Our Oriental Heritage

by Will Durant

  Western Han Dynasty, 698*

  Westminster Abbey (Henry VII’s Chapel), 599

  Whistler, James Abbott MacNeill, American etcher and painter (1834-1903), 909, 910, 912

  Whitman, Walt, American poet (1819-1892), 341*, 516, 909

  Whitsuntide, 65

  Wilde, Oscar O’Flahertie Fingal Wills, Irish poet and dramatist (1856-1900), 858–859

  Wilhelm Meister, 883

  Wilson, Thomas Woodrow, President of the United States (1856-1924), 467

  Winckler, Hugo, German Assyriologist (died 1913), 286

  Winter Palace Hotel, at Luxor, 140

  Winternitz, M., 536*, 579

  Wisdom of Amenope, 167

  Wolff, Christian, German philosopher and mathematician (1679-1754), 693

  Woman, position of, in primitive societies, 30–35, 69–70

  in Sumeria, 129–130

  in Egypt, 164–167

  in Babylonia, 247–248

  in Assyria, 275

  in Judea, 333, 334, 339

  in Persia, 375

  in India, 400–401, 493–496

  in China, 792, 819–820

  in Japan, 860–861

  Woodward, Sir Arthur Smith, 92

  Woolley, C. Leonard, 119, 130, 395†

  Woosung , 778

  Wordsworth, William, English poet (1770-1850), 754, 858, 883

  Works and Days, 329‡

  World Court, 931

  World’s Columbian Expedition, 618

  Writing, 135

  origins of, 14, 76–77, 104–106

  in Sumeria, 118*, 130–131, 135

  in Egypt, 131, 135, 144–145, 171–173

  in Babylonia, 119*, 131, 248–249

  in the Hittite Empire, 286–287

  in Phoenicia, 295–296, 298

  in Persia, 357

  in India, 406–407

  in China, 76, 745*, 772–773, in Japan, 76, 877

  Wu Shu , Chinese encyclopedist (947-1002), 731

  Wu Tao-tze , Chinese painter (born ca. 700), 749–750

  Wu Ti, Chinese emperor (140-87 B.C.), 675, 698–700, 779

  Wu Wang, Chinese emperor (1122-1115 B.C.), 686

  Wu Yi , Chinese emperor (1198-1194 B.C.), 644, 677

  Wu-tai-shan , 742

  X

  “Xanadu” , 761*

  Xanthippe, Greek, wife of Socrates (ca. 470-400 B.C.), 165

  Xavier, St. Francis, Apostle of the Indies (1506-1552), 469–471

  Xenophon, Greek historian and general (445-355 B.C.), 284, 352

  Xerxes I, King of Persia (485-464 B.C.), 222*, 249, 294, 358, 360, 373, 378, 379, 381–382, 383, 384

  Xerxes II, King of Persia (425 B.C.), 382

  Y

  Yahu , 310; see Yahveh

  Yahveh , 210, 211, 302, 305, 307, 309, 310–313, 318, 320, 321, 323, 324, 325, 326, 329, 332, 333, 335, 336, 338, 340, 344, 345, 346, 348, 349, 370

