Along the Silk Roads!

For millennium trade routes flourished between the countries of the East and the West. Along these trade routes happened the exchange of ideas, inflow of cultural influences, spread of religious ideas and philosophy, from one side to the other. No wonder Kings and Queens and the political leaderships set on conquering these nations and countries, which they presumed to be fabulously rich and resourceful, so that the riches will flow into their kingdoms and make them powerful.

It was delightful to read “The Silk Roads,” by Peter Frankopan, subtitled “A New History of the World.’[1] It is totally a new way of looking into history, not from the view points of conquerors and kingdoms, but the trade routes and economic activities of nations across the world, from Mediterranean to Hindu Kush and beyond up to China, a history of mankind for more than 5000 years. Many interesting facts get thrown on as one read the book.

The countries that lie between the east and the west are most important as the connecting bridge between the two sides of the world. God created Garden of Eden in the rich soil between the two rivers Tigris and Euphrates, so says the Bible. Ancient civilization of Sumeria flourished in and around Mesopotamia, and the area named Fertile Crescent, from these rivers in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west. From here we get the first recorded code of laws by Hammurabi, King of Babylon, 4000 years ago.  

Harappa and Mohenjo-daro civilizations in the Indus valley were of renown, all existing some 5000 years ago. Other great centers of civilizations rose in Babylon, Nineveh, Ur, Akkad in Mesopotamia, almost all of them mentioned in the Biblical narrative in Genesis, the first book of the Bible.

Persians became prominent in the area around 6^th century BC, from Southern Iran, and reached up to Egypt, conquering the lands in between. Their forays into Ancient Greece were stopped in the battles at Marathon and Salami by the brave Spartans and Athenians in 490-470 BC. Persian kingdom extended up to Hindu Kush and north-west India. It connected the Mediterranean with the heart of Asia.

A highly educated bureaucracy maintained meticulous records of all the payments made, quality and quantity of goods brought in and sold in the markets, maintenance of roads in the Empire and so on. Tolerance of minorities was legendary by the Persian rulers. Cyrus, the Mede was the Emperor, who allowed the exiled Jews to return to their country in Palestine to rebuild their temple in 539 BC.

Trade flourished in ancient Persia and spectacular buildings arose in Babylon, Persepolis, Pasargadae and Susa, where King Darius built a magnificent palace, with ebony and silver imported from Egypt, cedar from Lebanon, gold from Bactria, Lapis and cinnabar from Sogdiana, turquoise from Khwarezm and ivory from India.

Cyrus the Great of the Persian Empire in 6^th century BC, was killed trying to subjugate the ferocious nomads, Scythian from the northern steppes, extending from Black Sea through Central Asia to Mongolia. It is said that his head was carried around in a skin, filled with blood and they drank from it. Still it would take a few more centuries before Persians could be completely conquered.

Greece had its own civilization starting from Minoan civilization originating in Crete and then Mycenaean civilization in the mainland Greece. By the 6^th century BC, Athens was experimenting with the formation of democracy, giving voting power to all males of eighteen years and more, both rich and the poor, in running the affairs of their city-state. Of course women were excluded, but they were the queens in their homes, like elsewhere in ancient civilizations.

 From the northern Greece arose a typhoon, Alexander the Great from Macedon, who became the ruler in 336 BC. He turned his gaze towards Asia and not Europe, for the then Europe had no cities, no culture, no prestige and no profit. His heart was to win the East, including Persia. He crushed the Persians army under the command of Darius III, in a decisive battle in Gaugamela, a place near the modern town of Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan, in 331 BC.

City after city surrendered to Alexander’s command. The wealth of the Empire and the beautiful palaces of Persia and Babylon became his. He allowed the local people to continue in their ways, especially religious manners, showing tolerance and respect. He restored the desecrated tomb of Cyrus the Great and gave a decent burial to Darius III, whose body had been dumped in a wagon. He also relied on the local elite to rule the conquered places as his representatives. 

Alexander also founded cities bearing his name, in Herat, Kandahar and Bagram, with fortifications. These became his rallying points for further conquest and push towards the east. He pushed relentlessly across Asia, up to Hindu Kush and Indus valley in northwest India. On mutiny of his own battle-tired soldiers, who refused to go any further, Alexander returned to Babylon, only to die in 323 BC.

