Hot Coffee: Herodotus

HERODOTUS C. 484 - C. 424

Herodotus says: “For my part I am not going to say about these matters that they happened thus or thus, but I will set my mark upon that man that I myself know began unjust acts against the Greeks, and having so marked him, I will go forward in my account, covering alike the small and great cities of mankind. For of those that were great in earlier times most have now become small and those that were great in my time were small in the time before. Since, then, I know that man’s good fortune never abides in the same place, I will mention both alike” (I, 5).

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a fifth-century BCE Hellenic traveler and thinker. He is commonly referred to as “the father of history,” an appellation given him by the Roman orator and politician Cicero.

Herodotus’ only book, The Histories, is the first complete prose work from Greece. Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War is the second. The Histories describes the Persian Wars with Greece. There are many digressions discussing the customs (nomoi) of the peoples. Herodotus traces the histories of the Persian empire and Greece. Contemporary scholars might call Herodotus’ work as the study of culture. It may also be called a study that compares religions. Herodotus studied human societies to understand human nature. He relays tales told by the peoples about whom he writes.

[https://thegreatthinkers.org/herodotus/]

Herodotus was from Halicarnassus. It is now referred to as Bodrum. It is on the western coast of modern Turkey. During the fifth century BCE it was a Greek city under the rule of a Persian satrapy.
Satrap was a provincial governor in the Achaemenian Empire. The division of the empire into provinces (satrapies) was completed by Darius I (reigned 522–486 BC), who established 20 satrapies with their annual tribute. The satraps, appointed by the king, normally were members of the royal family or of Persian nobility, and they held office indefinitely. As the head of the administration of his province, the satrap collected taxes and was the supreme judicial authority; he was responsible for internal security and raised and maintained an army. [https://www.britannica.com/topic/satrap]

Herodotus was born in the Achaemenid empire about which he writes. Achaemenian Dynasty was also called Achaemenid. In Persian it was referred to as Hakhamanishiya (559–330 BCE). It was an ancient Iranian dynasty whose kings founded and ruled the Achaemenian Empire. Achaemenes is presumed to have lived early in the 7th century BCE. From his son Teispes two lines of kings descended. The kings of the older line were Cyrus I, Cambyses I, Cyrus II (the Great), and Cambyses II. After the death of Cambyses II (522 BCE) the junior line came to the throne with Darius I. The dynasty became extinct with the death of Darius III, following his defeat (330 BCE) by Alexander the Great.

Herodotus travelled widely for the purposes of his studies. He visited Egypt, Arabia, and Tyre. The fact that he was literate also suggests that he was from a wealthy background.

The tenth-century CE Byzantine lexicon, the Suidas, names his parents as Lyxes and Dryo, citizens of Halicarnassus, and says that he had one brother, Theodorus. Suidas is something like a dictionary and the encyclopaedia as it combines the essential features of both. Illustrations of pictures or diagrams are given. It reduces most entries to a few lines providing a brief but accurate introduction to the subject.

In Samos Herodotus learned the Ionian dialect, in which his Histories are written.

Sámos is a Greek island in the Aegean Sea. It is the closest one to the mainland of Asia Minor from which it is separated by the narrow Sámos Strait. The island is wooded and mountainous. Sámos was the birthplace of the philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras and the seat of a school of sculptors.

Ionic, Aeolic and Mycenaean are some of the dialects of Ancient Greece spoken in 1000 BC in Asiatic Ionia. Attic and Ionic dialects together form a dialect group. Attic Greek is the Greek dialect of the ancient city-state of Athens. Of the ancient dialects, it is the most similar to later Greek and is the standard form of the language that is studied in ancient Greek language courses. Attic Greek is sometimes included in the Ionic dialect.

The dialect of the Homeric epics is Asiatic Ionic, Homer’s maternal language, though it is interspersed with many Aeolic and some Mycenaean elements as a result of a long pre-Homeric epic tradition. This Epic-Ionic was used in all later hexametric and elegiac poetry, not only by Ionians but also by foreigners such as the Boeotian Hesiod. Standard Eastern Ionic is found in the iambic poetry of Archilochus, Semonides of Amorgos, and Hipponax of Ephesus. The oldest Greek prose, that of Heracleitus, Hecataeus, Herodotus, Democritus, and Hippocrates, was also written in the Ionic dialect, but by the end of the 5th century BC, it had been supplanted by Attic. [https://www.britannica.com]

Eusebius states that Athenians rewarded Herodotus for his public recitations in the year 445/4 BCE; such performances were common in fifth-century Greece. Herodotus was also linked to the circle of Pericles, the great democratic statesman of fifth-century Athens, and may have been friendly with Sophocles, the tragic playwright. By his own account, he travelled extensively in the cities of mainland Greece, including Delphi, Sparta, Thebes, and Corinth.

Thucydides refers to certain Herodotean “errors” in his prefatory Archaeology, and so we know that he was aware of his predecessor.

Herodotus was probably a slightly older contemporary of Socrates and a much older contemporary of Thucydides. The internal evidence of the Histories shows that Herodotus himself had no personal memories of the Persian invasion of 480/79, and had to rely on the testimony of others.

Herodotus wrote only one book, known today as the Histories. The Greek word that forms its title, historiai, from which our word “history” derives, means inquiries.

The book can be divided roughly into two major parts—an account of the wonders and peoples of the world which occupies the first half of the Histories, and then the relations between Greece and Persia leading up to and through the Persian Wars, which dominates Books Five through Nine. The primary narrative arc traces eighty years. It begins with Cyrus’ (and Croesus’) rise to power. Cyrus was the first Achaemenid king and founder of the Persian Empire, while Croesus was the Lydian king whose march against Cyrus, according to Herodotus, caused the Achaemenids to turn their attention to Ionia and to the Greek mainland. It concludes with the battle of Mycale, which, along with the battle of Plataea, ended the second Persian invasion of Greece, with the Greeks victorious.

Structured around the first four Achaemenid kings—Cyrus, Cambyses, Darius, and Xerxes— and their military campaigns against various peoples, the Histories contains a multitude of ethnographic digressions.

Modern editions of Herodotus follow the medieval manuscript tradition in dividing the Histories into nine books. These divisions, and the ascription of each book to one of the nine muses, can be attributed to the librarians of Alexandria from the first century BCE. Herodotus considered his narrative to contain a number of different logoi, or accounts. He often refers back and forth to “the Assyrian logos” or “the Libyan logos.”

These logoi were possibly originally intended as independent monographs or perhaps as performance pieces. Herodotus gave oral recitations during his travels in Greece.

Logos is a Greek word. It means reason or plan. Its plural form is logoi. It refers to the divine reason implicit in the cosmos, ordering it and giving it form and meaning. The concept defined by the term logos is found in Greek, Indian, Egyptian, and Persian philosophical and theological systems. It became significant in Christian doctrines to describe the role of Jesus Christ as the principle of God in revealing the divine plan of salvation to man. It thus underlies the basic Christian doctrine of the preexistence of Jesus. [https://www.britannica.com]

Current scholarship schematizes the Histories as twenty-eight main logoi.

Herodotus has a story-telling quality with details and anecdotes. He keeps maintaining the tone reflecting the conflict between the Greeks and the Persians. Using digressions is a style of epic writing. Probably, Herodotus followed this epic style in his prose work.

Homer’s theme of war between Greeks and western Asians is the direct precursor of Herodotus’ discussion, and signaled in the Histories by the work’s opening discussion of the retaliatory “abduction of women” between Greece and west Asia, including of course Helen of Troy, over whom the Trojan War was fought.

Troy is referred to in Greek language as Troia. It is also called Ilios or Ilion. In Latin it is referred to as Troia, Troja, or Ilium. It is an ancient city in northwestern Anatolia that holds an enduring place in both literature and archaeology. The legend of the Trojan War is the most notable theme from ancient Greek literature and forms the basis of Homer’s Iliad. The ruins of Troy at Hisarlık, Turkey, are a key archaeological site whose many layers illustrate the gradual development of civilization in northwestern Asia Minor. Troy or modern Turkey is in western Asia. [https://www.britannica.com]

To the ancient Greeks the hostilities between them and the Asian peoples were perpetual and Homer was the first to reveal such hostilities by recounting a great war between them, the legendary Trojan War. It has seldom been emphasized that for Homer the Trojan War was not only between Troy and the league of the Achaeans. It was rather a great war between Greece and the eastern peoples headed by the Trojans. Thus apart from the Trojans themselves, the Trojan forces included a list of nations: the Dardanians, the Zeleians, the Pelasgians, the Paionians, the Paphlagonians, the Mysians, the Phrygians, the Maionians, the Carians, the Lycians, and the Thracians.

It is worth noting that in this list many peoples such as the Paphlagonians, the Phrygians, the Carians and the Thracians were typical of the barbarians, famous for producing slaves, in the eyes of the later Greeks. Nevertheless it must be pointed out that Homer did not describe the Trojans and eastern peoples as culturally opposed or inferior to the Greeks, as has been noted by many scholars. The behaviour of the Trojans is not seen as markedly different from those of the Greeks.

Thucydides believes that Homer does not even use the word ‘barbarians’ because the Greeks were not yet known by one name and so make up an adversary of the other peoples. It is certain that the Homeric poems did not establish a general type of the ‘barbarian’ as opposed to the Greek.

Nevertheless we begin to see in the Homeric poems the earliest signs of a distinction between “civilized” Greeks and “barbaric” peoples both legendary (for example, the Cyclopes) and real. For example, in the representation of the Iliad only the warriors from the Trojan side seem to show cowardice, as Andrew Erschine has noticed.

More importantly, in the eyes of the later Greeks, Homer was the first to have revealed the great confrontation and conflict between them and the Eastern peoples. Therefore when Herodotus began his narrative of another great war between the ‘East’ and the ‘West’, he naturally traced the hostilities to the Homeric times. At the beginning of his Histories Herodotus reports about the Persian views of the hostilities between the Greeks and the barbarians, stating that the Persians believed that hostilities started with abducting each side’s women, and that the Trojan War broke out because each side took the abduction of women differently.

Herodotus reports:

“The Asiatics, according to the Persians, took the seizure of women lightly enough, but not so the Greeks: the Greeks, merely on account of a girl from Sparta, raised a big army, invaded Asia and destroyed the empire of Priam. From that root sprang their belief in the perpetual enmity of the Greek world towards them – with the Persians possessing Asia and its various barbarian peoples, and thinking that Europe and the Greeks being distinct from them” (Aubrey de Sélincourt’s translation)

More than two thousand years later the philosopher Hegel could still claim that the Iliad of Homer provides an example of an epic struggle that is “absolutely and essentially rooted in a profounder principle of necessity”. In that war “the Greeks invade an Asiatic people, and in doing so fight out as it were the preludic conflict of a tremendous opposition, the wars of which practically constitute the turning point of Greek history as we see it on the stage of universal history”.

Above all, the Homeric poems had already established a model in which the ‘East’ was represented and written about by the ‘West’. The Trojans had left no literary records about themselves or their adversaries. The ‘East’ had become the silent subject that was to be represented, written about and constructed. But it was the Persian Wars that had decisively shaped Greek conceptions of the Persians and the peoples in the Persian Empire. Faced with Persian invasions, the Greeks realized more strongly than ever that they were of one people. For Aeschylus the aggressive Persians represented the whole of Asia, the totality of the ‘East’ including Egypt, just as he says in the Persians, “From every realm of Asia the East in arms pours forward; the king’s dread word is spoken: A million sabers hear.” (56-58).

Prolonged wars with the Persians and the presence of potential threat from the ‘East’ compelled the Greeks to study and comprehend the world of the Persian Empire and beyond its borders, to grasp it conceptually and to represent it to their compatriots in a meaningful way. It was against this historical background that a system of discourse about the ‘East’ began to emerge. In the eighth year after the Battle of Salamis (472 BC) Aeschylus staged his Persians in Athens. The play recounts the great sea battle not from the viewpoint of the victorious Greeks, but from the viewpoint of the defeated Persians. It therefore pretends to be a tragedy on the side of the Persians whose Greek expedition ended in disaster, but it is nothing like the other Greek tragedies in that the true hero is not the protagonist, but his anonymous opponent, the Greeks. The real intention of the poet was to highlight the Greek victory through reenacting the Persian loss.

The ‘Father of History’ Herodotus spends almost half of his Histories on describing the history, culture and customs of the peoples within the Persian Empire or around its borders. The peoples that he deals with in some detail include the Lydian, the Persians, the Lycians, the Carians, the Babylonians, the Egyptians, the Indians, the Scythians, the Libyans, the Ethiopians and the mythical Amazons, and many more nations are mentioned. In doing so he virtually presented the entire known world to his compatriots. Yet there is something more than that. More importantly, he attempted to tell his Greek readers how to look at the world. The Histories ends abruptly with Cyrus the Great’s comment that “soft lands breed soft men” and the subsequent Persian decision to continue to live and rule from the mountains.

