The History of Antiquity, Vol. 6 (of 6)

Still more dangerous, though at a greater distance, appeared to be the attitude of a satrap who ruled over wide regions. Oroetes had been made satrap of Lydia and Ionia by Cyrus. In the last year of Cambyses he had enticed Polycrates of Samos to Magnesia into his power, and had caused him to be executed there, in order to bring about the subjugation of Samos. When called upon by Darius to declare against Gaumata he had paid no heed to the command, but had availed himself of the confusion to assassinate Mitrobates the satrap of Phrygia, who resided at Dascyleum, and possess himself of that satrapy. He now ruled from Sardis to the Halys. After the accession of Darius, so far from obeying his commands to appear at the court, he cut down the messenger who brought them. It was obviously his intention to establish an independent kingdom in Asia Minor. It did not appear possible to crush him without an open struggle, and the beginning of this would be a signal of revolt for many others. Darius summoned the chief of the Persians, and asked if any one could remove Oroetes out of the way. In the narrative of Herodotus not one only but thirty offered themselves for the venture. They cast lots, and the lot fell on Bagaeus the son of Artontes. Provided with the necessary letters from the king, he went as an extraordinary commissioner to Sardis. The garrison of the citadel at Sardis in which Oroetes resided consisted of a thousand Persian lance-bearers. Bagaeus caused a communication from Darius to be read to these troops in the presence of Oroetes. They showed respect for the letter and the royal seal, and expressed a willingness to obey the king's commands. As soon as Bagaeus had convinced himself of their feeling, he read an order from Darius in which the lance-bearers were forbidden to obey Oroetes any longer. They at once placed their lances on the ground. Encouraged by this, Bagaeus immediately read the last order, in which Darius bade the Persians at Sardis to put Oroetes to death. This command also was executed on the spot. It was a rapid success, and an extremely fortunate event for Darius. Asia Minor from the Halys to the Aegean was brought under his authority at a single blow.

Herodotus only remarks in passing, that the Medes revolted from Darius, but were conquered in the battle and reduced again to submission.222 He relates the rebellion of the Babylonians at greater length. Since the accession of the Magian the Babylonians had secretly prepared to throw off the yoke of Persia. They put to death all the women in the city who were not mothers, leaving only a childless wife and another woman in each household, that their provisions might not fail, and when Darius brought up his forces, and invested Babylon, they made merry over the siege and danced behind their towers. A whole year and seven months passed away, and Darius tried every art and invention in vain, including the means by which Cyrus had taken the city and many others, but the Babylonians were strongly on their guard, and it was impossible to take the city. In the twentieth month, Zopyrus the son of Megabyzus, one of the men who had taken part in the assassination of the Magian, appeared before the throne of Darius with his nose and ears cut off, his hair shaved, and his body covered with blows from a whip. Distressed to see one of the most distinguished men in such a condition, the king sprang up and asked who had done him such an irreparable injury. It was intolerable, Zopyrus answered, that the Assyrians should mock the Persians any longer; he had not acquainted the king with his design that he might not prevent him from carrying it out. It was his intention in this plight to seek admittance into the city and to tell the Babylonians that the king of the Persians had treated him thus. He thought that they would believe him, and entrust him with the command over a division. On the tenth day after his reception into the city, Darius was to place a thousand men of the troops which he valued least against the gate of Semiramis; on the seventeenth two thousand against the gate of Ninus; on the thirty-seventh four thousand against the gate of the Chaldæans. If he achieved great successes against these troops the Babylonians would no doubt entrust everything to him, even the keys of their gates. Then Darius was to attack the city on all sides, and place the Persians against the gates of Belus and the gate of the Cissians. "Zopyrus set forth, gave his name at the gate, pretended to be a deserter, and demanded entrance. The guards led him before the council of the city. He lamented the treatment which he had received from Darius because he had advised him to lead away his army, inasmuch as there was no way of taking the city. He could do them the greatest services, and Darius and the Persians the greatest harm, for he knew their plans in every direction. The Babylonians seeing the most distinguished Persian without nose or ears, covered with stripes and blood, listened to his words, and believed that he had come to aid them; and they were ready at his request to allow him the command of a division." At the head of his Babylonian soldiers Zopyrus cut down the three troops on the days agreed upon. "Then Zopyrus was all in all to the Babylonians; they elected him general and keeper of the walls of the city, and when Darius, as had been agreed upon, stormed the city on every side, and the besieged repulsed their opponents in every direction, Zopyrus opened the Cissian gate and the gate of Belus to the Persians and brought them into the city. The Babylonians who saw this fled into the shrine of Belus, but the others fought on in their ranks till they perceived that they had been betrayed. Thus Babylon was recovered, and Darius now did what Cyrus had neglected to do at the time of his conquest; he destroyed the walls, tore down the gates, impaled nearly three thousand of the leading men, and gave the city to the remainder for a habitation. In order that they might have wives and posterity, Darius commanded each of the neighbouring nations to send a number of women to Babylon; in all there were 50,000, and from these the present inhabitants of the city are descended. In the judgment of Darius no one had ever done greater service to the Persians than Zopyrus, with the exception of Cyrus, with whom no Persian could be compared. It is also asserted that Darius was wont to say that he would willingly lose twenty Babylons, if Zopyrus might be restored from his mutilated condition. He held him in great honour, gave him each year the presents which are most honourable among the Persians, conferred on him for his life the government of Babylon free of all tribute to the king, and a great deal besides."223

