the war and the baghdad rail way 1917

8/9/2019 The War and the Baghdad Rail Way 1917

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The original of tliis book is intlie Cornell University Library.

There are no known copyright restrictions inthe United States on the use of the text.


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Cornell University LibraryD 465.J39 1918War and the Bagdad railwa'

3 1924 027 913 999

THE WAR AND THEBAGDAD RAILWAYTHE STORY OF ASIA MINORAND ITS RELATION TO THEPRESENT CONFLICT


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BY THE SAME AUTHORTHE CIVILIZATION OF

BABYLONIA ANDASSYRIAITS REMAINS, LANGUAGE, HISTORY,RELIGION, COMMERCE, LAW, ARTAND LITERATURE

BYMORRIS JASTROW, Jr., Ph.D., LL.D.Professor of Semitic Languages, University of Pennsylvania

With map and 164 illustrations. Octavo. Gilt top,in a box. Net J7.00.Art and Archeology:"This magnificent book

gives a comprehensive and complete survey of thewhole civilization of the ancient peoples, who dwelt inthe Tigro-Euphrates Valley. It is written by one ofthe foremost Semitic scholars of the world, and super-sedes all works upon the subject. Written in theauthor's characteristic lucid style, it is sumptuouslyillustrated, and is a beautiful specimen of bookmaking.


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THE WAR AND THEBAGDAD RAILWAYTHE STORY OF ASIA MINOR AND ITSRELATK)N TO THE PRESENT CONFLICT

BYMORRIS JASTROW, Jr., Ph.D., LL.D.PROFESSOR IN THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIAAtlTHOR OF "THE CIVILIZATION OF BABYLONIA AND ASSYRIA," ETC.

WITH U ILLUSTRATIONSAND A MAP"Hard Days, Sword Days, Death Days."(Vaulundurs Saga)

SECOND IMPRESSION, WITH A NEW PREFACE

PHILADELPHIA AND LONDONJ. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANYf6


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COPYRIGHT, 191 7, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANYCOPYRIGHT, I918, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

PUBLISHED NOVEMBER, I9I7SECOND IMPRESSION, FEBRUARY, I9I8

/\'^l^Liol

PRINTED BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANYAT THE WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESSPHILADELPHIA, U. S. A.


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TO THEMEMBERS OF THE WEDNESDAYMORNING CLUB OF PITTSFIELD, MASS.WITH MANY PLEASANT MEMORIES


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PREFACE TOTHE SECOND IMPRESSIONI AVAIL myself of the publication of a second print-

ing of this work (without any changes in the text)to amplify somewhat the distinction between the waras it appeared in 1914 and its aspect in 1917, whichI set forth at the beginning of the concluding chapter.The distinction made between what I call the two warsis, as I can see, open to an interpretation which wasremote from my mind. The main purpose of thisconcluding chapter is to bring forward a proposedsolution for the Eastern Question, suggested as theresult of a prolonged study both of the ancient and ofthe modem East. By way of leading up to this solu-tion I felt it desirable to emphasize that the variousissues which confronted Europe at the outbreak ofthe war in 1914,and among which, as I endeavoredto show, the Bagdad Railway was the largest singlecontributing factor,^have been moved into the back-ground through the supreme and paramount issuewhich became more sharply defined as the war pro-gressed. This paramount issue, the existence of aruthless militarism in close alliance with an entirelyantiquated form of autocratic government, is essen-tially a moral one, for the attempt to terrorize theworld and to carry out a national policy of dominationthrough sheer military force are two cardinal sinsagainst what may be called the conscience of the world.

It is not the first time that such a menace has con-fronted the world, but it may safely be asserted thatthe menace has never appeared in so formidable a

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2 PEEFACEguise. The world cannot pursue its even course untilthe spectre of Prussian militarism has been laid. Theparamount issue, as I indicate in my volume, mustbe disposed of first, before the questions confrontingEurope during the fateful last week of July can betaken up.

In drawing a distinction, therefore, between thetwo wars, I did not wish to imply that there was noconnection between them. On the contrary I indicatedthat the main factor leading to the recognition on thepart of the civilized world of the paramount issuewas Germany's brutal and inexcusable conduct of thewar which revealed her sinister plans, formed longbefore 1914, for forceful domination of the East with-out regard to the simplest demands of internationallaw or to the most elementary considerations ofhurnanitarianism. The purpose of these plans was bymeans of such domination to establish for herself thecommanding place in the world to the discomfitureand virtual subjugation of her rivals.

Writing as a student of history, whose primaryobligation is to present the various sides of a situa-tion clearly and fairly before pronouncing a verdict,I give, in the course of the discussion, Germany's sideof the diplomatic position as it appeared on August1st, 1914, that is to say, at the time of the declarationof war on Russia ; and I do this in order to emphasizethat giving Germany the full benefit of every doubt,'on the assumption that she was entirely sincere in thepresentation of her case in the White Book issued bythe German Government shortly after the outbreakof the war,she would still be condemned in the eyesof the world by her conduct of the war, which spoiltany case that she might have had.


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PREFACE 3My indictment represents the verdict after a review

of her case. We might, as I suggest in the same con-nection, go even so far as to waive the question whethershe, actually willed the war, and assume that the pres-sure of the military party on the civil governmentforced the issue (and for which there is some evi-dence), and yet we would have to condemn her justas strongly because of her unwillingness to preventthe war by her fateful and criminal rejection of SirEdward Grey's proposition for a conference to settlethe Austrian-Servian crisis and to which conferenceall the other powers had consented.

Concerned as I am in this closing chapter, asthroughout the book, with the Eastern Question, Idid not deem it necessary to enlarge on the moregeneral aspects of the war (particularly as my viewson that phase have merely the value of the ordinaryobserver), or I would have emphasized strongly, in-stead of merely suggesting as I do, that Germany'ssupport of Austria's contention that the Servian ques-tion was a matter for her to settle without Europeanintervention, had a sinister substratum. That sinistersubstratum is, of coiirse, more clearly evident now,in 1917, than it was in 1914, though at that time it wasno doubt recognized in the European Chancelleries,familiar with the details of Germany's plan for domi-nation of the East. The railway from Berlin-Vienna-Constantinople leads through Belgrade, Nish and Sofia.The control of Servia, as of Bulgaria, was, therefore,essential to Germany for carrying out the Hamburgto Bagdad project, the very core of Pan-Germanism,as I point out towards the close of the chapter onthe Bagdad Railway.


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4 PREFACEAt the same time, while it is evident that the Bagdad

Railway project was thus the deciding factor thatled Germany in July, 1914, to take the position thatdirectly brought on the war as an inevitable outcomeof that position, it must be recognized by the historianas it is indeed recognized by all thoughtful stu-dents^that there were other issues, of a most seriousand threatening character, that helped to complicate thesituation in Europe and that contained the menaceof an Inter-European war. No one can read Mr.Lowes Dickinson's careful analysis of the Europeansituation in 1914, as succinctly set forth in his " Euro-pean Anarchy," to which I refer several times in thecourse of my book, or read the account of the diplo-matic negotiations in M. P. Price's Diplomatic Historyof the War, or any other of a dozen books that mightbe mentioned, without realizing the combustible ma-terial that lay loosely about in the diplomatic workshopsof Europe in 1914. It is only necessary to name theBalkan question, which had brought on two seriousconflicts in two successive years shortly before 1914,and to refer to the admirable investigation of the com-plicated problem that has recently been published byMr. J. A. R. Marriott ("The Eastern Question, AStudy in European Diplomacy," Oxford, 1917) towarn us against a onesided view by concentrating ourexclusive attention on Germany's aggressive plans. Theambitions of Russiaat the time under the sway ofan imperialistic group of much the same type as inGermanyto secure Constantinople and to form aPan-Slavonic union to thwart Germany's ambitionsand to check the plans of Austria-Hungary for theBalkan control, cannot, of course, be overlooked in asurvey of the European situation in 1914. Italy, too.


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PKEFACE 5had been growing restless for a slice of the East. In191 1 she had seized Tripoli, which had brought on herwar with Turkey. She was laying plans for a zoneof influence along the southern coast of Asia Minorand she manifested a direct and aggressive interest inthe Albanian question. The growing economic rivalrybetween England and Germany for the markets ofthe world was another issue that, to be sure, was notdisassociated from the political ambitions of Germany,for the German government was behind the commer-cial expansion plans of her manufacturers and mer-chants, ready to aid them in order to strengthen herpolitical hold over her own population, but the rivalrynevertheless was an outcome of conditions that did nothave their origin in diplomatic complications. It seemsto me, therefore, that to distinguish sharply betweenthe aspect of the war in 1914 and the aspect whichit has in 1917 is helpful to a clarification of the situa-tionThat is what I had in mind in representing thecontrast as that between two wars. The para-mount issue in the present aspect of the war, so clearlydefined in the various notable utterances of the officialspokesman of this republic during 1917 and 1918, was,of course, present also in the war of 1914, but as anundercurrent which was brought to the surfacethrough the three factors on which I dwell at thebeginning of the closing chapter, to wit: German/sconduct of the war, the Russian Revolution, arid ourentrance into the conflict.

