CHAPTER X.

THE LATER DEVELOPMENT OF EASTERN IRAN.

Of the tribes of the Arians occupying the table-land called by their

name, those which had their habitations on the northern slope of the

Hindu Kush, in the valleys of the Murghab and Zarefshan, outstripped the

rest in combining their forces, and uniting into a larger community. In

these regions they held advanced posts over against the steppes and the

migratory nations of the low plains stretching before them without limit

towards the north. We had good reason to suppose that it was the

repulsion of the attacks of the nomads from the steppes of the Oxus and

Jaxartes, which brought these tribes, whose possessions consisted of

flocks and pastures, into the habit of living in arms, and of

undertaking the protection of the country. From their midst arose the

monarchy intended to lead and combine the defence, the formation of

which we placed about the year 1100 B.C., and having its centre at

Bactria and Zariaspa. The tribes of the West, on the other hand, for

four centuries after this time lived in isolation under their

chieftains. The continuance of the struggles which Bactria had to

undergo, even after the formation of the monarchy, is proved, not only

by the proximity of the nomads of the steppes, but also by the traits of

warlike feeling preserved in the Avesta; by the order of warriors which

existed beside the orders of priests and husbandmen; by the chieftains

and their citadels, which we found here in the fourth century B.C.; and

lastly, by the circumstance, that the old shapes of the myth of the

Arians, the spirits of the sky which smite the demons, are changed in

the Avesta not merely into ideal patterns, but even into ancestors of

the Bactrian kings, and connected with the genealogical tree of the

nation. Yima, Thraetaona, Manuschithra, Airyu, Uca, and Hucrava, are

changed into ancestors of the kings and the people.

Like the Aryas in the Panjab, the tribes of the Airyas in Iran prayed to

Mithra, to the spirits of light, the clear air, the wind, and fire,

which protected them against the demons of the night and gloom, and gave

increase to their pastures and flocks, and recovered the water of the

sky which the demons sought to carry away. As in India, the juice of the

Soma plant was the principal offering presented to the gods; as Soma was

not only the king of plants, the lord of nourishment and life--so the

liquor which gave strength to the gods was here also a god, Haoma. The

belief in the opposition of the spirits of light and the spirits of

destruction, in the power of the correct sacrifice, in the influence of

the good sayings, the sacred words, was on both sides of the Indus, the

starting-point of religious ideas, and in Iran it became the hinge on

which they turned.

Iran was divided into fertile land and deserts; next to the most

luxuriant growth lay wide tracts, in which heat or cold, morass or

drought, storms of sand or of snow, made life and agriculture

impossible. These contrasts were most striking on the upper Oxus, in

Sogdiana and Margiana. Hence it came to pass that in Bactria the

ancient belief in the struggle of the good and evil spirits made an

essential advance. The old gods and spirits, the ancient worship of

fire, were not indeed overthrown by the doctrine of Zarathrustra; on the

contrary, the struggle between the good and evil powers was spread over

the whole of nature, and the means of repelling the evil ones were

increased. The good and evil spirits were respectively ranged under

chiefs, on the counter-operation of whom and their spirit-armies rests

the life of nature; and on this life depends the life of man. Henceforth

man must not merely keep the evil ones from himself, he must take part

in the struggle of the good against the evil powers, increase so far as

he can the good creation which now belongs to Auramazda and has

proceeded from him; and thus restrict the sphere in which the evil

spirit exercises his power. After death he will receive the reward of

his conflict; and if in and through this struggle he has been made a

participator in the nature of the pure and bright deities, he will

continue to live in their heaven of light.

This development of the old Arian views and reform of the religion

received the impulse which eventually called it into life at the time

when Vistacpa was king of Bactria. It must have taken place about the

year 1000 B.C., _i.e._ about the time when the Brahmans on the Ganges

came to reform their ancient faith, and exalted Brahman above Indra and

the ancient deities. From the idea of this new god, in which the power

of the Holy and the world-soul were equal factors, the Brahmans arrived

at a sharp distinction between spirit and matter. Their ethics,

beginning with the rejection of nature, could not but require the

annihilation of the body as their final goal, and this led to the vain

pursuit of impossibilities, to the ascetic suicide of body and soul.

The doctrine of Zarathrustra does not recognise the contradiction of

spirit and matter. The good God has not created the world in order to

entangle men in evil and wickedness, but in order to give to it and to

mankind life and increase. It is only one side of nature, not the whole

of it, and that side harmful to men, which has proceeded from evil, and

this evil does not come from the good, but from the wicked spirit. Evil

is here limited to gloom, desolation, drought and death. As it is this

part, and this only in nature, which has to be removed, man is not

called upon to lay aside his whole nature, but on the contrary to

rejoice in the beneficial side of it. This he must tend and strengthen

in himself, while he keeps the harmful side at a distance, struggles

against and annihilates it so far as possible both in himself and all

around him. He must strengthen the light side of his soul against the

dark, and make it the master of the dark; he must banish from his soul

lying and deceit, idleness and filthiness; purity of soul consists in

truthfulness. Thus must a man watch and work with the good gods and

under their eyes. It is not contemplation, meditation, or asceticism, as

in the doctrine of the Brahmans; it is practical activity and inward

effort that the teaching of Zarathrustra requires from men; the object

it placed before men was not self-annihilation, but the purification of

soul and body, and true assertion of self. If a man kept his body and

soul pure; if he was truthful in word and work, and increased the good

creation in meadow, field, and forest; if he slew the animals of the

evil spirits, then all would be well with him; he would have abundance

of cattle and descendants, long life in this world, and eternal life in

the heaven of the spirits of light.

This reform had been accomplished in its fundamental principles in

Bactria, and Auramazda had been elevated above Mithra as the creator of

heaven, of the gods, and the earth, when about the middle of the ninth

century B.C. the armies of Shalmanesar II. of Asshur invaded the East of

Iran. About this time, or soon after, the order of Athravas was formed.

It rose, on the one hand, out of the ancient families of the

fire-priests, who understood the custom of sacrifice, and had preserved

the efficacious prayers to Mithra, Verethraghna, Haoma, and Tistrya, to

Ardvicura and Drvacpa down to the period of the reform, so far as they

came over to the new doctrine; and on the other hand, out of the race of

Zarathrustra, and the families of the zealous adherents of the new

doctrine, who devoted themselves to the service of religion. This order

of priests, which handed down in its families the sayings of

Zarathrustra and those of old days, the ancient invocations as well as

those of the new teaching, took precedence of the families of the

nobles, warriors, and husbandmen, though they were not separated from

them by any rights of connubium or other privileges. From the whole

tendency of the reform there could not be any thought of acquiring such

a position as that which the Brahmans--the first created of

Brahman--attained among the orders of India. When the army of

Tiglath-Pilesar II. entered Arachosia about the middle of the eighth

century B.C. the new doctrine had already advanced to the West. It was

represented among the Medes by eminent teachers. In this region, at the

time when the Medes were under the supremacy of Assyria, a priestly

order grew up out of the old families of the priests or Magians, _i.e._

the powerful, and adherents of the new doctrine; the families of this

order abandoned their tribal connection among the Medes, and thus

formed an hereditary caste, which preserved the name already in use in

the West for the priests, and became so numerous that it could be ranked

as a tribe among the other tribes of the Medes. The formation of this

order was already complete when, after the middle of the seventh century

B.C., the Medes rebelled against the kings of Asshur.

Meanwhile the Athravas of the East were busily occupied in developing

and fixing the contents and meaning of the new idea of God, and of the

ethics resulting from it. They ranged the old gods under the new

doctrine, and determined their relation to the new supreme deity; they

peopled heaven with shapes corresponding to the reformed teaching, and

brought mythology into harmony with it; from the commands of purity they

developed in the spirit of the reformed religion the rules of

purification and the removal of impurities as required in every

occurrence of life. Thus, beside the old invocations of the gods, arose

theories of a speculative cast which sought to regard the gods as

ethical forces, and prayers of a formal character; from the dialectic of

the priestly schools was developed a very complicated system of purity

of life, of rubrics for expiation and purification, in which formalism

and casuistry were not wanting. Enquiries arose how law and justice

should be shaped so as to conform to the rules of religion; while, on

the other hand, the old sacrificial songs were collected, the liturgy

was fixed, as well as the order of the festivals and sacrifices for the

new moon and full moon, and the course of the year; the prescriptions of

medicine were written down, and those cycles formed which comprised the

battle between Auramazda and Angromainyu down to the last and eternal

victory of light and life. After various attempts at compilation, the

priests of the East finally succeeded in uniting the sum of these

labours into one great whole, which was the canon of the sacred

scriptures. We may assume that the labours of the priesthood of Bactria,

which came to an end with this result, may have occupied the same space

of time as the growth and writing down of the Brahmanas on the Ganges.

There are good reasons for supposing that the canon was finally

established about the year 600 B.C., and therefore, on the calculation

given, the labours of the priests upon it must have commenced about the

year 800 B.C.

Like the kindred tribes in India, the Arians in Iran were not destitute

of imagination and a tendency to abstraction. But from the first these

qualities were restrained within narrower limits owing to the nature of

the land,--while the scenery and phenomena of the Ganges tended to

develop them,--and the teaching of Zarathrustra provided a counterpoise

in the practical requirements which it set up. Labour took the place of

idle dreaming, conflict and energetic activity the place of asceticism,

and the imagination received impulses to simple and great conceptions.

The ethics of this religion guaranteed the conditions of a healthy human

existence; man's effort was essentially directed to this present world,

and the duties imposed upon him were such as he could fulfil. Thus they

led to results different from the introspection, quietism, and

asceticism of the Indians, and the relapse into sensuality which was the

inseparable concomitant of the latter. The doctrine of Zarathrustra

contributed essentially to educate the tribes which followed it in

truthfulness and manliness, and to qualify them for energy and action.

In their sensible, intelligent view of the world, in putting theory

below practice, and aiming at an active life, the Iranians are as far

before the Indians as the Romans are before the Greeks.

