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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
After the fall of Nineveh, Media, Babylonia, and Lydia had continued to exist side by side in peace and friendship. The successful rebellion of Cyrus altered at one blow the state of Asia. He had not been contented with winning independence for the Persians; he had subjected Media to his power. In the place of a friendly and allied house, the kings of Lydia and Babylonia saw Astyages deprived of his throne, and Media in the hands of a bold and ambitious warrior. Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia would
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PREFACE
PREFACE
Fifty years ago, the opinion was held by some that we could watch, in the tradition of the most ancient realms of the East, the first awkward steps in the childhood of the human race, while others believed that it was possible to discover there the remnants of an original wisdom, received by mankind at the beginning of their course immediately from the hand of heaven. The monuments of the East, subsequently discovered and investigated by the combined labour of English, German, and French scholar
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
In the course of the ninth century B.C. the power of Assyria had made considerable progress. In addition to the ancient dependencies on the upper Zab and the upper Tigris, in Armenia and Mesopotamia, the principalities and cities on the middle Euphrates had been reduced, the region of the Amanus had been won. Cilicia had been trodden by Assyrian armies, Damascus was humbled, Syria had felt the weight of the arms of Assyria in a number of campaigns; the kingdom of Israel and the cities of the Phe
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
History knows nothing of her infancy. The beginning of the development of the human race lies beyond the sphere of memory, and so also do the first steps in that development. The early stages of culture—whether in nations or individuals—are unconscious, and unobservant of self; they are therefore without the conditions which make remembrance possible. The original forms of social life in the family and in the tribe, the movement of wandering hunters and shepherds, the earliest steps in agricultu
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
The overthrow of the house of Omri had not raised the power of the kingdom of Israel. Jehu, it is true, sent tribute to Shalmanesar II. king of Assyria (842 B.C. ). But in spite of this subjection to the great king on the Tigris, neither Jehu nor his son Jehoahaz was in a position to repel the attacks of the princes of Damascus, Hazael and Benhadad III.; the whole region to the East of the Jordan, the land of Gilead, had to be conceded to Damascus after the most cruel devastation of that distric
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
However unexpected the attack of the Lydians had been by the ruler of the Medes and Persians, however inconvenient the war with them, he had brought it to a rapid and prosperous decision. Though he had entertained no thought of conquests in the distant West before Crœsus took up arms against him, he resolved to maintain the advantage which the war had brought him to such a surprising extent. Great as was the distance between Sardis and Pasargadae, Lydia was to be embodied in his empire, and the
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
In the eighteenth century B.C. , according to their reckoning, the tradition of the Hebrews presents us with a complete picture of court and civic life in the valley of the Nile, and it tells us of the building of cities in the east of the Delta, which, according to the same computation, must have been founded about the year 1550 B.C. The Homeric poems contain accounts of the land of Ægyptus, of the fair-flowing Zeus-born river of the same name, of the very beautiful fields and cities of Egypt,
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
When the kingdom of the Lydians had succumbed to the arms of Cyrus, Babylonia alone was left of the three states which had joined in the overthrow of Assyria. It was a region of very considerable extent, reaching from the Tigris to the coasts of Syria, and from the foot of the Armenian and Cilician mountains to the deserts of Arabia; the population was united, and a strong centre was not wanting. As we saw, Nebuchadnezzar had not only greatly increased the agriculture and trade of his kingdom, b
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
At the close of the fourteenth century B.C. Ramses III. had secured Egypt against the attacks of the Libyans, Syrians, and Arabians. His successors of the same name remained peacefully within the borders of their land. Neither tradition nor monuments tell us of their campaigns. Two or three sepulchres in the rocks of Biban el Moluk and some inscriptions give us their names, and inform us that these Ramessids built at the temple of Chon at Thebes, that they maintained the dominion of Thebes up th
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
When Tiglath Pilesar ascended the throne of Assyria, he first compelled Babylonia to recognise his supremacy; after that he advanced into the table land of Iran, as far as Arachosia, and there at the least maintained his supremacy far and wide over the Medes. To the North he fought against Nairi and Urarti, against Kummukh and Tubal (743 B.C. ); even the union into which the distressed princes of that region entered against him did not protect them; after a second subjugation the Tubal, i. e. th
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
Next to its language the oldest possession of a nation is its religion. Living in a country of very distinct outlines and characteristic forms, where the regularity of external life is brought more prominently before the view than in other countries, the Egyptians at an early period arrived at a fixed expression of their religious feelings and of the forms of their gods. Their original conceptions are unknown to us. The oldest monuments, our earliest sources of information, present us with a num
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
We were able to prove that Cyrus, soon after his victory over Astyages and the Medes, reduced the Parthians and Hyrcanians beneath his dominion, that the Caducians, the Armenians, and the Cappadocians were his subjects before the Lydian war, that his empire at this period extended to the Halys. How far he had already advanced towards the Bactrians and Sacae must remain uncertain, owing to the contradiction which exists on this point between the summary narrative of Herodotus and the excerpt from
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
In his inscriptions Sargon speaks of the kings who ruled over Asshur before him, but he mentions neither his father nor his grandfather, though these are regularly mentioned by all the other kings of Assyria who ascended the throne in direct succession. It follows that he was neither the son nor the grandson of Shalmanesar IV.; nevertheless he was one of the mightiest, most victorious, and powerful of the rulers of Assyria. Nor did the uninterrupted series of his campaigns prevent him from under
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
The lists of the Egyptians place Menes (Mena) at the head of their series of kings. They describe him as a native of This, a place in the neighbourhood of Abydus, below Thebes, a district which Diodorus considers the oldest part of Egypt. Menes passes for the founder of the kingdom and the builder of Memphis (Mennefer); he is said to have taught the Egyptians the worship of the gods and the offering of sacrifice. [130] Herodotus informs us that he learnt from the Egyptian priests that Menes had
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
After the death of the great king who had founded the Persian empire, Cambyses (Kambujiya), the elder of the two sons whom Cassandane had borne to Cyrus, ascended the throne of the new kingdom in the year 529 B.C. A few years before his death Cyrus had entrusted him with the vice-royalty of Babylonia. [139] Herodotus tells us that "Cambyses again reduced the nations which Cyrus had subjugated, and then marched against Egypt." Egypt was the oldest of the great powers of the ancient East, and, aft
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CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XI.
