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As we
already said in the preface, the creation in the Middle
Ages of a chronology which predominates even today in
historiography, by no means was caused God knows from
where by the whim of the lovers of antiquity who had
emerged.
This is in principle
an important aspect which demands explanation.
Otherwise, it will be complicated to understand what
happened with the history, for example, ofEurope in Scaliger's accounts
and of his followers.
The political situation in the European
countries, the aspiration of those holding supreme power
to demonstrate to the whole world the antiquity of their
race and on this basis to confirm the legitimacy of
claims for leadership both within the state and in the
international arena have become the chief stimulus in
the creation of a traditional chronology. Well, where
there's a demand, the supply springs up too.
Under all
monarchal courts immediately are found literate and in
many instances, talented people who carry out the most
important political orders.
It is clear, not unselfishly. Often even his life
depended on the talent and eagerness of the writer. It
didn't cost the all-powerful kings and dukes anything to
send an untalented scribbler to the block if his writing
didn't suit them.
And
there was another, powerful stimulus: rewards, honors,
scientific titles, and the benevolence of the monarchs.
By the way, this works in out time, too. Not long ago, a
certain author showed in his writing that the
representatives of the now ruling houses of
Europe are the descendants of
Jesus Christ! (D. Kalyuzhny and
A. Zhabinsky.
"The Other History of Wars.") They complimented
him for it and an English prince even conferred some
awards.
But let us return to Joseph Scaliger, the founder
of the traditional chronology who lived and labored in
that epoch. Then, besides the dynastic, the question of
the origin of the European peoples was one of the most
pressing. The process of their formation in the modern
sense of this word took place, and each of them,
naturally, wanted to know who the ancestors were.
The roots were called various things: both biblical
and Greek and barbarian, that is, German and English.
The Trojan version of the origin of the French was
popular. The historians
situated the centers of ancient cultures in their works
not only in
Greece
and Rome,
but also in
Spain,
England
and
France.
Everything depended on in which of the capitals the
writers were living. The very fundamental requirements
for roots were equal and common everywhere: the more
ancient, the better, and the more "antique" writings are
found, the more convincing.
After
the destruction of Rome
by the forces of Charles V (1527), there appeared so
many new versions of the origin of the European nations
that Anthony Grafton, author of a book about Scaliger,
compared the historical science of that time with a
mirrored labyrinth in which it is impossible to
understand and determine anything. Joseph Scaliger (1540
- 1609), philosopher, analyst of ancient texts and
mathematician, decided to put everything in order.
He didn't erect his creations in an empty place,
but to a significant degree, adhered to the generally
accepted ideas of his epoch. In particular, to the very
popular idea of the "succession of kingdoms" or the
"succession of monarchies." According to this idea, some
kind of a center of worldwide supremacy - a capital of
the main king, of an emperor, existed from the very
beginning of human history. At that, it changed its
location several times.
As a result, the history somehow was divided into
three parts - three monarchies. The first was called the
Babylonian. At first they called it Assyrian (Chaldean),
then - Persian-Medean. But the capital remained the same
- Babylon.
The second is the Greek or Macedonian with a
capital in
Alexandria.
It had been thought, and even now it is thought
in traditional history that the founder of the monarchy,
Alexander of Macedonia made
Alexandria
his capital.
Finally, the
Roman monarchy. They called it the last worldwide
monarchy. It was split into the Eastern and Western
Roman Empires. They, for their part, were broken up into
a multitude of independent states.
Such
is the overall plan. As the adherents of the new
chronology note, its traces are maintained in modern
history textbooks. Only instead of "monarchies" the term
"succession of civilizations" is used. The first
civilization arose in the area between two rivers - the
"Babylonian
Kingdom,"
then "ancient"
Greece
appeared, AND, finally -
Italy
- the "Roman
Empire." (Gleb
Nosovskiy, Anatoliy Fomenko "A New Chronology of
Russia,
England
and Rome")
If one tries to
examine the idea of the "three kingdoms" in more detail,
then questions unavoidably arise which demand
explanations. How in general was the idea born about
worldwide monarchies? Why in particular are there three
of them and not two or five? On what grounds were the
kingdoms placed in the pages of the historic works, in
particular in such an order and not in any other kind?
The adherents of the traditional chronology
confidently answer that these are the results of
archaeological research, an analysis of the compositions
of the ancient authors, linguistic investigations and so
on and so forth. Analyzing these
questions in particular, scholars of many generations
have created truly vast libraries of works. Hundreds of
books, dissertations, surveys, and abstracts written,
for example, one after the other about Ancient Greece
alone. Is it possible their authors relied on sources
which didn't contain a grain of truth, didn't reflect
the real situation of things? That doesn't
happen, they tell us. And they will be right.
The
inventive nature of "ancient" sources consists not in
the fact that the events described in them and their
heroes are fantastic, but in the fact that they, these
events, which occurred in the Middle Ages, have been
renamed and spread over various epochs and countries in
accordance with the ideological and other purposes of
noblemanly clients.
In connection with this, the notion of a
"worldwide monarchy" is of special interest for us. In
Scaliger's epoch there are no such monarchies. There exists, as
already has been said, a multitude of independent
states. From where, then, was the idea of "a center of
worldwide supremacy" taken? I doubt from the
imagination of historians. The memory of such a center
of such a monarchy was still very fresh in the
16th century. Yes, there was a worldwide
empire, at that, according to historic measurements,
very recently, and all the states, which arose on its
ruins, all the life of the people still bore on itself
the indelible stamp of this grandiose state structure,
the first in the history of mankind, under the name of
the Byzantine Empire.
As regards
the quantity of "worldwide empires," then it needs to be
said that Scaliger's predecessors and he himself didn't
write history, but computed it. There were whole trends
in just such a method of historiography - numerology,
cabala and astrology. Scaliger's older contemporary,
Jean Boden, composed a solid work, "A Method of Easy
Determination of History," in which he showed in
particular, how, in his opinion, to detect empires.
He
wrote: "The square of 12 is 144, and the cube is
1,728. Not
one empire in its existence exceeded the value of the
sum of these numbers; therefore, the larger numbers
should be rejected. Of the spherical numbers included in
the great number there are four - 125, 216, 625 and
1,296. With
the aid of several of these numbers. . . . . we permit
ourselves to study the miraculous changes of almost all
states. . .
