"Gray-haired antiquity" … How many different eras do we unwittingly mix under this mask! Homer, Akhenaten, Hammurabi, Cheops - they all fit there, although these people are separated from each other by centuries-old gaps and are less similar to each other than Alexander Nevsky and Peter the Great. But still Homer is closer to us than all the others: something in him is akin to people of the new and even modern times. One feels that the poet was on the threshold of a new world - European antiquity. And he sang about the wrath of Achilles and the wanderings of Odysseus, addressing their descendants, people of the same warehouse - brave explorers and navigators, brave and proud warriors, crafty and ambitious sly ones, moderately superstitious and self-confident, passionate and inquisitive, wild and wild … the world gave birth to these people? Why are they huddled together in little Hellas? Or is it just so it seems to usin fact, was the onset of antiquity a global phenomenon? And if so - what universal explosion was the reason for that, and what consequences did it cause in different parts of the Earth?
To understand this, let's move our thoughts to the Homeric era, to the middle of the 8th century BC, when Rome and Yerevan were already founded, but Babylon and Nineveh were not yet destroyed. Let's immediately note the main thing: this world has recently experienced a shake-up of the "iron revolution" and the great migration of peoples stimulated by it. The widespread prevalence of iron ores, in comparison with copper ones, opened the way for dozens of new peoples to master the advanced technology and culture that had previously flourished in a few isolated regions of the Near and Far East. Newcomers invaded the zones of ancient civilizations, and at the turn of the II-I millenniums, events occurred similar to those that, after more than a thousand years, were associated with the death of the Roman Empire. Unfortunately, the era we are talking about now did not yet know history as a science; there was no one to comprehend and describe what was happening. We can only see the cast at the beginning of the drama, in the time of Ramses II, and at the end, in the era of Homer. We distinguish between those who could not survive in the crucible of ethnic chaos, and those who survived it, having radically changed in the process; we see yesterday's "barbarians", for the first time creating their own states and creating their own epic, and next to them old and even ancient ethnic groups, burdened with the centuries-old burden of social traditions, continue to operate … Such is the new world. Let us study its dynamics in more detail and start with the Middle East - first of all, the initiator of technical and social evolution, which for some reason lost its leadership in the ancient era.we see yesterday's "barbarians", for the first time creating their own states and creating their own epic, and next to them old and even ancient ethnic groups continue to operate, burdened with the centuries-old burden of social traditions … Such is the new world. Let us study its dynamics in more detail and start with the Middle East - first of all, the initiator of technical and social evolution, which for some reason lost its leadership in the ancient era.we see yesterday's "barbarians", for the first time creating their own states and creating their own epic, and next to them old and even ancient ethnic groups continue to operate, burdened with the centuries-old burden of social traditions … Such is the new world. Let us study its dynamics in more detail and start with the Middle East - first of all, the initiator of technical and social evolution, which for some reason lost its leadership in the ancient era.
Assyria plays the first violin here: only she managed to withstand the era of migration of peoples, when a wave of barbarian raids swept away in Asia Minor the great kingdom of the Hittites and the powerful eastern neighbor of this kingdom - the state of Mitanni, when Egypt fell under the rule of the Libyans and Nubians for centuries, and Babylon passed from hand to hand of successive foreign rulers. How did Assyria survive?
Let us recall that the Assyrian ethnos declared itself long ago, at the end of the III millennium, when the last Sumerian kingdom perished. And even then, the Assyrians were definitely not “barbarians”, that is, they already had a state, although they still had a low level of organization. These Semitic-speaking highlanders from time immemorial inhabited the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates - the southern outskirts of the great Transcaucasian knot of mountain ranges, a country with a very difficult relief, rich in forests and mountain rivers, building stone and metal ores, but poor arable land. A nation of hunters and cattle breeders, stubborn workers and brave warriors has formed here. Much later than in the southern lowland Mesopotamia, the institutions of royal power and temple bureaucracy were formed here, but the role of the popular assembly was very great, and this military democracy traditionally overpowered the priestly aristocracy of the local cities. The Assyrians early adopted cuneiform writing, numerous crafts, and trade culture from their southern neighbors. And when Mesopotamia was mired in strife or raided by barbarians, Assyria stepped out of its usual role as a junior partner, seeking to establish control over the ancient land of Sumer and Akkad. But each time someone was ahead of the Assyrians … Only in the IX century did the Assyrian state enter the world arena - to meet its triumph, exhaustion and death. But every time someone was ahead of the Assyrians … Only in the 9th century did the Assyrian state enter the world arena - towards its triumph, exhaustion and death. But every time someone was ahead of the Assyrians … Only in the 9th century did the Assyrian state enter the world arena - towards its triumph, exhaustion and death.
