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they first fell, were busied in the same times with hopes of conquering Assyria.

Phraortes, the son of Deioces, king of the Medes, having by many victories enlarged his dominions, conceived at length a fair possibility of making himself lord of Nineveh. That city, (as Herodotus reports it',) having been a sovereign lady, was not forsaken of all her dependants; yet remained in such case, that of herself she was well enough. This makes it plain, that howsoever Merodach had gotten possession of this imperial seat, and made it subject as was the rest of the country, yet it found the means to set itself at liberty; as after this again it did, when it had been regained by Nabulassar his grandchild. Sharp war, and the very novelty of sudden violence, use to dismay any state or country, not inured to the like; but custom of danger hardeneth even those that are unwarlike. Nineveh had been the palace of many valiant kings lately reigning therein; it had suffered, and resisted all the fury wherewith either domestic tumults between the sons of Sennacherib, or foreign war of the Babylonians, could afflict it; and therefore it is the less wonderful, that Phraortes did speed so ill in his journey against it. He and the most of his army perished in that expedition; whereof I find no particular circumstances, (perhaps he undervalued their forces, and brought a less power than was needful.) It is enough that we may herein believe Herodotus.

Cyaxares, the son of Phraortes, a braver man of war than his father, won as much of Asia the Less as lay eastward from the river of Halys. He sought revenge upon the Assyrians for the death of his father, and besieged Nineveh itself, having a purpose to destroy it. I rather believe Eusebius, that he took the city, and fulfilled his displeasure upon it,'

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than Herodotus, that the Scythian army came upon him whilst he lay before it.' For where equal authorities are contradictory, (as Eusebius, though far later than Herodotus, yet having seen other authors, that are now lost, is to be valued according to his great reading,) there do I hold it best to yield unto the best likelihoods.

To think that the Scythians came upon Cyaxares, whilst he lay before Nineveh, were to accuse him of greater improvidence than ought to be suspected in one commended as a good soldier. But to suppose that he was fain to leave the town, when a war so dangerous fell upon his own country, doth well agree both with the condition of such business as that Scythian expedition brought into those parts, and with the state of the Chaldæan and Assyrian affairs ensuing.

The destruction of this great city is both foretold in the book of Tobit, and there set down as happening about these times; of which book, whosoever was the author, he was ancient enough to know the story of those ages, and hath committed no such error in reckoning of times as should cause us to distrust him in this. As for the prophecy of Nahum, though it be not limited to any certain term, yet it appears to have taken effect in the final destruction of Nineveh by Nabuchodonosor, according to the common opinion. For the prophet hath mention of a conquest of Egypt foregoing this calamity, whereof we will speak in due place. Some that ascribe more authority than the reformed churches yield to the book of Tobit, are careful, as in a matter of necessity, to affirm, that about these times Nineveh was taken; but they attribute, (conjecturally,) the victory over it to Ben Merodach; a needless conjecture, if the place of Eusebius be well considered. Yet I hold it probable, that Nabulassar, the son of Ben Merodach, did seize upon it, and place a king or viceroy therein, about such time as the country of

Assyria was abandoned by Cyaxares, when the Scythian war overwhelmed Media. For then was the conquest wrought out ready to his hand; the swelling spirits of the Ninevites were allayed, and their malice to Babylon so much assuaged, that it might be thought a great favour, if Nabulassar, appointing unto them a peculiar king, took him and them into protection; though afterwards, to their confusion, this unthankful people and their king rebelled again, as shall be shewed in the reign of Nabuchodonosor.

SECT. IV.

The great Expedition of the Scythians, who ruled in Asia eight and twenty years.

(1.) The time of this Expedition.

Now that I have shewed what impediment was given by the Assyrians and the Medes to the Babylonians, who thereby were much disabled to perform any action of worth upon the Egyptians in Syria, it is time that I speak of that great Scythian expedition, which grievously afflicted not only the Babylonians, but the Medes and Lydians, with the countries adjacent, in such wise, that part of the trouble redounded even to the Egyptians themselves. Of the Scythian people, in general, Herodotus makes very large discourse, but interlaced, as of matter ill known, with many fables. Of this expedition he tells many particulars, but ill agreeing with consent of time. Concerning his fabulous reports, it will be needless to recite them, for they are far enough distant from the business in hand. The computation of times, which, by inference out of his relations, may seem very strange, needeth some answer in this place, lest otherwise I should seem to make myself too bold

with an author, in citing him after a manner different from his own tale, or else to be too forgetful of myself, in bringing to act upon the which I had already buried.

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Eight and twenty years, he saith, that the Scythians reigned in Asia before Cyaxares delivered the country from them. Yet he reports a war between Cyaxares and Halyattes, the Lydian, as foregoing the siege of Nineveh; the siege of Nineveh being ere the Scythians came. And, further, he tells, how the Scythians, having vanquished the Medes, did pass into Syria, and were encountered in Palæstina by Psammeticus king of Egypt, who, by gifts and entreaty, procured them to depart from him. These narrations of Herodotus may every one of them be true, though not in such order of time as he hath marshalled them. For Psammeticus was dead before Cyaxares began to reign; and Cyaxares had spent half of his forty years ere Halyattes was king of Lydia; so that he could not, after those Lydian wars, reign eight and twenty years together with the Scythians. It is true, that Eusebius doth also call Psammis, the son of Pharaoh Necho, by the name of Psammeticus; and this king Psammis may, by some strange conjecture, be thought to have been he that met with the Scythians, for he lived with both Cyaxares and Halyattes. But Eusebius himself refers all that business of the Scythian eruption into Palæstina to Psammeticus the father of Necho, whom he leaves dead before the reign of Halyattes. Therefore I dare not rely upon Herodotus in this matter, otherwise than to believe him that such things were in these ages, though not in such order as he sets them down.

It remains that I collect as well as I can those memorials which I find of this expedition scattered in divers places; a work necessary, for that the greatness of this action was such as ought not to be omitted in a general history; yet not easy, the consent

of those that have written thereof being nothing near to uniformity.

I have noted before, that in the reign of Ardys king of Lydia, the Cimmerians over-ran that kingdom, and were not expelled until Halyattes, the nephew of Ardys, got the upper hand of them. In these times, therefore, of Ardys, Sadyattes, and Halyattes, are we to find the eight and twenty years wherein the Scythians reigned over Asia. Now, forasmuch as Psammeticus the Egyptian had some dealings with the Scythians, even in the height of their prosperity, we must needs allow more than one or two of his last years unto this their dominion. But the beginning of Halyattes's reign in Lydia, being three and twenty years complete after the death of Psammeticus, leaves the space very scant, either for the great victories of the Scythians, necessarily supposed before they could meet the Egyptian in Syria, or for those many losses which they must have received ere they could be driven quite away. To increase this difficulty, the victorious reign of Nabuchodonosor in Babylon is of no small moment; for how may we think it possible, that he should have adventured the strength of his kingdom against the Egyptians and Jews, had he stood in daily fear of losing his own, to a more mighty nation that lay upon his neck? To speak simply, as it appears to me, the victories ascribed to Cyaxares and Halyattes over these warlike people, were not obtained against the whole body of their army, but were the defeatures of some troops that infested their several kingdoms; other princes, and among these Nabulassar, having the like success, when the pleasures of Asia had mollified the courage of these hardy northern lads. Wherefore, we may probably annex the eight and twenty years of the Scythians rule to as many almost the last of Nabulassar's reign, in compass whereof their power was at the greatest. This is all

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