The History of Antiquity, Vol. 5 (of 6)

In the ranges of the Zagrus, which, running from the Alps of Atropatene to the south-east, separate the table-land of Iran from the valley of the Tigris – these summits rise above the hilly land of Assyria to a height of 15,000 feet – we must seek the territory which Ptolemy calls Choromithrene, i. e. by a name which beyond doubt goes back to the worship of Mithra. Further to the east, beyond the isolated mountain-group of Elvend, on the eastern foot of the mountains, lay the territory where Ecbatana was subsequently built. To the south-east were the "Nisæan plains" of Herodotus, on which, as he tells us, were kept the most beautiful and largest horses, superior to those of the Indians.454 Polybius has already stated, that in regard to horses Media surpassed the rest of Asia; the mares of the Parthian kings were kept in Media owing to the excellent pastures. According to Strabo, there were 50,000 mares on the "horse pastures" in the time of the Achæmenids; these pastures any one going from Babylonia and Persia to the Caspian gates, i. e. to the Sirdarra-pass in Elburz, would cross. Diodorus places them seven days' march to the east of Behistun, and tells us that at one time there were 160,000 wild horses here, though Alexander found only 60,000. Arrian puts the previous number at 150,000, and the number found by Alexander at 50,000, as the greater part had been carried off by robbers.455 That Herodotus has given the name of this region correctly is shown by the inscriptions of Darius, which speak of a province of Niçaya in Media.456 To the north-east of the region of Ecbatana, on an elevated plateau, lay the district of Raghiana. It takes its name from the metropolis Ragha, a city on the southern foot of Elburz, mentioned both in the Avesta and the inscriptions. Under the Arsacids Ragha was the largest city of Media. Its later name was Rai; the ruins (near the modern Teheran) are said to cover the land for leagues. Besides Ragha there were at one time numerous flourishing cities in Raghiana.457 Campadene,458 the Campada of the inscriptions of Darius, we must look for in the south of Media, to the east of the Zagrus; it is no doubt the district now called Chamabatan.459 According to the statement of the Greeks, the district of Bagistana extended to a mountain which was sacred to Zeus. As Diodorus says, it was a region fit for the gods, filled with fruit-trees and every other kind that ministers to delight and enjoyment.460 The name of the mountain consecrated to Zeus, Bagistana, and the similar name of the district, go back to the title under which the gods are comprised in the Avesta and the inscriptions of Darius (Old Bactr. bagha, Old Pers. baga, New Pers. bag); and if Diodorus tells us that the region was a land fit for the gods, the name Bagistana means the abode of the gods. The district may have been held peculiarly sacred by the Medes, or the name may have been intended to express their gratitude for its fertility and beauty. We can fix precisely the position of this district by the hill consecrated to Zeus near the modern Behistun. It lies south-west of Elvend, between that mountain and the Zagrus in the valley of the Choaspes, and is the district now known as Kirmenshah.

According to the statements of Berosus, the historian of Babylon, the Medes in the most ancient period had already reigned over Babylonia for more than two centuries. They had suddenly collected an army, reduced Babylonia, and there set up tyrants of their own people. According to the succession of the dynasties which Berosus represents as ruling over Babylonia, the beginning of this supremacy of the Medes fell, as has been shown (I. 241, 247), in the year 2458 B.C. The first of the Medes who thus ruled in Babylon is called Zoroaster by Syncellus, after Polyhistor; according to this writer the seven Medes reign till the year 2224 B.C. Whether Berosus called the first Median king who reigned in Babylon Zoroaster, or Polyhistor has ascribed that position to him as the most famous name in Iran, or the only name known in antiquity, must be left undecided, no less than the actual fact of the Median supremacy.

