[503] Xenoph. Hellen. i, 4, 7.
[504] Xenoph. Anab. i, 1; Diodor. xiii, 108.
[505] Xenoph. Hellen. ii, 3, 42; Isokratês, Or. xvi, De Bigis, s. 46.
[506] I put together what seems to me the most probable account of the death of Alkibiadês from Plutarch, Alkib. c. 38, 39; Diodorus, xiv, 11 (who cites Ephorus, compare Ephor. Fragm. 126, ed. Didot); Cornelius Nepos, Alkibiad. c. 10; Justin, v, 8; Isokratês, Or. xvi, De Bigis, s. 50.
There were evidently different stories, about the antecedent causes and circumstances, among which a selection must be made. The extreme perfidy ascribed by Ephorus to Pharnabazus appears to me not at all in the character of that satrap.
[507] Cornelius Nepos says (Alcib. c. 11) of Alkibiadês: “Hunc infamatum a plerisque tres gravissimi historici summis laudibus extulerunt: Thucydides, qui ejusdem ætatis fuit; Theopompus, qui fuit post aliquando natus, et Timæus: qui quidem duo maledicentissimi, nescio quo modo, in illo uno laudando conscierunt.”
We have no means of appreciating what was said by Theopompus and Timæus. But as to Thucydidês, it is to be recollected that he extols only the capacity and warlike enterprise of Alkibiadês, nothing beyond; and he had good reason for doing so. His picture of the dispositions and conduct of Alkibiadês is the reverse of eulogy.
The Oration xvi, of Isokratês, De Bigis, spoken by the son of Alkibiadês, goes into a labored panegyric of his father’s character, but is prodigiously inaccurate, if we compare it with the facts stated in Thucydidês and Xenophon. But he is justified in saying: οὐδέποτε τοῦ πατρὸς ἡγουμένου τρόπαιον ὑμῶν ἔστησαν οἱ πολέμιοι (s. 23).
[508] The Œdipus Tyrannus of Sophoklês was surpassed by the rival composition of Philoklês. The Medea of Euripidês stood only third for the prize; Euphorion, son of Æschylus, being first, Sophoklês second. Yet these two tragedies are the masterpieces now remaining of Sophoklês and Euripidês.
[509] The careful examination of Welcker (Griech. Tragödie. vol. i, p. 76) makes out the titles of eighty tragedies unquestionably belonging to Sophoklês, over and above the satyrical dramas in his tetralogies. Welcker has considerably cut down the number admitted by previous authors, carried by Fabricius as high as one hundred and seventy-eight, and even, by Boeckh, as high as one hundred and nine (Welcker, ut sup. p. 62).