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ἄγαλμα μέγα. H. does not make it clear whether this statue is the same as the one destroyed (§ 2); probably it was not. Lehmann (B. W. für K. P. 1900, 964 n. 6) considers that H. is here borrowing from Hecataeus (cf. 178. 2 n.); he quotes χρόνον ἐκεῖνον (§ 2) in proof (but v. i.). H. here records an important fact (as Lehmann points out), though he does not understand it. The god's statue was the symbol of the independent existence of Babylon, and the king at the beginning of the year (in the month Nisan) solemnly grasped the hand of Bel-Marduk, thus acknowledging his supremacy. A conqueror by doing this conciliated the prejudices of the Babylonians, owning himself a native king. So in our earliest important Cassite inscription (before 1000 B.C.) a Cassite king records that he brought the statue of Marduk back to Babylon, and becomes ‘king of Babylon’ (Winckler, Der Alte O. vi, 1904, pp. 23-4). So too Cyrus, in the Cyrus Cylinder (App. IV, § 1 and R. P.2 v. 167), professes that he rules by the grace of Marduk. Xerxes, giving up this policy of conciliation, removed the statue, and so ‘destroyed the personal union between Babylon and Persia’; Sennacherib had done the same, but his successors had restored the temple and statue of the god. It is to be noted that Xerxes' title changes at the same time; in 485 B.C. he is ‘King of Babylon and the lands’, afterwards he is ‘King of Persia and Media’ (Meyer, iii. 80). Apparently the change of policy was provoked by Babylonian rebellions which began at the end of the reign of Darius (so Darius is said ‘to have intended’ (ἐπιβουλεύσας) to take the statue; cf. Klio, vii. 447-8, for new inscriptions as to these rebellions).
ἐκεῖνον, ‘at that time,’ i.e. when Cyrus conquered Babylon.
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