METHOD OF ARGUING FROM THE GENUINENESS, TO THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE
HISTORY OF HERODOTUS.
That the Greek text of Herodotus, such as it now appears--small verbal
variations only excepted, was extant and well known in Greece, at least
as early as the commencement of the Peloponnesian war (B.C. 431), is
the conclusion that is warranted by the evidence already adduced.
It now remains to inquire how far this proof of the antiquity and
genuineness of the work carries with it a proof of the general truth of
the History.
In a civilized community, where a free expression of opinion is
allowed, and where opposing interests actually exist, a writer,
who professes to compile an authentic account of transactions
that are still fresh in the recollection of the people, can move
only within certain limits, even if he might wish to misrepresent
facts.--Circumstances, known only to a few, may be falsified--motives
may be maligned--actions may be exaggerated--wrongs and sufferings
may be coloured by rhetorical declamation--fair characters may be
defamed, and foul ones eulogised:--these are nearly the boundaries of
falsification. But if personages altogether fictitious are made the
heroes of the story--if invasions, battles, sieges, conspiracies, are
described which never happened--if, in a word, the entire narrative
is a fiction, then it ranks in a different class of productions, nor
could it ever gain credit as an authentic account of real and recent
events. The same evidence, therefore, which establishes the existence
of an historical work at a time near to that of the events it records,
establishes also the _general authenticity_ of the narrative;--for the
work is not only mentioned by contemporary writers, but it is mentioned
_as a history_. This character granted to the book by the author’s
contemporaries contains, by condensation, the suffrages of the whole
community. In substance, we hear the people of Greece assenting to the
historian in relation to those principal portions of his narrative, at
least, of which they were qualified to form an opinion, and relative to
which no writer would attempt to deceive them.
Equity demands that we treat an historian conformably with his
own professions. When he narrates events as well known to his
contemporaries as to himself, he is not to be considered as sustaining
any other responsibility than that of telling his story well:--in such
instances we may ask for proof of his impartiality, or of the soundness
of his judgment, but not of his veracity, which is not taxed. But when
he relates incidents of a private or remote kind;--when he makes a
demand upon the confidence of his contemporaries by affirming things in
relation to which _they_ could not generally detect his misstatements
if he erred;--then, and in such cases, we may fairly search for
evidence bearing upon the historian’s character, and circumstances,
and his means of information. This is an important distinction, never
to be lost sight of in reading history;--and the inference it contains
is this--that a history of _public_ transactions, published while many
of the actors were still living, and while the events were familiarly
remembered by a large number of persons, and which was commonly
received as authentic, must be accepted, as to its principal facts, as
true, even though there should be reason to suspect the impartiality,
the veracity, or the judgment of the writer; but if in these respects,
he is entitled to a common degree of confidence, then nothing more than
a few errors of inadvertency can, with any fairness, be deducted from
the narrative.
Every historical work, therefore, needs to be analyzed, and to have
its several portions separately estimated.--Whatever is remote or
particular will claim our credence according to the opinion we may
form of the historian’s veracity, accuracy, judgment, and his means of
information; but the truth of narratives relating to events that were
matters of notoriety in the writer’s time, rests altogether upon a
different ground; being necessarily involved in the fact that the work
was published and accepted as authentic at such or such a date. The
strength of this inference will best appear by examining a particular
instance.
In adherence to the distinction above mentioned, we must detach from
the History of Herodotus the following portions (not as if they
were proved to be false, or even improbable; but simply because
the truth of them cannot be _directly inferred from the fact of
the genuineness of the work_). First--Geographical and antiquarian
descriptions of countries remote from Greece: Secondly--The early
history of such countries, and indeed the early history of Greece
itself: Thirdly--Events or conferences said to have taken place at
the Persian court during the war with Greece; and lastly, many single
incidents, reported to have happened among the Greeks, but which rest
upon suspicious or insufficient evidence. After making deductions
of this sort, there will remain--all those principal events of the
Persian invasion which were as well known to thousands of the author’s
countrymen and contemporaries as to himself; and in describing which
his responsibility is that of an _author_ only, who is required
to digest his materials in the best manner he can--not that of a
_witness_, called to give evidence upon a matter of doubt.
The leading events which we may accept as vouched for by the antiquity
and genuineness of the work are these--The invasion of Greece by a
large Asiatic army, about five-and-forty years before the publication
of the History:--the defeat of that army by the Athenians and Platæans
on the plains of Marathon:--a second invasion of Greece ten years
afterwards, by an immense host, gathered from many nations:--the
desertion of their city by the Athenians:--an ineffectual contest with
the invaders at the pass of Thermopylæ:--the occupation of Athens by
the Persians:--the defeat of the invading fleet at Salamis:--the
retreat of the Persians, and their second advance in the following
year, when the destruction of Athens was completed; and--the final
overthrow of the Asiatic army at Platæa and Mycale. That these events
actually took place--assuming the History to be genuine--will appear if
the circumstances of the case are examined.
