[283] Lysias cont. Alkibiad. A. c. 11, p. 143: Harpokration. v. Ἀλκιβιάδης; Andokidês cont. Alkibiad. c. 11-12, pp. 129, 130: this last oration may afford evidence as to the facts mentioned in it, though I cannot imagine it to be either genuine, or belonging to the time to which it professes to refer, as has been observed in a previous note.

[284] Plutarch, Periklês. c. 4; Plutarch. Aristeid. c. 1.

[285] Ælian, V. H. xiii, 24; Herakleidês, περὶ Πολιτειῶν, c. 1, ed. Köhler.

[286] Plutarch, Themistoklês, 22; Plutarch, Aristeidês, 7, παραμυθία φθόνου καὶ κουφισμός. See the same opinions repeated by Wachsmuth, Hellenische Alterthumskunde, ch. 48, vol. i, p. 272, and by Platner, Prozess and Klagen bey den Attikern, vol. i, p. 386.

[287] Thucyd. viii, 73, διὰ δυνάμεως καὶ ἀξιώματος φόβον.

[288] Kratinus ap. Plutarch, Periklês, 13.

For the attacks of the comic writers upon Damôn, see Plutarch, Periklês, c. 4.

[289] Aristot. Polit. iii, 8, 4; v, 2, 5.

[290] Diodor. xi, 55-87. This author describes very imperfectly the Athenian ostracism, transferring to it apparently the circumstances of the Syracusan Petalism.

[291] Herodot. v, 70-72; compare Schol. ad Aristophan. Lysistr. 274.

[292] Herodot. v, 73.

[293] See vol. ii, p. 295, part ii, ch. 3.

[294] Thucyd. iii, 61.

[295] Herodot. vi, 108. ἐᾷν Θηβαίους Βοιωτῶν τοὺς μὴ βουλομένους ἐς Βοιωτοὺς τελέειν. This is an important circumstance in regard to Grecian political feeling: I shall advert to it hereafter.

[296] Herodot. vi, 108. Thucydidês (iii, 58), when recounting the capture of Platæa by the Lacedæmonians in the third year of the Peloponnesian war, states that the alliance between Platæa and Athens was then in its 93rd year of date; according to which reckoning it would begin in the year 519 B. C., where Mr. Clinton and other chronologers place it.

I venture to think that the immediate circumstances, as recounted in the text from Herodotus (whether Thucydidês conceived them in the same way, cannot be determined), which brought about the junction of Platæa with Athens, cannot have taken place in 519 B. C., but must have happened after the expulsion of Hippias from Athens in 510 B. C.,—for the following reasons:—

1. No mention is made of Hippias, who yet, if the event had happened in 519 B. C., must have been the person to determine whether the Athenians should assist Platæa or not. The Platæan envoys present themselves at a public sacrifice in the attitude of suppliants, so as to touch the feelings of the Athenian citizens generally: had Hippias been then despot, he would have been the person to be propitiated and to determine for or against assistance.

2. We know no cause which should have brought Kleomenês with a Lacedæmonian force near to Platæa in the year 519 B. C.: we know from the statement of Herodotus (v, 76) that no Lacedæmonian expedition against Attica took place at that time. But in the year to which I have referred the event, Kleomenês is on his march near the spot upon a known and assignable object. From the very tenor of the narrative, it is plain that Kleomenês and his army were not designedly in Bœotia, nor meddling with Bœotian affairs, at the time when the Platæans solicited his aid; he declines to interpose in the matter, pleading the great distance between Sparta and Platæa as a reason.

