Podcasts about Thracians

My guest today on the Online for Authors podcast is Ellis Shuman, author of the book Rakiya - Stories of Bulgaria. Ellis is an American-born Israeli author, travel writer, and book reviewer. His writing has appeared in The Jerusalem Post, The Times of Israel, World Literature Today, and The Huffington Post. His short fiction has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, and has appeared in Isele Magazine, Vagabond, The Write Launch, Esoterica, Jewish Literary Journal, San Antonio Review, and other literary publications. He is the author of The Virtual Kibbutz, Valley of Thracians, The Burgas Affair, and Rakiya – Stories of Bulgaria.   In my book review, I stated Rakiya - Stories of Bulgaria is a collection of cultural short stories set in Bulgaria. In these short stories we follow such characters as pickpocketing Roma, a WWII veteran, refugees, authors, makers of rakiya, and hunters - all while learning about the rich history of the area.    As someone who knows little about the Bulgarian culture or the history, I was enchanted by the stories. I was also intrigued by the foods, drinks, mountains, and churches. By the time I was finished with the collection, I wondered if a trip to Bulgaria might be in order!   As an author, I was fascinated with how the author weaved these tales into a cohesive whole - and loved how a character from one story would inevitably end up in another. Despite being a series of short stories, it reads far more like a novel, with Bulgaria as the main character. It's a great read.   Subscribe to Online for Authors to learn about more great books! https://www.youtube.com/@onlineforauthors?sub_confirmation=1   Join the Novels N Latte Book Club community to discuss this and other books with like-minded readers: https://www.facebook.com/groups/3576519880426290   You can follow Author Ellis Shuman Website: https://ellisshuman.blogspot.com/ FB: @Ellis Shuman Author   Purchase Rakiya - Stories of Bulgaria on Amazon: Paperback: https://amzn.to/3RwLK1L Ebook: https://amzn.to/4ja3EU6   Teri M Brown, Author and Podcast Host: https://www.terimbrown.com FB: @TeriMBrownAuthor IG: @terimbrown_author X: @terimbrown1   Want to be a guest on Online for Authors? Send Teri M Brown a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/member/onlineforauthors   #ellisshuman #rakiyastoriesofbulgaria #shortstories #contemporaryfiction #terimbrownauthor #authorpodcast #onlineforauthors #characterdriven #researchjunkie #awardwinningauthor #podcasthost #podcast #readerpodcast #bookpodcast #writerpodcast #author #books #goodreads #bookclub #fiction #writer #bookreview *As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Join Sean Marlon Newcombe and Dawn "Sam" Alden as they talk about what (little) is known about the goddesses of this almost forgotten but once influential people - the Thracians.

A Time WarpBy FinalStand. Listen to the Podcast at Explicit Novels.What follows is a diversion from the central storyline, but it is crucial to understanding why certain members of the supporting cast are behaving the way they are.808 BCE near Halab in what is today's Northern Syria:For me, Cael Nyilas, it was a return to last night's horrifying scene that engulfed me. The screams of dying horses and moribund men crying the pantheon of life's final regrets. Blood, piss, voided bowels and the stench of comingled sweat and leather filled my nostrils. The true cacophony of battle was all about. The battle shock faded into an innocuous background distraction.In my heart of hearts, I felt at ease, even content. We were cut off and surrounded yet hardly hopeless. Men, my brothers-in-arms and the younger noble sons of Assur and Nineveh combined to put a press of shields, armor and flesh encircling us. Those 'pampered' aristocrats stank with fear and well they should. Death was still possible before their relief arrived.I hurt, Shara (my deity?), I was wounded, but it meant nothing. I laughed; a primitive version of 'atheists and foxholes' passing through my mind. This body had lived through much worse. The closest man, her deceased husband's cousin, and I lifted the shattered wooden chariot off the person our circle was centered on. My arm was extended to her.She was glorious, fierce and half-drunk with battle lust. I could feel her talon-like fingers through the leather and 'parzillu' scales guarding my bicep. She half jumped and was half pulled to her feet. Her kinsman presented her 'misplaced' sword, hilt first. In her eyes, I saw the burning intensity of the Shamash (Sun God, consort of Aya?) at the height of the Burning Season.Her martial mirth exceeded any other noise as it passed her lips."You took your time getting here," Shammuramat taunted me, not a true reproach. "I was so bored, I decide to take a nap in the shade of my conveniently overturned chariot." She defied all fortunes that conspired toward her demise; her own breed of madness."You looked so peaceful in your sleep, I didn't want to wake you," I bantered back. Her 'kinsman' scowled at my familiarity with his monarch. My champions, more like brothers to me than any kin born of my blood, had carved a gory swath to her stranded bodyguard. Mounted on Median steeds, we had pressed back the entourages of two Aramean kings bent on her violent passing.A barricade of overturned, or unattended chariots gave us space to dismount and perform our very visible rescue mission. All the pieces were right where she wanted them; everything unfolding according to her plan. Focus the enemy in the center with her person and the banner of Assur while the rest of her chariots and all of her cavalry swept through an unguarded wadi and fell upon them from behind.Brilliant. Somewhat less brilliant when faced with the desperate energy of our enemies, but her victory was already a certainty. The allied Western Kings were sure my command was attempting to snatch the Queen back to the safety of her infantry. Those hardy, foot-bound souls were still holding their own against the greater mass of the enemy footmen.The children of rebellious nobles bent every bit of their remaining energy, squandered their last reserves to ensure Shammuramat didn't escape. If the positons were reversed, they would have eagerly abandoned their troops and sought safety to the rear. The idea of Shammuramat being overwrought with terror was absurd.Our opponents' bellows for our blood turned into wails of despair. The charging, plumaged steeds of Assyria had appeared behind them. Our enemies had nothing left to slow the new arrivals down, much less stop them. For those who dared defy Shammuramat, Queen of all the Akkadians, the slaughter was just beginning."Come 'Alal' (that was me); I promised 'Atarshumki' I would kick his head over his own city walls before sunset and I always keep my promises," she shoved one of my horse-holders aside and took one of my steeds. 'Alal' was not the name my father gave me. It meant destroyer and it was blasphemy to lay claim to it."Killing kings will cost you extra," was my impious response.Assyrians nobility barely tolerated mercenaries most of the time. My men and I didn't care. I hadn't taken up the killing business to make friends and my troops felt the same way. What mattered to us was that their coin was good and delivered on time. That was a good thing because whores and merchants were loath to advance 'our kind' anything on credit."I'll meet you half way," she grinned manically at me while my fighters and I raced for our mounts. (Saving the junior nobility wasn't what she were paying us for.) "I'll let you take any prince you capture as a hostage." I nodded. My men cheered hungrily, despite the choking dust. As long as I didn't get too greedy, the Kings would pay for their sons. Now we had to capture the bastards."Tūbātu," I reminded them. 'Goodwill'. It was a polite way of saying 'stop your chariot, rest your arms and your mother won't have to come begging for your corpse'. It was best to let opposing nobility keep their dignity in our business. Today's enemy might be tomorrow's paymaster.I blinked and things changed.Planting followed harvest and harvest followed planting. It had long ago become a blur. Shammuramat had grown older. Her first son became king when he was of age. I had long exceeded my welcome and my desire to stay. I was fixed to this small patch of the greater world by a rare emotion, empathy.It had come out of nowhere. We were campaigning against the Scythians raiding over the Zagros Mountains and followed them into Urartu. Night had fallen and I walked the camp as was my habit; being killed a few times in your sleep will make you err on the side of caution. Shammuramat was gazing out over the river Arkas."I though all the scouts have returned," I asked as I stepped to her side. A cool, early autumn breeze blew down the valley, tossing a few loose locks of her greying hair. She always had one patch shorn short which made her left-side braids prone to unwind."They have. We head back for Nineveh with the dawn," she murmured, her mind elsewhere."Do you ever dream of home?" she asked me out of the blue."No. I don't dream anymore. I rarely sleep and if I did, I would hope to dream of something less boring," I snorted in amusement. She had never talked about her home, to anyone as far as I knew."You will be going to Lydia when winter comes," she stated tensely."King Gyges needs someone with experience beating Cimmerians," I answered. The true reason was that I was no longer welcome on the Assyrian payroll because I insisted on recruiting only non-Assyrians into the ranks of my ferociously effective little band of one hundred; never more and rarely less."Shemtsu is a fool," she grumbled."That is unfair," I countered. My willingness to argue with her was one of my charms in her eyes. "He is an excellent Treasurer and he makes sure your vassals pay their tribute on time and in its full amount."The silence was hurtful to me because Shammuramat was never one to obfuscate her thoughts, especially around me. It was one of her charms, to my way of thinking."Salmu Eretu, the northern night sky has no answers for what ails you. Get some sleep. Tomorrow is going to start out cold before it bakes us." I called her 'Black Cloud' in Akkadian.I had first used that name twenty years ago to insult her, highlighting her tempestuous nature. In the Assyrian court, having just received recognition for my quick thinking, Shammuramat had belittled my accomplishment, throwing my body between her, her unborn child (the man who was now not-so-gently ushering me to the border) and a Kassite noble and his retainer bent on killing them both.Had my deed not been witnessed by half a dozen reliable sources, I wouldn't even have received that tawdry token."He sought glory without risk," she spat out her insult in a Hittite tongue alien to this court. Unfortunately for us both, I had worked for a Babylonian family for a few generations and they had been kind enough to turn me from an illiterate commoner to a man of some education.Ironically, they even taught me my native cuneiform long after my birthplace was barely a memory."Well aren't you a black cloud on an otherwise waste of a day," I replied somewhat bitterly. Her eyes widened, then narrowed and then I heard her laugh for the first time."Should I tell them what you said?" she mocked me and my predicament."But of course," I grunted in Akkadian. I'd screwed up. My inner thoughts were 'please not decapitation, please not decapitation' because getting my head on straight after that was a real bitch."You've been nothing but a black cloud bent on turning the choking dust at my feet into a grasping, muddy morass. Why stop now?" I announced loudly. If you are going to die, die well. Having died too many times to count, remembering my last words were all I had left to look forward to.The guards, familiar with the Queen's temper and stunned into inaction by me clearly embracing a long, messy death, stood around uselessly. Had I been allowed a weapon in the royal presence, I might have thought which one to kill first."I gift you, a lowborn man of the South (Sumerian), with honors and you respond by insulting my wife?" King, Shamshi Adad V growled as he rose from his throne."Husband," she stood to join him. I thought it was a pity she rarely smiled. "You asked that I too give a gift to my savior and the savior of our son (all unborn babies were sons back then until roughly half had the audacity to gender switch while exiting the womb). I have chosen." I was expecting my life for the moment and a day's head start to the border."It is your choice to make," the King allowed."From this day, until my passing, this man may always speak his mind in our lands," she demanded. She had a habit of fatally correcting anyone who saw her as less than co-ruler. The hesitation was deafening."As you will," Shamshi Adad V acquiesced to yet another of his wife's odd 'requests'. From that day forth we had been fast friends. She never asked about my immortality, where I was from, or how I ended up with my elite band of professional killers. I returned the favor. It was an unspoken understanding that in a few years, or decades, she would die and I would leave, not necessarily in that order. We had shared more years than I had given to any one person in quite some time."There is nothing left for me but ash," she declared with morbid certainty."Should any of us expect any better?" I did my best to offer words of comfort she would accept."Oh no," her noise was too bitter to be a laugh. "I had my own 'Life beyond Death' and it was stolen from me, along with my birthright.""We are chasing the thieves?" I asked."Yes and no," her face grew grim once more. "These were not the ones I was looking for. They share some bonds with some of the Scythian tribes who live on the far side of the Sea of Death (the Black Sea). These raiders weren't from those tribes.""Why are you turning back?" I questioned. "You know your Assyrians are loyal. They will follow wherever you lead. Your son won't begrudge you these few hundred. I'll come too.""Why?" she turned and looked into my eyes. She still had that blazing fire in her eyes. She was teasing me. If she asked, I too would follow and my men would follow me."The Scythians have been raiding the Lands of the Two Rivers from, well, before I graduated from 'spear for hire' to a 'seeker of a mastery of war'. The rich plunder of their camps will provide plenty of incentive for my men plus we can sell the horses when we come back," I stated."I do not have the years left to spend on such a campaign," she sighed. I had never heard a hint of defeat in her speech before. It was unsettling and rather tragic."I have squandered my years in marriage, being Queen and raising my boys. I tried to make Assyria my new family and I am revealed to be a fool. You had it right. We will always be outlanders. No matter how brave, loyal, just and smart, we would never be allowed in their sanctimonious circle," she said. "You. I should have ridden off with you after my first born was acknowledged (the present King Adad-nirari the 3rd).""We could have gathered up some more fighters, ridden over shattered Phrygia, to the narrows (Bosporus) and into the lands of the Thracians. There is a legend of a great river that pours out from the western shore of the Death Sea. What I seek is up that river.""How many would we face?" I grew equally serious."One," she coughed. "Me." My confusion was obvious. "I am not asking you to fight me, Alal. I want you to come back for me.""I can't. That is not how it works," I stated."How does it work then?" she looked into my eyes. The fire was there, but banked and waning. I didn't say anything. "I have never seen, or heard of you entering a temple.""Your men go. You do not stop them, but you have given up any pretense of worship," she pressed. "Do you not believe that anything exists beyond your senses?""I believe," I sighed. "I believe people are fools for giving offering, pledging their fidelity, pleading for mercy, or extending thanks to any deity. Those Shar-an (gnats) do as they will, unless it is to punish us for treating them like the spoiled children they are."Shammuramat regained her long-stilled laughter."I have always felt a kinship with you through our mutual bitterness.""Bitterness comes with familiarity," I snorted in amusement. Lovers had passion. We shared a simmering anger that came from being irredeemably wronged."I was born Baraqu, the first son of a potter in some city that no longer matters. I was a failure as a potter and an embarrassment to my house and my clan," I began a story I hadn't told another soul in, I couldn't recall. "In those days, the Priest-Kings declared wars and demanded each clan of the city give forth a certain number of males to fight. My family volunteered me and two rowdy cousins.Outside the gates, my clan elder gave each of us a cowhide shield and a spear with a small spindle of copper at the tip so we wouldn't think it was a staff. We marched, I forget which city we were fighting that time. Three days later we found the enemy behind a deep irrigation ditch that had dried out for the season. Our orders were simple, 'There they are. Attack!'My elder was at the back of our mob, making sure none of us ran away. My older cousin made it across the ditch first, but was speared twice; once in the right kidney, I can still remember my first sight of blood, and once, piercing the shield and lodging in his ribcage. My second cousin and I were pushed from behind into the fighting. I stabbed at one shield, doing no harm.Then my surviving cousin's morale broke and he tried to claw his way back into our ranks. He was stabbed in the back, his dying body tangling with mine and bearing us both to the ground. I saw this howling mad face over me. He was a commoner, like me, driven to violence by the terror of battle. His shoddily crafted spear plunged first into my right lung. The second stab found my heart. I died.From there, my spirit fell down toward the wretched dank caverns where all pitiful lowborn dregs are doomed to end up without hope of parole. Instead of endless misery, the Goddess Sarrat Irkalli appeared before me, barring my descent. With icy claws, she trisected my soul. I cannot begin to describe that agony. She snatched up my tattered bits and dragged me back into the world.Sarrat Irkalli is Goddess of the Netherworld, whispered a word that penetrated my brain through the left ear of my cooling corpse. It was an utterance so catastrophic to the fabric of the Veil I dare not repeat it even now.Baraqu? she blew a dark wind upon the first bit of my essence and it flew away.Cael, she whispered to the second portion and off it went in another direction. You are Baraqu no more. The second name was meaningless to me at the time but my name. Do you know that if you have your true name, your spirit can not find its way to your reward, no matter how foul, or pleasing? To the third part of my soul. I name you Alal, he who stands witness to the end of all he desires; their destroyer. Powerful yet powerless.}With that, she left me. My body was stiff from being dead so long. The next few hours were extremely painful. The Sun had set and the Moon was not in evidence. Jackals barked and hyenas laughed as they fought and feasted on the dead. I pushed the body of my cousin off me then crawled down into the ditch to hide. Hardly the reaction of a hero.""Not the actions of the man I know," Shammuramat smirked. "So, your name is Baraqu.""Was and I never much liked the name," I countered. "The priests gave it to me because right before my naming ceremony, a bolt of lightning from a spring storm struck the temple of Shara. So they named me Baraqu, which means 'struck by lightning'.""That sound likes a good name," the Queen Dowager regarded me."That is the noble meaning. The common meaning is less eloquent, it means 'idiot'."Another deep laugh from my treasured compatriot. So few had ever mattered so much to me."Struck by lightning, stricken dumb," she guffawed. "Still not the 'you' I know.""What does the other name mean?""I have no idea. In all my travels I have never found a people familiar with it," I shrugged. She looked out over the low waves lapping against the stony shore."No explanation?" she grudgingly inquired. She had wanted me to continue."No. I have never again come face to face with Sarrat Irkalli, been visited by a messenger, divine, or demonic, received an omen, or any otherworldly presence of any kind," I shrugged. I was long past any resentment. "After the battle I made my way back home, we'd lost, and resumed my life for a few years. My father took the excuse of me 'letting' my kinsmen die to place my younger brother over me.I didn't care. I always hated being a potter, so I ended up being a piddling nuisance all the time and a drunken brawler whenever I had wrangled some beer. I was always the first choice of my clan to send into battle. Despite my lack of training, I began surviving more battles than I died in. At some point, the priests began getting suspicious that I was still hanging around my great-grandnephew's house, so my house Elder suggested I leave the city.I was given a nice copper-headed mace that I had taken in a recent skirmish. Tradition dictated I offer it to the Elder, so he could give it back to me as a sign of my value to the clan. He had taken it for his own. Now he was giving it back out of fear that it held some part of my taint. I had no idea how to live on my own. Two days out, I was robbed and murdered for the first, but not last, time. That inaugural event, I got really angry and hunted those two farmers down.I got my mace back. I also relieved them of an onager, three slaves and a few ingots of silver. I guessed they had been rather successful robbers until they met me."

