The suggestion may be hazarded that the invention was preceded by an accidental recognition of the fact that it was easier to drag something along the ground, if it rested on round logs, than if it did not so rest; and by noting also that the logs were passed over and left behind continually. From this point to the mental conception of a roller that would not be left behind, but would be secured to the thing dragged by a round shaft on which it revolved, there was probably a single mental jump. Someone saw such a contrivance with his mental eye. It looked dim and unreal—but he saw it. To make the picture clear, and then to develop the thing pictured, constructiveness was used. In other words, conception and development accomplished their successive but cooperating tasks. The invention was complete when a wheel was actually produced.
To realize the importance of the wheel, we have but to ask ourselves (or our neighbors) how history could possibly have been even approximately what it has been if the wheel had not been invented.
Another important invention probably made by the Assyrians was the catapult; another one, somewhat similar, was the balista. The catapult was used for hurling stones, balls, etc.; the balista for shooting arrows with greater force than an archer could exert. Another was the battering ram for making breaches in the walls of fortresses.
Assyrians Flaying Prisoners Alive. (From a bas-relief.)
The Assyrians used these inventions in their wars against the contiguous nations of the East, and with their aid achieved the mastery, and unified the Orient. That the Assyrian rule was harsh and cruel should not be denied; but, on the principle that any kind of government is better than no government, it cannot reasonably be supposed that the central and efficient administration of Assyria was not better than the condition of continual petty wars and quarrels that had existed among the numerous tribes and nations, with their enormous possibilities for suffering of all kinds.
It may be pointed out here that the cruelties and injustices committed by any powerful government against great numbers of persons attract immeasurably more notice and condemnation by historians and others than do the numberless atrocities of all kinds that lie hidden in the darkness of anarchy, or the confusion of petty wars. In the endeavor to preserve order over widely separated and barbarous peoples, when means of transportation and communication were inadequate, stern measures seem always to have been required. That they have often been too stern, and that great cruelty has often been exercised, the wail of the ages testifies. But human nature is very imperfect; and no really good government, no government free from the faults of man, has ever been established. Yet every government has been better than anarchy.
The Assyrians, despite their cruel treatment of their conquered peoples, did a direct service to mankind and gave a powerful stimulus to the march of progress. For the great empire which they established, and the great cities which grew up, and the system of provinces which they instituted, formed a pattern for similar work by later nations; while the civilization which they spread throughout the more backward countries under their rule, especially in Greece, started the later culture which Greece developed, and which is the basis of all that is most beautiful in the civilization of today.
The influence of the weapons which the Assyrians invented was toward this end.
Between Egypt on the west and Babylonia and Assyria on the east lay Syria; a territory not very large, of which the part that played the most prominent part in history bordered the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Two important peoples dwelt in Syria, the Hebrews and the Phœnicians. Both belonged to the Semitic race, and neither was distinctly warlike; though the Hebrews during a brief period achieved considerable military strength and skill, under their great king David.