3. Again, Kleomenês, in advising the Platæans to solicit Athens, does not give the advice through good-will towards them, but through a desire to harass and perplex the Athenians, by entangling them in a quarrel with the Bœotians. At the point of time to which I have referred the incident, this was a very natural desire: he was angry, and perhaps alarmed, at the recent events which had brought about his expulsion from Athens. But what was there to make him conceive such a feeling against Athens during the reign of Hippias? That despot was on terms of the closest intimacy with Sparta: the Peisistratids were (ξείνους—ξεινίους ταμάλιστα—Herod. v, 63, 90, 91) “the particular guests” of the Spartans, who were only induced to take part against Hippias from a reluctant obedience to the oracles procured, one after another, by Kleisthenês. The motive, therefore, assigned by Herodotus, for the advice given by Kleomenês to the Platæans, can have no application to the time when Hippias was still despot.

4. That Herodotus did not conceive the victory gained by the Athenians over Thebes as having taken place before the expulsion of Hippias, is evident from his emphatic contrast between their warlike spirit and success when liberated from the despots, and their timidity or backwardness while under Hippias (Ἀθηναῖοι τυραννευόμενοι μὲν, οὐδαμῶν τῶν σφέας περιοικεόντων ἔσαν τὰ πολέμια ἀμείνους, ἀπαλλαχθέντες δὲ τυράννων, μακρῷ πρῶτοι ἐγένοντο· δηλοῖ ὦν ταῦτα, ὅτι κατεχόμενοι μὲν, ἐθελοκάκεον, etc. v, 78). The man who wrote thus cannot have believed that, in the year 519 B. C., while Hippias was in full sway, the Athenians gained an important victory over the Thebans, cut off a considerable portion of the Theban territory for the purpose of joining it to that of the Platæans, and showed from that time forward their constant superiority over Thebes by protecting her inferior neighbor against her.

These different reasons, taking them altogether, appear to me to show that the first alliance between Athens and Platæa, as Herodotus conceives and describes it, cannot have taken place before the expulsion of Hippias, in 510 B. C.; and induce me to believe, either that Thucydidês was mistaken in the date of that event, or that Herodotus has not correctly described the facts. Not seeing any reason to suspect the description given by the latter, I have departed, though unwillingly, from the date of Thucydidês.

The application of the Platæans to Kleomenês, and his advice grounded thereupon, may be connected more suitably with his first expedition to Athens, after the expulsion of Hippias, than with his second.

[297] Herodot. v, 75.

[298] Compare Kortüm, Zur Geschichte Hellenischer Staats-Verfassungen, p. 35 (Heidelberg, 1821).

I doubt, however, his interpretation of the words in Herodotus (v, 63)—εἴτε ἰδίῳ στόλῳ, εἴτε δημοσίῳ χρησόμενοι.

[299] Herodot. v, 77; Ælian, V. H. vi, 1; Pausan. i, 28, 2.

[300] Herodot. v, 80.

[301] In the expression of Herodotus, the Æakid heroes are really sent from Ægina, and really sent back by the Thebans (v, 80-81)—Οἱ δέ σφι αἰτέουσι ἐπικουρίην τοὺς Αἰακίδας συμπέμπειν ἔφασαν, αὖτις οἱ Θηβαῖοι πέμψαντες, τοὺς μὲν Αἰακίδας σφι ἀπεδίδοσαν, τῶν δὲ ἀνδρῶν ἐδέοντο. Compare again v, 75; viii, 64; and Polyb. vii, 9, 2. θεῶν τῶν συστρατευομένων.

Justin gives a narrative of an analogous application from the Epizephyrian Lokrians to Sparta (xx, 3): “Territi Locrenses ad Spartanos decurrunt: auxilium supplices deprecantur: illi longinquâ militiâ gravati, auxilium a Castore et Polluce petere eos jubent. Neque legati responsum sociæ urbis spreverunt; profectique in proximum templum, facto sacrificio, auxilium deorum implorant. Litatis hostiis, obtentoque, ut rebantur, quod petebant—haud secus læti quam si deos ipsos secum avecturi essent—pulvinaria iis in navi componunt, faustisque profecti ominibus, solatia suis pro auxiliis deportant.” In comparing the expressions of Herodotus with those of Justin, we see that the former believes the direct literal presence and action of the Æakid heroes (“the Thebans sent back the heroes, and asked for men”), while the latter explains away the divine intervention into a mere fancy and feeling on the part of those to whom it is supposed to be accorded. This was the tone of those later authors whom Justin followed: compare also Pausan. iii, 19, 2.

