cycle

The myth and folklore of ancient cultures speak of a vast cycle of time with alternating dark and golden ages; Plato called it the Great Year. Most of us were taught that this cycle was just a myth and the golden age, just a fairytale. Giorgio de Santillana, former professor of the history of science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA, tells us this idea of a cycle went far beyond Greece and India. In their landmark work, Hamlet’s Mill, de Santillana and co-author Hertha von Dechend show that the myth and folklore of more than thirty ancient cultures mention a cycle of time with long periods of enlightenment broken by dark ages of ignorance. Moreover, they show