Posted on 02/19/2008 3:02:57 PM PST by blam
Excavations In Iran Unravel Mystery Of 'Red Snake'
ScienceDaily (Feb. 18, 2008) — New discoveries unearthed at an ancient frontier wall in Iran provide compelling evidence that the Persians matched the Romans for military might and engineering prowess.
The 'Great Wall of Gorgan'in north-eastern Iran, a barrier of awesome scale and sophistication, including over 30 military forts, an aqueduct, and water channels along its route, is being explored by an international team of archaeologists from Iran and the Universities of Edinburgh and Durham. This vast Wall-also known as the 'Red Snake'-is more than 1000 years older than the Great Wall of China, and longer than Hadrian's Wall and the Antonine Wall put together.
Until recently, nobody knew who had built the Wall. Theories ranged from Alexander the Great, in the 4th century BC, to the Persian king Khusrau I in the 6th century AD. Most scholars favoured a 2nd or 1st century BC construction. Scientific dating has now shown that the Wall was built in the 5th, or possibly, 6th century AD, by the Sasanian Persians. This Persian dynasty has created one of the most powerful empires in the ancient world, centred on Iran, and stretching from modern Iraq to southern Russia, Central Asia and Pakistan.
Modern survey techniques and satellite images have revealed that the forts were densely occupied with military style barrack blocks. Numerous finds discovered during the latest excavations indicate that the frontier bustled with life. Researchers estimate that some 30,000 soldiers could have been stationed at this Wall alone. It is thought that the 'Red Snake'was a defence system against the White Huns, who lived in Central Asia.
Eberhard Sauer, of the University of Edinburgh's School of History, Classics and Archaeology, said: “Our project challenges the traditional Euro-centric world view. At the time, when the Western Roman Empire was collapsing and even the Eastern Roman Empire was under great external pressure, the Sasanian Persian Empire mustered the manpower to build and garrison a monument of greater scale than anything comparable in the west. The Persians seem to match, or more than match, their late Roman rivals in army strength, organisational skills, engineering and water management.”
The research is published in the new edition of Current World Archaeology and the periodical Iran, Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies 45.
Adapted from materials provided by University of Edinburgh.
That may have been so, then. But they are still living in those days. They haven’t come far from that time period.
The Romans warred on and off for centuries with the Persians. The Persians gave as good as they got and the Romans never managed to defeat them. The Persians might have been a real challenge to Roman domination in the region but they practiced a kind of fuedalism that kept them fighting one another more often than they did their neighbors. They could unite to fight off the Romans but once they managed that they went back to going at each other.
“The Persians seem to match, or more than match, their late Roman rivals”
Today, they are living under the boots of muslim dictators!
Ever heard of Marathon, Plataea, Thermopylae, Issus, Granicus?
This was apparently the pre-islam Persian empire. Islam halted the advancement somehow. How and why that occured is the question that needs an answer.
Actually, parts of the Great Wall were built about the same time as this one, although what one thinks of as the wall today was completed about a 1000 years later.
I’m sure this all very encouraging for Iranians - as long they don’t think too closely about what it says regarding their culture’s long degenerate slide for the last few thousand years...
And portions of the Great Wall were actually built 6-700 years before the Persian one.
Hadrian: 76-138 AD Red Snake built sometime between 400 & 599 AD
I would hope, that with 300-500 years to study Roman methods, the Persians could ‘exceed’ their accomplishments!
Unfortunately, like 20th Century Frenchmen, they built their wall to fight the last war, instead of the next one: The Muslims attacked along a different front.
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Thanks Blam.the 5th, or possibly, 6th century ADIt's amazing that ancient construction of a such frontier walls comes off as such a huge surprise. It wasn't rocket science to build walls. One advantage the Persians had was that parts of the empire were so harsh that they weren't practical as invasion routes. :') |
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:’) Under Trajan, the Romans did kick the Persians out of Mesopotamia, but big T died at the end of that campaign, and his successor Hadrian abandoned it almost immediately. Perhaps the best chance the Romans had of conquering Persia was following Pompey’s campaign in Asia Minor, but that was made impossible by the Senate. Years later Marc Antony started on such a Parthian campaign, but from the sound of it must have spent most of the money on booze, and that fell apart.
:’) The Persians were benevolent after they got done kicking the hell out of everyone they felt like conquering. In that, they took the same approach as successful conquerors throughout history, including Alexander the Great, the Romans, and the colonial powers of Europe. They had a foothold in Europe, but never could whelm the Greek mainland or the Scythians, whom they chased all over until winter approached and the Persians had to run for it. I’ve often wondered that Napoleon didn’t learn from that, and the Germans (twice) in the 20th century.
Ardashir I's son Shapur I (241–272) whose his mother was daughter of a Parthian monarch, possibly Ardavan IV or one of the members of Suren-Pahlav Clan, continued this expansion, conquering Bactria and Kushan, while leading several campaigns against Rome. Penetrating deep into Eastern-Roman territory, Shapur I conquered Antiochia (253 or 256) and finally defeated the Roman emperors Gordian III (238–244), Philip the Arab (244–249), and Valerian (253–260). The latter was taken (259) into captivity after the Battle of Edessa, a tremendous and hitherto unknown disgrace for the Romans. Shapur I celebrated his victory by carving the impressive rock reliefs in Naqsh-e Rostam.
