IMR fti HI I LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIP V ^ printed to the \ LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO by FRIENDS OF THE LIBRARY Mrs. Edwin W. Meise donor PULLING DOWN THE STATUE OF DIANA AT EPHESUS. POPULAR HISTORIES OF THE GREAT NATIONS. A POPULAR HISTORY OF GREECE. FROM THE EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE INCORPORATION WITH THE ROMAN EMPIRE. BY ,D. ROSE. Edited by H. W. DULCKEN, Ph.D. " In the laurelled field of finer arts And of bold freedom, they unequalled shone, The pride of smiling Greece and human kind." THOMSON. WARD, LOCK AND CO., LONDON: WARWICK HOUSE, SALISBURY SQUARE, E.C. NEW YORK: BOND STREET. [All rights reserved.'] PREFACE. As in the " Popular History of Rome," recently published, which forms the opening volume of Messrs. Ward, Lock and Co.'s series of "Popular Histories of the Great Nations," accuracy and completeness in so far as completeness can be achieved in telling, within the compass of a single volume, the story of the great nations of ancient Greece have been the chief objects kept in view. Commencing with a general view of Greece in the earliest times, giving the topographical details of the aspect of the country generally, with its limits and outlines, its rivers, mountain ranges and landmarks, the narrative proceeds to deal with those old, half-prehistoric legends of the mythical period, in which the deeds of heroes and founders of states are dimly shadowed forth. Thence through the Trojan war the history passes to the region of authentic narrative ; comprising the story of the various fortunes and deeds of Sparta and Athens, and the other states of Greece, with their rise, progress, foreign and intestine struggles, their decay and fall. Associated as it is in every age with the lives and actions of heroes, statesmen and philosophers, whose names have stamped Greece as the land of ancient culture, civilisation and refinement, a popular PREFACE. history of Greece must to a great extent be biographical in its nature. But it will be found that considerable space has been devoted to the description of the various systems of state polity, military discipline, laws, arts and learning of Greece ; the poets and prose writers, and especially the philosophers whose teachings have influenced thought and progress through succeeding ages are especially considered, and their systems will be found briefly but intelligibly set before the readers of the work. As in the Roman history, chronological and dynastic tables have been added ; and the contents of the various chapters are paragraphed and numbered for facility ol reference; while the pictorial illustrations will be found to exhibit accurately the architecture, costume, archaeology, weapons and topography of the nations and periods represented. WARWICK HOUSE, January, 1887. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE NAMES CHAPTER II. THE PRE-HISTORIC INHABITANTS OF GREECE . . . . , , .15 CHAPTER III. THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS .26 CHAPTER IV. THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES 43 CHAPTER V. MYTHICAL HEROES AND THE TROJAN WAR ...... 67 CHAPTER VI. CHARACTER OF THE LEGENDARY OR HEROIC AGE OF GREECE (1500- IIOOB.C.) 88 CHAPTER VII. CHARACTER OF THE EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE (uoo- 500 B.C.) 96 CHAPTER VIII. SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C 113 CHAPTER IX. THE HISTORY OF ATHENS FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 527 B.C. . 136 CHAPTER X. ATHENS TO 500 B.C. THE PEISISTRATID^ 156 CHAPTER XI. THE MINOR STATES AND ISLANDS, TO 500 B.C 174 CHAPTER XII. THE LYDIAN, MEDIAN, AND PERSIAN EMPIRES, AND THE IONIC REVOLT (716-494 B.C.) 184 CHAPTER XIII. THE WARS OF PERSIA AND HELLAS (492-449 B.C.) . . . 198 Contents. PAGE CHAPTER XIV. THE WARS OF PERSIA AND HELLAS (472-449 B.C.) CONCLUDED . . 220 CHAPTER XV. LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY AND ART FROM HOMER Tr ARISTOPHANES (900-400 B.C.) 237 CHAPTER XVI. THE ATHENIAN HEGEMONY (477-431 B.C.) 260 CHAPTER XVII. THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR (431-404 B.C.) 273 CHAPTER XVIII. THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR (431-404 B.C.) 297 CHAPTER XIX. THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY (404-371 B.C.) 324 CHAPTER XX. THE THEBAN STRUGGLE AND HEGEMONY (371-361 B.C.) . .356 CHAPTER XXI. THE STRUGGLE WITH PHILIP II. OF MACEDONIA (359-336 B.C.) . . 370 CHAPTER XXII. HELLAS UNDER ALEXANDER THE GREAT (336-323 B.C.) .... 393 CHAPTER XXIII. ART, LITERATURE AND PHILOSOPHY (400-146 B.C.) 419 CHAPTER XXIV. FROM THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT TO THE ROMAN CON- QUEST OF GREECE (323-146 B.C.) , . .451 RUINS OF THE TEMPLE OF ATHENA ON THE PROMONTORY OF SUNIUM. CHAPTER I. THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. NAMES. THE NAMES GREECE AND HELLAS t ACHAIA'. 2. PHYSICAL CONFORMATION OF GREECE : ADVANTAGES OF ITS SITUATION. 3. COMMUNICATION BY THE ISLANDS AND THE SEAS: BEAUTY OF THE MARINE SCENERY I ITS EFFECT ON GREEK CHARACTER : THE ETESIAN WINDS. 4. THE CLIMATE : ANCIENT FERTILITY OF THE SOIL: AGRICULTURE: MINERAL WEALTH. 5. THE PHYSICAL DEFENCES OF GREECE: EFFECT OF CONFIGURATION OF GREECE ON THE NATIONAL CHARACTER. 6. THE MOUNTAINS : THE PLAINS. 7 THE RIVERS AND STREAMS : THEIR SUBTERRANEAN OUTLETS. 8. THE ISLANDS. 9. THE TRIPLE NATURAL DIVISION OF GREECE : NORTHERN GREECE TIIESSAJ.Y, EPEIROS, DOLOPIA. IO. CENTRAL GREECE ACARNANIA, ^TOLIA, WESTERN LOCRIS, ^NIANA, DORIS, MALIS, EASTERN LOCRIS, PHOCIS, ECEOTIA, ATTICA, MEGARIS. II. SOUTHERN GREECE, OR PELOPONNESOS CORINTH, SICYON, ACHAIA, ELIS, ARCADIA, MESSENIA, LACONIA, ARGOLIS, EPIDAURIA, TRCEZENIA, AND HERMIONIS. HE name Greece, in Latin Grascia,was never used by any of the Greek nation to designate their home. It was a foreign name, like our own word Germany for the land called by the natives Deutschland.^ The Greeks, after the Homeric times, called themselves Hellenes ("EXX^cfy), glorying in their descent from their common ancestor Hellen (" EXXrjt/) ; "and the land of the Hellenes" was called by them Hellas ("EXXas) ; but this term indicated no particular country, bounded by certain geographical limits, but included every district in Europe, Africa, or Asia, where the Hellenic (or Greek) race was settled. Originally, in the Homeric age, the term Hellas had been applied to a town and B 2 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. small district of Phthiotis, in the south of Thessaly. It was next extended to the whole district between the Corinthian Gulf on the south, and the Ambracian Gulf and the Thessalian Peneios on the north. Hellas Proper thus excluded Epeiros and Peloponnesos (the Isle of Pelops). But later, Peloponnesos was included, and the name was gradually extended to the Greek Islands, Macedonia, and Illyricum. The name Graeci (TpaiKoi), Greeks, is said by Aristotle to have been applied to a tribe living about Dodona and the Acheloos in Epeiros: whence it is conjectured by modern scholars that it may have been used to designate several tribes on the west coast of Epeiros, and that it spread thence to the east coast of Italy, where the Romans first became acquainted with the Hellenic race. When the Romans conquered Greece (146 B.c.) the name Achaia, which properly denoted the north-west of Pelo- ponnesos, became the official name of the country. 2. The peninsula of Greece is the easternmost of the southern projections of the continent of Europe. It is bounded on the north by Macedonia and Illyria, from which it is separated by the great Cambunian and Acroceraunian range, which runs from the /Egean to the Ionian Sea : in all other directions it is bounded by the seas of the Mediterranean, namely, the Ionian on the west, the Jxibyan on the south, and the /Egcan and Cretan Sea on the east. Its greatest length is 250 miles, from Cape Taenaros to the Cam- bunian Mountains, and greatest breadth 180 miles, from the west of Acarnania to Marathon, in Attica, or from the Acroceraunian promontory to the mouth of the Thessalian Peneios : its superficial extent is about 35,000 square miles, which is about 5,000 more than that of Scotland. K. Ottfried Miiller thus briefly, though somewhat fancifully, describes the wonderful physical organisation of Greece : " It is like a body whose members are different in form, but amongst which a mutual connection and dependence necessarily exist. The northern districts, as- far as Thessaly, are the nutritive organs, which from time to time introduced fresh and vigorous supplies : as we approach the south, its structure assumes a more marked and decided form, and is impressed with more peculiar features. Attica and the Islands may be considered as extremities, which, as it were, served as the active instruments of the body of Greece, and by which it was kept in constant connection with others. While Peloponnesos, on the other hand, seems formed for a state of life included in itself, occupied more with its own than external con- cerns, and whose interests and feelings centred in itself; as it was the extremity of Greece, there also appeared to be an end set by nature to all change of place and habitation ; and hence the character of the Peloponnesians was firm, steady, and exclusive.'' The admirable situation and peculiar form of Greece enable it to take full advantage of the richness and copiousness of its pro- ductions. At the very extremity of Europe, it nearly touches the shores of Asia and Africa. By means of the ygean (Archipelago) and the Euxine (Black Sea), and the great rivers which flow into the latter, it could convey by water-carriage to its own shores the PHYSICAL CONFORMATION. 3 produce of the northern climes. By the eastern extremity of the Mediterranean Sea it gained access to the commerce of Egypt and the far East; whilst by means of its western division, it could hold commercial intercourse with all the rich countries in the west of Europe, with Italy, Gaul (France), and Hispania (Spain). 3. The absence of large navigable rivers is in part supplied by the islands which cluster around the continent, and lie so close to it and each other, that the intermediate seas assume the appearance of immense canals or rivers, and answer in some degree the pur- pose of internal navigation. The extensive line of insular and con- tinental coast is broken up and penetrated by large bays and gulfs, which form harbours of every degree of capacity and security, from the roadstead to the land-locked port in which a great navy may ride in safety. The sea is visible from every elevated point in the country, forms part of every view, and washes every state except one (Arcadia). The gulfs, bays, inlets, and creeks are so numerous that the effects of the most beautiful lake scenery are rivalled by them. The colour of the water is peculiar : blue, deep, but not dark, and apparently almost independent of the reflection of the sky, being often brilliant when the sky is misty. It is so transparent that when it bathes sheer precipices of rock, as it often does, it is difficult in a boat at a distance of a few feet to distinguish the water-line, the rock below the water being as clearly visible as that above, as the eye follows it into endless depths of blue colour. In calm weather, the short ripples breaking into myriads of sparkles, or, in wind, studded with crests of white foam upon the blue surface, the sea is the element of life and motion, bringing the thought of change and adventure into the mountains and valleys. The presence of the sea naturally incites to adventure and com- merce : and it is not wonderful that this feature in their landscape greatly modified the character of the Greek people, leading them the inhabitants of a small and mountainous country, possessed of a great extent of sea-coast by circumstances to intellectual and physical activity, and indisposing them from their seafaring life, to be apt subjects either to despotism or centralisation. The transparent clearness of the atmosphere allows the mariner at day- time to recognise the guiding points of his course at a distance of as many as twenty miles, and at night spreads over his head a cloudless sky, where the rising and setting of the stars in peaceful tranquillity regulate the business of peasant and mariner. The winds, " the legislators of the weather,'' submit in these latitudes to certain rules, and only rarely rise to the vehemence of desolating hurricanes. It is only in the short winter season that there is any irregularity in the wind and weather. The commencement of the fair season brings with it an immutable law followed by the winds in the entire Archipelago : the X.E. trade winds, called by the ancients the Etesian Winds (fnjo-iai, annual), arise from the .coasts of Thrace and pass over the whole Mediterranean: but these winds subside at sunset, upon which the sea becomes smooth, and air and water tranquil, and gradually a contrary wind, the soft and 4 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. cool sea-breeze from the south, begins to blow, and renders the navigation northwards easy. 4. The climate of the greater part of Greece was reputed in ancient times the most healthy and temperate in the world. Between the 36th and 4ist degrees of north latitude the heat has not that overwhelming power which enervates and depresses the natives of a more southern position, and its force in Greece is still further tempered by the vicinity of the sea, and by the mountain ridges, some of them clothed with eternal snows, which intersect it in every direction. Nothing can surpass the delicious temperature of the autumn in the Islands, where the sea-breeze, celebrated by the poets of antiquity, moderates the heat. The excellence and variety of climate were manifested also in the variety and quality of the produce of the earth. The soil, which now seems to have rotted away and left the very rocks beneath bare, was in ancient times rich and varied in its pro- ductions. It produced abundantly wheat, barley, flax, wines and oil, the cultivation of the vine and the olive being .particularly elaborate : and by the observant and industrious agriculture of the ancient Greeks, its natural fruits, in a great diversity of plants, herbs, and trees, were turned to account. Attica imported corn and salt-fish, and exported figs and other fruit, olives, oil, pottery, ornamental manufactures, and silver. The other states of Greece imported and exported but little. Beyond Attica, Sparta, and Arcadia, little animal food was consumed in Greece, except at festivals and sacrifices ; and hence the most of the available soil was under tillage. The forests were very valuable ; but in mineral and metallic wealth, Greece was not distinguished. Gold was obtained inconsiderable abundance in Thrace, Macedonia, Epeiros, some parts of Thessaly, and the islands Siphnos and Thasos. A considerable amount of silver was produced from the same districts and from the Athenian mines of Laureion, in the south of Attica; Copper was found in Cypros, Eubcea, and other parts. Iron for which bronze was chiefly used in ancient Greece was obtained in Eubcea, Bceotia, Melos, and the mountain range of Taygetos. Various kinds of excellent marble, were obtained in the quarries of Pentelicos and Hymettos, in Attica, Pares, Carystos, &c. 5. The sea, besides conferring on Greece great natural advan- tages, confirmed them by security of situation ; it encircled her on the east, the south, and the west. And the vast mountain range of Illyricurn and Macedonia formed her northern bulwark, not in one single line of defence which being forced, the interior of the country would be left exposed to the invader but backed and strengthened by other natural lines of circumvallation, by the range of Pindos and of (Eta, by the Corinthian and the Saronic Gulfs, and by the Isthmus; and even if these were captured, the deep defiles of Arcadia and Laconia would receive the retreating army, and give time to the last defenders of their country to rally and collect their scattered forces. The mountains, whose sides were clothed with forests, whose uplands supplied rich pasturage for MOUNTAIN BARRIERS. 5 Cattle, and from whose depths abundance of excellent limestone was obtained for building purposes, subdivided the country into a number of separate and sequestered districts, each protected by her mountain barriers against the rest ; and by nourishing anti- pathies, promoted that native intellectual development which characterises the Hellenes. From their position the Greeks were at once mountaineers and mariners. The sea, with its innumerable VALLSY OF DELPHI AND MOUNT PARNASSOS. arms, supplied them with all the adventures of a naval life : while tha mountain barriers severed each petty community from all the others, and gave it an individual life and character of its own ; but the difficulties of land communication were rendered less important than they otherwise would have been by the easy marine communi- cation, and thus each community was not entirely cut off from the sympathies of the rest. The various parts of Greece, however, differed very much in respect of climate and healthiness, and thus also a difference, was caused between the habits and character of particular localities, even in the same district. Not only was there 6 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. a difference between the inhabitants of the mountains and of the plains as between the Locrians, /Etolians, Phocians, Dorians, (Etaeans, and Arcadians, and the people of Attica, Bceotia and Elis and between the people of the plains themselves, as between Attica, with its light atmosphere and volatile people, and Bceotia, with its heavy, damp atmosphere and rude, stupid inhabitants: but also in Attica itself there was a difference between the inhabitants of the city of Athens and those of the country districts, and every separate town of the Boeotian confederacy had its particular physical, political and moral characteristics ; and similarly, among the Doric States, Corinth, Sicyon, Argos, and Sparta had their own dialect and their own -peculiar attributes. The autonomy of every separate city, which was universal in Hellas in the historical period, was un- doubtedly, to a great extent, due to physical causes. 6. The mountain chains of Greece are, like the Apennines, in Italy, a continuation of the great Alpine range. From the Albanian Alps, in longitude 210 East of Greenwich, and latitude 42 North, there is thrown off a chain, which, under various names: Scardos, Pindos, Corax, Taphiassos, Panachaicos, Lampeia, Pholoe, Par- rhasios, and Taygetos traverses the whole of the peninsula longi- tudinally, and throws off several cross-ranges. The chief of these lateral ranges are the Cambunianand Olympic Mountains, on the northern frontiers of Greece ; Othrys, separating Thessaly from Malis and yEniauia (or ^itaea) ; (Eta, between Malis and Doris ; Parnassos, Helicon, Cithaeron, and Parnes, separating Boeotia and Attica; Lingos, in northern Epeiros, opposite the Cambunian chain ; Tymphrestos, in northern JEtolia. ; Bornios, in central /Etolia; Scollis, separating Achaia from Elis ; Elaeon, between Elis and Messenia ; Erymanthos, Arodnia, and Cyllene, separating Achaia from Arcadia, and running westward to the Scyllaean promontory (Kavo-Skyli) in Argolis ; and Parthenon, between Argolis and Laconia. Besides the great longitudinal chain, there were others of secondary importance the most important being Pelion and Ossa, in the east of Thessaly ; Pentelicos, Hymettos, and Anhydros in Attica ; and Parnon, running in the Peloponnesos from the vicinity of Tegea to Cape Malea in the north-east of Laconia. The plains of Greece were necessarily very few. Almost the whole of Thessaly was a great plain, surrounded by mountains, and drained by the Peneios, at the mouth of which, between Olympos, on the north, and Ossa, on the south, is a narrow gorge, the beauti- ful valley of Tempe, which was much celebrated by ancient writers, and was said to have been caused by an earthquake. In Bceotia there were the marshy plain of the Cephissos, in which is the lake Copais, and the plain of the Asopos, near Thebes and Plataea. In Attica there were three plains at Eleusis, Athens, and Marathon. In Pcloponr.esos the only noteworthy plains were those of Elis, Macaria, Helos, Tegea, Mantineia, Pheneos, Orchomenos, and Argos. 7. There were no rivers of any magnitude, but a iarge number of streams, nearly all of which partook of the capricious character of RIVERS AND ISLANDS. 7 winter torrents. The most considerable of the river's were, the Achclos, which rises in Mount Pindos, in Epeiros, divides Acarnania from ^Etolia, and flows into the Ionian sea, where it has formed five alluvial islets (Echinades, or Echinae) at its mouth ; its god was famous in mythology as one of the suitors of Deianeira, in which character he contended with Heracles (Hercules), and changed him- self into a serpent and then an -ox, when Heracles broke off one of his horns, which the god received back in exchange for the famous horn of Amaltheia: the Thessalian Peneios, which drained the great Thessalian plain, and the god of which was father of Daphne and Cyrene, of whom the former was made a laurel on the river's banks ; and the Alpheios, flowing through Arcadia and Elis, near Olympia, the god of which was very famous in mythology ; he was enamoured of the nymph Arethusa, whom be pursued, and whom Artemis (Diana) changed into a fountain on the islet Ortygia in the Bay of Syracuse, where the Alpheios was supposed to rise again after passing beneath the sea ; and the waters of the river were used by Heracles to clean Augeias' stables. Of less importance were the Thyamis, Dropos. and Arachthos, in Epeiros ; the Evenos and Daphnos, in ^Etolia, the Spercheios, in Malis ; the Cephissos and Asopos, in Bceotia; and the Elean Peneios (now Gastuni), Pamisos, Eurotas, Stymphalos, and Inachos, in Peloponnesos. Several of the rivers of Greece have a part of their course under ground, or eventually disappear in subterranean passages, from the number of caves and fissures with which the lime-stone rocks abound. Many of the lakes, as Copais, Hylice, and Trapheia in Boeotia, in the land-locked basins, are drained similarly by underground channels. There are many lakes, but none of importance. The largest lakes are Copais (originally Cephissis), in Boeotia, which has a superficial extent of about forty square miles, and into which the Cephissos and several other streams discharge their waters, and Bcebeis, inThes- saly, which is chiefly formed by the overflowing of the Thessalian Peneios. Others deserving of mention are Pambotis, near Dodona, in Epeiros; Trichonis and Conope,in yEtolia ; Nessonis, in Thessaly ; Xynias, in Phthiotis (in Thessaly) ; Hylice and Trapheia, in Bceotia ; and the lakes in Arcadia at Pheneos, Stymphalos, Orchomenos, Mantineia, and Tegea. 8. The very numerous islands of Greece were of great importance for the development of the land in ancient times ; for navigation was in a comparatively rude state. The largest island was on the yEgean side of the peninsula, Eubosa, which formed a huge break water on the east coast of Attica and Boeotia, from which it was sepa- rated by the narrow strait called the Euripos (the flux and reflux of which greatly puzzled the ancients), and Locris : its length is ninety miles; greatest breadth thirty; and smallest four ; and its fertile plains contained excellent pasturage and cornfields. On the opposite, the western side of the peninsula, there was an island of great political importance, Corcyra (Corfu), twelve miles distant from the port Buthroton, in Epeiros; it was also called Drepane, from its resem- blance to an ancient sickle, and was believed, in the historic times, 8 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. to be identical with the Homeric Scheria, the home of Alkinoos and his luxurious Phasacians, and the scene of the shipwreck of Odysseus (Ulysses) ; it was forty miles in length, and its breadth varied from fifteen to five miles. Among other littoral islands, were, off the west coast, Paxos, Leucas or Leucadia, Ithaca, Cephallonia, and Zacynthos, now Zante ; off the south coast, the (Enussae and Cythera, now Cerigo ; and off the east coast, Hydrea, Calourea, /Egina, Salamis, Cythnos, Ceos, Helene, Andros, Scyros, Pcparcthos, Halonnesos, and Sciathos. From Cape Sunion, in south-eastern Attica, begins the line of the Cyclades, a cluster of about fifty JEgea.n isles, named from surrounding Delos as with a circle, which are continued by the series called the Sporades (scattered), to the very shores of Asia, between which continent and Greece they form, as it were, a set of stepping-stones across the /Egean. In the northern /Egean there were Lemnos, Imbros, Thasos, and Samothrace. Of the Cyclades and Sporades groups, in the central ^Egean, the chiet were Andros, Ceos, Cythnos, Tenos, Syros, Gyanos, Delos, Myconos, Naxos, Paros, Siphnos, Melos, Thera, Amorgos, &c. On the coast of Asia Minor were Proconnesos, an island with five marble quarries in the Propontis, north-west of Cyzicos : Tenedos, Lesbos, Chios, Samos, and Rhodes (Rhodes), in the /Egean ; and Cypros, in the eastern Mediterranean, now the Levant, south of Cilicia and west of Syria. Greece is thus by its isles brought near to Asia, Africa, and Italy. From Corey ra on a clear day the neighbouring coast cf Italy is visible : from Cape Malea can be seen in the southern /Egean the.snow peaks of Crete, now Candia, a mountainous but fertile island more than 2,000 square miles in area, its length from east to west being 150 miles and its average breadth fifteen miles at the south of the Cyclades, containing Gnossos, Gortyna, Cydonia, &c., and once famous for its 100 cities ; and from Crete can be seen the Asiatic coast and the mountains of Rhodes (an island twelve miles off the promontory Cynossema in southern Caria, and named from a nymph or from its abundant roses, poSa). 9. The great number of political divisions in Greece might at first sight appear arbitrary, but they were nearly all marked out by the natural character of the soil. The country is by na- ture divided into three parts, Northern, Central, and Southern. Northern Greece extends from the northern frontier to a line con- necting the Gulf of Malis, on the east, with the Gulf of Ambracia, on the west ; Central Greece extends from the southern limit of Northern to the Isthmos of Corinth ; and Peloponnesos forms southern Greece. Northern Greece comprised Thessaly, Epeiros, and Dolopia. Thes- saly formed one great circular plain, about seventy miles in diameter encircled by lofty mountains, and drained by theThessalian Peneios and its tributaries. It was divided into the following six districts : (i) Perrhaebia, in the north, along the base of the Cambunian range, its chief cities being Gonni and Phalanna ; (2) Histiaeotis (anciently Doris), in the north-west, on the sides of Pindos and running along the upper part of the Peneios; its chief towns were Gomphi and NORTHERN GREECE. 9 Trieca, and it was named from a people transported to it by the Perrhaebi from a town Histiaea (or Talanta), in Eubrea ; (3) Mag- nesia, a tract on the east coast between the mouth of the Peneios and the Pagasean Gulf, extending in length about sixty-five miles, and in breadth about twelve, on an average, and comprising the Ossa and Pelion ranges, and the country at their bases ; its chief towns were, on the coast, Myrae, Melibcea, Casthanaea and lolcos, io THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. and, inland, Boebe, near Lake Boebeis ; (4) Pelasgiotis, westwards of Magnesia and extending to the Euipeus, the chief towns being Larissa and Pherae ; (5) Thessaliotis, south-west of Pelasgiotis, the chief towns being Cierion and Pharsalos ; (6) Phthiotis, or Achaia Phthiotis, a square district of about 900 square miles, south-east of Thessaliotis, extending from the Pagasean Gulf to the Pindos range, and comprising Mount Othrys, and the country at its base, the chief cities being Halos, Thebae, Phthiotides, Itonos, Melitaea, Lamia, and Xyniae. West of Thessaly lay Epeiros, a region about seventy miles long, and about fifty-five broad. It was greatly intersected with cross ranges from the Pindos chain, its numerous valleys, which were drained by a large number of streams, being very narrow. Its chief districts were in the east, Molossis (of which the chief towns were Dodona and Ambracia), in the north-west, Chaonia (towns, Phcenice, Btithroton, Cestria), and in the south-west, Thesprotia (towns, Pandosia, Cassope). Epeiros was a rude district, and its inhabitants belonged rather to Illyrian than to Greek life. Dolopia, the country of the Dolopes, was a rugged and mountainous tract, about forty miles long and fifteen broad, south-west of Thessaliotis, and comprising a part of Mount Pindos and the western portion of Mount Othrys. io. Central Greece contained eleven districts Acarnania, yEtolia, Western Locris, yEniania, Doris, Malis, Eastern Locris, Phocis, Bceotia, Attica, and Megaris. Acarnania, separated by the Acheloos from yEtolia, and washed by the Ambracian Gulf on the north and by the Adriatic on the north-west, was a triangular tract, its sides measuring 50, 35, and 30 miles respectively. Its chief cities were on the coast, Anactorion, Sollion, Astacos, and CEniadae, and, inland, Stratos. It was a mountainous region, comprising several lakes and possessing excellent pasturage. /Etolia, bounded on the north by Dolopia, on the west by Acarnania, on the south by the Corinthian Gulf, and on the east by ^Eniania and Doris, was about twice the size of Acarnania, and was very mountainous, with the exception of the marshy tract between the estuaries of the Acheloos and Evenos, and the large plain containing the lakes Trichonisand Conope. Its chief cities were Pleuron, Calydon, and Thermon ; but its rude in- habitants mobtly lived in villages which were built on the declivities of the rugged hills. Western Locris, the home of the predatory Locri Ozolae, was bounded on the south by the Corinthian Gulf, on the west by /Etolia, on the north by Doris, and on the east by Phocis. Its coast line was thirty-seven miles, its greatest breadth twenty- three miles, and its smallest breadth two miles. Its chief towns were Amphissa, in the interior, and Naupactos on the coast, /Eniania or /Etaea, a district on the upper course of the Spercheios, north-east of /Etolia, between Mount Othrys on the north, and Mount CEta on the south, was of oval shape, about twenty-seven miles long and eighteen miles broad. The chief town was Hypata. Doris, on the upper course of the Pindos, a tributary of the Boeotian Cephissos, v/as bounded on the east by Phocis, on the north by Thessaly, on the west by ./Etolia, and on the south by Western Locris. It was a GREECE. n Small rugged district, enclosed between Mount Parnassos and Mount Callidromas : its greatest length was seventeen miles, and its great- est breadth ten miles ; and it was known as the Dorian Tetrapolis, from its four cities, Pindos or Dryopis, Erineon, Cytinion, and Boreion ; and also as the Dorian Hexapolis, when Lilaeon and Car- phaea were included. Malis was a small district, about fifteen miles long, and eight miles in its greatest breadth, bounded on the south by Doris, on the west by ^Eniania, on the north by Phthiotis, and on the west by the Malian Gulf. Its chief town was Malia, near which were hot mineral springs ; and at the eastern end of the country lay the celebrated pass of Thermopylae. Eastern Locris was a fertile region on the east of Doris and Phocis, and extended along the coast from Thessaly and Thermopylae to Bceotia. The northern part of it, about seventeen miles long, and eight miles broad, bounded by the Malian Gulf on the east, and Mount (Eta on the north, was inhabited by the Locri Epicnemidii : its chief town was Cnemides. A small strip of land, called Daphnus, and held by Phocis, separated Epicnemidian Locris from the part of eastern Locris inhabited by the Locri Opuntii : the Opuntian Locris, which was named from the chief town, Opus, was about twenty-six miles long, and eight miles broad. Phocis was a mountainous district, of an oblong shape, about twenty-five miles long and averaging twenty miles in breadth, bounded on the east by Boeotia, on the south by the Corinthian Gulf, on the west by Doris and the Locri Ozolae, and on the north by the Locri Opuntii and the Locri Epicnemidii. It had some fertile plateaus. Its chief towns were Delphi, Elataea, Parapotamii, Panopeus, Abae, and Hyampolis. Bceotia was bounded on the north by Phocis, on the south by Attica, on the east by the Eubcean channel (the Euripos), and on the west by the Corinthian ' Gulf. It was in general flat and marshy, but it was traversed in the south by the range of Helicon, the haunt of the Muses, and in the east by the chain of Ptoon, Messapion, Hypatos, and Teumessos. To the dampness and thickness of its atmosphere, the ancients attributed the general rudeness and stupidity of the natives. Bosotia was about fifty miles long and averaged twenty-three miles in breadth, its area being about 960 square miles. Its chief cities, were Thebes, Tanagra, Thespiae, Plataea, Orchomenos, Chaeroneia, Coroneia, Lebadeia, and Haliartos. It had a great lake, Copais, and two smaller ones, Hylice and Trapheia : its chief streams were the Cephissos, Asopos, Permessos, Olmeios, Thespias, and Oeroe; and it contained some fertile plains. Attica, bounded on the north by Bceotia, on the east by the ^Egean, on the south by the Saronic Gulf, and on the west by Megara, was a foreland projecting from the south-east of Bceotia, and extended, in length, seventy miles from Mount Cithaeron to Cape Sunion, while its greatest breadth from the port Munychia, on the west, to the deme Rhamnus, on the eastern coast, was thirty miles, the superficial extent being about 720 square miles. It was in general of a mountainous and barren character. The range of Cithaeron, Parnes, and Phelleus traversed it from east to west, in the northern part ; from these three spurs 12 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. were thrown out. The first, Cerata, separated Attica from Megaris ; the second, iEgaleos, separated the plain of Eleusis from that of Athens ; and the third, the chain of Pentelicos, Hymettos, and Anhydros, ran from Parnes by Deceleiaand Marathon to CapeZos- ter. Excepting Athens, Attica possessed only villages. Its streams, the Cephissos, Ilissos, Erasinos, and Charadros were merely torrents. Megaris, or the Mcgarid, lay west of Attica, on the northern part of the Isthmos of Corinth, between the Corinthian and the Saronic Gulfs. It was one of the smallest districts in Greece, its length being about fourteen miles, its breadth eleven miles, and its area less than 150 square miles. It possessed only one town, Megara, which had two ports, Pegae and Nisaea, and off the latter there was a fortified islet, Minoa. ii. Southern Greece was called the Peloponnesos (Isle of Pelops), from its settler Pelops ; and now bears the name of Morea, from its resemblance to a mulberry -leaf (/xope'u). Peloponnesos was connected with central Greece by the Isthmos of Corinth, and contained eleven districts Corinth, Sicyon, Achaia, Elis, Arcadia, Messenia, Laco- nia, Argolis, Epidauria, Troezenia, and Hermionis. It has three distinct regions the central basin, or Arcadia, encircled with a mountain-chain which opens only in the west in a narrow defile through which the Alpheios flows ; Laconia, on the basin of the Eurotas ; and Messenia, on the basin of the Pamisos : the last two adjoin the mountains of Arcadia, and are separated from each other by Faygetos. The rest of Peloponnesos, viz., the northern coast, is only a series of short valleys running down to the sea, each of which contained a city that formed an independent state. Corinth (Corinthia), the portion of the Isthmos south of Megaris and a con- 'siderable tract in Peloponnesos, contained about 230 square miles. The chief town was Corinth, which was situated on the middle of the Isthmos, and had two ports Crichreae, on the Saronic Gulf and Lechaeon, on the Corinthian Gulf. Sicyon (Sicyonia), was a fertile district in the north of Peloponnesos, east of Achaia, and west of Corinth. Its coast line (on the south of the Corinthian Gulf) was about fifteen miles, and it extended about twenty miles inland. Its city was Sicyon, which was in the most ancient times named /Egialea and afterward? Mecone. Achaia lay west of Sicyon, and north of Arcadia and Elis. Its area was about 650 square miles, its coast line being about sixty-five miles, and its average breadth ten miles. Of its twelve towns the chief were Dyme, Patrac, ancientry Aroe, and Pellene. Elis lay along the western coast, on the Ionian sea, south- west of Achaia, west of Arcadia, and north of Messenia. Its coast line was about fifty-seven miles, between the mouths of the Larissos and the Neda ; and its greatest breadth was about twenty-five miles, from the coast to the base of Mount Erymanthos. A portion in the middle of Elis was called Pisatis (the territory of the ancient city of Pisa), and the southern part was called Elis Triphylia. The country contained several fertile level tracts and valleys of consid- erable width, and it was well watered by the Poneios, Alpheios, and Neda. Its towns were Elis, Cyllene, Olympia. Pisa, ami Lopreon. PELOPONNESOS. 13 Arcadia was surrounded by land adjoining on the north Achaia, on the north-east Sicyon and Corinth, on the east Argolis, on the south Laconia and Messenia, and on the west Elis. Its general character was that of a series of plateaus, separated by mountain- ridges and narrow valleys. Its area was about 17,000 square miles, the length, from the chain of Erymanthos, Aroania, and Cyllene in the north to the sources of the Alpheios in the south being about seventy miles, and its average breadth (from east to west) being about forty miles. Of its numerous towns the chief were Orcho- nienos, Tegea, and Mantineia. Messenia lay south of Elis and western Arcadia, and west of Laconia, and was washed on the south by the Messenian Gulf, and on the west by the Ionian sea. Its area was about 1,150 square miles, its length, from the mouth of the Neda to Cape Acritas, being forty-five miles, and its greatest breadth thirty-seven miles. It was generally mountainous, but con- tained some considerable plains along the course of the Pamisos : the plains, the valleys, and the sides of the mountains were exceed- ingly fertile. Its chief towns were Stenycleros and Messene ; and Eira, Pylos (famous during the Peloponnesian war, and in modern history for the massacre of the Turkish sailors, known as the Battle of Navarino) and Methone (now Modon) were important places. Laconia contained two (Malea, now Malia, and Taenaros, now Matapan) out of the three forelands in which Peloponnesos termi- nates (Messenia forming the third, or easternmost), and a considerable portion of the interior northwards. It was bounded on the west by Messenia and the Messenian Gulf, on the south by the Laconian Gulf, on the east by the JEgean and Argolic Gulf, and on the north by Argolis and Arcadia. Its area was about 1,900 square miles, the greatest length, from Argolis in the north to cape Malea being about eighty miles and its greatest breadth nearly fifty miles. The country consisted chiefly of a narrow valley, the basin of the Eurotas, running, from north to south, between the ranges of Parnon and Taygetos. Its capital, the celebrated Sparta (or Lacedaemon), lay in this valley, on the Eurotas, about twenty miles from the coast, and hence was spoken of as, by Homer, " Hollow Lacedaemon." Its other towns were Gythlion, on the north-western shore of the Laco- nian Gulf, Thyrea, on the Argolic Gulf, and Sellasia in the basin of the JEnos. Argolis lay east of Arcadia, north of the district of Laconia called Cynuria,'west of Epidauros and Trrezenia, and south of Sicyon and Corinth, but sometimes Sicyonia, Epidauria, Trceze- nia, and Hermionis are included in Argolis. In its restricted sense, Argolis had an area of about 700 square miles, its greatest length from north to south being about thirty miles, and its greatest breadth from east to west about thirty-one miles. It was of a mountainous character, but contained one large fertile plain on the southern coast. Its most ancient city was Mycenas ; and later Argos became pro- minent ; its other important towns were Phlius, Cleonae, Tiryns, and Nauplia, the port of Argos. Epidauria, a small district, named from its chief town Epidauros, lay in the north-east of Argolis, in its extended sense, or east of Argolis proper and south-east of Corinth, 14 THE GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. its length, from north to south, being twenty-three miles, and its breadth, from east to west, eight miles. Trcezenia, named from its chief town Trcezene, lay east of Argolis proper, at the north-eastern extremity of the Argolic promontory, at the southern end of the Saronic Gulf. Its greatest length was sixteen miles and its greatest breadth ten miles. Besides Trcezene, it contained the city of Methana. Hermionis, named from its town Hermione, lay south of Epidauria and west of Trcezenia, and thus occupied the south- western extremity of the Argolic promontory. THE ISLAND OF CRETE. STREET SCENE IN ANCIENT GREECE. CHAPTER II. THE PRE-HISTORIC INHABITANTS OF GREECE. 12. INTEREST OF HELLENIC HISTORY! UNIQUE CHARACTER OF HELLENIC CIVILISATION. 13. CREDIBILITY OF GREEK HISTORY : PRE-HISTORIC CON- DITION OF GREECE. 14. THE PELASGI AND COGNATE TRIBES : THE PELASGIC PERIOD: ITS CHARACTER PELASGIC ART AND RELIGION. 15. ARRIVAL OF FOREIGN COLONIES I CECROPS DANAOS CADMOS PELOPS : INFLUENCE OF FOREIGN SETTLEMENTS INCONSIDERABLE. l6. RISE OF THE HELLENES: THE FOUR DIVISIONS: ACHAEANS -DORIANS IONIANS .EOLIANS: THE LEGEND OF HELLEN : THE ACHAEAN PERIOD. 17, MIGRA- TORY MOVEMENTS: THE GREAT DORIAN MIGRATION, OR RETURN OF THE HERACLEIDAE (lIO4 B.C.) TO PELOPONNESOS. 18. THE HELLENIC PERIOD : CONTINUED EMIGRATION: THE IONIC MIGRATION AND LEAGUE: DORIAN MIGRATION TO ASIA AND THE ISLANDS DORIAN HEXAPOLIS : THE /EOLIC MIGRATION : GREEK OCCUPATION OF COASTS OF ASIA MINOR. ig. GENERAL COLONISATION OF THE MEDITERRANEAN SHORES : DIFFUSION OF THE HELLENIC RACE : GREECE NOT A NATION ; HER UNITY. 12. [j^ffilHE history of the Hellenic race, which peopled not only Greece proper, but the isles of the great inland sea, and placed on its shores a circle of colonies that were as a fringe on the skirt of barbarism, is, when con- sidered as a drama, scarcely, if at all, surpassed by any other portion of authentic history. Its characters, its situations, and the very march of its incidents are epic ; it is one heroic poem, in which the personages are states. And of all histories it is the most fraught with consequences to the modern world. It has been well remarked, that the true ancestors of the European 16 THE PRE-HISTORIC INHABITANTS OF GREECE. nations are, not those from whose blood they are sprung, but those from whom they derive the richest portion of their inheritance. The battle of Marathon is as important in the history of the British Empire as the battle of Hastings ; for if the small band of the champions of Hellas and European civilisation had gone down before the hordes of the Asiatic invaders, the Britons and the Saxons might still have been wandering in the woods. The Hellenic is also the most remarkable race that has ever existed not in the sense that they approached nearest to the perfection of social arrangements or human character ; for their institutions, their mode of life, and even, what is their greatest characteristic, the cast of their sentiments and the development of their faculties, were radi- cally inferior to the best outcome of modern civilisation but measuring their greatness by the faculties and the efforts required to make their achievements, and not by the results achieved. The Hellenes were the beginners of nearly everything of which the modern world can boast, with the exception of Christianity; and even this, while deriving its ultimate origin from Judaism, is insepa- rably connected with the Greek language. The earliest Churches, beyond Palestine, were those in the Hellenic parts of Asia Minor and in Greece proper, and the systematic development of Christian doctrine was exclusively due to Greeks and to persons imbued with Hellenic discipline). The beginnings of all our intellectual civilisa- tion of our poetry, music, history, oratory, sculpture, painting and architecture, of our logical, metaphysical, ethical, political, mathe- matical and physical science must be traced to the Hellenic race. No other race can ever do for mankind what they did, unless a great physical convulsion were to reduce the world again to the condition of the antediluvians. Before Hellenic civilisation arose, the most civilised portion of the world was immersed in all the darkness of the early oriental form of society. Despotic governments were enforcing abject submission to the sovereign, and open discussion in the councils of the chiefs or the assemblies of the people was prohibited ; exclusive priest-castes dominated over the people ; polygamy was practised in private life ; cruel punishments and bodily mutilations abounded ; art was massive, shapeless, and grotesque ; there was no literature worthy of the name, no science, no oratory, no drama, no history beyond a meagre chronicle of genealogies and of the acts of the kings in short, there was nothing of what are considered the elements of civilisation till the influence of the Hellenic genius began to operate upon the inert mass. " It was this which first infused a soul into the lifeless body it was the Greek Prometheus who stole from heaven the fire which illuminated and warmed these benighted races ; and it was under its excitement that they made the first great step out of the stationary into the progressive state ; that step of which all experience proves the extreme difficulty, even when there is a model at hand to work upon. Lagrange said that Newton was a fortunate man, for there was only one system of the world to discover. We may in like manner say of the Greeks that they were a fortunate CREDIBILITY OF GREEK HISTORY. 17 nation, for the advance from oriental barbarism to occidental civilisation could only once be made " (Edinburgh Review). If in several things they were but slightly removed from barbarism, they were the only race that, so far as is known, by their own efforts, and with gigantic strides, emerged from barbarism, without the track of a more advanced people to guide them. Although slavery existed as an institution with them, in common with all the nations of an- tiquity, yet they originated political freedom, and they were the sources and exemplars of it to modern Europe. Their internal divisions, their discords, jealousies, and wars between city and city, caused the mournful and inglorious ruin of their national indepen- dence. Yet the arts of war and government evolved in those intes- tine contests made them the first who united great empires under civilised rule, the first who broke down those barriers of petty nationality which had been so fatal to themselves, and the first who, by making Hellenic ideas and language common to large regions of the earth, began that general fusion of races and nations which, followed up by their successors, the Romans whose political and military achievements, and systematic jurisprudence, together with Christianity, their subsequently adopted religion, gave its character and colour to the civilisation of the world for many successive cen- turies prepared the way for the cosmopolitanism of modern times. "In each of the arts and sciences they made the indispensable first steps, which are the foundation of all the rest, and which could only have been made by minds intrinsically capable of everything which has since been accomplished. Their religious creed was eminently unfavourable to speculation, for it supplied them readily with a supernatural solutions for all natural phenomena ; yet they originated freedom of thought. They were the first to interrogate nature and the universe by their rational faculties, and to bring forth answers not suggested by any established system of priestcraft ; and it was their unfettered and bold spirit that, surviving in its results, broke the yoke of another enthralling system of popular religion, sixteen hundred years after the Hellenes had ceased to exist as a people." These things were effected in two centuries of national existence. Two thousand years have elapsed since their meteor-like life ; and though, in institutions, in manners, and even in the ideal standard of human character, something has been added to their type of excellence by the philosophers and heroes who have handed on the torch of civilisation, little in comparison has been accomplished. 13. Authentic history, as we ascend the stream of time, becomes scanty ; the incidents are fewer, the narratives less circumstantial, shading off through every degree of twilight into the darkness of night. Greek history begins to dawn shortly before the first Olympiad,* 776 B.C., the point from which the historical Greeks commenced their computation of time, and near which must be * For convenience, the dates are given throughout this work in years B.C. or A.D. For the method of computing by Olympiads, and of converting the Olympic year into the corresponding year before or after the Christian era, or the reverse, see Beeton's Classical Dictionary , Appendix II., i. i8 THE PRE-HISTORIC INHABITANTS OF GREECE. fixed the regular employment, by public authority, of written characters for recording periodical religious solemnities, which were always the first events systematically noted, on account of the fearful religious consequences attaching to any mistake in the proper period for their celebration. From this period contemporary nota- tion begins, and the facts that are recorded, scanty enough for more than two centuries after this time, deserve consideration as real historical events.* All is lost in fable before the historical period, after the beginning of which the attention is distracted by numerous small independent communities, moving in almost parallel lines. But the legends pointed to a union of the Hellenic race in this pre-historic age. If ancient tradition, corroborated by the testimony of geology, can be accepted, a country (named by tradition Lectonia) once covered a great portion of the space now occupied by the ^Egean (or Archipelago). An extensive sea was spread over the plain of Scythia, which burst the Bosphorus and poured into the Mediterranean, submerging Lectonia and overflowing a large part of Greece. Hence this country was long under the dominion of water. The tradition of the fertile vales of Thessaty and Bceotia having been lakes was long preserved. 14. Buildings of gigantic dimensions, even at the present day to be seen in Greece, testify to its having been in a very remote period the seat of a civilised race. These ruins are long anterior to history, being mentioned in the Homeric poems, and, in their ignorance of the aboriginal inhabitants, the Greeks themselves ascribed the erection of them to the fabulous Cyclopes. Of any immigration from Asia the Greeks were ignorant in the historical period ; they believed that, under varying names, their ancestors had been always in the country. The earliest inhabitants seem to have been tribes which were more or less closely related in descent, and which were called * The history of Greece, with reference to its credibility, may be divided into three periods : the Legendary, before 776 B.C. ; the Crepuscular, or Semi-His- torical, between 776 and 500 B.C. ; and the Historical, after 500 B.C. The Legendary may again be subdivided into the part before and the part after the Dorian Conquest, or Return of the Heracleidae, 1104 B.C. The first part of the Legendary Period may be compared with Roman history under the first two kings, and its second part to the accounts of the remaining five kings of Rome ; and the Semi-Historical Period with the first two centuries of the Roman Re- public. The second, or Semi-Historical, Period contains materials to which the microscope of the historian is perfectly applicable. The subsequent state of Greece enables us to trace some historical elements in the part of the Legendary Period after the Dorian Migration. But for the first part of the Legendary Period, the Age of the Gods, and the Age of the Heroes (between 1500 and noo B.C.), no standard of historical criticism can be found; it is fruitless to attempt to analyse the legends, and to elicit from them any particular facts, in the absence of all other data but what the legends themselves supply ; any scheme for disentangling the religious memories, the poetic inventions, and the items of fact (if any), can commend itself on no grounds of logic, and can carry convic- tion with it to no one but its author. Of native Hellenic historians, the chief are, for the period before and during the Persian wars, Herodotos ; for a sum- mary of the early period and the greater part of the Peloponnessian war, Thucydides ; and for the close of that war and the expedition of Cyrus, Xenophon. THE PELASG1C PERIOD. 19 Pelasgi Leleges, Curetes^ Caucones, Aones, DolopeSj Dryopes> Chaones, Japhii, Hyantes, Zenimices, &c. Of these the Pelasgians,* regarding whom many modern theories have been propounded, were the most important tribe. The classic record regarding them is in Herodotus I. 56, 57 ; that autho'r, like Homer, speaks of the Pelasgi as occupying only some isolated points* and those not in the HOMER. continent of Greece, but in Crete and Asia Minor, where in the Trojan war they sided with the Trojans against the Greeks. But there is unquestionable evidence, which is confirmed by allusions in Homer to their ancient seats, that in remotest times they were * Pelasgi (ue\aa-fot) is probably from the same root as TreXXor, or 7reX6?, dark- coloured or dusky, Pelias (neX/as), and Pelops (ru'Xo^, the dark-face, from weXor and 0^1). Some have referred it to the root of 7rV 'HpaK\fi8wv Kado8os or the restoration, by the aid of the Dorians and .^Etolians of the lineal descendants of the hero Heracles (Hercules) to the land of which he had been dispossessed. Their fleet was built in the best harbour on the whole northern coast of the Corinthian Gulf, at Naupactos the " shipbuilding yard," now called Epakto by the Greek peasants, and Lepanto by the Italians, on the ^Etolian coast, a little eastward of the promontory Antirrhion, and where the passage across the gulf is narrowest. From this they crossed to the opposite promontory, Rhion, on the coast of Achaia in Peloponnesos, under the leadership of the three descendants of Heracles, namely, his great-great-grandsons, Temenos, Aristodemos, and Cresphontes, and the ^Etolian con- tingent was under one Oxylos, a one-eyed man who was pointed out by the oracle as their leader. The Dorian and ^Etolian forces effected a lodgment in Peloponnesos ; and Elis, Messenia, Laconia, and Argolis were attacked and partially subdued. The date of the Return of the Heracleidae is placed at 1104 B.C. ; and the subjuga- * According to Herodotos (I., 56), the Dorians had already moved from Phthiotis : " In the time of King Deucalion they inhabited the district Phthiotis ; in the time of Dorus, the son of Hellen, they inhabited the country called Histiaeotis, at the foot of Ossa and Olympos ; when expelled from Histiaeotis by the Cadmeians, they dwelt on Mount Pindos, under the name of Macedni ; thence they migrated to Dryopis ; and having passed from Dryopis into Pelo- ponnesos, were called the Dorians." According to Apollodoros (I., 7, 3), the chief, Dorus, and his clan, the Dorians, took possession of the country over against Peloponnesos, on the Corinthian Gulf, by which he probably means the whole northern coast of the gulf that is, all ^Etolia, Phocis, and Ozolian Lpcris. Grote remarks that this is more consonant with the facts which are historically established than the tradition given in Herodotos ; for it is scarcely probable that the inhabitants of so small a district as Doris could subsequently conquer all Peloponnesos ; and, besides, the legend, according to which the Dorians, having been baulked in all their efforts to march over the Isthmos, at length sailed from Naupactos for Peloponnesos, indicates their having been in posses- sion of the northern shore of the gulf. 24 THE PRE-HISTORIC INHABITANTS OF GREECE. tion of Peloponnesos is represented as having been rapidly effected, but undoubtedly it must have been a gradual and difficult work, from the nature of the country ; and it is certain that some of the fastnesses of the native population held out for more than three centuries. Elis was, according to the stipulation, assigned to the /Etolians ; and in Laconia, Argolis, and Messenia three Dorian kingdoms were established, under Aristodemos at Sparta, Temenos at Argos, and Cresphontes at Mycenae. The Achaean period now ends, and the Hellenic begins, in which the four races take a prominent part in the development of the civilisation of Greece. 18. These migrations led to others of still greater importance in the Hellenic world. In Peloponnesos some of the Achaean in- habitants, especially in Laconia, remained after the immigration of their Dorian kinsmen, but were reduced, after a stout resistance, to a subject condition : but the larger proportion, and especially in Messenia, fled from their homes, to the northern coast of Pelopon- nesos, from which they in turn dispossessed the lonians, and gave their name to the district known in the historical times as Achaia. The lonians proceeded to their Pelasgian kinsmen in Attica, whence, after a time, the great stream of the Ionic migration flowed through the Cyclades to Chios, Samos, and the opposite coasts of Asia. By these emigrants the Ionic League was formed, comprising, as in their original home, twelve cities, viz., Phocaea, Clazomenae, Erythrae, Teos, Colophon, Ephesos, Priene, Myus, Lebedos, Miletos, Chios, and Samos ; and Smyrna, an JEolic city, was subsequently added to the league. Their leaders are said to have been for the most part Neleids, or princes of the dynasty of Neleus, which had migrated from Pylos in Messenia, to Athens under Melanthos, who became king of Athens. The league celebrated a common festival Panionia, at the temple Panionion, their common meeting place on the western slope of Mount Mycale, in the territory of Priene, in honour of Heliconian Poseidon, or Poseidon, or Neptune, of Helice, in Achaia, their old home. Another Dorian migration, this time to Asia, soon followed, from Argos, Epidauros, and Troezene ; either from internal dissension, or want of room, or urged by their adventurous spirit, they crossed the sea and made themselves masters of the isles of Rhodes and Cos, and founded on the mainland Cnidos and Halicarnassos ; the three cities of Rhodes (Lindos, lalysos, and Camiros) and Cos, Cnidos, and Halicarnassos formed Doris in Asia Minor, on the Dorian Hexapolis (six towns), and they celebrated a common festival to their national god Apollo on the Triopian promontory, which is the south-western extremity of Asia Minor and eastern extremity of the peninsula of Cnidos. The Dorians also settled on some of the Sporades and on the isles between Crete and Rhodes. Crete had been colonised by Dorians before the Return of the Heracleidae; but after that period it received two Dorian colonies, one of Spartans and Minyans from Amyclae, after the conquest of that Achaean stronghold, and the other under the Argive Althaemenes. DIFFUSION OF THE HELLENIC RACE. 25 There was an earlier Hellenic migration to Asia than either the Ionic or Doric ; it is called the yEolic, or sometimes the Boeotian. It was led by the Achaean princes, the descendants of Orestes, who had been expelled from Pelopounesos by the invasion of the Dorians ; it was chiefly composed of Achaeans and the aborigines of Boeotia, and they were joined by some of their Breotian conquerors yEolians, whence the name of the migration. They sailed from Aulis, and first occupied Lesbos, in which isle they founded six cities, and then the opposite coast of Asia Minor, from the base of Mount Ida to the mouth of the Hermos. There were twelve JEolic cities on the mainland of Asia : Smyrna, Cyme (or Cumae), Temnos, Larissa, Neon-Teichos, ^Egas, Myrina, Gryneia, Cilia, Notion, yEgiroessa, Pitane. But Smyrna early passed into the hands of the lonians ; and the only JEolic city which rose to importance in the historical times was Cyme. Doubtless this stream of migration, which has been represented as limited in duration, really flowed for several generations, if we are to follow analogy. The whole of the western coast of Asia Minor was now occupied by the three great races of ^Eclians, lonians, and Dorians the yEolians in the northern portion of the coast, and in the isles of Lesbos and Tenedos ; the lonians in the central part, and in Chios, Samos, and the Cyclades ; and the Dorians in the south-western corner, and in Rhodes and Cos. 19. The causes of colonisation continued to operate during a long series of years. The coasts of Macedonia and Thrace on the JEgea.n were occupied by Hellenic settlements ; the lonians of Miletos sent colonists to the Propontis or Sea of Marmora, then entered the Euxine or Black Sea and made commercial settlements along the shores of Asia, Colchis, and Scythia. In the west of the Mediterranean, Sicily and the south coast of Italy were filled with Hellenic colonies, chiefly Dorian; and in the south, the island Cypros became Hellenic ; even the jealous Egyptians allowed the Hellenes to settle in their land at Naucratis, 550 B.C., and a flourishing Hellenic state was established 631 B.C. at Cyrene on the coast of Libya; while the Phocaeans of Ionia settled in 600 B.C. at Massilia (Marseilles) on the south coast of France. Thus the Hellenic race was scattered along the coasts of the Mediterranean : and it is only for a comparatively brief period, two centuries, that their history preserves any unity. At no period in their history did the Hellenes constitute a nation in the sense in which that term is applicable to Britain or France. Once or twice there was a common union of Greeks against the Barbarians ; but the unity created by the pressure of external force was only temporary. The union of Hellas was intellectual ; it lay in the possession of a common civilisation, which stood in bold contrast to that of the rest of the worldt THE HOMERIC GODS. (After FLAXMAN). CHAPTER III. THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. 20. THE LEGENDS THE RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF THE GREEKS : GREEK RATIONAL- ISMITS SCHOOLS. 21. MODERN THEORIES OF THE MYTH FIVE THE THEOLOGICAL: PHILOSOPHICAL OR MYSTIC: HISTORICAL : LINGUISTIC : POLYTHEISTIC AND POETIC. NO THEORY UNIVERSALLY APPLICABLE. 22. IGNORANCE OF GEOGRAPHY AMONG THE GREEKS : THE HOMERIC GEOGRAPHY THE SPHERE OF HEAVEN, EARTH, TARTAROS : STREAM OF OCEAN : GREECE : MYTHICAL ISLES I ^ETHIOPIA: PIGMIES : ELYSIUM: THE CIMMERIANS : OLYMPOS. 23. GREEK COSMOGONY : CHAOS : THE FIRST DYNASTY OF THE GODS URANOS AND GAIA, THE TITANS, CYCLOPES, HECATONCHEIRES, &C. : REVOLT OF CRONOS. 24. THE SECOND DYNASTY OF THE GODS CRONOS AND RHEA : CRUELTY OF CRONOS: BIRTH AND CONCEALMENT OF ZEUS (JUPITER) : REVOLT OF ZEUS AND HIS BROTHER: WAR WITH THE TITANS: BANISHMENT OF CRONOS. 25. THE THIRD (OR OLYMPIC) DYNASTY OF THE GODS- ZEUS, HADES, POSEIDON, &C. : WAR WITH THE GIANTS. 26. ZEUS : HIS PRODUCTION OF PALLAS ATHENA : HIS POWERS: HIS VISITS TO EARTH. 27. HERA. 28. POSEIDON. HADES. 29. PALLAS ATHENA: TIRESIAS. 30. LETO : PHOZBOS APOLLO: MARSYAS: MIDAS : TITYOS : DAPHNE : ATTRIBUTES OF APOLLO. ARTEMIS : ENDYMION : ORION: ACTAEON. 31. PERSEPHONE. DEMETER : HER VISIT TO ATTICA: HER OFFSPRING. 20. |gJ'Ssj|HE legends or myths of the Hellenic race formed also their religion, and they deserve notice on this score ; for the religion of an early people is the groundwork of its primitive system of thought on all subjects. Besides, with very few exceptions, they were the real belief of the Hellenes of the historical period regarding their own past ; and no view of Hellenic history would be complete in which what the Hellenes themselves regarded as a most important part of their national life was sup- pressed. Between the legends of the Gods and those of the Heroes a Greek was unable to see any difference in respect of historical credibility. To his mind both rested on the same identical testj. THEORIES OF MYTHOLOGY. 