Kitabı oku: «Bible of the Time. …from the Big Bang to the present day…», sayfa 3
Ancient China
A new colorful smear in our head – China, two hundred years BC. After the death of the great and terrible Emperor Shih Huang Ti, Confucianism (the school of learned scribes) was revived in the new Han Empire, a philosophy that still replaces the Celestial Empire.
Jin Empire
Han ruled for six hundred years. It is replaced by the Jin dynasty. In the fourth century A.D. e. North China is invaded by the Huns. For two centuries, the most powerful Chinese gene pool turns aliens into true Chinese. The next dynasty restores the state as if nothing had happened.
A new series of wars, enlargements, fragmentation of kingdoms, leads to the emergence of the great, flourishing Tang Empire (636—907) in the east of modern China. This dynasty controls part of Central Asia, Sogdiana, the territory of present-day Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. A native of one of the regions, the border governor in the service of the Yellow Emperor An Lushan convinces the monarch to replace the officers of the titular nation at the court with mercenaries from the steppe personally loyal to the Sogdian. The further course of events is not so difficult to predict. An Lushan almost without hindrance, using the resources of a huge state, forms an army tied only to him. When the masks are thrown off, the indigenous Chinese can only shrug their hands sadly. The insidious alien makes a trip to the capital Chang’an (now the provincial Xi’an, the location of the famous Shi Huang Terracotta Army).
Tang Empire, 7th century AD e. Dangerous territorial acquisitions. The Tang empire is marked in green, the territorial acquisition of Sogdiana, which destroyed the metropolis, is in purple.
There should be a whirlwind of wars of all against all, for the state, the emperor, your family and just food. Women and children become soldiers or simply murderers. The greatest city with a population of millions, reminiscent of a chessboard stretching beyond the horizon, Chang’an is turning into a heap of ruins. Look! All roads and shoulders are littered with corpses. This water in lakes and rivers retains its purple color for months. Don’t try to quench your thirst with it. According to census takers and tax collectors, 50 million China is losing 36 million of its inhabitants. Perhaps a significant part of them do not die, but move to other areas. However, the An Lushan uprising is considered the largest post-WWII armed conflict in history in terms of casualties.
During the Song dynasty, in the twelfth century, China was invaded by the Manchu Jurchen tribe. The Celestial Empire is entering a new round of assimilation. At the beginning of the thirteenth century, a 300,000-strong army of even more brutal invaders invades from the North. With each new campaign, the Mongols of Genghis Khan are advancing more and more south. Trying to fight back, the Chinese widely use multiply-charged crossbows, powder charges, missiles, and primitive artillery. Millions of people die in fire and smoke. The capital of the Celestial Empire Zhongda – modern Beijing surrenders in 1264. 16 years later, the whole of China falls under the hooves of Mongolian horses. The grandson of Genghis Khan, Kublai Khan, proclaims the creation of the Yuan dynasty in the Great Yuan State. At the same time, four Mongol ulus left the single rule of the Horde.
Mongol expeditions to Japan and Vietnam have not met with much success. In the first case, this happens due to irresistible external reasons – «divine wind». In the second, because of the desperate resistance of the Vietnamese. Ciao paper banknotes are being massively introduced. Paper innovation is not always a sign of progress. The Chinese economy is in a fever. Most of the Chinese become slaves, in the Mongolian dialect, arats (commoners). Craftsmen even lose their craft skills. Agriculture and trade are declining. The complex irrigation system ceases to function.
In the middle of the fourteenth century, the secret organization «White Lotus» organizes its people for a decisive struggle against the invaders. Having tasted the taste of their own blood, the Mongols leave to the north, to the familiar steppes. One of the leaders of the uprising comes to power – the son of a simple peasant Zhu Yuanzhang. This man founds no less, a new Ming dynasty. The era begun by the successful son of a farmer is marked by the flourishing of science, crafts and shipping. Authorities organize an ocean expedition led by Admiral Zheng He. The «Golden Fleet» consists of 40—60 Baochuan «treasure ships», 117 meters long, 48 wide, and 200 escort ships. The number of the expedition is 28 thousand people.
