Carians and Caunians and Lykians, taking also Ionians and Aiolians to
help him. Of these the Carians came to the mainland from the islands;
for being of old time subjects of Minos and being called Leleges, they
used to dwell in the islands, paying no tribute, so far back as I am
able to arrive by hearsay, but whenever Minos required it, they used
to supply his ships with seamen: and as Minos subdued much land and was
fortunate in his fighting, the Carian nation was of all nations by much
the most famous at that time together with him. And they produced three
inventions of which the Hellenes adopted the use; that is to say, the
Carians were those who first set the fashion of fastening crests on
helmets, and of making the devices which are put onto shields, and these
also were the first who made handles for their shields, whereas up to
that time all who were wont to use shields carried them without handles
and with leathern straps to guide them, having them hung about their
necks and their left shoulders. Then after the lapse of a long time the
Dorians and Ionians drove the Carians out of the islands, and so they
came to the mainland. With respect to the Carians the Cretans relate
that it happened thus; the Carians themselves however do not agree with
this account, but suppose that they are dwellers on the mainland from
the beginning, 172 and that they went always by the same name which they
have now: and they point as evidence of this to an ancient temple of
Carian Zeus at Mylasa, in which the Mysians and Lydians share as being
brother races of the Carians, for they say that Lydos and Mysos were
brothers of Car; these share in it, but those who being of another race
have come to speak the same language as the Carians, these have no share
in it.
172. It seems to me however that the Caunians are dwellers there from
the beginning, though they say themselves that they came from Crete: but
they have been assimilated to the Carian race in language, or else the
Carians to the Caunian race, I cannot with certainty determine which.
They have customs however in which they differ very much from all other
men as well as from the Carians; for example the fairest thing in their
estimation is to meet together in numbers for drinking, according to
equality of age or friendship, both men, women, and children; and again
when they had founded temples for foreign deities, afterwards they
changed their purpose and resolved to worship only their own native
gods, and the whole body of Caunian young men put on their armour and
made pursuit as far as the borders of the Calyndians, beating the air
with their spears; and they said that they were casting the foreign gods
out of the land. Such are the customs which these have.
173. The Lykians however have sprung originally from Crete (for in old
time the whole of Crete was possessed by Barbarians): and when the sons
of Europa, Sarpedon and Minos, came to be at variance in Crete about the
kingdom, Minos having got the better in the strife of parties drove
out both Sarpedon himself and those of his party: and they having been
expelled came to the land of Milyas in Asia, for the land which now the
Lykians inhabit was anciently called Milyas, and the Milyans were then
called Solymoi. Now while Sarpedon reigned over them, they were called
by the name which they had when they came thither, and by which the
Lykians are even now called by the neighbouring tribes, namely Termilai;
but when from Athens Lycos the son of Pandion came to the land of the
Termilai and to Sarpedon, he too having been driven out by his brother
namely Aigeus, then by the name taken from Lycos they were called after
a time Lykians. The customs which these have are partly Cretan and
partly Carian; but one custom they have which is peculiar to them, and
in which they agree with no other people, that is they call themselves
by their mothers and not by their fathers; and if one asks his neighbour
who he is, he will state his parentage on the mother's side and
enumerate his mother's female ascendants: and if a woman who is a
citizen marry a slave, the children are accounted to be of gentle birth;
but if a man who is a citizen, though he were the first man among them,
have a slave for wife or concubine, the children are without civil
rights.
174. Now the Carians were reduced to subjection by Harpagos without any
brilliant deed displayed either by the Carians themselves or by those
of the Hellenes who dwell in this land. Of these last there are besides
others the men of Cnidos, settlers from Lacedemon, whose land runs out
into the sea, 173 being in fact the region which is called Triopion,
beginning from the peninsula of Bybassos: and since all the land of
Cnidos except a small part is washed by the sea (for the part of it
which looks towards the North is bounded by the Gulf of Keramos, and
that which looks to the South by the sea off Syme and Rhodes), therefore
the men of Cnidos began to dig through this small part, which is about
five furlongs across, while Harpagos was subduing Ionia, desiring to
make their land an island: and within the isthmus all was theirs, 174
for where the territory of Cnidos ends in the direction of the mainland,
here is the isthmus which they were digging across. And while the
Cnidians were working at it with a great number of men, it was perceived
that the men who worked suffered injury much more than might have been
expected and in a more supernatural manner, both in other parts of their
bodies and especially in their eyes, when the rock was being broken
up; so they sent men to ask the Oracle at Delphi what the cause of
the difficulty was. And the Pythian prophetess, as the men of Cnidos
themselves report, gave them this reply in trimeter verse:—
"Fence not the place with towers, nor dig the isthmus through;
Zeus would have made your land an island, had he willed."
When the Pythian prophetess had given this oracle, the men of Cnidos
not only ceased from their digging but delivered themselves to Harpagos
without resistance, when he came against them with his army.