[302] Herodot. v, 81-82.

[303] Herodot. v, 83-88.

[304] Herodot. v, 81-89. μεγάλως Ἀθηναίους ἐσινέοντο.

[305] Herodot. v, 90.

[306] Herodot. v, 90, 91.

[307] Herodot. v, 92. ... τυραννίδας ἐς τὰς πόλις κατάγειν παρασκευάζεσθε, τοῦ οὔτε ἀδικώτερον ἐστὶ οὐδὲν κατ᾽ ἀνθρώπους οὔτε μιαιφονώτερον.

[308] Herodot. v, 93. μὴ ποιέειν μηδὲν νεώτερον περὶ πόλιν Ἑλλάδα.

[309] Herodot. v, 93-94.

[310] Thucydid. i, 68-71, 120-124.

[311] Herodot. v, 78-91. Ἀθηναῖοι μέν νυν ηὔξηντο· δηλοῖ δὲ οὐ κατ᾽ ἓν μόνον ἀλλὰ πανταχῇ, ἡ ἰσηγορίη ὡς ἔστι χρῆμα σπουδαῖον, εἰ καὶ Ἀθηναῖοι τυραννευόμενοι μὲν, οὐδαμῶν τῶν σφέας περιοικεόντων ἔσαν τὰ πολέμια ἀμείνους, ἀπαλλαχθέντες δὲ τυράννων, μακρῷ πρῶτοι ἐγένοντο· δηλοῖ ὦν ταῦτα, ὅτι κατεχόμενοι μὲν, ἐθελοκάκεον, ὡς δεσπότῃ ἐργαζόμενοι, ἐλευθερωθέντων δὲ, αὐτὸς ἕκαστος ἑωϋτῷ προθυμέετο κατεργάζεσθαι.

(c. 91.) Οἱ Λακεδαιμόνιοι—νόῳ λαβόντες, ὡς ἐλεύθερον μὲν ἐὸν τὸ γένος τὸ Ἀττικὸν, ἰσόῤῥοπον τῷ ἑωϋτῶν ἂν γένοιτο, κατεχόμενον δὲ ὑπό του τυραννίδι, ἀσθενὲς καὶ πειθαρχέεσθαι ἐτοῖμον.

[312] Herodot. iii, 80. Πλῆθος δὲ ἄρχον, πρῶτα μὲν, οὔνομα πάντων κάλλιστον ἔχει, ἰσονομίην· δεύτερα δὲ, τούτων τῶν ὁ μόναρχος, ποιέει οὐδέν· πάλῳ μὲν ἀρχὰς ἄρχει, ὑπεύθυνον δὲ ἀρχὴν ἔχει, βουλεύματα δὲ πάντα ἐς τὸ κοινὸν ἀναφέρει.

The democratical speaker at Syracuse, Athenagoras, also puts this name and promise in the first rank of advantages—(Thucyd. vi, 39)—ἐγὼ δέ φημι, πρῶτα μὲν, δῆμον ξύμπαν ὠνόμασθαι, ὀλιγαρχίαν δὲ, μέρος, etc.

[313] See the preceding chapter xi, of this History, vol. iii, p. 145, respecting the Solonian declaration here adverted to.

[314] See the two speeches of Periklês in Thucyd. ii, 35-46, and ii, 60-64. Compare the reflections of Thucydidês upon the two democracies of Athens and Syracuse, vi, 69 and vii, 21-55.

