Xerxes by Jacob Abbott (ink book reader .txt) 📖
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Human sacrifices.
The army halted, from time to time, for various purposes, sometimes for the performance of what they considered religions ceremonies, which were intended to propitiate the supernatural powers of the earth and of the air. When they reached the Strymon, where, it will be recollected, a bridge had been previously built, so as to be ready for the army when it should arrive, they offered a sacrifice of five white horses to the river. In the same region, too, they halted at a place called the Nine Ways, where Xerxes resolved to offer a human sacrifice to a certain god whom the Persians believed to reside in the interior of the earth. The mode of sacrificing to this god was to bury the wretched victims alive. The Persians seized, accordingly, by Xerxes's orders, nine young men and nine girls from among the people of the country, and buried them alive!
Marching slowly on in this manner, the army at length reached the point upon the coast where the canal had been cut across the isthmus of Mount Athos. The town which was nearest to this spot was Acanthus, the situation of which, together with that of the canal, will be found upon the map. The fleet arrived at this point by sea nearly at the same time with the army coming by land. Xerxes examined the canal, and was extremely well satisfied with its construction. He commended the chief engineer, whose name was Artachæes, in the highest terms, for the successful manner in which he had executed the work, and rendered him very distinguished honors.
Burial of the engineer.
It unfortunately happened, however, that, a few days after the arrival of the fleet and the army at the canal, and before the fleet had commenced the passage of it, that Artachæes died. The king considered this event as a serious calamity to him, as he expected that other occasions would arrive on which he would have occasion to avail himself of the engineer's talents and skill. He ordered preparations to be made for a most magnificent burial, and the body was in due time deposited in the grave with imposing funeral solemnities. A very splendid monument, too, was raised upon the spot, which employed, for some time, all the mechanical force of the army in its erection.
Scene of revelry.
While Xerxes remained at Acanthus, he required the people of the neighboring country to entertain his army at a grand feast, the cost of which totally ruined them. Not only was all the food of the vicinity consumed, but all the means and resources of the inhabitants, of every kind, were exhausted in the additional supplies which they had to procure from the surrounding regions. At this feast the army in general ate, seated in groups upon the ground, in the open air; but for Xerxes and the nobles of the court a great pavilion was built, where tables were spread, and vessels and furniture of silver and gold, suitable to the dignity of the occasion, were provided. Almost all the property which the people of the region had accumulated by years of patient industry was consumed at once in furnishing the vast amount of food which was required for this feast, and the gold and silver plate which was to be used in the pavilion. During the entertainment, the inhabitants of the country waited upon their exacting and insatiable guests until they were utterly exhausted by the fatigues of the service. When, at length, the feast was ended, and Xerxes and his company left the pavilion, the vast assembly outside broke up in disorder, pulled the pavilion to pieces, plundered the tables of the gold and silver plate, and departed to their several encampments, leaving nothing behind them.
The inhabitants of the country were so completely impoverished and ruined by these exactions, that those who were not impressed into Xerxes's service and compelled to follow his army, abandoned their homes, and roamed away in the hope of finding elsewhere the means of subsistence which it was no longer possible to obtain on their own lands; and thus, when Xerxes at last gave orders to the fleet to pass through the canal, and to his army to resume its march, he left the whole region utterly depopulated and desolate.
He went on to Therma, a port situated on the northwestern corner of the Ægean Sea, which was the last of his places of rendezvous before his actual advance into Greece.
Chapter VII. The Preparations of the Greeks for Defense. B.C. 480We must now leave, for a time, the operations of Xerxes and his army, and turn our attention to the Greeks, and to the preparations which they were making to meet the emergency.
The two states of Greece which were most prominent in the transactions connected with the invasion of Xerxes were Athens and Sparta. By referring to the map, Athens will be found to have been situated upon a promontory just without the Peloponnesus, while Sparta, on the other hand, was in the center of a valley which lay in the southern part of the peninsula. Each of these cities was the center and strong-hold of a small but very energetic and powerful commonwealth. The two states were entirely independent of each other, and each had its own peculiar system of government, of usages, and of laws. These systems, and, in fact, the characters of the two communities, in all respects, were extremely dissimilar.
