Plutarch's Lives Volume
IV
Source: Plutarch. Lives. The Internet Classics
Archive at MIT. Copyright statement: The Internet Classics Archive by Daniel
C. Stevenson, daniels@media.mit.edu. World Wide Web presentation Copyright
(C) 1994-2001, Daniel C. Stevenson. All rights reserved under international
and pan-American copyright conventions, including the right of reproduction
in whole or in part in any form. Direct permission requests to classics@classics.mit.edu.
The provenance of this text is obscure. The lives and comparisons are
the same as those in Volume IV of the Shakespeare Head edition used in
Volume III, but the translation is that of John Dryden (1683-86) as improved
by Arthur Hugh Clough in 1864. The MIT Internet version agrees with the
Modern Library Giant Edition (ca. 1950), which appears to be a reprint
of Clough's, except in pagination, and I have no idea where that comes
from.
Before using any portion of this text in any theme, essay, research
paper, thesis, or dissertation, please read the disclaimer.
Transcription conventions: Words or phrases singled out for indexing
are marked by plus signs. In the index, numbers in parentheses indicate
how many times the item appears. I have allowed Greek passages to stand
as the scanner read them, in unintelligible strings of characters.
Table of Contents:
Lysander+ | Sylla+ | Lysander &
Sylla_+ | Cimon+ |
Lucullus+ | Lucullus & Cimon_+
| Nicias+ |
Crassus+ | Crassus & Nicias_+
| Sertorius+ |
Eumenes+ | Sertorius & Eumenes_+
Index: Academy+(1)
| affability+(1) |
affable+(3) | ambition+(1) |
Ambition+(2) | anger+(1) |
Aristotle's+(1) | Atistotle+(1)
| avarice+(1) | birth+(1)
| Blunt+(1) | boasting+(1)
| bountiful+(1) |
brag+(3)
| breach_of_faith+(1) |
brother+(1) | Cassius+(1) |
Cicero+(1) | clemency+(4) |
coincidences+(1) | common+(2) |
condescension+(1) | constancy+(3)
| death+(1) |
decimation+(1) | easiness+(1)
| effeminacy+(3) |
eloquence+(1) | exclusive+(1)|
Falstaff+(4) | flatterers+(1)
| flattering+(1) |
flattery+(2) | formality+(1)
| fortitude+(2) |
fortunate+(1) | fortune+(6) |
Fortune*+(1) | Fortune+(1) | |
friendship+(1) | frugality+(1)
| gifts+(1) | glory+(1)
| Gloucester+(1) |
good_nature+(1) | good_will+(1)
| gratitude+(1) |
gravity+(1) | Hal+(1) |
Hamlet+(3) | Harfleur+(6) |
Hen4+(1) | honest+(1) |
Hotspur+(6) | inconstancy+(1)
| incorrupt+(1) |
interest+(2) | just+(1) |
justice+(2) | Lais+(1) |
lend+(1) | liberal_arts+(1)
| liberality+(1) |
lion_fox+(3) | love+(1) |
Lucca+(1) | lucky+(1) |
luxurious+(1) | luxury+(1) |
Macbeth+(1) | magnanimity+(1)
| magnificent+(1) |
modest+(1) | money_lenders+(1)
| moon+(1) |
natural_philosophers+(1) | non_nobis+(1)
| ostracism+(1) |
pedantic+(1)
| pleasure+(1) |
poverty+(6) | Providence+(1)
| puffed+(2) | ransom+(1)
| rash+(1) | republic+(1)
| Roxana+(1) |
self_control+(1) | seventy+(1)
| shirking+(1) |
Shylock+(1) | simplicity+(1)
| Socrates+(1) |
Statira+(1) | stone+(1) |
superciliousness+(1) | superstition+(1)
| temperance+(1) |
Thucydides+(1) | timorousness+(1)
| tyrant+(1) |
unfaithfulness+(1) |
unsociable+(1)
| usury+(1) | Venus+(1)
| virgin_birth+(1) |
voluptuousness+(1) | vulgar+(1)
| wastefully+(1) |
wrath+(1) | yahoo+(1) |
<<Plut4-1>
~Lysander+
The treasure-chamber of the Acanthians at Delphi has this inscription:
"The spoils which Brasidas and the Acanthians took from the Athenians."
And, accordingly, many take the marble statue, which stands within the
building by the gates, to be Brasidas's; but, indeed, it is Lysander's,
representing him with his hair at full length, after the old fashion, and
with an ample beard. Neither is it true, as some give out, that because
the Argives, after their great defeat, shaved themselves for sorrow, that
the Spartans contrariwise triumphing in their achievements, suffered their
hair to grow; neither did the Spartans come to be ambitious of wearing
long hair, because the Bacchiadae, who fled from Corinth to Lacedaemon,
looked mean and unsightly, having their heads all close cut. But
this, also, is indeed one of the ordinances of Lycurgus, who, as it is
reported, was used to say, that long hair made good-looking men more beautiful,
and ill-looking men more terrible.
<<Plut4-2>
* Lysander's father is said to have been Aristoclitus, who was not
indeed of the royal family but yet of the stock of the Heraclidae. He was
brought up in poverty, and showed himself obedient and conformable, as
ever any one did, to the customs of his country; of a manly spirit, also,
and superior to all pleasures, excepting only that which their good actions
bring to those who are honoured and successful; and it is accounted no
base thing in Sparta for their young men to be overcome with this kind
of pleasure. For they are desirous, from the very first, to have
their youth susceptible to good and bad repute, to feel pain at disgrace,
and exultation at being commended; and any one who is insensible and unaffected
in these respects is thought poor-spirited and of no capacity for virtue.Ambition+
and the passion for distinction were thus implanted in his character by
his Laconian education, nor, if they continued there, must we blame his
natural disposition much for this. But he was submissive to great
men, beyond what seems agreeable to the Spartan temper, and could easily
bear the haughtiness of those who were in power, when it was any way for
his advantage, which some are of opinion is no small part of political
discretion. Aristotle, who says all great characters are more or less atrabilious,
as Socrates and Plato and Hercules were, writes that Lysander, not indeed
early in life, but when he was old, became thus affected. What is
singular in his character is that he endured
poverty+ very well and that he was not at all enslaved or corrupted
by wealth, and yet he filled his country with riches and the love of them,
and took away from them the glory of not admiring money; importing amongst
them an abundance of gold and silver after the Athenian war, though keeping
not one drachma for himself. When Dionysius, the tyrant, sent his
daughters some costly gowns of Sicilian manufacture, he would not receive
them, saying he was afraid they would make them look more unhandsome.
But a while after, being sent ambassador from the same city to the same
tyrant, when he had sent him a couple of robes, and bade him choose which
of them he would, and carry to his daughter: "She," said he, "will be able
to choose best for herself," and taking both of them, went his way.
<<Plut4-3>
The Peloponnesian war having now been carried on a long time, and it
being expected, after the disaster of the Athenians in Sicily, that they
would at once lose the mastery of the sea, and ere long be routed everywhere,
Alcibiades, returning from banishment, and taking the command, produced
a great change, and made the Athenians again a match for their opponents
by sea; and the Lacedaemonians, in great alarm at this, and calling up
fresh courage and zeal for the conflict, feeling the want of an able commander
and of a powerful armament, sent out Lysander to be admiral of the seas.
Being at Ephesus, and finding the city well affected towards him, and favourable
to the Lacedaemonian party, but in ill condition, and in danger to become
barbarized by adopting the manners of the Persians, who were much mingled
among them, the country of Lydia bordering upon them, and the king's generals
being quartered there for a long time, he pitched his camp there, and commanded
the merchant ships all about to put in thither, and proceeded to build
ships of war there; and thus restored their ports by the traffic he created,
and their market by the employment he gave, and filled their private houses
and their workshops with wealth, so that from that time the city began,
first of all, by Lysander's means, to have some hopes of growing to that
stateliness and grandeur which now it is at.
<<Plut4-4>
Understanding that Cyrus, the king's son, was come to Sardis, he went
up to talk with him, and to accuse Tisaphernes, who, receiving a command
to help the Lacedaemonians, and to drive the Athenians from the sea, was
thought, on account of Alcibiades, to have become remiss and unwilling,
and by paying the seamen slenderly to be ruining the fleet. Now Cyrus was
willing that Tisaphernes might be found in blame, and be ill reported of,
as being, indeed, a dishonest man, and privately at feud with himself.
By these means, and by their daily intercourse together, Lysander, especially
by the submissiveness of his conversation, won the affection of the young
prince, and greatly roused him to carry on and when he would depart, Cyrus
gave him a banquet, and desired him not to refuse his goodwill, but to
speak and ask whatever he had a mind to, and that he should not be refused
anything whatsoever: "Since you are so very kind," replied Lysander, "I
earnestly request you to add one penny to the seamen's pay, that instead
of three pence, they may now receive four pence." Cyrus, delighted with
his public spirit, gave him ten thousand darics, out of which he added
the penny to the seamen's pay, and by the renown of this in a short time
emptied the ships of the enemies, as many would come over to that side
which gave the most pay, and those who remained, being disheartened and
mutinous, daily created trouble to the captains. Yet for all Lysander
had so distracted and weakened his enemies, he was afraid to engage by
sea, Alcibiades being an energetic commander, and having the superior number
of ships, and having been hitherto, in all battles, unconquered both by
sea and land.
<<Plut4-5>
But afterwards, when Alcibiades sailed from Samos to Phocaea, leaving
Antiochus, the pilot, in command of all his forces, this Antiochus, to
insult Lysander, sailed with two galleys into the port of the Ephesians,
and with mocking and laughter proudly rowed along before the place where
the ships lay drawn up. Lysander, in indignation, launched at first
a few ships only and pursued him, but as soon as he saw the Athenians come
to his help, he added some other ships, and, at last, they fell to a set
battle together; and Lysander won the victory, and taking fifteen of their
ships, erected a trophy. For this, the people in the city being angry,
put Alcibiades out of command, and finding himself despised by the soldiers
in Samos, and ill spoken of, he sailed from the army into the Chersonese.
And this battle, although not important in itself, was made remarkable
by its consequences to Alcibiades.
<<Plut4-6>
Lysander, meanwhile, invited to Ephesus such persons in the various
cities as he saw to be bolder and haughtier-spirited than the rest, proceeded
to lay the foundations of that government by bodies of ten, and those revolutions
which afterwards came to pass, stirring up and urging them to unite in
clubs and apply themselves to public affairs, since as soon as ever the
Athenians should be put down, the popular government, he said, should be
suppressed and they should become supreme in their several countries.
And he made them believe these things by present deeds, promoting those
who were his friends already to great employments, honours, and offices,
and, to gratify their covetousness, making himself a partner in injustice
and wickedness. So much so, that all flocked to him, and courted
and desired him, hoping, if be remained in power, that the highest wishes
they could form would all be gratified. And therefore, from the very
beginning, they could not look pleasantly upon Callicratidas, when he came
to succeed Lysander as admiral; nor, afterwards, when he had given them
experience that he was a most noble and just person, were they pleased
with the manner of his government, and its straightforward, Dorian,
honest+ character. They did, indeed, admire his virtue, as they
might the beauty of some hero's image; but their wishes were for Lysander's
zealous and profitable support of the interests of his friends and partisans,
and they shed tears, and were much disheartened when he sailed from them.
He himself made them yet more disaffected to Callicratidas; for what remained
of the money which had been given him to pay the navy, he sent back again
to Sardis, bidding them, if they would, apply to Callicratidas himself,
and see how he was able to maintain the soldiers. And, at the last,
sailing away, he declared to him that he delivered up the fleet in possession
and command of the sea. But Callicratidas, to expose the emptiness
of these high pretensions, said, "In that case, leave Samos on the left
hand, and sailing to Miletus, there deliver up the ships to me; for if
we are masters of the sea, we need not fear sailing by our enemies in Samos."
To which Lysander answering, that not himself but he commanded the ships,
sailed to Peloponnesus, leaving Callicratidas in great perplexity.
