The Great King (2 page)

Kithara
A stringed instrument of some complexity, with a hollow body as a soundboard.

Kline
A couch.

Kopis
The heavy, back-curved sabre of the Greeks. Like a longer, heavier modern kukri or Gurkha knife.

Kore
A maiden or daughter.

Kylix
A wide, shallow, handled bowl for drinking wine.

Logos
Literally ‘word’. In pre-Socratic Greek philosophy the word is everything – the power beyond the gods.

Longche
A six to seven foot throwing spear, also used for hunting. A
hoplite
might carry a pair of
longchai
, or a single, longer and heavier
doru
.

Machaira
A heavy sword or long knife.

Maenads
The ‘raving ones’ – ecstatic female followers of Dionysus.

Mastos
A woman’s breast. A
mastos
cup is shaped like a woman’s breast with a rattle in the nipple – so when you drink, you lick the nipple and the rattle shows that you emptied the cup. I’ll leave the rest to imagination . . .

Medimnos
A grain measure. Very roughly – 35 to 100 pounds of grain.

Megaron
A style of building with a roofed porch.

Navarch
An admiral.

Oikia
The household – all the family and all the slaves, and sometimes the animals and the farmland itself.

Opson
Whatever spread, dip or accompaniment an ancient Greek had with bread.

Pais
A child.

Palaestra
The exercise sands of the gymnasium.

Pankration
The military martial art of the ancient Greeks – an unarmed combat system that bears more than a passing resemblance to modern MMA techniques, with a series of carefully structured blows and domination holds that is, by modern standards, very advanced. Also the basis of the Greek sword and spear-based martial arts. Kicking, punching, wrestling, grappling, on the ground and standing, were all permitted.

Peplos
A short over-fold of cloth that women could wear as a hood or to cover the breasts.

Phalanx
The full military potential of a town; the actual, formed body of men before a battle (all of the smaller groups formed together made a
phalanx
). In this period, it would be a mistake to imagine a carefully drilled military machine.

Phylarch
A file-leader – an officer commanding the four to sixteen men standing behind him in the
phalanx
.

Polemarch
The war leader.

Polis
The city. The basis of all Greek political thought and expression, the government that was held to be more important – a higher god – than any individual or even family. To this day, when we talk about politics, we’re talking about the ‘things of our city’.

Porne
A prostitute.

Porpax
The bronze or leather band that encloses the forearm on a Greek
aspis
.

Psiloi
Light infantrymen – usually slaves or adolescent freemen who, in this period, were not organised and seldom had any weapon beyond some rocks to throw.

Pyrrhiche
The ‘War Dance’. A line dance in armour done by all of the warriors, often very complex. There’s reason to believe that the
Pyrrhiche
was the method by which the young were trained in basic martial arts and by which ‘drill’ was inculcated.

Pyxis
A box, often circular, turned from wood or made of metal.

Rhapsode
A master-poet, often a performer who told epic works like the
Iliad
from memory.

Satrap
A Persian ruler of a province of the Persian Empire.

Skeuophoros
Literally a ‘shield carrier’, unlike the
hypaspist
, this is a slave or freed man who does camp work and carries the armour and baggage.

Sparabara
The large wicker shield of the Persian and Mede elite infantry. Also the name of those soldiers.

Spolas
Another name for a leather
corslet
, often used for the lion skin of Heracles.

Stade
A measure of distance. An Athenian
stade
is about 185 metres.

Strategos
In Athens, the commander of one of the ten military tribes. Elsewhere, any senior Greek officer – sometimes the commanding general.

Synaspismos
The closest order that
hoplites
could form – so close that the shields overlap, hence ‘shield on shield’.

Taxis
Any group but, in military terms, a company; I use it for 60 to 300 men.

Thetes
The lowest free class – citizens with limited rights.

Thorax
See
corslet
.

Thugater
Daughter. Look at the word carefully and you’ll see the ‘daughter’ in it . . .

Triakonter
A small rowed galley of thirty oars.

Trierarch
The captain of a ship – sometimes just the owner or builder, sometimes the fighting captain.

Zone
A belt, often just rope or finely wrought cord, but could be a heavy bronze kidney belt for war.

