GRECIAN AFFAIRS DURING THE GOVERNMENT OF PEISISTRATUS AND HIS SONS AT
ATHENS.
We now arrive at what may be called the second period of Grecian
history, beginning with the rule of Peisistratus at Athens and of
Crœsus in Lydia.
It has been already stated that Peisistratus made himself despot
of Athens in 560 B. C.: he died in 527 B. C., and was succeeded by
his son Hippias, who was deposed and expelled in 510 B. C., thus
making an entire space of fifty years between the first exaltation of
the father and the final expulsion of the son. These chronological
points are settled on good evidence: but the thirty-three years
covered by the reign of Peisistratus are interrupted by two periods
of exile,—one of them lasting not less than ten years,—the other,
five years. And the exact place of the years of exile, being nowhere
laid down upon authority, has been differently determined by the
conjectures of chronologers.[193] Partly from this half-known
chronology, partly from a very scanty collection of facts, the
history of the half-century now before us can only be given very
imperfectly: nor can we wonder at our ignorance, when we find that
even among the Athenians themselves, only a century afterwards,
statements the most incorrect and contradictory respecting the
Peisistratids were in circulation, as Thucydidês distinctly, and
somewhat reproachfully, acquaints us.
[193] Mr. Fynes Clinton (Fast. Hellen. vol. ii, Appendix, c. 2,
p. 201) has stated and discussed the different opinions on the
chronology of Peisistratus and his sons.
More than thirty years had now elapsed since the promulgation of the
Solonian constitution, whereby the annual senate of Four Hundred had
been created, and the public assembly (preceded in its action as
well as aided and regulated by this senate) invested with a power of
exacting responsibility from the magistrates after their year of
office. The seeds of the subsequent democracy had thus been sown,
and no doubt the administration of the archons had been practically
softened by it; but nothing in the nature of a democratical sentiment
had yet been created. A hundred years hence, we shall find that
sentiment unanimous and potent among the enterprising masses of
Athens and Peiræeus, and shall be called upon to listen to loud
complaints of the difficulty of dealing with “that angry, waspish,
intractable little old man, Dêmus of Pnyx,”—so Aristophanes[194]
calls the Athenian people to their faces, with a freedom which shows
that _he_ at least counted on their good temper. But between 560-510
B. C. the people are as passive in respect to political rights and
securities as the most strenuous enemy of democracy could desire,
and the government is transferred from hand to hand by bargains
and cross-changes between two or three powerful men,[195] at the
head of partisans who echo their voices, espouse their personal
quarrels, and draw the sword at their command. It was this ancient
constitution—Athens as it stood before the Athenian democracy—which
the Macedonian Antipater professed to restore in 322 B. C., when he
caused the majority of the poorer citizens to be excluded altogether
from the political franchise.[196]
[194]
Ἀγροῖκος ὀργὴν, κυαμοτρὼξ, ἀκράχολος
Δῆμος Πνυκίτης, δύσκολον γερόντιον.
Aristoph. Equit. 41.
I need hardly mention that the Pnyx was the place in which the
Athenian public assemblies were held.
[195] Plutarch (De Herodot. Malign. c. 15, p. 858) is angry
with Herodotus for imparting so petty and personal a character
to the dissensions between the Alkmæônids and Peisistratus; his
severe remarks in that treatise, however, tend almost always to
strengthen rather than to weaken the credibility of the historian.
[196] Plutarch, Phokion, c. 27, ἀπεκρίνατο φιλίαν ἔσεσθαι τοῖς
Ἀθηναίοις καὶ ξυμμαχίαν, ἐκδοῦσι μὲν τοὺς περὶ Δημοσθένην
καὶ Ὑπερείδην, πολιτευομένοις δὲ τὴν ~πάτριον~ ἀπὸ τιμήματος
πολιτείαν, δεξαμένοις δὲ φρουρὰν εἰς τὴν Μουνυχίαν, ἔτι δὲ
χρήματα τοῦ πολέμου καὶ ζημίαν προσεκτίσασιν. Compare Diodor.
xviii, 18.
Twelve thousand of the poorer citizens were disfranchised by this
change (Plutarch, Phokion, c. 28).
By the stratagem recounted in a former chapter,[197] Peisistratus
had obtained from the public assembly a guard which he had employed
to acquire forcible possession of the acropolis. He thus became
master of the administration; but he employed his power honorably and
well, not disturbing the existing forms farther than was necessary
to insure to himself full mastery. Nevertheless, we may see by
the verses of Solon[198] (the only contemporary evidence which we
possess), that the prevalent sentiment was by no means favorable to
his recent proceeding, and that there was in many minds a strong
feeling both of terror and aversion, which presently manifested
itself in the armed coalition of his two rivals,—Megaklês at the head
of the Parali, or inhabitants of the sea-board, and Lykurgus at the
head of those in the neighboring plain. As the conjunction of the two
formed a force too powerful for Peisistratus to withstand, he was
driven into exile, after no long possession of his despotism.
[197] See the preceding volume, ch. xi, p. 155.
[198] Solon. Fragm. 10, ed. Bergk.—
Εἰ δὲ πεπόνθατε λυγρὰ δι᾽ ὑμετέρην κακότητα,
Μήτι θεοῖς τούτων μοῖραν ἐπαμφέρετε, etc.
But the time came, how soon we cannot tell, when the two rivals
who had expelled him quarrelled, and Megaklês made propositions to
Peisistratus, inviting him to resume the sovereignty, promising his
own aid, and stipulating that Peisistratus should marry his daughter.
The conditions being accepted, a plan was laid between the two new
allies for carrying them into effect, by a novel stratagem,—since
the simulated wounds and pretence of personal danger were not likely
to be played off a second time with success. The two conspirators
clothed a stately woman, six feet high, named Phyê, in the panoply
and costume of Athênê,—surrounded her with the processional
accompaniments belonging to the goddess,—and placed her in a chariot
with Peisistratus by her side. In this guise the exiled despot and
his adherents approached the city and drove up to the acropolis,
preceded by heralds, who cried aloud to the people: “Athenians,
receive ye cordially Peisistratus, whom Athênê has honored above
all other men, and is now bringing back into her own acropolis.”
The people in the city received the reputed goddess with implicit
belief and demonstrations of worship, while among the country cantons
the report quickly spread that Athênê had appeared in person to
restore Peisistratus, who thus found himself, without even a show of
resistance, in possession of the acropolis and of the government.
His own party, united with that of Megaklês, were powerful enough
to maintain him, when he had once acquired possession; and probably
all, except the leaders, sincerely believed in the epiphany of the
goddess, which came to be divulged as having been a deception, only
after Peisistratus and Megaklês had quarrelled.[199]
[199] Herodot. i, 60, καὶ ἐν τῷ ἄστεϊ πειθόμενοι τὴν γυναῖκα
εἶναι ~αὐτὴν τὴν θεὸν~, προσεύχοντό τε τὴν ἄνθρωπον καὶ ἐδέκοντο
τὸν Πεισίστρατον. A later statement (Athenæus, xiii, p. 609)
represents Phyê to have become afterwards the wife of Hipparchus.
