CHAPTER II .

THE ASCENDANCY OF SPARTA

I.

LYSANDER’S SETTLEMENT

 

THE end of the Peloponnesian War is one of the most clearly defined turning-points in Greek History. No previous Greek war, as Thucydides pointed out, drew in such large measure upon the resources of Greece, and none had a more decisive issue. These facts, however, are hardly sufficient to establish the common opinion that the Peloponnesian War was the culminating catastrophe of Greek History, the ‘suicide of Greece,’ and that the later chapters of that history are but the record of a prolonged death-agony. The damage inflicted upon Greece by the War was by no means irreparable. Its wastage in life and wealth was hardly proportionate to its extent and duration. Except before Syracuse and in the concluding naval actions, the fighting was mostly desultory and resulted in no heavy slaughter. On land the destruction of crops and even the despoiling of plantations inflicted no loss which a few years’ cultivation could not repair. On sea the ships of Athens and her allies, in whose hands the trade of Greece was mostly gathered, had carried on with little interruption. Again, and this is the most vital point, the effect of the War upon the mental life of the Greeks was not permanently ruinous. No doubt the strain and exasperation of a long-protracted conflict left its mark: in the fourth century the Greek people lacked that youthful buoyancy which inspired it after the ‘great deliverance’ of the Persian Wars. But as yet its capacity for sustained effort and constructive imagination was little impaired, as the history of Greek art, literature and science, no less than of politics and strategy, declares. In fine, the fourth century was not an age of senile decay, but of mature and active manhood.

The destruction of the Athenian Empire at the peace of 404  was a political event of the first magnitude. At first sight it might appear an irreparable disaster, for that Empire represented the first resolute attempt to solve the key problem of Greek politics, the assembling of the scattered Greek communities into a United States of Greece. But the seeds of decay had been planted in the Athenian state-system when the Athenians on their own confession degraded a free confederacy of allies into a ‘tyranny’ whose sanction lay in sheer force. The Peloponnesian War merely hastened its dissolution, but did not cause it. Nay more, the disappearance of the Athenian Empire left a clear site for a new and better structure; and Sparta, upon whom the political reconstruction of Greece devolved, possessed several important qualifications for that task. Although the Spartans fell as far below the general average of Greek culture as the Athenians surpassed it, their military prowess and the reputation which they enjoyed for stability of character were more important assets in a political leader than sheer brilliancy of intellect. After the Peloponnesian War their prestige stood higher than that of the Athenians at the zenith of their fortunes: indeed, as Xenophon said, ‘a Spartan could now do as he liked in any Greek town.’ Last but not least, Sparta had in her Peloponnesian League a ready-made pattern for the production of a general Hellenic League which should be at once comprehensive and liberal.

It may be objected that no Greek federation could be permanent, because the passion for local autonomy overrode the sense of Greek nationality, and that Sparta of all states could least afford to disregard this sentiment, since she had represented the Peloponnesian War as a crusade against ‘tyranny’. True enough, in the fifth century Greek jealousy for local autonomy had grown more powerful. But Greek national consciousness had also been quickened, for the remembrance of a common victory over Persia, and the universal comradeship of the Olympic games, then at the zenith of their popularity, had stimulated the sense of Greek solidarity. In the fourth century local dialects and alphabets were being replaced by a common language and script; the theatre and the schools of Athens were standardizing Greek thought; and above the babel of ephemeral politicians who proclaimed that Greeks were made to destroy each other, the voice could be heard of those who preached national union as the true goal of Greek politics. Moreover the meaning of the word ‘autonomy’ requires definition. So long as a Greek state was unfettered in its internal administration and had a voice in the framing of any foreign policy for which it might have to fight, it retained its ‘autonomy’, as that term was commonly understood. Thus autonomy was perfectly compatible with membership of a federal state, and Sparta could quite well proceed to form such a state without violating any of her pledges.

But would Sparta grasp her chance? During the Persian Wars she had led the Greeks like one who has greatness thrust upon him, and at the earliest moment she had bolted from her responsibilities as a national leader. Her outlook was by her own tradition almost confined to the Peloponnese. In 404, however, tradition counted for nothing in the shaping of Spartan policy. The government of the ephors, the guardians of Spartan tradition, had been virtually suspended, and all real power was vested for the time being in the hands of the war-winner Lysander. His victory at Aegospotami, no less complete and profitable than Octavian’s ‘crowning mercy’ at Actium, gave him an authority like that which Octavian used to remodel the policy of Rome. The future of Sparta and Greece alike lay in Lysander’s hands: his was an opportunity such as had never come to Themistocles or Pericles.

The architect of the New Greece was not without qualifications for his task. He had more than the usual Spartan capacity for leadership, for he was conspicuously free from love of wealth, the Spartans’ besetting sin, and unlike most of his fellow-citizens he could ‘slip on a fox hide where a lion’s skin did not avail.’ He also had a talent for organization which had been one of the decisive factors in the Peloponnesian War, and, in theory at least, he knew that a people accustomed to freedom must be led, not driven. To such a man it should have been possible to grasp the essentials of a lasting political settlement, and to devise the means of carrying it into effect. But Lysander’s good qualities were nullified by his consuming passion, a love of power which blinded him to morality and even to reason. Among a people which had acquired more than the elements of political decency he professed that ‘dice served to cheat boys, and oaths to cheat men.’ Though all Greek history proclaimed that despotism was not a stable form of government, he cast himself for the role of a despot.

The methods by which Lysander proceeded to establish his personal ascendancy over Greece are illustrated by his dealings with Miletus in 405. In this town he instigated a bloody oligarchic uprising and installed a government which in the nature of things could only maintain itself by sheer force. Immediately after the capitulation of Athens he led his victorious fleet to Samos, and having reduced this one remaining Athenian ally he expelled the entire population and handed over the island to a party of oligarchic refugees, at whose head he set up a ‘decarchy’ or Government of Ten (summer 404). Later in the year he made a tour of the Aegean Sea with a fresh squadron which was nominally commanded by his brother Libys but in reality stood under his own orders. The primary purpose of this expedition seems to have been to confirm the surrender of the states which had deserted Athens after Aegospotami, and to acquire a palpable proof of this surrender in the shape of war-contributions. But the principal use which Lysander made of his authority was to create more decarchies. It was probably during this tour that the decarchic system of government was made general throughout the Aegean area. In all the cities visited by him he placed despotic power in the hands of a few men drawn from his own adherents. In many instances these revolutions were attended with further violence—at Thasos, Lysander massacred his opponents wholesale after decoying them with a false offer of amnesty—in every case they left the city at the mercy of blind fanatics or mere adventurers, the scum that bubbles up in the cauldron of civil war. Indeed the more worthless the decarchies, the better they suited Lysander, for the less they could rely on the support of the governed, the more they depended on him. As a further precaution Lysander confirmed and probably extended the system of garrisoning the Aegean cities with mercenary forces under Spartan ‘harmosts’ or governors, whose maintenance became a charge upon the victims of this supervision. By these means he at once gratified many influential Spartans who coveted lucrative posts overseas, and provided a prop for the authority of the decarchs.

In the pursuit of his personal ambition Lysander threw away an opportunity of constructive statesmanship such as is not often repeated in a nation’s history. The best that can be said of his settlement is that it was too bad to last. As we shall see presently, his prestige at home did not endure long, and after his fall some of his worst measures were rescinded. Yet the Spartan empire never recovered from the bad start which Lysander gave it. The example of arbitrary interference in the affairs of the dependent states created a precedent which had a fatal attraction for Lysander’s successors, and for the duration of Sparta’s ascendancy the idea of an equitable Greek federation was lost out of sight.

 

II. 

SPARTAN HOME AFFAIRS

 

Before we trace the consequences of Lysander’s settlement in the Aegean area, it will be well to pass under review the domestic crises of Sparta after the Peloponnesian War, and her relations with the states of the Greek mainland.

