by Jim Lacey
Of course, a second Persian invasion would not have been necessary if Athens had lost at Marathon, as all of Greece would already have been incorporated into the Persian Empire. Moreover, it is unlikely that the rest of Greece would have found the fortitude to resist a much larger Persian invasion if Athens had been crippled by the smaller initial invasion force a decade before. At Marathon, victory was not enough. A win, just barely eked out, that saw Athens’s hoplites roughly handled would have doomed Greece.
In the decades after the battle, no Greek doubted its importance. In Athens itself there was a cult of Marathon, and the men who fought that day were honored until their death. They were the equivalent of Athens’s “greatest generation.” At the time Herodotus was reading his Histories (425 BC), Aristophanes was putting on his great play The Acharnians, in which he referred to the “Marathon Men” still alive: “They are veterans of Marathon, tough as oak or maple, of which they are made for rough and ruthless.”1 For those who fought at Marathon, it was the life event they never forgot. The great dramatist Aeschylus, for instance, wrote his own epitaph, in which he did not mention his career as a dramatist. His only desire was to be remembered as a “Marathon Man” despite having also fought at the great naval battle of Salamis. On his tombstone was written:
Beneath this stone lies Aeschylus, son of Euphorion, the Athenian, who perished in the wheat-bearing land of Gela; of his noble prowess the grove of Marathon can speak, or the longhaired Persians who know it well.
At Marathon, Athens saved itself, Greece, and by extension all of Western civilization. Some have proposed that Marathon made little difference in the creation and development of a unique Western civilization. After all, this argument goes, Pericles, Aristotle, Plato, and Socrates still would have been born. They still would have been brilliant, and their achievements would have been as great. One is hard-pressed, however, to think how these great minds and independent spirits would have soared as slaves to a despotic empire. In truth, Western civilization owes its existence to a thin line of bronze-encased “men as hard as oak” who went bravely forward against overwhelming odds, to victory and never-ending glory.
Acknowledgments
No book ever gets written without the help and encouragement of a number of other people. In my case I first want to thank my agent, Eric Lupfer, who believed in this project from the beginning and was instrumental in steering it to its final conclusion. I also wish to thank my editor, Jessie Waters. Her expert guidance, patient work, and friendly support were greatly appreciated. During the writing of this book, I also received the encouragement and assistance of two of the country’s foremost historians, Williamson Murray and Paul Rahe, both of whom provided me with invaluable advice and suggestions. Still, this book deals with an area of history where there remains much for scholars to debate. So where there are interpretations in this book that may trouble others, the responsibility for my claims rests solely with me.
Finally, I wish to thank my wife, Sharon, whose encouragement and support made it possible to write this book. I am fortunate to have found a wife willing to read multiple iterations of the same book and still remain ready to give cheerful advice. Without her, this book would have been much the poorer.
Notes
Introduction
1. For evidence of this, one has to look no further than the depiction of the Persians in the recent hit movie 300.
2. The Athenians were aided at Marathon by a small force of hoplites (one thousand) from Plataea.
3. Edward Creasy, The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World: From Marathon to Waterloo (Cambridge, UK: 1994).
4. J. A. S. Evans, “Father of History or Father of Lies: The Reputation of Herodotus,” Classical Journal 64, no. 1 (October 1968): 11–17.
5. A new edition of Herodotus’s Histories has recently been released and is strongly recommended for anyone looking for a starting point for delving into the original source material on the Greco-Persian wars. See Robert Strassler, The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories (New York: Pantheon Books, 2007). All endnotes to Herodotus’s works refer to Strassler’s book.
6. In this last regard, one needs to make exceptions for Professors Donald Kagan and Victor Davis Hanson.
7. Most historians now agree that while Plutarch caught some minor errors, Herodotus’s major problem, as far as Plutarch was concerned, was that he dared to criticize some Greek cities that Plutarch thought had saved Greece from the Persians. As a hyperpatriot, Plutarch could not let these “insults” to Greek national pride go by uncontested.