For neither had he brought any money from home with him, nor could he endure
to tax the towns or force them, being in hardship enough. Therefore,
the only course that was to be taken was to go and beg at the doors of
the king's commanders, as Lysander had done; for which he was most unfit
of any man, being of a generous and great spirit, and one who thought it
more becoming for the Greeks to suffer any damage from one another than
to flatter and wait at the gates of barbarians, who, indeed, had gold enough,
but nothing else that was commendable. But being compelled by necessity,
he proceeded to Lydia, and went at once to Cyrus's house, and sent in word
that Callicratidas, the admiral, was there to speak with him; one of those
who kept the gates replied, "Cyrus, O stranger, is not now at leisure,
for he is drinking." To which Callicratidas answered, most innocently,
"Very well, I will wait till he has done his draught." This time, therefore,
they took him for some clownish fellow, and he withdrew, merely laughed
at by the barbarians; but when, afterwards, he came a second time to the
gate, and was not admitted, he took it hardly and set off for Ephesus,
wishing a great many evils to those who first let themselves be insulted
over by these barbarians, and taught them to be insolent because of their
riches; and added vows to those who were present, that as soon as ever
he came back to Sparta, he would do all he could to reconcile the Greeks,
that they might be formidable to barbarians, and that they should cease
henceforth to need their aid against one another. But Callicratidas,
who entertained purposes worthy a Lacedaemonian, and showed himself worthy
to compete with the very best of Greece, for his justice, his greatness
of mind and courage, not long after, having been beaten in a sea fight
at Arginusae, died.
<<Plut4-7>
And now, affairs going backwards, the associates in the war sent an
embassy to Sparta, requiring Lysander to be their admiral, professing themselves
ready to undertake the business much more zealously if he was commander;
and Cyrus also sent to request the same thing. But because they had
a law which would not suffer any one to be admiral twice, and wished, nevertheless,
to gratify their allies, they gave the title of admiral to one Aracus,
and sent Lysander nominally as vice-admiral, but, indeed, with full powers.
So he came out, long wished for by the greatest part of the chief persons
and leaders in the towns, who hoped to grow to greater power still by his
means, when the popular governments should be everywhere destroyed.
<<Plut4-8>
But to those who loved honest and noble behaviour in their commanders,
Lysander, compared with Callicratidas, seemed cunning and subtle, managing
most things in the war by deceit, extolling what was just when it was profitable,
and when it was not, using that which was convenient, instead of that which
was good; and not judging truth to be in nature better than falsehood,
but setting a value upon both according to interest. He would laugh
at those who thought Hercules's posterity ought not to use deceit in war:
"For where the lion's skin will not reach, you must patch it out with the
fox's." {lion_fox+}
Such is the conduct recorded of him in the business about Miletus when
his friends and connections, whom he had promised, raised to assist in
suppressing popular government, and expelling their political opponents,
had altered their minds, and were reconciled to their enemies, he pretended
openly as if he was pleased with it, and was desirous to further the reconciliation,
but privately he railed at and abused them, and provoked them to set upon
the multitude. And as soon as ever he perceived a new attempt to
be commencing, he at once came up, and entered into the city, and the first
of the conspirators he lit upon, he pretended to rebuke, and spoke roughly,
as if he would punish them; but the others, meantime, he bade be courageous,
and to fear nothing, now he was with them. And all this acting and
dissembling was with the object that the most considerable men of the popular
party might not fly away, but might stay in the city and be killed; which
so fell out, for all who believed him were put to death.
<<Plut4-9>
There is a saying also, recorded by Androclides, which makes him guilty
of great indifference to the obligations of an oath. His recommendation,
according to this account, was to "cheat boys with dice, and men with oaths,"
an imitation of Polycrates of Samos, not very honourable to a lawful commander,
to take example, namely, from a tyrant; nor in character with Laconian
usages, to treat gods as ill as enemies, or, indeed, even more injuriously
since he who overreaches by an oath admits that he fears his enemy, while
he despises his God.
<<Plut4-10>
Cyrus now sent for Lysander to Sardis, and gave him some money, and
promised him some more, youthfully protesting in favour to him, that if
his father gave him nothing, he would supply him of his own; and if he
himself should be destitute of all, he would cut up, he said, to make money,
the very throne upon which he sat to do justice, it being made of gold
and silver; and, at last on going up into Media to his father, he ordered
that he should receive the tribute of the towns, and committed his government
to him, and so taking his leave, and desiring him not to fight by sea before
he returned, for he would come back with a great many ships out of Phoenicia
and Cilicia, departed to visit the king.
<<Plut4-11>
Lysander's ships were too few for him to venture to fight, and yet
too many to allow of his remaining idle; he set out, therefore, and reduced
some of the islands, and wasted Aegina and Salamis; and from thence landing
in Attica, and saluting Agis, who came from Decelea to meet him, he made
a display to the land-forces of the strength of the fleet as though he
could sail where he pleased, and were absolute master by sea. But
hearing the Athenians pursued him, he fled another way through the island
into Asia. And finding the Hellespont without any defence, he attacked
Lampsacus with his ships by sea; while Thorax, acting in concert with him
with the land army, made an assault on the walls; and so having taken the
city by storm, he gave it up to his soldiers to plunder. The fleet
of the Athenians, a hundred and eighty ships, had just arrived at Elaeus
in the Chersonese; and hearing the news, that Lampsacus was destroyed,
they presently sailed to Sestos; where, taking in victuals, they advanced
to Aegos Potami, over against their enemies, who were still stationed about
Lampsacus. Amongst other Athenian captains who were now in command
was Philocles, he who persuaded the people to pass a decree to cut off
the right thumb of the captives in the war, that they should not be able
to hold the spear, though they might the oar.
<<Plut4-12>
Then they all rested themselves, hoping they should have battle the
next morning. But Lysander had other things in his head; he commanded
the mariners and pilots to go on board at dawn, as if there should be a
battle as soon as it was day, and to sit there in order, and without any
noise, excepting what should be commanded, and in like manner that the
land army should remain quietly in their ranks by the sea. But the
sun rising, and the Athenians sailing up with their whole fleet in line,
and challenging them to battle, though he had had his ships all drawn up
and manned before daybreak, nevertheless did not stir. He merely
sent some boats to those who lay foremost, and bade them keep still and
stay in their order; not to be disturbed, and none of them to sail out
and offer battle. So about evening, the Athenians sailing back, he
would not let the seamen go out of the ships before two or three, which
he had sent to espy, were returned, after seeing the enemies disembark.
And thus they did the next day, and the third, and so to the fourth.
So that the Athenians grew extremely confident, and disdained their enemies
as if they had been afraid and daunted. At this time, Alcibiades,
who was in his castle in the Chersonese, came on horseback to the Athenian
army, and found fault with their captains, first of all that they had pitched
their camp neither well nor safely on an exposed and open beach, a very
bad landing for the ships, and secondly, that where they were they had
to fetch all they wanted from Sestos, some considerable way off; whereas
if they sailed round a little way to the town and harbour of Sestos, they
would be at a safer distance from an enemy, who lay watching their movements,
at the command of a single general, terror of whom made every order rapidly
executed. This advice, however, they would not listen to; and Tydeus answered
disdainfully, that not he, but others, were in office now. So Alcibiades,
who even suspected there must be treachery, departed.
<<Plut4-13>
But on the fifth day, the Athenians having sailed towards them, and
gone back again as they were used to do, very proudly and full of contempt,
Lysander sending some ships, as usual, to look out, commanded the masters
of them that when they saw the Athenians go to land, they should row back
again with all their speed, and that when they were about half-way across,
they should lift up a brazen shield from the fore-deck, as the sign of
battle. And he himself sailing round, encouraged the pilots and masters
of the ships, and exhorted them to keep all their men to their places,
seamen and soldiers alike, and as soon as ever the sign should be given,
to row boldly to their enemies. Accordingly, when the shield had
been lifted up from the ships, and the trumpet from the admiral's vessel
had sounded for the battle, the ships rowed up, and the foot soldiers strove
to get along by the shore to the promontory. The distance there between
the two continents is fifteen furlongs, which, by zeal and eagerness of
the rowers, was quickly traversed. Conon, one of the Athenian commanders,
was the first who saw from the land the fleet advancing, and shouted out
to embark, and in the greatest distress bade some and entreated others,
and some he forced to man the ships. But all his diligence signified
nothing, because the men were scattered about; for as soon as they came
out of the ships, expecting no such matter, some went to market, others
walked about the country, or went to sleep in their tents, or got their
dinners ready, being, through their commanders' want of skill, as far as
possible from any thought of what was to happen; and the enemy now coming
up with shouts and noise, Conon, with eight ships, sailed out, and making
his escape, passed from thence to Cyprus, to Evagoras. The Peloponnesians
falling upon the rest, some they took quite empty, and some they destroyed
while they were filling; the men, meantime coming unarmed and scattered
to help, died at their ships, or, flying by land, were slain, their enemies
disembarking and pursuing them. Lysander took three thousand prisoners,
with the generals, and the whole fleet, excepting the sacred ship Paralus,
and those which fled with Conon. So taking their ships in tow, and
having plundered their tents, with pipe and songs of victory, he sailed
back to Lampsacus, having accomplished a great work with small pains, and
having finished in one hour a war which had been protracted in its continuance,
and diversified in its incidents and in its fortunes, to a degree exceeding
belief, compared with all before it. After altering its shape and
character a thousand times, and after having been the destruction of more
commanders than all the previous wars of Greece put together, it was now
put an end to by the good counsel and ready conduct of one man.
<<Plut4-14>
Some, therefore, looked upon the result as a divine intervention, and
there were certain who affirmed that the stars of Castor and Pollux were
seen on each side of Lysander's ship, when he first set sail from the haven
toward his enemies, shining about the helm; and some say the stone which
fell down was a sign of this slaughter. For a stone of a great size
did fall, according to the common belief, from heaven, at Aegos Potami,
which is shown to this day, and held in great esteem by the Chersonites.
And it is said that Anaxagoras foretold that the occurrence of a slip or
shake among the bodies fixed in the heavens, dislodging any one of them,
would be followed by the fall of the whole of them. For no one of
the stars is now in the same place in which it was at first; for they,
being, according to him, like stones and heavy, shine by the refraction
of the upper air round about them, and are carried along forcibly by the
violence of the circular motion by which they were originally withheld
from falling, when cold and heavy bodies were first separated from the
general universe. {gravity+} But there
is a more probable opinion than this maintained by some, who say that falling
stars are no effluxes, nor discharges of ethereal fire, extinguished almost
at the instant of its igniting by the lower air; neither are they the sudden
combustion and blazing up of a quantity of the lower air let loose in great
abundance into the upper region; but the heavenly bodies, by a relaxation
of the force of their circular movement, are carried by an irregular course,
not in general into the inhabited part of the earth, but for the most part
into the wide sea; which is the cause of their not being observed.
Daimachus, in his treatise on Religion, supports the view of Anaxagoras.
He says, that before this stone fell, for seventy-five days continually,
there was seen in the heavens a vast fiery body, as if it had been a flaming
cloud, not resting, but carried about with several intricate and broken
movements, so that the flaming pieces, which were broken off by this commotion
and running about, were carried in all directions, shining as falling stars
do. But when it afterwards came down to the ground in this district,
and the people of the place recovering from their fear and astonishment
came together, there was no fire to be seen, neither any sign of it; there
was only a stone lying, big indeed, but which bore no proportion, to speak
of, to that fiery compass. It is manifest that Daimachus needs to
have indulgent hearers; but if what he says be true, he altogether proves
those to be wrong who say that a rock broken off from the top of some mountain,
by winds and tempests, and caught and whirled about like a top, as soon
as this impetus began to slacken and cease, was precipitated and fell to
the ground. Unless, indeed, we choose to say that the phenomenon
which was observed for so many days was really fire, and that the change
in the atmosphere ensuing on its extinction was attended with violent winds
and agitations, which might be the cause of this stone being carried off.
The exacter treatment of this subject belongs, however, to a different
kind of writing.
