Cambyses
historical figure · 8 works · 24 mentions · 37 anchored passages
King Cambyses · father · his father · my father · Cambyses his son · Cambyses son of Cyrus · Cyrus' son Cambyses · Cyrus's father · his own son Cambyses · king of Persia
in the texts
The Histories
Persian king, son of Cyrus and Cassandane, who inherits the throne and leads the Persian expedition against Egypt.
He considered the Ionians and Aeolians slaves inherited from his father, and prepared an expedition against Egypt, taking with him some of these Greek subjects besides others whom he ruled.
After the death of Cyrus, Cambyses inherited his throne.
Cambyses, when he had conquered Egypt and learned who Ladice was, sent her away to Cyrene unharmed.
Cyropaedia
King of the Persians, Cyrus' father, and Mandane's husband; he is associated with Persian plainness, lawful obedience, and moderation.
The father of Cyrus is said to have been Cambyses, king of the Persians:
Mind, therefore, that you be not flogged within an inch of your life, when you come home, if you return with a knowledge acquired from your grandfather here of the principles not of kingship but of tyranny, one principle of which is that it is right for one to have more than all.
But your father, at least, said Cyrus, is more shrewd at teaching people to have less than to have more, mother.
Orations
Persian king who mistreated a corpse believing it to be Amasis, illustrating the futility of harming what cannot feel.
Cambyses was mad, in that he pricked and scourged the corpse of Amasis the king of the Egyptians.
But, O Egyptians and Cambyses, whether it was someone else who suffered these things or Amasis himself, it was a figure bloodless, fleshless, soulless.
and, by Zeus, if a man should be entrusted by a king or a tyrant with gold or silver, or ships, or arms, or a citadel, or the whole empire—as Leptines often received Syracuse from his brother, and Philistus from the younger Dionysius, and the Magi the royal palace of the Persians from Cambyses, when he was on campaign in Egypt, and Mithranes the citadel of Sardis from Darius, and Persaeus the Acro …
On Anger
Persian king who, provoked by his friend's warning about his drunkenness, killed the friend's son to prove his steady hand
King Cambyses was too much given to wine, and Praexaspes, one of his dearest friends, warned him to drink more sparingly, saying that drunkenness was disgraceful in a king, whom the eyes and ears of all men followed.
Then he bent his bow and pierced the very heart of the youth—for that, he had said, was what he aimed at—and, cutting open the breast, showed the shaft lodged in the very heart, and, looking back at the father, asked whether he had a sure enough hand.
for against these, because they had not received servitude with upturned hands and had given free answers to the envoys sent to them—answers which kings call insolent—Cambyses raged, and, with no provisions made ready, no routes explored, dragged through trackless and parched lands all the throng useful for war.
Protrepticus
Persian king cited as an example of a ruler who plundered sanctuaries and reportedly slew the sacred Apis bull.
And if a Cambyses or a Darius or any other madman attempted such things, and if one slew the Egyptian Apis, I laugh that he slew their god, but am vexed that he did wrong for gain.
Letters to Lucilius
Persian king noted for frenzy or madness, invoked as a counter-example to Scipio's admirable moderation.
As for his soul, I persuade myself that it has returned to heaven, from which it came, not because he led great armies, for these the frenzied Cambyses too had, who used his frenzy with success, but on account of his remarkable moderation and devotion, which I judge more admirable in him when he left his country than when he defended it;
On Benefits
Persian king, cited alongside Cyrus as an example of a ruler whose conquest was never satisfied.
Run through Cyrus and Cambyses and the whole line of the Persian kingdom.
History of the Peloponnesian War
Son and successor of Cyrus as king of the Persians, during whose reign Polycrates of Samos built a strong fleet.
And the Ionians afterwards had a large navy in the time of Cyrus, the first king of the Persians, and Cambyses his son;