Of this remarkable story, not the least remarkable part is the
criticism with which Herodotus himself accompanies it. He treats
it as a proceeding infinitely silly (πρῆγμα εὐηθέστατον, ὡς ἐγὼ
εὐρίσκω, μακρῷ); he cannot conceive, how Greeks, so much superior
to barbarians,—and even Athenians, the cleverest of all the
Greeks,—could have fallen into such a trap. To him the story was
told as a deception from the beginning, and he did not perhaps
take pains to put himself into the state of feeling of those
original spectators who saw the chariot approach, without any
warning or preconceived suspicion. But even allowing for this,
his criticism brings to our view the alteration and enlargement
which had taken place in the Greek mind during the century
between Peisistratus and Periklês. Doubtless, neither the latter
nor any of his contemporaries could have succeeded in a similar
trick.
The fact, and the criticism upon it, now before us are remarkably
illustrated by an analogous case recounted in a previous chapter,
(vol. ii, p. 421, chap. viii.) Nearly at the same period as this
stratagem of Peisistratus, the Lacedæmonians and the Argeians
agreed to decide, by a combat of three hundred select champions,
the dispute between them as to the territory of Kynuria. The
combat actually took place, and the heroism of Othryades, sole
Spartan survivor, has been already recounted. In the eleventh
year of the Peloponnesian war, shortly after or near upon the
period when we may conceive the history of Herodotus to have
been finished, the Argeians concluded a treaty with Lacedæmon,
and introduced as a clause into it the liberty of reviving their
pretensions to Kynuria, and of again deciding the dispute by a
combat of select champions. To the Lacedæmonians of that time
this appeared extreme folly,—the very proceeding which had been
actually resorted to a century before. Here is another case, in
which the change in the point of view, and the increased positive
tendencies in the Greek mind, are brought to our notice not less
forcibly than by the criticism of Herodotus upon Phyê-Athênê.
Istrus (one of the Atthido-graphers of the third century B.
C.) and Antiklês published books respecting the personal
manifestations or epiphanies of the gods,—Ἀπόλλωνος ἐπιφανεῖαι:
see Istri Fragment. 33-37, ed. Didot. If Peisistratus and
Megaklês had never quarrelled, their joint stratagem might have
continued to pass for a genuine epiphany, and might have been
included as such in the work of Istrus. I will add, that the real
presence of the gods, at the festivals celebrated in their honor,
was an idea continually brought before the minds of the Greeks.
The Athenians fully believed the epiphany of the god Pan to
Pheidippidês the courier, on his march to Sparta, a little before
the battle of Marathôn (Herodot. vi, 105, καὶ ταῦτα Ἀθηναῖοι
πιστεύσαντες εἶναι ἀληθέα), and even Herodotus himself does
not controvert it, though he relaxes the positive character
of history so far as to add—“as Pheidippidês himself said and
recounted publicly to the Athenians.” His informants in this case
were doubtless sincere believers; whereas, in the case of Phyê,
the story was told to him at first as a fabrication.
At Gela in Sicily, seemingly not long before this restoration
of Peisistratus, Têlinês (ancestor of the despot Gelon) had
brought back some exiles to Gela, “without any armed force, but
merely through the sacred ceremonies and appurtenances of the
subterranean goddesses,”—ἔχων οὐδεμίην ἀνδρῶν δύναμιν, ἀλλ᾽ ἱρὰ
τουτέων τῶν θεῶν—τούτοισι δ᾽ ὦν πίσυνος ἐὼν, κατήγαγε (Herodot.
vii, 153). Herodotus does not tell us the details which he
had heard of the manner in which this restoration at Gela was
brought about; but his general language intimates, that they were
remarkable details, and they might have illustrated the story of
Phyê Athênê.
The daughter of Megaklês, according to agreement, quickly became
the wife of Peisistratus, but she bore him no children; and it
became known that her husband, having already adult sons by a former
marriage, and considering that the Kylonian curse rested upon all
the Alkmæônid family, did not intend that she should become a
mother.[200] Megaklês was so incensed at this behavior, that he not
only renounced his alliance with Peisistratus, but even made his
peace with the third party, the adherents of Lykurgus,—and assumed so
menacing an attitude, that the despot was obliged to evacuate Attica.
He retired to Eretria in Eubœa, where he remained no less than ten
years; but a considerable portion of that time was employed in making
preparations for a forcible return, and he seems to have exercised,
even while in exile, a degree of influence much exceeding that of
a private man. He lent valuable aid to Lygdamis of Naxos,[201] in
constituting himself despot of that island, and he possessed, we
know not how, the means of rendering valuable service to different
cities, Thebes in particular. They repaid him by large contributions
of money to aid in his reëstablishment: mercenaries were hired from
Argos, and the Naxian Lygdamis came himself, both with money and with
troops. Thus equipped and aided, Peisistratus landed at Marathon in
Attica. How the Athenian government had been conducted during his
ten years’ absence, we do not know; but the leaders of it permitted
him to remain undisturbed at Marathon, and to assemble his partisans
both from the city and from the country: nor was it until he broke
up from Marathon and had reached Pallênê on his way to Athens, that
they took the field against him. Moreover, their conduct, even when
the two armies were near together, must have been either extremely
negligent or corrupt; for Peisistratus found means to attack them
unprepared, routing their forces almost without resistance. In fact,
the proceedings have altogether the air of a concerted betrayal: for
the defeated troops, though unpursued, are said to have dispersed and
returned to their homes forthwith, in obedience to the proclamation
of Peisistratus, who marched on to Athens, and found himself a third
time ruler.[202]
[200] Herodot. i, 61. Peisistratus—ἐμίχθη οἱ οὐ κατὰ νόμον.
[201] About Lygdamis, see Athenæus, viii, p. 348, and his
citation from the lost work of Aristotle on the Grecian
Πολιτεῖαι; also, Aristot. Politic. v, 5, 1.
[202] Herodot. i, 63.
On this third successful entry, he took vigorous precautions for
rendering his seat permanent. The Alkmæônidæ and their immediate
partisans retired into exile; but he seized the children of those
who remained, and whose sentiments he suspected, as hostages for
the behavior of their parents, and placed them in Naxos, under the
care of Lygdamis. Moreover, he provided himself with a powerful
body of Thracian mercenaries, paid by taxes levied upon the
people:[203] nor did he omit to conciliate the favor of the gods
by a purification of the sacred island of Delos: all the dead
bodies which had been buried within sight of the temple of Apollo
were exhumed and reinterred farther off. At this time the Delian
festival,—attended by the Asiatic Ionians and the islanders, and
with which Athens was of course peculiarly connected,—must have
been beginning to decline from its pristine magnificence; for the
subjugation of the continental Ionic cities by Cyrus had been already
achieved, and the power of Samos, though increased under the despot
Polykratês, seems to have increased at the expense and to the ruin
of the smaller Ionic islands. From the same feelings, in part,
which led to the purification of Delos,—partly as an act of party
revenue,—Peisistratus caused the houses of the Alkmæônids to be
levelled with the ground, and the bodies of the deceased members of
that family to be disinterred and cast out of the country.[204]
[203] Herodot. i, 64. ἐπικούροισί τε πολλοῖσι, καὶ χρημάτων
συνόδοισι, τῶν μὲν αὐτόθεν, τῶν δὲ ἀπὸ Στρύμονος ποτάμου
προσιόντων.
[204] Isokratês, Or. xvi, De Bigis, c. 351.
