Herodotus' Words: Cambyses II in Egypt

The Histories by Herodotus painted the most fascinating, colorful and BS stories considering his work meant to be non-fiction. Herodotus’ account of Cambyses invasion of Egypt was already filled with gossip and stories, but his stay in Egypt continued this flair.

Image of Cambyses with prisoners

1. Revenge on Amasis and Psammenitus

Despite the mercy he showed to Psammenitus after his answer about his companion touched the heart of the Persian court, the deposed Egyptian leader planned a rebellion against the occupation. 

And if he had known how to mind his own business, he would have regained Egypt to govern…But as it was, Psammenitus plotted evil and got his reward; for he was caught raising a revolt among the Egyptians; and when Cambyses heard of it, Psammenitus drank bull's blood and died. Such was his end.

As for the original target of Cambyses, Amasis, the Persian king did not let death stop him from having his revenge.

Entering the house of Amasis, he had the body of Amasis carried outside from its place of burial; and when this had been done, he gave orders to scourge it and pull out the hair and pierce it with goads, and to desecrate it in every way. When they were weary of doing this (for the body, being embalmed, remained whole and did not fall to pieces), Cambyses gave orders to burn it, a sacrilegious command.

They desecrated Amasis body as an act of revenge, or so they thought. Herodotus then flouted a conspiracy that the molested corpse did not belong to Amasis. Nevertheless, he himself did not believe it in the end. He wrote:

...as the Egyptians say, it was not Amasis to whom this was done, but another Egyptian of a like stature, whom the Persians despitefully used thinking that they so treated Amasis. For their story is that Amasis learnt from an oracle what was to be done to him after his death, and so to avert this doom buried this man, him that was scourged, at his death by the door within his own vault, and commanded his son that he himself should be laid in the farthest corner of the vault. I think that these commands of Amasis, respecting the burial-place and the man, were never given at all, and that the Egyptians but please themselves with a lying tale.

2. The Legend of the Table of the Sun

 

Cambyses then planned to follow up his invasion of Egypt with other conquests, such as against the Phoenicians, Ammonians, and the Ethiopians. For the last, he wanted to know the truth about the legendary and bountiful Table of the Sun. 

...to Ethiopia he would send first spies, to see what truth there were in the story of a Table of the Sun in that country, and to spy out all else besides, under the pretext of bearing gifts for the Ethiopian king.Now this is said to be the fashion of the Table of the Sun. There is a meadow outside the city, filled with the boiled flesh of all four-footed things; here during the night the men of authority among the townsmen are careful to set out the meat, and all day he that wishes comes and feasts thereon. These meats, say the people of the country, are ever produced by the earth of itself.

Cambyses then requested for “fish-eaters” from the Elephantine, an island along the Nile, to serve as his messengers/spies to Ethiopia bearing gifts.

“When the Fish-eaters came from Elephantine at Cambyses’ message, he sent them to Ethiopia, charged with what they should say, and bearing gifts, to wit, a purple cloak and a twisted gold necklace and armlets and an alabaster box of incense and an earthenware jar of palm wine. These Ethiopians, to whom Cambyses sent them, are said to be the tallest and fairest of all men. Their way of choosing kings is different from that of all others, as (it is said) are all their laws; they deem worthy to be their king that townsman whom they judge to be tallest and to have strength proportioned to his stature.” 

Unfortunately, the meeting did not went well as the Ethiopians sensed the ulterior motive for the mission.

These were the men to whom the Fish-eaters came, offering gifts and delivering this message to their king: “Cambyses king of Persia, desiring to be your friend and guest, sends us with command to address ourselves to you; and he offers you such gifts as he himself chiefly delights to use.” But the Ethiopian, perceiving that they had come as spies, spoke thus to them: “It is not because he sets great store by my friendship that the Persian King sends you with gifts, nor do you speak the truth (for you have come to spy out my dominions), nor is your king a righteous man; for were he such, he would not have coveted any country other than his own, nor would he now try to enslave men who have done him no wrong. Now, give him this bow, and this message: "The King of the Ethiopians counsels the King of the Persians, when the Persians can draw a bow of this greatness as easily as I do, then to bring overwhelming odds to attack the long-lived Ethiopians; but till then, to thank the gods who put it not in the minds of the sons of the Ethiopians to win more territory than they have."

3. The Legendary Lost Army of Cambyses 

Cambyses, determined to invade Ethiopia, and along the way, decided to conquer the Ammonians too. Unfortunately, unlike the Egyptian campaign, Cambyses ordered the invasion ill prepared and badly supplied. Fearing cannibalism, he aborted the campaign.

...he himself went on towards Ethiopia with the rest of his host. But before his army had accomplished the fifth part of their journey they had come to an end of all there was in the way of provision, and after the food was gone they ate the beasts of burden till there was none of these left also…he went ever forward, nothing recking. While his soldiers could get anything from the earth, they kept themselves alive by eating grass; but when they came to the sandy desert, certain of them did a terrible deed, taking by lot one man out of ten and eating him. Hearing this, Cambyses feared their becoming cannibals, and so gave up his expedition against the Ethiopians and marched back to Thebes, with the loss of many of his army; from Thebes he came down to Memphis, and sent the Greeks to sail away.

