Chapter LXXIV (2)

Again, we do not know distinctly the situation of the point or
district called τὴν Ἐπιεικίαν (mentioned again, iv, 4, 13). But
it is certain from the map, that when the confederates were
at Nemea, and the Lacedæmonians at Sikyon,—the former must
have been exactly placed so as to intercept the junction of
the contingents from Epidaurus, Trœzen, and Hermionê, with the
Lacedæmonian army. To secure this junction, the Lacedæmonians
were obliged to force their way across that mountainous region
which lies near Kleônæ and Nemea, and to march in a line
pointing from Sikyon down to the Saronic Gulf. Having reached
the other side of these mountains near the sea, they would be in
communication with Epidaurus and the other towns of the Argolic
peninsula.

The line of march which the Lacedæmonians would naturally
take from Sparta to Sikyon and Lechæum, by Tegea, Mantineia,
Orchomenus, etc., is described two years afterwards in the case
of Agesilaus (iv, 5, 19).

After an interval seemingly of a few days, the Bœotians, on the day when their turn came to occupy the right wing and to take the lead, gave the signal for battle.[580] The Lacedæmonians, prevented by the wooded ground from seeing clearly, were only made aware of the coming attack by hearing the hostile pæan. Taking order of battle immediately, they advanced forward to meet the assailants when within a furlong of their line. In each army, the right division took the lead,—slanting to the right, or keeping the left shoulder forward, according to the tendency habitual with Grecian hoplites, through anxiety to keep the right or unshielded side from being exposed to the enemy, and at the same time to be protected by the shield of a right-hand neighbor.[581] The Lacedæmonians in the one army, and the Thebans in the other, each inclined themselves, and caused their respective armies to incline also, in a direction slanting to the right, so that the Lacedæmonians on their side considerably outflanked the Athenians on the opposite left. Out of the ten tribes of Athenian hoplites, it was only the six on the extreme left who came into conflict with the Lacedæmonians; while the remaining four contended with the Tegeans who stood next to the Lacedæmonians on their own line. But the six extreme Athenian tribes were completely beaten, and severely handled, being taken in flank as well as in front by the Lacedæmonians. On the other hand, the remaining four Athenian tribes vanquished and drove before them the Tegeans; and generally, along all the rest of the line, the Thebans, Argeians, and Corinthians were victorious,—except where the troops of the Achæan Pellênê stood opposed to those of the Bœotian Thespiæ, where the battle was equal and the loss severe on both sides. The victorious confederates, however, were so ardent and incautious in pursuit, as to advance a considerable distance and return with disordered ranks; while the Lacedæmonians, who were habitually self-restraining in this particular, kept their order perfectly, attacking the Thebans, Argeians, and Corinthians to great advantage when returning to their camp. Several of the Athenian fugitives obtained shelter within the walls of Corinth; in spite of the opposition of the philo-Laconian Corinthians, who insisted upon shutting the gates against them, and opening negotiations with Sparta. The Lacedæmonians however came so near that it was at last thought impossible to keep the gates open longer. Many of the remaining confederates were therefore obliged to be satisfied with the protection of their ancient camp;[582] which seems, however, to have been situated in such defensible ground,[583] that the Lacedæmonians did not molest them in it.

[580] Xen. Hellen. iv, 2, 18. The coloring which Xenophon puts
upon this step is hardly fair to the Thebans, as is so constantly
the case throughout his history. He says that “they were in no
hurry to fight” (οὐδέν τι κατήπειγον τὴν μάχην ξυνάπτειν) so
long as they were on the left, opposed to the Lacedæmonians on
the opposite right; but that as soon as they were on the right
(opposed to the Achæans on the opposite left), they forthwith
gave the word. Now it does not appear that the Thebans had
any greater privilege on the day when they were on the right,
than the Argeians or Athenians had when each were on the right
respectively. The command had been determined to reside in the
right division, which post alternated from one to the other; why
the Athenians or Argeians did not make use of this post to order
the attack, we cannot explain.

So again, Xenophon says, that in spite of the resolution taken by
the Council of War to have files sixteen deep, and no more,—the
Thebans made their files much deeper. Yet it is plain, from his
own account, that no mischievous consequences turned upon this
greater depth.

[581] See the instructive description of the battle of
Mantineia—in Thucyd. v, 71.

[582] Xen. Hellen. iv, 2, 20-23.

The allusion to this incident in Demosthenes (adv. Leptinem, c.
13, p. 472) is interesting, though indistinct.

[583] Xen. Hellen. iv, 2, 19. καὶ γὰρ ἦν λάσιον τὸ χωρίον—which
illustrates the expression in Lysias, Orat. xvi, (pro Mantitheo)
s. 20. ἐν Κορίνθῳ χωρίων ἰσχυρῶν κατειλημμένων.

So far as the Lacedæmonians separately were concerned, the battle of Corinth was an important victory, gained (as they affirmed) with the loss of only eight men, and inflicting heavy loss upon the Athenians in the battle, as well as upon the remaining confederates in their return from pursuit. Though the Athenian hoplites suffered thus severely, yet Thrasybulus their commander,[584] who kept the field until the last, with strenuous efforts to rally them, was not satisfied with their behavior. But on the other hand, all the allies of Sparta were worsted, and a considerable number of them slain. According to Diodorus, the total loss on the Lacedæmonian side was eleven hundred; on the side of the confederates twenty-eight hundred.[585] On the whole, the victory of the Lacedæmonians was not sufficiently decisive to lead to important results, though it completely secured their ascendency within Peloponnesus. We observe here, as we shall have occasion to observe elsewhere, that the Peloponnesian allies do not fight heartily in the cause of Sparta. They seem bound to her more by fear than by affection.

