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The term Golden Age
comes from Greek mythology and legend, but can also be found in other ancient cultures (see below). It refers either to the earliest, and most ideal age in the Greek range of Golden, Silver, Bronze, and Iron Ages, or to a time in the beginnings of humanity which was perceived as an ideal state, or utopia, when mankind was pure and immortal. A "Golden Age" is known as a period of peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity. In literary works, the Golden Age usually ends with a devastating event, which brings about the Fall of Man (see Ages of Man).
An analogous idea can be found in the religious and philosophical traditions of the Far East. For example, the Vedic or ancient Hindu culture saw history as cyclical composed of yugas with alternating Dark and Golden Ages. The Kali yuga (Iron Age), Dwapara yuga (Bronze Age), Treta yuga (Silver Age) and Satya yuga (Golden Age) correspond to the four Greek ages. Similar beliefs can be found in the ancient Middle East and throughout the ancient world.
Some Utopianist beliefs, both political and religious, hold that the Golden Age will return after a period of blessedness and gradual decadence is completed. Other proponents, including many modern day Hindus, believe a Golden Age will gradually return as a natural consequence of the changing yugas.
Some pastoral works of fiction depict life in an imaginary Arcadia as being a continuation of life in the Golden Age; the shepherds of such a land have not allowed themselves to be corrupted into civilization. [1]
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GOLDEN AGE TICKETS
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History
Islamic Golden Age
The Golden Age in Islam started from the time of
Prophet Muhammad, for around 500 years through the Ummayad, and Abbasid dynasties, until the Mongol Invasion. This was from the 7th century till the 11th century CE.
The Islamic Golden Age, also sometimes known as the Islamic Renaissance,[1] is traditionally dated from the 7th to 13th centuries C.E.,[2][3] but has been extended to the 15th[citation needed] century by some recent scholarship. During this period, artists, engineers, scholars, poets, philosophers, geographers and traders in the Islamic world contributed to the arts, agriculture, economics, industry, law, literature, navigation, philosophy, sciences, sociology, and technology, both by preserving and building upon earlier traditions and by adding inventions and innovations of their own.[4] Howard R. Turner writes: "Muslim artists and scientists, princes and laborers together made a unique culture that has directly and indirectly influenced societies on every continent."[4]
Greek and Roman antiquity
A myth of ages can be seen in Europe in the writings of
Hesiod in the late 7th and early 7th century BC.
The
Greek poet Hesiod, around the
8th century BC, in his compilation of the mythological tradition (the poem
Works and Days
, ll. 109-126), explained that, prior to
the present era, there were four other progressively more perfect ones, the oldest of which was called the
Golden Age
. In this stage:
[...] they lived like gods without sorrow of heart, remote and free from toil and grief: miserable age rested not on them; but with legs and arms never failing they made merry with feasting beyond the reach of all devils. When they died, it was as though they were overcome with sleep, and they had all good things; for the fruitful earth unforced bare them fruit abundantly and without stint. They dwelt in ease and peace upon their lands with many good things, rich in flocks and loved by the blessed gods.
In this age, Hesiod writes, mankind lived in absolute peace, carefree like the gods because they never aged and death was a falling asleep. The main characteristic of this age according to Hesiod was that the earth produced food in abundance, so that agriculture was rendered superfluous. This characteristic also defines almost all later versions of the myth.
The
Orphic school, a religious movement from
Thrace which spread to Greece in the 5th century BC, held similar beliefs, including the denomination of the ages with metals. Some Orphics identified the Golden Age with the era of the god
Phanes, who was regent over the
Olympus before Cronus. In
classical mythology however, the Golden Age took place during the reign of
Cronus. In the 5th century BC, the philosopher
Empedocles emphasised the idea of original peacefulness, innocence and harmony in all of nature, including human society.
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Several centuries later (
29 BC) the Golden Age was depicted in
Virgil's
The Georgics
1.125-8. Here, the poet looked back again to sing the good old times before
Jupiter, when:
The topic is taken up again by
Ovid's in his
Metamorphoses
(AD 7):
Peace and harmony prevailed during this age. Humans did not grow old, but died peacefully. Spring was eternal and people were fed on acorns from a great oak as well as wild fruits and honey that dripped from the trees. The spirits of those men who died were known as
Daimones and were guides for the later
ancient Greeks (who considered themselves to live in the later
Iron Age.)
This race of humans eventually died out after
Prometheus (a Titan) gave them the secret of fire. For this,
Zeus punished humans by allowing
Pandora to open
her box which unleashed all evil in the mortal world.
Within sequences or cycles of eras, the Golden Age stands in sequence with the
Silver age and the
Iron Age, and conditions can improve or decline according to one's conception of
mythic progression.
Plutarch, the Greek historian and biographer of the 1st century, also dealt with the blissful and mythic past of the humanity.
Hindu
The Indian teachings differentiate the four world ages (
Yugas) not according to metals, but according to quality depicted as colors, whereby the white color is the purest quality and belongs to the first, ideal age. These colors were originally assigned to the planet Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury and Mars just like the metals. After the world fall at the end of the fourth, worst age (the Kali yuga) the cycle should be continued, eventually culminating in a new golden age.
The
Krita Yuga also known as the Satya yuga, the First and Perfect Age, as described in the
Mahabharata
, a
Hindu epic:
[...] Men neither bought nor sold; there were no poor and no rich; there was no need to labour, because all that men required was obtained by the power of will; the chief virtue was the abandonment of all worldly desires. The Krita Yuga
was without disease; there was no lessening with the years; there was no hatred or vanity, or evil thought whatsoever; no sorrow, no fear. All mankind could attain to supreme blessedness. [...]