Megabyzus, the son of Daduhya, who aided Darius in putting the Magian to death, and his descendants, were only too well known to the Greeks, and more especially to the Athenians. Megabyzus conquered Perinthus, and reduced Thracia and Macedonia beneath the Persian rule. The son of this Megabyzus was Zopyrus, to whom Darius, according to the narrative of Herodotus, owed the capture of Babylon; the son of Zopyrus was Megabyzus the younger, who in the year 455 B.C. inflicted on the Athenians in Egypt one of the heaviest defeats which they ever experienced; they lost more than 200 triremes, and nearly the whole of the crews, for those who escaped to Cyrene were few in number.224 From the marriage of this Megabyzus with the daughter of Xerxes and Amestris, the granddaughter of Otanes, sprang the younger Zopyrus, who broke with Artaxerxes I. after the death of his parents, retired to Athens after 440 B.C., and afterwards, when attacking the city of Caunus in Caria with Attic troops – the city belonged to the Attic league but had withdrawn from it, and it was necessary to reduce it – was killed by a stone thrown from the walls.225 Hence the achievements of the princely family, who were the forefathers of the deserter – of his father Megabyzus, his grandfather, the elder Zopyrus, and his great-grandfather – were peculiarly interesting to the Greeks. The minute account which Herodotus gives of the greatest act of the older Zopyrus must be derived from information which he obtained in Athens either from the younger Zopyrus or from his retinue, and these would relate what the minstrels of the Persians had sung of the sacrifice made by the elder Zopyrus for the great king and the kingdom. We can trace a poetical source in the mocking of the besiegers, and the saying connected with it. A Babylonian cries to the Persians, "Why do you sit there? Why do you not retire? Ye will take the city when mules bring forth." A mule belonging to Zopyrus does bring forth; this sign, showing that Babylon can be taken, determines Zopyrus to mutilate himself, when he had previously ascertained from Darius that the king attached the greatest importance to the capture of the city. The massacre of the women of the Babylonians must also be poetical. Herodotus himself tells us that the Babylonians had prepared their rebellion for a long time, ever since the Magian had ascended the throne. Thus they had at least a year before the investment of the city in which to furnish it with provisions, and the adjacent country was most fruitful; moreover, the walls of Babylon enclosed a very large extent of arable and pasture land (III. 382). We may conceive of such wholesale massacre as an act of desperation in consequence of a long siege; but in the account of Herodotus it took place before the city was invested, and is one of the preparations of the Babylonians. It is not until he has heard of the massacre of the women that Darius sets out against Babylon. Not less remarkable are the definite numbers of the troops, which Zopyrus with the Babylonians cuts down on the appointed days. The names of the five gates mentioned in the narrative seem to show exact local knowledge. But though a gate in Babylon might be named after Belus, and another "the gate of Elam" (the Cissians); no gate in that city could have been named after the Chaldæans, or Ninus, or Semiramis. So far as the inscriptions of Babylon have been deciphered, the names of the gates were different.226 As the forms of Ninus and Semiramis and their history do not belong even in the remotest degree to Babylonia and her history, but are rather shown to be inventions of the Medo-Persian Epos, these two gates which are named after them point to the Persian source from which the narrative of Herodotus was derived. More incredible even than the massacre of the women at the beginning of the rebellion is their replacement after the capture by the 50,000 women whom Darius causes the neighbouring nations to send to Babylon. Darius had no reasons for assisting a city which had maintained itself against him for more than twenty months, the walls and gates of which he had broken, and at the same time, as Herodotus himself tells us, had executed the leading men, 3000 in number, by a cruel death. His interests lay in precisely the opposite direction.

