"Part 2:"
Western civilization has been the single most war-ridden, war-
dominated, and militaristic civilization in all human history.
Robert Nisbet
Yes. Which is why we are trying to kill it ASAP.
horse riding and tribal raiding were indeed key
elements in the migratory movements of Indo-Europeans. The
significance of horse riding was that it "greatly increased the
effectiveness and the scale of herding," which led to the
accumulation of larger herds, which necessitated larger
pastures, which in turn intensified tribal alliances and
conflicts.8 It has been estimated that horse-riding would have
allowed for the use of territories up to five times larger than
otherwise.9
I agree.
Horse riding increased the efficiency of surprise attacks and
retreats in raiding. Cunliffe notes that horse-riding probably
increased the overall speed of movement by about ten times.
Gimbutas estimates that a horse could carry a rider 20-30 miles
in one day—that is, about 4 to 5 times the distance traveled on
foot. "
In light of these facts, including the points presented in Part
One on the pastoral way of life of the IE migrants, one could
safely say that, starting in the fifth millennium and through the
fourth millennium, the Indo-Europeans initiated a most
dynamic way of life driven by the invention of wheeled
vehicles, the secondary products revolution, horseback riding,
large-scale herding, and aggressive raiding.
I agree. No part of which is aristocratic.
There is no denying, however, that Drews puts together a
superb case envisioning the arrival of the Mycenaeans as a
conquest by a class of chariot-warriors ("big men, taller and
broader" than the typical native inhabitants) rather than a
migration of impoverished pastoralists who had been evicted
from their original homeland and were seeking new lands "in
which to make an honest living."13
Drews is correct. The alternative hypothesis is laughable.
I think we miss much if we forget the aristocratic context of
these migrations, the constant competition for prestige and
honor among the noble elites, and the fact that the excess of
young men who were pushed or pulled to migrate were finely
built characters eager for adventure and joy within a culture
that afforded them with the opportunity to express themselves
as individuals and expected them to be jealous of their tribe's
dignity, as well as their own.
Yuck.
Let me start addressing this restless ethos by drawing attention
to the fact that the major themes of IE poetry revolved around
the heroic deeds, immortality, and fame of individual men.
Poets were highly respected in IE societies; they were not only
the repositories and transmitters of the overall cultural
knowledge but were also entrusted with singing the praises of
heroes. The preoccupation with going into battle in order to
seek personal recognition found expression in such poetic
phrases as "imperishable fame" and "to overcome death."
Fortson writes that a warrior valued battle above all else
because it afforded the opportunity to attain fame, which
brought immortality, and in this sense fame was a way of
overcoming death. 0
I agree that poets should write about heroes. But true heroes should not particularly desire to be written about. One who does outstanding deeds for the sake of being written about is already not a hero.
Combined with this heroic poetry was a highly individuated
mode of reckless but "glorious" fighting. Michael Speidel, in a
captivating paper, argues that "an outstanding feature of Indo-
European culture" was a style of "berserk-like" fighting in
which individual warriors would throw off armor or garments
in sight of the enemy, "showing off their utter fearlessness,"
rushing ahead yelling and "raging uncontrollably in a trance of
fury." "Flashing eyes, frenzy, and swirling-storm tactics are
customs natural to berserk-like warriors everywhere."23
...
Speidel cites numerous documentary sources, Roman writers,
mythological stories, and sagas showing that this style of
fighting—"naked, shouting, barefoot, flowing-haired, and often
in single combat"—was "for love of fame and out of daring."
The less protected the body and the greater the capacity to
sustain pain and maintain one's courage and "willfulness"
unbroken, the more heroic and human the fighter was in the
eyes of his peers.
The single and singular warrior in combat was idolized. Having
the opportunity to fight in this way, the "freedom...to outdo
other warriors" was the "highest happiness." A life that lacked
deeds was the "greatest grief."26 The "manhood" of warriors
depended on deeds of berserk daring.
We are supposed to admire this?!
This psychological state
of fighting—the wild, beast-like howling and "stormy
unruliness"—carried to an extreme the individuality and
singularity of the warrior. The etymology of "gone berserk"
stresses the "trance-like state madness" of fighters, their
animalized transfiguration into wild creatures, a bear or a wolf,
separated from social controls of any kind, in an utter state of
fury (furor, menos, or wut).27
I am reminded of vampires during feeding.
Azar Gat, in his
recent book, War in Human Civilization, admits that pastoral
peoples exhibited a higher disposition for warfare than non-
pastoral cultures.
Of course!
