The fourth year of the war, 428 B.C., opened with the third invasion of
Attica by Archidamus, but the Periclean policy of remaining within the
walls was continued. Athens herself remaining impregnable, revolt broke
out among her allies.[a]
One of the most remarkable events in the history of the Peloponnesian
war is the revolt of Mytilene. The island of Lesbos contained five
Æolian towns, which were indeed connected in a certain way, but were
yet perfectly independent of one another; Mytilene, however, by the
advantages of its position and by its excellent harbour, had risen far
above the other four towns. The three smaller ones among them, Pyrrha,
Eresus, and Antissa, had absolutely joined Mytilene, and were guided by
it; but Methymna had not done so, and the relation in which the Lesbians
stood to Athens was still very favourable: their contingent consisted
in ships commanded by Lesbians, and they paid no tribute. But the fate
of Samos had warned the few places standing in the same relation, Chios
and Lesbos, and had rendered them suspicious of the intentions of the
Athenians; and they feared lest the Athenians should treat them as they
had treated the smaller islands, and should reduce them to the same state
of dependence as Samos, by ordering them to deliver up their ships and
pay tribute. But the more such places became aware of their importance,
and the more they felt that by going over to the other side, they would
cast a great weight into the scale, the more they naturally became
inclined to revolt. Thus the Mytileneans were prepared for the step they
took, and the revolt spread thence over the whole of Lesbos, with the
exception of Methymna, which, as is always the case in confederations of
states, from jealousy of Mytilene, sided with the Athenians, and directed
their attention to the fact that treasonable plots were formed in Lesbos,
and that a revolt was near at hand.
THE REVOLT OF MYTILENE
[Sidenote: [428-427 B.C.]]
At first the Athenians, with incredible carelessness, paid little
attention to the information, a neglect which was the consequence of
the strange anarchical condition of Athens, where the government had
in reality no power. There was no magistracy to take the initiative,
or to form a preliminary resolution or _probuleuma_ in such cases. The
people might indeed meet, and did meet every day, and any demagogue might
propose a measure; but when this was not done, there was no authority on
which it was incumbent to introduce such measures, and nothing was done.
At Mytilene, on the other hand, although under the supremacy of Athens
democracy everywhere gained the upper hand, there seems to have been a
powerful aristocratic element, and the government must have been very
strong. Everything was carefully and cautiously prepared, and was kept
profoundly secret. The revolt was determined upon, and public opinion
was in favour of it. But as they wished to proceed safely, and provide
themselves sufficiently with arms and provisions, the undertaking was
delayed, and the Athenians, who at first had neglected everything, at
last fitted out an expedition which was to take Mytilene by surprise.
But on this occasion it became evident how injurious it was to Athens,
down to the end of the war, that at such times of urgent necessity the
government still continued to be as before, and that there had not been
instituted a separate magistrate for war to take such measures in time.
As all proceedings were public, and neither the preparations nor their
object could be kept secret, all the plans were known to everybody, as
they were discussed in the popular assembly. It was indeed resolved there
to surprise Mytilene; but this decree was ludicrous, and its consequences
might be foreseen.
A Mytilenean, who was staying at Athens, or some one else anxious to
do them a service, on hearing of it, went to Eubœa, took a boat, and
informed the Mytileneans of the danger that was threatening them. Had
this not been done, the revolt would have been prevented, and that for
the good of the Mytileneans themselves. The intention of the Athenians
was to surprise the city during the celebration of a festival, which the
Mytileneans solemnised at a considerable distance from their city, in
conjunction with the other Lesbians. Knowing the design of the Athenians,
they did not go out to the festival, and determined to raise the standard
of revolt at once. They quickly applied to the Peloponnesians, with whom
they had, no doubt, been already negotiating, and requested the Spartans
to send them succour of some kind or another. The Spartans sent them a
commander without a force, which was anything but what they would have
liked. He undertook the command in the city, and exhorted them to be
courageous and persevering. They were expected to undergo the hardships
of famine for the sake of the Spartans, but the general did not bring
them any additional strength to repel the Athenians. They had nothing but
their own forces.
[Sidenote: [427 B.C.]]
The Athenian fleet now arrived and blockaded the city; after several
little engagements the Mytileneans were reduced to extremities. Their
envoys had at length prevailed upon the Peloponnesians to send them a
motley fleet to relieve Mytilene. But it set sail with the usual slowness
of the Spartans, and did not arrive until Mytilene, compelled by famine,
had surrendered. Such was the care shown to save Mytilene! The long
endurance of famine, shows how strongly the Mytileneans were bent upon
escaping from the dominion of their enemies. How fearful it must have
been, may be inferred from the fact, that in the end they preferred
surrendering at discretion to an enraged enemy. The courage of the
Mytileneans was like that of the Campanians in the Hannibalic War: they
allowed themselves to be shut up like sheep in a fold, to be starved,
and thus there remained nothing for them in the end, but to surrender.
Many of those who had been most conspicuous, were taken prisoners by
Paches, the Athenian general. The capitulation contained nothing else but
a promise that the Athenian commander would not, on his own authority,
order any one to be put to death, and that he would leave the decision to
the people of Athens.
The war had already assumed the most fearful character: Alcidas, the
Spartan admiral of the Peloponnesian fleet, which went to the relief of
the Mytileneans, had, on his voyage, indulged in the most cruel piracy;
he had captured all the ships he met with, without any regard as to what
place they belonged to, and had thrown into the sea the crews of the
allies and subjects of the Athenians, for whose deliverance the Spartans
pretended to be anxious, as well as those of Athenian vessels. This
barbarous mode of warfare was practised by the Spartans from the very
beginning of the war. They not only captured the Athenian ships which
sailed round Peloponnesus, but mutilated the crews, chopping off the
hands of the sailors, and then drowned them.
This inhuman cruelty of the Spartans excited in the minds of the
Athenians a desire to make reprisals; and thus it unfortunately became
quite a natural feeling among the Athenians to devise inhuman vengeance
upon the Mytileneans. They felt that Athens had given the Mytileneans no
cause for revolt, that the alliance with them had been left unaltered
as it had been before, and that if the Mytileneans had succeeded in
joining the Spartans, they would have brought Athens into great danger,
partly by their power, and partly by their example. It was, moreover,
thought necessary to terrify Chios by a striking example, in order that
the oligarchical party there might not attempt a similar undertaking.
Those who did not see the necessity for such a measure, at least imagined
that they saw it, for reasons of this kind are never anything else than
an evil pretext. With all enticements of this description, the people
were induced to despatch orders to the general Paches to avenge on the
Mytileneans what the Spartans had done to the Athenians. He was to put to
death all the men capable of bearing arms, and to sell women and children
into slavery.
But the minds of the Athenians were too humane for such a design to be
entertained by them for any length of time; and although it had been
possible to carry out such a decree, through the existing confusion of
ideas about morality, yet the better voice had not yet died away in their
bosoms. The historian need not tell us that thousands could not close
their eyes during the night in consequence of the terrible decree; and
that through fear lest it should be carried into effect, they assembled
early in the morning, even before sunrise. The morning after the day on
which the decree had been passed, all the people met earlier than usual,
and demanded of the prytanes once more to put the question to the vote,
to see whether the decree should be carried into effect or not. This was
done, and although the ferocious Cleon struggled with all fury to obtain
the sanction of the first decree, yet humanity prevailed at this second
voting.[b]
It is in this debate that Cleon first appears in the pages of Thucydides;
he was opposed by Diodotus who, by calm logic rather than impassioned
appeal, won the Athenians over to mercy. It is thus that Thucydides
describes the escape of the Mytileneans:[a]
“And they immediately despatched another trireme with all speed, that
they might not find the city destroyed through the previous arrival of
the first; which had the start by a day and a night. The Mytilenean
ambassadors having provided for the vessel wine and barley-cakes, and
promising great rewards if they should arrive first, there was such haste
in their course, that at the same time as they rowed they ate cakes
kneaded with oil and wine; and some slept in turn while others rowed. And
as there happened to be no wind against them, and the former vessel did
not sail in any haste on so horrible a business, while this hurried on in
the manner described; though the other arrived so much first that Paches
had read the decree, and was on the point of executing the sentence,
the second came to land after it, and prevented the butchery. Into such
imminent peril did Mytilene come.
“The other party, whom Paches had sent off as the chief authors of the
revolt, the Athenians put to death, according to the advice of Cleon,
amounting to rather more than one thousand. They also dismantled the
walls of the Mytileneans, and seized their ships.”[c]
It was resolved that only the leaders of the rebellion should be taken to
account and conveyed to Athens, but that no harm should be done to the
other Mytileneans. The Mytileneans were, of course, obliged to deliver
up all their ships and arms; and their territory, with that of the other
towns, except Methymna, made a cleruchia: that is, it was divided into
equal lots, and given to Athenian citizens as fiefs. But this was, in
point of fact, nothing else than the imposition of a permanent land-tax
upon the former owners; for the Athenians let out their lots to the
ancient proprietors for a small rent. The number of rebels who were
carried to Athens and executed there, was, indeed, very great, sadly
great; but they were real rebels, and their blood did not come upon the
heads of the Athenians.
In the declamations of the sophists, we hear much of the evils of the
Athenian democracy, of the misfortunes of the most distinguished men:
and that of Paches is regarded as one of the most conspicuous cases. The
people, it is said, were ungrateful towards Paches, the conqueror of
Mytilene, who had, even before that conquest, distinguished himself as a
general; and they now took him to account for the manner in which he had
conducted the war; and he, in order to escape condemnation, made away
with himself. This story is believed to have been related by the father
of all sophists and declaimers, Isocrates, and is mentioned also by the
sophists of later times, and by a Roman writer on military affairs. But
the true account may be learnt from a poem of the _Greek Anthology_,
where Paches is said to have abused his power in subduing the island: he
dishonoured two noble ladies of Mytilene, who went to Athens to appeal to
the sense of justice of the Athenian people.
On that occasion the Athenians showed their true humanity, for they
forgot how dangerous enemies the Mytileneans had been to them, and
notwithstanding the victory of Paches, they were inexorable towards him,
and had he not put an end to his life, he would certainly have been
condemned and handed over to the Eleven. Of this deed the friends of
Athens need not be ashamed.
The conduct of the commander of the Spartan fleet, which appeared on
the coast of Ionia, shows the Spartans in the same light in which they
always appear, as immensely awkward and slow in all they undertook. It
was in vain that the Corinthians and other enterprising people advised
them to attack Mytilene, because the Athenians were in a newly-conquered
city, and the appearance of a superior force of Peloponnesians would
be sufficient to create a revolt in the city, and to crush the small
force of the Athenians. But Alcidas, in torpid Spartan laziness, was
immovable, and returned to Peloponnesus without undertaking or having
effected anything, except that he received on board the suppliants who
threw themselves into the sea, and carried on the most cruel piracy. The
Spartans followed the principle of not punishing their generals, which
was the very opposite to that of the Athenians, who often made their
commanders responsible when fortune had been against them; and when they
had neglected an opportunity, or been guilty of any crime, they never
escaped unpunished.[b]
It was shortly after the fate of Mytilene was sealed, that Platæa fell
into the power of ruthless Sparta, as described previously. The affair
of Mytilene was followed by an internal war in the island of Corcyra. In
describing this sedition Thucydides is unwontedly vivid and his final
moralising upon the bloody event, as Grote says, “will ever remain
memorable as the work of an analyst and a philosopher.”[a]
THUCYDIDES’ ACCOUNT OF THE REVOLT OF CORCYRA
Now the forty ships of the Peloponnesians which had gone to the relief of
the Lesbians, (and which were flying, at the time we referred to them,
across the open sea, and were pursued by the Athenians, and caught in a
storm off Crete, and from that point had been dispersed,) on reaching
the Peloponnese, found at Cyllene thirteen ships of the Leucadians
and Ambracians, with Brasidas, son of Tellis, who had lately arrived
as counsellor to Alcidas. For the Lacedæmonians wished, as they had
failed in saving Lesbos, to make their fleet more numerous, and to sail
to Corcyra, which was in a state of sedition; as the Athenians were
stationed at Naupactus with only twelve ships; and in order that they
might have the start of them, before any larger fleet reinforced them
from Athens. So Brasidas and Alcidas proceeded to make preparations for
these measures.
For the Corcyræans began their sedition on the return home of the
prisoners taken in the sea-fights off Epidamnus, who had been sent back
by the Corinthians, nominally on the security of eight hundred talents
given for them by their _proxeni_, but in reality, because they had
consented to bring over Corcyra to the Corinthians. These men then were
intriguing, by visits to each of the citizens, to cause the revolt of
the city from the Athenians. On the arrival of a ship from Athens and
another from Corinth, with envoys on board, and on their meeting for a
conference, the Corcyræans voted to continue allies of the Athenians
according to their agreement, but to be on friendly terms with the
Peloponnesians, as they had formerly been.
Now there was one Pithias, a volunteer _proxenus_ of the Athenians, and
the leader of the popular party; him these men brought to trial, on a
charge of enslaving Corcyra to the Athenians. Having been acquitted, he
brought to trial in return the five richest individuals of their party,
charging them with cutting stakes in the ground sacred to Jupiter, and to
the hero Alcinous; the penalty affixed being a stater for every stake.