If Eastern Iran, in the first instance, discharged a religious mission,

the duty of politics was undertaken by the West. The empire of the Medes

and of the Persians rose and fell, but the religion of Auramazda

survived the fall of the Achaemenids. It rose to renewed life with the

empire of the Arsacids and Sassanids. The national reaction against the

dominion of the Seleucids began with the Parthians; the empire of the

Sassanids, which subsequently took the place of that of the Arsacids,

was supported in the first place by the tribes of the Persians, and was

connected with the remembrance of the Achaemenids. Yet from the first the

Sassanids were prepared to deal equal measure to the East and West of

Iran; in opposition to any attempt at religious innovation they held

firmly to the tradition of the East. When after a rule of more than four

centuries the Sassanids succumbed to the invasion of the Arabs,

Yezdegerd III. attempted to maintain himself in Merv, as Darius III. had

attempted to maintain himself in Bactria. The attempt failed. Iran

succumbed to Islam. Yet it was the East from which, not quite two

centuries after the fall of the Sassanids, a reaction commenced against

the Arabs, and this gradually increased till it rescued the nationality

and the language of Iran. It was the viceroys in the districts of the

East who rebelled against the Chalifate, and they found support in the

population of their provinces. A process similar to that which had

previously broken down the dominion of the Seleucids over Iran shattered

the empire of the Abbasids. The impulse to this movement rose in

Taberistan, where the Taherids appeared, as independent princes soon

after the death of Harun-al-Rashid; some decads later the Soffarids

rebelled in Sejestan, and towards the end of the ninth century the power

of the Samanids sprang up in Sogdiana, Balkh, and Merv, and founded

seats in Samarcand and Bokhara. Not long after the Ziads obtained an

independent position in Dilem and Jorjan (the ancient Hyrcania). Towards

the end of the tenth century the Ghasnavids, who had hitherto been the

servants and captains of the Samanids, threw off their allegiance; and

united under their dominion all the lands which had been subject to the

Soffarids, the Samanids, and Ziads. Soon after the year 1000 B.C. they

ruled from their abode in Ghasna over Cabul, Balkh, Merv, and Chovaresm

to the north, and over Sejestan and Afghanistan to the south, and to the

west over the lands of Elburz, while their armies crossed the Indus to

the east, and advanced beyond the Panjab to the valley of the Ganges.

The ancient religion of Iran was not wholly lost even in the time of

Harun-al-Rashid; Magians were tolerated at the court of the Chalifs for

the sake of their skill in medicine. The Barmecides, who came from

Balkh, displayed, even under the Chalifate, a partiality for the legends

and the religion of Iran. The Samanids boasted to be sprung from the

Sassanids, the Ziads were reproached with being idolaters in heart and

Moslem in tongue. They called themselves once more by the names

celebrated in the legends of Eastern Iran: Minocher after Manuschithra,

Kai Kobad after Kava Kavata, Kai Kaus after Kava Uca, Isfendyar after

Cpentodata; and in the list of the Ghasnavids, the Afghan princes in

India, we meet at a later time with the name of Kava Hucrava (Chosru).

The regeneration of Old Iran, in opposition to the Arabs, found its

firmest stronghold in Ghasna. The deeds of the Achaemenids were

completely forgotten in the East which had no part in them; but the

legends of Yima, Thraetaona, Kava Hucrava, and Kava Vistacpa, had lived

on under the dominion of the Achaemenids, the Seleucids, the Greek

princes of Balkh and Cabul, and under the Arsacids. Then came the

revival of the Avesta under Shapur II. about the middle of the fourth

century A.D. (p. 61). The first Chosru (531-578 A.D.) caused the legends

and traditions of the nation and the priests to be collected and copied;

a comprehensive exposition of the whole was made under the last

Yezdegerd. Thus as early as the last days of the Sassanids the tradition

of Iran was collected and fixed, and this, transcribed in Pehlevi,

outlived the fall of the kingdom, and descended as a legacy of ancient

glory to the Soffarids, Samanids, and Ghasnavids.[437] On the basis of

this "book of kings," which he possessed in an Arabic translation,

Firdusi of Tus on the Tejend, a city of which at the present day some

scanty ruins remain not far from Meshhed, undertook to restore to life

the remembrance of the past of Eastern Iran and the fame of her ancient

heroes in a great Epic poem. He gathered together the entire existing

tradition, and under the dominion of Islam cast a new glory on the

ancient belief in Auramazda, who was now known as Yazdan. This poem, the

book of kings (Shahnameh) exhibits at the same time the New Persian

language in its pure form, developed out of the Eastern dialects, and

not yet contaminated with Aramaean and Arabic elements.

The first king in Firdusi is Gayumart. He assembles men and animals, and

teaches the first to hide their nakedness with the skins of leopards.

His son Siyamek is torn in pieces by a demon. We are acquainted with the

primeval man Gayo maretan; whom the priests placed at the beginning of

things (p. 183). Then king Hoshang taught men to harness the bull, to

tame the horse, to forge iron, to till the field, and introduced the

worship of fire. After Hoshang king Tahmurath reigned, who overcame the

Divs (Daevas), and compelled them to teach him the art of writing. He

taught his people the art of weaving, and rode round the world on

Angromainyu (now Ahriman) till the latter threw him off on Elburz, and

so killed him. In the Avesta Haoshyangha sacrifices in order to obtain

power over the evil spirits, and Takhmo urupa also sacrifices in order

to curb Angromainyu for the space of thirty years (p. 183). After

Tahmurath, Jemshid (Yima) is king. He teaches the art of forging weapons

and weaving precious stuffs, divides men into priests, warriors,

husbandmen, and artisans; discovers the art of healing, and compels the

demons to build houses, and erect for him a splendid palace and a

gorgeous throne adorned with gold and precious stones. Three hundred

years passed away while he was king, in which the Divs were bound, and

death could not approach mankind. Then Jemshid boasted that he had saved

the world by his remedies from sickness and death, and demanded divine

honours. This sin alienated from him the princes of his kingdom. Jemshid

was compelled to fly before Zohak, the king of Babylon. Zohak pursued

him. In the remote East, on the sea of China, Jemshid was overtaken and

slain.

The old Arian legend of the happy age of Yima shows itself even yet

through Firdusi's version. Death could not approach men under his

dominion; there was no sickness, and therefore Jemshid is said to have

discovered the art of healing. The Avesta had already found a motive for

the fall of Yima in the fact that he had refused to announce the law,

and at length had begun to love lies (p. 41). The Zohak of Firdusi is no

other than the ancient cloud dragon, Azhi dahaka, which attempts to

carry away the waters of the sky, and swallows up men and horses. He is

now a foreign, hostile, bloodthirsty king, who puts an end to the

blessings of Yima's reign in order to bring the reverse of blessing upon

Iran. Azhi dahaka had three heads and three throats; Zohak has two

serpents growing from his shoulders, to which by degrees thousands fall

as sacrifices, for they are fed with the brains of men, and for this

purpose two youths are slaughtered every day. That Zohak is called king

of Babylon is due to a reminiscence of the fact that the Assyrians ruled

over Western Iran, and the Seleucids and Chalifs over the whole country.

Zohak persecutes severely the descendants of Jemshid. Abtin, the last of

these, finally falls into his power; he causes him to be slain for his

serpents; but Abtin's wife carries off his young son Feridun in safety

to Elburz. When the latter is sixteen years of age his mother discloses

to him the fate of his father; the discontented gather round him, and

the angel Serosh teaches him how to overcome the magician Zohak. In the

citadel at Babylon Feridun strikes Zohak to the ground with a blow of

the club which Kave, the smith, has forged for him. But Serosh bids him

not to kill Zohak, who is now chained in a deep cave in Elburz, under

Demavend, the highest summit on the chain. Abtin, the descendant of

Jemshid, is the Athwya of the Avesta; Feridun is Thraetaona, the son of

Athwya, the slayer of Dahaka; the angel Serosh is the well-known god

Craosha. Feridun is not permitted to slay Zohak, because Azhi dahaka is

also a demon.

Feridun has three sons--Salm (Cairima), Tur (Tuirya), and Yrej (Airyu);

to the last, who was the youngest, Feridun gives Iran, the best part of

his dominions, while Salm receives the West and Tur the North. Filled

with envy at the favour shown to their youngest brother, Salm and Tur

slay the pious Yrej. Feridun is deeply moved; but he gives the daughter

whom Yrej has left in marriage to Pesheng. The son of Pesheng is

Minocher, who grows up to avenge his grandfather's death. In order to

prevent this, Salm and Tur invade Iran. The battle continues for three

days, till Minocher has slain Tur with his own hand. He also overtakes

Salm in flight, and slays him. Feridun can now die in peace, as he has

seen the kingdom handed over to Minocher. After the death of the latter

the kingdom descended to his son Naudar.[438] Then Afrasiab of Turan,

the great-grandson of Tur, whom Minocher had slain, invaded Iran to

avenge the death of his ancestor on the descendant of Minocher. Naudar's

army was defeated; he was taken captive with many princes of Iran, and

beheaded by the order of Afrasiab.

Besides the race of Abtin, Jemshid had left other descendants. In union

with the daughter of the king of Cabul, whose kingdom extends from Bost

on the Hilmend to Ghasna (and consequently includes the region of

Sejestan, the ancient Haetumat),[439] he had begotten Gershasp, a mighty

hero who stood by the side of Minocher in the struggle against Salm and

Tur; the sons of Gershasp are Neriman and Sam, and his grandson is Zal.

The Gershasp of Firdusi is the Kerecacpa of the Avesta, the son of

Thrita, of the race of Cama (p. 35), who slays the serpent Cruvara and

the giant Gandarewa. The Avesta gives him the epithet Nairimanao, _i.e._

the man-hearted, heroic, and represents him as seizing the brilliance of

majesty, when it departed for the third time from Yima (p. 36). This

hint was enough to give the royal power to Kerecacpa; his epithet and

his tribal name are personified, and become his descendants Neriman and

Sam. In accordance with their origin these princes from Zabul are in

Firdusi the most faithful adherents of the race of Feridun, which has

rewarded them with the dominion over the South. In this way the legend

of Sejestan is woven into the closest connection with the legend of the

Avesta. The power of the descendants of Feridun is extinguished with

Naudar, from whose sons "the splendour of the royal majesty shines no

longer;" thus does Firdusi repeat the metaphor current in the Avesta.

