DISCLAIMER: I AM NOT AN ANCIENT GREEK SCHOLAR. FOR THE FULL DISCLAIMER, READ HERE
Buy my new book None Escapes Life's Coils: My Journey Through the Plays of Sophocles. Kindle and Paperback versions available.
I hold it then in every way proved that Cambyses was quite insane; or he would never have set himself to deride religion and custom.
HERODOTUS, HISTORIES, BOOK 3.38; A. D. GODLEY TRANSLATION
Summary
After Cambyses’ disastrous military campaign against the Ethiopians, the Egyptians recognized that the god Apis had appeared. Whenever a cow miraculously conceived and gave birth, the calf was recognized to be Apis revisiting Egypt once again. The Egyptians would dress up and hold a festival in Apis’ honor.
Cambyses, thinking the Egyptians were celebrating his loss, called in Egyptian rulers and asked them what was going on. When the rulers told him, he thought they were lying and put them to death. Next, he called in priests and asked them the same question, to which they gave him the same answer. Cambyses mocked the appearance of Apis and ordered the priests to bring Apis to him. When they did, he attempted to stab Apis in the stomach, but hit its thigh instead. He then mocked the Egyptians for having gods of flesh and blood, had the priests flogged, and then ordered that any Egyptians found celebrating were to be killed. The festival was abruptly ended and Apis died of its wound. The priests then secretly buried Apis.
After this moment is when Herodotus says Cambyses went insane and began to act evil. He had his biological brother killed after he had a dream where he a messenger told him his brother was sitting on the Persian throne. He married two of his sisters and killed one of them because she openly despised Cambyses for kill their brother.
Next, he killed the son of the man he sent to kill his brother. This man, Prexaspes, was Cambyses’ most trusted Persian subject who personally delivered all messages to him. After Cambyses asked Prexaspes what he heard the Persians say about him, Prexaspes responded that the Persians thought highly of him except that they thought he drank too much. Cambyses, thinking the Persians believed he was insane, said that he would prove he wasn’t by shooting Prexaspes’ son, who was Cambyses’ cup-bearer, through the heart with an arrow. If he hit the son, it would prove his sanity. If he missed, it would prove the Persians correct. Cambyses shot the boy, and upon an autopsy, found that Cambyses had hit him in the heart, making Cambyses gleeful that he proved the Persians wrong.
After Cambyses had killed the boy, as well as buried alive twelve Persian nobles for a minor offense, Croesus, the former king of Lydia turned advisor to the Persian royal family, told Cambyses he was acting reckless. Cambyses responded by trying to shoot him, but Croesus ran away. Cambyses ordered his attendants to find and kill Croesus, but instead they hid him, thinking that later Cambyses would change his mind. Cambyses did, in fact, change his mind later on and wished Croesus was still around. When the attendants brought Croesus before him, Cambyses was happy to see him still alive. However, he was angry with the attendants for not killing Croesus and had them executed.
Herodotus then says that Cambyses would go on to desecrate some tombs and religious sites in Egypt. Putting all of this together, Herodotus concludes that Cambyses was definitely insane.
The Sacred Disease
Writing on Cambyses’ health, Herodotus writes:
“He is said to have been afflicted from his birth with that grievous disease which some call ‘sacred.’ It is not unlikely then that when his body was grievously afflicted his mind too should be diseased.”
Herodotus, Histories, Book 3.33; A. D. Godley translation
The “sacred disease” was the ancient Greek’s term for epilepsy. The reason it was called the “sacred disease” was because it was believed those who had it were possessed by one of the gods or getting divine revelations from the gods.
Here’s a sneak peak of an author I will be covering (way) down the road. Hippocrates (of Hippocratic Oath fame), or someone from his school, wrote a work called On the Sacred Disease. I’ll quote the opening lines of this work:
It is thus with regard to the disease Sacred: it appears to me to be nowise more divine nor more sacred than other diseases, but has a natural cause from the originates like other affections. Men regard its nature and cause as divine from ignorance and wonder, because it is not at all like to other diseases. And this notion of its divinity is kept up by their inability to comprehend it, and the simplicity of the mode by which it is cured, for men are freed from it by purifications and incantations. But if it is reckoned divine because it is wonderful,1 instead of one there are many diseases which would be sacred; for, as I will show, there are others no less wonderful and prodigious, which nobody imagines to be sacred.
Charles Darwin Adams translation
As you can see, Hippocrates dismissed the idea that epilepsy was due to the gods doing something to the person. This is one of the reasons why he made such an impact: he sought natural explanations for diseases and tried to find cures not based on superstition, but on the science of the day.
Fun fact #1: Hippocrates was one of the first to suggest healthy eating and exercise as a lifestyle.
Fun fact #2: Hippocrates didn’t write the Hippocratic Oath.
Religion and Custom
Cambyses is seen throughout this section mocking and even interfering with the religious practices and customs of the Egyptians. Herodotus even blames Cambyses’ descent into insanity on his malicious killing of the Apis calf.
