Those who are interested in historical studies, especially in the case of ancient Iranians, the name of Zabbihollah Mansoori is a familiar name for them; the eloquent writing, and His simple and fluent style makes it easier to read his works. He passed away a few years ago, and had always claimed that his books were translations of certain foreign historians who specialized in Iranian history. His writings, therefore, are not factual, and although each story is based in general on some historically documented accounts, but what the reader reads in his books is truly a fictional novel that is mostly the product of Mansouri’s imagination.
In an article in Sharq Newspaper by Ali Akbar Qazizadeh, in July 16, 2007, entitled "Clarify the Task of Zabihollah Mansouri", he presented solutions to elucidate the status of Mansouri's works. He writes:
“All of these works are presented to readers in the name of translation, but scholars and literature experts know that those Western writers whose books are introduced in their names, can be classified under one of these three categories:
1) These writers may have a foreign existence, but they have not written a book in such title or theme,
2) They may exist, but they have written a pamphlet, essay, or a multi-leaf note that has been transformed into a detailed book by mansouri's creative and constructive mind,
3) Or basically, since the beginning of the genesis of planet Earth, such people have not been born at all, let alone have written a book that Zabihollah Mansouri has translated into Persian.”
One of Mansouri's most famous books is "The majestic wars (imperial wars) of Iranians in Chaldoran and Greece", which claimed to have been translated by him from the book written by an American historian by the name of Joan Bark about these two important and ancient Persian wars. In this summary the second part of the book, the Iranian War in Greece, is analyzed.
To clarify original working of this book, the supposed author, American Joan Bark, was searched on Google, Facebook, and Wikipedia in different Latin spellings, but no one with that name as an author was found. The only conclusion was that these events were nothing but the product translator's creative mind. However, many names, events, and places were correctly recorded according to this book, meaning that Mansouri had a full knowledge of the actual historical events.
The story of the book is that Xerxes, Darius's son, decided to get a revenge for his father, after his father's death, and shortly after Xerces’ reign, by attacking Greece. To ensure his victory, Xerxes prepared a great and massive army, as no one had seen such colossal and well prepared military unit before.
The story of the attack is narrated by a Greek man from the old Spartan country. He is a religious man, a sorcerer and a wizard, by the name of Magus Tass, and since he can foresee the future, people call him The Prophet. About Iranians moving towards Greece in a war posture, the queen of Spartan asks The Prophet to foresee the future of the war Iranians attempt to wage on Greece. Devastated by the vision, the future he envisions is so violent that he does not dare to reveal it. However, in this story, The Prophet tells us the story as he witnesses it, which is what he had pictured it to be, as he can read into the future.
What follows is Mr. Mansouri’s writings about this story, and at the end, it will be compared with another historical writing of the same war by an American historian. The novel also includes a beautiful love story, which will be omitted from this short essay.
The author narrates in such a detail, as if he was there witnessing the events himself. For example, when the two lovers, Alas and Tuser, are sitting under the moonlight and exchanging love words, the scenery, their facial expressions, the environment surrounding them, the air and the sky, and all other conditions of the scenery are described in such a minute details, as if the author himself was present at the time. This adds to the romance of the story tenfold, and fascinates the reader. However, when we compare the whole story with historical facts, we find many discrepancies.
In this story, each Greek country (at that time the Great Greece was formed from a few smaller countries, the largest of which was Athens, and it included Spartan and Kernett, and a few other countries. Although independent, but these nations always competed for power, and they were never united. Each country had two kings, for the possibility that if one dies or gets killed, the other would continue the current affairs of the country.
After the Greeks became aware of the attacking Iranian assault, the King of Athens, at their gathering to discuss the issue, asks other Greek kings to put their disputes aside and cooperate, in order to defend their countries and defeat the foreign invader. He recommends to create a large army participated by each Greek country in defending their homeland in driving the Iranian army back. Among all the kings, king of Spartan agrees to contribute and even to take command of the army. However, most of the kings do not believe they would win the war and they refuse to participate in the battle. They consider negotiating with Persians.
Kings of Athens and Spartan, as the only kingdoms to defend the land, can only use their imperial guards legions of 3,000 men. As Iranians pass Thermopylae, a very narrow ridge, these armies attack them and prevent them from passing.
The Thermopylae valley with a short width and length and height, separates Greek countries from the eastern regions of the republic. In this story, the King of Iran is prepared for the war with the greatest equipment of the war available at the time, with several thousand columns of soldiers from all its territories, in addition to a great naval force. In their progress however, any attempt Iranian soldiers make in order to open Thermopylae ridge, it fails, and they cannot succeed in passing through the ridge.
As the story goes, there is a Greek man by the name of “Ephialtes” who knows the routs of the mountain. He offers the king of Iran to show the soldiers how to bypass the ridge, if he receives a prize. The king agrees to pay him certain amount of gold bullion, some before and some after he leads the king’s army to the other side of the ridge. The treacherous Greek guides a few number of the king’s army to pass through a path that bypasses Thermopylae. For his betrayal, he received all the gold bullion, which is too heavy for him to carry.
Soldiers who bypassed Thermopylae arrive behind the Greek army and destroy them all. Now that they have access to Athens, they plunder the towns and set fire to it all. This is a revenge that Xerxes has promised to take from those armies confronting him., and they do not attack other countries of Greece. There is only one short statement about Iranian navy destroying all Greek navy, as the defending navy tries to confront the Iranians, and defend themselves.
Finally, the narrator of our story comments on Xerxes' chivalry, and remarks on the reason the king did not attack other Greek nations, which was mainly to prevent his army from getting wounded and killed. Of course, if the king had any intention of keeping people of his country alive, he would not attempt to fight a war, and would not attack Greece to begin with! The story ends with a statement by the Prophet: “I am not sure what was in the King’s mind. However, if he thought of his soldiers’ wellbeing, it was as a result of his chivalry and the king was so fascinated by our soldiers’ selflessness in Thermopylae, that he did not plunder Spartan towns, and this will remain as a sign of democracy and equality of all nations in the world.”
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I received a book as a souvenir from my daughter when she came back from a trip to Greece, titled “Athens Burning”, written by “Robert Garland”, published by “John Hopkins University”. Notes regarding the sources of the author is printed on the last twenty pages of the book. The book is about the war that was quoted and discussed earlier, according to Mr. Mansouri’s book. Some of the sections of this book will also be explained, which differ in many aspects from the above.
In the preface of the book, the author discusses a wall constructed by Athenians before Xerxes’ strike, some ruins of which still exists and a picture of the ruins is also included.
In the first chapter, the historian discusses the two countries between the years 559 and 530 BC. Accordingly, the Achamedis controlled a vast geographic area, from Pakistan in the east to Macedonia in the west, and from Black Sea in the north to Egypt in the south. A map of the lands under the domination of this empire is also enclosed.
Politics and governments of these two nations is discussed as well. As it was mentioned earlier, Greece was divided into many nation states where votes of each state would provide political direction, while Iran was governed by a king, as a dictatorship. Then, Darius’ attack on Athens is discussed briefly, which was as a revenge on Greeks for burning Sardis. This attack was apparently victorious, but then Spartan enters the war to assist Athenians, and defeat Persians. We should mention that the author quotes heavily from Herodotes, Deoderoos, and Plutark, while in some sections criticizes their writings as well! For instance on page 15 there is a quotation from Herodotes about Darius who throws an arrow to locate Athene, and asks Zeus to help him get his revenge from them. The author criticizes this statement considering that Darius should have asked the help if his own god, Ahura Mazda, not Zeus, and it is strange if Darius did not know where Athene was and had to use his bow to throw an arrow! “Herodotus claims that when King Darius learned that Sardis had been burned down, he did what Cyrus and Artaphernes had done before him, and asked who the Athenians were. It’s obvious by now that this is a literary trope, perhaps intended to indicate ill-judged Persian contempt for the Greeks. Learning of their identity, Darius supposedly shot an arrow in the air and said, ‘O Zeus, may it be granted that I have my revenge upon the Athenians.’ (Herodotus gives no explanation as to why Darius should invoke a Greek god.)”
It is important to mention here that the reason that historians have to learn about this and other historical events by reading Greek’s historical writings, not Persians, is that almost no historical book written by Iranian historians exists. Considering glorious ancient Iranian empires, which we are aware of it reading the writings of ancient non-Iranian historians, there is no doubt that there had been many Iranian historians. In addition, in many corners of this vast nation, there still exists many engravings on ancient buildings by emperors about their accomplishments. If a king has engravings on a rock, there should have definitely been some historians at the time, who noted such endeavors. The reason that we cannot find such Persian historical books is the barbarous burning of all Persian books by Mohammedan Arabs, when they invaded Iran. Their slogan was that the only book that needed to be read was Quran, as that book had everything one would want to know. Obviously this useless and divisive book has nothing to learn from. With such slogans, they burned huge Persian libraries, which we only know of their existence. If there was any book written by Iranians, was burned in this book burning campaign, including religious and historical books.
Therefore, Xerxes decides to attack Greece and get revenge of his father from Athens and Spartan. Not long after he gets on the throne to replace his father, he prepares a large army equipped with all warfare gears and other necessary utilities such as food and camping equipment, and after studying the route, embarks on his trip. The diagram of his travel is also depicted on this book.
Xerxes spends the winter in Sardis and sends envoys to each Greek nation, except to Athens and Spartan, and demands their allegiance (submitting water and earth). On page 27 of the book we read about his speech for migrated Greeks in Sardis, when he promises to topple the present governments and install a king, such as the one they used to have in the past. The author of this book compares this act of Xerxes with enthroning Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan by the United States! “… since it was his intention to establish a stable, friendly regime in Athens, in much the same way as in 2004 the United States established Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan.” In the spring of 480 B.C., Persian army embarks on the attack on Athens and Spartan.
On page 33, the book discusses four options open to people of Athens: “the first was to come to terms with the Persians, in effect to medize and accept loss of sovereignty; the second was to risk open battle, hoping against hope for another victory like Marathon, albeit against a much larger expeditionary force; the third was to prepare for a siege, which they could hardly expect to withstand given the inadequacy of their defenses; and the fourth was to evacuate the entire population before the Persians arrive. It was this last option that carried the day.” In this case, they had to start everything from the beginning when they go back to their lands. After consulting with gods, and as it will be further discussed later, they decided to go with the last option.
As Athens was governed democratically, not only the representatives, but people individually participated in the voting process. First, the delegates went to the gods and came back with gods’ recommendations, which was a massive migration. Then, individual votes were counted, which was again the majority with those in favor of the migration.
The book written by Mansouri discusses Thermopylae in detail. This book talks about this narrow passageway as well. Although an army of five thousand was sent with the leadership of “Leonidus the First”, to protect this passageway, Iranians with the help of a defector by the name of “Ephialtes” defeat Greek army and conquer the passageway, as it is described on page 54 of the book: “Eventually, however, a Greek traitor called Ephialtes- the name means ‘Nightmare’- showed Xerxes how to attack the Greeks in the rear by taking a steep and narrow mountain track.”
After all the population of Athens leave, Xerxes enters and destroys all gods’ statutes. These broken statues are still kept in order for tourists to visit them, as a historical evidence of this crime. Although Garland notes that Xerxes did what Athenians had done 18 years prior, by burning the temple of Mother-God in Sardis. Perhaps, according to the writer’s suggestion on page 69, Xerxes considered himself as Ahura Mazda’s agent, in destroying false gods. “It is easy to denounce Xerxes’ act as vandalism, but it is important to realize that he saw it as payback for a previous act of desecration. The king had exacted revenge on the Athenians for the burning down of the Temple of the Mother Goddess in Sardis eighteen years earlier. Perhaps, too, he saw himself as acting as the representative of Ahura-Mazda in crushing the worship of false gods.” Herodotes writes that Xerxes regrets what he had done and orders those Athenians refugees to sacrifices for their gods. The Author of the book however suggests that Xerxes was not remorseful of what he had done, but decided to console those who came to him for his support.
Iranian navy takes position in Strait of Salamis. Herodotes writes that Iranians get the news that Greek navy plans to escape from the strait. So, Iranian navy stays guarding the strait throughout the night. A Greek ship that had alliance with Iranians, joins the Greek navy in the morning and reports to them about Iranian personnel staying awake the whole night, and being tired and sleepy while Greeks have well rested, it was a good time to attack them. Before nine o’clock, when the sun’s position is in their favor, Greeks attack Iranian navy, and drawn 200 of their ships, while only 40 of the Greeks’ ships get destroyed. This war continues until half an hour passed seven in the afternoon, and Iranian navy gets defeated.
Iranian armies attack cities devoid of people and plunder and pillage them. There is no defense as the cities are empty. After the naval disaster, Xerxes decides to return, and leaves Mardonius to lead the army.
The last war between the two armies happened in Plataya. Mardonius asked the Greeks to submit to Iranian army and sign a peace treaty, but Greeks don’t accept this offer and prefer to fight. The full detail of this war is listed on page 99 of the book. The author believes that this war could become a victory for Iranians, however, Mardonius dies, and as a result, the army disjoints and breaks apart, and leaves in defeat. “What ultimately turned the encounter between the Persians and the Spartans in favor of the Spartans was the death of Mardonius, which caused widespread panic. The outcome of battles in antiquity depended disproportionately on the courage and prowess of those who led their men into battle. What became of Mardonius’s corpse is unknown. Herodotus reports that it disappeared the day after the battle. It was due to the Athenians that the walled camp of the Persians was successfully stormed, which the Spartans on their own had allegedly been unable to accomplish. The armies of Elis and Mantinea were too late to join the battle, perhaps because they suspected the Persians would win.” After Iranian army leaves, migrated Greeks go back to their homes, and the rest of the book details their returning home.
As a result of Iranian army collapsing, the author concludes Greeks as the winner of that war, and spends the rest of the book in detailing how Greek families who survived the war, go back to destroyed and burned houses. At the end of the book, on page 135, the author concludes with an interesting statement. First, he confesses that there does not exist many historical facts about this war and he has tried to prevent any speculation or guesswork in this book, and rely on facts as much as possible, no matter how unclear those historical facts are. He ends his book with this interesting phrase: “All history is a dialogue between the present and the past across an invisible vacuum filled with unrecoverable detail.”
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