"Geometricians wish they had what Cusco had" His groove? ... sorry

I’m sure Red’s incident happened before they banned tourists from climbing the temple of the sun but it’s funnier to imagine that she ignored the signs and was immediately punished for her hubris.

For a channel called overly sarcastic productions, blue's genuine interest and joy of talking about interesting things is a really stark contrast

That's not fair to Conquistadors, Blue. They weren't defined only by their obsession with gold. They also liked silver, thank you very much.

Fun fact about Tenochtitlan. The Conquistadors were basically like "shame we have to destroy this cooler Venice, but we have no qualms about murdering the people who know how to maintain it, and ourselves we have no idea" so they filled in the lake and built Mexico City over Tenochtitlan. For centuries, people living in Mexico City have be using the lake as an unground reservoir. But by draining the water, it has caused some parts if the city to sink unevenly compared to others.

Incas were really on hardcore mode when they were building their city XD "So, your job is to built one of the most magnificient city on Earth, on top of a mountain, in stone, with no metal tools to carve the stone, nor mortar to hold them, nor wheels or beasts of burden to carry them. Good luck."

As a Mexican, everytime I imagine walking into the magnificence of a non-destroyed Tenochtitan I just feel so sad thinking how we will never get to experience it.

Honestly, of all the ways to go as a city, being covered in molten lava is pretty sick

Mesoamerica is an endlessly fascinating region. Would love to see Blue do a longer video on it. Or better yet, a series of videos.

The Aztec empire is really interesting, but I find it interesting that in history it’s treated as an ancient civilisation as if it isn’t younger than Oxford university

"Those conquistadors; no taste for urban design." Just urban legends.

Venicians: "We built our city on water for defensive purposes." Aztecs: "An eagle god told us to." As someone who loves trying to build forts in the middle of water in any game with building mechanics, I like this.

I love how Blue discusses so many different histories that we may not even know about. I learn something new with every video

"The only way to build a city in a lake is carefully"

Some corrections on the segment about Cuzco: 3:27 Cuzco was not intended to be shaped like a Puma. This comes from an Incan idiom calling Cuzco "the city of the Puma" but there is no evidence that the Incas would've thought of their own city as being of that shape, especially seeing as it only has that shape after the Spanish partially destroyed it lol 3:40 The Ceques were far from straight lines aligned with Cuzco. They were lines of sight between a series of shrines and natural features, and they bent quite wildly around the surrounding area, but they all happened to begin at the Coricancha, which was the holiest site to the Inca. (This may have just been cut for the sake of time, but I felt it was worth mentioning.) Some random additional information: That geometric stone architecture is particularly impressive, as they have survive many earthquakes which toppled later Spanish built structures and also the fact that the Inca LOVED to impose planar structures into the natural rock surfaces (look of "throne of the Incas" for an example) I think it's also worth mentioning that they did all of this with stone tools (insert "I used the stones to carve the stones" meme) They used quartz river cobbles to chip away at softer stones until they got the desired shape.

"God those conquistadors, just gold gold! Gold! No taste in urban design" Dang it Blue stop coming up with phrases that sound good on T-shirts! 😆

anyone else think blue says “Teotihuacan” like Cronk says “poison for cusco”?

I was hoping Cahokia would be mentioned but this is still really rad and gets less attention than they deserve

Classical Mayan truly is my favorite language. Ergative, polysynthetic, so cool. Also dont forget the iconic ejectives such as t' and ch'.

Infidels: *climb the literal Temple of the Sun* The gods: Shouldn't have done that.

*-El águila en el nopal, es una señal, aquí se construirá la ciudad más importante de estos tiempos* +Señor es un pinche lago *-Quedara mamalon*

Dang indigenous Mesoamerican and South American cities are so beutiful!

Let’s look at Chaco Canyon and the surrounding Pueblos, along with Cahokia with the Adena, Hopewell, and Mississippian Cultures next! Woo!

As a Native person myself it is very nice to hear how amazing some of the First Person's empire's really were before tragedy cut short. Makes me wish more of these cities survived. I would've very much welcomed if a few of these places became a Rome of sorts. Retaining some of its historical architecture.

Not going to lie, I was expecting something about the Native tribes here in the States, but this is just as awesome. Too bad about Red’s sunburn, I get them on occasion, but thanks to some Cherokee ancestry of my own, each subsequent Sun session gives me a nice bronzing instead.

Afro-Eurasia: Cities must be built beside a river or on floodplains. Americas : Amateurs....

