In recounting the various revolts of the dependencies of Athens which took place during the Peloponnesian war, I had occasion to point out more than once that all of them took place not merely in the absence of any Athenian force, but even at the instigation (in most cases) of a present hostile force,—by the contrivance of a local party,—and without privity or previous consent of the bulk of the citizens. The present revolt of Rhodes, forming a remarkable contrast on all these points, occasioned the utmost surprise and indignation among the Lacedæmonians. They saw themselves about to enter upon a renewed maritime war, without that aid which they had reckoned on receiving from Egypt, and with aggravated uncertainty in respect to their dependencies and tribute. It was under this prospective anxiety that they took the step of nominating Agesilaus to the command of the fleet as well as of the army, in order to ensure unity of operations;[505] though a distinction of functions, which they had hitherto set great value upon maintaining, was thus broken down,—and, though the two commands had never been united in any king before Agesilaus.[506] Pharax, the previous admiral, was recalled.[507]
But the violent displeasure of the Lacedæmonians against the revolted Rhodians was still better attested by another proceeding. Among all the great families at Rhodes, none were more distinguished than the Diagoridæ. Its members were not only generals and high political functionaries in their native island, but had attained even Pan-hellenic celebrity by an unparalleled series of victories at the Olympic and other great solemnities. Dorieus, a member of this family, had gained the victory in the pankration at Olympia on three successive solemnities. He had obtained seven prizes in the Nemean, and eight in the Isthmian games. He had carried off the prize at one Pythian solemnity without a contest,—no one daring to stand up against him in the fearful struggle of the pankration. As a Rhodian, while Rhodes was a subject ally of Athens during the Peloponnesian war, he had been so pronounced in his attachment to Sparta as to draw on himself a sentence of banishment; upon which he had retired to Thurii, and had been active in hostility to Athens after the Syracusan catastrophe. Serving against her in ships fitted out at his own cost, he had been captured in 407 B.C. by the Athenians, and brought in as prisoner to Athens. By the received practice of war in that day, his life was forfeited; and over and above such practice, the name of Dorieus was peculiarly odious to the Athenians. But when they saw before the public assembly a captive enemy, of heroic lineage, as well as of unrivalled athletic majesty and renown, their previous hatred was so overpowered by sympathy and admiration, that they liberated him by public vote, and dismissed him unconditionally.[508]
This interesting anecdote, which has already been related in my eighth volume,[509] is here again noticed as a contrast to the treatment which the same Dorieus now underwent from the Lacedæmonians. What he had been doing since, we do not know; but at the time when Rhodes now revolted from Sparta, he was not only absent from the island, but actually in or near Peloponnesus. Such, however, was the wrath of the Lacedæmonians against Rhodians generally, that Dorieus was seized by their order, brought to Sparta, and there condemned and executed.[510] It seems hardly possible that he can have had any personal concern in the revolt. Had such been the fact, he would have been in the island,—or would at least have taken care not to be within the reach of the Lacedæmonians when the revolt happened. Perhaps, however, other members of the Diagoridæ, his family, once so much attached to Sparta, may have taken part in it; for we know, by the example of the Thirty at Athens, that the Lysandrian dekarchies and Spartan harmosts made themselves quite as formidable to oligarchical as to democratical politicians, and it is very conceivable that the Diagoridæ may have become less philo-Laconian in their politics.
This extreme difference in the treatment of the same man by Athens and by Sparta raises instructive reflections. It exhibits the difference both between Athenian and Spartan sentiment, and between the sentiment of a multitude and that of a few. The grand and sacred personality of the Hieronike Dorieus, when exhibited to the senses of the Athenian multitude,—the spectacle of a man in chains before them, who had been proclaimed victor and crowned on so many solemn occasions before the largest assemblages of Greeks ever brought together,—produced an overwhelming effect upon their emotions; sufficient not only to efface a strong preëstablished antipathy founded on active past hostility, but to countervail a just cause of revenge, speaking in the language of that day. But the same appearance produced no effect at all on the Spartan ephors and senate; not sufficient even to hinder them from putting Dorieus to death, though he had given them no cause for antipathy or revenge, simply as a sort of retribution for the revolt of the island. Now this difference depended partly upon the difference between the sentiment of Athenians and Spartans, but partly also upon the difference between the sentiment of a multitude and that of a few. Had Dorieus been brought before a select judicial tribunal at Athens, instead of before the Athenian public assembly,—or, had the case been discussed before the assembly in his absence,—he would have been probably condemned, conformably to usage, under the circumstances; but the vehement emotion worked by his presence upon the multitudinous spectators of the assembly, rendered such a course intolerable to them. It has been common with historians of Athens to dwell upon the passions of the public assembly as if it were susceptible of excitement only in an angry or vindictive direction; whereas, the truth is, and the example before us illustrates, that they were open-minded in one direction as well as in another, and that the present emotion, whatever it might be, merciful or sympathetic as well as resentful, was intensified by the mere fact of multitude. And thus, where the established rule of procedure happened to be cruel, there was some chance of moving an Athenian assembly to mitigate it in a particular case, though the Spartan ephors or senate would be inexorable in carrying it out,—if, indeed, they did not, as seems probable in the case of Dorieus, actually go beyond it in rigor.
While Konon and the Rhodians were thus raising hostilities against Sparta by sea, Agesilaus, on receiving at Kymê the news of his nomination to the double command, immediately despatched orders to the dependent maritime cities and islands, requiring the construction and equipment of new triremes. Such was the influence of Sparta, and so much did the local governments rest upon its continuance, that these requisitions were zealously obeyed. Many leading men incurred considerable expense, from desire to acquire his favor; so that a fleet of one hundred and twenty new triremes was ready by the ensuing year. Agesilaus, naming his brother-in-law, Peisander, to act as admiral, sent him to superintend the preparations; a brave young man, but destitute both of skill and experience.[511]
Meanwhile, he himself pursued his march (about the beginning of autumn) towards the satrapy of Pharnabazus,—Phrygia south and south-east of the Propontis. Under the active guidance of his new auxiliary, Spithridates, he plundered the country, capturing some towns, and reducing others to capitulate; with considerable advantage to his soldiers. Pharnabazus, having no sufficient army to hazard a battle in defence of his satrapy, concentrated all his force near his own residence at Daskylium, offering no opposition to the march of Agesilaus; who was induced by Spithridates to traverse Phrygia and enter Paphlagonia, in hopes of concluding an alliance with the Paphlagonian prince Otys. That prince, in nominal dependence on Persia, could muster the best cavalry in the Persian empire. But he had recently refused to obey an invitation from the court at Susa, and he now not only welcomed the appearance of Agesilaus, but concluded an alliance with him, strengthening him with an auxiliary body of cavalry and peltasts. Anxious to requite Spithridates for his services, and vehemently attached to his son, the beautiful youth Megabates,—Agesilaus persuaded Otys to marry the daughter of Spithridates. He even caused her to be conveyed by sea in a Lacedæmonian trireme,—probably from Abydos to Sinôpê.[512]
Reinforced by the Paphlagonian auxiliaries, Agesilaus prosecuted the war with augmented vigor against the satrapy of Pharnabazus. He now approached the neighborhood of Daskylium, the residence of the satrap himself, inherited from his father Pharnakês, who had been satrap before him. This was a well-supplied country, full of rich villages, embellished with parks and gardens for the satrap’s hunting and gratification: the sporting tastes of Xenophon lead him also to remark that there were plenty of birds for the fowler, with rivers full of fish.[513] In this agreeable region Agesilaus passed the winter. His soldiers, abundantly supplied with provisions, became so careless, and straggled with so much contempt of their enemy, that Pharnabazus, with a body of four hundred cavalry and two scythed chariots, found an opportunity of attacking seven hundred of them by surprise; driving them back with considerable loss, until Agesilaus came up to protect them with the hoplites.
This partial misfortune, however, was speedily avenged. Fearful of being surrounded and captured, Pharnabazus refrained from occupying any fixed position. He hovered about the country, carrying his valuable property along with him, and keeping his place of encampment as secret as he could. The watchful Spithridates, nevertheless, having obtained information that he was encamped for the night in the village of Kanê, about eighteen miles distant, Herippidas (one of the thirty Spartans) undertook a night-march with a detachment to surprise him. Two thousand Grecian hoplites, the like number of light-armed peltasts, and Spithridates with the Paphlagonian horse, were appointed to accompany him. Though many of these soldiers took advantage of the darkness to evade attendance, the enterprise proved completely successful. The camp of Pharnabazus was surprised at break of day; his Mysian advanced guards were put to the sword, and he himself, with all his troops, was compelled to take flight with scarcely any resistance. All his stores, plate, and personal furniture, together with a large baggage-train and abundance of prisoners, fell into the hands of the victors. As the Paphlagonians under Spithridates formed the cavalry of the victorious detachment, they naturally took more spoil and more prisoners than the infantry. They were proceeding to carry off their acquisitions, when Herippidas interfered and took everything away from them; placing the entire spoil of every description, under the charge of Grecian officers, to be sold by formal auction in a Grecian city; after which the proceeds were to be distributed or applied by public authority. The orders of Herippidas were conformable to the regular and systematic proceeding of Grecian officers; but Spithridates and the Paphlagonians were probably justified by Asiatic practice in appropriating that which they had themselves captured. Moreover, the order, disagreeable in itself, was enforced against them with Lacedæmonian harshness of manner,[514] unaccompanied by any guarantee that they would be allowed, even at last, a fair share of the proceeds. Resenting the conduct of Herippidas as combining injury with insult, they deserted in the night and fled to Sardis, where the Persian Ariæus was in actual revolt against the court of Susa. This was a serious loss, and still more serious chagrin, to Agesilaus. He was not only deprived of valuable auxiliary cavalry, and of an enterprizing Asiatic informant; but the report would be spread that he defrauded his Asiatic allies of their legitimate plunder, and others would thus be deterred from joining him. His personal sorrow too was aggravated by the departure of the youth Megabazus, who accompanied his father Spithridates to Sardis.[515]
It was towards the close of this winter that a personal conference took place between Agesilaus and Pharnabazus, managed by the intervention of a Greek of Kyzikus named Apollophanês; who was connected by ties of hospitality with both, and served to each as guarantee for the good faith of the other. We have from Xenophon, himself probably present, an interesting detail of this interview. Agesilaus, accompanied by his thirty Spartan counsellors, being the first to arrive at the place of appointment, all of them sat down upon the grass to wait. Presently came Pharnabazus, with splendid clothing and retinue. His attendants were beginning to spread fine carpets for him, when the satrap, observing how the Spartans were seated, felt ashamed of such a luxury for himself, and sat down on the grass by the side of Agesilaus. Having exchanged salutes, they next shook hands; after which Pharnabazus, who as the older of the two had been the first to tender his right hand, was also the first to open the conversation. Whether he spoke Greek well enough to dispense with the necessity of an interpreter, we are not informed. “Agesilaus (said he), I was the friend and ally of you Lacedæmonians while you were at war with Athens; I furnished you with money to strengthen your fleet, and fought with you myself ashore on horseback, chasing your enemies into the sea. You cannot charge me with having ever played you false, like Tissaphernes, either by word or deed. Yet, after this behavior, I am now reduced by you to such a condition, that I have not a dinner in my own territory, except by picking up your leavings, like the beasts of the field. I see the fine residences, parks, and hunting-grounds, bequeathed to me by my father, which formed the charm of my life, cut up or burnt down by you. Is this the conduct of men mindful of favors received, and eager to requite them? Pray answer me this question; for, perhaps, I have yet to learn what is holy and just.”