6. The war of the Sicilian Greeks with the Carthaginians. Gelon.
(480 BC).
At the same time, like the Greeks of the metropolis, the Greek settlers on the beautiful, fruitful island of Sicily had to wage a hard war for their existence. This war was hampered by internal strife. The Sicilian cities were the scene of an almost continuous internecine struggle of the parties, which exhausted their best forces. The immediate consequence of this state of affairs was a frequent and disastrous change in the form of government: now the republic succeeded tyrants, now tyrants succeeded the republic.
Gelon
At this time, almost all the Sicilian Greek states were ruled by tyrants. Among them, Gelon, who was the owner of Gela, was distinguished by his wisdom. He gradually took possession of the entire eastern coast, as well as part of the northern and southern coasts of Sicily, conquered the city of Syracuse and expanded it by resettling there the most noble inhabitants from many other conquered cities. While the Hellenes were waging war against Xerxes, Gelon repelled a strong and terrible attack from Carthage.
The Carthaginian state, along with many other colonies, was founded on the northern coast of Africa by the Phoenicians in ancient times for trading purposes. In an effort to expand their trade relations and increase their maritime power, the Carthaginians inevitably had to face the Sicilian Greeks.
For the successful start of such a war, it seemed to the Carthaginians the most favorable time, when Xerxes attacked Greece from the sea and land, and thus deprived her of the opportunity to provide any assistance to the Sicilian Greeks.
The reason for the attack was given to the Carthaginians by the Greeks themselves. The tyrant Terillus, expelled from the city of Himera by the tyrant of Agrigent Feron, fled to Carthage and found protection and patronage there. Under the pretext of restoring the power of Terylla, the Carthaginians made such huge preparations that it was obvious that they intended, in addition to their possessions - Sardinia, Corsica and southern Spain, to conquer all of Sicily and extend their unlimited dominion to the western part of the Mediterranean Sea. They enlarged their fleet and, as was their custom, recruited mercenary troops from Africa, Spain, Sardinia, Corsica, and the Balearic Islands. The number of this army reached 300,000 people, although, most likely, this information is exaggerated.
With these forces, the Carthaginian general Hamilcar arrived at Himera in the same year in which Xerxes marched against Greece. Gelon and Theron marched against him with 50,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. Gelon succeeded in burning the Carthaginian fleet. Because of this, and also because of the death of Hamilcar, the land army of the Carthaginians was completely disordered, and the attack of the Greeks was crowned with success. Carthage was forced to make peace, in which he paid 2,000 talents of military costs, but kept his colonies in Sicily.
Gelon enjoyed great honor and trust among fellow citizens, and he soon became convinced of this. Having summoned all the armed Syracusans to the people's assembly, he himself, unarmed, ascended the pulpit, gave a detailed account of his administration of the state during peace and war, and placed himself and the fate of his children in the hands of the people.
Hamilcar
The people greeted him with loud exclamations as the savior and benefactor of the country, and demanded that he continue to rule them. He died in 478, and his memory was honored for a long time by obedience to his brother, the famous Hieron (died in 467). Hieron also took the city of Agrigentum into alliance with Syracuse, after having taken it from his third brother, Thrasybulus, who, with his short, brutal reign of eight months, presented a striking contrast to Gelon. The statue of Gelon, erected to him as a folk hero, remained intact even when the newly awakened universal spirit of freedom expelled tyrants not only from Syracuse, but from all the cities of the island of Sicily.
7. Themistocles, Pausanias, Aristides. Athenian domination of the sea.
(478 ... 477 BC).
The great controversy, which produced such a strong movement in the Greek people, was bound to affect the internal and external life of the Hellenes and change the course of their history. The innumerable production of gold and other valuables, inherited by governments and individuals, has changed the property status and the former measure of wealth and well-being. There was a desire to give the outer life more beautiful forms.
Just as an individual person always carries within himself the memories of a past life, so the Greeks knew how to find a way to preserve in the minds of the people the memories of all glorious deeds. Religion provided them with this remedy, linking memories of exploits with the veneration of the gods. Pious Greeks, attributing their salvation solely to the help of the gods, annually celebrated memorable days with sacred celebrations. Some of these days were preserved in memory thanks to all kinds of monuments. On the field of Marathon, the Greek traveler Pausanias, back in 170 BC, found two tombstones: on ten pillars of one of them one could read the names of the Athenians who fell there, on the other - the names of the Plataeans and slaves; Miltiades was honored with a special tomb. The memory of him and other heroes was vividly reminiscent of the annual commemoration of the fallen. The area at Thermopylae was decorated with monuments that recalled the four thousand Peloponnesians who died here and three hundred Spartans.
Isthmus of Corinth
The ashes of Leonidas were transferred by Pausanias to Sparta, where speeches were made annually in memory of the hero. Every year, the Plataeans publicly celebrated the memory of those who fell under Plataea and sacrificed the first fruits to the gods, the patrons of the fatherland and the shadows of the deceased heroes; not a single slave could serve at these sacrifices, since these heroes fell for freedom. The Plataeans, on the other hand, restored the burnt temple of Athena with 80 talents of silver received by them during the division of the Persian booty. The historian Plutarch saw this temple and the paintings that adorned it six hundred years later. All important and frequently visited places, like the Olympian Temple, the Isthmus of Corinth, and especially the temple at Delphi, reminded many monuments of that glorious time when the Hellenes had the right to be proud of their name. The monuments were mostly built with the proceeds from mining.
But most of all the rights to the consciousness of self-respect were acquired by Athens. They most brilliantly managed to resist the formidable force and temptations of the barbarians. The most beautiful monument of remembrance fell to the lot of Athens - the seeds of new life and development, sown in a military thunderstorm, irrigated with the blood of barbarians, sprung up in them, marked by brilliant deeds. The great creative spirit of Themistocles was able to continue the work begun with the same wisdom, skill and ability that he had shown before and during the Persian War. While the Athenians returned to their ruined city and thought only of building dwellings, Themistocles drew attention to the common good and the future of the entire state. Now Athens was not protected in the event of an enemy attack. And how easily and quickly the danger could come to Athens from the ambitious and envious Sparta, who now met a rival in her ancient claims to hegemony. Having understood the essence of the matter, Themistocles obtained the consent of the people to postpone the construction of any buildings whatsoever until the city was surrounded by a strong and extensive wall.
Ruins of Delphi
These preparations did not escape the watchful eyes of the Spartans. They began to prove to the Athenians that the Peloponnese could serve as a sufficient refuge from any military dangers, that the walls being erected in the event of a foreign invasion would serve the enemy as a fortified place for a storehouse of supplies and weapons, which Thebes had been for the Persians in the last war. Instead of building a wall around their city, the Athenians would be wiser if they helped to destroy all the walls that exist outside the Peloponnese.
The Athenians, on the advice of Themistocles, promised to send ambassadors to Sparta to consider this case, and at the same time zealously continued to build walls. Free citizens, their wives and children worked alongside the slaves. Workers were shifted day and night, somehow they put up the walls from the rubble, and the whole building bore traces of the haste with which it was erected.
Meanwhile, Themistocles himself went to Sparta as an ambassador, and the other two associates in the embassy were to remain in Athens and not leave until the walls were erected to the required height. Arriving in Sparta, Themistocles said that he could not start negotiations without the rest of the embassy.
When the news of the successful construction of the walls arrived, and the Spartans became more impatient, Themistocles gave the matter a new direction. He suggested that the Spartans themselves send ambassadors to Athens to investigate the matter on the spot. And so it was done. Then Themistocles immediately secretly let the Athenians know that they would detain the Spartan ambassadors as hostages for him and for the other two ambassadors who arrived at that time: Aristides and Abronichus. Then Themistocles boldly announced in the Spartan Senate that their city was now so surrounded by a wall that it was able to protect its inhabitants; that the Spartans and their allies should look to the Athenians as a people who can decide for themselves what is good for them and for the common good. Even without the invitation of the Spartans, they were quite determined to leave their city and go to the ships when they saw fit. And now they found it necessary to surround the city with a wall, both for the good of their own citizens and for the good of all allies. Because without such a balance in meetings about common affairs there will be neither law nor justice. Therefore, either all allies must have open cities, or they must be allowed to have fortifications. The Spartans had to hide their displeasure; they dismissed the ambassadors, but from that moment they harbored an irreconcilable hatred of Themistocles.
So Athens was secured against attack. Now care had to be taken to achieve hegemony at sea. This was the goal to which Themistocles, ever since the battles of Artemisia and Salamis, had never ceased to draw the attention of the people. To achieve this goal, the Athenians arranged a harbor nearby, taking advantage of the very convenient Piraeus Bay.
