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Pharnabazus II (ruled 413-374) was a Persian soldier and statesman, and
Satrap of Hellespontine
Phrygia. He was the son of Pharnaces II of Phrygia and grandson of
Pharnabazus I, and great-grandson of Artabazus I. He and his male ancestors,
forming the Pharnacid dynasty, had governed the satrapy of Hellespontine
Phrygia from its headquarters at
Dascylium since 478. He
married Apama, daughter of
Artaxerxes II of
Persia, and their son Artabazus was likewise a satrap of Phrygia. His
grand-daughter Barsine married Alexander the Great.
War with Sparta against Athens (c.413-404)
Athens was the dominant power in the Aegean in the 5th century, following the
repulse of the Achaemenids in the Second Persian invasion of Greece (480-479).
Athens, powered by the alliance formed under the
Delian League, has
even been called the Athenian Empire at that time, and formed the largest
threat to the Achaemenid possessions in Asia Minor. Pharnabazus II is first
recorded as satrap of this province in 413, when he received orders from
Darius II of Persia to
send in the outstanding tribute of the Greek cities on the Ionian coast,
tribute he had a hard time to obtain due to Athenian interference.
Thucydides described this situation, faced by both satraps Pharnabazes and
Tissaphernes: The king
(Darius II) had lately called upon him for the tribute from his government, for
which he was in arrears, being unable to raise it from the Hellenic towns by
reason of the Athenians; and he therefore calculated that by weakening the
Athenians he should get the tribute better paid, and should also draw the
Lacedaemonians into alliance with the king. He, like Tissaphernes of Caria,
entered into negotiations with Sparta and began a war with Athens. The conduct
of the war was much hindered by the rivalry between the two satraps, of whom
Pharnabazus was by far the more energetic and upright. Pharnabazus initially
fought with the Spartans against the Athenians during the Peloponnesian war
(431–404), even, in one instance, coming to the rescue of the retreating
Spartan forces, and riding his horse into the sea to fend off the Athenians
while encouraging his regiment. In 404, Pharnabazus may also have been
responsible for the assassination of the Athenian general
Alcibiades, who had
taken refuge in the Persian Empire. The assassination was probably at the
instigation of the Spartans, and specifically
Lysander. As Alcibiades
was about to set out for the Persian court, his residence was surrounded and
set on fire. Seeing no chance of escape he rushed out on his assassins, dagger
in hand, and was killed by a shower of arrows.
Conflict with the Ten Thousand (399)
After their victory in the Peloponnesian War (431–404), the Spartans
became the dominant power in the Aegean, creating a new threat for the
Achaemenid Empire. The Spartans then antagonized the Achaemenid king Artaxerxes
II by militarily supporting the rival bid of his brother
Cyrus the
Younger, their ally during the Peloponnesian war, leading to the campaign
of the Ten Thousand deep into Achaemenid territory in 401-399. Cyrus the
Younger failed, but the relationship between Sparta and the Achaemenid Empire
remained adversarial. Pharnabazus was involved in helping the Bithynians
against the plundering raids of the Greek Ten Thousand who were returning from
their failed campaign in the center of the Achaemenid Empire. He was also
trying to stop them from entering Hellespontine Phrygia. His cavalry is said to
have killed about 500 Greek mercenaries on that occasion, and mounted several
raids on the Greek mercenaries. Pharnabazus then arranged with Spartan Admiral
Anaxibius for the rest of the Greek mercenaries to be shipped out of the Asian
continent to Byzantium.
War with Athens against Sparta (395–387)
Hellespontine Phrygia was attacked and ravaged by the Spartan king Agesilaos in
396-395, who particularly laid waste to the area around Dasyliun, the capital
of Hellenistic Phrygia. Pharnabazus had several military encounters against the
invading Spartans on this occasion. Pharnabazus finally met in person with
Agesilaos, and Agesilaos agreed to remove himself from Hellespontine Phrygia
proper and retreated to the plain of Thebe in the Troad. In 394, while encamped
on the plain of Thebe, Agesilaus was still planning a campaign in the interior
of Asia Minor, or even an attack on Artaxerxes II himself, when he was recalled
to Greece to fight in the
Corinthian War
between Sparta and the combined forces of Athens, Thebes, Corinth, Argos and
several minor states. The outbreak of the conflict in Greece had been
encouraged by Persian payments to Sparta's Greek rivals, and had for effect to
remove the Spartan threat in Asia Minor. Pharnabazus sent Timocrates of Rhodes
as an envoy to Greece, and tens of thousands of Darics, the main currency in
Achaemenid coinage, were used to bribe the Greek states to start a war against
Sparta. According to Plutarch, Agesilaus said upon leaving Asia Minor "I
have been driven out by 10,000 Persian archers", a reference to
"Archers" (Toxotai) the Greek nickname for the Darics from their
obverse design, because that much money had been paid to politicians in Athens
and Thebes in order to start a war against Sparta because that much money had
been paid to politicians in Athens and Thebes in order to start a war against
Sparta.
