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歷史學 – 開欄文
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我在《 政治學 – 開欄文》一文中提到：年輕時我因為「急功近利」；對政治學的興趣不大。也由於同樣的原因，雖然初、高中時讀過幾篇《史記》的選錄，我對歷史學也一直興趣缺缺。
家父2004年過世後，他的藏書幾乎都捐給了武漢大學圖書館。我保留了20本左右；陳序經教授的《中國文化的出路》之外，大概有10本以「歷史哲學」為主題的著作。我保留和閱讀它們的原因在於：家父雖然以「政論家」聞名，但他把自己定位在歷史學家和歷史哲學家。在他老人家逝世10周年的紀念演討會上，我發表過一篇《胡秋原史學方法論》；可惜文檔不慎遺失。
所以，我在60歲以後才開始重視歷史學。近20年來我發表過關於「歷史」的看法以及轉載過一些史學論文；相形之下，寥寥無幾。
本文於 修改第 5 次
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古代時期希臘和波斯的關係 -- Laken Bonatch
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轉登這篇文章並非「發思古之幽情」；而是從古希臘和古波斯的關係，我們可以了解：幾千年來直到現在和可見的未來，國際上只有利益掛帥的酒肉朋友。其根本原因還是在於：人需要資源才能存活，而地球上的資源或者不夠分配，或者有人認為，資源多多益善，永遠都不夠用。
赫拉德特斯大概是第一個鼓吹「文明衝突論」的意識型態家(通譯為：希羅多得)；請見以下 : “Ancient Representations”一節。
Ancient Greece and Persia: Foes, Friends, or Both?
The Ancient Greek city-states and the Persian Empire had a complicated relationship that extended beyond the Greco-Persian Wars.
Laken Bonatch, 02/21/24
(請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
The Greco-Persian Wars have long stuck in the minds of those who study the ancient world. Although this series of battles had a significant impact on ancient Greece, including its history, literature, and identity, there is more to the relationship between ancient Greece and the Persian Empire. Furthermore, we only have the Greek perspective on this relationship, so it’s important to keep that in mind when discussing it. This article will examine the relationship between the Greek city-states and the Persian Empire before, during, and after the wars.
Greco-Persian Relations Before the 5th Century
Red-figured hydria, artist unknown, 400-380 BCE. Source: British Museum, London (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
Despite what more popular depictions of the Greco-Persian Wars may say, the relationship between the Greek city-states and the Persian Empire was not entirely antagonistic, especially before the 5th century BCE. The Greek city-states and the Persian Empire had a strong trade relationship, leading to the spread of goods, clothing styles (see above image), and art through mainland Greece. Before the Greco-Persian Wars, it was a sign of power for upper-class Greeks, particularly Athenians, to emulate Persian dress and customs.
In addition to a trade relationship, the Greek city-states and the Persian Empire also had a political relationship. There were official envoys from Greek city-states that would be received in one of the capitals of the Persian Empire. For example, although this is after the Greco-Persian Wars, Antalcidas was a Spartan politician and envoy to Persia in the 4th century. Persian kings often invited Greek artists and orators to their courts, with the Athenian tragedian Euripides being one such example.
Stater of Ionian Revolt, artist unknown, 498-494 BCE. Source: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
Another factor that complicated the relationship between Greece and Persia was the status of the Greek city-states in Ionia. Ionia was a region on present-day Turkey’s coast with Greek colonies. The Lydians had initially conquered the colonies in around 560 BCE. However, Cyrus the Great eventually took down the Lydians and brought the area under the Persian Empire. From then on, the Ionian cities would become restless Persian subjects leading to the Ionian Revolt in the early 5th century.
Relief from palace of Darius, artist unknown. Source: British Museum, London (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
The Ionian Revolt (499-493 BCE) is seen as the unofficial beginning of the Greco-Persian Wars by many scholars, as it involved the military rebellions of multiple Greek areas of Ionia against the Persian Empire. The areas that rebelled included Aeolis, Cyprus, Caria, Miletus, Naxos, and more. The revolt lasted around six years, beginning in 499 and ending in 493 with a Persian victory. Although the Greek city-states of Athens and Eretria offered their support, they were unable to substantially help Miletus and the rest of the revolting regions. In fact, their intervention placed them on Darius I’s (Darius the Great) radar.
Darius’ Invasion of Greece
Monument to Marathon, artist unknown, ~460 BCE. Source: Institute of Classical Studies (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
In 492, only one year after the end of the Ionian Revolt, Darius I began an invasion of Greece, starting with territories in the Aegean. Before making it to mainland Greece, the Persian military conquered Macedon and some islands off the coast of Greece. By the time the fleet landed and began marching toward Athens, it was 490. At this point, the only major battle in mainland Greece during this invasion occurred: the Battle of Marathon.