<<Plut4-15>
Lysander, after the three thousand Athenians {Harfleur+}
whom he had taken prisoners were condemned by the commissioners to die,
called Philocles the general, and asked him what punishment he considered
himself to deserve, for having advised the citizens, as he had done, against
the Greeks; but he, being nothing cast down at his calamity, bade him not
to accuse him of matters of which nobody was a judge, but to do to him,
now he was a conqueror, as he would have suffered, had he been overcome. {constancy+}
Then washing himself, and putting on a fine cloak, he led the citizens
the way to the slaughter, as Theophrastus writes in his history. After
this Lysander, sailing about to the various cities, bade all the Athenians
he met go into Athens, declaring that he would spare none, but kill every
man whom he found out of the city, intending thus to cause immediate famine
and scarcity there, that they might not make the siege laborious to him,
having provisions sufficient to endure it. And suppressing the popular
governments and all other constitutions, he left one Lacedaemonian chief
officer in every city, with ten rulers to act with him, selected out of
the societies which he had previously formed in the different towns. And
doing thus as well in the cities of his enemies as of his associates, he
sailed leisurely on, establishing, in a manner, for himself supremacy over
the whole of Greece. Neither did he make choice of rulers by birth
or by wealth, but bestowed the offices on his own friends and partisans,
doing everything to please them, and putting absolute power of reward and
punishment into their hands. And thus, personally appearing on many
occasions of blood-shed and massacre, and aiding his friends to expel their
opponents, he did not give the Greeks a favourable specimen of the Lacedaemonian
government; and the expression of Theopompus, the comic poet, seemed but
poor, when he compared the Lacedaemonians to tavern women, because when
the Greeks had first tasted the sweet wine of liberty, they then poured
vinegar into the cup; for from the very first it had a rough and bitter
taste, all government by the people being suppressed by Lysander, and the
boldest and least scrupulous of the oligarchical party selected to rule
the cities.
<<Plut4-16>
Having spent some little time about these things, and sent some before
to Lacedaemon to tell them he was arriving with two hundred ships, he united
his forces in Attica with those of the two kings Agis and Pausanias, hoping
to take the city without delay. But when the Athenians defended themselves,
he with his fleet passed again to Asia, and in like manner destroyed the
forms of government in all the other cities, and placed them under the
rule of ten chief persons, many in every one being killed, and many driven
into exile; and in Samos he expelled the whole people, and gave their cities
to the exiles whom he brought back. And the Athenians still possessing
Sestos, he took it from them, and suffered not the Sestians themselves
to dwell in it, but gave the city and country to be divided out among the
pilots and masters of the ships under him; which was his first act that
was disallowed by the Lacedaemonians, who brought the Sestians back again
into their country. All Greece, however, rejoiced to see the Aeginetans,
by Lysander's aid, now again, after a long time, receiving back their cities,
and the Melians and Scionaeans restored, while the Athenians were driven
out, and delivered up the cities.
<<Plut4-17>
But when he now understood they were in bad case in the city because
of the famine, he sailed to Piraeus, and reduced the city, which was compelled
to surrender on what conditions he demanded. One hears it said by Lacedaemonians
that Lysander wrote to the Ephors thus: "Athens is taken;" and that these
magistrates wrote back to Lysander, "Taken is enough." But this saying
was invented for its neatness' sake; for the true decree of the magistrates
was on this manner: "The government of the Lacedaemonians has made these
orders; pull down the Piraeus and the long walls; quit all the towns, and
keep to your own land; if you do these things, you shall have peace, if
you wish it, restoring also your exiles. As concerning the number
of the ships, whatsoever there be judged necessary to appoint, that do."
This scroll of conditions the Athenians accepted, Theramenes, son of Hagnon,
supporting it. At which time, too, they say that when Cleomenes,
one of the young orators, asked him how he durst act and speak contrary
to Themistocles, delivering up the walls to the Lacedaemonians, which he
had built against the will of the Lacedaemonians, he said, "O young man,
I do nothing contrary to Themistocles; for he raised these walls for the
safety of the citizens, and we pull them down for their safety; and if
walls make a city happy, then Sparta must be the most wretched of all,
as it has none."
<<Plut4-18>
Lysander, as soon as he had taken all the ships except twelve, and
the walls of the Athenians, on the sixteenth day of the month Munychion,
the same on which they had overcome the barbarians at Salamis, then proceeded
to take measures for altering the government. But the Athenians taking
that very unwillingly, and resisting, he sent to the people and informed
them that he found that the city had broken the terms, for the walls were
standing when the days were past within which they should have been pulled
down. He should, therefore, consider their case anew, they having
broken their first articles. And some state, in fact, the proposal
was made in the congress of the allies, that the Athenians should all be
sold as slaves; on which occasion, Erianthus, the Theban, gave his vote
to pull down the city, and turn the country into sheep-pasture; yet afterwards,
when there was a meeting of the captains together, a man of Phocis, singing
the first chorus in Euripides's Electra, which begins-
"Electra, Agamemnon's child, I come Unto thy desert home,"
they were all melted with compassion, and it seemed to be a cruel deed
to destroy and pull down a city which had been so famous, and produced
such men.
<<Plut4-19>
Accordingly Lysander, the Athenians yielding up everything, sent for
a number of flute-women out of the city, and collected together all that
were in the camp, and pulled down the walls, and burnt the ships to the
sound of the flute, the allies being crowned with garlands, and making
merry together, as counting that day the beginning of their liberty. He
proceeded also at once to alter the government, placing thirty rulers in
the city and ten in the Piraeus: he put, also, a garrison into the Acropolis,
and made Callibius, a Spartan, the governor of it; who afterwards taking
up his staff to strike Autolycus, the athlete, about whom Xenophon wrote
his "Banquet," on his tripping up his heels and throwing him to the ground,
Lysander was not vexed at it, but chid Callibius, telling him he did not
know how to govern freemen. The thirty rulers, however, to gain Callibius's
favour, a little after killed Autolycus.
<<Plut4-20>
Lysander, after this, sails out to Thrace, and what remained of the
public money, and the gifts and crowns which he had himself received, numbers
of people, as might be expected, being anxious to make presents to a man
of such great power, who was, in a manner, the lord of Greece, he sends
to Lacedaemon by Gylippus, who had commanded formerly in Sicily.
But he, it is reported, unsewed the sacks at the bottom, took a considerable
amount of silver out of every one of them, and sewed them up again, not
knowing there was a writing in every one stating how much there was.
And coming into Sparta, what he had thus stolen away he hid under the tiles
of his house, and delivered up the sacks to the magistrates, and showed
the seals were upon them. But afterwards, on their opening the sacks
and counting it, the quantity of the silver differed from what the writing
expressed; and the matter causing some perplexity to the magistrates, Gylippus's
servant tells them in a riddle, that under the tiles lay many owls; for,
as it seems, the greatest part of the money then current bore the Athenian
stamp of the owl. Gylippus having committed so foul and base a deed,
after such great and distinguished exploits before, removed himself from
Lacedaemon.
<<Plut4-21>
But the wisest of the Spartans, very much on account of this occurrence,
dreading the influence of money, as being what had corrupted the greatest
citizens, exclaimed against Lysander's conduct, and declared to the Ephors
that all the silver and gold should be sent away, as mere "alien mischiefs."
These consulted about it; and Theopompus says it was Sciraphidas, but Ephorus
that it was Phlogidas, who declared they ought not to receive any gold
or silver into the city; but to use their own country coin, which was iron,
and was first of all dipped in vinegar when it was red-hot, that it might
not be worked up anew, but because of the dipping might be hard and unpliable.
It was also, of course, very heavy and troublesome to carry, and a great
deal of it in quantity and weight was but a little in value. And
perhaps all the old money was so, coin consisting of iron, or, in some
countries, copper skewers, whence it comes that we still find a great number
of small pieces of money retain the name of obolus, and the drachma is
six of these, because so much may be grasped in one's hand. But Lysander's
friends being against it, and endeavouring to keep the money in the city,
it was resolved to bring in this sort of money to be used publicly, enacting,
at the same time, that if any one was found in possession of any privately,
he should be put to death, as if Lycurgus had feared the coin, and not
the covetousness resulting from it, which they did not repress by letting
no private man keep any, so much as they encouraged it, by allowing the
state to possess it; attaching thereby a sort of dignity to it, over and
above its ordinary utility. Neither was it possible, that what they
saw so much esteemed publicly they should privately despise as unprofitable;
and that every one should think that thing could be nothing worth for his
own personal use, which was so extremely valued and desired for the use
of the state. And moral habits, induced by public practices, are
far quicker in making their way into men's private lives, than the failings
and faults of individuals are in infecting the city at large. For
it is probable that the parts will be rather corrupted by the whole if
that grows bad; while the vices which flow from a part into the whole find
many correctives and remedies from that which remains sound. Terror
and the law were now to keep guard over the citizens' houses, to prevent
any money entering into them: but their minds could no longer be expected
to remain superior to the desire of it when wealth in general was thus
set up to be striven after, as a high and noble object. On this point,
however, we have given our censure of the Lacedaemonians in one of our
other writings.
<<Plut4-22>
Lysander erected out of the spoils brazen statues at Delphi of himself,
and of every one of the masters of the ships, as also figures of the golden
stars of Castor and Pollux, which vanished before the battle at Leuctra.
In the treasury of Brasidas and the Acanthians there was a trireme made
of gold and ivory, of two cubits, which Cyrus sent Lysander in honour of
his victory. But Alexandrides of Delphi writes, in his history, that
there was also a deposit of Lysander's, a talent of silver, and fifty-two
minas, besides eleven staters; a statement not consistent with the generally
received account of his poverty. And at that time, Lysander, being
in fact of greater power than any Greek before, was yet thought to show
a pride, and to affect a superiority greater even than his power warranted.
He was the first, as Duris says in his history, among the Greeks to whom
the cities reared altars as to a god, and sacrificed; to him were songs
of triumph first sung, the beginning of one of which still remains recorded:-
"Great Greece's general from spacious Sparta we
Will celebrate with songs of victory."
And the Samians decreed that their solemnities of Juno should be called
the Lysandria; and out of the poets he had Choerilus always with him, to
extol his achievements in verse; and to Antilochus, who had made some verses
in his commendation, being pleased with them, he gave a hat full of silver;
and when Antimachus of Colophon, and one Niceratus of Heraclea competed
with each other in a poem on the deeds of Lysander, he gave the garland
to Niceratus; at which Antimachus, in vexation, suppressed his poem; but
Plato, being then a young man and admiring Antimachus for his poetry, consoled
him for his defeat by telling him that it is the ignorant who are the sufferers
by ignorance, as truly as the blind by want of sight. Afterwards,
when Aristonus, the musician, who had been a conqueror six times at the
Pythian games, told him as a piece of flattery, that if he were successful
again, he would proclaim himself in the name of Lysander, "that is," he
answered," as his slave?"
<<Plut4-23>
This ambitious temper was indeed only burdensome to the highest personages
and to his equals, but through having so many people devoted to serve him,
an extreme haughtiness and contemptuousness grew up, together with ambition,
in his character. He observed no sort of moderation, such as befitted
a private man, either in rewarding or in punishing; the recompense of his
friends and guests was absolute power over cities, and irresponsible authority
and the only satisfaction of his wrath was the destruction of his enemy;
banishment would not suffice. As for example, at a later period,
fearing lest the popular leaders of the Milesians should fly, and desiring
also to discover those who lay hid, he swore he would do them no harm,
and on their believing him coming forth, he delivered them up to the oligarchical
leaders to be slain, being in all no less than eight hundred. And,
indeed, the slaughter in general of those of the popular party in the towns
exceeded all computation as he did not kill only for offences against himself,
but granted these favours without sparing, and joined in the execution
of them, to gratify the many hatreds and the much cupidity of his friends
everywhere round about him. From whence the saying of Eteocles, the Lacedaemonian,
came to be famous, that "Greece could not have borne two Lysanders." Theophrastus
says, that Archestratus said the same thing concerning Alcibiades.