More than two centuries before Cambyses set foot upon its soil, Egypt had experienced the rule of the stranger. The reign of the Ethiopic monarchs of Napata over Egypt (730-672 B.C. ) was followed by the more severe dominion of the Assyrians. But Psammetichus had been able to restore the kingdom, and the sovereignty of his house; the reign of Amasis had called into existence a beautiful after-bloom of Egyptian art, had given a lively impulse to trade, and increased the welfare of the land. Now t
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
In spite of the union of Upper and Lower Egypt, and the extension of the Egyptian dominion up the Nile as far as Semne and Kumne, the kingdom of the pyramids, of the lake of Moeris, and the labyrinth succumbed to the attack of a foreign enemy. According to Josephus, Manetho, in the second book of his Egyptian History, gave the following account: "There was a king Amyntimaeus. In his reign the divine power, I know not why, was ungracious. From the East came an unexpected swarm of men belonging to
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
When Babylonia rebelled against Sennacherib, immediately after the murder of Sargon; when Merodach Baladan, whom Sargon had deprived of the rule over Babylon, and had finally suffered to remain in South Chaldæa, succeeded in again making himself master of Babylon; when the Aramæans, the tribes of Arabia, Elam, and the land of Ellip had taken up arms against Sennacherib—the regions of Syria also thought of shaking off the yoke of Assyria. The cities of the Phenicians and of the Philistines, the k
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CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XII.
"When Cambyses returned from Thebes to Memphis," so Herodotus narrates, "Apis appeared to the Egyptians. They put on their best clothes, and made holiday. Cambyses seeing this, formed the opinion that they held the festival because misfortune had happened to him. He summoned the governors of Memphis, and when they came into his presence asked them why the Egyptians had done nothing of this kind when he had been in Memphis before, but only now that he had lost the greater part of his army. They r
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
Sennacherib had been compelled to retire from Syria before the Egyptians and Ethiopians, before the army of Tirhaka. If he did not seek to compensate this failure by new campaigns to Syria, if he omitted to attempt the subjugation of Syria a second time, the reason obviously lay in the fact, that his arms were occupied nearer home by the rebellion of Babylonia, the attitude of Merodach Baladan in South Chaldæa, and his combination with Elam. We are acquainted with the series of rebellions and st
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
The Greeks inform us that Sesostris, or Sesosis, was the greatest warrior among the kings of Egypt. Herodotus was told by the priests that he was the first who set out with ships of war from the Arabian Gulf, and reduced the dwellers by the Red Sea, until he was checked by waters which were too shallow for navigation. On his return from this expedition, Sesostris, as the priests said, gathered together a great army, invaded the continent, and reduced every nation in his path. In the conquered la
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
In his last years Esarhaddon had raised his son Assurbanipal to be co-regent with himself. [355] Shortly before his death, which overtook him in the year 668 B.C. after a short but eventful reign of 13 years, he appears to have given up the government entirely to him. [356] Immediately after his accession the new prince received the intelligence that Tirhaka, whom his father had driven out of Egypt into Napata, had invaded Egypt, and taken Memphis, that the princes whom Esarhaddon had entrusted
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
More than ten centuries seem to have elapsed from the founding of the kingdom of Memphis before Egypt ventured beyond her natural borders. The peninsula of Sinai, the shores of the Red Sea opposite Thebes, and Semne in Nubia were the extreme limits in the times of the kings who built the pyramids, of the Sesurtesen and Amenemha. The impulse given by the successful war of liberation carried Egypt beyond these boundaries. When Amosis and Tuthmosis III. had restored the kingdom, it reached the summ
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CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIII.
"The Persians, when they heard the words of Cambyses," so Herodotus continues his narrative, "did not believe that the Magians had possessed themselves of the throne; on the contrary, they thought that Cambyses had said what he had said of the death of Smerdis in order to deceive them, that the whole of Persia might rise against Smerdis. They believed that Smerdis the son of Cyrus was on the throne; for even Prexaspes solemnly denied that he had slain Smerdis; after the death of Cambyses it was
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CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XIV.
