History of Europe

Front matter

V n

,-0'

LOCKYER'S ASTRONOMY.

Contents

CHAP. PAGE

I. EUROPE AND ITS INHABITANTS . c , . . 5

IT. THE GREEKS . . o 12

Chapter I. Europe And Its Inhabitants

I. The Races of Man. — As far back as we can learn anything, we find different nations speaking different languages ; that is, different nations have used different words as the names of the same things. But even when several nations speak languages which are now so unlike that they cannot understand one another, it is often easy to see that there was a time when they all spoke the same language. Thus we can see that the chief words and forms of words in several languages were once the same. When we see that what we call night is in German nacht, in Latin noct, and in Greek nykt, and when we see the same kind of likeness in a great many other words, we need not doubt that all these tongues were once only one tongue. By thus comparing many languages together, we can class the chief nations of the world under several great groups. Each of these groups now contains several nations speaking several languages, which were once one nation speaking one language. In this book it will be enough to speak of those nations only which have at any time lived in Europe, and in those parts of Asia and Africa whose history has been always mixed up with that of Europe. These we may class under three great heads, the Aryan and the Semitic nations, and those which, whether they are all akin to each other or not, we may put together as not belonging to either of the other two classes.

2. The Aryan Nations. — The group of nations to which most of the nations of Europe have belonged ever since the beginning of trustworthy history is commonly called the Aryan group. Nearly all the languages which are now spoken in Europe and in other lands where Europeans have settled, as well as the languages which are spoken in a great part of Asia, were all once one language. The people who spoke this old Aryan language once lived all together in the middle parts of Asia, and they found out some of the most needful arts, and had got some notions of religion and governmeYit, before they began to spread in different directions. We know this, because many of the chief words which have to do with these matters are still the same in all or most of the iVryan tongues. But, long before written history begins, these old forefathers of ours began to leave their old seats and to move, some to the west and some to the south-east. Those who pushed to the south-east settled in Persia and northern India. The old language of northern India, the Sanscrit, has changed less than any other tongue from the first form of the common Aryan speech. The other Aryan nations pressed westward, and settled in Europe, and in the parts of Asia nearest to Europe. And from Europe men have in later times gone forth and made settlements or colonies in America and Australia, where they still keep the languages of those parts of Europe from which they first set out.

3. The Semitic Nations. — The other chief group which concerns us is that of the Semitic

I.] AR YAJV AND NON-AR YAN NA TIONS, 7

nations, who chiefly settled in those parts of Asia which lie between the eastern and western divisions of the Aryan group. These are the Jews, Phcenicians, Syrians, and Arabs. The languages of all these nations are very nearly akin. These Semitic nations have filled a much smaller part of the world than the Aryans ; but their place in history has been very great. For the three religions which have taught men to worship one God, the Jewish, the Christian, and the Mahometan, all arose among them. The Phoenicians and Arabs also have at different times made conquests and planted colonies in a large part of Africa and even of Europe.

4. The non-Aryan Nations of Europe. — When the Aryans first came into Europe, they found men living there who were neither Aryan nor Semitic, and whom, as they pushed on step by step, they destroyed or drove into corners. In some few parts of Europe there still are some remains of these old non-Aryan races. In the mountainous lands on the borders of Spain and Gaul men still speak the Basque tongue, which is one of the tongues which were spoken before the Aryans came. These Basques once filled all Spain, and much of western Europe, but now they are driven up into a corner. And, in another corner in the north, the Fins and JLaps, the remains of another non-Aryan people, also speak a non- Aryan tongue. And in some parts of eastern Europe non-Aryan nations have come in as conquerors of Aryan nations. These are the Hungarians and the Turks, both of whom made their way mto Europe in times of which the history is well known. But the Hungarians, though they have kept their non-Aryan language, have taken to the religion and manners of Europe. This the Turks have not done. Except these small remains of the nations which lived in Europe before the Aryans came, and these two non-Aryan nations who have come into

Europe in later times, all the nations of Europe, and all the European settlements in other parts of the world, speak languages which have sprung from the original Aryan stock.

