Notes. Herodotus 7, 8 9. D. B. Levine. March 15, 2021
Powerful Women:
Atossa.
Atossa was the daughter of Cyrus the first Persian king, and therefore king Darius said that her son, Xerxes, would be king after him, even though he had older step brothers. Herodotus says, “In fact, though it is my opinion that Xerxes would have become king even without the advice by Demaratus, because Atossa was all-powerful (ἡ γὰρ Ἄτοσσα εἶχε τὸ πᾶν κράτος.)” (7.3).
Artemesia.
Tyrant of Halicarnassus who was part of the Ionian contingent that supported Xerxes in the war on the mainland Greeks. Herodotus speaks of “her manly courage” (7.99). She was the head of a fleet of five ships, and at the battle of Salamis she attacked and sank the ship of another Persian ally, so as to make a pursuing Athenian crew think that she had changed sides. This causes a deluded Xerxes to say: “My men have turned into women and my women into men!” (8.88).
Herodotus: “None of Xerxes’ allies gave him better advice than her” (7.99).
It is Artemisia who had wisely advised Xerxes not to commit to a naval battle at Salamis, for the conditions were unfavorable (8.68). Xerxes commended her for her advice, but committed to battle anyway.
Xerxes asks for her advice after he loses the Battle of Salamis, and she suggests that he leave Mardonius in charge of the war in Greece, but that he, the king should go back to Persia. Xerxes takes her advice this time, “since it coincided with his own attentions” (8.103).
After his defeat at Salamis, Xerxes entrusted his children to her to take back to Asia (8.103).
After the battle, Herodotus says, the Athenians had put out a 10,000 drachma reward for her capture, “since the Athenians were furious that a woman was attacking their city” (8.93)
Advisors to King Xerxes.
Demaratus, an exiled Spartan king, advised Xerxes about how to justify his right to inherit the Persian throne, and Xerxes took his advice, and had Darius declare him his heir (7.3).
Before the invasion, Xerxes asks Demaratus if the Greeks will oppose his massive army. Demaratus replies that the Greeks, especially the Spartans, will never accept his sovereignty and bring slavery on Greeks. They will fight. This makes Xerxes laugh in disbelief, and Demaratus goes on to say that the Spartans obey their law, which means that they must either win or die. This makes Xerxes laugh, too. He does not want to face the truth.
At Thermopylae, Xerxes asks Demaratus why the Spartans were engaging in gymnastics and paying special attention to combing their hair before battle. When Demaratus tells him that such is the Spartan custom, thinking it “laughable.” Demaratus tells him that Sparta (his home town) is “the boblest and most royal city in Greece [with] the bravest men,” and that “It is their custom to do their hair when they are about to risk their lives” (7.209). Xerxes still did not believe him.
Demaratus advised Xerxes to take the island of Cythera and use it as a base against the Lacedaemonians (7.235), so they would leave the Greek alliance and come home to defend their own land, but Xerxes does not take his advice, after his brother Achaemenes tells him that Demaratus has bad intentions (7.236-7).
Mardonius son of Gobryas, a Persian general. Herodotus says, “…there was no one in Persian who had more influence with Xerxes” (7.5). He was the son of Darius’ sister, and therefore Xerxes’ cousin. When Xerxes was “rather reluctant to make war on Greece,” Mardonius argued that he needed to punish the Athenians, and told him that Europe was beautiful, and full of good trees, with excellent soil (7.5). Herodotus says that his motivation was personal: he wanted to be satrap of Greece.
Pisistratidae still wanted to return to Athens, and presented Onomacritus the oracle-monger, who gave oracles that seemed to encourage an invasion of Greece (7.6).
Artabanus, Xerxes’ uncle, opposes the invasion of Greece, and urges him to avoid that dangerous proposition (7.10). His arguments seem to reflect Herodotus’ out look elsewhere, to be careful if you have too much power: “It is the god’s way to curtail anything excessive” (7.10). His warning infuriates Xerxes (7.11), but later when he goes to bed, Xerxes decides that Artabanus had given him good advice. It is the recurrent dream that convinces both Artabanus and Xerxes to invade Greece. Artabanus: “the destruction overtaking the Greeks is apparently heaven-sent” (7.18). Artabanus later advises Xerxes not to send Ionian Greeks against their kinsmen the Athenians, because they might not prove loyal. Xerxes does not value that advice, and sends Artabanus back to Susa (7.51-52).
Dreams.
