FROM THE RESTORATION OF THE DEMOCRACY TO THE DEATH OF ALKIBIADES.
The period intervening between the defeat of Ægospotami (October,
405 B.C.) and the reëstablishment of the democracy as sanctioned by
the convention concluded with Pausanias, some time in the summer of
403 B.C., presents two years of cruel and multifarious suffering to
Athens. For seven years before, indeed ever since the catastrophe
at Syracuse, she had been struggling with hardships; contending
against augmented hostile force, while her own means were cut down
in every way; crippled at home by the garrison of Dekeleia; stripped
to a great degree both of her tribute and her foreign trade, and
beset by the snares of her own oligarchs. In spite of circumstances
so adverse, she had maintained the fight with a resolution not less
surprising than admirable; yet not without sinking more and more
towards impoverishment and exhaustion. The defeat of Ægospotami
closed the war at once, and transferred her from her period of
struggle to one of concluding agony. Nor is the last word by any
means too strong for the reality. Of these two years, the first
portion was marked by severe physical privation, passing by degrees
into absolute famine, and accompanied by the intolerable sentiment of
despair and helplessness against her enemies, after two generations
of imperial grandeur, not without a strong chance of being finally
consigned to ruin and individual slavery; while the last portion
comprised all the tyranny, murders, robberies, and expulsions
perpetrated by the Thirty, overthrown only by heroic efforts of
patriotism on the part of the exiles; which a fortunate change of
sentiment, on the part of Pausanias, and the leading members of the
Peloponnesian confederacy, ultimately crowned with success.
After such years of misery, it was an unspeakable relief to the
Athenian population to regain possession of Athens and Attica,
to exchange their domestic tyrants for a renovated democratical
government, and to see their foreign enemies not merely evacuate
the country, but even bind themselves by treaty to future friendly
dealing. In respect of power, indeed, Athens was but the shadow
of her former self. She had no empire, no tribute, no fleet, no
fortifications at Peiræus, no long walls, not a single fortified
place in Attica except the city itself. Of all these losses, however,
the Athenians probably made little account, at least at the first
epoch of their reëstablishment; so intolerable was the pressure which
they had just escaped, and so welcome the restitution of comfort,
security, property, and independence, at home. The very excess of
tyranny committed by the Thirty gave a peculiar zest to the recovery
of the democracy. In their hands, the oligarchical principle, to
borrow an expression from Mr. Burke,[459] “had produced in fact, and
instantly, the grossest of those evils with which it was pregnant in
its nature;” realizing the promise of that plain-spoken oligarchical
oath, which Aristotle mentions as having been taken in various
oligarchical cities, to contrive as much evil as possible to the
people.[460] So much the more complete was the reaction of sentiment
towards the antecedent democracy, even in the minds of those who
had been before discontented with it. To all men, rich and poor,
citizens and metics, the comparative excellence of the democracy, in
respect of all the essentials of good government, was now manifest.
With the exception of those who had identified themselves with the
Thirty as partners, partisans, or instruments, there was scarcely any
one who did not feel that his life and property had been far more
secure under the former democracy, and would become so again if that
democracy were revived.[461]
[459] “I confess, gentlemen, that this appears to me as bad
in the principle, and far worse in the consequences, than an
universal suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act.... Far from
softening the features of such a principle, and thereby removing
any part of the popular odium or natural terrors attending it,
I should be sorry _that anything framed in contradiction to
the spirit of our constitution did not instantly produce, in
fact, the grossest of the evils with which it was pregnant in
its nature_. It is by lying dormant a long time, or being at
first very rarely exercised, that arbitrary power steals upon a
people. On the next unconstitutional act, all the fashionable
world will be ready to say: Your prophecies are ridiculous, your
fears are vain; you see how little of the misfortunes which
you formerly foreboded is come to pass. Thus, by degrees, that
artful softening of all arbitrary power, the alleged infrequency
or narrow extent of its operation, will be received as a sort
of aphorism; and Mr. Hume will not be singular in telling us
that the felicity of mankind is no more disturbed by it, than by
earthquakes or thunder, or the other more unusual accidents of
nature.” (Burke, Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, 1777: Burke’s
Works, vol. iii, pp. 146-150 oct. edit.)
[460] Aristot. Polit. v, 7, 19. Καὶ τῷ δήμῳ κακόνους ἔσομαι, καὶ
βουλεύσω ὅ,τι ἂν ἔχω κακόν.
The complimentary epitaph upon the Thirty, cited in the Schol. on
Æschinês,—praising them as having curbed, for a short time, the
insolence of the accursed Demos of Athens,—is in the same spirit:
see K. F. Hermann, Staats-Alterthümer der Griechen, s. 70, note 9.
[461] Plato, Epistol. vii, p. 324. Καὶ ὁρῶν δή που τοὺς ἄνδρας ἐν
χρόνῳ ὀλίγῳ χρυσὸν ἀποδείξαντας τὴν ἔμπροσθεν πολιτείαν, etc.
It was the first measure of Thrasybulus and his companions, after
concluding the treaty with Pausanias, and thus reëntering the city,
to exchange solemn oaths, of amnesty for the past, with those against
whom they had just been at war. Similar oaths of amnesty were also
exchanged with those in Eleusis, as soon as that town came into
their power. The only persons excepted from this amnesty were the
Thirty, the Eleven who had presided over the execution of all their
atrocities, and the Ten who had governed in Peiræus. Even these
persons were not peremptorily banished: opportunity was offered to
them to come in and take their trial of accountability (universal
at Athens in the case of every magistrate on quitting office); so
that, if acquitted, they would enjoy the benefit of the amnesty
as well as all others.[462] We know that Eratosthenês, one of the
Thirty, afterwards returned to Athens; since there remains a powerful
harangue of Lysias, invoking justice against him as having brought to
death Polemarchus, the brother of Lysias. Eratosthenês was one of
the minority of the Thirty who sided generally with Theramenês, and
opposed to a considerable degree the extreme violences of Kritias,
although personally concerned in that seizure and execution of the
rich metics which Theramenês had resisted, and which was one of
the grossest misdeeds even of that dark period. He and Pheidon,
being among the Ten named to succeed the Thirty after the death of
Kritias, when the remaining members of that deposed Board retired to
Eleusis, had endeavored to maintain themselves as a new oligarchy,
carrying on war at the same time against Eleusis and against the
democratical exiles in Peiræus. Failing in this, they had retired
from the country, at the time when these exiles returned, and when
the democracy was first reëstablished. But after a certain interval,
the intense sentiments of the moment having somewhat subsided, they
were encouraged by their friends to return, and came back to stand
their trial of accountability. It was on that occasion that Lysias
preferred his accusation against Eratosthenês, the result of which we
do not know, though we see plainly, even from the accusatory speech,
that the latter had powerful friends to stand by him, and that the
dikasts manifested considerable reluctance to condemn.[463] We learn,
moreover, from the same speech, that such was the detestation of
the Thirty among several of the states surrounding Attica, as to
cause formal decrees for their expulsion, or for prohibiting their
coming.[464] The sons, even of such among the Thirty as did not
return, were allowed to remain at Athens, and enjoy their rights of
citizens, unmolested;[465] a moderation rare in Grecian political
warfare.
[462] Andokidês de Mysteriis, s. 90.
[463] All this may be collected from various passages of the
Orat. xii, of Lysias. Eratosthenês did not stand alone on
his trial, but in conjunction with other colleagues; though
of course, pursuant to the psephism of Kannônus, the vote of
the dikasts would be taken about each separately: ἀλλὰ παρὰ
Ἐρατοσθένους καὶ τῶν τουτουῒ συναρχόντων δίκην λαμβάνειν....
