Gyges | Lydian Ruler, Tyrant & Conqueror | Britannica (original) (raw)

Gyges (died c. 652 bc) was the king of Lydia, in western Anatolia (now Turkey), from about 680 to about 652 bc; he founded the Mermnad dynasty and made his kingdom a military power.

According to all the ancient sources, Gyges came to the throne after slaying King Candaules and marrying his queen, but there are several versions of the event itself. Herodotus wrote that Candaules, who was inordinately proud of his wife’s beauty, compelled Gyges to see her nude. She caught Gyges spying on her and forced him on pain of death to kill her husband. In the standard version of Plato’s Republic, Gyges was a shepherd who found a ring that made him invisible and used it to seduce the queen and murder the king. A third version is provided by Nicholas of Damascus, in the 1st century bc. Drawing upon the 5th-century Lydian historian Xanthus, Nicholas depicted Gyges as an army officer, already suspected of treachery by the royal house, who killed Candaules after the queen had accused him of attempted seduction.

Gyges cooperated with King Ashurbanipal of Assyria in a struggle against the Cimmerians, who had overrun Phrygia, in northern Anatolia. He then invaded Ionia in western Anatolia, capturing the Greek city of Colophon and attacking Miletus, after which he travelled to Greece to make offerings at Delphi. His downfall came when he lost Assyrian military support because he had dispatched troops to aid a revolt in Egypt. This left him open to another Cimmerian invasion, during which he was defeated and killed.

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