the Greek
historians and by the moderns who follow them, but Ctcsias
and others after him prefer Artoxerxes. The original form of
the Persian name was Artakhshathra.

[Illustration: 247.jpg Artaxerxes]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a daric in the _Cabinet des
Medailles_.

Other tales related that Artabanus had taken advantage of the free
access to the palace which his position allowed him, to conceal himself
one night within it, in company with his seven sons. Having murdered
Xerxes, he convinced Artaxerxes of the guilt of his brother, and
conducting him to the latter's chamber, where he was found asleep,
Artabanus stabbed him on the spot, on the pretence that he was only
feigning slumber.*

* Of the two principal accounts, the first is as old as
Ctesias, who was followed in general outline by Ephorus, of
whose account Diodorus Siculus preserves a summary
compilation; the second was circulated by Dinon, and has
come down to us through the abbreviation of Pompeius Trogus.
The remains of a third account are met with in Aristotle.
AElian knew a fourth in which the murder was ascribed to the
son of Xerxes himself.

The murderer at first became the virtual sovereign, and he exercised his
authority so openly that later chronographers inserted his name in the
list of the Achaemenids, between that of his victim and his _protege_;
but at the end of six months, when he was planning the murder of the
young prince, he was betrayed by Megabyzos and slain, together with his
accomplices. His sons, fearing a similar fate, escaped into the country
with some of the troops. They perished in a skirmish, sword in hand; but
their prompt defeat, though it helped to establish the new king upon his
throne, did not ensure peace, for the most turbulent provinces at the
two extremes of the empire, Bactriana on the northeast and Egypt in the
south-west, at once rose in arms. The Bactrians were led by Hystaspes,
one of the sons of Xerxes, who, being older than Artaxerxes, claimed
the throne; his pretensions were not supported by the neighbouring
provinces, and two bloody battles soon sealed his fate (462).* The
chastisement of Egypt proved a harder task. Since the downfall of the
Saites, the eastern nomes of the Delta had always constituted a single
fief, which the Greeks called the kingdom of Libya. Lords of Marea and
of the fertile districts extending between the Canopic arm o