At the time when, as it has been proved, the History of Herodotus was
generally known and received as authentic, the several states of Greece
were marshalled under the rival interests of Athens and Sparta; and an
intestine war, carried on with the utmost animosity, raged by turns
in all parts of this narrow territory. Such a period, therefore, was
not the time when flagrant misrepresentations of recent facts, tending
to flatter the vanity of one of these rival states, at the expense
of the honour of others, could be endured, or could gain any credit.
The Athenians gloried, beyond all bounds of modesty, in having, with
the assistance of the Platæans only, repelled the Median invasion on
the plains of Marathon. But would this boast have been allowed--would
the account of the battle given by Herodotus have been suffered to
pass without contradiction by the other states, if no such invasion
had actually taken place, or if it had been much less formidable than
is represented by the historian; or if the other states had in fact
been present on the field? Our author affirms that the Lacedæmonians,
though fully informed of the danger which threatened the independence
of Greece, persisted in a scrupulous adherence to their custom of
not setting out upon a military expedition till after the full moon.
In the meantime the battle took place, and a body of two thousand
Lacedæmonians, afterwards despatched from Sparta, reached the field of
battle only time enough to gratify their curiosity by a sight of the
slaughtered Medes. This absence of their allies was ever afterwards
made matter of arrogant exultation by the Athenians; and the historian,
in giving his support to their boast, dared the contradiction of one
half of the people of Greece.
The second invasion of Greece, conducted by the Persian monarch
in person, took place ten years after the defeat of the first at
Marathon; or about five and thirty years before the publication of the
History: many individuals, therefore, were then living who took part
in the several battles and engagements; and every remarkable event of
the war was then as well known and remembered in Greece as are the
circumstances of the French Revolution by the people of Europe at the
present time (1828).
Our immediate purpose does not demand that we should examine the
credibility of the description given by Herodotus of the Asiatic
army; for even if it were proved that the numbers stated by him are
exaggerated, the principal facts would not be brought into doubt; nor
would even the credit due to the historian be much impeached; for in
all these particulars he is careful, again and again, to remind the
reader that he brings forward the best accounts he could collect--not
vouching for their absolute accuracy. That he did avail himself of
authentic documents in compiling this description is rendered evident
by the graphic truth and propriety of all the particulars. Indeed the
picture of the Persian army, and of its discipline and movements, is
strikingly accordant with the known modes of Asiatic warfare. The army
of Xerxes consisted of a small body of brave and well-disciplined
troops--Medes, Persians, and Saces, which, if it had been ably
commanded, and unencumbered, might very probably have succeeded in
their enterprise; but being impeded and embarrassed by the presence of
a vast and disorderly mob of half-savage or dissolute attendants, they
were, at every step, surrounded by a wide-spreading desolation--more
fatal than the enemy, which rendered the advance of the army in the
highest degree difficult, and its retreat desperate. To all this,
parallel instances may be adduced from almost every page of Asiatic
history.
When speaking of the twenty Satrapies of Darius, Major Rennell, in his
Essay on the Geography of Herodotus, avails himself of the information
contained in our author’s description of the army of Xerxes, to which
he attributes a high degree of authority. Now it is evident that,
unless Herodotus had possessed authentic and accurate documents, it
would have been impossible for him to have given the consistency of
truth to two distinct accounts of nations and of people, so various
and so remote from Greece. “Although,” says this writer, “there are
some errors in the description, as there must necessarily be where the
subject is so very extensive, yet it is on the whole so remarkably
consistent, that one is surprised how the Greeks found means to acquire
so much knowledge respecting so distant a part. It is possible that
we have been in the habit of doing them an injustice, by allowing
them a less degree of knowledge of the geography of Asia, down to
the expedition of Alexander, than they really possessed; that is, we
have, in some instances, ascribed to Alexander, certain geographical
discoveries which perhaps were made long anterior to his expedition....
We shall close the account of the Satrapies, and our remarks on the
armament of Xerxes, with some additional ones on the general truth of
the statement of the latter, and on the final object of the expedition.
