Reginald Walter Macan, Herodotus, The Seventh, Eighth, & Ninth Books with Introduction and Commentary

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ἐξαναχθεῖσαι: ‘longiusinaltum evectae,’ 6. 98, 8. 84, Baehr: the others had rowed παρὰ τὴν ἤπειρον, e. 193 supra.

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οἱ βάρβαροι: Hdt. would perhaps have used the word in this connexion even if the ships had been manned by Greeks. It is not clear whether Sandokes commanded a ship or ships from Kyme, but there was one ship from Paphos, and at least one from Karia, among the fifteen. The squadron of Sandokes appears to have been rather a scratch lot. Perhaps it was composed of just the ships which happened, for one reason or other, to have been the last to put to sea; and Sandokes, happening to be a Persian, or the senior officer on board, was treated as στρατηγός. His στρατηγία is of a quite subordinate and, perhaps, oecasional charaeter: we cannot infer that the fleet had been re-arranged in squadrons of fifteen ships, of mixed origin, under Persian strategoi!

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τῶν ἐστρατήγεε: the sentence is a little irregular, τῶν referring not to πολεμίους but to οἱ βάρβαροι or even to the πεντεκαίδεκα (νἐες). It may be taken as demonstrative rather than as relative. Perhaps the whole passage from τῶν down to διαφυγὼν ἔσεσθαι was not originally in this pericope: that would account, inter alia. for there being here no explanatory note on the office of ‘Royal Judge.’ Such a note occurs in 3. 31. The βασιλήιοι δικασταί are also, however, previously mentioned in 3. 14. The insertion of the note may be due to difference of source or relative importance of occasion; but in any case the absence of the explanation here would be fully covered by the supposition that this anecdote of Dareios was a late insertion. Cp. Introduction, § 9.

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ὁ ἀπὸ Κύμης τῆς Αἰολίδος ὕπαρχος: the title ὕπαρχος is certainly used of ‘Satraps’: e.g. of Oroites 3. 120, of Mitrobates 3. 126, of Aryandes 4. 166, Artaphrenes 5. 25, etc., but it is also used of any lieutenant, or under-governor; so in Thuc. 8. 16. 3 “ὧν ἦρχε Στάγης ὕπαρχος Τισσαφέρνους”. Xenophon's account of Ma<*>a (Hellenics 3. 1. 10 ff.) especially illustrates the point. Her husband Zems, of Dardanos, had been ‘satrap’ of ‘Aiolis’: she applies to Pharnahazos, on the death of her husband, to be made ‘satrap’ in his room, and Pharnabazos, himself the ‘satrap’ in Daskyleion, deeided τὴν γυναῖκα σατραπεύειν. Thereafter she governed tbe district, and showed her gratitude to Pharnabazos hy her conduet. ὸπότε ἐκεῖνος εἰς τὴν χώραν καταβαίνοι πολὺ πάντων τῶν ὑπάρχων κάλλιστα καὶ ἤδιστα ἐδέχετο αὐτόν. Xenophon is not quite a<*>eurate in speaking of a ‘satrap of Aiolis,’ but Sandokes probably held much the same position in 480 B.C. as that occupied by Mania in 400 B.C., being governor of Arolis, under the satrap of Phrygia, and resident in Kyme.

Σανδώκης ὁ Θαμασίου: nothing is known of Thamasios, or Thamasias, wbo has a Greek-looking name for a Persian (eould it be connected with Θαμαναῖος?), nor of Sandokes himself, except what is here recorded. There seem to have been several anecdotes eurrent respecting the Royal Justices of Persia: a similar but more grisly illustration of the Great King's care for judicial purity is told of Kambyses in 5. 25. The two anecdotes are also illustrative of the different methods of Kambyses and Dareios.

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πρότερον τούτων: a rather superfluous note of time in this connexion: perhaps it has come over, with the anecdote, from the source, where the ταῦτα may have referred to something else.

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ἀνεσταύρωσε: crucifixion, or exposure at the stake, was a favonrite orientalism; cp. c. 33 supra, 3. 125, 6. 30, Thuc. 1. 110. 3, and involved a lingering and terrible death.

τῶν βασιληίων δικαστέων: their position explained 3. 31. Cp also 3. 14, 5. 25. The fact that it is here taken for granted does not support the hypothesis of the prior composition of Bks. 7-9 (Introduction, §§ 7, 8), but can be reconeiled therewith; see note above.

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οἶκον τὸν βασιλήιον: cp. 5. 31. By Persian law, according to Hdt. 1. 137, a λογισμός of this kind was in order. οἱ is perhaps rather ethical dative than of agency (=ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ Stein).

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ταχύτερα αὐτὸς ἢ σοφώτερα: the αὐτός would not have been necessary if the sentence had happened to run; ἔγνω ταχύτερα ἢ σοφώτερα ἐργασμένος. The double comparative is of course idiomatic; cp. Madvig § 93.

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ἐργασμένος εἴη is middle (as from ἐργάζεσθαι); optative, as representing the mind of Dareios, not presenting the opinion of the historian, or the mere matter of faet; pluperfeet, but with a continuance of the state, or aspect of the action (εἴη), so long as the man was left on the paling. (Cp. App. Crit.)

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ἔμελλε οὐ τὸ δεύτερον διαφυγὼν <περι>έσεσθαι: the emendation has destroyed a curiosity in the use of substantive verb and aorist participle. Materially, on Herodotean principles, it was too much to expect that any man should have two such escapes. But cp. App. Crit.

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ὡς γάρ: in this sentence σφέας, αύτῶν, and the second σφέας must surely all refer to the same antecedent, which must, strictly speaking, be οἱ βάρβαροι away up in 1. 3 as the masculine προσπλέοντας requires. The observation supports the view that the anecdote just told is an interpolation.

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ἁμαρτάς is an Ionian form, not differing apparently in sense from ἀμαρτία (8. 140). Cp. ἁμάρτημα just above.