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ions; he more often than not attributed the great events of history to larger and remoter causes than individual motives. This ability, remarkable in its time, allowed him to fonnulate a general theory "about the rise and fall of civilizations"; and, l_ike the early Greek philosopher-scientists, he sought to find a single explanation of events--a kind of law of history. He thought he had found the basis of this 268 lahin hi8 observation that history reveals a reoccurring cycle of rise and decline in all great powers--a cycle of intemperance and austerity, or more precisely, of hvbris and nemesis: "One power rises to great heights and then decays; into the vacutun thus created, another power moves, only to undergo the same pattern of rise and fal 1. n 3 This process comprehends the biography of all cities great and small; says Herodotos: For the cities which were fonnerly great have most of them become insignificant; and such as are at present powerful, were weak in the olden times.4 Later in Book I, he informs us that the pulsating flux of hybris and nemesis is bound up with a combination of other corrunonplaces of Greek cyclical thought, such as the "natural law" of birth, growth, decline, death and the mysterious cosmic wheel: A wheel on which the affairs of men revolve, and that its movements forbid the same man to be always fortunate.5 However, perhaps his best explanation of this hybris and nemesis cycle is found in Book VII (Ch. 10) where Artabanus, Xerxes' uncle, boldly warns the Shah that in his desire to subdue the Greek states can be seen the sin of hybris: See how god with his lightning always smites the bigger animals, and will not suffer them to wax insolent, while those of lesser bulk chafe him 269 not. How likewise his bolts fall ever on the highest houses and the tallest trees? So plainly does he love to bring down everything that exalts itself ••• Thus often a mighty host is discomfited by a few men, when god in his jealousy sends fear or storm from heaven, and they perish in a way unworthy of them. For god allows no one to have a high thought but himself. Again, hurry always brings about disasters from which huge sufferings are want to arise.6 In chapter 16 Artabanus continues his argument: For myself, it has irked me not so much to be reproached by you, as to observe, that when two courses were placed before the Persian people, one of a nature to increase their pride, the other to humble it, by showing them how hurtful it is to allow one's heart always to covet more than one at present possesses, you chose that which was the worse both for yourself and for the Persians.7 It is clear, then, that Herodotos believed that the pervading influence on the rise and fall of national fortunes was determined by the jealous interferences of the gods, who in exercising their government according to fixed laws based on principles of justice and retribution, punished excessive success with a violent reaction to the opposite extreme through the blind process of nemesis which inexorabley elevates the weak and brings down the mighty. This is the message at the very heart of his story: "it is what Herodotos wanted the statesman of the present and the future to learn from his History--that no nation can go beyond certain limits and survive." 8 270 The idea of vengeance in the Persian Wars gives tone and color to the events that are bound up with the cycle of time which, however, is only the skeleton of wordly action. This mysterious process explains the disaster of Croesus, as Herodotos tells us in Book I, 34: After Solon had moved aw~y a dreadful vengeance, sent of god, came upon Croesus, to punish him it is likely, for considering himself the happiest of men. It also explains indirectly the leniency of Cyrus, as de Romilly explains: "Solon fournit le secret de cette vengeance, et les oracles redus ~ Cresus lui servent d'instrument." 9 Herodotos also finds in this process a possible--though, admittedly unlikely explanation for the war between the Greeks and Persians. He says that according to knowledgable Persians, the blame for the conflict actually rested with the Phoenicians of old, and by a curious conflation of "incidents and counter-incidents" grew to include the whole complex of Persian and Greek peoples and allies. 10 J. B. Bury, I believe, strikes at the heart of the matter when he tells us that: The whole passage reads as if it might be the condensation of a friendly discussion between a Greek and a Persian as to the responsibility for the Persian war. It was undeniable that the Persians and not the Greeks have been the aggressors; the conquest of Ionia by Cyrus has been the beginning. The Persian advocate could only remove the blame from Asia by going farther back.11

Kykloi : cyclic theories in ancient Greece