The work on the fortified harbor was carried out so hastily that the Spartans, before they had time to make a request on this matter a second time, saw towering walls that were even stronger than the city walls and made Athens impregnable both from land and from the sea. In addition, Themistocles persuaded the people to decide on an annual increase in the fleet by twenty rowboats and on the release of meteci, who carry out sea service, from all taxes; this measure also contributed to an increase in population.
While in Sparta a long stay of strangers, and even more so their permanent residence, was not allowed, in Athens they enjoyed freedom and fairly large rights. Every foreigner who stayed in Athens for a certain time entered the category of meteks (“protected ones”). Their position in this city, as the center of Hellenic learning, was so attractive that by 309 the number of meteks increased to 10,000 people. For state patronage, they paid a moderate tax: men at 12, and widows only at 6 drachmas. With regard to crafts, trade and industry, their rights were unlimited, and the state, thanks to this, derived significant benefits for itself from the accumulation of large capitals and productive forces in it.
The enterprising spirit of the Athenians, which manifested itself with such energy and determination during the Persian war and was most clearly expressed in Themistocles, allowed them to extend their influence far beyond the borders of their fatherland. The rest of the Greeks began to recognize that it was not the Spartans with their immobile state structure and their arrogance, but the Athenians who were called to be the leaders of great Greece in the fight against the Persians. This conviction first entered the souls of the Greeks when they became convinced of the betrayal of the Spartan Pausanias, the winner at Plataea.
Pausanias, at the head of the allied fleet, together with the Athenian ships under the command of Aristides and the young Cimon, son of Miltiades, set off to finally liberate the islands and shores of the Hellespont from the Persians who still remained there. Without much difficulty, the barbarians were expelled from the island of Cyprus, from Thrace, the city of Byzantium was conquered. Many noble Persians were taken prisoner here, and among them even relatives of the Persian king himself. Pausanias, without the knowledge of the allies, voluntarily sent them to Xerxes, accompanied by the Eretrian Gongil, and sent the king a letter informing him that he was ready to subjugate Greece to the power of the king if he gave his daughter to him, and asked to send a reliable person for further negotiations. Xerxes was delighted with this proposal and sent the satrap Artabazus to Pausanias as an intermediary. From that time on, Pausanias did not refrain and showed contempt and ill will to his compatriots. He put on Persian clothes, set up a Persian table, and with proud arrogance began to shun his fellow tribesmen. Such actions aroused general indignation. The Peloponnesian allies returned home, while the inhabitants of the islands and the Ionians, the tribesmen of the Athenians, offered to take command of the fleet to Aristides, who managed to gain their confidence by his meekness, and surrendered themselves under the protection of Athens. Although Sparta immediately withdrew Pausanias and sent Dorcis in his place, the allies refused to obey him, and the Spartans, returning all their troops, left the Athenians to wage war on the Persians. The Athenians concluded with the Ionian islands and cities, and subsequently with the Aeolian and Dorian states, a great maritime alliance, which surpassed in its strength the Peloponnesian alliance, which was under the command of Sparta. However, Aristides did not dare to immediately appoint a gathering place for new allies. In order to put aside any thought of domination, he preferred to choose the island of Delos for this, both because it was revered as the sacred place of all the Greeks of the Ionian tribe, and because, thanks to famous temple Apollo and its famous festivities, served as a common meeting place for the Greeks. From now on, in this temple, general meetings of the allied representatives were to take place and the money that was required to continue the war with the Persians was to be kept. The managers of this money were called Hellenes? Tamiyas, that is, the treasurers of the Hellenes. At the very first meeting on Delos, Aristides was so highly trusted by the allies that they gave him the honorary position of chief treasurer and chief manager of annual monetary contributions and the construction of ships. These contributions amounted to over 406 talents.
Thus, Athens received such forces at her disposal that they soon became terrible for the Greeks, and especially for Sparta.
Meanwhile, the complaints of the allies against Pausanias were considered by the ephors, and Pausanias was sentenced to a fine. But the evidence on the basis of which it would be possible to accuse him of the main crime - high treason, seemed insufficient. Pausanias was released and immediately went to Byzantium without permission. There he again entered into a suspicious relationship with Artabazus. He was again summoned to Sparta on the denunciation of one of the helots, who showed that Pausanias promised them freedom and citizenship rights if they took part in the coup conceived by him in Sparta. Pausanias obeyed the order, was taken into custody, but the ephors soon released him again, since they could not recognize the testimony of a slave as sufficient proof of the guilt of such a high-ranking person in such a serious crime. This condescension made the traitor even more daring. He continued even from Sparta itself to negotiate with Xerxes. Finally, Pausanias was convicted of his treasonous connections. One inhabitant of Argil was to deliver his letter to Artabazus. It seemed strange to Argild that none of the letters sent for secret transmission had ever returned. A suspicion arose in him: he carefully opened the letter and found in it a demand that its bearer be immediately put to death. Hardened by this discovery, he handed over the letter, which contained a number of indications of high treason, to the ephors. But the ephors still did not believe; they wanted to personally ascertain the validity of such a fact. To this end, it was decided to set a trap for Pausanias. The Argilos, by order of the ephors, retired to the courtyard of the temple of Poseidon at Cape Tenare. Here he placed himself in a hut as if asking for protection. The hut was divided by a partition, behind which several ephors hid. Having received news of the flight of his servant, Pausanias overtook him; the Argilian began to reproach Pausanias for demanding that he, his faithful servant, be killed. Pausanias repented and asked to be forgiven and to fulfill his order as soon as possible. The ephors heard everything and decided to take Pausanias into custody as soon as they returned to the city. But when they approached him in the street, he ran away and hid in the temple of Athena. From such a shelter it was impossible to force the criminal to leave even by force. Therefore, it was decided to dismantle the roof and lock up the temple in order to starve Pausanias. His mother had to bring the first stone to fill up front door. Just before his death, so that his corpse would not desecrate this sacred place, he, already dying of hunger, was taken out of the temple. When he died, the Spartans first wanted to throw his body into the abyss where convicted criminals were thrown, but, on the advice of the oracle, they buried him where he died.
The death of this traitor proved fatal for Themistocles as well. The Spartans, who hated Themistocles for building the walls, accused him of complicity in the betrayal of their king. They could hope for the success of their complaint, since Themistocles in Athens had numerous and strong opponents.
Having accomplished such a great deed as the exaltation of his fatherland, great person he himself transgressed the measure of equality, and the democratic spirit of Athens could not bear this from a single citizen. Soon he became the subject of fear and distrust of the people, who constantly feared for their freedom. Since the time of the Persian wars, these feelings have become even more rooted in the people, since after the struggle waged by the common forces, the need for a uniform and equal participation of all in the common cause was felt even more strongly. Therefore, when, soon after the battles of Salamis and Plataea, the occupation of positions, and especially the position of archon, at the general request and with the assistance of Aristides, became a public right, the people objected to all Themistocles' reminders of their merits that these merits did not belong to him alone, but are common property. To all this was added the displeasure of many noble families, who, in troubled times of war, lost their wealth and were unfriendly to others, and especially to Themistocles, who had now reached wealth and a brilliant position. In addition, there were people like Cimon who looked from a different point of view on the relationship of Athens to Persia and Sparta. Themistocles had to yield to so many forces united against him. However, called to court, after a brilliant defense against the Spartan accusations, he was acquitted and again gained full universal respect. But the opponents of Themistocles, led by Cimon, soon insisted on his exile by ostracism (470 BC).
Themistocles goes into exile
Themistocles left Athens and settled in Argos, from where he visited many Peloponnesian cities. The Spartans, constantly fearing their opponent, immediately after the exposure of Pausanias in treason, resumed their complaints in Athens, as a result of which both states sent people to Argos to arrest Themistocles. Learning of this, Themistocles fled first to the island of Corcyra, whose inhabitants he had previously rendered significant services. Fearing the wrath of Athens and Sparta, they did not dare to bring him shelter, but instead helped him hide in Epirus. In such a predicament, he decided to seek refuge with Admetus, the Molossian king, with whom he had previously been on hostile terms. Themistocles did not find him at home and, in anticipation of the king, sat down, on the advice of the queen, with his young son on the threshold, as a petitioner. Touched by his appearance, Admet promised the exile his patronage and kept his word even when the Athenians and Spartans demanded his extradition. Then, releasing Themistocles at his own request to the Persian king, he sent him under the protection of guards to the Macedonian city of Pydna.