8. The Behistun inscription was engraved by King Darius at the site of his greatest victory at the end of the Persian civil war that marked the first year of his rule. The engravings were made on a cliff face approximately one hundred yards off the ground. The Babylonian Chronicles, which include the Nabonidus Chronicle, are a collection of clay tablets and cylinders that detail the great events of the Assyrian and Babylonian empires. All of these works are translated online at http://www.livius.org/.
9. A. R. Burn, Persia and the Greeks: The Defense of the West 546–478 B.C. (New York: Minerva Press, 1968). This excellent volume begins with an extensive review of the ancient sources of the Greco-Persian wars and is a wonderful starting point for anyone desiring to dig deeper into this aspect of events.
10. Ephorus (400–330 BC) wrote a universal history of Greece in twenty-nine volumes. Unfortunately, nothing but isolated fragments of his work survives. Cornelius Nepos’s work, The Lives of Eminent Commanders, includes a short history of Miltiades. A translation of the work can be found at http://www.tertullian.org/.
Chapter 1: AN EMPIRE RISES
1. The Cimmerians were a tribe of nomads who inhabited the Caucasus region. In one of their great raids south in about 652 BC, they destroyed a large part of the Lydian capital, Sardis, which they captured in its entirety a decade later. Between 637 and 626 BC, Alyattes II in a series of campaigns broke the back of Cimmerian power and forced their retreat into the Caucasus.
2. A solar eclipse was visible in the region in late May 585 BC.
3. The following pictures and story are drawn from Crawford H. Greenewalt Jr., “When a Mighty Empire Is Destroyed: The Common Man at the Fall of Sardis, ca. 546 BC,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 136, no. 2 (June 1992): 247–271.
4. For a thorough discussion of Croesus’s fate, see J. A. S. Evans, “What Happened to Croesus?” Classical Journal 73, no. 1 (October–November 1978): 34–40.
5. The Median Wall was constructed between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to the north of Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar II. Its purpose was to stand as a first line of defense against a Median invasion.
6. Ctesias’s original has been lost, but a fragment was copied by Nicholas of Damascus (Nicol. Damasc. Frag. 66, Ctes.; Frag. Pers., II, 5). According to Ctesias, Cyrus starts life as a peasant who rises from street sweeper to become Astyages’ most trusted adviser. A complete copy can be found at http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:mTqEQn5tcK4J:www.sacred-texts.com/neu/mbh/mbh10.htm+%2Bctesias+Astyages+harpagos&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us/.
7. There are three main sources for this conflict: Herodotus, the Babylonian Chronicles, and the Dream Text of Nabonidus. While these three versions often contradict one another, what follows is a synthesis of the three into what is the most likely historical circumstance.
Chapter 2: LOOKING TO THE WEST
1. Herodotus, 1.153, p. 83.
2. The following regions came under Persian control during this period: Parthia, Drangiana, Aria, Chorasmia, Bactria, Sogdiana, Gandhara, Scythia, Sattagydia, Arachosia, and Maka. All of these regions are listed on the Behistun inscriptions as part of the inheritance of Darius and were not under the control of the Medes when Cyrus assumed control of their empire.
3. As we will see, Cambyses attempted to make his name as a great conqueror in Egypt.
4. Herodotus, 1.162.
5. Ibid., 1.169.
6. That the Carians were capable of greater
resistance was proven fifty years later during the Ionian revolt, when they massacred a large Persian army.
Chapter 3: EMPIRE AT LAST
1. Herodotus’s account of Cyrus’s Babylonian campaign is notoriously flimsy and unreliable. It presents the improbable story that Cyrus, unobserved, diverted the Euphrates River, thereby allowing his army an uncontested entry into the city along the unguarded riverbank. By using various other sources (the Nabonidus Chronicle, the Verse Account of Nabonidus, and the Bible), this chapter hopefully presents a fuller and more accurate account of this war.
2. Isaiah 45:1.
3. Many historians have interpreted the Nabonidus Chronicle’s comment “The inhabitants of Akkad [Babylonia] revolted, but he massacred the confused inhabitants” as Cyrus conducting the massacre. However, the joyful welcome that greeted his forces all along their route of march makes this interpretation highly unlikely.
