Lights on the mounds. Jan V.

Vasily Yang (Yangchevetsky) - recognized classic of Soviet historical prose, author of the famous trilogy "Invasion of the Mongols", novels "Phoenician Ship", "Spartak", "On the Wings of Courage", etc. The historical story "Lights on the Kurgan", written At the turn of the 1920-30s and first published in 1932, and in a recycled form, published only in 1959, after the death of the author, talks about the confrontation between the Central Asian tribal peoples-sogds and Scythians-the invasion of the army of Alexander the Great. The glorified commander, the Lord of the world and the wise ruler, which since ancient times represented the historiographic tradition, was bred by Jan by a brutal conqueror, a proud tyrant, the oppressor of the nomadic peoples of Asia, mercilessly exterminated its opponents. The belligerent and despotistical king of Macedonia is opposed by the leader of the Scythians Spitamen-in the image of Jan, not a native of the Persian nobility (as he was in reality), but the son of a simple farmer-here and a woman from the Scythian tribe of the Saks, a talented brave leader who inflicts continuous defeats of Alexander for the troops, remaining elusive. Dramatic clashes of strong characters, colorful scenes of battles, detailed descriptions of the Scythian customs, a skillful combination of historical truth and literary fiction make the story of Jan and thematically adjacent the stories “Blue Joya Zarathustra”, “Letter from the Scythian Stan” and “Vatan” is highly exciting exciting reading.