06-04-2006, 08:57 PM
Thanks, Tarbicus, for the link to Curzon's essay. Whittaker quoted him in his "Frontiers of the Roman Empire", and now I was able to read the original. 
Now, concerning the article in the People's Daily, I wasn't impressed to be honest. Perhaps Visy knows something others don't, or he was being politie, or the People's Daily is misrepresenting comments concerning the parallels between Roman and Han frontier systems.
Fortified frontier zones are hardly uncommon. Prior to the various Chinese walls and the Roman limes, there were wall systems along Achaemenid Persia's northern frontiers; Alexander is supposed to have built one, and the Seleucids constructed a 250 km long wall system protecting Antiochia Margiana (Merv). From what I know of the Roman limes - with its great variety over time and place - it seems to have "organically grown" as a (possibly partly culturally conditioned) reaction to practical problems on the frontier, and it never physically resembled the Great Wall.
As for the similarities, I suspect it's simply a matter of similar problems leading to similar solutions.
Finally, the article erroneously claimed the Great Wall was first constructed in the 7th century BC (it wasn't - that happened in the late 3rd century BC, the work of the "First Emperor") and got the starting date of the Han dynasty 20 years too early (it was 206 rather than 226 BC).
Way to go for a Chinese newspaper... :roll:
Now, concerning the article in the People's Daily, I wasn't impressed to be honest. Perhaps Visy knows something others don't, or he was being politie, or the People's Daily is misrepresenting comments concerning the parallels between Roman and Han frontier systems.
Fortified frontier zones are hardly uncommon. Prior to the various Chinese walls and the Roman limes, there were wall systems along Achaemenid Persia's northern frontiers; Alexander is supposed to have built one, and the Seleucids constructed a 250 km long wall system protecting Antiochia Margiana (Merv). From what I know of the Roman limes - with its great variety over time and place - it seems to have "organically grown" as a (possibly partly culturally conditioned) reaction to practical problems on the frontier, and it never physically resembled the Great Wall.
As for the similarities, I suspect it's simply a matter of similar problems leading to similar solutions.
Finally, the article erroneously claimed the Great Wall was first constructed in the 7th century BC (it wasn't - that happened in the late 3rd century BC, the work of the "First Emperor") and got the starting date of the Han dynasty 20 years too early (it was 206 rather than 226 BC).
Way to go for a Chinese newspaper... :roll:
Andreas Baede