5. The Geography of Europe. — The continent of Europe, into which the western branch of the Aryans came, is made up of a solid mass of land in the middle, which joins on to Asia without any break, and of two systems of islands, peninsulas, and inland seas to the north and south. The whole southern part of Europe is washed by the Mediterranean Sea, the great inland sea which lies between the three continents of Europe, Asia, and Africa. This southern part is chiefly made up of three great peninsulas, those of Greece, Italy, and Spain, which are cut off by mountains — the Pyrenees, Alps, and others — from the great mass of central Europe. In the Mediterranean Sea are several great islands, as Sardinia, Sicily, Crete, and Cyprus, and many smaller ones, especially in the sea which lies between Greece and Asia, called the -ffigsean Sea or Archipelago. All this end of Europe is made up of islands and peninsulas, with gulfs and straits of the sea running among them. To the north again we get something of the same kind on a smaller scale. The Baltic Sea and its gulfs answer to the Mediterranean, and the peninsulas and islands of Scandinavia, that is, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, keep a faint likeness to the islands and peninsulas of the south. And to the north-west of Europe hes a great group of islands, our own island of Britain, the other great island of Ireland, with many smaller ones. And Iceland, another great island, Hes far far away to the north-west, cut off from the rest of the world.

6. Settlement of the Aryans in Europe. — Such were the lands into which the western branch of the Aryans began to press long before trustworthy

I.] EUROPE AND ITS INHABITANTS, 9

history begins. The two great peninsulas of Greece and Italy were settled by one branch of the Aryan family, which seems also to have spread itself over the lands near to Greece, both in Europe and in Asia. In central Europe the Celts came first; they pressed to the west, and setded in Gaul, the British Islands, northern Italy, and a great part of Spain. They were followed by the Teutonic branch, that to which we ourselves belong. These pushed upon the Celts from the east, and occupied Germany and Scandinavia, and, at a later time, the most part of Britain. The Celtic languages are now spoken only in some small parts of Gaul and the British Islands ; but in Germany, Scandinavia, and the greater part of Britain, Teutonic languages are still spoken. Of these four, Greeks, Italians, Celts, and Teutons, came most of the chief nations of Europe. But beyond the Teutons came another swarm. One branch, the smallest of all, was the people of Lithuania and Old Prussia. Their tongue is now spoken by very few people, but it has changed less from the oldest Aryan tongue than that of any other people in Europe. The other branch is that of the Slaves, whose name in their own tongue means glorious, though in other tongues it has another meaning, because bondmen of Slavonic race were once very common. These are the people of Poland, Russia, and of eastern Europe, including many of the nations which are now subject to the Turks. Thus various Aryan nations, from the old Greeks onwards, have spread themselves over all Europe, save only where a few of the older people are still left, or where non- Aryan people have come in in much later times.

7. The Three Chief Races of Europe. — Now of all the branches of the Aryan family which have settled in Europe, three have been, at different times and in different ways, the leaders of all the rest. The first were the old Greeks ; then the people lo HISTORY OF EUROPE, [chap.

of Italy, or more truly the one Italian city of Rome ; and lastly the Teutonic nations. For it was in the lands round the Mediterranean Sea that the true civilization of the world began, and it was in Greece that it began first of all. Here history, truly so called, begins, the history of men as members of a free commonwealth. The language and art of the Greeks, the works of their writers, and their buildings, have had a power over men's minds ever since. In this" way, and not by conquest, Greece has influenced the world. Rome, on the other hand, influenced the world both by conquest and by giving her laws to the nations which she conquered. Under Rome all the then civilized world, all the lands round the Mediterranean Sea, in Europe, Asia, and Africa, became one empire governed by one law;, and the power of that empire and of that law has never died away. For the next race which rose to the head, our own Teutonic race, did in a manner continue Rome's power, as the Teutons became half conquerors of Rome and half disciples.

8, Rome the Centre of European History. Now of all European history Rome is the centre. The history of Europe is almost wholly made up, first, of the steps by which the older states came under the power of Rome, S.nd secondly, of the way in which the modern states of Europe were formed by the breaking up of that power. Greece alone has a real history of its own, earlier than that of Rome and independent of it. Then in after times the chief place passed to the Teutonic nations who settled and conquered within the Roman empire, but who learned their arts, laws, manners, religion, and language from those whom they conquered. Since then the Teutonic nations have kept at the head, for, though nations speaking other languages have often done great things, yet they have done so chiefly by help of Teutonic laws and rulers. The Celts by them-

