By Theseustoo

Long, long ago, in the ancient land of Lydia, there was once a king named Candaules, descended from Alcaeus the son of Heracles, whom the Greeks knew by the name of Myrsilus. The first king of this dynasty was Agron, son of Ninus, grandson of Belus, and great-grandson of Alcaeus; Candaules, son of Myrsus, was destined to be the last. The kings who had reigned before Agron were descendants of Lydus, son of Atys, from whom the people of the land, previously known as the Meonians, took the name of Lydians.
The Heraclides, descendants of Heracles and the slave-girl of Jardanus, had been entrusted by these princes with the management of affairs and eventually obtained the kingdom because of an oracle. Their rule endured for twenty-two generations of men, a space of five hundred and five years; during the whole of which period, from Agron to Candaules, the crown descended in a direct line from father to son.
Now, strange as it may seem, especially in an age where most royal marriages were often largely political arrangements, Candaules was actually head-over-heels in love with his own wife; in fact, he was so besotted by her that he thought she was the most beautiful woman in the whole world. Perhaps from a desire to have someone else witness his good fortune in having such a beautiful wife he conceived a desire to share his wife’s beauty with a friend. This peculiar fancy would have strange and far-reaching consequences.

Candaules King of Lydia Shews his Wife to Gyges

In Candaules’ household guard there was a certain captain by the name of Gyges, the son of Dascylus, who was greatly favoured by the king. Candaules habitually entrusted all of his most important affairs to this man. To Gyges also, Candaules incessantly extolled the beauty of his wife. One day, when he had been elaborately describing the beauty of his queen, Candaules fancied he saw a sceptical look in Gyges’ eye and said,
“I see you do not believe what I tell you of my lady’s loveliness; but come now, since men’s ears are less credulous than their eyes, let us contrive some means whereby you may see her naked.”
Now, among the Lydians it is considered a great disgrace, even among men, to be seen naked. Gyges was shocked at the very thought of what his king was suggesting; he exclaimed,
“What you are saying is most unwise, master! You want me to behold my mistress naked? Do you think that a woman puts off her modesty with her clothes? Our fathers in ancient times distinguished right and wrong plainly enough and it is wisdom on our part, to submit to being taught by them. There is an old saying, ‘Let each look only on his own’. I’ll freely admit that your wife is the fairest of all woman-kind… Only I beg you, please do not ask me to do wickedly.”
Thus Gyges tried to decline the king’s proposal, trembling visibly at the thought of some dreadful evil which might befall him as a result, should he agree to the king’s wishes.
But the king was insistent; he replied,
“Courage, friend; I’m not trying to test your loyalty to me; and you need not fear that your mistress will do some mischief to you. I will arrange things so that she shall not even know that you have looked upon her. You must hide behind the open door of the chamber in which we sleep. When I enter to go to bed she will follow me. Near the entrance there is a chair on which she will lay her clothes one by one as she takes them off. You will thus be able to peruse her person at your leisure. Then, when she is moving from the chair toward the bed and her back is turned, you will be able to slip out before she sees you.”
Though they may seem like mere whims, the desires expressed by kings are not idle words but commands; feeling trapped, Gyges could only acquiesce. Reluctantly he agreed to carry out the king’s plan, hoping that everything would turn out just as Candaules had planned and that no harm would come of it.
Before he retired for the evening Candaules led Gyges to his hiding-place. At his usual bedtime, the king retired to his bed-chamber and he was followed a minute or so later, by his queen. Unaware that she was being watched, the queen casually undressed. Slipping off her garments one by one, she folded them and laid them on the chair, just as Candaules had said she would, while Gyges watched from behind the door, hardly daring to breathe. Finally the queen turned her back and moved toward the bed as Gyges seized his chance and stealthily slipped out through the door.
However, unbeknown to Gyges, the queen had seen him leave out of the corner of her eye, but, instantly divining what had happened, she decided that she would have her revenge upon the husband who had so shamed her… and so she made not the least sign that she had seen anything amiss.
In the morning, as soon as the sun rose, the queen chose her loyalest and most faithful companions from among her retinue and prepared them all for what she now planned to do. She had often had cause to summon Gyges to confer with him for some purpose or other, so when she summoned him into her presence that morning he obeyed unquestioningly, suspecting nothing out of the ordinary. But when she addressed him he was even more shocked than he had been at the thought of the previous night’s events.
“Take your choice, Gyges, of the two courses which are open to you. Either you must slay Candaules, and thereby become my lord, and gain the Lydian throne, or you must die this moment in his place. Thus you will never again behold what is not lawful for you, even at the command of your master! Either he must perish by whose counsel this thing was done, or you, who saw me naked, and so broke our customary laws, must die.”
Upon hearing these words, Gyges stood for awhile in mute astonishment. When he had recovered his wits sufficiently to speak he implored the queen not to force him to make so harsh a choice. But the queen was adamant. Realizing that he implored in vain, and that he must either kill or be killed, he chose life for himself, and replied to his queen with this question:
“If it must be so, and you compel me against my will to put my lord to death, come; let me hear how you will have me set on him.”
“Let him die,” she answered, “in the same room where he disgraced me and showed me naked to you… when he is asleep.”
When night fell, the queen led him into the royal bed-chamber, placed a dagger in his hand, and hid him behind the door just as he had done the previous night. When the king entered, Gyges waited until he was sure the king had fallen asleep, then silently crept towards the bed and struck him through the heart with his dagger.
As the famous poet, Archilochus the Parian, who lived about the same time, mentioned in a poem written in iambic trimeter verse, this was how the wife and kingdom of Candaules passed into the possession of Gyges and how the succession passed from the dynasty of the Heraclides to the Mermnadae.
The people of Lydia, however, were enraged at the slaughter of their king and flew to arms against the usurper; but after an uncomfortable civil struggle between the people and the followers of Gyges and the queen, they eventually allowed themselves to be persuaded that if the oracle at Delphi should confirm Gyges as king, then king he should remain; otherwise he would relinquish the throne to the Heraclides. The oracle, when consulted, decided in his favour and Gyges became king of Lydia. The Pythoness, however, added that, in the fifth generation after Gyges, vengeance would come for the Heraclides; but neither the Lydians nor their princes took much notice of this prophecy until it was fulfilled.