Brief as the descriptions in the text are, they contain a great variety
of information, and furnish a number of proofs of the general truth of
our author’s history; for the descriptions of the dress and weapons of
several of the remote nations, engaged in the expedition of Xerxes,
agree with what appears amongst them at this day; which is a strong
confirmation of it; notwithstanding that some attempts have been made
to ridicule it by different writers. Herodotus had conversed with those
who had seen the dress and weapons of these tribes during the invasion;
and therefore we cannot doubt that the Indians clothed in cotton, and
with bows made of reeds (i. e. bamboos), were amongst them: of course,
that the great king had summoned his vassals and allies, generally,
to this European war; a war intended, not merely against Greece, but
against Europe in general, as appears by the speeches of Xerxes, and
other circumstances.... The evident cause of the assemblage of so many
nations was that the Europeans (as at the present day) were deemed so
far superior to Asiatics as to require a vastly greater number of the
latter to oppose them. This is no less apparent in the history of the
wars of Alexander, and of the wars made by Europeans in the East in
modern times. However, we do not by any means believe in the numbers
described by the Greek historians; because we cannot comprehend,
from what is seen and known, how such a multitude could be provided
with food, and their beasts with forage. But that the army of Xerxes
was great beyond all example, may be readily believed, because it
was collected from a vastly extended empire, every part of which, as
well as its allies, furnished a proportion; and if the aggregate had
amounted to a moderate number only, it would have been nugatory to levy
that number throughout the whole empire; and to collect troops from
India and Ethiopia to attack Greece, when the whole number required
might be collected in Lower Asia.”
It seems impracticable, from the existing evidence, to ascertain how
great a deduction ought to be made from the calculations of Herodotus,
as to the numbers of the invading army; but it is easy to believe that
his authorities, which unquestionably were authentic in what relates
to the description of the forces, might lead him astray, without any
fault on his part. Or probably, as the numbers exceeded the facilities
of common computation, some conjectural mode of calculation was adopted
by the contemporary Greeks, which might easily exceed the truth.--For
example, the length of time occupied by the barbarian train in passing
certain defiles:--or the very fallacious mode of reckoning employed
by the Persians was perhaps followed:--this, as Herodotus describes
it, consisted in counting ten thousand men, who were packed in a
circle as closely as possible, and a fence formed round them: they
were then removed, and the entire army, in turns, was made to pass
within the inclosure: the whole was thus counted into ten thousands.
But how probable is it, that, by the inattention of the persons who
conducted this process, the successive packages were less and less
dense.--Seven thousand men might easily seem to fill the space in
which ten had been at first crammed. Nor is it at all safe to argue _à
priori_ on the supposition that so many could not have been supported
on the march. The power which drew a large levy of men from twenty-nine
nations, might also drain those nations of their grain. A vast fleet of
flat-bottomed barges attended the army along the coast; and as soon as
this fleet was separated from it, all the extremities of famine were
suffered by the retreating host. This armament is not fairly compared
with those which, in later times, have traversed the continent of Asia;
for in these instances the aid of an attendant fleet was not available.
Without this aid the distant movement of five hundred thousand men is
scarcely practicable; with it, three or four times that number might
with little difficulty be led a distance of three or six months’ march.
This important difference has not been duly regarded by those who
have discussed the question. If then such a deduction from the army
of Xerxes is made as may readily be accounted for from the inaccurate
mode of computation employed by the Persians or the Greeks; and if
the attendance of so large a fleet of store ships is considered, we
may well hold Herodotus excused from the charge, either of deliberate
falsification, or of intended exaggeration.
If it were alleged that Herodotus discovers an inclination on every
occasion to place the conduct of the Athenians in the most advantageous
light, it may be replied that, if such a disposition is charged upon
him, then his substantial impartiality, and the authenticity of the
narrative are convincingly proved, by his allowing to the Spartans the
undivided and enviable glory of having first encountered the invaders
at the pass of Thermopylæ. In relating this memorable action he affirms
that all the allies under the command of Leonidas, excepting only
a small body of Thebans and of Thespians, retired from the pass as
soon as it was known that they were circumvented by the Barbarians;
and he plainly attributes this desertion to the prevalence of
unsoldier-like fears. This statement therefore--like many others in the
History--challenged contradiction from the parties implicated in the
dishonour.
In recounting the naval engagements which took place in the Eubœan
straits, the historian contents himself with affirming that, after a
doubtful contest, each fleet retired to its station; and he attributes
the final success of the Greeks, not so much to their valour and
skill, as to a divine interposition, which, by a violent storm, so far
diminished the Persian fleet that the two armaments were reduced to an
equality.
The ill success of the Greeks in attempting to oppose the advance of
the Barbarians at Thermopylæ, and the losses they had sustained in
several naval engagements, having reduced them almost to despair, the
Athenians, thinking it impracticable to defend Attica, abandoned their
city, and took refuge on board their ships, and in the neighbouring
islands. The invader therefore was allowed, without opposition, to
execute his threat--that he would retaliate upon the Athenians the
burning of Sardis. Here then we arrive at a definite fact, which may be
considered as forming the central point of the History. If this fact be
established, most of the subordinate incidents must be admitted to have
taken place, as they were nothing more than either the proper causes,
or the effects, of this main event.
