Histories

not sailing in round freightships but in fifty-oared vessels. When they came to Tartessus they made friends with the king of the Tartessians, whose name was Arganthonius; he ruled Tartessus for eighty years and lived a hundred and twenty.[*](A common Greek tradition, apparently; Anacreon (Fr. 8) says “I would not... rule Tartessus for an hundred and fifty years.)

The Phocaeans won this man's friendship to such a degree that he invited them to leave Ionia (region (general)), Europe Ionia and settle in his country wherever they liked; and then, when he could not persuade them to, and learned from them how the Median power was increasing, he gave them money to build a wall around their city.

He gave it generously: for the circuit of the wall is of not a few stades, and all this is made of great stones well fitted together.

In such a manner the Phocaeans' wall was built. Harpagus marched against the city and besieged it, but he made overtures, and said that it would suffice him if the Phocaeans would demolish one rampart of the wall and dedicate one house.