The rivalry for supremacy among the great Euro-pean nations is assuredly a fact that cannot be denied,as little as the fact that all of them^Russia, England,France, Italy and even Greecehad their national am-bitions in 1914 and long before that period, as well


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6 PREFACEas Germany and Austria-Hungary. These ambitionstook on different forms, a longing for more territoryin some cases, a desire for political control of a regionin others, and an ambition for spheres of commercialinfluence with or without political control in stillothers. Conflicting ambitions are as natural amongnations as are rivalries in the non-political commercialworld. When these conflicting ambitions reach a crisis,war is always imminent, and under the historical con-ditions that held sway in Europe prior to 1914, it maybe said that war is almost inevitable. Witness thefact that the nineteenth century, despite its gloriousachievements in science and its marvelous materialprogress through discoveries and inventions that haverevolutionized the aspect of life, has more wars to itscreditor rather, to its discredit^than almost anyother century in the world's history.It is not easy, without an effort, to project our-selves back to 1914 without being influenced by theviewpoint that has developed in 1917. It is quitenatural that we should look at 1914 from the vantageground of the development of the war, but if wemake the effort to visualize conditions three and ahalf years ago as they then appeared to the- surfaceobserver, there is, I feel, considerable justification forregarding the war of 1914^viewed from the pointof view of 1914, and not of 191 7^as a struggle forsupremacy among European nations, brought about,in the last analysis, as the result of conflicting nationalambitions, with Germany's aggressive policy for dom-ination in the East, under the threat and menace ofthe mailed fist, as the chief factor, but not as the onlyone, in leading to the conflict that has plunged theworld in such sorrow and suffering.


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PREFACE 7We may, at the present moment, look hopefully

towards the future. The message, voiced so effec-tively by President Wilson, presaging the dawn of anew era in which the rights of nations to life andliberty will receive the first consideration, and inwhich the will of the people will be the sovereignforce everywhere, is sweeping like a mighty currentthrough the world. That message is penetrating eventhe thick walls that the Central Powers have erectedaround themselves to prevent their people from hear-ing the new gospel. It may be that these walls willhave to be stormed at the point of the bayonet andamidst the roar of cannon before the message canreach Germany and Austria-Hungary in all its force,but of the ultimate triumph of the higher principle inthe regulation of international relations, announcedover two thousand years ago by a Hebrew prophet," Not by might nor by power, but by my spirit "ofthe triumph of the idea, through its inherent force,and stripped of all shining armor^there need be nodoubt and there need be no fear. M. J., Jr.Philadelphia, February, 1918


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PREFACE TO THE FIRST IMPRESSIONThe purpose of this volume is to elucidate an

aspect of the war which although it is overshadowedat present by the paramount issuethe menace ofa militarism in league with autocracywas the mostsignificant single factor contributing to the outbreakof the long-foreseen war in 1914, and will form oneof the most momentous problems when the timefor the peace negotiations arrives. Ever since theannouncement was made towards the close of theyear 1899 that the Turkish government had con-ceded to a German syndicate the privilege of build-ing a railway to connect Constantinople withBagdad through a transverse route across AsiaMinor, the Bagdad Railway has been the core ofthe Eastern Question. There were to be sure otheraspects of that question, which led to the two Balkanwars of 1912 and 1913, but the addition of the BagdadRailway was an aggravating factor to an alreadysufficiently complicated situation that involved thegreat European powersEngland, France, Germanyand Russiain a network of diplomatic negotiations,the meshes of which became closer as the years rolledon. The railway became the spectre of the twen-tieth century. It was a spectre that always appearedarmed " from top to toe " and when occasionally he" wore his beaver up," the face was that of a grim,determined warrior.

As an industrial enterprise, the project of a rail-way through a most notable historic region, andpassing along a route which had resounded to thetread of armies thousands of years ago, was fraught


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10 PEEPACEwith great possibilities of usefulness in opening upthe nearer East to brisk trade with Europe thatwould follow in the wake of the locomotive, and ininfusing the young Western spirit into the old East,carrying western ideas, western modes of education,and western science to the mother-lands of civiliza-tion. The railway would also prove to be a shortcut to India and the farther East, and as such theundertaking was on a plane of importance with thecutting of the Suez Canal. Connecting throughjunctions and branches with the other railway sys-tems of Asia Minor, Syria and Palestine, the BagdadRailway would result in covering the entire regionwith a perfect network of modern methods of trans-portation that would embrace eventually also theprojected railways of Persia. Full credit should begiven to the German brains in which this projectwas hatched, and there is no reason to suspect thatat the outset, the German capitalists who fatheredthe enterprise were actuated by any other motivethan the perfectly legitimate one to create a greatavenue of commerce. When, however, the Germangovernment entered the field as the backer and pro-moter of the scheme, the political aspect of the rail-way was moved into the foreground, and that aspecthas since overshadowed the commercial one. Thefull political import of the Bagdad Railway becomesapparent in the light of the eventful history of AsiaMinor which can now be followed, at least in generaloutlines, from a period as early as 2000 B.C. Toillustrate the main thesis suggested by the route ofthe railway that the control of the historic highwaystretching from Constantinople to Bagdad has atall times involved the domination of the Near East,it has been necessary to sketch the history of Asia


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PREFACE UMinor in its relation to the great civilizations ofantiquity and to follow that history through theperiod of Greek, Roman, Parthian and Arabic con-trol, past the efforts of the Crusaders to save theroute for Christian Europe, to the final conquest ofit by the Ottoman Turks. That event, marked by thecapture of Constantinople in 1453, directly led to thediscovery of America in 1492.

I feel that no apology is needed for thus devotinga large chapter of the volume to this history, forapart from its intrinsic interest, our understandingof the present situation in the Near East is dependentupon an appreciation of the position that Asia Minor,as the bridge leading to the East, has always held.The war has resulted in bringing many countriescloser to our horizon, but no lands more so thanthose to which Asia Minor, as I shall attempt to show,is the HinterlandMesopotamia, Syria, Arabia andEgypt. Until recently, the history of these landshas been looked upon by the general public as thedomain of the specializing historian, philologist andarchaeologist. With the extension of the Europeanwar into these eastern lands, they become a partand an essential partof the general political situa-tion. Their history needs to be known, if the prob-lems arising from the relation of Asia Minor to theissues of the war are to be dealt with at the peaceconference in an intelligent manner. I cherish thehope which, I trust, is not a delusion, that my sketchof the history of Asia Minor will help to illuminatethe factors underlying " the trend towards the Eastwhich began with Alexander the Great, which ledmodern nations to take possession of eastern lands,and of which the Bagdad Railway is the latestmanifestation.


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12 PREFACEI have thought it proper to give the story of the

Bagdad Railway in some detail, because throughthis we can best follow the growth of the spirit ofhostile rivalry among European nations which cul-minated in the outbreak three years ago. A warlike the present one cannot, to be sure, be carriedback to any one issue, isolated from all others, butalthough many issues are behind the war, it is theBagdad Railway that created the frame of mindamong the European powers which made the warone is inclined to put itinevitable. A war breaksout when nations are ready for itready, I mean,in their disposition. The Bagdad Railway madethem ready in this sense. The story of the BagdadRailway tells us how this frame of mind was pro-ducedand yet back of it all, we must bear in mindthe deeper currents of history that produce theagitation on the surface.The study of the relation of Asia Minor to thepresent conflicton the basis of its historywould beincomplete without at least an attempt to peer intothe future, a hazardous undertaking but whichnevertheless has its value in at least suggestingthe line along which the solution of the problemof the Bagdad Railway, and with it the EasternQuestion of which it is the core is to be sought.As a preliminary to this outlook, I have tried toset forth the sharp distinction between what I wouldcall the two warsthe war of 1914 and the war of1917. The recognition of this distinction appears to meto be essential for an understanding of the situationthat will arise at the time of the peace conference.The former war is in the main the Europeanstruggle for supremacy, the latter is the great worldwar for the preservation and spread of the spirit


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PREFACE 13and the institutions of democracy. I am writing asa student of history and not as a partisan, exceptin so far as my position is, as I believe it to be, inaccord with the American point of view as voicedby its most thoughtful and most sober representa-tives. I have no sympathy even in war time withthat blatant form of patriotism which warps one'sjudgment and prevents a penetration into the deepermeaning of this war. It is the existence of thatkind of patriotism in Germany which has producedthe Pan-Germanic spirit, and the strength of which(though waning) prevents the German people fromeven now recognizing the reason for the hostilitythat they have aroused throughout the world. Myindictment, therefore, of Germany's conduct of thewar which has been the main factor, as I see it, lead-ing from the war of 1914 to that of 1917, is set forth" more in sorrow than in anger "a sorrow thatmust, I think, be shared by all who admired theGermany before the war for her remarkable achieve-ments in all fields, and that bears heaviest on thethousands of Americans who, like myself, receivedthe training for their careers at German universitiesand who feel keenly the intellectual ties that bindthem to that country. But Germany has none butherself to blame for having thus transformed herfriends into her opponents. She first handicappedthose who were disposed at the outbreak of the warto see and present her side sympathetically by theviolation of Belgian neutrality, she then condemnedthem to silence by the atrocious treatment of theBelgians and by the sinking of the Lusitania, andshe finally converted them into enemies in arms byher ruthless submarine warfare that has done farmore harm to the German name than any injury


