Libya

Leptis Magna, Libya

The first Phoenician colonies were established on North African shores around 1000 b.c.e. The original people of North Africa, surviving to this day in the form of various Berber tribes, strongly defended their territory and freedoms from outside domination.

The geography of North Africa made it easy to mount attacks on settled territory. Vast tribal armies could be hidden in the Sahara to the south. Despite geographic challenges to settlement, there were also irresistible agricultural riches that could be gathered from the coastal plains and valleys of North Africa.

The history of the Roman Empire and the Roman army would have been very different were it not for the breadbasket of Rome that was ancient Libya and North Africa. It provided the "bread and circuses", grain and olives, and wild beasts to the population of imperial Rome and other imperial cities.


The Romans defined ancient Libya as all the lands of North Africa to the west of Egypt. Two thousand years ago the climate of the region was very different. The Sahara did not extend as far north, and there were more regular rains.

Barbary elephants, lions, and apes roamed the forests. The tribes of Libya were not random, disorganized bands of warriors. Most settlement, however, occurred on the coasts where grain and other goods could be easily transported throughout the Mediterranean.

The Romans defeated Carthage in the Battle of Zama in 202 b.c.e., ushering in a new era of Roman colonization of the region. Augustus Caesar for example, granted rich farming territory in North Africa to retired army soldiers and officers. Granting land to veterans also gave them an incentive to defend the empire.

A vast system of mud walls and forts were erected throughout North Africa on the edge of the desert to defend settlers, and hundreds of new Roman cities and villages were established in the coastal plains of Tunisia and Libya.

In cases where it was too difficult to defend Roman territory, regions were given over to local client kings, and pacts of peace were signed. Soon many Africans would become integrated into the Roman system.

Several Roman emperors, including the formidable Septimius Severus were from North Africa. Other famous Roman North Africans included Apuleius, writer of the first classical novel, The Golden Ass, and Augustine of Hippo, the intellectual father of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Byzantines revived Roman North Africa in 533 c.e. after the invasion of the Vandals in 429. Sparked by the revolutionary message of Islam, the Arabs began their rapid invasion of North Africa around 641. Yet the Arabs, like the Romans before them, faced fierce resistance from the native Berbers.

According to legend, the famed Berber queen al-Kahina only surrendered after burning the forests and laying waste to the land. Indeed, centuries after the Arab invasion, cycles of conflict between the Berbers and Arabs, especially in modern Algeria, continue to this day.

Lucian of Samosata

Lucian came from the town of Samosata (modern-day Samsat, Turkey) in the Roman province of Syria. Likely of Semitic background, he learned of the Greek language and culture as an outsider.

He had a very short apprenticeship as a sculptor under an uncle and then began his education in earnest, becoming skilled in Greek language and rhetoric. He became a successful speaker on the lecture circuit, a more important part of his career than the law courts.

He made his way as far as Gaul (France), and Athens was his home for some time. Around the age of 40 he gave up his vocation as a public speaker to take up philosophy, or rather to write dialogues concerned superficially with philosophical matters but vigorously larded with touches of comedy.


About 80 works have come down to us from his hand, some spuriously. They testify to the education in rhetoric that Lucian had, his wide reading in the literature of the Greek world of prior eras, and his consciousness of being a Greek by acculturation.

These works can be divided into a number of genres. Some are rhetorical exercises (for example, In Praise of the Fly, where the rhetorician displays his ability to praise things unworthy of praise); others are short pieces presented to introduce a longer lecture.

A large number are dialogues, either actual or reported, wherein he sometimes uses verse. He also wrote essays on a variety of topics, romances of a sort, biographies, and one or two playlets.

Dear to Lucian was the "description", a subgenre in its own right, and he displays a truly remarkable ability to give the reader a picture of some painting or other object. However, he is perhaps best known for his comic dialogues, a type he considered to be somewhat of a novelty.

Lucian uses a variety of characters in these works, including famous people of bygone eras, gods and goddesses often ludicrously portrayed, and, most intriguingly, a person, sometimes named, sometimes not, who is no doubt the persona of the author. From this springboard, among others, Lucian was able to do what he did best—ridicule the minor idiocies of humans and the unique silliness and gullibility of humankind.

