in less than a year, convinced such governors, and the nations over which they bore rule, that the stately edifice erected by Cyrus and Cambyses was crumbling to pieces, and that the moment was propitious for each of them to carve out of its ruins a kingdom for himself; the news of the murder, rapidly propagated, sowed the seeds of revolt in its course—­in Susiana, at Babylon, in Media, in Parthia, in Margiana, among the Sattagydes, in Asia Minor, and even in Egypt itself*—­which showed itself in some places in an open and undisguised form, while in others it was contemptuously veiled under the appearance of neutrality, or the pretence of waiting to see the issue of events.

* In the Behistun Inscription, it is stated that insurrections broke out in all these countries while Darius was at Babylon; that is to say, while he was occupied in besieging that city, as is evident from the order of the events narrated.

The first to break out into open rebellion were the neighbouring countries of Elam and Chaldaea:  the death of Smerdis took place towards the end of September, and a fortnight later saw two rebel chiefs enthroned—­a certain Athrina at Susa, and a Nadinta-bel at Babylon.* Athrina, the son of Umbadaranma, was a scion of the dynasty dispossessed by the successors of Sargon in the preceding century, but nevertheless he met with but lukewarm assistance from his own countrymen;** he was taken prisoner before a month had passed, and sent to Darius, who slew him with his own hand.

* The latest known document of the pseudo-Smerdis is dated the 1st of Tisri at Babylon, and the first of Nebuchadrezzar III. are dated the 17th and 20th of the same month.  The revolt of Babylon, then, must be placed between the 1st and 17th of Tisri; that is, either at the end of September or the beginning of October, 521 B.C.

** The revolt cannot have lasted much more than six weeks, for on the 26th of Athriyadiya following, that is to say, at the beginning of December, Darius had already joined issue with the Babylonians on the banks of the Tigris.

Babylon was not so easily mastered.  Her chosen sovereign claimed to be the son of Nabonidus, and had, on ascending the throne, assumed the illustrious name of Nebuchadrezzar; he was not supported, moreover, by only a few busybodies, but carried the whole population with him.  The Babylonians, who had at first welcomed Cyrus so warmly, and had fondly imagined that they had made him one of themselves, as they had made so many of their conquerors for centuries past, soon realised their mistake.  The differences of language, manners, spirit, and religion between themselves and the Persians were too fundamental to allow of the naturalisation of the new sovereign, and of the acceptance by the Achaemenides of that fiction of a double personality to which Tiglath-pileser III., Shalmaneser, and even Assur-bani-pal had submitted.  Popular fancy grew