In the endless wars, the fighting skill of the Assyrians reached unprecedented heights. The hardened steel sword supplanted the old bronze ax, mass production of metal armor was launched; finally, the Assyrians were the first to create cavalry as a special kind of army. Special sapper units arose - builders of bridges and roads, creators of rams, catapults and other military equipment. All this is multiplied by the traditional discipline of the Assyrians, their indomitable fighting spirit, forged in merciless wars. But in the middle of the 8th century, Assyria found itself at a crossroads.
Even victorious wars cost a lot of human sacrifice, and captured slaves cannot replace the dead soldiers and citizens; it means that it is impossible to continue the conquests in the previous forms. But it is also impossible to cut them off - the professional soldiers left without work will overthrow the government. The dilemma was resolved by the civil war between the conservative priestly party and the military class. The warriors won, and in 745 the impostor Tiglathpalasar III, an outstanding commander and state reformer, ascended the throne of Assyria. He will not only complete the construction of the invincible Assyrian military machine, but will also open the way to the army for poor citizens, arming and supplying them at the expense of the state. The shortage of workers in the Assyrian economy will be made up for by the policy of "nashu" - the massive forced relocations of the conquered tribes to the empty lands of Assyria. With such a rear, the Assyrian army will subjugate the entire Middle East, including Babylon and Syria, Phenicia, Elam and Egypt. But the great empire will turn out to be a colossus with feet of clay, for its foundation - the Assyrian ethnos - will soon dissolve into a sea of "displaced persons" who, with disgust, submit to the military-bureaucratic despotism that crippled their fate. As a result, the transition to the "nasah" policy will only postpone the inevitable end of Assyria: at the end of the 7th century, its army will suffer a series of defeats from the Chaldeans of Babylon and the Medes of Iran, and the imperial subjects, who have replaced the former patriotic citizens, will not defend the stepmother power to the last drop of blood … Assyria will perish, almost all of its cities will be destroyed, and a small remnant of the Assyrian ethnos, preserved in its native mountains, will become part of the new powers, even changing the language. Such is the tragedy of the peopledoomed by the inertia of his social development and foreign policy situation to a suicidal struggle for leadership in the outgoing world.
A similar fate awaits the Urarts and Elamites, who inhabit, respectively, the far north and the far south of the Middle Eastern ecumene. If we conditionally group the local ethnic groups according to the age of their statehood, then the Assyrians look like mature, elderly men, the Urarts, on the other hand, are young men who have grown up early, and the Elamites are irrepressible elders.
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The homeland of the Urarts - the country of Biainili - lies in the mountainous outback around the salt lakes of Van and Urmia, north of Assyria and east of the Mitanni country, from which the Urarts inherited their special language along with the long-standing culture of horse breeding and the art of chariot warriors. The historical fate of the Urarts could repeat the fate of the early Assyrians (with a shift of a thousand years), had they not turned out to be the closest neighbors of Assyria in the late era of its unrestrained expansion. The constant raids of the Assyrians forced the Urarts to create a military-state machine on the Assyrian model. By the middle of the 8th century, the rivalry between Urartu and Assyria reached a climax. The young kingdom of Urartu is in dire need of foreign markets, and the way to the south, to the “world market” of glorious Babylon, is closed by the Assyrians. Therefore, the kings of Urartu are trying to cut a window to the west, to Asia Minor and the Mediterranean Sea. King Sarduri II almost succeeded in this: he reached Syria and made an alliance with the Damascus kingdom of the Arameans - the longtime enemies of Assyria. Such a success made Urartu the most dangerous enemy of the Assyrian rulers, and the very first campaign of the new army of Tiglatpalasar 111 in 743 was directed against the country of Biainili. The Assyrians will pass it from end to end with fire and sword, and the brief era of Urartian greatness will end, because the weakened Urarts will no longer be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who are increasingly penetrating into the depths of Transcaucasia from the Kuban steppes. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …he reached Syria and made an alliance with the Damascus kingdom of the Arameans - the longtime enemies of Assyria. Such a success made Urartu the most dangerous enemy of the Assyrian rulers, and the very first campaign of the new army of Tiglatpalasar 111 in 743 was directed against the country of Biainili. The Assyrians will pass it from end to end with fire and sword, and the brief era of Urartian greatness will end, because the weakened Urarts will no longer be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who are increasingly penetrating into the depths of Transcaucasia from the Kuban steppes. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …he reached Syria and made an alliance with the Damascus kingdom of the Arameans - the longtime enemies of Assyria. Such a success made Urartu the most dangerous enemy of the Assyrian rulers, and the very first campaign of the new army of Tiglatpalasar 111 in 743 was directed against the country of Biainili. The Assyrians will pass it from end to end with fire and sword, and the brief era of Urartian greatness will end, because the weakened Urarts will no longer be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who are increasingly penetrating into the depths of Transcaucasia from the Kuban steppes. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …and the very first campaign of the new army of Tiglatpalasar 111 in 743 was directed against the country of Biainili. The Assyrians will pass it from end to end with fire and sword, and the brief era of Urartian greatness will end, because the weakened Urarts will not be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who are increasingly penetrating into the depths of Transcaucasia from the Kuban steppes. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …and the very first campaign of the new army of Tiglatpalasar 111 in 743 was directed against the country of Biainili. The Assyrians will pass it from end to end with fire and sword, and the brief era of Urartian greatness will end, because the weakened Urarts will no longer be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who are increasingly penetrating into the depths of Transcaucasia from the Kuban steppes. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …for the weakened Urarts will not be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who from the Kuban steppes more and more actively penetrate into the depths of Transcaucasia. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …for the weakened Urarts will not be able to hold back the onslaught of the new northern "barbarians" - the Cimmerians, who from the Kuban steppes more and more actively penetrate into the depths of Transcaucasia. Under their blows, the rulers of the Urarts recognize themselves as vassals of Assyria, and then finally lose their independence, submitting to the Medes, the victors of the terrible Assyria and the formidable Scythians. But this will not happen soon …
And now our next turn is Elam - the only (apart from Egypt) state of the "first generation" still preserved in the Middle East. The Elamites are the same age as the ancient Sumerians, who created their written language and statehood more than twenty centuries before the Homeric era on the eastern coast of the Persian Gulf, in the Anshan mountain stronghold and on the adjacent fertile plain. Local residents have always proudly recognized their cultural isolation from Mesopotamia, and they themselves had a reputation there as evil wizards. But political ties have long tied Elam to Mesopotamia into one system. Either the king of Akkad enters the capital of Elam as a conqueror, then the last Sumerian king ends his days in Elamite captivity, then the "barbarian" ruling in Babylon annexes Elam to his dominions, then the Assyrian and Elamite kings fight among themselves for power over the weakened Babylon …
Undoubtedly, the mutual raids of the rulers of Elam and Mesopotamia caused much more damage to these countries than that which they suffered from all the "barbarians" who attacked them. And alas! - the lesson did not go for the future: as soon as in the middle of the VIII century the Elamite kingdom is revived after another era of decay and strife, its rulers again enter into the struggle for the repartition of Mesopotamia. This struggle will drag on for a whole century and will end with the complete defeat of Elam by the troops of the famous Assyrian literate king (archaeologists have found his library) Ashurbanipal; and although Assyria will survive this last victory for only thirty years, there will be no Elamites among its conquerors. The territory of Elam will become part of the Median kingdom, and a little later will become the possession and stronghold of the new "barbarian" people - the Persians. So, Assyria,Elam and Urartu, the most prominent powers of Western Asia, found themselves in a political impasse: aggressive kings and priests-conservatives are able to implement only political doctrines invented one and a half millennia ago, in the era of the formation of royal power, priestly hierarchy and slaveholding economy. The robes of that time were sewn "for growth", they were enough for a long time, but now they have become a straitjacket for a developed society. This is very noticeable in the content of the literature: the tsar's annals are filled with the bragging rights of a successful soldier-robber, and civil texts are saturated with deep