175. There were also the Pedasians, who dwelt in the inland country
above Halicarnassos; and among these, whenever anything hurtful is about
to happen either to themselves or to their neighbours, the priestess
of Athene has a great beard: this befell them three times. These of
all about Caria were the only men who held out for any time against
Harpagos, and they gave him trouble more than any other people, having
fortified a mountain called Lide.
176. After a time the Pedasians were conquered; and the Lykians, when
Harpagos marched his army into the plain of Xanthos, came out against
him 175 and fought, few against many, and displayed proofs of valour;
but being defeated and confined within their city, they gathered
together into the citadel their wives and their children, their property
and their servants, and after that they set fire to this citadel, so
that it was all in flames, and having done so and sworn terrible oaths
with one another, they went forth against the enemy 176 and were slain
in fight, that is to say all the men of Xanthos: and of the Xanthians
who now claim to be Lykians the greater number have come in from abroad,
except only eighty households; but these eighty households happened
at that time to be away from their native place, and so they escaped
destruction. Thus Harpagos obtained possession of Caunos, for the men of
Caunos imitated in most respects the behaviour of the Lykians.
177. So Harpagos was conquering the coast regions of Asia; and Cyrus
himself meanwhile was doing the same in the upper parts of it, subduing
every nation and passing over none. Now most of these actions I shall
pass over in silence, but the undertakings which gave him trouble more
than the rest and which are the most worthy of note, of these I shall
make mention.
178. Cyrus, so soon as he had made subject to himself all other parts
of the mainland, proceeded to attack the Assyrians. Now Assyria
has doubtless many other great cities, but the most famous and the
strongest, and the place where the seat of their monarchy had been
established after Nineveh was destroyed, was Babylon; which was a city
such as I shall say.—It lies in a great plain, and in size it is such
that each face measures one hundred and twenty furlongs, 177 the shape
of the whole being square; thus the furlongs of the circuit of the city
amount in all to four hundred and eighty. Such is the size of the city
of Babylon, and it had a magnificence greater than all other cities of
which we have knowledge. First there runs round it a trench deep and
broad and full of water; then a wall fifty royal cubits in thickness
and two hundred cubits in height: now the royal cubit is larger by three
fingers than the common cubit. 178
179. I must also tell in addition to this for what purpose the earth was
used, which was taken out of the trench, and in what manner the wall was
made. As they dug the trench they made the earth which was carried out
of the excavation into bricks, and having moulded enough bricks they
baked them in kilns; and then afterwards, using hot asphalt for mortar
and inserting reed mats at every thirty courses of brickwork, they built
up first the edges of the trench and then the wall itself in the same
manner: and at the top of the wall along the edges they built chambers
of one story facing one another; and between the rows of chambers they
left space to drive a four-horse chariot. In the circuit of the wall
there are set a hundred gates made of bronze throughout, and the
gate-posts and lintels likewise. Now there is another city distant from
Babylon a space of eight days' journey, of which the name is Is; and
there is a river there of no great size, and the name of the river is
also Is, and it sends its stream into the river Euphrates. This river Is
throws up together with its water lumps of asphalt in great abundance,
and thence was brought the asphalt for the wall of Babylon.
180. Babylon then was walled in this manner; and there are two divisions
of the city; for a river whose name is Euphrates parts it in the middle.
This flows from the land of the Armenians and is large and deep and
swift, and it flows out into the Erythraian sea. The wall then on each
side has its bends 179 carried down to the river, and from this point
the walls stretch along each bank of the stream in the form of a rampart
of baked bricks: and the city itself is full of houses of three and
four stories, and the roads by which it is cut up run in straight lines,
including the cross roads which lead to the river; and opposite to each
road there were set gates in the rampart which ran along the river, in
many in number as the ways, 180 and these also were of bronze and led
like the ways 181 to the river itself.
181. This wall then which I have mentioned is as it were a cuirass 182
for the town, and another wall runs round within it, not much weaker for
defence than the first but enclosing a smaller space. 183 And in each
division of the city was a building in the midst, in the one the king's
palace of great extent and strongly fortified round, and in the other
the temple of Zeus Belos with bronze gates, and this exists still up to
my time and measures two furlongs each way, 184 being of a square shape:
and in the midst of the temple 185 is built a solid tower measuring a
furlong both in length and in breadth, and on this tower another tower
has been erected, and another again upon this, and so on up to the
number of eight towers. An ascent to these has been built running
outside round about all the towers; and when one reaches about the
middle of the ascent one finds a stopping-place and seats to rest upon,
on which those who ascend sit down and rest: and on the top of the last
tower there is a large cell, 186 and in the cell a large couch is laid,
well covered, and by it is placed a golden table: and there is no image
there set up nor does any human being spend the night there except only
one woman of the natives of the place, whomsoever the god shall choose
from all the woman, as say the Chaldeans who are the priests of this
god.
