re: #176 albusteve

exactly…and the flow of ideas moved through those same people

My dad…I’m not sure if he got it published, but he once proposed that nomads—and in particular those that provided goods and services to sedentary populations, like European Roma (who used to be tinkers, entertainers, etc) were a “vector” by which intellectual and technological novelty were communicated from region to region. Not that they were intentionally “educating” people, but that it was a beneficial part of their economy to introduce new things…up to and including the professional storytellers and entertainers, whose only “product” was novelty.