Before the Incas

Chimu Ear Flares

I have previously written about certain early civilisations, such as Sumer or Egypt, mainly because I find them interesting but partly because knowledge of them is useful in understanding later historical developments. I will now spend some time looking at some civilisations in South America. The great watershed event in South American history is the arrival of European culture in the 1500’s and the destruction associated with this, combined with degradable materials comprising the settlements of many existing civilisations mean that our knowledge of ancient societies in the region is fragmentary and the remains of entire civilisations may lie buried for future generations to find. I will focus mainly on the region of the northern Andes (Peru, Bolivia etc.) and sketch the civilisations in broad strokes. I apologise in advance to enthusiasts of the subject if I make occasional generalisations or errors and the omissions due to space constraints.

Pyramid at Caral

The first notable South American urban society is the Norte Chico culture in northern Peru, dating from around 3000 BC to 1700 BC. Most early civilisations begin in river valleys, where pottery and irrigation allow increased populations that morph into urban areas. Despite impressive irrigation undertaken, the people of this culture did not use pottery. They did however build stepped pyramids and create impressive textiles. Their main city, Caral (an alternative name for the culture) was unfortified and may have been primarily a ceremonial centre. Lacking ceramics, their main artistic outlet was in textiles but if archaeologists are correct, the Norte Chico civilisation may have made a striking leap forward in this area by (pardon the atrocious pun) turning textiles to text.

Quipu

The threads shown in the picture are known as “quipu”. The Incas used them until the 1500’s to record numerical data but many scholars believe that the intricate systems of knots do not merely carry numbers but can denote linguistic content as well. If so, these knotted strings were in fact a writing system. Similar remains were found in the Norte Chico settlements, which would imply that this system of writing is truly ancient. It should be noted however that not all scholars are convinced that the quipu are a true writing system and the identification of them at Norte Chico sites is not entirely proved.

Interior of tunnel at Chavin de Huantar

Around 1800 BC the Norte Chico culture went into decline and the unfortified cities were abandoned. The next notable culture arose nearly a thousand years later in central Peru. This culture was referred to as the Chavin. Again, the cities are unfortified and evidence of warfare is very scarce. The culture centred on a site known as Chavin de Huantar near Lima, which contained impressive architecture and was worked upon and improved for hundreds of years. It is very speculative exactly what their religion comprised of, but it is almost certain that Chavin de Huantar was a place that held religious significance for the culture and the site held labyrinthine tunnels and intricate stele. Chavin artwork is found throughout the region but the fact that only one major centre of the culture has been found and the fact that this centre, Chavin de Huantar appears to be more ceremonial than urban, might suggest that the Chavin culture was more akin to a religious phenomena than an empire or state in the traditional sense.

Moche Pottery

Around 100 AD, in Northern Peru, the Moche culture rose to prominence. While the Moche do not appear to have been a single state but rather a set of highly organised states that existed in parallel. They were skilled metalworkers and built massive pyramidal monuments. One of these monuments was so large and contained so many tombs with grave goods that the Spanish later diverted a river to aid in mining it mining it for gold. This obviously caused (severe) damage to the structure, but prior to its destruction this pyramid (Huaca del Sol) was probably the largest building in Pre-Columbian America. The Moche flourished until around the year 500AD when their society went into decline.

The reasons for this decline are disputed. One popular theory suggests that there was a change in the climate and that the culture was battered by storms for decades before suffering decades of drought. If this was the case it should be noted that this did not destroy the culture. There are Moche settlements dated to 800 AD, (300 years after the extreme climate event). However, the later settlements display major fortifications and the excavated walls have revealed caches of sling stones (the bow was not used by the Moche). A foreign invasion has been suggested but another plausible scenario suggests that the culture survived the climate event but that the city-states then turned against each other in an increasingly desperate competition for resources before the urban populations eventually abandoned the cities to move towards more fertile lands. Another scenario postulates that the city-states were temporarily abandoned but that the population simply shifted to different urban centres around 800 AD and that later cultures in the area should be viewed as extensions of the original Moche culture.