4. The similarity to how the Germans flanked the French Maginot Line and broke through at Sedan in 1940 is too alluring a comparison to go unmentioned.
5. Herodotus gives a different version of the fall of Babylon (1.190–1.191). According to him, Cyrus besieged Babylon and finally took the city by lowering the level of the Euphrates River and then sneaking his assault troops in along the lowered river, which was unguarded.
6. Unreliable accounts by Berossus, writing in the early third century BC, state that he was permitted to live and was exiled to Carmania.
7. The Babylonian Chronicles of the seventeenth year of the reign of Nabonidus state: “Till the end of the month, the shield carrying Gutians were staying within Esagila [Marduk’s temple], but nobody carried arms in Esagila and its buildings.”
8. James Bennett Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1969): 315–16.
9. The cylinder was discovered in 1879 by Hormuzd Rassam and is currently on display in the British Museum. It confirms much of what is found in the Nabonidus Chronicle and the Nabonidus Verse Account (both of which are at odds with Herodotus’s account, which states that Babylon fell only after a long siege). The cylinder has been called by many the first “declaration of human rights,” and a replica is on display in the United Nations. Unfortunately, this is probably a misinterpretation of the document’s meaning and is better looked upon as a masterful act of propaganda not untypical of the kinds of pronouncements many rulers of the period made upon their accession to the throne. A complete translation of the cylinder can be found online at http://www.livius.org/ct-cz/cyrus_I/cyrus_cylinder2.html/.
10. In the Anabasis: “For it is a fact that Cyrus came here with the intention of invading India, but found the going so bad and the country so wild and barren that he lost nearly all his men before he could do so.”
11. Herodotus, 1.201–1.216.
12. Herodotus comments that there were many versions of Cyrus’s death circulating and that he finds this one the most credible. He does not give any indication as to what other stories were known to him.
Chapter 4: THE RISE OF DARIUS
1. A small statue in the Vatican Museums, purported to have the autobiography of an Egyptian admiral, Wedjahor-Resne, presents a different and much more balanced portrait of Cambyses, portraying him as a beneficent ruler who made every attempt to appeal to the Egyptian people. As there is no account of any naval fighting during Cambyses’ invasion of Egypt, it might be assumed that Wedjahor-Resne was bribed to desert his pharaoh and then rewarded with the position of adviser to Cambyses.
2. As will be discussed later, there is a strong possibility that Darius and his co-conspirators murdered Cambyses and therefore would have seized on any excuse to justify their actions.
3. This explanation of the death of Smerdis (he is called Bardiya in the Persian sources) is considerably more satisfying than the account given by Herodotus. For a full analysis of the various traditions regarding Smerdis’s death, see Mabel L. Lang, “Prexaspes and Usurper Smerdis,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 51, no. 3 (July 1992): 201–207.
4. Egypt had joined Lydia in a defensive alliance against Cyrus. Although Lydia collapsed before the Egyptian army could come to its relief, the act must have marked Egypt as the next target on the Persian agenda of conquest.
5. Herodotus, 3.12.
6. Ibid., 3.14.
7. See Archaeology 53, no. 5 (September–October 2000): “A Helwan University geological team, prospecting for petroleum in Egypt’s Western Desert, has come upon well-preserved fragments of textiles, bits of metal resembling weapons, and human remains they believe to be traces of the lost army of the Persian ruler Cambyses II.”
8. As was mentioned above, in the historical records, Smerdis is also referred to as Bardiya. He is often also referred to as Gaumata. All three names are the same person. Herodotus relates that the man pretending to be Cambyses’ brother Smerdis was actually named Smerdis himself.
9. The Magi were originally a Median tribe. From this tribe were drawn most, if not all, of the Median priesthood. Over time, the Magi tribe became a religious caste, with considerable power throughout first the Median Empire and then the Persian Empire.
