HERODOTUS: History (Book 4)

Americans aren’t the only ones who want “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”  Reading Herodotus it seems that even in ancient times all people wanted to live in freedom and be happy.  It’s not clear whether Herodotus thinks all people are essentially alike or if he thinks they’re fundamentally different.  Compare what he has to say about two great peoples, the Egyptians and the Scythians.  “The Egyptians adhere to their own national customs, and adopt no foreign usages.” (Book 2)  “The Scythians have an extreme hatred of all foreign customs, particularly those in use among the Greeks.” (Book 4)  In this way at least they’re alike; they both want to live in freedom and be happy living by their own traditional customs.  But in other ways they couldn’t be more different.  The Egyptians had been rooted in the same spot since prehistoric times.  They were an agrarian urban-based people.  The Scythians had wandered all over the northern part of Asia Minor.  They were a nomadic people.  “The Egyptians… believed themselves to be the most ancient of mankind.” (Book 2)  But “According to the account which the Scythians themselves give, they are the youngest of all nations.” (Book 4)  The Egyptians had to defend their homeland by the Nile River and had no place to retreat.  That’s why the Persians under Cambyses and Darius could defeat the Egyptians in battle (though they were less successful in Libya and Ethiopia).  The Scythians had a different defensive strategy.  They “make it impossible for the enemy who invades them to escape destruction, while they themselves are entirely out of his reach, unless it please them to engage with him.  Having neither cities nor forts, and carrying their dwellings with them wherever they go… how can they fail of being unconquerable, and unassailable even?”  Darius had to withdraw from Scythia without conquering them.  In fact, it was a somewhat humiliating retreat, not a strategic one.  Herodotus says “the Persians escaped from Scythia” and thinks they were lucky to get out alive.  The Greeks were intimately connected with both Egypt and Scythia.  Herodotus believed “almost all the names of the gods came into Greece from Egypt.”  He also says “I maintain that both the shield and the helmet came into Greece from Egypt.” (Book 2)  The seafaring Greeks were also well acquainted with the Scythians.  They had established colonies and trading posts around the Black Sea.  We can infer this from Herodotus’ testimony that “the Geloni were anciently Greeks who, being driven out of the factories along the coast, fled to the Budini and took up their abode with them.  They still speak a language half Greek, half Scythian.”  (The Budini were a people who lived in far northeastern Scythia.)  In spite of these intimate connections Aristotle still believed "It is proper that Greeks should rule over barbarians" (Politics, Book 1, chapter 2)  Why would he think this?  He believed Greek civilization was superior to all the others.  All people may want to live in freedom and happiness, but he thought the Greek way was best.  For example, Herodotus says “The Agathyrsi are a race of men very luxurious and are very fond of wearing gold.  They have wives in common...”  Aristotle thought wealth should be used to live a certain kind of moderate lifestyle, not a “luxurious” one.  He also thought the family (a husband and wife raising their own children) was the cornerstone of civilized life.  Herodotus told us that “The Androphagi are more savage than those of any other race.  They neither observe justice, nor are governed by any laws.”  Aristotle believed that when people are governed by rational laws they’re the best of creatures, but when they’re not, they’re the most savage of creatures.  For these reasons Aristotle thought it proper that Greeks should rule over barbarians, not the other way around.  That’s fine; but what did barbarians think of that idea?  Let Herodotus speak for them: “These be the names of the Libyan tribes whereof I am able to give the names; and most of these cared little then, and indeed care little now, for the king of the Medes.”  Presumably they cared little for the Greeks as well.  They didn’t give a fig for Darius or for Aristotle either.