Chapter XXXVI (3)

I have already observed that the phase of Grecian history best known to us, amidst which the great authors from whom we draw our information lived, was one of contempt for the Persians in the field. And it requires some effort of imagination to call back previous feelings after the circumstances have been altogether reversed: perhaps even Æschylus the poet, at the time when he composed his tragedy of the Persæ, to celebrate the disgraceful flight of the invader Xerxês, may have forgotten the emotions with which he and his brother Kynegeirus must have marched out from Athens fifteen years before, on the eve of the battle of Marathon. It must therefore be again mentioned that, down to the time when Datis landed in the bay of Marathon, the tide of Persian success had never yet been interrupted,—and that especially during the ten years immediately preceding, the high-handed and cruel extinction of the Ionic revolt had aggravated to the highest pitch the alarm of the Greeks. To this must be added the successes of Datis himself, and the calamities of Eretria, coming with all the freshness of novelty as an apparent sentence of death to Athens. The extreme effort of courage required in the Athenians, to encounter such invaders, is attested by the division of opinion among the ten generals. Putting all the circumstances together, it is without a parallel in Grecian history, surpassing even the combat of Thermopylæ, as will appear when I come to describe that memorable event. And the admirable conduct of the five dissentient generals, when outvoted by the decision of the polemarch against them, in coöperating heartily for the success of a policy which they deprecated,—proves how much the feelings of a constitutional democracy, and that entire acceptance of the pronounced decision of the majority on which it rests, had worked themselves into the Athenian mind. The combat of Marathon was by no means a very decisive defeat, but it was a defeat,—and the first which the Persians had ever received from Greeks in the field. If the battle of Salamis, ten years afterwards, could be treated by Themistoklês as a hair-breadth escape for Greece, much more is this true of the battle of Marathon;[661] which first afforded reasonable proof, even to discerning and resolute Greeks, that the Persians might be effectually repelled, and the independence of European Greece maintained against them,—a conviction of incalculable value in reference to the formidable trials destined to follow. Upon the Athenians themselves, the first to face in the field successfully the terrific look of a Persian army, the effect of the victory was yet more stirring and profound.[662] It supplied them with resolution for the far greater actual sacrifices which they cheerfully underwent ten years afterwards, at the invasion of Xerxês, without faltering in their Pan-Hellenic fidelity; and it strengthened them at home by swelling the tide of common sentiment and patriotic fraternity in the bosom of every individual citizen. It was the exploit of Athenians alone, but of all Athenians without dissent or exception,—the boast of orators, repeated until it almost degenerated into common-place, though the people seem never to have become weary of allusions to their single-handed victory over a host of forty-six nations.[663] It had been purchased without a drop of intestine bloodshed,—for even the unknown traitors who raised the signal-shield on Mount Pentelikus, took care not to betray themselves by want of apparent sympathy with the triumph: lastly, it was the final guarantee of their democracy, barring all chance of restoration of Hippias for the future. Themistoklês[664] is said to have been robbed of his sleep by the trophies of Miltiadês, and this is cited in proof of his ambitious temperament; but without supposing either jealousy or personal love of glory, the rapid transit from extreme danger to unparalleled triumph might well deprive of rest even the most sober-minded Athenian.

[661] Herodot. viii, 109. ἡμεῖς δὲ, εὕρημα γὰρ εὑρήκαμεν ἡμέας τε
καὶ τὴν Ἑλλάδα, νέφος τοσοῦτον ἀνθρώπων ἀνωσάμενοι.

[662] Pausanias, i, 14, 4; Thucyd. i, 73. φαμὲν γὰρ Μαραθῶνί τε
~μόνοι προκινδυνεῦσαι~ τῷ βαρβάρῳ, etc.

Herodot. vi, 112. πρῶτοι τε ἀνέσχοντο ἐσθῆτά τε Μηδικὴν ὁρέοντες,
καὶ τοὺς ἄνδρας ταύτην ἐσθημένους· τέως δὲ ἦν τοῖσι Ἕλλησι καὶ τὸ
οὔνομα τὸ Μήδων φόβος ἀκοῦσαι.

It is not unworthy of remark, that the memorable oath in the
oration of Demosthenês, de Coronâ, wherein he adjures the
warriors of Marathon, copies the phrase of Thucydidês,—οὐ μὰ τοὺς
ἐν Μαραθῶνι ~προκινδυνεύσαντας~ τῶν προγόνων, etc. (Demosthen. de
Coronâ, c. 60.)

[663] So the computation stands in the language of Athenian
orators (Herodot. ix, 27.) It would be unfair to examine it
critically.

[664] Plutarch, Themistoklês, c. 3. According to Cicero (Epist.
ad Attic. ix, 10) and Justin (ii, 9) Hippias was killed at
Marathon. Suidas (v. Ἱππίας) says that he died afterwards at
Lemnos. Neither of these statements seems probable. Hippias would
hardly go to Lemnos, which was an Athenian possession; and had
he been slain in the battle, Herodotus would have been likely to
mention it.

Who it was that raised the treacherous signal-shield to attract the Persians to Athens was never ascertained: very probably, in the full exultation of success, no investigation was made. Of course, however, the public belief would not be satisfied without singling out some persons as the authors of such a treason; and the information received by Herodotus (probably about 450-440 B. C., forty or fifty years after the Marathonian victory) ascribed the deed to the Alkmæônids; nor does he notice any other reported authors, though he rejects the allegation against them upon very sufficient grounds. They were a race religiously tainted, ever since the Kylonian sacrilege, and were therefore convenient persons to brand with the odium of an anonymous crime; while party feud, if it did not originally invent, would at least be active in spreading and certifying such rumors. At the time when Herodotus knew Athens, the political enmity between Periklês son of Xanthippus, and Kimon son of Miltiadês, was at its height: Periklês belonged by his mother’s side to the Alkmæônid race, and we know that such lineage was made subservient to political manœuvres against him by his enemies.[665] Moreover, the enmity between Kimon and Periklês had been inherited by both from their fathers; for we shall find Xanthippus, not long after the battle of Marathon, the prominent accuser of Miltiadês. Though Xanthippus was not an Alkmæônid, his marriage with Agaristê connected himself indirectly, and his son Periklês directly, with that race. And we may trace in this standing political feud a probable origin for the false reports as to the treason of the Alkmæônids, on that great occasion which founded the glory of Miltiadês; for that the reports were false, the intrinsic probabilities of the case, supported by the judgment of Herodotus, afford ample ground for believing.