Within so short a period as five and thirty, or forty years, it could
not be a matter of doubt or controversy among the Athenians, or indeed
with any of the people of Greece, whether Athens had been occupied by
a foreign army--its halls and temples overthrown or burned--its sacred
groves cut down, and its surrounding gardens and fields devastated. But
while several thousand citizens were still living, who had attained an
adult age at the time of the alleged invasion, and while the structures
of the new city were in their first freshness, or were scarcely
completed; and while, if it had actually taken place, the marks of
this destruction must have been everywhere apparent, a history is
published, and is universally applauded, in which this invasion of
Attica, and this destruction of Athens are particularly described. Can
then this fact be reconciled with the supposition that no such events
had really taken place--that these arrogant citizens had never been
driven from their homes? Can we believe that, for the sake of assuming
to themselves the glory of having repelled such an invasion, the
entire people of Athens would have given their assent to a fictitious
narrative, which every one of them must have known had no foundation
in truth? or, if such an infatuation had prevailed at Athens, would
their neighbours--the Corinthians, and the Bœotians, have left such a
falsehood uncontradicted?
It is evident that, unless a powerful invasion of Greece had taken
place, Athens--the principal city of Greece, could not have been
occupied and destroyed; and unless that invasion had been speedily
repulsed, Athens could not have regained that wealth, and power, and
liberty which, on other evidence, it is known to have possessed in
the first years of the Peloponnesian war. Here then, if the truth of
the History of Herodotus were to be argued, the question must come to
its issue. If it were denied that such an invasion of Greece happened
at the time affirmed by our author, then the fact of the general
diffusion, and the high credit, of the History of Herodotus, throughout
Greece, must be shown to consist with that denial. On the other hand,
an apologist for Herodotus, having established the antiquity and
genuineness of the work, must not be required, either to defend the
veracity of the historian, or to adduce corroborative evidence in
proof of the fact, until the difficulty which rests upon the contrary
hypothesis has been disposed of.
The account given by Herodotus of the subsequent events of the Persian
war--that is to say--the defeat of the Asiatic fleet at Salamis--the
retreat of Xerxes--the second occupation of Athens in the following
spring by the Persians under the command of Mardonius; and the final
discomfiture and destruction of the Barbarian army at Platæa and at
Mycale, follow of course, as substantially true, if the preceding
facts are established. It must however be observed that a peculiar
character of authenticity belongs to this latter portion of the
History: for though the issue of the war was indeed highly gratifying
to the vanity of the Greeks, one would almost think that the historian
wished, as far as possible, to check their exultation, or to balance
the vaunts of each of the states by some circumstances of dishonour.
For instance--no veil is drawn over those almost fatal contentions for
precedency by which the counsels of the confederates were distracted;
nor are the treasons and the interested conduct of the chiefs concealed
or excused. The pusillanimity of some, and the fears of all are
confessed: indeed so much of infamy or of discredit is thrown by
Herodotus upon individuals, and upon the whole community, that his
boldness in publishing such statements, and the candour of the Greeks
in admitting them, are alike worthy of admiration. Nor can we believe
otherwise than that a full conviction of the substantial truth of these
statements at once inspired the writer with this courage, and compelled
his hearers to exercise this forbearance. It cannot seem surprising
that, in later times, some writers, jealous for the honour of Greece
at large, or of some particular state, should attempt to remove these
blots, by impugning the credit of the historian. Yet even in making
this attempt, they venture no further than to call in question his
account of a few particular transactions, or to dispute those portions
of the work which relate to remote times, and distant nations.
We have seen that the history of the Persian invasion, as given by
Herodotus, is, in its main circumstances, established by the mere fact
that the work was known, and had been accepted as authentic, within
forty years of the events it records, This then is not an instance in
which the veracity of the historian needs to be vindicated, or in which
our faith in his veracity must be dependent upon other evidence. Yet it
is natural to look around for such other evidence as may be found to
bear upon the history. We have a good right to suppose that events of
such magnitude as those which Herodotus relates, would be mentioned,
more or less explicitly, by other writers of the same age--whether
philosophers, poets, orators, or historians. And this in fact is the
case in the instance before us; for almost every writer--contemporary
with Herodotus--whose works are extant, makes allusions of a direct or
indirect kind to the Persian invasion. Some of the authors already
adduced in proof of the antiquity and genuineness of the history, must
now be recalled to give evidence as to the matter of fact.