Ethnoastronomy in combination with new world mesoamerican archaeoastronomy is so fucking cool. I did an entire paper on it last year, entire cities got planned around the stars so that each temple and sacred spot would line up perfectly. The kind of measurement you have to take are so precise sometimes, its so cool

The Mexica didn't build in the middle of the lake for funsies - even if we ignore the prophecy, all the good land surrounding the lake was already taken by other peoples, and they weren't really in a position to conquer those spots yet without some sort of defensible home. Images like to depict the founding of Tenochtitlan as being surrounded by untouched wilderness, but in reality, it was fields of maize as far as the eye could see.

Mesoamerican history and cultures are overlooked all the time, and I am absolutely OVER THE MOON that OSP creates content exploring and explaining them

OH SO THAT is why Red is called Red the sunburn haunts her to this day.

Look up the Cahokia Mounds of Illinois, they're the largest archeological site of North America, and evidence shows that it was a complexly organized cosmopolitan city

JUST WHEN I STARTED LEARNING MESOAMERICAN HISTORY AGAIN Blue should be deemed a historian’s saint and given his own dome, make sure to make it very dome-y.

This is one of my favorite parts of this channel, learning things they just don't teach you in highschool world history, making me want to learn more about all of these cultures and their histories.

My favorite thing about Cusco's stonework is that there was a wall that was under construction when Pizarro conquered the city. The Spanish decided to finish the wall later because it was a valuable fortification. However, the discrepancy between the Inca's exquisite stonework and the Spaniards' much shoddier work could be clearly seen side-by-side in this wall. The locals like to joke that the old part of the wall was built "por los Inca" (by the Inca), and the new part of the wall was built "por los Incapaces" (by the Incapables).

"Wait, why are we building our city in the middle of a lake?" "Cause an eagle said so." "Say no more." - Aztec architects, 1325 (colourised)

Hey I know it would be a *lot* of work, but is there any time we could learn more about the indigenous cultures on where the continental US and Canada are today? As someone who’s indigenous and doesn’t know much about my own culture I’d really appreciate it!

You should talk about pre-contact Canada at some point! It’s a pretty wide range of cultures up here so maybe try one specific area to research

Ooooh, I can't wait to see Ravenclaw Princess pick up some of the moments from this vid into an Out of Context :D

This was fun, and now I want to see Blue working in Collab with Cody of Alternate History Hub discussing how one or all of these cultures would have gone if something (like Europeans not even making it to Mesoamerica for a few more decades or not popping up in South America for another century or so). I get the feeling Blue would really like doing the whole speculative history thing, he's hinted at possibly doing something like that in a few videos already and literally stopped himself short when he noticed either the script or his rant is getting a bit too off-topic.

Would have loved segments on the Puebloans (who boast the oldest continually habited city in the Americas), Cahokia, and Tollan, but I get that you had to choose. Maybe next time. Overall, job extremely well done as always. I had no idea the Inca shared the "center of everything" complex with China, and actually had a better argument than "because we're the coolest".

Red is called Red because she got a sunburn on a pyramid Got it

3:00 "K-U-ZC-O! Kuzco Kuzco, go go!"

Usually I don’t watch Blue’s stuff- I’m more into the mythology side of things- but I decided to give this one a shot and now I’ve learnt a lot!

"Geomatricians, wish they had what Cusco had" There's an Emperor's new Groove joke in here but I can't find it

I want to know more about the city that got covered in lava.

Interesting fact about the inka: In order to deliver messages or sometimes packages, they had the Chasquis, who were like relay runners for long distances, so one would get the message, run, and give it to another chasqui, until it got to its final destination. Anyway, really interesting video. Maybe you could do another explaining other indigenous cultures such as the Nazca, Wari, Moche, Paracas (these are from around Peru, but others would be interesting as well), etc.

...a city so magnificent that the conquistadors almost felt bad when they burnt it down. HAHAHAHAHA

YES!!!!! Finally a City Minute about Cusco!!! Thank you Blue!!! Been asking for it since you started doing this

Okay, I'm not too big into history. I've been watching this channel for Red's stuff. But I do sometimes watch Blue's videos just because I like his presentation, even if I'm not too into history. But this parrictular topic? It's been a long time since I was in high school, but I still remember the day (yes, one day) we spent talking about the indigenous people of America. Chief memory; Mayans lived here, Aztecs lived here, and Incans lived here. "Wait, the Mayans and Aztecs shared territory? How did that work?" I asked. "They weren't there at the same time." I was so confused but didnt ask further. It was kind of like if we clumped Egypt, Babylon, and Greece into the same day of teaching. And why was this done in a day? We needed to hurry along and talking about competing colonial powers. And looking back, it's sort of like clumping Egypt, Babylon, and Greece into the same day because we needed to hurry along to Rome. I felt ... cheated. Blue, if you did more videos on the civilizations of the Americas, I would be not just interested but grateful.

