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Survey 2023. This is John Batchelor. more from my two-hour conversation with Professor Peter

Francopan. His new book is about how history is changed by natural events, volcanoes earthquakes, storms, floods, pandemics, disasters.

The Earth transformed an untold history. In this instance we address the question of

how is it that Europe, with no obvious advantages, with very fractured governance.

The Romans left and then what?

How did they come to dominate the colonial world of the late 19th century into the

colonial wars of the 20th century. What advantage? Where did it come from? This is a media argument the professor tells me on all the time. His answer is

coal. Here's the professor to explain. The coal fields of Britain, the coal fields of Germany, that small advantage

that we're still dealing with the coal fields of China.

Peter Francapan, the Earth transformed.

Well, it's a great question.

There are so many fantastic scholars to work on this question, most notably Ken Bomberance at University of Chicago.

And the question really is, how was it that Europe, as you say, a relative backwater, you know, lots of pearls and individual moments of highlights before sort of 1500,

but how was it that Europe managed to take over the world? And in the case of Africa, for example,

every single part of Africa was colonized by a European power, apart from Ethiopia and Liberia, by the start of the First World War.

...