  Yajnavalkya , 410–411, 413, 414–415, 533

  Yajur-veda , 407

  Yakuts, 38, 52

  Yama , 405, 408–409, 516, 543

  Yami (yä’-mē), 408–409

  Yang and yin , 650, 732, 783

  Yang Chu , Chinese Epicurean philosopher (fl. 390 B.C.), 679–682

  Yang Kwei-fei (gwā-fā) (died 755), 704, 707, 708, 714*, 715

  Yang-tze (yäng-dzŭ) River, 641*, 806

  Yano Yeitoku , Japanese sculptor (ca. 1590), 895

  Yao (you), Chinese emperor (2356-2255 B.C.), 643, 661, 676, 687, 689

  Yariba, 43

  Yashts (yäsh-t-s), 365‡

  Yasna , 365‡, 367

  Yasumaro , Japanese historian (ca. 712), 885

  Yedo (yā-dō), 841; see Tokyo

  Yeishin Sozu , Japanese painter (ca. 1017), 903

  Yellow River, see Hoang-ho

  Yellow Sea, 641, 863

  Yemen (yěm’-ěn), 135

  Yen Hwuy (yăn hwē), Confucian disciple (ca. 500 B.C.), 660

  Yoga , 504, 541–545, 564

  Yoga-sutras, 543

  Yogis (yō’-gēz), 541–542, 545, 614

  Yokohama , 830, 920

  Yomei (yō-mā), Emperor of Japan (died 586), 833

  Yoni , 519, 520

  Yoritomo , Japanese dictator (1186-1199), 837

  Yoritomo, Japanese shogun (13th century), 899

  Yoshimasa , Japanese shogun (1436-1480), 838, 905

  Yoshimitsu , Japanese shogun (1387-1395), 838, 865†, 895, 904

  Yoshimune , Japanese shogun (1716-1745)* 843-844, 850–851, 873, 914, 927

  Yoshiwara , 862

  “Young Folk of the Pear Garden,” 721

  Young India, 631

  Young, Thomas, English philosopher and scholar (1773-1829), 145*

  Yozei (yō-zā), Emperor of Japan (877-949), 834

  Yü (ü), Chinese emperor (2205-2197 B.C.), 644, 680, 737–738, 739

  Yu Tze , Chinese philosopher (ca. 1250 B.C.), 650

  Yuan Chwang , Chinese traveler in India (7th century), 421, 446, 449, 453–454, 456, 481, 497, 499, 501, 521, 531, 557, 589, 593*, 594, 702

  Yuan Dynasty, 757

  see Mongol Dynasty

  Yuan Shi-kai , President of China (1848-1916), 811

  Yucatan, 2, 90, 107

  Yudishthira , 516, 561, 570

  Yuga , 513

  Yün Kan (ün kän), 739

  Yun Men , 740

  Yung Lo , Chinese emperor 1403-1425), 731, 742, 767

  Z

  Zagros (zä-grōs) Mountains, 122

  Zapouna , 296

  Zarathustra , Median sage (660-583 B.C.), 331‡, 364–368, 370, 371, 372, 374, 375*, 422*

  Zechariah , Hebrew prophet (ca. 520 B.C.), 294

  Zedekiáh , King of Judah 597-586 B.C.), 321-322, 323, 324

  Zen (zěn), 864, 872, 903

  Zend (language), 357, 397†

  Zend-Avesta , 350, 357, 364, 365–366, 369, 370, 374, 376, 406

  Zengoro Hozen (zěn-gō-rō hô-zěn), Japanese potter (died 1855), 901

  Zeno, Greek philosopher (ca. 342-270 B.C.), 553

  Zephaniah , Hebrew prophet (ca. 630 B.C.), 345*

  Zerubbabel , Hebrew prince (fl. 520 B.C.), 327

  Zeus, 60, 402

  Ziggurats , 133

  Zophar (zō’-fär), 344

  Zoroaster ,see Zarathustra

  Zoroastrianism, 351, 354, 364–372, 374, 405, 469, 471, 508*

  Zoser , King of Egypt (ca. 3150 B.C.), 147, 186, 189

  Zulus, 48, 57

  * Cf. p. 193 below.

  † The contributions of the Orient to our cultural heritage are summed up in the concluding pages of this volume.

  * Carter, T. F., The Invention of Printing in China, and Its Spread Westward; New York, 1925, p. xviii.

  * The reader will find, at the end of this volume, a glossary defining foreign terms, a bibliography with guidance for further reading, a pronouncing index, and a body of references corresponding to the superior figures in the text.

  * The word civilization (Latin civilis—pertaining to the civis, citizen) is comparatively young. Despite Boswell’s suggestion Johnson refused to admit it to his Dictionary in 1772; he preferred to use the word civility.2

  * Blood, as distinct from race, may affect a civilization in the sense that a nation may be retarded or advanced by breeding from the biologically (not racially) worse or better strains among the people.

  * Despite recent high example to the contrary,1 the word civilization will be used in this volume to mean social organization, moral order, and cultural activity; while culture will mean, according to the context, either the practice of manners and the arts, or the sum-total of a people’s institutions, customs and arts. It is in the latter sense that the word culture will be used in reference to primitive or prehistoric societies.

  * Note the ultimate identity of the words provision, providence and prudence.