They were ancient masters of cavalry, creators of dazzling treasures, and the ancestors of the legendary Spartacus, but who exactly were the Thracians?Join Tristan Hughes and Dr. Zosia Archibald in today's episode of The Ancients as they uncover the fascinating world of the Thracians, an extraordinary people that lived in the rugged mountains of eastern Europe. From their vital role in Greek mythology and Homer's epic poem The Iliad to archaeological wonders like the Panagyurishte Treasure and the bronze head of Seuthes III, they explore how this overlooked ancient culture shaped Eastern Europe from the Bronze Age to Roman times.Presented by Tristan Hughes. Audio editor is Aidan Lonergan, the producer is Joseph Knight. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff.The Ancients is a History Hit podcast.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. You can take part in our listener survey here:https://uk.surveymonkey.com/r/6FFT7MKTheme music from Motion Array, all other music from Epidemic Sound.

WHY BULGARIA?MEET THE AUTHOR Podcast: LIVE - Episode 177Originally aired Wednesday October 9,2024. Featuring Author ELLIS SHUMANABOUT ELLIS: Ellis Shuman is an American-born Israeli author, travel writer, and book reviewer. His writing has appeared in The Jerusalem Post, The Times of Israel, World Literature Today, and The Huffington Post. His short fiction has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, and has appeared in Isele Magazine, Vagabond, The Write Launch, Esoterica, Jewish Literary Journal, San Antonio Review, and other literary publications. He is the author of The Virtual Kibbutz, Valley of Thracians, The Burgas Affair, and Rakiya – Stories of Bulgaria.Links to watch or listen to all episodes at: https://indiebooksource.com/podcast

Deacon Harrison Garlick and Adam Minihan sit down to talk about Book 10 of the Iliad, Marauding Through the Night.In this episode we will discuss:What happens in Book 10?Hector calls for a spy.Diomedes goes on a rampageWhat else should be observed in book 10?Want our whole guide to The Iliad? Download it for free.53. What happens in book ten?Agamemnon cannot sleep (9.04). He is tormented by the thousand fires of the Trojans camped around his black ships (10.14), and he tears “his hair out by the roots” (10.18). He dresses for war and leaves his tent—only to run into his brother, Menelaus, who is also unsettled (10.30). Menelaus gives Agamemnon the idea of sending out spies against the Trojans (10.45). After waking the other Achaean warlords, Agamemnon holds a war council in which Nestor proposes someone should infiltrate the Trojans (10.241). Diomedes volunteers and selects Odysseus to go with him (10.284). Meanwhile, amongst the Trojans, Hector also calls for a spy, and the warrior Dolon, an ugly but fast fellow (10.369), agrees to go (10.366). In the black of night and out in the no man's land between the armies, Odysseus sees Dolan running, and Odysseus and Diomedes hide amongst the corpses as Dolan goes past at a “dead run” (10.409). The two Achaeans capture Dolon who, in turn, blurts out every detail he knows about the Trojan encampment (10.478, 493) under the assumption he will be taken captive (10.511). Diomedes then decapitates Dolon and his “shrieking head went tumbling in the dust” (10.327). Odysseus and Diomedes elect to attack an outpost described by Dolon, a group of Thracian warriors in league with Troy (10.501, 535). Athena blesses Diomedes (10.557), and he slaughters thirteen Thracians in their sleep—including their king (10.571). Apollo wakes a Thracian who sounds the alarm, and Odysseus and Diomedes ride the slain king's magnificent horses back to the Achaean camp (10.631). The book ends with Odysseus and Diomedes, now bathed and seated for a meal, pouring out a libation to Athena, the goddess who watches over them (10.670).54. What else should be observed in book ten?Agamemnon believes he and Menelaus should do the work of waking up the lesser warlords themselves (10.80); and, similarly, Diomedes notes that it is Nestor, not some younger solider, that has awakened him (10.195). One may interpret this to show the gravity of the situation and the ownership the higher Achaean warlords are exhibiting in this moment. Notice that Nestor unfairly critiques Menelaus for sleeping (10.134), and Agamemnon corrects Nestor but not without stating that Menelaus does tend toward inaction (10.139). Agamemnon's critique of his brother seems contrary to the pattern we have observed of Menelaus being quick to volunteer for some danger and Agamemnon drawing him back. Given the role of archers in the Iliad, it is notable that Homer reveals that Odysseus carries a bow (10.304). In book ten (and eleven), Homer will utilize a great deal of animal similes and imagery. One may note that many of the characters in book ten bear an animal hide, e.g., Agamemnon's lion hide (10.27), Menelaus' leopard hide (10.34), Diomedes' lion hide (10.209), and Dolon's wolf pelt and weasel cap (10.390). One is left to discern what lesson, if any, Homer intends here. Finally, book ten shows a certain comradery between Diomedes and Odysseus who are both cared for by Athena. One could assert that the two Achaean reflect the two general traits of Athena: her military tactics in Odysseus and her raw martial prowess in Diomedes. It should be noted, however, that Odysseus