μηδ᾽ ἀποῦσι μὲν τοῖς τριάκοντα ἐπιβουλεύετε, παρόντας δ᾽ ἀφῆτε·
μηδὲ τῆς τύχης, ἣ τούτους παρέδωκε τῇ πόλει, κάκιον ὑμῖν αὐτοῖς
βοηθήσητε (sects. 80, 81): compare s. 36.
The number of friends prepared to back the defence of
Eratosthenês, and to obtain his acquittal, chiefly by
representing that he had done the least mischief of all the
Thirty; that all that he had done had been under fear of his own
life; that he had been the partisan and supporter of Theramenês,
whose memory was at that time popular, may be seen in sections
51, 56, 65, 87, 88, 91.
There are evidences also of other accusations brought against
the Thirty before the senate of Areopagus (Lysias, Or. xi, cont.
Theomnest. A. s. 31, B. s. 12).
[464] Lysias, Or. xii, cont. Eratosth. s. 36.
[465] Demosth. adv. Bœotum de Dote Matern. c. 6, p. 1018.
The first public vote of the Athenians, after the conclusion of peace
with Sparta and the return of the exiles, was to restore the former
democracy purely and simply, to choose by lot the nine archons and
the senate of Five Hundred, and to elect the generals, all as before.
It appears that this restoration of the preceding constitution was
partially opposed by a citizen named Phormisius, who, having served
with Thrasybulus in Peiræus, now moved that the political franchise
should for the future be restricted to the possessors of land in
Attica. His proposition was understood to be supported by the
Lacedæmonians, and was recommended as calculated to make Athens march
in better harmony with them. It was presented as a compromise between
oligarchy and democracy, excluding both the poorer freemen and those
whose property lay either in movables or in land out of Attica; so
that the aggregate number of the disfranchised would have been five
thousand persons. Since Athens now had lost her fleet and maritime
empire, and since the importance of Peiræus was much curtailed not
merely by these losses, but by demolition of its separate walls and
of the long walls, Phormisius and others conceived the opportunity
favorable for striking out the maritime and trading multitude from
the roll of citizens. Many of these men must have been in easy and
even opulent circumstances, but the bulk of them were poor; and
Phormisius had of course at his command the usual arguments, by
which it is attempted to prove that poor men have no business with
political judgment or action. But the proposition was rejected; the
orator Lysias being among its opponents, and composing a speech
against it which was either spoken, or intended to be spoken, by some
eminent citizen in the assembly.[466]
[466] Dionys. Hal. Jud. de Lysiâ, c. 32, p. 526; Lysias, Orat.
xxxiv, Bekk.
Unfortunately, we have only a fragment of the speech remaining,
wherein the proposition is justly criticized as mischievous and
unseasonable, depriving Athens of a large portion of her legitimate
strength, patriotism, and harmony, and even of substantial men
competent to serve as hoplites or horsemen, at a moment when she
was barely rising from absolute prostration. Never, certainly, was
the fallacy which connects political depravity or incapacity with
a poor station, and political virtue or judgment with wealth, more
conspicuously unmasked, than in reference to the recent experience of
Athens. The remark of Thrasybulus was most true,[467] that a greater
number of atrocities, both against person and against property, had
been committed in a few months by the Thirty, and abetted by the
class of horsemen, all rich men, than the poor majority of the Demos
had sanctioned during two generations of democracy. Moreover, we
know, on the authority of a witness unfriendly to the democracy, that
the poor Athenian citizens, who served on shipboard and elsewhere,
were exact in obedience to their commanders; while the richer
citizens who served as hoplites and horsemen, and who laid claim to
higher individual estimation, were far less orderly in the public
service.[468]
[467] Xenoph. Hellen. ii, 4, 41.
[468] Xenoph. Memor. iii, 5, 19.
The motion of Phormisius being rejected, the antecedent democracy
was restored without qualification, together with the ordinances of
Drako, and the laws, measures, and weights of Solon. But on closer
inspection, it was found that this latter part of the resolution was
incompatible with the amnesty which had been just sworn. According
to the laws of Solon and Drako, the perpetrators of enormities under
the Thirty had rendered themselves guilty, and were open to trial.
To escape this consequence, a second psephism or decree was passed,
on the proposition of Tisamenus, to review the laws of Solon and
Drako, and reënact them with such additions and amendments as might
be deemed expedient. Five hundred citizens had been just chosen by
the people as nomothetæ, or law-makers, at the same time when the
senate of Five hundred was taken by lot: out of these nomothetæ,
the senate now chose a select few, whose duty it was to consider
all propositions for amendment or addition to the laws of the old
democracy, and post them up for public inspection before the statues
of the eponymous heroes, within the month then running.[469] The
senate, and the entire body of five hundred nomothetæ, were then to
be convened, in order that each might pass in review, separately,
both the old laws and the new propositions; the nomothetæ being
previously sworn to decide righteously. While this discussion was
going on, every private citizen had liberty to enter the senate,
and to tender his opinion with reasons for or against any law. All
the laws which should thus be approved, first by the senate, and
afterwards by the nomothetæ, but no others, were to be handed to the
magistrates, and inscribed on the walls of the portico called Pœkilê,
for public notoriety, as the future regulators of the city. After
the laws were promulgated by such public inscription, the senate of
Areopagus was enjoined to take care that they should be duly observed
and enforced by the magistrates. A provisional committee of twenty
citizens was named, to be generally responsible for the city during
the time occupied in this revision.[470]
[469] Andokidês de Mysteriis, s. 83. Ὁπόσων δ᾽ ἂν προσδέῃ
(νόμων), ~οἵδε ᾑρημένοι νομοθέται ὑπὸ τῆς βουλῆς~ ἀναγράφοντες ἐν
σάνισιν ἐκτιθέντων πρὸς τοὺς ἐπωνύμους, σκοπεῖν τῷ βουλομένῳ, καὶ
παραδιδόντων ταῖς ἀρχαῖς ἐν τῷδε τῷ μηνί. Τοὺς δὲ παραδιδομένους
νόμους δοκιμασάτω ~πρότερον ἡ βουλὴ καὶ οἱ νομοθέται οἱ
πεντακόσιοι, οὓς οἱ δημόται εἵλοντο~, ἐπειδὴ ὀμωμόκασιν.
Putting together the two sentences in which the nomothetæ are
here mentioned, Reiske and F. A. Wolf (Prolegom. ad Demosthen.
cont. Leptin. p. cxxix), think that there were two classes
of nomothetæ; one class chosen by the senate, the other by
the people. This appears to me very improbable. The persons
chosen by the senate were invested with no final or decisive
function whatever; they were simply chosen to consider what new
propositions were fit to be submitted for discussion, and to
provide that such propositions should be publicly made known. Now
any persons simply invested with this character of a preliminary
committee, would not, in my judgment, be called nomothetæ. The
reason why the persons here mentioned were so called, was, that
they were a portion of the five hundred nomothetæ, in whom the
power of peremptory decision ultimately rested. A small committee
would naturally be intrusted with this preliminary duty; and the
members of that small committee were to be chosen _by_ one of the
bodies with whom ultimate decision rested, but chosen _out of_
the other.
[470] Andokidês de Mysteriis, sections 81-85.
As soon as the laws had been revised and publicly inscribed in
the pœkilê, pursuant to the above decree, two concluding laws were
enacted, which completed the purpose of the citizens.
The first of these laws forbade the magistrates to act upon, or
permit to be acted upon, any law not among those inscribed; and
declared that no psephism, either of the senate or of the people,
should overrule any law.[471] It renewed also the old prohibition,
dating from the days of Kleisthenês, and the first origin of the
democracy, to enact a special law inflicting direct hardship upon any
individual Athenian apart from the rest, unless by the votes of six
thousand citizens voting secretly.
