(i) Historically, Cyrus was raised normally.
(ii) Mythologically, his life was threatened in infancy so he was brought up secretly by a herdsman.
(iii) Fictionally, in "Brave To Be A King" by Poul Anderson, Cyrus was killed in infancy but the murderer, Harpagus, later persuaded the captured Time Patrolman, Keith Denison, to play the role of the returned adult Cyrus, thus generating the myth.
(iv) Denison suggests a fourth option, a mere hypothesis within the fiction:
"'Suppose I had not shown up? Mightn't Harpagus have found a different pseudo-Cyrus?'" (p. 90)
Maybe, but the evidence is that it was only Denison's dramatic arrival that put the idea of the deception into Harpagus' head.
(v) After (iii), Everard and Denison prevent the murder of Cyrus, thus making (i) true after all although (ii) the myth remains.
This has strange consequences. In (ii), Harpagus' overlord, Astyages, who had ordered the murder of Cyrus, makes Harpagus eat his own son as punishment for having spared Cyrus' life. In (iii), Harpagus suffers this punishment even though he had killed Cyrus. In (i) and (v), none of this happens.
In (iii), Harpagus thinks that he has atoned for the murder by finding another Cyrus. Thus, he has no concept of the wrong done to the murdered infant.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
I don't think you were quite fair to Harpagus. I think he DID understand the wrong he had done that murdered infant. I'll quote a relevant bit from Section 8 of "Brave To Be A King": "Then I have atoned?" he asked in a thin anxious voice. "For the murder I did at my old king's behest--that I laid a helpless infant upon the mountainside and watched him die--have I atoned, King's countryman? For it was that prince's death...which brought the land close to ruin...but I found another Cyrus! I saved us! Have I atoned?"
That certainly sounds like Harpagus understood the wrong he had done in exposing the infant Cyrus!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
How does finding another Cyrus for the country atone for the wrong done to the infant?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, but note how Harpagus called what he had done to that infant was MURDER. And knew that child was a helpless infant. Finding another Cyrus could not ATONE for what Harpagus had done, I agree. But he KNEW he had murdered that child.
Ad astra! Sean
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