The princes of Zabul now take their place as the protectors and

guardians of Iran. The son of king Sam of Zabul is Zal. After Naudar's

melancholy fall he makes peace between Iran and Turan; the Oxus is fixed

as the boundary, Afrasiab returns to his own country, and in the place

of the sons of Naudar Zal allows Zav to be chosen king of Iran. Zav is

already aged and soon dies; Afrasiab invades Iran again. Then Zal

deliberates with the Mobedhs (_i.e._ with the chiefs of the Magians, p.

60), who is to be king of Iran. It is resolved to raise Kai Kobad to the

throne, who like Feridun before him dwells on Elburz. Zal sends his son

Rustem (Moses of Khorene is the first who mentions the Persian legend of

Rustem), a youth of great strength, who as a boy had slain an infuriated

elephant, to fetch Kai Kobad from Elburz. Rustem finds him prepared,

for he has seen in a dream two white falcons who place a golden crown

upon his head. Afrasiab's army, which opposes him, is defeated; Kai

Kobad ascends the throne of Iran, the Turanians are defeated in a great

battle, Rustem seizes Afrasiab by his girdle and drags him from his

horse; but the girdle breaks, Afrasiab falls to the ground, and is saved

by his own people. In the peace the Oxus is once more fixed as the

boundary between Iran and Turan. Kai Kobad is followed by his son Kai

Kaus. Against the advice of his vassals and of Zal he leads his army

against Mazanderan, a land inhabited by demons, which take the king

captive with his whole army. A single warrior escapes to bring the

terrible news to Zal. As Zal is now 200 years old, Rustem undertakes to

liberate the king. He has to overcome seven terrible monsters before he

can arrive at the demons. At last he makes his way to them, and on his

horse Reksh, he destroys the army of the demons. Then he slays their

chief, the white demon, in the dark cave, and liberates Kai Kaus and the

army of Iran. Kai Kaus now causes the conquered demons to build him

splendid palaces on Elburz, and resolves to fly up to heaven, in order

to see the course of the sun. Four eagles bound to his throne carry him

upwards, but then allow him to fall to earth. Ashamed at his pride he

humbles himself, and his penance appeases the wrath of heaven. When

Afrasiab breaks the peace and again invades Iran, Kai Kaus sends his son

Siavaksh, under the guidance of Rustem, against the Turanians. For three

days the battle rages at the gates of Balkh, and at length Siavaksh is

victorious. Afrasiab sues for peace, Siavaksh concludes a treaty; but

Kai Kaus will not confirm it. That he may not break his word, Siavaksh

gives himself up to the Turanians. Afrasiab receives him with honour,

and gives him his daughter Feringis to wife. Subsequently he harbours

suspicion against him, causes him to be executed, and the son, whom

Feringis bears after the execution of her husband, to be brought up

among the shepherds without any knowledge of his birth. To this son an

abode is then allotted in a remote region of Turan.

To avenge the execution of Siavaksh Rustem invades Turan. Victorious in

the battle he causes Surkha, the son of Afrasiab, whom he captures in

the battle, to be put to death in the same way as Siavaksh, pursues

Afrasiab to the extreme border of his kingdom, and does not return till

the whole of Turan has been laid waste: the booty is immense. Many years

afterwards it was revealed in a dream to Guderz (Gotarzes), a descendant

of that Kave, who had once forged for Feridun the club used against

Zohak, that a son of Siavaksh survived. Gev, the son of Guderz, arose to

seek in Turan the right heir to the throne of Iran. For seven years he

seeks in vain. At length he discovers Kai Chosru, to whom his mother

Feringis has already revealed the secret of his birth. In spite of the

most severe persecution on the part of Afrasiab, Gev succeeds in

carrying away mother and son to Iran; they swim through the swollen Oxus

on horseback. But when Kai Kaus wishes to make the grandson so happily

discovered his successor, Tur, the son of king Naudar, opposes the

elevation of a king who has Turanian blood in his veins. Kai Chosru

proves his higher claim by capturing a citadel of the demons, and

erecting a fire-altar in its place. Then he sets himself to avenge the

death of his father on Afrasiab. But the first army of the Iranians

under Tur is defeated; and when Feriborz receives the command the

warriors of Iran are again severely beaten in the valley of Peshen; a

third army is shut up on Mount Hamaven. To liberate this Rustem sets

forth, and conquers in the most terrible battle which he has ever

fought. At length Afrasiab and Kai Chosru take the lead of their armies.

After a bloody struggle the Turanians are compelled to retire, first

beyond the Oxus, and then beyond the Jaxartes. Afrasiab flies for refuge

to his fortified city Kang Bihist; the city is taken, but he escapes

into a cave. Kai Kaus and Kai Chosru entreat the fire Adar gucasp, that

Afrasiab may not escape them. A pious penitent, Hom, who hears the

lament of Afrasiab in his cave, recognises him, overpowers and binds

him, and leads him forth. Afrasiab entreats the penitent to loose his

bonds, and then escapes once more, into a lake. The pious Hom obtains

possession of him again, and hands him over to Kai Chosru, who has his

head cut off in revenge for his father Siavaksh. Kai Kaus has now seen

the fulfilment of vengeance on Afrasiab for the death of Siavaksh; his

days draw to a close. For sixty years after him, Kai Chosru rules over

Iran in peace, and then resolves to enter on a pilgrimage to heaven.

When the angel Serosh has bidden him nominate Lohrasp as his successor,

he fulfils this injunction, establishes Rustem as general-in-chief of

the kingdom and successor of his father Zal in the kingdom of the South,

and after long meditation, accompanied by the sons of Naudar, Tus and

Gustehem, and the heroes Gev and Feriborz, he begins the pilgrimage to

the East. When high up in the mountains he advises his companions to

return; soon they will see him no more. He disappears after bathing in a

spring; his heroes, in spite of the command to return, seek for him, and

are buried in a storm of snow.

We saw above that in the Avesta, Manuschithra and Airyu are connected

with Thraetaona, and that the group of the Paradhatas comes to an end

with these names. Hence Firdusi also represents the crown as being

brought to the first ruler of the new group, Kai Kobad, _i.e._ the Kava

Kavata of the Avesta, from the sky by two falcons; he also represents

him as being fetched from Elburz, _i.e._ from the holy mountain of the

old legend, in order to overcome Zohak, just as Thraetaona descended

from the same mountain. Kai Kaus, the Kava Uca of the Avesta, who

succeeded Kai Kobad, betrays his divine nature in Firdusi by his march

against the demons, by the castles which these demons build for him on

Elburz, and by his attempt to fly into heaven. In the Avesta Kava Uca

offers sacrifice, in order to obtain the dominion over men and Daevas,

and this favour is granted to him. That the march against the demons is

made in the direction of Mazanderan is due no doubt to the frequent

mention of the Mazanian Devs in the Avesta. Siavaksh, the son of Kai

Kaus, who honourably gives himself up to the Turanians, is the

Cyavarshana of the Avesta--from which we merely learn that he was

spotless, and that after Kava Uca the royal majesty united with the

beautiful body of Cyavarshana, and that he died by a violent death (p.

37). The destructive Turanian Franghracyana, who is now called Afrasiab,

is known to the Avesta. "Thrice," we are told, "he sought after the

royal majesty which belongs to the Arian lands, but he found it

not."[440] Kai Chosru, _i.e._ Kava Hucrava, is in the Avesta also the

son of Cyavarshana; he offers sacrifice, in order that it may be granted

to him "to put an end to the long period of dimness," "to bind the

Franghracyana filled with abundance;" he is said to be "without

sickness and death." Firdusi's poem neglects none of these traits. After

the triple war which, kindled by Afrasiab, has lasted for a long time,

Firdusi represents Chosru as invoking the fire Gucasp, that Afrasiab may

not escape him. In the Avesta the god Haoma is said himself to bind

Franghracyana, and to carry him away as a captive of king Hucrava, in

order that the latter may slay him beyond the lake Chaechacta (p. 37).

In Firdusi the pious Hom discovers the hiding-place of Afrasiab; he

binds him and carries him away a prisoner. Afrasiab escapes; but Hom

captures him once more in lake Kanyesht. As Hucrava is "without sickness

and death," Firdusi represents him as vanishing on a pilgrimage to

heaven.

In Firdusi, Lohrasp, whom Chosru has made his successor, erects a

fire-temple at Balkh, his royal abode, and after reigning 120 years,

abdicates in favour of Gushtasp, his elder son, in order to devote his

life to pious exercises at his temple. When Zartusht proclaims the

Avesta, Gushtasp and his wife receive the new doctrine. But Arjasp, the

king of Turan, sent Gushtasp a command not to listen to the words of

Zartusht. To this request Gushtasp did not accede; a battle took place

on the banks of the Oxus, which turned in favour of Iran, owing to the

bravery of Zarir, the brother of Gushtasp. An arrow from an ambush lays

the hero low at the moment of victory. His death terrifies the Iranians;

not one of them ventures to avenge it till Gushtasp promises Isfendyar,

the strongest and bravest of his sons, that he will give him the crown

if he succeeds in avenging the death of Zarir. Isfendyar overthrows the

warriors of Iran, brings the arms and horse of Zarir into the camp of

Iran, and Arjasp retires into his land. In the place of the promised

crown, Isfendyar receives from his father the high mission of spreading

abroad the new faith. By means of a chain which he places on his neck,

Zartusht makes Isfendyar invulnerable, and surrounds him with a charm so

that anyone who slays him will himself quickly die. When Isfendyar

returns home after a long time, his mission fully accomplished, as all

have received the law of Zartusht, accusations are made against him that

he is collecting an army to dethrone his father. On this unfounded

charge Gushtasp causes Isfendyar to be cast into prison. But while he

remains in Zabul, the Turanians attack Balkh. The aged Lohrasp takes up

arms; he cannot check the Turanians; he falls; the city is taken:

Zartusht with the fire-priests is slain in the fire-temple, the sacred

fire is quenched in their blood, and two daughters of Gushtasp are

carried away to Turan. In vain does Gushtasp hasten up, when he has

collected his army; thirty-eight of his sons are slain in the battle

against the Turanians. Gushtasp takes to flight, and with his warriors

finds refuge in a mountain which is quickly invested by Arjasp. Then

Jamasp, the faithful adviser of Gushtasp, passes in disguise through the

camp of the Turanians, to fetch Isfendyar out of prison, and urge him to

save his father and Iran. Forgetting his deep injury and wrong,

Isfendyar forces a way through the camp of Arjasp, and in the subsequent

battle slaughters so many of the enemy's men that he takes to flight.

