Hellenica · Xenophon
B.C. 390. Subsequently the Lacedaemonians made a second expedition against Corinth. They heard from the exiles that the citizens contrived to preserve all their cattle in Peiraeum; indeed, large numbers derived their subsistence from the place. Agesilaus was again in command of the expedition. In the first instance he advanced upon the Isthmus. It was the month of the Isthmian games, and here he found the Argives engaged in conducting the sacrifice to Poseidon, as if Corinth were Argos. So when they perceived the approach of Agesilaus, the Argives and their friends left the offerings as they lay, including the preparations for the breakfast, and retired with undisguised alarm into the city by the Cenchrean road. Agesilaus, though he observed the movement, refrained from giving chase, but taking up his quarters in the temple, there proceeded to offer victims to the god himself, and waited until the Corinthian exiles had celebrated the sacrifice to Poseidon, along with the games. But no sooner had Agesilaus turned his back and retired, than the Argives returned and celebrated the Isthmian games afresh; so that in this particular year there were cases in which the same competitors were twice defeated in this or that contest, or conversely, the same man was proclaimed victor twice over.
On the fourth day Agesilaus led his troops against Peiraeum, but finding it strongly defended, he made a sudden retrograde march after the morning meal in the direction of the capital, as though he calculated on the betrayal of the city. The Corinthians, in apprehension of some such possible catastrophe, sent to summon Iphicrates with the larger portion of his light infantry. These passed by duly in the night, not unobserved, however, by Agesilaus, who at once turned round at break of day and advanced on Piraeum. He himself kept to the low ground by the hot springs, sending a division to scale the top of the pass. That night he encamped at the hot springs, while the division bivouacked in the open, in possession of the pass. Here Agesilaus distinguished himself by an invention as seasonable as it was simple. Among those who carried provisions for the division not one had thought of bringing fire. The altitude was considerable; there had been a fall of rain and hail towards evening and the temperature was low; besides which, the scaling party were clad in thin garments suited to the summer season. There they sat shivering in the dark, with scarcely heart to attack their suppers, when Agesilaus sent up to them as many as ten porters carrying fire in earthen pots. One found his way up one way, one another, and presently there were many bonfires blazing--magnificently enough, since there was plenty of wood to hand; so that all fell to oiling themselves and many supped over again. The same night the sky was lit up by the blaze of the temple of Poseidon--set on fire no one knows how.
When the men in Piraeum perceived that the pass was occupied, they at once abandoned all thought of self-defence and fled for refuge to the Heraion --men and women, slaves and free-born, with the greater part of their flocks and herds. Agesilaus, with the main body, meanwhile pursued his march by the sea-shore, and the division, simultaneously descending from the heights, captured the fortified position of Oenoe, appropriating its contents. Indeed, all the troops on that day reaped a rich harvest in the supplies they brought in from various farmsteads. Presently those who had escaped into the Heraion came out, offering to leave it to Agesilaus to decide what he would do with them. He decided to deliver up to the exiles all those concerned with the late butchery, and that all else should be sold. And so from the Heraion streamed out a long line of prisoners, whilst from other sides embassies arrived in numbers; and amongst these a deputation from the Boeotians, anxious to learn what they should do to obtain peace. These latter Agesilaus, with a certain loftiness of manner, affected not even to see, although Pharax, their proxenus, stood by their side to introduce them. Seated in a circular edifice on the margin of the lake, he surveyed the host of captives and valuables as they were brought out. Beside the prisoners, to guard them, stepped the Lacedaemonian warriors from the camp, carrying their spears--and themselves plucked all gaze their way, so readily will success and the transient fortune of the moment rivet attention. But even while Agesilaus was still thus seated, wearing a look betokening satisfaction at some great achievement, a horseman came galloping up; the flanks of his charger streamed with sweat. To the many inquiries what news he brought, the rider responded never a word; but being now close beside Agesilaus, he leaped from his horse, and running up to him with lowering visage narrated the disaster of the Spartan division at Lechaeum. At these tidings the king sprang instantly from his seat, clutching his spear, and bade his herald summon to a meeting the generals, captains of fifties, and commanders of foreign brigades. When these had rapidly assembled he bade them, seeing that the morning meal had not yet been tasted, to swallow hastily what they could, and with all possible speed to overtake him. But for himself, he, with the officers of the royal staff, set off at once without breakfast. His bodyguard, with their heavy arms, accompanied him with all speed--himself in advance, the officers following behind. In this fashion he had already passed beyond the warm springs, and was well within the plateau of Lechaeum, when three horsemen rode up with further news: the dead bodies had been picked up. On receipt of these tidings he commanded the troops to order arms, and having rested them a little space, led them back again to the Heraion. The next day he spent in disposing of the captured property.
The ambassadors of the Boeotians were then summoned, and, being asked to explain the object of their coming, made no further mention of the word "peace," but replied that, if there was nothing to hinder it, they wished to have a pass to their own soldiers within the capital. The king answered with a smile: "I know your desire is not so much to see your soldiers as to feast your eyes on the good fortune of your friends, and to measure its magnitude. Wait then, I will conduct you myself; with me you will be better able to discover the true value of what has taken place." And he was as good as his word. Next day he sacrificed, and led his army up to the gates of Corinth. The trophy he respected, but not one tree did he leave standing--chopping and burning, as proof positive that no one dared to face him in the field. And having so done, he encamped about Lechaeum; and as to the Theban ambassadors, in lieu of letting them pass into the city, he sent them off by sea across to Creusis.