Pindar, the prince of lyric poets, is reported to have died at the
age of eighty, and was born about B. C. 521, and was in mid-life at
the time of the Persian invasion. The odes now extant were recited
in Greece before the history of Herodotus was composed. The subject
of these compositions are the praises of the victors at the Olympic,
the Isthmian, the Pythian, and the Nemean games; and in extolling his
heroes, the poet finds occasion to refer to the glories of the cities
to which they belonged: they contain therefore many allusions to the
events of Grecian history; and as these odes were recited at all the
great festivals, the allusions were such as the mass of the people
could not fail to understand. This sort of incidental and brief notice
of public events, intended to kindle the enthusiasm of the audience,
must of course rest upon the knowledge, or the convictions of those to
whom they were addressed. In the first of the Pythian odes, a rapid
sketch is given of the principal events of the Persian war.--Such
defeat as they suffered by the Syracusan prince, who, manning the swift
ships, with the youth, delivered Greece from heavy servitude.--I would
choose the praise won by the Athenians at Salamis:--or I would tell at
Sparta the fight near Mount Cithæron, in which the Medes with their
curved bows (ἀγκυλότοξοι) were oppressed.--The Median bow as seen in
the bas-reliefs of Persepolis, is very properly described by this
epithet--it is very long, and much curved, even in its extended state.
These allusions may be explained by referring to those places in
Herodotus, where it is related, that, while Xerxes was advancing
towards Greece, the Athenians and Lacedæmonians sent an embassy to
Gelon, tyrant of Syracuse, to ask his aid against the Barbarian: this
he refused to grant, except upon conditions with which the Greeks
could not comply. Yet he fitted out a fleet, and engaged and defeated
the Carthagenians, commanded by Amilcar, who had been incited by the
Persians to join in the war upon the Greeks: by this victory Greece was
delivered from the danger of an attack which must have proved fatal
to its liberties; for if the Carthagenian fleet had arrived in the
Archipelago, and had joined the Persians, the Greeks could hardly have
withstood so vast a combination. The next allusion is to the engagement
at Salamis, in which the Athenians, as Herodotus affirms, took the
principal part: and the last, is to the final defeat of the Barbarians
near Platæa, at the foot of Mount Cithæron. In this battle the Spartans
were the most distinguished. In the fifth Isthmian ode, another
allusion to Salamis occurs--where men innumerable met their death, as
by a hail-storm of destruction.
Æschylus, the father of tragedy among the Greeks, had reached manhood
at the time of the first invasion of Greece, and took part in the
battle of Marathon: he was present also in the engagement at Salamis,
and again at the battle of Platæa. Seven only of his seventy tragedies
have descended to modern times:--one of these is entitled “The
Persians.” The scene is laid at Susa in Persia, and the time supposed
is during the absence of Xerxes in Greece. The play is opened by a
chorus of elders, who discourse anxiously concerning the fate of the
expedition;--All Asia is exhausted of men:--wives count the days, and
mourn the long absence of their warrior-consorts--Atossa the queen
enters dejected, and recounts a portentous dream:--a messenger then
arrives from Greece: he reports the defeat of the Persian fleet, and
the retreat of Xerxes:--in relating the particulars, he glances at the
circumstances which preceded the engagement at Salamis, as mentioned
by Herodotus--That a messenger (sent by Themistocles) informed Xerxes
that the Greeks were about to disperse; to prevent which he imprudently
surrounded them:--an engagement ensued, of which Xerxes was a spectator
from a neighbouring hill:--the Persians are defeated;--those who
occupied the island (of Psyttalea) were all slain. The army, in its
retreat, suffers the extremity of cold, hunger, and thirst. On hearing
this, the queen invokes the shade of Darius, which appears.--Atossa
repeats the story of his son’s defeat:--The shade predicts the fatal
battle of Platæa, and the destruction of the army. In the closing
scene, Xerxes himself arrives, bewailing his misfortunes, and bringing
back nothing but an empty quiver. The only material point in which
Æschylus differs from Herodotus, is in reckoning the Greek fleet at
three hundred, instead of seven hundred sail:--this is evidently
a poetic deviation from fact, intended to enhance the glory of the
victory.