Pyramid at Cahuachi

At the same time as the Moche were flourishing in Northern Peru, an enigmatic culture existed along Peru’s southern coast. These people are referred to as the Nazca and while they left behind few physical remains, the remains in question are quite startling. The region is quite arid and agriculture is difficult to this day, however, the farmers of the region are able to water their crops by using underground aqueducts that have been there for an unspecified period of time. The identity of the builders is disputed and some maintain that these were built by early Spanish settlers. They could possibly have been built by an altogether unknown civilisation but the most likely candidates are the Nazca. The primary Nazca ceremonial centre was a site now known as Cahuachi, where the relatively well preserved (and partially reconstructed) remains of a pyramid stand.

Nazca Lines

More famously, they also constructed the Nazca lines. These are lines that stretch across the desert, seemingly insignificant when viewed from the plains on which they lie, but forming coherent shapes when viewed from local hills or the air. As the Nazca left no direct records (like all Pre-Incan Peruvian cultures) no one really knows what these lines are for (suggestions range from maps of the aqueducts to alien landing strips) but they do make for interesting viewing. The picture shown reveals (on close examination as it is a poor quality picture) a thick straight line and a stylised picture of a bird.

The Nazca were contemporary with the Moche and seem to have suffered the same fate, whether from climate change or invasion, as their culture fades out around 800AD. The Moche and the Nazca may have been centrally organised, but the Wari and Tiwanaku cultures were empires. The Wari, also known as the Huari, were a culture based in central and northern Peru, who controlled an extensive empire bound together by a corvee (taxes were paid in communal labour at the behest of the rulers) style tribute system and an intricate system of road.

Reconstructed Central Plaza in Tiwanaku

Meanwhile, in Southern Peru, a culture referred to as Tiwanaku (also known as Tiahuanaco) arose near Lake Titicaca. These were contemporary with the Wari and shared cultural links and trade ties but were almost definitely separate. The remains of the city at Tiwanaku show the skill of the architects and stonemasons who planned an executed the design. Certain people who were interested in the site believed that possible astronomical alignments of the buildings proved that the city of Tiwanaku was over 9,000 years old (as the alignments of stars shift slightly over time this is actually a semi-valid method of dating). This would have made Tiwanaku the oldest city on earth but most archaeologists are convinced that these calculations were in error and the evidence suggests that the Wari and Tiwanaku states existed roughly between 600-1100AD.

Decorated Wall in Chan Chan

The Chimu culture arose roughly around 900AD in the area that had been occupied by the Moche and there are many cultural similarities between the two. The Chimu left behind many artefacts and their immense adobe capital of Chan Chan still partially exists today. The Chimu were an organised state based around a narrow coastal strip. They worshipped the moon and their intensive agriculture supported a large population that was able to wage war effectively. Around the year 1300AD the Chimu state expanded rapidly until it controlled most of north and central Peru. However, their state was matched by a rising state to the south and around the year 1470AD the ruler of the Incan Empire, Tupac Inca Yupanqui, marched into Chan Chan and put an end to the Chimu empire and civilisation. Tupac Inca Yupanqui was the grandfather of the last Inca, Atahualpa and also the namesake of Tupac Amaru, whom Tupac Shakur was named after (a little bit of trivia for you there).

This has been a long post but it has covered, albeit briefly, a period of four thousand four hundred years and has hopefully given a glimpse into some of the civilisations that thrived before the famous Incas and the eventual Spanish conquest.

Related Blog Posts:
Some South American history from 4000-2000BC
Some South American history from 2000-1000BC
Some South American history from 1000-500BC

The Shang Dynasty

"Tigress Holding Man" Vessel

This is the first blog to be written since before Christmas so I must ask the readers to be lenient as I am a little out of practice. In a previous blog I referred to an episode in Chinese history. The piece was about an interesting time period but it was somewhat lacking in context to those who are unfamiliar with Chinese history so I have decided to dedicate a few blog posts over the next few months to putting early Chinese history in perspective. I should point out that I am not a great scholar of Chinese history and, although I have read some primary sources, much of my knowledge comes from fairly easily obtainable secondary sources. In other words, I am not an expert and what I write should be treated (as always) with a certain degree of caution.