182. These same men say also, but I do not believe them, that the god
himself comes often to the cell and rests upon the couch, as happens
likewise in the Egyptian Thebes according to the report of the
Egyptians, for there also a woman sleeps in the temple of the Theban
Zeus (and both these women are said to abstain from commerce with men),
and as happens also with the prophetess 187 of the god in Patara of
Lykia, whenever there is one, for there is not always an Oracle there,
but whenever there is one, then she is shut up during the nights in the
temple within the cell.
183. There is moreover in the temple at Babylon another cell below,
wherein is a great image of Zeus sitting, made of gold, and by it is
placed a large table of gold, and his footstool and seat are of gold
also; and, as the Chaldeans reported, the weight of the gold of which
these things are made is eight hundred talents. Outside this cell is
an altar of gold; and there is also another altar of great size, where
full-grown animals 188 are sacrificed, whereas on the golden altar it
is not lawful to sacrifice any but young sucklings only: and also on the
larger altar the Chaldeans offer one thousand talents of frankincense
every year at the time when they celebrate the feast in honour of this
god. There was moreover in these precincts still remaining at the time
of Cyrus, 189 a statue twelve cubits high, of gold and solid. This I
did not myself see, but that which is related by the Chaldeans I relate.
Against this statue Dareios the son of Hystaspes formed a design, but
he did not venture to take it: it was taken however by Xerxes the son of
Dareios, who also killed the priest when he forbade him to meddle with
the statue. This temple, then, is thus adorned with magnificence, and
there are also many private votive-offerings.
184. Of this Babylon, besides many other rulers, of whom I shall make
mention in the Assyrian history, and who added improvement to the walls
and temples, there were also two who were women. Of these, the one who
ruled first, named Semiramis, who lived five generations before the
other, produced banks of earth in the plain which are a sight worth
seeing; and before this the river used to flood like a sea over the
whole plain.
185. The queen who lived after her time, named Nitocris, was wiser than
she who had reigned before; and in the first place she left behind her
monuments which I shall tell of; then secondly, seeing that the monarchy
of the Medes was great and not apt to remain still, but that besides
other cities even Nineveh had been captured by it, she made provision
against it in so far as she was able. First, as regards the river
Euphrates which flows through the midst of their city, whereas before
this it flowed straight, she by digging channels above made it so
winding that it actually comes three times in its course to one of the
villages in Assyria; and the name of the village to which the Euphrates
comes is Ardericca; and at this day those who travel from this Sea of
ours to Babylon, in their voyage down the river Euphrates 18901 arrive
three times at this same village and on three separate days. This she
did thus; and she also piled up a mound along each bank of the river,
which is worthy to cause wonder for its size and height: and at a great
distance above Babylon, she dug a basin for a lake, which she caused to
extend along at a very small distance from the river, 190 excavating it
everywhere of such depth as to come to water, and making the extent such
that the circuit of it measured four hundred and twenty furlongs: and
the earth which was dug out of this excavation she used up by piling it
in mounds along the banks of the river: and when this had been dug by
her she brought stones and set them all round it as a facing wall. Both
these two things she did, that is she made the river to have a winding
course, and she made the place which was dug out all into a swamp, in
order that the river might run more slowly, having its force broken
by going round many bends, and that the voyages might be winding to
Babylon, and after the voyages there might succeed a long circuit of the
pool. These works she carried out in that part where the entrance to the
country was, and the shortest way to it from Media, so that the Medes
might not have dealings with her kingdom and learn of her affairs.
186. These defences she cast round her city from the depth; and she made
the following addition which was dependent upon them:—The city was in
two divisions, and the river occupied the space between; and in the
time of the former rulers, when any one wished to pass over from the
one division to the other, he had to pass over in a boat, and that, as I
imagine, was troublesome: she however made provision also for this; for
when she was digging the basin for the lake she left this other monument
of herself derived from the same work, that is, she caused stones to be
cut of very great length, and when the stones were prepared for her and
the place had been dug out, she turned aside the whole stream of the
river into the place which she had been digging; and while this was
being filled with water, the ancient bed of the river being dried up in
the meantime, she both built up with baked bricks after the same fashion
as the wall the edges of the river, where it flows through the city, and
the places of descent leading from the small gateways to the river; and
also about the middle of the city, as I judge, with the stones which
she had caused to be dug out she proceeded to build a bridge, binding
together the stones with iron and lead: and upon the top she laid
squared timbers across, to remain there while it was daytime, over which
the people of Babylon made the passage across; but at night they used to
take away these timbers for this reason, namely that they might not go
backwards and forwards by night and steal from one another: and when the
place dug out had been made into a lake full of water by the river, and
at the same time the bridge had been completed, then she conducted the
Euphrates back into its ancient channel from the lake, and so the
place dug out being made into a swamp was thought to have served a good
purpose, and there had been a bridge set up for the men of the city.