The Medo-Persian epos told us that Ninus of Asshur, after subjugating Babylonia and Armenia, attacked the Medes. Pharnus, their king, met him with a mighty army, but was nevertheless beaten. He was crucified with his wife and seven children by Ninus; one of his retinue was made viceroy of Media; and for many years the Medes were subject to the successors of Ninus on the throne of Assyria (II. 3 ff). Herodotus' account is as follows: "When the Assyrians had reigned over upper Asia for 520 years, the Medes were the first to revolt, and as they fought bravely for their freedom against the Assyrians, they succeeded in escaping slavery and liberating themselves. Afterwards the rest of the nations did what the Medes had done. And as all the nations of the mainland lived according to laws of their own, they again fell under a tyranny in the following manner: – Among the Medes was a man of ability, called Deioces, the son of Phraortes. He desired the tyranny, and did as follows: The Medes dwelt in villages, and Deioces, who was previously a man of importance, set himself more and more zealously to the task of doing justice, since lawlessness reigned throughout the whole of Media. When the Medes of his village discovered these qualities in him, they chose him for their judge. And as his heart was already set on the empire, he acted justly and rightly, and thus got no small credit among his fellow-citizens, so that the men from other villages, when they found that Deioces alone judged rightly, gladly resorted to him, since hitherto they had had to endure unjust sentences, and at last they would not go to any one else. As the number of the applicants became greater, and Deioces found that everything depended upon him, he refused to sit any longer in court and pronounce sentence, saying, that it was of no advantage to himself to neglect his own business and spend the day in settling the disputes of others. Then robbery and lawlessness became more rife than ever in the villages, and the Medes gathered together and consulted on the position of affairs. In my belief the friends of Deioces were the first to speak: 'As things are, it is impossible to live in the land; let us choose some one to be king, and thus the land will obtain good government. We can occupy ourselves with our own business, and shall not be compelled to wander from home.' With these words they persuaded the Medes to set up a monarchy. And when they at once began the discussion who should be king, Deioces was highly commended and put forward by every one, so that at last he was chosen by all to be king. Then Deioces commanded the Medes to build him a palace suitable for a king, and strengthen his power by a body-guard. This they did, and built a great and strong palace, on the place which Deioces pointed out to them, and allowed him to choose his lance-bearers out of all the nation. When he had obtained the sovereign power he at once compelled the Medes to build him a large city, in order that, being thus occupied, they might trouble him less about other things; and when the Medes obeyed him in this matter also, he erected the great and strong citadel now known as Ecbatana. The walls formed seven circles, in such a manner that the inner was always higher by the turrets than the next outer circle, an arrangement assisted by the locality, for the town was situated on a hill. In the seventh wall was the palace and the treasure-house of Deioces. After erecting this fortification for himself, and his palace, the king commanded the people to settle round the citadel. When the building was completed Deioces first made the arrangement that no one should enter in to the king, but every thing was done by messengers, in order that those who had grown up with him, and were of similar age, equal in descent and bravery, might not envy him, and set conspiracies on foot, but that by being invisible he might appear a different being; it was also disgraceful to laugh or spit, or do anything of that kind in his presence. When he had made these arrangements, and thus strengthened his tyranny, he adhered strictly to justice. Plaints had to be sent in to him in writing, and he sent back the sentence. Thus he managed this and all other matters, and if he found that any one was guilty of insolence, and did violence to others, he punished him according to the measure of his offence, and his spies and emissaries were everywhere in the land.461 In this manner Deioces united the Medes, and governed them for 53 years. After his death, his son Phraortes succeeded to the throne. Not content with ruling over the Medes only, he marched against the Persians, and first made them subject to the Medes. When he had become master of these two powerful nations, he subjugated all Asia, attacking one nation after another. Finally, he marched against the Assyrians, who had previously ruled over all men, but, though otherwise in excellent condition, were then abandoned by their allies, who had revolted. In the war against these Phraortes fell, after a reign of 22 years, and with him the greatest part of his army."462

The account of the history of the Medes given by Ctesias is wholly different. As their subjugation to Assyria is coeval with the founding of that kingdom, so is their liberation coeval with the fall of it. When the Medes, after their conquest by Ninus, had been subject to the rulers of Asshur, down to his thirty-sixth successor, Arbaces, the viceroy of Media, with Belesys, the viceroy of Babylonia, revolted from the Assyrian king. The kingdom of Assyria still remains unbroken; it is only after severe struggles, and in consequence of the desertion of the Bactrians and other nations during the conflict, that it is overthrown. After the capture of Nineveh, Arbaces, as supreme lord, takes the place of the king of Asshur.

