Persian Ambassadors in Sparta

Darius of Persia did not savagely attack the Greek city-states without warning. Being intelligent, he sought to obtain submission first by peaceful means; being a highly civilized man he employed diplomats to convey his message to the Greeks, including Sparta. In this scene from A Heroic King, Darius' ambassadors present their credentials to Sparta's ephors and the two kings. 

 

The Persian ambassadors bowed more deeply and at last pulled their credentials from their long, flowing sleeves for Zopyrus to hand to the Spartan kings. For a moment, Zopyrus was disconcerted because, with two kings, he did not know which took precedence. He decided to give the credentials to the man who looked older, but the man frowned and waved toward the other man. The fairer man unrolled the scrolls and his eyes scanned the contents that were in both Persian and Greek. Then he handed the scrolls back to Zopyrus and with a nod, remarked, “Deliver your message to the ephors. We are here at your request only as witnesses.”

The Persians consulted but agreed that they should proceed. They carefully positioned themselves between the ephors and the kings so they could deliver their message without having their backs to either.

Tisibazus was an eloquent man, and Zopyrus felt his Greek was not always up to the requisite level. He found himself using some words over and over again, and he was frustrated that he could not seem to convey the message adequately, because the Spartans listened utterly expressionless.

Tisibazus reminded the Spartans of the Great King’s many conquests, stressing both his great generosity to those who submitted to his justice and his great wrath with those who defied him. He spoke of the utter obliteration of the defiant Samians, and described vividly the crushing of the Ionian revolt. By this time, three of the ephors appeared to have fallen asleep with their eyes open.

Tisibazus realized he might have talked too long. He shortened his prepared speech slightly, coming to the point. “Athens and Eretrea ― without cause or provocation ― chose to attack the Great King. They burned and sacked his city of Sardis. They killed his soldiers and captured his ships. Yet the Great King has not punished them. He has ― with infinite and truly sovereign restraint ― sent ambassadors to these cities just as he has sent us to you.  All with just one purpose, to secure peace and end this senseless bloodshed unworthy of two civilized peoples. He begs you come to your senses, to use reason rather than passion, as civilized peoples do. He begs you to accept his offer of peace, to bask in the sun of mutual prosperity ― rather than call down the horrors of war upon your innocent wives and children.”

Tisibazus paused. Their audience sat blinking at them blankly like a flock of sheep or sun-bathing lizards. Tisibazus looked to Zopyrus in exasperation.

Finally, one of the Spartans officials, apparently more quick-witted than the rest, seemed to sense that the Persians were finished with their appeal, and asked. “The Great King is offering peace?”

“Yes, exactly,” Tisibazus responded, as soon as Zopyrus had translated. He was relieved that at least one of these apparent idiots had grasped what he was saying.

“But that’s what we already have,” the shorter, darker king burst out, scowling. “We are not at war with Persia.”

“Not yet, perhaps,” Tizibazus responded as soon as Zopyrus had translated, “and war is what the Great King in his divinely inspired mercy is anxious to avoid. He wishes nothing more earnestly than peace for both our peoples.”

“Well, he can have it. We aren’t going to attack him.” The short, dark king declared decisively, glaring at his fellows as if daring them to contradict him. Zopyrus was relieved that at least one of the kings had the backbone to act like a king, while his co-regent raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

“That is wonderful news!” Tisibazus declared when he heard Zopyrus’ translation. He laid a closed fist on his chest and bowed first to the king who had spoken, then to the other king and finally to the ephors, while Zopyrus translated, ending with, “Then you will send the tokens of submission back with us?”

“What tokens of submission?” The dark king demanded.

“Earth and water ― a jar of each ― mere symbols,” Zopyrus explained without waiting for Tisibazus’ answer.

“Symbols of submission, did you say?” the taller king asked.

Zopyrus repeated the word confident he had made no error of translation here, embellishing on his own, “Yes, yes, a mere gesture to show that you wish the Great King no harm and accept him as your overlord.”

What happened next was confusing. As if the five ephors had indeed fallen asleep during the bulk of the speech, they now all started looking at one another and repeating the word, “overlord?”