But in proportion to the unwontedness of such a calamity befalling Lacedaemonians, a widespread mourning fell upon the whole Laconian army, those alone excepted whose sons or fathers or brothers had died at their post. The bearing of these resembled that of conquerors, as with bright faces they moved freely to and fro, glorying in their domestic sorrow. Now the tragic fate which befell the division was on this wise: It was the unvaried custom of the men of Amyclae to return home at the Hyacinthia, to join in the sacred paean, a custom not to be interrupted by active service or absence from home or for any other reason. So, too, on this occasion, Agesilaus had left behind all the Amyclaeans serving in any part of his army at Lechaeum. At the right moment the general in command of the garrison at that place had posted the garrison troops of the allies to guard the walls during his absence, and put himself at the head of his division of heavy infantry with that of the cavalry, and led the Amyclaeans past the walls of Corinth. Arrived at a point within three miles or so of Sicyon, the polemarch turned back himself in the direction of Lechaeum with his heavy infantry regiment, six hundred strong, giving orders to the cavalry commandant to escort the Amyclaeans with his division as far as they required, and then to turn and overtake him. It cannot be said that the Lacedaemonians were ignorant of the large number of light troops and heavy infantry inside Corinth, but owing to their former successes they arrogantly presumed that no one would attack them. Within the capital of the Corinthians, however, their scant numbers--a thin line of heavy infantry unsupported by light infantry or cavalry--had been noted; and Callias, the son of Hipponicus, who was in command of the Athenian hoplites, and Iphicrates at the head of his peltasts, saw no risk in attacking with the light brigade. Since if the enemy continued his march by the high road, he would be cut up by showers of javelins on his exposed right flank; or if he were tempted to take the offensive, they with their peltasts, the nimblest of all light troops, would easily slip out of the grasp of his hoplites.
With this clearly-conceived idea they led out their troops; and while Callias drew up his heavy infantry in line at no great distance from the city, Iphicrates and his peltasts made a dash at the returning division.
The Lacedaemonians were presently within range of the javelins. Here a man was wounded, and there another dropped, not to rise again. Each time orders were given to the attendant shield-bearers to pick up the men and bear them into Lechaeum; and these indeed were the only members of the mora who were, strictly speaking, saved. Then the polemarch ordered the ten-years-service men to charge and drive off their assailants. Charge, however, as they might, they took nothing by their pains--not a man could they come at within javelin range. Being heavy infantry opposed to light troops, before they could get to close quarters the enemy's word of command sounded "Retire!" whilst as soon as their own ranks fell back, scattered as they were in consequence of a charge where each man's individual speed had told, Iphicrates and his men turned right about and renewed the javelin attack, while others, running alongside, harassed their exposed flank. At the very first charge the assailants had shot down nine or ten, and, encouraged by this success, pressed on with increasing audacity. These attacks told so severely that the polemarch a second time gave the order (and this time for the fifteen-years-service men) to charge. The order was promptly obeyed, but on retiring they lost more men than on the first occasion, and it was not until the pick and flower of the division had succumbed that they were joined by their returning cavalry, in whose company they once again attempted a charge. The light infantry gave way, but the attack of the cavalry was feebly enforced. Instead of pressing home the charge until at least they had sabred some of the enemy, they kept their horses abreast of their infantry skirmishers, charging and wheeling side by side.
Again and again the monotonous tale of doing and suffering repeated itself, except that as their own ranks grew thinner and their courage ebbed, the courage of their assailants grew bolder and their numbers increased. In desperation they massed compactly upon the narrow slope of a hillock, distant a couple of furlongs or so from the sea, and a couple of miles perhaps from Lechaeum. Their friends in Lechaeum, perceiving them, embarked in boats and sailed round until they were immediately under the hillock. And now, in the very slough of despair, being so sorely troubled as man after man dropped dead, and unable to strike a blow, to crown their distress they saw the enemy's heavy infantry advancing. Then they took to flight; some of them threw themselves into the sea; others--a mere handful--escaped with the cavalry into Lechaeum. The death-roll, including those who fell in the second fight and the final flight, must have numbered two hundred and fifty slain, or thereabouts. Such is the tale of the destruction of the Lacedaemonian mora.
Subsequently, with the mutilated fragment of the division, Agesilaus turned his back upon Lechaeum, leaving another division behind to garrison that port. On his passage homewards, as he wound his way through the various cities, he made a point of arriving at each as late in the day as possible, renewing his march as early as possible next morning. Leaving Orchomenus at the first streak of dawn, he passed Mantinea still under cover of darkness. The spectacle of the Mantineans rejoicing at their misfortune would have been too severe an ordeal for his soldiers.
But Iphicrates had not yet reached the summit of his good fortune. Success followed upon success. Lacedaemonian garrisons had been placed in Sidus and Crommyon by Praxitas when he took these fortresses, and again in Oenoe, when Peiraeum was taken quite lately by Agesilaus. One and all of these now fell into the hands of Iphicrates. Lechaeum still held out, garrisoned as it was by the Lacedaemonians and their allies; while the Corinthian exiles, unable since the disaster of the mora any longer to pass freely by land from Sicyon, had the sea passage still open to them, and using Lechaeum as their base, kept up a game of mutual annoyance with the party in the capital.