According to the dates of Herodotus Deioces ascended the throne of Media in the year 714 or 708 B.C.463 The time which elapsed between the liberation of the Medes and Deioces' elevation is not given by him. According to Ctesias Arbaces established the dominion of the Medes at least 170 years before the date given by Herodotus for Deioces. In Herodotus Phraortes, Cyaxares, and Astyages follow Deioces in the dominion over the Medes, with a total of 97 years. In Ctesias the successors of Arbaces, who reigns 28 years, are Mandaces with a reign of 50 years, Sosarmus with 30, Artycas with 50, Arbianes with 22, Artaeus with 40, Artynes with 22, Astibaras with 40, and finally Aspadas with 38 years. On this calculation the dominion of the Median kings lasted 320 years, and consequently Arbaces must have overthrown the Assyrian and established the Median Empire in the year 878 B.C.; or as Ctesias puts the fall of the last Median king in 564, and not in 550 B.C. – in the year 884 B.C. —i. e. precisely at the time when Assyria began to rise into the position of a widely dominant power (III. 269, 270). In the list of kings given by Ctesias Mandaces and Artycas each rule fifty years, Arbianes and Artynes 22 years, Artaeus and Astibaras 40 years. This uniformity points to an artificial extension of the series by duplicates.464 If it is reduced by striking out the three seconds in these pairs, and Arbaces is followed by Mandaces with 50 years, Sosarmus with 30 years, Arbianes with 22 years, Artaeus with 40 years, and Aspadas with 38 years, we obtain a period of 178 years for the kings of the Medes, and so arrive at a point nearer that given by Herodotus for the commencement of the Median kingdom, the year 736 B.C. (558 + 178), as the first year of Arbaces. Yet even so we do not find any coincidence whatever between the two narratives.

In the narrative of Herodotus we find with surprise that the Medes attained their liberation without any combination in the people; without the leadership of a single head. Yet soon after the time at which he describes the Medes as revolting from the Assyrians, Herodotus tells us that Sennacherib marched against Egypt, and asserts that for 75 years after the accession of Deioces, "the Assyrians were indeed without allies, since they had revolted, but were otherwise in a good condition," so that Phraortes and the greatest part of his army fell in battle against them. If after acquiring their freedom the Medes lived isolated in villages, as Herodotus states, would not the Assyrians have made use of this anarchy close upon their borders in order to reduce the Medes again to subjection, rather than engage in campaigns against Syria and Egypt? According to the account of Herodotus, it was the justice of Deioces which won for him ever-increasing importance, and finally helped him to the throne. But had Deioces, who sits on the throne for 53 years afterwards, sufficient time before his elevation to make himself known for his love of justice throughout all Media, unless we are willing to assign him a very unusual age?465 And if such dire anarchy did indeed prevail among the Medes, what man in such times submits to even the most righteous sentence? Least of all are the mighty and powerful willing to do so. How did Deioces obtain the means of compelling the insubordinate to obey his sentence? – how could he give protection to the accused, oppressed, and weak against their opponents? And supposing that he was able to do this, would he have been unanimously elected king? Herodotus himself remarks that Deioces knew that "the unjust are the enemies of the just."466 Moreover, if the Medes at that time lived in the simplest manner, how could a sovereign elected from their midst change these conditions at a single stroke, or at any rate in the course of a single reign, though a long one, so entirely as Herodotus supposes? Village life is changed into city life, the Medes are settled in one city round the royal fortress, and in the place of a patriarchal government over a simple people, Deioces, "as the first," establishes the whole apparatus of Oriental tyranny. Immense palaces, citadels, and walls are built; the wide outer walls are adorned with gold and silver; the secluded life of the sovereign in the palace becomes the established law; the legal process is carried on by writing; and a system of espionage is introduced over the whole country. It is obvious that in this narrative elements, belonging to the tradition of the Medes, have been taken by Herodotus and mingled with the views of the Greeks, who were familiar with the combination of villages into one canton, and the union of hamlets into a city, and had experience of the establishment of a monarchy by setting up a tyranny in consequence of the services rendered by the aspirant to the multitude. Herodotus expressly calls the dominion of Deioces a tyranny. It is a fact beyond dispute that Herodotus was influenced by such conceptions in shaping and forming the material which came to him from tradition.