One of the boldest deeds known to history had been accomplished, one of the most marvellous complications had been severed by a remarkable venture. At a distance from their home and people, six Persians, led by a prince of the royal house, had attacked and cut down the pretended son of Cyrus, in his fortified citadel, when surrounded by his adherents, after he had reigned for more than ten months (Spring 521 B.C. [219] ). An Achæmenid again sat on the throne of Cyrus. Whether the removal of the
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
"Asshur was a cedar in Lebanon," so the prophet Ezekiel tells us; "a shadowing thicket, and of a tall stature, with fair branches, and his top was among the thick boughs. The waters made him great, the flood set him up on high; with her stream she went round about his plants, and sent her conduits unto all the trees of the field. Therefore his height was exalted above all the trees of the field, and his boughs were great, and his branches became strong because of the multitude of waters, and spr
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
We have already called attention to the peculiar features in the position and nature of their country which favoured the development of the Egyptians. The shape of the land, so conducive to unity, must have led at an early time to a community of life; the protection of this favoured valley against the plundering tribes of the desert must have called into existence a military monarchy. But it is no longer in the form of a patriarchal rule or military chieftainship that the monuments and tradition
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
Other cares and other efforts than the maintenance of a wide dominion, the erection of splendid palaces, the restoration of impressive works of art, the preparation of magnificent furniture, occupied a small region which obeyed the lords of that military power, and those palaces,—the kings of Asshur. The kingdom of Israel, though not annihilated by the arms of Assyria, was thoroughly broken by them. Twenty years after, Judah escaped the same disaster, but not without the severest wounds. It was
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
The neighbours of Egypt on the east were the Syrians and Arabians. Herodotus gives the name of Syrians to the inhabitants of the Syrian coasts and Mount Lebanon, the settlers on the Euphrates and Tigris, and the population of the eastern districts of Asia Minor. In Xenophon the Babylonians speak Syriac. Strabo remarks that the Syrians and Arabians are closely related in language, mode of life, and physique—that Syrians dwelt on both sides of the Taurus—that the same language was spoken on both s
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CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XV.
Aeschylus represents the Persians as saying, "A great, prosperous, victorious life was granted to us by destiny, when King Darius, the lord of the bow, Susa's beloved captain, governed the land, without fault or failure, like a god. The Persians called him their divine counsellor: he was filled with a godlike wisdom, and wisely did he, the Susa-born god of Persia, lead our army. We were seen in splendid array; there was ready for him the unwearying might of armed men, and troops mingled from all
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CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XI.
Far from the centres of power and civilisation in Hither Asia, beyond the Caucasus and the Black Sea, dwelt wandering tribes who, in the accounts of the Greeks, were generally denoted by the common name of Scyths. It was known at an early time, among the Greeks, that these tribes which dwelt to the north of the Thracians lived on their herds, especially on the milk of their mares. Even the Homeric poems make mention of the "'horse-milkers,' of the 'Thracians,' who live poorly on milk, the most j
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CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVI.
Like Bactria and Arachosia, Asia Minor and Egypt had remained loyal, when the natives in the centre of the kingdom, the Semites and Arians, and even the Persians, had revolted against Darius. In Egypt Aryandes, who had been appointed satrap by Cambyses, still held his office. Uzahorsun, the Egyptian whom Cambyses had placed in his retinue and taken into his service (p. 171), tells us, "that his holiness, the king of upper and lower Egypt, Darius (Ntariush), the ever-living, had commanded him to
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
In the period from 2000 to 1000 B.C. , Babylonia under Hammurabi, Nebuchadnezzar, and Marduknadinakh, was already the foremost state of Hither Asia in power, science, and skill in art. Her civilisation had developed without external assistance. If the first foundations were borrowed, and not laid by the Babylonians, they certainly were not due to the Egyptians. The religious views of the Babylonians and the Egyptians rest on an entirely different basis. In Egypt the heavens were carefully observ
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CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVII.
The perseverance and vigour of Darius had succeeded in re-establishing and extending the kingdom of Cyrus. In the west he had reached Mount Olympus and the great Syrtis, in the east the course of the Indus, high up among the Himalayas; in the north the boundaries were the Caucasus and the Jaxartes, in the south the tribes of Arabia and the negroes above Nubia. He set himself to give a regulated administration to this empire, which had been acquired by such vast conquests, and which in its wide e
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CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XII.
From modest beginnings, with a land of moderate extent, Assyria, after passing through a training of severe warfare against the immediate neighbours, slowly raised herself by unwearied efforts, and extended wider and wider the circle of her dominion. The end of the twelfth century, the course and close of the ninth century, denote the epochs and the halts in this advance, which are followed in turn by periods of decline. With the middle of the eighth century, with the accession of Tiglath Pilesa
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
Like the Pharaohs, the rulers of Babylon sought their fame in magnificent buildings. But their works have not been able to withstand the ravages of time with the same durability as the stone mountains and porticoes on the Nile. The lower Euphrates does not lie, like the Nile, between walls of rocks, from which the most beautiful and hardest stone could be obtained. The plain of Babylonia afforded nothing but earth for the bricks, which were sometimes burnt, sometimes dried in the sun; and excell
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CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
The empire of Darius rested on the fact that the Persians regarded themselves as the governing nation in Asia, and on their desire and determination to maintain this position, with the advantages which it brought to them; on the devotion and fidelity with which the Persian tribal princes and nobles stood by the king; on their habits of obedience and subjection; on the ambition of officers and governors, which was excited by obvious distinctions; on the education of a considerable portion of the
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
The Arabian peninsula is a repetition of Africa on a smaller scale and in more moderate proportions, without a river-valley like that of the Nile. The centre is occupied by a table-land, which presents a few well-watered depressions lying under a burning sky between naked deserts, plains of sand, cliffs, and bald peaks. Thus, in spite of the great extent of the country (more than 1,000,000 square miles), there are few districts in the interior of Arabia suitable for agriculture. But towards the
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CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIII.
According to the account of Herodotus, a blind man from the city of Anysis, and bearing the same name as his city, ruled over Egypt at the time when Sabakon marched through the country. He retired before the Ethiopians into the marshes, and fled to an island called Elbo. The island measured ten stades in every direction, and thither, in obedience to his command, the Egyptians by turns secretly brought him nourishment. When fifty years had expired from the time that he made himself master of Egyp
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
Between the basin of the Euphrates and Tigris and the Mediterranean rise the mountains of Syria, an elevated plateau which ascends gradually from the right bank of the Euphrates and descends steeply on the sea-coast. A peculiar depression, known as Hollow Syria, [477] divides this region in its entire length from north to south—from the Taurus to the N.E. point of the Red Sea, and separates the plateau into an eastern and a western half. The bed of the narrow valley reaches its greatest elevatio
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CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XIV.
In the Median poems, from which Ctesias and Nicolaus have told us the story of the overthrow of the Assyrian kingdom by the combined Medes and Babylonians, the leader of the Medes naturally occupies the most prominent place. From him the prudent and crafty leader of the Babylonians obtains the satrapy of his home as the price of his co-operation—co-operation which mainly consists in imparting advice on the ground of his knowledge of astronomy. Afterwards he shows himself faithless and thievish,
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CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XIX.
Along with the new arrangement of the administration of the empire Darius had transferred the centre of it into a province, which had thrice rebelled against him, to Susa, [433] the ancient metropolis of Elam, which Assurbanipal had conquered, plundered, and destroyed 130 years previously. Since that time the city had risen from its ruins. We have seen what motives determined Darius to take this step. The position of the city, which was not far removed from his native territory, and at the same
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
Our knowledge of the religious conceptions of the Canaanites consists of scattered and meagre statements. Yet these statements are enough to show with certainty that the ideas of the Syrians about the powers of Heaven rested on the same basis as the worship of the Babylonians. But the sensual and lascivious side of this worship, no less than the cruel and bloody side, is more strongly and broadly developed in Syria than in Babylonia, while, on the other hand, the complete development of the star
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CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XV.
Assyria had become known to the Greeks about the time when Tiglath Pilesar II. had reduced Syria to submission, and the cities of the Phenicians were subject to the kings of Asshur— i. e. about the middle of the eighth century B.C. Hence for them the name Assyrians denoted the whole population of Asia from the Syrian coast to the Tigris, and the range of the Zagrus: "Syrians" is merely an abbreviated form of the name "Assyrians." In this sense Herodotus says: "After the fall of Nineveh Babylon w
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CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XX.
The arrangement which Darius had given to his vast empire allowed the character, laws, manners, and religion of the subject nations to remain as far as possible unchanged, and only interfered, exceptionally, in the hereditary local customs of the provinces. Adequate provision for the maintenance of the central government, the establishment of rapid combinations, care for the training of the generals and officers, ample and obvious rewards for service, a system of taxation far removed from extort
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
The tradition of the Hebrews of the early history and fortunes of their people previous to the settlement in Canaan is contained in the books of the Pentateuch. After they had settled in that land and had passed beyond the loose combination of their tribes to the unity of civic life, after a monarchy had been established, and under it a metropolis and a centre for the national religion had been founded, the priesthood engaged in this worship began to collect together ritualistic observances and
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CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVI.
Necho's views for subjugating Syria to his dominion, and renewing the campaigns of the ancient Pharaohs to the Euphrates, were wrecked after some successes. The day of Karchemish, which he lost to the Babylonians, carried with it the loss of the conquests in Syria, with perhaps the exception of Gaza and one or two other places of the Philistines. Necho might count himself fortunate that Nebuchadnezzar remained within Syria. His attempt to support the rebellion of Judah against Babylon, which kin
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
When the progenitors of the Hebrews had come from the Euphrates to Canaan, and had taken up their abode there at Hebron and Shechem, when Jacob and Esau had parted in peace, and the latter had gone to Mount Seir, Jacob, with all his sons, went to Egypt. Jacob dwelt at Hebron—so runs the narrative—when he sent Joseph, the son of Rachel, to his elder brethren in Shechem, to see if all was well with them and their flocks. But his brethren hated Joseph, because his father loved him more than them; a
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CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVII.
On the western coast of Asia Minor the nation of the Lydians, which possessed the vallies of the Hermus and Mæander, had early arrived at a monarchy and a point of civilization far in advance of the stages of primitive life. The ancient royal house of the Lydians claimed to be sprung from the gods, from Attys, the son of the god Manes. The city of Sardis is said to have been built under the dominion of this dynasty, to have been dedicated to the sun-god and fortified. [765] This house of the Att
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CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
The Delphian priesthood did no service to their countrymen on the western shore of Asia Minor when in the year 689 B.C. they helped Gyges to the throne in spite of the resistance of the Lydians. The cities of the Greeks on these coasts, whose founders had in days past been expelled by war and distress from their cantons, had come to power and prosperity in the course of the three centuries which had since elapsed. Forced to a vigorous exercise of their powers, amid an environment of many new imp
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
The oppression which, according to the Pentateuch, the Egyptians exercised upon the sons of Jacob when settled in the land of Goshen, by field-labour and tasks of building, may be regarded as a historical fact. It is proved by the position of Egypt and her relations to her neighbours on the north-east in the fourteenth century B.C. , and it agrees with the arrangements and aims entertained and carried out in this border-land by Sethos I. and Ramses II. It must have been a grievous burden for the
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
It was not only in the lower valley of the Nile, on the banks of the Euphrates and the Tigris, and along the coast and on the heights of Syria that independent forms of intellectual and civic life grew up in antiquity. By the side of the early civilisation of Egypt, and the hardly later civilisation of that unknown people from which Elam, Babylon, and Asshur borrowed such important factors in the development of their own capacities; along with the civilisation of the Semites of the East and West
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
The fortunes and achievements of the Israelites after leaving Egypt and escaping the pursuit of the Egyptians, are narrated in the second, third, and fourth books of the Pentateuch in the following manner. From the reed-sea the Israelites marched into the wilderness of Shur, and for three days found no water. When they came to Marah, they could not drink the water there, because it was bitter. Then Jehovah showed Moses a piece of wood, and he threw it into the water, so that the water became swe
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
We have already examined the earliest date at which the kings who reigned in antiquity in the lower valley of Nile attempted to bring their actions into everlasting remembrance by pictures and writing. The oldest inscription preserved there dates from the period immediately preceding the erection of the great pyramids. The same impulse swayed the rulers of Babylon and Asshur, of whom we possess monuments reaching beyond the year 2000 B.C. The Hebrews also began at a very early time to record the
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CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XI.