But in his case what had given most offence was a certain licentious and
wanton self-will; Lysander's power was feared and hated because of his
unmerciful disposition. The Lacedaemonians did not at all concern themselves
for any other accusers; but afterwards, when Pharnabazus, having been injured
by him, he having pillaged and wasted his country, sent some to Sparta
to inform against him, the Ephors taking it very ill, put one of his friends
and fellow-captains, Thorax, to death, taking him with some silver privately
in his possession; and they sent him a scroll, commanding him to return
home. This scroll is made up thus: When the Ephors send an
admiral or general on his way, they take two round pieces of wood, both
exactly of a length and thickness, and cut even to one another; they keep
one themselves, and the other they give to the person they send forth;
and these pieces of wood they call Scytales. When, therefore, they
have occasion to communicate any secret or important matter, making a scroll
of parchment long and narrow like a leathern thong, they roll it about
their own staff of wood, leaving no space void between, but covering the
surface of the staff with the scroll all over. When they have done
this, they write what they please on the scroll, as it is wrapped about
the staff; and when they have written, they take off the scroll, and send
it to the general without the wood. He, when he has received it,
can read nothing of the writing, because the words and letters are not
connected, but all broken up; but taking his own staff, he winds the slip
of the scroll about it, so that this folding, restoring all the parts into
the same order that they were in before, and putting what comes first into
connection with what follows, brings the whole consecutive contents to
view round the outside. And this scroll is called a staff, after
the name of the wood, as a thing measured is by the name of the measure.
<<Plut4-24>
But Lysander, when the staff came to him to the Hellespont, was troubled,
and fearing Pharnabazus's accusations most, made haste to confer with him,
hoping to end the difference by a meeting together. When they met,
he desired him to write another letter to the magistrates, stating that
he had not been wronged, and had no complaint to prefer. But he was
ignorant that Pharnabazus, as it is in the proverb, played Cretan against
Cretan; for pretending to do all that was desired, openly he wrote such
a letter as Lysander wanted, but kept by him another, written privately;
and when they came to put on the seals, changed the tablets, which differed
not at all to look upon, and gave him the letter which had been written
privately. Lysander, accordingly, coming to Lacedaemon, and going,
as the custom is, to the magistrates' office, gave Pharnabazus's letter
to the Ephors, being persuaded that the greatest accusation against him
was now withdrawn; for Pharnabazus was beloved by the Lacedaemonians, having
been the most zealous on their side in the war of all the king's captains.
But after the magistrates had read the letter they showed it him, and he
understanding now that-
"Others beside Ulysses deep can be,
Not the one wise man of the world is he,"
in extreme confusion, left them at the time. But a few days after,
meeting the Ephors, he said he must go to the temple of Ammon, and offer
the god the sacrifices which he had vowed in war. For some state
it as a truth, that when he was besieging the city of Aphytae in Thrace,
Ammon stood by him in his sleep; whereupon raising the siege, supposing
the god had commanded it, he bade the Aphytaeans sacrifice to Ammon, and
resolved to make a journey into Libya to propitiate the god. But
most were of opinion that the god was but the pretence, and that in reality
he was afraid of the Ephors, and that impatience of the yoke at home, and
dislike of living under authority, made him long for some travel and wandering,
like a horse just brought in from open feeding and pasture to the stable,
and put again to his ordinary work. For that which Ephorus states
to have been the cause of this travelling about, I shall relate by and
by.
<<Plut4-25>
And having hardly and with difficulty obtained leave of the magistrates
to depart, he set sail. But the kings, while he was on his voyage,
considering that keeping, as he did, the cities in possession by his own
friends and partisans, he was in fact their sovereign and the lord of Greece,
took measures for restoring the power to the people, and for throwing his
friends out. Disturbances commencing again about these things, and,
first of all, the Athenians from Phyle setting upon their thirty rulers
and overpowering them, Lysander, coming home in haste, persuaded the Lacedaemonians
to support the oligarchies and to put down the popular governments, and
to the thirty in Athens, first of all, they sent a hundred talents for
the war, and Lysander himself, as general, to assist them. But the kings
envying him, and fearing lest he should take Athens again, resolved that
one of themselves should take the command. Accordingly Pausanias
went, and in words, indeed, professed as if he had been for the tyrant
against the people, but in reality exerted himself for peace, that Lysander
might not by the means of his friends become lord of Athens again.
This he brought easily to pass; for, reconciling the Athenians, and quieting
the tumults, he defeated the ambitious hope of Lysander, though shortly
after, on the Athenians rebelling again, he was censured for having thus
taken, as it were, the bit out of the mouth of the people, which, being
freed from the oligarchy, would now break out again into affronts and insolence;
and Lysander regained the reputation of a person who employed his command
not in gratification of others, not for applause, but strictly for the
good of Sparta.
<<Plut4-26>
His speech, also, was bold and daunting to such as opposed him.
The Argives, for example, contended about the bounds of their land, and
thought they brought juster pleas than the Lacedaemonians; holding out
his sword, "He," said Lysander, "that is master of this, brings the best
argument about the bounds of territory." A man of Megara, at some conference,
taking freedom with him, "This language, my friend," said he, "should come
from a city." To the Boeotians, who were acting a doubtful part, he put
the question, whether he should pass through their country with spears
upright or levelled. After the revolt of the Corinthians, when, on
coming to their walls, he perceived the Lacedaemonians hesitating to make
the assault, and a hare was seen to leap through the ditch: "Are you not
ashamed," he said, "to fear an enemy, for whose laziness the very hares
sleep upon their walls?"
<<Plut4-27>
When King Agis died, leaving a brother Agesilaus, and Leontychides,
who was supposed his son, Lysander, being attached to Agesilaus, persuaded
him to lay claim to the kingdom, as being a true descendant of Hercules;
Leontychides lying under the suspicion of being the son of Alcibiades,
who lived privately in familiarity with Timaea, the wife of Agis, at the
time he was a fugitive in Sparta. Agis, they say, computing the time,
satisfied himself that she could not have conceived by him, and had hitherto
always neglected and manifestly disowned Leontychides; but now when he
was carried sick to Heraea, being ready to die, what by importunities of
the young man himself, and of his friends, in the presence of many he declared
Leontychides to be his; and desiring those who were present to bear witness
to this to the Lacedaemonians, died. They accordingly did so testify
in favour of Leontychides. And Agesilaus, being otherwise highly
reputed of and strong in the support of Lysander, was, on the other hand,
prejudiced by Diopithes, a man famous for his knowledge of oracles, who
adduced this prophecy in reference to Agesilaus's lameness:-
"Beware, great Sparta, lest there come of thee,
Though sound thyself, an halting sovereignty;
Troubles, both long and unexpected too,
And storms of deadly warfare shall ensue."
When many, therefore, yielded to the oracle, and inclined to Leontychides,
Lysander said that Diopithes did not take the prophecy rightly; for it
was not that the god would be offended if any lame person ruled over the
Lacedaemonians, but that the kingdom would be a lame one if bastards and
false-born should govern with the posterity of Hercules. By this
argument, and by his great influence among them, he prevailed, and Agesilaus
was made king.
<<Plut4-28>
Immediately, therefore, Lysander spurred him on to make an expedition
into Asia, putting him in hopes that he might destroy the Persians, and
attain the height of greatness. And he wrote to his friends in Asia,
bidding them request to have Agesilaus appointed to command them in the
war against the barbarians; which they were persuaded to, and sent ambassadors
to Lacedaemon to entreat it. And this would seem to be a second favour
done Agesilaus by Lysander, not inferior to his first in obtaining him
the kingdom. But with ambitious natures, otherwise not ill qualified
for command, the feeling of jealousy of those near them in reputation continually
stands in the way of the performance of noble actions; they make those
their rivals in virtue, whom they ought to use as their helpers to it.
Agesilaus took Lysander, among the thirty counsellors that accompanied
him, with intentions of using him as his especial friend; but when they
were come into Asia, the inhabitants there, to whom he was but little known,
addressed themselves to him but little and seldom; whereas Lysander, because
of their frequent previous intercourse, was visited and attended by large
numbers, by his friends out of observance, and by others out of fear; and
just as in tragedies it not uncommonly is the case with the actors, the
person who represents a messenger or servant is much taken notice of, and
plays the chief part, while he who wears the crown and scepter is hardly
heard to speak, even so was it about the counsellor, he had all the real
honours of the government, and to the king was left the empty name of power.
This disproportionate ambition ought very likely to have been in some way
softened down, and Lysander should have been reduced to his proper second
place, but wholly to cast off and to insult and affront for glory's sake
one who was his benefactor and friend was not worthy Agesilaus to allow
in himself. For, first of all, he gave him no opportunity for any
action, and never set him in any place of command; then, for whomsoever
he perceived him exerting his interest, these persons he always sent away
with a refusal, and with less attention than any ordinary suitors, thus
silently undoing and weakening his influence.
<<Plut4-29>
Lysander, miscarrying in everything, and perceiving that his diligence
for his friends was but a hindrance to them, forbore to help them, entreating
them that they would not address themselves to, nor observe him, but that
they would speak to the king, and to those who could be of more service
to friends than at present he could; most, on hearing this forbore to trouble
him about their concerns, but continued their observances to him, waiting
upon him in the walks and places of exercise; at which Agesilaus was more
annoyed than ever, envying him the honour; and, finally, when he gave many
of the officers places of command and the governments of cities, he appointed
Lysander carver at his table, adding, by way of insult to the Ionians,
"Let them go now, and pay their court to my carver." Upon this, Lysander
thought fit to come and speak with him; and a brief laconic dialogue passed
between them as follows: "Truly, you know very well, O Agesilaus, how to
depress your friends;" "Those friends," replied he, "who would be greater
than myself; but those who increase my power, it is just should share in
it." "Possibly, O Agesilaus," answered Lysander, "in all this there may
be more said on your part than done on mine, but I request you, for the
sake of observers from without, to place me in any command under you where
you may judge I shall be the least offensive, and most useful."
<<Plut4-30>
Upon this he was sent ambassador to the Hellespont; and though angry
with Agesilaus, yet did not neglect to perform his duty, and having induced
Spithridates the Persian, being offended with Pharnabazus, a gallant man,
and in command of some forces, to revolt, he brought him to Agesilaus.
He was not, however, employed in any other service, but having completed
his time returned to Sparta, without honour, angry with Agesilaus, and
hating more than ever the whole Spartan government, and resolved to delay
no longer, but while there was yet time, to put into execution the plans
which he appears some time before to have concerted for a revolution and
change in the constitution. These were as follows. The Heraclidae
who joined with the Dorians, and came into Peloponnesus, became a numerous
and glorious race in Sparta, but not every family belonging to it had the
right of succession in the kingdom, but the kings were chosen out of two
only, called the Eurypontidae and the Agiadae; the rest had no privilege
in the government by their nobility of birth, and the honours which followed
from merit lay open to all who could obtain them. Lysander who was
born of one of these families, when he had risen into great renown for
his exploits, and had gained great friends and power, was vexed to see
the city, which had increased to what it was by him, ruled by others not
at all better descended than himself, and formed a design to remove the
government from the two families, and to give it in common to all the Heraclidae;
or, as some say, not to the Heraclidae only, but to all Spartans; that
the reward might not belong to the posterity of Hercules, but to those
who were like Hercules, judging by that personal merit which raised even
him to the honour of the Godhead; and he hoped that when the kingdom was
thus to be competed for, no Spartan would be chosen before himself.
<<Plut4-31>
Accordingly he first attempted and prepared to persuade the citizens
privately, and studied an oration composed for this purpose by Cleon, the
Halicarnassian. Afterwards perceiving so unexpected and great an
innovation required bolder means of support, he proceeded, as it might
be on the stage, to avail himself of machinery, and to try the effects
of divine agency upon his countrymen. He collected and arranged for
his purpose answers and oracles from Apollo, not expecting to get any benefit
from Cleon's rhetoric, unless he should first alarm and overpower the minds
of his fellow-citizens by religious and superstitious terrors, before bringing
them to the consideration of his arguments. Ephorus relates, after
he had endeavoured to corrupt the oracle of Apollo, and had again failed
to persuade the priestess of Dodona by means of Pherecles, that he went
to Ammon, and discoursed with the guardians of the oracle there, proffering
them a great deal of gold, and that they, taking this ill, sent some to
Sparta to accuse Lysander; and on his acquittal the Libyans, going away,
said, "You will find us, O Spartans, better judges, when you come to dwell
with us in Libya," there being a certain ancient oracle that the Lacedaemonians
should dwell in Libya. But as the whole intrigue and the course of
the contrivance was no ordinary one, nor lightly undertaken, but depended
as it went on, like some mathematical proposition, on a variety of important
admissions, and proceeded through a series of intricate and difficult steps
to its conclusion, we will go into it at length, following the account
of one who was at once an historian and a philosopher.
