Washington DC, the Capital

It was a memorable day that we spent in Washington DC, which itself is full of memorials for the dead and the alive. On a bright day, early morning my brother, his wife and I boarded the tourist bus by Grey Line to the place.

                                                             

                                                                                 Arlington National Cemetery

First place to stop was Arlington National Cemetery encompassing some 624 acres. One can never imagine the huge number of crosses erected in the memory of the soldiers and officers who had died in the various wars of USA. There were 400,000 of them, row after row, sending an ominous message, ‘People die in war. Victory is not without price. There is a human cost to any war.’ What touched me here was the fact that when the wife of the veteran died her name gets inscribed at the back of the tomb stone, so also any minor children dying before their time. That I thought was beautiful and very sentimental.

Grave stone of Jaqueline Kennedy

We also saw the graves of John F. Kennedy, his wife Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, brothers Robert F. Kennedy, Ted Kennedy and Joe Kennedy – almost the whole family of Kennedys was there. What impressed me was the simplicity of their graves: just one granite slab was there to mark each of their burial places, with their names inscribed on the top of it. Many coins, pennies have been thrown on these slabs, result of superstition of the visitors over the years!

                               

                                  John F. Kennedy's grave stone

Next we walked on the National Mall which houses the Memorial to Abraham Lincoln, World War II, Vietnam veterans and so on. It is a spread out beautiful park with the Lincoln Memorial on one end, followed by the Washington Monument, which is the iconic Obelisk, leading to the Reflecting Pool and the other monuments.

Lincoln Memorial is a stately white building with columns, built in 1922, in honor of Abraham Lincoln, the President who unified the country after the civil war, which was fought to emancipate the slaves. It is proudly said that America is the only country which went to war to abolish slavery.

           Lincoln Memorial

It is built in Doric Architectural style, mimicking the colonnades of Ancient Greece on Pantheon. It is an unmistakable Greek revival architecture recalling the freedom which the City States of Athens and some other Greeks cities gave to their citizens in running their government. The early American fathers who wrote the constitution of their country were definitely impressed by the system of governance in Ancient Greece.

                                                                                 Washington Monument - the obelisk

The Obelisk itself was built in 1888 to commemorate George Washington, the First President of America, and is still the highest structure in Washington DC. The Reflecting Pool and the Obelisk stand as silent witness to many great events of the nation, starting from the oath-taking of the new Presidents to the rallies organized by various eminent leaders, including Dr. Martin Luther King, who fought for civil rights of the Colored people.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial was the next place we visited, which was also in the National Mall itself. It has been established in 1982, in memory of the US armed forces which fought in the Vietnam War of the 70s. More than 58,000 names of soldiers who either lost their lives in the war or lost have been inscribed here. It is written in the background, “Freedom is not free.” True, for the freedom of future generations these brave soldiers had laid down their lives.

Whether the Vietnam war itself was right or wrong and whether America should have participated in it just to ward off the influence of the Communist Russia or not, are not the questions I would want to debate on. In the final tally, people had died, families lost their sons, fathers, bread-winners and women, mothers and wives lost their sons or husbands and children grew up father-less. That is important. Will this madness ever end? Fighting over religion, over ideologies, over trade and over power? May be not, not as long as the world as we know lasts. Only in the Kingdom of God which will be ushered in by Jesus Christ in his Second Coming, can we expect such a scenario of peace and real freedom.

                                                                                         Korean War Veterans Memorial

Then we passed through the Korean War Veterans Memorial, established in 1995, where again life size statues of soldiers in their full combat dress are standing as mute witnesses of horrors of yet another war. There was also National World War II Memorial, established in 2004, in a semicircular manner in the outdoors.

National World War II Memorial

It left me wondering, is there any one place in India where we have such memorial for those who laid their lives to protect the freedom of those who are living now? I cannot recall any, except some well maintained World War I memorials spread across the country, maintained by World authorities. I remember seeing one in Calcutta, next to the CNI (Church of North India), burial ground, where my dear elder brother lies buried. What prevents us from making such memorials for the dead soldiers? Culture? May be, but we need to learn some of these from the West.

