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PASARGADAE (Ancient city) PERSIAN GULF
Ariaeus (Ariaios), or Aridaeus (Aridaios), the friend and lieutenant of Cyrus,
commanded the barbarians in that prince's army at the battle of Cunaxa, B. C.
401 (Xen. Anab. i. 8.5; Diod. xiv. 22; comp. Plut. Artax. c. 11). After the death
of Cyrus, the Cyrean Greeks offered to place Ariaeus on the Persian throne; but
he declined making the attempt, on the ground that there were many Persians superior
to himself, who would never tolerate him as king (Anab. ii. 1.4, 2.1). He exchanged
oaths of fidelity, however with the Greeks, and, at the commencement of their
retreat, marched in company with them; but soon afterwards he purchased his pardon
from Artaxerxes by deserting them, and aiding (possibly through the help of his
friend Menon) the treachery of Tissaphernes, whereby the principal Greek generals
fell into the hands of the Persians (Anab. ii. 2.8, &c., 4.1, 2, 9, 5.28, 38,
&c.; comp. Plut. Artax. c. 18). It was perhaps this same Ariaeus who was employed
by Tithraustes to put Tissaphernes to death in accordance with the king's order,
B. C. 396 (Polyaen. viii. 16; Diod. xiv. 80; comp. Xen. Hell. iii. 1.7). In the
ensuing year, B. C. 395, we again hear of Ariaeus as having revolted front Artaxerxes,
and receiving Spithridates and the Paphlagonians after their desertion of the
Spartan service (Xen. Hell. iv. 1.27; Plut. Ages. c. 11).
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Nov 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Cyrus the Great. (Old Persian Kurus; Hebrew Kores): founder of the Achaemenid empire. He was
born about 576 BCE as the son of Cambyses I, the king of the Persian kingdom called
Ansan. During Cambyses' reign, the Persians were vassals of the Median king Astyages.
Expressions like 'king of the Persian kingdom' and 'the Median kingdom'
are a bit misleading. The Medes and the Persians were coalitions of Iranian nomad
tribes; in the fifth century, this was still remembered and the Greek researcher
Herodotus wrote:
The achievement of Deioces [...] was to unite under his rules the peoples of
Media - Busae, Parataceni, Struchates, Arizanti, Budii, Magi.
The Persian nation contains a number of tribes [...]: the Pasargadae, Maraphii,
and Maspii, upon which all the other tribes are dependent. Of these, the Pasargadae
are the most distinguished; they contain the clan of the Achaemenids from which
spring the Perseid kings. Other tribes are the Panthialaei, Derusiaei, Germanii,
all of which are attached to the soil, the remainder -the Dai, Mardi, Dropici,
Sagarti, being nomadic. (Herodotus, Histories 1.101 and 125; tr. by Aubrey de
Selincourt).
These 'kingdoms' were in fact losely organized tribal coalitions.
In the first half of the sixth cenctury, the Median federation was the most powerful
and was able to demand tribute from the Persians, but also from the Armenians,
Parthians, Drangians and Arians.
Cyrus became king of Ansan in 559, and formed a new coalition of his
own tribe, the Pasargadae, together with the Maraphii, Maspii, Panthialaei, Derusiaei,
Germanii, Dahae, Mardi, Dropici and Sagarti. They revolted in 550 (or 554/553
according to another chronology).
The Median king Astyages sent an army to Ansan. It was commanded by
Harpagus, but he defected to the Persians. Astyages was captured and Cyrus became
the new ruler of the empire of Persians and Medes. According to the Greek topographer
Strabo of Amasia, who lived
more than five centuries later, Cyrus' victory took place among the Pasargadae,
where Cyrus built his residence. From now on, this tribal name became the name
of a city.
According to Herodotus, Cyrus' father Cambyses had been married to
Astyages' daughter Mandane. This would explain why the Medes accepted Cyrus' rule;
he was one of them. Intertribal marriages were common, but it is also possible
that the story of Cambyses' Median marriage was invented to justify Cyrus' rule.