One unforeseen result of the War was a sudden glut of precious metals in Sparta. The spoils of victory which Lysander and his agents brought home are credibly reported to have amounted to some 2000 talents. The tribute imposed upon the Athenians and their former allies is estimated to have exceeded 1000 talents, and although this total is probably exaggerated we need not doubt that Sparta exacted from her dependents more than she spent upon them. To these public revenues should be added the money which Spartan officials diverted into their own pockets, no inconsiderable sum, if these officials acted up to the usual Spartan reputation for rapacity. This accumulation of money, it is true, was strictly speaking illegal, for an ancient statute roundly forbade Spartan citizens to possess gold or silver. But in an imperial state which had to maintain mercenary forces and equip men-of-war such a statute was plainly obsolete, and although the ephors made a rule that precious metal must still not be gathered in private hands, this ordinance was only enforced in isolated cases. The makers of the ordinance were readily bribed to turn a blind eye on smugglers, and ere long the possession of gold at Sparta became a matter for open boasting.

This influx of treasure, it may safely be said, brought no good to its owners. The Spartans did not devote it to productive purposes, but were content to remain dependent on their Helot population for subsistence. Neither did they use it for the relief of their own war-victims, the so-called ‘ Hypomeiones ’ or ‘ Inferiors.’ These were mostly citizens who had been prevented by military service from supervising the cultivation of their land lots and had therefore fallen in arrears in their contribution to their ‘phiditia’ or messes. By an inexorable law these defaulters, while still liable to non-combatant duties at the discretion of the ephors, lost the Spartan franchise and its social privileges. The Inferiors constituted a peculiar danger, in that they had the ability, which the Helots lacked, to organize rebellion. In 398 a conspiracy for a general uprising of Inferiors, Helots and Perioeci was actually planned by a disfranchised citizen named Cinadon. This plot, it is true, was easily suppressed, for its author began by talking unguardedly and ended by betraying his accomplices. But since  nothing was done to remove its causes, the discontent of the Inferiors remained a latent peril to the state.

On the other hand, there is little evidence of positive harm accruing from Sparta’s enrichment. The accumulation of money consequent upon the Peloponnesian War must not be confused with the concentration of landed wealth which Aristotle noted as a characteristic of Sparta in his own day, and it is the latter, not the former process, that caused the eventual rapid decline in Sparta’s citizen population. Again, though we need not doubt that those who broke the laws by acquiring gold and silver further contravened them by spending it on what would have seemed to Lycurgus culpable luxury, we must admit that the discipline and endurance of the Spartan home levy was not impaired thereby. In their last losing battles the Spartans displayed the same steady valour as at Thermopylae or Plataea.

Another consequence of Sparta’s aggrandizement was a severe strain upon her man-power. It is not known whether the wastage of the Peloponnesian War had caused a serious absolute decrease in Sparta’s population. But after 404 the enlargement of her responsibilities created fresh calls upon her human resources. For her overseas garrisons, it is true, she employed mercenaries drawn from other Greek districts, but the governors and their staffs were mostly Spartan citizens, and as overseas service was highly popular the numbers of the staff were probably none too small. Thus Sparta’s foreign-service drafts depleted her effectives at home. Hence the Spartan home levies were increasingly diluted with Perioeci. During the Peloponnesian War the normal proportion of Perioeci to Spartans in a field company was three to two; in 390 it was two to one. As a means of increasing their effective man-power, and at the same time of palliating the perpetual discontentment of the serf population, the ephors had, during the Peloponnesian War, granted personal freedom to Helots who volunteered for military service. But this policy was not carried beyond the experimental stage. Enfranchisement on a large scale, by depleting the stock of serf labour which was reckoned indispensable to the cultivation of the land, would have undermined the economic basis of Spartan society. Rather than stint their land the Spartans resolved to eke out their military resources with increased drafts of Perioeci. It must be admitted that this makeshift was remarkably successful. The Perioeci, being incorporated in the same platoons and squads as the Spartans, acquired a sufficient measure of Spartan discipline, and their loyalty stood the test of several hard-fought battles.

The chief source of danger to Sparta’s internal stability lay in the revolutionary ambitions of Lysander, which became a menace to the victors no less than to the vanquished. After the reduction of Samos the Spartan generalissimo accepted divine worship from his clients in that city and surrounded himself with a bevy of court­poets. On the monument erected by him at Delphi out of the spoils of Aegospotami his figure was exhibited in the forefront amid a company of gods, while his vice-admirals stood huddled along the back wall. Lysander’s arrogance bore an ominous resemblance to the demeanour of Pausanias after his victories in the Persian Wars and heralded a fresh attack upon the Spartan constitution.

The trial of strength between the war-winner and the home authorities began in the autumn of 404, when a new board of ephors assumed office. This board proved less complaisant to Lysander than its predecessors. It rebuffed him by breaking up a colony of his former naval officers which he had established on his own authority at Sestos, and it clearly proved its intention of disarming him by taking the final settlement of Athenian affairs out of his hands and transferring it to his enemy, King Pausanias. The policy of the ephors was confirmed by the Council of Elders, who acquitted Pausanias of a charge of treason preferred against him by Lysander’s friends after the king’s return from Athens, and it was continued in 403—2 by the magistrates of that year. In the autumn of 403 or the spring of 402 Lysander was permitted to make a fresh tour of inspection among the overseas dependencies, but he acquired a new enemy in the person of the Persian satrap Pharnabazus, whose territory he plundered in the vain belief that his victim would not dare to ask for redress. Pharnabazus however lodged a complaint at Sparta, and the ephors, who at this stage had good reason not to incur an open breach with Persia, recalled Lysander and several of his harmosts. Lysander obeyed the summons. Unlike the war­winners who overturned the Roman Republic, he could not settle his quarrel with the home authorities by a sudden military coup. The ephorate possessed what the Roman Senate lacked, a home levy whom no foreign-service soldatesca could overawe.

But although Lysander had been disarmed for the time being, he did not finally abandon his hope of a revolution. The dictatorship which he had lost might yet be recovered and set on a permanent basis if only he could secure for himself the succession to the aged king Agis; the usurpation of absolute power which King Cleomenes accomplished in the third century would not lie beyond the means of King Lysander in the fourth. Accordingly he conceived a plan of making the Spartan kingship elective instead of hereditary, and under pretence of a pilgrimage he visited the sanctuary of Zeus Ammon, and also sounded the oracles of Delphi and Dodona, so as to obtain, more Lycurgeo, religious sanction for his constitutional schemes. But the priests could tell the difference between a Lycurgus and a Lysander, and, true to their usual practice, they refused to abet political intrigue. Thus Lysander’s plan broke down at the outset, for nothing short of a divine sanction could have commended his revolutionary proposals to the Spartan folk-moot.

For a while Lysander was reduced to a waiting role. But in 399 a new opportunity offered. In that year the long expected death of King Agis brought about a disputed succession. The claims of the heir-apparent Leotychidas were contested by Agis’ half-brother Agesilaus on the ground that Leotychidas was not a son of Agis but of the Athenian Alcibiades. Into this fray Lysander threw himself with all his vigour, hoping that Agesilaus, who had hitherto made no display of his talents and ambitions, would permit the king-maker to exercise the royal power on his behalf. The eventual success of Agesilaus was no doubt due in part to Lysander, who explained away a warning from Delphi against a ‘lame reign’ as referring not to his client’s physical deformity but to the halting pedigree of Leotychidas. But Agesilaus also owed his election to other causes such as his personal geniality, which had won him many friends, and, in any case, he was not prepared to repay Lysander by becoming his puppet. As we shall see presently, the new king took an early opportunity of declaring his independence, and Lysander henceforth resigned himself to his reduction to the rank of an ordinary citizen.

There was a saying in Sparta that ‘Greece could not have endured two Lysanders’. This is an understatement of the case. Had Lysander realized his ambitions, he would have exercised a despotism in Greece as ruthless as that which Dionysius wielded in Sicily, yet without the justification of a great national emergency which made Dionysius a deliverer no less than an oppressor. Greece and Sparta alike would have found a single Lysander beyond the limits of their endurance.

