A Little History of the World

“Behind every ‘Once upon a time’ there is always another. Have you ever tried standing between two mirrors? You should. You will see a great long line of shiny mirrors, each one smaller than the one before, stretching away into the distance, getting fainter and fainter, so that you never see the last. But even when you can’t see them any more, the mirrors still go on. They are there, and you know it. And that’s how it is with ‘Once upon a time’. ”

In the first chapter of A Little History, Gombrich uses vivid imagery to present the relationship between memory, history, and time. He explains that when we cannot see something, or understand it, it is still there, and the events of a long time ago can sometimes be very difficult to see or understand. The overwhelming magnitude of the past and the stories of the past is a theme that Gombrich touches on throughout the book.

“And just so that ‘Once upon a time’ doesn’t keep dragging us back down into that bottomless well, from now on we’ll always shout: ‘Stop! When did that happen?’ And if we also ask, ‘And how exactly did that happen?’ we will be asking about history. Not just a story, but our story, the story that we call the history of the world. Shall we begin?”

As the final lines of his first chapter, Gombrich defines history for the reader, while also neatly summarizing his project. The seemingly impossible task of understanding and examining the stories of people like us is best done through history—that is, asking “how” and “when.” History is the study of human stories.

“Now let’s take a last look at these people dressed in skins [...] They were people just like us. Often unkind to one another. Often cruel and deceitful. Sadly, so are we. But even then a mother might sacrifice her life for her child and friends might die for each other. No more but also no less often than people do today. And how could it be otherwise? After all, we’re only talking about things that happened between three and ten thousand years ago. There hasn’t been enough time for us to change! So, just once in a while, when we are talking, or eating some bread, using tools or warming ourselves by the fire, we should remember those early people with gratitude, for they were the greatest inventors of all time.”

Gombrich closes his chapter on prehistory by emphasizing one of his central themes, that the human experience is unchanging throughout time. In both a lament and an ode to the qualities of human beings, Gombrich reflects on human weakness and virtue in his reminder that we have more in common with those from the past than we do not. A remembrance or appreciation of those who created the things we take for granted is a motif throughout the book, and his unexpected description of prehistoric humans as “the greatest inventors” challenges the reader’s notions of