“What is the matter?” Tisibazus asked Zopyrus irritably.

“They seem unhappy with the word ‘overlord’ ― or indeed the idea of submitting earth and water.”

“Nonsense!” Tisibazus exclaimed. “Tell them it is a small price to pay for peace.” Zopyrus passed the message.

“Small?” The taller king asked in a voice that silenced the room. “You call it small?”

“Yes, of course,” Zopyrus answered even before translating.

Tisibazus elaborated on the answer. “Most subjects of the Great King are compelled to send tribute of all kinds and worth thousands of gold pieces to the Great King. Yet in his infinite mercy and generosity, he has chosen to ask of you only tokens. All we are talking about is a jar of earth, a jar of water, mere acknowledgment of the objective facts.”

“What facts?” the stocky king demanded frowning as if he wasn’t following the speech, despite it being delivered in Greek. Zopyrus began to suspect that the man was thick in the head.

“Why, the plain fact that you are weak and cannot hope to defend yourselves against the might of the Great King.” Came the expected answer from Tisibazus, which Zopyrus translated simultaneously. “By submitting freely to Darius the Allmighty, accepting his sovereignty over you, you do no more than bow to the inevitable, to what is reasonable, and what is right.”

“How dare you tell us what is right!” The stocky king growled belligerently.

Zopyrus translated with some trepidation, but Tisibazus was an experienced diplomat and took the insult in his stride. He bowed with mock respect to the petty king with a smile on his lips that betrayed his contempt, “Forgive me. Perhaps it is presumptuous for us to tell you what is right, but you will also have to acknowledge that whether it is right or not, the Great King commands armies of millions and fleets of thousands and your pitiable army will be crushed like ants beneath the heel of a giant, if it dares to defy us ― just as your brothers in Ionia learned.”

Everyone in the room seemed to hold their breath while Zopyrus translated this reply. When he finished it was the taller, fairer king who answered: “That, sir, is tantamount to saying that the prospect of defeat is grounds for surrender.”

“Isn’t it?” Tisibazus asked opening his arms in a gesture of absolute innocence and his answer seemed to need no translation. He continued, “Is it not the duty of reasonable men to bow to the inevitable? Is it not the privilege of intelligent men to avoid foreseeable disaster? You look like an intelligent man to me,” Tisibazus admitted generously, gesturing for Zopyrus to do his part, and then, this message delivered, he added, “Surely you can see that it is sometimes wiser to bend with the wind than to fight a storm you cannot beat?”

“You have misjudged me,” the tall man snapped, rudely (or so it seemed to Zopyrus) rejecting the compliment the Persian had paid him.

Baffled, Tisibazus cast his colleague a look of incomprehension. They had expected the Athenians to be emotional and foolish, but the picture they had been given of Sparta was of a single-minded, disciplined people, well suited to life inside the Persian Empire. Why these men were so docile and obedient, they had been told, the sons of even their noblemen allowed themselves to be publicly flogged!

Tisibazus’ companion took over, speaking in shorter sentences to ensure the translation went faster. “My colleague has been too oblique perhaps,” the second ambassador said. “The Great King is making you an offer. It is a simple and fair offer. Surrender your sovereignty to him and enjoy his benign reign, or face his wrath.”

“Surrender? Without a fight? To some stranger on the other end of the earth?” The stocky king demanded in a loud voice, his face turning red. “You’re out of your minds!”

Zopyrus did not dare translate that verbatim, but he didn’t need to. Tisibazus, who understood some Greek, had understood the gist of it without translation and answered immediately. “No. Rather you are mad not to accept this generous offer. The Great King could simply have come with his armies and wiped you out. He could have obliterated your entire insignificant city without so much as a siege!” He gestured with his hand as if he were shooing away a fly. “Instead, His Magnificence has shown the kindness of a father toward a wayward son. He has given you the chance to be taken under his care. He has given you an opportunity to become part of his great empire. You should be grateful.”

The two kings looked at one another, and then both stood and walked out of the chamber together without another word. One of the five officials hastily announced. “We will have to take this to the Assembly. We will put it to the Assembly. You will have your answer in three days.”

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"Athens discards her heroes..."

Great as the victory at Marathon had been, it was not decisive. The Persian capacity to launch a new campaign was undiminished and the Persian determination to do so increased. The Spartans knew what was coming, and in this excerpt from A Heroic King, Leonidas is in Athens trying to assess the willingness and ability of Athens to withstand a new assault.

Rain, driven by a strong wind, swept in from the east. The sky darkened dramatically and the clouds hung low, reaching out ephemeral yet ominous hands toward the rooftops. The temperature dropped abruptly and men clutched capes and cloaks more tightly around their shoulders, even before the first heavy drops of rain fell from the hostile sky. The torrent that followed pelted the open squares so violently that the drops jumped up again like millions of tiny fountains, while the rooftops reverberated. The rush of water overwhelmed the gutters and fell in sheets from the roofs, to join the rivulets cascading over the paving stones and sweeping refuse down the alleyways.

Leonidas and his companions dived for cover under the nearest roof and found themselves in the shopfront of a shoemaker. Belts hung from hooks hammered into the plaster wall, and pairs of sandals were lined up in neat rows. The man and his two apprentice sons looked up astonished from their workbenches as four armored men suddenly burst into the humble shop.

One of the boys gaped with an open mouth, but the older man, sitting astride his workbench and pushing a thick needle with thread through the sole of a sandal, got to his feet and came forward, bobbing his head. “My lord, what an honor!” His words were directed not to the Spartan king, whom he did not recognize, but to young Kimon, who had offered to help Leonidas negotiate with the outraged landlord about the damages allegedly done by the Minotaur’s crew.

“Ah―” Kimon took a moment to remember the name, and then it came to him. “Demeas! What a surprise! How are you?” Before the man could answer, he added, “This is King Leonidas of Sparta.” The shoemaker dutifully bobbed his head to Leonidas, while Kimon continued with the introductions. “Demeas fought with my father at Marathon.”

“Indeed! What a day that was! Look!” the shoemaker ordered the Spartan king, “I got this wound there!” He turned slightly sideways and lifted his short, rough chiton to reveal an ugly scar that ran down the side of his thigh. “And there hangs my hoplon!” He pointed deeper into the darkness of the shop, where a battered hoplon hung beside a sword in its baldric.

“Are you well, Demeas?” Kimon asked the shoemaker with apparent interest. “I heard you were ill.”

“No, not really, but business is bad.” He shook his head. “Too many cheap wares fl flooding the market from Thessaly these days. They have cheap leather up there because they have room for huge herds of cattle. The workmanship is crap, but people aren’t willing to pay for quality anymore. All they care about is the price! If it’s cheap, they’ll buy it even if the straps break in a fortnight. Then they run back and buy another pair of cheap sandals, rather than investing in good wares like these!” He grabbed a pair and held them out to Kimon as if he expected him to inspect them.

Kimon nodded politely and remarked, “I’m sorry I have not sent my steward around to buy for the household as my father used to do. I just can’t afford it.”

“I know, my lord―not after the fines the Assembly leveled on your good father. I voted against it! You can be sure many of us did.”

“I know, Demeas,” Kimon assured him. “I was there, even if I wasn’t old enough to vote.”

“They drove your father to his grave, they did―Xanthippos and the others.”

Kimon drew a deep breath but answered with restraint, sad rather than angry: “My father was seriously wounded, Demeas. There was little hope for his recovery.”

“But these ungrateful wretches! If you’d but seen him at Marathon. No one fought better than he did―but they would not even let him put up a monument to himself!”

“But it is true, Demeas, that he could not have won the battle without the others―without you.”

“Well said,” Leonidas remarked, prompting Kimon to add, “In Sparta, no living man is allowed a monument―isn’t that right, Leonidas?”

“Yes. Not even Olympic victors,” Leonidas agreed.

Demeas looked surprised, but not particularly taken with the idea. “But why not? If a man has done something noteworthy, why should he have to die before it is commemorated?”

“Perhaps because too much praise can go to a man’s head―and a man who is top-heavy tends to fall down,” Leonidas explained.

Demeas liked that and laughed heartily, but then he turned to Kimon again and asked, “Is it true, my lord, that we’re all to get ten drachma apiece from the silver mines?” 

“That’s the proposal of the Council,” Kimon assured him. 

“I could use ten drachma!” Demeas admitted. “There’s a break somewhere in the drainage pipe from our latrine, and I need to have the whole thing dug up and replaced. Besides, my daughter’s almost twelve, and I’ll need a dowry for her soon.”

“Ten drachma won’t last for long, though, will it?” a deep voice growled as another man entered the little shop. The newcomer was stocky with a burly chest and a thick, short neck. His short-cropped curly beard and short hair were wet with rain. His chiton came to mid-calf, an awkward length that had neither the elegance of the long robes worn by the rich nor the practicality of the knee-length clothes of workmen and slaves. His nose was rather flat in his broad face, but his eyes were sharp and seemed to glint even in the poor light. They focused directly and pointedly on Leonidas. “King Leonidas, if I’m not mistaken?”

“You are not mistaken, and with whom do I have the honor?”

“Themistocles, son of Neocles.”

“Ah!” Leonidas recognized the name. He had heard much about this man already. But to be sure he was not mistaken, he added, “The man who wanted to build a wall around Piraeus?”

“Yes, that’s me,” Themistocles agreed, his eyes still inspecting Leonidas intently. Abruptly he broke eye contact with Leonidas and turned on the poor shoemaker. “So, Master Shoemaker, you could use ten drachma, but what happens after the ten drachma are used up?”

Demeas shrugged, “At least I’ll have a fixed drainage pipe.”

The others laughed, but not unkindly. Themistocles clapped him on the shoulder and declared, “Indeed, so you would. But what would you say to money that comes in year after year? Not just once, but with every summer?”

“Is there that much silver in the mines?”

“No. That’s the point. The silver won’t go on forever. But if we invest the silver in something that makes Athens strong―really strong―we could multiply the benefits many-fold and keep the money coming in for years into the future.”

“How?” the shoemaker wanted to know.

“You’ll hear about it at the Assembly tomorrow,” Themistocles promised. “But remember what I said. My proposal will put money in the hands of Athens’ poor for generations to come.” Then, without even drawing a new breath, he pointed to a pair of sandals and declared, “Those look about my size.”

Demeas hastened to hand them to him. Themistocles inspected the sandals closely, pulling expertly at the places where they were most likely to come apart, then sat down on the nearest bench, removed the muddy sandals from his feet, and tried on the new pair.

Meanwhile, Kimon, noting that the rain had let up, suggested to Leonidas that they continue….[Outside, Kimon explained Themistocles plan to build 100 triremes, adding] “Themistocles is a brilliant man. My father mistrusted him yet warned me never to underestimate him. Themistocles seems to have an uncanny ability to anticipate developments. Certainly, if Themistocles’ walls had been finished in time, we would have had no need to fear the Persians during the last invasion. Can a navy replace walls? Can it defeat an enemy like Persia before it lands? I don’t know. But I certainly doubt whether even Themistocles can convince the Athenian Assembly―men like Demeas―to give up their ten drachma for the sake of a navy.”

“But the navy would put money in their pockets, too. That was his point,” Eurybiades entered the conversation. “He’s trusting that men much poorer than Demeas will see the advantages of a standing fleet that needs more than seventeen thousand oarsmen―year after year.”

“Yes, that’s what he’s counting on,” Kimon agreed. “But triremes don’t last forever. They ream from beaching too often or grow barnacles from being too long at sea. And once they start taking on water or can’t keep up with the others, they will be discarded like a pair of old shoes. Who will pay then for the new ships? Go down to Piraeus and count the number of hulks rotting on the shore―all once-proud triremes.”

