Justin's excerpt from Pompeius Trogus tells us that Darius sent an embassy to Carthage with the command that the Carthaginians must abstain from human sacrifices and the use of dogs' flesh, burn their corpses instead of burying them; and at the same time he bade them furnish auxiliary troops against the Greeks, whom he intended to attack. The Carthaginians refused the auxiliary troops because they were frequently at war with their neighbours; to the rest of his commands they readily submitted that they might not seem to be obstinate.[304] Both the objects mentioned for the embassy are fictions, though they show an acquaintance with the Arian religion and the views of Darius, but there is no reason to doubt that Darius entered into negotiations with Carthage. Cambyses had already fixed his eye on Carthage, and Darius by the expedition to Barca and Euhesperides, had become the neighbour of the city, the territory of which reached as far to the east as the Great Syrtis. In common opposition to the Greeks the interests of Carthage and Darius were united, for the Greek navy was the rival of the Phenicians and Carthaginians, and the Carthaginians were in conflict with the Greek cities in Sicily. In Justin's account the embassy of Darius came to Carthage at the time when the Carthaginians in Sicily were in conflict with Dorieus. Their struggle to prevent the settlement on Eryx fell between the years 510 and 508 B.C. The expedition against Barca came to an end as we saw in the year 512 B.C. Hence the negotiations between Persia and Carthage must have followed upon this expedition.[305]
While the Persians in the south of the Mediterranean were advancing to the west along the coast of Africa, the army of Megabyzus moved along the north in the same direction (512 B.C.). Perinthus and the cities on the northern shore of the Propontis were reduced and punished, and then Darius gave orders, according to Herodotus, for the reduction of Thrace. "And Megabyzus marched through Thrace, and reduced every nation and every city into submission to the king. The nation of the Thracians is the greatest after the Indians, and if it were united or governed by one man, it would be invincible, and in my opinion the strongest of all nations. But as this is impossible, and can never be brought about, they are weak. They buy their wives at a high price from their parents and sell the children into foreign countries. They regard it as the greatest degradation to till the field, as most honourable to do nothing, as most noble to live by war and plunder. It is a mark of birth to be tatooed, and of low origin to have no print upon the skin. The rich lay out their dead for three days; first they mourn for them, then they slay victims of every kind and make a feast, burn the corpse or bury it, heap up a mound, and celebrate games of all kinds, in which, as is right, the greatest prizes are put up for the victors. They worship only Ares, Dionysus, and Artemis; but their kings also specially worship Hermes from whom they claim to be descended. Of this territory Megabyzus subjugated the whole strip, which lay on the sea, to Darius." The Paeonians, who were settled on the Strymon and round Lake Prasias, assembled on their coast to await the attack. But Megabyzus turned into the inland region to the north of Mount Pangaeum, and from that direction fell unexpectedly upon the cities of the Paeonians, which were undefended. Then each of the Paeonians hastened back to his family and they submitted to the Persians, and Megabyzus caused the Paeonians on the Siris, and the Paeoplians, who were situated to the north of Pangaeum, on the Strymon, to be carried captive to Sardis to the king. "But the Paeonians who dwelt on Mount Pangaeum, and on piles in Lake Prasias, were not at first subjugated by Megabyzus, though he made the attempt."[306]
Together with the tribes of the Thracians, the numerous cities of the Greeks on this coast became subjects of Darius.[307] Doriscus on the mouth of the Hebrus received a Persian garrison.[308] In vain the inhabitants of Teos, more than thirty years previously, had emigrated before the siege of Harpagus, and founded Abdera on this coast—they now became subjects of the Persians. In return for the great service which he had rendered at the bridge on the Danube, Histiaeus the prince of Miletus received permission to found a colony on the Strymon, where it leaves Lake Prasias, in the land of the Edonians, near Myrcinus, on the north-west spur of Pangaeum, which is here clothed with magnificent forests, and possessed fruitful veins of silver.[309] Histiaeus began at once to build the walls which were to protect the new settlement.
With the subjugation of the Paeonians and the crossing of the Strymon, Megabyzus reached the border of an empire, the Macedonian kingdom, the central district of which lay between the Axius and the Haliaemon. Amyntas, the son of Alcetas,[310] the king of Macedonia, was requested by Megabyzus through an embassy of seven Persians to send earth and water as tokens of submission to Darius. Amyntas was in great terror of the Persians, as Herodotus tells us;[311] he did not refuse the request, and thus acknowledged the sovereignty of the Persians. In order to do honour to his envoys, they were hospitably entertained. But when in their intoxication they laid hands on the women of the royal house, Alexander the young son of Amyntas caused them to be cut down with their train. As they did not return, Megabyzus sent his son Bubares, the brother of the Zopyrus who had done good service before Babylon, and was now viceroy there, with an armed force.[312] Amyntas was prepared to pay a large sum as a fine, and to receive the son of Megabyzus at his royal house; he gave his own daughter Gygaea, the sister of Alexander, in marriage to Bubares.[313]
While Megabyzus subjugated the Thracian coast with its harbours and trading-places to the west as far as the Strymon, Otanes had completed the reduction of the rebellious Greek towns to the south of the straits, on the shores of Asia Minor. Not only Lamponium and Antandrus, opposite Lesbos, but also Abydus, Chalcedon, and Byzantium were punished. Coes, who had led the ships from Lesbos to the Danube, had been rewarded for his services to Darius by the government of the island. He was not required to furnish ships to Otanes for the conquest of Lemnos and Imbros. The Lemnians resisted bravely. When they had been conquered, Otanes made Lycaretus, a brother of Maeandrius of Samos (p. 261), tyrant of the island, and he governed it till his death (towards 500 B.C.[314]). With the conquest of Lemnos and Imbros, two large and important islands in the Ægean Sea, in addition to Samos, Chios and Lesbos were gained for the Persian kingdom.