Relief of Shapur I at Naqsh-e Rostam, showing the two defeated Roma Emperors, Valerian and Philip the Arab
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The abrupt fall of Sasanian Empire was completed in a period of five years, and most of its territory was absorbed into the Islamic caliphate; however many Iranian cities resisted and fought against the invaders several times. Cities such as Ray, Isfahan and Hamadan were exterminated thrice by Islamic caliphates in order to suppress revolts and to terrify Iranian people. The local population either willingly accepted Islam, thus escaping from various restrictions imposed on non-Muslims, including the requirement to pay a special poll tax (jizya), or were forced to convert by the invading armies. Invaders destroyed the Academy of Gundishapur and its library, burning piles of books. Most Sasanian records and literary works were destroyed. A few that escaped this fate were later translated into Arabic and later to Modern Persian. During the Islamic invasion many Iranian cities were destroyed or deserted, palaces and bridges were ruined and many magnificent imperial Persian gardens were burned to the ground...
islam destroys pretty much anything it touches.
Yeah, the region would have been almost impossible to hold even if the Romans had taken it. Too far and people too fractious. Besides it fell outside the “natural” boundaries of the empire which were centered on the Mediterranean (did I spell that right?). I have read that Augustus understood this and made it policy that while there were Roman interests in the region there would be no real effort to conquer farther east.
This wall is, accoprding to the article, older than the great wall of China and was constructed in the first milenium of the Christian era.
Huh?
I was thinking more of the battle of Carrhae and the fact that even though the Romans did push into the region - most notably into Armenia - they were never able to hold it. The main reason seems to me to be the fact that the empire was based on the Mediterranean and pushing that far east would have been too great a strain on the legions. I also note that by the end of the 4th century the armored cavalry that had been the backbone of the Persian army during many of its confrontations with Rome was being copied by the Romans so there must have been something about it that they found rather compelling.
Maybe it just didn't interest them that much.
The eastern empire tried. They warred with the Persians for a long time in the 6th and early 7th centuries to the detriment of both as both became so weakened they were easy prey for the Moslem invaders in the late 7th century.
That's my impression too. Rome and Parthia exhausted themselves after centuries of warfare and were unable to stop the onslaught from Arabia.
:’) The Romans remained entrenched in eastern Anatolia for centuries, which gave the empire a link to overland trade routes of Central Asia. The fact is, the Parthians threat crested before Augustus.
Prior to Alexander the Great, the Persian empire had broken down into a state of turmoil not dissimilar to the “thirty tyrants” period of the later Roman empire, lasting eighty years, and ending not long before Alexander’s invasion. This doesn’t take away anything from A the G of course. Trajan’s timing was also very good.
It seems likely that Trajan was out for plunder and conquest, and therefore it seems likely that he hadn’t planned to stop with Mesopotamia; he probably planned a naval base on the Gulf, and an overland campaign into the Persian heartland and the former Elam.
The Romans knew about Alexander the Great’s conquests, knew about the extent of Persia, knew there were Hellenistic communities in Asia, and knew about India. Rome had trade with India even before this (at least one nice Indian piece has been found under the 79 AD eruption layer), and maritime contact with China took place later. It would have happened not long after Trajan, but Hadrian had pulled Roman forces out of Mesopotamia, so the Chinese wound up trading with the Arabs.
Burning all the libraries will do that to a civilization
Thanks FN.
Crassus’ son Publius was killed trying to stop an attack against the army’s rear; his head was speared on a spike and carried to where his father could see it... Surena sent messengers summoning Crassus to a parley and hinted at a truce... Meeting the enemy, Crassus was brutally killed and his head and hand taken with the victorious Parthians to the king. Crassus and the remaining soldiers fled and eventually brought the grim details back to Rome. In all, 20,000 legionaries were dead and an additional 10,000 were taken prisoner and never returned. The legionary standards were gleefully captured by the enemy... In Armenia, Hyrodes had made peace with Crassus’ erstwhile ally, Artavasdes. The new allies feasted and held dramatic performances of Greek literature. A Greek actor, Jason of Tralles, was performing before the two kings (performing a scene from Euripedes’ Bacchae) when the head of Crassus was brought in. Jason immediately donned women’s clothes and, pretending to be a frenzied Bacchante in the play, used Crassus’ head as a prop in the performance... The legionary standards Crassus lost at Carrhae were not returned to Rome until 20 BC, when Augustus received them from the Parthians (along with those lost by L. Decidius Saxa in Syria in 40 BC and Marc Antony in 36 BC). The defeated standards were placed in the temple of Mars Ultor; Augustus, celebrating their return, was voted a triumphal chariot which was also kept in the temple. One of the few images remaining of Crassus’ death is on the coins showing a kneeling Parthian returning his lost standards to Rome.
http://web.mac.com/heraklia/Caesar/contemporaries/crassus/index.html
After Justinian's reign and the terrible plague which came at that time, the Persians conquered Syria-Palestine, including the city of Jerusalem, by the early 7th century. The Byzantines retook the area after another 20 years of war, but the Muslim invasion of both Empires followed in less than 10 years. Persia fell in a decade, and all of the African and Asian parts of the Byzantine Empire, excepting Asia Minor, within 20 years.
