AHC/WI: Third Assyrian Empire

The challenge is to create a third assyrian empire successfully rise up sometime between the death of Cyrus The Great and Alexander's invasion of Persia.

As I understand it, Assyrian soldiers were an important heavy infantry contingent to the Persian army-so there is a highly capable Assyrian force in the Persian army that could...help lead this revolt. What could be some consequences of a successful Assyrian uprising?
 
The challenge is to create a third assyrian empire successfully rise up sometime between the death of Cyrus The Great and Alexander's invasion of Persia.

As I understand it, Assyrian soldiers were an important heavy infantry contingent to the Persian army-so there is a highly capable Assyrian force in the Persian army that could...help lead this revolt. What could be some consequences of a successful Assyrian uprising?

I read in English Wikipedia that there is a version that Assyrians were important in the Achaemenid Persian army.
But there is another version that after the fall Assyria was devastated.
I am not sure but I am closer to the second opinion.

But there were a few revolts in Assyria during the Persian domination. So under certain circumstances you might have another Assyrian Empire. Why not?
But the "real" ethnic Assyrians of the heroic past were no more. The "real" Akkadian speaking Assyrians died in numerous wars of the last Assyrian Empire and were replaced by the Aramaic speaking tribes moved to Assyria which were a poor substitute as soldiers.
The last bilingual Assyrian nobility speaking both Akkadian-Assyrian and Aramaic died during the violent fall of of the Assyrian Empire.
So the new "Assyrian" Empire would have had no real ethnic Assyrian soldiers and even no real ethnic "Assyrian" nobility. That would be a bunch of Aramaic speaking tribes keeping the name "Assyria" as their geographical place of accommodation.
 
I read in English Wikipedia that there is a version that Assyrians were important in the Achaemenid Persian army.
But there is another version that after the fall Assyria was devastated.
I am not sure but I am closer to the second opinion.

But there were a few revolts in Assyria during the Persian domination. So under certain circumstances you might have another Assyrian Empire. Why not?
But the "real" ethnic Assyrians of the heroic past were no more. The "real" Akkadian speaking Assyrians died in numerous wars of the last Assyrian Empire and were replaced by the Aramaic speaking tribes moved to Assyria which were a poor substitute as soldiers.
The last bilingual Assyrian nobility speaking both Akkadian-Assyrian and Aramaic died during the violent fall of of the Assyrian Empire.
So the new "Assyrian" Empire would have had no real ethnic Assyrian soldiers and even no real ethnic "Assyrian" nobility. That would be a bunch of Aramaic speaking tribes keeping the name "Assyria" as their geographical place of accommodation.

Well, yes. So what would be the effects of having this new Assyrian state (presumably if they are able to successfully revolt, the Persian Empire is facing a lot of other problems and reeling).
 
Well, you have to start by figuring out how the Persian Empire is going to collapse, because the Mesopotamia was really very loyal to the Achaemenids once Cyrus conquered Babylon, so there's not an obvious PoD for Mesopotamian independence. My bet for the best PoD is to have Darius die and Cambyses live - let Cambyses and Bardiya fight a civil war while revolts elsewhere destroy the empire they're fighting to rule.

Russian's right with the whole lack of an Assyrian nobility thing. Even though it would only have been a hundred years since the fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the Assyrian line and culture had been pretty thoroughly defeated then. The more likely thing to happen is a resurgence of the Chaldean/Babylonian Empire, which would only be a couple decades removed from power and plenty of nobles who could win support as a rebel king.

You could have a new Assyrian state rise up, I'm not trying to say it's impossible, but it'd probably be more like the Chaldeans were to the original Babylonians rather than a continuation of the earlier empires - occupying the same land but not the same people. And I would imagine that that a theoretical third Assyrian Empire would move its administrative functions south to Babylon in the end anyways, since the great cities of Assyria were much less important by this time, and if that happens they'll depend on the Chaldean nobility to help rule anyways. So I think a Neo-Chaldean Empire is probably the most likely thing that's closest to what you're looking for.

The effects of such a state are hard to say. I would assume that things would end up kind of reverting back to how they were pre-Cyrus, with Egypt happily independent again, a Mesopotamian state (either the Chaldeans or new Assyrians), an Iranian state, and an Anatolian state or two. Maybe one of them tries to conquer all the others, maybe they achieve a long-term balance of power. For the Greeks, it probably keeps Greece poorer and more locked into petty polis warfare - Persian wealth empowered Greece as much as any sarissa or dory did, and there's no great unifying tradition of defeating Darius and then Xerxes. Perhaps this makes Sparta, the polis least dependent on wealth, more powerful long-term in Greece?
 
Well, you have to start by figuring out how the Persian Empire is going to collapse, because the Mesopotamia was really very loyal to the Achaemenids once Cyrus conquered Babylon, so there's not an obvious PoD for Mesopotamian independence. My bet for the best PoD is to have Darius die and Cambyses live - let Cambyses and Bardiya fight a civil war while revolts elsewhere destroy the empire they're fighting to rule.

Russian's right with the whole lack of an Assyrian nobility thing. Even though it would only have been a hundred years since the fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, the Assyrian line and culture had been pretty thoroughly defeated then. The more likely thing to happen is a resurgence of the Chaldean/Babylonian Empire, which would only be a couple decades removed from power and plenty of nobles who could win support as a rebel king.

