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The Imperialism of Thrasybulus

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

G. L. Cawkwell
G. L. Cawkwell
Affiliation:
University College, Oxford
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Extract

The achievement of Thrasybulus on his last voyage has been variously estimated. Busolt saw no more than a series of strong-arm acts that added up to very little. Beloch spoke of the Second Athenian Empire. For others there were mere renewals of friendship. This note has as its starting-point that Thrasybulus sought to restore the fifth-century empire.

If one looks merely at the list of places explicitly mentioned, the sum is not large. Thasos and its peraea, Samothrace and possibly its peraea, Byzantium, Chalcedon, Abydos possibly, Mytilene, Methymna, Eresus, Antissa, Chios, Halicarnassus, Aspendus. But Xenophon implies a great deal more.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , December 1976 , pp. 270 - 277
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1976

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References

1 Two important articles concerning Thrasybulus have appeared in recent years-R. Seager, ‘lThrasybulus, Conon, and Athenia Imperialism 396–386 B.C.’ JHS 87 (1967), 95–115 is a major contribution on which this note draws so extensively that explicit reference will be made only on points crucial to the argument, and S. Perlman, ‘Athenian democracy and the revival of imperialistic expansion at the beginning of the Fourth Century B.C.’ CPh 63 (1968), 257–67, to which this note offers a modification.

All references are to Xenophon, Hellenic, unless otherwise stated.

2 Busolt, Der zweite athenische Bund, 675 f.

3 Beloch, GG iii2. 1. 150 n. 2.

4 4. 8. 26–30; 5. 1. 7; Diod. 14. 94 and 99. 4 f.; Dem. 20. 59, 60; Lys. 28. 12 and 17. For Abydus, Dem. 57. 38, but the Thrasybulus there referred to is more probably not the Stirian, cf. 5. 1. 26 f.

5 Cf. the phrase of the inscription set up in honour of Conon (Dem. 20. 69). The of the fifth century had to be destroyed in 377 (Tod. GHI 123,1. 34).

6 Accame, Ricerche intorno alla guerra corinzia, 147 speaks of Thrasybulus' ‘programma politico, di un impero ateniese rispettoso dei diritti delle singole poleis’. He cites no evidence, but from ‘Il problema della nazionalità greca nella politica di Pericle e di Trasibulo’, Paideia 11 (1956), 250, it emerges that he is basing himself on the terms of the Eretrian alliance of 394 (Tod, GHI 103, and cf. Cloché, REA 21, 1919, 167), as if what happened in the early days of the Grand Alliance were at all relevant to the mood of 391 after the diplomatic experience of 392/1.

7 Cf. Perlman, art. cit., 266, and Cloché, art. cit., 187.

8 It is notable that Xenophon names Agyrrhius once only (4. 8. 31), but that is merely a reflection of the sketchy nature of the account of the naval war. His deme was Collytus which thus was doubly represented by him and Thrasybulus of Collytus. Presumably Agyrrhius was the ‘senior man’. His policies perhaps accorded with those of his nephew, Callistratus (Dem. 24. 135), both financially and in foreign affairs (Philoch. F. 149). (For his career, see J.K. Davies, Atb. Prop. Fam., 278.) His long imprisonment reflects the discredit into which he fell, after the King's Peace was produced by his imperialist activities (v.i).

9 Cf. esp. Seager, art. cit., 109.

10 Cf. Diod. 14. 99. 5 and 5. 1. 5. Lysias 28. 1 speaks of the betrayal of cities, and while this may refer to no more than Halicarnassus (cf. § 17), the cities of Rhodes also may be in mind.

11 GG iii2. 2. 224. For the nauarchies, cf. below, n. 14.

12 Cf. Seager, art. cit., 109, n. 127.

13 date of the negotiations at Sparta is sure, both from the references in Andocides 3 (the Boeotians have fought for four years, § 20, the war having begun in 395/4, and Sparta has captured Lechaeum, § 18, the event of early 392 described by Xenophon, 3. 4. 1 ff.) and from the archon date given by Philochorus, F. 149 (see below, note 25 for Bruce's mishandling of this passage, but he does not challenge the dating). Conon's recall and the congress at Sardis (4. 8. 12 f.) may fall in the first half of 392, not long after the capture of Lechaeum (cf. PW vi. 1 col. 1052 s.v. ‘Eukleios’ for probable dating of the Eucleia early in the Julian year). This would allow enough time for him to alarm the Spartans (4. 8. 12) and to send off the embassy to Syracuse, which checked the dispatch of a Syracusan fleet in spring 392 (Lys 19. 19 f.), and as much time as possible for the Congress of Sparta, which was in two stages, forty days apart (Andoc. 3. 33, 40). There is, however, no need to postulate a long delay between the Congress of Sardis and the Congress of Sparta, for, as Barbieri, Conone, 179, argued, the Persian share of the second was probably due to Tiribazus, who was later tried for his presumption (Diod. 15. 10). He perhaps issued a rescript in the name of the King (cf. Andoc. 3. 14 and Philoch. F. 149) before ‘going up’ to see him (4. 8. 16), and about six months before Strouthas appeared in Ionia to resume the war (4. 8. 17).

This note presumes that Sparta followed Sardis (pace Momigliano, Ann. Sc. Norm. Sup. Pisa 2nd Ser. v, 1936). The reason why Andocides does not deal explicitly with the question of the status of the Greeks of Asia in the proposed peace-terms is that, when he was speaking, their abandonment to the King was still the axiom, albeit uneasy, of Athenian policy, and it was not until Callistratus attacked the ambassadors on this very issue (Philoch. F. 149) that the new policy was, in the manner characteristic of Atheniai political life, proclaimed: after their condem nation negotiations of the sort conducted at Sardis were not conceivable. Further, pace Bruce (below, note 25), Philochorus makes it certain that the peace proposed at Sparta was a Royal peace, and to suppose that at Sparta Athens' claim to Lemnos etc. was conceded (Andoc. 3. 14), then at Sardis retracted, and then in 387/6, when Athens was at the King's mercy (5.1. 28), again conceded makes a senseless progression. Cf. Seager, art cit., 105, n. 92. Ryder, Koine Eirene, Appen dix XII, discusses the chronology of these years: on p. 31 he envisages that the Congress of Sparta may have followed the arrival of Strouthas in Ionia, because he rejects the evidence of Philochorus, a perilous procedure for the fourth century.

14 The nauarchy could be held once only (2. 1. 7). The only exception commonly admitted is Pollis, nauarch in 396/5 according to Hell. Oxy. 19. 1 and in 376 at the battle of Naxos (5. 4. 61), but proof is wanting that it was the same man on each occasion. Certainly Teleutias is unlikely to have been nauarch in 387, despite the doubtful text of 5. 1. 13; Antalcidas was nauarch in 388/7 (5. 1. 6) and was back from the King in time to blockade the corn ships coming from the Pontus (5. 1. 28), i.e. in autumn (cf. Dem. 50. 4, 19), but Teleutias had by then come to the ships on Aegina (5. 1. 13; cf. his allusions to Antalcidas' quest for money in the speech he delivered to the fleet, §§14–17). So there is no obstacle there to his being nauarch in 392/1. Xenophon names no one nauarch between Ecdicus, 391/0 (4. 8. 20), and Hierax, the immediate predecessor of Antalcidas (5. 1. 3, 5 f.), therefore 389/8. Who was nauarch in 390/89? Teleutias was operating in that year in command of the fleet (5. 1. 3) but, for the reason given above, not as nauarch. Can it have been the mysterious Chilon, the nauarch of Aesch. 2. 78, against whom Demaenetus fought a sea battle? Ed. Meyer, Theopomps Hellenica, 42, jumped to the presumption that Aeschines was really talking about Milon, the harmost on Aegina, who pursued Demaenetus in Hell. Oxy. 6 and 8. But that is wanton. Aeschines' use of the word, implies both more than the skirmish of Hell. Oxy. 8 and more than a single ship. Further, Chilon is a wellknown Spartan name, a bearer of which is to be met at 7. 4. 23. There is no justification for changing the name in Aeschines and scrapping the office assigned. Demaenetus was a general in 388/7 (5. 1. 10) and could have been, for all we know, previously, and the sea-battle in which he shared in defeating the nauarch could have been part of the operations Xenophon does not notice (see below). So Chilon may well be the missing name.

There is a convenient table of the evidence for Spartan commands in the Corinthian War in L. Pareti, Ricerche sulla potenza marittima degli Spartani, 157 f. Franke, PW xvi. 2, col. 1890 f., refers to the main discussions.

15 Dem. 3. 4.

16 Dem. 50. 29.

17 The chronology of the war is discussed by Beloch, GG iii2. 2. 226 ff. Cf. K. Spyridakis, Euagoras I von Salamis, 54 ff.

18 Cf. Lys. 19. 21. The ambassadors, who requested help from Athens, hired peltasts and bought arms. Perhaps these were for the preliminary land operations on Cyprus.

19 If Theopompus (F. 103) is to be trusts the Great King took no action against Evagoras until Autophradates was satrap of Lydia, who was appointed with Hecatomnus (for whom cf. Diod. 14. 98. 3) to conduct the war against Evagoras. Presumably Autophradates succeeded Strouthas (pace Tod, GHI 113, which makes him satrap of Ionia), and, unless Strouthas had a very short period as satrap, the order to Autophradates and Hecatomnus must have been later. The date of Tiribazus' return to Ionia (5. 1. 28) is quite unsure, but, since it probably betokened a change of mood in Susa, was probably not long before Antalcidas went out as nauarch to seek the help of Persia.

20 It is to be suspected that the ten ships that were sent to Cyprus (4. 8. 24) were not new ships, but the remnants of the fifth-century navy, which Athens had been allowed to keep.

21 Cf. the size of Thibron's army, Diod. 14. 99. 2, which equalled that of Agesilaus (3. 4. 2, Diod. 14. 79. 1 f.).

22 Perlman, art. cit., 261.

23 As Seager pointed out, art. cit., 98 f., there seems to have been considerable disillusionment by late 394 with the policy of Thrasybulus, but his share in the creation of the Grand Alliance, which safeguarded Athens against Spartan invasion, was much to his credit. His eclipse requires fuller explanation.

24 Cf. J.K. Davies, Atb.Prop.Fam., 181.

25 I.A.F. Bruce, ‘Athenian Embassies in the Early Fourth Century B.C.’ Historia 15 (1966), rejects Philochorus F. 149 in favour of Aristides, Panath. 172. 10 ff. (with Scholiast) and supposes that Epicrates was tried for his part in the embassy which made the King's Peace in 387/6. Assuming that the four ambassadors of Philochorus were together on some occasion, one may assert confidently enough that it was not in 387/6. Callias in his speech at the congress before Leuctra (6. 3. 4) asserted that he had on two previous occasions been on embassies to Sparta which had succeeded in making a peace: the probable occasions are 375 and 387/6; 404 is possible, if Callias was indeed born in the middle of the fifth century (Davies, Ath.Prop.Fam., 263), but the manner in which he alludes to his peacemaking missions (6. 3. 4) hardly suits a 33–year interval (and since his own generalships, to which he refers, included that of 4. 5. 13 and Philoch. F. 150, he has in mind the period of the King's Peace). In any case, to reject Philochorus in favour of Aristides is a wholly unsatisfactory procedure (cf. Jacoby, FGH iii b. 1. 227 f. and 230 f. for the standing of Philochorus), nor is it likely that Didymus in quoting at length as he does for F. 149 turned up the wrong archon. Philochorus referred to the peace of 392/1 not just as the Peace of Antalcidas but as –a just designation if 392/1 was essentially the King's Peace manqué.

26 Art. cit., 107 f.

27 5. 1. 26; Dem. 19. 180 and 24. 134; Lys. 19. 50. and 26. 23.

28 Cf. Diod. 16. 22 etc.