The Greek historian Ctesias of Cnidus
writes that Cyrus also married a daughter of Astyages. If both authors are right,
this woman must have been Cyrus' aunt.
Cyrus seems to have united Persia and Media
in a personal union; it was, therefore, a dual monarchy. Taking over the loosely
organized Median empire also implied taking over several subject countries: Armenia,
Cappadocia, Parthia, Drangiana,
Aria. They were probably ruled by vassal kings called satraps. It is plausible
that Elam was an early addition. In 547, Cyrus added Lydia
to his possessions, a state that had among its vassals the Greek and Carian towns
in the west and southwest of what is now Turkey.
According to Herodotus, Cyrus left Lydia and 'his mind was on Babylon
and the Bactrians and the Sacae and the Egyptians' (Histories 1.154). It is certain
that Cyrus never invaded Egypt, which was left to his son and successor Cambyses.
However, it is possible that he added Cilicia
to his dominions, making the local ruler (the Syennesis) a vassal king. Babylonian
sources do not mention imported Cilician iron after 545 - which may be signicant.
It is very plausible that Cyrus did indeed, ad Herodotus suggests,
conquer Bactria, although there is no independent confirmation of this. What we
do know for certain is that eight years after the conquest of Lydia, the Persian
king took Babylon (October 539). The Babylonian empire had been large, and Cyrus
now became ruler of Syria
and Palestine as well. He
allowed the Jews, who were exiled to Babylon,
to return home. This may have been an attempt to fortify the empire's western
border against possible Egyptian attacks.
The second century Greek-Roman author Arrian tells us in his book
about Alexander the Great (the Anabasis) that Cyrus founded a frontier town in
Sogdiana; there is no reason to doubt this statement. The Greeks called this town
Cyropolis ('town of Cyrus') or Cyreschata (a pun on the name of the king and the
word 'far away'); both names seem renderings of Kurushkatha, 'town of Cyrus'.
The Sacae (or Scythians) lived between Bactria and Cyreschata, and there is nothing
implausible in Herodotus' words that Cyrus subdued these tribes. All texts related
to the fall of Babylon can be found here.
Another story by Arrian deals with Cyrus' expedition to India; probably,
this story is also accurate, but we cannot be completely certain. If he did invade
India, he had to control Gandara first, and it is certain that Cyrus managed to
seize this country: in the Behistun inscription, it is mentioned in the list of
countries that king Darius inherited from earlier Persian kings. However, it seems
equally certain that Cyrus did not conquer the Indus valley itself, because India
is not mentioned in the Behistun inscription. Maybe his navy conquered Maka during
this campaign.
Cyrus' latest expedition took him to modern Khazakhstan, where he
fought against a nomadic tribe called Massagetes. The news of his death in battle
reached Babylon in December 530, where letters were dated 'first year of the reign
of king Cambyses', because Cyrus had appointed his son Cambyses as his successor.
(The mother of Cambyses was Cassadane, a sister of Otanes, who was to play an
important role after the death of Cambyses.)
Cyrus was buried near Pasargadae, in a small building containing a
gold sarcophagus, his arms, his jewellery and a cloak. This cloak played an important
role in the Persian inauguration rituals. When Persia was subjected by the Macedonian
king Alexander the Great, many sacred objects were taken away to prevent the coronation
of of an anarya, a foreigner; Cyrus' body was desacrated by throwing it on the
ground. Alexander ordered restorations in January 324 BCE.
Cyrus' capital was Pasargadae, where inscriptions in his palace state
Cyrus the Great King, an Achaemenid.
Jona Lendering, ed.
This text is cited July 2003 from the Livius Ancient History Website URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks.
Cyrus, the Elder (Kuros ho palaios or ho prhoteros), the founder of the Persian
empire. The life of this prince is one of the most important portions of ancient
history, both on account of the magnitude of the empire which he founded, and
because it forms the epoch at which sacred and profane history become connected:
but it is also one of the most difficult, not only from the almost total want
of contemporary historians, but also from the fables and romances with which it
was overlaid in ancient times, and from the perverseness of modern writers, of
the stamp of Rollin and Hales, who have followed the guidance, not of the laws
of historical evidence, but of their own notions of the right interpretation of
Scripture. Herodotus, within a century after the time of Cyrus, found his history
embellished by those of the Persians who wished to make it more imposing (hoi
Boulomenoi semnoun ta peri Kuron), and had to make his choice between four different
stories, out of which he professes to have selected the account given by those
who wished to tell the truth (ton eonta legein logon, i. 95). Nevertheless his
narrative is evidently founded to some extent on fabulous tales. The authorities
of Ctesias, even the royal archives, were doubtless corrupted in a similar manner,
besides the accumulation of errors during another half century. Xenophon does
not pretend, what some modern writers have pretended for him, that his Cyropaedeia
is anything more than an historical romance. In such a work it is always impossible
to separate the framework of true history from the fiction: and even if we could
do this, we should have gained but little. Much reliance is placed on the sources
of information which Xenophon possessed in the camp of the younger Cyrus. No idea
can be more fallacious; for what sort of stories would be current there, except
the fables which Herodotus censures, but which would readily and alone pass for
true in the camp of a prince who doubtless delighted to hear nothing but what
was good of the great ancestor whose name he bore, and whose fame he aspired to
emulate? And even if Xenophon was aware of the falsity of these tales, he was
justified, as a writer of fiction, in using them for his purpose. Xenophon is
set up against Herodotus. The comparative value of their authority, in point of
time, character, and means of information, is a question which, by itself, could
never have been decided by a sober-minded man, except in favour of Herodotus.
But it is thought that the account of Xenophon is more consistent with Scripture
than that of Herodotus. This is a hasty assumption, and in truth the scriptural
allusions to the time of Cyrus are so brief, that they can only be interpreted
by the help of other authorities. In the accounts of the modern Persian writers
it is impossible to separate the truth from the falsehood.
The account of Herodotus is as follows: In the year B. C. 594, Astyages
succeeded his father, Cyaxares, as king of Media. He had a daughter whom he named
Mandane. In consequence of a dream, which seemed to portend that her offspring
should be master of Asia, he married her to a Persian named Cambyses, of a good
house, but of a quiet temper. A second dream led him to send for his daughter,
when she was pregnant; and upon her giving birth to a son, Astyages committed
it to Harpagus, his most confidential attendant, with orders to kill it. Harpagus,
moved with pity, and fearing the revenge of Mandane, instead of killing the child
himself, gave it to a herdsman of Astyages named Mitradates, who was to expose
it, and to satisfy Harpagus of its death. But while the herdsman was in attendance
on Astyages, his wife had brought forth a still-born child, which they substituted
for the child of Mandane, who was reared as the son of the herdsman, but was not
yet called Cyrus. The name he bore seems from a passage of Strabo (xv.) to have
been Agradates, Agradates. When he was ten years old, his true parentage was discovered
by the following incident. In the sports of his village, the boys chose him for
their king, and he ordered them all exactly as was done by the Median king. One
of the boys, the son of a noble Median named Artembares, disobeyed his commands,
and Cyrus caused him to be severely scourged. Artembares complained to Astyages,
who sent for Cyrus, in whose person and courage he discovered his daughter's son.
The herdsman and Harpagus, being summoned before the king, told him the truth.
Astyages forgave the herdsman, but revenged himself on Harpagus by serving up
to him at a banquet the flesh of his own son, with other circumstances of the
most refined cruelty. As to his grandson, by the advice of the Magians, who assured
him that his dreams were fulfilled by the boy's having been a king in sport, and
that he had nothing more to fear from him, he sent him back to his parents in
Persia.