<<Plut4-32>
There was a woman in Pontus {virgin_birth+}
who professed to be pregnant by Apollo, which many, as was natural, disbelieved,
and many also gave credit to, and when she had brought forth a man-child,
several, not unimportant persons, took an interest in its rearing and bringing
up. The name given the boy was Silenus, for some reason or other.
Lysander, taking this for the groundwork, frames and devises the rest himself,
making use of not a few, nor these insignificant champions of his story,
who brought the report of the child's birth into credit without any suspicion.
Another report, also, was procured from Delphi and circulated in Sparta,
that there were some very old oracles which were kept by the priests in
private writings; and they were not to be meddled with, neither was it
lawful to read them, till one in aftertimes should come, descended from
Apollo, and, on giving some known token to the keepers, should take the
books in which the oracles were. Things being thus ordered beforehand,
Silenus, it was intended, should come and ask for the oracles, as being
the child of Apollo, and those priests who were privy to the design were
to profess to search narrowly into all particulars, and to question him
concerning his birth; and finally, were to be convinced, and, as to Apollo's
son, to deliver up to him the writings. Then he, in the presence of many
witnesses, should read, amongst other prophecies, that which was the object
of the whole contrivance, relating to the office of the kings, that it
would be better and more desirable to the Spartans to choose their kings
out of the best citizens. And now, Silenus being grown up to a youth,
and being ready for the action, Lysander miscarried in his drama through
the timidity of one of his actors, or assistants, who just as he came to
the point lost heart and drew back. Yet nothing was found out while
Lysander lived, but only after his death.
<<Plut4-33>
He died before Agesilaus came back from Asia, being involved, or perhaps
more truly having himself involved Greece, in the Boeotian war. For
it is stated both ways; and the cause of it some make to be himself, others
the Thebans, and some both together; the Thebans, on the one hand, being
charged with casting away the sacrifices at Aulis, and that being bribed
with the king's money brought by Androclides and Amphitheus, they had,
with the object of entangling the Lacedaemonians in a Grecian war, set
upon the Phocians, and wasted their country; it being said, on the other
hand, that Lysander was angry that the Thebans had preferred a claim to
the tenth part of the spoils of the war, while the rest of the confederates
submitted without complaint; and because they expressed indignation about
the money which Lysander sent to Sparta, but more especially, because from
them the Athenians had obtained the first opportunity of freeing themselves
from the thirty tyrants, whom Lysander had made, and to support whom the
Lacedaemonians issued a decree that political refugees from Athens might
be arrested in whatever country they were found, and that those who impeded
their arrest should be excluded from the confederacy. In reply to
this the Thebans issued counter decrees of their own, truly in the spirit
and temper of the actions of Hercules and Bacchus, that every house and
city in Boeotia should be opened to the Athenians who required it, and
that he who did not help a fugitive who was seized should be fined a talent
for damages, and if any one should bear arms through Boeotia to Attica
against the tyrants, that none of the Thebans should either see or hear
of it. Nor did they pass these humane and truly Greek decrees without
at the same time making their acts conformable to their words. For
Thrasybulus, and those who with him occupied Phyle, set out upon that enterprise
from Thebes, with arms and money, and secrecy and a point to start from,
provided for them by the Thebans. Such were the causes of complaint
Lysander had against Thebes. And being now grown violent in his temper
through the atrabilious tendency which increased upon him in his old age,
he urged the Ephors and persuaded them to place a garrison in Thebes, and
taking the commander's place, he marched forth with a body of troops.
Pausanias, also, the king, was sent shortly after with an army. Now
Pausanias, going round by Cithaeron, was to invade Boeotia; Lysander, meantime,
advanced through Phocis to meet him, with a numerous body of soldiers.
He took the city of the Orchomenians, who came over to him of their own
accord, and plundered Lebadea. He despatched also letters to Pausanias,
ordering him to move from Plataea to meet him at Haliartus, and that himself
would be at the walls of Haliartus by break of day. These letters
were brought to the Thebans, the carrier of them falling into the hands
of some Theban scouts. They, having received aid from Athens, committed
their city to the charge of the Athenian troops, and sallying out about
the first sleep, succeeded in reaching Haliartus a little before Lysander,
and part of them entered into the city. He upon this first of all
resolved, posting his army upon a hill, to stay for Pausanias; then as
the day advanced, not being able to rest, he bade his men take up their
arms, and encouraging the allies, led them in a column along the road to
the walls. But those Thebans who had remained outside, taking the
city on the left hand, advanced against the rear of their enemies, by the
fountain which is called Cissusa; here they tell the story that the nurses
washed the infant Bacchus after birth; the water of it is of a bright wine-colour,
clear, and most pleasant to drink; and not far off the Cretan storax grows
all about which the Haliartians adduce in token of Rhadamanthus having
dwelt there, and they show his sepulchre, calling it Alea. And the
monument also of Alcmena is hard by; for there, as they say, she was buried,
having married Rhadamanthus after Amphitryon's death. But the Thebans
inside the city, forming in order of battle with the Haliartians, stood
still for some time, but on seeing Lysander with a party of those who were
foremost approaching, on a sudden opening the gates and falling on, they
killed him with the soothsayer at his side, and a few others; for the greater
part immediately fled back to the main force. But the Thebans not
slackening, but closely pursuing them, the whole body turned to fly towards
the hills. There were one thousand of them slain; there died, also, of
the Thebans three hundred, who were killed with their enemies, while chasing
them into craggy and difficult places. These had been under suspicion
of favouring the Lacedaemonians, and in their eagerness to clear themselves
in the eyes of their fellow-citizens, exposed themselves in the pursuit,
and so met their death. News of the disaster reached Pausanias as
he was on the way from Plataea to Thespiae, and having set his army in
order he came to Haliartus; Thrasybulus, also, came from Thebes, leading
the Athenians.
<<Plut4-34>
Pausanias proposing to request the bodies of the dead under truce,
the elders of the Spartans took it ill, and were angry among themselves,
and coming to the king, declared that Lysander should not be taken away
upon any conditions; if they fought it out by arms about his body, and
conquered, then they might bury him; if they were overcome, it was glorious
to die upon the spot with their commander. When the elders had spoken
these things, Pausanias saw it would be a difficult business to vanquish
the Thebans, who had but just been conquerors; that Lysander's body also
lay near the walls, so that it would be hard for them, though they overcame,
to take it away without a truce; he therefore sent a herald, obtained a
truce, and withdrew his forces, and carrying away the body of Lysander,
they buried it in the first friendly soil they reached on crossing the
Boeotian frontier, in the country the Panopaeans; where the monument still
stands as you go on the road from Delphi to Chaeronea. Now the army
quartering there, it is said that a person of Phocis, relating the battle
to one who was not in it, said, the enemies fell upon them just after Lysander
had passed over the Hoplites; surprised at which a Spartan, a friend of
Lysander, asked what Hoplites he meant, for he did not know the name. "It
was there," answered the Phocian, "that the enemy killed the first of us;
the rivulet by the city is called Hoplites." On hearing which the Spartan
shed tears and observed how impossible it is for any man to avoid his appointed
lot; Lysander, it appears, having received an oracle as follows:-
"Sounding Hoplites see thou bear in mind,
And the earthborn dragon following behind."
Some, however, say that Hoplites does not run by Haliartus, but is a watercourse
near Coronea, falling into the river Philarus, not far from the town in
former times called Hoplias, and now Isomantus.
<<Plut4-35>
The man of Haliartus who killed Lysander, by name Neochorus, bore on
his shield the device of a dragon; and this, it was supposed, the oracle
signified. It is said also that at the time of the Peloponnesian
war, the Thebans received an oracle from the sanctuary of Ismenus, referring
at once to the battle at Delium, and to this which thirty years after took
solace at Haliartus. It ran thus:- "Hunting the wolf, observe the
utmost bound, And the hill Orchalides where foxes most are found." By the
words, "the utmost bound," Delium being intended, where Boeotia touches
Attica, and by Orchalides, the hill now called Alopecus, which lies in
the parts of Haliartus towards Helicon.
<<Plut4-36>
But such a death befalling Lysander, the Spartans took it so grievously
at the time, that they put the king to a trial for his life, which he not
daring to await, fled to Tegea, and there lived out his life in the sanctuary
of Minerva. The poverty+
also of Lysander being discovered by his death made his merit more manifest,
since from so much wealth and power, from all the homage of the cities,
and of the Persian kingdom, he had not in the least degree, so far as money
goes, sought any private aggrandizement, as Theopompus in his history relates,
whom any one may rather give credit to when he commends than when he finds
fault, as it is more agreeable to him to blame than to praise. But
subsequently, Ephorus says, some controversy arising among the allies at
Sparta, which made it necessary to consult the writings which Lysander
had kept by him, Agesilaus came to his house, and finding the book in which
the oration on the Spartan constitution was written at length, to the effect
that the kingdom ought to be taken from the Eurypontidae and Agiadae, and
to be offered in common, and a choice made out of the best citizens, at
first he was eager to make it public, and to show his countrymen the real
character of Lysander. But Lacratidas, a wise man, and at that time
chief of the Ephors, hindered Agesilaus, and said they ought not to dig
up Lysander again, but rather to bury with him a discourse, composed so
plausibly and subtilely. Other honours, also, were paid him, after
his death; and amongst these they imposed a fine upon those who had engaged
themselves to marry his daughters, and then when Lysander was found to
be poor, after his decease, refused them; because when they thought him
rich they had been observant of him, but now his
poverty+ had proved him just and good, they forsook him.
For there was, it seems, in Sparta, a punishment for not marrying, for
a late, and for a bad marriage; and to the last penalty those were most
especially liable who sought alliances with the rich instead of with the
good and with their friends. Such is the account we have found given
of Lysander.
<<Plut4-37>
~Sylla+
LUCIUS Cornelius Sylla was descended of a patrician or noble family.
Of his ancestors, Rufinus, it is said, had been consul, and incurred a
disgrace more signal than his distinction. For being found possessed
of more than ten pounds of silver plate, contrary to the law, he was for
this reason put out of the senate. His posterity continued ever after
in obscurity, nor had Sylla himself any opulent parentage. In his
younger days he lived in hired lodgings, at a low rate, which in aftertimes
was adduced against him as proof that he had been fortunate above his quality.
When he was boasting and magnifying himself for his exploits in Libya,
a person of noble station made answer, "And how can you be an honest man,
who, since the death of a father who left you nothing, have become so rich?"
The time in which he lived was no longer an age of pure and upright manners,
but had already declined, and yielded to the appetite for riches and
luxury+; yet still, in the general opinion, they who deserted the hereditary
poverty+ of their family were as much blamed as those who had run
out a fair patrimonial estate. And afterwards, when he had seized
the power into his hands, and was putting many to death, a freedman, suspected
of having concealed one of the proscribed, and for that reason sentenced
to be thrown down the Tarpeian rock, in a reproachful way recounted how
they had lived long together under the same roof, himself for the upper
rooms paying two thousand sesterces, and Sylla for the lower three thousand;
so that the difference between their fortunes then was no more than one
thousand sesterces, equivalent in Attic coin to two hundred and fifty drachmas.
And thus much of his early fortune.
<<Plut4-38>
His general personal appearance may be known by his statues; only his
blue, eyes, of themselves extremely keen and glaring, were rendered all
the more forbidding and terrible by the complexion of his face, in which
white was mixed with rough blotches of fiery red. Hence, it is said,
he was surnamed Sylla, and in allusion to it one of the scurrilous jesters
at Athens made the verse upon him-
"Sylla is a mulberry sprinkled o'er with meal."