[584] Lysias, Orat. xvi, (pro Mantitheo) s. 19.

Plato in his panegyrical discourse (Menexenus, c. 17, p. 245
E.) ascribes the defeat and loss of the Athenians to “bad
ground”—χρησαμένων δυσχωρίᾳ.

[585] Diodor. xiv, 83.

The statement in Xenophon (Agesil. vii, 5) that near ten thousand
men were slain on the side of the confederates, is a manifest
exaggeration; if indeed the reading be correct.

The battle of Corinth took place about July 394 B.C., seemingly about the same time as the naval battle near Knidus (or perhaps a little earlier), and while Agesilaus was on his homeward march after being recalled from Asia. Had the Lacedæmonians been able to defer the battle until Agesilaus had come up so as to threaten Bœotia on the northern side, their campaign would probably have been much more successful. As it is, their defeated allies doubtless went home in disgust from the field of Corinth, so that the confederates were now enabled to turn their whole attention to Agesilaus.

That prince had received in Asia his summons of recall from the ephors with profound vexation and disappointment, yet at the same time with patriotic submission. He had augmented his army, and was contemplating more extensive schemes of operations against the Persian satrapies in Asia Minor. He had established such a reputation for military force and skill, that numerous messages reached him from different inland districts, expressing their anxiety to be emancipated from Persian dominion; and inviting him to come to their aid. His ascendency was also established over the Grecian cities on the coast, whom he still kept under the government of partisan oligarchies and Spartan harmosts,—yet seemingly with greater practical moderation, and less license of oppression, than had marked the conduct of these men when they could count upon so unprincipled a chief as Lysander. He was thus just now not only at a high pitch of actual glory and ascendency, but nourishing yet brighter hopes of farther conquests for the future. And what filled up the measure of his aspirations,—all the conquests were to be made at the expense, not of Greeks, but of the Persians. He was treading in the footsteps of Agamemnon, as Pan-hellenic leader against a Pan-hellenic enemy.

All these glorious dreams were dissipated by Epikydidas, with his sad message, and peremptory summons, from the ephors. In the chagrin and disappointment of Agesilaus we can sincerely sympathize; but the panegyric which Xenophon and others pronounce upon him for his ready obedience is altogether unreasonable.[586] There was no merit in renouncing his projects of conquest at the bidding of the ephors; because, if any serious misfortune had befallen Sparta at home, none of those projects could have been executed. Nor is it out of place to remark, that even if Agesilaus had not been recalled, the extinction of the Lacedæmonian naval superiority by the defeat of Knidus, would have rendered all large plans of inland conquest impracticable. On receiving his orders of recall, he convened an assembly both of his allies and of his army, to make known the painful necessity of his departure; which was heard with open and sincere manifestations of sorrow. He assured them that as soon as he had dissipated the clouds which hung over Sparta at home, he should come back to Asia without delay, and resume his efforts against the Persian satraps; in the interim he left Euxenus, with a force of four thousand men for their protection. Such was the sympathy excited by his communication, combined with esteem for his character, that the cities passed a general vote to furnish him with contingents of troops for his march to Sparta. But this first burst of zeal abated, when they came to reflect that it was a service against Greeks; not merely unpopular in itself, but presenting a certainty of hard fighting with little plunder. Agesilaus tried every means to keep up their spirits, by proclaiming prizes both to the civic soldiers and to the mercenaries, to be distributed at Sestus in the Chersonesus, as soon as they should have crossed into Europe,—prizes for the best equipment, and best disciplined soldiers in every different arm.[587] By these means he prevailed upon the bravest and most effective soldiers in his army to undertake the march along with him; among them many of the Cyreians, with Xenophon himself at their head.

[586] Xen. Agesil. i, 37; Plutarch, Agesil. c. 15. Cornelius
Nepos (Agesilaus, c. 4) almost translates the Agesilaus of
Xenophon; but we can better feel the force of _his_ panegyric,
when we recollect that he had had personal cognizance of the
disobedience of Julius Cæsar in his province to the orders of the
Senate, and that the omnipotence of Sylla and Pompey in their
provinces were then matter of recent history. “Cujus exemplum
(says Cornelius Nepos about Agesilaus) utinam imperatores nostri
sequi voluissent!”

[587] Xen. Hellen. iv, 2, 2-5; Xen. Agesil. i, 38; Plutarch,
Agesil. c. 16.