[315] Thucyd. vii, 69. Πατρίδος τε τῆς ἐλευθερωτάτης ὑπομιμνήσκων καὶ τῆς ἐν αὐτῇ ἀνεπιτακτοῦ πᾶσιν ἐς τὴν δίαιταν ἐξουσίας, etc.

[316] Compare the remarkable speech of the Corinthian envoys at Sparta (Thucyd. i, 68-71), with the φιλοπραγμοσύνη which Demosthenês so emphatically notices in Philip (Olynthiac. i, 6, p. 13): also Philippic. i, 2, and the Philippics and Olynthiacs generally.

[317] Among the lost productions of Antisthenês the contemporary of Xenophon and Plato, and emanating like them from the tuition of Sokratês, was one Κῦρος, ἢ περὶ Βασιλείας (Diogenes Laërt. vi, 15).

[318] That this was the real story—a close parallel of Romulus and Remus—we may see by Herodotus, i, 122. Some rationalizing Greeks or Persians transformed it into a more plausible tale,—that the herdsman’s wife who suckled the boy Cyrus was named Κυνώ (Κυών is a dog, male or female); contending that this latter was the real basis of fact, and that the intervention of the bitch was an exaggeration built upon the name of the woman, in order that the divine protection shown to Cyrus might be still more manifest,—οἱ δὲ τοκέες παραλαβόντες τὸ οὔνομα τοῦτ (ἵνα θειοτέρως δοκέῃ τοῖσι Πέρσῃσι περιεῖναί σφι ὁ παῖς), κατέβαλον φάτιν ὡς ἐκκείμενον Κῦρον κύων ἐξέθρεψε· ἐνθεῦτεν μὲν ἡ φάτις αὐτὴ κεχωρήκεε.

In the first volume of this History, I have noticed various transformations operated by Palæphatus and others upon the Greek mythes,—the ram which carried Phryxus and Hellê across the Hellespont is represented to us as having been in reality a man named Krius, who aided their flight,—the winged horse which carried Bellerophon was a ship named Pegasus, etc.

This same operation has here been performed upon the story of the suckling of Cyrus; for we shall run little risk in affirming that the miraculous story is the older of the two. The feelings which welcome a miraculous story are early and primitive; those which break down the miracle into a common-place fact are of subsequent growth.

[319] Herodot. i, 95. Ὡς ὦν Περσέων μετεξέτεροι λέγουσιν, οἱ μὴ βουλόμενοι σεμνοῦν τὰ περὶ Κῦρον, ἀλλὰ τὸν ἐόντα λέγειν λόγον, κατὰ ταῦτα γράψω· ἐπιστάμενος περὶ Κύρου καὶ τριφασίας ἄλλας λόγων ὁδοὺς φῆναι. His informants were thus select persons, who differed from the Persians generally.

The long narrative respecting the infancy and growth of Cyrus is contained in Herodot. i, 107-129.

[320] See the Extracts from the lost Persian History of Ktêsias, in Photius Cod. lxxii, also appended to Schweighaüser’s edition of Herodotus, vol. iv, p. 345. Φησὶ δὲ (Ktêsias) αὐτὸν τῶν πλειόνων ἃ ἱστορεῖ αὐτόπτην γενόμενον, ἢ παρ᾽ αὐτῶν Περσῶν (ἔνθα τὸ ὁρᾷν μὴ ἐνεχώρει) αὐτήκοον καταστάντα, οὕτως τὴν ἱστορίαν συγγράψαι.

To the discrepancies between Xenophon, Herodotus, and Ktêsias, on the subject of Cyrus, is to be added the statement of Æschylus (Persæ, 747), the oldest authority of them all, and that of the Armenian historians: see Bähr ad Ktesiam, p. 85: comp. Bähr’s comments on the discrepancies, p. 87.

[321] Xenophon, Anabas. i, 8, 26.

[322] Herodot. i, 71-153; Arrian, v, 4; Strabo, xv, p. 727; Plato, Legg. iii, p. 695.