When they had been convicted, and, owing to the amount of the penalty,
were sitting as suppliants in the temples, that they might be allowed to
pay it by instalments, Pithias, who was a member of the council also,
persuades that body to enforce the law. So when they were excluded from
all hope by the severity of the law, and at the same time heard that
Pithias was likely, while he was still in the council, to persuade the
populace to hold as friends and foes the same as the Athenians did, they
conspired together, and took daggers, and, having suddenly entered the
council, assassinated Pithias and others, both counsellors and private
persons, to the number of sixty. Some few, however, of the same party as
Pithias, took refuge on board the Athenian trireme, which was still there.
Having perpetrated this deed, and summoned the Corcyræans to an assembly,
they told them that this was the best thing for them, and that so they
would be least in danger of being enslaved by the Athenians; and they
moved, that in future they should receive neither party, except coming in
a quiet manner with a single ship, but should consider a larger force
as hostile. As they moved, so also they compelled them to adopt their
motion. They likewise sent immediately ambassadors to Athens, to show,
respecting what had been done, that it was for their best interests, and
to prevail on the refugees there to adopt no measure prejudicial to them,
that there might not be any reaction.
On their arrival, the Athenians arrested as revolutionists both the
ambassadors and all who were persuaded by them, and lodged them in
custody in Ægina. In the meantime, on the arrival of a Corinthian ship
and some Lacedæmonian envoys, the dominant party of the Corcyræans
attacked the commonalty, and defeated them in battle. When night came on,
the commons took refuge in the citadel, and on the eminences in the city,
and there established themselves in a body, having possession also of the
Hyllaic harbour; while the other party occupied the market-place, where
most of them dwelt, with the harbour adjoining it, looking towards the
mainland.
The next day they had a few skirmishes, and both parties sent about into
the country, inviting the slaves, and offering them freedom. The greater
part of them joined the commons as allies; while the other party was
reinforced by eight hundred auxiliaries from the continent.
After the interval of a day, a battle was again fought, and the commons
gained the victory, having the advantage both in strength of position and
in numbers: the women also boldly assisted them, throwing at the enemy
with the tiling from the houses, and standing the brunt of the mêlée
beyond what could have been expected from their nature. About twilight
the rout of the oligarchical party was effected; and fearing that the
commons might carry the arsenal at the first assault, and put them to
the sword, they fired the houses round about the market-place, and the
lodging-houses, to stop their advance, sparing neither their own nor
other people’s; so that much property belonging to the merchants was
consumed, and the whole city was in danger of being destroyed, if, in
addition to the fire, there had been a wind blowing on it. After ceasing
from the engagement, both sides remained quiet, and kept guard during
the night. On victory declaring for the commons, the Corinthian ship
stole out to sea; while the greater part of the auxiliaries passed over
unobserved to the continent.
The day following, Nicostratus son of Diïtrephes, a general of the
Athenians, came to their assistance from Naupactus with twelve ships
and five hundred heavy-armed, and wished to negotiate a settlement,
persuading them to agree with each other to bring to trial the ten chief
authors of the sedition (who immediately fled), and for the rest to
dwell in peace, having made an arrangement with each other, and with
the Athenians, to have the same foes and friends. After effecting this
he was going to sail away; but the leaders of the commons urged him to
leave them five of his ships, that their adversaries might be less on the
move; and they would themselves man and send with him an equal number
of theirs. He consented to do so, and they proceeded to enlist their
adversaries for the ships. They, fearing that they should be sent off to
Athens, seated themselves as suppliants in the temple of the Dioscuri;
while Nicostratus was trying to persuade them to rise, and to encourage
them. When he did not prevail on them, the commons, having armed
themselves on this pretext, alleged that they had no good intentions, as
was evident from their mistrust in not sailing with them; and removed
their arms from their houses, and would have despatched some of them whom
they met with, if Nicostratus had not prevented it. The rest, seeing what
was going on, seated themselves as suppliants in the temple of Juno,
their number amounting to not less than four hundred. But the commons,
being afraid of their making some new attempt, persuaded them to rise,
and transferred them to the island in front of the temple, and provisions
were sent over there for them.
When the sedition was at this point, on the fourth or fifth day after
the transfer of the men to the island, the ships of the Peloponnesians,
three-and-fifty in number, came up from Cyllene, having been stationed
there since their return from Ionia. The commander of them, as before,
was Alcidas, Brasidas sailing with him as counsellor. After coming to
anchor at Sybota, a port on the mainland, as soon as it was morning they
sailed towards Corcyra.
The Corcyræans, being in great confusion, and alarmed both at the state
of things in the city and at the advance of the enemy, at once proceeded
to equip sixty vessels, and to send them out, as they were successively
manned, against the enemy; though the Athenians advised them to let them
sail out first, and afterwards to follow themselves with all their ships
together. On their vessels coming up to the enemy in this scattered
manner, two immediately went over to them, while in others the crews were
fighting amongst themselves, and there was no order in their measures.
The Peloponnesians, seeing their confusion, drew up twenty of their ships
against the Corcyræans, and the remainder against the twelve of the
Athenians, amongst which were the two celebrated vessels, _Salaminia_ and
_Paralus_.
The Corcyræans, coming to the attack in bad order, and by few ships
at a time, were distressed through their own arrangements; while
the Athenians, fearing the enemy’s numbers and the chance of their
surrounding them, did not attack their whole fleet, or even the centre
of the division opposed to themselves, but took it in flank, and sank
one ship. After this, when the Peloponnesians had formed in a circle,
they began to sail round them, and endeavoured to throw them into
confusion. The division which was opposed to the Corcyræans perceiving
this, and fearing that the same thing might happen as had at Naupactus,
advanced to their support. Thus the whole united fleet simultaneously
attacked the Athenians, who now began to retire, rowing astern; at the
same time wishing the vessels of the Corcyræans to retreat first, while
they themselves drew off as leisurely as possible, and while the enemy
were still ranged against them. The sea-fight then, having been of this
character, ended at sunset.
The Corcyræans, fearing that the enemy, on the strength of his victory,
might sail against the city, and either rescue the men in the island, or
proceed to some other violent measures, carried the men over again to the
sanctuary of Juno, and kept the city under guard. The Peloponnesians,
however, though victorious in the engagement, did not dare to sail
against the city, but withdrew with thirteen of the Corcyræan vessels
to the continent, whence they had put out. The next day they advanced
none the more against the city, though the inhabitants were in great
confusion, and though Brasidas, it is said, advised Alcidas to do so, but
was not equal to him in authority; but they landed on the promontory of
Leucimne, and ravaged the country.
Meanwhile, the commons of the Corcyræans, being very much alarmed lest
the fleet should sail against them, entered into negotiation with the
suppliants and the rest for the preservation of the city. And some of
them they persuaded to go on board the ships; for, notwithstanding the
general dismay, they still manned thirty, in expectation of the enemy’s
advance against them. But the Peloponnesians, after ravaging the land
till mid-day, sailed away; and at nightfall the approach of sixty
Athenian ships from Leucas was signalled to them, which the Athenians
had sent with Eurymedon son of Thucles, as commander, on hearing of the
sedition, and of the fleet about to go to Corcyra with Alcidas.
The Peloponnesians then immediately proceeded homeward by night with
all haste, passing along shore; and having hauled their ships over the
isthmus of Leucas, that they might not be seen doubling it, they sailed
back. The Corcyræans, on learning the approach of the Athenian fleet and
the retreat of the enemy, took and brought into the city the Messenians,
who before had been without the walls: and having ordered the ships
they had manned to sail round into the Hyllaic harbour, while they were
going round, they put to death any of their opponents they might have
happened to seize; and afterwards despatched, as they landed them from
the ships, all that they had persuaded to go on board. They also went to
the sanctuary of Juno, and persuaded about fifty men to take their trial,
and condemned them all to death. The majority of the suppliants, who had
not been prevailed on by them, when they saw what was being done, slew
one another there on the sacred ground; while some hanged themselves
on the trees, and others destroyed themselves as they severally could.
During seven days that Eurymedon stayed after his arrival with his
sixty ships, the Corcyræans were butchering those of their countrymen
whom they thought hostile to them; bringing their accusations, indeed,
against those only who were for putting down the democracy; but some were
slain for private enmity also, and others for money owed them by those
who had borrowed it. Every mode of death was thus had recourse to; and
whatever ordinarily happens in such a state of things, happened then, and
still more. For father murdered son, and they were dragged out of the
sanctuaries, or slain in them; while in that of Bacchus some were walled
up and perished. So savagely did the sedition proceed; while it appeared
to do so all the more from its being amongst the earliest.[54]
For afterwards, even the whole of Greece, so to say, was convulsed;
struggles being everywhere made by the popular leaders to call in the
Athenians, by the oligarchical party, the Lacedæmonians. Now they would
have had no pretext for calling them in, nor have been prepared to do
so, in time of peace. But when pressed by war, and when an alliance also
was maintained by both parties for the injury of their opponents and for
their own gain therefrom, occasions of inviting them were easily supplied
to such as wished to effect any revolution. And many dreadful things
befell the cities through this sedition, which occur, and will always
do so, as long as human nature is the same, but in a more violent or
milder form, and varying in their phenomena, as the several variations of
circumstances may in each case present themselves.
For in peace and prosperity both communities and individuals had better
feelings, through not falling into urgent needs; whereas war, by taking
away the free supply of daily wants, is a violent master, and assimilates
most men’s tempers to their present condition. The states then were
thus torn by sedition, and the later instances of it in any part, from
having heard what had been done before, exhibited largely an excessive
refinement of ideas, both in the eminent cunning of their plans, and the
monstrous cruelty of their vengeance. The ordinary meaning of words was
changed by them as they thought proper. For reckless daring was regarded
as courage that was true to its friends; prudent delay, as specious
cowardice; moderation, as a cloak for unmanliness; being intelligent in
everything, as being useful for nothing. Frantic violence was assigned to
the manly character; cautious plotting was considered a specious excuse
for declining the contest.
The advocate for cruel measures was always trusted; while his opponent
was suspected. He that plotted against another, if successful, was
reckoned clever; he that suspected a plot, still cleverer; but he that
forecasted for escaping the necessity of all such things, was regarded
as one who broke up his party, and was afraid of his adversaries. In a
word, the man was commended who anticipated one going to do an evil deed,
or who persuaded to it one who had no thought of it. Moreover, kindred
became a tie less close than party, because the latter was more ready
for unscrupulous audacity. For such associations have nothing to do
with any benefit from established laws, but are formed in opposition to
those institutions by a spirit of rapacity. Again, their mutual grounds
of confidence they confirmed not so much by any reference to the divine
law as by fellowship in some act of lawlessness. The fair professions of
their adversaries they received with a cautious eye to their actions, if
they were stronger than themselves, and not with a spirit of generosity.
To be avenged on another was deemed of greater consequence than to escape
being first injured oneself. As for oaths, if in any case exchanged with
a view to a reconciliation, being taken by either party with regard
to their immediate necessity, they only held good so long as they had
no resources from any other quarter; but he that first, when occasion
offered, took courage to break them, if he saw his enemy off his guard,
wreaked his vengeance on him with greater pleasure for his confidence,
than he would have done in an open manner; taking into account both the
safety of the plan, and the fact that by taking a treacherous advantage
of him he also won a prize for cleverness. And the majority of men, when
dishonest, more easily get the name of talented, than, when simple,
that of good; and of the one they are ashamed, while of the other they
are proud. Now the cause of all these things was power pursued for the
gratification of covetousness and ambition, and the consequent violence
of parties when once engaged in contention.
For the leaders in the cities, having a specious profession on each side,
put forward, respectively, the political equality of the people, or a
moderate aristocracy, while in word they served the common interests,
in truth they made them their prizes. And while struggling by every
means to obtain an advantage over each other, they dared and carried out
the most dreadful deeds; heaping on still greater vengeance, not only
so far as was just and expedient for the state, but to the measure of
what was pleasing to either party in each successive case: and whether
by an unjust sentence of condemnation, or on gaining the ascendency by
the strong hand, they were ready to glut the animosity they felt at the
moment. Thus piety was in fashion with neither party; but those who had
the luck to effect some odious purpose under fair pretences were the more
highly spoken of. The neutrals amongst the citizens were destroyed by
both parties; either because they did not join them in their quarrel, or
for envy that they should so escape.
Thus every kind of villainy arose in Greece from these seditions.
Simplicity, which is a very large ingredient in a noble nature, was
laughed down and disappeared; and mutual opposition of feeling, with a
want of confidence, prevailed to a great extent. For there was neither
promise that could be depended on, nor oath that struck them with fear,
to put an end to their strife; but all being in their calculations more
strongly inclined to despair of anything proving trustworthy, they
looked forward to their own escape from suffering more easily than they
could place confidence in arrangements with others. And the men of more
homely wit, generally speaking, had the advantage; for through fearing
their own deficiency and the cleverness of their opponents, lest they
might be worsted in words, and be first plotted against by means of the
versatility of their enemy’s genius, they proceeded boldly to deeds.
Whereas their opponents, arrogantly thinking that they should be aware
beforehand, and that there was no need for their securing by action what
they could by stratagem, were unguarded and more often ruined.
