1.
Mercenary
A mercenary is a person who takes part in an armed conflict who is not a national or party to the conflict and is motivated to take part in the hostilities by desire for private gain. Mercenaries fight for money or other recompense instead of fighting for ideological interests, in the last century, and as reflected in the Geneva Convention, mercenaries have increasingly come to be seen as less entitled to protections by rules of war than non-mercenaries. However, whether or not a person is a mercenary may be a matter of degree, Protocol Additional GC1977 is a 1977 amendment protocol to the Geneva Conventions. Article 47 of the protocol provides the most widely accepted definition of a mercenary, though not endorsed by some countries. The Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, a mercenary shall not have the right to be a combatant or a prisoner of war. All the criteria must be met, according to the Geneva Convention, according to the GC III, a captured soldier must be treated as a lawful combatant and, therefore, as a protected person with prisoner-of-war status until facing a competent tribunal.
That tribunal, using criteria in APGC77 or some equivalent domestic law, may decide that the soldier is a mercenary. The only possible exception to GC IV Art 5 is when he is a national of the authority imprisoning him, if, after a regular trial, a captured soldier is found to be a mercenary, he can expect treatment as a common criminal and may face execution. As mercenary soldiers may not qualify as PoWs, they cannot expect repatriation at wars end, the four mercenaries sentenced to death were shot by a firing squad on 10 July 1976. The legal status of civilian contractors depends upon the nature of their work, on 4 December 1989, the United Nations passed resolution 44/34, the International Convention against the Recruitment, Use and Training of Mercenaries. It entered into force on 20 October 2001 and is known as the UN Mercenary Convention. Article 1 contains the definition of a mercenary, Article 1.1 is similar to Article 47 of Protocol I, however Article 1. – under Article 1.2 a person does not have to take a part in the hostilities in a planned coup détat to be a mercenary.
Critics have argued that the convention and APGC77 Art,47 are designed to cover the activities of mercenaries in post-colonial Africa and do not address adequately the use of private military companies by sovereign states. While the United States governed Iraq, no U. S. citizen working as a guard could be classified as a mercenary because he was a national of a Party to the conflict. S. However, those who acknowledge the United States and other forces as continuing parties to the conflict might insist that U. S. armed guards cannot be called mercenaries. The laws of countries forbid their citizens to fight in foreign wars unless they are under the control of their own national armed forces. If a person is proven to have worked as a mercenary for any other country while retaining Austrian citizenship, in 2003, France criminalized mercenary activities, as defined by the protocol to the Geneva convention for French citizens, permanent residents and legal entities
2.
Hoplite
Hoplites were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greek city-states who were primarily armed with spears and shields. Hoplite soldiers utilized the phalanx formation in order to be effective in war with fewer soldiers, the hoplites were primarily represented by free citizens—propertied farmers and artisans—who were able to afford the bronze armour suit and weapons. Hoplites were not professional soldiers and often lacked sufficient military training, although some states did maintain a small elite professional unit, hoplite soldiers were relied on heavily and made up the bulk of ancient Greek armies of the time. In the 8th or 7th century BC, Greek armies adopted a military innovation known as the phalanx formation, the formation proved successful in defeating the Persians when employed by the Athenians at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC during the First Greco-Persian War. The phalanx was employed by the Greeks at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC. The word hoplite derives from hoplon, the name for the type of shield used by the soldiers, the shield was more commonly known as an aspis, so the word hopla may refer to the soldiers weapons or even their full armament.
In the modern Hellenic Army, the word hoplite is used to refer to an infantryman, the fragmented political structure of Ancient Greece, with many competing city-states, increased the frequency of conflict, but at the same time limited the scale of warfare. Limited manpower did not allow most Greek city-states to form armies which could operate for long periods because they were generally not formed from professional soldiers. Most soldiers had careers as farmers or workers and returned to these professions after the campaign, all hoplites were expected to take part in any military campaign when called for duty by leaders of the state. This inevitably reduced the duration of campaigns and often resulted in the campaign season being restricted to one summer. Armies generally marched directly to their destination, and in cases the battlefield was agreed to by the contestants in advance. Battles were fought on ground, and hoplites preferred to fight with high terrain on both sides of the phalanx so the formation could not be flanked.