27 mouy ; both were alike part of his religious creed ; supernatural agency and supernatural motives and springs of action are the pervading soul as much of the heroic as of the divine legends ; the gods themselves appear quite as prominently in the heroic legends and even the Heroes are real, though inferior, deities. By the bulk of the Hellenes of the historical age the legends were accepted without any doubts ; but gradually arose a want of har- mony with the tone of the more cultured portion of the race. As communications became more frequent, the mutually contradictory character of the legends themselves tended to undermine their authority, and in the characters and actions ascribed to the Gods and Heroes there was much that was repugnant to the altered moral feelings of a more civilised epoch. But, more than all, the com- mencement of physical science and intelligent observation of nature introduced a conception of the universe, and a mode of interpreting its phenomena, in continual conflict with the simplicity of ancient faith and men were now accustomed to refer to purely physical causes and natural laws what were conceived by their ancestors as voluntary interventions of supernatural beings, in wrath or favour to mortals. But even with the most cultivated there was no break- ing with the religion of their forefathers, which would have been too painful and difficult a disruption of old feelings for the average strength even of superior minds, and which might have entailed the fate of Anaxagoras and Socrates. The Legends were no longer believed in their obvious sense by the higher and more cultured classes, but a meaning was sought for, by which they could be believed :* and hence a series of efforts, continuing with increased energy from the early Eleatic philosopher Xenophanes who wrote verses teaching the pantheistic unity of the Deity, and de- nouncing, in the most vehement terms, the stories related of the gods by Hesiod and "the universal instructor," Homer and the first known prose historian Hecataeos (520 B.C.), down to the Neo- platonic adversaries of Christianity in the school of Alexandria. The legends, rejected in their obvious interpretation, were admitted in some other sense, which stripped the narratives of the direct in- tervention of any deity. They were represented either as ordinary histories, coloured by poetic ornament, or as al'egories in which moral instruction, physical knowledge, or esoteric religious doctrines were designedly wrapt up. 21. The early Christian writers referred all Greek mythology to a corruption of Old Testament doctrine and history. On the final overthrow of Paganism the Hellenic mythology, with historv and literature, slept the sleep of the dark ages ; but at the revival of learning poets and artists eagerly laid hold of it, and antiquarians and philosophers directed their attention to it. The first tendency * The rationalistic mode of interpretation is often called Euhemerism, from a Sicilian writer, Euhemeros, 320 B.C., who held that the Gods, as well as the Heroes, were merely earth-born men, though superior to the ordinary level in respect of force and capacity, and deified after death as a recompense for ser* Vices or striking exploits. 28 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. of modern scholars was to follow the Christian Fathers a system of interpretation adopted by Vossius, Bryant, Faber, and, though with more poetic feeling, very recently by Mr. Gladstone. But the example of the Germans is generally followed, and most scholars now adopt the rationalistic method. Modern theories of mythology may be divided into five classes excluding the view of Grote, that this mythology was " a past which was never present," for this is merely refusing to see palpable difficulties, and represents the Greek religion too much as a sort of accident. (r.) The Theological, which regards it as the theology of poly- theistic religions, and seeks to reduce it to harmony with the original monotheism of mankind. Regarding this theory, Professor Max M tiller, of Oxford, remarks : " It seems blasphemy to consider these fables of the heathen world as corrupted and misinterpreted frag- ments of a divine revelation once granted to the whole race of mankind." (2.) The Philosophical, or Mystic, or Allegorical, which supposes mythology to be purely symbolic, and merely the envelope of some one branch of human science a theory supported by Lord Bacon, Boccaccio, Tollius, Dupuis, Creuzer, Gorres, &c. (3.) The Historical, which represents all the mythic personages as having been once real human beings, and the legends as merely the acts of these persons poetically embellished. This theory has been supported by Bochart, Rudbecks, the Abbe Banier, Musgrave, Larcher, Clavier, Raoul-Rochette, Hug, Bottiger, Jones, Pococke, and others, who also support the Theological theory. (4.) The Linguistic, as it may be called, or that supplied by Max M tiller and other authorities on Comparative Philology. So much light has been already thrown on mythology by this theory, that it is desirable to give it in Professor Miiller's own words (Oxford Essays, 1856, and Lectures on the Science of Language) : " We can scarcely imagine a language without abstract nouns. There are, however, dialects spoken at the present day which have no abstract nouns, and the more we go back in the history of languages the smaller we find the number of these useful expressions. . . . But there are words which we hardly call abstract, but which neverthe- less were" so originally, and are so still in form ; " such words as day and night, spring and winter, dawn and twilight, storm and thunder, sky and earth, dew and rain, even rivers and mountains. In regard to all such words " we imagine something which does not fall under our senses ; but whether we call it a whole, a power, or an idea, in speaking of it we change it unawares into something individual. Now, in ancient language every one of these words had necessarily a termination expressive of gender, and this naturally produced in the mind the corresponding idea of sex ; so that these names re- ceived not only an individual, but a sexual character. There was no substantive which was not either masculine or feminine ; neuters being of later growth, and distinguishable chiefly in the nominative. What must have been the result of this ? As long as people thought in language it was simply impossible to spealv of morning or evening, LINGUISTIC THEORY. 29 ot spring and winter, without giving to these conceptions something of an individual, active, sexual, and, at last, personal character, They were either nothings, as they are nothings to our withered thought, or they were something ; and then they could not be con- ceived as mere powers, but as powerful beings." Mythology, there- fore, according to the comparative philologists, "is, in truth, a disease of language. A myth means a word, but a word which, 30 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. from being a name or an attribute; has been allowed to assume a more substantial existence. Most of the Greek, the Roman, the Indian, and other heathen gods are nothing but poetical namesj which gradually assumed a divine personality never contemplated by their original inventors. Eos (Aurora) was a name of the dawri before she became a goddess, the wife of Tithonos, or the dying day. Fatum (ala-a), or fate, meant originally what had been spoken ; and before Fate became a power even greater than Jupiter, it meant that which had once been spoken by Jupiter, and could never be changed not even by Jupiter himself. Zeus, or Jupiter, originally meant the bright heaven ; in Sanskrit, Dyaus ; and many of the stories told of him as the supreme god, had a meaning only as told originally of the bright heaven, whose rays, like golden rain, descend on the lap of the earth, the Danae of old, kept by her father in the dark prison of winter. No one doubts that Luna was simply a name of the moon ; but so was likewise Lucina, both de- rived from lucere, to shine. Hecate, too, was an old name of the moon, the feminine of Hekatos and Hekatebolos, the far-darting sun ; and Pyrrha, the Eve of the Greeks, was nothing but a name of the red earth, and in particular of Thessaly. This mythological disease, though less virulent in modern languages, is by no means extinct." (5.) The Polytheistic and Poetic, the theory according to which Mythology had its origin in the natural human faculties and the spontaneous tendencies of the uncultivated intellect, and received its development from the poets. Religion generally runs parallel with the progress of human conceptions of nature : each step made in the study of the phenomena of nature determines a modification in the religious theory. The savage who draws his idea of power from his own voluntary impulses, ascribes will and personality to every individual object in which he beholds a power beyond his control, and he at once commences propitiating it by prayer and sacrifice. This original Fetichism, towards natural objects which combine great power with a well-marked individuality, was pro- longed far into the period of Polytheism proper. The Gaia of Hesiod, mother of all tLe gods, was not a goddess of the earth, but the earth itself; and her physical are blended with her divine attributes in a singular medley. The sun and moon, not deities residing therein, were the objects of the ancient Grecian worship ; their identification with Apollo and Artemis belong to a much later age. The Hindoos worship as a goddess the river Nerbudda not a deity of the river, but the river itself; and, if they ascribe to it sex and other attributes inconsistent with the physical character- istics of the natural object, it is from inability to conceive the idea of personality, except in conjunction with the ordinary human impulses and attributes. The Homeric Scamander is scarcely other than the animated river itself; and the god Alpheios, who pursues Arethusa through ocean, is the actual river, flowing through the salt waves without mixing with them, and at length combining its waters in indissoluble union with those of the fountain it loves (Edinburgh THEORIES OF MYTHOLOGY. $1 Review). But when the mind can recognise in a great many natural objects, which are not thus strikingly individualised, one and the same power of affecting human interests, the tendency then is, not to deify the objects, but to place over them a deity who, being invisible, rules from a distance a whole class of phenomena : thus Bacchos over wine, Demeter (Ceres) over bread, Hephaestos (Vulcan) over fire, &c. As thought advanced, not only all physical agencies capable of ready generalisation, as Night, Morning, Sleep, Death, together with the more obvious of the great emotional agencies, Beauty, Love, War, but by degrees also the ideal products of a higher abstraction, as Wisdom, Justice, and the like, were severally accounted the work and manifestation of as many special ODYSSEUS AND POLYPHEMOS, KING OF THE CYCLOPES. divinities. But these objects of worship were certainly not con- ceived as ideas, but as persons, whose fundamental attributes, however, necessarily ran in close analogy to those of the ideas which they embodied. Afterwards poets and priests invented stories about the gods, more or less connected or consistent with their original attributes, and the stories were now made part of the popular religious belief; and those became the most popular deities regarding whom the most impressive stories had been feigned. Each of these theories will explain some of the legends, but not one of them is capable of such a universal application as their supporters intended. Each of them is useful within a certain limited sphere, but, with the exception to some extent of the fourth, that of Comparative Philology, the explanation afforded by any one of them is merely to be taken as a hypothesis and nothing more. In this history the legends of the Gods and of the other personages 32 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. of the Heroic Age are given in the form in which they were believed by the Greeks themselves ; the reader may apply to each myth the theory he prefers. 22. Before entering on the cosmogony and theogony of the Greek, their views on the origin of the world and the origin of the Gods, a few remarks are necessary on their geographical knowledge. Both with the Greeks and Romans the geographical horizon was very narrow and was but slowlv enlarged by commerce, conquest, and scientific discovery. At the lime of Herodotos (about 440 B.C.) the Greeks had in Asia become acquainted with a consid- erable part of the Persian empire, and in Africa the Nile had carried them into the interior of Egypt ; but to the west and north their knowledge did not reach much beyond the coasts of the Mediter- ranean. With the chief part of Europe the Greeks of that period were wholly unacquainted. They had never sailed beyond the Straits of Gibraltar ; the western shores of Spa"in, and France, Britain, Germany, and Scandinavia, were as unknown to them as America or Australia. Britain, though long known to the Phoe- nicians, was not known to the Greeks and Romans till shortly before the Christian era, and the belief in a circumfluous ocean had held its ground till shortly before. According to the ideas of the Homeric and Hesiodic ages, the universe was conceived as a hollow globe, divided into two equal portions by the flat disk of the earth, the external shell of this globe being called brazen or iron, probably to express its solidity. The upper hemisphere was Uranos, or heaven (ovpavos) the lower Tartaros Hesiod gives us the diameter of the sphere thus an anvil would take nine days to fall from heaven to Earth, and the same period from Earth to Tartaros. The lower hemisphere was filled with gloom and darkness, and its air was unmoved by any wind. The Earth, running across the middle of the sphere, was in shape a round flat disk, or cylinder, round which the great river Ocean flowed : and it was divided by the Sea into two parts, the northern part being named after Homer's time, Europe, and the southern Libya (i.e., Africa) and Asia. Delphi was in post-Homeric times, regarded as the central point of the Earth, and therefore called the navel of the earth op.a\os Tfjt yfjs. The only parts of the northern division of the Earth mentioned by Homer are the country of the Hellenes and some of the tribes of Thrace. But Hesiod placed a happy race, the Hyperboreans beyond the Rhipaean mountain range that was supposed to run all along the north of Europe. The Homeric Greeks may have known something of the country west of Greece. Here their imaginations or the tales of voyagers, placed the isle of Calypso, the JEa.es. of Circe, the Scheria of the Phasacians, and in the south-west, the Lotos-eaters, the Cyclopes, the Giants, and the Laestrygones. On the south coast, eastward of the mythical tribes just mentioned, lay Libya and Egypt. The Sidonians were known to Homer, and the Greeks of his day were well acquainted with the people of the west coast of Asia Minor: but they do not seem to have navigated the Euxine (Black Sea) thus early. In the GREEK THEORY OF THE UNIVERSE. 33 east of the earth Homer placed a tribe, the ^Ethiopians, a happy race like the Hyperboreans of Hesiod : in later times the ./Ethiop- ians were placed in the south, in the region to which Homer assigned the nation of dwarfs, the Pygmies, who had to defend themselves against the Cranes, which migrated to their country every winter. In the remote west, by the stream of Ocean, lay the great Elysian Plains, whither the mortal relatives of Zeus were borne, without submitting to death, to enjoy a blissful immortality : and later the Elysian Plains appear as the Isles of the Blest (identified with the Canaries). " The blissful plains Of utmost earth, where Rhadamanthus reigns, Joys ever young, unmix'd with pain or fear, Fill the wide circle of th' eternal year : Stern Winter smiles on that auspicious clime : The fields are florid with unfading prime ; From the bleak pole no winds inclement blow, Mould the round hail, or flake the fleecy snow ; But from the breezy deep the blest inhale The fragrant murmurs of the western gale." (Pope's Homer, Od., iv., 563.) Still further west, beyond the Ocean, the only occasion on which the transoceanic land is mentioned by Homer, lay the Cimmerians in a region unvisited by the sun and shrouded in perpetual darkness. The stream of Ocean flowed around the Earth from south to north up the western side of the Earth. It was the parent of all fountains and rivers on the earth ; and the stars, moving in the void between the Earth and the Heaven, rose every morning out of, and sank every evening into this great river. The Thessalian Olympos*, the highest mountain with which the Greeks of the Achaean period were acquainted, was the abode of the Gods. The approach to its summit was closed by a gate of clouds which was kept by the Goddesses called the Seasons Horae, " There no rude winds presume to shake the skies, No rains descend, no snowy vapours rise ; But on immortal thrones the blest repose ; The firmament with living splendour glows." (Pope's Homer, Od., vi., 41.) 23. The Greek cosmogonic system, like every other, commences with a chaos, or state of confusion and darkness. Out of the primeval chaos x<* oy > from ^da/cco, yawning abyss, or ^a^Sai/o), all- containing space emerged the first dynasty of the Gods Uranos,f the personification of Heaven, the Roman Coelus, and Gaea or Ge, * The name Olympos was common to several other mountains, each of which was apparently the highest in its own district in Mysia, Laconia, Elis, Lycia, and Cyprus. t It is the- same word as Varunas (the nightly firmament), from var (cover), in the Veda. D 34 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. the personification of Earth, the Roman Terra or Tellus; and also Erebos, the personification of Darkness, and Nyx, the personification of Night, and from the union of these two Hemera, the personifica- tion of Day, proceeded. The first Gods, Uranos and Gaea, had a numerous progeny. Gaea bore the twelve Titans six males,Oceanos, Coeos.Crios, Hyperion, lapetos, and Cronos and six females,Theia, Rhea, Themis, Mnemosyne, Phcebe, and Tethys ; the three Cyclopes, Brontes, Steropes, and Arges, and the three Hecatoncheires, or Hundred-handed giants, Cottos, Briareos, and Gyes. Uranos im- prisoned the Cyclopes and Hecatoncheires in Tartaros ; whereon Gaea, indignant at the punishment of her sons, instigated the Titans to revolt against their father, which they all, except Oceanos, did. Cronos, armed with an adamantine sickle, attacked and mutilated his father Uranos. From the blood that flowed from the god the Giants, Furies or Eumenides, and Nymphs sprang, and from the mangled flesh, which was cast into the sea, Aphrodite or Venus arose out of the sea-foam at Cythera. The Titans then, having liberated their brothers, deposed Uranos and placed Cronos on the throne of the world. Another mentioned as a seventh Titan is Atlas, whose story is referred to later. On his accession Cronos imprisoned again the Cyclopes and Hecatoucheires. 24. The second dynasty of gods, that of Cronos (Saturn) and his wife Rhea (Ops), now succeeds. Their children were Hestia (Vesta), Demeter (Ceres), Hera (Juno), Hades or Aidoneus (Pluto or Orcus), Poseidon (Neptune), and Zeus (Jupiter). It had been foretold by Uranos or Gaea that Cronos should be dethroned by one of his own children ; or according to another account the Titans had imposed on Cronos the condition that he should rear up no male children. He therefore swallowed his children as soon as they were born. After five had been thus destroyed, Rhea, by her parents' advice, withdrew to Lyctos, in Crete, where she gave birth to Zeus ; she then gave Cronos a large stone, dressed up as a babe, and he, not suspecting any trick, swallowed it. Rhea then concealed the infant Zeus in a cave on Mount Dicte or Mount Ida, where he was brought up by the Curetes or Corybantes, the priests :;: of Rhea or Cybele, and he was nursed by the bee-nymphs or Melissae, called Adrastea and Ida, the daughters of King Melisseus of Crete. The Corybantes drowned his infant cries with cymbals and drums, that Cronos might not discover him ; and the nymphs fed him on honey, and the milk of the goat Anialtheia, who is also called a daughter of Melisseus. One day the infant god broke off one of the goat's horns. It was presented as a talisman to the nymphs, and was afterwards called the Horn of Plenty, Cornucopia, and placed among the stars. When Zeus grew up, a potion was administered * Men are here recognised as existing on the earth. According to Hesiod, the Gods made the first, or golden, race of men in the time of Cronos; when these died, they became good terrestrial demons. A second, but inferior, race, the silver, was made by the Gods, and destroyed by Zeus. A third, and much inferior, race, the brazen, was made by Zeus, and they perished by each other's hand. Zeus then made the divine race of Heroes, to whom succeeded the existing, or iron, race. THE THIRD DYNASTY OF THE GODS. 35 by Metis, the daughter of the Titans, Oceanos and Tethys, to Cronos, and he vomited up the stone and the five children he had swallowed. Zeus and his brothers and sisters now rebelled against their father, who was supported in the struggle by the Titans. After the contest, which took place in Thessaly Cronos and the Titans being on Mount Othrys, and the party of Zeus on Mount Olympos had lasted ten years, Gaia foretold victory to Zeus if he would liberate her imprisoned sons. Zeus accordingly slew the monster Campe,which guarded them in Tartaros, and released them ; and by their aid he vanquished the Titans. He placed these in Tartaros, appointing the Hecatoncheires to watch them; and he banished Cronos. According to the later Italian tradition, in which Cronos was identified with Saturn, Cronos fled to Italy, where he was received by King Janus, and founded a settlement on the Capitoline hill. 25. The third and last the Olympic dynasty of the Gods now succeeds, and at its head Zeus was placed. He divided the sove- reign power of the world with his two brothers, Hades or Pluto and Poseidon (Neptune). He reserved for himself the supreme rule in heaven, and assigned the command of the sea to Poseidon, and that of Tartaros, or the nether world, to Hades. The Cyclopes, in grati- tude for their release, supplied Zeus with thunder and lightning, Hades with a helmet, and Poseidon with a trident. Angry at the overthrow of her sons, the Titans, Gaea stirred up a rebellion against her grandson. Among her progeny by Uranos were the Giants, a set of monsters like the Hecatoncheires. The most celebrated of them were Typhon, or Typhreus, Alcyoeus, Porphyrion, and Euce- lados. At the instigation of Gaea, they now assailed Zeus and the other gods, with rocks, oaks, and burning wood, and piled Ossa on Pelion to scale Olympos ; the affrighted gods fled into Egypt, where they assumed the forms of different animals. Zeus recollected that the giants could be conquered only by a mortal's aid, and therefore he summoned his son Heracles, or Hercules, and by his help over- came them. Many of the giants were killed ; some were buried alive under volcanic isles, and eruptions were ascribed to their writhings. 26. The dominion of Zeus* being now established, he married Metis (or Prudence) : but being afraid that she would bring forth a son greater than himself, he devoured her in the first month of her pregnancy. Being afterwards seized with great pains in the head, his skull was opened by Hephaestos, or Vulcan and suddenly Pallas Athena, also called Minerva, goddess of wisdom, sprang forth from his brain, full-grown and full-armed. The second wife of Zeus was the female Titan Themis, and by her he had the three Seasons or Horae : Eunomia, Dice, and Eirene, and the Moirae or Fates. His third wife was Hera (Juno), who was regarded as the queen of heaven. By her he had Ares (Mars), Hephaestos (Vulcan) and Ilithyia (Lucina). Zeus had a numerous progeny by other * The root is div, as in Koi, divine, Latin divus ; evfo.'eXor, distinct ; Sanskrit div, dyans (sky),devas (Latin dens, deity); old High German zio. 36 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. deities ; by Eurynome, daughter of Oceanos,the Charites or Graces by Demeter, or Ceres, Persephone (Proserpine); by the female Titan Mnemosyne, the Muses ; by Latona, daughter of the Titans Cceos and Phoebe, Apollo and Artemis, or Diana : and also by several mortals : by Semele, Bacchos ; by Danae, Perseus ; by Alcmena, Heracles, or Hercules ; by Europa, Minos, Rhadamanthos, and Sarpedon, &c. Among those who suffered most from his vengeance were Prometheus, Ixion, and the giant Tityos ; and to punish the wickedness of mankind he 1 sent the Deluge in the time of Deucalion. He was believed occasionally to visit earth. One of these visits is commemorated in a Phrygian story. Accompanied by Hermes (Mercury), he arrived in Phrygia, disguised as a mortal, and was denied entertainment by everyone except by an old man Philemon and his wife Baucis, a pair who lived in great poverty. In return for their hospitality, Zeus transformed their wretched hut into a splendid temple, of which he made Philemon and Baucis the ministers, and in their extreme old age he granted their prayer that they should die together at the same moment, and then he changed them into trees before the temple's doors. On another occasion when Zeus visited earth in man's form to witness the wickedness and impiety of men, the Arcadian King Lycaon, son of Pelasgos and Meliboea, served up human flesh to him at a banquet to test his divinity. The God changed him into a wolf and all his fifty sons, except Nyctimos, who succeeded him, were destroyed by the bolts of Zeus or made wolves. Lycaon's daughter, Callisto, bore a son, Arcos, to Zeus; Hera avenged herself on Callisto by changing her into a bear, and Zeus placed her and her son among the constella- tions as the Greater and the Lesser Bear. In Homer's time Zeus was regarded as the father of gods and men, the most powerful of the gods, and the ruler of the universe. From him everything good and bad proceeded ; but the Fates were at times regarded as independent of his authority. He was repre- sented as armed with thunder and lightning, and the shaking of his aegis produced storm and tempest. 27. Hera,* or Juno, the daughter of Cronos and Rhea,and sister and wife of Zeus, was, according to Homer, brought up by Oceanos and Tethys, and her marriage with Zeus was celebrated without the knowledge of her parents. Though treated by the gods with the same reverance as her husband, she is, in Homer, merely the wife of Zeus, and does not share his majesty as the sovereign of gods and men. But at a later day she was invested with all the attri- butes of queen of heaven. Hera is represented as very unamiable : she was jealous, obstinate, and quarrelsome, and frequently dis- puted with Zeus, and she once instigated Poseidon and Athena to assist her in putting him in chains. Zeus punished her for this by suspending her from the clouds with her hands fettered and two anvils hanging from her feet. Hephaestas, her son, attempted to * Perhaps akin to the root of np* (hero), Latin hems (master), hera (mistress,), German Herr, English Sir ZEUS WARRING AGAINST THE GIANTS. 38 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. release her, whereon Zeus kicked him out of Olympos, and He- phasstas, who alighted on Lemnos, was for ever lamed by the fall. Her special servant was the hundred-eyed Argos, and she also made use of Zeus' messenger, Iris, the rainbow. She was the chief enemy of the Trojans in their struggle with the Greeks. 28. Poseidon,* or Neptune, the God of the Mediterranean, was the brother of Zeus and was equal to him in dignity, though inferior in power. Though usually submissive to the King of the gods, he resented his attempts to intimidate him, and once joined Hera in conspiring against him. He had a palace in the depths of the sea near /Egae, in Eubrea, and there he stabled his horses with the brazen hoofs and golden manes. His wife was Amphitrite. He was usually attended by the Tritons, monsters half-men, half-fishes, the Nereides, Dolphins, &c. He built, along with Apollo, the walls of Troy for Laomedon, and severely punished the attempt to defraud him of his reward. He contested with Athena the privilege of naming Athens, on which occasion he produced the horse. He aided Heracles in destroying the Centaurs. He ravaged /Ethiopia with a sea-monster to punish the pride of Cassiopeia, wife of King Cepheus. In the Trojan war he supported the Greeks ; but he afterwards vindictively pursued Odysseus (Ulysses) for the murder of his son, the Cyclops Polyphemos. The unnatural passion of Pasiphae was a punishment for her husband Minos having refused to restore the bull which Poseidon had sent him, on his prayer from the sea. Poseidon was called Earth-shaker, Ennosgseos or Enosichthon, and was believed to cause earthquakes. Hades,f or Aidoneus (Pluto), the brother of Zeus, was god of the nether world, and dwelt in Tartaros, where, seated on an ebony throne, he kept the keys of the unseen world, the entrance to his realm being a dark cavern near the lake Avernos. His kingdom was watered by the Acheron, the Cocytos, the Phlegethon, and the Styx, over the last of which the shades were ferried by Charon, and thence were conducted by Hermes past the three-headed monster, the dog Cerberos. At his court were Plutos (Wealth), Night, Sleep, Death, Dreams, the Fates, Nemesis, &c. Hades was chiefly famous in legend for the rape of Demeter's daughter, Persephone, or Proser- pine, who became his queen and the goddess of the nether world. 29. Pallas^ Athena, Minerva, the virgin daughter of Zeus and Metis (Prudence), combined in her character the might and valour of her father with the prudence of her mother. Her extraordinary * Perhaps the same root as T 6v (preserved in the name of the Macedonian and Delphian month, 'An-eAAouos), K. O. Muller explains it as the Averter, or the Defender, from "TO (from) and EA (the root of t\afoa, drive, &c.). 40 THE LEGENDS OF -THE GREEK GODS. and friend, Hyacinthos, a youth of extraordinary beauty. From Pherae Apollo went to the Troad, where he assisted Poseidon, then also in banishment for conspiring with Hera against Zeus, to build the walls of Troy for Laomedon. Like the Muses, with whom he was associated as a patron of art and science, he was jealous of being excelled : the Phrygian satyr, Marsyas, who had challenged him to a contest with the flute, was, on being defeated, flayed alive by him; and the Phrygian king, Midas, who assigned the superiority to Pan at a musical contest between the rural god and Apollo, was punished by his ears being made like those of an ass. Tityos, a giant son of Gaia (or of Zeus and Orchomenos's daughter, Elara), was killed by the darts of Apollo and Artemis, for offering violence to their mother Leto : in Tartaros a serpent continually devoured his liver, or, according to others, a vulture preyed upon his entrails, which grew again as soon as devoured. Apollo was enamoured of Daphne, the daughter of the river god Ladon, and pursued her ; when, on her own prayer, she was transformed into a laurel, that became the favourite tree of Apollo. The attributes of this god, whose worship had a great effect on Greek character, were nume- rous. He was the god of punishment, of help, of prophecy, of song and music, of flocks and cattle, of civil establishments, and, in Homeric times, the sun. His favourite haunt was Parnassos, where he was often to be seen with the Muses, the daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne. Artemis (Diana), the daughter of Zeus and sister of Apollo, be- came the goddess of hunting and chastity, and, like her brother, she also scattered plagues among men with her arrows. Her favourite haunt was Laconia. She was often identified with Selene, or the Moon, and it is in regard to the latter that the story of Endymion is told the youth whom she nightly visited to kiss as he slept on the summit of Mount Latmos. Artemis slew the hunter and giant Orion, who annoyed her with his love ; and the hunter Actason, who had gazed on her when she was bathing, was, as a punishment, torn to pieces by his dogs. With Apollo, she destroyed the children of Niobe ; and she sent a boar to ravage the territory of Calydon, when the king, (Eneus, had neglected to offer up a sacrifice to her. Artemis was also identified with Persephone and Hecate. 31. Persephone,* or Proserpine, was the daughter of Zeus and Demeter, or Ceres. She made Sicily her residence, whence she was carried off by Hades, when she was gathering flowers with her female attendants in the plain of Enna. Demeter sought her all over the world ; she found her veil near the fountain Cyane, and was told by the nymph Arethusa that she had been carried off by Hades. Demeter immediately demanded of Zeus the restoration of her daughter, and refused to approve of her being married to Hades. Zeus promised to restore Persephone if she had not eaten anything in the nether world ; but Ascalaphos, son of Acheron and * Persephone (iiep( P eii, (to bring), QOVOV (slaughter). PERSEPHONE. 4 i Gorgyna, or Orphrie, who had been set by Hades to watch her, proved having seen her eat a pomegranate. To allay the grief of Demeter, Zeus allowed Persephone to spend six months with her mother and six with Hades. Persephone then became queen of the nether world. She was sometimes identified with Artemis, as Selene and Hecate. ARTEMIS (DIANA). Demeter, :;: or Ceres, the daughter of Cronos and Rhea, and mother of Persephone by Zeus, was the goddess of agriculture, fruits, and corn. In the course of her wanderings in search of Persephone, Demeter visited Eleusis, in Attica, where she was entertained by the king, Celeus. To reward him for his hospitality, Demeter resolved to make his son Deiphon, or Demophon, immortal. She began the Demeter ( is merely an old form for Mother Earth, yi} (Sa) 42 THE LEGENDS OF THE GREEK GODS. process by placing him on the fire every night, to destroy the mortal element. His mother, Metaneira, surprised at his growth, watched the goddess, and, seeing her proceedings, shrieked aloud. Demeter was so disturbed in her mysterious operations that Deiphon was allowed to perish in the flames. To compensate her entertainers for this bereavement, Demeter conferred on their other son, Tri- ptolemos, a knowledge of agriculture. She gave him some seeds, and lent him her chariot, drawn by winged dragons, to travel about the earth and communicate a knowledge of agriculture to men. By Triptolemos her mysteries were subsequently established at Eleusis. By Jasion, son of Zeus and Electra, she became mother of the god Plutos (Wealth). She several times displayed a vindictive cha- racter. She buried Ascalaphos under a stone, or changed him into an owl, for his evidence against Persephone : she changed a youth Stellio, into a lizard, for deriding her when she was drinking water with avidity ; and she punished with fearful hunger Erysichon, who had cut down some trees in her sacred grove. RUINS OF ANCIENT GREEK BUILDINGS. CHAPTER IV. THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES. 32. ARES. 33. HEPHAESTOS I APHRODITE. 34. DIONYSOS : HIS EXPEDITION TO INDIA. TRANSFORMATION OF A TYRRHENIAN CREW. 35. HERMES. 36. HELIOS : PHAETHON AND THE HELIADES. HEBE. DIONE. ERIS AND ENYO. IRIS. PAEAN. NEREUS. 37. THE HEROES CECROPS I HIS DAUGHTERS. 38. AGENOR OF PHCENICIA : RAPE OF EUROPA : SETTLEMENT OF CADMOS: THE SPARTI : ACTAEON I DESTRUCTION OF SEMELE: BIRTH OF BACCHOS: ATHAMAS, NEPHELE, AND INO : AGAVE, PENTHEUS. 39. INACHOS, INO : DONAOS AND THE FIFTY DANAIEDS. 40. TANTALOS : PELOPS ! PUNISHMENT OF TANTALOS : VICTORY OF PELOPS OVER CENOMAOS : DE- STRUCTION OF NIOBE AND HER CHILDREN : THE ACCURSED DESCENDANTS OF PELOPS ATREUS, THYESTES, AGAMEMNON, MENELAOS, EGISTHOS, CLY- TEMNESTRA : SACRIFICE OF IPHIGENEIA : MURDER OF AGAMEMNON AVENGED BY ORESTES : PYLAEDS : PURIFICATION OF ORESTES. 41. PRO- METHEUS : EPIMETHEUS : PANDORA: PUNISHMENT OF PROMETHEUS: DEUCALION AND PYRRHA : THE DELUGE I HELLEN AND HIS THREE SONS. 42. SISYPHOS. BELLEROPHON : PR^TOS AND ANTAEA : JOBATES : THE CHIMAERA : PEGASOS. 43. ACRUCIOS AND DANAEA POLYDECTES : PER- SEUS : THE GORGONS : THE GRAEAE : SLAUGHTER OF THE GORGONS : MEDUSA'S HEAD : METAMORPHOSIS OF ATLAS : ANDROMEDA : GORGOPHONE : TYNDAREUS AND THE TYNDARID/E CASTOR AND POLLUX. 44. ALCMENA : HERACLES (HERCULES): HIS SUBJECTION TO EURYSTHEUS : HIS TWELVB 44 THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES. LABOURS (l) THE NEMEAN LION : (2) LERNAEAN HYDRA : (3) THE STAG Of ENOE : (4) THE BOAR OF ERYMANTHOS THE CENTAURS : IXION : THE CENTAURS AND LAPITHAEA : DESTRUCTION OF THE CENTAURS : (5) THE STABLES OF AUGEIAS : (6) THE BIRDS OF STYMPHALOS : (7) CRETAN BULL : (8) THE MARES OF DIOMEDES : (9) THE GIRDLE OF HYPOLYTE : (lo) GERYON : (II)THE HESPERIDES ATLAS: THE ATLANTIDS: (12) CERBEROS: CACOS: ANTAEOS: BUSIRIS: ERYX : THE PILLARS OF HERACLES: THE GIANTS I LAOMEDON: IDLE AND IPHITOS : OMPHALE : DEJANEIRA: NESSOS : DEATH OF HERACLES ON MOUNT O2TA : HIS CHARACTER. 45. jEGEUS : THESEUS I HIS FEATS: MINOTAUR: PERITHOOS: HIPPOLYTOS: EXILE AND MURDER OF THESEUS. or Mars, the son of Zeus and Hera, is repre- sented by Homer as a gigantic warrior, the God of War and Slaughter, and by the tragedians as the God of Destruction generally, the Spirit of Strife, Plague, Famine. Despite his powers, he was once seized and confined in prison for thirteen months by the gigantic youths Otus and Ephialtes, called the Aloidas, sons of Poseidon and Iphimedeia : he was released by his half-brother, Hermes. By the aid of Pallas Athena, Dio- medes overcame Ares in the Trojan war; and, on another occasion, Athena overthrew the God of War, using an enormous rock as a missile ; his prostrate body covered 700 feet of earth. He was also once defeated by Heracles, and obliged to return to Olympos. Ares was greatly attached to Aphrodite ; and, assuming the form of a wild bear, he killed the young huntsman, Adonis, of whom the goddess was enamoured. For another murder, that of Halir- rhothios, son of Poseidon, Ares was tried before the gods on the hill at Athens, thence named the Areopagos, or Hill of Mars ; but he was acquitted. Ares and Aphrodite were once surprised by her husband Hephaestos, and caught in a net, from which they were delivered by the help of Poseidon ; the youth Alectryon, who had been set by Ares to keep watch and had fallen asleep, was trans- formed into a cock. By Aphrodite Ares was father of Eros, or Cupid, and Harmonia, and he had many other children. 33. Hephaestos, Vulcan, the son of Zeus and Hera, or of Hera alone, was the god of fire. He was lame and deformed from his birth, and he was in consequence thrown from Olympos into the sea by his mother ; but he was saved and reared by Eurynome and Thetis, two daughters of Oceanos and Tethys. He returned to heaven when he was grown up, but he was flung out by Zeus, when he tried to deliver Hera from her punishment, and he fell on the isle Lemnos, greatly increasing his lameness. He returned a second time to Olympos, and mediated between his parents. He was chiefly in his workshop in Olympos, or, according to the later legends, in the various volcanic isles, with his servants, the Cyclopes. Hephaestos made all the palaces of the gods in Olympos, the armour of Achilles and ^Eneas, the fatal necklace of Harmonia, the sceptre of Agamemnon, the fire-breathing bulls of king ^Eetes of Colchis, and the woman Pandora. Aphrodite, or Venus, literally " foam-born," the daughter of Zeus and Dione, was Goddess of Love and Beauty. According to one APHRODITE DIONYSOS HERMES. 45 legend, she was born from the foam of the sea, from the mutilated flesh of Uranos, and floated on the waves in a sea-shell to Cythera and then to Cypros. She once excited the anger of Zeus; and, on this account, he gave her in marriage to the deformed god Hephaestos ; but she was very unfaithful to him, and regarded with favour Ares, Dionysos, Hermes, Poseidon, Adonis, Anchises, Butes, &c. She was generally accompanied by the Graces and her son Eros, or Cupid. She bore Priapos and Hymen to Dionysos, -5neas to Anchises, Hermaphrodites to Hermes, &c. The award of the golden apple of Eris, Goddess of Discord, to Aphrodite, by the judgment of Paris led to the Trojan War. 34. Dionysos, or Bacchos, the son of Zeus and Semele, was saved from his mother's fate when she was burnt by the lightnings of Zeus, and was placed for safety and protection in the thigh of Zeus. He was regarded as the planter and guardian of the vine and the God of Wine and Inspiration, and of Dramatic Poetry at Athens. Though he is rarely mentioned in Homer, his worship was primitive and manifold ; and he was variously represented as the civiliser of mankind, as the inspirer of noble enthusiasm, as the symbol of the generative and productive principle of nature, &c. According to the legend, when he grew up, he was made insane by his mother's enemy, Hera, and wandered throughout the earth, visiting Egypt and Syria, from which he made an expedition to India, at the head of an army of men and women, all inspired by divine fury, and carrying thyrsi (wands wreathed in ivy and vine leaves, with a pine cone at the top), cymbals and other musical instruments; Dionysos being drawn in a chariot by a lion and a tiger, and accom- panied by Pan, Silenos, and all the Satyrs. Wherever he went, he taught the cultivation of the vine, and introduced the elements of civilisation. Amidst his benevolence to mankind, he was relentless in punishing all who affronted his divinity : and Pentheus, Agave, the daughters of Proetus, the Edonian king Lycurgos, &c., felt the severity of his vengeance. He assisted Zeus in his war with the giants. When on a voyage to Naxos he was seized by the crew, Tyrrhenians, who endeavoured to make for Asia ; but Dionysos changed the masts and oars into serpents, and himself assumed the shape of a lion the ship was clothed with ivy, and the music of flutes was heard in every direction ; the frenzied sailors flung them- selves overboard and were made dolphins, the pilot alone, who had commiserated the god, being spared. On his arrival at Naxos Dionysos married Ariadne, who had been deserted there by Theseus. 35. Hermes, or Mercury, the son of Zeus and Maia, is represented in Homer as messenger of the gods, as giver of good luck, with special reference to increase of cattle ; so that later he becomes a pastoral god, the God of all Secret Dealings, Cunning and Stratagem, as conductor of the spirits to the nether world, as a magician, from his golden rod, and, in a Homeric hymn, as inventor of the lyre and as a clever thief; later he was tutelary god of all skill and accom- plishments (as gymnastics, speech, writing, and all arts and sciences) 46 THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES. of traffic, markets, rods, and of heralds. He was commonly represented as a slightly-made youth. Hermes was born on Mount Cyllene, in Arcadia, and reared by the Horae, or Seasons. On the day of his birth he stole the oxen of Admetos, which Apollo tended ; he afterwards stole Apollo's quiver and arrows, Poseidon's trident, Aphrodite's girdle, the sword of Ares, the sceptre of Zeus, and the tools of Hephaestos. He was the confidant of Zeus, and often spied upon Hera's jealous intrigues. He invented the lyre with its seven strings, which he gave Apollo for the shepherd's staff with which the god had tended Admetos' flocks, and which became his famous magical caduceus (pci/38os). In the wars of the giants against the gods, Hermes behaved with great courage, and delivered Ares from his imprisonment. He puiified the Danaides of their murders, bound Ixion to his wheel, killed the hundred-eyed Argos, sold Heracles to Queen Omphale, of Lydia, conducted Priam to Achil- leus' tent to ransom Hector's body, and bore the infant Bacchos to the nymphs of Nysa. 36. The remaining gods may be dismissed in a few words, Helios or Sol (the Sun), was son of the Titan Hyperion and Thea : he used to traverse daily the heaven, from east to west, in a chariot drawn by four horses, proceeded by his sister Eos, or Aurora, He one day allowed his son Phaethon to drive his chariot, but the presumptuous youth was unable to check the horses ; they rushed out of their track and nearly set the earth on fire ; whereupon Zeus killed Phaethon with a flash of lightning and hurled him into the river Eridanos or Po, on the banks of which his sisters, the Heliades, were changed into poplars, and their tears became amber. Helios, the new god was later identified with Phoebus Apollo. He revealed to Hephaestos the loves of Aphrodite and Ares, and to Demeter the rape of Persephone. Hebe (Juventas, Youth), the daughter of Zeus and Hera, is repre- sented by Homer as cupbearer of the gods, from which post she was displaced by Ganymedes. She Was married to Heracles after his deification, and bore him two sons. Later she was represented as the Goddess of Youth. Dione, a female Titan, was reputed the mother of Aphrodite by Zeus, and was admitted into the circle of Olympos. Eris, or Discord, sister and companion of Ares, is the goddess who excites to war or strife. She was expelled from Olympos by Zeus for sowing dissensions. Angry at not being invited to the nuptials of Peleus and Thetis, she threw the " Golden Apple of Discord," which was inscribed " to the fairest," among the assembled deities, who were guests : the contest for it by Hera, Pallas Athena, and Aphrodite was the cause of the Trojaa War. A kindred goddess was Enyo, the Roman Bellona, the daughter of Phorcys and Ceto : she also was a Goddess of War, and the companion of Ares. Iris, the Rainbow, the daughter of Thaumas and Electra, was, like Hermes, the messenger of the gods. She was a virgin goddess, but was later represented as the wife of Zephyros, the west wind. One of her duties was to cut the last remaining hair or thread which IRIS PAEAN NEREUS. 47 held the souls of dying women to their bodies. She had also to bring from the Styx to heaven a cup of the water by which the gods took their most solemn oaths. Though in Homer she is chiefly the messenger of Zeus, she was later appropriated to Hera. Paean, or Paeon, was the divine physician of the gods. But when in post Homeric times, the office of healing was transferred to Apollo, the name also was applied to that god, and was likewise then extended to the prayer, or thanksgiving, to Apollo for deliver- ance from evil, especially from defeat in battle, whence the term a paean. ^Esculapios was also later identified with Paean. MARS ATTACKED BY DlOMED. (FfOM FLAXMAN's HOMER.) Of the minor gods, the only one that need here be noticed from among the greater impersonations of natural powers and ideas, is Nereus, the son of Oceanos and Gala, and father, by Doris, of the fifty Nereides, or nymphs, of the Mediterranean. He was generally * In the Greek Mythology, as represented by Homer, the Gods (t)eoi) proper were the great family of Olympos Zeus (Jupiter), Hera (Juno), Pallas Athena (Minerva), Phoebos (Apollo), Poseidon (Neptune), Hades, or Aidoneus (Pluto), Artemis (Diana), Persephone (Proserpine), Leto (Latona), Ares (Mars), Hermes (Mercury), Hephaestos (Vulcan), Aphrodite (Venus), Demeter (Ceres), Themis, Helios (Sol, the Sun), Dionysos, or Bacchos, Paean, Iris, Dione, Hebe (Youth), Eris, Enyo (Bellona). The minor Greek deities were : (i) The greater imper- sonations of natural powers and of ideas Oceanos and Tethys, Cronos (Saturn) and Rhea, Uranos (Coelus) and Gaea (Terra), Nereus and Amphitrite, Phobos (Terror), the Muses, &c. ; (2) the minor impersonations of natural powers the Winds, Rivers, Nymphs (the Dryads, Oreades, Naiades, Nereides, Oceanides, &c.) ; (3) superhuman beings, exterior to the proper system of Homeric mythology Proteus, Leucothca, the Sirens, Calypso, Circe, Atlas, Idothea, Perse, ^Eetes, &c. ; (4) the ministers of justice the Keres (Parcae, Fates), Harpies, Erinnyes or Eumenides (Furies) ; (5) Beings midway between gods and men viz., those translated during life, as Ganymedes or Cleitos ; those deified after death, as Heracles (Hercules), Orion, &c. ; and the kindred of the gods, or races intermediate between deity and humanity, the Cyclopes, Laestry- gones, Phaeaces. 48 THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES. represented as an old man, with a long flowing beard and azure hair. His daughters usually lived with him at the bottom of the /Egean, or in shell-adorned, vine-shaded grottoes and caves on the sea-shore. Nereus hadthe power of prophecy, and, like Proteus, the old marine god who tended Poseidon's flocks of seals, he could assume differ- ent shapes. Nereus informed Paris of the consequences of his elopement with Helen, and he directed Hercules how to obtain the apples of the Hesperidcs. 37. In later times the arrival of an Egyptian colonist in Attica was placed early in the Heroic Age. Cecrops, who was a native of Sais, in Egypt, led a colony to Attica 1550 B.C., and reigned over Cecropia, as the country was called from him. He divided the rude population into twelve villages, gave laws, and introduced the Egyptian deities. He married Agraulos the daughter of Actaeos. He taught his subjects to cultivate the olive, and regard Pallas Athena as the patroness of the city. He died after fifty years' reign, leaving, by Agraulos, three daughters, Aglauros, Herse and Pandrosos. Erichthonios, who was very deformed and had tails of serpents instead of legs, and who became fourth King of Athens, was the offspring of Hephaestos and Atthis, another daughter of Cecrops, and was given by Athena in a basket to the other three daughters of Cecrops, with strict injunctions not to examine the contents. Aglauros disobeyed, and was punished by being made jealous of her sister Herse, who was beloved by Hermes. The god informed Aglauros of his passion, to procure her aid : and Aglauros was turned by him into a stone for betraying his love out of jealousy. Herse bore him Cephalios, and was deified after death. 38. King Agenor, of Phoenicia, son of Poseidon and Libya, and brother of Belos, married Telephassa, or Agriope, by whom he had Cadmos, Phcenix, Celix and Europa. Zeus became enamoured of Europa and appeared as a bull among the herds of Agenor. Europa, gathering flowers, with her maidens, in the meadows, caressed the beautiful animal, and at last sat on his back, when the bull at once retired to the shore, and crossed over safely to Crete, with her on his back. Here the god assumed his proper shape, and she after- wards bore him Minos, Sarpedon, and Rhadamanthos, who were adopted by King Asteruos, of Crete, on her marrying him. Sarpedon became King of Lycia ; Rhadamanthos was expelled from Crete by his brother Minos, who is celebrated as legislator and King of Crete, and became king of Ocalea, in Bceotia. Both Minos and Rhadaman- thos became judges, with ^Eacos, in the lower world, in reward for their equity. Cadmos, son of Agenor, was sent by his father to seek his sister Europa, and was never to return without her. Cadmos settled in Thrace, and was .ordered by the Delphic Oracle to found a city where he should see a certain young heifer sink in the grass. On the spot indicated Cadmos founded Cadmeia or Thebes, 1493 B.C. ; and, wishing to sacrifice the heifer to Athena (Minerva), he sent his servants for water to the well of Ares, in a neighbouring grove ; it LEGENDS OF CADMOS, SEMELE, PHRIXUS & HELLE. 49 was guarded by a dragon, which devoured the servants. Cadmos went and slew the dragon, by Athena's aid, and sowed its teeth in tHe plain, and armed men (Sparti, Sown-men) sprang up, who killed each other, excepting five, who became the ancestors of the Thebans. Cadmos married Hermione, daughter of Aphrodite, and she bore him Polydoros, Illyrios, Ino, Agave, Antonoe, Semele. From Hera's persecution of the children, Cadmos and Hermione fled in old age, to Illyricum, and at their own request, were changed into serpents. Cadmos introduced into Greece an alphabet of ten letters, increased to twenty by Palamedes, and to twenty-four by Simonides, of Melos. Of the children of Cadmos, Antonoe married Aristaeos, and bore Actaeon. Actaeon became a famous huntsman ; he was changed into a stag and devoured by his dogs for surprising Artemis bathing. On this Antonoe retired from Bceotia to Megara. Semele was beloved by Zeus. Hera, in the form of her nurse Beroe, persuaded Semele, when about to give birth to Bacchos, to ask Zeus to visit her in all his majesty ; Zeus complied, and the mortal Semele, unable to bear his splendour, was consumed in his lightnings and reduced to ashes ; but the babe was saved, and placed in the thigh of Zeus, and in due time born. According to some he was saved from the flames by Dirce, a nymph of the Acheloos. According to a tradition related by Pausanias, as current at Brasiae, in Peloponnesos, Cadmos had Semele and the babe shut up in a coffer : it drifted to Brasiae, where Bacchos was found alive, and was reared ; while Semele, who was found dead, was mag- nificently buried. Bacchos afterwards took Semele up to Olympos, where she was deified as Thyone. Athamas, king of Orchomenos, in Bceotia, and son of ^Eolus, married Nephele, also called Themisto and Demotice, who bore him Phrixus and Helle : pretending that she was subject to fits of madness, he divorced her for Ino, daughter of Cadmos, who bore him Learchos and Melicerta. Ino wished to destroy Nephele's children, and procured an oracle that a pestilence then raging could be stayed only by their sacrifice. They were led to the altar, but fled to Colchis through the air on the celebrated winged ram with the golden fleece ; and Hera, who was hostile to Ino, as the descendant maternally, of Aphrodite, sent the fury Tisiphone to make Athamas mad. He took Ino for a lioness, and her sons for whelps, and dashed Learchos against a wall ; whereon Ino fled with Melicerta, and threw herself from a high rock into the sea ; she was changed into a sea deity, called Leucothoe, the Roman Mater Matuta, and Melicerta was made by Poseidon the marine god Palaemon, the Roman Portumnus. Athamas, recovered his senses, and adopted Coronos, and Haliartos, sons of his nephew Thersander, and went to settle in Thessaly-. Agave married Echion, one of the five Sparti who survived, and the successor of Cadmos, and bore him Pentheus, who became king of Thebes. Pentheus was driven mad by Bacchos as a punishment for having resisted the introduction of the god's orgies. His palace 50 THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES, was laid in ruins, and he was torn to pieces by his mother and his sisters. 39. Inachos son of Oceanos, and Tethys, married his sister, the Oceanid Melia, by whom he had a son Phoroneus, the first man according to one tradition, while another tradition represents him as collecting the rude inhabitants of Argolis into society, and giving them fire and social institutions. Phoroneus also decided a dispute for the land between Hera and Poseidon, by which decision Hera became the tutelary deity of Argos. Phoroneus had by his wife the nymph Laodice, a son Apis, from whom all Peloponnesos was anciently named Apia, and a daughter Niobe, who bore to Zeus the hundred-eyed Argos, from whom the district was named, and Pelasgos, from whom the inhabitants were named Pelasgi. lo, the daughter of Inachos and sister of Phoroneus, or according to others, a daughter of Jasos, was priestess of Hera's temple at Argos. She attracted the love of Zeus. Hera discovered their intrigue ; and Zeus, to deceive Hera, changed lo into a beautiful heifer, which Hera succeeded in obtaining from him as a present. Hera set the hundred-eyed Argos to watch lo, but Hermes, by order of Zeus, slew Argos, and released her. Hera now sent an insect to persecute lo, who wandered over Peloponnesos and crossed the sea to Egypt, and on the banks of the Nile, being tormented by the insect, she entreated Zeus to restore her to her human shape. After reassumiug a woman's form, she bore Epaphos, and subsequently married King Telegonos of Egypt, or Osiris, and for her mild rule she was deified as Isis. Epaphos founded Memphis, where he was worshipped, and called it after his wife, the daughter of the Nile ; his daughter Libya bore Belus to Poseidon. Danaos, son of Belos and Anchinoe, and great-grandson of Epaphos, shared with his brother ^Egyptos the throne of Egypt. A difference arose between the brothers, and Danaos set sail in the Armais, with his fifty daughters, the Danaides. He visited Rhodes, where he consecrated a statue to Athena ; and went to Argos, where he was received by King Gelanon, the last of the Inachidae, or de- scendants of Inachos, who had recently ascended the throne. Gelanon was unpopular, and Danaos compelled him to abdicate, and he himself, the first of the Belidae, became king. The suc- cess of Danaos tempted his nephews, the fifty sons of ^Egyptos, to follow. Danaos gave them his fifty daughters in marriage; but, afraid of being dethroned, he ordered the brides to murder their husbands on the first night of their marriage. All, except Hypermnestra, obeyed, and each, as a proof of obedience, pre- sented Danaos with the head of her murdered bridegroom. Hyperm- nestra, who had spared her husband Lynceus, was, through the influence of the people, pardoned by her father, and she dedicated a temple to Peitho (Persuasion). The Danaides were punished by being compelled in Tartaros, to fill with water a vessel full of holes, from which the water ran out as soon as poured in ; and thus their labour was eternal. But, according to another tradition, they were purified of the murder by Hermes and Athena, by order of Zeus. LEGENDS OF TANTALOS AND NIODE. 51 Danaos at first persecuted Lynceus, but afterwards acknowledged him and made him his successor. 40. Tantalos, King of Lydia, son of Zeus and a nymph, Pluto, was father of Niobe, Pelops, &c., by the Atlantid Dione, Eurya- nassa. Pelops was murdered by his father, and served up at a. repast to the gods, whom Tantalos had invited ; but none of the gods touched the meat, except Demeter, who, absorbed in grief at the loss of Persephone, eat of the shoulder. Hermes was ordered by the gods to restore Pelops to life by boiling the pieces of his body, and Clotho, one of the three Fates, replaced the lost shouldeY with one of ivory, which could, by its touch, remove diseases ; and the descendants of Pelops, Pelopidae, were afterwards believed to have an ivory-white shoulder. King Tros, of Troy, afterwards in- vaded Phrygia, to avenge the loss of Ganymedes, whom he sup- posed Tantalos to have carried off, and Tantalos and his son had to flee. Tantalos, for his cruelty to Pelops, was condemned in the nether world to perpetual thirst, and was placed up to the chin in water, which fled from his lips the moment he attempted to touch it. Pelops came to Pisa in Elis, where King (Enomaos had offered the hand of his beautiful daughter Hippodameia as the prize for victory in the chariot race. But the penalty for the unsuccessful was death ; and before Pelops came, thirteen suitors had forfeited their lives. Myrtilos, who was son of Hermes, and so skilled in driving that he had been appointed charioteer to CEnomaos, was bribed by Pelops ; and he gave a defective chariot to CEnomaos, who, enamoured of his daughter himself, or afraid, from an oracle, lest he should perish by one of her children, entered the lists with Pelops, but lost the race and his life. Hippodameia avenged her father by throwing Myrtilos into the sea, whereon he was changed into the star Auriga, the charioteer. Pelops had by her Atreus, Thyestes, &c. Pelops was revered afterwards in Greece as one of the chief heroes, and Peloponessos, the Isle of Pelops, was named after him. The daughter of Tantalos, Niobe, married Amphion, the son of King lasos, of Orchomenos, by Persephone, the daughter of Mius. Niobe became very proud, and boasted that she was greater and more deserving of immortality than even Leto, the mother of Apollo and Artemis. Thereupon all her children, except Chloris, who subsequently married Neleus, were destroyed by the darts of Apollo and Artemis, and Niobe herself was changed on Mount Sipylus into a stone, which still retained sensibility, and distilled tears. Amphion then killed himself. The Pelopidae, or descendants of Pelops, were as unfortunate as Niobe. Atreus andThyeste,the sons of Pelops and Hippodameia, were advised by their mother to murder the illegitimate son of Pelops, Chrysippos ; and on their refusal,' she perpetrated the crime herself : but Atreus and Thyestes were suspected by Pelops, and had to flee. Atreus went to his uncle, King Eurystheus of Argos, whom he suc- ceeded, and whose daughter, Aerope, he married, and by her he had Pleisthenes, Agamemnon, and Menelaos ; but, according to some, THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES. Aerope was the wife of Pleisthenes, to whom she had borne Agamem- non and Menelaos, the Atreidae, who were reputed the sons of Atreus, from being reared by him. Thyestes came to Argos, but, for his incest with Aerope, he was banished ; he was afterwards recalled, and fearfully punished by Atreus, who invited him to a sumptuous feast, at which the flesh of the children whom Thyestes had had by his sister-in-law, the queen, was served up; and their arms and heads were produced after the feast to convince him that he had par- taken of their bodies. Thyestes at once fled to the court of Thes- protos, and thence to Sicyon. Thyestes was told that he could avenge himself on his brother Atreus only by a son of himself and his daughter Pelopeia : to avoid this incest, he consecrated her to Athena ; but afterwards meeting Pelopeia in the grove of Athena, at Sicyon, and not recognising her, a son, ^Egisthos, was born to him by her, and exposed by the mother, but preserved. Pelopeia subsequently married her uncle, Atreus, who sent ^Egis- thos, whom he had then adopted, to murder Thyestes at Delphi ; but vEgisthos, being recognised by his father's sword, which Pelopeia had kept, Thyestes sent him to murder Atreus. Thyestes was placed on the throne by /Egis- thos, but was banished by Aga- memnon to Cythera, where he died, ^gisthos then seized the throne, and banished Agamem- non and Menelaos, who fled to MENELAOS. Polypheidos, of Sicyon, and next to (Eneus, of Calydon. They married Clytemnestra and Helen, the daughters of Tindareus, King of Sparta, to whom Menelaos succeeded, while Agamemnon went to claim Argos. But /Egisthos became reconciled to the Atreidae, and gave up the throne to Agamemnon ; he was after- wards made guardian of Agamemnon's kingdom and wife Clytem- nestra during his absence at Troy, in the war waged for the recovery of Helen. When the Greek fleet against Troy was detained by con- trary winds at Aulis, Iphigeneia, daughter of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, was offered in sacrifice, in obedience to the sooth- sayer's advice, by her father, to appease Artemis, whom he had offended by killing a favourite stag. Agamemnon only consented when forced by the other generals, and Iphigeneia was obtained from her mother on pretence of being married to Achilleus. Her entreaties at the altar were unavailing ; Calchas was about to strike, when she disappeared ; a beautiful goat was found in her place, IPHIGENEIA ORESTES PROMETHE US. 53 and was sacrificed, whereon the wind immediately changed. Iphigeneia was carried by Artemis in pity to Tauris, and made priestess of her temple, where all strangers were sacrificed. Mean- while ^Egisthos lived in adultery with Clytemnestra, and the two murdered Agamemnon on his return, on pretence of avenging the sacrifice of Iphigeneia ; and then they were publicly married. Orestes, Agamemnon's son, had been sent by his sister Electra to his uncle Stropheos, King of Phocis, where he became very intimate with his cousin, Pylades. Orestes now returned to Mycenae ; and Electra, having given out that he was dead, ^Egisthos and Clytem- nestra went to thank Apollo for it, when Orestes, who had been concealed in the temple, killed both, and they were buried without the city walls. For this matricide Orestes was persecuted and rendered mad by the avenging Erinnyes, or Furies, till at last purified by Apollo at Delphi, and acquitted on trial before the Areopagites, then instituted by Athena, in whose temple he had taken refuge. But, according to Euripides, the condition of his purification was that he should bring to Greece the statue of Artemis from the Tauric Chersonese, of whose temple his sister Iphigeneia was then sacrificial priestess. Pylades and Orestes visited Tauris, and disclosed to Iphigeneia that one of the human victims she was about to offer was her brother ; whereon she agreed with them to flee away and carry off the goddess's statue. The three effected their esape ; and the pursuit by Thoas, who enforced the human sacrifices, was stopped by Athena declaring that it was all done with the approbation of the gods. Orestes then ascended his paternal throne of Mycenae, and, after killing Achilleus' son, Neoptolemus, or Pyrrhos, took his wife Hermione, who had been betrothed to Orestes before her marriage with Neoptolemus. The friendship of Orestes and Pylades has become proverbial. Pylades' services to Orestes were rewarded with the hand of the latter's sister Electra, who bore him Medon and Strophuos. 