Talk:Assyrian Soldier/@comment-108.20.253.170-20150123072055

This article is littered with factual errors. Assyrian chariots carried 3 and sometimes 4 men, not 2 like the article attests. And the barebacked horse riding--"When Assyrians rode horses themelves (which they did barebacked and before the stirrup was invented), they always did so with two, with the man behind the driver being armed with composite bow or lance. " Oh, look, an Assyrian relief depicting mounted archers on saddle and harness, riding in front of all things:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/69/Assyrian_Horse_Archer.jpg

The Assyrians are credited with the development of proper cavalry, which began as a kind of chariotless chariot team, but evolved by the 8th century BCE to self-sufficient cavalrymen.

But perhaps the most ridiculous part is the section on Assyrian faith and state ideology. It's always embarassing to see someone so inseminated with the Judeo-Christian-Islamic worldview that they are incapable of regarding any non-abrahamic religions with any kind of objectivity outside of their crusader/jihadi worldview. Says the article: "Assyrian religion dictated warfare as divine, a tool used to spread the worship of Assyrian gods to other realms. The gods gave the Assyrians the task to conquer and spread their faith. The Assyrians took up that challenge and did very well for their time." Yeah, sure. To quote Karlsson's book Neo-Assyrian Ideology,

"The king’s relationship with the foreign deities is described as characterized by mutual respect. At least Shalmaneser III occasionally presents himself in a priestly role in relation to them. The theme of “godnapping” conveys the ideas of divine abandonment and fulfilment of divine orders, i.e. the foreign deities had abandoned their worshippers and locality, and had ordered the Assyrian king to conquer. Tenable evidence of iconoclasm and a fanatic imposition of Mesopotamian deities is not attested."

Furthermore,

"Regarding the issue of nationalism, racism, and ethnicity as possible components of Assyrian state ideology, the first two terms are obviously anachronistic and non-applicable. The component of ethnos is however relevant to discuss. The terms Assyria and Assyrians are mostly described as flexible and dynamic, referring to political identities. Similarly, so-called Assyrianization centred on political measures rather than on any agenda of cultural imperialism. Thus, in the often antagonistic relations between the king and the foreign lands, a dichotomy of Assyrian/foreign is not a focal point. Tendencies towards a constructed ethnos are present but subordinated. A belief in a fixed and static Assyrian ethnos is definitively not expressed in the sources. Ethnos was not an important component of Assyrian state ideology."