https://www.patreon.com/GnosticInformant Please Consider joining my Patreon to help finding scholars to bring on. Any amount helps me. Thank you existing Patrons. 2nd Channel:    / @latenitegnosis   Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/NealSendlak1 Discord: https://discord.com/invite/uWBZkxd4UX SABAZIOS , a god of the Thracians and the Phrygians, is also known from Greek and Latin sources as Sabadios, Sauazios, Saazios, Sabos, Sebazios, Sabadius, and Sebadius. His name is related to the Macedonian word sauâdai, or saûdoi, meaning "satyrs" (Detschew, 1957, p. 427). According to some scholars (e.g., Lozovan, 1968), he was a Thracian mountain god whose cult was carried by Phrygian emigrants from Thrace to Anatolia. Greek sources from the fifth century bce onward mention Sabazios as a Thracian or Phrygian god. In Athens, his cult's initiation ceremonies took place by night, and the adepts were purified by being rubbed with mud. A sacramental drink was also involved. The identification of Sabazios with Dionysos, which occurs regularly in Hellenistic sources, is unquestionable. However, Phrygian inscriptions relate him to Zeus, and in North Africa, where his cult is attested as early as the fourth century bce, he might have had the features of a heavenly god; hence he was later identified with the Semitic god Baal, both of them receiving the Greek epithet hupsistos ("highest, supreme"). He was probably worshiped in Thrace under other local names, such as Athyparenos, Arsilenos, Batalde Ouenos, Eleneites, Mytorgenos, Ouerzel(enos), and Tasibastenus. Sabazios's name has been connected with the Indo-European *swo-, meaning "[his] own," and with the idea of freedom, which occurs frequently among the epithets of Dionysos. Franz Cumont has suggested a relationship with the Illyrian sabaia, or sabaium, identifying a beer extracted from cereals (see Russu, 1969, p. 241). More recently, Gheorghe Muşu has translated Sabazios as "sap god," from the Indo-European roots *sap- ("taste, perceive") and *sab- ("juice, fluid"). This translation corresponds well to the pattern of Dionysos/Sabazios, who was the divinity of humidity and as such was connected with both vegetation and intoxication (see Muşu, in Vulpe, 1980, pp. 333–336). The Jews of Syria and Anatolia identified Sabazios with Sabaoth. Under the Roman rulers Sabazios was worshiped in Thrace, where he was more often known as Sebazios or, in Latin, Sabazius, Sabadius, or Sebadius and where he received such epithets as epekoos ("benevolent"), kurios ("lord"), megistos ("greatest"), and so forth. In Crimea, probably under Jewish-Anatolian influence, he was called hupsistos. He was constantly identified with both Zeus and the sun. Motifs of hands making the votive gesture of benedictio Latina are among the distinctive features of his cult. According to several Christian writers (Clement of Alexandria, Arnobius, and Firmicus Maternus), the most impressive rite of initiation into the mysteries of Sabazios consisted of the adept's contact with a snake (aureus coluber ) that was first put over his breast (per sinum ducunt ) and then pulled down to his genitals. No less enigmatic than Zalmoxis, Sabazios was worshiped as early as the fourth century bce both as a chthonic and as a heavenly god. Scholars have too often tried to solve this riddle by supposing a borrowing from Jewish religion, but Jewish influence was not relevant in Anatolia before the third century bce. One should rather consider that chthonic features determined the character of the Thracian Sabazios, whereas the Phrygian Sabazios was probably connected with the sky. The ecstatic Eastern rites practiced largely by women in Athens were thrown together for rhetorical purposes by Demosthenes in undermining his opponent Aeschines for participating in his mother's cultic associations: #gnosticinformant #documentary #christianity --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/gnosticinformant/message

Age of Alexander Thracians are covered in this episode. Send your voicemail to: +49 6404 8030756

Back in the early 1990s comedienne Mandy Knight did a show at the Edinburgh Fringe called, “Some of my best friends are ginger”. I always thought it was an inspired title, exposing a double standard that still persists today, and it always stayed with me.Then, a few years back I presented a series for Italian TV about beauty, Senso Della Bellezza - Sense of Beauty - and we did a feature on red heads. I thought it would be a nice piece today to mine that feature and expand on it, explore the history of redheads, and thereby celebrate the unjustly mocked 1% of the global population that carry the MC1R gene.The Book of Genesis is perhaps the first book to have been written down and, in the book of Genesis we have the first celebrity redhead, and a victim of some treachery, Esau. Esau came home hungry one day after a long shift in the fields, and his brother Jacob offered him a bowl of soup, but only in exchange for something: his birthright, his first-born son status. Esau, who seems to have been a bit of short-term thinker, put his stomach first and he accepted. Thus did Jacob inherit, and so did Jacob - and not Esau - go on to become one of the Fathers of the Israelites. All things considered, it was probably better for the Israelites that he did.Esau was born red all over “like a hairy garment”, and one interpretation is that Esau had some recessive Neanderthal gene - the theory is that Neanderthals had red hair, although I do not suggest red heads are any more Neanderthal than the rest of us. The genetic mutation responsible is different to the one that which causes red hair in modern humans.Red hair occurs most commonly in people of Germanic or Celtic origin. Ireland has the most red  heads per capita at around 10%, but the highest density of red heads and thus the red head capital of the world is actually Edinburgh. No wonder Mandy's show did so well there.It's thought that the reason red heads are more commonly found in colder climates is that it is actually an advantage to be pale, where sunlight is sparse. The lighter skin of red heads improves the absorption of sunlight, which is vital for the production of vitamin D by the body. Red hair is also relatively common among Ashkenazi Jews. Many Jews in literature have been portrayed with red hair. Shylock in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice and Fagin in Dickens' Oliver Twist, being two of the most famous. Judas, the betrayer of Christ, is often portrayed as a redhead.During the Inquisition in Italy and Spain, where red hair is less common, those with red hair were identified as Jews, even if they weren't actually Jewish. Today the commission for Racial Equality do not monitor cases of discrimination and hate crimes against redheadsRedheads were first mentioned in literature by the Greek poet Xenophanes around 500BC describing the Thracians, who it seems were red headed and blue eyed. The Ancient Greeks seemed to be particularly admiring of red heads. In men red hair was associated with honour and courage, while in women red hair was associated with beauty. Homer says the heroes Menelaus and Achilles were both redheads, while Helen of Troy, the most beautiful woman that ever lived, was also a red head.Aphrodite, Goddess of beauty and love was also red headed. (During the Renaissance, Botticelli and, especially, Titian were always painting beautiful women with red hair to the extent that titian now means auburn).The hair of female statues in Ancient Greece was often painted red - the Greeks loved the colour red.Many slaves in ancient Greece and Rome were the northern territories. Red headed slaves would often fetch a higher price, as they were thought to bring good luck. Red wigs were given to actors depicting slaves in Greek and Roman theatre. Indeed one fringe theory to explain modern mocking of redheads is that it stems from the Roman subjugation and persecution of Celts after the Romans arrived in the British Isles.Aristotle was not as keen as other Ancient Greeks is supposed to have said that "Those with tawny coloured hair are brave; witness the lions. But the reddish are of bad character; witness the foxes."Romans seemed just as admiring of red heads as the Greeks, particularly among the fierce Gaulish tribes, who Titus Levy said, “stand first in reputation for war … with their tall bodies, long red hair, huge shields, very long swords, and songs and yells as they go into battle, they terrify their foes.”From the Gauls to the Vikings to the Celts there has always been this connection between martial strength and flame-colored hair. The English warrior queen Boudicca was a red head. Perhaps the greatest warrior of the lot, Ghenghis Khan, was “long-bearded, red-haired, and green-eyed.”Egyptian pharaohs were found to have hair with reddish pigments, among them ‘Rameses the Great', the most powerful of them all, and Cleopatra. Alexander the Great, Richard the Lionheart, the great Ottoman naval commander Hayreddin Barbarossa (Red Beard), Queen Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, Mary Magdalen - they were all depicted with red hair. Even the gods Bacchus and Hades were.Red-headed men have often been stereotyped as temperamental and quick to violence, while red headed women as loose, libidinal and wild. The Prose Edda is one of the oldest Norse documents. Odin the All-Father, ruler of the gods, is a wise and thoughtful ruler with blonde hair, but his quick-tempered son Thor, God of Thunder, though, is possessed of a full head of red hair and an enormous bushy red beard.In Gullivers Travels, Jonathan Swift said "It is observed that the red-haired of both sexes are more libidinous and mischievous than the rest, whom yet they much exceed in strength and activity."This might even be born out by science. A  German sex researcher found that women with red hair have sex more often, and an English study found that redhead girls have sex an average of three times a week, while blondes and brunettes only twice. As for the temper stereotype, a 2004 study found that redheads feel both pain and cold temperatures more vividly, and they get stung by bees more often. Maybe there's a reason for the anger.A 1486 Treatise on Redheads, Malleus Maleficarum, declared that those whose hair is red, of a certain peculiar shade, are unmistakably vampires. So now you know. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.theflyingfrisby.com/subscribe