I.] ROME THE GREAT CENTRE. ii

selves have done but little; they came too soon to hold a chief place. But the Celts of Gaul, the people of the modern kingdom of France, have held one of the first places in Europe by help of what they learned, first from Roman and then from Teutonic conquerors. And, as the Celts came too soon, so the Slaves came too late. They have formed several powerful nations, yet they have never taken the lead in the way that the Greeks, Romans, and Teutons have done. Our history then will mainly be a history of the way in which the Roman dominion came together, and of the way in which it fell asunder. 9. Things common to all the European Nations. — If the Aryan people ever were mere savages, that time had passed away before they came into Europe. They had already made some way in the most needful arts, and all of them had much the same original form of government. x\s families and clans grew into tribes, and as tribes grew into nations, each tribe or nation had a king or chief of some kind, a council of elders or nobles, and a general assembly of the whole people. And there was commonly a three-fold distinction between the nobles by birth, the common freemen, and their slaves. or bondmen. Out of these elements, all modern, European society has grown up. The oJd, Aryans, had also a common religion, which toofc different: forms among different nations, but in alL of which, many gods were worshipped, the chief gods having^ been at first the great powers of nature, as. the .sky and the sun. Afterwards Chi^istianity became 'the religion of the Romati Empire, a,nd spread , gradually over all Europe ; but it took somewhat :d,i|ferent forms in eastern and western, in nprthern a/nd southern, Europe. But for many ages past, all the people of Europe have been Christiai;is of some kind, except perhaps a few non-Aryan, people in the extreme north, and also except the Mahometans who in some parts have come in as conquerors. This they did in Spain and Sicily, whence they have been driven out, and in south-eastern Europe, where they still abide.

TO. Summary. — Europe then is a continent consisting of three main parts, Southern, Central, and Northern. Of these, the southern part consists of the islands and peninsulas of the Mediterranean Sea, among which the history of civihzed man begins. Of the great families of mankind, those which concern us are the Aryan, the Semitic, and the others whom we may call n on- Aryan. Successive swarms of Aryan nations have gradually settled in Europe, destroying the older people or driving them into corners. These Aryan nations had all once been one people, and they still showed signs of having been one people in their language, their religion, and their laws and manners. Among the nations, three, the Greeks, the Romans, and the Teutons, have, one after another, held the chief place. Among these again, the Romans at one time united under their power all the nations round the Mediterranean Sea, and European history is chiefly made up of the way in which their dominion came together and broke asunder. Lastly, all the Aryan nations of Europe gradually embraced the Christian religion, though that religion took different forms in different countries.

CHAPTER 11.

THE GREEKS.

I. Greece and the Greek People. — As Europe has more inland seas, islands, and peninsulas than any other part of the old world, so Greece has more inland seas, islands, and peninsulas than any other part of Europe. It is also a very mountainous land.

II.] GREECE AND THE GREEKS, 13

SO that the whole of Greece is made up of peninsulas, islands, and valleys, cut off from one another either by the sea or by the mountains. Tlius the men who dwelled in that land could hardly fail to become a sea-faring folk, and to plant colonies in other lands. They were also sure not to join under one government, but to keep apart in small states, each town or district being, or trying to be, independent of all others. And, though no part of Greece is very far from the sea, yet some parts are more inland, and some parts are still fuller of islands and peninsulas, than others ; and it was in the parts of Greece which lay nearest to the sea that the most famous Greek cities arose. And from the sea-faring parts of Greece men went forth who planted Greek colonies, some in the neighbouring islands, and some at more distant points round a large part of the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, The name which the Greeks called themselves, was Hellenes, and wherever Hellenes dwelled was Hellas. Thus there were patches of Hellas in many parts of the Mediterranean coasts, planted in the midst of other nations. But in Greece itself all was Hellas, and none but Hellenes dwelled there.

2. Character of the Greeks. — Now all these things, division into many small states, a sea-faring life, and all that such a life leads to, are things that greatly tend to sharpen the wits, and Greece was peopled by men who had more wits to sharpen than any other men. Another people in Greece might not have done such great things as the Greeks did ; and the Greeks might not have done such great things in any other land. But the land and its people fitted one another, and so great things came of them. The Greeks had the start of all other people in literature and art and science, and, above all, in the art of government or politics. For they were the first people who made free commonwealths, and who put the power of the law instead of mere force and the arbitrary will of a single man.

3. Greeks and Barbarians. — It is most likely that the Greeks and Italians, and several other nations of eastern Europe and western Asia, all belonged to the same great branch of the Aryan family. Anyhow the Greeks and Itahans, the Sikels, who gave their name to the island of Sicily, the people to the north of Greece in Epeiros and Macedonia, and some of the people on the eastern coast of the^gsean Sea, were all akin to each other. But the Greeks early shot ahead of all their kinsfolk, so that they looked upon the rest as barbarians. This word at first meant simply people whose language could not be understood, and the Greeks called all nations by that name. They even called men barbarians whose tongue was really very nearly akin to their own, if it had so parted off that they could no longer understand it. Afterwards the word came to carry with it a certain feehng of contempt and disHke ; and in modern use it has a stronger meaning stilL But, at first, it simply meant not-Greek. All mankind were either Hellenes or barbarians.