[665] Thucyd. i, 126.

When the Athenian army made its sudden return-march from Marathon to Athens, Aristeidês with his tribe was left to guard the field and the spoil; but the speedy retirement of Datis from Attica left the Athenians at full liberty to revisit the scene and discharge the last duties to the dead. A tumulus was erected on the spot[666]—such distinction was never conferred by Athens except in this case only—to the one hundred and ninety-two Athenian citizens who had been slain. Their names were inscribed on ten pillars erected at the spot, one for each tribe: there was also a second tumulus for the slain Platæans, a third for the slaves, and a separate funeral monument to Miltiadês himself. Six hundred years after the battle, Pausanias saw the tumulus, and could still read on the pillars the names of the immortalized warriors;[667] and even now a conspicuous tumulus exists about half a mile from the sea-shore, which Colonel Leake believes to be the same.[668] The inhabitants of the deme of Marathon worshipped these slain warriors as heroes, along with their own eponymus, and with Hêraklês.

[666] Thucyd. ii, 34.

[667] Pausan. i, 32, 3. Compare the elegy of Kritias ap. Athenæ.
i, p. 28.

[668] The tumulus now existing is about thirty feet high, and two
hundred yards in circumference. (Leake, on the Demi of Attica;
Transactions of Royal Soc. of Literat. ii, p. 171.)

So splendid a victory had not been achieved, in the belief of the Athenians, without marked supernatural aid. The god Pan had met the courier Pheidippidês on his hasty route from Athens to Sparta, and had told him that he was much hurt that the Athenians had as yet neglected to worship him;[669] in spite of which neglect, however, he promised them effective aid at Marathon. The promise was faithfully executed, and the Athenians repaid it by a temple with annual worship and sacrifice. Moreover, the hero Theseus was seen strenuously assisting in the battle; and an unknown warrior, in rustic garb and armed only with a ploughshare, dealt destruction among the Persian ranks: after the battle he could not be found; and the Athenians, on asking at Delphi who he was, were directed to worship the hero Echetlus.[670] Even in the time of Pausanias, this memorable battle-field was heard to resound every night with the noise of combatants and the snorting of horses. “It is dangerous (observes that pious author) to go to the spot with the express purpose of seeing what is passing; but if a man finds himself there by accident, without having heard anything about the matter, the gods will not be angry with him.” The gods, it seems, could not pardon the inquisitive mortal who deliberately pried into their secrets. Amidst the ornaments with which Athens was decorated during the free working of her democracy, the glories of Marathon of course occupied a conspicuous place. The battle was painted on one of the compartments of the portico called Pœkilê, wherein, amidst several figures of gods and heroes,—Athênê, Hêraklês, Theseus, Echetlus, and the local patron of Marathon,—were seen honored and prominent the polemarch Kallimachus and the general Miltiadês, while the Platæans were distinguished by their Bœotian leather casques.[671] And the sixth of the month Boëdromion, the anniversary of the battle, was commemorated by an annual ceremony, even down to the time of Plutarch.[672]

[669] Herodot. vi, 105; Pausan. i, 28, 4.

[670] Plutarch, Theseus, c. 24; Pausan. i, 32, 4.

[671] Pausan. i, 15, 4; Dêmosthen. cont. Neær. c. 25.

[672] Herodot. vi, 120; Plutarch, Camill. c. 19; De Malignit.
Herodoti, c. 26, p. 862; and De Gloriâ Atheniensium, c. 7.

Boëdromion was the third month of the Attic year, which year
began near about the summer solstice. The first three Attic
months, Hekatombæon, Metageitnion, Boëdromion, approach (speaking
in a loose manner) nearly to our July, August, September;
probably the month Hekatombæon began usually at some day in the
latter half of June.

From the fact that the courier Pheidippidês reached Sparta on
the ninth day of the moon, and that the two thousand Spartans
arrived in Attica on the third day after the full moon, during
which interval the battle took place, we see that the sixth day
of Boëdromion could not be the sixth day of the moon. The Attic
months, though professedly lunar months, did not at this time
therefore accurately correspond with the course of the moon. See
Mr. Clinton, Fast. Hellen. ad an. 490 B. C. Plutarch (in the
Treatise De Malign. Herodoti, above referred to) appears to have
no conception of this discrepancy between the Attic month and
the course of the moon. A portion of the censure which he casts
on Herodotus is grounded on the assumption that the two must
coincide.

M. Boeckh, following Fréret and Larcher, contests the statement
of Plutarch, that the battle was fought on the sixth of the month
Boëdromion, but upon reasons which appear to me insufficient.
His chief argument rests upon another statement of Plutarch
(derived from some lost verses of Æschylus), that the tribe
Æantis had the right wing or post of honor at the battle; and
that the public vote, pursuant to which the army was led out
of Athens, was passed during the prytany of the tribe Æantis.
He assumes, that the reason why this tribe was posted on the
right wing, must have been, that it had drawn by lot the first
prytany in that particular year: if this be granted, then the
vote for drawing out the army must have been passed in the first
prytany, or within the first thirty-five or thirty-six days of
the Attic year, during the space between the first of Hekatombæon
and the fifth or sixth of Metageitnion. But it is certain that
the interval, which took place between the army leaving the
city and the battle, was much less than one month,—we may even
say less than one week. The battle, therefore, must have been
fought between the sixth and tenth of Metageitnion. (Plutarch,
Symposiac. i, 10, 3, and Ideler, Handbuch der Chronologie,
vol. i, p. 291.) Herodotus (vi, 111) says that the tribes were
arranged in line ὡς ἠριθμέοντο,—“as they were numbered,”—which
is contended to mean necessarily the arrangement between them,
determined by lot for the prytanies of that particular year. “In
acie instruendâ (says Boeckh, Comment. ad Corp. Inscript. p. 299)
Athenienses non constantem, sed variabilem secundum prytanias,
ordinem secatos esse, ita ut tribus ex hoc ordine inde a dextro
cornu disponerentur, docui in Commentatione de pugnâ Marathoniâ.”
Proœmia Lect. Univ. Berolin. æstiv. a. 1816.

