The Inside Assyria Discussion Forum #5

=> and another thing.....

and another thing.....
Posted by pancho (Moderator) - Monday, July 15 2013, 4:00:06 (UTC)
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...on page 23 of her book the author, referring to who she thinks really built the Hanging Gardens, writes..."Diodorus Siculus said it was built 'not by Semiramis but by a later Syrian king"...and then, in parenthesis, right after, she writes "['Syrian' meant 'Assyrian' from at least the 7th century BC onwards"]...and gives not a single footnote for such a bold claim...that strikes me as odd. She does do so later on, a few pages along when she mentions that fragment as the source for her claim....but where is the evidence that by the 7th century OTHER people began calling Assyrians "Syrians"? Besides, it doesn't matter what OTHER people called them...it only matters what THEY called themselves...and she gives no evidence anywhere that the Assyrians EVER called themselves Syrians....not until centuries later.

What does it matter what names other people give you...isn't the deciding factor the name YOU give yourself?

Ms Dalley's book is all about proving that the Gardens were never in Babylon, but rather in Nineveh...and built not by Nebuchadnezzer but by the Assyrian king Sennakherib...in order to "prove" this she has to discredit the Greek writers who all say it was anyone BUT an Assyrian king....the way she does this is by re-interpreting a quote found in the writings of the same Diodorus, a Greek, contemporary of Julius Caesar who said that the famous Garden, "...was built, not by Semiramis, but by a later Syrian king...". This gives her the idea, and the incentive, to prove that "Syrian" really means, or can also mean, Assyrian.

She concludes by saying, "Therefore the earlier supposition that Syria and Assyria meant two different regions in Greek texts at that time, must be abandoned, and the 'Syrian king' of Diodorus Siculus can safely be understood as 'Assyrian king'". p 33

..maybe...to a LUWIAN! And to her, because her theory needs it to be so. I hardly think her theory settles the issue for all time, as she declares...I have no doubt the argument will continue. She has proven nothing that does the assyrian cause any good...she proves nothing that does assyrians any good....just as the Genome and DANA project, when properly understood, never claimed to "prove" that Aprim was a real assyrian...only that his roots could be traced back 500 years to whatever regions his ancestors came from..and since he already knows he comes from Iraq, it's hardly proof of anything.

Her one last footnote on this subject is..."That Syria could include Babylonia is unlikely", is interesting. I don't like when I'm just told something is "unlikely", or even "likely" without some foundation being laid...why is it unlikely? I'd like to know....and I don;t like when provocative statements are made without any footnotes of reference material offered..makes me uneasy, especially on such a controversial subject as this.



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