B.C. 390-389. At a later date the Achaeans, being in possession of Calydon, a town from old times belonging to Aetolia, and having further incorporated the Calydonians as citizens, were under the necessity of garrisoning their new possession. The reason was, that the Arcarnanians were threatening the place with an army, and were aided by contingents from Athens and Boeotia, who were anxious to help their allies. Under the strain of this combined attack the Achaeans despatched ambassadors to Lacedaemon, who on arrival complained of the unfair conduct of Lacedaemon towards themselves. "We, sirs," they said, "are ever ready to serve in your armies, in obedience to whatever orders you choose to issue; we follow you whithersoever you think fit to lead; but when it comes to our being beleaguered by the Acarnanians, with their allies the Athenians and Boeotians, you show not the slightest concern. Understand, then, that if things go on thus we cannot hold out; but either we must give up all part in the war in Peloponnesus and cross over in full force to engage the Arcarnanians, or we must make peace with them on whatever terms we can." This language was a tacit threat that if they failed to obtain the assistance they felt entitled to from Lacedaemon they would quit the alliance.
The ephors and the assembly concluded that there was no alternative but to assist the Achaeans in their campaign against the Acarnanians. Accordingly they sent out Agesilaus with two divisions and the proper complement of allies. The Achaeans none the less marched out in full force themselves. No sooner had Agesilaus crossed the gulf than there was a general flight of the population from the country districts into the towns, whilst the flocks and herds were driven into remote districts that they might not be captured by the troops. Being now arrived on the frontier of the enemy's territory, Agesilaus sent to the general assembly of the Acarnanians at Stratus, warning them that unless they chose to give up their alliance with the Boeotians and Athenians, and to take instead themselves and their allies, he would ravage their territory through its length and breadth, and not spare a single thing. When they turned a deaf ear to this summons, the other proceeded to do what he threatened, systematically laying the district waste, felling the timber and cutting down the fruit-trees, while slowly moving on at the rate of ten or twelve furlongs a day. The Acarnanians, owing to the snail-like progress of the enemy, were lulled into a sense of security. They even began bringing down their cattle from their alps, and devoted themselves to the tillage of far the greater portion of their fields. But Agesilaus only waited till their rash confidence reached its climax; then on the fifteenth or sixteenth day after he had first entered the country he sacrificed at early dawn, and before evening had traversed eighteen miles or so of country to the lake round which were collected nearly all the flocks and herds of the Acarnanians, and so captured a vast quantity of cattle, horses, and grazing stock of all kinds, besides numerous slaves.
Having secured this prize, he stayed on the spot the whole of the following day, and devoted himself to disposing of the captured property by public sale. While he was thus engaged, a large body of Arcarnanian light infantry appeared, and availing themselves of the position in which Agesilaus was encamped against the mountain side, assailed him with volleys of sling-stones and rocks from the razor-edge of the mountain, without suffering any scathe themselves. By this means they succeeded in dislodging and forcing his troops down into the level plain, and that too at an hour when the whole camp was engaged in preparations for the evening meal. As night drew on, the Acarnanians retired; sentinels were posted, and the troops slept in peace.
Next day Agesilaus led off his army. The exit from the plain and meadow-land round the lake was a narrow aperture through a close encircling range of hills. In occupation of this mountain barrier the Acarnanians, from the vantage-ground above, poured down a continuous pelt of stones and other missiles, or, creeping down to the fringes, dogged and annoyed them so much that the army was no longer able to proceed. If the heavy infantry or cavalry made sallies from the main line they did no harm to their assailants, for the Acarnanians had only to retire and they had quickly gained their strongholds. It was too severe a task, Agesilaus thought, to force his way through the narrow pass so sorely beset. He made up his mind, therefore, to charge that portion of the enemy who dogged his left, though these were pretty numerous. The range of hills on this side was more accessible to heavy infantry and horse alike. During the interval needed for the inspection of victims, the Acarnanians kept plying them with javelins and bullets, and, coming into close proximity, wounded man after man. But presently came the word of command, "Advance!" and the fifteen-years-service men of the heavy infantry ran forward, accompanied by the cavalry, at a round pace, the general himself steadily following with the rest of the column. Those of the Acarnanians who had crept down the mountain side at that instant in the midst of their sharpshooting turned and fled, and as they climbed the steep, man after man was slain. When, however, the top of the pass was reached, there stood the hoplites of the Acarnanians drawn up in battle line, and supported by the mass of their light infantry. There they steadily waited, keeping up a continuous discharge of missiles the while, or launching their long spears; whereby they dealt wounds to the cavalry troopers and death in some cases to the horses. But when they were all but within the clutches of the advancing heavy infantry of the Lacedaemonians their firmness forsook them; they swerved and fled, and there died of them on that day about three hundred. So ended the affair.
