ome modifications,
the arrangement of Marquart, which seems to me to give the
clearest "conspectus" of these confused wars.

The Persian empire, like those of the Chaldaeans and Medes, had consisted
hitherto of nothing but a fortuitous collection of provinces under
military rule, of vassal kingdoms, and of semi-independent cities and
tribes; there was no fixed division of authority, and no regular system
of government for the outlying provinces. The governors assigned by
Cyrus and Cambyses to rule the various provinces acquired by conquest,
were actual viceroys, possessing full control of an army, and in some
cases of a fleet as well, having at their disposal considerable revenues
both in money and in kind, and habituated, owing to their distance from
the capital, to settle pressing questions on their own responsibility,
subject only to the necessity of making a report to the sovereign when
the affair was concluded, or when the local resources were insufficient
to bring it to a successful issue. For such free administrators the
temptation must have been irresistible to break the last slender ties
which bound them to the empire, and to set themselves up as independent
monarchs. The two successive revolutions which had taken place in less
than a year, convinced such governors, and the nations over which they
bore rule, that the stately edifice erected by Cyrus and Cambyses was
crumbling to pieces, and that the moment was propitious for each of them
to carve out of its ruins a kingdom for himself; the news of the murder,
rapidly propagated, sowed the seeds of revolt in its course--in Susiana,
at Babylon, in Media, in Parthia, in Margiana, among the Sattagydes,
in Asia Minor, and even in Egypt itself*--which showed itself in
some places in an open and undisguised form, while in others it was
contemptuously veiled under the appearance of neutrality, or the
pretence of waiting to see the issue of events.

* In the _Behistun Inscription_, it is stated that
insurrections broke out in all these countries while Darius
was at Babylon; that is to say, while he was occupied in
besieging that city, as is evident from the order of the
events narrated.

The first to break out into open rebellion were the neighbouring
countries of Elam and Chaldaea: the death of Smerdis took place towards
the end of September, and a fortnight later saw two rebel chiefs
enthroned--a certain Athrina at Susa, and a Nad