"But is it possible that it took place after the Persian Wars? I think not. In the face of the patriotic conduct of Tiryns and Mycenæ, and at the moment of Argos' greatest national unpopularity, any such attempt to destroy free Greek cities would have brought down the vengeance of all Greece. Moreover, early historians are silent about it. Herodotus and Thucydides never allude to it. What is still more remarkable, the contemporary Æschylus, though composing plays which ought to have had their scene laid at Mycenæ, never once mentions Mycenæ, and transfers the palace of Agamemnon to Argos.[405] If the more ancient city, whose inhabitants had fought with him in the great Persian struggle, had only lost its independence in his mature age, is such a curious ignorance on his part conceivable? I think, then, that the συνοικισμός of the Argive territory must have taken place long before, and that Pausanias was misled by the monuments of the Persian War to transfer it to an impossible period.
"If we look back into earlier history, and consider at what time Argos was daily expecting an attack from Sparta, and found it necessary to strengthen its power, I think the most natural period will be not immediately after the Persian, but immediately after the Messenian Wars, that is, the second Messenian War, which was concluded in Ol. 29. According to our revised chronology, the development of Phidon's power at Argos must be placed close to this time, and it was probably the twenty-eighth Ol. which he celebrated with the Pisatans at Olympia to the exclusion of the Eleans. Of course the Spartans were bound to interfere, but the Messenian War must have greatly hampered their vigour. When this war was over, and Sparta had acquired new territory and prestige, the Argives must have expected that they would be the first to suffer. Hence I attribute to Phidon, and to his policy, the consolidation of all the smaller towns in Argos, and perhaps this may have been the secret of his greatness.
"But how then is the existence of Tiryns and Mycenæ during the Persian War to be explained? I suppose that these towns, though conquered, and their gods transferred to Argos, nevertheless continued to exist as κῶμαι or villages, but inhabited by Argive citizens, and that accordingly these descendants of the old inhabitants, who took the patriotic side, and had not forgotten their history, joined the Hellenic army under these obsolete names, which the nation was glad to sanction as a slight to the neutral Argives.[406] The very small number of men they were able to muster (80 from Mycenæ at Thermopylæ, 400 from Mycenæ and Argos together at Platæa) strongly corroborates this view; for in that day the smallest Greek towns had a considerable armed population—Platæa, for example, had 600. It is very likely that the Argives were nettled at this conduct, and determined to efface these places altogether; and this change, which was very unimportant, as the real συνοικισμός had been long accomplished, attracted no notice at the time, but gave rise afterwards to a distortion of history.
DATE OF THE CAPTURE OF MYCENÆ.
"I will quote, in conclusion, what seems to me a parallel case. Pausanias says (IV. 27, 10), that the Minyæ of Orchomenus were expelled by the Thebans after the battle of Leuctra. We know very well that the power of Orchomenus was gone long before, but the increased strength of Thebes, and some offence on the part of the subject city during the struggle with Sparta, determined its complete extinction by the Thebans. But this was no great siege or subjugation of a free city. That had been done by the Thebans long before. So I believe the capture of the great fort at Mycenæ probably occurred long before the Persian Wars.
"The explicit passage in Diodorus (xi. 65), which seems at first sight a conclusive corroboration of the ordinary view, only strengthens my conviction that it is wrong. Diodorus is precise about the date. He says that in the 78th Ol. (468-4), while the Spartans were in great trouble on account of a destructive earthquake and rising of the Helots and Messenians, the Argives took the opportunity of attacking Mycenæ. But they did so because Mycenæ alone of the cities in their territories would not submit to them. This distinctly asserts that all the other towns, such as Tiryns and Midea, had been formerly subdued, and contradicts Pausanias. Diodorus then enumerates the various claims of Mycenæ to old privileges about the Heraeon and the Nemean Games, and adds what Pausanias says about their joining the Greeks at Thermopylæ, alone among the Argive cities. The share taken by Tiryns with Mycenæ at Platæa seems unknown to both authors. But after long waiting for an opportunity, the Argives now collected a considerable force from Argos and the allied cities, and made war upon Mycenæ—upon Mycenæ, which was only able, jointly with Tiryns, to supply 400 men at Platæa, and which, when unaided, sent 60 men to Thermopylæ! The Argives first defeated them in battle, and then besieged the fortress, which, after some time, through lack of defenders (which is indeed credible), they stormed. Here again Pausanias is contradicted. Diodorus concludes with stating that they enslaved the Mycenæans, consecrating a tenth of the spoil, and levelled the town with the ground.
"I think my theory is perfectly consistent with the critical residue which may be extracted from this passage. It is probably true that the Argives chose the opportunity of a Messenian war to make this conquest, but it was the second, not the third, Messenian war. It is probably true—nay, I should say certainly true—that they levelled Mycenæ with the ground in the 78th Ol.; but this was not their first conquest of it. If they enslaved the then inhabitants, this harsh measure was probably by way of punishment for the impertinence of a subject town in sending an independent contingent to a war in which the sovereign city had determined to maintain a strict neutrality. That the facts related by Diodorus should have caused no general comment throughout Greece, or that no echo of it should have reached us, seems to me almost incredible. There is a possible corroboration of Diodorus' statement that Mycenæ was the last conquered of the subject cities in the Homeric catalogue, where Tiryns is mentioned as already subject to Argos, while Mycenæ is the capital of Agamemnon. But even when that catalogue was compiled, Argos had conquered all the seaboard of the Argolic peninsula, and Mycenæ lies at the extreme south of the territory (chiefly Corinthian and Sicyonic) which is assigned to Agamemnon. Possibly the traditions were still too strong for the poet to make Mycenæ subject to Argos, but he plainly denies any hegemony of Mycenæ over the Argive plain."
DATE OF THE CAPTURE OF MYCENÆ.
Mr. A. H. Sayce further directs my attention to a passage of Homer, which, in my opinion, also seems to favor this hypothesis, and which seems categorically to contradict the stories which Pausanias and Diodorus have borrowed from Ephorus.[407] This last has seemingly made an error as to the epoch of Pheidon. The passage pointed out by Mr. Sayce is in the Iliad, IV., 50-56: