(June 20, 2015 at 12:27 am)Rhythm Wrote: The greeks themselves were fairly famous adopters (not quite as prolific as the romans..on that count), yes...but hellenism only refers to the cultural phenomenon of the transmission of greek thought (however arrived at...borrowed, or stolen) that swept the entire western world for a long period of time. The persians were successful, but never like this, and never to this extent...again...in the western world. It was just about impossible to prevent, given that the greeks were writing other folks stories for them...in greek, and we lean on it heavily today. Their idioms and notions would have crept in by default, by accident, had people not valued them...which they did.
A combination Greek/Persian story is told in the books of Maccabees in the Catholic Bible.