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The Historians' History of the World 02 [Israel, India, Persia, Phoenicia, Minor Nations of Western Asia]
- Автор: Gutenberg
- Год: 1905
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: История
Электронная книга - «The Historians' History of the World 02 [Israel, India, Persia, Phoenicia, Minor Nations of Western Asia]». Краткое содержание книги:
The first great wandering started from the northern coast of the Black Sea. About the eighth century the Scythian Scoloti, one of the Iranian nomadic tribes, ostensibly themselves crowded out by the Massagetæ, crossed the Volga and the Don, and drove the Cimmerians out of their abode. Apparently a remnant of the original population remained in the Crimea (this name is itself derived from that of the Cimmerians); but the great mass left home with wives and children. In all probability they went over the Danube into Thrace, being joined by Thracian tribes on the way; and the passage of the Thynians and Bithynians across the Bosporus, and their settlement in the ancient territory of the Bebrykians (as far as the Sangarius), are also connected with these movements.
About 700 B.C. the Cimmerians, together with the Thracian tribes that had joined them, invaded Asia Minor, devastating and plundering the land far and wide. It was a migration like that of the northern tribes which passed through Syria in the twelfth century, and that of the Galatians into Asia Minor in the third century, who ravaged there just as the Cimmerians did. The invading tribes were doubtless accompanied by wives and children, and carried all their possessions with them.
The isolated notices of the invasion which are all that we possess cannot be determined chronologically. Aristotle records that Antandrus, the Lelegian city on the southern slope of Mount Ida, was in the possession of the Cimmerians for a hundred years. Thracians are also said to have occupied Abydos before its colonisation from Miletus.
They also made their way farther to the east. Sinope is called the principal seat of the Cimmerians; they are said to have slain here the leader of the Milesian settlement, Abrondas (?). When they entered Phrygia, it is said, the last king, Midas, the son of Gordius, killed himself by drinking the blood of a bull. After that the Phrygian kingdom disappears from history.
From here, then, they presumably first came into contact with the Assyrians. King Esarhaddon tells, before his Cilician campaign, of a fight in the unknown district of Khubushna with “the Teuspa of Gimir [Hebrew Gomer], … whose dwelling is far.” This battle, the scene of which can only be sought in Cappadocia, must be put about 675 B.C.
The movements were directed toward Lydia as well as Phrygia. Here at this time the last of the Heraclids, Candaules or Sadyattes, had fallen a victim to a palace revolution, and his murderer, Gyges, son of Dascylus, of the distinguished family of the Mermnadæ, which had been for generations at feud with the Heraclids, had taken possession of the throne. The Delphian oracle having decided in his favour, he had been acknowledged by the Lydians. The new ruler seems to have been a capable warrior. According to Strabo, the whole Troad was subject to him; consequently, he must also have possessed the coast of Teuthrania. That the districts of Caria were under his rule, if not that of his predecessors, appears certain. The Greek coast cities were also attacked by him, and Colophon was taken. In order to defend himself against the Cimmerians, he swore allegiance to the Assyrian king, Asshurbanapal, who records that Gyges (Assyrian Gugu), in consequence, won a great victory over the Cimmerians, and sent two of their chiefs captive to Nineveh.
The allegiance rendered to the Assyrian king was nothing more than a temporary expedient. As soon as he felt safe from the Cimmerians, Gyges began preparations to attack the Assyrian supremacy, which was likely to become dangerous to the hitherto unassailed countries of Asia Minor. With this end in view, he made an alliance with Psamthek of Saïs, who had revolted against Assyria, and sent Greek and Carian mercenaries to his aid. Asshurbanapal, who was fully occupied by his Elamite wars, could take no steps against him.
But soon afterwards the Cimmerians appeared again in Lydia; Gyges himself fell in battle; the whole land was overrun by the wild hordes and Sardis taken. Then they attacked the Greek coast cities. In Ephesus the poet Callinus inspired a resistance that successfully repulsed the attack of the Cimmerian prince Lygdamis;[11] but the temple of Artemis outside the city was burned. On the other hand, the flourishing city of Magnesia, on the Mæander, was taken and destroyed. However, the savage hordes were no more able to hold the plundered territory permanently than to lay regular siege to the fortified cities. Ardys, the son of Gyges, finally restored the power of his father’s kingdom; and as we are told that he attacked the Greeks, he must first have repulsed the Cimmerians and covered his rear. Asshurbanapal tells that he repented the sins of his father, and sent an embassy to renew his allegiance (646 B.C.); however, this certainly means nothing more than the restoration of friendly relations with Assyria.e
FOOTNOTES
[11] [It is possible that this Lygdamis is the “Tuktammu of the Manda,” for whose defeat, according to a recently deciphered inscription, Asshurbanapal returned thanks to the Assyrian gods.]
CHAPTER III. SOME PEOPLES OF SYRIA, ASIA MINOR, AND ARMENIA
THE ARAMÆANS
Next to the Hittites the Aramæans were the people who held the most important towns of Syria, gradually advancing until at last they occupied the whole country. Of the Aramæan stocks named in Genesis x. 23; xxii. 21 sq. very little is known, but it is certain that Aramæans at an early period had their abode close to the northern border of Palestine (in Maachah). A great part was played in the history of Israel by the state of Aram Dammesek, i.e., the territory of the ancient city of Damascus; it was brought into subjection for a short time under David. The main object of the century-long dispute between the two kingdoms was the possession of the land to the east of the Jordan (Hauran, and especially Gilead). Another Aramæan state often mentioned in the Bible is that of Aram Zobah. That Zobah was situated within Syria is certain, though how far to the west or north of Damascus is not known; in any case it was not far from Hamath. Hamath in the valley of the Orontes, at the mouth of the Beka valley, was from an early period one of the most important places in Syria; according to the Bible, its original inhabitants were Canaanites. The district belonging to it, including amongst other places Riblah (of importance on account of its situation), was not very extensive. In 733 B.C. Tiglathpileser III compassed the overthrow of the kingdom of Damascus; he also took Arpad (Tel-Arfad), an important place three hours to the north of Aleppo. Hamath was taken by Sargon in 720. Henceforth the petty states of Syria were at all times subject to one or other of the great world empires, even if in some cases a certain degree of independence was preserved.c
Definite knowledge concerning the smaller peoples of Asia Minor is so limited and vague, the intermixture of small tribes and ruling houses so chaotic, and the literature remaining so meagre and uncertain, that we can do little better than make a brief summary of the fortunes of each of these lesser communities.
PHRYGIA
Phrygia is a country of many mountains and numerous river valleys. The fertility of the latter was always remarkable, and on the northern boundary, at the sources of the river Sangarius, wide stretches of pasture land afforded nourishment for sheep. Grapes were also extensively cultivated.
The ancient Phrygians were an agricultural people, and the strange rites of their religious worship all had reference to the renewal and decay of nature. The “Phrygian mother,” who was called by the Greeks Rhea, or Cybele, and whose name in the Phrygian language is said to have been Amma, had her temple at the foot of Mount Agdus, near Pessinus, where she was served by hosts of priests. She was worshipped in the temple under the guise of a formless stone, said to have fallen from heaven, and was conceived of as driving over the mountains in a chariot, and wearing a crown of towers upon her head. The beloved of Cybele was Attys, and the festivals of his birth and death were celebrated with wild grief and frantic joy and accompanied by barbarous and unlovely rites, much like those of the worship of Adonis at Byblus. Cybele represents nature, or nature as the producer of life, and the birth and death of Attys typify the spring and autumn of the year.