Scythian campaign of Darius I
Scythian campaign of Darius I | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Map of the European Scythian campaign of Darius I | |||||||
| |||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
Achaemenid Empire Ionian allies | Royal Scythians | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Darius I Megabazus Ionian allies: Miltiades the Athenian Strattis of Chios Histiaeus of Miletus Coes of Mytilene |
Idanthyrsus Scopasis Unnamed others | ||||||
Units involved | |||||||
Mostly infantry;[1] 80,000 after Darius' return to Asia (Herodotus)[2] | Unknown number of Scythian horsemen[3] |
The Scythian campaign of Darius I was a
The Scythians managed to avoid a direct confrontation with the Persian army due to their mobile lifestyle and lack of any settlement (except Gelonus), while the Persians suffered losses due to the Scythians' scorched earth tactic. However, the Persians conquered much of their cultivated lands and damaged their allies, forcing the Scythians to respect the Persian force. Darius halted the advance to consolidate his gains, and built a defence line.
Practically everything that is known of this campaign is from Herodotus's book The Histories; almost no Persian sources exist, and no Scythian ones. As a result, it is difficult to know for sure how much of Herodotus's account is accurate.
The campaign
Darius crossed the
While moving eastwards in the European Scythian lands, he captured
Towards the end of the campaign
Darius ordered a halt at the banks of
Further reasons behind the invasion past the Danube
The whole area from central Thrace to Georgia and from Ukraine to the north-east Mediterranean formed a compact area with mutual economic interests between Scythians, Thracians or Ionians, and Iranians.[9] In strategic terms, Darius must have seen that some Scythian-type peoples extended from Ukraine all the way to what is modern-day Uzbekistan, forming a continuum of dangerous nomadic raiders.[9] Furthermore, control of the Black Sea recognized no international divisions. The Persians and the Greeks (many of whom lived in the Persian Empire, while another number lived in the Greek colonies in what is nowadays southern Ukraine) had a common interest in seeking to control the source of Scythian exports of gold, grain, hides, and furs. As Fol and Hammond further state, Ctesias, a Greek doctor at the Persian court ca. 400 BC, wrote that before the invasion of Darius into the European Scythian lands a satrap of Cappadocia named Ariaramnes had crossed the Black Sea to the north, raiding the European Scythian regions with a fleet of thirty penteconters, returning with Scythian men and women, including the brother of a Scythian king.[9]
While some have supposed that the reason for Darius' invasions was merely to destroy the Scythian lands, the erection of a bridge over the
Date of the invasion
Though Herodotus does not mention the season of the year, as Fol and Hammond write, it is possible to infer it, knowing that if Darius marched from Susa in spring 513 BC, he would have reached Chalcedon in May, and mustered his forces on the European side in June. Thus, he may have started to go beyond the Danube in late August.[9]
Aftermath
Darius inflicted widespread damage on the Scythians and their allies, weakened the prestige of the Royal Scythians especially, and upset the balance of power among the various peoples of the region.[9] But because he failed to bring the Scythians to battle, he was unable to secure any territorial gains and he did not even complete the building of the forts at what could have been a frontier.[9] The campaign was little more than an expensive stalemate.[9] As winter now had come, Darius did not return to attack, and marched towards Thrace, towards his firmly secured territories.[9]
Some form of
Involved groups
Allied groups to the Scythians included the
Assessment
The Scythian campaign was decisive in that the Persians abandoned the attempt to subjugate the European Scythians.[9] Herodotus was correct in his assessment that the Scythians owed their escape to their mobility, their lack of inhabited centres, and the skill of their mounted archers.[9] He furthermore states that their refusal to submit to Persia was due to such factors as the authoritarian power of the kings, the widespread hatred of foreigners (IV.76.1),[9] and the ordinary man's belief that what brought him and his tribe honour was the killing of enemies.[9] The various Scythian tribes co-operated with each other, winning support of other neighboring peoples as well.[9] In that regard, they showed more of a sense of a community than the Greek city-states were to show through much of the subsequent Greco-Persian Wars.[9]
See also
- Scythia
- History of Ukraine
- History of the Balkans
- Gherla
- Achaemenid Macedonia
- First Persian invasion of Greece
- Gog and Magog
References
- ^ Herodotus, Histories, 4.136.2
- ^ Herodotus, Histories, 4.143.3
- ^ Herodotus, Histories, 4.136.2
- ISBN 9004282157p 70
- ^ Shahbazi 1996, p. 41.
- ^ Woolf 2004, p. 686.
- ^ Ross 2004, p. 291.
- ^ Beckwith 2009, p. 68-69.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Boardman 1982, pp. 239–243.
- ^ Boardman 2012, pp. 239–243.
- ^ Herodotus 2015, pp. 352.
- ^ Chaliand 2004, p. 16.
- ^ Shahbazi 1996, p. 45.
- ISBN 9781107016521.
- ^ DNa - Livius.
- ^ Boardman 1982, p. 67.
- ^ Harmatta 1999, p. 128.
Sources
- Ross, William; H. G. Wells (2004), The Outline of History: Volume 1 (Barnes & Noble Library of Essential Reading): Prehistory to the Roman Republic (illustrated ed.), Barnes & Noble Publishing, ISBN 978-0-7607-5866-3, retrieved 28 July 2011
- Boardman, John, ed. (1982). ISBN 978-0521228046.
- ISBN 978-3-774-92415-4.
- ISBN 978-0375712715.
- Shahbazi, Shapur (1996), "Darius I the Great", Encyclopedia Iranica, vol. 7, New York: Columbia University
- Woolf, Alex; Steven Maddocks; Richard Balkwill; Thomas McCarthy (2004), Exploring Ancient Civilizations (illustrated ed.), Marshall Cavendish, ISBN 978-0-7614-7456-2
Further reading
- The Cambridge Ancient History, Volume 10 - IV Persia, Greece and the Western Mediterranean, pp 66–67