Alexander is said to have promised to the Athenians so ample a supply of cattle as should keep the price of meat very low at Athens (Plutarch, Apophtheg. Reg. p. 193 E.)
[606] Diodor. xv, 71; Plutarch, Pelop. c. 28; Pausanias ix, 15, 1.
[607] Plutarch (Pelopidas, c. 29) says, a truce for thirty days; but it is difficult to believe that Alexander would have been satisfied with a term so very short.
[608] The account of the seizure of Pelopidas by Alexander, with its consequences, is contained chiefly in Diodorus, xv, 71-75; Plutarch, Pelopidas, c. 27-29; Cornel. Nep. Pelop. c. 5; Pausanias, ix, 15, 1. Xenophon does not mention it.
I have placed the seizure in the year 366 B.C., after the return of Pelopidas from his embassy in Persia; which embassy I agree with Mr. Fynes Clinton in referring to the year 367 B.C. Plutarch places the seizure before the embassy; Diodorus places it in the year between Midsummer 368 and Midsummer 367 B.C.; but he does not mention the embassy at all, in its regular chronological order; he only alludes to it in summing up the exploits at the close of the career of Pelopidas.
Assuming the embassy to the Persian court to have occurred in 367 B.C., the seizure cannot well have happened before that time.
The year 368 B.C. seems to have been that wherein Pelopidas made his second expedition into Thessaly, from which he returned victorious, bringing back the hostages. See above, p. 264, note.
The seizure of Pelopidas was accomplished at a time when Epaminondas was not Bœotarch, nor in command of the Theban army. Now it seems to have been not until the close of 367 B.C., after the accusations arising out of his proceedings in Achaia, that Epaminondas missed being rechosen as general.
Xenophon, in describing the embassy of Pelopidas to Persia, mentions his grounds for expecting a favorable reception, and the matters which he had to boast of (Hell. vii, 1, 35). Now if Pelopidas, immediately before, had been seized and detained for some months in prison by Alexander of Pheræ, surely Xenophon would have alluded to it as an item on the other side. I know that this inference from the silence of Xenophon is not always to be trusted. But in this case, we must recollect that he dislikes both the Theban leaders; and we may fairly conclude, that where he is enumerating the trophies of Pelopidas, he would hardly have failed to mention a signal disgrace, if there had been one, immediately preceding.
Pelopidas was taken prisoner by Alexander, not in battle, but when in pacific mission, and under circumstances in which no man less infamous than Alexander would have seized him (παρασπονδηθεὶς—Plutarch, Apoph. p. 194 D.; Pausan. ix, 15, 1; “legationis jure satis tectum se arbitraretur” Corn. Nep.). His imprudence in trusting himself under any circumstances to such a man as Alexander, is blamed by Polybius (viii, 1) and others. But we must suppose such imprudence to be partly justified or explained by some plausible circumstances; and the proclamation of the Persian rescript appears to me to present the most reasonable explanation of his proceeding.