We moved over these memorials to the most important buildings of Washington. The capital city itself is situated on the banks of river Potomac and is known as Washington DC, because it was formally the District Columbia. As a National Capital of United States of America, it has three main important buildings, the Capitol, White House and the Supreme Court.

      The Capitol

Capitol is the home of US Congress and the seat of legislative branch of US Federal government. It was opened up in 1800 and built in Neo-classical style. Does it remind you of another Capitol, the Capitol Hills of Rome? Yes, Capitoline is one of the seven hills on which Ancient Rome was founded.

It was the political and religious hub of Rome, the symbol of eternity and indestructibility of Rome. Yet in 476 AD the Western Roman Empire with its capital in Rome fell to the barbarians and in 1453 AD the Eastern Roman Empire and its capital Constantinople fell to the ravages of Ottoman Army. What is so eternal about any earthly kingdom or Empire? They all rise only to fall after some centuries. May be, Roman Empire lasted the longest, some 2000 and more years!  

                                                                            The White House - Northern Facade

White House is the official residence of the President of USA and also the work place. Though built in 1800, additions, alterations and modifications were on till 1950s. It is the seat of Oval Office of the President, created in 1909 and the executive residence of the President. The seat of power, one might say.

The Supreme Court of US is the highest federal court in US founded in 1789. It is the final appellate court for all cases and has its own original jurisdiction too. It is also the final interpreter of the federal law as enshrined in the US Constitution. Its present imposing and dignified building was built in 1935; “Equal Justice under the Law” is inscribed on the top facade of the building.  

There are many museums in the capital city, but we could see only the Natural Air and Space museum, for want of time and also due to the tired legs begging us to sit and not wander any more.  We returned tired but well informed about the capital of America, the leading nation of the world. Sure worth the visit.

Holiday in Big Apple!

Setting aside the blogs on history, I decided to write on my recent trip abroad that was so very interesting and eventful. On a rainy night we left, my brother his wife and me, on a grand plan to tour the world, which was unfortunately limited to USA and Canada.

We left Bangalore on 23^rd May 2018 early morning, 1.45 am to be precise and landed in New York, via Amsterdam on 23^rd itself by 1 pm. Amazing isn’t it? To have traveled 13,360 kms in 19.50 real flying hours, with a change of flight at Amsterdam with a waiting time of 2 hours, and then to land on the other side of the globe on the same day! Wow, that is definitely a marvel of human invention!

We had booked our hotel rooms right in the heart of New York City, in Manhattan itself, in Comfort Inn Middletown West, which is located at 48^th Street, in between 10^th and 11^th Avenue roads. Excellent location, just 1 km away from Times Square! Hiring a taxi cab at the airport, we reached the hotel, booked into the room and immediately started in search of the places to visit and the means of visiting. Three of us were total strangers and had no one to guide us around. Well, I was the leader of the pack and off we marched to explore the city.

First we walked towards the subway, planning to take the tube, so that we can go around the city. When we saw the ticket vending machine, and people inserting dollars and getting the tickets, not having a clue about how to do that correctly, we beat a hasty retreat and came up to the terra firma. As we crossed the 7^th Avenue, we saw the Big Bus hop on, hop off bus service and booked our tickets for the next day visit and heaved a sigh of relief, mission accomplished.

                                                                                                                        Time Square running Ads

On the way back, without knowing it, accidentally we strayed into the Time Square. It was there itself in the 7^th Avenue. We sat there in the steps and kept gawking at the running colorful advertisements all over the place with childish glee. One could see all the humanity there – black, brown, yellow, white and mixed colors, politely called, differently colored.

We bought hot dogs from a street vendor and ate it with relish. Throughout the four days of our stay in New York, we did that unabashedly – hotdogs, hamburgers, muffins, Mexican rice dish and so on. Morning breakfast was courtesy the hotel - bed and breakfast, so nice and heavy. It was all an adventure, trying to save the dollars that we spent on room rent!

