Next, my fellow comrades and explorers in time---Chrononauts if I may--- Let us take a visual tour through ancient Jerusalem, the grand Israelite city, with the aid of a scale model. This is a very particular Jersusalem during the Hasmonean period, during the reign of King Herod the great and the life of Jesus as well. As Judea was a Roman province then (and had been part of the hellenistic world for hundreds of years prior to that) it was a very metropolitan and advanced city by ancient standards. Away we go then, use this chart below as a visual reference comrades! This is a view of Herod's temple-(1) on the map And a view of the Temple and city from the Southern wall 2 PS, I never defined what I meant by ancient history because I thought it went without mention what I was implying. However, 'ancient' is up to debate itself. Ancient can be any period of man from neolithic times to ??? It's hard to say when the ancient age ends and the middle ages begin, I like to use the beginning of the Byzantine empire, after the collapse of what is known as the Roman empire. Afterwards it was Christianity that was a major factor in Europe and this new religion displaced the pagan gods, unified seperate kingdoms through common religion, etc. For all intents and purposes the Byzantines were ancient, but paved the road for the middle ages and the medievel era.
A view of the Hippodrome(a horse raceway) 16 The Upper city (rich town) 23 An aerial view of the Upper city with the temple in the background
Jonathan: I raised the question for the precise reasons you gave actually- it's immediately understood in a general sense what constitutes 'Ancient History,' and yet what precisely falls under the term is open to debate. Speaking generally, I'd like to define it between two major paradigm shifts- between the rise of centralised agricultural civilisations to... well, that's a lot harder. I agree that the fall of the Western Empire is a pretty good marker. Personally, I consider 'Ancient History' completely over in Europe around the time of Boethius as the work of Plato and Aristotle became scarce... but even then, I feel it should extend as far as the rise of Islam. Maybe it's best to think of it like the Renaissance and Early Modern Period, a major cultural shift which took root at different times in different areas. Also, for ancient Jewish history, if you haven't yet look into the Bar Kokhba revolt. A very interesting but tragic episode.
Agreed then, to the end of the middle ages and the beginning of the Renaissance it is then. And also, not restricted to the western world or anything like that. I have a personal bias for the near east and western culture, but all cultures should and must be covered. I shall look into the Bar Kokhba revolt.
To add something new to the debate, how about the Three Kingdoms Era of chinese history. It started with the Yellow Turban Rebellion which was led by Zhang Jiao, who gave himself the title of "The Great Teacher." This started a chain of events that led to the rapid decay of imperial authority across China. The power vacum was filled by governers and military leaders. My favorite person from this era was Sun Ce. He, along with the help of his sworn brother and top advisor Zhou Yu, counquered a large section of south east China and laid the foundations of what would become the Wu Kingdom. He planned on attacking the southern border of General Cao Cao's (creator of the Wei Kingdom) border, since his main force was in the north battling Yuan Shao's forces. However, before he could execute the attack, Sun Ce was wounded by a bandit ambush. The wounds would cause his death soon after. His territory was handed down to Sun Ce's younger brother, Sun Quan, who decided that attacking Cao Cao would be too risky. In my opinion, had Sun Ce lived and invaded Cao Cao's territory, he may have defeated Cao Cao, and vastly changed the out come of the Three Kingdoms Era.
It's nice to see a post about events outside of Europe and the Near East. I've been curious about the Three Kingdoms Era for some time, but I'm not sure where to start- can you recommend any books on the subject that would help get someone interested up to speed?
Well, Romance of the Three Kingdoms is the primary book about that era. From what I've heard it has the tendecy to stretch the facts a little, but it'll give you basics about what heppened when and who the important people were. I've learned most of what I know from video games by Koei, their Dynasty Warriors series and Romance of the Three Kingdoms series. From them I found out who the major people were and got a short bio of each one, as well as learning who was involved in the important battles. The did internet searched for the characters that I thought were interesting to learn more about them and their battles.
Ive never seen a copy of the the romance! I want one real bad, maybe I can order it online or something. I heard that the Communist Chinese burned alot of books so I think a good deal of their ancient literature was lost, what a shame.
Oh, Romance of the Three Kingdoms was also made into a pretty long mini-series back in the nineties or eighties. I forget which decade it was made.
Funny enough, Dynasty Warriors is how I first came across it- next time I visit the book store I'll look for Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
Oh and just one thing to keep in mind, in ancient China they put the family name first and then the individual name. Like in the case of Sun Ce, Sun is his family's name. One of my favorite legends from that era, was how Zhuge Liang (of the Shu Kingdom) defended Xicheng against Sima Yi (of the Wie Kingdom). Zhuge Liang had a much smaller force with him at the moment, so he wanted to avoid open combat with Sima Yi's force. So, he opened the city gates and ordered the civilians to be out sweeping the streets. Meanwhile, he was atop the gate, playing his zither, with a couple kids. When Sima Yi arrived with the Wei army, they were (obviously) a bit confused. So Sima Yi, thinking he was doing the smart thing, just turned around and left; along with his battalion of soldiers. So his attempt to avoid Zhuge Liang's trap, caused him to do exactly what Zhuge Liang wanted. It's too bad it's supposedly just a myth. I could definetely see a military commander just turning and leaving if he arrived at that scene.
A good tip for anyone studying history is to divide the estimates of someone writing at the time by about ten. I wouldn't give much credit to battles that had a few hundred thousand soldiers when in Europe they were nothing like that, and the population of the world was less urbanised.
Agreed. The battles between the Greek nations and the Persian empire is a good example of that. Extremely lard battles like that were rare in the ancient world and usually only happened when to nations were throwing everything they had at one another.
This is a brilliant example of what a bit of thought can do to ancient Greek records, because I couldn't find a better one that worked out that to feed an army the size of the one they apparently fought with they'd need not just Greece and Macedonia but most of the Balkans and eastern Europe.
Plus rep Gallow for a cool link, I shall read up on it later, it seems to be a controversial historical topic. I agree that numbers were exaggerated in many ancient accounts, for simplicity sake or because of dramatic reasons, but there is a precedence for large ancient armies. PS Gallow...Loch...Alba...you're a Scot eh? Kewl, Caledonia in the house
I guess to get some discussion going again, we can move on to the 'middle ages?' As with 'ancient history,' I think the term itself is interesting to discuss. Of all the ages of history from the Roman Republic to our time, the only period I'm more unclear on is the 19th century. Even the term itself feels problematic- it's a pejorative referring to it as the middle space between two better ages. On the one hand I can see why- in some ways, especially socially, it seems to be a quite chaotic and unpleasant period. Philosophical discourse in the West was largely relegated to theologians like Aquinas, and as someone who's had to read Aquinas, I feel confident in saying his writing is very inaccessible. And yet, especially in fantasy, the period is sometimes looked on as an ideal age. To say it was culturally stagnant would be to ignore some of the greatest works of art in Western culture, including The Consolation of Philosophy, Beowulf, The Decameron and The Canterbury Tales, the works of Petrarch, and of course The Divine Comedy. So as with 'ancient history,' what immediately comes to mind when you hear the term 'middle ages?' If you've read any of the works I mentioned, or have another you'd like to discuss, what did you think of them? I kind of want to make a big post on The Divine Comedy, but I think I'll save that for now- it's suffice to say it's my favourite written work of art.
I think by now you know my stance on the middle ages, I consider it a tragic era between all of the culture lost and found and lost again, all of the fighting, the tyranny of the Abrahamic religions, and how little is understood of them. I would love to see your treating of the Divine Comedy, it is some intellectual heavyweight stuff, and sure to be an ambitious project. In the context of the thread it's slightly off topic, but as long as no one else objects I see no reason to. I prefer to stick to periods between Neolithic times to the beginning of the Byzantine age, which is a vast period, but I am open to later periods as well and know that all modern people would benefit a great deal by studying our early cousins.