The reaction of Sparta’s foreign conquests upon her domestic affairs was on the whole singularly small. Her conservatism made her all but impervious to those influences which transformed Rome after the Punic and Macedonian Wars.

 

III. 

SPARTA’S DEPENDENTS IN THE GREEK HOMELAND

 

In the Peloponnese the authority of Sparta, which had been seriously impaired by her early failures in the War, was not wholly restored by her later successes, for the people of Elis took little or no part in the last campaigns against Athens, and in defiance of Sparta’s ruling they retained possession of the borderland of Triphylia. At the close of the War the Spartans took no immediate steps against the Eleans, but in 401 they ordered them to surrender not only Lepreum but all their other dependencies, and in the ensuing year they sent King Agis at the head of a large allied force to coerce them. The Eleans offered a long but purely passive resistance behind the walls of their fortified towns. Agis’ columns, being thus left free to ravage the countryside, did their work so thoroughly and so persistently that in 399 the Eleans sued for peace. The terms of the previous year’s ultimatum were now enforced upon them. Of the dependent communities which were detached from them Triphylia and the villages of the Lower Alpheus valley received their independence, the hill-country on the Arcadian border was made over to the nearest Arcadian communities.

While the Spartans thus repaid the Eleans in full for their insubordination, they offered no return for the loyalty of their remaining allies. Considering that their armies, and still more so their fleets, had been indispensable instruments of Sparta’s victory over Athens, the loyal Peloponnesians were morally, if not legally, entitled to a share of the war-booty, and had they gone further and claimed a voice in the government of Sparta’s new empire overseas, they would scarcely have exceeded their equitable rights. Yet the Spartans appropriated all the fruits of victory to themselves and sent their confederates home empty-handed. This shabby treatment of course did not make the Peloponnesians any the more zealous in fulfilling their treaty obligations, and in their operations against the democrats at the Piraeus, and against the Eleans, the Spartans lacked their usual contingent from Corinth. As we shall see presently, the Corinthians did not stop short at this species of passive resistance. On the other hand, there is no good evidence that at this stage the Spartans introduced harmosts and decarchies into the Peloponnese. Moreover, however much Sparta’s allies might nurse their grievances, they could not readily forget that it was to her that they owed the ‘pax Peloponnesiaca ’ which was their economic mainstay, and in Sparta’s new empire those veterans of the war who wished to make a profession of soldiering could find plenty of employment. The discontent in the Peloponnese would probably not have passed beyond the smouldering stage, had not other fires broken out close by.

Among the neighbouring states the one which contained most inflammable material was Athens. The misrule of the Thirty Tyrants could not but leave many bitter memories here. After the restoration of the democracy several agents of the Thirty had to stand a trial, and we may fairly assume that many victims of the Thirty would have liked to wreak their vengeance on Sparta for installing and abetting these oppressors. The soreness of feeling which the misrule of the Thirty engendered is forcibly illustrated in the forensic speeches which the orator Lysias, himself a victim of their cupidity, directed against one surviving member of them, and against one of their agents. The deadly calm of Lysias’ tone betrays a deep-seated resentment, and the irrelevant vindictive­ness with which he blackens the memory of Theramenes shows that his anger was indiscriminate as well as profound.

Furthermore, the lost empire of Athens could not be readily forgotten by the proletariat who had found their livelihood in the navy and the administrative services, and by the evicted land­owners from the cleruchies. Indeed the hope of restoring the spacious days of Pericles lived on in Athens for another half century and at times became the determinant factor in Athenian politics. Nevertheless in the early years of the restored democracy the desire for revanche was firmly repressed, and the yoke of Sparta was borne with unfaltering acquiescence.

This submissive policy was imposed upon Athens by a new political party which from the fourth century onwards acquired an ever-increasing preponderance. Under stress of the sufferings inflicted by the Peloponnesian War the more solid elements of the Athenian population who subsisted on agriculture and industry began to draw together in opposition to those who lived on the perquisites of empire. After the restoration of 403 these ‘moderates’ made a better economic recovery than the ‘imperial­ists’ whose vocation was now gone. In 401 their numbers were increased by the break-up of the separatist settlement at Eleusis and the repatriation of the moderate section among the emigres. Under the leadership of some old associates of Theramenes who had acquired prestige by sharing in Thrasybulus’ forlorn hope, the new party seized and for several years maintained the initiative in shaping Athenian policy. Under their influence the Athenian people abode strictly by the settlement of 403. The amnesty to political offenders was made secure by a new law which required the law-courts to stay all proceedings against defendants who could show that the amnesty covered their case; and not a single clear instance of the amnesty being broken is on record. To avoid opening up old wounds Anytus, one of the ‘moderate’ leaders, renounced his just claims to properties which had been confiscated under the Thirty, and Thrasybulus himself waived his rights in the same way. For fear of further complications the ‘moderates’ even defeated an equit­able proposal by Thrasybulus that the Athenian franchise should be conferred en bloc upon those foreigners who had flocked to his standard, and only allowed certain selected categories of metics to receive citizenship. The obligations imposed upon Athens by Sparta were likewise observed with religious care. In spite of financial difficulties which drove the Athenians to issue plated coins and even to pronounce unjust sentences of confiscation on well-to-do defendants in the courts, the debts contracted at Sparta by the Thirty were honoured by their successors and gradually repaid, and Athenian contingents were sent to serve under Spartan orders in Elis and Asia Minor. From Athens the Spartans at first had nothing to fear.

The conciliatory attitude of Athens towards Sparta stood in marked contrast to the provocative policy of Thebes. This city owed to the Lacedaemonians its restoration to the headship of the Boeotian League, and while it rendered good service to Sparta during the Peloponnesian War it had fully repaid itself for its exertions by systematically looting the occupied areas of Attica. But when the Thebans claimed their share of the spoils of the maritime war, they were met with a point-blank refusal, despite the fact that they were not dependents of Sparta but free and equal allies. In return for this rebuff they both refused assistance to Sparta in her campaign against Elis and furnished assistance to the exiles whom the Thirty had banished from Athens, and Sparta had endeavoured to outlaw from all Greece. A further cause of offence was provided by Spartan activities in Thessaly  where Thebes had hopes of establishing her own influence. A few years later, when the Spartan king Agesilaus made an unauthorized but inoffensive landing on the Boeotian coast, the Theban government drove him off with threats of open force. Thus were laid the seeds of a long and bitter quarrel, which presently broke out into open war. But the anti-Spartan party in Thebes had to reckon with a strong minority who desired to restore good relations with Sparta, and until they had won allies outside of Boeotia they were in no position to try a fall with their former allies.

Of the remaining Greek states Thessaly alone requires notice here. This district had scarcely been touched by the turmoil of the Peloponnesian War, but ever since the decay of its federal institutions it had been distracted by the conflicting ambitions of its principal landlords, whose wealth enabled them to arm their tenants or to hire professional troops. In 404 Lycophron, the chief noble of Pherae, engaged and heavily defeated the armies of Larissa and other Thessalian towns; but he was presently held in check by Aristippus, who had established a quasi-despotic ascendancy in Larissa and provided himself with a strong mercenary corps. These internal dissensions made Thessaly a prey to foreign intervention. The Macedonian king Archelaus, who had successfully begun the task of modernizing his country and organizing it for foreign conquest, entered Thessaly on the invitation of some exiles from Larissa and made himself master of that town (c. 400 BC). This encroachment on Greek soil by a prince who was an ostentatious patron of Greek culture, yet was regarded by most Greeks as a barbarian, made some impression beyond the borders of Thessaly. A leading Greek rhetorician, Thrasymachus of Chalcedon, issued an appeal on behalf of Larissa, whose gist is probably contained in an extant rhetorical exercise of the second century A.D. The appeal was not without effect, for the Spartans, to whom it was principally directed, actually sent a force which occupied the frontier fortress of Heraclea and installed a garrison at Pharsalus (399 BC). These operations, we may assume, were but the opening moves in a war of liberation against the usurper Archelaus. But in the selfsame year the death of Archelaus, which threw Macedonia into a state of prolonged confusion, automatically set Larissa free. The Spartans thereupon turned their attention from Thessaly in order to pursue with more energy another war of Hellenic deliverance, of which we shall speak presently. For the time being Thessaly was left to its own devices, and Medius, the successor of Aristippus at Larissa, resumed an indecisive war with Lycophron.