But the task is not yet accomplished; it still remains to set at liberty

the two sisters whom the Turanians had carried away from Balkh, and whom

Arjasp keeps imprisoned in "the brazen fortress." After seven conflicts,

corresponding to those which Rustem had to undergo, when he liberated

Kai Kaus from the power of the demons, Isfendyar reaches the fortress.

He sends his army back, and in the guise of a merchant obtains entrance

into the citadel. Here he asks Arjasp, to whom he is unknown, for

permission to give a feast to the principal men on the turrets of the

citadel. When the wine has done its work, Isfendyar gives the signal of

fire already agreed upon to his followers; the garrison is overpowered;

Arjasp is slain by Isfendyar in single combat, and Isfendyar returns

victorious with his sisters to Balkh.

Here a new and yet more dangerous task awaits him. Rustem, who made Kai

Kobad ruler of Iran, and has since done such good service, and achieved

such noble acts for Kai Kaus and Kai Chosru, remains at a distance from

the court and army of king Gushtasp. He despises the doctrine of

Zartusht. At Gushtasp's bidding Isfendyar must break down this

opposition, and bring him to the king. Isfendyar marches out and

commands Rustem to follow him in chains to the court. With a heavy heart

Rustem seeks to withdraw from the contest; he treats with Isfendyar; but

the latter obstinately insists on his terms. Nothing remains for the

aged hero but to give battle against his will. Isfendyar's invulnerable

body resists his blows, and Reksh, the horse of Rustem, is wounded;

Rustem is himself wounded and compelled to retire. He has no hope of

conquering in the battle which is to begin again on the next day. In his

deep distress he calls to the bird Simurgh, who comes, sucks the blood

from his wound, and heals the horse. Simurgh is acquainted with the

future, and advises a compromise: there is indeed a way of overcoming

Isfendyar, but anyone who takes his life "must not expect salvation in

this world or the next." Rustem cannot bring himself to suffer defeat in

the battle, and therefore in the night Simurgh carries him away to the

tree of life, on the sea of China, and bids him break off the branch to

which Isfendyar's life is bound. Out of this branch is cut the

death-arrow for the conflict of the morrow. With it Rustem hits the

place in the eye in which alone Isfendyar is vulnerable. But for Rustem

also the lot of death is cast. He is invited by the king of Cabul, a

tributary prince, to hunt; and the king's son-in-law, Sheghad, prepares

a pit filled with swords and lances, for the destruction of the aged

hero. Into this Rustem falls with his horse, but even in the moment of

death his arrow hits Sheghad, who had concealed himself in a hollow

tree, in order to watch the success of his scheme. Rustem's son Feramorz

avenges the murder of his father on the king of Cabul; but Gushtasp

renounces the world, and transfers the government to his grandson

Bahman, the son of Isfendyar.

Here also we find traces of the Avesta underlying the poem. In the

Avesta Aurvatacpa, now Lohrasp, and Vistacpa, now Gushtasp, form a group

distinct from the most ancient princes. Firdusi represents Kai Chosru as

making Lohrasp his successor in spite of the murmurs of the nobles.

Arejatacpa, now Arjasp, the Turanian, sacrifices in the Avesta in order

to obtain victory over Vistacpa, and the great equestrian, Zairivairi,

the brother of Vistacpa. In Firdusi this brother, the bravest warrior of

Iran against Turan, is Zarir. In the Avesta Vistacpa conquers

Arejatacpa; in Firdusi Arjasp finally succumbs in the conflict. In the

Avesta Jamacpa is a prince of great influence with Vistacpa; in Firdusi

he is his faithful counsellor. In the Avesta Zarathrustra offers

sacrifice that he may unite with the warlike Vistacpa, and that the

king's consort Hutaoca may impress the law on her memory (p. 37); in

Firdusi Gushtasp and his wife receive the new law. According to the

Avesta Vistacpa has given his support and protection to the law, has set

up the law in the world, and given it a high position, and made the path

broad for purity. In Firdusi Isfendyar is sent to spread abroad the new

law over the earth. The Avesta mentions twenty-nine sons of Vistacpa,

Firdusi even more; in both Cpentodata (Isfendyar) has the first place.

In the Avesta Zarathrustra pronounces a blessing on Vistacpa, in Firdusi

he pronounces it on Isfendyar. That the latter was extolled, even in the

Avesta, as supporting the faith and spreading it abroad--though our

fragments do not allow us to draw any further conclusions--is

nevertheless clear from the creed of the Parsees: "I abide in the law

which the lord Ormuzd taught to Zartusht, and Zartusht to king Gushtasp,

and Gushtasp to Frashaostra (p. 62), Jamasp, and Isfendyar, and these to

all the faithful in the world." Firdusi has made use of the spread of

the new law by Isfendyar, in order to bring to a conclusion the legend

of Sejestan which he connects with the tradition of the Avesta, and to

provide an adequate motive for the fall of the mighty Rustem of Ghasna,

the descendant of the mighty Kerecacpa. In his zeal for the faith,

Isfendyar demands more than Rustem can grant; the champion of the faith

is stronger in the conflict than Rustem; and the latter, in order to

keep his honour, avails himself of wicked magical arts. We have seen

what was the occupation of the two eagles of the sky, Amru and Chamru,

at the tree in Lake Vourukasha, which bears the seeds of all life (p.

172). To these arts the champion of the faith succumbs, but by his

success the victor has pronounced judgment on himself.

In the form which Firdusi has given them, the legends of Ancient Iran

have to some extent continued to live among the people, and to some

extent they have failed. The Shahnameh celebrates Jemshid's (Yima's)

glittering palace and splendid throne; hence the ruins of the great

palace of the Achaemenids at Persepolis have gained the name of the

throne of Jemshid; ruins near Bamiyan in the Hindu-Kush, on the road

from Balkh to Cabul, are still called Zohak's castle. The smoke rising

out of the crater of Demavend is the breath of Zohak chained in the

depths of the mountain. Each year, on the last day of August, the

inhabitants of Elburz celebrate the festival of the overthrow of Zohak

with bonfires on every height, and demonstrations of joy. The ruins of

Takt-i-Bostan are called the garden of Kai Chosru, and in Iran Balkh is

still the mother of cities.[441] A lofty and steep rock in Lake Zirreh

in Sejestan is said to have been crowned with the castle of Rustem, and

the site of a second castle is pointed out at Aivan. Aqueducts and dams

pass for works of Rustem. In the desert of Beluchistan, the ancient

Gedrosia, the tracks of the camels of Rustem are still shown by large

stones in the sand. In Mazanderan is the battle-field where Rustem

defeated the Divs in order to liberate Kai Kaus (p. 253). The sculptures

of the Achaemenids on the tombs at Persepolis are called pictures of

Rustem (Naksh-i-Rustem), and in the bed of the Hilmend his grave is

shown. When Timour's Mongols devastated Sejestan in the fourteenth

century, the people called on Rustem to raise his head from the grave,

and behold Iran in the hand of his enemy, the warrior of Turan. By a

strange misconception the nobles in Mazanderan assume the name Div as a

title of honour. A large family of nobles in Sejestan call themselves

Kaianids, and boast of their descent from Jemshid and the ancient

kings, and to this family, down to the most recent times, the

viceroyalty of Sejestan belonged as an hereditary office. When the

holder of it died, the eldest of the family went to court in order to

apply for the office, and was duly installed by investment with the robe

of honour and armour.[442]

While the ancient legends have lived on in Iran, the religion of

Zoroaster has passed beyond Iran, and survives on the Malabar coast.

Every day the Parsees utter their invocations before the sacred fire,

and present bowls filled with the juice of the Haoma. Each month, as we

have seen, belongs to one of the heavenly deities, who is then specially

invoked; each of the thirty days of the month has its own protecting

spirit, who is especially honoured on his own day. Six yearly festivals,

each of five days, celebrate the creation of the heaven, water, the

earth, the trees, animals, and men (p. 182); on each of which special

prayers are said. At the close of the year the Parsees purify and adorn

their houses, in order to receive worthily the souls of their ancestors:

sacrificial bread, fruits, milk, wine, and meat are put ready for them.

The Fravashis, now called Farvars, are invoked "to receive the

sacrifice, to lift up their hands to it, and depart in peace from the

dwelling."[443] On these days the priests read the liturgies appointed

as prayers for the souls of the damned, and for ten days the laity have

to repeat many thousands of times the prayers "Ahuna-vairya" and "Ashem

Vohu." Each morning, on waking, the Parsee prays: "The best purity is to

the just, who is pure. He is pure who does pure works. I pray with

purity of thought, of word, and act." When removing, and again when

putting on, his girdle (p. 217), he says, with face turned to the East:

"May Ormuzd be king; may Ahriman be defeated and destroyed; may the

enemies be confounded, and remain far off; of all my sins I repent."

Then he takes gomez for ablutions, washes his face and hands with it,

rubs himself with earth, and with gomez in his hand says: "May Ahriman

be destroyed; may the thirty-three Amshaspands and Ormuzd be victorious

and pure." After a prayer to Crosh (Craosha)--"the pure and strong, may

he increase to greater majesty, whose body is the word, and whose club

is victorious"--follows ablution with water, dressing of the fire with

wood and perfumes, and the proper morning prayer to Ushahin, the spirit

of the morning: "Praise to thee, high Dawn." When it is light, a prayer

is offered to Mithra, and two others at midday and sunset. In the

morning a prayer to Ormuzd is recited, in which all his names and

qualities are enumerated. Before eating, the Parsee must wash himself

and pronounce the prayer "Ahuna-vairya," and after eating, the prayer

"King Ormuzd." When the Parsee goes to rest he must arrange his bed in

such a way that he lies towards the fire, or the moon, or the East.

Before sleeping, a prayer is offered to Ormuzd. On turning over in bed,

sneezing, the discharge of natural or sexual functions, kindling a

light, approaching water or fire, special prayers are uttered, and the

sum of daily duties is increased on many occasions in family life--at

the time of a birth, or death, or festivals, and when impurities have

been incurred. However external and formal these numerous prayers and

rituals may appear, the Parsee forms of confession are nevertheless

evidence of the depth of their religious feeling, and their retention in

the family and social life proves that the ancient religion still

possesses a powerful influence.