Both these states, though in name republics, had certain magistrates, called commonly, in history, kings. These kings were, however, in fact, only military chieftains, commanders of the armies rather than sovereign rulers of the state. The name by which such a chieftain was actually called by the people themselves, in those days, was tyrannus, the name from which our word tyrant is derived. As, however, the word tyrannus had none of that opprobrious import which is associated with its English derivative, the latter is not now a suitable substitute for the former. Historians, therefore, commonly use the word king instead, though that word does not properly express the idea. They were commanders, chieftains, hereditary generals, but not strictly kings. We shall, however, often call them kings, in these narratives, in conformity with the general usage. Demaratus, who had fled from Sparta to seek refuge with Darius, and who was now accompanying Xerxes on his march to Greece, was one of these kings.
It was a peculiarity in the constitution of Sparta that, from a very early period of its history, there had been always two kings, who had each other, like the Roman consuls in later times. This custom was sustained partly by the idea that by this division of the executive power of the state, the exercise of the power was less likely to become despotic or tyrannical. It had its origin, however, according to the ancient legends, in the following singular occurrences:
The twins.
At a very early period in the history of Sparta, when the people had always been accustomed, like other states, to have one prince or chieftain, a certain prince died, leaving his wife, whose name was Argia, and two infant children, as his survivors. The children were twins, and the father had died almost immediately after they were born. Now the office of king was in a certain sense hereditary, and yet not absolutely so; for the people were accustomed to assemble on the death of the king, and determine who should be his successor, choosing always, however, the oldest son of the former monarch, unless there was some very extraordinary and imperious reason for not doing so. In this case they decided, as usual, that the oldest son should be king.
But here a very serious difficulty arose, which was, to determine which of the twins was the oldest son. They resembled each other so closely that no stranger could distinguish one from the other at all. The mother said that she could not distinguish them, and that she did not know which was the first-born. This was not strictly true; for she did, in fact, know, and only denied her power to decide the question because she wished to have both of her children kings.
In this perplexity the Spartans sent to the oracle at Delphi to know what they were to do. The oracle gave, as usual, an ambiguous and unsatisfactory response. It directed the people to make both the children kings, but to render the highest honors to the first-born. When this answer was reported at Sparta, it only increased the difficulty; for how were they to render peculiar honors to the first-born unless they could ascertain which the first-born was?
In this dilemma, some person suggested to the magistrates that perhaps Argia really knew which was the eldest child, and that if so, by watching her, to see whether she washed and fed one, uniformly, before the other, or gave it precedence in any other way, by which her latent maternal instinct or partiality might appear, the question might possibly be determined. This plan was accordingly adopted. The magistrates contrived means to place a servant maid in the house to watch the mother in the way proposed, and the result was that the true order of birth was revealed. From that time forward, while they were both considered as princes, the one now supposed to be the first-born took precedence of the other.
Two lines established.
When, however, the children arrived at an age to assume the exercise of the governmental power, as there was no perceptible difference between them in age, or strength, or accomplishments, the one who had been decided to be the younger was little disposed to submit to the other. Each had his friends and adherents, parties were formed, and a long and angry civil dissension ensued. In the end the question was compromised, the command was divided, and the system of having two chief magistrates became gradually established, the power descending in two lines, from father to son, through many generations. Of course there was perpetual jealousy and dissension, and often open and terrible conflicts, between these two rival lines.
The Spartans were an agricultural people, cultivating the valley in the southeastern part of the Peloponnesus, the waters of which were collected and conveyed to the sea by the River Eurotas and its branches. They lived in the plainest possible manner, and prided themselves on the stern and stoical resolution with which they rejected all the refinements and luxuries of society. Courage, hardihood, indifference to life, and the power to endure without a murmur the most severe and protracted sufferings, were the qualities which they valued. They despised wealth just as other nations despise effeminacy and foppery. Their laws discouraged commerce, lest it should make some of the people rich. Their clothes were scanty and plain, their houses were comfortless, their food was a coarse bread, hard and brown, and their money was of iron. With all this, however, they were the most ferocious and terrible soldiers in the world.
They were, moreover, with all their plainness of manners and of life, of a very proud and lofty spirit. All agricultural toil, and every other species of manual labor in their state, were performed by a servile peasantry, while the free citizens, whose profession was exclusively that of arms, were as aristocratic and exalted in
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