During the Neolithic period China had a number of fairly sophisticated cultures mainly along the banks of the Huang He River in the north of China. Notable cultures included the Longshan culture, which flourished in the late centuries of the third millennia BC and produced some extraordinary works of pottery. Other cultures such as the Erlitou, rose to prominence after 2000 BC but unfortunately, despite the obvious sophistication of these cultures, we have no reliable written records concerning them, leaving historian to puzzle over the archaeological evidence and the later traditions that may have been based on these cultures.

Territory controlled by the Shang Dynasty

According to traditional accounts written around 100 BC, the first ruling dynasty of China was the Xia, however these rulers have left no definitive archaeological remains. The first rulers who left translatable documents were the Shang. They rose to power around 1700 BC and reigned until around 1000 BC. Their power base was around the Huang He River in northern China. Later Chinese writers viewed China as effectively a single entity that was ruled by successive dynasties, but the situation may have been more complex, with the Shang (also known as the Yin) probably being a dynasty that overlapped with others. The Erlitou culture has been tentatively identified as the Xia Dynasty but until records are found it must be unconfirmed.

Longshan Culture Vase

The Shang culture was highly adept at using bronze and they left behind some truly extraordinary works of  bronze artwork, particularly ritual tripods, jars and drinking vessels. While there are many exquisite artworks surviving from the period I have always admired the vessel of tigress holding a man as one of the most impressive pieces of bronze art that I have ever seen, although the picture shown here does not do it justice.

Their armies used chariots and were armed with bronze weapons and from the quality of that items discovered, these armies must have been formidable indeed. The political organisation was centralised under the figure of an emperor, although the regional lords held considerable power due to the difficult nature of communication over their large realm. The Shang were involved in almost continual warfare with their neighbours, who were represented as barbarians in the Shang documents but who shared certain cultural similarities with the Shang. The Shang moved capitals frequently and the last capital of the dynasty was at Anyang.

Shang Oracle Bone

Later historians, most notably the famed Sima Qian, wrote about the Shang and provide us with some details of their time but these historians wrote nearly a thousand years after the Shang had fallen so, while useful, these records are far from perfect. The best sources for the Shang are the oracle bones. To predict the future the Shang would inscribe tortoise shells with questions and then apply heat to the bones, shattering the hard surface with heat fractures. The patterns of fracturing through the writing was held to give an indication of the answer to the question and the results and details of the prediction were recorded on the shell. While these are obviously fairly small documents nearly one hundred thousand of them have been discovered and the cumulative details given by these records give an extraordinary insight into the culture of the time.

The Shang emperors and other high ranking members of society were often buried in lavish tombs with an assortment of grave goods. Often a number of humans (who may have been slaves, prisoners of war or soldiers to guard the emperor in the afterlife) were killed and buried in the tomb as well. It has been speculated (speculated being the important word here) that the later terracotta armies of later dynasties were a remnant of this tradition but with terracotta soldiers being used as substitutes for actual people. This practice strikes us today as distasteful but it was not an unknown practice in antiquity (certain Sumerian rulers were known to have practiced it).

Trove of Oracle Bones

Unfortunately for historians most of the royal Shang tombs were looted but one exception has so far been found. Unlike the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb in Egypt (where a very unimpressive figure left behind an absolute treasure trove) the most impressive Shang tomb found was that of Lady Fu Hao. Lady Fu Hao was a wife of one of the later Shang emperors/ She was both an oracle figure and a noted general and her tomb is a godsend for archaeologists.

The later Shang emperors came under pressure fighting the Xirong people who lived east of Anyang and their vassals, the Zhou, became independent and a threat in their own right. Some archaeologists have speculated that there were volcanic eruptions or climate change in the last years of the Shang dynasty, affecting the harvests and causing starvation and discontent. Very little evidence has been found to prove these beliefs so far.