From here Themistocles went by ship to Ionia. But the storm drove him to Naxos, where the Athenian fleet was located. Fearing for his fate if he was recognized, Themistocles announced his name to the shipbuilder and promised him a large reward if he would save him. The shipbuilder granted Themistocles' wish and delivered him safely to Ephesus. From here Themistocles went to Susa and at the same time informed in writing about his fate the Persian king Artaxerxes I, who had just ascended the throne.
Thucydides
The letter sent by Themistocles read:
“I, Themistocles, come to you. Of all the Greeks, I caused the most misfortune to your house while I had to defend myself against the attack of your father; but as soon as I found myself safe, and he was exposed to incessant dangers, then I did him the most good. Now, persecuted by the Hellenes for my friendship with you, I come to render you the greatest service. But about the purpose of my arrival, I will only reveal to you personally after one year has passed.
Having sufficiently familiarized himself with the Persian language and customs during the year, he asked the king for an audience. The king received him well and, according to Persian custom, assigned him income from three cities: Magnesia was to deliver bread to him, Lampsak - wine, and Miy - fish and vegetables. Owning these cities, Themistocles lived and died in Magnesia in 460 either from an illness or from a poison he himself had taken. The last reason is pointed out by those who claim that Themistocles allegedly promised the king to conquer Greece, but when he had to get down to business, he found it impossible and unpatriotic. From the fact that the relatives of Themistocles, in accordance with his will, transferred his remains to Attica, we can conclude that love for the fatherland never died in him. And there can be no doubt that such a man as Themistocles - of whom Thucydides said that by his spiritual strength alone, without a scientific education, he was best able to find himself in a moment of extremeness and predicted the future more accurately than anyone - and in Asia he thought and acted according to his former glorious life.
8. The reign of Cimon. Victory at the Eurymedon River.
(473 ... 469 BC).
Cimon, the son of Miltiades, thanks to his origin and abilities, managed, together with Themistocles and Aristides, to attract the attention of the people early. When, during the invasion of the Persians, Themistocles tried to persuade the Athenians to leave the city and seek salvation on ships, Cimon, for his part, tried to persuade the people to this decision. To this end, he went with his friends to the temple of Athena and hung a bridle there as a sign that now there was no more need for horseback riding. When Themistocles was exiled, Cimon got rid of the rival of his fame and the opponent of his political convictions and became the most powerful person at the head of the Athenian state. Now he was able to carry out his ideas quite calmly.
What were his political convictions, we can already conclude from the fact that Cimon belonged to the party of Aristides and, while he was alive, acted with him in common and in perfect accord. Then, in the aspirations of Kimon, two definite directions appeared. In matters of internal state administration, he tried to counteract the further development of democratic principles and preserve the original structure of Solon. This device, in its severity and firmness, was closer to the Spartan institutions, to which Cimon always treated with respect. He knew how to win people over to his side by generously handing out gifts. Often one of his guides had to take off his outer clothing to give it to the poor. He kept a daily open table for fellow citizens and ordered that the fences surrounding his gardens be broken down so that everyone could enjoy their fruits. He was always accompanied by servants with money, so that he could immediately give something to everyone who asked for alms. In foreign affairs, Cimon constantly tried to continue the offensive policy of Greece against Persia and, to this end, took care of maintaining strong and peaceful relations between the Greek states, and especially between Athens and Sparta, as the two main, mutually complementary, states of Greece. The war with Persia was Cimon's main idea, for the implementation of which he devoted all his strength. His first feat was the conquest of the city of Eion on the Thracian coast.
Through this acquisition, Athens took possession of a fertile region in which Athenian citizens, attracted by the country's abundance of timber, gold and silver mines, subsequently founded the important colony of Amphipolis. Then Cimon conquered the robber island of Skyros, settled Athenian citizens there, and from there brought the remains of King Theseus to Athens. The city of Karist on Euboea and the island of Lemnos were also conquered. The most glorious feat of Cimon was his victory over the Persians at the Eurymedon River in Pamphylia in 466 BC. At this time, bloody strife raged among the reigning family in Persia. Xerxes himself was completely immersed in the luxurious and intriguing life of his court and did not pay any attention to the administration of the state. The Persians did not take effective measures to stop the conquest of the Greeks. Only when Cimon launched an unusually successful offensive war in Caria and Lycia, conquered many cities and expelled the Persian garrisons from there, did the Persians turn their attention to him. They gathered a ground army and a fleet on the Eurymedon River, which were to be significantly strengthened with the arrival of eighty Phoenician ships. Upon learning of this, Cimon decided, before the Persians received this reinforcement, to enter into a sea battle with them. The Persians, fearing to engage in battle without the Phoenicians, brought their ships back into the river, after a short fight they gave a significant part of them into the hands of the Greeks and joined with the ground army. Cimon immediately led his soldiers against the Persians, inspired by success. A stubborn battle took place, and the victory finally won by the Greeks was bought by them by the loss of many capable and brave men. The survivors, and especially Cimon, in addition to rich booty, acquired a rare glory for themselves, having won two victories in one day. Cimon completed his brilliant feat by immediately hastening to Cyprus and sinking the Phoenician ships that were there.
Kimon
Thus, the Persians were forced out of the Greek seas for a long time, and the Greek cities of Asia Minor were freed from paying tribute to the "great king." However, the war continued, even though the Persians, having exhausted their military means, were forced to suspend military operations on their part.
Equality in relations between Athens and the allied cities and islands gradually disappeared, and their relationship became one of dominance and subject. The Athenians found this completely natural and justified the new relationship with their former merits. The public meetings that had hitherto taken place in Delos were now replaced by orders and orders from Athens. Monetary contributions and the supply of ships and troops were demanded with merciless severity. Those who thought of resisting were threatened by the example of Naxos and Thasos: both of these islands were conquered by force of arms and had to pay a large fine, give up their ships and tear down the walls.
The cramped position of the allies was the result of their own imprudence. Due to laziness and the habit of calmness, they soon got tired of the difficult naval service and agreed to Cimon's cunning proposal to replace the supply of ships and crew with cash contributions. The allies did not notice that because of this they themselves lost their warlike spirit and transferred full power over themselves to the Athenians, who built ships with their money and armed them with their people. The allies noticed this only when they were completely under the power of the Athenians, and any attempt to free themselves from the heavy oppression became impossible due to their own impotence. Now they had no choice but to seek salvation in outside help. The rise of the power of Athens awakened with renewed vigor the ancient envy of their rival Sparta, and the allies placed all their hopes on her help. The Spartans were ready to intervene even when the Thasians, during their war with Athens, offered them to attack Attica. But a sudden misfortune of their own - an earthquake and an uprising of the helots - put the Spartans in such a position that they themselves were forced to turn to the Athenians for help.
and to the silver mines of Greece, since international trade requires a money economy and thus stimulates the exploitation of minerals. The country is rich in various natural resources: excellent marble, excellent clay; from metals, silver, copper, lead, and later iron were mined here, and gold was mined on the island of Thasos. Gold was also mined in Thrace (on the territory of modern Bulgaria). But some metals were not enough or were negligible (tin), and they had to be imported. All this taken together - exports and imports, industry, merchant ships and money - brought to life the development of the navy. Thus, the bareness of the soil in Greece was compensated by the development of the sea.
An unknown Greek writer, who lived even before Plato, described the advantages of power over the sea for the Greeks: “Bad harvests are the scourge of the most powerful powers, while maritime powers easily overcome them. places where the field was prosperous... I would add that the dominance of the sea enabled the Athenians... through extensive external contacts to discover new sources of wealth Delicacies of Sicily, Italy, Cyprus, Egypt, Lydia, the Black Sea, the Peloponnese or any other country become available to the masters of the sea."
CONCLUSION
To study the problem of the influence of the climatic factor on the development of civilizations, we examined the most ancient civilizations. This choice is due to the fact that, due to the primitiveness of the tools of labor, it was the natural environment that had the greatest influence on ancient civilizations, both on their birth and development and on their death. People are highly dependent on the environment. If it created too many obstacles, it slowed down development (for example, the development of the Ganges valley in India). But the absence of "challenges", according to the theory of A. Toynbee, means the absence of incentives for growth and development. The traditional opinion, according to which favorable climatic and geographical conditions certainly contribute to social development, turns out to be wrong. On the contrary, historical examples show that too good conditions tend to encourage a return to nature, the cessation of all growth.
In this paper, we examined the origin and development of six ancient civilizations: Egyptian, Sumerian, Indus, Chinese, Phoenician and Ancient Greek. Some of them can be called river, others - seaside. They developed in different natural conditions, but the formation of all these civilizations was accompanied by severe trials of nature, a change in the usual way of life. In order to give a worthy response to the challenge that nature threw them, people had to look for new solutions, improve nature and themselves.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Encyclopedia for children. T. 1. World history. –M.: Avanta+, 1996.