Back in the early 1990s comedienne Mandy Knight did a show at the Edinburgh Fringe called, “Some of my best friends are ginger”. I always thought it was an inspired title, exposing a double standard that still persists today, and it always stayed with me.Then, a few years back I presented a series for Italian TV about beauty, Senso Della Bellezza - Sense of Beauty - and we did a feature on red heads. I thought it would be a nice piece today to mine that feature and expand on it, explore the history of redheads, and thereby celebrate the unjustly mocked 1% of the global population that carry the MC1R gene.The Book of Genesis is perhaps the first book to have been written down and, in the book of Genesis we have the first celebrity redhead, and a victim of some treachery, Esau. Esau came home hungry one day after a long shift in the fields, and his brother Jacob offered him a bowl of soup, but only in exchange for something: his birthright, his first-born son status. Esau, who seems to have been a bit of short-term thinker, put his stomach first and he accepted. Thus did Jacob inherit, and so did Jacob - and not Esau - go on to become one of the Fathers of the Israelites. All things considered, it was probably better for the Israelites that he did.Esau was born red all over “like a hairy garment”, and one interpretation is that Esau had some recessive Neanderthal gene - the theory is that Neanderthals had red hair, although I do not suggest red heads are any more Neanderthal than the rest of us. The genetic mutation responsible is different to the one that which causes red hair in modern humans.Red hair occurs most commonly in people of Germanic or Celtic origin. Ireland has the most red  heads per capita at around 10%, but the highest density of red heads and thus the red head capital of the world is actually Edinburgh. No wonder Mandy's show did so well there.It's thought that the reason red heads are more commonly found in colder climates is that it is actually an advantage to be pale, where sunlight is sparse. The lighter skin of red heads improves the absorption of sunlight, which is vital for the production of vitamin D by the body. Red hair is also relatively common among Ashkenazi Jews. Many Jews in literature have been portrayed with red hair. Shylock in Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice and Fagin in Dickens' Oliver Twist, being two of the most famous. Judas, the betrayer of Christ, is often portrayed as a redhead.During the Inquisition in Italy and Spain, where red hair is less common, those with red hair were identified as Jews, even if they weren't actually Jewish. Today the commission for Racial Equality do not monitor cases of discrimination and hate crimes against redheadsRedheads were first mentioned in literature by the Greek poet Xenophanes around 500BC describing the Thracians, who it seems were red headed and blue eyed. The Ancient Greeks seemed to be particularly admiring of red heads. In men red hair was associated with honour and courage, while in women red hair was associated with beauty. Homer says the heroes Menelaus and Achilles were both redheads, while Helen of Troy, the most beautiful woman that ever lived, was also a red head.Aphrodite, Goddess of beauty and love was also red headed. (During the Renaissance, Botticelli and, especially, Titian were always painting beautiful women with red hair to the extent that titian now means auburn).The hair of female statues in Ancient Greece was often painted red - the Greeks loved the colour red.Many slaves in ancient Greece and Rome were the northern territories. Red headed slaves would often fetch a higher price, as they were thought to bring good luck. Red wigs were given to actors depicting slaves in Greek and Roman theatre. Indeed one fringe theory to explain modern mocking of redheads is that it stems from the Roman subjugation and persecution of Celts after the Romans arrived in the British Isles.Aristotle was not as keen as other Ancient Greeks is supposed to have said that "Those with tawny coloured hair are brave; witness the lions. But the reddish are of bad character; witness the foxes."Romans seemed just as admiring of red heads as the Greeks, particularly among the fierce Gaulish tribes, who Titus Levy said, “stand first in reputation for war … with their tall bodies, long red hair, huge shields, very long swords, and songs and yells as they go into battle, they terrify their foes.”From the Gauls to the Vikings to the Celts there has always been this connection between martial strength and flame-colored hair. The English warrior queen Boudicca was a red head. Perhaps the greatest warrior of the lot, Ghenghis Khan, was “long-bearded, red-haired, and green-eyed.”Egyptian pharaohs were found to have hair with reddish pigments, among them ‘Rameses the Great', the most powerful of them all, and Cleopatra. Alexander the Great, Richard the Lionheart, the great Ottoman naval commander Hayreddin Barbarossa (Red Beard), Queen Elizabeth I, Mary Queen of Scots, Mary Magdalen - they were all depicted with red hair. Even the gods Bacchus and Hades were.Red-headed men have often been stereotyped as temperamental and quick to violence, while red headed women as loose, libidinal and wild. The Prose Edda is one of the oldest Norse documents. Odin the All-Father, ruler of the gods, is a wise and thoughtful ruler with blonde hair, but his quick-tempered son Thor, God of Thunder, though, is possessed of a full head of red hair and an enormous bushy red beard.In Gullivers Travels, Jonathan Swift said "It is observed that the red-haired of both sexes are more libidinous and mischievous than the rest, whom yet they much exceed in strength and activity."This might even be born out by science. A  German sex researcher found that women with red hair have sex more often, and an English study found that redhead girls have sex an average of three times a week, while blondes and brunettes only twice. As for the temper stereotype, a 2004 study found that redheads feel both pain and cold temperatures more vividly, and they get stung by bees more often. Maybe there's a reason for the anger.A 1486 Treatise on Redheads, Malleus Maleficarum, declared that those whose hair is red, of a certain peculiar shade, are unmistakably vampires. So now you know. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit frisby.substack.com/subscribe

Subscribe to Quotomania on Simplecast or search for Quotomania on your favorite podcast app!Archilochus, (flourished c. 650 BCE, Paros [Cyclades, Greece]), was a poet and soldier, the earliest Greek writer of iambic, elegiac, and personal lyric poetry whose works have survived to any considerable extent. The surviving fragments of his work show him to have been a metrical innovator of the highest ability.Archilochus's father was Telesicles, a wealthy Parian who founded a colony on the island of Thasos. Archilochus lived on both Paros and Thasos. Fragments of his poetry mention the solar eclipse of April 6, 648 BCE, and the wealth of the Lydian king Gyges (c. 680–645 BCE). The details of Archilochus's life, in the ancient biographical tradition, are derived for the most part from his poems—an unreliable source because the events he described may have been fictitious or may have involved imaginary personae or ritual situations.Modern discoveries, however, have supported the picture given in the poetry. Two inscriptions dedicated to Archilochus were discovered in a sacred area on Paros; they are named, after the men who dedicated them, the Mnesiepes inscription (3rd century BCE) and the Sosthenes inscription (1st century BCE). Archilochus's self-presentation was taken seriously as early as the late 5th century BCE by the Athenian politician and intellectual Critias, who denounced him for presenting himself as the impoverished, quarrelsome, foul-mouthed, lascivious son of a slave woman. Some scholars feel that the Archilochus portrayed in his poems is too scurrilous to be real.Archilochus probably served as a soldier. According to ancient tradition, he fought against Thracians on the mainland near Thasos and died when the Thasians were fighting against soldiers from the island of Naxos. In one famous poem, Archilochus tells, without embarrassment or regret, of throwing his shield away in battle. (“I saved my life. What do I care about my shield? The hell with it! I'll buy another just as good.”) The motif of the abandoned shield appears again in the lyric poems of Alcaeus and Anacreon, in a parody by Aristophanes (Peace), and in a learned variation by the Latin poet Horace (Carmina).Although the truth is difficult to discern with certainty from the poems and other evidence, Archilochus may have been disreputable. He was particularly famous in antiquity for his sharp satire and ferocious invective. It was said that a man named Lycambes betrothed his daughter Neobule to the poet and then later withdrew the plan. In a papyrus fragment published in 1974 (the “Cologne Epode”)—the longest surviving piece of Archilochus's poetry—a man, who is apparently the poet himself, tells in alternately explicit and hinting language how he seduced the sister of Neobule after having crudely rejected Neobule herself. According to the ancient accounts, Lycambes and his daughters committed suicide, shamed by the poet's fierce mocking.Archilochus was the first known Greek poet to employ the elegiac couplet and various iambic and trochaic metres, ranging from dimeter to tetrameter, as well as epodes, lyric metres, and asinarteta (a mixture of different metres). He was a master of the Greek language, moving from Homeric formulas to the language of daily life in a few lines. He was the first European author to make personal experiences and feelings the main subject of his poems: the controlled use of the personal voice in his verse marks a distinct departure from other surviving Greek verse, which is typically more formulaic and heroic. For his technical accomplishments Archilochus was much admired by later poets, such as Horace, but there was also severe criticism, especially of a moralistic character, by writers such as the poet Pindar (5th century BCE).From https://www.britannica.com/biography/Archilochus-Greek-author. For more information about Archilochus:“Archilochus”: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0480%3Avolume%3D2%3Atext%3D21“Archilochus: A poet and a mercenary?”: https://www.ancientworldmagazine.com/articles/archilochus-poet-mercenary/

Greek and Roman writers would highlight the Thracians as some of the best mercenaries fielded in foreign armies from the mid-5th century and beyond. They would excel at hit and run tactics, harassing heavier troops and being able to defend difficult ground. This reputation would appear to be born out of their tradition of Homeric style warfare practiced in their own lands. Though we get no detailed accounts of how they fought against one another in their home territories. Our knowledge of the Thracians in war during the 6th and early 5th centuries comes to us thanks to account revolving around the Greek and Persian wars found in the Histories written by Herodotus. This would see their history during this period told through the context of various Persian campaigns through their lands, therefore lacking the details of how they fought, though we can get an idea from their reputation as warriors in later histories.Thracian lands would become a crossroads for Persian campaigns during the close of the 6th and opening of the 5th centuries BC. Initially Persia would attempt to expand north into Scythian lands, where a path through Thracian lands would need to be secured. Though the hold in Thrace during this period would only stay intact as long as a sizable occupying force was present. After the Scythian campaign continued attempts would be made to secure the regions close to the Persian Empires frontiers with mixed results.The most successful period of Persian control would come during the lead up to and during the Greek and Persian Wars. A sizable Persian force would secure lands in Thrace and Macedonian paving a way forward to Greece. The Persians held enough control in Thracian coastal regions to construct their monumental engineering feats to prepare for Xerxes invasion. Though, with the ultimate Persian defeat in Greece, Thrace would once again become very inhospitable to Persians within their lands.   Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/castingthroughancientgreece)

North East of Greece would be a land seen as wild and untamed stretching from the modern-day nation of Hungary to the Ukraine, and then to the Black Sea and Aegean. The Greeks would view the people that inhabited these lands as barbarians, much the same way they did to other cultures that differed from theirs. Though these people that they would call the Thracians, seemed that much more uncivilised compared to the other barbarians they had encountered.Although the Greeks would call them Thracian, a united people they were not. these people would be a lose collection of tribes with a shared common culture. Herodotus would say of the Thracians; “If they could all be united under one ruler and think the same way, they would, in my opinion, be the most invincible and strongest of all nations. But that is impossible; it will never happen, since their weakness I that they are incapable of uniting and agreeing.”The Thracians would be a result of earlier Neolithic cultures that had formed in the Balkans thousands of years earlier. The Thracian identity that would come to describe their shared culture would be a result of these indigenous Balkan cultures interacting with the numerous Indo-European migrations that would take place as the Bronze Age developed.Thrace would enter into the Greeks memory as far back as the Trojan War through Homers epic poem the Iliad. Though it wouldn't be until the 7th and 6th centuries where Thrace would truly enter the Greek periphery. Greek colonies would begin to dot the Thracian coast lines, where trade of goods and ideas would take place in both times of peace and times of tension. Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/castingthroughancientgreece)

In this Madaxeman Army List Podcast the regular team run the rule over 5 lists all of which featured at the recent 3T's ADLG v4 event held in York in June 2021. The lists covered are Thracian and Late Roman, together with the top 3 placed lists, Bosporan, Parthian and Nobades. This podcast is also available in video format on the Madaxeman YouTube Channel, and a series of 5 battle reports featuring the Thracians is online on Madaxeman.com All of the lists are also on the ADLG Wiki   

26. Three Legs Broken I love travel. I'm considering buying a plane ticket to Bulgaria. I mean, what do we really know of the Thracians? The first show to be featured on the podcast THE UNUSEFUL HOUR, Alaxsxaq features the writing and acting of DW Draffin, who has been doing both for a very long time.