Alright fellas, it’s time for another history report! This time, let’s take a gander at the Minoans Part I (note: the bulk of this essay is derived from the Wikipedia article on Minoan culture) a) Who are the Minoans? The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age culture on the island of Crete. They were mainly a mercantile culture much like the Phoenicians who engaged in overseas trade far beyond their island. They were a highly organized people with sophisticated multi-storied palaces and art. The Minoan culture flourished from approximately 2700 to 1450 BC; afterwards, Mycenaean Greek culture became dominant at Minoan sites in Crete. It was rediscovered at the beginning of the 20th century, at first through the work of the British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans, Minoan Crete took its historic place, as Will Durant said in 1939, as "the first link in the European chain." What the Minoans called themselves is unknown. The term "Minoan" was coined by Arthur Evans after the mythic "king" Minos. Minos was associated in Greek myth with the labyrinth, which Evans identified as the site at Knossos. It has sometimes been argued that the Egyptian place name "Keftiu" (*kaftāw) and the Semitic "Kaftor" or "Caphtor" and "Kaptara" in the Mari archives apparently refer to the island of Crete. In the Odyssey which was composed centuries after the destruction of the Minoan civilization, Homer calls the natives of Crete Eteocretans ("true Cretans"); these may have been descendants of the Minoans. (note: there is also a reference to “Caphtorites” in the Book of Genesis, in the table of nations they are descendants of Mizraim, who was descended from Ham, who was a son of Noah and a survivor of the flood) b)Periods of Minoan history: 7000 BC first settlement 3100 BC-2100 BC Early Minoan period 2100 BC-1700 BC Middle Minoan period = Old Palace Age 1700 BC-1420 BC Late Minoan period = Young Palace Age 1420 BC-1050 BC Mycenaean period Rather than tell calendar dates for the Minoan period, archaeologists use two systems of relative chronology. The first, created by Evans and modified by later archaeologists, is based on pottery styles. It divides the Minoan period into three main eras—Early Minoan (EM), Middle Minoan (MM), and Late Minoan (LM). These eras are further subdivided, e.g. Early Minoan I, II, III (EMI, EMII, EMIII). Another dating system, proposed by the Greek archaeologist Nicolas Platon, is based on the development of the architectural complexes known as "palaces" at Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, and Kato Zakros, and divides the Minoan period into Prepalatial, Protopalatial, Neopalatial, and Post-palatial periods. The relationship among these systems is given in the accompanying table, with approximate calendar dates drawn from Warren and Hankey (1989). Minoan Chronology 3650-3000 BC Early Minoan I - Prepalatial 2900-2300 BC Early Minoan II 2300-2160 BC Early Minoan III 2160-1900 BC Middle Minoan IA 1900-1800 BC Middle Minoan IB - Protopalatial (Old Palace Period) 1800-1700 BC Middle Minoan II 1700-1640 BC Middle Minoan IIIA - Neopalatial (New Palace Period) 1640-1600 BC Middle Minoan IIIB 1600-1480 BC Late Minoan IA 1480-1425 BC Late Minoan IB 1425-1390 BC Late Minoan II - Postpalatial (At Knossos, Final Palace Period) 1390-1370 BC Late Minoan IIIA1 1370-1340 BC Late Minoan IIIA2 1340-1190 BC Late Minoan IIIB 1190-1170 BC Late Minoan IIIC 1100 BC Subminoan The oldest evidence of inhabitants on Crete are pre-ceramic Neolithic farming community remains that date to approximately 7000 BC. A comparative study of yDNA haplogroups of modern Cretan men showed that a male founder group came from Anatolia or the Levant, like the Greeks. The beginning of the Bronze Age in Crete, around 2600 BC marked the beginning of Crete as an important center of civilization. At the end of the MMII period (1700 BC) there was a large disturbance in Crete, probably an earthquake, or possibly an invasion from Anatolia. The use of the term "colony", however, like "thalassocracy", has been subjected to an increasing critique in recent years. The Minoan strata there replace a mainland-derived culture in the Early Bronze Age, the earliest Minoan settlement outside Crete. The Cyclades were in the Minoan cultural orbit, and, closer to Crete, the islands of Karpathos, Saros and Kasos, also contained Minoan colonies, or settlements of Minoan traders, from the Middle Bronze Age (MMI-II); most of them were abandoned in LMI, but Minoan Karpathos recovered and continued with a Minoan culture until the end of the Bronze