The Battle of Marathon changed the course of history in ancient Greece. To many, the impossible seemed to have been achieved – the mighty Persian Empire halted in its advance. What happened that day, why was the battle fought, and how did people make sense of it? This bold new history of the battle examines how the conflict unfolded and the ideas attached to it in antiquity and beyond. Many thought the battle offered lessons in how people should behave, with heroism to be emulated and faults to be avoided. While the battle itself was fought in one day, the battle for the idea of Marathon has lasted ever since. After immersing you in the battle, this work will help you to explore how the ancient Athenians used the battle in their relations between themselves and others, and how the battle continued to be used to express ideas about gods, empire, and morality in the age of Alexander and his successors, at Rome and in Greece under the Roman Empire, and in the ages after antiquity, even in our own era, in which Marathon plays a remarkable role in sport, film, and children’s literature with each retelling a re-imagining of the battle and its meaning. A clash of weapons, gods, and principles, this is Marathon as you’ve never seen it before!
Table of Contents Introduction
Athenians at a Turning Point
The Greek World
Persia
Revolt in Ionia
The Plain of Marathon
The Fight
Surviving Marathon
Events after Marathon
Memories of Marathon in Fifth-Century Art and Literature
The Hunt for Ancient Israel celebrates the contribution of Diana V. Edelman to the field of biblical studies and celebrates her personally as researcher, teacher, mentor, colleague, and mastermind of new research paths and groups. It salutes her unconventional, constant thinking and rethinking outside the box, and her challenging of established consensuses. This volume includes essays addressing biblical themes and texts, archaeological fieldwork, historical method, social memory and reception history.
This volume highlights and advances new developments in the study of Edom and Idumea in eighteen essays written by researchers from different disciplines (history, archaeology, Assyriology, epigraphy, memory studies, and Hebrew Bible studies). The topics examined include the emergence of Idumea, the evolution of Edomite/Idumean identity, the impact of the Arabian trade on the region, comparative and regional studies of Idumea and Judah, studies of specific sites, artifacts, epigraphic and literary sources, and a section on literary and ideological constructions and memories of “Edom” reflected in the Hebrew Bible. This volume is a “go-to” for all who are interested in the current state of research about Edom and Idumea.
The feeding habits of camels entail exceedingly long periods (6-9 hours) of daily grazing and browsing unless fodder and/or rations are given to them as dietary supplements. Historical sources from the 17th to the 20th century attest to the use of such rations, particularly when camels were working, whether in commercial caravans or on military campaigns, and time constraints or a shortage of grazing would not provide the caloric intake necessary to keep the animals healthy and able to sustain their workload. These sources provide the key to understanding a small number of Persepolis Fortification Archive texts recording the disbursement of flour rations for camels. They also explain how ‘flour,’ normally a coarsely ground meal made of barley or another grain, was prepared with the addition of water, oil and/or other additives (fish, legumes), and formed into balls that were fed to camels as supplemental foodstuff. The study also presents some thoughts on long-distance travel involving camels. Based on several historical itineraries from the 17th and 18th century, it is possible to calculate likely rates of travel per day and time out for rest days, suggesting how long it may have taken to cover some of the distances mentioned in the Persepolis texts.
The Persian Empire was the world’s first hyperpower, with territory stretching from Central Asia to Northeastern Africa and from Southeastern Europe to the Indus Valley. It was the dominant geopolitical force from the later sixth century to its conquest by Alexander in the 330s BCE. Much of the empire’s territory was conquered by its founder, Cyrus the Great, who reigned from 559-530 BCE. Cyrus became a legend in his own lifetime, and his career inspired keen interest from Persia’s unruly neighbors to the west, the ancient Greeks. The idealized portrait of Cyrus by the Greek Xenophon had a profound impact on ancient, medieval, and early modern debates about rulership.
King of the World provides an authoritative and accessible account of Cyrus the Great’s life, career, and legacy. While Greek sources remain central to any narrative about Cyrus, a wealth of primary evidence is found in the ancient Near East, including documentary, archaeological, art historical, and biblical material. Matt Waters draws from all of these sources while consistently contextualizing them in order to provide a cohesive understanding of Cyrus the Great. This overview addresses issues of interpretation and reconciles limited material, while the narrative keeps Cyrus the Great’s compelling career at the forefront. Cyrus’ legacy is enormous and not fully appreciated― King of the World takes readers on a journey that reveals his powerful impact and preserves his story for future generations.
The two founding works of the Western historiographical tradition, Herodotus’ Histories and Thucydides’ History, feature, among many other things, mentions and quotations of inscriptions (that is, texts written on durable materials such as stone).