This third and last period of the rule of Peisistratus lasted several
years, until his death in 527 B. C.: it is said to have been so
mild in its character, that he once even suffered himself to be
cited for trial before the Senate of Areopagus; yet as we know that
he had to maintain a large body of Thracian mercenaries out of the
funds of the people, we shall be inclined to construe this eulogium
comparatively rather than positively. Thucydidês affirms that both
he and his sons governed in a wise and virtuous spirit, levying
from the people only an income-tax of five per cent.[205] This is
high praise coming from such an authority, though it seems that
we ought to make some allowance for the circumstance of Thucydidês
being connected by descent with the Peisistratid family.[206] The
judgment of Herodotus is also very favorable respecting Peisistratus;
that of Aristotle favorable, yet qualified,—since he includes these
despots among the list of those who undertook public and sacred works
with the deliberate view of impoverishing as well as of occupying
their subjects. This supposition is countenanced by the prodigious
scale upon which the temple of Zeus Olympius at Athens was begun
by Peisistratus,—a scale much exceeding either the Parthenôn or
the temple of Athênê Polias, both of which were erected in later
times, when the means of Athens were decidedly larger,[207] and her
disposition to demonstrative piety certainly no way diminished. It
was left by him unfinished, nor was it ever completed until the Roman
emperor Hadrian undertook the task. Moreover, Peisistratus introduced
the greater Panathenaic festival, solemnized every four years, in the
third Olympic year: the annual Panathenaic festival, henceforward
called the Lesser, was still continued.
[205] For the statement of Boeckh, Dr. Arnold, and Dr. Thirlwall,
that Peisistratus had levied a tythe or tax of ten per cent.,
and that his sons reduced it to the half, I find no sufficient
warrant: certainly, the spurious letter of Peisistratus to Solon
in Diogenes Laërtius (i, 53) ought not to be considered as
proving anything. Boeckh, Public Economy of Athens, B. iii, c.
6 (i, 351 German); Dr. Arnold ad Thucyd. vi, 34; Dr. Thirlwall
Hist. of Gr. ch. xi, pp. 72-74. Idomeneus (ap. Athenæ. xii, p.
533) considers the sons of Peisistratus to have indulged in
pleasures to an extent more costly and oppressive to the people
than their father. Nor do I think that there is sufficient
authority to sustain the statement of Dr. Thirlwall (p. 68),
“He (Peisistratus) possessed lands on the Strymon in Thrace,
which yielded a large revenue.” Herodotus (i, 64) tells us that
Peisistratus brought mercenary soldiers from the Strymon, but
that he levied the money to pay them in Attica—ἐῤῥίζωσε τὴν
τυραννίδα ἐπικούροισί τε πολλοῖσι, καὶ χρημάτων συνόδοισι, τῶν
μὲν αὐτόθεν, τῶν δὲ ἀπὸ Στρύμονος ποταμοῦ συνιόντων. It is,
indeed, possible to construe this passage so as to refer both τῶν
μὲν and τῶν δὲ to χρημάτων, which would signify that Peisistratus
obtained his funds partly from the river Strymon, and thus serve
as basis to the statement of Dr. Thirlwall. But it seems to me
that the better way of construing the words is to refer τῶν μὲν
to χρημάτων συνόδοισι, and τῶν δὲ to ἐπικούροισι,—treating both
of them as genitives absolute. It is highly improbable that he
should derive money from the Strymon: it is highly probable that
his mercenaries came from thence.
[206] Hermippus (ap. Marcellin. Vit. Thucyd. p. ix,) and the
Scholiast on Thucyd. i, 20, affirm that Thucydidês was connected
by relationship with the Peisistratidæ. His manner of speaking
of them certainly lends countenance to the assertion; not merely
as he twice notices their history, once briefly (i, 20) and
again at considerable length (vi, 54-59), though it does not
lie within the direct compass of his period,—but also as he so
emphatically announces his own personal knowledge of their family
relations,—Ὅτι δὲ πρεσβύτατος ὢν Ἱππίας ἦρξεν, ~εἰδὼς~ μὲν καὶ
ἀκοῇ ἀκριβέστερον ἄλλων ἰσχυρίζομαι (vi, 55).
Aristotle (Politic. v, 9, 21) mentions it as a report (φασι) that
Peisistratus obeyed the summons to appear before the Areopagus;
Plutarch adds that the person who had summoned him did not appear
to bring the cause to trial (Vit. Solon, 31), which is not at all
surprising: compare Thucyd. vi, 56, 57.
[207] Aristot. Politic, v, 9, 4; Dikæarchus, Vita Græciæ, pp.
140-166, ed. Fuhr; Pausan. i, 18, 8.
I have already noticed, at considerable length, the care which he
bestowed in procuring full and correct copies of the Homeric poems,
as well as in improving the recitation of them at the Panathenaic
festival,—a proceeding for which we owe him much gratitude, but which
has been shown to be erroneously interpreted by various critics. He
probably also collected the works of other poets,—called by Aulus
Gellius,[208] in language not well suited to the sixth century B.
C., a library thrown open to the public; and the service which he
thus rendered must have been highly valuable at a time when writing
and reading were not widely extended. His son Hipparchus followed up
the same taste, taking pleasure in the society of the most eminent
poets of the day,[209]—Simonidês, Anakreon, and Lasus; not to mention
the Athenian mystic Onomakritus, who, though not pretending to the
gift of prophecy himself, passed for the proprietor and editor of
the various prophecies ascribed to the ancient name of Musæus. The
Peisistratids were well versed in these prophecies, and set great
value upon them; but Onomakritus, being detected on one occasion
in the act of interpolating the prophecies of Musæus, was banished
by Hipparchus in consequence.[210] The statues of Hermês, erected
by this prince or by his personal friends in various parts of
Attica,[211] and inscribed with short moral sentences, are extolled
by the author of the Platonic dialogue called Hipparchus, with an
exaggeration which approaches to irony; but it is certain that
both the sons of Peisistratus, as well as himself, were exact in
fulfilling the religious obligations of the state, and ornamented the
city in several ways, especially the public fountain Kallirrhoê. They
are said to have maintained the preëxisting forms of law and justice,
merely taking care always to keep themselves and their adherents in
the effective offices of state, and in the full reality of power.
They were, moreover, modest and popular in their personal demeanor,
and charitable to the poor; yet one striking example occurs of
unscrupulous enmity, in their murder of Kimôn, by night, through the
agency of hired assassins.[212] There is good reason, however, for
believing that the government both of Peisistratus and of his sons
was in practice generally mild until after the death of Hipparchus
by the hands of Harmodius and Aristogeitôn, after which event the
surviving Hippias became alarmed, cruel, and oppressive during his
last four years. And the harshness of this concluding period left
upon the Athenian mind[213] that profound and imperishable hatred,
against the dynasty generally, which Thucydidês attests,—though he
labors to show that it was not deserved by Peisistratus, nor at first
by Hippias.
[208] Aul. Gell. N. A. vi, 17.
[209] Herodot. vii, 6; Pseudo-Plato, Hipparchus, p. 229.
[210] Herodot. v, 93, VI, 6. Ὀνομάκριτον, χρησμολόγον καὶ
διαθέτην τῶν χρησμῶν τῶν Μουσαίου. See Pausan. i, 22, 7. Compare,
about the literary tendencies of the Peisistratids, Nitzsch, De
Historiâ Homeri, ch. 30, p. 168.
[211] Philochor. Frag. 69, ed. Didot; Plato, Hipparch. p. 230.