4. The Phoenicians. — Among the barbarian nations, the Greek colonies had to deal with men of all the different nations round the Mediterranean. The Greeks of old Greece had in Kurope mainly to deal with the kindred nations who had not grown so fast as they had. Their first great barbarian rivals came from Asia. These were the Phoenicians, as the Greeks called them, but they called themselves Canaanites. They lived in Sidon and Tyre, and other cities on the Syrian coast, and they planted colonies in many parts of the Mediterranean before the Greeks did. The Greeks in earlier times drove them out of many of the islands of the ^gsean Sea ; and in after times Greek and Phoenician colonies strove for the great islands of Sicily and

II.] - THE GREEK COLONIES. 15

Cyprus. And it was from the Phoenicians that the Greeks learned the art of alphabetic writing,"^ which the rest of Europe has learned from them. This is almost the only great gift which the Greeks got from any strangers. In everything else they wrought up the common stock of the Aryan family to greater perfection than any other people, and with less help irom strangers,

5. The Greek Colonies. — When trustworthy history first begins, many Greek colonies had already been planted round a large part of the coast of the Mediterranean. But in some places the Phoenicians had got before the Greeks, and in others, as in central and northern Italy, the native people were too strong and brave to let any strangers settle among them. But Greek colonies were planted round the whole of the ^gaean and part of the Euxine Sea ; in the lands and islands to the north-west of Greece ; in Sicily and southern Italy ; in Cyprus ; in the part of Africa which lies between Egypt and the great Phoenician settlement of Carthage; and on the Mediterranean coasts of Gaul and Spam. But no Greeks ever dared to pass the Pillars of Herakles, that is, the Straits of Gibraltar, to j^lant colonies on the coasts of the Ocean. Many of these colonies, as Miletos in Asia, Sybaris in Italy, oyracuse in Sicily, and Massalia, now Marseilles, in Gaul, were in early times among the greatest cities of the Greek zone. They everywhere spread the Greek tongue, and somewhat of Greek manners, among the people around them. The colonies on the western coast of Asia were among the oldest and most famous of all, and the story of the War of Troy, as sung by Homer, is most likely a legendary account of the Greek settlements in those lands.

6. The Legendary Times of Greece. — We learn something of the state of Greece in very early times from the poems of Homer. In those days the Greeks had already made some progress in the

HISTORY OF EUROPE.

II tn 5

UJ s

w

u

H _J S-

Q O o

UJ °-

UJ iJ

cd

" o

II.] LEGENDARY GREECE, 17

arts, and they had formed governments of the kind common to all the Aryan nations. Each city ot other small district had its king, with a council of elders or nobles, and an assembly of the people. But before historic times begin, kings were put aside in most Greek cities, and the power had come into the hands of the nobles. In early Greece also the geographical divisions, and the degree of power held by different cities, were quite unlike what they were afterwards. The catalogue of the Greek forces in Homer gives us a kind of map of legendary Greece, which is quite unhke anything in historical Greece. Thus, in the north of Greece, Thessaly was of much more importance than it was afterwards. Thus in Peloponnesos the chief power was at My kene, a city which in later times had no power at all. Agamemnon, King of Mykene, is described as the commander of the whole Greek force ; and in those early times his people, the Achaians, were certainly the head people of Peloponnesos and of all Greece, and Mykene was their chief city. The southern islands of the ^^gaean were already Greek, but no part of the coast of Asia. The poems describe the beginning of the Greek settlements there.

7. The Dorian Migration. — This state of things was greatly changed shortly before trustworthy history begins. For the Dorians, hitherto a small people of northern Greece, invaded Peloponnesos and occupied its chief cities. From this time the Dorian cities, first Argos and then Sparta, were the leading powers of Peloponnesos, and for a time of all Greece. The greatness of Athens came later ; and for some ages the cities of old Greece were less great and flourishing than many of the Greek colonies, though the greatness of the cities in old Greece, when it came lasted longer.

8. The Greek Commonwealths. — When the kingly power was abolished in the Greek cities, they i8 HISTORY OF EUROPE, [chap.

became republics or commonwealths. Sometimes a priest or magistrate kept the title of king, but he was no longer the head of the state. But at Sparta the kings went on, two kings at a time, the kingdom in each line going on from father to son. But though the Spartan kings were held in high honour, and commanded armies and had various powers of other kinds, still they ceased, step by step, to be the real heads of the state. This doing away with kings was one of the chief things which distinguished the Greeks in Greece from their neighbours and kinsfolk; for in Macedonia and Epeiros, and in some of the Greek islands and colonies, kings went on after they had come to an end in Greece itself.