An example of this was the Battle of Thermopylae, where the Spartans specifically chose a narrow pass to make their stand against the massive Persian army. The vastly outnumbered Greeks held off the Persians for seven days, when battles occurred, they were usually set piece and intended to be decisive. The battlefield would be flat and open to facilitate phalanx warfare and these battles were usually short and required a high degree of discipline. At least in the classical period, when cavalry was present, its role was restricted to protection of the flanks of the phalanx, pursuit of a defeated enemy. Light infantry and missile troops took part in the battles but their role was less important, before the the opposing phalanxes engaged, the light troops would skirmish with the enemies light forces, and protect the flanks and rear of the phalanx. The military structure created by the Spartans was a phalanx formation
3.
Byzantine Empire
It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until it fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire was the most powerful economic, several signal events from the 4th to 6th centuries mark the period of transition during which the Roman Empires Greek East and Latin West divided. Constantine I reorganised the empire, made Constantinople the new capital, under Theodosius I, Christianity became the Empires official state religion and other religious practices were proscribed. Finally, under the reign of Heraclius, the Empires military, the borders of the Empire evolved significantly over its existence, as it went through several cycles of decline and recovery. During the reign of Maurice, the Empires eastern frontier was expanded, in a matter of years the Empire lost its richest provinces and Syria, to the Arabs. This battle opened the way for the Turks to settle in Anatolia, the Empire recovered again during the Komnenian restoration, such that by the 12th century Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest European city.
Despite the eventual recovery of Constantinople in 1261, the Byzantine Empire remained only one of several small states in the area for the final two centuries of its existence. Its remaining territories were annexed by the Ottomans over the 15th century. The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 finally ended the Byzantine Empire, the term comes from Byzantium, the name of the city of Constantinople before it became Constantines capital. This older name of the city would rarely be used from this point onward except in historical or poetic contexts. The publication in 1648 of the Byzantine du Louvre, and in 1680 of Du Canges Historia Byzantina further popularised the use of Byzantine among French authors, however, it was not until the mid-19th century that the term came into general use in the Western world. The Byzantine Empire was known to its inhabitants as the Roman Empire, the Empire of the Romans, the Roman Republic, and as Rhōmais. The inhabitants called themselves Romaioi and Graikoi, and even as late as the 19th century Greeks typically referred to modern Greek as Romaika and Graikika.
The authority of the Byzantine emperor as the legitimate Roman emperor was challenged by the coronation of Charlemagne as Imperator Augustus by Pope Leo III in the year 800. No such distinction existed in the Islamic and Slavic worlds, where the Empire was more seen as the continuation of the Roman Empire. In the Islamic world, the Roman Empire was known primarily as Rûm, the Roman army succeeded in conquering many territories covering the entire Mediterranean region and coastal regions in southwestern Europe and north Africa. These territories were home to different cultural groups, both urban populations and rural populations. The West suffered heavily from the instability of the 3rd century AD
4.
Phrygian cap
The Phrygian cap is a soft conical cap with the top pulled forward, associated in antiquity with several peoples in Eastern Europe and Anatolia, including Phrygia and the Balkans. In early modern Europe it came to signify freedom and the pursuit of liberty through a confusion with the pileus, the Phrygian cap is sometimes called a liberty cap, in artistic representations it signifies freedom and the pursuit of liberty. It is used in the coat of arms of certain Republics or of republican State institutions in the place where otherwise a Crown would be used and it thus came to be identified as a symbol of the republican form of government. A number of national personifications, in particular Frances Marianne, are depicted wearing the Phyrgian cap. By the 4th century BC the Phrygian cap was associated with Phrygian Attis, the consort of Cybele, at around the same time, the cap appears in depictions of the legendary king Midas and other Phrygians in Greek vase-paintings and sculpture. Such images predate the earliest surviving references to the cap.