It was in Corcyra then that most of these things were first ventured on;
both the deeds which men who were governed with a spirit of insolence,
rather than of moderation, by those who afterwards afforded them an
opportunity of vengeance, would do as the retaliating party; or which
those who wished to rid themselves of their accustomed poverty, and
passionately desired the possession of their neighbours’ goods, might
unjustly resolve on; or which those who had begun the struggle, not from
covetousness, but on a more equal footing, might savagely and ruthlessly
proceed to, chiefly through being carried away by the rudeness of their
anger. Thus the course of life being at that time thrown into confusion
in the city, human nature, which is wont to do wrong even in spite of the
laws, having then got the mastery of the law, gladly showed itself to be
unrestrained in passion, above regard for justice, and an enemy to all
superiority. They would not else have preferred vengeance to religion,
and gain to innocence; in which state envy would have had no power to
hurt them. And so men presume in their acts of vengeance to be the first
to violate those common laws on such questions, from which all have a
hope secured to them of being themselves rescued from misfortune; and
they will not allow them to remain, in case of any one’s ever being in
danger and in need of some of them.[c]
DEMOSTHENES AND SPHACTERIA
[Sidenote: [426-425 B.C.]]
These massacres at Corcyra, Mytilene, Platæa, and Melos were doubly
disastrous; iniquity always striking back at its perpetrators, thus
making two victims. Through such reversions to the barbarity of former
days the sense of right, of justice will everywhere become enfeebled
until it finally disappears.
As though nature herself had wished to take part in the general disorder,
earthquakes visited Attica, Eubœa, and all of Bœotia, particularly
Orchomenos. Pestilence had never made its appearance in the Peloponnesus:
now for a year it raged among the Athenians with terrible mortality.
Since its outbreak it had carried off forty-three hundred hoplites, three
hundred horsemen, and innumerable victims among the general population.
This was the last blow fate dealt the Athenians. To appease the god to
whom all pollution was an offence, they caused the island of Apollo to be
thoroughly purified as had already been done by the Pisistratidæ. Birth
and death being alike forbidden at Delos, the remains of the dead buried
there were exhumed and sent elsewhere, and the sick were transported to
Rhenea, a neighbouring island. Finally, there were instituted in honour
of Apollo games and horse-races which were to be celebrated every four
years, the Greeks as well as the Romans thinking to gain thus the
protection of a god, whom they caused to be represented by images at
these festivals.
The Ionians, excluded from the Peloponnesian solemnities, flocked to
those of Delos, where Nicias, at the first celebration, made himself
remarkable for the magnificence of his gifts. In one night he caused to
be constructed between Delos and Rhenea a bridge seven hundred metres
long, carpeted and decorated with wreaths, across which was to pass the
procession of the dead exiled in the name of religion from the holy
island (425 B.C.).
It is a proof of the part taken by the people of Athens in the great
things accomplished by Pericles, that in the four years passed without
his enlightened counsel, they had displayed under the double scourge
of plague and war that steadfastness he had particularly enjoined upon
them: no disturbances took place in the city and no pettiness of spirit
was shown in the choice of military chiefs. In vain Cleon thundered from
the tribune. Into the hands of none but tried generals, were they noble,
rich, or friends of peace, like Nicias and Demosthenes, was given the
command of their armies. At Mytilene and Corcyra those who had placed
their trust in Lacedæmon had perished; the destruction of Platæa was the
only check received by Athens. She began to turn her gaze toward Sicily;
soon she sent there twenty galleys to aid the Leontini against Syracuse.
Her pretext was community of origin with the Leontini, but in reality she
wished to prevent the exportation of Sicilian grain into the Peloponnesus.
Demosthenes was a true general, able and bold; to him war was a
science made up of difficult combinations as well as courage. Leaving
to his colleague, Nicias, the seas near Athens he set out for western
waters, to destroy the influence of Corinth even in the gulf that bears
his name. Aided by the Acarnanians he had the preceding year (426)
vanquished in the land-battle of Olpæ, by force of superior tactics, the
Peloponnesians, who lost so many men that the general had three hundred
panoplies, his share of the plunder, consecrated in the temple at Athens.
But this Acarnanian War, related at such length by Thucydides, could
not have very serious results. An audacious enterprise by Demosthenes
seemed, at one moment, to have brought it to a close. Struck, while
navigating around the Peloponnesus, by the advantageous position of Pylos
a promontory on the coast of Messene which commands the present harbour
of Navarino, the best sea-port of the peninsula, left deserted by the
Spartans since the Messenian War, the idea came to him that if he could
occupy it with Messenians he would be “attaching a burning torch to the
flank of the Peloponnesus.” He obtained from the people permission to act
on this idea; but when the fleet which had set out for Corcyra and Italy
arrived at Pylos, the generals commanding it shrank from the project
and refused to execute it. The winds interposed in Demosthenes’ behalf,
by driving the ships on to the coast and forcing the Athenians to land.
Once on shore the soldiers, with that industry that characterised the
Athenians, set to work to construct walls and fortifications, without
either tools for cutting stone or hods for carrying mortar. At the end
of six days the rampart was about finished and Demosthenes, with six
galleys, took up his position on the point (425).
[Sidenote: [425 B.C.]]
Sparta was with reason alarmed at this move, the place chosen by
Demosthenes at the west of the Peloponnesus, forming an excellent station
for hostile fleets, and from Pylos the Athenians would be able to spread
agitation through all Messene, perhaps even to incite the helots to fresh
revolt. The Peloponnesian army was at once recalled from Attica where it
had only arrived two weeks before, and also the fleet from Corcyra with
the end in view of blockading Pylos by land and by sea. At the entrance
to this harbour was an island fifteen stadia [not quite two miles] long
called Sphacteria. The Lacedæmonians landed on this island a force of
four hundred and twenty hoplites, and barred the channel on either side
with vessels having their prows turned outward. Pylos had no other
defence seaward than the difficulty of effecting a landing on her shores,
but it was on this side that the attack began. It lasted two days and
was unsuccessful. Brasidas, who had displayed great valour, was covered
with wounds and lost his shield, which the waters carried over to the
Athenians. There was still hope for the Lacedæmonians; but at this point
forty Athenian galleys arriving from Zacynthus, assailed their fleet and
after a furious combat drove their ships upon the land. Thus Sphacteria
was surrounded by an armed circle that kept close guard about her night
and day.
Sparta was thrown into consternation by the news of this defeat. Her
population that in Lycurgus’ time numbered nine thousand was reduced
in the year of the battle of Platæa to five thousand, which in another
quarter of a century had dwindled to seven hundred; hence she could
not support the loss of the men now held under siege by the Athenians.
