(Worn relief thought to be of Darius I in Parsa, photographed by O.
Mustafin, [Public Domain] via Creative Commons)
If ancient sources are true,
the reign of Cambyses II (ruled 530-522 BCE) came to a peculiar end. It all
happened in 522 BCE, when either Cambyses’ brother Bardiya (also known as
Smerdis), or an imposter posing as Bardiya, successfully usurped power in
Persia.
The story about the fake
Bardiya (or the False Smerdis) can be traced back to an elaborate inscription
on the Bīsitūn (or Behistun) rock, located in modern-day Iran. In
this multiple-column inscription, Darius I “The Great” (r. 522-486 BCE)
recorded how he came to rule Persia, as well as some of the exploits he
accomplished during his reign.
Darius
I gave a fairly sterile version of his ascension to power. His monument in
Bīsitūn states that Cambyses II murdered his own brother, Bardiya, but that
very few people in the Persian realm knew that the assassination had occurred.
Seizing upon the lack of knowledge, a man named Gaumata, a magi or religious
leader in Persia, impersonated the slain Bardiya and usurped power from
Cambyses II in a coup. When this occurred, Darius claimed that Camyses II
committed suicide, but other sources suggested he might have died in an
accident. Nevertheless, Cambyses II was dead and Bardiya, or the impersonator,
was in power.
It
did not take long for plots to form—within the year a group of conspirators
(including Darius) decided that the ruler of Persia was an imposter and needed
to be removed. According to the Bīsitūn inscription, Darius and his accomplices
killed the impostor, and then crowned Darius as the Great King of Persia.
Later
sources, such as Herodotus and Ctesias, recorded (or fabricated) more detail
about the impersonator and the conspiracy that put the throne into Darius’ hands.
According to Herodotus, a group of seven conspirators became convinced that
Bardiya was an impostor after they heard that the man was missing his ears. On
top of this, members of the conspiracy already had prior knowledge about the
death of the original Bardiya. With this information, the conspirators enacted
their plot and assassinated Gaumata, the imposter.
According
to Herodotus, once the imposter was killed, the conspirators supposedly all
gathered to debate the political future of Persia. One spoke in favor of a
popular government, another proposed an oligarchy, but Darius won the day with
a plea for the traditional system of monarchy. When they agreed that Persia
would remain a monarchal government, the conspirators reportedly decided to
appoint their next monarch by means of a simple game of chance—they would all
ride horses to a pre-designated spot and the crown would be given to whichever
man’s horse neighed first after dawn had arrived.
Curiously, Herodotus and
other later sources claimed that Darius cheated to ensure his horse neighed
first. Fair warning, the stories about how he cheated are a bit odd. Herodotus
gave two different accounts about how Darius increased his chances of becoming
king. In both, a handler named Oebares played a prominent role.
In the first story, Oebares
snuck out during the night and tied up a mare at the spot where the
conspirators would hold their contest. The handler then brought Darius’s
stallion out to the spot, circled him around the mare, and then let the anxious
beasts mate. After the deed was done, Oebares returned the horses to their
stables and waited for the contest to begin. When, as dawn was approaching, the
conspirators all began to line up for their contest, Darius’ stallion
immediately neighed, remembering the spot and the mare that had been there not
long before.
The second story is just as
strange as the first. In this account, Oebares had the same idea, but carried
the plan out in a different way. In this version of the story, Oebares
thoroughly coated his hand with the smell of a mare’s genitalia—you can use
your own imagination to try to piece together the specifics. With his hand
thickly coated with unmistakable odors and pheromones, Oebares attended the
contest. Once the competition began, Oebares simply raised his hand toward the
nostrils of Darius’ stallion, causing the horse to be the first to neigh.
Historians will likely never
know for certain if any such contest took place, just as they remain uncertain
as to whether Bardiya was a legitimate king or truly an imposter from the ranks
of the magi. All we do know is that Darius I went on to be considered one of
the greatest kings of ancient Persia.
Written by C. Keith Hansely.
- The Histories by Herodotus, translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt and revised by John Marincola. New York: Penguin Classics, 2002).
- http://mcadams.posc.mu.edu/txt/ah/Persia/Behistun_txt.html
- http://www.ancient.eu/Darius_I/
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Darius-I
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bardiya
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