em, were the legitimate successors
of the old Median sovereigns; they welcomed every legend which tended to
justify their pretensions, and this particular one was certain to please
them, since it attributed the submission of Bactriana not to a mere
display of brute force, but to the recognition of an hereditary right.
The annexation of this province entailed, as a matter of course, that
of Margiana, of the Khoramnians,** and of Sogdiana. Cyrus constructed
fortresses in all these districts, the most celebrated being that
of Kyropolis, which commanded one of the principal fords of the
Iaxartes.***

* This is the campaign which Ctesias places before the
Lydian war, but which Herodotus relegates to a date after
the capture of Sardes.

** Ctesias must have spoken of the submission of these
peoples, for a few words of a description which he gave of
the Khoramnians have been preserved to us.

*** Tomaschek identifies Kyra or Kyropolis with the present
Ura-Tepe, but distinguishes it from the Kyreskhata of
Ptolemy, to which he assigns a site near Usgent.

The steppes of Siberia arrested his course on the north, but to the
east, in the mountains of Chinese Turkestan, the Sakas, who were
renowned for their wealth and bravery, did not escape his ambitious
designs. The account which has come down to us of his campaigns against
them is a mere romance of love and adventure, in which real history
plays a very small part. He is said to have attacked and defeated
them at the first onset, taking their King Amorges prisoner; but this
capture, which Cyrus considered a decisive advantage, was supposed to
have turned the tide of fortune against him. Sparethra, the wife of
Amorges, rallied the fugitives round her, defeated the invaders in
several engagements, and took so many of their men captive, that they
were glad to restore her husband to her in exchange for the prisoners
she had made. The struggle finally ended, however, in the subjection of
the Sakae; they engaged to pay tribute, and thenceforward constituted
the advance-guard of the Iranians against the Nomads of the East. Cyrus,
before quitting their neighbourhood, again ascended the table-land, and
reduced Ariana, Thatagus, Harauvati, Zaranka, and the country of Cabul;
and we may well ask if he found leisure to turn southwards beyond Lake
Hamun and reach the shores of the Indian Ocean. One tradition, of little
weight, relates that, lik