Nor is it out of place to make use of marks of character like these, in
the case of one who was by nature so addicted to raillery, that in his
youthful obscure years he would converse freely with players and professed
jesters, and join them in all their low pleasures. And when supreme
master of all, he was often wont to muster together the most impudent players
and stage-followers of the town, and to drink and bandy jests with them
without regard to his age or the dignity of his place, and to the prejudice
of important affairs that required his attention. When he was once
at table, it was not in Sylla's nature to admit of anything that was serious,
and whereas at other times he was a man of business and austere of countenance,
he underwent all of a sudden, at his first entrance upon wine and good-fellowship,
a total revolution, and was gentle and tractable with common singers and
dancers, and ready to oblige any one that spoke with him. It seems
to have been a sort of diseased result of this laxity that he was so prone
to amorous pleasures, and yielded without resistance to any temptation
of voluptuousness+, from which even
in his old age he could not refrain. He had a long attachment for
Metrobius, a player. In his first amours, it happened that he made
court to a common but rich lady, Nicopolis by name, and what by the air
of his youth, and what by long intimacy, won so far on her affections,
that she rather than he was the lover, and at her death she bequeathed
him her whole property. He likewise inherited the estate of a step-mother
who loved him as her own son. By these means he had pretty well advanced
his fortunes.
<<Plut4-39>
He was chosen quaestor to Marius in his first consulship, and set sail
with him for Libya, to war upon Jugurtha. Here, in general, he gained
approbation; and more especially, by closing in dexterously with an accidental
occasion, made a friend of Bocchus, King of Numidia. He hospitably
entertained the king's ambassadors on their escape from some Numidian robbers,
and after showing them much kindness, sent them on their journey with presents,
and an escort to protect them. Bocchus had long hated and dreaded
his son-in-law, Jugurtha, who had now been worsted in the field and had
fled to him for shelter; and it so happened he was at this time entertaining
a design to betray him. He accordingly invited Sylla to come to him,
wishing the seizure and surrender of Jugurtha to be effected rather through
him, than directly by himself. Sylla, when he had communicated the
business to Marius, and received from him a small detachment, voluntarily
put himself into this imminent danger; and confiding in a barbarian, who
had been unfaithful to his own relations, to apprehend another man's person,
made surrender of his own. Bocchus, having both of them now in his
power, was necessitated to betray one or other, and after long debate with
himself, at last resolved on his first design, and gave up Jugurtha into
the hands of Sylla.
<<Plut4-40>
For this Marius triumphed, but the glory of the enterprise, which through
people's envy of Marius was ascribed to Sylla, secretly grieved him.
And the truth is, Sylla himself was by nature vainglorious, and this being
the first time that from a low and private condition he had risen to esteem
amongst the citizens and tasted of honour, his appetite for distinction
carried him to such a pitch of ostentation, that he had a representation
of this action engraved on a signet ring, which he carried about with him,
and made use of ever after. {Hotspur+}
The impress was Bocchus delivering, and Sylla receiving, Jugurtha.
This touched Marius to the quick; however, judging Sylla to be beneath
his rivalry, he made use of him as lieutenant, in his second consulship,
and in his third as tribune; and many considerable services were effected
by his means. When acting as lieutenant he took Copillus, chief of
the Tectosages, prisoner, and compelled the Marsians, a great and populous
nation, to become friends and confederates of the Romans.
<<Plut4-41>
Henceforward, however, Sylla, perceiving that Marius bore a jealous
eye over him, and would no longer afford him opportunities of action, but
rather opposed his advance, attached himself to Catulus, Marius's colleague,
a worthy man, but not energetic enough as a general. And under this commander,
who intrusted him with the highest and most important commissions, he rose
at once to reputation and to power. He subdued by arms most part
of the Alpine barbarians; and when there was a scarcity in the armies,
he took that care upon himself and brought in such a store of provisions
as not only to furnish the soldiers of Catulus with abundance, but likewise
to supply Marius. This, as he writes himself, wounded Marius to the
very heart. So slight and childish were the first occasions and motives
of that enmity between them, which, passing afterwards through a long course
of civil bloodshed and incurable divisions to find its end in tyranny,
and the confusion of the whole state, proved Euripides to have been truly
wise and thoroughly acquainted with the causes of disorders in the body
politic, when he forewarned all men to beware of
Ambition+, as of all the higher Powers the most destructive and pernicious
to her votaries.
<<Plut4-42>
Sylla, by this time thinking that the reputation of his arms abroad
was sufficient to entitle him to a part in the civil administration, betook
himself immediately from the camp to the assembly, and offered himself
as a candidate for a praetorship, but failed. The fault of this disappointment
he wholly ascribes to the populace, who, knowing his intimacy with King
Bocchus, and for that reason expecting, that if he was made aedile before
his praetorship, he would then show them magnificent hunting-shows and
combats between Libyan wild beasts, chose other praetors, on purpose to
force him into the aedileship. The vanity of this pretext is sufficiently
disproved by matter-of-fact. For the year following, partly by flatteries
to the people, and partly by money, he got himself elected praetor.
Accordingly, once while he was in office, on his angrily telling Caesar
that he should make use of his authority against him, Caesar answered him
with a smile, "You do well to call it your own, as you bought it." At the
end of his praetorship he was sent over into Cappadocia, under the pretence
of reestablishing Ariobarzanes in his kingdom, but in reality to keep in
check the restless movements of Mithridates, who was gradually procuring
himself as vast a new acquired power and dominion as was that of his ancient
inheritance. He carried over with him no great forces of his own,
but making use of the cheerful aid of the confederates, succeeded, with
considerable slaughter of the Cappadocians, and yet greater of the Armenian
succours, in expelling Gordius and establishing Ariobarzanes as king.
<<Plut4-43>
During his stay on the banks of the Euphrates, there came to him Orobazus,
a Parthian, ambassador from King Arsaces, as yet there having been no correspondence
between the two nations. And this also we may lay to the account
of Sylla's felicity, that he should be the first Roman to whom the Parthians
made address for alliance and friendship. At the time of which reception,
the story is, that, having ordered three chairs of state to be set, one
for Ariobarzanes, one for Orobazus, and a third for himself, he placed
himself in the middle, and so gave audience. For this the King of
Parthia afterwards put Orobazus to death. Some people commended Sylla
for his lofty carriage towards the barbarians; others again accused him
of arrogance and unseasonable display. It is reported that a certain
Chaldaean, of Orobazus's retinue, looking Sylla wistfully in the face,
and observing carefully the motions of his mind and body, and forming a
judgment of his nature, according to the rules of his art, said that it
was impossible for him not to become the greatest of men; it was rather
a wonder how he could even then abstain from being head of all.
<<Plut4-44>
At his return, Censorinus impeached him of extortion, for having exacted
a vast sum of money from a well-affected and associate kingdom. However,
Censorinus did not appear at the trial, but dropped his accusation.
His quarrel, meantime, with Marius began to break out afresh, receiving
new material from the ambition of Bocchus, who, to please the people of
Rome, and gratify Sylla, set up in the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus images
bearing trophies, and a representation in gold of the surrender of Jugurtha
to Sylla. When Marius, in great anger, attempted to pull them down,
and others aided Sylla, the whole city would have been in tumult and commotion
with this dispute, had not the Social War, which had long lain smouldering,
blazed forth at last, and for the present put an end to the quarrel.
<<Plut4-45>
In the course of this war, which had many great changes of fortune,
and which, more than any, afflicted the Romans, and, indeed, endangered
the very being of the Commonwealth, Marius was not able to signalize his
valour in any action, but left behind him a clear proof, that warlike excellence
requires a strong and still vigorous body. Sylla, on the other hand,
by his many achievements, gained himself, with his fellow-citizens, the
name of a great commander, while his friends thought him the greatest of
all commanders, and his enemies called him the most fortunate. Nor
did this make the same sort of impression on him as it made on Timotheus
the son of Conon, the Athenian; who, when his adversaries ascribed his
successes to his good luck, and had a painting made, representing him asleep,
and Fortune by his side, casting her nets over the cities, was rough and
violent in his indignation at those who did it, as if, by attributing all
to Fortune+, they had robbed him of his
just honours; and said to the people on one occasion at his return from
war, "In this, ye men of Athens, Fortune had no part." A piece of boyish
petulance, which the deity, we are told, played back upon Timotheus; who
from that time was never able to achieve anything that was great, but proving
altogether unfortunate in his attempts, and falling into discredit with
the people, was at last banished the city. Sylla, on the contrary, not
only accepted with pleasure the credit of such divine felicities and favours,
but joining himself and extolling and glorifying what was done, gave the
honour of all to Fortune*+, whether it
were out of boastfulness, or a real feeling of divine agency. He
remarks, in his Memoirs, that of all his well-advised actions, none proved
so lucky in the execution as what he had boldly enterprised, not by calculation,
but upon the moment. And, in the character which he gives of himself,
that he was born for fortune rather than war, he seems to give Fortune
a higher place than merit, and, in short, makes himself entirely the creature
of a superior power, accounting even his concord with Metellus, his equal
in office, and his connection by marriage, a piece of preternatural felicity.
For expecting to have met in him a most troublesome, he found him a most
accommodating, colleague. Moreover, in the Memoirs which he dedicated
to Lucullus, he admonished him to esteem nothing more trustworthy than
what the divine powers advise him by night. And when he was leaving
the city with an army, to fight in the Social War, he relates that the
earth near the Laverna opened, and a quantity of fire came rushing out
of it, shooting up with a bright flame into the heavens. The soothsayers
upon this foretold that a person of great qualities, and of a rare and
singular aspect, should take the government in hand, and quiet the present
troubles of the city. Sylla affirms he was the man, for his golden head
of hair made him an extraordinary-looking man, nor had he any shame, after
the great actions he had done, in testifying to his own great qualities.
And thus much of his opinion as to divine agency.
<<Plut4-46>
In general he would seem to have been of a very irregular character,
full of inconsistencies with himself much given to rapine, to prodigality
yet more; in promoting or disgracing whom he pleased, alike unaccountable;
cringing to those he stood in need of, and domineering over others who
stood in need of him, so that it was hard to tell whether his nature had
more in it of pride or of servility. As to his unequal distribution
of punishments, as, for example, that upon slight grounds he would put
to the torture, and again would bear patiently with the greatest wrongs;
would readily forgive and he reconciled after the most heinous acts of
enmity, and yet would visit small and inconsiderable offences with death
and confiscation of goods; one might judge that in himself he was really
of a violent and revengeful nature, which, however, he could qualify, upon
reflection, for his interest. In this very Social War, when the soldiers
with stones and clubs had killed an officer of praetorian rank, his own
lieutenant, Albinus by name, he passed by this flagrant crime without any
inquiry, giving it out moreover in a boast, that the soldiers would behave
all the better now, to make amends, by some special bravery, for their
breach of discipline. He took no notice of the clamours of those
that cried for justice, but designing already to supplant Marius, now that
he saw the Social War near its end, he made much of his army, in hopes
to get himself declared general of the forces against Mithridates.
<<Plut4-47>
At his return to Rome he was chosen consul with Quintus Pompeius, in
the fiftieth year of his age, and made a most distinguished marriage with
Caecilia, daughter of Metellus, the chief priest. The common people
made a variety of verses in ridicule of the marriage, and many of the nobility
also were disgusted at it, esteeming him, as Livy writes, unworthy of this
connection, whom before they thought worthy of a consulship. This was not
his only wife, for first, in his younger days, he was married to Ilia,
by whom he had a daughter; after her to Aelia; and thirdly to Cloelia,
whom he dismissed as barren, but honourably, and with professions of respect,
adding, moreover, presents. But the match between him and Metella,
falling out a few days after, occasioned suspicions that he had complained
of Cloelia without due cause. To Metella he always showed great deference,
so much so that the people, when anxious for the recall of the exiles of
Marius's party, upon his refusal, entreated the intercession of Metella.
And the Athenians, it is thought, had harder measure, at the capture of
their town, because they used insulting language to Metella in their jests
from the walls during the siege. But of this hereafter.