This series is set in the very dawn of the so-called Classical Era, often measured from the Battle of Marathon (490
BC
). Some, if not most, of the famous names of this era are characters in this series – and that’s not happenstance. Athens of this period is as magical, in many ways, as Tolkien’s Gondor, and even the quickest list of artists, poets, and soldiers of this era reads like a ‘who’s who’ of western civilization. Nor is the author tossing them together by happenstance – these people were almost all aristocrats, men (and women) who knew each other well – and might be adversaries or friends in need. Names in bold are historical characters – yes, even Arimnestos – and you can get a glimpse into their lives by looking at Wikipedia or Britannia online. For more in-depth information, I recommend Plutarch and Herodotus, to whom I owe a great deal.

Arimnestos of Plataea may – just may – have been Herodotus’s source for the events of the Persian Wars. The careful reader will note that Herodotus himself – a scribe from Halicarnassus – appears several times . . .

Archilogos – Ephesian, son of Hipponax the poet; a typical Ionian aristocrat, who loves Persian culture and Greek culture too, who serves his city, not some cause of ‘Greece’ or ‘Hellas’, and who finds the rule of the Great King fairer and more ‘democratic’ than the rule of a Greek tyrant.

Arimnestos
– Child of Chalkeotechnes and Euthalia.

Aristagoras
– Son of Molpagoras, nephew of Histiaeus. Aristagoras led Miletus while Histiaeus was a virtual prisoner of the Great King Darius at Susa. Aristagoras seems to have initiated the Ionian Revolt – and later to have regretted it.

Aristides
– Son of Lysimachus, lived roughly 525–468
BC
, known later in life as ‘The Just’. Perhaps best known as one of the commanders at Marathon. Usually sided with the Aristocratic party.

Artaphernes
– Brother of Darius, Great King of Persia, and Satrap of Sardis. A senior Persian with powerful connections.

Behon – A Kelt from Alba; a fisherman and former slave.

Bion – A slave name, meaning ‘life’. The most loyal family retainer of the Corvaxae.

Briseis – Daughter of Hipponax, sister of Archilogos.

Calchus – A former warrior, now the keeper of the shrine of the Plataean Hero of Troy, Leitus.

Chalkeotechnes – The Smith of Plataea; head of the family Corvaxae, who claim descent from Herakles.

Chalkidis – Brother of Arimnestos, son of Chalkeotechnes.

Cimon
– Son of Miltiades, a professional soldier, sometime pirate, and Athenian aristocrat.

Cleisthenes – was a noble Athenian of the Alcmaeonid family. He is credited with reforming the constitution of ancient Athens and setting it on a democratic footing in 508/7
BC
.

Collam – A Gallic lord in the Central Massif at the headwaters of the Seine.

Dano of Croton – Daughter of the philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras.

Darius
– King of Kings, the lord of the Persian Empire, brother to Artaphernes.

Doola – Numidian ex-slave.

Draco – Wheelwright and wagon builder of Plataea, a leading man of the town.

Empedocles – A priest of Hephaestus, the Smith God.

Epaphroditos – A warrior, an aristocrat of Lesbos.

Eualcides
– A Hero. Eualcidas is typical of a class of aristocratic men – professional warriors, adventurers, occasionally pirates or merchants by turns. From Euboeoa.

Heraclitus
–
c
.535–475
BC
. One of the ancient world’s most famous philosophers. Born to an aristocratic family, he chose philosophy over political power. Perhaps most famous for his statement about time: ‘You cannot step twice into the same river’. His belief that ‘strife is justice’ and other similar sayings which you’ll find scattered through these pages made him a favourite with Nietzsche. His works, mostly now lost, probably established the later philosophy of Stoicism.

Herakleides – An Aeolian, a Greek of Asia Minor. With his brothers Nestor and Orestes, he becomes a retainer – a warrior – in service to Arimnestos. It is easy, when looking at the birth of Greek democracy, to see the whole form of modern government firmly established – but at the time of this book, democracy was less than skin deep and most armies were formed of semi-feudal war bands following an aristocrat.