Athenian hoplites cut off the Persian military’s path to Athens and fended them off in this battle. Most of the information for Marathon (and the second invasion, as well) comes from Herodotus, a Greek historian. Herodotus’ account describes a much smaller Athenian army (in addition to some forces from Plataea) taking on the large Persian military in an attempt to prevent them from capturing Athens.
Terracotta Nolan, artist unknown, 480-470 BCE. Source: MET, New York (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
The Persian fleet still attempted to sail to the undefended city, but the Athenian military hurried back and intercepted them, forcing them to sail back to Persia.
It was also in this battle that the famous origin of the marathon race came about. Before the battle, one Athenian named Pheidippides was tasked with running to Sparta from Marathon to seek aid for the battle, which he did. Sparta could not make it in time due to a religious festival. Pheidippides had to run back to Marathon within only a few days, and after the battle, he was tasked with running another 42.195 km (the exact distance of the Marathon race) back to Athens to inform the city of the victory. Pheidippides successfully made it to Athens, announced that “we won”, and died.
The victory at Marathon ended the first invasion of Greece, which, in reality, was a campaign in the Aegean and the northern countries above Greece, with only one battle occurring on the mainland. Although this invasion has often been seen as a failure for the Persian Empire, they conquered many territories and re-subjugated Thrace before their loss at Marathon.
Xerxes’ Invasion of Greece
Jar with inscriptions of Xerxes, artist unknown, 485-465 BCE. Source: MET, New York (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
Ten years after the Battle of Marathon, Darius’ son, Xerxes I, began the second invasion of Greece in 480. According to Herodotus, he wished to finish his father’s campaign, but that is only one guess as to why Xerxes decided to resume the invasion. Once again, Herodotus is the main source for this invasion, and many aspects of it are even more exaggerated than Darius’ invasion.
Unlike the first invasion of Greece, where Athens was the only city-state that faced off against the Persian Empire, the second invasion brought more of the Greek city-states together. Although the Athenian role is still emphasized in Herodotus’ works, multiple cities formed an alliance to fight the Persian military. The invasion lasted only one year, but there were multiple notable battles that occurred in these twelve months.
Leonidas at Thermopylae by Jacques-Louis David, 1814. Source: Louvre, Paris (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
After the Persian fleet crossed the Hellespont and landed on mainland Greece, they first encountered Greek forces at Thermopylae, a pass that was defended by Sparta and its allies until the Greek forces were defeated. After Thermopylae, the Persian army marched to Athens and ransacked the city, burning the Acropolis and destroying religious sanctuaries. This act was one of the most significant events in the 5th century for Athens, and it would greatly impact the relationship between the Persian Empire and the city-state.
Bay of Salamis drawing by William Simpson. Source: British Museum, London (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
After the sack of Athens, the city-state met the Persian forces in a naval battle at Salamis, giving the Athenians a victory and contributing to their naval pride. The final major battle happened nearly a year later at Plataea with a large alliance of Greek forces from Sparta, Athens, Corinth, Megara, and other city-states. At this point, Xerxes had returned to Persia, leaving his general Mardonius in charge of the remaining campaign. After Mardonius’ loss at Plataea, the Greco-Persian Wars are seen as over by some. However, the conflict would continue in the Aegean and beyond for around three more decades, ending around 449 with the Peace of Callias (whose date is debated).
Ancient Representations
Bust of Herodotus, artist unknown, 2nd CE. Source: MET, New York (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
As already mentioned, the relationship between the Persian Empire and the Greek city-states was not always hostile. However, during the 5th century, there was a notable shift in how Persia was represented in art and discussed in literature, which evidently ties in with the beginning of the Greco-Persian Wars.
Due to a lack of primary sources, Herodotus informs much of our knowledge on how the Persian Empire was represented in literature around the 5th and 4th centuries. However, he contributes to a trend seen in other representations of the Persian Empire that frame the empire as the one true enemy of Greece, which has helped shape the more modern interpretation of the Greco-Persian Wars as a divide between “East” and “West.”
Herodotus begins his account of the Greco-Persian Wars by recounting the history of the Persian Empire and its kings, but his characterization of Xerxes, the king responsible for the second invasion of Greece, follows a pattern of portraying the man as effeminate, hubristic, and careless. For example, there is the famous scene of Xerxes whipping the Hellespont after his forces were unable to cross. This scene only appears first in Herodotus and then later in authors who have read his works, but it has still become part of how Xerxes is remembered, despite the high probability that it is not true.
Marble relief from Parthenon frieze by Pheidias, 438-432 BCE. Source: British Museum (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
In addition to a shift in how the Persian Empire is represented in literature, we also see new artistic representations. Following the destruction of Athens after the Battle of Thermopylae, Pericles, an Athenian politician, began a reconstruction campaign on the Acropolis. As part of this reconstruction, he funded the Parthenon, which replaced the former temple of Athena that had been destroyed by the Persian military.