<<Plut4-48>
At present esteeming the consulship but a small matter in comparison
of things to come, he was impatiently carried away in thought to the Mithridatic
War. Here he was withstood by Marius; who out of mad affectation
of glory and thirst for distinction, those never dying passions, though
he were now unwieldy in body, and had given up service, on account of his
age, during the late campaigns, still coveted after command in a distant
war beyond the seas. And whilst Sylla was departed for the camp,
to order the rest of his affairs there, he sate brooding at home, and at
last hatched that execrable sedition, which wrought Rome more mischief
than all her enemies together had done, as was indeed foreshown by the
gods. For a flame broke forth of its own accord, from under the staves
of the ensigns, and was with difficulty extinguished. Three ravens
brought their young into the open road, and ate them, carrying the relics
into the nest again. Mice having gnawed the consecrated gold in one
of the temples, the keepers caught one of them, a female, in a trap; and
she bringing forth five young ones in the very trap, devoured three of
them. But what was greatest of all, in a calm and clear sky there
was heard the sound of a trumpet, with such a loud and dismal blast, as
struck terror and amazement into the hearts of the people. The Etruscan
sages affirmed that this prodigy betokened the mutation of the age, and
a general revolution in the world. For according to them there are in all
eight ages, differing one from another in the lives and the characters
of men, and to each of these God has allotted a certain measure of time,
determined by the circuit of the great year. And when one age is run out,
at the approach of another, there appears some wonderful sign from earth
or heaven, such as makes it manifest at once to those who have made it
their business to study such things, that there has succeeded in the world
a new race of men, differing in customs and institutes of life, and more
or less regarded by the gods than the preceding. Among other great
changes that happen, as they say, at the turn of ages, the art of divination,
also, at one time rises in esteem, and is more successful in its predictions,
clearer and surer tokens being sent from God, and then, again, in another
generation declines as low, becoming mere guesswork for the most part,
and discerning future events by dim and uncertain intimations. This
was the mythology of the wisest of the Tuscan sages, who were thought to
possess a knowledge beyond other men. Whilst the senate sat in consultation
with the soothsayers, concerning these prodigies, in the temple of Bellona,
a sparrow came flying in, before them all, with a grasshopper in its mouth,
and letting fall one part of it, flew away with the remainder. The
diviners foreboded commotions and dissensions between the great landed
proprietors and the common city populace; the latter, like the grasshopper,
being loud and talkative; while the sparrow might represent the "dwellers
in the field." {Gloucester+}
<<Plut4-49>
Marius had taken into alliance Sulpicius, the tribune, a man second
to none in any villainies, so that it was less the question what others
he surpassed, but rather in what respects he most surpassed himself in
wickedness. He was cruel, bold, rapacious, and in all these points
utterly shameless and unscrupulous; not hesitating to offer Roman citizenship
by public sale to freed slaves and aliens, and to count out the price on
public money-tables in the forum. He maintained three thousand swordsmen,
and had always about him a company of young men of the equestrian class
ready for all occasions, whom he styled his Anti-senate. Having had
a law enacted, that no senator should contract a debt of above two thousand
drachmas, he himself, after death, was found indebted three millions.
This was the man whom Marius let in upon the Commonwealth, and who, confounding
all things by force and the sword, made several ordinances of dangerous
consequence, and amongst the rest one giving Marius the conduct of the
Mithridatic war. Upon this the consuls proclaimed a public cessation
of business, but as they were holding an assembly near the temple of Castor
and Pollux, he let loose the rabble upon them, and amongst many others
slew the consul Pompeius's young son in the forum, Pompeius himself hardly
escaping in the crowd. Sylla, being closely pursued into the house
of Marius, was forced to come forth and dissolve the cessation; and for
his doing this, Sulpicius, having deposed Pompeius, allowed Sylla to continue
his consulship, only transferring the Mithridatic expedition to Marius.
<<Plut4-50>
There were immediately despatched to Nola tribunes to receive the army,
and bring it to Marius; but Sylla, having got first to the camp, and the
soldiers, upon hearing the news, having stoned the tribunes, Marius, in
requital, proceeded to put the friends of Sylla in the city to the sword,
and rifled their goods. Every kind of removal and flight went on,
some hastening from the camp to the city, others from the city to the camp.
The senate, no more in its own power, but wholly governed by the dictates
of Marius and Sulpicius, alarmed at the report of Sylla's advancing with
his troops towards the city, sent forth two of the praetors, Brutus and
Servilius, to forbid his nearer approach. The soldiers would have
slain these praetors in a fury, for their bold language to Sylla; contenting
themselves, however, with breaking their rods, and tearing off their purple-edged
robes, after much contumelious usage they sent them back, to the sad dejection
of the citizens, who beheld their magistrates despoiled of their badges
of office, and announcing to them that things were now manifestly come
to a rupture past all cure. Marius put himself in readiness, and
Sylla with his colleague moved from Nola, at the head of six complete legions,
all of them willing to march up directly against the city, though he himself
as yet was doubtful in thought, and apprehensive of the danger. As
he was sacrificing, Postumius the soothsayer, having inspected the entrails,
stretching forth both hands to Sylla, required to be bound and kept in
custody till the battle was over, as willing, if they had not speedy and
complete success, to suffer the utmost punishment. It is said, also, that
there appeared to Sylla himself, in a dream, a certain goddess, whom the
Romans learnt to worship from the Cappadocians, whether it be the Moon,
or Pallas, or Bellona. This same goddess, to his thinking, stood
by him, and put into his hand thunder and lightning, then naming his enemies
one by one, bade him strike them, who, all of them, fell on the discharge
and disappeared. Encouraged by this vision, and relating it to his
colleague, next day he led on towards Rome. About Picinae being met
by a deputation, beseeching him not to attack at once, in the heat of a
march, for that the senate had decreed to do him all the right imaginable,
he consented to halt on the spot, and sent his officers to measure out
the ground, as is usual, for a camp; so that the deputation, believing
it, returned. They were no sooner gone, but he sent a party on under
the command of Lucius Basillus and Caius Mummius, to secure the city gate,
and the walls on the side of the Esquiline hill, and then close at their
heels followed himself with all speed. Basillus made his way successfully
into the city, but the unarmed multitude, pelting him with stones and tiles
from off the houses, stopped his further progress, and beat him back to
the wall. Sylla by this time was come up, and seeing what was going
on, called aloud to his men to set fire to the houses, and taking a flaming
torch, he himself led the way, and commanded the archers to make use of
their fire-darts, letting fly at the tops of houses; all which he did,
not upon any plan, but simply in his fury, yielding the conduct of that
day's work to passion, and as if all he saw were enemies, without respect
or pity either to friends, relations, or acquaintance, made his entry by
fire, which knows no distinction betwixt friend or foe.
<<Plut4-51>
In this conflict, Marius, being driven into the temple of Mother-Earth,
thence invited the slaves by proclamation of freedom, but the enemy coming
on he was overpowered and fled the city.
<<Plut4-52>
Sylla having called a senate, had sentence of death passed on Marius,
and some few others, amongst whom was Sulpicius, tribune of the people.
Sulpicius was killed, being betrayed by his servant, whom Sylla first made
free, and then threw him headlong down the Tarpeian rock. As for Marius,
he set a price on his life, by proclamation, neither gratefully nor politically,
if we consider into whose house, not long before, he put himself at mercy,
and safely dismissed. Had Marius at that time not let Sylla go, but
suffered him to be slain by the hands of Sulpicius, he might have been
lord of all: nevertheless he spared his life, and a few days after, when
in a similar position himself, received a different measure.
<<Plut4-53>
By these proceedings Sylla excited the secret distaste of the senate;
but the displeasure and free indignation of the commonalty showed itself
plainly by their actions. For they ignominiously rejected Nonius,
his nephew, and Servius, who stood for offices of state by his interest,
and elected others as magistrates, by honouring whom they thought they
should most annoy him. He made semblance of extreme satisfaction
at all this, as if the people by his means had again enjoyed the liberty
of doing what seemed best to them. And to pacify the public hostility,
he created Lucius Cinna consul, one of the adverse party, having first
bound him under oaths and imprecations to be favourable to his interest.
For Cinna, ascending the capitol with a stone in his hand, swore solemnly,
and prayed with direful curses, that he himself, if he were not true to
his friendship with Sylla, might be cast out of the city, as that stone
out of his hand; and thereupon cast the stone to the ground, in the presence
of many people. Nevertheless Cinna had no sooner entered on his charge,
but he took measures to disturb the present settlement, having prepared
an impeachment against Sylla, got Virginius, one of the tribunes of the
people, to be his accuser; but Sylla, leaving him and the court of judicature
to themselves, set forth against Mithridates.
<<Plut4-54>
About the time that Sylla was making ready to put off with his force
from Italy, besides many other omens which befell Mithridates, then staying
at Pergamus, there goes a story that a figure of Victory, with a crown
in her hand, which the Pergamenians by machinery from above let down on
him, when it had almost reached his head, fell to pieces, and the crown
tumbling down into the midst of the theatre, there broke against the ground,
occasioning a general alarm among the populace, and considerably disquieting
Mithridates himself, although his affairs at that time were succeeding
beyond expectation. For having wrested Asia from the Romans, and
Bithynia and Cappadocia from their kings, he made Pergamus his royal seat,
distributing among his friends riches, principalities, and kingdoms. Of
his sons, one residing in Pontus and Bosporus held his ancient realm as
far as the deserts beyond the lake Maeotis, without molestation; while
Ariarathes, another, was reducing Thrace and Macedon, with a great army,
to obedience. His generals, with forces under them, were establishing
his supremacy in other quarters. Archelaus, in particular, with his
fleet, held absolute mastery of the sea, and was bringing into subjection
the Cyclades, and all the other islands as far as Malea, and had taken
Euboea itself. Making Athens his headquarters, from thence as far
as Thessaly he was withdrawing the states of Greece from the Roman allegiance,
without the least ill-success, except at Chaeronea. For here Bruttius
Sura, lieutenant to Sentius, governor of Macedon, a man of singular valour
and prudence, met him, and, though he came like a torrent pouring over
Boeotia, made stout resistance, and thrice giving him battle near Chaeronea,
repulsed and forced him back to the sea. But being commanded by Lucius
Lucullus to give place to his successor, Sylla, and resign the war to whom
it was decreed, he presently left Boeotia, and retired back to Sentius,
although his success had outgone all hopes, and Greece was well disposed
to a new revolution, upon account of his gallant behaviour. These
were the glorious actions of Bruttius.
<<Plut4-55>
Sylla, on his arrival, received by their deputations the compliments
of all the cities of Greece, except Athens, against which, as it was compelled
by the tyrant Aristion to hold for the king, he advanced with all his forces,
and investing the Piraeus, laid formal siege to it, employing every variety
of engines, and trying every manner of assault; whereas, had he forborn
but a little while, he might without hazard have taken the Upper City by
famine, it being already reduced to the last extremity, through want of
necessaries. But eager to return to Rome, and fearing innovation
there, at great risk, with continual fighting and vast expense, he pushed
on the war. Besides other equipage, the very work about the engines
of battery was supplied with no less than ten thousand yoke of mules, employed
daily in that service. And when timber grew scarce, for many of the
works failed, some crushed to pieces by their own weight, others taking
fire by the continual play of the enemy, he had recourse to the sacred
groves, and cut down the trees of the Academy, the shadiest of all the
suburbs, and the Lyceum. And a vast sum of money being wanted to
carry on the war, he broke into the sanctuaries of Greece, that of Epidaurus
and that of Olympia, sending for the most beautiful and precious offerings
deposited there. He wrote, likewise, to the Amphictyons at Delphi,
that it were better to remit the wealth of the god to him, for that he
would keep it more securely, or in case he made use of it, restore as much.
He sent Caphis, the Phocian, one of his friends, with this message, commanding
him to receive each item by weight. Caphis came to Delphi, but was
loth to touch the holy things, and with many tears, in the presence of
the Amphictyons, bewailed the necessity. And on some of them declaring
they heard the sound of a harp from the inner shrine, he, whether he himself
believed it, or was willing to try the effect of religious fear upon Sylla,
sent back an express. To which Sylla replied in a scoffing way, that
it was surprising to him that Caphis did not know that music was a sign
of joy, not anger; he should, therefore, go on boldly, and accept what
a gracious and bountiful god offered.
<<Plut4-56>
Other things were sent away without much notice on the part of the
Greeks in general, but in the case of the silver tun, that only relic of
the regal donations, which its weight and bulk made it impossible for any
carriage to receive, the Amphictyons were forced to cut it into pieces,
and called to mind in so doing, how Titus Flamininus, and Manius Acilius,
and again Paulus Aemilius, one of whom drove Antiochus out of Greece, and
the others subdued the Macedonian kings, had not only abstained from violating
the Greek temples, but had even given them new gifts and honours, and increased
the general veneration for them. They, indeed, the lawful commanders
of temperate and obedient soldiers, and themselves great in soul, {magnanimity+}
and simple in expenses, lived within the bounds of the ordinary established
charges, accounting it a greater disgrace to seek popularity with their
men, than to feel fear of their enemy. Whereas the commanders of
these times, attaining to superiority by force, not worth, and having need
of arms one against another, rather than against the public enemy, were
constrained to temporize in authority, and in order to pay for the gratifications
with which they purchased the labour of their soldiers, were driven, before
they knew it, to sell the commonwealth itself, and, to gain the mastery
over men better than themselves, were content to become slaves to the vilest
of wretches. These practices drove Marius into exile and again brought
him in against Sylla. These made Cinna the assassin of Octavius,
and Fimbria of Flaccus. To which courses Sylla contributed not the
least; for to corrupt and win over those who were under the command of
others, he would be munificent and profuse towards those who were under
his own; and so, while tempting the soldiers of other generals to treachery,
and his own to dissolute living, he was naturally in want of a large treasury,
and especially during that siege.
<<Plut4-57>
Sylla had a vehement and an implacable desire to conquer Athens whether
out of emulation, fighting as it were against the shadow of the once famous
city, or out of anger, at the foul words and scurrilous jests with which
the tyrant Aristion, showing himself daily, with unseemly gesticulations,
upon the walls, had provoked him and Metella.
<<Plut4-58>
The tyrant Aristion had his very being compounded of wantonness and
cruelty, having gathered into himself all the worst of Mithridates's diseased
and vicious qualities, like some fatal malady which the city, after its
deliverance from innumerable wars, many tyrannies and seditions, was in
its last days destined to endure. At the time when a medimnus of
wheat was sold in the city for one thousand drachmas and men were forced
to live on the feverfew growing round the citadel, and to boil down shoes
and oil-bags for their food, he, carousing and feasting in the open face
of day, then dancing in armour, and making jokes at the enemy, suffered
the holy lamp of the goddess to expire for want of oil, and to the chief
priestess, who demanded of him the twelfth part of a medimnus of wheat,
he sent the like quantity of pepper. The senators and priests who
came as suppliants to beg of him to take compassion on the city, and treat
for peace with Sylla, he drove away and dispersed with a flight of arrows.
At last, with much ado, he sent forth two or three of his revelling companions
to parley, to whom Sylla, perceiving that they made no serious overtures
towards an accommodation, but went on haranguing in praise of Theseus,
Eumolpus, and the Median trophies, replied, "My good friends, you may put
up your speeches and be gone. I was sent by the Romans to Athens,
not to take lessons, but to reduce rebels to obedience."
<<Plut4-59>
In the meantime news came to Sylla that some old men, talking in the
Ceramicus, had been overheard to blame the tyrant for not securing the
passages and approaches near the Heptachalcum, the one point where the
enemy might easily get over. Sylla neglected not the report, but
going in the night, and discovering the place to be assailable, set instantly
to work. Sylla himself makes mention in his Memoirs that Marcus Teius,
the first man who scaled the wall, meeting with an adversary, and striking
him on the headpiece a home-stroke, broke his own sword, but, notwithstanding,
did not give ground, but stood and held him fast. The city was certainly
taken from that quarter, according to the tradition of the oldest of the
Athenians.
<<Plut4-60>
When they had thrown down the wall, and made all level betwixt the
Piraic and Sacred Gate, about midnight Sylla entered the breach, with all
the terrors of trumpets and cornets sounding, with the triumphant shout
and cry of an army let loose to spoil and slaughter, {Harfleur+}
and scouring through the streets with swords drawn. There was no
numbering the slain; the amount is to this day conjectured only from the
space of ground overflowed with blood. For without mentioning the
execution done in other quarters of the city, the blood that was shed about
the market-place spread over the whole Ceramicus within the Double-gate,
and, according to most writers, passed through the gate and overflowed
the suburb. Nor did the multitudes which fell thus exceed the number
of those who, out of pity and love for their country which they believed
was now finally to perish, slew themselves; the best of them, through despair
of their country's surviving, dreading themselves to survive, expecting
neither humanity nor moderation in Sylla. At length, partly at the
instance of Midias and Calliphon, two exiled men, beseeching and casting
themselves at his feet, partly by the intercession of those senators who
followed the camp, having had his fill of revenge, and making some honourable
mention of the ancient Athenians, "I forgive," said he, "the many for the
sake of the few, the living for the dead." He took Athens, according to
his own Memoirs, on the calends of March, coinciding pretty nearly with
the new moon of Anthesterion, on which day it is the Athenian usage to
perform various acts in commemoration of the ruins and devastations occasioned
by the deluge, that being supposed to be the time of its occurrence.
<<Plut4-61>
At the taking of the town, the tyrant fled into the citadel, and was
there besieged by Curio, who had that charge given him. He held out a considerable
time, but at last yielded himself up for want of water, and divine power
immediately intimated its agency in the matter. For on the same day and
hour that Curio conducted him down, the clouds gathered in a clear sky,
and there came down a great quantity of rain and filled the citadel with
water.
<<Plut4-62>
Not long after, Sylla won the Piraeus, and burnt most of it; amongst
the rest, Philo's arsenal, a work very greatly admired.
<<Plut4-63>
In the meantime Taxiles, Mithridates's general, coming down from Thrace
and Macedon, with an army of one hundred thousand foot, ten thousand horse,
and ninety chariots, armed with scythes at the wheels, would have joined
Archelaus, who lay with a navy on the coast near Munychia, reluctant to
quit the sea, and yet unwilling to engage the Romans in battle, but desiring
to protract the war and cut off the enemy's supplies. Which Sylla
perceiving much better than himself, passed with his forces into Boeotia,
quitting a barren district which was inadequate to maintain an army even
in time of peace. He was thought by some to have taken false measures
in thus leaving Attica, a rugged country, and ill suited for cavalry to
move in, and entering the plain and open fields of Boeotia, knowing as
he did the barbarian strength to consist most in horses and chariots. But
as was said before, to avoid famine and scarcity, he was forced to run
the risk of a battle. Moreover he was in anxiety for Hortensius,
a bold and active officer, whom on his way to Sylla with forces from Thessaly,
the barbarians awaited in the straits. For these reasons Sylla drew
off into Boeotia. Hortensius, meantime, was conducted by Caphis,
our countryman, another way unknown to the barbarians, by Parnassus, just
under Tithora, which was then not so large a town as it is now, but a mere
fort, surrounded by steep precipices whither the Phocians also, in old
times, when flying from the invasion of Xerxes, carried themselves and
their goods and were saved. Hortensius, encamping here, kept off
the enemy by day, and at night descending by difficult passages to Patronis,
joined the forces of Sylla who came to meet him. Thus united they
posted themselves on a fertile hill in the middle of the plain of Elatea,
shaded with trees and watered at the foot. It is called Philoboeotus,
and its situation and natural advantages are spoken of with great admiration
by Sylla.
<<Plut4-64>
As they lay thus encamped, they seemed to the enemy a contemptible
number, for there were not above fifteen hundred horse, and less than fifteen
thousand foot. Therefore the rest of the commanders, over-persuading
Archelaus and drawing up the army, covered the plain with horses, chariots,
bucklers, targets. The clamour and cries of so many nations forming
for battle rent the air, nor was the pomp and ostentation of their costly
array altogether idle and unserviceable for terror; for the brightness
of their armour, embellished magnificently with gold and silver, and the
rich colours of their Median and Scythian coats, intermixed with brass
and shining steel, presented a flaming and terrible sight as they swayed
about and moved in their ranks, so much so that the Romans shrunk within
their trenches, and Sylla, unable by any arguments to remove their fear,
and unwilling to force them to fight against their wills, was fain to sit
down in quiet, ill-brooking to become the subject of barbarian insolence
and laughter. This, however, above all advantaged him, for the enemy,
from contemning of him, fell into disorder amongst themselves, being already
less thoroughly under command, on account of the number of their leaders.
Some few of them remained within the encampment, but others, the major
part, lured out with hopes of prey and rapine, strayed about the country
many days' journey from the camp, and are related to have destroyed the
city of Panope, to have plundered Lebadea, and robbed the oracle without
any orders from their commanders.
<<Plut4-65>
Sylla, all this while, chafing and fretting to see the cities all around
destroyed, suffered not the soldiery to remain idle, but leading them out,
compelled them to divert the Cephisus from its ancient channel by casting
up ditches, and giving respite to none, showed himself rigorous in punishing
the remiss, that growing weary of labour, they might be induced by hardship
to embrace danger. Which fell out accordingly, for on the third day,
being hard at work as Sylla passed by, they begged and clamoured to be
led against the enemy. Sylla replied, that this demand of war proceeded
rather from a backwardness to labour than any forwardness to fight, but
if they were in good earnest martially inclined, he bade them take their
arms and get up thither, pointing to the ancient citadel of the Parapotamians,
of which at present, the city being laid waste, there remained only the
rocky hill itself, steep and craggy on all sides, and severed from Mount
Hedylium by the breadth of the river Assus, which, running between, and
at the bottom of the same hill falling into the Cephisus with an impetuous
confluence, makes this eminence a strong position for soldiers to occupy.
Observing that the enemy's division, called the Brazen Shields, were making
their way up thither, Sylla was willing to take first possession, and by
the vigorous efforts of the soldiers, succeeded. Archelaus, driven
from hence, bent his forces upon Chaeronea. The Chaeroneans who bore
arms in the Roman camp beseeching Sylla not to abandon the city, he despatched
Gabinius, a tribune, with one legion, and sent out also the Chaeroneans,
who endeavoured, but were not able to get in before Gabinius; so active
was he, and more zealous to bring relief than those who had entreated it.
Juba writes that Ericius was the man sent, not Gabinius. Thus narrowly
did our native city escape.
<<Plut4-66>
From Lebadea and the cave of Trophonius there came favourable rumours
and prophecies of victory to the Romans, of which the inhabitants of those
places gave a fuller account, but as Sylla himself affirms in the tenth
book of his Memoirs, Quintus Titius, a man of some repute among the Romans
who were engaged in mercantile business in Greece, came to him after the
battle won at Chaeronea, and declared that Trophonius had foretold another
fight and victory on the place, within a short time. After him a soldier,
by name Salvenius, brought an account from the god of the future issue
of affairs in Italy. As to the vision, they both agreed in this,
that they had seen one who in stature and in majesty was similar to Jupiter
Olympius.
<<Plut4-67>
Sylla, when he had passed over the Assus, marching under the Mount
Hedylium, encamped close to Archelaus, who had intrenched himself strongly
between the mountains Acontium and Hedylium, close to what are called the
Assia. The place of his intrenchment is to this day named from him,
Archelaus. Sylla, after one day's respite, having left Murena behind
him with one legion and two cohorts to amuse the enemy with continual alarms,
himself went and sacrificed on the banks of Cephisus, and the holy rites
ended, held on towards Chaeronea to receive the forces there and view Mount
Thurium, where a party of the enemy had posted themselves. This is a craggy
height running up in a conical form to a point called by us Orthopagus;
at the foot of it is the river Morius and the temple of Apollo Thurius.
The god had his surname from Thuro, mother of Chaeron, whom ancient record
makes founder of Chaeronea. Others assert that the cow, which Apollo
gave to Cadmus for a guide, appeared there, and that the place took its
name from the beast, Thor being the Phoenician word for cow.
<<Plut4-68>
At Sylla's approach to Chaeronea, the tribune who had been appointed
to guard the city led out his men in arms, and met him with a garland of
laurel in his hand; which Sylla accepting, and at the same time saluting
the soldiers and animating them to the encounter, two men of Chaeronea,
Homoloichus and Anaxidamus, presented themselves before him, and offered,
with a small party, to dislodge those who were posted on Thurium.
For there lay a path out of sight of the barbarians, from what is called
Petrochus along by the Museum, leading right down from above upon Thurium.
By this way it was easy to fall upon them and either stone them from above
or force them down into the plain. Sylla, assured of their faith
and courage by Gabinius, bade them proceed with the enterprise, and mean |
