Book 3: Thalia

Chapter 1

1It was against this Amasis that Cambyses son of Cyrus marched, bringing with him, along with the others he ruled, Greeks too, both Ionians and Aeolians, for the following reason. Cambyses sent a herald to Egypt to ask Amasis for his daughter in marriage, and he asked at the advice of an Egyptian who had a grudge against Amasis and so brought this about—because Amasis, tearing him away from all the physicians in Egypt and separating him from his wife and children, had handed him over to the Persians, back when Cyrus sent to Amasis and asked for the best eye-physician in Egypt.

2Nursing this grievance, the Egyptian urged his advice on Cambyses, bidding him ask Amasis for his daughter, so that either Amasis would give her and be grieved, or refuse and incur Cambyses' enmity. Amasis, distressed by the power of the Persians and in dread of it, was at a loss whether to give or to refuse; for he knew well that Cambyses would not take her as a wife but as a concubine.

3Weighing this in his mind, he did as follows. There was a daughter of Apries, the former king, very tall and beautiful, the only one left of the house, and her name was Nitetis. This girl Amasis adorned with raiment and gold and sent off to the Persians as his own daughter.

4After a time, when Cambyses greeted her, calling her by her father's name, the girl said to him: "O king, you do not understand that you have been deceived by Amasis. He decked me out in finery and sent me to you, giving me as his own daughter, when in truth I am the daughter of Apries, whom he killed—his own master—when he rose against him together with the Egyptians."

5This word of hers, and the charge that came with it, brought Cambyses son of Cyrus against Egypt in great anger.

Chapter 2

1This, then, is the Persian account. The Egyptians claim Cambyses for themselves, saying that he was born of this very daughter of Apries; for it was Cyrus, they say, and not Cambyses, who sent to Amasis for the daughter. But in saying this they do not speak the truth.

2Nor is it hidden from them (for if any people understand the customs of the Persians, the Egyptians do) that, first, it is not their law for a bastard to be king when a true-born son is available; and second, that Cambyses was the son of Cassandane daughter of Pharnaspes, a man of the Achaemenid house, and not of the Egyptian woman. But they distort the account, pretending to be kin to the house of Cyrus.

Chapter 3

1So this is how the matter stands. Another story is told as well, which I do not find convincing: that one of the Persian women came in among Cyrus' wives, and when she saw the children standing by Cassandane, tall and good-looking, she broke into loud praise and marveled greatly; and Cassandane, being Cyrus' wife, spoke as follows:

2"And yet, though I am the mother of such children, Cyrus holds me in dishonor, while the woman he has won from Egypt he holds in honor." She said this, vexed as she was with Nitetis; and her elder son Cambyses spoke up and said:

3"Therefore, mother, when I grow to be a man, I will turn Egypt upside down." He is said to have said this when he was about ten years old, and the women were astonished by it; and he kept it in mind, so that when he came of age and held the kingship, he made the campaign against Egypt.

Chapter 4

1Something else too, of this kind, helped bring about the campaign. Among the mercenaries of Amasis there was a man, a Halicarnassian by birth, named Phanes, a man of sound judgment and brave in war.

2This Phanes, having some grievance or other against Amasis, escaped by ship out of Egypt, wanting to come to speak with Cambyses. Since he was a man of no small standing among the mercenaries and knew the affairs of Egypt with the greatest exactness, Amasis set out in pursuit, eager to catch him; and he sent in pursuit the most trusted of his eunuchs in a trireme after him, and the eunuch caught him in Lycia. But once he had caught him he did not bring him back to Egypt—for Phanes outwitted him by a clever trick:

3he got the guards drunk and so made his escape to Persia. When Cambyses had set his heart on marching against Egypt and was at a loss how to make the crossing and get through the waterless tract, Phanes came to him and told him the rest of Amasis' affairs as well, and set out the route for him, advising him thus: to send to the king of the Arabs and ask him to grant safe passage through.

Chapter 5

1This is the only way by which there are known approaches into Egypt. For from Phoenicia to the borders of the city of Cadytis is the land of the Syrians who are called Palestinians;

2from Cadytis, which is a city, as it seems to me, not much smaller than Sardis, the trading towns along the sea belong to the Arab as far as the city of Ienysus; from Ienysus, again, it is Syrian territory as far as Lake Serbonis, beside which Mount Casius stretches down to the sea;

3and from Lake Serbonis, in which, so the story goes, Typhon is hidden, from there on lies Egypt. The space between the city of Ienysus and Mount Casius and Lake Serbonis—this is no small stretch of country but as much as a three days' journey—is terribly without water.

Chapter 6

1Now there is one thing that few of those who sail to Egypt have noticed, and this I am going to relate. Into Egypt, from all of Greece and from Phoenicia as well, pottery jars full of wine are imported twice every year; and one may say that not a single empty wine jar is to be seen.

2"Where, then," someone may ask, "is all this used up?" This too I will explain. Each headman must collect all the pottery jars from his own city and bring them to Memphis, and the people of Memphis must carry them out to the waterless parts of Syria after filling them with water. In this way the pottery that keeps arriving and being emptied in Egypt is carried to Syria in place of the old.

Chapter 7

1The Persians, then, are the ones who furnished this way of entry into Egypt, stocking it with water as I have described, once they took Egypt into their power.

2At that time, however, since no water was ready yet, Cambyses learned of this from his Halicarnassian guest-friend, and sending messengers to the Arab and asking for safe passage, he obtained it, both giving and receiving pledges of faith from him.

Chapter 8

1The Arabs hold pledges of faith in greater reverence than any other people, and they make them in this way: when two men wish to pledge their faith, another man stands between them both, and with a sharp stone cuts the inside of their hands near the thumbs of those making the pledge; then he takes a thread from the cloak of each and smears it with the blood on seven stones that lie between them. As he does this, he calls upon Dionysus and Urania.

2When the man has done this, the one who has pledged his faith commends the stranger to his friends—or the fellow citizen, if it is with a fellow citizen that he makes the pledge; and these friends too count it a duty to respect the pledge.

3They believe that Dionysus and Urania are the only gods, and they say that they cut their hair in the same way as Dionysus himself is cropped; they cut it in a ring, shaving the temples. They call Dionysus Orotalt, and Urania Alilat.

Chapter 9

1When the Arab had made the pledge of faith to the messengers who had come from Cambyses, he contrived the following: filling camel-skins with water, he loaded the water onto the backs of all the camels he had, and having done so, he drove out into the waterless country and there waited for the army of Cambyses.

2This is the more plausible of the accounts; but since the less plausible one is also told, it must be told. There is a great river in Arabia called the Corys, and it empties into the sea called the Red Sea.

3From this river, the story goes, the king of the Arabs stitched together a conduit of raw ox hides and other skins, long enough to reach the waterless country, and brought the water through it; and in the waterless country he dug great cisterns, so that they might receive the water and keep it safe.

4It is a twelve days' journey from the river to this waterless country; and he led the water through three conduits to three separate places.

Chapter 10

1At the mouth of the Nile called Pelusium Psammenitus son of Amasis encamped, waiting for Cambyses.

2For Cambyses did not find Amasis alive when he marched against Egypt; Amasis had died after reigning forty-four years, in which time no great misfortune befell him; and after his death he was embalmed and buried in the tombs in the temple that he had built himself.

3In the reign of Psammenitus son of Amasis over Egypt, the greatest portent that ever befell the Egyptians occurred: Thebes in Egypt was rained on, though it had never been rained on before, nor has it been since up to my time, as the Thebans themselves say; for Upper Egypt is not rained on at all. Yet even then Thebes was rained on only in a drizzle.

Chapter 11

1When the Persians had crossed the waterless country and encamped near the Egyptians, ready to join battle, the mercenaries of the Egyptian—men who were Greeks and Carians, angry with Phanes for having brought an army of foreign speech against Egypt—devised the following against him.

2Phanes had children left behind in Egypt; these they brought to the camp and, setting a mixing bowl before the eyes of the father between the two armies, they led up the children one at a time and cut their throats into the bowl.

3When they had gone through all the children, they poured wine and water into the bowl, and all the mercenaries drank of the blood; and only then did they join battle. A hard battle was fought, and though great numbers fell on both sides, the Egyptians were routed.

Chapter 12

1A great marvel I saw, when I learned of it from the people of the place. The bones of those who fell in this battle lie heaped apart for each side (the Persian bones lay here, as they were separated at the first, and the Egyptian bones there); and the skulls of the Persians are so weak that if you hit one with a pebble alone, you will break through it, whereas the skulls of the Egyptians are so very strong that you could scarcely crack one by striking it with a stone.

2The cause of this they told me, and they easily convinced me: it is because the Egyptians shave their heads from childhood on, and the bone grows thick in the sun.

3The same thing is also the reason why they are not bald; for of all people one would see the fewest bald men among the Egyptians.

4This, then, is the reason why they carry strong skulls; but the reason why the Persians carry weak skulls is this: they are raised in the shade, wearing felt caps and tiaras. Such, then, are these things; and I saw other things like them at Papremis, among the men who perished with Achaemenes son of Darius at the hands of Inarus the Libyan.

Chapter 13

1When the Egyptians were routed from the battle, they fled in disorder; and when they had been driven into Memphis, Cambyses sent a ship up the river—a Mytilenian vessel carrying a herald and a Persian man—summoning the Egyptians to come to terms.

2When they saw the ship entering Memphis, they poured out in a mass from the wall and destroyed the ship, and tearing the men to pieces like slaughtered cattle, they carried them up onto the wall.

3The Egyptians, then, were besieged after this and in time gave in. The neighboring Libyans, in fear of what had befallen Egypt, surrendered without a battle and agreed to pay tribute and sent gifts. So too did the Cyrenaeans and the Barcaeans, who were afraid just as the Libyans were.

4Cambyses received the gifts that came from the Libyans kindly; but the gifts sent by the Cyrenaeans he took amiss, as I think, because they were few—for the Cyrenaeans had sent five hundred minas of silver—and seizing them he scattered them with his own hand among the army.

Chapter 14

1On the tenth day after he had taken the wall at Memphis, Cambyses set the king of the Egyptians, Psammenitus, who had reigned six months, out in the suburb to mock him; and having set him there along with other Egyptians, he put his spirit to the test by doing as follows.

2He sent out his daughter in a slave's dress to fetch water, carrying a water jar; and he sent along other maidens too, chosen from the leading men, dressed in the same way as the king's daughter.

3When the maidens went past their fathers with shouting and weeping, all the rest cried out and wept in answer at the sight of their children so abused; but Psammenitus, when he saw and understood, bent his eyes to the ground.

4When the water carriers had gone by, next he sent the man's son, with two thousand other Egyptians of the same age, their necks bound with a rope and their mouths bridled.

5They were being led off to pay the penalty for the Mytilenians who perished at Memphis together with the ship; for the royal judges had so decreed, that for each man ten of the foremost Egyptians should be put to death in exchange.

6When he saw them going by and understood that his son was being led to death, while the other Egyptians sitting around him wept and made great lament, he did the same as he had done over his daughter.

7When these too had gone by, it so happened that one of his former drinking companions, an older man who had fallen from his wealth and had nothing left but what a beggar has and was begging from the army, went past Psammenitus son of Amasis and the Egyptians sitting in the suburb. When Psammenitus saw him, he broke into loud weeping and called his companion by name and beat his own head.

8Now he had guards, who reported to Cambyses everything he did on each occasion. Cambyses, wondering at what was being done, sent a messenger and asked him, speaking as follows.

9"Your master Cambyses asks you, Psammenitus, why it is that, when you saw your daughter abused and your son going to death, you neither cried out nor wept, while you honored the beggar, who is nothing to you, as he learns from others." So he asked him, and Psammenitus answered him as follows.

10"Son of Cyrus, my own troubles were too great for weeping; but the grief of my companion deserved tears—a man who has fallen from much wealth and good fortune into beggary on the threshold of old age." And when this answer of his was reported, it seemed to them to have been well spoken.

11Then, as the Egyptians tell it, Croesus wept (for he too had come with Cambyses against Egypt), and the Persians present wept as well; and Cambyses himself felt a touch of pity, and he straightway ordered them to save his son out of those being killed and to bring Psammenitus himself up out of the suburb to him.

Chapter 15

1Those sent for the son found that he was no longer alive but had been the first to be cut down; and Psammenitus himself they brought to Cambyses.

2There he lived out the rest of his life, suffering no violence. And if he had known better than to meddle in affairs, he would have received Egypt back to govern it; for the Persians are accustomed to honor the sons of their kings: even if their subjects rebel, they still give the rule back to their sons.

3There are many other proofs that this is their established practice, and among them the case of Thannyras son of Inarus, who received back the rule his father had held, and of Pausiris son of Amyrtaeus; for he too received back his father's rule. And yet no men ever did more harm to the Persians than Inarus and Amyrtaeus.

4Now, however, Psammenitus was caught plotting harm and got his reward; for he was caught stirring up the Egyptians to revolt, and when he was detected by Cambyses, he drank bull's blood and died on the spot. And so this is how he met his end.

Chapter 16

1Cambyses came from Memphis to the city of Sais, wanting to do what he did in fact do. For as soon as he entered the house of Amasis, he ordered them at once to bring the corpse of Amasis out from the tomb; and when this had been done, he ordered them to scourge it, and to pluck out its hair, and to stab it, and to abuse it in every other way.

2When they had wearied themselves doing this (for the corpse, since it was embalmed, held firm and did not fall apart), Cambyses ordered them to burn it—commanding what is not holy; for the Persians hold fire to be a god.

3Now to burn the dead is in no way the custom of either people: for the Persians, for the reason I have given, saying that it is not right to give the corpse of a man to a god; while the Egyptians believe that fire is a living beast that devours whatever it catches, and when it is full of its meal, dies together with what it has devoured.

4It is in no way their custom, then, to give the dead to beasts, and for this reason they embalm them, so that the corpse does not lie and be eaten by worms. So Cambyses ordered them to do what is the custom of neither people.

5As the Egyptians say, however, it was not Amasis who suffered these things, but another Egyptian of the same age as Amasis, whom the Persians abused in the belief that they were abusing Amasis.

6For they say that Amasis had learned from an oracle what was going to happen to him after his death, and so, to avert what was coming, he buried this man who had been scourged and had died at the entrance, inside his own tomb, while he gave orders to his son to place him in the innermost recess of the tomb.

7These injunctions of Amasis concerning the burial and the man do not, in my judgment, have any foundation at all; the Egyptians merely dress the story up to make it grand.

Chapter 17

1After this Cambyses planned three campaigns: one against the Carthaginians, one against the Ammonians, and one against the long-lived Ethiopians, who dwell on the southern sea of Libya.

2In his planning he decided to send the fleet against the Carthaginians, to detach part of the foot army against the Ammonians, and to send scouts first to the Ethiopians, to find out whether the so-called Table of the Sun among these Ethiopians really exists, and to spy out the rest of the country as well, carrying gifts for their king as a pretext.

Chapter 18

1The Table of the Sun is said to be like this: there is a meadow in the suburbs, full of boiled meat of every kind of four-footed beast; and into it, by night, those of the citizens who hold office at the time are said to place the meat, while by day whoever wishes comes and feasts there. The natives say that the earth itself brings this forth each day.

Chapter 19

1Such, then, is the account of what the Table of the Sun is said to be. When Cambyses resolved to send the spies, he immediately sent for men from the city of Elephantine, of the Fish-eaters, who knew the Ethiopian language.

2While these men were being fetched, he ordered the fleet to sail against Carthage. But the Phoenicians said they would not do it: they were bound by great oaths, and it would be unholy for them to make war on their own children. And since the Phoenicians refused, the rest were not a match for the enemy.

3The Carthaginians, then, in this way escaped enslavement at the hands of the Persians; for Cambyses did not think it right to use force on the Phoenicians, since they had given themselves over to the Persians and the whole naval force depended on the Phoenicians. The Cypriots too had given themselves to the Persians, and they took part in the campaign against Egypt.

Chapter 20

1When the Fish-eaters had come to Cambyses from Elephantine, he sent them to the Ethiopians, instructing them in what they must say, and giving them gifts to carry: a purple cloak, and a twisted golden neck-chain, and bracelets, and an alabaster casket of perfume, and a cask of palm wine. These Ethiopians to whom Cambyses sent are said to be the tallest and most beautiful of all men.

2They are said to follow customs that set them apart from other men, and especially in the matter of their kingship: whichever of the citizens they judge to be the tallest and to have strength to match his size, him they hold worthy to be king.

Chapter 21

1When the Fish-eaters reached these men, they gave the gifts to their king and spoke as follows: "The king of the Persians, Cambyses, wishing to become your friend and guest-friend, has sent us to come and speak with you, and he gives you these gifts, in which he himself most delights to be clad."

2The Ethiopian, understanding that they were spies, spoke to them as follows: "The king of the Persians did not send you with gifts because he greatly values becoming my guest-friend, nor do you speak the truth—for you are spies of my realm—nor is that man a just man. For if he were just, he would not desire any land beyond his own, nor would he lead men into slavery who have done him no wrong. Now, then, give him this bow and speak to him these words:

3the king of the Ethiopians advises the king of the Persians that, when the Persians can draw bows of this size as easily as this, then let him march against the long-lived Ethiopians, with a host that outnumbers them; until then, let him give thanks to the gods, who have not put it into the minds of the sons of the Ethiopians to win more land to add to their own."

Chapter 22

1Having said this, he unstrung the bow and gave it to those who had come. Then he took the purple cloak and asked what it was and how it was made; and when the Fish-eaters told him the truth about the purple and the dyeing, he said the men were deceitful and their garments deceitful as well.

2Second he asked about the twisted golden neck-chain and the bracelets; and when the Fish-eaters explained their ornament, the king laughed and, taking them for fetters, said that among his people there were fetters stronger than these.

3Third he asked about the perfume; and when they told him of its making and its anointing, he said the same as he had said about the cloak. When he came to the wine and learned how it was made, he was exceedingly pleased with the drink, and he asked what the king ate and how long was the longest life of a Persian.

4They said that he ate bread, explaining to him the nature of wheat, and that eighty years was the longest span of life set before a man. To this the Ethiopian replied that he was not surprised if, eating dung, they lived only a few years; nor indeed could they live even that long, if they did not revive themselves with the drink—he meant the wine to the Fish-eaters; for it is by this that they themselves are surpassed by the Persians.

Chapter 23

1When the Fish-eaters asked the king about their life and their way of living, he said that most of them reached one hundred and twenty years, and that some even exceeded that; and that their food was boiled meat, and their drink milk.

2When the scouts marveled at the number of years, he led them to a spring, in which those who bathed grew more sleek-skinned, as though it were oil; and it smelled of violets.

3The water of this spring, the scouts said, was so very weak that nothing could float upon it, neither wood nor anything lighter than wood, but everything sank down to the bottom. If this water is really such as it is said to be, it would be through this, since they use it for everything, that they are long-lived.

4From the spring he led them away to a prison of men, where all were bound in fetters of gold. Among these Ethiopians bronze is the rarest and most precious of all things. And after they had viewed the prison, they viewed also the so-called Table of the Sun.

Chapter 24

1After this, the last thing they viewed was their coffins, which are said to be made of crystal in the following manner:

2when they have dried the corpse—whether in the same way as the Egyptians or in some other fashion—they coat the whole of it with gypsum and adorn it with painting, making the likeness as true to life as they can; then they set a hollow pillar of crystal around it. This stone is dug up in great quantity and is easy to work.

3Inside the pillar the corpse is visible, giving off no unpleasant smell and nothing else unseemly, and all its parts are as plainly visible as the corpse itself.

4For a year the pillar is kept in the houses of the nearest kin, who make first offerings of everything to it and bring sacrifices; after that they carry it out and set it up around the city.

Chapter 25

1When the scouts had viewed everything, they set off back again. And when these men had made their report, Cambyses at once, in a passion, marched against the Ethiopians, without issuing any order to lay in provisions, and without giving a thought to the fact that he was about to march to the ends of the earth;

2but like a man out of his mind and beside himself, as soon as he heard the report of the Fish-eaters, he marched, stationing the Greeks who were with him to wait where they were, and taking the whole foot army along with him.

3When on his march he came to Thebes, he detached about fifty thousand from the army; these he ordered to enslave the Ammonians and to burn the oracle of Zeus, while he himself marched on against the Ethiopians with the rest of the army.

4Before the army had covered a fifth part of the way, all the provisions they had with them ran out; and after the provisions, the beasts of burden too gave out, since they were being eaten.

5If Cambyses, on learning this, had admitted his mistake and led the army back, he would have been a wise man despite the mistake he made at the start; but as it was, he paid it no heed and pressed ever onward.

6The soldiers, as long as they could get anything from the land, kept alive by eating grass; but when they came to the sand, some of them did a terrible thing: drawing lots by tens, they ate up one of their own.

7When Cambyses learned of this, in dread of the men devouring each other, he abandoned the expedition against the Ethiopians and marched back, arriving at Thebes with many of the army lost; and coming down from Thebes to Memphis he let the Greeks sail away home.

Chapter 26

1Such was the outcome of the expedition against the Ethiopians. Those of the army who had been dispatched to march against the Ammonians set out from Thebes with guides, and they are known to have arrived at the city of Oasis, which is inhabited by Samians said to be of the Aeschrionian tribe, seven days' journey from Thebes through the sand; and this region is called in the Greek tongue the Island of the Blessed.

2This is the region the army is said to have reached; but beyond it, save for what the Ammonians themselves and those who have heard it from them report, no one has anything to tell about them; for they never reached the Ammonians, nor did they ever make their way back.

3This is the account the Ammonians themselves give: that when the army set out from this Oasis and was marching through the sand against them, and had come to a point about midway between themselves and the Oasis, as they were taking their meal a south wind blew upon them, a great and violent one, driving heaps of sand before it and burying them; and in this way they vanished from sight. Such is the Ammonian account of what befell this army.

Chapter 27

1When Cambyses came to Memphis, the Apis appeared to the Egyptians—the bull the Greeks call Epaphus. As soon as it appeared, the Egyptians at once put on their finest clothes and held a festival.

2When Cambyses saw the Egyptians doing this, suspecting that they were making merry over his misfortunes, he called for the governors of Memphis; and when they came into his presence, he asked why the Egyptians had done nothing of the sort before, when he was in Memphis, yet now did so, when he was there after losing a part of his army.

3They told him that a god had appeared to them, one whose custom it is to show himself after a long time, and that when he appears all the Egyptians keep the festival and rejoice. When Cambyses heard this, he said they were lying, and as liars he condemned them to death.

Chapter 28

1Having put these to death, next he called the priests into his presence; and when the priests told the same story, he said it would not escape his notice if some tame god had come to the Egyptians. Having said this much, he ordered the priests to bring the Apis away. So they went off to fetch him.

2This Apis, or Epaphus, is born as a calf from a cow that is no longer able to bear any other offspring. The Egyptians say that a gleam from heaven falls upon the cow, and that from this she brings forth the Apis.

3The calf called Apis has these markings: it is black, with a white triangle on its forehead, on its back the image of an eagle, double hairs in its tail, and a beetle under its tongue.

Chapter 29

1When the priests brought the Apis, Cambyses, being somewhat out of his mind, drew his dagger and, meaning to strike the belly of the Apis, stabbed its thigh; and laughing he said to the priests:

2"You wretches, are these the kind of gods you have—things of blood and flesh, that can feel the bite of iron? This is a god fit for Egyptians indeed! But you shall not make a laughingstock of me and get away with it." Having said this, he ordered the men in charge of such matters to scourge the priests, and to kill any other Egyptian they caught celebrating the festival.

3The festival of the Egyptians was thus broken up, and the priests paid the penalty; and the Apis lay wounded in the thigh and wasted away in the temple. When he died of the wound, the priests buried him secretly, without Cambyses' knowledge.

Chapter 30

1Cambyses, as the Egyptians say, went mad straightway because of this outrage, though even before he had not been in his right mind. And the first of the evils he wrought was the death of his brother Smerdis, who had the same father and mother—a brother he had sent back to Persia out of Egypt in a fit of jealousy, because Smerdis alone of the Persians had drawn the bow, by as much as two fingers' breadth—the bow that the Fish-eaters had brought from the Ethiopian—while none of the other Persians was able to do it.

2After Smerdis had gone away to Persia, Cambyses saw a vision in his sleep like this: a messenger seemed to come from Persia and report that Smerdis, sitting on the royal throne, touched the sky with his head.

3Afraid for himself at this, that his brother might kill him and take the rule, he sent Prexaspes to Persia—the man who was most trusted by him among the Persians—to kill him. Prexaspes went up to Susa and killed Smerdis: some say he took him out hunting and killed him, others that he led him out to the Red Sea and drowned him.

Chapter 31

1This, then, is said to have been the first of the evils that beset Cambyses. Second, he killed his sister who had followed him to Egypt, to whom he was married and who was his sister by both parents.

2He married her in this way: the Persians had no earlier custom of marrying their sisters. Cambyses fell in love with one of his sisters, and then, wishing to marry her, since he intended to do what was not customary, he summoned the royal judges and asked whether any law permitted a man to marry his sister.

3The royal judges are men chosen from among the Persians, who hold office until they die or some wrongdoing is found in them—until then. These are the men who judge cases for the Persians and act as interpreters of the ancestral ordinances, and everything is laid upon them.

4When Cambyses put the question to them, they gave him an answer that was both just and safe, saying that they found no law permitting a brother to live with his sister, but that they had found another law, which allowed the king of the Persians to do whatever he wished.

5So in this way they did not break the law, out of fear of Cambyses, and yet, so that they themselves might not perish by standing by the law, they devised another law, one that supported the man who wished to marry his sister.

6Cambyses, then, married the woman he loved; but not long afterward he took another sister as well. It was the younger of these, the one who had followed him to Egypt, that he killed.

Chapter 32

1About her death, just as about the death of Smerdis, two accounts are told. The Greeks say that Cambyses matched a lion's cub against a puppy of a dog, and that this wife of his was watching as well; and when the puppy was getting the worse of the fight, its brother, another puppy, broke its leash and came to its aid; and so the two of them together got the better of the cub.

2Cambyses was delighted as he watched, but the woman sitting beside him wept. Cambyses, noticing this, asked her why she wept; and she said that, when she saw the puppy come to the aid of its brother, she wept, remembering Smerdis and realizing that he had no one to come to his aid.

3The Greeks say that it was for this word that she was destroyed by Cambyses; but the Egyptians say that once, when the two were sitting at table, the woman took a lettuce and stripped it of its leaves, and asked her husband which was the fairer, the plucked lettuce or the leafy one; and he said the leafy one, and she said:

4"Yet it was this lettuce that you once imitated, when you stripped the house of Cyrus bare." And he, flying into a rage, leapt on her as she was with child, and she miscarried and died.

Chapter 33

1Such was the madness Cambyses showed against those of his own house—whether because of the Apis or for some other reason; for it is the way of the world for troubles to beset men in great numbers. Cambyses is also said to have had a serious disease from birth, one that some call the sacred disease. It is nothing strange, then, if, with his body afflicted by a serious disease, his mind too was not sound.

Chapter 34

1Such was the madness he showed against the other Persians. He is said to have spoken to Prexaspes—the man he honored most of all, and who carried his messages for him, and whose son was cupbearer to Cambyses, this too being no small honor—and the words he is said to have spoken are these:

2"Prexaspes, what kind of man do the Persians think I am, and what do they say of me?" And Prexaspes said: "Sire, in all other matters they praise you highly, but they say you are too much given to wine."

3Such was what Prexaspes said about the Persians; and Cambyses, angered, answered as follows: "So now the Persians say that I give way to wine and that I have lost my wits? Then even their earlier words were not true."

4For on an earlier occasion, when the Persians were sitting with him and Croesus was present too, Cambyses asked what kind of man he seemed to be in comparison with his father Cyrus; and they answered that he was better than his father, since he held everything Cyrus had and had won Egypt and the sea besides.

5This the Persians said; but Croesus, who was present and did not agree with their judgment, spoke to Cambyses as follows: "In my judgment, son of Cyrus, you are not like your father; for you do not yet have a son such as the one he left behind in you." Cambyses was pleased to hear this, and praised the judgment of Croesus.

Chapter 35

1Recalling this, then, he spoke in anger to Prexaspes: "Now you shall learn for yourself whether the Persians speak the truth, or whether it is they who say these things out of their wits:

2for if, with your son standing here in the doorway, my shot strikes him in the middle of the heart, it will be plain that the Persians say nothing true; but if I miss, then allow that the Persians tell the truth and that I am not in my right mind."

3Having said this he drew his bow and shot the boy; and when the boy fell, he ordered his attendants to cut him open and examine the shot; and when the arrow was found lodged in the heart, he said to the boy's father, laughing and overcome with delight—

4"Prexaspes, it has been made clear to you both that I am not mad and that the Persians are out of their wits. Now tell me: of all mankind, whom have you ever seen shoot so unerringly?" Prexaspes, seeing that the man was not in his right mind and fearing for himself, said, "Master, I do not think even the god himself could shoot so well."

5This, then, was what he did on that occasion; on another, seizing twelve Persians of the first rank on no charge of any weight, he buried them alive head downward.

Chapter 36

1While he was doing this, Croesus the Lydian took it upon himself to admonish him with these words: "O king, do not give yourself over entirely to your youth and your passion, but hold back and master yourself. It is a good thing to be provident; providence is wisdom. You put to death men who are your own citizens, seizing them on no charge of any weight, and you put to death boys as well.

2If you go on doing many such things, take care that the Persians do not revolt against you. Your father Cyrus laid it upon me, with many injunctions, to admonish you and to suggest to you whatever good thing I might find." Such was the counsel he gave him, showing his good will; and the other answered as follows:

3"You dare to give counsel to me—you who ruled your own fatherland so handsomely, and gave such fine advice to my father, bidding him cross the river Araxes and march against the Massagetae, when they were the ones who wished to cross into our land! You ruined yourself and your own country besides by governing it badly, and you ruined Cyrus by his obeying you—but you shall not rejoice in it, since I have long been wanting to lay hold of some pretext against you."

4With these words he took up his bow to shoot him down, and Croesus ran out and made his escape. When he found that he could not shoot him, he ordered his attendants to take him and kill him.

5The attendants, knowing his temperament, hid Croesus on this understanding: if Cambyses repented and wanted Croesus back, they would produce him and receive gifts for sparing Croesus' life; but if he felt no regret and did not miss him, then they were to make an end of him.

6Cambyses did come to miss Croesus not long afterward, and the attendants, learning of this, told him that he was still alive. Cambyses said that he was glad Croesus had survived, but that those who had kept him alive would not go unpunished—he would put them to death; and this he did.

Chapter 37

1Such were the many frenzies he vented upon the Persians and their allies while he stayed at Memphis, opening ancient tombs and examining the corpses.

2He also went into the temple of Hephaestus and laughed long at the image. For the image of Hephaestus is most like the Phoenician Pataeci, which the Phoenicians carry about in the prows of their warships. To anyone who has not seen these I will explain: it is a likeness of a man of pygmy stature.

3He also entered the temple of the Cabiri, which it is not lawful for any man to enter except the priest; and these images too he burned, after mocking them greatly. They too resemble the images of Hephaestus; and these are said to be his children.

Chapter 38

1In every way, then, it is clear to me that Cambyses was mightily mad; for he would never have made so bold as to mock sacred rites and customs. If a man were to set before all mankind and bid each people choose the fairest customs from all the customs in the world, each, after examining them, would choose their own; so thoroughly does everyone believe their own customs to be far the fairest.

2It is not to be supposed, then, that anyone but a madman would make a laughingstock of such things; and that all mankind is of this mind about their customs may be judged by many other proofs as well, and by this one among them:

3Darius, in the course of his reign, asked the Greeks who were present for how great a sum of money they would be willing to consume their fathers when they died; and they said that for no price would they do such a thing.

4Darius next summoned the Indians called Callatiae, who eat their parents, and asked them—for the Greeks were present and learned what was said through an interpreter—for what sum they would consent to burn their fathers with fire when they died; and they cried aloud and bade him speak no more of such things. So firmly are these things established; and Pindar, in my judgment, was right when he wrote in his verse that custom is "king of all."

Chapter 39

1While Cambyses was campaigning against Egypt, the Lacedaemonians too made an expedition against Samos and against Polycrates son of Aeaces, who had seized Samos by an uprising,

2and at first divided the city into three and gave shares to his brothers Pantagnotus and Syloson; but afterward he killed one of them and drove out the younger, Syloson, and held all of Samos. Once he was established, he formed a guest-friendship with Amasis king of Egypt, sending gifts and receiving others in return from him.

3In a short time the power of Polycrates grew apace and was noised abroad throughout Ionia and the rest of Greece; wherever he chose to campaign, everything turned out well for him. He had acquired a hundred fifty-oared galleys and a thousand archers, and he harried all and sundry, making no distinction;

4for he said that he would please a friend more by returning what he had taken than by never having taken it at all. He had taken many of the islands, and many cities of the mainland; among them he defeated the Lesbians in a sea battle as they came with all their strength to help the Milesians, and took them, and these men dug the whole trench around the wall on Samos while kept in chains.

Chapter 40

1Now Amasis was not unaware of Polycrates' great good fortune; it was a matter of concern to him. As his prosperity grew ever greater, Amasis wrote the following in a scroll and sent it to Samos. "Amasis to Polycrates, thus he says:

2"It is pleasant to hear that a friend and guest-friend is doing well; but your great good fortune does not please me, for I know that the divine power is envious; and somehow I would wish, both for myself and for those I care for, that some part of our affairs should prosper and some should go awry, and so to pass through life in alternation rather than prospering in everything.

3For I have never yet heard tell of any man who prospered in everything and did not come to a bad end, utterly rooted up. So now take my advice and do this in the face of your good fortune:

4consider and find what is worth the most to you, and whose loss above all would grieve you in your heart, and cast it away so that it never again comes among men; and if from that time on your good fortune does not alternate with reverses, then heal your troubles by the remedy I propose."

Chapter 41

1Polycrates read this and understood that Amasis was giving him good advice; and he searched for the one of his treasures whose loss would grieve him most, and in his searching he found this: he had a signet ring that he wore, bound in gold, made of an emerald stone, and it was the work of Theodorus son of Telecles of Samos.

2When he had decided to cast this away, he did as follows: he manned a fifty-oared galley and boarded it, and then ordered them to put out to the open sea; and when he was far out from the island, he drew off the signet ring in the sight of all his fellow voyagers and threw it into the sea. Having done this he sailed home; and when he reached his house he gave himself up to grief.

Chapter 42

1On the fifth or sixth day after this the following befell him. A fisherman caught a fish, great and beautiful, and thought it right that it be given to Polycrates as a gift; bringing it to Polycrates' door he said that he wished to come into his presence, and when this was granted him he spoke, offering the fish:

2"O king, when I caught this I did not think it right to carry it to the market, though I live by my own hands, but it seemed to me worthy of you and of your sovereignty; so I bring it and give it to you." Pleased by these words, he answered as follows: "You have done very well indeed, and my thanks are doubled, both for your words and for your gift; and we invite you to dinner."

3The fisherman, thinking much of this, went home; and the attendants, cutting open the fish, found in its belly the signet ring of Polycrates.

4When they saw it and took it out as quickly as they could, they brought it to Polycrates in delight, and as they gave him the ring they told him the manner of its finding. When it struck him that the matter was a thing of heaven, he wrote in a scroll everything that had happened to him, just as it had befallen him, and having written it he sent it to Egypt.

Chapter 43

1When Amasis read the scroll that came from Polycrates, he understood that it is impossible for a man to rescue another man from what is destined to come to pass, and that Polycrates, who prospers in all things and even finds again what he throws away, is destined to come to a bad end.

2He sent a herald to Samos to announce that he was dissolving their guest-friendship. His reason for this was that, if some terrible and great misfortune should overtake Polycrates, he might not grieve in his heart as over a guest-friend.

Chapter 44

1It was against this Polycrates, then, prospering in all things, that the Lacedaemonians made their expedition, at the invitation of the Samians who afterward founded Cydonia in Crete. Polycrates secretly sent a herald to Cambyses son of Cyrus, who was mustering an army for Egypt, and asked him to send to Samos and demand a force from him as well.

2Cambyses, hearing this, eagerly sent to Samos asking Polycrates to send a naval force along with him against Egypt. Polycrates chose out those of the citizens whom he most suspected of disaffection and sent them off in forty triremes, charging Cambyses not to send them back.

Chapter 45

1Some say that the Samians sent off by Polycrates never reached Egypt, but that when they were sailing and came to Carpathus they took counsel and resolved to sail no further; others say that they did reach Egypt and escaped from there while under guard.

2As they sailed back to Samos, Polycrates came against them with his ships and joined battle; the returning men won and disembarked on the island, but they were defeated in a land battle upon it, and so they sailed on to Lacedaemon.

3There are those who say that the men from Egypt defeated Polycrates; but they speak, I think, wrongly; for there would have been no need for them to call in the Lacedaemonians if they had been well able to reduce Polycrates themselves. And besides, it does not stand to reason that a man who had mercenary allies and household archers in great numbers should be defeated by the returning Samians, who were few.

4Polycrates had gathered the children and wives of the citizens under his rule into the ship-sheds and held them ready, so that if these men should betray him to the returning exiles, he could set fire to the ship-sheds with them inside.

Chapter 46

1When the Samians who had been expelled by Polycrates came to Sparta, they presented themselves before the magistrates and spoke at length, as men in sore need; but the magistrates answered them at their first hearing that they had forgotten what was said first and did not understand what came last.

2After this they presented themselves a second time and said nothing else at all, but carrying a bag they said that the bag was in need of meal. The magistrates answered that the bag was a needless piece of work; but all the same they resolved to help them.

Chapter 47

1And then the Lacedaemonians made their preparations and campaigned against Samos—according to the Samians, to repay a service, because the Samians had earlier sent ships to help them against the Messenians; but according to the Lacedaemonians, they made the expedition not so much to aid the Samians at their request as to avenge the carrying off of the mixing bowl that they were conveying to Croesus, and of the corselet that Amasis king of Egypt had sent them as a gift.

2For the Samians had carried off the corselet the year before the bowl; it was of linen, with many figures woven into it, and it was adorned with gold and with wool that grows from trees;

3and what is most worth wondering at is what each thread of the corselet achieves: fine as it is, it holds within it three hundred and sixty strands, all visible. Another such corselet is the one that Amasis dedicated to Athena at Lindos.

Chapter 48

1The Corinthians too took part in the expedition against Samos, and eagerly; for an outrage had been done to them by the Samians one generation before this expedition, at the same time as the carrying off of the bowl.

2Periander son of Cypselus had sent to Sardis to Alyattes three hundred boys, sons of the foremost men of Corcyra, for castration; and when the Corinthians who were carrying the boys put in at Samos, the Samians learned the story and the purpose for which the boys were being taken to Sardis, and first they taught the boys to lay hold of the temple of Artemis;

3then, since they would not stand by and see the suppliants dragged from the temple, and the Corinthians cut off the boys' food, the Samians made a festival, which they still observe even now in the same fashion. When night came on, for as long as the boys remained suppliants, they set up choruses of maidens and young men, and as they set up the choruses they made it a custom that dried sesame and honey should be brought, so that the Corcyraean boys might snatch at them and have food.

4This went on until the Corinthian guards of the boys went away and left them; and the Samians carried the boys off to Corcyra.

Chapter 49

1Now if, after Periander's death, the Corinthians had been on friendly terms with the Corcyraeans, they would not have joined the expedition against Samos for this reason. But as it is, ever since they settled the island the two have been at odds with one another, though they are of one blood,

2and it was for these reasons that the Corinthians bore a grudge against the Samians. Periander had sent to Sardis for castration boys chosen out from among the foremost of the Corcyraeans, in vengeance; for the Corcyraeans had begun it first, by committing an outrage against him.

Chapter 50

1For after Periander had killed his own wife Melissa, there befell him another misfortune in addition to the one that had already happened. He had by Melissa two sons, in age one seventeen and the other eighteen years old.

2Their mother's father, Procles, who was tyrant of Epidaurus, sent for them and showed them warm kindness, as was natural, they being sons of his daughter. When he sent them away he said to them as he sped them on their way:

3"Do you know, boys, who it was that killed your mother?" This word the elder of the two took for nothing; but the younger, whose name was Lycophron, was so stung by it that when he came to Corinth he would not speak to his father, as to his mother's murderer, nor converse with him when he spoke to him, nor give him any reply when he asked a question. At last Periander, in a fury, drove him out of the house.

Chapter 51

1After driving him out, Periander questioned the elder son about what their mother's father had said to them. He told him how kindly he had received them; but of that word which Procles had spoken as he sent them off, being heedless, he made no mention. Periander said there was no way he had not laid some suggestion before them, and pressed him with questions; and when he remembered, he told him this too.

2Periander took this to heart [and this too], and, being resolved to yield in nothing, he sent a messenger to the houses where the son he had driven out was lodging and forbade them to receive him in their homes.

3And whenever the boy, being driven away, came to another house, he was driven away from that one too, Periander threatening those who received him and ordering them to put him out; driven away, he would go on to another of his companions' houses; and they, since he was Periander's son, received him even so, though they were afraid.

Chapter 52

1At last Periander made a proclamation: whoever should receive him in his house or hold any conversation with him should owe a sacred penalty to Apollo, in whatever sum he should name.

2At this proclamation no one was willing either to hold conversation with him or to receive him in their house; and the young man himself did not think it right to make the attempt once it had been forbidden, but held out, making his lodging in the colonnades.

3On the fourth day Periander saw him worn down by want of washing and want of food, and took pity on him; relaxing his anger, he came closer and said, "My boy, which of these two is more to be chosen—the life you now lead and the troubles you now endure, or the tyranny and the good things I now hold, which it befits a father's son to take over—

4you who, being both my son and king of prosperous Corinth, have chosen a beggar's life, resisting and showing anger toward the one against whom you least should? If some misfortune has befallen in this business, from which you hold suspicion against me, it has befallen me too, and I have the greater share in it, inasmuch as I myself brought it about.

5Learn, then, how much better it is to be envied than pitied, and how wrong it is to be angry with parents and with those who are your betters, and go home."

6Periander thus tried to win him over; but the son answered his father with nothing else except to say that he owed a sacred penalty to the god for having come into conversation with him. Periander, understanding that his son's malady was something beyond remedy and unconquerable, sent him out of his sight, dispatching a ship to Corcyra; for this island too was under his rule.

7After sending him away, Periander marched against his father-in-law Procles as the man most responsible for his present troubles; and he took Epidaurus, and took Procles himself alive.

Chapter 53

1As time went on and Periander grew past his prime, and he knew himself to be no longer able to oversee and manage affairs, he sent to Corcyra and summoned Lycophron to the tyranny; for in the elder of his sons he saw no promise at all, but the boy seemed to him the duller.

2But Lycophron did not even deign to question the bearer of the message. Periander, holding fast to the young man, sent next his sister, his own daughter, thinking that she above all would persuade him.

3When she arrived she said, "Boy, do you wish the tyranny to fall into the hands of others, and your father's house to be torn apart, rather than go back and hold them yourself? Go home; stop punishing yourself.

4Ambition is a perverse thing to possess. Do not cure evil with evil. Many men put what is more reasonable before what is just, and many before now, seeking what is their mother's, have lost what is their father's. Tyranny is a slippery thing, and there are many who desire it, while he is now old and past his prime; do not give your own good things over to others."

5She, instructed by her father in the most winning arguments, spoke thus to him; but he answered and said that he would never come to Corinth so long as he learned that his father was alive.

6When she reported this, Periander sent a herald a third time, wishing to come to Corcyra himself, and bidding Lycophron come to Corinth and take over the tyranny as his successor.

7When the boy consented to these terms, Periander set out for Corcyra and the boy for Corinth. But the Corcyraeans, learning all that had been arranged, killed the young man, so that Periander should not come into their land. In return for this Periander punished the Corcyraeans.

Chapter 54

1The Lacedaemonians arrived with a great fleet and laid siege to Samos; assaulting the wall, they got upon the tower that stood by the sea over against the suburb of the city, but when Polycrates himself came to its rescue with a great force they were driven off.

2At the upper tower that stands on the ridge of the mountain, the mercenaries together with many of the Samians themselves sallied out; they withstood the Lacedaemonians for a short time and then fled backward, and the Lacedaemonians pursued and killed them.

Chapter 55

1If the Lacedaemonians present that day had been the equals of Archias and Lycopes, Samos would have been taken; for Archias and Lycopes alone burst in with the fleeing Samians through the wall, and being cut off from the road back they died in the city of the Samians.

2In the third generation after this Archias there was another Archias, son of Samius son of Archias, with whom I myself talked at Pitane—for he was of that deme—who honored the Samians above all strangers, and who said that his father had been given the name Samius because his father Archias died after winning distinction at Samos; and he said he honored the Samians because his grandfather had been buried at public expense by the Samians.

Chapter 56

1The Lacedaemonians, when they had been besieging Samos for forty days and their affairs had advanced no further, withdrew to the Peloponnese.

2As the more foolish story goes, Polycrates struck a great quantity of the local coinage in lead, gilded it, and gave it to them, and they took it and so departed. This was the first expedition that the Lacedaemonian Dorians made into Asia.

Chapter 57

1The Samians who had campaigned against Polycrates, when the Lacedaemonians were about to leave them, themselves sailed away to Siphnos;

2for they were in need of money, and the affairs of the Siphnians were at their height at this time, and they were the richest of all the islanders, since they had gold and silver mines in their island, so much so that from a tithe of the revenue won from them there stands a treasure at Delphi, matching those of the very richest; and they divided among themselves the money that came in each year.

3When, then, they were building the treasure house, they consulted the oracle to ask whether their present good fortune would abide with them for a long time; and the Pythia gave them this answer:

4"But when in Siphnos the prytaneia are white and the market is white-browed, / then it is the part of a shrewd man to take thought, / and beware of a wooden ambush and a red herald." Now at that time the market and the prytaneium of the Siphnians were clad in Parian marble.

Chapter 58

1This oracle they were not able to understand, either at the time or when the Samians arrived. For as soon as the Samians put in at Siphnos, they sent one of their ships to the city, carrying ambassadors.

2In ancient times all ships were painted with red ochre, and this it was that the Pythia foretold to the Siphnians, bidding them beware of the wooden ambush and the red herald.

3When the messengers arrived they asked the Siphnians to lend them ten talents; and when the Siphnians refused to lend it to them, the Samians ravaged their lands.

4Learning of this the Siphnians came at once to the rescue; they joined battle with them and were defeated, and many of them were shut out of the city by the Samians; and afterward the Samians exacted a hundred talents from them.

Chapter 59

1From the Hermionians they took over the island of Hydrea, off the Peloponnese, in place of money, and entrusted it to the Troezenians; and they themselves founded Cydonia in Crete—though they had not sailed there for that purpose, but to drive the Zacynthians out of the island.

2They stayed there and prospered for five years, so that the sanctuaries now at Cydonia were the work of these men [and the temple of Dictynna].

3In the sixth year the Aeginetans defeated them in a sea battle and enslaved them together with the Cretans; and since their ships bore boars' heads on their prows, the Aeginetans cut these off and dedicated them in the temple of Athena in Aegina.

4This the Aeginetans did because they bore a grudge against the Samians; for the Samians had earlier, in the reign of Amphicrates at Samos, campaigned against Aegina and wrought great harm upon the Aeginetans, and suffered harm from them in turn. Such is the cause.

Chapter 60

1I have spoken at such length about the Samians because three works of theirs are the greatest ever accomplished by any of the Greeks: a mountain of a hundred and fifty fathoms in height, with a tunnel begun at its foot, having two mouths.

2The length of the tunnel is seven stades, and its height and breadth are eight feet each. Through its whole length another tunnel has been dug, of twenty cubits in depth and three feet in breadth, through which the water, led through pipes, is brought to the city from a great spring.

3The architect of this tunnel was Eupalinus son of Naustrophus, a Megarian. This is one of the three; the second is a mole in the sea around the harbor, of a depth of about twenty fathoms; and the length of the mole is more than two stades.

4The third is a temple they have built, the largest of all the temples we know of; its first architect was Rhoecus son of Philes, a native of the island. For these reasons I have spoken at somewhat greater length about the Samians.

Chapter 61

1While Cambyses son of Cyrus was lingering in Egypt and had lost his wits, two men, Magi brothers, rose against him, one of whom Cambyses had left behind as steward of his household. This man, then, rose against him, having learned that the death of Smerdis had come about but was being kept secret, and that few of the Persians knew of it, while the mass of them believed that Smerdis was still alive.

2With this in mind he planned as follows and made his attempt on the royal power. He had a brother—the one I said rose with him—who was most like in appearance to Smerdis son of Cyrus, whom Cambyses, being his own brother, had killed; and this man was like Smerdis in appearance, and he bore the same name, Smerdis.

3This man the Magus Patizeithes persuaded, promising that he would bring everything about himself, and seated him on the royal throne. Having done this he sent heralds in all directions, and in particular to Egypt, to announce to the army that from now on they were to obey Smerdis son of Cyrus and no longer Cambyses.

Chapter 62

1The other heralds proclaimed this, and so did the one appointed for Egypt; for he found Cambyses and the army at Agbatana in Syria, and standing in their midst he proclaimed the charge laid upon him by the Magus.

2Cambyses, hearing this from the herald and believing that he spoke the truth and that he himself had been betrayed by Prexaspes—for Prexaspes had been sent to kill Smerdis and had not done so—looked at Prexaspes and said, "Prexaspes, is this how you carried out the task I set you?"

3And he said, "Master, it is not true that Smerdis your brother has risen against you, nor that any trouble, great or small, will come to you from that man; for I myself, doing what you commanded, buried him with my own hands.

4If the dead rise again, then expect that Astyages the Mede will rise against you too; but if things are as they were before, no new trouble will spring from that quarter. Now, then, I think we should send after the herald and examine him with questions, asking from whom he comes when he proclaims to us that we are to obey King Smerdis."

Chapter 63

1Prexaspes said this, and it pleased Cambyses; straightway the herald was pursued and brought back; and when he arrived Prexaspes questioned him as follows: "My man, you say that you come as a messenger from Smerdis son of Cyrus; so now tell the truth and go on your way rejoicing: was it Smerdis himself, appearing before you in person, who charged you with this, or one of his servants?"

2And he said, "I have not seen Smerdis son of Cyrus since King Cambyses set out for Egypt; it was the Magus whom Cambyses appointed steward of his household who gave me this charge, saying that Smerdis son of Cyrus was the one who ordered this to be said to you."

3So he spoke, adding nothing false on his own account; and Cambyses said, "Prexaspes, by doing what was commanded like the good man you are, you are cleared of blame; but who among the Persians can it be that has risen against me, riding on the name of Smerdis?" And he said:

4"I think I understand what has come about here, my king: it is the Magi who have risen against you—Patizeithes, whom you left steward of your household, and his brother Smerdis."

Chapter 64

1When Cambyses heard the name of Smerdis, the truth of both the words and the dream struck home; for it had seemed to him in his sleep that a messenger reported to him how Smerdis, seated on the royal throne, touched the sky with his head.

2Realizing that he had killed his brother for nothing, he wept for Smerdis; and having wept and grieved bitterly at the whole misfortune, he leapt upon his horse, intending to march against the Magus at Susa as fast as he could.

3And as he leapt upon his horse, the hilt of his sword fell from its scabbard, and the bared sword struck his thigh. Wounded in the place where he had himself earlier struck the Egyptian god Apis, when it seemed to him that the wound was mortal, Cambyses asked what the name of the city was; and they told him it was Agbatana.

4An oracle had been given to him before this, from the city of Buto, that he would end his life at Agbatana. He supposed that he was fated to die of old age in the Agbatana in Media, where all his power lay; but the oracle, it seems, meant the Agbatana in Syria.

5And so, when he asked and learned the name of the city, sobered by the misfortune that had struck him—from the Magus and from the wound—he grasped the meaning of the oracle and said, "Here it is fated that Cambyses son of Cyrus die."

Chapter 65

1So much for that. About twenty days later he sent for the most notable of the Persians who were present and spoke to them as follows: "Persians, I am compelled to reveal to you the thing that of all things I most wished to keep hidden.

2For while I was in Egypt I saw a vision in my sleep, which I wish I had never seen: a messenger seemed to come from my home and report how Smerdis, seated on the royal throne, touched the sky with his head.

3Afraid that I should be deprived of my rule by my brother, I acted more quickly than wisely; for in human nature, it seems, it is not possible to turn aside what is destined to happen. And I, fool that I am, sent Prexaspes to Susa to kill Smerdis. With so great an evil done I lived without fear, never considering that once Smerdis was put out of my way some other man might rise against me.

4Missing altogether what was destined to be, I have become a brother's murderer for nothing, and none the less I have been deprived of my kingdom; for the Magus Smerdis is the one the divine power showed me in my vision as destined to rise against me.

5The deed, then, is done, and reckon that Smerdis son of Cyrus is no longer among you; but it is the Magi who hold your royal power—both the one I left steward of my household and his brother Smerdis. The man who above all should have avenged me, after the shameful treatment I suffered from the Magi, has met an unholy end at the hands of those closest to him;

6and since he is gone, it falls next most of all to you, Persians, that I charge you with what I wish to be done as I end my life; and this I lay upon you, calling on the royal gods, upon all of you and above all upon the Achaemenids present: do not suffer the sovereign power to pass back again into the hands of the Medes, but if they hold it by treachery, take it from them by treachery; if they won it by force, win it back by force of arms.

7If you do this, may the earth bear you its fruit, and may your wives and flocks bear you young, and may you be free for all time; but if you do not win back the rule, or do not even attempt to win it back, I call down upon you the opposite of these things, and further, that the end of each one of the Persians come upon him as it has come upon me." When Cambyses had said this, he wept over all that he had done.

Chapter 66

1When the Persians saw the king break into weeping, they all tore the clothes they wore and gave themselves over to unbounded lamentation.

2After this, when the bone mortified and the thigh rotted away most quickly, it carried off Cambyses son of Cyrus, who had reigned in all seven years and five months, and who was left altogether without child, male or female.

3The Persians present were strongly inclined to disbelieve that the Magi held the power; they supposed that Cambyses had said what he did about the death of Smerdis out of malice, to make the whole Persian people hostile to him.

Chapter 67

1These men, then, believed that Smerdis son of Cyrus was established as king; for Prexaspes too stoutly denied that he had killed Smerdis—it was not safe for him, now that Cambyses was dead, to say that he had destroyed the son of Cyrus with his own hand.

2So with the death of Cambyses the Magus reigned without fear, trading on the name of Smerdis son of Cyrus, for the seven months remaining to make up Cambyses' eight years;

3in the course of which he conferred great benefits upon all his subjects, so that when he died all men in Asia, apart from the Persians themselves, mourned his loss. For the Magus sent word to every people he ruled and proclaimed immunity from military service and from tribute for three years.

Chapter 68

1This he proclaimed at once when he took over the rule, and in the eighth month he was exposed in the following way. Otanes was a son of Pharnaspes, and in birth and in wealth the equal of the foremost of the Persians.

2This Otanes was the first to suspect that the Magus was not Smerdis son of Cyrus but the man he actually was, reasoning thus: that he never came out of the acropolis, and that he never summoned into his presence any of the notable Persians.

3With this suspicion he did as follows. Cambyses had married his daughter, whose name was Phaedyme; this same woman the Magus now had, and he lived with her and with all the other wives of Cambyses. Otanes, then, sent to this his daughter and asked with which of men she lay, whether with Smerdis son of Cyrus or with some other.

4She sent word back saying that she did not know; for she had never seen Smerdis son of Cyrus, nor did she know who it was that lived with her. Otanes sent a second time, saying, "If you do not know Smerdis son of Cyrus yourself, then find out from Atossa who this man is with whom you both live—she, that is, and you; for surely she knows her own brother." To this his daughter replied:

5"I can hold no conversation with Atossa, nor can I see any other of the women who live here with me; for as soon as this man—whoever he may be—took over the royal power, he scattered us apart, lodging each of us in a separate place."

Chapter 69

1When Otanes heard this, the matter became plainer still to him. A third message he sent in to her, saying this:

2"Daughter, since you are well born, you must take upon yourself whatever danger your father bids you undertake. For if this is not Smerdis son of Cyrus but the man I suspect, then he must not be suffered to go off rejoicing, lying with you and holding the power of the Persians; he must pay the penalty.

3Do this, then: when he lies with you and you learn that he is fast asleep, feel for his ears; and if he is shown to have ears, believe that you live with Smerdis son of Cyrus; but if he has none, then you live with Smerdis the Magus."

4To this Phaedyme replied that she would be running a great risk if she did this; for if he happened to have no ears and she were caught feeling for them, she knew well that he would make an end of her; still, she would do it.

5She undertook, then, to bring this about for her father. This Magus Smerdis had had his ears cut off by Cyrus son of Cambyses, on a charge of no small weight.

6Phaedyme, the daughter of Otanes, carried out everything she had undertaken toward her father; and when her turn came to go to the Magus—for the wives of the Persians visit them in rotation—she went to him and lay with him, and when the Magus was fast asleep she felt for his ears. Finding without difficulty, but easily, that the man had no ears, as soon as day had come she sent word to her father of what had been done.

Chapter 70

1Otanes took into his confidence Aspathines and Gobryes, both among the foremost of the Persians and the men most dear to him in trust, and told them the whole story; and they had themselves already suspected that this was how matters stood, and when Otanes laid the matter before them they agreed.

2It was resolved that each of them should take as a partner the one man he trusted most. Otanes brought in Intaphrenes, Gobryes brought in Megabyzus, and Aspathines brought in Hydarnes.

3When these were six, Darius son of Hystaspes arrived at Susa, coming from Persia; for his father was viceroy there. When this man arrived, the six Persians resolved to take Darius into their company as well.

Chapter 71

1These men, being seven, met together and gave one another pledges and words. When it came to Darius to declare his opinion, he spoke to them as follows:

2"I thought that I alone knew this—that the one who reigns is the Magus, and that Smerdis son of Cyrus is dead; and for this very reason I have come in haste, to bring about the death of the Magus. Since it has fallen out that you know it too and not I alone, I think we should act at once and not put it off; for that is not the better course."

3To this Otanes said, "Son of Hystaspes, you are born of a noble father, and you show yourself to be no whit inferior to your father. Yet this enterprise—do not hurry it on so rashly, but take it in the more prudent way; for we must be more in number before we make the attempt."

4To this Darius said, "Men here present, if you follow the course Otanes has laid down, know that you will perish most miserably; for someone will carry word of it to the Magus, seeking private gain for himself.

5Best of all, then, you should have done this on your own initiative; but since it seemed good to you to bring the matter before more men, and you referred it to me—then either let us do it today, or be sure that if this present day slips by, no one else will denounce you ahead of me, but I will denounce you to the Magus myself."

Chapter 72

1To this Otanes said, seeing Darius pressing on: "Since you force us to hasten and will not allow us to put it off, come, explain to us yourself by what means we shall get into the palace and set upon them. For the guards posted there you know yourself, if not by sight then by report; by what means shall we pass them?" Darius answered as follows:

2"Otanes, there are many things that cannot be made plain by words but only by deed; and again there are things that words can express, but no bright achievement comes of them. You may be sure that the watches posted there are not hard to pass.

3In the first place, for men of our standing, there is no one who will not let us pass—some from respect for us, others from fear; and in the second place, I have myself a most plausible excuse for going in, saying that I have just arrived from Persia and wish to deliver a message from my father to the king.

4Where a lie must be told, let it be told. For the same end is pursued both by liars and by those who deal in truth: the liars lie when they expect to win some profit by their lies, and the truthful tell the truth to draw gain by their truthfulness and to be trusted the more. So though we practice opposite courses, we hold to the same end.

5If neither stood to gain anything, the truthful man would be false and the liar truthful in the same way. So whoever of the gatekeepers lets us pass willingly, it will be the better for him in time to come; but whoever tries to resist—let him be marked down there and then as an enemy—and then let us push inside and set to the work."

Chapter 73

1Gobryes said next, "Dear friends, when will there be a better time for us to win back the rule—or, if we cannot take it up again, to die? Since we who are Persians are ruled by a Mede, a Magus, and one who has no ears at that.

2All of you who were present at Cambyses' sickbed surely remember what he charged the Persians to do as he ended his life, if they did not attempt to win back the rule; those words we did not accept at the time, but supposed that Cambyses had spoken them out of malice.

3Now, then, I cast my vote that we obey Darius, and that we do not break up this meeting but go straight against the Magus." So Gobryes spoke, and all of them approved this view.

Chapter 74

1While these men were so planning, the following came about by chance. The Magi, taking counsel, resolved to attach Prexaspes to themselves as a friend, both because of what he had suffered at the hands of Cambyses, who had killed his son with an arrow, and because he alone knew of the death of Smerdis son of Cyrus, having destroyed him with his own hand; and besides, Prexaspes stood in the highest honor among the Persians.

2For these reasons they summoned him and won him as a friend, taking pledges and oaths from him that he would keep it to himself and reveal to no man the deception they had practiced upon the Persians; and they promised that they would give him rewards beyond counting.

3When Prexaspes had promised to do this, the Magi, having persuaded him, made him this second proposal: they said that they themselves would summon all the Persians beneath the royal wall, and they bade him go up on a tower and proclaim that they were ruled by Smerdis son of Cyrus and by no other.

4This they charged him to do because he was reputed to be the most trustworthy man among the Persians, and because he had many times declared that Smerdis son of Cyrus was alive, and had denied his murder.

Chapter 75

1When Prexaspes said that he was ready to do this as well, the Magi summoned the Persians, set him up on a tower, and bade him proclaim. But of the things they asked of him he deliberately remembered nothing; beginning with Achaemenes he set out the lineage of Cyrus' house, and when at last he came down to Cyrus he recounted all the good things Cyrus had done for the Persians;

2and having gone through this he revealed the truth, saying that before now he had kept it hidden—for it was not safe for him to speak of what had happened—but that at this moment necessity compelled him to make it known. And so he told them that he had killed Smerdis son of Cyrus under compulsion from Cambyses, and that the Magi were reigning.

3Having called down many curses upon the Persians if they did not win back the rule and punish the Magi, he let himself fall headfirst from the tower below. Such was the end of Prexaspes, who had been all his life a man of mark.

Chapter 76

1The seven Persians, when they had resolved to set upon the Magi at once and not put it off, went forth after praying to the gods, knowing nothing of what had been done concerning Prexaspes.

2As they were marching along the middle of the road they learned what had happened to Prexaspes. Thereupon they stepped aside from the road and debated again among themselves: the party of Otanes urged them absolutely to put it off and not attack while affairs were in turmoil, while the party of Darius urged them to go at once and do what had been resolved, without delay.

3As they were contending, there appeared seven pairs of hawks pursuing two pairs of vultures and plucking and tearing them. When the seven saw this, they all approved Darius' opinion, and then they went on to the palace, emboldened by the birds.

Chapter 77

1When they came up to the gates it turned out just as Darius had expected; for the guards, out of respect for the foremost men of the Persians, and suspecting nothing of the sort from them, let them pass as men guided by divine prompting, and no one even questioned them.

2When they had passed into the court they fell in with the eunuchs who carried the messages; these asked them what they wanted and why they had come, and at the same time as they questioned them they threatened the gatekeepers for having let them through, and tried to stop the seven from going further.

3The seven, cheering one another on and drawing their daggers, stabbed those who tried to hold them back where they stood, and themselves ran at full speed into the men's quarters.

Chapter 78

1The Magi happened at that moment to be both within and in consultation about what Prexaspes had done. When they saw the eunuchs in an uproar and shouting, both ran back, and understanding what was afoot they turned to defend themselves.

2One of them snatched up the bows, the other turned to the spear. Then they closed with one another. To the one who took up the bows, with the enemy close at hand and pressing upon him, they were of no use; but the other defended himself with the spear, and with it he struck Aspathines in the thigh and Intaphrenes in the eye; and Intaphrenes lost his eye from the wound, though he did not die of it.

3One of the Magi thus wounded these two; and the other, when his bows proved of no use—for there was a bedchamber opening into the men's quarters—fled into it, intending to close the doors, and two of the seven rushed in with him, Darius and Gobryes.

4When Gobryes grappled with the Magus, Darius stood by at a loss, since it was dark, fearing that he might strike Gobryes.

5Gobryes, seeing him stand idle, asked him why he did not use his hand; and he said, "Because I am careful of you, for fear I strike you." Gobryes answered, "Thrust with your sword—and through both of us." Darius obeyed and drove his dagger home, and somehow struck the Magus.

Chapter 79

1Having killed the Magi and cut off their heads, they left their wounded companions there, both because they were incapacitated and to guard the acropolis; and the other five ran carrying the Magi's heads, with shouting and clamor, calling on the rest of the Persians, telling them what had been done and showing the heads, and at the same time killing every Magus they came upon in their path.

2The Persians, learning from the seven what had happened and of the deception of the Magi, thought it right to do likewise themselves; drawing their daggers they killed every Magus they found; and if night had not come on and stopped them, they would have left no Magus alive.

3This day the Persians celebrate above all other days, and on it they hold a great festival, which is called by the Persians the Magophonia; on that day no Magus is allowed to show himself abroad, but the Magi keep to their houses on this day.

Chapter 80

1When the tumult had settled and five days had passed, the men who had risen against the Magi took counsel about all their affairs, and words were spoken that some of the Greeks find incredible—but they were spoken nonetheless.

2Otanes urged that the rule be laid before the Persians in common, speaking as follows: "It seems to me that we should no longer have one man as our ruler; for it is neither pleasant nor good. You saw how far the arrogance of Cambyses went, and you had your share of the arrogance of the Magus.

3How can monarchy be a well-ordered thing, when it is allowed to do whatever it wishes without answering for it? Even the best of all men, if he were placed in this position, would be turned aside from his usual way of thinking. For arrogance grows in him from the good things that surround him, and envy is implanted in a man from the very beginning.

4With these two in him he has every form of wickedness; for satiated with arrogance he does many reckless and wanton things, and others out of envy. And yet a tyrant ought to be without envy, seeing that he holds every good thing. But the opposite is his nature toward his citizens: he envies the best of them while they still live and thrive, he delights in the vilest of the citizens, and he is quickest of all to welcome slanders.

5And most inconsistent of all: if you honor him with moderation, he is aggrieved that he is not served with great attentiveness; and if anyone serves him with great attentiveness, he is aggrieved as at one who fawns. But I come now to the greatest charges of all: he alters the customs of our fathers, and forces women, and puts men to death without trial.

6A multitude ruling has, first of all, the fairest name of all—equality under law; and second, it does none of the things the monarch does: it holds office by lot, it holds office answerable for its acts, and it refers all its decisions to the common account. I therefore give as my opinion that we give up monarchy and make the multitude great; for in the many lie all things."

Chapter 81

1This was the opinion Otanes brought forward; Megabyzus urged that they entrust the rule to an oligarchy, speaking as follows: "What Otanes said in abolishing tyranny—let that be my word too; but in urging that we carry the power over to the multitude he has missed the best judgment; for nothing is so senseless or so violent as a useless mob.

2And to flee the arrogance of a tyrant and fall into the arrogance of an undisciplined people is in no way to be endured. The tyrant, at least, does whatever he does with knowledge; but the mob has not even knowledge: how should it, who has neither been taught nor seen anything noble that is its own, but rushes headlong into affairs without reason, like a winter torrent?

3Let those who wish ill to the Persians make use of the mob; but for our part, let us choose the best of men and put the power into their hands—for we shall ourselves be among those men; and from the best of men the best counsels are likely to come."

Chapter 82

1Megabyzus then proposed his opinion; and third Darius declared his own, saying, "What Megabyzus said about the rule of the people seems to me to have been rightly said, but what he said about oligarchy was not rightly said. For with three forms of government laid before us, and all three of them the best in argument—the rule of the people, oligarchy, and monarchy—I say that monarchy far surpasses the others."

2"For nothing can be found better than the rule of one excellent man; for if he uses such judgment he will guard the multitude blamelessly, and designs against enemies will be kept secret above all in this way."

3"In an oligarchy, where many practice excellence in the public interest, strong private hatreds are apt to arise; for each man, wishing to be the leader, strives to prevail with his own opinions, and they fall into great enmities with one another, from which faction springs, and from faction bloodshed; and the outcome of bloodshed is monarchy—and in this too it has been made plain how much better monarchy is."

4"And where the people rule, it is impossible for baseness not to follow; and once baseness enters public life, enmity does not spring up among the base, but strong friendship does; for the men who corrupt the commonwealth work with their heads together. This is how things go on until some champion of the people puts a stop to such men. Then he is admired by the people; and being admired, he proves to be a monarch—and in this he too shows that monarchy is best."

5"To sum it all up in one word: where did our freedom come from, and who gave it to us? From the people, or from an oligarchy, or from a monarch? My judgment, then, is that since we were freed through one man, we should keep this form of government; and besides, we should not break the laws of our fathers, which serve us well; for that would not be better."

Chapter 83

1These three opinions, then, were set out; and four of the seven men gave their vote for this one. When Otanes was outvoted, though he was eager to establish equality of rights for the Persians, he spoke among them as follows.

2"Comrades in this cause—for it is plain that one of us must become king, whether by drawing lots, or by leaving it to the Persian people to choose whom they will, or by some other device—I for my part will not compete with you: for I want neither to rule nor to be ruled. On these terms I stand aside from the rule, on condition that neither I nor any descendant of mine after me shall ever be ruled by any of you."

3When he had said this and the six agreed to these terms, he took no further part in the contest but withdrew to private life; and to this day this house alone remains free among the Persians, and is governed only so far as it itself chooses, without overstepping the laws of the Persians.

Chapter 84

1The rest of the seven deliberated how they might most justly establish a king; and they resolved that to Otanes and to his descendants forever, if the kingship passed to any other of the seven, there should be given as special gifts a Median dress every year and the whole gift that is most prized among the Persians. The reason they voted to give him this was that he had first thought out the enterprise and brought them together.

2These, then, were the special privileges for Otanes; and they resolved the following for the common good: that any of the seven who wished might enter the palace unannounced, unless the king happened to be sleeping with his wife; and that the king might not marry a wife from anywhere except the families of those who had joined in the rising.

3And on the matter of the kingship they resolved as follows: whichever man's horse should neigh first as the sun rose, while they were all mounted in the suburb, he should have the kingship.

Chapter 85

1Darius had a groom, a clever man named Oebares. When the others had separated, Darius spoke to this man as follows: "Oebares, our resolve concerning the kingship is to act thus: whichever man's horse neighs first as the sun rises, while we are mounted, he is to have the kingship. Come then, if you have any skill, contrive that we win this prize and no one else."

2Oebares answered him thus: "Sire, if it rests on this whether you are to be king or not, be confident on that account and be of good heart, for no one else shall be king before you—such charms do I have." Darius said, "If then you have some such device, it is time to set it to work and not to put it off, for our contest is tomorrow."

3When Oebares heard this, he did as follows. When night came, he took one of the mares that Darius' horse was most fond of, led her to the suburb and tied her up, and then brought Darius' horse there; and for the most part he kept leading him up close against the mare, and at the last he let the horse cover her.

Chapter 86

1At daybreak the six came on their horses as they had agreed; and as they rode through the suburb, when they reached the place where the mare had been tied up during the night before, there Darius' horse ran forward and neighed;

2and at the same moment as the horse did this, there came a flash of lightning out of a clear sky and a clap of thunder. These signs, appearing for Darius, confirmed him as though they had been contrived; and the others leapt down from their horses and did obeisance to Darius.

Chapter 87

1Some say that Oebares contrived it in this way, others as follows (for both stories are told by the Persians): that he touched the horse's parts with his hand, which he kept hidden in his trousers; and that when the horses were about to start at sunrise, Oebares held out his hand to the nostrils of Darius' horse, and the horse, catching the scent, snorted and neighed.

Chapter 88

1Darius son of Hystaspes was now proclaimed king, and all the peoples in Asia were subject to him except the Arabians—Cyrus having subdued them and afterwards Cambyses again. But the Arabians were never subject to the Persians in slavery; they became guest-friends instead, and let Cambyses pass through to Egypt; for without the consent of the Arabians the Persians could not have invaded Egypt.

2The first marriages Darius made were with two daughters of Cyrus, Atossa and Artystone—Atossa, who had been married first to his brother Cambyses and then again to the Magus, and Artystone, still a maiden;

3and he married as a second wife a daughter of Smerdis son of Cyrus, whose name was Parmys; and he also won the daughter of Otanes, the woman who exposed the Magus. And in every way he was filled with power. First of all he had a stone monument made and set up; the figure on it was a horseman, and he inscribed words to this effect: "Darius, son of Hystaspes, by the valor of his horse—whose name he mentions—along with that of Oebares his groom, won the kingship of the Persians."

Chapter 89

1When he had done this, he established twenty administrations in Persia, which they themselves call satrapies; and having set up the administrations and appointed governors over them, he assessed tribute to come in by nations, assigning to each nation the peoples that were its neighbors, and sometimes passing over the immediate neighbors and assigning the more distant peoples now to one and now to another.

2The administrations and the annual revenue from taxes he divided as follows. Those who brought silver were ordered to bring it by the Babylonian talent of weight, and those who brought gold by the Euboean talent. And the Babylonian talent is equivalent to seventy-eight Euboean minas.

3For in the reign of Cyrus, and again of Cambyses, nothing had been settled about tribute, but they used to bring gifts. Because of this assessment of tribute and other things like it, the Persians say that Darius was a tradesman, Cambyses a master, and Cyrus a father—Darius because he made merchandise of everything, Cambyses because he was harsh and contemptuous, and Cyrus because he was kindly and contrived everything good for them.

Chapter 90

1From the Ionians and the Magnesians in Asia, and the Aeolians, Carians, Lycians, Milyans, and Pamphylians—for one single tax had been assessed on all of these—there came in four hundred talents of silver. This was the first tax district established for him; and from the Mysians, Lydians, Lasonians, Cabalians, and Hytennians, five hundred talents: the second district.

2From the Hellespontians on the right as you sail in, and the Phrygians, and the Thracians in Asia, and the Paphlagonians, Mariandynians, and Syrians, the tax was three hundred and sixty talents: the third district.

3From the Cilicians, three hundred and sixty white horses—one for each day of the year—and five hundred talents of silver; of this silver one hundred and forty was spent on the cavalry that guards the Cilician country, and the three hundred and sixty came in to Darius: the fourth district.

Chapter 91

1From the city of Posideium, which Amphilochus son of Amphiaraus founded on the borders of the Cilicians and the Syrians, beginning from this city and reaching to Egypt—except for the portion belonging to the Arabians, since this was free of tax—there was a tribute of three hundred and fifty talents. In this district are all of Phoenicia, and the Syria called Palestine, and Cyprus: the fifth district.

2From Egypt and the Libyans bordering Egypt, and from Cyrene and Barca—for these had been assigned to the Egyptian district—there came in seven hundred talents, apart from the silver produced from Lake Moeris, which came from the fish;

3apart from this silver and the [measured] grain there came in seven hundred talents; for they measure out twelve myriads of grain to the Persians settled in the White Wall at Memphis and to their auxiliaries. The sixth district.

4The Sattagydae, Gandarii, Dadicae, and Aparytae, assessed together, brought in a hundred and seventy talents: the seventh district. From Susa and the rest of the country of the Cissians, three hundred: the eighth district.

Chapter 92

1From Babylon and the rest of Assyria there came in a thousand talents of silver and five hundred castrated boys: the ninth district. From Ecbatana and the rest of Media, and the Paricanians and the Orthocorybantians, four hundred and fifty talents: the tenth district.

2The Caspii, Pausicae, Pantimathi, and Dareitae, contributing together, brought in two hundred talents: the eleventh district.

Chapter 93

1From the Bactrians as far as the Aegli there was a tribute of three hundred and sixty talents: the twelfth district. From Pactyice and the Armenians and the peoples bordering them as far as the Euxine Sea, four hundred talents: the thirteenth district.

2From the Sagartians, Sarangians, Thamanaians, Utians, Mycans, and those who live on the islands in the Erythraean Sea, where the king settles those called the Uprooted—from all of these together the tribute amounted to six hundred talents: the fourteenth district.

3The Sacae and the Caspii brought in two hundred and fifty talents: the fifteenth district. The Parthians, Chorasmians, Sogdians, and Arii, three hundred talents: the sixteenth district.

Chapter 94

1The Paricanians and the Ethiopians in Asia brought in four hundred talents: the seventeenth district. On the Matieni, Saspires, and Alarodians two hundred talents were assessed: the eighteenth district.

2On the Moschi, Tibareni, Macrones, Mossynoeci, and Mares, three hundred talents were assessed beforehand: the nineteenth district. The Indians are by far the most numerous of all the peoples we know of, and their tribute, set against all the others, is three hundred and sixty talents of gold dust: the twentieth district.

Chapter 95

1The silver, then, reckoned by the Euboean talent, comes to nine thousand eight hundred and eighty talents; and the gold, reckoned at thirteen to one, the gold dust is found to amount to four thousand six hundred and eighty Euboean talents.

2When all these are added together, the total collected for Darius' yearly tribute amounts to fourteen thousand five hundred and sixty Euboean talents; and anything less than these I pass over and do not count.

Chapter 96

1This is the tribute that came in to Darius from Asia and from a few parts of Libya. As time went on, however, tribute came in also from the islands and from the peoples settled in Europe as far as Thessaly.

2The king stores this tribute in the following fashion: he melts it down and pours it into earthen jars, and when the jar is full he takes off the pottery around it; and when he needs money, he cuts off as much as he requires at the time.

Chapter 97

1These, then, were the administrations and the assessments of tribute. The Persian land alone I have not named as paying tribute; for the Persians hold their land free of tax.

2These were assessed to pay no tribute but to bring gifts: the Ethiopians bordering Egypt, whom Cambyses subdued as he marched against the long-lived Ethiopians, and those who dwell around sacred Nysa and celebrate the festivals of Dionysus; [these Ethiopians and their neighbors use the same seed as the Callantian Indians, and their dwellings are underground.]

3These together bring gifts every third year, and they still bring them down to my time: two choenices of unsmelted gold, two hundred logs of ebony, five Ethiopian boys, and twenty large elephant tusks.

4The Colchians and their neighbors as far as the Caucasus range—for this is the boundary of Persian rule, and the Persians take no account of anything north of the Caucasus—these too still bring the gifts they assigned, down to my time, every five years: a hundred boys and a hundred maidens.

5The Arabians brought a thousand talents of frankincense every year. These, then, brought these gifts to the king over and above the tribute.

Chapter 98

1The Indians acquire this great quantity of gold, from which they bring the gold dust I have mentioned to the king, in the following fashion.

2The part of the Indian land that faces the rising sun is sand; for of all the peoples about whom anything trustworthy is told, the Indians dwell furthest toward the dawn and the sunrise of any who live in Asia; for east of the Indians there is a desert because of the sand.

3There are many nations of the Indians, and they do not all speak the same language; some of them are nomads and some are not, and some live in the marshes of the river and eat raw fish, which they catch setting out in boats made of reeds; and each boat is made from a single joint of cane.

4These Indians wear clothing of rush; when they have cut the rushes from the river and pounded them, they weave them together mat-fashion and put them on like a breastplate.

Chapter 99

1Other Indians, living to the east of these, are nomads and eat raw flesh; they are called Padaei, and they are said to observe the following customs. Whenever one of their citizens falls ill, whether woman or man, if it is a man, the men who are closest to him kill him, saying that the disease is wasting away his flesh and spoiling it for them; he protests that he is not ill at all, but they, refusing to agree, kill him and feast on him.

2If a woman falls ill, in the same way the women who are closest to her do just what the men do. For anyone who reaches old age they sacrifice and feast on him; but very few of them reach that point, since they kill everyone who falls into illness before that.

Chapter 100

1Other Indians live in this way: they kill no living creature, they sow nothing, and they hold it wrong to have houses; they eat herbs; and they have a grain the size of millet, growing of its own accord from the ground in a husk, which they gather and boil, husk and all, and eat. Whoever of them falls ill goes away into the desert and lies there; and no one pays any heed to him, whether he is sick or dies.

Chapter 101

1The mating of all these Indians whom I have described is done openly, like that of cattle, and they all have a skin color alike and much like the Ethiopians.

2The seed that they send into the women is not white, as with other men, but black, like their skin; and the Ethiopians likewise emit black seed. These Indians live furthest away from the Persians toward the south wind, and they were never subject to King Darius.

Chapter 102

1Other Indians live near the city of Caspatyrus and the country of Pactyice, and are settled to the north and toward the north wind of the rest of the Indians; these have a way of life much like that of the Bactrians. These are the most warlike of the Indians, and it is they who are sent out after the gold; for in that direction the land is desert because of the sand.

2Now in this desert and this sand there are ants, in size somewhat smaller than dogs but larger than foxes; for there are some at the court of the Persian king that have been hunted there. These ants make their dwellings underground and bring up the sand just as the ants in Greece do in the same fashion—and they are themselves very like those in appearance; and the sand that is brought up is gold-bearing.

3It is after this sand that the Indians set out into the desert, each man yoking three camels, a male harnessed in traces on either side and a female in the middle; on her he himself mounts, taking care to yoke one that he has taken from her young as early as possible. For the camels are no slower than horses, and much more able to carry heavy loads.

Chapter 103

1The shape of the camel, what sort of creature it is, I will not describe, since the Greeks know it; but what they do not know about it, that I will tell: the camel has in its hind legs four thigh bones and four knee joints, and its genitals are turned toward the tail through the hind legs.

Chapter 104

1The Indians, using this way of driving and this harness, set out after the gold, reckoning so that they are there for the snatching when the heat is at its fiercest; for the heat makes the ants disappear underground.

2The sun is hottest for these people in the morning, not at midday as for others, but from the time it has risen until the market breaks up. During this stretch it burns them far more than it burns Greece at midday—so much so that the story is they bathe in water at that hour.

3At midday the sun burns the Indians and other men nearly alike. When midday declines, the sun becomes for them what the morning sun is for others, and from then on, as it sinks away, it grows cooler and cooler, until at sunset it is bitterly cold.

Chapter 105

1When the Indians reach the place carrying bags, they fill these with the sand as fast as they can and drive back again; for the ants at once catch the scent, so the Persians say, and give chase. Their speed, they say, is like that of nothing else, so that unless the Indians win a start on the road while the ants are mustering, not one of them would come through alive.

2The male camels—for they are poorer runners than the females—are unyoked and left trailing behind, but never both at once; and the females, remembering the young they have left at home, slacken not at all. This is how the Indians win most of their gold, so the Persians say; there is another supply, more seldom come by, that is dug from the ground.

Chapter 106

1The furthest edges of the inhabited world have somehow obtained the fairest things, just as Greece has obtained seasons far the best tempered of all.

2In the first place, India lies at the easternmost limit of the inhabited lands, as I said a little before; in it, first, the living creatures, both four-footed and winged, are much larger than in other places—except the horses, which are outdone by the Median horses called Nesaean; and second, there is untold gold there, one part of it dug up, one brought down by rivers, and one snatched as I have described.

3The wild trees there bear a fruit of wool, surpassing in beauty and in quality the wool of sheep; and it is from these trees that the Indians make their clothing.

Chapter 107

1Again, toward the south, Arabia is the furthest of the inhabited lands; and it is the only land of all where frankincense grows, and myrrh, and cassia, and cinnamon, and ledanum. All of these the Arabians gather with difficulty except the myrrh.

2Frankincense they gather by burning the styrax, which the Phoenicians export to the Greeks; this they burn and so gather it. For these frankincense trees are guarded by winged serpents, small in size, of many colors, in great numbers around every tree—those same ones that march against Egypt—and nothing drives them from the trees but the smoke of the styrax.

Chapter 108

1The Arabians say further that all the earth would be filled with these serpents, if there did not happen to them something of the kind that I know happens to the vipers.

2And somehow the forethought of the divine, being wise—as is right and fitting—has made all creatures that are timid and good to eat very fertile, so that they may not be eaten up and fail, while those that are savage and hurtful bear few young.

3Thus, for one thing, the hare is hunted by every beast and bird and man, and yet it is so very fertile: it is the only creature that conceives while already pregnant, some of its young furry in the womb, others bare, others only just taking shape, and others only just conceived.

4This is one such case; and the lioness, the strongest and boldest of creatures, bears one single cub once in her life; for in giving birth she casts out her womb along with the cub. The reason for this is as follows: when the cub inside the mother begins to stir, being armed with claws far sharper than those of any other creature, it tears the womb; and as it grows it scratches much harder; and by the time birth is near, nothing at all sound is left of them.

Chapter 109

1If the vipers and the winged serpents of Arabia were born as their nature would have it, men could not live; but as it is, when they mate in pairs, and the male is in the very act of emission, the female catches hold of his neck and, fastening on, does not let go until she has bitten clean through.

2The male then dies in the manner I have described, but the female pays such a penalty as this to the male: the young, avenging their father while still inside her, eat their way through their mother, and when they have eaten through her belly, this is how they make their way out.

3The other serpents, which do no harm to men, lay eggs and hatch out a vast number of young. The vipers are found over all the earth, but the winged serpents are gathered in Arabia and nowhere else; that is why they seem to be so many.

Chapter 110

1This is how the Arabians gather frankincense; and cassia they gather as follows. When they have bound up their whole body and face with hides and other skins, leaving only their eyes, they go after the cassia. It grows in a shallow lake, and around it and in it lurk winged creatures, most like bats, which screech dreadfully and are fierce in fight; these a man must beat off from his eyes, and so he plucks the cassia.

Chapter 111

1Cinnamon they gather in a way more marvelous still. Where it grows, and what the land is that nurtures it, they cannot say; only this, that some, following a plausible account, say it grows in those regions where Dionysus was reared;

2and they say that large birds carry these sticks—which we, learning it from the Phoenicians, call cinnamon—carry them to nests of clay plastered against sheer cliffs, where there is no way up for a man.

3To meet this, the Arabians have the following device: they cut up the limbs of oxen and donkeys and the other beasts of burden into the biggest pieces they can and carry them to these places, and having laid them near the nests they withdraw far off; and the birds fly down and carry the limbs of the beasts up to their nests, which cannot hold them and break apart and fall to the ground, and the men come up and gather it. In this way the cinnamon is gathered and so comes from these lands to the rest of the world.

Chapter 112

1Ledanum, which the Arabians call ladanum, is more marvelous still; for it is gathered in the foulest-smelling place and is the sweetest of scents; for it is found forming in the beards of he-goats, like a gum that comes from the trees. It is useful in many perfumes, and it is this above all that the Arabians burn as incense.

Chapter 113

1So much then for spices; and the land of Arabia breathes out a fragrance wonderfully sweet. There are two kinds of sheep there worth wonder, found nowhere else at all. One of them has long tails, not less than three cubits, and if a man let these drag along, they would get sores from the tails being rubbed on the ground;

2but as it is every one of the shepherds knows enough of carpentry for this; for they make little carts and bind them under the tails, tying the tail of each beast to one cart. The other kind of sheep carry broad tails, a cubit across.

Chapter 114

1Past midday, toward the setting sun, the land of Ethiopia is the furthest of the inhabited lands; and it brings forth much gold, and elephants in great plenty, and every kind of wild tree, and ebony, and men who are the tallest and the fairest and the longest-lived of all.

Chapter 115

1These, then, are the furthest lands in Asia and in Libya. Of the westernmost parts of Europe I cannot speak with certainty; for I do not accept that there is a river called Eridanus among foreigners, emptying into the northern sea, from which the amber is said to come, nor do I know of any islands called the Cassiterides, from which our tin is brought.

2For first, the very name Eridanus gives it away as Greek and not foreign, made up by some poet or other; and second, though I have made it my business to find out, I cannot learn from anyone who has seen it whether there is a sea beyond Europe. At any rate, from the ends of the earth both the tin and the amber reach us.

Chapter 116

1Toward the north of Europe there is plainly far the most gold; how it comes to be there I cannot say with certainty either, though it is said that the Arimaspians, one-eyed men, snatch it from under the griffins.

2Nor do I believe this either, that men grow with one eye, whose nature in all other respects is like that of other men;

3and yet the furthest regions of the world, which enclose and fence in the rest of the land and shut it round about, seem to possess the things that we think fairest and rarest.

Chapter 117

1There is a plain in Asia encircled on every side by a mountain range, and there are five gorges in the mountain. This plain once belonged to the Chorasmians, lying on the borders of the Chorasmians themselves and the Hyrcanians, the Parthians, the Sarangians, and the Thamanaians; but since the Persians have held the power, it is the king's.

2From this mountain that encircles it flows a great river, whose name is the Aces. In former times it watered, being split five ways, the lands I have named, led through a separate gorge to each of them; but since they have been under the Persian, they have suffered as follows.

3The king walled up the gorges in the mountains and set a gate in each gorge; and with the water's way out blocked, the plain within the mountains becomes a lake, since the river keeps flowing in but has nowhere at all to get out.

4So those who were formerly used to making use of the water, being now unable to use it, are in sore distress. In winter the god sends them rain as he does to other men, but in summer they sow millet and sesame and need the water.

5When then no share of the water is granted to them, they come to the Persians, they and their wives, and standing at the king's doors they cry and wail; and the king orders the gates opened that lead toward those who are in the greatest need.

6And when their land has had its fill of drinking the water, those gates are closed, and he orders others opened for others among the rest who are most in need. As I know from what I have heard, he opens them only for great sums of money, over and above the tribute.

Chapter 118

1This, then, is how these things stand. Of the seven men who rose against the Magus, one, Intaphrenes, was caught out in wanton outrage and died at once after the rising, as follows. He wanted to enter the palace and do business with the king; for the law was this, that those who had risen against the Magus should have right of entry to the king without being announced, unless the king happened to be sleeping with a woman.

2Intaphrenes, then, would not have anyone announce him, but wanted to enter because he was one of the seven. But the doorkeeper and the messenger would not allow it, saying that the king was sleeping with a woman. Intaphrenes, thinking they were lying to him, did as follows: drawing his scimitar he cut off their ears and their noses, and fastening them on the bridle of his horse he tied them round their necks, and let them go.

Chapter 119

1They showed themselves to the king and told him the reason why they had been so treated. Darius, fearing that the six had done this by common agreement, sent for each one of them in turn and sounded out their opinion, whether they approved of the deed.

2When he had learned that Intaphrenes had not acted together with them, he seized both Intaphrenes himself and his children and all his kin, having strong suspicion that with his kinsmen he was plotting a rising against him; and seizing them he put them in bonds under sentence of death.

3The wife of Intaphrenes kept coming to the king's doors and weeping and wailing; and by always doing this same thing she moved Darius to pity her. He sent a messenger, who said: "Lady, King Darius grants you the life of one of your imprisoned kin—choose whichever one you wish of them all."

4She took thought and made this answer: "If then the king grants me the life of one, of them all I choose my brother."

5When Darius heard this and marveled at her answer, he sent and asked: "Lady, the king asks you what you have in mind, that you, leaving behind your husband and your children, chose your brother to be spared to you, who is further from you than your children and less dear to you than your husband?"

6She answered thus: "O king, another husband might be mine, if heaven willed, and other children, if I lost these; but since my father and mother no longer live, no other brother could I have in any way at all. It is with this judgment that I spoke as I did."

7The woman seemed to Darius to have spoken well, and he let go both the man she asked for and the eldest of the children, being pleased with her; but all the others he put to death. So one of the seven perished at once in the manner described.

Chapter 120

1About the time of Cambyses' illness, this happened. Set over Sardis by Cyrus was Oroetes, a Persian; this man conceived an unholy design—for he had suffered nothing at all, nor heard any insulting word from Polycrates of Samos, nor even set eyes on him before—yet he longed to seize him and destroy him. As most say, for the following reason.

2Oroetes and another Persian, whose name was Mitrobates, governor of the province at Dascylium, were sitting at the king's gates; and from talk they fell to quarreling, and as they compared their worth Mitrobates said to Oroetes, reproaching him:

3"You, who pass for a man of account, did not win for the king the island of Samos lying hard by your own province, so easy as it is to bring under the hand—one that a single man among the natives seized with fifteen men-at-arms and now rules as tyrant?"

4Some say that on hearing this and chafing at the reproach, he was set not so much on punishing the man who said it as on destroying Polycrates at all costs, on whose account he had been abused.

Chapter 121

1The fewer number say that Oroetes sent a herald to Samos to demand some sum of money or other (for what it was is not told); and Polycrates happened to be lying in his men's hall, and with him was Anacreon the Teian;

2and whether Polycrates slighted Oroetes' business on purpose, or whether some chance of the kind came about—for the herald came in and spoke to him, and Polycrates, who happened to have his face turned to the wall, neither turned around nor answered him.

Chapter 122

1Two causes, then, are given for the death of Polycrates, and it is open to a man to believe whichever of them he wishes. Oroetes at any rate, quartered in Magnesia on the upper Maeander river, sent Myrsus son of Gyges, a Lydian, to Samos bearing a message, having learned the mind of Polycrates.

2For Polycrates is the first of the Greeks we know of who set his mind on ruling the sea—apart from Minos of Cnossus and if any other before him held power over it; but of the human race as it is called, Polycrates is the first, with great hopes of ruling Ionia and the islands.

3Learning that this was what he intended, Oroetes sent a message saying: "Oroetes to Polycrates, thus says: I learn that you are aiming at great enterprises, and that your means do not match your ambitions. Do then as follows, and you will both set yourself upright and save me; for King Cambyses is plotting my death, and this is reported to me plainly.

4So carry me out of here together with my money; keep some of it yourself, and let me keep the rest—and with the money you will rule all Greece. But if you doubt what I say about the money, send whoever is most trusted by you, and I will show him."

Chapter 123

1Polycrates was pleased to hear this and inclined to go; for he was mightily desirous of money, he first sent Maeandrius son of Maeandrius, one of the citizens, to look into it—this man was his secretary; who not long afterwards dedicated all the furnishings of Polycrates' men's hall, a sight worth seeing, in the temple of Hera.

2Oroetes, learning that the spy was on his way, did as follows: he filled eight chests with stones, leaving only a very shallow space at the very brim, and poured gold over the stones on top; and having tied the chests up he kept them ready. When Maeandrius came and saw them, he reported back to Polycrates.

Chapter 124

1Although the oracles warned him off again and again, and his friends as well, he set out for that place; and moreover his daughter had seen a vision in a dream: it seemed to her that her father was high in the air, being bathed by Zeus and anointed by the sun.

2Seeing this vision, she did everything she could to keep Polycrates from going away to Oroetes; and when he was actually on his way aboard the fifty-oared ship, she spoke an ill-omened word. He threatened her that if he came back safe she would remain unwed for a long time to come. She prayed that this might come to pass; for she would rather stay unwed longer than lose her father.

Chapter 125

1Polycrates, paying no heed to any advice, sailed to Oroetes, taking with him many others of his companions, and among them Democedes son of Calliphon, a man of Croton, who was a physician and practiced his art better than any other man of his time.

2When Polycrates came to Magnesia, he was destroyed in a manner unworthy of himself and of his ambitions; for of all the tyrants of the Greeks, none save those who held Syracuse is worth comparing with Polycrates in magnificence.

3Oroetes killed him in a manner not worth the telling, and impaled him. Of those who had followed him, as many as were Samians he let go, bidding them count it a favor from him that they were free; but as many as were foreigners or slaves among the followers he kept and counted as chattels.

4Polycrates, hanging there, fulfilled every part of his daughter's vision; for he was bathed by Zeus whenever it rained, and anointed by the sun, as he himself shed moisture from his body.

Chapter 126

1So the many good fortunes of Polycrates ended in the way Amasis, king of Egypt, had prophesied for him. And not long afterwards vengeance for Polycrates came upon Oroetes as well. For after the death of Cambyses and the seizure of the kingship by the Magus, Oroetes, staying at Sardis, did the Persians no service, though they had been robbed of their rule by the Medes;

2but in that turmoil he first killed Mitrobates, the governor from Dascylium, who had reproached him over the business of Polycrates, and then the son of Mitrobates, Cranaspes—men of good standing among the Persians; and he committed wanton deeds of every kind; and when a messenger came to him from Darius, because the news was not to his liking, he killed the man as he was on his way back, having set men in wait for him on the road; and killing him he made him vanish, horse and all.

Chapter 127

1When Darius had won the power, he longed to punish Oroetes for all his wrongs, and above all for what he had done to Mitrobates and his son. To send an army openly against him did not seem advisable, since the state of affairs was still unsettled, he himself was newly in power, and he learned that Oroetes had great strength: a thousand Persians served him as bodyguard, and he held the provinces of Phrygia, Lydia, and Ionia.

2In the face of this, then, Darius contrived the following. Summoning the most notable of the Persians, he spoke to them: "Persians, which of you will undertake to accomplish this for me by skill and not by force and numbers? For where skill is what is needed, there is no work for force;

3and which of you will bring me Oroetes alive, or kill him? For he has done the Persians no good at all, but great harm: first, he has made two of us disappear, Mitrobates and his son; and next, he kills the men who summon him and whom I send, displaying a wantonness not to be borne. Before he works some greater harm upon the Persians, he must be brought down by death at our hands."

Chapter 128

1Darius put this question, and thirty men offered themselves, each one eager to do it. As they quarreled, Darius stopped them and bade them draw lots; and when they drew, out of them all the lot fell to Bagaes son of Artontes;

2and having drawn the lot, Bagaes did as follows. He wrote many documents, dealing with many different matters, and sealed them with Darius' seal; then he set out for Sardis, taking them with him.

3On arriving and coming into the presence of Oroetes, he unwrapped each of the documents in turn and gave them to the royal secretary to read aloud—for all the governors have royal secretaries; and Bagaes kept handing the documents to the bodyguard to try them out, to see whether they would accept defection from Oroetes.

4Seeing that they reverenced the documents greatly, and what was read from them still more, he gave them another in which were these words: "Persians, King Darius forbids you to guard Oroetes." When they heard this, they lowered their spears.

5When Bagaes saw them obeying the document, then at last, taking courage, he gave the last of the documents to the secretary, in which was written: "King Darius commands the Persians at Sardis to kill Oroetes." When the bodyguard heard this, they drew their scimitars and killed him on the spot; and so vengeance for Polycrates of Samos came upon Oroetes the Persian.

Chapter 129

1When the treasure of Oroetes had been carried off to Susa, not long afterwards it happened that King Darius, leaping from his horse in a hunt, twisted his foot.

2And somehow it was twisted badly; for the ankle bone came out of its socket. Thinking—as he had for some time—that he had about him the Egyptians who were thought the foremost physicians, he put himself in their hands. But they wrenched and forced the foot and made the harm worse.

3For seven days and seven nights Darius was kept awake by the trouble that was upon him; and on the eighth day, when things were going badly with him, someone who had heard tell of the skill of Democedes of Croton back in Sardis reported it to Darius; and he ordered him to be brought to him as fast as possible. When they found him among the slaves of Oroetes, where he had been left neglected, they brought him out before them, still dragging his fetters and clad in rags.

Chapter 130

1When he was brought out before them, Darius asked him whether he knew the art; but he would not admit it, fearing that if he made himself known he would be cut off from Greece altogether;

2and it was plain to Darius that he was dissembling, and he ordered those who had brought him to fetch whips and goads into the middle. Then at last Democedes declared himself, saying that he did not know the art exactly, but that through keeping company with a physician he had a sorry knowledge of it.

3After that, when Darius had put himself in his hands, he used Greek treatments and applied gentle remedies after strong ones, and brought him to sleep; and in a short time he made him sound again, though Darius had no longer any hope of being sound of foot.

4Darius then rewarded him with two pairs of golden fetters; and Democedes asked him whether he were dealing him double trouble on purpose, since he had made him well. Pleased with the remark, Darius sent him to his wives; and the eunuchs who brought him told the women that this was the man who had given the king back his life.

5Each of them, scooping with a bowl into the gold of the coffer, made Democedes so lavish a gift that the attendant who followed after, whose name was Sciton, gathered up the staters that fell from the bowls, and a great sum of gold was collected for him.

Chapter 131

1This Democedes had come from Croton and joined Polycrates as follows: in Croton he was hard pressed by a father of violent temper; when he could no longer bear it, he left and went to Aegina. Settling there, in his first year he outdid the other physicians, though he was without equipment and had none of the tools that belong to his craft.

2In his second year the Aeginetans hired him publicly for a talent, in the third year the Athenians for a hundred minas, and in the fourth year Polycrates for two talents. That is how he came to Samos; and it is not least because of this man that the physicians of Croton won their great name.

3For this was the time when the physicians of Croton were said to be the first in Greece, and those of Cyrene second. And at this same time the Argives were accounted the first of the Greeks in music.

Chapter 132

1Then Democedes, having healed Darius at Susa, had the greatest household of any and became the king's table companion; everything was his except one thing—to go home to the Greeks.

2And he saved the Egyptian physicians, who had before been the king's healers and were about to be impaled for being outdone by a Greek physician, by pleading for them with the king; and he saved an Elean seer who had followed Polycrates and lay neglected among the slaves. And Democedes stood very high with the king.

Chapter 133

1Not long after this, the following also came to pass. On Atossa, daughter of Cyrus and wife of Darius, a growth appeared on her breast; and after it burst it kept spreading. As long as it was small she kept it hidden and, being ashamed, told no one; but when she was in a bad way she sent for Democedes and showed it to him.

2He promised to make her well, but bound her by oath that she would in turn do for him whatever he should ask of her; and that he would ask for nothing that carried any shame with it.

Chapter 134

1When he had treated her and made her well, Atossa, instructed by Democedes, brought up in bed with Darius a speech like this: "Sire, you hold so great a power and sit idle, winning neither a new nation nor new strength for the Persians.

2It is right that a man who is young and master of great wealth should show forth some achievement, so that the Persians may learn that they are ruled by a man. It is to your advantage in both ways to do this: both so that the Persians may know that the man who stands over them is a man indeed, and so that they may be worn with war and have no leisure to plot against you.

3For now you could set forth some achievement, while you are still young in years; for as the body grows, the wits grow with it, and as a man ages they age with him and are dulled for every kind of business."

4So she said this, as she had been taught; and he answered as follows: "Woman, you have said everything that I myself intend to do; for my plan is to yoke a bridge from this continent to the other continent and make war on the Scythians; and this will be accomplished in a short time." Atossa said this:

5"Consider then: leave going against the Scythians for the first time—for these, whenever you wish, will be yours; but march instead against Greece. For I long, from what I hear, to have Lacedaemonian women as my servants, and Argive, and Attic, and Corinthian. And you have the man best suited of all men to set before you everything about Greece and to be your guide—the man who healed your foot."

6Darius answered: "Woman, since it seems good to you that we try Greece first, it seems better to me first to send spies along with this man you speak of among them, who will learn and see each thing there and report it all to us; and then, when I know it thoroughly, I will turn against them."

Chapter 135

1So he spoke, and at once put his word into action. As soon as day broke, he summoned fifteen notable Persian men and charged them, following Democedes, to travel through the coastlands of Greece, and to see to it that Democedes did not slip away from them but that they brought him back at all costs.

2Having given them this charge, next he called Democedes himself and asked him that, when he had shown and explained all of Greece to the Persians, he would come back again; and he bade him take all his own household goods as gifts for his father and his brothers, saying that he would give him many times more in return; and besides the gifts, he said he would contribute a merchant ship filled with all manner of good things, which would sail with him.

3Darius, in my judgment, offered him this with no deceitful intent. But Democedes, fearing that Darius was sounding him out, did not leap at everything that was offered but said he would leave his own goods where they were, so that he might have them when he came back; the merchant ship, however, that Darius promised as a gift for his brothers, he said he would accept. Darius, having given him the same charge, sent them off to the sea.

Chapter 136

1These men went down to Phoenicia, and to the city of Sidon in Phoenicia; there they at once manned two triremes, and with them a great round ship loaded with all manner of good things; and when all was ready they sailed for Greece. Coasting along its shores, they observed and recorded what they saw, until, having viewed most of its famous places, they came to Tarentum in Italy.

2There, by Democedes' contrivance, Aristophilides, king of the Tarentines, first took the rudders off the Median ships, and then shut up the Persians themselves, on the ground that they were spies. While these were being so treated, Democedes made his way to Croton; and once he had reached his own country, Aristophilides released the Persians and gave back what he had taken from their ships.

Chapter 137

1Sailing from there and pursuing Democedes, the Persians came to Croton; and finding him in the marketplace they laid hands on him.

2Some of the Crotoniates, in fear of Persian power, were ready to give him up; but others held on to him and struck the Persians with staves, while they held out their hands and spoke these words: "Men of Croton, you see what you are doing; you are seizing a man who has become a runaway from the king.

3How will King Darius let this insult stand? How will what you are doing turn out well for you, if you take him from us? What city shall we march against first? Which shall we be the first to enslave?"

4Saying this, they did not persuade the Crotoniates; but being robbed of Democedes and stripped of the round ship they had brought with them, they sailed back to Asia, and no longer sought to learn more by going further into Greece, being deprived of their guide.

5This much, however, Democedes charged them as they sailed away: that they should tell Darius that Democedes had married the daughter of Milo as his wife. For the wrestler Milo had a name that was great in the king's ears; and it is my opinion that Democedes made haste to complete this marriage at great cost so that he might appear to Darius a man of consequence in his own country as well.

Chapter 138

1Sailing out from Croton, the Persians were wrecked with their ships in Iapygia; and Gillus, a man of Tarentum living in exile, ransomed them while they were in slavery there and brought them to King Darius. In return for this Darius was ready to give him whatever he might ask.

2Gillus chose that he should be brought home to Tarentum, first telling the story of his misfortune; and so as not to throw Greece into confusion, if a great expedition should sail to Italy on his account, he said that the Cnidians alone would be enough to bring him home, thinking that through them, who were the closest of friends to the Tarentines, his return would most likely come about.

3Darius promised and saw it through; for he sent a messenger to Cnidos and bade them bring Gillus to Tarentum. The Cnidians, obeying Darius, could not persuade the Tarentines, and were not able to use force.

4These things, then, happened thus; and these were the first Persians to come from Asia to Greece, and they became spies for the following reason.

Chapter 139

1After this King Darius took Samos, the first city of all, Greek and foreign alike, for the following reason. When Cambyses son of Cyrus was campaigning against Egypt, many other Greeks also came to Egypt—some, naturally enough, following the army on business, and some to see the land itself; among them was Syloson son of Aeaces, the brother of Polycrates, who was in exile from Samos.

2This Syloson had the following piece of good fortune. He had bought a fine crimson cloak and wrapped it around him, and was trading in Memphis; and Darius, seeing him—he was then a bodyguard of Cambyses and as yet of no great account—coveted the cloak, and coming up to him offered to buy it.

3Syloson, seeing that Darius coveted the cloak greatly, guided by heaven's chance said: "I will not sell this cloak for any price, but I will give it to you outright, if so it must be entirely yours." Darius, commending these words, took the garment.

Chapter 140

1Now Syloson knew well that it was through his own artless kindness that he had lost it. As time went on, Cambyses died, the Seven rose up against the Magus, and out of the Seven Darius came to hold the kingship; and Syloson learned that the royal power had passed to the very man to whom he had once given the cloak in Egypt, when he was asked for it. He went up to Susa, sat at the outer gates of the king's house, and declared that he was a benefactor of Darius.

2The gatekeeper heard this and announced it to the king; and the king, in astonishment, said to him: "What Greek is there who has been my benefactor, that I should remember him, when I have only just taken up my rule? No one of them has yet come up to us, and I owe no acknowledgment to any Greek man. Still, bring him inside, so that I may learn what he intends by saying this."

3The gatekeeper led in Syloson, and when he stood in the middle of the court the interpreters asked him who he was and what he had done that he claimed to be the king's benefactor. Syloson then told the whole story of the cloak, and that he himself was the man who had given it.

4Darius made answer to this: "Noblest of men, you are the very man who gave me something, small though it was, when I had not yet any power at all; and the debt of gratitude is as great as if I had now received some great gift. In return for it I give you gold and silver beyond counting, so that you may never repent having done a kindness to Darius son of Hystaspes." Syloson spoke to this:

5"Do not give me gold, O king, nor silver, but win my fatherland back for me and give me Samos, which now, since my brother Polycrates was killed by Oroetes, a slave of ours possesses. Give it to me without either bloodshed or enslavement."

Chapter 141

1Hearing this, Darius sent out an army with Otanes for its general, one of the Seven, charging him to accomplish in full for Syloson all that he had asked. Otanes went down to the sea and set his army in motion.

Chapter 142

1The power at Samos was held by Maeandrius son of Maeandrius, who had received the rule from Polycrates as his appointed steward; though he wished to become the most just of men, it did not prove possible.

2For when the death of Polycrates was announced to him, he did as follows. First he set up an altar to Zeus the Free and consecrated a precinct about it—the one that stands today in the suburb of the city. Then, that done, he gathered an assembly of all the citizens and spoke to them as follows.

3"The scepter and all the power of Polycrates, as you yourselves know, have been entrusted to me, and it is now in my hands to rule over you. I blame in others what I will not do myself, though I have the power: it did not please me that Polycrates lorded it over men his equals, nor does any other man who does such things. Polycrates has met his own destiny; but I, setting the rule in the midst, proclaim to you equality of rights."

4"These honors only I do claim for myself: out of Polycrates' wealth let six talents be set apart for me; and in addition I choose the honors of a hero, for myself and for my descendants forever, to belong to Zeus the Free—the god whose sanctuary I myself founded, and to whom I now give over your freedom."

5Such was the proclamation Maeandrius made to the Samians; but one of them rose up and said: "You are not fit to rule over us, ill-born as you are and a destruction to boot; better that you give an account of the money you handled."

Chapter 143

1This was said by Telesarchus, a man held in honor among the citizens. Maeandrius reflected that if he gave up the rule, another would set himself up as tyrant in his place, and he no longer had any thought of surrendering it; he withdrew into the citadel, and then, summoning the citizens one by one on the pretense that he would give an account of the money, he laid hold of them and bound them.

2So they were bound; and after this Maeandrius fell ill. His brother, whose name was Lycaretus, expecting him to die, killed all the prisoners, that he might the more easily get the affairs of Samos into his own hands; for it was not, as one may suppose, out of any wish to set them free.

Chapter 144

1When the Persians arrived at Samos bringing Syloson back, no one raised a hand against them; the partisans of Maeandrius said they were ready to come to terms, and Maeandrius himself agreed to leave the island. When Otanes accepted on these conditions and an agreement was struck, the most distinguished of the Persians set out thrones opposite the citadel and sat down.

Chapter 145

1Now Maeandrius the tyrant had a brother somewhat short of sense, whose name was Charilaus. This man had been bound in a pit for some offense; and now, hearing what was being done and peering out through the pit, when he saw the Persians sitting quietly at ease, he shouted and said that he wished to speak with Maeandrius.

2When Maeandrius heard this, he had him released and brought before him; and as soon as he arrived he fell to reviling and abusing him, and tried to persuade him to attack the Persians, speaking as follows. "You, vilest of men: me, your own brother, who had wronged you in nothing worthy of bonds, you bound and shut in a pit; and now, when you see the Persians casting you out and leaving you without a home, you dare not take your revenge—such easy men are these to conquer!"

3"But if you are afraid of them, give me the mercenaries, and I will take vengeance on them for coming here; and I am ready to send you yourself out of the island."

Chapter 146

1So Charilaus spoke, and Maeandrius took up the counsel—in my judgment not out of folly so deep as to believe his own force would overcome the king's, but rather out of envy of Syloson, that the city was to fall to him undamaged and without a struggle.

2He wanted, by provoking the Persians, to leave the affairs of Samos in the weakest possible state and so hand them over, knowing full well that the Persians, once they suffered harm, would turn all the more bitterly against the Samians; and he knew too that he had a safe way out of the island whenever he himself pleased—for a hidden channel had been dug for him from the citadel down to the sea.

3Maeandrius himself sailed away from Samos; but Charilaus armed all the mercenaries and, flinging open the gates, led them out against the Persians, who neither expected any such thing nor thought that anything of the kind could befall them. Falling upon the Persians, the mercenaries killed those who rode in carriages and were men of the greatest account.

4While they did this, the rest of the Persian army came up to the rescue; and the mercenaries, hard pressed, were driven back and shut up in the citadel.

Chapter 147

1Otanes the general, seeing what great harm the Persians had suffered, quite forgot the orders with which Darius had sent him out—to kill no Samian and enslave none, but hand the island over to Syloson untouched by harm—and instead gave the army this command: to kill everyone they captured, man and boy alike.

2Then part of the army besieged the citadel, while the rest killed every soul who stood in their way, alike inside the temples and outside them.

Chapter 148

1Maeandrius stole away from Samos and sailed to Lacedaemon; and after arriving and bringing out the possessions he had, he took up his lodging and acted as follows: as often as he set out cups of silver and gold, his servants would set them forth; and as often as he found himself in talk with Cleomenes son of Anaxandrides, who was then king of Sparta, he would bring him home with him; and when Cleomenes saw the cups, he would marvel and be astounded, and Maeandrius would tell him to take away as many of them as he liked.

2When Maeandrius had said this two or three times, Cleomenes showed himself the most just of men: he thought it wrong to take what was offered, and learning that if Maeandrius gave to others among the citizens, punishment would be found for him, he went off to the ephors and said it was better for Sparta that the Samian guest-friend should depart out of the Peloponnese, lest he persuade either himself or some other Spartan to become a wicked man. The ephors listened, and proclaimed Maeandrius an exile.

Chapter 149

1Samos [swept up in the net] the Persians handed over to Syloson, empty of men. Later, however, Otanes the general even resettled it, on account of an ominous dream and a sickness that seized him in his private parts.

Chapter 150

1While this naval force was being lost on the Samos venture, the Babylonians revolted, in the best possible state of preparation; for during all the time the Magus reigned and the Seven rose up against him, in all that time and turmoil they had been making ready for a siege.

2And somehow they managed all this unobserved. But once they were in open revolt, they did as follows. They brought out their mothers, and each man chose from his own household the one wife he wanted; then, gathering all the rest together, they strangled them. Each man also chose out one woman to bake his bread, and all the rest of these they strangled, so that they should not eat up their bread to no purpose.

Chapter 151

1When Darius learned of this, he gathered together all the force he had and marched against them; and coming up to Babylon he besieged it, though the Babylonians gave the siege not a thought. Going up on the battlements of their wall, they jeered at Darius and his army with indecent gestures, and one of them called out this saying:

2"Why do you sit camped here, Persians, instead of going away? Only when mules give birth will you take us." This one of the Babylonians cried out, never supposing that a mule would give birth.

Chapter 152

1When a year and seven months had gone by, Darius was sorely distressed, and his whole army found itself unable to take the Babylonians. And yet Darius had devised every trick and every stratagem against them; still he could not take them—he had tried other cunning devices too, and that one as well by which Cyrus had taken them. But the Babylonians were on their guard so fiercely that he could not take them.

Chapter 153

1Then, in the twentieth month, a portent befell Zopyrus son of Megabyzus—the man who was one of the Seven that overthrew the Magus: one of the mules that carried his provisions gave birth. When word was brought him, Zopyrus went to see the creature himself, for very disbelief; then he forbade those who had seen it to tell anyone what had happened, and took counsel.

2And when he bethought him of the words of the Babylonian who had said at the very first that only when mules gave birth would the wall be taken, it seemed to Zopyrus, in the light of that saying, that Babylon could be taken; for by the working of a god the man had spoken, and for him the mule had foaled.

Chapter 154

1And when it now seemed to him that Babylon was fated to be taken, he went to Darius and asked whether he made the taking of Babylon a matter of the greatest moment. Learning that it was prized so highly, he began to plan otherwise, how he himself might be the man to take it and the deed be his own; for among the Persians services of merit are honored according to their greatness, with an eye to the days to come.

2He saw no deed by which he could bring the city to subjection unless he mutilated himself and deserted to them. Thereupon, holding himself of little account, he inflicted on himself a wound beyond remedy: cutting off his own nose and his ears, clipping his hair in shameful fashion, and scourging himself, he came before Darius.

Chapter 155

1Darius took it very ill, seeing a man of the highest standing so mutilated; he leaped up from his throne and cried aloud, asking him who it was that had so used him and for what deed.

2He said: "No man has such power to treat me so, except you. And none other has done these things, O king, but I myself upon my own body—seeing the Assyrians make a laughingstock of the Persians."

3Darius answered: "Most reckless of men, you have set the fairest of names on the most shameful of deeds, saying that for the sake of the besieged you have ruined yourself beyond remedy. Fool—when you are maimed, will the enemy yield any the sooner? How is it you have not gone clean out of your mind?"

4He said: "Had I thought you would stand in the way of what I meant to do, I should never have let you see it; but I took it upon myself, and it is done. Now then, if I fail of nothing that is yours, we take Babylon. For I will go just as I am and desert to the wall, and tell them that you did this to me; and I believe that, once I have persuaded them this is so, I shall get command of an army.

5"You, from whatever day I enter within the wall—count ten days from that one, and set a thousand men of your army, men of whom not one must be lost, before the gates that are called the gates of Semiramis; then, after that, from the tenth day to the seventh day after it, set me another two thousand before the gates called the gates of the Ninevites; and from the seventh day let twenty days pass, and then bring up others before the gates called the gates of the Chaldaeans, four thousand in number. Let neither the first men nor these have any weapon of defense—nothing but daggers; even those let them keep.

6"After the twentieth day, order the rest of your army at once to assault the wall all around it, and set the Persians before the gates called the gates of Bel and of the Cissians. For as I judge, when I have shown great deeds, the Babylonians will entrust everything else to me, and the very keys of some of the gates; and from that point on, the Persians and I will see to what needs doing."

Chapter 156

1With these orders given, Zopyrus went toward the gates, letting himself be seen turning this way and that, like a true deserter. The men stationed there, seeing him from the towers, ran down below and, drawing the other gate ajar a little, asked who he was and on what business he had come. He told them he was Zopyrus and that he was deserting to them.

2The gatekeepers then, hearing this, led him to the assembly of the Babylonians; and standing before it he made loud lament, saying that he had suffered at Darius' hands the very injuries he had done to himself, and that he had suffered them because he had advised Darius to break off the siege, since no way of taking the city had appeared.

3"And now," he said, "I come to you, men of Babylon, bringing the greatest of good; to Darius and his army and the Persians the greatest of harm; for he will never bring his mutilating of me to anything, and I know every outlet of his designs." Such were his words.

Chapter 157

1The Babylonians, seeing a man of the very highest standing among the Persians robbed of nose and ears, smeared with weals and blood, believed outright that he spoke the truth and had come to them as an ally, and were ready to grant what he asked of them—and what he asked was an army.

2And once he had received this from them, he did what he had agreed with Darius: leading out the Babylonian army on the tenth day, he surrounded the thousand men he had first ordered Darius to post, and slaughtered them.

3When the Babylonians saw that his deeds matched his words, they were overjoyed, and ready to serve him in everything. And when the days agreed upon had passed, he chose out the Babylonians again, led them forth, and slaughtered two thousand soldiers of Darius.

4Seeing this exploit too, all the Babylonians had Zopyrus in their mouths, singing his praises. And when the agreed days had passed again, he led out his force as before, surrounded the four thousand, and slaughtered them. When this too was accomplished, Zopyrus was everything among the Babylonians: they had appointed him both their commander and keeper of the walls.

Chapter 158

1And when Darius made his assault around the wall on the days agreed, then Zopyrus revealed the whole of his treachery. For while the Babylonians climbed up on the wall and beat back the assaulting army of Darius, Zopyrus flung open the gates called the gates of the Cissians and of Bel, and admitted the Persians within the wall.

2Those of the Babylonians who saw what was done fled to the temple of Zeus Bel; those who did not see it stayed each at his own post, until they too learned that they were betrayed.

Chapter 159

1Thus was Babylon taken for the second time. When Darius had mastered the Babylonians, he tore down their wall and pulled away all their gates—neither of which things Cyrus had done when he first took Babylon. Darius then impaled the leading men among them, to the number of some three thousand; but to the rest of the Babylonians he gave the city back to dwell in.

2And since the Babylonians would have no wives, so that no offspring could spring from them, Darius, foreseeing this, did as follows: the Babylonians, as was made plain at the beginning, had strangled their own women, looking to their store of bread; so he commanded the peoples dwelling round about to settle women in Babylon, assigning a number to each, until there were gathered together in all fifty thousand women. From these women the Babylonians of today are sprung.

Chapter 160

1No Persian ever surpassed the good service of Zopyrus in Darius' judgment—neither of those who came after nor of those who came before—Cyrus alone excepted; for no Persian ever thought himself worthy to measure himself against Cyrus. Darius is said often to have declared this opinion: that he would rather Zopyrus were untouched by his disfigurement than have twenty Babylons added to the one he had.

2He rewarded him greatly: every year he gave him the gifts that are held most precious among the Persians, and he gave him Babylon to hold free of tribute until his life's end, and much else besides. Of this Zopyrus was born Megabyzus, who was general in Egypt against the Athenians and their allies; and of this Megabyzus was born Zopyrus, who deserted from the Persians to Athens.

Chapter 1

1Cambyses son of Cyrus marched against this Amasis, leading with him other men of whom he had command, and also Greek Ionians and Aeolians, and the cause was this. Cambyses sent a herald to Egypt and asked Amasis for his daughter. He asked on the advice of an Egyptian man, who brought this about out of grievance against Amasis: Amasis had picked him out from all the doctors in Egypt, torn him from his wife and children, and handed him over to the Persians, when Cyrus sent to Amasis and asked for a doctor of eyes, the best of those in Egypt.

2So it was out of this grievance that the Egyptian pushed this advice, telling Cambyses to ask for Amasis' daughter, so that Amasis would grieve if he gave her, and be hated by Cambyses if he did not. Amasis, weighed down by the power of the Persians and afraid of it, could neither give her nor refuse; for he knew well that Cambyses would not have her as a wife but as a concubine.

3Working this out, he did as follows. There was a daughter of Apries, the former king, very tall and beautiful, the only one of his house left; her name was Nitetis. Amasis dressed this girl in fine clothing and gold and sent her to the Persians as his own daughter.

4After some time, when Cambyses embraced her, calling her his father's daughter, the girl said to him: "King, you do not perceive how you have been misled by Amasis. He dressed me up and sent me to you, giving me out as his own daughter, though truly I am the daughter of Apries, whom he killed — he rose up against him with the Egyptians, though Apries was his own lord."

5This word and this cause, once they had come about, brought Cambyses son of Cyrus, greatly angered, against Egypt.

Chapter 2

1The Persians tell the story this way. The Egyptians, however, claim Cambyses as one of their own, saying that he was born from this daughter of Apries; for they say it was Cyrus, not Cambyses, who sent to Amasis for the daughter. But in saying this they do not speak the truth.

2Nor has it escaped them (the Egyptians know the laws of the Persians, if any people do) that, first, it is not lawful for a bastard to rule when a legitimate heir is present, and, second, that Cambyses was the son of Cassandane daughter of Pharnaspes, an Achaemenid man, and not born of the Egyptian woman. But they twist the story, pretending to be related to the house of Cyrus.

Chapter 3

1So much for that. There is also this story told, which I for my part do not believe: that one of the Persian women came to the wives of Cyrus, and, seeing the children standing beside Cassandane, beautiful and tall, used much praise, marveling at them greatly; and Cassandane, the wife of Cyrus, said this:

2"Though I am the mother of such children, Cyrus holds me in dishonor, while the new wife from Egypt is held in honor." She said this, they say, out of anger at Nitetis; and Cambyses, the elder of her sons, said:

3"Then, mother, when I become a man, I will turn Egypt upside down: the upper parts I will make lower, and the lower upper." They say he said this at about ten years of age, and that the women were amazed; and that he kept it in mind, and when he grew to manhood and gained the throne, he made the campaign against Egypt.

Chapter 4

1Another thing like this also came together for this campaign. There was among the foreign soldiers of Amasis a man of Halicarnassian birth, named Phanes, capable in judgment and brave in war.

2This Phanes, holding some grievance against Amasis, fled from Egypt by ship, wanting to come to a meeting with Cambyses. Since he was a man of no small standing among the soldiers, and knew the affairs of Egypt most exactly, Amasis hurried after him to catch him: he sent after him the most trusted of his eunuchs with a trireme. The eunuch caught him in Lycia, but did not bring him back to Egypt, for Phanes got around him by cunning:

3he made the guards drunk and got away to the Persians. When Cambyses was setting out to make war on Egypt and was at a loss about the march — how to get across the waterless stretch — Phanes came to him, told him the rest of Amasis' affairs, and explained the march with this advice: send to the king of the Arabs and beg him to grant a safe passage through.

Chapter 5

1This is the only way into Egypt that is open. For from Phoenicia as far as the borders of the city of Cadytis, the land belongs to the Syrians called Syrians of Palestine;

2from the city of Cadytis — which is not much smaller than Sardis, as it seems to me — the trading towns along the sea as far as the city of Ienysus belong to the Arabians; and from Ienysus again the land belongs to Syrians, as far as Lake Serbonis, along which Mount Casium stretches out to the sea;

3from Lake Serbonis — the lake in which, the story goes, Typhon is hidden — from there on it is already Egypt. And the stretch lying between the city of Ienysus and Mount Casium and Lake Serbonis, which is not a small piece of ground but about three days' journey, is terribly without water.

Chapter 6

1I now come to tell what few of the men who trade by sea to Egypt have learned. Into Egypt, from all of Hellas and also from Phoenicia, wine jars are brought in twice each year; and you could not see, one might almost say, a single empty wine jar anywhere in the country.

2"Where do all these go, then?" someone might say. I will tell this too: each district chief must gather up all the jars from his own city and bring them to Memphis, and from Memphis they carry them, filled with water, to this waterless part of Syria. So the wine jar that keeps arriving and is emptied in Egypt makes its way back again to Syria.

Chapter 7

1These were the Persians who prepared this way of entry into Egypt, getting the water arranged as has been said, as soon as they took possession of Egypt.

2At that time, since no water was yet ready, Cambyses, who had learned of it from the Halicarnassian guest-friend, sent messengers to the Arabian and asked for safe passage, and got what he asked, giving pledges and taking them from him.

Chapter 8

1The Arabs hold pledges between men in honor above almost all things, and they make them in this way: when two men want to make a pledge, a third man stands between them and cuts, with a sharp stone, the inside of the hands of the two making the pledge, along their thumbs; then, taking a tuft of wool from the cloak of each, he smears with the blood seven stones that lie between them; and as he does this he calls on Dionysus and on Urania.

2When this man has finished the rite, the man who made the pledge recommends the stranger to his friends — or the townsman, if the pledge was made with a townsman — and his friends too hold themselves bound to honor the pledge.

3They hold Dionysus and Urania to be the only gods. They say they cut their hair round about the head, shearing it in the same way as Dionysus is shorn; they cut it in a ring, shaving their temples. They call Dionysus Orotalt, and Urania Alilat.

Chapter 9

1When the Arabian had made the pledge with the messengers who had come from Cambyses, he contrived this: he filled skins of camels with water and loaded them on the backs of all his camels, and drove them into the waterless land, and there he waited for the army of Cambyses.

2This is the more believable of the two stories told; but the less believable one must also be told, since it too is told. There is a great river in Arabia named the Corys; it empties into the sea called the Red Sea.

3From this river, it is said, the king of the Arabs sewed a channel of ox-hides and other hides, reaching in length to the waterless land, and brought the water through it; and in the waterless land he dug great cisterns, so that they, taking in the water, might keep it.

4It is a journey of twelve days from the river to this waterless stretch. He led the water, they say, by three channels, into three separate places.

Chapter 10

1Psammenitus son of Amasis was encamped at the mouth of the Nile called the Pelusian, waiting for Cambyses.

2For Cambyses, marching against Egypt, did not find Amasis alive; Amasis had ruled forty-four years and then died, and in all that time nothing great and harmful befell him. After he died he was embalmed and buried in the tomb in the temple, which he himself had built.

3Under Psammenitus son of Amasis, while he ruled Egypt, the greatest marvel of all befell the Egyptians: Egyptian Thebes was rained on — so the Thebans themselves say, it had never been rained on before, nor after, down to my time; for rain does not fall at all in the upper parts of Egypt — but then Thebes was rained on in scattered drops.

Chapter 11

1When the Persians had crossed the waterless stretch and settled down near the Egyptians to give battle, then the foreign soldiers of the Egyptian — Greek and Carian men — laid the blame on Phanes for bringing a foreign-speaking army against Egypt, and they contrived this thing against him:

2Phanes had sons left behind in Egypt. The soldiers brought them into the camp and into their father's sight, set a mixing bowl in the space between the two armies, and then, taking them one by one, cut the throat of each son over the bowl.

3When they had gone through all the sons, they poured wine and water into it, and when all the soldiers had drunk of the blood, they joined battle. After a hard-fought battle, with many fallen from both armies, the Egyptians turned and fled.

Chapter 12

1Here I saw a great marvel, which I learned from the people of the place. The bones of the dead of this battle lie scattered apart on the two sides (for the Persians' bones lay by themselves, as they had been separated at the start, and the Egyptians' on the other side). The skulls of the Persians are so weak that if you hit one with a single pebble you will break it through; but the skulls of the Egyptians are so strong that you could hardly break one even by hitting it with a stone.

2This is the reason they gave, and they easily persuaded me too: the Egyptians shave their heads starting from childhood, and the bone thickens against the sun.

3The same thing is also the reason they do not go bald; for one would see fewer bald men among the Egyptians than among any other people.

4That, then, is the reason the Egyptians have strong skulls; and this is the reason the Persians have weak skulls: from the first they shelter themselves, wearing hats, the tiaras. But this is not all: I saw other things like these at Papremis, in the case of the men destroyed together with Achaemenes son of Darius by Inarus the Libyan.

Chapter 13

1When the Egyptians turned in the battle, they fled in no kind of order. Shut up in Memphis, they were met by Cambyses, who sent a Mytilenean ship up the river carrying a herald, a Persian man, to call the Egyptians to terms.

2When the Egyptians saw the ship come into Memphis, they rushed out of the wall in a crowd, destroyed the ship, and tore the men limb from limb like butcher's meat, carrying the pieces up onto the wall.

3After that the Egyptians, besieged for a time, gave in. The Libyans next door, afraid of what had happened in Egypt, handed themselves over without a fight, laid tribute on themselves, and sent gifts. So too did the Cyrenaeans and Barcaeans, afraid just as the Libyans were.

4Cambyses received the gifts that came from the Libyans warmly. The gifts that came from the Cyrenaeans he slighted — as it seems to me, because they were small: the Cyrenaeans had sent five hundred minas of silver. Grabbing them up, he scattered them with his own hand among the army.

Chapter 14

1On the tenth day after Cambyses took the wall of Memphis, he sat Psammenitus, the king of the Egyptians — who had ruled six months — in the suburb to shame him, and, seating him there with other Egyptians, he probed his spirit, doing the following:

2he dressed Psammenitus' daughter in a slave's dress and sent her out to fetch water, carrying a water jar, and he sent along with her other girls, chosen from the daughters of the men of first rank, dressed the same way as the king's daughter.

3When the girls went past their fathers crying out and wailing, all the other fathers shouted and wept in reply, seeing their children treated so; but Psammenitus, seeing and recognizing, bent down to the ground.

4When the water carriers had gone by, he sent his son second, with two thousand other Egyptians of the same age, their necks bound in halters and bits set in their mouths.

5They were being led out to pay a penalty to the Mytileneans who had died at Memphis with the ship. For the royal judges had judged that for each man ten Egyptians of the first rank were to be put to death in return.

6When Psammenitus saw them passing by and learned that his son was being led to death, while the other Egyptians sitting around him wept and lamented, he did the same thing he had done over his daughter.

7When these too had gone by, it happened that one of his old drinking companions, a man past his prime, who had fallen from his fortunes and had nothing except what a beggar has, and was begging from the army, went past Psammenitus son of Amasis and the Egyptians sitting in the suburb. When Psammenitus saw him, he cried out loud, called his companion by name, and struck his own head.

8There were guards of his, who reported everything he did to Cambyses at each going out. Cambyses, wondering at what he was doing, sent a messenger and asked him, saying this:

9"Cambyses your master asks you, Psammenitus: why, when you saw your daughter ill treated and your son walking to his death, did you neither shout nor weep, but when a beggar who is nothing to you, as he learns from others, is honored by you?" He asked this, and the other answered as follows:

10"Son of Cyrus, the troubles of my own house were too great for weeping; but the grief of my companion was worth tears — a man fallen from great wealth and good fortune into beggary, come at last to the threshold of old age." When this answer was carried back by the messenger, it seemed to them well said,

11and, as the Egyptians say, Croesus wept (he too had followed Cambyses to Egypt), and the Persians present wept; and some pity came upon Cambyses himself, and at once he gave orders to save his son from those being put to death, and to raise Psammenitus himself out of the suburb and bring him to him.

Chapter 15

1The men sent running found that his son was no longer alive — he had been cut down first — but they raised Psammenitus himself up and led him to Cambyses;

2there he lived from then on, suffering no violence. And if he had been found not to be plotting trouble, he would have gotten Egypt back so as to govern it, since the Persians make a habit of honoring the sons of their kings; even when these revolt from them, they still give the rule back to their sons.

3Many other cases show that this is their settled practice — among them Thannyrus son of Inarus, who received the rule his father had held, and Pausiris son of Amyrtaeus, who also received his father's rule; and yet Inarus and Amyrtaeus harmed the Persians more than anyone else.

4But now Psammenitus, plotting harm, got his reward: he was caught stirring up the Egyptians. When his plot became known to Cambyses, he drank bull's blood and died at once. That is how this man met his end.

Chapter 16

1Cambyses went from Memphis to the city of Sais, wanting to do the thing he in fact did. When he entered the house of Amasis, he at once ordered Amasis' dead body brought out from its tomb; and when that was done, he ordered it whipped, its hair plucked out, its body stabbed, and every other outrage done to it.

2When the men had worn themselves out doing this (for the corpse, since it was embalmed, held together and did not break apart), Cambyses ordered it burned — an order that was not lawful; for the Persians hold fire to be a god.

3So burning dead bodies is no way part of the custom of either people: for the Persians, for the reason given — they say it is not right to give a human corpse to a god; for the Egyptians, because fire is by their custom a living animal, which devours everything it catches, and when it is filled with its food it dies together with what it has devoured.

4It is utterly against their custom to give a corpse to animals, and that is why they embalm, so that a body, lying, may not be eaten by worms. So Cambyses ordered what was against the custom of both peoples.

5But, as the Egyptians say, it was not Amasis who suffered this, but some other Egyptian of the same age as Amasis; by mistreating him, the Persians thought they were mistreating Amasis.

6For they say that Amasis, when he learned from an oracle what was going to befall him after death, took precautions against what was coming: he buried this man — the man who was whipped and killed — just inside the doors of his own tomb, and he ordered his son to place himself as far inside the tomb as possible.

7These orders of Amasis, about the tomb and about the man, do not seem to me to be the reason; the Egyptians honor these things for some other reason.

Chapter 17

1After this Cambyses planned three campaigns: against the Carthaginians, against the Ammonians, and against the long-lived Ethiopians, who live in Libya on the southern sea.

2In his planning he decided to send the naval force against the Carthaginians, to detach part of his infantry against the Ammonians, and, against the Ethiopians, to send spies first — men who would look at the so-called table of the sun among the Ethiopians, whether it truly exists, and spy out everything else besides, carrying gifts as their cover, for the king of the Ethiopians.

Chapter 18

1The table of the sun is said to be of such a kind: it is a meadow in the suburb, full of boiled meats of all four-footed animals; into it, by night, the citizens who hold the office for the time being set out the meats, and by day anyone who wants comes up and feasts. The people of the place say the ground itself gives these things again every time.

Chapter 19

1Such is the so-called table of the sun. When Cambyses decided to send the spies, he at once sent for men of the Fish-eaters from the city of Elephantine, who know the Ethiopian language.

2While these men were being sent for, he ordered the naval force to sail against Carthage. The Phoenicians said they would not do it: they were bound by great oaths, and they would not be doing right to march against their own children. Since the Phoenicians were unwilling, the rest of the force was not worth fighting with.

3So the Carthaginians escaped slavery at the hands of the Persians. For Cambyses did not think it right to use force with the Phoenicians, since they had given themselves to the Persians of their own will, and the whole naval force hung on the Phoenicians. The Cyprians too, when they gave themselves to the Persians, took part in the campaign against Egypt.

Chapter 20

1When the Fish-eaters came to Cambyses from Elephantine, he sent them to the Ethiopians, telling them what they must say and having them carry gifts: a purple robe, a golden twisted necklace, bracelets, an alabaster box of myrrh, and a jar of palm wine. These Ethiopians, to whom Cambyses sent them, are said to be the biggest and most beautiful of all men.

2They use laws too, different from those of other men, and among them the kingship works this way: the citizen they judge to be the biggest, and to have strength matching his size, him they judge worthy to rule.

Chapter 21

1When the Fish-eaters came to these men, they gave the gifts to their king and said this: "Cambyses king of the Persians, wanting to become your friend and guest-friend, sent us to speak with you and orders you to come, and gives you these gifts — things he himself most enjoys using."

2But the Ethiopian, learning that they had come as spies, said this to them: "Neither did the king of the Persians send you bearing gifts because he sets great store on becoming my guest-friend, nor do you speak the truth (for you have come as spies of my realm), nor is that man a just man. If he were just, he would neither crave another land than his own nor lead men into slavery over whom he has suffered no wrong. Now give him this bow and say these words:

3The king of the Ethiopians counsels the king of the Persians: when the Persians can draw a bow of this size this easily, then let him march against the long-lived Ethiopians with more men than they; until then, let him thank the gods, who do not turn the minds of the sons of the Ethiopians to winning another land in addition to their own."

Chapter 22

1Having said this and unstrung the bow, he handed it to the men who had come. Then he took the purple robe and asked what it was and how it was made; and when the Fish-eaters told him the truth about the purple and the dye, he said the men were deceitful, and their clothes deceitful too.

2Second he asked about the gold, the twisted necklace and the bracelets; and when the Fish-eaters explained the adornment, the king laughed, decided they were fetters, and said they had fetters at home stronger than these.

3Third he asked about the myrrh; and when they told him about its making and its use for anointing, he gave the same answer as about the robe. When he came to the wine and asked how it was made, he was greatly pleased with the drink and asked what the king ate, and what the longest time is that a Persian man lives.

4They said he ate bread, explaining the nature of wheat, and that eighty years is the outermost limit of life laid down for a man. To this the Ethiopian said he did not wonder at all that, feeding on such dung, they lived only a few years; for they could not live even that long if the drink did not refresh them — showing the Fish-eaters the wine; for by that, he said, the Persians were weaker than his own people.

Chapter 23

1Then the Fish-eaters in turn asked the king about the length of life and their way of living, and he said that most of them reach a hundred and twenty years, that some go beyond even that, and that their food is boiled meat and their drink milk.

2When the spies showed their wonder at the years, he led them to a spring, from which, when they bathed in it, they grew sleek, as if it were oil; and it gave off a scent as of violets.

3The water of this spring, the spies said, is so weak that nothing can float on it, neither wood nor any of the things lighter than wood, but everything sinks to the bottom. If this water is truly such as it is said to be, then, using it for everything, they would be long-lived because of it.

4When they left the spring, he led them to a prison for men, in which all the prisoners were bound in golden fetters. Among these Ethiopians copper is the rarest and most precious of all things. When they had seen the prison, they also saw the so-called table of the sun.

Chapter 24

1After this they saw last of all their tombs, which are said to be made from crystal in this way:

2When they have dried the body — whether as the Egyptians do or in some other way — they plaster it all over and adorn it with painting, making the likeness as close as they can; then they set around it a slab made of crystal, hollow, which they dig out; it is large and clear to see through.

3The body, lying inside the middle of the slab, shows through, giving off no unpleasant smell and nothing else unseemly, and everything is visible just as on the body itself.

4The nearest kin keep the slab in their houses for a year, offering the first fruits of everything and bringing sacrifices to it; after that they carry it out and set it up around the city.

Chapter 25

1When the spies had seen everything, they went back home. When they reported all this, Cambyses at once fell into a rage and marched against the Ethiopians, without ordering any provision of food, and without giving a thought to the fact that he was going to make war at the far ends of the earth;

2being mad and not in his right mind, the moment he heard the Fish-eaters he set out, ordering the Greeks present with him to stay behind, and leading all his foot soldiers with him.

3When, on the march, he came to Thebes, he detached from his army about fifty thousand men, and to these he gave orders to enslave the Ammonians and burn the oracle of Zeus; he himself, leading the rest of the army, marched on against the Ethiopians.

4Before the army had gone a fifth part of the way, all the food they had was gone; and after the food, the pack animals were eaten up too.

5Now if Cambyses, learning this, had come to his senses and led his army back, he would have been a wise man even with the mistake he had made at the start; as it was, he paid no heed at all and kept pressing ever forward.

6As long as the soldiers could get anything from the ground, they kept alive by eating grass; but when they came into the sand, some of them did a terrible thing: out of every group of ten they drew lots for one of their own and ate him.

7When Cambyses learned this, afraid that his men would eat one another, he gave up the march against the Ethiopians and turned back, and came to Thebes, having lost many of his army; and from Thebes he went down to Memphis and let the Greeks sail away.

Chapter 26

1So the march against the Ethiopians turned out. The men sent from it against the Ammonians, after setting out from Thebes and marching with guides, are known to have arrived at the city of Oasis, which is said to be held by Samians of the Aeschrionian tribe, and which is seven days' journey from Thebes across the sand; this place is called, in the Greek tongue, the Island of the Blessed.

2The army is said to have reached this place. From here on, no one can say anything about them — except the Ammonians themselves and those who have heard it from them; for they never came to the Ammonians, and they never made their way back home.

3This is the story the Ammonians themselves tell: when the army was setting out from this Oasis across the sand toward them, and had got about midway between them and the Oasis, and was taking its morning meal, a south wind blew on them, great and sudden, carrying sands, and buried them; and that is how they disappeared. So the Ammonians say it happened to this army.

Chapter 27

1When Cambyses came to Memphis, Apis appeared to the Egyptians — the one the Greeks call Epaphus. As soon as he appeared, the Egyptians put on their finest clothes and held feasts.

2When Cambyses saw the Egyptians doing this, he was fully convinced that they were rejoicing over his own misfortune, and he called the overseers of Memphis before him. When they came into his presence, he asked why the Egyptians had done nothing of the sort before, while he was in Memphis, but did it then, when he had come back after losing part of his army.

3They answered that a god had appeared to them, one who was used to appearing only after long intervals of time, and that whenever he appeared, all the Egyptians, glad of it, held feasts. When Cambyses heard this, he said they were lying, and he punished them with death for lying.

Chapter 28

1After killing these men, he next called the priests before him. When the priests said the same thing, he said he would not let it pass if some tame god had come to the Egyptians. With that he told the priests to take Apis away. So they went off leading him.

2This Apis, this Epaphus, is a calf born from a cow that can never afterward conceive another offspring. The Egyptians say that a light comes down on the cow from the sky, and that from this she bears the Apis.

3This calf, called Apis, has these marks: it is black; it has a white triangle on its forehead; it has the likeness of an eagle on its back; the hairs of its tail are double; and under its tongue there is a beetle.

Chapter 29

1When the priests led Apis in, Cambyses — being as mad as he was — drew his dagger and, meaning to strike the belly of Apis, struck his thigh; then he laughed and said to the priests:

2"Blockheads, are gods made like this — things of blood and flesh, that feel iron? A worthy god, this, for the Egyptians! But you will not laugh at me for long." With this he ordered the men whose duty it was to whip the priests, and to kill any other Egyptian they caught holding a feast.

3So the festival was broken off for the Egyptians, the priests were beaten, and Apis, struck in the thigh, wasted away lying in the temple. And when he died of the wound, the priests buried him secretly from Cambyses.

Chapter 30

1Cambyses, as the Egyptians say, went mad at once because of this wrong — though he had never been in his right mind even before. The first of his evil deeds was against his brother Smerdis, born of the same father and the same mother, whom he sent away from Egypt to Persia out of jealousy: Smerdis alone of the Persians had drawn the bow the Fish-eaters brought from the Ethiopian, coming within about two fingers of it, and no other Persian had managed it.

2After Smerdis had gone to Persia, Cambyses saw a vision in his sleep of this kind: he thought a messenger came from Persia and reported that Smerdis, sitting on the royal throne, had touched his head to the sky.

3Fearing this for himself — that his brother, killing him, would rule — he sent Prexaspes to Persia, the most trusted of his Persian men, to kill him. Prexaspes went up to Susa and killed Smerdis; some say he led him out on a hunt, others that he brought him down to the Red Sea and drowned him.

Chapter 31

1They say this was the first of his evil deeds. The second he did against his sister, who had followed him to Egypt, and with whom he both lived as his wife and shared both father and mother.

2He married her in this way: the Persians had never at all been in the habit of living with their sisters. Cambyses fell in love with one of his sisters and wanted to marry her; because this was not the custom, but he meant to do it anyway, he called the royal judges and asked whether there was any law that allowed the man who wanted it to live with his sister.

3The royal judges are men chosen out of the Persians, and they hold the post until they die, or until some wrongdoing is found in them; these men give judgments for the Persians and are the interpreters of the ancestral laws, and everything is referred to them.

4When Cambyses asked, they answered him both justly and safely: they said they could find no law that tells a brother to live with his sister, but they had found another law, which lets the king of the Persians do whatever he wants.

5So, fearing Cambyses, they did not undo the law, lest they themselves be destroyed for bending it; but they found another law to back the man who wanted to marry sisters.

6So Cambyses married the sister he loved; but not long after he took another sister as well. It was the younger of these two, the one who had followed him to Egypt, that he killed.

Chapter 32

1About her death, as about Smerdis', two stories are told. The Greeks say that Cambyses set a lion's cub against a puppy, and that this wife of his watched too; and that when the puppy was losing, a brother of its, another puppy, broke its chain and came to it, and that the two puppies together then overpowered the cub.

2Cambyses, they say, was pleased as he watched, but the woman sitting by him wept. When Cambyses learned of it, he asked her why she wept, and she said she wept because she had seen the puppy come to its brother's help — remembering Smerdis, and knowing that there was no one to avenge him.

3The Greeks say this word was why Cambyses destroyed her. The Egyptians say that, as they sat at table, the woman took a lettuce, plucked off its leaves, and asked her husband whether the lettuce looked better plucked bare or full of leaves; and he said full of leaves; and she said:

4"Yet once you stripped Cyrus' house bare, the way you have stripped this lettuce." They say that at this he flew into a rage and leaped on her — she was with child — and that she lost the child and died from his blow.

Chapter 33

1These are the mad acts Cambyses did against his own people — whether because of Apis or for other reasons, since many strange evils are apt to seize men. For they say Cambyses had a great sickness from birth, which some call the sacred disease. It was nothing strange, then, that when his body was gravely sick, his mind too was not sound.

Chapter 34

1He went mad against the other Persians in the following way. They say he said this to Prexaspes — the man he honored most, and who carried his messages for him; this man's son was cupbearer to Cambyses, and that too was no small honor. They say he said this:

2"Prexaspes, what sort of man do the Persians take me to be, and what do they say of me?" He answered: "Master, in all other things they praise you highly, but they say you lean too much to wine."

3He said this about the Persians, they say, and Cambyses answered in anger: "So now the Persians say that, taken with wine, I am out of my senses and have no understanding. Then their earlier words were not true either."

4For once before, when the Persians were sitting with him and Croesus too, Cambyses had asked what kind of man they thought he was compared with his father Cyrus; and they answered that he was better than his father: he held everything Cyrus had held, and had won Egypt and the sea besides.

5The Persians said this; but Croesus, who was present and not pleased by their judgment, said to Cambyses this: "To me, son of Cyrus, you do not seem like your father; for you have no son such as he left behind in you." Cambyses was pleased when he heard this and praised the judgment of Croesus.

Chapter 35

1Remembering this, he spoke in anger to Prexaspes: "Now find out for yourself whether the Persians are telling the truth, or whether they are out of their minds when they say this."

2"If your son here is standing in the doorway and I shoot and hit him right in the middle of the heart, it will be clear that the Persians are saying nothing true. But if I miss, say that the Persians are telling the truth and that I am not in my right mind."

3After saying this, he drew the bow and shot the boy. When the boy fell, he ordered him cut open so that the shot could be examined. When the arrow was found in his heart, he laughed and was overjoyed and said to the boy's father:

4"Prexaspes, it is now clear to you that I am not mad and that the Persians are out of their minds. Now tell me, who of all men have you ever seen shoot so accurately?" Prexaspes saw that the man was not in his right mind and was afraid for himself, so he said, "Master, I do not think that even the god himself would shoot so well."

5That is what he did then. At another time he seized twelve Persians of the highest rank on no serious charge and buried them headfirst while they were still alive.

Chapter 36

1While he was doing these things, Croesus the Lydian thought it right to warn him with these words: "King, do not hand everything over to your youth and your temper. Hold back and take yourself in hand. It is good to think ahead, and foresight is a wise thing. Yet you are killing men who are your own countrymen, seizing them on no serious charge, and you are killing children too."

2"If you go on doing many things like this, watch out that the Persians do not turn against you. Your father Cyrus gave me orders, telling me again and again to warn you and to suggest to you whatever good thing I might find." Croesus showed his good will in giving this advice. But Cambyses answered him as follows:

3"So you dare to give me advice, you who managed your own country so well and gave my father such good advice, telling him to cross the Araxes river and march against the Massagetae, when they were the ones who wanted to cross into our land! You ruined yourself by governing your own country badly, and you ruined Cyrus as well, since he obeyed you. But you will not get away with it, because I have long been looking for a chance to catch you on some charge."

4With these words he took up his bow, ready to shoot him down. Croesus jumped up and ran outside. Since he could not shoot him, he ordered his attendants to seize Croesus and kill him.

5The attendants knew the king's character, so they hid Croesus on this plan. If Cambyses changed his mind and asked for Croesus, they would bring him out and get gifts for sparing his life. If he did not change his mind and did not miss him, then they would do away with Croesus.

6Not long afterward Cambyses did miss Croesus. The attendants found this out and told him that Croesus was still alive. Cambyses said that he was glad Croesus had survived, but that the men who had saved him would not go unpunished—he would have them killed. And that is what he did.

Chapter 37

1This is how he raged against the Persians and their allies, in many other ways like this, while he stayed at Memphis, opening ancient tombs and examining the dead bodies.

2He also went into the temple of Hephaestus and made fun of the statue at great length. The statue of Hephaestus looks very much like the Phoenician Pataeci, which the Phoenicians carry on the prows of their warships. For anyone who has not seen these, I will explain: it is a figure of a dwarf man.

3He also went into the temple of the Cabeiri, which no one is allowed to enter except the priest. After mocking these statues at great length, he burned them up. They too look like the statue of Hephaestus, and they say that they are Hephaestus' children.

Chapter 38

1In every way it is clear to me that Cambyses was quite mad. Otherwise he would not have tried to make fun of holy things and customs. If someone set all the peoples a task and told them to pick out the best laws from all the laws there are, after looking them over each people would choose its own. That is how strongly each people believes its own laws are far the best.

2So it is not likely that anyone but a madman would make a joke of things like that. That all people think this way about their laws can be worked out from many other proofs as well, and from this one in particular.

3Darius, when he was king, called the Greeks who were at his court and asked them for how much money they would agree to eat their fathers when they died. They said there was nothing for which they would do it.

4After that Darius called the Indians known as the Callatiae, who eat their parents. With the Greeks present and learning what was said through an interpreter, he asked them for what payment they would agree to burn their fathers with fire when they died. They shouted loudly and told him not to say such things. That is how strongly these customs are held, and I think Pindar was right when he wrote in his poem that law is king of all.

Chapter 39

1While Cambyses was campaigning against Egypt, the Lacedaemonians too made an expedition against Samos and against Polycrates, son of Aeaces. He had taken control of Samos by rising up against it.

2First he divided the city into three parts and gave them to his brothers Pantagnotus and Syloson. Later he killed one of them and drove out the younger one, Syloson, and held all of Samos. Once he held it, he made a friendship with Amasis, the king of Egypt, sending him gifts and getting others back from him.

3In a short time Polycrates' power grew, and his name was famous throughout Ionia and the rest of Greece. Wherever he decided to campaign, everything went well for him. He owned a hundred fifty-oared ships and a thousand archers. He plundered everyone alike, making no distinction.

4He said that he would please a friend more by giving back what he had taken than by never taking anything at all. He had taken many of the islands and many towns on the mainland as well. Among them he beat the Lesbians in a sea battle, when they had come with their whole force to help the Milesians, and he took them. They were the ones who had dug the whole trench around the wall on Samos while bound in chains.

Chapter 40

1Polycrates' great success did not escape Amasis, but he was worried about it. When Polycrates' good fortune grew much greater still, Amasis wrote the following on a scroll and sent it to Samos. This is what Amasis says to Polycrates:

2"It is sweet to hear that a friend and guest is doing well. But your great good fortune does not please me, because I know that the divine power is jealous. Somehow I want both myself and the people I care for to have some things go well and to stumble on others, and so to get through life with ups and downs, rather than to succeed in everything."

3"For I have never yet heard of anyone, in any story, who did not come to a bad end and get destroyed root and branch, when he succeeded in everything. So take my advice and do the following to deal with your good fortune:"

4"Think which one of your possessions is worth the most to you, and whose loss would hurt you the most in your heart. Throw that away so that it will never come back among people. If from then on your good fortune does not come in turns with your troubles, then use the remedy I suggest."

Chapter 41

1Polycrates thought this over and understood that Amasis was giving him good advice. He searched for the treasure whose loss would hurt him most in his heart, and in his search he found this one: the signet ring he wore. It was set in gold, made of emerald stone, and it was the work of Theodorus, son of Telecles, of Samos.

2When he decided to throw this away, he did as follows. He filled a fifty-oared ship with men and got on board. Then he ordered them to sail out to the open sea. When he was far out from the island, he took off the ring and threw it into the sea, with everyone sailing with him watching. After doing this he sailed home, and when he reached his house he acted as though he had suffered a great loss.

Chapter 42

1On the fifth or sixth day after this, the following happened to him. A fisherman caught a large and beautiful fish and thought it ought to be given to Polycrates as a gift. He carried it to Polycrates' door and said he wanted to come into his presence. When this was allowed, he handed over the fish and said:

2"King, when I caught this, I did not think it right to take it to the market, even though I live by the work of my hands. It seemed to me worthy of you and of your rule. So I bring it and give it to you." Polycrates was pleased with these words and answered: "You have done very well, and I thank you twice over, for your words and for your gift. And I invite you to dinner."

3The fisherman thought a great deal of this and went home. When the attendants cut the fish open, they found Polycrates' signet ring inside its belly.

4As soon as they saw it and picked it up, they brought it to Polycrates, overjoyed. They gave him the ring and told him how it had been found. When it came over Polycrates that this was the god's doing, he wrote down on a scroll everything that had happened to him, exactly as it had befallen him, and sent it off to Egypt.

Chapter 43

1When Amasis read the scroll that came from Polycrates, he understood that it is impossible for a man to save a man from what is going to happen, and that Polycrates was not going to end well, since he succeeded in everything—even what he throws away he finds again.

2He sent a herald to Samos and said he was breaking off their friendship. He did this so that, if some terrible and great disaster ever overtook Polycrates, he would not feel the pain in his heart that he would feel for a man who was his guest friend.

Chapter 44

1It was against this Polycrates, who succeeded in everything, that the Lacedaemonians made their expedition. They were called on by the Samians who later founded Cydonia in Crete. Polycrates secretly sent a herald to Cambyses, son of Cyrus, who was gathering an army for Egypt. He asked Cambyses to send someone to Samos and ask him for troops as well.

2When Cambyses heard this, he eagerly sent to Samos and asked Polycrates to send a naval force with him to Egypt. Polycrates picked out the citizens he most suspected of wanting to revolt and sent them off in forty warships, with instructions to Cambyses not to send them back.

Chapter 45

1Some say that the Samians sent off by Polycrates never reached Egypt. When they came to Carpathus on the voyage, they took counsel and decided not to sail any farther. Others say that they did reach Egypt and escaped from there while under guard.

2When they sailed back to Samos, Polycrates met them with his ships and battle was joined. The returning men won and landed on the island, but they were defeated in a battle on land there. So they sailed on to Lacedaemon.

3There are some who say that the men from Egypt defeated Polycrates. In my view what they say is wrong. There would have been no need for them to call in the Lacedaemonians if they had been strong enough to bring Polycrates under their power. Beyond that, there is no sense in the claim that a man who had mercenary troops and large numbers of archers of his own was defeated by the returning Samians, who were few.

4Polycrates gathered the children and the wives of the citizens under his control and shut them up in the ship sheds, ready to burn down the sheds with them inside, in case those citizens betrayed the city to the returning men.

Chapter 46

1When the Samians who had been driven out by Polycrates arrived at Sparta, they came before the officials and said many things, pleading hard with them. At their first meeting the officials answered that they had forgotten what was said at the beginning and did not understand what was said at the end.

2After that they came a second time and said nothing at all. They carried a bag and said that the bag needed barley meal. The officials answered that the bag had gotten the better of them. Even so, they decided to help.

Chapter 47

1After making their preparations, the Lacedaemonians made an expedition against Samos. By the Samians' account, they were paying back a favor, because the Samians had earlier helped them with ships against the Messenians. By the Lacedaemonians' account, they did not make the expedition so much to help the Samians when they asked as to punish them for stealing the mixing bowl they were carrying to Croesus, and the breastplate that Amasis, the king of Egypt, had sent them as a gift.

2The Samians had raided and carried off the breastplate the year before the mixing bowl. It was made of linen, with many animals woven into it, and it was decorated with gold and with wool from wood.

3What makes it worth admiring is this: every single thread of the breastplate is remarkable. Although it is fine, it has three hundred sixty threads in it, and every one of them can be seen. Amasis dedicated another one just like it to Athena at Lindos.

Chapter 48

1The Corinthians too took part eagerly in the expedition against Samos. The Samians had done an outrage against them as well, one generation before this expedition, at the same time as the stealing of the mixing bowl.

2This is what happened. Periander, son of Cypselus, sent three hundred boys, the sons of the leading men of Corcyra, to Sardis to Alyattes, to be castrated. When the Corinthians who were taking the boys put in at Samos, the Samians learned why the boys were being taken to Sardis. First they taught the boys to take refuge in the temple of Artemis.

3They would not stand by and let the suppliants be dragged out of the temple, and the Corinthians kept the boys from food. So the Samians held a festival, which they still keep in the same way. When night fell, for as long as the boys kept up their supplication, they set up dances of girls and young men. As they set up the dances, they made it a rule to bring dried sesame and honey, so that the boys from Corcyra could grab it and have something to eat.

4This went on until the Corinthian guards of the boys gave up and left. Then the Samians took the boys back to Corcyra.

Chapter 49

1If after Periander's death the Corinthians had been on friendly terms with the Corcyraeans, they would not have joined in the expedition against Samos for this reason. As it is, ever since they founded the island the two have been at odds with each other, even though they are the same people.

2It was for these reasons that the Corinthians bore a grudge against the Samians. Periander had picked out the sons of the leading Corcyraeans and sent them to Sardis to be castrated, to punish them—for the Corcyraeans had struck first, committing a terrible crime against him.

Chapter 50

1After Periander killed his wife Melissa, another misfortune happened to him, on top of the one that had already happened. He had two sons by Melissa. One was seventeen years old and the other eighteen.

2Their mother's father, Procles, who was ruler of Epidaurus, sent for them and entertained them warmly, as was right for boys who were the children of his own daughter. When he sent them away, he said as he saw them off:

3"Do you know, boys, which of you killed your mother?" The older of the two paid no attention to this remark. But the younger one, whose name was Lycophron, was so hurt by it that when he arrived at Corinth he treated his father as his mother's killer. He did not speak to him. When his father talked to him, he would not talk back. When his father asked him something, he gave him no answer. In the end Periander was in a fury and drove him out of the house.

Chapter 51

1After driving him out, Periander asked the older boy what their mother's father had said to them. The boy told him how warmly Procles had received them. He did not remember the remark Procles made when he sent them off, because he had not paid attention to it. Periander said there was no way Procles had not suggested something to them, and he kept pressing his questions. When the boy remembered, he told him this too.

2Periander understood [this too], and since he was not willing to give way at all, he sent a messenger to the people with whom the son he had driven out was staying and forbade them to take him into their homes.

3Every time he was turned away and went to another house, he was turned away from that one too. Periander threatened anyone who took him in and ordered them to put him out. Turned away, he would go on to another house of his friends. Even though they were afraid of Periander, they still took him in, because he was Periander's son.

Chapter 52

1Finally Periander made a proclamation: anyone who took him in at home or spoke with him would owe a sacred fine to Apollo, in the amount he named.

2After this proclamation no one was willing to speak with him or take him in at home. He himself did not think it right to try to break a ban that had been declared, but held his ground and kept lying around in the stoas.

3On the fourth day Periander saw that he had worn himself out by not washing and not eating, and he felt sorry for him. Giving in to his anger, he went closer and said, "Boy, which of these two is better to choose: what you are doing now, or the tyranny and the good things I have now, which it is right for a son to take over from his father,

4you who, though you are my son and king of prosperous Corinth, chose a beggar's life, opposing me and showing anger toward the one you least should? If some disaster has happened in this matter that makes you suspicious of me, it has happened to me too, and I have the greater share in it, since I myself was the one who brought it about.

5You must learn how much better it is to be envied than to be pitied, and at the same time how bad it is to be angry with your parents and your betters. Go home."

6That is how Periander tried to win him over. His son gave his father no other answer. He only said that he owed the sacred fine to the god for coming to talk with him. When Periander understood that his son's trouble had no cure and could not be beaten, he sent him out of his sight and shipped him off to Corcyra, for he ruled that island too.

7After sending him off, Periander made war on his father-in-law Procles, since he held him most to blame for his present troubles. He took Epidaurus, and he took Procles himself alive.

Chapter 53

1As time went on, Periander grew old and admitted to himself that he was no longer able to watch over and manage his affairs. He sent to Corcyra and called Lycophron back to take the tyranny. He saw nothing in his older son; the boy seemed to him rather slow-witted.

2Lycophron did not even think the messenger worth questioning. Periander, set on the young man, sent next his own daughter, the young man's sister, to him, thinking that she would persuade him best of all.

3When she arrived she said, "Boy, do you want the tyranny to fall into other hands and your father's house to be torn apart, instead of going back and having it yourself? Go home. Stop punishing yourself.

4Ambition is a bad thing to own. Do not cure evil with evil. Many people put what is fairer ahead of what is strictly their right, and many have already lost what came from their fathers while seeking what came from their mothers. A tyranny is a slippery thing, and there are many who want it. The old man is past his prime now. Do not give your own good things to others."

5She said these most persuasive words, which her father had taught her, to him. But he answered that he would never come to Corinth as long as he knew his father was still alive.

6When she reported this, Periander sent a herald a third time. He wanted to come to Corcyra himself, and he told the son to come to Corinth and take over the tyranny.

7The son agreed to these terms. Periander set off for Corcyra, and his son for Corinth. When the Corcyraeans learned all about it, so that Periander would not come to their land, they killed the young man. Periander punished the Corcyraeans for this.

Chapter 54

1When the Lacedaemonians arrived with a great force, they laid siege to Samos. They attacked the wall and got on top of the tower that stood by the sea, opposite the suburb of the city. But Polycrates came to the rescue with a large force and drove them off.

2At the upper tower, the one that stood on the ridge of the mountain, the mercenaries and many of the Samians themselves made a sortie. They held off the Lacedaemonians for a short time, then fled back, and the Lacedaemonians followed and killed them.

Chapter 55

1If the Lacedaemonians who were there had been like Archias and Lycopes on that day, Samos would have been taken. Archias and Lycopes alone chased the fleeing Samians right up to the wall. Cut off from the way back, they died inside the Samians' city.

2I myself met another Archias, the son of Samius son of Archias, who was the third in descent from this Archias, in Pitane, for that was his deme. He honored the Samians more than any other foreigners, and he said that his father had been given the name Samius because his father Archias died after showing great valor at Samos. He said he honored the Samians because his grandfather had been buried at public expense by the Samians.

Chapter 56

1The Lacedaemonians had been besieging Samos for forty days and were getting no further with their task, so they went away to the Peloponnese.

2As the less reliable story goes, Polycrates struck local coins out of a great weight of lead, gilded them, and gave them to the Lacedaemonians, and they took them and so departed. This was the first campaign the Lacedaemonians, who are Dorians, made into Asia.

Chapter 57

1When the Lacedaemonians were about to leave them, the Samians who had campaigned against Polycrates sailed off themselves to Siphnos,

2because they needed money. At this time the affairs of the Siphnians were at their height, and they were the richest of the islanders, since they had gold and silver mines on their island. Out of a tenth of the revenue they got there a treasury has been set up at Delphi that rivals the richest of them. They divided the money that came in each year among themselves.

3So when they were building the treasury, they consulted the oracle to ask whether their present good fortune would stay with them for a long time. The Pythia gave them this answer:

4"But when the town hall in Siphnos is white, and the market place is white-browed, / then a clever man must beware of a wooden ambush and a red herald." At that time the Siphnians' market place and town hall were decorated with Parian marble.

Chapter 58

1They could not understand this oracle, neither at the time nor when the Samians arrived. As soon as the Samians put in at Siphnos, they sent one of their ships to the city carrying envoys.

2In ancient times all ships were painted with red ochre, and this is what the Pythia was warning the Siphnians about when she told them to guard against the wooden ambush and the red herald.

3When the envoys arrived, they asked the Siphnians to lend them ten talents. The Siphnians refused to lend it, so the Samians ravaged their lands.

4When the Siphnians heard about it, they came at once to help. They joined battle with the Samians and were defeated, and many of them were shut out of the town by the Samians. After that the Samians demanded a hundred talents from them.

Chapter 59

1From the Hermionians they took over the island of Hydre, off the Peloponnese, in place of money, and left it in the care of the Troezenians. They themselves founded Cydonia in Crete. They had not sailed there for this purpose, but to drive the Zacynthians out of the island.

2They stayed there and prospered for five years. So it is these Samians who made the shrines that are now at Cydonia, [and the temple of Dictynna].

3In the sixth year the Aeginetans defeated them in a sea battle and sold them into slavery, together with the Cretans. Their ships had boars' heads on the prows; the Aeginetans cut these off and dedicated them in the temple of Athena at Aegina.

4The Aeginetans did this because they bore a grudge against the Samians. For earlier, when Amphicrates was king of Samos, the Samians campaigned against Aegina and did great harm to the Aeginetans, and suffered harm themselves in return. That is the reason.

Chapter 60

1I have gone on at greater length about the Samians because they have three works, greater than anything the Greeks have made. One is a tunnel started from the bottom of a mountain a hundred and fifty fathoms high, with an opening at each end.

2The tunnel is seven stades long, and its height and width are eight feet each. Along its whole length another channel has been dug, twenty cubits deep and three feet wide. Through this the water is carried in pipes and reaches the city, brought from a large spring.

3The designer of this tunnel was a Megarian, Eupalinus son of Naustrophus. That is one of the three. The second is a breakwater in the sea around the harbor, going down to a depth of twenty fathoms; the breakwater is more than two stades long.

4The third is a temple they have built, the largest of all the temples we know of. Its first designer was a local man, Rhoecus son of Philes. For these reasons I have gone on at greater length about the Samians.

Chapter 61

1While Cambyses the son of Cyrus was delayed in Egypt and had lost his mind, two Magi who were brothers rose up against him. One of them Cambyses had left behind as caretaker of his household. This was the one who rose against him. He had learned that the death of Smerdis was being kept secret, that few of the Persians knew of it, and that most of them believed Smerdis was still alive.

2Thinking this over, he planned the following and made his attempt on the royal power. He had a brother — the one I said rose up with him — who looked very much like Smerdis the son of Cyrus, the man Cambyses killed even though he was his own brother. This brother looked like Smerdis and even had the same name, Smerdis.

3The Magus Patizeithes won this man over, promising that he would carry the whole thing through for him, and seated him on the royal throne. When he had done this, he sent heralds in all directions, including to Egypt, to tell the army that from now on they were to obey Smerdis the son of Cyrus and not Cambyses.

Chapter 62

1The other heralds proclaimed this, and so did the one who was sent to Egypt. He found Cambyses and the army at Ecbatana in Syria, and standing in the middle of them he proclaimed the Magus's orders.

2When Cambyses heard this from the herald and believed he was telling the truth, he thought he had been betrayed by Prexaspes, since Prexaspes had been sent to kill Smerdis and had not done it. He looked at Prexaspes and said, "Prexaspes, is this how you carried out the task I set you?"

3He said, "My lord, this is not true. It is not possible that your brother Smerdis has ever risen against you, and you will never have any trouble from that man, great or small. I myself did what you ordered and buried him with my own hands.

4If the dead come back to life, then you should expect Astyages the Mede to rise up against you too. But if things are as they were before, nothing new will come from him. Now I think we should send men after the herald and examine him, asking him from whom he comes when he tells us to obey King Smerdis."

Chapter 63

1When Prexaspes had said this — and it pleased Cambyses — the herald was pursued at once and brought back. When he arrived, Prexaspes questioned him as follows: "Man, you say you come as a messenger from Smerdis the son of Cyrus. Now tell the truth and go on your way in peace: did Smerdis himself appear before you and give you these orders, or was it one of his servants?"

2He said, "I have not seen Smerdis the son of Cyrus at all since King Cambyses set out for Egypt. The Magus whom Cambyses appointed caretaker of the household is the one who gave me these orders. He said that it was Smerdis the son of Cyrus who wanted this, and told me to say it to you."

3So the man told them this without adding any lie of his own. Cambyses said, "Prexaspes, you did what you were ordered like the good man you are, and you are clear of the charge. But who among the Persians has risen against me, making use of the name of Smerdis?" He said,

4"I think I understand what has happened here, my king. It is the Magi who have risen against you: Patizeithes, whom you left as caretaker of your household, and his brother Smerdis."

Chapter 64

1When Cambyses heard the name Smerdis, the truth of the words and of the dream struck home. In his sleep he had thought that someone told him that Smerdis sat down on the royal throne and touched the sky with his head.

2When he understood that he had killed his brother for nothing, he wept for Smerdis. After he had wept and grieved bitterly over the whole disaster, he leaped onto his horse, intending to march against the Magus to Susa as fast as possible.

3As he leaped onto his horse, the end cap fell off the sword's scabbard. The bare sword cut his thigh. He was wounded in the same place where he himself had earlier struck the Egyptian god Apis. When the wound seemed to him to be fatal, Cambyses asked what the city's name was. They told him it was Ecbatana.

4An oracle from the city of Buto had told him before this that he would end his life at Ecbatana. He had thought it meant he would die of old age at Ecbatana in Media, where all his affairs were. But the oracle was speaking of Ecbatana in Syria.

5So when he asked and learned the city's name, he came to his senses, struck down by the disaster of both the Magus and the wound. Working out the oracle, he said, "Here it is fated that Cambyses the son of Cyrus die."

Chapter 65

1That was as far as things went then. About twenty days later he sent for the most notable of the Persians who were with him and said this to them: "Persians, I have been forced to reveal to you the one thing I hid above everything else.

2While I was in Egypt I saw a vision in my sleep, one I wish I had never seen. I thought a messenger came from home and told me that Smerdis sat down on the royal throne and touched the sky with his head.

3Afraid that my brother would take my power away from me, I acted faster than wisely. In human nature, it seems, there is no power to turn aside what is going to happen. I, the fool, sent Prexaspes to Susa to kill Smerdis. When this terrible deed was done, I lived without fear, never considering that with Smerdis out of the way some other man might rise against me.

4I missed everything that was going to happen. I have become a brother-killer for no reason, and all the same I have lost my kingdom. The Magus Smerdis was the one the divine power showed me in the vision as the one who would rise against me.

5The deed is done. Count Smerdis the son of Cyrus as no longer alive. The Magi hold the royal power: the one I left as caretaker of my household, and his brother Smerdis. The one who should above all have taken vengeance for me, after the shameful way the Magi treated me, has met an unholy end at the hands of those closest to him.

6Now that he is gone, the next most necessary thing for me is to give you orders, Persians, about what I want done when I end my life. This is my charge to you, and I call on the royal gods as I make it, to all of you and most of all to the Achaemenids who are here: do not let the rule pass back to the Medes. If they took it by trickery, then let it be taken away from them by trickery; if they won it by force, then win it back by force.

7If you do this, may the earth bear its fruit and may women and flocks bear young, and may you remain free for all time. But if you do not win back the rule, or do not even try to win it back, I pray for the opposite of these things to happen to you, and on top of that for the end that has come upon me to come upon each one of the Persians." When Cambyses had said this, he wept over his whole life's story.

Chapter 66

1When the Persians saw the king break into weeping, they all took hold of their clothes and tore them, and they cried out without restraint.

2After this the bone became infected and the thigh rotted away as fast as it could, and it carried off Cambyses the son of Cyrus. He had ruled in all seven years and five months, and he left no child at all, neither male nor female.

3The Persians who were there found it hard to believe that the Magi held the power. They thought Cambyses had said what he did about the death of Smerdis out of malice, to make all the Persians hostile to him.

Chapter 67

1These men believed that Smerdis the son of Cyrus was now king. Prexaspes too strongly denied that he had killed Smerdis. After Cambyses was dead it was not safe for him to say that he had killed Cyrus' son with his own hand.

2When Cambyses was dead, the Magus ruled without fear, using the name of Smerdis the son of Cyrus. He held power for the seven months that were left to complete Cambyses' eight years.

3In that time he showed great kindness to all his subjects, so that when he died everyone in Asia except the Persians themselves felt his loss. The Magus sent word to every people he ruled and proclaimed freedom from military service and from tribute for three years.

Chapter 68

1He announced these things as soon as he took power, but in the eighth month he was found out in this way. Otanes was the son of Pharnaspes, and in family and wealth he was equal to the first man among the Persians.

2This Otanes was the first to suspect the Magus. He thought that he was not Smerdis the son of Cyrus but the man he really was. He reasoned it out from this: the man never came out of the citadel, and he never called any of the notable Persians into his presence.

3With this suspicion he did the following. Cambyses had married a daughter of his, whose name was Phaedyme. This same woman was now married to the Magus. He shared her bed and the beds of all the rest of Cambyses' wives. So Otanes sent messages to this daughter of his and asked her which man she slept with: whether it was Smerdis the son of Cyrus or another man.

4She sent back word that she could not tell. She had never once seen Smerdis the son of Cyrus, and she did not know who the man was who shared her bed. Otanes sent a second message, saying, "If you cannot tell who Smerdis the son of Cyrus is, then find out from Atossa which man it is that she and you both live with, for she surely knows her own brother." To this the daughter sent back word:

5"I cannot get to speak with Atossa, and I cannot see any of the other women who live here with me. As soon as this man, whoever he is, took over as king, he separated us and put each of us in a different place."

Chapter 69

1When Otanes heard this, the matter seemed still clearer to him. He sent a third message to her, which said the following.

2"My daughter, you are well born, and you must take on whatever danger your father tells you to face. If this is not Smerdis the son of Cyrus but the man I suspect, then he must not be allowed to sleep with you and hold the power of the Persians and get away free. He must pay the penalty."

3"Now do this: when he sleeps with you and you find that he is sound asleep, feel for his ears. If he turns out to have ears, you may believe that you are married to Smerdis the son of Cyrus. If he does not have them, then you are married to the Magus Smerdis."

4Phaedyme sent back word to this that she would be taking a great risk if she did it. If he happened to have no ears and she was caught feeling for them, she knew well that he would make her disappear. Even so, she said, she would do it.

5So she promised her father that she would carry this out. Cyrus the son of Cambyses had cut the ears off this Magus Smerdis over a charge that was no small matter.

6This Phaedyme, the daughter of Otanes, did everything she had promised her father. When her turn came to go to the Magus—for the wives of the Persians visit their husbands in rotation—she went to him and slept with him. When the Magus was sound asleep, she felt for his ears. Without any trouble, quite easily, she found that the man had no ears. As soon as it was day, she sent word to her father of what had happened.

Chapter 70

1Otanes took Aspathines and Gobryes into his confidence. They were leading men among the Persians and the ones he trusted most. He told them the whole story. They had themselves suspected that this was how things stood, and when Otanes brought the matter to them, they accepted it.

2They decided that each of them should bring in as a companion the man he trusted most. Otanes brought in Intaphrenes, Gobryes brought in Megabyzus, and Aspathines brought in Hydarnes.

3When these six were together, Darius the son of Hystaspes arrived at Susa, coming from Persia. His father was governor there. When he arrived, the six Persians decided to bring Darius in as a companion too.

Chapter 71

1These men, seven in all, met and exchanged pledges and words. When it came Darius' turn to give his opinion, he said to them:

2"I thought that I alone knew this: that the Magus was the one on the throne and that Smerdis the son of Cyrus was dead. That is exactly why I came here in haste, to bring about the Magus' death. Since it has turned out that you know it too and not just I alone, I think we should act at once and not put it off, since putting it off is not the better course."

3To this Otanes said: "Son of Hystaspes, you come of a good father and you show that you are no worse than your father. But do not rush this attempt so rashly. Take it more cautiously instead. We need to be more in number before we make the attempt."

4Darius said to this: "Men who are here, if you follow the plan Otanes has described, know that you will come to a very bad end. Someone will carry the story to the Magus, looking to win profit for himself in secret."

5"You should really have done this on your own. But since you thought it right to bring it before more people and you waited for me, either we do it today or else know this: if this present day slips by, no one will get ahead of me as your accuser. I will denounce you myself to the Magus."

Chapter 72

1When Otanes saw that Darius was pressing hard, he said to this: "Since you force us to hurry and will not let us put it off, come and tell us yourself how we are to get into the palace and make our attempt on them. You know that guards are posted, I am sure, even if you have not seen them, only heard of them. How will we get past them?" Darius answered with this:

2"Otanes, there are many things that words cannot show but action can. There are other things that words can show, but no bright result comes from them in practice. You may be sure that the guards set on duty here are not hard to get past."

3"First, since we are the men we are, there is no one who will not let us through. Partly they will feel respect for us, and partly they will be afraid. Second, I myself have a very plausible excuse for going in: I can say that I have just arrived from Persia and want to pass on a message from my father to the king."

4"Where a lie needs to be told, let it be told. Those who lie and those who tell the truth are after the same thing. Men lie when they expect to gain something by winning people over with their lies, and men tell the truth so that the truth may draw them a profit and they may be trusted with something more. So we practice opposite things but hold on to the same goal."

5"If they were not going to gain anything, the truth-teller would be just as much a liar and the liar just as much truthful. So if any of the gatekeepers lets us through of his own free will, things will turn out better for him in time. If anyone tries to stand in our way, let him be shown to be an enemy right there, and then let us push our way in and get to work."

Chapter 73

1After this Gobryes said: "Friends, when will we have a better chance to win back our rule, or, if we cannot take it back, to die? We are Persians and we are ruled by a man of the Medes, a Magus—and one who has no ears at that."

2"All of you who were there when Cambyses was sick certainly remember the charge he laid on the Persians as he ended his life: that they were making no attempt to win back their rule. We did not accept it at the time. We thought that Cambyses was speaking out of spite."

3"So now I cast my vote that we follow Darius and do not break up this meeting but go straight at the Magus." That is what Gobryes said, and everyone agreed.

Chapter 74

1While they were holding this council, the following happened by chance. The Magi decided to win Prexaspes over as a friend. He had suffered unfriendly treatment from Cambyses, who had shot and killed his son with an arrow. He was the only one who knew how Smerdis the son of Cyrus had died, since he had killed him with his own hand. And besides, Prexaspes was held in the highest honor among the Persians.

2For these reasons they called him in and tried to win him as a friend. They took a pledge and oaths from him that he would keep the matter to himself and tell no man about the deception they had worked on the Persians, and they promised to give him ten thousand of everything.

3When Prexaspes promised to do this and the Magi had won him over, they made a further proposal. They said that they would call all the Persians together under the palace wall, and they ordered him to go up on a tower and announce that they were ruled by Smerdis the son of Cyrus and by no one else.

4They gave him these orders because he was supposedly the most trustworthy man in Persia. He had often declared his opinion that Smerdis the son of Cyrus was alive, and he had denied that he had killed him.

Chapter 75

1Prexaspes said that he was ready to do this too. The Magi called the Persians together, put him up on a tower, and told him to speak. He deliberately forgot what they had asked of him. Starting from Achaemenes, he went through the family line of Cyrus. When he came down the line to him, he ended by telling of all the good things Cyrus had done for the Persians.

2After going through this, he revealed the truth. He said that he had kept it hidden before, because it was not safe for him to tell what had happened. Now, he said, necessity was forcing him to make it known. He said that he himself had killed Smerdis the son of Cyrus, when Cambyses forced him to, and that the Magi were the ones who held the throne.

3He called down many curses on the Persians if they did not win back their rule and punish the Magi. Then he let himself fall headfirst from the tower to the ground below. Prexaspes, who had been a man of standing all his life, met his end in this way.

Chapter 76

1The seven Persians had decided to attack the Magi at once and not put it off. They prayed to the gods and set out. They knew nothing of what had happened to Prexaspes.

2As they were walking along the middle of the road, they heard what had happened to Prexaspes. Then they stepped off the road and argued with one another again. Otanes and his group strongly urged them to put it off and not to attack while everything was in an uproar. Darius and his group said to go at once and do what had been decided, without delay.

3While they were arguing, seven pairs of hawks appeared. They were chasing two pairs of vultures and tearing at them and pecking them. When the seven saw this, they all approved Darius' plan, and then they went on to the palace, taking courage from the birds.

Chapter 77

1When they came up to the gates, things turned out just as Darius had said they would. The guards felt respect for these leading men of the Persians, and they suspected nothing of the kind from them, so they let them through, believing that a god was guiding them. No one even asked them anything.

2When they had passed into the courtyard, they ran into the eunuchs who carry in the messages. The eunuchs asked them what they wanted and why they had come. At the same time they threatened the gatekeepers for letting them through, and tried to hold the seven back from going further.

3The seven urged each other on, drew their daggers, and stabbed the men who were holding them back right where they stood. Then they ran at full speed into the men's hall.

Chapter 78

1The Magi happened to be inside at the time, discussing what had happened with Prexaspes. When they saw the eunuchs in an uproar and shouting, both of them ran back. When they realized what was going on, they turned to defend themselves.

2One of them was quicker and got hold of his bows. The other turned to his spear. Then the two sides clashed. For the one who had picked up his bows, they were no use at all, since the enemy was close and pressing him. The other defended himself with his spear. He struck Aspathines in the thigh and Intaphrenes in the eye. Intaphrenes lost his eye from the wound, but he did not die.

3This is how one of the Magi wounded these two. The other, when his bows were of no use to him, ran off into a bedchamber that opened out of the men's hall. He wanted to shut the doors behind him, but two of the seven, Darius and Gobryes, burst in with him.

4When Gobryes grappled with the Magus, Darius stood by at a loss. It was dark, and he was afraid of striking Gobryes.

5Gobryes saw him standing there doing nothing and asked him why he was not using his hand. Darius said: "I am careful of you, so I do not strike." Gobryes answered: "Thrust your sword, even through both of us." Darius obeyed and drove his dagger in, and he somehow hit the Magus.

Chapter 79

1They killed the Magi and cut off their heads. They left their own wounded men right there, both because they could not move them and to guard the citadel. The other five ran on with the Magi's heads, shouting and making a din. They called on the rest of the Persians, telling them what had happened and showing them the heads, and at the same time they killed every Magus who came in their way.

2When the Persians learned from the seven what had happened and how the Magi had deceived them, they decided to do the same themselves. They drew their daggers and killed every Magus they found. If night had not come on and stopped them, they would have left no Magus alive.

3The Persians observe this day in common more than any other day. On it they hold a great festival, which is called by the Persians the Magophonia. On that day no Magus is allowed to come out into the light, and the Magi keep themselves indoors all that day.

Chapter 80

1When the uproar had settled and five days had gone by, the men who had risen against the Magi took counsel about the whole state of affairs. Speeches were made that some of the Greeks do not believe, but they were made all the same.

2Otanes urged them to put the government in the hands of the Persian people. He said: "It seems to me that we should no longer have one man as our ruler. It is neither pleasant nor good. You saw how far Cambyses' arrogance went, and you had your own share of the Magus' arrogance too."

3"How can monarchy be a sound thing when it lets a man do whatever he wants with no one to hold him to account? Even the best man in the world, if he were set in that position, would be changed from his usual way of thinking. He gets arrogance from the good things he has around him, and envy is planted in a man from the very start."

4"With these two things he has every kind of badness. With his arrogance sated he does many reckless things, and with his envy he does others. And yet a ruler should be a man without envy, since he has every good thing. Instead, he acts in just the opposite way toward his citizens. He envies the best of them while they are still alive and here, and he is pleased with the worst of the citizens. He is quickest to listen to slanders."

5"He is also the most impossible man to deal with. If you praise him moderately, he is annoyed that he is not honored enough. If someone honors him too much, he is annoyed at being flattered. And now I come to the worst of it: he overturns the customs of our fathers, he forces women, and he kills men without trial."

6"Rule by the people has, first of all, the finest name of all: equal rights. Second, it does none of the things a monarch does. It fills offices by lot. It holds power to account. It brings every decision before the public. So my advice is that we give up monarchy and make the people strong. In the many is everything."

Chapter 81

1This was the opinion Otanes put forward. Megabyzus urged them to entrust the rule to an oligarchy. He said: "What Otanes said in ending the rule of one man, I agree with that too. But when he urges us to carry power over to the people, he has chosen the worst advice there is. There is nothing more senseless and more violent than a useless crowd."

2"It is in no way to be borne that men who are running from a ruler's arrogance should fall into the arrogance of an undisciplined mob. The ruler, if he does something, does it with knowledge. The mob does not even have knowledge. How could he understand anything, when he has never been taught and never seen anything fine of his own? He pushes the business along headlong and without sense, like a rushing river."

3"Let those who wish the Persians ill make use of the mob. Let us instead pick out the best of the men and put the power in their hands. We ourselves will be among them. From the best men it is reasonable to expect the best plans."

Chapter 82

1Megabyzus gave this opinion; and third, Darius set out his own opinion, saying: "In my view, what Megabyzus said about the rule of the people seems to be right, but what he said about oligarchy is not right. Since three forms of government are laid out before us, and all three are the best in argument—rule by the people, oligarchy, and monarchy—I say that this last one is far the best.

2Nothing could be better than the rule of one excellent man. When he uses judgment like that, he will look after the people without blame, and plans against enemies will best be kept secret in this way.

3In an oligarchy, where many men practice excellence in public, strong private hatreds tend to grow up. Each man wants to be the leader and to win with his own opinions, and so they come to hate one another bitterly. From these hatreds come factions, from the factions come killings, and from the killings it ends in monarchy. In this it has been shown clearly how much better that one form is.

4And when the people rule, it is impossible for badness not to grow up. When badness grows up in public life, the bad men do not grow hostile to one another; instead they form strong friendships. The men who damage the public good work together with their heads down. This goes on until someone becomes the people's champion and puts a stop to such men. Then this man is admired by the people; and once admired, he turns out to be a monarch. In this way too he shows that monarchy is the best form.

5To sum everything up in one word: where did our freedom come from, and who gave it to us? Was it the people, or an oligarchy, or a monarch? So my opinion is that we, who were freed by one man, should keep this form of government; and apart from that, we should not break our ancestral laws, since they serve us well. That would not be better."

Chapter 83

1These, then, were the three opinions laid before them, and four of the seven men sided with this one. When Otanes was beaten in the vote, though he was eager to give the Persians equality before the law, he spoke these words to all of them.

2"My companions in this struggle—for it is clear that one of us must become king, whether by drawing lots, or by leaving the choice to the Persian people, who can pick whoever they want, or by some other device—I will not compete against you. I do not want to rule or to be ruled. On these terms I withdraw from the contest for power: neither I myself nor any of my descendants will ever be ruled by any of you."

3When he said this, the six agreed to these terms. So he did not compete with them but stood aside. And to this day this family alone remains free among the Persians. It is not ruled, except as much as it itself wishes, and it does not break the laws of the Persians.

Chapter 84

1The rest of the seven took counsel on how they could set up a king in the most just way. They decided that Otanes and his descendants should receive special gifts every year, if the kingship passed to one of the other seven: a set of Median clothing, and the full gift that is held in highest honor among the Persians. They decided to give him these things because he first planned the whole business and brought them together.

2These, then, were the special honors for Otanes. They made the following rules for all of them in common: any of the seven who wished could enter the palace without being announced, unless the king happened to be in bed with his wife; and the king was not allowed to marry from anywhere except the families of those who had joined him in rising up.

3About the kingship they made this plan: whichever man's horse neighed first at sunrise, when the men were mounted in the suburb, that man was to have the kingship.

Chapter 85

1Darius had a skilled horse-keeper, whose name was Oebares. When they had broken up, Darius spoke to this man: "Oebares, we have decided to settle the kingship this way: whichever man's horse neighs first at sunrise, when we are mounted, he is to have the kingship. So now, if you have any skill, find a way for me to win this prize and not someone else."

2Oebares answered him as follows: "My lord, if it really depends on this whether you are to be king or not, then take heart and be of good courage, for no one else will be king before you—I have tricks that will do it." Darius said: "If you have a clever device like that, it is time to get to work and not to put it off. Tomorrow is our contest."

3When Oebares heard this, he did the following. When night fell, he took one of the mares—the one that Darius's horse was most eager to mate with—led her to the suburb, and tied her up. Then he brought Darius's horse there. He led the horse around the mare for a long time, bringing it close to her, and in the end he let the horse cover her.

Chapter 86

1At daybreak the six arrived on their horses as they had agreed. As they rode through the suburb, when they came to the place where the mare had been tied up the night before, Darius's horse ran up and neighed.

2And as the horse did this, there came a flash of lightning and a clap of thunder from a clear sky. These signs, coming for Darius, made him king, as if by agreement. The others jumped down from their horses and bowed low to Darius.

Chapter 87

1Some say that Oebares arranged the matter this way; others tell a different story, and the Persians tell it both ways: that he touched the mare's private parts with his hand and kept it hidden in his trousers; and when the horses were about to be let go at sunrise, Oebares held out his hand to the nostrils of Darius's horse. The horse caught the scent, got excited, and neighed.

Chapter 88

1Darius, son of Hystaspes, was now declared king, and everyone in Asia obeyed him except the Arabians. Cyrus had brought the region under his rule, and later Cambyses did the same again. The Arabians never submitted to the Persians as subjects. Instead they became friends, allowing Cambyses to pass through on his way to Egypt. Without the willing help of the Arabians, the Persians would not have been able to invade Egypt.

2Darius made his first marriages among the Persians with two of Cyrus's daughters, Atossa and Artystone. Atossa had been married before to her brother Cambyses, and later to the Magus. Artystone was a virgin.

3He also married a daughter of Smerdis, son of Cyrus, whose name was Parmys. And he took the daughter of Otanes, the woman who had exposed the Magus. In every way he was filled with power. First he had a monument made of stone and set up. The figure carved on it was a man on horseback, and he wrote this inscription: "Darius, son of Hystaspes, won the kingship of the Persians with the excellence of his horse—I name the horse's name—and of Oebares, the horse-keeper."

Chapter 89

1After doing this, he set up twenty provincial governments in Persia, which they themselves call satrapies. When he had set up the governments and appointed governors, he fixed the taxes to be paid to him by nation, assigning the neighboring peoples alongside each nation and skipping over those next to each other, so that peoples farther apart were given to different groups.

2He divided the provincial governments and the yearly revenue from taxes as follows. Those who brought in silver were ordered to bring it by the Babylonian talent, and those who brought in gold by the Euboean talent. The Babylonian talent equals seventy-eight Euboean minas.

3Under Cyrus, and again under Cambyses, nothing had been fixed about taxes; the peoples used to bring gifts. Because of this tax assessment and other things like it, the Persians say that Darius was a shopkeeper, Cambyses a master, and Cyrus a father. Darius, because he made a petty trade of everything; Cambyses, because he was harsh and careless; and Cyrus, because he was kind and looked out for their good in every way.

Chapter 90

1From the Ionians and the Magnesians in Asia, and the Aeolians, Carians, Lycians, Milyans, and Pamphylians—for one tax was assigned to all of them together—there came four hundred talents of silver. This was the first tax district that he set up. From the Mysians, Lydians, Lasonians, Cabalians, and Hytennians there came five hundred talents. This was the second district.

2From the Hellespontians on the right as you sail in, the Phrygians, the Thracians in Asia, the Paphlagonians, the Mariandynians, and the Syrians, the tax was three hundred and sixty talents. This was the third district.

3From the Cilicians there were three hundred and sixty white horses, one for every day of the year, and five hundred talents of silver. Of these, one hundred and forty were spent on the cavalry that guards the Cilician country, and the other three hundred and sixty went to Darius. This was the fourth district.

Chapter 91

1From the city of Posideion, which Amphilochus, son of Amphiaraus, founded on the borders of Cilicia and Syria, the tax was three hundred and fifty talents, counting from that city all the way to Egypt, except for the part belonging to the Arabians (for that part was free of tax). In this district are all of Phoenicia, the part of Syria called Palestine, and Cyprus. This was the fifth district.

2From Egypt, the Libyans next to Egypt, Cyrene, and Barca—for these had been assigned to the Egyptian district—there came seven hundred talents, apart from the silver that came from Lake Moeris, which came from the fish.

3Apart from this silver and the grain that was measured out, there came seven hundred talents. They measure out twelve myriads of grain to the Persians who live in the White Wall at Memphis and to their helpers. This was the sixth district.

4The Sattagydae, Gandarii, Dadicae, and Aparitae were grouped together and paid one hundred and seventy talents. This was the seventh district. From Susa and the rest of the Cissian country, three hundred talents. This was the eighth district.

Chapter 92

1From Babylon and the rest of Assyria there came one thousand talents of silver and five hundred castrated boys. This was the ninth district. From Agbatana and the rest of Media, and from the Paricanians and Orthocorybantians, four hundred and fifty talents. This was the tenth district.

2The Caspians, Pausicae, Pantimathi, and Daritae all together paid two hundred talents. This was the eleventh district.

Chapter 93

1From the Bactrians as far as the Aegli the tax was three hundred and sixty talents. This was the twelfth district. From Pactyice, the Armenians, and their neighbors as far as the Euxine Sea, four hundred talents. This was the thirteenth district.

2From the Sagartians, Sarangians, Thamanaians, Utians, Mycans, and the people living on the islands in the Red Sea—where the king settles the so-called deported peoples—all of these together produced six hundred talents of tax. This was the fourteenth district.

3The Sacae and the Caspians paid two hundred and fifty talents. This was the fifteenth district. The Parthians, Chorasmians, Sogdians, and Arii paid three hundred talents. This was the sixteenth district.

Chapter 94

1The Paricanians and the Ethiopians in Asia paid four hundred talents. This was the seventeenth district. Two hundred talents were assessed on the Matieni, Saspires, and Alarodians. This was the eighteenth district.

2Three hundred talents were assigned to the Moschi, Tibareni, Macrones, Mossynoeci, and Mares. This was the nineteenth district. The Indians are by far the most numerous of all the peoples we know, and as tax they bring in three hundred and sixty talents of gold dust, over and above all the others. This was the twentieth district.

Chapter 95

1When the silver is reckoned against the Euboean talent, it comes to nine thousand eight hundred and eighty talents. The gold, counted at thirteen times the value of silver, works out at four thousand six hundred and eighty Euboean talents.

2When all of these are added together, the total collected for Darius's yearly tax came to fourteen thousand five hundred and sixty Euboean talents. I am not counting the amounts smaller than this.

Chapter 96

1This was the tax that came in to Darius from Asia and, in a few places, from Libya. As time went on, more tax also came in from the islands and from the peoples living in Europe as far as Thessaly.

2The king stores this tax in the following way: he melts it down and pours it into clay jars. When the jar is full, he takes off the clay casing. Whenever he needs money, he cuts off as much as he needs at the time.

Chapter 97

1These, then, were the provincial governments and the tax assessments. The Persian country is the only one I have not mentioned as paying tribute, for the Persians hold their land free of tax.

2These peoples were not assigned to pay any tax but brought gifts: the Ethiopians bordering Egypt, whom Cambyses conquered when he marched against the long-lived Ethiopians, and those who live around sacred Nysa and hold the festivals of Dionysus. [These Ethiopians and their neighbors use the same seed as the Callantian Indians, and their houses are underground.]

3Both of these groups brought their gifts every third year, and they still bring them down to my own day: two choenices of unmelted gold, two hundred logs of ebony, five Ethiopian boys, and twenty large elephant tusks.

4The Colchians and their neighbors as far as the Caucasus mountains—for up to this mountain the land is ruled by the Persians, and north of the Caucasus the Persians pay no attention to anything—still bring the gifts that were assigned to them, even in my time, once every five years: one hundred boys and one hundred girls.

5The Arabians brought one thousand talents of frankincense every year. These peoples, then, brought these gifts to the king in addition to the tax.

Chapter 98

1The Indians obtain this great quantity of gold, from which they bring the gold dust I mentioned to the king, in the following way.

2The part of the Indian land that faces the rising sun is sand. Of the peoples we know of, and about whom anything precise is said, the Indians live farthest toward the dawn and the sunrise of all the peoples in Asia. East of the Indians there is a desert, because of the sand.

3There are many peoples among the Indians, and they do not all speak the same language. Some of them are nomads and some are not. Some live in the marshes of the river and eat raw fish, which they catch from boats made of reeds. Each boat is made from a single joint of cane.

4These Indians wear clothes made of plant fiber. When they cut the reeds from the river and pound them, they weave the result together like a mat and put it on like a breastplate.

Chapter 99

1Other Indians live to the east of these. They are nomads and eat raw meat. They are called Padaei, and they are said to follow these customs. Whenever a citizen falls ill, whether woman or man, if it is a man, the men who spend the most time with him kill him, saying that the disease is wasting away his flesh and spoiling their meat. He insists that he is not sick, but they disagree; they kill him and feast on him.

2If a woman falls ill, the women who are closest to her do the same as the men. They sacrifice anyone who reaches old age and feast on him. But not many of them reach that point, because before that they kill everyone who falls ill.

Chapter 100

1Other Indians have this different custom: they kill nothing that lives, they sow no crops, and they think it is wrong to have houses. They eat plants. They have a grain the size of a millet seed, which grows of its own accord from the ground inside a pod. They gather it pod and all, boil it, and eat it. If any one of them falls ill, he goes into the desert and lies there. No one pays any attention to him, whether he is sick or dying.

Chapter 101

1All these Indians I have described mate openly, like cattle, and they all have a color that is similar and close to that of the Ethiopians.

2The seed that they release into the women is not white like that of other people, but black, like their skin. The Ethiopians too release black seed. These Indians live farther from the Persians and toward the south wind, and they never obeyed King Darius.

Chapter 102

1Other Indians live next to the city of Caspapyrus and the country of Pactyice. They are settled to the north and toward the north wind compared with the other Indians, and they live much as the Bactrians do. These are the most warlike of the Indians, and they are the ones who are sent out for the gold; for in that direction there is desert because of the sand.

2In this desert and sand there are ants that are smaller than dogs but bigger than foxes. Some of them, caught there, have even been brought to the Persian king. These ants make their homes underground and bring up the sand, in the same way as the ants in Greece do—and they look very much like them too. The sand they bring up contains gold.

3It is after this sand that the Indians set out into the desert, each man yoking three camels: a male on either side to run in the traces, and a female in the middle, which he rides himself. He makes sure to yoke them after taking them away from their young, which are as young as possible. For camels are no slower than horses, and they can carry much heavier loads.

Chapter 103

1Now, about the shape of the camel: I am not writing for Greeks who already know it. For those who do not know it, I will tell this much. In its back legs the camel has four thighs and four knees, and its sex organs are turned inward, between its back legs, toward its tail.

Chapter 104

1The Indians set out for the gold with this method and this kind of team. They calculate the time carefully, so that they will be doing their grabbing during the greatest heat. For under that heat the ants go underground and vanish from sight.

2For these people the sun is hottest in the morning, not at midday as it is for everyone else. It burns from sunrise until about the time when the morning market breaks up. At that hour it burns Greece far more than the Greek midday sun does, so much so that people say they soak themselves in water then.

3At midday the sun burns them almost exactly as it burns everyone else, the Indians included. When midday is past, the sun among them is like the morning sun among other people. From then on it cools more and more as it goes down, and when it reaches its setting it is very cool indeed.

Chapter 105

1When the Indians reach the place with their bags, they fill them with the sand as fast as they can and drive back. For the ants, the Persians say, learn of them at once by smell and give chase. Nothing else matches their speed. If the Indians did not get a head start on the road while the ants are still gathering, not one of them would get away alive.

2The male camels are slower runners than the females, and they give out as they are dragged; the two of them do not slow down together. The females, remembering the young they left behind, never give way at all. This, the Persians say, is how the Indians get most of their gold. The other gold in the land is much scarcer, because it has to be dug out of the ground.

Chapter 106

1The far ends of the inhabited world have drawn the finest lot, just as Greece has drawn the finest seasons by far, blended better than anywhere else.

2Toward the east, the last land of the inhabited world is India, as I said a little earlier. The living creatures there, the four-footed animals and the birds, are far larger than in other lands. The horses are the exception; they are smaller than the Median horses, which are called Nesaean horses. Gold there is endless: some of it is dug from the ground, some is carried down by rivers, and some is seized in the way I described.

3The wild trees there also bear fruit with wool on it, and in beauty and in quality that wool beats the wool of sheep. The Indians make their clothing from these trees.

Chapter 107

1Toward the south, Arabia is the last of the inhabited lands. In it grow frankincense, myrrh, cassia, cinnamon, and ledanon; it is the only country in the whole world where they grow. The Arabs find it hard to get all of these except the myrrh.

2They gather the frankincense by burning styrax, the gum that the Phoenicians export to Greece; it is by burning this that they take it. For many winged snakes guard the frankincense trees, small snakes, marked in many colors, in great numbers around each tree. These are the same snakes that attack Egypt. Nothing drives them from the trees except the smoke of the styrax.

Chapter 108

1The Arabs also tell this: the whole earth would be full of these snakes if they did not breed in the strange way I know that vipers breed.

2Here the wisdom of the divine power shows itself, as is fitting. It made all the timid, edible creatures bear many young, so that, eaten as they are, they may not run out. It made the fierce and harmful creatures bear few.

3Here is a proof: the hare is hunted by every beast, every bird, and by man, so it is wonderfully fertile. It is the only animal that is always pregnant. Some of its young in the womb are already furred, some are bare, some are just being formed in the womb, and some are just being conceived.

4That is what the hare is like. The lioness is the strongest and boldest of creatures, yet she gives birth once in her life, to one cub. In giving birth she pushes out her womb together with the cub. The reason is this: when the cub begins to stir inside its mother, it scratches the womb with claws far sharper than those of any other creature. As it grows, it digs in more and more, so that when the birth is near hardly any of the womb is left whole.

Chapter 109

1So too with vipers and the winged snakes of Arabia: if they were born as nature gives them to be, human beings could not survive. But this is what happens. They mate in pairs, and as the male releases his seed the female grips his neck. She bites in and does not let go until she has eaten through.

2So the male dies in the way described. Then the female pays this penalty to the male. The young, avenging their father, eat through their mother while they are still in the womb. After eating through her belly, that is how they make their escape.

3The other snakes, which do no harm to people, lay eggs and hatch out a great many young. Vipers are found in every land. The winged snakes are all crowded together in Arabia and nowhere else, and that is why they seem to many people to be so many.

Chapter 110

1The Arabs get the frankincense in this way; they get the cassia like this. They wrap their whole bodies and faces in hides and other skins, leaving only their eyes bare, and go to the cassia. It grows in a shallow lake. Around it and in it live winged beasts, most like bats, that shriek terribly and fight fiercely. The men must ward these off from their eyes while they cut the cassia.

Chapter 111

1They gather the cinnamon in a way still more wonderful than these. They cannot say where it comes from or what land grows it, except that some, using a plausible argument, say it grows in the places where Dionysus was raised as a child.

2They say great birds carry off those twigs that we, having learned from the Phoenicians, call cinnamon. The birds carry them to nests plastered of mud on sheer cliffs, where a man has no way of reaching them.

3So the Arabs contrive this trick. They cut the meat of dead cattle and donkeys and other beasts of burden into pieces as large as they can. They carry it to those places, set it down near the nests, and go away. The birds swoop down and lift the chunks of meat up to the nests, and the nests, unable to bear the weight, break and fall to the ground. Then the men come up and gather it. Gathered in this way, the cinnamon then reaches other lands.

Chapter 112

1The ledanon, which the Arabs call ladanon, is more amazing still. Though it comes from the foulest-smelling thing, it is the sweetest in scent. It is found forming in the beards of he-goats, like gum dripping from wood. It is useful for many perfumes, and the Arabs burn it above all in their incense.

Chapter 113

1Let this much be said about the incenses. The land of Arabia gives off a sweet smell so strong it is a wonder. Two kinds of sheep there are worth marveling at, and they are found nowhere else. One kind has tails three cubits long or even longer. If the sheep dragged their tails along, they would have sores, for the tails would be rubbed raw against the ground.

2As it is, every one of the shepherds knows enough carpentry for this. They make little carts and fasten them under the tails, tying the tail of each animal to its own cart. The other kind of sheep carry tails that are broad, a cubit across.

Chapter 114

1When midday is past, the land of Ethiopia stretches toward the setting sun, the last of the inhabited lands. It produces much gold and huge elephants, wild trees of every kind and ebony, and men who are the tallest, the most beautiful, and the longest lived.

Chapter 115

1These then are the far ends in Asia and in Libya. About the far ends of Europe toward the west I cannot speak with certainty. For my part, I do not accept that there is a river called Eridanus by foreigners, pouring into the northern sea, from which amber is said to come. Nor do I know that the Cassiterides islands exist, from which our tin comes.

2The name Eridanus itself gives it away: it is Greek, not foreign, and some poet made it. Though I have made this my study, I have never been able to learn from anyone who has seen it that there is a sea beyond Europe. Tin and amber do come to us from the far ends.

Chapter 116

1Toward the north of Europe the gold appears in by far the greatest quantity. How it is produced I cannot say for certain either. It is said that one-eyed men, the Arimaspi, snatch it from the griffins.

2I do not believe this either: that men with one eye are born, who in all other respects have the same nature as other men.

3The far ends of the world, circling round and fencing in the other lands, have the things we think are finest, and have them in the greatest scarcity.

Chapter 117

1In Asia there is a plain enclosed all around by mountains. Five passes cut through the mountains. This plain once belonged to the Chorasmians. It lay on the borders of the Chorasmians themselves and of the Hyrcanians, the Parthians, the Sarangians, and the Thamanaians. But since the Persians hold power, it belongs to the king.

2From this mountain ring flows a great river called the Aces. In earlier times it watered the lands of the peoples I named. Its water was split into five channels, each led through one of the passes to each people. But since they have been under Persian rule, this is what has happened:

3The king dammed up the passes in the mountains and set gates at each pass. With the water shut off from its way out, the plain inside the mountains becomes a lake. The river pours in, but the water has no outlet anywhere.

4So the people who used to use that water are in great trouble, now that they cannot use it. In winter the god sends them rain, just as he does other people. But in summer they sow millet and sesame, and then they need the water.

5When none of the water is given to them, the men and their wives go to the Persians. They stand at the king's doors and cry out and wail. Then the king orders the gates opened for those whose need is greatest, the gates that lead toward them.

6When their land has drunk its fill of the water, those gates are shut again, and he orders others opened for those who need it most among the rest. As I have heard, he takes large sums of money for opening them, over and above the tribute.

Chapter 118

1So much for that; it stands thus. Of the seven men who rose up against the Magus, one of them, Intaphrenes, met with death for this outrage at once after the revolt. He wanted to go into the palace and speak with the king. And the law did in fact allow the men who had risen against the Magus to go in to the king without a messenger, unless the king happened to be lying with his wife.

2Intaphrenes thought it was his right that no one announce him. Because he was one of the seven, he wanted to walk in. But the gatekeeper and the messenger would not let him pass. They said the king was lying with his wife. Intaphrenes, believing they were lying, did this: he drew his short sword and cut off their ears and their noses. He strung them on his horse's bridle and tied them around the men's necks, then let them go.

Chapter 119

1The two men went to the king, showed themselves, and told the reason why they had suffered this. Darius was afraid that the six had done it by common plan. He sent for each man one by one and tested his thinking, asking whether he approved of what had been done.

2When he learned that Intaphrenes had not done this together with them, he took Intaphrenes himself, his sons, and all his household. He had strong suspicions that Intaphrenes and his kinsmen were plotting a revolt against him. He bound them all, to be put to death.

3Intaphrenes' wife kept coming to the doors of the king, weeping and mourning. She did this constantly, until she moved Darius to pity her. He sent a messenger, who said: "Woman, King Darius gives you the life of one of your bound household. Save the one you want of them all."

4She thought it over and answered: "If the king gives me the life of one, I choose my brother from them all."

5When Darius heard this and marveled at her words, he sent a messenger, who said: "Woman, the king asks you this: what were you thinking, that you left your husband and your children behind and chose to save your brother, who is less close to you than your children and less pleasing to you than your husband?"

6She answered this: "King, if the god is willing, I could have another husband, and other children too, if I lost these. But with my father and mother dead, no way at all can I get another brother. That is the thought I had in mind when I said it."

7Darius thought the woman had spoken well. He released the one she begged for, and, pleased with her, the eldest of her children as well. All the others he killed. So one of the seven was lost at once, in the way described.

Chapter 120

1This happened at just about the time of Cambyses' illness. Oroetes, a Persian, had been appointed by Cyrus to be governor of Sardis. He wanted to do a deed that was not holy. He had suffered no wrong from Polycrates of Samos and had heard no reckless word from him; he had never even seen him before. Yet he wanted to take him and destroy him. Most people give this reason:

2Oroetes and another Persian named Mitrobates, governor of the district of Dascyleium, were sitting at the king's gates. The two fell from talk into quarrels, and as they argued over which was the better man, Mitrobates flung this taunt at Oroetes:

3"They count you among men of worth, yet you have not won for the king the island of Samos, which lies right next to your district and is easy beyond words to conquer. One of the local men rose against it with fifteen armored men, took the island, and still rules it as tyrant."

4They say that when Oroetes heard this and was pained by the taunt, his desire was less to punish the man who said it than to destroy Polycrates without fail, because of whom he was spoken ill of.

Chapter 121

1A smaller number say this: that Oroetes sent a herald to Samos to demand money, though what he wanted it for is not told; and that Polycrates happened to be lying in the men's chamber, with Anacreon of Teos beside him.

2Whether he did it on purpose, making little account of Oroetes' business, or whether such a chance fell to him: the herald of Oroetes came in and spoke with him, and Polycrates, who happened to be turned toward the wall, neither turned around nor gave any answer.

Chapter 122

1These two reasons are told for the death of Polycrates, and anyone may believe whichever of the two he wants. Oroetes, then, was living in Magnesia, which stands above the river Maeander. Having learned what Polycrates intended, he sent Myrsus son of Gyges, a Lydian, to Samos with a message.

2Polycrates is the first Greek we know of who planned to rule the sea, apart from Minos of Cnossus, and anyone else who may have ruled the sea before him. Of the race called human, Polycrates was the first. He held great hopes of ruling Ionia and the islands.

3So Oroetes, learning that this was his plan, sent a message that said this: "Oroetes says this to Polycrates. I hear you are planning great enterprises, and that you do not have money to match your ambitions. Do this, and you will raise yourself up and save me as well. For King Cambyses is plotting my death, and the report of it reaches me plainly."

4"So bring me out of the country, me and my money. Keep part of the money yourself, and let me keep part. With that money you will rule all of Greece. If you do not trust me about the money, send the man you trust most of all, and I will hand it over to him."

Chapter 123

1When Polycrates heard this, he was pleased and wanted to do it. But he craved money so much that he first sent a man to look it over: Maeandrius son of Maeandrius, one of the townspeople, who served him as secretary. Not long after these events, this same man took all the splendid furnishings from Polycrates' men's chamber, things worth seeing, and dedicated them to the temple of Hera.

2Oroetes, learning that the spy was on his way, acted as follows. He filled eight chests with stones, leaving only a very little space near their rims, and laid gold on top of the stones. Then he tied the chests shut and kept them ready. Maeandrius came, saw them, and went back to report to Polycrates.

Chapter 124

1The seers warned him against it and so did his friends, but he set out for there anyway. His daughter had also seen a vision in a dream like this: she dreamed that she saw her father up in the air, washed by Zeus and anointed by the sun.

2When she saw this vision, she did everything she could to keep Polycrates from going off to Oroetes. When he was already on his way to board the fifty-oared ship, she called out words of ill omen. He threatened her that if he came back safe, she would stay a virgin for a long time. She prayed that this would happen, because she wanted to stay a virgin longer than to lose her father.

Chapter 125

1Polycrates ignored all advice and sailed to Oroetes. He took many of his companions with him, and among them Democedes, the son of Calliphon, a man from Croton, who was a doctor and practiced his art better than anyone of his own day.

2When Polycrates reached Magnesia, he was destroyed in a shameful way, not worthy of himself or of his pride. For apart from the tyrants of Syracuse, not one of the other Greek tyrants is worth comparing with Polycrates for magnificence.

3Oroetes killed him and then impaled him, not in a way that deserves a long story. Of the people with him, the Samians he let go, telling them to thank him for setting them free. The foreigners and the slaves among them he kept and counted as slaves.

4Polycrates hung there and brought his daughter's vision completely true. He was washed by Zeus whenever it rained, and he was anointed by the sun as his body gave off moisture.

Chapter 126

1This was the end of Polycrates' many good fortunes, at the point that Amasis, the king of Egypt, had predicted for him. Not long afterward retribution for Polycrates came for Oroetes too. After the death of Cambyses and while the Magi held the kingship, Oroetes stayed in Sardis. He did nothing to help the Persians, whose rule had been taken away from them by the Medes.

2In this confusion he killed Mitrobates, the governor from Dascylium, who had reproached him about Polycrates. He also killed Mitrobates' son Cranaspes. These were men of high standing among the Persians. He also committed every other kind of outrage. Once a messenger came to him from Darius, and the message was not to his liking, so he killed him on his way home. He set men on him along the road, and after killing him he made him disappear, along with his horse.

Chapter 127

1When Darius took power, he wanted to punish Oroetes for all his crimes, and especially for Mitrobates and his son. He did not think he should send an army against him openly. The situation was still unsettled, he himself had only just taken power, and he learned that Oroetes had great strength: a thousand Persians were his guards, and he held the province of Phrygia, Lydia, and Ionia.

2So Darius came up with this plan. He gathered the most respected Persians and said to them: "Persians, which of you will take this on and finish it for me with cleverness and not with force and numbers? For where cleverness is needed, force has no use.

3Which of you, then, will bring Oroetes to me alive or kill him? He has done the Persians no good at all, and he has done us great harm. First, he has destroyed two of us, Mitrobates and his son. Then he kills the men who summon him and who are sent by me. He shows an arrogance we cannot stand. Before he does the Persians some worse harm, he must be caught and put to death by us."

Chapter 128

1Darius asked this, and thirty men offered to do it, each one wanting the job. Darius stopped them from competing and told them to draw lots. They drew lots, and Bagaos, son of Artontes, was chosen from all of them.

2When the lot fell to him, Bagaos did the following. He had many documents written up, covering many matters, and sealed them with Darius' seal. Then he took them and went to Sardis.

3When he arrived and came into Oroetes' presence, he unwrapped each of the documents in turn and gave it to the royal secretary to read out. All the governors have royal secretaries. Bagaos was testing the guards, to see whether they would accept a revolt from Oroetes.

4He saw that they respected the documents greatly and what was read from them even more. So he gave another document, in which were these words: "Persians, King Darius forbids you to serve as guards for Oroetes." When they heard this, they lowered their spears to him.

5When Bagaos saw that they obeyed the document, he took courage and gave the last document to the secretary. In it was written that King Darius commanded the Persians in Sardis to kill Oroetes. When the guards heard this, they drew their swords and killed him on the spot. In this way Oroetes the Persian paid the price owed to Polycrates of Samos.

Chapter 129

1When Oroetes' property had been carried to Susa, not long afterward King Darius had an accident while hunting. He leapt off his horse and twisted his foot.

2It was twisted quite badly: his ankle came out of its joint. He had long kept with him the Egyptians who were thought to be the best doctors, and he used them. But they twisted and forced his foot and made the trouble worse.

3For seven days and seven nights Darius could not sleep because of the trouble he had. On the eighth day, when he was in a bad state, someone who had heard earlier in Sardis about the skill of Democedes of Croton told Darius about him. Darius ordered them to bring him to him as fast as possible. They found him among Oroetes' slaves, where he had been left neglected. They brought him out in front, wearing chains and dressed in rags.

Chapter 130

1When he was brought to the middle, Darius asked him whether he knew the art. He did not admit it. He was afraid that if he revealed himself, he would be cut off from Greece completely.

2Darius saw that he knew the art and was hiding it. He ordered the men who had brought him to bring whips and goads out to the middle. Then Democedes admitted it. He said that he did not know the art exactly, but that he had been with a doctor and had a poor grasp of it.

3After that, when Darius put him in charge, he used Greek treatments and applied gentle remedies after the strong ones. He got him to sleep and in a short time made him sound again, though Darius had never expected to walk on a sound foot again.

4Then Darius gave him two pairs of gold fetters. Democedes asked him whether he was giving him twice the trouble on purpose, since he had made him well. Darius was pleased with the remark and sent him to his wives. The eunuchs led him in and told the women that this was the man who had given the king back his life.

5Each of them dipped a golden bowl into the chest and gave it to Democedes. They gave so freely that a servant named Sciton, who followed along, picked up the staters that fell from the bowls, and a large amount of gold was gathered for him.

Chapter 131

1This is how Democedes came from Croton to join Polycrates. He lived with his father in Croton, and his father had a harsh temper. When he could not put up with him, he left and went to Aegina. He settled there and in his first year outdid the other doctors, even though he had no equipment and none of the tools that belong to the art.

2In his second year the Aeginetans hired him for a talent, at public expense. In the third year the Athenians hired him for a hundred minas, and in the fourth year Polycrates hired him for two talents. That is how he came to Samos. It was thanks to this man more than anything that the doctors of Croton won their high reputation.

3This was the time when the doctors of Croton were said to be the first in Greece, and the doctors of Cyrene the second. Around this same time the people of Argos were reputed to be the first of the Greeks in music.

Chapter 132

1By then Democedes had cured Darius at Susa. He had the largest household and became a companion at the king's table. Everything was his except one thing: to go back to Greece.

2He saved the Egyptian doctors who had treated the king before him. They were about to be impaled because a Greek doctor had beaten them, and he asked the king for them and saved them. He also saved an Elean seer who had gone with Polycrates and had been left neglected among the slaves. Democedes was a very important man at the king's court.

Chapter 133

1Not long after this, the following also happened. Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus and the wife of Darius, grew a lump on her breast. After it burst, it spread further. As long as it was small, she hid it and was ashamed, and she told no one. When she was in a bad way, she sent for Democedes and showed it to him.

2He said he would make her well and made her swear that she would pay him back in return for whatever he asked her for. He said he would not ask for anything that would bring her shame.

Chapter 134

1After he had treated her and made her well, Atossa, coached by Democedes, brought this speech to Darius in bed: "My king, you have such great power and yet you sit idle. You win no new people and no new power for the Persians.

2It is right for a man who is young and master of great wealth to show some accomplishment, so that the Persians can learn that they are ruled by a man. It works to your advantage in both ways to do this: the Persians will know that a man stands at their head, and they will be worn down by war and have no free time to plot against you.

3Now is the time when you could accomplish something, while you are still young. As the body grows, the mind grows with it. As a man grows old, the mind grows old too and becomes dull in everything it does."

4She said this as she had been taught. He replied as follows: "Woman, you have said everything I plan to do. I have decided to build a bridge from this land to the other continent and campaign against the Scythians. These things will be done in a short time." Atossa spoke next:

5"Look now, leave the Scythians for later. They will be there for you whenever you want them. But campaign against Greece instead. I want to have Laconian women as my servants, and Argive and Attic and Corinthian ones too. You have the man best suited of all men to show you each part of Greece and guide you through it: the man who healed your foot."

6Darius answered: "Woman, since you think we should try Greece first, it seems better to me to first send some of the Persians there as scouts, together with the man you mention. They can learn about each thing there and see it and report it all back to me. Then, when I know exactly what is what, I will turn against them."

Chapter 135

1He said this and did it at the same moment. As soon as day broke, he called fifteen respected Persian men and ordered them to follow Democedes and travel along the coast of Greece. They were to make sure that Democedes did not slip away from them and that they brought him back no matter what.

2After giving them these orders, he called Democedes himself and asked him to show all of Greece to the Persians and explain it to them, and then come back. He told him to take gifts for his father and brothers, all his own belongings, and said he would give him many times more in return. On top of the gifts, he said he would add a cargo ship filled with all kinds of good things, which would sail with him.

3Darius, I think, was not making these promises with any treacherous intent. But Democedes was afraid that Darius was testing him. He did not rush to accept everything that was offered. He said he would leave his own things where they were, so that he would have them when he came back. But he said he would accept the cargo ship that Darius promised as a gift for his brothers. Darius gave him the same orders and sent them off to the sea.

Chapter 136

1These men went down to Phoenicia and to the city of Sidon in Phoenicia. Right away they manned two triremes and, along with them, a large cargo boat with all kinds of good things. When everything was ready, they sailed for Greece. They put in along its coast and looked around and wrote things down, until they had seen most of the famous places and arrived at Tarentum in Italy.

2There, because Democedes let his guard down, Aristophilides, the king of the Tarentines, took the rudders off the Median ships and detained the Persians themselves as spies, or so he made it seem. While these men were being treated like this, Democedes reached Croton. Once he was home, Aristophilides released the Persians and gave back what he had taken from the ships.

Chapter 137

1Sailing on from there, the Persians pursued Democedes and reached Croton. They found him in the marketplace and laid hold of him.

2Some of the Crotonians were afraid of Persian power and were ready to give him up. Others resisted and hit the Persians with clubs. The Persians put forward these words: "Men of Croton, look at what you are doing. You are taking away a runaway slave of the king.

3How do you think King Darius will accept this insult? How will things turn out well for you if you take him away from us? Which city of this land shall we march against first? Which one will you let us enslave first?"

4Saying this, they still did not persuade the Crotonians. Democedes was taken away from them, and the cargo boat they had brought with them was taken away too. They sailed back to Asia. They did not try to go on further into Greece to learn more, because they had lost their guide.

5Democedes did give them one instruction as they set sail. He told them to say to Darius that Democedes had married the daughter of Milo. The wrestler Milo was very well known at the king's court. For this reason, I think, Democedes rushed to complete this marriage at great cost, so that Darius would see that he was a man of standing in his own country as well.

Chapter 138

1Setting out from Croton, the Persians were wrecked with their ships in Iapygia. They were living there as slaves when Gillus, a man of Tarentum in exile, rescued them and brought them to King Darius. In return the king was ready to give him whatever he wanted.

2Gillus chose to be brought back to Tarentum, and he first told the story of his misfortune. But so that Greece would not be thrown into confusion by a great expedition sailing to Italy on his account, he said that the Cnidians alone would be enough to bring him back. He thought that since they were good friends of the Tarentines, they would get him home most easily.

3Darius promised this and carried it out. He sent a messenger to Cnidos and ordered them to bring Gillus back to Tarentum. The Cnidians obeyed Darius, but they did not persuade the Tarentines, and they were not able to use force.

4This is how it turned out. These were the first Persians to come from Asia to Greece, and it was because of this affair that they became spies.

Chapter 139

1After this, King Darius captured Samos, the first city he took of all the Greek and foreign cities, for the following reason. When Cambyses, the son of Cyrus, campaigned against Egypt, many other Greeks also came to Egypt. Some came with the army, naturally, for trade. Others came to see the land itself. Among them was Syloson, son of Aeaces, a brother of Polycrates, who was living in exile from Samos.

2This Syloson had a piece of luck like this. He had got a cloak and put on a red one, and he was shopping in Memphis. Darius saw him. Darius was a guardsman of Cambyses at the time and still a man of no great account. He wanted the cloak, so he came up to him and offered to buy it.

3Syloson saw that Darius wanted the cloak badly. By a stroke of luck he said: "I am not selling this for any price, but I will give it to you for nothing, if it has to be yours anyway." Darius was pleased and took the cloak.

Chapter 140

1Now Syloson knew that he had lost this because of his own simple-mindedness. As time went on, Cambyses died, the Seven rose up against the Magus, and from among the Seven Darius took the kingship. Syloson learned that the kingdom had passed to the very man to whom he had once given the cloak in Egypt, when he asked for it. So he went up to Susa and sat down in front of the doors of the king's house, and he said he was a benefactor of Darius.

2The gatekeeper heard this and reported it to the king. Darius was surprised and said to him: "And what Greek is a benefactor whom I know well, when the rule is so new in my hands? Has any Greek ever come up to us on his own, or has no one ever done so? I have no debt to any Greek man. But bring him in anyway, so that I may learn what he wants by saying this."

3The gatekeeper brought Syloson in. When he stood in the middle, the interpreters asked him who he was and what he had done to claim that he was a benefactor of the king. So Syloson told all that had happened with the cloak, and that he himself was the man who gave it.

4Darius answered: "Noblest of men, you are the one who gave me something when I had no power at all, small as it was. And yet the thanks from me are equal, just the same as if I were now receiving some great thing from someone. In return for it I give you gold and silver beyond measure, so that you never regret doing good to Darius the son of Hystaspes." Syloson said to this:

5"Do not give me gold or silver, O king, but give me back my fatherland, Samos, which a slave of ours now holds, since my brother Polycrates died at the hands of Oroetes. Give it to me with no killing and no enslaving of the people."

Chapter 141

1Hearing this, Darius sent out an army and a general, Otanes, who had been one of the Seven. He ordered him to carry out to the full all the things Syloson had asked for. Otanes went down to the sea and sent his army forward.

Chapter 142

1Now Samos was held by Maeandrius son of Maeandrius. He had received the rule from Polycrates as a guardianship. This man wanted to be the most just of men, but he never got the chance.

2For when the death of Polycrates was reported to him, he did this: first he set up an altar of Zeus the Free and marked out a sacred enclosure around it—this is the one that now stands in the suburb. Next, when that was done, he called an assembly of all the citizens and spoke as follows:

3"The scepter of Polycrates and all his power were handed over to me, as you yourselves know. So now I have the chance to rule you. I blame that sort of thing in others, and I myself, as far as I am able, will not do it. For it did not please me that Polycrates lorded it over men like himself, nor does it please me in any other man who acts this way. Polycrates has met his allotted fate. I set the rule in your common hands, and I proclaim to you equal rights under the law."

4"But I claim these honors for myself: from Polycrates' money, let a sum of six talents be set aside for me. In addition, I choose the priesthood of Zeus the Free for myself and for my descendants forever. It is for him that I set up his temple myself, and it is to him that I give your freedom."

5This is what he proclaimed to the Samians. But one of them stood up and said: "You are not worthy to rule even one of us. You were base-born, and you are a plain ruin. You should rather give an account of the money you have handled."

Chapter 143

1The man who said this was one who stood well with the citizens; his name was Telesarchus. Maeandrius saw in his own mind that if he gave up the rule, someone else would be set up as tyrant in his place. So he had no more thought of giving it up. Instead he withdrew to the citadel. There he sent for the men one by one, as if to give an account of the money, and he seized them and bound them.

2So these men were bound. After this, sickness seized Maeandrius. His brother, whose name was Lycaretus, expected Maeandrius to die, and to take control of affairs in Samos more easily, he killed all the prisoners. For they, as people suppose, did not want to be free.

Chapter 144

1When the Persians came to Samos bringing Syloson, no one raised a hand against them. The partisans of Maeandrius said they were ready to come under truce, and Maeandrius himself agreed to leave the island. Otanes agreed to these terms, and when the truce was made, the most honored Persians set up thrones facing the citadel and sat down.

Chapter 145

1The tyrant Maeandrius had a brother who was not quite sane; his name was Charilaus. This man had been shut in a pit for some offense he had given. Now at this time he heard what was going on, and he peered out through the pit. When he saw the Persians sitting there in peace, he called out and said he wanted to come to talks with Maeandrius.

2Maeandrius heard this and ordered men to release him and bring him to him. When he was brought as fast as possible, Maeandrius, railing at him and abusing him, tried to persuade him to attack the Persians, speaking as follows: "You worst of men: I was your own brother and had done nothing worthy of bonds, and you shut me in a pit. And now, when you see the Persians casting you out and making you homeless, you dare not take revenge—and they are so easy to conquer."

3"But if you are afraid of them yourself, give me the guards, and I will take vengeance on them for landing here. And I am ready to send you yourself out of the island."

Chapter 146

1Charilaus said this. Maeandrius took up the word. In my judgment he did not reach such a height of folly that he believed his own power would overcome the king's. He acted rather out of envy of Syloson, because Syloson was going to get the city unharmed and at no cost.

2So he wanted to provoke the Persians, to make Samian affairs as weak as possible, and to hand them over in that state. He knew well that if the Persians suffered harm, they would grow even more bitter toward the Samians. He also knew that he had a safe way out of the island whenever he himself wished. For a secret channel had been made for him from the citadel leading down to the sea.

3Maeandrius himself sailed away from Samos. Charilaus armed all the guards, threw the gates open, and led them out against the Persians, who expected nothing of the kind and indeed thought nothing of the sort had happened. The guards fell upon the Persians who rode in chariots and were held in the highest honor, and killed them.

4While they were doing this, the rest of the Persian army came up to help. The guards were hard pressed and were driven back and shut up inside the citadel.

Chapter 147

1Otanes the general saw that the Persians had suffered a great disaster. Darius, who sent him out, had given him commands: to kill no Samian, to enslave no one, and to hand the island over to Syloson untouched by harm. Those commands he remembered and yet forgot. He gave the army the order to kill everyone they captured, man and boy alike.

2Then part of the army besieged the citadel, and part killed everyone who got in their way, both inside the temple and outside it.

Chapter 148

1Maeandrius escaped from Samos by stealth and sailed to Lacedaemon. When he arrived there and brought out the goods he had, he did this: whenever he set out cups of silver and gold, his servants polished them; and whenever at that time he was in talk with Cleomenes son of Anaxandrides, who was king of Sparta, he would lead him into the house. When Cleomenes saw the cups, he was amazed and astonished, and Maeandrius would tell him to carry off as many of them as he wanted.

2Maeandrius said this two or three times, and Cleomenes proved himself the most just of men: he refused to take what was offered. But when he learned that by giving to others of the citizens Maeandrius would find himself a helper, he went to the ephors and said that it was better for Sparta that the guest-friend, the Samian, leave the Peloponnese, so that he would not persuade either Cleomenes himself or some other Spartan to become a wicked man. They obeyed him, and Maeandrius was banished by public proclamation.

Chapter 149

1The Persians [having netted it] handed Samos over to Syloson, empty of men. But in later times the general Otanes also gathered people to settle it again, because of a bad dream he had seen and because of a sickness that seized him in his private parts.

Chapter 150

1While the naval force was away on the Samos campaign, the Babylonians revolted, very well prepared. For during the whole time the Magus ruled and the Seven rose up, during all that time and confusion, they had been getting ready for a siege.

2And doing this they somehow escaped notice. When they openly revolted, they did this: they set apart their mothers, and each man chose one wife, the one he wanted, from his own household. All the rest they gathered together and strangled. Each man also picked out one woman as his bread-maker. But all the others they strangled, so that they would not eat up the grain.

Chapter 151

1When Darius learned of this, he gathered his whole force and marched against them. When he came up to Babylon, he besieged them—and they gave no thought to the siege. For the Babylonians climbed up on the battlements of the wall and mocked Darius and his army from above, and one of them said this word:

2"Why do you sit there, Persians, instead of going away? You will take us when mules give birth." One of the Babylonians said this, never supposing that a mule would give birth.

Chapter 152

1When a year and seven months had gone by, Darius was in deep distress, and his whole army was unable to take the Babylonians. Yet Darius had tried every trick and every device against them. Even so he could not take them. He had tried other tricks, and he had tried the very one by which Cyrus took them too. But the Babylonians were terribly on their guard, and he could not take them.

Chapter 153

1Then, in the twentieth month, this portent happened to Zopyrus son of Megabyzus—the Megabyzus who had been one of the Seven who brought down the Magus. One of his grain-carrying mules gave birth. When this was reported to him, Zopyrus did not believe it, and he went and saw the young one himself. He warned everyone who had seen it to tell no one what had happened, and he began to plan.

2Now the Babylonian had said at the very first that when mules gave birth, then the wall would be taken. In view of those words, it seemed to Zopyrus that Babylon could be taken. For with a god's help, that man had spoken it, and the mule had given birth for him.

Chapter 154

1When it seemed to him that Babylon was now fated to be captured, he came to Darius and asked whether he thought it a matter of very great worth to take Babylon. Learning that Darius did value it highly, he planned something else: how he himself would be the man who took it, and how the deed would be his own. For among the Persians good deeds are honored, and they make a man great in the time to come.

2He judged that no other deed could put the city under their control. But if he maimed himself and deserted to them, that would do it. So he counted this a light thing and maimed himself beyond healing: he cut off his own nose and ears, clipped his hair close around his head, and after whipping himself he went to Darius.

Chapter 155

1Darius took it very hard when he saw so distinguished a man so maimed. He leaped up from his throne, cried out, and asked him who had maimed him, and for doing what.

2He said: "No man but you has power enough to deal with me like this. No one else did these deeds, O king. I did them to myself, because I take it as a grievous thing that the Assyrians laugh at the Persians."

3Darius answered: "You most reckless of men, you have put the fairest name on the ugliest deed, claiming that you ruined yourself beyond cure because of the men under siege. And besides, fool, will the enemy surrender any sooner because you are maimed? How have you not gone out of your mind, destroying yourself?"

4He said: "If I had told you beforehand what I meant to do, you would not have let me. So I took it on myself and did it. Now then: unless I need your help, we take Babylon. As I am, I will desert to the wall and tell them that you did this to me. And I believe that once I have persuaded them that this is so, I will get command of an army."

5"And you: from the day I enter the wall, on the tenth day after that, station a thousand of your own army, of which no part will be lost, at the gates called the gates of Semiramis. Then again, from the tenth day, seven days later, station two thousand more for me at the gates called the Ninevite gates. From that seventh day let twenty days pass, and then bring others down in the same way, four thousand, to the gates called the Chaldean gates. Let neither the first men nor these have any weapon of defense, except daggers; but let them keep those."

6"And after the twentieth day, on that very day, order the rest of the army to attack the wall all around, and station the Persians for me at the gates called the Belian gates and the Cissian gates. For as I judge, when they have seen my great deeds, the Babylonians will entrust me with everything else, and even with the keys of the gates. From that point on, it will be for me and the Persians to do what must be done."

Chapter 156

1He gave these orders and went toward the gates, looking back and playing the true deserter. The men posted there saw him from the towers, ran down, and drew the inner gate back a little. They asked him who he was and in need of what he had come. He called out to them that he was Zopyrus and that he was deserting to them.

2The gatekeepers, hearing this, led him to the meeting place of the Babylonians. Standing before them, he made them pity him. He said that Darius had done these things to him—though he himself had inflicted them—and that he had suffered them because he had advised Darius to break off the siege, since no way of taking the city had appeared.

3"Now," he said, "I say to you, Babylonians: I come to you bringing the greatest good, but to Darius and his army and the Persians the greatest evil. For he will not get away with maiming me like this. And I know all the turns of his plans." Such words he spoke.

Chapter 157

1The Babylonians saw a man who stood highest in honor among the Persians robbed of his nose and ears, spattered with whip marks and blood. They fully believed that he spoke the truth and had come to them as an ally. They were ready to grant him what he asked of them. He asked for an army.

2When he received this from them, he did exactly what he had agreed with Darius. On the tenth day he led the Babylonian army out, and having surrounded the thousand men whom he had first instructed Darius to station, he killed every one of them.

3The Babylonians saw that his deeds matched his words. Overjoyed, they were ready to serve him in everything. After the agreed days had passed, he mustered the Babylonians again and led them out, and he killed two thousand of Darius' soldiers.

4The Babylonians, seeing this deed too, all had Zopyrus in their mouths, praising him. After the agreed days passed again, he led them out as before, and having surrounded them, he killed the four thousand. When he had done this too, Zopyrus was everything among the Babylonians: they had accepted him both as their commander and as warden of the wall.

Chapter 158

1When Darius attacked the wall all around on the agreed days, then Zopyrus revealed the whole treachery. The Babylonians climbed up on the wall and defended themselves against Darius' attacking army. Zopyrus opened the gates called the Cissian gates and the Belian gates and let the Persians inside the wall.

2Those Babylonians who saw what had been done fled to the temple of Zeus Belus. Those who did not see it each stayed in his own post, until they too learned that they had been betrayed.

Chapter 159

1So Babylon was taken for the second time. When Darius gained control of the Babylonians, he pulled down their wall and tore away all their gates. Cyrus, when he took Babylon the first time, had done neither of these. Darius impaled the leading men among them, about three thousand in all, but to the other Babylonians he gave the city back to live in.

2And so that the Babylonians would have wives, so that a race would grow for them, Darius, looking ahead, did this. The Babylonians, as was made plain at the start, had strangled their own women, thinking of the grain. So he ordered the peoples who lived around to bring wives into Babylon, as many women as he assigned to each. The total of the women gathered came to five myriads. From these women the Babylonians of today are descended.

Chapter 160

1No Persian ever surpassed Zopyrus in good service, with Darius as judge, neither of those who came later nor of those who came before, except Cyrus alone. No Persian ever thought himself worthy to compare himself with Cyrus. It is often said that Darius gave this opinion: that he would rather Zopyrus be untouched by the shameful maiming than have twenty Babylons added to the one he had.

2He honored him greatly. Every year he gave him gifts of the kind the Persians value most. He gave him Babylon to hold tax-free for the rest of his life, and he gave him many other things besides. To this Zopyrus was born Megabyzus, who commanded the army in Egypt against the Athenians and their allies. To this Megabyzus was born Zopyrus, who deserted from the Persians to Athens.

Chapter 1

1Cyrus' son Cambyses was leading an army of his subjects, Ionian and Aeolian Greeks among them, against this Amasis for the following reason. Cambyses had sent a herald to Egypt asking Amasis for his daughter; he asked on the advice of an Egyptian, who advised it out of resentment against Amasis, that out of all the Egyptian physicians Amasis had dragged him away from his wife and children and sent him up to Persia when Cyrus sent to Amasis asking for the best eye-doctor in Egypt.

2Out of resentment, the Egyptian by his advice induced Cambyses to ask Amasis for his daughter, so that Amasis would either be wretched if he gave her, or hated by Cambyses if he did not. Amasis, intimidated by the power of Persia and frightened, could neither give his daughter nor refuse her; for he knew well that Cambyses was not going to take her as his wife but as his concubine.

3After considering the matter, he did as follows. There was a daughter of the former king Apries, all that was left of that family, quite tall and pretty, and her name was Nitetis; this girl Amasis adorned with clothes and gold and sent to Cambyses as his own daughter.

4But after a time, as he embraced her addressing her as the daughter of Amasis, the girl said to him, “O King, you do not understand how you have been made a fool of by Amasis, who dressed me in finery and sent me to you as his own daughter, when I am in fact the daughter of Apries, the ruler Amasis revolted from with the Egyptians and killed.”

5This speech and this crime that occurred turned Cyrus' son Cambyses, furiously angry, against Egypt. So the Persians say.

Chapter 2

1But the Egyptians, who say that Cambyses was the son of this daughter of Apries, claim him as one of theirs; they say that it was Cyrus who asked Amasis for his daughter, and not Cambyses.

2But what they say is false. They are certainly not unaware (for if any understand the customs of the Persians the Egyptians do) firstly, that it is not their custom for illegitimate offspring to rule when there are legitimate offspring; and secondly, that Cambyses was the son of Cassandane, the daughter of Pharnaspes, who was an Achaemenid, and not of the Egyptian woman. But they falsify the story, pretending to be related to the house of Cyrus. That is the truth of the matter.

Chapter 3

1The following story, incredible to me, is also told: that one of the Persian women who came to visit Cyrus' wives, and saw the tall and attractive children who stood by Cassandane, expressed her admiration in extravagant terms. Then Cassandane, Cyrus' wife, said,

2“Although I am the mother of such children, Cyrus dishonors me and honors his new woman from Egypt.” So she spoke in her bitterness against Nitetis; and Cambyses, the eldest of her sons, said,

3“Then, mother, when I am grown up, I will turn all Egypt upside down.” When he said this, he was about ten years old, and the women were amazed; but he kept it in mind, and it was thus that when he grew up and became king, he made the campaign against Egypt.

Chapter 4

1It so happened, too, that something else occurred contributing to this campaign. There was among Amasis' mercenaries a man who was a Halicarnassian by birth, a clever man and a good soldier, whose name was Phanes.

2This Phanes had some grudge against Amasis, and fled from Egypt aboard ship, hoping to talk to Cambyses. Since he was a man much admired among the mercenaries and had an exact knowledge of all Egyptian matters, Amasis was anxious to catch him, and sent a trireme with his most trusted eunuch to pursue him. This eunuch caught him in Lycia but never brought him back to Egypt, for Phanes was too clever for him.

3He made his guards drunk and so escaped to Persia. There he found Cambyses prepared to set out against Egypt, but in doubt as to his march, how he should cross the waterless desert; so Phanes showed him what was Amasis' condition and how he should march; as to this, he advised Cambyses to send and ask the king of the Arabians for a safe passage.

Chapter 5

1Now the only apparent way of entry into Egypt is this. The road runs from Phoenicia as far as the borders of the city of Cadytis, which belongs to the so-called Syrians of Palestine.

2From Cadytis (which, as I judge, is a city not much smaller than Sardis ) to the city of Ienysus the seaports belong to the Arabians; then they are Syrian again from Ienysus as far as the Serbonian marsh, beside which the Casian promontory stretches seawards;

3from this Serbonian marsh, where Typho is supposed to have been hidden, the country is Egypt. Now between Ienysus and the Casian mountain and the Serbonian marsh there lies a wide territory for as much as three days' journey, terribly arid.

Chapter 6

1I am going to mention something now which few of those who sail to Egypt know. Earthen jars full of wine are brought into Egypt twice a year from all Greece and Phoenicia besides: yet one might safely say there is not a single empty wine jar anywhere in the country.

2What then (one may ask) becomes of them? I shall explain this too. Each governor of a district must gather in all the earthen pots from his own township and take them to Memphis, and the people of Memphis must fill them with water and carry them to those arid lands of Syria; so the earthen pottery that is brought to Egypt and unloaded or emptied there is carried to Syria to join the stock that has already been taken there.

Chapter 7

1Now as soon as the Persians took possession of Egypt, they became the caretakers of the entryway into it, having it provisioned with water in the way I have described.

2But at this time there was as yet no ready supply of water; and so Cambyses, hearing what was said by the stranger from Halicarnassus, sent messengers to the Arabian and asked and obtained safe conduct, giving to him and receiving from him pledges.

Chapter 8

1There are no men who respect pledges more than the Arabians. This is how they give them: a man stands between the two pledging parties, and with a sharp stone cuts the palms of their hands, near the thumb; then he takes a piece of wool from the cloak of each and smears with their blood seven stones that lie between them, meanwhile calling on Dionysus and the Heavenly Aphrodite;

2after this is done, the one who has given his pledge commends the stranger (or his countryman if the other be one) to his friends, and his friends hold themselves bound to honor the pledge.

3They believe in no other gods except Dionysus and the Heavenly Aphrodite; and they say that they wear their hair as Dionysus does his, cutting it round the head and shaving the temples. They call Dionysus, Orotalt; and Aphrodite, Alilat.

Chapter 9

1When, then, the Arabian had made the pledge to the messengers who had come from Cambyses, he devised the following expedient: he filled camel-skins with water and loaded all his camels with these; then he drove them into the waterless land and there awaited Cambyses' army.

2This is the most credible of the stories told; but I must relate the less credible tale also, since they tell it. There is a great river in Arabia called Corys, emptying into the sea called Red.

3From this river (it is said) the king of the Arabians brought water by an aqueduct made of sewn oxhides and other hides and extensive enough to reach to the dry country; and he had great tanks dug in that country to try to receive and keep the water.

4It is a twelve days' journey from the river to that desert. By three aqueducts (they say) he brought the water to three different places.

Chapter 10

1Psammenitus, son of Amasis, was encamped by the mouth of the Nile called Pelusian, awaiting Cambyses.

2For when Cambyses marched against Egypt, he found Amasis no longer alive; he had died after reigning forty-four years, during which he had suffered no great misfortune; and being dead he was embalmed and laid in the burial-place built for him in the temple.

3While his son Psammenitus was king of Egypt, the people saw an extraordinary thing, namely, rain at Thebes of Egypt, where, as the Thebans themselves say, there had never been rain before, nor since to my lifetime; for indeed there is no rain at all in the upper parts of Egypt; but at that time a drizzle of rain fell at Thebes.

Chapter 11

1When the Persians had crossed the waterless country and encamped near the Egyptians intending to engage them, the Egyptian mercenaries, Greeks and Carians, devised a plan to punish Phanes, angered at him for leading a foreign army into Egypt.

2Phanes had left sons in Egypt; these they brought to the camp, into their father's sight, and set a great bowl between the two armies; then they brought the sons one by one and cut their throats over the bowl.

3When all the sons had been slaughtered, they poured wine and water into the bowl, and the mercenaries drank this and then gave battle. The fighting was fierce, and many of both armies fell; but at last the Egyptians were routed.

Chapter 12

1I saw a strange thing on the site of the battle, of which the people of the country had told me. The bones of those killed on either side in this fight lying scattered separately (for the Persian bones lay in one place and the Egyptian in another, where the armies had first separately stood), the skulls of the Persians are so brittle that if you throw no more than a pebble it will pierce them, but the Egyptian skulls are so strong that a blow of a stone will hardly crack them.

2And this, the people said (which for my own part I readily believed), is the explanation of it: the Egyptians shave their heads from childhood, and the bone thickens by exposure to the sun.

3This also is the reason why they do not grow bald; for nowhere can one see so few bald heads as in Egypt.

4Their skulls then are strong for this reason; while the Persian skulls are weak because they cover their heads throughout their lives with the felt hats (called tiaras) which they wear. Such is the truth of the matter. I saw too the skulls of those Persians at Papremis who were killed with Darius' son Achaemenes by Inaros the Libyan, and they were like the others.

Chapter 13

1After their rout in the battle the Egyptians fled in disorder; and when they had been overtaken in Memphis, Cambyses sent a Persian herald up the river aboard a Mytilenean boat to invite the Egyptians to an accord.

2But when they saw the boat coming to Memphis, they sallied out all together from their walls, destroyed the boat, dismembered the crew (like butchers) and carried them within the walls.

3So the Egyptians were besieged, and after a long while surrendered; but the neighboring Libyans, frightened by what had happened in Egypt, surrendered without a fight, laying tribute on themselves and sending gifts; and so too did the people of Cyrene and Barca, frightened like the Libyans.

4Cambyses received in all kindness the gifts of the Libyans; but he seized what came from Cyrene and, displeased, I think, because it was so little—for the Cyrenaeans had sent five hundred silver minae—cast it with his own hands among his army.

Chapter 14

1On the tenth day after the surrender of the walled city of Memphis, Cambyses took Psammenitus king of Egypt, who had reigned for six months, and confined him in the outer part of the city with other Egyptians, to insult him; having confined him there, he tried Psammenitus' spirit, as I shall show.

2He dressed the daughter of the king as a slave and sent her out with a pitcher to fetch water, together with other girls from the families of the leading men, dressed like the daughter of the king.

3So when the girls went out before their fathers' eyes crying and lamenting, all the rest answered with cries and weeping, seeing their children abused; but Psammenitus, having seen with his own eyes and learned all, bowed himself to the ground.

4After the water-carriers had passed by, Cambyses next made Psammenitus' son go out before him with two thousand Egyptians of the same age, all with ropes bound round their necks and bridle-bits in their mouths;

5they were led out to be punished for those Mytileneans who had perished with their boat at Memphis; for such was the judgment of the royal judges, that every man's death be paid for by the deaths of ten noble Egyptians.

6When Psammenitus saw them passing and perceived that his son was being led out to die, and all the Egyptians who sat with him wept and showed their affliction, he did as he had done at the sight of his daughter.

7After these too had gone out, it happened that there was one of his companions, a man past his prime, who had lost all his possessions, and had only what a poor man might have, and begged of the army; this man now went out before Psammenitus son of Amasis and the Egyptians confined in the outer part of the city. When Psammenitus saw him, he broke into loud weeping, striking his head and calling on his companion by name.

8Now there were men set to watch Psammenitus, who told Cambyses all that he did as each went forth. Wondering at what the king did, Cambyses made this inquiry of him by a messenger:

9“Psammenitus, Lord Cambyses wants to know why, seeing your daughter abused and your son going to his death, you did not cry out or weep, yet you showed such feeling for the beggar, who (as Cambyses learns from others) is not one of your kindred?” So the messenger inquired. Psammenitus answered:

10“Son of Cyrus, my private grief was too great for weeping; but the unhappiness of my companion deserves tears—a man fallen from abundance and prosperity to beggary come to the threshold of old age.” When the messenger reported this, Cambyses and his court, it is said, thought the answer good.

11And, the Egyptians say, Croesus wept (for it happened that he too had come with Cambyses to Egypt ) and the Persians that were there wept; Cambyses himself felt some pity, and he ordered that Psammenitus' son be spared from those that were to be executed, and that Psammenitus himself be brought in from the outer part of the city and brought before him.

Chapter 15

1Those that went for him found that the son was no longer alive, but had been the first to be slaughtered; but they brought Psammenitus up and led him to Cambyses; and there he lived, and no violence was done him for the rest of his life.

2And if he had known how to mind his own business, he would have regained Egypt to govern; for the Persians are inclined to honor kings' sons; even though kings revolt from them, they give back to their sons the sovereign power.

3There are many instances showing that it is their custom so to do, and notably the giving back of his father's sovereign power to Thannyras son of Inaros, and also to Pausiris son of Amyrtaeus; yet none ever did the Persians more harm than Inaros and Amyrtaeus.

4But as it was, Psammenitus plotted evil and got his reward; for he was caught raising a revolt among the Egyptians; and when Cambyses heard of it, Psammenitus drank bull's blood and died. Such was his end.

Chapter 16

1From Memphis Cambyses went to the city Sais, anxious to do exactly what he did do. Entering the house of Amasis, he had the body of Amasis carried outside from its place of burial; and when this had been done, he gave orders to scourge it and pull out the hair and pierce it with goads, and to desecrate it in every way.

2When they were weary of doing this (for the body, being embalmed, remained whole and did not fall to pieces), Cambyses gave orders to burn it, a sacrilegious command; for the Persians hold fire to be a god;

3therefore neither nation thinks it right to burn the dead, the Persians for the reason given, as they say it is wrong to give the dead body of a man to a god; while the Egyptians believe fire to be a living beast that devours all that it catches, and when sated with its meal dies together with that on which it feeds.

4Now it is by no means their custom to give the dead to beasts; and this is why they embalm the corpse, that it may not lie and feed worms. Thus what Cambyses commanded was contrary to the custom of both peoples.

5The Egyptians say, however, that it was not Amasis to whom this was done, but another Egyptian of the same age as Amasis, whom the Persians abused thinking that they were abusing Amasis.

6For their story is that Amasis learned from an oracle what was to be done to him after his death, and so to escape this fate buried this dead man, the one that was scourged, near the door inside his own vault, and ordered his son that he himself should be laid in the farthest corner of the vault.

7I think that these commands of Amasis, regarding the burial-place and the man, were never given at all, and that the Egyptians believe in them in vain.

Chapter 17

1After this Cambyses planned three expeditions, against the Carchedonians, against the Ammonians, and against the “long-lived” Ethiopians, who inhabit that part of Libya that is on the southern sea.

2He decided after consideration to send his fleet against the Carthaginians and a part of his land army against the Ammonians; to Ethiopia he would first send spies, to see what truth there was in the story of a Table of the Sun in that country, and to spy out all else besides, under the pretext of bringing gifts for the Ethiopian king.

Chapter 18

1Now the Table of the Sun is said to be something of this kind: there is a meadow outside the city, filled with the boiled flesh of all four-footed things; here during the night the men of authority among the townsmen are careful to set out the meat, and all day whoever wishes comes and feasts on it. These meats, say the people of the country, are ever produced by the earth of itself. Such is the story of the Sun's Table.

Chapter 19

1When Cambyses determined to send the spies, he sent for those Fish-eaters from the city of Elephantine who understood the Ethiopian language.

2While they were fetching them, he ordered his fleet to sail against Carthage. But the Phoenicians said they would not do it; for they were bound, they said, by strong oaths, and if they sailed against their own progeny they would be doing an impious thing; and the Phoenicians being unwilling, the rest were inadequate fighters.

3Thus the Carthaginians escaped being enslaved by the Persians; for Cambyses would not use force with the Phoenicians, seeing that they had willingly surrendered to the Persians, and the whole fleet drew its strength from them. The Cyprians too had come of their own accord to aid the Persians against Egypt.

Chapter 20

1When the Fish-eaters arrived from Elephantine at Cambyses' summons, he sent them to Ethiopia, with orders what to say, and bearing as gifts a red cloak and a twisted gold necklace and bracelets and an alabaster box of incense and an earthenware jar of palm wine. These Ethiopians, to whom Cambyses sent them, are said to be the tallest and most handsome of all men.

2Their way of choosing kings is different from that of all others, as (it is said) are all their laws; they consider that man worthy to be their king whom they judge to be tallest and to have strength proportional to his stature.

Chapter 21

1When the Fish-eaters arrived among these men, they gave the gifts to their king and said: “Cambyses, the king of the Persians, wishing to become your friend and ally, sent us with orders to address ourselves to you; and he offers you as gifts these things which he enjoys using himself.”

2But the Ethiopian, perceiving that they had come as spies, spoke thus to them: “It is not because he values my friendship that the Persian King sends you with gifts, nor do you speak the truth (for you have come to spy on my realm), nor is that man just; for were he just, he would not have coveted a land other than his own, nor would he try to lead into slavery men by whom he has not been injured. Now, give him this bow, and this message:

3‘The King of the Ethiopians advises the King of the Persians to bring overwhelming odds to attack the long-lived Ethiopians when the Persians can draw a bow of this length as easily as I do; but until then, to thank the gods who do not incite the sons of the Ethiopians to add other land to their own.’”

Chapter 22

1So speaking he unstrung the bow and gave it to the men who had come. Then, taking the red cloak, he asked what it was and how it was made; and when the Fish-eaters told him the truth about the color and the process of dyeing, he said that both the men and their garments were full of deceit.

2Next he inquired about the twisted gold necklace and the bracelets; and when the Fish-eaters told him how they were made, the king smiled, and, thinking them to be fetters, said: “We have stronger chains than these.”

3Thirdly he inquired about the incense; and when they described making and applying it, he made the same reply as about the cloak. But when he came to the wine and asked about its making, he was vastly pleased with the drink, and asked further what food their king ate, and what was the greatest age to which a Persian lived.

4They told him their king ate bread, showing him how wheat grew; and said that the full age to which a man might hope to live was eighty years. Then, said the Ethiopian, it was no wonder that they lived so few years, if they ate dung; they would not even have been able to live that many unless they were refreshed by the drink—signifying to the Fish-eaters the wine—for in this, he said, the Persians excelled the Ethiopians.

Chapter 23

1The Fish-eaters then in turn asking of the Ethiopian length of life and diet, he said that most of them attained to a hundred and twenty years, and some even to more; their food was boiled meat and their drink milk.

2The spies showed wonder at the tale of years; whereupon he led them, it is said, to a spring, by washing in which they grew sleeker, as though it were of oil; and it smelled of violets.

3So light, the spies said, was this water, that nothing would float on it, neither wood nor anything lighter than wood, but all sank to the bottom. If this water is truly such as they say, it is likely that their constant use of it makes the people long-lived.

4When they left the spring, the king led them to a prison where all the men were bound with fetters of gold. Among these Ethiopians there is nothing so scarce and so precious as bronze. Then, having seen the prison, they saw what is called the Table of the Sun.

Chapter 24

1Last after this they viewed the Ethiopian coffins; these are said to be made of alabaster, as I shall describe:

2they cause the dead body to shrink, either as the Egyptians do or in some other way, then cover it with gypsum and paint it all as far as possible in the likeness of the living man;

3then they set it within a hollow pillar of alabaster, which they dig in abundance from the ground, and it is easily worked; the body can be seen in the pillar through the alabaster, no evil stench nor anything unpleasant proceeding from it, and showing clearly all its parts, as if it were the man himself.

4The nearest of kin keep the pillar in their house for a year, giving it of the first-fruits and offering it sacrifices; after which they bring the pillars out and set them round about the city.

Chapter 25

1Having seen everything, the spies departed again. When they reported all this, Cambyses was angry, and marched at once against the Ethiopians, neither giving directions for any provision of food nor considering that he was about to lead his army to the ends of the earth;

2being not in his right mind but mad, however, he marched at once on hearing from the Fish-eaters, ordering the Greeks who were with him to await him where they were, and taking with him all his land army.

3When he came in his march to Thebes, he detached about fifty thousand men from his army, and directed them to enslave the Ammonians and burn the oracle of Zeus; and he himself went on towards Ethiopia with the rest of his host.

4But before his army had accomplished the fifth part of their journey they had come to an end of all there was in the way of provision, and after the food was gone, they ate the beasts of burden until there was none of these left either.

5Now had Cambyses, when he perceived this, changed his mind and led his army back again, he would have been a wise man at last after his first fault; but as it was, he went ever forward, taking account of nothing.

6While his soldiers could get anything from the earth, they kept themselves alive by eating grass; but when they came to the sandy desert, some did a terrible thing, taking by lot one man out of ten and eating him.

7Hearing this, Cambyses feared their becoming cannibals, and so gave up his expedition against the Ethiopians and marched back to Thebes, with the loss of many of his army; from Thebes he came down to Memphis, and sent the Greeks to sail away.

Chapter 26

1So fared the expedition against Ethiopia. As for those who were sent to march against the Ammonians, they set out and journeyed from Thebes with guides; and it is known that they came to the city of Oasis, inhabited by Samians said to be of the Aeschrionian tribe, seven days' march from Thebes across sandy desert; this place is called, in the Greek language, Islands of the Blest.

2Thus far, it is said, the army came; after that, except for the Ammonians themselves and those who heard from them, no man can say anything of them; for they neither reached the Ammonians nor returned back.

3But this is what the Ammonians themselves say: when the Persians were crossing the sand from Oasis to attack them, and were about midway between their country and Oasis, while they were breakfasting a great and violent south wind arose, which buried them in the masses of sand which it bore; and so they disappeared from sight. Such is the Ammonian tale about this army.

Chapter 27

1When Cambyses was back at Memphis, there appeared in Egypt that Apis whom the Greeks call Epaphus; at whose epiphany the Egyptians put on their best clothing and held a festival.

2Seeing the Egyptians so doing, Cambyses was fully persuaded that these signs of joy were for his misfortunes, and summoned the rulers of Memphis; when they came before him, he asked them why the Egyptians behaved so at the moment he returned with so many of his army lost, though they had done nothing like it when he was before at Memphis.

3The rulers told him that a god, wont to appear after long intervals of time, had now appeared to them; and that all Egypt rejoiced and made holiday whenever he so appeared. At this Cambyses said that they lied, and he punished them with death for their lie.

Chapter 28

1Having put them to death, he next summoned the priests before him. When they gave him the same account, he said that if a tame god had come to the Egyptians he would know it; and with no more words he bade the priests bring Apis. So they went to fetch and bring him.

2This Apis, or Epaphus, is a calf born of a cow that can never conceive again. By what the Egyptians say, the cow is made pregnant by a light from heaven, and thereafter gives birth to Apis.

3The marks of this calf called Apis are these: he is black, and has on his forehead a three-cornered white spot, and the likeness of an eagle on his back; the hairs of the tail are double, and there is a knot under the tongue.

Chapter 29

1When the priests led Apis in, Cambyses—for he was all but mad—drew his dagger and, meaning to stab the calf in the belly, stuck the thigh; then laughing he said to the priests:

2“Simpletons, are these your gods, creatures of flesh and blood that can feel weapons of iron? That is a god worthy of the Egyptians. But for you, you shall suffer for making me your laughing-stock.” So saying he bade those, whose business it was, to scourge the priests well, and to kill any other Egyptian whom they found holiday-making.

3So the Egyptian festival ended, and the priests were punished, and Apis lay in the temple and died of the wound in the thigh. When he was dead of the wound, the priests buried him without Cambyses' knowledge.

Chapter 30

1But Cambyses, the Egyptians say, owing to this wrongful act immediately went mad, although even before he had not been sensible. His first evil act was to destroy his full brother Smerdis, whom he had sent away from Egypt to Persia out of jealousy, because Smerdis alone could draw the bow brought from the Ethiopian by the Fish-eaters as far as two fingerbreadths, but no other Persian could draw it.

2Smerdis having gone to Persia, Cambyses saw in a dream a vision, in which it seemed to him that a messenger came from Persia and told him that Smerdis sitting on the royal throne touched heaven with his head.

3Fearing therefore for himself, lest his brother might slay him and so be king, he sent Prexaspes, the most trusted of his Persians, to Persia to kill him. Prexaspes went up to Susa and killed Smerdis; some say that he took Smerdis out hunting, others that he brought him to the Red Sea and there drowned him.

Chapter 31

1This, they say, was the first of Cambyses' evil acts; next, he destroyed his full sister, who had come with him to Egypt, and whom he had taken to wife.

2He married her in this way (for before this, it had by no means been customary for Persians to marry their sisters): Cambyses was infatuated with one of his sisters and when he wanted to marry her, because his intention was contrary to usage, he summoned the royal judges and inquired whether there were any law enjoining one, that so desired, to marry his sister.

3These royal judges are men chosen out from the Persians to function until they die or are detected in some injustice; it is they who decide suits in Persia and interpret the laws of the land; all matters are referred to them.

4These then replied to Cambyses with an answer which was both just and prudent, namely, that they could find no law enjoining a brother to marry his sister; but that they had found a law permitting the King of Persia to do whatever he liked.

5Thus, although they feared Cambyses they did not break the law, and, to save themselves from death for keeping it, they found another law abetting one who wished to marry sisters.

6So Cambyses married the object of his desire; yet not long afterwards he took another sister as well. It was the younger of these who had come with him to Egypt, and whom he now killed.

Chapter 32

1There are two tales of her death, as there are of the death of Smerdis. The Greeks say that Cambyses had set a lion cub to fight a puppy, and that this woman was watching too; and that as the puppy was losing, its brother broke its leash and came to help, and the two dogs together got the better of the cub.

2Cambyses, they say, was pleased with the sight, but the woman wept as she sat by. Cambyses perceiving it asked why she wept, and she said that when she saw the puppy help its brother she had wept, recalling Smerdis and knowing that there would be no avenger for him.

3For saying this, according to the Greek story, she was killed by Cambyses. But the Egyptian tale is that as the two sat at table the woman took a lettuce and plucked off the leaves, then asked her husband whether he preferred the look of it with or without leaves. “With the leaves,” he said; whereupon she answered:

4“Yet you have stripped Cyrus' house as bare as this lettuce.” Angered at this, they say, he sprang upon her, who was great with child, and she miscarried and died of the hurt he gave her.

Chapter 33

1Such were Cambyses' mad acts to his own household, whether they were done because of Apis or grew from some of the many troubles that are wont to beset men; for indeed he is said to have been afflicted from his birth with that grievous disease which some call “sacred.” It is not unlikely then that when his body was grievously afflicted his mind too should be diseased.

Chapter 34

1I will now relate his mad dealings with the rest of Persia. He said, as they report, to Prexaspes—whom he held in particular honor, who brought him all his messages, whose son held the very honorable office of Cambyses' cup-bearer—thus, I say, he spoke to Prexaspes:

2“What manner of man, Prexaspes, do the Persians think me to be, and how do they speak of me?” “Sire,” said Prexaspes, “for all else they greatly praise you, but they say that you love wine too well.”

3So he reported of the Persians. The king angrily replied: “If the Persians now say that it is my fondness for wine that drives me to frenzy and madness, then it would seem that their former saying also was a lie.”

4For it is said that before this, while some Persians and Croesus were sitting with him, Cambyses asked what manner of man they thought him to be in comparison with Cyrus his father; and they answered, “Cambyses was the better man; for he had all of Cyrus' possessions and had won Egypt and the sea besides.”

5So said the Persians; but Croesus, who was present, and was dissatisfied with their judgment, spoke thus to Cambyses: “To me, son of Cyrus, you do not seem to be the equal of your father; for you have as yet no son such as he left after him in you.” This pleased Cambyses, and he praised Croesus' judgment.

Chapter 35

1Remembering this, then, he said to Prexaspes in his anger: “Judge then if the Persians speak the truth, or rather are themselves out of their minds when they speak of me so.

2Yonder stands your son in the porch; now if I shoot and pierce his heart, that will prove the Persians to be wrong; if I miss, then say that they are right and that I am out of my senses.”

3So saying, he strung his bow and hit the boy, and gave orders to open the fallen body and examine the wound: and the arrow being found in the heart, Cambyses laughed in great glee and said to the boy's father:

4“It is plain, Prexaspes, that I am in my right mind and the Persians mad; now tell me: what man in the world did you ever see that shot so true to the mark?” Prexaspes, it is said, replied (for he saw that Cambyses was mad, and he feared for his own life), “Master, I think that not even the god himself could shoot so true.”

5Thus did Cambyses then; at another time he took twelve Persians, equal to the noblest in the land, convicted them of some minor offense, and buried them alive up to the neck.

Chapter 36

1For these acts Croesus the Lydian thought fit to take him to task, and addressed him thus: “Sire, do not sacrifice everything to youth and temper, but restrain and control yourself; prudence is a good thing, forethought is wise. But you kill men of your own country whom you have convicted of some minor offense, and you kill boys.

2If you do so often, beware lest the Persians revolt from you. As for me, your father Cyrus earnestly begged me to counsel you and to give you such advice as I think to be good.” Croesus gave him this counsel out of goodwill; but Cambyses answered:

3“It is very well that you should even dare to counsel me; you, who governed your own country so well, and gave fine advice to my father—telling him, when the Massagetae were willing to cross over into our lands, to pass the Araxes and attack them; thus you worked your own ruin by misgoverning your country and Cyrus', who trusted you. But you shall regret it; I have long waited for an occasion to deal with you.”

4With that Cambyses took his bow to shoot him dead; but Croesus leapt up and ran out; and Cambyses, being unable to shoot him, ordered his attendants to catch and kill him.

5They, knowing Cambyses' mood, hid Croesus; intending to reveal him and receive gifts for saving his life, if Cambyses should repent and ask for Croesus, but if he should not repent nor wish Croesus back, then to kill the Lydian.

6Not long after this Cambyses did wish Croesus back, and the attendants, understanding this, told him that Croesus was alive still. Cambyses said that he was glad of it; but that they, who had saved Croesus, should not escape with impunity, but be killed; and this was done.

Chapter 37

1Cambyses committed many such mad acts against the Persians and his allies; he stayed at Memphis, and there opened ancient coffins and examined the dead bodies.

2Thus too he entered the temple of Hephaestus and jeered at the image there. This image of Hephaestus is most like the Phoenician Pataici, which the Phoenicians carry on the prows of their triremes. I will describe it for anyone who has not seen these figures: it is the likeness of a dwarf.

3Also he entered the temple of the Cabeiri, into which no one may enter save the priest; the images here he even burnt, with bitter mockery. These also are like the images of Hephaestus, and are said to be his sons.

Chapter 38

1I hold it then in every way proved that Cambyses was quite insane; or he would never have set himself to deride religion and custom. For if it were proposed to all nations to choose which seemed best of all customs, each, after examination, would place its own first; so well is each convinced that its own are by far the best.

2It is not therefore to be supposed that anyone, except a madman, would turn such things to ridicule. I will give this one proof among many from which it may be inferred that all men hold this belief about their customs.

3When Darius was king, he summoned the Greeks who were with him and asked them for what price they would eat their fathers' dead bodies. They answered that there was no price for which they would do it.

4Then Darius summoned those Indians who are called Callatiae, who eat their parents, and asked them (the Greeks being present and understanding through interpreters what was said) what would make them willing to burn their fathers at death. The Indians cried aloud, that he should not speak of so horrid an act. So firmly rooted are these beliefs; and it is, I think, rightly said in Pindar's poem that custom is lord of all.

Chapter 39

1While Cambyses was attacking Egypt, the Lacedaemonians too were making war upon Samos and upon Aeaces' son Polycrates, who had revolted and won Samos.

2And first, dividing the city into three parts, he gave a share in the government to his brothers Pantagnotus and Syloson; but presently he put one of them to death, banished the younger, Syloson, and so made himself lord of all Samos; then he made a treaty with Amasis king of Egypt, sending to him and receiving from him gifts.

3Very soon after this, Polycrates grew to such power that he was famous in Ionia and all other Greek lands; for all his military affairs succeeded. He had a hundred fifty-oared ships, and a thousand archers.

4And he pillaged every place, indiscriminately; for he said that he would get more thanks if he gave a friend back what he had taken than if he never took it at all. He had taken many of the islands, and many of the mainland cities. Among others, he conquered the Lesbians; they had brought all their force to aid the Milesians, and Polycrates defeated them in a sea-fight; it was they who, being his captives, dug all the trench around the acropolis of Samos.

Chapter 40

1Now Amasis was somehow aware of Polycrates' great good fortune; and as this continued to increase greatly, he wrote this letter and sent it to Samos: “Amasis addresses Polycrates as follows.

2It is pleasant to learn that a friend and ally is doing well. But I do not like these great successes of yours; for I know the gods, how jealous they are, and I desire somehow that both I and those for whom I care succeed in some affairs, fail in others, and thus pass life faring differently by turns, rather than succeed at everything.

3For from all I have heard I know of no man whom continual good fortune did not bring in the end to evil, and utter destruction. Therefore if you will be ruled by me do this regarding your successes:

4consider what you hold most precious and what you will be sorriest to lose, and cast it away so that it shall never again be seen among men; then, if after this the successes that come to you are not mixed with mischances, strive to mend the matter as I have counselled you.”

Chapter 41

1Reading this, and perceiving that Amasis' advice was good, Polycrates considered which of his treasures it would most grieve his soul to lose, and came to this conclusion: he wore a seal set in gold, an emerald, crafted by Theodorus son of Telecles of Samos;

2being resolved to cast this away, he embarked in a fifty-oared ship with its crew, and told them to put out to sea; and when he was far from the island, he took off the seal-ring in sight of all that were on the ship and cast it into the sea. This done, he sailed back and went to his house, where he grieved for the loss.

Chapter 42

1But on the fifth or sixth day from this it happened that a fisherman, who had taken a fine and great fish, and desired to make a gift of it to Polycrates, brought it to the door and said that he wished to see Polycrates. This being granted, he gave the fish, saying:

2“O King, when I caught this fish, I thought best not to take it to market, although I am a man who lives by his hands, but it seemed to me worthy of you and your greatness; and so I bring and offer it to you.” Polycrates was pleased with what the fisherman said; “You have done very well,” he answered, “and I give you double thanks, for your words and for the gift; and I invite you to dine with me.”

3Proud of this honor, the fisherman went home; but the servants, cutting up the fish, found in its belly Polycrates' seal-ring.

4As soon as they saw and seized it, they brought it with joy to Polycrates, and giving the ring to him told him how it had been found. Polycrates saw the hand of heaven in this matter; he wrote a letter and sent it to Egypt, telling all that he had done, and what had happened to him.

Chapter 43

1When Amasis had read Polycrates' letter, he perceived that no man could save another from his destiny, and that Polycrates, being so continually fortunate that he even found what he cast away, must come to an evil end.

2So he sent a herald to Samos to renounce his friendship, determined that when some great and terrible mischance overtook Polycrates he himself might not have to sadden his heart for a friend.

Chapter 44

1It was against this ever-victorious Polycrates that the Lacedaemonians now made war, invited by the Samians who afterwards founded Cydonia in Crete. Polycrates had without the knowledge of his subjects sent a herald to Cambyses, son of Cyrus, then raising an army against Egypt, inviting Cambyses to send to Samos too and request men from him.

2At this message Cambyses very readily sent to Samos, asking Polycrates to send a fleet to aid him against Egypt. Polycrates chose those men whom he most suspected of planning a rebellion against him, and sent them in forty triremes, directing Cambyses not to send the men back.

Chapter 45

1Some say that these Samians who were sent never came to Egypt, but that when they had sailed as far as Carpathus discussed the matter among themselves and decided to sail no further; others say that they did come to Egypt and there escaped from the guard that was set over them.

2But as they sailed back to Samos, Polycrates' ships met and engaged them; and the returning Samians were victorious and landed on the island, but were there beaten in a land battle, and so sailed to Lacedaemon.

3There are those who say that the Samians from Egypt defeated Polycrates; but to my thinking this is untrue; for they need not have invited the Lacedaemonians if in fact they had been able to master Polycrates by themselves. Besides, it is not even reasonable to suppose that he, who had a great army of hired soldiers and bowmen of his own, was beaten by a few men like the returning Samians.

4Polycrates took the children and wives of the townsmen who were subject to him and shut them up in the boathouses, with intent to burn them and the boathouses too if their men should desert to the returned Samians.

Chapter 46

1When the Samians who were expelled by Polycrates came to Sparta, they came before the ruling men and made a long speech to show the greatness of their need. But the Spartans at their first sitting answered that they had forgotten the beginning of the speech and could not understand its end.

2After this the Samians came a second time with a sack, and said nothing but this: “The sack wants flour.” To this the Spartans replied that they were over-wordy with “the sack”; but they did resolve to help them.

Chapter 47

1The Lacedaemonians then equipped and sent an army to Samos, returning a favor, as the Samians say, because they first sent a fleet to help the Lacedaemonians against Messenia; but the Lacedaemonians say that they sent this army less to aid the Samians in their need than to avenge the robbery of the bowl which they had been carrying to Croesus and the breastplate which Amasis King of Egypt had sent them as a gift.

2This breastplate had been stolen by the Samians in the year before they took the bowl; it was of linen, decked with gold and cotton embroidery, and embroidered with many figures;

3but what makes it worthy of wonder is that each thread of the breastplate, fine as each is, is made up of three hundred and sixty strands, each plainly seen. It is the exact counterpart of that one which Amasis dedicated to Athena in Lindus.

Chapter 48

1The Corinthians also enthusiastically helped to further the expedition against Samos. For an outrage had been done them by the Samians a generation before this expedition, about the time of the robbery of the bowl.

2Periander son of Cypselus sent to Alyattes at Sardis three hundred boys, sons of notable men in Corcyra, to be made eunuchs. The Corinthians who brought the boys put in at Samos; and when the Samians heard why the boys were brought, first they instructed them to take sanctuary in the temple of Artemis,

3then they would not allow the suppliants to be dragged from the temple; and when the Corinthians tried to starve the boys out, the Samians held a festival which they still celebrate in the same fashion; throughout the time that the boys were seeking asylum, they held nightly dances of young men and women to which it was made a custom to bring cakes of sesame and honey, so that the Corcyraean boys might snatch these and have food.

4This continued to be done until the Corinthian guards left their charge and departed; then the Samians took the boys back to Corcyra.

Chapter 49

1If after the death of Periander, the Corinthians had been friendly towards the Corcyraeans, they would not have taken part in the expedition against Samos for this reason. But as it was, ever since the island was colonized, they have been at odds with each other, despite their kinship.

2For these reasons then the Corinthians bore a grudge against the Samians. Periander chose the sons of the notable Corcyraeans and sent them to Sardis to be made eunuchs as an act of vengeance; for the Corcyraeans had first begun the quarrel by committing a terrible crime against him.

Chapter 50

1For after killing his own wife Melissa, Periander suffered yet another calamity on top of what he had already suffered. He had two sons by Melissa, one seventeen and one eighteen years old.

2Their mother's father, Procles, the sovereign of Epidaurus, sent for the boys and treated them affectionately, as was natural, seeing that they were his own daughter's sons. When they left him, he said as he sent them forth:

3“Do you know, boys, who killed your mother?” The elder of them paid no attention to these words; but the younger, whose name was Lycophron, was struck with such horror when he heard them that when he came to Corinth he would not speak to his father, his mother's murderer, nor would he answer him when addressed nor reply to his questions. At last Periander was so angry that he drove the boy from his house.

Chapter 51

1Having driven this one away, he asked the elder son what their grandfather had said to them. The boy told him that Procles had treated them kindly, but did not mention what he had said at parting; for he had paid no attention. Periander said that by no means could Procles not have dropped some hint, and interrogated him persistently;

2until the boy remembered, and told him. And Periander, comprehending, and wishing to show no weakness, sent a message to those with whom his banished son was living and forbade them to keep him.

3So when the boy, driven out, would go to another house, he would be driven from this also, since Periander threatened all who received him and ordered them to shut him out; so when driven forth, he would go to some other house of his friends, and they, although he was the son of Periander, and although they were afraid, nonetheless took him in.

Chapter 52

1In the end Periander made a proclamation, that whoever sheltered the boy in his house or spoke to him, would owe a fine to Apollo, and he set the amount.

2In view of this proclamation no one wished to address or receive the boy into his house; and besides, the boy himself did not think it right to attempt what was forbidden, but accepting it slept in the open.

3On the fourth day, when Periander saw him starved and unwashed, he took pity on him, and his anger being softened, he came near and said: “My son, which is preferable—to follow your present way of life, or by being well-disposed toward your father to inherit my power and the goods which I now possess?

4Though my son and a prince of prosperous Corinth, you prefer the life of a vagrant, by opposing and being angry with me with whom you least ought to be. For if something has happened as a result of which you have a suspicion about me, it has happened to my disadvantage and I bear the brunt of it, inasmuch as I am the cause.

5But bearing in mind how much better it is to be envied than to be pitied, and at the same time what sort of thing it is to be angry with your parents and with those that are stronger than you, come back to the house.”

6With these words Periander tried to move his son, but he said nothing else to his father, only told him that because he had conversed with him he owed the fine to Apollo. When Periander saw that his son's stubbornness could not be got around or overcome, he sent him away out of his sight in a ship to Corcyra; for Corcyra too was subject to him.

7And when he had sent him away, he sent an army against Procles his father-in-law, since he was most to blame for his present troubles; and he took Epidaurus, captured Procles, and imprisoned him.

Chapter 53

1As time went on, Periander, now grown past his prime and aware that he could no longer oversee and direct all his affairs, sent to Corcyra inviting Lycophron to be sovereign; for he saw no hope in his eldest son, who seemed to him to be slow-witted.

2Lycophron did not dignify the invitation with a reply. Then Periander, pressing the young man, sent to him (as the next best way) his daughter, the boy's sister, thinking that he would listen to her.

3She came and said, “Child, would you want the power to fall to others, and our father's house destroyed, rather than to return and have it yourself? Come home and stop punishing yourself.

4Pride is an unhappy possession. Do not cure evil by evil. Many place the more becoming thing before the just; and many pursuing their mother's business have lost their father's. Power is a slippery thing; many want it, and our father is now old and past his prime; do not lose what is yours to others.”

5So she spoke communicating their father's inducements. But he answered that he would never come to Corinth as long as he knew his father was alive.

6When she brought this answer back, Periander sent a third messenger, through whom he proposed that he should go to Corcyra, and that the boy should return to Corinth and be the heir of his power.

7The son consented to this; Periander got ready to go to Corcyra and Lycophron to go to Corinth; but when the Corcyraeans learned of all these matters, they put the young man to death so that Periander would not come to their country. It was for this that Periander desired vengeance on the Corcyraeans.

Chapter 54

1The Lacedaemonians then came with a great army, and besieged Samos. They advanced to the wall and entered the tower that stands by the seaside in the outer part of the city; but then Polycrates himself attacked them with a great force and drove them out.

2The mercenaries and many of the Samians themselves sallied out near the upper tower on the ridge of the hill and withstood the Lacedaemonian advance for a little while; then they fled back, with the Lacedaemonians pursuing and destroying them.

Chapter 55

1Had all the Lacedaemonians there that day been like Archias and Lycopas, Samos would have been taken. These two alone entered the fortress along with the fleeing crowd of Samians, and were cut off and killed in the city of Samos.

2I myself have met in his native town of Pitana another Archias son of Samius, and grandson of the Archias mentioned above, who honored the Samians more than any other of his guest-friends, and told me that his father had borne the name Samius because he was the son of that Archias who was killed fighting bravely at Samos. The reason that he honored the Samians, he said, was that they had given his grandfather a public funeral.

Chapter 56

1So when the Lacedaemonians had besieged Samos for forty days with no success, they went away to the Peloponnesus.

2There is a foolish tale abroad that Polycrates bribed them to depart by making and giving them a great number of gilded lead coins, as a native currency. This was the first expedition to Asia made by Dorians of Lacedaemon.

Chapter 57

1When the Lacedaemonians were about to abandon them, the Samians who had brought an army against Polycrates sailed away too, and went to Siphnus;

2for they were in need of money; and the Siphnians were at this time very prosperous and the richest of the islanders, because of the gold and silver mines on the island. They were so wealthy that the treasure dedicated by them at Delphi, which is as rich as any there, was made from a tenth of their income; and they divided among themselves each year's income.

3Now when they were putting together the treasure they inquired of the oracle if their present prosperity was likely to last long; whereupon the priestess gave them this answer:

4“When the prytaneum on Siphnus becomes white And white-browed the market, then indeed a shrewd man is wanted Beware a wooden force and a red herald.” At this time the market-place and town-hall of Siphnus were adorned with Parian marble.

Chapter 58

1They could not understand this oracle either when it was spoken or at the time of the Samians' coming. As soon as the Samians put in at Siphnus, they sent ambassadors to the town in one of their ships;

2now in ancient times all ships were painted with vermilion; and this was what was meant by the warning given by the priestess to the Siphnians, to beware a wooden force and a red herald.

3The messengers, then, demanded from the Siphnians a loan of ten talents; when the Siphnians refused them, the Samians set about ravaging their lands.

4Hearing this the Siphnians came out at once to drive them off, but they were defeated in battle, and many of them were cut off from their town by the Samians; who presently exacted from them a hundred talents.

Chapter 59

1Then the Samians took from the men of Hermione, instead of money, the island Hydrea which is near to the Peloponnesus, and gave it to men of Troezen for safekeeping; they themselves settled at Cydonia in Crete, though their voyage had been made with no such intent, but rather to drive Zacynthians out of the island.

2Here they stayed and prospered for five years; indeed, the temples now at Cydonia and the shrine of Dictyna are the Samians' work;

3but in the sixth year Aeginetans and Cretans came and defeated them in a sea-fight and made slaves of them; moreover they cut off the ships' prows, that were shaped like boars' heads, and dedicated them in the temple of Athena in Aegina.

4The Aeginetans did this out of a grudge against the Samians; for previously the Samians, in the days when Amphicrates was king of Samos, sailing in force against Aegina, had hurt the Aeginetans and been hurt by them. This was the cause.

Chapter 60

1I have written at such length of the Samians, because the three greatest works of all the Greeks were engineered by them. The first of these is the tunnel with a mouth at either end driven through the base of a hill nine hundred feet high;

2the whole tunnel is forty-two hundred feet long, eight feet high and eight feet wide; and throughout the whole of its length there runs a channel thirty feet deep and three feet wide, through which the water coming from an abundant spring is carried by pipes to the city of Samos.

3The designer of this work was Eupalinus son of Naustrophus, a Megarian. This is one of the three works; the second is a breakwater in the sea enclosing the harbor, sunk one hundred and twenty feet, and more than twelve hundred feet in length.

4The third Samian work is the temple, which is the greatest of all the temples of which we know; its first builder was Rhoecus son of Philes, a Samian. It is for this cause that I have expounded at more than ordinary length of Samos.

Chapter 61

1Now after Cambyses, son of Cyrus, had lost his mind, while he was still in Egypt, two Magus brothers rebelled against him. One of them had been left by Cambyses as steward of his house; this man now revolted from him, perceiving that the death of Smerdis was kept secret, and that few knew of it, most believing him to be still alive.

2Therefore he plotted to gain the royal power: he had a brother, his partner, as I said, in rebellion; this brother was in appearance very like Cyrus' son Smerdis, whom Cambyses, his brother, had killed; nor was he like him in appearance only, but he bore the same name too, Smerdis.

3Patizeithes the Magus persuaded this man that he would manage everything for him; he brought his brother and set him on the royal throne; then he sent heralds to all parts, one of whom was to go to Egypt and proclaim to the army that henceforth they must obey not Cambyses but Smerdis, the son of Cyrus.

Chapter 62

1So this proclamation was made everywhere. The herald appointed to go to Egypt, finding Cambyses and his army at Ecbatana in Syria, came out before them all and proclaimed the message given him by the Magus.

2When Cambyses heard what the herald said, he supposed that it was the truth, and that Prexaspes, when sent to kill Smerdis, had not done it but had played Cambyses false; and he said, fixing his eyes on Prexaspes, “Is it thus, Prexaspes, that you carried out my instructions?”

3“No,” said Prexaspes, “this is not true, sire, that your brother Smerdis has rebelled against you; he cannot have any quarrel with you, small or great; I myself did as you instructed, and I buried him with my own hands.

4If then the dead can rise, you may expect to see Astyages the Mede rise up against you; but if things are as usual, assuredly no harm to you will arise from Smerdis. Now then this is my opinion, that we pursue this herald and interrogate him, to learn from whom he comes with his proclamation that we must obey Smerdis as our king.”

Chapter 63

1Cambyses liked Prexaspes' advice; the herald was pursued at once and brought; and when he came, Prexaspes put this question to him: “Fellow, you say that your message is from Cyrus' son Smerdis; tell me this now, and you may go away unpunished: was it Smerdis who appeared to you and gave you this charge, or was it one of his servants?”

2“Since King Cambyses marched to Egypt,” answered the herald, “I have never seen Smerdis the son of Cyrus; the Magus whom Cambyses made overseer of his house gave me the message, saying that it was the will of Smerdis, son of Cyrus, that I should make it known to you.”

3So spoke the herald, telling the whole truth; and Cambyses said, “Prexaspes, having done what you were told like a good man you are free of blame; but who can this Persian be who rebels against me and usurps the name of Smerdis?”

4Prexaspes replied, “I think, sire, that I understand what has been done here; the rebels are the Magi, Patizeithes whom you left steward of your house, and his brother Smerdis.”

Chapter 64

1The truth of the words and of a dream struck Cambyses the moment he heard the name Smerdis; for he had dreamt that a message had come to him that Smerdis sitting on the royal throne touched heaven with his head;

2and perceiving that he had killed his brother without cause, he wept bitterly for Smerdis. Having wept, and grieved by all his misfortune, he sprang upon his horse, with intent to march at once to Susa against the Magus.

3As he sprang upon his horse, the cap fell off the sheath of his sword, and the naked blade pierced his thigh, wounding him in the same place where he had once wounded the Egyptian god Apis; and believing the wound to be mortal, Cambyses asked what was the name of the town where he was.

4They told him it was Ecbatana. Now a prophecy had before this come to him from Buto, that he would end his life at Ecbatana; Cambyses supposed this to signify that he would die in old age at the Median Ecbatana, his capital city; but as the event proved, the oracle prophesied his death at Ecbatana of Syria.

5So when he now inquired and learned the name of the town, the shock of his wound, and of the misfortune that came to him from the Magus, brought him to his senses; he understood the prophecy and said: “Here Cambyses son of Cyrus is to die.”

Chapter 65

1At this time he said no more. But about twenty days later, he sent for the most prominent of the Persians that were about him, and thus addressed them: “Persians, I have to make known to you something which I kept most strictly concealed.

2When I was in Egypt I had a dream, which I wish I had not had; it seemed to me that a messenger came from home to tell me that Smerdis sitting on the royal throne touched heaven with his head.

3Then I feared that my brother would take away my sovereignty from me, and I acted with more haste than wisdom; for it is not in the power of human nature to run away from what is to be; but I, blind as I was, sent Prexaspes to Susa to kill Smerdis. When that great wrong was done I lived without fear, for I never thought that when Smerdis was removed another man might rise against me.

4But I mistook altogether what was to be; I have killed my brother when there was no need, and I have lost my kingdom none the less; for it was the Magus Smerdis that the divinity forewarned in the dream would revolt.

5Now he has been done for by me, and I would have you believe that Smerdis Cyrus' son no longer lives; the Magi rule the kingdom, the one that I left caretaker of my house, and his brother Smerdis. So then, the man is dead of an unholy destiny at the hands of his relations who ought to have been my avenger for the disgrace I have suffered from the Magi;

6and as he is no longer alive, necessity constrains me to charge you, men of Persia, in his place, with the last desire of my life. In the name of the gods of my royal house I charge all of you, but chiefly those Achaemenids that are here, not to let the sovereignty fall again into Median hands; if they have it after getting it by trickery, take it back through trickery of your own; if they have got it away by force, then by force all the stronger get it back.

7And if you do this, may your land bring forth fruit, and your women and your flocks and herds be blessed with offspring, remaining free for all time; but if you do not get the kingdom back or attempt to get it back, then I pray things turn out the opposite for you, and on top of this, that every Persian meet an end such as mine.” With that Cambyses wept bitterly for all that had happened to him.

Chapter 66

1When the Persians saw their king weep, they all tore the clothing which they wore and wailed loud and long.

2But when after this the bone rotted and the thigh rapidly putrefied, it carried off Cambyses son of Cyrus, who had reigned in all seven years and five months, but was altogether childless, without male or female issue.

3To the Persians who were present it was quite incredible that the Magi were masters of the kingdom; they believed that Cambyses' intent was to deceive them with his story of Smerdis' death, so that all Persia might be embroiled in a war against him.

Chapter 67

1So they believed that it was Cyrus' son Smerdis who had been made king. For Prexaspes stoutly denied that he had killed Smerdis, since now that Cambyses was dead, it was not safe for him to say that he had slain the son of Cyrus with his own hands.

2Cambyses being dead, the Magus, pretending to be the Smerdis of like name, Cyrus' son, reigned without fear for the seven months by which Cambyses had fallen short of reigning eight years.

3In this time he benefitted all his subjects to such an extent that after his death all the Asiatics except the Persians wished him back; for he sent to every nation he ruled and proclaimed an exemption for three years from military service and from tribute.

Chapter 68

1Such was his proclamation at the beginning of his reign; but in the eighth month he was exposed in the following manner. There was one Otanes, son of Pharnaspes, as well-born and rich a man as any Persian.

2This Otanes was the first to guess that the Magus was not Cyrus' son Smerdis and who, in fact, he was; the reason was, that he never left the acropolis nor summoned any notable Persian into his presence. And having formed this suspicion Otanes did as follows:

3Cambyses had taken his daughter, whose name was Phaedyme; this same girl the Magus had now and he lived with her and with all Cambyses' other wives. Otanes sent to this daughter, asking at what man's side she lay, with Smerdis, Cyrus' son, or with some other?

4She sent back a message that she did not know; for (she said) she had never seen Cyrus' son Smerdis, nor did she know who her bedfellow was. Then Otanes sent a second message, to this effect: “If you do not know Cyrus' son Smerdis yourself, then find out from Atossa who it is that she and you are living with; for surely she knows her own brother.”

5To this his daughter replied: “I cannot communicate with Atossa, nor can I see any other of the women of the household; for no sooner had this man, whoever he is, made himself king, than he sent us to live apart, each in her own appointed place.”

Chapter 69

1When Otanes heard that, he saw more clearly how the matter stood; and he sent her this third message:

2“Daughter, your noble birth obliges you to run any risk that your father commands you to face. If this man is not Smerdis son of Cyrus but who I think he is, then he must not get away with sleeping with you and sitting on the throne of Persia, but be punished.

3Now, then, when he lies with you and you see that he is sleeping, feel his ears; if he has ears, rest assured that you are living with Smerdis son of Cyrus; but if he has none, it is Smerdis the Magus.”

4Phaedyme answered by messenger that she would run a very great risk by so doing; for if it should turn out that he had no ears, and she were caught feeling for them, he would surely kill her; nevertheless she would do it.

5So she promised to do this for her father. Cyrus son of Cambyses during his reign cut off the ears of this Magus Smerdis for some grave reason.

6So Phaedyme, daughter of Otanes, performed her promise to her father. When it was her turn to go to the Magus (for their wives go in sequence to the Persians), she came to his bed and felt for the Magus' ears while he slumbered deeply; and having with no great difficulty assured herself that he had no ears, she sent and told this to her father as soon as it was morning.

Chapter 70

1Otanes then took aside two Persians of the highest rank whom he thought worthiest of trust, Aspathines and Gobryas, and told them the whole story. These, it would seem, had themselves suspected that it was so; and now they readily believed what Otanes revealed to them.

2They resolved that each should take into his confidence that Persian whom he most trusted; Otanes brought in Intaphrenes, Gobryas brought Megabyzus, and Aspathines Hydarnes.

3When they were six, Darius, whose father, Hystaspes, was a subordinate governor of the Persians, arrived at Susa. When he came, then, the six Persians resolved to include Darius too.

Chapter 71

1The seven then met and gave each other tokens of good faith and spoke together; and when it was Darius' turn to declare his mind, he spoke as follows:

2“I thought that I alone knew that it was the Magus who was king and that Smerdis son of Cyrus was dead; and it was for this reason that I made haste to come, that I might effect the Magus' death; but since it turns out that you know too and not only I, I think that we should act at once and not put it off.”

3Otanes replied, “son of Hystaspes, you have a good father and seem likely yourself to be in no way inferior to your father; do not hurry this undertaking without thinking, but take it up more prudently; there must be more of us to try it.”

4To this Darius answered: “You gentlemen who are here, if you do as Otanes says, know that you will die horribly; for someone will inform the Magus, looking to enrich himself alone.

5You ought to have done it by yourselves; but since you decided to confide in others and have included me, let us either act today or else understand that if the present day passes, nobody else will betray you before I do, for I shall myself betray you to the Magus.”

Chapter 72

1To this Otanes replied, seeing Darius' vehemence, “Since you force us to hurry and will tolerate no delay, tell us now yourself how we shall pass into the palace and attack them. For you know yourself, I suppose, if not because you have seen them then you have heard, that guards are stationed all around; how shall we go past the guards?”

2“Otanes,” answered Darius, “there are many things that cannot be described in words, but in deed; and there are other things that can be described in words, but nothing illustrious comes of them. You know well that the guards who are set are easy to go by.

3There is no one who will not allow us to pass, from respect or from fear, because of who we are; and further, I have myself the best pretext for entering, for I shall say that I have just arrived from Persia and have a message for the king from my father.

4When it is necessary to lie, lie. For we want the same thing, liars and those who tell the truth; some lie to win credence and advantage by lies, while others tell the truth in order to obtain some advantage by the truth and to be more trusted; thus we approach the same ends by different means.

5If the hope of advantage were taken away, the truth-teller would be as ready to lie as the liar to tell the truth. Now if any of the watchmen willingly let us pass, it will be better for him later. But if any tries to withstand us, let us note him as an enemy, and so thrust ourselves in and begin our work.”

Chapter 73

1Then Gobryas said, “Friends, when shall we have a better chance to win back the kingship, or, if we cannot, to die, since we who are Persians are ruled by a Mede, a Magus, and he a man that has no ears?

2Those of you that were with Cambyses at his death-bed of course remember the curse which he pronounced as he died on the Persians if they should not try to get back the kingship, although we did not believe Cambyses then, but thought that he spoke to deceive us.

3Now therefore my vote is that we follow Darius' plan, and not quit this council to do anything else but attack the Magus at once.” So spoke Gobryas; and they all consented to what he said.

Chapter 74

1While they were making these plans, by coincidence the following happened. The Magi had resolved after consideration to make a friend of Prexaspes, because he had been wronged by Cambyses (who had killed his son with an arrow) and because he alone knew of the death of Cyrus' son Smerdis, having himself been the slayer; but besides this, because he was in great repute among the Persians.

2For these reasons they summoned him and tried to make him a friend, having bound him by tokens of good faith and oaths to keep to himself and betray to no one their deception of the Persians, and promising to give him all things in great abundance.

3When Prexaspes agreed to do this, since the Magi importuned him, the Magi made this second proposal to him, that they should call an assembly of all the Persians before the palace wall, and he should go up on to a tower and declare that it was Smerdis son of Cyrus and no other who was king of Persia.

4They gave him this charge, because they thought him to be the man most trusted by the Persians, and because he had often asserted that Cyrus' son Smerdis was alive, and had denied the murder.

Chapter 75

1When Prexaspes said that he was ready to do this too, the Magi summoned the Persians together, and brought him up on to a tower and bade him speak. Then, deliberately forgetting all the Magi's instructions, he traced the lineage of Cyrus from Achaemenes downwards; when he came at last to the name of Cyrus, he recounted all the good which that king had done to Persia,

2and after he had narrated this, he revealed the truth, saying that he had concealed it before, as it had not been safe for him to tell what had happened, but at the present time necessity forced him to reveal it: and he said that he himself, forced by Cambyses, had killed Smerdis son of Cyrus, and that the Magi were in power.

3Then, invoking a terrible curse on the Persians if they did not win back the throne and take vengeance on the Magi, he threw himself headlong down from the tower; so Prexaspes, a man who was always well thought of, perished in this way.

Chapter 76

1The seven Persians, when they had decided to attack the Magi at once and not delay, prayed to the gods and set forth, knowing nothing of what had happened to Prexaspes.

2But when they had gone half way they learned what had happened to Prexaspes. Then they argued there, standing beside the road, Otanes' party demanding that they delay and not attack while events were in flux, and Darius' party that they go directly and do what they had decided and not put it off.

3While they were arguing, they saw seven pairs of hawks chase and slash and tear to bits two pairs of vultures. And seeing this all seven consented to Darius' opinion, and went on to the palace, encouraged by the birds.

Chapter 77

1When they came to the gate, it turned out as Darius had expected; the guards, out of respect for the leading men in Persia and never suspecting that there would be trouble from them, allowed them to pass, who enjoyed divine guidance, and no one asked any questions.

2And when they came to the court, they met the eunuchs that carry messages, who asked the seven why they had come; and while they were questioning these, they were threatening the watchmen for letting them pass, and restraining the seven who wanted to go on.

3These gave each other the word, drew their knives, and stabbing the eunuchs who barred their way, went forward at a run to the men's apartment.

Chapter 78

1Both the Magi were within, deliberating about the consequences of Prexaspes' act. Seeing the eunuchs in confusion and hearing their cries they both sprang up: and when they realized what was happening they turned to defending themselves.

2One rushed to take down a bow, the other went for a spear. Then the fighting started. The one that had caught up the bow found it was no use to him, as the antagonists were close and jostling one another; but the other defended himself with his spear, wounding Aspathines in the thigh and Intaphrenes in the eye; Intaphrenes lost his eye from the wound but was not killed.

3So one of the Magi wounded these; the other, as the bow was no use to him, fled into a chamber adjoining the men's apartment and would have shut its door.

4Two of the seven flung into the room with him, Darius and Gobryas; as Gobryas and the Magus wrestled together, Darius stood helpless in the darkness, afraid of stabbing Gobryas.

5Gobryas, seeing Darius stand helpless, asked why he did not lend a hand; and he said, “Because I am afraid for you, that I might stab you.” And Gobryas answered, “Stick your sword even if it goes through us both.” So Darius complying stabbed with his knife and somehow stuck the Magus.

Chapter 79

1When they had killed the Magi and cut off their heads, they left their wounded there because of their infirmity and for the sake of guarding the acropolis, while five of them carrying the Magi's heads ran outside with much shouting and commotion, calling all Persians to aid, telling what they had done and showing the heads; at the same time they killed every Magus that came in their way.

2The Persians, when they learned what had been done by the seven and how the Magi had tricked them, resolved to follow the example set, and drew their daggers and killed all the Magi they could find; and if nightfall had not stopped them they would not have left one Magus alive.

3This day is the greatest holy day that all Persians alike keep; they celebrate a great festival on it, which they call the Massacre of the Magi; while the festival lasts no Magus may go outdoors, but during this day the Magi remain in their houses.

Chapter 80

1After the tumult quieted down, and five days passed, the rebels against the Magi held a council on the whole state of affairs, at which sentiments were uttered which to some Greeks seem incredible, but there is no doubt that they were spoken.

2Otanes was for turning the government over to the Persian people: “It seems to me,” he said, “that there can no longer be a single sovereign over us, for that is not pleasant or good. You saw the insolence of Cambyses, how far it went, and you had your share of the insolence of the Magus.

3How can monarchy be a fit thing, when the ruler can do what he wants with impunity? Give this power to the best man on earth, and it would stir him to unaccustomed thoughts. Insolence is created in him by the good things to hand, while from birth envy is rooted in man.

4Acquiring the two he possesses complete evil; for being satiated he does many reckless things, some from insolence, some from envy. And yet an absolute ruler ought to be free of envy, having all good things; but he becomes the opposite of this towards his citizens; he envies the best who thrive and live, and is pleased by the worst of his fellows; and he is the best confidant of slander.

5Of all men he is the most inconsistent; for if you admire him modestly he is angry that you do not give him excessive attention, but if one gives him excessive attention he is angry because one is a flatter. But I have yet worse to say of him than that; he upsets the ancestral ways and rapes women and kills indiscriminately.

6But the rule of the multitude has in the first place the loveliest name of all, equality, and does in the second place none of the things that a monarch does. It determines offices by lot, and holds power accountable, and conducts all deliberating publicly. Therefore I give my opinion that we make an end of monarchy and exalt the multitude, for all things are possible for the majority.”

Chapter 81

1Such was the judgment of Otanes: but Megabyzus urged that they resort to an oligarchy. “I agree,” said he, “with all that Otanes says against the rule of one; but when he tells you to give the power to the multitude, his judgment strays from the best. Nothing is more foolish and violent than a useless mob;

2for men fleeing the insolence of a tyrant to fall victim to the insolence of the unguided populace is by no means to be tolerated. Whatever the one does, he does with knowledge, but for the other knowledge is impossible; how can they have knowledge who have not learned or seen for themselves what is best, but always rush headlong and drive blindly onward, like a river in flood?

3Let those like democracy who wish ill to Persia; but let us choose a group of the best men and invest these with the power. For we ourselves shall be among them, and among the best men it is likely that there will be the best counsels.”

Chapter 82

1Such was the judgment of Megabyzus. Darius was the third to express his opinion. “It seems to me,” he said, “that Megabyzus speaks well concerning democracy but not concerning oligarchy. For if the three are proposed and all are at their best for the sake of argument, the best democracy and oligarchy and monarchy, I hold that monarchy is by far the most excellent.

2One could describe nothing better than the rule of the one best man; using the best judgment, he will govern the multitude with perfect wisdom, and best conceal plans made for the defeat of enemies.

3But in an oligarchy, the desire of many to do the state good service often produces bitter hate among them; for because each one wishes to be first and to make his opinions prevail, violent hate is the outcome, from which comes faction and from faction killing, and from killing it reverts to monarchy, and by this is shown how much better monarchy is.

4Then again, when the people rule it is impossible that wickedness will not occur; and when wickedness towards the state occurs, hatred does not result among the wicked, but strong alliances; for those that want to do the state harm conspire to do it together. This goes on until one of the people rises to stop such men. He therefore becomes the people's idol, and being their idol is made their monarch; and thus he also proves that monarchy is best.

5But (to conclude the whole matter in one word) tell me, where did freedom come from for us and who gave it, from the people or an oligarchy or a single ruler? I believe, therefore, that we who were liberated through one man should maintain such a government, and, besides this, that we should not alter our ancestral ways that are good; that would not be better.”

Chapter 83

1Having to choose between these three options, four of the seven men preferred the last. Then Otanes, whose proposal to give the Persians equality was defeated, spoke thus among them all:

2“Fellow partisans, it is plain that one of us must be made king (whether by lot, or entrusted with the office by the choice of the Persians, or in some other way), but I shall not compete with you; I desire neither to rule nor to be ruled; but if I waive my claim to be king, I make this condition, that neither I nor any of my descendants shall be subject to any one of you.”

3To these terms the six others agreed; Otanes took no part in the contest but stood aside; and to this day his house (and no other in Persia ) remains free, and is ruled only so far as it is willing to be, so long as it does not transgress Persian law.

Chapter 84

1The rest of the seven then considered what was the fairest way of making a king; and they decided that if another of the seven than Otanes should gain the royal power, that Otanes and his descendants should receive a yearly gift of Median clothing and everything else that the Persians hold most valuable. The reason for this decision was that it was he who had first planned the matter and assembled the conspirators.

2For Otanes, then, they choose this particular honor; but with regard to all of them they decreed that any one of the seven should, if he wished, enter the king's palace unannounced, except when the king was sleeping with a woman; and that the king should be forbidden to take a wife except from the households of the conspirators.

3As for the making of a king, they decided that he should be elected whose horse, after they were all in their saddles in the suburb of the city, should first be heard to neigh at sunrise.

Chapter 85

1Now Darius had a clever groom, whose name was Oebares. When the council broke up, Darius said to him: “Oebares, we have resolved to do as follows about the kingship: he shall be elected whose horse, after we are all mounted on our horses in the suburb of the city, neighs first at sunrise. Now if you have any cunning, figure out how we and no one else can win this prize.”

2“Master,” Oebares answered, “if this is to determine whether you become king or not, be confident for this reason and have an easy mind, for no one else shall be king before you, such are the tricks I have.” “Then,” said Darius, “if you have any trick such as you say, use it and don't put it off, for tomorrow is the day of decision.”

3When Oebares heard that, he did as follows. At nightfall he brought one of the mares which Darius' horse particularly favored, and tethered her in the suburb of the city; then bringing Darius' horse, he repeatedly led him near the horse, bumping against the mare, and at last let the horse mount.

Chapter 86

1At dawn of day the six came on horseback as they had agreed. As they rode out through the suburb and came to the place where the mare had been tethered in the past night, Darius' horse trotted forward and whinnied;

2and as he so did there came lightning and thunder out of a clear sky. These signs given to Darius were thought to be foreordained and made his election perfect; his companions leapt from their horses and bowed to him.

Chapter 87

1Some say that this was Oebares' plan; but there is another story in Persia besides this: that he rubbed this mare's vulva with his hand, which he then kept inside his clothing until the six were about to let go their horses at sunrise, when he took his hand out and held it to the nostrils of Darius' horse, which at once snorted and whinnied.

Chapter 88

1So Darius son of Hystaspes was made king, and the whole of Asia, which Cyrus first and Cambyses after him had conquered, was subject to him, except the Arabians; these did not yield as of slaves to the Persians, but were united to them by friendship, having given Cambyses passage into Egypt, which the Persians could not enter without the consent of the Arabians.

2Darius took wives from the noblest houses of Persia, marrying Cyrus' daughters Atossa and Artystone; Atossa had been a wife of her brother Cambyses and afterwards of the Magus; Artystone was a virgin.

3He also married a daughter of Cyrus' son Smerdis, whose name was Parmys, and the daughter of Otanes who had discovered the truth about the Magus; and everything was full of his power. First he made and set up a carved stone, upon which was cut the figure of a horseman, with this inscription: “Darius son of Hystaspes, aided by the excellence of his horse” (here followed the horse's name) “and of Oebares his groom, got possession of the kingdom of Persia.”

Chapter 89

1Having done these things in Persia, he divided his dominions into twenty provinces, which they call satrapies; and having divided his dominions and appointed governors, he instructed each people to pay him tribute, consolidating neighboring peoples and distributing outlying peoples among different provinces, passing over those adjoining.

2I will now show how he divided his provinces and the tributes which were paid him yearly. Those that paid in silver were required to render the weight of a Babylonian talent; those that paid in gold, of a Euboic talent; the Babylonian talent being equal to seventy-eight Euboic minae.

3In the reigns of Cyrus and Cambyses after him there was no fixed tribute, but payment was made in gifts. It is because of this fixing of tribute, and other similar ordinances, that the Persians called Darius the merchant, Cambyses the master, and Cyrus the father; for Darius made petty profit out of everything, Cambyses was harsh and arrogant, Cyrus was merciful and always worked for their well-being.

Chapter 90

1The Ionians, Magnesians of Asia, Aeolians, Carians, Lycians, Milyans, and Pamphylians, on whom Darius laid one joint tribute, paid a revenue of four hundred talents of silver. This was established as his first province. The Mysians, Lydians, Lasonians, Cabalians, and Hytennians paid five hundred talents; this was the second province.

2The third comprised the Hellespontians on the right of the entrance of the straits, the Phrygians, Thracians of Asia, Paphlagonians, Mariandynians, and Syrians; these paid three hundred and sixty talents of tribute.

3The fourth province was Cilicia. This rendered three hundred and sixty white horses, one for each day in the year, and five hundred talents of silver. A hundred and forty of these were expended on the horsemen who were the guard of Cilicia; the three hundred and sixty that remained were paid to Darius.

Chapter 91

1The fifth province was the country (except the part belonging to the Arabians, which paid no tribute) between Posideion, a city founded on the Cilician and Syrian border by Amphilochus son of Amphiaraus, and Egypt; this paid three hundred and fifty talents; in this province was all Phoenicia, and the part of Syria called Palestine, and Cyprus.

2The sixth province was Egypt and the neighboring parts of Libya, and Cyrene and Barca, all of which were included in the province of Egypt. From here came seven hundred talents, besides the income in silver from the fish of the lake Moeris;

3besides that silver and the assessment of grain that was given also, seven hundred talents were paid; for a hundred and twenty thousand bushels of grain were also assigned to the Persians quartered at the White Wall of Memphis and their allies.

4The Sattagydae, Gandarii, Dadicae, and Aparytae paid together a hundred and seventy talents; this was the seventh province; the eighth was Susa and the rest of the Cissian country, paying three hundred talents.

Chapter 92

1From Babylon and the rest of Assyria came to Darius a thousand talents of silver and five hundred castrated boys; this was the ninth province; Ecbatana and the rest of Media, with the Paricanians and Orthocorybantians, paid four hundred and fifty talents, and was the tenth province.

2The eleventh comprised the Caspii, Pausicae, Pantimathi, and Daritae, paying jointly two hundred;

Chapter 93

1The twelfth, the Bactrians as far as the land of the Aegli; these paid three hundred and sixty. The thirteenth, the Pactyic country and Armenia and the lands adjoining as far as the Euxine sea; these paid four hundred.

2The fourteenth province was made up of the Sagartii, Sarangeis, Thamanaei, Utii, Myci, and the inhabitants of those islands of the southern sea on which the king settles the so-called displaced people; these together paid a tribute of six hundred talents.

3The Sacae and Caspii were the fifteenth, paying two hundred and fifty. The Parthians, Chorasmians, Sogdi, and Arii were the sixteenth, paying three hundred.

Chapter 94

1The Paricanii and Ethiopians of Asia, the seventeenth, paid four hundred; the Matieni, Saspiri, and Alarodii were the eighteenth, and two hundred talents were the appointed tribute.

2The Moschi, Tibareni, Macrones, Mossynoeci, and Mares, the nineteenth province, were ordered to pay three hundred. The Indians made up the twentieth province. These are more in number than any nation of which we know, and they paid a greater tribute than any other province, namely three hundred and sixty talents of gold dust.

Chapter 95

1Now if these Babylonian silver talents be calculated in Euboic money, the sum is seen to be nine thousand eight hundred and eighty Euboic talents:

2and the gold coin being thirteen times the value of the silver, the gold-dust is found to be worth four thousand six hundred and eighty Euboic talents. Therefore it is seen by adding all together that Darius collected a yearly tribute of fourteen thousand five hundred and sixty talents; I take no account of figures less than ten.

Chapter 96

1This was Darius' revenue from Asia and a few parts of Libya. But as time went on he drew tribute also from the islands and the dwellers in Europe, as far as Thessaly.

2The tribute is stored by the king in this fashion: he melts it down and pours it into earthen vessels; when the vessel is full he breaks the earthenware away, and when he needs money coins as much as serves his purpose.

Chapter 97

1These were the governments and appointments of tribute. The Persian country is the only one which I have not recorded as tributary; for the Persians live free from all taxes.

2As for those on whom no tribute was laid, but who rendered gifts instead, they were, firstly, the Ethiopians nearest to Egypt, whom Cambyses conquered in his march towards the long-lived Ethiopians; and also those who dwell about the holy Nysa, where Dionysus is the god of their festivals. These Ethiopians and their neighbors use the same seed as the Indian Callantiae, and they live underground.

3These together brought every other year and still bring a gift of two choenixes of unrefined gold, two hundred blocks of ebony, five Ethiopian boys, and twenty great elephants' tusks.

4Gifts were also required of the Colchians and their neighbors as far as the Caucasus mountains (which is as far as the Persian rule reaches, the country north of the Caucasus paying no regard to the Persians); these were rendered every four years and are still rendered, namely, a hundred boys and as many maids.

5The Arabians rendered a thousand talents' weight of frankincense yearly. Such were the gifts of these peoples to the king, besides the tribute.

Chapter 98

1All this abundance of gold, from which the Indians send the aforementioned gold-dust to the king, they obtain in the following way.

2To the east of the Indian country is sand. Of all the people of Asia whom we know - even those about whom something is said with precision - the Indians dwell nearest to the dawn and the rising sun; for on the eastern side of India all is desolate because of the sand.

3There are many Indian nations, none speaking the same language; some of them are nomads, some not; some dwell in the river marshes and live on raw fish, which they catch from reed boats. Each boat is made of one joint of reed.

4These Indians wear clothes of bullrushes; they mow and cut these from the river, then weave them crosswise like a mat, and wear them like a breastplate.

Chapter 99

1Other Indians, to the east of these, are nomads and eat raw flesh; they are called Padaei. It is said to be their custom that when anyone of their fellows, whether man or woman, is sick, a man's closest friends kill him, saying that if wasted by disease he will be lost to them as meat; though he denies that he is sick, they will not believe him, but kill and eat him.

2When a woman is sick, she is put to death like the men by the women who are her close acquaintances. As for one that has come to old age, they sacrifice him and feast on his flesh; but not many reach this reckoning, for before that everyone who falls ill they kill.

Chapter 100

1There are other Indians, again, who kill no living creature, nor plant anything, nor are accustomed to have houses; they eat grass, and they have a grain growing naturally from the earth in its husk, about the size of a millet-seed, which they gather with the husk and boil and eat. When any one of them falls sick, he goes into the desert and lies there, and no one notices whether he is sick or dies.

Chapter 101

1These Indians whom I have described have intercourse openly like cattle; they are all black-skinned, like the Ethiopians.

2Their semen too, which they ejaculate into the women, is not white like other men's, but black like their skin, and resembles in this respect that of the Ethiopians. These Indians dwell far away from the Persians southwards, and were not subjects of King Darius.

Chapter 102

1Other Indians dwell near the town of Caspatyrus and the Pactyic country, north of the rest of India; these live like the Bactrians; they are of all Indians the most warlike, and it is they who are sent for the gold; for in these parts all is desolate because of the sand.

2In this sandy desert are ants, not as big as dogs but bigger than foxes; the Persian king has some of these, which have been caught there. These ants live underground, digging out the sand in the same way as the ants in Greece, to which they are very similar in shape, and the sand which they carry from the holes is full of gold.

3It is for this sand that the Indians set forth into the desert. They harness three camels apiece, males on either side sharing the drawing, and a female in the middle: the man himself rides on the female, that when harnessed has been taken away from as young an offspring as may be. Their camels are as swift as horses, and much better able to bear burdens besides.

Chapter 103

1I do not describe the camel's appearance to Greeks, for they know it; but I shall tell them something that they do not know concerning it: the hindlegs of the camel have four thighbones and four knee-joints; its genitals are turned towards the tail between the hindlegs.

Chapter 104

1Thus and with teams so harnessed the Indians ride after the gold, being careful to be engaged in taking it when the heat is greatest; for the ants are then out of sight underground.

2Now in these parts the sun is hottest in the morning, not at midday as elsewhere, but from sunrise to the hour of market-closing. Through these hours it is much hotter than in Hellas at noon, so that men are said to sprinkle themselves with water at this time.

3At midday the sun's heat is nearly the same in India as elsewhere. As it goes to afternoon, the sun of India has the power of the morning sun in other lands; as day declines it becomes ever cooler, until at sunset it is exceedingly cold.

Chapter 105

1So when the Indians come to the place with their sacks, they fill these with the sand and drive back as fast as possible; for the ants at once scent them out, the Persians say, and give chase. They say nothing is equal to them for speed, so that unless the Indians have a headstart while the ants were gathering, not one of them would get away.

2They cut loose the male trace-camels, which are slower than the females, as they begin to lag, one at a time; the mares never tire, for they remember the young that they have left. Such is the tale. Most of the gold (say the Persians) is got in this way by the Indians; they dig some from mines in their country, too, but it is less abundant.

Chapter 106

1The most outlying nations of the world have somehow drawn the finest things as their lot, exactly as Greece has drawn the possession of far the best seasons.

2As I have lately said, India lies at the world's most distant eastern limit; and in India all living creatures four-footed and flying are much bigger than those of other lands, except the horses, which are smaller than the Median horses called Nesaean; moreover, the gold there, whether dug from the earth or brought down by rivers or got as I have described, is very abundant.

3There, too, wool more beautiful and excellent than the wool of sheep grows on wild trees; these trees supply the Indians with clothing.

Chapter 107

1Again, Arabia is the most distant to the south of all inhabited countries: and this is the only country which produces frankincense and myrrh and casia and cinnamon and gum-mastich. All these except myrrh are difficult for the Arabians to get.

2They gather frankincense by burning that storax which Phoenicians carry to Hellas; they burn this and so get the frankincense; for the spice-bearing trees are guarded by small winged snakes of varied color, many around each tree; these are the snakes that attack Egypt. Nothing except the smoke of storax will drive them away from the trees.

Chapter 108

1The Arabians also say that the whole country would be full of these snakes if the same thing did not occur among them that I believe occurs among vipers.

2Somehow the forethought of God (just as is reasonable) being wise has made all creatures prolific that are timid and edible, so that they do not become extinct through being eaten, whereas few young are born to hardy and vexatious creatures.

3On the one hand, because the hare is hunted by every beast and bird and man, therefore it is quite prolific; alone of all creatures it conceives during pregnancy; some of the unborn young are hairy, some still naked, some are still forming in the womb while others are just conceived.

4On the one hand there is this sort of thing, but on the other hand the lioness, that is so powerful and so bold, once in her life bears one cub; for in the act of bearing she casts her uterus out with her cub. The explanation of this is that when the cub first begins to stir in the mother, its claws, much sharper than those of any other creature, tear the uterus, and the more it grows the more it scratches and tears, so that when the hour of birth is near seldom is any of the uterus left intact.

Chapter 109

1So too if the vipers and the winged serpents of Arabia were born in the natural manner of serpents life would be impossible for men; but as it is, when they copulate, while the male is in the act of procreation and as soon as he has ejaculated his seed, the female seizes him by the neck, and does not let go until she has bitten through.

2The male dies in the way described, but the female suffers in return for the male the following punishment: avenging their father, the young while they are still within the womb gnaw at their mother and eating through her bowels thus make their way out.

3Other snakes, that do no harm to men, lay eggs and hatch out a vast number of young. The Arabian winged serpents do indeed seem to be numerous; but that is because (although there are vipers in every land) these are all in Arabia and are found nowhere else.

Chapter 110

1The Arabians get frankincense in the foregoing way, and casia in the following way: when they go after it they bind oxhides and other skins all over their bodies and faces except for the eyes. Casia grows in a shallow lake; around this and in it live winged creatures, very like bats, that squeak similarly and make a fierce resistance; these have to be kept away from the eyes in order to take the casia.

Chapter 111

1As for cinnamon, they gather it in an even stranger way. Where it comes from and what land produces it they cannot say, except that it is reported, reasonably enough, to grow in the places where Dionysus was reared.

2There are great birds, it is said, that take these dry sticks which we have learned from the Phoenicians to call cinnamon and carry them off to nests stuck with mud to precipitous cliffs, where man has no means of approach.

3The Arabian solution to this is to cut dead oxen and asses and other beasts of burden into the largest possible pieces, then to set these near the eyries and withdraw far off. The birds then fly down (it is said) and carry the pieces of the beasts up to their nests, while these, not being able to bear the weight, break and fall down the mountain side, and then the Arabians come and gather them up. Thus is cinnamon said to be gathered, and so to come from Arabia to other lands.

Chapter 112

1But ledanon, which the Arabians call ladanon, is produced yet more strangely than this. For it is the most fragrant thing produced in the most malodorous; for it is found in he-goats' beards, forming in them like gum among timber. This is used in the manufacture of many perfumes; there is nothing that the Arabians burn so often as incense.

Chapter 113

1Enough of marvels, and yet the land of Arabia gives off a scent as sweet as if divine. They have besides two marvellous kinds of sheep, found nowhere else. One of these has tails no less than nine feet long. Were the sheep to trail these after them they would suffer by the chafing of the tails on the ground;

2but every shepherd there knows enough of carpentry to make little carts which they fix under the tails, binding the tail of each sheep on its own cart. The other kind of sheep has a tail a full three feet broad.

Chapter 114

1Where south inclines westwards, the part of the world stretching farthest towards the sunset is Ethiopia; this produces gold in abundance, and huge elephants, and all sorts of wild trees, and ebony, and the tallest and handsomest and longest-lived people.

Chapter 115

1These then are the most distant lands in Asia and Libya. But concerning those in Europe that are the farthest away towards evening, I cannot speak with assurance; for I do not believe that there is a river called by foreigners Eridanus issuing into the northern sea, where our amber is said to come from, nor do I have any knowledge of Tin Islands, where our tin is brought from.

2The very name Eridanus betrays itself as not a foreign but a Greek name, invented by some poet; nor for all my diligence have I been able to learn from one who has seen it that there is a sea beyond Europe. All we know is that our tin and amber come from the most distant parts.

Chapter 116

1But in the north of Europe there is by far the most gold. In this matter again I cannot say with assurance how the gold is produced, but it is said that one-eyed men called Arimaspians steal it from griffins.

2But I do not believe this, that there are one-eyed men who have a nature otherwise the same as other men.

3The most outlying lands, though, as they enclose and wholly surround all the rest of the world, are likely to have those things which we think the finest and the rarest.

Chapter 117

1There is a plain in Asia shut in on all sides by mountains through which there are five passes. This plain was once the Chorasmians', being at the boundaries of the Chorasmians, the Hyrcanians, Parthians, Sarangians, and Thamanaei, but since the Persians have held power it has been the king's.

2Now from the encircling mountains flows a great river whose name is the Aces. Its stream divides into five channels and formerly watered the lands of the above-mentioned peoples, going to each through a different pass, but since the beginning of the Persian rule

3the king has blocked the mountain passes, and closed each passage with a gate; with the water barred from outlet, the plain within the mountains becomes a lake, seeing that the river pours into it and finds no way out.

4Those therefore who before were accustomed to use the water endure great hardship in not being able to use it; for during the winter, god rains for them just as for the rest of mankind, but in the summer they are in need of the water for their sown millet and sesame.

5So whenever no water is given to them, they come into Persia with their women, and cry and howl before the door of the king's palace, until the king commands that the river-gate should be opened for those whose need is greatest;

6then, when this land has drunk its fill of water, that gate is shut, and the king has another opened for those of the rest who most require it. I know by hearsay that he gets a lot of money, over and above the tribute, for opening the gates. So much for these matters.

Chapter 118

1Of the seven men who revolted against the Magus, one, Intaphrenes, got his death through his own violence immediately after the rebellion. He wanted to enter the palace and speak with the king; and in fact the law was, that the rebels against the Magus could come into the king's presence unannounced, if the king were not having intercourse with one of his wives.

2Intaphrenes, as one of the seven, claimed his right to enter unannounced; but the gatekeeper and the messenger forbade him, telling him that the king was having intercourse with one of his wives. Intaphrenes thought that they were lying; drawing his scimitar he cut off their noses and ears, then strung these on his horse's bridle and hung it around the men's necks, and so let them go.

Chapter 119

1They showed themselves to the king and told him why they had been treated so. Darius, fearing that the six had done this by common consent, sent for each and asked his opinion, whether they approved what had been done;

2and being assured that they had no part in it, he seized Intaphrenes with his sons and all his household—for he strongly suspected that the man was plotting a rebellion with his kinsmen—and imprisoned them with the intention of putting them to death.

3Then Intaphrenes' wife began coming to the palace gates, weeping and lamenting; and by continuing to do this same thing she persuaded Darius to pity her; and he sent a messenger to tell her, “Woman, King Darius will allow one of your imprisoned relatives to survive, whomever you prefer of them all.”

4After considering she answered, “If indeed the king gives me the life of one, I chose from them all my brother.”

5Darius was astonished when he heard her answer, and sent someone who asked her: “Woman, the king asks you with what in mind you abandon your husband and your children and choose to save the life of your brother, who is less close to you than your children and less dear than your husband?”

6“O King,” she answered, “I may have another husband, if a god is willing, and other children, if I lose these; but since my father and mother are no longer living, there is no way that I can have another brother; I said what I did with that in mind.”

7Darius thought that the woman answered well, and for her sake he released the one for whom she had asked, and the eldest of her sons as well; he put to death all the rest. Thus immediately perished one of the seven.

Chapter 120

1While Cambyses was still ill, the following events occurred. The governor of Sardis appointed by Cyrus was Oroetes, a Persian. This man had an impious desire; for although he had not been injured or spoken badly of by Polycrates of Samos, and had in fact never even seen him before, he desired to seize and kill him, for the following reason, most people say.

2As Oroetes and another Persian whose name was Mitrobates, governor of the province at Dascyleium, sat at the king's doors, they fell from talking to quarreling; and as they compared their achievements Mitrobates said to Oroetes,

3“You are not to be reckoned a man; the island of Samos lies close to your province, yet you have not added it to the king's dominion—an island so easy to conquer that some native of it revolted against his rulers with fifteen hoplites, and is now lord of it.”

4Some say that Oroetes, angered by this reproach, did not so much desire to punish the source of it as to destroy Polycrates utterly, the occasion of the reproach.

Chapter 121

1A few people, however, say that when Oroetes sent a herald to Samos with some request (it is not said what this was), the herald found Polycrates lying in the men's apartments, in the company of Anacreon of Teos;

2and, whether on purpose to show contempt for Oroetes, or by mere chance, when Oroetes' herald entered and addressed him, Polycrates, then lying with his face to the wall, never turned or answered him.

Chapter 122

1These are the two reasons alleged for Polycrates' death; believe whichever you like. But the consequence was that Oroetes, then at Magnesia which is above the river Maeander, sent Myrsus son of Gyges, a Lydian, with a message to Samos, having learned Polycrates' intention;

2for Polycrates was the first of the Greeks whom we know to aim at the mastery of the sea, leaving out of account Minos of Cnossus and any others who before him may have ruled the sea; of what may be called the human race Polycrates was the first, and he had great hope of ruling Ionia and the Islands.

3Learning then that he had this intention, Oroetes sent him this message: “Oroetes addresses Polycrates as follows: I find that you aim at great things, but that you have not sufficient money for your purpose. Do then as I direct, and you will succeed yourself and will save me. King Cambyses aims at my death; of this I have clear intelligence.

4Now if you will transport me and my money, you may take some yourself and let me keep the rest; thus you shall have wealth enough to rule all Hellas. If you mistrust what I tell you about the money, send someone who is most trusted by you and I will prove it to him.”

Chapter 123

1Hearing this, Polycrates was pleased and willing; and since he had a great desire for money he first sent one of his townsmen, Maeandrius, son of Maeandrius, to have a look; this man was his scribe; it was he who not long afterwards dedicated in the Heraeum all the splendid furnishings of the men's apartment in Polycrates' house.

2When Oroetes heard that an inspection was imminent, he filled eight chests with stones, leaving only a very shallow space at the top; then he laid gold on top of the stones, locked the chests, and kept them ready. Maeandrius came and saw, and brought word back to his master.

Chapter 124

1Polycrates then prepared to visit Oroetes, despite the strong dissuasion of his diviners and friends, and a vision seen by his daughter in a dream; she dreamt that she saw her father in the air overhead being washed by Zeus and anointed by Helios;

2after this vision she used all means to persuade him not to go on this journey to Oroetes; even as he went to his fifty-oared ship she prophesied evil for him. When Polycrates threatened her that if he came back safe, she would long remain unmarried, she answered with a prayer that his threat might be fulfilled: for she would rather, she said, long remain unmarried than lose her father.

Chapter 125

1But Polycrates would listen to no advice. He sailed to meet Oroetes, with a great retinue of followers, among whom was Democedes, son of Calliphon, a man of Croton and the most skillful physician of his time.

2But no sooner had Polycrates come to Magnesia than he was horribly murdered in a way unworthy of him and of his aims; for, except for the sovereigns of Syracuse, no sovereign of Greek race is fit to be compared with Polycrates for magnificence.

3Having killed him in some way not fit to be told, Oroetes then crucified him; as for those who had accompanied him, he let the Samians go, telling them to thank him that they were free; those who were not Samians, or were servants of Polycrates' followers, he kept for slaves.

4And Polycrates hanging in the air fulfilled his daughter's vision in every detail; for he was washed by Zeus when it rained, and he was anointed by Helios as he exuded sweat from his body.

Chapter 126

1This was the end of Polycrates' string of successes [as Amasis king of Egypt had forewarned him]. But not long after, atonement for Polycrates overtook Oroetes. After the death of Cambyses and the rule of the Magi, Oroetes stayed in Sardis, where he did not help the Persians in any way to regain the power taken from them by the Medes,

2but, to the contrary, in this confusion killed two prominent Persians, Mitrobates, the governor from Dascyleium, who had taunted him about Polycrates, and Mitrobates' son Cranaspes; and on top of many other violent acts, he set an ambush down the road after a messenger from Darius came with a message which displeased him and killed that messenger on his homeward journey, and concealed the man's body and horse.

Chapter 127

1So when Darius became king, he wanted to punish Oroetes for all his wrongdoing, and especially for killing Mitrobates and his son. But he thought it best not to send an army openly against the satrap, seeing that everything was still in confusion and he was still new to the royal power; moreover he heard that Oroetes was very powerful, having a guard of a thousand Persian spearmen and being governor of the Phrygian and Lydian and Ionian province.

2He had recourse, then, to the following expedient: having summoned an assembly of the most prominent Persians, he addressed them as follows: “Persians, which of you will promise to do this for me, not with force and numbers, but by cunning? Where there is need for cunning, force has no business.

3So then, which of you would either bring me Oroetes alive or kill him? For he has done the Persians no good, but much harm; he has destroyed two of us, Mitrobates and his son, and is killing my messengers that are sent to recall him, displaying an insolence that is not to be borne. So, then, before he does the Persians some still greater harm, he has to be punished by us with death.”

Chapter 128

1Darius asked this and thirty men promised, each wanting to do it himself. Darius told them not argue but draw lots; they did, and the lot fell to Bagaeus, son of Artontes.

2Bagaeus, having drawn the lot, did as follows: he had many letters written concerning many things and put the seal of Darius on them, and then went with them to Sardis.

3When he got there and came into Oroetes' presence, he took out each letter in turn and gave it to one of the royal scribes to read (all of the governors of the King have scribes); Bagaeus gave the letters to test the spearmen, whether they would consent to revolt against Oroetes.

4Seeing that they were greatly affected by the rolls and yet more by what was written in them, he gave another, in which were these words: “Persians! King Darius forbids you to be Oroetes' guard.” Hearing this, they lowered their spears for him.

5When Bagaeus saw that they obeyed the letter so far, he was encouraged and gave the last roll to the scribe, in which was written: “King Darius instructs the Persians in Sardis to kill Oroetes.” Hearing this the spearmen drew their scimitars and killed him at once. Thus atonement for Polycrates the Samian overtook Oroetes the Persian.

Chapter 129

1Oroetes' slaves and other possessions were brought to Susa. Not long after this, it happened that Darius twisted his foot in dismounting from his horse while hunting

2so violently that the ball of the ankle joint was dislocated from its socket. Darius called in the best physicians of Egypt, whom he had until now kept near his person. But by violently twisting the foot they made the injury worse;

3and for seven days and nights the king could not sleep because of the pain. On the eighth day, when he was doing poorly, someone who had heard in Sardis of the skill of Democedes of Croton told Darius of him; and he told them to bring him as quickly as possible. When they found him among the slaves of Oroetes, where he was forgotten, they brought him along, dragging his chains and dressed in rags.

Chapter 130

1Darius asked him when he was brought in if he were trained in medicine. He refused to admit it, for he was afraid that if he revealed himself he would be cut off from Hellas for good.

2It was clear to Darius, however, that he was trained in deceit, and he ordered those who had brought him to bring along scourges and goads. Then he confessed, saying that his training was not exact, but that he had associated with a physician and had a passing acquaintance with medicine.

3But when Darius turned the case over to him and Democedes applied Greek remedies and used gentleness instead of the Egyptians' violence, he enabled him to sleep and in a short time had him well, although Darius had had no hope of regaining the use of his foot.

4After this, Darius rewarded him with a gift of two pairs of golden fetters. “Is it your purpose,” Democedes asked, “to double my pains for making you well?” Pleased by the retort, Darius sent him to his own wives. The eunuchs who conducted him told the women that this was the man who had given the king his life back.

5Each of them took a bowl and dipped it in a chest full of gold, so richly rewarding Democedes that the servant accompanying him, whose name was Sciton, collected a very great sum of gold by picking up the staters that fell from the bowls.

Chapter 131

1Now this is how Democedes had come from Croton to live with Polycrates: he was oppressed by a harsh-tempered father at Croton; since he could not stand him, he left him and went to Aegina. Within the first year after settling there, he excelled the rest of the physicians, although he had no equipment nor any medical implements.

2In his second year the Aeginetans paid him a talent to be their public physician; in the third year the Athenians hired him for a hundred minae, and Polycrates in the fourth year for two talents. Thus he came to Samos, and not least because of this man the physicians of Croton were well-respected [

3for at this time the best physicians in Greek countries were those of Croton, and next to them those of Cyrene. About the same time the Argives had the name of being the best musicians].

Chapter 132

1So now because he had healed Darius at Susa Democedes had a very grand house and ate at the king's table; he had everything, except permission to return to the Greeks.

2When the Egyptian physicians who until now had attended the king were about to be impaled for being less skilful than a Greek, Democedes interceded with the king for them and saved them; and he saved an Elean seer, too, who had been a retainer of Polycrates' and was forgotten among the slaves. Democedes was a man of considerable influence with the King.

Chapter 133

1A short time after this, something else occurred; there was a swelling on the breast of Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus and wife of Darius, which broke and spread further. As long as it was small, she hid it out of shame and told no one; but when it got bad, she sent for Democedes and showed it to him.

2He said he would cure her, but made her swear that she would repay him by granting whatever he asked of her, and said that he would ask nothing shameful.

Chapter 134

1And after he treated her and did cure her, Atossa addressed Darius in their chamber as she had been instructed by Democedes: “O King, although you have so much power you are idle, acquiring no additional people or power for the Persians.

2The right thing for a man who is both young and the master of great wealth is to be seen aggrandizing himself, so that the Persians know too that they are ruled by a man. On two counts it is in your interest to do this, both so that the Persians know that their leader is a man, and so that they be occupied by war and not have time to plot against you.

3You should show some industry now, while you are still young: for sense grows with the growing body, but grows old too with the aging body and loses its edge for all purposes.”

4She said this as instructed, but he replied with this: “Woman, what you have said is exactly what I had in mind to do. For I have planned to make a bridge from this continent to the other continent and lead an army against the Scythians; and this will be done in a short time.”

5“Look,” Atossa said, “let the Scythians go for the present; you shall have them whenever you like; I tell you, march against Hellas. I have heard of Laconian and Argive and Attic and Corinthian women, and would like to have them as servants. You have a man who is fitter than any other to instruct and guide you in everything concerning Hellas: I mean the physician who healed your foot.”

6Darius answered, “Woman, since you think that we should make an attempt on Greece first, it seems to me to be best that we first send Persian spies with the man whom you mention, who shall tell us everything that they learn and observe; and then when I am fully informed I shall rouse myself against them.”

Chapter 135

1He said this, and no sooner said than did it. For the next day at dawn he summoned fifteen prominent Persians, and instructed them to go with Democedes and sail along the coast of Hellas; telling them, too, by all means to bring the physician back and not let him escape.

2Having given these instructions to them, he then sent for Democedes, and asked of him that when he had shown and made clear all of Greece to the Persians, he would come back; and he told him to take all his movable goods to give to his father and siblings, saying that he would give him many times as much in return and would send with him a ship with a cargo of all good things.

3Darius, I think, made this promise without a treacherous intent, but Democedes was afraid that Darius was testing him; therefore he was in no hurry to accept all that was offered, but answered that he would leave his own possessions where they were, so as to have them when he returned; the ship which Darius promised him to carry the gifts for his siblings, he said he would accept. Having given the same instructions to Democedes too, Darius sent them all to the coast.

Chapter 136

1They came down to the city of Sidon in Phoenicia, and there chartered two triremes, as well as a great galley laden with all good things; and when everything was ready they set sail for Hellas, where they surveyed and mapped the coasts to which they came; until having viewed the greater and most famous parts they reached Tarentum in Italy.

2There Aristophilides, king of the Tarentines, out of sympathy for Democedes, took the steering gear off the Median ships and put the Persians under a guard, calling them spies. While they were in this plight, Democedes made his way to Croton; and Aristophilides did not set the Persians free and give them back what he had taken from their ships until the physician was in his own country.

Chapter 137

1The Persians sailed from Tarentum and pursued Democedes to Croton, where they found him in the marketplace and tried to seize him.

2Some Crotoniats, who feared the Persian power, would have given him up; but others resisted and beat the Persians with their sticks. “Men of Croton, watch what you do,” said the Persians; “you are harboring an escaped slave of the King's.

3How do you think King Darius will like this insolence? What good will it do you if he gets away from us? What city will we attack first here? Which will we try to enslave first?”

4But the men of Croton paid no attention to them; so the Persians lost Democedes and the galley with which they had come, and sailed back for Asia, making no attempt to visit and learn of the further parts of Hellas now that their guide was taken from them.

5But Democedes gave them a message as they were setting sail; they should tell Darius, he said, that Democedes was engaged to the daughter of Milon. For Darius held the name of Milon the wrestler in great honor; and, to my thinking, Democedes sought this match and paid a great sum for it to show Darius that he was a man of influence in his own country as well as in Persia.

Chapter 138

1The Persians then put out from Croton; but their ships were wrecked on the coast of Iapygia, and they were made slaves in the country until Gillus, an exile from Tarentum, released and restored them to Darius, who was ready to give him whatever he wanted in return.

2Gillus chose to be restored to Tarentum and told the story of his misfortune; but, so as not to be the occasion of agitating Greece, if on his account a great expedition sailed against Italy, he said that it was enough that the Cnidians alone be his escort; for he supposed that the Tarentines would be the readier to receive him back as the Cnidians were their friends.

3Darius kept his word, and sent a messenger to the men of Cnidos, telling them to take Gillus back to Tarentum. They obeyed Darius; but they could not persuade the Tarentines, and were not able to apply force.

4This is what happened, and these Persians were the first who came from Asia into Hellas, and they came to view the country for this reason.

Chapter 139

1After this, King Darius conquered Samos, the greatest of all city states, Greek or barbarian, the reason for his conquest being this: when Cambyses, son of Cyrus, invaded Egypt, many Greeks came with the army, some to trade, as was natural, and some to see the country itself; among them was Syloson, son of Aeaces, who was Polycrates' brother and in exile from Samos.

2This Syloson had a stroke of good luck. He was in the market at Memphis wearing a red cloak, when Darius, at that time one of Cambyses' guard and as yet a man of no great importance, saw him, and coveting the cloak came and tried to buy it.

3When Syloson saw Darius' eagerness, by good luck he said, “I will not sell this for any money, but I give it to you free if you must have it so much.” Extolling this, Darius accepted the garment.

Chapter 140

1Syloson supposed that he had lost his cloak out of foolish good nature. But in time Cambyses died, the seven rebelled against the Magus, and Darius of the seven came to the throne; Syloson then learned that the successor to the royal power was the man to whom he had given the garment in Egypt; so he went up to Susa and sat in the king's antechamber, saying that he was one of Darius' benefactors.

2When the doorkeeper brought word of this to the king, Darius asked “But to what Greek benefactor can I owe thanks? In the little time since I have been king hardly one of that nation has come to us, and I have, I may say, no use for any Greek. Nevertheless bring him in, so that I may know what he means.”

3The doorkeeper brought Syloson in and the interpreters asked him as he stood there who he was and what he had done to call himself the king's benefactor. Then Syloson told the story of the cloak, and said that it was he who had given it.

4“Most generous man,” said Darius, “it was you who gave me a present when I had as yet no power; and if it was a small one, I was none the less grateful then than I am now when I get a big one. In return, I give you gold and silver in abundance so you may never be sorry that you did Darius son of Hystaspes good.”

5Syloson answered, “Do not give me gold, O king, or silver, but Samos, my country, which our slave has now that my brother Polycrates has been killed by Oroetes; give me this without killing or enslaving.”

Chapter 141

1Having heard this, Darius sent an army and Otanes, one of the seven, to command it, instructing him to do whatever Syloson asked. So Otanes went down to the coast and got his army ready.

Chapter 142

1Now Samos was ruled by Maeandrius, son of Maeandrius, who had authority delegated by Polycrates. He wanted to be the justest of men, but that was impossible.

2For when he learned of Polycrates' death, first he set up an altar to Zeus the Liberator and marked out around it that sacred enclosure which is still to be seen in the suburb of the city; when this had been done, he called an assembly of all the citizens, and addressed them thus:

3“To me, as you know, have come Polycrates' scepter and all of his power, and it is in my power now to rule you. But I, so far as it lies in me, shall not do myself what I blame in my neighbor. I always disliked it that Polycrates or any other man should lord it over men like himself. Polycrates has fulfilled his destiny, and inviting you to share his power I proclaim equality.

4Only I claim for my own privilege that six talents of Polycrates' wealth be set apart for my use, and that I and my descendants keep the priesthood of Zeus the Liberator, whose temple I have founded, and now I give you freedom.”

5Such was Maeandrius' promise to the Samians. But one of them arose and answered: “But you are not even fit to rule us, low-born and vermin, but you had better give an account of the monies that you have handled.”

Chapter 143

1This was the speech of Telesarchus, a man of consequence among the citizens. But Maeandrius, realizing that if he let go of the sovereignty someone else would make himself sovereign instead, resolved not to let it go. Withdrawing into the acropolis, he sent for the citizens individually as if he would give an account of the money; then he seized and bound them.

2So they were imprisoned, and afterwards Maeandrius fell sick. His brother Lycaretus thought him likely to die, and, so that he might the more easily make himself master of Samos, he put all the prisoners to death. They had, it would seem, no desire to be free.

Chapter 144

1So when the Persians brought Syloson back to Samos, no one raised a hand against them, but Maeandrius and those of his faction offered to evacuate the island under a flag of truce; Otanes agreed to this, and after the treaty was made, the Persians of highest rank sat down on seats facing the acropolis.

Chapter 145

1Now Maeandrius the sovereign had a crazy brother named Charilaus, who lay bound in the dungeon for some offense; this man heard what was going on, and by peering through the dungeon window saw the Persians sitting there peaceably;

2whereupon he cried with a loud voice that he wanted to talk to Maeandrius. His brother, hearing him, had Charilaus loosed and brought before him. No sooner had he been brought than he attempted with reviling and abuse to persuade Maeandrius to attack the Persians. “Although I am your brother, you coward,” he said, “and did no wrong deserving of prison, you have bound and imprisoned me; but when you see the Persians throwing you out of house and home, you have no courage to avenge yourself, though you could so easily beat them?

3If you are yourself afraid of them, give me your foreign guards, and I will punish them for coming here; as for you, I will give you safe conduct out of the island.”

Chapter 146

1This was what Charilaus said; and Maeandrius took his advice, to my thinking not because he was so foolish as to suppose that he would be strong enough to defeat the king, but because he did not want Syloson to recover Samos safe and sound with no trouble.

2He wanted therefore by provoking the Persians to weaken Samos as much as he could before surrendering it, for he was well aware that if the Persians were hurt they would be furiously angry with the Samians. Besides, he knew that he could get himself safely off the island whenever he liked, having built a secret passage leading from the acropolis to the sea.

3Maeandrius then set sail from Samos; but Charilaus armed all the guards, opened the acropolis' gates, and attacked the Persians. These supposed that a full agreement had been made, and were taken unawares; the guard fell upon them and killed the Persians of highest rank, those who were carried in litters.

4They were engaged in this when the rest of the Persian force came up in reinforcement, and, hard-pressed, the guards retreated into the acropolis.

Chapter 147

1The Persian captain Otanes, seeing how big a loss the Persians had suffered, deliberately forgot the command given him at his departure by Darius not to kill or enslave any Samian but to deliver the island intact to Syloson; and he commanded his army to kill everyone they took, men and boys alike.

2Then, while some of the Persians laid siege to the acropolis, the rest killed everyone they met, inside the temples and outside the temples alike.

Chapter 148

1Maeandrius sailed to Lacedaemon, escaping from Samos; and after he arrived there and brought up the possessions with which he had left his country, it became his habit to make a display of silver and gold drinking cups; while his servants were cleaning these, he would converse with the king of Sparta, Cleomenes son of Anaxandrides, and would bring him to his house. As Cleomenes marvelled greatly at the cups whenever he saw them, Maeandrius would tell him to take as many as he liked.

2Maeandrius made this offer two or three times; Cleomenes showed his great integrity in that he would not accept; but realizing that there were others in Lacedaemon from whom Maeandrius would get help by offering them the cups, he went to the ephors and told them it would be best for Sparta if this Samian stranger quit the country, lest he persuade Cleomenes himself or some other Spartan to do evil. The ephors listened to his advice and banished Maeandrius by proclamation.

Chapter 149

1As for Samos, the Persians swept it clear and turned it over uninhabited to Syloson. But afterwards Otanes, the Persian general, helped to settle the land, prompted by a dream and a disease that he contracted in his genitals.

Chapter 150

1While the fleet was away at Samos, the Babylonians revolted. They had made very good preparation; for during the reign of the Magus, and the rebellion of the seven, they had taken advantage of the time and the confusion to provision themselves against the siege; and (I cannot tell how) this went undetected.

2At last they revolted openly and did this:—sending away all the mothers, each chose one woman, whomever he liked of his domestics, as a bread-maker; as for the rest, they gathered them together and strangled them so they would not consume their bread.

Chapter 151

1When Darius heard of this, he collected all his forces and led them against Babylon, and he marched up to the town and laid siege to it; but the Babylonians thought nothing of the siege. They came up on to the ramparts of the wall and taunted Darius and his army with gesture and word, and one of them uttered this mot:

2“Why loiter there, Persians, and not go away? You will take us when mules give birth.” One of the Babylonians said this, by no means expecting that a mule would give birth.

Chapter 152

1A year and seven months passed, and Darius and his whole army were bitter because they could not take Babylon. Yet Darius had used every trick and every device against it. He tried the stratagem by which Cyrus took it, and every other stratagem and device, yet with no success; for the Babylonians kept a vigilant watch, and he could not take them.

Chapter 153

1But in the twentieth month of the siege a marvellous thing befell Zopyrus, son of that Megabyzus who was one of the seven destroyers of the Magus: one of his food-carrying mules gave birth. Zopyrus would not believe the news; but when he saw the foal for himself, he told those who had seen it to tell no one;

2then reflecting he recalled the Babylonian's word at the beginning of the siege—that the city would be taken when mules gave birth—and having this utterance in mind he conceived that Babylon might be taken; for the hand of heaven, he supposed, was in the man's word and the birth from his own mule.

Chapter 154

1As soon as he thought that it was Babylon 's fate to fall, he came and inquired of Darius if taking Babylon were very important to him; and when he was assured that it was, he then cast about for a plan by which the city's fall would be accomplished by him alone; for good service among the Persians is very much esteemed, and rewarded by high preferment.

2He could think of no other way to bring the city down than to mutilate himself and then desert to the Babylonians; so, making light of it, he mutilated himself beyond repair, and after cutting off his nose and ears and cropping his hair as a disfigurement and scourging himself, he came before Darius.

Chapter 155

1The king reacted very violently to seeing a man so well-respected mutilated, and springing from the throne he uttered a cry and asked Zopyrus who it was who had mutilated him and why.

2“There is no man,” he said, “except you, who has enough power to do this to me, and no one but I myself did this, O King, because I felt it terribly that Assyrians were laughing at Persians.”

3Darius answered, “Unfeeling man, you give a pretty name to an ugly act if you say that it was on account of those besieged that you did for yourself past cure. Why, you poor fool, will the enemy surrender sooner because you mutilated yourself? How could you not have been out of your mind to disfigure yourself?”

4“Had I told you,” said Zopyrus, “what I intended to do, you would not have let me; but now I have done it on my own. Now, then, if you do your part we shall take Babylon. I shall desert to the city as I am, and I shall say to them that I suffered this at your hands; and I think that I shall persuade them, and thus gain a command.

5Now, on the tenth day after I enter the city, take a thousand men from the part of your army about which you will least care if it is lost, and post them before the gate called the gate of Semiramis; on the seventh day after that, post two thousand more before the gate called the gate of the Ninevites; and when twenty days are past after that seventh, lead out four thousand more and post them before the Chaldean gate, as they call it; allow neither these, nor the others that go before them, to carry any weapons except daggers; leave them these.

6But immediately after the twentieth day command the rest of your army to assault the whole circuit of the walls, and post the Persians before the gate of Belus and the gate called Cissian. For I think that once I have done conspicuous things the Babylonians will give me, among other things, the keys of their gates; then it will depend on me and on the Persians to do what is necessary.”

Chapter 156

1Having given these instructions, he went to the gates, turning and looking back as though he were in fact a deserter. When the watch posted on the towers saw him, they ran down, and opening half the gate a little asked him who he was and why he came; he told them that he was Zopyrus and was deserting to them.

2When they heard this, the gatekeepers brought him before the general assembly of the Babylonians, where he made a pitiful sight, saying that he had suffered at the hands of Darius what he had suffered at his own because he had advised the king to lead his army away, since they could find no way to take the city.

3“Now,” he said in his speech to them, “I come as a great boon to you, men of Babylon, and as a great bane to Darius and to his army and to the Persians; for he shall not get away with having mutilated me so; and I know all the issues of his plans.” This was what he said.

Chapter 157

1When the Babylonians saw the most well-respected man in Persia without his nose and ears and all lurid with blood from the scourging, they were quite convinced that he was telling them the truth and came as their ally, and were ready to give him all that he asked; and he asked for a command.

2When he got this from them, he did exactly as he had arranged with Darius. On the tenth day he led out the Babylonian army, surrounded and slaughtered the thousand whom he had instructed Darius to put in the field first.

3Seeing that he produced works equal to his words, the Babylonians were overjoyed and ready to serve him in every way. When the agreed number of days was past, he led out once more a chosen body of Babylonians, and slaughtered the two thousand men of Darius' army.

4When the Babylonians saw this work too, the praise of Zopyrus was on everyone's lips. The agreed number of days once again passing, he led out his men to the place he had named, where he surrounded the four thousand and slaughtered them. And when he had done this, Zopyrus was the one man for Babylon: he was made the commander of their armies and guard of the walls.

Chapter 158

1So when Darius assaulted the whole circuit of the walls, according to the agreed plan, then Zopyrus' treason was fully revealed. For while the townsmen were on the wall defending it against Darius' assault, he opened the gates called Cissian and Belian, and let the Persians inside the walls.

2Those Babylonians who saw what he did fled to the temple of that Zeus whom they call Belus; those who had not seen it remained in position, until they too discovered how they had been betrayed.

Chapter 159

1Thus Babylon was taken a second time, and when Darius was master of the Babylonians, he destroyed their walls and tore away all their gates, neither of which Cyrus had done at the first taking of Babylon; moreover he impaled about three thousand men that were prominent among them; as for the rest, he gave them back their city to live in.

2Further, as the Babylonians, fearing for their food, had strangled their own women, as I described above, Darius provided wives to give them a posterity by appointing that each of the neighboring nations should send a certain number of women to Babylon; the sum of the women thus collected was fifty thousand: these were the mothers of those who now inhabit the city.

Chapter 160

1There never was in Darius' judgment any Persian before or after who did better service than Zopyrus, except Cyrus, with whom no Persian could compare himself. Many times Darius is said to have declared that he would rather Zopyrus were free of disfigurement than have twenty Babylons on top of the one he had.

2He honored him very much; every year he sent him such gifts as the Persians hold most precious, and let him govern Babylon all his life with no tribute to pay, giving him many other things besides. This Zopyrus was the father of Megabyzus, who was general of an army in Egypt against the Athenians and their allies; and Megabyzus' son was that Zopyrus who deserted from the Persians to Athens.