When the Israelites had delivered themselves from the dominion of Egypt, they pastured their flocks on the peninsula of Sinai. Afterwards they wandered further to the north-east into the Syrian desert, and at length, as the oases in this district were few, and the wells insufficient, they threw themselves upon the rich uplands on the east of the Jordan. From the table-land, which they had conquered, they saw before them the happy valley of the Jordan, the fig-trees and pomegranates, the vines an
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CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XII.
The peninsula of Asia Minor is a table-land of about 750 miles in length by 400 in breadth, lying between the Black Sea, the Ægean, and the Mediterranean. This table-land reaches its highest level in the south; here run along the Mediterranean, from east to west, parallel ranges of mountains, the chain of Taurus, and under the snow-clad heights lie green Alpine pastures, while the slopes are filled with the most beautiful wood. Under these mountains on the sea we find here and there narrow and h
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
The life of the Aryas in the Panjab was manly and warlike. From the songs of the Rigveda we saw how familiar they were with the bow and the chariot, how frequent were the feuds between the princes, and the prayers offered to the gods for victory. Such a life could, no doubt, increase the pleasure in martial achievements, and lead to further enterprises, even if the plains and pastures of the Panjab had not been too narrow for the inhabitants. We remember the prayer in which the war-god was invok
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THE HISTORY OF ROME,
THE HISTORY OF ROME,
Translated with the Author's sanction, and Additions by the Rev. P. W. Dickson ; to which is added an Introduction by Dr. Schmitz . THE LIBRARY EDITION , in Four Vols., Demy 8vo., with Index, 75 s. The Index (8vo.) separately, 3 s. 6 d. ; but the Volumes not sold separately. THE PEOPLE'S EDITION , in Four Vols., Crown 8vo., with Index, 46 s. 6 d. ; or the Volumes sold separately: Vols. I. and II., 21 s. ; Vol. III., 10 s. 6 d. ; Vol. IV., with Index, 15 s. The Index (Crown 8vo.) separately, 3 s.
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
The Aryas had now advanced far beyond the borders of their ancient territory; from the land of the Panjab they had conquered and occupied the valley of the Ganges. The plundering raids and feuds which had occupied the tribes on the Indus had passed away, and in their place came the migration, conquest, settlement, the conflict for the conquered districts, and a warlike life of considerable duration. It was only when attempted in large masses that attack or defence could be successful. By this me
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
In the land of the Ganges the Brahmans had gained a great victory and carried out a great reform. A new god had thrown the old gods into the background, and with the conception of this new god was connected a new view of the world, at once abstract and fantastic. From this in turn followed a new arrangement of the state, and of the orders, which were now of divine origin, as direct products of creation, and thus became irrevocably fixed. The monarchy itself was of humbler descent than the Brahma
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THE HISTORY OF GREECE.
THE HISTORY OF GREECE.
In Five Vols., Demy 8vo., 84 s. : or separately, Vols. I. and II., each 15 s. ; Vols. III., IV., and V., with Index, each 18 s. "A history known to scholars as one of the profoundest, most original, and instructive of modern times."— Globe. "We cannot express our opinion of Dr. Curtius' book better than by saying that it may be fitly ranked with Theodor Mommsen's great work."— Spectator....
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EVELYN ABBOTT, M.A., FELLOW AND TUTOR OF BALLIOL COLLEGE, OXFORD.
EVELYN ABBOTT, M.A., FELLOW AND TUTOR OF BALLIOL COLLEGE, OXFORD.
The present volume has been translated from the fifth edition of the original, and has had, throughout, the benefit of Professor Duncker's revision. E. A. Oxford, Jan. 14, 1879....