The Proœmia here referred to I have not been able to consult,
and they may therefore contain additional reasons to prove the
point advanced, viz., that the order of the ten tribes in line
of battle, beginning from the right wing, was conformable to
their order in prytanizing, as drawn by lot for the year; but
I think the passages of Herodotus and Plutarch now before us
insufficient to establish this point. From the fact that the
tribe Æantis had the right wing at the battle of Marathon, we
are by no means warranted in inferring that that tribe had drawn
by lot the earliest prytany in the year. Other reasons, in my
judgment equally probable, may be assigned in explanation of the
circumstance: one reason, I think, decidedly _more_ probable.
This reason is, that the battle was fought during the prytany of
the tribe Æantis, which may be concluded from the statement of
Plutarch, that the vote for marching out the army from Athens
was passed during the prytany of that tribe; for the interval,
between the march of the army out of the city and the battle,
must have been only a very few days. Moreover, the deme Marathon
belonged to the tribe Æantis (see Boeckh, ad Inscript. No. 172,
p. 309): the battle being fought in their deme, the Marathonians
may perhaps have claimed on this express ground the post of
honor for their tribe; just as we see that at the first battle
of Mantineia against the Lacedæmonians, the Mantineians were
allowed to occupy the right wing or post of honor, “because
the battle was fought in their territory,” (Thucyd. v, 67.)
Lastly, the deme Aphidnæ also belonged to the tribe Æantis (see
Boeckh, _l. c._): now the polemarch Kallimachus was an Aphidnæan
(Herodot. vi, 109), and Herodotus expressly tells us, “the law
or custom _then_ stood among the Athenians, that the polemarch
should have the right wing,”—ὁ γὰρ νόμος τότε εἶχε οὕτω τοῖσι
Ἀθηναίοισι, τὸν πολέμαρχον ἔχειν κέρας τὸ δέξιον (vi, 111). Where
the polemarch stood, there his tribe would be likely to stand:
and the language of Herodotus indeed seems directly to imply
that he identifies the tribe of the polemarch with the polemarch
himself,—ἡγεομένου δὲ τούτου, ἐξεδέκοντο ὡς ἀριθμέοντο αἱ φυλαὶ,
ἐχόμεναι ἀλλήλων,—meaning that the order of tribes began by that
of the polemarch being in the leading position, and was then
“taken up” by the rest “in numerical sequence,”—_i. e._ in the
order of their prytanizing sequence for the year.

Here are a concurrence of reasons to explain why the tribe Æantis
had the right wing at the battle of Marathon, even though it may
not have been first in the order of prytanizing tribes for the
year. Boeckh, therefore, is not warranted in inferring the second
of these two facts from the first.

The concurrence of these three reasons, all in favor of the same
conclusion, and all independent of the reason supposed by Boeckh,
appears to me to have great weight; but I regard the first of the
three, even singly taken, as more probable than his reason. If my
view of the case be correct, the sixth day of Boëdromion, the day
of battle as given by Plutarch, is not to be called in question.
That day comes in the second prytany of the year, which begins
about the sixth of Metageitnion, and ends about the twelfth of
Boëdromion, and which must in this year have fallen to the lot of
the tribe Æantis. On the first or second day of Boëdromion, the
vote for marching out the army may have passed; on the sixth the
battle was fought; both during the prytany of this tribe.

I am not prepared to carry these reasons farther than the
particular case of the battle of Marathon, and the vindication
of the day of that battle as stated by Plutarch; nor would I
apply them to later periods, such as the Peloponnesian war. It
is certain that the army regulations of Athens were considerably
modified between the battle of Marathon and the Peloponnesian
war, as well in other matters as in what regards the polemarch;
and we have not sufficient information to enable us to determine
whether in that later period the Athenians followed any known
or perpetual rule in the battle-order of the tribes. Military
considerations, connected with the state of the particular army
serving, must have prevented the constant observance of any rule:
thus we can hardly imagine that Nikias, commanding the army
before Syracuse, could have been tied down to any invariable
order of battle among the tribes to which his hoplites belonged.
Moreover, the expedition against Syracuse lasted more than
one Attic year: can it be believed that Nikias, on receiving
information from Athens of the sequence in which the prytanies
of the tribes had been drawn by lot during the second year of
his expedition, would be compelled to marshal his army in a new
battle-order conformably to it? As the military operations of the
Athenians became more extensive, they would find it necessary to
leave such dispositions more and more to the general serving in
every particular campaign. It may well be doubted whether during
the Peloponnesian war _any_ established rule was observed in
marshalling the tribes for battle.

One great motive which induces critics to maintain that the
battle was fought in the Athenian month Metageitnion, is, that
that month coincides with the Spartan month Karneius, so that
the refusal of the Spartans to march before the full moon,
is construed to apply only to the peculiar sanctity of this
last-mentioned month, instead of being a constant rule for the
whole year. I perfectly agree with these critics, that the
answer, given by the Spartans to the courier Pheidippidês, cannot
be held to prove a regular, invariable Spartan maxim, applicable
throughout the whole year, not to begin a march in the second
quarter of the moon: very possibly, as Boeckh remarks, there may
have been some festival impending during the particular month in
question, upon which the Spartan refusal to march was founded.
But no inference can be deduced from hence to disprove the sixth
of Boëdromion as the day of the battle of Marathon: for though
the months of every Grecian city were professedly lunar, yet they
never coincided with each other exactly or long together, because
the systems of intercalation adopted in different cities were
different: there was great irregularity and confusion (Plutarch,
Aristeidês, c. 19; Aristoxenus, Harmon. ii, p. 30: compare also
K. F. Hermann, Ueber die Griechische Monatskunde, p. 26, 27.
Göttingen, 1844; and Boeckh, ad Corp. Inscript. t. i, p. 734).