The frieze running along the Parthenon’s top depicted Athenian mythological heroes in scenes like the Amazonomachy (battle between Greeks and Amazons) and the Centauromachy (battle between Greeks and centaurs), which are often perceived as representing the battle between Greeks and barbarians or in this case probably the Greeks and the Persians. Furthermore, the frieze was likely influenced by Persian reliefs such as the ones from Persepolis.
Greece & Persia: A Shifting Relationship
Kylix of Greek and Persian soldiers, artist unknown, 460 BCE. Source: National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh (請至原網頁觀看相關照片)
We do not have much evidence of the Greco-Persian Wars from the Persian Empire, so it’s difficult to say if these wars had anywhere near the name impact as they did on the Greek city-states, particularly Athens. However, it’s important to remember that the Persian Empire was enormous. While the failure to conquer mainland Greece may have had some impact, it didn’t erase the amount of power or territory that Xerxes had in the 5th century. Nevertheless, it is interesting to see how the relationship between these two ancient powers shifted over time. Prior to the 5th century, they had a relationship built on trade, and elites in Greece would spend money imitating Persian dress and buying Persian art and goods. Additionally, there were few artistic representations of the empire.
With the beginning of the Greco-Persian Wars, we see a shift in how the Persian Empire is represented in literature and art. They were now rebranded as the effeminate enemy of Greece; a common enemy that helped bolster national identity. Also, the Greek wins during the Persian Wars were perceived as major blows to Persian imperial power. Although this interpretation is far from the truth, it is important to understand where it came from and how the relationship between Greece and the Persian Empire changed due to the wars.
READ NEXT: A Complete Timeline of the Greco-Persian Wars
Laken Bonatch, MA History and MS Archives Management (in-progress), BA History & Classics, Laken has a BA in History and Classics from Bryn Mawr College and is currently pursuing an MA in History and MS in Library Science with a concentration on Archives Management from Simmons University. She is working toward becoming an archivist in order to help others in their research while preserving history at the same time, and her academic interests include medieval and ancient history.
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《拆穿巴勒斯坦當代史神話》讀後
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切蕊教授是經濟學家。我對巴勒斯坦的歷史和當代情況都缺乏了解；因此，沒有能力評論切蕊教授在他大作中對史實的陳述和詮釋。轉載下文只是做為參考(本欄上一篇)，並無替他背書的意思。從標題與用字遣詞兩個角度分析，全文難稱公允；切蕊教授支持以色列人與貶低巴勒斯坦人的情緒躍然紙上。
我同意齊椰克教授在《左派在加薩議題和「解除殖民統治」上的思考盲點》中所引用撒伊德博士觀點：巴勒斯坦人和以色列人都有權利在該地區生活。請見以上超連結一欄中2023/12/22貼文。
如何將這個觀點落實為現實政治，則有待兩族人民的智慧，以及各國領袖的見識和手腕來決定了。
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拆穿巴勒斯坦當代史神話 ---- Robert Cherry
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索引：
Nakba：巴勒斯坦人的浩劫；浩劫日 (本文中兩義皆有，依脈絡定之)
Countering Historical Myths of the Palestinian Experience
Robert Cherry, 01/06/24
Much of the left’s animus towards Israel is based on a false history of the 1948 War: the uprooting of a longstanding Arab population, quelching their aspirations for an independent Palestinian state. Instead, there were longstanding Jewish communities in Palestine; a significant share of Arab refugees were recent migrants to Jewish areas; there was little Palestinian nationalist sentiment; and the Nakba had nothing to do with the refugee problem.
There were longstanding Jewish populations in a number of Palestinian cities. Since at least the nineteenth century, the majority of Jerusalem residents were Jewish despite its home to the third most holy site in Islam. The reason was that the Al-Aqsa Mosque was never a pilgrimage site and during the Ottoman era was never maintained so by the 1920s had severely deteriorated. Besides organizing pogroms against Jewish communities in 1921 and 1929, Haj Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, made a concerted effort to transform the mosque by sending emissaries throughout the Muslim world to obtain funds for renovations. These successful efforts led him to be revered in the Muslim world.
The Mufti’s leadership of the 1936-39 Arab Revolt led to his exile in Iraq. In 1941, he fled to Germany where he was an important propagandist for the Nazis, helping to organize a Bosnian contingent in the Nazi Army. After the war, he “escaped” from house arrest in France, and was given a hero’s welcome when arriving in Cairo. The newly formed Arab League made him the head of the Arab Higher Committee, the representative of Palestinian interests.
A significant share of Arabs living in Jewish areas were recent migrants. Throughout the prewar years, Jewish successes drew Arab migrants from other parts of Palestine. The historian Fred Gottheil estimated that between 1922 and 1931 migrants comprised one-quarter of the Arab population growth in areas that would become the state of Israel.