Pleasantly tired we returned to the hotel which was just 20 minutes walk and we popped into our beds for a sound sleep. I was very particular that we don’t sleep in the afternoon of the first day so that we don’t get into the problem of jet lag. Having been busy, walking up and down, we slept off the night.

Next day early morning we left by walk to to 7^th Avenue again to catch the Big Bus for the day trip to see New York City. New York City is formed by interconnecting five islands, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Bronx and Staten Island, which were consolidated in 1898. We got on to the top of the 8 am bus and of the many stops I will narrate only the important ones. We got down at the Empire State Building, bought the ticket and got on to open-air observation deck on the 86^th floor.

Amazing sights and facts awaited us. I was able to spot out the Chrysler tower among the many skyscrapers around. Statue of Liberty and the Hudson River joining the Atlantic Ocean were visible at a distance.

Chrysler tower among others viewed

from Empire State Building

The construction itself, as exhibited there, was with structural steel, reinforced cinder concrete arches, Indiana limestone exterior with chrome nickel steel trim and aluminium spandrels. But the amazing fact is the cost of construction per sq.ft was only $9.20! The total cost of construction including the land price was $40,948,900, while the cost of the building alone was $24,718,000. That was of course in 1930, when the construction was started. Still it is so meagre. May be General Depression had to do something with it. 

                                                                    Liberty Island and Ellis Island from 

                                                                             Empire State Building. 

The building was completed within one year and 45 days. One floor per day was the construction rate! On an average 3500 workers per day worked on the construction. It has 86 floors at 1050 feet height, then up to 102 floors another 250 ft, and from there to the tip, another 230 ft, the total height being 1480 ft. Though it was the tallest building when it was built, it is now the 5^th tallest in USA.

                                                                     Memorial Pools with names of the martyrs

From the giddying heights of Empire State Building, we got down and onto the bus to alight at the 9/11 memorial site. The place where the Twin Towers stood, the Ground Zero, there are two memorial pools with running water cascading like a perpetual waterfall, with the names of all the 2977 people who died on that day in the 9.11.2001 terrorist attacks, inscribed all around the edges of the pools. There are holes around the names where roses and flowers can be placed in honor of the dead. It is heart-rending to see the names of some of the Indians who had died in the tragedy, Alok Agarwal and Chowdhury. The dead will live in the hearts of their loved ones and the visitors like us.

9/11 Museum is a grand one, built like a huge white bird alighting on the ground, with its wings still open. It is a beautiful memorial to those whose lives were taken in an unnecessary frenzy of hatred by some misguided people.

         Like a huge white bird

That evening we spent time again at the Times Square, observing all the customs and dresses of the people assembled there from all over the world and cheekily passing comments. We ate the stuff they sold there and returned to the hotel to sleep and rest.

                 Inside the Museum of 9/11

The next day we were picked up by an eminent student of my brother, who has done very well in New York, having his own company. He very graciously took us around to show around the Big Apple that day. He took us to the Freedom Tower, built in the place of the Twin Towers, which was very close to where we had been the previous day. This is a new tower built in the place of the twin towers and is called the “One World Trade Center.” It shines as a brand new building in blue, beautifully arising out of the ashes of the previous one.

      The Freedom Tower

The names of the dead on 9/11 are inscribed on a wall here too. We pass through a cave where the rocks on which it is built could be seen. As the lift took us to the topmost floor, history of the building and the sky-scrappers around and the construction process of the building, etc., came in quick succession on the walls of the lift as we ascended and almost in split seconds we were at its 102^nd floor, which has an Observation Deck.  

                       Bedrocks under Manhattan

For a second time we had a spectacular view of the buildings around New York City and the Hudson River with the Statue of Liberty and all the paraphernalia. We could see ferries arriving and leaving the shores of Hudson, giving it all a busy appearance.  