Granting, therefore, that the answer given by the Spartans to
Pheidippidês is to be construed, not as a general rule applicable
to the whole year, but as referring to the particular month in
which it was given,—no inference can be drawn from hence as to
the day of the battle of Marathon, because either one of the two
following suppositions is possible: 1. The Spartans may have had
solemnities on the day of the full moon, or on the day before it,
in _other months_ besides Karneius; 2. Or the full moon of the
Spartan Karneius may actually have fallen, in the year 490 B. C.,
on the fifth or sixth of the Attic month Boëdromion.

Dr. Thirlwall appears to adopt the view of Boeckh, but does not
add anything material to the reasons in its favor (Hist. of Gr.
vol. ii, Append. iii, p. 488).

Two thousand Spartans, starting from their city, immediately after the full moon, reached the frontier of Attica, on the third day of their march,—a surprising effort, when we consider that the total distance from Sparta to Athens was about one hundred and fifty miles. They did not arrive, however, until the battle had been fought, and the Persians departed; but curiosity led them to the field of Marathon to behold the dead bodies of the Persians, after which they returned home, bestowing well-merited praise on the victors.

Datis and Artaphernês returned across the Ægean with their Eretrian prisoners to Asia; stopping for a short time at the island of Mykonos, where discovery was made of a gilt image of Apollo carried off as booty in a Phenician ship. Datis went himself to restore it to Dêlos, requesting the Delians to carry it back to the Delium, or temple of Apollo, on the eastern coast of Bœotia: the Delians, however, chose to keep the statue until it was reclaimed from them twenty years afterwards by the Thebans. On reaching Asia, the Persian generals conducted their prisoners up to the court of Susa, and into the presence of Darius. Though he had been vehemently incensed against them, yet when he saw them in his power, his wrath abated, and he manifested no desire to kill or harm them. They were planted at a spot called Arderikka, in the Kissian territory, one of the resting-places on the road from Sardis to Susa, and about twenty-six miles distant from the latter place: Herodotus seems himself to have seen their descendants there on his journey between the two capitals, and to have had the satisfaction of talking to them in Greek,—which we may well conceive to have made some impression upon him, at a spot distant by nearly three months’ journey from the coast of Ionia.[673]

[673] Herodot. vi, 119. Darius—σφέας τῆς Κισσίης χώρης κατοίκισε
ἐν σταθμῷ ἑωϋτοῦ τῷ οὔνομα ἐστὶ Ἀρδέρικκα—ἐνθαῦτα τοὺς Ἐρετριέας
κατοίκισε Δαρεῖος, οἳ καὶ μέχρι ἐμέο εἶχον τὴν χώρην ταύτην,
φυλάσοντες τὴν ἀρχαίην γλῶσσαν. The meaning of the word σταθμὸς
is explained by Herodot. v, 52. σταθμὸς ἑωϋτοῦ is the same as
σταθμὸς βασιλήϊος: the particulars which Herodotus recounts about
Arderikka, and its remarkable well, or pit of bitumen, salt, and
oil, give every reason to believe that he had himself stopped
there.

Strabo places the captive Eretrians in Gordyênê, which would be
considerably higher up the Tigris; upon whose authority, we do
not know (Strabo, xv, p. 747).

The many particulars which are given respecting the descendants
of these Eretrians in Kissia, by Philostratus, in his Life of
Apollonius of Tyana, as they are alleged to have stood even in
the first century of the Christian era, cannot be safely quoted.
With all the fiction there contained, some truth may perhaps
be mingled; but we cannot discriminate it (Philostratus, Vit.
Apollon. i, c. 24-30).

Happy would it have been for Miltiadês if he had shared the honorable death of the polemarch Kallimachus,—“animam exhalasset opimam,”—in seeking to fire the ships of the defeated Persians at Marathon. The short sequel of his history will be found in melancholy contrast with the Marathonian heroism.

His reputation had been great before the battle, and after it the admiration and confidence of his countrymen knew no bounds: it appears, indeed, to have reached such a pitch that his head was turned, and he lost both his patriotism and his prudence. He proposed to his countrymen to incur the cost of equipping an armament of seventy ships, with an adequate armed force, and to place it altogether at his discretion; giving them no intimation whither he intended to go, but merely assuring them that, if they would follow him, he would conduct them to a land where gold was abundant, and thus enrich them. Such a promise, from the lips of the recent victor of Marathon, was sufficient, and the armament was granted, no man except Miltiadês knowing what was its destination. He sailed immediately to the island of Paros, laid siege to the town, and sent in a herald to require from the inhabitants a contribution of one hundred talents, on pain of entire destruction. His pretence for this attack was, that the Parians had furnished a trireme to Datis for the Persian fleet at Marathon; but his real motive, so Herodotus assures us,[674] was vindictive animosity against a Parian citizen named Lysagoras, who had exasperated the Persian general Hydarnês against him. The Parians amused him at first with evasions, until they had procured a little delay to repair the defective portions of their wall, after which they set him at defiance; and Miltiadês in vain prosecuted hostilities against them for the space of twenty-six days: he ravaged the island, but his attacks made no impression upon the town.[675] Beginning to despair of success in his military operations, he entered into some negotiation—such at least was the tale of the Parians themselves—with a Parian woman named Timô, priestess or attendant in the temple of Dêmêtêr, near the town-gates. This woman, promising to reveal to him a secret which would place Paros in his power, induced him to visit by night a temple to which no male person was admissible. He leaped the exterior fence, and approached the sanctuary; but on coming near, was seized with a panic terror and ran away, almost out of his senses: on leaping the same fence to get back, he strained or bruised his thigh badly, and became utterly disabled. In this melancholy state he was placed on ship-board; the siege being raised, and the whole armament returning to Athens.

[674] Herodot. vi, 133. ἔπλεε ἐπὶ Πάρον, πρόφασιν ἔχων ὡς οἱ
Πάριοι ὕπηρξαν πρότεροι στρατευόμενοι τριήρεϊ ἐς Μαραθῶνα ἅμα τῷ
Πέρσῃ. Τοῦτο μὲν δὴ πρόσχημα τοῦ λόγου ἦν· ἀτάρ τινα καὶ ἔγκοτον
εἶχε τοῖσι Παρίοισι διὰ Λυσαγόρεα τὸν Τισίεω, ἐόντα γένος Πάριον,
διαβαλόντα μιν πρὸς Ὑδάρνεα τὸν Πέρσην.