. . Starting with the cube of 12, we shall find
that the monarchy of the Assyrians from King Ninus to
Alexander the Great embodies this number precisely. . .
It would be more accurate to say that a single monarchy
of the Assyrians and Persians existed than there
allegedly existed two different monarchies. In a
different case, we are supposed to distinguish the
kingdom of the Chaldeans, Medians and Parthians from the
Assyrian-Persian monarchy. . ."
It is impossible to distinguish; otherwise, the
great number will be broken. That is, the author
discovered an entire world empire, as they say, at the
tip of a pen, as a century later the astronomers
Leverrier and Adams calculated the planet
Neptune. Actually, the
"perception of history" is an extraordinarily easy
method. And discoveries, as we see, of a strictly
limited quantity of empires.
Relying on an
understanding of numerology, the author also easily and
naturally finds other chronological dates of various
states in antiquity. He juggles the names like a
magician:
"As regards the cube of seven, there also are
many examples. This number was chosen by Moses for the
establishment of a great festival. From the victory of
the Jews over Haman with the aid of Esther to the
victory over
Antioch, 343
years had passed, and both that and the other victory
were gained on the 13th day of the
12th month, which the Jews call Adar. . .
That same number of years had passed from the time, when
Augustus I established control, until the time when
Constantine the Great achieved domination. The kingdom of
the Persians, from Cyrus to Alexander, lasted 210 years
- a number which is formed from 30 whole sevens."
The whole book is built on such arguments. For
Boden, history is not the past of mankind, but a design
created as a result of manipulations with numbers. He is
a faithful adherent of the Masons and numerologists who
impart a mystical essence to numbers.
It wouldn't be worth talking about Boden's
exercises if they weren't used and developed in the
works of Scaliger and his followers, especially
Petavius. The astrologers, numerologists and prophets
are who laid the basis of the traditional chronology.
And this is appropriate. One need remember that other
methods for the analysis of history still didn't exist
then. There were and could not be any other fundamental
principles besides those designated in the Bible and in
a number of mystical studies.
Thus, numerology for Scaliger and his followers
is not a questionable mind game, but a serious method of
historic
research.
One
need recognize that they were executing a task of
grandiose complexity: they were forming
a plan of the development of all world history! No one
after them has undertaken such a fundamental problem.
They wrote, more than once, numerous volumes of writings
with the envelopment of the majority of countries and
peoples, but in the main it was the very same plan of
Scalger and Petavius.
What
is especially important, in this plan such a
structural-forming medieval result also is used as the
theory of historic cycles.
Quite a number of the names of the disciples of
their theory have been preserved. Traditional
historiography relates them to various epochs and
peoples. Here are both
Ancient Greece, and
Rome, and
China
and Central
Asia. The Roman
historian Polybius supposedly as early as before the
start of the Christian Era wrote a 40 volume "General
History," in which it was based on the notion of
"historic cycles."
Polybius and his confederates examined the
history of society as a rotation, as a movement along a
closed circle with a periodic return to the starting
point. This meant that mankind moves endlessly along a
wheel, stretched out in time.
Then an understanding
of the cycle as a spiral began to prevail, the
repetition of analogous, but distinct phases in a
forward movement, an undulating and progressive
development. (Yuriy Yakovets
"Cycles. Crises.
Forecasts" 1999)
As is explained in the books on "cycles," all
great phenomena and facets of life also have their own
"spirals," and each country, it is clear, also. They
endlessly are superimposed on each other, resembling on
the whole the entangled turns of barbed wire.
We will
not examine the validity of such a vision of history.
Perhaps there are its
own reasons in it. Let us say only that it too now is
enjoying relative popularity. In the times of Scaliger
it was overwhelming. And it allowed the chronologists to
arrange historical events as the theory suggested. And if they discovered
that, let us assume, on the coil of "ancient"
Greece,
which corresponds to today's coil, there is no event
similar to it, that has happened now, and then they sent
a duplicate of such an event into extreme antiquity.
Since history is repeated, that means at some time the
very same thing happened as today.
At the same
time, history should have been sufficiently consistent
and allowed to fabricate solid and convincing
genealogical rulers and to fill the past as if it were
with significant events which have great moral and
educational significance for the descendants. Scaliger and his
followers in the literal sense of the word created
history and were convinced that they were doing a good
thing.
They
fabricate history, unfortunately, in all epochs,
including too in ours, and in all countries, recasting
it in accordance with present political interests.
Let us look at how the medieval reality of
"ancient" Greece
was reflected in history. What do we know about this
country?
We know, to our
delight, much. To our delight for the reason that none
of the originals of the "ancient Greek" compositions
ever were in the hands of even the most conscientious
researchers. Some are only references in works ascribed
to various chroniclers, frequently also to the
legendary.
At that,
these works appeared after the millennium of the "Dark
Ages," when no one and nowhere recalled anything about a
Greece and a Rome. In the Middle Ages themselves
both the volumes of ancient historians and the poems of
Homer and also of other Hellas poets, and legends and myths were
found suddenly. . . Where they were hidden for ten
centuries, no one knows. And they still say that there
are no miracles in the world.
But
we will not find fault.
The
traditional views are such:
the history of Ancient Greece starts from the
turn of the 3rd and 2nd millennia B.C. -- with the rise of the first state
formations on the island of Crete, and ends in the 2nd - 1st centuries B.C., when the
Greek and Hellenistic states of the Eastern
Mediterranean were conquered by Rome and included as
part of the Roman Mediterranean power.
We
shall single out several bright moments in this history,
which are the most well-known to the readers. One of the most
popular is the Trojan War, described in the poems of the
great blind poet, Homer. Historians have been drawing
from them over the centuries one or the other signs of
the past. The poems "Iliad" and "Odyssey" became, per
se, a source for the construction of a whole section of
Greece's history.
The Trojan War,
as the traditional historians write, is a war of the
Achaeans against Troy at the
end of the 13th century
B.C.
According to mythological tradition, the
abduction by Paris, the son of the Trojan king Priam, of
the beautiful Helen, the wife of the King of Sparta,
Menelaus was the casus belli. Then irregulars of
kings from almost all the areas and cities of Greece,
who at sometime had laid claim to Helen's hand and were
connected by a vow to always aid him whose wife she
became, were assembled. According to Iliad
there were 100,000 warriors in the Achaean force,
and 1,186 ships.
