My goal with this posting is to make Heinsohn's method clear. In the process you can decide for yourself if Ev Cochrane has refuted anything regarding Heinsohn. Let's start with a quote from the English summary of Heinsohn's “Die Sumerer gab es nicht”:
The following is taken straight from some of Heinsohn's presentation slides, hence the missing prose:For two decades this author has been suggesting that certain empires of the Ancient Near East did not really exist, and should therefore be removed from modern textbooks. At the same time realms and empires well-known since antiquity should be restored to the place they once held in the history and chronology of the ancient world.
The logical basis for this proposal is that in order for great empires and civilizations that appear in modern textbooks to be accepted as genuine there must be evidence of their existence in the archaeological layers of the earth. If textbook empires are without such layers, then there are two possibilities: (1) these empires should disappear from the pages of modern textbooks; (2) the existence of these empires must be affirmed by using archaeological layers that are currently assigned to other empires, thus causing these latter empires to disappear.
The author prefers a conservative solution, i.e. possibility (2). Otherwise we would have to throw out teachings and empires that have dominated historical writings for two and a half millennia. We would have to punish thus countless authors of antiquity – Jews, Greeks, Romans and Armenians –by calling them liars, without being able to explain why, in their own time, they had no doubt that the realms described by them were real. Despite their rather quarrelsome dispositions they were united in agreement about the imperial succession of Early Assyrians, Medes (with Chaldeans and Scythians), Persians and Macedonians starting – quite in tune with proven Chinese chronology –after -1000.
Each of the rows that are shown represent the stratigraphical layers and how they are dated by mainstream and down below by Heinsohn. Between Hellenism and the Stone Age we see usually three or four main stratigraphical layers, not more.Ancient Greek (Roman, Armenian etc.) historiography has known a sequence of pre-Hellenistic periods and empires that is seen as completely refuted by modern scholarship because 200 years of excavations did not produce archaeological strata for these empires. This may be exemplified for Assyria:
-330: Hellenism (later Parthians) (with strata in Assyria)
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-550: Persian satrapy Athura for 1st world empire (no strata in Assyria)
-620: Media in Assyria (1st Indo-Aryan empire) (no strata in Assyria)
-750: Ninos-Assyria as mankind‘s 1st empire (no strata in Assyria)
-1150: Beginning of high culture in Assyria (no strata in Assyria)
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- Earlier than -1150: Stone Age (no stone age strata at such a late age)
Heinsohn is stating that Assyrian history as related to us by ancient sources (Greek, Hebrew, Roman, ...) does not conform to the current mainstream view of history. The stratigraphical layers are conventionally dated to be much older than what has been passed down to us from ancient writers. This results in the empires of the ancient historians not showing up in the stratigraphy and empires of the 2nd and 3rd millenium, that were unknown to the ancient historians, taking their place.The bewilderment of modern scholars regarding the incompetence of their ancient colleagues grew exponentially after they had understood that they were not only shameless enough to invent empires for which there are no strata but – with the exception of Hellenism – were also entirely ignorant of the empires whose strata have been found in the last two centuries:
-330: Hellenism (later Parthians) (with strata in Assyria)
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-1300: Middle to Late Assyrians (with strata in Assyria)
-1550: Mitanni in Assyria (1st Indo-Aryan empire) (with strata in Assyria)
-2350: Naram Sin-Assyria as mankind‘s 1st empire (with strata in Assyria)
-3000: Beginning of high culture in Assyria (with strata in Assyria)
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- Earlier than -3000: Stone Age (with strata in Assyria)
Heinsohn‘s reconciliation of ancient and modern scholarship:
The author claims (since 1987) that both groups of scholars got it right. However, they adhere to different dating schemes. Only for Hellenism both schools apply the same ancient Greek date of -330. For earlier periods modern scholars have taken resort to questionable methods that are outlined below:
-330: Hellenism (later Parthians): Ancient Greek dates
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-1300: Middle to Late Assyrians: Sothic and Biblical dates
-1550: Mitanni in Assyria: Sothic dates
-2350: Naram Sin-Assyria: Abraham Biblical dates
-3000: Beginning of high culture: Counting back from Biblical Dates
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- Earlier than -3000: Stone Age: Counting back from Biblical Dates
The first column shows the mainstream dates for the stratigraphical layers, the second one is Heinsohn's dating based on the position and thickness of the layer.Heinsohn‘s solution for Ancient Assyria:
- 330: Hellenism (later Parthians) = -330 Hellenism (later Parthians)
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-1300: Middle to Late Assyrians = -550 Assyria under Persia
-1550: Mitanni in Assyria = -620 Media in Assyria
-2350: Naram Sin-Assyria = -750 Ninos-Assyria
-3000: Beginning of high culture = -1150 Early urban Assyria
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- Earlier than -3000: Stone Age: = Earlier than -1150: Stone Age
So if one brings down the dates to Heinsohn's then the stratigraphical layers conform to the testimony of the ancients, and the "ghost" empires disappear. How can you do that? It is all based on two simple rules of archeology-founded historiography:However, the Greek dates (-1150 to -330) too must be taken with a grain of salt. They may not fit absolute dates once it will be possible to calculate them. Yet, the Greeks got the periods and empires right.