[675] Ephorus (Fragm. 107, ed. Didot; ap. Stephan. Byz. v. Πάρος)
gave an account of this expedition in several points different
from Herodotus, which latter I here follow. The authority of
Herodotus is preferable in every respect; the more so, since
Ephorus gives his narrative as a sort of explanation of the
peculiar phrase ἀναπαριάζειν. Explanatory narratives of that sort
are usually little worthy of attention.

Vehement was the indignation both of the armament and of the remaining Athenians against Miltiadês on his return;[676] and Xanthippus, father of the great Periklês, became the spokesman of this feeling. He impeached Miltiadês before the popular judicature as having been guilty of deceiving the people, and as having deserved the penalty of death. The accused himself, disabled by his injured thigh, which even began to show symptoms of gangrene, was unable to stand, or to say a word in his own defence: he lay on his couch before the assembled judges, while his friends made the best case they could in his behalf. Defence, it appears, there was none; all they could do, was to appeal to his previous services: they reminded the people largely and emphatically of the inestimable exploit of Marathon, coming in addition to his previous conquest of Lemnos. The assembled dikasts, or jurors, showed their sense of these powerful appeals by rejecting the proposition of his accuser to condemn him to death; but they imposed on him the penalty of fifty talents “for his iniquity.”

[676] Herodot. vi, 136. Ἀθηναῖοι δὲ ἐκ Πάρου Μιλτιάδεα
ἀπονοστήσαντα ἔσχον ἐν στόμασι, οἵ τε ἄλλοι, καὶ μάλιστα
Ξάνθιππος ὁ Ἀρίφρονος· ὃς θανάτου ὑπαγαγὼν ὑπὸ τὸν δῆμον
Μιλτιάδεα, ἐδίωκε τῆς Ἀθηναίων ἀπάτης εἵνεκεν. Μιλτιάδης δὲ,
αὐτὸς μὲν παρεὼν, οὐκ ἀπελογέετο· ἦν γὰρ ἀδύνατος, ὥστε σηπομένου
τοῦ μηροῦ. Προκειμένου δὲ αὐτοῦ ἐν κλίνῃ, ὑπεραπελογέοντο
οἱ φίλοι, τῆς μάχης τε τῆς ἐν Μαραθῶνι γενομένης πολλὰ
ἐπιμεμνημένοι, καὶ τὴν Λήμνου αἵρεσιν· ὡς ἑλὼν Λῆμνόν τε καὶ
τισάμενος τοὺς Πελασγοὺς, παρέδωκε Ἀθηναίοισι. Προσγενομένου
δὲ τοῦ δήμου αὐτῷ κατὰ τὴν ἀπόλυσιν τοῦ θανάτου, ζημιώσαντος
δὲ κατὰ τὴν ἀδικίην πεντήκοντα ταλάντοισι, Μιλτιάδης μὲν μετὰ
ταῦτα, σφακελίσαντός τε τοῦ μηροῦ καὶ σαπέντος, τελευτᾷ· τὰ δὲ
πεντήκοντα τάλαντα ἐξέτισεν ὁ πάϊς αὐτοῦ Κίμων.

Plato (Gorgias, c. 153, p. 516) says that the Athenians passed a
vote to cast Miltiadês into the barathrum (ἐμβαλεῖν ἐψηφίσαντο),
and that he would have been actually thrown in, if it had not
been for the prytanis, _i. e._ the president, by turn for that
day, of the prytanizing senators and of the ekklesia. The
prytanis may perhaps have been among those who spoke to the
dikastery on behalf of Miltiadês, deprecating the proposition
made by Xanthippus; but that he should have caused a vote once
passed to be actually rescinded, is incredible. The Scholiast
on Aristeidês (cited by Valckenaer ad Herodot. vi, 136) reduces
the exaggeration of Plato to something more reasonable—Ὅτε γὰρ
ἐκρίνετο Μιλτιάδης ἐπὶ τῇ Πάρῳ, ~ἠθέλσαν~ αὐτὸν κατακρημνίσαι· ὁ
δὲ πρύτανις εἰσελθὼν ~ἐξῃτήσατο~ αὐτὸν.

Cornelius Nepos affirms that these fifty talents represented the expenses incurred by the state in fitting out the armament; but we may more probably believe, looking to the practice of the Athenian dikastery in criminal cases, that fifty talents was the minor penalty actually proposed by the defenders of Miltiadês themselves, as a substitute for the punishment of death. In those penal cases at Athens, where the punishment was not fixed beforehand by the terms of the law, if the person accused was found guilty, it was customary to submit to the jurors, subsequently and separately, the question as to amount of punishment: first, the accuser named the penalty which he thought suitable; next, the accused person was called upon to name an amount of penalty for himself, and the jurors were constrained to take their choice between these two,—no third gradation of penalty being admissible for consideration.[677] Of course, under such circumstances, it was the interest of the accused party to name, even in his own case, some real and serious penalty,—something which the jurors might be likely to deem not wholly inadequate to his crime just proved; for if he proposed some penalty only trifling, he drove them to prefer the heavier sentence recommended by his opponent. Accordingly, in the case of Miltiadês, his friends, desirous of inducing the jurors to refuse their assent to the punishment of death, proposed a fine of fifty talents as the self-assessed penalty of the defendant; and perhaps they may have stated, as an argument in the case, that such a sum would suffice to defray the costs of the expedition. The fine was imposed, but Miltiadês did not live to pay it; his injured limb mortified, and he died, leaving the fine to be paid by his son Kimon.