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14 PREFACEthat the sink-at-sight procedure can inflict on theworld's shipping. As I write these lines I havebefore me a monograph by a German scholar onGermany's position in the East after the two Balkanwars in 1912 and 1913. Incidental to the discus-sion the author gives some shocking details, vouchedfor by reliable witnesses, of the atrocities committedin the first of these wars by the Bulgarians andSerbians. He speaks of the systematic attempt towipe out the Turks by wholesale massacres on ahuge scale, and the autiior asks, in a tone of right-eous indignation, whether the voice of humani-tarianism and civilization can remain silent with suchdeeds going on ? The Bulgarians are now the alliesof the Germans, and in the present war the Turksseem to be following exactly the same policy towardsthe Armenians that the Bulgarians adopted to anni-hilate an entire people. Did the German govern-ment respond to the desperate cry of humanity tostop officially ordered massacres in Armenia? Andyet the Turk is neither cruel norunless stirred upfanatical. Those who have lived longest in Turkishcountries and who know the Turk best bear evi-dence to the fine traits of his character and that undernormal conditions, Turkish Moslems and ChristianArmenians live quite amicably side by side. TheArmenian massacres represent a part of the policyof the Turkish government, as the Russian pogromsunder the old regime were always organized by theRussian government. The population is stirred upby spreading false reports of a proposed revolt onthe part of the Armeniansand the rest follows.The war of 1914 as conducted by Germany formsa close parallel. The cruelties practised and theinhuman methods of warfare resorted to are part of


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PREFACE 15the military policy, and for which the German gov-ernment, following a deliberate plan of spreadingterrorism and enforcing subordination, must bearthe responsibility. The author whom I have quoted,assuming (as I do) that he is sincere in his denuncia-tion of cruelties officially carried out by the Bul-garian government, ought certainly to be able toanswer the question why the whole civilized worldhas changed its former admiration for Germany intoa realization that through her military policy, dic-tated by an autocratic group that cannot be calledto account by the people, Germany has become amenace to the safety of the world. The Germanarmyin its origin the creation of the Germanpeople organized to fight for its liberty as a nationhas become a mighty weapon in the hands of therulers of Germany to hold the people at their mercyand to use the splendid patriotism of the people (thatbrought 1,800,000 volunteers to the front withinone week after the declaration war), for the fur-therance of plans that endanger the happiness ofother nations and that are to serve towards strength-ening the power of autocracy. This " new " Ger-many, revealed by the conduct of the war, must beovercome in order to bring back the Germany ofante-bellum days. The " old " Germany, we nowsadly recognize, died in 1914possibly earlier, onJune 15, 1888, when Frederick III, surnamed the" Noble," passed away after a reign of one hundreddays.^ The old Germany, as Brandes well says,gave us " everything German that is loved or appreci-ated." It can be recreated only through the democra-

* George Brandes, a friend and lover of Germany if everthere was one, calls these one hundred days the " short gleamof a clear human spirit breaking in on our war-mad empire."The World at War, p. 6.


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16 PREFACEtization of Germany's form of government. Thisadvance will assuredly come about either duringthe war, or as a direct result of the war, when theghastly crisis through which the world is passingshall happily be a thing of the past, to become,after the lapse of some years, a memory that willcontinue to haunt the world for generations to come.

Unless, however, at the end of the war, the greatnations of the world give the proper cue for thework of reconstruction by advocating a policy ofco-operation with the East, instead of open or dis-guised exploitation, we will continue to have anEastern Question that may again pass throughthe same process (with perhaps different contest-ants) to culminate in open hostility. " Internation-alization " of all schemes for opening up the Eastto the West is the solution of the Eastern Questionfor which I have ventured to enter a plea at theclose of this book.

It remains for me to make acknowledgment, asin the case of all my publications, to the invaluableassistance given to me by my dear wife in readingboth the manuscript and the proof, and helping invarious other ways, including the encouragementto trespass upon fields adjacent to my own and towhich the study of the war in the East led me. Ialso wish to make grateful acknowledgment to myfriend, Mrs. Gardiner Gayley, for many sugges-tions made in discussing with her the plan and thethesis of this study. To my former student, Hon.Edward I. Nathan, American Consul at Mersinafrom 1910 to the breaking of our diplomatic rela-tions with Turkey, and who has rendered distin-guished services at his responsible post, I amunder obligations for criticisms and for valuableinformation regarding the industries of Turkey, par-


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PREFACE ITticularly at Mersina, which I have embodied inone of the notes attached to the volume. I shouldlike to call particular attention to these notes inwhich I have given bibliographical and explanatorydetails for those who wish to pursue the subjectfurther. The map, prepared by Mr. Earl Thatcherwith great care, will, I trust, prove useful. I amindebted to Mr. Leon Dominian, of the AmericanGeographical Society, for permission to make useof his map of railroads in Turkey published by himin " Frontiers of Language and Nationality inEurope " (Henry Holt & Co., N. Y., 1917). A specialfeature of my map is the inclusion of all railroads,both those constructed and those projected in AsiaMinor, Syria, Palestine and Mesopotamia. Themap will enable the reader to follow the furthercourse of development of the war in the varioussections of the Near East. For countries, lying out-side of the special topic of this volume, I have contentedmyself with indicating merely a few places as an orien-tation ; and in order not to confuse the reader by makingthe map too crowded, I have selected for Asia Minoronly the important places and more particularlythose that are connected with events in the historyof the region. My thanks are due to Dr. EdwardRobinson, Director of the Metropolitan Museum ofNew York, who kindly placed at my disposal aphotograph of the fine Hittite monument of theMuseumthe only one of the kind (so far as I amaware) in this country. To my friend and colleague.Professor J. H. Breasted, of the University ofChicago, and to the publishers, Ginn & Co. and theUniversity of Chicago, I am indebted for permissionto use two illustrations, one in his excellent manualon Ancient History (Boston, 1916) and the otherfrom his monograph. The Battle of Kadesh (Chicago,


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18 PREFACE1901); to Professor John Garstang for permissionto use some of the illustrations in his Land of theHittites (Dutton & Co., New York) ; to Mr. ErnestLeroux for the similar courtesy to use some illustra-tions from Nettancourt-Vaubecourt Sur Les GrandesRoutes de I'Asie Mineure (Paris, 1908) published byhim; and to Mr. C. E. Lydecker, the Counsellor ofthe American Chamber of Commerce of Constanti-nople, for his approval in using several illustrationsfrom The Levant Trade Reviewa most importantsource of information for the commerce and indus-tries of the Near East, and to which I am particularlyglad to call the attention of all interested in Easternmatters.To the Hon. Otis A. Glazebrook, who has madesuch a notable record as United States Consul at Jeru-salem till the diplomatic break with Turkey, I beg tomake acknowledgment for authentic information in re-gard to present conditions of railways in Palestine.

Mr. H. De Wolf Fuller, the editor of The Nation(New York) has kindly permitted me to embody inthis book, in an enlarged and revised form, some viewsset forth by me in an article written for The Nationand published in the issue of August 30, 1916, under thetitle of " The World's Highway." Lastly, it is a gen-uine pleasure to .dedicate the little volume to the mem-bers of the Wednesday Morning Club, of Pittsfield(Mass.), in recollection of many visits to the charming" heart of the Berkshires " as their guest. To speakbefore the delightful and sympathetic audience thatgathers at the weekly reunions of this Club during thesummer months is a privilege which I am sure all whoare invited to do so value as highly as I do.

Morris Jastrow, Jr.UNrVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIANovember, 1917


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CONTENTSCHAPTER PACE

I. THE WAR IN THE EAST 23II. THE STORY OF ASIA MINOR 31III. THE STORY OF THE BAGDAD RAILWAY 82IV. THE ISSUE AND THE OUTLOOK 122

NOTES 153


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ILLUSTRATIONSPAQS

English Steamers on the Tigris at Bagdad FrontispieceView Near Sardis, the Ancient Capital of Lydia 32

(Reproduced from Garstang, The Land of the Hilliles, PlateXXVI.)The Entrance of the Famous Cilician Gates Across Which

Armies have Passed from Before 2000 B.C. Down toOur Own Days. The Bagdad Railway Passes a Little tothe East of the Pass 32(Reproduced from Garstang, Plate XXI.)

Hittite Rock Scvilpture at Ivriz, not Far from Eregli, on theBagdad Railway Route, Representing a Hittite Rulerin an Attitude of Adoration Before a God of Agricul-ture and Viniculture^A Hittite Bacchus. A Specimenof the Enormous Rock Sculptures Pound in Central andNorthern Asia Minor, Dating from the Days of theHittites. The Figure of the Deity is 14 Feet High;that of the King 8 Feet High. The Sculpture Datesfrom About 1000 B.C 36(Reproduced from Nettancourt-Vaubecourt, Sar Us CrandesRoutes de I'Asie Mineure, Leroux, Paris, 1908, Plate XVII.)

Ruins of the Entrance to the Great Hittite Fortress atBoghaz-Keui, Showing Cyclopean Character of the (in-struction and the Lion Sphinxes Guarding the Entrance;Dating from About 1500 B.C 36(Reproduced from Meyer, Reich und Kultur der Chetiter, (Berlin,1914), Fig. S.