Though Agesilaus, in leaving Greece, had prided himself on hoisting the flag of Agamemnon, he was now destined against his will to tread in the footsteps of the Persian Xerxes in his march from the Thracian Chersonese through Thrace, Macedonia, and Thessaly, to Thermopylæ and Bœotia. Never, since the time of Xerxes, had any army undertaken this march; which now bore an Oriental impress, from the fact that Agesilaus brought with him some camels, taken in the battle of Sardis.[588] Overawing or defeating the various Thracian tribes, he reached Amphipolis on the Strymon where he was met by Derkyllidas, who had come fresh from the battle of Corinth and informed him of the victory. Full as his heart was of Pan-hellenic projects against Persia, he burst into exclamations of regret on hearing of the death of so many Greeks in battle, who could have sufficed, if united, to emancipate Asia Minor.[589] Sending Derkyllidas forward to Asia to make known the victory to the Grecian cities in his alliance, he pursued his march through Macedonia and Thessaly. In the latter country, Larissa, Krannon, and other cities in alliance with Thebes, raised opposition to bar his passage. But in the disunited condition of this country, no systematic resistance could be organized against him. Nothing more appeared than detached bodies of cavalry, whom he beat and dispersed, with the death of Polycharmus, their leader. As the Thessalian cavalry, however, was the best in Greece, he took great pride in having defeated them with cavalry disciplined by himself in Asia; backed, however, it must be observed, by skilful and effective support from his hoplites.[590] After having passed the Achæan mountains or the line of Mount Othrys, he marched the rest of the way without opposition, through the strait of Thermopylæ to the frontier of Phokis and Bœotia.

[588] Xen. Hellen. iii, 4, 24.

[589] Xenoph. Agesil. vii, 5; Plutarch, Agesil. c. 16.

[590] Xen. Hellen. iv, 2, 4-9; Diodor. xiv, 83.

In this latter part of his march, Agesilaus was met by the ephor Diphridas in person, who urged him to hasten his march as much as possible, and attack the Bœotians. He was further joined by two Lacedæmonian regiments[591] from Corinth, and by fifty young Spartan volunteers as a body-guard, who crossed by sea from Sikyon. He was reinforced also by the Phokians and the Orchomenians,—in addition to the Peloponnesian troops who had accompanied him to Asia, the Asiatic hoplites, the Cyreians, the peltasts, and the cavalry, whom he had brought with him from the Hellespont, and some fresh troops collected in the march. His army was thus in imposing force when he reached the neighborhood of Chæroneia on the Bœotian border. It was here that they were alarmed by an eclipse of the sun, on the fourteenth of August, 394 B.C.; a fatal presage, the meaning of which was soon interpreted for them by the arrival of a messenger bearing news of the naval defeat of Knidus, with the death of Peisander, brother-in-law of Agesilaus. Deeply was the latter affected by this irreparable blow. He foresaw that, when known, it would spread dismay and dejection among his soldiers, most of whom would remain attached to him only so long as they believed the cause of Sparta to be ascendant and profitable.[592] Accordingly, he resolved, being now within a day’s march of his enemies, to hasten on a battle without making known the bad news. Proclaiming that intelligence had been received of a sea-fight having taken place, in which the Lacedæmonians had been victorious, though Peisander himself was slain,—he offered a sacrifice of thanksgiving and sent round presents of congratulation,—which produced an encouraging effect, and made the skirmishers especially both forward and victorious.

[591] Plutarch (Agesil. c. 17; compare also Plutarch, Apophth.
p. 795, as corrected by Morus ad Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 15) states
two moræ or regiments as having joined Agesilaus from Corinth;
Xenophon alludes only to one, besides that mora which was in
garrison at Orchomenus (Hellen. iv, 3, 15; Agesil. ii, 6).

[592] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 13.

Ὁ μὲν οὖν Ἀγησίλαος πυθόμενος ταῦτα, τὸ μὲν πρῶτον χαλεπῶς
ἔφερεν· ἐπεὶ μέντοι ἐνεθυμήθη, ὅτι τοῦ στρατεύματος τὸ πλεῖστον
εἴη αὐτῷ, οἷον ἀγαθῶν μὲν γιγνομένων ἡδέως μετέχειν, εἰ δέ τι
χαλεπὸν ὁρῷεν, οὐκ ἀνάγκην εἶναι κοινωνεῖν αὐτοῖς, etc.

These indirect intimations of the real temper even of the
philo-Spartan allies towards Sparta are very valuable when coming
from Xenophon, as they contradict all his partialities, and are
dropped here almost reluctantly, from the necessity of justifying
the conduct of Agesilaus in publishing a false proclamation to
his army.

To his enemies, now assembled in force on the plain of Korôneia, the real issue of the battle of Knidus was doubtless made known, spreading hope and cheerfulness through their ranks; though we are not informed what interpretation they put upon the solar eclipse. The army was composed of nearly the same contingents as those who had recently fought at Corinth, except that we hear of the Ænianes in place of the Malians; but probably each contingent was less numerous, since there was still a necessity for occupying and defending the camp near Corinth. Among the Athenian hoplites, who had just been so roughly handled in the preceding battle, and who were now drafted off by lot to march into Bœotia, against both a general and an army of high reputation,—there prevailed much apprehension and some reluctance; as we learn from one of them, Mantitheus, who stood forward to volunteer his services, and who afterwards makes just boast of it before an Athenian dikastery.[593] The Thebans and Bœotians were probably in full force, and more numerous than at Corinth, since it was their own country which was to be defended. The camp was established in the territory of Korôneia, not far from the great temple of Itonian Athênê, where the Pambœotia, or general Bœotian assemblies were held, and where there also stood the trophy erected for the great victory over Tolmides and the Athenians, about fifty years before.[594] Between the two armies there was no great difference of numbers, except as to the peltasts, who were more numerous in the army of Agesilaus, though they do not seem to have taken much part in the battle.