[212] Herodot. vi, 38-103; Theopomp. ap. Athenæ. xii, p. 533.
[213] Thucyd. vi, 53; Pseudo-Plato, Hipparch. p. 230; Pausan. i,
23, 1.
Peisistratus left three legitimate sons,—Hippias, Hipparchus, and
Thessalus: the general belief at Athens among the contemporaries
of Thucydidês was, that Hipparchus was the eldest of the three and
had succeeded him; but the historian emphatically pronounces this
to be a mistake, and certifies, upon his own responsibility, that
Hippias was both eldest son and successor. Such an assurance from
him, fortified by certain reasons in themselves not very conclusive,
is sufficient ground for our belief,—the more so as Herodotus
countenances the same version. But we are surprised at such a degree
of historical carelessness in the Athenian public, and seemingly even
in Plato,[214] about a matter both interesting and comparatively
recent. In order to abate this surprise, and to explain how the name
of Hipparchus came to supplant that of Hippias in the popular talk,
Thucydidês recounts the memorable story of Harmodius and Aristogeitôn.
[214] Thucyd. i, 20, about the general belief of the Athenian
public in his time—Ἀθηναίων γοῦν τὸ πλῆθος οἴονται ὑφ᾽ Ἁρμοδίου
καὶ Ἀριστογείτονος Ἵππαρχον τύραννον ὄντα ἀποθανεῖν, καὶ οὐκ
ἴσασιν ὅτι Ἱππίας μὲν πρεσβύτατος ὢν ἦρχε τῶν Πεισιστράτου
παιδῶν, etc.
The Pseudo-Plato in the dialogue called Hipparchus adopts this
belief, and the real Plato in his Symposion (c. 9, p. 182) seems
to countenance it.
Of these two Athenian citizens,[215] both belonging to the ancient
gens called Gephyræi, the former was a beautiful youth, attached to
the latter by a mutual friendship and devoted intimacy, which Grecian
manners did not condemn. Hipparchus made repeated propositions to
Harmodius, which were repelled, but which, on becoming known to
Aristogeitôn, excited both his jealousy and his fears lest the
disappointed suitor should employ force,—fears justified by the
proceedings not unusual with Grecian despots,[216] and by the
absence of all legal protection against outrage from such a quarter.
Under these feelings, he began to look about, in the best way that
he could, for some means of putting down the despotism. Meanwhile
Hipparchus, though not entertaining any designs of violence, was so
incensed at the refusal of Harmodius, that he could not be satisfied
without doing something to insult or humiliate him. In order to
conceal the motive from which the insult really proceeded, he
offered it, not directly to Harmodius, but to his sister. He caused
this young maiden to be one day summoned to take her station in a
religious procession as one of the kanêphoræ, or basket carriers,
according to the practice usual at Athens; but when she arrived at
the place where her fellow-maidens were assembled, she was dismissed
with scorn as unworthy of so respectable a function, and the summons
addressed to her was disavowed.[217] An insult thus publicly offered
filled Harmodius with indignation, and still farther exasperated the
feelings of Aristogeitôn: both of them, resolving at all hazards to
put an end to the despotism, concerted means for aggression with
a few select associates. They awaited the festival of the Great
Panathenæa, wherein the body of the citizens were accustomed to march
up in armed procession, with spear and shield, to the acropolis;
this being the only day on which an armed body could come together
without suspicion. The conspirators appeared armed like the rest
of the citizens, but carrying concealed daggers besides. Harmodius
and Aristogeitôn undertook with their own hands to kill the two
Peisistratids, while the rest promised to stand forward immediately
for their protection against the foreign mercenaries; and though
the whole number of persons engaged was small, they counted upon
the spontaneous sympathies of the armed bystanders in an effort to
regain their liberties, so soon as the blow should once be struck.
The day of the festival having arrived, Hippias, with his foreign
body-guard around him, was marshalling the armed citizens for
procession, in the Kerameikus without the gates, when Harmodius and
Aristogeitôn approached with concealed daggers to execute their
purpose. On coming near, they were thunderstruck to behold one of
their own fellow-conspirators talking familiarly with Hippias, who
was of easy access to every man, and they immediately concluded that
the plot was betrayed. Expecting to be seized, and wrought up to
a state of desperation, they resolved at least not to die without
having revenged themselves on Hipparchus, whom they found within the
city gates near the chapel called the Leôkorion, and immediately
slew him. His attendant guards killed Harmodius on the spot; while
Aristogeitôn, rescued for the moment by the surrounding crowd, was
afterwards taken, and perished in the tortures applied to make him
disclose his accomplices.[218]
[215] Herodot. v, 55-58. Harmodius is affirmed by Plutarch to
have been of the deme Aphidnæ (Plutarch, Symposiacon, i, 10, p.
628).
It is to be recollected that he died before the introduction
of the Ten Tribes, and before the recognition of the demes as
political elements in the commonwealth.
[216] For the terrible effects produced by this fear of ὕβρις εἰς
τὴν ἡλικίαν, see Plutarch, Kimon, 1; Aristot. Polit. v, 9, 17.
[217] Thucyd. vi, 56. Τὸν δ᾽ οὖν Ἁρμόδιον ἀπαρνηθέντα τὴν
πείρασιν, ὥσπερ διενοεῖτο, προυπηλάκισεν· ἀδελφὴν γὰρ αὐτοῦ,
κόρην, ἐπαγγείλαντες ἥκειν κανοῦν οἴσουσαν ἐν πομπῇ τινι,
ἀπήλασαν, λέγοντες οὐδὲ ἐπαγγεῖλαι ἀρχὴν, διὰ τὸ μὴ ἀξίαν εἶναι.
Dr. Arnold, in his note, supposes that this exclusion of the
sister of Harmodius by the Peisistratids may have been founded on
the circumstance that she belonged to the gens Gephyræi (Herodot.
v, 57); her foreign blood, and her being in certain respects
ἄτιμος, disqualified her (he thinks) from ministering to the
worship of the gods of Athens.
There is no positive reason to support the conjecture of Dr.
Arnold, which seems, moreover, virtually discountenanced by the
narrative of Thucydidês, who plainly describes the treatment
of this young woman as a deliberate, preconcerted insult. Had
there existed any assignable ground of exclusion, such as that
which Dr. Arnold supposes, leading to the inference that the
Peisistratids could not admit her without violating religious
custom, Thucydidês would hardly have neglected to allude to
it, for it would have lightened the insult; and indeed, on
that supposition, the sending of the original summons might
have been made to appear as an accidental mistake. I will add,
that Thucydidês, though no way forfeiting his obligations to
historical truth, is evidently not disposed to omit anything
which can be truly said in favor of the Peisistratids.
[218] Thucyd. vi, 58, οὐ ῥᾳδίως διετέθη: compare Polyæn. i, 22;
Diodorus, Fragm. lib. x, p. 62, vol. iv, ed. Wess.; Justin, ii,
9. See, also, a good note of Dr. Thirlwall on the passage, Hist.
of Gr. vol. ii, ch. xi, p. 77, 2nd ed. I agree with him, that we
may fairly construe the indistinct phrase of Thucydidês by the
more precise statements of later authors, who mention the torture.