An Ancient Hittite and His Modem Armenian Descendant 40(Reproduced from Breasted, Ancient Times, Ginn and Company,igi6. Fig. 146.)

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20 ILLUSTRATIONSMonolith of a Hittite Ruler with an Inscription in Hittite

Hierogljrphics, Containing a Dedicatory Record of theRuler's Achievements. Found Outside of Marash to theNorth of Killis on the Bagdad Railway Route in AsiaMinor. This is the Only Hittite Monument in thisCountry and is Reproduced from a Photograph KindlyFurnished for this Volume by Dr. Edward Robinson,Director of the Metropolitan Museum. The Stone is 3Feet 6 Inches High 40

The Great Battle of Eadesh on the Orontes, Between theEgyptians and Hittites, which Took Place c. 1295 B.C.The Egyptian Pharaoh, in His Chariot, Dominatingthe Scene is Rameses II, Who is Represented as Per-sonally Directing the Battle. Relief on a Temple Wallat Luxor 46(Reproduced from Breasted, The Bottle of Kadesk, TTniversity ofChicago Decennial Publications, 1903.)

Primitive Method of Irrigation in Mesopotamia as StillCarried on by the Natives. The Bucket of Skin isLowered into the Water and is then Raised by a DraftAnimal^Horse, Donkey or BullockWalking Downthe Inclined Plane, and the Water Distributed Throughthe Neighboring Fields 65(Reproduced from the Levant Trade Review, September, 1914.)

The Portal at Nigdeh (not Far from Eregli on the BagdadRoute), Forming Part of a Medresseh (MohammedanSchool) and Dating from c. 1223 A.D. Specimen of theArt and Architecture of the Selyuk Turks in Asia Minor. 65(Reproduced from Garstang, Plate XXXII.)

View of Angora, the Ancient Ancyra, the Scene of ManyBattles in the History of Asia Minor, and the Terminusof the Anatolian Railway 82(Reproduced from Nettancourt-Vaubecourt, Plate VII.)


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ILLUSTRATIONS 21Konia, the Ancient Iconium, the Seat of Residence of the

Selyuk Sultans and One of the Main Stations on theBagdad Railway 82(Reproduced from the levant Trade Rnitw, March, 1915J

Bridge on the Bagdad Railway Route over the Euphratesat Jerablus, the Site of the Ancient Hittite City ofCarchemish. The Bridge has a Length of 850 Yardsand Its Constructive Steel and Iron parts have a TotalWeight of 3400 tons no(Reproduced from the Levant Trade Review, June, 1915O

The Terminal Station of the Bagdad Railway at Haidar-Pasha, Opposite Constantinople. This is the Starting-point of the Famous Railway, which has Now Been(Completed Except for Two Sections Ojvering About265 Miles. The Length of the Railway from Constan-tinople to Bagdad is 1512 Miles no(Reproduced from the Levant Trade Review, March, 1915.)

Map of Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, Palestine, Syria, Arabiaand Egypt, Showing Route of the Bagdad Railway andOther Railroads in Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine andArabia, the Ancient Trade Routes and the Route ofAlexander the Great 160


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THE WAR AND THEBAGDAD RAILWAYCHAPTER ITHE WAR IN THE EAST

History is being made to-day through thfe war inlands replete with historic associations, that havewitnessed the rise and decay of many a civilization.The conflict raging in three continents and shared inby the fourth sees armies taking possession of thevalley of the Nile, whose pyramids were built 5000years ago. Passing over a route identical in partwith that of the traditional Exodus, the march of theEnglish troops toward Jerusalem suggests a repe-tition of the Crusades of the Middle Ages. Cross andCrescent once more lock arms at sites that haveacquired a sacred significance in the traditions ofthree religions. Further East, Russian armies arefollowing the route of the Ten Thousand^ on theeastern border of Asia Minor, and are moving inPersia along some of the old routes on which thehosts of Cyrus passed in their descent upon theEuphrates Valley, and which two centuries laterwitnessed the remarkable invasion of the old East

^Trebizond at the southeastern corner of the Black Sea,captured by the Russians in the early campaigns of the war,is the point where the Greeks on their retreat from Babylonia(401 B.C.) at last reached the seashore.

23


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24 THE WAE AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYby the young Lochinvar, come out of the West. Theimagination is stirred by the exploits of Englisharmies landing at the head of the Persian Gulf andmoving along the Tigris across the mounds, whichhave in part yielded but in large part still coverthe remains of the civilization that arose in theEuphrates Valley thousands of years ago and which,spreading northwards, became the rival of Egyptianachievements.

Can any romance be stranger than the streetsof Bagdad, only sixty miles distant from the ruinsof ancient Babylon, with memories of past gloryreaching back to Harun al-Rashid, resotmding tothe steps of European soldiery, and Mosul, oppositewhich lies all that remains of Nineveh " the greatcity," once mistress of the world, at the mercy ofa European power! What does it all mean? Itis reported that on the top of the remains of one ofthe ancient towers that formed a feature of thetemples of Babylonia a " wireless " station has beeninstalled since the beginning of the war. This par-ticular tower is the one, curiously enough, whichtradition associates with the famous Tower of Babel.Are we perhaps to see in the use to which this senti-nel of a hoary antiquity has been converted anomen of the conquest of the East by the aggressiveWest? Or is it a symbol of the resuscitation ofthe East through the infusion of the progressivespirit of the West? Are the dry bones scatteredthrough the valley as in the vision of Ezekiel,^ oncemore to be knit together with sinews and to becovered with new flesh?On the other hand, in Arabia the standard of re-

'Ezekiel, Chap. 37.


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THE WAR IN THE EAST 25volt has been unfurled.' The cry has been raisedto reclaim the land in which Mohammed preachedhis new religion in the early part of the seventhcentury of our era for the people to which Moham-med belonged. Are we to witness perhaps a re-vival of the spirit which once created mighty forcesto spread the Koran with the help of the swordthroughout the world? Up to the present, to besure, the " revolt " in Arabia hardly merits so digni-fied a name. The accounts of it sound more like ascore of opera bouffe than a serious performance,but the anomaly presented for many centuries of areligion so essentially a product of the Semitic mindand an expression more particularly of the Arabicspirit as Islam controlled by a power of non-Arabicorigin cannot endure for all times. To have theSheikh el-Islam, the " chief of the church," at Con-stantinople, merely because Constantinople becamethe centre of a Turkish Empire four centuries ago,and a purely nominal head at that under the sur-veillance of a Young Turk cabinet, suspected of infi-delity and acting at the dictation of German officials,is indeed ludicrous. But England in encouragingthe demand of Arabia for the Arabsfor she is be-hind this revoltmay be stirring up a spirit whichit will be hard for her to control, for the spirit ofIslam is still the spirit of fanaticism that sees onlythe doings of Iblis in a world that does not acknowl-edge Mohammed as the apostle of Allah. " Die ichrief, die Geister, werd' ich nun nicht los," saysGoethe. The Near East is still largely the Moham-

"See Snouck Hurgronje's vivid account "The Revoltin Arabia," with a foreword by Richard J. H. Gottheil (NewYork, 1917)-


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26 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD EAHiWAYmedan East, capable of acting in accord if a greatleader should arise, who will succeed in uniting thefollowers of Orthodox Sunna (" tradition ") withthe Shiites * for a great common cause. Islam doesnot spell Progress. If reinforced, it may lead to arevival of a Near East that will once more be theantagonist of western culture, rather than a minorpartner. The revival of the East is thus fraughtwith various possibilities that may take a turn forgood or evil according to the throw of the diceon the table of fate. Or shall we accept the morecomforting western belief that we can control thedice, and by wise counsels direct the course of eventsinto the right channels ? Which shall it be, the optimis-tic creed of the West, "Life and death, the blessingand the curse, have I placed before thee, choosethou life" (Deuteronomy 30, 19), or the fatal-ism of the disillusioned East, which declares that" Allah is the only knowing one " ?

IIThe key to the situation, however, lies not in

Egypt nor in Arabia, neither in Palestine nor inMesopotamia, but in the region of Asia Minoralong the great highway leading from Constantinopleto Bagdad. That region has from the most ancienttimes determined the fate of the Near East. Itsrole in the distant past has ever been to threatenthe existence of civilizations and powers that arose

'Islam, apart from numerous sects, is divided into twogreat divisions formed by those who follow the " sunna " orOrthodox tradition, as against those who set up the claim thatAll was the direct successor of Mohammed. The latter areknown as "Shiites" ("partisans").