This survey of Greek affairs has shown that Sparta missed her chance of establishing a permanent Hellenic peace and prepared for fresh inter-Hellenic conflicts by estranging some of her chief allies. Yet her authority was not immediately threatened with any active rebellion. Like the Athenian empire at the outset of the Peloponnesian War, the Spartan empire at the beginning of the fourth century was too strong to be overthrown without foreign intervention. The first successful attack upon the Spartan empire originated not in Greece but in Persia.

 

IV. 

SPARTA’S RELATIONS WITH PERSIA

 

Of all the legacies which the Peloponnesian War bestowed upon Sparta none was more embarrassing than the debt which she had contracted with Persia in accepting subsidies from that power. By the terms of her pact she was bound to hand over to Persia ‘all the land in Asia which belonged to the King’, i.e. all the Greek cities of Asia Minor whom Sparta had but lately delivered from the yoke of Athens. At the end of the War Sparta stood in an awkward dilemma. By honouring her contract she would dishonour herself in the eyes of Greece. If she went back on her promise, she would furnish Persia with a casus belli, and although she might clear herself morally by offering to refund the subsidies, it was by no means certain whether Persia would forego her legal rights and accept an equitable compromise. Still less certain were the prospects of success in a Persian war. True enough, Persia was not as strong as she was big. Under a succession of weak kings, and none of them weaker than the reigning sovereign, Artaxerxes II, she was beginning to dissolve into her component satrapies, whose rulers were often disloyal both to the King and to each other; and her military machine was woefully out of date. Given the loyal support of her dependents new and old, Sparta need not have feared a trial of strength with Persia, and a victorious Persian war would have been as good a cement for her empire as it had been for the Delian League. But could Sparta make sure that her home front would not fail her? In view of the course which events actually took, she was entitled to have misgivings on this point.

The course which Sparta actually adopted was a series of tacks between the opposite policies of compliance and defiance. In 404, contrary to her compact, she concluded peace with Athens without consulting Persia. On the Hellespontine sea­board, whose satrap Pharnabazus as yet commanded little influence, she kept the Greek towns in her own possession. On the other hand she ceded the Ionian towns to prince Cyrus, whom she could not decently or safely offend. In 401, when Cyrus rebelled against his brother, she gave him every facility to recruit Greek mercenaries and thus incidentally to rid Greece of unemployed soldiers; yet realizing that Cyrus might fail, or that if he succeeded he might become as dangerous to Greece as his name­sake, the founder of the Persian empire, she gave him no overt support. After Cyrus’ death the ephors at first appeared anxious to put themselves right with Artaxerxes. In 400 they forbade the remnant of Cyrus’ Greek auxiliaries to settle down in Pharnabazus’ satrapy and bundled them away into the backwoods of Thrace. But before the year was out they changed their course and definitely broke with Persia.

The reason for this sudden reversal of policy is to be found in the action of the satrap Tissaphernes, who had been reduced during Cyrus’ governorship to the Carian province, but after Cyrus’ death resumed control of Lydia. In 404 Tissaphernes had seized Miletus, the chief Greek town on the Carian coast, and thrown a garrison into it. In 400 he proceeded against the towns of Cyrus’ former province, which had profited by Cyrus’ rebellion to slip out of Persian control, and laid siege to Cyme. The threatened Greek cities appealed to Sparta, and not in vain. It may be that Cyrus’ Anabasis and the retreat of the Ten Thousand were beginning to alter Sparta’s ideas of Persian power. In any case, she had little reason to give anything away to Tissaphernes, for this satrap, unlike Cyrus, had never properly kept his part of the bargain with Sparta in the payment of subsidies; and though Sparta might at a pinch have made an amicable cession of Greek territory to Persia, she could not decently connive at its forcible conquest.

In the autumn of 400 the ephors dispatched an expeditionary force of some 5000 men, mostly Peloponnesians, to Ephesus. On their arrival they discovered that Tissaphernes had withdrawn from Cyme. But their commander Thibron, not to be denied, carried the war into enemy country. After a preliminary foray into the Maeander valley, where the Persian horse soon headed him off, he reinforced himself with the 6000 Greek survivors of Cyrus’ Anabasis, who now passed out of Thrace into Spartan service, and in the summer of 399 opened a new attack in the hilly hinterland of Cyme. In this broken country the Persian cavalry was unable to molest his advance, and its impotence encouraged several local dynasts of Greek origin, and chief among them the lords of the castle of Pergamum, to make common cause with him. On the other hand Thibron made little headway against strongholds which offered resistance. In spite of the contributions which he had imposed upon his allies he ran short of funds; and not having realized enough booty to pay his large forces he weakly gave them licence to plunder the Greek towns where they were quartered. The ephors hereupon, while approving Thibron’s policy of attack, recalled him to Sparta and entrusted the execution of his plans to a former officer of Lysander named Dercyllidas.

The new commander was content at first to carry on Thibron’s campaign; but, thanks to the better discipline which he maintained and to the mutinous disposition of the Greek mercenaries employed by the local dynasts, he met with prompt success. In a whirlwind campaign of eight days he carried the whole coast­line of the Troad and the Scamander valley, and in the castle of Scepsis he seized enough treasure to maintain his 8000 soldiers for a year. At the end of the season the satrap of the Hellespontine region Pharnabazus, who had evidently been caught unprepared, concluded a truce with Dercyllidas, and in the spring of 398 he extended it over the whole of that year. This left Dercyllidas free to undertake a minor but urgent task in the Gallipoli peninsula, where the scattered Greek population was unable to protect its highly cultivated lands from the inroads of plundering Thracians. These inroads Dercyllidas checked for a while by repairing the fortifications on the Bulair isthmus.

So far the Greeks had hardly crossed swords with Tissaphernes, who had, as was his wont, left Pharnabazus in the lurch. Yet until Tissaphernes had been forced to come to an agreement the Greek cities could enjoy no security. In 397 therefore the ephors ordered Dercyllidas to attack Tissaphernes in his Carian province and sent a small naval squadron to co-operate with him. But this double assault was never carried out, for Tissaphernes, who had summoned Pharnabazus to his aid and received his loyal support, was strong enough to threaten a counter-attack upon the Ionian seaboard. Dercyllidas, who had advanced from Ephesus across the Maeander, was caught up on his retreat along the river valley by the Persian field force, and a panic which seized his Asiatic recruits nearly involved the whole Greek army in disaster. But the Peloponnesians and Cyrus’ old troops held firm, and Tissaphernes, who had seen Greek hoplites carrying all before them at Cunaxa, called off his attack.

The campaign of 397 having thus ended in a deadlock, the rival captains arranged an armistice until the ensuing year and threw out feelers to ascertain the terms of a definitive peace. At this stage it is likely that the Spartans would have accepted any settlement that safeguarded the liberties of the Asiatic Greeks. But the Persian commanders made an unreasonable stipulation that the Spartans should withdraw all their troops without offering guarantees as to their own movements. Their object in parleying was probably nothing more than to gain time while a new Persian armament was being prepared in another quarter.

 

V. 

