Apries

Family: Egyptian · Role: king · First appears: Book 2 · §158–165

Apries succeeded Psammis as king of Egypt and led an army against Sidon, where he fought a sea-fight with the king of Tyre. His expedition against the Kyrenians suffered a great disaster, and the Egyptians blamed him and revolted. When they set Amasis up as king, Amasis prepared to march against Apries. Apries sent Patarbemis to bring Amasis to him alive, then ordered Patarbemis’s ears and nose cut off when he returned without him. Seeing Patarbemis’s treatment, Apries’s remaining supporters joined the revolt and went over to Amasis.

At Momemphis, Amasis defeated Apries and took him alive. He kept Apries in his palace at Saïs for some time and treated him well, but at last handed him over to the Egyptians, who strangled and buried him. Later, Nitetis revealed to Cambyses that she was Apries’s daughter, not Amasis’s. In Book 4, Adicran and the Libyans placed themselves under Apries after losing land to the Kyrenians; Apries sent an Egyptian army against Kyrene, but it was defeated, and the Egyptians revolted against him again.