[471] Andokidês de Myster. s. 87. ψήφισμα δὲ μηδὲν μήτε βουλῆς
μήτε δήμου (νόμου), κυριώτερον εἶναι.
It seems that the word νόμου ought properly to be inserted here:
see Demosth. cont. Aristokrat. c. 23, p. 649.
Compare a similar use of the phrase, μηδὲν κυριώτερον εἶναι, in
Demosthen. cont. Lakrit. c. 9, p. 937.
The second of the two laws prescribed, that all the legal
adjudications and arbitrations which had been passed under the
antecedent democracy should be held valid and unimpeached, but
formally annulled all which had been passed under the Thirty. It
farther provided, that the laws now revised and inscribed should
only take effect from the archonship of Eukleidês; that is, from the
nomination of archons made after the recent return of Thrasybulus and
renovation of the democracy.[472]
[472] Andokidês de Myster. s. 87. We see (from Demosthen. cont.
Timokrat. c. 15, p. 718) that Andokidês has not cited the law
fully. He has omitted the words, ὁπόσα δ᾽ ἐπὶ τῶν τριάκοντα
ἐπράχθη, ἢ ἰδίᾳ ἢ δημοσίᾳ, ἄκυρα εἶναι, these words not having
any material connection with the point at which he was aiming.
Compare Æschinês cont. Timarch. c. 9, p. 25, καὶ ἔστω ταῦτα
ἄκυρα, ὥσπερ τὰ ἐπὶ τῶν τριάκοντα, ἢ τὰ πρὸ Εὐκλείδου, ἢ εἴ τις
ἄλλη πώποτε τοιαύτη ἐγένετο προθεσμία....
Tisamenus is probably the same person of whom Lysias speaks
contemptuously, Or. xxx, cont. Nikomach. s. 36.
Meier (De Bonis Damnatorum, p. 71) thinks that there is a
contradiction between the decree proposed by Tisamenus (Andok. de
Myst. s. 83), and another decree proposed by Dioklês, cited in
the Oration of Demosth. cont. Timokr. c. 11, p. 713. But there is
no real contradiction between the two, and the only semblance of
contradiction that is to be found, arises from the fact that the
law of Dioklês is not correctly given as it now stands. It ought
to be read thus:—
Διοκλῆς εἶπε, Τοὺς νόμους τοὺς πρὸ Εὐκλείδου τεθέντας ἐν
δημοκρατίᾳ, καὶ ὅσοι ~ἐπ᾽~ Εὐκλείδου ἐτέθησαν, καὶ εἰσὶν
ἀναγεγραμμένοι, [~ἀπ᾽ Εὐκλείδου~] κυρίους εἶναι· τοὺς δὲ μετ᾽
Εὐκλείδην τεθέντας καὶ τολοιπὸν τιθεμένους κυρίους εἶναι ἀπὸ τῆς
ἡμέρας ἧς ἕκαστος ἐτέθη, πλὴν εἴ τῳ προσγέγραπται χρόνος ὅντινα
δεῖ ἄρχειν. Ἐπιγράψαι δὲ, τοῖς μὲν νῦν κειμένοις, τὸν γραμματέα
τῆς βουλῆς, τριάκοντα ἡμερῶν· τὸ δὲ λοιπὸν, ὃς ἂν τυγχάνῃ
γραμματεύων, προσγραφέτω παραχρῆμα τὸν νόμον κύριον εἶναι ἀπὸ τῆς
ἡμέρας ἧς ἐτέθη.
The words ἀπ᾽ ~Εὐκλείδου~, which stand between brackets in the
second line, are inserted on my own conjecture; and I venture
to think that any one who will read the whole law through, and
the comments of the orator upon it, will see that they are
imperatively required to make the sense complete. The entire
scope and purpose of the law is, to regulate clearly the time
_from which_ each law shall begin to be valid.
As the first part of the law reads now, without these words, it
has no pertinence, no bearing on the main purpose contemplated by
Dioklês in the second part, nor on the reasonings of Demosthenês
afterwards. It is easy to understand how the words ἀπ᾽ Εὐκλείδου
should have dropped out, seeing that ἐπ᾽ Εὐκλείδου immediately
precedes: another error has been in fact introduced, by putting
~ἀπ᾽~ Εὐκλείδου in the former case instead of ~ἐπ᾽~ Εὐκλείδου,
which error has been corrected by various recent editors, on the
authority of some MSS.
The law of Dioklês, when properly read, fully harmonizes with
that of Tisamenus. Meier wonders that there is no mention made
of the δοκιμασία νόμων by the nomothetæ, which is prescribed in
the decree of Tisamenus. But it was not necessary to mention this
expressly, since the words ὅσοι εἰσὶν ἀναγεγραμμένοι presuppose
the foregone δοκιμασία.
By these ever-memorable enactments, all acts done prior to the
nomination of the archon Eukleidês and his colleagues, in the summer
of 403 B.C., were excluded from serving as grounds for criminal
process against any citizen. To insure more fully that this should
be carried into effect, a special clause was added to the oath taken
annually by the senators, as well as to that taken by the Heliastic
dikasts. The senators pledged themselves by oath not to receive any
impeachment, or give effect to any arrest, founded on any fact prior
to the archonship of Eukleidês, excepting only against the Thirty,
and the other individuals expressly shut out from the amnesty, and
now in exile.[473] To the oath annually taken by the Heliasts, also,
was added the clause: “I will not remember past wrongs, nor will I
abet any one else who shall remember them; on the contrary,[474]
I will give my vote pursuant to the existing laws;” which laws
proclaimed themselves as only taking effect from the archonship of
Eukleidês.
[473] Andokidês de Mysteriis, s. 91. καὶ οὐ δέξομαι ἔνδειξιν οὐδὲ
ἀπαγωγὴν ἕνεκα τῶν πρότερον γεγενημένων, πλὴν τῶν φευγόντων.
[474] Andokid. de Mysteriis, s. 91. καὶ οὐ μνησικακήσω, οὐδὲ
ἄλλῳ (sc. ἄλλῳ μνησικακοῦντι) πείσομαι, ψηφιοῦμαι δὲ κατὰ τοὺς
κειμένους νόμους.
This clause does not appear as part of the Heliastic oath given
in Demosthen. cont. Timokrat. c. 36, p. 746. It was extremely
significant and valuable for the few years immediately succeeding
the renovation of the democracy. But its value was essentially
temporary, and it was doubtless dropped within twenty or thirty
years after the period to which it specially applied.
A still farther precaution was taken to bar all actions for redress
or damages founded on acts done prior to the archonship of Eukleidês.
On the motion of Archinus, the principal colleague of Thrasybulus
at Phylê, a law was passed, granting leave to any defendant against
whom such an action might be brought, to plead an exception in bar,
or paragraphê, upon the special ground of the amnesty and the legal
prescription connected with it. The legal effect of this paragraphê,
or exceptional plea, in Attic procedure, was to increase both
the chance of failure, and the pecuniary liabilities in case of
failure, on the part of the plaintiff; also, to better considerably
the chances of the defendant. This enactment is said to have been
moved by Archinus, on seeing that some persons were beginning to
institute actions at law, in spite of the amnesty; and for the better
prevention of all such claims.[475]
[475] The Orat. xviii, of Isokratês, Paragraphê cont.
Kallimachum, informs us on these points, especially sections 1-4.