By extension, the Phrygian cap came to be applied to several other non-Greek-speaking peoples as well, other Greek earthenware of antiquity depict Amazons and so-called Scythian archers with Phrygian caps. Although these are military depictions, the headgear is distinguished from Phrygian helmets by long ear flaps, the headgear appears in 2nd-century BC Boeotian Tanagra figurines of an effeminate Eros, and in various 1st-century BC statuary of the Commagene, in eastern Anatolia. Greek representations of Thracians regularly appear with Phrygian caps, most notably Bendis, the Thracian goddess of the moon and the hunt, and Orpheus, a legendary Thracian poet and musician. While the Phrygian cap was of wool or soft leather, in times the Greeks had already developed a military helmet that had a similarly characteristic flipped-over tip. These so-called Phrygian helmets were usually of bronze and in prominent use in Thrace, Magna Graecia and the rest of the Hellenistic world from the 5th century BC up to Roman times.
Due to their similarity, the cap and helmet are often difficult to distinguish in Greek art unless the headgear is identified as a soft flexible cap by long earflaps or a long neck flap. The Greek concept passed to the Romans in its sense, and thus encompassed not only to Phrygians or Trojans. On Trajans Column, which commemorated Trajans epic wars with the Dacians, parthians appear with Phrygian caps in the 2nd-century Arch of Septimius Severus, which commemorates Roman victories over the Parthian Empire. Likewise with Phrygians caps, but for Gauls, appear in 2nd-century friezes built into the 4th century Arch of Constantine, the Phrygian cap reappears in figures related to the first to fourth century religion Mithraism. This astrology-centric Roman mystery cult projected itself with pseudo-Oriental trappings in order to distinguish itself from both traditional Roman religion and from the mystery cults. In the artwork of the cult, the figures of the god Mithras as well as those of his helpers Cautes and Cautopates are routinely depicted with a Phrygian cap.
The function of the Phrygian cap in the cult are unknown, early Christian art build on the same Greco-Roman perceptions of Zoroaster and his Magi as experts in the arts of astrology and magic, and routinely depict the three wise men with Phrygian caps
5.
Classical Greece
Classical Greece was a period of around 200 years in Greek culture. This Classical period saw the annexation of much of modern-day Greece by the Persian Empire, Classical Greece had a powerful influence on the Roman Empire and on the foundations of western civilization. Much of modern Western politics, artistic thought, scientific thought, literature, in the context of the art and culture of Ancient Greece, the Classical period, sometimes called the Hellenic period, corresponds to most of the 5th and 4th centuries BC. The Classical period in this sense follows the Archaic period and is in turn succeeded by the Hellenistic period and this century is essentially studied from the Athenian outlook because Athens has left us more narratives and other written works than the other ancient Greek states. From the perspective of Athenian culture in Classical Greece, the period referred to as the 5th century BC extends slightly into the 4th century BC. In this context, one might consider that the first significant event of this occurs in 508 BC, with the fall of the last Athenian tyrant.
However, a view of the whole Greek world might place its beginning at the Ionian Revolt of 500 BC. The Persians were defeated in 490 BC, the Delian League formed, under Athenian hegemony and as Athens instrument. Athens excesses caused several revolts among the cities, all of which were put down by force. After both forces were spent, a brief peace came about, the war resumed to Spartas advantage, Athens was definitively defeated in 404 BC, and internal Athenian agitations mark the end of the 5th century BC in Greece. Since its beginning, Sparta had been ruled by a diarchy and this meant that Sparta had two kings ruling concurrently throughout its entire history. The two kingships were both hereditary, vested in the Agiad dynasty and the Eurypontid dynasty, according to legend, the respective hereditary lines of these two dynasties sprang from Eurysthenes and Procles, twin descendants of Hercules. They were said to have conquered Sparta two generations after the Trojan War, in 510 BC, Spartan troops helped the Athenians overthrow their king, the tyrant Hippias, son of Peisistratos.
Cleomenes I, king of Sparta, put in place a pro-Spartan oligarchy headed by Isagoras, but his rival Cleisthenes, with the support of the middle class and aided by democrats, took over. Cleomenes intervened in 508 and 506 BC, but could not stop Cleisthenes, through his reforms, the people endowed their city with isonomic institutions — i. e. with equal rights for all —and established ostracism. The isonomic and isegoric democracy was first organized into about 130 demes, the 10,000 citizens exercised their power as members of the assembly, headed by a council of 500 citizens chosen at random. The territory of the city was divided into thirty trittyes as follows, ten trittyes in the coastal region ten trittyes in the ἄστυ. A tribe consisted of three trittyes, selected at random, one each of the three groups
6.