Modern scholars got their archeology right but stumbled by applying Bible-fundamentalism and pseudo-astronomical retro-calculations. Once they have abandoned such measures they will be able to honor their colleagues of the past working under much harder conditions.
- 1. rule: If two strata are lying on top of each other without hiatus then there is a direct historic connection between those two strata
2. rule: If two sites contain strata from the same time then also the strata lying hiatus free below and above those strata belong to the same epoch
Southern Mesopotamia (Babylonia):
(http://www.chrono-rekonstruktion.de/wp- ... mpires.pdf)
Iran (Susa, Perseopolis):Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Macedonians / Parthians; Greek (from -300)
Found: Macedonians and (later) Parthians (from -300)
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? Yes
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Yes
1st Pre-Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Akhaemenid Satrapy Babylonia, Mardoi (tribe of Cyrus); Greek (from -550)
Found: Old to Late Babylonians (-2000/-550). Gap to -300; Biblical Deportation of Judah (Late Babylon.); Sothic pseudo-astronomy (Middle-Babyl.-Cassites); Biblical Abraham genealogy (Martu=Old Babylon)
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? No, too high!
Did ancient Greeks know empires? Supposedly no
2nd Pre-Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Chaldeans (908 settlements); Greek (from -700)
Found: URIII-”Sumerians” (Kalam in [their] own language; -2100); Biblical Abraham genealogy for “Sumerians”
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? No, too high!
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Supposedly no
Searched for: Interregnum of Scythians (known for vassal graves) under Madyas; Greek (from -650)
Found: Qutheans (Guti) with General Madga (-3rd mill.); Vassal graves of Ur; Counted back from Biblical Abraham genealogy
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? No, too high!
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Supposedly no
3rd Pre-Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Early Chaldaeans (cradle of civil.); Greek (from -800)
Found: Early “Sumer” (Kalam, cradle of civilization, -3000); Counted back from Biblical Abraham genealogy
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? No, too high!
Did ancient Greeks know civilization? Supposedly no
(http://www.chrono-rekonstruktion.de/wp- ... mpires.pdf)
The same can be done for other regions. How does Heinsohn arrive at those conclusions? The important part is to carefully read the reports on site-digs. Archaeologists are trained not to plainly write down what they see or find, but to already interpret it for example in the context of a given chronology. They do not check the chronology against their finds. If the chronology requires a hiatus they put it in, even if it is not really there. It then becomes a pseudo-hiatus. A real archaeological hiatus instead is usually visible by aeolian layers, it shows on worn down remains, on complete cultural discontinuities at a site, etc.Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Macedonians / Parthians; Greek (from -300)
Found: Macedonians and (later) Parthians (from -300)
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? Yes
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Yes
1st Pre-Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Akhaemenids; Greek (from -550)
Found: Akhaemenids (from -550)
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? Yes
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Yes
2nd Pre-Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Medes under Cyaxares; Greek (from -700)
Found: “Elamites” under Kutuk-Inshushinak; then gap; Sothic pseudo-astronomy
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? No, too high
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Supposedly no
3rd Pre-Hellenistic strata group:
Searched for: Assyrians as 1st Great Power in control of Media; Ninos (greatest), Sharakos (last king); Greek (from -800)
Found: Old-Elamites under Akkad as 1st Great Power (-2300) in control of Media; Naram-Sin (greatest), Sharkalisharri (last king); Counted back from Biblical Abraham to Naram Sin
Do dates fit stratigraphic depth? No, too high
Did ancient Greeks know empire? Supposedly no
Charles Ginenthal explains the situation very well in “Pillars of the Past II”, p. 43-44:
If we now look for example at the above mentioned (by Ev/Lloyd) site Mari we find directly below the Hellenistic/Parthian strata without archaeological hiatus the Old-Babylonian and then Cassites strata (Heinsohn: Assyrerkönige gleich Perserherrscher!, p. 41 (1996)). If you read the Mari text that Ev/Lloyd quoted between the lines you recognize that there is no real Middle-Assyrian layer, just one building assigned to this “layer” in the outskirts of the dig is mentioned in the quote and a necropolis. Mari has a Middle-Assyrian necropolis but no corresponding city. The Old-Babylonian city has no necropolis (Heinsohn: Maris Chronologie; in Vorzeit-Frühzeit-Gegenwart 1/1992, p. 11-17). At other sites (Brak or Hamadiyah) the Middle-Assyrian layer is found directly under the Hellenistic/Parthian strata without archaeological hiatus (Heinsohn: Assyrerkönige gleich Perserherrscher!, p. 40 (1996)). What does this tell us about Old-Babylonians and Middle-Assyrians if we follow the rules given above? Heinsohn sees the Middle-Assyrians in one layer with the Old Babylonians and both before the Sargonides. They all belong to the same “Persian” layer and as Hamadiyah shows the Middle-Assyrians existed in parallel with Old Babylonians as well as the Sargonides. There is no problem with a Middle-Assyrian necropolis build into the ruins of an Old Babylonian palace.There are two forms of stratigraphical research that must first be distinguished from one another before one can properly determine the chronology of the ancient world. There is a fundamental difference between geological stratigraphy and historical–archaeological stratigraphy. Geological stratigraphy is based on a well understood scientific process. When an ancient city, town, or village was abandoned in Mesopotamia and never resettled or, after being abandoned for a long period the same site was resettled, a geological process occurs that leaves clear-cut evidence to show what happened. Once a place has been abandoned, the wind blows sand, soil, etc., into the streets and the ruins of the buildings of the first settlers that were left standing. These materials, called Aeolian or wind-blown layers, are a rather clear geological marker that tells a geologist that the site was abandoned. When it rains – as it does in Mesopotamia during the winter season – the mud brick walls still standing above these Aeolian deposits slump and flow down over these wind-blown materials, sealing them in place. Erosion does play a part in this process but it is negligible because once the mud-brick walls flow as mud over the Aeolian deposits, desert weeds grow on the mounds of these settlements and protect the mound, or "tell", from further erosion. Even after thousands of years of abandonment, the ancient city, town, or village mounds of Mesopotamia have not been weathered by sandstorms or eroded away. Aeolian layers are fundamental scientific proof that a site has been abandoned.
Historical, archaeological stratigraphy is not based on this geological marker but rather on markers of a very different nature. These markers are the various artifacts: pottery, tools, metals, architectural forms, etc., that are left at a site by different cultures one above the other. By interpreting the level or stratum in an ancient mound where these ancient relics are found, archaeologists determine the sequence of the cultures, which is the stratum at the bottom of the mound. Above that in different strata are the relics of the cultures that came afterwards. The archaeological stratigraphical interpretation of the chronology of these ancient sites is not as clear-cut as stratigraphical geology but an interpretation of what the forms of these ancient relics are and at what level or stratum in the mound they are found would be instructive.
If the chronology of ancient Mesopotamia is 3000 to 4500 years long, as the historians claim, then the settlement gaps at certain sites will be hundreds or even a thousand years or more in length and must be reflected by Aeolian layers as evidence of any assumed settlement gap. If on the other hand, the chronology of the ancient Near East is only around 850 or so years in length, as Heinsohn claims, then none of these civilizations could have been separated from another by 700, 800, to over 1000 years. These civilizations would largely have overlapped one another almost continuously and thus their stratigraphy would rarely show longtime settlement gaps. Under the chronology Heinsohn posits, these cultures would tend to be found one directly above the other without Aeolian layers separating them.