After the expedition across the Danube, Darius intended to carry his conquests to the west of Europe, not to the north. The cantons of Hellas were the aim towards the attainment of which Megabyzus and Otanes prepared the way. The co-operation of the marine appeared indispensable for further enterprises in this direction. The events at the bridge over the Danube had shown Darius that it was extremely rash to leave in the hands of the tyrants of the Greeks the command of the fleet formed out of the vessels from their cities. The Phenicians he could certainly trust, if he led them against the Greeks, but the navigation of the Greeks had long ago driven the trade of the Phenicians from the Greek coasts. In any case it was advisable that a number of leading Persians should be acquainted with the Greek waters, that they might be entrusted with the command of squadrons. That Persians were equal to such an office had been shown in Africa. Darius commanded fifteen Persians selected by himself to go on board Phenician ships in order to visit and investigate the coasts of Hellas and Sicily. The expedition embarked on two Sidonian ships of the line, which were accompanied by a transport vessel, and set sail from Sidon. On board was a Greek physician as interpreter and guide—Democedes of Croton, who had previously been physician to Polycrates of Samos. He had accompanied his master on his unfortunate voyage to Magnesia (p. 261). After the execution of Polycrates, Oroetes had released the Samians in his company, and retained the rest as slaves in his house. When Bagaeus had caused Oroetes to be slain he sent his property and slaves to the court of the king, where Democedes was kept in rags and chains along with his companions in misfortune. It happened that Darius, in leaping from his horse when hunting, dislocated his ancle. The Egyptian physicians, who were in the greatest repute in the east, and had already been retained since the time of Cyrus at the Persian court (p. 134), could not cure the mischief. At last some one remembered to have heard of the fame of Democedes among the Greeks. Darius caused him to be summoned, and was healed by him. Soon after Democedes cured Atossa, the daughter of Cyrus, the first wife of Darius, of a dangerous tumour in the breast. In return for his successful treatment Darius presented him with two pairs of golden chains; and when receiving them Democedes, according to the Greeks, inquired: Whether the king desired to double his misery in return for the cure? From that time he was in high favour with the king, and was appointed a companion of his table, one of the greatest and rarest distinctions in Persia; it was said to be his intercession which rescued the Egyptian physicians who were about to be crucified because they were unable to heal Darius. He now accompanied the expedition, as a man acquainted with the localities, to Hellas and Sicily, in the year 512 B.C. The king bade the Persians keep watch upon Democedes, and not suffer him to escape to the Hellenes. The expedition sailed round Hellas; it kept close to the shore, and sketched the coast; as Herodotus remarks, these were the first Persians who had come to Greece. From Hellas they directed their course to lower Italy. When the Persians were at Tarentum Democedes succeeded in escaping. When it was discovered that he had gone to Crotona, his native city, the Persians sailed thither and requested the inhabitants to give him up, but in vain. Then they experienced a further disaster; they were driven to Iapygia; the crew were captured and enslaved; only after some time had passed were the Persians ransomed by Gillus, a Tarentine exile, and carried back to Persia.[315] However vexatious the loss of his physician might be to Darius, this expedition enabled him to prepare for the enterprise in the Greek waters which he had in view. The main object was attained; a number of Persians had been made acquainted with the sea and the coasts.
FOOTNOTES:
[288] De Rougé, "Revue Archéolog." 8, 51, 52. De Rougé has Aram, Brugsch now reads Elam ("Hist. of Egypt," 2, 297), and translates: "For he also was the great lord of all lands and a great king of Egypt,—in order that I might reinstate the number of the sacred scribes of the temples, and revive whatever had fallen into ruin. The foreigners escorted me from land to land, and brought me safe to Egypt, according to the command of the lord of the land. I did according to what he had commanded. I chose them from all their (?) of the sons of the inhabitants—to the great sorrow of those who were childless—and I placed them under expert masters, the skilful in all kinds of learning, that they might perform all their works. The king did all this—in order to uphold the name of all the gods, their temples, their revenues, and the ordinances of their feasts for ever."
[289] Herod. 2, 110; Diod. 1, 50, 95. For Rach-num-hat which he read previously Brugsch now reads Chnum-ab-rha. "Hist. of Egypt," 2, 299.
[290] Mariette, "Athen. Franç." 1855; Mai, p. 48.