Not only the tall handsome man dreams demanding his invasion, but also Xerxes dreamt about wearing an olive garland that disappeared, and the Magi interpreted it as a sign of his future reign over the whole world (7.19).
Omens.
Xerxes dismisses the bad omens that Herodotus reports: a horse gave birth to a hare; a donkey gave birth to a hermaphroditic foal. “Xerxes dismissed both these omens as unimportant and carried on his way…” (7.57-8).
Xerxes’ delights:
Rich Lydian Pythius offers Xerxes great riches, and Xerxes offers him even more money, in exchange for his generosity, and becomes his guest friend (ξεῖνόν τέ σε ποιεῦμαι ἐμὸν 7.28-29; but later Xerxes will punish him terribly for making a modest request 7.38-39)
Xerxes sees a beautiful plane-tree that delighted him so much that he gives it gold decorations and left one of the Immortals as its guardian (7.31).
He delights in watching sea-races of his fleet near Abydus, which he watches from a marble dais on a hill (7.44): “Xerxes took great pleasure in the race, and indeed in the whole army.” [But then cries because he realizes that soon they all will be dead.]
Xerxes also liked watching horse races. When he was in Thessaly, he “had set up a horse-race, pitting his own horses against the local Thessalian stock, because he had heard that Thessalian horses were the best in Greece. As a matter of fact, though, the Greek horses were easily beaten” (7.196)
Xerxes’ Rages.
His Hellespont bridge is destroyed in a storm, and he orders his slaves to whip the Hellespont and insult it, as they throw shackles into the water. He then had his bridge engineers beheaded (7.34-35).
When the rich Pythius asks for one of his five sons to stay in Lydia with him, Xerxes is outraged and while acknowledging their ties of xenia (τὰ ξείνια), he nevertheless cuts this eldest son in half, and marches his army between the bisected body (7.39).
Xerxes orders his men to mutilate Leonidas’ corpse after the battle of Thermopylae: “After this discussion Xerxes made his way through the bodies of the dead. When he came to Leonidas’ corpse and was told that this was the Lacedaemonian king and commander, he told his men to cut off his head and stick it on a pole.” Herodotus gives his opinion here: “This, to my mind, is the most convincing piece of evidence (although there is plenty more) that during his lifetime Leonidas had been more of an irritation to King Xerxes than anyone else in the world. Otherwise he would never have acted with such abnormal violence towards his corpse, because the Persians are normally the last people in the world, to my knowledge, to treat men who fight bravely with disrespect” (7.238).
Herodotus’ Opinion of Xerxes at Commander of a Massive Military Force.
Herodotus does not shy away from giving Xerxes credit. “Nevertheless, among all those thousands upon thousands of men, there was not one who had more of the looks or the height to deserve the position of supreme power than Xerxes himself” (7.187). [This is hardly the monstrous picture that the film “300” portrays.]
Herodotus’ Rationalism vs. Mythological Explanations.
Herodotus is respectful of myth traditions, but adds his rational explanation. The River Peneius flows through the Vale of Tempe, from the Thessalian plain: “According to native Thessalian tradition, the ravine through which the Peneius flows was made by Poseidon. This is not implausible, because the sight of this ravine would make anyone who thinks that Poseidon is responsible for earthquakes, and there that rifts formed by earthquakes are cause by him, say that it was the work of Poseidon. For it seems to me that this rift in the mountains was caused by an earthquake” (7.129).
Herodotus makes a similar statement about the winds that created havoc for the Persian fleet: “It was a monster of a storm, quite impossible to ride out” (7.189). Herodotus then says that the Athenians had prayed to Boreas the North Wind before the storm. Herodotus comments skeptically, but respectfully: “Now, whether or not this is why Boreas struck the Persians as they were lying at anchor, I cannot say. In any case, the Athenians say that Boreas had come to their help in the past, and that on the occasion in question what happened was his doing, and when they got home they built a sanctuary to him on the banks of the River Ilissus” (7.189). He goes on, “The storm raged for three days. Finally, the Magi performed sacrifices and set about soothing the wind with spells, and also sacrificed to Thetis and the Nereids, until the storm died down on the fourth day – or maybe it did so of its own accord. They offeree sacrifices to Thetis because the Ionians told them that this was the place from where she had been abducted by Peleus, and that the whole of Cape Sepias was sacred to her and her fellow Nereids” (7.191). But the Greeks gave thanks to “Poseidon the Saviour,” believing that this sea god was responsible for the destruction of part of the Persian fleet (7.192): “This was the origin of the worship that still goes on at Athens of Poseidon as the Saviour.”