S.: 46-50, 55-61, 64-67, 90-94, 114-115.
2. Children's encyclopedia for middle and older age. T.8. From the history of human society. –M.: Enlightenment, 1967.
S.: 32-35, 56-59.
3. A. J. Toynbee. "Comprehension of history". Electronic version. gumilevica.kulichki/Toynbee/index.html
4. History of Europe from ancient times to the present day (in eight volumes).
Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Institute of World History. Institute of History of the USSR. Institute of Slavonic and Balkan studies. Electronic version. gumilevica.kulichki/HEU/index.html
5. S. Nefedov. Ancient world history. Electronic version of the book, published by the publishing house "Vlados" in 1996. hist1.narod/IHFW/index.htm
6. ancient.holm/topics/maps/index.htm
7. ancient.holm/topics/data/egypt/index.htm
8. ww rubricon
9. http:// www. ancient. holm. en/ topics/ data/ shumer/ index. htm
10. http:// www. ancient. holm. en/ topics/ data/ India/ index. htm
11.http:// www. ancient. holm. en/ topics/ data/ China/ index. htm
12. ancient.holm/topics/data/finikia/index.htm
13. krugosvet/articles/63/1006305/1006305a1.htm
History of Ancient Egypt The history of Ancient Egypt refers to the history of Egyptian civilization since the birth of class society and statehood in Egypt, which occurred in the second half of the 4th millennium BC. the fall of the independence of the Egyptian state at the end of the VI century BC ....
Among the cities of the Ancient East, Babylon was perhaps the most revered. The very name of the city - Bab-Ilu (Gate of God) - spoke of its holiness, of the special patronage of the gods.
It is not known whether Sumer or Egypt was the cradle of the world's oldest civilization; it is possible that the civilization that arose in northeast Africa, on the banks of the great Nile, was more ancient.
Human development in the course of evolution. The first tools of labor, the use of fire. Everyday life Cro-Magnons and their descendants. Agriculture, stone tools and hunting. Invention of the wheel, ceramics, spinning and weaving. Discovery and processing of metals.
REPORT ON THE COURSE "HISTORY OF WORLD CIVILIZATIONS". CIVILIZATIONS OF THE ANCIENT EAST. " ANCIENT EGYPT". Completed by a student of group 82/s of the Institute of Special Pedagogy and Psychology
The first settlements Uruk period. Jemdet-Nasr. ancient states. Sumerian kingdom. Military art of Sumer and Akkad.
The era of the New Kingdom, illuminated by the largest number of ancient Egyptian monuments, coincides with the reign of the three Manetho dynasties - XVIII, XIX and XX (from the XVI to XI centuries BC).
The relief of the territory of Mitino was formed as a result of the activity of the Moscow River. The river valley has a very ancient origin. It lay on the site of a deep depression that existed for more than a million years and was filled with a two-kilometer thickness of sedimentary rocks. Riverbed of ancient...
Indian civilization. Around 2500 BC In the fertile valley of the Indus River (on the territory of modern Pakistan), farmers moved from the west. The first settlements spread over vast areas. About 100 settlements of Indian civilization were discovered on a territory stretching over 1770 km ...
History of Origin The Tigris and Euphrates rivers originate from the Armenian Highlands. In the interfluve (in Greek - in Mesopotamia) about 5000 BC. the Sumerians settled. The epic mentions their homeland, which they considered the homeland of all people high mountains on the island of Dilmun. What made them leave the mountains is not...
Many scientists and researchers call Egypt "the gift of the Nile", because if it were not for this mighty river, nothing would grow in the valley, and it would simply turn into a desert. The annual floods of the Nile made the land fertile, and by 5 thousand BC. the first agricultural settlements appeared along its banks...
Early Ashur. geographic environment. Features of development. Public relations. Political system.
Ministry of Education of Ukraine College № 29 Completed by: uch. 6-B Bazhenov Sasha Ancient Egypt. Sources and historiography of Ancient Egypt The original culture of Ancient Egypt has attracted the attention of all mankind since time immemorial. She aroused surprise in the proud of her civilization ...
Introduction Human history is nothing but a long series of examples of how the conditions of the environment and the shape of the surface of our planet have had a beneficial or retarding effect on the development of mankind. So, for example, the oceans, which in our time are an instrument of international unity ...
Early kingdom of ancient Egypt. Stone and copper tools. Crafts of the Early Kingdom. Tribes that lived around Egypt.
Sources and historiography of Ancient Egypt A systematic and in-depth study of Ancient Egypt began only in the 19th century. Before that, the assistants of scientists were only biblical data and the works of Greek and Latin authors, who did not have the opportunity to use written before ...
The evolution of economic and political activity of man from primitive to civilization. Features of ancient civilizations. Natural conditions and their impact on the formation of civilization. Eastern despot states, the position of the king, the structure of society.
Heyday background Agriculture Ancient Egypt. Agriculture of the pre-dynastic period and the early kingdom. Agriculture ancient kingdom. Socio-economic relations.
The early kingdom is the time of the reign in Egypt of the I and II Manetho dynasties, covering more than two hundred years of the history of dynamic Egypt (c. 3000-2800 BC).
() Only one thing is missing for the Athenians. Namely, if they ruled over the sea, living on an island, they could, harming others if they wish, not tolerate anything bad, while they themselves rule over the sea, and their land would not suffer, and enemies would not have to expect beyond that. to yourself. But in the present situation, the peasants and rich Athenians suffer more from the arrival of enemies, while the democratic element, knowing full well that the enemies will not burn or destroy anything of its property, lives carelessly, without fear of their arrival. () And besides this, if the Athenians lived on the island, they would also be freed from another danger, that someday their state would be betrayed by a handful of people, that the gates would be opened and enemies would break in. And indeed, how could this happen if they lived on an island? Yes, and the uprising of some part of the population against the democratic party would not be afraid if they lived on the island. After all, now, if they raised an uprising, they would rise up counting on the enemies, thinking that they would bring them to their aid by dry means. And if they lived on the island, and in this respect they would not be in danger. () So, since from the very beginning they did not settle on the island, now they are doing the following. They give their property to the islands for safekeeping, confident in the strength of their dominance on the sea, and do not look at the fact that the land of Attica is being devastated, because they understand that if they feel sorry for her, they will be deprived of other more important benefits.
() Further, allied treaties and oaths for oligarchic states must be observed; if they do not keep their contracts, then either they tell you the one through whose fault you suffer, or those famous persons - in view of their small number - who concluded the contract. And as for the people, no matter what treaties it concludes, each of them can, shifting the blame on someone alone - on the orator who spoke then and on the chairman of the meeting who put the question to a vote - to renounce, saying that he was not present then, and that he does not agree with this, unless they find out that the agreement was concluded with a full assembly of the people. And if they do not find it necessary to consider it valid, they have invented thousands of pretexts so as not to do what they do not want. Moreover, if anything bad happens from a decision taken by the people, the democrats attribute the blame for this to the fact that a handful of people, by opposing it, spoiled the whole thing; if there be any success, then they attribute the honor of it to themselves. () On the other hand, the Athenians do not allow ridicule in comedies and scolding the people, so that the blasphemy does not extend to themselves; but in relation to private individuals, if someone wants to ridicule another, they encourage it, knowing full well that not from the people and not from the ordinary mass for the most part is ridiculed, but it is either rich, or noble, or influential, and only rarely one of the poor and democrats is ridiculed, and even then only if he meddles in all affairs and strives to stand out from the people in some way; therefore, if they are ridiculed, they are not indignant. () So, I at least assert that the people in Athens understand which of the citizens are noble and which are simple, and, understanding this, love their supporters and guardians, even if they were simple, but rather hate the noble, because they do not think so that their nobility serves for his good, but expects only evil from him. And, conversely, some who really stand for the people are by origin not democrats at all. () For my part, I admit a democratic point of view for the people themselves, because it is excusable for everyone to take care of himself. But whoever, not belonging to the people, prefers to live in a democratic rather than an oligarchic state, he simply sets himself on some criminal intentions and sees that a swindler can rather go unnoticed in a democratic state than in an oligarchic one.
III.() So, with regard to the state structure of the Athenians, then of course I do not approve of its character; but since they have decided to have a democratic government, it seems to me that they successfully preserve democracy, using the methods that I have indicated.