For additional notes and resources check out Douglas’ website.This lesson covers the final 5 apostles -- previous podcasts covered the first 7 plus Paul. Note: While we covered Judas Iscariot, we did not discuss Matthias (Acts 1:13,26), who was Judas' replacement. Click here for more on this somewhat obscure addition to the apostolic band. 1. Matthew (Levi)Matthew is mentioned in Matthew 9:9 and 10:3, and comes from Capernaum. His other name is Levi, son of Alpheus (Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27). Matthew collected taxes for Herod Antipas, tetrarch of Galilee. He may have been despised as a collaborator, but his willingness to follow Christ shows his heart was good. As a tax collector he would have been literate in both Aramaic and Greek, in addition to being good with numbers. We actually know more about Zacchaeus (Luke 19), another tax collector in the first century.2. Bartholomew (Nathanael)In the synoptic gospels, Philip and Bartholomew are mentioned together; in John, it's Philip and Nathanael. Thus we can equate Bartholomew with Nathanael. We encounter this direct and honest man in John 1:43-51, 21:2. Despite his initial skepticism, he quickly came to faith once he began to interact with Jesus.3. Simon the ZealotSome ancient church fathers thought he was Simon the Canaanite (Hebrew qana' = be zealous). We find him in Luke 6:15 and Acts 1:13, though little is known about him. If "zealot" was not a description of his personality or Christian commitment, then perhaps he was part of the first-century extreme political faction, the Zealots.4. James the Younger (James son of Alphaeus)This apostle was son of the other Mary, wife of Clopas (Cleopas). There is little information on this man5. Thaddaeus (the other Judas)Thaddaeus was Lebbaeus, in some manuscripts of Matthew 10:3. He was also called Judas son of James (John 14:22), known as St. Jude by the Catholics. He preached in Syria, launching the Christian movement east of Palestine, which led to the Church of the East. This Christian movement evangelized Syria, Persia, China, Mongolia, and other lands. It was a persecuted people, for the Church of the East never became political, or a state church. Eusebius (church historian at the court of Constantine, early 4th century AD), wrote "Thomas, one of the twelve apostles, under divine impulse sent Thaddeus, who was also numbered among the seventy disciples of Christ, to Edessa, as a preacher and evangelist of the teaching of Christ" (Church History I, xiii), Thaddaeus was martyred about 65 AD. Some things we learn from these 5 apostles Be willing to take the gospel into all the world; either "go and grow," or "stay and pay."There is a high price to be paid for leadership.Be careful not to judge people for their former political associations.Authenticity -- from Nathanael (Bartholomew) -- doesn't mean one has to remain a skeptic, or take forever to make a decision of faith.Apostles and MartyrdomHippolytus, a disciple of Irenaeus (2nd/3rd century AD), provides information about the deaths of the apostles, and may contain some true history. These stories should definitely be taken with a grain of salt. The 8 apostles Hippolytus says were martyred are marked with the sign +.+Peter -- preached in Asia Minor and Italy, crucified upside down in Rome+Andrew --  preached to Scythians and Thracians, then crucified on an olive tree in AchaiaJohn -- banished to Patmos, dying in the time of Trajan (emperor 98-117)+James -- beheaded by Herod the Tetrarch in Judea (Acts 12)+Philip -- preached in Phrygia, crucified upside-down in Hierapolis+Bartholomew -- preached to Indians, and crucified upside-down, and buried in ArmeniaMatthew -- died in Parthia+Thomas -- preached to Medes, Parthians, Persians, and others, speared to death with a spear of pine wood in India+James son of Alphaeus -- stoned to death while preaching in JerusalemJude (also called Lebbaeus) -- preached in Syria and MesopotamiaSimon the Zealot (also called Jude) -- died in JerusalemMatthias -- died in Jerusalem+Paul -- beheaded in Rome

In part 2 of our discussion of the history of the Amazons with Dr. Walter Penrose, we talk about the tribes of warrior women who inhabited the Black Sea region and Eurasian Steppe-- the "Fertile Crescent" of female warriors. Thracians, Scythians, Sauromatians were all renowned for their warlike women. Join us as we explore the truth of those legends. Sean Marlon Newcombe and Dawn "Sam" Alden host.

With the region of Ionian in the Persian Empire back under control, Darius could now turn to other business. He had reportedly, after learning of the Athenian involvement in the revolt, had one of his servants repeat to him three times “Master, remember the Athenians” whenever he sat down to a meal. Remember the Athenians, and the others who had also dared assist the Ionians, he would.An initial campaign was sent north into Thrace which also had a navy shadowing the land forces as they marched following the coast line. This campaign would ultimately run into disastrous problems causing the commander to return into the empire. The naval force would be destroyed, not by the Greeks but by a storm that whipped up as the fleet rounded the notorious Mt Athos. While, the land forces would encounter unexpected resistance from the Thracians who would also wound the Persian commander, Mardonious.The second campaign would see a fleet assembled which would transport the Persian land forces across the Aegean in what would amount to an Island-hopping campaign. Along the way Persian policy towards those willing to submit and those who would resist were on full display, acting as an example to those yet to encounter the armada.Accompanying the Persian fleet was the old exiled Tyrant of Athens, Hippias with the expectation that he would be re-established as the leader in Athens, answerable to Darius of course. Before landing in Attica the Persians first laid waste to another polis who had accompanied Athens during the revolt, Eretria. Once revenge had been taken against them the fleet now made its way to a bay along the Attic coast known as Marathon Bay.

For most of human history, depending on the culture of the victors, enemy combatants on the losing side in a battle who had surrendered and been taken as prisoners of war could expect to be either slaughtered or enslaved. Early Roman gladiators could be prisoners of war, categorised according to their ethnic roots as Samnites, Thracians, and Gauls (Galli). Homer's Iliad describes Greek and Trojan soldiers offering rewards of wealth to opposing forces who have defeated them on the battlefield in exchange for mercy, but their offers are not always accepted; see Lycaon for example.

Tonight on Crossing Over we host special guest Zen Garcia of Sacred Word Publishing. Dr. Stephen Pidgeon and Zen will discuss the Ancient Texts; extra-scriptural readings such as the Aramaic and Palestinian Targums, the Kolbrin Bible, the Chronicles of the Thracians and much much more. To contact Zen Garcia: https://www.youtube.com/ZenGarcia https://www.youtube.com/EndeavorFreedom https://sacredwordpublishing.com/ https://www.patreon.com/sacredwordpublishing To Contact Dr. Stephen Pidgeon: https://www.cepher.net?af=40 Cepher Radio: http://cepherradio.com/ To Contact Jessica Arellanes or to join our email list: crossingover8@gmail.com To donate: https://paypal.me/jarellanes #crossingover ~~~~~~~ If this blessed you, share it. Contact or Follow me @ BeGoodBroadcast@gmail.com Twitter @WinInHim --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/begoodbroadcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/begoodbroadcast/support

The Thracians were the most feared professional killers of the ancient world—serving as hired assassins, enforcers, and mercenaries in famous battles from one end of the Mediterranean to the other. They were the ones the Romans and Greeks hired for their really dirty work. But there was more to the Thracians than violence. In this episode, we use ancient sources and modern archeology to build a picture of how these epic people lived, loved, fought, and died. http://ancienthistoryfangirl.com/ https://www.patreon.com/ancienthistoryfangirl

Who was Spartacus, really? It’s not an easy question to answer. The ancient sources agree that he was Thracian, but even this is up for debate. Still, we’re going to go out on a limb and say that to know Spartacus, you have to know the Thracians. The Thracians were a fierce warrior people, consummate mercenaries who fought in every major Greek and Roman war—and believed that they would never die. Join us as we try to breathe life into these epic people by exploring their unique mythology and religious beliefs. http://www.ancienthistoryfangirl.com/ https://www.patreon.com/ancienthistoryfangirl

Tonight on Crossing Over we host special guest Zen Garcia of Sacred Word Publishing. Dr. Stephen Pidgeon and Zen will discuss the Ancient Texts; extra-scriptural readings such as the Aramaic and Palestinian Targums, the Kolbrin Bible, the Chronicles of the Thracians and much much more.

contact@historyuncensoredpod.com Twitter: @Seth4nerds   Spartacus:   Even those who aren’t familiar with history have probably heard the name. It’s a name that has been passed down 2 millenia, over two thousand years the ultimate underdog story has capitulated in the minds of men. It has given some hope, it has assailed others with fear. What does the name Spartacus mean to you if anything?   today I want to change things up a bit. Usually i focus the narrative on pretty much just facts and I hope that it is as interesting to you as it is to me.   For those of you that do not know me personally which I assume is most of you something that I do in my spare time is Dungeons and Dragons, I know huge nerd. Beyond that as probably would surprise nobody listening to this podcast is I am a dungeon master (How can something sound so cool, so terrible and so utterly silly at the same time) Nevermind that’s for a different time.   I am going to try and tell his story, Spartacus’ story as just that a narrative. Yes, it will hopefully have all of the facts within it but it might also contain the excitement and I will not refrain my tongue from the narrative as I normally do. If I did that Normally each episode would be at least two hours and I would never subject you guys to that.   So here we go!   Welcome to History Uncensored as always I am your host Seth Michels and today history can go “uck itself.   Spartacus was born in Thrace and if you don’t know where that is I forgive you because “Thrace” is not a real fucking place anymore. Just as in a lot of cases with these old stories some of these places have gone through different names and 2000 years can be hard on historical accuracy. Also, I suck with names deal with it.   Where was I… Oh yeah Thrace! That place geographically it is to the north and east of what we can think of as traditional Greece.    Thrace was still very rural during the times of the Roman’s and during the 2nd and 3rd century BC were enemies of Rome. That was a long time ago in the story of Spartacus though. Our hero, our underdog was born sometime around 109bc when Thrace was firmly under the rule and “subjugation” of Rome.   Interesting Cultural note on Thrace: They like to “uck   The Thracians were polygamous as Menander puts it: "All Thracians, especially us and the Getae, are not much abstaining, because no one takes less than ten, eleven, twelve wives, some even more. If one dies and has only four or five wives he is called ill-fated, unhappy and unmarried."[59] According to Herodotus virginity among women was not valued, and unmarried Thracian women could have sex with any man they wished to.   Also of interesting note, Thracians were often depicted as having red or auburn hair. The gingers of the ancient world. I am not sure if that makes Spartacus more or less terrifying than what I envisioned him as. Thanks, Kubrick ya Prick.   Thracians were a warrior people and valued bravery in battle, especially on horseback. They made excellent light cavalry units and were proficient with javelins and spears. Perhaps it was this early warfare training that brought out what would eventually be Spartacus the Gladiator and Spartacus the General.   We don’t know shit about Spartacus’ upbringing I mean literal Dogshit about it. I know Fuckall- he was born and then suddenly we pick up history as an auxiliary unit within the Roman army- probably fighting Mithridates.   Mithridates is important to Spartacus, probably not as a person or a friend or anything but Mithridates war on Rome really assisted in making Spartacus’ uprising the most successful Slave Revolt in history to that point.   Also while we are talking about slave revolts, don’t worry guys ill get to Spartacus ginger big dick in a little bit. I want to talk about the two slave revolts that took place in the recent history in Spartacus’ time that contributed to the decisions that Rome made and the Decisions that Spartacus made.   Important Revolt number 1 in Rom --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/seth-michels66/support

Twitter: Seth4nerds Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/historyuncensoredpod/ Email: Contact@historyuncensoredpod.com    Gladiators part 2   Last week we Learned about who the gladiators were, as people. This week I want to Focus on the fights and who the gladiators were as combatants.    Let the Games begin! Gladiators were not an undifferentiated group of sword fighters; they were divided up into categories based on different styles of armour, weapons and fighting. Sometimes it is hard to determine with certainty the type a gladiator depicted in surviving ancient representations. We must accept the possibility that occasionally variety in armour and weapons was allowed within a given gladiator category.166 For the most part, however, gladiators conformed generally to type. During the Republic, there were five known gladiator types: samnis (Samnite), gallus (Gaul), thraex (Thracian), provocator (‘challenger’) and eques (‘horseman’).    The first three types are ethnic in origin, that is, their armour, weapons and style of fighting were derived from peoples who had engaged in war with the Romans: the Samnites, Gauls and Thracians. As noted earlier, these gladiator types must have developed from the practice of forcing prisoners of war from the same region to fight each other wearing their characteristic armour and employing their distinctive fighting styles. In time, the names of these three ethnic gladiatorial types no longer indicated warriors native to these regions, but merely a gladiatorial style. These ethnic gladiatorial types throughout the Republic kept the memory of Rome’s past military successes alive by re-enacting them in the arena. The Samnite and the Gaul, the earliest gladiator types we know of, did not survive much beyond the Republic; only the thraex survived into the imperial period and remained popular into late antiquity.   Eques One type of gladiator easy to identify is the eques (‘horseman’), a lightly armed fighter who fought both on horseback and on the ground. It is clear that the equites were real horsemen. Cicero reports that the crowd’s hissing of an unpopular politician startled ‘the gladiators and their horses’.171 These gladiators with horses could only be the equites. An eques always fought an opponent of the same category.172 The only detailed description we have of the equites in a munus comes from a medieval author Isidore of Seville (seventh century AD), but his overall knowledge of gladiators accords well with the ancient sources, thus giving credence to the evidence he provides:   “Of the several types of gladiators, the first contest involves the equestrians. Two equites, preceded by military standards, entered the arena, one from the west, the other from the east, riding on white horses, wearing smallish golden helmets and carrying light weapons.”   Provocator The provocator(‘challenger’) was another gladiatorial type that originated in theRepublicandsurvivedintoimperialtimes.Ciceromentionstheprovocator in the same speech along with the equites and the Samnites.178 The provocator looked much more like a standard gladiator than did the eques. His visored helmet was not brimmed and had a neck guard in the back. He wore a loincloth (subligaculum), standard attire for all gladiators except for the eques, and a greave on his left leg. The shield of the provocateur was concave and rectangular. Perhaps his most identifiable feature was the breastplate he wore, held on the body by straps that met at the back, which protected the upper chest.179 No other type of gladiator wore any protective armour on the chest.   Thraex The thraex was the sole survivor into the imperial period of the ethnic-based gladiators of the Republic. It is uncertain when the thraex became a gladiatorial type at Rome. There are two possibilities: (1) when Rome took Thracian mercenaries captive in the war against Perseus (171–167 BC), or (2) when many Thracians were taken as prisoners in the Mithdridatic wars in the 80s BC --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/seth-michels66/support

