From: Torsten
Message: 67605
Date: 2011-05-25
--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:
>
> > > > > (GK)(Diophantes didn't) i.e. engage in military activity
> > > > > north of the isthmus of Perekop prior to 110 BCE
> > >
> > > > (TP) Sez you.
> > >
> > > GK: Because there is no evidence that he did.
> >
> > If you emend that of Strabo out of existence, there isn't.
>
> ****GK: It doesn't really matter whether one amends Strabo or not.
> In any case, Strabo needs to be understood properly. Reread the
> passage in question: (7,4,3) It begins thus:
> "This city [Chersonesos GK] was at first self-governing, but when it
> was sacked by the barbarians"
>
> STOP. We can't take "sack" literally. We know as an absolute fact
> that Chersonesos was never "sacked" in that time period. We know
> that its state was fiercely attacked, that it lost its northern
> holdings (Kerkinitis and Kalos Limen), and that it was even subject
> to siege. This evidently began when Skilur was still alive. We must
> understand "sacked" to mean "fiercely attacked" (nothing like the
> sack of Rome by Alaric).
Okay, Strabo is being imprecise here, which casts doubt on the validity of this passage.
> Strabo then continues: " it was forced to choose Mithridates Eupator
> as protector"
>
> We know as an absolute fact that Chersonesos did not immediately
> lose its independence as a result of Diophantos' activity on its
> behalf in 110-108 BCE (The Chersonesos decree is clear). But after
> mentioning some details of the Pontic intervention, Strabo concludes
> that "from that time on down to the present the city of the
> Chersonesites has been subject to the potentates of the Bosporus".
>
> "That time" must mean some point shortly after 108. We just can't
> ignore the Diophantos Decree.
Being independent and having a protector are not, contrary to what you implicitly assume here, mutually exclusive states. Only after your protector puts forth and gets acknowledged terms for his protection have you lost your independence. That process can be delayed in formality by various tactics, which of course doesn't change the reality, so in that sense Strabo describes here the situation accurately.
> Strabo has thus telescoped information about a series of events
> which by and by led to Chersonesos losing its self-government.
No, as I just said, you could argue that Strabo's description matches the actual political reality. Denmark was in a similar situation politically 1940-1945, the Germans had occupied the country but formally still recognized Denmark as an independent state, which meant that every time the Germans wanted to have more say in the forced arrangement, the Danish administration were in a situation where they had to trade formalia for realia, as one civil servant put it. Of course, in spite of those negotiations, describing Denmark as having lost its self-government from 1940 is accurate eneough.
> BTW as an aside, Strabo's "to the present" is a bit puzzling, and
> may be indicative of which sources he was using. We know that
> Chersonesos regained its independence from Bosporus in 45 BCE
> through a decree of Caesar, and managed to retain it (though
> subsequently subject to Roman supervision or control of various
> types).
That might corroborate your claim that Strabo in general is describing a situation from a perspective around the Mithridatic wars.
> I have interpreted him to imply that this happened in the context of
> a Pontic campaign north of the isthmus, and I have identified that
> campaign with Mithradates' war against the Bastarnae and Sarmatians
> (Iazyges) of 91-88.
I think that is a non-sequitur.
> I admit that this is tentative, and wholly linked to a "real fact"
> understanding of this segment by Strabo: "He [Mithradates GK] was
> then leading an army against the barbarians who lived beyond the
> isthmus as far as the Borysthenes and the Adrias; this, however, was
> preparatory to a campaign against the Romans".
A non-sequitur since the above passage is not proven untrue by Strabo's erroneous claim that Chersonesos was sacked at that time.
> You don't like my emendation of Adrias to Tyras. But as "real
> history" that seems the only possibility.
Only if you stick with your interpretation of that passage as
'He was then leading an army against the barbarians (who lived beyond the isthmus) as far as the Borysthenes and the Adrias'.