Finally! More appreciation for mesoamerica! As a mexican and a ethnic undergrad it makes me so damn happy to see more love being given to the rich and incredible history of our people!

One of the people the people I'm world-building for my graphic novel are based on Mesoamerican cultures and this video reminded me how much more research I need to do. Thank you, the way you described these cities really helped put a lot into perspective for me!

Love to see this! Great work on these cities and thank you for spreading the knowledge. Hope someday you can cover Cahokia and the Mississippian culture. So few people know that there was as expansive a place north of Mexico.

Blue this is amaziiing!!! You should really look into he history of the Caribbean Islands! They are so rich in history and traditions! And the indigenous people on the islands before the Spaniards came where fascinating

You should make a video on the Kievan Rus. It's a pretty interestig part of Slavic history, especially with the connection to the Byzantines. Plus it's a region which hasn't gotten much love from the OSP-verse yet

Please do African architecture next!!!

I am Peruvian and even I did not know about some of the things you talked about Cusco! I really want this channel to touch more on the Indigenous side of history, folklore, mythology, and literature! Latin America is highly underrated when it comes to this stuff I think because you rarely find it as a subject, at least on a surface glance. There are so many stories that could be looked at. The Hero Twins of the Ancient Maya, the two foundation myths of Cusco from the Incas (Lake Titicaca and the Ayar Brothers), 100 Years of Solitude if you want a Modern Classic. And there is a rich history there too, especially when it comes to the South American relations to Communism (see Shining Path in Peru or Peronismo in Argentina). This is a subject that is near and dear to my heart and I would love to see more of it.

0:00 ♫ Behold Teotihuacan! The Magnificent! ♫

Me: Man, I wanna make a D&D campaign about MesoAmerica, but it’s awfully hard to learn about it because of the conquistadors! Blue: *releases video Me: :)

The Andes are more hospitable than you might think. Being in the tropics a city like Cusco has consistent temperatures all year but the high altitude means that instead of hot temperatures all year it has moderate temperatures all year. This type of climate is known as the Subtropical Highlands and to this day it has the 2nd highest population density out of all climate types, being considerably more dense than the tropical climates. It makes perfect sense why the Inca chose to live up there; the mountains provided a reprieve from the tropical heat, the dense jungle, and especially the tropical diseases.

Love how you put a spotlight into less known cities

I thought the pyramids in Tikal looked familiar! That was the filming location for the Yavin IV Rebel Base in a New Hope!

Now this series has opened the door to the possibility of native American cities, I'd love to learn more about Cahokia places like that. Also, did the native Polynesians or Australians have any major cities before European settlers arrived?

I love so much the idea of "Oh hey a lake, that looks like a great place to put our city." Because WHY THE FUCK NOT. Like, "Oh I'm sorry, building your house on solid ground? Nah that sounds way too fucking boring, here in ancient america we have *style*."

You know, this video is gold to me because I write a spanish exam in school after the autumn holidays. It is about spanish and latinoamerican history but we will get a text we haven't dealt with in class, so this video gives some outlook for what might come. It is few but precious

Respect to blue for pronouncing those names so confidently.

Thank you for making an effort to use Nahuatl pronunciation. I know it's a short video so I won't be to critical but please do not misrepresent how the conquistadors took over; they had a lot of aid from rival tribes, being used as used as a source sacrifices for a while tends to make you angry lol. Still really grateful for the video, I see my Spanish ancestry represented a lot but not my Mexica ancestry not as much👍.

I've been waiting for this episode for so long!

thank you for briefly covering these amazing cities

can we PLEASE get some Cahokia recognition blue? The damn city was bigger than medevial London or Paris at it’s prime and NOBODY talks about it! >:T

NEW this is actually very good

Everytime i see something old and interesting. I think wow i should visit that someday! CONQUISTADORS: Wow, nice city you have there..... It'd be a shame if something, HAPPENED TO IT

agree with another comment hoping for a longer video/series of videos. i'd love to hear more about other cultures in pre-europe america.

We’ve seen enough Fantasy cities based in European aesthetics. Where are my cities in the clouds based on Incan Architecture and infrastructures? Gimme some desert empires based on the beautiful Pueblo houses from the Anasazi!! (I believe the Anasazi built the pueblos. I’m so so sorry if I’m wrong)

Imagine Blue's reaction if there had been any major Domes in the native cities. :P

As a proud Missourian, I'd love to see you do a follow up video on Cahokia. Not as large as the Mesoamerican cities, but still quite a populus and one of the few examples of Indigenous city building in North America (to my knowledge)

Always learning something new on this channel

Unfortunately most sources, if not all, regarding mesoamerican culture are second hand at best by descendants of native-Spanish settlers. Much if what we know is based on books written by people with agendas regarding their history- most of it nationalism before it was cool. It’s hard work to piece together the truth when the sources make active efforts to peacock or make a point.

