is maximum 7,000 years old, people don’t know shit from 10,000 years ago, and even 1,000 years ago is the damn Norman Invasion of England and that’s pretty spotty too! I’m looking at you, Voltron!
Plot Designing 