Part 58

Immediately after the dreadful calamity at Syracuse became known, "extraordinary measures were adopted by the people; a number of citizens of advanced age were formed into a deliberative and executive body under the name of Probuli, and empowered to fit out a fleet. Whether this laid the foundation for oligarchical machinations or not, those aged men were unable to bring back men's minds to their former course; the prosecution of the Hermocopidæ had been most mischievous in its results; various secret associations had sprung up and conspired to reap advantage to themselves from the distress and embarrassment of the state; the indignation caused by the infuriated excesses of the people during that trial, possibly here, as frequently happened in other Grecian states, determined the more respectable members of the community to guard against the recurrence of similar scenes in future, by the establishment of an aristocracy. Lastly, the watchful malice of Alcibiades, who was the implacable enemy of that populace, to whose blind fury he had been sacrificed, baffled all attempts to restore confidence and tranquillity, and there is no doubt that, whilst he kept up a correspondence with his partisans at home, he did everything in his power to increase the perplexity and distress of his native city from without, in order that he might be recalled to provide for its safety and defence. A favourable opportunity for the execution of his plans presented itself in the fifth year of his exile, Ol. 92. 1; 411. B. C.; as he had incurred the suspicion of the Spartans, and stood high in the favour of Tissaphernes, the Athenians thought that his intercession might enable them to obtain assistance from the Persian king. The people in Athens were headed by one of his most inveterate enemies, Androcles; and he well knew that all attempts to effect his return would be fruitless, until this man and the other demagogues were removed. Hence Alcibiades entered into negotiations with the commanders of the Athenian fleet at Samos, respecting the establishment of an oligarchical constitution, not from any attachment to that form of government in itself, but solely with the view of promoting his own ends. Phrynichus and Pisander were equally insincere in their co-operation with Alcibiades. … Their plan was that the latter should reconcile the people to the change in the constitution which he wished to effect, by promising to obtain them the assistance of the great king; but they alone resolved to reap the benefit of his exertions. Pisander took upon himself to manage the Athenian populace. It was in truth no slight undertaking to attempt to overthrow a democracy of a hundred and twenty years' standing, and of intense development; but most of the able bodied citizens were absent with the fleet, whilst such as were still in the city were confounded by the imminence of the danger from without; on the other hand, the prospect of succour from the Persian king doubtless had some weight with them, and they possibly felt some symptoms of returning affection for their former favourite Alcibiades. Nevertheless, Pisander and his accomplices employed craft and perfidy to accomplish their designs; the people were not persuaded or convinced, but entrapped into compliance with their measures. Pisander gained over to his purpose the above named clubs, and induced the people to send him with ten plenipotentiaries to the navy at Samos. In the mean time the rest of the conspirators prosecuted the work of remodelling the constitution."

_W. Wachsmuth, History Antiquities of the Greeks, volume 2, pages 252-255._

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The people, or an assembly cleverly made up and manipulated to represent the people, were induced to vote all the powers of government into the hands of a council of Four Hundred, of which council the citizens appointed only five members. Those five chose ninety-five more, to make one hundred, and each of that hundred then chose three colleagues. The conspirators thus easily made up the Four Hundred to their liking, from their own ranks. This council was to convene an assembly of Five Thousand citizens, whenever it saw fit to do so. But when news of this constitutional change reached the army at Samos, where the Athenian headquarters for the Ionian war were fixed, the citizen soldiers refused to submit to it—repudiated it altogether—and organized themselves as an independent state. The ruling spirit among them was Thrasybulus, and his influence brought about a reconciliation with Alcibiades, then an exile sheltered at the Persian court. Alcibiades was recalled by the army and placed at its head. Presently a reaction at Athens ensued, after the oligarchical party had given signs of treasonable communication with Sparta, and in June the people assembled in the Pnyx and reasserted their sovereignty. "The Council was deposed, and the supreme sovereignty of the state restored to the people—not, however, to the entire multitude; for the principle was retained of reserving full civic rights to a committee of men of a certain amount of property; and, as the lists of the Five Thousand had never been drawn up, it was decreed, in order that the desired end might be speedily reached, to follow the precedent of similar institutions in other states and to constitute all Athenians able to furnish themselves with a complete military equipment from their own resources, full citizens, with the rights of voting and participating in the government. Thus the name of the Five Thousand had now become a very inaccurate designation; but it was retained, because men had in the last few months become habituated to it. At the same time, the abolition of pay for civic offices and functions was decreed, not merely as a temporary measure, but as a fundamental principle of the new commonwealth, which the citizens were bound by a solemn oath to maintain. This reform was, upon the whole, a wise combination of aristocracy and democracy; and, according to the opinion of Thucydides, the best constitution which the Athenians had hitherto possessed. On the motion of Critias, the recall, of Alcibiades was decreed about the same time; and a deputation was despatched to Samos, to accomplish the union between army and city."

