Page:History of Greece Vol IV.djvu/221

CONQUEST OF PHOKJEA. 20JJ AS the mound around their walls had rendered farther resistance impossible, embarked and emigrated, some to Thrace, where they founded Abdera, others to the Cimmerian Bosphorus, where they planted Phanagoria ; a portion of them, however, must have remained to take the chances of subjection, since the town appears in after-times still peopled and still Hellenic. 1 The fate of Phoka^a, similar in the main, is given to us with more striking circumstances of detail, and becomes the more in- teresting, since the enterprising mariners who inhabited it had been the torch-bearers of Grecian geographical discovery in the west. I have already described their adventurous exploring voy- ages of former days into the interior of the Adriatic, and along the whole northern and western coasts of the Mediterranean as far as Tartessus (the region around and adjoining to Cadiz), together with the favorable reception given to them by old Arganthonius, king of the country, who invited them to emigrate in a body to his kingdom, offering them the choice of any site which they might desire. His invitation was declined, though probably the Phdkaeans may have subsequently regretted the refusal ; and he then manifested his good-will towards them by a large present to defray the expense of constructing fortifications round their town. 2 The walls, erected in part, by this aid, were 1 Herodot. i, 168; Skymnus Chius, Fragm. v, 153; Dionys. Perieg. v, 553. 2 Herodot. i, 163. 'O <5e irv-Qofievof Trap' avruv -bv M^dov <lif av^otTo, tdidov cr(j>i xprjfj.aTa -elxof TrepijSahecr&ai. TTJV TroAtv. I do not understand why the commentators debate what or who is meant by rbv M.r t -6ov : it plainly means the Median or Persian power generally : but the chronological difficulty is a real one, if we are to suppose that there was time between the first alarm conceived of the Median power of the lonians, and the siege of Phokaea by Harpagus, to inform Argantho- nius of the circumstances, and to procure from him this large aid as well as to build the fortifications. The Ionic Greeks neither actually did conceive, nor had reason to conceive, any alarm respecting Persian power, until the arrival of Cyrus before Sardis ; and within a month from that time Sardis was in his possession. If we are to suppose communication with Argan- thonius, grounded upon this circumstance, at the distance of Tartessus, and under the circumstances of ancient navigation, we must necessarily imagine, also, that the attack made by Harpagus upon Phokoea which city lie assailed before any of the rest was postponed for at least two or three years. Such postponement is not wholly impossible, yet it is not in th