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THE WAR IN THE EAST 27in the valley of the Nile and in the valley of theEuphrates, as in the intervening lands of Palestineand Arabia. Egypt, Babylonia and Assyria ex-hausted their vitality in warding off the menaceof the hordes that held the region. Hebrew Prophetsannounced the doom of the world through the com-ing of nations from the northmeaning Asia Minor.Cyrus and Alexander began their conquests of theold-time world by first securing a grasp on AsiaMinor. With that in their hands. Babylonia, Pales-tine and Egypt fell easily into their lap. TheRomans kept their grasp on the East as long asthey held the routes through the mountain ridgesof central Asia Minor. Islam failed in its worldconquest because it could not hold this wild regionin check, and the union of the Arabs broke up intorival caliphates. Decisive battles of the Crusadestook place along these historic routes. A kingdomof Jerusalem was destined to failure from the startbecause it lay exposed to attacks from the North.The Turkish Empire was founded with the con-quest of Constantinople in 1453, because throughthat event the control of the highway leading tothe Persian Gulf was established. As long as thatempire was able to maintain the two poles of theelectric wire stretching from Constantinople toBagdad, her dominant position remained unchal-lenged; her definite decline begins with a breakin the current.The conquest of that highway by Ottoman Turksmeant the final triumph of Crescent over Cross, forit erected a barrier, shutting off Christian Europefrom access to the entire East. A new route toIndia had to be found, and so in 1492 Columbus, sail-


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28 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYing from Spain with this end in view, discovereda new continent.In our own days we are witnessing what prom-ised to be the reopening of the old historic highwaythe bridge uniting Europe to Asiato Westerncontrol, through the project of a great railwaystretching along a distance of nearly 2000 miles froma point opposite Constantinople to Bagdad, andthence to Basra and to the Persian Gulf. That proj-ect, which was well under way at the time of theoutbreak of the war, is thus marked through its his-torical background as one of the most momentousenterprises of our age^more momentous because ofthe issue involved than the opening up of the twoother world highways, the Suez and Panama canals.The creation of a railway from Constantinopleto Bagdad under European control is at once asymptom of the dissolution of the Turkish Empirewhich has become a mere shadow of its former wideextension, and a significant token of the new in-vasion of the East by the spirit of Western enter-prise. Passing along a highway over which armieshave marched forward and backward ever sincethe days of antiquity, the railway is also a linkconnecting the present with the remote past.More than this a project, which, on the surface,would appear to be solely commercial, assumes aromantic aspect through the struggle that the rail-way aroused for the control of a region that markedthe ambition of all the great empires of ancientand mediaeval times. The rivalry between Ger-many, England, France and Russia, centering solargely during the past decade afound the BagdadRailway, is merely the renewal under changed


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THE WAR IN THE EAST 29conditions of a conflict that began thousands ofyears ago. The modern world fights for this regionas the ancient world did, with the railroad as thenew symbol of a possession stronger and firmer thanthe garrisons and outposts of antiquity and the for-tresses of the Roman and mediaeval periods. Theimportance of Constantinople lies in its positionas the starting-point of the great highway that hasas its natural outlets the Bay of Alexandretta onthe one hand, and the Persian Gulf on the other.The historical role of this highway gives to theBagdad Railway a political import far transcendingits aspect as one of the great commercial enterprisesof our days. Backed as the project was by theGerman government, steadily growing in power andaggressiveness since the establishment of the unitedGerman Empire, it added to the already complicatedEastern Question an aggravating factor that con-tributed largely to the outbreak of the great war.The present struggle for supremacy among Euro-pean powers resolves itself in its ultimate analysisinto a rivalry for the control of the East as anadjunct to commercial expansion. The " trendtowards the East " ^ did not originate with modernGermany. It began with Greece, wa^ taken up byancient Rome and has actuated evftfy Westernpower with ambitions to extend its commerce andits sphere of influenceSpain, Holland, England andFrance, and in days nearer to us Russia and Ger-many, Austria and Italy. Through a curious com-bination of circumstances, superinduced by the grad-ual weakening of the once dominant Turkish Em- " Drang nach Osten "a favorite phrase among Germanpolitical and economic publicists.


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30 THE WAE AND THE BAGDAD EAILWATpire, the struggle has shaped itself into its presentaspect for a control of the great highway that isthe key to the Eastthe ne-rer and the farther East.A survey of the history of Asia Minor, as aresultant of the geographical contour of the region,furnishes the illustration to the thesis that the mostrecent events are merely the repetition on a largerscale of such as took place thousands of years ago,and at frequent intervals since. The weapons havechanged, new contestants have arisen to take theplace of civilizations that after serving their dayfaded out of sight, but the issue has ever remainedthe same. We are confronted by that issue to-daythe control of the highway that leads to the East.Through the war archaeological investigations and his-torical researches have been removed from theiracademic isolation to furnish the explanation for thepolitical import of the Bagdad Railw|ay project.The study of the remote past, so energetically pur-sued by European and American scholars duringthe past decades, is brought into the foregroundthrough the stirring events of our days to illuminethe bearings of the historic highway of Asia Minoron the issues at stake in the present world conflict.The decisive battlefields for the triumph of democ-racy are in the West, but the decision for supremacyamong European nations lies in the East. TheBagdad Railway is the most recent act in a dramathe beginnings of which lie in the remote past.To understand the Bagdad Railway project,therefore, we must turn to the role that Asia Minorhas played in history. That history reveals to uswhy Asia Minor was ever, in the past, as she is to-day, the determining element in bringing about thealternate rise and decline of the East.


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CHAPTER IITHE STORY OF ASIA MINOR

Asia Minor is the Hinterland to Syria, Palestineand Egypt on the one side, and to Mesopotamia on theother. With an area of about 206,378 square miles *(a little larger than France and a little smaller thanGermany) its distinctive features are (i) a seriesof high plateaus in the interior, sloping from 2000feet at the western edge to over 4000 feet towardsthe eastern border, with (2) several mountain rangestraversing the region longitudinally, rising in the northto over 8000 feet and in the south to over 10,000 feet,(3) a deeply indented western coast line with a fringeof protecting islands and with deep gulfs affordingplenty of harbors. In contrast, the bleak north coaston the Black Sea has few harbors and no islands,while the southern coast is marked by a broad bayand a deep gulf and a number of land-locked har-bors. The rivers, though numerous, are of no greatimportance, and only a few are navigable for a shortdistance from their mouths. On the plateaus,broken by broad valleys in the west, the winters arelong and cold, and the summers hot. The coastclimate varies from cold winters and humid sum-mer vegetation on the Black Sea to a moderate eli-

cits greatest length is 720 miles along the northern edgeand at the south edge 650 miles. The breadth varies from 300to 420 miles.

31


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32 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYmate on the west coast, the summer heat beingtempered by an almost daily north wind blowingoff the sea, and reaching to extreme summer heatand mild winters on the south coast. Along thecourse of the rivers, vegetation is rich, aided byalluvial deposits to the soil, brought down by thestreams as they pass through mountain gorges. Themineral wealth of Asia Minor is very great, and itwould appear that iron was introduced as early asthe second millenium before our era into the ancientEast, through the working of the ore in the north-eastern corner of Asia Minor.

The contrast presented by the coast land to thatof the interior is paralleled by the totally differentaspect of the earliest settlements along the Mgea.nSea from the conditions that led to the rise ofpowerful states in the interior. The western coastof Asia Minor appears to have been settled in veryearly days through .^Egean traders coming probablyfrom Crete where, as the remarkable excavations ofthe last two decades have shown, a high degree ofcivilization, more commonly spoken of as Minoan,was developed between c. 3000 and 2500 b.c. Itreached its height about 1600 B.C., but long ere this sentits offshoots to the Grecian mainland, notably toArgos. The great castles and palaces of Mycenaeand Tiryns, excavated by Schlieman, are the worksof these .^geans coming from Crete, and there aretraces of such settlements and influences elsewhere.The proto-Greek civilization, commonly spoken ofas Mycenean, thus turns out to be of Cretan origin.Similarly, these ^geans came to the coast of AsiaMinor, and in time a powerful kingdom with Troy


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THE STORY OF ASIA MINOR 33as a centre was established in the northwesterncorner, reaching its height between c. 1500 and 1200B.C.* The Homeric poems, commemorating the con-flicts between ^geans and Greeks, are thus broughtnearer to us by the spade of the archselogist. These-^geans belonged to the Indo-European stock, and,in passing, it may be noted that the Philistines whoas traders settled on the Palestinian coast (and gavetheir name to the country) also came from Crete,and represent, therefore, a part of a general move-ment of the spread of ^gean civilization, thoughconfined to coast lands. Whether the earliest set-tlers of the interior of Asia Minor belonged to thissame general stock, designated by the unsatisfactoryterm " Aryan," is not certain, though possible, butin any case these settlers appear to have come fromthe steppes of southern Russia across the CaucasusMountains. From this centre streams of migrationradiated in various directions, some passing to thesoutheast and eventually reaching India where theydeveloped the old Hindu civilization; others passedaround the Black Sea on the north and moved alongthe Danube into central Europe, and still othersentered Asia Minor somewhere near its northeasternborder. Traces of very ancient routes along thissouthern coast of the Black Sea and running into theinterior^ show how early the settlement of the in-terior of Asia Minor must have begun.

' The so-called sixth city of Schliernan's excavations. SeeWalter Leaf, Troy, pp. 85-101 and the map.

See Ramsay's invaluable work, "The Historical Geog-raphy of Asia Minor" (London, 1890), chapters I-VII, fora full discussion of these old routes.