When Cyrus grew up towards manhood, and shewed himself the most courageous
and amiable of his fellows, Harpagus, who had concealed a truly oriental desire
of revenge under the mask of most profound submission to his master's will, sent
presents to Cyrus, and ingratiated himself with him. Among the Medians it was
easy for Harpagus to form a party in favour of Cyrus, for the tyranny of Astyages
had made him odious. Having organized his conspiracy, Harpagus sent a letter secretly
to Cyrus, inciting him to take revenge upon Astyages, and promising that the Medes
should desert to him. Cyrus called together the Persians, and having, by an ingenious
practical lesson, excited them to revolt from the Median supremacy, he was chosen
as their leader. Upon hearing of this, Astyages summoned Cyrus, who replied that
he would come to him sooner than Astyages himself would wish. Astyages armed the
Medes, but was so infatuated (Deublabes eon) as to give the command to Harpagus,
" forgetting," says Herodotus, " how he had treated him." In the battle which
ensued, some of the Medes deserted to Cyrus, and the main body of the army fled
of their own accord. Astyages, having impaled the Magians who had deceived him,
armed the youths and old men who were left in the city, led them out to fight
the Persians, and was defeated and taken prisoner, after a reign of 35 year, in
B. C. 559. The Medes accepted Cyrus for their king, and thus the supremacy which
they had held passed to the Persians. Cyrus treated Astyages well, and kept him
with him till his death. The date of the accession of Cyrus is fixed by the unanimous
consent of the ancient chronologers (African. ap. Euseb. Praep. Evan. x. 10 ;
Clinton, Fast. Hell. ii. s. a. 559). It was probably at this time that Cyrus received
that name, which is a Persian word (Kohr), signifying the Sun.
In the interval during which we hear nothing certain of Cyrus, he was doubtless
employed in consolidating his newly-acquired empire. Indeed there are some notices
(though not in Herodotus) from which we may infer that a few of the cities of
Media refused to submit to him, and that he only reduced them to obedience after
a long and obstinate resistance (Xen. Anab. iii. 4.7).
The gradual consolidation and extension of the Persian empire during
this period is also stated incidentally by Herodotus in introducing his account
of the conquest of Lydia, which is the next event recorded in the life of Cyrus.
It took place in 546 B. C.
The Ionian and Aeolian colonies of Asia Minor now sent ambassadors
to Cyrus, offering to submit to him on the same terms as they had obtained from
Croesus. But Cyrus, who had in vain invited the Ionians to revolt from Croesus
at the beginning of the war, gave them to understand, by a significant fable,
that they must prepare for the worst. With the Milesians alone he made an alliance
on the terms they offered. The other Ionian states fortified their cities, assembled
at the Panionium, and, with the Aeolians, sent to Sparta for assistance. The Lacedaemonians
refused to assist them, but sent Cyrus a message threatening him with their displeasure
if he should meddle with the Greek cities. Having sent back a contemptuous answer
to this message, Cyrus returned to the Median capital, Ecbatana, taking Croesus
with him, and committing the government of Sardis to a Persian, named Tabalus.
He himself was eager to attempt the conquest of Babylon, the Bactrian nation,
the Sacae, and the Egyptians. He had no sooner left Asia Minor than a revolt of
the states which had lately formed the Lydian empire was raised by Pactyes, a
Persian; but, after a long and obstinate resistance, the whole of Asia Minor was
reduced by Harpagus. In the mean time, Cyrus was engaged in subduing the nations
of Upper Asia, and particularly Assyria, which since the destruction of Ninus
had Babylon for its capital. Its king was Labynetus, the Belshazzar of Daniel.
Cyrus marched against Babylon at the head of a large army, and in great state.
He carried with him a most abundant supply of provisions for his table; and for
his drink the water of the Choaspes, which flows by Susa, was carried in silver
vessels. He passed the river Gyndes, a tributary of the Tigris, by diverting its
water into a great number of rills, and arrived before Babylon in the second spring
from the commencement of his expedition. Having defeated in battle the whole forces
of the Babylonians, he laid siege to the city, and after a long time he took it
by diverting the course of the Euphrates, which flowed through the midst of it,
so that his soldiers entered Babylon by the bed of the river. So entirely unprepared
were the Babylonians for this mode of attack, that they were engaged in revelry
(en eupatheiesi), and had left the gates which opened upon the river unguarded.
This was in B. C. 538.