“Athens discards her heroes when they no longer serve her,” Leonidas reflected sadly, adding softly, “Like your father.” Kimon sighed and looked away, not meeting Leonidas’ eyes. “Why do you stay? With the money you paid to an ungrateful Assembly, you could have founded a colony somewhere else. My brother did.”

“I can’t leave,” Kimon admitted, helplessly gesturing to the city around him. “Athens isn’t Aristides and Xanthippos―much less Kallixenos or Pheidon! It’s not even Themistocles or my father. It’s Demeas and all the men like him: men without any particular politics or vision, yet a dogged determination to be themselves. Demeas can’t afford his panoply, and he is certainly no trained soldier like you Spartans, but when the Persians landed at Marathon, he was there with that battered hoplon and his cheap sword, and he stood for six hours with blood gushing from his thigh against the onslaught of an army twice our size.” Kimon shrugged. “I can’t explain it, but it has to do with something in the air here. Freedom―despite the stink of broken latrines.” He paused and turned to look at Leonidas. “And, I promise you, they will fi ght for it as they did at Marathon. They will fight when the Persians come, by land or by sea. They will die fighting rather than surrender their freedom. You can count on that, Leonidas. On us.”

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The Chians did not go crawling on their bellies....

The Ionian Revolt was hastily suppressed, leaving hundreds of men dead -- and the women and children in slavery. Herodotus specifically mentions the castration of attractive boys. In this excerpt from A Heroic King, one of those slave boys, now serving the concubines of a Persian Ambassador on a diplomatic mission, finds himself in Sparta 

“What can I sell you today, young sir?” said the woman behind the sweets stand, bringing him back to the present.

“Oh, I’m just a slave,” he hastened to correct her, ever conscious of his status. “But―but I do have money to buy―for my mistress. I’m sure she’d like some of these.” He pointed to the honey squares.

“Only those?” the saleswoman asked, astonished. “What about some of the raisin and walnut tarts? Or my lemon squares? Do you want to test my wares to be sure they are good enough?” she suggested with a little wink.

Danei understood her gesture as one of kindness from a woman showing sympathy for a boy in bondage. Her kindness lured a smile from him as he glanced up and asked, “May I try the lemon squares and the almond tarts, please?”

She smiled back and bent to retrieve a knife from under the counter to start cutting into her wares. His eyes focused hungrily on the sweets, Danei did not realize someone had come up behind him until a deep male voice asked, “Where are you from, young man?”

Danei nearly jumped out of his skin. He turned to look over his shoulder at the owner of the voice and felt his heart in his throat. It was one of the Spartiates―tall, muscular, tanned, and wearing bronze armor including a helmet tipped on the back of his neck, the nosepiece resting on his forehead. Danei wanted to flee. He started to shrink back, away from this man who smelled of sweat and bronze and freedom. “I―I’m―no one,” Danei told him. “I’m sorry.” He turned to run, but the woman stopped him.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of, young sir. That’s just the master come to snatch a slice of cheesecake for himself. Here.”

Still poised to flee, Danei turned to look at her. She was smiling at him, an almond tart on the palm of her hand. “You need it more than he does,” she noted with a little nod in the direction of her master―who, incomprehensibly, laughed at her impudence.

Danei gaped. No Persian’s slave would risk using such a tone of voice with his master, and if they did, they would probably have their tongue torn out. “It’s all right,” she assured him gently, “the master won’t hurt you.”

“She’s right. I won’t.”

Danei still hesitated, but now it was in shame rather than fear. The man was the embodiment of masculinity, and Danei felt the scar between his legs as if he were naked. He looked down at the pavement beneath his feet, rooted to it from sheer humiliation. He was remembering how they had been lined up and castrated on a bloody block, one after the other, without so much as a glass of wine. Two men held the boys down backward over the block. The surgeon made a few expert cuts with his knife. The removed genitals landed in a bucket that had to be emptied several times before the day was over, and then each new eunuch was pushed off the block to make room for the next victim.

