[18] So it is presented by Justin, v, 11.
The moment when Cyrus returned to Sardis was highly favorable to his plans and preparations. The long war had just been concluded by the capture of Athens and the extinction of her power. Many Greeks, after having acquired military tastes and habits, were now thrown out of employment; many others were driven into exile, by the establishment of the Lysandrian Dekarchies throughout all the cities at once. Hence competent recruits, for a well-paid service like that of Cyrus, were now unusually abundant. Having already a certain number of Greek mercenaries, distributed throughout the various garrisons in his satrapy, he directed the officers in command to strengthen their garrisons by as many additional Peloponnesian soldiers as they could obtain. His pretext was,—first, defence against Tissaphernes, with whom, since the denunciation by the latter, he was at open war,—next, protection of the Ionic cities on the seaboard, who had been hitherto comprised under the government of Tissaphernes, but had now revolted of their own accord, since the enmity of Cyrus against him had been declared. Miletus alone had been prevented from executing this resolution, for Tissaphernes, reinforcing his garrison in that place, had adopted violent measures of repression, killing or banishing several of the leading men. Cyrus, receiving these exiled Milesians with every demonstration of sympathy, immediately got together both an army and a fleet, under the Egyptian Tamos,[19] to besiege Miletus by land and sea. He at the same time transmitted to court the regular tribute due from these maritime cities, and attempted, through the interest of his mother Parysatis, to procure that they should be transferred from Tissaphernes to himself. Hence the Great King was deluded into a belief that the new levies of Cyrus were only intended for private war between him and Tissaphernes; an event not uncommon between two neighboring satraps. Nor was it displeasing to the court that a suspected prince should be thus occupied at a distance.[20]
[20] Xen. Anab. i, 1, 7, 8, ὥστε οὐδὲν ἤχθετο (the king) αὐτῶν πολεμοῦντων.
Besides the army thus collected around Miletus, Cyrus found means to keep other troops within his call, though at a distance and unsuspected. A Lacedæmonian officer named Klearchus, of considerable military ability and experience, presented himself as an exile at Sardis. He appears to have been banished, (as far as we can judge amidst contradictory statements,) for gross abuse of authority, and extreme tyranny, as Lacedæmonian Harmost at Byzantium, and even for having tried to maintain himself in that place after the Ephors had formally dismissed him. The known efficiency, and restless warlike appetite of Klearchus,[21] procured for him the confidence of Cyrus, who gave him the large sum of ten thousand Darics, (about £7600), which he employed in levying an army of mercenary Greeks for the defence of the Grecian cities in the Chersonese against the Thracian tribes in their neighborhood; thus maintaining the troops until they were required by Cyrus. Again, Aristippus and Menon,—Thessalians of the great family of the Aleuadæ at Larissa, who had maintained their tie of personal hospitality with the Persian royal family ever since the time of Xerxes, and were now in connection with Cyrus,[22]—received from him funds to maintain a force of two thousand mercenaries for their political purposes in Thessaly, subject to his call whenever he should require them. Other Greeks, too, who had probably contracted similar ties of hospitality with Cyrus by service during the late war,—Proxenus, a Bœotian; Agias and Sophænetus, Arcadians; Sokrates, an Achæan, etc.,—were also empowered by him to collect mercenary soldiers. His pretended objects were, partly the siege of Miletus; partly an ostensible expedition against the Pisidians,—warlike and predatory mountaineers who did much mischief from their fastnesses in the south-east of Asia Minor.