My main purpose was to point out that even with a facile comparison, we are missing a very salient element (normalization of violence as a political tool). For

My main purpose was to point out that even with a facile comparison, we are missing a very salient element (normalization of violence as a political tool). For the rest, I really should have just said "signal event". I wasn't suggesting anything along the lines of "but for that event things would have gone the other way". Here, I merely meant a threshold was passed. Personally, I'm more interested in cultural comparisons, mainly because they were so different from us in many ways. And, if I may add to your concern about cherry-picking, we should also have a great deal of humility about how much we really know. What's the metaphor? The ancient world is Versailles, and everything we know about it is what we can see through the keyhole on the front door.