Medes a.k.a. Persians

[P. Lilius Frugius Simius]

Well, when we were integrated in RAT, they thought about creating a forum for the enemies of Rome (and it was an excellent idea!).

Unfortunately for us, they didn't create a forum for the enemies of the Greek. However, in truth, Greece was also defined by her enemies, and how she related to them (in a certain way, most of the world cultures were any polis enemies at certain time! :-) )

So, this time is the Persians, the Eternal Enemy.

I'm already into writing (at last) my novel about the Inarus's Rebellion (project code-name "Inaros", and working title "The Lybian", thanks to historical novel writer Scott Oden, who graciously passed by my blog and offered his help).

Now, thanks to the excellent, intensive, exhaustive work done on primary and secondary sources about the Inarus's Rebellion, by our forum mate, and overall gentleman, Pierre Coutier---who graciously provided me with a draft of his book on the subject, and a large collection of articles related to this incident (my public thanks and acknowledges to his vital contribution, however good or bad my novel will be, it'll be tenfold better thanks to him)--- I have a fine grasp on the events I am telling, and my knowledge of greek and egyptian culture and history of the time (ca. 460 BCE) is improving every day... however Persians are hard for me...

so, please, give me resources about them... web better than trees, but I may be able to buy some books... of course all revisions will have to wait for the draft to be written, but I may play catchup with what I don't know as I go, and then update the whole book with the million errors I know I will have...

thanks a thousand :-) )

khairete!

[Pacal]

Thanks for the compliments. Its nice to know that my work will be put to good use.

Regarding the Persians I suggest the following book.

History of the Persian Empire, by A. T. Olmstead,University of Chicago Press, 1948. A bit dated but it does try to give the Persian point of view.

If you can find it Pierre Briant's recent L'histoire de L'empire Perse is the best recent history of the Achaemenids. (Borrow don't buy its outrageously expensive).


Now in order to understand the Persians of this time period you have to understand that they were Zoroastrians. The Greek / Roman understanding of Persian religion was to put it mildly pathetic. An excellent Website that contains also the early Zoroastrian scriptures is Avesta located at [url:1alkro1q]http://www.avesta.org/avesta.html[/url].

A site of limited use, (it has not been maintained in about 3 years) is Achaemenid Royal inscriptions, at [url:1alkro1q]http://oi.uchicago.edu/OI/PROJ/ARI/ARIIntro.html[/url]. Try browse versions by section selection the other choices don't work, in this one you get some of the translations at least.

A good site is Achaemenid Persia located at [url:1alkro1q]http://members.ozemail.com.au/~ancientpersia[/url] which contains good information about military equipment etc.

A truly excellent Website, Livius has a whole series of articles on the Ancient world including many on Persia which can be located here [url:1alkro1q]http://www.livius.org/persia.html[/url], including a the bottom a slection of pictures, translations and transliterations of Royal inscriptions.

I trust that the above will help.

One thing I think you should try to avoid is the "Europe against the hordes of Asia" nonsense that disfigures much writing about the Persians. In which Persians as "Asians" are cast as the "other", like the forces of darkness, unlike the Greeks who are in a sense "us". The fact is in some respectswe are closer to the Persians than the Greeks. Certainly I find Greek Religion more "alien" than Zoroastrianism.

All the best.

Pierre

[Anonymous]

Some good books which might be interesting (probably you know them already):
- Warfare in the Classical World (John Warry)
- Greece and Rome at war (Peter Connolly)

Gives information from both Greek as Persians.

[hoplite14gr]

Herodotos will give you a very biased view of the Persians but Xenophon can give you an edjucated person's view both in KYROY PEDEIA (Cyros Edjucation) and KYROY ANAVASIS (The ascend of Cyros).
Kind regards
Stefanos

[P. Lilius Frugius Simius]

All,

thanks for your suggestions.

Pierre: your links have already given me a lot of information, LIVIUS is indeed very good, thanks!

As for the books, silly me for not thinking in Xenophon! I have read his _Anabasis_, didn't think of his books on Cyrus the Young!

As for Warry's and Conolly's, they are on the basket to be bought sometime, I will eventually have them, they will surely prove useful.

My initial idea, when I had it a couple of years ago, was to tell this story from the Greeks POV, but the further I read about this whole subject, the more fascinating it seemed to give a thorough inside look of all the matters involved. Pierre's book and e-mail advice reinforced this idea, and I have finally settled in a three-way novel, where the POVs are conducted by three main characters, one per civilization: a metic athenian psiloi, Amyrteus for the egyptians/lybians and Megabyzus for the Persians. Therefore I will have to provide accurate information as narrator, and then biased information for the three of them. I expect that the end result will be that all civilizations involved, through the main characters and the wealth of secondary characters, will be well represented, without a clear "favourite".

It's easy to demonize your enemies (we are doing exactly that why demonizing terrorists nowadays, instead of dealing with the true causes that create terrorists) and the sources must show, specially since we know that except, maybe, Thukydides, most ancient historians were specially prone to "fill-in" and tell the story they wanted their audience to know, and not a dispassionate account of events, with judgement left for the reader.