THE PERSIAN THALASSOCRACY

 

In the previous winter Pharnabazus had paid a visit to the Persian court in order to urge upon the King the need of a naval counter-stroke against the Greeks. So successful was his suit that he obtained a commission to raise a fleet, and a sum of 500 talents. With this fund he betook himself to Cyprus, which he had selected for his naval base (spring 397). This island, a standing battle­ground between Greeks and Phoenicians, had since 410 been almost wholly absorbed into the dominion of a Greek captain of fortune named Evagoras. Having wrested the city of Salamis from the Phoenicians by a daring coup de main and installed himself as king of that town, Evagoras had attracted to his service adventurers from all parts of Greece, and with their help he had made such systematic conquests, that by 399 the Greeks had come to call him 'king of Cyprus’. Having made these conquests without any commission from his overlord the Persian king, he further compromised himself by neglecting to pay his tribute. But in 398 he showed a sudden desire to put himself right with Persia and sent up the sums due from him. The reason for this change of policy may be found in the influence exerted upon him by his most distinguished guest, the former Athenian admiral Conon, who was scheming to use Evagoras for the furtherance of his own plans, the avenging of Aegospotami and the restitution of the Athenian empire. Evagoras, who had a sentimental affection for Athens as the focus of Greek culture, and had more than once rendered the Athenians political aid, fell in so far with Conon’s proposals that he allowed him to send a petition to Artaxerxes reinforcing Pharnabazus’ plea. It was no doubt in view of this petition, which was presented at court on Conon’s behalf by the King’s Greek house-surgeon Ctesias, that Pharnabazus resolved to use Evagoras and Conon as his principal coadjutors in the naval war. On his arrival at Salamis he presented Conon with an admiral’s commission from Artaxerxes and left him in charge of the naval preparations. In the summer of 397, as we have seen, Pharnabazus was back on the western front, where he joined hands with Tissaphernes against Dercyllidas. The truce which the satrap subsequently arranged with Dercyllidas was no doubt intended to let Pharnabazus’ naval policy mature.

When news of Persia’s naval effort reached Sparta, the ephors, realizing that the war was taking a critical turn, convened a congress of their allies, the first since 404. The congress resolved on energetic counter-preparations and agreed to raise a fresh expeditionary force of 8000 men for service under the new king Agesilaus (winter 397—6). The decision of the congress was mainly due to Lysander, who at this time still believed that he could use Agesilaus for his own purposes and counted on restoring his dominion in the Aegean area through the king’s agency. In the spring of 396 Lysander went out to Asia as chief of staff to Agesilaus. He immediately set to work to secure appointments of all sorts for his nominees. But the king readily divined Lysander’s purpose and lost no time in asserting his authority. Although Agesilaus had hitherto neither solicited nor received any high command, he was determined to make the most of his present opportunity. Indeed he fancied himself a second Agamemnon leading forth the Greeks in a new Trojan War, and it was in hopes of repeating Agamemnon’s farewell sacrifices at Aulis that he made a preliminary excursion to Boeotia, with results which we have already noticed. He therefore refused to let Lysander exercise any patronage and presently dispensed with his services altogether.

In the campaigns of 396 and 395 Agesilaus revealed unsuspected powers of generalship, and he was well served by his army, whom he infected with his own enthusiasm. At the expiry of the armistice in the summer of 396, he hoodwinked Tissaphernes by a pretended attack on Caria, and, having thus only Pharnabazus left to deal with, made a bold advance into Phrygia, where he plundered freely until a defeat inflicted upon his horse­men by the superior Persian cavalry compelled him to retreat. Having reinforced his mounted contingent, Agesilaus resumed the attack in the spring of 395. This time he played the double bluff on Tissaphernes by proclaiming his intention to attack Sardes and keeping to it. Advancing from Ephesus by way of Smyrna he arrived close to Sardes before Tissaphernes, who had guessed that the real attack would fall on Caria, could overtake him. Before the Persian infantry could come up he decoyed the horse into an ambuscade and put it out of action for that season. Having thus won a free road Agesilaus made a promenade up the Hermus and Cogamis valleys and back along the Maeander. This expedition finally rid the Greeks of Tissaphernes, who was now discredited at the Persian court and put to death at the instance of the mother of his former rival Cyrus. His successor, the vizier Tithraustes, showed even less fight; by offering a six months’ truce and a danegeld of 30 talents he treacherously persuaded Agesilaus to transfer his attention to Pharnabazus. Agesilaus, being thus left free to attack Phrygia, now undertook a truly ambitious invasion. Advancing up the Caicus he gained the Phrygian plateau and came out on the Sangarius valley at Gordium. From here he struck back along the river to the Sea of Marmora, establishing his winter quarters within Pharnabazus’ grounds by Dascylium.

This foray, the last which Agesilaus made on Asian soil, fell short of complete success, in that the Spartan king failed to carry any fortified centre, and therefore could not establish a secure line of communications. Nevertheless he had accomplished a march of some 500 miles without serious hindrance from Pharnabazus, and he had won over the hill-tribes as far east as Paphlagonia for a systematic attack upon Pharnabazus’ province in 394. It is even reported that Agesilaus now dreamt of lopping all Asia Minor from the Persian empire. Not that Agesilaus was in any position to anticipate Alexander’s conquests. His cavalry was weak, his siege-train non-existent, and his tactical ability did not match his undoubted powers as a strategist. From end to end the Spartan campaigns in Asia were mere predatory raids, and as the war went on it became increasingly clear that the invaders could not force a decision. Yet these campaigns fully attained their primary object of protecting the Greek towns; they demonstrated afresh the invincibility of the Greek hoplite; and they brought together the Spartans and their allies in a common enterprise. The reason for their discontinuance after 395 is to be found not in their own lack of success, but in Persia’s effective counter-attacks on other fronts.

In 396 the Persian naval offensive was opened by Conon at the head of an advance squadron of 40 ships, mostly manned by Greek rowers. This flotilla was all but destroyed on its first venture, for the hitherto lethargic Spartan admiral, sallying forth from his base at Rhodes, drove it into the Carian port of Caunus and put it under blockade. The intervention of Tissaphernes and Pharnabazus, who were at this time guaranteed by armistice against an attack from Agesilaus, saved Conon from disaster, for on their approach the Spartan admiral raised the blockade. A further reinforcement of 40 ships which Conon now received enabled him to draw closer to Rhodes, where the mere news of his approach precipitated a democratic revolution and defection from Sparta. The offerings which King Artaxerxes dedicated to Athena at Lindus in memory of this event no more than repaid a just debt, for the example of rebellion set by Rhodes eventually changed the whole face of the war.

In its immediate strategic effects, however, the revolt of Rhodes was of little consequence, for Conon was unable to follow up his success. Owing to the remissness of Artaxerxes in providing funds for the payment of his fleet, the crews became mutinous and could scarcely be prevented from disbanding. It was fortunate for Conon that in 395 no counter-attack was attempted by the Spartan admiral, who was content to wait on some decisive move by Agesilaus on land. After a year’s inaction Conon at length paid personal visits to Tithraustes and to the Persian king (late 395). From both of these sources he drew fresh supplies of money, and from the King he also obtained a commission for Pharnabazus to assume the nominal supreme command by sea. In 394 Pharnabazus and Conon resumed naval operations. To secure better co-operation between the Spartan army and fleet, the ephors had left the choice of an admiral for this year in the hands of Agesilaus, who gave the command to his brother-in-law Peisander, a man who made up in resolution for what he lacked in experience. The new Spartan commander at first showed no more fight than his predecessors. A change on the home front, which we shall describe presently, had compelled Agesilaus to abandon his projected campaign in the interior of Asia Minor and to withdraw the greater part of his forces into Europe. While this retreat was in progress, Peisander was content to cover his brother-in- law’s movements. But after Agesilaus’ departure he offered battle near Cnidus, and with 85 ships of his own engaged the Persian fleet, now augmented to some 100 sail (August 394). On the centenary of Lade history repeated itself. While Peisander’s Peloponnesian crews gave a good account of themselves, the contingents drawn from the insular and Asiatic Greeks broke into a general flight, Peisander himself fell fighting, and the whole of his fleet was sunk or scattered. At one stroke the Persian navy became undisputed master of the Aegean Sea.

How are we to account for the poor spirit displayed by a Greek squadron fighting on behalf of Greek liberty against an enemy over whom the Greeks had held a moral ascendancy since Salamis? In the first place, the Persian navy was largely manned by Greek crews and led by a Greek admiral. Secondly, Sparta’s insular and Asiatic dependents had come to the conclusion that the price paid by them for Spartan protection was too high. The debacle at Cnidus completed the proof of what the revolt at Rhodes had already indicated, that in the Aegean area Sparta had come to be viewed as an oppressor rather than a defender.