[677] That this was the habitual course of Attic procedure in
respect to public indictments, wherever a positive amount of
penalty was not previously determined, appears certain. See
Platner, Prozess und Klagen bei den Attikern, Abschn. vi, vol.
i, p. 201; Heffter, Die Athenäische Gerichtsverfassung, p.
334. Meier and Schömann (Der Attische Prozess, b. iv, p. 725)
maintain that any one of the dikasts might propose a third
measure of penalty, distinct from that proposed by the accuser
as well as the accused. In respect to public indictments, this
opinion appears decidedly incorrect; but where the sentence to
be pronounced involved a compensation for private wrong and an
estimate of damages, we cannot so clearly determine whether there
was not sometimes a greater latitude in originating propositions
for the dikasts to vote upon. It is to be recollected that
these dikasts were several hundred, sometimes even more, in
number,—that there was no discussion or deliberation among
them,—and that it was absolutely necessary for some distinct
proposition to be laid before them to take a vote upon. In regard
to some offences, the law expressly permitted what was called a
προστíμημα; that is, after the dikasts had pronounced the full
penalty demanded by the accuser, any other citizen who thought
the penalty so imposed insufficient, might call for a certain
limited amount of additional penalty, and require the dikasts to
vote upon it,—ay or no. The votes of the dikasts were given, by
depositing pebbles in two casks, under certain arrangements of
detail.

The ἀγὼν τιμητὸς, δίκη τιμητὸς, or trial including this separate
admeasurement of penalty,—as distinguished from the δίκη
ἀτίμητος, or trial where the penalty was predetermined, and
where was no τίμησις, or vote of admeasurement of penalty,—is
an important line of distinction in the subject-matter of Attic
procedure; and the practice of calling on the accused party,
after having been pronounced guilty, to impose upon himself a
_counter-penalty_ or _under-penalty_ (ἀντιτιμᾶσθαι or ὑποτιμᾶθαι)
in contrast with that named by the accuser, was a convenient
expedient for bringing the question to a substantive vote of the
dikasts. Sometimes accused persons found it convenient to name
very large penalties on themselves, in order to escape a capital
sentence invoked by the accuser (see Dêmosthen. cont. Timokrat.
c. 34, p. 743, R). Nor was there any fear, as Platner imagines,
that in the generality of cases the dikasts would be left under
the necessity of choosing between an extravagant penalty and
something merely nominal; for the interest of the accused party
himself would prevent this from happening. Sometimes we see him
endeavoring by entreaties to prevail upon the accuser voluntarily
to abate something of the penalty which he had at first named;
and the accuser might probably do this, if he saw that the
dikasts were not likely to go along with that first proposition.

In one particular case, of immortal memory, that which Platner
contemplates actually did happen; and the death of Sokratês was
the effect of it. Sokratês, having been found guilty, only by a
small majority of votes among the dikasts, was called upon to
name a penalty upon himself, in opposition to that of death,
urged by Melêtus. He was in vain entreated by his friends to name
a fine of some tolerable amount, which they would at once have
paid in his behalf; but he would hardly be prevailed upon to name
any penalty at all, affirming that he had deserved honor rather
than punishment: at last, he named a fine so small in amount, as
to be really tantamount to an acquittal. Indeed, Xenophon states
that he would not name any counter-penalty at all; and in the
speech ascribed to him, he contended that he had even merited the
signal honor of a public maintenance in the prytaneium (Plato,
Apol. Sok. c. 27; Xenoph. Apol. Sok. 23; Diogen. Laërt. ii, 41).
Plato and Xenophon do not agree; but taking the two together, it
would seem that he must have named a very small fine. There can
be little doubt that this circumstance, together with the tenor
of his defence, caused the dikasts to vote for the proposition of
Melêtus.

According to Cornelius Nepos, Diodorus, and Plutarch, he was put in prison, after having been fined, and there died.[678] But Herodotus does not mention this imprisonment, and the fact appears to me improbable: he would hardly have omitted to notice it, had it come to his knowledge. Immediate imprisonment of a person fined by the dikastery, until his fine was paid, was not the natural and ordinary course of Athenian procedure, though there were particular cases in which such aggravation was added. Usually, a certain time was allowed for payment,[679] before absolute execution was resorted to, but the person under sentence became disfranchised and excluded from all political rights, from the very instant of his condemnation as a public debtor, until the fine was paid. Now in the instance of Miltiadês, the lamentable condition of his wounded thigh rendered escape impossible,—so that there would be no special motive for departing from the usual practice, and imprisoning him forthwith: moreover, if he was not imprisoned forthwith, he would not be imprisoned at all, since he cannot have lived many days after his trial.[680] To carry away the suffering general in his couch, incapable of raising himself even to plead for his own life, from the presence of the dikasts to a prison, would not only have been a needless severity, but could hardly have failed to imprint itself on the sympathies and the memory of all the beholders; so that Herodotus would have been likely to hear and mention it, if it had really occurred. I incline to believe therefore that Miltiadês died at home: all accounts concur in stating that he died of the mortal bodily hurt which already disabled him even at the moment of his trial, and that his son Kimon paid the fifty talents after his death. If _he_ could pay them, probably his father could have paid them also. And this is an additional reason for believing that there was no imprisonment,—for nothing but non-payment could have sent him to prison; and to rescue the suffering Miltiadês from being sent thither, would have been the first and strongest desire of all sympathizing friends.

[678] Cornelius Nepos, Miltiadês, c. 7; and Kimon, c. 1;
Plutarch, Kimon, c. 4; Diodorus, Fragment. lib. x. All these
authors probably drew from the same original fountain; perhaps
Ephorus (see Marx, ad Ephori Fragmenta, p. 212); but we have no
means of determining. Respecting the alleged imprisonment of
Kimon, however, they must have copied from different authorities,
for their statements are all different. Diodorus states, that
Kimon put himself voluntarily into prison after his father had
died there, because he was not permitted on any other condition
to obtain the body of his deceased father for burial. Cornelius
Nepos affirms that he was imprisoned, as being legally liable to
the state for the unpaid fine of his father. Lastly, Plutarch
does not represent him as having been put into prison at all.
Many of the Latin writers follow the statement of Diodorus: see
the citations in Bos’s note on the above passage of Cornelius
Nepos.

There can be no hesitation in adopting the account of Plutarch
as the true one. Kimon neither was, nor could be, in prison,
by the Attic law, for an unpaid fine of his father; but after
his father’s death, he became liable for the fine, in this
sense,—that he remained disfranchised (ἄτιμος) and excluded from
his rights as a citizen, until the fine was paid: see Dêmosthen.
cont. Timokrat. c. 46, p. 762, R.

