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In the writings of the
Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic pe ...
chronicler
Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus, part of the Persian Empire (now Bodrum, Turkey) and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria (Italy). He is known fo ...
, the
phrase In syntax and grammar, a phrase is a group of words or singular word acting as a grammatical unit. For instance, the English expression "the very happy squirrel" is a noun phrase which contains the adjective phrase "very happy". Phrases can consi ...
''earth and water'' ( ''ge kai hydor'') is used to represent the demand by the
Persian Empire The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire (; peo, 𐎧𐏁𐏂, , ), also called the First Persian Empire, was an ancient Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC. Based in Western Asia, it was contemporarily the largest emp ...
of formal
tribute A tribute (; from Latin ''tributum'', "contribution") is wealth, often in kind, that a party gives to another as a sign of submission, allegiance or respect. Various ancient states exacted tribute from the rulers of land which the state conq ...
from the cities or people who surrendered to them.


Usage in Herodotus' histories

In Book 4, Herodotus mentions for the first time the term ''earth and water'' in the answer of king Idanthyrsus of the
Scythians The Scythians or Scyths, and sometimes also referred to as the Classical Scythians and the Pontic Scythians, were an ancient Eastern * : "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved for the ancient tribes of northern and eastern Cent ...
to king Darius. In Book 5, it is reported that Darius sent heralds demanding ''earth and water'' from king
Amyntas I Amyntas I (Greek: Ἀμύντας Aʹ; 498 BC) was king of the Ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia (c. 547 – 512 / 511 BC) and then a vassal of Darius I from 512/511 to his death 498 BC, at the time of Achaemenid Macedonia. He was a son of Alce ...
of
Macedon Macedonia (; grc-gre, Μακεδονία), also called Macedon (), was an ancient kingdom on the periphery of Archaic and Classical Greece, and later the dominant state of Hellenistic Greece. The kingdom was founded and initially ruled ...
, which he accepted. It was also requested of the Athenian embassy to
Artaphernes Artaphernes ( el, Ἀρταφέρνης, Old Persian: Artafarna, from Median ''Rtafarnah''), flourished circa 513–492 BC, was a brother of the Achaemenid king of Persia, Darius I, satrap of Lydia from the capital of Sardis, and a Persian gener ...
in 507 BC, which complied. In the 6th book, Darius sent
heralds A herald, or a herald of arms, is an officer of arms, ranking between pursuivant and king of arms. The title is commonly applied more broadly to all officers of arms. Heralds were originally messengers sent by monarchs or noblemen to ...
throughout
Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders wi ...
demanding ''earth and water'' for the king (Hdt. 6.48). There were not many city-states that refused. In Book 7, he recounts that when the
Persians The Persians are an Iranian ethnic group who comprise over half of the population of Iran. They share a common cultural system and are native speakers of the Persian language as well as of the languages that are closely related to Persian. ...
sent envoys to the Spartans and to the Athenians demanding the traditional symbol of surrender, an offering of soil and water, the Spartans threw them into a well and the Athenians threw them into a gorge, suggesting that upon their arrival at the bottom, they could "Dig it out for yourselves."


Interpretation

The demand for ''earth and water'' symbolized that those surrendering to Persians gave up all their rights over their land and every product of the land. Giving ''earth and water'', they recognized the Persian authority over everything; even their lives belonged to the king of Persians. Then negotiations would take place to specify the obligations and the benefits of the liegemen. The phrase ''earth and water'', even in modern
Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
, symbolizes unconditional subordination to a conqueror. According to the modern historian J. M. Balcer, the significance of earth and water is that they were
Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheisti ...
symbols and representative of vassalage to the Persian Empire. "Persian heralds traveled throughout Greece demanding the recognition of Persian Suzerainty and the Zoroastrian symbols of earth and water, the marks of vassalage...".


Result of not surrendering Earth and Water

In order to appease Xerxes, who was about to launch the Second Persian invasion of Greece after succeeding his father, Darius, two Spartans were voluntarily sent to Susa for execution, in atonement for the death of the Persian heralds sent earlier by Darius. This did not satisfy Xerxes who punished the Greeks by defeating the Spartan Army and destroying Athens.Holland, pp. 305–306


See also

*
Persian Wars The Greco-Persian Wars (also often called the Persian Wars) were a series of conflicts between the Achaemenid Empire and Greek city-states that started in 499 BC and lasted until 449 BC. The collision between the fractious political world of the ...


References


Further reading

* {{cite journal , last1=Rung , first1=Eduard , title=The Language of the Achaemenid Imperial Diplomacy towards the Greeks: The Meaning of Earth and Water , journal=Klio , date=2015 , volume=97 , issue=2 , pages=503–515 , doi=10.1515/klio-2015-0035, s2cid=193669818


External links


Livius.org: Earth and water
Greco-Persian Wars Greek words and phrases Achaemenid Empire