9. Aristocracies and Democracies. — The governments which were now formed were for the most part aristocracies or oligarchies, that is to say, governments in which the power is in the hands of some particular class of the people. Such a government, if it ruled well, the Greeks called aristocracy or government of the best; and, if it ruled badly, an oligarchy or government of the few. The aristocracy or oligarchy was commonly made up of the old citizens, who did not allow those who settled afterwards to have the same rights as themselves. Some cities always remained oligarchies ; but in others the new citizens or commons were able to get the power placed in the hands of all citizens without distinction. This was called a democracy or government of the whole people. And sometimes, when strifes of this kind were going on in a city, a cunning man was able, most commonly by pretending to help the commons, to get all power into his own hands. Such an one was called a Tyrant, that is to say, one who had got the power, or more than the power, of a king, in a state where there was no king by law. The Greeks held that monarchy, where the chief power is in the hands of a king,

II.] FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, 19

aristocracy, where it is in the hands of part only of the people, and democracy, where it is in the hands of the whole people, were all lawful forms of government. But tyranny was always held to be something in itself, and it was thought a good work to kill a tyrant. Of the aristocratic states Sparta was the greatest ; for, though Sparta had kings, yet the chief power was in the hands of a few senators and magistrates, who were chosen from the old citizens only. Athens, on the other hand, was the great example of a democracy where every free citizen had a vote in the assembly which chose magistrates and made war and peace.

10. Ruling and Subject Cities. — It must be remembered that every Greek city was, or wished to be, an independent state, with the power of making war and peace. But very often one city bore rule over other cities, which were commonly eager to cast off its yoke if they could. Thus Sparta ruled over a large part of Peloponnesos, having many smaller towns as her subjects. In Attica, on the other hand, the free citizens of all the towns had equal rights wdth those who lived in Athens. But Athens too, in after times, begai> to make subjects in other parts of Greece.

11. The Greek Nation. — As the Greeks were thus divided into many separate commonwealths^ and scattered over distant parts of the world, they did not form one nation in the sense in which the great kingdoms and commonwealths of modern Europe do. Yet there was much to bind all Greeks everywhere together, and to make them feel themselves one people as compared with the rest of the world. They spoke one language ; for, though the Greek tongue was not spoken everywhere in exactly the same way, yet all Greeks everywhere could understand one another. They worshipped the same gods ; there were common games in honour of those gods, in which every

20 HIS TOR V OF E UROPE, [chap.

Greek, and none but Greeks, might take a part ; and all Greeks all over the world had many customs in common. They had a common possession in the songs of Homer and other poets ; and they gradually began to feel that they were above other nations in literature and art. Thus the distinction between Greeks and barbarians grew wider ; and, though the Greeks were always fighting against one another, yet it was commonly thought shameful to let any Greeks fall under the power of barbarians. At last, towards the beginning of the fifth century before Christ, the Greeks of old Greece were driven to act together as they had never done before when their country was invaded by a barbarian king.

12. The Persian Wars. — We have said that the Greek colonies were not able to keep their freedom so long as the cities of old Greece. This was first shown in the case of the Greeks on the east coast of the ^gaean. In the course of the sixth century before Christ, Croesus, king of Lydia, conquered the Greek cities in his neighbourhood. The Lydian kingdom was soon after conquered by Cyrus, king of Persia, and now the Persians got possession of the Greek cities in Asia. Thus the two great branches of the Aryan family, eastern and western, which had been so long parted, now met again as enemies ; for the Persians were really kinsfolk of the Greeks, though neither Greeks nor Persians knew of it. The first city of old Greece which had any war with the Persians was Athens. Athens was now a democracy, and had lately driven out its Tyrant, Hippias the son of Peisistratos. The Greeks of Asia and Cyprus now tried to throw off the Persian yoke ; the Athenians gave them help, and so made the Persian kings their enemies. In 490 B.C., the Persian king Darius sent an array against Athens, which the Athenians, under Miltiades, defeated at Marathon, with no help except from the little city of Plataia. In 480

[I.] PERSIAN AND PELOPONNESIAN WARS, 21

B.C., Xerxes, the son of Darius, himself came into Greece with a much greater force by sea and land. All the lands through which he passed in Thrace and Macedonia submitted to him, and so did a great part of Greece itself. But Athens, Sparta, and many other Greek cities, withstood the Persians manfully both by sea and land. Then were fought the batdes of Thermopylai, where Leonidas, the Spartan king, was killed ; of Salamis, w^here we hear of the famous Athenian Themistokles, of Plataia, and of Mykal6. The Persians were thus driven out of Greece for ever, and for a while also out of all the lands round the ^gasan, till the quarrels of the Greeks allowed the barbarians again to get power at their cost.