The ephors went in person to Pylos to examine the condition of affairs
and saw no other way to preserve the lives of their fellow-citizens
than to conclude an armistice with the Athenian generals. It was agreed
that Laconia should send ambassadors to Athens, and that she should
immediately surrender all the vessels, sixty galleys, that she had in the
port of Pylos; Athens to continue the blockade of Sphacteria but allowing
to pass in daily, two Attic phœnices of flour, two cotyles of wine, and a
portion of meat per soldier, with half that allowance for the menials.
The Lacedæmonian deputies appeared in the assembly at Athens and,
contrary to their usual custom, delivered a long discourse offering peace
in exchange for the Spartan prisoners and adding that the treaty once
made, all other cities would follow their example and lay down arms.
Where now were all the causes of complaint held against Athens at the
commencement of the war? The Spartans deserted their allies and the cause
they had formerly held so just for the sake of some fellow-citizens in
danger. But had they not also the preceding year betrayed the Ambracians
after the defeat at Olpæ? Unfortunately Pericles was no longer there to
urge upon the people a prudent generosity. Cleon exhorted the assembly to
demand the restitution of the towns ceded when the Thirty Years’ Truce
was concluded, and the deputies, unable to accept such terms, retired
without having accomplished anything.
The armistice ceased with their return; but the Athenians, pretending the
violation of certain conditions, refused to give up the Spartan vessels,
which was an entirely gratuitous breach of faith since the ships were no
longer of any use to the Spartans. Famine was the greatest danger the
besieged had to fear; the island, thickly wooded as it was, offering
peril to the enemy that would attempt to take it by force. Freedom was
promised each helot who would carry provisions through the blockade, and
many attempting and succeeding, the four hundred and twenty were enabled
to hold out till the approach of winter.
The Athenians at Pylos had also to fear for themselves the difficulty
of obtaining provisions through the severe season. The army already
suffered, and this fact became known at Athens. Cleon, who had rejected
the overtures of the Lacedæmonians, laid the blame on the generals. It
was because of their lack of resolution, he said, that hostilities were
so prolonged. In this he was right, the Athenians at Pylos numbering ten
thousand men as against four hundred and twenty Spartans. Nicias, in a
constant state of alarm, believed success even with their superior force
impossible, and to silence the demagogue proposed to him to go himself to
Sphacteria.
Cleon hesitated, but the impatient people took the general at his word,
and Cleon was obliged to go; promising that in twenty days all trouble
would be at an end. In truth this was time enough to effect his purpose
when he once seriously set to work. He first prudently requested that
Demosthenes co-operate with him, and was wise enough to take counsel of
this able man at every step. Shortly after his arrival at Pylos a fire
lighted on Sphacteria to cook food and imperfectly extinguished, was
fanned by a violent wind into a blaze that destroyed the whole forest.
This accident removed the principal obstacle in the way of an attack.
Demosthenes made the preparations aided by Cleon, and one night they
fell upon the island with their entire force. Having among their troops
many that were lightly armed, they were able to reach the highest points
and from there sorely harass the Lacedæmonians who were unused to the
methods of attack of an enemy that uttered wild cries and fled as soon
as they had struck. The ashes of the recently consumed forest rose into
the air and blinded the besieged men, and unable longer to distinguish
objects they stood motionless in one place and received from every side
projectiles that their felt cuirasses were ill-fitted to turn aside. To
render the combat a little less unequal they retired in a body to an
elevated fort at the extremity of the island. This position gave them a
decided advantage, and they were beginning to repulse their assailants
when there appeared upon the rocks above them a corps of Messenians who
had outflanked them.
They saw the necessity of surrendering, but named a condition: that they
be allowed to consult with the Lacedæmonians who were stationed on the
neighbouring coast. Their compatriots replied: “You are free to act as
you think best provided you incur no dishonour.” At this they laid down
their arms and surrendered; the course wherein dishonour formerly lay for
Sparta apparently containing it no more. One hundred and twenty-eight
were killed in the engagement: of the two hundred and ninety-two
survivors one hundred and twenty belonged to the noblest families of
Sparta. Some one praised in the hearing of one of the prisoners the
courage of those of his companions who had been slain: “It would be
impossible,” he said, “to esteem the darts too highly if they are capable
of distinguishing a brave man from a coward.” This retort was, for a
Spartan, very Athenian in spirit. The blockade had lasted fifty-two days.
His victory at Sphacteria raised Cleon high in the estimation of the
people. A decree gave him the right to live in the Prytaneum at the cost
of the republic, and to perpetuate the memory of his success a statue of
Victory was erected on the Acropolis. Aristophanes in revenge presented
six months later his comedy of the _Knights_, in which Cleon as the
“Paphlagonian,” the slave who ingratiates himself with Demos for the
purpose of robbing him, causes blows to rain upon the faithful servants
Nicias and Demosthenes, and finally serves up to his master the cake of
Pylos that Demosthenes alone has prepared. We will only say in conclusion
that though all the honour of the affair may go to Demosthenes, Cleon
manifested in it an energy that was not without effect; that even in
the account of Thucydides he does not appear to have borne himself
discreditably as captain or soldier; and lastly, that all that he
promised he performed.
The balance of power was now disturbed, fortune leaned to the side
of the Athenians. Nevertheless, while the Lacedæmonians were taking
their land-forces economically over into Attica from Laconia, Athens
was ruining herself by maintaining fleets in all the seas of Greece,
recruiting at heavy cost the rowers to man them. Her annual expenses
amounted to twenty-five hundred talents. In 425 the reserved funds
amassed by Pericles being exhausted, it became necessary to increase both
the tribute paid her by her allies and the tax laid upon the revenues of
her citizens. One of these measures was to cause disaffection later, and
the other, that which weighed upon the rich, was to give rise to plots
against the popular government, germs of disaster that the future was to
bring to fruition.
FURTHER ATHENIAN SUCCESSES
[Sidenote: [425-424 B.C.]]
The Athenians had as yet no forebodings, but applied rare vigour to the
following up of their success. Nicias, at the head of a considerable
armament, landed on the isthmus and defeated the Corinthians, then he
proceeded to the capture of Methone between Trœzen and Epidaurus on the
peninsula, and extending towards Ægina. A garrison was left behind a wall
that closed the isthmus, and from this post which communicated by fire
signals with Piræus the Athenians made frequent raids into Argolis (425).
The following year Nicias took the island of Cythera which, situated
near the southern coast of the Peloponnesus, offered great facility for
making raids into that district and for waylaying ships bound there. It
commanded, moreover, the seas of Crete and Sicily in both of which Athens
had stationed fleets for the support of the cities at war with Syracuse.