Tomb of Fu Hao

The last king of the Shang, who is confusingly called Zhou (no relation to the rapidly rising Zhou state that he was in conflict with), is remembered as an archetypal bad ruler in China. He had a consort called Daji, who was hated by the people for her random acts of cruelty and King Zhou himself allegedly neglected the empire to engage in a life of pleasure and torture of innocents. While King Zhou was hated, it should be remembered that, if there is a major food shortage, the ruler of a state may acquire a reputation for gluttony by default (see Vitellius and Louis XVI/Marie Antoinette).

The Zhou state rose up against their Shang overlords and the Shang armies were defeated at the Battle of Muye. While later sources state that large contingents of the Shang army defected to the Zhou they also state that the battle was extremely bloody, suggesting that there were few survivors of the loyal Shang soldiers. The triumphant Zhou armies marched on Anyang and the King Zhou, the last King of the Shang Dynasty, allegedly gathered up his treasures into his palace before setting fire to the building and dying in the conflagration. Thus, in 1046 BC the Shang Dynasty came to a violent and dramatic end and the long-lasting Zhou Dynasty began.


Reconstruction of the Shang Palace at Anyang

Despite the bloody ending ascribed to the Shang Dynasty the entire family was not wiped out. The Zhou allowed the relatives to live on as a minor aristocratic family under the new order. Some legends suggest that disgruntled Shang princes may have fled to Korea to join the burgeoning civilisation there. The Shang Dynasty period saw great advances in bronze working and writing styles and their successors, the Zhou Dynasty, were able to start the mass working of iron. But probably the most lasting legacy of the Shang was not their technical accomplishments but the solidity that they gave to the idea of the "civilised state". This concept gradually evolved and became a pivotal part of Chinese culture.

Related Blog Posts:
Zhou Dynasty and the Warring States

Sumer

"Standard" of Ur showing scenes of battle

This will be the last post that I shall do for a while. The assignment that I have been doing will be completed this week. I shall continue the blog (I have grown to enjoy it) but time constraints mean that I shall probably put it on hold for a few weeks before resuming posting at some point after Christmas. I would like to thank everyone who took the time to read or comment on the blog. I hope that you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

This final post will be about my favourite ancient civilisation, Sumer. When I was in my early teens I wanted to study Sumerian (or Mesopotamian) history for a living and I occasionally still wish that I had gone down that route. I have alluded to this civilisation in earlier posts, such as The Gardener Who Became King and Hearing History but I never gave them a proper introduction to the reader.

A map of some of the cities of Sumer

Sumer is special because in many ways it is the first civilisation. There are Neolithic settlements around the world that are far older than any Sumerian sites and other areas could claim to have been roughly contemporary with Sumer but it is uncontested that Sumer is the oldest civilisation yet discovered that we can say anything about with certainty. They are indisputably the earliest culture to leave behind records that can still be read by scholars today.

Sumer is located in the south of Iraq, from the Persian Gulf in the south to roughly around Baghdad in the north and bounded by the Arabian Desert and Iranian Plateau to the west and east respectively. It is generally a flat floodplain for the two rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates that give Mesopotamia its name (Mesopotamia literally means "the land between the rivers" in Greek). It lacks natural resources, including stone and wood and the deltas of the rivers have extensive marshland around the mouths.

King Gudea of Lagash

In or around 3500 BC (by most conventional dating) the inhabitants of the land banded together to create irrigation systems. These systems allowed the inhabitants to control the floodwaters of the two unpredictable rivers, drain the marshlands and irrigate the deserts. The new farmland was exploited to allow the Sumerians to produce multiple harvests per year. Their population expanded but not in a haphazard fashion. They needed to cooperate in order to maintain these complex irrigation systems. This led to communities living together in the world’s first cities.

The plain of Sumer lacked stone so to build their houses and monuments the Sumerians used mud bricks. This was a poor building material so they would periodically destroy their buildings and build new ones on top of them. This led to their cities (occupied for hundreds and, in some cases, thousands of years) to eventually rise above the plains on artificial hills. These mounds survive today across the Middle East and are referred to as "tells".

