About 40 years after the Persian conquest of Ionia, and in the reign of the fourth Persian king, Darius the Great, the stand-in Milesian tyrant Aristagoras found himself in this familiar predicament. In 500 BC, Aristagoras was approached by some exiles from Naxos, who asked him to take control of the island. Seeing an opportunity to strengthen his position in Miletus by conquering Naxos, Aristagoras approached the satrap of Lydia, Artaphernes, proposing a joint attack on Naxos, to which Artaphernes assented.