FOOTNOTES:

[437] Fluegel, "Mani," s. 407; Mohl, "Livre des Rois," Intro. Mordtmann,

"Z. D. M. G." 19, 485 ff; Noeldeke, "Tabari," s. xv.

[438] Nohodares in Ammian, 1, 14, 3; 1, 25, 3.

[439] Spiegel, "Eran," 1, 557.

[440] "Zamyad Yasht," 56 ff. Above, p. 37.

[441] Ritter, "Erdkunde," 8, 153, 183, 491, 561.

[442] Chanikof, in Spiegel, "Eran," 1, 556.

[443] "Farvardin Yasht," 147.

BOOK VIII.

THE EMPIRE OF THE MEDES AND PERSIANS.

THE EMPIRE OF THE MEDES AND PERSIANS.

CHAPTER I.

THE FOUNDATION OF THE MEDIAN KINGDOM.

On the northern edge of the table-land of Iran, where the mountains

descend to the Caspian Sea, we found dwelling towards the east the

Hyrcanians (_Vehrkana_ in the Avesta, _Varkana_ in the inscriptions of

Darius).[444] Their territory may have corresponded to the modern

district of Jorjan, which has preserved their name (p. 9). To the west

of the Hyrcanians, between Elburz and the Caspian, lay the Tapurians,

whose name has survived in the modern Taberistan, and further yet, on

the sea-coast, and at the mouth of the Mardus (now Safidrud), were the

Mardians. Adjacent to these, on the shores of the Caspian Sea as far as

the mouth of the Cyrus, lay the nation whom the Greeks called Cadusians,

but whose native name was Gaels[445]--a name still preserved in the name

of the district of Ghilan.[446] To the south of these tribes--the

Tapurians, Mardians, and Cadusians--the north-west of the table-land was

entirely occupied by the Medes.

The country of the Medes, Herodotus tells us, is very high and

mountainous in the north towards the Euxine, and covered with forests,

but the remainder of it is flat.[447] Polybius gives a more minute

description of the nature of Media. "It is difficult to speak adequately

of the natural strength and of the extent of the country of the Medes.

It lies in the centre of Asia, and in the size and elevation of the land

surpasses all other parts, while the situation enables it to govern the

strongest and most populous nations. Towards the east it is protected by

the desert which lies between Persia and Parthia, it has control of the

Caspian gates, and abuts on the mountains of the Tapurians, which are

not far distant from the Hyrcanian Sea. Towards the north it is bounded

by the Matieni and Cadusians, on the west it extends to the Saspeires,

who dwell close to the tribes which lie on the Euxine. Towards the south

it extends to Mesopotamia and abuts on Persia; on this side it is

protected by the range of the Zagrus, which reaches an elevation of one

hundred stadia, and is broken into various ranges and groups, separated

by deep valleys and open plains, in which dwell the Carchi, Cossaei, and

other warlike tribes. Media itself is traversed by several ranges in the

direction from east to west, but between them are plains filled with

cities and villages. The Medes possess corn and cattle in untold

abundance, and in horses their country is superior to the whole of Asia,

so that it takes the first place, not only in virtue of its extent, but

also owing to the number and excellence of the men and horses."[448]

Strabo allows Media an extent of 4000 stades (500 miles) in length and

breadth. It reached from the Zagrus to the Caspian gates. The greater

part of the land was high and cold, but the district below the Caspian

gates on the lower ground was very fertile. Even in the rest of the

land, with the exception of some mountain districts, there was no lack

of the means of subsistence, and everywhere on the high ground there was

excellent pasture for horses.[449]

The nation of the Medes belongs to the group of the Arian tribes, which

occupied the table-land of Iran. This has been already proved by the

statement of Herodotus that in ancient time the Medians were called

Areans by all men (p. 14), by the religion of the Medes, and by all the

Median words and names that have come down to us.[450] According to

Herodotus the nation consisted of six tribes: the Arizanti, Busae,

Struchates, Budii, Paraetaceni, and Magi. Whether certain parts of the

land belonged to these tribes as their habitation, is not clear from

this statement. The Magians we have already found to be a hereditary

order of priests (p. 191), and therefore we can hardly assume a separate

part of the country as their habitation. The question thus becomes

limited to the remaining five tribes. The name of the Paraetaceni occurs

in the mountain district, which the later Greeks call Paraetacene. This

district separated Media from Persia, and there is therefore nothing

remarkable in the fact that the Paraetaceni are counted among the

Persians or spoken of as an independent tribe.[451] If the Paraetaceni

had a special province, we shall be all the more justified in allotting

the same to the Arizanti, the Budii, Struchates, and Busae, as the tribe

of the Matieni, which Strabo reckons among the Medes,[452] had a special

habitation and territory in the district of Matiene, _i.e._ in the

region which after the time of the Seleucids was known as Atropatene;

and the tribes of the Persians, who were closely akin to the Medes, were

also settled in special regions, or marched through them with their

flocks. The name Arizanti (_Arizantu_) might signify the noble families,

_i.e._ an eminent tribe, which tribe might nevertheless possess a

separate habitation. Among the Persians there was a privileged tribe, to

which the royal family belonged, which ruled over all the tribes, and

this tribe like the rest had a special territory.

The districts of Media, as we know them from the accounts of later

writers, are beside Atropatene: Choromithrene, Nisaea, Rhagiana,

Cambadene, and Bagistana.[453] Atropatene is the elevated plain which

spreads round the lake which Ptolemy calls the Matienian lake (now

Urumiah). The inscriptions of the kings of Asshur call the inhabitants

of this land Mati and Mala.[454] Shut in by mighty summits which reach

a height of more than 12,000 feet, naked ridges, fields of snow,

mountain pastures, green forests and meadows here make up the wildest,

but at the same time most beautiful, Alpine landscape in the west of

Iran. The snow lies on the backs of the heights for about nine months,

but in the valleys there reigns for the most part uninterrupted spring;

in the deeper clefts the summer is hot, and the naphtha springs must

have caused this region to appear as one highly favoured by the gods in

the eyes of such zealous worshippers of fire as the Arians of Iran. We

have already seen (p. 74) that the name Atropatene, which in middle

Persian is Aturpatkan, and modern Persian Aderbeijan, means "protected

by fire."

In the ranges of the Zagrus, which, running from the Alps of Atropatene

to the south-east, separate the table-land of Iran from the valley of

the Tigris--these summits rise above the hilly land of Assyria to a

height of 15,000 feet--we must seek the territory which Ptolemy calls

Choromithrene, _i.e._ by a name which beyond doubt goes back to the

worship of Mithra. Further to the east, beyond the isolated

mountain-group of Elvend, on the eastern foot of the mountains, lay the

territory where Ecbatana was subsequently built. To the south-east were

the "Nisaean plains" of Herodotus, on which, as he tells us, were kept

the most beautiful and largest horses, superior to those of the

Indians.[455] Polybius has already stated, that in regard to horses

Media surpassed the rest of Asia; the mares of the Parthian kings were

kept in Media owing to the excellent pastures. According to Strabo,

there were 50,000 mares on the "horse pastures" in the time of the

Achaemenids; these pastures any one going from Babylonia and Persia to

the Caspian gates, _i.e._ to the Sirdarra-pass in Elburz, would cross.

Diodorus places them seven days' march to the east of Behistun, and

tells us that at one time there were 160,000 wild horses here, though

Alexander found only 60,000. Arrian puts the previous number at 150,000,

and the number found by Alexander at 50,000, as the greater part had

been carried off by robbers.[456] That Herodotus has given the name of

this region correctly is shown by the inscriptions of Darius, which

speak of a province of Nicaya in Media.[457] To the north-east of the

region of Ecbatana, on an elevated plateau, lay the district of

Raghiana. It takes its name from the metropolis Ragha, a city on the

southern foot of Elburz, mentioned both in the Avesta and the

inscriptions. Under the Arsacids Ragha was the largest city of Media.

Its later name was Rai; the ruins (near the modern Teheran) are said to

cover the land for leagues. Besides Ragha there were at one time

numerous flourishing cities in Raghiana.[458] Campadene,[459] the

Campada of the inscriptions of Darius, we must look for in the south of

Media, to the east of the Zagrus; it is no doubt the district now called

Chamabatan.[460] According to the statement of the Greeks, the district

of Bagistana extended to a mountain which was sacred to Zeus. As

Diodorus says, it was a region fit for the gods, filled with fruit-trees

and every other kind that ministers to delight and enjoyment.[461] The

name of the mountain consecrated to Zeus, Bagistana, and the similar

name of the district, go back to the title under which the gods are

comprised in the Avesta and the inscriptions of Darius (Old Bactr.

_bagha_, Old Pers. _baga_, New Pers. _bag_); and if Diodorus tells us

that the region was a land fit for the gods, the name Bagistana means

the abode of the gods. The district may have been held peculiarly sacred

by the Medes, or the name may have been intended to express their

gratitude for its fertility and beauty. We can fix precisely the

position of this district by the hill consecrated to Zeus near the

modern Behistun. It lies south-west of Elvend, between that mountain and

the Zagrus in the valley of the Choaspes, and is the district now known

as Kirmenshah.

According to the statements of Berosus, the historian of Babylon, the

Medes in the most ancient period had already reigned over Babylonia for

more than two centuries. They had suddenly collected an army, reduced

Babylonia, and there set up tyrants of their own people. According to

the succession of the dynasties which Berosus represents as ruling over

Babylonia, the beginning of this supremacy of the Medes fell, as has

been shown (I. 241, 247), in the year 2458 B.C. The first of the Medes

who thus ruled in Babylon is called Zoroaster by Syncellus, after

Polyhistor; according to this writer the seven Medes reign till the year

2224 B.C. Whether Berosus called the first Median king who reigned in

Babylon Zoroaster, or Polyhistor has ascribed that position to him as

the most famous name in Iran, or the only name known in antiquity, must

be left undecided, no less than the actual fact of the Median supremacy.