It would be easy to turn this into some commentary on respecting other cultures’ customs, or respecting the practices of other religions.2 However, Cambyses wasn’t just being disrespectful. He was being brazenly hostile. Here’s one example—possibly the most shocking of the handful of examples Herodotus gives:
Also he entered the temple of Cabeiri, into which no one may enter save the priest; the images here he even burnt, with bitter mockery.
Herodotus, Histories, Book 3.37; A. D. Godley translation
That is more than just being derisive. That is more than just saying mean things about a religion and thinking its people stupid. That is iconoclastic. That is the work of someone who thinks he can burn down a church and get away with it. And, to be realistic, he could get away with it because of his position which gives him power and places him above criticism. It’s no wonder Herodotus wanted to blame Cambyses’ insanity on his hostility toward the Egyptians’ religious practices. At least then one could say that Cambyses truly didn’t get away with his actions.
Croesus Gets Canceled
Our favorite former Lydian king makes another appearance. If you will recall, Cyrus sent Croesus with Cambyses to be his advisor just before he launched his campaign against the Massagetae and died in battle:
Then he entrusted Croesus to the care of his own son Cambyses, to whom he would leave his sovereignty, telling Cambyses to honor Croesus and treat him will if the crossing of the river against the Massagetae should not go well. With these instructions, he sent the two back to Persia, and he and his army crossed the river.
Herodotus, Histories, Book 1.208; A. D. Godley translation
We see in this section of Book Three that Croesus faithfully upholds Cyrus’ request. We first see him tell Cambyses his truthful opinion in contrast to the Persians who were simply trying to flatter Cambyses:
For it is said that before this, while some Persians and Croesus were sitting with him, Cambyses asked what manner of man they thought him to be in comparison with Cyrus his father; and they answered, “Cambyses was the better man; for he had all of Cyrus’ possessions and had won Egypt and the sea besides.” So said the Persians; but Croesus, who was present, and was dissatisfied with their judgment, spoke thus to Cambyses: “To me, son of Cyrus, you do not seem to be the equal of your father; for you have as yet no son such as he left after him in you.” This pleased Cambyses, and he praised Croesus’ judgment.
Herodotus, Histories, Book 3.34; A. D. Godley translation
This response hearkens back to Croesus’ conversation with Solon the Athenian while he was still king of Lydia.3 When Croesus had asked Solon whom he thought was the happiest man he met, Solon replied a man from Athens named Tellus. Aside from dying a glorious death and being honored by the public for it (in other words, Tellus had a good end to his life while not suffering any misfortune along the way), Tellus was the happiest because he had good and noble children and saw all his grandchildren survive. Croesus knew that Cyrus was more fortunate than Cambyses because he had a son to pass his legacy to, but Cambyses did not.4
Next, however, things don’t go as well for Croesus. When he calls out Cambyses’ erratic behavior after casually murdering Prexaspes’ son and burying alive a group of Persian nobles for a minor offense, Cambyses tries to kill him. As we read above, Croesus ultimately survives the experience.
Cambyses’ response to Croesus’ criticism, though, is very interesting to me:
“It is very well that you should even dare to counsel me; you, who governed your own country so well, and gave fine advice to my father—telling him, when the Massagetae were willing to cross over into our lands, to pass the Araxes and attack them; thus you worked your own ruin by misgoverning your country and Cyrus’, who trusted you. But you shall regret it; I have long waited for an occasion to deal with you.”
Herodotus, Histories, Book 3.36; A. D. Godley translation
Cambyses uses Croesus’ past as a justification to not only ignore him, but to finally execute him—all because Cambyses didn’t like what Croesus had to say. This is basically the ancient version of what happens on social media nowadays. Don’t like what someone has to say? Can’t argue against their point? Resort to personal attacks and then use whatever leverage you have to get them “canceled.”
Nothing new under the sun.
One last thing I wanted to touch on with this story. Croesus had to have known that, after observing Cambyses’ behavior, that speaking up would potentially mean the end of his life. However, he did so anyway in order to honor the charge that the late king Cyrus gave him.
Croesus is the kind of advisor everyone needs. Someone who isn’t afraid to speak up and give his assessment or opinion of a situation—even if it means it may cost him his reputation or worse. You know that advisors like that are out for your best interests rather than their own gain.
May there be more Croesus’ in the world. May their value be understood and appreciated.
And may there be fewer Cambyses’.
That's all for the Histories, Book 3.27-38.
May your days be filled with grace.
-Andronikos Anodos
Kindle and paperback versions available.
Find me on social media!
The books list I am going through.
Thumbnail: Cambyses Slays the Apis Bull. Taken from Cyclopedia of Universal History by John Clark Ridpath, 1890.
1I’m guessing, by “wonderful,” Hippocrates (or the translator) meant something beyond comprehension, astonishing, strange, etc.
2Although, the very people who preach this to the rooftops seem to have no problem openly deriding and interfering with certain religions—as if those religions are the exception to the rule for some reason.
3See Book 1.30
4This conversation will end up being a foreshadowing of things to come, although Herodotus had already mentioned something along these lines in Book 1.209-10.