In thirteen years Alexander had conquered the then known world and established a permanent like between the west and the east, which will flourish henceforth. Culture, philosophy and language of Greece were carried through to all these places, and influenced those in Persia, India, Central Asia and eventually China too. The cultures and ideas of the places he conquered influence Greece and its culture and thinking too. It was the start of a cultural exchange, or Hellenization, which will last for a long time to come.

The Empire of Alexander was in turmoil after his death, but four enclaves emerged soon under his generals. Seleucus took charge of the lands from Tigris River to Indus River, consisting of today’s Syria, Iraq, Iran, Central Asia, and India. Seleucid dynasty founded by him will rule for the next three centuries. Egypt went to Ptolemy, along with Palestine, Cilicia, Petra and Cyprus. Cassander took over Macedonia and Greece. Lysimachus ruled Thrace, Asia Minor, including parts of modern Turkey, Phrygia, Lydia and Ionia.   

It is interesting to note that Daniel in the Bible mentions that he saw in a vision,[2] a Ram with two horns standing by the river Ulai in Shushan, the capital, the horns being the Kingdoms of Media and Persia. Then he goes on to say that he saw a shaggy goat arise and attack the ram and break his horns. This is the Greek (Macedonian) King Alexander, who conquered Persia. Then he goes on to say that he saw its large horn was broken and four kingdoms will come in its place. These are the four kingdoms that arose after Alexander’s death, as divided among his four generals.

Amazing, isn’t it? That Daniel, an Israelite taken as captive by the Babylonians in 605 BC should leave accounts of history that would happen three centuries later on the plains of Mesopotamia!

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[1] Peter Frankopan, The Silk Roads: A New History of the World, Bloomsbury, London, 2016

[2] Daniel 8:3, 5, 20-22. Interpretation is given by the angel Gabriel to Daniel.

Hannibal, the Carthaginian General

What an inspiring life Hannibal led! He marched his army over the Alps Mountains in winter and defeated the Romans on the other side of the mountain, a formidable task! Hannibal’s Alpine crossing had fired the imagination of many a warrior, especially Wellington, the 19^th century British Commander and Napoleon, the First Emperor of France.    

Hannibal Barca was born to Hamilcar, a Carthaginian general, in 247 BC in Carthage, Tunisia, in North Africa. His father took Hannibal at a very young age of nine years to Spain, along with his brother, to rough it up in the war fronts. Carthage had suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of Rome in the First Punic War of 264-241 BC. Hamilcar had made his two boys, swear an oath never to show goodwill to the Romans, an oath of eternal enmity.

As Hamilcar sank to his death in a river during the battle with an Iberian tribe in 229 BC, both the sons witnessed it and fled for their lives. Hannibal was 18 years old then. The leadership of Carthaginian forces passed on to his elder brother Hasdrubal, who negotiated a peace treaty with Rome. When he was assassinated in Spain, Hannibal at the age of 26 was elected general by popular vote of the Carthaginian troops in Spain, ratified by the Senate in Carthage.

Within three years Hannibal tore up the treaty that his brother had worked so assiduously with Romans and laid siege to the Roman town Saguntum, south of the Ebro River in Spain. From there he marched across Pyrenees mountains and then Alps to swoop down on Italy. Basically the fight was to determine who will be the masters of the Mediterranean waters and the surrounding lands.

Hannibal led his forces atop Alps, in the summer of 218 BC. His was the first ever troops to cross the Alps with an army, since the Greek hero Heracles (Hercules), who according to traditions was the first to force a route through Alps. Hannibal was supposed to have started with 90,000 infantry, 12000 cavalry and 37 African elephants. He and his troupes started to climb Alps early November at the very onset of winter. By the time he crossed over he was left with only 50,000 infantry and 9000 cavalry but all the 37 elephants.

Hannibal’s army tried to cross over Alps through one of the 6 narrow passes, with the rugged and steep mountain peaks rising before them and bitter cold winds howling through the narrow passes, with bone-chilling effects. With the stirring speeches of Hannibal and grit, and the reward of reaching the fertile plain of Po valley down on the side of northern Italy on crossing the mountain, the troops made the journey in an amazing 9 days.

The bewildered animals, horses and elephants and the pack animals slipped over the snow and skidded to their death. On reaching Po valley, Hannibal did not give them rest for too long. He pushed them to move on, as the snow fall was heavy and if immobile, they might freeze to death.