Usually, the bottom strata are older than those above them. But where there is immediate overlap of civilizations we encounter a further problem. The conquering society may employ the artisans of the subjugated one to produce pottery, jewelry, temples, etc., for them as well as using their own artisans to do the same. This creates a somewhat subjective interpretation to the archaeological stratigraphy which cannot be tested and falsified by scientific tests. Therefore, the evidence of geological stratigraphy, because it is based on science and can be tested and falsified, must override historical-archaeological stratigraphy because it is based on interpretations that may be false. Forensic historical evidence comes before interpretive historical-archaeological evidence! Only after the geological stratigraphy has been presented can the archaeological stratigraphy come into play, in order to interpret the chronology, and not the other way round. An archaeological analysis only becomes acceptable after it is validated and underpinned by geological stratigraphy.
And why do we not find the Persians themselves directly at those sites under the Hellenism?
Again Ginenthal (PP II, p. 44):
Another claim of Ev is that in Heinsohn's reconstruction it is impossible to find Neo-Babylonians above Old Babylonians, as it is the case in the city of Babylon itself. But again Ev does not get the full picture, Heinsohn states Old-Babylonian = Middle-Babylonian = Neo-(Late-)Babylonian (eg. “Die Sumerer gab es nicht”, p. 61 (22007). Those groups belong to the same main stratigraphic layer. Finding a Neo-Babylonian palace over Old-Babylonian layers is entirely possible.With respect to the Persians, it is also important to note a further distinction. The Persians ruled over a vast empire and therefore they could not and did not occupy every city, town, or village. Rather, they generally, at first, permitted the original rulers, who had surrendered to them, to act on their behalf as their agents. Only here and there did they station military and political overseers of their own people who were entrusted with carrying out the duties of running their empire.
Is Heinsohn's method really invalidated by what Ev/Lloyd writes? Is he refuted? I don't think so, instead the method of primarily using geographical and archaeological layers and evidence produces the following results for Mesopotamia (quoted from the English summary of “Die Sumerer gab es nicht”):
(A) The dimensions of the Achaemenid Empire remain in the textbooks. They are well-known in the cuneiform literature pars pro toto under the name of the martial and metallurgically competent Persian tribe of the Mardians/Amardians. They are thus the Old Babylonian and/or Middle Assyrian Martu/Amorites who didn’t enter our history books until the late l9th century. Their great kings are really Old to Late Babylonian and/or Middle to Late Assyrian throne names for the Persian rulers of Persia’s two richest provinces – Babylon and Assyria.
(B) The first Indo-Aryan empire of the horse-breeding Medes can be identified in the layers of the Mitanni and the “Old Assyrians” (imperial dimension) and the post-Akkadian Elamites (Iran proper). These powers were only admitted to the history books in the 19th century. Cyaxares, despoiler of Assur, and Shaushatra, despoiler of Ashur, are one and the same Medish Cyaxares. Shamsi Addad, the Amorite from Ekallatum, as well as Kutik-Inshushinak, the King of the four Quarters emerging from Susa, are additional identities of Cyaxares. The Scythians under Madyas as allies of the Medes and Chaldeans against Sharakos likewise return to the history books. The Qutheans (Guti) under Madga, who were admitted to history books in the late 19th century as allies of the “Sumerians” and Elamites against Sharkali-sharri, disappear. The vassal graves of Ur, a unique feature in the entire history of Babylonia, belong to the brief interregnum of Scythians well known for that type of burial.
(C) Chaldea as “the cradle of civilization” returns to the textbooks. To Chaldea are given the archaeological layers that not until 1868 began to be called “Sumer”. In its own cuneiform the country is never called “Sumer” but Kalam. There[fore] “Sumer” disappears from the books.
(D) The Ninos and/or Nimrod Assyrians as the first empire builders of history get the layers of the Old-Akkadians, who got those layers in a 19th century transfer. In Egypt, the empire Assyrians were known as the Great Hyksos. The first Akkadian “world ruler” Naram Sin (= Egyptian Narmer), a great hunter, supplies the empirical basis for Ninos of the Greeks and/or Nimrod of the Hebrews, a “great hunter before the Lord”.