Age. Other supposed Minoan colonies, such as that hypothesised by Adolf Furtwängler for Aegina, have been dismissed by subsequent archaeological studies. There was a Minoan colony at Triandra on Rhodes. Certain locations within Crete emphasise it as an 'outward looking' society. The Neopalatial site of Kato Zakro, for instance, is located within 100 metres of the modern shore-line, situated within a bay. Its large number of workshops and the richness of its site materials indicate a potential 'entrepôt' for import and export. Such activities are elaborated in artistic representations of the sea, including the 'Flotilla' fresco from room 5, in the west house at Akrotiri. Minoan cultural influence indicates an orbit that extended not only throughout the Cyclades (so-called Minoanisation), but in locations such as Egypt and Cyprus. Late Minoan I (LMI) stonework has been observed at Amman. Furthermore, in fifteenth-century tomb paintings at Thebes a number of individuals have been distinguished as Minoan in appearance, bearing gifts. Inscriptions record these people as coming from Keftiu, or the "islands in the midst of the sea", and may refer to gift-bringing merchants or officials from Crete (It was an ancient custom for foreign powers to make tribute payments. In some cases, as when the Romans demanded tributary payments from the Carthaginians, it was considered punitive and in that case post-bellum. In the case of the Minoans, which I believe to have been a peaceful culture, their tributes were more than likely earned from reputation and respect for their high level of culture). The Thera eruption occurred during a mature phase of the LM IA period. The calendar date of the volcanic eruption is extremely controversial. Radiocarbon dating has indicated a date in the late 1600s BC; those radiocarbon dates, however, conflict with the estimates of archaeologists who synchronize the eruption with the Conventional Egyptian chronology and obtain a date of around 1525-1500 BC. The eruption often is identified as a catastrophic natural event for the culture, leading to its rapid collapse, perhaps being narrated mythically as Atlantis by Classical Greeks. (My own theory about this that was influenced by others. The Egyptians mention in their stelas an invasion from a coalition of so-called “sea people” which coincides curiously with the destruction and looting of temples and cities from the western Mediterranean to modern day Turkey. I believe that these sea people had a significant pat in the decline of Minoan culture) “Around 1200 BC there was crisis in the Mediterranean which resulted in the collapse of the late Bronze Age empires. In mainland Greece, Thebes, Lefkandi, Tiryns, Mycenae, and Pylos and on Crete, Khania, all suffered destruction, partial or complete. Mostly these cities and their palaces seem to have gone up in flames. In Anatolia, all of the major Bronze Age sites have a destruction level which can be dated to around this time. The Hittite capital of Hattusas was plundered and burned, as were the chief cities of Cyprus. On the coast of North Syria, the trading city of Ugarit was destroyed and never reoccupied. Further south in the Levant many other sites show similar destruction. This wave of destruction did not spread east to Mesopotamia, and although it moved southwards, Egypt possessed the strength to withstand it.” “Of the various theories put forward to explain the crisis, that which has been most highly favored attributes it to ethnic movements, principally from the north. In Greece, it was attributed to the invasion of the Dorians, and in western Asia, to the Phrygians and the “sea peoples”. The identity of the sea peoples is based on Egyptian inscriptions and reliefs of the reigns of the Pharaohs Merneptah and Ramses III. The names of some of the groups preserved in the Egyptian sources clearly relate to known place-names. For example, the Shardana have long been associated with Sardinia. It was suggested that, following the repulse of the invasion by the Pharaoh Ramses III, this group sailed off and eventually colonized Sardinia.” - The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Greece, Robert Morkot; pgs 30-31 The Palaces at Knossos, Phaistos, Malia, and Kato Zakros were destroyed. But with the start of the Neopalatial period, population increased again, the palaces were rebuilt on a larger scale and new settlements were built all over the island. This period (the 17th and 16th centuries BC, MM III / Neopalatial) represents the apex of the Minoan civilization. The Thera eruption occurred during LMIA (and LHI). A short