[202] Theopompus, Fragm. 21, ed. Didot; Plutarch, Lysand. c. 30.
[203] Plutarch, Lysander, c. 8.
[204] Diodor. xiii, 65; Xenoph. Hellen. iii, 2, 11. I presume that this conduct of Kratesippidas is the fact glanced at by Isokratês de Pace, sect. 128, p. 240, ed. Bekk.
[205] Xenoph. Hellen. i, 5, 3-4; Diodor. xiii, 70; Plutarch, Lysander, c. 4. This seems to have been a favorite metaphor, either used by, or at least ascribed to, the Persian grandees; we have already had it, a little before, from the mouth of Tissaphernês.
[206] Xenoph. Hellen. i, 5, 5. εἶναι δὲ καὶ τὰς συνθήκας οὕτως ἐχούσας, τριάκοντα μνᾶς ἑκάστῃ νηῒ τοῦ μηνὸς διδόναι, ὁπόσας ἂν βούλοιντο τρέφειν Λακεδαιμόνιοι.
This is not strictly correct. The rate of pay is not specified in either of the three conventions, as they stand in Thucyd. viii, 18, 37, 58. It seems to have been, from the beginning, matter of verbal understanding and promise; first, a drachma per day was promised by the envoys of Tissaphernês at Sparta; next, the satrap himself, at Milêtus, cut down this drachma to half a drachma, and promised this lower rate for the future (viii, 29).
Mr. Mitford says: “Lysander proposed that an Attic drachma, which was eight oboli, nearly tenpence sterling, should be allowed for daily pay to every seaman.”
Mr. Mitford had in the previous sentence stated three oboli as equal to not quite fourpence sterling. Of course, therefore, it is plain that he did not consider three oboli as the half of a drachma (Hist. Greece, ch. xx, sect. i. vol. iv, p. 317, oct. ed. 1814).
That a drachma was equivalent to six oboli, that is, an Æginæan drachma to six Æginæan oboli, and an Attic drachma to six Attic oboli, is so familiarly known, that I should almost have imagined the word eight, in the first sentence here cited, to be a misprint for six, if the sentence cited next had not clearly demonstrated that Mr. Mitford really believed a drachma to he equal to eight oboli. It is certainly a mistake surprising to find.
[207] Thucyd. viii, 29.