In a treatise entitled On the Fortune or the Virtue of Alexander Plutarch praised Alexander’s conquest of Asia, saying that he “sowed all Asia with Greek magistracies, and thus overcame its uncivilized and brutish manner of living”. (Source: Orientalism in the Ancient World: Greek and Roman Images of the Or ient f rom Homer to Virgil by HUANG Yang)

“The Persians” was a play by Aeschylus originally presented as the second part of the trilogy that won the first prize at the dramatic competitions in Athens’ City Dionysia festival in 472 BCE. It recounts the Persian response to news of their military defeat under Xerxes at the Battle of Salamis in 480 BCE, one of the decisive episodes in the ongoing Greco-Persian Wars. Excerpts from the play The Persians (472 B.C.E) by Aeschylus:

Dramatis Personae

ATOSSA, widow of Darius and mother of XERXES

MESSENGER

GHOST OF DARIUS

XERXES

CHORUS OF PERSIAN ELDERS, who compose the Persian Council of State

Scene

Before the Council-Hall of the Persian Kings at Susa. The tomb of Darius the Great is visible. The time is 480 B.C., shortly after the battle of Salamis. The play opens with the CHORUS OF PERSIAN ELDERS singing its first choral lyric.

Chorus

While o'er the fields of Greece the embattled troops

Of Persia march with delegated sway,

We o'er their rich and gold-abounding seats

Hold faithful our firm guard; to this high charge

Xerxes, our royal lord, the imperial son

Of great Darius, chose our honour'd age.

But for the king's return, and his arm'd host

Blazing with gold, my soul presaging ill

Swells in my tortured breast: for all her force

Hath Asia sent, and for her youth I sigh.

Nor messenger arrives, nor horseman spurs

With tidings to this seat of Persia's kings.

The gates of Susa and Ecbatana

Pour'd forth their martial trains; and Cissia sees

Her ancient towers forsaken, while her youth,

Some on the bounding steed, the tall bark some

Ascending, some with painful march on foot,

Haste on, to arrange the deep'ning files of war.

Amistres, Artaphernes, and the might

Of great Astaspes, Megabazes bold,

Chieftains of Persia, kings, that, to the power

Of the great king obedient, march with these

Leading their martial thousands; their proud steeds

Prance under them; steel bows and shafts their arms,

Dreadful to see, and terrible in fight,

Deliberate valour breathing in their souls.

Artembares, that in his fiery horse

Delights; Masistress; and Imaeus bold,

Bending with manly strength his stubborn bow;

Pharandaces, and Sosthanes, that drives

With military pomp his rapid steeds.

Others the vast prolific Nile hath sent;

Pegastagon, that from Aegyptus draws

His high birth; Susiscanes; and the chief

That reigns o'er sacred Memphis, great Arsames;

And Ariomardus, that o'er ancient Thebes

Bears the supreme dominion; and with these,

Drawn from their watery marshes, numbers train'd

To the stout oar. Next these the Lycian troops,

Soft sons of luxury; and those that dwell

Amid the inland forests, from the sea

Far distant; these Metragathes commands,

And virtuous Arceus, royal chiefs, that shine

In burnish'd gold, and many a whirling car

Drawn by six generous steeds from Sardis lead,

A glorious and a dreadful spectacle.

And from the foot of Tmolus, sacred mount,

Eager to bind on Greece the servile yoke,

Mardon and Tharybis the massy spear

Grasp with unwearied vigour; the light lance

The Mysians shake. A mingled multitude

Swept from her wide dominions skill'd to draw

The unerring bow, in ships Euphrates sends

From golden Babylon. With falchions arm'd

From all the extent of Asia move the hosts

Obedient to their monarch's stern command.

Thus march'd the flower of Persia, whose loved youth

The world of Asia nourish'd, and with sighs

Laments their absence; many an anxious look

Their wives, their parents send, count the slow days,

And tremble at the long-protracted time.

Strophe 1

Already o'er the adverse strand

In arms the monarch's martial squadrons spread;

The threat'ning ruin shakes the land,

And each tall city bows its tower'd head.

Bark bound to bark, their wondrous way

They bridge across the indignant sea;

The narrow Hellespont's vex'd waves disdain,

His proud neck taught to wear the chain.

Now has the peopled Asia's warlike lord,

By land, by sea, with foot, with horse,

Resistless in his rapid course,

O'er all their realms his warring thousands pour'd;

Now his intrepid chiefs surveys,

And glitt'ring like a god his radiant state displays.

Antistrophe 1

Fierce as the dragon scaled in gold

Through the deep files he darts his glowing eye;

And pleased their order to behold,

His gorgeous standard blazing to the sky,

Rolls onward his Assyrian car,

Directs the thunder of the war,

Bids the wing'd arrows' iron storm advance

Against the slow and cumbrous lance.

What shall withstand the torrent of his sway

When dreadful o'er the yielding shores

The impetuous tide of battle roars,

And sweeps the weak opposing mounds away?

So Persia, with resistless might,

Rolls her unnumber'd hosts of heroes to the fight.

Strophe 2

For when misfortune's fraudful hand

Prepares to pour the vengeance of the sky,

What mortal shall her force withstand?

What rapid speed the impending fury fly?

Gentle at first with flatt'ring smiles

She spreads her soft enchanting wiles,

So to her toils allures her destined prey,

Whence man ne'er breaks unhurt away.

For thus from ancient times the Fates ordain

That Persia's sons should greatly dare,

Unequall'd in the works of war;

Shake with their thund'ring steeds the ensanguined plain,

Dreadful the hostile walls surround,

And lay their rampired towers in ruins on the ground.

Antistrophe 2

Taught to behold with fearless eyes

The whitening billows foam beneath the gale,

They bid the naval forests rise,

Mount the slight bark, unfurl the flying sail,

And o'er the angry ocean bear

To distant realms the storm of war.

For this with many a sad and gloomy thought

My tortured breast is fraught:

Ah me! for Persia's absent sons I sigh;

For while in foreign fields they fight,

Our towns exposed to wild affright

An easy prey to the invader lie:

Where, mighty Susa, where thy powers,

To wield the warrior's arms, and guard thy regal towers?

Epode

Crush'd beneath the assailing foe

Her golden head must Cissia bend;

While her pale virgins, frantic with despair,

Through all her streets awake the voice of wo;

And flying with their bosoms bare,

Their purfled stoles in anguish rend:

For all her youth in martial pride,

Like bees that, clust'ring round their king,

Their dark imbodied squadrons bring,

Attend their sceptred monarch's side,

And stretch across the watery way

From shore to shore their long array.

The Persian dames, with many a tender fear,

In grief's sad vigils keep the midnight hour;

Shed on the widow'd couch the streaming tear,

And the long absence of their loves deplore.

Each lonely matron feels her pensive breast

Throb with desire, with aching fondness glow,

Since in bright arms her daring warrior dress'd

Left her to languish in her love-lorn wo.

Now, ye grave Persians, that your honour'd seats

Hold in this ancient house, with prudent care

And deep deliberation, so the state

Requires, consult we, pond'ring the event

Of this great war, which our imperial lord,

The mighty Xerxes from Darius sprung,

The stream of whose rich blood flows in our veins,

Leads against Greece; whether his arrowy shower

Shot from the strong-braced bow, or the huge spear

High brandish'd, in the deathful field prevails.