After Cyrus had subdued the Assyrians, he undertook the subjugation
of the Massagetae, a people dwelling beyond the Araxes. Cyrus offered to marry
Tomyris, the widowed queen of this people; but she refused the offer, saying that
he wooed not her, but the kingdom of the Massagetae. The details of the war which
followed may be read in Herodotus. It ended in the death of Cyrus in battle. Tomyris
caused his corpse to be found among the slain, and having cut off the head, threw
it into a bag filled with human blood, that he might satiate himself (she said)
with blood. According to Herodotus, Cyrus had reigned 29 years. Other writers
say 30. He was killed in B. C. 529.
The account of Ctesias differs considerably in some points from that
of Herodotus. According to him, there was no relationship between Cyrus and Astyages.
At the conquest of Media by Cyrus, Astyages fled to Ecbatana, and was there concealed
by his daughter Amytis, and her husband, Spitamas, whom, with their children,
Cyrus would have put to the torture, had not Astyages discovered himself. When
he did so, he was put in fetters by Oebaras, but soon afterwards Cyrus himself
set him free, honoured him as a father, and married his daughter Amytis, having
put her husband to death for telling a falsehood. Ctesias also says, that Cyrus
made war apon the Bactrians, who voluntarily submitted to him, when they heard
of his reconciliation with Astyages and Amytis. He mentions a war with the Sacae,
in which Cyrus was taken prisoner and ransomed. He gives a somewhat different
account of the Lydian war (Ctesias, Pers. c. 5). Cyrus met with his death, according
to Ctesias, by a wound received in battle with a nation called the Derbices, who
were assisted by the Indians. Strabo also mentions the expedition against the
Sacae, and says, that Cyrus was at first defeated but afterwards victorious. He
also says, that Cyrus made an expedition into India, from which country he escaped
with difficulty.
The chief points of difference between Xenophon and Herodotus are
the following: Xenophon represents Cyrus as brought up at his grandfather's court,
as serving in the Median army under his uncle Cyaxares, the son and successor
of Astyages, of whom Herodotus and Ctesias know nothing; as making war upon Babylon
simply as the general of Cyaxares, who remained at home during the latter part
of the Assyrian war, and permitted Cyrus to assume without opposition the power
and state of an independent sovereign at Babylon; as marrying the daughter of
Cyaxares; and at length dying quietly in his bed, after a sage and Socratic discourse
to his children and friends. The Lydian war of Cyrus is represented by Xenophon
as a sort of episode in the Assyrian war, occasioned by the help which Croesus
had given to the Assyrians in the first campaign of Cyrus against them.
Diodorus agrees for the most part with Herodotus; but he says, that
Cyrus was taken prisoner by the Scythian queen (evidently meaning Tomyris), and
that she crucified or impaled him.
Other variations, not worth specifying, are given by the chronographers
and compilers.
To form a complete and consistent life of Cyrus out of these statements
is obviously impossible; but the leading events of his public life are made out
with tolerable certainty, namely, the dethronement of Astyages, the conquest of
the Lydian and Assyrian empires, his schemes to become master of all Asia and
of Egypt, and his death in a battle with one of the Asiatic tribes which he wished
to subdue. His acquisition of the Median empire was rather a revolution than a
conquest. Herodotus expressly states, that Cyrus had a large party among the Medes
before his rebellion, and that, after the defeat of Astyages, the nation voluntarily
received him as their king. This was very natural, for besides the harshness of
the government of Astyages, Cyrus was the next heir to the throne, the Medes were
effeminate, and the Persians were hardy. The kingdom remained, as before, the
united kingdom of "the Medes and Persians", with the difference, that the supremacy
was transferred from the former to the latter; and then in process of time it
came to be generally called the Persian empire, though the kings and their people
were still, even down to the time of Alexander, often spoken of as Medes. If Cyrus
had quietly succeeded to the throne, in virtue of his being the grandson of the
Median king Astyages, it seems difficult to account for this change. The mere
fact of Cyrus's father being a Persian is hardly enough to explain it.