The huge Chinese fleet makes seven long-distance voyages. But the composition and views of the ruling dynasty suddenly change. Orders are coming from Beijing: burn all ships, destroy expedition reports. China is adopting a strictly isolationist policy.
Meanwhile, the Jurchens from South Manchuria recall their military past. Initially, they stop paying tribute to central China. Then the nomads unite with Inner Mongolia and organize massive raids on the metropolis. Moving south and west, in 1683 the former vassals seize the last stronghold of the resistance of the Celestial Empire – the island of Taiwan. Now China is named after the Manchu dynasty itself – Qing. The aliens are trying to prevent mixed marriages. But they do not oppose their culture to the local, and everything, as quickly as always before, turns into Chinese. By the early nineteenth century, the Qing population was 300 million.
Chinese goods are in great demand in Europe. However, the Chinese accept only silver, gold, Russian furs and Venetian glass as payment. This approach does not suit the British, who are importing a new popular product from India into the Celestial Empire – opium. Dried in the sun, the milky juice of unripe opium poppy capsules contains morphine, codeine, narcotine. By 1830, sales reach 1,500 tons per year. It’s a lot. 35% of the Qing population becomes drug addicts. The Chinese emperor prohibits this simple happiness. In response, the Yellow Empire is attacked by the main drug dealer – Great Britain. China loses this war, pays an indemnity and hands over the island of Hong Kong to the winners, formally on a 99-year lease.
In 1851, the Taiping rebellion took place. The Chinese Christian Hong Xiutsuan became the organizer of the large-scale riot. The main idea of this Chinese dreamer is the expulsion of the Manchus and, note, the founding of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. The million-strong Taiping army is distinguished by discipline, a humane attitude towards the population, and the absence of robberies. A community of 25 families is becoming the cell of society in the territories occupied by Chinese Christians. Hierarchies and estates are to be liquidated.
After twelve years of confrontation, marked by the emergence of more and more centers of the Civil War, the Second Opium War takes place. Everything is proceeding according to the same scenario, with the same sad result for China.
Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Banner
Hong Xiuquan, from the very beginning of the great Liberation campaign, departs from practical matters and indulges in meditation. Its commanders continue a fierce struggle, including among themselves. Considering Europeans as brothers in faith, the Taipings cannot understand why the British and French turned against their new relatives. The Heavenly Kingdom Army strictly prohibits smoking opium and, in addition, destroys everything associated with Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism. Things are getting worse. The besieged capital of the Taiping, Nanjing, disappears into the flames of a majestic conflagration. Hong Xiuquan commits suicide. His son, heir to the throne, ends his young life on the chopping block. The last detachments of the Kingdom of Heaven, after a desperate attempt to storm Beijing, perish almost in full force on August 16, 1868.
During the Taiping uprising, between 20 and 30 million people are separated from their precious lives. The Chinese authorities, to this day, are trying to limit the spread of Christianity. In 1900, during the uprising of the ihetuan (boxers), the adherents of traditional beliefs exterminated almost all the Christians in Beijing (Chinese), seeing them as accomplices of the Europeans. Be that as it may, with or without them, the Celestial Empire is occupied by the forces of Germany, Russia and Japan. The winners receive an indemnity of 450 million lans of silver (the bar weighs 31 grams) and open up conservative China to the world even more fully.
In 1908, the two-year-old Emperor Pu I. ascends the throne of the Yellow Empire. Three years later, the Wuchansk uprising breaks out. The war of all against all leads to the collapse of the Qing Empire and the proclamation of the Republic of China. Tibet and Mongolia are leaving China «in their own way».