You could have a new Assyrian state rise up, I'm not trying to say it's impossible, but it'd probably be more like the Chaldeans were to the original Babylonians rather than a continuation of the earlier empires - occupying the same land but not the same people. And I would imagine that that a theoretical third Assyrian Empire would move its administrative functions south to Babylon in the end anyways, since the great cities of Assyria were much less important by this time, and if that happens they'll depend on the Chaldean nobility to help rule anyways. So I think a Neo-Chaldean Empire is probably the most likely thing that's closest to what you're looking for.

The effects of such a state are hard to say. I would assume that things would end up kind of reverting back to how they were pre-Cyrus, with Egypt happily independent again, a Mesopotamian state (either the Chaldeans or new Assyrians), an Iranian state, and an Anatolian state or two. Maybe one of them tries to conquer all the others, maybe they achieve a long-term balance of power. For the Greeks, it probably keeps Greece poorer and more locked into petty polis warfare - Persian wealth empowered Greece as much as any sarissa or dory did, and there's no great unifying tradition of defeating Darius and then Xerxes. Perhaps this makes Sparta, the polis least dependent on wealth, more powerful long-term in Greece?
Speaking of a Babylonian resurgence, I found this jewel that goes into detail on Babylonia under the Persians: http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/babylonia-i

Anyway, I feel the Spartans couldn't remain the dominant power in Greece. If this POD happens before the Peloponessian War, weren't they still far too worried about their helots and other potential problems on the Peloponesse (like Argos) to send their armies any distance for too long? After the Peloponessian War, I believe they were dependent on Persian gold and their days just seemed to be numbered (could be wrong on the dependent on Persian wealth part though). Thebes could be a major player, in the absence of Athens increasing its wealth via its trading empire.
 
Speaking of a Babylonian resurgence, I found this jewel that goes into detail on Babylonia under the Persians: http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/babylonia-i

That is pretty great; I'll have to thumb through it here in a sec.

Anyway, I feel the Spartans couldn't remain the dominant power in Greece. If this POD happens before the Peloponessian War, weren't they still far too worried about their helots and other potential problems on the Peloponesse (like Argos) to send their armies any distance for too long? After the Peloponessian War, I believe they were dependent on Persian gold and their days just seemed to be numbered (could be wrong on the dependent on Persian wealth part though). Thebes could be a major player, in the absence of Athens increasing its wealth via its trading empire.

What I was saying is that they're the least dependent of the major Greek powers on outside trade, so they would be the least affected by the lack of Persian wealth. Sparta did absolutely use Persian gold to finance their hegemony, but it came into its position of power far less so because of Persian trade than Athens did or even Thebes. All of the Greek cities, including Sparta, would probably be less powerful as a result, but considering how Sparta was the strongest Greek city from the Battle of the Champions to Leuctra (excepting the Periclean era in Athens through to maybe the Sicilian Expedition), and Sparta's odd societal structure, I'm imagining that it will be even stronger relatively speaking than it was IOTL. That all said, the structural flaws of the Spartan state will eventually doom it just like OTL, so I'm not saying Sparta would have a permanent hegemony over Greece either. Hopefully I'm making sense; I don't feel like I'm explaining my stance well. :eek:

And honestly I've always thought that Sparta's fear of sending armies any distance away is overblown. They did so plenty when it was in the state's best interests to do so. Agesilaos II spent half his reign campaigning in Anatolia. The helots are a major concern but not one that cripples their strategic thinking.
 
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And honestly I've always thought that Sparta's fear of sending armies any distance away is overblown. They did so plenty when it was in the state's best interests to do so. Agesilaos II spent half his reign campaigning in Anatolia. The helots are a major concern but not one that cripples their strategic thinking.

I have nothing to argue with you on the rest, just this part. I think post-Peloponessian War, Sparta became far more comfortable with sending troops out as they recognized it more of as a necessity (IMO) now that they had kind of taken over the Athenians place in Greek politics. Even Thucydides mentions Sparta's extreme unwillingness to leave the Peloponesse (their constant insistence of any defense from foreign invasion by the Greeks should be at isthmus of Corinth supports this as well), so it seems to have been a common assumption among the Greeks of the time as well.
 
I have nothing to argue with you on the rest, just this part. I think post-Peloponessian War, Sparta became far more comfortable with sending troops out as they recognized it more of as a necessity (IMO) now that they had kind of taken over the Athenians place in Greek politics. Even Thucydides mentions Sparta's extreme unwillingness to leave the Peloponesse (their constant insistence of any defense from foreign invasion by the Greeks should be at isthmus of Corinth supports this as well), so it seems to have been a common assumption among the Greeks of the time as well.

I guess the way I've always seen it is that circumstances changed and Sparta's responsibilities and sphere of influence grew larger, so it had more reason to send troops further away, rather than it becoming more comfortable over time doing so after having been forced to do so due to the Persian Wars experience. While Athens ruled in Attica and Thebes in Boeotia, Sparta intervened (and later on ruled) in affairs all over the Peloponnese, from home base in Laconia and Messenia, to Arcadia, Achaea, Argolis, Corinth, Elis, etc., and Cleomenes I even famously tried to interfere in the chaotic events that marked the birth of Athenian democracy. Wanting the defense at the isthmus in my opinion is because of two things: because it is a phenomenal chokepoint from which to defend (although Greece is obviously full of those), and because the Peloponnese is their sphere of influence, not Attica or Boeotia. It is the reputation they gained even in ancient times but I'm not convinced that it's a fair one.
 
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