But see, the monarch's mother: like the gods

Her lustre blazes on our eyes: my queen,

Prostrate I fall before her: all advance

With reverence, and in duteous phrase address her

(Source: http://classics.mit.edu/Aeschylus/persians.html)

In ancient Greek drama the strophe was the first part of a choral ode that was performed by the chorus while it moved from one side of the stage to the other. The strophe was followed by an antistrophe of the same metrical structure (performed while the chorus reversed its movement) and then by an epode of different structure that was chanted as the chorus stood still.

Some critics (including Aristotle) have interpreted “The Persians” as sympathetic toward the defeated Persians, while others (such as Aristophanes) have seen it as a celebration of Greek victory within the context of an ongoing war. In fact, it can be argued that “The Persians” is not a tragedy at all in the true Greek sense, but that its real aim is the triumphant glorification of Athens and the exultation of the whole nation over the ruin of their foe.

Thus, both as a historic drama and in its real effect, the play was something of an experiment that was not to be repeated either by the author or his successors. It was, however, a popular play in the later Roman and Byzantine Empires (which also fought wars with the Persians) and its popularity has endured in modern Greece and throughout the world.

Thucydides starts off close to where Herodotus himself ended.

Herodotus’ emphasis on evidence and autopsy is shared with the early medical writers of the Hippocratic corpus. And his combative rhetorical style is reminiscent of the Sophists. Indeed, some of the dialogues that Herodotus presents—for instance the famous discussion of the nature of the regime between Darius and his fellow conspirators (III 80–3)—remind one of the set piece rhetorical debates for which the Sophists were famous.

Excerpts frpm Herodotus:

The Persians Reject Democracy/Darius' State

Otanes recommended that the management of public affairs should be entrusted to the whole nation. "To me," he said, "it seems advisable, that we should no longer have a single man to rule over us---the rule of one is neither good nor pleasant. You cannot have forgotten to what lengths Cambyses went in his haughty tyranny, and the haughtiness of the Magi you have yourselves experienced. How indeed is it possible that monarchy should be a well-adjusted thing, when it allows a man to do as he likes without being answerable? Such licence is enough to stir strange and unwonted thoughts in the heart of the worthiest of men. Give a person this power, and straightway his manifold good things puff him up with pride, while envy is so natural to human kind that it cannot but arise in him. But pride and envy together include all wickedness---both of them leading on to deeds of savage violence.

True it is that kings, possessing as they do all that heart can desire, ought to be void of envy; but the contrary is seen in their conduct towards the citizens. They are jealous of the most virtuous among their subjects, and wish their death; while they take delight in the meanest and basest, being ever ready to listen to the tales of slanderers. A king, besides, is beyond all other men inconsistent with himself. Pay him court in moderation, and he is angry because you do not show him more profound respect--- show him profound respect, and he is offended again, because (as he says) you fawn on him. But the worst of all is, that he sets aside the laws of the land, puts men to death without trial, and subjects women to violence.

The rule of the many, on the other hand, has, in the first place, the fairest of names, to wit, isonomy; and further it is free from all those outrages which a king is wont to commit. There, places are given by lot, the magistrate is answerable for what he does, and measures rest with the commonalty. I vote, therefore, that we do away with monarchy, and raise the people to power. For the people are all in all."

III.81: Such were the sentiments of Otanes. Megabyzus spoke next, and advised the setting up of an oligarchy: "In all that Otanes has said to persuade you to put down monarchy," he observed, "I fully concur; but his recommendation that we should call the people to power seems to me not the best advice.

For there is nothing so void of understanding, nothing so full of wantonness, as the unwieldy rabble. It were folly not to be borne, for men, while seeking to escape the wantonness of a tyrant, to give themselves up to the wantonness of a rude unbridled mob. The tyrant, in all his doings, at least knows what is he about, but a mob is altogether devoid of knowledge; for how should there be any knowledge in a rabble, untaught, and with no natural sense of what is right and fit?

It rushes wildly into state affairs with all the fury of a stream swollen in the winter, and confuses everything. Let the enemies of the Persians be ruled by democracies; but let us choose out from the citizens a certain number of the worthiest, and put the government into their hands. For thus both we ourselves shall be among the governors, and power being entrusted to the best men, it is likely that the best counsels will prevail in the state."

III.82: This was the advice which Megabyzus gave, and after him Darius came forward, and spoke as follows: "All that Megabyzus said against democracy was well said, I think; but about oligarchy he did not speak advisedly; for take these three forms of government---democracy, oligarchy, and monarchy---and let them each be at their best, I maintain that monarchy far surpasses the other two. What government can possibly be better than that of the very best man in the whole state? The counsels of such a man are like himself, and so he governs the mass of the people to their heart's content; while at the same time his measures against evil-doers are kept more secret than in other states.

Contrariwise, in oligarchies, where men vie with each other in the service of the commonwealth, fierce enmities are apt to arise between man and man, each wishing to be leader, and to carry his own measures; whence violent quarrels come, which lead to open strife, often ending in bloodshed. Then monarchy is sure to follow; and this too shows how far that rule surpasses all others.

Lastly, to sum up all in a word, whence, I ask, was it that we got the freedom which we enjoy? Did democracy give it us, or oligarchy, or a monarch? As a single man recovered our freedom for us, my sentence is that we keep to the rule of one. Even apart from this, we ought not to change the laws of our forefathers when they work fairly; for to do so is not well."

III.83: Such were the three opinions brought forward at this meeting; the four other Persians voted in favor of the last. Otanes, who wished to give his countrymen a democracy, when he found the decision against him, arose a second time, and spoke thus before the assembly: "Brother conspirators, it is plain that the king who is to be chosen will be one of ourselves, whether we make the choice by casting lots for the prize, or by letting the people decide which of us they will have to rule over them, in or any other way. Now, as I have neither a mind to rule nor to be ruled, I shall not enter the lists with you in this matter. I withdraw, however, on one condition---none of you shall claim to exercise rule over me or my seed for ever."

The six agreed to these terms, and Otanes withdrew and stood aloof from the contest. And still to this day the family of Otanes continues to be the only free family in Persia; those who belong to it submit to the rule of the king only so far as they themselves choose; they are bound, however, to observe the laws of the land like the other Persians.

The following were made common to them all: It was to be free to each, whenever he pleased, to enter the palace unannounced, unless the king were in the company of one of his wives; and the king was to be bound to marry into no family excepting those of the conspirators. Concerning the appointment of a king, the resolve to which they came was the following: They would ride out together next morning into the skirts of the city, and he whose steed first neighed after the sun was up should have the kingdom.

III.85: Now Darius had a groom, a sharp-witted knave, called Oibares. After the meeting had broken up, Darius sent for him, and said, "Oibares, this is the way in which the king is to be chosen---we are to mount our horses, and the man whose horse first neighs after the sun is up is to have the kingdom. If then you have any cleverness, contrive a plan whereby the prize may fall to us, and not go to another."

