Why do some civilizations not have the habit of keeping historical documents and recording history?

Many of my predecessors have told us countless times that people who are involved in history should try not to get involved in such a big cross-civilization comparison issue, but unfortunately I always fail to remember, so now I have to rely on bullshit to answer the question.

The first thing I want to emphasize is that basically every written people record history, whether actively or not, and even many of the unwritten communities record history, for example, primitive people like to draw little people on the walls. All of these materials are historical documents, including many myths, legends, and religious texts, while those not recorded in writing can be categorized as physical historical materials.

When it comes to this, it is impossible not to mention the difference between history that is recorded, and history that is written.

China has a long tradition of revision of history, which can be traced back to the Shangshu and the Spring and Autumn Annals. The so-called revision of history has actually gone beyond recording to the stage of narration, but of course the Shangshu is still very much a recording, and by the time it reaches the Shiji, it is already a complete narration.

The difference between a record and a narrative is similar to the direct difference between an archive and a dissertation nowadays, with the former serving only as a backup and the latter for the purpose of expressing a point of view.

The habit of communities, races, and nations to record history is innate, for whatever can be preserved and passed on can be said to record history. But the official intentional recording of history is different; the official intentional recording of history is later than the official intentional writing of history, because intentional recording is actually a process of writing under the official ideology.

Officials, governments, regimes, rulers and the like, there is no country in the world that recognizes the importance of writing history beyond China, and in fact, China, as a "Confucian" heritage, started out under the belief that "following the wise rule of the sages" is the way of the future. In fact, China, as the heritage of "Confucianism," started a system of official orthodox self-exposition from generation to generation under the belief of "following the wise rule of the sages. This system is said to have begun with Confucius, who held the belief that "the rites of the sages can be restored, if we record them and our behavior and come as close as we can to them". But it was Sima Qian who essentially started it, because under Sima Qian, history was written not to be close to the sages, but to seek "proof", proof that the present behavior was inherited from the sages.

So when we look at the twenty-four histories, we see that one generation follows the other, and one generation replaces the other, and even though most of these histories were written by later dynasties, the sense of conformity to the heavenly teachings of the sages remains undiminished.

So, Chinese dynasties have attached great importance to the "writing of history", thinking that this is a symbol of the orthodoxy of their inherited predecessors, and, therefore, have attached great importance to the "record of history", because this is the process of the dynasty to build the evidence of orthodoxy.