In the last months of the failing revolt, the Persians were reconquering rebel country city by city. Choosing not to remain and make a stand alone, Aristagoras led a colony to Thrace, where he had negotiated a franchise to settle from the Thracians. No sooner did he arrive than he and all his men were massacred in a surprise attack by the Thracians, for reasons unspecified by Herodotus, whether loyal to the Great King, or influenced by the Scythians, who hated the Ionians for their rescue of the Great King, or just because they changed their minds about the number of Hellenes they would allow in their country. The revolt gained momentum briefly but then began to fail again. When all was nearly lost, the Great King allowed Histiaeus to convince him that he could settle the conflict and now should be sent back to Miletus. Aristagoras was gone. According to Herodotus, they never met again.