[323] Xenophon, Anabas. iii, 3, 6; iii, 4, 7-12. Strabo had read accounts which represented the last battle between Astyagês and Cyrus to have been fought near Pasargadæ (xv, p. 730).

It has been rendered probable by Ritter, however, that the ruined city which Xenophon called Mespila was the ancient Assyrian Nineveh, and the other deserted city which Xenophon calls Larissa, situated as it was on the Tigris, must have been originally Assyrian, and not Median. See about Nineveh, above,—the Chapter on the Babylonians, vol. iii, ch. xix, p. 305, note.

The land east of the Tigris, in which Nineveh and Arbêla were situated, seems to have been called Aturia,—a dialectic variation of Assyria (Strabo, xvi, p. 737; Dio Cass. lxviii, 28).

[324] Xenophanês, Fragm. p. 39, ap. Schneidewin, Delectus Poett. Elegiac. Græc.—

compare Theognis, v, 775, and Herodot. i, 163.

[325] Strabo, xv, p. 724. ὁμόγλωττοι παρὰ μικρόν. See Heeren, Ueber den Verkehr der Alten Welt, part i, book i, pp. 320-340, and Ritter, Erdkunde, West-Asien, b. iii, Abtheil. ii, sects. 1 and 2, pp. 17-84.

[326] About the province of Persis, see Strabo, xv, p. 727; Diodor. xix, 21; Quintus Curtius, v, 13, 14, pp. 432-434, with the valuable explanatory notes of Mützell (Berlin, 1841). Compare, also, Morier’s Second Journey in Persia, pp. 49-120, and Ritter, Erdkunde, West Asien, pp. 712-738.

[327] Ktêsias, Persica, c. 2.

[328] Herodot. i, 153.

[329] That this point of view should not be noticed in Herodotus, may appear singular, when we read his story (vi, 86) about the Milesian Glaukus, and the judgment that overtook him for having tested the oracle; but it is put forward by Xenophon as constituting part of the guilt of Crœsus (Cyropæd. vii, 2, 17).

[330] Herodot. i, 47-50.

[331] Herodot. i, 52-54.

[332] Herodot. i, 55.

[333] Herodot. i, 67-70.

[334] Herodot. i, 77.

[335] Herodot. i, 83.

[336] The story about the successful employment of the camels appears also in Xenophon, Cyropæd. vii, 1, 47.

[337] Herodot. i, 84.

[338] Compare Herodot. i, 84-87, and Ktêsias, Persica, c. 4; which latter seems to have been copied by Polyænus, vii, 6, 10.

It is remarkable that among the miracles enumerated by Ktêsias, no mention is made of fire or of the pile of wood kindled: we have the chains of Crœsus miraculously struck off, in the midst of thunder and lightning, but no fire mentioned. This is deserving of notice, as illustrating the fact that Ktêsias derived his information from Persian narrators, who would not be likely to impute to Cyrus the use of fire for such a purpose. The Persians worshipped fire as a god, and considered it impious to burn a dead body (Herodot. iii, 16). Now Herodotus seems to have heard the story, about the burning, from Lydian informants (λέγεται ὑπὸ Λυδῶν, Herodot. i, 87): whether the Lydians regarded fire in the same point of view as the Persians, we do not know; but even if they did, they would not be indisposed to impute to Cyrus an act of gross impiety, just as the Egyptians imputed another act equally gross to Kambysês, which Herodotus himself treats as a falsehood (iii, 16).

The long narrative given by Nikolaus Damaskênus of the treatment of Crœsus by Cyrus, has been supposed by some to have been borrowed from the Lydian historian Xanthus, elder contemporary of Herodotus. But it seems to me a mere compilation, not well put together, from Xenophon’s Cyropædia, and from the narrative of Herodotus, perhaps including some particular incidents out of Xanthus (see Nikol. Damas. Fragm. ed. Orell. pp. 57-70, and the Fragments of Xanthus in Didot’s Historic. Græcor. Fragm. p. 40).