In addition, as I see, some reproach the Athenians also for the fact that sometimes their Council and people fail to decide for a person, even if he sits waiting for a whole year. This also happens in Athens only because, due to the multitude of cases, they do not have time to let everyone go, resolving their cases. () Yes, and how could they have time to do this when, firstly, they have to celebrate as many holidays as any of the Greek states, - and during them it is more difficult to achieve something on state affairs, - then sort out so many private and public processes 72 77 , and in the case of an application from any of them, complaints have to be dealt with year after year; in addition, it is necessary to make a dokimasia of officials and resolve disputes on their part, subject orphans to dokimasia and appoint prison guards. () All this happens from year to year. But from time to time it is necessary to deal with cases of misconduct by military command, and also if some other unexpected crime happens, for example, some unprecedented atrocity or wickedness is committed. There are many other things I don't talk about; the most important thing is mentioned everything except the establishment of taxes for the allies. And these things happen for the most part every five years. () So what - is it not necessary to consider all this not worth the trial? Yes, let someone say which of these cases should not be dealt with here. And if one has to agree that all this must be sorted out, then it must be done within a year, because even now, although they judge all year round, they are not able to stop the criminals, due to the large population. () Good! But someone will say that it is necessary to judge, but not to such a large number of judges. Then, of necessity, in each judicial commission, if they are not reduced in number, only a limited number of members will sit, as a result of which it will be easy to enter into a deal with the judges due to their small number and bribe them, but at the same time it will be much more difficult for them to judge the truth. . () In addition, we must take into account the fact that the Athenians have to celebrate holidays, during which it is impossible to make judgment. Moreover, they celebrate twice as many holidays as the rest; but I already put it equal to the number of holidays, which happens in the state that celebrates the smallest number of them. So, in view of this, I do not consider it possible that things in Athens would go differently than now: except in something insignificant one can be thrown out, another added, but much cannot be changed without at the same time taking away something from the democratic system. . () Of course, in order to improve the state order, you can think of a lot, but in order for democracy to exist and at the same time to have better government, it is not easy to find a satisfactory solution to this; unless, as I just said, something can be added or taken away in small things.
() Then, it seems to me, the Athenians and in that respect incorrectly argue that they take the side of the worst in states where confusion occurs. But they do it consciously, because if they took the side of the best, they would not stand up for their like-minded people: after all, in no state the best people sympathize with democracy, but the worst in every state sympathize with democracy; Of course, like like is always a friend. That is why the Athenians stand up for what comes to them. () And no matter how many times they tried to intercede for the noble, it did not benefit them; on the contrary, the Boeotian people soon fell into slavery; another time, when they took the side of the nobles in Miletus, they soon fell away and killed the democrats; once again, when they took the side of the Lacedaemonians instead of the Messenians, the Lacedaemonians soon subdued the Messenians and began to fight with the Athenians.
() Perhaps someone will object that apparently no one was unfairly deprived of civil honor in Athens. I maintain that there are some who are unjustly deprived of their rights, but these are only a few, a few. Meanwhile, in order to encroach on the existence of Athenian democracy, it takes not a handful of people; moreover, it usually happens that those who are justly deprived of rights do not think about this at all, but only those who are unjustly. () How, then, can it be imagined that the majority would be unjustly deprived of their rights in Athens, where the people themselves correct their posts and where they are deprived of their rights only for such deeds as dishonest office, dishonest speech and actions? Taking this into consideration, one should not think that any danger threatened in Athens from people deprived of civic honor.
The ideals that illuminated my path and gave me courage and courage were kindness, beauty and truth. Without a sense of solidarity with those who share my convictions, without the pursuit of the eternally elusive objective in art and science, life would seem to me absolutely empty.
From the Dark Ages - a period of decline that came in the XI-IX centuries. BC e. - Hellas carried the seeds of a new state system. From the first kingdoms there remained a placer of villages that fed the nearest city - the center of public life, a market and a refuge during the war. Together they constituted a city-state ("polis"). The largest policies were Athens, Sparta, Corinth and Thebes.
Rebirth from darkness
During the Dark Ages, Greek settlements spread from the southern part of the Balkan Peninsula to the western coast of Asia Minor (present-day Turkey), covering the islands of the Aegean Sea. By the beginning of the 8th century BC. e. Greeks began to restore trade relations with other peoples, exporting olive oil, wine, pottery and metal products. Thanks to the recent invention of the alphabet by the Phoenicians, a script lost during the Dark Ages has begun to revive. However, the established peace and prosperity led to a sharp increase in the population, and it became increasingly difficult to feed them due to the limited agricultural base.
Trying to solve this problem, the Greeks sent entire parties of their citizens to develop new lands, found new colonies that could provide for themselves. Many Greek colonies settled in southern Italy and in Sicily, so this whole area became known as "Greater Greece". For two centuries, the Greeks built many cities around the Mediterranean and even on the Black Sea coast.
The process of colonization was accompanied by drastic changes in policies. The monarchy gave way to the aristocracy, that is, the rule of the most noble landowners. But with the expansion of trade and the introduction of metallic money into circulation around 600 BC. e. following the example of the neighboring kingdom of Lydia in the south of Asia Minor, their positions were noticeably shaken.
In the VI century BC. e. conflicts constantly arose in the policies, tyrants often came to power. "Tyrant" is a Greek word, like "aristocracy", but the ancient Greeks did not mean that the tyrant's regime was cruel and anti-people, but meant that a person forcibly seized power, but could at the same time be a reformer.
Despite the reforms of the famous legislator Solon, the tyrant Pisistratus seized power in Athens. But after the expulsion from Athens of Peisistratus' successor Hippias in 510 BC. e. a democratic constitution was adopted. Essay on Ancient Greece. This is another word of Greek origin, which means the rule of the demos, that is, the people. Greek democracy was limited as women and slaves did not have the right to vote. But due to the small size of cities, citizens could not depend on their elected representatives, as they took a direct part in determining laws and discussing particularly important decisions at popular assemblies.
In the 5th century BC e. conflicts broke out between democratic and oligarchic parties in many policies. Supporters of the oligarchy believed that power in society should belong to the wealthiest citizens.
Athens and Sparta
If Athens can be called a stronghold of democracy, then Sparta was rightfully considered the center of the oligarchy. Sparta was distinguished by a number of other features.
In most Greek states, the percentage of slaves to free citizens was quite low, while the Spartans lived as a "master race" surrounded by a superior number of potentially dangerous helot slaves. To maintain their dominance, the entire people of Sparta was turned into a caste of warriors, who were taught from early childhood to endure pain and live in barracks.
Although the Greeks were ardent patriots of their cities, they recognized that they were one people - the Hellenes. They were united by the poetry of Homer, belief in the all-powerful Zeus and other Olympian gods, and the cult of the development of mental and physical abilities, the expression of which was the Olympic Games. In addition, the Greeks, who honored the rule of law, felt their difference from other peoples, whom they indiscriminately dubbed "barbarians." Both under democracy and in oligarchic policies, everyone had legal rights, and a citizen could not be deprived of his life at the whim of the emperor - unlike, for example, the Persians, whom the Greeks considered barbarians.
However, the Persian expansion, which began in the VI century BC. e. and directed against the peoples Ancient Greece and Asia Minor, seemed inevitable. However, the Persians were not particularly interested in the lands of the Greeks - poor and remote on the other side of the Aegean until Athens supported the Asian Greeks who rebelled against Persian rule. The uprising was crushed, and in 490 BC. Persian king Darius sent troops to take revenge on Athens. However, the Athenians won a landslide victory at the Battle of Marathon - 42 km from Athens. In memory of the feat of the messenger, who ran all this distance without stopping, in order to quickly announce the joyful bear, a marathon was included in the program of the Olympic Games.
Ten years later, Darius' son and successor, Xerxes, staged a much larger attack. He ordered to line up his ships in a row, forming a bridge across the Hellespont Strait, dividing Asia Minor and Europe (the current Dardanelles), through which his huge army passed. In the face of a common threat, the Greek cities were forced to unite. Essay on Ancient Greece. The army of Xerxes came from the north, and the Greeks, who gathered troops from different cities, accomplished a real feat, putting a barrier in the way of the Persians. King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans gave their lives trying to hold the narrow Thermopylae Gorge as long as possible.
Unfortunately, the death of the Spartans was in vain, since Ancient Greece still fell under the onslaught of the enemy. The inhabitants of Athens were evacuated, and the invaders burned all the temples in the Acropolis. Although a year before the war, the leader of the Athenians, Themistocles, seriously strengthened the fleet, in terms of the number of ships, he was hopelessly inferior to the superior forces of the Persians and the Phoenicians they had conquered. But Themistocles managed to drive the Persian armada into the narrow Strait of Salamis, where it was unable to maneuver. This caused panic in the ranks of the Persians and allowed the Greeks to completely defeat the enemy fleet.