[593] Lysias, Orat. xvi, (pro Mantitheo) s. 20. φοβουμένων
ἁπάντων εἰκότως, etc.

[594] Plutarch, Agesil. c. 19.

Having marched from Chæroneia, Agesilaus approached the plain of Korôneia from the river Kephissus, while the Thebans met him from the direction of Mount Helikon. He occupied the right wing of his army, the Orchomenians being on the left, and the Cyreians with the Asiatic allies in the centre. In the opposite line, the Thebans were on the right, and the Argeians on the left. Both armies approached slowly and in silence until they were separated only by an interval of a furlong, at which moment the Thebans on the right began the war-shout, and accelerated their march to a run,—the rest of the line following their example. When they got within half a furlong of the Lacedæmonians, the centre division of the latter, under the command of Herippidas (comprising the Cyreians, with Xenophon himself, and the Asiatic allies) started forward on their side, and advanced at a run to meet them; seemingly, getting beyond their own line,[595] and coming first to cross spears with the enemy’s centre. After a sharp struggle, the division of Herippidas was here victorious, and drove back its opponents. Agesilaus, on his right, was yet more victorious, for the Argeians opposed to him, fled without even crossing spears. These fugitives found safety on the high ground of Mount Helikon. But on the other hand, the Thebans on their own right completely beat back the Orchomenians, and pursued them so far as to get to the baggage in the rear of the army. Agesilaus, while his friends around were congratulating him as conqueror, immediately wheeled round to complete his victory by attacking the Thebans; who, on their side also faced about, and prepared to fight their way, in close and deep order, to rejoin their comrades on Helikon. Though Agesilaus might have let them pass, and assailed them in the rear with greater safety and equal effect, he preferred the more honorable victory of a conflict face to face. Such is the coloring which his panegyrist, Xenophon,[596] puts upon his manœuvre. Yet we may remark that if he had let the Thebans pass, he could not have pursued them far, seeing that their own comrades were at hand to sustain them,—and also that having never yet fought against the Thebans, he had probably no adequate appreciation of their prowess.

[595] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 17. ἀντεξέδραμον ἀπὸ τῆς Ἀγησιλάου
φάλαγγος, etc.

[596] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 19; Xen. Agesil. ii, 12.

The crash which now took place was something terrific beyond all Grecian military experience,[597] leaving an indelible impression upon Xenophon, who was personally engaged in it. The hoplites on both sides came to the fiercest and closest bodily struggle, pushing shields against each other, with all the weight of the incumbent mass behind impelling forward the foremost ranks,—especially in the deep order of the Thebans. The shields of the foremost combatants were thus stove in, their spears broken, and each man was engaged in such close embrace with his enemy, that the dagger was the only weapon which he could use. There was no systematic shout, such as usually marked the charge of a Grecian army; the silence was only broken by a medley of furious exclamations and murmurs.[598] Agesilaus himself, who was among the front ranks, and whose size and strength were by no means on a level with his personal courage, had his body covered with wounds from different weapons,[599]—was trodden down,—and only escaped by the devoted courage of those fifty Spartan volunteers who formed his body-guard. Partly from his wounds, partly from the irresistible courage and stronger pressure of the Thebans, the Spartans were at length compelled to give way, so far as to afford a free passage to the former, who were thus enabled to march onward and rejoin their comrades; not without sustaining some loss by attacks on their rear.[600]

[597] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 16; Xen. Agesil. ii, 9.

Διηγήσομαι δὲ καὶ τὴν μάχην· καὶ γὰρ ἐγένετο οἵα οὐκ ἄλλη τῶν γ᾽
ἐφ᾽ ἡμῶν.

[598] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 19; Xen. Agesil. ii, 12.

Καὶ συμβαλόντες τὰς ἀσπίδας ἐωθοῦντο, ἐμάχοντο, ἀπέκτεινον,
ἀπέθνησκον. Καὶ κραυγὴ μὲν οὐδεμία παρῆν, οὐ μὴν οὐδὲ σιγή· φωνὴ
δέ τις ἦν τοιαύτη, οἵαν ὀργή τε καὶ μάχη παράσχοιτ᾽ ἄν.

[599] Xen. Agesil. ii, 13. Ὁ δὲ, καίπερ πολλὰ τραύματα ἔχων
πάντοσε καὶ παντοίοις ὅπλοις, etc.

Plutarch, Agesil. c. 18.

[600] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 19; Xen. Agesil. ii, 12.