After having ravaged Laconia for seven days with impunity, Nicias
returned to Thyrea in Cynuria, where the Spartans had established the
Æginetans. He took the city despite the proximity of a Lacedæmonian army
which did not venture to aid it, and his prisoners were sent to Athens
and there put to death. This new-born national greatness, if such a
return to savagery can merit the name, increased constantly in power:
the foe was a criminal meriting punishment and his defeat equivalent to
a sentence of death. In just this period occurred a tragedy, the story
of which we would refuse to receive were it not for Thucydides’ direct
affirmation; the massacre of two thousand of the bravest helots for the
sole purpose of weakening the corps and of frightening those of their
companions to whom the success of Athens might have given the idea
of revolt. Overwhelmed by so many reverses and fearful of seeing war
established permanently around Laconia, at Pylos, Cythera, and Cynuria,
the Spartans shrank from further action. Whatever step they took might
lead them into error and having never learned the lessons of misfortune,
they remained irresolute and timid. The Athenians, on the contrary, were
full of confidence in their good fortune. The Greeks in Sicily having
brought their wars to a close by a general reconciliation, the generals
sent to that country by the Athenians allowed themselves to be included
in the treaty. On their return the people condemned two of them to exile
and one to a heavy fine, on the pretext that they had it in their power
to subjugate Sicily but had been bought off by presents. The Athenian
people believed themselves to be irresistible, and in the loftiness of
their aspirations denied to any enterprise, whether practicable or not,
the possibility of defeat. This was the forerunner of the fatal madness
that seized them when Alcibiades planned the unfortunate expedition into
Sicily.
Athens was thus taking everywhere the offensive, and Sparta, paralysed,
had entirely ceased to act; she had recourse again to Darius, begging
aid more insistently than ever, thus betraying the cause of all Greece
and dimming the glory of their deeds at Thermopylæ. The Athenians
intercepted the Persian Artaphernes in Thrace. In the letter this envoy
bore, the king set forth that not being able to grasp the meaning of the
Spartans--no two of their envoys delivering to him the same message--he
had thought best in order to come to a clear understanding, to send them
a deputy. Athens at once took steps to neutralise Sparta’s measures;
perhaps even to supplant her in the favour of the Great King, and sent
Artaphernes back honourably accompanied by ambassadors. From now on
Greece was to witness the shameful spectacle offered by the descendants
of the victors of Salamis and Platæa bowing down to the successors of
Xerxes. At Ephesus the embassy learnt of the death of the Great King and
went no further; but Athens had none the less been false, in intent if
not in deed, to all the traditions of her past, and was to expiate her
sin without delay.
A CHECK TO ATHENS; BRASIDAS BECOMES AGGRESSIVE
[Sidenote: [424 B.C.]]
Demosthenes’ able plan had succeeded; the Peloponnesus was encircled
by hostile posts; there now remained but to shut off the isthmus and
imprison the Spartans in their retreat. One way of doing this was to
occupy Megara, but a still better method would be to obtain an alliance
with Bœotia. The attempt on Megara having failed, Demosthenes turned his
attention to Bœotia. He held secret communication with the inhabitants of
Chæronea, who promised to deliver over the city to a body of Athenians
who were to leave Naupactus unseen, aided by the Phocians, while he
himself was to storm Siphæ on the Gulf of Crissa, the Athenian general
Hippocrates being charged with the capture of Delium, on the Eubœan side.
These three enterprises were to be executed the same day, and if they
succeeded, Bœotia, like the Peloponnesus, would be encircled by a hostile
ring, and Thebes would be separated from Lacedæmon. But too many were in
the secret to allow of its being kept, the enemy was warned and the three
Athenian forces, failing to act in concert, lost the advantage that would
have lain in a simultaneous attack.
The enterprise against Siphæ and Chæronea failed also and Hippocrates,
delayed a few days in his advance, found arrayed against him in one
body all the Bœotian forces that he and his colleagues had plotted to
divide. He succeeded in occupying Delium and fortified the temple of
Apollo found there. To the Bœotians it was profanation to turn a temple
into a fortress, and this scruple was shared by many of the Athenians
who entered but half-heartedly into the combat. A thousand hoplites with
their chief perished in the action; contrary to sacred usage Thebes
let the bodies of the dead lie without sepulture seventeen days, until
the taking of Delium; holding them to be sacrilegious evil-doers whose
wandering souls were to receive punishment in the infernal world.
Socrates had taken part in this battle. In company with his friend Laches
and some others equally brave, he had held his ground to the last,
retreating step by step before the Theban cavalry. Simultaneously with
this display of heroism Aristophanes was writing his comedy, the _Clouds_.
Sparta possessed but one man of ability, Brasidas, who had saved Megara,
menaced Piræus, and almost defeated Demosthenes at Pylos. Clear-sighted
and brave to the point of audacity, he possessed an additional weapon,
one that was capable of inflicting cruel wounds, and that the Spartans
had hitherto known little how to use, eloquence. The sea being closed to
him, he decided that it would be possible to injure Athens seriously both
in fortune and renown without leaving the land. The very policy she had
used against Sparta, Pylos, Cythera, and Methone, could now be turned
against her in Chalcidice and Thrace. At the commencement of the war she
had forced Perdiccas, king of Macedonia, to enter her alliance and had
gained the friendship of Sitalces the powerful king of the Odrysians,
whose territory extended from the Ægean Sea to the Danube, and from
Byzantium to the source of the Strymon, a distance not to be covered
under thirty days’ travel.
At Athens’ instigation Sitalces had in 429 invaded Macedonia, but since
then his zeal had cooled. Perdiccas, on his side, had never lost an
opportunity of secretly injuring the Athenians. Even at this moment he
was urging Sparta to send an expedition to Chalcidice and the coast
of Thrace. To deprive Athens of these regions whence she obtained her
timber was to attack her in her navy, and to carry at the same time the
centre of hostilities towards the north, was to draw her away from the
Peloponnesus which had lately suffered so many ills. Brasidas was charged
with the enterprise, but Sparta refused to engage in it deeply. He raised
a force of seven hundred helots who were armed as hoplites, to which were
added a thousand Peloponnesians attracted by Perdiccas’ promises. This
was little; but Brasidas held in reserve the treacherous but magical
word, Liberty, that was to open for him many gates.
He took possession in this way of Acanthus, Stagira, and Amphipolis
itself fell into his power, he having entered one of its suburbs by
stealth, and won over all the inhabitants by the generosity of his
conditions. Amphipolitans and Athenians alike he permitted to remain with
retention of all their rights and property; he also accorded to those who
wished to leave, five days in which to carry away all their belongings.
