The early civilizations lacked adequate means to obtain knowledge about the human brain. Their assumptions about the inner workings of the mind, therefore, were not accurate. Early views on the function of the brain<span> regarded it to be a form of "cranial stuffing" of sorts. In ancient Egypt, from the late </span>Middle Kingdom<span> onwards, in preparation for mummification, the brain was regularly removed, for it was the </span>heart<span> that was assumed to be the seat of intelligence. According to </span>Herodotus<span>, during the first step of mummification: "The most perfect practice is to extract as much of the brain as possible with an iron hook, and what the hook cannot reach is mixed with drugs." Over the next five thousand years, this view came to be reversed; the brain is now known to be the seat of intelligence, although colloquial variations of the former remain as in "memorizing something by heart".</span>
Two example of foods they produce in the south is wheat and rice and cotton pecan trees.
The invention from Song, China that had the greatest influence on the spread of learning was paper and printing. This helped to get the public interested in reading.