Emperor Pu Yi (1906—1967)
Pu Yi, aka Xundi – «The Forsaken Emperor» – since 1932 has been the ruler of the puppet republic of Manzhou-go, formed by militaristic Japan for its own purposes. In 1945, Pu Yi surrendered to a Soviet airborne assault force near the city of Mukden. For some time, the humble monarch was kept in a Soviet prisoner of war camp near Khabarovsk. He is later allowed to return to China. Here Pu Yi is re-educated according to the system of the Red Emperor, Mao Zedong for nine years, and after that, for the amusement of the entire Communist Party of China, they are given relative freedom. The last emperor watering plants in the Beijing Botanical Garden. Then, like an ordinary archivist, he goes through the books in the National Library
Ancient Rome by Octavian Augustus
…Several decades before the beginning of our era. Two ambitious generals, Octavian Augustus and Mark Antony, divide Rome into Eastern and Western empires.
Gaius Julius Caesar Octavian Augustus (63 BC – 14 AD), adopted son of Caesar, successor who won the Civil War. The first real Roman emperor.
Mark falls under the spell of the heiress of the Egyptian dynasty of the Ptolemies, Cleopatra, who is not averse to becoming the queen of Rome itself. The emperor gets involved in a war with the Roman Senate and former friend Octavian Augustus. Alternating feasts with military preparations, he misses the blows of the metropolis one after the other and, in the end, ends his colorful life with a blow of the sword. The enchantment of thirty-nine-year-old Cleopatra no longer works on the winner. The heiress of the pharaohs follows the example of Anthony. After her, four children remain. Seventeen-year-old Caesarion, son of Caius Caesar, is killed by order of Augustus. Two twins from Anthony are raised by the sister of the new emperor. We do not know anything about the fate of the fourth.
Emperor Tiberius, stepson and heir to Augustus, was allegedly strangled during an illness by his own grand-nephew and adopted son Caligula.
Guy Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (Caligula), 12 -41 y. AD, the second Roman emperor, according to Seneca’s definition «boundless depravity combined with boundless power.» Eight months after the ascent, initially peaceful Caligula falls ill with encephalitis. Having recovered, he becomes an insane dictator. Favorite expression – «Let them hate, if only they were afraid» – (Oderint dum mitvant). In 41 A.D. conspirators surround the emperor in one of the underground passages from the theater to the baths. The last thing that Caligula hears – the formula used in the sacrifice «Do it» (ok aje) – after which he is struck with a sword. Together with Caesar, the Praetorians kill his wife and two-year-old daughter
Having ascended to the pinnacle of power, Caligula builds bridges from ships, floating palaces, cracks down on senators – and he is loved by the people for the fact that life in the Empire is at least somewhat different. This emperor, however, was stabbed to death by his own bodyguards. The new ruler, a distant relative of Caligula, Claudius, is remembered by mankind according to Messalina, who has become a household name for an unfaithful and insidious wife. The next wife of Claudius Agrippina, the middle sister of Caligula, already has her son Nero. Her plot succeeds. Native blood, Nero becomes the emperor of Rome. But the mother’s reign over time ceases to appeal. The parent is going to bring to power her own son Claudius and Messalina, the beloved Britannica of the masses. Nero feeds his opponent with poisoned mushrooms in time. The ungrateful son also tries to poison Agrippina, but she in time accepts the invention of the eastern king, Mithridates Eupator, an effective antidote. Unable to drown his mother during a staged shipwreck (in the past, the empress’s hobby is diving for pearls), Nero explicitly orders a naval officer to stab her.
This is the story offered to us by the victorious ill-wishers of the emperor.
Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, 37—68, Roman emperor, the last of the Julian-Claudian dynasty, persecutor of Christians, nicknamed «Antichrist».
The tax-cutting policy brings the monarch nationwide popularity. But, after the death of Agrippina, the emperor loses his former administrative acumen. The rebuilding of Rome after a fire, the construction of the Golden Palace with an area of one and a half kilometers, gladiatorial fights comparable in scope to full-size battles, digging a canal across the Isthmus of Corinth and constant large-scale orgies drain the treasury. Legions rise in depleted and impatient provinces. One not at all fine morning, Nero does not find any of his guards in his palace. The emperor flees to a country house. Realizing that the sweet life is over, he takes it into account.