Participation to the Corinthian War on the side of Athens (395-393)
Pharnabazes went on to aid the Athenians against the Spartans in the Corinthian
War (394–387). During this period, Pharnabazus is notable for his command
of the Achaemenid fleet at the Battle of
Cnidus) in 394 in
which the Persians, allied with the former Athenian admiral and then
commissioned into Persian service,
Conon, annihilated the
Spartan fleet, ending Sparta's brief status as the dominant Greek naval power.
Naval raids in Ionia
Pharnabazus followed up his victory at Cnidus by capturing several
Spartan-allied cities in Ionia, instigating pro-Athenian and pro-Democracy
movements. Abydus and Sestus were the only cities to refuse to expel the
Lacedaemonians despite threats from Pharnabazus to make war on them. He
attempted to force these into submission by ravaging the surrounding territory,
but this proved fruitless, leading him to leave Conon in charge of winning over
the cities in the Hellespont.
Naval raids on the Peloponnesian coast
From 393, Pharnabazus II and Conon sailed with his fleet to the Aegean island
of Melos and established a base there.] This was the first time in 90 years,
since the Greco-Persian Wars, that the Achaemenid fleet was going so far west.
The military occupation by these pro-Athenian forces led to several democratic
revolutions and new alliances with Athens in the islands. The fleet proceeded
further west to take revenge on the Spartans by invading Lacedaemonian
territory, where the Achaemenids laid waste to Pherae and raided along the
Messenian coast. Their aim was probably to instigate a revolt of the Messanian
helots against Sparta. Eventually they left due to scarce resources and few
harbors for the Achaemenid fleet in the area, as well as the looming
possibility of Lacedaemonian relief forces being dispatched. They then raided
the coast of Laconia and seized the island of Cythera, where they left a
garrison and an Athenian governor to cripple Sparta's offensive military
capabilities. Cythera in effect became Achaemenid territory. Seizing Cythera
also had the effect of cutting the strategic route between Peloponnesia and
Egypt and thus avoiding Spartan-Egyptian collusion, and directly threatening
Taenarum, the harbour of Sparta. This strategy to threaten Sparta had already
been recommended, in vain, by the exiled Spartan Demaratus to Xerxes I in 480.
Pharnabazus II, leaving part of his fleet in Cythera, then went to Corinth,
where he gave Sparta's rivals funds to further threaten the Lacedaemonians. He
also funded the rebuilding of a Corinthian fleet to resist the Spartans.
Xenophon gave a detailed contemporary account of the naval campaign of
Pharnabazus in his Hellenica:
"Pharnabazus, and Conon with him, sailed through the islands to Melos, and
making that their base, went on to Lacedaemon. And first Pharnabazus put in at
Pherae and laid waste this region; then he made descents at one point and
another of the coast and did whatever harm he could. But being fearful because
the country was destitute of harbours, because the Lacedaemonians might send
relief forces, and because provisions were scarce in the land, he quickly
turned about, and sailing away, came to anchor at Phoenicus in the island of
Cythera. And when those who held possession of the city of the Cytherians
abandoned their walls through fear of being captured by storm, he allowed them
to depart to Laconia under a truce, and having repaired the wall of the
Cytherians, left in Cythera a garrison of his own and Nicophemus, an Athenian,
as governor. After doing these things and sailing to the Isthmus of Corinth and
there exhorting the allies to carry on the war zealously and show themselves
men faithful to the King, he left them all the money that he had and sailed off
homeward. (...) The Corinthians, on the other hand, manned ships with the money
which Pharnabazus left, appointed Agathinus as admiral, and established their
mastery of the sea in the gulf around Achaea and Lechaeum."
Pharnabazus funded the rebuilding the walls of Athens, and provided his seamen
as manpower, in 393. After being convinced by Conon that allowing him to
rebuild the Long Walls around Piraeus, the main port of Athens, would be a
major blow to the Lacedaemonians, Pharnabazus eagerly gave Conon a fleet of 80
triremes and additional funds to accomplish this task. Pharnabazus dispatched
Conon with substantial funds and a large part of the fleet to Attica, where he
joined in the rebuilding of the long walls from Athens to Piraeus, a project
that had been initiated by Thrasybulus in 394.
