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Game Design and Project Resources: The Workshops Quarter => Mods, Maps & Game Add-Ons - The Bazaar => Rome - Total Realism => Topic started by: ahowl11 on July 05, 2016, 07:45:45 AM

Title: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 05, 2016, 07:45:45 AM
I literally know nothing about this area, so let the research and knowledge begin!

Military
Geography
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Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 05, 2016, 12:07:44 PM
I don't know a huge amount but I'm happy to do some research if you want - in my not-modding capacity my academic specialism is this region in the 12th-13th centuries AD, so I'm happy to look for some early stuff as well. :)
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Gabrielkouda on July 06, 2016, 04:06:42 PM
Here a nice thread about Caucasian Iberia and Colchis: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?686893-Caucase-Iberian-(-Kartli-)-and-Colchian-(Egrisi)-units (http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?686893-Caucase-Iberian-(-Kartli-)-and-Colchian-(Egrisi)-units)
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 07, 2016, 11:58:44 PM
I'll try and get some stuff done on this at the weekend, I've found some relevant books/sources to look through :)
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 08, 2016, 05:37:01 AM
Great news indeed!
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 17, 2016, 01:20:59 AM
So some obvious starting points:

The ecosystem/climate of the area is somewhat alpine in the highlands, and rather warmer (though still generally temperate) in the lowlands. Colchis (roughly speaking, the western lowlands of Georgia and Abkhazia) and Caucasian Iberia (the eastern part, comprising what is now eastern Georgia, some parts of northeast Turkey and wester Azerbaijan) were separate kingdoms (as indeed they're separate provinces on the RTR map.

I'll definitely be recommending changing the cities, though I want to do some more work before telling you what the city for the Colchis region should be - it's difficult because it's quite possible that the largest settlements were the Greek coastal ports like Phasis, but those were semi-detached from the actual Kingdom of Colchis.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 17, 2016, 04:40:42 AM
Good info, and yeah I am wanting more of the actual native capital or main center than a greek colony.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 17, 2016, 04:31:21 PM
OK, so Vani (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vani) for Colchis and Mtskheta (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mtskheta) for Iberia seem to be the most obvious choices. Vani should be at (213, 146) or (214, 146). Mtskheta should be where the current "Mestleta" (a misspelling possibly?) is located though ideally a bit further south (see my comments regarding the Kura river below, it's not actually that close to the upper Caucasus range. It actually sits on the river of course, but to the river's north I guess makes more sense. I'd put the port for Colchis at Phasis, which is roughly right where it is.

The geography of the region needs work. Colchis should extend at least one valley further south, and Iberia should extend a lot further south to pull in a lot of the mountains that actually formed ancient Iberia (most of which are now in the overly large Greater Armenia province), but lose the bits north of the upper Caucasus range and the eastern lowlands which are more naturally part of Caucasian Albania (which should also take in some of the plains from Greater Armenia to encompass what's now Azerbaijan more closely). This whole Caucasus area shouldn't look so desertified either, it's a very green/fertile area (swampy in places in the lowlands). I'd also pull the Kura/Mt'kvari river (the long one that flows down to the Caspian) a tile southwards along the upper curve.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 19, 2016, 01:39:02 PM
Thank you for this info, I want to focus completely on Colchis for this thread, I'll make a thread for Iberia and Albania later. I'm going to get EmoDude over to this forum to join the fun.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 19, 2016, 02:05:35 PM
Yeah, I get that - it's just hard with the wider geography to explain the necessary border and map changes without discussing several provinces at once :)
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 19, 2016, 03:33:18 PM
No worries
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 28, 2016, 11:37:20 PM
So, culturally it's a bit hard to say all that much about Colchis because it was rather a mix of the inland Iberian and the coastal Greek cultures - the flavour of the province is very much "semi-hellenised Iberians" (and the Iberians were an incredibly mixed bunch). A lot of Colchian towns, even inland, would have looked and felt pretty Greek in our period, though the language, coinage and religion would all have been Georgian.

Religion
The main religion in both Colchis involved the pantheon of the "Seven stars":
The associations clearly have some relationship to Greek deities, and it's hard to say whether they may have been altered somewhat post-hoc by writers with a strong awareness of Greek traditions, but that's the basic pantheon.

Exports
Flax, hemp, pitch and slaves are all recorded exports from the area - as are pheasants (or at least pheasant meat, something of a luxury food), which apparently derive their name from the area (the greek is Phasianos or Φασιανος, aka the bird of Phasis, the main Greek port colony there). There's evidence of gem working, and the production in large numbers of (low quality) silver coins.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 30, 2016, 08:41:10 AM
Great info, now we just need to get some unique units from the region. That thread link was helpful but it seems as if it was from a nationalist perspective. I rather have an educated perspective.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on July 30, 2016, 09:01:48 AM
Yeah, I'll need to dig a bit deeper and find some archaeological papers, will hopefully get to that soon :)
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on July 31, 2016, 04:38:28 PM
Some sources given to us
Researches in Iberia-Colchology by Gela Gamqrelize

The greek colonisation of the black sea area by Gocha R. Tsetskhladze

There are also other good books and articles by Tsetskhladze. Plus Pontos.dk has good publications for the area

Edit:
Contacted the first author, hopefully he can help us.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Mausolos of Caria on August 08, 2016, 02:37:19 PM
Do you have these books then or do you need them? My uni library has that book by Tsetskhladze (and many more texts by him).
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on August 08, 2016, 06:28:11 PM
We need them
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Arjos Suadurix on September 19, 2016, 10:16:36 AM
What is the exact startdate of RTR? 281 BC?