Agesilaus thus remained master of the field of battle, having gained a victory over his opponents taken collectively. But so far as concerns the Thebans separately, he had not only gained no victory, but had failed in his purpose of stopping their progress, and had had the worst of the combat. His wounds having been dressed, he was brought back on men’s shoulders to give his final orders, and was then informed that a detachment of eighty Theban hoplites, left behind by the rest, had taken refuge in the temple of Itonian Athênê as suppliants. From generosity mingled with respect to the sanctity of the spot, he commanded that they should be dismissed unhurt, and then proceeded to give directions for the night-watch, as it was already late. The field of battle presented a terrible spectacle; Spartan and Theban dead lying intermingled, some yet grasping their naked daggers, others pierced with the daggers of their enemies; around, on the blood-stained ground, were seen broken spears, smashed shields, swords and daggers scattered apart from their owners.[601] He directed the Spartan and Theban dead to be collected in separate heaps, and placed in safe custody for the night, in the interior of his phalanx; the troops then took their supper, and rested for the night. On the next morning, Gylis the Polemarch was ordered to draw up the army in battle-array, to erect a trophy, and to offer sacrifices of cheerfulness and thanksgiving, with the pipers solemnly playing, according to Spartan fashion. Agesilaus was anxious to make these demonstrations of victory as ostentatious as possible, because he really doubted whether he had gained a victory. It was very possible that the Thebans might feel confidence enough to renew the attack, and try to recover the field of battle, with their own dead upon it; which Agesilaus had, for that reason, caused to be collected in a separate heap and placed within the Lacedæmonian line.[602] He was, however, soon relieved from doubt by a herald coming from the Thebans to solicit the customary truce for the burial of their dead; the understood confession of defeat. The request was immediately granted; each party paid the last solemnities to its own dead, and the Spartan force was then withdrawn from Bœotia. Xenophon does not state the loss on either side, but Diodorus gives it at six hundred on the side of the confederates, three hundred and fifty on that of the Lacedæmonians.[603]

[601] Xen. Agesil. ii, 14. Ἐπεί γε μὴν ἔληξεν ἡ μάχη, παρῆν δὴ
θεάσασθαι ἔνθα συνέπεσον ἀλλήλοις, τὴν μὲν γῆν αἵματι πεφυρμένην,
νεκροὺς δὲ κειμένους φιλίους καὶ πολεμίους μετ᾽ ἀλλήλων, ἀσπίδας
δὲ διατεθρυμμένας, δόρατα συντεθραυσμένα, ἐγχειρίδια γυμνὰ κουλεῶν
τὰ μὲν χαμαί, τὰ δ᾽ ἐν σώμασι, τὰ δ᾽ ἔτι μετὰ χειρός.

[602] Xen. Agesil. ii, 15. Τότε μὲν οὖν (καὶ γὰρ ἦν ἤδη ὀψέ)
συνελκύσαντες ~τοὺς τῶν πολεμίων νεκροὺς~ εἴσω φάλαγγος,
ἐδειπνοποιήσαντο καὶ ἐκοιμήθησαν.

Schneider in his note on this passage, as well as ad. Xen.
Hellen. iv, 3, 21—condemns the expression τῶν πολεμίων as
spurious and unintelligible. But in my judgment, these words hear
a plain and appropriate meaning, which I have endeavored to give
in the text. Compare Plutarch, Agesil. c. 19.

[603] Diodor. xiv, 84.

Disqualified as he was by his wounds for immediate action, Agesilaus caused himself to be carried to Delphi, where the Pythian games were at that moment going on. He here offered to Apollo the tithe of the booty acquired during his two years’ campaigns in Asia; a tithe equal to one hundred talents.[604] Meanwhile the polemarch Gylis conducted the army first into Phokis, next on a predatory excursion into the Lokrian territory, where the nimble attack of the Lokrian light troops, amidst hilly ground, inflicted upon his troops a severe check, and cost him his life. After this the contingents in the army were dismissed to their respective homes, and Agesilaus himself, when tolerably recovered, sailed with the Peloponnesians homeward from Delphi across the Corinthian Gulf.[605] He was received at Sparta with every demonstration of esteem and gratitude, which was still farther strengthened by his exemplary simplicity and exact observance of the public discipline; an exactness not diminished either by long absence or enjoyment of uncontrolled ascendency. From this time forward he was the effective leader of Spartan policy, enjoying an influence greater than had ever fallen to the lot of any king before. His colleague, Agesipolis, both young and of feeble character, was won over by his judicious and conciliatory behavior, into the most respectful deference.[606]

[604] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 21; Plutarch, Agesil. c. 19. The latter
says—εἰς Δελφοὺς ἀπεκομίσθη ~Πυθίων ἀγομένων~, etc. Manso, Dr.
Arnold, and others, contest the accuracy of Plutarch in this
assertion respecting the time of year at which the Pythian games
were celebrated, upon grounds which seem to me very insufficient.

[605] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 22, 23; iv. 4, 1.

[606] Plutarch, Agesil. c. 17, 20; Xen. Hellen. v, 3, 20.

Three great battles had thus been fought in the space of little more than a month (July and August)—those of Corinth, Knidus, and Korôneia; the first and third on land, the second at sea, as described in my last chapter. In each of the two land-battles the Lacedæmonians had gained a victory; they remained masters of the field, and were solicited by the enemy to grant the burial-truce. But if we inquire what results these victories had produced, the answer must be that both were totally barren. The position of Sparta in Greece as against her enemies had undergone no improvement. In the battle of Corinth, her soldiers had indeed manifested signal superiority, and acquired much honor. But at the field of Korôneia, the honor of the day was rather on the side of the Thebans, who broke through the most strenuous opposition, and carried their point of joining their allies. And the purpose of Agesilaus (ordered by the ephor Diphridas) to invade Bœotia, completely failed.[607] Instead of advancing, he withdrew from Korôneia, and returned to Peloponnesus across the gulf from Delphi; which he might have done just as well without fighting this murderous and hardly contested battle. Even the narrative of Xenophon, deeply colored as it is both by his sympathies and his antipathies, indicates to us that the predominant impression carried off by every one from the field of Korôneia was that of the tremendous force and obstinacy of the Theban hoplites,—a foretaste of what was to come at Leuktra!