This book explores the epigraphic dimension of Herodotus’ Histories and Thucydides’ History (including potential allusions to inscriptions in general, possible instances of a tacit use of epigraphically recorded information, and explicit references to specific inscriptions) and offers a number of case studies aimed at elucidating the subtle uses to which specific embedded inscriptions are put in the works of Herodotus and Thucydides. Special attention is paid to the ways in which these inscriptions contribute to the characterisation of historical actors and to the self-fashioning of the Herodotean and Thucydidean narrator.
The book may appeal to literary classicists, ancient historians, epigraphists, and other readers with an interest in ancient historiography and/or epigraphic culture.
This chapter concerns itself with ideological expressions or, better, intimations of royal divinity during the Achaemenid Period (559–330 BCE). It is a foray into not only art historical matters but also subjects that have their own well-developed methodologies beyond their application in Near Eastern studies, particularly ideology and ambiguity. It takes as its case study a series of deliberately ambiguous portrayals of the Achaemenid king, primarily from the reign of Darius I, that blur the already vague line between king and god, and it briefly considers the impetus and implications for these.
The Archaeology of Iran from the Palaeolithic to the Archaemenid Empire is the first modern academic study to provide a synthetic, diachronic analysis of the archaeology and early history of all of Iran from the Palaeolithic period to the end of the Achaemenid Empire at 330 BC.
Drawing on the authors’ deep experience and engagement in the world of Iranian archaeology, and in particular on Iran-based academic networks and collaborations, this book situates the archaeological evidence from Iran within a framework of issues and debates of relevance today. Such topics include human–environment interactions, climate change and societal fragility, the challenges of urban living, individual and social identity, gender roles and status, the development of technology and craft specialisation and the significance of early bureaucratic practices such as counting, writing and sealing within the context of evolving societal formations.
Richly adorned with more than 500 illustrations, many of them in colour, and accompanied by a bibliography with more than 3000 entries, this book will be appreciated as a major research resource for anyone concerned to learn more about the role of ancient Iran in shaping the modern world.
Le 12 octobre 539 avant notre ère, l’antique et splendide ville de Babylone tombe aux mains du roi perse Cyrus le Grand en à peine une nuit. Capitale déchue d’un empire qui s’étendait des rives de l’Euphrate à la Méditerranée et des monts du Taurus aux confins de l’Arabie, Babylone va devenir une cité de second rang pour le restant de son histoire.
Le nom et la localisation de Babylone, cité vieille de 4 000 ans, sont universellement connus. Mais qu’en est-il des événements souvent dramatiques qui jalonnent son histoire ? Sait-on que son magnifique empire n’était qu’un colosse aux pieds d’argile ? Et que le roi Nabonide, dernier souverain du pays « entre les fleuves », s’est révélé l’antithèse de son prédécesseur, le grand Nabuchodonosor ? Usurpateur, conquérant perdu dans les sables de l’Arabie, partisan du dieu de la Lune au détriment de Bêl-Marduk, le roi des dieux, chef du panthéon babylonien, Nabonide n’a sans doute pas bénéficié du soutien inconditionnel de ses sujets.
Francis Joannès, spécialiste de l’histoire de la Mésopotamie antique, mène l’enquête pour dénouer les fils de l’effondrement soudain de Babylone. Ce faisant, il nous décrit toute une civilisation, sa géographie, sa société et sa culture. Il fait revivre le roi Nabonide lui-même, tout comme ses sujets, notables urbains, hommes d’affaires, esclaves domestiques ou simples travailleurs au service des grands temples.
Die Faszination an Alexander III. (dem Großen) ist nach wie vor ungebrochen, obwohl mittlerweile zahlreiche biographische Darstellungen vorliegen. Ein kaum berücksichtigter Aspekt seiner Herrschaft ist das von ihm geschaffene Imperium, das sich über Makedonien, Griechenland und einen Großteil des Achaimenidenreichs erstreckte. Um das größte Imperium seiner Zeit zu schaffen, musste Alexander nicht nur auf dem Schlachtfeld erfolgreich sein, sondern sich gegenüber lokalen Vorstellungen von legitimer Herrschaft positionieren.
Julian Degen analysiert ein vielschichtiges und heterogenes Quellencorpus, das nicht nur aus der griechisch-römischen Alexanderhistoriographie besteht, sondern auch griechische Inschriften und altorientalische Texte umfasst. Durch die Einordnung dieser bislang vernachlässigten Quellen in den größeren Kontext des Imperiumsdiskurses des ersten vorchristlichen Jahrtausends kann Degen die teilweise nur schwer verständlichen Handlungen und Praktiken Alexanders vor neuen Hintergründen interpretieren. So betrachtet er Alexander nicht mehr als historisches “Einzelphänomen”, sondern stellt seine Herrschaft in den großen Zusammenhang imperialer Herrschaft, die durch ihn wesentlich dynamisiert und transformiert wurde.