  * Reduced type, unindented, will be used occasionally for technical or dispensable matter.

  * The American I
ndians, content with this device, never used the wheel.

  * Perhaps one reason why communism tends to appear chiefly at the beginning of civilizations is that it flourishes most readily in times of dearth, when the common danger of starvation fuses the individual into the group. When abundance comes, and the danger subsides, social cohesion is lessened, and individualism increases; communism ends where luxury begins. As the life of a society becomes more complex, and the division of labor differentiates men into diverse occupations and trades, it becomes more and more unlikely that all these services will be equally valuable to the group; inevitably those whose greater ability enables them to perform the more vital functions will take more than their equal share of the rising wealth of the group. Every growing civilization is a scene of multiplying inequalities; the natural differences of human endowment unite with differences of opportunity to produce artificial differences of wealth and power; and where no laws or despots suppress these artificial inequalities they reach at last a bursting point where the poor have nothing to lose by violence, and the chaos of revolution levels men again into a community of destitution.

  Hence the dream of communism lurks in every modern society as a racial memory of a simpler and more equal life; and where inequality or insecurity rises beyond sufferance, men welcome a return to a condition which they idealize by recalling its equality and forgetting its poverty. Periodically the land gets itself redistributed, legally or not, whether by the Gracchi in Rome, the Jacobins in France, or the Communists in Russia; periodically wealth is redistributed, whether by the violent confiscation of property, or by confiscatory taxation of incomes and bequests. Then the race for wealth, goods and power begins again, and the pyramid of ability takes form once more; under whatever laws may be enacted the abler man manages somehow to get the richer soil, the better place, the lion’s share; soon he is strong enough to dominate the state and rewrite or interpret the laws; and in time the inequality is as great as before. In this aspect all economic history is the slow heart-beat of the social-organism, a vast systole and diastole of naturally concentrating wealth and naturally explosive revolution.

  * So in our time that Mississippi of inventions which we call the Industrial Revolution has enormously intensified the natural inequality of men.

  * It is a law that holds only for early societies, since under more complex conditions a variety of other factors—greater wealth, better weapons, higher intelligence—contribute to determine the issue. So Egypt was conquered not only by Hyksos, Ethiopian, Arab and Turkish nomads, but also by the settled civilizations of Assyria, Persia, Greece, Rome and England—though not until these nations had become hunters and nomads on an imperialistic scale.

  * Note how this word betrays the origin of the state.

  * A phrase apparently invented by Cicero.

  * Perhaps an exception should be made in the case of the Brahmans, who, by the Code of Manu (VIII, 336-8), were called upon to bear greater punishments for the same crime than members of lower castes; but this regulation was well honored in the breach.

  † Some of our most modern cities are trying to revive this ancient time-saving institution.

  * Cf. below, p. 245.

  * Briffault thinks that marriage by capture was a transition from matrilocal to patriarchal marriage: the male, refusing to go and live with the tribe or family of his wife, forced her to come to his.26 Lippert believed that exogamy arose as a peaceable substitute for capture;26a theft again graduated into trade.

  * This is half the theme of Synge’s drama, The Playboy of the Western World.

  * However, the range within which the moral code is applied has narrowed since the Middle Ages, as the result of the rise of nationalism.

  * Cf. Chap, XII, § vi below.

  * Freud, with characteristic imaginativeness, believes that the totem was a transfigured symbol of the father, revered and hated for his omnipotence, and rebelliously murdered and eaten by his sons.117 Durkheim thought that the totem was a symbol of the clan, revered and hated (hence held “sacred” and “unclean”) by the individual for its omnipotence and irksome dictatorship; and that the religious attitude was originally the feeling of the individual toward the authoritarian group.118

  * Relics of ancestor-worship may be found among ourselves in our care and visitation of graves, and our masses and prayers for the dead.

  * From the Portuguese feitico, fabricated or factitious.

  * Cf. the contemporary causation of birth control by urban industrialism, and the gradual acceptance of such control by the Church.

