e sat before all to
decide causes; and this throne, a sight worth seeing, stands in the
same place with the bowls of Gyges. This gold and silver which Gyges
dedicated is called Gygian by the people of Delphi, after the name of
him who offered it.

Now Gyges also, 13 as soon as he became king, led an army against
Miletos and Smyrna, and he took the lower town of Colophon: 14 but no
other great deed did he do in his reign, which lasted eight-and-thirty
years, therefore we will pass him by with no more mention than has
already been made,

15, and I will speak now of Ardys the son of Gyges, who became king
after Gyges. He took Priene and made an invasion against Miletos; and
while he was ruling over Sardis, the Kimmerians driven from their abodes
by the nomad Scythians came to Asia and took Sardis except the citadel.

16. Now when Ardys had been king for nine-and-forty years, Sadyattes his
son succeeded to his kingdom, and reigned twelve years; and after him
Alyattes. This last made war against Kyaxares the descendant of Deiokes
and against the Medes, 15 and he drove the Kimmerians forth out of Asia,
and he took Smyrna which had been founded from Colophon, and made an
invasion against Clazomenai. From this he ed not as he desired, but
with great loss: during his reign however he performed other deeds very
worthy of mention as follows:--

17. He made war with those of Miletos, having received this war as
an inheritance from his father: for he used to invade their land and
besiege Miletos in the following manner:--whenever there were ripe crops
upon the land, then he led an army into their confines, making his march
to the sound of pipes and harps and flutes both of male and female tone:
and when he came to the Milesian land, he neither pulled down the houses
that were in the fields, nor set fire to them nor tore off their doors,
but let them stand as they were; the trees however and the crops that
were upon the land he destroyed, and then departed by the way he came:
for the men of Miletos had command of the sea, so that it was of no use
for his army to blockade them: and he abstained from pulling down the
houses to the end that the Milesians might have places to dwell in while
they sowed and tilled the land, and by the means of their labour he
might have somewhat to destroy when he made his invasion.

18. Thus he continued to war with them for eleven years; and in the
course of these years the Milesians suffered two gr