41. Prometheus (Forethought) was son of the Titan Ipetos and the Oceanid Clymene, and brother of Atlas, Menoetios, and Epi- metheus (Afterthought). To punish men for their iniquity, Zeus had taken away fire from earth ; but Prometheus, whose cunning was very great, by Athena's aid climbed the heavens and stole fire from the chariot of Helios (the Sun) conveying it to earth in a tube. This provoked Zeus, who ordered Hephaestos to make a woman of clay, Pandora (All-gifted), and having endued her with life, he sent her to Prometheus. Pandora, who had received from each of the gods some attraction, bore with her a box containing, according to the earlier legend, all human ills ; but Prometheus, suspecting some artifice of Zeus sent her to his brother Epimetheus who, forgetting the advice of Prometheus to receive no gifts from the gods, married her, and opened the box ; whereon at once all the evils flew forth and spread over the earth, Hope alone remaining; but according to the later legend, the box was full of blessings, which escaped when it was opened by Pandora. Prometheus was then, by the order of Zeus, seized by Hermes and chained to a rock on mount Caucasos, 54 THE GREEK GODS AND HEROES. where an enormous eagle, the offspring of Typhon and Echidna, daily preyed on his liver, which was miraculously restored every night. He was at last delivered from his torture by Heracles, who killed the eagle. This Prometheus had made the first man and woman on earth out of clay and water, which he animated by the fire he stole from heaven ; and he gave man a part of the qualities peculiar to each animal. He had the gift of prophecy, and he invented many useful arts, and taught men the medicinal use of plants, taming different animals, &c. The Athenians raised an altar to him in the grove of Academos,where they annually celebrated games, Lampadephoria,* or torch races, &c., in his honour. Deucalion, the son of Prometheus, married Pyrrha, the daughter of Epimetheus, and reigned in Thessaly. The inhabitants of the earth were destroyed, 2505 B.C., in a deluge, subsequently to the deluge of Ogyges, in Attica, by Zeus for their wickedness, and Deucalion and Pyrrha alone escaped by taking refuge on the summit of Mount Parnassos or of Mount JEtna.. According to some, Deu- calion, by Prometheus' advice, built a ship in which he and his wife embarked, and which after being tossed about for nine days, grounded on the top of Parnassos. On the subsidence of the waters, the pair were directed by the oracle of Themis to repeople the world by throwing behind them the bones of their grandmother, i.e., the stones of the earth, and the stones thrown by Deucalion became men, and those by Pyrrha women. Deucalion had two sons by Pyrrha, Hellen and Amphictyon, and a daughter Protogeneia. The deluge of Deucalion was caused by the inundation of the Peneios, which had been diverted from its course by an earthquake near Mount Olympos ; and the overflowing waters disappeared through a small aperture, about a cubit in diameter, near the temple of Zeus Olympos. Hellen the son of Deucalion and Pyrrha, reigned in Phthiotis 1495 B.C. By Orseis he had three sons JEolos, Doros, and Xuthos, from whom sprang the four great races of the Greeks, or Hellenes, the ^olians, Dorians, and the Achaeans and lonians, named from Xuthus' sons Achsos and Ion. Amphictyon, the other son of Deucalion and Pyrrha, succeeded King Cranaos at Athens. The daughter, Protogeneia, bore to Zeus ^Ethlios, the father of Endy- mion. 42. Sisyphos was King of Corinth, and son of /Eolos and Enarete ; he married Merope the Pleiad, who bore him Glaucos, Thersander, * In the Lampadephoria " young men raced with torches, one handing it to another to relieve him when the course was partly finished, and so on in suc- cession, the prize being awarded to that set of runners which succeeded in carrying their torches unextinguished to the goal ; whence the frequent classical comparison of the succession of human lives, e.g., Plato's } KO.\T) TO pn^ov). It was immediately claimed by Hera, Pallas Athena, and Aphrodite ; and Paris was made umpire, by order of Zeus. The three goddesses appeared before him nude and without ornament, and each endeavoured to influence his decision by pro- mises Hera by offering him Asia for a kingdom, Pallas Athena military glory, and Aphrodite the greatest beauty for a wife. By the Judgment of Paris the golden apple was awarded to Aphrodite, and Hera and Athena became, in consequence, the deadly foes of Paris and his family. Soon after, Priam offered one of the finest bulls of Mount Ida as a reward for a contest among his sons and other princes : it was found in the possession of Paris, who was at first reluctant to give it up, and afterwards went to Troy to contend for it. After vanquishing several competitors, Paris had to flee before his elder brother, Hector, to the temple of Zeus, where the family likeness in his features was recognised by his sister, the pro- phetess Cassandra, and he was acknowledged by Priam as his second son. Aphrodite then directed Paris to build a ship, and desired her son, ^neias (by Anchises, the grandson, paternally, of Assaracos, and, maternally, of Ilos II.) to accompany him. Not- withstanding the prophetic warnings of his brother and sister, Helenos and Cassandra, Paris set sail, ostensibly to bring back his aunt Hesione, whom Heracles had given in marriage to yEacos' son Telamon. Paris visited Sparta, where he was entertained by the Atreid Menelaos. The king soon after left for Crete, directing his wife Helen, the beautiful daughter of his predecessor Tyn- dareus, to entertain his guests in his absence. By Aphrodite's influence, a warm attachment sprang up between Helen and her guest, Paris, whom Mr. Gladstone calls "the fine gentleman and the pattern voluptuary of the Heroic Ages ; " and, during Menelaos' absence, Paris persuaded Helen to elope with him. The pair sailed to Troy, where their marriage was celebrated. Tyndareus, the father of Helen, alarmed at the number of her suitors, had, on the advice of Odysseus or Ulysses, bound them all by an oath to accept his choice, and to defend her person against all attempts to take her from her husband. Helen, whose abduc- tion by Theseus, when she was a girl, had spread her fame through- out Greece, had all the young princes of Greece for her suitors ; and Menelaos therefore, when he learned on his return from Crete, 'the abduction of his wife, summoned all these princes to aid him in recovering her. After the support of Odysseus and Achilleus had been procured, both of whom had endeavoured to avoid going in the expedition, preparations were begun. Menelaos and Odysseus were then despatched to Troy as envoys, to demand the restoration of Helen ; but, notwithstanding the advice of the Trojan Antenor, Priam and his people refused to give her up. On the failure of the embassy, the great Achaean expedition was formed, this being the period of Achaean ascendancy. Among the principal heroes were Achilleus, son of Peleus, King of the Myrmidons, 8o MYTHICAL HEROES AND THE TROJAN JIM A 1 . and the goddess Thetis, the hero of Homer's Iliad ; Patroclos, the friend and kinsman of Achilleus; Ajax, the son of kingTelamon, of Salamis, and grandson of ^Eacos; Ajax, the son of king Oileus, of the Locri; Idomeneus, of Crete, grandson of Minos and Pasiphae, along with his brother Meriones; Diomedes, called Tydeides, or son of king Tydeus, of Calydon, who had been one of the Epigoni, and had succeeded his maternal grandfather Adrastos on the throne of Argos ; Palamedes, son of king Nauplios, of Euboea ; the aged Nestor, who had reigned over "three generations of men " and was the only son of Neleus who had been spared when Heracles invaded Pylos, and had acquired great renown in the contest of the Lapithae and Centaurs, the Calydonian Hunt, and the Argonautic expedition ; king Odysseus or Ulysses, of Ithaca, a small rugged and barren island off Acarnania, still named Ithace, the crafty son of Laertes or of Sisyphos, and Autolycos' daughter Anticleia ; Protesilaos, of Phylace in Phthiotis; Machaon and Podalirios, sons of ^Esculapius, who led the Thessalians of Tricca, and acted as the physicians of the armament; Menelaos himself; and, as com- mander-in-chief, Agamemnon, the elder brother of Menelaos, hus- band of Helen's sister Clytemnestra, and king of Mycenae. Before the end of the war Philoctetes, the friend and armour-bearer of Heracles, and the possessor of the hero's poisoned arrows, took a part in it ; and also Pyrrhos or Neoptolemos, the son of Achilleus. The fleet assembled at Aulis, on the Euripos. opposite Eubcea, where it was delayed by contrary winds, through the wrath of Artemis, till she was appeased by the sacrifice of Aga- memnon's daughter Iphigeneia. At length they set sail with a fail- wind. During their stay at Chryse, one of Heracles' poisoned arrows fell on the foot of Philoctetes ; and the stench from the wound was so great that he had to be left behind on the isle Lemnos, the command of his seven ships being taken by Medon, the half-brother of Oilcan Ajax. It had been declared by an oracle that the first Greek who landed on the Trojan shore must perish. Protesilaos nobly offered himself, and sprang ashore, and he was at once killed by a Trojan. At the prayer of his fond wife Laodameia, his shade re-visited her, and she expired when he again departed to the nether world. Near his tomb, on the Trojan shore, some elm trees, which were planted by nymphs, grew to a great height, but withered as soon as they were of sufficient height to be visible at Troy, and again grew up, suffering the same vicissitude. The Greeks now began their attack on Ilion, but their task was not so easy of accomplishment as they had anticipated. Among the most noted defenders of the city were Priam's sons, Hector, Deiphobos, Troilos, and Polydoros ; Antenor ; /Eneias ; the ./Ethiopian prince Memnon, son of Tithonos and Eos (Aurora) ; Pentheseleia, Queen of the Amazons ; the Lycian princes, Sarpedon (son of Zeus and Bellerophon's daughter Laodameia) and Glaucos ; and the Thracian prince Rhesos, son of king Eioneus. An oracle declared that Troy could not be taken if the white steeds of Rhesos once drank of the Xanthos or C j:.::::.::^cr, and fed on the grass of the THE QUARREL OF AGAMEMNON AND ACHILLEUS. Si Trojan plains; on Rhesos encamping in the Trojan territory, Dio- rnedes and Odysseus penetrated into his camp at night, killed Rhesos, and carried off his horses ; his wife, the huntress Argan- thone, killed herself in despair. The immediate danger was thus removed by the Greeks; but the strong fortifications of Troy successfully resisted all their efforts, and the siege was protracted for ten years, as had been predicted by the seer Calchas, the strength of the Greeks being weakened by the dissensions of their chiefs, and by the marauding expeditions on which large parties of the allies were frequently absent. During the siege several of the Greek and Trojan chiefs fell. Hector, the great son of Priam, especially distinguished him- self on the Trojan side, and Achilleus on the Greek. Hera and Athena gave active support to the Greeks ; Ares and Aphrodite to the Trojans; and several of the other deities frequently interfered in the struggle. Aphrodite and Ares were wounded by Diomedes, Hector and Agenor were saved by Apollo from the spear of Achilleus, Paris from Menelaos, and yEneias from Diomedes by Aphrodite ; and the whole course of events was under the direction of the council of the Gods. At length, in the tenth year of the war, a quarrel occurred between Achilleus and Agamemnon, regarding the distribution of the spoils of Lyrnessos, one of the many neigh- bouring towns plundered by the Greeks. Chryseis, the daughter of Apollo's priest, Chryses, fell to the share of Agamemnon ; Chryses visited the Greek camp to demand her freedom, and on this being refused, he called, when he left the camp, on Apollo to avenge his wrong ; and the god at once discharged his pestiferous darts on the Greeks. Calchas, encouraged by Achilleus, announced the cause of the woe, and Agamemnon accordingly liberated Chryseis. But his wrath being excited against Achilleus, Agamem- non, as commander-in-chief, demanded Briseis, the daughter of Chryses' brother, Briseus, who had fallen to the share of Achilleus. The hero, by Athena's advice, gave up Briseis to Agamemnon ; but he withdrew, with his friend Patroclos, to his tents, and refused to take any further part in the war ; and Zeus, on the prayer of Thetis, granted that the Greek cause should not prosper till Achilleus was honoured. At the entreaty of grave Nestor, Achilleus lent his armour to Patroclos and allowed his friend to return to the war. Patroclos displayed prodigies of valour, and repulsed the Trojans from the Greek fleet, which they had set on fire ; but Apollo, alarmed at his success, struck him senseless ; and as he lay he was wounded by Euphorbos and finally despatched by Hector. Achilleus, whom even the offer to restore Briseis had not before lured back to the war, now issued from his tent to avenge his friend. He put the Trojans to flight, and after chasing Hector thrice round the walls of Troy, killed him ; he tied Hector's corpse to his chariot, and dragged it to the ships. But when Priam, conducted by Hermes, and accompanied by his daughter, Polyxena, visited his tent, Achilleus showed every respect to the aged king and restored him G 8 2 MYTHICAL HEROES AND THE TtiOjAtt WAR. the body for a ransom ; and it received great funeral honours from the Trojans. Among others who fell by the sword of the avenging hero were the beautiful Amazonian queen Penthesileia, Priam's sons Polydorus and Troilos, and Priam's nephew Memnon. Achilleus is said to have been attached to Penthesileia ; he wept over her corpse, and slew the Greek Thersites for ridiculing his grief. Briseis was restored to Achilleus, and he and Agamemnon were reconciled. But the Greeks had not long the benefit of his prowess. Achilleus had become enamoured of Polyxena, when she accom- panied her father Priam to negotiate the ransom of Hector's body; he went to meet her in the temple of the Thymbrasan Apollo, to arrange a marriage and a peace ; but he was treacherously shot by Paris in the heel, the only vulnerable part of his body, as by that part his divine mother, Thetis, had held him when she plunged him into the Styx, to make him invulnerable. A contest for the armour of Achilleus ensued between Odysseus and the Telamonian Ajax. When it was awarded to Odysseus, Ajax became frenzied ; he slaughtered the sheep of the Greek army, believing them to be enemies, and at last killed himself. It was declared by the seers that the arrows of Heracles, with Neoptolemos son of Achilleus, must be brought to the Greek camp, and that the Palladion must be stolen from Troy. Odysseus and Diomedes brought Philoctetes with the arrows of Heracles, and Neoptolemos;* and Philoctetes was cured by Machaon. With one of the poisoned arrows, Paris Was soon after wounded ; and died his wife, the Idaean nymph CEnone, whom he had neglected so long, having refused to heal him till it was too late. Helen was then assigned to Priam's son, Deiphobos; another son of Priam, Helenos, who had wished to obtain her hand, retired to Ida, and communicated with the Greeks. Shortly afterwards Odysseus and Diomedes succeeded in stealing the Palladion. The Greeks now had recourse to stratagem. They re-embarked, and retired to the isle of Tenedos, leaving a huge wooden horse, filled with armed men. Sinon, a Greek, left behind, was taken by the Trojans, and pretended that he had fled on account of the persecution of Odysseus ; that the Greeks had left the horse as an offering to Athena, whom they had offended by stealing the Palla- dion, and in hopes that the Trojans would incur the goddess' wrath by destroying the horse, and further that if the horse were received within the walls of Troy, Asia would acquire the supremacy over Greece. The Trojans fell into the snare. Laocoon, Apollo's priest, having hurled a spear against the horse, was crushed to death, with his two young sons, by two serpents, which came from the sea ; and the people, regarding this as a sign from Athena, with joy dragged the horse into the city. At dead of night Odysseus, Menelaos, Neoptolemos, Sthenelos, Machaon, Acamas, and many others, liberated by Sinon, issued from the fatal horse ; and ad- * Achilleus' son, Pyrrhos (the ruddy or red-haired), received the name Neo- ptolemos, from having come late to the war. THE FUNERAL PILE OF PATROCLOS. ! 84 MYTHICAL HEROES AND THE TROJAN WAR. mitted the Greeks, \vlio had returned, within the walls. Troy fell an easy prey (1184 B.C.). Priam was killed by Neoptolemos at the altar of Zeus, his son Polites having been slain by the same hand before his eyes ; and Deiphobos was betrayed by his wife Helen, to recover the confidence of Menelaos, and was killed by the latter. Helenos and Hector's wife, Andromache, were assigned as spoils to Neoptolemos ; the queen, Hecabe, to Odysseus ; and Cassandra to Oilcan Ajax. Some Trojans under Antenor, and another band under yEneias, escaped to Italy. 55. The adventures of the chiefs on their way home were as wonderful as those before the walls of the beleaguered city. Menelaos and Helen were tossed for eight years about the Medi- terranean, before arriving at Sparta ; they lived happily together for the rest of their lives. Oilcan Ajax was destroyed at sea by Poseidon. Idomeneus arrived, after a great storm, in Crete, and offered up his son as a sacrifice, having vowed to give Poseidon whatever he should first meet on landing ; a plague followed, and he migrated to Calabria, in Italy, and subsequently to Colophon, in Asia Minor. Philoctetes was shipwrecked on the coast of Italy, and founded Petelia and Crimissa, in the north- western part of that peninsula. Podalirios was shipwrecked off Caria, where he settled and founded Syros ; his brother Machaon had been killed before Troy by the Mysian prince, Eurypylos. Diomedes, finding that by Aphrodite's instigation, his wife had been unfaithful, migrated from Argos to JEtolia. ; when, trying to return to Argos, he was cast on the Italian coast, and settled in the district called Daunia. The tragic fate of the leader, Agamemnon, who was murdered by his wife, Clytemnestra, and her paramour, /Egisthos, has already been related. The most famous adventures of all, however, were those of Odysseus, which form the subject of Homer's "Odyssey." 56. When Odysseus set sail from the Trojan coast, he was borne to the country of the Cicones, in Thrace ; his men landed and burned the town of Ismaros ; but while they were feasting they were attacked by the Cicones, and driven to their ships. With the exception of a single storm, they met with a prosperous voyage till they were doubling Malea, when a north-east gale drove them to Libya, to the country of the Lotophagi, or Lotos-eaters, who lived on a fruit Lotos, the delicious taste of \\hich took away from those who tasted of it all desire to return home. Odysseus com- pelled his crew to re-embark ; and sailing westwards, he arrived at the island of the Cyclopes, cannibal giants, with only one eye, and that in the centre of the forehead. Leaving all his ships but one on an island well stocked with goats, he proceeded to the land, later identified with Sicily, on which the Cyclopes were. The Cyclops Polyphemos seized Odysseus and his crew, five of whom he eat ; but Odysseus intoxicated him, and then put out his e) r e with a burning stake, and made his escape from the cave by clinging under a ram while the blinded Cyclops felt its back. Next he went to the isles of -flSolos, Strongyle, in the Lipari Isles, THE ADVENTURES OF ODYSSEUS. 85 and ^Eolos gave him, shut up in a bag, all the winds which could obstruct his return to Ithaca. Just when they were in sight of Ithaca, Odysseus having fallen asleep, his inquisitive companions opened the bag, and all the winds rushed out; and in the tempest the fleet was driven back to the island of ^Solos, but the wind-king refused to have anything rnore to do with them. After six days' sailing, Odysseus was driven westwards on the coasts of the Laes- trygones, in Libya, another huge cannibal race, the wife of the king, Lamos, being "as big as a mountain;" but, unlike the Cyclopes, living in a social state. All the ships entered the harbour, except that of Odysseus; the Laestrygones attacked them with huge rocks, and destroyed them and their crews, the ship of Odysseus alone escaping. He was next driven to the isle of yaea, in the far west, the home of the enchantress Circe, the daughter of Helios and the Oceanid Perse, sister of ^Eetes and Pasiphae, and aunt of Medea. The seamen sent to her were all changed into swine, except Eurylochos, who conveyed the news to Odysseus, the hero, and who, by aid of Hermes, from whom he received a counter-charm, a herb with a black root and a white blossom, moly (/icoAv), was proof against her charm, and compelled her to restore his companions to their human form. After being hospit- ably entertained for a while, Odysseus wished to depart. Circe advised him first to visit the realm of Hades. He therefore sailed to the still remoter west, to the dark land of the Cimmerians, beyond the ocean stream ; and there at sunset in the same day, after he had dug a pit and offered sacrifices, the ghosts of Tiresias the seer, Agamemnon, Achilleus, and the mighty dead came troop- ing to him. The gloomy view entertained by the Greeks of the other world, and of its vast inferiority to this, are shown by the words which Homer puts in the mouth of Achilleus as a reply to Odysseus ftovXoinrjv K' (Trdpovpos tu>v 6rjTfVfp.fi' XXw, ai/Spt Trap' aK\Tjpa> w p.f] /St'oror TTO\VS fit], r] iracriv vfnvtcrcri KaTa(f>6ififvouriv avacrcreiv. " Rather I'd choose laboriously to bear A weight of woes and breathe the vital air, A slave to some poor hind that toils for bread, Than reign the sceptred monarch of the dead." (Pope's Homer, Od., XL, 489.) After being counselled by Tiresias, Odysseus hurried back to his ship and sailed for JEsea.. After a sojourn with Circe, Odysseus and his crew sailed for home. They came to the island of the Sirens, sea-nymphs, whose songs so charmed listeners that they forgot all their employments, and continued listening till death overtook them. By Circe's advice, Odysseus stopped the ears of his companions with wax, and had himself tied to the mast, and thus he was the only person who heard the song of the Sirens and escaped ; it was afterwards said they flung themselves into the sea with vexation at the escape of Odysseus, and were changed into rocks. 86 MYTHICAL HEROES AND THE TROJAN WAR. Having thus escaped the Sirens, and shunned the Wandering Rocks, which Circe had told him lay beyond the realm of these songsters, he came to two lofty cavernous cliffs, the abodes of the monsters Scylla and Charybdis; and Scylla seized six of his crew. Next he came to the Thrinacian Isle, Sicily, where his crew per- sisted in landing; here were the herd of Helios, tended by his daughters, Lampetia and Phaethusa. A storm prevented their leaving for a month ; and during this period, their provisions being exhausted, they slaughtered the sacred oxen of the god, when Odysseus was asleep. The displeasure of the god was manifested by prodigies; the hides crept along the ground, and the flesh lowed on the spits, No sooner had the adventurers left the isle than a terrific ODYSSEUS WEEPS AT TIIE LAY OF DEMODOCOS. storm burst on them ; the ship was destroyed by the bolts of Zeus, and the sacrilegious crew were drowned. Odysseus, as he floated by the wreck, managed to make himself a raft ; and having again escaped Scylla and Charybdis, after ten days, he was driven to the isle Ogygia, the home of the nymph Calypso, the daughter of Atlas and Goddess of Silence. With her he remained eight years, and she wished to make him immortal and detain him with her; but Hermes was sent to order him to build a bark and depart. Eighteen days after sailing from Ogygia, the isle of Scheria (usually identified with Corcyra, now Corfu), the home of the Phaeacians, appeared to Odysseus " like a shield in the dark sea," and the hero drifted ashore. Odysseus was found by the princess Nausicaa and her maidens. He was conducted to the city and hospitably entertained by the Phaeacian king, Alcinoos ; and when at a banquet on the following day, the royal bard, Dcmodocos,sang of the Fall of Troy, THE RETURN OF THE HERACLEID&. 87 the hero was moved to tears, and confessed who he was, and narrated his wanderings. The Phxacians eventually conveyed him in a galley to Ithaca; by the wrath of Poseidon, the galley on its return was petrified in the harbour of Scheria ; and in the bay of Corfu a rock still bears the name of the Sail of Odysseus. Odysseus, who had assumed the disguise of a beggar, made himself known to his son Telemachos, whom he had left a babe, and to his steward Eumaeos, and he was instantly recognised by his dog, Argos ; the faithful animal, worn out with age, died in his joy at his master's feet. Odysseus then slew with his famous bow the nobles of Ithaca, Same, Dulichion, and Zacynthos, who had during his absence been clamorous for the hand of his wife, Penelope, and had wasted his substance with revelry in his palace. Odysseus was subsequently killed by Telegonos, his own son by Circe. Telegonos had been sent by his mother in search of Odysseus ; he was ship- wrecked on Ithaca, and began plundering the fields, not knowing the island ; and when attacked by Odysseus and Telemachos he ran his father through with the spear which Circe had given him. 57. Eight years after the fall of Troy the last great expedition of the Heroic Ages took place (i 104 B.C.). This was the Dorian Migra- tion known as the Return of the Heracleidas, or Return of the Children of Heracles, the direct descendants of the hero. Heracles left to his son Hyllos his claims on Peloponnesos, and allowed him to marry Eurycas' daughter lole as soon as he came of age. Hyllos and the other children of Heracles were obliged to take refuge from Eurystheus, their father's foe, with King Ceyx, of Trachinia, and next with King Theseus, of Athens. The latter helped them against Eurystheus, whom Hyllos killed, thus acquiring the cities of Peloponnesos ; but a pestilence came, and an oracle informed the Heracleidse that they had taken Peloponnesos before the appointed time. They returned to Attica, where Hyllos married lole. Obeying an ambiguous oracle, Hyllos made a second attempt on Peloponnesos, and challenged King Atreus, of Mycenae, Eurys- theus' successor, to single combat ; and it was agreed that the victor should have undisturbed possession; in the duel Hyllos was killed. A third unsuccessful attempt was made by Hyllos' son Cleodaeus, whose son Aristomachos was killed in the fourth equally fruitless attempt; but the three sons of Aristomachos Aristo- demos, Temenos, and Cresphontes encouraged by an oracle, at the head of the Dorians, and supported by the ^tolians under Oxylos, invaded Peloponnesos from Naupactos by sea, having I een repulsed in their efforts to enter by the Isthmos; they gained several victories, and divided Peloponnesos among them (1104 f.c.) 1 20 3 ears after Hyllos' first attempt. DEATH OF ODYSSEUS' DOG ARGOS. LAXMA;:.) CHAPTER VI. CHARACTER OF THE LEGENDARY OR HEROIC AGE OF GREECE (1500 noo B.C.) 58. HOMER THE AUTHORITY. PREVALENCE OF MONARCHY BY DIVINE RIGHT. , THE BOULE OF THE CHIEFS: AGORA: INFERIORITY OF THE FREEMEN. 59. PREDOMINANCE OF THE TRIBE OVER THE CITY. 60. OCCUPATION OP THE FREEMEN: SLAVERY. 61. FREQUENCY OF WARS: ABSENCE OF IN- TERNATIONAL LAW: PIRACY: FEROCITY OF WARFARE. 62. SIMPLICITY OF MANNERS. 63. RESPECT FOR WOMEN. 64. AGRICULTURE : COM- MERCE : IMPORTS FROM EGYPT AND PHCENICIA. 65. THE INITIATIVE ARTS: STATUARY: PAINTING: SCULPTURE: MEDICINE USE OF OPIUM: NAVIGATION : ASTRONOMY : WRITING : EDUCATION. 66. MODE OF WAR- FARE. 67. INTENSITY OF RELIGIOUS FEELING. 68. RELIGION A BOND OF UNION THE AMPHICTYONY : THE DELPHIC AMPHICTYONY. HE prime authority for the character of the Heroic Age is and ever must be, the two poems, the "Iliad" and ."Odyssey," which pass under the venerable name of Homer. These poems present to us everywhere throughout Legen- dary Greece the same political organisation, the existence of kingly government, based on divine right ; nowhere is there a republic. 'Ov ft.v TTO>S mivrfs ftanktwrOjUf tvddS 'Amatol' OVK dyadw Trn\vKotpavii]' (Is Koipavos e&w/ce Kpoj/ou Trms dyKv\op.j]T(u>, exclaims Odysseus at Troy "We Greeks cannot all, by any means, govern here ; a government of many is not a good thing. Let there be but one chief, one king, to whom the son of wily Cronos has given THE BOULE AND THE AGORA. 89 a sceptre." The sovereign power, which had been delivered to the ancestors of the king by the Olympic gods, was handed by him to his son as a divine inheritance. The king was not merely the political ruler, but also the general, judge, and priest of his people. An ample domain was assigned for his support, and his favour was won and his enmity averted by large presents. There were no laws to restrain him from acts of violence ; but it was only when, in accord- ance with his divine descent and appointment, he possessed great personal superiority, both in mental and physical qualities, that there was complete submission to his acts. When he had no such excellence, there was one body which exercised a powerful check. This was the Boule, or council of the chiefs. Like the king, the chiefs or nobles were distinguished by their divine descent, their strength, their personal prowess, and their majestic bearing. In the Boule they acted as a board of assessors to the king, but they exercised no effectual control over his action ; they tendered advice, but they originated nothing. The Agora, or Assembly of the Free- men, was convened by the king, or, in his absence, by one of the chiefs, to receive communications of plans, or of what had been accomplished, and to witness trials ; but the Agora neither advised nor judged, and it took no real part in the government. The physical superiority of the chiefs would have prevented the free- men exercising any influence ; for, with the strength of their armour, the excellence of their weapons, the fleetness of their steeds, and their personal skill, strength, and bravery, these chiefs are repre- sented as easily routing in battle whole troops of ordinary soldiers. 59. Another marked political feature of that time was the pre- dominance of the tribe or nation over the city. Political life was monopolised by the city, as in later days. The germ of the division which afterwards was so deeply fixed in Greece was even then visible, but the political unit was the State. In the time of the Trojan War, Peloponnesos comprised five kingdoms Mycenae, Sparta, Pylos, Elis, and Arcadia ; Odysseus ruled over a part of Epeiros, as well as the islands of Ithaca, Zacynthos (Zanti), and Cephallenia, or Same, now Cephalonia. Agamemnon ruled over not only Mycenae, but Argos and many of the isles, and his insular dominion seems to have extended to Cypros, the great centre of Phoenician commerce and worship ; and Eubcea, Rhodes, and Crete had each its own separate king. 60. The freemen performed the greater part of the agricultural and industrial labour. Many of them possessed peasant-farms of their own, which they tilled, and some worked for hire on the estates of others ; while another class, distinguished by their ac- quirements and knowledge, devoted themselves to the few trades or professions that then existed as the seer, the bard, the herald, the carpenter, and the smith. Beneath these three classes King, Lords, and Freemen was a body that was entirely outside the political system, the Slaves. Throughout Hellas slavery prevailed, and was considered to be right. But at this time the king and the nobles alone possessed slaves ; and their treatment contrasted very go LEGENDARY AND HEROIC AGE OF GREECE. favourably with that under republican Greece, and especially with the exaggerated form of slavery which prevailed at Sparta, where a whole race men, women, and children were reduced to a slavery unequalled even by that of the Israelites in Goshen. It was from this early restriction of slavery that industry, however mechanical, was never in Greece, except at Sparta, regarded as unworthy of a freeman, or even of a citizen ; and in this early rude state of the arts of life, slavery was a great accelerator of progress. 61. The preference of the military virtues over all others, and the great admiration for high stature and physical strength, so charac- teristic of that period, were the necessary result of the condition of Greek society. The petty states were continually involved in wars among themselves or with the neighbouring barbarian tribes. Greece proper was dependent on foreign lands for some necessary articles, and hence the Greeks were devoted to a nautical life ; but their disinclination to venture into unknown seas left the carrying trade to remoter parts in the hands of the Phoenicians. With no power to rule the sea and keep its police, and with no recognised international rights," piracy and sudden attacks by whole cities were common ; and hence cities were built at some distance from the coast, as a slight security against these naval attacks. The occu- pation of a pirate was not in any way dishonourable : and regular warfare was conducted with the greatest cruelty, the conquered being, as in far later times, put to the sword or enslaved. War had more than its full share of horrors ; the corpse of the fallen foe was treated with indignity, and thrown to the beasts of prey. The fact that the ancient battles consisted more of duels, from the close fighting, and that the personal spoils of the enemy fell to the man who first acquired them, may account for this ferocity. But the wildest excesses were checked by religion, and the fear of the avenging gods occasionally restrained even the most sanguinary tempers. Foreigners were but little esteemed, and were not admitted to legal rights; but the most generous hospitality was always exercised ; and outlaws and suppliants, regarded as under the special protection of Zeus, were never surrendered. 62. The Heroic Age was characterised by great simplicity of manners. The kings and nobles were often skilled in the manual arts, and Odysseus was noted for his attainments in this respect. Kings and nobles cooked their own food, and at meals there was no distinction between them and private persons. Their food was of the simplest animal flesh (generally beef, mutton, or goats'-flesh', bread and fruit, and a little wine ; and the bard's songs and the dance heightened the enjoyment of their banquets. The women worked in the house, not merely weaving, &c., but performing * The Greeks, even of the historical period, like almost all other ancient com- munities, recognised no international rights, unless such as were expressed in a treaty, excepting the sanctity of heralds. It was never considered wrong for one Hellenic State to attack even another Hellenic State without any cause or any declaration of war, if there was no treaty existing between the two com- munities. AGRICULTURE AND THE IMITATIVE ARTS. 91 menial duties; thus Nausicaa was engaged, with her maids, in washing the household linen, when Odysseus was discovered by her on the coast of Scheria. 63. Notwithstanding the ferocity of the times, women were held in high regard, contrasting with Oriental seclusion and the uninfluential position of women in later times. Monogamy prevailed, but the chiefs frequently had concubines. As among barbarous or semi- barbarous peoples, the bride was purchased (Z&va) from her parents with valuable presents ; but in the new home she occupied a position of great dignity and influence, and enjoyed a wide sphere of action. 64. Agriculture formed the chief occupation of the people. Homer describes the various labours of farming, the culture of the vine, the tilling of gardens, and the different duties of herdsmen. But commerce was then but little pursued or esteemed by the Greeks themselves. The precious metals were in abundance, and were used for domestic utensils and ornaments, as well as for the accoutrements of the warriors ; but there was no coined money, and commerce was earned on by barter. Most of the trade was with Egypt and Sidon ; from these countries the most beautiful garments were imported, and articles in the production of which skilled work- manship was required, as jewellery, silver bowls, &c. The people already were congregated in fortified towns, which were embellished with the splendid residences of the kings and nobles, and the temples. 65. There was some acquaintance with the imitative arts. The garment woven by Helen contained a number of battle-scenes ; and one presented by Penelope to Odysseus was embroidered with a picture of a hunting party, wrought with gold threads. The shield of Achilleus was divided into two compartments, exhibiting many complicated groups of figures; and though this was a masterpiece of Hephasstos, the inference is that Homer must have seen many less elaborate and difficult works of a like nature. But there is only one allusion in the Homeric poems to a statue when the priestess placed the robe, the gift of Hecabe (Hecuba), on the knees of what must have been the sitting statue of Athena ; works by Hephasstos are mentioned, as the golden statues of youths to hold the lights in the palace of Alcinoos, an indication that Homer was not a stranger to such objects. To the art of painting, properly so called, Homer makes no allusion, though he speaks of the colouring of ivory as the art in which the Carian and Moeouian women excelled. In only one passage he expressly mentions a kind of delineation, but many \\ orks which he has described imply the art of design. Sculpture was already cultivated at Mycenae ; the existing sculptured lions on the gate of Mycenae belong to this period. And Homer's descrip- tions of the palaces which must rest on fact, though they may be over-coloured show that already architecture had made great progress. The science of the physician was chiefly displayed in the application of medicinal herbs, by which he stanched the blood and eased the pain. Popular credulity excessively exaggerated the virtue qf medicinal herbs ; certain lands were supposed to be par- 93 LEGENDARY /LVD HEROIC AGE OF GREECE. ticularly favourable to their growth, and, at the same time to, that of deadly poisons. The allusion in the Odyssey (iv., 221) to the use of the drug which Helen had received from Polydamna, Queen of Egypt (frdpfJuiKov, VT]n(v6es u\o\6v re, KCIKWV tx'ikTjdov airavrw (a drug lulling sorrow, allaying anger, and causing oblivion of all ills) is generally taken to prove that the Greeks were then acquainted with the virtues of opium. Though the art of navigation was but little known, and the ships never ventured out of sight of land, fifty- oared galleys were in use, by which rapid coasting voyages could be made ; but the vessels were merely slender half-decked boats, with a movable mast, which was only hoisted to take advantage of a fair wind. No naval engagements are mentioned, though piratical excursions are so frequently alluded to. All their knowledge was of the practical kind. Astronomy taught them to observe the constellations most necessary for the guidance of their ships, and their months were measured by the interval be- tween one new moon and the next ; but their scanty knowledge of the science is shown by Homer mentioning only the Great and Little Bear, the Pleiades, Hyades, Orion, and the Dog-star. In the division of the seasons, Homer makes no distinction between summer and autumn, and the season-goddesses, the Hora% were originally three in number. The ignorance of geography which prevailed so long has already been mentioned. It is a disputed point whether the art of writing was known or not, but the proba- bilities are in favour of its use even then. The main object of education was to make the youths excel in military exercises, especially in throwing the lance and driving the chariot ; and the commemorative games, for civil or sacred events, while supplying amusement, afforded also an opportunity for testing and displaying the athletic acquirements of the youth and manhood of each state. 66. Though war was the chief business and delight of the heroic ages, it was very far from being reduced to the form of an art. A great deal is said about the combats of the chiefs in the Homeric poems, but little about the engagements of armies ; and although the poet occasionally attaches importance to the compact array of the troops, and contrasts the silent and steady advance of the Greeks with the noisy march of the Trojans, the issue of the conflict is always decided by the immediate interposition of the gods, or by the personal valour of the kings and nobles, the common warriors serving only as figures in the background to fill up the picture. Each chief was mounted in his war chariot, drawn by two horses, the charioteer being usually a friend or a comrade, and he carried two spears as missiles or as thrusting weapons, and a long sword and a short dagger. The strength and dexterity of the chiefs, clad in heavy armour, in wielding their ponderous weapons are probably not much exaggerated, and were doubtless the effect of a long application of chivalrous exercises ; they explain the terror with which a whole host might be inspired by the presence of a single enemy. The chariots of the chiefs advanced at full gallop on the foe, and the spears were hurled against the hostile ranks; the WAR AMD WEAPONS RELIGION. 93 chariots do not seem to have been used, like those of the ancient Britons, for throwing the enemy's ranks into disorder ; the chief frequently descended from his chariot and fought on foot, but the chai'iot was sufficiently near for his retreat. It was only for chariots that horses were used, riding being unknown to the Homeric Greeks. The common men, protected by armour much inferior in strength to that of the chiefs shield, helmet, breastplate, and greaves advanced after the chariots, but with no regular step or line, and discharged their spears on the enemy ; occasionally they were aided by bowmen. There was no artificial means of attacking towns fortified, as was then usual, with only a wall and ditch ; and when the walls were too strong or too well defended to be scaled, the besiegers had to wait for an opportunity of effecting an entrance by surprise or stratagem, or to blockade the town and reduce it by famine. 67. As in subsequent times, there was a strong religious feeling. Religion was one of the most active elements in Hellenic life, with an effect, in the early times probably, on the whole beneficial, but growing more and more injurious as civilisation advanced. All public and private transactions were pervaded with an incessant reference to supernatural hopes and fears. The gods were always present ; the legends told of the progeny of the immortals ; and the feasts of the Greeks, their dwellings, their farming, their battles, and every incident and occupation of their daily life were under the immediate sanction of some presiding deity. Polytheism every- where prevailed, with a belief in fate, in the divine Nemesis, or retribution in this world for crimes and pride and insolence, and especially the punishment of heinous crimes by the avenging Erinnyes, or Furies, who were believed to punish perjury, homicide, undutiful conduct to parents, ill-treatment of suppliants, disrespect to elders, and any presumptuous conduct ; and, like Ate, the Goddess of Mischief, the cause of all blind, rash actions and their results, to lead men to mistake evil for good, and to pursue their vengeance in Erebos, beyond the grave. Respect prevailed for the priestly character, for heralds, soothsayers, guests, and suppliants, as under the protection of the gods ; and temples and festivals were invested with a peculiar sanctity. 68. The religious sentiment gave rise to one of the most important ties between states,that described by the Greek word Amphictyony.* From community of belief there naturally arose a community of worship, and the tribes lying around a common sanctuary were led * The ancients derived the name from a hero, Amphictyon, who was son of Deucalion and Pyrrha, and founded the Delphic League, named from him Amphictyonic, at Thermopylae ; according to others, he was a native of Attica, and, having married the daughter of King Cranaos, he expelled his father-in- law and usurped the throne ; and Dionysios of Halicarnassos, while regarding him as.founder of the league at Thermopylae, calls him a son of Hellen. These statements, however, merely arose from the habit of the ancients of assigning the establishment of their institutions to a mythical hero. The word is properly Amphictiony (i/i^i/cn'orer, the dwellers around or near). 94 LEGENDARY AND HEROIC AGE OP GREECE. to enter into leagues with each other. The associations bearing the name of Amphictyony included several tribes, that were in many cases connected more by local proximity than by ties of blood ; but the fact that the local centre of the league was always the scene of periodical meetings for the celebration of a common worship im- plies, that in the earliest times there was considered to be a common descent of the members of the league. Each confederation was strictly limited to purely religious purposes the protection of certain buildings, rites, and persons ; but occasionally this religious union led to common political action. Probably there were many amphictyonies in remote times in Greece which were dissolved ia the historical epoch. Strabo mentions a Boeotian amphictyony, which had its common sanctuary at Onchestos ; and another, hi- WE AMPHICTYONICS. . 95 eluding Argolis, Epidauros, Hermione, Nauplia, Prasise, ^Egina, Athens, and Boeotian Orchomenos, had its place of congress in the temple of Poseidon in the isle Calaureia. There was also an am- phictyony of which Delos was the centre. Those of the colonies in Asia Minor have already been noticed. But the most famous was that which continued to exist to a late period, the Delphic Am- phictyony. Its constituent tribes were twelve, namely, the Thessalians, the Boeotians, the Dorians, the lonians, the Perrhaeians, the Magnetes, the Locrians, the (Etaeans, or-^Enianians, the Achaeans, of Phthia, the Phocians, the Dolopians, or the Delphians* and the Malians, or the Melians. One peculiarity of this Amphictyony was that its con- gress had two places of meeting, in the spring at Delphi and in the autumn usually at Anthela, near Thermopylae. To this congress each component state sent two or more deputies, each called a Pylagoras (TIv\ay6pas), or orator at Pylce, accompanied by a Sacred Secretary or Recorder, called a Hieromnemon (ttpopjnjfuov). Each tribe had two votes in the deliberation of the congress ; the influence assigned to the most powerful states, as the Dorians and Athenians, was utterly insignificant, in comparison with that given to small and decaying communities, and thus the political value of the con- gress was necessarily little. Its original object was twofold to guard the temple, and to restrain the cruelty of warfare among the Amphictyonic tribes as is shown by the oath which was taken by the members of the council for their respective states, and which bound the Amphictyonic tribes to refrain from utterly destroying any Amphictyonic city and from cutting off its supply of water even in war, and to defend the sanctuary and treasures of the Delphic God from sacrilege. " A review of the history of the council shows that it was almost powerless for good, except, perhaps, as a passive instrument, and that it was only active for purposes which were either unimportant or pernicious. In the great national struggles it lent no strength to the common cause ; but it now and then threw a shade of sanctity over plans of ambition or revenge. It sometimes assumed a jurisdiction, uncertain in its limits, over its members ; but it seldom had the power of executing its sentences, and com- monly committed them to the party most interested in exacting the penalty But its most legitimate sphere of action lay in cases where the honour and safety of the Delphic sanctuary were concerned ; and in these it might safely reckon on general co-opera- tion from all the Greeks As the Delphic oracle was the object to which the principal duties of the Amphictyons related, it might have been imagined to have been under their control, and thus to have afforded them an engine by which they might, at least secretly, exert a very powerful influence over the affairs of Greece. But though this engine was not unfrequently wielded for political purposes, it appears not to have been under the management of the council, but of the leading citizens of Delphi, who had opportunity of constant and more efficacious access to the persons employed in revealing the supposed will of the God." THIRLWALL. THE ARMY OF T;IE ATHENIANS. CHAPTER VII. CHARACTER OF THE EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE (1100-500 B.C.). I. POLITICAL EFFECT OF THE MIGRATIONS: SUBVERSION OF THE HEROIC MONARCHIES : IDEA OF POLITICAL EQUALITY : RISE OF THE CITY. 2. CAUSES OF SUBVERSION OF THE MONARCHIES: AGE OF THE OLIGARCHIES (900-700 B.C.) I STRUGGLE OF OLIGARCHY AND DEMOCRACY: POSITION OF THE SLAVES. 3. FALL OF THE OLIGARCHIES. 4. AGE OF THE TYRANTS (650-500 B.C.): CHARACTER OF THE REVOLUTION: FIVE MODES OF ESTABLISHING A TYRANNY. 5. INSTABILITY OF TYRANNIES CAUSES ! DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TYRANT AND KING : EXCELLENT ADMINISTRATION OF SOME TYRANTS. 6. NOTABLE TYRANNIES PEISISTRATOS : THE ORTHAGONID/E OF SICYON (676-560 B.C.) CLEISTHENES. 7. THE CYPSE- LID.E OF CORINTH (655-585 B.C.) CYPSELOS : PERIANDER : HIS POWER AND SPLENDOUR: HIS DEATH. 8. POLYCRATES OF SAMOS (535-522 B.C.): HIS UNPARALLELED PROSPERITY : HIS CRUCIFIXION BY ORCETES. Q. RE- NEWED STRUGGLE OF OLIGARCHY AND DEMOCRACY. IO. GREEK ATOMISM '. UNIFYING INFLUENCES. II. COMMUNITY OF LANGUAGE DIALECTS: IN- FLUENCE OF HOMERIC POEMS. 12. COMMUNITY OF RELIGIONS SENTI- MENT, RITES, AND FESTIVALS THE ORACLES : DODONA : DELPHI. 13. THE AMPHICTYONIES : THE FOUR GREAT GAMES OLYMPIC, PYTHIA, NEMEAN, ISTHMIAN. 14. COMMUNITY OF MANNERS AND HABITS. [HE migrations \vhich followed the Trojan war checked for a time the progress of civilisation, by substituting ruder, though stronger and more energetic races, for the more polished but weaker. But a new political vigour was infused. The EFFECT OF THE MIGRATIONS. 97 movement of whole communities stimulated the personal qualities of individuals. A consequence of this was the growth of the idea of political equality, and the rise of the power of the City. The Post-Homeric period was marked, therefore, by the subversion of the old Heroic Monarchies, and by the still minuter division of Greece from the rise of cities into independence. The importance of the City, as distinct from the old Heroic State, now begins, and continues to be the most striking characteristic of Greek life. The conquering people naturally selected a stronghold for their habita- tion in their new home, and each of these strongholds became an independent community, holding a certain part of the surrounding territory. In the parts of Greece in which no migration took place, similar movement towards town life was seen ; the villagers began to congregate in towns, and village life was in later times charac- teristic only of Arcadia and the north of Greece. In some cases a counteracting influence to Greek atomism was found, which was, perhaps, really a continuance of some amphictyonic union. This was the confederation of several independent towns in a district, when the inhabitants were of the same race ; but, excepting in Bceotia, these political ties were never very strong and Attica and Laconia alone were really states, in which all the towns recognised the authority of the capital. 2. Contemporary with the rise of the City into dignity and im- portance had been the movement towards political equality in each community. The Heroic Monarchies had stood on no very secure principle ; and the extinction of many of the royal families in the Trojan War, and the expulsion of others on their return after so many years' absence, the troubles which the Thessalian, Boeotian, and Dorian migrations brought in their train, and the diminishing size of the Greek states in which it was difficult for the king to sur- round himself with any pomp or seclusion, or to conceal his weak- nesses from the people, or insist on a more divine right to power than the nobles gradually undermined the Heroic Monarchies. Between goo and 700 B.C. in every Greek state except Sparta where, however, the government really passed to an oligarchy, though the form of the monarchy was retained by Lycurgos and apparently without any sudden or violent revolutions, the supreme power passed from the hands of one ruler to an oligarchy, or a combination of a few privileged families the first form in which republican government appears in the Hellenic world. But the extension of the power from one family to several was of necessity not a final step ; it taught the freemen that the power might be further extended from the few to the many that the government which had been transformed from a monarchy to an oligarchy might be transformed from an oligarchy to a demo- cracy. The subversion of the Heroic Monarchy was, therefore, only the beginning of the struggle for political rights ; that struggle had hitherto been between the king and the nobles, henceforward it was between the nobles, or privileged families, and the whole body of the freemen, But there was never any question of extending H 98 EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. those rights to the great majority of the population, the slave class; the existence of slavery exercised a perpetual influence on the body of free citizens and their internal relations, and, in particular, solved, in the most democratic of Greek states, the important questions which are now comprehended under the name of Socialism, all manual labourers being slaves. 3. In some cases the nobles defended their patrimonial wealth by a species of political entail, so as to keep their property unim- paired. Sometimes they sought after military protection and the security of strongholds. Sometimes they made concessions to the commonalty, and allowed them a share in the election of magis- trates. Sometimes the oligarchy itself was widened by the admis- sion of new families, even to the extent, in a few rare instances, of establishing wealth instead of birth as the qualification of its members a system which ancient writers on government termed a Timocracy. Temporary means were adopted on other occasions to restore an equilibrium between conflicting powers ; such was the choice of an ^symnetes, an officer similar to the Podesta of the Italian Republics of the middle ages, invested for a time with absolute authority. But all these precautions seem only to have delayed, never to have averted, the eventual fall of the patrician power by causes operating from within. Thus in most of the Greek states the hereditary oligarchy was broken up. Its fall was some- times accelerated by incidental and inevitable disasters, as by a protracted war, which at once exhausted its wealth and reduced its members, or, as at Argos.bythe loss of a battle, in which the flower of its youth was cut off; sometimes by internal feuds between factions in the governing bodies themselves ; sometimes, as at Mytilene and Corinth, by licentious excesses on the part of powerful families ; and sometimes, as at Erythrae,by the mere violence of popular prejudice. The oligarchies that existed at the same time in states politically related to each other served in some degree for the purposes of mutual security : and hence the downfall of this form of govern- ment, when once begun, proceeded from state to state with acce- lerated rapidity by the force of example. 4. The fall of the oligarchies began in the middle of the seventh century B.C. From revolution against their nobles, the Greek cities proceeded, nearly simultaneously, to prostration under tyrants (Tvpavvoi) or despots. "A tyranny, in the Greek sense of the word, was the irresponsible dominion of a single person, not founded on hereditary right, like the monarchies of the heroic ages and of many barbarian nations, nor on a free election, like that of a dictator or aesymnetes, but enforce." (THIRLWALL.) Between 650 and 500 B.C.. almost every Greek city of importance fell under a ruler of this kind. The heroic king had large and indefinite powers, both in peace and war; but he was in the habit of recognising some rights co-ordinate with his own in persons near his throne, and of discuss- ing certain questions in a public council or assembly. The trans- ition, therefore, from the primitive heroic monarchy to the primitive 9li-archv of a few chieftains was easy and natural. But the change THE TYRANNIES THEIR INSTABILITY. 99 from oligarchies to tyrannies was violent and abrupt, and the new mode of government had no parallel. The tyrant was in many cases a demagogue like Peisistratos at Athens, Cypselos at Corinth, and Panaetios at Leontini, in Sicily that is, a leader who espoused the popular cause, and acquired his power by popular support, but fighting his way to supremacy by his sword, and not acquiring his influence, as in later times, by his powers of speech in the popular assembly. At other times men of great wealth, like Cylon, at Athens, put down their brother-oligarchs and established their own exclusive power. A third way was when the executive magistrate, who was temporarily entrusted by his brother-oligarchs with extraordinary power for a special purpose, obtained his functions permanently, and, in some cases, transmitted them to his son, like Phalaris, at Agrigentum, Thrasybulos and others, at Miletos, &c. A fourth way was when the lineal descendant of the ancient kings succeeded in wresting the ascendancy from the oligarchs, like Pheidon at Argos. And a fifth, when a citizen was chosen for a limited period, like Pittecos, at Mytilene, to be sesymnetes, or dictator, in a season of great peril, from internal dis- sensions or external foes, was formally invested with supreme and irresponsible power over the citizens and the army, and was assigned a standing body-guard. Occasionally he was re-elected, and became practically despot for life, or he sometimes acquired sufficient influence to keep the supreme power against the will of the citizens. 5. Sometimes a tyrant was enabled to found a dynasty, which lasted for a few generations ; but in general the usurpation was of short duration, as it could be maintained only by constant vigilance, and a perpetual struggle against a reluctant people. The tyrant had generally all the population arrayed in opposition ; the oligarchical or democratical factions had to contend with only a part. Like an oriental despotism, it was founded on a naked fear ; but, unlike an oriental despotism, the people did not submit tamely to their master. " Nothing, 1 ' Thales is supposed to have said, " is so rare a sight as an aged tyrant." " Of all forms of government," said Aristotle, "oligarchy and tyranny are the most short-lived.'" It was a rare event for an ab- solute prince to die in his bed. " Ad genertun Cereris sine caede et sanguine pauci descendunt reges, et sicca morte tyranni." Contempt of the laws and usages of the country, cruelty, lust, and rapacity, were the recognised characteristics of the Greek tyrant. In general, his relation with his subjects was avowedly hostile ; for the favour with which the freemen regarded his rise, as a deliverance from the oligarchy, was short-lived. His person was only safe so long as it was protected by a body-guard of mercenaries ; and he was perpetually in danger of being overpowered by open attack, or of being stabbed by the dagger of private vengeance. All Greek antiquity, oligarchs and democrats, the philosophers and the vulgar, were united in their hatred of tyrants, and in their approbation of tyrannicide. Plato, in his eloquent description of the tyrant's mind, and Aristotle, in his exhaustive analysis of his policy, equally bear witness to thfj ioo EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. anti-social character of his rule. Many of the maxims of policy in Machiavelli's " Prince," which have been stamped with the repro- bation of the modern civilised world, are literally borrowed from Aristotle's account of the means by which a Greek despotism was preserved ; with this difference, however, that what Aristotle describes as facts, Machiavelli converts into precepts. Whatever might be the necessity of submission produced by suc- cessful usurpation, ancient Greece was unanimous in detesting the irresponsible rule of a single man, and in preferring some form of government in which several persons, either the few or the many, bore a part. " The Greeks certainly made, both in practice and theory, a wide distinction between a.f3acn\(vs, or king, and a rupawos, or tyrant. The former was considered as reigning by an hereditary, in early times a divine title, and as exercising his power according to the established usages of the state ; the latter was essentially an usurper, whose power was acquired by force and illegality Cromwell and Napoleon may serve as modern examples of the latter class of rulers; Charles I. and Louis XVI. of the former." But the tyrants, who partly broke down the wall of distinction between the great mass of freemen and the oligarchy, were un- doubtedly, even when they were of the worst type, more formidable to the rich than to the poor ; and though they usually governed on narrow and selfish principles, the people were better off than under the oligarchies. Some of them, like Polycrates, of Samos, erected magnificent public works, thus finding employment for the poorest class of citizens; and others, like Periander, of Corinth, were muni- ficent patrons of literature and art, and maintained a crowd of philosophers, poets, and sculptors at their courts. Their greatest enemy was Sparta ; for the government of that city being, though in form a limited monarchy, in reality a close oligarchy, the Spartans were interested in putting down most of the tyrannies. 6. The most noted tyrants were Peisistratos and his sons, at Athens, and those of Sicyon, Corinth, Samos, and Syracuse. Peisistratos and the Dionysii of Syracuse are treated of later. Orthagoras, or Andreas, who is said to have been originally a cook, overthrew the Dorian oligarchy at Sicyon, about 676 B.C. : he was not a member of the dominant race, but of the aboriginal popu- lation, and it was by the support of the latter that his dynasty, the Orthagoridas, held the tyranny for a century. Orthagoras was suc- ceeded by his son Myron, who was a victor in the chariot race at Olympia in 648 B.C. Myron was succeeded by Aristonymos, and the latter by Cleisthenes, the last of the dynasty. Cleisthenes was distinguished for his wealth and magnificence, and he displayed an intense enmity against Argos, w-hich led him to stop the worship of the hero Adrastos, that was common to Argos and Sicyon. He carried out to an extreme tlje purpose for which his tyranny had been created, and for which it received support the depression of fie Dorian race. He changed the names of the three Dorian tribes (Hylleis, Pamphyli, and Dymaneis,) into the insulting names of Hyatcz ( Vurot, from vs , a sow), Oncatce ('Oj/efmu, from '6vos, an ass), THE CYPSEL1D& OF CORINTH. 101 and Chcereata (Xotpe 9- P'g) an ^ ne asserted the pre-eminence of his own, the aboriginal, part of the population by giving it the name Archdai ('Apx&aoi, Lords of the people). He supported the Amphictyonic council in the first sacred war. Cleisthenes' daughter Agariste married, as will be related hereafter, an Athenian, the Alcmaeonid Megacles ; and her son, Cleisthenes, was the author of the democracy at Athens. Cleisthenes died about 560 B.C., and, having no son, the dynasty ended with him. Sixty years later the feud between the inhabitants of Sicyon was healed, the three Dorian tribes resuming their old names, and the name of the Archelai being changed to JEgialeis y from ^Egialeus, the son of Adrastos. 