Kansojen historia 2 : Kansojen elämä ja sivistys : Vanha aika 2 : Persialaiset ja kreikkalaiset vuoteen 404 e.Kr.

"Kansojen historia 2" by Carl Gustaf Grimberg is a historical account written in the early 20th century. It surveys the ancient Near East and the Greek world up to the end of the Peloponnesian War, interweaving narrative history with myth, archaeology, linguistics, and classical sources. The volume concentrates on the rise of the Medes and Persians, the growth of Greek civilization, and the decisive encounters between East and West. The opening of this volume provides translator’s notes, acknowledgments, and a table of contents that frames the journey from Iranian peoples and Aegean culture to Greek politics, literature, and wars. It then examines competing theories about the Indo-European homeland using comparative linguistics and cultural clues (temperate climate, barley, limited seafaring vocabulary, early copper use, wheeled transport), before turning to the Iranian branch. A substantial section outlines Zarathustra’s dualistic faith—Ormuzd versus Ahriman, strict purity, the moral worth of work, judgment after death, a final renewal—and notes its later echoes and contrasts with Judaism and Christianity. The narrative moves to political history: scarce early sources on Medes and Persians give way to fuller material from Cyrus onward, balancing Herodotean stories (Cyrus’s youth, Croesus, the Delphic oracle) with inscriptions such as the Babylonian cylinder that presents Marduk’s favor. It highlights Cyrus’s pragmatic tolerance—local autonomy and the Jews’ return to Jerusalem—and recounts his end in the campaign against the Massagetae under queen Tomyris. Finally, it covers Kambyses’s conquest of Egypt and the expedition toward Aithiopia, setting Herodotus’s dramatic tales (the Apis bull, cannibalism) against archaeological and textual evidence that challenges their veracity. (This is an automatically generated summary.)