"Truly, master," Oibares answered, "if it depends on this whether you shall be king or no, set your heart at ease, and fear nothing: I have a charm which is sure not to fail."

"If you have really anything of the kind," said Darius, "hasten to get it ready. The matter does not brook delay, for the trial is to be tomorrow."

So Oibares when he heard that, did as follows: When night came, he took one of the mares, the chief favorite of the horse which Darius rode, and tethering it in the suburb, brought his master's horse to the place; then, after leading him round and round the mare several times, nearer and nearer at each circuit, he ended by letting them come together.

III.86: And now, when the morning broke, the six Persians, according to agreement, met together on horseback, and rode out to the suburb. As they went along they neared the spot where the mare was tethered the night before, whereupon the horse of Darius sprang forward and neighed. Just at the same time, though the sky was clear and bright, there was a flash of lightning, followed by a thunderclap. It seemed as if the heavens conspired with Darius, and hereby inaugurated him king: so the five other nobles leaped with one accord from their steeds, and bowed down before him and owned him for their king.

III.87: This is the account which some of the Persians gave of the contrivance of Oibares; but there are others who relate the matter differently. They say that in the morning he stroked the mare with his hand, which he then hid in his trousers until the sun rose and the horses were about to start, when he suddenly drew his hand forth and put it to the nostrils of his master's horse, which immediately snorted and neighed.

III.88: Thus was Darius, son of Hystaspes, appointed king; and, except the Arabians, all they of Asia were subject to him; for Cyrus, and after him Cambyses, had brought them all under. The Arabians were never subject as slaves to the Persians, but had a league of friendship with them from the time when they brought Cambyses on his way as he went into Egypt; for had they been unfriendly the Persians could never have made their invasion.

And now Darius contracted marriages of the first rank, according to the notions of the Persians: to wit, with two daughters of Cyrus, Atossa and Artystone; of whom, Atossa had been twice married before, once to Cambyses, her brother, and once to the Magus, while the other, Artystone, was a virgin. He married also Parmys, daughter of Smerdis, son of Cyrus; and he likewise took to wife the daughter of Otanes, who had made the discovery about the Magus. And now when his power was established firmly throughout all the kingdoms, the first thing that he did was to set up a carving in stone, which showed a man mounted upon a horse, with an inscription in these words following: "Darius, son of Hystaspes, by aid of his good horse" (here followed the horse's name), "and of his good groom Oibares, got himself the kingdom of the Persians."

III.89: This he set up in Persia; and afterwards he proceeded to establish twenty governments of the kind which the Persians call satrapies, assigning to each its governor, and fixing the tribute which was to be paid him by the several nations. And generally he joined together in one satrapy the nations that were neighbors, but sometimes he passed over the nearer tribes, and put in their stead those which were more remote.

The following is an account of these governments, and of the yearly tribute which they paid to the king: Such as brought their tribute in silver were ordered to pay according to the Babylonian talent; while the Euboic was the standard measure for such as brought gold. Now the Babylonian talent contains seventy Euboic minae. During all the reign of Cyrus, and afterwards when Cambyses ruled, there were no fixed tributes, but the nations severally brought gifts to the king. On account of this and other like doings, the Persians say that Darius was a huckster, Cambyses a master, and Cyrus a father; for Darius looked to making a gain in everything; Cambyses was harsh and reckless; while Cyrus was gentle, and procured them all manner of goods.

III.90: The Ionians, the Magnesians of Asia, the Aeolians, the Carians, the Lycians, the Milyans, and the Pamphylians, paid their tribute in a single sum, which was fixed at four hundred talents of silver. These formed together the first satrapy.

The Mysians, Lydians, Lasonians, Cabalians, and Hygennians paid the sum of five hundred talents. This was the second satrapy.

The Hellespontians, of the right coast as one enters the straits, the Phrygians, the Asiatic Thracians, the Paphlagonians, the Mariandynians' and the Syrians paid a tribute of three hundred and sixty talents. This was the third satrapy.

The Cilicians gave three hundred and sixty white horses, one for each day in the year, and five hundred talents of silver. Of this sum one hundred and forty talents went to pay the cavalry which guarded the country, while the remaining three hundred and sixty were received by Darius. This was the fourth satrapy.

III.91: The country reaching from the city of Posideium (built by Amphilochus, son of Amphiaraus, on the confines of Syria and Cilicia) to the borders of Egypt, excluding therefrom a district which belonged to Arabia and was free from tax, paid a tribute of three hundred and fifty talents. All Phoenicia, Palestine, Syria, and Cyprus, were herein contained. This was the fifth satrapy.

From Egypt, and the neighbouring parts of Libya, together with the towns of Cyrene and Barca, which belonged to the Egyptian satrapy, the tribute which came in was seven hundred talents. These seven hundred talents did not include the profits of the fisheries of Lake Moeris, nor the corn furnished to the troops at Memphis. Corn was supplied to 120,000 Persians, who dwelt at Memphis in the quarter called the White Castle, and to a number of auxiliaries. This was the sixth satrapy.

The Sattagydians, the Gandarians, the Dadicae, and the Aparytae, who were all reckoned together, paid a tribute of a hundred and seventy talents. This was the seventh satrapy.

Susa, and the other parts of Cissia, paid three hundred talents. This was the eighth satrapy.

III.92: From Babylonia, and the rest of Assyria, were drawn a thousand talents of silver, and five hundred boy-eunuchs. This was the ninth satrapy.

Agbatana, and the other parts of Media, together with the Paricanians and Orthocorybantes, paid in all four hundred and fifty talents. This was the tenth satrapy.

The Caspians, Pausicae, Pantimathi, and Daritae, were joined in one government, and paid the sum of two hundred talents. This was the eleventh satrapy.

From the Bactrian tribes as far as the Aegli the tribute received was three hundred and sixty talents. This was the twelfth satrapy.

III.93: From Pactyica, Armenia, and the countries reaching thence to the Euxine, the sum drawn was four hundred talents. This was the thirteenth satrapy.

The Sagartians, Sarangians, Thamanaeans, Utians, and Mycians, together with the inhabitants of the islands in the Erythraean sea, where the king sends those whom he banishes, furnished altogether a tribute of six hundred talents. This was the fourteenth satrapy.

The Sacans and Caspians gave two hundred and fifty talents. This was the fifteenth satrapy.

The Parthians, Chorasmians, Sogdians, and Arians, gave three hundred. This was the sixteenth satrapy.

III.94: The Paricanians and Ethiopians of Asia furnished a tribute of four hundred talents. This was the seventeenth satrapy.

The Matienians, Saspeires, and Alarodians were rated to pay two hundred talents. This was the eighteenth satrapy.

The Moschi, Tibareni, Macrones, Mosynoeci, and Mares had to pay three hundred talents. This was the nineteenth satrapy.