[607] Plutarch, Agesil. c. 17. Cornelius Nepos, Agesil. c. 4.
“Obsistere ei conati sunt Athenienses et Bœoti,” etc. They
_succeeded_ in barring his way, and compelling him to retreat.

If the two land-victories of Sparta were barren of results, the case was far otherwise with her naval defeat at Knidus. That defeat was pregnant with consequences following in rapid succession, and of the most disastrous character. As with Athens at Ægospotami,—the loss of her fleet, serious as that was, served only as the signal for countless following losses. Pharnabazus and Konon, with their victorious fleet, sailed from island to island, and from one continental seaport to another, in the Ægean, to expel the Lacedæmonian harmosts, and terminate the empire of Sparta. So universal was the odium which it had inspired, that the task was found easy beyond expectation. Conscious of their unpopularity, the harmosts in almost all the towns, on both sides of the Hellespont, deserted their posts and fled, on the mere news of the battle of Knidus.[608] Everywhere Pharnabazus and Konon found themselves received as liberators, and welcomed with presents of hospitality. They pledged themselves not to introduce any foreign force or governor, nor to fortify any separate citadel, but to guarantee to each city its own genuine autonomy. This policy was adopted by Pharnabazus at the urgent representation of Konon, who warned him that if he manifested any design of reducing the cities to subjection, he would find them all his enemies; that each of them severally would cost him a long siege; and that a combination would ultimately be formed against him. Such liberal and judicious ideas, when seen to be sincerely acted upon, produced a strong feeling of friendship and even of gratitude, so that the Lacedæmonian maritime empire was dissolved without a blow, by the almost spontaneous movements of the cities themselves. Though the victorious fleet presented itself in many different places, it was nowhere called upon to put down resistance, or to undertake a single siege. Kos, Nisyra, Teos, Chios, Erythræ, Ephesus, Mitylênê, Samos, all declared themselves independent, under the protection of the new conquerors.[609] Pharnabazus presently disembarked at Ephesus and marched by land northward to his own satrapy; leaving a fleet of forty triremes under the command of Konon.

[608] Xenoph. Hellen. iv, 8, 1-5.

[609] Xen. Hellen. iv, 8, 1-3; Diodor. xiv, 84. About Samos, xiv,
97.

Compare also the speech of Derkyllidas to the Abydenes (Xen.
Hellen. iv, 8, 4)—Ὅσῳ δὲ μᾶλλον αἱ ἄλλαι πόλεις ξὺν τῇ τύχῃ
ἀπεστράφησαν ἡμῶν, τοσούτῳ ὄντως ἡ ὑμετέρα πιστότης μείζων φανείη
ἄν, etc.

To this general burst of anti-Spartan feeling, Abydos, on the Asiatic side of the Hellespont, formed the solitary exception. That town, steady in hostility to Athens,[610] had been the great military station of Sparta for her northern Asiatic warfare, during the last twenty years. It was in the satrapy of Pharnabazus, and had been made the chief place of arms by Derkyllidas and Agesilaus, for their warfare against that satrap as well as for the command of the strait. Accordingly, while it was a main object with Pharnabazus to acquire possession of Abydos,—there was nothing which the Abydenes dreaded so much as to become subject to him. In this view they were decidedly disposed to cling to Lacedæmonian protection; and it happened by a fortunate accident for Sparta, that the able and experienced Derkyllidas was harmost in the town at the moment of the battle of Knidus. Having fought in the battle of Corinth, he had been sent to announce the news to Agesilaus, whom he had met on his march at Amphipolis, and who had sent him forward into Asia to communicate the victory to the allied cities;[611] neither of them at that moment anticipating the great maritime defeat then impending. The presence in Abydos of such an officer, who had already acquired a high military reputation in that region, and was at marked enmity with Pharnabazus,—combined with the standing apprehensions of the Abydenes,—was now the means of saving a remnant at least of maritime ascendency to Sparta. During the general alarm which succeeded the battle of Knidus, when the harmosts were everywhere taking flight, and when anti-Spartan manifestations often combined with internal revolutions to overthrow the dekarchs or their substitutes, were spreading from city to city,—Derkyllidas assembled the Abydenes, heartened them up against the reigning contagion, and exhorted them to earn the gratitude of Sparta by remaining faithful to her while others were falling off; assuring them that she would still be found capable of giving them protection. His exhortations were listened to with favor. Abydos remained attached to Sparta, was put in a good state of defence, and became the only harbor of safety for the fugitive harmosts out of the other cities, Asiatic and European.

[610] Ἐκ γὰρ Ἀβύδου, τῆς τὸν ἅπαντα χρόνον ὑμῖν ἔχθρας—says
Demosthenes in the Athenian assembly (cont. Aristokrat. c. 39, p.
672; compare c. 52, p. 688).

[611] Xen. Hellen. iv, 3, 2.