The Medo-Persian epos told us that Ninus of Asshur, after subjugating

Babylonia and Armenia, attacked the Medes. Pharnus, their king, met him

with a mighty army, but was nevertheless beaten. He was crucified with

his wife and seven children by Ninus; one of his retinue was made

viceroy of Media; and for many years the Medes were subject to the

successors of Ninus on the throne of Assyria (II. 3 ff). Herodotus'

account is as follows: "When the Assyrians had reigned over upper Asia

for 520 years, the Medes were the first to revolt, and as they fought

bravely for their freedom against the Assyrians, they succeeded in

escaping slavery and liberating themselves. Afterwards the rest of the

nations did what the Medes had done. And as all the nations of the

mainland lived according to laws of their own, they again fell under a

tyranny in the following manner:--Among the Medes was a man of ability,

called Deioces, the son of Phraortes. He desired the tyranny, and did as

follows: The Medes dwelt in villages, and Deioces, who was previously a

man of importance, set himself more and more zealously to the task of

doing justice, since lawlessness reigned throughout the whole of Media.

When the Medes of his village discovered these qualities in him, they

chose him for their judge. And as his heart was already set on the

empire, he acted justly and rightly, and thus got no small credit among

his fellow-citizens, so that the men from other villages, when they

found that Deioces alone judged rightly, gladly resorted to him, since

hitherto they had had to endure unjust sentences, and at last they would

not go to any one else. As the number of the applicants became greater,

and Deioces found that everything depended upon him, he refused to sit

any longer in court and pronounce sentence, saying, that it was of no

advantage to himself to neglect his own business and spend the day in

settling the disputes of others. Then robbery and lawlessness became

more rife than ever in the villages, and the Medes gathered together and

consulted on the position of affairs. In my belief the friends of

Deioces were the first to speak: 'As things are, it is impossible to

live in the land; let us choose some one to be king, and thus the land

will obtain good government. We can occupy ourselves with our own

business, and shall not be compelled to wander from home.' With these

words they persuaded the Medes to set up a monarchy. And when they at

once began the discussion who should be king, Deioces was highly

commended and put forward by every one, so that at last he was chosen by

all to be king. Then Deioces commanded the Medes to build him a palace

suitable for a king, and strengthen his power by a body-guard. This they

did, and built a great and strong palace, on the place which Deioces

pointed out to them, and allowed him to choose his lance-bearers out of

all the nation. When he had obtained the sovereign power he at once

compelled the Medes to build him a large city, in order that, being thus

occupied, they might trouble him less about other things; and when the

Medes obeyed him in this matter also, he erected the great and strong

citadel now known as Ecbatana. The walls formed seven circles, in such a

manner that the inner was always higher by the turrets than the next

outer circle, an arrangement assisted by the locality, for the town was

situated on a hill. In the seventh wall was the palace and the

treasure-house of Deioces. After erecting this fortification for

himself, and his palace, the king commanded the people to settle round

the citadel. When the building was completed Deioces first made the

arrangement that no one should enter in to the king, but every thing was

done by messengers, in order that those who had grown up with him, and

were of similar age, equal in descent and bravery, might not envy him,

and set conspiracies on foot, but that by being invisible he might

appear a different being; it was also disgraceful to laugh or spit, or

do anything of that kind in his presence. When he had made these

arrangements, and thus strengthened his tyranny, he adhered strictly to

justice. Plaints had to be sent in to him in writing, and he sent back

the sentence. Thus he managed this and all other matters, and if he

found that any one was guilty of insolence, and did violence to others,

he punished him according to the measure of his offence, and his spies

and emissaries were everywhere in the land.[462] In this manner Deioces

united the Medes, and governed them for 53 years. After his death, his

son Phraortes succeeded to the throne. Not content with ruling over the

Medes only, he marched against the Persians, and first made them subject

to the Medes. When he had become master of these two powerful nations,

he subjugated all Asia, attacking one nation after another. Finally, he

marched against the Assyrians, who had previously ruled over all men,

but, though otherwise in excellent condition, were then abandoned by

their allies, who had revolted. In the war against these Phraortes fell,

after a reign of 22 years, and with him the greatest part of his

army."[463]

The account of the history of the Medes given by Ctesias is wholly

different. As their subjugation to Assyria is coeval with the founding

of that kingdom, so is their liberation coeval with the fall of it. When

the Medes, after their conquest by Ninus, had been subject to the rulers

of Asshur, down to his thirty-sixth successor, Arbaces, the viceroy of

Media, with Belesys, the viceroy of Babylonia, revolted from the

Assyrian king. The kingdom of Assyria still remains unbroken; it is only

after severe struggles, and in consequence of the desertion of the

Bactrians and other nations during the conflict, that it is overthrown.

After the capture of Nineveh, Arbaces, as supreme lord, takes the place

of the king of Asshur.

According to the dates of Herodotus Deioces ascended the throne of Media

in the year 714 or 708 B.C.[464] The time which elapsed between the

liberation of the Medes and Deioces' elevation is not given by him.

According to Ctesias Arbaces established the dominion of the Medes at

least 170 years before the date given by Herodotus for Deioces. In

Herodotus Phraortes, Cyaxares, and Astyages follow Deioces in the

dominion over the Medes, with a total of 97 years. In Ctesias the

successors of Arbaces, who reigns 28 years, are Mandaces with a reign of

50 years, Sosarmus with 30, Artycas with 50, Arbianes with 22, Artaeus

with 40, Artynes with 22, Astibaras with 40, and finally Aspadas with 38

years. On this calculation the dominion of the Median kings lasted 320

years, and consequently Arbaces must have overthrown the Assyrian and

established the Median Empire in the year 878 B.C.; or as Ctesias puts

the fall of the last Median king in 564, and not in 550 B.C.--in the

year 884 B.C.--_i.e._ precisely at the time when Assyria began to rise

into the position of a widely dominant power (III. 269, 270). In the

list of kings given by Ctesias Mandaces and Artycas each rule fifty

years, Arbianes and Artynes 22 years, Artaeus and Astibaras 40 years.

This uniformity points to an artificial extension of the series by

duplicates.[465] If it is reduced by striking out the three seconds in

these pairs, and Arbaces is followed by Mandaces with 50 years, Sosarmus

with 30 years, Arbianes with 22 years, Artaeus with 40 years, and

Aspadas with 38 years, we obtain a period of 178 years for the kings of

the Medes, and so arrive at a point nearer that given by Herodotus for

the commencement of the Median kingdom, the year 736 B.C. (558 + 178),

as the first year of Arbaces. Yet even so we do not find any coincidence

whatever between the two narratives.

In the narrative of Herodotus we find with surprise that the Medes

attained their liberation without any combination in the people; without

the leadership of a single head. Yet soon after the time at which he

describes the Medes as revolting from the Assyrians, Herodotus tells us

that Sennacherib marched against Egypt, and asserts that for 75 years

after the accession of Deioces, "the Assyrians were indeed without

allies, since they had revolted, but were otherwise in a good

condition," so that Phraortes and the greatest part of his army fell in

battle against them. If after acquiring their freedom the Medes lived

isolated in villages, as Herodotus states, would not the Assyrians have

made use of this anarchy close upon their borders in order to reduce the

Medes again to subjection, rather than engage in campaigns against Syria

and Egypt? According to the account of Herodotus, it was the justice of

Deioces which won for him ever-increasing importance, and finally helped

him to the throne. But had Deioces, who sits on the throne for 53 years

afterwards, sufficient time before his elevation to make himself known

for his love of justice throughout all Media, unless we are willing to

assign him a very unusual age?[466] And if such dire anarchy did indeed

prevail among the Medes, what man in such times submits to even the most

righteous sentence? Least of all are the mighty and powerful willing to

do so. How did Deioces obtain the means of compelling the insubordinate

to obey his sentence?--how could he give protection to the accused,

oppressed, and weak against their opponents? And supposing that he was

able to do this, would he have been unanimously elected king? Herodotus

himself remarks that Deioces knew that "the unjust are the enemies of

the just."[467] Moreover, if the Medes at that time lived in the

simplest manner, how could a sovereign elected from their midst change

these conditions at a single stroke, or at any rate in the course of a

single reign, though a long one, so entirely as Herodotus supposes?

Village life is changed into city life, the Medes are settled in one

city round the royal fortress, and in the place of a patriarchal

government over a simple people, Deioces, "as the first," establishes

the whole apparatus of Oriental tyranny. Immense palaces, citadels, and

walls are built; the wide outer walls are adorned with gold and silver;

the secluded life of the sovereign in the palace becomes the established

law; the legal process is carried on by writing; and a system of

espionage is introduced over the whole country. It is obvious that in

this narrative elements, belonging to the tradition of the Medes, have

been taken by Herodotus and mingled with the views of the Greeks, who

were familiar with the combination of villages into one canton, and the

union of hamlets into a city, and had experience of the establishment of

a monarchy by setting up a tyranny in consequence of the services

rendered by the aspirant to the multitude. Herodotus expressly calls the

dominion of Deioces a tyranny. It is a fact beyond dispute that

Herodotus was influenced by such conceptions in shaping and forming the

material which came to him from tradition.

Apart from the motives which influenced him in describing the elevation

of Deioces, Herodotus wishes to show how the nations of Asia obtained

their freedom, and subsequently lost it. He begins with the statement,

that the Medes revolted from Assyria, and all the nations of Asia

followed their example. According to his dates, which have been already

mentioned, the Medes must have revolted precisely at the time when

Tiglath Pilesar II. and Sargon reigned over Assyria, _i.e._ in the

period between 745 and 705 B.C. The liberation of the remaining nations

must therefore have taken place under Sargon or his successors,

Sennacherib and Esarhaddon, _i.e._ between the year 705 and 668 B.C.

That this general liberation from the sovereignty of the Assyrians did

not take place at this period is abundantly clear from the inscriptions

of the kings and the Hebrew Scriptures. We have seen above to what an

extent Tiglath Pilesar caused the whole of Syria to feel the weight of

the Assyrian arms; he reduced Babylonia to dependence as far as the

Persian Gulf; Sargon was sovereign of Babylonia, maintained Syria, and

received the homage of the island of Cyprus, and the islands of the

Persian Gulf. His successor, Sennacherib, though unable to protect Syria

against Egypt, yet retained Babylonia and the eastern half of Asia Minor

under his dominion. Esarhaddon united the crowns of Asshur and Babel,

restored the supremacy of Assyria over Syria, subjugated a part of

Arabia and the whole of Egypt.[468] Hence it is clear, that precisely at

the time when, according to Herodotus, the rest of the nations following

the example of the Medes threw off the Assyrian yoke, that kingdom

reached a wider extent than at any previous time. If, nevertheless, we

wish to maintain the statement that the rest of the nations followed the

example which the Medes are supposed to have set about the year 736

B.C.,[469] we must place these events in the last decade of the reign of

Assurbanipal, _i.e._ in the period between 636 and 626 B.C. We must

therefore bring them down a full century, and this was a very late

result of the action of the Medes.

