Posted on 03/23/2019 3:53:54 PM PDT by wildbill
In the fifth century BC, the Greek historian Herodotus visited Egypt and wrote of unusual river boats on the Nile. Twenty-three lines of his Historia, the ancient world’s first great narrative history, are devoted to the intricate description of the construction of a “baris”.
For centuries, scholars have argued over his account because there was no archaeological evidence that such ships ever existed. Now there is. A “fabulously preserved” wreck in the waters around the sunken port city of Thonis-Heracleion has revealed just how accurate the historian was.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
Slowly proofs are coming to light that validate Herodotus as a skillful observer of his time.
Sunken Civ check this out. A well preserved ship matches Herodotus observations of peculiar Egyptian shipbuilding.
I suspect most ancient tales are more or less true.
For a long time most historians did not believe that Troy was a real place.
Yep. Although ancient tales had details embellished over time. Trojan War did happen while we all know that the Trojan Horse was a myth.
Pretty cool, but I am not sure how unusual this type of construction was or how different it was from, say Roman or Greek ships of the time. I am no engineer, but I do know that the nature of wood is you have to cut it into into strips of various lengths, widths and thicknesses to build with it. To make those strips into a boat, you have to fasten the strips together, arranged into a symmetrical hull with a center beam.
So is it the papyrus layers that is unique, water repellent?
Herodotus placed Xerxes army at a million. Modern historians say it might have been as few as 35,000.
I suppose a million might be an exaggeration but the Persian Empire probably did have a massive army.
But, did Herodotus see Xerxes Army first hand? Or was he just using Athenan propaganda ? It was big—real big, maybe 100,000 with an equal number of camp followers and support people.
Knowing the vast area and nations within the Persian Empire there is not much doubt they could have produced an army that size.
The main reason modern historians say it could not be that large was the logistics. Feeding and supplying that many on the march was probably impossible.
Calypso Louie stretched numbers a bit too.
A million people can sound impressive.
An understandable exaggeration, since they didn't have a word that was the equivalent of "shitload."
“Shipwrecks and Archeology” and “The Sea Remembers”, Throckmorton, Peter. I hope my late friend is looking down and smiling.
Thx
Herodotus also said that Egyptian history was over 20,000 years old in his time.
It is just like with the Bible, Josephus, et cetera:
Do not trust the people who lived then, or shortly thereafter; oh no, only trust academics two thousand - or more - years removed.
It was once fashionable to categorically denounce the historicity of the Bible because the Hittite Empire was clearly mythical.
Then they found Hattushah, its capital... so they just moved on to the Next Big Reason to denounce the historicity of the Bible.
Academics are typically disingenuous anti-Christian snobs.
Riiiight....what’s a cubit? Bill Cosby, 1965.
You make a good point. “shitload” and “many orders of magnitude” and “!!!!!!” are more or less interchangeable.
I’m not so sure about that. I do suspect that if the horse existed it was much smaller than typically depicted and only contained one or two men, enough to open the gates - or throw lines down to their friends to allow them to come in and open the gates.
Probably was convenient shorthand for “there were Persians for as far as I could see and it was pointless for me to try to count them”. These days, someone seeing the Persians in that quantity and asked to determine how many there were would probably reply that it was ALL the Persians. :P
There are many archeological discoveries that support the Bible. And none that refute it. There are undiscovered things, but, as you said, when artifacts or cities are unearthed, they support the text of the Bible. One day, Noah’s ark will be located and then real fireworks will happen.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.