The Hindus make reference to at least two overlapping yuga cycles, driven by celestial motions, that affect conditions on earth. One cycle, the Maha Yuga, is millions of years in length and therefore difficult to relate to human history or events. The shorter yuga cycle lasts 24,000 years, including an ascending age of 12,000 years (one daiva yuga) and a descending age of 12,000 years, for a total equal to one
precession of the equinox. Both cycles are composed of the four eras, and the Satya Yuga is the first and the most significant age in each cycle. This Golden Age era lasts 7200 years (out of the 12,000 years in the ascending period) and another 7200 years (out of 12,000 years in the descending period) in the precessional cycle. Knowledge, meditation, and communion with Spirit hold special importance in this era. The average life expectancy of a human being in Satya Yuga is believed to be about 400 years. During Satya Yuga, most people engage only in good, sublime deeds and mankind lives in harmony with the earth.
Ashrams become devoid of wickedness and deceit.
Natyam (such as
Bharatanatyam), according to
Natya Shastra, did not exist in the Satya Yuga "because it was the time when all people were happy".
Christianity
According to
Tom Whyte and
John Ashton's
The Quest for Paradise
, the Golden Age idea contributed to the modern Christian views of
Heaven.
The Golden Age is identified with
Eden. It is considered to return during the
Kingdom of God, the reign of
Christ which will never end. See also
millennialism. The church father
Lactantius availed himself with his description "golden age" of the future thousand-year old of Christ's Kingdom including the usual characteristics (blessedness of entire nature, sumptuous fertility, animal peace, disappearing agriculture and navigation).
Book of Isaiah Ch. 65, which somehow is reminiscent of the mythological Golden Age descriptions, is believed
[who?] to refer to that state:
Another connection made by some Christians and Jews was that this was a reference to the
Nephilim spoken of in the book of Genesis, as referenced from the
Book of Enoch, a
pseudopigraphal work. The book of Enoch is quoted in
Jude 14, 15.
Norse
The
Old Norse word
gullaldr
(literally "Golden Age") was used in
Völuspá to describe the period after
Ragnarök where the surviving gods and their progeny build the city
Gimlé on the ruins of
Asgard. During that period,
Baldr reigns.
Early modern Europe
In early modern Europe, some called the
Enlightenment a second Golden Age (the first assumed to be that of the ancient authors
Homer,
Aristophanes,
Virgil and especially
Horace); in
England and
Ireland, the
Augustan Age and the 18th century were then considered a Golden Age for the progress made in thought (
David Hume), science (
Royal Society), and literature (
Jonathan Swift,
Daniel Defoe,
Alexander Pope).
Some believe that the Matter of Britain, a series of legends including Arthurian legends, talks about a Golden Age.
China
In
China, the idea of a golden age was believed as no different from the Greek or Christian term. Pre-modern Chinese regarded the distant antiquity of the
Sage Kings,
Xia,
Shang, and
Western Zhou dynasties as the Golden Age. Modern historians generally choose instead the
Han,
Tang,
Northern Song, and/or the
Ming dynasties.
Fantasy
In modern
fantasy worlds whose background and setting sometime draw heavily on real-world myths, similar or compatible concepts of Golden Age exist in the said world's prehistory; when Deities or
Elf-like creatures existed, before the coming of
humans.
For example, a Golden Age exists in
Middle-earth legendarium.
Arda (the period of our world where
The Lord of the Rings
is set), was designed to be symmetrical and perfect. After the wars of the Gods, Arda lost its perfect shape (known as
Arda Unmarred
) and was called
Arda Marred. Another kind of 'Golden Age' follows later, after the Elves awoke; the
Eldar stay on
Valinor, live with the
Valar and advance in arts and knowledge, until the rebellion and the fall of the Noldor, reminiscent of the Fall of Man. Eventually, after the
end of the world, the
Silmarilli will be recovered and the light of the
Two Trees of Valinor rekindled. Arda will be remade again as
Arda Healed.
In
The Wheel of Time universe, the
Age of Legends
is the name given to the previous Age: In this society, channelers were common and
Aes Sedai - trained channelers - were extremely powerful, able to make
angreal
, sa'angreal
, and ter'angreal
, and holding important civic positions. The Age of Legends is seen as a utopian society without war or crime, and devoted to culture and learning. Aes Sedai were frequently devoted to academic endeavours, one of which inadvertently resulted in a hole - 'The Bore' - being drilled in the Dark One's prison. The immediate effects were not realised, but the Dark One gradually asserted power over humanity, swaying many to become his followers. This resulted in the War of Power and eventually the Breaking of the World.
Another
jaylen was here example is in the background of the
Lands of Lore
classic computer game, the history of the Lands is divided in Ages. One of them is also called
Golden Age
, where the Lands were ruled by the 'Ancients', no wars existed yet, until that age was over with the 'War of the Heretics'.
Present-day usage
The term "Golden Age" is at present frequently used in the context of various fields, such as "
Golden age of alpinism", "
Golden Age of American animation", "
Golden Age of Comics", "
Golden Age of Science Fiction", "
Golden Age of Hollywood", "
Golden Age of Hip Hop" etc. Invariably, the term "Golden Age" is bestowed retroactively, when the period in question has ended and in comparison with what followed in the specific field discussed.
See also
- Ages of Man
- Arcadia (utopia)
- Garden of Eden
- Great year
- Utopia
- Merrie England
- Millennialism
- Satya Yuga/Krita Yuga
References
- Bridget Ann Henish, ''The Medieval Calendar Year'', p96, ISBN 0-271-01904-2