Knock it off.
[ /Moderating ]
Not directly, but it’s something I think was being suggested with a focus on the “Renaissance” by BG and the comment about how the Muslims “never lost the old Greek writings.”
The truth is neither did the Western Europeans. I don’t think there is any evidence all of Western Europe was wholly ignorant of Aristotle & gang during the “Dark Ages” and later Middle Ages. Scattered scribes and learned men would have always known of them to some degree here and there. Especially in Italy which always kept much closer relationships (both in animosity and in trade at times) with the near east, first when it was dominated by the Byzantines and later when it was Muslim controlled, and as has been noted appreciation for Greek thinkers never went away there and was widely emphasized so it would have always been something learned Italians at the least would have been exposed to in some degree.
But what must be recognized is much of Western Europe the Romans basically accepted the “barbarian” (I’m using that as a self-aware ignorant simplification catch all term) peoples as tributary entities that slowly achieved some level of integration with “Roman” culture. But throughout Gaul, Hispania and Britannia it was also the case that the Romans almost had a dual system at times with “Roman towns” being towns Romans founded and built along Roman lines coexisting with “native” settlement. In this less developed part of the world, outside of the Roman “colonists” so to speak you’re talking about mostly illiterate tribal peoples that never had a great appreciation for the Greeks in the first place. While they advanced while subjects of the Empire none of those regions I mentioned ever became centers of learning where great libraries were built and great thinkers and philosophers of the Empire congregated. On the other hand some of the great cities in the East had been that way since pre-Roman times and remained so afterward.