Thus in the catastrophe of Cnidus we recognize the fruits of Lysander’s policy of government by harmosts and decarchies. Though little is recorded of the actual performance of these rulers, such evidence as we have plainly shows that they generally followed the example of the Thirty Tyrants at Athens. True enough, after Lysander’s fall in 402 BC the ephors allowed the dependent cities to revert to their previous form of government, and it is not unlikely that they diminished the overseas garrisons. But this arrangement was overturned by Agesilaus, who restored the system of Lysander in all its essential features. In following out this policy the Spartan king did not act at Lysander’s dictation, neither did he have recourse to Lysander’s sanguinary methods. But he copied Lysander’s example in setting up narrow oligarchies drawn from his personal adherents. At first sight it may seem strange that Agesilaus should have repeated Lysander’s mistakes. Jealous as he was of the authority which attached by right to the kingly office, he did not share Lysander’s aspirations to a political dictatorship. But the king was a convinced believer in oligarchic methods of government, and though herein he acted from sentiment rather than cool calculation, he shared Lysander’s excessive zeal on behalf of his personal followers. We may pro­bably acquit Agesilaus’ oligarchies of the gross excesses which marked the rule of Lysander’s decarchies, but we cannot be surprised at their unpopularity, for they exercised an essentially arbitrary rule in communities which were accustomed to a democratic or at any rate a responsible form of government.

The same discontents which caused the loss of Sparta’s fleet at Cnidus brought about the collapse of Sparta’s overseas empire after that defeat. The appearance of Conon’s victorious squadron in Aegean waters was the signal for a general rebellion against Sparta’s authority, and only at a few isolated points, where suf­ficient garrisons had been left by Agesilaus before his departure, was Sparta’s supremacy maintained. In one campaign Sparta lost the fruits of her victory over Athens and was reduced once more to the rank of a continental power.

 

VI. 

THE CORINTHIAN WAR

 

But the loss of her naval empire is not a full measure of the damage which Persia inflicted upon Sparta. The naval attack which obtained its decision at Cnidus was supplemented by a political offensive whose success was equally complete. In 396 Pharnabazus was encouraged by the anti-Spartan insurrection at Rhodes to try the effect of propaganda behind the Spartan fighting line. For this purpose he dispatched a Rhodian named Timocrates—presumably one of the revolutionary leaders—on a diplomatic mission to Greece. Among the states which Timocrates visited, Thebes and Corinth were already estranged from Sparta; and Argos, as usual, was ready to take part where a coalition against Sparta was in the making. At Athens the first news of naval preparations in Cyprus had roused the dormant hopes of a new empire. While Thrasybulus joined hands with the moderates in maintaining a correct attitude towards Sparta, the imperialists, led by Cephalus and Epicrates, sent unofficial messages to Susa and smuggled out men and material to Conon. In these four cities Timocrates secured the ascendancy of a party which desired an open breach with Sparta. As an earnest of Persian support the Rhodian brought with him a liberal supply of gold. The institution of payment for attendance at the Athenian Assembly may be regarded as a result of Timocrates’ bounty; and it is not unlikely that personal bribery played its part in mobilizing opinion against Sparta. But we need not doubt that the promise of Persian co-operation by sea and of further rebellions among Sparta’s over­seas dependents were the main inducements to Sparta’s enemies in Greece Proper to risk an open conflict.

The ‘Corinthian War,’ as this conflict came to be called, was precipitated in summer 395 by the action of Thebes in taking sides in a fortuitous frontier quarrel between the Phocians and Western Locrians, and invading the land of Phocis. Though there is no convincing evidence that this quarrel was originally fomented by the Thebans, it is clear that they overran Phocis with the deliberate intention of forcing war upon Sparta, for when the ephors in answer to an appeal from the Phocians offered to arbi­trate the dispute in a council of their allies, the Thebans refused to negotiate.

In view of their commitments in Asia, the Spartans had good reason to avoid a fresh war at home; but once the war was fastened upon them they took prompt measures to carry it into the enemy country. While King Pausanias assembled the Peloponnesian army, Lysander was commissioned to raise a force of Phocians and other Central Greeks and enter Boeotia by the Cephisus valley. These rapid strokes took the Thebans unawares, for Pausanias crossed Mt Cithaeron without opposition, and Lysander was allowed to carry Orchomenus by friendly overtures and to penetrate into Boeotia as far as Haliartus. At this point Lysander planned to join forces with Pausanias, but his message was intercepted and Pausanias’ march thereby delayed. Nevertheless Lysander attempted a coup de main upon Haliartus, only to find himself trapped between the defenders of the town and a Theban field force which hurried up to the spot. The Spartan general himself was killed and his army routed in this surprise, but had Pausanias come at once to the rescue the defeat might yet have been retrieved. The Spartan king, however, gave the Thebans time to receive reinforcements from Athens, their nearest ally, and rather than risk an engagement with an enemy who had now grown superior in numbers and morale he agreed to evacuate Boeotia under a convention.

On his return to Sparta Pausanias was put on trial and only escaped death by timely flight. The chagrin of the Spartans at the failure of the Boeotian campaign need cause no wonder, for the entire political situation was thereby altered. The quadruple alliance between Thebes, Athens, Corinth and Argos, which had been thrown out of gear by Sparta’s quick initiative, was now put into working order, and a congress was convened at Corinth for the joint prosecution of the war. The first measure of the congress was to invite Sparta’s remaining allies to rebellion. In the Peloponnese the appeal failed in its main purpose, but it deterred the Spartans from ordering any fresh levies for the best part of a year. In Central and Northern Greece, where Sparta’s arm could no longer reach, not only the neighbours of Thebes, such as the Locrians and Euboeans, but the more distant peoples such as the Acarnanians, the Chalcidians and most of the Thessalians, joined the coalition.

In the spring of 394 BC, while Sparta stood inactive, the new coalition assumed the offensive. A joint expedition of Boeotians and Argives co-operated with Medius of Larissa in expelling the Spartan garrison from Pharsalus, and on its way home took by surprise the fortress of Heraclea; another composite army under the Theban Ismenias drove the Phocians out of the field. These preliminary successes encouraged the coalition to force a decision by invading Laconia. At midsummer the full confederate force mustered at Corinth. Had this army advanced forthwith, it might have prevented the concentration of the enemy forces and so reduced Sparta to desperate straits. But the allies wasted time discussing tactical details, and this delay enabled the Spartans to push forward to the Isthmus, collecting their allies as they went. The decisive action of the campaign was therefore fought, not in Laconia, but on the plain between Sicyon and Corinth; and instead of the Spartans facing hopeless odds they brought up a force of 20—25,000 men which roughly equalled that of the enemy. The battle of Nemea was a typical encounter of the pre-scientific age of Greek warfare. As the armies moved up into action the opposing lines edged away to the right, so that each right wing eventually overlapped and enfiladed the adversary’s left. At one end of the field the Argives and Corinthians overbore Sparta’s allies; at the other the Spartans outfought the Athenians, who broke away in disorder, despite the efforts of Thrasybulus to rally them. Thus far the battle remained drawn; but the Spartans checked their pursuit in Cromwellian fashion and caught in the flank three successive enemy divisions as these returned separately to their base, inflicting heavy losses upon each. The action of Nemea was in so far decisive as it deterred the confederates from ever attempting another offensive on a large scale.

From henceforth the Spartans maintained the initiative in the land operations of the war. But they were prevented from exploiting their advantage by the extensive fortifications of the Isthmus, behind which the beaten enemy forces soon rallied. In addition to its own ring wall Corinth had a pair of ‘Long Walls’ to connect it with Lechaeum on the Corinthian Gulf, and a chain of forts to guard the defiles in the mountainous tract between the city and its eastern port of Cenchreae. Before attacking this position the Spartans decided to await the result of a new invasion of Boeotia which befel some two or three weeks after Nemea.