     Ferries busying around

In a circular glass pedestal inside the 102th  floor of the Freedom Tower, one can see the vehicular traffic deep underneath on the busy streets of Manhattan. Very scary experience indeed!

We also visited the Statue of Liberty that day, from the side of New Jersey, travelling through Holland Tunnel one way and through Lincoln Tunnel the other way. Both the tunnels run under the Hudson River! marvelous feat of engineering, unthinkable in India in 1927, when the Holland Tunnel, named after the engineer who constructed it was thrown open to the public.  

  

      

State Cruises run by the State to ferry people 

to and fro Liberty Island

       Statue of Liberty

                                    Statue of Liberty was standing on its pedestal in Liberty Island, beckoning every immigrant since 19^th century as they entered the New York harbor, offering them hope and a future. This is a copper statue, 93 meters high, a gift from the people of France to the people of America. It shows a robed woman, representing the Roman goddess of Liberty, known as Libertas, worshiped by the Ancient Romans. She holds a torch aloft in her right hand and in her left hand holds a book, inscribed in Roman numerals July 4, 1776, the date of United States’ Declaration of Independence.  

        Having said that, I would also like to point out that this figure was influenced by the sun god and the ancient Egyptian goddess of fertility Isis and the ancient Babylonian fertility goddess known as Ishtar, both of which were adopted by the Romans as goddess Libertas. Good to know that, isn’t it?

      Museum in Ellis Island                                 Central Railway of New Jersey

       

         

       As we boarded the Cruise run by the State, we also glimpsed the Ellis Island, where 80% of the immigrants to USA were received, inspected and passed through. It was opened in 1892 and some 12 million immigrants had passed through its inspections, before it was closed down in 1954. Presently it houses a Museum of Immigration. We also walked through the Central Railroad of New Jersey, opened in 1889 and abandoned in 1967, after having done its duty of transporting the immigrants and others to all over USA.

       We ended the day with a good lunch at an Indian restaurant and a visit to the Princeton University and treading the ground once trod by the great mind like Einstein, whom our host respected immensely. He also introduced us to his family and graciously treated us to dinner at his beautiful house in New Jersey, before getting us dropped at our hotel.     

Well, New York City and its attractions really dazzled and amazed us. It was nice to have spend two and a half days in visiting the various places of interest within the city, some on our own and some with the help of well-wishers. 

Grateful to God for the wonderful time He gave us in this marvelous city.

Trade and Conquest of Nations

Already Romans considered themselves the rulers of the whole world, and not just the world around the Mediterranean Sea. There was no point of extending their rule westward into Europe; there was hardly any revenue, it was dry and cold with no resources. But conquest of Egypt added riches to the Roman Empire and increased the surplus wealth of the population that could be invested in buying the riches from the east – India and China.

Romans wanted to conquer India and China too so that the wealth of these nations would pour into Rome. Horace, that popular Roman poet, who lived (65-8 BC) during the time of Emperor Augustus, wrote of the imagined Rome’s mastery of the entire world, including India and China. This involved moving against Persian Empire which lay in between and it became a preoccupation of the Roman Emperors to plan expeditions against Persia, which was the heart of the world.

Emperor Trajan led a huge army against Persia in 113 AD, and speedily captured Mesopotamia and other Persian cities like Babylon, Seleucia and Ctesiphon quickly fell into the Roman’s hands. Coins were minted and issued declaring Persia has been captured. He went up to Basra at the mouth of the Persian Gulf and looked wistfully at a merchant ship that set sail to India. Unfortunately, he couldn’t become a second Alexander the Great and march up to the shores of India, for on the heel of these victories, Trajan passed away of cerebral oedema! Hearing this news revolt spread quickly starting with Judaea, all over the conquered lands.

Roman Emperors did not give up their dreams so easily. Successive Emperors kept fighting the Persian Empire. In 260 AD, Emperor Valerian, in his skirmish, was taken a prisoner by Persian army and was humiliated. He was used as a human footstool for the Persian ruler to mount his horse. His body on death was flayed; skin stripped off the flesh, stuffed, dyed with vermilion and placed in their temple as a trophy.

