The Battle of Marathon: Part 2 - Cyrus

I know this goes well, well before the Battle of Marathon, and perhaps the title of the last couple blogs is a touch misleading, but gosh darn it the Persian stuff is crazy interesting. There's been baby prejudice (though both eating them and attempting to murder them), psychotic kings, and enough political intrigue to pass for a "poignant" television show on HBO. And just like a good HBO drama, there are a plethora of characters with separate backstories that all somehow link together into one little package. Lets meet them:

Astyages, the king of Media - brutal and cold, fond of infanticide.
Harpagos, general in Astyages army - he may have eaten his own son, but notably against infanticide.

Without the taking of Lydia,
Cyrus the Great may have only
been known as "the pretty good".

Cyrus, Persian baby - narrowly avoiding his murder as an infant, he's rising up and a little angry.

Cyrus grew up to become a member of what was a very small Persian population. They were also a population that was rather upset with the rule of Astyages, and understandably - I believe I've done well enough to show that he was not a pleasant fellow. Eventually the Persians got fed up with him to the point that a revolt was now in the cards. Astyages, in all his infinite wisdom, decided to send Harpagos to quell the rebellion. Keep in mind this is the very same Harpagos that quite possibly ate his own son earlier due to the trickery of the king (at least according to the Greek historian that is going to be pretty well the only source we're going to get on the matter). Somehow - somehow! - Astyages didn't see any possible discontent within the ranks. The result was a Median force that went to stomp out a rebellion, but ended joining it instead. Suddenly, Harpagos was buddy buddy with the leader of the rising Persian force - none other than Cyrus, the child prophesized to usurp the king of Media, Astyages.

Fearing the worst after hearing the news of his general moving to the other side, he sent out another force to meet them - but that force brought the king in chains and turned him over. It really makes you think just how terrible this guy was to his people. He gets undermined at every turn. While Astyages' fate becomes a little muddled after this (but we can presume it didn't lead to a very positive outcome) what's really important is the fact that Persia and Media essentially merged - well, not entirely, but for all we need to know, they're essentially one and the same. Unfortunately for them, they had little time to celebrate as Lydia, the powerful and rich land to the west got word and wasn't really too fond of having a strong military power on their border while not knowing of their intents.

Croseus, the leader of Lydia, feels it's a good idea to let the Greeks know of the impending threat and sends for some help before this force to the east truly becomes a powerful and established army. They quickly hop on board, knowing that any army that's big and strong but isn't of their own flesh and blood is inherently a negative. Feeling confident in their wealthy, Greek-supported fighting force, Croseus sets out to check on the Persians. He moves to defend the city of Sardis before his allies arrive. He's also a little overconfident; thinking these Persians won't put up much of a fight, he sends home a large number of his men, except for his trump card - his expert cavalry force, enough to rival anyone against him basically on their own.

Croesus, shares my personal desires of being immortalized
on jars after my death.

The Persia/Media army, with Cyrus at the helm, suddenly realize that war is coming and the stakes are high. If they don't hit them now, they're going to be going against one heck of an army when the Greeks arrive, so they have no choice but to knock these guys off before they can become unified and stronger than ever. Croesus, powerful army of cavalry at his side, moves to meet the Persians in the open field. However, Cyrus had a trick up his sleeve, as he knew this was to be the case.

Camels.

Horses are notoriously skittish creatures, and when they see something new and unexpected they may not be so willing to charge into battle towards it. Knowing this to be true, Cyrus leads a great number of men on camels into the fray, terrifying the horses and sending them anywhere but where they needed to go. The Persian archers only had an undefended, scared, and defenceless infantry to deal with. It was a rout. Lydian forces retreated as fast as they could, back towards Sardis to defend the walls and lick their wounds.

Camels. The beast that scared the tremendous
cavalry force of Croesus into submission.
Camels. Really.

Unfortunately for Cyrus, attacking a walled city usually ended up in siege warfare that could take weeks, and time was not on his side. Knowing reinforcements were on the way, he had to act fast and take them out as soon as possible. Now, there's a story that Herodotus relates to the siege that should be taken with a grain of salt. It's hard to say exactly how true it is, or if it's just a good story to pass along. He says the Persians spotted a section of the walls where it was so tall that it was virtually undefended. A Persian scout was watching this section and saw a defender drop his helmet off the edge by accident, and climbed down a section of the wall to retrieve it, and returned without much issue. A Persian scout saw this and reported it back to the generals, showing them how to climb a section of seemingly unscalable wall where the defenders would be scarce. They had the rather easy decision of saying that was the place to attack from. The end result was an annihilation of the city much faster than a traditional siege. Croesus had an unknown fate, but that hardly matters - Persia took their capital and made it their city. While the story may sound far fetched at first, archaeological evidence was found (somehow) that could very well relate it to truth. After finding what is very likely to be the spot of attack, they found the remains of a man the appropriate age for a soldier, with arms broken from what may be desperately defending sword attacks, in a position that likely would have had him thrown from the wall. The icing on the cake was finding a helmet roughly the age of when Cyrus would have attacked just feet from his body. Who knows? Could be true.

So I leave you with Cyrus at the helm, strong as ever, having defeated the Lydians. Greece is already not too fond of them. We'll see how this plays out.