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Before the Age of Exploration, what was a common belief about the Earth's shape in some cultures?Group of answer choices

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Before the Age of Exploration, many cultures commonly believed that the Earth was flat. This belief was prevalent in various ancient civilizations, including early Mesopotamian and Greek societies. The concept of a flat Earth arose from the observations of the horizon and the landscape, which appeared to be flat from the perspective of individuals living on the surface.

However, there were also cultures and individual thinkers, like the ancient Greeks, who proposed the idea of a spherical Earth as early as the 6th century BCE. Figures such as Pythagoras and later Aristotle supported the spherical model based on different observations, such as the way ships disappeared hull-first over the horizon and the circular shadow of the Earth on the Moon during a lunar eclipse.

Overall, while the flat Earth belief was widespread, the notion of a spherical Earth existed and was debated in some intellectual circles.

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