If you parse it instead as
'He was then leading an army against the barbarians (who lived beyond the isthmus as far as the Borysthenes and the Adrias)'
the passage can be said to describe 'real history', and not as a 'dream' by Mithridates. As for your objection that the barabarians thus delimited were not a single ethnos, you could argue what I am beginning to suspect, namely that Proto-Romanian, starting as a Latin http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pidgin
then Latin
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creole_language
at the head of the Adriatic, esp. in
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nauportus
cf. the presence of a Romanian language, the
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Istro-Romanian_language ,
in (H)istria.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map-balkans-vlachs.png
In that scenario that Latin creole, Proto-Romanian would have been the language of Burebista's proto-state, used because the Dacian language, because of the political situation in Dacia with small warlords fighting each other for plunder and slaves would have been split into mutually unintelligible dialects. That BTW, gives us another anchor on Burebista's rise, it would have occurred because of the almost unlimited funds pouring into the country (countries) when Roman slave procurement had to change markets in 73-71 BCE.
> A way out is to treat it as "dream" i.e. as a plan to be realized,
> not yet a "real fact"
There is no way you can interpret 'he was then leading an army against the barbarians (who lived beyond the isthmus) as far as the Borysthenes and the Adrias' as anything but a statement about facts, whether true or not. However, reading it as 'he was then leading an army against the barbarians (who lived beyond the isthmus as far as the Borysthenes and the Adrias)' it becomes a true statement even if Mithridates only made it part of the way. It might be interpreted in another interesting way, namely that the genesis of a Romanian ethnos, at least defined linguistically as 'those who speak a Latin creole', living in the area between the Borysthenes and the Adrias (which incidentally is where there are found today), was underway already in 108 BCE.
> (for which, I repeat there is no evidence prior to 110-108).
except, I repeat, Strabo's statement and numismatic evidence from the Greek cities on the northwestern Black Sea litoral.
> This ("Mithradates' dream") is also an arguable interpretation.
I disagree. 'Mithridates actions, preparatory to aa campaign against
the Romans' is inevitable here.
> Strabo would then mean that Mithradates as early as 110 or even
> sooner was "intending" (or planning) to lead "an army against the
> barbarians who lived beyond the isthmus as far as the Borysthenes
> and the Adrias; this, however, was preparatory to a campaign against
> the Romans". Not that he or his generals were already on the field!
Were too.
> There is support available for such a view in the next segment of
> Strabo's verbalization:
>
> "So, then, in accordance with these hopes of his he gladly sent an
> army to Chersonesus, and at the same time carried on war against the
> Scythians, not only against Scilurus, but also the sons of Scilurus"
>
> M's "hopes" (dreams, plans) were to march north of the isthmus
> against the barbarians who lived "beyond the isthmus as far as the
> Borysthenes and the Adrias". This meant first and foremost the
> Scythians, and then others. When he was making these plans Skilur
> was perhaps still alive. He would be the main opponent. We actually
> don't know for sure when Skilur died. Everything is tentative about
> this event. But possibly Strabo meant that Skilur still lived when
> Chersonesos made its appeal for help, but died before Diophantos
> began his campaign of 110.
M'kay.
> We are unfortunately still left in ignorance of the exact dates for
> the establishment of Pontic hegemony over the Greeks and
> "barbarians" of the northern and northwestern Black Sea area as a
> whole which existed as of 88 BCE. Bosporus= 108. That is certain.
> The Scythians of the Crimea= 108, also certain. The rest, sometimes
> later. In any case, his dream war against the Romans was delayed for
> twenty years and more...
>
> So there are two choices re Strabo's "This city was at first
> self-governing, but when it was sacked by the barbarians it was
> forced to choose Mithridates Eupator as protector. He was then
> leading an army against the barbarians who lived beyond the
> isthmusas far as the Borysthenes and the Adrias" (1) This refers to
> the campaign of 91-88 (though here also there is the "sack"
> complication), which is when Chersonesos was finally incorporated.
Exactly. 'sack' is equally wrong applied to 108 BCE and to 91-88 BCE.
> Or (2) This represents Mithradates' political dream of ->110, which
> he saw the opportunity to realize when Chersonesos appealed to him
> for help.
His mother endebted his kingdom (probably to the Romans) and favored his younger brother over him. He sent them to jail. The formal charge would have been related to their conduct in that respect, his own intentions thus being the opposite of theirs, namely to get rid of the debt and of Roman influence.
Torsten