An
attempt to obtain Helen's return by negotiations (the
embassy of Menelaus and Odysseus to Priam) failed, and a
siege of the city began which lasted more than 9 years.
The events of the final, 10th year of the war make up
the content of "Iliad." Apollo's priest,
Chryses, asked Agamemnon to return to him a
daughter who had been taken captive, Chryseis, but was
refused. Apollo, who had been
aiding the Trojans, inflicted a plague on the
Achaean forces. In order to propitiate
the god, Agamemnon returned Chryses' daughter,
but in exchange took Briseis from Achilles as his
prisoner. The angry Achilles
refused to take part in the war. The Achaeans
began to meet with failure after this, and many heroes
were casualties.
Only when the Trojans burst into the Achaean camp
and began to threaten the ships did Achilles send his
friend Patroclus, having given him his own armor. The Trojans ran to the
protection of the fortress walls, but Patroclus died by
Hector's hand. Achilles, avenging his
friend and in new armor forged by Hephaestus, entered
the battle and killed Hector, desecrating his body.
Hector's father, the old Priam, on coming to Achilles
prayed for the return of his son's body. At the sight of the
father's grief, Achilles softened and gave back Hector's
body. "Iliad" ends with the
funerals of Patroclus and Hector.
Excavations in the places referred to in the
myths about the Trojac war supposedly confirm the
historicity of a huge military clash of Achaeans with
the tribes of the northwestern part of Asia Minor in the beginning of the 13th Century B.C.
So write the traditional historians.
They suppose that the fall of
Troy occurred in 1225 B.C. The
precision of the date is astonishing if one considers
that no written sources which confirm it exist. Well and
when did Homer live? According to the
Columbian Encyclopedia (U.S.), the poems "Iliad" and
Odyssey were written by the poet for an aristocratic
audience in Asia Minor before 700 B.C. That is, if one
is to believe this report, the author lived 500 years
after the war. Just how come one can write beautiful
verses and about events of such long standing? One can
expect everything from poets. But, you see, Homer didn't
write anything, not ever: he was blind. Moreover, his poems,
written in small print, take up 700 pages!
Let us assume
Homer possessed a staggering memory and recalled all the
lines composed by him. But you see, the poems weren't
written during down his lifetime as well. Commentators
report to readers that a special commission in Athens wrote
down the "Iliad" and Odyssey" for the first time several
hundred years later. How did these works
then get to the commission?
The
traditional historiography promotes the following
version: fellow citizens of
the poet learned by heart all 700 pages, then retold
them to new audiences, who in their own turn, to the
next generations, and thus it was continued for several
centuries.
For
the sake of fairness, it must be said that the 20th century knows several
outwardly similar cases. When the Kirghiz, who live in
Central Asia, received their written language for the
first time (the first half of the 20th century), their national
oral epos "Manas" finally was fixed on paper, the text
of which was handed down from generation to generation.
In Uzbekistan
in that very same decade, the "Alpamysh" epos was
written down. Musicians and poets used special
techniques and methods for the fixation of the famous
Uzbek "Makom," the popular sung legends of hoary
antiquity.
It would seem,
in relation to "Iliad" and "Odyssey," one also can
assume such a variant. But all the trouble is in the
fact that these poems over many centuries are the "Dark
Ages"! - they were not known to anyone. The traditional
historians themselves write: "In medieval Europe, they knew Homer
only through the quotations and references from Latin
writers and Aristotle. At the end of the
14th century, the
Italian humanists became more closely acquainted with
Homer. . . Only in 1723 did the first translation of the
"Iliad" appear, done by the poet Anton Maria Salvini".
It is
asked, where then was the text of the Homeric
compositions for nearly 2,000 years? In which heads were
they kept? And did a blind poet by the name of Homer
exist in any event?
Vico
(1668-1744), the author of the work "Principles of the
New Science Concerning the Common Nature of Nations"
thought that the Homeric poems were written by various
authors and in various epochs. He, as also many others,
started from the works themselves. They were written as
magnificent verse, polished to perfection, and strike
one with a wealth of vocabulary and persistent
expressions, and this testifies beyond controversy to
the fact that the author or authors were grounded in the
solid poetical traditions of their time. However, we
know neither Homer's predecessors nor followers. As
early as the 20th
century, there existed the opinion that Homer created in
proud solitude. On the other hand, the composition of
the poems is loose, full of long, drawn out passages,
unnecessary insertions and digressions, which don't
relate to the subject. For specialists, this is serious
evidence of the fact that more than one author had art
and part in the creation of Iliad and "Odyssey."
A question about the authorship of the "Iliad"
and the "Odyssey" was put forward in 1795 also by the
German scholar Friedrich August Wolf in a forward to an
edition of the Greek text of the poems. Wolf considered
the creation of a large epos in an illiterate period as
impossible, suggesting that the tales were created by
various poets.
Scholars
were divided into "analysts," followers of Wolf's theory
(the German scholars Karl Lachmann, A Kirchhoff with his
theory of "small eposes;" G. Herman and the English
historian George Grote with their "theory of the basic
kernel," in Russia F.F. Zelinskiy shared it) and the
"unitarians," adherents of a strict unity of the epos
(the translator of Homer, Johann Heinrich Voss and the
philosopher Gregor Wilhelm Nitzsch, Friedrich Schiller,
Johann Wolfgan von Goethe, and Hegel in Germany, and
N.I. Gnedich, V.A. Zhukovsky and Alexander Pushkin in
Russia.)
At the same
time, however, not one of them doubted that nonetheless
there had been a Trojan War.
The archaeological digs performed later, in
particular by Heinrich Schliemann literally according to
Homer's poems, also somehow showed that the Trojans at
sometime had been beaten with the Achaeans there in
particular where the "Iliad" indicated. Contemporary
commentators of the "Iliad" and the "Odyssey" are in
full rapture from Schliemann: "The sensational
discoveries of G. Schliemann in 1870 - 80 have shown
that Troy,
Mycenae and
the Achaean strongholds are not myths, but reality.