With regard to the order of Cyrus's conquests in Asia, there seems
much confusion. It is clear that there was a struggle for supremacy between Cyrus
and the king of Babylon, tile latter having become master of Mesopotamia and Syria
by the conquests of Nebuchadnezzar. It was in fact a struggle between the Zend
tribes, which formed the Medo-Persian empire, and the Semitic tribes under the
king of Babylon, for the supremacy of Asia. We can scarcely determine whether
Cyrus conquered Lydia before making any attack on Babylon, and perhaps in this
matter Xenophon may have preserved something like the true succession of events.
That Croesus was in alliance with Babylon is stated also by Herodotus, who however,
makes Croesus entirely the aggressor in the Lydian war. No clear account can be
given of his campaigns in Central Asia, but the object of them was evidently to
subdue the whole of Asia as far as the Indus.
With respect to the main points of difference between Herodotus and
the Cyropaedeia, besides what has been said above of the historical value of Xenophon's
book, if it could be viewed as a history at all, its real design is the great
thing to be kept in view; and that design is stated by Xenophon himself with sufficient
clearness. He wished to shew that the government of men is not so difficult as
is commonly supposed, provided that the ruler be wise; and to illustrate this
he holds forth the example of Cyrus, whom he endows with all virtue, courage,
and wisdom, and whose conduct is meant for a practical illustration and his discourses
for an exposition of the maxims of the Socratic philosophy, so far as Xenophon
was capable of understanding it. Of course it would not have done to have represented
this beau ideal of a philosophic king as the dethroner of his own grandfather,
as the true Asiatic despot and conqueror, and as the victim of his own ambitious
schemes. It seems incredible that any one should rise from the perusal of the
Cyropaedeia without the firm conviction that it is a romance, and, moreover, that
its author never meant it to be taken for anything else; and still more incredible
is it that any one should have recognized in the picture of Xenophon the verisimilitude
of an Asiatic conqueror in the sixth century before Christ. That Cyrus was a great
man, is proved by the empire he established; that he was a good man, according
to the virtues of his age and country, we need not doubt; but if we would seek
further for his likeness, we must assuredly look rather at Genghis Khan or Timour
than at the Cyrus of Xenophon.
It has, however, been supposed, that the statement of Xenophon about
Cyaxares II. is confirmed by Scripture; for that Dareius the Mede, who, according
to Daniel, reigns after the taking of Babylon (for two years, according to the
chronologers) and before the first year of Cyrus, can be no other (this is the
utmost that can be asserted) than Cyaxares II. This matter seems susceptible of
a better explanation than it has yet received.
1. Xenophon's Cyaxares is the son of Astyages; Dareius the Mede is the son of
Ahasuerus. Now, it is almost beyond a doubt that Ahasuerus is the Hebrew form
of the Persian name or title which the Greeks called Xerxes, and Cyaxares seems
to be simply the form of the same word used in the Median dialect. Cyaxares, the
son of Phraortes, is called Ahasuerus in Tobit xiv. 15. It is granted that this
argument is not decisive, but, so far as it goes, it is against the identification.
2. After the taking of Babylon, Dareius the Mede receives the kingdom, and exercises
all the functions of royalty, with great power and splendour, evidently at Babylon.
But in Xenophon it is Cyrus who does this, and Cyaxares never comes near Babylon
at all after its capture, but remains in Media, totally eclipsed and almost superseded
by Cyrus. There are other arguments which seem to shew clearly that, whoever Dareius
the Mede may have been (a point difficult enough to decide), he was not the Cyaxares
of Xenophon. The matter cannot be further discussed here; but the result of a
most careful examination of it is, that in some important points the statements
of Xenophon cannot be reconciled with those of Daniel; and that a much more probable
explanation is, that Dareius was a noble Median, who held the sovereignty as the
viceroy of Cyrus, until the latter found it convenient to fix his court at Babylon;
and there are some indications on which a conjecture might be founded that this
viceroy was Astyages. It is quite natural that the year in which Cyrus began to
reign in person at Babylon should be reckoned (as it is by the Hebrew writers)
the first year of his reign over the whole empire. This view is confirmed by the
fact, that in the prophecies of the destruction of Babylon it is Cyrus, and not
any Median king, that is spoken of. Regarding this difficulty, then, as capable
of being explained, it remains that Xenophon's statement about Cyaxares II. is
entirely unsupported. Xenophon seems to have introduced Cyaxares simply as a foil
to set off the virtues of Cyrus. In the passage of Aeschylus, which is sometimes
quoted as confirming Xenophon, the two kings before Cyrus are clearly Phraortes
and Cyaxares, or Cyaxares and Astyages. At all events, no room is left for Cyaxares
II. The most natural explanation seems to be, that Phraortes, in whose reign the
Persians were subjected to the Medes, and who was therefore the first king of
the united Medes and Persians, is meant in the line:
Medos gar en ho protos hegemon stratou.