As the passage was too narrow for the pack animals and soldiers to move, men worked hard building a path along the cliff side, packing the path with any material that was available. In a single day they created a path wide enough for horses and pack animals to pass and descend.

Then came the elephants, which were stuck in the snow. The path had to be widened and made strong enough for the elephants to cross. Men worked tirelessly around the animals for three days and created a path good enough for them to cross. They reached Turin, exhausted and frost-bitten and malnourished, and despondent. They had lost 70,000 infantry, half the cavalry and many elephants. War was yet to begin.  

Romans were in panic on hearing that Hannibal with his army had crossed over the Alps Mountain within 15 days in mid-November winter and landed in Italy in 218 BC. Hannibal fought many battles in Italy: battle of Ticinus in November, 218; battle at Trebbia in December 218; in June 217 at the battle of Trasimene and the battle of Cannae in August 216, and won all of them, in spite of all odds.

His army was emaciated and depleted, but he held the element of surprise. His huge war elephants from Africa were enough to strike terror into the hearts of Roman soldiers. His strategy was superb; he had uncanny ability to place his troops in the position most appropriate to their fighting skill. Had Hannibal pushed straight for Rome, he could have captured it, but he knew his limits, so never went against Rome itself.

Romans were so scarred of Hannibal’s advance; they quickly sacrificed a Gallic man and woman and a Greek man and woman, burying them alive in dual sacrifice to get the goodwill of their gods! But Hannibal and his army were was not in good shape. His compatriots back home in Carthage were refusing to send in additional reinforcements. He is said to have stripped the dead Romans of their rings and sent these home to be poured out before the Senate, who impressed by this gesture, agreed to send in more men and elephants.

Hannibal sent in ambassadors to Rome to force them to come to the negotiating table. Romans refused and persisted in fighting Hannibal to finish. Hannibal’s men were tired with the perpetual war and needed to return, may be just like Alexander’s army that revolted on the banks of Indus River in 327 BC. In 215 BC, when Romans faced them once again in Cumae, Hannibal suffered his first ever defeat in Italy.

Roman general Publius Cornelius Scipio had reached the den of the lion by landing Roman troops in Spain itself and Hannibal had to divert men and material to defend his home base. In 205 BC, Hannibal in his forties was war weary and steadily losing, losing Spain and other allies to Romans. Roman army was progressing towards Carthage. The Senate hurriedly agreed to all the terms dictated by Romans to negotiate peace. Hannibal was asked to return to Carthage and fight the Romans, which he did.

In the last fight in 202 BC, Hannibal and Scipio met and fought at Zama, near Carthage. Hannibal’s army lost. Thousands of Carthaginians died, many thousands were taken prisoners; some managed to escape, including Hannibal. He rode 120 miles over two days at full gallop and evaded his pursuers. He returned to Carthage, but on learning that Romans had asked for him as a hostage and the willingness of Carthaginians to give him up, he escaped again and reached Tyre, the ancestral home of Carthaginians, where he was welcomed as a hero. 

Rome emerged victorious and as undisputed masters of central and western Mediterranean and surrounding coastlines. Hannibal continued his tirades against Rome, by first serving as adviser to Antiochus III of Seleucid Empire, and goading him to go against Rome. In 191 BC, Antiochus lost the battle at Thermopylae, Greece, where 300 Spartans had resisted the Persians in 480 BC.

Hannibal fled once again from the Romans, this time to the royal court of King Prusias of Bithynia, a small kingdom on the shores of Black Sea. He aided in the king’s campaigns against king of Pergamon, a long time ally of Rome. In 182 BC the Romans persuaded King Prusias to hand over Hannibal to them. Hannibal aged 63, not wanting to end up a Roman prisoner and having lost all his options, took his life by drinking poison.

Thus ended the magnificent story of Hannibal, an all time great military general world had produced, who succeeded in holding Romans in anxiety and fear for a long time. Hannibal was an enigma; there are no written records left by him. All the accounts we have of him were written by his enemies, Livy the Roman historian and Polybus, the Greek historian.

Even his enemies admired his ability to survive hardship, deprivation and uncertainty. He was most formidable under extreme pressure. He not only performed, but goaded his men to perform difficult feats of endurance and bravery. He was a brilliant strategist and fearsome to his enemies.

A great general, nevertheless he lost to the Romans, whom he had vowed to hate till the end. Rome was left as the Queen of Mediterranean with no one to challenge her once Hannibal left the stage.