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By Theseustoo

[Editor’s note: Short of reading time but I have picked out some nice pictures with the aid of a few key words.]

Oracle

Since the most ancient times the sovereignty of Lydia had belonged to the Heraclides; the dynasty which had been founded centuries ago by the god-like Heracles, whom the poets all say was the earthly son of the All-father; Almighty Zeus himself. However, the Lydian crown eventually passed out of their hands and through sheer chance it fell into the hands of the Mermnadae; the Lydian-born family of Croesus which had originally been founded by Gyges; Croesus’ own fifth ancestor.

This man had been the captain of the guard of the final king of the Heraclides dynasty, whose name was Candaules. This king had been so proud of his wife’s beauty that he had wished to confirm his belief that she was the most beautiful of all women. To this end he had persuaded Gyges to hide behind his wife’s chamber door before she retired, and spy on her as she undressed for bed. Unfortunately, however, he had been seen by the queen, who, in her desire for revenge, had eventually goaded him into murdering her husband, the king.

Lydia: Click to see incredible Green eyes!

Thus Gyges usurped Candaules’ throne and stole his wife; putting an end to the Heraclides dynasty and removing the descendants of Heracles from power forever. The incident which had so outraged his queen, however, was in no way Gyges’ fault. In truth it was providence itself, rather than any base or ignoble ambition, which had prompted his action; and although at first there was a huge public outcry against the regicide, eventually the decision of the Delphic Oracle had vindicated him and the people of Lydia were persuaded finally to accept him as their monarch. Thus after several generations of Greek rule under the Heraclides, the throne of Lydia was finally returned to Lydian hands.

Mermaidae

Croesus, son of Alyattes, was the fifth Mermnadae King of Lydia; succeeding to his father’s throne at the age of thirty-five. Now, ever since Gyges had freed the Lydians from the Greek yoke, the Mermnadae kings of Lydia had wondered how they might revenge themselves for the indignities they had suffered during Lydia’s prolonged period of subjection to Greek occupation and rule. However, it would not be until the reign of the legendary and fabulously wealthy, King Croesus, that Lydia at last had the opportunity to do something about it. As often happens, revenge and ambition went hand in hand for Croesus; and as he grew in wealth and experience, so too grew both his desire for revenge and his ability to accomplish it; as a result, he developed imperial ambitions.

Turning his armies first against the Greek cities in Ionia and Aeolia, Croesus attacked Ephesus. When he laid siege to the city, the Ephesians made an offering of the whole city to their goddess, Artemis by stretching a rope from the town wall to her temple, a good seven furlongs distant from the ancient city. Unwilling to incur the wrath of the Ephesians’ dreaded and bloodthirsty goddess, Artemis; Croesus was thus obliged to spare the lives of the city’s inhabitants.