Let us attempt, by a comparison of the statements of the Assyrian

inscriptions on the events which took place on the table-land of Iran

and the narrative of Herodotus, to ascertain the real facts of the

liberation of the Medes. We saw above (p. 19) that Shalmanesar II. of

Asshur (859-823 B.C.) carried his campaigns as far as the East of Iran.

In the year 835 B.C. he imposed tribute on twenty-seven princes of the

land of Parsua, and "turned against the plains of the land of Amadai;"

in 830 B.C. his general-in-chief, Dayan Asshur, went down into the land

of Parsua, and laid tribute on the land of Parsua, "which did not

worship Asshur," obtained possession of the cities, and sent their

people and treasures into the land of Assyria.[470] Tiglath Pilesar II.

(745-727 B.C.), in the campaign which carried him to Arachosia,

subjugated "the land of Nisaa" and "the cities of the land of Media

(Madai)." In the following year he occupied "the land of Parsua;"

"Zikruti in rugged Media, I added to the land of Assyria; I received the

tribute of Media;" and on his ninth campaign he again marched into "the

land of Media." In an inscription which sums up all his achievements, he

declares that he has imposed tribute "on the land of Parsua," the city

of Zikruti, "which depends on the land of the Medes," and on the

chieftains of "the land of Media."[471] The books of the Hebrews tell us

that after the fall of Samaria in 721 B.C. "the king of Assyria carried

Israel away, and gave them habitations in Chalah, and in the cities of

the Medes." It was Sargon (722-705 B.C.) to whom Samaria yielded.[472]

His inscriptions also tell us that he carried away the inhabitants of

Samaria, and they make mention of the cities of the Medes. According to

them, he received heavy tribute from twenty-five chiefs of the Medes in

the year 716 B.C., and set up his royal image in the midst of their

cities. In the next year he carried away captive "Dayauku with his

people and his family, and caused him to dwell in the land of Amat,"

built fortresses in order to control Media, received tribute from

twenty-two chiefs of the Medes, conquered thirty-four cities in Media,

and united them with Assyria. In the year 713 B.C. he marched against

Bit Dayauku, reduced the chief districts of Media, which had cast off

the yoke of Assyria, and received tribute from forty-five Median chiefs;

4609 horses, asses, and sheep in great abundance. Sargon repeatedly

boasts that "he has reduced the distant land of Media, all the places of

distant Media, as far as the borders of the land of Bikni; that he

brought them under the dominion of Asshur; and that his power extended

as far as the city of Simaspati, which belonged to distant Media in the

East."[473] The inscriptions of his successor Sennacherib (705-681 B.C.)

tell us that on his return from his second campaign (against the land of

Ellip), he received the heavy tribute of the distant land of Media, and

subjugated the land to his dominion.[474] Esarhaddon (681-668 B.C.), the

successor of Sennacherib, according to the Hebrew Scriptures, deported

people from Persia to Samaria. He tells us himself: "The land of

Patusarra, a district in the region of ----, in the midst of distant

Media, on the border of the land of Bikni, the copper mountains. None of

the kings my forefathers had subjugated this land. Sitirparna and

Iparna, the chiefs of the fortified places, had not bowed before me. I

carried them away with their subjects, horses, chariots, oxen, sheep,

asses, as rich booty to Assyria." "The chiefs of the cities of Partakka,

Partukka, and Uraka-zabarna, in the land of Media, who lay far off, and

in the days of the kings my forefathers had not trodden the soil of

Assyria--them the fear of Asshur, my lord, threw to the ground; they

brought for me, to my city Nineveh, their great animals, copper, the

product of their mines, bowed themselves with folded hands before me,

and besought my favour. I put my viceroys over them, who united the

inhabitants of these regions with my kingdom; I imposed services upon

them, and a fixed tribute."[475] The period at which this tribute was

imposed on the most distant part of Media can only be so far fixed that

it must lie between 681 and 673 B.C. Assurbanipal, who succeeded

Esarhaddon (668-626 B.C.), tells us: "I captured Birizchadri, the warden

of the city of Madai (?); Sariti and Pariza, the sons of Gagi, the

warden of the cities of the land of Sakhi, and 75 citadels had cast off

the yoke of my dominion; I took the cities; the chiefs fell alive into

my hands; I sent them to Nineveh my metropolis." These events belong to

the period between the years 660 and 650 B.C.[476]

To weaken the contradiction between this series of statements and the

narrative of Herodotus, we may call to mind the gross exaggerations in

which the kings of Assyria indulge in describing their acts and

successes, and the grandiloquence which we have already noticed more

than once in the statements of Assyrian history (III. 139, 200). But

however great or however small may have been the success of the

campaigns of Tiglath Pilesar II., Sargon, Sennacherib, Esarhaddon and

Assurbanipal against the chiefs of the Medes, it cannot be denied that

these campaigns took place. And if from the very frequency of such

campaigns, after the reign of Tiglath Pilesar, we are inclined to draw

the conclusion that they are a proof of the lax and nominal character of

the dominion of Assyria over Media, this conclusion proves too much. The

same repetition of warlike enterprises on the part of the kings of

Asshur takes place, as we saw, in every direction. We shall have as much

right to conclude that there was no such thing as an Assyrian empire,

either before the year 736 or after it, over the Medes or any other

nation. As I have shown (III. 185), the Assyrian kingdom never acquired

a firm dominion over the subjugated nations, still less an organisation

of the empire, like the subsequent kingdom of the Achaemenids. Their

sovereignty consisted almost exclusively in the collection of tribute by

force of arms, in the subjugation or removal of the princes who refused

it, and setting up of others, who in turn soon withheld it. At the most,

Assyrian fortresses were planted here and there; and no doubt Assyrian

viceroys were placed over smaller regions. The same procedure is seen in

the inscriptions as in use towards the Medes; and if this is not

regarded as the sovereignty of Assyria, no such sovereignty existed

before Tiglath Pilesar. If, to meet this objection, the existence of an

Assyrian dominion is allowed, in the very lax form which is everywhere

characteristic of it, we may, from the same frequency of the campaigns

against Media, draw the opposite conclusion, that the Medes had

struggled very vigorously for freedom, that in the first place the most

remote tribes acquired it, and for them the liberation gradually spread,

and the tradition of the Medes has accepted the beginning of the

movement as the completion of it.

Setting aside any conclusions of this kind, even tradition can only have

regarded the beginning of the struggle for freedom as the beginning of

liberation, if it covered the nucleus of a firm resistance, either in

some definite district, or in a dynasty which took the lead in the

struggle and carried it on. Herodotus is not acquainted with any leader

in the struggle and does not mention any, while the campaigns of the

Assyrians are always directed against a greater or less number of

princes and cities; sometimes they fall on this chieftain and sometimes

on that.[477] If, moreover, the fact that Sargon receives tribute from

twenty-five, then from twenty-two, and then from forty-five chieftains,

is brought forward to confirm the narratives of Herodotus about the

anarchy which prevailed among the Medes, it is not the separation of the

Medes under different chiefs which constitutes the anarchy as described

by Herodotus, but actual lawlessness. His description gives us no

chieftains in Media, ruling their lands as captains in war and judges in

peace. The Medes dwell in villages, and the inhabitants choose the

village judge, though it is in their power to go for decision to another

village. Chieftains, even if they had not forbidden their tribes to seek

for justice out of the tribe, would in any case have left the decision

of Deioces unnoticed.

However this may be, one harsh contradiction between the narrative of

Herodotus and the inscriptions cannot be removed by any exposition or

any deductions. According to Herodotus Deioces reigned from the year 708

to 655 B.C., Phraortes from 655 to 633 B.C., over the whole of Media.

The inscriptions of Sennacherib mention the great payment of tribute by

the distant land of Media, and its subjugation under Sennacherib (p.

282); Esarhaddon removes two chieftains with their flocks and subjects

out of Media from the border of the land of Bikni to Asshur, and three

chiefs from the same district bring their tribute to Nineveh; he places

his viceroys over them, and they unite this district with Assyria. After

the year 660 B.C. Assurbanipal is said to have taken a chieftain of

Media captive; and in the inscriptions there is nowhere any mention of

Deioces, Phraortes, and the Median kingdom.

The inscriptions extend the land of the Medes to the East as far as the

copper mountains, or borders of the land of Bikni.[478] The people lived

separately under a considerable number of chieftains. The five tribes of

the Median nation, enumerated by Herodotus, if they also possessed

separate territory, were not isolated groups, but on the contrary broken

up into yet smaller divisions. The booty taken by the Assyrians from the

Medes, the tribute imposed upon them, consists chiefly in oxen, asses,

sheep, and horses. The number of horses given by the chieftains to

Sargon allows on an average a hundred for each, and we also hear of

other property, treasures, and the product of copper mines. We have

repeated mention of the cities of Media and their governors; Sargon

conquers thirty-four cities. Though we ought to regard these mainly as

citadels, yet civic life cannot have been so unknown to the Medes as the

narrative of Herodotus would compel us to suppose. Other elements of

civilisation also are known to the Medes at this time, _i.e._ in the

second half of the eighth and first half of the seventh century B.C. It

has been proved above that at the beginning of this period the doctrine

of Zoroaster must have reached them, and the names could be given of the

men in Media who published it; and the priests of the new religion

became formed during this century into an order which perpetuated in

their families the knowledge of the good sayings and the customs of

sacrifice. To this order we may also attribute what the Medes acquired

of the superior civilisation and skill of Assyria, especially the

knowledge of the Assyrian cuneiform writing, which underwent a change in

the hands of the Magians, and assumed the form known to us from the

Achaemenid inscriptions of the first class. When Herodotus ascribes the

introduction of written process at law to Deioces, the tradition

presupposes an established and extensive use of writing.