The Indians, who are more numerous than any other nation with which we are acquainted, paid a tribute exceeding that of every other people, to wit, three hundred and sixty talents of gold-dust. This was the twentieth satrapy.

III.95: If the Babylonian money here spoken of be reduced to the Euboic scale, it will make nine thousand five hundred and forty such talents; and if the gold be reckoned at thirteen times the worth of silver, the Indian gold-dust will come to four thousand six hundred and eighty talents. Add these two amounts together and the whole revenue which came in to Darius year by year will be found to be in Euboic money fourteen thousand five hundred and sixty talents, not to mention parts of a talent.

III.96: Such was the revenue which Darius derived from Asia and a small part of Libya. Later in his reign the sum was increased by the tribute of the islands, and of the nations of Europe as far as Thessaly. The Great King stores away the tribute which he receives after this fashion---he melts it down, and, while it is in a liquid state, runs it into earthen vessels, which are afterwards removed, leaving the metal in a solid mass. When money is wanted, he coins as much of this bullion as the occasion requires.

III.97: Such then were the governments, and such the amounts of tribute at which they were assessed respectively. Persia alone has not been reckoned among the tributaries---and for this reason, because the country of the Persians is altogether exempt from tax.

The following peoples paid no settled tribute, but brought gifts to the king: first, the Ethiopians bordering upon Egypt, who were reduced by Cambyses when he made war on the long-lived Ethiopians, and who dwell about the sacred city of Nysa, and have festivals in honour of Bacchus. The grain on which they and their next neighbours feed is the same as that used by the Calantian Indians. Their dwelling-houses are under ground. Every third year these two nations brought---and they still bring to my day---two choenices of virgin gold, two hundred logs of ebony, five Ethiopian boys, and twenty elephant tusks. The Colchians, and the neighbouring tribes who dwell between them and the Caucasus---for so far the Persian rule reaches, while north of the Caucasus no one fears them any longer---undertook to furnish a gift, which in my day was still brought every fifth year, consisting of a hundred boys, and the same number of maidens. The Arabs brought every year a thousand talents of frankincense. Such were the gifts which the king received over and above the tribute-money.

(Source: From: Herodotus, The History, George Rawlinson, trans., (New York: Dutton & Co., 1862). Scanned by: J. S. Arkenberg, Dept. of History, Cal. State Fullerton. Prof. Arkenberg has modernized the text.)

Herodotus presents his analytical method openly and candidly. He distinguishes between autopsy—“seeing for oneself,” or first-hand knowledge—and akoe—oral testimony, or things “heard by report.” He manifestly prefers the first to the second, although he accepts, and interrogates, the latter when he has no personal knowledge of a particular issue. As already mentioned, he sometimes reports what people say because it reveals what they actually think and not because he is somehow credulous. At times, he even tells the reader that he was unable to obtain certain information, and he occasionally presents and adjudicates between various sources and accounts. The overall impression is that of a careful and credible reporter, as well as someone who has an abiding curiosity about the world.

Herodotus’ veracity or accuracy is perhaps the most disputed aspect of his writing. Plutarch calls him “the father of lies.” Thucydides hints that Herodotus wrote display pieces for immediate hearing.

There are many inaccuracies in the Histories. Herodotus mistakenly says the pass at Thermopylae runs north to south (VII 176, 3). His account of Upper Egypt in Book II has many errors. He writes about Persian ants that dig for gold (III 102, 5). May be they were marmots.

One of the accurate reports of Herodotus is about Phoenicians who circumnavigated Africa. It seems they said that they noted that at a certain point the sun started to appear on the right (IV, 42, 4). Herodotus writes that he does not believe this report. Modern exploration has proved that Herodotus was right.

Plutarch calls this kind of inaccurate reporting as a rhetorical strategy. In various places, Herodotus offers differing accounts of the same event. He also says that his duty is to report what is said though he may not believe everything.

In the book on Lydia, the Athenian Solon (one of seven wise men of ancient Greece) offers a rumination on fortune, happiness, and the god to the wealthy Lydian king Croesus. Solon warns that we cannot call any one lucky until we observe his entire life.

An excerpt from the Histories:

[31] Solon set out upon his travels, in the course of which he went to Egypt to the court of Amasis, and also came on a visit to Croesus at Sardis. Croesus received him as his guest, and lodged him in the royal palace. On the third or fourth day after, he bade his servants conduct Solon over his treasuries, and show him all their greatness and magnificence. When he had seen them all, and, so far as time allowed, inspected them, Croesus addressed this question to him. "Stranger of Athens, we have heard much of thy wisdom and of thy travels through many lands, from love of knowledge and a wish to see the world. I am curious therefore to inquire of thee, whom, of all the men that thou hast seen, thou deemest the most happy?"

This he asked because he thought himself the happiest of mortals: but Solon answered him without flattery, according to his true sentiments, "Tellus of Athens, sire." Full of astonishment at what he heard, Croesus demanded sharply, "And wherefore dost thou deem Tellus happiest?" To which the other replied, "First, because his country was flourishing in his days, and he himself had sons both beautiful and good, and he lived to see children born to each of them, and these children all grew up; and further because, after a life spent in what our people look upon as comfort, his end was surpassingly glorious. In a battle between the Athenians and their neighbours near Eleusis, he came to the assistance of his countrymen, routed the foe, and died upon the field most gallantly. The Athenians gave him a public funeral on the spot where he fell, and paid him the highest honours."

Thus did Solon admonish Croesus by the example of Tellus, enumerating the manifold particulars of his happiness. When he had ended, Croesus inquired a second time, who after Tellus seemed to him the happiest, expecting that at any rate, he would be given the second place. "Cleobis and Bito," Solon answered; "they were of Argive race; their fortune was enough for their wants, and they were besides endowed with so much bodily strength that they had both gained prizes at the Games. Also this tale is told of them:—There was a great festival in honour of the goddess Juno at Argos, to which their mother must needs be taken in a car.

Now the oxen did not come home from the field in time: so the youths, fearful of being too late, put the yoke on their own necks, and themselves drew the car in which their mother rode. Five and forty furlongs did they draw her, and stopped before the temple. This deed of theirs was witnessed by the whole assembly of worshippers, and then their life closed in the best possible way. Herein, too, God showed forth most evidently, how much better a thing for man death is than life. For the Argive men, who stood around the car, extolled the vast strength of the youths; and the Argive women extolled the mother who was blessed with such a pair of sons; and the mother herself, overjoyed at the deed and at the praises it had won, standing straight before the image, besought the goddess to bestow on Cleobis and Bito, the sons who had so mightily honoured her, the highest blessing to which mortals can attain. Her prayer ended, they offered sacrifice and partook of the holy banquet, after which the two youths fell asleep in the temple. The Argives, looking on them as among the best of men, caused statues of them to be made, which they gave to the shrine at Delphi."

