52 HISTORY OF GREECE. itself; and as Strabo seems in the main to have derived his ac- count from Herodotus, ve may suppose that on this point he lias incorrectly remembered his authority. 1 CHAPTER XXXIV. DEMOKLDES.-DAIHUS INVADES SCYTHIA. DARIUS had now acquired full authority throughout the Persian empire, having put down the refractory satrap Orcetes, as well as the revolted Medes and Babylonians. He had, moreover, com- pleted the conquest of Ionia, by the important addition of Samos ; and his dominion thus comprised all Asia Minor, with its neigh- boring islands. But this was not sufficient for the ambition of a Persian king, next but one in succession to the great Cyrus. The conquering impulse was yet unabated among the Persians, who thought it incumbent upon their king, and whose king thought it incumbent upon himself, to extend the limits of the empire. Though not of the lineage of Cyrus, Darius had taken pains to connect himself with it by marriage ; he had married Atossa and Artystone, daughters of Cyrus, and Parmys, daughter of Smerdis, the younger son of Cyrus. Atossa had been first the wife of her brother Kambyses ; next, of the Ma- gian Smerdis, his successor ; and thirdly of Darius, to whom she bore four children. 2 Of those children the eldest was Xerxes, respecting whom more will be said hereafter. Atossa, mother of the only Persian king who ever set foot in Greece, the Sultana Validi of Persia during the reign of Xerxes, was a person of commanding influence in the reign of hei Strabo, xiv, p. 638. He gives a proverbial phrase about the d^popula turn of the island
- E7?T( Stt/loCTwirof evpv%upii],
Which is perfectly consistent with the narrative of Herodotus.
- Herodot. iii, 88, vii, 2.