Apart from the motives which influenced him in describing the elevation of Deioces, Herodotus wishes to show how the nations of Asia obtained their freedom, and subsequently lost it. He begins with the statement, that the Medes revolted from Assyria, and all the nations of Asia followed their example. According to his dates, which have been already mentioned, the Medes must have revolted precisely at the time when Tiglath Pilesar II. and Sargon reigned over Assyria, i. e. in the period between 745 and 705 B.C. The liberation of the remaining nations must therefore have taken place under Sargon or his successors, Sennacherib and Esarhaddon, i. e. between the year 705 and 668 B.C. That this general liberation from the sovereignty of the Assyrians did not take place at this period is abundantly clear from the inscriptions of the kings and the Hebrew Scriptures. We have seen above to what an extent Tiglath Pilesar caused the whole of Syria to feel the weight of the Assyrian arms; he reduced Babylonia to dependence as far as the Persian Gulf; Sargon was sovereign of Babylonia, maintained Syria, and received the homage of the island of Cyprus, and the islands of the Persian Gulf. His successor, Sennacherib, though unable to protect Syria against Egypt, yet retained Babylonia and the eastern half of Asia Minor under his dominion. Esarhaddon united the crowns of Asshur and Babel, restored the supremacy of Assyria over Syria, subjugated a part of Arabia and the whole of Egypt.467 Hence it is clear, that precisely at the time when, according to Herodotus, the rest of the nations following the example of the Medes threw off the Assyrian yoke, that kingdom reached a wider extent than at any previous time. If, nevertheless, we wish to maintain the statement that the rest of the nations followed the example which the Medes are supposed to have set about the year 736 B.C.,468 we must place these events in the last decade of the reign of Assurbanipal, i. e. in the period between 636 and 626 B.C. We must therefore bring them down a full century, and this was a very late result of the action of the Medes.

Let us attempt, by a comparison of the statements of the Assyrian inscriptions on the events which took place on the table-land of Iran and the narrative of Herodotus, to ascertain the real facts of the liberation of the Medes. We saw above (p. 19) that Shalmanesar II. of Asshur (859-823 B.C.) carried his campaigns as far as the East of Iran. In the year 835 B.C. he imposed tribute on twenty-seven princes of the land of Parsua, and "turned against the plains of the land of Amadai;" in 830 B.C. his general-in-chief, Dayan Asshur, went down into the land of Parsua, and laid tribute on the land of Parsua, "which did not worship Asshur," obtained possession of the cities, and sent their people and treasures into the land of Assyria.469 Tiglath Pilesar II. (745-727 B.C.), in the campaign which carried him to Arachosia, subjugated "the land of Nisaa" and "the cities of the land of Media (Madai)." In the following year he occupied "the land of Parsua;" "Zikruti in rugged Media, I added to the land of Assyria; I received the tribute of Media;" and on his ninth campaign he again marched into "the land of Media." In an inscription which sums up all his achievements, he declares that he has imposed tribute "on the land of Parsua," the city of Zikruti, "which depends on the land of the Medes," and on the chieftains of "the land of Media."470 The books of the Hebrews tell us that after the fall of Samaria in 721 B.C. "the king of Assyria carried Israel away, and gave them habitations in Chalah, and in the cities of the Medes." It was Sargon (722-705 B.C.) to whom Samaria yielded.471 His inscriptions also tell us that he carried away the inhabitants of Samaria, and they make mention of the cities of the Medes. According to them, he received heavy tribute from twenty-five chiefs of the Medes in the year 716 B.C., and set up his royal image in the midst of their cities. In the next year he carried away captive "Dayauku with his people and his family, and caused him to dwell in the land of Amat," built fortresses in order to control Media, received tribute from twenty-two chiefs of the Medes, conquered thirty-four cities in Media, and united them with Assyria. In the year 713 B.C. he marched against Bit Dayauku, reduced the chief districts of Media, which had cast off the yoke of Assyria, and received tribute from forty-five Median chiefs; 4609 horses, asses, and sheep in great abundance. Sargon repeatedly boasts that "he has reduced the distant land of Media, all the places of distant Media, as far as the borders of the land of Bikni; that he brought them under the dominion of Asshur; and that his power extended as far as the city of Simaspati, which belonged to distant Media in the East."472 The inscriptions of his successor Sennacherib (705-681 B.C.) tell us that on his return from his second campaign (against the land of Ellip), he received the heavy tribute of the distant land of Media, and subjugated the land to his dominion.473 Esarhaddon (681-668 B.C.), the successor of Sennacherib, according to the Hebrew Scriptures, deported people from Persia to Samaria. He tells us himself: "The land of Patusarra, a district in the region of – , in the midst of distant Media, on the border of the land of Bikni, the copper mountains. None of the kings my forefathers had subjugated this land. Sitirparna and Iparna, the chiefs of the fortified places, had not bowed before me. I carried them away with their subjects, horses, chariots, oxen, sheep, asses, as rich booty to Assyria." "The chiefs of the cities of Partakka, Partukka, and Uraka-zabarna, in the land of Media, who lay far off, and in the days of the kings my forefathers had not trodden the soil of Assyria – them the fear of Asshur, my lord, threw to the ground; they brought for me, to my city Nineveh, their great animals, copper, the product of their mines, bowed themselves with folded hands before me, and besought my favour. I put my viceroys over them, who united the inhabitants of these regions with my kingdom; I imposed services upon them, and a fixed tribute."474 The period at which this tribute was imposed on the most distant part of Media can only be so far fixed that it must lie between 681 and 673 B.C. Assurbanipal, who succeeded Esarhaddon (668-626 B.C.), tells us: "I captured Birizchadri, the warden of the city of Madai (?); Sariti and Pariza, the sons of Gagi, the warden of the cities of the land of Sakhi, and 75 citadels had cast off the yoke of my dominion; I took the cities; the chiefs fell alive into my hands; I sent them to Nineveh my metropolis." These events belong to the period between the years 660 and 650 B.C.475