After this he made war on every Ionian and Aeolian state one after the other, on any pretext he could find or invent, regardless of how flimsy the excuse. Thus he eventually made himself master of all the Greek cities in Asia west of the River Halys, forcing them to become his vassals and tributaries until his interest in war and conquest waned after the tragic death of his son and heir, Atys, whom he mourned for two full years.

Persian

Eventually however, the news which had spread through the region like wildfire, of Cyrus’ meteoric rise to power in Persia, would drag the monarch out of mourning and return his wandering attention once again to the land of the living as Persia very suddenly began to expand the boundaries of her own empire, to eventually become the only force in Asia with both the numbers and the leadership to represent a threat to the Lydians. Lydia’s recently conquered and newly subjugated empire was now at its zenith; her warriors had a well-earned a reputation for being the best and bravest in all Asia at that time; as the power of the Assyrians had been effectively nullified generations earlier by the Median revolt.

When Cyrus’ rose to power, he soon conquered all of the smaller states around Media and Persia, which had hitherto been tributaries of Babylon and her Assyrian rulers. Asia was thus now effectively divided into two regions: the western region, consisting of all the Ionian and Aeolian cities to the west of the River Halys, now ruled by the fabulously wealthy Croesus; and the eastern region, which was now ruled by the upstart Cyrus of Persia who had overthrown the Medes who had hitherto ruled Asia ever since it was first conquered by Astyages’ father and Cyrus’ own great-grand-father, the bellicose Cyaxares.

Assyrian

It was Cyaxares who had finally driven out the horde of Scythian invaders whose incursion into Media had caused a twenty-eight year interruption in their on-going revolutionary war with the Assyrians. Eventually the cunning of Cyaxares had prevailed; he had all of the Scythian leaders murdered at a treacherous feast; after which the rest of the invaders were chased right out of Asia. The Assyrians too, were then finally defeated and forced to flee from their capital city, Nineveh, until that too was taken by the Medes.

The remainder of the Assyrian nobility then fled to Babylon where they established a government in exile in what was now their final remaining stronghold, behind her high and famously impenetrable blue-glazed walls.

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Before Picture: The Median Empire

By Theseustoo

When the defeat of the Median armies was reported to the astonished Astyages it struck him like a bolt from the blue; it seemed as if the Medes had all spontaneously decided that they had suffered too much at Astyages’ hands and had thus all simultaneously decided to join the Persian revolt.
Astyages was not unaware of their suffering; far from it; indeed he derived a great deal of personal pleasure from inflicting it; but he was very surprised that they had revolted; he had thought that they had been well and truly cowed into total submission to his god-given kingly authority; and that their spirits had been so completely broken to his will that they had not the courage to revolt. But even more surprising than this was the fact that his spies had not discovered the plot and reported it to him before now.
“What? My whole army turned tail and fled?” Astyages yelled incredulously as he heard the tale of the total rout of all his armies. No! It couldn’t be, he thought desperately to himself, it was impossible. How could his spies not have known there was something wrong? Were they ignorant of the plot, he wondered, or were they perhaps complicit in it?
He made a mental note to have all of his current spies executed and replaced. If they were ignorant of the plot, he thought, it must mean that they had been deliberately kept ignorant; and that in turn implied that his current spies must all be well known to everyone as such and thus useless as spies; those who had planned this revolt had easily avoided them. They should have known; the king thought to himself darkly; he should have been warned…
And what if they had known about the plot and had not reported it, he asked himself. That would mean they were complicit in it, and disloyal to their king; treasonous indeed. No, they were probably ignorant, he decided, or this terrified spy would not be here now, cowering in front of his master in fear for his very life, due to the nature of what he had just reported. This man knew only too well that messengers who were unfortunate enough to be the bearers of especially bad tidings were sometimes sacrificed in order to prevent the news from spreading panic among the populace and thus adding more chaos to the disaster. Yet he had brought the message in spite of the obvious danger to himself, the king realized; so Astyages decided to let this spy live; but only this one…
But Astyages was not about to give what remained of his city’s population any time to panic; decisive action, he knew, was the only thing which could possibly save his kingdom now… if anything could! As for this slave; if he killed him, he knew it would look as if he were trying to cover up bad news and may actually start a panic inadvertently. Yes, he thought, of all his spies, this one could keep his life, he decided; for the time being at least…
“Well it will give Cyrus no joy!” the king declared bitterly as, turning to the captain of his guards, he issued his orders,
“Call the Assembly; every available man still capable of using a weapon in this city is to arm himself with whatever he can and assemble to fight the Persians!”
As the guard captain nodded and left immediately to obey his king, Astyages next addressed the guards who were on duty on either side of the door and posted at regular intervals around the throne-room; and as he left the room he casually instructed them, “Guards; arrest these Magi and have them impaled in front of the city gates immediately!”
Perhaps for the first time in their about-to-be truncated lives the three Magi advisors were utterly speechless as the guards moved forward as one to surround the king’s former advisors, then seized them and dragged them, screaming inarticulate protests and kicking their legs in a desperate but futile attempt to resist; as, between them, the guards virtually carried the doomed astrologers to their unforeseen, untimely and most excruciating end.

