Western History 25: Who were the Dorics?

The Doric Greeks originated in the mountains of Epirus and Macedonia in what is now known as Northern Greece. The expansion of the Dorians southwards from 1150 BC appears to have hastened the fall of the earlier Mycenean culture. However it was the Dorians that would eventually provide the basis for the a more coherent Greek civilization that would dominate the peninsular in the 5^th and 4^th centuries BCE.

Extremely adept colonists the Dorians would also set up settlements in Asia Minor (Modern Turkey) that would develop into the Ionian realm of Greek civilization This  expansion seems to have been motivated by plague and famine in the Greek heartland. The Dorians introduced several dialects to Greece that include Delphic, Locrian, Elean, Northwest Greek Koine and Epirotic.  However they did not have a written language and much of what we know about them comes from a legacy of storytellers that specialized in myths and fables - a tradition that would carry through into the collective literature of western civilization.

The fabulist Aesop lived around the period of Doric domination although it is commonly believed that his origin comes from Thrace (modern day European Turkey).

Western History 24: How did Persia impact the World?

While the Egyptian Civilization was defined in a sense by its longevity (it survived for over three thousand years), the Persians Achaemenids were the great acquirers of territory so much so that at its height the Persian Empire covered 8.5 million km².  This made the Empire the largest of the Ancient World (Yes…. it was bigger than the Empires of Alexander the Great and Rome which covered 5.2 and 5.0 million km² respectively). Over 40% of the World’s population at the time is believed to have lived under the domain of the Achaemenids.

The Achaemenid Empire was centred in the Iranian Plateau but spread throughout Asia and encompassed much of what we now know as the Middle East. Libya, Egypt, Bulgaria, Afghanistan, parts of China and Thrace-Macedonia, Pakistan. Georgia,  Armenia, Abkhazia and Azerbaijan. .It was Cyrus who defeated the Kingdoms of Media and Lydia and the Babylonian to build establish the Achaemenid legacy that would dominate the geo-political arena from 550 to 330 BCE.

Table 5 lists some of the most important Achaemenid Emperors, their period of reign and the key events of their respective eras of rule.

Emperor	Key Events of Reign
Cyrus the Great aka Cyrus II (559-530 BCE)	Established the Achaemenid after defeating the Medes, Lydia and Babylonia. Champion of Religious Freedom. Allowed the Jews to return to the Holy Land. Occupied Cyprus. Father of the First Persian Empire. Solidified Zoroastrian religion in the Empire.
Cambyses II (530-522 BCE)	Conquered Indus Valley Takok the city of Pelsium, defeated and brought Egypt into the Persian domain.
Darius I (Darius the Great) (522-486 BCE)	Linked the Nile to the Red Sea by Canal (early version of Suez Canal). Wages war against the Scythians (people from the European Steppes) Fought against the Greeks during the Ionian rebellion. Lydian city of Sardis was burnt to the ground. Persians are defeated by the Greeks at the Battle of Marathon. But Darius will go on to capture the island of Rhodes.
Xerxes I (486-465 BCE)	Destroyed Babylon. Defeated Greeks (albeit at a high cost ) at the Battle of Thermopylae but lost the key naval battle of Salamis (480 BCE). His ambition to invade mainland Greece came to an end at the Battle of Plataea (479BCE). He did however build the Gate of All Nations, the Hall of 100 Columns and the Grand Palace of Xerxes.
Artaxerxes I (465-424 BCE)	Negotiated a peace settlement with the Greeks (Peace of Callias). Ionian Greek cities gain autonomy.
Darius III (336-330 BCE)	Adversary of Alexander the Great. His defeat hastened the end of the Achaemenid collapse.

While the Persian made many contributions to Western Civilization their greatest legacy arguably lies with the religion of Zoroastrianism – one of the earliest attempts at monotheism and the dualism of good and evil as forces in nature. The Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity and Islam – have all placed considerable emphasis on these notions within their respective theological philosophies.

The Achaemenid Empire would eventually fall to the sweeping force of Alexander the Great in c. 330 BC but it would resurrect itself in various forms under the later Parthian (247 BCE- 224 CE), Sassanian (224-651 CE) and Safavid (1502-1736) Empires. While none of these later Empires would aspire to the global dominance of the Achaemenid, they certainly carried much of the cultural wealth of the Achaemenids, who through their great building projects, road design, postal service and system of Satraps (governors) provided the foundation model that the Greeks, Romans, Ottoman and British would adopt in their later version of Empire.

Western History 23: What was the fate of Babylon?