Having secured his hold upon Abydos, Derkyllidas crossed the strait to make sure also of the strong place of Sestos, on the European side, in the Thracian Chersonese.[612] In that fertile peninsula there had been many new settlers, who had come in and acquired land under the Lacedæmonian supremacy, especially since the building of the cross-wall by Derkyllidas to defend the isthmus against Thracian invasion. By means of these settlers, dependent on Sparta for the security of their tenures,—and of the refugees from various cities all concentrated under his protection,—Derkyllidas maintained his position effectively both at Abydos and at Sestos; defying the requisition of Pharnabazus that he should forthwith evacuate them. The satrap threatened war, and actually ravaged the lands around Abydos,—but without any result. His wrath against the Lacedæmonians, already considerable, was so aggravated by disappointment when he found that he could not yet expel them from his satrapy, that he resolved to act against them with increased energy, and even to strike a blow at them near their own home. For this purpose he transmitted orders to Konon to prepare a commanding naval force for the ensuing spring, and in the mean time to keep both Abydos and Sestos under blockade.[613]

[612] Lysander, after the victory of Ægospotami and the expulsion
of the Athenians from Sestos, had assigned the town and district
as a settlement for the pilots and Keleustæ aboard his fleet. But
the ephors are said to have reversed the assignment, and restored
the town to the Sestians (Plutarch, Lysand. c. 14). Probably,
however, the new settlers would remain in part upon the lands
vacated by the expelled Athenians.

[613] Xen. Hellen. iv, 8, 4-6.

As soon as spring arrived, Pharnabazus embarked on board a powerful fleet equipped by Konon; directing his course to Melos, to various islands among the Cyclades, and lastly to the coast of Peloponnesus. They here spent some time on the coast of Laconia and Messenia, disembarking at several points to ravage the country. They next landed on the island of Kythêra, which they captured, granting safe retirement to the Lacedæmonian garrison, and leaving in the island a garrison under the Athenian Nikophêmus. Quitting then the harborless, dangerous, and ill-provided coast of Laconia, they sailed up the Saronic gulf to the isthmus of Corinth. Here they found the confederates,—Corinthian, Bœotian, Athenian, etc., carrying on war with Corinth as their central post, against the Lacedæmonians at Sikyon. The line across the isthmus from Lechæum to Kenchreæ (the two ports of Corinth) was now made good by a defensive system of operations, so as to confine the Lacedæmonians within Peloponnesus; just as Athens, prior to her great losses in 446 B.C., while possessing both Megara and Pegæ, had been able to maintain the inland road midway between them, where it crosses the high and difficult crest of Mount Geraneia, thus occupying the only three roads by which a Lacedæmonian army could march from the isthmus of Corinth into Attica or Bœotia.[614] Pharnabazus communicated in the most friendly manner with the allies, assured them of his strenuous support against Sparta, and left with them a considerable sum of money.[615]

[614] See Sir William Gell’s Itinerary of Greece, p. 4. Ernst
Curtius—Peloponnesos—p. 25, 26, and Thucyd. i, 108.

[615] Xen. Hellen. iv, 8, 7, 8; Diodor. xiv, 84.

The appearance of a Persian satrap with a Persian fleet, as master of the Peloponnesian sea and the Saronic Gulf, was a phenomenon astounding to Grecian eyes. And if it was not equally offensive to Grecian sentiment, this was in itself a melancholy proof of the degree to which Pan-hellenic patriotism had been stifled by the Peloponnesian war and the Spartan empire. No Persian tiara had been seen near the Saronic Gulf since the battle of Salamis; nor could anything short of the intense personal wrath of Pharnabazus against the Lacedæmonians, and his desire to revenge upon them the damage inflicted by Derkyllidas and Agesilaus, have brought him now so far away from his own satrapy. It was this wrathful feeling of which Konon took advantage to procure from him a still more important boon.

Since 404 B.C., a space of eleven years, Athens had continued without any walls around her seaport town Peiræus, and without any Long Walls to connect her city with Peiræus. To this state she had been condemned by the sentence of her enemies, in the full knowledge that she could have little trade,—few ships either armed or mercantile,—poor defence even against pirates, and no defence at all against aggression from the mistress of the sea. Konon now entreated Pharnabazus, who was about to go home, to leave the fleet under his command, and to permit him to use it in rebuilding the fortifications of Peiræus as well as the Long Walls of Athens. While he engaged to maintain the fleet by contributions from the islands, he assured the satrap that no blow could be inflicted upon Sparta so destructive or so mortifying, as the renovation of Athens and Peiræus with their complete and connected fortifications. Sparta would thus be deprived of the most important harvest which she had reaped from the long struggle of the Peloponnesian war. Indignant as he now was against the Lacedæmonians, Pharnabazus sympathized cordially with these plans, and on departing not only left the fleet under the command of Konon, but also furnished him with a considerable sum of money towards the expense of the fortifications.[616]

[616] Xen. Hellen. iv, 8, 9, 10.

