And mortal-slaying wave of troublous war.”
Leotychides said that this oracle referred to Agesilaus, for he limped on one leg, but Agesilaus said it referred to Leotychides’ not being the legitimate son of Agis. And the Lacedæmonians did not avail themselves of their privilege to refer the question to Delphi: but Lysander, the son of Aristocritus, seems to have prevailed upon the people to unanimously choose Agesilaus.
CHAPTER IX.
So Agesilaus the son of Archidamus was king, and the Lacedæmonians resolved to cross over into Asia with their fleet to capture Artaxerxes the son of Darius: for they had learnt from several people in authority, and especially from Lysander, that it was not Artaxerxes that had helped them in the war against the Athenians, but Cyrus who had supplied them with money for their ships. And Agesilaus, after being instructed to convey the expedition to Asia as commander of the land forces, sent round the Peloponnese to all the Greeks except at Argos and outside the Isthmus urging them to join him as allies. The Corinthians for their part, although they had been most eager to take part in the expedition to Asia, yet, when their temple of Olympian Zeus was suddenly consumed by fire, took it as an evil omen, and remained at home sorely against their will. And the Athenians urged, as pretext for refusing their aid, the strain of the Peloponnesian war and the city’s need of recovery from the plague: but their having learnt from envoys that Conon the son of Timotheus had gone to the great king, was their main motive. And Aristomenidas was sent as ambassador to Thebes, the father of Agesilaus’ mother, who was intimate with the Thebans, and had been one of the judges who, at the capture of Platæa, had condemned the garrison to be put to the sword. The Thebans however cried off like the Athenians, declining their aid. And Agesilaus, when his own army and that of the allied forces was mustered and his fleet ready to sail, went to Aulis to sacrifice to Artemis, because it was there that Agamemnon had propitiated the goddess when he led the expedition to Troy. And Agesilaus considered himself king of a more flourishing state than Agamemnon, and that like him he was leading all Greece, but the success would be more glorious, the happiness greater, to conquer the great King Artaxerxes, and to be master of Persia, than to overthrow the kingdom of Priam. But as he was sacrificing some Thebans attacked him, and threw the thigh-bones of the victims that were burning off the altar, and drove him out of the temple. And Agesilaus was grieved at the non-completion of the sacrifice, but none the less he crossed over to Asia Minor and marched for Sardis. Now Lydia was at this period the greatest province in Lower Asia Minor, and Sardis was the principal city for wealth and luxury, and it was the chief residence of the satrap by the sea, as Susa was the chief residence of the great king. And fighting a battle with Tissaphernes, the satrap of Ionia, in the plain near the river Hermus, Agesilaus defeated the Persian cavalry and infantry, though Tissaphernes’ army was the largest since the expedition of Xerxes against Athens, and earlier still the expedition of Darius against the Scythians. And the Lacedæmonians, delighted at the success of Agesilaus by land, readily made him leader of the fleet also. And he put Pisander his wife’s brother, a very stout soldier by land, in command of the triremes. But some god must have grudged his bringing things to a happy conclusion. For when Artaxerxes heard of the victorious progress of Agesilaus, and how he kept pushing on with his army, not content with what he had already gained, he condemned Tissaphernes to death, although he had in former times done him signal service, and gave his satrapy to Tithraustes, a longheaded fellow and very able man, who greatly disliked the Lacedæmonians. Directly he arrived at Sardis, he forthwith devised means to compel the Lacedæmonians to recall their army from Asia Minor. So he sent Timocrates a native of Rhodes into Greece with money, bidding him stir up war against the Lacedæmonians in Greece. And those who received Timocrates’ money were it is said Cylon and Sodamas among the Argives, and at Thebes Androclides and Ismenias and Amphithemis: and the Athenians Cephalus and Epicrates had a share, and the Corinthians with Argive proclivities as Polyanthes and Timolaus. But the war was openly commenced by the Locrians of Amphissa. For the Locrians had some land which was debated between them and the Phocians, from this land the Phocians, at the instigation of the Thebans and Ismenias, cut the ripe corn and drove off cattle. The Phocians also invaded Locris in full force, and ravaged the territory. Then the Locrians invited in the Thebans as their allies, and laid Phocis waste. And the Phocians went to Lacedæmon and inveighed against the Thebans, and recounted all that they had suffered at their hands. And the Lacedæmonians determined to declare war against the Thebans, and among other charges which they brought against them was their insult at Aulis to the sacrifice of Agesilaus. And the Athenians, having heard of the intention of the Lacedæmonians, sent to Sparta, begging them not to war against Thebes, but to submit their differences to arbitration. And the Lacedæmonians angrily dismissed the embassy. And what happened subsequently, viz. the expedition of the Lacedæmonians and the death of Lysander, has been told by me in reference to Pausanias. And what is known to history as the Corinthian war began with this march into Bœotia of the Lacedæmonians, and grew into a big war, and compelled Agesilaus to bring his army home from Asia Minor. And when he had crossed over in his ships from Abydos to Sestos, and marched into Thessaly through Thrace, the Thessalians attempted to bar his way to ingratiate themselves with the Thebans, partly also in consequence of their long standing friendship with Athens. And Agesilaus having routed their cavalry marched through Thessaly, and then through Bœotia, having conquered the Thebans and their allies at Coronea. And when the Bœotians were routed, some of them fled to the temple of Athene Itonia: and though Agesilaus was wounded in the battle, he did not for all that violate their sanctuary.
