Being alive to witness the events that occurred in and around fifth century B. C. E. Greece meant that Thucydides could not help but write down his experiences. The Athenians of Greece and the people of the Persian Empire were constantly at odds with each other, and these differences eventually led to the Peloponnesian war. This war lasted from 431-404 B.C.E. and began an era of conflict between the two peoples (Bulliet). This power struggle not only inflated the ego of the Athenians, but created many negative viewpoints of the Persians. Thucydides, being an Athenian, was therefore extremely biased against the Persians. A Mesopotamian creation story that was very popular in Persia was The Epic of Gilgamesh. If a fellow Athenian were to have …show more content…
Throughout his writing, Thucydides used language that implies that he viewed Athenians as superior to Persians (Thucydides). It could be said that he was an extreme nationalist and created propaganda to paint Persia in a bad light. The Epic of Gilgamesh originated from Mesopotamia, an ancient region within the Persian Empire, and would no doubt have provided Thucydides to draw from it the negative aspects of Persian life. The little information that has been written about Persians and their history has come from outside their culture, so there is not really any concise information about Persian life from an internal point of …show more content…
The Melians were a civilization that the Athenians conquered. Before they were conquered, however, the Melians were telling the Athenians that they would not surrender and that the Spartans would come to their aid (Thucydides). The Melians did not want to give up or surrender and the Athenians viewed them as foolish for thinking that the Spartans would save them. Gilgamesh, in a similar fashion, did not want to surrender to death. He wanted Utnapishtim to give him eternal life because, after Enkidu died, he became fearful of death (George). Thucydides would draw the parallel that both were weak and ignorant for not accepting an inevitable
On one hand, Thucydides is an Athenian and was probably intending to write for an Athenian audience. On the other hand, Thucydides also had the goal of this history surviving through the ages. A goal that was achieved as it is the only surviving account of the events in the Peloponnesian War. I think that this caused him to make a more unbiased summary of events that happened. I think if he could have he may have tried to get some eyewitness reports from the Spartan side of
Why did the Greeks defeat the Persians in the Persian wars? The Persian Wars were a sequence of fights between the Achaemenid Empire of Persia and Greek city-states which began in 499 BCE and ended in 449 BCE. The fight between the small governmental land of the Greeks and the huge empire of the Persians began when Cyrus the Great defeated and conquered the Greek-inhabited territory of Ionia in 547 BCE. At that time,Persia was a huge empire, led by a strong king and was controlled by an organized society.
The Peloponnesian War was a difficult period in Athenian history. Every victory was quickly followed by a crushing defeat. The overall morale of the Athenian people was low. During the funeral oration, Pericles gave a speech with this thesis: In order to protect the splendor and ideals of Athens, the Athenian citizens needed to undergo hardship for her sake.
In the reading of Xerxes war, the Persian are described and portrayed as sort of the “bad guys” in a way. For example the first way we see the Persian people portrayed is with a sense of revenge and greed for power. In the text we see the Persian leader Xerxes, resemble this when he states, “I tend to bridge the hellespont and take my army straight through Europe and into Greece, to punish the Athenians for what they did to the Persian and my father.” Here we see Xerxes trying to claim revenge over the Greeks because they defeated his father in an earlier preceding battle. “I have pondered how not to fall short of the standard of honor my ancestor have set, and how not to diminish the power of the Persians.”
On the other hand, the Mesopotamians sort of have a fear to die especially if it was not of an epic or heroic death. In the “Epic of Gilgamesh,” Gilgamesh realizes
The first goal that led to the Peloponnesian War was Beautification. Pericles wanted Athens to be the most beautiful city in the world. So Pericles stole the money from the Delian League, which had formed in case Persia attacked again. This made Sparta and the other city-states feel threatened. Pericles built the Parthenon and other famous buildings, making Athens beautiful again.
The Melian dialogue is a conversation between the council of Melos and the Athenians. The Melians were a colony of the Lacedaemonians (Sparta), but they did not wish to be the subject to the Athenians. The Athenian Empire was a powerful enemy to be reckoned with, and they had the power to back it up. Before the Athenians came along, the Melians were a neutral colony, but did not wish to participate in any war unless they were being under attacked. The Athenians however, wished to take the Melians under their rule even though the Melians refused to be their subject.
The historian Thucydides described himself as a wealthy Athenian general whose exile to the Peloponnese allowed him to personally observe, from both the sides of the conflict, a comprehensive account of the Peloponnesian War. Book 1 in Thucydides’ “History of the Peloponnesian War” is dedicated to explaining over fifty years of the events and proceedings that led to the abandonment of the Thirty Year’s Peace and subsequent war. In Book 1 he identifies four main incidents, which I shall refer to as ‘grievances’, regarding the conduct of Athens towards both their Delian members and the Peloponnesian allies. Yet he also mentions what he deems to be a more ‘real’ truth than these four grievances that led to Sparta and the Peloponnese going to
Gilgamesh and Odysseus are great warriors from different time periods who both in search of the meaning of life. They are both featured in great epics; the Epic of Gilgamesh which was developed in early Mesopotamia and the Odyssey of Odysseus developed at the beginning of Greece. Both the Epic of Gilgamesh as well as the Odyssey of Odysseus became very popular and valuable to historians in how they addressed religion, such as their attitudes towards gods, definitions of heroes as well as their views on death and
The Sumer region was in Mesopotamia, which is now the current Iraq. This area is very famous due to writing which was the cuneiform script on the clay tablets. The systematic record keeping, the plow, which was the agricultural development. Social and economic organization was also a well known factor, followed by, units of time which was the division of a day into 24 hours as well as one hour into 60 minutes. Also, mainly because of the settlement that took place there.
Throughout history, there has been many battles in which two large and powerful empires fought to maintain land, fought over religion, or to gain an abundance of resources. These empires, the Greek and the Persian, were hostile towards each other at the time. Although these empires were quite similar, they were near direct opposites at the time.
Many see love as a positive quality and for the most part it is. It gives us compassion for our fellow man, allows us to bond with each other, and care for our families. But it also has self-destructive properties too. In Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War, the Athenians feel a really strong patriotism to their city and empire.
Pericles 2). Pericles saw the Peloponnesians as lacking in funds to sustain a war and thought it best to attack by sea (Thucy. History of the Peloponnesian War 1.140-.145). To Pericles the war as inevitable. While it is said that Pericles started the war, his impact on the war did not lead to the outcome of the defeat of Athens.
But still there are certain differences that can be drawn between them. The epic of Gilgamesh depicts the Sumerian culture and on the other hand iliad poem is set in ancient Greek culture. Even though they both grieve for the loss of their best friends, the main contrast is in how they react with this loss. Both Achilles and Gilgamesh were worried about the mortality and did not wanted to die at once in their life.
The Epic of Gilgamesh: Relevant Truth for Today’s Society The Epic of Gilgamesh is set in Uruk, an ancient city of the ancient Mesopotamian civilization of Sumer, now modern-day Iraq. The epic was said to be written by Sin-liqe-unninni, but it is based on five earlier Sumerian poems with no known author. The piece was difficult to translate, and there are two main version for the Epic of Gilgamesh. This is the result of the environment during the time the piece was being written.