Attacked by his pen are those he considered to be false prophets, religious charlatans, superstitious folk, and proponents of a certain fanatical interest in the niceties of classical Attic diction. This last group is especially interesting because, as an outsider, Lucian was interested in the proper usage of language, and yet he was able to see the excesses involved in such interest.

Ultimately, Lucian is an amusing skeptic, though not a serious thinker, and extremely difficult to set within a typology of litterateurs; in a way he is sui generis. As a late writer had it, Lucian was "serious—at raising a laugh".

The vigor of his language, his powers of description, and especially his adroitness in poking fun at man’s idiosyncrasies and foibles, made him one of the most infl uential authors for later Western literature.

Minoans

The Minoan civilization has its roots on the island of Crete in the Mediterranean Sea during the Neolithic Period (7000–3000 b.c.e.). The original inhabitants most likely emigrated from Asia Minor, which had already developed cities and conducted trade by 2000 b.c.e.

The Greek poet Homer refers to the Minoan population as "Eteo-Cretans" in book 9 of the Odyssey. This early culture used hieroglyphics similar to that of the Egyptians, which they eventually developed into a linear script for keeping records.

Most of what is known about this civilization was discovered during the excavations of Sir Arthur Evans during the early 1900s. Despite a strong naval influence, Minoan culture has no evidence of any warlike activity or organization.


The most important center of Minoan civilization was the palace city of Knossos. Located inland on the island of Crete, Knossos was built at the confluence of the Vlihia stream and the Keratos River, with good lands for vineyards and olive groves. The main palace was constructed on Kefala Hill in the early second millennium b.c.e.

The Minoans also built a sophisticated system of drains, roads, and warehouses to promote trade. The structures at Knossos show evidence of compartmentalized homes with working doors and partitions, with no difference between the homes of the wealthy and the workers.

This suggests that wealth may have been more evenly shared as the Minoan trade routes prospered. The palace and larger buildings may have even had functioning toilets. Many of the ruins at Knossos have colorful frescos or intricately designed pottery, which display a unique form of art in the ancient world.

Nearly all of the artwork uncovered displays Minoan daily life, showing fishing, sailors trading goods, young men and women participating in sporting games or rituals, wildlife, and religious figures. The Minoans developed art for art’s sake, a revolutionary concept in the ancient world. Through the Mycenaeans they passed this love of art on to mainland Greece.

Inside Minoan building

The religious beliefs of the early Minoan culture were polytheistic and matriarchal, a goddess religion. The serpent goddess played a prominent role in the homes of Minoans, perhaps a foreshadowing of the strong female deities in the Greek religion. Minoan influence in the Mediterranean spread through trade.

The Cretans and their Aegean relatives developed what was one of the most advanced mercantile navies in history. There is evidence of trade with diverse areas such as Turkey, Cyprus, Egypt, Afghanistan, and Scandinavia. Goods traded with Knossos included copper, ivory, amethyst, lapis lazuli, carnelian, gold, and amber.

Clay tablets have been found at Knossos with both Linear A and B writing styles that contain records of goods traded and stored. Evidence of this vast trading network can also be found in the palace city of Akrotiri, located on the southwestern tip of Santorini island.


This city had only been rediscovered in the mid-1900s, having been buried by a volcanic eruption. Excavations revealed an elaborate drainage system built under sophisticated, multi-tiered buildings.

The building interiors were decorated with magnificent frescos, furniture, and vessels. The absence of skeletal remains or any valuables hints that the population may have been warned of the eruption and evacuated.

The most important Minoan artifact is the Law Code of Gortyn, which dates to 450 b.c.e. It is inscribed in marble at the Odeion using Dorian Greek in the boustrophedon style (one line is read right to left, then the next left to right).

Most of the laws pertain to property rights, marriage, divorce, and inheritance relating to free men and women and slaves. The content of the code corroborates the concept that men and women were given equal status in Minoan society.

Scholars cannot agree on what exactly brought about the end of the Minoan civilization. It was, perhaps, a combination of calamities over a short period of time. Crete is susceptible to seismic events. It is believed that the volcanic eruption at Thíra (Thera) may have caused a tsunami that decimated the civilization.

