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Herippidas, Harmost At Thebes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

H. W Parke
H. W Parke
Affiliation:
Wadham College, Oxford
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Extract

In Plutarch's two narratives (Vita Pelopidae XIII. and De genio Socratis) of the recapture of the Cadmea by the Thebans, 379/8 B.C. (winter), he speaks of three harmosts as in command of the Spartan garrison. This is the only instance in Spartan history where more than one harmost is mentioned as exercising authority in the same city, and it suggests the question: Was Thebes for some reason receiving different treatment from the other cities where we hear of harmosts in residence ?

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 21 , Issue 3-4 , June 1927 , pp. 159 - 165
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1927

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References

page 159 note 1 Compare the form of statement (Plut. De gen. Socr.I.) Λνσανορíδαν δÈ т ρ í т о ν α ú т ò ν ἀνт’ ἐκɛíνον(Phoebidas) πέμψαντς, and the whole tenor of V.

page 159 note 2 De gen. Socr. XXXIV.; but there is a lacuna in the text.

page 159 note 3 Dinarchus (I. 40) is very rhetorical, and has been carried away by patriotic feeling. In many respects his account is historically untrue.

page 159 note 4 Unless, as Mr. Wade-Gery has suggested to me, Lysanoridas is to be identified with the Lysandridas of Theopompus (Hunt, frag. 233). Athenaeus (XII. 609b) quotes from the Fifty-sixth Book of the Philippica a reference to the beauty of Xenopeitheia, the mother of Lysandridas, and adds that the Spartans killed her and her sister Chryse, ὅтε καì τὸν Λνσανορíδαν ἐΧθρóν ὅντα ’ Αƴɛσίλαος /3a<rtXet)s KaTtuTTaffi&tras (pvyaSevSovcu iirolr/<Ttv vwb AaKeSai/iovlwv• This passage must, then, have occurred in one of Theopompus' many digressions. If the identification is correct it provides another reference to Lysanoridas' condemnation, and goes beyond our other accounts in attributing it to Agesilaus. This is very probable in view of the setback which the surrender of the Cadmea had inflicted on Agesilaus' foreign policy.

page 160 note l Casaubon, Polyaeni Strategemata, Notae in Libr. II., Herippidas. Editio princeps, Lug-duni Batavorum, 1589.

page 160 note 2 In 376 the allies demanded the formation of a Spartan navy: Xen. Hell. V. iv. 60.

page 160 note 3 E.g. Philodicus (XV. xxvii.) — Ecdicus (Xen. Hell. IV. viii. 20); Hegelochus (XV. 84) = Hegesilaus (xen. de vect. III. 7), and many minor instances.

Page 161 note 1 Compare Poralla's Prosopographia. The fact that Herippidas is unique as a name would help to explain its corruption; similarly in MSS. of Plutarch it has occasionally become Hermippidas. Two hundred and fifty years later the Hyper-Laconized form ΣHPIIIIIOΣ ( = θηριπ.πος), never ΣHPIIIIIIΔΣ, occurs in Spartan inscriptions (cf. C.I.G. V. 210, etc.; not earlier than the close of the second century B.C.).

Page 161 note 2 Polyaenus II. 7; Frontinus IV. vii. 19, and expulsion, Xen. Hell. V. iv. 56, We hear of another harmost of Histiaea, Aristodamus, in Plut. Amat. Narrat. III. but there is no indication of date, except that the incident preceded the battle of Leuctra. He was probably there sometime between 405 and 376 B.C.

Page 161 note 3 E.g. Xen. Hell. II. iv. 28 (Lysander), III. i. 3 (Thibron), IV. ii. 5 (Euxenus), V. ii. 37 (Teleutias), V. iii. 20 (Polybiadas); Aeneas Tac-ticus XXVII. 7 (Eudamidas).

4 So Aeneas Tacticus, in the passage quoted above, speaks of Eudamidas (when leading a force of 2,000 men, Xen. Hell. V. ii. 24) as 6 ὁ Λακώ-νων ἁρμοσƺής ἐ πἱ θ ρ ᾁ κ η. He also speaks as a contemporary and a technical writer.

Page 162 note 1 1 On harmosts compare also Kahrstedt, Griechisches Staatsrecht, p. 179, etc. Compare for a similar pair of meanings φρονρά = garrison, and φρονρά (in φρονράν = expeditionary force. In its former sense ὰρμοστής is also applied officials appointed by Athens (Xen. Hell. IV. iv. 8), Thebes (ibid VII. i. 43), and Sinope (Xen. Anab. V. v. 19). There seems to be no instance of ὰρμοστής in the second sense applied to other than Spartans.

Page 162 note 2 The choice of likely sources lies between Ephorus and Callisthenes. Dionysodorus and Anaxis are hardly ever quoted, and were prob- ably little read. If Ephorus was the originator of the figure 1,500, he might have obtained itby reckoning a mora to each harmost (for he estimated the mora at 500, Plut. Pelop. XVII.). But this method of calculation is improbable, as force. the garrison included a large majority of allied to troops (Diod. S. XV. xxvii. 2) who would never have been brigaded in Spartan morae. In any case Spartan morae were only kept abroad in very serious wars during this period. Yet Stern, Von (Spartanische Hegemonic, p. 58, note 2)Google Scholar explains the three harmosts wrongly as mora commanders. The ultimate common source for both Diodorus and Plutarch is probably Ephorus, while Plutarch has also used Callisthenes. Cotnably pare Bloch, Fried, Untersuchungen zur Plutarchus de genio Socratis, München, 1910Google Scholar

Page 163 note 1 Compare Hellenica Oxyrhynchia XII. i. 2. Unfortunately Athens seems to be the only other instance where we know the numbers of a harmost's garrison in peace times. Instances in war were influenced by strategic and other considerations for which we cannot make due allowance.

Page 163 note 2 In 377 the Olynthians were able to send a force of cavalry to help Thebes against Agesilaus (Xen. Hell. V. iv. 54).

Page 164 note 1 Compare Plut. Phocion XII., παραδνομένον είς τήν Еŏimg;οιαν τοȗ Φιλπ¿… καἱ τας πϬλεις οἰκειοu διὰ τράννν.

Page 164 note 2 For the presence of a harmost with a garrison and a harmost with a field force in the same district compare again Athens in 403: while Callibius was still harmost of Athens ('AΘπολ. XXXVIII. 2), Lysander was sent as harmost and his brother as navarch to help the Thirty (Xen. Hell. II. iv. 28).

Page 165 note 1 The reason for σύμβουλοι in these circumstances is clear. A king on the field of battle was supreme by Spartan νόμος (Thuc. VI. 66, 3), but from youth or inexperience he might not be safely trusted to his own discretion. The incomnavarchy also was, as Aristotle says, αξεδὀν ἐρα βααιλεία. In all these instances of αὐμβουλοι so called (Thuc. II. 85, III. 69, VIII. 39) the same difficulty had arisen. The navarch early in his year of office had proved himself unreliable, Probably to depose a navarch was difficult, so he was restricted by one or more αὐμβουλοι. The essential characteristic of a harmost's office was that he was already limited: if he proved incom-petent he could be superseded easily (e.g. Thibron, Xen. Hell. III. i. 7). αὐμβουλοι were only attached to limit those with absolute command.