I am confident I will be able to provide a fair account of all civilizations, because, while I have my favourites as well, I am fascinated enoough by them all to be able to detach myself from my likings... Truly, the characters dictate the book, I simply type it, and by having several main characters reclaiming attention, I hope the book will be well balanced.

Anyway, I will be vigilant and try to catch my own biaes when doing the successive revisions. I'm already into the 6,000 words, not much but it's a good pace for the draft, revisions will go more slowly. OTOH, I was planning to write it while I didn't start my Visigoths novel in November, but I am thinking that this story certainly deserves my time, no mater how long it takes. I can work on it during Nanowrimo anyway, so no problem :-) )

thanks to all, I will need your help along the way, anyway... I'm keeping a blog about my historical novels, and this one is the main starring, you can check there, and contribute, and so on... the url is http://praeter.blogspot.com/

thanks again!

[Carlton Bach]

I'm afraid I can't help you much with web-based stuff, but if you read German you might want to take a look at

F. Wiesehöfer: Das Antike Persien (excellent introductory text to society and culture as well as history, extensively referenced, and available in paperback)

H. Koch: es kuendet Dareios der Koenig... vom Leben im persischen Grossreich, Mainz 1992 (a study of everyday life in the Persian empire from administrative documents, clpose cousion to 'soldier and civilian in Roman egypt' in approach)

Sorry, these are the only two really good books on Persia I know.

[P. Lilius Frugius Simius]

Okay, things are progressing, slowly but stready (I'm around the 12,500 words by now)...

I am reading Xenophons _Cyropedia_, which is showing itself really^H^H^H^H^H^Hextremely (!) interesting (perhaps too much!), but the "Kiroi Anavasis"... I guess this is not the Ten Thousands account of the battle of Cyrus the Young vs. Artaxerxes II... If so, I cannot find any translation of it online (or anywhere else :-P P any pointers, please?

if this story was fascinating when I started to dig into it, it is revealing wonderful now that I am actually putting it down. The funny thing is that I have already written a hosts more than any classical author about it, and I will probably add 'em up very soon! (damned Ktesias!)

anyway, once i'm well documented about the Persians (thanks for the info, unfortunately I cannot read german, but the english sources will have to suffice for now) I may need to dig into egyptians as well... so little time, so much to learn!

thanks to all, i'll check in from time to time...

[Jona Lendering]

Pierre Briant's recent L'histoire de L'empire Perse is the best recent history of the Achaemenids.

There's an English translation that may be more accessible. From Cyrus to Alexander. A History of the Persian Empire (2002 Winona Lake, Indiana). It has the weight of a brick but there's simply nothing better.

Relevant is also [url:2478s9z6]http://www.achemenet.com[/url], and then click ressources and bibliographies. BHAch I and BHAch II are the sequels of Briant's brick.

I happen to know the webmaster of [url:2478s9z6]http://www.livius.org[/url] very well :wink: , and think that he will be glad to help you on specific points.

[P. Lilius Frugius Simius]

There's an English translation that may be more accessible. From Cyrus to Alexander. A History of the Persian Empire (2002 Winona Lake, Indiana). It has the weight of a brick but there's simply nothing better.

I found it on Amazon, but it's extremely expensive for my purposes (I mean, if I were a historian, I would get it, undoubtedly, but I cannot afford going so deep into the Persians, I would never finish the damn book!)... The bad thing is that I don't think it will be available on public libraries in Spain, and some things (a Saturday morning, for example) I could surely find out on a quick search over it... For example: which was the capital of the Siria satrapy when Megabyzos was the satrap? Biblos? Damascus? (was it an important city at the time, btw?) which phoenician kings were ruling and where by that time?

and hundreds of little, nagging questions like that, that would help to make the book better...

Relevant is also [url:pj7xs12u]http://www.achemenet.com[/url], and then click ressources and bibliographies. BHAch I and BHAch II are the sequels of Briant's brick.

thanks for the extra links, some of the articles available there are proving very interesting...

I got in touch with the Iranian Embassy in Spain, and they forwarded me to their Cultural Center, where a Doctor there told about a couple of encyclopedic books, one of them written by two spanish historians I happen to have relatively close (already written an email to one of them, but it's exams time, he'll be busy, I guess),

the others are (approx. titles, haven't searched for them yet): _Encyclodedia Iranica_, by Ehsan Yarshater, and _History of Civilizations_, by William Duran(t). Any pointers on this last one? Yarshater appears on Wikipedia, thus he'll be easy to pinpoint...

I happen to know the webmaster of [url:pj7xs12u]http://www.livius.org[/url] very well :wink: , and think that he will be glad to help you on specific points.

thank you very much... I may honor that offer from time to time, but not yet, probably on the second walk through the manuscript, once it's finished, where I'll have to rewrite many parts to have accurate culture and historical facts, good dialogues, descriptions, and what not :-P P

BTW, updated my wordcount, up to 21,800 and moving up :-) )

thanks a bunch for your help, follow me on a different thread about the Hellenic navy, I will write it shortly :-) )

laters!