In this lecture we discuss, (a) Dolon's "folle volo" into the hands of Diomedes and Odysseus, (b) the fate of Rhesos and the Thracians, and (c) we move into Book XI (11) where we discuss Agamemnon's "aristeia" and (d) observe the tides of battle shift against the Achaians as the first of many major injuries occurs and Hektor takes the field. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/alexander-schmid9/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/alexander-schmid9/support

'Fierce fighters, masterful mercenaries, backwards barbarians: these were only a few of the ways the ancient Greeks described their tribalistic neighbours to the north'. In this episode of the podcast we discuss Ancient Warfare XII-2, Wild Allies and Enemies: Thracians in the Fourth Century.Angus is joined by regulars Jasper Oorthuys, Murray Dahm, Marc DeSantis, Lindsay Powell and Myke Cole.

In part one of this four-part series depicting the life of Alexander the Great, we discuss Alexander’s early years, his first skirmish against the Thracians, his first battle against the Greeks, his father’s death, Alexander’s ascension to the throne, his squashing a potential rebellion, and then his first foray into Persia, which was a monumental success. If you enjoyed Memoir, visit Memoir.one to subscribe to our newsletter for bonus content and other cool stuff. Also, we have a voting widget there so YOU can help choose the next featured memoir. Lastly, if you're enjoying the life story of Alexander the Great, you simply MUST listen to the audiobook The Virtues of War by Steven Pressfield. It is EPIC. If you’re not currently an audible member you can listen to this audiobook for FREE by visiting Memoir.one/book. After signing up to audible, (which is free), you’ll be gifted an audiobook of your choice. That’s Memoir.one/book. Thank you for listening to Memoir: Audio biographies of the men and women who changed the world.

