The Coming of the Greeks. Indo-European Conquests in the Aegean and the Near East

The Coming of the Greeks

reputation as charioteers, Kammenhuber refused to credit

them with having pioneered the art.

Kammenhuber recognized, of course, that it was remarkable

that the Aryans, who knew nothing about chariots when they

arrived in the Near East, were so suddenly transformed into

charioteers par excellence. She therefore advised that further

investigations would be necessary to explain the about-face,

and to determine why, for instance, Aryan terms for hippo-

logical subjects enjoyed such prestige among Hittite and Hur-

rian scribes.

What is the basis for this prestige? Why in the

Kikkuli treatise do the Hurrians use for "laps"

terms that they had taken over from the Aryans?

What help in the training of horses could the Hur-

rians of Mitanni expect from the Aryans, since the

Hurrians themselves had known the horse and char-

iot longer than had the Aryans: could it be that the

Aryans, after their contact with Mesopotamia had

taught them to hitch chariots to their horses, so

quickly gained so much experience as horse trainers

that the Hurrians of Mitanni regarded and accepted

them as teachers? 15

The questions arise, of course, only because of the partipris that
the Aryans knew nothing about chariots until they encoun-
tered them in the "Gebirgszonen um Babylon." 16
Kammenhuber's strained attempt to dissociate the Aryan
speakers from the development and dissemination of chariotry
goes against the grain of most of our evidence. It overlooks the
fact, first of all, that effective chariot warfare began at the very
time that the Aryans began to make their presence felt. Kam-
menhuber was able to ignore this synchronism because she as-
sumed that chariot warfare in its full elaboration began when

15. DieArier, 239.


16. Ibid., 238.

144