Note 598 — Chapter XXXVI · FROM THE IONIC REVOLT TO THE BATTLE OF MARATHON.

That which marks the siege of Milêtus, and the defeat of the Argeians by Kleomenês, as contemporaneous, or nearly so, is, the common oracular dictum delivered in reference to both: in the same prophecy of the Pythia, one half alludes to the sufferings of Milêtus, the other half to those of Argos (Herodot. vi, 19-77).

Χρεωμένοισι γὰρ Ἀργείοισι ἐν Δελφοῖσι περὶ σωτηρίης τῆς πόλιος τῆς σφετέρης, τὸ μὲν ἐς αὐτοὺς τοὺς Ἀργείους φέρον, τὴν δὲ παρενθήκην ἔχρησε ἐς Μιλησίους.

I consider this evidence of date to be better than the statement of Pausanias. That author places the enterprise against Argos immediately (αὔτικα—Paus. iii, 4, 1) after the accession of Kleomenês, who, as he was king when Mæandrius came from Samos (Herodot. iii, 148), must have come to the throne not later than 518 or 517 B. C. This would be thirty-seven years prior to 480 B. C.; a date much too early for the war between Kleomenês and the Argeians, as we may see by Herodotus (vii, 149).