In the spring of 394 the ephors, believing that all available men were required for home defence, recalled Agesilaus from Asia. The Spartan king, however loth to abandon his crusade against Persia, obeyed the home government’s summons with prompt loyalty. Leaving only a few garrisons in Asia he made a rapid march home through Macedonia and Thessaly with the greater part of his forces. In Thessaly the horsemen of the cities allied to Thebes hovered round his column but dared not engage him at close quarters. Thus Agesilaus arrived unscathed in Central Greece, where he received reinforcements from Phocis and Orchomenus and a division which came from the Peloponnese across the Corinthian Gulf. Advancing with this combined force into Boeotia he was brought to battle in the gap of Coronea by a general levy of the coalition states. In this encounter, as at Nemea, each right wing routed its opponents; the victorious Spartans thereupon turned inward to cut off the winners on the other flank; but the Theban division thus intercepted rallied and despite heavy casualties cut its way clear through the Spartan obstruction. In effect, Coronea was a Theban victory, for it definitely stayed Agesilaus’ advance. Having left a small force to protect Orchomenus and Phocis and disbanded the veterans of his Asiatic campaigns, the Spartan king led back the rest of his force to the Peloponnese by way of the Corinthian Gulf.

The failure of Agesilaus’ Boeotian campaign left the Spartans no effective point of attack except at Corinth, which was the keystone of the enemy coalition. A tedious war of positions ensued round this city. At first the Spartans tried the effect of systematically ravaging the Corinthian territory. By 393 the Corinthian landowners began to agitate for peace. But the Corinthian war-party met this clamour by instituting a massacre among its opponents and calling in a garrison from Argos. For the rest of the war Corinth remained under Argive control: nominally it was even absorbed into the Argive state and stood to Argos as Acharnae or Marathon stood to Athens. Some Corinthian dissentients nevertheless contrived to admit a Spartan force within the Long Walls. Having gained a foothold within the Corinthian lines, the Spartans not only defeated a determined attempt by a large confederate force to dislodge them, but made a clear gap through the Long Walls, and captured the ports of Lechaeum on the western, of Sidus and Crommyon on the eastern seaboards of Corinth.

The blockade thus established round Corinth was relieved in 392 by the Athenians, who realized that if Corinth fell the way would lie open for a Spartan invasion of Attica. Lechaeum and the Long Walls were recaptured by the Athenian hoplite levy, and the Long Walls were repaired by an Athenian labour corps. The pressure upon Corinth was further eased by an Athenian flying column which penetrated the Peloponnese as far as Arcadia. The leader of this column was a soldier of fortune named Iphicrates, who may be regarded as the prototype of the fourth­century condottieri. His soldiers, professionals like himself, constituted the first of those light corps which henceforth played a substantial part in Greek military history. While they dispensed with the expensive equipment of the hoplite, these ‘peltasts’ were drilled with no less care than the heavy troops and under favourable circumstances could defeat them in a set combat. Iphicrates’ corps at once established an ascendancy over Sparta’s allies, and its forays must have seriously hampered Sparta’s operations against Corinth.

The campaigns of 393-2 on the Greek mainland thus ended in a stalemate. We must now follow the course of the naval war from the battle of Cnidus. In 394 the victorious Persian fleet sailed up the east Aegean coast, expelling the Spartan garrisons as it went. In 393 it made a prolonged cruise in European waters. After a preliminary descent on the coast of Laconia and on Cythera, where an Athenian governor was left in charge, Pharnabazus and Conon repaired to the Isthmus and contracted a formal treaty of alliance between Persia and the enemies of Sparta in Greece. Having made a parting gift of money to his new allies, Pharnabazus sailed home. But Conon obtained permission from his colleague to take a strong detachment to Athens and to employ the crews and the remainder of Pharnabazus’ funds in reconstructing the Long Walls. The repair of these fortifications had been commenced in 394 with the help of Thebes and other allies, but owing to lack of funds and labour the work had proceeded but slowly. With Conon’s assistance the Long Walls were practically completed in 393, though they did not receive the finishing touches until 391. It is not unlikely that the sudden emission of gold coins from the mint of Thebes at this period was an effect of the Persian subsidies.

 

VII.

A NEW PACT BETWEEN SPARTA AND PERSIA

 

 The visit of Conon to Athens had a far-reaching effect on the war. After the restoration of the Long Walls the Athenians were free to take a lesser interest in the politics of the mainland and to devote themselves again to maritime expansion. The impulse to this renewal of the old imperial policy was given by Conon himself, who stayed on in Athens after the departure of his fleet and resumed active Athenian citizenship. Though he failed in an attempt to negotiate a treaty with the Syracusan despot Dionysius, Conon succeeded in contracting alliances with several of the Aegean cities recently liberated by him. These states, having forfeited the protection of Sparta, had now to consider whether they could stand alone. True enough, they had little to fear from Pharnabazus, who had promised to respect the autonomy of the towns set free by him and Conon, and not to impose garrisons upon them. But though Pharnabazus might be trusted, there was little likelihood of other Persian governors keeping their hands off. In view of these risks the Aegean cities began to cast about for fresh alliances. One short-lived League, in which Rhodes, Cnidus, Iasus, Samos, Ephesus and Byzantium were associated, has come to our notice through its coins. The common type of these pieces, Heracles strangling the snakes, was evidently borrowed from Thebes, which had recently adopted it for the Boeotian coins as a symbol of liberty. But the general tendency among the Aegean states was to seek a rapprochement with Athens. In 393, or shortly after, Rhodes, Cos, Cnidus, Carpathus, Eretria are known to have made fresh alliances with Athens, and the same probably holds true of Ephesus, Chios, Erythrae, Mitylene and some other towns. At the same time the Athenians resumed possession of Lemnos, Imbros and Scyros, and by 390 they had recovered the sacred island of Delos.

This gathering of the fruits of Persia’s victory by Athens afforded Sparta an opportunity of creating a rift between Persia and her Greek allies. In pursuit of this war-aim, the ephors decided to write off their overseas possessions, which in any case appeared irrecoverable, and to execute another volte-face in their Persian policy. At the end of 393 a Spartan envoy named Antalcidas visited Tiribazus, the new satrap of Lydia, and protested that Sparta, not Athens, was his friend. In proof thereof he declared that Sparta was now prepared to cede all the Greek cities of Asia to Persia and stipulated nothing beyond the enjoyment of their autonomy for the other states of Greece, whereas Athens was plainly reviving the anti-Persian imperialism of Cimon’s age. With these arguments Antalcidas carried his point against the pleas of a counter-embassy from Athens, Thebes, Corinth and Argos. In proof of his conversion Tiribazus at once supplied the Spartan with money for the equipment of a new fleet and arrested Conon, the head of the Athenian mission, as a deserter from the Persian navy.

Tiribazus’ reversal of policy was supported by the logic of facts, and it was eventually confirmed by the Persian court. But when the Lydian satrap went to Susa to obtain a royal warrant for his procedure he found that the King was little disposed to transfer his affections at such short notice. Far from sanctioning Tiribazus’ change of front, Artaxerxes detained him at court and sent an officer named Struthas, with Ionia for his province, to resume active co-operation with Athens (end of 392). Meantime Conon escaped from prison and returned to his patron Evagoras, but, before he could render further aid to the Athenians, he fell sick and died.

Stung by the rejection of their advances, the ephors prepared to resume active warfare with Persia, and at the same time opened negotiations with their enemies in Greece. In the winter of 392—1 they summoned a peace congress to Sparta and proposed a general settlement on the basis of ‘autonomy for all.’ Under this convenient formula, which was henceforth impressed into service wherever diplomatists met to settle the map of Greece, Sparta offered to let Athens complete her fortifications, rebuild her fleet and retain her new connections with the Aegean states; from Argos she required the liberation of Corinth and from Thebes a guarantee not to coerce Orchomenus. The Thebans, who had come to consider that the war was a luxury beyond their means, assented to these conditions; the Argives refused on behalf of themselves and Corinth. At Athens the case for acceptance was put in a still extant speech by the envoy Andocides, who had no difficulty in showing that Sparta was offering a good bargain. But his arguments were met with the familiar cries, ‘we want back our cleruchies,’ and ‘the democracy is in danger.’ Andocides and his colleagues were sent into exile for their pains; the terms which they brought from Sparta were rejected.