Arab migration to Jewish areas continued during the next decade, fueled by the worsening situations in rural areas. The sociologist Christopher Anderson estimated that as many as half of the Arab peasantry were either agricultural laborers or tenant farmers, with a large share of the remainder having landholdings that were too small to survive long term. Jewish land acquisitions exacerbated the situation. As a result, many Arab workers moved to the dismal slums that had begun to proliferate around coastal cities, especially Haifa and Jaffa.
Poor Muslims who had streamed there regularly returned to their villages for seasonal work and married spouses from their birthplaces. When the 1948 War broke out, they returned to their villages to avoid the military conflict. This was especially the case after news of the Deir Yasim massacre was broadcast throughout Arab communities. At this village, just outside Jerusalem, Jewish forces were indiscriminate in their response to the unexpected resistance they encountered, bombing structures without concern for civilian casualties. As a result, an estimated 110 Arabs were killed, half noncombatants.
The Palestinian leadership more than doubled the numbers, claiming inaccurately that many were killed after the combat had ended. Their goal was to counter the reluctance of Arab countries to send troops after British rule ended. The immediate effect, however, was to instill fear of what would happen if Zionist forces attacked Arab villages. As a result, many Arabs fled even before their villages were attacked. For these reasons, some important historians, including Benny Morris and Meron Benvenisti, distinguish between the 350,000 refugees by the end of May 1948 and the similar numbers afterward. They argue that military efforts and considerations are responsible for the earlier group while ethnic cleansing objectives dominated the latter group.
During the first phase of the war before foreign armies entered, the Jewish forces were opposed by the Arab Liberation Army (ALA); the hoped-for indigenous army organized by the Arab League, supplemented by foreign volunteers. However, it was unable to enlist many Palestinians so that as much as 90% was comprised of foreign volunteers. Indeed, it was led by Fawzi al-Qawuqji, a Lebanese Arab nationalist, rather than a Palestinian.
He had led the foreign volunteers who had fought during the 1936-39 Arab revolt. Qawugji escaped British capture, going to Syria where he was active in the 1941 Jewish pogroms and helped install a pro-Nazi regime. When the British overthrew this new regime, Qawuqji escaped to Germany where he fought for the Nazis. Released from a Soviet prison camp in 1947, he came to Cairo and was chosen to lead the “indigenous” rebellion.
Gaining meager aid from Arab villagers, the ALA had few victories and many defeats. And a belated attempt by the Arab League to form a provisional Palestinian government failed. Most Palestinian leaders opposed him, particularly for his dictatorial policies during the Arab Revolt ten years earlier. Then he harshly responded to those who questioned any of his decisions, even assassinating some. This opposition not only rejected his provisional government but his efforts to have a say in postwar affairs in the West Bank or Gaza.
That the war was solely against the Jews is clear when the concept of the Nakba was developed. Pan-Arabism was the overriding meaning of the Nakba when first enunciated in 1948 with the publication, The Meaning of the Nakba by Constantin Zureiq, the most important Arab nationalist intellectual at the time. He saw the defeat of the Arab armies as a catastrophe for allowing an alien Jewish state within Arab lands.
In 1958, the Nakba was commemorated by radio stations of the United Arab Republic calling on the world’s Arab and Muslim states to hold a symbolic five minutes to mourn the establishment of Israel. The historian Hillel Cohen noted that there was no mention of the Palestinian displacement. Negation of Israel became the ideological foundation for Hamas and other fundamentalist Islamic organizations.
Only in the 1990s did the Nakba evolve into a focus on the refugees. At the time, Yasar Arafat was pressed to follow through on the Oslo Accords. In his negotiations, Arafat never offered an alternative map to the ones proposed by the Israeli government. Instead, he demanded an uncapped right-of-return of refugees, strengthening his case by referring to their plight as the Nakba. And for the last twenty-five years, the right-of-return has been the major stumbling block to a two-state solution, not Jewish settlements. Indeed, over this time period, there have only been three small West Bank settlements approved with virtually the entire population growth in long-time settlements around Jerusalem.
None of this denies the harshness of Zionist policies during and after the war: The ethnic clearing that dominated the second half of the war and an unwillingness to allow more than a small share of refugees to return to their villages. However, given the Nazi leadership of the Palestinian struggle, and the universal Arab unwillingness to accept any Jewish state in its midst, Zionist policies towards Arab villagers are understandable.
Finally, without a Jewish state, there would have been nowhere to go for Holocaust survivors stuck in displaced persons camps, the Mizrachi Jews when the Arab countries engaged in ethnic cleansing in the early 1950s, or Russian Jews when Soviet policies turned antisemitic. And the tens of thousands of Ethiopian Jews would have remained oppressed. Are these the images of colonial settlers that Palestinian supporters project?
