The Historians' History of the World 02 [Israel, India, Persia, Phoenicia, Minor Nations of Western Asia]

BASED ON THE WORKS QUOTED, CITED, OR EDITORIALLY CONSULTED IN THE PREPARATION OF THE PRESENT HISTORY

The nations of Asia Minor, having a relatively unimportant position, have naturally not attracted the attention of historians to any such extent as their more important contemporaries. The Hittites, as already noted, are mentioned a few times in the Hebrew writings, and are referred to explicitly in the Egyptian records of Ramses the Great. But they had passed from the scene before the advent of the Greek historians, which fact accounts largely for the infrequent reference to them in modern times, until the decipherment of the Egyptian and Assyrian records brought them again to notice. A peculiar interest attaches to the Hittites now, since their own monuments have shown that they possessed a unique form of hieroglyphic writing. Professor Sayce has investigated this perhaps more fully than any other scholar; but various others have entered into controversies as to its exact character,—controversies which as yet have led to no very definite conclusion.

Hittite Hieroglyphics

Of the other nations of Asia Minor, the Lydians have received most attention from the historian. The chief known sources for Lydian history were the native historian Xanthus, whose works have mostly failed to come down to us; and Herodotus, whose stories of the Lydian kings, no doubt somewhat embellished, have been a source of interest to all subsequent investigators. In recent times special works on the Lydians have been written by Radet and by Schubert. Numerous travellers have given us more or less valuable notes on Asia Minor, chiefly of a geographical and archæological character. The best general treatment of the subject is to be found in the histories of antiquity of Duncker and Eduard Meyer. Duncker’s treatment is more popular, but in some respects not quite up to date. Eduard Meyer’s treatment is at once scientific and philosophical, but the first volume of his work has been out of print for some time, and the promised new edition is not yet forthcoming. The new archæological finds have given a fresh interest to the nations of Asia Minor, which will probably result in a much more voluminous literature on the subject in the near future.