Persia itself flourished as a land lying in between the rich and fabulously wealthy lands of China and India on one hand and the Roman Empire on the other. Trade passed through the Persian land and it added revenue to the government. Glazed pottery from Persia headed to India and Sri Lanka during the first two centuries AD. A new ruling dynasty named Sasanians emerged in Persia around 220 AD, who centralized the administration and gave power to their officials to record their decisions and stamp on them their seals.

Guilds were organised for producers and traders, specific areas allocated in bazaars, which made it easy for the traders to be inspected and to ensure quality and quantity standards set and collect tax and duties. Countless new cities were founded and urban development blossomed all over Central Asia, Iranian land, Mesopotamia and the Near East. Large scale irrigation projects were taken up in Khuzistan and Iraq, to boost agricultural production. Meticulous records were maintained of all transactions and many of these records and seals have survived and dug up in archaeological surveys.

As Persia soared Rome tottered. By 300 AD, Rome became a victim of its own success. The barbaric and violent tribes and nations living beyond its borders started to attack it on all sides. Cost of defending the long borders skyrocketed, while the tax revenue dwindled. During the reign of Diocletian, Roman tax inspectors spread throughout the land, assessing the cost and price of everything from shoe lace to sugar to collect tax. Diocletian divided the Roman territory into four and ruled it along with another Emperor and two junior Deputy Emperors named Caesars. They just about managed to keep the Empire intact.

You will be surprised to know that in the so-called Roman Republic, it was the soldiers and the Praetorian guards (the elite units of the Imperial Roman Army whose members served as personal body guards to the Roman Emperors), who really elected a promising general as the Emperor and the Senate was forced to ratify the selection. Hence people of obscure origins could by sheer dint of hard work and distinction in the military service, come to occupy the highest post in the Empire.

On coming to be vested with the Royal Purple, the Emperor’s first act was to bountifully reward the soldiers, his benefactors, with Roman gold and wealth. Doesn’t it sound similar to our politicians offering money to cross over, and Chief Ministers offering plum ministries to their supporters and defectors from the other parties? Well, Romans have done it earlier! Why, don’t all empires thrive on bloodshed and bribe and corruption?

When the elected Emperor fell short of their expectations, the soldiers mutinied and killed the Emperor and massacred their supporters. Military might was able to make and unmake the Emperors in the Roman world. I feel sometimes that a hereditary ruler from a dynasty is far better than these unruly soldiers making an Emperor.

Diocletian was followed by Emperor Constantine. His father was Constantius, who had served as Deputy Emperor, Caesar, under the Tetrarchy of Diocletian. After his father’s death, Constantine overcame the others in the civil war and became the sole Emperor of Rome. He successfully guarded the Empire from the tribes on Roman frontiers, the Franks, Alamanni, Goths, and Sarmatians. He brought in many improvements in administration.

He had a new vision and built a brand new capital city on the site of the old town Byzantium, on the banks of Bosporus and named it Constantinople, exactly on the midway, the point where Europe met Asia. He built huge palaces, Hippodrome for chariot races, and other parallel institutions as in Rome. It became the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire that came to be known as the Byzantine Empire.  It survived for another 1000 years, until it was conquered by the Ottoman Turks in 1453 AD. What an Empire, the longest to survive in human history!

This is the same Constantine who changed the course of the history of Christianity from a persecuted religion to a state-sponsored religion. He issued the Edict of Milan in 313 AD, declaring tolerance to the religion of Christianity. He also convened the first council of Nicaea in 325 AD, where the Nicene Creed was formulated and had become the watchword of Christian faith, being recited even today in the churches. He himself was baptized only on his death bed.

His mother was a devoted Christian and under her influence he built the Church of the Holy Sepulcher on the site of Jesus’ tomb in Jerusalem. This stands even today as an important place of pilgrimage for Christians from all over the world. I had the privilege of visiting this place in 2015.  