Decisive battle
Since Sparta actually retired from the liberation struggle, Athens became the undisputed leader in ancient Greece. In 478 BC. e. The Delian League was concluded, which allowed Athens and its allies to pool their resources and continue the war. However, the union soon turned into an instrument of political radicalism. The allies were obliged to introduce in their states democratic forms of government on the model of Athens and to finance the maintenance of an ever-increasing fleet for the needs of general defense. After the end of the war with the Persians in 449 BC. e. the union was preserved, and all attempts to withdraw from it were severely suppressed.
Classical Athens
5th century BC e. is considered the great age of classicism of Greek civilization, which is primarily identified with Athens. But both before and after this period, other Greek cities made a very significant contribution to Greek culture, giving the world many masterpieces of poetry, ceramics and sculpture, as well as the first philosophers who tried to explain the universe from the standpoint of physics, and not magic and miracles.
And yet the main achievements of human thought and art are connected with Athens. Among the temples built on the Acropolis, the most famous is the Parthenon, with its perfect proportions and superb stucco decorations. The first dramatic works in the world arose on the basis of Athenian rituals in honor of the god Dionysus. Athenian philosophers, including the famous Socrates and Plato, were the first to deeply analyze questions of morality and political ideals. In addition, Athens was the birthplace of Herodotus of Halicarnassus, the first true historian (that is, a scholar engaged in critical research, and not just retelling of fables and rumors).
No less outstanding historian was Thucydides, who was not only the commander of the Athenian army, but also the chronicler of the great Peloponnesian war of 431-404 BC. Concerned about the growing power of Athens, the Spartans founded the Peloponnesian Union, which included representatives of the large Peloponnesian Peninsula in the south of the mainland of Ancient Greece. The first clashes between the two alliances were indecisive, and it seemed that this situation would continue for a long time. However, after the plague broke out in Athens, which claimed the life of the leader of the Athenians, Pericles, Sparta won this confrontation. But although the Spartans controlled the area around Athens (Attica), the city itself remained impregnable for them, since the famous Long Walls surrounding the city cut off the approaches to the port of Piraeus, from where supplies were delivered to Athens. Essay on Ancient Greece. Thus, Athens' dominance of the sea was preserved.
Defeated Winners
After a seven-year truce, war broke out again, when the Athenian army, which had besieged the powerful Greek city in Sicily of Syracuse, was itself surrounded, and the entire expeditionary force was completely destroyed. The Spartans closed Athens in a tight blockade ring. The Athenian fleet was defeated in the battle of Aegospotami. In 404 BC. e. the starving city was forced to surrender.
Sparta and Thebes
The dominance of Sparta also did not last long, she was opposed by the unification of Athens, Corinth and Thebes. In 371 BC. e. The Thebans, led by Epaminondas, inflicted a crushing defeat on Sparta at the Battle of Louctra.
The superiority of Thebes turned out to be even more fleeting, and in the second half of the 4th century Greece entered as never before disunited. In comparison with other states, Macedonia, located in the north of Greece, remained an underdeveloped outskirts, but it was ruled by the talented king Philip II of Macedon, and she had a well-trained army. In 338 B.C. e. in the battle of Chaeronea, the Macedonian army completely defeated the combined army of the Athenians and Thebans. Ancient Greece had a single ruler. A new era has begun.
In order for the upbringing of children to be successful, it is necessary that the educators, without ceasing, educate themselves.
We have quite definitely established the truth that favorable conditions are inimical to civilization, and have shown that the more favorable the environment, the weaker the incentive for the emergence of civilization. Let's try to move further in our study, going from the contrary. Suppose that the incentive to build civilization increases as living conditions become more and more difficult. Let us verify this statement by a well-tested method. First, consider the arguments ";for";, and then - ";against"; and try to draw the appropriate conclusion. The historical material confirming the existence of the dependence we have identified is so abundant that it may even be difficult to select it. For convenience, we divide the historical examples of interest to us into two groups. The first group includes those cases when a civilization was born under the influence of the natural environment, the second - those civilizations where the human environment had a greater influence. Consider first the first group.
Aegean coasts and their continental hinterlands. The Aegean land, which gave the world the Minoan and Hellenic civilizations, is unusually difficult to study when viewed in a broad geographical context. I have seen this from my own experience. I made my first trip to Aegea by sea, and perhaps that is why the impressions and contrasts seemed especially vivid.
The contrast between Greece and England, due to natural geographical reasons, was so striking that there was not enough imagination to comprehend it. The second time I arrived in Aegea also by sea, but this time, stopping at Athens, I made three more journeys from there. First I went to Smyrna, and from there - into the depths of Anatolia; then he visited Constantinople and again the Anatolian regions: and before returning home, I visited Thessaloniki, from where I made a trip into the depths of Macedonia. I returned to England by train, direct from Constantinople to Calais. During this trip, I often caught myself thinking that, leaving the Aegean region, I was from an unpleasant, rocky and naked country entering completely different borders - green, rich and friendly. The impact of these contrasts on the imagination was very strong. In such an unfavorable comparison, the Aegean land loomed as an area unusually difficult to develop. And only then did I understand the true meaning of the words put by Herodotus into the mouth of the Spartan exile Demaratus in a conversation with the great king Xerxes [+34] : "; Poverty in Hellas existed from time immemorial, while valor was acquired by innate wisdom and harsh laws. And with this valor, Hellas is saved from poverty and tyranny" ;.
Attica and Boeotia. Similar contrasts of the natural environment are also characteristic of the territory of the Aegean itself. For example, if you take a train from Athens through Thessaloniki to the center of Europe, at first a familiar scene appears before your eyes. The train goes around the eastern spurs of Parnassus for hours with its limestone cliffs overgrown with tall pines. And suddenly a panorama of a carefully cultivated fertile valley opens up unexpectedly. The first impression is that the train is already on the Austro-German border, somewhere between Innsbruck and Munich. The northern slopes of Parnassus and Kytheron may well be mistaken for the northernmost range of the Tyrolean Alps. Of course, this landscape is "curiosity";. The traveler will not see anything like it again until the train passes Nis (a town in Serbia), which will happen in some thirty-six hours, and descends into the low valley of the Morava, moving in the direction of the Middle Danube: and then the traveler will find this Greek Bavaria.
What was the name of this small country during the existence of the Hellenic civilization? It was called Boeotia; in the Hellenic mouth the word "Boeotian"; had a definite connotation. This word denoted a simple, dull, unimpressive and rude ethos - an ethos that falls out of the general line of the Hellenic culture marked by genius. This discrepancy between the Boeotian ethos and Hellenism is emphasized by the fact that immediately beyond the mountain range of Cithaeron, around one of the spurs of Parnassus, where Railway makes a spiral, there was Attica - "; Hellas of Hellas"; a country whose ethos was the quintessence of Hellenism. And a people lives very close by, whose ethos for a normal Hellenic was like a dissonant sound. This contrast can be felt in the expressions "Boeotian pig"; and ";attic salt"; [+35] .
What is important for our present study is that this cultural contrast, which had such a vivid effect on the Hellenic consciousness, coincided geographically with an equally striking contrast in the physical environment - a contrast that has not been erased to this day and continues to amaze everyone who travels in these places. Attica is "; Hellas of Hellas"; not only in his soul, but also in appearance. It is related to other parts of the Aegean in the same way that the entire Aegean is to countries outside its borders. If you approach Greece by sea from the west, then, passing through the Gulf of Corinth, you will feel that your eyes have already become accustomed to the sight of the Greek landscape - beautiful and bitter at the same time. But as soon as your steamer, passing along the isthmus, again finds itself in the Aegean waters, you will again be amazed at the austerity of the landscape that has opened up to you on the other side of the isthmus. This austerity reaches its highest point in the region of the salamis ledge, when the land of Attica opens before your eyes.
In Attica, with its extremely light and stony soil, the process called denudation (exposure, denudation), a process that Boeotia happily avoided, was completed under Plato.