Danei had struggled too much at the wrong moment. The surgeon’s knife slipped and the man cursed in professional annoyance. Another man grabbed Danei and crushed a cloth down into his wound with all his might, ignoring Danei’s screams. Danei passed out. When he came to again, a crude bandage was made fast to his crotch with tarred twine and the bleeding had slowed to a trickle, but he would never again walk without a limp.

He was yanked from his memories by the saleswoman. She reached out and took his hand, pressing her pastry into it. As he looked up and met her eyes, he saw only his mother looking back at him, not just pitying him but encouraging him, too. He closed his eyes, unable to bear it.

“You speak with the accent of the islands,” the terrifying Spartan hoplite insisted. “Which island are you from?”

Danei looked up at him and mouthed the word. When was the last time he’d dared utter it? “Chios, master,” he whispered, and then he dropped his eyelids over his eyes to hide his tears. The word, said at last, instantly conjured up images: the sun coming up over the Aegean, the smell of the soil when his father turned it with a plow, the humming of the bees in their little orchard, his mother singing ….

“Chios?” the Spartan inquired, unsure if he had read the youth’s lips correctly.

Danei nodded, his eyes still down and staring, unintentionally, at the Spartan’s sandaled feet while his free hand tugged unconsciously at the hem of his shirt, pulling it down to cover his crotch more completely.

There was a pause. Then the deep voice said softly, “A man’s heart―not his extremities―make him a man. My life was once saved by a squadron of Chian triremes. I know the Chians did not go crawling on their bellies to the Persians, but died upright, as free men. I believe the sons of such men have the hearts of lions―no matter what the Persians have done to their bodies.”

Danei gasped and looked up. Their eyes met only for an instant, and then the Spartan turned and was gone. Danei stood rooted to the pavement and watched the Spartan continue down the street. He was filled with a strange sensation of lightness.

Danei’s father had been boatswain on one of Chios’ proud triremes, and he had been killed at sea in the great sea battle. More than half of Chios’ ships had been crushed and sunk in that battle, but the remainder, with shattered rams and crushed sides, limping and listing, had been dragged to Chios by the triumphant Persians. There the captive men had been hog-tied and run up the halyards of their own ships like bunting. There they had been left to die slowly of thirst as the sun burned them like rotting grapes. Danei had recognized some of the men, the fathers and brothers of friends, his cousins, a maternal uncle. While the men died overhead, the Persians had herded the boys onto the open decks and divided them into categories: the galleys, the mines, whores, eunuchs ….

Danei stared after the Spartan until he turned a corner and was lost from sight, and still he stared after him, trying to remember with every nerve of his body what he had said. A man’s heart, not his extremities…. The image of his father, dressed as he had been the day he sailed away for the last time…. His father had died a free man…. The sons of such men…. He turned and looked at the saleswoman in wonder.

She was no longer alone. The exchange had attracted two other Spartiates. They were younger than the man who had spoken to Danei. The first, wearing a striped chiton and hair braided at a rakish angle, remarked, “You can take his word for it, young man. He knows what he’s talking about.”

“But―who was he, master?”

“That was Leonidas, the man who should be king of Sparta.”

Danei looked again in the direction in which the Spartan had disappeared, as if hoping he might re-emerge, but he did not. When Danei turned back, the other Spartiates, too, had faded into the crowd. Only the woman selling sweets was still there. “How many do you want?” she asked.

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An Improper Proposal

One of the key events leading to the confrontation between Persia and Greece at Thermopylae in 480 BC was the subject status of the Greek cities of the Eastern Aegean. These cities had submitted to Persian overlordship in the reign of Cyrus, but they soon grew restless. When the "tyrant" of Miletos Aristogoras grew tired of Persian suzerainty over his city, he looked for allies to help him regain his independence. The first place he went was to Sparta. The excerpt below from A Peerless Peer is based on Herodotus.

Aristagoras opened his appeal: “I hope, Cleomenes, that you are not too surprised by my visit. After all, Sparta is the leading city in all Greece, and you are the Spartan king with the greatest intelligence and vision.” Cleomenes bowed graciously at the compliment, although he had far from forgotten the insults of this morning.