pessimism. The world is full of evil, people have ceased to be brothers, the rulers are cruel and unjust, and nothing can be done about it, for even the gods are indifferent to human suffering … These theses have long become a common truth on the banks of the Euphrates, Tigris, Nile … General apathy reigned,and only rare prophets cry out in the wilderness. Who are they, what do they teach? The most famous of them is Isaiah. A contemporary of Homer, a poor metropolitan resident of the small Kingdom of Judah, he was not a genius, but possessed the common sense and political flair of an enlightened city dweller, and moreover, he was, in modern language, an intellectual in the full sense of the word, that is, he could not live the plant life of an ordinary man in the street and did not want to become a predator-courtier: he "was sick with someone else's pain," this made him an orator and writer. In a different environment, Isaiah could have become the leader of a popular uprising or an influential reformer, but in the conditions of social stagnation he had the fate of Cassandra and the lot of the holy fool, for his fellow citizens are not yet so poor as to listen to the prophet with hope, and are no longer so prosperous as to listen to him. with curiosity. Calls to love your neighborhumble the oppressors, protect widows and orphans are listened to with a skeptical grin, advice not to tease the formidable Assyria hangs in the air, and the predictions of the coming times, when peoples will stop fighting and beat swords into plowshares, sound like a delusional invention. The social situation is hopeless, that is, the natural way out of it does not suit anyone, and no one knows how to find another real way. "The kingdom, divided within itself, will soon perish …", "Woe to the city of blood, which is full of deceit and plunder!" - such is the forecast of the prophets, and it will come true in the heart of the Middle East node of the most ancient civilizations of the Earth. The social situation is hopeless, that is, the natural way out of it does not suit anyone, and no one knows how to find another real way. "The kingdom, divided within itself, will soon perish …", "Woe to the city of blood, which is full of deceit and plunder!" - such is the forecast of the prophets, and it will come true in the heart of the Middle East node of the most ancient civilizations of the Earth. The social situation is hopeless, that is, the natural way out of it does not suit anyone, and no one knows how to find another real way. "The kingdom, divided within itself, will soon perish …", "Woe to the city of blood, which is full of deceit and plunder!" - such is the forecast of the prophets, and it will come true in the heart of the Middle East node of the most ancient civilizations of the Earth.
But on the periphery of this node, the situation is different, and the best example of this is the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Here, the movement of barbarian peoples at the turn of the II-I millennia swept like a hurricane, the population almost completely changed, but soon the ancient civilization blossomed in new hands, enriching itself considerably. Semitic-speaking nomads Arameans brought here the one-humped camel they first tamed, and they themselves quickly mastered agriculture, navigation and shipbuilding, adopted in the coastal cities a great novelty invented there - the alphabet.
It is curious that the "old" peoples of Mesopotamia, well aware of this invention, did not manage to adapt it to their traditional writing. As a result, the Assyrian king dictates his decrees to two scribes at once - the Assyrian and the Aramean; the first writes them in Akkadian, hieroglyphic cuneiform, and the second - in Aramaic, using the Phoenician alphabet (which so far consists of only consonants, but in Semitic languages, where the main meaning of the word is conveyed by consonants, this does not create much inconvenience). It is clear where this will lead: Aramaic will soon replace Akkadian from business correspondence, and then from colloquial speech. All the later writing systems of the peoples of Eurasia directly or indirectly originate from the ancient Phoenician alphabet spread by the Arameans (and Greeks).
The inclusion of the Arameans in the Middle Eastern statehood was less successful, because there were not enough empty "ecological niches". Only in the north of the future Syria a strong Damascus kingdom was formed, but it lives under the eternal threat of the Assyrian invasion. Another branch of the Arameans settled on the lands of Sumer itself, in southern Mesopotamia, taking the name of the Chaldeans here. While Assyria is strong, it does not allow the Chaldeans to create their own state, but they are actively penetrating all layers of the Babylonian society, and in the 7th century it is the Chaldeans who will lead the general uprising of the Assyrian subjects against their formidable rulers. The Chaldean leaders Nabopalasar and Nebuchadnezzar will destroy Assyria and create the mighty New Babylonian kingdom - the last power in the style of ancient Sumerian traditions.