The news flew quickly to Hippias in the Kerameikus, who heard it
earlier than the armed citizens near him, awaiting his order for the
commencement of the procession. With extraordinary self-command,
he took advantage of this precious instant of foreknowledge, and
advanced towards them,—commanding them to drop their arms for a
short time, and assemble on an adjoining ground. They unsuspectingly
obeyed, and he immediately directed his guards to take possession of
the vacant arms. He was now undisputed master, and enabled to seize
the persons of all those citizens whom he mistrusted,—especially all
those who had daggers about them, which it was not the practice to
carry in the Panathenaic procession.
Such is the memorable narrative of Harmodius and Aristogeitôn,
peculiarly valuable inasmuch as it all comes from Thucydidês.[219]
To possess great power,—to be above legal restraint,—to inspire
extraordinary fear,—is a privilege so much coveted by the giants
among mankind, that we may well take notice of those cases in which
it brings misfortune even upon themselves. The fear inspired by
Hipparchus,—of designs which he did not really entertain, but was
likely to entertain, and competent to execute without hindrance,—was
here the grand cause of his destruction.
[219] Thucyd. i, 20, vi, 54-59; Herodot. v, 55, 56, vi, 123;
Aristot. Polit. v, 8, 9.
The conspiracy here detailed happened in 514 B. C., during the
thirteenth year of the reign of Hippias,—which lasted four years
longer, until 510 B. C. And these last four years, in the belief
of the Athenian public, counted for his whole reign; nay, many of
them made the still greater historical mistake of eliding these
last four years altogether, and of supposing that the conspiracy of
Harmodius and Aristogeitôn had deposed the Peisistratid government
and liberated Athens. Both poets and philosophers shared this faith,
which is distinctly put forth in the beautiful and popular Skolion
or song on the subject: the two friends are there celebrated as
the authors of liberty at Athens,—“they slew the despot and gave
to Athens equal laws.”[220] So inestimable a present was alone
sufficient to enshrine in the minds of the subsequent democracy
those who had sold their lives to purchase it: and we must farther
recollect that the intimate connection between the two, so repugnant
to the modern reader, was regarded at Athens with sympathy,—so that
the story took hold of the Athenian mind by the vein of romance
conjointly with that of patriotism. Harmodius and Aristogeitôn were
afterwards commemorated both as the winners and as the protomartyrs
of Athenian liberty. Statues were erected in their honor shortly
after the final expulsion of the Peisistratids; immunity from taxes
and public burdens was granted to the descendants of their families;
and the speaker who proposed the abolition of such immunities, at a
time when the number had been abusively multiplied, made his only
special exception in favor of this respected lineage.[221] And since
the name of Hipparchus was universally notorious as the person slain,
we discover how it was that he came to be considered by an uncritical
public as the predominant member of the Peisistratid family,—the
eldest son and successor of Peisistratus,—the reigning despot,—to the
comparative neglect of Hippias. The same public probably cherished
many other anecdotes,[222] not the less eagerly believed because
they could not be authenticated, respecting this eventful period.
[220] See the words of the song:—
Ὅτι τὸν τύραννον κτανέτην
Ἰσονόμους τ᾽ Αθήνας ἐποιησάτην—
ap. Athenæum, xv, p. 691.
The epigram of the Keian Simonidês, (Fragm. 132, ed. Bergk—ap.
Hephæstion. c. 14, p. 26, ed. Gaisf.) implies a similar belief:
also, the passages in Plato, Symposion, p. 182, in Aristot.
Polit. v, 8, 21, and Arrian, Exped. Alex. iv, 10, 3.
[221] Herodot. vi, 109; Demosthen. adv. Leptin. c. 27, p. 495;
cont. Meidiam, c. 47, p. 569; and the oath prescribed in the
Psephism of Demophantus, Andokidês, De Mysteriis, p. 13; Pliny,
H. N. xxxiv, 4-8; Pausan. i, 8, 5; Plutarch, Aristeidês, 27.
The statues were carried away from Athens by Xerxês, and restored
to the Athenians by Alexander after his conquest of Persia
(Arrian, Ex. Al. iii, 14, 16; Pliny, H. N. xxxiv, 4-8).
[222] One of these stories may be seen in Justin, ii, 9,—who
gives the name of Dioklês to Hipparchus,—“Diocles, alter ex
filiis, per vim stupratâ virgine, a fratre puellæ interficitur.”
Whatever may have been the moderation of Hippias before, indignation
at the death of his brother, and fear for his own safety,[223] now
induced him to drop it altogether. It is attested both by Thucydidês
and Herodotus, and admits of no doubt, that his power was now
employed harshly and cruelly,—that he put to death a considerable
number of citizens. We find also a statement, noway improbable in
itself, and affirmed both in Pausanias and in Plutarch,—inferior
authorities, yet still in this case sufficiently credible,—that
he caused Leæna, the mistress of Aristogeitôn, to be tortured to
death, in order to extort from her a knowledge of the secrets and
accomplices of the latter.[224] But as he could not but be sensible
that this system of terrorism was full of peril to himself, so he
looked out for shelter and support in case of being expelled from
Athens; and with this view he sought to connect himself with Darius
king of Persia,—a connection full of consequences to be hereafter
developed. Æantidês, son of Hippoklus the despot of Lampsakus on
the Hellespont, stood high at this time in the favor of the Persian
monarch, which induced Hippias to give him his daughter Archedikê
in marriage; no small honor to the Lampsakene, in the estimation of
Thucydidês.[225] To explain how Hippias came to fix upon this town,
however, it is necessary to say a few words on the foreign policy of
the Peisistratids.
[223] Ἡ γὰρ δειλία φονικώτατόν ἐστιν ἐν ταῖς τυραννίσιν—observes
Plutarch, (Artaxerxês, c. 25).
[224] Pausan. i, 23, 2: Plutarch, De Garrulitate, p. 897; Polyæn.
viii, 45; Athenæus, xiii. p. 596.
[225] We can hardly be mistaken in putting this interpretation on
the words of Thucydidês—Ἀθηναῖος ὢν, Λαμψακηνῷ ἔδωκε (vi, 59).
Some financial tricks and frauds are ascribed to Hippias by the
author of the Pseudo-Aristotelian second book of the Œconomica
(ii, 4). I place little reliance on the statements in this
treatise respecting persons of early date, such as Kypselus or
Hippias; in respect to facts of the subsequent period of Greece,
between 450-300 B. C., the author’s means of information will
doubtless render him a better witness.
It has already been mentioned that the Athenians, even so far
back as the days of the poet Alkæus, had occupied Sigeium in the
Troad, and had there carried on war with the Mityleneans; so that
their acquisitions in these regions date much before the time of
Peisistratus. Owing probably to this circumstance, an application
was made to them in the early part of his reign from the Dolonkian
Thracians, inhabitants of the Chersonese on the opposite side of the
Hellespont, for aid against their powerful neighbors the Absinthian
tribe of Thracians; and opportunity was thus offered for sending out
a colony to acquire this valuable peninsula for Athens. Peisistratus
willingly entered into the scheme, and Miltiadês son of Kypselus, a
noble Athenian, living impatiently under his despotism, was no less
pleased to take the lead in executing it: his departure and that
of other malcontents as founders of a colony suited the purpose of
all parties. According to the narrative of Herodotus,—alike pious
and picturesque,—and doubtless circulating as authentic at the
annual games which the Chersonesites, even in his time, celebrated
to the honor of their œkist,—it is the Delphian god who directs the
scheme and singles out the individual. The chiefs of the distressed
Dolonkians went to Delphi to crave assistance towards procuring
Grecian colonists, and were directed to choose for their œkist the
individual who should first show them hospitality on their quitting
the temple. They departed and marched all along what was called the
Sacred Road, through Phocis and Bœotia to Athens, without receiving
a single hospitable invitation; at length they entered Athens, and
passed by the house of Miltiadês, while he himself was sitting in
front of it. Seeing men whose costume and arms marked them out as
strangers, he invited them into his house and treated them kindly:
they then apprized him that he was the man fixed upon by the oracle,
and abjured him not to refuse his concurrence. After asking for
himself personally the opinion of the oracle, and receiving an
affirmative answer, he consented; sailing as œkist, at the head of a
body of Athenian emigrants, to the Chersonese.[226]
[226] Herodot. vi, 36-37.
