His first act was to send a message to those Pæonians whom Darius had removed from the Strymon to Asia, telling them that they were free to return, as all Ionia had revolted from the king. Unless his object in so doing were to create an impression in the Persian sphere of influence in Europe, it is impossible to attribute a motive to any otherwise apparently causeless act. Herodotus looks upon it as simply designed to give annoyance to Darius, an end which, it may be presumed, Aristagoras had sufficiently attained by raising the standard of revolt. It is quite possible that he sought to carry out the policy attributed to his father-in-law, Histiæus, some ten years before, and to enlist the aid of the Thracians in a struggle with the Persian power in Western Asia. If this was the intent, the design did not meet with success. The Thracians did not take any active part in the revolt, though they took advantage of the events on the Asian side to throw off whatever allegiance they had hitherto owed to the king.
In the spring of 498 the twenty Athenian ships, accompanied by five triremes from Eretria, arrived on the Asiatic coast. The Eubœan city had apparently sent her aid unasked, influenced by those trade relations of which so little is heard from the two great historians of the fifth century, but which must have played so decisive a part in the shaping of events. The academic atmosphere of the Athens of the latter part of the century excluded such banausic details from a cultured narrative of events.
Hitherto the offensive operations of the insurgents had been confined to the deposition of the tyrants of the Greek cities.
Herodotus is absolutely silent as to the measures which Artaphernes took in consequence of this bloodless act of war. He can hardly have entertained any illusions as to its significance; yet, if Herodotus’ account is to be taken as a complete narrative of events, the Ionians took the offensive in the spring of 498, some months at least after this act of unmistakable hostility, without meeting at first with any opposition.
H. v. 99.
After the arrival of the ships from European Greece Aristagoras sent an expedition against Sardes. He did not accompany it himself, but placed his brother Charopinos and another Milesian in command. The expedition went by sea to Ephesus, and, leaving the ships at Koresos in the Ephesian territory, went up country under the guidance of the Ephesians.[20]
Following first the river Kaÿster, they afterwards crossed Mount Tmolos, and took Sardes, except the Acropolis, without opposition. That was saved by Artaphernes “with no inconsiderable force.”
ATTACK ON SARDES.
The town was composed of houses either thatched with reeds or wholly constructed of them. One of these was kindled by a Greek soldier, either by accident or design, and the whole place was burnt to the ground. A statement is then made which seems inconsistent with the assertion that the town had been taken without opposition, to the effect that, in consequence of the conflagration, the Lydians and Persians were compelled to defend themselves in the market-place, and that the Ionians, by reason of their numbers, found it advisable to retreat under cover of night to their ships.
The most remarkable feature of this story, as it stands in Herodotus, is its lack of consequence. Cause and effect are as little apparent in it as in the narrative of a dream. Artaphernes, after months of warning, is caught unprepared. Sardes is taken without opposition; yet, when the conflagration takes place, a host, not merely of Lydians, but of Persians also, springs from its very ashes, and in such formidable numbers that the Ionians are obliged to withdraw under cover of night.