Book 5
Having been admitted to converse with Cleomenes, Aristagoras spoke thus to him: “Do not wonder, Cleomenes, that I have been so eager to come here, for our present situation is such that the sons of the Ionians are slaves and not free men, which is shameful and grievous particularly to ourselves but also, of all others, to you, inasmuch as you are the leaders of Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas.
Now, therefore, we entreat you by the gods of Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas to save your Ionian kinsmen from slavery. This is a thing which you can easily achieve, for the strangers are not valiant men while your valor in war is preeminent. As for their manner of fighting, they carry bows and short spears, and they go to battle with trousers on their legs and turbans on their heads.
Accordingly, they are easy to overcome. Furthermore, the inhabitants of that continent have more good things than all other men together, gold first but also silver, bronze, colored cloth, beasts of burden, and slaves. All this you can have to your heart's desire.
The lands in which they dwell lie next to each other, as I shall show: next to the Ionians are the Lydians, who inhabit a good land and have great store of silver.” (This he said pointing to the map of the earth which he had brought engraved on the tablet.) “Next to the Lydians,” said Aristagoras, “you see the Phrygians to the east, men that of all known to me are the richest in flocks and in the fruits of the earth.
Close by them are the Cappadocians, whom we call Syrians, and their neighbors are the Cilicians, whose land reaches to the sea over there, in which you see the island of Cyprus [33,35] (island), AsiaCyprus lying. The yearly tribute which they pay to the king is five hundred talents. Next to the Cilicians, are the Armenians, another people rich in flocks, and after the Armenians, the Matieni, whose country I show you.
Adjoining these you see the Cissian land, in which, on the Choaspes, lies that Shush [48.333,32.2] (inhabited place), Khuzestan, Iran, AsiaSusa where the great king lives and where the storehouses of his wealth are located. Take that city, and you need not fear to challenge Zeus for riches.
You should suspend your war, then, for strips of land of no great worth—for that fight with with Messenians, who are matched in strength with you, and Arcadians and Argives, men who have nothing in the way of gold or silver (for which things many are spurred by zeal to fight and die). Yet when you can readily be masters of all Asia (continent)Asia, will you refuse to attempt it?”
Thus spoke Aristagoras, and Cleomenes replied: “Milesian, my guest, wait till the third day for my answer.”
At that time, then, they got so far. When, on the day appointed for the answer, they came to the place upon which they had agreed, Cleomenes asked Aristagoras how many days' journey it was from the +Ionian Sea [19,39] (sea), Europe Ionian sea to the king.
Till now, Aristagoras had been cunning and fooled the Spartan well, but here he made a false step. If he desired to take the Spartans away into Asia (continent)Asia he should never have told the truth, but he did tell it, and said that it was a three months' journey inland.
At that, Cleomenes cut short Aristagoras' account of the prospective journey. He then bade his Milesian guest depart from Sparta [22.4417,37.0667] (Perseus) Sparta before sunset, for never, he said, would the Lacedaemonians listen to the plan, if Aristagoras desired to lead them a three months' journey from the sea.
Cleomenes went to his house after this exchange, but Aristagoras took a suppliant's garb and followed him there. Upon entering, he used a suppliant's right to beg Cleomenes to listen to him. He first asked Cleomenes to send away the child, his daughter Gorgo, who was standing by him. She was his only child, and was about eight or nine years of age. Cleomenes bade him say whatever he wanted and not let the child's presence hinder him.
Then Aristagoras began to promise Cleomenes from ten talents upwards, if he would grant his request. When Cleomenes refused, Aristagoras offered him ever more and more. When he finally promised fifty talents the child cried out, “Father, the stranger will corrupt you, unless you leave him and go away.”
Cleomenes was pleased with the child's counsel and went into another room while Aristagoras departed from Sparta [22.4417,37.0667] (Perseus) Sparta, finding no further occasion for telling of the journey inland to the king's palace.
Now the nature of this road“The royal road from Sardis [28.0167,38.475] (Perseus) Sardis to Shush [48.333,32.2] (inhabited place), Khuzestan, Iran, AsiaSusa is far older than the Persian empire,” say How and Wells. Evidence points to the existence of a Hittite capital in +Cappadocia [36,38.5] (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Cappadocia, to connect which with Sardis [28.0167,38.475] (Perseus) Sardis on the one hand and Assyria on the other was the purpose of the road. is as I will show. All along it are the king's road stations and very good resting places, and the whole of it passes through country that is inhabited and safe. Its course through Lydia [27.516,38.683] (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Lydia and Phrygia (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Phrygia is of the length of twenty stages, and ninety-four and a half parasangs.
