Note 98 — Chapter LXIX · CYRUS THE YOUNGER AND THE TEN THOUSAND GREEKS.
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Diodorus (xiv, 23) notices the legendary pair of hostile brothers, Eteokles and Polyneikes, as a parallel. Compare Tacitus, Annal. iv, 60. “Atrox Drusi ingenium, super cupidinem potentiæ, et solita fratribus odia, accendebatur invidia, quod mater Agrippina promptior Neroni erat,” etc.; and Justin, xlii, 4.
Compare also the interesting narrative of M. Prosper Mérimée, in his life of Don Pedro of Castile; a prince commonly known by the name of Peter the Cruel. Don Pedro was dethroned, and slain in personal conflict, by the hand of his bastard brother, Henri of Transtamare.
At the battle of Navarrete, in 1367, says M. Mérimée, “Don Pèdre, qui, pendant le combat, s’était jété au plus fort de la mêlée, s’acharna long temps à la poursuite des fuyards. On le voyait galoper dans la plaine, monté sur un cheval noir, sa bannière armoriée de Castille devant lui, cherchant son frère partout où l’on combattait encore, et criant, échauffé par le carnage—‘Où est ce bâtard, qui se nomme roi de Castille?’” (Histoire de Don Pèdre, p. 504.)
Ultimately Don Pedro, blocked up and almost starved out in the castle of Montiel, was entrapped by simulated negotiations into the power of his enemies. He was slain in personal conflict by the dagger of his brother Henri, after a desperate struggle, in which he seemed likely to prevail, if Henri had not been partially aided by a bystander.
This tragical scene (on the night of the 23d of March, 1369) is graphically described by M. Mérimée (p. 564-566).