Agesilaus set up a trophy of victory, and afterwards making a tour of the country, he visited it with fire and sword. Occasionally, in obedience to pressure put upon him by the Achaeans, he would assault some city, but did not capture a single one. And now, as the season of autumn rapidly approached, he prepared to leave the country; whereupon the Achaeans, who looked upon his exploits as abortive, seeing that not a single city, willingly or unwillingly, had as yet been detached from their opponents, begged him, as the smallest service he could render them, at any rate to stay long enough in the country to prevent the Acarnanians from sowing their corn. He answered that the course they suggested ran counter to expediency. "You forget," he said, "that I mean to invade your enemies again next summer; and therefore the larger their sowing now, the stronger will be their appetite for peace hereafter." With this retort he withdrew overland through Aetolia, and by roads, moreover, which no army, small or great, could possibly have traversed without the consent of the inhabitants. The Aetolians, however, were only too glad to yield the Spartan king a free passage, cherishing hopes as they did that he would aid them to recover Naupactus. On reaching Rhium he crossed the gulf at that point and returned homewards, the more direct passage from Calydon to Peloponnesus being effectually barred by an Athenian squadron stationed at Oeniadae.
B.C. 389-388. On the expiration of winter, and in fulfilment of his promise to the Achaeans, Agesilaus called out the ban once more with early spring to invade the Acarnanians. The latter were apprised of his intention, and, being persuaded that owing to the midland situation of their cities they would just as truly be blockaded by an enemy who chose to destroy their corn as they would be if besieged with entrenchments in regular form, they sent ambassadors to Lacedaemon, and made peace with the Achaeans and alliance with the Lacedaemonians. Thus closes this page of history concerning the affairs of Arcarnania.
To turn to the next. There was a feeling on the part of the Lacedaemonians that no expedition against Athens or Boeotia would be safe so long as a state so important and so close to their own frontier as Argos remained in open hostility behind them. Accordingly they called out the ban against Argos. Now when Agesipolis learnt that the duty of leadership devolved on him, and, moreover, that the sacrifices before crossing the frontier were favourable, he went to Olympia and consulted the will of the god. "Would it be lawful to him," he inquired, "not to accept the holy truce, on the ground that the Argives made the season for it depend not on a fixed date, but on the prospect of a Lacedaemonian invasion?" The god indicated to the inquirer that he might lawfully repudiate any holy truce which was fraudulently antedated. Not content with this, the young king, on leaving Olympia, went at once to Delphi, and at that shrine put the same question to Apollo: "Were his views in accordance with his Father's as touching the holy truce?"--to which the son of Zeus made answer: "Yea, altogether in accordance."
Then without further hesitation, picking up his army at Phlius (where, during his absence to visit the temples, the troops had been collecting), he advanced by Nemea into the enemy's territory. The Argives, on their side, perceiving that they would be unable to hinder his advance, in accordance with their custom sent a couple of heralds, garlanded, and presented their usual plea of a holy truce. Agesipolis answered them curtly that the gods were not satisfied with the justice of their plea, and, refusing to accept the truce, pushed forward, causing thereby great perplexity and consternation throughout the rural districts and the capital itself.
But while he was getting his evening meal that first evening in the Argive territory--just at the moment when the after-dinner libation had been poured out--the god sent an earthquake; and with one consent the Lacedaemonians, beginning with the officers of the royal quarters, sang the sacred hymn of Poseidon. The soldiers, in general, expected to retreat, arguing that, on the occurrence of an earthquake once before, Agis had retired from Elis. But Agesipolis held another view: if the god had sent his earthquake at the moment when he was meditating invasion, he should have understood that the god forbade his entrance; but now, when the invasion was a thing effected, he must needs take it as a signal of his approval. Accordingly next morning he sacrificed to Poseidon, and advanced a short distance further into the country.
The late expedition of Agesilaus into Argos was still fresh in men's minds, and Agesipolis was eager to ascertain from the soldiers how close his predecessor had advanced to the fortification walls; or again, how far he had gone in ravaging the open country--not unlike a competitor in the pentathlon, eager to cap the performance of his rival in each event. On one occasion it was only the discharge of missiles from the towers which forced him to recross the trenches round the walls; on another, profiting by the absence of the majority of the Argives in Laconian territory, he came so close to the gates that their officers actually shut out their own Boeotian cavalry on the point of entering, in terror lest the Lacedaemonians might pour into the town in company, and these Boeotian troopers were forced to cling, like bats to a wall, under each coign of vantage beneath the battlements. Had it not been for the accidental absence of the Cretans, who had gone off on a raid to Nauplia, without a doubt numbers of men and horses would have been shot down. At a later date, while encamping in the neighbourhood of the Enclosures, a thunder-bolt fell into his camp. One or two men were struck, while others died from the effect of the concussion on their brains. At a still later period he was anxious to fortify some sort of garrison outpost in the pass of Celusa, but upon offering sacrifice the victims proved lobeless, and he was constrained to lead back and disband his army--not without serious injury inflicted on the Argives, as the result of an invasion which had taken them wholly by surprise.
394 B.C. Such were the land operations in the war. Meanwhile another series of events was being enacted on the sea and within the seaboard cities; and these I will now narrate in detail. But I shall confine my pen to the more memorable incidents, and others of less account I shall pass over.
In the first place, then, Pharnabazus and Conon, after defeating the Lacedaemonians in the naval engagement of Cnidus, commenced a tour of inspection round the islands and the maritime states, expelling from them, as they visited them, one after another the Spartan governors. Everywhere they gave consolatory assurances to the citizens that they had no intention of establishing fortress citadels within their walls, or in any way interfering with their self-government. Such words fell soothingly upon the ears of those to whom they were addressed; the proposals were courteously accepted; all were eager to present Pharnabazus with gifts of friendship and hospitality. The satrap, indeed, was only applying the instructions of his master Conon on these matters--who had taught him that if he acted thus all the states would be friendly to him, whereas, if he showed any intention to enslave them, the smallest of them would, as Conon insisted, be capable of causing a world of trouble, and the chances were, if apprehensions were once excited, he would find himself face to face with a coalition of united Hellas. To these admonitions Pharnabazus lent a willing ear.