Having reached this peninsula, and having been constituted despot
of the mixed Thracian and Athenian population, he lost no time in
fortifying the narrow isthmus by a wall reaching all across from
Kardia to Paktya, a distance of about four miles and a half; so that
the Absinthian invaders were for the time effectually shut out,[227]
though the protection was not permanently kept up. He also entered
into a war with Lampsakus, on the Asiatic side of the strait, but was
unfortunate enough to fall into an ambuscade and become a prisoner.
Nothing preserved his life except the immediate interference of
Crœsus king of Lydia, coupled with strenuous menaces addressed to
the Lampsakenes, who found themselves compelled to release their
prisoner; Miltiadês having acquired much favor with this prince, in
what manner we are not told. He died childless some time afterwards,
while his nephew Stesagoras, who succeeded him, perished by
assassination, some time subsequent to the death of Peisistratus at
Athens.[228]
[227] Thus the Scythians broke into the Chersonese even
during the government of Miltiadês son of Kimôn, nephew of
Miltiadês the œkist, about forty years after the wall had been
erected (Herodot. vi, 40). Again, Periklês reëstablished the
cross-wall, on sending to the Chersonese a fresh band of one
thousand Athenian settlers (Plutarch, Periklês, c. 19): lastly,
Derkyllidas the Lacedæmonian built it anew, in consequence of
loud complaints raised by the inhabitants of their defenceless
condition,—about 397 B. C. (Xenophon. Hellen. iii, 2, 8-10). So
imperfect, however, did the protection prove, that about half a
century afterwards, during the first years of the conquests of
Philip of Macedon, an idea was entertained of digging through
the isthmus, and converting the peninsula into an island
(Demosthenês, Philippic ii, 6, p. 92, and De Haloneso, c. 10, p.
86); an idea, however, never carried into effect.
[228] Herodot. vi, 38, 39.
The expedition of Miltiadês to the Chersonese must have occurred
early after the first usurpation of Peisistratus, since even his
imprisonment by the Lampsakenes happened before the ruin of Crœsus,
(546 B. C.). But it was not till much later,—probably during the
third and most powerful period of Peisistratus,—that the latter
undertook his expedition against Sigeium in the Troad. This
place appears to have fallen into the hands of the Mityleneans:
Peisistratus retook it,[229] and placed there his illegitimate son
Hegesistratus as despot. The Mityleneans may have been enfeebled
at this time (somewhere between 537-527 B. C.) not only by the
strides of Persian conquest on the mainland, but also by the ruinous
defeat which they suffered from Polykratês and the Samians.[230]
Hegesistratus maintained the place against various hostile attempts,
throughout all the reign of Hippias, so that the Athenian possessions
in those regions comprehended at this period both the Chersonese
and Sigeium.[231] To the former of the two, Hippias sent out
Miltiadês, nephew of the first œkist, as governor, after the death
of his brother Stesagoras. The new governor found much discontent
in the peninsula, but succeeded in subduing it by entrapping and
imprisoning the principal men in each town. He farther took into his
pay a regiment of five hundred mercenaries, and married Hegesipylê,
daughter of the Thracian king Olorus.[232] It appears to have
been about 515 B. C. that this second Miltiadês went out to the
Chersonese.[233] He seems to have been obliged to quit it for a time,
after the Scythian expedition of Darius, in consequence of having
incurred the hostility of the Persians; but he was there from the
beginning of the Ionic revolt until about 493 B. C., or two or three
years before the battle of Marathon, on which occasion we shall find
him acting commander of the Athenian army.
[229] Herodot. v, 94. I have already said that I conceive this as
a different war from that in which the poet Alkæus was engaged.
[230] Herodot. iii, 39.
[231] Herodot. vi, 104, 139, 140.
[232] Herodot. vi, 39-103. Cornelius Nepos, in his Life of
Miltiadês, confounds in one biography the adventures of two
persons,—Miltiadês son of Kypselus, the œkist,—and Miltiadês son
of Kimôn, the victor of Marathon,—the uncle and the nephew.
[233] There is nothing that I know to mark the date except that
it was earlier than the death of Hipparchus in 514 B. C., and
also earlier than the expedition of Darius against the Scythians,
about 516 B. C., in which expedition Miltiadês was engaged: see
Mr. Clinton’s Fasti Hellenici, and J. M. Schultz, Beitrag zu
genaueren Zeitbestimmungen der Hellen. Geschichten von der 63sten
bis zur 72sten Olympiade, p. 165, in the Kieler Philologische
Studien 1841.
Both the Chersonese and Sigeium, though Athenian possessions, were
however now tributary and dependent on Persia. And it was to this
quarter that Hippias, during his last years of alarm, looked for
support in the event of being expelled from Athens: he calculated
upon Sigeium as a shelter, and upon Æantidês, as well as Darius, as
an ally. Neither the one nor the other failed him.
The same circumstances which alarmed Hippias, and rendered his
dominion in Attica at once more oppressive and more odious, tended
of course to raise the hopes of his enemies, the Athenian exiles,
with the powerful Alkmæônids at their head. Believing the favorable
moment to be come, they even ventured upon an invasion of Attica, and
occupied a post called Leipsydrion in the mountain range of Parnês,
which separates Attica from Bœotia.[234] But their schemes altogether
failed: Hippias defeated and drove them out of the country. His
dominion now seemed confirmed, for the Lacedæmonians were on terms of
intimate friendship with him; and Amyntas king of Macedon, as well as
the Thessalians, were his allies. Yet the exiles whom he had beaten
in the open field succeeded in an unexpected manœuvre, which, favored
by circumstances, proved his ruin.
[234] Herodot. v, 62. The unfortunate struggle at Leipsydrion
became afterwards the theme of a popular song (Athenæus, xv,
p. 695): see Hesychius, v. Λειψύδριον, and Aristotle, Fragm.
Ἀθηναίων Πολιτεία, 37, ed. Neumann.
If it be true that Alkibiadês, grandfather of the celebrated
Alkibiadês, took part with Kleisthenês and the Alkmæonid exiles
in this struggle (see Isokratês, De Bigis, Or. xvi, p. 351), he
must have been a mere youth.