The Later Evolution of Religion (1003.1) 92:0.1 MAN possessed a religion of natural origin as a part of his evolutionary experience long before any systematic revelations were made on Urantia. But this religion of natural origin was, in itself, the product of man’s superanimal endowments. Evolutionary religion arose slowly throughout the millenniums of mankind’s experiential career through the ministry of the following influences operating within, and impinging upon, savage, barbarian, and civilized man: (1003.2) 92:0.2 1. The adjutant of worship — the appearance in animal consciousness of superanimal potentials for reality perception. This might be termed the primordial human instinct for Deity. (1003.3) 92:0.3 2. The adjutant of wisdom — the manifestation in a worshipful mind of the tendency to direct its adoration in higher channels of expression and toward ever-expanding concepts of Deity reality. (1003.4) 92:0.4 3. The Holy Spirit — this is the initial supermind bestowal, and it unfailingly appears in all bona fide human personalities. This ministry to a worship-craving and wisdom-desiring mind creates the capacity to self-realize the postulate of human survival, both in theologic concept and as an actual and factual personality experience. (1003.5) 92:0.5 The co-ordinate functioning of these three divine ministrations is quite sufficient to initiate and prosecute the growth of evolutionary religion. These influences are later augmented by Thought Adjusters, seraphim, and the Spirit of Truth, all of which accelerate the rate of religious development. These agencies have long functioned on Urantia, and they will continue here as long as this planet remains an inhabited sphere. Much of the potential of these divine agencies has never yet had opportunity for expression; much will be revealed in the ages to come as mortal religion ascends, level by level, toward the supernal heights of morontia value and spirit truth. 1. The Evolutionary Nature of Religion (1003.6) 92:1.1 The evolution of religion has been traced from early fear and ghosts down through many successive stages of development, including those efforts first to coerce and then to cajole the spirits. Tribal fetishes grew into totems and tribal gods; magic formulas became modern prayers. Circumcision, at first a sacrifice, became a hygienic procedure. (1003.7) 92:1.2 Religion progressed from nature worship up through ghost worship to fetishism throughout the savage childhood of the races. With the dawn of civilization the human race espoused the more mystic and symbolic beliefs, while now, with approaching maturity, mankind is ripening for the appreciation of real religion, even a beginning of the revelation of truth itself. (1004.1) 92:1.3 Religion arises as a biologic reaction of mind to spiritual beliefs and the environment; it is the last thing to perish or change in a race. Religion is society’s adjustment, in any age, to that which is mysterious. As a social institution it embraces rites, symbols, cults, scriptures, altars, shrines, and temples. Holy water, relics, fetishes, charms, vestments, bells, drums, and priesthoods are common to all religions. And it is impossible entirely to divorce purely evolved religion from either magic or sorcery. (1004.2) 92:1.4 Mystery and power have always stimulated religious feelings and fears, while emotion has ever functioned as a powerful conditioning factor in their development. Fear has always been the basic religious stimulus. Fear fashions the gods of evolutionary religion and motivates the religious ritual of the primitive believers. As civilization advances, fear becomes modified by reverence, admiration, respect, and sympathy and is then further conditioned by remorse and repentance. (1004.3) 92:1.5 One Asiatic people taught that “God is a great fear”; that is the outgrowth of purely evolutionary religion. Jesus, the revelation of the highest type of religious living, proclaimed that “God is love.” 2. Religion and the Mores (1004.4) 92:2.1 Religion is the most rigid and unyielding of all human institutions, but it does tardily adjust to changing society. Eventually, evolutionary religion does reflect the changing mores, which, in turn, may have been affected by revealed religion. Slowly, surely, but grudgingly, does religion (worship) follow in the wake of wisdom — knowledge directed by experiential reason and illuminated by divine revelation. (1004.5) 92:2.2 Religion clings to the mores; that which was is ancient and supposedly sacred. For this reason and no other, stone implements persisted long into the age of bronze and iron. This statement is of record: “And if you will make me an altar of stone, you shall not build it of hewn stone, for, if you use your tools in making it, you have polluted it.” Even today, the Hindus kindle their altar fires by using a primitive fire drill. In the course of evolutionary religion, novelty has always been regarded as sacrilege. The sacrament must consist, not of new and manufactured food, but of the most primitive of viands: “The flesh roasted with fire and unleavened bread served with bitter herbs.” All types of social usage and even legal procedures cling to the old forms. (1004.6) 92:2.3 When modern man wonders at the presentation of so much in the scriptures of different religions that may be regarded as obscene, he should pause to consider that passing generations have feared to eliminate what their ancestors deemed to be holy and sacred. A great deal that one generation might look upon as obscene, preceding generations have considered a part of their accepted mores, even as approved religious rituals. A considerable amount of religious controversy has been occasioned by the never-ending attempts to reconcile olden but reprehensible practices with newly advanced reason, to find plausible theories in justification of creedal perpetuation of ancient and outworn customs. (1004.7) 92:2.4 But it is only foolish to attempt the too sudden acceleration of religious growth. A race or nation can only assimilate from any advanced religion that which is reasonably consistent and compatible with its current evolutionary status, plus its genius for adaptation. Social, climatic, political, and economic conditions are all influential in determining the course and progress of religious evolution. Social morality is not determined by religion, that is, by evolutionary religion; rather are the forms of religion dictated by the racial morality. (1005.1) 92:2.5 Races of men only superficially accept a strange and new religion; they actually adjust it to their mores and old ways of believing. This is well illustrated by the example of a certain New Zealand tribe whose priests, after nominally accepting Christianity, professed to have received direct revelations from Gabriel to the effect that this selfsame tribe had become the chosen people of God and directing that they be permitted freely to indulge in loose sex relations and numerous other of their olden and reprehensible customs. And immediately all of the new-made Christians went over to this new and less exacting version of Christianity. (1005.2) 92:2.6 Religion has at one time or another sanctioned all sorts of contrary and inconsistent behavior, has at some time approved of practically all that is now regarded as immoral or sinful. Conscience, untaught by experience and unaided by reason, never has been, and never can be, a safe and unerring guide to human conduct. Conscience is not a divine voice speaking to the human soul. It is merely the sum total of the moral and ethical content of the mores of any current stage of existence; it simply represents the humanly conceived ideal of reaction in any given set of circumstances. 3. The Nature of Evolutionary Religion (1005.3) 92:3.1 The study of human religion is the examination of the fossil-bearing social strata of past ages. The mores of the anthropomorphic gods are a truthful reflection of the morals of the men who first conceived such deities. Ancient religions and mythology faithfully portray the beliefs and traditions of peoples long since lost in obscurity. These olden cult practices persist alongside newer economic customs and social evolutions and, of course, appear grossly inconsistent. The remnants of the cult present a true picture of the racial religions of the past. Always remember, the cults are formed, not to discover truth, but rather to promulgate their creeds. (1005.4) 92:3.2 Religion has always been largely a matter of rites, rituals, observances, ceremonies, and dogmas. It has usually become tainted with that persistently mischief-making error, the chosen-people delusion. The cardinal religious ideas of incantation, inspiration, revelation, propitiation, repentance, atonement, intercession, sacrifice, prayer, confession, worship, survival after death, sacrament, ritual, ransom, salvation, redemption, covenant, uncleanness, purification, prophecy, original sin — they all go back to the early times of primordial ghost fear. (1005.5) 92:3.3 Primitive religion is nothing more nor less than the struggle for material existence extended to embrace existence beyond the grave. The observances of such a creed represented the extension of the self-maintenance struggle into the domain of an imagined ghost-spirit world. But when tempted to criticize evolutionary religion, be careful. Remember, that is what happened; it is a historical fact. And further recall that the power of any idea lies, not in its certainty or truth, but rather in the vividness of its human appeal. (1006.1) 92:3.4 Evolutionary religion makes no provision for change or revision; unlike science, it does not provide for its own progressive correction. Evolved religion commands respect because its followers believe it is The Truth; “the faith once delivered to the saints” must, in theory, be both final and infallible. The cult resists development because real progress is certain to modify or destroy the cult itself; therefore must revision always be forced upon it. (1006.2) 92:3.5 Only two influences can modify and uplift the dogmas of natural religion: the pressure of the slowly advancing mores and the periodic illumination of epochal revelation. And it is not strange that progress was slow; in ancient days, to be progressive or inventive meant to be killed as a sorcerer. The cult advances slowly in generation epochs and agelong cycles. But it does move forward. Evolutionary belief in ghosts laid the foundation for a philosophy of revealed religion which will eventually destroy the superstition of its origin. (1006.3) 92:3.6 Religion has handicapped social development in many ways, but without religion there would have been no enduring morality nor ethics, no worth-while civilization. Religion enmothered much nonreligious culture: Sculpture originated in idol making, architecture in temple building, poetry in incantations, music in worship chants, drama in the acting for spirit guidance, and dancing in the seasonal worship festivals. (1006.4) 92:3.7 But while calling attention to the fact that religion was essential to the development and preservation of civilization, it should be recorded that natural religion has also done much to cripple and handicap the very civilization which it otherwise fostered and maintained. Religion has hampered industrial activities and economic development; it has been wasteful of labor and has squandered capital; it has not always been helpful to the family; it has not adequately fostered peace and good will; it has sometimes neglected education and retarded science; it has unduly impoverished life for the pretended enrichment of death. Evolutionary religion, human religion, has indeed been guilty of all these and many more mistakes, errors, and blunders; nevertheless, it did maintain cultural ethics, civilized morality, and social coherence, and made it possible for later revealed religion to compensate for these many evolutionary shortcomings. (1006.5) 92:3.8 Evolutionary religion has been man’s most expensive but incomparably effective institution. Human religion can be justified only in the light of evolutionary civilization. If man were not the ascendant product of animal evolution, then would such a course of religious development stand without justification. (1006.6) 92:3.9 Religion facilitated the accumulation of capital; it fostered work of certain kinds; the leisure of the priests promoted art and knowledge; the race, in the end, gained much as a result of all these early errors in ethical technique. The shamans, honest and dishonest, were terribly expensive, but they were worth all they cost. The learned professions and science itself emerged from the parasitical priesthoods. Religion fostered civilization and provided societal continuity; it has been the moral police force of all time. Religion provided that human discipline and self-control which made wisdom possible. Religion is the efficient scourge of evolution which ruthlessly drives indolent and suffering humanity from its natural state of intellectual inertia forward and upward to the higher levels of reason and wisdom. (1006.7) 92:3.10 And this sacred heritage of animal ascent, evolutionary religion, must ever continue to be refined and ennobled by the continuous censorship of revealed religion and by the fiery furnace of genuine science. 4. The Gift of Revelation (1007.1) 92:4.1 Revelation is evolutionary but always progressive. Down through the ages of a world’s history, the revelations of religion are ever-expanding and successively more enlightening. It is the mission of revelation to sort and censor the successive religions of evolution. But if revelation is to exalt and upstep the religions of evolution, then must such divine visitations portray teachings which are not too far removed from the thought and reactions of the age in which they are presented. Thus must and does revelation always keep in touch with evolution. Always must the religion of revelation be limited by man’s capacity of receptivity. (1007.2) 92:4.2 But regardless of apparent connection or derivation, the religions of revelation are always characterized by a belief in some Deity of final value and in some concept of the survival of personality identity after death. (1007.3) 92:4.3 Evolutionary religion is sentimental, not logical. It is man’s reaction to belief in a hypothetical ghost-spirit world — the human belief-reflex, excited by the realization and fear of the unknown. Revelatory religion is propounded by the real spiritual world; it is the response of the superintellectual cosmos to the mortal hunger to believe in, and depend upon, the universal Deities. Evolutionary religion pictures the circuitous gropings of humanity in quest of truth; revelatory religion is that very truth. (1007.4) 92:4.4 There have been many events of religious revelation but only five of epochal significance. These were as follows: (1007.5) 92:4.5 1. The Dalamatian teachings. The true concept of the First Source and Center was first promulgated on Urantia by the one hundred corporeal members of Prince Caligastia’s staff. This expanding revelation of Deity went on for more than three hundred thousand years until it was suddenly terminated by the planetary secession and the disruption of the teaching regime. Except for the work of Van, the influence of the Dalamatian revelation was practically lost to the whole world. Even the Nodites had forgotten this truth by the time of Adam’s arrival. Of all who received the teachings of the one hundred, the red men held them longest, but the idea of the Great Spirit was but a hazy concept in Amerindian religion when contact with Christianity greatly clarified and strengthened it. (1007.6) 92:4.6 2. The Edenic teachings. Adam and Eve again portrayed the concept of the Father of all to the evolutionary peoples. The disruption of the first Eden halted the course of the Adamic revelation before it had ever fully started. But the aborted teachings of Adam were carried on by the Sethite priests, and some of these truths have never been entirely lost to the world. The entire trend of Levantine religious evolution was modified by the teachings of the Sethites. But by 2500 B.C. mankind had largely lost sight of the revelation sponsored in the days of Eden. (1007.7) 92:4.7 3. Melchizedek of Salem. This emergency Son of Nebadon inaugurated the third revelation of truth on Urantia. The cardinal precepts of his teachings were trust and faith. He taught trust in the omnipotent beneficence of God and proclaimed that faith was the act by which men earned God’s favor. His teachings gradually commingled with the beliefs and practices of various evolutionary religions and finally developed into those theologic systems present on Urantia at the opening of the first millennium after Christ. (1008.1) 92:4.8 4. Jesus of Nazareth. Christ Michael presented for the fourth time to Urantia the concept of God as the Universal Father, and this teaching has generally persisted ever since. The essence of his teaching was love and service, the loving worship which a creature son voluntarily gives in recognition of, and response to, the loving ministry of God his Father; the freewill service which such creature sons bestow upon their brethren in the joyous realization that in this service they are likewise serving God the Father. (1008.2) 92:4.9 5. The Urantia Papers. The papers, of which this is one, constitute the most recent presentation of truth to the mortals of Urantia. These papers differ from all previous revelations, for they are not the work of a single universe personality but a composite presentation by many beings. But no revelation short of the attainment of the Universal Father can ever be complete. All other celestial ministrations are no more than partial, transient, and practically adapted to local conditions in time and space. While such admissions as this may possibly detract from the immediate force and authority of all revelations, the time has arrived on Urantia when it is advisable to make such frank statements, even at the risk of weakening the future influence and authority of this, the most recent of the revelations of truth to the mortal races of Urantia. 5. The Great Religious Leaders (1008.3) 92:5.1 In evolutionary religion, the gods are conceived to exist in the likeness of man’s image; in revelatory religion, men are taught that they are God’s sons — even fashioned in the finite image of divinity; in the synthesized beliefs compounded from the teachings of revelation and the products of evolution, the God concept is a blend of: (1008.4) 92:5.2 1. The pre-existent ideas of the evolutionary cults. (1008.5) 92:5.3 2. The sublime ideals of revealed religion. (1008.6) 92:5.4 3. The personal viewpoints of the great religious leaders, the prophets and teachers of mankind. (1008.7) 92:5.5 Most great religious epochs have been inaugurated by the life and teachings of some outstanding personality; leadership has originated a majority of the worth-while moral movements of history. And men have always tended to venerate the leader, even at the expense of his teachings; to revere his personality, even though losing sight of the truths which he proclaimed. And this is not without reason; there is an instinctive longing in the heart of evolutionary man for help from above and beyond. This craving is designed to anticipate the appearance on earth of the Planetary Prince and the later Material Sons. On Urantia man has been deprived of these superhuman leaders and rulers, and therefore does he constantly seek to make good this loss by enshrouding his human leaders with legends pertaining to supernatural origins and miraculous careers. (1008.8) 92:5.6 Many races have conceived of their leaders as being born of virgins; their careers are liberally sprinkled with miraculous episodes, and their return is always expected by their respective groups. In central Asia the tribesmen still look for the return of Genghis Khan; in Tibet, China, and India it is Buddha; in Islam it is Mohammed; among the Amerinds it was Hesunanin Onamonalonton; with the Hebrews it was, in general, Adam’s return as a material ruler. In Babylon the god Marduk was a perpetuation of the Adam legend, the son-of-God idea, the connecting link between man and God. Following the appearance of Adam on earth, so-called sons of God were common among the world races. (1009.1) 92:5.7 But regardless of the superstitious awe in which they were often held, it remains a fact that these teachers were the temporal personality fulcrums on which the levers of revealed truth depended for the advancement of the morality, philosophy, and religion of mankind. (1009.2) 92:5.8 There have been hundreds upon hundreds of religious leaders in the million-year human history of Urantia from Onagar to Guru Nanak. During this time there have been many ebbs and flows of the tide of religious truth and spiritual faith, and each renaissance of Urantian religion has, in the past, been identified with the life and teachings of some religious leader. In considering the teachers of recent times, it may prove helpful to group them into the seven major religious epochs of post-Adamic Urantia: (1009.3) 92:5.9 1. The Sethite period. The Sethite priests, as regenerated under the leadership of Amosad, became the great post-Adamic teachers. They functioned throughout the lands of the Andites, and their influence persisted longest among the Greeks, Sumerians, and Hindus. Among the latter they have continued to the present time as the Brahmans of the Hindu faith. The Sethites and their followers never entirely lost the Trinity concept revealed by Adam. (1009.4) 92:5.10 2. Era of the Melchizedek missionaries. Urantia religion was in no small measure regenerated by the efforts of those teachers who were commissioned by Machiventa Melchizedek when he lived and taught at Salem almost two thousand years before Christ. These missionaries proclaimed faith as the price of favor with God, and their teachings, though unproductive of any immediately appearing religions, nevertheless formed the foundations on which later teachers of truth were to build the religions of Urantia. (1009.5) 92:5.11 3. The post-Melchizedek era. Though Amenemope and Ikhnaton both taught in this period, the outstanding religious genius of the post-Melchizedek era was the leader of a group of Levantine Bedouins and the founder of the Hebrew religion — Moses. Moses taught monotheism. Said he: “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God.” “The Lord he is God. There is none beside him.” He persistently sought to uproot the remnants of the ghost cult among his people, even prescribing the death penalty for its practitioners. The monotheism of Moses was adulterated by his successors, but in later times they did return to many of his teachings. The greatness of Moses lies in his wisdom and sagacity. Other men have had greater concepts of God, but no one man was ever so successful in inducing large numbers of people to adopt such advanced beliefs. (1009.6) 92:5.12 4. The sixth century before Christ. Many men arose to proclaim truth in this, one of the greatest centuries of religious awakening ever witnessed on Urantia. Among these should be recorded Gautama, Confucius, Lao-tse, Zoroaster, and the Jainist teachers. The teachings of Gautama have become widespread in Asia, and he is revered as the Buddha by millions. Confucius was to Chinese morality what Plato was to Greek philosophy, and while there were religious repercussions to the teachings of both, strictly speaking, neither was a religious teacher; Lao-tse envisioned more of God in Tao than did Confucius in humanity or Plato in idealism. Zoroaster, while much affected by the prevalent concept of dual spiritism, the good and the bad, at the same time definitely exalted the idea of one eternal Deity and of the ultimate victory of light over darkness. (1010.1) 92:5.13 5. The first century after Christ. As a religious teacher, Jesus of Nazareth started out with the cult which had been established by John the Baptist and progressed as far as he could away from fasts and forms. Aside from Jesus, Paul of Tarsus and Philo of Alexandria were the greatest teachers of this era. Their concepts of religion have played a dominant part in the evolution of that faith which bears the name of Christ. (1010.2) 92:5.14 6. The sixth century after Christ. Mohammed founded a religion which was superior to many of the creeds of his time. His was a protest against the social demands of the faiths of foreigners and against the incoherence of the religious life of his own people. (1010.3) 92:5.15 7. The fifteenth century after Christ. This period witnessed two religious movements: the disruption of the unity of Christianity in the Occident and the synthesis of a new religion in the Orient. In Europe institutionalized Christianity had attained that degree of inelasticity which rendered further growth incompatible with unity. In the Orient the combined teachings of Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism were synthesized by Nanak and his followers into Sikhism, one of the most advanced religions of Asia. (1010.4) 92:5.16 The future of Urantia will doubtless be characterized by the appearance of teachers of religious truth — the Fatherhood of God and the fraternity of all creatures. But it is to be hoped that the ardent and sincere efforts of these future prophets will be directed less toward the strengthening of interreligious barriers and more toward the augmentation of the religious brotherhood of spiritual worship among the many followers of the differing intellectual theologies which so characterize Urantia of Satania. 6. The Composite Religions (1010.5) 92:6.1 Twentieth-century Urantia religions present an interesting study of the social evolution of man’s worship impulse. Many faiths have progressed very little since the days of the ghost cult. The Pygmies of Africa have no religious reactions as a class, although some of them believe slightly in a spirit environment. They are today just where primitive man was when the evolution of religion began. The basic belief of primitive religion was survival after death. The idea of worshiping a personal God indicates advanced evolutionary development, even the first stage of revelation. The Dyaks have evolved only the most primitive religious practices. The comparatively recent Eskimos and Amerinds had very meager concepts of God; they believed in ghosts and had an indefinite idea of survival of some sort after death. Present-day native Australians have only a ghost fear, dread of the dark, and a crude ancestor veneration. The Zulus are just evolving a religion of ghost fear and sacrifice. Many African tribes, except through missionary work of Christians and Mohammedans, are not yet beyond the fetish stage of religious evolution. But some groups have long held to the idea of monotheism, like the onetime Thracians, who also believed in immortality. (1010.6) 92:6.2 On Urantia, evolutionary and revelatory religion are progressing side by side while they blend and coalesce into the diversified theologic systems found in the world in the times of the inditement of these papers. These religions, the religions of twentieth-century Urantia, may be enumerated as follows: (1011.1) 92:6.3 1. Hinduism — the most ancient. (1011.2) 92:6.4 2. The Hebrew religion. (1011.3) 92:6.5 3. Buddhism. (1011.4) 92:6.6 4. The Confucian teachings. (1011.5) 92:6.7 5. The Taoist beliefs. (1011.6) 92:6.8 6. Zoroastrianism. (1011.7) 92:6.9 7. Shinto. (1011.8) 92:6.10 8. Jainism. (1011.9) 92:6.11 9. Christianity. (1011.10) 92:6.12 10. Islam. (1011.11) 92:6.13 11. Sikhism — the most recent. (1011.12) 92:6.14 The most advanced religions of ancient times were Judaism and Hinduism, and each respectively has greatly influenced the course of religious development in Orient and Occident. Both Hindus and Hebrews believed that their religions were inspired and revealed, and they believed all others to be decadent forms of the one true faith. (1011.13) 92:6.15 India is divided among Hindu, Sikh, Mohammedan, and Jain, each picturing God, man, and the universe as these are variously conceived. China follows the Taoist and the Confucian teachings; Shinto is revered in Japan. (1011.14) 92:6.16 The great international, interracial faiths are the Hebraic, Buddhist, Christian, and Islamic. Buddhism stretches from Ceylon and Burma through Tibet and China to Japan. It has shown an adaptability to the mores of many peoples that has been equaled only by Christianity. (1011.15) 92:6.17 The Hebrew religion encompasses the philosophic transition from polytheism to monotheism; it is an evolutionary link between the religions of evolution and the religions of revelation. The Hebrews were the only western people to follow their early evolutionary gods straight through to the God of revelation. But this truth never became widely accepted until the days of Isaiah, who once again taught the blended idea of a racial deity combined with a Universal Creator: “O Lord of Hosts, God of Israel, you are God, even you alone; you have made heaven and earth.” At one time the hope of the survival of Occidental civilization lay in the sublime Hebraic concepts of goodness and the advanced Hellenic concepts of beauty. (1011.16) 92:6.18 The Christian religion is the religion about the life and teachings of Christ based upon the theology of Judaism, modified further through the assimilation of certain Zoroastrian teachings and Greek philosophy, and formulated primarily by three individuals: Philo, Peter, and Paul. It has passed through many phases of evolution since the time of Paul and has become so thoroughly Occidentalized that many non-European peoples very naturally look upon Christianity as a strange revelation of a strange God and for strangers. (1011.17) 92:6.19 Islam is the religio-cultural connective of North Africa, the Levant, and southeastern Asia. It was Jewish theology in connection with the later Christian teachings that made Islam monotheistic. The followers of Mohammed stumbled at the advanced teachings of the Trinity; they could not comprehend the doctrine of three divine personalities and one Deity. It is always difficult to induce evolutionary minds suddenly to accept advanced revealed truth. Man is an evolutionary creature and in the main must get his religion by evolutionary techniques. (1012.1) 92:6.20 Ancestor worship onetime constituted a decided advance in religious evolution, but it is both amazing and regrettable that this primitive concept persists in China, Japan, and India amidst so much that is relatively more advanced, such as Buddhism and Hinduism. In the Occident, ancestor worship developed into the veneration of national gods and respect for racial heroes. In the twentieth century this hero-venerating nationalistic religion makes its appearance in the various radical and nationalistic secularisms which characterize many races and nations of the Occident. Much of this same attitude is also found in the great universities and the larger industrial communities of the English-speaking peoples. Not very different from these concepts is the idea that religion is but “a shared quest of the good life.” The “national religions” are nothing more than a reversion to the early Roman emperor worship and to Shinto — worship of the state in the imperial family. 7. The Further Evolution of Religion (1012.2) 92:7.1 Religion can never become a scientific fact. Philosophy may, indeed, rest on a scientific basis, but religion will ever remain either evolutionary or revelatory, or a possible combination of both, as it is in the world today. (1012.3) 92:7.2 New religions cannot be invented; they are either evolved, or else they are suddenly revealed. All new evolutionary religions are merely advancing expressions of the old beliefs, new adaptations and adjustments. The old does not cease to exist; it is merged with the new, even as Sikhism budded and blossomed out of the soil and forms of Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, and other contemporary cults. Primitive religion was very democratic; the savage was quick to borrow or lend. Only with revealed religion did autocratic and intolerant theologic egotism appear. (1012.4) 92:7.3 The many religions of Urantia are all good to the extent that they bring man to God and bring the realization of the Father to man. It is a fallacy for any group of religionists to conceive of their creed as The Truth; such attitudes bespeak more of theological arrogance than of certainty of faith. There is not a Urantia religion that could not profitably study and assimilate the best of the truths contained in every other faith, for all contain truth. Religionists would do better to borrow the best in their neighbors’ living spiritual faith rather than to denounce the worst in their lingering superstitions and outworn rituals. (1012.5) 92:7.4 All these religions have arisen as a result of man’s variable intellectual response to his identical spiritual leading. They can never hope to attain a uniformity of creeds, dogmas, and rituals — these are intellectual; but they can, and some day will, realize a unity in true worship of the Father of all, for this is spiritual, and it is forever true, in the spirit all men are equal. (1012.6) 92:7.5 Primitive religion was largely a material-value consciousness, but civilization elevates religious values, for true religion is the devotion of the self to the service of meaningful and supreme values. As religion evolves, ethics becomes the philosophy of morals, and morality becomes the discipline of self by the standards of highest meanings and supreme values — divine and spiritual ideals. And thus religion becomes a spontaneous and exquisite devotion, the living experience of the loyalty of love. (1013.1) 92:7.6 The quality of a religion is indicated by: (1013.2) 92:7.7 1. Level of values — loyalties.* (1013.3) 92:7.8 2. Depth of meanings — the sensitization of the individual to the idealistic appreciation of these highest values. (1013.4) 92:7.9 3. Consecration intensity — the degree of devotion to these divine values. (1013.5) 92:7.10 4. The unfettered progress of the personality in this cosmic path of idealistic spiritual living, realization of sonship with God and never-ending progressive citizenship in the universe. (1013.6) 92:7.11 Religious meanings progress in self-consciousness when the child transfers his ideas of omnipotence from his parents to God. And the entire religious experience of such a child is largely dependent on whether fear or love has dominated the parent-child relationship. Slaves have always experienced great difficulty in transferring their master-fear into concepts of God-love. Civilization, science, and advanced religions must deliver mankind from those fears born of the dread of natural phenomena. And so should greater enlightenment deliver educated mortals from all dependence on intermediaries in communion with Deity. (1013.7) 92:7.12 These intermediate stages of idolatrous hesitation in the transfer of veneration from the human and the visible to the divine and invisible are inevitable, but they should be shortened by the consciousness of the facilitating ministry of the indwelling divine spirit. Nevertheless, man has been profoundly influenced, not only by his concepts of Deity, but also by the character of the heroes whom he has chosen to honor. It is most unfortunate that those who have come to venerate the divine and risen Christ should have overlooked the man — the valiant and courageous hero — Joshua ben Joseph. (1013.8) 92:7.13 Modern man is adequately self-conscious of religion, but his worshipful customs are confused and discredited by his accelerated social metamorphosis and unprecedented scientific developments. Thinking men and women want religion redefined, and this demand will compel religion to re-evaluate itself. (1013.9) 92:7.14 Modern man is confronted with the task of making more readjustments of human values in one generation than have been made in two thousand years. And this all influences the social attitude toward religion, for religion is a way of living as well as a technique of thinking. (1013.10) 92:7.15 True religion must ever be, at one and the same time, the eternal foundation and the guiding star of all enduring civilizations. (1013.11) 92:7.16 [Presented by a Melchizedek of Nebadon.]

