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... А. Дан рассматривает греческое и персидское отношение к «обузданию» Геллеспонта. Она доказывает, что, если для греков «наказание Боспора» было оскорблением божества, то для персов, напротив, это было обузданием злого демона, который попытался помешать Ксерксу в завоевании мира [16]. Согласно Геродоту (Hdt. ...
This article explores the perception of the yoke as a symbol of domination and subordination in texts from Ancient Mesopotamia and the Middle East, as well as from ancient Greek and Roman writings. The metaphor of the yoke is analyzed from the perspective of both the conquerors and subjugated. In the texts of the Assyrian kings, conquest is perceived as the imposition of a yoke, while the fight for independence is portrayed as liberation from it. The Greeks adopted the concept of the yoke from the East, which explains why it was often used to describe the Greco-Persian conflict in the ancient Greek tradition. In many cases, the yoke was not only a metaphor for subordination but also had a military-political meaning. For example, the Assyrians harnessed captives to the royal chariot, while the Romans drove away captive enemies “under the yoke”, which was a structure consisting of two spears or pillars stuck into the ground with a third spear or pillar as a crossbar.
... 40 Briant 2002, 198;Bichler, Rollinger 2017, 9. 41 Rollinger 2013. В обстоятельной статье А. Дан переправа Дария через Боспор почему-то не названа в числе других подобных деяний, связанных с преодолением символических природных границ: переход Кира через Аракс, Креза -через Галис, Дария -через Истр (в ходе все той же скифской кампании), Ксеркса -через Стримон; наиболее же подробно здесь анализируется переправа Ксеркса через Геллеспонт (Dan 2015). Это, однако, ничуть не отменяет применимости значительной части рассуждений исследовательницы и к рассматриваемому нами эпизоду. ...
The article presents a new interpretation of the fragment of Old-Persian inscription discovered at Phanagoreia in the 2016 excavation season. First editors of the document, V.D. Kuznetsov and A.B. Nikitin, concluded that the author of the text could be identified with Xerxes, and connected the appearance of the stone in Phanagoreia with a hypothetic military expedition of that king against the Greek poleis of Cimmerian Bosporus, which they dated before his invasion of mainland Greece. However, the remains of the text in lines 1 and 2 allow to attribute the inscription to Darius I and to connect its creation with the events of that king's Scythian campaign (ca 513-512 BC). Herodotus (IV. 87), Ctesias of Cnidus (FGrHist 688 F 13. 21) and Dionysius of Byzantium (52) provide clear evidence of the erection by Darius' order in immediate proximity to the bridge over the Thracian Bosporus of a symbolically significant complex of monumental constructions, including a cuneiform inscription. Following the rumour of the king's defeat in Europe the citizens of Byzantium and Chalcedon destroyed those monuments with the purpose of proclaiming their own liberation from the Persian control and triumphing over the hybris that Darius had shown. The fragments of Darius' inscription could be brought to Phanagoreia as a kind of a trophy, that had political relevance because of the foundation of this polis by the citizens of Teos in Asia Minor, who fled from the menace of enslavement by the Persians in 546 BC (Hdt. I. 168; Strab. XIV. 1. 30) and had the reasons to hate the Great King later. It is equally possible, however, that the stone was transported to the Cimmerian Bosporus merely as ship's ballast.
... Le système complexe formé par la confrontation des façades de la Thrace et de l'Asie Mineure, avec la succession de canaux et de bassins marins unissant la mer Égée et la mer Noire, constitue dans la culture géographique antique une articulation centrale du monde, modèle de démarcation terraquée à partir duquel les Grecs imaginèrent l'agencement de leur univers. Du fait de leur étroitesse soudaine et de l'affluence des flots qui s'y déversaient, les détroits en général étaient perçus par les Grecs comme des fleuves maritimes (Dan 2015). Le courant vigoureux qui descendait le Bosphore et l'Hellespont était appréhendé comme un prolongement des grands courants du nord du Pont-Euxin, du Borysthène et surtout du Tanaïs, les actuels fleuves Dniepr et Don. ...
... A. D. Godley, The Loeb Classical Library). On this text, see and nowDan (2015); alsoHerrenschmidt & Lincoln (2004) andLincoln (2007: p. 128) for the contrast between sweet and salt water. ...
The Persian king Xerxes, when he attacked Greece in 480 B.C., built a bridge over the Hellespont which was destroyed by a storm. His behaviour was interpreted by Greek observers as an act of hybris, the intolerable pride of a human who could not accept his limits. But the true meaning was quite different: according to ideas which go back to Indo-European prehistory, a hero had to prove his value by overcoming the opposition of water. This was a consequence of the concept of "fire in water", which can be reconstructed from many parallels outside Iran - e.g. Rome, Ireland and even Greece.
Zusammenfassung
Während der Fahrt der Flotte Alexanders durch den Indischen Ozean sichteten seine Seeleute angeblich ein Seeungeheuer. Die an der Unternehmung beteiligten Autoren Nearchos, Onesikritos und Orthagoras nahmen die ungewöhnliche Begegnung in ihre Werke auf, gaben diese aber in unterschiedlicher Weise wieder. Obwohl es sich dabei um eine in mehrerer Hinsicht interessante Episode handelt, besitzt sie einen besonders hohen Quellenwert, um Rückschlüsse über Alexanders Positionierung gegenüber den altorientalischen Kontexten seiner Herrschaft anzustellen. Schließlich behaupteten bereits die neuassyrischen Herrscher, auf dem Meer am Rande der Welt Seeungeheuer gesichtet zu haben, womit ein allumfassender Herrschaftsanspruch einherging. Die achaimenidischen Großkönige benutzten dasselbe Argument, um Universalherrschaft und dadurch legitime Herrschaft zu kommunizieren. Kontextualisiert man die Sichtung des Seeungeheuers in den Fragmenten der Werke der Feldzugsteilnehmer in den Diskurs um Universalherrschaft des ersten Jahrtausends v. Chr., so lassen sich Alexanders Bestrebungen feststellen, sich zu den Konzepten legitimer Herrschaft nicht-makedonischer Prägung zu positionieren und sich in einer Weise als rechtmäßiger Herrscher zu präsentieren, die auch für seine asiatischen Untertanen verständlich war. Die am Alexanderzug teilnehmenden Autoren nahmen die hierfür benutzten Ideologeme in ihre Werke auf, passten sie aber entsprechend ihrer literarischen Absichten an.