Herodotus shows skepticism about the “sacred snake” on the Athenian Acropolis, but Waterfield’s translation does not make that clear. When the Athenians are thinking about abandoning their city before the Persian advance, the “sacred snake” did not touch its food, thus being a bad omen meaning that even the goddess had left the city, and thus making the people more determined to leave the city. “The Athenians say that a large snake, the guardian of the Acropolis, lives in the sanctuary. They say these things, and indeed, as if it really existed (ὡς ἐόντι)they serve the snake a monthly quota of food” (8.41). I think that this is a clear indication that Herodotus is skeptical.
But Herodotus is not skeptical about the miraculous events at Delphi when the Persians approached. Perhaps he wants to respect that oracular shrine, even though he sees a physical monument of one of the “miracles.”
1) The Pythian prophet saw that the sanctuary’s sacred weapons of their own accord “had been brought out o the temple and were lying in front of the building” (8.37).
2) And when the Persians reached the sanctuary of Athena Pronaia below Delphi, “thunderbolts crashed down on them from the sky, and two crags broke off from Mount Parnassus, hurtled towards them with a terrible noise, and hit a large number of them, and at the same time the sound of a loud shout and a war-cry emerged from the sanctuary. The combination of all these events filled the invaders with fear, and they began to run away…
3) “I have learnt that the Persians who made it back claimed to have witnessed further miracles, over and above the ones already mentioned; they said they were followed by two heavily armed men of superhuman height, ho harried them and killed them” (8.38). Herodotus says that the Delphians believe that these figures were the local heroes Phylacus and Autonous, whose precincts are near the sanctuary. “The rocks that fell from Parnassus were still preserved in my day, lying in the precinct of Athena Before the Temple, where they came to rest after sweeping through the Persians” (8.39).
And Herodotus is not skeptical when he reports that the Persians saw that the sacred olive tree of Athena that had been burnt down when the Persians sacked the Acropolis was seen to have sent up “a shoot about a cubit long, which had already sprouted from the stump. They reported the phenomenon to Xerxes” (8.55). Herodotus express no skepticism about this observation, which the Athenians reported. Acually, olive trunks do sprout new boughs rather quickly. But it is a great symbol and metaphor for the comeback that Athens was about to make.
Herodotus is not skeptical about the ghostly procession on the Sacred Way to Eleusis, where clouds of dust “that thirty thousand men would make” (8.65) and the cry of the Mysteries “Iacchus!” appeared, as in the procession for Demeter and Persephone. Demaratus tells the Athenian Dicaeus who saw this not to let Xerxes find out about it, bscause it was a bad omen for the Persians. Herodotus says that the sound was carried towards the Greeks at Salamis, “And so they realized that Xerxes’ fleet was destined to be destroyed. This is the story told by Dicaeus the son of Theocydes, and he used to claim that various people, including Demaratus, could vouch for its truth” (8.65). Herodotus does not show skepticism here; he has a named source who himself says he has witnesses.
Herodotus is a Believer in Oracles.
“I cannot argue against the truth of oracles, because when they speak clearly I do not want to try to discredit them.” He gives the text of an oracle of Bacis that predicted the defeat of the Persians, when Justice crushes Hybris’ son Excess and brings Victory, and concludes, “Faced with the clarity of this kind of statement… I hesitate to challenge the validity of oracles myself, and I do not accept such challenges from others either.” (8.77)
Herodotus’ Opinion of Why the Greeks Won: The Athenians Stood Firm.
“If the Athenians had taken flight at the danger that was bearing down on them and had abandoned their country, or if they had stayed put where they were but had surrendered to Xerxes, no one would have tried to resist Xerxes at sea… anyone who claims that the Athenians proved themselves to be the saviours of Greece would be perfectly correct… it was they, with the help of the gods [who] repelled the king’s advance. Not even the fearsome and alarming oracles that came from Delphi persuaded them to abandon Greece; they held firm and found the courage to withstand the invader of their country” (7.139).
Herodotus’ Statement On Himself as Historian.
“The only version of events I am prepared to affirm is the one told by the Argives themselves… I am obliged to record the things I am told, but I am certainly not required to believe them – this remark may be taken to apply to the whole of my account” (7.152).
Oracles of Delphi.
Discouraged the Athenians: “Fly to the ends of the earth” (7.140). When the Athenians came back as suppliants, the oracle said that a wall of wood would stand intact… Blessed Salamis, you will be the death of mothers’ sons either when the seed is scattered or when it is gathered in” (7.141). This encouraged the Athenians.