. The consistencies of a
number of his finds in the fourth tunneled tomb in
Mycenae with
Homer's accounts have amazed Schliemann's
contemporaries. The impression was so
strong that Homer's epoch for a long time began to be
associated with the period of the flourishing of Achaean
Greece
in the 14th - 13th centuries B.C."
However, in
other works devoted to the Trojan War, the traditional
historians just as joyfully write: "Like Columbus, he
opened up a world more astonishing that that which he
had searched. These riches were many
centuries older than Priam and Hecuba; these graves were
not the tombs of the Atrides, but ruins of an Aegean
civilization in continental Greece,
just as ancient as the Minoan epoch of Crete. While not suspecting
it himself, Schliemann confirmed the truth of Horace's
famous line: vixerunt fortes ante Agamemnona - "Brave
men were living before Agamemnon."
So, finally, did Heinrich Schliemann discover
Troy or
something else? No one knows.
Indignation bursts from archaeologists when they recall
Heinrich Schliemann. They write that he was a
self-taught person, had digs while not observing any
rules and destroyed beyond hope whole cultural groups at
the site of an ancient settlement, which arbitrarily was
called Troy by him.
That is how the discoverer turned out.
As
regards the Trojan War itself, then it turns out there
is evidence of its immediate participants. That is,
there was. And these participants are called Dictis and
Dares Phrygius. Only they didn't live in great
antiquity, but in the Middle Ages and wrote not in
Greek, but in the Latin language. At that, their "dry
and monotonous account of the facts of the siege" was
thought of more highly in those times than "Homer's
incredible poem." In particular, not just anybody writes
in such expressions but the traditional historians
themselves.
The journals of
Dictis and Dares gave birth in medieval Europe to a multitude
of works which are combined today under the title of the
"Trojan Cycle." And their fame
eclipsed the fame of Homer until the 17th century itself: "Dares Phrygius became
one of the most well-known writers of antiquity."
But, perhaps, Dictis and Dares also were
invented? Nothing like it. Both
of them are mentioned in Homer's poems. If one recalls
that the text of "Iliad" and "Odyssey" appeared for the
first time only in the 14th century, then everything
falls into place. They really existed and really wrote
their journals long before the author or authors of the
poems which afterwards mentioned them in their own
compositions.
There is an interesting fact in the history of
the Middle Ages: supposedly in the 8th - 9th centuries A.D. at the
court of Charlemagne there lived the famous poet
Englebert. And he bore the name
of Homer! Would he one way or the other give his own
name to the Greek variant of the description of the
Trojan War?
However, we won't persist in this, because there
is one more fact worthy of mentioning. The 19th century German historian
Ferdinand Gregorovius in the thorough monograph, "A
History of the City of Athens in
the Middle Ages," gives a detailed alphabetized index of
the names of rulers, heroes and warriors. Among them is
also the family Saint Homer, that is St. Homer, who
played a noticeable role in the history of
Italy
and Greece
in the 13th Century A.D.
Representatives of this family were participants of the
"Trojan" war of the 13th
century. It is fully assumable that someone of the
representatives of this family - a remarkable poet of
the 14th - 15th centuries - collected and wrote down the
family legends of the family of Homers about this war in
the form of the two grandiose epic poems.
In any case, "Iliad" and "Odyssey" are belated
works of art which were created in the Renaissance epoch
as the poetic peak of all the "Trojan Cycle." (Gleb Nosovskiy,
Anatoliy Fomenko "Russia
and Rome," Vol.
1)
The Trojan War
in "ancient" Greece
is an imaginary reflection of the
Gothic War, which occurred in the early Middle
Ages. A detailed comparison of the two wars shows their
coincidence even in trifles. We shall cite some of the
results of the research described in the book
"Russia
and Rome."
The Trojan kingdom knows seven kings who ruled in
sequence. The first is the
founder of the city and all the state. The fall of Troy and the
death of the kingdom occurs with the seventh king.
The
Roman
Empire, described by Livy, also has seven
emperors who ruled in sequence. The first is the founder
of the city and the state. Rome comes
to an end and is turned into a republic during the
seventh empire.
Both wars last almost equally:
the first - 10, the second - 12 years.
The
Trojan kingdom was destroyed twice. And these collapses
are the only ones in its history.
In the history of the Roman Empire (according
to Livy) and its duplicate - Roman Empire III (in the
West), there also were two collapses. The second and
final is the Gothic War. These two collapses are also
the same in the history of Roman Empire III.
The
two newcomer-strangers Jason and Hercules destroyed the
first Trojan kingdom. "Newcomers from the
West. . . captured the city" ("Trojan Legends")
The
two newcomer-strangers Odoacer and Theodoric destroyed
the "purely Roman" Empire (First Empire), having invaded
from the northwest.
After the first
destruction, the Trojan empire, in essence also becomes
Trojan: earlier it had been
called the Dardan Settlement.
After the first
collapse, the Roman
Empire in the West changes its name. It is
turned into an Ostrogothic kingdom in
Italy.
A Tarquin-ruled dynasty.
The
Trojan name arose from the name of the new king, Troil,
who "built more than others in the city and gave it his
own name - Troy."
A new
name appears at the end of the Roman Empire II - the
Emperor Trajan.
The newcomer Greeks
complete the second and final destruction of the Trojan
kingdom.
The
second and final collapse of the Roman Empire III in the
West also is the handiwork of the newcomer Greco-Romans.
The
Trojan War flared up because of a woman - a so-called
offence to Helen, wife of Menelaus.
The
Tarquin War was caused by an offence to Lucretia. This
is most colorfully described by Livy. A quarrel breaks
out between the husband rulers of the kingdoms over
whose wife is better. "Each extremely
praises his own," and the quarrel soon develops into an
armed conflict.
In the tale
about Troy,
Paris
kidnaps Helen by force.
According
to Livy, Sextus Tarquinius seizes Lucretia and dishonors
her. . .
Don't let
the numbering of Roman Empires I, II and III confuse the
readers. In the opinion of the adherents of the new
chronology, the real Holy Roman Empire was
in the 10th - 11th centuries. The rest, which are
referred to by the traditional historiography in various
centuries are the imaginary reflections of the Middle
Ages.
The
parallels between the Trojan and Gothic wars are
endless. Even the famous episode with the Trojan horse
coincides. What is known about
it? It is so huge that
several hundred warriors were able to find room inside
it. It stands on wooden legs. It in some way got into
the city. In "Iliad" it says that the stupid Trojans
pulled it into Troy. This
is as absurd as the historical joke about the fact that
the shepherds of ancient Greece
were singing Homer's verses for several hundred years
while educated people didn't write down the poems.
(Dmitri Kalyuzhny, Aleksandr Zhabinsky)
Is
there anything similar in the Gothic war?
Of course. The Greeks also used guile in the
storming of Naples (New
Town or New Rome), which they had not been able to take
in any way. They penetrated it at night through a huge,
recently deserted aqueduct which was a stone tunnel with
an exit beyond the fortress walls. In the morning they
opened the gates, and the troops who attacked
slaughtered the still sleeping defenders of the city.
The
evidence of the fact that the famous Trojan horse is the
poetic form of the real aqueduct water supply is not
complicated. The first Trojan
chronicles which reached us, as we recall, were written
in Latin. And in Latin the word "horse" is written
"equa," and water is "aqua." That is, practically the
same. Moreover, the word
aqueduct - "aqua-ductio" - "that which leads water" is
identical to the word "that which leads a horse" -
"equa-ductio." There is a difference in only one vowel.
Therefore,
aqueduct also was changed into a perception of the late
foreign authors who confused one vowel, in horse, which
called into being a blossoming of
absurd legends about the Trojan horse.
It must be said that
there are a lot of similar events in literature, and it
concerns in particular the literature and not the true
history. Only the most well-known. We already have
talked about the fact that in the translation of the Old
Testament from Hebrew to Greek the Reed Sea, on the bottom of which Moses led
the Jews during the Exodus from
Egypt, was turned into the Red and even
remained so in the text of the Scripture. There also is
another famous example, but it is somewhat amusing.
Charles Perrault, the author of the world-renowned tale
"Cinderella," was not writing in the least about a glass
slipper which fell off the heroine's foot at the ball.
He was writing about a lady slipper, edged with fur. But
in the translation from the French, the lady slipper by
mistake became a glass slipper, and this was so in
keeping with the spirit of the tale, that the slipper
has stayed in it forever.
And so the
aqueduct in the passing of centuries in the poems was
changed into the Trojan horse.
The classical period in this
story, according to the accepted periodization, embraces
the time from the threshold of the 6th and 7th centuries
to 338 B.C. Greece had to defend its distinctive
character and right to existence in a struggle with the
Achaemenid power, which was realizing its expansion to
the West. Let us chose one moment in this battle:
In
480 B.C., a huge Persian army and navy under the
leadership of King Xerxes invaded Greece. Despite the
heroic resistance of a detachment of Spartans headed by
King Leonidas in the Thermopylae ravine, the Persians
broke through to Central Greece. The population of
Athens fled, the conquerors captured the city and
plundered it. The main events occurred in 479 B.C., when
the Persians endured two defeats - both on the land and
at sea. Greece had been able to defend its independence.
The
legendary battle at Thermopylae of 300 Spartans with the
Xerxes horde is well known to the whole civilized world.
It is glorified in many works as an example of
fearlessness and bravery of people in a struggle for the
freedom and independence of their country. The "father
of history" Herodotus wrote about it in his monumental
work, "The Histories," which is devoted mainly to the
wars of the Greeks with the Persians.
But
whether there was such a battle in actual fact and
really whether Herodotus lived in the 5th century B.C.
evokes deep and well-founded doubts. Having glanced at
Ferdinand Gregorovius' writing devoted to medieval
Greece, we will find there a detailed description of the
same battle. With only one difference: instead of the
Spartans, 300 knights were active in it.
The
events in the Middle Ages developed according to the
same plan as with "antiquity." (According to the
"historic cycle"!) Byzantine and Turkish forces attack
the country (1275 A.D.) Much about them is curious, the
navy supports them from the sea. They surround the city
of Neopatria. The city's ruler, having safely escaped
and stealing his way through Thermopylae to Duke Jean la
Roche, asks him for help. The latter gathers 300 well
armed knights and meets the aggressors in the
Thermopylae ravine. By the way, among the knights is
Lord de Saint Homer, that is, of the Homers. But this is
an aside. At the sight of the large numbers of enemy,
Jean la Roche pronounces the famous phrase: "Many
people, but few men." It is well known by the fact that,
it turns out, the Persian King Xerxes pronounced it
1,800 years before the duke, when he was preparing to
battle with the 300 Spartans. Here are Herodotus'
precise words: "Then, one can say, it became clear to
all, and especially to the king himself, that the
Persians have many people, but among them the men are
few."
An
absolute coincidence. Therefore, it cannot be
accidental. Ferdinand Gregorovius is in some confusion
from such a turn: "It seems to me that these words are
borrowed from Herodotus.. . Although its expression was
able to enter the duke's head simply at the sight of a
similar state of affairs." The author, naturally, is in
no condition even to imagine that it is a question of
one and the same battle, and that, most likely,
Herodotus was writing his book not in great antiquity,
but as early as after the battle at Thermopylae, not
earlier than the 14th
century. Otherwise, he would not have found out what the
most gallant and worthy duke had said.
Ferdinand Gregorovius generally notes quite a few
coincidences that occurred in the Middle Ages, with the
period of "antiquity." For example, of the sort:
"Suleiman, the valiant son of Orhan, crossed the
Hellespont
by night in 1345. . . Here for the first time the Turks
gained a foothold on European soil. The Byzantines
compared this horde of conquerors with the Persians and
even called them that same name." That which they were
comparing was not surprising:
people always compare something somehow. But the
fact that they called the Turks Persians defies any
explanation. This in any case what the German masses of
the Second World War called the French, recalling
Napoleon's campaigns.
The
next famous event in Ancient Greece is the Peloponnesian
War of 431 - 404 B.C. It is described in detail by
Thucydides, a military leader and Greek historian of
that time, in "The History of the Peloponnesian War."
The traditional
historiography reports that his work became will known
in Europe
thanks to the Latin translation of Lorenzo Valla and the
English of Thomas Hobbes. That is, according to historic
measurements, quite recently. Just where did the
book disappear over the centuries until it became
well-known in Europe? Traditional
historiography is keeping quiet.
The historians
are saying nothing and because of the fact that the
views of Thucydides', who is
well-known for his aphorism, are very close to the
logical creations of the father of political science,
Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527 A.D.), who thought that
in history one must search for methods of strengthening
sovereign power and that its main goal is to serve the
interests of the rulers. Thucydides expressed himself
more abstractly, but per se he thought the same way:
"History is a philosophy in examples." With such an
approach there cannot even be talk about an objective
account of the movement of events that took place. This
is a view of a medieval historian who worked for the
sake of certain goals. And you see, between Thucydides
and Machiavelli, in the opinion of the traditional
chronology, is the abyss of centuries.
Let
us look at what Thucydides writes.
In
431 B.C., a war broke out between the Peloponnesian and
Athenian naval allies, which had seized all of
Greece
and received the name of the Peloponnesus. It continued, with a
short period of truce all of 27 years, but Thucydides
told only about the first 20 years.
Adherents of the new chronology think that
well-known medieval war in Greece
(1374 - 1387), which led to the death of the Catalan
state on this country's territory, was its original.
The people of
Navarre
and the Athenians participate in the14th century war. A most huge
congress preceded it, at which delegates from all the
areas of Greece
had gathered. Sparta and
Athens
collide in the Peloponnesian War. The congress of
deputies of the Peloponnesian Alliance preceded it.
In both cases, the war started a year after the
meetings.
In the Middle Ages, the Peloponnesian and
Corinthians invade the enemy's territory. The Corinthian
principality is the strongest in Peloponnesia in that
epoch.
The
Spartans (Peloponnesians) headed by the Peloponnesian
Alliance attack Athens.. In both cases, Athens held out in the first military
period.
In
both cases the war bears a violent nature. Both
Gregorovius and Thucydides write about it.
At the end of the war of the 14th century, Nerio Acciaiuoli
becomes the leader. A successful military leader, a fine
diplomat. His forces capture Athens in
particular.
At the end of the Peloponnesian War, the
Spartan
Lysander advanced into first place. A successful
military leader, a fine diplomat. He destroyed the
Athenian state in particular.
The
storming of Athens in
both cases is identical.
The
victor Nerio establishes a new political order -
tyranny. He is now called "the Athenian Tyrant."
After the victory, Lysander introduces in
Athens "the
tyranny of the thirty." This period in the history of
the ancient city also is called: "the government of the
thirty tyrants." ... The coincidences fall
as if from the horn of plenty in the hands of the
goddess Gaia.
The
fact that brought itself to the attention of the
adherents of the new chronology is that Thucydides in
his "History" described three eclipses which occurred in
the Mediterranean
Sea area during the war. In as much as
eclipses occur with invariable precision and regularity
over the course of thousands and thousands of years, the
possibility appeared to determine in which centuries in
particular and years this astronomical show took place.
It turned out that of the temporal segment from 900 B.C.
to 1700 A.D. there are only two
precise astronomical calculations. And both of them are
related to the 11th century. In the first solution - for
the 1039th, 1046th and 1057th years. In the second, for
the 1113th, 1140th and 1151st years. In both cases, the
triad embraces 18 years each and the intervals between
the eclipses coincide. There has not been such a triad
of eclipses in the last 2,600 years of precise
astronomical calculations.
It is
useless to argue with astronomy. Therefore, one may say
unambiguously that there were no such eclipses in
ancient Greece.
Consequently, there wasn't even the Peloponnesian War
itself. True, the eclipses
also don't occur for the years of the medieval war. But
as has been discovered by the adherents of the new
chronology, a displacement of temporal segments happened
steadily in the traditional historiography, which is
called chronological shifts, when several real events
are mixed up onto one whole and later carried into the
distant past.
The mathematical methods used in the analysis of
traditional history have shown that these shifts and
carry-overs are not chaotic. The have approximately the
same magnitude and are found in hundreds of cases. And
what is more in accordance with the "historic cycles"
and Masonic numerology with its magical numbers. The graphical
representation of the Scaliger chronology, created by
contemporary scholars, even looks on the surface like
symbols of masonry - the compass (Greek history) and the
set square (Roman history.) This, as Dmitri Kalyuzhny
and Aleksandr Zhabinsky write, is the "composite center"
of Scaliger history. ("The Other
History of Wars")
Moving
further along the time scale, we come to Alexander of
Macedonia. In the traditional history it is recounted
that a new force gradually ripened in the north of
Greece
- the Macedonian Empire. With King
Phillip II (359 - 336 B.C.) it achieved power that had
been unknown earlier.
Athens headed a battle with Phillip. But,
despite desperate resistance, they suffered
defeat.
As early
as with Alexander's father war starts with the Persians,
however, the murder of Phillip in 336 B.C. postponed the
realization of the Eastern Crusade for some time. Having come to the
throne, Alexander cruelly dealt with the father's
killers and possible pretenders to the throne.
In the spring of
334 B.C., the Macedonian army and allied Greek
detachments ferry to Asia Minor. Alexander's
army was considerably inferior numerically to the
Persian, but won in a severe battle, and the way to
Asia Minor
was opened to Alexander.
Having finished
its conquest, Alexander entered Northern Syria. Here he had once again
to meet with Persian forces - this time King Darius III
himself stood at their head. The Macedonians
succeeded in winning the battle that took place the fall
of 333 B.C. near Issa.
Later,
Alexander captures the Phoenician
Coast,
where Tyre
rendered the most stubborn resistance, but in 332 the
city was taken by storm. The capture of
Gaza opened
the way to Egypt,
the satrap of which, not having sufficient forces for
resistance, surrendered.
During the stay
in Egypt,
Alexander founded a city in the Nile delta, giving it
his own name. He completed a
pilgrimage to the oracle of Ammon in the desert, priests
of whom declared Alexander as the son of Ammon, having
recognized, consequently, his divine parentage. Thus his power over
Egypt
received a divine basis.
In
the spring of 331 B.C., Alexander moved to the north.
Crossing the
Euphrates
and the Tigris, he approached
the small town of Gaugamela,
and here on 1 October 331 B.C.
occurred the decisive battle. Although the Persian
army was stronger than at Issa, the Macedonians did not
succeed this time in routing it.
Now Alexander
already had been dreaming about worldwide rule. He
conquered vast areas along the Indus river, but
nevertheless, he did not succeed in completing the
Indian campaign. The army, exhausted by
the campaign, refused to go further. Alexander turned back
with the remnants of his army to Babylon.
