Whatever the measure of success attained, it was more than compensated for by the loss of the battle on land. There was grievous treachery in the Cypriote army. Stesenor, tyrant of Kourion, with a large band, deserted during the battle; and part, at least, of the Salaminian contingent followed his example. Onesilos and one of the Greek tyrants perished in the battle.
The Ionian fleet seems to have remained some time longer upon the coast, until, at any rate, the Persians began the siege of the various Greek cities. Then, finding itself powerless to effect anything, it sailed away home. CHRONOLOGICAL DISCREPANCY. One of the towns, Soli, held out for five months, but with its capture the revolt of Cyprus came to an end; and “thus,” says Herodotus “the Cyprians, after a year of freedom, were enslaved anew.”
Five months of siege would protract the revolt far into the winter of 497–96. It is noteworthy that the chronological details deducible from the account of the revolt in Cyprus are in reasonable agreement with the general statements as to its duration. This chapter of the history of the revolt as a whole is, indeed, conspicuous as being the only one in which chronological data can be said to be existent.
From the end of the revolt in Cyprus in the winter of 497–96 until the siege of Miletus in 494, the course of recorded events does not admit of any certain chronological arrangement, and, apart from this, the record is manifestly of a most fragmentary character.
It is now necessary to carry back the story to the Ægean coast. Earlier in the year the Ionian fleet had brought about the revolt of Caria and the district of the Propontis. These events can be attributed with some assurance to the spring and early summer of 497. But the chronology of the measures taken by the Persians to reduce these revolted regions to submission is so hopelessly involved that it is impossible to accept it.[29]
H. v. 116, ff.
The greatness of the chronological discrepancy will be best appreciated when it is pointed out that Herodotus in one chapter ascribes the reduction of the revolt on the Hellespont and in Caria to a period which, H. v. 103. if the data of a previous chapter be correct, must have been from four to six months before the outbreak of the insurrection in those regions. Of the two series of chronological data the earlier one is by far the more trustworthy. It is connected with the outbreak of the revolt by a continuous chain of events whose dates can be fixed with reasonable probability. The later chronological series is not merely in disaccord with the previous one, but, if adhered to, renders the whole story of the revolt incomprehensible. The reader wanders amid a maze of circumstances without cause and without effect.
The main incidents attendant on the suppression of the revolt on the continent of Asia Minor seem, in so far as they are told, to be correctly told by Herodotus, in all save their chronological setting. The modern world has, at any rate, no other evidence on the subject. On the question of fact the position must be accepted. On the question of chronology, Herodotus must be corrected by his own chronological statements, and by the strong presumptive evidence of his own statements of fact. The direct evidence makes it quite clear that the measures undertaken by the Persians for the suppression of the widespread revolt were not undertaken at the time to which he attributes them. His statements of fact render it possible to form some conclusion as to when they were undertaken.
It is not possible to assign an earlier date than the summer of 497 to the despatch of the Ionian fleet to Cyprus. Herodotus himself says that the General Council of the Ionians were prompt in their decision to send it. It may reasonably be concluded that the circumstances of the insurrection on Asia Minor were at the time in a favourable condition. The lack of hesitation would be otherwise incomprehensible, inasmuch as the combination of the cities against attack was, from the vary nature of things, dependent upon the fleet.
It is not a mere assumption to say that the circumstances must have been favourable. The formidable character of the rising had been well-nigh quadrupled by the accession of the Hellespont, Caria, and Cyprus to the insurrection in the earlier half of the year 497. The forces which Artaphernes had at his disposal were sufficient to save the citadel of Sardes in 498, and to inflict some sort of reverse on the retreating Ionians at Ephesus; but were they sufficient to cope with the infinitely more dangerous situation in the early months of the following year?