The Ammonian campaign fared no better with supplies and the environment hampering the army’s progress. Herodotus wrote:

As for those of the host who were sent to march against the Ammonians, they set forth and journeyed from Thebes with guides; and it is known that they came to the city Oasis, where dwell Samians said to be of the Aeschrionian tribe, seven days’ march from Thebes across sandy desert; this place is called, in the Greek language, the Island of the Blest. Thus far, it is said, the army came; after that, save the Ammonians themselves and those who heard from them, no man can say aught of them; for they neither reached the Ammonians nor returned back. But this is what the Ammonians themselves say: When the Persians were crossing the sand from the Oasis to attack them, and were about midway between their country and the Oasis, while they were breakfasting a great and violent south wind arose, which buried them in the masses of sand which it bore; and so they disappeared from sight. Such is the Ammonian tale about this army.

4. Despotic Cambyses

Cyrus the Great came to be known as a tolerant conqueror and the same expected to be with his successors, unfortunately, a pissed off Cambyses, back from a botched campaign created scandalous actions that smeared his reputation. In particular, his killing of the sacred and highly venerated Apis Bull.

After Cambyses came to Memphis there appeared in Egypt that Apis whom the Greeks call Epaphus; at which revelation straightway the Egyptians donned their fairest garments and kept high festival. Seeing the Egyptians so doing, Cambyses was fully persuaded that these signs of joy were for his misfortunes, and summoned the rulers of Memphis; when they came before him he asked them why the Egyptians acted so at the moment of his coming with so many of his army lost, though they had done nothing like it when he was before at Memphis. The rulers told him that a god, who had been wont to reveal himself at long intervals of time, had now appeared to them; and that all Egypt rejoiced and made holiday whenever he so appeared. At this Cambyses said that they lied, and he punished them with death for their lie.

Executing guides to a religious festival mistaken as a celebration of failure failed to convince Cambyses who then followed through.

…he next summoned the priests before him. When they gave him the same account, he said that “if a tame god had come to the Egyptians he would know it”; and with no more words he bade the priests bring Apis. So they went to seek and bring him. This Apis, or Epaphus, is a calf born of a cow that can never conceive again. By what the Egyptians say, the cow is made pregnant by a light from heaven, and thereafter gives birth to Apis… When the priests led Apis in, Cambyses—for he was well-nigh mad—drew his dagger and made to stab the calf in the belly, but smote the thigh; then laughing he said to the priests: “Wretched wights, are these your gods, creatures of flesh and blood that can feel weapons of iron? that is a god worthy of the Egyptians. But for you, you shall suffer for making me your laughing-stock.

He banned the festival, punished the priest, and promised no mercy to those caught celebrating. Herodotus commented the episode as Cambyses descent to madness.

5. Assassination of Smerdis and Marrying his Sister

Herodotus added proof of Cambyses madness. One of the most consequential being the death of his brother Smerdis. Cambyses felt jealous of his brother’s strength and sent him back to Persia. A dream where Smerdis slew Cambyses and took the throne added to Cambyses paranoia and decided to eliminate the threat.

His first evil act was to make away with his full brother Smerdis, whom he had sent away from Egypt to Persia out of jealousy, because Smerdis alone could draw the bow brought from the Ethiopian by the Fish-eaters as far as two fingerbreadths; but no other Persian could draw it. Smerdis having gone to Persia, Cambyses saw in a dream a vision, whereby it seemed to him that a messenger came from Persia and told him that Smerdis had sat on the royal throne with his head reaching to heaven. Fearing therefore for himself, lest his brother might slay him and so be king, he sent to Persia Prexaspes, the trustiest of his Persians, to kill Smerdis. Prexaspes went up to Susa and so did; some say that he took Smerdis out a-hunting, others that he brought him to the Red Sea and there drowned him.

Cambyses then decided to marry his sister, which seemed odd if not abomination in the eyes of the Persians.

he made away with his full sister, who had come with him to Egypt, and whom he had taken to wife. He married her on this wise (for before this, it had by no means been customary for Persians to marry their sisters): Cambyses was enamoured of one of his sisters and presently desired to take her to wife; but his intention being contrary to usage, he summoned the royal judges and inquired whether there were any law suffering one, that so desired, to marry his sister. 

The judges, fearing reprisal from the mad Cambyses, decided to give a political answer. They just thought that the King of Persia had the power to do whatever he pleased. Cambyses married a sister and after becoming tired, eliminated one for the other. 

These royal judges are men chosen out from the Persians to be so till they die or are detected in some injustice; it is they who decide suits in Persia and interpret the laws of the land; all matters are referred to them. These then replied to Cambyses with an answer which was both just and safe, namely, that they could find no law giving a brother power to marry his sister; but that they had also found a law whereby the King of Persia might do whatsoever he wished. Thus they broke not the law for fear of Cambyses, and, to save themselves from death for maintaining it, they found another law to justify one that desired wedlock with sisters. So for the nonce Cambyses married her of whom he was enamoured; yet presently he took another sister to wife. It was the younger of these who had come with him to Egypt, and whom he now killed.

Smerdis by William Caxton, 1480

See also:

Herodotus' Words: Cambyses II and His Conquest of Egypt

Cambyses II

Bibliography:

Herodotus, trans. by A.D. Godley. "Herodotus The Persian Wars (Godley )/Book III." Wikisource. Accessed on November 9, 2024. URL: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Herodotus_The_Persian_Wars_(Godley)/Book_III