The dominion of the princes under which the Medes stood is followed by

the dominion of the monarchy, which must have arisen out of it. One of

the families of these princes must have succeeded in obtaining influence

and power over the others. The position of Deioces and Phraortes must

have arisen and developed itself in this manner. Whether the Dayauku,

whom Sargon carried off in the year 715 B.C. with his followers to Amat,

is one and the same person with the prince of Bit Dayauku, against whom

the Assyrian king marched in the year 713 B.C. (p. 282), would be

difficult to decide; and even if the matter could be determined with

certainty, it would not be of great importance. We often find the kings

of Asshur replacing conquered and captive princes in their dominions. On

the other hand, it is of importance that there was a region of Media,

which could be called Bit Dayauku, _i.e._ the land of Dayauku, by the

Assyrians in the year 713 B.C. There must have existed at this time a

principality of Deioces among other principalities, and the beginning of

this must be put earlier than the date allowed by Herodotus for the

election, _i.e._ at the latest at 720 B.C. In course of time the land of

Deioces may have increased in extent, and the importance of the ruler

may have grown--though he may not, after the conflict of 713 B.C., have

taken any leading part in the resistance to the payment of tribute, the

conflicts and successes of other chieftains against the Assyrians; at

any rate, there is no subsequent mention of the land in the

inscriptions. Neither Deioces nor his land is mentioned when Sennacherib

speaks of the tribute of the whole of Media, and the subjugation of the

country under his dominion; nor even when Esarhaddon speaks of the

conquest of the most distant princes. Hence we can only grant to the

narrative of Herodotus that, in the times of Sennacherib and Esarhaddon,

Deioces, the son of Phraortes, had a considerable territory among the

chiefs of the Medes, and greater importance than others, and we have no

reason to look for his dominion elsewhere than at Ecbatana. His son

Phraortes (Fravartis), who according to Herodotus came to the throne in

the year 655 B.C., must have succeeded in uniting the chiefs of the

Medes under his sway, and combining with the tribes of the Persians,

among whom at that time the race of the Achaemenids had acquired a

prominent position,[479] in order to maintain their independence against

Assyria.

From this point downwards we can date the union and independence of

Media. Had the country been free and united at the time of Sargon,

Sennacherib, and Esarhaddon, the rulers of Assyria would not have

marched against Syria and Cilicia, or undertaken the conquest of Egypt.

Assurbanipal could not have employed the forces of the kingdom to

maintain Egypt, or reduce Babylon, or annihilate Edom, or make campaigns

to the distant parts of Arabia, if the united power of Media had existed

behind the Zagrus, close on the borders of his native land, the very

centre of the Assyrian power. Still less could he have looked on in

inaction, while Phraortes, as Herodotus tells us, conquered the

Persians, and attacked one nation after another till he had subjugated

Asia. On the other hand, the annihilation of Elam by Assurbanipal, and

consequent strengthening of the Assyrian power on the borders of Persia,

may well have determined the Persians to unite with the Medes, and

accept a position under Phraortes.

In considering the situation and importance of the powers, we may assume

that Phraortes, in the first instance, thought rather of defence than of

any attack on Assyria, and for this object undertook the fortification

of Ecbatana on a large scale. What could have induced him to abandon the

protecting line of the Zagrus, in order to attack under the massive

walls of its metropolis the power which had just dealt such heavy and

destructive blows on ancient states like Babylonia and Elam, unless we

attribute to him the most reckless audacity? Nor, on the other hand, can

we suppose that an ancient ruler like Assurbanipal, who had held his own

successfully against the searching attack of his brother, and finally

gained important conquests, would have allowed the formation of the

Median power in the closest proximity, and its combination with the

Persians, without the least attempt to prevent it. It was in repulsing

this attack that Phraortes fell.[480]

If this inquiry leads us to attribute to Phraortes the foundation of a

consolidated government, the establishment of monarchy in Media, the

union of the Persians and Medes, and the subordination of the former to

Phraortes, we can yet understand that the traditions of the Medes,

anxious to increase the glory of the country, threw the monarchy further

back, ascribed to Deioces, the father of Phraortes, the consolidation of

Media, and represented the liberation from the sway of Assyria as prior

to the foundation of the monarchy. What Median poems can do for the

glorification of their country, even in the teeth of the established

facts of history, will soon become even more clear. How this tradition

explained the elevation of Deioces we cannot now discover; it is clear

that Herodotus gives a Greek turn to this part of the story (p. 280).

And if tradition ascribes to Deioces the extensive and strong

fortifications of Ecbatana, which more correctly belong to Phraortes and

his successors, it is Herodotus who credits him with the discovery of

the mode of life usual among Oriental monarchs. The Medo-Persian Epos

shows us the successors of Semiramis in the seclusion of the palace. On

the other hand, the Median tradition must have ascribed the reduction of

Asia to Phraortes. We have already remarked (III. 280), that towards the

close of the sixth century B.C. Cyaxares and not Phraortes was regarded

by the nation as the founder of the power and greatness of Media.

Herodotus himself tells us "that Cyaxares was far more powerful than his

predecessors." Hence the later legend, which Herodotus reproduces,

ascribed the foundation to Phraortes, and the extension of the Median

power to Cyaxares. But if Phraortes was to be the conqueror of Asia, he

must "when he had attacked and conquered the other nations one after the

other," have finally marched against the Assyrians, against whom he did

in fact contend.

FOOTNOTES:

[444] "Vend." 1, 42; Behist. 2, 92.

[445] Plin. "H. N." 6, 18, (48).

[446] Alexander came from Hyrcania and Parthia to the land of the

Tapurians. According to Arrian's statements, the Hyrcanians, Parthians

and Tapurians were all under one leader in the army of Darius III.

"Anab." 3, 8, 4; 3, 11, 4; Strabo, p. 507, 508, 514, 524; Justin, 12, 3;

41, 5.

[447] Herod. 1, 110.

[448] Polyb. 5, 44; 10, 27. Cf. Curt. 3, 2 ff.

[449] Strabo, p. 523-525.

[450] In the most recent times it has been maintained that the Medes

were of Turkish-Tatar (Altaic) family, but this view rests simply on the

assumption that the inscriptions of the second class in the inscriptions

of the Achaemenids must have been written in the language of the Medes.

This hypothesis contradicts everything that has come down to us of

Median names and works, and the close relationship between the Medes and

Persians. Whether the Arians, on immigrating into Media, found there

Turkish-Tatar tribes, overpowered, expelled or subjugated them, is

another question. If this were the case, the fragments of the population

could hardly have exercised any influence worth mentioning on the Arian

Medes.

[451] Paraetacene is derived no doubt from _parvata_, mountain, or

_parvataka_, mountainous. Strabo remarks that when the Persians had

conquered the Medes, they took some land from them. The distance between

Persepolis and Ecbatana was twenty marches; Alexander reached the

borders of Media on the twelfth day after leaving Persepolis. Arrian,

"Anab." 3, 19.

[452] Strabo, p. 73; 509.

[453] Under the Sassanids Media (Mah) consisted of four regions:

Aderbeijan, Rai (Rhagiana), Hamadan (Ecbatana), Isfahan.

[454] Herodotus allows the Matieni a considerable extent, for he

includes under the name the Armenians and the inhabitants of Atropatene.

Later authors confine the Matieni to the region round the lake of

Urumiah; in this sense, Polybius, quoted above in the text, limits Media

in the North by the Cadusians and Matieni.

[455] Herod. 3, 106; 7, 40.

[456] Strabo, p. 525; Diod. 17, 110; Arrian, "Anab." 7, 13.

[457] Behist. 1, 13. Strabo's [Greek: Nesaia] (p. 509, 511), the Nisiaea

of Pliny (6, 29), the Parthaunisa of Isidore of Charax, must be sought

in the neighbourhood of Nishapur, which was built by Shapur II. The

Avesta puts Nica between Merv and Balkh.

[458] Diod. 19, 44. Alexander in eleven forced marches advanced from

Ecbatana to Ragha.

[459] Isid. Ch. "M. P." c. 5.

[460] Mordtmann, "B. d. Bair. Akademie," 1876, s. 364.

[461] Diod. 2, 13; 17, 110. The city of Baptana, which Isidore (c. 5)

mentions "as situated on a mountain in Cambadene," is in any case

Bagistana (Behistun).

[462] Herodotus, 1, 95-101.

[463] Herod. 1, 102.

[464] Vol. III. 257 ff. According to the reigns which Herodotus allows

to Deioces and his successors, 150 years before the overthrow of

Astyages, which took place 558 B.C., _i.e._ 708, but, according to the

total given by Herodotus--156 years, 714 B.C.

[465] Volney, "Recherches," 1, 144 ff.

[466] In order to remove this objection, the dates of Deioces and

Phraortes must be transposed, and the 22 years of Phraortes given to the

former, the 53 years of Deioces to the latter. Phraortes would then have

marched out against the Assyrians in extreme old age, and fallen in the

battle.

[467] Herod. 1, 96.

[468] Vol. III. Bk. 4; Chaps. 1, 4, 5-8.

[469] According to Von Gutschmid. Cf. _supr._ p. 278.

[470] Vol. II. p. 319. I cannot accept the theory which Lenormant has

attempted to establish on the geographical differences in the

inscriptions of Shalmanesar II. and Tiglath Pilesar II.--that the Medes

and Persians obtained possession of Western Iran shortly before the

middle of the eighth century. "Lettres Assyriolog." and "Z. Aegypt.

Spr." 1870, s. 48 ff.

[471] Vol. III. 3-5.

[472] Vol. III. 85.

[473] Vol. III. 101.

[474] Vol. III. 113.

[475] Vol. III. 150.

[476] Vol. III. 167.

[477] That is the reason why I cannot regard the parallels which Von

Gutshchmid suggests ("Neue Beitraege," s. 90 ff.) of the struggle between

the Arsacids and Seleucids, and the relations between the Great Mogul

and the Mahrattas, as pertinent.

[478] The Patusarra of Esarhaddon might be the Patisuvari of Darius; the

Pateischoreans, whom Strabo quotes among the tribes of the Persians; Von

Gutschmid, _loc. cit._ s. 93, but in the Babylonian version of the

inscription of Behistun the Pateischoreans are called _Pidishuris_.

[479] Von Gutschmid, _loc. cit._ s. 88; below, c. 3.