CHAPTER X.
And not long afterwards those Corinthians who had been exiled for their Lacedæmonian proclivities established the Isthmian games. But those who were at this time in Corinth remained there from fear of Agesilaus, but when he broke up his camp and returned to Sparta, then they also joined the Argives at the Isthmian games. And Agesilaus came again to Corinth with an army: and, as the festival of Hyacinthus was coming on, he sent home the natives of Amyclæ, to go and perform the customary rites to Apollo and Hyacinthus. This detachment were attacked on the road and cut to pieces by the Athenians under Iphicrates. Agesilaus also marched into Ætolia to help the Ætolians who were hard pressed by the Acarnanians, and compelled the Acarnanians to bring the war to an end, when they had all but taken Calydon and the other fortified towns in Ætolia. And some time afterwards he sailed to Egypt, to the aid of the Egyptians who had revolted from the great king: and many memorable exploits did he in Egypt. And he died on the passage home, for he was now quite an old man. And the Lacedæmonians, when they got his dead body, buried it with greater honours than they had shewn to any of their kings.
And during the reign of Archidamus, the son of Agesilaus, the Phocians seized the temple of Apollo at Delphi. Offers of mercenary aid came privately to the Thebans to fight against the Phocians, and publicly from the Lacedæmonians and Athenians, the latter remembering the old kindnesses they had received from the Phocians, and the Lacedæmonians under pretext of friendship, but really as I think in hostility to the Thebans. And Theopompus, the son of Damasistratus, said that Archidamus also had a share of the money at Delphi, and that also Dinichas, his wife, had received a bribe from the authorities of the Phocians, and that all this made Archidamus more willing to bring the Phocians aid. I do not praise receiving sacred money, and assisting men who made havoc of the most famous of oracles. But this much I can praise. The Phocians intended to kill all the young men at Delphi, and to sell the women and children into slavery, and to raze the city to its foundations: all this Archidamus successfully deprecated. And he afterwards crossed over into Italy, to assist the people of Tarentum in a war with their barbarian neighbours: and he was slain there by the barbarians, and his dead body failed to find a tomb through the wrath of Apollo. And Agis, the elder son of this Archidamus, met his death fighting against the Macedonians and Antipater. During the reign of Eudamidas the younger one the Lacedæmonians enjoyed peace. All about his son Agis, and his grandson Eurydamidas, I have already related in my account of Sicyonia.
Next to the Hermæ[32] is a place full of oak trees, and the name of it Scotitas (dark place) was not derived from the thickness of the foliage, but from Zeus surnamed Scotitas, whose temple is about 10 stades as you turn off the road to the left. And when you have returned to the road, and gone forward a little, and turned again to the left, there is a statue and trophy of Hercules: Hercules erected the trophy it is said after killing Hippocoon and his sons. And a third turn from the high road to the right leads to Caryæ and the temple of Artemis. For Caryæ is sacred to Artemis and the Nymphs, and there is a statue of Artemis of Caryæ in the open air, and here the Lacedæmonian maidens have a festival every year, and hold their national dances. And as you return to the high road and go straight on you come to the ruins of Sellasia, which place (as I have mentioned before) the Achæans reduced to slavery, when they had conquered in battle the Lacedæmonians and their king Cleomenes the son of Leonidas. And at Thornax, which you next come to, is a statue of Pythæan Apollo, very similar to the one at Amyclæ, which I shall describe when I come to Amyclæ. But the one at Amyclæ is more famous than the Lacedæmonian one, for the gold which Crœsus the Lydian sent to Pythæan Apollo was used to adorn it.
