Religious Appropriation of National Symbols in Iran: Searching for Cyrus the Great

In this article I examine the debate over the character of Cyrus the Great in Iran during the last four decades, using it as a prism to view the struggle over the desired balance between religious and ethnic components of Iranian identity. Heated polemics over the historical figure of Cyrus and his legacy reveal undercurrents of Iranian identity dilemmas as well as different and conflicting views of Iranian identity. Beyond a mere historical or religious controversy, the debate over the “right” memory of Cyrus presents an interesting case of shifting emphasis on identity and sources of political inspiration in Iranian society from the late 1960s to the present. Moreover, putting the debate over the ancient king in perspective, there emerges a wider picture of religious adaptation and embrace of what once seemed pagan or secular.     

守望抚宁永远的古长城

<正>城外驿道的山水长城间,春天的第一抹新绿已渐染。和煦的春风和新开的野花将把长城最妩媚温暖的一面呈现出来,原本刚毅的城墙似乎也不再冰冷了。长城脚下,静静的流水,古树的嫩芽,桥下的野鸭,淘米的阿婆,春光里守城将士后裔的村落……第一时间,第一到达,在春天里,开始与古老长城的亲密接触。     

长城

核心价值概述 长城是公元前3世纪至公元17世纪中华帝国在国家北部边境持续修建的军事防御工程.长城东起辽宁虎山,西达甘肃嘉峪关,总长度约2万多千米,包括由墙体、马道、敌台、铺舍等构成的城墙主体,以及沿线配置的城堡、关塞等相关军事设施.     

巍巍松花顶

松花顶是乐都境内一座常年积雪且高耸入云的名山,也是当地土、汉、藏、蒙古等民族的圣山。也许是这座山峰很像松花,还是自身高大秀美的缘故,自从有     

Commentary. The Diseases of Alexander the Great

The accompanying articles that speculate that Alexander the Great had a traumatic carotid dissection or congenital cervical scoliosis demonstrate the difficulties in retrospective diagnosis as a historical enterprise. The extant primary sources were written centuries after Alexander’s death and are ambiguous in their original languages, and even more so in translation. Thus we cannot be certain what illness Alexander actually had. Furthermore, anachronistic diagnosis removes Alexander from the medical context of this time, telling us little of historical significance about him. Such investigations also illustrate the more general limits that the absence of context imposes on the study of ancient history.     

The Enigma of the Great Thapsus Harbour Mole

On the East coast of Tunisia, between Sousse and Sfax, lie the scant remains of the ancient city of Thapsus, notable mainly for a battle fought in the civil war in 46 BC. Visits by the authors resulted in the discovery of one of the longest‐known harbour moles in the entire Roman Empire. No ancient sources make reference to any work of such magnitude and the paper suggests that the harbour was never completed, but might have been started by the local emperors Gordianus, none of whom survived long enough to have executed such a project.