According to Xenophon in Hellenica: Conon said that if he (Pharnabazus) would
allow him to have the fleet, he would maintain it by contributions from the
islands and would meanwhile put in at Athens and aid the Athenians in
rebuilding their long walls and the wall around Piraeus, adding that he knew
nothing could be a heavier blow to the Lacedaemonians than this. (...)
Pharnabazus, upon hearing this, eagerly dispatched him to Athens and gave him
additional money for the rebuilding of the walls. Upon his arrival Conon
erected a large part of the wall, giving his own crews for the work, paying the
wages of carpenters and masons, and meeting whatever other expense was
necessary. There were some parts of the wall, however, which the Athenians
themselves, as well as volunteers from Boeotia and from other states, aided in
building.
With the assistance of the rowers of the fleet, and the workers paid for by the
Persian money, the construction was soon completed. Athens quickly took
advantage of its possession of walls and a fleet to seize the islands of
Scyros, Imbros, and Lemnos, on which it established cleruchies (citizen
colonies). As a reward for his success, Pharnabazus was allowed to marry the
king's daughter, Apame. He was recalled to the Achaemenid Empire in 393, and
replaced by satrap Tiribazus.
In 386, Artaxerxes II betrayed his Athenian allies and came to an arrangement
with Sparta, to the expense of the Greek cities of Asia Minor, which Sparta
agreed to concede to the Achaemenids in exchange for Spartan domination in
Greece. In the Treaty of
Antalcidas he forced his erstwhile allies to come to terms. This treaty
restored control of the Greek cities of Ionia and Aeolis on the Anatolian coast
to the Persians, while giving Sparta dominance on the Greek mainland.
Achaemenid campaign of Pharnabazus II against Egypt in 373.
In 377, Pharnabazus was then reassigned by Artaxerxes II to help command a
military expedition into rebellious Egypt, having proven his ability against
the Spartans. After 4 years of preparations in the Levant, Pharnabazes gathered
an expeditionary force had 200,000 Persian troops, 300 triremes, 200 galleys,
and 12,000 Greeks under Iphicrates. The Achaemenid
Empire had also been applying pressure on Athens to recall the Greek general
Chabrias, who was in the
service of the Egyptians, but in vain. The Egyptian ruler
Nectanebo I was thus
supported by Athenian General Chabrias and his mercenaries.
The force landed in Egypt with the Athenian general Iphicrates near Mendes in
373. The expedition force was too slow, giving time to the Egyptians to
strengthen defenses. Pharnabazus and Iphicrates appeared before Pelusium, but
retired without attacking it, Nectanebo I, king of Egypt, having added to its
former defences by laying the neighboring lands under water, and blocking up
the navigable channels of the Nile by embankments. Fortifications on the
Pelusiac branch of the Nile ordered by Nectanebo forced the enemy fleet to seek
another way to sail up the Nile. Eventually the fleet managed to find its way
up the less-defended Mendesian branch. At this point, the mutual distrust that
had arisen between Iphicrates and Pharnabazus prevented the enemy from reaching
Memphis. Then the annual Nile flood and the Egyptian defenders' resolve to
defend their territory turned what had initially appeared as certain defeat for
Nectanebo I and his troops into a complete victory. After several weeks the
Persians, and their Greek mercenaries under Iphicrates, had to reembark. The
expedition against Egypt had failed. It was the end of the career of
Pharnabazus, who was now over 70 years old. Pharnabazus was replaced by Datames
to lead a second expedition to Egypt, but he failed and then started the
"Satraps' Revolt" against the Great King. From 368 many western
satrapies of the Achaemenid Empire started to rebel against Artaxerxes II, in
the Great Satraps' Revolt, so Nectanebo provided financial support to the
rebelling satraps and re-established ties with both Sparta and Athens.
Pharnabazus was one of the best known Satraps among the Greeks, and had many
exchanges with them. He is one of the main characters in the Hellenica
of Xenophon, also appears in his Anabasis, and is also very present in
the History of the Peloponnesian War of Thucydides. The family of
Pharnabazus was closely related to the Greek world. His son Artabazos II
married a Greek noblewoman from Rhodes, and lived in exile with his family at
the Macedonian court of Philip II for
more than ten years. His grand-daughter Barsine was half Rhodian Greek, and
married Alexander the Great.
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