John Keegan, in his
encyclopedic study, A History of Warfare, is quite definitive in
his assessment that the pastoral peoples of the steppes,
Scythians, Huns, Mongols, were a "new sort of people" in
being "warriors for war's sake, for the loot it brought, the risks,
the thrill, the animal satisfactions of triumph."
Which is why their bloodlines must be eliminated.
if we agree that the IE were a people of
the steppes, the first horseback riders and inventors of chariots,
we can make the inference that they were the first peoples from
the steppes to engage in warfare for the sake of the joys, the
risks, and the prestige it brought.
They were. Which is why their bloodlines must be eliminated.
young pastoralists had to "learn to kill, and to
select for killing" their domesticated animals. "It was flock
management, as much as slaughter and butchery, which made
the pastoralists so cold-bloodedly adept at confronting the
sedentary agriculturalists."33
We will avenge their flocks! We are the disciples of Cain!
The IE economic lifestyle included fierce competition for
grazing rights for specific areas, constant alertness in the
defense of one's portable wealth, and an expansionist
disposition in a world in which competing herdsmen were
motivated to seek new pastures as well as tempted to take the
movable wealth (cattle) of their neighbors. This life required
not just the skills of a butcher but a life span of horsemanship
and arms which brought to the fore certain mental dispositions
including aggressiveness and individualism, in the sense that
each individual, in this male-oriented atmosphere, needed to
become as much a warrior as a herdsman.
I agree.
Indo-Europeans were also uniquely ruled by a class of free
aristocrats. In very broad terms, I define as "aristocratic" a state
in which the ruler, the king, or the commander-in-chief is not
an autocrat who treats the upper classes as unequal servants but
is a "peer," who exists in a spirit of equality as one more
warrior of noble birth.
A ludicrous definition. The exact opposite definition would be correct.
Let me pull together a number of traits I have found in the
literature which, in their combination, point to a life of
aristocratic equality and, in Nietzsche's words, of "vigorous,
free, joyful activity." First, all IE cultures from the "earliest"
times in the fifth millennium—when ranking was just
emerging—have seen the presence of warriors who sought to
demonstrate their standing and wealth, by dressing in
"ostentatious" ways; for example, with long or multiple belts
and necklaces of copper beads, copper rings, copper spiral
bracelets, gold fittings in their spears and javelins—with
variations of styles depending on place and time but all
demonstrative of an "individualizing ideology."
...
Diodorus Siculus, a Greek historian of the first century
BC, had this to say of the Celts: "The clothing they wear is striking:
tunics and breeches dyed and embroidered in various colours....
They wear bracelets on their wrists and arms, and heavy necklaces of
solid gold, rings of great value and even corselets."
A true aristocratic court requires uniforms.
Second, the IE warriors "were interred as personalities
showing off the equipment of life and their personal position in
a final coup de theatre, rather than joining a more anonymous
community of ancestors."35 Kurgan burials commemorated the
deaths of special males; the stone circles and mounds, and the
emphasis on "prestige weapons and insignia," were intended to
isolate and self-aggrandize the achievements of warriors.
True aristocrats cremate.
Third, IE aristocrats developed a distinctive tradition of
feasting and drinking, in which "individual hospitality rather
than great communal ceremonies" dominated the occasions.
These feasts—backed by a "prestige goods economy"—were
"cheerful" events of gift-giving and gift-taking, performance of
praise poetry, and animal sacrifices.3
But we will avenge the sacrificed animals before we cremate ourselves.
They were also an opportunity for the less
powerful or younger warriors to attach themselves to patrons
who offered opportunities for loot and glory. The more
followers the patron could recruit, the greater the expectation
of success and loot to be gained by all.
Why are
bandits being called "aristocrats" FFS?!
Fourth, as Gimbutas has clearly articulated, and as Anthony
has further noted, this was a culture in which "all [the] most
important deities lived in the sky." While Gimbutas described
these sky gods in negative terms as the gods of a belligerent
people, one may see them as the gods of an energetic, life-
affirming people whose gods were personified as celestial
heroes and chieftains.
The sky-gods of the Indo-Europeans reflected—to use the
words of Christopher Dawson—their "intensely masculine and
warlike ethics, their mobility."
It is safe to say that Gnosticism never crossed the minds of such barbarians.