Darius himself informs us about the rising of the Babylonians and their subjugation. "When I had slain Gaumata, there was a man Atrina, by name, the son of Upadarma, who rebelled in Susiana. He said to the people: 'I am king in Susiana.' Then the inhabitants in Susiana became rebellious; they went over to Atrina; he was king in Susiana. Moreover there was a man of Babylon, Naditabira by name (Nidintabel in the Babylonian text), the son of Aniri; he rebelled in Babylon. He deceived the people thus: 'I am Nabukadrachara (Nabukudurussur), the son of Nabunita.' Then the people of Babylon went over entirely to Naditabira; he seized the throne in Babylon. After this I sent (an army?) to Susiana; Atrina was brought in fetters before me; I slew him. Then I marched to Babylonia against Naditabira, who called himself Nabukadrachara. The army of Naditabira maintained the Tigris, and occupied the river with ships; his whole power protected the Tigris.227 Auramazda came to my aid; by the grace of Auramazda I crossed the Tigris, and severely defeated the army of Naditabira. On the 26th of the month of Athriyadiya (on the 26th of the month Kislev), then it was, that we gave battle. After this I marched against Babylon. When I went against Babylon, there is a city, by name Zazana on the Euphrates, there this Naditabira, who called himself Nabukadrachara, had come with an army to give me battle. Then we joined battle. Auramazda came to my aid; by the grace of Auramazda I severely defeated the army of Naditabira. The enemy was driven into the water; the water carried him away;228 on the second day of the month of Anamaka, then we joined battle. Then Naditabira went with a few horse to Babylon, and I went to Babylon. By the grace of Auramazda I took Babylon and captured Naditabira. Then I slew Naditabira at Babylon. While I was in Babylonia these provinces revolted: Persia, Susiana, Media, Assyria, Parthia, Margiana, the Sattagydæ, the Sacæ."229

The inscription shows that the inhabitants of Elam gave the signal for revolt, that their leader Atrina attempted to raise once more that ancient kingdom 125 years after its fall. Nabonetus (Nabunahed, Nabunita), the last king of Babylon, had been sent by Cyrus to Carmania and had died there (p. 89). A man, who gave himself out to be his younger son, took the lead of the Babylonians, and once more called into existence the revered name of Nebuchadnezzar. He had time to collect an army, and considered himself strong enough to meet the Persians in the open field. On the eastern border of the ancient kingdom, on the Tigris, he awaited the attack of the Persians; he brings armed ships to the place, that they may facilitate his defence of the right bank, and make it difficult for the enemy to cross the river. The Elamites were overpowered, their leader captured and slain. The heavier task of reducing Babylon was undertaken by Darius himself. The army which he led was obviously the same as that which conquered Susiana; it consisted of Persians and Medes, as is shown by the sequel of the inscription. Darius had to open the campaign against the new Nebuchadnezzar in the same manner in which Cyrus nineteen years previously had begun his war against Nabonetus. He had first to cross the Tigris. This was done, and Nebuchadnezzar retired in a slanting direction across Babylonia to the Euphrates, closely pursued by Darius. On the Euphrates he was again defeated, and his people were driven in part into the river, but he was not cut off from the city as Nabonetus had been by Cyrus; he was able to reach the protection of the walls of Babylon. We know their powers of resistance. The Persians had crossed the Tigris at a place where it is not more than 100 miles distant from the Euphrates, i. e. not far below the Median walls; for the battle on the Tigris was fought on the 26th (or 27th) of Athriadiya, and six days after, on the 2nd of Anamaka, the Babylonian army suffered its second defeat on the bank of the Euphrates at Zazana. As Athriadiya coincides with the Kislev (November-December) and Anamaka with the Tebet (December-January) of the Babylonians (p. 195), the rebellion of Babylonia must have taken place in the summer and the investment of the city in the last weeks of the year 521 B.C. The inscriptions tell us nothing of the length of the siege. On the other hand we have five tablets from the reign of the rebel, Nebuchadnezzar III., all dated from Babylon, and bearing the name of the same witness. They date, in the time of this king, from Kislev 20, to the next Tisri and Marchesvan, i. e. from November-December of the year of the battles down to October-November of the next year.230 The inscription of Behistun allows that all the central lands of the kingdom, not excepting Persia, rebelled against Darius during the siege. It follows therefore that success at Babylon was long enough delayed to awake the hope that Darius would be checked before Babylonia, and defeated there. The twenty months of Herodotus would carry us from the end of the year 521 B.C. to the autumn of the year 519 B.C.

The rebellion made head everywhere. In spite of the day of Çikathauvatis, the kingdom was going to ruin. The position of Darius was desperate. The longer the siege, the more fixed the belief that he could not succeed, the greater was the progress of the revolt. If he raised the siege to turn against the rebels, that was a proof that he could not conquer Babylon; the confidence of the rebels in their fortunes would be increased, and the army discouraged with which he had conquered on the Tigris and the Euphrates, with which he stood in personal relations, and which he had drawn into close connection with himself. On this army the kingdom rested; it remained yet loyal in the camp at Babylon. The deed in Nisaea had been best confirmed by the fact that Media recognized Darius as king, that he had been able to summon the Median contingent to the field, and by his successes to connect the Median army with himself. "The Persian and Median army which was with me remained faithful; the Median nations which remained at home, revolted" – so we learn from the inscription.231 Darius perceived that he must not weaken the only support which he had in this difficult crisis, or remove it by his own act. He judged the situation correctly, and remained before Babylon in spite of bad news which was brought to him from all sides. But the resistance was not less stubborn than the attack. It seemed as though the new reign of Darius must come to an end before Babylon. Could it continue beside the defection of the Medes, Parthians, Hyrcanians, Margiani, Sagartians and Sattagydæ, the Armenians, Assyrians, and Susiani, the rebellion of the Persians themselves? Was it possible to check the outbreak of the storm of ruin in the face of the indomitable resistance of Babylon? Only in the distant east and west were there glimpses of light. The satraps of Arachosia and Bactria, Vivana and Dadarshis, remained loyal to Darius and kept their lands in obedience. Asia Minor was quiet; if Darius had not succeeded in removing Oroetes at the right moment, these regions also would have taken up arms against Darius either under him or under some native ruler.

The account of Darius allows us to see that the recently-subdued Susiani were the first to rebel when Darius was delayed at Babylon. After them the Medes rebelled, in order to renew the struggle for the sovereignty between Persia and Media; this was followed in the east by the rebellion of the Sattagydæ, the Parthians, the Hyrcanians, the Margiani, the Sacæ; in the west the Armenians and Syrians took up arms. Finally, even the Persians held out a hand to the subject nations for the overthrow of the kingdom and their own dominion. Vahyazdata, a Persian of the tribe of the Utians (V. 323), declared himself to be the legitimate ruler; the brother of Cambyses was alive; he was no other than Bardiya, the son of Cyrus. The Persians believe him; this second pretender finds many adherents.

The inscription is as follows: "There was a man, by name Martiya; he dwelt in the city of Kuganaka in Persia; he revolted in Susiana; and said to the people: 'I am Ymani, king in Susiana.' There was a man, Fravartis (Phraortes) by name, a Mede. He revolted in Media, and said: 'I am Khsathrita of the family of Uvakhshathra' (Cyaxares). The Median nation then became rebellious towards me; they went over to Fravartis; and he was king in Media. Thereupon I sent an army. I made Vidarna, a Persian, my servant, the general, and said to them: 'Go down and smite the Median army which does not call itself mine.' Then Vidarna marched out. When he came to Media, he fought a battle with the Medes at Marus, a city in Media. By the grace of Auramazda the army of Vidarna conquered that rebellious army on the (twenty-seventh) day of the month Anamaka (of the month Tebet).232 There was a district Campada (Cambadene) in Media; there my army awaited me. The Parthians and Hyrcanians became rebellious to me, and joined Fravartis. Vistaçpa, my father, was in Parthia; the people left him and revolted. Then Vistaçpa took those who adhered to him and marched against the rebels. On the 22nd day of the month Viyakhna Vistaçpa, by the grace of Auramazda, defeated the rebels near the city of Viçpauvatis in Parthia. I sent my servant, Dadarshis by name, an Armenian, to Armenia. When he came to Armenia, the rebels gathered together and marched against Dadarshis to give battle. By the grace of Auramazda my army defeated the revolted army near Zuza in Armenia, on the 6th day of the month of Thuravahara. The rebels marched against Dadarshis a second time. Near the fortress of Tigra in Armenia on the 18th of Thuravahara my army defeated the rebellious army; they slew 526 of them, and took 520 prisoners.233 A third time the rebels marched against Dadarshis. Near the fortress of Uhyama in Armenia my army defeated the rebellious army on the 9th day of the month Thaigarshis. There Dadarshis waited till I came to Media. A man, by name Chitratakhma, revolted from me. 'I am king of Sagartia,' he said to the people, 'of the race of Uvakhshathra' (Cyaxares). There is a province Margiana (Margu) by name which revolted from me. They made a man of Margiana, Frada by name, their leader. Against him I sent Dadarshis (Dadarsu) a Persian, my servant, the satrap of Bactria. There was a man, Vahyazdata by name, in the city of Tarava, in the district of Yutiya in Persia; he said to the people: 'I am Bardiya, the son of Kurus.' The Persian nation revolted from me. He was king in Persia. This Vahyazdata, who called himself Bardiya, sent an army to Arachosia against the Persian Vivana, my servant, the satrap of Arachosia."