[339] Justin (i, 7) seems to copy Ktêsias, about the treatment of Crœsus.

[340] Herodot. i, 91. Προθυμεομένου δὲ Λοξίεω ὅκως ἂν κατὰ τοὺς παῖδας τοὺς Κροίσου γένοιτο τὸ Σαρδίων πάθος, καὶ μὴ κατ᾽ αὐτὸν Κροῖσον, οὐκ οἷόν τε ἐγένετο παραγαγεῖν Μοίρας· ὅσον δὲ ἐνέδωκαν αὗται, ἠνύσατο, καὶ ἐχαρίσατό οἱ· τρία γὰρ ἔτεα ἐπανεβάλετο τὴν Σαρδίων ἅλωσιν. Καὶ τοῦτο ἐπιστάσθω Κροῖσος, ὡς ὕστερον τοῖσι ἔτεσι τούτοισι ἁλοὺς τῆς πεπρωμένης.

[341] Herodot. i, 91. Ὁ δὲ ἀκούσας συνέγνω ἑωϋτοῦ εἶναι τὴν ἁμαρτάδα, καὶ οὐ τοῦ θεοῦ.

Xenophon also, in the Cyropædia (vii, 2, 16-25), brings Crœsus to the same result of confession and humiliation, though by steps somewhat different.

[342] Herodot. i, 13.

[343] See above, chap, xi, vol. iii, pp. 149-153.

[344] Herodot. vii, 10. οὐ γὰρ ἐᾷ φρονέειν ἄλλον μέγα ὁ θεὸς ἢ ἑωϋτόν.

[345] In the oracle reported in Herodot. vii, 141, as delivered by the Pythian priestess to Athens on occasion of the approach of Xerxês, Zeus is represented in the same supreme position as the present oracle assigns to the Mœræ, or Fates: Pallas in vain attempts to propitiate him in favor of Athens, just as, in this case, Apollo tries to mitigate the Mœræ in respect to Crœsus—

Compare also viii, 109, and ix, 16.

O. Müller (Dissertation on the Eumenides of Æschylus, p. 222, Eng. Transl.) says: “On no occasion does Zeus Soter exert his influence directly, like Apollo, Minerva, and the Erinnyes; but whereas Apollo is prophet and exegetes by virtue of wisdom derived from him, and Minerva is indebted to him for her sway over states and assemblies,—nay, the very Erinnyes exercise their functions in his name,—this Zeus stands always in the background, and has in reality only to settle a conflict existing within himself. For with Æschylus, as with all men of profound feeling among the Greeks from the earliest times, Jupiter is the only real god, in the higher sense of the word. Although he is, in the spirit of ancient theology, a generated god, arisen out of an imperfect state of things, and not produced till the third stage of a development of nature,—still he is, at the time we are speaking of, the spirit that pervades and governs the universe.”

To the same purpose Klausen expresses himself (Theologumena Æschyli, pp. 6-69).

It is perfectly true that many passages may be produced from Greek authors which ascribe to Zeus the supreme power here noted. But it is equally true that this conception is not uniformly adhered to, and that sometimes the Fates, or Mœræ are represented as supreme; occasionally represented as the stronger and Zeus as the weaker (Promêtheus, 515). The whole tenor of that tragedy, in fact, brings out the conception of a Zeus τύραννος,—whose power is not supreme, even for the time; and is not destined to continue permanently, even at its existing height. The explanations given by Klausen of this drama appear to me incorrect; nor do I understand how it is to be reconciled with the above passage quoted from O. Müller.

