Legend of Korra with Jacob! Episodes 21 and 22

I watched the original Avatar: The Last Airbender some time ago and I remember the basics of the world, but not a lot of specifics.  However, I remember liking it very much, so I thought I’d watch the follow up series.  Please no spoilers for this show, but if I’m forgetting something from the original series, feel free to remind me.  I will be spoiling episodes as I go along, naturally, so consider yourself warned.

Episode 21 - The Guide
Episode 22 - A New Spiritual Age

So these episodes maintain the weirdness of the Spirit World, but in the standard animated style.  It's less cool, but still, I really dig the Miyazaki-ness.  Especially the second episode which is all in the Spirit world.  And while I don't have much to say about the real world stuff going on, it is interesting.  I'm really glad that non-Korra characters get focus when Korra isn't around them.  I don't know exactly how Mako, Bolin, and Asami are going to line up with the spiritual war, but I feel like there's a good payoff coming.

However, that's not really the topic of today.  What really jumped out at me with these episodes was the statement (that admittedly they had made before, but it never really clicked), that the first Avatar, Wan, was 10,000 years ago.  Since then, there has been a continuous string of Avatars. That's a big number and I want to put that in perspective.

There are a number of fairly old institutions in the real world.  The first that many probably think of is the Roman Catholic Church, which is definitely old, but exactly how old is a subject of much debate.  It'd be hard to claim that the Christianity that existed before Emperor Constantine was "Roman" in any way, there have been a number of schisms, reformations, splits, and Anti-Popes.  As To try to carve out a direct line of who was the Pope at any given time is never going to be agreed upon by all scholars, but the last time there was an Antipope was 1449.  I think it's fair to say that the modern institution of the Papacy really only dates back to the Council of Trent in 1545, making it less than 500 years old.   However, if we accept the official lineage of the Papacy, and that the institution goes all the way back to St. Peter (who, while the leader of the early Christian Church, was several hundred years removed from anybody being given the title "Pope"), that still puts the Catholic Church at just under 2000 years old and the number of Popes at 266.  So we're one fifth of the way to Avatar Age, and we're already at 266.  As we'll see, though, the number of Popes is pretty high, largely due to them being appointed at an old age and not holding the position for a long time.  Meanwhile, the Avatar is usually "found" at the age of 16, so I'd expect the average life span to be much longer.  Although both positions seem to be risky in regards to war and assassination.

The next oldest institution I can come up with is the Imperial House of Japan.  There is solid evidence of a continuous line all the way back to Emperor Kinmei in 539 AD.  This is the oldest "incontrovertible" organization we can get, historically.  Which means that we can track the 94 Emperors of Japan for the last 1500 years.  It's only a tenth of the way back as the Avatar, but those numbers would imply that there have been about 600 Avatars since Wan.    However, the Imperial House claims that Kinmei was the 29th of his line.  Emperor Sujin is the earliest that has some evidence for, though the actual dates of his reign are unknown and estimates vary by several hundred years.  However, if we give the official story the benefit of the doubt, he came to power in 97 BCE.  But even he isn't the oldest of the Yamato Family, there are 9 who game before him, allegedly.  Again, evidence is in short supply and converting dates to a modern calendar is also not an exact science, so while Emperor Jimmu may or may not have existed, there is also debate over what century he lived in.   However, if we go with the official family tree date, he came to power in 660 BCE, making the Imperial House of Japan 2677 years old, containing 125 Emperors in that time, averaging a reign of 21 years.  But that's still only a fourth of the way to 10,000 years old.  And I think this is our winner, here, for real world, probably true examples.

There are two organizations that I want to mention, even though it's a stretch.  The first is Imperial China.  Traditionally, Imperial China is thought to have started with the Qin Dynasty in 221 BCE and go till the Revolution in 1911, putting it at about 2100 years old.  However, this time period was not as stable as the Yamato Dynasty in Japan, there were many civil wars and uprisings and different dynasties.  But, if we want to just get as old as we can, the oldest claims of dynastic rule in China are the Xia dynasty, dates back to 2070 BCE.  It should be noted that there is no evidence that they existed older than 1000 BCE, and they may have been a legend invented to legitimize later dynasties.  This highlights very well the fact that even just 4000 years ago is so colored in myths and mystery.  The last organization is the Freemasons, which some claim practice rituals today that were developed when they built the Great Sphinx of Giza, which was about 2558 BCE, and would put them at 4500 years old.  There is no evidence to support this claim.

So the fact that Avatarland has had one contiguous institution, the Avatar, for 10,000 years, is really incredible.  If we use Japan as an example, we can guess there have been about 500 Avatars in that time.   Culture has evolved in Avatarland from feudal city-states made of what looks like adobe to full on nation states with fairly modern construction.  Technology has gone from pre-bow and arrow to radio, electricity, and airplanes.  Avatarland is, basically, about 80 years behind modern Earth.  But the thing is, they started way ahead of us.

What did Earth look like 10,000 years ago?  In 8000 BCE, glaciers still covered much of northern North America, at least all the way down to Wisconsin and New Hampshire.  England was still connected to mainland Europe and Alaska was connected to Russia.  Civilization was just kicking off.  Agriculture was just starting in certain areas, though most people were still hunter-gatherers.  Sheep were domesticated but cows were not. The whole concept of blades was in the process of being invented.  The largest "city" was likely Mureybet in Syria, with a peak population of 500, though about 1,000 years later, Çatalhöyük, Turkey, would be the first city hit 1,000 people and some argue by 6,500 BCE, it hit 10,000.  During that 1500 year time period, writing and pottery would be invented.  It would be about 1000 years before a permanent settlement existed in Sumer, and another 1000 before Egypt or Babylon were a thing.  It's at this time that human civilization on Earth looked like the civilization depicted as 10,000 year ago Avatarland.  So Avatarland had about a 4,000 year head start on Earth.  It really makes you wonder what happened in all that time.  Yet through it all, there was always an Avatar.

Stray Observations

1. There's a horn or a flute or something played by airbending the air through it instead of blowing it.  This show still surprises me with it's creativity.
2. I would love for somebody knowledgeable in the field to talk to me about the fashion of Avatarland.  I want to comment on how the Southern Water Tribe wears what looks like a Sexy Eskimo Halloween costume, while the Norther Water Tribe has tons of layers and those really weird vest/caplets that actually would be pretty sexy if that was the top.  Anyway, my point is I feel like there is something up with all this, but I don't know enough about it.
3. Tenzin goes from being really understanding and great to a stubborn ass and back again so fast.
4. Lin, you used to be my favorite, what happened to you?  Did you forget that Mako saved your life a bunch?  Did you forget that time you busted him out of jail?  Did Korra steal your memories?
5. A place that feeds off of Korra's emotions is a real horrifying place.
6. 8 planets in their solar system.  
7. I don't bring up the music enough, it really is beautiful and fitting.