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The regular Persian and Median infantry: From the Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies website

Spurred on by Astyages’ own personal bodyguards, who now whipped them mercilessly into the fray; the people of Agbatana, now comprised mostly of old men and young boys armed with picks, hoes, mattocks, axes and other pieces of farming or kitchen equipment or perhaps an occasional piece of antique armour or weaponry; now put up only a little more resistance than had the Median armies to Cyrus’ forces. Meanwhile the women cowered in the city’s Temples, tying themselves to the altars with fragile wreaths of flowers; thus dedicating themselves as suppliants to their gods: Should their city be invaded and conquered, their conqueror must refrain from harming them or risk breaking one of the most ancient and sacred of all laws; the law of sanctuary; and thus risk incurring the wrath of the gods.
Yet despite their extremity and their terror of Astyages’ guards, many still deserted to the Persians as soon as they found an opportunity. The Persians, for their part, together with those Medians who had already deserted, encouraged their fellow-Medes not to fight but instead to throw down their weapons. Most of those who could obey their relatives within the ‘enemy’s’ ranks did as they were bid and surrendered; and they were immediately welcomed very warmly into the Persian ranks.
Those few Medes who still stubbornly resisted the Persian army, including most of Astyages’ own personal guard; and those few peasants who had not managed to avoid being forced to fight, were swiftly and utterly defeated. Although more blood was spilled on both sides in this battle than there had been in the first parody of a battle, the Medes were again defeated, utterly and absolutely. Finally realizing the pointlessness of opposing such overwhelming odds, even the remnant of the King’s bodyguard eventually capitulated, as Artembares finally held aloft a white rag tied to the end of a spear to indicate their submission.
Astyages was captured alive and at once enslaved; and as the blacksmith hammered the rivets into the iron chains which now imprisoned his hands and feet, he looked up to see Harpagus, his servant and Commander in Chief of all his armies, standing in front of him. Astyages was astonished when he saw that his minister was not enchained, but was walking freely among the enemy, who all hailed him as a hero as he passed. When Harpagus saw Astyages and the astonished expression on his face, he could not conceal his delight. In bantering tones, completely devoid of respect, the former servant now rudely addressed his former king, “Well then Astyages, how does it feel to be a slave?”
The defeated tyrant looked his tormentor in the eyes as he demanded bitterly, “Why do you claim the achievements of Cyrus as your own?”
“Because it was my letter which made him revolt; and so I am entitled to the credit for the whole enterprise” Harpagus replied smugly.
Astyages laughed even more bitterly when he heard this; then, with something resembling pity in his voice, he said, “In that case you are both the silliest and the most unjust of men: the silliest because when it was in your power to put the crown on your own head, you placed it on the head of another; the most unjust, because, on account of that supper you have brought slavery on the Medes, who were not to blame for it.”
Harpagus gasped in astonishment as Astyages continued, “…If you must put the crown on another’s head, rather than keep it for yourself, justice requires that a Mede, rather than a Persian, should have it. Now, however, the Medes are made slaves instead of lords, and the slaves moreover of those who, till recently, were their subjects. For a hundred and twenty-eight years Media has ruled all Asia east of the River Halys and now you hand her dominion over to the Persians!”