_E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 4, chapter 5._

Most of the leaders of the Four Hundred fled to the Spartan camp at Decelia. Two were taken, tried and executed.

_Thucydides, History, book 8, section 48-97._

See, also, GREECE: B. C. 413-412.

ALSO IN: _V. Duruy, History of Greece, chapter 26 (volume 3)._

ATHENS: B. C. 411-407. Victories at Cynossema and Abydos. Exploits of Alcibiades. His triumphal return. His appointment to command. His second deposition and exile.

See GREECE: B. C. 411-407.

ATHENS: B. C. 406. The Peloponnesian War: Battle and victory of Arginusae. Condemnation and execution of the Generals.

See GREECE: B. C. 406; and above: B. C. 424-406.

ATHENS: B. C. 405. The Peloponnesian War: Decisive defeat at Aigospotamoi.

See GREECE: B. C. 405.

ATHENS: B. C. 404. The Surrender to Lysander.

After the battle of Ægospotami (August, B. C. 405), which destroyed their navy, and cut off nearly all supplies to the city by sea, as the Spartans at Decelea had long cut off supplies upon the land side, the Athenians had no hope. They waited in terror and despair for their enemies to close in upon them. The latter were in no haste, for they were sure of their prey. Lysander, the victor at Ægospotami, came leisurely from the Hellespont, receiving on his way the surrender of the cities subject or allied to Athens, and placing Spartan harmosts and garrisons in them, with the local oligarchs established uniformly in power. About November he reached the Saronic gulf and blockaded the Athenian harbor of Piræus, while an overwhelming Peloponnesian land force, under the Lacedæmonian king Pausanias, arrived simultaneously in Attica and encamped at the gates of the city. The Athenians had no longer any power except the power to endure, and that they exercised for more than three months, mainly resisting the demand that their Long Walls—the walls which protected the connection of the city with its harbors—should be thrown down. But when famine had thinned the ranks of the citizens and broken the spirit of the survivors, they gave up. "There was still a high-spirited minority who entered their protest and preferred death by famine to such insupportable disgrace. The large majority, however, accepted them [the terms] and the acceptance was made known to Lysander. It was on the 16th day of the Attic month Munychion,—about the middle or end of March,—that this victorious commander sailed into the Peiræus, twenty-seven years, almost exactly, after the surprise of Platæa by the Thebans, which opened the Peloponnesian War. Along with him came the Athenian exiles, several of whom appear to have been serving with his army and assisting him with their counsel."

_G. Grote, History of Greece, part 2, chapter 65 (volume 8)._

The Long Walls and the fortifications of Piræus were demolished, and then followed the organization of an oligarchical government at Athens, resulting in the reign of terror under "The Thirty."

_E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 4, chapter 5._

ALSO IN: _Xenophon, Hellenics, book 2, chapter 2._

_Plutarch, Lysander._

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ATHENS: B. C. 404-403. The tyranny of the Thirty. The Year of Anarchy.