The conquistadors: "hmm...buena ciudad, me la llevo."

You've def found your City Minutes format Blue- such a joy to watch!! Also Indigenous America playing civilization/ urban planning HARD MODE. Def need to be celebrated and learned about more

More of this please! Thank You!

Damn, and I was hoping he’d bring up the ones north of what is now Mexico… Regardless, the fact that so much information on pre-colonialism civilizations was lost makes me resent my ancestors.

I feel Cortez gets a little bit of a bad rep when it comes to how he dealt with the Azteca. I'm not saying his intentions were pure or praiseworthy, but he hardly had enough men to conquer them all on his own. He rallied all the people the Azteca had enslaved or subjugated and forced to pay tribute in both gold and (iirc) human sacrifices and essentially led a revolution against the Aztec empire... and then took all of their gold. Again, not saying he was altruistic, but I'm sure the former Aztec slaves thought it was overall a good deal. Gold for freedom?

Great video. I would love to see you guys take on the Mapuches

Thank for this video on our indigenous ancestors, I will visit Teotihuacan for the first time soon! Pakilistli pan inin Masewalilwitl! Happy indigenous peoples day in Nahuatl!

Fun fact: the Aztecs did not have a king! Their leader, called a huey tlatoani, would be more accurately described as a ‘speaker of the house for the committee of foreign affairs’ for the Triple Alliance. This is why Mocteuzoma was the one tasked with handling the Spanish-their presence was considered a foreign affair. The other two leaders in the alliance had specific roles too-one was essentially in charge of managing laws within the Triple Alliance, and the other was the religious leader.

But first Bring us the *Hearts* quite literally!

As an anthropology & American Indian Studies student, as well as someone who studies pre-Columbian America on their own time, this is a pretty nifty exposition despite a time constraint of 5 minutes! I think the biggest thing that needs to be more common in education about Mesoamerican is a discussion of the cities and cultures outside the popular ones. There's a lot of history before and between Teotihuacan and Tenochtitlan that's worth mentioning: the Zapotec city of Dani Baan (Monte Alban, which the map shows Teotihuacan conquering but it didn't really) spanning centuries of empire building in Oaxaca, and even Cholula has a little-known history of having an expansive kingdom in its grasp. And in South America, I really couldn't go into talking about amazing Andean cities without Chan Chan on the Peruvian coast, housing hundreds of thousands of people and being home to dozens of palaces. Wari and Tiwanaku are also really important for understanding the development of the Incas, too. Civilizations north of the Rio Grande really get the short end of the stick, though! In the American Southwest, people built towns of 6-15,000 people, traded with Mesoamerica, built huge roads extending straight across the four directions for miles and miles, and dug one of the most extensive canal systems in the world from which Phoenix, Arizona gets its name. And in the eastern U.S. we have the city of Cahokia which was like nothing the Eastern Woodlands had seen before, with over 20,000 people organized into a city-state dominated by a clay pyramid larger at the base than the biggest ones in Egypt, drastically changing the face of the region with later Mississippian chiefdoms carrying on its traditions of mound-building, organized armies and riverine navies and complex religion. One of my favorite parts of pre-Columbian America concurs with Blue's thoughts that it always throws curveballs at what you've been told to expect. At every turn there's some novel solution to a problem we didn't see before, and we're always learning more.

So glad you covered this!

Finally.

4:00 0:56 .

There is a serious a serious lack of content about pre-Columbian central and southern America v happy to see this!!

My grandmother and father were Quechua from Ecuador. My grandma even spoke the language but my dad did not. I’m only half Inca myself but I’m trying to keep the culture alive.

The lesson in all this is “screw you, conquistadors. Let us have our feats of engineering.”

Noam chomsky once wrote: "We still name our military helicopter gunships after victims of genocide. Nobody bats an eyelash about that: Blackhawk. Apache. And Comanche. If the Luftwaffe named its military helicopters Jew and Gypsy, I suppose people would notice"

So many cool cities. I love how they just decide to build over a lake or volcano. So awesome.

I know we like to get up about architecture but blue you have to REALLY get to learn about those stones, they're incredible

Being in the Incan empire seems like a party

Its always super disheartening when histories of mesoamerica start at close to year 0 and then jump straight to the 1400s 1400 years of history we'll never get detailed accounts of because of colonialism..

You should do a video on the even more overlooked cities of North America like Cahokia and those built by the Pueblo peoples.

If you want to know more about the Inca extra credits has a 4 part series all about them. And if you want to know more about the Aztecs history scope has a 6 part series about them. I have watched both multiple times and can't suggest them enough.