There are possible writing systems that may predate the Sumerian one, but many scholars are convinced that these systems are just collections of pictures and are not actually writing. The Sumerian script is the oldest decipherable script. It originally seems to have been a method for recording transactions but evolved into a medium for writing advanced mathematics and literature. They wrote on clay tablets. The scribes would use a wedge shaped stick to make impressions on the clay, which led scholars to name the script cuneiform ("cuneus" is Latin for "wedge"). The Sumerians kept a huge amount of records and thousands upon thousands of tablets and tablet fragments have been found documenting everything from their musical scales, to epic poetry, to humour (they liked situational comedy) to the price of sheep. Many civilisations leave behind a few enigmatic fragments. The Sumerians left behind libraries.

Cuneiform text of the Epic of Gilgamesh

The language that they wrote in is a language isolate. There is no language on earth today that is related to it. There are wild theories about extraterrestrial contact and stuff, but language isolates are not all that uncommon (Basque is one) and there were doubtless many languages spoken thousands of years ago that have died out without a trace. Fortunately for scholars, for thousands of years scribes would write parallel texts in Sumerian and Akkadian. Akkadian is a Semitic language that can be understood so the Sumerian texts could be read by measuring them against the parallel texts. Nevertheless the unique formation of the language leads to occasional difficulties in translation.

As fascinating as the price of sheep might be to an agricultural historian the rest of us can be glad that they left behind somewhat more interesting texts. They were deeply interested in astronomy, or more strictly speaking, astronomy mixed with astrology. They believed that there was a correlation between celestial events and earthly ones, plus they needed to keep a close track of the seasons to maximise their agriculture so they used their recording skills to develop a sophisticated astronomy and mathematics. Many of their ideas were subsequently transmitted to the Greeks and survive today. Did you ever wonder why, when we have a decimal system (with ten as a base) we have 24 hours in a day? The 24-hour day, twelve-signed zodiac and 360-degree circle are (possibly, as there is some debate about this) legacies of Sumerian astronomy and mathematics.

They also created some of the most poignant literary works the world has ever seen. The Sumerian worldview is generally held to have been a gloomy one. The gods ruled in heaven and the underworld and humanity lived a life of toil for a brief period before descending to the underworld for an uncomfortable life as an insubstantial ghost. The Sumerians were very concerned with the meaning of life and the greatest of their works (perfected by the successors of their civilisation but created originally by the Sumerians) is the Epic of Gilgamesh. This epic tells of a king who rules harshly until he finds a real friend. When his friend dies Gilgamesh falls into despair and goes on a quest to try and find eternal life and give meaning to his existence. Storytelling has changed greatly over the last four thousand years but the basic storyline is still gripping. The first known author (there are literary texts that predate her, but she is the first named author) was a priestess called Enheduanna writing in the Sumerian city of Ur.

The partially restored Ziggurat of Ur

Sumerian architecture is often overlooked for two reasons. Firstly because their buildings were built of mud-brick, which degenerates over time and made it difficult to truly build large structures and secondly because the near-contemporaneous Egyptian civilisation produced lasting architecture on a truly colossal scale. The Sumerian cities were ornamented with at least one ziggurat apiece. A ziggurat was a series of brick platforms built on top of each other with a temple at the top. The temples were the symbolic home of the gods of the city and may have doubled as astronomical observation platforms for the priests.

The Sumerians lived in city-states with rulers (who seem to have had advisory councils). These city-states rose or declined in prominence over the years and the latter part of the third millennium BC the cities were involved in direct warfare with each other. The Sumerians were either the first, or among the first, to invent the wheel and used chariots in battle. The horse was not yet domesticated in that area of the world so their chariots were massive, slow platforms for warriors to fight from, drawn by onagers (wild donkeys), that would lumber into battle. Their warriors had helmets, body armour, spears and bows. It is theorised, based on certain reliefs, that their armies may have used the phalanx formation but this is unclear and I suspect that it may have more to do with artistic conventions than actual military formations.

