Achaemenid History • II The Greek Sources Proceedings of the Groningen 1984 Achaemenid History Workshop edited by Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg and Amélie Kuhrt Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten Leiden 1987 ACHAEMENID HISTORY 11 THE GREEK SOURCES PROCEEDINGS OF THE GRONINGEN 1984 ACHAEMENID HISTORY WORKSHOP edited by HELEEN SANCISI-WEERDENBURG and AMELIE KUHRT NEDERLANDS INSTITUUT VOOR HET NABIJE OOSTEN LEIDEN 1987 © Copyright 1987 by Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten Witte Singe! 24 Postbus 9515 2300 RA Leiden, Nederland All rights reserved, including the right to translate or to reproduce this book or parts thereof in any form CIP-GEGEVENS KONINKLIJKE BIBLIOTHEEK, DEN HAAG Greek The Greek sources: proceedings of the Groningen 1984 Achaemenid history workshop / ed. by Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg and Amelie Kuhrt. - Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten.- (Achaemenid history; II) ISBN90-6258-402-0 SISO 922.6 UDC 935(063) NUHI 641 Trefw.: AchaemenidenjPerzische Rijk/Griekse oudheid; historiografie. ISBN 90 6258 402 0 Printed in Belgium TABLE OF CONTENTS Abbreviations. VII-VIII Amelie Kuhrt and Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg INTRODUCTION. IX-XIII Pierre Briant INSTITUTIONS PERSES ET HISTOIRE COMPARATISTE DANS L'HIS- TORIOGRAPHIE GRECQUE. 1-10 P. Calmeyer GREEK HISTORIOGRAPHY AND ACHAEMENID RELIEFS. 11-26 R.B. Stevenson LIES AND INVENTION IN DEINON'S PERSICA . 27-35 Alan Griffiths DEMOCEDES OF CROTON: A GREEKDOCTORATDARIUS' COURT. 37-51 CL Herrenschmidt NOTES SUR LA PARENTE CHEZ LES PERSES AU DEBUT DE L'EM- PIRE ACHEMENIDE. 53-67 Amelie Kuhrt and Susan Sherwin White XERXES' DESTRUCTION OF BABYLONIAN TEMPLES. 69-78 D.M. Lewis THE KING'S DINNER (Polyaenus IV 3.32). 79-87 Dieter Metzler STILISTISCHE EVIDENZ FUR DIE BENUTZUNG PERSISCHER QUELLEN DURCH GRIECHISCHE HISTORIKER. 89-91 Oswyn Murray HERODOTUS AND ORAL HISTORY. 93-115 Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg THE FIFTH ORIENTAL MONARCHY AND HELLENOCENTRISM. 117-131 VI TABLE OF CONTENTS Christopher Tuplin THE TREATY OF BOIOTIOS. 133-153 G. Wa1ser PERSISCHER IMPERIALISMUS UND GRIECHISCHE FREIHEIT (Zum Verhiiltnis zwischen Griechen und Persern in friihklassischer Zeit). 155-165 Bibliography . 167 ABBREVIATIONS AA Archiiologischer Anzeiger. ABL Harper, R.F. (1892-1914), Assyrian and Babylonian Letters belonging to the Kouyunjik Collection of the British Museum I-XIV, London, Chicago. AC L'Antiquite Classique. AfO Archiv fiir Orientforschung. AJSL American Journal of Semitic Languages. AMI Archiiologische Mitteilungen aus Iran. ANET J.B. Pritchard (ed.) Ancient Near Eastem Texts, Oxford-Princeton 1955 2 (19693). An.Or. Analecta Orientalia. A&R Atene e Roma. ASNP Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. BaM Baghdader Mitteilungen. BCH Bulletin de Correspondance Hellenique. BIDR Bollettino dell'Istituto di Diritto Romano. BiOr Bibliotheca Orientalis. BRM II A.T. Clay, Legal Documents fi'om Erech dated in the Seleucid era (312-65 BC), New York 1913. CAH Cambridge Ancient History. Cam b. Strassmaier, J.N. (1890), Inschriften von Cambyses, Konig von Babylon (529- 521 v. Chr.), (Babylonische Texte 8-9), Leipzig. CHI Cambridge History of Iran. CDAFI Cahiers de la Delegation Archeologique Fran<;aise en Iran. CJ The Classical Journal. CQ Classical Quarterly. CRAI Comptes Rendus de l'Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres. CSSH Comparative Studies in Society and History. CT Cuneiform Texts in the British Museum. D.A.G.R.Dictionnaire des Antiquites grecques et romaines, red. Ch. Daremberg & E. Saglio, Paris 1877-1919. FGrH F. Jacoby, Die Fragmente der Griechischen Historiker, Berlin/Leiden 1923- 1958. GGA Gottingische Gelehrte Anzeigen. HSCP Harvard Studies in Classical Philology. IrAnt Iranica Antiqua. JAOS Journal of the American Oriental Society. JEA Journal of Egyptian Archaeology. JEOL Jaarbericht van het Vooraziatisch-Egyptisch Genootschap Ex Oriente Lux. JHS Journal of Hellenic Studies. JNES Journal of Near East Studies. JSOT Journal for the Study of the Old Testament. JWI Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institute. NEB New English Bible. NBD Moore, E. (1939), Neo-Babylonian Documents in the University of Michigan Collection, Ann Arbor. VIII ABBREVIATIONS NRVU Ungnad, A. & San Nicolo, M. (1929-1935), Neubabylonische Rechts- und Verwaltungsurkunden iibersetzt und erliiutert, Bd. I: Rechts- und Wirtschafts­ urkunden der Berliner Museen aus vorhellenistischer Zeit, Leipzig. OECT Oxford Editions of Cuneiform Texts. OIP Oriental Institute Publications. PCPS Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society. PFT Hallock, R.T., Persepolis Fortification Tablets, (OIP 92), Chicago 1969. pp La Parola del Passato. PTT Cameron, G.G., Persepolis Treasury Tablets, (OIP 65), Chicago 1948. RE Pauly's Realenzyklopiidie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft: bearbeitet von G. Wissowa (Stuttgart). REG Revue des Etudes Grecques. RhM Rheinisches Museum. RLA Reallexikon der Assyriologie, Berlin. RSI Rivista Storica Italiana. RTP P. Briant, Rois, Tributs et Paysans, Paris 1982. SBAW Sitzungsberichte der Bayerischen Akad. der Wissenschaften, Phil.-Hist. Ab­ teilung. SDAW Sitzungsberichte der Dt. Akad. der Wissenschaften zu Berlin, Klasse fUr Philosophie, Staats-, Rechts-, und Wirtschaftswissenschaften. SHAW Sitzungsberichte der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phil.-Hist. Klasse. SPAW Sitzungsberichte der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Stir Studia Iranica. TAPhA Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association. TCS Texts from Cuneiform Sources TPhS Transactions of the Philological Society. TRE Theologische Realenzyklopiidie, hrsg. G. Krause & G. Muller, Berlin 1974ff. TvG Tijdschrift voor Geschiedenis. UET Ur Excavations, Texts. UVB Vorliiufige Berichte iiber die von der Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissen­ schaft in Uruk-Warka unternommenen Ausgrabungen. VAB Vorderasiatische Bibliothek. VAT Vorderasiatische Tontafelsammlung, Berlin. VS Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmiiler der Koniglichen Museen zu Berlin. VT Vetus Testamentum. YOS VII Tremayne, A. (1925) Records from Erech, time of Cyrus and Cambyses ( 538- 521 BC), New Haven, Conn. YOS/BT Yale Oriental Series: Babylonian Texts. ZA Zeitschrift fUr Assyriologie und verwandte Gebiete. ZDMG Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenliindischen Gesellschaft. INTRODUCTION Of the two most famous wars in ancient history, the Persian Wars and the Punic Wars, only the latter has, very recently, ended in an armistice. A newspaper clipping announced that the Mayor of Rome and the Consul of Tunisia had signed an agreement for the ending of hostilities. The Persian Wars are not over yet, and one might be tempted to see in the repeatedly uttered accusations of 'hellenocentrism' and 'iranocentrism' in scholarly liter­ ature a sign of continued warfare. The echoes of Marathon and Salamis are still resounding. Not only to the extent that two, often well defined, parties can be distinguished in the field of research on early Persian history, roughly corresponding with classical historians on the one side and archaeologists on the other, but also because the Persian Wars have caused the conceptual framework that profoundly influences all perceptions of the history of the Achaemenid period to come into being. History in the sense that we under­ stand it is, at least partly, a result of the great conflict between Greece and Persia. In its formation it embodies a particular way of thinking that was typical of the Greek fifth century. However great, generous and honest the first historian of Persia may have been, he nevertheless participated in a conflict, no longer perhaps overt but still lingering on. Strict neutrality, if such a thing is ever possible for a historian, was beyond even the reach of Herodotus, although he made a serious attempt. Later, in the fourth century the parties became more clearly defined but at the same time real interest in the Persians was lost and consequently they were reduced to two-dimensional figures. Persian history was now neatly divided into two periods, one of vigour and one of decay: the boundary between these usually taken as coinciding with the 'Great Persian Wars.' The empire itself was no longer seen as an evolving state with problems and successes, with developments and changes within its administrative structure and in its relations with subjects, but as a petrified entity dominated by the shadowy figure of the King of Kings. This was the picture of Persian history at the time of Alexander, when the original model of it gradually ceased to exist. The concept was frozen and immobile and has lasted for two millennia. It has had its functions and was used, first by Alexander and his troops and for centuries afterwards by European historians. It even remained quite unaffected by the great discoveries of the 19th century: the decipherment of Old Persian cuneiform hardly influenced the principal tenets on which Persian history was based. Not even the important excavations in Iran had any substantial effect on the received image: if the monuments did not agree with Herodotus, so much the worse for X AMELIE KUHRT- HELEEN SANCISI-WEERDENBURG the monuments. The Greeks could not have been too far wrong: they were first of all Greeks, and therefore almost infallible, and secondly, they had been contemporaries and thus had first hand knowledge. This picture has only very recently become unsatisfactory.· As Iranian linguists and archaeologists attempted to analyze their material within its own frame of reference the Greek brand of Persian history seemed to supply very few answers to their