The rebellion of Phraortes (which took place in the summer of 520 B.C.) was the more dangerous because it was undertaken with the obvious intention of restoring the independence of Media under a scion of the old native royal house, and the name of Cyaxares could not but excite and give new life to national memories among the Medes. Whatever troops Darius could spare, and for this purpose he could only use Persians, he sent under the command of the tribal prince Hydarnes, his associate in the assassination of the Magi, against the Medes, at the same time despatching Dadarshis an Armenian to Armenia, to check the advance of the rebellion there, and mainly, no doubt, to prevent the alliance of the Armenians and the Medes. A whole year after Darius had begun the investment of Babylon, on the 27th day of Anamaka (December-January, 520 B.C.), Hydarnes encountered Phraortes at Marus. He did not obtain any great success. He had to content himself with maintaining against Phraortes the district of Cambadene in the south of Media. In the west of Media, Dadarshis had no better success against his Armenian compatriots. When he had fought two battles, of no great importance, if we are to judge from the losses of the rebels in one, in one month (on the eight and eighteenth), and a third in May (Thaigarshis) of the year 519 B.C., he was compelled to retire to a fortress named Uhyama. In Parthia, to the east of Media, Hystaspes the father of Darius, who was expected to keep these regions of the kingdom in obedience, was not in a position, with the forces at his disposal, to prevent the defection of the Parthians, Hyrcanians, Margiani, and Sacæ. He contented himself with the attempt to prevent the combination of the Parthians and Hyrcanians with Phraortes, and to limit as far as possible the spread of the rebellion. He only succeeded in retaining a part of the Parthians in obedience. The battle at Viçpauvatis (in Viyakhna, i. e. in March, 519), made it possible for him to maintain himself in Parthia, but was far from giving him the control of the land. The troops and generals sent by Darius were not able to prevail against the rebels; in Media and Armenia they were reduced to the defensive, and the same was the case with Hystaspes the father of Darius in Bactria. This collapse of the kingdom and general rebellion was used by a Persian of the tribe of the Utians (Yutiya234) in order to win over the Persians once more with the name of Bardiya, and to wrest them from the rule of Darius. Vahyazdata must have found a considerable following in Persia, and his successes must have been important, since he could attempt to extend his dominion to the east over Carmania and Arachosia, and to send an army to Arachosia in order to win this province also from Darius.

The position of Darius before Babylon was hopeless. The danger increased every day, and there was still no prospect of winning the city. We may certainly believe the narrative of Herodotus that Darius left no means untried to reduce it, that he repeated the device of drawing off the water of the Euphrates into the basin of Sepharvaim, by which Cyrus had attained his object twenty years previously; the Babylonians had been taught by that siege to be on their guard in this direction. The account of Darius does not tell us how the city was finally taken; he does not mention the name of Zopyrus. The pressure of the surrounding dangers was so great, the hope of taking the city by force so small, that the son of a tribal king might feel himself called upon to sacrifice himself for the king and the kingdom, to adopt desperate measures. That Zopyrus did take a prominent part in the capture of Babylon is clear from the fact, which we do not learn from Herodotus only, that the satrapy of Babylon was given to him, and remained in his hands during the whole reign of Darius and afterwards. He is said to have lost his life in a rebellion of the Babylonians in the reign of Xerxes.235 We cannot doubt that after the capture Darius proceeded with greater severity against Babylon than Cyrus had done, that the gates were broken and large spaces of the walls thrown down (p. 234). The inscription of Behistun merely mentions the execution of the third Nebuchadnezzar.