Greave
A greave is a piece of armour that protects the leg. The primary purpose of greaves is to protect the tibia from attack, the tibia is a bone very close to the skin, and is therefore extremely vulnerable to just about any kind of attack. Furthermore, an attack on the shin results in that leg being rendered useless. Greaves were used to counteract this, Greaves usually consisted of a metal exterior with an inner padding of felt. The felt padding was particularly important because, without it, any blow would transfer directly from the plating to the shin. During Greek antiquity, greaves were mentioned in texts, including Hesiod’s Shield of Heracles, Homer’s Iliad. In the Illiad, the Greek forces are referred to as well-greaved Acheans. While these are primarily mythological texts, they dealt with warfare. There are testimonies of their use among Roman light infantry from Polybius up to Vegetius. These greaves are thought to have been mass-produced by the Romans using presses on sheets of metal and attaching lining, while it is generally assumed that greaves were always worn in pairs, there is evidence that many wore just a single greave on the left or right leg.
Many skeletons have been buried with only a single greave. People may have worn a single greave as a sign of status, Greaves were common until around the ninth century, when they largely disappeared. There is not much evidence of their use until the quarter of the thirteenth century. Almost all greaves used at this time are known as “Demi-greaves”, early in the fourteenth century, many illustrations were found showing “closed greaves”, or greaves that protected the entire leg. Closed greaves are made of two plates joined on the outside by hinges and fastening with buckles and straps on the inside, Japanese greaves, known as suneate, were first introduced during the eleventh century, during the late Heian period. The earliest suneate consisted of three plates of metal covering the shin, by the Kamakura period, suneate became a standard part of Japanese armor. Around the Muromachi period, suneate became a splint mounted on a piece of fabric with mail in between the metal splint and fabric, not unlike European greaves.
This is the most common form of suneate, termed shino-suneate, cavalrymen used the older three-plate greaves, known as tsutsu-suneate
7.
Amazons
In Greek mythology, the Amazons were a tribe of women warriors. The Scythian women may have inspired the myth, apollonius Rhodius, at Argonautica, mention that Amazons were the daughters of Ares and Harmonia. They were brutal and aggressive, and their concern in life was war. Later, he says, they established Mitylene a little way beyond the Caïcus, Aeschylus, at Prometheus Bound, places the original home of the Amazons in the country about Lake Maeotis and they moved to Themiscyra on the Thermodon. Homer tells that the Amazons were sought and found somewhere near Lycia, Diodorus mention that the Amazons traveled from the Libya under Queen Myrina. Amazon warriors were often depicted in battle with Greek warriors in amazonomachies in classical art, the Amazons have become associated with many historical people throughout the Roman Empire period and Late Antiquity. In Roman historiography, there are accounts of Amazon raids in Anatolia. From the early period, their name has become a term for female warriors in general.
Greeks used epithets for them. Herodotus used the Androktones and Androleteirai, in Iliad they called Antianeirai and Aeschylus in his work, Prometheus Bound, the origin of the word is uncertain. Πέρσαι», where it appears together with the Indo-Iranian root *kar- make, alternatively, a Greek derivation from *ṇ-mṇ-gw-jon-es manless, without husbands has been proposed, an explanation deemed unlikely by Hjalmar Frisk. 19th century scholarship connected the term to the ethnonym Amazigh, a further explanation proposes Iranian *ama-janah virility-killing as source. The Hittite researcher Friedrich Cornelius assumes that there had been the land Azzi with the capital Chajasa in the area of the Thermodon-Iris Delta on the coast of the Black Sea and he brings its residents in direct relation to the Amazons, namely based on its name and its customs. The location of land as well as his conclusions are controversial. There is no indication of such a practice in ancient works of art, adrienne Mayor suggests the origin of this myth was due to the words etymology.
Herodotus and Strabo placed them on the banks of the Thermodon, later, he says, they established Mitylene a little way beyond the Caïcus. Aeschylus, at Prometheus Bound, places the home of the Amazons in the country about Lake Maeotis. According to Pseudo-Plutarch, the Amazons lived in and about the Tanais river, formerly called the Amazonian or Amazon river, the Amazons moved to Themiscyra on the River Thermodon
8.