The relationship between the chief and his followers was
personal and contractual: the followers would volunteer to be
bound to the leader by oaths of loyalty wherein they would
promise to assist him while the leader would promise to reward
them from successful raids. The sovereignty of each member
was thus recognized even though there was a recognized
leader, "the first among equals." These "groups of comrades,"
to use IE vocabulary, were singularly dedicated to predatory
behavior and to "wolf-like" living by hunting and raiding, and
to the performance of superior, even superhuman deeds.4
In short, vampirism.
In contrast to the
radical transformations we saw in Europe, the IE invaders who
came into Anatolia, Syria, and Mesopotamia were eventually
assimilated to the far more advanced civilizations of this
region.
...
It is noteworthy that they borrowed Hattic words for "throne,"
"king," "heir apparent," and for a wide variety of bureaucratic
positions or functions—which are indicative of IE
acculturation to non-aristocratic forms of government.
Which are actually the truly aristocratic forms of government.
The Vedas pictured a people of enormous pride
with a fondness for feasting, dancing, and for making war.
I know.
But while the Rig-Veda was "decidedly pastoral" in its values
and practices, the number of non-Indo-European words
contained in the 1,028 hymns of this classic text suggest "a
close cultural relationship" between Indo-Iranian speakers and
4 8 the old native folk. The Indie speakers who moved into the
Indus valley came into an area already inhabited by a civilized
culture known as "Harappan," and as the Indo-Europeans
penetrated deeper through the Ganges south to Banaras, in the
course of centuries, "they gradually gave up their pastoral
habits and settled into agricultural life." 9
From our perspective, it was a mistake for us to teach them our ways. We should have eliminated their bloodlines instead.
This settled agriculture involved the cultivation of semi-arid
areas by means of river irrigation. As the Rig-Veda reported,
"They made fair fertile fields, they brought the rivers. Plants
spread everywhere over the desert, waters filled the hollows."50
Now, the importance of this point, which I can only outline
here, is that this river-based agriculture took on an "agro-
bureaucratic" character; centralized patterns of irrigation and
social control became the order of the day in the effective
handling of water supplies (canals, aqueducts, reservoirs and
dikes).
Doesn't this sound much more aristocratic than what we have been reading about above?
Similarly, the pastoralists who moved into the land of Iran
came to fall within the orbit of a hydraulic system of
agriculture and a form of "despotic" rule
Which is what aristocracy actually means.
we
should not underestimate the oppressive character of the
Achaemenid monarchy as symbolized in the uniquely Eastern
practice of prostration.5 4
What is oppressive about it? It is done voluntarily! If we want to talk about oppression, let's start with the victims of all the raiding that Duchesne describes the Turanians do! Did those victims volunteer to be raided? (Here's a thought: perhaps they prostrate to their rulers in gratitude because their rulers defend them from the raids!)
He
reports a speech made by Callisthenes, a pupil of Aristotle, to
Alexander and his elite companions, in which he derided the homage
of prostration as a "humiliating custom,"
That is what you get from Aristotelianism.
The humanistic idea underlying this
transformation was the assumption that, if culture be
conceived as a 'privilege' due to 'noble birth,' there can
be no higher claim to such a privilege than that inherent
in the nature of man as a rational being. Thus instead of
vulgarizing that which was noble, the cultural
development of Greece ennobled the whole human race
by offering it a programme for a higher form of life, the
life of reason.68
Thus:
https://trueleft.createaforum.com/ancient-world/antropocentricism-the-most-dangerous-ideology-in-the-world/This is how inferior our enemies are.
There were no
Possessors of the Way in aristocratic Greece; no Chinese Sages
decorously deferential to their superiors and expecting
appropriate deference from their inferiors. The search for the
truth was a free-for-all, each philosopher competing for
intellectual prestige, in a polemical tone that sought to discredit
the theories of others and to promote one's own.6
Except it is
not a search for the truth, but (as Duchesne admits before the end of his own sentence) a mere competition to come up with something novel (and hence become famous for doing so). An actual seeker of truth would seek to discredit only false theories, while reacting to true theories with sincere deference. It is the seeker of prestige who seeks to discredit theories of others irrespective of whether the theories of others are true or false, for the sake of promoting one's own.
Far more that their counterparts in most other ancient
civilizations, Greek doctors, philosophers, sophists,
even mathematicians, were alike faced with an openly
competitive situation of great intensity. While the
modalities of their rivalries varied, in each the
premium, to a greater or less degree, was on skills of
self-justification and self-advertisement, and this had
far-reaching consequences for the way they practiced
their investigations as well as on how they presented
their results.
We are supposed to admire this?!
the roots of the West are to be found in a profoundly
different aristocratic character that first came into the light of
history in the Pontic steppes.
Western civilization must die.
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