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[1]
While they were making these plans, by coincidence the following happened. The Magi had resolved after consideration to make a friend of Prexaspes, because he had been wronged by Cambyses (who had killed his son with an arrow) and because he alone knew of the death of Cyrus' son Smerdis, having himself been the slayer; but besides this, because he was in great repute among the Persians.
While they were making these plans, by coincidence the following happened. The Magi had resolved after consideration to make a friend of Prexaspes, because he had been wronged by Cambyses (who had killed his son with an arrow) and because he alone knew of the death of Cyrus' son Smerdis, having himself been the slayer; but besides this, because he was in great repute among the Persians.
[2] For these reasons they summoned him and tried to make him a friend, having bound him by tokens of good faith and oaths to keep to himself and betray to no one their deception of the
Persians, and promising to give him all things in great abundance.
[3] When
Prexaspes agreed to do this, since the
Magi importuned him, the
Magi made this second proposal to him, that they should call an assembly of all the
Persians before the palace wall, and he should go up on to a tower and declare that it was
Smerdis son of
Cyrus and no other who was king of
Iran [53,32] (nation), Asia
Persia
.
[4] They gave him this charge, because they thought him to be the man most trusted by the
Persians, and because he had often asserted that
Cyrus' son
Smerdis was alive, and had denied the murder.
Histories. Herodotus. ed. A.D. Godley. Cambridge. 1920-1925.
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