The
king's policy at that time was directed at the
unification of his huge state. A broad campaign for
the founding of new cities in the conquered territories
is put into practice (Alexander viewed them as the
strong points of his power.) He also was preparing
for new campaigns. However, at the
high point
of these preparations, Alexander dies in 323 B.C. from a
fever at the age of 33.
A fine
subject, worthy of the pen of a great writer. A whole
epic, compressed by us to the dimensions of one page.
But, alas, it is not original. The empire of Alexander
of Macedonia has too many of the same features as the
Osman (Ottoman) Empire, which was founded in the 15th Century by Mahomet II. He
conquered countries just as it is described in the
legends about the Macedonian. In a comparison
of the maps of the Osman Empire and the Macedonian
empire, it is clearly visible that the European and
Mediterranean borders
of both conquests practically coincide.
There are overly curious pages in the medieval
writings and manuscripts connected with the Macedonian
and Mahomet II. In some Turkish
documents of that time, Mahomet II is glorified as
Alexander! In others - of
European origin - Alexander the Macedonian pays
compliments. . . to France.
Monks are present with
crosses and thuribles during the funerals of the great
conqueror. And the Macedonian is buried not anywhere,
but in one of the Egyptian pyramids. From the point of
view of the traditional historians, all of this is
absolute nonsense.
One
may add that, in the opinion of the medieval authors,
"Orpheus is the contemporary of Aeneas, Sardanapal - the
King of Greece, and Julian the Apostate - a Papal
chaplain. That is, a multitude of epochs, countries and
names is supposedly fully mingled. It is not difficult
to understand the contemporary historians when they
write that in the Middle Ages "the notion of
chronological consistency almost was lost. . .
Everything in this world takes on a fantastic coloring.
The most coarse anachronisms and the strangest
fabrications get along peacefully. The basis for such a
conclusion is the same: the medieval evidence does not
correspond to the place of Scaliger and Petavius. Well,
and since they do not correspond, then, consequently, in
the Middle Ages everyone was going crazy together, and
hardly had started to write history. And the medieval
author Fredegarius Scholasticus even pointed to King
Priam (from the legendary Troy! ) as a
personage of a previous generation. Scholasticus already
had fully lost his bearing in the centuries and the
adherents of the traditional chronology are at a loss
how to react.
As we see, the
documents of that time are full of names which
supposedly belonged to distant ancestors. This seems
absurd and laughable, because today the notion reigns
that in the Middle Ages names were distributed that
weren't in "antiquity." A mistaken notion. Books,
messages, and letters of that time are evidence of it.
For example, Georgius Phrantzae in "History" (1258 -
1476 A.D.) names his contemporaries: Antioch,
Demetrios, Dionysius, Minos, Cleope and so forth. Nil
Sinayskiy in that very same period writes letters to the
monks Demosthenes, Apollosius, Aristocles, Aristarchus and the like. An
obvious "antiquity"!
But it shows only that
not only various events, but also the names of their
heroes were replicated and referred to in the distant
past, according to the historic cycles. (Anatoliy
Fomenko, Gleb Nosovskiy "Which Century Is It Now?")
In
history textbooks it is emphasized that the time of
Alexander of Macedonia was noted by many important
achievements in Greek literature, science, philosophy
and art, and it is connected with the creation of such
prominent thinkers of antiquity as, for example, Plato.
And generally, then a significant phenomenon sprang up
in the history of ancient Greece
which was called the Hellenic period. It is acceptable
to examine it as the expansion of Greek culture in the
countries conquered by the Macedonian.
The
15th century A.D. is in
no way distinguished from antiquity in this regard. The
fall of Byzantium
and Greece
and the formation of the Osman empire caused medieval
Hellenism which is well known in history and which
spread to all Europe. Ferdinando Gregorovius writes: "From
the moment of the fall of Hellas, the story of
the Greeks is split: one into their
enslaved motherland, the other into exile. . . . they
came to be resettled in strange countries in masses. The
West accepted them hospitably. . . Their religious
aristocracy found refuge in the capitals and in the
educational institutions of Italy,
bringing Greek literature here anew."
Everything is correct except the word "anew."
There was nothing "anew," everything was for the first
time. And that which is ascribed to antiquity is a
duplicate of medieval events and personalities. Even
Plato is a duplicate.
Supposedly it is known of traditional history
that "Plato was the greatest representative of the
idealistic school in ancient Greek philosophy. He created the Academy
- a school of philosophy in which his students were
united. The notion of ideas
became the basis of Plato's instruction - of the eternal
and unchanging image patterns of things, the weak
reflections of which are the subjects of the real
world." (Encyclopedia)
It is
thought that his instruction died in order to be reborn
several hundred years later reappears in the famous
Plotinus (205 - 270 A.D.) His name, it is clear,
is absolutely accidental, and practically identical to
Plato's name. Then Platonicism again for some reason
dies, in order to be reborn in the 15th century in the
teaching . . of Pleton! He also
is almost Plato and also a famous philosopher, writer
and public figure.
For fullness of the picture, let us say that
Plato's ideas appear out of nowhere for the first time
from in the 15th
century, at the high point of Pleton's activity, and
that Pleton organizes in Italy, in Florence, the Pleton
Academy - an exact analogue of the Platonist Academy.
And the fact is of
interest that Pleton writes "Utopia," as did Plato, and
also "A Treatise on Laws," following in everything his
own "ancient" predecessor, the author of the treatise
"Laws." At the same time, the Pleton of the 15th century as too the ancient
Plato, promotes the idea of an ideal state.
The
traditional historians know all this well. All the
examples cited by us have been taken from their works.
It would seem the
conclusions suggest themselves: the ancient Plato is the
duplicate of the medieval Pleton! But no, it is
impossible to violate Scaliger's chronology, and
therefore, Plotinus and Pleton are declared
neoplatonists, that is, followers of Plato.
The development
of art in the 4th
century A.D. reflects the new phenomena of Greek
society, it is said in the solid works devoted to
antiquity. Greek sculpture knows
many prominent masters (Scopas, Leochares, Bryaxis,
Praxiteles, Lysippus.) Their works supposedly
have been found with various excavations, often just "by
accident." Travelers bring them to museums and merchants
sell them, who, heaven knows by which routes, have
obtained the "antique" from some kind of unknown
secondhand dealer.