Other theories point to the adoption of Linear B writing as proof that the Mycenaeans conquered Crete and treated it as its colony. All that is known for certain is that Minoan culture declined as the Mycenaeans prospered.

Mittani

The kingdom of Mittani was an impressive Indo-European empire that ruled over northern Mesopotamia, or the Fertile Crescent, during the 15th and 14th centuries b.c.e. At its height the geographical region of Mittani stretched from the ancient city of Nuzi and the Tigris River in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west.

The two capital cities, Taite and Waššukanni, were most likely located in the heartland of the Khabur river valley or at its headwaters. The capitals’ archaeological sites have not yet been located.

Despite its greatness no Mittani texts regarding its own history have been found, so most of the information concerning the Mittani comes from Egyptian, Hittite, and Assyrian records. The Hurrians, a people who were present in the Khabur River valley for several hundred years prior to the Mittani’s political establishment, composed the majority of the population.


The ruling class of Mittani, however, seems to have been an Indo-European people in origin and worshipped Vedic deities; that is, the marks of this society planted in today’s Middle Eastern heartland bore resemblance to classical Indian culture.

Whether the Mittani introduced the horse to the Fertile Crescent is disputed, yet they did make use of it in a new form of chariot warfare. The Mittani developed a two-wheeled chariot drawn by two horses.

The elite aristocratic warriors, called Maryannu (meaning "noble in chariot"), and an accompanying archer manned these chariots. The Maryannu, along with their horses, were clothed in bronze or iron scale armor.

Mittani warriors

The chariots were used as a vehicle to surround enemies and a base from which to fire consistent volleys of arrows and javelins. The chariots were also used as collision and trampling weapons. This form of warfare served as a model for the Egyptians, Hittites, Babylonians, and Canaanites.

The Mittani kingdom ruled over all of northern Mesopotamia in the 15th century b.c.e. and reduced the former Assyrian state to vassal status. By the 14th century b.c.e. the constant conflict with the Hittites and Egyptians caused a significant reduction in the size of the Mittani Empire.

After the Mittani king Artatama established a treaty with Thutmose IV, pharaoh of Egypt, the two nations lived in relative peace, and the Egyptians acquired daughters of the Mittani kings for wives. However, the growing power of the Hittite kingdom in the west and the resurgence of the Assyrians in the east quickly became too much for the Mittani to handle.


During Tushratta’s reign, the last independent Mittani monarch, the Hittite king Suppiluliumas sacked Waššukanni. This event marked the fall of the Mittani Empire around 1370 b.c.e. The region of the Mittani was reduced to a Hittite vassalage known as Hanilgalbat and would later be controlled by the Assyrians.

A Hittite and Assyrian alliance destroyed the last remnant of the Mittani state in the north about 1340 b.c.e. Finally, an Assyrian king by the name of Shalmaneser I wiped history clean of the Mittani by securing the territory of Hanilgalbat (1280–70 b.c.e.) and deporting the Mittani people across the known world as cheap labor.

Palmyra

Palmyra (City of Palms), an oasis in the northeastern desert in present-day Syria, became a trading center and stopping point on the Silk Road as early as the 19th century b.c.e. Its importance as a trading point rose as the Seleucid Empire declined and the Palmyrenes became middlemen in trade destined for other parts of the Roman Empire.

It was made a Roman protectorate in the first century c.e. whereby residents became Roman citizens, with all its benefits, but enjoying considerable local autonomy. As their wealth from trade and commerce grew, Palmyrenes built lavish temples, public monuments, and elaborate stone funerary towers for the burial of their dead.

The Palmyran ruler Odaynath defeated the Sassanids in 260 c.e. and then proclaimed himself king of kings. Soon afterward he was assassinated, perhaps on orders from his wife, Queen Zenobia.


Known for her beauty and ambition, Zenobia, who claimed to have descended from Cleopatra, ruled in the name of her young son. Exceedingly ambitious, she led major military battles in her own right. By 269 she ruled virtually all of Syria and then moved to invade Egypt and parts of present-day Turkey.

