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Men have long ago made wise rules from which one ought to learn; one of these is that one should mind one’s own business.
HERODOTUS, HISTORIES, BOOK 1.8; A. D. GODLEY TRANSLATION
Summary
Herodotus states that Croesus, king of Lydia, was the first foreign power to subjugate Greeks and take tribute1 from them. He subjugated Greek colonies that were set up in Asia Minor.
Herodotus then explains how the descendants of Croesus came to power. Before his family ruled, the descendants of Heracles (the Heraclidae) ruled Lydia. The last of the Heraclidae was King Candaules.
Candaules believed his wife, the queen, was the most beautiful woman in the world, and would always say this to his most trusted bodyguard, Gyges. One day, Candaules accused Gyges of not taking him seriously about his wife’s beauty and declared that, in order to rectify this, Gyges needed to see the queen naked. Gyges was horrified by the suggestion and told his master that doing something like that was simply unacceptable. However, Candaules wouldn’t budge and ordered Gyges to follow this plan: Gyges will follow Candaules inside his bedchamber and hide behind the door. When the queen enters, Gyges will watch her undress, and when she turns her back on the door sneak out of the room.
Gyges reluctantly obeyed Candaules. After he saw the queen naked, he slipped out of the bedchamber, but the queen noticed him. Deducing what had happened, the queen kept the matter to herself rather than cry out. The next day, the queen called Gyges to her and gave him an ultimatum: Gyges is to either kill Candaules, marry the queen, and take the throne for himself; or, be executed. Gyges, not wanting to kill his master, tried to talk the queen out of her decision but she was resolute. Gyges chose his to spare his own life. After hiding in the bedchamber the same way he had the night before, he killed Candaules in his sleep. Afterward, he married the queen and became the king of Lydia. When the people of Lydia protested, the oracle of Delphi confirmed that Gyges was now the legitimate ruler of Lydia. Thus, the Heraclidae rule over Lydia ended.
After Gyges, his successors were: Ardys, Sadyattes, and Alyattes (the father of Croesus). During the reign of Sadyattes, Lydia began waging war with Miletus, a Greek colony. Rather than destroy the Milesians, the Lydians would simply plunder and destroy their crops while leaving all of their buildings in tact. This went on for the final six years of Sadyattes’ reign and the first five of Alyattes’. In the final year the Lydians waged war with the Milesians, they went to destroy their crops like normal, but unbeknownst to them, the fires ended up burning down a temple of Athena.
Alyattes fell ill after this, and when his sickness wouldn’t be cured, he consulted the oracle of Delphi about it. The oracle refused to talk to him unless he restored the burnt down temple of Athena. Alyattes then sent a herald to the Milesians to make a temporary truce with them so he could rebuild the temple. However, the king of Miletus, Thrasybulus, had heard about the oracle, and ordered his people to throw a great feast with the little food they had left. When the herald arrived and saw the feast, he reported it to Alyattes who was shocked. After years of having their crops destroyed, the Milesians apparently still had so much food left. Thus, Thasybulus tricked Alyattes into thinking the war barely affected the Milesians and Alyattes made an alliance with the Milesians instead. Alyattes then built them two temples of Athena and soon recovered from his illness. After reigning 57 years, Alyattes died and his son Croesus became king of Lydia.
In a tangent, Herodotus tells the story of Arion. Arion was the best lyre-player alive at the time and was the one who invented the literary form of the dithyramb.2 He decided he wanted to travel to Italy in order to get rich. He sailed off in a boat manned by a crew of Corinthians, thinking he would be safe with them. However, the crew plotted to take his money and kill him. When Arion found out, he begged them to let him sing one last song and then he would jump off the boat. The crew agreed to this, and after Arion sang his song, he jumped into the sea. The boat sailed away, but a dolphin carried Arion on its back and returned him home. Arion went to Corinth and told the king what had happened. Not believing him, the king hid him away. When the Corinthian crew returned, the king asked them about Arion. When they told him they took Arion to Italy, Arion revealed himself and the crew were forced to admit what they had done to him.