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34 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYII

A region like the interior of Asia Minor broken upby mountain ranges, with no large river as anavenue of transportation, is not conducive to thecreation of a single state, uniting groups of popula-tion through common interests. Rivalry rather thanpermanent union would represent the natural tend-ency among the combinations that would be formedby the hordes moving from time immemorial acrossthe Caucasus and from lands lying beyond to thenorth and northeast. An indigenous civilizationarising under such conditions would be marked bya hardiness reflecting the traits of the region. Thebreak-up of the population through natural barriersseparating the various groups would tend to theunfolding of strength, in order to secure protectionfrom attack and to safeguard an independent exist-ence. Such peoples will build huge fortified castlesand will create strong armies, actuated by the nat-ural ambition to put their strength to a test. AsiaMinor is thus adapted to develop powers markedby militarism.

Excavation and exploration in the interior ofAsia Minor during the last thirty years have, as amatter of fact, revealed the existence of powerfulmilitary states organized by groups known as Hit-tites, and whose history reverts to the border of thethird millennium before this era. Until archasology hadthus opened up the early history of Asia Minor,nothing was known of these Hittites beyond whatcould be gleaned from incidental notices in the OldTestament, where they appear chiefly as one of thegroups like the Amorites, Perizzites and Canaanites


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THE STOBY OF ASIA MINOR 35with whom the Hebrews were forbidden to marry.Then, as Eg3rptian and Babylonian monuments re-leased their secrets, references to the Khatti, whomscholars at first hesitatingly identified with theHittites of the Old Testament, began to multiply inthe records of Egyptian and Assyrian rulers. Grad-ually, it became evident that these Hittites must havebeen the most serious menace that the two greatcivilizations of the Near East had to encounter.Hittites loomed up larger and larger, as the writtenand pictorial material increased, but the full forceof their position and achievements was not recog-nized until, through more thorough exploration,Hittite monuments and Hittite remains turned upin various parts of Asia Minor, dating back to thesecond millennium before this era.The character of these monuments and remainsscattered throughout Asia Minor and northern Syriais so marked that there can be no doubt of theirbelonging to the same civilization. Rock sculptures,stone reliefs and inscribed stones extend east to westfrom Sipylos, not far from Smyrna, to Malatia on theEuphrates, and north to south from Boghaz-Keui to Hama on the Orontes, all showing thesame characteristics. Great fortresses and palacesof elaborate construction have been found at Boghaz-Keui and Eyuk in northern Asia Minor and in Sakje-Geuzi and Sendjerli in the southeast beyond theTaurus range. These sites represent some of thewalled towns of the Hittites, of which there weremany, scattered throughout the region at strategicalpoints near the mountain passes and elsewhere alongthe main routes. The scale of the constructions andof the rock sculptures illustrate the power developed


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36 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYby the Hittites in the hey-day of their glory, whichextends from c. 1500 to 1000 B.C. The entrance tothe fort was through enormous gates flanked by lionsor sphinxes. The city walls and the defences wereconstructed of large stones built in the most solidmasonry. At Eyuk, some 20 miles to the northof Boghaz-Keui, on either side of the gateway, thereis a long series of huge blocks on which scenes of areligious character, processions of priests and musi-cians, paying homage to a god and goddess, weresculptured in relief. Elsewhere the rocks portray vividscenes of stag and lion hunts which were favorite sportsof the Hittite rulers.

Finally, there are a large number of inscriptionsin the peculiar Hittite hieroglyphic characters,accompanying the sculptures, and the many in-scribed stones containing the explanation of thescenes or embodying votive dedications. By the sideof these inscribed lapidary monuments, excavationsat Boghaz-Keui conducted by the late Hugo Winck-ler in 1906-1907 have brought to light, to cap thesurprise of scholars, thousands of clay tablets, likethose found in Babylonian and Assyrian mounds,covered with cuneiform characters, but representingnot the Sumerian (non-Semitic) or Akkadian (Semi-tic) language of the Euphrates Valley, but Hittitethe same language as that of the hieroglyphic inscrip-tions, transliterated into cuneiform.* This proof ofthe adoption of the cuneiform script for writingHittite, because more convenient and simpler forcorrespondence and business documentsand that

* A parallel would be to come across Egyptian inscriptionswritten not with any of the varieties of the Egyptian script,but with Greek letters.


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HITTITE ROCK SCULPTURE AT IVRIZ (C. 1000 B.C.)

RUINS OF THE ENTRANCE TO A HITTITE FORTRESS ATBOGHAZKEUI (C. I5OO B.C.)


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THE STOEY OF ASIA MINOR 37as early at least as 1500 b.cis one of the mostnotable results of archaeological activity in AsiaMinor. It points to the intercourse that must haveexisted between Asia Minor and the Euphrates Val-ley in the second millenium before this era.Although the Hittite hieroglyphics have not as yetbeen deciphered, the character of the language spokenby the Hittites has been established. It turns outto belong to the " Aryan " or more properly theIndo-European stocka somewhat surprising dis-covery, and yet in keeping with the most plausiblehypothesis of the origin of the Hittites from thesteppes of southern Russia as the starting-point ofsuccessive waves of Aryan migration in variousdirections.

Looking, however, at the types of Hittite aspictured on their sculptures, one cannot escape thecomparison with Mongoloid types, and this impres-sian is confirmed by the representation of Hittiteson Egyptian monuments which give us distinctly thehigh cheek-bones and retreating forehead, character-istic of the Tartar races. To these features is tobe added the pig-tail,^ depicted on Egyptian monu-ments and so consistently portrayed on Hittitesculptures. By the side of this type, however, wefind also on the Egyptian monuments, portrayingscenes and expeditions in Asia Minor, another whichis more Indo-European in character, and we en-counter this type also in some of the figures in thereligious processions and in the ceremonial designson tombstones throughout the Hittite region. Suchindications point again to the supposition which, on

" The pig-tail is, however, not confined to the Tartars andChinese.


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38 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYa priori grounds, is plausible that what we call theHittite civilization is the result of a comminglingof different ethnic groups. Culture seems to be thespark that ensues when two different elements meetand combine, though in time one of the elementspredominates.

IllIt will be evident from this survey that the term

Hittite is to be regarded as a very general one tomark a type of civilization in which the Hittite be-came the predominating element, but in which, as aproduct of the mixture of Hittites with other ethnicelements, others than Hittites participate. It isnatural, therefore, to find various centres of Hittiteculture. We find several Hittite states of consider-able power in northern Syria, while further north,Boghaz-Keui became the capital of a Hittite state,which in the middle of the fifteenth century b.c.acquired a commanding position over a large part ofAsia Minor, including northern Syria.Now the historical significance of these Hittitestates lies entirely in their geographical position,which made them a menace to Egypt on the onehand and to Babylonia on the other, while Palestineas the unfortunate buffer state between these twocivilizations was even more at the mercy of the war-like Hittites. The early history of Asia Minor islinked to the fortunes of these three lands. The keyto the understanding of the political development ofthe ancient East, accompanying the rise of a highorder of civilization in the two fertile valleys^theNile and the Euphrateslies in an appreciation ofthe fact that Egypt and Babylonia could only main-tain themselves by successfully holding in check the


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THE STORY OF ASIA MINOR 39rugged mountaineers of Asia Minor. Attracted bythe allurements of a far higher culture than theirown, the Hittites would be tempted, as their strengthincreased to break through their natural barriers andto seek the plains of Mesopotamia and the lowlandsof Egypt, with Palestine as a natural passagewaytoo insignificant ever to unfold any considerablepower of her own. Once the mountain passes of theAnti-Taurus and Amanua ranges were crossed, therewas nothing to prevent the rugged mountaineerforces from marching along to the Mediterraneancoast, to Palestine and Egypt, or eastwards to theEuphratesthe avenue to both Babylonia in thesouth and to Assyria towards the north. Assyriacould also be reached by direct routes from easternAsia Minor, following river courses and throughmountain passes to Diarbekr and thence along theTigris. That this was the actual part played bythe Hittite groups from very early days down totheir final dissolution at the close of the eighthcentury before this era, when new forces made theirappearance in Asia Minor, is shown by Egyptian andBabylonian and Assyrian records stretching frombefore 2000 B.C. to the fall of Assyria herself in 606 B.C.