Over the years the Sumerian culture had imitators and similar cultures arose in what is now Iran and in northern Iraq. Around the year 2270 BC (according to certain dating systems) the Sumerian city-states were conquered by the Akkadian king Sargon and ruled from Akkad for several generations. The empire eventually broke down when Gutian invaders from the Iranian Plateau conquered the Akkadians. There was a revival in Sumerian culture (there were several major revolts by the Sumerian cities during the Akkadian Empire) after the Gutian invasion and a city called Ur (which is possibly the city identified by the Bible as the birthplace of Abraham) became the centre of an empire in the south of Iraq. But this empire only lasted a few generations and by the year 1800 BC Sumerian cities had declining populations, reduced farmland and were ruled from Babylonia. The Akkadian language gradually replaced Sumerian and Sumerian culture as a distinct entity effectively came to an end.

The Stele of Vultures: Lagash victory stele

Sumer had an impressive legacy however. Their language remained as a language of learning (rather like Latin used to be in Europe) and the last Sumerian texts were written around the first century AD. The Akkadians, Elamites and later Assyrian and Babylonian cultures were deeply influenced by them and in many ways Sumerian culture didn’t die so much as change into a broader Mesopotamian culture. While the later Persian Empire drew primarily on Iranian culture it was also influenced by the Mesopotamian empires it replaced, thus extending the range of Sumerian influence. The Greek philosophers borrowed concepts such as certain mythic cycles and mathematical and astronomical ideas from the Mesopotamians thus drawing on Sumerian cultural achievements in a way that perpetuates their influence to this day.

So, hopefully this has sparked some interest in this most ancient of civilisations, whose ultimate legacy to us is more than mathematics, the wheel, writing, irrigation etc. The real legacy of the Sumerians to us is, well, civilisation itself. 

Related Blog Posts:
Sumerian History: 3500-1940BC
The Time of the Amorites: Part I
The Time of the Amorites: Part II

Indus Valley Links

Figure from Mohenjo-Daro

Over the last few weeks there has been some interest in the blog post written about the Indus Valley Civilisation. If anyone is interested I am posting a link to a site that contains a number of theories and scholarly opinions about the civilisation and its script. While I am to a certain extent detached from the controversies surrounding this area and it is definitely not my field of study, I found it to be a generally well-worded and careful site. Here is the link to the main site.

Johannes Scottus Eriugena

Interior of Charlemagne's chapel at Aachen

Scholars think that the whole concept of the Dark Ages in Europe is overrated, that things weren’t as bad as they are sometimes portrayed. But it seems fair enough to say that between the years of around 450-1000 AD that original thought and culture in Western Europe suffered. In the Roman Empire the language of learning had been Greek, but after the Empire had split and the Western Empire had collapsed, libraries were destroyed, travel became difficult and these factors, combined with indifference, meant that by around 700 AD there was almost no one in Western Europe who could speak Greek, meaning that there was no one who could act as an ambassador between the western states and the surviving Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. Worse still, it meant that the surviving manuscripts of ancient learning were unable to be read or replaced once the original manuscripts degenerated.

Image from illustrated Bible of Charles the Bald

After the Western Empire collapsed the migrating tribes set up a bewildering mixture of states. By around 800 AD these states had largely been united into a new empire of sorts by Charlemagne and his descendants with a power base based upon their Frankish tribe, centred roughly around northern France. Charlemagne was illiterate but understood the importance of culture and tried to foster a revival of Roman culture and learning. Among other projects he founded a new school at his court where the best thinkers of Europe could teach under the auspices of the emperor.

This cultural project was hampered by politics. Unfortunately in the Frankish kingdom inheritance was divided between heirs and personal loyalty was a far higher consideration than loyalty to a state, meaning the Frankish Empire was split up and reunited based upon how many princes there happened to be at the time. One of these descendants of Charlemagne, a king by the unfortunate name of Charles the Bald, required a new teacher for the school, preferably anyone who could speak Greek so that Charles could establish better diplomatic relations with the Byzantines.