Kallimachus had entered an action against the client of Isokratês
for ten thousand drachmæ (sects. 15-17), charging him as an
accomplice of Patroklês,—the king-archon under the Ten, who
immediately succeeded the Thirty, prior to the return of the
exiles,—in seizing and confiscating a sum of money belonging
to Kallimachus. The latter, in commencing this action, was
under the necessity of paying the fees called _prytaneia_; a
sum proportional to what was claimed, and amounting to thirty
drachmæ, when the sum claimed was between one thousand and ten
thousand drachmæ. Suppose that action had gone to trial directly,
Kallimachus, if he lost his cause, would have to forfeit his
prytaneia, but he would forfeit no more. Now according to the
paragraphê permitted by the law of Archinus, the defendant is
allowed to make oath that the action against him is founded
upon a fact prior to the archonship of Eukleidês; and a cause
is then tried first, upon that special issue, upon which the
defendant is allowed to speak first, before the plaintiff. If
the verdict, on this special issue, is given in favor of the
defendant, the plaintiff is not only disabled from proceeding
further with his action, but is condemned besides to pay to
the defendant the forfeit called epobely: that is, one-sixth
part of the sum claimed. But if, on the contrary, the verdict
on the special issue be in favor of the plaintiff, he is held
entitled to proceed farther with his original action, and to
receive besides at once, from the defendant, the like forfeit or
epobely. Information on these regulations of procedure in the
Attic dikasteries may be found in Meier and Schömann, Attischer
Prozess, p. 647; Platner, Prozess und Klagen, vol. i, pp.
156-162.
By these additional enactments, security was taken that the
proceedings of the courts of justice should be in full conformity
with the amnesty recently sworn, and that, neither directly nor
indirectly, should any person be molested for wrongs done anterior
to Eukleidês. And, in fact, the amnesty was faithfully observed: the
reëntering exiles from Peiræus, and the horsemen with other partisans
of the Thirty in Athens, blended again together into one harmonious
and equal democracy.
Eight years prior to these incidents, we have seen the oligarchical
conspiracy of the Four Hundred for a moment successful, and
afterwards overthrown; and we have had occasion to notice, in
reference to that event, the wonderful absence of all reactionary
violence on the part of the victorious people, at a moment of severe
provocation for the past and extreme apprehension for the future.
We noticed that Thucydidês, no friend to the Athenian democracy,
selected precisely that occasion—on which some manifestation of
vindictive impulse might have been supposed likely and natural—to
bestow the most unqualified eulogies on their moderate and gentle
bearing. Had the historian lived to describe the reign of the
Thirty and the restoration which followed it, we cannot doubt that
his expressions would have been still warmer and more emphatic in
the same sense. Few events in history, either ancient or modern,
are more astonishing than the behavior of the Athenian people, on
recovering their democracy after the overthrow of the Thirty: and
when we view it in conjunction with the like phenomenon after the
deposition of the Four Hundred, we see that neither the one nor the
other arose from peculiar caprice or accident of the moment; both
depended upon permanent attributes of the popular character. If we
knew nothing else except the events of these two periods, we should
be warranted in dismissing, on that evidence alone, the string of
contemptuous predicates,—giddy, irascible, jealous, unjust, greedy,
etc., one or other of which Mr. Mitford so frequently pronounces,
and insinuates even when he does not pronounce them, respecting the
Athenian people.[476] A people, whose habitual temper and morality
merited these epithets, could not have acted as the Athenians acted
both after the Four Hundred and after the Thirty. Particular acts may
be found in their history which justify severe censure; but as to
the permanent elements of character, both moral and intellectual, no
population in history has ever afforded stronger evidence than the
Athenians on these two memorable occasions.
[476] Wachsmuth—who admits into his work, with little or no
criticism, everything which has ever been said against the
Athenian people, and indeed against the Greeks generally—affirms,
contrary to all evidence and probability, that the amnesty was
not really observed at Athens. (Wachsm. Hellen. Alterth. ch. ix.
sect. 71, vol. ii, p. 267.)
The simple and distinct words of Xenophon, coming as they do from
the mouth of so very hostile a witness, are sufficient to refute
him: καὶ ὀμόσαντες ὅρκους ἦ μὴν μὴ μνησικακήσειν, ἔτι καὶ νῦν
ὁμοῦ γε πολιτεύονται, καὶ ~τοῖς ὅρκοις ἐμμένει ὁ δῆμος~, (Hellen.
ii, 4, 43).
The passages to which Wachsmuth makes reference, do not in the
least establish his point. Even if actions at law or accusations
had been brought, in violation of the amnesty, this would not
prove that the people violated it; unless we also knew that the
dikastery had affirmed those actions. But he does not refer to
any actions or accusations preferred on any such ground. He
only notices some cases in which, accusation being preferred on
grounds subsequent to Eukleidês, the accuser makes allusion in
his speech to other matters anterior to Eukleidês. Now every
speaker before the Athenian dikastery thinks himself entitled to
call up before the dikasts the whole past life of his opponent,
in the way of analogous evidence going to attest the general
character of the latter, good or bad. For example, the accuser
of Sokratês mentions, as a point going to impeach the general
character of Sokratês, that he had been the teacher of Kritias;
while the philosopher, in his defence, alludes to his own
resolution and virtue as prytanis in the assembly by which the
generals were condemned after the battle of Arginusæ. Both these
allusions come out as evidences to general character.
If we follow the acts of the Thirty, we shall see that the horsemen
and the privileged three thousand hoplites in the city had made
themselves partisans in every species of flagitious crime which
could possibly be imagined to exasperate the feelings of the exiles.
The latter, on returning, saw before them men who had handed in
their relations to be put to death without trial, who had seized
upon and enjoyed their property, who had expelled them all from
the city, and a large portion of them even from Attica; and who
had held themselves in mastery not merely by the overthrow of the
constitution, but also by inviting and subsidizing foreign guards.
Such atrocities, conceived and ordered by the Thirty, had been
executed by the aid, and for the joint benefit, as Kritias justly
remarked,[477] of those occupants of the city whom the exiles
found on returning. Now Thrasybulus, Anytus, and the rest of these
exiles, saw their property all pillaged and appropriated by others
during the few months of their absence: we may presume that their
lands—which had probably not been sold, but granted to individual
members or partisans of the Thirty[478]—were restored to them; but
the movable property could not be reclaimed, and the losses to which
they remained subject were prodigious. The men who had caused and
profited by these losses[479]—often with great brutality towards
the wives and families of the exiles, as we know by the case of
the orator Lysias—were now at Athens, all individually well known
to the sufferers. In like manner, the sons and brothers of Leon and
the other victims of the Thirty, saw before them the very citizens
by whose hands their innocent relatives had been consigned without
trial to prison and execution.[480] The amount of wrong suffered had
been infinitely greater than in the time of the Four Hundred, and the
provocation, on every ground, public and private, violent to a degree
never exceeded in history. Yet with all this sting fresh in their
bosoms, we find the victorious multitude, on the latter occasion
as well as on the former, burying the past in an indiscriminate
amnesty, and anxious only for the future harmonious march of the
renovated and all-comprehensive democracy. We see the sentiment of
commonwealth in the Demos, twice contrasted with the sentiment of
faction in an ascendent oligarchy;[481] twice triumphant over the
strongest counter-motives, over the most bitter recollections of
wrongful murder and spoliation, over all that passionate rush of
reactionary appetite which characterizes the moment of political
restoration. “Bloody will be the reign of that king who comes back
to his kingdom from exile,” says the Latin poet: bloody, indeed, had
been the rule of Kritias and those oligarchs who had just come back
from exile: “Harsh is a Demos (observes Æschylus) which has just got
clear of misery.”[482] But the Athenian Demos, on coming back from
Peiræus, exhibited the rare phenomenon of a restoration, after cruel
wrong suffered, sacrificing all the strong impulse of retaliation
to a generous and deliberate regard for the future march of the
commonwealth. Thucydidês remarks that the moderation of political
antipathy which prevailed at Athens after the victory of the people
over the Four Hundred, was the main cause which revived Athens from
her great public depression and danger.[483] Much more forcibly
does this remark apply to the restoration after the Thirty, when the
public condition of Athens was at the lowest depth of abasement, from
which nothing could have rescued her except such exemplary wisdom and
patriotism on the part of her victorious Demos. Nothing short of this
could have enabled her to accomplish that partial resurrection—into
an independent and powerful single state, though shorn of her
imperial power—which will furnish material for the subsequent portion
of our History.