After the son of Agrippina, the brutal but sane emperors Titus and his son Vespasian rule. They are inherited by Vespasian’s younger brother, Domitian, (killed by his own servant for the execution of Nero’s assistant in suicide).
After the average Emperor Galba comes the golden autumn of the Empire. Five worthy rulers come to power in a row – Trajan, Adrian, Antoninus Pius, Lucius Verus and Marcus Aurelius. At the end of the time of this galaxy, the era of soldier emperors elected by the Praetorian Guard begins.
Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121—180). Since the departure of the last emperor of the era of the «Golden Autumn of the Empire», Marcus Aurelius, the era of legendary Antiquity ends. Rome is waiting for the extinction of the previous institutions of power, a series of defeats, the loss of the meaning of the existence of a superpower and a change of religion.
The coming to power in 323 of Constantine the Great marks the transition of the state to Christianity. Forty years later, Emperor Julian (the Apostate) is trying to revive paganism. He encourages the priests of Jupiter to be as godly as Christians. These efforts are in vain. Nobody seriously believes in Jupiter, Mars, Venus, Mithra, Hera and some guides to the afterlife, nums. The last emperor, the young Romulus Augustulus, was sent into exile by the rebellious barbarian commander Odoacer. Little is known about the further fate of Romulus, except that perhaps this boy became a Christian monk. Although Odoacer ruled over the remnants of Western Rome by formal permission from the monarch of the Eastern Empire, AD 476 historians are officially considered the last milestone of Antiquity.
…In the youth of Rome, (5th-2nd century BC), slaves are quite rare. As a rule, they have the status of family members. The second-first centuries BC and the beginning of the new era are marked by a significant increase in the number of prisoners of war. Over time, the ratio of the number of free people to slaves in Italy reaches 2.5: 1, in the provinces 10: 1. The situation of the slaves deteriorates sharply. Nevertheless, they cherish not an illusory hope of raising their status, free literacy, the generic name of the master in addition, and unlimited promotion up the social ladder. At least two emperors of Rome were originally slaves.
The price of a slave in the first century BC is 4—400 denarii, depending on the degree of success of the last war. The daily salary of a legionnaire is 1 denarius, (4 sestertius or 16 aces), including bonuses. For this amount, you can buy 20 loaves of bread of your choice, 4 liters of regular or a liter of fine Falernian wine. If we count in terms of gold, the price of which remains unchanged as an opportunity to acquire basic material goods, a soldier earns 40 thousand rubles a month.
Gladiator games last until the reign of the last ruler of the Empire – Flavius Theodosius (370—395). The institution of slavery comes to naught with a general softening of morals, as well as at the behest of lawyers, who usually take the side of the oppressed. Serfdom is taking over the baton of this phenomenon. Emperor Diocletian (284—305) issues a law attaching peasants – both tenants and owners of land, as well as artisans to their place of residence, or to a profession inherited by inheritance.
Roman legion in battle formation
…The Roman legion (legionis – military collection) consists of 5—7 thousand, later 4.5 thousand infantry and auxiliary units. Heavy cavalry (equits) – 300 people. Archers – 200 people. The latter act from the flanks, firing arrows along the line of raised shields. Velites – «Swift» – irregular infantry, recruited from local allied tribes or young legionnaires. Armament – a round shield with a diameter of 90 cm, a helmet, several darts «gasta velitaris», 120 cm long and a short, 50 cm. Roman sword – «gladius». In a free formation, dodging projectiles by jumping, the velites throw spears at the enemy and retreat behind the ranks of the heavily armed infantry.
The first line of the legion lined up for battle is the ghastats (spearmen), warriors 20—25 years old, who really need combat experience. Armament – chain mail, or, in the era of the Empire – plate armor, rectangular shield scutum, gladius and two one and a half meter darts – pilum.
The second line is the principles («First»). These are warriors in their prime, 25—35 years old. They give the young men experience, let the hastats pass between the maniples and continue the fight.
