The Old and the Restless - The Egyptians and the Scythians in Herodotus' Histories by Robert J. Hagan

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invasion of the Massagetae. Cyrus’ campaign against Tomyris is unsuccessful because, among
other reasons, the Persians have become softened through their taste of Ionian culture and are
thus unable to overcome the comparably harder Massagetae. Although he aptly keeps some
initial rebellions in check, Darius is unable to conquer his intended targets the Scythians and the
Greeks, who as hard peoples, both use unconventional tactics when confronted. The Scythians
use Fabian tactics to wear down the Persians, and the Greeks deploy their most famous hoplite
charge at Marathon (6.112), thus demonstrating the impossibility of a soft people vanquishing a
hard foe, at least as far as Herodotus tells us. 39
In establishing this dynamic, Herodotus sets up a broad reading of the history of the
Persians’ wars: an ongoing struggle between the hard and the soft; the civilized and the
undercivilized. To grow as an empire is to inevitably assimilate and in doing so, one is bound to
fall into the trap of new luxuries and soft living. The mainland Greeks have a reminder of this
danger not far away in the form of the Ionians, and the memory of the long-gone Lydian Empire.
The Lydians succumbed to soft living and were overrun by the Persians as a result. Supposedly
the descendants of Heracles, the epitome of masculinity, they tumble into court intrigue under
Candaules, whose excessive pride in his wife’s beauty becomes his ruin. He is so proud that he
forces his favorite bodyguard, Gyges, to play the voyeur as she takes off her clothes in the
bedroom, an immoral request given that “among the Lydians and most of the foreign peoples it is
felt as a great shame that even a man be seen naked.” After consenting, Gyges is seen by the
shamed woman, who offers him an ultimatum: he must be killed for seeing the queen naked and
disgracing her, or kill the immoral king and become her husband. He carries out the task and
becomes king of Lydia, founding his dynasty on treachery and sexual intrigue.
39 Redfield, J., “Herodotus the Tourist” 111-112.