This series is set in the very dawn of the so-called Classical Era, often measured from the Battle of Marathon (490 BC). Some, if not most, of the famous names of this era are characters in this series — and that’s not happenstance. Athens of this period is as magical, in many ways, as Tolkien’s Gondor, and even the quickest list of artists, poets, and soldiers of this era reads like a ‘who’s who’ of western civilization. Nor is the author tossing them together by happenstance — these people were almost all aristocrats, men (and women) who knew each other well — and might be adversaries or friends in need. Names in bold are historical characters — yes, even Arimnestos — and you can get a glimpse into their lives by looking at Wikipedia or Britannia online. For more in-depth information, I recommend Plutarch and Herodotus, to whom I owe a great deal.
Arimnestos of Plataea may — just may — have been Herodotus’s source for the events of the Persian Wars. The careful reader will note that Herodotus himself — a scribe from Halicarnassus — appears several times. .
Archilogos — Ephesian, son of Hipponax the poet; a typical Ionian aristocrat, who loves Persian culture and Greek culture too, who serves his city, not some cause of ‘Greece’ or ‘Hellas’, and who finds the rule of the Great King fairer and more ‘democratic’ than the rule of a Greek tyrant.
Arimnestos — Child of Chalkeotechnes and Euthalia.
Aristagoras — Son of Molpagoras, nephew of Histiaeus. Aristagoras led Miletus while Histiaeus was a virtual prisoner of the Great King Darius at Susa. Aristagoras seems to have initiated the Ionian Revolt — and later to have regretted it.
Aristides — Son of Lysimachus, lived roughly 525–468 BC, known later in life as ‘The Just’. Perhaps best known as one of the commanders at Marathon. Usually sided with the Aristocratic party.
Artaphernes — Brother of Darius, Great King of Persia, and Satrap of Sardis. A senior Persian with powerful connections.
Bion — A slave name, meaning ‘life’. The most loyal family retainer of the Corvaxae.
Briseis — Daughter of Hipponax, sister of Archilogos.
Calchas — A former warrior, now the keeper of the shrine of the Plataean Hero of Troy, Leitos.
Chalkeotechnes — The Smith of Plataea; head of the family Corvaxae, who claim descent from Heracles.
Chalkidis — Brother of Arimnestos, son of Chalkeotechnes.
Darius — King of Kings, the lord of the Persian Empire, brother to Artaphernes.
Draco — Wheelwright and wagon builder of Plataea, a leading man of the town.
Empedocles — A priest of Hephaestus, the Smith God.
Epaphroditos — A warrior, an aristocrat of Lesbos.
Eualcidas — A Hero. Eualcidas is typical of a class of aristocratic men — professional warriors, adventurers, occasionally pirates or merchants by turns. From Euboea.
Heraclitus — c.535–475 BC. One of the ancient world’s most famous philosophers. Born to an aristocratic family, he chose philosophy over political power. Perhaps most famous for his statement about time: ‘You cannot step twice into the same river’. His belief that ‘strife is justice’ and other similar sayings which you’ll find scattered through these pages made him a favourite with Nietzsche. His works, mostly now lost, probably established the later philosophy of Stoicism.
Herakleides — An Aeolian, a Greek of Asia Minor. With his brothers Nestor and Orestes, he becomes a retainer — a warrior — in service to Arimnestos. It is easy, when looking at the birth of Greek democracy, to see the whole form of modern government firmly established — but at the time of this book, democracy was less than skin deep and most armies were formed of semi-feudal war bands following an aristocrat.
Heraklides — Aristides’ helmsman, a lower-class Athenian who has made a name for himself in war.
Hermogenes — Son of Bion, Arimnestos’s slave.
Hesiod — A great poet (or a great tradition of poetry) from Boeotia in Greece, Hesiod’s ‘Works and Days’ and ‘Theogony’ were widely read in the sixth century and remain fresh today — they are the chief source we have on Greek farming, and this book owes an enormous debt to them.
Hippias — Last tyrant of Athens, overthrown around 510 BC (that is, just around the beginning of this series), Hippias escaped into exile and became a pensioner of Darius of Persia.
Hipponax — 540-c.498 BC. A Greek poet and satirist, considered the inventor of parody. He is supposed to have said ‘There are two days when a woman is a pleasure: the day one marries her and the day one buries her’.
Histiaeus — Tyrant of Miletus and ally of Darius of Persia, possible originator of the plan for the Ionian Revolt.
Homer — Another great poet, roughly Hesiod’s contemporary (give or take fifty years) and again, possibly more a poetic tradition than an individual man. Homer is reputed as the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two great epic poems which, between them, largely defined what heroism and aristocratic good behaviour should be in Greek society — and, you might say, to this very day.
Kylix — A boy, slave of Hipponax.
Miltiades — Tyrant of the Thracian Chersonese. His son, Cimon or Kimon, rose to be a great man in Athenian politics. Probably the author of the Athenian victory of Marathon, Miltiades was a complex man, a pirate, a warlord and a supporter of Athenian democracy.
Penelope — Daughter of Chalkeotechnes, sister of Arimnestos.
Sappho — A Greek poetess from the island of Lesbos, born sometime around 630 BC and died between 570 and 550 BC. Her father was probably Lord of Eresus. Widely considered the greatest lyric poet of Ancient Greece.
Simonalkes — Head of the collateral branch of the Plataean Corvaxae, cousin to Arimnestos.
Simonides — Another great lyric poet, he lived c.556–468 BC, and his nephew, Bacchylides, was as famous as he. Perhaps best known for his epigrams, one of which is:
Go tell the Spartans, thou who passest by,
That here, obedient to their laws, we lie.
Thales — c.624-c.546 BC The first philosopher of the Greek tradition, whose writings were still current in Arimnestos’s time. Thales used geometry to solve problems such as calculating the height of the pyramids in Aegypt and the distance of ships from the shore. He made at least one trip to Aegypt. He is widely accepted as the founder of western mathematics.
Theognis — Theognis of Megara was almost certainly not one man but a whole canon of aristocratic poetry under that name, much of it practical. There are maxims, many very wise, laments on the decline of man and the age, and the woes of old age and poverty, songs for symposia, etc. In later sections there are songs and poems about homosexual love and laments for failed romances. Despite widespread attributions, there was, at some point, a real Theognis who may have lived in the mid-6th century BC, or just before the events of this series. His poetry would have been central to the world of Arimnestos’s mother.
I’m not any younger, and that’s a fact. But I gather my story’s a good one. Or you young people wouldn’t cluster around so eagerly to hear my tale.
Honey, you’ve brought your scribbler back to me. He’s promised to write it all out in the new way, although if I was allowed, I’d rather hear a rhapsode sing it the old way. But the old ways died with the Medes, didn’t they? It’s all different now. The world I’m telling you about is as dead as old Homer’s heroes at Troy. Even my thugater here thinks I’m the relic of a time when the gods still walked abroad. Eh?