Sun 13 Nov 2005
Greece – The Hellenization of the world
Posted by Henry under History , Ancient Civilizations , The Ancient Greeks , The Early Development of the Ancient Civilizations1 Comment
In the northeastern area of the Mediterranean Sea, just west of where the Ark of Noah alighted after the Great Flood in Turkey, lies a large, rocky and mountainous peninsula full of beautiful bays and red soil, with craggy shorelines and striking cliffs; the land of Greece. The Ionian people that initially inhabited this region were descendents of Noah’s son, Japheth. These early settlers were largely stonemasons, seafarers and farmers and from this region they spread out to colonize many of the Islands of the Mediterranean. Some time later, around 2,100 BC, the Indo-European people that had migrated from the area of Persia moving west through all of Europe, descended into Greece from the north. The two cultures merged and formed, perhaps one of the most remarkable civilizations of antiquity, known to us, as the Mycenaean civilization. The subsequent postdiluvian civilization that developed in this area grew to influence the rest of the civilized world like no other culture before it. Few nations can boast of the global impact, which the philosophers and thinkers of this relatively small nation have had worldwide, stretching even across the centuries into our own modern times. It is to the Greeks that we owe our modern concepts of the scientific process, a democratic form of government, many important mathematical theorems, the stately and clean forms of architecture, the emphasis on physical fitness and the Olympic games.
Around 490 – 480 BC, the Persian Empire had grown to become the most powerful nation in the world, covering the entire Middle East and even conquering the powerful and wealthy nation of Egypt. The Persians then set their eyes on conquering Europe and for this reason they needed to first subjugate Greece, since they were located right at the crossroads into Europe. In an impressive engineering wonder, they built a bridge spanning the Bosporous Strait in order to march their army across the sea to invade Greece.
According to Herodotus, it took seven days and seven nights for the entire Persian army to cross the Hellespont, which he claimed numbered approximately 1,700,000 soldiers in his land army at this point. In addition the expedition consisted of some 3,000 ships from the various nations that they had already subjugated. Marching from the north the huge Persian army bivouacked in Therma. From this position “Xerxes could see the vast bulk of Mount Olympus and Mount Ossa in Thessaly. He found out that half-way between then there was a narrow ravine, with the River Peneius flowing through it, and was told that there was a way into Thessaly there.” (The Histories, Herodotus, Oxford University Press, New York, 1998, pg.447)
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