Tissaphernes
Tissaphernes was a Persian soldier and statesman. He was the grandson of Hydarnes, chithrafarna Shining Fortune, čiθra is from the Proto-Indo-European adjective koitrós bright, farnah is equivalent to Avestan xvarənah fortune, which appears as luminous. čiθra means nature, specifically the animate nature, the phrase čihr-farn means of glorious or splendid nature, or of radiant appearance. Tissaphernes was born in 445 BC and he belonged to an important Persian family, he was the grandson of Hydarnes, an eminent Persian general, who was the commander of the Immortals during the time of king Xerxes invasion of Greece. In 413 BC, Tissaphernes suppressed the rebellion of Pissuthnes and had him arrested, as a reward, Tissaphernes was appointed as satrap of Lydia and Caria, and commander in chief of the Persian army in Asia Minor. But Tissaphernes was unwilling to take action and tried to achieve his aim by astute, on the death of Darius II in 404 BC, Artaxerxes II was crowned king of Persia. Tissaphernes, who found out about Cyrus the Youngers plan to assassinate his brother, informed the king about the conspiracy, but by the intercession of his mother Parysatis, Cyrus was pardoned and sent back to his satrapy.
According to Plutarch, his resentment for him more eagerly desirous of the kingdom than before. With the desire for revenge, Cyrus gathered an army and pretended to prepare an expedition against the Pisidians. In the spring of 401 BC, Cyrus united all his forces into an army, which now included Xenophons Ten Thousand, by dexterous management and promises of large rewards, he overcame the misgivings of the Greek troops over the length and danger of the war. A Spartan fleet of 35 triremes sent to Cilicia opened the passes of the Amanus into Syria, Tissaphernes managed to warn Artaxerxes II and quickly gathered together an army. Cyrus advanced into Babylonia before he met with any opposition, in October 401 BC, the battle of Cunaxa ensued. Cyrus had 10,400 Greek hoplites,2,500 peltasts, Cyrus saw that the outcome depended on the fate of the king. He therefore wanted Clearchus of Sparta, the commander of the Greeks, as a result, the left wing of the Persians under Tissaphernes was free to engage the rest of Cyrus forces.
Cyrus in the centre threw himself upon Artaxerxes but was slain, Tissaphernes claimed to have killed the rebel himself. They offered to make their Persian ally, Ariaeus and they offered their services to Tissaphernes, but he refused. However, the Greeks refused to surrender to him, Tissaphernes was left with a problem, he faced a large army of heavy troops that he could not defeat by frontal assault. He supplied them with food and, after a wait, led them northwards for home, meanwhile detaching Ariaeus
9.
Peloponnesian War
The Peloponnesian War was an ancient Greek war fought by Athens and its empire against the Peloponnesian League led by Sparta. Historians have traditionally divided the war into three phases and this period of the war was concluded in 421 BC, with the signing of the Peace of Nicias. That treaty, was undermined by renewed fighting in the Peloponnese. In 415 BC, Athens dispatched an expeditionary force to attack Syracuse in Sicily. This ushered in the phase of the war, generally referred to either as the Decelean War. The destruction of Athens fleet at Aegospotami effectively ended the war and Thebes demanded that Athens should be destroyed and all its citizens should be enslaved, but Sparta refused. The Peloponnesian War reshaped the ancient Greek world, the economic costs of the war were felt all across Greece, poverty became widespread in the Peloponnese, while Athens found itself completely devastated, and never regained its pre-war prosperity. Greek warfare, originally a limited and formalized form of conflict, was transformed into a struggle between city-states, complete with atrocities on a large scale.
Indeed, the fifty years of Greek history that preceded the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War had been marked by the development of Athens as a major power in the Mediterranean world. The city proceeded to conquer all of Greece except for Sparta and its allies, by the middle of the century, the Persians had been driven from the Aegean and forced to cede control of a vast range of territories to Athens. This tribute was used to support a fleet and, after the middle of the century, to fund massive public works programs in Athens. According to Thucydides, although the Spartans took no action at this time, conflict between the states flared up again in 465 BC, when a helot revolt broke out in Sparta. The Spartans summoned forces from all of their allies, including Athens, Athens sent out a sizable contingent, but upon its arrival, this force was dismissed by the Spartans, while those of all the other allies were permitted to remain. According to Thucydides, the Spartans acted in this way out of fear that the Athenians would switch sides and support the helots, the offended Athenians repudiated their alliance with Sparta.