7. The Cypselidcs, or tyrannic dynasty of Corinth, was even more celebrated than the Orthagoridae. The founder of the tyranny was Cypselos, 655 B.C., who overthrew the ruling class called the Bacchiadae. The latter was a Heracleid clan named from Bacchis (king of Corinth, 926 891 B.C.) in which as a close oligarchy the monarchical government had merged in 748 B.C. on the murder of king Telestes. Bacchis himself was probably a lineal descendant of the Heracleid Aletes, who, in 1074 B.C., received the Corinthian throne on his overthrow of the powerful dynasty of the Sisyphidas, the descendants of the legendary Sisyphos, whose fraudulent, avaricious, and altogether bad character had entailed so severe a punishment in the lower world. The mother of the tyrant Cypselos was a member of the Bacchiadae clan, but, from her ugly and deformed appearance, she could not find a husband among any of her kinsmen. At length she married one Action, who claimed descent from Caeneus, the companion of Peirithoos. The union was for a time without issue ; and when Action consulted the Delphic oracle on the subject, he was told that a son would be born who would overthrow the Bacchiadas. On the birth of a son, the Bacchiadse, having heard of the oracle, sent persons to murder him, but, moved by the babe's smiles, their messengers spared him. His mother concealed him in a chest, Kin^'Xi/, from which he derived his name Cypselos ; and when the Bacchiadas again sent to kill him, their search was ineffectual. When he grew up, he appeared as the champion of the freemen, and by their aid he expelled the Bacchiadae, but retained their power in his own hands. The begin- ning of his reign is said to have been marked by great severity towards the partisans of the deposed family, but his rule was after- wards very popular, and he required no body-guard. He accumu- lated great wealth, but used it in a princely fashion. He held the government from 655 B.C. till his death in 625 B.C., and the tyranny was transmitted to his son Periander. Periander soon surrounded himself with a body-guard of mer- cenaries, and enforced a most rigorous rule. A story, which was current in Greece, and which has been transferred to the Roman royal family of the Tarquins, illustrates the severity with which the oligarchical partisans were treated. Periander is said to have con- sulted the tyrant Thrasybulos, of Miletos, on the best mode of main- 163 EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. taining his power. Thrasybulos took his messenger through a corn-field, cutting off, as he went, the tallest ears, and then dismissed him without any verbal reply. The messenger reported his recep- tion. Periander took the hint, and proceeded to get rid, by banish- ment or death, of the most powerful families. But the account of his cruelties must be received with very great caution, for it comes through his enemies, who succeeded to power shortly after his death. Under him Corinth became the most powerful commercial city in Greece, and he formed a scheme of extending her power over several states. He kept up a large navy, with a view of occupying all the coast of the Ionian sea as far as Illyricum, and of establish- ing a connection with the barbarous tribes of the interior. He also intended to cut through the Isthmos of Corinth, and so open up direct communication with the eastern waters of Greece ; and a colony was sent to Apollonia, on the Macedonian coast. He con- quered Epidauros, and established the supremacy of Corinth over Corcyra ; and he endeavoured to check the rise of the rival city in the neighbourhood, Athens, by supporting the Mytileneans in their contest with her for the possession of Sigeium. To strengthen his dynasty he allied with several other tyrants, and even with the Lydian king, Alyattes. He also embellished Corinth with magnificent public buildings, dedicated to the gods ; and he was a liberal patron of literature and philosophy ; the lyric poet Arion, and the philosopher Anacharsis, were resident at his court. Periander himself wrote a didactic poem of 2,000 verses ; and generally he was reckoned among the Seven Sages of Greece. In his private life, however, Periander was ex- ceedingly unfortunate. Some accused him of an involuntary incest with his mother, to which they attributed the change from an originally kindly nature, as manifested in his mild and beneficent rule, for a time at first, to misanthropic cruelty. In a fit of passion he killed his wife Milissa, whereon his son Lycophron withdrew to Corcyra, and declared he would never return to Corinth. When Periander, in his old age, found that his son was inexorable, he offered to resign the tyranny, and go to reside at Corcyra, if Lyco- phron would return to Corinth and take the government. Lycophron assented, but he was murdered by the Corcyreans, who dreaded the arrival of Periander. To punish this crime, Periander caused 300 Corcyrean boys to be seized and sent to his ally, king Alyattes, of Lydia, to be mutilated ; they were, however, rescued on their way by the Samians. Shortly afterwards, 585 B.C., Periander died of despondency, after holding the tyranny forty years. A kinsman, Psammetichos, held the tyranny for three years after Periander : he was deposed by the Spartans. 8. The tyrant who raised himself to the greatest height of power was Polycrates, of Samos, who, by the assistance of his brothers, Pantagnotos and Syloson, made himself master of that island about 535 B.C. Polycrates, at first, associated his brothers with himself in the government ; but he shortly afterwards banished Syloson and put Pantagnotos to death, and became sole tyrant. He raised a POLYCkAfES OF SAMOS. 103 fleet of 100 ships and a mercenary force of 1,000 bowmen, and with Miese he conquered several of the neighbouring islands and the towns on the adjacent coast of Asia Minor, and he obtained a victory over the people of Miletos and Lesbos. Samos now became the greatest Greek maritime power, and Polycrates formed the design io 4 EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. of conquering all the /Egean isles and the Ionian cities of Asia. King Amasis of Egypt, fearing the growing power of Persia, had formed an alliance with him ; but he renounced it on account of the tyrant's extraordinary good fortune, which he considered would be visited with the jealous Nemesis of the gods. According to Hero- dotos, Amasis advised Polycrates to throw away one of his most valuable possessions to " afflict his soul," and by this loss avoid the total reverse of fortune which was sure to eventually befall such unexampled prosperity. Polycrates caused a valuable signet-ring to be thrown into the sea ; but, after a few days, it was brought to him by a fisherman, who had found it in the belly of a fish ; and Amasis immediately renounced his friendship. But Grote considers that the facts rather point to a renunciation on the part of Polycrates, to gain the favour of the Persian monarch Cambyses, who was then about to invade Egypt. Polycrates sent all his Samian malcontents on board forty vessels to Cambyses, but they succeeded in gaining their freedom, and returned in the ships to attack Samos. Being repulsed, they procured the aid of the Spartans and Corin- thians. The joint force presently besieged Samos for forty days, but then had to raise the siege. The Samian exiles, after plunder- ing the isle Siphnos, and purchasing, for a settlement, the isle Hydrea from the people of Hermione, in Argolis which, however, they did not inhabit, but handed over to the Troerenians sailed for Crete, and expelled the Zacynthian settlers from Cydonia, where they themselves settled. But, five years later, the Cretans, with the aid of a naval force from /Egena, captured Cydonia, and sold the Samian intruders into slaver}'. Polycrates now devoted himself to the adornment of Samos with splendid works, and to strengthening his power. His court was the scene of great splendour and luxury. Orcetes, the Persian satrap of Sardis, had conceived a deadly hatred to him, and was resolved to compass his destruction ; he pro- bably intended, like many Persian satraps, to make himself inde- pendent, and the position of Samos and the power to which it had attained under Polycrates, would have been a barrier to his schemes. Herodotos states that Oroetes had been taunted with want of bravery, and that he had moreover been personally insulted by Polycrates, who had on one occasion taken no notice of a herald sent with some demand. Orcetes pretended to Polycrates that he was about to fly from Asia with all his treasures, his life being threatened by his master, and offered to give the tyrant enough money to make him master of all Greece if he would convey him away. Masandrios, the secretary of Polycrates, having been sent across, on his return reported that he had seen eight of the satrap's huge coffers full of gold, all ready for de- parture. Polycrates, allured by this bait, crossed over to Mag- nesia with a large suite, notwithstanding the entreaties of his daughter, to whom his fate had been revealed in a dream, and the warnings of the soothsayers. He was at once arrested on the mainland, and crucified by order of Oroetes, 522 B.C. OLIGARCHY AND DEMOCRACY-GREEK UNITY. 105 g. On the overthrow of the Tyrannies, the contest between Oli- garchy and Democracy, which had been temporarily suspended, was resumed with great violence ; the progress of this struggle, and the gradual development of the free institutions, on the ruins of the Tyrannies, in those states which were destined to play the most important part in the Hellenic world, constitute a large portion of the subsequent history of Greece. 10. In the Republican period of Greece, as has been said above (ch. iv. 2), the country is divided into much smaller communities than in the Heroic Age. Notwithstanding the atomism of Greek politics, there were certain unifying influences gradually giving rise to a Pan-Hellenic, or national, feeling inspiring a consciousness of unity and friendliness, and making the Greeks ready to unite as one people against the barbarians. The legend of Hellen was completely accepted throughout the Greek world ; and this convic- tion of identity of race was fostered by their possession of a common language and a common literature, of a common religion, temples, and festivals, and of common manners, habits and ideas. 11. One LANGUAGE was spoken throughout the whole Hellenic world. The Greek language is superior to all the other branches of the Indo-Teutonic stem in its richness, variety, and euphony, and in the extreme delicacy and subtlety of its metrical and musical development. From very early times there was a distinction of dialects of this common language.* But there was sufficient uni- * It was with the Greek language as with most modern ones almost every place had its peculiarities of dialect, both in the use of single letters and of single words, in the forms of words, inflexions and expressions, in the whole style, in the species of verse, and in the quantity of syllables. In most modern languages, notwithstanding the very various pronunciation, and the different expressions and modes of speaking, used in particular districts, there is in general one orthography and one form of language in writing. Of these dialects the four principal are the ^Eolic, the Doric (which is merely a variety of the JEolic), the Ionic, and the Attic, these alone being cultivated and ren- dered classic by writers. But each of these dialects, according to the different places where it was used, had various deviations, which were called local dialects (3, x, 0) to the smooth (*, , T ). Thus arose the middle Attic, in which Gorgias, of Leontini, in Sicily, first wrote, and which is the dialect of the historian Thucydides ; the tragic poets, ^Eschylos, Sophocles and Euripides ; the comic poet, Aristophanes, &c. The new Attic is dated from Demosthenes and ^Eschines, although Plato, Xenophon, Aristophanes, Lysias and Isocrates have many of its peculiarities ; it differed from the middle Attic in preferring some of the softer forms e. g., the second aorist, ov\\eydt, for the first aorist, tv\\fx6e" ; the double rr ' pp ) for the old rs (per) the double tt (TT), instead of the double ss (aa); a*v for fiv. After the overthrow of Greek freedom, a mixed language arose, comprising not only the peculiarities of the Attic, which had become the most common and the literary dialect, but also foreign expressions and modes of speech : this is called Hellenistic Greek, and is the language used by that class of writers called the Alexandrine, by the Alexandrine translators of the Old Testament (the Septuagint Version), the writers of the New Testa- ment, and by all to whom Greek was not the native lang,- COMMUNITY OF RELIGIONS THE ORACLES. 107 years could recite from memory the whole, or the greater part of them. It has been advanced as an argument against the Homeric poems having been originally delivered in the form in which they are extant, that a far greater discrepancy between their language and that of later times should be visible, according to all analogy ; but undoubtedly the maintenance of one type of language among the scattered Greek races is to be attributed to the universal popu- larity of these poems, a popularity to which there is no parallel. The " Iliad," the more popular of the two Homeric poems, which represented the Greeks as all united against a common Asiatic foe, fed the pride of the Greek, and strengthened his antipathy against the barbarian. 12. The community of religious sentiment, rites, and festivals was another great bond of union among the Greeks. The great reverence which the Hellenes entertained for the gods led them to seek oracles from them on all important occasions of public and private life, not merely to satisfy the individual's curiosity about the issue of his undertaking, but also to procure the solemn sanction and authorisation of the deity. There were many such oracles in Greece; some of them had merely a local celebrity, but others were known and reverenced throughout the Hellenic world. The two great oracles were those of Zeus at Dodona and of Apollo at Delphi, the latter being consulted even by foreign nations, as by the Lydians, Phrygians, and Romans. The most ancient Hellenic oracle was that of Zeus in a grove of oak and beech trees on a hill, Tmaros, near the town Dodona, in Thesprotia, a district of Epeiros. It was founded by a black dove, another having gone to found the oracle at Ammon. According to Herodotos, this tradition arose from the Phoenicians having carried off two Egyptian (dark-skinned} priestesses, one of whom was settled at Dodona. The oracle was interpreted from the rustling of the leaves caused by the wind, and sometimes from the sounds cf brazen vessels suspended from the branches as they swung in the wind, originally by men, but afterwards by three women called TreXeiriSff, from Tre'Aeia, pigeon ; and the temple was under the charge of priests called Selli or Helli, also designated Tomuri (ropovpoi). The ^Etolians destroyed the temple and sacred oaks, 219 B.C., but the oracle was in existence till the third century after Christ. The Argo had in her prow a beam from one of the oaks of Dodona, from which the Argonauts drew oracles. In the historical period the oracle of Apollo, the "interpreter" or "prophet of Zeus," at Delphi, eclipsed that of Zeus himself at Dodona. Delphi was a small town of Phocis, in a valley on the south-west of Mount Parnassos. According to some authorities, Gaea, Poseidon, and Themis gave oracles there before Apollo. The oracle was discovered by a shepherd, who observed that his goats were affected by a vapour ascending from a fissure in Mount Parnassos ; and he, himself, going near it, was seized with a fit of enthusiasm, and uttered wild expressions which passed for pro- phecies. Delphi was also called Pytho, from the monstrous io8 EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. serpent Python, which Apollo slew, having lived near it in the caverns of Mount Parnassos, or from the Python having rotted there; Apollo also bore the epithet Pythios, Pythian, and hence his priestess was called the Pythia. The priestess, who was con- secrated to celibacy and the service of the god for life, was always a native of Delphi, and in early times always a young girl ; but after violence had once been offered to the Pythia by a Thessalian, Echecrates, no one was elected under fifty, but the dress of a young virgin was always worn. When she was to give the oracle of the god, the Pythia was led by her spokesman (Trpo^njy), and seated on a high tripod over an opening in the ground, from which there issued an intoxicating smoke that was believed to be connected with the well of Cassotis, the waters of which disappeared in the ground close to the temple. The Pythia became delirious from the fumes, and her ravings were carefully noted down, and regarded as the god's response. The oracles extant are chiefly in Ionic hexameters. In later times there were two Pythias, who took their seats alternately, and a third was kept for any exigency ; for it sometimes happened that the Pythia was ill for some time after being seized with the divine enthusiasm on the tripod, and occa- sionally death occurred from the excitement. 13. The religious associations themselves never really exercised any unifying influence. The AMPHICTYONIC LEAGUE never attained to the character of a natioqal institution ; a far more important means of preserving the Hellenic unity was found in the public GAMES, which were at first merely local festivals, though never expressly confined to certain tribes, and gradually enlarged the sphere of their fame and attraction till they embraced the whole Hellenic world. Yet the games were practically little more than local solemnities in four separate parts of Greece, at which it would be as absurd to suppose that all the nation was present, or even in the smallest reasonable degree represented, as it would be to say that the English people meet in common assembly four times every year at Epsom, Ascot, Newmarket, and Doncaster. But the value of the games as a unifying influence was, not merely their attracting large crowds, but the fact that none but those who could prove their Hellenic blood were admitted as competitors; and the excessive regard paid by the Greeks to physical excellence drew champions from nearly every state, and the glory of the victor was considered to be reflected also on his native place. The greatest of the Hellenic festivals was the Olympic Games, celebrated near the temple (Olympieiitm) of the Olympian Zeus, the national god of Greece, in the .small plain of Olympia in Elis, north of the Alpheios and east of the Cladeus. The games, in- stituted at a remote period, were re-established by King Iphitos of Elis, assisted by the Spartan lawgiver Lycurgos and Cleosthenes of Pisa, 884 (or 828) B.C., and were celebrated at the end of every four years, on the first full moon after the summer solstice. Their celebration was long contested between Elis and the original cele- brant, the town Pisa, successfully by the Pisatans, 748 and 644 B.C. ; TEE FOUR GREAT PUBLIC GAMES. 109 but their subjugation, 572 B.C., by the Eleans, left the latter the honour undisputed. During the sacred month (i(pop.r)vla) of the games a truce (eW^ftpia) was proclaimed, and all warfare was sus- pended throughout Greece; and the territory of Elis was for the time sacred. The festival, under the patronage of Zeus Olympics, was attended by an immense throng from all parts of Greece. It was celebrated with sacrifices, processions, games, and banquets to the victors. The games consisted of foot-races for men and boys, leaping, throwing the quoit and spear, wrestling, boxing, horse and chariot races, and contests of heralds and trumpeters. The prize was a garland of wild olive (KOTIVOS) cut from a tree in the Altis or sacred grove of Zeus ; it was placed on the head of the victor while he was standing on a bronze-covered tripod, or, later, on a table of ivory and gold, and palm-branches were put in his hands, and his name, and that of his father and his country, were proclaimed by a herald, a triumphal ode being sung to him on his return home. The prize was awarded by judges (Hellanodicce), who were chosen by lot from among the Eleans, and who, with their subordinate officers, preserved order. It was very common for authors to recite their literary compositions at this gathering, and for artists to exhibit their productions. No women or slaves were allowed to be present, and the competitors were of pure Greek blood, down to the admis- sion of the Romans on their conquest of Greece. The Olympic games were not discontinued till after Alaric's invasion, A.D. 390. The Pythian Games were celebrated near Delphi (Pythd) in honour of Leto, Artemis, and Apollo, by the last of whom they were in- stituted to commemorate his slaying the Python. They became gradually extended from a local festival in connection with the Delphic oracle, when hymns were sung, into a great national gathering, at which all the contests of the Olympic games were ex- hibited. Originally they were celebrated every eighth year, but after 527 B.C. at the end of every fourth year, and in the third year of each Olympiad, the celebration of the games being at the same time transferred from the Delphians to the Amphictyonic council. The Nemean Games were celebrated every alternate year in the sacred grove surrounding the great teryple of Zeus Nemeos in the valley Nemea, between Cleonas and' Phlious in Argolis. Nemea was the scene of Heracles' destruction of the famous lion ; and on that occasion Heracles reinstituted the games. They had origi- nally been established by the Argives in honour of Archemoros, the infant son of King Lycurgos of Nemea and Eurydice ; Archemoros had been entrusted to Queen Hypsipyle of Lemnos, then in exile, to be nursed. When she met the army of Adrastos marching to Thebes, and had to show the way, she laid the child on the grass, and during her absence it was killed by a serpent. The Argives, Corinthians, and people of Cleonas presided by turns at the cele- bration. Foot, horse, and chariot races, boxing, wrestling, and all kinds of gymnastic exercises were exhibited. The prizes were, at first, crowns of olive, and of green parsley in later times. The Isthmian Games which were next in importance to the no EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. Olympic, were celebrated on the Isthmus of Corinth, and instituted 1326 B.C. to commemorate the burial of Melicerta, the son of Athamas and Ino, and metamorphosed into the sea-god Palaemou, whose body was washed ashore there. After being for a time interrupted, they were reinstituted by Theseus in honour of Poseidon. They were celebrated every third or fifth year; after the destruction of Corinth by the Romans (146 B.C.), the Sicyonians conducted the celebration. Combats of every kind were exhibited. The prizes were crowns of pine leaves ; but later it was usual to give a crown of dry parsley. Notwithstanding the great differences existing among the Hel- lenes themselves, as between the Athenians and Boeotians, or the Ionian cities and the Spartans, there was yet a contrast between the Hellenic world and the barbarians. There were no human sacrifices, bodily mutilation, or selling of their own offspring into slavery; polygamy was unknown from the heroic ages down- wards, and an absolute oriental despotism was abhorrent to the Greek mind. This contrast must have tended to heighten the pride of the Greek in his race, and his contempt for the barbarian. 14. These unifying influences were gradually drawing the Greeks together, and moulding the Hellenic nationality; it only needed the pressure of the barbarian to make the race conscious of their unity. The Hellenic development, when it began, proceeded most rapidly ; no people ever unfolded itself so brilliantly in so short a time. But after that wonderful outburst, the Hellenic race appeared to have become suddenly exhausted ; its decline, if not so rapid as its elevation, was yet strangely swift. It seemed as though the creative force of the principle of Greek civilisation had spent itself, and no other principle came to its assistance. Guizot has some philosophical remarks on this subject. He observes that one of the points of difference by which modern civilisation is distinguished from ancient is the complication, the multiplicity, which characterises it. In all previous forms of society, Oriental, Greek, or Roman, there is a remarkable character of unity and simplicity. Some one idea seems to have presided over the con- struction of the social framework, and to have been carried out into all its consequences, without encountering on its way any counter- balancing or limiting principle. Some one element, some one power in society, seems to have early attained predominance and extinguished all other agencies which could exercise an influence over society capable of conflicting with its own. Thus, in Egypt the theocratic principle absorbed everything. The temporal government was grounded on the uncontrolled rule of a caste of priests ; and the moral life of the people was built upon the idea, that it belonged to the interpreters of religion to direct the whole detail of human actions. The dominion of an exclusive class, at once the ministers of religion and sole possessors of letters and secular learning, has impressed its character on all which survives of Egyptian monuments on all we know of Egyptian life. Else- where, the dominant fact was the supremacy of a military caste, COMMUNITY OF MANNERS AND HABITS. in or race of conquerors; the institutions and habits of society were principally modelled by the necessity of maintaining this supre- macy. In other places again, society has been merely the expression of the democratic principle. The sovereignty of the majority and the equal participation of all male citizens in the administration of the state were the leading facts by which the aspect of those societies was determined. This singleness in the governing prin- ciple had not, indeed, always prevailed in those states, their early history often presented a conflict of forces ; as between the caste of warriors and that of priests among the Egyptians, Etruscans, and even the Greeks, or between the spirit of clanship and that of voluntary association, as in ancient Gaul, or the aristocratic against the popular principle. But most of these contests were confined to the pre-historical periods, and only a vague remembrance of them survived ; while if at a later time the struggle was ever renewed, it was always promptly terminated, and the power which achieved the victory took exclusive possession of society. This unity of the dominant principle produced the rapid rise and fall of Greece. In Egypt and India it had a different effect. Society fell into a stationary state. Simplicity produced monotony ; the state did not fall into dissolution ; society continued to exist, but immovable, and as it were congealed. Guizot ably contrasts the state of modern Europe " Her civilisation is confused, diversified, stormy ; all forms, all principles of social organisation co-exist ; spiritual and temporal authority, theocratic, monarchic, aristocratic, democratic elements, every variety of classes and social conditions, are mixed and crowded together ; there are in- numerable gradations of liberty, wealth, and influence. And these forces are in a state of perpetual conflict, nor has any of them ever been able to stifle the others, and establish its own exclusive authority. Modern Europe offers examples of all systems, of all attempts at social organisation ; monarchies pure and mixed, theo- cracies, republics more or less aristocratic, have existed simultan- eously one beside another ; and, in spite of their diversity, they have all a certain homogeneity, a family likeness, not to be mistaken. In ideas and sentiments, there is the same variety and the same struggle. Theocratic, monarchic, aristocratic, popular creeds, check, limit and modify one another." Hence, continues Guizot, the modern world, while inferior to many of the ancient forms of human life in the characteristic excellence of each, is yet, all things taken together, richer and more developed than any of them ; from the multitude of elements to be reconciled, each of which during long ages spent the greater part of its strength in combating the rest, the progress of modern civilisation has necessarily been slower, but it has lasted and remained steadily progressive, for a greater period than any other civilisation. Guizot's view must be qualified to a certain extent. It is not true that each of the civilisations of the ancient v, orld was under the Complete ascendancy of some one exclusive principle ; and he H2 EARLY HISTORICAL PERIOD OF GREECE. ignores the fact that different societies (as Athens and Sparta, and later, Persia and Macedonia, or Rome, Carthage, and the East), under different dominant principles, did co-exist at one epoch in the closest contact. But substantially his doctrine is correct ; not one of the ancient forms of society contained in itself that systematic antagonism* which appears to be the only condition under which stability and progressiveness can be permanently reconciled to one another. Society contains a number of distinct forces, separate and independent sources of power as knowledge, religion, military skill and discipline, wealth, physical force, &c. The predominance of any one of these social elements is doubtless attended with cer- tain good results, but it must leave many necessary interests un- provided for. To the contest, through many ages, of rival powers for dominion over society, a contest unparalleled in history, must be attributed that spirit of improvement which has never ceased to exist, and still makes progress among the nations of modern Europe ; and to the absence of this co-ordinate action among rival powers naturally tending in different directions, is undoubtedly due the rapid rise of Greece and its decay for lack of such other ele- ments of civilisation as could sufficiently unfold themselves only under some other patronage than that of the dominant element in each state. * Government by Party was unknown in the ancient world : hence the violent antagonism of oligarchs and democrats, and the expulsions of one party, or a portion of it, by .the other, so that from nearly every city there was nearly always a body of exiles (oi imrfaovre* or oi ^eiT/omr, called ol KareAMmt on their return). ATHENIAN COIN HEAD OF PALLAS. DIOMEDES, ODYSSEOS, NESTOR, ACHILLEUS, AGAMEMNON GREEK HEROES OF THE TROJAN WAR. CHAPTER VIII. SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. I. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF LACONIA. 2. THE ABORIGINES LELEGES : LEGENDARY KINGS ! THE LELEGIAN DYNASTY : THE ACH^AN DYNASTY MKNELAOS, ORESTES, TISAMENOS : THE DORIAN INVASION (l IO4 B.C.) 3. POLITICAL ORGANISATION OF LACONIA UNDER THE DORIANS SPARTANS, PERICECI, HELOTS. 4. THE DOUBLE MONARCHY. 5. NECESSITY OF MILI- TARY ORGANIZATION AT SPARTA : REGENCY OF LYCURGOS. LEGISLATION OF LYCURGOS (850 B.C.) 6. CIVIL CONSTITUTION THE THREE TRIBES : THE KINGS I THE GEROUSIA : THE EPHORS : AGGRANDISEMENT OF THE EPHORALTY: SPARTA A CLOSE OLIGARCHY. 7. THE DISCIPLINE OF LYCURGOS : DESTRUCTION OF THE FAMILY : SPARTAN BREVITY : MILITARY EXCELLENCE THE END OF EDUCATION : SYSSITIA : TRAINING OF WOMEN : ALLEGED DISTRIBUTION OF THE LAND. 8. THE SPARTAN SYSTEM UNIQUE: ITS INSTITUTIONS NECESSARY, AND SUCCESSFUL. ANCIENT AND MODERN THEORIES OF GOVERNMENT. Q. K. O. MULLER ON THE DORIAN CHARACTER AND DORIC RELIGION. IO. EFFICACY OF LYCURGEAN REFORMS. ARGOS UNDER PHEIDON. VICTORIES OF SPARTA OVER ARGOS THE THREE HUNDRED CHAMPIONS: CONQUEST OF CYNURIA. II. SPARTAN SUCCESS OVER THE ACII.3ANS. 13. THE FIRST MESSENIAN WAR H4 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. (743-724B.C.): SURPRISE OF AMPHEIA. SIEGE OF ITHOME : ARISTODEMOS SACRIFICE OF HIS DAUGHTER HIS ELECTION TO THE THRONE : MES- SENIAN VICTORY: THE ORACLE ITS FULFILMENT: SUICIDE OF ARISTO- DEMOS : CONQUEST OF MESSENIA. 13. THE SECOND MESSENIAN WAR (685-668 B.C.) : SUCCESSES OF ARISTOMENES : THE SPARTANS RE-ANIMATED BY TYRA^OS : EXPLOITS OF ARISTOMENES : SIEGE OF EIRA : THE ORACLE ITS FULFILMENT: STORMING OF EIRA ESCAPE OF ARISTOMENES. 14. MES- SENIAN RETREAT TO ARCADIA: ARISTOMENES AT RHODES: MESSENIAN COLONIES. 15. SPARTAN WAR WITH TEGEA (554 B.C.) : ORACLE ABOUT THE BONES OF ORESTES : REDUCTION OF TEGEA : SUCCESSES IN ARCADIA AND JEGINA. l6. EXTENT OF THE SPARTAN POWER, 500 B.C.: SPARTA'S INFLUENCE IN GREECE : HER IMMOBILITY. JACONIA is formed by two mountain chains running from Arcadia and enclosing the valley of the Eurotas, the source of this river being separated from that of an Arcadian stream by a small hill. The Eurotas presents the cha- racter of a swift stream for some distance below the town of Sparta, to the point at which it forms a cascade, after which it discharges its waters into a marsh, but subsequently emerges and flows with a gentle current directly to the sea. In the vicinity of Sparta the river is approached on both sides by rocks and hills, which almost enclose the river both above and below the town, and from the " hollow Lacedaemon " valley of Homer. From the narrowness of the valley of the Eurotas and the projection, like a lofty parapet, of the heights of Taygetos, the heat of summer is here very intense, the sunbeams being concentrated, as it were, into a focus, and the cool sea breezes excluded ; and in winter the cold is doubly violent. The same natural circumstances produce violent storms of rain, and then the numerous mountain torrents fre- quently inundate the narrow valleys. The mountain chains are much interrupted ; their broken and rugged forms were attributed by the ancients to earthquakes, to which the country was subject.* The country, however, contains some plains ; that along the lower course of the Eurotas, exposed to the south and protected by a mountain chain from the north wind, is one of the finest in Greece, and the rock-girt plain between Malea and Epidauros Limera was extremely fertile. The valleys towards the Messenian frontier weru equally productive ; but in the south-western extremity of Laconia, towards Tsenaros, the soil was hard and ferruginous. The fertility of a large portion of the country is shown by the large list of vegetable productions in Theophrastos and other ancient authors, and by its wines being celebrated by Alcman and Theognis ; the vines were planted on the mountain sides even to the very summit of Taygetos, and watered from fountains in forests of plane-trees. Hut its most valuable product was doubtless the iron of the moun- tains. For purposes of defence the situation of the country was excellent, invasion by land being possible only through narrow passes and mountain roads from Arcadia, Argolis. and Messenia ; and the most fertile part was the least exposed to incursions ' During the revolt of the Helots, 464 B.C.. afl earthquake occurred a {jrul caused great con-;' THE ABORIGINES LEGENDARY KINGS. 115 from such quarters ; while the want of harbours isolated Laconia by sea. 2. During the earliest, or Pelasgic period of Greece, the Leleges had their chief home* in Laconia, and Sparta being naturally the very kernel and heart of the country, the ruling class occupied that site which afterwards became so famous in Greek history. Accord- ing to the tradition, the first king, Lelex, was succeeded by his son Myles, and the latter by his son Eurotas, who collected into a channel the waters which had made the plain a morass, and gave his name to the stream which he thus formed. His daughter, and only child, Sparta, married Lacedaemon, the son of Zeus and Tayeta, and her husband became king, the people and the country being now named from the king, and the capital, Sparta, from his wife. LacedEemon was succeeded by his son Amyclas, who built another town Amyclae, and a lineal descendant of Lacedaemon, Fatreus, subsequently founded Patrae. Argalos, or Harpalos, the eldest son and successor of Amyclas, was succeeded by his brother, Cynortas, and the latter by Cynortas' son, (Ebalos. Others omit Myles from the list of kings and insert Perieres between Cynortas and (Ebalos, Perieres being represented as son of Cynortas and father of CEbalos. Tyndareus succeeded his father, or brother CEbalos, on the throne; and by Leda he was the father of the celebrated Clytemnestra and Hefen. When Menelaos, the Atreid, married Helen, Tyndareus abdicated in favour of his son- in-law. Thus, shortly before the Trojan war (1184 B.C.), the Spartan throne passed to an Achaean family, after the Lelegian dynasty had been in possession of it for nine generations. On the death of Menelaos, his daughter Hermioue having married his nephew Orestes, Agamemnon's son, the king of Mycenae and Argos, the Lacedaemonians conferred the crown on Orestes, whom, as grandson of Tyndareus, they preferred to Nicostratus and Mega- penthes, the sons of Menelaos by a slave. The three kingdoms, Sparta, Mycenae, and Argos were now united under one ruler. But the union was destined to be only temporary. For in the reign of his son and successor, Tisamenos, the Donians, who had under Hyllos invaded Peloponnesos in the reign of Orestes, made their successful expedition from Naupactos, and Tisamenos fell in battle with the Heracleidae. The legend represents the Dorians as having conquered the greater part of Peloponnesos at once ; and the united kingdom was partitioned into its three original parts, Argos being assigned to Temenos, Messenia to Cresphontes, and Sparta to Aristodemos, or his twin sons Procles and Eurystheus, according to the tradition which represented the father as having been struck dead at Naupactos. 3. The Dorians who, on the return of the Heracleida;, established themselves in Messenia and Argolis, expelled the inhabitants. But those who settled in Laconia allowed the aborigines to remain in the country, but in a subject condition ; and some of the commu- " The Lelegeg were alp ill Megaris, Locris, Evjbcea, Boeotia, Magnesia, &C, u6 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. nities which endeavoured to liberate themselves were conquered and degraded to a servile state. From this time dates the forma- tion of the Lacedaemonians * into the three classes which continued during the whole of their subsequent history. These were (i.) The Dorians of Laconia, or the Spartans proper, named Spartans from their concentrating themselves in Sparta, or Lacedasmon ; they were the sole possessors of political rights and privileges, and they were the landowners, living in independence on the rent. (2.) The Periceci, or dwellers around, the free inhabitants of the country towns and villages of Laconia ; they were chiefly of Archaean extraction ; they alone engaged in commerce and trade, and they also held the less fertile portion of the soil ; they did not possess any political rights or privileges. (3.) The Helots (Helotes) were the servile popu- lation. The origin of this class is said to have been the reduction to serfdom of the inhabitants of the town Helos in Laconia by Agis I., 1058 B.C., for neglecting to pay the tribute. The Helots were chiefly employed in cultivating the farms of the Spartans, to whom they paid a rent of one-half of the produce ; they constituted the greater part of the population after the Messenian wars, and they were treated with great cruelty and kept in a state of ignorance ; and, lest their numbers should become too formidable, a body of the Spartan youth formed a rural secret police (Crypteia), which went round occasionally to diminish them by assassination. 4. According to the legend the government of Sparta was vested in two kings from the time of the conquest. Aristodemos left twin sons, Eurysthenes and Procles ; and their mother, Argeia, wishing both to succeed to the throne, had refused to say which was born first ; the Delphic oracle, being appealed to, appointed both to be kings, 1102 B.C., but gave the precedence to Eurysthenes. After them the Spartan throne was always occupied by two kings con- jointly, one from the family of Eurysthenes, the Eurysthenidas or Agidae (from Agis I., the son and successor of Eurysthenes), and one from the family of Procles, the Procleidae or Eurypontidas(from Eurypon or Eurytion, the grandson of Procles). The legend may be perfectly accurate, but it is evident that this continuance of the division of power was a device to limit and curtail the royal author- ity ; it was part of the movement which was taking place in nearly every other state in Greece, the substitution of oligarchies, or the government of the few, for the heroic monarchies. 5. The Spartans having everything to fear from the hatred of their Achaean subjects and their slaves, were obliged to perpetuate in the state a kind of military organization, and to have always arms near them, and to be ready to use them, like an army encamped in * The name Lacedatmon (Aa') is applied in Homer both to the district and to the chief town ; later, it was restricted to the chief town Sparta, the usual Greek name for the country being Laconice (h AOKUIIKI;), in Latin, Laconica, or Laconia. The term Lacedaemonians (o \axfioinci>toi) was applied to the whole free population of the district of Laconia, including the Spartan citizens and the Periceci ; but Spartans (ol in-op-naTai) is restricted to the citizens of Sparta fen-apm), the Doric population that alone possessed civic rights. MILITARY ORGANISATION REGENCY OF LYCURGOS. 117 an enemy's country. Hence the singular character of the consti- tution and private life of the Spartans. Their famous legislator, Lycurgos, did not create these strange laws ; he found them already existing in the usages and manners of the people, and he merely gave them a definite expression. Lycurgos was the younger son of king Eunomos : his date is probably about 850 B.C.* His elder brother, Polydectes, succeeded to the throne on the death of Eunomos : but Polydectes, like his father, met a premature death. His widowed queen, then pregnant by him, proposed to Lycurgos to destroy the babe if he would share the throne with her : Lycurgos feigned consent till the son Charitaos was born, when he immediately proclaimed him king of Sparta, and, as his next of kin, assumed the regency ; but from the resentment of the queen and her friends, or to avoid all suspicion of designs on the crown of his infant nephew, he set out to visit Egypt, Crete, and Asia, proceeding, it was said, even as far as India. On his return, after an absence of eighteen years, Lycurgos found everything in disorder, and he was requested by all parties to reform the govern- ment. To add to the authority of the plans he proposed for a re- modelled constitution, civil and military, he consulted the oracle of the Delphic Apollo, whose authority was acknowledged throughout the whole of the countries around the Mediterranean ; and he was saluted by Apollo's priestess, the Pythia, as the friend of Zeus. Strengthened by this divine approval, he easily procured the accept- ance of his laws. He bound the people by an oath to observe his constitution till he returned to Sparta ; and he again went abroad and remained in voluntary exile till his death; and the time of his death, and his place of burial, were kept secret that the Spartans might not bring back his corpse, and be able to change his laws. The constitution of Sparta, as it existed in the historical age, was attributed to Lycurgos, but doubtless much of it was anterior or subsequent to his time. The changes introduced in the civil consti- tution by Lycurgos were comparatively unimportant ; his reforms aimed chiefly at developing and maintaining the physical excellence of the citizens, and the public discipline which he enforced was his most important measure. 6. In the civil constitution Lycurgos retained the division of the citizens into THREE TRIBES Hyllaei, Dymanes, and Pamphyli, which prevailed in all the Dorian communities, and the thirty OB^E or * There was inextricable confusion, even in ancient times, regarding the epoch of the great Spartan lawgiver. Herodotos states, and gives it as the statement of the Spartans themselves, that Lj'curgos was uncle and guardian of King Labotas, of the Eurystheneid, or JEgid, family of kings ; and, therefore, according to the received chronology, flourished about 996 B.C. All the other accounts made him a younger son of the Procleid family of kings. Aristotle, following Dieutychidas, placed him about 880 B.C., and Eratosthenes and Apollodoros somewhat later ; Thucydides between 830 and 820 B.C. ; and Xenophon at about noo B.C., and therefore contemporary with the Heracleid heroes. Among modern scholars, Grote places the Lycurgean legislation at not later than 825 B.C., and Clinton fixes the regency of Lycurgos at 852 B.C., and his legislation about thirty-five years later, 817 B.C. 118 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST T/A/$ TO 500 B.C. subdivisions of each tribe, the institution of which has been attri- buted by some to him. The power of the Kings was very much reduced and gradually usurped by the new magistrates, the Ephors, and even their most important privileges ; the supreme command of the army in foreign expeditions was curtailed in later times, two of the five Ephors always accompanying the royal commander. The kings were, however, always regarded with a feeling of religious reverence ; for, as the supposed descendants of Heracles, they con- nected the whole state with the gods, and guaranteed the possession of Laconia to the Dorian conquerors. Like the heroic monarchs, they were the high priests of the people, and offered monthly sacri- fices to Zeus. The royal estates were left them untouched ; their private fortunes were frequently increased by presents, and their death was the occasion of an extraordinary public lamentation. Lycurgos retained the Senate, or COUNCIL OF OLD MEN, the GEROUSIA (repovo-i'a). It consisted of thirty members, viz., the two kings, and twenty-eight citizens elected by acclamation in the popular assembly. The Gerontes, or citizen members of the Gerousia, were elected for life, and were irresponsible : they transacted nominally all affairs of state, and sat in judgment on capital crimes or offences of the kings; but their age, as no one could be elected who was less than sixty years old, was a bar to active participation in the govern- ment, and all real power was in the hands of their ministers, the EPHORS (?0opot, overseers). These officials, five in number, were in- stituted by Lycurgos, primarily to protect, like the Roman tribunes at a later epoch, the rights and liberties of the people. Hence, down to the latest times, every month an oath was interchanged between them and the kings, the kings swearing to act according to the law, and the Ephors that the royal authority, if thus exercised, should not be interfered with by them. But gradually these merely defen- sive functions of the Ephors grew into a general superintendence over all the powers in the state, and a censorship over every trans- gression of public order. Exempted during their year of office from the public discipline, the Ephors became supreme over every autho- rity in the state, with no recognised limit to their despotic powers. They usurped the military privileges of the kings, whose rights as hereditary commanders they reduced. They selected the Hippa- gretae, or leaders of the Hippeis, who chose from out of the Ephelei, or 3'ouths between 18 and 20, three hundred, called Hippeis, or knights, though they were not horsemen, to serve as the royal body- guard, a corps in the midst of which the king felt rather watched than guarded. The Ephors trenched even on the religious privileges of the kings, usurping the right of consulting the stars, and thus, by declaring the omens adverse, they could interrupt the exercise of the regal functions ; and hence they could suspend the kings, till Delphi, the supreme oracle for Sparta, allowed the resumption of their functions ; and on suspicion they could even imprison the king or a regent. In several cases, at their instance, the kings were tried and fined, and their houses were ordered to be destroyed. In the same way, and more readily from the age of the gerontes, the TklBES KINGS GERO USlA EPHORS. 119 powers of the Gerousia gradually passed to the Ephors. They obtained also in process of time judicial functions, sitting, either individually or collectively, for the trial of cases of great urgency, except in capital offences, which were tried by the senate, and with no written laws to hamper their decision. " In short, the ancient dignities and offices, the origin of which dated from the Homeric age, continue to pale into mere shadowy forms ; the royal power becomes a mere ornament of the state ; it is nothing beyond a sacred decoration, a standard still borne aloft on account of the reminiscences attaching to it, in order that the entire population, of all ranks and of every kind of descent, may flock around ; and in the same way the senate becomes more and more a mere honorary council in which certain families are prominently represented. The office of the Ephors is proportionately enlarged into an unlimited GYMNASTIC EXERCISES OF THE SPARTANS. power. Their presidency gives the names to the year, and they give unity to the state : to them the policy of Sparta owes its firm- ness and consistency ; their official residence is the centre of the state, the hearth of Sparta, close to which the sanctuary of Fear shows how severe a discipline abides in it. The Ephors were chosen out of the Dorian community of citizens, whose interests it had be- come their mission to represent against the Achaean royal power. The influence of the Dorians increases simultaneously with the authority of the Ephors. Externally Sparta retained her antiquated appearance, and the wanderer through her streets found no monu- ments dedicated to any but the gods and heroes of the early Achaeo- yEolic age. But internally a thorough transformation took place, and the strength of the Dorian people, invigorated and systematised by the laws of Lycurgos, penetrated deeper and deeper. Thus the state, whose essential institutions had originally been Achasan, be- came more and more a Dorian state." (Prof. WARD'S Translation of CURTIUS' History of Greece.) And thus while the Spartan govern- 120 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. ment remained in form a limited monarchy, it became in reality a close and unscrupulous oligarchy, the objectionable character of which was veiled by the annual change of the absolute Ephors. It is uncertain whether Lycurgos changed in any way the functions of the popular assembly, the 'AXi'a ; but in the historical times it possessed as little real power as its prototype, the assembly of the people under the heroic monarchies, or as, later, the Spartan Gerousia itself. Its meetings were merely formal, to ratify the decisions of the Gerousia, or to hear what had been done abroad ; and its voting was usually by acclamation. 7. The discipline enforced by the Lycurgean legislation was un- doubtedly the original feature in the reforms, and that which distinguished the Spartan from all the other Dorian communities. Its main point was the complete regulation of everything connected with family life, to such an extent that real family life was almost abolished. The government interfered at the birth of every child, and determined whether it should be reared or not ; all the deformed were put to death immediately after birth. At seven years of age, all boys were taken away from their parents, and handed over to the State teachers. The literary part of the education was very little attended to. Neither reading nor writing was regularly taught, and rhetoric and logic were as little cultivated as the other arts. Instead of pointed and logical reasoning, the Spartans expressed themselves by sententious and concise sayings, conveying as much meaning in as few words as possible, whence we have the adjec- tive laconic, from their name Laconians. Great brevity of speech was the characteristic of the race, and formed a remarkable contrast to the copious and headlong torrent of eloquence which distin- guished the Athenians. Boys were taught to give ready and pointed answers, and to impart a peculiar sharpness and brilliancy to their sayings ; and hence the Spartan fondness for the Doric lyric poetry, with its enigmatical compression, of which Pindar is the great master. The gymnastic part of the education was of great importance, the object of the teachers being to produce youths of the finest physical development for the military service of the State ; that every citizen might be a soldier in the highest state of efficiency. The physical training consisted of three grades, gymnastics proper, hunting, and drill. Great pains were taken to give youths dexterity in the use of arms, endurance under fatigue, and courage in braving peril and death ; to make them indifferent to physical pain they were beaten with rods before the altar of Artemis Orthia during her festivals ; those who bore the lash most patiently (bomo- niece) received a prize, and it was no uncommon occurrence for the victims of flagellation to expire at the altar without betraying their sufferings by a groan. The boys took their simple meals in public at the syssitia (o-vo-crma) or public messes, and slept in the public dormitories ; and at a certain age they were obliged to obtain their own food in any way they liked, and they might steal it, provided the theft was not discovered. The citizens of adult years were as little free as the boys ; their whole time was given to the service of THE DISCIPLINE OF LYCURGOS. 121 the state. They were occupied in athletic exercises, hunting, drills, and superintending the training of the boys. They had scarcely any family life at all, for they all eat at the syssitia of the same coarse food, slept in the barracks, and visited their homes only rarely, and, as it were, by stealth. As all the citizens were, in the earlier times at least, landowners, and received sufficient from the rent-chai'ge to support themselves, this very anomalous life, in which neither commerce nor agriculture nor any other remunerative business found a place, became possible. Women were subjected to the state training before marriage, but not subsequently. The girls were trained to athletic exercises very similar to those of the boys, but apart, except on some special occasions. Even mar- riage was entirely a matter of state regulation. No one was allowed to marry till of the legal age, and a heavy penalty was imposed on anyone who remained single after attaining that age ; but each was allowed to choose his o\vn wife ; violations of the sanctity of marriage were allowed by the law under certain circumstances. To prevent the citizens from abandoning public life, great impediments were thrown in the way of commerce ; the possession of gold and silver was forbidden by law, and the coinage consisted of heavy iron money. Polybios and Plutarch state that Lycurgos, to establish complete equality among the Spartans, distributed all the land in 9,000 equal lots, that being then the number of the citizens ; that one lot was assigned to each citizen, and was declared inalienable, in order that the distribution of wealth might be stationary, and that there might be neither poor nor rich in the state. Such a distribution of the soil was, however, unknown to the great authorities on Greek history and antiquities Herodotos, Thucydides, Xenophon, Isocrates, Plato, and Aristotle ; and Grote has shown that it is intrinsically improbable. 8. Sparta was not a mere type of the Dorian institutions : its system was, in the main, peculiar to itself, and the result of its own local circumstances. " The Spartans were certainly Dorians, who had established themselves by conquest in the midst of a primitive Greek population Achaean and Lelegian belonging to a different race. Towards these subjects they kept up a markedly hostile posi- tion; some, the Helots, were retained in absolute slavery; while the rest, the Periceci, were excluded from all civil rights. The polity was unequal as regarded the Periceci ; and it had this singu- larity the slave class were native Greeks, and not imported bar- barians. Now, the Doric Spartans were not entrenched in a strong acropolis, whence a despot, with the assistance of a body-guard, or a small band of oligarchs, could exercise their sway over a popula- tion of unarmed cultivators. Sparta was an open, unwalled town on the banks of the Eurotas ; protected, indeed, by strong frontiers and a harbourless coast from foreign attack, but exposed to domestic enemies. Hence, in order that their newly-founded state and exclusive power should continue, a peculiar system was needed. It was necessary that the Spartans should be a community of 122 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. soldiers a civil army of occupation permanently encamped in an enemy's country. They were enabled to fulfil this condition by the institutions of an early legislator, of whom, in detail, the later Greeks knew nothing authentic, but to whom the unanimous voice of posterity attributed the origin of the distinctive laws of Sparta. By what means he induced the Doric aristocracy to submit to the iron discipline by which their entire lives were regulated, we have no means of ascertaining : but the system, having been once estab- lished, was perpetuated, partly from habit and a respect for antiquity which was omnipotent at Sparta and partly from a sense of its necessity for maintaining the privileges of the Doric race. To this source are to be traced all the peculiar institutions of Sparta ; and particularly its celebrated iratfaia, or training, which was in fact nothing else than a drill. The Spartans despised all literature : they were a sort of military quakers, combining ostentatious sim- plicity with a steady pursuit of the virtues of the soldier; they did not even learn to read. We have a difficulty in conceiving an education which did not comprise reading and writing, and did not even include instruction in Homer, the corner-stone of Greek teach- ing. Such, however, was their system. It was a training of the body to endurance of hardships, and to the exercises of a military life ; not a mental education. All experience proves the efficacy of military training and discipline, against either numbers or courage without organisation and practice. This the Spartans had the sagacity to see; and, on account of their position, submitted to the privations necessary for the purpose. They may be compared in many respects with the Romans who, however, did more by organ- isation and civil government, and less by mere drill. The internal relations of the Romans were sounder; and although they started from a beginning as small as the Spartan state, they were soon able to operate upon a large scale, and their enmity was turned more against foreign than domestic foes. Their capacity, too, was higher, and the results consequently greater. The Spartans were stiff, unsocial, dry, austere, illiterate ; but their system generated a high spirit of military honour, courage, and patriotism, and of mutual reliance ; greater even than that of the other Greeks, and contrast- ing strongly with the military state of the Asiatics and barbarians, and with that imperfect discipline which lashed the troops into the fight. The character of the Spartan is so unattractive that there is a danger now of underrating it too much, as compared with the Athenian. The philosophers, however, fell into the opposite error. Their systematic minds were captivated with the orderliness of the Spartan constitution, and the public recognition of a system of training for all the citizens. They admired the means ; and only censured the exclusive devotion of a good system to an unworthy end." (Edinburgh Review.) To understand the Spartan polity we must bear in mind the antithesis of the ancient and modern notions as to the origin, essence, and object of the state. According to modern ideas the state is merely an institution for protecting the persons and property of the TH DORIAN CHARACTER AND RELIGION. 123 individuals contained in it ; whereas the ancients held that by re- cognition of the same opinions and principles, and the direction of actions to the same ends, the whole body politic should become, as it were, one moral agent. This unity of opinion and actions was far more complete among the Greeks than among modern nations, and it was, perhaps, nowhere so strongly marked as among the Dorian states, whose national views, with regard to political institutions, were most strongly manifested in the government of Sparta. The greatest freedom of the Spartan, and, in a less degree, of the Greeks in general, was only to be a living member of the body of the state ; whereas that which in modern times com- monly receives the name of liberty consists in having the fewest possible claims from the community, that is, in dissolving the social union to the greatest degree possible, as far as the individual is concerned. 9. The learned Ottfried Miiller presents the following estimate of the national character of the Dorians : " The first feature in the character of the Dorians which we shall notice, is one that has been pointed out in several places, namely, their endeavour to produce uniformity and unity in a numerous body. Every individual was to remain within those limits which were prescribed by the regulation of the whole body. Thus, in the Doric form of government, no in- dividual was allowed to strive after personal independence, nor any class or order to move from its appointed place. The privileges of the aristocracy, and the subjection of the inferior orders were main- tained with greater strictness than in other tribes ; and greater importance was attached to obedience, in whatever form, than to the assertion of individual freedom. The government, the army, and the public education were managed on a most complicated, but most regular succession and alternation of commanding and obey- ing. Everyone was to obey in his own place. All the smaller associations were also regulated on the same principle ; always we find gradation of power, and never independent equality. But it was not sufficient that this system should be complete and perfect within ; it was fortified without. The Dorians had little inclination to admit the customs of others, and a strong desire to disconnect themselves from foreigners ; hence, in later times, the blunt and harsh deportment of those Dorians who most scrupulously adhered to their national habits. This independence and seclusion would, however, sometimes be turned into hostility; and hence the military turn of the Dorians, which may also be traced in the development of the worship of Apollo. A calm and steady courage was the natural quality of the Dorians. As they were not ready to receive, neither were they ready to communicate outward impressions ; and this, neither as individuals nor as a body. Hence, both in their poetry and prose, the narrative is often concealed by expressions of the feelings, and tinged with the colour of the mind. They endeavoured always to condense and concentrate their thoughts, which was the cause of the great brevity and obscurity of their language. Their desire of disconnecting themselves from the things 124 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 fi.d. and persons around them, naturally produced a love for past times; and hence their great attachment to the usages and manners of their ancestors, and to existing institutions. The attention of the Doric race was turned to the past rather than to the future. And thus it came to pass that the Dorians preserved most rigidly, and repre- sented most truly, the customs of the ancient Greeks. Their advances were constant, not sudden ; and all their changes were ARISTOTELES. imperceptible. With the desire to attain uniformity, their love for measure and proportion was also combined. Their works of art are distinguished by this attention to singleness of effect, and everything discordant or useless was pruned off with an unsparing hand. Their moral system also prescribed the observance of the proper mean ; and it was in this that the temperance (o-vtypoo-vvr)}, which so distin- guished them, consisted. One great object of the worship of Apollo was to maintain the even balance of the mind, and to remove every- thing that might disquiet the thoughts, rouse the mind to passion, AND CUSTOMS OF THE DORIANS. 125 or dim its purity and brightness. The Doric nature required an equal and regular harmony, and, preserving that character in all its parts, dissonances, even if they combined into harmony, were not suited to the taste of the nation. The national tunes were, doubt- less, not of a soft or pleasing melody ; the general accent of the language had the character of command or of dictation, not of question or entreaty. The Dorians were contented with themselves, with the powers to whom they owed their existence and happiness ; and therefore they never complained. They looked, not to future, but to present existence. To preserve this, and to preserve it in enjoyment, was their highest object. Everything beyond this boundary was mist and darkness ; and everything dark they sup- posed the deity to hate. They lived in themselves, and for them- selves. Hence man was the chief and almost only object which attracted their attention. The same feeling may also be perceived in their religion, which was always unconnected with the worship of any natural object, and originated in their own reflections and conceptions. And to the same source may, perhaps, be traced their aversion to mechanical and agricultural labour. In short, the whole race bears generally the stamp and character of the male sex ; the desire of assistance and connection, of novelty and of curiosity, the characteristics of the female sex, being directly opposed to the nature of the Dorians, which bears the mark of independence and subdued strength. . . . Both in the development of modes of religion peculiar to that race, and in the adoption and alteration of those of other nations, an ideal tendency may be perceived, which considered the deity not so much in reference to the works or objects of nature, as to the actions and thoughts of men. Consequently, their religion had little of mysticism, which belongs rather to elemental worships; but the gods assume a more human and heroic form, although not so much as in epic poetry. Hence the piety of the Doric race had a peculiarly energetic character, as their notions of the gods were clear, distinct, and personal ; and it was probably connected with a degree of cheerfulness and confidence, equally removed from the exuberance of enthusiasm, and the gloominess of superstition. Funeral ceremonies and festivals, with violent lamentations, as well as enthusiastic orgies, were not suited to the character of the Dorians, although their reverence for antiquity often induced them to adopt such rites when already established. On the other hand, we see displayed in their festivals and religious usages a brightness and hilarity which made them think that the most pleasing sacrifice which they could offer to the gods was to rejoice in their sight, and use the various methods which the arts afforded them of expressing their joy. With all this, their worship bears the stamp of the greatest simplicity, and at the same time, of warmth of heart. The Spartans prayed the gods, ' to give them what was honourable and good ' ; and although they did not lead out any splendid processions, and were even accused of offering scanty sacrifices, still Zeus of Ammon declared that the calm solemnity of the prayers of the Spartans was dearer to him than all the sacrifices of the Greeks." 126 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. 