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
The requirements of the new doctrine extended throughout the whole circle of life. The establishment of the arrangement into castes struck deep into the sphere of the family, of civic society, and the state; the old rules for purification were enlarged to suit the new system, and changed into rubrics for expiation and penance, touching almost at every step upon daily life. The ethical notions of the old time had to make room for a new ideal of the life pleasing to God. How could the ancient cust
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
About the middle course of the Tigris, where the mountain wall of the Armenian plateau steeply descends to the south, there is a broad stretch of hilly country. To the west it is traversed by a few water-courses only, which spring out of the mountains of Sindyar, and unite with the Tigris; from the east the affluents are far more abundant. On the southern shore of the lake of Urumiah the edge of the plateau of Iran abuts on the Armenian table-land, and then, stretching to the south-east, it boun
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
The book of the law was the canon of pure conduct, and the holy order of the state and society, which the Brahmans held up before the princes and nations on the Ganges. They made no attempt to get the throne into their own hands; they had no thought of giving an effective political organisation to their caste; they did not seek to set up a hierarchy which should take its place by the side of the state, or rise superior to it, and thus secure such obedience for their demands among clergy and lait
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
The unity in regard to law and morals, which the book of the law sought to establish throughout all the regions of India, between the Vindhyas and Himalayas, was never carried out to this extent. Indeed, the book itself is wanting in unity owing to the gradual accumulation of different strata in it, and the various rules which it contains for the same circle of life. Nor did it even attempt to remove the usages of Brahmavarta, or the customs of "the good" in general. In other points its requirem
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
To relegate Ninus and Semiramis with all their works and deeds to the realm of fiction may appear to be a startling step, going beyond the limits of a prudent criticism. Does not Ctesias state accurately the years of the reigns: Ninus reigned, according to his statement, 52 years; Semiramis was 62 years old, and reigned 42 years? Do not the chronographers assure us that in Ctesias the successors of Ninus and Semiramis, from Ninyas to Sardanapalus, the last ruler over Assyria, 34 kings, were enum
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
At the time when Babylonia, on the banks of the Euphrates, flourished under the successors of Hammurabi in an ancient and peculiar civilisation, and Assyria was struggling upwards beside Babylonia on the banks of the Tigris, strengthening her military power in the Armenian mountains and the ranges of the Zagrus, and already beginning to try her strength in more distant campaigns, a Semitic tribe succeeded in rising into eminence in the West also, in winning and exerting a deep-reaching influence
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
The list of the kings of Magadha, preserved not only among the Brahmans, but from the seventh century B.C. downwards among the Buddhists who then came forward to oppose them, allow us to assert with tolerable accuracy that the dynasty of the Pradyotas, which ascended the throne of Magadha in the year 803 B.C. , was succeeded in 665 B.C. by another family, known to the Brahmans as the Çaiçunagas. [384] The first two kings of this house were Kshemadharman and Bhattya (the Kshatraujas of the Brahma
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
Not far removed from the harbour-cities, whose ships discovered the land of silver, which carried the natural wealth of the West to the lands of the Euphrates and Tigris, and the Nile, in order to exchange them for the productions of those countries, in part immediately upon the borders of the marts which united the East and the West, and side by side with them, dwelt the Israelites on the heights and in the valleys which they had conquered, in very simple and original modes of life. Even during
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
So far as we can ascertain the conditions of the states on the Ganges in the sixth century B.C. the population suffered under grievous oppression. To the capricious nature of the sentences pronounced by the kings and the cruelty of their punishments were added taxes and exactions, which must have been severely felt over wide circles. The sutras tell us that a king who required money received this answer from his two first ministers: "It is with the land as with grains of sesame; it produces no o
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
More than a century and a half had passed since the Israelites had won their land in Canaan. The greater part of the tribes, beside the breeding of cattle, were occupied with the cultivation of vines and figs, and regular agriculture; the minority had become accustomed to life in settled cities, and the earliest stages of industry; but the unity of the nation was lost, and in the place of the religious fervour which once accompanied the exodus from Egypt, the rites of the Syrian deities had forc
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
King Ajataçatru of Magadha, who is said to have dethroned his father Bimbisara in the the year 551 B.C. and put him to death, to have persecuted the "Enlightened," and then, from a persecutor to have changed into a zealous follower, demanded, according to the legends of the Buddhists, that the Mallas should give up to him the remains of Buddha (the ashes and the bones of his corpse) for preservation. But the Mallas refused to do this. The Çakyas also laid claim to them because Buddha sprang from
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
The position which Samuel gained as a priest, seer, and judge after the death of Eli and his sons, and continued to hold under the sway of the Philistines must have undergone a marked change, owing to the establishment of the monarchy in Israel, though in the later text of the Books of Samuel it is maintained that "Samuel judged Israel till his death." [235] We know that Samuel had set up an altar to Jehovah at Ramathaim, his home and dwelling-place (p. 115), but it is not handed down that he ha
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
The examination of the accounts of exploits said to have been performed by Cyrus (Kuru), the founder of the Persian kingdom, in the region of the Indus, showed us above (p. 16) that it was the Gandarians, the neighbours of the Arachoti, whom Cyrus subjugated. Hence the spies of Darius could travel from Caspapyrus, i. e. from the city of Cabul (Kabura) down the Cabul and the Indus; from the mouth of the latter they sailed round Arabia and returned home by the Arabian Gulf. Not quite thirty years
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