What did the Athenians do when their country began to lose the serenity of its Boeotian youth? We know that they "gave education"; Hellas. When the pastures of Attica dried up and the cultivated land was depleted, the people switched from animal husbandry and agriculture to the cultivation of olive plantations. This phenomenal tree is not only able to survive on a bare stone, but also bears fruit abundantly. However, one olive oil you will not live, and the Athenians began to exchange oil for Scythian grain [+36] . Oil was transported by sea, pre-packaged in earthenware jugs, and this, in turn, stimulated pottery and developed the art of navigation. The Scythian market also affected the silver mines of Attica, since international trade requires a money economy and thus stimulates the development of minerals, in this case precious metals and pottery clay. Finally, all this taken together - exports, industry, merchant ships and money - brought to life the development of the navy. Thus, the denudation of the soil in Attica was compensated by the development of the sea. The Athenians multiplied the lost wealth a hundredfold. What gave the Athenians power over the sea is colorfully described by an anonymous Athenian writer who lived shortly before Plato. "Bad harvests are the scourge of the most powerful powers, while sea powers easily overcome them. Crop failure is never widespread, and therefore the masters of the sea send their ships to those places where the cornfield was generous ... I would add that dominance at sea allowed the Athenians... through extensive external contacts to discover new sources of wealth.The delicacies of Sicily, Italy, Cyprus, Egypt, Lydia, the Black Sea, the Peloponnese or any other country become available to the masters of the sea... In addition, the Athenians are the only people who have shown the ability to the accumulation of wealth"; [*10] . It was these riches - riches that the Boeotian farmer did not think about, because he was never let down by the good soil of the fields - became the economic basis of the political, spiritual, artistic culture that made Athens "the school of Hellas"; Politically, Athenian industrialists and seafarers were the voters of Athenian democracy, while Attic trade and maritime power created the framework for the international union of the Aegean city-states, which took shape in the Delphic League. [+37] under the patronage of Athens. In artistic terms, the flourishing of Attic pottery gave birth to new forms of fine art. The disappearance of forests forced Attic architects to work not in wood but in stone, and the Parthenon was born as a result. Attic culture absorbed the achievements and character traits all other manifestations of Hellenic culture, in order to improve them and pass them on to their descendants.
Aegina and Argos. Another illustration from Hellenic history is the fate of two city-states of Argolis: Argos and Aegina. Argos, being the owners of the most suitable for agriculture territory of the Pelononnese. feeling that the land was not enough, they decided to act. Like the Chalcidians, they planned to annex new lands to their own and turned their eyes to the nearby hills, which served as the natural border of their territory. Replacing the plow with a spear, they rushed to the lands of their neighbors, but this enterprise turned out to be difficult, because the neighbors also knew how to hold a spear. The Chalcidians could easily negotiate with the stupid Boeotians; they saved their steel to fight the poorly armed and undisciplined Thracians and Sicels. The Argives proved to be less prudent. Fighting for the possession of the Peloponnese, they encountered the Spartans, and they answered the blow with a blow, and the Spartans were armed, as they say, to the teeth. With such warriors, the Argos, of course, could not compete; and this sealed the end of their city's history.
Meanwhile, the small Argolic island of Aegina played a completely different role in history, due to the much poorer natural environment it received from Nature. Aegina, towering over the waters of the bay with its only mountain so that its top could be seen from Athens, undoubtedly belonged to the number of "small islands" that the Athenian philosopher (Plato) considered examples of denudation. Aegina is Attica in miniature; and under even more severe pressure from the physical environment than that experienced by the Athenians, the Aegines anticipated many of the achievements of the Athenians. Aegina merchants controlled trade with the Hellenic settlement at Navcratis [+38] in Egypt, where Athenian merchants were very rare guests, and Aegina sculptors decorated the temple built by their own architects in Aphaia in honor of the local goddess, and this is half a century before the Athenian Phidias created his masterpieces for the Parthenon [+39] .
STIMULUS OF NEW LANDS
Evidence of philosophy, mythology and religion. Comparing different types of natural environment, we found that they carry a different stimulating impulse, and this is due to how favorable the environment is for living. Let us turn to the same issue from a slightly different angle and compare the stimulating effect of the old and new lands, regardless of quality features territory.
Is the effort to develop new lands an incentive in itself? Spontaneous human experience, finding its cumulative and concentrated expression in mythology, gives a positive answer to this question. A Western philosopher, a representative of the critical empiricism of the 18th century, agrees with this. David Hume, who concludes his treatise On the Origin and Development of the Arts and Sciences; the observation that "the arts and sciences, like some plants, require fresh soil; and however rich the earth may be, and however you maintain it, with skill or care, it will never, becoming exhausted, produce anything that would be perfect or complete in its kind"; [*11] .
An equally positive answer is given by the myth "Expulsion from Paradise"; and the myth "Exodus from Egypt";. Expelled from the magical garden into the everyday world, Adam and Eve move away from gathering and lay the foundation for the emergence of an agricultural and pastoral civilization. The exodus from Egypt, depriving the children of Israel of the tangible benefits of Egyptian civilization, gave them the Promised Land, where they laid the foundations of the Syrian civilization. Moving from myths to documents, one can see that these insights were confirmed in practice.
To the surprise of those who ask the sacramental question: "Can anything good come from Nazareth?"; [+40] - the answer can be found in the history of religions. The Messiah emerges from an unknown village in the "Galilee of the Infidels", a land conquered by the Maccabees less than a hundred years before the birth of Jesus [+41] . And when the rapid growth of the Galilean mustard seed [+42] turns the dissatisfaction of Orthodox Jewry into active hatred, and not only in Judea itself, but also in the Jewish diaspora, the preachers of the new faith deliberately "turn to the Gentiles"; and continue to conquer new worlds for Christianity.
In the history of Buddhism one can also see how the Indian idea did not find a place for itself in the old Hindu world, but, going beyond it, conquered new worlds. Hinayana began its advance from Ceylon, which was a colonial appendage of the Indus civilization. And the Mahayana, starting its long and roundabout path on Far East, conquers the Syrianized and Hellenized Indian province of Punjab. Only on this new basis could the religious geniuses of the Indus and Syrian civilizations, having come into contact, bear fruit, which once again confirms the truth: "There is no prophet without honor, except in his own country and his own house"; (Matt. 13:57).
Evidence of related civilizations. Let's turn to the class ";connected"; civilizations that have arisen in place of those that already existed. Let us compare the corresponding stimulating impulses of the old and new foundations, fixing the point or points through which the line of new social activity passed, and try to determine where the impulse comes from.
Let's start with the Babylonian civilization, the place of origin of which completely coincides with the boundaries of the Sumerian civilization. Consider three centers: Babylonia, Elam, Assyria. In which of them did the Babylonian civilization get its maximum development? Undoubtedly, in Assyria. The military prowess of the Assyrians, their successes in politics, achievements in the arts suggest that it was in Assyria that civilization reached its zenith. Was Assyria a new or old basis? Upon further analysis, it seems that Assyria was only part of the ancestral home of the Sumerian civilization that preceded it and can be seen as a new base - at least in comparison with Sumer, Akkad and Elam. Archaeological excavations on the territory of Assyria give some reason to believe that Assyria was not one of the local communities. In a sense, it was a colony, albeit a colony that almost coincided with the territory of its mother country. Perhaps it will not seem strange to say that the stimulus of renewal, having originated at some time in the early stages of the development of Sumerian society, could have a particularly strong impact on the subsequent development of the Babylonian civilization precisely on Assyrian soil.
Turning to Hindu civilization, let us note the local sources of new creative elements in Hindu life - especially in religion, which has always been the main and highest form of activity in Hindu society. We find these springs in the south. Here all the most characteristic features of Hinduism were formed: the cult of the gods, represented in temples by material objects or images, the emotional and personal attitude of the believer to God; metaphysical sublimation of figurative faith and emotionality in intellectually refined theology. Was South India the old or the new base? This was a new basis, as long as it did not fall within the realm of the related Indus civilization until the period of the Mauryan Empire (c. 323-185 B.C.), when the Indus society entered the stage of disintegration of civilization.
Turning to Hellenic history, the question can be raised about the two regions which, as we have just established, dominated the Hellenic world. The Hellenic civilization covered the Anatolian coast of the Aegean and the Greek peninsula on the European continent. Did civilization flourish on new or old soil? It should be recognized that on the new one, because none of these regions coincided with the ancestral home of the previous Minoan civilization, with which the Hellenic civilization was related. As for the peninsula, there the Minoan civilization, even in its heyday, was represented by nothing more than a series of fortified positions along the southern and eastern coastline. On the Anatolian coast of the Aegean, all attempts by Western archaeologists to find traces of the presence or at least the influence of the Minoan civilization ended in failure, and this can hardly be considered an accident. Rather, this indicates the existence of some reason that did not allow the inclusion of the coast in the sphere of the Minoan range. As far as is known, the first settlers of the western coast of Anatolia were representatives of the Minoan culture who spoke the Greek language. They appeared there in the 12th century. BC. as a result of the last convulsions of the post-Minoan tribal movement, which threw the Philistines to the shores of Syria. These were the founders of Aeolia and Ionia. Consequently, Hellenism flourished on soil that the preceding civilization, in fact, had not touched. Moreover, when the seeds of civilization came from Ionia to other parts of the Hellenic world, they sprouted most amicably on the stony soil of Attica. However, they did not ascend the Cyclades - the Ionian islands that lay like steppe oases between Asia and Europe. Throughout Hellenic history, the inhabitants of the Cyclades recognized themselves as humble slaves of the changing masters of the sea. This is remarkable because the Cyclades were one of the two centers of the preceding Minoan civilization. The other Minoan center, of course, was Crete. His role in Hellenic history is even more amazing.