To weaken the contradiction between this series of statements and the narrative of Herodotus, we may call to mind the gross exaggerations in which the kings of Assyria indulge in describing their acts and successes, and the grandiloquence which we have already noticed more than once in the statements of Assyrian history (III. 139, 200). But however great or however small may have been the success of the campaigns of Tiglath Pilesar II., Sargon, Sennacherib, Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal against the chiefs of the Medes, it cannot be denied that these campaigns took place. And if from the very frequency of such campaigns, after the reign of Tiglath Pilesar, we are inclined to draw the conclusion that they are a proof of the lax and nominal character of the dominion of Assyria over Media, this conclusion proves too much. The same repetition of warlike enterprises on the part of the kings of Asshur takes place, as we saw, in every direction. We shall have as much right to conclude that there was no such thing as an Assyrian empire, either before the year 736 or after it, over the Medes or any other nation. As I have shown (III. 185), the Assyrian kingdom never acquired a firm dominion over the subjugated nations, still less an organisation of the empire, like the subsequent kingdom of the Achæmenids. Their sovereignty consisted almost exclusively in the collection of tribute by force of arms, in the subjugation or removal of the princes who refused it, and setting up of others, who in turn soon withheld it. At the most, Assyrian fortresses were planted here and there; and no doubt Assyrian viceroys were placed over smaller regions. The same procedure is seen in the inscriptions as in use towards the Medes; and if this is not regarded as the sovereignty of Assyria, no such sovereignty existed before Tiglath Pilesar. If, to meet this objection, the existence of an Assyrian dominion is allowed, in the very lax form which is everywhere characteristic of it, we may, from the same frequency of the campaigns against Media, draw the opposite conclusion, that the Medes had struggled very vigorously for freedom, that in the first place the most remote tribes acquired it, and for them the liberation gradually spread, and the tradition of the Medes has accepted the beginning of the movement as the completion of it.

Setting aside any conclusions of this kind, even tradition can only have regarded the beginning of the struggle for freedom as the beginning of liberation, if it covered the nucleus of a firm resistance, either in some definite district, or in a dynasty which took the lead in the struggle and carried it on. Herodotus is not acquainted with any leader in the struggle and does not mention any, while the campaigns of the Assyrians are always directed against a greater or less number of princes and cities; sometimes they fall on this chieftain and sometimes on that.476 If, moreover, the fact that Sargon receives tribute from twenty-five, then from twenty-two, and then from forty-five chieftains, is brought forward to confirm the narratives of Herodotus about the anarchy which prevailed among the Medes, it is not the separation of the Medes under different chiefs which constitutes the anarchy as described by Herodotus, but actual lawlessness. His description gives us no chieftains in Media, ruling their lands as captains in war and judges in peace. The Medes dwell in villages, and the inhabitants choose the village judge, though it is in their power to go for decision to another village. Chieftains, even if they had not forbidden their tribes to seek for justice out of the tribe, would in any case have left the decision of Deioces unnoticed.