Let's talk about some of the weaves that have been 'lost' since the AoL.

Travelling/Skimming, Compulsion, Balefire, Creating Cuendillar, Creating Angreal.

For most of these weaves it makes no sense how they got lost. I can see Balefire and Compulsion being forbidden, and once the Aes Sedai who knew them died.. Even so, even if they were forbidden, you would think some book somewhere in the Tower would explain them. Even forbidden losing knowledge forever should be obscene to an Aes Sedai, especially of the Brown Ajah.

Something like Travelling I do not see how that would become lost at all. Every Aes Sedai would use that weave, and there are a lot in this day and age who can use it by themselves, so the theory that the Aes Sedai weren't strong enough to use it is moot.

Maybe creating things from Cuendillar could be passed off as "well, most women had no strength in Earth", this is hairy at best because there are plenty of women who were in the Tower in Exile that could do it, Egwene being one, and Leane being another and Nicola and more. So it just got erased too?

Same with Angreal. You're going to forget and/or not pass down how to create them? Even if no one was strong enough to do it in thousands of years, no one will even write it down?

There's a million theories we could make say, but all seem weak.

'They were too busy to write them down'

' They never write a weave down'

' All the strongest died and no one's been strong enough in 3-4 thousands years until now (all of a sudden)'

None of those really fly with me. For one thing it seems like there is an immense amount of strong channelers today even though channelers breeding with channelers purposely has been out since the AoL. So does anyone have any idea besides just that it was more suspenseful and exciting for RJ to make them all get 'discovered' in this day and age?