Declaring complete independence from Rome, she had coins minted with her own image and in 271 proclaimed her son Augustus. Rome retaliated by launching a successful military attack under Domitius Aurelianus on Palmyra in 272. Aurelianus took the city and captured Zenobia. He spared the city, leaving only a small force to maintain Roman rule.

Shortly thereafter Palmyra rose in revolt, and Aurelianus retaliated by having his troops pillage and raze the city, which never recovered its former glory. Zenobia was allegedly brought back to Rome in golden chains and pensioned off to live out the rest of her days in Tibur, present-day Tivoli, in Italy.

Phoenician Colonies

Phoenician Colonies

Beginning with the Greek Dark Ages, Phoinikoi was the word used by Greeks to refer to the urban populations of the eastern Mediterranean seacoast. Phoenician cities from coastal Syria and Lebanon to the northern shore of Palestine, such as Ras al-Bassit (Poseidon), Tell Sukas (Sianu), Arwad (Arados), Tell Kazel (Sumur, Simyra), Tripolis, Byblos, Beirut, Sidon, Tyre, Ushu, Akhzib, Akko, Tell Keisan, Tell Abu Hawam, and Dor, clung to the rocky islands, sheer cliffs, promontories, and open plains of the coastline.

Inhabitants of these cities shared some degree of common ancestry and spoke a common language, also called Phoenician. The Phoenician-speaking populations were also united by numerous similarities of material culture, social organization, religious belief and practice, and economic enterprise.

The Phoenicians are perhaps most famous for promulgating the 22-letter alphabet in which their documents were composed. The Phoenician alphabet is an ancestor of or inspiration for all succeeding alphabetic systems.


The Phoenician dialect of Tyre and Sidon reached its most extensive use in the Neo-Assyrian period (c. 860–600 b.c.e.). North of Syria, the Cilician region of Anatolia (modern Turkey) adopted the Tyrian-Sidonian Phoenician language and script for royal, administrative, and legal texts, generally with a parallel version in the local Luwian language, which was written in a hieroglyphic script.

Westward expansion of Phoenician exploration and settlement would carry the language and script to Cyprus, Crete, the Aegean islands, Sardinia, Sicily, Malta, the Balearics, and to the Atlantic coast of the Iberian Peninsula. Cádiz, ancient Gades, now in Spain, was the western-most Phoenician city.

Phoenician harbor and ship

An eighth-century b.c.e. inscription from Castillo de Doña Blanca (Puerto de Santa María, near Cádiz) identifies its writer as originating from Akko, suggesting that westward expansion radiated from Tyre, as traditionally held.

Tyre was also the mother city of colonies on the African continent: Utica the oldest, Lixus on the Atlantic coast of West Africa the most remote, and Carthage the largest and best known. Phoenician cultural influence extended south to the Sahara and sustained later Christian and Muslim Arab traditions that the indigenous population of North Africa was descended from Canaanites driven out of Palestine by Joshua.

The territory of contemporary Syria, Lebanon, and Israel/Palestine from Ras al-Bassit in the north to Dor in the south was called "Canaan" in ancient times, and people in the western Phoenician diaspora referred to themselves as "Canaanites".


Phoenician material culture is readily detected by the distinctive traditions of pottery form and decoration, with bichrome decoration giving way to black-on-red and an enduring red-slipped style. Phoenician graphic and plastic arts developed Egyptian themes and later Anatolian and European and African styles, often in exquisite miniature forms on seals and amulets.

Early Phoenician settlements generally lack evidence of pork consumption, but later sites under European influence show a more varied diet. Both cremation burials and inhumation were practiced. Western loci exclusively for cremation burials of infants and children are widely interpreted as evidence of ritual infanticide.

Phoenician trireme

Phoenician religion was local, polytheistic, and family centered. Lineages of priests male and female conducted animal sacrifices and life cycle rituals; individual piety often combined Canaanite traditions with Egyptian magical practices.

In the Levant, distinctives of Phoenician culture weakened under Hellenistic and later Roman influence. Christianity replaced earlier beliefs in many Phoenician cities; in North Africa, the Punic (late Phoenician) language and some other cultural practices survived—largely among the Christian population—until the Arab conquests.