Imagine, 2000 years back silk made by the Chinese was being worn by the rich and powerful in Carthage and the other cities of Mediterranean; pottery manufactured in southern France was found in England and in Persian Gulf; spices and condiments from India was used in the kitchens of the Romans; buildings and edicts in Afghanistan carried inscription in Greek, and horses from Central Asian steppes were being ridden in far east, including India. Trade had built bridges that connected the east and the west and a flourishing economic transaction flowed through them all.

It was a vibrant, competitive, efficient society that operated this world-wide net work of trade and commerce interconnecting the world, the east and the west, following the opening up of the silk route through the conquest of the world by Alexander the Great.

Is it any less than today’s globalization and neo-colonization and faint taste of imperialism? Nations fought each other to have control over trade and resources as it is today. What Romans couldn’t do, the British succeeded in doing by conquering the whole subcontinent of India, establishing the East India Company and the riches of Indian and trade of the surrounding areas filled their coffers, leaving India poor and denuded. Opium wars that British fought against China opened the gateway to China and its riches too.

Only in the 20^th century colonialism ended after the World War II and countries like India which won freedom are still struggling to come to their former glory. China, we can vouchsafe has almost come to its former greatness and economic power. When would India match up to that? If the Lord tarries, may be one day!    

Hellenisation and opening up of the Silk Trade

Death of Alexander might have brought an end of his dreams of establishing a worldwide Greek Empire, but it could said that his desire was accomplished by the spread of Greek culture and philosophy from the West to the East, with the ideas, themes and symbols from ancient Greece being introduced to the east, the regions in between serving as the connecting bridge between the two.

Greek language became the lingua franca of the Roman world by in the first century AD. It would be recalled that the whole of New Testament, including Paul’s letters, was written in Greek. Greek language can be heard all over Central Asia and even in the Indus valley. It was in vogue in Asia, for more than a century after the death of Alexander. Maxims from Delphi, the oracle of Apollo in Delphi, Greece were found carved on a monument in Ai Khanoum in northern Afghanistan, a city founded by Seleucus. Tax receipts and documents regarding the soldiers’ pay from Bactria around 200 BC were written down in Greek.  

Mauryan Emperor Ashoka, who ruled in 268 BC, propagated his Buddhist tenets through his edicts, which are found in the north west of Indian subcontinent, had parallel Greek translations for the benefit of the local population. Buddha statues started to appear around the time when the cult of Apollo started to be established in Gandhara valley and western India. Buddhism till then had no visual representation of Buddha.

In southern Tajikistan images of Apollo and miniature ivories depicting Alexander have been found. Homer and tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides were studied and taught in Persia and Asia. It may not be far fetched to say that Indian epic poem Ramayana was influenced by Iliad and Odyssey, epics of Ancient Greece, where the elopement of Helen with Paris of Troy triggered the Trojan War. In Ramayana abduction of Sita by Ravana triggered the war! Mahabharata, another epic of Indian subcontinent is said to have influenced Aeneid, a Latin epic poem written by Virgil in 29-29 BC. The cultural influence thus flew from both the sides enriching each other.

China was rising in the east, pushing its frontiers to include the northern steppes, during their dynasty of Hans, 206 BC – 220 AD. Their territories extended up to Hindu Kush. There was a vibrant trade up to tens of thousands of head of cattle head, which the Chinese bought from the steppe tribes, including Scythian in Central Asia. Chinese required horses to keep vigilance over their territory and tribal chieftains of the region of Xinjiang made a fortune selling horses to them. The Chinese Emperor Qin Shi Huangdi, who died in 210 BC was buried with 80 of his favored steeds, along with some 8000 terracotta soldiers, recently excavated in Xi’an.

The feared tribes of the steppes of Mongolia, Xiongnu, were kept in good humor by the Chinese Emperors, through a formal system of tribute of rice, wine and textiles, mainly silk. Chinese silk soon became the symbol of political and social power among the rulers of the steppe and elsewhere. In 1 BC, Xiongnu were given 30,000 rolls of silk as peace offering! China tried to deal with these tribes once and for all, by pushing them up to Pamir mountains and beyond where lay a new world. China had opened a door leading to a trans-continental network for trade. The Silk Roads were born.