But here
is the trouble: from time to time it turns out that one
or the other work is counterfeit. From century to
century skilled craftsmen are discovered who work "like
the old days" in order to earn their daily living. A
great deal of books have been written about the
counterfeit industry, no less fascinating than the
detective stories of famous writers. At that, they tell
only about those cases when falsifications have been
discovered. And how many have not been discovered! . .
Here are only several subjects.
We
already have talked about the origin of a series of
"ancient" sculptures. Even the great Michelangelo sinned
with counterfeits in his youth. He created a figurine of
Cupid and at the suggestion of a friend sold it as an
antique original. The forgery presently was uncovered,
but the sculptor was already well known:
they thought that he was able to "ascend to the
mastery of the ancient sculptors."
The
famous Benvenuto Cellini told in his own autobiography
how he created vases which were declared as
antique: "By this little job I
obtained much." There were sculptors who even
specialized in this source of counterfeits. One of them
was so successful that he merited the nickname Antico.
Israel Rouchomovsky was famous in the 19th
century, the author of a whole series of "antiques." The
Louvre bought the "tiara of Saitapharnes" from him for
200,000 francs as an original of 3rd century B.C.
Grecian art. Only later did it become clear that the
figures on the tiara were copied from pictures out of an
atlas of cultural history published in 1882. They were
made so skillfully that they didn't believe Rouchomovsky
when he announced his authorship of the tiara. Then he
produced a series of "antiques" of his own productions
and the museum gave in.
They called Alceo Dessena the king of antique
forgeries. He had a special workshop which flooded the
worldwide market with counterfeit antiquities:
"Athenian" statues, sculptures "a la Gothic," and
statuettes "three thousand years old." Afterward Dossena
exposed himself. The fact is that he, as did
Rouchomovsky, had been using the services of a firm for
marketing in "antiquities" and became dissatisfied that
they paid him so little. And he decided to take
revenge. But they didn't
believe him! Then, in 1927, he shot
a film about how he made an "antique" statue of a
goddess. Only here did he convince everyone.
In
1937, a certain Honon, while plowing a field not far
from Brizet, found a marble statue of Venus. Specialists
unanimously proclaimed it a work of the first century
B.C. Honon received 250,000 francs for a "creation of
Praxiteles or Phidias." But in 1938, the sculptor
Francesco Cremonese, declared that he had hidden a
statue of his own execution in the field. And he proved
this. And he had completed the forgery in order to show
to everyone of what he was capable as a sculptor.
Though,
as regards "ancient" sculptures and other works of
"antiquity," one can manage even without these examples.
It is enough just to glance into the textbooks and study
aids for specialists who talk about the properties of
natural stones.
Here is what is said about marble: "A stone, like
metals, subject to corrosion. The stone's corrosion
appears in the form of peeling, splitting, swelling and
a loosening of the rock, the appearance of cracks,
splotchiness, cavities and
scabbings, discoloration or
coloration of the stone's surface in dark tones,
the appearance of brown and greenish spots of organic
origin.
Among damages of the surface layer
one also can pick out a sugary and scaly disintegration
of the stone. The sugary
disintegration of marble is caused by the uneven
disintegration of the surface layer. At the same time, the
rough surface of the stone resembles the texture of
sugar.
. . . It is
necessary to note that the Italian, Greek, and Turkish
classifications of the stone do not use the term
"marbleized limestone." An overwhelming
quantity of limestone is called marble.
The
durability of limestone is 120 years. The durability of
real marble is up to 300 years! It is worth scrutinizing
marble sculptures which are displayed in museums as
authentic works of two millennia ago and right away it
will become clear when they were made.
And,
finally, about archaeological monuments. For the start,
let's say that the first catalogue of inscriptions and
local names of monuments in Athens was
established just in the middle of the 15th century. But the fateful
lot of a majority of originals befell it:
the catalog was lost! If one doesn't know that in
particular the traces of the subsequent forgeries were
wiped out, then one may think that the evil fate from
the Greek myths had risen in earnest in the Middle Ages.
Contemporary specialists are acquainted only with the
mention of the catalog in the works of later authors.
Ferdinand Gregorovius notes, "over the course of
time, the original name of the majority of ancient
Athenian monuments, from which in many cases only
individual ruins remained, was forgotten." One can understand the
historian's assertion. According to his ideas, the
monuments had to be named as it said in the "ancient"
writings. And living people were calling them otherwise!
That means, they had forgotten the original names.
Ferdinand Gregorovius does not offer other variants.
That they named the monument themselves is, in the
opinion of the traditional historians, absurd. They
considered the remnants of the Olympion in those days as
a basilica, "since no one knew that it is the ruins of
the once world renowned temple of
Olympus."
Ciriacus (the compiler of the first catalog) calls these
tremendous ruins. . . Adrian's
palace, as the Athenians themselves called it. . .
In 1678, Babin didn't
know where the temple of
Zeus
was in Athens. . .
the Academy, Lyceum, Stoa and gardens of Epicurus had
disappeared without a trace. In the times of Ciriacus,
they called some kind of a group of basilicas the
Academy, the location of which it is impossible to
determine. . . They located the Lyceum or Aristotle's
didascalion in the ruins of the theatre of Dionysus. . .
Ciriacus copied the Greek inscription here, not
mentioning the great philosopher. . . The ruins near
Callirhoe turned out to be the remnants of Aristophanes'
stage.
The
traditional historiography, thus, supposes that not only
the authors of the medieval writings, but also simply
the residents of Athens were
great muddle-headed persons and dreamers. The whole
world knew the Olympic temple, but they didn't even
guess that it was located in their home town. And they
didn't have the slightest idea where the Academy and the
gardens of Epicurean were located. Moreover, they
considered the great comedian Aristophanes almost as
their own contemporary. As too many other figures of
"antiquity."
There
were not dreamers. They were guided by personal
recollection and real knowledge, and what the creators
of "antiquity," who were in no way satisfied with the
Ciriacus catalog, write later about Athens.
As sad as it is to part with the usual ideas
mastered while still in school about Ancient Greece, one
need recognize that it is only a reflection of medieval
Greece. Not always precise, often even
warped, but only a
reflection.
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