It is surprising to find that as early as 1900 B.C.Hittites actually invaded the Euphrates Valley.We have the official record of a Hittite occupyingat this time the throne of Babylon. The Hittite occupa-tion did not last long, but the fact of its having beenaccomplished for a short period shows the power whichthese doughty warriors must have acquired by thebeginning of the second millenium. The dangerof an attack from the region to the north and north-west of the Euphrates Valley must havj been real-


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40 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYized by the Babylonian rulers, for we find themestablishing an outpost against the Hittites as earlyas 2400 B.C. beyond the Anti-Taurus range in what isnow known as Cappadocia. On this supposition wecan account for the discovery of numerous cuneiformtablets near Csesarea. The contents of these tabletsare of a business nature. They deal with commer-cial transactions, and the language is a kind ofpatois, Babylonian mixed with foreign words thatwill probably turn out to be Hittite. Since theyare dated after the fashion of Babylonian documents,we are in a position to determine their age as rangingfrom about 2400 to 2000 B.C. The proof which theyfurnish of active business transactions between theEuphrates Valley and Asia Minor is of the greatestvalue in illustration of trade routes that must havebeen established through the heart of Asia Minorat this early period. Trade and war are close bed-fellows in antiquity, as they are in modern days.Trade in this instance must have been incidental tothe garrison established by Babylonian rulers at astrategic point far north, to ward off an advanceof Hittites across the mountain passes of the Anti-Taurus and the Amanus ranges in the direction ofthe Euphrates Valleyprecisely the menace thatoverwhelmed the Euphrates Valley some centurieslater. The Euphrates Valley could not be held with-out the Hinterland, which in itself is the continuationof the " Fertile Crescent " that starts at the PersianGulf and stretches in a semi-circle around a desertregion to the Mediterranean. We accordingly finda great conqueror like Sargon I (c. 2700 B.C.), underwhom the Akkadians (or Semites) gain their first defi-nite triumph over the Sumerians, leading his armies


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AN ANCIENT HITTITE AND HISMODERN ARMENIAN DESCENDANT

MONOLITH OF A HITTITE RULER WITH INSCRIPTION(METROPOLITAN MUSEUM)


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THE STORY OP ASIA MINOR 41northward and obtaining a firm hold to the shores ofthe Mediterranean. Sargon's predecessors were satis-fied with being kings of Sumer and Akkad/ com-prising the Euphrates Valley, but he and his suc-cessors aspire to the grandiloquent title of " Kingof the Four Regions." It was, however, militarynecessity rather than an original greed of conquestthat led these early rulers to become conquerors andto convert their empire into a military power.Under such conditions, the destiny of Babylonialay inevitably in the direction of becoming a strongmilitary state, with its chief aim to secure control ofas large a territory as possible to the north andnorthwest, so as to maintain itself against encroach-ments of Hittite groups from these directions. WhenBabylonia waxed strong, the Hittites were kept insuppression, when it grew weaker, we find the Hit-tites acquiring greater strength. A period of declineset in in the Euphrates Valley at the end of the eigh-teenth century, when the control passes for five cen-turies into the hands of a people known as theCassites and whose origin is still doubtful.The weakness of Babylonia furnishes the favor-able opportunity for the unfolding of greater strengthin Assyria to the north. The admixture of Hittiteelements in the population of Assyria stamped As-syria as more naturally warlike from the start thanBabylonia, but her rulers likewise had to fortifythemselves against invasions from Asia Minor alongroutes that led along the eastern extremity of thatregion, identical in part with the march of the Rus-

" Sumer is the designation of the southern part of theValley, Akkad, to which the Semitic settlers were drivenback by the Sumerians, the designation of the northern part.


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42 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYsian army in the present war from Trebizond toErzerum southwards in the direction of Mosulopposite which lay Nineveh, the later capital ofAssyria, and a little to the south Ashur, the oldercapital. Assyria was unable, however, to preventthe rise of a powerful Hittite kingdom in northernAsia Minor with its centre at Boghaz-Keui, c. 1500B.C., and which succeeded in obtaining a dominantposition over Hittite centres and settlements through-out eastern and central Asia Minor and beyond theAnti-Taurus range in northern Syria, close to theborders of Mesopotamia.

IVTurning to Egypt, we find this region during the

first period of her most ancient history, the so-calledPyramid Age, extending from about 3000 to 2500B.C., marked by high achievements in art, notably thebuilding of the great pyramids on the outskirts of thecapital, Memphis. Egypt like Babylonia was a culturalpower, and as such advanced through peaceable prog-ress rather than by the force of arms. Civilizationsthat arise in valleys and in islands do not developmilitary strength, except for purposes of defence;they are essentially pacific. The centre of the Egyp-tian kingdom was in the north. There were, to besure, encounters with the south, as a natural resultof the extension of Egyptian culture, but there wereno attempts at conquest beyond the natural borders.It was not till the close of the Feudal Age (c. 2500 to1800 B.C.), that we find standing armies organized,though on a moderate scale, with the help of whichNubia was conquered and Palestine, as the coastlandimmediately adjoining Egypt and a natural bulwark,


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THE STORY OF ASIA MINOR 43brought under the control of the Pharaohs. Anentirely different aspect is assumed by Egyptian his-tory with a new line of rulers, marked by extraordi-nary energy, who come upon the scene about 1600B.C. A new capital is established at Thebes, about400 miles to the south of Memphis. The change issignificant as indicative of the larger extent of theempire, which brought with it a transfer of the seatof government nearer to the centre of the dominion.No doubt a contributing factor also in the changewas the need of a powerful bulwark closer to thesouthern frontier, which at all times needed to beprotected against attacks from the population incentral Africa. What led to the decline of thePharaohs of the Feudal Age, so named because ofthe position which the nobles, owning large estatesunder royal agents, acquired, is still a mystery.The age was marked by progress in literature, lead-ing to collections of papyrus rolls that assumed thedimensions of libraries, as well as by an advancein ethical standards. Was it perhaps a long periodof intellectual development that softened the virilequalities of the Egyptians so that they fell an easyprey to foreigners who seized the throne?

These are the so-called Hyksos or " shepherdkings, a traditional designation whose identification isstill a matter of dispute among Egyptologists. The des-ignation points to an identification of these invaderswith the Semitic nomads from Arabia and Palestinewho at frequent intervals passed into Egypt,attracted by the higher civilization, just as the Eu-phrates Valley proved a magnet for Bedouin groupscoming into Babylonia by way of the Euphrates.The movement of some of the Hebrew groups into


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44 THE WAE AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYEgypt as depicted by the traditional narratives ofGenesis furnishes an illustration of such an invasion,prompted in part also by economic conditions.Large settlements of these Semitic nomads weremade in the outlying districts of Egypt bordering onand near the Red Sea. It is, however, on the faceimprobable that such loosely organized bands, not par-ticularly warlike and occupying a grade of culture onlysome degrees removed from primitive conditions,should have been capable of taking hold of the gov-ernment of Egypt. Some stronger factor must beassumed that may have utilized these nomads in aserious attack on Egypt. Recalling that as early as1900 B.C. the Hittites invaded Babylonia, and thatBiblical tradition reports the presence of Hittites insouthern Palestine at this same early date, it is areasonable conjecture that the leaders of the in-vasion were the powerful Hittites, who in alliancewith the nomads wrested the throne of Egypt fromthe native rulers and occupied it for a time until theywere once more replaced by a native dynasty.'However this may be, we soon find the Pharaohsof the new empire turning their faces in the direc-tion of Asia, and under Thutmose III (c. 1500-1450B.C.) these efforts at bringing Palestine and theMediterranean coast and northern Syria well intothe interior of Asia Minor under subjection reachedtheir culmination. The motive, however, whichoriginally prompted this military policy, was notgreed of conquest but the necessity of maintainingthe Egyptian empire unimpaired in her strengththe same condition, therefore, that changed Baby-

' See Garstang, Land of the Hittites, p. 324, who agreesin associating the Hyksos with Hittite influences.


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THE STORY OF ASIA MINOR 45Ionia from a naturally pacific to a military power.The land of the Nile could not be held without keep-ing in check the constant menace of an invasionfrom the north. The coast cities along the Mediter-ranean and the interior of Palestine had to be con-verted into Egyptian garrisons under the control ofgovernors subject to the Pharaohs. Palestine andSyria thus became vassal states of Egypt, and thisstep was necessarily followed by an extension of mili-tary activities northward and eastward into the strong-holds of the Hittites. Success brought with it the en-largement of ambitions, and under Thutmose III Egyptdefinitely enters upon a career of military conquest.

It is not accidental that this new epoch of mili-tary activity in Egyptian history is coincident withthe period when the Hittites reached the height oftheir power under the kingdom which had its centrein Boghaz-Keui. The great strength developed bythe Hittites had to be counterbalanced by the put-ting forth of the strongest effort on the part ofEgypt. This was all the more important becauseBabylonia under the rule of the Cassites was unableto hold the Hittites in check, and Assyria in thenorth had not developed sufficient strength to do so.In the century following upon Thutmose HI, wefind Assyrian kings taking up the challenge andShalmaneser I succeeds (c. 1300 b.c.) in sweepingthe Hittites back from the Euphrates. In thisperiod we encounter also the first alliances betweenEgypt and Babylonia, reinforced by intermarriagesbetween the two courts, in order to present a unitedfront against the Hittite forces.The reign of Amenhotep IV, or Ikhnaton, famousin Egyptian history as a religious reformer, gave the


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46 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYHittites a breathing spell, for this remarkable rulerwas more interested in reforms of the cult, in theencouragement of the new art,* and in other internalproblems than in extending the sway of Egypt. Anew line of kings succeeded Ikhnaton that took upthe former military policy, and under Rameses IIthe crisis in the test of strength with the Hittitescame. The Hittite ruler Mursil and the EgyptianPharaoh locked arms at Kadesh on the Orontes(c. 1295 B.C.). The battle proved to be one of thedecisive events in ancient history. All portions ofAsia Minor were represented in the tremendous forcethat Mursil had gathered for the encounter. RamesesII, who gives us a detailed account of the battle,illustrated by numerous pictured representations,on the temple walls at Abu Simbel, at Abydos, atLuxor and Karnak, recounts how at first the battlewent favorably for the Hittites. The king confessesthat at one stage in the encounter he was in dangerof being captured. In the end, however, the Egyp-tians secured the advantage and, if we may trustthe Egyptian chronicler, the Hittites were driven offthe field. Had the fortune of battle gone againstthe Egyptians, a Hittite invasion of Egypt wouldhave been inevitable and the course of Egyptianhistory would have been radically changed. As itwas, the battle of Kadesh merely marked the zenithof Hittite power, and Egypt could hereafter breathemore freely. Her safety, however, was always de-pendent upon her holding as a minimum foreign pos-session southern Syria to act as a bulwark againstHittite advance. The Hittites under Mursil againundertook an offensive against Egypt, aided by

' See on this reformer the note on p. 156.