The First Tangent
Here in this section of the Histories, we come across the first of many tangents Herodotus goes on: the story of Arion and the dolphin. Remember, that the primary focus of the Histories is the Persian War. However, Herodotus will often stop talking about the Persian War to mention something else entirely. It’s pretty humorous when you think about it. If I were to put a modern spin on this tangent, it would go something like:
“So, Alyattes consults the oracle at Delphi about his illness, but the oracle refuses to listen to him until he rebuilds the temple of Athena he accidentally burnt down during his usual terror campaign against the Milesians. But, guess what? The king of Corinth heard about the oracle and tipped off the Milesian king about it. Oh, and speaking of Corinth, I heard this wild story about this guy who once got saved by a dolphin. You see…”
Look forward to more of this.
I Feel Bad For Gyges
We have in Gyges, yet again, another individual who is caught between a rock and a hard place and has to make a difficult decision. Actually, he was put in a difficult situation twice:
1) Does Gyges obey his master’s order and do something that shouldn’t be done? Or, does he refuse which may lead to a punishment including imprisonment, torture, and/or execution?
2) Having obeyed the order, does Gyges listen to the queen and kill his master, marry the queen, and take the throne? Or, does he refuse and be executed?
One observation that immediately stands out is that, after the queen gave him her ultimatum, why didn’t he immediately go to Candaules and tell him what the queen was doing? Was it because he couldn’t? Was it because Candaules may not believe him? Or, maybe Candaules would believe him, but would still side with his queen because he was completely enamored with her?
Regardless, even though Gyges got to marry and have children with this most beautiful queen, and even though he got to become a king, it would come with a price:
However, the Pythian priestess declared that the Heraclidae would have vengeance on Gyges’ posterity in the fifth generation; an utterance to which the Lydians and their kings paid no regard until it was fulfilled.
Herodotus, Histories, Book 1.13; A. D. Godley translation
That fifth generation would happen to be none other than Croesus. And boy, did he suffer.
I ask myself what I would do in Gyges’ situation. If I stood by my moral conviction of refusing to see my master’s wife naked, my life could be over. If I ignored that conviction to save myself, I would go on to lead a comfortable life—most men’s dream in fact—but one of my future descendants would suffer terribly due to my actions. At the same time, if I were executed for standing by my morals, I wouldn’t have any future descendants. All of those people wouldn’t exist. But, at least then, one of them wouldn’t have to suffer a harsh life because of me.
This just speaks to the broader reality of being forced into situations due to societal norms or power dynamics. Gyges could have refused Candaules if he wasn’t a servant. Or, having done the deed, he could have refused the queen’s ultimatum if he hadn’t been a servant. Removing the power imbalance would be the better option, as the alternative would have been to no longer make it a taboo to see another man’s wife naked without her consent.
Wisdom From the Past
I wanted to take a moment to talk about the epigraph of this post:
Men have long ago made wise rules from which one ought to learn; one of these is that one should mind one’s own business.
Here we see Gyges repeat a rule of thumb that was passed down from generations past. It was a bit of wisdom that was probably learned after much trial and error. In context, this is what Gyges told Candaules after Candaules suggested he see the queen naked to prove to him how beautiful she was. Gyges is basically telling Candaules that it’s not for him to know these kinds of things. It’s none of his business and it needs to stay that way.
Well, Candaules ended up forcing Gyges to make it his business… and it cost Candaules not only his life, but it ended an entire dynasty.
It sounds like the rule made from long ago was wisdom for a reason.
It’s also why we should be careful with ignoring or undoing established wisdom and standards from the past. Unfortunately, our society has not been careful with that—and the effects have been devastating.
That's all for the Histories, Book 1.6-25.
May your days be filled with grace.
-Andronikos
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1Tribute was essentially a tax on conquered regions.
2The dithyramb (dith-ram) was a form of lyric poetry that preceded ancient Greek plays. Typically, they were hymns to the god Dionysus and had a dialogue component to them (usually between a leader and the chorus). They were sang in a way to put the participants into an orgiastic frenzy.