At the cost of his nation, in collusion with the enemies of his land, and under the protection of the Philistines, David had paved the way to dominion over Israel. He had much to make good. He had to cause the way which led him to the throne to be forgotten, to heal the wounds which the long contention must have inflicted on his land, to surpass the great services which Saul had rendered to the Israelites by yet greater services, by more brilliant exploits, by more firmly-rooted institutions. A
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
The Arians on the Indus and in the Panjab had remained more true to the old tendencies of life than their tribesmen who had turned towards the east. In the variety of the forms of their political life and their stimulating influence on each other, in healthy simple feeling, in warlike energy and martial spirit they were in advance of the land of the Ganges. Great as was the number of the tribes and states which filled the region of the Indus, and thickly as the land was populated, wide and many-
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
In the last hour of his life David had raised his favourite son to the throne. The young king was not much more than 20 years of age, [326] and the news of the death of the dreaded ruler of Israel could not but awaken among all who had felt the weight of his arm the hope of withdrawing themselves from the burden laid upon them. The son of the king of Edom, whom his father's servants had carried away in safety into Egypt, had grown up there under the protection of the Pharaoh; at the news of Davi
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
The life of the Indians had developed without interference from without, following the nature of the country and the impulse of their own dispositions. Neither Cyrus nor Darius had crossed the Indus. The arms of the Macedonians were the first to reach and subjugate the land of the Panjab. The character and manners of another nation, whose skill in war, power, and importance only made themselves felt too plainly, and to whom civilisation and success could not be denied, were not only suddenly bro
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
In the century and a half which passed between the date of Kalaçoka of Magadha, the council of the Sthaviras at Vaiçali, and the reign of Vindusara, the doctrine of the Enlightened had continued to extend, and had gained so many adherents that Megasthenes could speak of the Buddhist mendicants as a sect of the Brahmans. The rulers of Magadha who followed Kalaçoka, the house of the Nandas, which deposed his son, and the succeeding princes of that house, Indradatta and Dhanananda, were not favoura
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
Out of the peculiar relation in which Israel stood from all antiquity to his God, out of the protection and prosperity which he had granted to the patriarchs and their seed, out of the liberation from the oppression of the Egyptians, which Jehovah had prepared for the Israelites with a strong arm, out of the bestowal of Canaan, i. e. the promise of Jehovah to conquer the land, which the Israelites had now possessed for centuries, there grew up in the circles of the priests, from about the time o
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
A doctrine coming forward with so much self-confidence and force as Buddhism, touching such essential sides of the Indian national spirit, and meeting such distinct needs of the heart and of society, could not but react on the system which opposed it, which it fought against and strove to remove, i. e. on Brahmanism. We cannot suppose that the Brahmans looked supinely on at the advances of Buddhism. The accounts which we received from the Greeks about the various forms of worship dominant about
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
The monarchy in Israel was established by the people to check the destruction and ruin with which the land and population were threatened by the incursions of the neighbours on the east, by the dangerous arms of the Philistines. The first attempt to set up a monarchy in connection with the cities of the land was soon wrecked and swept away, without leaving a trace behind. In spite of his support in the wishes of the great majority of the Israelites, the monarchy of Saul had not succeeded in esta
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
The Brahmans had reason to expect favourable effects from the changes they had made in their doctrine and ethics. They had taken account of the desire for the worship of more real and living deities, and in order to satisfy this they had pushed Brahman into the background; they were zealous in giving tangible shape to the benefits which their deities had bestowed upon men; they ascribed the best results to pilgrimages, and if on the one hand they intensified the merits and efficacy of penance, t
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CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XI.
The voyages of the Phenicians on the Mediterranean; their colonies on the coasts and islands of that sea; their settlements in Cyprus, Rhodes, Crete, the islands of the Ægean, Samothrace, and Thasos, on the coasts of Hellas, on Malta, Sicily, and Sardinia; their establishments on the northern edge of Africa in the course of the thirteenth and twelfth centuries B.C. ; their discovery of the Atlantic about the year 1100 B.C. , have been traced by us already. Of the internal conditions and the cons
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
The Arians in India at an early time developed important spheres of human nature into peculiar forms. In that tribal life, by no means feeble of its kind, which they lived in the land of the Panjab, they worshipped the spirits of fire, of light, of water; with deep religious feeling they invoked these helpers, protectors, and judges, with earnestness, zeal, and lively imagination. The movements of the emigration and conquest of the Ganges, the acquisition of extensive regions, led them forward o
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CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XII.
We found above at what an early period the migratory tribes of Arabia came into intercourse with the region of the Euphrates, and the valley of the Nile, how in both these places they purchased corn, implements, and weapons in return for their horses and camels, their skins and their wool, and the prisoners taken in their feuds. It was this exchange trade of the Arabian tribes which in the first instance brought about the intercourse of Syria with Babylonia and Egypt. Egypt like Babylonia requir
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
Between the valley of the Indus and the land of the Euphrates and Tigris, bounded on the south by the ocean and the Persian Gulf, on the north by the broad steppes which the Oxus and Jaxartes vainly attempt to fertilise, by the Caspian Sea and the valley of the Aras, lies the table-land of Iran. Rising to an average height of 4000 feet above the level of the sea, it forms an oblong, the length of which from east to west is something more than 1500 miles. The breadth in the east is about 1000 mil
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CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIII.
