Sunset of the Gods (31 page)

“Like what those men we fought beside at Marathon did,” Jason nodded. “Yes, I think you may possibly do.” He turned to Rutherford. “Will that be all for now?”

“Yes.” Then, as Jason and Mondrago got to their feet, Rutherford seemed to remember something. “Oh, yes, Jason, I almost forgot. A most remarkable coincidence occurred.” He took out the little plastic case Jason had left in his care. It was empty. Then he held out his other hand. It held a tiny TRD.

“Do you recall our last exchange just before your departure? Afterwards, still thinking about it, I looked in the case and found it was empty. A subsequent search revealed this on the displacer stage. Would you like to keep it?”

“No. I don’t think I need it anymore.” Jason smiled. “Come on, Alexandre. We’ve got work to do.”

HISTORICAL NOTE

That Marathon was one of the most crucial battles of world history has been recognized by such diverse authorities as Sir Edward Creasy and the U.S. House of Representatives, in a resolution on its 2500th anniversary. I fail to see how any other view is possible.

The events of Xerxes’ invasion of Greece ten years afterwards—the immensity of the Persian host, even when discounted for exaggeration; the heroic last stand of the three hundred Spartans (and their seven hundred forgotten Thespian allies) at Thermopylae; the stunning naval victory at Salamis; the titanic clash of massive armies at Plataea—have an epic quality which causes them to get most of the attention. But none of these things would ever have happened had the Athenians lost at Marathon, or submitted without fighting. No subsequent Persian invasion would have been necessary. It would have all been over in 490 b.c.—or perhaps the following year, if Sparta had not yielded and another campaigning season had been required to complete its obliteration.

A few historians—including Arnold Toynbee, in one of his less brilliant passages—have attempted to minimize the criticality of the Persian Wars. And in the 2006 collection
Unmaking the West
, Barry Strauss presented a counterfactual scenario suggesting that even if the Persians had conquered Greece and gone on to conquer the rest of the Mediterranean basin, it is not impossible that Western civilization—or at least
a
Western civilization, sharing many of the characteristics and values we associate with that term—still
could
, maybe, just possibly, have arisen. As an intellectual exercise, the essay is as original, ingenious and thought-provoking as one would expect from Professor Strauss . . . and it doesn’t convince for an instant. Not even he can succeed in defending the indefensible.

No. When those ten thousand hoplites broke into a run and charged three times their number of a hitherto invincible enemy, our future went with them. We cannot calculate the debt we owe them.

The scholarly literature relevant to Marathon is intimidating in its voluminousness. For the interested reader with finite time, I recommend three books on which I have leaned heavily and to which I take this opportunity to acknowledge my debt.

The first is
The Western Way of War
, by Victor Davis Hanson, a brilliant study of Classical Greek warfare and its long-term historical repercussions, which latter theme is further developed in the author’s subsequent
Carnage and Culture
. Hanson has been on the receiving end of a great deal of hysterical invective and politically correct name-calling. He must be doing something right.

The second is
Persian Fire,
by Tom Holland, a compulsively readable overview of the Persian Wars which achieves an almost unique degree of evenhandedness without ever seeming to lean over backwards to be evenhanded. Rather, the author simply accepts each side on its own terms while skewering both with his trademark sardonic wit. He is particularly good on the little-known and less-understood subject of what can only be called the ideology of the Persian Empire.

Third and most recent is
The First Clash
, by Jim Lacey, which focuses on the Marathon campaign and benefits from the fact that its author, aside from his academic credentials, is an experienced infantry officer and defense analyst. And unlike all too many historians, he does his math. On narrowly military questions I have tended to defer to his judgment, or at least to give it respectful weight when balancing it against Holland’s. I have not always done so in less specialized areas such as the much-disputed chronology and sequence of events. For example, I agree with Holland and an ever-increasing number of other historians that the battle took place in August. Lacey, in his Prologue, does perfunctory obeisance to the traditional date of September 12, but he doesn’t mention it again—which is understandable, inasmuch as his own reconstruction of the campaign (and, in particular, of the logistical constraints under which the Persians labored) makes nonsense of it. In fact, in a later chapter he himself refers to the “hot August sun” in the days immediately preceding the battle.

Finally, in addition to these books, I cannot forbear to mention
The Ancient City
, by Peter Connolly and Hazel Dodge. In the absence of actual time travel, it is the next best thing. After studying the segment on Classical Athens, I felt as though I had been there.

With the exception of Callicles, all the fifth century b.c. Greeks named in this novel are historical. Themistocles is the only one for whom we have what is self-evidently an individual portrait—the Ostia bust—free of artistic conventions and idealization. Otherwise, I have had to use my imagination about personal appearance, aided by hints from sculpture (the baldness of Aeschylus) and names (“Miltiades,” derived from the word for red ochre clay, was often bestowed on reddish-haired children).

The dualistic theology of Zoroastrianism is complex and fascinating, but I have not gone into it as it deserves. The Persian kings of the period in question were far from consistent in their practice of it, for their imperial policy was based on scrupulous (if insincere) respect for the innumerable gods of their various conquered peoples. Even among the Iranians themselves, Ahura Mazda was by tradition merely the chief god of a pantheon almost as inchoate as that of the Greeks, rather than the one uncreated God proclaimed by Zoroaster. The Persian Empire was not in any sense a Zoroastrian theocracy. But Darius I, one of the greatest masters of spin who has ever lived, used Zoroastrian imagery and terminology to justify his usurpation of the Persian throne. It was in this spirit that Datis used a distorted version of it as a propaganda tool as I have described. I have followed in his footsteps, albeit with even more outrageous distortion.

* * *

In the matter of dialogue, I have permitted myself certain anachronisms in the interest of clarity.

The initial Persian conquerors of Ionia were Medes led by their General Harpagus, and since this was the Greeks’ first contact with the Persian Empire they tended to refer to all the Persians as the “Medes,” just as Near Easterners today call all Western Europeans “Feringhi,” or Franks. In these pages the Persians are simply the Persians.

Conversely, the Greeks referred to themselves as “Hellenes,” as in fact they still do. I have used the more familiar “Greeks,” a name later applied to them by the Romans, who derived it from the Graeci, the inhabitants of the colony of Graeae in Italy. Interestingly, in light of the preceding paragraph, Near Eastern terms for the Greeks have always been some variation on “Ionians,” the Greeks with whom the Near East was most directly in contact. (The Persian word was “Yauna”; in the Old Testament, one of the sons of Japheth, the son of Noah whose progeny peopled Europe, is “Javan.”)

Likewise, I have used the well-known Latinized forms of Persian names rather than the originals. (“Cyrus,” not “Kurush”; “Darius,” not “Daryush.”)

Whenever transliteration of Greek place-names is disputed, I cheerfully admit that I have simply picked whichever version struck my fancy, with a fine lack of that foolish consistency which as we all know is the bugbear of small minds. (“Mount Pentelikon,” not “Mount Pentelicus”; “Phalerum,” not “Phaleron.”)