10. This Gobryas does not appear to be any relation to the Gobryas who was of such great assistance to Cyrus in his assault on Babylon. Also, Herodotus gets Aspathines’ name wrong, and in this case we refer back to the Behistun inscription on the assumption that Darius had a pretty good handle on who helped him overthrow the established order. Finally, Otanes is the son of Prexaspes, who is credited by all with killing the real Smerdis on Cambyses’ orders.
11. Soon after his rise to ultimate power, Darius had Intaphrenes and most of his family killed, claiming they were plotting his overthrow.
12. Also called in some histories Sikayauvatis.
Chapter 5: TRIAL BY FIRE
1. Dadarshish is referred to in some histories as Dadarsi and as such should not be confused with another general in Darius’s service of the same name, fighting rebel forces in Armenia concurrent with Dadarshish’s campaigns.
2. The chronology of Darius’s first year has been a matter of great dispute among historians for over a century. For what I still believe is the single best effort to make sense of this chaotic year, see Arno Poebel, “Chronology of Darius’ First Year of Reign,” American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literature 55, no. 3, (July 1938): 285–314.
3. He also remained in Media to make sure it would remain loyal and peaceful when he marched south.
4. Herodotus states that Darius placed Babylon under siege for almost two years before it was taken by the ruse of sending a supposed traitor into the city who would eventually gain enough trust to position himself in a place where he could give up the city. However, Herodotus appears particularly uninformed about this period, and there is no reason to give his account much credence. In this case, his account should certainly not be given any precedence over Darius’s own testimony on the Behistun inscription.
5. The new Smerdis, whose actual name was Vahyazdata, had marched into the province of Arachosia to attack the loyal satrap, Vivana, but was decisively defeated.
6. Fravartish is often referred to as Phraortes.
7. Although he is not referred to by the sources, it is likely that Darius obtained substantial funds within Babylon, which would have bought quite a bit of continued loyalty from his army. He of course would not have been as concerned with Babylonian sensibilities now that they had shown themselves to be rebels. A heavy-handed approach might also account for Babylon’s renewed rebellion as soon as Darius departed the city to deal with Media.
8. There is still some historical debate as to which army first marched against Armenia. The Behistun inscription is the only reference, and it starts its description with Vaumisa marching first. However, Darius often tells the story of this revolt in geographic order of events and not in chronological order. In order to validate the timeline the inscription presents for the entire course of events, most histor
ians have placed the march of Vaumisa first. Also, there is general agreement that the fighting in Armenia and Media was concurrent, although they appear to be sequential on the Behistun inscription.
9. Kundar is also referred to as Kundurus in some histories. Ahuramazda, which translates as “wise lord,” was the supreme god of the Persians, whose cult was spread by the prophet Zarathustra.
10. Ragae was a Median religious center and Magi stronghold at this time. It is currently a suburb of Tehran.
11. Here, where Darius learned that his forces were successful everywhere and that his empire was finally secure, was to be the location where his descendant Darius III was to lose the empire to Alexander the Great.
12. It is interesting that on the Behistun inscription Darius refers to the rebel leaders as kings and not rebels. Why he did so is a mystery, but perhaps it enhanced his image with the people to be seen as the conqueror of kings like himself, rather than just a ruler who crushed inferior rebels.
13. Herodotus, 3.128. It is just as likely that Darius paid off some of Oroites’ guards to murder him and Herodotus is reporting a fable concocted at a later date.
14. The only major exception to this was the short civil war between brothers (Cyrus and Artaxerxes) over the throne in about 401 BC, as detailed by Xenophon in the Anabasis.
Chapter 6: THE MIGHT OF PERSIA
1. As this work deals primarily with the military aspects of empire, particularly as they pertain to the momentous first clash between East and West on the Plain of Marathon, topics such as Persian art, architecture, religion, and law are not examined in the detail they deserve. Those interested in delving deeper into these topics are encouraged to start their readings with Richard N. Frye, The Heritage of Persia (Cleveland: Mentor Books, 1963); A. T. Olmstead, History of the Persian Empire (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1959); and Josef Wiesehofer, Ancient Persia (London: I. B. Tauris, 2001).