* Pompeius Trogus asserts that such co-regencies were contrary to Persian law; we have seen above that, on the contrary, they were obligatory when the sovereign was setting out on a campaign.

** This is the version of the story given by Dinon and accepted by Pompoius Trogus.  A chronological calculation easily demonstrates its unlikelihood.  It follows from the evidence given by Justin himself that Artaxerxes died of grief soon after the execution of his son; but, on the other hand, that the battle of Cunaxa took place in 400 B.C.:  Aspasia must then have been fifty or sixty years old when Darius fell in love with her.

By the removal of this first obstacle the crafty prince found himself only one step nearer success, for his brother Ariaspes was acknowledged as heir-apparent:  Ochus therefore persuaded him that their father, convinced of the complicity of Ariaspes in the plot imputed to Darius, intended to put him to an ignominious death, and so worked upon him that he committed suicide to escape the executioner.  A bastard named Arsames, who might possibly have aspired to the crown, was assassinated by Ochus.  This last blow was too much for Artaxerxes, and he died of grief after a reign of forty-six years (358 B.C.).* Ochus, who immediately assumed the name of Artaxerxes, began his reign by the customary massacre:  he put to death all the princes of the royal family,** and having thus rid himself of all the rival claimants to the supreme power, he hastened on preparations for the war with Egypt which had been interrupted by his father’s death and his own accession.

* This is the length attributed by Plutarch to this reign, and which is generally accepted.  It was narrated in after- days that the king kept the fact of his father’s death hidden for ten months, but it is impossible to tell how much truth there is in this statement, which was accepted by Dinon.

** According to the author followed by Pompeius Trogus, the princesses themselves were involved in this massacre.  This is certainly an exaggeration, for we shall shortly see that Darius III., the last king of Persia, was accounted to be the grandson of Darius II.; the massacre can only have involved the direct heirs of Artaxerxes.

The necessity for restoring Persian dominion on the banks of the Nile was then more urgent than at any previous time.  During the half-century which had elapsed since the recovery of her independence, Egypt had been a perpetual source of serious embarrassment to the great king.  The contemporaries of Amyrtseus, whether Greeks or barbarians, had at first thought that his revolt was nothing more than a local rising, like many a previous one which had lasted but a short time and had been promptly suppressed.  But when it was perceived that the native dynasties had taken a hold upon the country, and had carried on a successful contest with Persia, in spite of the immense disproportion