[679] See Boeckh, Public Economy of Athens, b. iii, ch. 13, p.
390, Engl. Transl. (vol. i, p. 420, Germ.); Meier und Schömann,
Attisch. Prozess, p. 744. Dr. Thirlwall takes a different view
of this point, with which I cannot concur (Hist. Gr. vol. iii,
Append. ii, p. 488); though his general remarks on the trial of
Miltiadês are just and appropriate (ch. xiv, p. 273).

Cornelius Nepos (Miltiadês, c. 8; Kimon, c. 3) says that the
misconduct connected with Paros was only a pretence with the
Athenians for punishing Miltiadês; their real motive, he affirms,
was envy and fear, the same feelings which dictated the ostracism
of Kimon. How little there is to justify this fancy, may be seen
even from the nature of the punishment inflicted. Fear would have
prompted them to send away or put to death Miltiadês, not to fine
him. The ostracism, which was dictated by fear, was a temporary
banishment.

[680] The interval between his trial and his decease is expressed
in Herodotus (vi, 136) by the difference between the present
participle σηπομένου and the past participle σαπέντος τοῦ μηροῦ.

Thus closed the life of the conqueror of Marathon. The last act of it produces an impression so mournful, and even shocking,—his descent from the pinnacle of glory to defeat, mean tampering with a temple-servant, mortal bodily hurt, undefended ignominy, and death under a sentence of heavy fine, is so abrupt and unprepared,—that readers, ancient and modern, have not been satisfied without finding some one to blame for it: we must except Herodotus, our original authority, who recounts the transaction without dropping a single hint of blame against any one. To speak ill of the people, as Machiavel has long ago observed,[681] is a strain in which every one at all times, even under a democratical government, indulges with impunity and without provoking any opponent to reply; and in this instance, the hard fate of Miltiadês has been imputed to the vices of the Athenians and their democracy,—it has been cited in proof, partly of their fickleness, partly of their ingratitude. But however such blame may serve to lighten the mental sadness arising from a series of painful facts, it will not be found justified if we apply to those facts a reasonable criticism.

[681] Machiavel, Discorsi sopra Tito Livio, cap. 58. “L’ opinione
contro ai popoli nasce, perchè dei popoli ciascun dice male senza
paura, e liberamente ancora mentre che regnano: dei principi si
parla sempre con mille timori e mille rispetti.”

What is called the fickleness of the Athenians on this occasion is nothing more than a rapid and decisive change in their estimation of Miltiadês; unbounded admiration passing at once into extreme wrath. To censure them for fickleness is here an abuse of terms; such a change in their opinion was the unavoidable result of his conduct. His behavior in the expedition of Paros was as reprehensible as at Marathon it had been meritorious, and the one succeeded immediately after the other: what else could ensue except an entire revolution in the Athenian feelings? He had employed his prodigious ascendency over their minds to induce them to follow him without knowing whither, in the confidence of an unknown booty: he had exposed their lives and wasted their substance in wreaking a private grudge: in addition to the shame of an unprincipled project, comes the constructive shame of not having succeeded in it. Without doubt, such behavior, coming from a man whom they admired to excess, must have produced a violent and painful revulsion in the feelings of his countrymen. The idea of having lavished praise and confidence upon a person who forthwith turns it to an unworthy purpose, is one of the greatest torments of the human bosom; and we may well understand that the intensity of the subsequent displeasure would be aggravated by this reactionary sentiment, without accusing the Athenians of fickleness. If an officer, whose conduct has been such as to merit the highest encomiums, comes on a sudden to betray his trust, and manifests cowardice or treachery in a new and important undertaking confided to him, are we to treat the general in command as fickle, because his opinion as well as his conduct undergoes an instantaneous revolution,—which will be all the more vehement in proportion to his previous esteem? The question to be determined is, whether there be sufficient ground for such a change; and in the case of Miltiadês, that question must be answered in the affirmative.

In regard to the charge of ingratitude against the Athenians, this last-mentioned point—sufficiency of reason—stands tacitly admitted. It is conceded that Miltiadês deserved punishment for his conduct in reference to the Parian expedition, but it is nevertheless maintained that gratitude for his previous services at Marathon ought to have exempted him from punishment. But the sentiment upon which, after all, this exculpation rests, will not bear to be drawn out and stated in the form of a cogent or justifying reason. For will any one really contend, that a man who has rendered great services to the public, is to receive in return a license of unpunished misconduct for the future? Is the general, who has earned applause by eminent skill and important victories, to be recompensed by being allowed the liberty of betraying his trust afterwards, and exposing his country to peril, without censure or penalty? This is what no one intends to vindicate deliberately; yet a man must be prepared to vindicate it, when he blames the Athenians for ingratitude towards Miltiadês. For if all that be meant is, that gratitude for previous services ought to pass, not as a receipt in full for subsequent crime, but as an extenuating circumstance in the measurement of the penalty, the answer is, that it was so reckoned in the Athenian treatment of Miltiadês.[682] His friends had nothing whatever to urge, against the extreme penalty proposed by his accuser, except these previous services,—which influenced the dikasts sufficiently to induce them to inflict the lighter punishment instead of the heavier. Now the whole amount of punishment inflicted consisted in a fine which certainly was not beyond his reasonable means of paying, or of prevailing upon friends to pay for him, since his son Kimon actually did pay it. And those who blame the Athenians for ingratitude,—unless they are prepared to maintain the doctrine that previous services are to pass as full acquittal for future crime,—have no other ground left except to say that the fine was too high; that instead of being fifty talents, it ought to have been no more than forty, thirty, twenty, or ten talents. Whether they are right in this, I will not take upon me to pronounce. If the amount was named on behalf of the accused party, the dikastery had no legal power of diminishing it; but it is within such narrow limits that the question actually lies, when transferred from the province of sentiment to that of reason. It will be recollected that the death of Miltiadês arose neither from his trial nor his fine, but from the hurt in his thigh.