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Nabonidus Chronicle - A hard copy of the story

By Theseustoo

CHAPTER 6:  The Persians Revolt

Astyages was conferring with his astrologers in his throne room. On a large table the Magi had spread extensive charts of the heavens, which their tribe had painstakingly compiled over the course of many centuries. Explaining their analyses, they pointed out the meanings of the aspects between the various planets on these charts as they expounded their prognostications to their king. Currently an opposition to the planet Ares, the god of War, they felt, indicated a threat to the national security.
Suddenly the door burst open and a man whom Astyages instantly recognized as one of his spies, now dressed in a herald’s uniform, hurriedly entered the room, flanked by two guards. The spy threw himself to his knees at Astyages’ feet and touched the floor with his forehead in ritual abasement. The king was furious at the interruption,
“How dare you interrupt our conference?” the monarch demanded of the intruder; “If your reason is not a good one, your life will be forfeit!”
The spy trembled with fear; but he was undeterred and responded instantly, “The Persians are in revolt Majesty; I have come as quickly as I could to warn you; Cyrus is raising an army…”
“What’s this?” Astyages was incredulous, “In revolt you say? Very well; you may keep your head. Now, you may take a message to Cyrus for me; he is to come at once to attend me here in Agbatana!”
“At once Sire!” The spy replied, and then swiftly bowed deeply, turned and left, to return immediately to Persia with the King’s message. When he had gone, Astyages turned round to address his servant.
“Harpagus! Tell the tribal princes to assemble their armies! And have my army assemble too; you will be Commander in Chief of this expedition; take the armies and slaughter these Persian rebels.” Then, with an evil glint in his eye, he added, “Show them no mercy!”
“At once Sire!” his servant replied. Harpagus could not conceal his delight; but he didn’t have to; the king, he knew, would undoubtedly interpret his visible pleasure simply as happiness at his promotion to the position of Commander in Chief of all the Median armies; and the chance to lead this most important expedition against Persia

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The message from Astyages was not unexpected; indeed Cyrus was well prepared for this ultimatum even before the herald delivered it. His response was instantaneous and very brief:
“Tell Astyages that I shall appear in his presence sooner than he will like!” he declared. Then, as soon as the spy had left the room, he turned to the captain of his guards, “Guard! Call the Assembly! To arms!”

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A Persian nobleman

The ‘battle’ went just as Harpagus and the Princes of the Tribes had planned, much to the astonishment of Artabarzanes, the captain of the king’s own regiment. As the commanding officer of the king’s regiment he was one of very few of the Median king’s officers who had been kept ignorant of the princes’ plot. Even his own subordinate officers had known of the plan, he very soon realised, when they too deserted to the Persians. But these, he knew, were all good men, whose loyalty, not only to their country, but, he would have sworn, also their personal loyalty to himself as their commander, he would never have questioned… Yet they had kept this plot entirely secret from him. Of course; in retrospect, he realized that they really had no choice; his integrity was too well-known for the conspirators to risk being caught by attempting to subvert him.
As he watched the Median armies either feign fear and flee, or else desert en masse to their enemy, he knew he should be outraged at this betrayal, of himself as well as their country. Yet somehow, after the event, he found he could not bring himself to blame them; for he too thought of Astyages as a tyrant. Nonetheless he still felt just as bound to protect his king as he had always been by his sense of duty, as well as by his own personal sense of honour.
From earliest childhood he had been taught, like all noble Median men, that their loyalty was due first to the King, then to the people of Media and then to their own families. Yet, as he now witnessed the rout which was happening all around him, it occurred to him, even in the midst of battle, that most Medians were loyal to their families first, then to the people of Media, and only then to their king.
For what seemed like an age but which in reality was only a few minutes, Artabarzanes and his regiment bravely resisted the overwhelming Persian forces, armed with Assyrian bows and bronze-tipped arrows as well as long, bronze-tipped spears and short, wickedly-pointed daggers, also of sharpened bronze; and protected by their light wickerwork shields. The Persians, for their part, did their best to keep this small pocket of serious resistance busy without doing them any real damage, until they were finally ordered to lay down their arms by their own Commander in Chief, Harpagus, who soon arrived at the head of a large Median contingent, which had just been reinforced by a battalion of Persian troops.
When Artabarzanes and his men finally saw that Astyages’ forces had openly deserted to the Persians or else had feigned terror at the size of the Persian horde and fled, they quickly obeyed. Since further resistance was clearly futile, even Artabarzanes finally decided that discretion was the better part of valour and capitulated.
Though defeated, he felt that at least he had dishonoured neither himself, nor his position. But Artabarzanes knew that Harpagus too was a man of honour; and when he discovered that the purpose of the rebellion was to install a legitimate heir on the throne of Media, and not merely to advance the ambitions of either Harpagus or the tribal princes, he found that when given the choice, he could only support the new cause.

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veni,vidi.

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