[477] Xenoph. Hellen. ii, 4, 9.
[478] Xenoph. Hellen. ii, 4, 1. ἦγον δὲ ἐκ τῶν χωρίων (οἱ
τριάκοντα) ἵν᾽ αὐτοὶ καὶ οἱ φίλοι τοὺς τούτων ἀγροὺς ἔχοιεν.
[479] Isokratês cont. Kallimach. Or. xviii, sect. 30.
Θρασύβουλος μὲν καὶ Ἄνυτος, μέγιστον μὲν δυνάμενοι τῶν ἐν
τῇ πόλει, πολλῶν δ᾽ ἀπεστερημένοι χρημάτων, εἰδότες δὲ τοὺς
ἀπογράψαντας, ὅμως οὐ τολμῶσιν αὐτοῖς δίκας λαγχάνειν οὐδὲ
μνησικακεῖν, ἀλλ᾽ εἰ καὶ περὶ τῶν ἄλλων μᾶλλον ἑτέρων δύνανται
διαπράττεσθαι, ἀλλ᾽ οὖν περί γε τῶν ἐν ταῖς συνθήκαις ἶσον ἔχειν
τοῖς ἄλλοις ἀξιοῦσιν.
On the other hand, the young Alkibiadês (in the Orat. xvi, of
Isokratês, De Bigis, sect. 56) is made to talk about others
recovering their property: τῶν ἄλλων κομιζομένων τὰς οὐσίας.
My statement in the text reconciles these two. The young
Alkibiadês goes on to state that the people had passed a vote to
grant compensation to him for the confiscation of his father’s
property, but that the power of his enemies had disappointed him
of it. We may well doubt whether such vote ever really passed.
It appears, however, that Batrachus, one of the chief informers
who brought in victims for the Thirty, thought it prudent to live
afterwards out of Attica (Lysias cont. Andokid. Or. vi, sect.
46), though he would have been legally protected by the amnesty.
[480] Andokidês de Mysteriis, sect. 94. Μέλητος δ᾽ αὖ οὑτοσὶ
ἀπήγαγεν ἐπὶ τῶν τριάκοντα Λέοντα, ὡς ὑμεῖς ἅπαντες ἴστε, καὶ
ἀπέθανεν ἐκεῖνος ἄκριτος.... Μέλητον τοίνυν τοῖς παισὶ τοῖς τοῦ
Λέοντος οὐκ ἔστι φόνου διώκειν, ὅτι τοῖς νόμοις δεῖ χρῆσθαι ἀπ᾽
Εὐκλείδου ἄρχοντος· ἐπεὶ ὥς γε οὐκ ἀπήγαγεν, οὐδ᾽ αὐτὸς ἀντιλέγει.
[481] Thucyd. vi, 39. δῆμον, ξύμπαν ὠνομάσθαι, ὀλιγαρχίαν δὲ,
μέρος.
[482] Æschylus, Sept. ad Thebas, v, 1047.
Τραχύς γε μέντοι δῆμος ἐκφυγὼν κακά.
[483] Thucyd. viii, 97.
While we note the memorable resolution of the Athenian people to
forget that which could not be remembered without ruin to the future
march of the democracy, we must at the same time observe that which
they took special pains to preserve from being forgotten. They
formally recognized all the adjudged cases and all the rights of
property as existing under the democracy anterior to the Thirty.
“You pronounced, fellow-citizens (says Andokidês), that all the
judicial verdicts and all the decisions of arbitrators passed under
the democracy should remain valid, in order that there might be
no abolition of debts, no reversal of private rights, but that
every man might have the means of enforcing contracts due to him
by others.”[484] If the Athenian people had been animated by that
avidity to despoil the rich, and that subjection to the passion of
the moment, which Mr. Mitford imputes to them in so many chapters
of his history, neither motive nor opportunity was now wanting for
wholesale confiscation, of which the rich themselves, during the
dominion of the Thirty, had set abundant example. The amnesty as
to political wrong, and the indelible memory as to the rights of
property, stand alike conspicuous as evidences of the real character
of the Athenian Demos.
[484] Andokidês de Mysteriis, sect. 88. Τὰς μὲν δίκας, ὦ ἄνδρες,
καὶ τὰς διαίτας ἐποιήσατε κυρίας εἶναι, ὁπόσαι ἐν δημοκρατουμένῃ
τῇ πόλει ἐγένοντο, ὅπως μήτε χρεῶν ἀποκοπαὶ εἶεν μήτε δίκαι
ἀνάδικοι γένοιντο, ἀλλὰ τῶν ἰδίων συμβολαίων αἱ πράξεις εἶεν.
If we wanted any farther proof of their capacity of taking the
largest and soundest views on a difficult political situation,
we should find it in another of their measures at this critical
period. The Ten who had succeeded to the oligarchical presidency of
Athens after the death of Kritias and the expulsion of the Thirty,
had borrowed from Sparta the sum of one hundred talents, for the
express purpose of making war on the exiles in Peiræus. After the
peace, it was necessary that such sum should be repaid, and some
persons proposed that recourse should be had to the property of those
individuals and that party who had borrowed the money. The apparent
equity of the proposition was doubtless felt with peculiar force at
a time when the public treasury was in the extreme of poverty. But
nevertheless both the democratical leaders and the people decidedly
opposed it, resolving to recognize the debt as a public charge; in
which capacity it was afterwards liquidated, after some delay arising
from an unsupplied treasury.[485]
[485] Isokratês, Areopagit. Or. vii, sect. 77; Demosth. cont.
Leptin. c. 5, p. 460.
All that was required from the horsemen, or knights, who had been
active in the service of the Thirty, was that they should repay
the sums which had been advanced to them by the latter as outfit.
Such advance to the horsemen, subject to subsequent repayment, and
seemingly distinct from the regular military pay, appears to have
been a customary practice under the previous democracy;[486] but
we may easily believe that the Thirty had carried it to an abusive
excess, in their anxiety to enlist or stimulate partisans, when we
recollect that they resorted to means more nefarious for the same
end. There were of course great individual differences among these
knights, as to the degree in which each had lent himself to the
misdeeds of the oligarchy. Even the most guilty of them were not
molested, and they were sent, four years afterwards, to serve with
Agesilaus in Asia, at a time when the Lacedæmonians required from
Athens a contingent of cavalry;[487] the Demos being well pleased to
be able to provide for them an honorable foreign service. But the
general body of knights suffered so little disadvantage from the
recollection of the Thirty, that many of them in after days became
senators, generals, hipparchs, and occupants of other considerable
posts in the state.[488]
[486] Lysias pro Mantitheo, Or. xvi, sects. 6-8. I accept
substantially the explanation which Harpokration and Photius give
of the word κατάστασις, in spite of the objections taken to it
by M. Boeckh, which appear to me not founded upon any adequate
ground. I cannot but think that Reiske is right in distinguishing
κατάστασις from the pay, μισθὸς.
See Boeckh, Public Economy of Athens, b. ii, sect. 19, p. 250. In
the Appendix to this work, which is not translated into English
along with the work itself, he farther gives the Fragment of an
inscription, which he considers to bear upon this resumption of
κατάστασις from the horsemen, or knights, after the Thirty. But
the Fragment is so very imperfect, that nothing can be affirmed
with any certainty concerning it: see the Staatshaush. der
Athener, Appendix, vol. ii, pp. 207, 208.