[682] Machiavel will not even admit so much as _this_, in the
clear and forcible statement which he gives of the question here
alluded to: he contends that the man who has rendered services
ought to be recompensed for them, but that he ought to be
punished for subsequent crime just as if the previous services
had not been rendered. He lays down this position in discussing
the conduct of the Romans towards the victorious survivor of
the three Horatii, after the battle with the Curiatii: “Erano
stati i meriti di Orazio grandissimi, avendo con la sua virtù
vinti i Curiazi. Era stato il fallo suo atroce, avendo morto la
sorella. Nondimeno dispiacque tanto tale omicidio ai Romani,
che lo condussero a disputare della vita, non ostante che gli
meriti suoi fussero tanto grandi e si freschi. La qual cosa, a
chi superficialmente la considerasse, parrebbe uno esempio d’
ingratitudine popolare. Nondimeno chi lo esaminerà meglio, e con
migliore considerazione ricercherà quali debbono essere gli’
ordini delle republiche, biasimearà quel popolo piuttosto per
averlo assoluto, che per averlo voluto condannare: e la ragione
è questa, che nessuna republica bene ordinata, non mai cancellò
i demeriti con gli meriti dei suoi cittadini: ma avendo ordinati
i premi ad una buona opera, e le pene ad una cattiva, ed avendo
premiato uno per aver bene operato, se quel medesimo opera dipoi
male, lo gastiga senza avere riguardo alcuno alle sue buone
opere. E quando questi ordini sono bene osservati, una città vive
libera molto tempo: altrimenti sempre rovinera presto. _Perchè
se, ad un cittadino che abbia fatto qualche egregia opere per
la città, si aggiunge oltre alla riputazione, che quella cosa
gli arreca, una audacia e confidenza di potere senza temer pena,
far qualche opera non buona, diventerà in breve tempo tanto
insolente, che si risolverà ogni civiltà._”—Machiavel, Discorsi
sop. Tit. Livio, ch. 24.

The charge of ingratitude against the Athenian popular juries really amounts to this,—that, in trying a person accused of present crime or fault, they were apt to confine themselves too strictly and exclusively to the particular matter of charge, either forgetting, or making too little account of, past services which he might have rendered. Whoever imagines that such was the habit of Athenian dikasts, must have studied the orators to very little purpose. Their real defect was the very opposite: they were too much disposed to wander from the special issue before them, and to be affected by appeals to previous services and conduct.[683] That which an accused person at Athens usually strives to produce is, an impression in the minds of the dikasts favorable to his general character and behavior. Of course, he meets the particular allegation of his accuser as well as he can, but he never fails also to remind them emphatically, how well he has performed his general duties of a citizen,—how many times he has served in military expeditions,—how many trierarchies and liturgies he has performed, and performed with splendid efficiency. In fact, the claim of an accused person to acquittal is made to rest too much on his prior services, and too little upon innocence or justifying matter as to the particular indictment. When we come down to the time of the orators, I shall be prepared to show that such indisposition to confine themselves to a special issue was one of the most serious defects of the assembled dikasts at Athens. It is one which we should naturally expect from a body of private, non-professional citizens assembled for the occasion, and which belongs more or less to the system of jury-trial everywhere; but it is the direct reverse of that ingratitude, or habitual insensibility to prior services, for which they have been so often denounced.

[683] Machiavel, in the twenty-ninth chapter of his Discorsi
sopra T. Livio, examines the question, “Which of the two is more
open to the charge of being ungrateful,—a popular government, or
a king?” He thinks that the latter is more open to it. Compare
chapter fifty-nine of the same work, where he again supports a
similar opinion.

M. Sismondi also observes, in speaking of the long attachment of
the city of Pisa to the cause of the emperors and to the Ghibelin
party: “Pise montra dans plus d’une occasion, par sa constance à
supporter la cause des empereurs au milieu des revers, combien la
reconnoissance lie un peuple libre d’une manière plus puissante
et plus durable qu’elle ne sauroit lier le peuple gouverné par un
seul homme.” (Histoire des Républ. Italiennes, ch. xiii, tom. ii,
p. 302.)

The fate of Miltiadês, then, so far from illustrating either the fickleness or the ingratitude of his countrymen, attests their just appreciation of deserts. It also illustrates another moral, of no small importance to the right comprehension of Grecian affairs; it teaches us the painful lesson, how perfectly maddening were the effects of a copious draught of glory on the temperament of an enterprising and ambitious Greek. There can be no doubt, that the rapid transition, in the course of about one week, from Athenian terror before the battle to Athenian exultation after it, must have produced demonstrations towards Miltiadês such as were never paid towards any other man in the whole history of the commonwealth. Such unmeasured admiration unseated his rational judgment, so that his mind became abandoned to the reckless impulses of insolence, and antipathy, and rapacity;—that distempered state, for which (according to Grecian morality) the retributive Nemesis was ever on the watch, and which, in his case, she visited with a judgment startling in its rapidity, as well as terrible in its amount. Had Miltiadês been the same man before the battle of Marathon as he became after it, the battle might probably have turned out a defeat instead of a victory. Dêmosthenês, indeed,[684] in speaking of the wealth and luxury of political leaders in his own time, and the profuse rewards bestowed upon them by the people, pointed in contrast to the house of Miltiadês as being noway more splendid than that of a private man. But though Miltiadês might continue to live in a modest establishment, he received from his countrymen marks of admiration and deference such as were never paid to any citizen before or after him; and, after all, admiration and deference constitute the precious essence of popular reward. No man except Miltiadês ever dared to raise his voice in the Athenian assembly, and say: “Give me a fleet of ships: do not ask what I am going to do with them, but only follow me, and I will enrich you.” Herein we may read the unmeasured confidence which the Athenians placed in their victorious general, and the utter incapacity of a leading Greek to bear it without mental depravation; while we learn from it to draw the melancholy inference, that one result of success was to make the successful leader one of the most dangerous men in the community. We shall presently be called upon to observe the same tendency in the case of the Spartan Pausanias, and even in that of the Athenian Themistoklês. It is, indeed, fortunate that the reckless aspirations of Miltiadês did not take a turn more noxious to Athens than the comparatively unimportant enterprise against Paros. For had he sought to acquire dominion and gratify antipathies against enemies at home, instead of directing his blow against a Parian enemy, the peace and security of his country might have been seriously endangered.

[684] Dêmosthenês, Olynth. iii, c. 9, p. 35, R.