Next after Phrygia (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Phrygia it comes to the river Halys River (river), Turkey, Asia Halys, where there is both a defile which must be passed before the river can be crossed and a great fortress to guard it. After the passage into +Cappadocia [36,38.5] (region (general)), Turkey, Asia Cappadocia, the road in that land as far as the borders of Cilicia [34.333,36.666] (region (general)), Turkey, AsiaCilicia is of twenty-eight stages and one hundred and four parasangs. On this frontier you must ride through two defiles and pass two fortresses.
Ride past these, and you will have a journey through Cilica of three stages and fifteen and a half parasangs. The boundary of Cilicia [34.333,36.666] (region (general)), Turkey, AsiaCilicia and Armenia (region (general)), AsiaArmenia is a navigable river, the name of which is the Euphrates [47.5,31.83] (river), AsiaEuphrates. In Armenia (region (general)), AsiaArmenia there are fifteen resting-stages and fifty-six and a half parasangs. Here too there is a fortress. From Armenia (region (general)), AsiaArmenia the road enters the Matienian land, in which there are thirty-four stages and one hundred and thirty-seven parasangs.
Through this land flow four navigable rivers which must be passed by ferries, first the Tigris [47.416,31] (river), AsiaTigris, then a second and a third of the same name, yet not the same stream nor flowing from the same source. The first-mentioned of them flows from the Armenians and the second from the Matieni.
The fourth river is called Gyndes, that Gyndes which Cyrus parted once into three hundred and sixty channels.Cp. Hdt. 1.189.
When this country is passed, the road is in the Cissian land, where there are eleven stages and forty-two and a half parasangs, as far as yet another navigable river, the Choaspes, on the banks of which stands the city of Shush [48.333,32.2] (inhabited place), Khuzestan, Iran, AsiaSusa.
Thus the sum total of stages is one hundred and eleven. So many resting-stages, then, are there in the journey up from Sardis [28.0167,38.475] (Perseus) Sardis to Shush [48.333,32.2] (inhabited place), Khuzestan, Iran, AsiaSusa. If I have accurately counted the parasangs of the royal road, and the parasang is of thirty furlongs' length, which assuredly it is, then between Sardis [28.0167,38.475] (Perseus) Sardis and the king's abode called Memnonian Memnon was the legendary king of the “eastern Ethiopians,” or Assyrians. When tradition began to place the Homeric Ethiopians in Libya [17,25] (nation), AfricaLibya, Memnon, the Ethiop king, came to be associated with Thebes [32.666,25.683] (deserted settlement), Qina, Upper Egypt, Egypt, AfricaThebes in Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt. there are thirteen thousand and five hundred furlongs, the number of parasangs being four hundred and fifty. If each day's journey is one hundred and fifty furlongs, then the sum of days spent is ninety, neither more nor less.
Aristagoras of Miletus [27.3,37.5] (Perseus) Miletus accordingly spoke the truth to Cleomenes the Lacedaemonian when he said that the journey inland was three months long. If anyone should desire a more exact measurement, I will give him that too, for the journey from +Ephesus [27.316,37.916] (deserted settlement), Izmir Ili, Ege kiyilari, Turkey, Asia Ephesus to Sardis [28.0167,38.475] (Perseus) Sardis must be added to the rest.
So, then, from the Greek sea to Shush [48.333,32.2] (inhabited place), Khuzestan, Iran, AsiaSusa, which is the city called Memnonian, it is a journey of fourteen thousand and forty stages, for there are five hundred and forty furlongs from +Ephesus [27.316,37.916] (deserted settlement), Izmir Ili, Ege kiyilari, Turkey, Asia Ephesus to Sardis [28.0167,38.475] (Perseus) Sardis. The three months' journey is accordingly made longer by three days.
When he was forced to leave Sparta [22.4417,37.0667] (Perseus) Sparta, Aristagoras went to Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens, which had been freed from its ruling tyrants in the manner that I will show. First Hipparchus, son of Pisistratus and brother of the tyrant Hippias, had been slain by Aristogiton and Harmodius, men of Gephyraean descent. This was in fact an evil of which he had received a premonition in a dream. After this the Athenians were subject for four years to a tyranny not less but even more absolute than before.
Now this was the vision which Hipparchus saw in a dream: in the night before the Panathenaea he thought that a tall and handsome man stood over him uttering these riddling verses: O lion, endure the unendurable with a lion's heart. No man on earth does wrong without paying the penalty.
As soon as it was day, he imparted this to the interpreters of dreams, and presently putting the vision from his mind, he led the procession in which he met his death. Hipparchus was killed in 513.