187. This same queen also contrived a snare of the following kind:—Over
that gate of the city through which the greatest number of people passed
she set up for herself a tomb above the very gate itself. And on the
tomb she engraved writing which said thus: "If any of the kings of
Babylon who come after me shall be in want of wealth, let him open my
tomb and take as much as he desires; but let him not open it for any
other cause, if he be not in want; for that will not be well." 191 This
tomb was undisturbed until the kingdom came to Dareios; but to Dareios
it seemed that it was a monstrous thing not to make any use of this
gate, and also, when there was money lying there, not to take it,
considering that the money itself invited him to do so. Now the reason
why he would not make any use of this gate was because the corpse would
have been above his head as he drove through. He then, I say, opened the
tomb and found not indeed money but the corpse, with writing which said
thus: "If thou hadst not been insatiable of wealth and basely covetous,
thou wouldest not have opened the resting-places of the dead."
188. This queen then is reported to have been such as I have described:
and it was the son of this woman, bearing the same name as his father,
Labynetos, and being ruler over the Assyrians, against whom Cyrus was
marching. Now the great king makes his marches not only well furnished
192 from home with provisions for his table and with cattle, but also
taking with him water from the river Choaspes, which flows by Susa, of
which alone and of no other river the king drinks: and of this water of
the Choaspes boiled, a very great number of waggons, four-wheeled
and drawn by mules, carry a supply in silver vessels, and go with him
wherever he may march at any time.
189. Now when Cyrus on his way towards Babylon arrived at the river
Gyndes,—of which river the springs are in the mountains of the
Matienians, and it flows through the Dardanians and runs into another
river, the Tigris, which flowing by the city of Opis runs out into the
Erythraian Sea,—when Cyrus, I say, was endeavouring to cross this river
Gyndes, which is a navigable stream, then one of his sacred white horses
in high spirit and wantonness went into the river and endeavoured to
cross, but the stream swept it under water and carried it off forthwith.
And Cyrus was greatly moved with anger against the river for having done
thus insolently, and he threatened to make it so feeble that for the
future even women could cross it easily without wetting the knee. So
after this threat he ceased from his march against Babylon and divided
his army into two parts; and having divided it he stretched lines and
marked out straight channels, 193 one hundred and eighty on each bank of
the Gyndes, directed every way, and having disposed his army along them
he commanded them to dig: so, as a great multitude was working, the work
was completed indeed, but they spent the whole summer season at this
spot working.
190. When Cyrus had taken vengeance on the river Gyndes by dividing it
into three hundred and sixty channels, and when the next spring was just
beginning, then at length he continued his advance upon Babylon: and
the men of Babylon had marched forth out of their city and were awaiting
him. So when in his advance he came near to the city, the Babylonians
joined battle with him, and having been worsted in the fight they were
shut up close within their city. But knowing well even before this that
Cyrus was not apt to remain still, and seeing him lay hands on every
nation equally, they had brought in provisions beforehand 194 for very
many years. So while these made no account of the siege, Cyrus was
in straits what to do, for much time went by and his affairs made no
progress onwards.
191. Therefore, whether it was some other man who suggested it to him
when he was in a strait what to do, or whether he of himself perceived
what he ought to do, he did as follows:—The main body of his army 195 he
posted at the place where the river runs into the city, and then again
behind the city he set others, where the river issues forth from the
city; and he proclaimed to his army that so soon as they should see that
the stream had become passable, they should enter by this way into the
city. Having thus set them in their places and in this manner exhorted
them he marched away himself with that part of his army which was not
fit for fighting: and when he came to the lake, Cyrus also did the same
things which the queen of the Babylonians had done as regards the river
and the lake; that is to say, he conducted the river by a channel into
the lake, which was at that time a swamp, and so made the former course
of the river passable by the sinking of the stream. When this had been
done in such a manner, the Persians who had been posted for this very
purpose entered by the bed of the river Euphrates into Babylon, the
stream having sunk so far that it reached about to the middle of a man's
thigh. Now if the Babylonians had had knowledge of it beforehand or had
perceived that which was being done by Cyrus, they would have allowed
196 the Persians to enter the city and then destroyed them miserably;
for if they had closed all the gates that led to the river and mounted
themselves upon the ramparts which were carried along the banks of the
stream, they would have caught them as it were in a fish-wheal: but as
it was, the Persians came upon them unexpectedly; and owing to the size
of the city (so it is said by those who dwell there) after those about
the extremities of the city had suffered capture, those Babylonians who
dwelt in the middle did not know that they had been captured; but
as they chanced to be holding a festival, they went on dancing and
rejoicing during this time until they learnt the truth only too well.
Babylon then had thus been taken for the first time: