Chapter I: If, as there maintained, his exhortations not to be won over

by gains to exalt any tyrant and his complaints about tradesmen controlling the state all point to fears of a tyranny of wealth, then it is particularly likely that his alarm may have had a historical basis in the career of Theagenes.

[Sidenote: Miletus.]

At Miletus during the seventh and sixth centuries[1357] there appear to have been several periods of tyranny with intervals of anarchy in between. The most famous and powerful of the Milesian tyrants was Thrasybulus, whose reign must have begun towards the end of the seventh century. While he was tyrant the city enjoyed great material prosperity. Then in the middle of the sixth she was afflicted with two generations of civil war, after which there came a great revival of prosperity under the tyrant Histiaeus. Plutarch records the names of two other tyrants, Thoas and Damasenor, but only to introduce an account of the state of things that followed their overthrow. They may have been joint successors of Thrasybulus[1358], much as the Athenians tended to regard Peisistratus as having been succeeded by Hippias and Hipparchus ruling conjointly. Or possibly Plutarch is mentioning two successive rulers of a distinct period of tyranny, the latter of whom only was deposed, in which case they are probably to be put before Thrasybulus[1359], somewhere about the middle of the seventh century.

The fall of Thoas and Damasenor was followed by a struggle between two parties called Ploutis (?) and Cheiromache, names which sound remarkably like Capital and Labour.

There is no certainty as to either the etymological or the historical meaning of these names. Plutarch seems to identify the Ploutis (?) faction with a body called Aeinautai (always on shipboard)[1360] and the reading Plontis, connected with πλοῖον (ship), has been proposed by Plass[1361]. Cheiromache again means not hand-workers but hand-fighters, a name that need not have any industrial implication. Hand-fighters might be just people who did not wear swords, the lower classes generally. But Cheiromache is said by Eustathius to have been a synonym for χειρώναξ, a common word for artizan[1362], and Suidas speaks of rival parties in Miletus composed of the wealthy (πλούσιοι) and the manual labourers (Γέργηθες, s.v., explained as χειρώνακτες), and though the period to which he is referring is quite uncertain, he still lends some support to the Capital and Labour interpretation of Plutarch’s Ploutis (?) and Cheiromache[1363]. The latter name would have been given to the party by its opponents, much as though enemies of a modern labour party should call them the Strikers or Down-Toolers. The other name for labour (Γέργιθες or Γέργηθες) is said by Heraclides Ponticus[1364] to have been given to it by the faction of the wealthy, a statement quite compatible with the explanation of the name as derived from a place and denoting the poor subject Carians, the descendants of the pre-Hellenic population of the Milesian territory[1365]. Perhaps we may see a hint that Gergethes and Cheiromache were alternative names both given to labour by its rich opponents in the reply given by the oracle to the party of the rich after they had been brutally massacring the party of the poor. “I too” says the god “take heed of the murder of the unwarlike Gergithes[1366].” The rebuke gains in point if the Gergithes had been also called Cheiromachoi, the manual _fighters_[1367].

Of the early careers of the Milesian tyrants we know practically nothing. Aristotle indeed[1368] refers to Miletus as a place where tyranny arose from the great power possessed by the magistrate called prytanis. But as argued already in discussing the office of polemarch held before his tyranny by Cypselus, a position of this kind does not by itself explain a tyrant’s rise to supreme power. Moreover in the case of Miletus there is nothing to show which tyrant Aristotle is referring to. When on the throne Thrasybulus pursued the policy of “cutting off the heads of those ears of corn which he saw higher than the rest” or in other words of “putting to death those who were eminent among his subjects[1369].” It is fairly certain that a ruler who pursued this policy did not rest his power on the support of the upper classes. One of the few anecdotes about the tyrant tells how he outwitted the king of Lydia by a misleading display of corn in the Milesian market-place[1370].

The accession of Histiaeus seems to have synchronized with a revival of the commercial prosperity of Miletus. Histiaeus was the friend and vassal of Darius of Persia, and the basis of his power must therefore not be sought exclusively in the internal conditions of Miletus. But on the other hand the Persians seem to have been remarkably free from any tendency to Persianize the nations they subdued. Their sins were those rather of Abdul Hamid than of the Young Turks. Purely internal conditions continued to operate much as before[1371].

In the absence therefore of all evidence as to how Histiaeus came by his power[1372] it becomes interesting to see how he sought to expand it. The chance came to him when he had won Darius’ confidence and gratitude in his Scythian campaign and the Great King invited him to choose his reward. “He asked for Myrcinus in Edonia, wishing to found in it a city[1373].” Darius granted his request and the foundation was begun. But when the news of this gift reached Megabazus, the able Persian officer who had reduced Edonia and other parts of Thrace and Macedonia, he was much alarmed, and remonstrated with his master:

O King, what manner of thing hast thou done, granting to a clever
and cunning Greek to acquire a city in Thrace? Where there is an
inexhaustible supply of timber for building ships and oars, and
mines of silver, and a large population of Greeks living in the
neighbourhood and a large population of barbarians: if they get a
patron (προστάτης) they will do what he directs day and night. Now
therefore do thou stop him from doing this, that thou be not
involved in a war against thine own[1374].

As pointed out by Grundy[1375] Myrcinus occupied a most important site on great strategic and commercial highways. But there is no reason to suspect Herodotus when he tells us that the town owed its importance first and foremost not to its geographical situation but to its minerals and forests. It is as a great mine-owner and shipbuilder and the employer of hosts of miners and shipbuilders and seamen that Histiaeus threatens to make himself a ruler sufficiently powerful to be a danger to the Great King himself[1376].

[Sidenote: Ephesus.]

The earliest tyrant of Ephesus appears to have been Pythagoras, who overthrew the government of the Basilidae. Baton of Sinope[1377], who wrote a history of the tyrants of Ephesus[1378], states that Pythagoras lived “before Cyrus the Persian.” This seems to be rather an understatement of the tyrant’s antiquity, since we hear of two other tyrants, Melas and Pindaros, of whom the latter was son and successor of the former and was deprived of his throne by Croesus[1379], and of yet another pair, by name Athenagoras and Komas, who lived at the same time as the poet Hipponax and must therefore be assigned to about the middle of the sixth century[1380], while during part of the reign of Croesus, after the fall of Pindaros, Ephesus appears to have enjoyed a moderate democracy guided by the aesymnetes Aristarchus[1381]. All this leaves little room for Pythagoras in the period just preceding Cyrus, and since too the Basilidae were almost certainly one of the hereditary aristocracies, like the Bacchiadae of Corinth, that overthrew the hereditary monarchy in most Greek cities before the end of the dark ages, it becomes probable that Pythagoras flourished at the beginning of the sixth century or possibly even in the seventh[1382].

According to our only authority Suidas, who quotes Baton on the date of Pythagoras and very possibly used him for the rest of his notice, Pythagoras displayed an insatiable passion for money (ἔρως χρημάτων ἄμετρος) and showed himself a cruel tyrant (τύραννος πικρότατος) but “with the people and the multitude he both was and appeared to be well liked, sometimes making them hopeful by his promises, sometimes secretly distributing small gratuities[1383].” “Those however who enjoyed reputation or power he plundered and subjected to confiscations[1384].” Suidas deals only with the tyrant on the throne and draws plainly from a most unfriendly source[1385]: but as far as he goes he suggests that the power of Pythagoras was based on wealth.

The tyrant Pindarus, who was overthrown by Croesus, was a grandson of Alyattes, Croesus’ father and predecessor[1386]. Ephesus was one of the chief termini of the great caravan route from the Far East that ran to Sardis and then branched to several places on the coast. In the chapter on Lydia we have had occasion to notice the story of the eighth century Lydian Ardys, who when banished from his native land went into business at Cyme (another of these branch termini) and from there returned as ruler to Sardis. Radet may therefore be right in thinking that the Ephesian tyrants shared with the Lydian the monopoly of the trade that traversed this great road[1387]. The overthrow of Pindarus is perhaps to be associated with the story of the financial dealings of Croesus while his father Alyattes was still on the throne[1388]. To pave the way to his own succession as against his half brother, the half Greek Pantaleon, Croesus has to borrow large sums of money. He first tries in Sardis, and failing there proceeds to Ephesus, where he succeeds in raising money, not however from the house of Melas, but from a certain Pamphaes the son of Theocharides. It is hardly rash to assume that the tyrant family at Ephesus were putting their money on the half Greek candidate, and that Pindarus fell because his family had taken the wrong side in this great battle of high finance.

[Sidenote: Leontini.]

Panaitios of Leontini was the first in Sicily to seize the tyranny (Panaitios primus in Sicilia arripuit tyrannidem), which he is stated to have done a few years before the end of the seventh century[1389]. The stratagem by which he made himself tyrant is described by Polyaenus[1390]. The people of Leontini were at war with Megara, and Panaitios was polemarch. The actual coup was a matter of disarming the rich citizens who served on horseback (τοῖς εὐπόροις καὶ ἱππεῦσι), which he did with the help of their grooms. But before carrying out this _coup d’état_ Panaitios had started a conflict between these rich knights and the poor who served on foot (τοὺς πένητας καὶ πεζούς). Aristotle[1391] adds little. He classes Panaitios with “Cypselus in Corinth, Peisistratus in Athens, and Dionysius in Syracuse, and others who in the same way (became tyrants) from demagogy,” a view that has already been dealt with[1392]. His other statement, that the government of Panaitios succeeded an oligarchy, is credible but unilluminating[1393].

[Sidenote: Agrigentum.]

Phalaris of Agrigentum, a tax collector, when the citizens wished to
erect a temple of Zeus Polieus for two hundred talents on the
citadel as being rocky and strong and for the further reason that it
would be pious to give the god the highest place, undertook, if he
was given charge of the work, to have the best craftsmen and provide
the material cheaply and offer sound securities for the money. The
people trusted him, thinking that thanks to his life as a
tax-collector he had experience of such proceedings. So taking the
public money he hired many foreigners and bought many prisoners and
carried up to the citadel much material of stone, timber, iron. And
when the foundations were already being dug, he sent down his herald
to proclaim “whoever gives information against those who stole the
stone and iron on the citadel shall receive such and such a reward.”
The people were annoyed at the report of the material being stolen.
“Well then,” said he, “allow me to enclose the acropolis.” The city
allowed him to enclose it and to raise a wall round it. He released
the prisoners, armed them with the stones and hatchets and axes,
made an attack during the Thesmophoria, killed most of the men, and
having established himself as master of women and children, became
the tyrant of the city of Agrigentum[1394].

For over two centuries the name of Phalaris has been chiefly associated with the famous controversy between the Cambridge Bentley and the Oxford Boyle as to the authenticity of the letters ascribed to him. The spuriousness of these letters was so convincingly established by the Cambridge scholar, that everyone since then seems to have shrunk from attributing historical value to anything whatsoever that Phalaris is reported to have done. It so happens that the best known tradition about Phalaris tells of his extreme cruelty[1395], and more particularly how he did his victims to death by roasting them alive in a brazen bull[1396]. This bull story has no doubt helped further to discredit Phalaris as a strictly historical character.

Yet there can be no dispute that Phalaris did make himself tyrant of Agrigentum and that his cruelty made a lasting impression on the people whom he ruled. His existence and importance is shown by a whole series of references to him that begins with Pindar[1397] and includes allusions in Aristotle[1398]. Considering that the tyrant probably died only one generation before Pindar was born[1399], there is no reason why a trustworthy tradition about him should not have been preserved and more particularly why the account of his early days in Polyaenus should not have a historical basis.

If it has, its significance is important. It means that Phalaris owed his tyranny in the ultimate instance to his skill in finance and more immediately to the control of large sums of money that gave him great influence over the lower classes who earned their living by manual labour[1400].

Polyaenus cannot be decisively confirmed. But still less can he be decisively discredited. The story itself suggests that its source was the temple of Zeus Polieus, and a temple founded in the sixth century may well have kept some record, oral or written, of the days of its foundation. There is of course the possibility of forgery, but forgeries generally have some motive, such as gain or glory or love of the sensational. No such motive can easily be imputed to this narrative of Polyaenus, whose picture of Phalaris is borne out by notices in various other writers.

Lucian for instance makes the tyrant a great builder and great financier and a great patron of the common people[1401]. Lucian’s Phalaris is represented as defending himself at Delphi against the charge of cruelty: he certainly utters many paradoxes in so doing; but the point of the picture is that it is based on the received tradition, and it may fairly be used as evidence on a question such as that which is being here considered.

Aristotle classes Phalaris among the tyrants who owed their position to some high office that they had previously held[1402], a statement which is good evidence for Phalaris as a historical personage and as far as it goes accords with Polyaenus.

“When the Agrigentines were rid of Phalaris they decreed that nobody should wear a blue-grey cloak: for the servants of the tyrant wore aprons (περιζώματα) of blue-grey[1403].” The prohibition of these blue-grey aprons makes it look as if the men who overthrew the tyranny of Phalaris thought it necessary to disband his army of uniformed employees.

Further the part of the narrative of Polyaenus that most concerns us here can claim a certain probability from what is known of an early namesake and fellow-townsman of the Syracusan tyrant Agathocles. According to Diodorus[1404] this earlier Agathocles, who lived while Syracuse was still under a landed aristocracy called γεωμόροι, probably about 700 B.C.[1405],

Being chosen to have charge of the building of the temple of Athena,
picked out the finest of the stones that were being quarried and met
the expense out of his own pocket (τὴν μὲν δαπάνην ἐκ τῆς ἰδίας
οὐσίας ἐποιεῖτο), but misused the stones and built a costly house.
At this they say the divine power gave forth a sign: Agathocles was
struck by lightning and consumed by fire along with all his house.
The Geomoroi confiscated his property to the state, although the
kleronomoi (the financial officials) showed that he had taken
nothing of the monies of the temple or of the state. They devoted
his house to the gods and forbade those who came there to set foot
in it, and to this day it is called the embrontaion (_i.e._ the
place struck by lightning).

The positions of Phalaris and Agathocles as described by Polyaenus and Diodorus are very similar. Both are in charge of the building of a great temple, the Greek word in each case being ἐπιστάτης, which means literally superintendent, but is rather a vague term and appears to include the idea of contractor[1406]. Both again misuse their position, and in neither case is the offender charged with misappropriation. Phalaris secures himself a tyranny, Agathocles builds himself a house. But the house is a very special sort of house, and though the builder is specifically acquitted of any dishonest dealings about it, it brings down on him the wrath both of the gods and of the government. The gods burn him and his house: the government confiscate his property. What sort of a house was it that had such disastrous consequences for its builder? A close parallel is offered by the history of the Roman Maelius, who is said in the fifth century B.C. to have had his house pulled down and his property confiscated. In the case of Agathocles the gods, when they destroyed his house, are said to send a sign (ἐπισημαίνειν): in that of Maelius the offence that caused his house to be demolished is pronounced to be not a scelus but a monstrum. The charge that brought down on Maelius these extreme penalties was that of aiming at the throne. Maelius was extremely rich, and had a large army of clients, and we may reasonably infer that his house was so severely dealt with because it looked too much like a royal palace. Considering the analogies in the story of Agathocles with that of Maelius on the one hand and that of Phalaris on the other, it looks not unlikely that the exception taken to the house of Agathocles was due to its palatial character. Private dwellings in early Greek cities were notoriously simple and unpretentious[1407]. A house in which it was possible to employ stones intended for a great temple was obviously quite the reverse. It would challenge comparison with the government buildings and might be used as the rallying-place for an armed attack[1408] upon the government, and it was this in all probability that brought on it so terrible a fate.

The stories of Agathocles and Maelius lend support to the view that Polyaenus in his account of the rise of Phalaris is describing the normal way in which tyrannies were established at this early period in Sicily and Italy. If so, the normal tyrant in early Sicily and Italy was some very rich man who used his riches to secure financial control of some large section of the labouring classes and this control was sometimes secured by undertaking big building operations which provided not only continuous work for numerous employees but often too a strong and imposing headquarters that could soon be converted into the castle or palace from which he ruled the whole state[1409].

[Sidenote: Cumae.]

Aristodemus of Cumae is dated by the fact that he gave shelter to Tarquinius Superbus when banished from Rome[1410]. “In those days Cumae was renowned throughout Italy for its wealth and power[1411].” Before he became tyrant he is said to have distinguished himself as a soldier[1412]. But it was not as a soldier that he is represented as securing the tyranny. “He won over the people by turning demagogue ... relieving many of the poor out of his own purse ... distributing money to them man by man, and depositing for the common good the presents he had received from the people of Aricia[1413].” At the end of his reign he is represented as employing citizens on a large scale on manual labour: “he chanced about that time to be making a trench round the place, a work neither necessary nor useful, but merely because he wished to weary and exhaust the citizens with toils and labours. For each was ordered to remove a certain extent of earth[1414].” The chronology of the tyrant’s career is not altogether easy and the narrative not entirely credible[1415], but we appear to have a tyrant of the early type, taking a prominent part in war and politics but relying largely at any rate on the control of labour and the power of wealth.