10. The reforms of Lycurgos produced a marked effect on the other states of Peloponnesos by the impetus that \vas given to the Spartan power. One of the most powerful states in Peloponnesos hitherto had been Argos, which had rapidly attained to political im- portance after the return of the Heracleids. Her new Dorian in- habitants sent forth several colonies, as to Epidauros, Trcezen, Phlius, Sicyon, and Corinth, while its colonies threw off others, thus /Egina and Epidauros Limera were colonised from Epidauros, and Megara from Corinth. Argos, the . metropolis or mother city, exercised over the colonies almost the authority of a ruler. The government of Argos was that of a heroic monarchy, and the throne was possessed by the Temenidas, or descendants of Temenos the eldest son of Aristomachos the Heracleid. In the course of three centuries, however, the regal privileges were very much reduced, and the government, while retaining the monarchical form, had become almost republican. But a man of great vigour, Pheidon, ascended the throne in 780 B.C., and speedily recovered the whole of the royal prerogatives. In a short time he broke through even the slight checks that were imposed on the king in a heroic monarchy, and made himself an autocrat ; hence he is known as the first Greek tyrant. The vigour of his government soon af- fected the foreign relations of Argos, which became the leading state of Peloponnesos. Several colonies are believed to have been sent forth during his reign (780-744 B.C.), and by means of some of these, as Rhodes, Cos, and Halicarnassos, Argos was brought into communi- cation with the southern shores of Asia Minor. From Asia, Pheidon introduced into Argos the invention of coined money, and the system of weights and measures, usually called the ./Eginetan scale from having been first made generally known by the com- mercial activity of the ^Eginetans. On the death of this active and talented sovereign, the government reverted to its previous form and the power of Argos declined, partly from the absence of excellent rulers and the tyranical attitude assumed by Argos to her confede- rate cities, but chiefly from the rapid rise of Sparta after the Lycur- gan reforms. A series of petty wars had been -.vaged between the two rival cities, which were terminated about 554 B.C., by the cession, on the part of Argos, of a considerable region. The occa- sion for this last war was a dispute about the possession of Cynuria (or the Thyreatis), a mountainous tract, by which the Argives kept up communication by land with the rest of their territory, for Argos held all the eastern coast of Laconia as far as Cape Malea. To avoid a battle, the Spartans and Argives agreed that each side should choose 300 champions, and that the possession of Cynuria should be determined by wager of battle. Of the 300 Spartan champions, Othryades, alone survived ; but he was severely wounded. Of the 300 Argives, Alcenor and Chronius alone survived, and they were unwounded : not seeing any more enemies to oppose them, they hastened to bear to their fellow-citizens the news of their victory. Meanwhile, Othryades, who was lying on a pile of the slain, made a last effort, aud reared a trophy with the arms of the enemies THE FIRST MESSENIAN WAR, 743-724 B.C. 127 had fallen; he then stabbed himself with his sword, thinking it unworthy of a Spartan to survive his comrades. On the following day both camps claimed the victory, and it was necessary to decide the question by a general battle, in which the Spartans were victorious. Thereupon the Argives ceded the disputed tract and the whole of the western coast of Laconia. In 514 the Spartans gained another victory, which brought them up to the very gates of Argos. 11. The advance of Sparta upon Argos had been accompanied by corresponding successes over the other formidable communities in Peloponnesos. When the Dorians occupied the upper valley of the Eurotas, after the return of the Heracleidas, the Achseans still held the lower valley, between Sparta and the sea ; the Achaean strong- hold, Amyclas, was within t\vo miles of Sparta, and for three centuries it resisted the incessant assaults of the Spartans. During the same time Sparta made unavailing attempts on Arcadia, Messenia, and Argos. But on the adoption of the Lycurgan legis- lation, the tide of success turned. Amyclse fell in the generation succeeding Lycurgos, and within half a century the other Achaean strongholds, Pharis, Geronthrae, and Helos were taken, and the whole valley of the Eurotas fell under the Spartans, who had at first occupied only the tract between Taygetos and Parnon. 12. The aggrandisement of Sparta, by her successes over the Achaeans, and her gradual advance on Argos, prompted, from the mere lust of conquest, her Dorian inhabitants to attempt the subju- gation of their kinsmen, the Dorians of Messenia.* The contest consisted of two great wars. The account of the struggle which the ancients gave is to a considerable extent legendary. The First Messenian War (743-724 B.C.) is said to have arisen thus: A Spartan had stolen the flocks and killed the son of a Messenian, Polychares ; whereupon the latter came to Sparta to demand the punishment of the criminal, but the kings would not listen to his suit. Polychares, enraged at this treatment, posted himself on the * The earliest inhabitants of Messenia were Leleges, who were introduced into the country by king Polycaon, the youngest son of the legendary king, Lelex, of Laconia. Polycaon married Messene, the daughter of an Argive, Triopas, and sister of lasos, the father, according to some, of lo, and he called the country after her. Five generations later, there was an ^Jolian immigration under Perieres, son of ^Eolos, who became king. In the reign of Aphareus, the son and successor of Perieres, Neleus, the son of Poseidon, and Salmoneus 1 daughter, Tyro (afterwards wife of king Cretheus, of lolchos), having been expelled from Thessaly by his twin brother, Pelias, who had usurped the throne of lolchos from jEson, Jason's father, came to Messenia and was allowed to found Pylos, and govern the western coast of the country. On the extinction of the /Eolian dynasty of Perieres, the eastern part of Messenia was incorporated with the Atreid dominion in Laconia. Pylos, in the western part, became very powerful under Neleus and his son, the celebrated Nestor. On the return of the Heracleidae, the Dorian invaders, according to the legend, conquered all the country at once : but there te good reason for believing that under Cres- phontes and his son ^EpytoS, from whom the dynasty was called yEpytidae, at least, the Dorians were confined to the plain of Stenycleros. The .iCpytid, dynasty kept possession of th.e Mesgeni^n throne till the First Megseruan War, 128 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 B.C. Messenian frontiers and assassinated every Spartan who passed near. The Spartans in turn demanded satisfaction, and threatened war in the event of refusal ; the Messenians offered to submit the matter to arbitration, but the Spartans continued their preparations for war secretly. A Spartan expedition, the members of which bound them- selves by an oath not to return to Sparta before they had conquered Messeuia, at length marched forth and made a night attack on Ampheia, a border town and a fit place for a basis of operations. It was taken without any resistance, and its inhabitants were put to the sword, 743 B.C. The three first years of the war were passed in skirmishes and ravaging the country, but in the fourth year a great but indecisive battle was fought, and for a few years all the engage- ments were of a doubtful character. The war, however, was very exhausting, for the Messenians, as they were forced to main- tain garrisons in each town, while the agricultural labourers did not venture to cultivate the fields, the produce of which might be swept away by the Spartan troops, and the slaves were deserting in crowds. The horrors of famine, which followed the ravaging of the country, were increased by a plague. The Messenians now determined to abandon their towns and retire to Mount Ithome, an isolated ridge which commands the whole of Messenia, and which, from the steep- ness and ruggedness of its sides, formed a natural citadel. Mean- while they sent to consult the oracle, and received, for repty, that a virgin of the blood of ^Epytos (the son of Cresphontes and Merope, and king of Messenia) must be offered up by night as a sacrifice to the infernal gods ; and that failing such a one, a voluntary victim would appease them. The lot fell on the daughter of Lysiscos, but she and her father fled to Sparta. A Messenian chief, Aristo- demos, himself of the race of ^Spytos, offered his daughter, who was betrothed to a Messenian noble, but her lover claimed that as she was espoused the right of disposal of her belonged to him and not to her father, and that she was in reality even as his wife. Aristo- demos, enraged at this opposition, himself slew his daughter, and by investigation refuted the calumny : he then declared the com- mand of the oracle fulfilled. The Messenians, who had been thrown into great alarm, were now reassured, and the Spartans, correspond- ingly depressed, relaxed their efforts. The Messenians took advan- tage of this to enter into an alliance with the people, who already dreaded the ambition of Sparta, the Arcadians, the Argives, and the Sicyonians. The Spartans made no further attack for six years, when Theopompos marched against Ithome, and fought an indecisive action with the Messenians under Euphaes. Subsequently in a duel with Theopompos, Euphaes fell: Aristodemos was elected his successor on the throne of Messenia, notwithstanding the opposi- tion of soothsayers on the ground that his hand was stained with his daughter's blood ; and the mildness of his government won him the affection of all ranks. The Arcadians aided him on several occasions in making forays into Laconia. Five years later a great battle was fought between the Messenians, Arcadians, Argives, and Sicyonians, and the Spartans and Corinthians, in which the latter END FO THE FIRST MESSENIAN WAR. 129 suffered great loss. After this the Spartans attempted to make use of treachery. They banished a hundred of their citizens, hoping that they would be received in Messenia and would be able to betray the country that sheltered them ; but Aristodemos sent back the exiles, with the remark that " the crimes of the Spartans were new, but their tricks were very old." The Spartans were equally unsuccessful in their attempts to detach the allies whom the Messenians had gained. But their clever fulfilment of an oracle soon after raised their spirits. The Pythia, Apollo's priestess at Delphi, had replied to the Messenians sent to ascertain the god's will, that the gods would grant the Messenian land to these who should first place a hundred tripods around the altar of the temple of Zeus, at Ithome. The reply was communicated by a Delphian to the Spartans, one of whom, (Ebalos, made a hundred small tripods of clay and hid them in a sack ; and then v dressing himself up as a huntsman, and carrying a hunting net, he mingled with the country people and passed into Ithome with his sack ; and by night he offered the tripods to the god. The sight of them threw the Messenians into consternation, and Aristo- demos could not reassure them, for he saw that the hour of his country's ruin had come ; but he placed the wooden tripods, which were now made, around the altar of Zeus. Other portents seemed to confirm the destiny that they believed to be imminent. The brazen arms fell from the statue of Artemis, the rams that were to be sacrificed killed themselves by striking their heads against the altar ; the dogs, assembling in one place, howled every night, and at last went in a body to the Spartan camp ; and Aristodemos had a vision of his daughter, when she appeared to lay bare her blood- stained bosom, and to fly from his arms and seemed clad in the long white robe and the golden crown with which the Messenians dressed the bodies of the illustrious dead. Aristodemos now yielded to despair, and slew himself on his daughter's tomb. Deprived of their intrepid chief, the Messenians still resisted the attacks of the enemy and of famine ; but in the twentieth year of the war (724 B.C.) they were obliged to evacuate Ithome and dis- continue their resistance. A large number of the Messenians fled to Argolis and Arcadia. The town of Ithome was razed to the ground by the Spartans; and all the Messenians who remained in the country were reduced to the condition of Helots, and were com- pelled, men and women alike, to come to Sparta in black, to assist at the funerals of the Spartan kings and great personages. 13. For nearly forty years the Spartan yoke was submitted to by the Messenians, till a young hero, Aristomenes, arose and attempted the deliverance of his country by the Second Messenian War (685-668 B.C.). The oppressed people rose in unanimous response, and the Spartans found that they had the whole country to conquer again. Aristomenes struck terror into the Spartans by entering their city by night and affixing to the temple of Pallas AthenaChalci- cecos, i.e. of the Brazen House, a buckler with the inscription " Aristomenes to Pallas Athena, from the spoils of the Spartans." The Spartans in alarm consulted the Delphic oracle, and were told K 130 SPARTA PROM THE &ARUEST TIMES TO 500 6.0, that they must obtain a leader from the Athenians. The lattef were unwilling in any way to aid the development of the Spartan power, and yet feared to incur by refusal the wrath of the god ; they accordingly sent a lame and deformed schoolmaster, Tyrtasos. But though he possessed no military qualities, Tyrtaeos was most valuable to the Spartans. He was an elegiac poet of high rank, and his martial songs recalled their courage and stirred them up to emulate their predecessors in the First Messenian War. As one of the finest specimens of the Greek military marching songs, replete with fire and energy in sound and sense, may be cited one of the fragments of Tyrtaeos : /ryer', o Smipras evdydp KOVpOl TTCLTtpUiV TTO\11)TUI. Xdi p.fv ITVV 7rpo^a\(cr6f fiopv 8' curoX/Jcof p.?) (pfi86fj.(voi TO 9 fcodr, oit yap TTiirpiov TUS ^Trdpras . . " To the field, to the field, gallant Spartan band, Worthy sons, like your sires, of our warlike land ! Let each arm be prepared for its part in the fight, Fix the shield on the left, poise the spear with the right. Let no care for your lives in your bosoms find place, No such care knew the heroes of old Spartan race." (Col. MURE). Meanwhile at Caprusema, in the plain of Stenycleros, the Mes- senians under Aristomenes had obtained a great victory over the Spartans, breaking up division after division, till all were scattered in disorderly flight. Aristomenes himself was the most formidable foe with whom the Spartans had to contend, and he performed many adventurous exploits. One day he was taken prisoner by seven Cretan mercenaries of the Spartans, who stopped with him for a night at a house on the road. A girl in the house had dreamed the previous night that she should deliver a lion which wolves had seized, and recognising Aristomenes as the lion of her dream, she made his captors drunk and then freed him from his chains. Aris- tomenes slew the seven Cretans and gave the girl in marriage to one of his sons. The treachery of the Arcadian king, Aristocrates, who deserted the Messenian forces at the " Battle of the Great Trench" (Megaletaphros) soon compelled him to withdraw his bands to Mount Eira, where he maintained himself for eleven years, frequently issuing forth and carrying fire and sword into the heart of Laconia. In one of his expeditions he was surrounded by the Spartans, and felled to the ground with a stone. He was carried in- sensible, with fifty of his companions, and thrown into the Ceadas, a pit at Sparta into which malefactors were flung. The other Messenian prisoners were killed by the fall, but, according to the legend, Aristomenes was caught in his descent by the outspread wings of an eagle and reached the ground unhurt. He lay three days helpless, with his face covered with his robe and expecting the agonies of a death by starvation ; suddenly he heard a slight THE ESCAPE OF noise, and, uncovering his face, he raw, his eyes being now accus- tomed to the gloom and able to detect objects in it, a fox which was gnawing the corpses. Hoping to be able to escape by the same secret fissure through which the fox must have entered, he allowed the animal to approach him, and then seized it by the tail The fox took to flight, and Aristomenes, retaining his hold, 132 SPARTA FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 500 e.C, arrived at a small aperture, which he soon enlarged with his hands ; through this he escaped, and arrived in safety at Eira, where he offered a great sacrifice. The time appointed by the fates for the fall of Eira was now approaching. An oracle had declared that when a goat should drink in the winding river Neda, near Eira, the pro- tection of the gods would be withdrawn from the Messenians. To prevent the dreaded catastrophe, Aristomenes had caused all goats to be removed to a distance. But the same word, rpdyos, denotes in the Messenian dialect a species of wild fig-tree. Theoclus, the seer, observed that the branches of one of these trees projected over the Neda waters, and, that the extremities of its branches dipped in the river. The oracle was now fulfilled ; and Aristomenes was privately warned of this by his friend Theoclus. Shortly afterwards, on a stormy night, the Messenian guard on the most exposed part of the walls of Eira took refuge from the rain, which was falling in torrents in the neighbouring houses, till the storm had passed. A slave, who had deserted from the Spartans, observed this, and, to regain favour with his late masters, he passed to the Spartan camp and announced that the walls of Eira were then unguarded. The Spartans immediately armed themselves and advanced to the walls. The sounds of their approach were unheard, from the fury of the storm, and they had entered the city before they were discovered. Aristomenes himself was the first who observed them, and he at once called the Messenians to arms. They immediately responded to his summons, and even the women ascended the roofs of the houses to throw down tiles upon the Spartans. For three days a hand-to- hand encounter was waged in the streets of Eira, and during the whole of the time the storm continued with all its violence ; but the Spartans had not only the advantage of numbers, but also signs of the favour of the gods, for the lightning repeatedly flashed on their right. Aristomenes, after his faithful companion, the seer Theoclus, had flung himself on the swords of the enemy, signalled to the Spartans that he wished to retire with his few followers ; the enemy did not want to reduce the lion-hearted general to despair ; he was allowed to place the old men, the women, and the children in the midst of his warriors and march out of Eira with the fortunes of Messenia (668 B.C.). Most of the Messenians who remained in the country were again reduced to the condition of Helots, but a portion received the privileges of the Periceci. 14. The indefatigable Aristomenes did not despair of his country's ( - cause. From Messenia he retired to Arcadia, where he proposed to *. the 500 Messenians who followed him, to make a sudden invasion of Laconia and to seize Sparta, which was umvalled, or, at least, to get possession of some important hostages. The project was received with enthusiasm, and 300 Arcadians volunteered their aid. But Aristocrates, king of Orchomenos, in Arcadia, betrayed the plan to the Spartans ; he was stoned to death by the infuriated Arcadians. Shortly after the failure of his project by this treachery, Aristomenes went to Delphi. While he was there, Damagetus, king of lalysus in Rhodes, came to consult the oracle on the choice of a TRIUMPH OF SPARTA OVER HER ENEMIES. 133 u ife. The Pythia having told him to marry the daughter of the bravest of the Greeks, the king concluded that the daughter of Aris- tomenes alone could be thus designated, and he therefore sought her hand. Aristomenes gave his consent, and accompanied his daughter and her husband to Rhodes. His hatred against Sparta still continued, and he was engaged in stirring up new enemies against her when death overtook him. His memory was fondly cherished by his exiled countrymen. When. Aristomenes had pro- ceeded with his band from Eira to Arcadia, the Messenians of Pylos and Mothone went on board their vessels, with their families and goods, and proceeded to Cyllene, the sea-port of Elis. They then opened up communications with their countrymen, who had retired with Aristomenes to Arcadia, and agreed to form a settlement in a foreign country. They received, as leaders, Gorges and Manticles, the sons of Aristomenes, and set sail for Rhegium, now Reggio, on the western coast of the southern termination of the Italian penin- sula, to which place several of their countrymen had accompanied a Chalcidian colony after the First Messenian War. Two centuries later a Messenian, Anoxilas, seized the government of Rhegium, constituting himself the tyrant, and conquered Zancle (Sickle, so named from the shape of its harbour), a city of Sicily on the straits separating that island from Italy. Zancle had been originally colonised from Chalcis, in Eubcea, and had received, in 494 B.C., an accession of Samians : Anoxilas and his Messenians from Rhegium now expelled the inhabitants of Zancle, and took possession of the town, which they named anew, in honour of their own country, Messene or Messana, now Messina, and in their new home they played an important part in the history of Sicily and Italy. 15. Notwithstanding the fictions with which the account of the Messenian wars is embellished, the result of the struggle is clear. Sparta now ruled all Peloponnesos south of Cynuria and the Neda, and her dominions were speedily increased by a war with Tegea, and by the termination of the series of petty wars with Argos, which have been referred to above. The war with Tegea, one of the Arcadian cities, is also adorned by a famous legend. The Spartans consulted the god of Delphi, who replied that they would be vic- torious over the Tegeans if they were to bear to their city the bones of Orestes, Agamemnon's son. ' Ecrri ris 'ApKa8ir]s Tey/77 \(vpa> eVt %u>p(d. evd J avefjioi Ttveiovcri 8110 Kpareprjs vrr' dvuyicrjs, Kai TVTTOS aVTLTVTTOS, KCll TTrjp,' (Ttl TTTJ/iaTl Kf'iTUl' end' J AyafJ.ffJ.voi>i8r^v Kare^fi i>), was elected by the nobles for life, and was theoretically at least, responsible, but this dignity was confined to DWistoN iNfo ?&IB$-THE AkctioMs. 143 the descendants of- the Neleid Codros. Medon, a younger sou of Codros, was elected Archon, on the recommendation of the Delphic oracle ; his brothers, whose dissensions about the succession were doubtless the occasion of this limitation of the regal tenure, emi- grated to Asia Minor, where they founded several of the Ionic colonies. There can be little doubt that this abolition of the monarchy was really due to the gradual development of the influ- ence of the aristocracy, the Eupatridae. At this period the whole people were divided into four tribes, the Teleontes, or Geleontes, variously rendered as priests or farmers, the Hopletes, the warriors, the ^Egicoreis, the goatherds, and the Argadeis, the labourers or husbandmen ; this division was common to all the Ionic peoples, and seems to imply the early existence of something like caste feeling in Greece. The tribes were subdivided into fraternities ((pparpim) and clans (yeVjj), a division probably based on the principle of consanguinity ; and into thirds (rpiTTi'ts) and nau- craries (vavKpupim) ; this distribution being made for state purposes, for taxation, military and naval service, &c. There was besides a recognition of three distinct classes in the community, the Eupatridae ((virarpiScu) , or aristocracy, the Geomori (ytcopopoi), or farmers, and the Demiurgi (S^/ztoupyoi) , or artisans. Of these classes the Eupatridae alone possessed political power ; all the offices were monopolised by them, and from them the members of the Senate, or Council (jSoiAij), which sat on the Areopagos, Hill of Mars, were drawn. The king had kept this class in check, but their influence had now surpassed that of the royal family. The life archonship lasted for about three centuries (1050-1752 B.C.). The life archons were Medon, 1070 B.C. ; Acastos, 1050 ; Archippos, 1014; Thersippos, 995; Phorbas, 954; Megacles,923 ; Diognetos, 893 ; Pherecles, 865 ; Ariphron, 846; Thespios, 826; Agameston,799; yEschylos, 778; and Alcmseon, 756. During this long period scarcely anything occurred of historical interest beyond the great migration to Asia from Attica of the lonians, Minyans, and other refugees. The power of the Eupatridae was, however, continually on the increase, and on the death of Alcmaeon, in 754 B.C., they made a further change in the archonship, by which the responsibility in theory of the holder of that office was made a reality ; this was the institution of the decennial archonship, or limitation of the tenure of the office to ten years, so that the ex-archons were now liable to a prosecution for mal-administration. The dignity was still restricted to the Medontidae, as the descendants of Codros were now called, from the first life archon, Medon ; but on the deposition of the fourth decennial archon, in 714 B.C., for cruelty, their privileges were abolished and the office was opened to all the Eupatridas. The seven decennial archons were Charops, 754 B.C. ; yEsimedes, 744 ; Clidicos, 734; Ilippomanes, 724; Leocrates, 714; Apsander, 704 ; and Eryxias, 694. 7. After the decennial archonship had lasted seventy years, the Eupatridae, on the expiration of the tenure of office of Eryxias in 684 B.C., completed their reforming movement by substituting an 144 ATHENS FROil THE EARLIEST TIMES TO 527 B.C. annual for a decennial archonship, and at the same time vesting the office in a Board of Nine, instead of in the hands of one man. The chief of the commission was called the Archon Eponumos, as giving his name to the year ; his duty was to determine all causes between husband and wife, to exercise a supervision over orphans and wills, and to punish drunkenness and riotous living. The second archon, called Basileus, or king, presided over the priestly families, punished impiety, offered up public sacrifices, assisted at the Eleusinian and other great festivals, and sat in the council of the Areopagos ; the wife of the Archon Basileus had to be of pure Athenian blood and of unsullied virtue. The third, the Archon Polemarchos, was, till 510 B.C., commander-in-chief ; he superin- tended foreign residents, and the families of those who had lost their lives for their country. The other six archons, called Thesmo- thetac, received complaints against persons accused of impiety, bribery, and bad behaviour, settled disputes among citizens, and redressed the wrongs of strangers. From this period the history of Athens may be regarded as authentic. 8. The division of the supreme power might have been an advantage if it had not been restricted to a particular class, or if it had been accompanied by other changes, giving the other classes the protection which they had lost by the abolition of royalty. But the measure had been conceived entirely in the interests of the Eupatridae; and to such an extent had the influence of these now increased that the Agora (dyopd), or Assembly of the People, rarely met, and transacted business only in a formal manner. As there were no written laws, and all the political privileges, the whole government, and the whole administration of justice were in the hands of the Eupatridae, it was inevitable that great oppression should result, and that the two other classes, who possessed no political privileges and were in all lawsuits entirely at the mercy of the aristocracy, should become discontented. The popular discontent reached its height in 624 B.C., sixty years after the complete triumph of the aristocracy (684), when the Geomori and Demiurgi presented a demand for a written code. The Eupatridrc were forced to yield in appearance, but the draw- ing up of the code was entrusted to one of their own order, Draco, whose name has become proverbial for severity. By his laws death was made the penalty for almost every kind of crime, and the lives of the citizens were now entirely at the disposal of the nobles. Still the codification was a distinct victory on the part of the people ; for the aristocracy had conceded the principle, and the severity of the laws by which the latter hoped to crush the rising democratic spirit only gave an impetus to the movement. 9. Cylon, an Athenian nobleman of great wealth, who had dis- tinguished himself as a victor at the Olympic games in 640 B.C., took advantage of the increasing discontent to seize, with a hired band, the citadel of Athens, the Acropolis, and attempt to make himself the tyrant. The Eupatridae, however, immediately caused the Acropolis to be blockaded. When provisions and water failed, EPIMENIDES SOLON FIRST CIRRH&AN WAR. 145 Cylon escaped from the citadel ; his supporters took refuge as suppliants at the altar of Athena. The Archon Megacles, one of the powerful family of the Alcmaeonidae, persuaded them to come before him for judgment, and that they might not lose their privi- lege of asylum, they kept in their hands, as they went to the judg- ment seat, a thread, the one end of which was attached to the statue of the goddess. When the suppliants were passing near the temple of the Eumeuides, or Furies, the thread broke. Megacles declared that this accident proved that Athena refused them her protection, and he caused those who were without the temple to be stoned to death, while those who fled to the altars were butchered even at the sacred places. The people, who had hoped to obtain some amelioration of their condition if Cylon suc- ceeded, were exasperated still more against the Eupatridae, and their superstitious feelings were aroused by the guilt of sacrilege which the nobles had incurred through the massacre of the sup- pliants. Athens was soon after visited by a pestilence, which was believed to be sent by the deities whose sanctuaries had been violated. A venerated man, the sage of Crete, Epimenides, the son of Agia- sarchos and Blasta, and famous for his sleep of fifty-seven years in a cave, was invited by the Athenians to visit them, and offer expiatory sacrifices. On his arrival, in 595 B.C., the sage informed them that the gods demanded a human victim ; two youths, Crateinos and Aristodemos, united in intimate friendship, offered themselves to the sacrificial knife. When Epimenides set out again for Crete, he declined the great presents which were offered him, and took only a branch from the sacred olive-tree of Athena, and he advised the people to follow the advice of one of their own number, Solon. 10. Solon, the politician whom Epimenides had recommended, was then in his forty-third year, having been born in 638 B.C. ; he was one of the Eupatrida;, and a descendant of Codros, but from his father's extravagance his family were in such poor circum- stances that he had in early life to betake himself to trade. He first became prominent in politics about 600 B.C., on the occasion of the quarrel between Athens and Megara for the Isle of Salamis. The Athenians, having suffered several defeats, had resolved to let the Megarians take possession of the isle, and had passed a law by which the penalty of death was decreed against anyone who should propose to attack again the island. Solon for a time counterfeited madness, to escape from his responsibility to the law, and then rushed one day into the Agora, and recited an elegiac poem, which he announced had been dictated to him by Apollo, and which called upon his countrymen to attempt to regain Salamis. His enthusiasm was imparted to the assembled citizens, and it was resolved by acclamation to fit out another expedition, of which Solon himself was made general. After a protracted war, in which the Athenians met with varying success, Sparta was chosen arbiter, and the island was assigned to Athens. Solon subse- L 146 ATHENS FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES Td 527 fi.C. quently took an active part in instigating the First Sacred, or the Cirrhasan War (595-586 B.C.). ii. This contest is also called the Crissaean War, Crissa being a town a little inland of the Crissaean Gulf, and Cirrha its port at the top of the bay. Several authorities consider that these are but different names of the same place, but there is good evidence, from the examination of the topography of the district by Ulrichs, that they were distinct places, and that the port had now out- grown in importance the old town, Crissa, and hence the usual name of the war, Cirrhasan. The inhabitants of the two towns possessed the fertile plain of Phocis, extending from Delphi to the sea, and naturally they derived great advantage from the concourse of pilgrims, who disembarked at their port to repair to the oracle. Merchants used to resort with their wares to the same place, and the Cirrhasans soon imposed taxes on their imports ; the customs dues were gradually augmented, and at last, not satisfied with this revenue, the Cirrhasans imposed a tax on the pilgrims. The Del- phians, finding the number of pilgrims decreasing, complained of this infraction of the decree of the Amphictyons, who had declared that the oracle should be accessible to all without expense. The people of the "divine Crissa" (Kpi /3ovXi}), from its place of meeting on the rocky eminence a little \vest of the Acropolis, to distinguish it from the Boule which met in the Ceramlicos within the city was a body of very great antiquity, and acted as a criminal tribunal, its members being, in all probability, taken from the aristocracy only, like the Court of Ephetae (fj.iKoi), poets who wrote maxims, as Solon, Theognis, Phocylides, of Miletos, 530 B.C. The seven sages of Hellas men who were actively engaged in the affairs of public life, and wrote brief maxims were among these Gnomic poets. Their names are variously given ; but those most generally admitted are Solon, Thales, of Miletos, 600 B.C., Pittacos, Periander, 620 B.C., Cleobulos, of Lindos, in Rhodes, 564 B.C., Chilon, of Sparta, 590 B.C., and Bias, 550 B.C., of Priene, in Ionia. 5. The half-century succeeding saw the rapid rise of tragedy and of history and the perfection of lyric poetry. The drama originated in the workshop of Dionysos or Bacchos. At the village festivals the principal object of reverence was this god ; and, as he was held to be typical of the first generating principle, the phallos was his most conspicuous emblem. At these meetings there were two kinds TtJE WORSHIP OP BACCHOS. 243 of poetry, the one in honour of the god, the dithyramb, set in the Phrygian mode, and therefore accompanied by flutes ; the other, Phallic songs, or ludicrous and satirical effusions, interspersed with mutual sarcasms and jests ; from the former tragedy * was eventually * Tragedy (rp^a/a), etymologically means goat-song (rp^cr and <**';) : it was so named because at the representation of early tragedies a goat was sacrificed 244 LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY, AND ART. developed ; from the latter, comedy.* This first stage of dramatic representations was succeeded by one in which the actor prepared beforehand some story, which he represented partly by narration, partly by dancing and gesticulation. The drama then passed from an extemporaneous song into an act. The period when comedy underwent this change is unknown ; but it flourished early in the Doric communities, and it was introduced into Attica from Megara between 580-564 B.C., and the first Attic representations were given at the deme Icaria, which was a great seat of the worship of Dionysos. A considerable period, however, elapsed before it developed itself on its new soil, and it continued to have little plot at Athens till the beginning of the fourth century B.C. The corresponding change in tragedy is connected with the name of Thespis, who was a native of the deme Icaria, and lived in the time of Peisistratos. His first representation is placed in 535 B.C. Before, only a chorus had taken part in the performance. He added one actor, both to give rest to the chorus and to act independently of it, and by changes of dress, and by linen masks, this actor was able to assume different characters. His immediate successors were Chcerilos, who began to exhibit about 523 B.C. ; Phrynichos, 511-476 B.C , who was fined for putting on the stage the fall of Miletos and termination of the Ionic Revolt ; and Pratinas, a Dorian of Phlius, who removed to Athens, and began to exhibit about 500 B.C. During the rise of tragedy at Athens, comedy made great progress in Syracuse. Epicharmos, who was born at Cos about 540 B.C., and spent his boyhood at Megara, and his youth and manhood at Syracuse, was in high favour at the Court of Hiero. The comedies which he wrote had a regular plot, and raised the stage from mere buffoonery. He was a Pythagorean philosopher; and his plays abounded with philosophical and moral maxims. 6. The rise of the Drama was contemporary with the rise of history and prose writing. The philosopher Anaximander, 580 B.C., wrote geographical works. The earliest prose writer of importance was Hecataeos, of Miletos, who flourished some time before and during the Ionic revolt. History, genealogy, and geography were as yet all combined. In his " Circuit of the Earth " he embodied the results of his extensive travels in Europe, Asia, Egypt, and Libya, with historical information, and in his four books of " Gene- alogies," or " Inquiries," he gave an account of the legends of the Hellenes. The next writer of any note, Charon, of Lampsacos, who flourished about 480 B.C., gave geographical and historical informa- tion about Persia, ^Ethiopia, and Hellas. To Scylax, of Caryanda, in Caria, who was sent by Dareios I. on a voyage of discovery down to Dionysos, from its destroying the vine, or because a goat was the prize, or because the actors were clothed in goat-skins. * Comedy (Ktanyiia.) etymologically means either the revel-song (KU>H Comedy was also called trugctdia (rpvi^tiaj, from rpi>f (must, or wine with' the lees in it,) and fin, either because the singers smeared their faces with lees a* a ludicrous disguise, or because the prize was new wine, DEVELOPMENT OF LYRIC POETRY. S 245 the Indus, some have ascribed the extant " Periplus," or Coasting Voyage. Hellanicos, of Mytilene, who was born about 490 B.C. and lived till 411 B.C., wrote a number of genealogical, chronological, and historico-geographical works. But all these names are insigni- ficant beside that of the Father of History, Herodotos. He was the son of Lyxes and Dryo, born at Halicarnassos, in Asia Minor, about 484 B.C. To avoid the tyranny of Lygdamis, he fled to Samos, and subsequently travelled in Egypt and Greece. He returned to Hali- carnassos, and took part in the expulsion of the tyrant. He agcvn left, and took up his residence at Athens, from whence he went with the colony that was sent to Thurii, in Italy, where he settled. He lived to see the fall of the Athenian empire. In his thirty -ninth year, 445 B.C., Herodotos recited his great History at the Olympic games, and received such approval that each of the nine books received at once the name of a Muse. His history is written in the Ionic dialect, though he was a Dorian, and is the first great historical composition of the Hellenes. Its theme is the wars of the Persians against Hellas, but it includes an account of all the great nations of antiquity, with geography, mythology, &c. Herodotos also wrote a lost history of Assyria and Arabia. 7. While the Drama and History were being developed, Lyric Poetry attained its highest perfection under two poets and two poetesses. Simonides, of Cos, who was born about 556 B.C., amassed a large fortune by acting as a poet laureate to several Hellenic states, supplying them with odes for festivals and victories. He died in 467 B.C. His poetry, of which only some fragments exist, was dis- tinguished for elegance and sweetness, rather than vigour. He is said to have added the letters 17, o>, , ty to the Greek alphabet. Myrtis, a native of Authedon, in Bceotia, was a celebrated lyric poetess about 530 B.C. She is said to have been the instructress of Corinna and Pindar. Corinna, the daughter of Archelodoros, and a pupil of Myrtis, was a native of Tanagra, near Thebes, and flourished 510 B.C. She five times obtained a poetical prize when Pindar was her competitor ; probably her beauty contributed to the success of her odes. Pindar was born at Cynoscephalae, 523 B.C., and lived at Thebes. It was fabled that when he was young a swarm of bees settled on his lips, and left some honey on them. He first gained fame by winning a prize over Myrtis, but he was unsuccessful in his contests with Corinna. Pindar speedily became famous, and, like his predecessor Simonides, acted as poet laureate to the states and tyrants through- out Greece. He died full of honours, 442 B.C. His extant poems are four books of Epinicia triumphal odes called respectively Olympian, Pythian, Nemean, and Isthmian ; he also wrote encomia, dirges, hymns, and paeans, of which only fragments exist. His poetry was highly esteemed by the ancients, but it is considered very obscure by modern scholars. 8. The same generation saw the improvement of Tragedy under ^schylos, and the next its perfection under Sophocles and Euri- pides. Pratinas had introduced a change into the manner of repre- senting tragedies ; he made it usual to represent three tragedies on 246 LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY, AND ART. heroic subjects, followed by a Satyric drama,* or farce, to which the chorus of Satyrs was confined, instead of taking part in the tragedies. The set of three tragedies was called a Trilogy, and when * The Satyric Drama never possessed an independent existence ; it was given as an appendage to several tragedies, and was apparently always considerably shorter. In external form it resembled tragedy, and the materials were in like manner mythological. It is distinguished from tragedy by the kind of person- ages it admits ; by the catastrophe, which is never calamitous ; and by the strokes of pleasantry and buffoonery, which constitute its principal merit. It differs from comedy by the nature of the subject, by the air of dignity which reigns in some of the scenes, and the attention with which it avoids all per- sonalities. The scene presented to view groves, mountains, grottoes, and land- scapes of every kind. The personages of the chorus, disguised under the grotesque forms attributed to the satyrs, rural demigods, sometimes executed lively dances, and sometimes discoursed in dialogue, or sang with the gods or heroes ; and from the diversity of sentiments and expressions there resulted a striking and singular contrast. The distinctive mark, therefore, of the Satyric Drama was a chorus consisting of satyrs who accompanied the adventures of the fable with lively songs, gestures, and movements. The immediate cause of this species of drama was derived from the festivals of Bacchos, where satyr-masks were a common disguise. As the chorus was thus composed of satyrs, and they performed the peculiar dances alluded to, it was not a matter of indifference where the poet should place the scene of his fable. The scene must be where such a choir might naturally, according to Hellenic fancy, display itself; not in cities or palaces, but in a forest, or a retired valley, or on a mountain or the sea-shore. The great tragedians, jEschylos, Sophocles, and Euripides, all distinguished themselves by pieces of this kind ; but those who specially devoted their talents to these compositions were Achaeos, of Eretria, in Eubcea, who con- tended with Sophocles, 457 B.C., and who, though he gained the prize only once, was esteemed by some ancient critics inferior to ^Eschylos only in this depart- ment, and Hegemon of Thasos, who flourished at Athens 410 B.C. The latter added a new charm to the Satyric Drama by parodying several well-known tragedies. It was during the representation of his " Battle of the Giants," and whila the audience were in a violent fit of laughter, that the news arrived of the defeat of the army in Sicily. The " Cyclops " of Euripides is the only drama of this kind that has come down to us. Its subject is drawn from Homer's Odyssey Odysseus depriving Polyphemos of his eye, after having made him drunk with wine. In order to connect with this a chorus of satyrs, the poet re- presents Silenos and his sons, the satyrs, as seeking over every sea for Bacchos, who had been carried away by pirates. In the search they are wrecked upon the shores of Sicily, enslaved by the Cyclops, and forced to tend his sheep ; when Odysseus is cast upon the same shore, they league with him against their master, but their cowardice renders them very poor assistants to him, while they take advantage of his victory and escape from the island by embarking with him. The piece derives its chief value from its rarity, and from being the only speci- men from which we can form an estimate of the species of composition to which it belongs. It is important not to confound this satyrical drama of the Hellenes with the Roman poems called "Satires," or medleys, of which Horace and Juvenal are the models, and which sprang from the rustic extemporaneous farces of Campania, called "Atellane Fables," and " Fescennine Verses," the last also giving birth to Roman Comedy under Livius Andronicus. It may be remarked here, however, that the Hellenes had satire in various forms, both in poetry and prose. The " Margites " of Homer is a sort of epic satire ; of the lyric kind the iambics of Archilochos, of Simonides, of Amorgos, and of Hip- ponax, of Ephesos, the inventor of Choliambics, were specimens. There was also a class of metrical compositions, at once ludicrous and sarcastic, called "Silli " (zi\\o<), which some have designated didactic satire, as they seem to have ridiculed especially the pretensious of ignorance ; they were a sort of parody, in GREEK POETS AND PHILOSOPHERS. 247 the satyric play was included, a Tetralogy. The plays were only exhibited on the occasions of the great festivals, and all their sub- jects were taken from the popular mythology ; their representation formed an integral part of the religious services, and several trilogies or tetralogies were exhibited in a day, the prize being awarded to the one who produced the best set of dramas. The public competition, common in every branch of culture throughout Hellas, was a great stimulus, and well calculated to force intellectual development. ^Eschylos, the son of Euphorion, and brother of Cynaegeiros, born about 525 B.C., took part in the battles of Marathon, Salamis, and Platasa. He wrote ninety tragedies, of which forty gained prizes, but only seven remain, namely the " Prometheus Bound," the " Seven against Thebes," the " Persians," the " Aga- memnon," the " Choephoras," the "Eumenides," and the "Sup- pliants." He introduced two actors, gave suitable dresses, and removed the commission of murder from the stage. His imagina- tion was strong and comprehensive, but too wild, fruitful in prodi- gies, but disdaining probabilities, and his style is obscure. He was accused of impiety and condemned, but pardoned, it is said, on his brother Amynias uncovering an arm of which the hand was lost at Salamis. On the democratic reforms of Ephialtes and Pericles, ^Eschylos withdrew to Sicily, where he was killed in 456 B.C. by an eagle dropping a tortoise on his bald head which it mistook for a stone. His younger rival, Sophocles, the son of Sophillos, was born at Colonos, in Attica, 495 B.C. He received a liberal education, and from his skill in music and dancing he was chosen, when sixteen, by the Athenians, to lead the chorus that danced around the trophy erected in honour of the victory of Salamis. The first tragedy of Sophocles was represented in 468 B.C., when his competitor was ^Eschylos. Party spirit was so much evoked that the archon hesitated to name the judges ; when the victorious Cimon and his nine colleagues entered the theatre they were at once sworn as judges. They awarded the prize to Sophocles, whereupon ^Eschylos retired from Athens for a time. In 440 B.C. Sophocles was one of the generals, with Pericles, at the siege of Samos, and in the following years his star paled before that of his young rival, Euripides. In his old age he was charged with imbecility by his son lophon, who was jealous of the old man's affection for a grandson, Sophocles ; but the judges at once dis- missed the case when the poet read to them the magnificent chorus which the verses of well-known poets, especially Homer, were applied in a ludicrous manner to the object of the satire. The philosopher, Xenophanes, of Colophon, is regarded as the first author of this kind, but the only one who is certainly known to have composed " Silli " is Timon, the sceptical philosopher of Phlius, about 279 B.C., who wrote, in three books of hexameters, the first in the form of an address by himself, and the other two a dialogue between himself and Xenophanes, a sarcastic account of the tenets of all philosohers, living and dead, except the Pyrrhonists, to which sect he belonged ; a work of which only a few fragments exist. The prose satire of the Hellenes, of which the principal writers were Lucian the Syrian, A.D. 150, and the Emperor Julian, A.D. 360, belongs to a very late period, . , 248 LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY, AND ART. GREEK MEN OF LETTERS AND PHILOSOPHERS HERODOTOS, ARISTOPHANES, SOPHOCLES, SOCRATES. SOPHOCLES AND EURIPIDES. 249 from his " CEdipus Coloneios, verses 668-719. He died in 406 B.C., aged eighty-nine. Of his one hundred and thirty plays, eighty-one of which were written after he was fifty-four years of age, only seven are extant, namely, the " Trachinise," the " Ajax " (Telamonian), the " Philoctetes,'' the " Electra," the " CEdipus Tyrannos," the " CEdipus Coloneios," and the " Antigone." Sophocles added another actor, so that there were now three ; he also broke the con- nection in the trilogy, so that the three tragedies might be on different subjects. The last of the three great Athenian tragic poets, Euripides, was born at Salamis on the day of the defeat of Xerxes' expedition, 23rd Sept., 480 B.C. He studied eloquence under Prodicos, ethics under Socrates, and Physics under Anaxa- goras. When he applied himself to the drama, he often retired to a solitary cave near Salamis, where he finished his best pieces. The hostility between him and his senior Sophocles gave opportunity to Aristophanes to ridicule them both ; the ridicule and envy to which he was continually exposed at length obliged him to retire to the Court of king Archelaos, of Macedonia, where he was well received. When walking alone he was attacked by Archelaos' dogs and torn to pieces, 406 B.C. Euripides was majestic in person, and his de- portment was always grave and serious. He was such an enemy to women as to receive the name of Misogynist (fjna-oyvvrjs) ; he was, however, twice married, but was divorced from both wives. He was very slow in composing, but he wrote seventy-five tragedies, of which only nineteen are extant. He is peculiarly happy in delineat- ing the passion of love, and, as Aristotle remarks, he represented men, not as they ought to be, as Sophocles did, but as they are. His compositions became so popular throughout Hellas that the unfortunate companions of Nicias in Sicily obtained their freedom by reciting passages from his compositions. 9. Comedy rose to importance, with equal speed, and in con- nection with this period, called that of the Old Comedy, 10393 B - c - are three great names Cratinos, Eupolis, Aristophanes. Hitherto the comic poets had aimed only at exciting laughter; Cratinos turned comedy into a powerful weapon for attacking by name the most prominent persons of the day. The comic poet now became a censor of public and private life, corresponding, but in a very exaggerated form, to the caricaturists of modern times. Only a few fragments remain of the twenty-one plays of this great comic writer. His first play was exhibited in 454 B.C., and he gained altogether nine prizes. Cratinos was very much addicted to in- toxication, yet he lived till he was ninety-seven (431 B.C.). Eupolis first exhibited in 429 B.C., and he died about eighteen years after- wards. There were constant recriminations of plagiarism between him and Aristophanes ; but his popularity did not ensure the pre- servation of his works. Aristophanes, the best known, from the number of his preserved works, of all the ancient comic poets, was the son of one Philip, of JEgma., and was born 444 B.C. He lived till 380 B.C. He wrote fifty-four comedies, of which only eleven remain. His poems were characterised by great wit, but disfigured by licen- 250 LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY, AXD ART. tiousness. The virulence and personality of the Old Comedy culmi- nated in Aristophanes, and in consequence a law was passed for- bidding the comic writers from referring to or representing any living persons on the stage. The subsequent period is called that of the Middle Comedy. 10. It was among the prosperous cities of Ionia that Hellenic philosophy first dawned, and that men first departed from the mythological explanation of nature, and endeavoured to find an explanation of the universe in some fixed law. The earliest of these was Thales, of Miletos, who flourished about 600 B.C. He was the founder of the Ionic school of philosophy, the physical philoso- phers who endeavoured to find the principle, or first cause (d/>xj) in something physical. Thales supposed this first cause to be Water. His pupil, Anaximander, who was born at Miletos, in 610 B.C., was the first to construct spheres, geographical maps, and sundials, and asserted that the earth was of a cylindrical form. Anaximander taught that Fire was the principle, or cause of all; that men had sprung from earth and water mixed, and heated by the sun ; that the earth moved ; and that the moon received light from the sun, which was a circle of fire about twenty-eight times the size of the earth. He died in 547 B.C. Of the same school was Anaximenes, the son of Erasistratos. He was the pupil and successor of Anaximander, and flourished 544-480 B.C. Anaximenes taught that air was the principle or material cause of all things, and that the sun, moon and stars had been made from the earth, which he considered to be a plane, while the heavens were a solid concave figure, on which the stars were fixed like nails an opinion then prevalent whence the proverb, ri fl ovpavbs dyMVOW, " what if the heavens were to fall ? " His pupil, Diogenes, of Apollonia, in Crete, was also a celebrated philosoper, and wrote a treatise on nature. 11. The development of the Ionic philosophy disclosed the ten- dency to abstract matter from all else ; but this process was directed solely to the determined quality of matter its qualitative determi- nateness. This abstraction was carried to a higher step to the quantitative determinateness by Pythagoras, who was a native of Samos and son of Mnesarchos, and flourished about 540-510 B.C. After being educated in poetry, music, eloquence, and astronomy, he proceeded abroad, and is said to have travelled, not merely in Egypt, but far in the east. Returning to Greece, he received great honours at the Olympic games, where he was saluted publicly as Sophist (iXd(ro(os, or Friend of Wisdom. After visiting the various states of Hellas, he withdrew to southern Italy, and settled at Crotona, Cortone, where he founded a fraternity of 300 members the Pythagorean brotherhood, bound by vows to conform to the religious theories and ascetic life of Pythagoras, and devote them- selves to the study of his religious and philosophical theories. Similar fraternities, whose members had secret signs or words for mutual recognition, were established in the other cities of southern Italy ; THE PYTHAGOREAN PHILOSOPHERS. 251 but at Crotona the people rose against them and burnt their houses, when only the younger members escaped ; and in other places they were equally unpopular. Pythagoras is said by some to have perished in the fire at Crotona, with his disciples, but by others to have fled to Tarentum, and thence to Metapontum, where he starved himself. However, little is really known personally of him- self or his doctrines. The latter are chiefly inferred from the system of his followers, the Pythagoreans, among whom there was an absence of individuality, though in Aristotle's time divergences of doctrine occurred among them. The chief Pythagorean is Philalaos, the contemporary of Socrates ; but Plato was considerably tinged with Pythagoreanism, which he is said to have eventually adopted. Pythagoras, a metaphysical and geometrical, rather than a physical philosopher, carried abstraction higher than the Ionic school, and, looking away from the sensible concretions of matter and its quali- tative determinateness, as water, air, &c., regarded only its quanti- tative determinateness, its space-filling property, i.e., Number, which is the principle, or first cause, of Pythagoras ; but the ancients differ as to whether he held that things had their origin in number, or that it was merely their archetype ; probably it was first regarded in the former light, and afterwards in the latter. Of course the carrying out of this abstract principle into the province of the real could only lead to a fruitless symbolism. The only value in this mysticism of numbers is the thought at the bottom of it, but hidden under extravagant and vapid fancies that there really are a rational order, harmony and conformity to law in the phenomena of nature, and that these laws of nature can be represented in measure and number. The physics of the Pythagoreans possessed little value except Philolaos' doctrine respecting the circular motion of the earth. All that is known of their ethics refers to their canon of life, which like the Orphic both of them supposed by Herodotos to be chiefly derived from Egypt was distinguished by a multiplicity of abstinences, disgust and antipathies in respect to food and other physical circumstances of life, elevated into rules of the most imperative force and necessity. Connected with their asceticism were their doctrines respecting the metempsychosis or transmigration of the soul, their view of the body as the soul's prison, their opposition to suicide, &c. 12. While the Pythagoreans had made matter, in so far as it is quantity and the manifold, the basis of their philosophising, and while in this they only abstracted from the determined elemental condition of matter, Xenophanes, or rather his pupils, carried this process to its ultimate limit, and made, as the principle of phi- losophy, a total abstraction from every finite determinateness, from every change and vicissitude which belongs to concrete being. Xenophanes, who was a native of Colophon, removed from Asia Minor to Italy about 520 B.C., and established at the Phocasan colony of Elea or Velia, near the mouth of the Alento, in Lucania, his school, which was thence named the Eleatic. In his didactic poem " On Nature," he taught the pantheistic unity of God, and HERODOTOS READING HIS GREAT HISTORY TO THE GREEKS. GREEK SYSTEM OF PHILOSOPHY. 253 denounced the Hellenic mythology. His doctrines were developed by Parmenides, who was born at Elea about 513 B.C. Parmenides taught that truth was recognisable by the reason only, and that the senses gave a deceptive appearance. His poem "On Nature "treated, therefore, of the two systems, true and apparent knowledge. To account for this unreal appearance, he supposed two principles the positive, or intellectual element (fyjuovpyds), which was heat or light, ethereal fire, and the negative, or limitative (TO fj.f/ oi>), which was cold or darkness, the earth ; but he failed to bridge over the gulf between the two. Parmenides was succeeded by Zeno, the Eleatic. The latter sought to remove this contradiction of the one and the many, this unmedicated juxtaposition of being (TO ov) and not being (TO /LUJOV), of Parmenides, with whom he went to Athens about 450 B.C. He developed and defended the system of his master, not by any new defences of its absolute One against objectors, but by directing an attack on the rival scheme of an absolute Many. With Gorgias, the Leontine, he imparted a new character to Greek philosophy by his development of negative dialectic, or mode of arguing by meeting an opponent with starting difficulties to his system, instead of defending his own. This was carried to the extreme by Socrates and the other Sophists. Zeno denied the existence of the phenomenal world by showing the con- tradictions in which a belief in it involved us ; and he constructed four famous arguments against the possibility of motion. 13. Being and existence, the one and the many, could not be united by the principle of the Eleatics : the Monism which they had striven for resulted in an ill-concealed Dualism. An attempt to reconcile this contradiction by affirming that being and not being, the one and the many, existed at the same time as the be- coming, was made by Heracleitos, who flourished at Ephesos about 510 B.C. He sought, like his predecessors, to reduce the universe to one principle of law, which he considered to be ytvfa-is, the be- coming or change ; holding that everything was in a continual flux, that nothing was for two moments the same. Heracleitos delivered his tenets in obscure apophthegms; he devoted himself to study, and lived an unsocial life. He died of dropsy, aged sixty. According to some, he was torn to pieces by dogs. 14. An attempt to combine the Eleatic being, and the Heracleitic becoming, was made by Empedocles, the philosopher, poet, and historian of Agrigentum, in Sicily, who flourished about 440 B.C. He was a pupil of the Pythagorean Telanges, and warmly adopted the doctrine of metempsychosis. He wrote a poem on Pythago- i reanism, in which he spoke of the various transmigrations of his own soul, through a girl, a boy, a shrub, a bird, a fish, to, lastly, Empedocles. His verses were much esteemed and recited at the Olympic games. His physical philosophy was a combination of the Atomism of Democritos with the doctrines of Heracleitos and Pythagoras. Starting with the Eleatic thought that neither any- thing which had previously been could become, nor anything that ' now ia could depart, he set up as unchangeable being, four eternal 254 LITERATURE, PHILOSOPHY, AND ART. original materials, which, though divisible, were independent, and underived from each other, and which were originally absolutely alike and immovable till and here he unites the Heracleitic view of nature they received a form by the working of two moving powers. Thus he held that there were four elements earth, water, air, fire moved by two forces, philia (ld the .K, r inetans into slavery fiom \\hich they were collected by the Spartan, Lysander, at the end of the war. 404 B.C., and restored to .Kgina. The Athenians next made an attempt to capture Megara, which resulted only in the acquisition of its port, Xisaea. Hitherto Athens had been continually more and more successful ; but now the fortune of war changed, and a series of disasters ensued. An invasion of Bceotia from two quarters was planned to recover all the possessions held before the " Thirty Years' Truce," but it failed, and the Athenians suffered a signal defeat in the battle of Delion a small place, with a temple, on the coast of Tanagra, and about a DELION AND AtfPtilPOLlS. 293 mile from the territory of Oropos. The Athenian commander, Hippocrates, had seized the temple at Delion, and, having con- verted it into a fort, left a garrison in it. On his homeward march his retreat was cut off, and in the battle which ensued the flower ot the Athenian troops perished, recalling to the Athenians the saying of Pericles, on a similar occasion, that " the spring was taken out of the year." In this battle the philosopher Socrates took part, and saved the life of Xenophon, while his own retreat was protected by his friend Alcibiades, who was serving in the cavalry. On the seventeenth day after their victory the Boeotians retook the temple of Delion. At the same time the Hellenic cities in Sicily came to terms, and called upon the Athenians to quit the island. A greater disaster followed, the loss of all the Athenian allies in Thrace. Brasidas, the Spartan, who had foiled the Athenians in their attack on Megara, was sent to Thrace at the head of a small body of troops, at the request of Perdiccas II., of Macedonia, who had de- serted the Athenian alliance, and of the Chalcidian towns. His bravery, his conciliating manners, and his good faith, more than his proclamation that he had come to deliver them from the tyranny of Athens, gained him one town after another ; and the important cities of Acanthos, Stageira, and Argilos, opened their gates to him. Early in winter he appeared suddenly before Amphipolis. He failed in surprising it, though he became master of the lands in the vicinity ; but the favourable terms of capitulation which he offered procured acceptance, and the gates were opened. The historian Thucydides, who was then at Thasosin, joined in command with Eucles of a squadron, immediately, on receipt of intelligence of the advance of Brasidas, sailed to the Strymon, and secured Eion at its mouth ; but before he had sailed up the river to Amphipolis the town had surrendered. The conduct of the Athenians had been marked by inaction and despondency after the battle of Delion, and they had taken no measures to arrest the progress of Brasidas in Thrace. But the loss of Amphipolis produced great alarm and dismay at Athens, and corresponding elation of the hopes of her enemies; for Amphipolis was one of the most important positions in that part of Greece. The Strymon almost flowed round the town, whence its name, Amphipolis, which stands in a pass traversing the mountains bordering the Strymonic gulf (Gulf of Rendina), and com- mands the only easy communication from the coast into the great Macedonian plains, while in its vicinity were the gold and silver mines of Mount Panga^os and large forests of ship timber. The commanders were the scapegoats for the common inactivity; and, on the motion of Cleon, Thucydides was sentenced to banishment, and he spent the following twenty years of his life in exile. Bra- sidas, who had acquired extraordinary personal glory, esteem, and influence, succeeded in surprising Torone on the Sithonian penin- sula, and stormed the neighbouring town, Lecythos. 