[32] When Solon had thus assigned these youths the second place, Croesus broke in angrily, "What, stranger of Athens, is my happiness, then, so utterly set at nought by thee, that thou dost not even put me on a level with private men?"

"Oh! Croesus," replied the other, "thou askedst a question concerning the condition of man, of one who knows that the power above us is full of jealousy, and fond of troubling our lot. A long life gives one to witness much, and experience much oneself, that one would not choose. Seventy years I regard as the limit of the life of man. In these seventy years are contained, without reckoning intercalary months, twenty-five thousand and two hundred days. Add an intercalary month to every other year, that the seasons may come round at the right time, and there will be, besides the seventy years, thirty-five such months, making an addition of one thousand and fifty days. The whole number of the days contained in the seventy years will thus be twenty-six thousand two hundred and fifty, whereof not one but will produce events unlike the rest. Hence man is wholly accident. For thyself, oh! Croesus, I see that thou art wonderfully rich, and art the lord of many nations; but with respect to that whereon thou questionest me, I have no answer to give, until I hear that thou hast closed thy life happily. For assuredly he who possesses great store of riches is no nearer happiness than he who has what suffices for his daily needs, unless it so hap that luck attend upon him, and so he continue in the enjoyment of all his good things to the end of life.

For many of the wealthiest men have been unfavoured of fortune, and many whose means were moderate have had excellent luck. Men of the former class excel those of the latter but in two respects; these last excel the former in many. The wealthy man is better able to content his desires, and to bear up against a sudden buffet of calamity. The other has less ability to withstand these evils (from which, however, his good luck keeps him clear), but he enjoys all these following blessings: he is whole of limb, a stranger to disease, free from misfortune, happy in his children, and comely to look upon. If, in addition to all this, he end his life well, he is of a truth the man of whom thou art in search, the man who may rightly be termed happy. Call him, however, until he die, not happy but fortunate. Scarcely, indeed, can any man unite all these advantages: as there is no country which contains within it all that it needs, but each, while it possesses some things, lacks others, and the best country is that which contains the most; so no single human being is complete in every respect- something is always lacking. He who unites the greatest number of advantages, and retaining them to the day of his death, then dies peaceably, that man alone, sire, is, in my judgment, entitled to bear the name of 'happy.' But in every matter it behoves us to mark well the end: for oftentimes God gives men a gleam of happiness, and then plunges them into ruin." (The Histories by Herodotus. Translated By George Rawlinson)

Ancient Greek and Roman thought will refer to thinking from the fifth century BCE to the end of the Roman empire in the West in the fifth century CE. Political philosophy as a genre was invented in this period by Plato. It was reinvented by Aristotle. Ancient political philosophy revolved around discussions on political institutions, justice, equality, ethics, politics and constitutional arrangements.

The etymological origins of ‘political philosophy’ in Greek pertains to the polis or city-state and the love of wisdom (philosophia). Greek political philosophy’s main concern is the forms of regimes or “constitutions” (politeia, singular). The classification of types of constitutions is found in Herodotus. Plato develops it. Aristotle refines it further.

Herodotus: The Persians Reject Democracy/Darius' State

III.80: And now when five days were gone, and the hubbub had settled down, the conspirators met together to consult about the situation of affairs. At this meeting speeches were made, to which many of the Hellenes give no credence, but they were made nevertheless. Otanes recommended that the management of public affairs should be entrusted to the whole nation. "To me," he said, "it seems advisable, that we should no longer have a single man to rule over us---the rule of one is neither good nor pleasant. You cannot have forgotten to what lengths Cambyses went in his haughty tyranny, and the haughtiness of the Magi you have yourselves experienced. How indeed is it possible that monarchy should be a well-adjusted thing, when it allows a man to do as he likes without being answerable? Such licence is enough to stir strange and unwonted thoughts in the heart of the worthiest of men. Give a person this power, and straightway his manifold good things puff him up with pride, while envy is so natural to human kind that it cannot but arise in him. But pride and envy together include all wickedness---both of them leading on to deeds of savage violence.

True it is that kings, possessing as they do all that heart can desire, ought to be void of envy; but the contrary is seen in their conduct towards the citizens. They are jealous of the most virtuous among their subjects, and wish their death; while they take delight in the meanest and basest, being ever ready to listen to the tales of slanderers. A king, besides, is beyond all other men inconsistent with himself. Pay him court in moderation, and he is angry because you do not show him more profound respect--- show him profound respect, and he is offended again, because (as he says) you fawn on him. But the worst of all is, that he sets aside the laws of the land, puts men to death without trial, and subjects women to violence. The rule of the many, on the other hand, has, in the first place, the fairest of names, to wit, isonomy; and further it is free from all those outrages which a king is wont to commit. There, places are given by lot, the magistrate is answerable for what he does, and measures rest with the commonalty. I vote, therefore, that we do away with monarchy, and raise the people to power. For the people are all in all."

III.81: Such were the sentiments of Otanes. Megabyzus spoke next, and advised the setting up of an oligarchy: "In all that Otanes has said to persuade you to put down monarchy," he observed, "I fully concur; but his recommendation that we should call the people to power seems to me not the best advice. For there is nothing so void of understanding, nothing so full of wantonness, as the unwieldy rabble. It were folly not to be borne, for men, while seeking to escape the wantonness of a tyrant, to give themselves up to the wantonness of a rude unbridled mob. The tyrant, in all his doings, at least knows what is he about, but a mob is altogether devoid of knowledge; for how should there be any knowledge in a rabble, untaught, and with no natural sense of what is right and fit? It rushes wildly into state affairs with all the fury of a stream swollen in the winter, and confuses everything. Let the enemies of the Persians be ruled by democracies; but let us choose out from the citizens a certain number of the worthiest, and put the government into their hands. For thus both we ourselves shall be among the governors, and power being entrusted to the best men, it is likely that the best counsels will prevail in the state."

III.82: This was the advice which Megabyzus gave, and after him Darius came forward, and spoke as follows: "All that Megabyzus said against democracy was well said, I think; but about oligarchy he did not speak advisedly; for take these three forms of government---democracy, oligarchy, and monarchy---and let them each be at their best, I maintain that monarchy far surpasses the other two. What government can possibly be better than that of the very best man in the whole state? The counsels of such a man are like himself, and so he governs the mass of the people to their heart's content; while at the same time his measures against evil-doers are kept more secret than in other states. Contrariwise, in oligarchies, where men vie with each other in the service of the commonwealth, fierce enmities are apt to arise between man and man, each wishing to be leader, and to carry his own measures; whence violent quarrels come, which lead to open strife, often ending in bloodshed. Then monarchy is sure to follow; and this too shows how far that rule surpasses all others.