Reading all comments with interest.
Hey, as everyone knows, Europe has contributed nothing... /sarc
Romans May Have Learned From Chinese Great Wall: Archaeologists
People’s Daily Online/Xinhua | 12-20-2005
Posted on 12/20/2005 12:59:10 PM EST by blam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1544089/posts
I thought that the pre-Islam Persians were Zoroastrians.
And the current Islamic blight under Ahmadi-Nejad (aka The Turd) continues this destruction by drowning the tomb of Cyrus the Great, who brought the first Declaration of Human Rights to the world, under the lake formed by a dam. He has also recently destroyed a historical. very ancient (pre-Mongolian era?) bridge in order to widen a road!
Barbarism knows no bounds with Islamic Iran today as in millenia past.
Muslims have a history of erasing any and all traces of history before the koran. If it wasn’t built or invented by a muslim, it must be erased.
All those ancient greek and roman statues missing noses, hands, feet, and sometimes heads?...mostly done by muslims. The sphinx?...muslims. The pyramids of egypt stripped...muslims.
Never heard that before, are you sure about that?
Thanks Fars for the ping.
The pyramids were originally covered with white marble or limestone or a stone that was inbetween these two. These were removed and cut up to build muslim homes. The pyramids also had a gold point. All those centuries the pyramids sat there unmolested until the muslims moved into the area. I forget the exact date the nose was chopped off the sphinx, but it was done by a muslim. I’m pretty sure history has the actual name of the actual man that did the chopping recorded. It’s been a long time since I read it. You may have a hard time finding these things on the internet. History has been sanitized in order to not insult the muslims.
You do remember the taliban destroying the ancient buddist statues in afghanistan don’t you?
Muslims believe that before the koran all mankind was ignorant and unenlightened and barbaric. Therefore, any evidence to the contrary is insulting to the muslim faith and must be erased.
This is why the european museums are reluctant to return ancient egyptian artifacts to the egyptian government. These artifacts were removed from egypt in a time when they would have been destroyed on sight. And now that there is perceived value by the western world, the muslims want them back. What for? To make a buck on them, or to destroy them? Maybe they want to do official “scientific” studies on them to prove that they are hoaxes or were actually muslim artifacts. Maybe they think they can prove that the Pharaohs were students of islam.
A lot of the destruction of Roman temples and art was done in the name of the Catholic Church. They actually reused the stones from Roman structures to build churches, or at least that’s what I was told by a tour guide in Italy.
I have pictures of my great grandparents in Russia about 1920.
America was really a dream to them, not for them...but their children and grandchildren etc. It took a lot of THEIR struggles to get to where myself and my children are today.
You have to WORK for the American Dream!!! We're an amazing country.
Thanks for the ping!
Interesting. Thanks for the ping.
Howdy Fred
Still giving history lessons I see. How’s everything?!
A.A.C.
still bashing islamo-nazis at every chance!
You bet! Nice to hear from you...where have you been?
As for islamo-nazis, Save this constantly updated file compiled by FReeper Beckwith:
http://www.freedomsenemies.com/_more/obama.htm
One of the few Gentile rulers who is mentioned in the Bible as being good. Cyrus was also prophesied LONG before he was even born. # Isaiah 45:13 I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness: I will make all his ways straight. He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free, but not for a price or reward, says the LORD Almighty. Isaiah lived and worked in the 8th Century BC. Cyrus was the king who let the Jews return to rebuild Jerusalem. This is most probably why the "Little Horn" of Iran has allowed the tomb of Cyrus the Great to be destroyed..................
Their time was not yet. God's hand is in everything. Their time is coming again, in The Latter Days........
Scientific dating has now shown that the Wall was built in the 5th, or possibly, 6th century AD, by the Sasanian Persians. This Persian dynasty has created one of the most powerful empires in the ancient world, centred on Iran, and stretching from modern Iraq to southern Russia, Central Asia and Pakistan.
The bridging of the Hellespont and invasion of Greece a thousand years earlier than this wall, was enough to convince me long ago "that the Persians matched the Romans for military might and engineering prowess."
Xerxes' second attempt to bridge the Hellespont was successful. Xerxes concluded an alliance with Carthage, and thus deprived Greece of the support of the powerful monarchs of Syracuse and Agrigentum. Many smaller Greek states, moreover, took the side of the Persians, especially Thessaly, Thebes and Argos. Xerxes set out in the spring of 480 BC from Sardis with a fleet and army which Herodotus claimed was more than two million strong.
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