time after the LMIB/LMII catastrophe, around 1420 BC, the palace sites were occupied by the Mycenaeans, who adapted the Linear A Minoan script to the needs of their own Mycenaean language, a form of Greek, which was written in Linear B. The first such archive anywhere is in the LMII-era "Room of the Chariot Tablets". Later Cretan archives date to LMIIIA (contemporary with LHIIIA) but no later than that. During LMIIIA:1, Amenhotep III at Kom el-Hatan took note of k-f-t-w (Kaftor) as one of the "Secret Lands of the North of Asia". (the ancient Egyptian language, like ancient Hebrew, had no vowels, as the sounds produced by vowels were merely implied and not written. We have no idea how their words are pronounced, even though it survives in the Coptic church of modern Egypt much as Latin is preserved in Catholic churches, it has not been spoken by an ancient for thousands of years. It is not so unusual to write words without vowels. If I were to write "Lck th dr pls" one may be able to correctly assume that I was saying "lock the door please". What we have in common are a common language and culture, something that ancient Egyptians and Minoans might have actually shared at one point or for centuries through mutual trade and relations, but that we share with neither culture) Also mentioned are Cretan cities such as Αμνίσος(Amnisos), Φαίστος (Phaistos), Κυδονία (Kydonia) and Kνόσσος(Knossos) and some toponyms reconstructed as belonging to the Cyclades or the Greek mainland. If the values of these Egyptian names are accurate, then this pharaoh did not privilege LMIII Knossos above the other states in the region. After about a century of partial recovery, most Cretan cities and palaces went into decline in the 13th century BC. Knossos remained an administrative center until 1200 BC; the last of the Minoan sites was the defensive mountain site of Karfi, a refuge site which displays vestiges of Minoan civilization almost into the Iron Age. c)Geography Crete is a mountainous island with natural harbors (this may have explained their sea-faring, or at least mercantile maritime nature, as well as their strategic interest to invaders and colonists). There are signs of earthquake damage at many Minoan sites and clear signs of both uplifting of land and submersion of coastal sites due to tectonic processes all along the coasts. d)-Government Homer recorded a tradition that Crete had 90 cities. The island was probably divided into at least eight political units during the height of the Minoan period and at different stages in the Bronze Age into more or less. The north is thought to have been governed from Knossos, the south from Phaistos, the central eastern part from Malia, and the eastern tip from Kato Zakros and the west from Chania. Smaller palaces have been found in other places. Some of the major Minoan archaeological sites are: Palaces -Knossos - the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete; was -purchased for excavations by Evans on March 16, 1900. -Phaistos - the second largest palatial building on the island, excavated by the Italian school shortly after Knossos -Malia - the subject of French excavations, a palatial centre which affords a very interesting look into the development of the palaces in the protopalatial period (above: the ruins of the palace of Knossos in modern Crete, an aerial view of the ruins, an artistic rendition of the palace, and a floor plan. Notice all of the labyrinthian corridors and walls that inspired archaelogists to compare it to the labyrinth of Greek mythology) -Kato Zakros - a palatial site excavated by Greek archaeologists in the far east of the island. This is also referred to as "Zakro" in archaeological literature. -Galatas - the most recently confirmed palatial site -Agia Triada - an administrative centre close to Phaistos -Gournia - a town site excavated in the first quarter of the 20th Century by the American School -Pyrgos - an early minoan site on the south of the island -Vasiliki - an early minoan site towards the east of the island which gives its name to a distinctive ceramic ware -Fournu Korfi - a site on the south of the island -Pseira - island town with ritual sites -Mount Juktas - the greatest[citation needed] of the Minoan peak sanctuaries by virtue of its association with the palace of Knossos -Arkalochori - the findsite of the famous Arkalochori Axe -Karfi - a refuge site from the late Minoan period, one of the last of the Minoan sites -Akrotiri - settlement on the island of Santorini (Thera), near the site of the Thera Eruption -Zominthos - a mountainous city in the northern