13. During the winter,, negotiations were opened up between Athens and Sparta, and, with a view to a definitive treaty of peace, in March, 423 B.C., a truce for one year, on the uti possidetis basis, 294 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. was concluded. Two days after the plenipotentiaries had exchanged oaths, the town of Scione, on the isthmus of Pallene, revolted from Athens. Brasidas immediately crossed over the Gulf of Scione, where he was enthusiastically received. Reinforcements soon fol- lowed him, and he conveyed away the women and children to a place of safety. Commissioners now arrived from Athens and Sparta to announce the conclusion of the truce, and a dispute arose regarding the revolt of Scione. The Athenians were very indignant when they heard of the revolt ; they resolved at once to undertake an expedition to quell it, and, on the proposal of Cleon, to put to death all the adult males of the place as soon as it should have been re-conquered. The war, therefore, continued in Thrace, but was suspended everywhere else. Mende, on the south-western side of the peninsula of Pallene, next revolted, and Brasidas sent a force to garrison it. He then set out on an expedi- tion along with Perdiccas II., against Archibaeos, the chieftain ot the Macedonians of Lyncestis, or Lygcestis, between the Pelagones and the Eordasi, in north-western Macedonia, who were then in revolt against the suzerainty of Perdiccas. Brasidas and Perdiccas, however, had to retreat. Brasidas was attacked by the Illyrians, but repulsed them, the Macedonians having fled on the first news of danger. Perdiccas was so indignant at the conduct of Brasidas' troops, who seized and appropriated all the baggage of the Mace- donians, and even unharnessed out of the baggage carts the oxen and slew them, that he opened up communications with the Athenians. During this expedition an Athenian armament, under Nicias and Nicostratos, had arrived at Pallene, and, after being repulsed by the Spartan garrison under Polydamidas, were ad- mitted into Mende, from a mutiny of the democratic classes against Polydamidas. The Athenians then closely invested Scione, and Nicias sailed with a portion of the forces for Athens. 14. During this year of truce everywhere, except in Thrace, little progress had been made towards a definitive peace ; and the Pelo- ponnesians prepared for a renewal by sending a large reinforce- ment through Thessaly to Brasidas. But through the influence of Perdiccas II., the Thessalians refused to allow the troops to pass, and the latter were compelled to return home. During the lull a war had broken out in Peloponnesos itself, among the Arcadians, between Mantineia and Tegea and their respective allies, and a battle was fought at Laodicion, and each claimed the victory. In the same year the ancient temple of Hera, at Argos was burnt down. Though the truce expired in March, 422 B.C., there was no re- sumption of hostilities till the Pythian festival in August. Thucy- dides states that the great enemies of peace were Brasidas and Cleon, the former because he was in full success and rendered illus- trious by the war, the latter because he thought that if peace were concluded he should be detected in his dishonest politics and be less easily credited in his crimination of others. Cleon, when he commenced his career, had been an opponent of the warlike policy OF BRA SID AS AMD OP CLEON. 2Q5 of Pericles ; but his unexpected success at Sphacteria had filled him with overweening military conceit, and he actually proposed and took the command of an expedition to re-conquer Arnphipolis. Notwithstanding the exertions of Nicias and the peace party at Athens, the war was renewed in August. Cleon captured Torone, and then went to Eion, whence he sent out envoys to invite Mace- donian and Thracian auxiliaries. The expressed dissatisfaction of his troops with his inaction while waiting for these auxiliaries obliged him to make a demonstration. He therefore marched from Eion along the walls of Arnphipolis to reconnoitre the top of the ridge, which runs in an easterly direction from Amphipolis to Pangaeos. Brasidas had recourse to the ordinary stratagem of making everything look as if he had no intention to give battle ; the garrison of Amphipolis gave no sign of movement, and the larger portion of the troops of Brasidas were seen on Mount Cer- dylion, across the Strymon, west of Amphipolis. The tanner, having no Demosthenes now to prompt him, fell into the trap thus laid for him ; he took no precautions, and marched in a careless and disorderly array. While Cleon was surveying the country from the summit of the ridge, Brasidas moved his forces down Cerdylion and over the river into the city, and immediately offered the battle sacrifice at the temple of Athena. The Athenian scouts having reported this, Cleon resolved to retreat. While the men were marching with their right, or unshielded side, exposed to the enemy and in the same disorderly array, Brasidas, with 150 chosen soldiers, suddenly sallied forth and charged the central division on the right flank. The Athenians, panic-stricken, fled ; and the left wing, which had already advanced some way on the road to Eion, also took to flight. Brasidas then proceeded to charge the Athenian right wing, but in the advance he was mortally wounded. Mean- while the Spartan Clearidas, a friend of Brasidas, by whom he had been made governor of Amphipolis, had sallied from another gate upon the Athenian right wing. These soldiers had halted and formed on the hill ; but Cleon proved himself an arrant coward, and fled at the sight of the enemy ; he was pursued by a Thracian peltast from Myrcinos, and slain. His men held their ground till they were assailed also in flank and rear by the Chalcidian cavalry and peltasts of Myrcinos. They were thrown into disorder, and fled to the hilly grounds of Pangasos in their rear, the enemy still pursuing them. When they mustered again at Eion, Cleon and 600 heavy-armed men, half the force, were missing. 15. The incompetence of Cleon entailed a fitting punishment on his conceit. Grote has endeavoured to colour his character more favourably, and attributes a great deal to the alleged misrepresenta- tions of Thucydides, who, for once, is said to have laid aside his impartiality and vilified the man who had caused his banishment. Whether Thucydides is prejudiced or not, enough remains to con- demn the tanner. The picture of a low-born demagogue, which Aristophanes, in his own time, drew of him, must have had some foundation in fact. His venality was proved by the fact that, in 296 THE PELOPONNES1AN WAR, 431-404 B.C. 426 B.C., by a combination of his conservative opponents, he was put on his trial for having procured five talents, 1,218 155. sterling, from some of the islands, and, notwithstanding his influence with the mob, the dicastery condemned him and compelled him to dis- gorge the sum. His presumption in taking military commands was self-condemned ; the stratagem by which he fell is one of the com- monest tried with inexperienced generals ; to him the development of the licentiousness of the Athenian assembly was in great mea- sure due, and the Ecclesia continued to degenerate till the age of he Orators. The death of Cleon freed the peace party at Athens from their greatest opponent, and the death of Brasidas had taken away th<> chief supporter of the war at Sparta. The efforts of Nicias\vc;<- now comparatively easy, the Spartans being very desirous to recover the Sphacterian prisoners and the rival cities, Athens and Sparta, in March, 421 B.C., concluded a peace for fifty years, which is usually called the Peace of Nicias. The terms were not dishonour- able to Athens, as, with the exceptions of Platxa. and the Thracian towns, she remained generally in the same position as before the war, all prisoners being restored on each side. The allies of Sparta were, however, dissatisfied with the arrangement ; and the Boeotians, Megarians, and Corinthians refused to be bound by it. In this di- lemma an alliance, offensive and defensive, for fifty years, was contracted between Athens and Sparta. CHAPTER XVIII. THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR (431-404 B.C.). I. SECOND PERIOD (DURING THE PEACE OF NICIAS, 421-404 B.C.). CON- FEDERACY UNDER ARGOS: RISE OF ALCIBIADES: ALLIANCE OF BCEOTIA AND SPARTA: ALCIBIADES' ARTIFICE WITH THE SPARTAN ENVOYS: ALCIBIADES IN PELOPONNESOS (419 B.C.): WAR OF ARGOS AND EPIDAU- ROS : SPARTA TAKES THE FIELD: BATTLE OF MANTINEIA (JUNE, 418 B.C.): REVOLUTION AT ARGOS: ARGIVE AND ATHENIAN ALLIANCE (417 B.C.). 2. ATTACK ON MELOS (416 B.C.): ATHENIAN BARBARITY. 3. FEUD OF SEGESTA AND SELINUS : ATHENIAN ALLIANCE WITH SEGESTA : THE MUTILATION OF THE HERM^E AT ATHENS (MAY, 415 B.C.): CONSTERNATION OF THE ATHENIANS: DEPARTURE OF THE ATHENIAN EXPEDITION TO SICILY (SUMMER, 415 B.C.): CAPTURE OF CATANA : RECALL AND CON- DEMNATION OF ALCIBIADES HIS FLIGHT TO SPARTA. 4. BATTLE AT THE ANAPOS (AUTUMN, 415 B.C.): NICIAS WINTERS AT NAXOS : EARLY HISTORY OF SYRACUSE WAR WITH CAMARINA : TYRANNY OF GELON : HIERO I.: WAR WITH AGRIGENTUM: AMBITION OF SYRACUSE. 5. DESCRIPTION OF SYRACUSE: EMBASSY TO CORINTH AND SPARTA: THE SIEGE OF SYRA- CUSE (SPRING, 414 AUTUMN, 413 B.C.): ARRIVAL OF THE SPARTAN, GYLIPPOS: WITHDRAWAL OF NICIAS TO PLEMMYRION (SUMMER, 414 B.C.) 8 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 ft.c. NEW EXPEDITION UNDER DEMOSTHENES AND EURYMEDON. 6. THIRD PERIOD OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR (413-404 B.C.). THE SPARTAN FORTIFICATIONS AT DECELEIA : SYRACUSAN DEFEAT OF ATHENIAN FLEET (SPRING, 41 B.C.): ARRIVAL OF DEMOSTHENES: ATHENIAN REPULSE: THE ECLIPSE: ATHENIAN DEFEAT DEATH OF EURYMEDON: TOTAL DEFEAT OF ATHENIAN FLEET: LAND RETREAT OF ATHENIANS: SUR- RENDER OF DEMOSTHENES OF NICIAS (SEPT., 413 B.C.) : FATE OF THE PRISONERS. 7. CONSTERNATION AT ATHENS: RENEWED EFFORTS : OTHER SIGNS OF DECLINE DEFEAT AT NAUPACTOS : TRANSFERENCE OF THE WAR TO ASIA (413-404 B.C.). 8. REVOLT OF CHIOS, MILETOS, &C. (412 B.C.): INTRIGUES OF ALCIBIADES (4!! B.C.) FINESSE OF TISSAPHERNES : REVOLUTION AT ATHENS THE FOUR HUNDRED (41 1 B.C.): PROCEEDINGS AT SAMOS : THE DEMOCRACY RESTORED AT ATHENS: RECALL OF ALCI- BIADES. 9. DEFEAT OF MINDAROS AT CYNOSSEMA, ABYDOS, AND CYZICOS (APRIL, 410 B.C.) : DEJECTION AT SPARTA. 10. SUCCESSES OF ALCIBIADES ON THE HELLESPONT : DEFEAT OF THRASYLLOS AT EPHESOS (409 B.C.) : HIS VICTORY AT METHYMNA OVER THE SYRACUSANS : FALL OF CHALCE- DON AND BYSANTION CONVENTION WITH PHARNABAZOS (408 B.C.). II. RETURN OF ALCIBIADES TO ATHENS (MAY, 407 B.C.) : HIS DEPARTURE (SEPT. 407 B C.). 12. ARRIVAL OF CYRUS CHANGE OF PERSIAN POLICY: APPOINTMENT OF LYSANDER. 13. ALCIBIADES AT CYNE : DEFEAT OF ANTIOCHOS AT NOTION DISMISSAL OF ALCIBIADES: ARRIVAL OF CAL- LICRATIDAS (406 B.C.): CONON IN MYTILENE : ATHENIAN VICTORY AT ARGINUS/E : TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF THE GENERALS. 14. LYSANDER CAPTURES LAMPSACOS (40560.): ATHENIAN OVERTHROW AT JEGOSPO- TAMI (SEPT., 405 B.C.): THE MASSACRE BY THE SPARTANS. 15. DISMAY AT ATHENS : SURRENDER OF HER DEPENDENCIES : THE SIEGE OF ATHENS (NOV., 405-APRIL, 404 B.C.) SURRENDER FROM FAMINE: END OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR. 16. REVOLUTION AT ATHENS THE THIRTY TYRANTS (404 B.C.) : REIGN OF TERROR : BOARDS OF TEN IN THE CON- QUERED CITIES : DISSENSIONS AMONG THE THIRTY TYRANTS : EXECUTION OF THERAMENES. 17. DEATH OF ALCIBIADES (WINTER, 404 B.C.) : THRA- SYBULOS INVADES ATTICA (SPRING, 403 B.C.): HIS SUCCESSES: DEATH OF CRITIAS. 18. DEPOSITION OF THE THIRTY TYRANTS THE DECARCHY : CHANGE OF HELLENIC SENTIMENT: SPARTAN INTERVENTION: RESTORA- TION OF THE DEMOCRACY PEACE. IQ. CAUSES OF THE FALL OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. I HE second period of the PeloponnesianWar, from 421-413 B.C., was characterised by an attempt on the part of Argos, which had maintained a complete neutrality during the war, to regain her ancient supremacy, taking advantage of the discontent of the allies at the cessation of hostilities between Sparta and Athens. The inveterate hatred which Corinth bore to Athens and her unceasing energy in forming coalitions against her, led to the formation of a new confederacy, which included Argos, Corinth, Elis, Mantineia, and Chalcidice. While the Peloponnesian Confederacy was completely unhinged, the relations between Athens and Sparta were rendered unsatisfactory by the ambition and influence of the rising statesman Alcibiades, who hoped to obtain by the renewal of the war a sphere suitable to his talents. This celebrated man, who was as famous for his enterprising spirit and versatile genius as for his natural foibles, and united in his most unique character heroism, military skill, statesmanship, philo- sophy, and debauchery, was son of Cleinias and Deinomache, and claimed descent from the Telamonian Ajax, and maternally he was BATTLE OF MANTINEIA, 418 B.C. 209 connected with the Alcmaeonidas, and therefore with Pericles. He was exceedingly vain of the great beauty of his person, and early made himself notorious by his amours and debaucheries. His great liberality in discharging the office of trierarch and in providing for public amusements, his lavish display at the Olympic games, where, in 421 B.C., he contended with seven chariots in the same race and gained the first, second, and fourth prizes, and his great eloquence, rendered him very popular, and readily procured an excuse, on the ground of youthful impetuosity and thoughtlessness, for his extra- vagant or violent acts. Having been born about 450 B.C., he was about thirty at the time of the conclusion of the peace of Nicias. In the negotiations regarding the evacuation of Pylos which Athens had refused to give up on the ground that Sparta had not forced her Corinthian and Breotian allies to observe peace and had not restored Amphipolis Alcibiades took a prominent part. Boaotia and Sparta had now concluded an offensive and defensive alliance : and Alcibiades, irritated at the Spartan authorities having declined his offers to act as their agent in negotiations at Athens, took advantage of the annoyance which this created there. He privately assured the Spartan envoys that they must state they were not sent as plenipotentiaries but merely to discuss the ques- tion of the cession of Pylos and other matters, otherwise the Athenians would demand extravagant concessions. When the envoys declared this to the assembhy, there was a general burst of indignation, and Alcibiades himself was loud in his denunciation of Spartan duplicity. At the beginning of the following year, 420 B.C., he used the popular irritation, thus aroused, for the completion of a treaty of alliance for 100 years with Argos; and Mantineia and Elis soon joined this new league. It was after this that his great display took place at the Olympic festival. The formation of this new league was followed by Sparta being rejoined by most of her old allies. In 419 B.C., Alcibiades persuaded the Athenians to let him pene- trate with a force into the very heart of Peloponnesos to visit the allied states. He procured the adhesion of Patroe, in Achaia, and then he proceeded to assist Argos in her war, which had just broken out, with Epidauros. Late in the autumn the Spartans sent 300 men to assist Epidauros, but nothing was effected, and there being no collision of the Athenian and Spartan forces, the treaty was still valid. In the following year, 418 B.C., the Spartans determined to act with vigour, and accordingly, under king Agis, took the field against Argos. The decisive battle was fought in June, 418 B.C., to the south of Mantineia, between that city and the frontiers of Tegea, where the Argives, Mantineians, and Athenians were defeated with great loss. The Mantineians thereupon concluded a peace with Sparta, by which they renounced the dominion over the Arcadian districts which they had conquered. At Argos the result of the battle was a change of government, and the oligarchy gained the upper hand, the young men of wealth and station having kept their ground at Mantineia, while the democratical soldiers were 300 THE PZLOPONNES1AN WAR, 431-404 B.C. utterly routed. The oligarchical partisans procured the conclusion of a treaty with Sparta by which Argos submitted and joined the Peloponnesian league ; and in the next year, 417 B.C., assisted by some Spartan troops, they overthrew the democratical form of government. But at the end of four months the democracy rose and put down the oligarchy, and re-entered the Athenian league, to which they remained faithful to the termination of the Pelopon- nesian war. The presence and defeat of the Athenian force at Mantineia was not considered a breach of the treaty. 2. In 416 B.C., the Athenians attacked Melos, the south-western island of the Cyclades, about 70 miles north of Crete, and 65 east of Peloponnesos. This island and Hera, the chief of the Sporades, were the only yEgean isles not subject to Athens. Melos, now Milo, which is about 14 miles long and eight broad, resembles a bow in shape, and on the north side there is a deep bay with an excellent harbour ; the chief town, also called Melos, was at this harbour. The Melians having refused to submit, their town was blockaded by sea and land for several months. During the blockade the Melians made two successful sallies, and the Athenians were obliged to send reinforcements ; but at length from failure of provisions and internal dissensions the town had to surrender at discretion. A decree, strenuously supported by Alcibiades, was passed in the Athenian Ecclesia, to put all the men of military age to death, and sell the women and children into slavery. This barbarous resolution was earned out, and 500 Athenian citizens were subsequently sent to colonise Melos. This was truly "one of the grossest and most inexcusable pieces of cruelty combined with injustice which Grecian history presents to us." (GFOTE.) The act would have been in accordance with Hellenic custom in time of war ; but the Athenians had attacked Melos without any pretext, merely to gratify their pride of empire and to annoy Sparta. 3. This wanton act was speedily to be punished by a dire cata- strophe in Sicily. A quarrel had broken out as early as 580 B c., between Segesta, or Egesta as it was usually called by the Greeks, a city in the north-west of Sicily, about six miles from the coast, which was said to have been founded by a body of Trojans, and the maritime city of Selinus, a Hellenic settlement in the south- west of the same island, whose territory had then reached to the Segestan frontier; by the help of some Cindian and Rhodian emi- grants the Segestans gained the advantage. The two cities seem to have been thenceforward engaged in perpetual disputes ; and on the occasion of the Athenian expedition under Laches to assist the Leontines in 426 B c., the Segestans concluded a treaty of alliance with Athens, from which, however, nothing resulted. Open hostili- ties again broke out, and the Selinutines obtained the aid of the Syracusans and closely pressed Segesta. The latter city, after vainly appealing to Agrigentum, and even to Carthage, sent an embassy to Athens. The Segestans are said to have procured Athenian help by giving a very exaggerated notion of their own resources. Nicias was opposed to any interference with the western MUTILATION OF THE HERMJE. 301 waters, but the ambitious views of Alcibiades were supported by the Ecclesia, and it was resolved to send a large fleet, under three commanders, Nicias, Alcibiades, and Lamachos, not only to assist the Segestans but to establish the Athenian influence throughout Sicily. The success of this project would have completely destroyed the balance of power in Hellas, and have made Athens irresistible ; it would have provoked a struggle with Carthage, and, by antici- pating the empire of Rome which city had not then extended its sway over even the neighbouring tribes would have altered the whole course of the world's history. The preparations for this great expedition were carried on for three months, and almost the whole population was in a fever of excitement. Suddenly, one morning about the end of May, 415 B.C., dismay was spread throughout all ranks by the mutilation of the Hermas. At every door in Athens, at the corners of streets, in the market-place, before gymnasia, and other public places, stood Hennas, or busts of the god Hermes, Mercury, placed on a quadrangular block of marble about the height of the human figure. It was found that all these had been mutilated during the night by unknown hands. The Athenians were noted for their extreme fear of the gods, for their suscepti- bility to religious impressions, and for the care and diligence with which they preserved their temples, statuei, and other sacred monuments. Hut it was not merely an act of sacrilege. For to the Hellenes the whole political constitution was dependent on the pro- tection of the gods ; the act of impiety was connected with a design on the State. A change of the guardian deity in connection with a change in policy and government has already been noticed, namely, in the conduct of the Tyrant Cleisthenes at Sicyon. Hence dismay, terror, and wrath seized upon the whole community. The investi- gation as to the authors of the sacrilege brought to light similar acts of impiety, and more especially a profanation of the Athenian Mysteries by drunken revellers, who had given a caricature of them in private houses. Alcibiades himself was one of those accused ; but though he demanded an immediate trial, the investigation was delayed. At length the fleet was ready to depart, and an immense crowd of citizens assembled on the shore to bid farewell ; and amid many gloomy forebodings, the ships departed. The armament con- sisted of 134 triremes, 5,100 heavy-armed men, and 1,300 light- armed men. On reaching Rhegium, in southern Italy, the hopes of the Athenians regarding the resources of Segesta were disappointed, for only 30 talents, 7,312 IDS. sterling, were contributed, the Segestans, however, having already supplied double that sum. The three admirals determined to gain over by offers as many of the Hellenic cities in that quarter as possible ; and they soon procured the alliance of Naxos, Capo di Schiso, on the east coast of Sicily, and took by surprise its neighbour, Catana. At the latter city the sacred Salaminian trireme arrived from Athens to summon Alci- biades to return at once in his trireme to take his trial. When the ships, coasting along, arrived at the Athenian colony at Thurii, Alcibiades effected his escape in his ship, and proceeded to Sparta. 302 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. On this being reported at Athens, his trial proceeded, and sentence of death, with confiscation of his property, was passed on him, while the Eumolpidae pronounced the divine curses against him. The dread of having their liberties endangered, and their horror at the profanation forced the Athenians to risk the failure of the expedition by the recall of Alcibiades. He alone, the man who had planned it, was competent to carry it out, and deal with all its peculiar difficulties. The talents of the unprincipled and unpatriotic exile were now devoted to the cause of Sparta. 4. Nicias had never displayed any vigour in his military expe- ditions. He was a man of mediocrity in intellect, in education, and in oratory; and only his incorruptible honesty and his devoutness had procured for him his long-continued political influence. Instead of striking a decisive blow, he now frittered away the valuable months in desultory operations. Late in the autumn he sailed into the great harbour of Syracuse, and landed near the estuary of the Anapos, now called Anapo or Alfeo, the bulk of the Syracusan forces having been drawn to the vicinity of Catana by a rumour which he put in circulation that the people of that town were ready to rise against the Athenian garrison. On the return of the Syra- cusan troops a battle ensued in which Nicias gained the victory. He then sailed to Catana, and subsequently to Naxos, where he wintered. Syracuse had been founded by a colony from Corinth about 735 B.C. ; but the great prosperity of the Hellenic cities, Sybaris and Crotona, in Italy, had prevented her from rising to any great height of power for about two centuries and a half after her founda- tion. During that period, however, two aprekiae were sent forth to Acras, Palazzolo, in the south of Sicily, about 663 B.C., and to Cas- menae, near the western coast of the southern extremity of the island, about 643 B.C., and a cleruchia to Camarina (Camarana), on the south coast of the island, at the mouth of the Hipparis (Fiume di Camarana), about 599 B.C. In 553 B.C. Camarina endea- voured to throw off the Syracusan yoke, but was reduced and razed to its foundations, 552 B.C. During this early period, internal dissensions in Syracuse led to the expulsion of a family, the Myle- tidas, about 648 B.C., who took part in the foundation of Himera, near Termini, on the northern coast of Sicily. About 495 B.C., Hippocrates, the Tyrant of Gela, Terranova, on the southern coast of the island, attacked Syracuse, and, after a victory near the Heloros, Abisso, compelled her to cede the site of Camarina, on which he rebuilt the town, but held the government in his own hands. Shortly after this defeat, the Syracusan oligarchy, called the Geomori or Gamori, were expelled, 485 B.C., by the lower orders of freemen, who were assisted by the slaves. The Gamori retired to the Syracusan colony of Casmenae, and implored the aid of Gelon, who was now the Tyrant of Gela. He made a successful attack on Syracuse, and reinstated the oligarchy in their homes, but not in their privileges, for he now constituted himself Tyrant of Syracuse, 484 B.C. Under his rule Syracuse rose to great power and wealth., POWER AND DEMAND OF GELON. 33 He was already master of all eastern and'south-eastern Sicily ; and he now devoted himself to increasing the size and population of his new capital. He transferred to Syracuse all the citizens of the lately rebuilt town of Camarina the town being a second time de- stroyed and left desolate till 461 B.C. a half of the population of Gela, and the wealthier citizens of Megara, called also, by way of distinction, Megara Hyblaea, near Agosta, on the eastern coast, and of Eubrea, a colony of the Eubcean Chalcidians, of Leontini, near which town it was situated. Gelon's power was so extensive that, on the invasion of continental Greece by Xerxes, he was asked to assist the Hellenes. His demand that he should be made com- mander-in-chief by sea and land, while justified by his power, was probably prompted by a desire to evade giving help, as he knew that the Greeks would not accept the condition, and that a Cartha- ginian armament was about to be directed, against himself. Hig 3 04 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. great victory at Himera, in the same year with Salamis, frus- trated the Carthaginian attempt. On the death of Gelon, in 477 B.C., his brother, Hiero I., succeeded to the tyranny, and reigned till 467 B.C. with great splendour. He assisted the people of Cunue, in Italy, in their resistance to the Etruscan aggression, and he gained a great victory over the Etruscan fleet in 474 B.C. He kept up a brilliant court, which was thronged with men of eminence in literature and art, and he gained several victories at the Olympic and the other great Hellenic festivals. On his death, in 467 B.C., he was succeeded by his brother, Thrasybulos. The Ionic cities of Sicily had been ruled with considerable severity by Hiero, and Thrasybulos exercised a similar severity on all his subjects; in con- sequence, he had to flee from Sicily, on a general insurrection, eight months after his accession to the tyranny, 466 i;.c. The dominion which had been assigned to the Gelonian dynasty at Syracuse was then broken up, and, after commotions, democracies were established in the various cities, and they all became inde- pendent. A combination was now formed among the Siceli, the aboriginal inhabitants of the interior of the island, by one of their chiefs, Ducetios, who, in 453 n.c., founded a capital, Palice, close to the small volcanic lake of the Palici, Lago di Naftia, to which he transferred the population of Menaeon, a neighbouring town, which he seems to have founded shortly before. Ducetios made an attack on Agrigentum, and the conduct of the Syracusans towards that chief, whom they hospitably received after his failure, and sent out of the island, led to a war between Syracuse and Agri- gentum, which ended in a great defeat of the Agrigentines near the Himera, 446 B.C. Syracuse, in common with most of the cities of Sicily, had now developed her resources to the utmost ; and she began an attempt to recover the supremacy she had held under the tyrants Gelon and Hiero I. Her attacks on the Chalcidian cities, Naxos, Catana, and Leontini, led to the first expedition of Athens to Sicily, in 427 B.C. ; but the Sicilian cities, alarmed at the ready interference of the mistress of the yEgean, held a congress, and, after concluding a general peace among themselves, called upon the Athenians to retire. The resumption of internal quarrels, in 415 B.C., led to the great Athenian expedition. 5. At this time Syracuse was a large and powerful city. It con- sisted of two parts the old or inner city (which is the modern city) on the island Ortygia, a low, oblong islet, which is one mile long and a little more than two miles in circumference, and lies at the northern extremity of the bay called the Great Harbour, being separated from the mainland by a narrow channel, \\hile the southern end of the island approaches so near the southern ex- tremity of the bay, called Plemmyrion, as to leave an entrance of only 1,200 yards in width, the great bay itself being an oval land- locked basin of about five miles in circumference. Ortygia also formed the southern side of a small bay called the Lesser Port ; and a little north of the northern shore of this bight was the new or outer city, the Achradina, the northern end of which is the OPERATIONS OF THE SYRACUSANS. 305 south-western extremity of the bay of Thapsos. On the mainland, west of Ortygia was a suburb, Neapolis, or New Town, and west of the northern portion of Achradina lay another suburb called Tyche, or Fortune ; the range of hills west of Tyche was called Epipolse. The two suburbs were at this time unfortified. The Syracusans spent all the winter in increasing their means of defence ; they also despatched envoys to Corinth and Sparta for help. Alcibiades, now the sworn foe of his country, urged the Spartan's, among whom he was residing, to send an armament to baulk the designs of the Athenians, and at the same time to send a force to establish a permanent post in Attica. They were persuaded to send an expedition to Sicily, but it was the following spring, 414 B.C., before they despatched it. Early in 414 B.C. Nicias moved from Naxos, and landed on the Syracusan coast at Leon, a place between Achradina and Epipolae. Thence he advanced to Epipolae, near the eastern end of which he raised a fort, Labdalon. From this he advanced his lines eastwards and established another fort, Syke. He then began a line of circumvallation, from Syke, south- wards to the Great Harbour, and northwards to the southern shore of the bay of Thapsos. In the repeated engagements during these operations the admiral Lamachos was killed, Nicias being now left in sole command. The fleet was placed in the Great Harbour to maintain the blockade. The Syracusans now were so depressed that they sent offers of surrender ; but Nicias, confident of success, would not treat of terms, while at the same time he ceased to push forward the siege with activity. At this juncture the Spartan ad- miral, Gylippos, arrived with only four ships at Tarentum to learn the situation of affairs. He sailed up the straits of Messana and landed at Himera, near Termini, on the north coast of Sicily; and, having announced the approach of a large Spartan armament, he began to levy an army in the name of Sparta. In the course of a few days he had collected 3,000 men, and marched across the island to Syracuse : the Syracusans boldly sent out to meet him on the heights of Epipolae, which the flagrant incompetency of Nicias had left unsecured, and Gylippos entered the city. He now sent an insulting message to the Athenians to leave the inland within five days, to which Nicias returned no reply. Gyl ppos then at- tacked and captured the fort Labdalon, which secured the command of Epipolae, and began counter-works on the Athenian northern lines. Many of the Sicilian cities now passed over to the Syracusan side, and a fleet of thirty triremes from Corinth, Ambracia, and Leucadia arrived. Nicias, finding the tide turned against him, de- termined to move his forces to the headland, Plemmyrion, at the south-eastern extremity of the Great Harbour, and he remained inactive for the remainder of 414 B.C. : there the attacks of the enemy led to great discontent among his troops, and to frequent deser- tions ; from this, and his own bad health, he was obliged to send to Athens an urgent demand for reinforcements. The Athenians, though prudence required them to relinquish their scheme, clung desperately to it, and resolved to send another armament, though x 306 THE PELOPONNESIAN WMtf, 431-404 B.C. it was then mid-winter, and two admirals, Demosthenes and Eur\ - medon, to be associated in the command with Nicias, in whom, notwithstanding his lamentable inaction and presumptuous neglect, implicit confidence was still placed. 6. The new expedition from Athens was the signal for open war on the part of Sparta. Already the Peace of Nicias, and the Fifty Years' Offensive and Defensive Alliance were broken by the struggle of Gylippos and Nicias. In the spring of 413 B.C. king Agis led a large Spartan force into Attica, and established a military post north of Athens, at the deme. Deceleia (Tatoy), near the entrance of the eastern pass, across Mount Parnes, which leads from the north-eastern part of the Athenian plain to Oropos, branching thence on one side to Tanagra and on the other to Delion and Chalcis. This deme was about 120 stadia, or 13 miles, 1,390 yards from the Boeotian frontier and about the same distance from Athens, from which it was visible. The object of the Lacedaemonians in establishing this port in Attica, which they held till the end of the war, was somewhat similar to that of the Athenians in holding Pylos. Deceleia commanded the Athenian plain, and the Athe- nians, being now unable to cultivate their neighbouring lands, were obliged to import all their supplies from Eubcea, round cape Sunion, and consequent scarcity in the city was the result. Meanwhile the Syracusans had actually attacked and defeated the Athenian fleet in the Great Harbour ; and the latter were com- pelled to haul up their ships under the protection of their foils on Plemmyrion. This was a great blow to the Athenian maritime prestige, and increased the discontent of the seamen and troops. Their courage was raised for a time by the arrival, early in the summer of 413 B.C., of a fresh armament of seventy-five triremes, 5,000 heavy-armed men, and a large number of light-armed troops, under Demosthenes and Eurymedon. The new commanders in- fused vigour into the operations; but both the open attack by day and the nocturnal attempt at a surprise of the Syracusan works failed. Demosthenes now proposed to abandon the expedition, or at least to sail out into the open sea and there await an attack ot the enemy ; but Nicias refused to consent till he saw that Gylippos had received large naval reinforcements. When at last Nicias consented to retreat, an eclipse of the moon occurred ; and the "rigidly decorous and ultra religious" commander accepted the declaration of the soothsayers that the armament must not move for a full circuit of the moon. On learning from deserters the in- tention of the enemy to withdraw, Gylippos made an attack by land, in which he was repulsed ; but the naval attack was entirely successful, the Athenian fleet was totally defeated, and Eurymedon was slain. The Syracusans then moored a line of ships across the mouth of the Great Harbour, to cut off the retreat of the Athenian fleet. The Athenian ships, numbering no triremes, now attacked the Syracusan fleet in the Great Harbour, the shores of which were lined "with spectators, in one part the Athenian army, in another the Syracusans. Again the Athenians suffered a total defeat, one SURRENDER OF N I CIAS, 413 B.C. 307 half of their ships being lost. The Syracusans had also suffered a great loss. Nicias, roused to unwonted activity, and Demosthenes urged their men to make another attempt, but their courage was not now equal even to re-embarking. Compelled for their own safety to leave their dead unburied and their wounded on the shore, the Athenians endeavoured to retreat inland. After moving from their position, harassed by the Syracusans, they made an unsuc- cessful attempt for two days, on a Syracusan port on the Acraean cliff, which blocked their advance. They were further disheartened by storms of thunder and lightning. For a little they were com- pelled to fall back, but by night they changed their direction and marched toward the southern coast. Nicias, worn out with an in- curable disease, led the van, the baggage was in the middle, and Demosthenes brought up the rear. Panics and darkness made them part company, and Demosthenes fell far behind. The rear division under Demosthenes was overtaken before reaching the ford of the Cacyparis, or Cassibili, while the van had already got across the Erineos, Miranda, or Fiume di Avola, six miles in ad- vance. Assailed on all sides with showers of missiles, and gradually driven into a walled olive-ground, they were compelled to surrender, Gylippos undertaking that their lives should be spared. Gylippos now pushed forward and attacked the van under Nicias, to whom he sent a herald to communicate the surrender of Demosthenes. The Athenians resisted the attacks as best they could till nightfall. Early next morning it was now the sixth day of the retreat Nicias attempted to reach the Asimaros Falconara, or Fiume di Noto. On reaching its banks the men, who had suffered fearfully from thirst, rushed in a disorderly mass into the water. So violent was their thirst that they gave no heed to the missiles which the enemy showered upon them. Even when the dead and wounded were heaped in the river, and the water was impure with blood and mud, men continued to rush in and drink. The Athenians were so de- moralised that all hope of resistance was useless ; therefore, on the advance of the Peloponnesian heavy-armed men, Nicias surrendered at discretion. This catastrophe took place towards the end of September, 413 B.C. The Athenian prisoners, numbering about 10,000 such a reduction had death and desertion made in a few days' retreat in the army of 40,000 were congregated, and made to work in the quarries of Achradina and Epipolae. Despite the exer- tions of Gylippos and the Syracusan general Hermocrates.who had taken a great part in the defence, the Syracusans put Nicias and Demosthenes to death. The city being threatened with an epidemic from the number of bodies lying unburied and from the diseased condition of the prisoners, it was resolved two months afterwards to sell the survivors into slavery. Many of them, according to Plutarch, regained their liberty by reciting to their masters the verses of the tragic poet Euripides. 7. This terrible blow to the power of Athens, from which she never recovered, was due to the hatred of the Corinthians ; it was from an improvement in shipbuilding, the strengthening the bows 3 o8 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. of the ships as rams, which the Corinthians had devised, and which the men of the triremes they sent communicated to the Syracusans, that the Athenian fleet had been totally defeated. Thucydides rightly considers it the greatest exploit of the Peloponnesian War, and of all Hellenic achievements the most splendid for the con- querors and the most disastrous for the conquered ; for the Athenians were defeated in every point, and their army and fleet utterly anni- hilated. The Athenians were thrown into great consternation and sorrow by the intelligence of this awful disaster; their treasury was empty, their docks were nearly destitute of triremes, and the flower of their soldiers and seamen had perished. They dreaded that their Sicilian enemies would sail for the Peiraeus, that their foes in continental Greece would press them by land and sea, and that their hold over the confederacy was lost. Yet there was no thought of making peace ; it was resolved to equip another fleet as fast as possible, and recruit all their resources in every way they could by curtailing their expenses, for which a board of ten elderly councillors, Probouli, was appointed, securing the alliance of all their confederates, especially Eubasa, fortifying Cape Sunion, and collecting ship-timber. Their resolution was only intensified by the vigorous operations of Agis in the vicinity of the city. He over- ran all Attica by his frequent excursions, and carried off all the sheep and cattle, while more than 20,000 slaves deserted to him at Deceleia, and the Peloponnesian men-of-war frequently attacked the transports from Euboea. Besides enduring these privations and losses, all the citizens, rich and poor, had their military duty multi- plied ; Athens had become almost a beleaguered city, and night and day the long extent of walls was heavily guarded. The financial pressure had, even before the Sicilian disaster, been so great that the Thracian mercenaries had to be dismissed ; on their way home they attacked the town of Mycalessos in Boeotia, sacked it, and committed every excess of barbarian cruelty ; they were pursued by the Thebans, but the majority were taken on board again by the Athenian ships and conveyed to Thrace. And it was not only in the west that the naval superiority of Athens had declined, for in May, 413 B.C., shortly before the arrival of the rein- forcements of Demosthenes at Syracuse, a fleet of thirty-three Athenian triremes, under Diphilos, had met an equal number o Corinthian triremes off a place called Erineos, in the territory of khypes in Achaia, opposite Naupactos, in which the Athenians could do no more than maintain their station, and though each party thought itself entitled to erect a trophy, the reputed maritime superiority of Athens was felt by both parties to have been diminished, and the real feeling of victory lay with the Corinthians. The effect now produced on the Hellenic world was almost like that on the destruction of the great armament of Xerxes ; the furthest Hellenic cities were aroused, and even the Persian satraps and the court of Susa. Athens had lost her command of the seas ; the sub- ject allies were now encouraged to shake off her yoke, and the Persian court had again an opportunity for interfering in the affairs 3io THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. of Hellas. In the Second Period of the Peloponnesian War the western waters of the great inland sea had been the chief theatre of the struggle. In the Third Period, 413-404 B.C., the scene was transferred to the opposite end of the Mediterranean ; for Sparta saw the necessity of encouraging the defection of the ^gean isle and the Hellenic cities of Asia, and of procuring the aid of Persian gold to give her a fleet superior to that of Athens, and thereby ulti- mately the victory in this long-continued struggle. But even now the Athenians, from the elasticity of their spirit, their fertility of resource, their courage, and their patriotism, rose superior for a time to all their disasters, and, though contending with such fearful odds, made the issue again seem doubtful. 8. The loyalty of Chios had been suspected in the First Period of the war, and now this island was the first to profit by the Athenian disaster, and renounce its allegiance, 412 B.C. The Chians had been incited by messages from Alcibiades, and he now persuaded the Spartans to send a fleet to support the insurgents. Miletos and the other Ionian cities soon followed the example of Chios ; and Eubcea and Lesbos sent applications to Agis at Deceleia for help. Pharnabazos, the satrap of the Hellespontine Provinces, and Tissaphernes, the satrap of the south-western sea- board of Asia Minor now separately sent envoys to Sparta ; and arrangements were made for carrying on the war in Asia Minor. The woes of Athens were further increased by the revolt of the wealthy island of Samos, but a bloody revolution, in which the democracy got the upper hand, preserved the isle to Athens. The 1,000 talents, 243,750 sterling, which had been laid aside by Pericles to repulse an attack on the Peiraeus were now applied to fitting out a fleet to restore the Athenian dominion in the /Egean, and it forthwith, in the autumn of 412 B.C., sailed for Samos, where it established its basis of operations. The Athenians recovered Lesbos and Clazomenas, 411 B.C., and ravaged the lands of Chios; and in a battle at Miletos they defeated the Peloponnesians. The Spartans now began to secure to themselves the supremacy which the Athenians had lost ; they sent out to the various islands and dependent cities governors, each called a Harmost (up^oo-ri??). Meanwhile their influence with the Persian was declining through the intrigues of Alcibiades, who was out with the Spartan fleet ; but who, for having seduced the wife of King Agis, had been recalled to Sparta. He took refuge with Tissaphernes in Magnesia, and the satrap acted on his advice to trim the balance between the rivals, so that neither should obtain a decided preponderance over the other. The inactivity of the Spartans for the remainder of this year and the greater part of 411 B.C., and their not turning to the account they might have done the revolt of Cnidos and Rhodes from Athens at the close of 412 B.C., was due to their admiral Astyochos, who had sold himself to the Persian satrap. Having procured the Barbarians', aid for Athens, Alcibiades opened up com- munications with the Athenian generals at Samos, and offered the Persian alliance, provided he was recalled to Athens, and, to secure ALCIBIADES INVITED TO SAMOS. 311 his own safety, the democracy gave place to an oligarchy. One of the generals, Peisander, went to Athens and laid the proposal before the Ecclesia. Already, in 412 B.C., by the appointment of the Probouli, the constitution had been modified in an aristocratic direction, the democracy having been discredited by the Sicilian disaster; but only dire necessity and the terrorism which the political clubs exercised could now extort from the assembly a decree for the subversion of the democracy. A committee was appointed to nominate in a complicated way a council of Four Hundred, which superseded the elective Boule of Five Hundred, and became an irresponsible government; and the Ecclesia of all the citizens gave place to a body of 5,000, who were to be selected from the citizens and summoned by the Four Hundred when they thought proper. At the same time all payment for the discharge of civil functions, which had greatly demoralised the poorer citizens, ceased. This government was practically the rule of three or four individuals, who were able to overawe the populace by reference to this body of 5,000, of whom nobody knew anything; and it lasted only about four months. The fleet at Samos refused to recognise this revolution, and elected new officers whom they could trust. Persuaded by one of these, Thrasybulos, they invited Alcibiades to Samos, notwithstanding his support of the oligarchy, and he made great boasts about his influence with the satrap. The news of the proceedings at Samos caused discord among the Four Hundred, and their power received a death-blow on the revolt of Eubcea ; if the democracy had been incapable, the Four Hundred were still more so, for the main source of the city's supplies was now cut off. An assembly was held in the Pnyx, the Four Hundred were deposed, and the democracy was restored, the franchise being now, however, restricted to 5,000 citizens, whose qualification was the ability to furnish a panoply or complete suit of armour of shield, helmet, cuirass, belt, greaves, sword, and lance ; and all payment for civic functions was discontinued. At the same time the sentence on Alcibiades was annulled, and he and his friends were recalled. 9. The inactivity of Astyochos, who had taken no advantage of the dissensions at Athens and Samos on the establishment of the Four Hundred, had given rise to great dissatisfaction at Sparta ; and in the summer of 411 B.C. he was superseded by Mindaros. The new admiral, seeing the duplicity of Tissaphernes, sailed for the Hellespont, to assist the insurgent cities, Abydos, Chalcedon, and Byzantion, or Constantinople, having revolted from Athens shortly before his arrival. Here he procured the support of the satrap, Pharnabazos. But in a few days he was followed by the Athenian fleet, under Thrasybulos ; and a naval engagement ensued in the narrow channel between Sestos and Abydos. The Athenians, though they had fewer ships, gained the victory and erected a trophy on Cynossema. It was immediately after this that Eubcea revolted, and the democracy was restored. Two other successes rapidly fol- lowed the reduction of Cyzicos, which had revolted, and a second 312 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. defeat of the Peloponnesian fleet near Abydos, to which the timely arrival of Alcibiades, with a reinforcement of eighteen triremes from Samos, greatly contributed. The' Athenian victories alarmed Tissaphernes. He visited the Hellespont, and when Alcibiades came before him, he commanded him to be seized and sent to Sardes But Alcibiades contrived to escape and rejoin the fleet. Mindaros had by this time invested Cyzicos, and the Athenian fleet, in which Alcibiades was now the presiding spirit, advanced to its relief. A complete victory was won ; except the triremes of Syracuse, which were burnt by their own crews, every ship of the Peloponnesian fleet was captured, Mindaros was slain, and the Spartan and the Persian forces, of Pharnabazos, on land were utterly routed, about April, 410 B.C. Hippocrates, the second in command (Epistoleus, or secretary) of the Peloponnesian fleet, thus laconically announced the calamity to the ephors : " All honour and advantage are gone from us. Mindaros is slain ; the men are starving ; we are in straits what to do." His despatch"-'" was intercepted by the Athenians ; but the ephors doubtless heard the same deplorable account soon enough from many witnesses. Such was the discouragement of the Spartans that they now, in an indirect manner, proposed peace ; but the advice of the demagogue, Cleophon, prevailed, and the envoy, Endios, an old guest-friend, or Xenos, of Alcibiades, was dismissed. 10. The Athenian fleet was now supreme in the Propontis, the Bosporos, and the Hellespont ; but, in the course of the summer, 409 B.C., Pharnabazos, besides supplying the distressed Peloponne- sians with maintenance and clothing, encouraged the construction of new ships, granted an abundant supply of ship-timber from the forests of Mount Ida, and armed the seamen and kept them in his pay. The Athenians, during the summer, laid siege to Chalcedon ; and Alcibiades took, and soon surrounded with strong fortifications the town of Chrysopolis, Scutari, on the eastern coast of the Bos- poros, opposite Byzantion, and here he levied the toll on all vessels coming out of the Euxine which had formerly been levied by the Athenians at Byzantion. A detachment of the Athenian fleet was sent to Thasos, from which the Spartan garrison was expelled. At Deceleia, Agis, who had lately been repulsed with spirit by Thra- syllos when he approached near the walls of Athens, saw the convoys of provisions from the Euxine, and felt that the port of Deceleia and the possession of Eubrea were useless if this supply was to be unchecked. He therefore despatched Clearchos, with a squadron of fifteen triremes, to Byzantion and Chalcedon in the winter of 410-409 B.C. In April, 409 B.C., Thrasyllos was sent out * In despatches to and from the Spartan commanders the Scytale was usually employed to obtain the advantages of a cypher ; a strip of leather or papyrus was rolled slantwise round the staff called the Scytale, and on this the despatches were written lengthwise, so that when unrolled, the lines being broken up, they were unintelligible ; the commander abroad had a staff of like thickness with that at Sparta, so that the despatch was easily read by the person for whom it was designed. ALCIBIADES' RETUKN TO ATHENS, 407 B.C. 313 with a reinforcement of fifty triremes from Athens. He made an attempt on Ephesos, but sustained a severe defeat, and was com- pelled to set out for Notion, and on his voyage, while lying at Methymna, on the north of Lesbos, he attacked a Syracusan squad- ron, captured four triremes, and chased the rest to their station at Ephesos. The Syracusan prisoners were taken to Athens, and sent to work in the quarries of the Peiraeus, in retaliation for the treat- ment of the Athenians at Syracuse; but in a few months they contrived to escape to Deceleia. In the autumn of 409 B.C., Thra- syllos joined Alcibiades at Sestos, and their combined forces ob- tained a great victory, near Abydos, over the troops sent by Phar- nabazos to relieve that city. During the same summer, 409 B.C., Pylos, which had remained as an Athenian port and a refuge for revolted Helots ever since 425 B.C., was vigorously attacked by the Spartans, and had to surrender. The main forces of Athens being on the Asiatic coast, a squadron of only thirty triremes, under Anythos, could be mustered to relieve it ; but the unfa- vourable winds prevented his doubling Malea in time to save the place. About the same time the Megarians recovered their port, Nisasa, which the Athenians had held since 424 B.C. In the fol- lowing year, 408 B.C., operations were more important ; Chalcedon capitulated, Selymbria (Silivri) was captured, and a part}' in Byzan- tion opened the gates of their city to the Athenian forces. On the capitulation of Chalcedon, a convention was entered into be- tween the Athenians and Pharnabazos, the latter binding himself to pay twenty talents, 4,875 sterling, to the Athenians on behalf of the Chalcedonians, as part of their arrears of tribute, and to escort five Athenian and two Argive envoys up to Susa to treat with the Great King, while the Athenians bound themselves to abstain from hostilities against the satrapy of Pharnabazos till the return of the envoys. ii. After levying contributions on the coast of Caria, Alcibiades set sail for Athens, where he arrived about the end of May, 407 B.C. He had been elected strategos in his absence. He received, how- ever, no very cordial welcome from the vast crowd that assembled to meet him on the shores of the Peiroeus. But his own protests of his innocence of the impiety laid to his charge, before the Boule and Ecclesia, and the warm addresses of his friends soon evoked a strong sentiment in his favour ; the plate of lead, on which his condemnation was engraved, was thrown into the sea, the curses of the Eumolpidae were revoked, all his property was restored, he was proclaimed strategos, with full powers, and allowed to prepare an expedition of 100 triremes, 1,500 heavy-armed men, and 150 horse- men. Alcibiades was intoxicated with his apparently unbounded ascendancy, after his eight years' absence, 415-407 B.C., from his native land. He delayed his departure till the autumn, that he might be able to escort the solemn procession, by land, of the Eleusinian mysteries, which had been discontinued since th2 establishment of Agis at Deceleia ; and after this he repulsed an attempt of Agis to surprise Athens. At length, in September, 314 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431 404 u.e. 407 B.C., he set sail, Adeimantos and Aristocrates accompanying him, to act as commander of the heavy-armed men in operations on shore. 12. Meanwhile a complete change had taken place in the state of affairs on the Asiatic coast, caused by the arrival of the younger Cyrus, the younger of the two sons of King Dareios II., Ochos, by the cruel queen, Parysatis, and brother of the reigning Great King, Artaxerxes II., Mnemon. Cyrus was ambitious enough to aim at the Persian crown ; and he had at this time procured, through the influence of his mother, the satrapy of Lydia, the greater Phrygia, and Cappadocia, and the command of the military division which mustered at " the Plain of Castolos," Tissaphernes and Pharna- bazos still retaining their coast satrapies. The views of Cyrus in- volved the assistance of Hellenic forces, and it was therefore his interest to ally with the strongest state, and terminate the struggle in her favour. He selected Sparta, and when, on his way to the coast, he met Pharnabazos and the envoys going up to the Great King, he commanded the satrap to detain the envoys, and send no message to Susa. Pharnabazos, on seeing the commission and the seal of the Great King, had no alternative but to obey. At the same time with this important change of Persian policy, in Decem- ber, 408 B.C., or January, 407 B.C., the Spartan anarchoson admiral, Cratesippidas, was superseded by a man of great talent, but utterly unscrupulous in the prosecution of his ambitious views, Lysander, " the last, after Brasidas and Gylippos, of that trio of eminent Spartans from whom all the capital wounds of Athens proceeded, during the course of this long war." (GROTE.) Lysander visited Cyrus at Sardes in May, 407 B.C., and won the peculiar esteem of the prince, who now furnished the Peloponnesian armament with abundant pay, and Lysander himself with the means of organising factions among the Asiatic cities. 13. When Alcibiades, after an unsuccessful attempt on Andros, arrived at Samos in autumn, he first learned the failure of all his hopes by the change of Persian policy. He induced Tissaphernes to mediate, and sent envoys to Cyrus ; but the prince would not re- ceive the envoys. Lysander was now lying, with a fleet of 90 triremes, at Ephesos, and he declined all offers of battle. Alcibiades, leaving the main body of his fleet at Samos, under the command of Antiochos, visited Phocasa, which Thrasybulos was fortifying, and Cyme. He plundered the latter place, though it was an Athe- nian dependency ; but the Cymeans recovered their property, and repulsed his attack on their walls. Alcibiades had given the most express orders to Antiochos not to fight till he returned ; but the lieutenant crossed over to Notion, the harbour of Colophon, and thence to Ephesos. Some of the Peloponnesian triremes came out, and gradually a general battle ensued. The Athenian ships had been sailing in disorder, and they had at length to flee to Notion, and thence to Samos. Fifteen Athenian triremes were lost, and Antiochos himself was killed. Alcibiades hurried back to Samos, mustered his fleet, and offered battle at Ephesos ; but Lysander LYSANDER SUPERSEDED BY CALLICRATIDAS. 315 would not be tempted out. Dissatisfaction with Alcibiades now arose in the fleet ; these murmurs were conveyed to Athens, where the C.ymeans also made a complaint, and. the popular indignation was aroused. He was dismissed from his command, and ten Strategi were named to succeed him. Conon, the most talented of the new generals, took the command at the time when Lysander's year of office had expired. Lysander was superseded by Callicra- tidas, 406 B.C. ; but by refunding to Cyrus all the money that had been advanced, he threw great difficulties in the way of his suc- cessor. Thougla treated with great coolness by Cyrus, and em- barrassed by want of funds and his unpopularity among the troops, Callicratidas acted with great vigour. He obtained a considerable grant of money from Miletos and Chios, and was able to add 50 triremes to his fleet of 90. Conon, whose force was only half that of his rival, now took refuge at Mytilene. Callicratidas entered the harbour, a battle ensued, and Conon could only rescue 40 ships, little more than half his fleet, by hauling them upon the beach, under protection of the forts. Callicratidas now landed a portion of his force, and completely invested Mytilene. A trireme succeeded in escaping and conveying the news to Athens, where great efforts were at once made to release Conon, and a fresh armament of no triremes was sent out. On its approach to the three islets, Arginusae (Janot), between Canae (Cape Coloni), in .'Eolis, and the south-eastern cape of Lesbos, the Athenian fleet, reinforced from various quarters, now amounted to 150 ships. Callicratidas sailed out to meet it with 120 vessels, having left 50 to blockade Mytilene. A long and obstinate battle ensued. Calli- cratidas fell overboard in the shock of his trireme charging another, and was drowned. At length the Athenians were victorious, and the Peloponnesians, having lost 77 ships, were driven back to Chios, whence they retreated to Phocaea. The Athenian loss was also considerable 25 ships, but more than a dozen of these were still afloat. A storm came on, and all the water-logged ships sank, no attempt having been made to rescue them. For making no exertions to save these, containing more than 1,000 men, or to collect the dead, the generals were summoned home. Six obeyed, and were put upon their trial. An adjournment was made for the Apaturia, and the absence of their relatives from this festival greatly exasperated the people ; and on the resumption of the trial, a senator, Callixenos, made in the Ecclesia the illegal pro- posal to include all the prisoners in one condemnation. The Prytanes at first refused to put the question, but at length, except- ing Socrates, they yielded ; and the generals were condemned to drink the bowl of hemlock. The generals who were thus executed were Pericles, the legitimised son of the great statesman, Lysias, Diomedon, Eraunides, Aristocrates, and Thrasyllos. Of the re- maining four of the ten, Conon's presence in Mytilene of course excused him ; Protomachos and Aristogenes had gone into volun- tary exile rather than risk the trial, and Archestratos had died at Mytilene. VICTORY OF sEGOSPOTAMI, B.C. 405. 317 14. In the next year, 405 B.C., upon solicitations from Cyrus, Chios, and other quarters, the ephors sent out Lysander to take the command of the fleet, which Eteonicos had assumed on the death of Callicratidas ; but, as the same man did not usually hold command for two years, the nominal commander was Aracos, with the title of Navarchos, or admiral, while Lysander was nominally the Epistoleus, or secretary. Lysander at once proceeded to the Hellespont, and laid siege, with all his forces, to Lampsacos. The Athenian fleet, which Conon, released by the battle of Arginusae, had now joined, followed him, and, the town already having fallen, took up a position at the estuary of the stream called the yEgospo- tami, or " Goats' Rivers, 1 ' in the Thracian Chersonesos, though there was no town at hand to supply a market for provisions, and the station was very exposed. They sailed over several times, but in vain, to tempt Lysander to battle; and at length they became very neglectful, from the seeming supineness of the Peloponnesians. Alcibiades, who, on his dismissal from command, had retired to his private castle at Bisanthe, Rodasto, on the neighbouring coast of the Propontis, warned them of their danger. The extreme care- lessness of the generals, excepting Conon, gives considerable pro- bability to the assertion of some of the ancients that they had been bribed ; if so, their execution later must have been intended to clear away all traces of this, and place the glory of the whole transaction to the credit of Spartan strategy. At length, one day in September, 405 B.C., when the Athenian crews had gone ashore for their meals, Lysander, with the Spartan fleet, rowed swiftly across, while Thorox marched along the strand with the land force. Conon's and a few other triremes alone, of a fleet of 180 ships, were prepared. These and the sacred galley, or paralos, effected their escape ; all the others, nearly 170, were captured, and the most of the crews also were seized on the shore, only a few escaping to the nearest fortified towns. The late Spartan admiral, Callicra- tidas had given a noble instance of Pan-Hellenic patriotism on his capture of Methymna, in Lesbos. He had released all the prisoners, and declared that, while he was in command, not a single Greek should ever be sold into slavery. Lysander was unequal to such nobility of conduct ; the Athenian prisoners were carried across to Lampsacos, where the whole, generals, officers, and men, number- ing from 3,000 to 4,000, were massacred forthwith. 