In the summer of B. C. 404, following the siege and surrender of Athens, and the humiliating close of the long Peloponnesian War, the returned leaders of the oligarchical party, who had been in exile, succeeded with the help of their Spartan friends, in overthrowing the democratic constitution of the city and establishing themselves in power. The revolution was accomplished at a public assembly of citizens, in the presence of Lysander, the victorious Lacedæmonian admiral, whose fleet in the Piraeus lay ready to support his demands. "In this assembly, Dracontidas, a scoundrel upon whom repeated sentences had been passed, brought forward a motion, proposing the transfer of the government into the hands of Thirty persons; and Theramenes supported this proposal which he declared to express the wishes of Sparta. Even now, these speeches produced a storm of indignation; after all the acts of violence which Athens had undergone, she yet contained men outspoken enough to venture to defend the constitution, and to appeal to the fact that the capitulation sanctioned by both parties contained no provision as to the internal affairs of Athens. But, hereupon, Lysander himself came forward and spoke to the citizens without reserve, like one who was their absolute master. … By such means the motion of Dracontidas was passed; but only a small number of unpatriotic and cowardly citizens raised their hands in token of assent. All better patriots contrived to avoid participation in this vote. Next, ten members of the government were chosen by Critias and his colleagues [the Critias of Plato's Dialogues, pupil of Socrates, and now the violent and blood-thirsty leader of the anti-democratic revolution], ten by Theramenes, the confidential friend of Lysander, and finally ten out of the assembled multitude, probably by a free vote; and this board of Thirty was hereupon established as the supreme government authority by a resolution of the assembly present. Most of the members of the new government had formerly been among the Four Hundred, and had therefore long pursued a common course of action." The Thirty Tyrants so placed in power were masters of Athens for eight months, and executed their will without conscience or mercy, having a garrison of Spartan soldiers in the Acropolis to support them. They were also sustained by a picked body of citizens, "the Three Thousand," who bore arms while other citizens were stripped of every weapon. Large numbers of the more patriotic and high-spirited Athenians had escaped from their unfortunate city and had taken refuge, chiefly at Thebes, the old enemy of Athens, but now sympathetic in her distress. At Thebes these exiles organized themselves under Thrasybulus and Anytus, and determined to expel the tyrants and to recover their homes. They first seized a strong post at Phyle, in Attica, where they gained in numbers rapidly, and from which point they were able in a few weeks to advance and occupy the Piræus. When the troops of The Thirty came out to attack them, they drew back to the adjacent height of Munychia and there fought a battle which delivered their city from the Tyrants. Critias, the master-spirit of the usurpation, was slain; the more violent of his colleagues took refuge at Eleusis, and Athens, for a time, remained under the government of a new oligarchical Board of Ten; while Thrasybulus and the democratic liberators maintained their headquarters at Munychia. All parties waited the action of Sparta. Lysander, the Spartan general, marched an army into Attica to restore the tyranny which was of his own creating; but one of the two Spartan kings, Pausanias, intervened, assumed the command in his own person, and applied his efforts to the arranging of peace between the Athenian parties. The result was a restoration of the democratic constitution of the Attic state, with some important reforms. Several of The Thirty were put to death,—treacherously, it was said,—but an amnesty was extended to all their partisans. The year in which they and The Ten controlled affairs was termed in the official annals of the city the Year of Anarchy, and its magistrates were not recognized.

_E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 4, chapter 5, and book 5, chapter 1._

ALSO IN: _Xenophon, Hellenics, book 2, chapters 3-4._

_C. Sankey, The Spartan and Theban Supremacies. chapters 2-3._

ATHENS: B. C. 395-387. Confederacy against Sparta. Alliance with Persia. The Corinthian War. Conon's rebuilding of the Long Walls. Athenian independence restored. The Peace of Antalcidas.

See GREECE: B. C. 399-387.

ATHENS: B. C. 378-371. Brief alliance with Thebes against Sparta.

See GREECE: B. C. 379-371.

ATHENS: B. C. 378-357. The New Confederacy and the Social War.

Upon the Liberation of Thebes and the signs that began to appear of the decline of Spartan power—during the year of the archonship of Nausinicus, B. C. 378-7, which was made memorable at Athens by various movements of political regeneration,—the organization of a new Confederacy was undertaken, analogous to the Confederacy of Delos, formed a century before. Athens was to be, "not the ruling capital, but only the directing city in possession of the primacy, the seat of the federal council. … Callistratus was in a sense the Aristides of the new confederation and doubtless did much to bring about an agreement; it was likewise his work that, in place of the 'tributes' of odious memory, the payments necessary to the existence of the confederation were introduced under the gentler name of 'contributions.' … Amicable relations were resumed with the Cyclades, Rhodes and Perinthus; in other words, the ancient union of navies was at once renewed upon a large scale and in a wide extent. Even such states joined it as had hitherto never stood in confederate relations with Athens, above all Thebes."

_E. Curtius, History of Greece, book 6, chapter 1_.

This second confederacy renewed much of the prosperity and influence of Athens for a brief period of about twenty years. But in 357 B. C., four important members of the Confederacy, namely, Chios, Cos, Rhodes, and Byzantium leagued themselves in revolt, with the aid of Mausolus, prince of Caria, and an inglorious war ensued, known as the Social War, which lasted three years. Athens was forced at last to assent to the secession of the four revolted cities and to recognize their independence, which greatly impaired her prestige and power, just at the time when she was called upon to resist the encroachments of Philip of Macedonia.

_C. Thirlwall, History of Greece, chapter 42._

ATHENS: B. C. 370-362. Alliance with Sparta against Thebes. Battle of Mantinea.

See GREECE: B. C. 371-362.

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ATHENS: B. C. 359-338. The collision with Philip of Macedon. The Policy of Demosthenes and Policy of Phocion.