foothills of Mount Ida e)Culture Minoans were traders, and their cultural contacts reached far beyond the island of Crete — to Old Kingdom Egypt, to copper-bearing Cyprus and the Syrian coasts beyond, and to Anatolia. Minoan techniques and styles in ceramics provided models, of fluctuating influence, for Helladic Greece. In addition to the familiar example of Thera, Minoan "colonies" — if that is not too misleading a term— can be found first of all at Kastri on Cythera, the birthplace for Greeks of Aphrodite, an island close to the Greek mainland that came under Minoan influence in the mid-third millennium (EMII) and remained Minoan in culture for a thousand years, until Mycenaean occupation in the thirteenth century. Their culture, from 1700 BC onward, shows a high degree of organization. Many historians and archaeologists believe that the Minoans were involved in the Bronze Age's important tin trade: tin, alloyed with copper apparently from Cyprus, was used to make bronze. The decline of Minoan civilization and the decline in use of bronze tools in favor of iron ones seem to be correlated. The Minoan trade in saffron, the stigma of a mutated crocus which originated in the Aegean basin as a natural chromosome mutation, has left fewer material remains: a fresco of saffron-gatherers at Santorini is well-known. This inherited trade pre-dated Minoan civilization: a sense of its rewards may be gained by comparing its value to frankincense, or later, to pepper. Archaeologists tend to emphasize the more durable items of trade: ceramics, copper, and tin, and dramatic luxury finds of gold and silver. Objects of Minoan manufacture suggest there was a network of trade with mainland Greece (notably Mycenae), Cyprus, Syria, Anatolia, Egypt, Mesopotamia, and westward as far as the coast of Spain. Minoan men wore loincloths and kilts. Women wore robes that had short sleeves and layered flounced skirts. These were open to the navel allowing their breasts to be left exposed, perhaps during ceremonial occasions. Women also had the option of wearing a strapless fitted bodice, the first fitted garments known in history.[ The patterns on clothes emphasized symmetrical geometric designs. It must be remembered that other forms of dress may have been worn of which we have no record. In spring of 2009, a discovery regarding sewing techniques was made by Grant MacEwan College student Meg Furler. The Minoan religion focused on female deities, with females officiating. The statues of priestesses in Minoan culture and frescoes showing men and women participating in the same sports such as bull-leaping, lead some archaeologists to believe that men and women held equal social status. Inheritance is thought to have been matrilineal. The frescos include many depictions of people, with the genders distinguished by colour: the men's skin is reddish-brown, the women's white. Concentration of wealth played a large role in the structure of society. Multiroom constructions were discovered in even the ‘poor’ areas of town, revealing a social equality and even distribution of wealth. (I am not alone in thinking that ancient Minoan Crete had a matriarchal society, with men actually being subservient to men, and with women holding actual power. For example, there are no frescos or paintings male heroes, phallic symbols, and perhaps only one fresco and one questionable and apocryphal literary mention of a king, making it unusual for bronze age cultures. While matriarchal societies are not unheard of, it is a peculiar example and interesting to see men portrayed as not only on the same level as woman, but perhaps even beneath them in class)
I'm able to justify it to myself, because I like to think the emergence of modernity falls most clearly with Descartes, and with the emergence of Copernican cosmology. I think, as seems to be its curse, it falls right on the margins of the ancients and modernity. I actually find the culture of the middle ages fascinating- I think one reason it's hard to get a hold on is because so much of it was symbolic- even the patterns of the week were symbolic. That said, it seemed by its nature to be very rigid and uncompromising- even The Divine Comedy is structured to reflect a hierarchical view of human nature and society. Which does not mean things never changed- lower ranked landowners, for example, often had very little stability in their lives. And of course there were the plagues, which went a long way in changing medieval society.
The Minoans: What blows me away about the Minoans is that they had a working, flushing toilet, thousands of years ago.