Themistocles.
Fleet Maker.
This Athenian argued that the oracle was in Athens’ favor (7.143). He had urged the Athenians earlier to use the revenue from the Laurion silver mines to make a fleet to use against their neighbors the people of Aegina.
Bribe Taker.
At Artemisium, the Greek fleet was terrified by the size of the Persian armada, and were about to leave. The Greeks of Euboea, who wanted their protection, asked the supreme commander Eurybiades the Spartan to stay while they evacuated their women and children, but he refused. The Euboeans thereafter bribed the Athenian Themistocles to make sure that the Greeks stayed and protected Euboea. They gave Themistocles 30 talents (a small fortune), and he cleverly kept the fleet together by giving 5 talents to Eurybiades as a bribe to stay, and 3 talents to the Corinthian commander Adeimantus, “and the Euboeans got their way. Moreover, Themistocles himself made a healthy profit. No one knew that he had the rest of the money; the people who had been given some of it assumed that it had come from Athens just for the purpose to which it was put” (8.5).he contest and his fleet.
Persuasive Talker.
Without a bribe, Themistocles was able to convince the Spartan admiral Eurybiades to stay at Salamis to fight the Persian fleet, by the strength of his arguments alone (8.62-63).
Misinformation Manager.
Before the battle of Salamis, when the allies were hoping to retreat to the Isthmus near Corinth, Themistocles sent his slave Sicinnus to give false information to Xerxes, namely, that the Greeks were planning to flee, and that he should attack right away and trap them. this made the king commit to battle in circumstances unfavorable to him, and also forcing the allied Greeks to stay together and to fight, and to win the battle.
Contrast Between Clever (but Mendacious) Themistocles and Aristides “The Just.”
Themistocles’ main political rival at Athens was Aristides, who had been ostracized from Athens by Themistocles’ supporters. But at the crisis at Salamis, Aristides put aside his rivalry and helped Themistocles and the Greeks by telling them that the Persians planned to attack. Themistocles cleverly tells Aristides to give the allies the news himself, because “If I tell them, they’ll think I’m making it up and they won’t believe me” (8.80). Themistocles kknows that he has a reputation as a liar, but that Arisitces has a reputation as an honest man. In fact, Herodotus describes Aristides as “the best and most honourable man in Athens” (8.79).
Themistocles Cozies up to Xerxes.
Herodotus tells us that Themistocles argued against destroying the Hellespont bridge, so that Xerxes could go back to Asia on it. He argues that they should not chase him as he retreats. Herodotus: “His reason for saying this was to earn credit with Xerxes, so that if he ever got into trouble with the Athenians, he would have somewhere to gurn to. And in fact this is exactly what happened” (8.109). He then sent a secret message to Xerxes (again via Sicinnus), telling the king that the Greeks would not pursue him and his forces, because Themistocles of Athens wished to do him a favor (8.110). [And in fact, Themistocles does end up going over to the Persians, and even spent a year learning Persian.]
Differences Between Greeks and Persians. The Olympics.
Arcadian deserters went to the Persian camp, where in the presence of Xerxes they spoke of the Olympic games. They told the Persians that the usual award was an olive garland. When Xerxes’ cousin Tritantaechmes “could not stop himself blurting out in front of everyone, “Well, Mardonius, what sort of men are these you have brought us to fight? They make excellence rather than money the reason for a contest!” (8.26). Compare Solon and Croesus’ conversation in book 1, where the rich Lydian king makes it clear that he thinks that money is more important than excellence.
Differences Between Greeks and Persians. The Spartan Meal.
After the battle of Plataea, when the Greeks find the sumptuous tent of Mardonius with its gold and silver decorations, the Spartan king Pausanias asked Mardonius’ cook to prepare the kind of meal that they used to prepare for Mardonius. They prepared a magnificent Persian feast, and so Pausanias, “for a joke, told his own servants to prepare a typical Laconian meal. When the food was ready, Pausanias was amused to see the huge difference between the two meals, and he sent for the Greek commanders. Once they were all there, he pointed to the two meals and said, “Men of Greece, my purpose in asking you all here is to show you just how stupid the Persian king is. Look at the way he live, and then consider that he invade our country to rob us of our meager portions!” (9.82). This reminds us again of Solon and Croesus: the rich and magnificent (but foolish) Asian ruler, and the self-sufficient and satisfied Greek.
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