Of all the Greek historians, none bears so high a character for
authenticity and for exactness in matters of fact as Thucydides: his
impartiality, his laborious collection, and his judicious selection of
materials, and his rejection of whatever seemed to rest on suspicious
evidence, are apparent on almost every page of the history of the
Peloponnesian war. This history was published about sixty years after
the expedition of Xerxes. Thucydides had conversed with many of
those who had taken part in the battles described by Herodotus. Many
allusions to the events of the Persian invasion occur in the course
of the work, and they are all of that kind which is natural, when
an historian refers to facts which he supposes to be fresh in the
recollection of his readers. The introductory sections of the history
contain an outline of Grecian affairs, from the earliest times to the
commencement of the war between Athens and Sparta. In this preliminary
sketch, the leading circumstances of the invasion, as related by
Herodotus, are mentioned; such as--the war and conquests of Cyrus
and Cambyses--the subjugation of the Greeks of Asia Minor--the naval
power of Polycrates, tyrant of Samos--the Median war, the reigns of
Darius and of Xerxes, and the conduct of Themistocles.--The expulsion
of the Pisistratidæ from Greece, the battle between the Medes and the
Greeks at Marathon, and, ten years afterwards, the second invasion
of Greece by the Barbarians--the desertion of their city by the
Athenians, and their taking refuge on board their ships.--Not many
years after the expulsion of the tyrants from Greece, happened the
battle between the Medes and the Athenians at Marathon; and ten years
after that battle, the Barbarians arrived with a great armament,
intended to reduce the Greeks to bondage. In this imminent danger,
the Lacedæmonians, who were more powerful than the other states, took
the command in the war. The Athenians, as the Medes advanced, having
resolved to abandon their city, collected all their goods, and went
on board their ships, and from that time became a maritime people.
After, by their united efforts, the Greeks had repulsed the Barbarians,
the several states, as well those which fell away from the king, as
those which had fought with the Greeks, took part, some with the
Athenians, and some with the Lacedæmonians.--Again, Thucydides refers
to--the late Median war--which, he says, was quickly terminated in
two battles and two naval engagements. The battle of Marathon, and
the burial of the slain upon the field, are afterwards mentioned; and
in a funeral oration pronounced by Pericles (whether really so or not
is of no consequence to the argument) the exploits of the Athenians
in repelling the Barbarians are spoken of as being too well known to
need to be particularized; and again, the conflict at Thermopylæ is
mentioned;--the battle of Platæa, and the engagement at Artemisium. The
defeat of the Medes, the devastation of Athens, and its restoration
are narrated. The distance of time, namely, fifty years, between the
defeat of Xerxes, and the commencement of the Peloponnesian war, is
mentioned.--All these actions which took place either among the Greeks,
or between them and the Barbarians, were included within a period
of nearly fifty years, reckoning from the retreat of Xerxes, to the
commencement of the present war.
These, and some other allusions to the events of the Persian invasion,
coinciding as they do with the more ample narrative given by Herodotus,
and coming from an historian who made it his boast that he admitted
nothing into his work which was not supported by satisfactory
evidence, and who, moreover, was disposed rather to detract from the
credit of his rival, than to confirm it, must be held to furnish the
most conclusive kind of independent testimony. Indeed, the express
affirmation of Thucydides that Athens was destroyed by the Persians,
affords alone a sufficient proof of the fact; for no such affirmation
as this could either have been made, or tolerated, within sixty years
after the event, unless it were universally known to be true.
Lysias the orator, at the early age of fifteen years, it is said,
accompanied Herodotus and other Athenians to Thurium: after a long
residence in Italy, he returned to Athens, where he distinguished
himself by his eloquence. In a funeral oration, pronounced in honour of
the Athenians who fell in the Corinthian war, he speaks of the Persian
war.--The king of Asia, unsatisfied with his present greatness, and
actuated by a boundless ambition, prepared an army of 500,000 men,
hoping by this mighty force to reduce Europe under his subjection....
With such rapidity was the victory (at Marathon) accomplished, that
the other states of Greece learned by the same messenger the invasion
of the Persians, and their defeat; and without the terror of danger,
felt the pleasure of deliverance. It is not surprising, then, that such
actions, though ancient (about eighty years) should still retain the
full verdure of glory, and remain to succeeding ages the examples and
the envy of mankind.... Many causes conspired to engage Xerxes, king
of Asia, to undertake a second expedition against Europe.... After ten
years preparation, he landed in Europe, with a fleet of 1200 sail, and
such a number of land forces, that it would be tedious to recount even
the names of those various nations by whom he was attended.... He made
a journey over land, by joining the Hellespont, and a voyage by sea, by
dividing Mount Athos. The orator then briefly mentions the engagements
at Artemisium and Thermopylæ, the abandonment of Athens, and the
removal of the citizens to Salamis:--their city was deserted, their
temples burnt or demolished, their country laid waste.