Ellis Shuman live from Israel talks to me about his novel, Valley Of Thracians, his life and future plans. I get to know Ellis. His time in Bulgaria was the inspiration for his book and his passion for more books with the character of Bulgaria shining through. iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/bulgaria-now/id889642431?mt=2 Rating and sharing are great ways to help others find this weekly podcast. #BulgariaNow on twitter This show was recorded using skype and an Editor's Keys Portable Vocal Booth Pro 2nd Edition. Sponsors http://www.cleves.bg http://www.appfactory.bg http://www.banskoblog.com Links http://ellisshuman.blogspot.com/ VALLEY OF THRACIANS by Ellis Shuman http://www.amazon.com/Valley-of-Thracians-ebook/dp/B00B68J114 THE PARCHMENT MAZE by Ludmila Filipova http://www.amazon.com/Parchment-Maze-Ludmila-Filipova-ebook/dp/B00C14WFF6/ The new novel by Haruki Murakami http://www.amazon.com/Colorless-Tsukuru-Tazaki-Years-Pilgrimage-ebook/dp/B00IHMEAYK/ The memorable quote by Theodor Herzl: "If you will it, it is no dream" Links for my Podcasting studio http://www.banskoblog.com/mobile-apps https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bansko/id491461324?ls=1&mt=8 http://www.overcast.fm http://www.apogeedigital.com http://www.bossjockstudio.com http://www.editorskeys.com http://www.audacity.sourceforge.net http://www.soundcloud.com Chris's Dynamic Compressor Plugin for Audacity If you enjoyed this show then I really appreciate you taking a few moments for sharing, rating and reviewing it. iTunes https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/bulgaria-now/id889642431?mt=2 Your rating, reviewing and sharing Bulgaria Now's weekly podcast will help others find it.

Caught in the cultural crosshairs of Europe, Bulgaria is emerging as one of Eastern Europe's bargains. Travelers to Bulgaris can expect Ancient Byzantine and Ottoman influences and experience Mummers and midwives keeping traditions dating back to the ancient Thracians and Romans times alive. Rick also takes a house call from the travel doctor, who offers preventive advice for the long plane ride overseas and visiting the third world. For more information on Travel with Rick Steves - including episode descriptions, program archives and related details - visit www.ricksteves.com.