Life 500 Years Ago Sucked by Peter Diamandis (Scaling Abundance Series 7)
The average person today lives a vastly superior life to those in the past, as evidenced by improvements in life expectancy, literacy, violence, and child mortality. Technology has allowed humanity to move beyond mere survival, making this a fascinating era in human history. It's essential to shift to an optimistic mindset and embrace the abundance of the present.
A Glimpse into 1523
The Romanticized Past vs. Reality
How often do we hear, “I wish we could live in a time before technology ruined everything”? We often romanticize the past out of ignorance. While the Kovač family's story is fictional, it's based on historical understanding. And it's fictional for a good reason: written accounts from that time primarily focus on the wealthy, not the common people.
As Amanda Mull points out in her article in *The Atlantic*, most peasants were illiterate, leaving behind few records of their daily lives. We know life was short, brutal, and difficult. The average lifespan was around 35 years, and child mortality was incredibly high. Epidemics were frequent and devastating. There was no running water, indoor plumbing, electricity, readily available nutritious food, cars, air conditioning, telephones, or any of the modern conveniences we take for granted.
Our Comment: It's easy to idealize a simpler time, but the lack of modern conveniences also meant a lack of basic necessities and protection from disease. Even kings lived in conditions we would consider incredibly uncomfortable today.
Does this sound like a paradise by Peter Diamandis? In our next blog post, we'll move closer to the present and examine life in 1923.
Our Comment: This fictionalized account, while not based on a specific family, paints a realistic picture of the hardships faced by many in the 16th century. It's important to remember that this was the reality for the vast majority of people, not just a few isolated cases.