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THE STORY OF ASIA MINOR 47Amorites and other groups of Palestine. The tideof war flowed and ebbed until c. 1280 B.C., when anoifensive and defensive treaty between Hattusil, theHittite ruler of Boghaz-Keui, and Rameses II wasdrawn up, of which by a fortunate chance we now haveboth the Egyptian and the Hittite accounts. On thetemple walls of Karnak Rameses records the fact of thereception of the Hittite treaty sent by Hattusil on asilver tablet. Some years later, c. 1266 B.C., to furthermark the friendship now existing between the twoempires, a Hittite princess was added to the haremof Rameses. She was escorted to Egypt by herroyal father, accompanied by a retinue worthy of soextraordinary an occasion. Thus Hittites andEgyptians actually met in the Valley of the Nile.One is reminded of the jealousies and suspicionsof modern powers when one reads on cuneiformdocuments of an inquiry directed by the king ofBabylonia to Hattusil as to the meaning of thisalliance between Egyptians and Hittites. Was thisancient " Entente Cordiale " aimed against the Baby-lonian Empire? Hattusil's answer is as diplomati-cally correct and non-committal as possible. " TheKing of Egypt and I have made an alliance and hav.ebecome brothers. Brothers we are and will beagainst any common enemy." The implication,however, is clear, and Hattusil made use of the situ-ation to exert pressure upon Babylonia. Thus thegame of diplomacy was played thousands ofyears ago.The power of Egypt declined with the end of thenineteenth dynasty at the turn of the thirteenth cen-tury. The succeeding dynasties were occupied withprotecting themselves against encroachments from


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48 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYthe south. Even their hold on Palestine and thePhoenician coast was relaxed so as to permit of theestablishment of an independent state by theHebrews in the interior, and by the Philistines andPhoenicians on the coast. We Jiear no more ofEgyptian encounters with Hittites to whom freerscope was thus given by the decline of the militarystrength of the Empire of the Nile.A steady stream of hordes passing into AsiaMinor brought new groups into the fields that estab-lished independent states in the mountain recessesand beyond in northern Syria. These come into con-flict more particularly with Assyria, whose rulersfrom the twelfth century on find themselves obligedto undertake expedition after expedition against onegroup or the other. Now it is a group known as theMuski who hold a dominant position over the south-ern portions of Asia Minor, now the Phrygian King-dom, founded probably by " JEgeans " who passedinto the interior during the period of Hittite declineand who dominated a large portion of the west-ern plateau, and some centuries later, newcomersacross the Caucasus, known as the Cimmerians, whooverran Asia Minor and put an end to Phrygianindependence, and against whom the Assyrian rulerswere obliged to lead their forces in order to maintaintheir own position. Tiglathpileser I (c. 1130-1100B.C.) of Assyria is one of the names that looms uplarge in this effort to keep the hordes and groupsof Asia Minor in check, but though successful inpart, his successors are unable to prevent the riseof a powerful Hittite state in northern Syria withCarchemish on the Euphrates as the centre, thatmaintains itself till 717 b.c. when it is finally over-


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THE STOEY OF ASIA MINOR 49come by Sargon II of Assyria. With this decisiveevent, the way was open to Assyria for the completecontrol of the lands around the Mediterranean.Palestine, the Phoenician coast, northern Arabia andEgypt fall into Assyria's hands. Ashurbanapal, the" Grande Monarque " of Assyria (668-626 b.c), underwhom the Assyrian Empire reaches its climax, receivesthe homage of the Lydians, who ha:d establishedan independent kingdom in Asia Minor after theoverthrow of the Hittites and the Phrygians. Theremoval of the Asia Minor menace was the con-dition needed to make Nineveh the mistress of theancient world. V

The earliest history of Asia Minor thus fore-shadows the role which the control of the highwayleading from Constantinople to Bagdad was destinedto play in subsequent ages down to our own days.Asia Minor as the Hinterland to Egypt and Meso-potamia forced these empires to become militarypowers in order to secure their position against attacksfrom the north to which they were exposed, thoughwhat was originally a matter of necessity becamethrough the allurements of conquest a growing ambi-tion. L'appetit vient en mangeant.The position of Babylon, as the capital of theunited Euphrates states, on the Euphrates, at a pointwhere it runs closest to the Tigris, was chosenbecause the Euphrates was the natural avenue alongwhich the hordes of Asia Minor after having passedthrough the Cilician gates and the Amanus rangewould swoop down upon the Mesopotamian plain.The continuity of the historical relationship of Meso-potamia to Asia Minor is well illustrated by the per-

4


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50 THE WAE AND THE BAGDAD RAILWATsistency of the site, constituting the natural centreof the Euphrates Valley. Seleucia (founded bySeleucus I in 312 B.C.), the capital in the days ofGreek occupancy, Ctesiphon in the later Parthianperiod (founded c. 129 b.c.) and Bagdad in Arabiantimes (founded about 763 a.d.) are all within seventymiles from Babylon. The only significant changebrought about by time and different circum-stances is the transfer of the capital of the regionfrom the banks of the Euphrates to that of theTigris.' This was due to the growth of commercewhich made for a position on the Tigris as the avenueof commerce ^^ from the Persian Gulf up to thenorthern confines of Assyria. Seleucia was selectedas the most favorable site on the Tigris, where thatriver runs closest to the Euphrates, so that the capitalmight serve the same purpose as ancient Babylondid in being at a strategic point to ward off an attackfrom Asia Minor, while the change from Seleucia toBagdadonly 15 miles apartappears to have beendue to a deviation in the course of the Euphrateswhich brought it nearest to the Tigris, at some re-move from Seleucia. The choice of Nineveh as thecapital of Assyria was similarly dictated by strategicconsiderations to offset the Asia Minor menace."

' Seleucia, 5 miles north of Babylon, lies on the westernbank of the Tigris, Ctesiphon directly opposite on the easternbank, and Bagdad, 15 miles further north, originally on thewestern bank, but now and for centuries chiefly on theeastern bank."The Euphrates is only navigable in parts, and as itapproaches the Persian Gulf loses itself in swamp and marshes."The older capital at Ashur (represented by the moundKaleh Shergat) is only some 40 miles further south.


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THE STORY OF ASIA MINOB 51It lay at the northern limit of navigation on theTigris, which forms the avenue of approach to Mesopo-tamia from the eastern end of Asia Minor along theroutes from Sinope and Trebizond that converge atDiarbekr, near the source of both the Tigris and Eu-phrates. For Assyria, lying to the north at the out-skirts of the Anti-Taurus range, the danger lay in adirect attack from the region of Diarbekr. We findthe Assyrian rulers establishing an outpost at or nearthis point, and placing monuments of themselves therewith records of their achievements, in order to inspireterror among their inveterate enemies in the strong-holds of northern and eastern Asia Minor. Thehistory of Babylonia and Assyria thus moves alongthe centuries under the shadow of this menace fromAsia Minor.

For Egypt, the possession of Palestine formedthe natural bulwark against the north. We haveseen that already towards the close of the FeudalAge, efforts were directed towards this end whichculminated in the fifteenth century B.C., in placingofiScials under Egyptian suzerainty in the importanttowns of Palestine, Gaza, Byblos, Sidon and Jerusa-lem. All these towns attain their rank because oftheir strategic location. In the reports which thesegovernors send to the Pharaohs of existing con-ditions, the Hittites are portrayed threatening theEgyptian control of Palestine and the coast. Thesetroublesome groups appear to have overrun Pales-tine, coming down from their mountain strongholdsacross the great highway of Asia Minor that led tothe plains of northern Syria through the passageof the.Cilician gates. They intermingle freely withthe native populationwith the Amorites in the


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52 THE WAR AND THE BAGDAD RAILWAYnorth, and with the Canaanitish settlers and thesemi-nomadic groups further south. The Hebrewtradition of Hittites as far south^ as Hebron " at thetime when the Hebrews first make their appearancein the land reflects this state of affairs. The sametradition represents Esau as marrying Hittitewomen.^* True to their warlike character, we findHittites forming a contingent in the Hebrew armiesof later days. Hebrew chroniclers take it as per-fectly natural that among David's followers thereshould be Hittites, like Ahimelech " and the unfor-tunate Uriah,^" whose wife Bathsheba arousesDavid's passion and on whom the king practisesa dastardly deception in order to secure posses-sion of the woman. Solomon, the offspring of themarriage, may thus himself have been half-Hittite.This close association between Hebrew and Hittites,as also with the Amorites, must have continued ona considerable scale so that centuries afterwards theprophet Ezekiel, rebuking the people for theirboasted superiority, could say of Jerusalem " theAmorite was thy father and the Hittite thy mother." ^Biblical writers find it necessary to issue a warningagainst intermarriages with H

the war and the baghdad rail way 1917

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