Gold coin of Michael III, Byzantine Emperor of the time

Charles asked Johannes Scotus Eriugena to lead his school. I should explain his name first. In the early Middle Ages Irish people were sometimes referred to as Scots. Probably due to the high number of migrants from Ireland to what is now Scotland, Ireland was referred to as Scotia Majora and the word Scotland derives from the Latin term Scotia Minora (little Scotland). Eventually Scotia Majora was no longer used but the Scotus in the Eriugena’s name merely means "Irish" or possibly "Gael". Similarly, "Eriu" was a name of Ireland, so Eriugena is simply a way of saying from Ireland. Names at that time had a certain bluntness about them, so we can say that around the year 845 AD "Charles the Bald" asked "Irish John from Ireland" to be head of his school.

Eriugena could speak Greek; in fact he was fluent in it. Because Ireland had never been part of the Roman Empire and was fairly isolated on the edge of Europe it had escaped much of the chaos that followed the fall of the Western Empire. The newly Christianised island had a number of monasteries that preserved learning and the texts preserved there presumably allowed Eriugena to learn the language.

Coin of Alfred the Great. The word "Aelfredre" is visible

Eriugena was a somewhat colourful character in subtle ways. He was a friend of Charles the Bald and the two often dined. Now even back in the Dark Ages the Irish had a reputation for being somewhat over fond of alcohol. The king asked (in Latin, but the rhyme is the same) what separated a Scot (an Irishman) from a sot (a drunkard). Eriugena, sitting opposite the king at dinner, heard the joke and turned it back on the king (who was noted for his own alcohol consumption) with the wry quote "Mensa tantum" meaning "Only a table".

The table joke is not particularly well attested, coming from a much later source that may well be unreliable. But the confidence of Eriugena can be definitely seen in the title of his major work, the "Periphyseon". This may not sound all that defiant or confident but one has to remember that Eriugena was writing his book for the educated classes of the Frankish Empire, who could speak Latin but who could not speak Greek. "Periphyseon" is a Greek title and a reminder of his own superiority compared to the scholars of the realm.

The ruins of the much later abbey at Malmesbury

Eriugena’s work was heavily influenced by Plato, whose works he could read in the original Greek. He was very concerned with the nature of existence and tried to draw up a logical scheme to divide the entire universe into objects with different attributes based upon some simple first principles. It was an elegant theory and one that attracted a lot of positive attention at the time but after Eriugena’s death his ideas were condemned at Church councils and his writings were banned. However it says a fair bit about the lazy medieval tolerant intolerance that we know his works still circulated. It is proven that figures as orthodox as St Thomas Aquinas (whose philosophy is still the official philosophy of the Catholic Church) read and quoted Eriugena (omitting only the name) while writing their own ideas.

Apart from his own original work Eriugena also restarted the tradition of translation. The last great translator had been Boethius in the early 500’s. Eriugena translated and wrote commentaries on an important philosophical work at the request of the Byzantine emperor and in doing so, helped to revive the idea of translation and prove its utility. The translation and textual preservation efforts of the Europeans and the Islamic world have preserved the vast majority of ancient texts available to us today.

Eriugena commemorated on an Irish five pound note

Sources are scarce for the final sections of Eriugena’s life but there is some evidence to suggest that he was asked to come to the newly united England by Alfred the Great and teach at the abbey of Malmesbury. The story goes that he was stabbed to death in Malmesbury by some disgruntled students with their sharpened pens. This story sounds a little too metaphorical to be true and some scholars allow that there may have been such a bizarre murder but that it happened to another John from Ireland (there was probably more than one). Be that as it may, we know that around 877 AD this innovative thinker in a staunchly traditionalist age passed away. Philosophy has changed and we now no longer see the ability to speak Greek as something almost impossible but we can still admire the abilities and audacity of this diplomat, translator, courtier, teacher and philosopher. 

The Plain of Jars

I recently wrote a post dealing mainly with megalithic sites in Ireland. While writing this I was reminded of a site that has always fascinated me on the other side of the world. As megalithic monuments go, they don’t get too much more enigmatic than the Plain of Jars.
         
