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Babylonian army in Alcaeus (1)

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Topics (move over topic to see place in topic list) Assyria and Assyrians in Greek, Latin and Jewish sources 12 Assyrian Identity 12.02 Assyrian identity in post-Empire times 12.02.03 Assyria and Assyrians in Greek, Latin and Jewish sources Mercenaries 09 Army and warfare 09.02 Standing army 09.02.04 Mercenaries	Keywords armies Babylonia Greeks
Period 6th century BCE Greek Archaic Age	Channel Greek poets

Text
Alcaeus welcomes his brother Antimenidas back home, who has served as a mercenary for the Babylonians during one of their Palestinian campaigns shortly before and after 600 BCE.

Alcaeus 48:
“… the sea … to be carried … might be carried … destroys … (from?) holy Babylon … Ascalon … to stir up chilling (war?) … from the summit … and good … house of Hades … to think … garlands for us … all these … -selves …”

Alcaeus 350:
“You have come from the ends of the earth with the hilt of your sword ivory bound with gold … you performed a great feat while fighting as ally of the Babylonians and rescued them from trouble by killing a warrior who was only one palm’s breadth short of five royal cubits.”

Sources (list of abbreviations) (source links will open in a new browser window)
Alcaeus 48
Alcaeus 350

Bibliography

Campbell 1982, 260-263, 386-387	Campbell, David A. Greek Lyric, Sappho and Alcaeus. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press, London: Heinemann 1982.
Niemeier 2001, 18	Niemeier, Wolf-Dietrich. “Archaic Greeks in the Orient. Textual and archaeological evidence.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 322 (2001) 11-32. [JSTOR (requires subscription)]

Erik van Dongen

URL for this entry: http://www.aakkl.helsinki.fi/melammu/database/gen_html/a0001399.php

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