Not for an age had war been carried on with such humanity, and it was
a Spartan who was setting the example! We must also note the lack of
eagerness shown by Athens’ allies to cast off her yoke which, viewed in
the light of facts, takes on an aspect much less odious than that in
which it is represented by rhetoricians.
THE BANISHMENT OF THUCYDIDES
The approach of so active an enemy as Brasidas, and the blows he
had dealt, should have led the Athenian generals in that region to
concentrate their forces on the continent not far from Amphipolis, which
was Athens’ principal stronghold on that side. One of these commanders
had gone with seven galleys to Thasos, where there was no need of his
presence, the island being secure from menace. Though too late to save
Amphipolis he arrived in time to save the port, Eion. At the suggestion
of Cleon the people punished this act of negligence by a twenty years’
sentence of exile. It is to this sentence that posterity owes a
masterwork in which vigorous thoughts are expressed in a style of great
conciseness, the exiled one being Thucydides, who employed his leisure
in writing the history of the Peloponnesian War. The real culprit was
Eucles, the commander of Amphipolis, who had allowed himself to be taken
by surprise.
In according liberty to the towns he took, Brasidas deprived Athens of
many subjects without bestowing any on Lacedæmonia who had no desire for
conquest in such distant regions; hence the success of the adventurous
general astonished Greece without arousing great enthusiasm in Sparta;
neither did it cause much vexation at Athens after the first outburst
of anger to which Thucydides fell a victim. Deprived of a few cities of
importance, Athens retained her island empire; the loss of Amphipolis
being her most serious reverse.
King Plistoanax, exiled in 445 from Sparta for having lent ear to the
propositions of Pericles, had taken refuge on Mount Lycæus in Arcadia
near the temple of Zeus, and had dwelt there nineteen years. The
partisans of peace recalled the exile, who returned to his native land
filled with the determination to end the war. Neither was Athens, for the
moment, in a bellicose mood.
A TRUCE DECLARED; TWO TREATIES OF PEACE
[Sidenote: [423-421 B.C.]]
Her desire to reduce expenses and Sparta’s to recover captives that
belonged to her most influential families brought about, in fact, a sort
of union between the two nations. In March, 423, a truce of one year
was declared, the conditions being that each side should retain all
its possessions. The population forming the Peloponnesian league were
authorised to navigate the waters surrounding their own coasts and those
of their allies, but they were forbidden the use of war-galleys. The
signers of the treaty must guarantee to all free access to the temple and
oracle of Pythian Apollo, must harbour no refugees, free or slave, must
protect all heralds and deputies journeying by land or sea, must, in a
word, aid by every means in their power the conclusion of permanent peace.
While the treaty was being concluded at Athens, Brasidas entered Scione,
on the peninsula of Pallene where he was received with open arms, the
inhabitants decreeing him a golden crown, and binding his head with
fillets as though he had been a victorious athlete. This victory being
achieved two days after the conclusion of peace, the conquered territory
ought to have been given back; this Sparta refused to do and hostilities
broke out again. Nicias, arriving with a considerable force, took
Scione, then Mende, which was delivered over to him by the people, and
persuaded Perdiccas to ally himself again with Athens. Brasidas failed
in an enterprise against Potidæa. The following year Cleon was named
general. He urged Athens and with reason to repeat against Potidæa the
vigour of her action at Pylos, it being necessary to check the advance
of Brasidas. He first seized Torone and Galepsus, then established
himself at Eion to await the auxiliaries that were on their way to him
from Thrace and Macedonia. But his soldiers carried him along with them
in a rush to Amphipolis, where Brasidas was stationed. This latter took
advantage of a false move on the part of the Athenians to attack them by
surprise, and won a victory that cost him his life. Cleon also fell in
this action. In the account of Thucydides Cleon was one of the first to
seek flight, but according to Diodorus he died bravely. Brasidas, mourned
by all his allies who took part, fully armed, in his funeral procession,
was interred with the ceremonies accorded to one of the ancient heroes.
His tomb was enclosed within a consecrated circle and in his honour were
instituted annual games and sacrifices (422).
The death of these two men facilitated the conclusion of peace; Brasidas
by his activity and success, Cleon by his discourses having been for
long the chief sustainers of war. Athens, which had experienced a
serious check, lost confidence, as did also Sparta, the victory of
Amphipolis having been gained not by her native troops but by a body
of mercenaries upon whom no reliance could be placed; the war she had
lightly undertaken against Athens had lasted ten years, with the menace
of another contest in the near future; the Thirty Years’ Truce concluded
with the Argives was on the point of expiring, and lastly her naval ports
were still in the hands of the enemy and her citizens were still held
captive. In both cities the balance of influence was on the side of the
peace partisans, prudent Nicias in Athens, and the easy-going Plistoanax
in Lacedæmon. There were two treaties of peace which were finally
concluded in 421.
[Sidenote: [421 B.C.]]
The first treaty guaranteed to the Greeks, according to usage, the right
to offer sacrifices at Delphi, to consult its oracle and to attend its
festivals. It was agreed that each side should restore the cities taken
in war; Thebes alone was to be allowed to retain Platæa, in exchange for
which the Athenians would keep Nisæa in the Megarid, and Anactorium and
Sollium in Acarnania. It was stipulated that “what was decreed for the
majority of the allies should bind them all, unless hindrances should
occur on the part of the gods and heroes.” All the allies save Corinth,
Megara, and the Eleans, accepted these conditions. It was finally decided
that peace should be ratified by an oath renewed each year and inscribed
upon the columns of Olympia and Delphi, of the temple of Poseidon on the
isthmus, in the citadel at Athens, and the Amyclæum at Sparta.
One of the articles of the treaty read that prisoners should be restored
on both sides. When those of Sphacteria arrived, they were degraded from
their rights as citizens, that the stain on Spartan courage might be
removed by showing that Lacedæmon recognised no compromise with duty,
even in the face of death. It is true that shortly after, these same
citizens were reinstated in their former position.
The first of these treaties which brought temporary cessation to the ills
the people had suffered for the last ten years, bore the name of the
honourable man who had been instrumental in having it drawn, Nicias. Who
had profited by all the blood that had been shed? Sparta had increased
neither in strength nor in glory, while Greece simply retained her
original empire, her people not for a moment renouncing the hatred that
had armed them against each other. No side had gained, and civilisation
had lost what ten years of peace would have added to the brilliancy of
the Age of Pericles.[e]
FOOTNOTES
[54] [Over five hundred of the oligarchical party escaped to Mount
Istone, and when the Athenian fleet sailed away proceeded to make
frequent raids upon the democratic strongholds, till in 425 the Athenian
fleet on the way to Sicily paused in Corcyra and aided the people to
storm Istone. The prisoners left to the mob were foully butchered and the
oligarchical party annihilated.]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]