After a reign of two years Callippus was overthrown by Hipparinus and Nysæus, brothers of Dionysius and nephews of Dion. They reigned successively. Then Dionysius, after ten years’ absence, seized the city by surprise. But Hicetas, tyrant of the Leontines, forced him to take refuge in the isle of Ortygia. In the midst of this anarchy, and threatened, moreover, by an attack of the Carthaginians, the Syracusans implored help from Corinth, who sent one of her citizens, Timoleon, to the aid of her colony. Timoleon had previously saved the life of his brother Timophanes in a battle. Later on Timophanes had tried to usurp the tyranny at Corinth, and Timoleon joined his brother’s murderers. Haunted by his mother’s curse and troubled by his conscience, he was living in retirement when the Corinthians entrusted him with the mission of delivering Syracuse from tyranny. He set out with twelve hundred men, and after escaping the Carthaginian fleet, landed at Tauromenium, on the east coast of Sicily. When he reached Syracuse, Dionysius was besieged in his fortress by Hicetas; seeing that he could not defend himself against two enemies at the same time, rather than make terms with Hicetas, he offered to deliver Ortygia up to Timoleon on condition that he should be sent to Corinth with his riches. He lived there for several years, and is said to have opened a school for children, to have at least a similitude of royalty.
Timoleon occupied Ortygia; but his position was difficult, for Hicetas had called the Carthaginians to his assistance, and, under command of Mago, they filled the port with one hundred and fifty vessels and the town with six thousand men. Fortunately Timoleon received from Corinth a reinforcement of ten vessels filled with troops. Catana and other Greek towns along the coast declared for him. Mago, on learning that the Corinthian garrison had succeeded in seizing Achradina, the principal suburb of Syracuse, believed that Hicetas had betrayed him, and feared lest all the Greeks should unite against him. He embarked his soldiers and set sail for Carthage. Hicetas, left with only his own troops, could no longer resist: he returned to Leontini with his army, and Timoleon, without the loss of a single man, was master of Syracuse.
He began by doing what Dion had refused to do; he destroyed the fortress of Ortygia, built on its site courts of justice and restored to power the democratic legislation of Diodes. The town was half deserted; he recalled the exiles, and caused it to be proclaimed at the public games in Greece that Syracuse required colonists. Sixty thousand men answered this appeal. In order to relieve public poverty, he distributed the unoccupied lands to the poor, and sold the statues of the tyrants, except that of Gelo, the conqueror of the Carthaginians. He then turned his attention to the overthrow of tyranny in the other Siceliot towns, and began by forcing Hicetas to live simply as a private citizen. Leptines, tyrant of Engyum, consented to go to the Peloponnesus, as Dionysius had done, for Timoleon was anxious to show the Greeks the tyrants whom he had driven from Sicily. He also seized Apollonia and Entella and restored them their freedom. All the Greek towns sided with him, because he allowed them self-government according to their own inclination. Following their example, several Sican and Sicel towns asked to be admitted into alliance with him.
[343-337 B.C.]
Terrified by this commencement of a league between the towns, and by the increasing prosperity of Syracuse, the Carthaginians landed seventy thousand men at Lilybæum. Timoleon, who had only succeeded in collecting an army of eleven thousand men, advanced nevertheless against the enemy, whom he surprised on the banks of the brook Crimisus on Selinuntine territory. He established himself in a strong position, attacked the Carthaginians as they were crossing the river, and killed ten thousand of them, of whom three thousand were Carthaginian citizens. He imposed no onerous conditions, for Syracuse was not in a position to carry on a prolonged war: the limits of their territory were fixed at the river Halycus, to the west of Agrigentum, and they agreed to give no more help to the tyrants (338). Timoleon overcame those who were still left; Hicetas, who had again seized the power, was put to death, as were also Mamercus, tyrant of Catana, Hippon, tyrant of Messana, and some others. Timoleon then helped in the rebuilding and repeopling of the towns destroyed by the Carthaginians, Gela and Agrigentum, for instance, drove from Ætna a band of Campanians, Dionysius’ former mercenaries, who had made the town into a retreat for brigands. At last, his work being complete, he abdicated the power. But he always retained the great moral authority; towards the end of his life he became blind, and whenever there was an important discussion he was carried into the market place and his advice was always followed. He died eight years after his arrival in Sicily (337), and the expenses of his funeral were paid from the public treasury. The Syracusans instituted annual games in his honour, “because,” said the decree, “he drove away the tyrants, defeated the barbarians, repeopled the towns, and restored to the Siceliots their laws and institutions.”[b]
