Artaxerxes I. (465-424):  the revolt of Megabyzos—­The palaces of Pasargadae.  Persepolis, and Susa; Persian architecture and sculpture; court life, the king and his harem—­Revolutions in the palace—­Xerxes I., Sekudianos, Darius II.—­Intervention in Greek affairs and the convention of Miletus; the end of the peace of Gallias—­Artaxerxes II. (404-359) and Gyrus the Younger:  the battle of Kunaxa and the retreat of the ten thousand (401).

Troubles in Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt—­Amyrtxus and the XXVIIIth Saite dynasty—­The XXIXth Sebennytic dynasty—­Nephorites I, Hakoris, Psammutis, their alliances with Evagoras and with the states of Continental Greece—­The XXXth Mendesian dynasty—­Nectanebo I, Tachos and the invasion of Syria, the revolt of Nectanebo II.—­The death of Artaxerxes II.—­The accession of Ochus (359 B.C.), his unfortunate wars in the Delta, the conquest of Egypt (342) and the reconstitution of the empire.

The Eastern world:  Elam, Urartu, the Syrian kingdoms, the ancient Semitic states decayed and decaying—­Babylon in its decline—­The Jewish state and its miseries—­Nehemiah, Ezra—­Egypt in the eyes of the Greeks:  Sais, the Delta, the inhabitants of the marshes—­Memphis, its monuments, its population—­Travels in Upper Egypt:  the Fayum, Khemmis, Thebes, Elephantine—­The apparent vigour and actual feebleness of Egypt.

Persia and its powerlessness to resist attack:  the rise of Macedonia, Philippi —­Arses (337) and Darius Codomannos (336)—­Alexander the Great—­The invasion of Asia—­The battle of Granicus and the conquest of the Asianic peninsula—­Issus, the siege of Tyre and of Gaza, the conquest of Egypt, the foundation of Alexandria—­Arbela:  the conquest of Babylon, Susa, and Ecbatana—­The death of Darius and the last days of the old Eastern world.

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CHAPTER II—­THE LAST DAYS OF THE OLD EASTERN WORLD

The Median wars—­The last native dynasties of Egypt—­The Eastern world on the eve of the Macedonian conquest.

[Drawn by Boudier, from one of the sarcophagi of Sidon, now in the Museum of St. Irene.  The vignette, which is by Faucher-Gudin, represents the sitting cyno-cephalus of Nectanebo I., now in the Egyptian Museum at the Vatican.]

Darius appears to have formed this project of conquest immediately after his first victories, when his initial attempts to institute satrapies had taught him not only the condition and needs of Asia Minor, but of the teaching the Scythians such a lesson as would prevent them from bearing down upon his right flank during his march, or upon his rear while engaged in a crucial struggle in the Hellenic peninsula.  On the other hand, the geographical information possessed by the Persians with regard to the Danubian regions was of so vague a character, that Darius must have believed the Scythians to have been nearer to his line of operations, and their country less desolate than was really the case.* A flotilla, commanded by Ariaramnes, satrap of Cappadocia, ventured across the Black Sea in 515,** landed a few thousand men upon the opposite shore, and brought back prisoners who furnished those in command with the information they required.***