"A new period opens with the growth of the Macedonian power under Philip (359-336 B. C.) We are here chiefly concerned to notice the effect on the City-State [of Athens], not only of the strength and policy of this new power, but also of the efforts of the Greeks themselves to counteract it. At the time of Philip's accession the so-called Theban supremacy had just practically ended with the death of Epaminondias. There was now a kind of balance of power between the three leading States, Sparta, Athens, and Thebes, no one of which was greatly stronger than the others; and such a balance could easily be worked upon by any great power from without. Thus when Macedon came into the range of Greek politics, under a man of great diplomatic as well as military capacity, who, like a Czar of to-day, wished to secure a firm footing on the sea-board of the Ægean [see GREECE: B. C. 359-358], she found her work comparatively easy. The strong imperial policy of Philip found no real antagonist except at Athens. Weak as she was, and straitened by the break-up of her new confederacy, Athens could still produce men of great talent and energy; but she was hampered by divided counsels. Two Athenians of this period seem to represent the currents of Greek political thought, now running in two different directions. Demosthenes represents the cause of the City-State in this age, of a union, that is, of perfectly free Hellenic cities against the common enemy. Phocion represents the feeling, which seems to have been long growing up among thinking men at Athens, that the City-State was no longer what it had been, and could no longer stand by itself; that what was needed was a general Hellenic peace, and possibly even an arbiter from without, an arbiter not wholly un-Hellenic like the Persian, yet one who might succeed in stilling the fatal jealousies of the leading States. … The efforts of Demosthenes to check Philip fall into two periods divided by the peace of Philocrates in 346 B. C. In the first of these he is acting chiefly with Athens alone; Philip is to him not so much the common enemy of Greece as the dangerous rival of Athens in the north. His whole mind was given to the internal reform of Athens so as to strengthen her against Philip. In her relation to other Greek States he perhaps hardly saw beyond a balance of power. … After 346 his Athenian feeling seems to become more distinctly Hellenic. But what could even such a man as Demosthenes do with the Hellas of that day? He could not force on the Greeks a real and permanent union; he could but urge new alliances. His strength was spent in embassies with this object, embassies too often futile. No alliance could save Greece from the Macedonian power, as subsequent events plainly showed. What was needed was a real federal union between the leading States, with a strong central controlling force; and Demosthenes' policy was hopeless just because Athens could never be the centre of such a union, nor could any other city. Demosthenes is thus the last, and in some respects the most heroic champion of the old Greek instinct for autonomy. He is the true child of the City-State, but the child of its old age and decrepitude. He still believes in Athens, and it is on Athens that all his hopes are based. He looks on Philip as one who must inevitably be the foe alike of Athens and of Greece. He seems to think that he can be beaten off as Xerxes was, and to forget that even Xerxes almost triumphed over the divisions of the Greek States, and that Philip is a nearer, a more prominent, and a far less barbarian foe. … Phocion was the somewhat odd exponent of the practical side of a school of thought which had been gaining strength in Greece for some time past. This school was now brought into prominence by the rise of Macedon, and came to have a marked influence on the history of the City-State. It began with the philosophers, and with the idea that the philosopher may belong to the world as well as to a particular city. … Athens was far more open to criticism now than in the days of Pericles; and a cynical dislike betrays itself in the Republic for the politicians of the day and their tricks, and a longing for a strong government of reason. … Aristotle took the facts of city life as they were and showed how they might be made the most of. … To him Macedon was assuredly not wholly barbarian; and war to the death with her kings could not have been to him as natural or desirable as it seemed to Demosthenes. And though he has nothing to tell us of Macedon, we can hardly avoid the conclusion that his desire was for peace and internal reform, even if it were under the guarantee of the northern power. … Of this philosophical view of Greek politics Phocion was in a manner the political exponent. But his policy was too much a negative one; it might almost be called one of indifferentism, like the feeling of Lessing and Goethe in Germany's most momentous period. So far as we know, Phocion never proposed an alliance of a durable kind, either Athenian or Hellenic, with Macedon; he was content to be a purely restraining influence. Athens had been constantly at war since 432; her own resources were of the weakest; there was little military skill to be found in her, no reserve force, much talk, but little solid courage. Athens was vulnerable at various points, and could not possibly defend more than one at a time, therefore Phocion despaired of war, and the event proved him right. The faithfulness of the Athenians towards him is a proof that they also instinctively felt that he was right. But he was wanting on the practical and creative side, and never really dominated either Athens, Greece, or Philip. … A policy of resistance found the City-State too weak to defend itself; a policy of inaction would land it in a Macedonian empire which would still further weaken its remaining vitality. The first policy, that of Demosthenes, did actually result in disaster and the presence of Macedonian garrisons in Greek cities. The second policy then took its place, and initiated a new era for Greece. After the fatal battle of Chæronea (338 B. C.) Philip assumed the position of leader of the Greek cities."

_W. W. Fowler, The City-State of the Greeks and Romans, chapter 10._

See, also, GREECE: 357-336.

ATHENS: B. C. 340. Alliance with Byzantium against Philip of Macedon.

See GREECE: B. C. 340.

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