Polycrates

The offerings in Samos were dedicated because of the friendship between Amasis and Polycrates, son of Aeaces;

While Cambyses was attacking Egypt, the Lacedaemonians too were making war upon Samos and upon Aeaces ' son Polycrates, who had revolted and won Samos.

Reading this, and perceiving that Amasis ' advice was good, Polycrates considered which of his treasures it would most grieve his soul to lose, and came to this conclusion:

Then it was that Polycrates, an Athenian captain, asked to be detached from his division;

Since, therefore, the sacrifices appeared to be favourable, portending that he and the army might go to Seuthes in safety, Xenophon took Polycrates, the Athenian captain, and from each of the generals except Neon a man in whom each had confidence, and set off by night to visit Seuthes’ army, sixty stadia away.

Well, then, said Xenophon, at this moment I am here myself, along with Phryniscus here, one of the generals, and Polycrates yonder, one of the captains, and outside are representatives of the other generals except Neon the Laconian, in each case the man most trusted by each general.

You may hear her blamed by farmers and merchants, and by the rich on the score of their money, and by the beautiful on the score of their bodies, and by Pantheia on the score of her husband, and by Croesus on the score of his son, and by Astyages when he was conquered, and by Polycrates when he was taken.

And Polycrates, they say, so long as he ruled Samos alone, was the most fortunate of all men;

Polycrates also, tyrant of Samos, in the time of Cambyses, having a strong fleet, both made some other of the islands subject to him, and took Rhenea and dedicated it to the Delian Apollo.

(This Rhenea is so short a distance from Delos, that Polycrates the tyrant of Samos, after being powerful at sea for a considerable time, and ruling over the rest of the islands, and taking Rhenea, dedicated it to the Delian Apollo, by connecting it with Delos by a chain.

Polycrates of Samos they called happy.

Our mutual hostility has become so acute that, when I wanted to convey my fleet to the Hellespont, I was compelled to escort it with my army through the Chersonese, because your settlers there were at war with us in accordance with the decree of Polycrates, backed up by your resolutions, and your general was inciting the Byzantines and publicly announcing that your orders were to make war on me, if he got the chance.

And you, Polycrates, assume that you will make men better even if they are not related to you, provided that they become your pupils, yet believe that the gods have no care for the virtue of their own children!

Having observed, therefore, that you take especial pride in your Defense of Busiris and in your Accusation of Socrates, I shall try to make it clear to you that in both these discourses you have fallen far short of what the subject demands.

I have learned of your fairmindedness, Polycrates, and of the reversal in your life, through information from others;

How many better men, nevertheless, have you left in the lower world!

as when his daughter foresaw a cross for Polycrates of Samos, from the anointing of the sun and the washing of Jupiter.