15. The Milesian privateer, Theopompos, conveyed the news of this signal victory to Sparta within three days. At Athens it was announced by the paralos, which arrived during the night. The contemporary historian, Xenophon (Hell. ii. 2, 3), describing the distress and the agony at Athens, says : " On that night not a man slept ; not merely from sorrow for the past calamity, but from terror for the future fate with which they themselves were now menaced, a retribution for what they had themselves inflicted on the /Eginetans, Melians, Scionasans, and others." The battle of yEgospotami had virtually decided the war; the whole forces of Athens had been swept away. The only policy now was to assume 3 i8 THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B.C. a defensive attitude, and prepare to stand a siege. One by one the /Egean dependencies of Athens submitted, and Samos alone offered a vigorous resistance. The Athenian garrisons and cleru- chi which capitulated were sent to Athens to swell the population of the city, and render its resistance shorter when Lysander should appear before its walls to starve it into submission. In November, 405 B.C., Lysander arrived at /Egina, that old "eye-sore of the Peiraeus," with 150 triremes, and, after devastating Salamis, pro- ceeded to closely blockade the Peirasus. At the same time the whole Peloponnesian army was moved close up to the walls ot Athens to completely invest the city by land. Though all hope had now abandoned the Athenians, their pride still sustained them, and they resolutely held out. It was not till the pressure of famine was manifested by a rapid increase of deaths that they made pro- posals, and even then their offers were such as might have been made at a much earlier period of the war : they proposed to become allies of Sparta, but demanded that their walls and their fortified harbour, Peirasus should be left them entire which, of course, the ephors rejected. Their misery increased, but all classes manifested a heroic endurance. At length the sufferings from famine became intolerable, and the city had to surrender after a five months' siege, in April, 404 B.C. Sparta, contrary to the general sentiment of her allies, granted peace on the following terms : (i.) That the Long Walls and the Fortifications of the Peincus should be destroyed. (2.) That all ships of war, except twelve, should be given up. (3.) That the Hegemony of Sparta should be accepted by land and sea, and that the same enemies and friends should be recognised. And (4.) That all exiles should be recalled. Immediately afterwards Lysander sailed into the Peirasus; and the demolition of the fortifications, which was accompanied by the music of female flute-players and the execution of dances, as if at a festival, began, the thoughtless Peloponnesians and their allies ex- claiming that now the day of the liberation of Hellas had come ! 1 6. The return of the exiles soon led to the subversion of the democracy ; for the triumph of Sparta was the triumph of oligarchy throughout Hellas. One of the returned exiles, Critias, a man of great wealth and the uncle of Plato, was joined by The- ramenes, one of the Four Hundred, in forming an oligarchical party, to which Lysander gave his countenance. A proposal was made, and of course carried, in the Ecclesia, to entrust the government to a board of thirty, known in history by the ominous name of the "Thirty Tyrants." A new Boule and new magistrates were nomi- nated, and a Spartan garrison, under the harmost Callibios, was placed in the Acropolis. A band of reckless young men was now organised, and the citizens, except 3,000, who were devoted to the Tyrants, were disarmed. The Thirty Tyrants then gave full play to their malevolence and rapacity ; blood flowed freely, and the leading citizens were compelled to flee from the city, or submit to THE THIRTY TYRANTS. 3*9 death. It is said that in eight months 1,500 persons were executed on the simple order of the Thirty. They further stretched their tyranny to crush the intellectual vigour of the people. They issued an edict for the suppression of all who taught logic and rhetoric, literary criticism and composition, and forbade all professors to handle the political and moral topics which were matter of ordinary 3 2o THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR, 431-404 B c. conversation. Lysander set up boards of ten as the supreme authority in Sainos and other cities, and in every city a Spartan harmost, with indefinite powers ; and the reign of terrorism under the Thirty at Athens may be regarded as a fair specimen of what generally occurred in the other Hellenic cities which were placed by the fortune of war at the mercy of Sparta. This cruelty, how- ever, was not approved by all of the Thirty, and a moderate party was formed by Theramenes. He was too powerful to be destroyed by a summary process. At a council at which Theramenes was present, Critias had the building surrounded with a body of men provided with concealed arms, and then rose in his place, and, accusing Theramenes of treason, proposed that he should be put to death, solely on the ground of convenience to the party by whom he was to be judged. Theramenes, seeing it useless to offer any defence on the ground of law or justice, pointed out the folly of the course Critias was pursuing. Critias, perceiving that the moment was fatal, left the room to summon his armed attend- ants. On his return with them, he declared it to be his duty as a good magistrate to see that no enemy of the oligarchy should be allowed to escape, and ordered him to be put to death. In vain Theramenes laid hold of the altar, and reminded the other oligarchs that the same fate might in the next moment be directed against them by Critias, if they now yielded to him ; the " Eleven," the board which had charge of the police, the prisons, and the punish- ment of criminals, immediately seized him, and hurried him across the market-place to the place of execution. When he drank off the poison, he threw the drops that remained in the cup upon the ground, and at the same time tinkled the cup, as in the popular game called cottabos, :;: saying, " This libation to the gentle Critias." 17. Among the list of the exiled was Alcibiades, who was still at Bisanthe. He now, for his greater safety, took refuge with Phar- nabazos ; but the animosity of the Thirty and the Spartans pur- sued him even in this retreat, and the satrap treacherously took means to carry out the decree of death before the exile could pro- ceed, as he intended, to the court at Susa. The house of Alcibiades was surrounded at night by a band of armed men, and set on fire. As he tried to escape, he was killed by a shower of arrows, towards the close of 404 B;C. The accomplished but unprincipled Athenian was then about forty-six yeais of age. The able general Thrasy- bulos, who had to seek refuge in exile, was at this time in Bceotia, * The Cottabos (K orra/So^), a Sicilian pcme, was much in vogue at the drink- ing parties of young men at Athens. The. simplest mode of playing it was when each guest threw the wine left in his cup so as to strike smartly in a metal basin, and at the same time invoked his mistress' name ; if all fell into the basin, and the sound was clear, it was a sign he stood well with her. The game soon became complicated, and was played in various ways. Sometimes a number of little cups (ofr/Sa^u) were set floating, and he who threw his cottabos so as to upset the greatest number in a given number of throws, won a prize. Sometimes the wine was thrown upon a scale suspended over a little image placed in water ; here the cottabos was to be thrown so as to make the scale descend on the head of the image. Tti DECARCHY ESTABLISHED. 321 watching for an opportunity favourable to an attack oil the tyrants from without. On receiving news of the death of Theramenes, he resolved to take advantage of the jealousies and discontent which so violent a measure was sure to create, and, though it was then mid-winter, 404-403 B.C., he entered Attica with seventy heavy- armed men, and seized Phyle, a strong fortress near the Boeotian frontiers, and on the south-western slope of Mount Parnes, within twelve miles of Athens. The Thirty sent a force to attack it. They went without tents or camp equipage, as the weather was fine, and they expected an easy victory ; but they were obliged to begin a circumvallation, and, as there was a heavy fall of snow during the night, they withdrew in the morning, but in so disorderly a manner that, when suddenly attacked by Thrasybulos, they lost a large portion of their baggage. Thrasybulos' forces were now swelled, by numerous accessions, to 700 men ; and when the cavalry of the Thirty, and the greater part of the Spartan troops in Athens, went out to keep the invaders in check, Thrasybulos surprised the en- campment of the Thirty at daybreak and routed their troops, of whom 120 were slain. Thrasybulos, whose forces now amounted to 1,000, boldly advanced and entered the undefended Peirseus ; but as his troops were too few for the points to be occupied for de- fence, he moved to the adjoining hill of Munychia. Critias, who had till now looked on the invasion as a mere raid for plunder, saw that only an immediate victory could save the oligarchy. He led his men to the attack, but they were routed, and he himself, another of the Thirty, called Hippomachos, and 70 followers, were killed. 18. The loss of Critias led to a change in the government, which now passed to the party of moderation, of which Theramenes had been the leader. The Thirty Tyrants were deposed, and a new Board of Ten, a Decarchy (8(Kapx ia or 8fAyyio), as in the other cities, was established. The more violent section of the Thirty and their supporters withdrew to Eleusis, and at the same time a request was sent by them and by the Ten to Sparta for assistance. But in the year that had elapsed since the fall of Athens in the spring of 404 B.C. a great change had taken place in Hellenic sentiment. The delusion of the Hellenes had been dispelled: they had exchanged the yoke of a refined and polished, though ambitious, power, for that of one which was at once ambitious, arrogant, coarse, and cruel. The governments established by Lysander were exceedingly un- popular, and the announcement that Sparta, to procure a revenue for the maintenance of the empire which had passed to her, was about to exact an annual contribution of 1,000 talents, 243,750 sterling, from her subject-allies had created general alarm. While the position of Sparta was thus weakened abroad by the overween- ing ambition and cruel harshness of Lysander, this general's popu- larity at home had been much reduced. The Ephors now regarded the Tyrants as merely the tools of Lysander's ambition, and they were unwilling to concede further support to them. Yet they allowed Lysander to set out at the head of a Lacedaemonian force, and he entered Athens a second time. But he was immediately followed 322 TtiE PELtiPONNESlAN WAR, 43* -404 *- by another force under the king Pausanias, and the command of the whole army was transferred to the latter. The citizens of Athens, hitherto cowed, were now emboldened to express their wishes, and Thrasybulos took care to cultivate good relations with the new com- mander. Commissioners, representatives of all parties, were sent by Pausanias to Sparta. The Ephors referred the deputation to A THEHS LOSES THE HEGEMONY. 323 a committee of 15 persons, of whom Pausanias was one. The king was joined by his 14 colleagues at Athens, and a solution of the difficulty was arrived at. The oligarchy was formally de- posed, and the democracy restored in the modified form which it had assumed before the fall of Athens, all exiles were recalled, and a general amnesty was passed. Immediately after this reconcilia- tion, in the spring of 403 B.C., the Peloponnesian forces evacuated Attica, and were disbanded by Pausanias. Thrasybulos and his followers then marched in solemn procession, and as in triumph, from the Peirseus to the Acropolis, to offer a sacrifice to Athena Polias. 19. Thus ended the great Peloponnesian War, and thus fell Athens from her hegemony of thedemocratical cities. Herdemocracy and independence were now restored, and she soon returned to her old connections and old policy ; but she never recovered the preponderating influence she had wielded, and her subsequent glory was only that of being the intellectual capital and university lit Hellas. The fall of the Athenian empire had necessarily resulted from the one-sided maritime policy pursued. The growth of the city had more and more turned the people away from the cultiva- tion of Attica, and their devotion to maritime affairs made them incapable of defending their native soil. They wasted their ener- gies to save the Asiatic cities, while their own mountain fastnesses, within view of the city, were held by the enemy for nine years, without an attempt to dislodge them. To counterbalance the evils attendant on their maritime policy, it was necessary to effect a complete amalgamation between Athens and her confederate cities. But no such thing was attempted; each city remained a separate republic, and the citizen of any one city was a foreigner in Athens, as were all other members of the confederacy. Her dominion was therefore essentially weak and insecure ; the whole founda- tions of her power were artificial, and could only remain intact by the energies and the patriotism of statesmen of genius. In Pericles Athens possessed the strong will, the foresight, and the command- ing will that she required. Under the feeble or corrupt politicians that immediately succeeded him she began to totter. Alcibiades might have become her preserver by his undoubtedly great genius ; but his selfishness and want of principle prevented this and inflicted on her the blows under which her glories passed away. MARCH OF TIIZ SPARTAN ARMV ACROSS THE MOUNT.MNS. CHAPTER XIX. THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY (404-371 B.C.). I. THE PERSIAN SUCCESSION : REVOLT OF THE YOUNGER CYRUS HIS INLAND EXPEDITION (401 B.C.): BATTLE OF CUNAXA DEFEAT AND DEATH OF CYRUS. 2. RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND (401-40x3 B.C.): SEIZURE OF THE HELLENIC GENERALS : ELECTION OF XENOPHON : ARRIVAL AT THE EUXINE: FATE OF THE SURVIVORS. 3. CHARACTER OF SOCRATES: HIS TKIAL AND EXECUTION: HIS INFLUENCE ON PHILOSOPHY. 4. RIGOUR OF TH I ! PARTAN RULE: EMPLOYMENT OF MERCENARIES: DIMINUTION OF SPARTAN CITIZENS: DECADENCE OF SPARTAN SPIRIT: VIEWS OF LYSAN- DER: ACCESSION OF AGESILAOS (398 B c ). 5. GROWING UNPOPULARITY o.- SPARTA: WAR WITH ELIS (402 B.C.): HOSTILITY OF PERSIA: OPERATIONS OF THIMBRON AND DERCYLLIDAS : A TRUCE: AGESILAOS APPOINTED GENERAL. 6. AGESILAOS IN ASIA (396-394 B.C.): HIS INVA- SION OF PHRYGIA: DISGRACE OF LYSANDER : AGESILAOS' VICTORY OVER THE PERSIAN SUCCESSION. 325 SARDES : EXECUTION OF TISSAPHERNES : TRUCE BETWEEN TITHRAUSTES AND AGESILAOS: INTERVIEW OF AGESILAOS AND PHARNABAZOS : RECALL OF AGESILAOS. 7. PERSIAN INTRIGUES IN GREECE : WAR BETWEEN SPARTA AND THEBES (395 B.C.): DEATH OF LYSANDER : RETREAT OF KING PAUSANIAS : LEAGUE AGAINST SPARTA. 8. THE CORINTHIAN WAR (394-387 B.C.): BATTLE OF CORINTH (394 B.C.): CONON'S VICTORY AT CNIDOS : BATTLE OF CORONEIA (394 B.C.). Q. OPERATIONS OF THE PER- SIAN FLEET : SEDITION AT CORINTH : THE PERSIAN FLEET AT ATHENS : THE LONG WALLS REBUILT : ARREST AND DEATH OF CONON : MILITARY IMPROVEMENTS OF IPHICRATES HIS SUCCESS: AGESILAOS IN ACAR- NANIA (390 B.C.): EXPEDITION OF THRASYBULOS HIS DEATH: SPARTAN NEGOTIATIONS WITH PERSIA THE PEACE OF ANTALEIDAS (387 B.C.). 10. DESTRUCTION OF MANT1NEIA : SPARTA DICTATES TO PHLIUS: RE- STORATION OF PLAT/EA : CONFEDERATION OF OLYNTHOS : THE OLYN- THIAN WAR (382-379 B.C.) : SURPRISE OF THE CADMEIA BY THE SPARTANS (382 B.C ) : FALL OF OLYNTHOS : PHLIUS GARRISONED BY SPARTA. II. PLOT OF THE THEBAN EXILES AT ATHENS: REVOLUTION UNDER PELOPIDAS AT THEBES (379 B.C.). 12. CHARACTER OF EPAME1NONDAS : CHARACTER OF PELOPIDAS. 13. SPARTAN ATTEMPT ON THE PEIR^EUS : RE-FORMATION OF THE ATHENIAN CONFEDERACY ; THE THEBAN SACRED BAND. 14. SPAR- TAN INVASION OF BCEOTIA: VICTORY OF THE ATHENIAN CHABRIAS : DISSENSIONS AT THESPI/E ; REPULSE OF CLEOMBROTOS I ATHENIAN NAVAL VICTORY OFF NAXOS (376 B.C.) : EXPEDITION OF TIMOTHEOS : VICTORY OF PELOPIDAS. 14. TRIAL OF TIMOTHEOS: EXPEDITION TO CORCYRA : DE- STRUCTION OF PLAT^EA : THE PEACE OF CALLIAS (371 B.C.). 15. BATTLE OF LEUCTRA (377 B.C.): FALL OF SPARTAN HEGEMONY. i. The termination of a long war always leaves a large number of men unfitted by their campaigning to return to their former modes of life, and ready to embark in any enterprise, however adventurous. At the end of the Peloponnesian War, crowds were left thus unoccu- pied the mercenaries on both sides and large numbers of exiles: and these readily offered their swords to the astute and ambitious Cjru>. The Persians, incapable of renewing the great struggle, which had brought on them the disasters of Marathon, Salamis, Plataea, Mycale, and the Eurymedon, had endeavoured to weaken Hellas by corruption and discord. The East is noted for the revolutions of the palace, and the decadence of dynasties. To the great monarchs who had founded and extended the empire Cyrus, Cambyses, Dareios I. Hystaspes feeble princes had succeeded. Xerxes I. had perished by the dagger of his captain of the guard, Artabanos, 465 B.C.; Artaxerxes I. Macrocheir or Longimanus, Long-handed, son of the late king, succeeded, though a younger son, and gave himself up to the rule of his mother and his wife. His son, Xerxes II., succeeded him, 425 B.C., but was assassinated two months after his succession by his half-brother Sogdianos, and the latter was, within seven months, murdered by his half-brother, the illegitimate son of Artaxerxes I., who is known as Dareios II. Ochos, or Nothos, i.e., the bastard. On the death of the latter, after twenty years' reign, 405 B.C., his son Artaxerxes II. Mnemon ascended the throne. During the reigns of these sovereigns the Persian policy towards the Hellenes had been left very much to the court satraps. The empire was again tending to dismember- ment, and the satraps were advancing to the position of independent 326 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. sovereigns. The younger Cyrus, the brother of the reigning monarch Artaxerxes II. Mnemon, saw in the position of the empire an opportunity of dethroning his brother and placing himself on the throne. Immediately on his procuring a satrapy in Asia Minor, he set about preparations for this object, and introduced the change of policy which was calculated to give him the support of the best Hellenic soldiers. He gave 10,000 daries, 10,916 135. $d. sterling, to a Spartan exile, Clearchos, to enlist a band of Thracian mercen- aries, and similar commissions were given to others. From Sparta he received an auxiliary corps of 700 heavy-armed men, and a squadron of 25 galleys. He also assembled a body of 14,000 Hellenes, chiefly Arcadians and Achaeans. His army of barbarians numbered 100,000 men. As a pretext for the assembling of this armament, he announced that he intended to take by force, from Tissaphernes, the portion of his satrapy which that satrap refused to deliver up to him, and also that he meditated an expedition against the Pisidians, who harassed his frontiers with freebooting incur- sions. He set out from Sardes in the spring of 401 B.C., and directed his course to the south-west, across Phrygia, Lycaonia, and Cilicia. It was not till he arrived at Tarsos that his designs were suspected ; there he remained twenty days for his forces to rest ; and a revolt occurred among his mercenaries, who were alarmed at the idea of penetrating into the interior of Asia. In this mutiny Clearchos was nearly stoned to death by the troops whom he had enlisted. Cyrus restored discipline by raising the pay of each man to the high rate of a darie and a half, i 12$. gd. sterling, per month, and by declaring he was only going to contend with the governor of Syria. On his arrival at Thupsacos, the Biblical Tiphsah, near Deir, on the right bank of the Euphrates, he announced openly that his destina- tion was Babylon. Renewed murmurs arose, which were allayed by another increase of pay. His forces crossed the Euphrates, traversed the deserts of Mesopotamia, and at length arrived in the plain of Cunaxa, about 500 stadia, 57 miles 805 yards, from Babylon. Here tidings reached Cyrus of the approach of the royal army, with Artaxerxes at its head. Cyrus immediately ordered the troops to form in their lines. The forces of the Great King are said to have amounted to 900,000 men. It was late in the day when the action began : and the Greeks on the right wing speedily routed the Persian left. At this success the friends of Cyrus, who was with his picked body-guard in the centre, saluted him as the Great King; but their felicitations were stopped by the movement of the Persian right and centre, which were endeavouring to encircle them. c'ynis now charged with his mounted body-guard of 600 men, and routed the 6,000 horsemen that guarded the person of the Great King. He caught sight of his brother and hurled his javelin, which struck him in the breast ; but as he galloped up, with his few companions, he was cut down. Clearchos and his Hellenic com- rades, on learning the defeat of their centre and left, stayed their pursuit and retired to their camp, which they found had been completely plundered in their absence. On the following day THE RETREAT OF THE TEN THOUSAND. 327 great dismay was spread amongst them when they learned the death of Cyrus. They vainly attempted to persuade his lieutenant Ariasos to continue the expedition, and claim the crown for himself. He knew that however probable might have been the success of one who bore the name and inherited the talents of the great founder of the empire, only failure could attend such an attempt on the part of a grandee. Accordingly it was agreed to retreat ; and Clearchos, the Boeotian Proxenos, the Thessalian Aristippos, the Achsan Socrates, and the other Hellenic generals, exchanged oaths of fidelity and alliance with Ariaeos. 2. Then began the famous retreat of the ten thousand, as it is termed, from that being nearly the number of the Greek troops. The Great King caused a summons to be sent them to lay down- their arms ; and when they proudly replied that it did not belong to the victors to disarm, he changed his attitude and sought to gain them over by promising them the provisions of which they stood in need. They accepted and took advantage of the offers, but never- theless they continued their retreat. Soon Tissaphernes arrived, on his way, as he said, to his government, a reconciliation was effected by him with the forces of Arises, and the Greeks were now left all alone. The hostility of the Persians now became manifest ; and Clearchos, desiring to come to some agreement, went, with four other generals, to Tissaphernes; they were immediately seized by the satrap's orders and sent to the Great King, who ordained their death. The Hellenic soldiers, deprived of all their generals at one blow, were now very dejected. They were 10,000 stadia, about 1,150 miles, from Greece; they had no provisions, no cavalry to achieve a victory or protect their retreat ; on every side were hostile peoples, and they had to traverse an unknown region of mountains and deserts. The genius of an Athenian was again to deliver the Hellenes from their Persian foes. There was in the army an Athenian knight, Xenophon, the historian of this Anabasis, or expedition into the interior, who had, at the request of his friend Proxenos, joined the expedition in the character of a volunteer, in hopes of gaining the favour of CJTUS. He had con- sulted his friend, the philosopher Socrates, about the expedition, and the latter advised him to consult the Delphic god; he received an ambiguous oracle, to ' do what he wished to do,' and he decided to go to Asia. When he saw the despondency of his comrades, he urged them to elect generals at once ; this was done and he and four others were raised to the command. By his exertions a body of fifty horsemen and another of two hundred slingers or archers, to repel the harassing attacks of the enemy, were organ- ised. The ten thousand now crossed the Zabatos, or Lycos, the Greater Zab, a river flowing from the frontier mountains of Arme- nia and Kurdistan, into the Tigris, south of the great mound of Nimrud, and advanced to the great ruins of Mespila, Mosul and Koyunjik, on the Tigris, and thence, suffering from the incessant attacks of the enemy, to the mountainous country of the Carduchi Kurdistan. At this point Tissaphernes ceased the pursuit and set 328 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. out with his army for Ionia. But they only escaped from him to fall into the ambuscades of the mountaineers, who inflicted great loss with their long arrows, against which the bucklers were of little service. Then, after a march of seven days, they emerged from the mountain passes into the great plateau of Armenia ; they were favourably received by the satrap Tiribazos and obtained supplies of food readily from the villages. But they were overtaken by a snowstorm it was then December and many of the soldiers perished from cold. In five days' march after this disaster, they reached the eastern branch ot the Euphrates ; but in the march after crossing the river many succumbed to the rigours of the winter and famine; the plains they traversed were covered with snow, and the keen north wind blew incessantly. After crossing the Phasis, probably not the river of Colchis, the Rion, but identical with the Araxes, Eraskh, or Ras, of Armenia, which flows from Mount Abusinto the Caspian Sea, and fighting their way through the territory of the Taochi, mountaineers near the frontiers of Armenia and nearer the Enxine, and the warlike Chalybes, they reached the city of Gymnias, probably Gumisch-Khana, the site of the most ancient and considerable mines in the Ottoman dominions, on the road from Trebizond to Erzeroum, belonging to the Scythini, in the province of Kars, between the Harpasos, Arpachai or Jorak, on the east, and the Asparos on the west, and north of the mountain.; of the Chalybes. In five days' march from the latter place, the van, winding along a mountain, came suddenly in sight of the Euxine, and burst out in loud shouts ; the troops in the rear, thinking the shouting due to an attack in front, hurried up, and, when they beheld what they had never hoped to gaze on again the sea they embraced their comrades and all shed tears from excess of joy. After some combats with the warlike tribes of the coast, they arrived at a Hellenic city, Trapezus, Trebizond, a co- lony of Sinope. Here they were received with great hospitality, and celebrated their deliverance by solemn games and sacrifices. The survivors were 860 heavy-armed men and 1,400 archers. They had only one desire, to find transports to take them to their homes. A Spartan admiral was lying with a squadron at Byzantion, and Cheirisophos was sent to ask him for the use of some vessels, but he ;met with a refusal. The forces thereupon set out to complete their march to the Hellespont; at several points on the coast they had to fight their way ; but they were hospitably received by two other colonies of Sinope, Cerasus, and Cotyora, and from the latter place they were transported on ship-board to Sinope itself and thence to Heracleia, Pontia, Erekli, and the port Calpe, Kirpe Liman, at the mouth of the Calpe. In crossing Bithynia they were subjected to the incessant attacks of the cavalry of Pharnabazos, but they successfully resisted every attempt to break their ranks, and made their way to Chrysopolis, Scutari, opposite Byzantion. Pharna- bazos, anxious to deliver his satrapy from such intruders, paid the Spartan admiral, Anaxibios, to convey them across the Hellespont and they then entered into the service of the Odrysian prince, THE PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES. 329 Seuthes, whom they restored to the possession of his heritage, about the end of 400 B.C., and in the following year the bulk of them became incorporated with the Spartan army, which, under Thim- bron, carried on operations against the satraps, Pharnubazos and Tissaphernes. 3. The year 390 B.C., that following the escape of the Ten Thousand, witnessed one of the great tragedies of Hellenic history, the execution of Socrates. This famous Athenian was son of the statuary Sophroniscos, and the midwife, Phxnarete, and husband of the shrew Xanthippe. He was born in 469 B.C.; he served in the engagements at Potidasa, 432 B.C., Dehon,424 B.C., and Amphipolis, 422 B.C., and he was a senator in 406 B.C., on which occasion he refused to act with the other members of the Prytany in putting to the vote the illegal proposal of Callixenos to condemn the com- manders at Arginusa; without hearing their defence individually. His personal appearance was striking; he had a flat nose, thick lips, and prominent eyes, like a Silenos; he went barefooted at all seasons, and was capable of bearing great physical fatigue. Socrates was brought up as a statuary, but abandoned his pro- fession to become a teacher of a most unique character, unparalleled in history, and only possible in the existing state of society, when all the citizens had a considerable amount of education, and spent the greater part of their time in publ.'c in the market-place. He pro- lessed that he himself 1 ne v nothing, and he considered that it was on account of this consciousness of his own ignorance that he was pronounced by the Delphic oracle the wisest of men ; the great mission of his life, which he believed to be imposed on him by the gods, was to expose the false estimate of knowledge, which was universal. This he effected by his Socratic dialectic, i.e., cross- examining a person on his alleged knowledge of anything, and gradually bringing him to confess his ignorance ; but Socrates him- self had no positive solution to offer for the difficulties he made patent, and hence his unpopularity at Athens ; for, like the " Sophists," whom he opposed, he generated a sceptical spirit. He believed himself to be inspired by a dasmon, or inward spiritual voice, a divine agency, which by different workings and manifesta- tions conveyed to him special revelations ; he also believed in communications by dreams, &c., and conformed to the popular polytheistic religion. The attack on him in the " Clouds " ot Aristophanes, 423 B.C., showed that he was even then hated by all parties for uprooting ancient prejudices; he was at length accused, in 399 B.C., of corrupting the youth of Athens, and of sub- stituting new gods for the tutelary deities cf the state. His accusers were the demagogue tanner, Anytos a wealthy manufacturer, whom he had offended by making his son, a youth of intelligence, averse to continuing in trade ; a wretched tragic poet, Meletos. and the orator, Lycon. Conscious of his innocence, he declined the proffered services of the great orator, Lysias, and conducted his own defence boldly, denying the charges, challenging the most complete investigation, and declining to accept an acquittal if the THE DEATH OF SOCRATES. 331 court attached to it the condition of abandoning the mission which he had carried out to the great profit of Athens. The boldness of his defence probably militated against him; by a majority of votes, 283 against 278, he was declared guilty. Meletos then proposed the sentence of death. Socrates boldly refused to acquiesce, in a greater punishment than a fine of 60 minx, one talent, or 243 155. sterling, declaring that his sentence really ought to be "free entertain- ment for the rest of his days in the Prytaneion, or Council Hall, at the public cost," for having devoted himself entirely to the service of his country, to make his fellow-citizens virtuous. The bold self- conscious utterance had the effect that might have been anticipated ; sentence of death was passed by 361 votes to 198. The vessel which went with the sacred theoria, or deputation for the annual festival at Delos, had departed the day before, and no one could be put to death till the theori returned ; and thus the execution was postponed for thirty days. Socrates passed the interval in prison in conversation on subjects of philosophy with his friends. On the eve of the day on which the theoria returned to Athens, one of his disciples, Crito, offered him the means of escaping to Thessaly, and undertook to bribe the gaoler; but Socrates resolutely refused, appealing to the moral obligation imposed on every citizen, legally condemned, to submit to the punishment imposed by the judges. When his last day of life arrived, he conversed with his disciples on the immortality of the soul, a discourse embodied by Plato in his dialogue called the Phaedon. At sunset, the cup of poison, hemlock, was brought to Socrates, and calm and unmoved, and even cheerful, amid the wailings of his disciples and of even the gaoler, he drank it to the dregs. When the torpor of death had seized on his limbs and was advancing to the trunk, he said, " Crito, we owe a cock to yEsculapius ; do not forget to pay this debt." A few minutes afterwards a slight movement of the body indicated that the spirit had left it. Thus perished one of the most extraordinary persons in history, a victim to religious intolerance. The value of Socrates in the history of philosophy is that "he brought down philosophy from Heaven; " he revolutionised the method and the object of philo- sophic inquiry, directing philosophy away from physics, for which he had no taste, to social, political, and ethical topics. He com- bated commonplace, and substituted morality on ethical grounds for the morality of custom and habit. For this new morality the determination of conceptions was necessary; and hence the originating of the method of induction, and the giving of strict logical definitions must be ascribed to him. His only positive doctrinal sentence transmitted to us is that "virtue is knowledge;" in his view the good action followed as necessarily from the know- ledge of the good as a logical conclusion from its premise. Three schools sprang directly from among his disciples. Antisthenes was the founder of the Cynics; Euclid, Eucleides, of the Megarians, and Plato of the Academics ; but all the schools, and every subse- quent philosophic movement of the world, may be traced up to the influence of Socrates. 333 THE SPARTAX HEGEMONY, 404 371 B.C. 4. Vv'hcn the Athenian hegemony was shattered by the Spartans, supported by Per.-ian gold, ths conquerors betook themselves to organising the Hellenic world for their o-.vn benefit. The decarchies, which had been established by Lysander in the conquered cities, were deposed shortly after by the ephors, and the government of the dependencies entrusted to a Spartan harmost, who ruled with great oppression by means of his Lacedaemonian garrison, while ia-3 autnorities at Sparta turned a deaf ear to all appeals. Such was the fear inspired by the severity of fie now dominant state in all Hellas that Xenophoa refused to accept the title of general- issimo, which the remnant of the Tea Thousand wished to confer oa him ; for he feared that Sparta would look with an unfavourable eye on supreme power in the hand of an Athenian. The Lace- daemonian admiral even sjld into slavery four hundred of the brave comrades of Xenophon for having disobeyed some order given them. Sparta's hegemony was preserved by her great prestige, by the active and energetic surveillance exercised at Sparta itself by the ephors and in the other cities by the ephors, and by her fleet, which cruised throughout the /Egean, from Cypros to Byzan- tioa ; her treasures were carefully hoarded, not spent in magnificent and useless structures as at Athens ; and she could readily find in the poor and greedy populations of Peloponnesos thousands of excellent mercenary troops. A revolution had now taken place in the military arrangements of Hellas : the democratic army, which had succeeded the aristocratic army of the heroic age, had in turn, to a great extent, given place to an army of mercenaries. The introduction of the system of paying the citizen soldiers, had soon led to a substitution of mercenaries for the national militia; and the great losses inflicted during the Peloponnesian War had made the employment of foreign mercenaries common in every Hellenic city. To obtain gold to pay troops, recourse was had to Persia, and hence the constant intervention of the successors of Xerxes in Hellenic affairs, and the efforts which both confederacies made to secure the countenance of the Barbarian, alliance with whom they had once spurned. Meanwhile the Spartan citizens were con- tinually decreasing in numbers and degenerating. Besides the great losses sustained in the war, the citizen roll was thinned by large numbers being reduced to a lower grade from their poverty not permitting them to occupy their seats at the public tables; for he who could not contribute his proportion to the public mess was deprived of his political rights. This political inequality was daily extending its area. Gold and silver had practically ceased to be proscribed. Those who returned from Asiatic commands, or had been harmosts, brought back with them large sums of money and many articles of value; and, with these, the love of luxury and effeminacy, and a spirit of venality, vices from which the severe Lycurgean discipline had been intended to protect the city. Even the ephors and senators gave signs of this change in Spartan life and demeanour. The government had become more and more oligarchical; the fewer the number of the citizen? became, the, POPULARITY OF LYSANDER. 333 more jealous the leading families were, and the more averse to allow others to share the civic honours. If they were to expand the constitution and allow the impoverished families to recover their political rights, they dreaded that the majority of the lower citizens, which would then exist, would demand some territorial reforms, and insist on a partition of the great domains which were now concentrated in the hands of a few ; and though the public interests demanded such a measure, private interests were too powerful. Hence the gulf was widening between the privileged and the lower classes ; the latter were recruited by Spartans who had lost their civic rights through want of means, by manumitted Helots, by Laconians on whom certain rights had been conferred, and by the children of Spartan fathers, possessed of full civic rights, by foreign mothers. There were now recognised four classes, the Equals, or full citizens ; the Inferiors, virofjifiovff, who had lost their position by poverty, the Neodamodes,* and the Periceci. A formidable conspiracy of the three inferior classes was formed under one Cinadon ; but it was discovered, and re- pressed with the usual severity of the oligarchy, 398-397 B.C. The great popularity of Lysander after the capitulation 01 Athens had made him, for a time, all-powerful in the state. He was intoxicated with his success, and looked on himself as the ^Esymnete of the Hellenic world. He is said to have intended a revolution in Sparta the abolition of the privileges which the two reigning families possessed to the exclusion of the Heracleidan clan, and the extension of eligibility to the throne to all its members : and, according to some, he wished to make the throne open to all Spartans, trusting that if the crown were given as the reward of talent, no citizen would be preferred to him. The reaction which his pride and dictation speedily created at Sparta and in the subject states as evidenced by the expedition of Pausanias to Athens and the general abolition of the Decarchies for the time dissipated his ambitious schemes. But the death of Agis, in 399 B.C., seemed to him a fitting opportunity for advancing himself: and he had sufficient influence to secure the crown for Agesilaos, the half-brother of the deceased king, to the exclusion of his son, Leotychides, whom Lysander represented to be illegitimate, on account of the intrigue of Alcibiades with the wife of Agis. Lysander had been totally deceived in the character of the new monarch ; he expected to be the real king himself, but the protege only waited an opportunity to throw off the tutelage. Agesilaos, who was then about forty years of age, was of mean stature and lime ; but though the Spartans had an oracle warning them against a " lame reign," they were not alarmed by his bodily defects, as Lysander and others averred that the oracle referred to the illegi- timacy of a monarch, and so had especial reference to the exclusion * The Neodamodes, ^o&ina,&e^, lately made one of the people, or newly enfranchised, were those Helots who were freed by the state in reward for ser- vices in war. Probably they received some civil rights, in which respect they were above the Perireci. 334 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. of Leotychides. Agesilaos was already popular from his personal courage, his rigid adherence to the Spartan canon of life, and his affability ; and his deference to the ephors soon placed a great amount of real power in his hands. The foreign relations of Spsrla were now such as to admit of his displaying his real character. INVASION OF KING AGIS, 401 B.C. 335 5- Thebes had long sought to play in central Greece he part which Sparta took in Peloponnesos. Between the former and Athens there was jealousy, but not the same serious rivalry and opposition of interests as with Sparta, notwithstanding the form of government being oligarchical at Thebes as at the capital of Laconia. Intoxicated with her victory over Athens, Sparta believed that she had no other state in Hellas to question her supremacy : she was indignant that the Thebans had claimed at Deceleia the tithes of Apollo, and had treated with disdain their demands for a share in the treasure brought back by Ly sander, 1470 talents, 358,3 1 2 los. sterling, the balance of the advances made by Cyrus and the booty from the Athenian cities and armaments. Corinth was as dis- contented with the Spartan hegemony as was Thebes. The Eleians had already felt the full severity of the Spartan rule. On their refusal of the Spartan demand to restore independence to their sub- ject cities, King Agis had advanced against them with an army in 402 B.C. His progress was stopped in consequence of an earthquake ; but in the following year he returned with the contingents of all the allies, even of Athens, but excepting Corinth and Thebes, and with a large force of volunteers from Achaia and Arcadia. The invasion was very successful : the treasures of the province, which had been spared from the storm of war for two centuries, were seized and distributed throughout the other Peloponnesian states; the Eleians had to recognise the independence of the towns of Triphylia and Pisatis, and to enter into the ranks of the subject allies of Sparta. But a 'more formidable enemy than any in Greece proper had been stirred up against Sparta : the Persians were no longer allies The Hellenic cities of Asia, the independence of which had been acknowledged by the Persians in their treaty with Athens, and which had joined the Delian confederacy, and some others during or at the close of the Peloponnesian War, had become allies of Sparta, had incurred the wrath of Persia by their support of Cyrus, for whom they all had declared, except Miletos, which he was besieg- ing at the time he commenced his expedition. Tissaphernes. after his return to Ionia from the pursuit of the Ten Thousand, deter- mined to reduce them : whereupon they appealed for aid to Sparta, and in 399 B.C. an armament was sent out to them under Thimbron, consisting of 2,000 Neodamodes, 4,000 Peloponnesians, and 300 Athenian horsemen, which was joined by the remnant of the Ten Thousand and 3,000 men furnished by the lonians themselves. Thimbron captured Pergamos and some other cities ; but the want of discipline and the marauding habits of his troops having excited the complaints of the allies, he was superseded in 398 B.C. by Dercyllidas and was condemned for his inefficiency to a heavy fine, and, being unable to pay it, had to go into exile. Thimbron's suc- cessor, Dercyllidas, who was appropriately nick-named Sisyphos, profited, as Lysander had done, by the rivalry of the satraps Pharnabazos and Tissaphernes. He ravaged a large portion of the satrapy of the former, while the latter took no steps to check his progress in the adjacent province. During a brief truce Dercyllidas SPARTAN IlEGEMotiy, 464-371 B.C. crossed over to the Thracian Chersonesos, which he delivered from the incursions of the neighbouring barbarian tribe?. On his return to Asia, he carried the war into Caria, the satrapy of Tissaphernes. A battle was on the point of being fought : but the Hellenic posi- tion was unfavourable; and Tissaphernes had such a large army, besides bodies of Hellenic mercenaries for these were now to be found everywhere that the Asiatic Hellenes were alarmed and Dercyllidas could not venture on an attack. Tissaphernes was himself equally averse to risk a general battle. An interview was arranged between the rival commanders : Dercyllidas demanded that the Persians should leave the Hellenic cities of Asia to govern themselves by their own laws, and Pharnabazos that the Spartan troops should depart from the territory of the Great King and the Spartan harmosts from the various places where they were estab- lished. A truce was concluded to allow of the questions being referred to their several governments, 397 B.C. It was at this juncture that Lysander procured the appointment of king Agesilaos to the command of the army in Asia. He intended to volunteer his own services and, by his influence over the king, to be the real governor of the army, while the military operations in Asia would afford him an opportunity of regaining the influence which had culminated in the Fall of Athens. To arouse the traditional senti- ments of the Hellenes, it was determined that the king should embark, like Agamemnon, at Aulis, in Boeotia. Here Agesilaos assembled a force of 2 ooo Nedamodes, and 6,000 heavy-armed from the allies, Sparta itself sending only 30 men. Corinth and Thebes, as formerly in the expedition against the Eleians, refused their contingents : Athens was excused on account of her weakness. When Agesilaos arrived with a portion of his fleet at Aulis, he pro- ceeded to offer sacrifice, with the help of his own prophets and ministers. The Thebans, irritated at his thus acting contrary to the usages of the country in employing foreign ministers and diviners, advanced, with an armed force, seized the altar, and scattered the flesh of the victims. Agesilaos had to sail for Asia without avenging this insult, but he never forgave it. 6. The Hellenic cities of Asia were in disorder, on the arrival of Agesilaos at Ephesos in 396 is.c. Neither the democracy, formerly protected by Athens, nor the oligarchy, established by Lysander, was dominant. Lysander resolved again to support the oligarchies, and, so little had he understood the character of his king that he already acted as commander-in-chief, and lived in royal style, attaching to his court all who came to solicit his protection. Agesi- laos and the small band of thirty Spartans soon showed their disgust at his arrogance, and subjected him to such humiliation, that Lysander requested a distant mission to conceal the spectacle of his powerlessness from those to whom he had appeared an un- lettered ruler ; and he was accordingly sent to the Hellespont. Tissaphernes, during the truce, had assembled a large army to guard Cana ; but Agesilaos suddenly set out for Phrygia, the satrapy of Pharnabazos, which had been left defenceless, and carried off an AND AGESILAOS. 337 immense booty. The want of cavalry compelled Agesilaos to retrace his steps ; he again established his head quarters at Ephesos, where he raised a force of cavalry, composed of Asiatic Hellenes, and during the winter made great preparations for a march upon SardeF. To increase his men's contempt for the barbarians, he caused several Persian prisoners to be sold in a state of complete nudity ; the view of their bodies, white from constantly wearing clothes, and delicate from always being conveyed in carriages, inspired his men with the belief that they had to contend only with women. The designs of Agesilaos had been announced during the winter ; but Tissaphernes dreaded another stratagem, and distributed his horse in the plain of the Maeander. When therefore Agesilaos set out for Sardes in the spring of 395 B.C., the cavalry could not be recalled in time to interfere with his advance ; and in three days he marched unopposed to the banks of the Pactolos. Here, on the fourth day, the Persian cavalry appeared, but unsupported by the infantry. Agesilaos made a vigorous attack on the enemy with his new corps of cavalry and some heavy-armed men, and completely routed them capturing their camp, in which was found booty of the value of 70 talents, 17,062 IDS. sterling. Agesilaos now ravaged the country up to the very walls of Sardes, into which Tissaphernes had retired, with his infantry and the remnant of the cavalry. The news of this disaster excited the wrath of the Great King ; by the influence of the queen mother, Parysatis, Tithraustes was appointed satrap, and an order was sent down from Susa for the execution of Tissa- phernes ; he was seized in a bath at Colossae in Phrygia and at once beheaded. Tithraustes when he had carried out this sentence of Artaxerxes II. Mnemon, pretended that there was no further cause of war between Hellas and the Great King; he even offered to re- cognise the independence of the Asiatic Hellenes, on condition of their paying the ancient tribute ; and eventually he gave Agesi- laos 30 talents, 7,312 los. sterling, to evacuate his satrapy till a reply should be received from Sparta to his overtures. Agesilaos took the money and marched into Phrygia, the satrapy of Pharna- bazos ; on his route he received intelligence from Sparta that, contrary to all precedent, the command-in-chief of the naval forces had been united to that of the army in his hands ; and he at once commissioned his brother-in-law Peisander to act as his deputy in the fleet. Agesilaos continued his advance, and after gaining the alliance of Otys, a Paphlagonian prince, penetrated as far as the neighbourhood of Dascylion, the residence of Pharnabazos. The satrap requested an interview. Agesilaos and his thirty Spartans seated themselves on the turf, and when Pharnabazos arrived, in splendid robes, his slaves spread out cushions for him on the ground, but the satrap was ashamed of such effeminacy, and took his seat on the green grass. Agesilaos offered to make the satrap a sovereign prince, but the latter did not accept the offer; from his reply how- ever, Agesilaos concluded that it would not be a difficult task to detach the western provinces from the Persian Empire, and he formed the idea of placing a crowd of small states between the z 338 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. Great King and Greece. He therefore set himself to raise his forces in numbers and efficiency ; his fleet soon numbered 120 gal- leys, and preparations for an inland expedition were being rapidly made. But in the midst of his preparations and his hope, 394 B.C., he received orders from home to return immediately to Greece, where riots which had broken out necessitated his presence. There- upon Tithraustes procured the withdrawal of Agesilaos from his satrapy. It was indifferent whether he attacked another portion of the empire or not ; but he well knew that the enemy would return unless recalled from Asia by some complications at home. He therefore determined to kindle a war in Greece ; and for this pur- pose he despatched a trusty agent, Timocrates, the Rhodian, with 50 talents, 12,187 Ios - sterling, to Greece. The envoy found the Thebans in a mood favourable to war with Greece ; and a war between the Phocians and the Opuntian Locrians, the latter of whom were supported by Thebes, soon gave an opportunity for war, 395 B.C. The Phocians appealed to Sparta, and Lysander procured his appointment as leader of an auxiliary force to Phocis. He should have been joined under the walls of Haliartos, a Boeotian town in a pass on the south of Lake Copais, by the king Pausanias, but the latter did not arrive at the time. The garrison was reinforced by a body of Thebans, and a sally was made, in which the troops of Lysander were routed and he himself slain. Before the rally a Theban embassy had been sent to Athens to ask assist- ance. Though Athens was no longer the mistress of the sea, though her forts were dismantled, and though it was her tradi- tionary foe that solicited her to do an act which must involve a collision with that power whose heel had been so lately on her neck, the deliberation was but brief; and, on the proposal of Thrasybulos, an alliance with Thebes was decreed. An Athenian force was at once sent off, and arrived at Haliartos the day after the sally ; and it had already joined the Theban contingent before Pausanias arrived. When the king came, he did not venture to risk a battle ; but after holding a council of war, solicited a truce to collect and bury the dead. Pausanias then retired to Pelopon- nesos ; but being afraid of the popular indignation at Sparta, he went to the temple of Athena Alea, at Tegea ; in his absence his trial was conducted at Sparta, and sentence of death was passed upon him. The sanctuary, however, was not violated ; but he died shortly after at Tegea. The intervention of Athens, or the Persian gold, now induced the Eubceans, Acarnanians, Locrians, Corin- thians, Argives, and other states in Greece, to enter into the new alliance. 8. The contest waged by this league with Sparta is known as the v orinthian War, 394-387 B.C., from Corinth being the central point of the struggle. A congress of the allies met at Corinth early in the spring of 394 B.C.; immediately after which the ephors recalled Agesilaos ; but the allies did not act with the vigour which the Corinthian Timolaos advised, to advance direct upon Sparta ; and the Spartans marched into Sicyonia before the allies took the THE CORINTHIAN WAR, 394 u.<5. 339 field. The allies had 24,000 heavy-armed men, 1,550 horsemen, and some light-armed infantry ; the Spartan force numbered 13,500 heavy-armed men. The hostile forces met in the vicinity of Corinth in July, 394 B.C. ; the hesitancy of the Thehans and the want of agreement among the generals brought on the allies defeat and the loss of 2,800 men. The Spartan victory in Greece was more than counterbalanced two months later, August, 394 B.C , by a naval disaster on the Asiatic coast : when the armistice had been concluded in 397 B.C., between Dercyllidas and Pharnabazos, the latter, amid other preparations for a successful renewal of the war, organised a fleet, partly Phoenician and partly Hellenic, the com- mand of which he entrusted to the Athenian admiral Conon, who had been living with King Enagoras of Salamis, in Cypros, since his escape from the massacre at ^gospotami, 405 B.C. ; and Conon, after having excited a revolution which overthrew the oligarchy at Rhodes, and having intercepted a convoy of provisions which the Egyptian Nepherites was sending to the Spartans, on the departure ot Agesilaos from Asia, attacked his naval lieutenant Peisander off Cnidos, in Caria, and captured or sank 50 out of the 85 triremes, Peisander himself being killed in the action. Thus was destroyed the Spartan maritime supremacy. Agesilaos, now on his home- ward march, had forced his way through Thessaly to the frontiers of Phocis and Bceotia, where he received intelligence of this calamity at Cnidos. Lest the troops should be depressed, he announced a naval victory, and before resuming his march, offered up a sacrifice for the pretended success of his countrymen. On receiving news of the march of Agesilaos upon their rear, the allies fell back from Corinth upon the plain of Coroneia, near Mount Helicon, to which Agesilaos advanced without opposition. The battle which ensued was one of the most severely contested in all the internecine wars of Greece. The Thebans fought with a courage that augured ill for the hegemony of Sparta ; they drove in the left wing, composed of Orchomenians, and then turned to rejoin their own centre and left, which had fallen back upon Mount Helicon ; but Agesilaos intercepted them, and a fearful hand to hand combat ensued with daggers, the spears and shields of the front ranks on both sides having been shattered by the shock of the charge ; but the Thebans cut their way through. Agesilaos himself was covered with wounds, but he was saved from being trampled upon by his comrades. With him the victory of Coroneia nominally rested, for the Thebans solicited a truce to bury the dead ; but the moral effect was in favour of the allies, for they had held ground against those whom shortly before they would not have ventured to meet in the field. 9. Agesilaos was heartily welcomed at Sparta, and became the arbiter of her foreign policy. She now stood sorely in need of a vigorous and talented ruler, for her hegemony had been shaken to its foundations in a few months. The loss of the maritime supre- macy had been immediately followed by Conon and his Helleno- Persian fleet acting on the offensive. Conon and Pharnabazos 340 THE SPARTAN 404-371 B.C. visited the islands and Hellenic cities of Asia, from which they expelled the Spartan harmosts, and which they wisely left to form governments of their own choice ; they then conducted their fleet to the Gulf of Messenia, where they ravaged the rich valley of the Pamisos, and next seized Cythera, in which they placed a garrison of Athenian troops. On land the forces of the allies, ARRIVAL OF CON ON AND PHARNABAZOS, 393 B.C. 341 concentrated at Corinth, were barring the two roads across the isthmos to shut up the Spartans in Peloponnesos. But at Corinth scenes nearly as atrocious as at Corcyra were witnessed. One political party made a sudden onslaught on a festal day on its oppo- nents, and massacred them even in the temples and at the bases of the statues of the gods. The survivors fled the city and invoked the aid of the Spartans, who cut off the long walls of Corinth and seized the port, Lechseon, so that Corinth was now in a besieged state, and one of the roads across the Isthmos was opened. Athens and Thebes now became alarmed and made overtures of peace. Sparta consented to allow Athens to rebuild her walls and con- struct a fleet, and even recognised her right to the possession of Lemnos, Imbros, and Scyros, but refused to give up the Thracian Chersonese. The assembly at Athens declined to ratify the obliga- tions of the deputies, and Thebes also withdrew from the negotia- tions. In the spring of 393 B.C. Conon and Pharnabazos came, with their ships, from the southern coasts of Peloponnesos to the Saronic Gulf. When Pharnabazos was desirous of leaving for Asia Conon offered if he would leave the ships, to maintain their crews free of charge to the Persian exchequer and employ them to rebuild the long walls of Athens, which would be a severe blow aimed at Sparta. The satrap entered eagerly into his views and even gave him the balance of treasure in the military chest, that the work might be completed with greater speed. Conon then sailed into the Peiraeus with 80 galleys, and the Athenians beheld the rare sight of a Persian fleet moored peacefully in their harbours. Work- men flocked in from Thebes and other allied cities ; and the great structure of Themistocles, Cimon, and Pericles was again raised, but unfortunately this time it was the Great King who paid the workmen. The real intentions of the court of Susa were shown in the following year, 392 B.C., by the fate of Conon, who, having been induced by Tiribazos to visit Sardes, was arrested on the charge of betraying the Persian interests and endeavouring to recover Ionia and jEolia for Athens, and died shortly afterwards in prison ; or, according to others, in Cypros, to which island he had escaped. The rapid rise of the Athenian power and her attempts to reestab- lish her sway over the islands had so alarmed the Spartans that they determined to conclude a treaty with Persia, even if the Asiatic Hellenes must be abandoned ; and though their overtures were at first rejected, the Persian jealousy of Athens was again aroused. In Greece itself little of importance was effected in 393 and 392 B.C., Corinthian territory being still the scene of the campaigns. But a new system of tactics was introduced by Iphicrates, an Athenian, who commanded a body of mercenaries at the Isthmos. Mercen- ary forces lacked the ardour and patriotic spirit of the old citizen soldiers ; and as skill in warfare now superseded the old more ignorant but more heroic style, the science of tactics rose among them, as strategy in modern times among the Italian condottieri. Iphicrates not only took an active part in this revolution, but he also changed the mode of arming a portion qf the Athenian army. 342 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. For the cuirass of the heavy-armed men, hoplitae, 6n-X2ru, he substituted a linen corselet, while he lessened their shield, and increased the length of the light javelin and the short sword of the peltasts, so that the body of peltasts which he commanded, pos- sessed the peculiar advantage at once of light-armed and of heavy- armed infantry. This organisation permitted the soldiers to make very rapid movements. Iphicrates, who had nearly anticipated that which a little later, on the other side of the Ionian Sea, won for the Romans so many triumphs, occupied his troops unceasingly and never encamped, even in a friendly country, without entrenching the encampment. He also introduced the custom in the rounds, of a double sign, the first given by the officer and the second by the sentinel. In 391 B.C., Iphicrates gained great renown for himself and his reforms by an attack on a Lacedaemonian mora, or regiment, nearly all of which was slain ; his peltasts were then able to ravage the country as far as the south of Arcadia, while the allies of Sparta did not venture to meet them. In the following year, 390 B.C., Sparta made a great effort ; the Achasans wished to extend along the northern shores of their gulf, and at their request Agesilaos invaded the country of the Acarnanians, who were compelled to enter the league. At the same time his colleague, Agesipolis, invaded the territory of Argos, and desolated it, notwithstanding the protest of the Argives that they were protected by a sacred truce existing during the celebration of the Isthmian games. In the same year, 390 B.C., Athens gave encouragement to the Salaminian prince Enagoras, who had thrown off the Persian suzerainty ; and Thrasybulos was sent forth at the head of forty galleys, with which he brought over to the Athenian alliance two Thracian princes, Arnadocos and Seuthes ; and Byzantion, Chalcedon, and a part of Lesbos re-established, in the interest of Athens, the tolls on the Euxine, and levied con- tributions from all the towns of the Asiatic coast as far as Pam- phylia. Thrasybulos unfortunately perished at Aspendos, about seven miles from the mouth of the Eurymedon, in Pamphylia, in a sally by the citizens at night, 389 B.C. ; but Iphicrates, who was then sent with his peltasts to the Hellespont, continued the work which he had begun. The successes of the Athenians alarmed both Persia and Sparta; and when Antalcidas, the Spartan admiral, arrived in Asia, he found little difficulty in coming to an agreement with the satrap Tiribazos, the successor of Tithraustes, and he was conducted by him to Susa, where the basis of a peace was drawn up. Then the admiral and the satrap returned to the coast ; the Spartan fleet of eighty sail sailed to the Hellespont. Against this force Iphicrates could, of course, offer no resistance, and the market supplies of Athens were again stopped. This circumstance, and the continued incursions of the /Eginetans, who one night surprised the Peiraeus, made the great Attic city desire peace. Tiribazos therefore convoked the deputies of all the belligerent cities, and read to them the orders of the Great King " King Artaxerxes II. Mnemon deems it just that the Hellenic cities of Asia and the PEACE OF ANTALCIDAS, 387 B.C. 343 slands of Cypros and Clazomenae should be subject to him ; and that the other Hellenic cities, whether great or small, should be free, with the exception of Lemnos, Imbros and Scyros, which must belong, as formerly, to the Athenians ; on those who may refuse this peace I will make war, in alliance with those who accept it. I will make war on them by land and by sea, with my ships and my treasures." This disgraceful peace of Antalcidas, concluded 387 B.C., was accepted quietly by the sons of the conquerors of Marathon, Salamis and Platasa from the sovereign of an empire which they had twice with impunity traversed. No Hellenic states- man could look beyond the narrow boundaries of his own city, and Agesilaos was no exception to the rule. The policy of Sparta was now guided by him ; and the object he had in view in this pact with Persia was to break up the various leagues in Hellas, and leave Sparta free to regain her hegemony. The other states were then too weak to maintain the contest against the allied armies and fleets of Persia and Sparta. The words of the Great King, in which, as sovereign lord, he dictated the destinies of Hellas, were engraved brazen tablets and stone, and placed in the temples of the gods. By the peace every league in Hellas was dissolved ; Thebes refused to allow the detachment of the Boeotian towns which had so long been her dependencies; but on Agesilaos assembling an army to force the recognition of their independence, the Thebans submitted. Argos was similarly obliged to recall the garrison which she kept at Corinth, where the oligarchical faction, devoted to Sparta, immediately re- turned, while the democratic chiefs were in turn exiled. But Agesi- laos carefully avoided applying the treaty to Sparta : Messenia was not restored to the Messenians. Sparta wished to remain alone united and strong, while all around were divided and enfeebled. It is said that on one remarking to Agesilaos that Sparta Persized, he re- plied, " No, it is Persia that Laconizes ; " unfortunately the state- ments were equally true. Xenophon says that the peace of Antal- cidas reflected much glory on the Spartans ; but subsequent his- torians have not ratified his judgment. Under the Athenian hegemony Hellas had risen to the height of glory and power : under the Spartan she had fallen, in less than seventeen years, at the feet of Persia. After her overthrow of Athens, Sparta had exhibited only oppression, without even the grandeur of despotism. Her fall was rapid. The peace of Antalcidas temporarily checked her decadence ; but that decadence had begun, and only the weak- ness and jealousies of the rest of Greece prevented its proceeding with swift steps. 