The territory of Phenicia (the future Lebanon) does not in any way resemble the plain of Babylonia. Here the wooded mountain ranges come close to the warm sea, here every city is primarily a port; it is the land of sailors whose gaze is turned westward into the Great Green Sea. Neither Babylonian nor Egyptian way of life took root here. After the great sea kingdom of Crete fell into decay in the 15th century, the Phoenicians took the place of the Cretans, became the rulers of the seas and created their own special branch of the Middle Eastern civilization, much less burdened by outdated traditions than Egypt or Babylon. It was then that the alphabet was invented, that culture was created, which was later adopted by the aliens - the Arameans. Now the Phoenicians have mastered the Mediterranean up to the Pillars of Hercules, established their colonies in Sicily and on the Iberian Peninsula, along the entire northern coast of Africa. For more than half a century there has been a flourishing New City - Kartadasht (Carthage), the young heir of ancient Tire. Interestingly, the unhindered (yet) maritime expansion of the Phoenicians, caused by the rapid growth of the commodity economy and the population explosion in the coastal cities, prevented the formation of a single state in Phenicia itself. The inhabitants of Tire, Sidon, Byblos, Arvada are too busy with naval affairs to participate in continental strife or to fight among themselves. And later, when the Assyrian armies break into Phenicia, the reaction of the Phoenicians will be unusual: after a short or stubborn defense, each city will submit to the Assyrians, paying a huge ransom to survive and maintain freedom of action at sea. It is the profits from overseas trade that will allow the Phoenicians to pay tribute to foreign kings, without becoming poorer, as the farmers of Mesopotamia become poorer. A small, disunited Phenicia will outlive a huge centralized Assyria; Here, for the first time in world history, a commodity-money economy, not constrained by an overly political reins, will demonstrate its vitality in comparison with a state economy that exploits the forced labor of farmers. This is already the step of modern times: Phenicia was the first to enter the ancient era.
Let's move now to the eastern border of Mesopotamia, where it joins with the Iranian plateau. From here, the mountaineers-Sumerians once descended into the swampy valley of the Euphrates, and later many multilingual barbarians invaded the fabulously rich Mesopotamia. The last to come from Central Asia were the Indo-European tribes - nomads, owners of the fastest horses and the most powerful two-humped camels, familiar with metallurgy and agriculture, but not yet familiar with the royal power and priestly hierarchy. By the 9th century, new settlers reached the borders of Assyria and faced its formidable war machine; in a desperate struggle with it, an alliance of multilingual local tribes (close in culture to their ancient southern neighbor Elam) and newcomer honeys, or Medes, as they were called by the Assyrians, and the Greeks will later adopt this word. At the beginning of the 7th century, this union will turn into a powerful kingdom - Media,future conqueror of Assyria. In the meantime, the Medes pay tribute to the Assyrians with horses, bronze and lapis lazuli, and they themselves are rapidly improving in military affairs, adopting the skills of urban planning and state administration …
This is the ethnic and social situation in and around Mesopotamia in the middle of the 8th century BC. It resembles a cut of the trunk of a once mighty, but old and sick tree: the core has already rotted, deprived of the influx of fresh juices, but these juices are still moving freely along the living sapwood, under the bark itself, and the tree continues to turn green and grow, although the trunk has lost its strength and will soon collapse in the next storm. Let's see if this is the fate of Egyptian civilization, after all, it is the same age as its Mesopotamian sister, although there is an important difference between them: due to its geographical position, Mesopotamia has long served as a gateway for more and more new alien peoples, and the Nile Valley has always been somewhat suburb, few people entered here.
The Egyptian ethnos is in deep decline, however, not for the first time in its long history, but at least for the third time. The new kingdom of the time of Ramses II collapsed in the same way as the Middle and Old Kingdoms perished before it. Obviously, in this process, the general laws of the development of the slave-owning formation were manifested: the ruling elite is increasingly detached from the masses, the bureaucracy loses its ability to respond to changes in the course of social development, and the entire regime perishes; after the era of strife, society is reborn in almost its former form, until a new revolution in the development of productive forces makes it possible for society to transition to a new economic formation. In the middle of the VIII century, Egypt is going through just such an era of strife: the country again disintegrated into the North - the land of the lotus and cobra,and the South is the land of papyrus and kite (such are the ancient symbols of Lower and Upper Egypt). Both regions are dominated by former "barbarians": Libyans in the north, Nubians in the south. Both those and others over the many centuries of neighborhood with the Egyptian civilization assimilated its achievements in full, created their kingdoms according to the Egyptian model, during the next crisis of the Egyptian state they subdued its north and south and now vie for power over all of Egypt, following the beaten path pharaohs. Libyans took this path earlier. In the X century, Pharaoh Sheshonk, intervening in the feuds of the sons of King Solomon, invaded Palestine and captured Jerusalem; however, the Libyans could not keep these conquests - all their forces were occupied by the war in the south, in the "country of Nub". This is how the Egyptians have long called the steppe lands above the Nile rapids,rich in placer gold and inhabited by dark-skinned and curly Semitic-speaking herders (later the Greeks would call them Ethiopians).
Once the pharaohs of the New Kingdom made the country of Nub their colony, their successors, the Libyans, did not succeed - on the contrary, they had to defend Upper Egypt from attacks from the south, and the Libyans did not succeed in this. By the middle of the VIII century, their military governors in Upper Egypt were imbued with local interests, found a common language with the southern Ethiopian rulers, became related with them and lost their unity with the Libyan pharaohs of Lower Egypt, who sit in the Nile delta.