On the third line are the triarii («Third») warriors 40—45 years old, veterans, the reserve of the legion. Among other things, they are armed with long shock spears.
The army is ruled by six tribunes (people’s representatives) and a representative of the clan aristocracy – a legate.
In the era of the Republic, the legion consists of 30 maniples («handful» or «hand»), two centuria («hundred») in each. The centuria has 60 to 120 fighters. The manipulators are united in ten cohorts («enclosure») of 360 legionnaires. One of the cohorts (First) is considered elite and has a doubled membership.
Roman legionaries. Historical reconstruction
In the days of the Empire, the maniple disappears as a tactical unit. There remains a cohort consisting of 6 centuries.
The legion deployed from the marching column follows to the place of battle with maniples or centuria, located in a checkerboard pattern. This makes it easier to move around rough terrain. Then the squares made up of fighters are rearranged into three solid lines. «Brothers» hurl pilums, sometimes putting the enemy to flight with this one volley, close shields and draw swords.
Ancient Latin America
Inca city, Machu Picchu, territory of modern Peru. Height 2.5 km. Architects fit stones of various shapes to each other, like puzzles. The Incas also erected pyramids, but these temples never reached the splendor of Mayan structures.
The Incas. State of Tahuantisuyu. The western coast of South America, starting from the northern territories of modern Chile and Colombia. Another smear in memory – one thousand two hundred years BC. – the first ruler of Manco Capaca. The last, who led the revolt against the Spaniards, the Great Indian – Tupac Omaru (1570—1572).
There is no monetary system. The benefits are distributed according to the order established by the leader.
Aztecs. The self-name of the people is Meshika, hence the well-known toponym «Mexico». These Indians are to the south of Mexico from the north, in the thirteenth century AD. e. The Aztecs rebuild the city of Tenochtitlan, the future Mexico City on an island in the middle of a lake, and in a short time become the rulers of local tribes. But in 1519 the Aztecs meet even more ambitious Spaniards. After just six years, the huge, by the standards of Europe in the Middle Ages, the Aztec empire ceases to exist. Presumably, by this time the Indians were already 95% mowed down by smallpox and chickenpox, introduced by Columbus in 1492, and spread to both continents. The world, equal in culture to Ancient Egypt during its heyday, moves into the realm of legends.
One of the Mayan pyramids in modern Mexico is the pyramid of Kukulkan. Initially, these structures are not intended for performing bloody rituals. However, the Aztecs who came to these lands use them for mass executions of prisoners of war.
For a warrior and a priest, it is considered permissible to write poetry. Let's listen to excerpts from the author's hymns of the Aztecs:
May our land be forever!
Yes, the mountains are indestructible!
So says Ayokuan Kuezpaltsin
Here in Tlaxcale, in Huesocinco
Let them feed everyone without exception
And ruddy maize and cocoa
May the Earth be forever!
(A. Kuezpaltsyn)
We got drunk in Michuacan
We were called to a feast, we went for the booty
We came and were completely drunk from the fight
…And they saw how our soldiers fled
How the gold quivered and the quetzal feather banners faded
If only the soldiers did not become prisoners
Hurry up – so that this does not happen to you
If the young warriors become prisoners.
They will be sacrificed, condemned to the slaughter
If this happens, what are we going to do?
We will growl as fierce as jaguars
We, the eagles, the old men, will call the eagles
Avoid captivity, fear the slaughter
Hurry up – so that this does not happen to you!
(«Song of the Old Men», by the warrior Aishakatl)
Mayan.
Former possessions of the Maya, the city of Teotehuacan («The place where the gods gather»)
The territory of the legendary founders of Mesoamerica is located somewhat south of the future possessions of the Aztecs. Scientists deduce the beginning of civilization as a thousand years BC. e. By the ninth century A.D. Mayan culture is in decline. The reason, according to the conclusion of paleogeologists, is a long-term drought caused by a change in ocean currents. The inhabitants of the country simply disappear. They leave behind magnificent pyramids, a complex irrigation system and a calendar.