China sent explorers to find out about the culture and economics of the countries of Indus valley, Persia and Central Asia. The nomads displaced by the Chinese had descended on the Central Asia, they observed. Military strength of these countries was poor, but trade flourished in the capital Bactra. Trade between China and these regions soon started to develop, but slowly. They had to navigate treacherous places like Gobi desert, Taklmakan desert, passes of Pamirs and other mountains. The route was dangerous and deadly. To weather the sand storms in the region, Bactrian camels were found to be useful.

In spite of the dangers of the route and death of animals and traders, luxury items like silk started to flow along these routes. Under Hans dynasty silk was used to pay troops along with coins and grain. Bolts of raw silk were regularly used as currency. Very soon silk became international currency and also a much sought after luxury product.

Chinese controlled the traders who were entering their territory and leaving, by maintaining exhaustive records on bamboo and wooden tablets. Visitors had to stick to designated routes, issued with written passes and were regularly counted by Chinese officials to ensure all those entered the country went back! Sounds a bit like communist regime, isn’t it? But the thing to note is globalization is not a modern phenomena, it was there in the world even in 2^nd Century BC!

By the 1^st century AD Rome, established in the shores of Italy, came to dominate Mediterranean and their demands stirred up the flow of luxury items from the east. With a highly disciplined and trained army, Rome soon took up the reigns as a world power. Conquest of Gaul in the now central Europe brought gold into Roman Empire. But the real profits for Roman Empire came from its conquest of Eastern Mediterranean and the regions beyond.

Egypt under Ptolemy was fabulously rich and Alexandria had become a great city of wealth. Food grains left its shores by ships for distant lands and brought in wealth. This rich Egypt was conquered by Octavius in 30 BC and on return he was bestowed with the title Augustus by the Senate and Rome itself had became an empire.  

As the wealth of the rich Nile river poured into Rome, its economy got transformed. Rome ruthlessly expropriated Egypt’s tax revenue and its economic resources, a repeat performance by the British Empire in India, many centuries later. A new poll tax was introduced, which was payable by every male member of the age between 16 and 60, who were registered in a census. This census was for taxation purposes.

The sucking of the resources was extended to Judaea too, and births and deaths were recorded, to increase the revenue by taxing each male member of the society. In one such process Jesus’ parents traveled to Bethlehem to be enumerated in a census ordered by Quirinius, who was the Governor of Syria.

The east, especially Asia was seen as a rich and fabulous place with reputation for lazy luxury and fine living. In 1 BC, Augustus ordered a detailed survey of both sides of Persian Gulf and the trade in the region along the sea routes. He also investigated the land routes leading deep into Central Asia through Persia. His officers recorded the important locations from the Euphrates up to modern Kandahar in Afghanistan in the east. Trade exploded with India, but some Romans would moan that the Asian decadence destroyed the old fashioned Roman virtues.

Ports in western and eastern coasts of India served as the market place for goods brought from all over eastern and south-eastern Asia, shipped to the Rome. Similarly Kushan Empire established in the north western India became so rich by serving as the market place for the goods secured from all over India, Central Asia and China, and trading it with the Romans.

 Chinese silk was increasingly available in Mediterranean and the wealthy resorted to using it as their attire. Pliny the Elder would complain that the Roman coffers were being emptied in this effort to adorn the rich women of Rome. He indicated that 100 million sesterces per year were pumped out of the Roman economy to provide for such luxuries, which amounted to 10% of the annual budget of the Roman Empire.

No wonder Rome wanted to extend its empire to India and beyond to China. The country of Persia lay in its way, so the Roman emperors waged war against Persia time and again, sometimes to win and other times to lose.

More of this in the next blog; hope you are enjoying what you are reading.

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.