When the rebellious helots were finally forced to surrender and permitted to evacuate the country, a fifteen-year conflict, commonly known as the First Peloponnesian War, ensued, in which Athens fought intermittently against Sparta, Aegina, and a number of other states. The war was ended by the Thirty Years Peace, signed in the winter of 446/5 BC. The Thirty Years Peace was first tested in 440 BC, when Athens powerful ally Samos rebelled from its alliance with Athens, the rebels quickly secured the support of a Persian satrap, and Athens found itself facing the prospect of revolts throughout the empire. The Spartans, whose intervention would have been the trigger for a war to determine the fate of the empire
10.
Archaic Greece
According to Anthony Snodgrass, the Archaic period in ancient Greece was bounded by two revolutions in the Greek world. The Archaic period saw developments in Greek politics, international relations, warfare and it laid the groundwork for the Classical period, both politically and culturally. The word archaic derives from the Greek word archaios, which means old and it refers to the period in ancient Greek history before the classical. The Archaic period was considered to have been less important and historically interesting than the classical period. More recently, Archaic Greece has come to be studied for its own achievements, with this reassessment of the significance of the Archaic period, some scholars have objected to the term archaic, due to its connotations in English of being primitive and outdated. No term which has suggested to replace it has gained widespread currency, however. Much of our evidence about the period of ancient Greece comes from written histories. By contrast, we have no evidence from the Archaic period.
We have written accounts of life in the period in the form of poetry, and epigraphical evidence, including parts of law codes, inscriptions on votive offerings, none of this evidence is in the quantity for which we have it in the classical period. What is lacking in evidence, however, is made up for in the rich archaeological evidence from the Archaic Greek world. Indeed, where much of our knowledge of classical Greek art comes from Roman copies, other sources for the period are the traditions recorded by Greek writers such as Herodotus. However, these traditions are not part of any form of history as we would recognise it today, Herodotus does not even record any dates before 480 BC. Politically, the Archaic period saw the development of the polis as the predominant unit of political organisation, many cities throughout Greece came under the rule of autocratic leaders, called tyrants. The period saw the development of law and systems of communal decision-making, with the earliest evidence for law codes, by the end of the Archaic period, both the Athenian and Spartan constitutions seem to have developed into their classical forms.
The Archaic period saw significant urbanisation, and the development of the concept of the polis as it was used in classical Greece. The urbanisation process in Archaic Greece known as synoecism – the amalgamation of small settlements into a single urban centre – took place in much of Greece in the eighth century BC. Both Athens and Argos, for instance, began to coalesce into single settlements around the end of that century and these two factors created a need for a new form of political organisation, as the political systems in place at the beginning of the Archaic period quickly became unworkable. Though in the part of the classical period the city of Athens was both culturally and politically dominant, it was not until the late sixth century that it became a leading power in Greece
11.
Scythian art
Modern archaeologists recognise, among others, the Pazyryk and Aldy-Bel cultures, with the furthest east of all, the Ordos culture a little west of Beijing. The art of these peoples is known as steppes art. Over this period many Scythians became sedentary, and involved in trade with neighbouring peoples such as the Greeks. The mixture of the two cultures in terms of the background of the artists, the origin of the forms and styles, and the possible history of the objects, gives rise to complex questions. Many art historians feel that the Greek and Scythian styles were too far apart for works in a style to be as successful as those firmly in one style or the other. Other influences from urbanized civilizations such as those of Persia and China, Scythian art especially Scythian gold jewellery is highly valued by museums and many of the most valuable artefacts are in the Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg. Their Eastern neighbours, the Pazyryk culture in Siberia produced similar art, although related to the Chinese in a way comparable to that of the Scythians with the Greek.