Isocrates flourished a few years later than Lysias, yet he was
contemporary with Herodotus. One of his orations, pronounced in praise
of the Athenians, contains passages to the same effect. They first
(the Athenians) signalized their courage against the troops of Darius
(at Marathon).... The Persians, a short time after renewed their
attempts, and Xerxes himself, forsaking his palace and his pleasures,
ventured to become a general. At the head of all Asia he formed the
most towering designs. For who, though inclined to exaggeration, can
come up to the reality? The conquest of Greece appeared to him an
object below his ambition.--Designing to effect something beyond human
power, he projected that enterprise, so celebrated, of making his army
sail through the land, and march over the sea; and he carried this
idea into execution by piercing Mount Athos, and by throwing a bridge
over the Hellespont. Against a monarch so proud and enterprising, who
had executed such vast designs, and who commanded so many armies, the
Lacedæmonians, dividing the danger with Athens, drew themselves up
at Thermopylæ. With a thousand of their own troops, and a small body
of their allies, they determined in that narrow pass to resist the
progress of all his land forces. While our ancestors (the Athenians
of the _last_ generation) sailed with sixty galleys to Artemisium,
and expected the whole fleet of the Barbarians.... The Lacedæmonians
perished to a man; but the Athenians conquered the fleet they had
undertaken to oppose. Their allies were dispirited. The Peloponnesians,
occupied for their own safety, had begun to fortify the Isthmus.... The
enemy approached Attica with a fleet of twelve hundred sail, and with
land forces innumerable.... The Athenians assembled all the inhabitants
of their city, and transported them into the neighbouring island.--And
where shall we find more generous lovers of Greece than those who in
its defence abandoned their abodes, suffered their city to be ravaged,
their altars to be violated, their temples to be burned to the ground,
and all the terrors of war to rage in their native country?... Athens,
even in her misfortunes, furnished more ships for the sea-fight off
Salamis, which was to decide the fate of Greece, than all the other
states together; and there is no one, I believe, so unjust as to deny,
that by our victory in that engagement the war was terminated, and the
danger removed.
Ctesias, as we have seen, affords a testimony conclusive in favour of
the antiquity of the history attributed to Herodotus. We have now to
adduce his evidence on the subject of the Persian invasion--reminding
the reader that his history of Persia was composed with the avowed
design of invalidating the account given by Herodotus of Persian
affairs: he thus speaks of the expedition of Xerxes:--Xerxes, having
collected a Persian army, consisting, besides the chariots of war,
of eight hundred thousand men, and a thousand galleys, led them into
Greece by a bridge which he had caused to be constructed at Abydos. It
was then that he was accosted by Demaratus the Lacedæmonian, who passed
with him into Europe, and who endeavoured to dissuade the king from
attacking the Lacedæmonians. Xerxes arriving at the pass of Thermopylæ,
placed ten thousand men under the command of Artapanus, who there
engaged Leonidas--chief of the Lacedæmonians. In this conflict a great
slaughter of the Persians took place, while not more than three or
four of the Lacedæmonians were slain. After this Xerxes sent twenty
thousand men to the field; these also were overcome, and though driven
to fight by blows, were still vanquished. The next day he sent forward
fifty thousand men; but as these also failed in their attack, he no
longer attempted to fight. Thorax the Thessalian, and Calliades and
Timaphernes, princes of the Trachinians, were then present (in the
Persian camp) with their troops. These, with Demaratus, and Hegias of
Ephesus, Xerxes called into his presence, and from them he learned that
the Lacedæmonians could by no means be vanquished unless they were
surrounded and attacked on all sides. Forty thousand Persians were
therefore despatched under the command of these two Trachinian leaders,
who traversing a difficult path, came behind the Lacedæmonians. Thus
surrounded, they fought valiantly, and perished to a man. Again
Xerxes sent an army of one hundred and twenty thousand men, commanded
by Mardonius, against the Platæans: it was the Thebans who incited
the king against the Platæans. Mardonius was met by Pausanias the
Lacedæmonian, at the head of not more than three hundred Spartans--one
thousand of the people of the country--and about six thousand from the
other cities. The Persian army being vanquished, Mardonius fled from
the field wounded. This same Mardonius was sent by Xerxes to pillage
the temple of Apollo; but to the great grief of the king, perished in
the attempt by a hail-storm.
Xerxes next advanced with his army to Athens; but the Athenians having
fitted out one hundred and ten galleys, fled to the island of Salamis:
he therefore entered the deserted city, and burned it, except only the
citadel, which was defended by a few who remained; but they retiring by
night, he burned that also. The king then advancing to the narrowest
part of Attica, called Heracleum, began to construct a mole towards
Salamis, with the intention of marching his army on to the island. But
by the advice of Themistocles the Athenian, and of Aristides, a body of
Cretan archers was brought up to obstruct the work. A naval engagement
then took place between the Persians and the Greeks, the former having
more than a thousand ships, commanded by Onophas--the latter seven
hundred. Yet the Greeks conquered, and the Persians lost five hundred
ships. Xerxes himself, by the counsel and contrivance of Themistocles
and Aristides, fled:--not fewer than one hundred and twenty thousand
men having perished on the side of the Persians in the several actions.
Passages to this effect occur in the Myriobiblon of Photius.