The two oracles here cited from Herodotus exhibit plainly the fluctuation of Greek opinion on this subject: in the one, the supreme determination, and the inexorability which accompanies it, are ascribed to Zeus,—in the other, to the Mœræ. This double point of view adapted itself to different occasions, and served as a help for the interpretation of different events. Zeus was supposed to have certain sympathies for human beings; misfortunes happened to various men which he not only did not wish to bring on, but would have been disposed to avert; here the Mœræ, who had no sympathies, were introduced as an explanatory cause, tacitly implied as overruling Zeus. “Cum Furiis Æschylus Parcas tantum non ubique conjungit,” says Klausen (Theol. Æsch. p. 39); and this entire absence of human sympathies constitutes the common point of both,—that in which the Mœræ and the Erinnyes differ from all the other gods,—πέφρικα τὰν ὠλεσίοικον θεὰν, οὐ θεοῖς ὁμοίαν (Æschyl. Sept. ad Theb. 720): compare Eumenid. 169, 172, and, indeed, the general strain of that fearful tragedy.

In Æschylus, as in Herodotus, Apollo is represented as exercising persuasive powers over the Mœræ (Eumenid. 724),—Μοίρας ἔπεισας ἀφθίτους θεῖναι βροτούς.

[346] The language of Herodotus deserves attention. Apollo tells Crœsus: “I applied to the Mœræ to get the execution of the judgment postponed from your time to that of your children,—but I could not prevail upon them; but as much as they would yield of their own accord, I procured for you.” (ὅσον δὲ ἐνέδωκαν αὗται, ἐχαρίσατό οἱ—i, 91.)

[347] Thucyd. i, 22.

[348] This important date depends upon the evidence of Solinus (Polyhistor, i, 112) and Sosikratês (ap. Diog. Laërt. i, 95): see Mr. Clinton’s Fasti Hellen. ad ann. 546, and his Appendix, ch. 17, upon the Lydian kings.

Mr. Clinton and most of the chronologists accept the date without hesitation, but Volney (Recherches sur l’Histoire Ancienne, vol. i, pp. 306-308; Chronologie des Rois Lydiens) rejects it altogether; considering the capture of Sardis to have occurred in 557 B. C., and the reign of Crœsus to have begun in 571 B. C. He treats very contemptuously the authority of Solinus and Sosikratês, and has an elaborate argumentation to prove that the date which he adopts is borne out by Herodotus. This latter does not appear to me at all satisfactory: I adopt the date of Solinus and Sosikratês, though agreeing with Volney that such positive authority is not very considerable, because there is nothing to contradict them, and because the date which they give seems in consonance with the stream of the history.

Volney’s arguments suppose in the mind of Herodotus a degree of chronological precision altogether unreasonable, in reference to events anterior to contemporary records. He, like other chronologists, exhausts his ingenuity to find a proper point of historical time for the supposed conversation between Solon and Crœsus (p. 320).

[349] Herodot. i, 141.

[350] Herodot. i, 152. The purple garment, so attractive a spectacle amid the plain clothing universal at Sparta, marks the contrast between Asiatic and European Greece.

[351] Herodot. i, 153. ταῦτα ἐς τοὺς πάντας Ἕλληνας ἀπέῤῥιψε ὁ Κῦρος τὰ ἔπεα, etc.

[352] Herodot. i, 155.

[353] Herodot. i, 159.

[354] Herodot. i, 160. The short fragment from Charôn of Lampsakus, which Plutarch (De Malignitat. Herod. p. 859) cites here, in support of one among his many unjust censures on Herodotus, is noway inconsistent with the statement of the latter, but rather tends to confirm it.

In writing this treatise on the alleged ill-temper of Herodotus, we see that Plutarch had before him the history of Charôn of Lampsakus, more ancient by one generation than the historian whom he was assailing, and also belonging to Asiatic Greece. Of course, it suited the purpose of his work to produce all the contradictions to Herodotus which he could find in Charôn: the fact that he has produced none of any moment, tends to strengthen our faith in the historian of Halikarnassus, and to show that in the main his narrative was in accordance with that of Charôn.

[355] Herodot. i, 161-169.