CHAPTER XI.
On going forward from Thornax, you come to the city which was originally called Sparta, but afterwards Lacedæmon, which was once the name of the whole district. And according to my rule which I laid down in my account about Attica, not to give everything in detail but to select what was most worthy of account, so I shall deal in my account of Sparta: for I determined from the outset to pick out the most remarkable of the particulars which tradition hands down. From this determination I shall on no occasion deviate. At Sparta there is a handsome market-place, and a council chamber for the Senate, and public buildings in the market-place for the Ephors and guardians of the laws, and for those who are called the Bidiæi. The Senate is the most powerful governing body in Sparta, but all these others take part in the government: and the ephors and the Bidiæi are each five in number, and are appointed to preside over the games of the young men in the Platanistas and elsewhere, and the Ephors manage all other important matters, and furnish one of their number as the Eponymus, who like the magistrates of the same name at Athens presides over the rest. But the most notable thing in the market-place is what they call the Persian Portico, built of the spoils taken from the Medes: and in time they have brought it to its present size and magnificence. And there are on the pillars statues in white stone of Mardonius, the son of Gobryas, and other Persians. There is also a statue of Artemisia, the daughter of Lygdamis, who was Queen of Halicarnassus: and who they say of her own accord joined Xerxes in the expedition against Greece, and displayed great valour in the sea fight at Salamis. And there are two temples in the market-place, one to Cæsar, who was the first of the Romans that aimed at Autocracy, and established the present régime, and the other to Augustus his adopted son, who confirmed the Autocratic rule, and advanced further in consideration and power even than Cæsar had done. His name Augustus has the same signification as the Greek Sebastus. At the altar of Augustus they exhibit a brazen statue of Agias, who they say foretold Lysander that he would capture all the Athenian fleet at Ægos-potamoi but ten triremes: they got off safe to Cyprus, but the Lacedæmonians took all the rest and their crews. This Agias was the son of Agelochus, the son of Tisamenus. This last was a native of Elis of the family of the Iamidæ, who was told by the oracle that he should win the prize in 5 most notable contests. So he trained for the pentathlum at Olympia, and came off the ground unvictorious in that, though he won the prize in two out of the five, for he beat Hieronymus of Andros in running and leaping. But having been beaten by him in wrestling, and losing the victory, he interpreted the oracle to mean that he would win five victories in war. And the Lacedæmonians, who were not ignorant of what the Pythian priestess had foretold Tisamenus, persuaded him to leave Elis, and carry out the oracle for the benefit of the Spartans. And Tisamenus had his five victories, first at Platæa against the Persians, and secondly at Tegea in a battle between the Lacedæmonians and the people of Tegea and the Argives. And next at Dipæa against all the Arcadians but the Mantinæans: (Dipæa is a small town of the Arcadians near Mænalia.) And the fourth victory was at Ithome against the Helots that had revolted in the Isthmus. However all the Helots did not revolt, but only the Messenian portion who had separated themselves from the original Helots. But I shall enter into all this more fully hereafter. After this victory the Lacedæmonians, listening to Tisamenus and the oracle at Delphi, allowed the rebels to go away on conditions. And the fifth victory was at Tanagra in a battle against the Argives and Athenians. Such is the account I heard about Tisamenus. And the Spartans have in their market-place statues of Pythæan Apollo, and Artemis, and Leto. And this place is called Dance-ground because during the Festival of Gymnopædia,[33] (and there is no feast more popular among the Lacedæmonians,) the boys have dances here in honour of Apollo. And at no great distance are temples of Earth, and Market Zeus, and Market Athene, and Poseidon whom they call Asphalius, and Apollo again, and Hera. There is also a huge statue of a man to represent the People of Sparta. And the Destinies have a temple at Sparta, near to which is the tomb of Orestes the son of Agamemnon: for they say his bones were brought from Tegea and buried here in accordance with the oracle. And near the tomb of Orestes is an effigy of Polydorus the son of Alcamenes, whom of all their kings they so extolled that the government seal all their public documents with Polydorus’ image. There is also a Market Hermes carrying a little Dionysus, and some antiquities called Ephorea, and among them memorials of Epimenides the Cretan, and of Aphareus the son of Perieres. And I think the Lacedæmonian account of Epimenides truer than the Argive one. Here also are statues of the Destinies, and some other statues. There is also a Hospitable Zeus and a Hospitable Athene.