It appears as if the recent victory had been the result of a secret and treacherous compact between Agathokles and Deinokrates; and as if the prisoners massacred by Agathokles were those of whom Deinokrates wished to rid himself as malcontents; for immediately after the battle, a reconciliation took place between the two. Agathokles admitted the other as a sort of partner in his despotism; while Deinokrates not only brought into the partnership all the military means and strong posts which he had been two years in acquiring, but also betrayed to Agathokles the revolted general Pasiphilus with the town of Gela occupied by the latter. It is noticed as singular, that Agathokles, generally faithless and unscrupulous towards both friends and enemies, kept up the best understanding and confidence with Deinokrates to the end of his life.[1038]
The despot had now regained full power at Syracuse, together with a great extent of dominion in Sicily. The remainder of his restless existence was spent in operations of hostility or plunder against more northerly enemies—the Liparæan isles[1039]—the Italian cities and the Bruttians—the island of Korkyra. We are unable to follow his proceedings in detail. He was threatened with a formidable attack[1040] by the Spartan prince Kleonymus, who was invited by the Tarentines to aid them against the Lucanians and Romans. But Kleonymus found enough to occupy him elsewhere, without visiting Sicily. He collected a considerable force on the coast of Italy, undertook operations with success against the Lucanians, and even captured the town of Thurii. But the Romans, now pushing their intervention even to the Tarentine Gulf, drove him off and retook the town; moreover his own behavior was so tyrannical and profligate, as to draw upon him universal hatred. Returning from Italy to Korkyra, Kleonymus made himself master of that important island, intending to employ it as a base of operations both against Greece and against Italy.[1041] He failed however in various expeditions both in the Tarentine Gulf and the Adriatic. Demetrius Poliorketes and Kassander alike tried to conclude an alliance with him; but in vain.[1042] At a subsequent period, Korkyra was besieged by Kassander with a large naval and military force; Kleonymus then retired (or perhaps had previously retired) to Sparta. Kassander, having reduced the island to great straits, was on the point of taking it, when it was relieved by Agathokles with a powerful armament. That despot was engaged in operations on the coast of Italy against the Bruttians when his aid to Korkyra was solicited; he destroyed most part of the Macedonian fleet, and then seized the island for himself.[1043] On returning from this victorious expedition to the Italian coast, where he had left a detachment of his Ligurian and Tuscan mercenaries, he was informed that these mercenaries had been turbulent during his absence, in demanding the pay due to them from his grandson Archagathus. He caused them all to be slain, to the number of 2000.[1044]
As far as we can trace the events of the last years of Agathokles, we find him seizing the towns of Kroton and Hipponia in Italy, establishing an alliance with Demetrius Poliorketes,[1045] and giving his daughter Lanassa in marriage to the youthful Pyrrhus king of Epirus. At the age of seventy-two, still in the plenitude of vigor as well as of power, he was projecting a fresh expedition against the Carthaginians in Africa, with two hundred of the largest ships of war, when his career was brought to a close by sickness and by domestic enemies.
He proclaimed as future successor to his dominion, his son, named Agathokles; but Archagathus his grandson (son of Archagathus who had perished in Africa), a young prince of more conspicuous qualities, had already been singled out for the most important command, and was now at the head of the army near Ætna. The old Agathokles, wishing to strengthen the hands of his intended successor, sent his favored son Agathokles to Ætna, with written orders directing that Archagathus should yield up to him the command. Archagathus, noway disposed to obey, invited his uncle Agathokles to a banquet, and killed him; after which he contrived the poisoning of his grandfather the old despot himself. The instrument of his purpose was Mænon; a citizen of Egesta, enslaved at the time when Agathokles massacred most of the Egestæan population. The beauty of his person procured him much favor with Agathokles; but he had never forgotten, and had always been anxious to avenge, the bloody outrage on his fellow-citizens. To accomplish this purpose, the opportunity was now opened to him, together with a promise of protection, through Archagathus. He accordingly poisoned Agathokles, as we are told, by means of a medicated quill, handed to him for cleaning his teeth after dinner.[1046] Combining together the various accounts, it seems probable that Agathokles was at the time sick—that this sickness may have been the reason why he was so anxious to strengthen the position of his intended successor—and that his death was as much the effect of his malady as of the poison. Archagathus, after murdering his uncle, seems by means of his army to have made himself real master of the Syracusan power; while the old despot, defenceless on a sick bed, could do no more than provide for the safety of his Egyptian wife Theoxena and his two young children, by despatching them on shipboard with all his rich movable treasures to Alexandria. Having secured this object, amidst extreme grief on the part of those around, he expired.[1047]
The great lines in the character of Agathokles are well marked. He was of the stamp of Gelon and the elder Dionysius—a soldier of fortune, who raised himself from the meanest beginnings to the summit of political power—and who, in the acquisition as well as maintenance of that power, displayed an extent of energy, perseverance, and military resource, not surpassed by any one, even of the generals formed in Alexander’s school. He was an adept in that art at which all aspiring men of his age aimed—the handling of mercenary soldiers for the extinction of political liberty and security at home, and for predatory aggrandizement abroad. I have already noticed the opinion delivered by Scipio Africanus—that the elder Dionysius and Agathokles were the most daring, sagacious, and capable men of action within his knowledge.[1048] Apart from this enterprising genius, employed in the service of unmeasured personal ambition, we know nothing of Agathokles except his sanguinary, faithless, and nefarious dispositions; in which attributes also he stands pre-eminent, above all his known contemporaries, and above nearly all predecessors.[1049] Notwithstanding his often-proved perfidy, he seems to have had a joviality and apparent simplicity of manner (the same is recounted of Cæsar Borgia) which amused men and put them off their guard, throwing them perpetually into his trap.[1050]
Agathokles, however, though among the worst of Greeks, was yet a Greek. During his government of thirty-two years, the course of events in Sicily continued under Hellenic agency, without the preponderant intervention of any foreign power. The power of Agathokles indeed rested mainly on foreign mercenaries; but so had that of Dionysius and Gelon before him; and he as well as they, kept up vigorously the old conflict against the Carthaginian power in the island. Grecian history in Sicily thus continues down to the death of Agathokles; but it continues no longer. After his death, Hellenic power and interests become incapable of self-support, and sink into a secondary and subservient position, overridden or contended for by foreigners. Syracuse and the other cities passed from one despot to another, and were torn with discord arising out of the crowds of foreign mercenaries who had obtained footing among them. At the same time, the Carthaginians made increased efforts to push their conquests in the island, without finding any sufficient internal resistance; so that they would have taken Syracuse, and made Sicily their own, had not Pyrrhus king of Epirus (the son-in-law of Agathokles) interposed to arrest their progress. From this time forward, the Greeks of Sicily become a prize to be contended for—first between the Carthaginians and Pyrrhus—next, between the Carthaginians and Romans[1051]—until at length they dwindle into subjects of Rome; corn-growers for the Roman plebs, clients under the patronage of the Roman Marcelli, victims of the rapacity of Verres, and suppliants for the tutelary eloquence of Cicero. The historian of self-acting Hellas loses sight of them at the death of Agathokles.
CHAPTER XCVIII.
OUTLYING HELLENIC CITIES.
1 IN GAUL AND SPAIN.