Accordingly, when disembarking at Ephesus, he presented Conon with a fleet of forty sail, and having further instructed him to meet him at Sestos, set off himself by land along the coast to visit his own provinces. For here it should be mentioned that his old enemy Dercylidas happened to be in Abydos at the time of the sea-fight; nor had he at a later date suffered eclipse with the other governors, but on the contrary, had kept tight hold of Abydos and still preserved it in attachment to Lacedaemon. The course he had adopted was to summon a meeting of the Abydenians, when he made them a speech as follows: "Sirs, to-day it is possible for you, who have before been friends to my city, to appear as benefactors of the Lacedaemonians. For a man to prove faithful to his friends in the heyday of their good fortune is no great marvel; but to prove steadfast when his friends are in misfortune--that is a service monumental for all time. But do not mistake me. It does not follow that, because we have been defeated in a great sea-fight, we are therefore annihilated. Certainly not. Even in old days, you will admit, when Athens was mistress of the sea, our state was not powerless to benefit friends or chastise enemies. Moreover, in proportion as the rest of the cities have joined hands with fortune to turn their backs upon us, so much the more certainly will the grandeur of your fidelity shine forth. Or, is any one haunted by the fear that we may find ourselves blockaded by land and sea?--let him consider that at present there is no Hellenic navy whatever on the seas, and if the barbarian attempts to clutch the empire of the sea, Hellas will not sit by and suffer it; so that, if only in self-defence, she must inevitably take your side."
To this the Abydenians lent no deaf ears, but rather responded with willingness approaching enthusiasm--extending the hand of fellowship to the ex-governors, some of whom were already flocking to Abydos as a harbour of refuge, whilst others they sent to summon from a distance.
So when a number of efficient and serviceable men had been collected, Dercylidas ventured to cross over to Sestos--lying, as it does, not more than a mile distant, directly facing Abydos. There he not only set about collecting those who held lands in the Chersonese through Lacedaemonian influence, but extended his welcome also to the governors who had been driven out of European states. He insisted that, if they came to think of it, not even was their case desperate, reminding them that even in Asia, which originally belonged to the Persian monarch, places were to be found--such as the little state of Temnos, or Aegae, and others, capable of administering their affairs, unsubjected to the king of Persia. "But," he added, "if you want a strong impregnable position, I cannot conceive what better you can find than Sestos. Why, it would need a combined naval and military force to invest that port." By these and such like arguments he rescued them from the lethargy of despair.
Now when Pharnabazus found Abydos and Sestos so conditioned, he gave them to understand that unless they chose to eject the Lacedaemonians, he would bring war to bear upon them; and when they refused to obey, having first assigned to Conon as his business to keep the sea closed against them, he proceeded in person to ravage the territory of the men of Abydos. Presently, finding himself no nearer the fulfilment of his object--which was their reduction--he set off home himself and left it to Conon the while so to conciliate the Hellespontine states that as large a naval power as possible might be mustered against the coming spring. In his wrath against the Lacedaemonians, in return for the treatment he had received from them, his paramount object was to invade their territory and exact what vengeance he could.
B.C. 393. The winter was thus fully taken up with preparations; but with the approach of spring, Pharnabazus and Conon, with a large fleet fully manned, and a foreign mercenary brigade to boot, threaded their way through the islands to Melos. This island was to serve as a base of operations against Lacedaemon. And in the first instance he sailed down to Pherae and ravaged that district, after which he made successive descents at various other points on the seaboard, and did what injury he could. But in apprehension of the harbourless character of the coast, coupled with the enemy's facility of reinforcement and his own scarcity of supplies, he very soon turned back and sailed away, until finally he came to moorings in the harbour of Phoenicus in Cythera. The occupants of the city of the Cytherians, in terror of being taken by storm, evacuated the walls. To dismiss these under a flag of truce across to Laconia was his first step; his second was to repair the fortress in question and to leave a garrison in the island under an Athenian governor--Nicophemus. After this he set sail to the Isthmus of Corinth, where he delivered an exhortation to the allies begging them to prosecute the war vigorously, and to show themselves faithful to the Great King; and so, having left them all the moneys he had with him, set off on his voyage home.
But Conon had a proposal to make:--If Pharnabazus would allow him to keep the fleet, he would undertake, in the first place, to support it free of expense from the islands; besides which, he would sail to his own country and help his fellow-citizens the Athenians to rebuild their long walls and the fortifications round Piraeus. No heavier blow, he insisted, could well be inflicted on Lacedaemon. "In this way, I can assure you," he added, "you will win the eternal gratitude of the Athenians and wreak consummate vengeance on the Lacedaemonians, since at one stroke you will render null and void that on which they have bestowed their utmost labour." These arguments so far weighed with Pharnabazus that he despatched Conon to Athens with alacrity, and further supplied him with funds for the restoration of the walls. Thus it was that Conon, on his arrival at Athens, was able to rebuild a large portion of the walls--partly by lending his own crews, and partly by giving pay to carpenters and stone-masons, and meeting all the necessary expenses. There were other portions of the walls which the Athenians and Boeotians and other states raised as a joint voluntary undertaking.
Nor must it be forgotten that the Corinthians, with the funds left them by Pharnabazus, manned a fleet--the command of which they entrusted to their admiral Agathinus--and so were undisputed masters of the sea within the gulf round Achaia and Lechaeum.
B.C. 393-391. The Lacedaemonians, in opposition, fitted out a fleet under the command of Podanemus. That officer, in an attack of no great moment, lost his life, and Pollis, his second in command, was presently in his turn obliged to retire, being wounded, whereupon Herippidas took command of the vessels. On the other hand, Proaenus the Corinthian, who had relieved Agathinus, evacuated Rhium, and the Lacedaemonians recovered that post. Subsequently Teleutias succeeded to Herippidas's fleet, and it was then the turn of that admiral to dominate the gulf.
B.C. 392. The Lacedaemonians were well informed of the proceedings of Conon. They knew that he was not only restoring the fortifications of Athens by help of the king's gold, but maintaining a fleet at his expense besides, and conciliating the islands and seaboard cities towards Athens. If, therefore, they could indoctrinate Tiribazus--who was a general of the king--with their sentiments, they believed they could not fail either to draw him aside to their own interests, or, at any rate, to put a stop to his feeding Conon's navy. With this intention they sent Antalcidas to Tiribazus: his orders were to carry out this policy and, if possible, to arrange a peace between Lacedaemon and the king. The Athenians, getting wind of this, sent a counter-embassy, consisting of Hermogenes, Dion, Callisthenes, and Callimedon, with Conon himself. They at the same time invited the attendance of ambassadors from the allies, and there were also present representatives of the Boeotians, of Corinth, and of Argos. When they had arrived at their destination, Antalcidas explained to Tiribazus the object of his visit: he wished, if possible, to cement a peace between the state he represented and the king--a peace, moreover, exactly suited to the aspirations of the king himself; in other words, the Lacedaemonians gave up all claim to the Hellenic cities in Asia as against the king, while for their own part they were content that all the islands and other cities should be independent. "Such being our unbiased wishes," he continued, "for what earthly reason should (the Hellenes or) the king go to war with us? or why should he expend his money? The king is guaranteed against attack on the part of Hellas, since the Athenians are powerless apart from our hegemony, and we are powerless so long as the separate states are independent." The proposals of Antalcidas sounded very pleasantly in the ears of Tiribazus, but to the opponents of Sparta they were the merest talk. The Athenians were apprehensive of an agreement which provided for the independence of the cities in the islands, whereby they might be deprived of Lemnos, Imbros, and Scyros. The Thebans, again, were afraid of being compelled to let the Boeotian states go free. The Argives did not see how such treaty contracts and covenants were compatible with the realisation of their own great object--the absorption of Corinth by Argos. And so it came to pass that this peace proved abortive, and the representatives departed each to his own home.
Tiribazus, on his side, thought it hardly consistent with his own safety to adopt the cause of the Lacedaemonians without the concurrence of the king--a scruple which did not prevent him from privately presenting Antalcidas with a sum of money, in hopes that when the Athenians and their allies discovered that the Lacedaemonians had the wherewithal to furnish a fleet, they might perhaps be more disposed to desire peace. Further, accepting the statements of the Lacedaemonians as true, he took on himself to secure the person of Conon, as guilty of wrongdoing towards the king, and shut him up. That done, he set off up country to the king to recount the proposals of Lacedaemon, with his own subsequent capture of Conon as a mischievous man, and to ask for further guidance on all these matters.
On the arrival of Tiribazus at the palace, the king sent down Struthas to take charge of the seaboard district. The latter, however, was a strong partisan of Athens and her allies, since he found it impossible to forget the long list of evils which the king's country had suffered at the hands of Agesilaus; so that the Lacedaemonians, contrasting the hostile disposition of the new satrap towards themselves with his friendliness to the Athenians, sent Thibron to deal with him by force of arms.
B.C. 391. That general crossed over and established his base of operations in Ephesus and the towns in the plain of the Maeander--Priene, Leucophrys, and Achilleum--and proceeded to harry the king's territory, sparing neither live nor dead chattels. But as time went on, Struthas, who could not but note the disorderly, and indeed recklessly scornful manner in which the Lacedaemonian brought up his supports on each occasion, despatched a body of cavalry into the plain. Their orders were to gallop down and scour the plain, making a clean sweep of all they could lay their hands on. Thibron, as it befell, had just finished breakfast, and was returning to the mess with Thersander the flute-player. The latter was not only a good flute-player, but, as affecting Lacedaemonian manners, laid claim to personal prowess. Struthas, then, seeing the disorderly advance of the supports and the paucity of the vanguard, appeared suddenly at the head of a large body of cavalry, all in orderly array. Thibron and Thersander were the first to be cut down, and when these had fallen the rest of the troops were easily turned. A mere chase ensued, in which man after man was felled to earth, though a remnant contrived to escape into the friendly cities; still larger numbers owed their safety to their late discovery of the business on hand. Nor, indeed, was this the first time the Spartan commander had rushed to the field, without even issuing a general order. So ends the history of these events.
B.C. 390. We pass on to the arrival at Lacedaemon of a party of Rhodian exiles expelled by the popular party. They insisted that it was not equitable to allow the Athenians to subjugate Rhodes and thus build up so vast a power. The Lacedaemonians were alive to the fact that the fate of Rhodes depended on which party in the state prevailed: if the democracy were to dominate, the whole island must fall into the hands of Athens; if the wealthier classes, into their own. Accordingly they fitted out for them a fleet of eight vessels, and put Ecdicus in command of it as admiral.
At the same time they despatched another officer on board these vessels named Diphridas, on a separate mission. His orders were to cross over into Asia and to secure the states which had received Thibron. He was also to pick up the survivors of Thibron's army, and with these troops, aided by a second army which he would collect from any other quarter open to him, he was to prosecute the war against Struthas. Diphridas followed out his instructions, and amongst other achievements was fortunate enough to capture Tigranes, the son-in-law of Struthas, with his wife, on their road to Sardis. The sum paid for their ransom was so large that he at once had the wherewithal to pay his mercenaries. Diphridas was no less attractive than his predecessor Thibron; but he was of a more orderly temperament, steadier, and incomparably more enterprising as a general; the secret of this superiority being that he was a man over whom the pleasures of the body exercised no sway. He became readily absorbed in the business before him--whatever he had to do he did it with a will.
Ecdicus having reached Cnidus, there learned that the democracy in Rhones were entirely masters of the situation. They were dominant by land and sea; indeed they possessed a fleet twice the size of his own. He was therefore content to keep quiet in Cnidus until the Lacedaemonians, perceiving that his force was too small to allow him to benefit their friends, determined to relieve him. With this view they ordered Teleutias to take the twelve ships which formed his squadron (at present in the gulf adjoining Achaia and Lechaeum), and to feel his way round to Ecdicus: that officer he was to send home. For himself, he was to undertake personally to protect the interests of all who cared to be their friends, whilst injuring the enemy by every possible means.
So then Teleutias, having reached Samos, where he added some vessels to his fleet, set sail to Cnidus. At this point Ecdicus returned home, and Teleutias, continuing his voyage, reached Rhodes, at the head now of seven-and-twenty vessels. It was during this portion of the voyage that he fell in with Philocrates, the son of Ephialtes, who was sailing from Athens to Cyprus with ten triremes, in aid of their ally Evagoras. The whole flotilla fell into the Spartan's hands--a curious instance, it may be added, of cross purposes on the part of both belligerents. Here were the Athenians, supposed to be on friendly terms with the king, engaged in sending an allied force to support Evagoras, who was at open war with him; and here again was Teleutias, the representative of a people at war with Persia, engaged in crippling a fleet which had been despatched on a mission hostile to their adversary. Teleutias put back into Cnidus to dispose of his captives, and so eventually reached Rhodes, where his arrival brought timely aid to the party in favour of Lacedaemon.
B.C. 389. And now the Athenians, fully impressed with the belief that their rivals were laying the basis of a new naval supremacy, despatched Thrasybulus the Steirian to check them, with a fleet of forty sail. That officer set sail, but abstained from bringing aid to Rhodes, and for good reasons. In Rhodes the Lacedaemonian party had hold of the fortress, and would be out of reach of his attack, especially as Teleutias was close at hand to aid them with his fleet. On the other hand, his own friends ran no danger of succumbing to the enemy, as they held the cities and were numerically much stronger, and they had established their superiority in the field. Consequently he made for the Hellespont, where, in the absence of any rival power, he hoped to achieve some stroke of good fortune for his city. Thus, in the first place, having detected the rivalries existing between Medocus, the king of the Odrysians, and Seuthes, the rival ruler of the seaboard, he reconciled them to each other, and made them friends and allies of Athens; in the belief that if he secured their friendship the Hellenic cities on the Thracian coast would show greater proclivity to Athens. Such being the happy state of affairs not only in Europe but as regards the states in Asia also, thanks to the friendly attitude of the king to his fellow-citizens, he sailed into Byzantium and sold the tithe-duty levied on vessels arriving from the Euxine. By another stroke he converted the oligarchy of Byzantium into a democracy. The result of this was that the Byzantine demos were no longer sorry to see as vast a concourse of Athenians in their city as possible. Having so done, and having further won the friendship of the men of Calchedon, he set sail south of the Hellespont. Arrived at Lesbos, he found all the cities devoted to Lacedaemon with the exception of Mytilene. He was therefore loth to attack any of the former until he had organised a force within the latter. This force consisted of four hundred hoplites, furnished from his own vessels, and a corps of exiles from the different cities who had sought shelter in Mytilene; to which he added a stout contingent, the pick of the Mytileneian citizens themselves. He stirred the ardour of the several contingents by suitable appeals: representing to the men of Mytilene that by their capture of the cities they would at once become the chiefs and patrons of Lesbos; to the exiles he made it appear that if they would but unite to attack each several city in turn, they might all reckon on their particular restoration; while he needed only to remind his own warriors that the acquisition of Lesbos meant not only the attachment of a friendly city, but the discovery of a mine of wealth. The exhortations ended and the contingents organised, he advanced against Methymna.