Again, in a democracy, it is impossible but that there will be malpractices: these malpractices, however, do not lead to enmities, but to close friendships, which are formed among those engaged in them, who must hold well together to carry on their villainies. And so things go on until a man stands forth as champion of the commonalty, and puts down the evil-doers. Straightway the author of so great a service is admired by all, and from being admired soon comes to be appointed king; so that here too it is plain that monarchy is the best government. Lastly, to sum up all in a word, whence, I ask, was it that we got the freedom which we enjoy? Did democracy give it us, or oligarchy, or a monarch? As a single man recovered our freedom for us, my sentence is that we keep to the rule of one. Even apart from this, we ought not to change the laws of our forefathers when they work fairly; for to do so is not well."

III.83: Such were the three opinions brought forward at this meeting; the four other Persians voted in favor of the last. Otanes, who wished to give his countrymen a democracy, when he found the decision against him, arose a second time, and spoke thus before the assembly: "Brother conspirators, it is plain that the king who is to be chosen will be one of ourselves, whether we make the choice by casting lots for the prize, or by letting the people decide which of us they will have to rule over them, in or any other way. Now, as I have neither a mind to rule nor to be ruled, I shall not enter the lists with you in this matter. I withdraw, however, on one condition---none of you shall claim to exercise rule over me or my seed for ever." The six agreed to these terms, and Otanes withdraw and stood aloof from the contest. And still to this day the family of Otanes continues to be the only free family in Persia; those who belong to it submit to the rule of the king only so far as they themselves choose; they are bound, however, to observe the laws of the land like the other Persians.

III.84: After this the six took counsel together, as to the fairest way of setting up a king: and first, with respect to Otanes, they resolved, that if any of their own number got the kingdom, Otanes and his seed after him should receive year by year, as a mark of special honor, a Median robe, and all such other gifts as are accounted the most honorable in Persia. And these they resolved to give him, because he was the man who first planned the outbreak, and who brought the seven together. These privileges, therefore, were assigned specially to Otanes. The following were made common to them all: It was to be free to each, whenever he pleased, to enter the palace unannounced, unless the king were in the company of one of his wives; and the king was to be bound to marry into no family excepting those of the conspirators. Concerning the appointment of a king, the resolve to which they came was the following: They would ride out together next morning into the skirts of the city, and he whose steed first neighed after the sun was up should have the kingdom.

III.85: Now Darius had a groom, a sharp-witted knave, called Oibares. After the meeting had broken up, Darius sent for him, and said, "Oibares, this is the way in which the king is to be chosen---we are to mount our horses, and the man whose horse first neighs after the sun is up is to have the kingdom. If then you have any cleverness, contrive a plan whereby the prize may fall to us, and not go to another." "Truly, master," Oibares answered, "if it depends on this whether you shall be king or no, set your heart at ease, and fear nothing: I have a charm which is sure not to fail." "If you have really anything of the kind," said Darius, "hasten to get it ready. The matter does not brook delay, for the trial is to be tomorrow." So Oibares when he heard that, did as follows: When night came, he took one of the mares, the chief favorite of the horse which Darius rode, and tethering it in the suburb, brought his master's horse to the place; then, after leading him round and round the mare several times, nearer and nearer at each circuit, he ended by letting them come together.

III.87: This is the account which some of the Persians gave of the contrivance of Oibares; but there are others who relate the matter differently. They say that in the morning he stroked the mare with his hand, which he then hid in his trousers until the sun rose and the horses were about to start, when he suddenly drew his hand forth and put it to the nostrils of his master's horse, which immediately snorted and neighed.

III.88: Thus was Darius, son of Hystaspes, appointed king; and, except the Arabians, all they of Asia were subject to him; for Cyrus, and after him Cambyses, had brought them all under. The Arabians were never subject as slaves to the Persians, but had a league of friendship with them from the time when they brought Cambyses on his way as he went into Egypt; for had they been unfriendly the Persians could never have made their invasion.

And now Darius contracted marriages of the first rank, according to the notions of the Persians: to wit, with two daughters of Cyrus, Atossa and Artystone; of whom, Atossa had been twice married before, once to Cambyses, her brother, and once to the Magus, while the other, Artystone, was a virgin. He married also Parmys, daughter of Smerdis, son of Cyrus; and he likewise took to wife the daughter of Otanes, who had made the discovery about the Magus. And now when his power was established firmly throughout all the kingdoms, the first thing that he did was to set up a carving in stone, which showed a man mounted upon a horse, with an inscription in these words following: "Darius, son of Hystaspes, by aid of his good horse" (here followed the horse's name), "and of his good groom Oibares, got himself the kingdom of the Persians."

III.89: This he set up in Persia; and afterwards he proceeded to establish twenty governments of the kind which the Persians call satrapies, assigning to each its governor, and fixing the tribute which was to be paid him by the several nations. And generally he joined together in one satrapy the nations that were neighbors, but sometimes he passed over the nearer tribes, and put in their stead those which were more remote. The following is an account of these governments, and of the yearly tribute which they paid to the king: Such as brought their tribute in silver were ordered to pay according to the Babylonian talent; while the Euboic was the standard measure for such as brought gold. Now the Babylonian talent contains seventy Euboic minae. During all the reign of Cyrus, and afterwards when Cambyses ruled, there were no fixed tributes, but the nations severally brought gifts to the king. On account of this and other like doings, the Persians say that Darius was a huckster, Cambyses a master, and Cyrus a father; for Darius looked to making a gain in everything; Cambyses was harsh and reckless; while Cyrus was gentle, and procured them all manner of goods.

The Mysians, Lydians, Lasonians, Cabalians, and Hygennians paid the sum of five hundred talents. This was the second satrapy.

III.91: The country reaching from the city of Posideium (built by Amphilochus, son of Amphiaraus, on the confines of Syria and Cilicia) to the borders of Egypt, excluding therefrom a district which belonged to Arabia and was free from tax, paid a tribute of three hundred and fifty talents. All Phoenicia, Palestine Syria, and Cyprus, were herein contained. This was the fifth satrapy.

From Egypt, and the neighbouring parts of Libya, together with the towns of Cyrene and Barca, which belonged to the Egyptian satrapy, the tribute which came in was seven hundred talents. These seven hundred talents did not include the profits of the fisheries of Lake Moeris, nor the corn furnished to the troops at Memphis. Corn was supplied to 120,000 Persians, who dwelt at Memphis in the quarter called the White Castle, and to a number of auxiliaries. This was the sixth satrapy.

The Sattagydians, the Gandarians, the Dadicae, and the Aparytae, who were all reckoned together, paid a tribute of a hundred and seventy talents. This was the seventh satrapy.

Susa, and the other parts of Cissia, paid three hundred talents. This was the eighth satrapy.

III.92: From Babylonia, and the rest of Assyria, were drawn a yousand talents of silver, and five hundred boy-eunuchs. This was the ninth satrapy.