“Now, the fact is this,” Aristagoras continued: “the Ionians have become slaves to the Persians. This is not only their shame, but yours.” Cleomenes raised his eyebrows. “It is your shame, King Cleomenes, because—as I said earlier—the Spartans are the leaders of Greece; and if any Greek is enslaved, then it diminishes your own glory.”

“Ah,” Cleomenes remarked ambiguously.

“But if you do that which is pleasing to the Gods and come to the aid of your oppressed brothers, you will find rich rewards. I do not speak only of the rewards of glory and fame—although these would be yours in abundance—but also the rewards of riches quite beyond counting.”

“We have highly trained accountants here,” Cleomenes corrected the impertinent stranger.

“So I heard—your women.” Aristagoras laughed to show he recognized this was a joke.

Cleomenes only frowned.

“Please, may I show you something I had made and transported all this way merely to show you where your own interests lie?”

Cleomenes was scowling now. “What?”

“If I may send to my quarters?”

“Of course.” Aristagoras asked one of the attending helots to go to his quarters and ask his own slaves to bring “the map.”

Shortly afterward, four of Aristagoras’ slaves appeared, carrying the awkward box offloaded at Limera. Cleomenes was curious, and he got up to stand over the slaves as they pried open the wooden box, revealing a large bronze sheet on which a map of the world had been etched. “Here,” Aristagoras explained, pointing, “are the Gates of Herakles. Here is Italy and Sicily, and here is Hellas, with this dot representing Sparta.”

Cleomenes pointed, “And that is the Isthmus, Corinth, and there is Athens.”

“Exactly! Now, look here. These are the oppressed cities of Ionia. Here is the Persian provincial capital of Sardis, and here—all the way over here—is the principal seat of the Great King, Susa. But his Empire does not end here. It goes on and on and on to the very ends of the earth in the East. The riches of all this vast Empire would be yours, if only you defeat the Persians in Ionia.”

Cleomenes gave the tyrant-emissary a skeptical look.

“I have seen your army and I have heard that it is the best in the world—that is why I wonder so much at its staying here idle when your brothers cry out to you to save them from the Persian yoke. You will have no trouble beating the Persians. They fight in turbans and trousers, and their weapons are bows and short spears hardly better than their arrows. They are softened by a life of luxury and rich foods, nothing like your tough young men! If you defeat these effeminate men with their perfumed hair and painted faces in Ionia, you will not only have freed your brothers, but this whole, vast Empire will be yours for the taking.” He gestured with his hand.

“Odd that these perfumed men with painted faces have conquered such a vast empire, then, isn’t it?” Cleomenes noted.

“That was decades ago, under Cyrus. The new generation is soft.” Aristagoras dismissed Cleomenes’ objection and pointed to the map again. “Look, here is Lydia, a fine, rich country where the noblemen have houses filled with gold; and then Armenia, rich in cattle; here are Assyria and Cilicia and Media; and here Arabia, rich in spice, Phoenicia, the master of the Mediterranean, and Egypt, with all the riches of the Nile; here is conquered Babylon and humbled Media. Here, beyond the banks of the Choaspes, is Susa.” He pointed to a star on the map. “This is where the Great King lives and keeps his treasure—the tribute paid by all these subject states and peoples. But beyond is still half the Empire—there is Parthia, Bactria, and India.” He paused again and looked at Cleomenes’ face.

Cleomenes’ eyes were narrowed, and he appeared to be calculating.

“Look!” Aristagoras drew his attention back to the lower left-hand quarter of the map, where the Greek peninsula was etched onto the bronze. “Isn’t it time you stopped squabbling over this insignificant rocky scrap of land and turned your attention—and your superb army—to places of great fertility and wealth? Why do you shed the blood of your beautiful young men in interminable skirmishes with the Argives and Arcadians? Why not set before them a task worthy of their skills and courage? There is no gold or silver to be taken from Messenia or Arcadia—poor, rocky places that they are. But here!” He pointed again to Persia and Susa. “Here are treasures beyond imagination, and all waiting for whoever is bold enough to seize them.”