Had the Assembly voted for peace, Argos must certainly have given way, and a settlement more equitable than that of 386 would have been the result. As it was, Athens dragged Thebes back into the war, and hostilities were resumed in 391 along the whole front. At first the fighting went in favour of Sparta. King Agesilaus once more pierced the Long Walls of Corinth, while his brother Teleutias with a Spartan fleet recaptured Lechaeum. In 390 the king passed through the gap in the Long Walls to the eastern side of the Isthmus and wrested from the Argives the stewardship of the Isthmian festival then in process of celebration. After dealing this coup de théâtre he returned to the Corinthian Gulf and carried the posts of Peiraeum and Oenoe in the extreme north of the Corinthian territory. By these captures he deprived Corinth of its remaining pasture-grounds and severed its communications with Boeotia.

Corinth was now in greater danger than ever; but once more the Athenians came to the rescue. Shortly after the fall of Peiraeum the corps of Iphicrates caught a company of 600 Spartans marching to Lechaeum without the usual flank-guard of cavalry. Choosing their own range and rallying promptly from each counter-attack, the peltasts had the hoplites at their mercy; under the fire of their javelins the Spartan company broke into pieces and was all but destroyed. Though this encounter was no true measure of the relative merits of weight and speed in battle, yet by its moral effect it profoundly influenced the course of the war. A separate peace overture which the Boeotians had been making to King Agesilaus was hastily withdrawn. On the other hand, the prestige of the Spartan fighting forces was so much lowered that they could scarcely maintain discipline among Sparta’s auxiliaries.

After the battle of Lechaeum Iphicrates followed up his success by recapturing the posts of Oenoe, Sidus and Crommyon. The blockade of Corinth was thus once more broken. But Iphicrates’ exploits did not lure Athens or her allies into more ambitious ventures. Once Corinth had been made safe, they remained content to hold their ground. On the other hand, the Spartans were henceforth reduced to making mere demonstrations. In 389 and 388 Agesilaus made two successful forays into Acarnania. By these expeditions he confirmed the loyalty of the Achaeans, whose outlying possessions on the north coast of the Gulf were now restored to them, and made the Acarnanians purchase peace at the price of their independence; but he derived no strategic advantage from them. In 387 Agesipolis, the successor of King Pausanias, invaded Argolis but occupied no permanent posts there.

The only other land operation that requires notice was an expedition which the Spartans directed against Struthas in 391. Its commander Thibron was even more unfortunate than in 399. Having recovered possession of Ephesus for a base, he made plundering incursions into the Maeander valley, but was presently killed with a great part of his force in a surprise attack by Struthas’ horse. This was Sparta’s last Anabasis into Asia.

The issue of the Corinthian War was thus left to be fought out on sea. While Artaxerxes was practising his usual economies by laying up his ships, Athens in misplaced reliance on him had dispensed with a fleet of her own. This gave the Spartans a new opportunity. With Tiribazus’ subsidies they had built a fresh squadron which eventually totalled 27 sail. In 390 this flotilla recaptured Samos and Cnidus and made preparations for the reconquest of Rhodes. But here its achievements came to an end. In 389 a new Athenian fleet of 40 sail appeared under Thrasybulus. In this last campaign of his the hero of Phyle made no direct attack upon the Spartans. His chief preoccupation was to raise funds for the upkeep of his squadron. To this end he re­imposed the customs duties of the Delian Confederacy on the cities which had again allied with Athens, and plundered the territories of the rest. The penury of Thrasybulus, and the methods by which he relieved it, epitomize the decline and fall of the revived Athenian Empire. They were fatal to Thrasybulus himself, who was killed during a piratical raid on Aspendus in southern Asia Minor, and to his treasurer Ergocles, whom the Athenians subsequently executed on a charge of extortion and embezzlement. Nevertheless Thrasybulus achieved some important successes. In the northern Aegean he enrolled Thasos as an ally. By winning over Byzantium and Chalcedon and securing the friendship of the Thracian chieftains on either side of the Gallipoli peninsula, he restored the free use of the Black Sea route to Athens. With the help of the Mityleneans he conquered all the minor towns of Lesbos. In addition, the mere presence of his fleet prevented fresh conquests by the Spartan squadron.

In 388-7 the centre of operations shifted to the Dardanelles, where Dercyllidas had retained the key positions of Sestos and Abydos for Sparta. Here again the Athenians got the upper hand, for under Iphicrates’ leadership they penned up Dercyllidas’ successor in Abydos.

But the decision in the naval war was imposed not by Athens but by Persia, and Persia’s final stroke was delivered in aid of Sparta against Athens. The reason for Persia’s ultimate rally to the side of Sparta is to be found in a new turn of events on Cyprus, where King Evagoras resumed his attack upon the communities, both Greek and Phoenician, which had not yet submitted to him, and thus roused the suspicions of his Persian overlord. In defence of the threatened cities Artaxerxes mobilized a fresh army under the new Lydian satrap Autophradates, and a fleet under a native dynast named Hecatomnus who had succeeded Tissaphernes in the satrapy of Caria. Evagoras in turn invoked the aid of the Athenians, and they with greater chivalry than discretion sent two small squadrons to his support (389 and 387 BC). The warning which Antalcidas had given to Tiribazus about the dangers of a revived Athenian Empire thus came true. In 388 moreover the same envoy was sent by the ephors to Susa to drive home his point. Artaxerxes now required no further convincing. To give effect to his new friendship with Sparta he recalled Pharnabazus from Phrygia and reinstated Tiribazus in Lydia.

In 387 Tiribazus had a small squadron ready to co­operate with the Spartans. In the same year Dionysius of Syracuse, who had in past years received support from Sparta, sent 20 ships in answer to an appeal for assistance. Antalcidas, taking charge of the combined squadrons of Sparta, Persia and Syracuse, 80 sail in all, was now able to deal a decisive blow. With this overwhelming force he entered the Dardanelles and cut off the Athenian fleet.

The way to a general peace was thus laid open, for the Athenians, who had previously been the chief obstacle to a settlement, now became most eager for it. The new empire for whose sake they had prolonged the war had proved a burden rather than a benefit. Besides the contributions levied upon the allies, the upkeep of their navy had entailed a property-tax and increased customs duties upon themselves. Athenian commerce had suffered at the hands of a flotilla established by the Spartans at Aegina, and the Piraeus itself had been raided by this force. Thus the policy of naval expansion, which the landowners of Attica had steadily opposed, fell into temporary disfavour with the urban population of Athens and Piraeus. A contemporary comedy of Aristophanes, the Plutus, shows that the old spirit of adventure, to which he had formerly given expression in his Birds, was for the time being dead: the dominant issue for the Athenians was now to make ends meet. At the news of Antalcidas’ successes the price of corn rose sharply and completed the disillusionment of the imperialists.

Towards the end of 387 Tiribazus summoned delegates from all the belligerents to Sardes to receive conditions of peace; and the delegates came. The terms proved to be the same as Antalcidas had suggested in 393: all the Asiatic mainland and the island of Cyprus to be the King’s; Lemnos, Imbros and Scyros to remain Athenian dependencies, as of old; all other Greek states, great and small, to receive autonomy.

When the delegates referred this paix octroyée to their respective states, there was some demur on the part of the Argives, who wanted to keep Corinth in their own pocket, and of the Thebans, who apprehended that in the name of autonomy they would have to dissolve the Boeotian League. But Athens gave these recalcitrants no support, and the mere mobilization of a general Peloponnesian levy by King Agesilaus sufficed to disarm their opposition. Early in 386 the peace was everywhere accepted and carried into effect: the Athenians dissolved their alliances in the Aegean area, the Argives withdrew from Corinth, and the Thebans conceded full independence to the other Boeotian cities. Thus the Corinthian War was concluded by a settlement which was sometimes styled the ‘Peace of Antalcidas,’ but was commonly known by the more appropriate name of the ‘ King’s Peace.’

 

 

CHAPTER III

THE SECOND ATHENIAN LEAGUE