The Libyan-Ethiopian ruler Kashta confidently ruled all of Upper Egypt and the "land of Nub" from the ancient Egyptian capital Uaset (which the Greeks would later call Thebes, by analogy with the glorious city of Hellas).
His son Pianhi strives for more. Around 730, the southern navy, descending the Nile, will storm the ancient capital of Lower Egypt, Men-nefer (in Greek - Memphis). The specific princes-Libyans will immediately betray the defeated ruler, and the "Libyan" dynasty of the pharaohs will be replaced by a new, "Ethiopian" dynasty.
And again, everything will go according to the old stencil: new pharaohs will invade Palestine and Syria, and there they will face the Assyrian war machine. The army of Assarhaddon will defeat the Ethiopian troops and even conquer Egypt, but Assyria will not be able to keep the distant foreign country under control. And then fate will show all its irony: the weakening Assyria will become a victim of the Chaldeans and Medes, and then the Egyptian army will once again enter Syria to save the yesterday's enemy from final death, or at least participate in the division of his inheritance. None of this will come of it: the Chaldeans will defeat the Egyptians.
So, Egyptian society is afflicted with the same ailments as Mesopotamian. It seems that the entire Middle East has turned into a reserve of "living fossils", and only the Phoenicians hold in their hands the golden key from the door to the future - they and those who will be able to follow their example. We know that the Greeks will do it, but why are they so lucky?
Let us recall that in the VIII century the Greeks are already a rather ancient people, their speech sounds on the shores and islands of the Aegean Sea for about a thousand years, since the time of the reign of the great Cretan state here, the first teacher of the Greeks (or rather, the Achaeans, Ionians, Aeolians, Dorians - so they they call themselves; Greeks, that is, "croaking", they will be called later by the inhabitants of Italy). In the II millennium, the early Greeks adopted from the Cretans the art of navigation, many crafts, the foundations of statehood (in the form of a palace and temple bureaucracy) and hieroglyphic writing, which the Greeks boldly adapted to their Indo-European language, which was not at all similar to ancient Cretan. Then came the "iron revolution", followed by the resettlement of the barbarians, which turned the old, "Mycenaean" world. The shake-up went for the good: the archaic state structure collapsed,but useful technical and cultural skills were preserved, and wild new people began to build their new world, not experiencing a shortage of raw materials and not looking back at the forgotten past, captured only in the legends of the Trojan War and in the names of ancient heroes, but by no means in their customs! The fact is that already in the era of their creation, Homer's poems were more likely historical novels than a chronicle or eyewitness memoirs. Their heroes behave like dashing barbarian leaders of the era of military democracy, and the author of the poems (about whom we know almost nothing) and his listeners (about whom we know quite a lot) live in the era of the formation of policies, when the times of military democracy have already become epic …captured only in the legends of the Trojan War and in the names of ancient heroes, but by no means in their morals! The fact is that already in the era of their creation, Homer's poems were more likely historical novels than a chronicle or eyewitness memoirs. Their heroes behave like dashing barbarian leaders of the era of military democracy, and the author of the poems (about whom we know almost nothing) and his listeners (about whom we know quite a lot) live in the era of the formation of policies, when the times of military democracy have already become epic …captured only in the legends of the Trojan War and in the names of ancient heroes, but by no means in their morals! The fact is that already in the era of their creation, Homer's poems were more likely historical novels than a chronicle or eyewitness memoirs. Their heroes behave like dashing barbarian leaders of the era of military democracy, and the author of the poems (about whom we know almost nothing) and his listeners (about whom we know quite a lot) live in the era of the formation of policies, when the times of military democracy have already become epic …and the author of the poems (about whom we know almost nothing) and his listeners (about whom we know quite a lot) live in the era of the formation of policies, when the times of military democracy have already become epic.and the author of the poems (about whom we know almost nothing) and his listeners (about whom we know quite a lot) live in the era of the formation of policies, when the times of military democracy have already become epic.
Why did Homer choose this particular plot and why did his contemporaries like it so? Obviously, they also feel themselves young masters of the new world, unprecedentedly free in their designs, and want to see their ancestors similar to themselves, although the era has come completely different.