The next line admirably describes Cyaxares, who took Ninus, and consolidated the empire.
Allos d' ekeinou pais tod' ergon enuse.
If so, Astyages is omitted, probably because he did not complete his reign, but
was dethroned by Cyrus, who is thus reckoned the third Medo-Persian king, Tritos
d' ap autou Kuros. For the ap autou surely refers to the person who is called
protos. On the other hand, the account which Herodotus gives of the transference
of the Median empire to the Persians is in substance confirmed by Plato, Aristotle,
Isocrates, Anaximenes, Dinon, Ctesias, Amyntas, Strabo, Cephalion, Justin, Plutarch,
Polyaenus, and even by Xenophon himself in the Anabasis, as above quoted. Much
light would be thrown on the subject if the date of Cyrus's birth could be fixt;
but this is impossible. Dinon says, that he was seventy at his death; but this
is improbable for various reasons, and Herodotus evidently considered him much
younger.
None but the sacred writers mention the edict of Cyrus for the return
of the Jews. A motive for that step may be perhaps found in what Herodotus says
about his designs on Egypt. The very remarkable prophecy relating to the destruction
of Babylon and the restoration of the Jews by Cyrus is in Isaiah xliv. xlv., besides
other important passages in Isaiah and Jeremiah, which predict the fall of Babylon
without mentioning the name of Cyrus, and the corresponding history is in the
books of Daniel, Ezra, and 2 Chron. xxxvi. 22, 23. The language of the proclamation
of Cyrus, as recorded both in Ezra i. 2 and Chron. xxxvi. 22, seems to countenance
the idea that he was acquainted, as he might easily be through Daniel, with the
prophecy of Isaiah. "The Lord God of heaven... hath charged me to build him an
house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah" (compare Isaiah xliv. 28, xlv. 13); but
beyond this one point there is nothing to sustain the notion of Hales and others,
that Cyrus was more than an unconscious instrument in accomplishing the designs
of Providence. The contrary is intimated in Isaiah xlv. 5.
In the East Cyrus was long regarded as the greatest hero of antiquity,
and hence the fables by which his history is obscured. The Persians remembered
him as a father (Herod. iii. 89, 160), and his fame passed, through the Greeks,
to the Europeans, and the classical writers abound with allusions to him. His
sepulchre at Pasargadae was visited by Alexander the Great. (Arrian, vi. 29; Plut.
Alex. 69.) Pasargadae is said to have been built on the spot where Cyrus placed
his camp when he defeated Astyages, and in its immediate neighbourhood the city
of Persepolis grew up. The tomb of Cyrus has perished, but his name is found on
monuments at Murghab, north of Persepolis, which place, indeed, some antiquarians
take for Pasargadae (Herodotus, lib. i.; Ctesias, ed. Lion; Xenophon, Cyropaedeia;
Diodorus; Justin; Strabo; and other ancient authors)
This text is from: A dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology, 1873 (ed. William Smith). Cited Nov 2005 from The Perseus Project URL below, which contains interesting hyperlinks
Amytis, (Amutis). The daughter of Astyages, the wife of Cyrus, and the mother of Cambyses, according to Ctesias. (Pers. c. 2, 10, &c.)
Cassandane (Kassandane), a Persian lady of the family of the Achaemenidae, daughter of Pharnaspes, who married Cyrus the Great, and became by him the mother of Cambyses. She died before her husband, who much lamented her loss, and ordered a general mourning in her honour. (Herod. ii. 1, iii. 2.)
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