[487] Xenoph. Hellen. iii, 1, 4.
[488] Lysias, Or. xvi, pro Mantitheo, sects. 9, 10; Lysias, cont.
Evandr. Or. xxvi, sects. 21-25.
We see from this latter oration (sect. 26) that Thrasybulus
helped some of the chief persons, who had been in the city,
and had resisted the return of the exiles, to get over the
difficulties of the dokimasy, or examination into character,
previously to being admitted to take possession of any office,
to which a man had been either elected or drawn by lot, in after
years. He spoke in favor of Evander, in order that the latter
might be accepted as king-archon.
Although the decree of Tisamenus—prescribing a revision of the laws
without delay, and directing that the laws, when so revised, should
be posted up for public view, to form the sole and exclusive guide
of the dikasteries—had been passed immediately after the return from
Peiræus and the confirmation of the amnesty, yet it appears that
considerable delay took place before such enactment was carried into
full effect. A person named Nikomachus was charged with the duty, and
stands accused of having performed it tardily as well as corruptly.
He, as well as Tisamenus,[489] was a scribe, or secretary; under
which name were included a class of paid officers, highly important
in the detail of business at Athens, though seemingly men of low
birth, and looked upon as filling a subordinate station, open to
sneers from unfriendly orators. The boards, the magistrates, and
the public bodies were so frequently changed at Athens, that the
continuity of public business could only have been maintained by paid
secretaries of this character, who devoted themselves constantly to
the duty.[490]
[489] I presume confidently that Tisamenus the scribe, mentioned
in Lysias cont. Nikomach. sect. 37, is the same person as
Tisamenus named in Andokidês de Mysteriis (sect. 83) as the
proposer of the memorable psephism.
[490] See M. Boeckh’s Public Economy of Athens, b. ii, c. 8, p.
186, Eng. Tr., for a summary of all that is known respecting
these γραμματεῖς, or secretaries.
The expression in Lysias cont. Nikomach. sect. 38, ὅτι
ὑπογραμματεῦσαι οὐκ ἔξεστι δὶς τὸν αὐτὸν τῇ ἀρχῇ τῇ αὐτῇ, is
correctly explained by M. Boeckh as having a very restricted
meaning, and as only applying to two successive years. And I
think we may doubt whether, in practice, it was rigidly adhered
to; though it is possible to suppose that these secretaries
alternated, among themselves, from one board or office to
another. Their great usefulness consisted in the fact that they
were constantly in the service, and thus kept up the continuous
march of the details.
Nikomachus had been named, during the democracy anterior to the
Thirty, for the purpose of preparing a fair transcript, and of
posting up afresh, probably in clearer characters, and in a place
more convenient for public view, the old laws of Solon. We can
well understand that the renovated democratical feeling, which
burst out after the expulsion of the Four Hundred, and dictated
the vehement psephism of Demophantus, might naturally also produce
such a commission as this, for which Nikomachus, both as one of the
public scribes, or secretaries, and as an able speaker,[491] was a
suitable person. His accuser, for whom Lysias composed his thirtieth
oration, now remaining, denounces him as having not only designedly
lingered in the business, for the purpose of prolonging the period
of remuneration, but even as having corruptly tampered with the
old laws, by new interpolations, as well as by omissions. How far
such charges may have been merited, we have no means of judging;
but even assuming Nikomachus to have been both honest and diligent,
he would find no small difficulty in properly discharging his duty
of anagrapheus,[492] or “writer-up” of all the old laws of Athens,
from Solon downward. Both the phraseology of these old laws, and the
alphabet in which they were written, were in many cases antiquated
and obsolete;[493] while there were doubtless also cases in which
one law was at variance, wholly or partially, with another. Now such
contradictions and archaisms would be likely to prove offensive,
if set up in a fresh place, and with clean, new characters; while
Nikomachus had no authority to make the smallest alteration, and
might naturally therefore be tardy in a commission which did not
promise much credit to him in its result.
[491] Lysias, Or. xxx, cont. Nikomach. sect. 32.
[492] Lysias, Or. xxx, cont. Nikomach. sect. 33. Wachsmuth calls
him erroneously antigrapheus instead of anagrapheus (Hellen.
Alterth. vol. ii, ix, p. 269).
It seems by Orat. vii, of Lysias (sects. 20, 36, 39) that
Nikomachus was at enmity with various persons who employed Lysias
as their logograph, or speech-writer.
[493] Lysias, Or. x, cont. Theomnest. A. sects. 16-20.
These remarks tend to show that the necessity of a fresh collection
and publication, if we may use that word, of the laws, had been felt
prior to the time of the Thirty. But such a project could hardly
be realized without at the same time revising the laws, as a body,
removing all flagrant contradictions, and rectifying what might
glaringly displease the age, either in substance or in style. Now
the psephism of Tisamenus, one of the first measures of the renewed
democracy after the Thirty, both prescribed such revision and set in
motion a revising body; but an additional decree was now proposed and
carried by Archinus, relative to the alphabet in which the revised
laws should be drawn up. The Ionic alphabet—that is, the full Greek
alphabet of twenty-four letters, as now written and printed—had been
in use at Athens universally, for a considerable time, apparently for
two generations; but from tenacious adherence to ancient custom, the
laws had still continued to be consigned to writing in the old Attic
alphabet of only sixteen or eighteen letters. It was now ordained
that this scanty alphabet should be discontinued, and that the
revised laws, as well as all future public acts, should be written up
in the full Ionic alphabet.[494]
[494] See Taylor, Vit. Lysiæ, pp. 53, 54; Franz, Element
Epigraphicê Græc. Introd. pp. 18-24.
Partly through this important reform, partly through the revising
body, partly through the agency of Nikomachus, who was still
continued as anagrapheus, the revision, inscription, and publication
of the laws in their new alphabet was at length completed.
But it seems to have taken two years to perform, or at least
two years elapsed before Nikomachus went through his trial of
accountability.[495] He appears to have made various new propositions
of his own, which were among those adopted by the nomothetæ: for
these his accuser attacks him, on the trial of accountability, as
well as on the still graver allegation, of having corruptly falsified
the decisions of that body; writing up what they had not sanctioned,
or suppressing that which they had sanctioned.[496]
[495] Lysias cont. Nikom. sect. 3. His employment had lasted six
years altogether: four years before the Thirty, two years after
them, sect. 7. At least this seems the sense of the orator.
[496] I presume this to be the sense of sect. 21 of the Oration
of Lysias against him: εἰ μὲν νόμους ἐτίθην περὶ τῆς ἀναγραφῆς,
etc.; also sects. 33-45: παρακαλοῦμεν ἐν τῇ κρίσει τιμωρεῖσθαι
τοὺς τὴν ὑμετέραν νομοθεσίαν ἀφανίζοντας, etc.
The tenor of the oration, however, is unfortunately obscure.
The archonship of Eukleidês, succeeding immediately to the
anarchy,—as the archonship of Pythodôrus, or the period of the
Thirty, was denominated,—became thus a cardinal point or epoch in
Athenian history. We cannot doubt that the laws came forth out of
this revision considerably modified, though unhappily we possess no
particulars on the subject. We learn that the political franchise
was, on the proposition of Aristophon, so far restricted for the
future, that no person could be a citizen by birth except the son
of citizen-parents, on both sides; whereas previously, it had been
sufficient if the father alone was a citizen.[497] The rhetor Lysias,
by station a metic, had not only suffered great loss, narrowly
escaping death from the Thirty, who actually put to death his brother
Polemarchus, but had contributed a large sum to assist the armed
efforts of the exiles under Thrasybulus in Peiræus. As a reward
and compensation for such antecedents, the latter proposed that
the franchise of citizen should be conferred upon him; but we are
told that this decree, though adopted by the people, was afterwards
indicted by Archinus as illegal or informal, and cancelled. Lysias,
thus disappointed of the citizenship, passed the remainder of his
life as an isoteles, or non-freeman on the best condition, exempt
from the peculiar burdens upon the class of metics.[498]
[497] Isæus, Or. viii, De Kiron. Sort. sect. 61; Demosthen. cont.