Greece is a country of mountains and sea, like Phenicia, but the coastline here is extremely indented: there are many islands, straits and bays closed from the winds, on the shores of which, from time immemorial, settlements of fishermen and farmers have formed - they have always numerically prevailed here over the highlanders-shepherds … There are tens of times more convenient places for port cities in Greece than in Phenicia - this is an important advantage of the Greeks in their future competition with the Phoenicians for maritime dominance.
Another advantage turned out to be the combination of the long-standing cultural unity of Greece with the motley mosaic of tribes, customs and economic structures that arose here during the "barbarian" migrations at the beginning of the 1st millennium. In such conditions, almost each of the new cities in Greece arose, like the later Novgorod on the Volkhov, as a result of the symbiosis of several villages, often inhabited by people of different tribes, and, naturally, became a polis - a self-governing urban republic, a school of a new ancient way of life. At the same time, the influence of the more mature Phoenician culture was very noticeable. It was from the Phoenicians that the new Greeks adopted the alphabet and already added vowels to it. Phoenician example played an important role and spontaneously. the emerging "division of labor" between Greek policies according to the range of exported goods:this is how the common Greek market is formed - the basis of the "United States of Hellas", as later historians will call them. It was in the 8th century that the idea of Greek unity first became a material force: in 776 or so, the first Olympic Games took place, tantamount to an intercity "convention of goodwill"; in the same era, Homer's Iliad was formed and gained immense popularity, where the legendary wars of half-forgotten kings are depicted as the first common Greek enterprise - a symbol of a nation being born. The "Odyssey" (created around the same time) is no less relevant for the Greeks of the mid-8th century: at this time, Greek policies began to intensively create their trading posts overseas, in the east and in the west, looking for new markets for the exchange of their handicraft products (primarily ceramics) for foreign raw materials - primarily for metals,which Greece is not rich. In the east, the Greeks communicate without intermediaries with merchants from the mighty Assyria, Urartu and rich Phrygia - the kingdom of Gordia (the father of the legendary Midas), which controls the whole of Asia Minor, and in the west - with energetic Etruscans, also immigrants from Asia Minor, whom the resettlement of peoples threw into the interior Italy. On the near and far shores, Greek colonies are emerging, since relative overpopulation has already arisen in the Greek city-states and many cities are happy to evict their extra people to new lands. These are the people who listen to Homer and are inspired by the example of his heroes; in front of the Greeks three centuries of rapid economic and social development. In the meantime, they confidently look into a difficult and promising future, they feel almost demigods, like Achilles and Ajax in the face of the Olympians. The huge difference in the worldviews of the inhabitants of young Hellas and ancient Western Asia is especially noticeable in their attitude towards the gods. A Greek, a Babylonian and a Jew are equally alien to the naive faith in the omnipotent celestials. However, the Greek considers his gods as if senior relatives, the veneration of which is a human duty, but a mutual duty - even the gods should not interfere in their own business, otherwise it will be bad for them. The enlightened skeptic Babylonian thinks differently: the world of the gods is a foreign appendage to the world of people, requiring sacrifice and obedience, but giving nothing in return. Finally, the fiery Isaiah, proclaiming the only God - the creator of the Universe, is trying very hard to endow him with human qualities, but in vain: the daring Hellenic thought about the influence of people on the gods does not fit in his clever head … Even with the help of the best translators, Homer and Isaiah would not understand each other friend,for they think about different problems of being, and their gods embody very different social forces.
This is how the Middle Eastern ecumene lives in the middle of the 8th century. But there is also India, China. What's going on there? We know much less about this.
India has become, as it were, a separate planet since the ancient Indian civilization fell into decay in the middle of the 2nd millennium and the sea route from here to the Persian Gulf was forgotten. Two or three centuries later, the Indo-European tribes, which we call Indo-Aryans, invaded India from Central Asia - the elder brothers of the Medes and Persians, pastoralists and farmers who were not yet familiar with iron and writing, they found here mostly the ruins of ancient cities and began to build their own the new world is practically anew, pushing back into the forests or enslaving the local inhabitants - Dravids.
