Herodotus
Cyrus
Captures Babylon Account in 539 B.C.
Herodotus, Book I, para 189-191
The Histories by the Greek researcher Herodotus of
Halicarnassus who wrote in the fifth century B.C. on the
Persian conquest of Babylon.
"(1.189)
Cyrus on his way to Babylon came to the banks of the Gyndes,
a stream which, rising in the Matienian mountains, runs
through the country of the Dardanians, and empties itself
into the river Tigris. The Tigris, after receiving the
Gyndes, flows on by the city of Opis[i.e., Baghdad], and
discharges its waters into the Erythraean sea [i.e., the
Persian Gulf]. When Cyrus reached this stream, which could
only be passed in boats, one of the sacred white horses
accompanying his march, full of spirit and high mettle,
walked into the water, and tried to cross by himself; but
the current seized him, swept him along with it, and drowned
him in its depths. Cyrus, enraged at the insolence of the
river, threatened so to break its strength that in future
even women should cross it easily without wetting their
knees. Accordingly he put off for a time his attack on
Babylon, and, dividing his army into two parts, he marked
out by ropes one hundred and eighty trenches on each side of
the Gyndes, leading off from it in all directions, and
setting his army to dig, some on one side of the river, some
on the other, he accomplished his threat by the aid of so
great a number of hands, but not without losing thereby the
whole summer season.
(1.190) Having, however, thus wreaked his vengeance on the
Gyndes, by dispersing it through three hundred and sixty
channels, Cyrus, with the first approach of the ensuing
spring, marched forward against Babylon. The Babylonians,
encamped without their walls, awaited his coming. A battle
was fought at a short distance from the city, in which the
Babylonians were defeated by the Persian king, whereupon
they withdrew within their defenses. Here they shut
themselves up, and made light of his siege, having laid in a
store of provisions for many years in preparation against
this attack; for when they saw Cyrus conquering nation after
nation, they were convinced that he would never stop, and
that their turn would come at last.
(1.191) Cyrus was now reduced to great perplexity, as time
went on and he made no progress against the place. In this
distress either some one made the suggestion to him, or he
bethought himself of a plan, which he proceeded to put in
execution. He placed a portion of his army at the point
where the river enters the city, and another body at the
back of the place where it issues forth, with orders to
march into the town by the bed of the stream, as soon as the
water became shallow enough: he then himself drew off with
the unwarlike portion of his host, and made for the place
where [former queen] Nitocris dug the basin for the river,
where he did exactly what she had done formerly: he turned
the Euphrates by a canal into the basin, which was then a
marsh, on which the river sank to such an extent that the
natural bed of the stream became fordable. Hereupon the
Persians who had been left for the purpose at Babylon by
the, river-side, entered the stream, which had now sunk so
as to reach about midway up a man's thigh, and thus got into
the town. Had the Babylonians been apprised of what Cyrus
was about, or had they noticed their danger, they would
never have allowed the Persians to enter the city, but would
have destroyed them utterly; for they would have made fast
all the street gates which gave upon the river, and mounting
upon the walls along both sides of the stream, would so have
caught the enemy, as it were, in a trap. But, as it was, the
Persians came upon them by surprise and so took the city.
Owing to the vast size of the place, the inhabitants of the
central parts (as the residents at Babylon declare) long
after the outer portions of the town were taken, knew
nothing of what had chanced, but as they were engaged in a
festival, continued dancing and reveling until they learnt
the capture but too certainly. Such, then, were the
circumstances of the first taking of Babylon." "
Herodotus,
Book I, para 189-191
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