As for Crete, here one would expect that it would retain its social significance not only for historical reasons as the center of the Minoan civilization, but also for geographical reasons. Crete for a long time remained the largest island of the Aegean archipelago and lay at the crossroads of the most important sea routes of the Hellenic world. Every ship going from Piraeus to Sicily passed between Crete and Laconia, and ships going from Piraeus to Egypt inevitably sailed between Crete and Rhodes. But if Laconia and Rhodes really played a leading role in Hellenic history, then Crete was considered an abandoned province. Hellas was famous for statesmen, poets, artists and philosophers, while the island, which was once the birthplace of the Minoan civilization, could only boast of doctors, merchants and pirates, and although the former greatness of Crete could be traced in Minoan mythology, this did not save Crete from dishonor, which consolidated by human rumor, turning its name into a common noun. Indeed, he was finally branded in the Song of Hybrius [+43] and later in Christian Scripture. "; Of them themselves, one poet said: "; Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy wombs"; "; (Tit 1:12). A poem called "Minos"; attributed to the Minoan prophet Epimenides [+44] . Thus, even the Apostle of the Gentiles did not recognize the virtues in the Cretans, which he endowed the Hellenes as a whole. [+45] .
A SPECIAL INCENTIVE TO OVERSEAS MIGRATION
This review is about creative possibilities old and new foundations, illustrated by fragments of histories of interconnected civilizations, provides some empirical support for the thought expressed by the myths of the Exodus and Exile - the idea that the emergence of new foundations generates a strong effect. Let's take a look at some examples that support this idea. Observations show that the unusual vitality of Orthodoxy in Russia and the Far Eastern civilization in Japan is a consequence of the fact that the stimulating effect of the new foundation becomes especially strong when the new foundation is found in overseas territories. [+46] .
A particular stimulus for overseas colonization is clearly seen in the history of the Mediterranean during the first half of the last millennium BC, when its western basin was colonized by overseas pioneers representing three distinct civilizations in the Levant. This becomes especially evident when one compares the largest of these colonial formations, Syrian Carthage and Hellenic Syracuse, with their ancestral home and sees how much they surpassed their mother city.
Carthage surpassed Tyre in terms of volume and quality of trade, building on this economic basis a political empire that the mother city could not even dream of. [+47] . IN equally Syracuse surpassed its mother city of Corinth in terms of political power, and their contribution to Hellenic culture is simply incomparable. The Achaean colonies in Magna Graecia, that is, in the south of the Apennines, began in the 6th century. BC. lively places of Hellenic trade and industry and brilliant centers of Hellenic thought, while the mother Achaean communities along the northern coast of the Peloponnese remained for more than three centuries aloof from the mainstream of Hellenic history, and rose from the darkness of oblivion after the Hellenic civilization had passed its zenith [+48] . As for the Locrians, the neighbors of the Achaeans, it was only in their overseas settlement in Italy that they acquired some individual features. [+49] . The Locrians of mainland Greece remained devoid of any identity.
Most striking is the case of the Etruscans, who successfully competed with the Greeks and Phoenicians in the colonization of the Western Mediterranean. The Etruscan colonies on the western coast of Italy were neither in number nor size inferior to the Greek colonies in Magna Graecia and Sicily and the Phoenician colonies in Africa and Spain; nevertheless, the Etruscan colonists, unlike the Greeks and Phoenicians, did not stop there. They moved forward into the depths of Italy, driven by an impulse that irresistibly drew them through the Apennines and the Po River to the very foot of the Alps, where they established their outposts. The Etruscans maintained close contacts with the Greeks and Phoenicians, and although this contact gradually led them to integrate into the Hellenistic social system, this by no means diminished their role and importance in the Mediterranean world. History has left us evidence of the unsuccessful Etruscan colonial undertaking, when a bold but futile attempt was made to compete with the Greeks in Greek native waters for dominance over the Dardanelles and for control of the Black Sea. More remarkable is the fact that the Etruscan homeland in the Levant, from where their overseas expansion began, turned out to be historical. terra incognita. There is no exact historical record of her whereabouts. The Greek legend that the Etruscans came from Lydia seems unfounded. One should be satisfied with the information provided by written sources from the time of the New Kingdom of Egypt. From these documents it follows that the ancestors of the Etruscans, as well as the ancestors of the Achaeans, participated in the post-Minoan movement of tribes, and their sea route to the west began somewhere on the Asian coast of the Levant in the no man's land between the Greek Sid and the Phoenician Arad [+50] . This amazing gap in historical evidence can only mean one thing, namely that the Etruscans, while at home, did not show themselves in any remarkable way. The striking contrast between the historical inconspicuousness of the Etruscans at home and their greatness in an overseas colony shows how powerful the stimulus they received in the course of overseas colonization was.
The stimulus effect of the sea route is perhaps the strongest of all that migratory peoples are exposed to.
Such cases seem rather unusual. The few examples that the author of this study could name are the migration of Teucres [+51] , Ionians, Aeolians and Dorians through the Aegean to the western coast of Anatolia and the migration of the Teucres and Philistines around the eastern edge of the Mediterranean to the coast of Syria during the post-Minoan movement of tribes; migration of the Angles and Jutes across the North Sea to Britain in the course of the post-Hellenistic tribal movement, the subsequent migration of the Britons across the strait into Gaul [+52] ; contemporaneous migration of Irish Scots across the North Channel to Northern Britain [+53] ; the migration of the Scandinavians in the course of the tribal movement, which followed the unsuccessful attempt to evocation the ghost of the Roman Empire by the Carolingians.
All these outwardly heterogeneous cases have one common and very specific feature that unites them. During overseas migration, the entire social baggage of migrants is stored on board the ship, as it were, rolled up. As the migrants enter alien territory, it unfolds, regaining its strength. However, it is often found here that everything that was so carefully preserved during the trip and was of significant value to migrants loses its value in a new place or cannot be restored to its original form.
This law is characteristic of all overseas migrations without exception. He, for example, acted during the ancient Greek, Phoenician, Etruscan colonization of the western basin of the Mediterranean and in the modern European colonization of America. The incentive to acquire new lands put the colonists before the challenge of the sea, and the challenge, in turn, prompted a response. In these particular cases, however, the colonists belonged to a society that was in the process of building a civilization. When overseas migration is part of a tribal movement, the challenge is much greater and the stimulus proportionately much stronger, due to the pressure that is then being placed on a society that is socially undeveloped and largely static. The transition from passivity to an unexpected paroxysm of "storm and stress"; makes a dynamic impact on the life of any community subjected to such a test; but this impact is naturally greater when migrants are on the high seas than when they move on land. An ox-cart driver has more power over the natural environment than a ship's captain. The driver may maintain constant contact with the house from which he set off; he can stop and set up camp where and when it suits him; and of course, it is easier for him to maintain the usual social order, which his seafaring comrade must abandon. Thus, it is possible to compare the stimulating effect of overseas migration during the movement of tribes with overland migration, and even more so with a stable stay in one place.
One distinctive phenomenon of overseas migration will help to clarify somewhat the problem of interracial tensions. The carrying capacity of any ship is limited, it is especially small for primitive vessels of small sizes. At the same time, even a primitive ship has relative maneuverability compared to a wagon or other land vehicle. In addition, overseas migration, unlike land migration, requires the selection of a ship's crew on a functional basis. In land migration, the tribe carries women, children, grain and household utensils in carts, while the men walk. Reflections of this can be seen in the legends about the founding of Hellenic Aeolia and Ionia, which have come down to us through Herodotus and Pausanias. Many inhabitants of the Greek city-states located along the western coast of Anatolia were connected by family ties with the inhabitants of the settlements on the peninsula. In addition, marriages were practiced with local women, whom the pioneers captured.
J. Major (1980-1990s) No. 5 Kudryavtsev...