Now the Gephyraean clan, of which the slayers of Hipparchus were members, claim to have come at first from +Eretria [23.8083,38.3917] (Perseus) Eretria, but my own enquiry shows that they were among the Phoenicians Gephyra (=bridge or dam) was another name for +Tanagra [23.6,38.3083] (Perseus) Tanagra; perhaps Herodotus' theory of an oriental origin is based on the fact that there was a place called Gephyrae in +Syria [38,35] (nation), Asia Syria. who came with Cadmus to the country now called Boeotia (department), Central Greece and Euboea, Greece, Europe Boeotia. In that country the lands of +Tanagra [23.6,38.3083] (Perseus) Tanagra were allotted to them, and this is where they settled.
The Cadmeans had first been expelled from there by the Argives,This happened sixty years after the fall of +Troy [26.2833,39.9167] (Perseus) Troy, according to Thucydides. and these Gephyraeans were forced to go to Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens after being expelled in turn by the Boeotians. The Athenians received them as citizens of their own on set terms, debarring them from many practices not deserving of mention here.
These Phoenicians who came with Cadmus and of whom the Gephyraeans were a part brought with them to Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeHellas, among many other kinds of learning, the alphabet, which had been unknown before this, I think, to the Greeks. As time went on the sound and the form of the letters were changed.
At this time the Greeks who were settled around them were for the most part Ionians, and after being taught the letters by the Phoenicians, they used them with a few changes of form. In so doing, they gave to these characters the name of Phoenician, as was quite fair seeing that the Phoenicians had brought them into Greece [22,39] (nation), EuropeGreece.Whether Herodotus' theory of derivation be right or not, there is certainly a similarity in the form and order of early Greek and Phoenician letters.
The Ionians have also from ancient times called sheets of papyrus skins, since they formerly used the skins of sheep and goats due to the lack of papyrus. Even to this day there are many foreigners who write on such skins.
I have myself seen Cadmean writing in the temple of Ismenian Apollo at Thebes [23.3333,38.325] (Perseus) Thebes of Boeotia (department), Central Greece and Euboea, Greece, Europe Boeotia engraved on certain tripods and for the most part looking like Ionian letters. On one of the tripods there is this inscription: Amphitryon dedicated me from the spoils ofThis is reading ἑλών, Meineke's change for the MSS ἐών. Teleboae. This would date from about the time of Laius the son of Labdacus, grandson of Polydorus and great-grandson of Cadmus.
A second tripod says, in hexameter verse: Scaeus the boxer, victorious in the contest, Gave me to Apollo, the archer god, a lovely offering. Scaeus the son of Hippocoon, if he is indeed the dedicator and not another of the same name, would have lived at the time of Oedipus son of Laius.
The third tripod says, in hexameter verse again: Laodamas, while he reigned, dedicated this cauldron To Apollo, the sure of aim, as a lovely offering.
During the rule of this Laodamas son of Eteocles, the Cadmeans were expelled by the Argives and went away to the Encheleis. The Gephyraeans were left behind but were later compelled by the Boeotians to withdraw to Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens. They have certain set forms of worship at Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens in which the rest of the Athenians take no part, particularly the rites and mysteries of Achaean Demeter.
I have told both of the vision of Hipparchus' dream and of the first origin of the Gephyreans, to whom the slayers of Hipparchus belonged. Now I must go further and return to the story which I began to tell, namely how the Athenians were freed from their tyrants.
Hippias, their tyrant, was growing ever more bitter in enmity against the Athenians because of Hipparchus' death, and the Alcmeonidae, a family of Athenian stock banished by the sons of Pisistratus, attempted with the rest of the exiled Athenians to make their way back by force and free Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens. They were not successful in their return and suffered instead a great reverse. After fortifying Lipsydrium north of Paeonia, they, in their desire to use all devices against the sons of Pisistratus, hired themselves to the Amphictyons for the building of the temple at Delphi [22.5167,38.4917] (Perseus) Delphi which exists now but was not there yet then.
Since they were wealthy and like their fathers men of reputation, they made the temple more beautiful than the model showed. In particular, whereas they had agreed to build the temple of tufa, they made its front of Parian marble.
These men, as the Athenians say, established themselves at Delphi [22.5167,38.4917] (Perseus) Delphi and bribed the Pythian priestess to bid any Spartans who should come to inquire of her on a private or a public account to set Athens [23.7333,37.9667] (Perseus)Athens free.
Then the Lacedaemonians, when the same command was ever revealed to them, sent Anchimolius the son of Aster, a citizen of repute, to drive out the sons of Pisistratus with an army despite the fact that the Pisistratidae were their close friends, for the god's will weighed with them more than the will of man.