Heraklides – Aristides’ helmsman, a lower-class Athenian who has made a name for himself in war.

Hermogenes – Son of Bion, Arimnestos’s slave.

Hesiod
– A great poet (or a great tradition of poetry) from Boeotia in Greece, Hesiod’s ‘Works and Days’ and ‘Theogony’ were widely read in the sixth century and remain fresh today – they are the chief source we have on Greek farming, and this book owes an enormous debt to them.

Hippias
– Last tyrant of Athens, overthrown around 510
BC
(that is, just around the beginning of this series), Hippias escaped into exile and became a pensioner of Darius of Persia.

Hipponax
– 540–
c.
498
BC
. A Greek poet and satirist, considered the inventor of parody. He is supposed to have said ‘There are two days when a woman is a pleasure: the day one marries her and the day one buries her’.

Histiaeus
– Tyrant of Miletus and ally of Darius of Persia, possible originator of the plan for the Ionian Revolt.

Homer
– Another great poet, roughly Hesiod’s contemporary (give or take fifty years!) and again, possibly more a poetic tradition than an individual man. Homer is reputed as the author of the
Iliad
and the
Odyssey
, two great epic poems which, between them, largely defined what heroism and aristocratic good behaviour should be in Greek society – and, you might say, to this very day.

Idomeneus – Cretan warrior, priest of Leitus.

Kylix – A boy, slave of Hipponax.

Leukas – Alban sailor, later deck master on
Lydia
. Kelt of the Dumnones of Briton.

Miltiades
– Tyrant of the Thracian Chersonese. His son, Cimon or Kimon, rose to be a great man in Athenian politics. Probably the author of the Athenian victory of Marathon, Miltiades was a complex man, a pirate, a warlord, and a supporter of Athenian democracy.

Penelope – Daughter of Chalkeotechnes, sister of Arimnestos.

Polymarchos – ex-slave swordmaster of Syracusa.

Phrynicus
– Ancient Athenian playwright and warrior.

Sappho
– A Greek poetess from the island of Lesbos, born sometime around 630
BC
and died between 570 and 550
BC
. Her father was probably Lord of Eressos. Widely considered the greatest lyric poet of Ancient Greece.

Seckla – Numidian ex-slave.

Simonalkes – Head of the collateral branch of the Plataean Corvaxae, cousin to Arimnestos.

Simonides
– Another great lyric poet, he lived
c.
556–468
BC
, and his nephew, Bacchylides, was as famous as he. Perhaps best known for his epigrams, one of which is:

Ω ξεῖν’, ἀγγέλλειν Λακεδαιμονίοις ὅτι τῇδε κείμεθα, τοῖς κείνων ῥήμασι πειθόμενοι.

Go tell the Spartans, thou who passest by, That here, obedient to their laws, we lie.

Thales
–
c
.624–
c
.546
BC
The first philosopher of the Greek tradition, whose writings were still current in Arimnestos’s time. Thales used geometry to solve problems such as calculating the height of the pyramids in Aegypt and the distance of ships from the shore. He made at least one trip to Aegypt. He is widely accepted as the founder of western mathematics.

Themistocles
– Leader of the demos party in Athens, father of the Athenian Fleet. Political enemy of Aristides.

Theognis
– Theognis of Megara was almost certainly not one man but a whole canon of aristocratic poetry under that name, much of it practical. There are maxims, many very wise, laments on the decline of man and the age, and the woes of old age and poverty, songs for symposia, etc. In later sections there are songs and poems about homosexual love and laments for failed romances. Despite widespread attributions, there was, at some point, a real Theognis who may have lived in the mid-6th century
BC
, or just before the events of this series. His poetry would have been central to the world of Arimnestos’s mother.

Vasileos – master shipwright and helmsman.

If you all keep coming, night after night, my daughter will
have
the greatest wedding feast in the history of the Hellenes. Perhaps, should my sword-arm fail me, I can have an evening-star life as a rhapsode.

Heh. But the truth is, it’s the story, not the teller. Who would not want to hear the greatest story of the greatest war ever fought by men? And you expect me to say ‘since Troy’ and I answer – any soldier knows Troy was just one city. We fought the
world
, and we triumphed.