The Chinese ecumene has always been a special world - it is too far removed from other regions of ancient civilizations. We can say that the Yellow River, the Yellow River, plays here the same role as the Nile in Egypt. But the Nile Valley was squeezed in a barren desert, and the lands around the Yellow River were covered with virgin forests, so Ancient China (like India) did not experience overpopulation, and social development here proceeded at a slower pace. The ancient kingdom of Yin slowly expanded its territory to the east, downstream of the Yellow River, until in the 11th century an acute political crisis made Yin a prey for the Western "barbarians" - Zhou. They played a role in China similar to the role of the Ethiopians in Egypt, only instead of the Libyan governor Kasht and his warlike son Pianhi, we see here the powerful governor of the West, Chan Si-bo and his son Fa Wu-wang,who killed the last Yin king and founded the new state of Zhou, which for the first time covered the entire flat course of the Yellow River to its mouth. The disintegration of the tribal system in the new kingdom accelerated: already in the 10th century, the ruler Mu-wan introduced a set of written laws that formalized a new social situation. A century later, social conflicts escalated to a popular uprising: in 841, the absolutist king of Lebanon was expelled, and his heir Xuan-wang was placed under the control of the state council, representing the military aristocracy of Zhou. But it was impossible to stop the natural course of the political development of the state: the matured Xuan-wang conducted the first population census in the country, and then refused to participate in the annual ritual of the "first furrow" - the opening of field work. It was a complete break with the tradition of communal land ownership and collective cultivation;so the bureaucratic mechanism of the state pushed the ancient tribal institutions of society into the background. And, of course, the political evolution took place not only in the capital: Zhou's troops seized more and more lands from the surrounding barbarians, created new provinces, and the further, the more successfully the rulers of these provinces turned them into principalities, only nominally dependent on the central government. In the 770s, a coalition of such princes, including the "western barbarians" - the Rongs, defeated the tsarist capital and forced the Zhou rulers to move their headquarters further to the east, where they would soon become a powerless plaything of rival principalities - Zheng and Jin, Qi and Chu, Qin, Wu and Yue …created new provinces, and the rulers of these provinces, the further, the more successfully they turn them into principalities, only nominally dependent on the central government. In the 770s, a coalition of such princes, including the "western barbarians" - the Rongs, defeated the tsarist capital and forced the Zhou rulers to move their headquarters further to the east, where they would soon become a powerless plaything of rival principalities - Zheng and Jin, Qi and Chu, Qin, Wu and Yue …created new provinces, and the rulers of these provinces, the further, the more successfully they turn them into principalities, only nominally dependent on the central government. In the 770s, a coalition of such princes, including the "western barbarians" - the Rongs, defeated the tsarist capital and forced the Zhou rulers to move their headquarters further to the east, where they would soon become a powerless plaything of rival principalities - Zheng and Jin, Qi and Chu, Qin, Wu and Yue …Qi and Chu, Qin, Wu and Yue …Qi and Chu, Qin, Wu and Yue …
The rapid disintegration of the Zhou state into hundreds of small possessions opens a five-century era of maturation of a new super-ethnic community of people that will embrace the entire Far Eastern ecumene and will rise on a par with the ancient Mediterranean world. In all parts of the Yellow River basin, against the background of petty political squabbling between kings and princes, a great variety of small dialogues between tribes - carriers of different economic structures, languages and beliefs, sometimes belonging to different races - unfolds. In this environment, new ethnic groups are emerging, previously unprecedented social institutions are being formed, original cultural novelties are accumulating and spreading throughout the country. In short, the basis is being prepared for the future Chinese civilization - a worthy representative of the "second generation" of civilizations of the earth, the same age as India and Hellas.
What is the difference between this new ancient world and the most ancient worlds of local civilizations in the river valleys of the Nile, Euphrates, Indus? First of all, in diversity - it has grown tremendously since the time when the first farmers, driven by drought, descended into the green hell of the river jungle and began to reclaim their arable land - the basis of the first civilizations. This is not only about the variety of natural conditions in which human society can now flourish. Even more important is the accumulated variety of means of production, which allows numerous ethnic groups that have entered the era of technical evolution to create very different types of economic structures and cultures that are completely different from each other in different regions of the Earth. This unprecedentedly colorful mosaic, for the first time in the history of mankind, creates an opportunity for international economic cooperation and intensive cultural mutual influence of neighboring peoples in vast territories, be it the Mediterranean or the Indian subcontinent, the steppe zone of Eurasia or the entire Chinese world. Imperceptibly, mankind has stepped over the threshold beyond which the development of civilization is already becoming a global self-accelerating process, local crises and the death of individual slave-owning powers cannot now slow it down. There is no opportunity to live as if in the shadow of the past "golden age": the path of society leads only forward, and only people of a new warehouse are capable of relentlessly following it - citizens of Antiquity, who are becoming more and more in all parts of the Earth. The ancient era was the dawn of this process, and now the sun is approaching noon,that is why our ancestors of Homeric times seem so close and understandable to us.