Located near Phonsavan, in the mountains of Laos, are megalithic (literally “big stone”) monuments. But, almost uniquely insofar as I can tell, these objects are shaped as giant stone jars. Thousands of them have been identified and they are dispersed over a number of sites, but all within a relatively small area. These jars range in size, but the largest of them are very impressive. They become even more impressive to the viewer when it becomes evident on inspection that they are carved from solid rock.

It is unclear what date should be assigned to them. Scholarly estimates range from 500 BC to 1100 AD. As they are carved into stone it is impossible to use standard radio-carbon testing on them and the continuous occupation of the site means that artefacts from a variety of eras may be found.

The main theories are that either the jars were the burial places of important people or it was a place for traders to stop and use the rainwater collected in the jars. The fact that these theories are so completely different highlights the difficulties in understanding this site.

There is however, a more immediate obstacle to understanding the site. During the Vietnam War the US Air Force carried out bombing raids on the surrounding countries of Cambodia and Laos to try to stop North Vietnamese supplies reaching the Viet Cong by different routes. The Plain of Jars was heavily bombed with some destruction of the artefacts. Due to the remote nature of the site and lack of resources allocated, the site is still quite dangerous decades after the bombing ended. Unexploded bombs and rusted shrapnel are a hazard for those who stray off the beaten track. There are ongoing projects to attempt to clear the site in its entirety and develop it into a major attraction and possibly a UNESCO World Heritage site.
       
I have to apologise to the reader for an ongoing theme over the last few posts, where I have spoken at length about the difficulty of getting real information about a particularly interesting place or event. I have decided to write some background articles about earlier history to provide perspective for those who are not comfortable with ancient history. If you enjoy the mystical fog of unknowing and have enjoyed the last few posts, I am delighted. If you are more comfortable with firm facts and such like, then rest assured that I shall return to the realms of the well-documented shortly. 

The Pyramids of Kush

Pyramids at Meroe seen from the ai

The pyramids of Giza are probably the most famous pyramids in the world and there is no doubt that the public perception of pyramids is inextricably linked with Egypt. However, by number, the single largest concentration of pyramids isn’t even in Egypt but in Sudan.

Since the time of the Middle Kingdom it is clear that the Egyptians had difficulties dealing with organised political entities on their southern border. These eventually coalesced into the state generally referred to as Kush. Around the year 760 BC the Kushites actually conquered all of Egypt and held it for around a hundred years until they were expelled by the invading Assyrians. Due to its isolation, the kingdom of Kush is less well-known to history than their northern neighbour Egypt, but the two kingdoms shared a great deal of cultural similarities. It is clear that the Kushites were impressed with the Egyptian pyramids and they buried the majority of their kings in similar constructions, but added a distinctive look to them by elongating the height.

A Kushite crown

Over 53 pyramids have been identified in Meroe (a city that was the capital of Kush for a significant part of its history). Many of them have been extensively damaged and ongoing instability in Sudan has led to a lack of significant restoration but many of the pyramids survive and some idea of the grandeur of the site can be grasped. As well as their pyramids they also left behind writings, sculptures and a variety of other artefacts that all help to shed light on this ancient kingdom.

After being expelled from Egypt the kingdom of Kush survived in relative isolation until the first century, although it appeared that they may have had to move their capital from Napata to city of Meroe further to the south. They went to war with the Roman Empire, achieving some successes but also suffering defeats. The Kushites raided Egypt but the Romans burned Napata. Kush and Rome came to a treaty arrangement that was suitable to both sides and fostered trade agreements between the two kingdoms. Raiding occasionally still took place however and excavations in Meroe found broken off head of a statue of Augustus that had been buried in Meroe as a war trophy. It is currently on display in the British Museum.

Pyramids at Meroe

By about the year 300 AD the kingdom of Kush had fallen into decline for unknown reasons and they were conquered by the rising kingdom of Axum. Axum has its own fascinating history and surviving architecture and it eventually became the start of what is effectively the start of the Ethiopian state.