Eubulid. c. 10, p. 1307.
[498] Plutarch, Vit. x, Orat. (Lysias) p. 836; Taylor, Vit.
Lysiæ, p. 53.
Such refusal of citizenship to an eminent man like Lysias, who
had both acted and suffered in the cause of the democracy, when
combined with the decree of Aristophon above noticed, implies a
degree of augmented strictness which we can only partially explain.
It was not merely the renewal of her democracy for which Athens had
now to provide. She had also to accommodate her legislation and
administration to her future march as an isolated state, without
empire or foreign dependencies. For this purpose, material changes
must have been required: among others, we know that the Board of
Hellenotamiæ—originally named for the collection and management of
the tribute at Delos, but attracting to themselves gradually more
extended functions, until they became ultimately, immediately before
the Thirty, the general paymasters of the state—was discontinued,
and such among its duties as did not pass away along with the loss
of the foreign empire, were transferred to two new officers, the
treasurer at war, and the manager of the theôrikon, or religious
festival-fund.[499] Respecting these two new departments, the latter
of which especially became so much extended as to comprise most of
the disbursements of a peace-establishment, I shall speak more fully
hereafter; at present, I only notice them as manifestations of the
large change in Athenian administration consequent upon the loss of
the empire. There were doubtless many other changes arising from
the same cause, though we do not know them in detail; and I incline
to number among such the alteration above noticed respecting the
right of citizenship. While the Athenian empire lasted, the citizens
of Athens were spread over the Ægean in every sort of capacity, as
settlers, merchants, navigators, soldiers, etc.; which must have
tended materially to encourage intermarriages between them and the
women of other Grecian insular states. Indeed, we are even told that
an express permission of connubium with Athenians was granted to the
inhabitants of Eubœa,[500] a fact, noticed by Lysias, of some moment
in illustrating the tendency of the Athenian empire to multiply
family ties between Athens and the allied cities. Now, according
to the law which prevailed before Eukleidês, the son of every such
marriage was by birth an Athenian citizen, an arrangement at that
time useful to Athens, as strengthening the bonds of her empire,
and eminently useful in a larger point of view, among the causes
of Pan-Hellenic sympathy. But when Athens was deprived both of her
empire and her fleet, and confined within the limits of Attica,
there no longer remained any motive to continue such a regulation,
so that the exclusive city-feeling, instinctive in the Grecian mind,
again became predominant. Such is, perhaps, the explanation of the
new restrictive law proposed by Aristophon.
[499] See respecting this change Boeckh, Public Econ. of Athens,
ii, 7, p. 180, _seq._, Eng. Tr.
[500] Lysias, Fragm. Or. xxxiv, De non dissolvendâ Republicâ,
sect. 3: ἀλλὰ καὶ Εὐβοεῦσιν ἐπιγαμίαν ἐποιούμεθα, etc.
Thrasybulus and the gallant handful of exiles who had first seized
Phylê, received no larger reward than one thousand drachmæ for a
common sacrifice and votive offering, together with wreaths of
olive as a token of gratitude from their countrymen.[501] The debt
which Athens owed to Thrasybulus was indeed such as could not be
liquidated by money. To his individual patriotism, in great degree,
we may ascribe not only the restoration of the democracy, but its
good behavior when restored. How different would have been the
consequences of the restoration and the conduct of the people, had
the event been brought about by a man like Alkibiadês, applying great
abilities principally to the furtherance of his own cupidity and
power!
[501] Æschinês, cont. Ktesiphon. c. 62, p. 437; Cornel. Nepos,
Thrasybul. c. 4.
At the restoration of the democracy, however, Alkibiadês was already
no more. Shortly after the catastrophe at Ægospotami, he had sought
shelter in the satrapy of Pharnabazus, no longer thinking himself
safe from Lacedæmonian persecution in his forts on the Thracian
Chersonese. He carried with him a good deal of property, though he
left still more behind him, in these forts; how acquired, we do not
know. But having crossed apparently to Asia by the Bosphorus, he
was plundered by the Thracians in Bithynia, and incurred much loss
before he could reach Pharnabazus in Phrygia. Renewing the tie of
personal hospitality which he had contracted with Pharnabazus four
years before,[502] he now solicited from the satrap a safe-conduct
up to Susa. The Athenian envoys—whom Pharnabazus, after his former
pacification with Alkibiadês in 408 B.C., had engaged to escort to
Susa, but had been compelled by the mandate of Cyrus to detain as
prisoners—were just now released from their three years’ detention,
and enabled to come down to the Propontis;[503] and Alkibiadês, by
whom this mission had originally been projected, tried to prevail
on the satrap to perform the promise which he had originally given,
but had not been able to fulfil. The hopes of the sanguine exile,
reverting back to the history of Themistoklês, led him to anticipate
the same success at Susa as had fallen to the lot of the latter; nor
was the design impracticable, to one whose ability was universally
renowned, and who had already acted as minister to Tissaphernês.
[502] Xenoph. Hellen. i, 3, 12. τόν τε κοινὸν ὅρκον καὶ ἰδίᾳ
ἀλλήλοις πίστεις ἐποιοῦντο.
[503] Xenoph. Hellen. i, 4, 7.
The court of Susa was at this time in a peculiar position. King
Darius Nothus, having recently died, had been succeeded by his
eldest son Artaxerxes Mnemon;[504] but the younger son Cyrus, whom
Darius had sent for during his last illness, tried after the death
of the latter to supplant Artaxerxes in the succession, or at least
was suspected of so trying. Being seized and about to be slain, the
queen-mother Parysatis prevailed upon Artaxerxes to pardon him, and
send him again down to his satrapy along the coast of Ionia, where
he labored strenuously, though secretly, to acquire the means of
dethroning his brother; a memorable attempt, of which I shall speak
more fully hereafter. But his schemes, though carefully masked,
did not escape the observation of Alkibiadês, who wished to make a
merit of revealing them at Susa, and to become the instrument of
defeating them. He communicated his suspicions as well as his purpose
to Pharnabazus; whom he tried to awaken by alarm of danger to the
empire, in order that he might thus get himself forwarded to Susa as
informant and auxiliary.
[504] Xenoph. Anab. i, 1; Diodor. xiii, 108.
Pharnabazus was already jealous and unfriendly in spirit towards
Lysander and the Lacedæmonians, of which we shall soon see plain
evidence, and perhaps towards Cyrus also, since such were the
habitual relations of neighboring satraps in the Persian empire.