In recent years, archeologists have made valuable finds in various places within the area, the Scythians worked in a wide variety of materials such as gold, leather, bronze, iron and electrum. Clothes and horse-trappings were sewn with small plaques in metal and other materials, wool felt was used for highly decorated clothes and horse-trappings, and an important nomad mounted on his horse in his best outfit must have presented a very colourful and exotic sight. Other pieces are thought to be imports from Greece, as the Scythians prospered through trade with the Greeks, they settled down and started farming. They established permanent settlements such as a site in Belsk, Ukraine believed to the Scythian capital Gelonus with craft workshops and these include wood carvings, textiles including clothes and felt appliqué wall hangings, and even elaborate tattoos on the body of the so-called Siberian Ice Maiden. These make it clear that important ancient nomads and their horses and their iconography includes animals and anthropomorphic beasts, and probably some deities including a Great Goddess, as well as energetic geometric motifs.
Archaeologists have uncovered felt rugs as well as well-crafted tools and domestic utensils, clothing uncovered by archaeologists has been well made many trimmed by embroidery and appliqué designs. Wealthy people wore clothes covered by gold embossed plaques, but small pieces are often found in what seem to be relatively ordinary burials. Imported goods include a carpet, the oldest to survive. Steppes jewellery features various animals including stags, birds, bears, the gold figures of stags in a crouching position with legs tucked beneath its body, head upright and muscles tight to give the impression of speed, are particularly impressive. The looped antlers of most figures are a feature, not found in Chinese images of deer. The species represented has seemed to many scholars to be the reindeer, the largest of these were the central ornaments for shields, while others were smaller plaques probably attached to clothing
12.
Alexander the Great
Alexander III of Macedon, commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon and a member of the Argead dynasty. He was born in Pella in 356 BC and succeeded his father Philip II to the throne at the age of twenty and he was undefeated in battle and is widely considered one of historys most successful military commanders. During his youth, Alexander was tutored by Aristotle until the age of 16, after Philips assassination in 336 BC, he succeeded his father to the throne and inherited a strong kingdom and an experienced army. Alexander was awarded the generalship of Greece and used this authority to launch his fathers Panhellenic project to lead the Greeks in the conquest of Persia, in 334 BC, he invaded the Achaemenid Empire and began a series of campaigns that lasted ten years. Following the conquest of Anatolia, Alexander broke the power of Persia in a series of battles, most notably the battles of Issus. He subsequently overthrew Persian King Darius III and conquered the Achaemenid Empire in its entirety, at that point, his empire stretched from the Adriatic Sea to the Indus River.
He sought to reach the ends of the world and the Great Outer Sea and invaded India in 326 BC and he eventually turned back at the demand of his homesick troops. Alexander died in Babylon in 323 BC, the city that he planned to establish as his capital, without executing a series of planned campaigns that would have begun with an invasion of Arabia. In the years following his death, a series of civil wars tore his empire apart, resulting in the establishment of several states ruled by the Diadochi, Alexanders surviving generals, Alexanders legacy includes the cultural diffusion which his conquests engendered, such as Greco-Buddhism. He founded some twenty cities that bore his name, most notably Alexandria in Egypt, Alexander became legendary as a classical hero in the mold of Achilles, and he features prominently in the history and mythic traditions of both Greek and non-Greek cultures. He became the measure against which military leaders compared themselves, and he is often ranked among the most influential people in human history.
He was the son of the king of Macedon, Philip II, and his wife, Olympias. Although Philip had seven or eight wives, Olympias was his wife for some time. Several legends surround Alexanders birth and childhood, sometime after the wedding, Philip is said to have seen himself, in a dream, securing his wifes womb with a seal engraved with a lions image. Plutarch offered a variety of interpretations of dreams, that Olympias was pregnant before her marriage, indicated by the sealing of her womb. On the day Alexander was born, Philip was preparing a siege on the city of Potidea on the peninsula of Chalcidice. That same day, Philip received news that his general Parmenion had defeated the combined Illyrian and Paeonian armies, and it was said that on this day, the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, burnt down. This led Hegesias of Magnesia to say that it had burnt down because Artemis was away, such legends may have emerged when Alexander was king, and possibly at his own instigation, to show that he was superhuman and destined for greatness from conception