Konon betook himself to the work energetically and without delay. He had quitted Athens in 407 B.C., as one of the joint admirals nominated after the disgrace of Alkibiades. He had parted with his countrymen finally at the catastrophe of Ægospotami in 405 B.C., preserving the miserable fraction of eight or nine ships out of that noble fleet which otherwise would have passed entire into the hands of Lysander. He now returned, in 393 B.C., as a second Themistokles, the deliverer of his country, and the restorer of her lost strength and independence. All hands were set to work; carpenters and masons being hired with the funds furnished by Pharnabazus, to complete the fortifications as quickly as possible. The Bœotians and other neighbors lent their aid zealously as volunteers,[617]—the same who eleven years before had danced to the sound of joyful music when the former walls were demolished; so completely had the feelings of Greece altered since that period. By such hearty coöperation the work was finished during the course of the present summer and autumn without any opposition; and Athens enjoyed again her fortified Peiræus and harbor, with a pair of Long Walls, straight and parallel, joining it securely to the city. The third, or Phalêric Wall (a single wall stretching from Athens to Phalêrum), which had existed down to the capture of the city by Lysander, was not restored; nor was it indeed by any means necessary to the security either of the city or of the port. Having thus given renewed life and security to Peiræus, Konon commemorated his great naval victory by a golden wreath in the acropolis, as well as by the erection of a temple in Peiræus to the honor of the Knidian Aphroditê, who was worshipped at Knidus with peculiar devotion by the local population.[618] He farther celebrated the completion of the walls by a splendid sacrifice and festival banquet. And the Athenian people not only inscribed on a pillar a public vote gratefully recording the exploits of Konon, but also erected a statue to his honor.[619]

[617] Xen. Hellen. iv. 8, 10; Diodor. xiv. 85.

Cornelius Nepos (Conon, c. 4) mentions fifty talents as a sum
received by Konon from Pharnabazus as a present, and devoted by
him to this public work. This is not improbable; but the total
sum contributed by the satrap towards the fortifications must,
probably, have been much greater.

[618] Demosthen. cont. Androtion. p. 616. c. 21. Pausanias (i, 1,
3) still saw this temple in Peiræus—very near to the sea; five
hundred and fifty years afterwards.

[619] Demosthen. cont. Leptin. c. 16. p. 477, 478; Athenæus, i,
3; Cornelius Nepos, Conon, c. 4.

The importance of this event in reference to the future history of Athens was unspeakable. Though it did not restore to her either her former navy, or her former empire, it reconstituted her as a city, not only self-determining, but even partially ascendant. It reanimated her, if not into the Athens of Perikles, at least into that of Isokrates and Demosthenes; it imparted to her a second fill of strength, dignity, and commercial importance, during the half century destined to elapse before she was finally overwhelmed by the superior military force of Macedon. Those who recollect the extraordinary stratagem whereby Themistokles had contrived (eighty-five years before) to accomplish the fortification of Athens, in spite of the base but formidable jealousy of Sparta and her Peloponnesian allies, will be aware how much the consummation of the Themistoklean project had depended upon accident. Now, also, Konon in his restoration was favored by unusual combinations, such as no one could have predicted. That Pharnabazus should conceive the idea of coming over himself to Peloponnesus with a fleet of the largest force, was a most unexpected contingency. He was influenced neither by attachment to Athens, nor seemingly by considerations of policy, though the proceeding was one really conducive to the interests of Persian power,—but simply by his own violent personal wrath against the Lacedæmonians. And this wrath probably would have been satisfied, if, after the battle of Knidus, he could have cleared his own satrapy of them completely. It was his vehement impatience, when he found himself unable to expel his old enemy, Derkyllidas, from the important position of Abydos, which chiefly spurred him on to take revenge on Sparta in her own waters. Nothing less than the satrap’s personal presence would have placed at the disposal of Konon either a sufficient naval force, or sufficient funds for the erection of the new walls, and the defiance of all impediment from Sparta. So strangely did events thus run, that the energy, by which Derkyllidas preserved Abydos, brought upon Sparta, indirectly, the greater mischief of the new Kononian walls. It would have been better for Sparta that Pharnabazus should at once have recovered Abydos as well as the rest of his satrapy; in which case he would have had no wrongs remaining unavenged to incense him, and would have kept on his own side of the Ægean; feeding Konon with a modest squadron sufficient to keep the Lacedæmonian navy from again becoming formidable on the Asiatic side, but leaving the walls of Peiræus (if we may borrow an expression of Plato) “to continue asleep in the bosom of the earth.”[620]

[620] Plato, Legg. vi, p. 778; καθεύδειν ἐᾷν ἐν τῇ γῇ κατακείμενα
τὰ τείχη, etc.

But the presence of Konon with his powerful fleet was not the only condition indispensable to the accomplishment of this work. It was requisite further, that the interposition of Sparta should be kept off, not merely by sea, but by land, and that, too, during all the number of months that the walls were in progress. Now the barrier against her on land was constituted by the fact, that the confederate force held the cross line within the isthmus from Lechæum to Kenchreæ, with Corinth as a centre.[621] But they were unable to sustain this line even through the ensuing year,—during which Sparta, aided by dissensions at Corinth, broke through it, as will appear in the next chapter. Had she been able to break through it while the fortifications of Athens were yet incomplete, she would have deemed no effort too great to effect an entrance into Attica and interrupt the work, in which she might very probably have succeeded. Here, then, was the second condition, which was realized during the summer and autumn of 393 B.C., but which did not continue to be realized longer. So fortunate was it for Athens, that the two conditions were fulfilled both together during this particular year!

[621] The importance of maintaining these lines, as a protection
to Athens against invasion from Sparta, is illustrated in Xen.
Hellen. v, 4, 19, and Andokides, Or. iii, De Pace, s. 26.