[356] Herodot. i, 168; Skymnus Chius, Fragm. v, 153; Dionys. Perieg. v, 553.

[357] Herodot. i, 163. Ὁ δὲ πυθόμενος παρ᾽ αὐτῶν τὸν Μῆδον ὡς αὔξοιτο, ἐδίδου σφι χρήματα τεῖχος περιβαλέσθαι τὴν πόλιν.

I do not understand why the commentators debate what or who is meant by τὸν Μῆδον: it plainly means the Median or Persian power generally: but the chronological difficulty is a real one, if we are to suppose that there was time between the first alarm conceived of the Median power of the Ionians, and the siege of Phôkæa by Harpagus, to inform Arganthônius of the circumstances, and to procure from him this large aid as well as to build the fortifications. The Ionic Greeks neither actually did conceive, nor had reason to conceive, any alarm respecting Persian power, until the arrival of Cyrus before Sardis; and within a month from that time Sardis was in his possession. If we are to suppose communication with Arganthônius, grounded upon this circumstance, at the distance of Tartêssus, and under the circumstances of ancient navigation, we must necessarily imagine, also, that the attack made by Harpagus upon Phôkæa—which city he assailed before any of the rest—was postponed for at least two or three years. Such postponement is not wholly impossible, yet it is not in the spirit of the Herodotean narrative, nor do I think it likely. It is much more probable that the informants of Herodotus made a slip in chronology, and ascribed the donations of Arganthônius to a motive which did not really dictate them.

As to the fortifications (which Phôkæa and the other Ionic cities are reported to have erected after the conquest of Sardis by the Persians), the case may stand thus. While these cities were all independent, before they were first conquered by Crœsus, they must undoubtedly have had fortifications. When Crœsus conquered them, he directed the demolition of the fortifications; but demolition does not necessarily mean pulling down the entire walls: when one or a few breaches are made, the city is laid open, and the purpose of Crœsus would thus be answered. Such may well have been the state of the Ionian cities at the time when they first thought it necessary to provide defences against the Persians at Sardis: they repaired and perfected the breached fortifications.

The conjecture of Larcher (see the Notes both of Larcher and Wesseling),—τὸν Λυδὸν instead of τὸν Μῆδον,—is not an unreasonable one, if it had any authority: the donation of Arganthônius would then be transferred to the period anterior to the Lydian conquest: it would get rid of the chronological difficulty above adverted to, but it would introduce some new awkwardness into the narrative.

[358] Herodot. i, 164.

[359] Herodot. i, 165. ὑπερημίσεας τῶν ἀστῶν ἔλαβε πόθος τε καὶ οἶκτος τῆς πόλιος καὶ τῶν ἠθέων τῆς χώρης· ψευδόρκιοί τε γενόμενοι, etc. The colloquial term which I have ventured to place in the text expresses exactly, as well as briefly, the meaning of the historian. A public oath, taken by most of the Greek cities with similar ceremony of lumps of iron thrown into the sea, is mentioned in Plutarch, Aristid. c. 25.

[360] Herodot. i, 166.

[361] Aristot. Polit. iii, 5, 11; Polyb. iii, 22.

[362] Herodot. i, 167.

[363] Herodot. i, 170. Πυνθάνομαι γνώμην Βίαντα ἄνδρα Πριηνέα ἀποδέξασθαι Ἴωσι χρησιμωτάτην, τῇ εἰ ἐπείθοντο, παρεῖχε ἂν σφι εὐδαιμονέειν Ἑλλήνων μάλιστα.

[364] Herodot. i, 174.

[365] Herodot. i, 176. The whole population of Xanthus perished, except eighty families accidentally absent: the subsequent occupants of the town were recruited from strangers. Nearly five centuries afterwards, their descendants in the same city slew themselves in the like desperate and tragical manner, to avoid surrendering to the Roman army under Marcus Brutus (Plutarch, Brutus, c. 31).