  * Such onomatopoeia still remains a refuge in linguistic emergencies. The Englishman eating his first meal in China, and wishing to know the character of the meat he was eating, inquired, with Anglo-Saxon dignity and reserve, “Quack, quack?” To which the Chinaman, shaking his head, answered cheerfully, “Bow-wow.”4

  † E.g., divine is from Latin divus, which is from deus, Greek theos, Sanskrit deva, meaning god; in the Gypsy tongue the word for god, by a strange prank, becomes devel. Historically goes back to the Sanskrit root vid, to know; Greek oida, Latin video (see), French voir (see), German wissen (know), English to wit; plus the suffixes tor (as in author, praetor, rhetor), ic, al, and ly (═ like). Again, the Sanskrit root ar, to plough, gives the Latin arare, Russian orati, English to ear the land, arable, art, oar, and perhaps the word Aryan—the ploughers.6

  * Extract from an advertisement in the Town Hall (New York) program of March 5, 1934: “Horoscopes, by,—————————Astrologer to New York’s most distinguished social and professional clientele. Ten dollars an hour.”

  * This word will be used as applying to all ages before historical records.

  * Current geological theory places the First Ice Age about 500,000 B.C.; the First Interglacial Stage about 475,000 to 400,000 B.C.; the Second Ice Age about 400,000 B.C.; the Second Interglacial Stage about 375,000 to 175,000 B.C; the Third Ice Age about 175,000 B.C.; the Third Interglacial Stage about 150,000 to 50,000 B.C; the Fourth (and latest) Ice Age about 50,000 to 25,000 B.C2 We are now in the Postglacial Stage, whose date of termination has not been accurately calculated. These and other details have been arranged more visibly in the table at the head of this chapter.

  * An oasis west of the Middle Nile.

  * Combarelles, Les Eyzies, Font de Gaume, etc.

  * Remains of similar lake dwellings have been found in France, Italy, Scotland, Russia, North America, India, and elsewhere. Such villages still exist in Borneo, Sumatra, New Guinea, etc.26 Venezuela owes its name (Little Venice) to the fact that when Alonso de Ojeda discovered it for Europe (1499) he found the natives living in pile-dwellings on Lake Maracaibo.27

  * If we accept “Peking Man” as early Pleistocene.

  * A submarine plateau, from 2000 to 3000 metres below the surface, runs north and south through the mid-Atlantic, surrounded on both sides by “deeps” of 5000 to 6000 metres.

  * Professor Breasted believes that the antiquity of this culture, and that of Anau, has been exaggerated by De Morgan, Pumpelly and other students.2

  * The unearthing of this forgotten culture is one of the romances of archeology. To those whom, with a poor sense of the amplitude of time, we call “the ancients”—that is, to the Romans, the Greeks and the Jews—Sumeria was unknown. Herodotus apparently never heard of it; if he did, he ignored it, as something more ancient to him than he to us. Berosus, a Babylonian historian writing about 250 B.C., knew of Sumeria only through the veil of a legend. He described a race of monsters, led by one Oannes, coming out of the Persian Gulf, and introducing the arts of agriculture, metal-working, and writing; “all the things that make for the amelioration of life,” he declares, “were bequeathed to men by Oannes, and since that time no further inventions have been made.”6 Not till two thousand years after Berosus was Sumeria rediscovered. In 1850 Hincks recognized that cuneiform writing—made by pressing a wedge-pointed stylus upon soft clay, and used in the Semitic languages of the Near East—had be
en borrowed from an earlier people with a largely non-Semitic speech; and Oppert gave to this hypothetical people the name “Sumerian.”7 About the same time Rawlinson and his aides found, among Babylonian ruins, tablets containing vocabularies of this ancient tongue, with interlinear translations, in modern college style, from the older language into Babylonian.8 In 1854 two Englishmen uncovered the sites of Ur, Eridu and Uruk; at the end of the nineteenth century French explorers revealed the remains of Lagash, including tablets recording the history of the Sumerian kings; and in our own time Professor Woolley of the University of Pennsylvania, and many others, have exhumed the primeval city of Ur, where the Sumerians appear to have reached civilization by 4500 B.C. So the students of many nations have worked together on this chapter of that endless mystery story in which the detectives are archeologists and the prey is historic truth. Nevertheless, there has been as yet only a beginning of research in Sumeria; there is no telling what vistas of civilization and history will be opened up when the ground has been worked, and the material studied, as men have worked and studied in Egypt during the last one hundred years.

  * Cf. above, p. 104.