By an accident which had occurred in the year 548 B. C.,[235] the
Delphian temple was set on fire and burnt. To repair this grave loss
was an object of solicitude to all Greece; but the outlay required
was exceedingly heavy, and it appears to have been long before the
money could be collected. The Amphiktyons decreed that one-fourth
of the cost should be borne by the Delphians themselves, who found
themselves so heavily taxed by this assessment, that they sent envoys
throughout all Greece to collect subscriptions in aid, and received,
among other donations, from the Greek settlers in Egypt twenty minæ,
besides a large present of alum from the Egyptian king Amasis: their
munificent benefactor Crœsus fell a victim to the Persians in 546
B. C., so that his treasure was no longer open to them. The total
sum required was three hundred talents (equal probably to about one
hundred and fifteen thousand pounds sterling),[236]—a prodigious
amount to be collected from the dispersed Grecian cities, who
acknowledged no common sovereign authority, and among whom the
proportion reasonable to ask from each was so difficult to determine
with satisfaction to all parties. At length, however, the money
was collected, and the Amphiktyons were in a situation to make a
contract for the building of the temple. The Alkmæônids, who had
been in exile ever since the third and final acquisition of power by
Peisistratus, took the contract; and in executing it, they not only
performed the work in the best manner, but even went much beyond the
terms stipulated; employing Parian marble for the frontage, where
the material prescribed to them was coarse stone.[237] As was before
remarked in the case of Peisistratus when he was in banishment, we
are surprised to find exiles whose property had been confiscated so
amply furnished with money,—unless we are to suppose that Kleisthenês
the Alkmæônid, grandson of the Sikyonian Kleisthenês,[238] inherited
through his mother wealth independent of Attica, and deposited it in
the temple of the Samian Hêrê. But the fact is unquestionable, and
they gained signal reputation throughout the Hellenic world for their
liberal performance of so important an enterprise. That the erection
took considerable time, we cannot doubt. It seems to have been
finished, as far as we can conjecture, about a year or two after
the death of Hipparchus,—512 B. C.,—more than thirty years after the
conflagration.
[235] Pausan. x, 5, 5.
[236] Herodot. i, 50, ii, 180. I have taken the three hundred
talents of Herodotus as being Æginæan talents, which are to
Attic talents in the ratio of 5 : 3. The Inscriptions prove that
the accounts of the temple were kept by the Amphiktyons on the
Æginæan scale of money: see Corpus Inscrip. Boeckh, No. 1688, and
Boeckh, Metrologie, vii, 4.
[237] Herodot. vi, 62. The words of the historian would seem
to imply that they only began to think of this scheme of
building the temple after the defeat of Leipsydrion, and a year
or two before the expulsion of Hippias; a supposition quite
inadmissible, since the temple must have taken some years in
building.
The loose and prejudiced statement in Philochorus, affirming that
the Peisistratids caused the Delphian temple to be burnt, and
also that they were at last deposed by the victorious arm of the
Alkmæônids (Philochori Fragment. 70, ed. Didot) makes us feel the
value of Herodotus and Thucydidês as authorities.
[238] Herodot. vi, 128; Cicero, De Legg. ii, 16. The deposit here
mentioned by Cicero, which may very probably have been recorded
in an inscription in the temple, must have been made before the
time of the Persian conquest of Samos,—indeed, before the death
of Polykratês in 522 B. C., after which period the island fell at
once into a precarious situation, and very soon afterwards into
the greatest calamities.
To the Delphians, especially, the rebuilding of their temple on
so superior a scale was the most essential of all services, and
their gratitude towards the Alkmæônids was proportionally great.
Partly through such a feeling, partly through pecuniary presents,
Kleisthenês was thus enabled to work the oracle for political
purposes, and to call forth the powerful arm of Sparta against
Hippias. Whenever any Spartan presented himself to consult the
oracle, either on private or public business, the answer of the
priestess was always in one strain, “Athens must be liberated.”
The constant repetition of this mandate at length extorted from
the piety of the Lacedæmonians a reluctant compliance. Reverence
for the god overcame their strong feeling of friendship towards
the Peisistratids, and Anchimolius son of Aster was despatched by
sea to Athens, at the head of a Spartan force to expel them. On
landing at Phalêrum, however, he found them already forewarned and
prepared, as well as farther strengthened by one thousand horse
specially demanded from their allies in Thessaly. Upon the plain of
Phalêrum, this latter force was found peculiarly effective, so that
the division of Anchimolius was driven back to their ships with great
loss and he himself slain.[239] The defeated armament had probably
been small, and its repulse only provoked the Lacedæmonians to send a
larger, under the command of their king Kleomenês in person, who on
this occasion marched into Attica by land. On reaching the plain of
Athens, he was assailed by the Thessalian horse, but repelled them
in so gallant a style, that they at once rode off and returned to
their native country; abandoning their allies with a faithlessness
not unfrequent in the Thessalian character. Kleomenês marched on to
Athens without farther resistance, and found himself, together with
the Alkmæônids and the malcontent Athenians generally, in possession
of the town. At that time there was no fortification except around
the acropolis, into which Hippias retired with his mercenaries and
the citizens most faithful to him; having taken care to provision it
well beforehand, so that it was not less secure against famine than
against assault. He might have defied the besieging force, which was
noway prepared for a long blockade; but, not altogether confiding in
his position, he tried to send his children by stealth out of the
country; and in this proceeding the children were taken prisoners. To
procure their restoration, Hippias consented to all that was demanded
of him, and withdrew from Attica to Sigeium in the Troad within the
space of five days.
[239] Herodot. v, 62, 63.
Thus fell the Peisistratid dynasty in 510 B. C., fifty years after
the first usurpation of its founder.[240] It was put down through the
aid of foreigners,[241] and those foreigners, too, wishing well to
it in their hearts, though hostile from a mistaken feeling of divine
injunction. Yet both the circumstances of its fall, and the course
of events which followed, conspire to show that it possessed few
attached friends in the country, and that the expulsion of Hippias
was welcomed unanimously by the vast majority of Athenians. His
family and chief partisans would accompany him into exile,—probably
as a matter of course, without requiring any formal sentence of
condemnation; and an altar was erected in the acropolis, with a
column hard by, commemorating both the past iniquity of the dethroned
dynasty, and the names of all its members.[242]
[240] Herodot. v, 64, 65.
[241] Thucyd. vi, 56, 57.
[242] Thucyd. vi, 55. ὡς ὅ τε βωμὸς σημαίνει, καὶ ἡ στήλη περὶ
τῆς τῶν τυράννων ἀδικίας, ἡ ἐν τῇ Ἀθηναίων ἀκροπόλει σταθεῖσα.
Dr. Thirlwall, after mentioning the departure of Hippias,
proceeds as follows: “After his departure many severe measures
were taken against his adherents, who appear to have been for a
long time afterwards a formidable party. They were punished or
repressed, some by death, others by exile or by the loss of their
political privileges. The family of the tyrants was condemned to
perpetual banishment, and appears to have been excepted from the
most comprehensive decrees of amnesty passed in later times.”
(Hist. of Gr. ch. xi, vol. ii, p. 81.)
I cannot but think that Dr. Thirlwall has here been misled by
insufficient authority. He refers to the oration of Andokidês
de Mysteriis, sects. 106 and 78 (sect. 106 coincides in part
with ch. 18, in the ed. of Dobree). An attentive reading of
it will show that it is utterly unworthy of credit in regard
to matters anterior to the speaker by one generation or more.