In those particulars in which this account of the Persian invasion
differs from that of our author, no one who carefully compares the
two, can hesitate to give his confidence to Herodotus rather than to
Ctesias, not only because he lived some years nearer to the events; but
because his narrative displays more judgment, more consistency, and
more probability, and is also better supported by other evidence. It is
enough for our present purpose that this writer affirms the same great
events to have taken place--that the Persian king led an immense army
into Greece, where he met a total defeat.
Of the authors whom we have cited, the first two--Pindar and Æschylus,
had reached maturity at the time of the Persian invasion, and were
personally concerned in its events, and composed the works to which
we have referred while Herodotus was yet a youth. Though poets, they
represent the victories of the Greeks as recent facts, well known
to their hearers, and the slightest allusion to which was enough to
kindle the national enthusiasm. The other writers--Thucydides, Lysias,
Isocrates, and Ctesias, were also contemporary with Herodotus; and
two of them were his professed rivals. From their evidence it is
apparent that the events of the Persian invasion were matters of common
knowledge and conversation, and were the themes of writers in every
class among the Greeks, in the very age in which they are said to have
taken place.
It follows therefore that the historian of these transactions is not to
be regarded as if he were the author of a narrative for the truth of
which he is individually responsible, and in which we cannot confide
until we have proof of his veracity. He is rather the collector of
facts that were universally acknowledged by his contemporaries:--and
the truth of the history rests upon the fact that it was published, and
was accepted, while the individuals to whom the events were known were
still living.
If we look to the Greek writers of the next and of the following age,
we find the same general facts affirmed or alluded to--orators, poets,
and historians, hold the same language, and assume it as certain that
their ancestors gloriously repulsed an innumerable Asiatic army. But
historical proof of a _traditionary_ kind differs essentially from that
which it is just now our intention to display; we therefore do not
bring it forward in the present instance.
In a preceding chapter (XV.) we have referred to the mass of evidence,
confirmatory of the _written_ testimony of ancient Historians, which
might be brought forward from the treasures of the British Museum.
In many instances the _general_ truthfulness of Herodotus, and his
exactness also, are vouched for in the most substantial and convincing
manner, by objects of various kinds, to which the reader may have
access any day in that vast collection. Yet in relation to such
instances there may be room for a cautionary remark; and it is of this
kind.--
There is a tendency in the mind to relieve itself from the labour of
_thinking_, by accepting, without inquiry, any sort of proof that
offers itself to the senses--to the eye and to the touch. In this
manner we may fall into the habit of forgetting, or of neglecting,
the direct and proper evidence of _written_ and authentic testimony,
while we are occupied with that which _seems_, although it may not be
so in reality, to be more convincing, or to be less precarious; as for
example: after giving attention to the evidence that has been adduced
in the preceding chapters, we may feel assured of the fact--that the
Greeks and Persians did fight on the plains of Marathon. There is then
shown to us a seal, which, on good evidence, we know to have been
picked up upon the very spot that still bears that name in Greece:
the device upon this gem is manifestly Persian;--the winged lions are
almost a copy of the bas-reliefs still existing on several ruins in
Persia: we conclude therefore that this relic of antiquity belonged to
a chief of the Persian army, and we accept it as a palpable proof of
the truth of the historian’s narrative: and though that narrative thus
gains, in our view, a confirmation, it does so by losing something of
its proper weight; and we are afterwards inclined to think, that if the
_tangible_ proof were withdrawn, the _written_ proof would stand less
firmly than it did before.
Then again, in relying upon the evidence of gems, inscriptions, or
sculptures, not merely as illustrations of history, but as proofs of
its truth, we may sometimes substitute the worse kind of evidence
for the better.--The relics of ancient art, in very many instances,
derive their meaning, and draw their historic value from the
concurrent testimony of _written_ history: the entire _proof_ is a
product of the _two_ taken together. Then it must not be forgotten
that the _traditionary_ history of the relic is often of doubtful
authenticity--resting perhaps upon the word of those who had a
commodity of indefinite value to sell;--or the workmanship may be of a
later age than the antiquary is willing to admit;--or the inscription
may have been placed by authority out of the reach of that opinion
to which an historian is always amenable. An arrogant republic, or a
vain-glorious tyrant, might, without fear, stamp bold lies upon coins,
or engrave impudent untruths upon the entablatures of temples; and
the brazen or the marble record may receive from the modern antiquary
a degree of respect which it never won from contemporaries. Herodotus
mentions some instances of this kind. An intelligent inquirer into the
truth of remote facts will usually give more confidence to the explicit
assertions of one with whose character and qualifications he is in some
measure acquainted, than he does to positive averments that come from a
party altogether unknown. Now an historian is a person concerning whose
veracity, discretion, and intentions we have the means of forming our
own opinion; but in admitting the evidence of inscriptions and coins,
we receive a testimony--knowing perhaps nothing of the witness.