Robert Cherry is an American Enterprise Institute affiliate and author of "The State of the Black Family: Sixty Years of Tragedies and Failures – and New Initiatives Offering Hope."
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奧特曼帝國入侵歐洲與埃及簡史 -- Connor Brighton
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索引：
Anatolia：安納托利亞，亞洲西南部的半島，位於黑海和地中海之間。
Battle of Kosovo：科索沃戰役(1389)
Battle of Nicopolis：尼科波利斯戰役(1396)
Battle of Varna：瓦爾納戰役(1444)
Janissary system：耶尼切里軍團，也譯為加尼沙里軍團、新軍、禁衛軍或蘇丹親兵，是奧特曼帝國的常備軍隊與蘇丹侍衛的統稱。
levy：徵兵(此處用法)；徵稅，課稅；徵收額；稅款；徵兵額
Mamluks：布爾吉王朝(此處用法)；奴隸
Ottoman Interregnum (1402-1413)：奧特曼帝國大空位期
Thrace：色雷斯 (極具歷史和地緣政治價值的地區，位於歐洲東南部)
Turkik tribes：突厥族
The Ottoman Empire: Early Expansion Into Europe And Egypt
Connor Brighton, 01/02/24
Starting from humble beginnings, the Ottoman Empire would grow to become one of the largest and most powerful empires the world has ever known. Spanning across three continents, at the height of its power in the 16th century, tens of millions of people lived under its rule. The standard of living, prosperity, and wealth that the Ottomans ushered into their lands had not been seen since the time of the Romans.
While the influence and prestige of the empire slowly faded after the failed Siege of Vienna in 1683, the Ottoman's quick and sudden rise to power was nothing short of extraordinary. Beginning as an insignificant nomadic tribe from Central Asia, the Ottomans grew into a mighty empire in only a few short centuries and would last until the end of the First World War.
The story of the Ottoman Empire begins with Osman I. In 1299 AD, in the wake of the Mongol invasion of the Middle East, dozens of Turkik tribes had flooded into Anatolia. One of these tribes was under the rule of Osman I. Osman was a cunning and capable leader who was incredibly perceptive of the weaknesses of his neighbors. Both the other Turkic tribes and the ever-weakening Byzantine Empire were ripe for the taking. Osman conquered the Byzantine province of Bithynia and then moved to eliminate his fellow Turkic chiefs who threatened his rule.
By 1345, Osman was dead, but his forebearers continued to conquer in his name. The Ottomans controlled a sizeable plot of land in Anatolia and were now in the position to make the daring cross into Europe. The Byzantines, who controlled much of Thrace, were weak and preoccupied with petty internal squabbles. Now was the perfect time to strike.
Into The Balkans
The Ottoman and Byzantine clashed in many wars in the middle of the 14th century. With each conflict, the Ottomans slowly chipped away at what remained of a once great empire. Soon, the Ottomans controlled both Thrace and Macedonia, and it was not long before the Byzantines were left stranded within the walls of their capital city, Constantinople.
Not only did the Byzantines suffer at the hands of the newly arrived Ottomans, but so did the rest of the nations within the Balkans. In 1389, the Ottomans managed to conquer Serbia at the Battle of Kosovo and then destroyed a Crusader force at the Battle of Nicopolis in 1396, bringing Bulgaria into the fold as well.
In 1402, the Ottomans would enter into a chaotic and bloody civil war known as the Ottoman Interregnum but emerged from it in 1413 as strong as ever. For the next 30 years, Ottoman sultans made concerted efforts to hold and consolidate their power. In 1444, the Ottomans defeated yet another Crusading army at the Battle of Varna. With no more external threats on the horizon, the Ottomans were finally free to snuff out their stubborn Byzantine rivals once
The Fall Of Rome In The East
Under the command of Mehmed the Conqueror, the Ottoman army laid siege to Constantinople in 1453. This was not the first time the city had been under siege by the Ottomans. In previous decades, Ottoman armies had attacked the city but were unsuccessful, thanks to the near impenetrable walls of Constantinople. Constructed in the times of the Roman Empire, the Theodocian Walls that protected the city had remained its strongest deterrent since the city was first founded more than 1000 years ago. However, this time was different.
Mehmed had come well prepared. Unlike the previous failed attempts to take the city, Mehmed introduced a new and devastating weapon into the equation. In preparation for the monumental task of taking Constantinople, Mehmed commissioned the construction of enormous siege cannons known as bombards to take down the formidable walls of the city.
The Byzantines put up stiff resistance against the Ottomans, but their defenses could not withstand the power of the Ottoman cannons. The city was finally conquered, and with it, the last vestige of the Roman Empire was gone. Mehmed the Conqueror named Constantinople the new capital of his empire and spent the rest of his time as sultan consolidating his power.
The Mamluks
Since the capture of Constantinople, the relationship between the two Muslim powers, the Ottomans and the Mamluks, became tense at best. Both empires now controlled lands that relied heavily on the lucrative spice trade in Asia and wanted to eliminate the competition whenever possible. The Ottomans were also interested in controlling the Muslim holy cities of Mecca and Medina, both of which were protected by the Mamluks. After defeating a Persian army in Iraq in 1514, the Ottomans turned their entire attention to destroying this newfound rival in Egypt at the soonest possible moment. In 1516, the Ottomans pounced when the Mamluks were vulnerable, declaring they were the oppressors of Muslims and had no right to govern over the holy cities.
Both sides could muster armies numbering nearly 60,000 men each, but this was far from a fair fight. The Ottoman army consisted of professional soldiers who had just seen combat only two years before in Iraq, while the bulk of the Mamluk force consisted of poorly trained and equipped conscripts. The battles that took place all resulted in decisive Ottoman victories, and within only two years of the outbreak of the war, the Ottomans controlled all of Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and the holy cities within Arabia.
Professional Armies And Slave Soldiers
The key to Ottoman military success in the early years of the empire can be directly attributed to their professional army. One of the first of its kind, as early as the middle of the 14th century, the Ottomans maintained an army that was made up of professional full-time soldiers, a far cry from the peasant levies that still formed large segments of rival militaries. In the late 14th century, the Janissary system was introduced, only bolstering the Ottoman army even further. As they conquered Christian lands in the Balkans, the Ottomans would take the young boys of Christian families and train them from a young age to become soldiers.
Converting them to Islam as boys and having them swear loyalty to the sultan, the Janissaries were some of the most effective and loyal soldiers of their day. Sworn to not take wives they instead dedicated their lives to the sultan. Numerous times throughout the Ottoman Empire's history, it was these slave soldiers who turned the tide in battles time and time again. The Janissaries would eventually turn into an incredibly powerful and influential faction within Ottoman politics, often to the detriment of the empire, but that was centuries after the fact.
The Ottoman rise to power is perhaps one of the most remarkable and sudden success stories for any empire in history. Not only was it able to gain power, but it was also able to maintain it well into the 20th century, something that many other upstart conquerors failed to accomplish. Lasting more than 600 years, it is nothing short of extraordinary that the Ottomans were able to conquer so successfully and hold on to the areas they annexed so stubbornly despite the best efforts of their rivals. Today, the modern nation of Turkey inherits its legacy, albeit with much less of an emphasis on invading neighboring countries.
相關閱讀：
WHY DID THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE FALL?
Ottoman Empire officially ended in 1922, and the Republic of Turkey was established shortly after.
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何以「歐洲黑暗時代」其實並非那樣不堪 – Robbie Mitchell
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這篇文章用淺顯的文字指出「歐洲黑暗時代」這個觀念的錯誤，以及它後面的偏見。對此議題有興趣的朋友，可以參考以下兩文。
Scholars Cringe at the Term ‘Dark Ages.’ Dan Jones Explains Why.
Slaughtering conventional history’s sacred cows
Why the Dark Ages Weren't Really All That Dark
ROBBIE MITCHELL, UPDATED 12/26/23
For hundreds of years, a period often referred to as ‘the Dark Ages’, covering the 5th to the 10th centuries, was looked down upon by historians, especially during the Renaissance and Enlightenment eras. It was seen as a dormant period during which art and intellectualism languished. Thankfully more modern historians have taken a more balanced view. Far from a dormant period, it stands as a dynamic era defined by human resilience and innovation. From the meticulous manuscripts in monasteries to the towering cathedrals, the Dark Ages unveiled a nuanced chapter in history. In many ways, the Dark Ages weren’t so dark, and common people lived better lives than their counterparts would have during the so-revered classical period.
Redefining the Dark Ages: The Good Old Days
Ever had an elderly relative complain that things aren’t as good today as they were in the “good old days”? Well, that’s pretty much where the whole myth surrounding the Dark Ages began. People complaining.
In 476 AD the Western Roman Empire officially ended when the last Roman emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed by the Germanic chieftain Odoacer. From this point onwards what had once been the glorious Roman Empire was divided up by numerous Germanic peoples who, understandably, ignored old Roman traditions and brought in their own.
Those educated enough to be writing at the time, men like St. Jerome and St. Patrick in the fifth century, Gregory of Tours in the sixth, and Bede in the eighth tended to have a strong Roman bias and began writing how things under the Germanic tribes weren’t as good as under the Romans. To an extent, they had a point.
In some ways, these Germanic tribes simply weren’t as advanced. For example, innovations like Roman concrete and many other engineering marvels were lost and the literacy rate plummeted. However, these drawbacks were heavily exaggerated by later scholars.
The actual idea of the “Dark Ages” comes from a mid-14th century Italian scholar, Petrarch, who divided all of history into two periods- the Classical and the Dark Ages (which he believed he lived in). To Petrarch, the Classical period was a time when the Greeks and Romans had showered the world with intellectual and philosophical achievements. The Dark Ages on the other hand were a period of stagnation where nothing could live up to the ‘Good Old Days.” It was a case of rose-tinted glasses.
Petrarch wasn’t alone either. The 9th-century Carolingian writer Walahfrid Strabo had made similar comments centuries earlier, bemoaning he hadn’t gotten to live in the more enlightened times of the Carolingian Renaissance (which we’ll come to later) under Charlemagne.
Petrarch’s idea of a Dark Age took root and inspired later historians and writers. When the Renaissance came along between the 15th and 17th centuries the humanists lapped up Petrarch’s idea of a barbaric medieval past. It played right into their belief that they were reviving long-lost classical culture.
The Enlightenment Plays Along
The reputation of the Dark Ages only got worse during the Enlightenment of the 17th and 18th centuries. Humanists had a problem with the Dark Ages because they saw it as a time when Latin language, literature, and culture had languished. The Protestants on the other hand saw it as a time during which the Catholic Church had grown fat and corrupt. It’s these criticisms that led the scholars of the Enlightenment to declare war on the Dark Ages.
The Enlightenment was all about the pursuit of knowledge and happiness and placed great emphasis on qualities such as reason, progress, light, and freedom. Its scholars believed the Dark Ages epitomized the exact opposite. While the Dark Ages had largely been ruled over by Papal corruption, the Ancient Greeks had given the world its first true democracy.
This caused scholars like the German art historian Johann Joachim Winckelmann to argue Greek classical art was superior because it hadn’t been created under tyrannical rule. This led to the creation of a new art form, neoclassicism, designed to emphasize the superiority of everything classical over Medieval.
The only problem with this train of thought is it was wrong. The Dark Ages were arguably simply different, not worse than the classical period. By listening to medieval scholars bemoaning the loss of the “good old days” Renaissance and Enlightenment historians overlooked the many bright spots of the Dark Ages.
The Carolingian Renaissance Would Like a Word
For a start, this way of thinking completely ignores the Carolingian Renaissance. In 768 AD Pepin the Short, a Frankish king, died and his two sons inherited his entire kingdom. One of them, Carloman, died a few years after his father while the other survived.
The survivor’s name was Karl but after taking complete control he became known as the legendary King Charlemagne, also known as Charles the Great. Through at least 50 massive military campaigns he took anyone who stood in his way- the Muslim rulers of Spain, the Bavarians, the Saxons in Germany, and Italy’s Lombards. As he did so the Frankish Empire grew into a medieval powerhouse. Where Charlemagne went, he spread his Catholic faith with him and in 800 AD Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne “emperor of the Romans.”
Charlemagne became known as the “Holy Roman Emperor,” a nod to how many believed his rule would take Europe back to the glory days of the Roman Empire. The king lived up to his new title, creating a centralized state whose buildings were inspired by Roman architecture.
Charlemagne also pushed educational reform and worked hard to ensure the preservation of ancient Latin texts. It was also during this time that a standard handwriting script, Carolingian minuscule, was invented.
Going beyond nice penmanship, it standardized things like punctuation, spacing, and the use of upper and lower cases. This in turn revolutionized literacy and reading and made it that much easier to produce books and other texts.
Unfortunately, the Carolingian Renaissance was a bit of a flash in the pan. Charlemagne died in 814 AD and his dynasty didn’t survive much longer after him. Still, its contributions to literature, art, and education provided the foundations for techniques used during the Renaissance and Enlightenment centuries later.
The Rise of the Catholic Church
During the Enlightenment much was made of the corrupting power of the Catholic Church during the Dark Ages. The Dark Ages were both a barbaric time and a time when the Catholic Church ruled with an iron fist. But the truth is a little more nuanced.
Ignoring Charlemagne’s little renaissance in the early years of the Dark Ages it is somewhat true that Europe lacked a unifying power like the Roman Empire to keep everything in check. But that was quickly fixed by the rise of the Catholic Church.
The spread of Catholicism meant many of medieval Europe’s kings and queens derived most of their power from their relationship with the church. As the papacy grew in strength, beginning with Gregory the Great (590-604) monarchs couldn’t monopolize power like they had during the Roman Empire. No man was bigger than God (or the Pope). While it’s true that the rot eventually set in and the Popes became mind-bogglingly corrupt, it wasn’t all bad.
Religion and Education
The power the Catholic Church wielded during this period led Protestant Reformers and Enlightenment thinkers to call it dark. In particular, they wrote that during the Dark Ages, the popes and their clergy had done their best to repress intellectual thinking and scientific advancement.
However, this way of thinking ignores the rise of monasticism and how the early Christian monasteries actively encouraged both literacy and learning. Many medieval monks adored the arts and were artists themselves, they didn’t just sit around praying all day.
Take for example Benedict of Nursia (480-543), founder of the great monastery of Montecassin. His Benedictine Rule, as it came to be known, provided a comprehensive guide for communal life in a monastery, emphasizing prayer, work, and study. It quickly spread across Europe and inspired many Western monasteries.
Benedict believed that “Idleness is the enemy of the soul” and the monks who followed his rule often became great scholars. They believed that monks should do manual as well as intellectual and spiritual labor. Which sounds pretty enlightened for the Dark Ages.
Advances in Science and Mathematics
There’s long been the idea that the Catholic Church suppressed the sciences during the Dark Ages, especially when it came to medical science and the study of things like dissections and autopsies. This is true to an extent- scientists certainly had to be careful to make sure anything they discovered didn’t contradict Catholic teachings or threaten the church’s rule.
However, the idea that there was basically no scientific advancement during the period is a gross exaggeration. There were scientific advancements, they just came a little slower than during the classical period.
This way of thinking also completely ignores the Islamic World, which was most definitely not suffering a dark period. During the Dark Ages, the Islamic world made leaps and bounds in the realms of both math and sciences, building on the work of ancient Greek texts that had been translated into Arabic.
The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing, written by al-Khwarizmi (a Persian), might be a bit of a mouthful but it revolutionized mathematics and gave Europe algebra. Not only did it introduce the first systematic solution of linear and quadratic equations, but it also gave us the decimal points that we still use today. The word algorithm even comes from the Latinized version of the author’s name.
Basically, when Renaissance and Enlightenment writers bemoaned the Dark Ages, they were completely ignoring many of the advancements made by Islamic thinkers during the period. White Europeans marginalizing the achievements of another ethnic group? It certainly wasn’t the first, or last time.
The Rule of Law
The romanticization of Greek and Roman civilization also tended to ignore the many, many downsides of being alive during that time. Like the fact that for most people (like slaves) it was really, really unpleasant.
The early Middle Ages was a period during which fairer systems of law began to prevail. These law systems were far from perfect for sure, but they tended to do a better job at protecting “normal” people. Traveling merchants were protected by Lex Mercatoria (Law Merchant) which featured the idea of arbitration and was designed to protect merchants and encourage good practices between traders.
Anglo-Saxon Law during the early Middle Ages focused on keeping the peace and protecting people. While it eventually became harsher and more draconian, for a long time it was relatively flexible and fair.
While later scholars looked down on the many changes made by the Germanic peoples they brought in Early Germanic Law. These laws ensured everyone the right to be tried by their own people and were designed to protect people from the dangers of ignorance and cultural prejudice. Many of the laws founded during the Dark Ages form the basis for laws still in action in much of Europe today.
Weather and Agriculture- It Literally Wasn’t Very Dark
It’s not just the new laws that made the Dark Ages a “not so bad” time to be alive. The weather was also surprisingly good. The period’s name tends to conjure up images of dark skies, rain, and snow but in reality, the Dark Ages was a period of warming for the north Atlantic region.
By the High Middle Ages (around 1100 AD) Europe was well into a period now called the Medieval Warm Period. It was particularly beneficial for the Vikings who, thanks to melting ice, could finally colonize Greenland and its neighbors.
For the rest of Europe, it meant an agricultural boom. The improved weather, alongside improved agricultural knowledge, meant there was plenty of food. In fact, there was such a surplus of food that livestock could be fed on grains, not grass which upped production.
At the same time feudalism (despite its many downsides) encouraged efficient land management and in many areas introduced the idea of crop rotation. It was also built on reciprocal relationships of obligation. Lords were expected to protect their vassals, and in return, vassals provided military service.
This interdependence could foster a sense of security within the feudal structure. Meaning contrary to popular belief the Dark Ages weren’t such a bad time to be a peasant and were much better than during the Roman Empire.
Conclusion
In revisiting the often-misunderstood epoch labeled the Dark Ages, it becomes evident that beneath the conventional narrative of stagnation lay a tapestry of vibrant achievements. Sure, most people were certainly worse off than today but, in many ways, they didn’t have things so bad.
Art and literature still thrived, science wasn’t as stagnant as once believed, and the lower classes in particular were much better off than they had been during the classical period. There is an important lesson to be learned when examining the Dark Ages, be wary of rose-tinted glasses and the allure of the good old days. It’s easy to look around at the state of the world compared to the past and point out all the things that are wrong with it. Someone should have told Petrarch that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side.
‘Just’ War and Martialism in Dark Age Britain
Were the Dark Ages Really Dark?
Forged Medieval Charters: How To Rewrite History In The Middle Ages
Caught Red-Handed! Law and Order in Medieval England
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