But the Lacedæmonians and Cyrus were now all-powerful on the
Asiatic coast, so that he probably did not dare to exasperate them,
by identifying himself with a mission so hostile and an enemy so
dangerous to both. Accordingly, he refused compliance with the
request of Alkibiadês; granting him, nevertheless, permission to
live in Phrygia, and even assigning to him a revenue. But the
objects at which the exile was aiming soon became more or less fully
divulged, to those against whom they were intended. His restless
character, enterprise, and capacity, were so well known as to raise
exaggerated fears as well as exaggerated hopes. Not merely Cyrus, but
the Lacedæmonians, closely allied with Cyrus, and the dekadarchies,
whom Lysander had set up in the Asiatic Grecian cities, and who
held their power only through Lacedæmonian support, all were uneasy
at the prospect of seeing Alkibiadês again in action and command,
amidst so many unsettled elements. Nor can we doubt that the exiles
whom these dekadarchies had banished, and the disaffected citizens
who remained at home under their government in fear of banishment
or death, kept up correspondence with him, and looked to him as a
probable liberator. Moreover, the Spartan king, Agis, still retained
the same personal antipathy against him, which had already some
years before procured the order to be despatched, from Sparta to
Asia, to assassinate him. Here are elements enough, of hostility,
vengeance, and apprehension, afloat against Alkibiadês, without
believing the story of Plutarch, that Kritias and the Thirty sent
to apprize Lysander that the oligarchy at Athens could not stand,
so long as Alkibiadês was alive. The truth is, that though the
Thirty had included him in the list of exiles,[505] they had much
less to dread from his assaults or plots, in Attica, than the
Lysandrian dekadarchies in the cities of Asia. Moreover, his name
was not popular even among the Athenian democrats, as will be shown
hereafter, when we come to recount the trial of Sokratês. Probably,
therefore, the alleged intervention of Kritias and the Thirty, to
procure the murder of Alkibiadês, is a fiction of the subsequent
encomiasts of the latter at Athens, in order to create for him claims
to esteem as a friend and fellow-sufferer with the democracy.
[505] Xenoph. Hellen. ii, 3, 42; Isokratês, Or. xvi, De Bigis, s.
46.
A special despatch, or skytalê, was sent out by the Spartan
authorities to Lysander in Asia, enjoining him to procure that
Alkibiadês should be put to death. Accordingly, Lysander communicated
this order to Pharnabazus, within whose satrapy Alkibiadês was
residing, and requested that it might be put in execution. The
whole character of Pharnabazus shows that he would not perpetrate
such a deed, towards a man with whom he had contracted ties of
hospitality, without sincere reluctance and great pressure from
without; especially as it would have been easy for him to connive
underhand at the escape of the intended victim. We may therefore be
sure that it was Cyrus, who, informed of the revelations contemplated
by Alkibiadês, enforced the requisition of Lysander; and that the
joint demand of the two was too formidable even to be evaded, much
less openly disobeyed. Accordingly, Pharnabazus despatched his
brother Magæus and his uncle Sisamithres with a band of armed men, to
assassinate Alkibiadês in the Phrygian village where he was residing.
These men, not daring to force their way into his house, surrounded
it and set it on fire; but Alkibiadês, having contrived to extinguish
the flames, rushed out upon his assailants with a dagger in his right
hand, and a cloak wrapped round his left to serve as a shield. None
of them dared to come near him; but they poured upon him showers of
darts and arrows until he perished, undefended as he was either by
shield or by armor. A female companion with whom he lived, Timandra,
wrapped up his body in garments of her own, and performed towards it
all the last affectionate solemnities.[506]
[506] I put together what seems to me the most probable account
of the death of Alkibiadês from Plutarch, Alkib. c. 38, 39;
Diodorus, xiv, 11 (who cites Ephorus, compare Ephor. Fragm. 126,
ed. Didot); Cornelius Nepos, Alkibiad. c. 10; Justin, v, 8;
Isokratês, Or. xvi, De Bigis, s. 50.
There were evidently different stories, about the antecedent
causes and circumstances, among which a selection must be made.
The extreme perfidy ascribed by Ephorus to Pharnabazus appears to
me not at all in the character of that satrap.
Such was the deed which Cyrus and the Lacedæmonians did not
scruple to enjoin, nor the uncle and brother of a Persian satrap
to execute, and by which this celebrated Athenian perished, before
he had attained the age of fifty. Had he lived, we cannot doubt
that he would again have played some conspicuous part,—for neither
his temper nor his abilities would have allowed him to remain in
the shade,—but whether to the advantage of Athens or not, is more
questionable. Certain it is, that taking his life throughout, the
good which he did to her bore no proportion to the far greater evil.
Of the disastrous Sicilian expedition, he was more the cause than
any other individual, though that enterprise cannot properly be said
to have been caused by any individual, but rather to have emanated
from a national impulse. Having first, as a counsellor, contributed
more than any other man to plunge the Athenians into this imprudent
adventure, he next, as an exile, contributed more than any other man,
except Nikias, to turn that adventure into ruin, and the consequences
of it into still greater ruin. Without him, Gylippus would not have
been sent to Syracuse, Dekeleia would not have been fortified, Chios
and Milêtus would not have revolted, the oligarchical conspiracy of
the Four Hundred would not have been originated. Nor can it be said
that his first three years of political action as Athenian leader,
in a speculation peculiarly his own,—the alliance with Argos, and
the campaigns in Peloponnesus,—proved in any way advantageous to
his country. On the contrary, by playing an offensive game where
he had hardly sufficient force for a defensive, he enabled the
Lacedæmonians completely to recover their injured reputation and
ascendency through the important victory of Mantineia. The period of
his life really serviceable to his country, and really glorious to
himself, was that of three years ending with his return to Athens in
407 B.C. The results of these three years of success were frustrated
by the unexpected coming down of Cyrus as satrap: but, just at the
moment when it behooved Alkibiadês to put forth a higher measure
of excellence, in order to realize his own promises in the face of
this new obstacle, at that critical moment we find him spoiled by
the unexpected welcome which had recently greeted him at Athens, and
falling miserably short even of the former merit whereby that welcome
had been earned.
If from his achievements we turn to his dispositions, his ends, and
his means, there are few characters in Grecian history who present
so little to esteem, whether we look at him as a public or as a
private man. His ends are those of exorbitant ambition and vanity,
his means rapacious as well as reckless, from his first dealing with
Sparta and the Spartan envoys, down to the end of his career. The
manœuvres whereby his political enemies first procured his exile were
indeed base and guilty in a high degree; but we must recollect that
if his enemies were more numerous and violent than those of any
other politician in Athens, the generating seed was sown by his own
overweening insolence, and contempt of restraints, legal as well as
social.
On the other hand, he was never once defeated either by land or sea.
In courage, in ability, in enterprise, in power of dealing with new
men and new situations, he was never wanting; qualities, which,
combined with his high birth, wealth, and personal accomplishments,
sufficed to render him for the time the first man in every successive
party which he espoused; Athenian, Spartan, or Persian; oligarchical
or democratical. But to none of them did he ever inspire any lasting
confidence; all successively threw him off. On the whole, we shall
find few men in whom eminent capacities for action and command are
so thoroughly marred by an assemblage of bad moral qualities, as
Alkibiadês.[507]
[507] Cornelius Nepos says (Alcib. c. 11) of Alkibiadês:
“Hunc infamatum a plerisque tres gravissimi historici summis
laudibus extulerunt: Thucydides, qui ejusdem ætatis fuit;
Theopompus, qui fuit post aliquando natus, et Timæus: qui quidem
duo maledicentissimi, nescio quo modo, in illo uno laudando
conscierunt.”
We have no means of appreciating what was said by Theopompus and
Timæus. But as to Thucydidês, it is to be recollected that he
extols only the capacity and warlike enterprise of Alkibiadês,
nothing beyond; and he had good reason for doing so. His picture
of the dispositions and conduct of Alkibiadês is the reverse of
eulogy.
The Oration xvi, of Isokratês, De Bigis, spoken by the son
of Alkibiadês, goes into a labored panegyric of his father’s
character, but is prodigiously inaccurate, if we compare it with
the facts stated in Thucydidês and Xenophon. But he is justified
in saying: οὐδέποτε τοῦ πατρὸς ἡγουμένου τρόπαιον ὑμῶν ἔστησαν οἱ
πολέμιοι (s. 23).