Books by Jens Nieling

For 200 years, from the second half of the 6th century BC to the decades before 330 BC, the Persian dynasty of the Achaemenids ruled an enormous empire stretching from the Mediterranean to Afganistan and India. The Great Kings Dareios I and Xerxes I even tried to conquer Greece and the northern Black Sea, but failed. Why were they interested in the Pontic area? In contrast to rich satrapies, such as Egypt, Phoenicia, and Syria, the Black Sea had no prosperous cities to offer. After 479 BC, the Persians acknowledged that the coast and Caucasus formed the natural borders of the empire. Nevertheless, the satraps became involved in the affairs of the Black Sea region in order to safeguard the empire's frontiers. The local inhabitants of the region became bearers and transmitters of Persian culture.

This German doctoral thesis challenges the orthodox view that the South-Caucasian culture of the Late Bronze Age played a decisive role in early iron production. The region is characterized, on the contrary, as a traditionally-bound aristocratic society with an impressive bronze industry. It was the underestimated nomad population of South-Eastern Turkey that first made use of the new metal and discovered the art of steel making. Climatic changes forced a southward migration, which not only brought the two cultures into contact, but also into conflict, with each other. A process of successful acculturation finally resulted in the creation of the Urartian Empire. For some time the neighbouring Assyrian and Neohittite states remained hesitant towards the adoption of advanced iron technology, but this soon changed as they recognized the opportunity for cheap mass-production. Text in German.