The campaigns which Tiglath Pilesar, king of Asshur, undertook towards the West about the end of the twelfth century, and which carried him to the Upper Euphrates and into Northern Syria, remained without lasting result. The position which Tiglath Pilesar then had won on the Euphrates was not maintained by his successors in any one instance. More than 200 years after Tiglath Pilesar we find Tiglath Adar II. (889-883 B.C. ) again in conflict with the same opponents who had given his forefather su
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
Among the ruins of the residence of the kings of Asshur at Chalah, on the confluence of the Greater Zab and the Tigris, was discovered the obelisk which Shalmanesar II., who reigned from 859 to 823 B.C. over Assyria, erected in memory of his successes. In the tribute offered to him we find the rhinoceros, the elephant, the humped ox, and the camel with two humps (II. 320). This species of camel and the yak are found in Bactria, on the southern edge of the Caspian Sea, and in Tartary, and we afte
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
The statements of the Avesta concerning the ancient rulers of Eastern Iran were proved to be without historical value, yet we found in them an ancient and genuine tradition, the form of which allowed us to draw certain conclusions about the political condition of that region in a period for which we have no other records except the poetry of Western Iran. But what the Avesta tells us of the rulers of ancient days is of secondary importance for the book, which comprises the doctrines and ordinanc
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
The examination of the difficult questions, whether, from what period, and to what extent, the Avesta was known in Western Iran before the time of Alexander, when the book came into existence, whether its contents have come down uninjured from an ancient period, or whether it underwent alterations in the time of the Parthians and the Sassanids, will be best opened by collecting and testing the accounts which have been preserved in the West about Zarathrustra and his work. Herodotus does not ment
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
The examination of the traditions of the East and West has simply led to the confirmation of the result, which we gain from the Avesta—that the name and the doctrine of Zarathrustra belong to Bactria. With regard to the antiquity of the doctrine, the inscriptions of Darius and the statements of the Greeks allowed us to draw the conclusion that it became current and dominant in Bactria about the year 800 B.C. ; and from the analogy of the development of the Arians on both sides of the Ganges we a
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CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VI.
In the Gathas of the Avesta the spirit who keeps watch over the increase of the flocks speaks to the heavenly powers, saying: "All creatures are distressed; whom have ye for their assistance?" Auramazda makes answer: "I have one only who has received my commands, the holy Zarathrustra; he will proclaim my exhortations and those of Mazda and Asha, for I will make him practised in speech." [197] Then Auramazda sacrificed to Ardviçura that he might unite with Zarathrustra the son of Pourushaçpa, to
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CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VII.
When the tribes of the Aryas advanced from the Panjab towards the East, and established themselves on the Ganges, the gods to whom they had offered prayers on the Indus faded away amid the abundant fertility of the new land; and the lively perception of the struggle of the gods of light against the spirits of darkness made room for the conception of the world-soul, from which nature and all living creatures were thought to have emanated. Similar religious principles led the Arians in Iran to a r
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CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER VIII.
In the form in which we have them the books of the Avesta are the work of the priests of Eastern Iran. According to the evidence repeatedly furnished by them, there were three orders in Sogdiana and Bactria: priests, warriors, and husbandmen. This sequence, which is uniformly preserved both in the invocations and in the book of the law, shows that the priests had risen above the warriors, and claimed to be the first of the three orders. [312] In considering the civilisation of the Bactrian kingd
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CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER IX.
The rules concerning purity and purification, the expiations and penances necessary to avert the Daevas, which we possess in the Vendidad of the Avesta, are only the remnant of a far more comprehensive law. From the list of books and chapters traditional among the Parsees, we can see that it was intended to include not only all the invocations and prayers which the worship required, the rules of sacrifice, and the entire ritual, together with the Calendar of the year of the Church, but also the
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CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER X.
Of the tribes of the Arians occupying the table-land called by their name, those which had their habitations on the northern slope of the Hindu Kush, in the valleys of the Murghab and Zarefshan, outstripped the rest in combining their forces, and uniting into a larger community. In these regions they held advanced posts over against the steppes and the migratory nations of the low plains stretching before them without limit towards the north. We had good reason to suppose that it was the repulsi
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CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER I.
On the northern edge of the table-land of Iran, where the mountains descend to the Caspian Sea, we found dwelling towards the east the Hyrcanians ( Vehrkana in the Avesta, Varkana in the inscriptions of Darius). [444] Their territory may have corresponded to the modern district of Jorjan, which has preserved their name (p. 9). To the west of the Hyrcanians, between Elburz and the Caspian, lay the Tapurians, whose name has survived in the modern Taberistan, and further yet, on the sea-coast, and
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CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
"When Phraortes had fallen, he was succeeded by his son Cyaxares. This prince collected all his subjects and marched against Nineveh, in order to avenge the death of his father and destroy the city. He defeated the Assyrians, and while encamped before Nineveh, there came upon him the vast army of the Scythians, led by their king Madyas, the son of Protothyas, who invaded Asia in pursuit of the Cimmerians, and as they did not come through the land of the Saspeires, but kept the Caucasus to the ri
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CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER III.
The oldest subjects in the Median kingdom were the Persians. Their country lay in the south-west corner of the table-land of Iran. The heights of the Zagrus, which run down to the sea in a south-easterly direction, divide it from the ancient kingdom of Elam, and the land of the Tigris, just as in the north they divide the land of the Medes from the valley of the two rivers. The Eastern border of the Persian territory was formed, almost down to the coast, by the great desert, which fills the cent
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CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER IV.
"Cyaxares was succeeded by his son Astyages on the throne of the Medes"—such is the narrative of Herodotus—"and the latter had a daughter named Mandane. Once he saw his daughter in a dream, and water came from her in such quantities that all Asia was inundated. This vision Astyages laid before the interpreters of dreams, among the Magians, and their interpretation alarmed him. To guard against the event portended, he gave his daughter, who was already of marriageable age, to none of the Medes of
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CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER V.
The Median empire was not of long duration. Little more than a century had passed since Phraortes succeeded Deioces in the government of the land of Ecbatana, little more than eighty since Phraortes had united the tribes of the Medes under his leadership, about sixty since Cyaxares had expelled the Scythians, and not quite fifty since Nineveh had succumbed to the arms of the Medes and Babylonians. In the overthrow of so mighty a power, Cyrus had achieved a great, and, so far as we can tell, an u
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