HOME UNIVERSITY LIBRARY OF MODERN KNOWLEDGE
No. 92
Editors:
HERBERT FISHER, M.A., F.B.A.
PROF. GILBERT MURRAY, LITT.D., LL.D., F.B.A.
PROF. J. ARTHUR THOMSON, M.A.
PROF. WILLIAM T. BREWSTER, M.A.
THE ANCIENT EAST
BY
D. G. HOGARTH, M.A., F.B.A., F.S.A.
KEEPER OF THE ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM, OXFORD;AUTHOR OF "IONIA AND THE EAST,""THE NEARER EAST," ETC.
CONTENTS
LIST OF MAPS
1. THE REGION OF THE ANCIENT EAST AND ITS MAIN DIVISIONS
2. ASIATIC EMPIRE OF EGYPT. TEMP. AMENHETEP III
3. HATTI EMPIRE AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT. EARLY 13TH CENTURY B.C.
4. ASSYRIAN EMPIRE AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT. EARLY YEARS OF ASHURBANIPAL
5. PERSIAN EMPIRE (WEST) AT ITS GREATEST EXTENT. TEMP. DARIUS HYSTASPIS
6. HELLENISM IN ASIA. ABOUT 150 B.C.
THE ANCIENT EAST
INTRODUCTORY
The title of this book needs a word of explanation, since each of itsterms can legitimately be used to denote more than one conception bothof time and place. "The East" is understood widely and vaguely nowadaysto include all the continent and islands of Asia, some part ofAfrica--the northern part where society and conditions of life are mostlike the Asiatic--and some regions also of South-Eastern and EasternEurope. Therefore it may appear arbitrary to restrict it in the presentbook to Western Asia. But the qualifying term in my title must beinvoked in justification. It is the East not of to-day but of antiquitywith which I have to deal, and, therefore, I plead that it is notunreasonable to understand by "The East" what in antiquity Europeanhistorians understood by that term. To Herodotus and his contemporaryGreeks Egypt, Arabia and India were the South; Thrace and Scythia werethe North; and Hither Asia was the East: for they conceived nothingbeyond except the fabled stream of Ocean. It can be pleaded also that myrestriction, while not in itself arbitrary, does, in fact, obviate anotherwise inevitable obligation to fix arbitrary bounds to the East. Forthe term, as used in modern times, implies a geographical areacharacterized by society of a cert