Babylon was the greatest of all the Mespotamian cities and features prominently in the both the bible and the historical records of the Ancient Greeks. It is thought to be the location of the Tower of Babel and has a name origin Bavil which means the city of God. Located less than 100 kilometers from modern day Baghdad the city was believed to have been founded by Sargon of Akkad in the 23^rd century BC. One of its greatest earlier rulers was Hammuabi (already mentioned in Entry 9).  Hammurabi (a prince of Amorite origin) was the Old Kingdom’s greatest rulers. He unified all of Mesopotamia and built the foundation for the Old Babylonian Kingdom in the 18^th century BC.

Babylon under Hammurabi was the largest city in the world but fell apart soon after his death with each of the Hittites, Kassites and Assyrians growing to dominate the region. Assyrian overlordship inspired revolt and in 734 BC the City (now well known as a center of learning and culture) was taken over by the Chaldeans. The Assyrians reclaimed the city in 729 BC before the full wait of the Babylonians and Medes (forerunners of the Persians) brought an end to the Assyrian Empire when they sacked and burnt Nineveh.

The Neo-Babylonian Empire’s greatest ruler was Nebuchadnezzar II, who expanded the territory of the city, increased the size of its walled defence and built the famous Hanging Gardens and Ishtar Gates. Nebuchadnezzar II is the same monarch associated with the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, the fall of Judea and the Babylonian exile of the Hebrews. He expanded the city’s aqueduct system but could not stop what was to be the inevitable, the defeat of the Babylon and its absorption into the Persian Empire and event that would occur in 538 BC, a mere twenty plus year’s after Nebuchadnezzar’s death.

Arguably the greatest contribution of the Babylonians occurred in the realm of mathematics. They developed a base 60 numerical system which defines the breakdown of the hour into 60 minutes and the minute into 60 seconds. They had elaborate systems for squaring and cubing a number and developed methodologies around long division, quadratic equations, exponential growth as well as approximations for the square root of 2 and pi. Babylonian geometricians were also aware of the Pythagorean theorem and extended their knowledge to astronomical applications involving eclipses and positions on the celestial sphere.

On a religious level it is believed that many of the notions of Angels, Archangels and hierarchies of supernatural entities, so prevalent in Jewish, Christian and Islamic thought may have entered the religion during the Babylonian exodus of the  Jews that followed the destruction of the First Temple in 587 BC.

Western History 22: What events defined the rise and fall of Assyria?

Ancient History is replete with several warrior civilizations. We have already encountered the Hyksos and the Mycenaeans but perhaps none were as successful in their conquests (at least until the emergence of the Persians) as the Assyrians. The Assyrians were a Semitic people who emerged in Mesopotamia and played a key role in the power politics of the Near East from 1250-612 BCE (although the civilization dates back to the 27^th century BCE). Two key cities played a role in the Assyrian Empire  - Assur (the original capital that also gave its name to the people) and Nineveh to the north (a city that also features in the biblical story of Jonah).

The Assyrians conquered an Empire that stretched from the Western flank of Persia through the Levant and Israel and into Egypt As soldiers the Assyrians were renowned for their archery skills. They also used the chariot effectively and were known for building roads and highways.

Culturally the Assyrians built the first ever library of the Ancient World that contained over 200,000 clay tablets (Library of Assurbanipal – same ruler who destroyed Thebes in Egypt). They had brewed beer and had an effective postal delivery service. Some even claim that they originally invented an electric battery.

Table 4 summarizes the high points in Ancient Assyrian History.

Key Event	Date
Ashuruballit establishes foundations of the first Assyrian empire	1365 BCE
Adadnarari builds the first Assyrian empire.	1307 BCE
Second Assyrian Empire established under Tiglath-Pileser	1115 BCE
Ashurdan II sets up the Neo-Assyrian empire. The Empire spreads from the Caspian Sea to Egypt.	934 BCE
Aramaic becomes official language of Empire (same language spoken in the Holy Land at the time of the birth of Christ).	752 BCE
Assyrian conquest of Babylonia. Syria falls under control of the Assyrians.	732 BCE
Northern Israel captured by Assyrians	722 BCE
Jerusalem/Judah forced to pay tribute to Assyria . Military campaigns of Sennacherib. Campaigns were followed by those of Esarhaddon who crossed the Sinai desert by camel to fight the Egyptians.	701 BCE
Assyrian Capital of Nineveh falls to the Babylonians. Highpoint in the decline. The Empire would eventually fall in 607 BCE.	612 BCE.

The Assyrian population continues to survive as an identifiable group today. Most Assyrians are Christians (Syriac Christians) and number about 3 million. While Syria and Iraq boast the highest numbers of Assyrians populations in those regions have diminished as a result of regional instability and war.