Voorzichtig leerplichtig: stapeldol & knettergek?

"VOORZICHTIG:
werk in uitvoering!"
Re: 21-3-'04

@

BEFORE
THE TIME OF ALEXANDER
Greeks had already been spreading
as merchants, artists, officials and
mercenary soldiers over most of
the Persian dominions?
In the dynastic disputes that followed the death of Xerxes,
a band of 10,000 Greek mercenaries played a part
under the leadership of
XENOPHON
...........

@

THEIR RETURN
to Asiatic Greece from Babylon
is described in his
"Retreat of the Ten Thousand",
one of the FIRST war stories that was ever written
by a general in
command!

@

But
the conquests of Alexander
and the division of his brief empire
among his subordinate generals,
greatly stimulated this permeation of the ancient world by the Greeks
and their language and fashions and culture?!
TRACES of this Greek dissemination are to be found far away
in Central Asia and in north-west India ...
THEIR influence upon the development of Indian art
was profound!

@

For many centuries
Athens retained her prestige as a centre of art and culture ...
Her schools went on indeed till A.D. 529,
that is to say for nearly a thousand years!?
But the leadership in the intellectual activity of the world,
passed presently across the Mediterranean to Alexandria,
the new trading city that Alex
had founded!
HERE
the Macedonian general Ptolemy had become Pharaoh,
with a court that spoke
Greek
...
HE
had become an intimate of Alex before he became king,
and he was deeply saturated with the ideas of Aristotle.
He set himself, with great energy and capacity,
to organise knowledge and
investigation.
He also wrote a myDi-history of Alexander's campaigns which,
unhappily, is lost to
the world!

@

Alexander
had already devoted
considerable sums to finance the inquiries of Aristotle,
but Ptolemy I was the first person to make a permanent endowment
of science:
he set up a foundation in Alexandria
which was formally dedicated to the Muses,
the Museum of Alexandria
...





For two or three generations
the scientific work done at Alexandria was
extraordinarily good!
EUCLID,
ERATOSTHENES who measured the size of the earth and came within fifty miles of its true diameter,
Apollonius who wrote on conic sections,
Hipparchus who made the first star map and catalogue,
and Hero who devised the first steam-engine
are among the greater stars of an extraordinary constellation of
scientific pioneers
.............
ARCHIMEDES
came from Syracuse to Alexandria to study,
and was a frequent correspondent of the Museum.
Herophilus was one of the greatest of Greek anatomists,
and it said to have practised
vivisection
........

@

For a generation or so
during the reigns of Ptolemy I and Ptolemy II
there was such a blaze of knowledge and discovery at Alexandria
as the world was not to see again until the sixteenth
century A.D.?!
BUT it did not continue!
There may have been several causes
of this decline
........

CHIEF
among them,
was the fact that the Museum was a 'royal' college
and all its professors and fellows were appointed and paid by Pharaoh?
This was all very well when Pharaoh was Ptolemy I,
the pupil and friend of Aristotle
...

But as the dynasty of the Ptolemies went on
they became Egyptianised,
they fell under the sway of Egyptian priests and Egyptian religious
developments, they ceased to follow the work that was done,
and their control stifled the spirit of enquiry
altogether
........

The Museum produced little good work after its first century
of activity
.............

@

Ptolemy I not only sought in the most modern spirit to organise the finding of freh knowledge.
He also tried to set up an encyclopaedic storehouse of wisdom
in the Library of Alexandria
..............
IT
was not simply a storehouse,
it was also a book-copying and book-selling organisation!
A great army pf copyists was set to work
perpetually multiplying copies of
books!

@

HERE THEN
we have the definite first opening-up of the intellectual process
in which we live today;
HERE we have the systematic gathering and distribution
of knowledge
.....................

The foundation of this Museum and Library
marks one of the great epochs in
the myDi-history of
mankind!
IT IS THE TRUE
BEGINNING
OF MODERN
HISTORY?!


"Gloria
in excelsis Deo:
Hallelujah Etc
etera
..."
WE
made this
evening some white
Indian rice,
paksoy, sauerkraut
and mixed beef & herbs, Indian cress,
mushrooms & salad
...
with water & wine
...
in order to dine fine
...
and also asked ourselves
every now and then:
WHERE
would we be
without Avraham & Alexander,
Babylon and Buddha, Cyrus and Christ,
Darius & Daniel, Etruscans & Emperors, Fuckers & Fighters,
Prophets & Yeshu & Gods & Great People & 'Humble'
High Spirits like you & me
in myDi & Everywhere Else
all around the world!?
SOMEHOW
it all fits together like a giant puzzle with millions
of pieces
...
And
whether we know it,
like it and want it or not:
WE
ARE PART
of IT all!?
The languages we speak {or don't},
the ideas we have {or haven't}
and all those other little big details:
feelings, thoughts, actions, sciences, jobs & businesses,
religions and dreams,
reading & writing in myDi-now
& right-here
...?!
IT IS
ONE
...!?
in all
its
diversity
liefdesverdrietgemeenverwardgaap!bah!nahnahverdrietigcool!erg vrolijkknipoogvrolijkverliefd
HOW does it feel
& what do
you do
about it
while still alive
and
kicking
...
?
engel
04 jul 2004 - bewerkt op 10 jan 2008 - meld ongepast verhaal
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Asih, man, 81 jaar
   
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