trustme.bro/r/…
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trust me, bro:
here is the receipt.
the claim
Margaret Mead stated that a healed femur is the earliest sign of civilization
the verdict
DISPUTED
the quote archives themselves record the doubt

Wikiquote records this attribution to Margaret Mead as DISPUTED: the archive itself currently sets out doubt about whether they said it. This anecdote, published after Mead's death, is contradicted by Mead herself in an interview she gave in "Talks with Social Scientists", published in 1968. Mead was asked "When does a culture become a civilization?" She replied, "Well, this is a matter of definition. Looking at the past we have called societies civilizations when they have had great cities, elaborate division of labor, some form of keeping records. These are the things that have made civilization. Some form of script, not necessarily our kind of script, but some form of script or record keeping; ability to build great, densely populated cities and to divide up labor so that they could be maintained. Civilization, in other words, is not simply a word of approval, as one would say 'he is

Evidence for · 1
Wikiquote: Margaret Mead
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This anecdote, published after Mead's death, is contradicted by Mead herself in an interview she gave in "Talks with Social Scientists", published in 1968. Mead was asked "When does a culture become a
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first checked31 Jul 2026
judged → CONTESTED · 7531 Jul 2026
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