Possible capitals could be Kutaisi or Tsikhekhuji imo...

And the ports could be either Phasis or Dioskourias...
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on September 19, 2016, 11:29:06 AM
Right now we are at 270, a united roman Italy. Though it's possible we push it back to 280, however it seems as if too many mods have done that so we will see. So for right now, 270.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on September 22, 2016, 07:53:07 AM
Right now, our city is Kotais and the port is Phasis.

What we really need help on is the troop types for them.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on September 25, 2016, 10:09:04 AM
Updated OP
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Arjos Suadurix on September 28, 2016, 02:38:35 PM
The people of Kolkhis were for the most part Kartvelian highlanders (reading about the armies facing Pompeivs Magnvs in the east would be a start), some having however experienced a larger degree of urbanisation. While the coastal people had been Hellenised to a little. Here larger bronze-faced shields have been discovered, but there still would've been perishable materials used as armour too...

As far as archaeology goes axes and swords seems to have been the majority, plus javelins of course...

The Satevari dagger seems to have been a status symbol even back then...

There are indications for the possible use of wooden helmets and there definitely existed body armour made of flax...

Cavalry in Kolkhis proper wasn't employed particularly, at most mounted javelineers with hide shields...
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Mausolos of Caria on September 28, 2016, 06:36:39 PM

The greek colonisation of the black sea area by Gocha R. Tsetskhladze



I got this book now, but unfortunately it is completely useless for us. Its articles only focus on the foundation of the black sea areas and the Archaic period, and even within that time frame Colchis only plays a very minor role. Most authors spend a big part of their articles complaining about the scarcity of sources and don't really find much new stuff...
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on October 01, 2016, 04:45:31 PM
Arjos, when you see this please check your messages
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Arjos Suadurix on October 06, 2016, 07:14:12 PM
There are no new messages, which ones are you referring to?
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Gigantus on October 07, 2016, 05:02:35 AM
The long list across the top of the page, 'My Messages' should have a number next to it if you have unread messages:
  
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on October 09, 2016, 08:14:24 AM
Yes, Arjos, check 'My messages'. We are trying to figure out how to have messages appear automatically like at the org and twc.

Also, I found a few books on the region, anyone want to try and get their hands on them?

https://www.amazon.com/Georgia-Antiquity-History-Colchis-Transcaucasian/dp/0198144733/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1475997308&sr=8-1&keywords=Georgia+in+Antiquity

https://www.amazon.com/Peoples-Hills-Ancient-Caucasus-Civilization/dp/1842122525/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1475997333&sr=8-1&keywords=ancient+caucasus
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Arjos Suadurix on October 09, 2016, 09:03:07 AM
In My Messages there is only one from september, which I answered back then and nothing more...
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on October 09, 2016, 11:02:06 AM
Quote
We are trying to figure out how to have messages appear automatically like at the org and twc.

Sounds like my department - what do you mean exactly?
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Gigantus on October 09, 2016, 12:41:56 PM
I just figured you can have a pop up when messages come in - is that what you meant with "TWC style"?

Use Profile\Accounts Settings from the top line of options and in the new window\tab choose modify profile\personal messaging. Activate the 'Show a pop up...' tick box, click on 'Change Profile' to save the new setting.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: ahowl11 on October 09, 2016, 05:19:32 PM
Arjos, I checked and saw you did respond, my apologies! I responded just now with a list of the areas we have not really touched yet that you said you have knowledge in.
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Vardan on October 18, 2016, 12:18:15 AM
Hi all. My name is Vardan. I am from Armenia currently living in Budapest (Hungary) making my MA in Economics. I am not an expert in Ancient Colchis in particular, but I have sufficient information about ancient Armenia and Kartli. This makes me believe that I will be able to provide more or less valuable stuff to you. As I said I am studying, so please be merciful on my possible rare activity. Cheers!
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Jubal on October 18, 2016, 10:20:18 PM
Hi Vardan, welcome :)
Title: Re: Ancient Colchis
Post by: Arjos Suadurix on October 28, 2016, 05:33:42 PM
For the local units:

(http://amigo.ge/saunjegallery/albums/userpics/10001/berulava-nax20.JPG)

(https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/16/7b/69/167b695f0cbe63d82747a2dc8fc0e5fa.jpg)

(http://amigo.ge/saunjegallery/albums/userpics/10001/1~2.JPG)

(http://amigo.ge/saunjegallery/albums/userpics/10001/berulava-nax2.JPG)

(http://www.georgianjournal.ge/images/GJ/2015/6/satevari.jpg)

(http://amigo.ge/saunjegallery/albums/userpics/10001/523071bc05a6.jpg)

(http://amigo.ge/saunjegallery/albums/userpics/10001/berulava-nax6.JPG)

Shields were covered with metal bands or narrow plates, but were Argive Aspis in shape. In the 2nd-1st centuries BC metal umbones appeared...

Obviously these guys wouldn't have had as much training when it comes to formation, instead they would fight in a more mobile manner, compared to Argive Hoplitai...