10. No sooner had the several states settled down to the new condition of affairs than Spartan deputies appeared before Man- tineia to demand the levelling of the walls, 385 B.C. Mantineia had been guilty of receiving a democratic constitution, of having supplied some corn to the Argives during the war, of having been tardy in furnishing her contingent, and of not having exhibited a becoming sorrow at the reverses of Sparta. On the refusal of the Mantineians, King Agesipolis was sent to ravage their territory and 344 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. besiege their city. He captured the latter by raising an embank- ment and diverting the waters of the mountain torrent Ophis, on the frontiers of Mantineia and Tegea, into a new channel along the walls, whereby the unbaked bricks, which formed the foundations of the walls, were softened, and the walls fell. Mantineia was de- stroyed, and its inhabitants were distributed among four villages, which Sparta pretended to treat as distinct states and which he placed under the charge of citizens selected by herself; but fourteen years later, 371 B.C., the Mantineians took advantage of the Spartan overthrow at Leuctra to re-assemble and rebuild their city. Phlius had expelled its oligarchical leaders ; the exiles now came to Sparta and represented that, while they had been masters, their city had always been docile and submissive ; whereupon the ephors de- manded their recall and the restoration of their confiscated property, and the Phlinsians readily submitted to the dictation, 383 B.C. Agesilaos next set himself to injure Thebes. The Plataeans were authorised to rebuild their city on its old site and surround it with walls. This was the same policy in a different form ; Agesilaos sought to attain his end in two ways, by destroying every great city or every formidable union of cities, and by raising and foster- ing cities on the territory of the rivals of Sparta, to weaken them. Under the pretext of protecting the Boeotian towns against Thebes, harmosts were sent from Sparta to them to organise oligarchies in each, and bring them under the influence of Sparta ; and Spartan garrisons were actually placed in Orchomenos and Thespias. In the following year, 382 B.C., ambassadors arrived from Acanthos and Apollonia.'in Chalcidice the peninsula of Macedonia between the Thermaic and Strymonic gulfs to solicit aid against Olynthos, which menaced their independence. The Chalcidic towns, united by community of origin and of interests, had formed to defend themselves at once against Athens and Macedonia, a confederation of which Olynthos, at the head of the Toronaic gulf, was the capital. Each of the confederate cities preserved its own constitution ; but the league was of a more close character than any other in Greece, for an inhabitant of any one of the cities could enjoy all civil rights in any of the others. The Macedonian king, Amyntas II., pressed by the Illyrians, had ceded to Olynthos the coast of the Thermaic Gulf, which greatly strengthened the confederation ; and the great Macedonian towns of Pellas and Potidam, which commanded the isthmus of Pallene, entered the league. Olynthos, the head of the confederacy, had now 8,000 heavy-armed men, a larger number of peltasts, and 1,000 horsemen ; she had an understanding with the Thracians, and was at this time on good terms with Athens and Thebes ; with serviceable allies, a full exchequer, plenty of naval timber, and the gold and silver mines of Pangaeos in her neighbour- hood, she had plenty of resources to make herself a state of the first rank in Hellas. The two neighbouring towns, Acanthos and Apollonia, had been averse to merge their individuality in the con- federation ; they had rejected all the overtures of Olynthos, and when menaced by her, appealed to Sparta. It was not a difficult CAPTURE OF THE CADMEIA, 382 B.C. 345 task to induce Sparta to do in Chalcidice what she was doing in the rest of Greece. A force was at once sent off under a general, Eudamidas, and his brother Phcebidas immediately followed with another corps, 382 B.C. The Spartan forces marched through the territory of Thebes, and when they drew near that city, the pole- march Leontiades, with some others of the oligarchical party, came out to meet Phoebidas. It happened to be the day of the Thesmo- phorian festival of Demeter, when the Cadmeia, the citadel, was always given up to the women for the celebration of the rites ; and as the day was excessively hot it was then midsummer the streets of the city were deserted at noon. The moment was con- sidered a favourable one for introducing the Spartan forces ; and ere any resistance could be organised, Phcebidas had marched, with his men, through the city into the acropolis, which they seized and detained all the women in it as hostages for the surrender of the inhabitants. The general indignation aroused by this act of treachery was such that Sparta had to offer some reparation ; she superseded and fined Phcebidas ; but she kept possession of the Cadmeia, and subsequently conferred a command on Phrebidas. Ismenias, the leader of the popular party in Thebes, fell a victim to the oligarchs, in whose hands the government was placed by the Spartan garrison ; and Thebes, now an ally of Sparta, sent a con- tingent to join the first Spartan force against Olynthos. The war with the latter city lasted three years, and lost Sparta two of her generals and one king ; Eudamidas fell in the siege, his successor Teleutias, after some brilliant successes, to which the Macedonians contributed, met with a like fate; and the king Agesipolis, who came with considerable reinforcements, after having made some successful raids in the neighbouring country and captured Torone, was carried off in seven days by a fever ; his body was embalmed in honey and sent to Sparta. The general Polybiades had the glory of reducing the Olynthians. Invested by sea and land, they solicited peace, 379 B.C., which was granted them on condition ot having the same friends and enemies as Sparta, and of marching as faithful allies under the banners of this republic. The fall of the Olynthian confederacy delivered at a period more or less remote, but certain, the Hellenic cities of Chalcidice and Thrace to Mace- donia, as the ruin of the Athenian empire had delivered the Hellenic cities of Asia to Persia. It was by Sparta that this double treason to the general interests of Hellas was accomplished. During the siege of Olynthos, the oligarchs, who had been restored to Phlius made complaints of being ill-treated ; Agesilaos marched to the siege of the town, and captured it after a siege of twenty months ; on which a garrison was placed in the town, 379 B.C. While Sparta was thus planting her foot everywhere and apparently extending her power by fresh misdeeds and new annexations, she was in reality draining her resources and deepening the odium with which she was universally regarded. To prop up her hegemony, which had now attained its zenith, she allied herself with two foes of Hellenic inde- pendence Amyntas II,, of Macedonia, and the tyrant Dionysios I., 346 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. oi Syracuse as she had already done with the Great King ; but her selfishness and unscrupulousness were soon to meet their fitting punishment. In the calamities that followed in rapid succession and precipitated her from the position of influence which she had occupied for nearly five centuries, Xenophon sees the hand of the gods: "One might cite many facts from that time to prove that the gods behold the impious and the wicked ; the Lacedaemonians too, who had sworn to leave the cities autonomous, and neverthe- less kept the fortress of Thebes, were punished by those very persons whom they oppressed." u. The Cadmeia had now been for three years in the hands of the Spartans. The chiefs of the Theban oligarchy, Leontiades and Archias, relying on their support, gratified their feelings of animo- sity unchecked ; the prisons were filled, and executions were as numerous as in the time of the Thirty at Athens. Dreading the intrigues of four hundred Theban exiles at Athens, they sent emis- saries to assassinate them ; but a timely warning was given and only one fell by the assassin's dagger. The exiles now began to form a plan for their return. They saw that the influence of Sparta would continue to produce the same effects at Thebes as it had done at Athens, and that, while their lives were as insecure at Athens as they could be in Thebes, an effort to return by force would give them a chance of either death or victory. Among these exiles was one Pelopidas, a man of heroic courage, of noble birth and of for- tune, and linked in a friendship, which had been often tried on the field of battle, with Epameinondas, a man celebrated for his private virtues and military accomplishments. The example of Thrasy- bulos, who had set out from Thebes to deliver Athens, inspired him with the design of setting out from Athens to deliver Thebes. The Athenians, in gratitude for the asylum which their own exiles had found in Bceotia in the time of the Thirty, had refused to obey Sparta when she demanded the expulsion of the four hundred exiles. Pelopidas formed a conspiracy at Athens, while his friend Epameinondas, whom his poverty and his modest obscurity had preserved from exile, urged the Theban youths to contend in their athletic exercises with the Spartans and acquire the habit of over- coming them. The conspirators at Thebes held secret meetings in the house of one of their number, Phyllidas, who was secretary to the two polemarchs, Archias and Philip. The day for the accom- plishment of their design was fixed : to save a distinguished citizen who was about to be executed, they took an earlier date. Pelopidas and six others set out from Athens, clad in private garments, lead- ing dogs in leashes, and bearing stakes for stretching nets, to give the appearance of a hunting party ; and in this guise they entered Thebes by different gates and afterwards met in the house of one of the wealthiest of the conspirators, who bore the ominous name of Charon. On the following evening Phyllidas gave a banquet to the two polemarchs, at which he had promised the most attractive women in Thebes should be present. The guests were already in their cups when a rumour reached them that some of the exiles had CONSPIRACY AGAINST THEBES. 347 arrived and were concealed in the city. The polemarchs ordered Charon to denounce them : but his imperturbable calm dissipated all their suspicions. Another warning came : a friend at Athens sent a letter with full details of the conspiracy to Archias and directed the messenger to inform him, when he delivered the missive, that its contents were of urgent importance, but the intoxi- 348 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 B.C. cated polemarch threw the letter unopened under the cushion of his couch, exclaiming " Business to-morrow." A few moments afterwards the conspirators entered, disguised as the women who were expected loose robes covering their cuirasses and weapons, and garlands of pine and poplar leaves concealing their faces. The amorous polemarchs, when they tried to embrace them, were stabbed : the conspirators then drew their swords, leapt across the tables, and slaughtered with ease the stupefied guests. They next hurried to the house of Leontiades and Hypates, who shared the fate of their brother oligarchs : and Phylhdas gained admittance to the gaol and released all who were confined as enemies to the government. On the first intelligence of these events, Epamei- nondas had armed himself, and ran with some young men to sup- port Pelopidas. To increase their little band, the conspirators sent messengers in several directions to sound the trumpet and announce to the people their deliverance. Confusion and alarm spread in the city : every house was lit up, and the streets were filled with people running to and fro, whose fears were increased by the darkness of the night. If the Spartan garrison, which numbered 1,500 men, had now descended from the Cadmeia, they could have gained a victory at little cost : but the numerous lights and the excitement of the multitude made them remain in the acropolis and confine themselves to guarding it. At dawn the other exiles, with a body of Athenian supporters, who had assembled on the frontiers, arrived. The citizens, whose joy was unbounded when daylight revealed to them the truth as to their freedom, met them in the market-place and constituted an assembly. Epameinondas pre- sented to the assembly Pelopidas and his fellow-conspirators, sur- rounded with priests, who carried in their hands fillets and called on the citizens to succour their country and their gods. At the sight of them the whole assembly broke out in cries of gratitude and saluted the exiles as the liberators of their city, and nominated Pelopidas, Charon and Mellon, three of the most active chiefs in the plot, Bceotarchs a title which declared that Thebes wished to resume, along with her liberty, her ancient rank among Boeotian towns. Preparations for an assault on the Cadmeia were at once made. A force sent in all haste from Platasa, where Sparta also kept a garrison, was repulsed by the Thebans. Provisions began to fail in the Cadmeia, and the allies, who formed the greater part of the garrison, refused to continue the defence. The Thebans were about to storm their Acropolis when the Spartans offered to capitulate ; and with extraordinary clemency, the Thebans allowed them to march out, 379 B.C. Sparta condemned to death two of the harmosts, and imposed on the third, who was absent during these events, a heavy fine, which he was unable to pay, and he therefore had to go into exile. 12. The deliverance of Thebes was the first of a series of events that broke the chains with which Sparta had loaded Greece. The Boeotians now temporarily aroused themselves from their pro- verbial dulness. Probably the emigration from Athens during the EPAMEINONDAS THE THEBAN. 349 tyranny of the Thirty, and of many Hellenic Italians, who imported the doctrines of Pythagoras, had chiefly contributed to this awakening. To Epameinondas was due the great effort which Thebes now made. He was the most perfect type of what could be produced, under favourable conditions by the Theban nature a nature exhibiting docility, justice, firmness and seriousness, without any of the exquisite strategy, or acuteness, or unconquer- able petulance of the Attic spirit. He belonged to a distinguished family, to that autochthonous race of the Sparti, which claimed descent from the dragon's teeth sown by Cadmos : he was poor by birth, and continued so all his life, and he congratulated himselt that he was free from the care and anxiety which wealth entails. His education was superior to that of his countrymen. Even the gravest of the Hellenes joined the cultivation of the body to that of the mind ; the arts to philosophy. Socrates was a sculptor ; and Polybios attributes wonderful political effects to the general instruction in music. Epameinondas omitted none of those studies that made a man complete in the Hellenic estimation : he learned to play on the harp and the flute, to accompany them with the voice, and even to dance ; he gave himself up with ardour to gymnastics exercises and the attainment of skill in the use of arms, always more eager to acquire agility than strength, the former seeming to him the characteristic of the soldier, the latter that of the athlete. To this body which he rendered so nimble and vigorous by exercise, nature had joined intellectual qualities of a high order, which were developed by meditation. His instructor in philosophy had been the Pythagorean Lysis, of Tarentum ; and when yet a youth, Epameinondas became attached to this grave old man, whose society he preferred to that of all of his own age. The moral character of Epameinondas was the purest and most elevated in Hellas. When Pelopidas conspired, Epameinondas refused to take part in the plot, not from any indifference to the misfortunes of his countrymen, but from his dislike to anything but a fair and open contest. On the day of action, he came forward to share the perils of the combatants. His friend Pelopidas was exclusively a man of action ; athletic exercises and hunting, more than books or the teaching of philosophers, were his favourite occupations. He was of a noble and generous spirit, and fond of glory, but his ambition was as much for his country as himself. The example of Epameinondas was not lost upon him : he lived in a simple style, and shared his wealth with his poorer friends. 13. The greatness of Thebes, which was so suddenly attained, continued only during the lives of these two men. Their first care was to place their country in a position to sustain the struggle which they foresaw. The Spartan ephors had just decided to send an army to recover their influence in Thebes, and restore the oligarchy. Agesilaos refused to assume the command, pleading his age ; and his colleague made a rapid incursion into Boeotia. The proximity of this Spartan force created considerable alarm at Athens, of which the oligarchical party took advantage to procure 350 THE SPARTAN HEGEMONY, 404-371 u.c. the condemnation to death of the two strategi who had generously supported the Theban conspirators, but without the instructions of the Ecclesia, and who had thereby endangered the peaceful relations between Athens and Sparta ; one of the two was executed, the other was banished. Shortly after this, a treacherous attempt was made by a Spartan detachment on Athens, which drove her into open alliance with Thebes. Cleombrotos, in his raid into Bceotia, left Sphodrias with a corps at Thespise ; tempted by the example of Phoebidas, Sphodrias resolved to surprise the Peirseus, to make amends to Sparta for the loss of Thebes. He set out from Thespiae by night ; but it was day ere he had passed Eleusis, and the surprise consequently failed. Sphodrias was accused at Sparta of having attacked an ally, but Agesilaos procured his acquittal on the ground that his conduct hitherto had been irreproachable. Athens, indignant, broke with Sparta and prepared for war. The walls of the Peirseus were completed ; a hundred galleys were laid on the stocks, and a great effort was made to re-constitute the Athenian confederacy. Conon and Thrasybulos had restored to Athens some of the towns which had once been her tributaries, but the peace of Antalcidas had deprived her of them again. The withdrawal of her fleet, which had acted as the police of the yEgean, had led to the pirates again swarming in those island-studded waters and the islanders who sought her market were again inclined to side with the city which could assure their commerce the security required. Athens had preserved the superintendence of the temple of Delos, the sanctuary of the Cyclades and of the Ionian race. To change this religious into a political bond was not a difficult task, how little soever circumstances might be favourable. Driven towards Athens by their interests, and by the pride and violence of the Spartan harmosts, Chios, Byzantion, Rhodes, Mytilene, and almost all Euboea in all, seventy maritime or insular towns came, in the persons of their deputies, to Athens to solicit the renewal of the confederation, which for sixty years had given them peace, security, and prosperity. Athens had the wisdom to adopt the plan of Aristeides : the members of the new league remained independent as regarded their internal constitution ; and representatives from each were to be sent to a general congress held at Athens, in which the vote of each state was to be of equal value. This assembly was charged with voting the general "contribution" (i'a, or (f>pV Kfjircav. By the sweetness and gravity of his manners and fcis social virtues he soon attracted many disciples and adherents, who formed a social league, united by the closest band of friendship, an interesting illustration of the general con- dition of affairs in Greece after the time of Alexander, when the social took the place of the decaying political life. Epicures him- self used to compare his society to the Pythagorean fraternity, but he excluded the community of goods, affirming that true friends can confide in one another. His moral conduct has been re- peatedly assailed by comic poets and later philosophers, but, according to the best evidence, his life was simple, temperate, and blameless in every respect, and his personal chaiacter was es- timable and amiable : the reproaches on the offensive voluptuous- ness of the Epicurean society are merited only by his followers in a later and more degenerate age. Epicures was a voluminous writer, exceeding even Aristotle, whence Diogenes Laertios has called him jro\vypa(f)o)TaTos. Only four epistles and a few fragments are extant. Epicuros defined philosophy as an activity which, by means of con- ceptions and arguments, procures the end of life happiness. The end of philosophy is, therefore, essentially practical, the produc- tion of a scheme of morals under which a happy life may be in- evitably attained. The three old divisions of philosophy, therefore, are acknowledged in Epicureanism, but in a reversed order, logic or canonics, as it was called, and physics being the handmaids of ethics. Logic was confined to the doctrine of the criterion of truth, and considered only as an instrument and introduction to physics, for which Epicuros adopted the atomism of Democritus ; while the latter was treated of as existing .wholly for ethics, and as necessary to free men from superstitious fear, and deliver them from the power of fables and mythical fancies concerning nature, which AND HIS TEACHINGS. 449 might hinder the attainment of happiness. Epicureanism, which has been so beautifully expounded in the poem of the Roman Lucretius, " De Rerum Natura," was a development of the Cyrenaic school, and placed the good, the summum bonum, in happiness or pleasure. But in his more accurate determination of pleasure he differs essentially from the Cyrenaics. The latter made the plea- sure of the moment the end of human efforts, whereas Epicures directs men to strive after a system of pleasures which should ensure the permanent happiness of life ; pleasures that result in pain must be despised, and pains that lead to a greater pleasure cheerfully en- dured, that true pleasure may be attained. The pleasures and pains of the soul, which, like memory and hope, embrace the past and the future, must be held in greater esteem than those of the body, which refer only to the moment. Happiness, therefore, in the view of Epicures, was not that which arises from sensual gratifi- cation, but from the enjoyments of the mind and the practice of virtue ; for he would not seek the most exquisite enjoyments in order to attain to a happy life, but recommends one to be satisfied with little, and to practise sobriety and temperance of life, to attain to that happiness which should be abiding and for the whole life. " In opposition to the positive pleasure of some He- donists, the theory of Epicures expends itself in negative concep- tions, representing that freedom from pain is pleasure, and that hence the activity of the sage should be prominently directed to avoid that which is disagreeable. All that man does, says Epicures, is that he may neither suffer nor apprehend pain ; and, in another place he remarks, that not to live is far from being an evil. Hence death, for which men have the greatest terror, the wise man does not fear. For while we live, death is not, and, when death is, we are not ; when it is present, we feel it not ; for it is the end of all feeling, and that, which by its presence cannot affect our happiness ought not, when thought of as a future, to trouble us. Here Epicuros must bear the censure urged against him by the ancients, that he does not recognise any positive end of life, and that the object after which his sage should strive is a mere passion- less state. The crown of Epicures' view of the universe is his doctrine of the gods, where he has carried over his ideal of hap- piness. To the gods belong human forms, though without any fixed body or human wants. In the void space they lead an undis- turbed and changeless life, whose happiness is incapable of increase. From the blessedness of the gods he inferred that they had nothing to do with the management of our affairs, for blessedness is repose, and on this account the gods neither take trouble to themselves nor cause it to others. It may, indeed, be said that these inactive gods of Epicuros these indestructible and yet not fixed forms these bodies which are not bodies have but an ill connection with his general system, in which there is, in fact, no point to which his doctrine of the gods can be fitly joined, but a strict scientific con- nection is hardly the merit of this whole philosophy." (ALBRECHT SCHWEGLER.) Epicuros had been aided by his three brothers in G G 450 ART, LITERATURE AND PHILOSOPHY. the "Garden:" Neocles, Charidemos, and Aristobulos: and, after his death, which took place in 270 B.C., of a painful in- ternal disease, the agonies of which he bore with great fortitude, his school was still continued. His followers were exceedingly numerous, and rapidly propagated his opinions ; but among his successors there was no one who further developed his philosophy, and the only change his system underwent was that its tone was gradually lowered from his lofty notion of pleasure or happiness to that of a mere material and sensual pleasure. RUINS OF THE PARTHENON, ATHENS. CHAPTER XVIII. FROM THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST OF GREECE (323-146 B.C.). i. REVOLT OF ATHENS: THE LAMIAN WAR (323-3226.0.): DEFEAT OF LEON- NATOS : BATTLE OF CRANNON (7 AUG. 322 B.C.) RESTORATION OF THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY: FALL OF ATHENS : DEATH OF HYPEREIDES AND DEMOSTHENES. 2. ACCESSION OF PHILIP III. : ARRHID^OS (323 B.C.) DISTRIBUTION OF THE PROVINCES AMONG ALEXANDER'S GENERALS : BIRTH AND PROCLAMATION OF ALEXANDER IV. : DEFEAT AND DEATH OF PER- DICCAS (321 B.C.): DEATH OF ANTIPATER (318 B.C.): REGENCY OF POLY- SPERCHON. 3. SIEGE OF MUNYCHIA : DEATH OF PHOCION (317 B.C.): INVASION OF CASSANDER: DEMETRIOS PHALEREUS, GOVERNOR OF ATHENS : BATTLE OF PYDNA (316 B.C.) : DEATH OF PHILIP III. ARRHID^EOS : CIVIL WAR ; EXECUTION OF ROXANE AND ALEXANDER IV. : EXPEDITION OF DEMETRIOS POLIORCETES (307 B.C.) FALL OF ATHENS : SIEGE OF SALAMIS (306 B.C.). 4. UNSUCCESSFUL SIEGE OF RHODES (306-305 B.C.) : DEFEAT AND DEATH OF ANTIGONOS AT IPSOS (301 B.C.): DEMETRIOS CONQUERS MACEDONIA (294 B.C.): INVASION OF PYRRHOS AND PTOLEMY: LYSIMA- CHOS CONQUERS MACEDONIA (287 B.C.) : DEFEAT AND DEATH OF LYSIMA- CHOS AT SARDES (281 B.C.) : MURDER OF SELEUCOS (280 B.C.) : DEATH OF PTOLEMY CERAUNOS : ACCESSION OF ANTIGONOS GONATOS. 5. RISE OF THE ACH.EAN LEAGUE : ARATOS GENERAL (245-243 B.C.) I SEIZURE OF CORINTH: DEATH OF AGIS iv. : WAR OF SPARTA AND THE ACH.-EANS 452 ALEXANDER TO TttE ROMAtt COtiQVESf, 323-146 B.C, DEFEAT OF THE SPARTANS BY ANTIGONOS DOSON (229 B.C.) : PHILOPCEMEN, GENERAL OF THE ACH^EANS (209 B.C.) . BATTLE OF CYNOSCEPHALJE (197 B.C.): THE ROMANS DEFEAT ANTIOCHOS III. AT THERMOPYLAE (igi B.C.), AND OVERTHROW THE ^ETOLIAN LEAGUE (189 B.C.) : BATTLE OF PYDNA FALL OF THE MACEDONIAN MONARCHY (167 B.C.) : THE ACHAEAN HOSTAGES: THEIR RETURN (151 B.C.): WAR OF THE ACHJEAN LEAGUE WITH ROME (151-146 B.C.) : BATTLES OF SCARPHEIA (147 B.C.), AND CORINTH : GREECE THE ROMAN PROVINCE OF ACHAIA (146 B.C.). | HE intelligence of the death of Alexander the Great caused general joy in Greece; though unable to attain liberty and incapable of making the sacrifices necessary for it, the Greeks still sighed for independence, and the death of the childless king seemed likely to restore them, without a great struggle, their freedom. At Athens Hypereides, who had succeeded Demosthenes as leader of the anti-Macedonian party, procured a decree in favour of maintaining the rights and liberties of the Greek states ; and envoys were immediately despatched to all the leading cities to incite a general rising. Bceotia, Achaia, Arcadia, and Sparta gave, however, no response ; and the Athenians found that only the minor states would take any part in a new anti- Macedonian league. The several contingents of the confederate states were rapidly organized, and assembled under the command of Leosthenes near Thermopylae. Antipater, who had not yet been superseded by Crateros, advanced to the banks of the Sper- cheios, but the desertion of the Thessalian cavalry in a body com- pelled him to retreat and throw himself into Lamia, a strong fortress on the Acheloos, on the shores of the Maliac gulf in Phthiotis. The war is termed the Lamian War (323-322 B.C.), from its being chiefly concentrated in the siege of this place. Leosthenes immediately advanced to attack the town, but his assaults were unsuccessful, and he was compelled to convert the siege into a blockade. Antipater made overtures of peace, but the Athenians were so elated with their success that they would not listen to any terms. Meanwhile Demosthenes, excited by the patriotic efforts of his native city, had crossed to Peloponnesos, and was passing from state to state, urging support of the con- federacy. His party being now completely in the ascendant at Athens, he \\as recalled from his exile, and, on landing at the Peirsus, was received in triumph. Leosthenes was killed in a sally at Lamia shortly after the blockade began, and his successor, Antiphilos, foimd himself in danger of being taken in the rear by the advance of Leonnatos, the governor of Hellespontine Phrygia, who was leading 20,000 infantry and 2,500 cavalry to relieve Lamia. Antiphilos was therefore obliged to raise the blockade; he marched to meet Leonnatos, when an engagement ensued, and Leonnatos was killed and his forces were totally defeated. Antipater had now evacuated Lamia, following in the rear of Antiphilos ; and shortly afterwards he collected the fugitives from the battle. Antiphilos was unable to prevent his junction with Crateros and his veterans, who were on their homeward march ; and had to accept battle in the vicinity of Crannon.mThessaly.on the 7th Aug., REVOLT OF ATHENS THE L AMI AN WAR. 453 322 B.C. The confederate Hellenes, who were much inferior in numbers, were completely defeated, and had no choice left them but to sue for peace. Antipater, however, with admirable policy, declined to recognise the confederacy or treat with the states otherwise than separately. Many consequently abandoned the confederacy ; and Athens, whose fleet had just been destroyed by the Macedonians, was soon left all alone. On the advance of Antipater on Athens, Phocion was sent out to him to procure the best terms he could ; at the second interview he was informed that Demosthenes, Hypereides, and several of the minor orators must be surrendered, that the democracy should be modified by a limitation of the franchise, by an increase of the property qualifica- tion, that an indemnity should be paid, and that a Macedonian garrison should be received into the Acropolis. Hard as the terms were, there was no alternative. Before the Macedonian garrison arrived, the orator Demades proposed that all the orators whose surrender was demanded should at once be put to death. The orators contrived to escape, but Hypereides and Demosthenes were only for the moment successful. Hypereides was caught in the temple of Demeter at Hermione ; and, after being brought to Athens, he was put to death, his tongue being cut out and his corpse thrown to the dogs. He had been discovered by a Thurian, Archias, who had formerly been an actor, and the same person betrayed Demosthenes. The latter had taken refuge in the isle Calaureia, near Troezen. Archias was accompanied with a few soldiers ; and, on finding his invitations unavailing, he began to employ threats, to remove Demosthenes from the temple of Poseidon, that its sanctity might not be violated. The orator promised to go out as soon as he had written some final directions to his friends ; when he began to write, he carried the reed (or quill) to his mouth and bit it, his usual custom when he was medi- tating and composing ; but a powerful poison was concealed in it, and it immediately began to work. He then leaned against a pillar, and covered his head with his robe, on which the soldiers at the door began to laugh and jeer at what' they deemed his cowardice. Feeling death approaching, he asked Archias to lead him out, exclaiming that his corpse might now be cast out un- buried, but that he had saved the temple from pollution by going out alive, while the guilt of violating the sanctuary would attach to the Macedonians ; scarcely had he uttered the words when he fell dead at the altar of the god. 2. While the Macedonian chains were again being riveted more firmly than ever on Greece, the great empire which Alexander had formed was broken up into fragments. His generals, in a council held the day after his death, came to an agreement that the young and weak Philip III., Arrhidasos, half-brother of Alexander (being son of Philip II. and a Thracian woman, Philinna), should occupy the throne till Roxane was delivered of her offspring, and, if the babe should be a boy, that Arrhidaeos should continue king, and that the generals should be appointed governors of the various 454 ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST, 323-146 B.C. provinces as follows : Antipater and Crateros for Macedonia and Greece, Lysimachos for Thrace, Leonnatos for Hellespontine Phrygia. Antigonos for Phrygia proper, Lycia and Pamphylia, Eumenes for Cappadocia and Paphlagonia, and Ptolemy for Syria, Egypt, &c., while Perdiccas should take the command of the royal guards, and thus practically be invested with the central govern- ment. Such an arrangement was a mere compromise for the moment, and made the dismemberment of the empire eventually all the more complete ; and jealousies soon arose between the generals. The corpse of Alexander was treated with great THE NILE. honour, and was conveyed to Alexandria, where the funeral rites were performed. His widow, Roxane, gave birth to a son, Alexander IV., who was proclaimed partner in the throne with Philip III., Arrhidaeos. The sovereignty of the one was as much an unreality as that of the other. The ambition of Perdiccas led him to summon Antigonos before the nominal kings on some accu- sation, that he might take possession of his government. Antigonos fled to Greece, and received the support of Antipater and Crateros, who opened up communications with Ptolemy for a joint attack on Perdiccas. The latter immediately invaded Egypt, but, after suffering several repulses and misfortunes, he was assassinated in his tent, 321 B.C. A new arrangement of the provincial govern,- DEATH OF PHOCION. 455 ments was now made, Seleucos receiving Babylon, and Antigonos obtaining Susiana, in addition to his former provinces, while Antipater, besides holding Greece and Macedonia with Crateros, was declared regent. Antipater only held the regency three years, dying in 318 B.C., at the age of eighty. He bequeathed his power to the oldest of the generals, Polysperchon, and left his own son Cassander only tlta command of the royal cavalry. 3. Cassander immediately left Macedonia for Asia to intrigue for his own appointment to the regency. Under Antipater a semi- independence had heen given to the Hellenic states, oligarchies TEMPLE OF THESEUS. being established in each ; and Polysperchon now prepared for an expedition to put down these oligarchies, in order to procure the goodwill of the majority. His own son, Alexander, was despatched with a force to summon the governor, Nicanor, of the Macedonian garrison in Munychia, but he refused to open the gates of that port except to Cassander. Phocion had now to flee from Athens, being supposed to be negotiating with Nicanor : he took refuge with Alexander, who was encamped near the city, and. having first been sent by the latter to his father, Polysperchon, he was sent back to Athens, where he was tried for treason, and sentenced to death. He drank the hemlock with a coolness worthy of his dignified life, 317 B.C. His body was cast to the dogs on the Megarian frontier, but the Athenians afterwards repented, and collected his bones. 456 ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST, 323-146 B.C. which were honoured with a magnificent funeral and a monument. The arrival of Cassander in the Peirseus, with a fleet which he had received from Antigonos, compelled Polysperchon's forces to retire. Cassander immediately established an oligarchy in Athens, and placed the governorship in the hands of Demetrios Phalereus. Cassander marched into Macedonia, of which he became master on the fall of Pydna, 316 B.C., when Alexander's mother, Olympias Roxane, and the young king Alexander IV., were taken prisoners, Cassander gave orders for the rebuilding of Thebes, by which he gained considerable popularity. Shortly afterward^ 3 war which. OLIGARCHY OF CASSANDER IN ATHENS. 457 broke out in Asia between the generals, 315 B.C., was terminated, in 311 B.C., by a pact which acknowledged the independence of all the Hellenic cities, and left the provinces nearly as before. Almost immediately afterwards Roxane and Alexander IV. were put to death by Cassander. Olympias had put Philip III., Arrhidaeos, to death in 316 B.C., so that the Macedonian empire was now without ft head. The truce between the generals was broken in the fo.Howr 458 ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST, 323-146 B.C. ing year, 311 B.C., by Ptolemy, who alleged that Antigonos had not withdrawn his troops like the others from the Hellenic states in his province, and he was joined by Cassander. Antigonos sent his son, the active and talented Demetrios, surnamed Poliorcetes (i.e., the Besieger) to gain over Greece from Cassander. On his arrival in the Peirasus, 307 B.C., Demetrios Poliorcetes proclaimed that he had come to liberate Athens ; upon which the popular excitement in the city became so great that Demetrios Phalereus and the Macedonian party had to open the gates to him. Demetrios Phalereus now retired to Egypt, where his literary talents found a ready patron in Ptolemy. From Athens Demetrios Poliorcetes TY.MPLE AT CORINTH. sailed to Cypros, and began the siege of Salamis, and totally de- feated Ptolemy, who had advanced with a great armament to its relief, 306 B.C. On this victory Antigonos assumed the title of king, and the other generals of Alexander immediately followed his example. The formal disintegration of Alexander's empire was now complete. 4. Sailing from Cypros, Demetrios Poliorcetes proceeded against Rhodes, which had declined to aid him in the late siege. The catapults of his vessels being of no avail, he invested the city by land ; but the enormous towers and engines constructed by Epi- machos were equally unavailing, and, after a siege of a year, he had to retire, 305 B.C. Four years later, 301 B.C., the coalition was suc- cessful against his father, Antigonos, who was totally defeated at Ipsos, in Phrygia, arid who fell on the field, at the age qf eighty' DISINTEGRATION OF ALEXANDER'S EMPIRE. 459 one. Demetrios was now without a home, but the marriage of his daughter Stratonice with Seleucos, who now ruled the whole country from Syria to the Euphrates, with parts of Phrygia and Cappadocia, restored him to some influence. Emboldened by the death of Cassander, 298 B.C., he collected a fleet, and appeared before Athens, which, after a somewhat long siege, was obliged to submit to him ; and when, on the death of Philip IV., Cassander's son, in 295 B.C., the succession was disputed by his two brothers, Antipater and Alexander, Demetrios invaded Macedonia, and be- came master of that country and Greece, 294 B.C. During the seven years that he maintained undisputed possession of the country, 287 B.C., he devoted himself to strengthening his position and preparing an armament for the recovery of the territory over which his father had ruled in Asia. These preparations alarmed Ptolemy, who attacked by sea, while Lysimachos, from Thrace, and Pyrrhos, from Epeiros, made an invasion. Pyrrhos was nearly as famous a general as Alexander himself. He was born 318 B.C., being son of King /Eacides and Phthia, and claimed descent pater- nally from Achilleus, and maternally from Heracles. He was educated at the court of King Glautias, of Illyricum, his family being in banishment from Epeiros ; and when twelve years old he was placed on his ancestral throne by Glautias ; but five years later he was expelled by the intrigues of Cassander, who conferred the crown again on the usurper, Neoptolemos, by whom it had been held from the expulsion of /Ecidas to the restoration of Pyrrhos. The youthful exile then went with his brother-in-law, Demetrios Poliorcetes, to the east, and took a prominent part in the battle of Ipsos, 301 B.C., and on afterwards going as a hostage for Deme- trios into Egypt, he received the hand of Queen Berenice's daughter, Antigone, and soon obtained from King Ptolemy a sufficient force to attempt the recovery of his throne, in which he was saccessfu 1 , 295 B.C. On his now invading Macedonia, the army revolted to him, and Demetrios Poliorcetes had to seek safety in flight, 287 B.C. Pyrrhos held the throne of Macedonia for seven months, when he was expelled by Lysimachos, who took possession of it. Demetrios, after unsuccessful attempts on Macedonia and the territories of Lysimachos and Seleucos, in Asia, was made prisoner, 286 B.C., but was treated very leniently. After three years of captivity he expired, 283 B.C., when his body was given up to his son Antigonop. Lysimachos lost the attachment of his Macedonian subjects by his countenancing the murder of his son and heir, Agathocles, by the young prince's stepmother, Arsinoe and Ptolemy Ceraunos (eldest son of Ptolemy I., of Egypt), who was then in exile at the Macedo- dian court. Seleucos took advantage of this unpopularity to declare war, and in a battle fought near Sardes, 281 B.C., Lysimachos was killed, and his dominion was transferred to Seleucos. The whole of Alexander's empire, except Egypt, Syria, part of Phoenicia, and Cypros, was again united under Seleucos. But on his way to Macedonia he was murdered at Lysimachia, in Thrace, 280 B.C., by Ptolemy Ceraunos, whom he had taken into favour. Sleugos wa.s. i'ALL OF MACEDONIA AND GREECE. 46 succeeded by his son, Antiochos I. Soter, who, however, obtained only the Asiatic dominions, as the army that had accompanied Seleucos saluted Ptolemy Ceraunos as king, and to the latter Macedonia and Thrace fell. Thus the empire was finally broken up. In a great invasion by a migratory horde of the Celts, in the same year, Ptolemy Ceraunos was killed. In the next year, 279 B.C., the Celts made another invasion, and attacked Delphi, when they were repulsed with great loss their king, Brennos, being slain by a force commanded by the Athenian Callippos. After a 3'ear of anarchy, during which many pretenders laid claim to the crown, Macedonia and Greece fell under Antigonos Gonatos, the son of Demetrios Poliorcetes. He had to maintain his position SISYPHUS, IXION AND TANTALUS. against Pyrrhos, after the return of the latter from his unsuccessful expedition into Italy and Sicily. The death of Pyrrhos in the siege of Argos, in 272 B.C., left him in undoubted possession of the throne. 5. Meanwhile a state, which had in the best days of Hellas done little for the increase of her glory, was now coming into prominence. This was Achaia, the towns of which had long been bound together by a loose league. Aratos, of Sicyon, in 245 B.C., was elected general of the league, and organized it on a new and more practical basis. In 243 B.C., he seized Corinth, the signal for war with Macedonia, and for the accession of most of the leading Greek states. Agis IV. of Sparta, refused to join the league, made an ineffectual attempt to reform the constitution by distributing the land anew and re- storing the full Lycurgean discipline, but he perished in the attempt. His successor, Cleomenes, carried out those reforms, and waged war with the League. The latter now made its peace with Mace- 462 ALEXANDER TO TflE ROMAN CONQUEST, 323-146 i,., . donia, and the joint forces advanced under King Antigonos Doson, who had succeeded in 229 B.C., and totally defeated the Spartans at Selluria, in Laconia, 221 B.C:, the hitherto unconquered capital, Sparta, falling into the hands of the Macedonians. The death of the king and the accession of the youthful Demetrios, Philip V., in 220 B.C., emboldened the ALioliaii League, which was now also becoming prominent, to invade Macedonia and occupy Bccotiaand Phocis. On the Aitolians attacking Messenia, the first collision occurred between the two leagues; and the Achaeans solicited the aid of Macedonia. Philip V. gave the aid required, but was obliged to make peace with them, in 217 B.C., to take part with the Car- thaginians in their great struggle with the Romans, who were rapidly advancing to the dominion of the world. In 209 B.C., Philip V. again aided the Achaeans, whose general now was Philo- TRAGEDY, COMEDY, POETRY AND HISTORY. pcemen, one of the few noble spirits in the decadence of Greece. Philopcemen extended the territory of the League by a victory over the Spartans, who had called in the Romans. The war between Philip V. and the Romans, terminated by the total defeat of the former at Cynoscephalae in 197 B.C., restored Greece to nominal independence under the protection of Rome. The /Etolian League, desirous of extending its own power, invited over Antiochos III. of Syria, who was totally defeated by the Roman forces at Thermo- pylae, 191 B.C., and, after some ineffectual resistance, the yEtolians had to submit in 189 B.C. The Achaean League now remained the dominant power; but Sparta and several other states withdrew from it. Philip's successor, Perseus, resumed the war with Rome, 171 B.C., which was in three years terminated by the total over- throw of the Macedonians at Pydna by /Emilius Paullus, in 167 B.C. Greece was involved in the fall of Macedonia. The Roman com missioners visited Greece, and carried away one thousand of the leading partisans of the Achaean League as hostages. They were 464 ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST, 323-146 B.C. detained in the various cities of Italy till 151 B.C., when the sur- vivors were allowed to go home. Their release was followed by a general rising of the cities of the League in 150 B.C. The Romans, then preparing for their final struggle with Carthage, did not prose- cute the war vigorously till 147 B.C., when Metellus obtained a decisive victory at Scarpheia, in Locris. His successor, Mum- mius, pushed on to the Isthmus, and totally overthrew the Achaean forces near Corinth. This city was immediately taken possession of by Mummius, plundered of its works of art, and then set on fire. In the course of the year, 146 B.C., Mummius arranged the affairs of the several states, and Greece became an integral part of the Roman dominion under the name of the province of Achaia. THE LAST OF THE ATHENIANS.'' APPENDICES. TABLE OF GRECIAN HISTORY, FROM 2000 B.C. TO 145 B.C. B.C. 2000-1600 The Pelasgic Age. 1856 Inachos in Argos. 1749 Deluge of Ogyges. 1600 The early Hellenic or Achaean Period. 1558 Deluge of Deucalion. 1556 Cecrops immigrates to Athens. 1500 Arrival of Danaos in Argos. 1493 Immigration of Cadmos to Thebes. 1397 Sisyphos reigns at Corinth. 1283 Immigration of Pelops. 1263 Expedition of the Argonauts. 1225 The Seven against Thebes. 1216 The War of the Epigoni. 1194-1184 The Trojan War. 1124 Migratory Movements begin. 1104 Return of the Heraeleidse Division of Peloponnesos by the Dorians. 1 100 Immigration of the Neleidas to Athens. 1070 Archonship instituted at Athens. 1044 Emigration of the lonians. 1050-900 Fall of Heroic Monarchies. 850 Legislation of Lycurgos. 776 Olympic Victory of Corcebos Era of Olympiads begins. 750 Prosperity of Miletos. 748 Pheidon, Tyrant of Argos. 743 First Messenian War, 743-724. 735 The Chalcidians of Eubcea found Naxos in Sicily. 734 Syracuse founded from Corinth. 709 The Median Monarchy founded. 685 Second Messenian War, 685-668. 683 Annual Archonship at Athens. 664 Naval battle between Corcyraeans and Corinthians. 657 Byzantion founded from Megara. 655 Expulsion of Bacchiadae from Coriuth. 634 Scythians invade Asia. 625 Periander at Corinth, 625-585. 621 Legislation of Draco at Athens. 620 Rebellion of Cylon Sacrilege of Megacles the Alcmseonid. 612 Lydian War with Miletos ends. 600 Phocasans found Massilia. 595 The Cirrhaean, or First Sacred War, 595-585. 594 Legislation of Solon at Athens. 589 Pittacos ^Esymnetes of Mytilene. 586 Age of the Seven Wise Men. H H 466 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES OF GREEK HISTORY. B.C. 572 Eleians conquer Pisa. 570 Phalaris at Agrigentum. 560 Peisistratos, Tyrant of Athens. 559 Conquest of the Medes Foundation of the Persian Monarchy under Cyrus. 546 Cyrus conquers Lydia. 538 Cyrus captures Babylon. 532 Polycrates, tyrant of Samos. 527 Death of Peisistratos. 525 Cambyses conquers Egypt. Spartan war with Polycrates. 522 Crucifixion of Polycrates. 521 Dareios I. Hystaspes becomes King of Persia. 519 Plataea allies with Athens. [Aristogeiton. 514 Murder of the Peisistratid Hipparchos by Harmodios and 513 Dareios invades Scythia. 510 Expulsion of the Peisistratidse. 501 Persian attempt on Naxos. 499 The Ionic Revolt (499-494). Sardes burned by lonians and Athenians. 498 Persians re-conquer Cypros. 494 Fall of Miletos. [Chersonesos. 493 Persians recover the Islands. Flight of Miltiades from the 492 Persians under Mardonios advance successfully to Macedonia. 491 Dareios I. sends heralds to Greece. War between Athens and .flCgina. Deposition of Demaratos. 490 Persian Invasion under Datis and Artaphernes. Battle of Marathon. 489 Trial and death of Miltiades. 486 Egypt revolts from Persia. 483 Ostracism of Aristeides. Influence of Themistocles. Athe- nians build a Navy. 480 Invasion of Xerxes. Battles of Thermopylae, Artemision, and Salamis. 479 Return of Persians under Mardonios. Battle of Plataea. Hellenic victory at Mycale. 478 Surrender of Sestos. 477 The Athenian Hegemony, 477-404. 476 Cimon's victory at Eion. 471 Ostracism of Themistocles. Death of Pausanias. 469 Cimon captures Scyros. Pericles becomes influential. 466 Revolt of Naxos from Athens. Cimon's victory at the Eury- medon. Flight of Themistocles to Persia. 465 Revolt of Thasos. 464 Earthquake at Sparta. Third Messenian War, 464-455. 461 Ostracism of Cimon. Revolt of Egyptians under Inaros. 460 Athenian fleet in Egypt. 457 War between Corinth and Athens. Spartans defeat Athe- nians at Tanagra. Athenians begin the Long Walls. 456 Athenians under Myronides defeat Thebans at (Enophyta. Recal of Cimon. EVENTS FROM 455 TO 406 B.C. 467 B.C. 455 Tolmides the Athenian settles Messenians at Naupactos ; he ravages Peloponnesos. 450 Truce between Athens and Sparta. 449 Athenian victory over Persians at Salamis in Cypros. Death of Cimon. Peace between Hellas and Persia. 448 The Second Sacred War. 444 Pericles predominant at Athens. 440 Revolt of Samos from Athens. 439 Splendour of Athens. 435 Troubles in Epidamnos. War of Corinthians and Corey- raeans. Naval victory of Corcyraeans. 433 Athens allies with Corcyra. 432 Defeat of the Corinthians. Revolt of Potidaea from Athens. Congress of Peloponnesians. 431 The Peloponnesian War, 431-404. Theban attempt on Plataea. Peloponnesians invade Attica. 430 Peloponnesians invade Attica. The Plague desolates Athens. 429 Surrender of Potidaea. Naval successes of Phormio. Siege of Plataea, 429-427. 428 Mytilene revolts from Athens its siege. Attica invaded. 427 Attica invaded. Fall of Mytilene. Surrender of Platsa. Sedition at Corcyra. Athenian expedition to Leontini, in Sicily. 426 Delos purified by Athenians. 425 Attica invaded. Athenian post at Pylos Surrender of Spartans on Sphacteria to Cleon. 424 Athenians ravage Laconian coast. Brasidas in Thrace. Surrender of Acanthos, Amphipolis, &c. Thebans defeat Athenians at Delion. 423 One Years' Truce, except in Thrace. 422 Death of Brasidas and of Cleon. 421 Fifty Years' Truce. 420 Athens and Argos ally. 419 Alcibiades in Peloponnesos. 418 War between Argos and Sparta Battle of Mantineia. 416 The Athenians sieze Melos. 415 Athenian Expedition to Sicily Mutilation of the Hermae. Athenians capture Catana. Flight of Alcibiades to Sparta. [Gylippos. 414 Siege of Syracuse begins : Spartan reinforcements under 413 Spartans occupy Deceleia the Truce openly broken. Surrender of Athenians at Syracuse. [Asia. 412 Revolt of Leslos from Athens. Intrigues of Alcibiades in 411 The Four Hundred at Athens. Recall of Alcibiades. Defeat of Mindaros at Cynossema. 410 Alcibiades defeats Mindaros at Cyzicos. 408 Alcibiades takes Byzantion. 407 Return of Alcibiades to Athens his Expedition. Lysander the Spartan defeats the Athenian fleet off Notion. Exile of Alcibiades. [Generals. 406 Athenian naval victory off Arginusse Execution of the 468 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES OF GREEK HISTORY. B.C. 405 Destruction of the Athenian armament off ^Egospotami by Lysander. The Spartan Hegemonies. 404 Siege of Athens its Fall. Peace. The Thirty Tyrants. 403 Return of Thrasybulos and the Exiles The Thirty deposed r the Ten ; the Democracy restored. 401 War of Sparta and Elis, 401-399. The Expedition (Anabasis) of Cyrus : Battle of Cunaxa : Retreat of the Ten Thousand. 399 War between Sparta and Persia Thimbron in Asia. 398 Dercyllidas supersedes Thimbron. 396 King Agesilaos in Asia. [Greece. 395 Successes of Agesilaos. Combinations against Sparta in 394 Recall of Agesilaos. Spartan victory near Corinth. Naval victory of Athenians under Conon. Agesilaos' victory at Coroneia. 393 Sedition at Corinth. Arrival of Persian fleet under Conon and Pharmabazos : Fortifications of Athens rebuilt. 392 Success of Iphicrates. 391 Agesilaos in Acarmania. 390 Agesipolis in Argolis. The Persians arrest Conon, and Athens supports the revolt in Cypros. Defeat of Thrasy- bulos at Aspendos. 389 Iphicrates at the Hellespont. 387 The Peace of Antalcidas. 385 Destruction of Mantineia. 382 Siege of Olynthos 382-379. The Spartans under Phcebidas surprise the Cadmeia ; oligarchy established in Thebes. 379 Fall of Olynthos. Phlius submits to Sparta. Pelopidas regains the Cadmeia. 378 Cleombrotos invades Bceotia. Spartan attempt on the Peirseens ; League of Athens and Thebes. Revival of the Athenian confederacy. 376 Repulse of Cleombrotos at the passes of Mount Cithseron. Athenians under Chabrias defeat Spartan fleet off Naxos, and recover the maritime supremacy. 375 Pelopidas' victory at Tegyra. 374 Athens takes Corcyra, and makes overtures to Sparta. 373 Spartan attempt on Corcyra. 371 The Peace of Callias. The Thebans defeat the Spartans at Leuctra End of the Spartan Hegemony ; the Theban Hegemony. Foundation of Megalopolis. 370 Agesilaos in Arcadia. The Thebans invade Pelopbnnesos, and rebuild Messene. 368 Pelopidas in Thessaly. 367 Spartans under Archidamos defeat the Arcadians, Messenians, and Argives. Pelopidas an envoy to Persia. Death of Dionysios I. of Syracuse. 366 War of Arcadia and Elis, 366-362. 364 Battle of Olympia. Pelopidas slain at Cynoscephalae. 362 Theban victory at Mantineia Death of Epameinondas. Decline of the Theban Hegemony. 361 A general peace (excluding Lacedemonians and Messenians). by the mediation of Persia. Death of Agesilaos in Egypt. EVENTS FROM 360 TO 324 B.C. 469 B.C. 360 War between Athens and Olynthos for Amphipolis ; Repulse of Timotheos. 359 Accession of Philip II. in Macedonia. Defeat of Athenians and the usurper Argaeos at Methone. Peace be- tween Athens and Macedonia the Athenians seize Pydna, 358 Philip II. takes Amphipolis. Athenian expedition into Eubcea. 358 Revolt of Chios, Rhodes, and Byzantion from Athens. The Athenian Social War, 357-355. Chios unsuccessfully besieged by Chares and Chabrias. The Phocaeans plunder Delphi Third Sacred War, 357-346, 356 Philip II. takes Potidaea. 355 End of the Social War Athens acknowledges the indepen- dence of her allies. 354 Timotheos tried and exiled. 353 Philip II. occupies Pagasae. 352 Philip II. captures Methone, and reduces Thessaly ; he is repulsed from Thermopylae by the Athenians. War ot Sparta with Megalopolis. 350 The Athenians under Phocion in Eubcea their victory at Tamynae over Callias of Chalcis. 349 The Athenians aid the Olynthians in their war with Philip II. 348 Philip besieges Olynthos. 347 Fall of Olynthos, Philip II. expels the Athenians from Eubcea. 346 Peace between Athens and Macedonia. Philip II. destroys the Phocian cities and ends the Sacred War. 345 ^Eschines intrigues with Philip. 344 Timoleon's expedition to Sicily. 343 Success of Timoleon. Athenian expedition to Acarnama. 342 Philip II. invades Thrace. 340 Philip II. besieges Byzantion. 339 War between Athens and Macedonia Relief of Byzantion. 338 Fourth Sacred War Philip II., general of the Amphic tyons against Amphissa. Athens-Theban alliance. Battle of Chseroneia Philip Master of Greece. War de- clared against Persia. 336 Murder of Philip II. Accession of Alexander the Great. 335 Alexander wars with the Thracians, Triballi, and Illyrians ; he destroys Thebes. 334 Alexander crosses the Hellespont. Battle Of the Granicos. 333 Battle of Issos. 332 Capture of Tyre and Gaza, and conquest of Egypt ; Alex- ander visits Ammon. 331 Battle ol Arbela. Defeat and death of Agis. 330 Murder of Dareios III. 329 Alexander defeats the Scythians. 327 Alexander at the Indos. 326 Alexander returns to Persia. 324 Alexander at Babylon. 470 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLES OF GREEK HISTORY. B.C. 323 Death of Alexander the Great The empire divided by his generals. The Lamian War, 323-322, B.C. 32 Battle of Cranon End of the Lamian War. 318 Nicanor seizes the Peirseens. 317 Execution of Phocion. Cassander reduces Athens. 316 Cassander rebuilds Thebes. 313 /Etolian war with Cassander. 308 Ptolemy's expedition into Greece. 307 Demetrios Polioncetes frees Athens. 303 Demetrios made general of Greece. 302 Demetrios gains upon Cassander. 297 Attempt of Demetrios on Athens. 295 Fall of Athens. 294 Defeat of Pyrrhos at Sparta. 2i$7 Athens revolts from Demetrios. 284 The ./Etolian league against Macedonia. 282 The .i-Etolians invade Peloponnesos. 250 The Achaean league renewed. 279 Irruption of the Gauls Brennos defeated and killed at Delphi. 272 Pyrrhos in Peloponnesos. 268 Antigonos captures Athens. 256 Aratos frees Athens, which now joins the Achaean league. 251 Aratos liberates Sicyon. 244 Agis III. endeavours to restore the Lycurgean constitution and distribute the land. 243 Leonidas abdicates at Sparta. The citadel at Corinth seized by Aratos. 240 Murder of Agis III. 228 First Roman envoys in Greece. 227 Cleomenes III. defeats Aratos. 226 Revolution in Sparta Cleomenes overthrows the Ephons and restores the Lycurgean constitution. Cleomenes defeats the Achaeans. 225 Second Roman embassy. 223 Battle of ^Etolians and Macedonians at Thermopylae. Cleo- menes takes Megalopolis. 222 Battle of Sellasia. 220 War of Achaeans and ^Etolians. The ^Etolo-Achasan Social War, 220-217. 219 ./Etolians ravage Peloponnesos. 218 Acarnania ceded to Macedonia. 215 Atheno-^Etolian alliance. 214 Battle of Lamia. 313 Philopoemen, Achaean general. 211 A Roman fleet at Athens. 210 The Ephons abolished at Sparta. 209 Anarchy in Epeiros. 208 Battle of Mantineia. 207 Usurpation of Nabis at Sparta The Ephons overthrown. 204 ^Etolian league re-organised. 201 Massacres by ^Etolians. 200 The ^Etolians support Rome, the Achaeans Philip. 197 Sparta besieged by the Romans, Battle of Cynoscephalse. 196 At the Isthmian games, Flamininus declares Greece free. EVENTS FROM 195 TO 145 B.C. 471 195 Coalition against Rome. 194 Nabis defeats Philopoemen. 192 The ^Etolians obtain Sparta Nabis assassinated. 191 Sparta joins the Achaean league, Acilius Glabrio defeats Antioshos and the ^Etolians at Thermopylae. 183 The Messenians desert the Achaean league. Murder of Philopoemen. 182 The Achaeans overrun Messenia. 179 The Macedonians- reduce Epeiros. 177 The Achasans ally with Rome. 172 The Boeotian confederacy dissolved. 1 68 Fall of Macedonian kingdom. 167 The Romans ravage Epeiros. Arrest of a thousand Achsean hostages. 165 The Romans invade Achaia. 155 Embassy of Diogenes, Carneades, and Critolaos to Rome. 151 The Achaean hostages released. 150 Achaean war with Rome. 147 The Romans invade Greece, and subdue Sparta. 146 The Romans defeat the Achaeans, destroy Corinth, and dissolve the league. 145 Greece becomes the Roman province of Achaia. Cyrus Cambyses. . . . 529 Pseudo-Smerdis, eight months of ... Darius 521 Xerxes 1 486 Artaxerxes . . . 465 Xerxes II., 45 days of THE KINGS OF PERSIA. FROM CYRUS TO ALEXANDER THE GREAT. From B.C. . 558 To B.C. 529 522 522 486 From B.C. Sogdianus (or Secy- dianus) six months 424 Darius II. ... 423 Artaxerxes II. . . 405 Artaxerxes III. . . 359 Arces 338 425 424 Darius III. . . . 336 To B.C. 423 405 62 338 330 PERDICCAS Perdiccas I. . Argceus . . Philip I. . . Aeropus . . Alcetas . . Amyntas I. . Alexander I. Perdiccas II. Archelaus . . Orestes . . Aeropus . . (Alexander the Great, Lord of Persia). THE KINGS OF MACEDONIA. FROM ABOUT 700 B.C. TQ ALEXANDER THE GREAT. From To B.C. B.C. about 700 650 Pausanias. . . . about 650 620 Amyntas II., first From To B.C. B.C. 394 393 about 620 590 about 590 565 about 565 537 about 537 498 498 454 454 413 413 399 399 395 395 394 part of reign . . 393 392 Argeus 392 391 Amyntas II., restored 391 369 Alexander II. Ptolemy of Alorus (regent) .... Perdiccas III. . . Philip II Alexander the Gt. 369 368 23112 472 KINGS OF ATHENS. LEGENDARY KINGS OF ATHENS. Cecrops I. ... Cranaos .... Amphictyon . . , Erichthonios . . . Pandion I. ... Erechtheus . . , Cecrops II. . . . Pandion II. . . . vEgeus HERA EURYSTHENID (AGIO) Eurysthenes . . . From To B.C. B.C. 1556 1506 1506 1497 1497 1487 1487 1437 1437 *397 1397 J 347 1347 1307 1307 1283 1283 1235 CLEID KII ARISTODEMC LINE. From To B.C. B.C. 1072 IO32 IO32 1031 IO3I 996 996 959 959 928 928 884 884 826 826 786 786 752 752 712 712 688 688 652 652 600 600 564 564 524 524 491 491 480 480 458 458 408 408 394 394 380 38o 371 371 370 370 309 309 265 265 264 264 256 c 240 236 243 240 236 220 220 219 Theseus .... Menestheus . . . Demophoon . . . Oxyntes .... Aphidas .... Thymcetes . . . Melanthos. . . . Codros From To B.C. B.C. 1235 1205 I2O5 Il82 Il82 1149 1149 1137 1137 1136 1136 1128 1128 logi 1091 1070 no) LINE. From To B.C. B.C. 1072 1033 1033 1006 1006 986 986 934 934 889 889 884 S 54 810 Sio 786 786 740 740 688 688 652 652 604 604 552 552 510 510 491 491 469 469 427 437 398 398 361 361 338 338 330 33 300 300 280 -?So 244 244 240 240 235 235 ^GS OF SPARTA. >s, 1104 B - c - PROCLEID (EURYPON Procles Soos Echestratos . . . Labotas .... Doryssos .... Agesilaos I. ... Archelaos .... Teleclos .... Alcamenes . . . Polydoros .... Eurycrates . . . Anaxander . . . Eurycratides. . . Eurypon .... Prytanis .... Eunomos .... Polydectes . . . Charilaos .... Nicander .... Theopompos. . . Zeuxidamos . . . Anaxidamos . . . Archidamos I. . . Agesicles .... Ariston Anaxandrides . . Cleomenes I. . . Leonidas .... Pleistarchos . . . Pleistoanax . . . Pausanias .... Agesipolis I. . . . Cleombrotos I. . . Agesipolis II. . . Cleomenes II. . . Areus I Demaratos . . . Leotychides . . . Archidamos II. Agis II Agesilaos II. . . Archidamos III. Agis III Eudamidas I. . . Archidamos IV. Eudamidas II. . . Agis IV Acrotatos .... Areus II Leonidas II. 256-243 & Cleombrotos . . Cleomenes III. . . Agesipolis III. . . Eurydamidas. . . Archidamos V. . .