Therimachus, who chanced to be the Lacedaemonian governor at the time, on hearing of the meditated attack of Thrasybulus, had taken a body of marines from his vessels, and, aided by the citizens of Methymna themselves, along with all the Mytileneian exiles to be found in that place, advanced to meet the enemy on their borders. A battle was fought and Therimachus was slain, a fate shared by several of the exiles of his party.
As a result of his victory the Athenian general succeeded in winning the adhesion of some of the states; or, where adhesion was refused, he could at least raise supplies for his soldiers by freebooting expeditions, and so hastened to reach his goal, which was the island of Rhodes. His chief concern was to support as powerful an army as possible in those parts, and with this object he proceeded to levy money aids, visiting various cities, until he finally reached Aspendus, and came to moorings in the river Eurymedon. The money was safely collected from the Aspendians, and the work completed, when, taking occasion of some depredations of the soldiers on the farmsteads, the people of the place in a fit of irritation burst into the general's quarters at night and butchered him in his tent.
So perished Thrasybulus, a good and great man by all admission. In room of him the Athenians chose Agyrrhius, who was despatched to take command of the fleet. And now the Lacedaemonians--alive to the fact that the sale of the Euxine tithe-dues had been negotiated in Byzantium by Athens; aware also that as long as the Athenians kept hold on Calchedon the loyalty of the other Hellespontine cities was secured to them (at any rate while Pharnabazus remained their friend)--felt that the state of affairs demanded their serious attention. They attached no blame indeed to Dercylidas. Anaxibius, however, through the friendship of the ephors, contrived to get himself appointed as governor, on a mission to Abydos. With the requisite funds and ships, he promised to exert such hostile pressure upon Athens that at least her prospects in the Hellespont would cease to be so sunny. His friends the ephors granted him in return for these promises three ships of war and funds to support a thousand mercenaries, and so they despatched him on his mission. Reaching Abydos, he set about improving his naval and military position. First he collected a foreign brigade, by help of which he drew off some of the Aeolid cities from Pharnabazus. Next he set on foot a series of retaliatory expeditions against the states which attacked Abydos, marching upon them and ravaging their territories; and lastly, manning three vessels besides those which he already held in the harbour of Abydos, he intercepted and brought into port all the merchant ships of Athens or of her allies which he could lay hands on.
Getting wind of these proceedings, the Athenians, fearing lest the fair foundation laid for them by Thrasybulus in the Hellespont should be ruined, sent out Iphicrates with eight vessels and twelve hundred peltasts. The majority of them consisted of troops which he had commanded at Corinth. In explanation it may be stated that the Argives, when once they had appropriated Corinth and incorporated it with Argos, gave out they had no further need of Iphicrates and his troops; the real fact being that he had put to death some of the partisans of Argos. And so it was he turned his back on Corinth and found himself at home in Athens at the present crisis.
B.C. 389-388. When Iphicrates first reached the Chersonese he and Anaxibius carried on war against each other by the despatch of guerilla or piratic bands across the straits. But as time wore on, information reached him of the departure of Anaxibius to Antandrus, accompanied by his mercenaries and his own bodyguard of Laconians and two hundred Abydenian hoplites. Hearing further that Anaxibius had won the friendly adhesion of Antandrus, Iphicrates conjectured that after establishing a garrison in that place he would make the best of his way back, if only to bring the Abydenians home again. He therefore crossed in the night, selecting a desert point on the Abydene coast, from which he scaled the hills above the town and planted himself in ambuscade within their folds. The triremes which brought him across had orders at break of day to coast up northwards along the Chersonese, which would suggest the notion that he was only out on one of his customary voyages to collect money. The sequel more than fulfilled his expectations. Anaxibius began his return march, and if report speaks truly, he did so notwithstanding that the victims were against his marching that day; contemptuously disregarding the warning, and satisfied that his march lay all along through a friendly country and was directed to a friendly city. Besides which, those whom he met assured him that Iphicrates was off on a voyage to Proconnesus: hence the unusual absence of precaution on the march. On his side Iphicrates saw the chance, but, so long as the troops of Anaxibius lingered on the level bottoms, refused to spring from his lair, waiting for the moment when the Abydenian division in the van was safely landed in the plain of Cremaste, at the point where the gold mines stand; the main column following on the downward slope, and Anaxibius with his Laconians just beginning the descent. At that instant Iphicrates set his ambuscade in motion, and dashed against the Spartan at full speed. The latter quickly discerned that there was no hope of escape as he scanned the long straggling line of his attenuated column. The troops in advance, he was persuaded, would never be able to come back to his aid up the face of that acclivity; besides which, he observed the utter bewilderment of the whole body at sight of the ambuscade. He therefore turned to those next him, and spoke as follows: "Sirs, it is good for me to die on this spot, where honour bids me; but for you, sirs, yonder your path lies, haste and save yourselves before the enemy can close with us." As the words died on his lips he took from the hands of his attendant shield-bearer his heavy shield, and there, at his post, unflinchingly fought and fell; not quite alone, for by his side faithfully lingered a favourite youth, and of the Lacedaemonian governors who had rallied to Abydos from their several cities yet other twelve fought and fell beside the pair. The rest fled, dropping down one by one as the army pursued them to the walls of the city. The death-roll amounted to something like fifty hoplites of the Abydenians, and of the rest two hundred. After this exploit Iphicrates returned to the Chersonese.
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End of part 8 of 14
Continue readingBook V (Part 1): Chapters 1-2
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