Cleomenes’ eyes were swinging from Greece to Susa and back again. At last, he asked, “Just how far is it from Sparta to Susa?”

“Your troops, I am told, march very fast. I was told that they can be in Messenia in a day or Athens in three. So if they were to set off from Miletos marching at that pace, they could reach Susa in three months.” Aristagoras was being generous. Even Persian royal messengers using relays of horses took a month. He did not really think a Spartan army could cover the distance in three months, but he thought this sounded plausible enough to impress upon Cleomenes how vast the Persian empire was.

Cleomenes, however, took a step back from the map, which he had been examining closely, and announced sharply, “Stranger! Your proposal to take the Lacedaemon Army three months’ journey from the sea is highly improper! You must leave Sparta before sunset!”

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Night at Thermopylae

Athough historians doubt the tale told by Diodorus of a Spartan raid into Xerxes camp on the night before the final battle at Thermopylae,

the story is just too good to exclude from a novel. Here's an excerpt from "A Heroic King," which describes how it may have come about.

By the time Dienekes and Oliantus reached Leonidas' tent, a heated argument was raging among Leonidas' closest friends. "For all we know, he's a fake, a plant, a traitor," Alkander was arguing.

"So what?" Prokles answered. "He came out of Xerxes camp, and he knows where the bastard's tent is."

"But why should he lead you to it?"

"Because I'll have a sword up his ass!"

"So he'll lead you to Hydarnes' tent, and when you're surrounded by Immortals, he'll squeal."

"So what? Then I die sooner rather than later. What the hell difference does it make? But if I can get him to lead me to the Great Asshole himself, there's a chance I could cut off the snake's head. If Xerxes is killed, that whole anthill won't be able to take another step!" Prokles was gesturing contemptuously toward the Persian positions. "They'll be headless -- or rather, all Xerxes' brothers will be so busy fighting one another for the throne, they won't have another thought for us. That's the real advantage of their polygamy, you know; they produce packs of royal whelps who hate one another more than anyone else in the world."

"And what do you propose to do? Stroll through the West Gate by the light of the full moon and say 'cheers' to Persians sentries as you walk past?"

"You're still a stupid little--"

"Prokles!" Leonidas cut him off and turned to Dienekes. "Everything alright?"

"Yes, an eager young lad by the name of Gylis is on his way right now. What's this all about?"

"We have in the form of this Tyrrhastiadas of Cyme," Prokles answered, "a man in our midst who knows the exact location of Xerxes' tent. He could lead me to it. All I need to do is slip inside --"

"The unguarded, isolated royal tent--" Alkander mocked sarcastically.

Leonidas clapped his hands once sharply to shut Alkander up, and Prokles continued, "And cut his throat. Then the whole war, let alone this battle, will be over."

Leonidas looked straight at Dienekes without a word.

"It sounds like a good idea to me. I'd say, six men. No more and no less."

"Why so many? THey'd just attract attention!" Prokles protested.

"The idea is too good to put all our hopes on the likes of you!" Dienekes retorted bluntly. "We should send in two teams of three men each. One can take the path that leads up from the Hot Gates over the spot where Xerxes had his throne. The helots can show the way up, and our deserter can show them the way down. The other three can take a fishing boat around to the back of the camp," he gestured vaguely toward the lights that dotted the dark stretch of the coast beyond the Malian Gulf. "From there they can ask their way to Xerxes' tent, which will hardly be a secret. Given the number of Ionian troops with the Great King's army, no one will take any note of a trio of Greek hoplites. We should have thought of this days ago."

"Choose the men, Dienekes -- anyone but yourself," Leonidas warned.

"For the three men to go over the mountain: Mindarus, Labotas, and Gallaxidoros. They're all born mountaineers, used to hunting in the harshest parts of Taygetos. For the sea route: Prokles here, Bulis, who speaks some Persian and has seen Xerxes face-to-face, and...." He paused for a moment, thinking carefully, before deciding, "Temenos."

Leonidas started slightly at this last choice, but he had told Dienekes to make the selection and had no grounds for calling his decision into question. "Fetch them," he ordered Meander.  

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