The orators often permit themselves great license in speaking
of past facts, but Andokidês in this chapter passes the bounds
even of rhetorical license. First, he states something not
bearing the least analogy to the narrative of Herodotus as to
the circumstances preceding the expulsion of the Peisistratids,
and indeed tacitly setting aside that narrative; next, he
actually jumbles together the two capital and distinct exploits
of Athens,—the battle of Marathon and the repulse of Xerxês
ten years after it. I state this latter charge in the words of
Sluiter and Valckenaer, before I consider the former charge:
“Verissime ad hæc verba notat Valckenaerius—Confundere videtur
Andocidês diversissima; Persica sub Miltiade et Dario et
victoriam Marathoniam (v, 14)—quæque evenere sub Themistocle,
Xerxis gesta. Hic urbem incendio delevit, non ille (v, 20).
Nihil magis manifestum est, quam diversa ab oratore confundi.”
(Sluiter, Lection. Andocideæ, p. 147.)
The criticism of these commentators is perfectly borne out by the
words of the orator, which are too long to find a place here.
But immediately prior to those words he expresses himself as
follows, and this is the passage which serves as Dr. Thirlwall’s
authority: Οἱ γὰρ πατέρες οἱ ὑμέτεροι, γενομένων τῇ πόλει κακῶν
μεγάλων, ὅτε οἱ τύραννοι εἶχον τὴν πόλιν, ὁ δὲ δῆμος ἔφυγε,
νικήσαντες μαχόμενοι τοὺς τυράννους ἐπὶ Παλληνίῳ, στρατηγοῦντος
Λεωγόρου τοῦ προπάππου τοῦ ἐμοῦ, καὶ Χαρίου οὗ ἐκεῖνος τὴν
θυγατέρα εἶχεν ἐξ ἧς ὁ ἡμέτερος ἦν πάππος, κατελθόντες εἰς τὴν
πατρίδα τοὺς μὲν ἀπέκτειναν, τῶν δὲ φυγὴν κατέγνωσαν, τοὺς δὲ
μένειν ἐν τῇ πόλει ἐάσαντες ἠτίμωσαν.
Both Sluiter (Lect. And. p. 8) and Dr. Thirlwall (Hist. p. 80)
refer this alleged victory of Leogoras and the Athenian demus to
the action described by Herodotus (v, 64) as having been fought
by Kleomenês of Sparta against the Thessalian cavalry. But the
two events have not a single circumstance in common, except
that each is a victory over the Peisistratidæ or their allies:
nor could they well be the same event, described in different
terms, seeing that Kleomenês, marching from Sparta to Athens,
could not have fought the Thessalians at Pallênê, which lay on
the road from _Marathon_ to Athens. Pallênê was the place where
Peisistratus, advancing from Marathon to Athens, on occasion of
his second restoration, gained his complete victory over the
opposing party, and marched on afterwards to Athens without
farther resistance (Herodot. i, 63).
If, then, we compare the statement given by Andokidês of the
preceding circumstances, whereby the dynasty of the Peisistratids
was put down, with that given by Herodotus, we shall see that
the two are radically different; we cannot blend them together,
but must make our election between them. Not less different are
the representations of the two as to the circumstances which
immediately ensued on the fall of Hippias: they would scarcely
appear to relate to the same event. That “the adherents of the
Peisistratidæ were punished or repressed, some by death, others
by exile, or by the loss of their political privileges,” which
is the assertion of Andokidês and Dr. Thirlwall, is not only
not stated by Herodotus, but is highly improbable, if we accept
the facts which he does state; for he tells us that Hippias
capitulated and agreed to retire while possessing ample means of
resistance,—simply from regard to the safety of his children. It
is not to be supposed that he would leave his intimate partisans
exposed to danger; such of them as felt themselves obnoxious
would naturally retire along with him; and if this be what is
meant by “many persons condemned to exile,” here is no reason to
call it in question. But there is little probability that any
one was put to death, and still less probability that any were
punished by the loss of their political privileges. Within a year
afterwards came the comprehensive constitution of Kleisthenês,
to be described in the following chapter, and I consider it
eminently unlikely that there were a considerable class of
residents in Attica left out of this constitution, under the
category of partisans of Peisistratus: indeed, the fact cannot be
so, if it be true that the very first person banished under the
Kleisthenean ostracism was a person named Hipparchus, a kinsman
of Peisistratus (Androtion, Fr. 5, ed. Didot; Harpokration, v.
Ἵππαρχος); and this latter circumstance depends upon evidence
better than that of Andokidês. That there were a party in Attica
attached to the Peisistratids, I do not doubt; but that they were
“a powerful party,” (as Dr. Thirlwall imagines,) I see nothing to
show; and the extraordinary vigor and unanimity of the Athenian
people under the Kleisthenean constitution will go far to prove
that such could not have been the case.
I will add another reason to evince how completely Andokidês
misconceives the history of Athens between 510-480 B. C. He
says that when the Peisistratids were put down, many of their
partisans were banished, many others allowed to stay at home with
the loss of their political privileges; but that afterwards, when
the overwhelming dangers of the Persian invasion supervened,
the people passed a vote to restore the exiles and to remove
the existing disfranchisements at home. He would thus have us
believe that the exiled partisans of the Peisistratids were all
restored, and the disfranchised partisans of the Peisistratids
all enfranchised, just at the moment of the Persian invasion,
and with the view of enabling Athens better to repel that grave
danger. This is nothing less than a glaring mistake; for the
first Persian invasion was undertaken with the express view of
restoring Hippias, and with the presence of Hippias himself at
Marathon; while the second Persian invasion was also brought
on in part by the instigation of his family. Persons who had
remained in exile or in a state of disfranchisement down to that
time, in consequence of their attachment to the Peisistratids,
could not in common prudence be called into action at the moment
of peril, to help in repelling Hippias himself. It is very
true that the exiles and the disfranchised were readmitted,
shortly before the invasion of Xerxês, and under the then
pressing calamities of the state. But these persons were not
philo-Peisistratids; they were a number gradually accumulated
from the sentences of exile and (atimy or) disfranchisement every
year passed at Athens,—for these were punishments applied by the
Athenian law to various crimes and public omissions,—the persons
so sentenced were not politically disaffected, and their aid
would then be of use in defending the state against a foreign
enemy.
In regard to “the exception of the family of Peisistratus from
the most comprehensive decrees of amnesty passed in later
times,” I will also remark that, in the decree of amnesty,
there is no mention of them by name, nor any special exception
made against them: among a list of various categories excepted,
those are named “who have been condemned to death or exile
either as murderers or as despots,” (ἢ σφαγεῦσιν ἢ τυράννοις,
Andokid. c. 13.) It is by no means certain that the _descendants_
of Peisistratus would be comprised in this exception, which
mentions only the person himself condemned; but even if this were
otherwise, the exception is a mere continuance of similar words
of exception in the old Solonian law, anterior to Peisistratus;
and, therefore, affords no indication of particular feeling
against the Peisistratids.
Andokidês is a useful authority for the politics of Athens in his
own time (between 420-390 B. C.), but in regard to the previous
history of Athens between 510-480 B. C., his assertions are so
loose, confused, and unscrupulous, that he is a witness of no
value. The mere circumstance noted by Valckenaer, that he has
confounded together Marathon and Salamis, would be sufficient
to show this; but when we add to such genuine ignorance his
mention of his two great-grandfathers in prominent and victorious
leadership, which it is hardly credible that they could ever have
occupied,—when we recollect that the facts which he alleges to
have preceded and accompanied the expulsion of the Peisistratids
are not only at variance with those stated by Herodotus, but so
contrived as to found a factitious analogy for the cause which
he is himself pleading,—we shall hardly be able to acquit him of
something worse than ignorance in his deposition.